Grounded

Jacob is grounded.  He had a less than stellar grade so for one week, no phone, no tv, no peace (for me).  I really wish he wasn't grounded.  I wish his punishment was actually related to his crime and Danny would have assigned him something.  A book report or research paper or something, anything that would keep him occupied as I try to get my own work done!
When I was a junior, I spent one quarter of the school year grounded.  For one week, I was grounded to my room.  I had to strip the paint off the window sills.   After that week, I still had five more weeks of house arrest.  My mom gave me all kinds of chores to do.  I picked up every available extra hour at work.  My only freedom was a daily walk to Bever Park.  I walked that nearly every day.  That grounding was related to my getting caught drinking at a school function so any type of punishment I received was just.  
But Jacob, Jacob is not really being punished as much as I am being punished.  I think he thinks if he bugs me long enough, I will relent.
Last night he decided that he was going to straighten his hair.  Well, he had just showered so he had to get his hair dry first.  That meant he needed to be in my bathroom dinking around with the blow dryer.  After his hair was pretty dry he started to straighten it.  The straightener is in Hayley's room so that is where he ended up.  After the straightening, there was a long discussion on what kind of hairstyles made him look- good, gross, metro and douche. 
Tonight, he slept for much of the evening.  When he woke up, he was full of energy but had no way of using it.  So, he started catching cats and putting them in the big box in the living room.  Catching Sophie and Elsa was easy but catching Emmitt required finding him.  That brought him to my room.  Emmitt was hiding.  Jacob made a whole lot of ruckus trying to find him.  I was trying to do homework.  Next thing I hear is Jacob hollering for Danny to come and see the cats in the box.  There is much cat walloring, wall bumping and laughing coming up the stairs and Jacob and Danny bring the cats in a box game to me. 
Well, the problem with carrying three cats up a flight of stairs while laughing and one cat is crying desperately is that the attention of one large dog is piqued.  Harlow wanted to see what was going on in the box that was now in the room that I was trying to do my homework in.  Harlow put her giant head in the box, Emmitt jumped out, the other two stayed in the box and my homework wasn't getting done.  But Jacob was grounded.
At some point tonight, Jacob will come in with his guitar or his harmonica and will play me a bit of song.  My homework is done so I will be able to play the guess that tune game.  He and Danny will probably get into some sort of scuffle in the family room.  Cats will probably get chased again.  None of this is teaching him anything about doing better in school!
When I was grounded, it was from the stuff that was getting me grounded.  I was doing dumb stuff so to prevent me from doing more dumb stuff, I was kept at home.  Jacob is doing dumb stuff at home.  He is not studying harder.  In fact, he is preventing me from studying harder and I may get poor grades and then I will be grounded and then I can pay him back.  Oh, if he realizes how in plan may backfire I think he would actually pick up a book.