Commandos on the Road

Recipe for a successful Commando road trip. Add to smallish, 2002 vintage, four-door sedan full of necessary rations, camouflage, and battle plans for storming Seattle's playgrounds:

• 1 busy Commando kid, bottled into a booster seat
• 2 toy Army trucks that make a lot of noise every time you push a certain button—keep them just out of mom’s reach
• 3 CDs of favorite marching orders—but insist on playing the one song about fire trucks and police cars over and over and over
• 4 different flavors of rations—none of them will be what you wanted. Insist mom stop at the next truck stop for the licorice that you meant to ask for
• 5 stops to move your legs, and five fights to keep from getting strapped back in that seat
• 6 different road games, such as: counting trucks (80 seems to be the upper limit); the alphabet game (it’s hard to find V); I spy; who can kick mommy’s chair the most (Commando always wins); do I have to stop this car and give you a timeout? (mom always wins); who can be quiet the longest (it’s a draw if you start kicking the seat again)…
• 7 markers fallen on the floor, including the one you MUST have to finish your picture of the policeman
• 8 steps in the directions to help mommy find the black marker behind her seat without looking
• 9 toy army men launching kamikaze automobile missions out the window of the car
• 10 times an hour asking “Are we there yet?”

Mix all ingredients, and add one tall frosty mug of Corona for Mom at the end of the five-hour car ride. Spend the next two days securing control of foreign territory—play pirates at the playground, take advantage of the kindness of grandma, dig holes to China at the beach—and repeat for the car ride home. You and Mom will both arrive home in your fatigues.