Diabetic Rum Runner

My son's become a rum runner of sorts. The booty was just too good to pass up for Mitchell. He even lured his cousin Kyle into being his accomplice.

This particular scuttlebutt begins with  a confession:
Around our house we're big diet coke drinkers. Sad but true. But with three kids with diabetes sometimes the precarious haze of blood sugars we marinate in every day just won't let everyone have a snack at the same time. And when they all want to eat something but they can't, a glass of water seems like a final insult to their cancelled-out calorie cravings. So whats a family to do? Well this family turned to the drink, Diet Coke that is. All of us, diabetic or not, have become "drinkers of the diet". We call it that because it makes our little habit sound kinda shady, which it is--being DIET and all.  But these sorts of things are a slippery slope. Over the years Mitchell and Chey spun out of control and soon they were drowning their diabetic doldrums by drinking harder stuff like Diet Dr. Pepper. And soon it became their favorite among syrupy swigs.

So recently, when our local grocery store had this sign out front:

I knew I needed to send a picture text to Mitchell ASAP.

Now usually when I text this kid, it takes a while before I hear back. And sometimes my texts get ignored completely. But as you can imagine, he instantly text me back:

Mitchell: "huh?"

Me: "For real."

Mitchell: "really??"

Me: [picture text]

Mitchell: "Where??"

Mitch grabbed his cousin Kyle and headed for the store. They parked just yonder and eyed the booty--it was ALL DIET DR. PEPPER.  Not only that, it was late in the day and there was A LOT of soda left and as Mitchell said to me later, "There's just a small target market for this kinda stuff mom".

I don't even wanna know if they made a million discreet trips or if they just pulled up and loaded the car. There are some things a mother just shouldn't ever know. But what I do know is that the Rum Run ended with the sound of my garage door opening and my kid backing his car into the garage whereby conveniently locating the trunk end nearest the garage's refrigerator.

This is what I found in my garage:

And what ended up being stashed in my garage fridge:

And here's the younger cousins all enjoying a bit of bribed boot-er-y in return for their hushed silence on the matter:

A Rum Run for Diabetics.
Now go and brush your teeth!