Here is Silas, slouched down in his seat because we were transporting the Doggie Door box in Ethel's car.

Now, it seems to me that Silas often sits in the car like this - especially when he's tired or being irritated. However, when he had to sit like this, I got to hear some pretty consistent grumbling and complaining.

I'm really, really ready for Ethel to come home (she comes home tonight). Not only will the house smell right again, but I'll get to go back to the office. Sitting here in the home office with Silas can mean a lot of work; he's massively distracted - and distracting. He takes Strattera, the same as I do; I'm starting to think that he needs Ritalyn or maybe amphetamines.

He's always asking questions. Ethel must encourage that - but it sort of makes me crazy. And he's always wanting to talk about the music that he's downloading or the fiction book that he's reading or...or....or....AAAGGGGHHHHH!!!

Ethel will be home tonight. Ethel will be home tonight. Ethel will be home tonight. Wheeee!

(Yes, he's a sweet kid, and no mistake. But I think that he's gotten pretty tired of not having his mom around; I don't do as well with a teenage boy as she does. And that makes sense - he's putting off pheromones that are screaming at my hypothalamus "Run me out of here! Make me leave the nest and go form my own tribe!" Unfortunately, he can't leave the nest yet. First he needs to learn how to code in Java and he'll need relational databases as well. But I can't get him to study that stuff - he'd rather listen to his "music" (to my ear, it sounds like unhappy people shrieking at each other) or read science fiction. I'm really, really concerned about this next generation...at least, the generation of Pucketts. So far, I've peed in the gene pool three times, and the lifeguard has told me to "get out")