We miss most of the Trick-or-Treaters as we are out at a party.
We get back and Ben, my routine-loving toddler, starts to close all the doors. I watch him make his way to the front door, pulling the loo door open towards him and manoevering himself into the corner of the hallway by the stroller. There, by the front door, he waits, looking through the distorted glass at the flickering pumpkins outside. This is his routine bid for a bit of privacy and so I know exactly what he is doing.
I leave him to it, knowing he will be a good five minutes or so before his diaper needs changing and go upstairs to get other boys down from their party high and ready for bed.
A few seconds later I am immersed in a different dirty diaper – oh the joy of having two in nappies – and so when the doorbell rings I figure I’ll have to risk the trick rather than deserting ship to risk handing out the treat. However I need not worry; my assistant, in the form of my overly-sociable Ben, is taking care of things for me. ‘Hello,’ I hear him shout through the front door. ‘Just busy. I DOING A POO! Go away! Coming! I DOING A POO. HELLO? Hear me?’
I cannot risk opening the door now out of embarrassment and I cannot risk opening the door because of the smell. So I hide upstairs while my son shouts out his scatalogical news. To a bewildered audience that wasn’t quite expecting that sort of treat.
