I don’t know what was worse this week … the threat of a category 3 hurricane remodeling the house … or my daughter going off to kindergarten. Which is exactly what she’s doing this week. Just like all the other little ones across the county. Done with pre-school, and now graduated into the big leagues. Elementary school. ELEMENTARY school. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL!!!
Believing in Grandmom Evie
“Believe in her, dad. Believe in Grandma Evie.” My daughter — just 5 years old — was pleading with me. Sounded like a line from a bad baseball movie. It was 86+ degrees in my mother’s house. After a rainstorm. A temperature she would dispute using complex physics and something about the silver in the China cabinet causing things to heat up by the thermostat. “That thing isn’t right,” she said. I had been complaining about how hot it was inside. Had walked over to the digital thermostat to read it. To prove that it was hot. Which would explain the sweat on my kid’s brow and why she was fanning herself. My mother doesn’t use her air conditioning. Thinks it’s a scourge. Calls once a quarter to tell me that I need to get used to life without it myself. Because the economy is crap, the energy is in crisis and soon we’ll all be AC-less. Her words not mine. She’s been saying it my whole life.
Gnarly credit card strips and no more swiping
I love a news headline that will brighten a day. That will put a spring in my step. That will make me leap with joy for the little things — the teensy, weensy things. The ones that make life worth living, as ridiculous or silly as they might seem. Like when I read that magnetic strips on credit cards are going away. JOYYYYY! To be replaced with embedded microchips. Visa is moving in that direction. The reason? Security, of course. But I could give a rotted melon about that. Nor the time saved or the convenience. For me, the reason to switch — the ONLY reason — is quite simply this: no more embarrassment.
Dreaming of summer camp … for adults
I am thrilled the debt ceiling fight is finally over. Now the country can move on to bigger issues. Like summer camp for all adults. Congress, you want to get behind something every American can support? Then make it a requirement — shoot, maybe even a law! — that all of us big kids get to go to summer camp again. Talk about non-partisan. Something that will bring the country together.
Toaster texting madness
Hahahahaha … wait a minute … seriously? Someone really — REALLY! — hooked up his toaster to Facebook? Set it up so it can tell him (and I guess all his friends) when his toast is ready? Because the little bell that goes “ding” wasn’t high tech enough? I read it in the Wall Street Journal. An article titled, “Now, even granny’s fuzzy slippers are texting you.”
Failing the worm test. Now on to a house with chickens
So we did the test. The worm test. Vermicomposting worms. The kind that eat table scraps and leftover vegetable bits and human flesh. (No, I’m making that last part up.) My wife said: “If we can keep worms alive then it will be a great test for how we’ll do with chickens.” Chickens have been her dream for years. Laying hens. Big, fluffy fowl that you wear on your shoulder like a parrot. Who guard your house while furnishing you with eggs. Who bring love and joy and eat everything in your yard, down to the bricks, which they would also eat if only they had sledgehammers.
Playing hero to a daughter … if only briefly
A hero for five minutes. But what a five minutes it was. All thanks to Elmer the Elephant. Or I should say finding Elmer. Which I did. And which made me a hero. Even if for only five short ones. I’ll take it. It had been bedlam that morning. Mother and child hurrying about the house, trying to find something. Heck if I knew what. All I knew is it looked like there had been an avalanche of stuffed animals in my daughter’s closet, and there may or may not have been one of my family members trapped below them.
As my arteries slowly weep …
I can feel it. Creeping up my sides. Slithering through my veins. In my belt, oh yes, definitely there. How my pants don’t snap the same way anymore. There’s less give. A bit more snugness. And I feel heavy. And slow. And lethargic. When I sweat I smell barbecue sauce. Thank you Fourth of July. Thank you for my grilled meat overdose. I awoke Monday to a meat hangover. A coworker asked if I had the meat sweats.
A new knee and playing nurse for dear old dad
It’s a strange and wonderful thing, helping a parent recover from surgery. “Wonderful” because you’re returning the favor after all those years he or she raised you. Wiping your bottom. Cutting up your steak. Listening to doctors’ instructions, and remembering when you’re supposed to take medicine. Not even trying to duck when you threw up. “Strange” because now it’s you asking things like: “So … uh … you don’t actually need help going to the bathroom, right?” Because I’m sure as heck not wiping any bottoms! Pop got a ride home from the hospital and I’m calling it even.
Coming to terms with a silent, dog-less house
It’s a quiet house. An empty house. You don’t hear the rat-a-tat-tat of toenails on the hardwood floors. Or feel hot breath on your kneecaps at dinner. There’s no need for spastic, acrobatic leaps when you turn around at the fridge, realizing an instant too late there’s a dog sitting at your feet. She would scramble out of the way when she saw I was about to topple on her.