Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Ask And You Shall Receive

So does Arizona Cardinals head coach Ken Whisenhunt read my blog? After the beating his team took last Sunday (oops sorry, that hit on Boldin was a cheapshot), I can only assume the answer is yes. After a frustrating single point loss in fantasy football last week I asked in one of my posts for his team lot let Coles score four touchdowns on Sunday. He scored three, for the first time in his career. The only conclusion I can reach is that he read my post and did what he could to help me. Thank you very much, three was more than enough to help me win. I guess it just goes to show that sometimes you just have to ask nicely.

That's a lesson that came up this morning. My oldest woke me up this morning by asking if she could have a brownie. We made brownies yesterday so that was fresh in her mind. Of course I said that she had to have breakfast before we could have brownies. That led to some whining so I got ready for yet another screaming, crying, whining battle against sanity and logic. As I reached into my holster for my nice shiny, fully loaded "because I said so" gun, she surprised me. She calmly started listing off her reasons for having a brownie.

"I should have a brownie because I really like the chocolate. I like that crunchy part. And I could have a little one while you cook breakfast and then I can eat breakfast."

"Motherfu.."

I know brownies first thing in the morning are never a good idea. I've never actually consulted a nutritionist on the topic but I'm pretty sure that question would elicit a blank stare of disbelief or an "are you seriously that stupid?" However, faced with such a well thought out and calmly presented argument I had no choice. I had to positively reinforce that kind of behavior and let her have a little brownie before breakfast. So it wasn't a great job from the standpoint of good eating habits but it was definitely a good learning experience. She learned that is she calmly and rationally come up with reasons why she should get her way then her chances improve. Asking works a lot better than crying or demanding. And I learned that the next time we make brownies I have to make sure I eat them all before the kids wake up the next morning. It won't be easy but we all know that as parents we have to make sacrifices.


P.S. Since last week worked out so well I'll try again. So this week if the coaches of Baltimore, New Orleans, and Houston could give up two or three touchdowns each to White, Peterson, and Wayne, respectively, I'd really appreciate it.

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Happy Birthday To Me

It's funny how birthdays change as you get older. When you're a kid it's a magical day filled with presents, cake, and parties. As you get a bit older people use it as an excuse to do a lot of drinking or, in my case, go out to see a movie or something. Once you have kids though there's not as much of that other stuff. Our big birthday outing yesterday was a trip to an orchard to go apple picking. Not exactly the sort of birthday celebration you read about in People but definitely fun.

We met up with some friends and their kids there. I had a lot more fun watching them laugh and play than I would have at any movie that's out now. The idea of watching the kid from Holes running for his life for a couple hours doesn't really peak my interest. Throw in some robot cars and it's a different story but until then I'll take apple picking with the kids. Like I said, they had a blast. The oldest actually went on the tractor ride, thanks for peer pressure. Once she saw her friend jump on she was willing to try it. By the end, we had to go on it again just for her. I think peer pressure gets the short end of the stick. Sure it leads some kids to drink or do drinks but if it means I don't have to worry about getting peed on during a hayride then it's worth the risk in my opinion.

The other big crowd pleaser was the hay jump. Basically, it was just a little barn full of hay for the kids to jump around in. It's what a ball pit would be if Chuck E. Cheese had opened it's first location out in the country. Sounds like the beginning of one of those "you know you're a redneck if" jokes to me. Of course, that advantage ball pits have is I don't recall having to work so hard to get the plastic balls out of my kids' hair when they were done. For that matter, I don't remember finding balls in a diaper when I changed them later on. Wish I could say the same about the hay. Thanks to my two little hay magnets I now have my own haystack at home from the pieces we pulled off them later. All I need to do is toss in a needle and let the fun times roll. That's probably not a good idea judging by how much my kids seemed to enjoy throwing hat at each other, as well as at just about anyone else. Wouldn't it be great if you could do that as an adult? Just out of nowhere dump an arm load of hay on someone. Everyone laughs and suddenly you have a new best friend. Too bad because I've got lots of hay now.

Our other big adventure yesterday was going out for supper. It went pretty well, for a while. The problem with taking kids to eat out is they have a cut off point after which they are only capable of crying and whining. They don't tell you where that point is though so it 's a bit of a gamble. It's like eating with a ticking timebomb, or the game perfection, at the table. You just know at some point there's going to be an explosion. We were pretty much able to finish eating before the clock struck zero. I waited to pay and get the rest wrapped up to go while my wife took the kids to the van. As I was paying the waitress was nice enough to point out on the menu that was stapled to our doggy bag that "you could always call ahead to order and then pick it up." She was just trying to be helpful but it still sounded like a subtle please don't come back. I just about wet myself laughing at it, as did my wife when I told her about it in the van. We chuckled all the way home. Once we got there, the kids gave me the Homer Simpson pajama pants they'd gotten me. According to my wife they went out shopping for them when the questions started.

"Why are we getting daddy these?"

"Daddy likes pants with cartoon pictures on them."

"How about we get him some pants with my picture on them?"

"Well, they don't have pants with your picture on them."

"Why not?"

"Because not everyone knows you."

"Mom, everyone knows me."

Neither one of us is about to tell her she's not as famous as she thinks. Especially since they're both stars to us. Guess it was the sort of birthday you might read about in People, what with the celebrities and all. "Yes sweetie, everyone knows you."

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

My Kitchen Floor Is Clean

For some reason I was feeling kind of ambitious yesterday so I scrubbed the kitchen floor. Maybe it wasn't ambition. I think I was just pissed at losing in fantasy football by one point, again. Two fumbles go my way and I'm 3-0 instead of 1-2. I'm going to start emailing the coaches to let them know what I need each player to do. "Ok, no pressure but I need Coles to score 4 touchdowns tomorrow. I know he's on the other team but would it kill you to just do me a little favour?"

Like I was saying, I scrubbed the floor yesterday. I think I scrubbed too hard and took all the colour off the linoleum. I'd have to check some photos from when we first moved in but I don't remember the floor ever being that strange white colour. I guess everyday traffic and a couple fires really pile up the dirt. I'm just happy the cleaning actually worked for me this time because it doesn't always. Turns out using the vacuum on the curtains is not good for the curtains, or the vacuum for that matter. Another helpful hint, which I can't stress enough, you can't use regular dish soap in a dishwasher. No matter how much you'd rather avoid going to the store to get the right kind of soap, it really just causes more problems than it solves. I found that out when I walked into a kitchen filled with soapy bubbles and a water covered floor. I thought that sort of thing only happened in silly movies but it turns out those movies are surprisingly accurate. It reminded me of the time a bubble bath got out of hand as a kid.

When I was like seven of eight we had a jacuzzi type tub with jets. It made bath time lots of fun especially when my parents would add some bubbles. So this one time I was playing in the tub along with my sister who's a couple years younger than me. The bubbles were going and it was great fun. The switch for the jets was on the wall by the door and my parents made sure to set it for a couple minutes. Just enough to make a descent pile of bubbles. Anyways, I got out of the tub and turned the dial to like twenty minutes. Now that I think about it, I'm wondering why were unsupervised at the time but that's a question for another time. As I'm sure you can imagine bubble bath plus twenty minutes of being stirred by jets equals a lot of bubbles. Actually, five or six minutes does the trick. That's about how long it took for my parents to realise the jets should have stopped already. They came in and had to wade through a giant wall of bubbles to try and find us. I don't remember them ever making that mistake again.

I can't talk about that tub though without mentioning when they installed it. It was a bit bigger than the tub that was originally in that bathroom. That meant my parents needed to take out the closet in the bathroom to accommodate their dream tub. They were also smart enough to know how to get that done for them. One day a friend of mine came over to play. My parents set us up with safety goggles, gloves, and some hammers. They told us to go ahead and knock that wall down. Do you have any idea how much fun that is for a seven year old? Hell, even at 31 I'd be downright giddy if I got to do something like that today. As I'm writing this, I'm looking around our house to figure out if we really need all these walls. I imagine when my wife reads this she's going to quickly hide anything in the house that could used for demolition purposes. Oh well, at least I've got the memories. The best part of it was when my friend's mom came to pick him up. We're both covered in dust with pieces of gyprock in our hair. Her face went white when he told her we'd knocked down a wall. Her panic turned to relief and I'm guessing a little bit of confusion when she found out we'd had permission to tear down the wall.

I find it kind of comforting to look back and realise my parents didn't always make the best decisions. Hopefully, I'll be able to remember some mistakes before I make the same ones myself. Not to say the wall thing was a mistake. I'd actually classify it as figgin' awesome. If the same situation does arise though I think I'll make sure to let the parents of the other kids involved aware of what's going on before they show up and think their child has just demolished a significant part of someone's house. Although freaking someone out like that does sound awfully tempting too. Guess we'll have to wait and see which path I choose on that one.

Monday, September 22, 2008

Just One Of Those Days

As we're all aware the big downside with kids is they're always there. It doesn't matter if you didn't get enough sleep the night before or if you have a headache. Those two things may lead you to certain conclusions so I'll just deal with that right now. No, I was not up late drinking. Judging how today is going I can't guarantee I'll be able to say the same thing tomorrow morning but that's not important. Last night's lack of sleep was a combination of working until one and coming home to a youngster who threw up and then seemed to believe last night that "sleep is overrated". I kind of agree with that as I'm not a big fan of sleep, or maybe that's just the lie I've convinced myself of since the kids came along. It's hard to say anymore. Sleep does make it easier to deal with things though.

Like I said, the little one wasn't feeling well and decided to stay up nice and late last night. Not a problem because if she stays up late she'll just sleep in a bit later. Too bad her big sister didn't get the memo. She got up at 7:30 and then was nice enough to come wake us up. Thank goodness because I'd hate to miss making breakfast, I mean a snack, for them by sleeping. I'll give them credit, they weren't behaving extraordinarily dickish today. They were right around their normal levels. Some fighting, some complaints, some outrageously impossible demands. If anyone out there has a machine that makes tiny baby shoes increase in size so they fit a three year old please let me know because I'd be very interested. My tired, cranky state just amplified it all.

It was the sort of mood where you just need some sort of outlet to let all the frustration out on. Personally, I've been wishing for a burglar to break into the house so I could beat the crap out him. Not anyone dangerous, just someone with poor coordination, asthma, and very poor vision who loses his glasses early on in the encounter. A person to show up and create a situation where force is seen as a totally reasonable response but who can't really do any harm to me or the kids. The emotional release of pounding on a punching bag and the ego boost of having protected your family. Is that too much to ask? To date nobody has fallen for the Lenscrafters/Asthma Clinic sign I put out on the front lawn. Maybe if I used a different font.

I find the next best thing to that probably unrealistic scenario is telemarketers. Telling off a complete stranger over the phone can be very cathartic. I'm actually pretty torn on the idea of signing up for that new "no call list" that's being instituted. On the one hand, it's a pain getting all those pointless calls. On the other hand, letting them go through their whole monologue before asking them "hey, is my dial tone working?" and then hanging up on them always brightens up my day. That's why I think there should be a number you can call. You call, the person answers and then goes on about how great their long distance service/credit card/home meat delivery/direct purchasing wholesale group is. Then they sit and listen as you take out all your frustrations by cursing at them. It'd be like a parental helpline. Until then I'll just have to dream and get excited every time the phone rings on a frustrating day.

"Sure, I've got a couple minutes to talk to you about lawn care but first do you have a couple minutes for me to curse at you like Richard Pryor with tourrettes?"

Friday, September 19, 2008

While I Was Sleeping

You ever read an article about parenting and feel good about yourself because the advice they give is something you've already come up with on your own? "Put jackets on the kids when it's cold? Heck, I've been doing that for ages. I must be an awesome parent." The other day I read an article about getting kids to try new foods. I meant to click on the one giving me the latest fantasy football advice but I'd already read too much by the time I realised my mistake. Imagine my frustration when I couldn't find a running back on any team named Avocado. Anyways, one of the points of the article was that kids are more open to trying foods when they participate in the cooking of that food. All this time I thought I was being lazy but it turns out it was good parenting.

"Ok, you guys devil these eggs and I'll be back after this inning, I mean in a moment."

The food should be almost edible once they learn to read a recipe. I wonder if they touched on that issue later in the article. Maybe I should have read the whole thing. Once it had me feeling like a good parent though I didn't see any reason to read further. Parenting is like gambling; quit while you're ahead.

No matter how great I may think I am at this parenting game, I'm still not at the point where I can do it in my sleep. I often do it when extremely tired (you ever fall asleep at a red light?) but when I go to sleep my A game goes out the window. I'm told last night was a prime example. The little one was sleeping in the room she's sharing with her sister. That's going pretty well, 2:45 is the latest she's made it so far before ending up in our bed. So she's sleeping and then around 2 wakes up crying. I go get her and bring her to our bed so I can change her diaper and then she can cuddle her mom while I make a bottle for her. Everything went well and I moved her back to her little bed. Apparently, my wife didn't realise I'd moved our youngster. She woke up a little while later and questioned me when she couldn't find the baby.

This is the part I have no memory of. According to her account I told her I'd put the baby on the floor. She was a little skeptical but apparently I was adamant that our youngest child was resting safely on the floor. According to her there was some pointing and a great deal of certainty on my part. I wasn't convincing enough as she went to the kids' room and found them both sleeping in their beds. I wish I could say that was the end of it but I can't. Apparently, again I have no memory of it, my wife got up later in the night to go into the bathroom and vomit, a little HG alone time. At the same time our oldest woke up and was calling for something. On her way into the bathroom my wife asked me to go deal with the situation. My response was a confident "OK". Five minutes later she came out of the bathroom to find our little girl still calling for assistance and me sleeping in the exact same spot I'd been before her morning puking. From what I've been told it was frustrating.

This next one is my favourite because I almost got i right. Our youngest was still just a baby and slept in a crib that was in our room. In the middle of the night she woke up crying, as per usual. My wife asked me to hand her the baby as she grabbed the already prepared bottle. I didn't roll over and go back to sleep. I didn't tell her something crazy like she already had the baby or "Go back to sleep, we don't have a baby". No, I sprung into action. I rose from my slumber, reached down to the foot of the bed, grabbed the baby and handed her to my wife. At least I thought that's what I was doing. In reality the crib wasn't at the foot of the bed and what I'd done was handed her the dog. I was certain I was handing her the baby though. Before you judge, have you ever tried to tell the difference between my kids and my dog in the middle of the night? Yeah, I didn't think so. One more reason I hope my kids never ever read most of this crap.

So apparently being conscious is an important factor when it comes to parenting. At least in my case. At least there's hope that will change over time and I can take solace in the knowledge that it doesn't seem to diminish my skills as a pet owner.

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Sharing A Room

There used to be a time we didn't have to share our room with any children. I don't remember it myself but I've been told it existed. It's a lot like the way I view Intelligent Design. Lots of people go around telling you it's the way it was but I just think it's a bunch of crap. Seriously, if I was "intelligently designed" then why is my junk in the same area as the zipper on my pants? That just seems unnecessarily dangerous. That's a discussion for another time though.

Getting back on point, last night was the first time since forever that we went to bed without a youngster somewhere in our room. The oldest has been in her new room all week. There's still a couple minor cosmetic things to be done in there but for our purposes it's done. We moved her stuff in over the weekend and she loves it. We can't threaten to send her to her room anymore because she loves it so much but that's no big deal. I can always come up with more threats. "Ok, if you don't want to pick up your toys that's your choice. I feel obligated to tell you though that messes attract monsters. I'm getting out of here before they show up so just scream if you need anything." Do they send you a letter telling you you're father of the year or do they show up at your door like Publisher's Clearinghouse?

Anyways, I decided to move the other little bed into the room yesterday so they could try and sleep in the same room together. I purposely chose the night my wife was out to avoid any discussion. The last thing I need when I'm about to do something potentially stupid is someone pointing out why it's stupid. Also, it if worked and she came home to find our bedroom kid-free then I just look like a badass parent. So I got the bed in and everything set up. They were pretty excited about the idea of sharing a room. I took that as a bad sign and figured they'd just keep each other up all night. That's what happened for a little while. The little one went from her bed to her sister's bed and then back several times. They lie down ever so cutely and then pop up and want to play. After about twenty minutes of that I decided to try a different attack.

I love that as kids get older you can actually start to reason with them. That made it so nice when I decided to tell the older one that if she was quiet and let me get her sister to sleep I'd bring her back to the little bed. I ended up having to agree to lie down with the big one too. So I took the little one to my room for the usual bedtime routine. That consists of laying down with her as she drinks her bottle. Once she decides she's had enough she'll hand over her bottle, give a good night kiss, then roll over and fall asleep. "Do you have to rub it in my face that you make the decisions around here?" She got to sleep and I got her into the other room. Twenty minutes of laying down with the big one and I was able to get out.

FREEDOM!!! Having our nice big bed to ourselves. Not having to worry about waking up a youngster. It's the stuff dreams are made of. It only lasted half the night but that's longer than we thought it would. Hopefully, we can build on that foundation and actually get some entire restful kidless nights. Before the next one shows up that is. Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Anything For A Laugh

There's nothing better than hearing your kids laugh. It's quite simply the personification of joy. It's fun to hear anyone laugh but I'll do just about anything I can to get my kids to laugh. Unfortunately, they don't seem to find this blog all that funny. Could be the fact they're illiterate (dark family secret so don't go blabbing about it). They're just not real big on jokes yet. Actually, the older one's getting there. I'd forgotten how funny "why did the chicken cross the road" actually is. Anyways, that pretty much just leaves physical humour for me to use. The big problem with physical comedy is that people don't believe you when you actually get hurt. Kind of frustrating to be rolling around on the floor in pain while everyone in the room is just laughing at you. I'm getting ahead of myself though.

It's not hard for me to trace back where my ideas of what entertains kids comes from. My Dad stopped at nothing to entertain us kids. If he thought he could get a chuckle then he'd do it. I vividly remember we were playing tag in the house one evening when I was about eight or nine. Nothing like having the kids run around the house for an hour to get them good and ready for bedtime. So I came running around the corner and down the hallway. Dad was hiding in my room, which had a door that faced the top of the staircase leading to the ground floor. I run past and he jumped out of the room to try and "catch" me. Of course, he missed and dove headfirst down the stairs. My eyes went wide as I laughed at what I thought was the coolest thing ever. My mom's eyes went wide as she read my mind and immediately said, "Don't even think about it". For some reason she figured I would wind up more injured than Dad who had a bit of a carpet burn on his forearms from stopping himself on the stairs. Guess we'll never know.

As far as injuries go, the carpet burn was pretty minor. The most serious one he got while playing with us was probably the time he tore the cartilage in his knee. He turned when one of us called to him but his leg didn't cooperate. My sister and I found it pretty funny at the time. The knee surgery and time spent in the hospital, not quite as much. "Ok, when you fell down it was funny but I just don't get this joke. You can get out of that hospital bed because I don't think I'm going to laugh." In addition to the torn cartilage I think his entertainment injury list includes cuts and bruises, some cracked ribs, chipped teeth, numerous bloody noses, and of course numerous shots to the groin. I'm sure he could give a more complete list but that's the ones I remember. Having seen all that and witnessing him hurl himself down a flight of stairs for our amusement, what kind of parent would I be if I didn't?

That brings me to a couple days ago. The girls decided to go downstairs and bring along a blanket. I was trying to convince them to stay upstairs and jokingly grabbed onto the blanket. The inevitable happened and that led to them standing on the landing of the staircase competing against me in a tug of war. Of course they won and I was "pulled" down half a dozen stairs or so to where they were. They laughed so hard. They laughed just as hard every time I did it. For fifteen minutes they pulled me down the stairs and laughed as I crashed in front of them. I imagine when my wife reads this she's going to want to have a little talk with me.

To speed things up I'll just give my rebuttal here. "I know we keep telling them not to play on the stairs because it's dangerous but in my defense it was very, very funny." Check and mate.

The stair game was just one in a long line of times I've fallen down or pretended to hurt myself in order to make them laugh. That backfired today though. The little one was walking around in the kitchen with a ceramic onion soup bowl. It had been on the floor with water in it for the dog because his normal dish was in the dishwasher. Of course, she dumped the water on the floor so I cleaned it up with a towel. That's when she dropped the bowl. She dropped it right on my pinkie toe, pointy little handle first. I immediately drop to the ground. As my now purple toe throbs and swells the kids are beside themselves laughing. They're on the verge of wetting themselves and my wife is laughing just as hard as they are. I expect it from the kids but her too? Eventually, she regained her composure and tried to tell them I was actually hurt. And what does the older one say?

"If he moved he wouldn't have gotten hurt." Traitor.

So now I'm the Dad who cried wolf. I can't get hurt or fall down without everyone immediately thinking it's a joke. Can't say I'm that bothered by it though. It's always great to hear them laugh. I figure we're all going to have our bodies break down as we get older so an injury here and there in exchange for some laughter is worth it. And hopefully when they're older they'll remember me being able to take a fall or dive down some stairs. Instead of as the fat bald middle aged guy who embarrasses them every time I pick them up from high school in my slippers and a robe full of holes. Yeah, their teen years will be very special.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Why Didn't We Think Of That Sooner?

Have you ever done something that worked out great and then wondered why the hell didn't we do it like that before? No, I'm not talking about that you sick bastards. Honestly, what's wrong with you? I ask a simple question and your mind goes straight to the gutter. Anyways, what was I saying? Oh yeah, here's a tip that might spice up your sex life. Just kidding.

So from time to time mealtime can prove challenging. When I say from time to time I mean the times we eat. My kids aren't really picky eaters, as I've said. The problem comes from the older one deciding she'd rather play than eat. An issue further complicated by the fact the little one takes her cues from her big sister. It leads to the negotiating that parents have had to resort to throughout the ages. "Eat four more bites and then you can play. Ok, that doesn't count as a bite. I'm talking about four normal bites. Fine, eat those potatoes and then you can play." Can't help but think that's the one upside of famine. Can't imagine parents have to fight that battle when starvation is a major issue. Guess I'm just the sort of person who sees the silver lining in every cloud.

Anyways, we were having supper tonight. The kids and I baked a cake today so that was sitting on the counter. A big chocolate bribe I gladly used as incentive to get the older one to eat her supper. That worked for a few bites and then it became negotiation time. She told us that she wanted to save room for cake. I was figuring out in my head how much chicken and potato she'd have to eat before I felt like I'd done some decent parenting. I was about to reach for the Canada food guide when my wife had a stroke of genius. "You know the more supper you eat, the more dessert you can have." Brilliant. Much better than when I told her it didn't matter how much supper she ate because the supper section of her stomach was separate from the dessert section.

"No, your supper doesn't go into that part of your stomach. That part is just for dessert. What do you mean you don't believe me? You're three, you're supposed to take my words of wisdom at face value. Fine, I'll go on wikipedia right now and prove it to you."

It's really not fun having a toddler call you on your BS. Thanks to my wife's quick thinking I didn't have to go through that, again. Our little girl went to town on her supper and then made short work of her cake before going off to play. That left the two of us there wondering why it took us so long to think of that. I assume it's the way inventors feel when they finally get it right. "Platinum filament, what the hell was I thinking? What a dumbass I was." It just goes to show that a little luck and improvisation are the cornerstones of adequate parenting. The problem I see arising later is she's going to clue into our little trick. I just wonder how long before she's going to want us to quantify the correlation between how much supper she eats and her dessert size. I figure I'll just stick an old tire gauge against her stomach to measure it's fullness and then consult a periodic table to come up with the answer. I figure if it looks scientific enough she'll believe me. Either that or I'll just pick up the phone and call the "dessert fairy".

Monday, September 8, 2008

I Fixed The Keyboard

That's right, I fixed the keyboard. I poked around a bit in the back and noticed that the flux capacitor was impinging on the labrum. A little counter clockwise rotation of the tubular joint arm and it was good as new. Fine, what really happened was the power went out for like three seconds and when it came back on everything was working fine. I have no idea what caused it or how that brief power outage fixed it. Personally, I think Scientology was the cause of it all. Friggin' Xenu using thetans to keep me from reaching the bridge to total freedom. All that crap I was saying doesn't sound so stupid anymore eh?

Anyways, let's see what's happened in the past week. That hurricane came and went. My parents evacuated, to a bed and breakfast in Mississippi. Who evacuates to a bed and breakfast? Apparently, they believe you can't spell evacuation without vacation. Wonder if that would work for us. A little natural disaster in exchange for a night away sounds like a fair deal to me. I say one night because that's how long their evacucation lasted. They went home the next day to find their neighbourhood pretty much undamaged. So that was one crisis averted.

The other big cloud hanging over our heads last week was the beginning of the school year. My wife couldn't come up with any way of avoiding going back to work so she had to just bite the bullet. I'd like to say she got a nice restful night's sleep the night before but I can't. In the middle of the night our youngest fell out of our bed. The laundry left on the floor provided a safe landing area so she wasn't hurt, just startled. My wife said she woke up to find the little one crying and just sort of walking in circles. I was in the basement watching TV at the time and heard the commotion on the baby monitor. I started tearassing (screw you spell check; if I say it's a word then it's a word) up the stairs. I got the top of the stairs when I misstepped. My foot slipped off the stair and onto the one below causing me to go over on my ankle a bit. So there's the baby walking in circles as she comes to grips with her confusion about why she's suddenly on the floor, my wife sitting up in bed trying to figure out why she's being denied the sleep she so desperately needs, and me on the floor trying to determine if I've actually hurt myself or not. Then just to add to the fun, that's when the oldest starts calling out from her room that she needs us. If I'd been in my wife's shoes I think that's when I would have called in sick to work. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure this isn't a good sign so I'm not coming in today. I haven't checked the union contract but I'm pretty sure we're granted a couple bad omen days each year."

She didn't stay home though. She went to work. Sick, tired, and tethered to a pump full of meds but she made it through the week. A four day week but it still counts. It's got to be wearing her out but she's holding up pretty well. Or she's hiding it well. If it was me I'd be super tired, pissed off all the time, and constantly on the verge of a profanity infused blow up that would make a bout of tourrette's look like a church sermon. But that's me. She hasn't gone that route yet but who knows what the future holds. Guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Experiencing Technical Difficulties

I noticed I haven't put anything up here in about a week. Just wanted to let you know it's not because I'm lazy. Ok, it's not just because I'm lazy. The big obstacle right now is that our keyboard isn't working. Tried plugging in multiple keyboards into any port they'll fit into and nothing. So if you've got any ideas feel free to send them my way. The only way I'm able to get this up is to do it at work. If this stupid spacebar doesn't keep sticking then this keyboard is going to be broken too. Good thing nobody else is around or they'd easily realise I'm not doing anything work related. That's just between us so be cool about it ok?

I have to give credit to my wife though. She was smart enough to email herself a bunch of useful words from work. Mostly usernames and passwords for stuff like the web banking and what not. Heaven forbid we should have to go to an actual bank like in the olden days. I told her that writing on the screen with a marker would work just fine. I was pretty sure I saw something about that on one of those Tech TV shows one time. She doubted me. Started using made up words like touchscreen and stylus, whatever the hell that means. So for now I'll do it her way. Keep checking from time to time and hopefully we'll get this fixed sooner rather than later.