Which of the following did we recently excavate from my disgusting, perpetually stench-infested minivan? This isn’t counting the permanent fixtures (two car seats, one stroller, two beach chairs, one umbrella, six towels, one giant bag of toys, a stash of diapers and wipes, various clothes, etc):

a) not one, but two rotting, decrepit sippy cups half-filled with curdled milk
b) about half a dozen empty Go-Go-Squeeze applesauce pouches
c) about ten empty water bottles
d) a plastic bag with a decaying, half-eaten Spam musubi in it
e) a pile of parenting magazines, unread (obviously)
f) about half a dozen Happy Meal toys
g) enough sand to create our own beach
h) enough crumbs and unidentifiable food chunks to feed…(see next item)
i) …a well-established colony of ants
j) all of the above

The answer, of course, is all of the above. Ok, so you’re probably thinking, “Why don’t you just clean your car more often? Why do have to be such a disgusting slob?” Ah, not so fast, my friend. SCIENCE can explain and justify my inability to keep grime at bay.

At first, I wanted to compare the backseat area of my minivan merely to a Black Hole. After all, it is a region in spacetime where all the junk and filth in our known physical world gravitate to this point in the universe. Raisins, Goldfish, applesauce, sippy cups, Happy Meal remnants, tsunami debris, pink slime, you name it…somehow, my kids are able to launch all this junk into another dimension that cannot be cleaned.

But the vastness of our squalor goes far beyond that. Upon further research on Black Holes, I actually discovered that the interior of my Mazda 5 sounds frighteningly similar to an Event Horizon. According to Wikipedia:

“Around a black hole there is a mathematically defined surface called an event horizon that marks the point of no return…a boundary in spacetime through which matter and light can only pass inward towards the mass of the black hole. Nothing, not even light, can escape from inside the event horizon. The event horizon is referred to as such because if an event occurs within the boundary, information from that event cannot reach an outside observer, making it impossible to determine if such an event occurred.”

You see? It’s physically impossible for one to see and locate the mass once it is thrown into the Minivan Event Horizon, aka, the space where my kids drop all their crusty remnants. It remains unseen to the human eye – and this explains why I went weeks without knowing there were rotting dairy products and Spam in my backseat – that is, until they were unveiled at The Semi-Annual Minivan Clearance Event.

And just in case you need me to show my work:
(“my work” = copied & pasted from Wikipedia):

“The size of a black hole, as determined by the radius of the event horizon, or Schwarzschild radius, is roughly proportional to the mass M through

where r_sh is the Schwarzschild radius and M_Sun is the mass of the Sun.^[42]“

Bear with me. This equation simply explains how in our Event Horizon, the mass of the goo my toddler is slinging, which is usually greater than or equal to the mass of the sun, is inversely proportional to the amount of remaining baby wipes and/or hand sanitizer I have left. Furthermore, the volume of mysterious liquids (and sometimes solids and gasses) my daughter spills on herself is directly proportional to N, where N = the newness of the outfit she is wearing.

God, I hate math. Anyway, so I’ve now nicknamed my minivan the Event Horizon. And interestingly, my minivan’s characterisitcs also apply to the 1997 sci-fi horror film of the same name, starring Sam Neill and Laurence Fishburn. This Event Horizon takes place in a haunted space ship that’s actually a portal to Hell. Much like the movie characters, when we begin to spend too much time in the Event Horizon, we mutate into tortured passengers, some in catatonic states, others in hysteria, due to the manifestation of an evil presence (the rotting Spam, perhaps?). The movie poster’s tagline summarizes it best: “Event Horizon: Infinite Space. Infinite Terror.”

A comparative analysis:
-A vessel full of tormented occupants? Check
-Said occupants are plagued with hallucinations of their fears and regrets? Check
-Those who stay in the vessel for too long go insane? Check
-Once-normal humans are launched into “a dimension of pure chaos, pure evil”? Check

Sigh. Off to the car wash.

 What my minivan’s interior should look like:

What it actually looks like:

An artist’s rendering of anything that happens behind the front seat:

The warning sign I will now place near all entrances:  

The sticky little handprints all over everything. The dried raisins, peas, string cheese, and other unidentifiable chunks under the table. The rug that still smells faintly of vomit after our recent bout with the stomach flu. The gazillion tiny toy pieces scattered in every corner. The crusty yogurt blobs on the couch. Ugggghh, always with the yogurt blobs.

Seriously, if I let a herd of feral hogs run rampant through the house, it’d still be cleaner. Now, thanks to some “research” (a lazy Google search and the top result) I can confirm that my beloved babies are, in fact, very closely related to swine.

According to Texas A&M’s web page dedicated to “Coping with Feral Hogs”:
“Damage caused by feral hogs is a growing problem because of their destructive feeding habits, potential to spread disease and increasingly growing population.”

…Hmm. Sounds familiar. And in an article from AgriLife Today, Dr. Billy Higginbotham, AgriLife Extension wildlife specialist, explains:

“Feral hogs were once largely a rural or agricultural issue in Texas, inflicting over $52 million in damage annually,” he said. “But the porkers have literally moved to town and are now causing significant damage in urban and suburban communities. This damage includes the rooting of landscapes, parks, lawns, golf courses, sports fields and even cemeteries, as they search for food. It has been estimated that a single hog can cause over $200 damage annually.”

(source: http://feralhogs.tamu.edu/2011/05/agrilife-today-busting-feral-hog-myths/)

I can personally attest that the porkers are indeed in urban communities, and that a single hog can cause more damage than agricultural experts once believed. One extraordinary morning, my son managed to perform the following in less than an hour:
-Dumped a bowl of ramen noodles over the clean laundry.
-Snatched a stick of butter from the fridge, then rubbed it into the couch.
-Poured a full cup of apple juice directly into my purse.
-Spilled ketchup, stepped in it, then walked all over house, leaving creepy little red footprints everywhere.

And then there was that time he escaped from the bath, ran naked into the kitchen, and promptly took a crap on the floor. He was swift and efficient, much like his hooved hog cousins in Texas. You know, it’s not until you’ve had a fresh human turd in the same room where you prepare meals, when you really just throw in towel. Ok, my little piglet progeny, you win.

My kids, enjoying a quick GoGurt in our living room:

-(Me, gasping at the splendor) Wow, look at this! Isn’t it beautiful!?!
-No.
-HEY. You should know how lucky you are to live here. It doesn’t look like this everywhere, you know. We live on a tropical island; one of the most beautiful places on Earth. People travel from all over the world to come see this place.
-Well, I don’t.

And that launched me into another spiel about not taking things for granted, appreciating what’s around you, yada yada yada. I could tell she was really taking what I said to heart – truly absorbing the wisdom from her respected elder – because she promptly swiped a toy away from her brother then launched into a few rounds of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.”

Okay. She’s only four, and I need to be realistic. I don’t know many preschoolers who are beacons of appreciation and humble gratitude. And maybe I’m being a tad dramatic myself – she usually is excited and happy about these things, but happened to be in a cranky mood that day. But come on! There was another recent weekend when I announced we were all going to the beach, she whined in response, “The beach AGAIN?”

YES. THE BEACH AGAIN. Sometimes people ask if I get bored of the beach, living in Hawaii. The answer is no. No, clear blue water and crystal white sand and tropical breezes and swaying palm trees never get boring. But perhaps they do if you grow up with them and it’s all you know. When I first moved here, I remember several of my local friends saying “I can’t wait to get off this rock.” I thought they were insane. Insane! But will my children grow up to feel the same way?

^ This view to my kids, apparently: Oh sure, Mom. Yawn.

^Me, bestowing wisdom to the ingrates.

I know that “waahh, being a working mother is hard” is nothing new. But when it hits you hard, it hits you hard. It’s just a fact of life that during your busiest, most stressful times at work, the phone will ring and you get the dreaded call: your child is sick, and you need to go pick him up.

Your maternal instinct tells you to run there with arms open, swoop up your poor darling and nurse him back to health, like any decent child-rearin’ woman would do. Your employee instinct screams nooooooo, not today, any time but now! The meetings, the deadlines, the Very Important Project That Is Due Tomorrow! Suck it up, kid –  I just have too much shit to do.

But there is no choice. With your childless boss watching and judging, as you apologize profusely, you dump a pile of unfinished work on an unsuspecting coworker’s desk, and leave feeling even more stressed and guilty than before.

And then you pick up your poor, sick darling. Red, coughing, burning up, looking at you with sad, crusty eyes, and you think, my poor baby … and … I still need to reschedule that meeting, I still need to meet that deadline, I still need to finish that goddamn Very Important Project. So you hold your crying baby in one hand and do your best to take conference calls and return emails with the other. Shitty mom or shitty worker? I suppose I have years and years more of being mediocre at both.

Please stop licking the wall.

Please stop putting peas down your shirt.

Please stop sticking your finger up your butt.

Please stop hitting Mommy with the baseball bat.

Please stop sticking coffee beans up your nose.

Please stop dunking the chicken in the toilet.

Please stop scaring your brother with the pancakes.

I know that every other parent on Earth says crap like this all the live-long day, too. But I still find it amusing. What’s the weirdest plea you’ve ever made as a parent? 

Here’s a clip of our dumb fun:  Fast food

At first I thought, cool, what a cultured little kid. We encouraged his fascination by letting him watch YouTube videos on the iPad. He couldn’t get enough of them. Even after hours upon hours of those clanging cymbals, drums, and gongs, he kept demanding more lion dancers. So then it got old, fast. This particular cultural performance, while spectacular, isn’t exactly the most soothing experience. I mean, if there’s a faster way to induce a migraine, I have yet to find it.

Coincidentally, this week he also got the stomach flu. The poor boy has been plagued with vomiting and diarrhea the last few days, but not for one second has it diminished his demands for lion dancers. Just last night, he woke at midnight, crying, his crib and jammies completely covered in puke. My husband and I cleaned everything up, only to have him wretch all over us a few times more. Once he stopped crying, pooping, and spewing, he looked up with his sweet little eyes, and murmured sadly, “Lion danther! Lion danther!” So of course, my husband and I took turns: one on throw-up cleanup duty, one on YouTube lion dancer duty.

My point is, the last few days have been filled with absolutely nothing except toddler vomit and Chinese lion dancers. To better understand, imagine watching this video about 75 times in 3 days. Now imagine watching it for the 76^th time, exhausted in the middle of the night, with chunks of fresh upchuck in your hair.

It’s been a bizarre week. I swear, for the rest of my existence, I will forever associate clanging Chinese drums with hurl. And I’ve learned more about lion dancers than I ever thought I would know – I’ve been reading the histories behind them, and in brief, they’re supposed to ward off evil spirits and bring good luck and great happiness. So if all goes well, hopefully our YouTube lions will ward off the great misfortunes of upset stomachs and loose bowels, and bring our little kingdom good fortune, prosperity, and a decent night’s sleep.

So, we’re at Ho‘omaluhia Botanical Garden for a little family fun, and the first order of business is to feed the ducks. Ella is squirming with excitement as we pull out our stale bread for the hungry flock. Very matter-of-factly, yet loud enough for all to hear, she yells, “LET’S GO FEED THESE FUCKS!”

Aaaaaaand there’s another angelic childhood moment I’ll never f-ing forget.

Anyway, I ran into this one coming up my stairs today. It was about the size of my hand, and dead, thankfully. And even though I’ve seen hundreds of them, I’m never any less horrified every time. Ugly, evil little bastards!

For more heebie jeebies, click here.