Outfoxed

The lass decided that she didn’t like dinner last night, so she refused to eat it.

The way she operates; however, is not nearly in so straight forward a manner. Instead, she sits there and dithers. Then she wants some milk. She eats some applesauce. She plays with the dogs and “rewards” them for doing tricks like “sit.” Then she says that she isn’t hungry. Five seconds later, she wants more applesauce. “But you weren’t hungry a second ago” we reply. “I wasn’t hungry for that.” she replies pointing at the food on her plate.

We’d had enough of this stuff. Mostly it gets to be insulting because she thinks we don’t get the game. We put her unfinished plate in the fridge and informed her she would be getting it for lunch.

Fast forward to lunch time today. I set the plate in front of her and the gnashing of teeth commences. She wants ketchup. She wants A1. She won’t eat. She doesn’t like it. She doesn’t have her favorite fork, that’s why she won’t eat it. Finally, I put it back in the fridge and inform her she’ll be getting it again for supper. More teeth gnashing.

At this point, I had to take the boy up to get onto the bus. Curiously, the lass informed me she didn’t want to come up. Just for reference, she always wants to wait for the bus. I knew something was up, I just wasn’t sure what. My own thought is that she’d fix herself a sandwich or something, or at least try.

So after the bus drove off with the boy, I arrive back at the house. The lass is sitting quietly on the couch flipping through a book. I sit down to check email.

“I finished my lunch Dad.”

“You finished your lunch. Really?” I replied.

“Yup.”

So I head into the kitchen. No plate in the fridge. There it is, on the counter, sans food- save for some crumbs. I scrutinize the plate looking for telltale doggie tongue signs, but the crumbs lead me to believe that no dog mouths have touched the plate. Hmmm.

“Why did you wait for me to leave before eating?” I asked.

“I just did.”

“Did you eat all of it? There isn’t any in the garbage? or the sink?” I pressed.

“No.” she calmly replied as she continued to flip through her book. The moxie was really breathtaking at this point. She really thinks I’m caught in the little web she’s weaving.

“How much did you feed to the dogs?”

Crack. “Just a little.” she said in a little voice as she squirmed.

“And how much is a little?” I asked.

“Just a little…” she said pinching her fingers together to show me how much. Now she was looking at me with a sheepish little grin. She was also trying to sink back into the couch.

“I’ll ask you again- did you eat your lunch? or did you feed it to the dogs?”

“I fed it to the dogs.” she mumbled. Now she was slouched completely on her back with just her head tilted up against the back of the couch. She kept on with the sheepish grin. She was still looking at me, but she knew the jig was up. I’m sure she was waiting for … something.

But nothing. What could I do at that point? Payback will come later when she wants something and doesn’t get it because she lied and because she didn’t eat the lunch offered to her. Hopefully she remembers that I was onto her from the start. My guess is she’ll know better how to evade capture the next time.

Wily like a fox is that one.