Where's Your Pants?

The Swede will often comment about "my shows". I admit it, I watch Top Chef, The Voice, Xfactor....ok trash. But I think I've earned it. Pile that on top of the plethora of vamp smut I read and there may be cause for concern. But NOT from this seventeen old. One who leaves his jeans on my dining room table balled up does not get to call into question my TV addictions. It's funny, I went to bed, no pants on table, I come down this morning, pants on table. Whut?

The open pacakge syndrome lingers as well. The Leprechaun art was followed up by the innovative "open TastyKake box from the side. Now, he has a good sense of humor so earlier on he "Swedified" the name. Phonetically it is "TaastyKaka" short a. Use the inflection like Jamie Lee Curtis from Trading Places "I am Inga From Sveden". You get the picture..... Or maybe not.

Since we are on the topic of pants placement. The Swede has an exceptional collection of music. Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, And the ever famous Jizz in My Pants. We had his phone hooked up to the stereo driving back from NYC. Credence Clearwater plows right into Jizz. He is trying to manage this from the backseat, but I will have none of that. I turn and look at him laughing hysterically and his response, "Come on, I'm a 17 year old boy". Yes, indeed, you are as long as the Jizz stays in the song and not in your pants on my dining room table

The Swede Makes Art

Now, I know 2 is not an acceptable sample size, but I feel confident in the statement that all 17 year old boy exchanges students can live off cereal and cheeseburgers. The two photos are what I walked down to this morning. I was so touched. The Swede made me a sculpture in honor of the great leprechaun on Lucky Charms. It has texture and height and color how pretty and thoughtful. Just in case I forgot where to get my pop tarts, he even left me a huge clue with the open door. I have to confess I hit his double fudge pop tarts yesterday? But I only took one and left the open package in there for him. Hee Hee.

BoyStink

Hmmmmmmm……the smell.  You know the one in a teenage boy’s bedroom.  It seems to be universal.  Its not a specific smell.  Not necessarily sweat, or yuck, its just boy smell.  It is limited to teenage boys I am convinced.  It has arrived back into our household.  When opening the door this morning to gently waken the Swede, I was immediately hit with odoriferous emanations of unknown sources.   Yeah, not so sure, and I respect the Swede’s privacy, but what I can reach from the safety of the hallway is going in the washer tonight.  I think I did witness movement among the clothing.  Determining what is clean and what is not could prove challenging, so I am making the executive decision to drag it out and throw it right into the washer.  I’ll check back tomorrow with are report out on success or non-success for eliminating the boystink.

Swedes Don't Need No Stinkin Blankets.....

The Making of The Bed: Or Lack There Of….

We have entered our fourth week with the Swede and I have to say, this kid is so well-mannered and speaks such excellent English, it’s as if he has known this country and customs for years.  With that being said….the teenager is beginning to emerge.  Without fail, every morning, he would make his bed; even arrange the pillows that are in shams.  If you asked me where they are now, I would guess under a pile, behind a chair,  or in the closet, because I have not seen them in days.  In fact, I have not seen the Swede’s comforter in days either.  BUT, what I did find, are his jammie bottoms on the bathroom floor, his shorts draped over his chair and one of the two laundry baskets with various articles of clothing in it.  In addition, a collection of candy boxes, wrappers and other random items.  The teenager trail is marking throughout our house.  There are hangers in the closet for their obvious purpose of collecting dust.  The shelves are now covered with balled up clothes and I am afraid of what his dresser looks like.  The mild mannered Swede is settling in nicely and assuming a full-on 17 year old status.

On a side note, we had taken the Swede down to Wildwood.  I was making  his bed and foolishly asked if he had enough blankets and would he be warm enough.  He paused, looked at me and said, “I’m Swedish”  RIIIIIIGGGGGHHHHHTTTTTT.  I put the blankets back in the closet.  Silly Host Mom. 

SOHCAHTOA

SOHCAHTOA

Wait for it.....wait for it....do you remember

SOHCAHTOA???  Sine = Side Opposite over Hypoteneuse...is it coming back...remember? Cosine = Adjacent/Hypoteneuse...and the crowd favorite TANGENT = Opposite/Adjacent.  THIS is how I spent my Monday night.  Right angles and CoSecants

Half Time, I'll Do it At Half Time

So I am looking at my title and is half time supposed to be one word?  I am going off on a TANGENT.....hahhaha..Ok, not funny...back to our regularly scheduled program....

The Swede had settled into his chair because of course Monday Night Football was on.  He had his first JV game today and he played AWESOME!  Kickoff squad and defense...he had a big tackle too, couldn't have been prouder.  We avoided concussions but the kid got quite the stinger on his shoulder. So he is iced up, under his blanket, assortment of dogs on his lap and calmly avoiding his homework.  I ask about it and he says, it's only 10 math problems, I will do it at half time.  Well, guess what, half time rolls, the kid hasn't moved, I drop his book and papers in his lap and he starts asking questions.  He is still translating many things, so we work through that, but then he asks me about Pythagoreum Theorem.  I walk over...mind you, boy is still under blanket and doggies, I had to mute the TV, he said he could concentrate with it on. I won.  He still doesn't get up, so I take the book and sit at the table and start doing homework.   I was terrible at math in high school, being the daughter of a mathematician had its perks, but many drawbacks and having him help was one of them.  The dude was way to smartypants and I was way to 13 and hormonal.  So back to Trig. I went off on another Tangent....har har!  I am toooo punny.  I just punched myself in the face for that one. 

OK...so I do his math problems while he sat in his chair, with his blanket and his dogs and his ice packs, oh and his napping.  Doing the kid's homework, not in the handbook, but, well, but nothing.  I just can't wait to see what I got right.

The Swede and The Superman Pants!

The Swede and The Superman Pants!

OK, so here we are August 2012 and we are welcoming another exchange student into our home. Unlike the boy, where we only had 10 days to prepare, we had a couple of months. That had its interesting challenges too. It was almost too much time to prepare, if there is ever such a thing. And yet, we still didn’t get things done. This is mostly because I have no sense of responsibility when something spontaneous arises. Case in point: We have had a mirror to hang on his wall for about 2 months. It is STILL leaning on the wall on the floor next to the sticky things we need to put on the four corners and stick it up. REALLY? Yes, really.

We completely re-did the bedroom for the Swede, painted, new carpet, etc. When speaking with the boy on this, we had discussed this for months while HE was here to update the room and instead we went to NYC every weekend or downtown. Priorities, priorities….

I have already enrolled the Swede with me in two fantasy football pools, a pick em league and a fantasy league. Not sure if in the handbook it outlines gambling as a no-no, but that would require us to actually read it. We realized we were rule breakers long ago, so no need to verify. We named a team THE SWEDE to strike fear in the hearts of the poor sots we are playing against. This kid knows every stat of every player of every team since the beginning of time. I have no idea how he doesn’t have numbers and facts falling out of his ears. I look and watch and wait for it to happen. Its impossible for a person to retain this data. I am exploiting it and proud to do so.

The Swede is 17, introspective and speaks beautiful English. To top it off, his grammar is better than mine, as his grasp of the English language . Awkward. He has a penchant for pajama bottoms and we just picked up a pair of Superman jammie pants. I mentioned that we needed school supplies (because we only had 2 months to get prepared) so off to WalMart we go on Tuesday. What does this have to do with jammie bottoms. WELLLLL…..I explained that a favorite past time is watching the freak flags fly at the local WalMart and that people wear their jammies there all the time. He happened to be in his jammies (Superman) and said he should just go in those. BAD HOST MOTHER, I agreed. It seems that every other parent in the tri-state region had to go and get supplies. It was full contact shopping. Someone took a freaking notebook out of our cart because it was the last one! WTF!!! I had to do a coupla cart blocks and throw some elbows, but we came out unscathed with some of what we needed.

We went back to the camping and hunting section just for kicks. You never know who/what might be lurking back there. He was astonished that you could buy a 3 ft machete for 6.99 hanging for purchase in a regular aisle….did you know that? Packaged up like a pair of head phones. I got him to put on a Camo Jacket though with his superman pants, then handed him a bow and arrow, he fit in there real good.

Think to yourself, you probably don’t wear tube tops or jammies to WalMart, right? You probably have never had anyone comment on your clothes while at WalMart and say, hey “awesome pants” because you were actually wearing REAL PANTS. The Swede, on his first visit, got exactly that. A kid in the seat of the shopping cart yells over to The Swede “HEY AWESOME SUPERMAN PANTS!” and so it begins……

The Redux

The Redux

The boy got on the plane back in July 2011 and I SWORE I would never host again because saying goodbye and leading up to the goodbye was so heart wrenching.  I had to let the boy go back to his country and then what?  I moped, for while.  Fortunately or unfortunately I was working at a place that had me so consumed that I didn’t have enough time to think about it.  We did manage to go and visit him back in February of this year (2012) and the antics picked up exactly where they left off.  I think he got taller, he definitely got handsomer, and he was the perfect gentleman he always was.

What has changed is that I now get texts from him as he visited his first strip club.  5am his time and pictures, no less to go along with them.  I am 4k miles away asking him to please collect his friend from being face down on the floor (EWWWWWWW!) and get in a cab to get home.  He was so excited and proud of the strip club experience, one that he could not share with his real mom.  Wait, What?   He is preparing to enter college in the spring and become a doctor.  YES!  A surgeon no less, and my heart overflows with joy and awe of this exceptional young man who gets that working hard pays off, but life is short and should be lived with zeal.  I would just like to keep that zeal out of strip clubs………