He told me about this brilliant idea and I kind of remained neutral. I wasn't exactly thrilled at the prospect of him staring at a screen for that long, but thought maybe that would be a "cool" thing to do.
He kept talking about it and I kept neutral. He talked to his friends and his brothers to see if they would be interested. He also talked about days that he was completely free of responsibility.
Finally, he decided that he would do it this last Saturday right at the end of Spring break. He convinced Bennett and one other friend to come over at 4:00 in the morning to start watching. I was now curious to see if he could actually sit down and watch that much TV. So, in short I let him do it.
Sure enough his friend showed up at 4:00 in the morning and Bennett dragged himself out of bed. I dimly remember him coming into my room to let me know they had started the marathon. I rolled over and went back to sleep. 4:00 in the morning? No way was I getting up.
They watched and they watched and they watched. Owen and Chasey also decided to join in the marathon after they got up at their regular time. At about 11:30 that morning (71/2 hours of watching) Taylor wandered upstairs for something to eat and he expressed that he was having second thoughts. I told him he didn't need to do it. I didn't care either way. (How's that for a parent that semi-encouraged his child to quit? :)) However, he went back down and kept watching. That same conversation was repeated with Bennett as well.
At about 4:30 that afternoon, several of his buddies decided to come over and watch the last 2 movies with him. I had to scramble and feed 10 boys dinner, popcorn and soda. I can't remember how many batches of popcorn I made and they ate. They inhaled the pizzas I bought them in a matter of minutes.
But sure enough, they finished at 11:55 that night. From start to finish about 20 hours.
That's a lot of TV. I honestly can't say if I'm embarrassed that my children did this, proud of their commitment to sitting on their butts for 20 hours straight or somewhere in the middle. I'm guessing somewhere in the middle.
I was encouraged though by Ben's and Taylor's response to me after they finished.
"How do you feel?" I asked.
Ben - "Bad like throw up. Bad and tired"
Taylor - "Like I kind of wasted a part of my life."
I feel so much better at that response than a response like "That was the best 20 hours of my life!! I can't wait to do that again!!" I might have been alarmed at that point that I had just created some really lazy, slovenly monsters.
I also informed then that I would not allow that again for a long, long time, so don't bother asking! That may have been unnecessary as they didn't seem too keen to do that again anytime soon.
Monday afternoon will be cleaning day. The mess that is down there is.....10 smelly boys. I don't think I need to elaborate.
7 comments:
Now all you need to do is come to Universal Studios in Orlando and go to the Harry Potter world stuff. We'd even house you!! :)
The best part of that story was their response after it ended. Way to go at being supportive and non committed. You left the responsibility to follow through with them.
I, too, loved their thoughts on the experience. I bet they won't forget that!
Brillant! I love their responses. Sometimes letting them experience what they think will be "amazing" is the best parenting you can do. Like jumping off the deck onto the trampoline repeatedly. Yes, you will be sore the next day. Very sore!
This is awesome. I was laughing at the end.
That is some kind of determination.
Never a dull moment at your house!! And their commentary about the experience was worth it all!!
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