Moving

I am excited. Lauren and the boys are excited and I think my parent's are absolutely thrilled (they have been incredible and awesome putting up with my family the past 5 months) with the fact that Lauren and I bought a house. We make settlement on Friday (9-28).

With the new house comes paint and work and moving and unpacking and work and work. I will be MIA for a bit. I may try to post some before and after pictures throughout the week but that all depends on whether we actually can achieve any "after" type look we want to. I also told Maxfield that he can help me paint his room so there may be a bunch of before and after and after and after pictures of his room.

While I am away please visit these other blogs and tell them I sent you.

The first blog is one that my friend in real life, Dave, started. He was recently diganosed with cancer and he is using a blog to journal his treatments and thoughts and what not.

His blog is Heal Cole.

It is not depressing or sad or a downer type of cancer blog. It is a straight shot, up front account of his situation and the importance that family and friends play in the healing process. He only has a few posts, so read it from the beginning to get a sense of what it is about. I am a firm believer in "Laughter is the best medicine" so leave him a comment and make him laugh.

Here are some others to visit.

Childs Play X2

Flailing My Arms

Truths and Half Truths

Cheeky's Hideaway


She Looks Like Me


Sweet Juniper

Egel Nest

Bossy


I will be back in a about a week.

Flirting

I love hitting on my wife. I really do. Sometimes the flirting is a genuine, “I think you are beautiful.” Or something along those lines. But most of the times the pass or come on line is usually an immature verbal “boob-grab-honk-honk” type of compliment like “You are so hot.” Or “You are sexy.”

And like most guys, my flirting, and yes it is flirting, sometimes is just turning a normal conversation turned into something along the lines of a wink-wink-nudge-nudge.

Lauren’s cell phone is broken. It only works when it is in speakerphone mode. Meaning that anyone around Lauren can hear what is being said on the line. It took me a couple of conversations to remember that I am on speakerphone when talking to her.

She calls me.

“Hey Bill. I am at my mom’s and she is going to watch the kids while I run to the store to get dinner.”

“What are you going to get?”

“I need to pick up some spices for a recipe I am trying.”

“I got some spice for you.”

“Bill.”

“Yes.”

“You’re on speaker phone.”

That is how the conversations went. Now that I know her cell only works on speakerphone I use it my advantage.

“Hey Bill. I am at Jessica’s and I need you to do me a favor.”

“Am I on speaker phone?”

“Yes.”

“What kind of favor do you need? Bow Chicka bow wow.”

“Bill. Knock it off.”

I now use the phrase “Am I on speakerphone?” very much like Michael from the show The Office uses “That’s what she said.” It may be starting to get a little old with Lauren.

She called me the other day.

“Hey Bill. My Mom and I and the kids just left the park and we are going back to her house for dessert. Can you stop and pick up some Cool Whip?”

“Am I on speakerphone?”

“Goodbye.” –Click.

She didn’t even wait to see if I could pick some up.

Pre School

Maxfield started preschool this week. He is quite proud of the fact that he gets to go to school. Lauren and I are very happy that the school accepted him.

Last week Lauren brought Max to the school for an intereview. Lauren was interviewing them and they were interviewing Lauren. During the interview Max played in the corner. The teacher at the school asked all types of questions and wanted to make sure that Max was potty trained, had all his shots etc. etc. Lauren gave her Max's medical records and told the teacher that Max is potty trained but has the occasional accident. Everything looked good and Lauren signed him up for class.

When Lauren went to get Max so they could go home, with the teacher next to her, she realized that Max had pooped his pants. How did she notice this? The poop fell out of his pants and was sitting on the floor next to him.

They still accepted him. I guess the teacher thought it was like a student leaving an apple for her.

Brushing

It appears that my morning exercise and diet plan are not working as observed by my 3 year old.

The other day I was getting dressed in the bathroom when Maxfield and Wyatt came in to get their toothbrushes. I applied the paste to their brushes, handed them over to the kids and they disappeared into Max’s room. I started brushing my own teeth when I realized it was too quiet in the other room. I continued brushing my teeth as I walked down the hallway to Max’s room.

I was only wearing a pair of shorts and I was brushing my teeth vigorously as I entered the room. Max looked up at me, stared at my belly for a second, took his toothbrush out of his mouth and he motioned towards my stomach and chest and said, “Look Daddy. You are making that all wiggly.”

Shopping with Mom

Yesterday I had the pleasure of food shopping with my mom. The last time I was at a super market with my mom I was probably twelve and I am sure my brother Lawnwhisperer was with me, and most likely we were sent to the car midway through the shopping trip with the instructions of "I have never been so embarrased in my life. I want you to sit in the car and DO NOT touch anything and I swear when we get home I am going to..."

Being that I never made it to the check out aisle in a grocery store with my mom present, she was never able to teach me a lesson about the cashiers that work the registers. Yesterday she taught me, what she considered, a life lesson.

As I squeezed the cart between the candy rack and the Magazine rack, where all the magazines talked about Britney and OJ and Angelina etc., my mom looked up to see that a guy, a boy, a young man really, was working the lane and she made a face.

"What?" I asked.

"You never pick a lane where a guy is working. They are slow. Women are much faster at the grocery store."

"What? That's not true."

"Bill, trust me. Men are so much slower with this type of stuff."

"Well that's sexist." I said.

We watched the guy working the scanner and register and he was barely bagging the groceries for the woman in front of us. For this particular incident, my mom had a point.

Whe we got home I told Lauren what my mom said about men working in the grocery store. My mom then said, "I have many years of experience, in the supermarket male workers are always slower than the females."


What do you think? In your experience are men or women slower at working the cash register?

Don't get me.

The phone rings at my parent's house, I can see from the caller ID that it is some type of telemarketer.

"Hello." I answer.

The guy on the other end says, "Yes. Hello. Is Barbara available?"

"I am sorry sir." I said. "But Barbara is married and has been for over forty years. So no she is not available and I do not think my dad would appreciate you calling here trying to hit on her like that."

Crickets on the other end.

Learning to Drive

I was only 16 years old for a few days when I went to get my learners permit. Once I had the little yellow card that legally allowed me behind the wheel of a car all I wanted to do was drive. There were no hours-in-training requirements to get a bonafide driver license. I only had to pass the official drivers test and I needed the practice. The restrictions on a permit were that I had to have a licensed driver over the age of 18 in the car with me while I learned behind the wheel.

Most of my siblings that were of the legal teaching age were either off to school or were too busy to teach me. My Godmother’s husband, Uncle Brian, took me out a few times but after I ran the stop sign at the bottom of Hoffman and Karen lanes I don’t think his heart could take it anymore.

The only other alternative to get some driving time was with my dad. The only problem with that was his car. I wanted to learn how to drive in a car that was close, in size and handling, to the type of car I would eventually use take my drivers test. My dad’s car was an old “cargo” van.

The old van was a beat up blue Ford with no windows on the side and no seats in the back. I think at one point it was used for a carpet business. The back of the van had a wooden bench bolted to the driver’s side wall, which is where we kids sat going to and from different places. Actually there was only one legitimate seat in the van and that was the driver’s seat. The front passenger seat was the spare tire. On top of that tire was a seat from a different van that was not mounted or fastened to anything. It was just placed on top of the tire so my mom had a place to sit. Whenever the van made a hard turn the seat would lean and slide in the opposite direction.

With no one to teach me I had to ask my father. I needed his approval to get my license anyway so maybe it would work out okay. He drove me out early on a Sunday morning, to the Jefferson Ward parking lot. On the way there, as I bounced back and forth on the passenger seat tire contraption, he explained that the parking lot would be empty and it would be a great place to drive We made a quick stop at the 7-11 to get a cup of coffee and a newspaper.

He pulled into the expansive empty lot and we got out of the van. He tossed me the keys and I jumped into the drivers seat and he climbed into the loose passenger seat. Before I could start the engine he talked about driving responsible and what not. He also wanted to go over some ground rules.

My dad pointed to some trees. “That is a stop sign.” He said. “That trash can is another stop sign. The speed limit on this side of the lot is 25 and on the other side is 35.”

I nodded.

“I want you follow all the painted lines. If you miss a stop sign you fail. If you go too fast or too slow you fail and we will come back again each week until you get it right.”

“Okay.” I said as I started the engine. “Ready?”

“Yes.” He said as he took off the lid of his coffee cup. “And one more thing. I want to be able to drink my coffee and read the paper. If I spill my coffee or I can’t focus on the paper because I am bouncing around, you fail and we will have to come back until you get it right.”

I looked at the passenger seat sitting on top of the tire and knew I would be coming back many more times. My dad is a very patient man. He took me back at least four times.

Caption this.

Blanket

Recently, I started to make the beds in the morning. Making the bed is one of those pain in the ass chores that just does not make sense to me. I mean, why make it in the morning, you’re just going to sleep in it that night anyway right? Fix it right before you get into bed. Anyway, I am just trying to help Lauren out.

But I am somewhat confused by Maxfield’s blankets. His blanket has the image of Thomas the Tank Engine on it. I have noticed that when Lauren makes up his bed she places the cover so the image is viewable from the foot of the bed. It looks nice and presentable to anyone entering the room.

I, however, think that the blanket should be placed so that it is viewable from the head of the bead. Meaning that if Max is in bed, with his head on the pillow he can look down and see Thomas staring back up at him. The way Lauren fixes it, when Max looks down, Thomas is upside down.

The way I see it, Thomas is on the blanket for Max, so he should have the best angle.

How would you make it?

Gross

My sister Sharon was over the other day. She stepped outside onto my parent’s front step to catch a smoke. When she returned, she stood in the family room and chatted for a few moments. She turned towards the couch, lifting a blanket to make room for her to sit down when she let out a screech.

“Ahhh. Oh my god, Oh my God.” She yelled.

“What is it?” My mom asked.

“Get it off. Get it off.” Sharon said. She turned her leg towards me and begged. “Bill get it off me.”

I looked at her lower leg and slightly skeeved out. “In a minute.” I said. “I want to take a picture first.”

“What?” She screamed.

“I need a picture for the blog.”

I retrieved my camera from the other room. I took a few pictures. And then I removed the thing from her leg.

Apparently these things live out by my parent’s garden. It must have climbed onto my sisters shoe and up her leg while she was outside.

Sometimes God smiles upon me

Really, God must like me because the fine people over at Doritos now have two (count em TWO) different flavored chips in ONE bag. And they came out with this fine product right at the beginning of football season.

And since God knows that I am watching my Cholesterol, he made sure the nutrition label looks like this.

Do you see that? Zero Cholesterol.*

The only thing that God and the fine people at Doritos could do to beat this, would be to come out with Chocolate and Bacon flavored chips. **

*-Yes I know that there is some cockamamy formula that fat and saturated fat magically turn into Cholesterol, but I am not buying it.

**- What? I know you have thought of this flavor combination too.

Author

I enjoy reading. My tastes vary and I read a little bit of everything but I usually stick to just a few authors. Waiting for one of these author’s new books sometimes puts me in spot of having nothing new to read. I may try a recommended book or author (for instance MRTL suggested Carl Hiaasen and now I have a new author on my list) and sometimes I discover a new author all on my own.

My latest discovery is Brad Meltzer. I discovered Meltzer because I found the cover of his last book, The Book of Fate, interesting. I Googled him and found his website. He is a best selling author of suspense/thriller books that are set in the world of government. Not politics, but government. I am fascinated by the way government works (or does not work) and I also saw that he was writing some comic books. While surfing his website I found that he also had a blog. I read few entries, and as bloggers do, I left a comment on one his posts. He sent me email in reply to my comment.

I figured, here is a guy who writes thriller/mystery/suspense books which revolve around various areas of government, writes comic books and has a blog AND he replied to a comment I made, I had to check out his work. I started with his book Zero Game and I loved it. I told my wife, Lauren, about the book and about his email to me, and how I wanted to buy the rest of his books. Lauren started teasing me claiming I had a Man-Crush on Brad Meltzer.

This summer I have read five out of six of his books. I also received another personal email from Brad regarding something or other from his blog. I loved the fact that a best selling author was so accessible.

His last book I read, The First Counsel, I bought at Barnes and Noble. I read it over the next two weeks and I was nearing the end of the book. I only had a few chapters left to go and I purposely set some time aside so I could finish. I sat outside on the front porch and started to finish the book. I was on the second to the last chapter and things were starting to come together when I turned the page (page 497 to be exact) and noticed that page 498 was blank. Page 499 was printed but page 500 was blank. There were about 10 pages total at the end of the book that were blank. I was pissed. I could not finish the book.

I took the spine creased, dog-eared, coffee-stained book back to the store and I asked for a replacement. The manager told me he could not take the book back in the condition that it was in. He needed a reason to replace the book. I showed him the blank pages. He still refused.

“Look,” I said “How was I supposed to know that the pages were blank when I bought it. The book is tattered because I was reading it the way it is supposed to be read, from the beginning to the end. If the pages in the beginning of the book were blank I would have returned it in better condition.”

The manager was still not sure if he could replace the book. I was frustrated and I said, “Fine. If you can’t replace it I will just email Brad Meltzer and ask him for the missing pages.”

The manager gave me a look. The look that he gave me as he rolled his eyes said You, Sir, are the biggest dork I have ever encountered, sheesh emailing the author….

He then exchanged the book for me.

I told Lauren about the exchange with the bookstore manager and she concurred with his Look.

Snack