Sunday, October 24, 2010

It's all in your head

There are some things that, according to Angie, I just shouldn't blog about. I'm surprised that she hasn't figured it out yet, but I don't listen very well. My mom can certainly testify to that.

Peter had lice last week. Disgusting? Yes. Gross? More than slightly. A royal pain in the ass? Absolutely, but the important thing here is that his school learned a valuable lesson. Hopefully.

See, all of the kids are required to wear yellow baseball caps, which they throw into a box when they enter the classroom. That's right - a box. Not 'boxes', as in the plural form that might indicate that they actually do hygienically separate garments to avoid widespread outbreaks by human disease agents like, hmmm, I don't know - lice!

Needless to say, Angie freaked out and not in the gentle, loving kind of way. No, General Mama declared martial law and immediately went ballistic.

All breathing humans within a four-room radius were stripped naked and quarantined to the bathroom. The first phase of decontamination involved a special shampoo that I'm pretty sure was not tear-free. Then, crazy woman whipped out a comb made of pointy needles that might do it for Freddy Krueger but did less than little for the kids. At this point, it was clear to everyone that phase two would involve pain and torture. And more tears.

The General kicked off phase two of the decon party by scrapping off a few layers of skull from three kids, one adult female-type, and a hairy man-beast. During the interrogation, four out of five of us were told 'this is gonna hurt me more than it will you'. Yeah, complete bullshit.

The final phase was thankfully more passive. The recently dehumanized were allowed to cower in a corner while the General ransacked the apartment for any item that might have had any contact with Peter's head. Hats, coats, scarves, pillows, sheets, blankets, stuffed animals and the kitchen sink were tossed into trash bags and sealed shut. According to chapter five of the General's War Book, three days of lockdown should be sufficient to neutralize any head-buggies. With prejudice.

After three days, the General initiated 'the cleansing' phase. The cool thing is, I can't remember the last time I saw the bottom of the hamper. The not-so-cool thing will probably come when Angie reads this post, but after last week, I'm confident that I can survive just about anything.

I must admit, Angie didn't handle the post traumatic stress so well. In the past week, Angie has needed to cleanse her scalp and check for lice at least sixteen times daily. It became borderline certifiable and trust me, she doesn't need that big of a push. Yesterday, I caught Angie ripping out chunks of her hair and holding them up to the light for inspection.

'Do you see any little buggies? I feel them. My head is SO itchy. They're all over. I know they are. Get them out! Aaaarrrgghh!'

'Calm down, woman! You've checked your head now about eight bazillion times - you don't have them. Stop ripping your hair out - it's just psychological, okay? Relax! It's all in your head.'

'I knew it! Aaaaaggghh. They're in my head! Aaaaaaaghh!'


  1. poor Johnsons!!! and poor Angie living with a bunch of BOYS!!!

    'with prejudice' -now THAT's freakin' hilarious

  2. Now tell me. Have the yellow caps been destroyed and is there a new system of storing them? Angie's a real trooper. A good scalp scraping is needed now and then. Makes 'em tough. Jean Albrecht

  3. I'd be checking my head a bazillion times a day too. I hope they got rid of the yellow caps.

  4. Ha-ha, poor Angie indeed. I'm still waiting on confirmation, but Angie's continued checks twice daily seem to verify that the yellow hat box of buggies is gone for good.

    Ceci - at least your buggies and our buggies never hooked up; that would be one mean case of bed-head. :-)