Bribery Won't Work

If you are ever in a position where you want to bribe my kids to do something for you, I just want to be the first to say, bribery won't work. It won't. I have trained them to be upstanding and moral and impervious to bribery. (Blackmail is a different matter.)

But Bribery won't work. And I know this because I tested it. Over 5 months ago, I bought the kids a Wii.

It was a bribe. An experiment in motivation. Which failed. Because they aren't so much upstanding and moral and impervious, as they are inherently a little lazy (which they come by naturally from their dad). And they are HUGE procrastinators (another unsightly trait that comes from their dad), and they all have a big heaping inability to pay attention wee bit of ADD. OK, a couple have a wee bit of the ADHHHHHHHHHHHHHHD. But there's no need to discuss where that comes from. And I am completely worn down to a raw nerve with just getting them to comb their hair and put clean clothes on trying to teach them to make their own choices and be responsible for themselves.

What I'm trying to say is that we STILL haven't opened the Wii. In spite of Dave and I working beside them, (C'mon, kids! The de-garbaging of the house is fun for the whole family!) we are still not done.

Finally, in desperation, I sat the kids down a few nights ago and said, "Do you know what I really want for Mother's Day?" And please, feel free to judge me for using that holiday against them. It's the only one I get any mileage out of all year. I plan my requests 6-8 months in advance. Last year, I received the "World's Best MOM" award. Yep, I effectively used that against them for months.

"What Mommy? What do you want?" 10 beautiful eyes stared at me expectantly. . .
"I really really really want to play the Wii." Because it's now just one more piece of clutter sitting around collecting dust! Because I love you and I know you are all dying to play with that amazing gaming system which has been next to the TV, ironically buried in clutter, since I bought it 5 months ago. Because if I have to spend one more day staring at piles of stuff no one uses, cares about or will miss, I might be forced to take a little vacation to the psyche ward.

And, those darling little kids proceeded to. . . do very nearly nothing. It's OK. At least I know they can not be bribed. I am proud of that achievement.

And at the rate we're going, we will be able to play the Wii about the time the next generation console, the Puu, comes out. Yep, you heard it here first. The Puu. Which is clearly fictional. Unless Nintendo has an extraordinarily infantile funny bone. And "they might, rabbit. They might". (quick. . .who can tell me where that last quote was adapted from? I'll even give a prize to the first correct guess. I'm thinking itunes credit. But I draw the line at bribes)