Happy Birthday, 98

98's birthday was last month, and I gave him tickets to Blue Man Group.   We didn't go until tonight, a month later, because this was the first 5:00 pm show I could get five front row seats for, and I knew I couldn't be trusted to stay awake for the 8:00 pm show.   It was: me, 96, 98, and two of 98's friends, let's call them Curt and Rod. They weren't twins, but if I had twins I would totally have named them Curt 'n Rod.  I am happy to report that I survived the evening without running away screaming, leaving them to take the train home alone spent the evening with four teenage boys. I love all four of these boys, and would run in to a burning building to save any of them but man, oh man, are teenage boys insufferable.

They argued about Pokemons (the plural of which 96 has reminded me more than once is Pokemon, but I say Pokemons because, well, I know it bugs him) and they argued about how long ago 15 minutes was.  They disagreed about 'Droid or iPhone.  They debated the merits of public vs. private vs. parochial.   They each knew stuff that the others didn't know, and they each had to make sure that all the others knew they knew this stuff they didn't know.   Do you remember Charlie Brown's teacher?   By the end of the car ride, that's all I heard.   That, punctuated with the random, "No, you're wrong," and "Shut up," and "You don't know anything."    Good to know it's not just mine.

The other thing I noticed about teenage boys: They havetohavetohaveto have the last word.   Every. Single.  Time.   The last word.  Spoken.  Has to be theirs.   And not someone else's.

See how annoying that is?

All's well that ends well, though. 98 made it home with a piece of spit-paintball-artwork from one of the bits.  As we were leaving I handed him a sharpie to ask one of the Blue Men for an autograph on the way out. The Blue Man did him one better, and swiped a bit of blue ink/makeup/whatever it is off his face and planted a cool thumbprint in the corner.  And the next time we go, we're going to count how many marshmallows that one guy ultimately crammed into his mouth.  Double digits, for sure.