Help! My boys are on a destructive mission

My house is not just a house. It is a testing ground for all sorts of things: from my patience to our household items.

That’s why I plan to go to the internet to search for special awards that only my house qualifies for. But before I ask good old uncle Google for suggestions, I will tell God to bless my house in a very special way because it is special.

I am not being selfish, hogging all these “awards” for myself. If you think your house can beat mine pants down, let’s meet over a cup of tea and compare notes. Speaking of notes; come prepared because I have an entire library of “supporting documents”.

Primarily, it is because of the six boys, that is, husband and five sons – that my house is one beautiful mess. Well, they say boys will always be boys. And there’s no place that this is most exemplified than in my house. The one-third gender rule doesn’t apply here, where the only woman is yours truly.

BOYS AND TOYS

The folks at the Kenya Bureau of Standard (KeBS) should visit me. KeBS, please note that my house is the testing ground where you can prove the durability of items like toys. Any toy that can survive with an intact wheel beyond the first night should be given a green light to be in the market. Ditto a ball that will survive my son Issa’s teeth. After the little testers are through with the toys, their durability can be vouched for. 

Toys like robots or dolls that can again survive more than two hours after they are bought should also be given that all-important KeBS stamp of approval.

The first things the boys go for in a toy are the wheels and any other movable parts. Next thing you know, that toy is all over the house, in a thousand-and-one pieces.

I wonder where my boys get such energy to dismantle toys. Don’t even talk of toys that make sounds. The boys will go for the toys’ midsection to find out how and where the sound is coming from. That same dogged “re-engineering” is applied to toys that produces any kind of light.

It is only here that remote controls should be tested before being sent to the market. Plus, any electronic gadget should first pass by my house to be tested for resilience. For waterproof gizmos, my house is also the ideal testing ground to prove that they will stand the test of time and use.

Here, all remote controls have been washed and flashed down the toilet. If one survives this mother of all battering, it disappears for days, and when it is finally found, the person who was last seen with it of course insists that he is innocent.

Afterwards, Issa and the twins, Baraka and Gabriel, will take care of it by confining it to their dumping site, which is behind one of the seats.

You would think that after being put through the wringer, the remote control would give up its gizmo ghost. Some function happily ever after.

Others don’t. I have witnessed one remote control that survived being flashed down the toilet, repeated banging on hard surfaces, and washed in the shower. Even after being condemned to the “useless” heap behind the seat, it still functions. Now this is a remote control worth the KeBS approval stamp .

FOOTBALL WIDOW

Still on the remote control, it’s only in my house where, before a football match starts, father and sons argue over who will watch what – the bigger men love football, while the smaller ones adore cartoons.

This tug-of-war is especially unbearable during the World Cup and English Premier League. During such times, I become a football widow. 

When there’s “conflict of interest”, the only thing that works is an unwritten gentlemen’s agreement, which says that the remote should not do a disappearing act.

Does your home beat my home in terms of chaos?