Like a Suitcase Full of Cheese on the Stairwell. But Grosser.

*Don't read this at or near any meal time.  It's gross, yet touching.  You've been warned.*

I know, it's been a while since I blogged.  I should probably fill you in or something but I couldn't possibly.  Going to skip right to the good stuff.

First of all, we are doing no TV M-F this summer.  You can roll you eyes now like I did Monday morning when I forgot about it and Levi reminded me.  This annoyed me greatly.  I wake the girls up and carry them into the living room every morning and they watch PBS while I get ready.  Genius.  Done that for their whole lives.  I still carry Mia.  She always tucks her arms under mine and whispers to me if it's her turn to be on the couch.  If it isn't her turn she says nothing in hopes that I will forget and put her an the couch anyway.

Jules, however, tells me every single morning that it's her turn to be on the couch and that's why she gets carried into the living room last.  Because she lies.

When I wake Jules up the first thing she does is search for her blanket and then grabs around my neck so tight sometimes it makes me cough.  She hits my gizzard.  Except that I always thought a gizzard was a neck part of a chicken and now I know it's not so I should stop saying that when referring to my Adam's apple.

Don't Google gizzard. 

Google is good for lots of things.  But not gizzards.

Like to find out if your 7 day old hermit crab is alive or dead and what that fishy smell is coming out of it's crabitat. 

Mia's crab to be exact. Hermie.  Aunt Stephanie and the cousins gifted them to us for their birthdays.  First bad sign....fuzzy mold on the coconut fiber substrate.  Second bad sign....gnats in the crabitat.  Third bad sign....WHAT is that smell?  As if bad sign number 3 weren't enough... let me tell you about bad sign number four.

I decided to figure out just exactly what was going on with those guys and took them out and put them in a big white bowl with a puddle of water in the bottom.  I left them alone to give them time to come out and quit being all hermit-like.

I returned to them after a few minutes and Jules' crab, "Violet but you can call her Allison for short", was peeking out and trying in vain to get out of the bowl.  Mia's crab had not moved so naturally I picked it up and looked inside it.  It looked fine.

Ok, not really naturally.  I'm not down with critters like Mia.   But, after noticing that those guys weren't exactly the huge pinching threat that I thought, I got brave.

So I gently shook it.

And then.  THEN.  It slung out of it's shell and landed with a plop into the bowl. The nasty naked crab body was not in it's shell where all good nasty naked crab bodies SHOULD be.  In absolute shock and horror I threw the shell down and covered my eyes and squealed.  My heart was racing and I was gagging.  And squealing.

Then I peeked through my fingers...at a distance.

The next part is the grossest part ever. 

I had to lean in a little to confirm that it was being eaten by worms.    I think you know what those would be called but I can't bring myself to type that nasty "M" word. 

No wonder "Violet but you can call her Allison for short" was trying to get out of that bowl of death.  At this point I must admit I contemplated hermit crab murder.  It would have been a lot easier to say they were both dead than just one and would prevent worm infested crab guts ever coming into my line of vision again.  Then I realized that would be a lot harder and involve more of me than I am capable of so I decided to save her.  I can't even step on a bug for Pete's sake and not because I like bugs but b/c GROSS!  I trap them under cups and let Levi take care of it when he gets home.  Duh.  I quickly picked her up and rinsed her off under the faucet at the risk of drowning her.  BUT death germs must be washed off and I had to make sure she didn't have the same problem Hermie did.

Here is the part where I'd just like to say that I am not Heather Hendrick and should not have to put up with this boy-nasty-business in my house.  I keep finding myself in situations that surely only a mother of 4 boys would be in.  What gives?

I put "Violet but you can call her Allison" in a new bowl and she did not like it and is still not happy.   It's like I have a caged hermit crab zombie scratching and clawing to get out.  Quite unsettling.  Hmmm.  Perhaps she IS a hermit crab zombie.  If she will just be patient and give me time to think I will have her in appropriate living quarters soon enough. 

At this point the girls were unaware of the happenings.  I always err on delaying bad news but not that night.  I decided to take the "blurt it out" method in hopes that Mia wouldn't really care b/c, after all, it had only been 7 days.  I knew (sadly) that Jules' crab still being alive would be difficult.

"Hey Mia?  Um, your crab is dead."

She stared at me for a few seconds then asked if Jules' was dead too.

"No, her's is ok right now."

And, then the tears came.  Sounds mean but, whatever.  It is far worse to have your hermit crab die than for your sister's to die.  It just is.

Because of her intense love for creepy crawlies I knew this would be hard despite her mere 7 day relationship with Hermie.  Jules was trying to console Mia and at the same time cover her elation at the non-dead status of her own crab.  A very hard thing to master.  She's not quite there yet.

When people cry I often offer money or prizes. Even my friends.  Try me.  Start confiding in me and cry.  You might end up with whatever the most valuable thing in my purse is.  Kind of how you reach in for candy or gum for a child, except it might end up being my Bobbi Brown Concealer which is quite the catch, really.  I would hand it to you and then say "There, do you feel better now?" 

Anyway, she asked where it was.  The dead body.  Because she wanted to BURY it.  I pretended to not hear that and moved on to ice cream.

I told her the very best thing about a pet dieing is the my-pet-died-and-now-I-get-ice-cream trip.  She was not overly impressed with that and began to ask if crabs have babies.

Um.  Maybe.  BUT, let's talk about ice cream.  And...tap tap tap...is this thing on?  Your crab is dead.  Dead crabs def. do not have babies.

And then she asked how that even works. Hermit crabs having babies.  I was thinking... Oh heck no.  I am NOT having the your-pet-died conversation and where-do-babies-come-from conversation all in one night.  So I said, "Want to go rock climbing with dad this week?"

That seemed to brighten her mood enough to go to bed without being too upset.

I was adamant that the girls did not see the nasty naked dead crab body for obvious reasons.  I was traumatized by what I saw so certainly they would be.  But, dad took care of that.  He let them both see it after I left for work the next morning.  Awesome.  I was thinking he, in the very least, disposed of it after the viewing.   Why else would you bother going within 10 feet of that thing?  Neither of us handle gross situations well and we sort of use the Everybody Loves Raymond see who caves first method.  You know, like the suitcase full of cheese on the stairwell? 

Mia was absolutely insistent that we bury it.  Fine.  When your dad comes home he can do just that.

As soon as Levi got home he was asked to bury it repeatedly until he did.  There might have been some heavy threats persuasion on my part but either way I was glad that it was somewhere other than in the bowl on the back porch.  I was willing to just not ever go out there again and leave it. 

I was relieved and thought the horror was over however, the girls had a different plan. 

 

They gracefully prepared the grave site because that is what "Heremy the heremt" deserved.   As I approached Mia standing over it I put my arm around her.  Jules walked up with a weed in her hands carrying it like a bridal bouquet.  She began speaking, breaking the silence.

"Dear God, thank you for our hermit crabs.  They were fun and we love them and we really did try to take care of both of them.  Please help Hermie have fun playing with all the other dead hermit crabs and help Mia not be sad.  And please help the whole world too.  Amen."

 

Goodbye Heremy.  And good-luck "Violet but you can call her Allison".