The hardest thing about raising teenagers is that they suck. And they’re terrible people. And they never listen to a damn word you say. You would think that as they get older this idiotic behavior would improve. But it doesn’t, probably because teenagers become worse people as they get older. I’m not sure which age they start to get better, but I have a 16-year-old who shows no signs of behaving like a normal, reasonable human person any time soon.

We are trying to get the big kids summer plan figured out. Since we will sell this house and get packed out quite a while before we can actually leave Alaska we have to move into Army Lodging for a little while. Under normal circumstances living in an efficiency hotel room is unpleasant, add two 6-year-olds and two 16-year-olds to the equation and it is miserable beyond any stretch of the imagination. The smell alone is enough to kill a cat. Luckily we don’t have one of those, just a stupid dog who will either add to the stench or be sentenced to several weeks in an overpriced kennel.

To avoid further cirrhosis of my liver we are sending the big kids to visit family in Texas while we are in lodging. They usually spend some time each summer with them anyway, so everyone is on board. The big kids get out of school May 23, we aren’t scheduled to leave here until the beginning of July. John told us that if his soccer team makes it to the state tournament he’ll miss it if he goes to Texas. This is the conversation, seriously – word for word.

“Yeah, so I won’t be able to play at state if I go to Grandma’s”

“How do you know that?”

“Because the tournament is after school gets out.”

“Well, when is it, is it a month after school is out? That wouldn’t make sense.”

“I don’t know, Mom. Nobody knows. They have to play all the games first to see who goes to state.”

“Where is it?”

“I think it’s way down in Kenai. I’m not sure they know that yet.”

“John, I’m sure there is a web site with that information, they don’t plan this stuff at the last minute. A state soccer tournament is kind of a big deal.”

“No Mom, that’s not how it works. Duh.”

He then rolled his eyes and finished his dinner with a look on his face that said, PARENTS ARE SO STUPID. Today I told him the tournament was the three days after school got out, held at one of the local high schools. He told me, “no way Mom, it’s not being held here.”

I showed him the site. He said, “Ummm, Mom this is last year.”

“John, it says Alaska State Soccer Tournament 2013.”

“I know Mom. But these pictures are from last year, I know these kids.”

“Ohmyfreakinggod. John, they don’t have any pictures from this year because it hasn’t happened yet. Look at it, it says 2013.”

“Oh.”

Terrible, awful, smelly, gross people. That’s what teenagers are.

Our bathroom remodel is complete. We no longer have the worst bathroom in America. It started like this…

If you look closely you’ll see the lovely plaid wallpaper and sheep border. Yes, sheep. My friend Kim B. called it the “baaathroom.” It also had “oh crap!” bars and a cut out in the tub to make it wheelchair accessible. This bathroom was to be the first project we took on when we bought this house. That was November 2009.

After six months I couldn’t take the sheep anymore so I painted over it. I don’t know why I thought chocolate brown would look good, it didn’t. And in a bathroom it looked like something else so it became our “shit brown bathroom.”

It was really gross. But we lived with it for three years. A month ago we were finally ready to tear it out and start over. Dallas and I tore it out, then hired a professional to do all the real work. I did pick out everything myself, so don’t say anything bad about it.

In hindsight the renovation wasn’t that bad. The worst part was six people sharing one bathroom. Especially when that bathroom is not on the same level as my bedroom. When you’ve had two sets of twins and are knocking on 40s door the last thing you need is a long trip to the potty in the middle of the night. Or in my case, several trips.

Added to that indignity was putting up with the disgusting smell that comes with sharing a bathroom with a teenage boy. 16-year-old boys do not smell good and frankly, 16-year-old girls don’t smell much better. Dallas and I both noticed how bad their bathroom smelled, but figured it was always like that because teenagers are gross. I didn’t mind though because on Monday night all of the glue and grout and whatever else was going to be dry so I could start showering upstairs again. It made me very happy.

I was looking forward to that stench-free shower on Monday morning when I went down to do some laundry. Our laundry room backs up to the downstairs bathroom and is directly underneath the newly remodeled upstairs bathroom. On this morning it was full of water.

I lost it.

I started frantically texting Dallas (my car was warming up and I don’t understand bluetooth technology, so our calls wouldn’t work). The “f” word was used a lot in those texts. I was certain our new bathroom was going to have to come out. Certain that I would spend weeks with only one stinky, gross, teenage boy soiled bathroom.

But I was wrong. The plumber came and said a back flow pipe was missing its cap. He replaced the cap but said we needed to have the drains cleared. Then he said, “I’m surprised you haven’t noticed a bad sewage smell down here.”

Oops. I had to admit I had smelled something bad, but had blamed my teenager for it. The drain guy came the next day and pulled this out of the floor drain in the laundry room…

That definitely smells worse than teenagers. So there. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for accusing my teenagers of making the bathroom smell bad when it was really backed up sewage. But it was an honest mistake because they really do smell bad.