I keep repeatedly having to defend myself to my teenage son about my choice of toilet paper. We keep going around and around again because I say it doesn’t matter. I don’t mind the thin school-like cheap toilet paper that takes a month to use. He likes soft comfy Charmin kissing his bum. So every time I come home from the store with a roll of what he likes to call “sandpaper,” he and I end up having the same conversation over and over again. I know the majority of people are probably on his side. People like that soft stuff. I get it. It’s like wiping your butt with a newborn kitten, except it doesn’t meow or scratch. But those commercials are misleading when they say you get two times as much per roll. Or a twelve pack is like 24 rolls. Maybe in length, that’s true, but in practice, I beg to differ. I think the softer it is, the more he uses. I can get the soft stuff and we will literally go through four rolls of it in the same amount of time that it takes us to use one roll of my single wrapped thin Scott tissue. And I like it that way. We literally had a conversation the other day where he was telling me that he hated that toilet paper and that kind of toilet paper was the reason that he refuses to poop at school. I say, “so if your butt is on strike, it’s my fault for buying that toilet paper?” He says, “Mom, it’s scratchy on my butt. Have you ever freakin used it?” Duh… and then my oldest son came over and said the same thing, but his comment was more like, “mom, what the fuck is up with the toilet paper?” So the big one and the little one are on the same team here.
This is when I bring out what I like to call the big guns aka the word vagina. Men dislike that word. It really works in all occasions. Having a bad day? Man wants to be a dick to you? Just casually reply with, “I would love to (insert any action verb here), but my vagina is currently bleeding” or “I can’t be of any help right now, my vagina looks like a murder scene.” It always works. It’s like an immediate argument winner. Is it appropriate? Eh, who cares. So I used the vag line on my kid, but in a much more mild manner. I told him that he only pooped once a day and only had to use the sandpaper once a day. I go pee numerous times a day and had to wipe my vagina with that same paper and I was getting through just fine. And then I added for good measure, “and vaginas are way more sensitive than buttholes.” Case closed. He did not feel the need to further discuss it, but he’s on to me because he did say, “why do you always have to bring your vagina into it?” Like I’m not playing fair. He’s right. I’m not. And just when he thinks it can’t get any worse, I add the mom card to the top of the deck. “You can buy whatever toilet paper you want when you get a job and/or move out.” I always hated that card and yet, here I am using it. I know it probably puts me on the bottom of the parent of the year list, but it’s cool. I didn’t make that list with my first two so it wouldn’t be fair to them if I made that list with the last one. So I feel like I have won this argument and my long lasting roll of sandpaper toilet tissue will live to see another day or thirty. Eat your heart out Charmin.
RouletteWeekend 