Travelling with small children

So I was attempting to leave anywhere near the time I said I would to take my children to visit my in-aws today when Dizzy happened.  Dizzy being my mischievous, stubborn, crazy second child.  We had gone not one exit down the highway by our home when I hear-
CRASH!
Clatter
 "MY MOOOOOVIE!!!"

Ugh.  I pull over to ascertain what tragedy has befallen my youngest in the 5 minutes since we left home and she has dropped the portable movie player, the movie has clattered out (under my seat, of course) and she is bereft.  I'm in a little dirt turn out off the first exit, top half of my body in the car stretching over blankets, feet, children's paraphernalia, etc. and my sarong-clad lower half is dangling out as I swear and get her situated.  I never even hear them approach.
"uh...ma'am?"
I nearly jump out of my skin.  As I right myself out of the car, there are two motorcycle cops with lights on behind my vehicle and one of them has now approached me.
"Iiiiis everything okay?" he draws it out as though I'm armed with more than just  shitty attitude and a potty mouth.
"Yep," I counter, half light-hearted, half crazy-mommy impatient, "just travelling with small children."
He and his partner laugh heartily at this one. "oookay.  Just wanted to make sure you weren't in any kind of trouble."
"Nope, not yet," I sigh, "wanna 3 year old?"
He LITERALLY takes a step back while his partner laughs at me.  
"NO!" he snorts "I've got a sixteen year old."
"Shit," I say, mentally cursing myself for my continued profanity, "good luck."
They're really laughing now. 
 "Yeah," he laughs climbing back on his bike, "you too."

I climb back in, actually thankful for the heart-jumping nervousness I get around cops because it has at least stopped my seething.  Like the last few days, this morning with my daughter has been hell.  When I was about to leave and only 5 minutes later than I had planned, Elizabeth willingly did "one last potty" and I was thrilled that, for once that didn't cause a meltdown.  The joy didn't last long.  I realized, as I was asking William to get in the car, that she had been in there WAY too long.
"Uh...Diz?" I call, "Whatcha doing in there?"
"Nothing." 
THIS, any parent will tell you, is NOT the answer you want.  I open the door to water pooling on the counter, dripping down the cabinets and pooling on the floor.  Elizabeth is soaked as though she has showered with clothes on.
"WHAT THE..."
"I was thirsty..." she starts.
"YOU were? Or the whole bathroom was, Diz?!  JESUS CHRIST, we're trying to leave here and you just...AAAAAAGGGGHHH!". I'm carrying her out of the bathroom toward my room so I can mop up the mess and have her far enough from me that I won't be tempted to flush her down the toilet.

What is it about youngest children?  I've bee talking to a lot of fellow moms lately and, regardless of the number and gender of children we have, we all agree the youngest child is there to make you feel like a total idiot.  They will be the one to make you doubt that you have ANY business trying this parenting thing.

They make the messes and do the gross things that come straight out of books and movies.  You know the ones - entire rolls of toilet paper strewn around your bathroom, every shade of eye shadow you own painted on themselves and your bathroom, taking the lid off of your tiny, multi-colored, round cupcake sprinkles and letting them dance across your hardwood floor, shredding your mail to decorate the living room in confetti, using your powdered sugar as snow, swimming in mud puddles, picking up discarded Popsicle sticks and straws at the park and putting them IN THEIR MOUTH (eeeeek!), and my personal favorite from today after we finally made it to Mom Mom and Pop Pop's and went to the park, asking "what's this" as she squishes her finger into fresh bird or squirrel droppings.  Are you f@#!ing kidding me?  I was thankful my mother in law had her anti-bacterial wipes on her as mine were back at her house.

Seriously, she make s me feel incompetent.  Oh, and the other kicker today... As I'm hurriedly and angrily carrying her out to the car after the water fiasco, she wails right in front of the neighbor, 
"DON'T HIT MEEEEEEEEE!"

We don't spank our kiddos.  But now our neighbors think we do.