Spying on Mom
In the afternoons, whilst I am at work, toiling ceaselessly amidst all those books I threw on the floor, Sam is home, instructing the child in Life.
This involves poker playing, for one thing, and buying excellent camping gear for the Night In the Backyard which will be happening soon, for another thing, and also practicing with the tools sent the child by his mail order spy school.
I don't think that the CIA is actually running this spy school -- lord, I hope not, cause we're in even worse trouble than I thought if that's true -- no, it's Scholastic Books, I think, having gone over to the Dark Side.
Once a month the child receives Spy Equipment in the mail. He is so in love with this spy equipment he can't sit still. Last month I believe he got some sort of motion detector -- yes, that's what it was. I remember because it kept detecting my motion, and announcing it with high pitched squealy beeps, and got banished from my vicinity. It's only allowed to detect the motion of the cats and Sam. When I'm not home.
This month things got worse. He now has a periscope, a little tiny camera, and a set of headphones with a tiny tiny receiver.
All these things -- with the exception of the periscope, which is large, bulky, white, and cannot be missed -- are much of a size for the garden fairies to use. If the garden fairies wanted. Which they don't. Cause we're pretty much of the same opinion about these things, me and the garden fairies.
I told the child he wasn't allowed to surveille me, ever, cause I'd been surveilled enough back in my wild youth.
(There was a point, back in Berkeley in the 70's, and then in San Francisco in the 80's, when I wondered whether there was anybody in America being surveilled by The Government who DIDN'T know about it, but later I realized that my life was made up of such small potatoes that probably all the new agents had been sent out to us to practice. I told the child this, and he wanted to know if we could send away for my FBI file. No. We can't. Because I know what it's going to look like, having seen others. It's going to be about three pages long, and entirely blacked out. Very disappointing. Much better not to know. Believe me. Your mother was Not Important.)
He was very disappointed by my refusal to be Secretly Observed. Eventually I relented. So he's allowed to surveille me if he asks first. Then I agree. This is always in the evening, after his bath and before he goes to bed. I sit on the sofa, knitting and watching some gawdawful mess on the TV, and he sits on the basement stairs with the periscope, surveilling his mom. Who is, as noted above, Not Important.
True love.
He's been trying to disguise the periscope. His little Spy Handbook suggests tree branches, but I told him I'd probably notice tree branches in the living room, and he'd do better to use books, on account of there were so many of those around on every surface I probably wouldn't notice a couple more on the stairs.
So he tried that. I noticed him anyway, but pretended I didn't.
So, he's happy with the periscope surveillance. Now he's working on the Pictures Taken in Secret.
Sam has had to order by mail the tiny special film for the tiny special camera. When it comes in, we are told by the Spy Handbook, the camera will best be hid in a bag of potato chips.
I said that was a very bad idea, as the grease was going to ruin the tiny special camera, and he should get pretzels instead. So that's been agreed to as a modification of the Spy Instructions. Glad I could help.
But the child apparently now needs more tiny special batteries for the tiny special earphones, cause he left them running all night by mistake, even though he'd been Warned.
I don't know whether these have to be ordered by mail, too.
I think we should go down in the herb garden and see if we can buy some from the garden fairies. Who are surely making a killing selling this stuff to the CIA.
This involves poker playing, for one thing, and buying excellent camping gear for the Night In the Backyard which will be happening soon, for another thing, and also practicing with the tools sent the child by his mail order spy school.
I don't think that the CIA is actually running this spy school -- lord, I hope not, cause we're in even worse trouble than I thought if that's true -- no, it's Scholastic Books, I think, having gone over to the Dark Side.
Once a month the child receives Spy Equipment in the mail. He is so in love with this spy equipment he can't sit still. Last month I believe he got some sort of motion detector -- yes, that's what it was. I remember because it kept detecting my motion, and announcing it with high pitched squealy beeps, and got banished from my vicinity. It's only allowed to detect the motion of the cats and Sam. When I'm not home.
This month things got worse. He now has a periscope, a little tiny camera, and a set of headphones with a tiny tiny receiver.
All these things -- with the exception of the periscope, which is large, bulky, white, and cannot be missed -- are much of a size for the garden fairies to use. If the garden fairies wanted. Which they don't. Cause we're pretty much of the same opinion about these things, me and the garden fairies.
I told the child he wasn't allowed to surveille me, ever, cause I'd been surveilled enough back in my wild youth.
(There was a point, back in Berkeley in the 70's, and then in San Francisco in the 80's, when I wondered whether there was anybody in America being surveilled by The Government who DIDN'T know about it, but later I realized that my life was made up of such small potatoes that probably all the new agents had been sent out to us to practice. I told the child this, and he wanted to know if we could send away for my FBI file. No. We can't. Because I know what it's going to look like, having seen others. It's going to be about three pages long, and entirely blacked out. Very disappointing. Much better not to know. Believe me. Your mother was Not Important.)
He was very disappointed by my refusal to be Secretly Observed. Eventually I relented. So he's allowed to surveille me if he asks first. Then I agree. This is always in the evening, after his bath and before he goes to bed. I sit on the sofa, knitting and watching some gawdawful mess on the TV, and he sits on the basement stairs with the periscope, surveilling his mom. Who is, as noted above, Not Important.
True love.
He's been trying to disguise the periscope. His little Spy Handbook suggests tree branches, but I told him I'd probably notice tree branches in the living room, and he'd do better to use books, on account of there were so many of those around on every surface I probably wouldn't notice a couple more on the stairs.
So he tried that. I noticed him anyway, but pretended I didn't.
So, he's happy with the periscope surveillance. Now he's working on the Pictures Taken in Secret.
Sam has had to order by mail the tiny special film for the tiny special camera. When it comes in, we are told by the Spy Handbook, the camera will best be hid in a bag of potato chips.
I said that was a very bad idea, as the grease was going to ruin the tiny special camera, and he should get pretzels instead. So that's been agreed to as a modification of the Spy Instructions. Glad I could help.
But the child apparently now needs more tiny special batteries for the tiny special earphones, cause he left them running all night by mistake, even though he'd been Warned.
I don't know whether these have to be ordered by mail, too.
I think we should go down in the herb garden and see if we can buy some from the garden fairies. Who are surely making a killing selling this stuff to the CIA.
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