Guest post: Captain's Log

Captain’s log: What happens when Mom is left alone with three boys under six for five days. 

Three boys, one mom, five days, no dad. There are many strong humans who are used to this sort of thing and roll with the punches. For me, one soft with the presence of consistent reinforcements, it seemed like an eternity; every second brought a crumbling of my mental stature. 

While alone, I documented my condition through a series of logs shared via social media. The following is a transcript and photo-log of how I survived using the my life raft of sarcasm and my 72 hour kit of cynicism. 

Captain's log, Day 3 sans reinforcements: 

Captain can’t remember the last she changed her underwear. Found a band aid in hair this morning, not sure where it came from. Natives are growing restless, their access to sugar and screens is increasing dramatically.

Captain survives nights by watching too many episodes of Hoarders and eating unspeakable amounts of ice cream. 

Captain fears an uprising is imminent, and requests, if she perishes, to please bury her near a quiet bathroom so at least in the afterlife Captain can pee in peace.

Captain's log, day 4 sans reinforcements:

Shower managed, but at the expense of a box of Cheerios, the contents of which still remains ground into captain's new, expensive, and impulsively purchased wool area rug. 

Natives have learned 2 new swears, claiming captain yelled them at various natives throughout the day. Captain denies such claims. 

Morale is looking up as captain's extended family has sent pizza to the ship and crew and natives are now dining in peace. Captain’s motivation to cook meals is all but gone due to crushing fatigue and growing indifference to the ‘five servings of fruits and veggies a day’ rule.

Captain still seeks a quiet place to pee, as solitary urination has not yet been achieved.

Captain’s log, Day 5, help arrives:

Reinforcements have arrived, and not a moment too soon as natives had grown deaf to Captain's voice and anarchy was building. Her commands now make natives laugh and throw food. 

Order has been restored, but reinforcements may be sleeping on couch after complaining about free massage received on voyage.

Also, if reinforcements do not stop talking about luxury of 5-hour-long solo flight, Captain may be forced to feed natives diet coke and leave the house right before bedtime. 

Captain has, at last, peed alone.

"Cooking dinner with a toddler underfoot is always a blast." from Instagram @robynn.garfield

Robynn Garfield has worked as a professional writer and journalist for 10 years. Her employment adventures have included KSL.com out of Salt Lake City, freelance work for NPR and CNN, and a fruit salad of writing projects featured in published anthologies, blogs (), and angry letters to the editor. 

Robynn currently stays at home with her three young boys. She staves off insanity by reading crap on the Internet and waiting longingly by the front door every night for her husband to come home.

Potty Humor

Public bathrooms.

I mean, am I right? Public bathrooms are one of my least favorite things in the world. After a lot of actual horrible injustices in the world and the fear of spiders laying eggs in my flesh, of course.

I know I am not alone in my dislike of public restrooms. WebMd has an article about what germs and illnesses you can catch in them (allegedly not a lot if you wash your hands and stuff) so I know there are plenty of others who don't eagerly use public bathrooms. BUT, I am grateful for them. I like to venture outside of my house on occasion and it sure is nice when places have facilities you can use for those gotta-go moments.

Full disclosure: I had public germ issues as a teenager. Like, I wouldn't touch a lot of things because I read some terrifying germ statistics. I had to throw a lot of those issues out of the window when I had kids. Especially when I had more than one child. Suddenly holding onto the escalator hand rail was for safety reasons and a dropped pacifier wasn't THAT dirty. But public bathrooms remain difficult for me. I have one daughter and three sons--those boys pee twice as often as my daughter ever did. Bringing kids into bathrooms has also brought a lot of laughter in our home as well. Here are a few of our stories, please share yours in the comments or on our Facebook page:

• When my second son was in a public bathroom stall with me, he loudly asked me why I didn't have a wiener. I told him it was because I was a girl and he was a boy like his brothers and dad. Only boys have wieners. "Then why is my wiener so small and Dad's is so huge?" The ladies in the other stalls began to laugh quietly. "Because Dad is very lucky," I said. "Yours will get bigger, too." He looked down and said, "I hope not. Dad's wiener is way too big." The laughter grew and I joined in. All I could think to say at that point was, "Dad will be really happy that you think so."
• Speaking of my husband, a month ago we took our sons to see their sister perform in a school play. Our youngest son could not hold his need to pee any longer, so my husband took him to the bathroom. They were sharing a stall and after my son did his business, my husband told him to wait for a second while he did his. My son knew it wasn't a good idea to open the door when someone was going to the bathroom, so he got down on his hands and knees and CRAWLED under the stall. Mortified, my husband made him wash his hands super well, but neglected to tell me this story until after the play was over and I had shared my box of candy with this bathroom crawler sitting on my lap.
• When my oldest son was two years old, he would rate the noise level of others in the public bathrooms. "Mom, did you hear that? Sounded like lightning." One time he said, "Did you hear that woman? That one is gonna stink!" Apologies if you are reading this now and remember a squeaky voice calling you out.

Velvet, a follower of kidsaretheworst, shared this story about her daughter in a public bathroom:

• While camping, Velvet took her toddler daughter to the campground bathroom. There was a long line and while waiting, the daughter really wanted her mom's attention as she tugged on Velvet's sweater. Before she could ask "what?" her daughter yelled out, "MOM THAT LADY HAS A REALLY BIG BUTT!" She tried to shush her daughter but the girl would not hear any of it. She pointed at the woman ahead of them in line and again proclaimed at the top of her voice, "BUT MOM! LOOK AT IT! IT'S REALLY REALLY REALLY BIG!" The woman turned around and quickly told Velvet that little children just tended to tell the truth and that it was completely okay. She apologized but then her daughter piped in with a confident, "See Mom, I told you it was huge."

I'm still wiping the tears from my eyes from laughing at that one. Got a public bathroom story you want to share? Write it in the comments or share it on our Facebook page. Bless our kids' hearts, am I right?!

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