Where I'm left feeling like Dennis' mom.

I used to LOVE Denis the Menace when I didn't have one of my own. I still love him, but I frequently end up feeling HUGELY empathetic to Dennis' Mom.

Yesterday, Sonny boy and I were covering all his new text books (for the new school term) with brown paper. The Acha had gotten some labels custom-made for him- with all his favourite characters- Chota Bheem, the characters in Ice Age and Rio and Cars, Ben10, Phineas and Herb or Ferb or some such person and some others I can't remember now... and Sonny boy was totally thrilled to be helping me- which means that he was simply sitting opposite me, poring over the labels and asking every 5 minutes when he could stick them on the covered books!

As ususal, the art/drawing notebook was a horizontally long one, and I had to scrimp on the brown paper to be able to use one single sheet to cover that as well as another regular book. To ensure that the paper would not come off the cover, I thought I'd better use scotch tape to stick the small inside edges to the cover.

"Sonny boy, bring me scotch tape...."
"Where is it, Amma?"
"On top of the fridge, or in the drawer in front of the mirror, or on your study table.

After some ten minutes ostensibly spent looking for scotch tape, but in reality spent mulling over/picking up whatever of his toys he found in all those places.

"Sonny boy, WHERE is the scotch tape????"
"I don't know- I'm still searching, Amma....."
*Ominous silence from me*
"Amma, I can't FIND it anywhere..." and he comes back to me...

*Looks at him irritatedly* "Sonny boy, it HAS to be somewhere in this house, right? I told you where to search also! How do I always find things??? Where do I search for these things????

*Meets my glare wonderingly* "That is what I am also thinking now..."