Wednesday was picture day and I decided that I better take my own pre-picture because he never fails to eff up his hair between leaving home and saying “cheese!” or “organic locally-source hummus!” or whatever nutritious PC thing schools pretend to care about these days.
There are a lot of attitudinal things I dislike about the age 11, but mostly Middle School Chooch has been pretty cool to observe. Dude is serious as fuck about his school work, has a good group of friends (and not that hoodlum DAVID SHITFER*), and is funny as fuck.
*(NOT HIS REAL NAME.)
Here are some Chooch Tales.
- Last week we were en route to a haunted house and out of nowhere, he blurted out with passion, “Just once in my life, I want to cut down a tree.” His anger seemed unreasonable but I’ve never wanted to cut down a tree so who am I to say.
- Almost every night, we take a walk around the neighbors, just us two, and have spirited conversations about grammar, the characters of Brookline, school drama — it’s so much fun and we always come home with something to tell Henry because Brookline is always poppin’ you guys. Like last night for example, a dead leaf wanted to walk with us so we all skipped down the sidewalk together, and then we overheard a super vitriolic domestic argument coming from one of the houses and it was chilling.
- Today was parent teacher conferences and I’m proud to say that Chooch is super-loved up in that school. I always feel like I’m walking around with a celeb when I’m there with him. His Communications teacher is this older black woman who is challenging him so hard and I love her for it. She said he is one of only two people in the class who has an A because everyone else is having such a hard time adjusting to middle school. Then we ran into his Second Family who I have actually never met and the mom came over and gave me a big hug and gushed about how much they love having Chooch over and how he is the spitting image of me. The communications teacher said it too! I love when this happens because it feels like I scored a point against all the jerkbuns who say he looks like Henry. Then we chilled with the VP and talked about PVRIS because that’s what level we’re on over there. Oh! And his one teacher from last year shouted down the hall, “What’s up Riley! You going to see GWAR this weekend?” because now he’s notorious with some of the male teachers for meeting GWAR at Warped Tour lol.
- Hey speaking of Chooch’s celebrity status, we were on a family walk (lol) back from the local coffee joint when some broad yelled hello to Chooch from her car. Who the fuck was that, I asked. Oh, she lives across from Bob. She has two Corgis. Bob, you may remember, is the older man a few streets away who Chooch befriended because he too has a Corgi. Chooch has so many neighborhood friends. Which reminds me that I never wrote about his cookie dough sales from last month. There’s a lot of words for that one so I’ll have to get back to you.
- In case you were wondering, Chooch still hates pretty much everything that I like. Today, he said, “ugh I just noticed that you’re using a kimchi jar as a succulent pot.” His voice was full of disgust and contempt. Two of his least-favorite things about me, colliding!
- Chooch wants to be this alligator hoop skirt thing for Halloween, thanks Wicker Man pagan procession:
(Henry just yelled THERE IS NOT ENOUGH TIME!)
- Chooch’s favorite Kpop song is GO GO by BTS.
- He’s excited to go to South Korea because they have a raccoon cafe, it’s all he cares about. Of all the millions of awesome things there….
I guess that’s it for now. We’re currently en route to Royal Oak, Michigan and I need to talk Henry’s ear off.
PEACE OUT GIRL SCOUT.