Humiliation - why I spent my weekend with a stuffed rat

Steve (Izzy's Dad) and I take it in turns to look after Izzy at the weekends, and this weekend it was my turn. So as planned, Steve summarily turned up at my house to drop Izzy off. But with an addition. Under her arm, Izzy was carrying a big, ugly stuffed toy rat (with a horrible thick pink tail).

Once Izzy was out of earshot, I turned to Steve. "What in god's name is that vile rat-thing that she is lugging about?"

"Erm ....... the school gave it to her for the weekend," he replied, "something to do with her being the best behaved pupil in her class this week."

"You said the weekend. The whole weekend? You mean I've got to put up with that rodenty thing for more than a couple of hours?" I asked him.

"Ermmm yes," Replied Steve sheepishly, "and you also have to take photographs of what it gets up to at the weekend."

"Look, I hate pointing out the bloody obvious, but it is an inanimate object. It's not going to get up to anything." I retorted.

"You have to pretend it's doing stuff and photograph it," Steve said.

"For the love of all things holy!" I exclaimed. "I am nearly 40 years of age, and you are telling me that my weekend will be spent role-playing with a large stuffed rat? And if that wasn't humiliating enough, I've got to capture it on camera?!"

"Well, yeh. That's about the long and short of it," Steve flinched, before adding, "but you will also need to stick the photographs into the rat's 'school book' so when the children get back to school on Monday, they can discuss what it got up to at the weekend."

Sacre Bleu! The rat has it's own school book? That stuffed, synthetic, static-electricity-generating, dust ball had its own school book? 'HELLO?!' I shout and only hear my own echo, 'Is it only me who realises that the rat isn't real?!'

Sacre Bleu the Sequel! Izzy got rewarded for being the best behaved pupil in her class! I was very proud of her, but could say with certainty that she didn't get that from me.

And so with a heavy heart I took possession of the rat (which was ironically called George, a name which always implies 'git') and set about my task of chronicling his action-packed weekend [What am I doing? What have I become? It wasn't six years since I was selling landing gear to major airlines, and now I was playing make believe with a stuffed rat. That's kids for you that is].

Just in case you were wondering if George the Rat was a flash in the pan fad, I can wholeheartedly assure you that he wasn't. Izzy didn't put flea-infested, polyester-furred, travesty-of-a-rat down for the entire weekend. Here is a half-hearted sample of the pictures for you to look at.
 

Pic.No.1 Izzy and rat thing bouncing on a trampoline

Pic.No.2 Ratty the rancid rodent on a funfair ride with Izzy and her chum Honey

 

 Pic.No.3 Yep you got it. That's the rat eating Izzy's banana cake whilst at lunch

So the moral of the story? Listen carefully because I have learnt the hard way. Do whatever you can to make sure that your kid doesn't come top at anything. Sure you will have to adopt a multi-faceted approach which encourages bad behaviour, low academic standards, and the opposite of sporting prowess. But trust me, an under-achieving kid will forever spare you from the rat [taps side of nose]. Yeh, I know - I'm good!