11/30/07

Black Friday

Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. The biggest shopping day of the year. There is no politeness. There is no niceties. It is a brutal, up at 3 am, slug the soccer mom by 5, give me the tickle me Elmo god damit kind of day.

“No! Don’t go!” you scream. “Think of your children! For the love of god man, think of your children!”

I’m not listening.

“They’re monsters!” you further utter. “They’ll make you apply for the department store credit card for 10% savings!”

You are a coward, I scoff at you.

“At least leave you two children with Hossmom!” This is your last piece of advice. “They’ll never retain their sanity!”

I can’t leave them with Hossmom. Because today they are my army. What you may see as insanity driven bargain shoppers, the kind that get up at 4 am on Saturdays for garage sales so they can buy other peoples junk, I see as glory waiting to be claimed. And I ride with Little Hoss.

We do not go unprepared to Old Navy. Our double stroller, henceforth known as the Vehicle of Ankle Death, is not an ordinary stroller. It’s not ordinary because I have drawn flames on my lime green Vehicle of Ankle Death. I used Hossmom’s nail polish, blood red to match the carnage that we are about to waste. If I could have chromed it out I would have. I go to my workshop and attempt to fashion a cow catcher but Hossmom stops me. You know the kind, the kind on all the old trains that would slaughter any wandering cow. In my case, I was going to use it for psychotic middle aged women. They should all thank Hossmom.

We are off to get a pair of gloves and a hat for Little Hoss. It’s gotten cold and she needs it and she will not be denied. I load up Little Hoss’s wingman, Bubba Hoss, and we set sail for Old Navy. The earth groans at our departure.

We arrive and it is crowded. It is carnage. It is victory waiting to be snatched by those with the guts to do so. We load up in the Vehicle of Ankle Death.

We do not come unprepared. Remember this.

“Mush!” my daughter says because that is what I have taught her to say this morning. We are in sync, we are of one mind.

“Mush!” I reply, proud of Little Hoss’s desire for destruction and submission.

We don’t even bother opening the doors with our hands and we use the Vehicle of Ankle Death as a battering ram as we storm the store. The doors fling open. Somewhere I hear a young Swedish chick gasp. We have arrived.

We stop at the beginning of the aisle. We see our goal at the end. The aisle is the 9th circle of hell, full of those that have betrayed the worst. They have betrayed sleep and common sense. They have betrayed courtesy and manners. They have betrayed themselves. But we will remind them.

The aisle is almost unnegotiatable. Thousands stand in the way. They are looking at racks but failing to make any room for anyone that wishes to pass. For some reason, people on this day lose all sense of decency, I have no idea why. But at least they are shopping which is more than I can say for the couple that has decided to argue in the middle of the aisle. You would think they would have some tact and at least take this to the side, but they don’t because they are madness, madness in this world and on this day.

Again, we are prepared.

“Now” I tell Little Hoss in my calm and commanding voice.

Immediately she unleashes her fury.

“Beep Beep!” she yells. This is the second special words that I have taught her this morning. “Beep Beep! Beep Beep! Beep Beep!”

I have given the people a chance at redemption. It is of no concern of mine if they choose to ignore it. The Vehicle of Ankle Death does not slow down, it’s flames burning on the side from the speed of our movements. We split the couple who are startled at Little Hoss’s warnings. We catch his shin but do not bother to look back. I smelled blood from his brand new leg wound. Others should take heed.

We hack down grandmothers, we scare old guys with bad hearts, soccer moms dive into the nearest sales rack to escape our wrath. I love the smell of napalm in the morning. A few running kids collide with the side of the Vehicle of Ankle Death. I help them up because I am not heartless. Then Bubba Hoss pukes on them because he believes that all should feel our justice, there will be no exceptions.

We reach the gloves and hats. We try them on. Little Hoss is still yelling Beep Beep and I am still proud. To the check out stand we go, Little Hoss and the Vehicle clearing the way. The check out girl charges me 8 bucks as I hear her heart flutter in her chest. A dad out alone on Black Friday with his 2 kids under the age of 2 makes any woman melt. I wink and she sucks in the air like she is trying to fill her soul with my presence. Here baby, take my card, I write a blog.

We again use the Vehicle as a battering ram as we leave the store. I glance back and see that in our wake the carnage still continues although with a few less unfortunate souls. We are back in the house within 45 minutes of leaving.

Hossmom is impressed and shocked. She likes the hat and she likes the gloves but truly they are of no concern to Little Hoss, Bubba Hoss and I. We have our victory and it smells of fleece.

11/29/07

Xbox Eulogy

Dear friends, thank you all for coming today.

Yesterday, as some of you may have heard, my Xbox 360 died quite suddenly. It suffered from the mythical Ring of Death that so many Xbox owners are familiar with. Unfortunately, there was no way to diagnosis this problem as there were no symptoms. As a result, my Xbox 360 passed away yesterday at 8:30 am. I am devastated as you can imagine.

The Xbox was always a good and loyal friend. He never judged and was always there with an open controller and an online game. He understood that sometimes a man needs a chance to distribute virtual justice to the legions of those that wished to doom me. He understood a chainsaw to the face was much better than any therapy.

The Xbox always understood that an hour without complaint is what every man wishes for. He understood that in that hour you could transcend normal work life and become an agent for justice as you let fly a grenade at your enemies. He understood that escapes in life are rare and he provided that rarity.


My Xbox will be remembered for the marathon sessions that we had together. He will be remembered the night we played until 4 am when all the kids were asleep. In that night we attained new heights as we waylaid the 14 year old bastard that had the smart mouth. In that night we put down destruction vs. the 20 year old gorked out of his head college student. And in that night, we became more than just a man and his video game machine.

We became a scourge on the multiplayer/online world. We became a name to be respected as Namssoh unleashed hell. Gears of War, Call of Duty, Halo—they were just the vehicles for our greatness, our shared glory.

And finally, he will be remembered for our last online adventure together. We had just gotten the new Call of Duty 4 game and we were finally getting to a point where we were not just cannon fodder for the kids with the greater reflexes and unlimited practice time. We entered the game and we were quickly promoted to Major General, which is a rank benefiting my greatness.

Oh the devastation that we caused! We quickly went from the hunted to the hunter as we stalked out latest victim. We used a ruse, a common tactic of feeding the enemy false information on our location. When that enemy came, we were behind him. And yes my friends! Yes! We distributed a version of vengeance not seen since biblical days. We destroyed our enemy and then took his gun. And we used this gun to further lay a siege upon all those that challenged us.

So to you my good friend, we say goodbye. Because after calling Microsoft we have learned that there is no easy fix for you. But as you are more than a man, and are a machine, perhaps all is not lost. We will send you in for repairs and you will once again be in our sweet embrace in 4 to 6 weeks.

Until that time, we will keep you in our thoughts and our prayers.

Let us now have a moment of silence to honor my Xbox.

11/26/07

The Ambush

I had my son sitting on one leg. I had my daughter sitting on the other because she has determined that every time I hold my newborn son she must be right there in the thick of the action.

It was bliss, a moment straight out of the goodness of the Waltons or Leave it to Beaver. I was the proper picture of the perfect father. I had both children calmly playing on my lap.

And then both kids farted on me.

At the same time, in unison. It was like it was some prearranged attack plan. It was the Pearl Harbor of the kid fart attack.

I have pretty much had to suffer many things as a father. Some I expected and some I didn’t. I knew that I would have to watch my kids come out in a bloody mess of goo when born and I took it in stride. I knew that I would never get any sleep and I took that in stride. I even knew that they would suck money out of me like a Vegas slot machine and I still rolled with the punches.

But no one ever told me that both my kids would think it was so funny to gas bomb dad. This is in no book I had ever read. There is no pamphlet at the pediatricians office explaining this eventually. There is not even a PBS public service announcement. That’s why I never donate to them, because they never get to the hard core topics like a 2 month old and a 20 month old laying down on pop.

My daughter, who’s vocab consists of Touchdown and Offsides, started to laughing as she said “Poop”, one of the few non football related words she knows unless you are talking about Notre Dame Football this season. Then I looked at my son and I swear to god that little chump smiled. He knew exactly what was going on.

I have no doubt that Little Hoss put him up to this. I know that she is the mastermind because she was not allowed to come into the kitchen when I was cooking. She threw a temper tantrum which I ignored which makes her even more mad. She has the temper of my wife. Hossmom will deny this but it’s true. Even the “upset” look is the same with the eyebrows coming down. I get it pretty constantly when I won’t give either of them shoes.

And now my son has been recruited into this diabolical revenge plan. But I honestly can’t say that I’m surprised because Little Hoss can be very manipulative and aggressive when she doesn’t get her way. Ok, let me back up, that’s a complete dad statement. I understand that as Dad I will forgive my daughter a lot and sugar coat things. So let me re-state it. Little Hoss screams her head off and then starts taking swings at people when she doesn’t get her way. She has a pretty good right hook, I’ll give her that.

I looked at both of my children and their smiling and laughing. I asked them it perhaps they want to rethink this farting terrorism on dear old dad. I mean, after all, I’m a 32 year old guy and this is not an arena that you really want to get into with me. I mean come on, one Mexican dinner night and I will have you begging for mercy. I have trained in the trenches of locker rooms and my mentor was my older brother who, like all older brothers, had farting on people down to an absolute science.

My daughter then bowed her head as she came in for a hug and said “I wuv oooo”.

See, I told you. Manipulative.

11/20/07

The Racoon and the Pack

The doorman at the bar just shook her head when I pulled out my ID. She smiled and let me in. It would appear that there was no reason to check to see if I was under the age of 21.

I know the law about this in the State of Texas. If you appear within 10 years of 21 they are supposed to check your ID. Now granted, it has been a pretty long time since I have been to a bar but I had no idea that I now officially look “old”. Hey, here’s an idea, let me lay down and spread my legs so that you can stomp on my nuts to.

But maybe it’s because we went to a college bar and I was about the only one there not wearing torn jeans and a ragged out cap. I remember these days. You spend a good 2 hours trying to dress like you don’t care. How do I look laid back enough to get the women to be laid back for me?

The last time Hossmom and I went to a bar was a year ago. It’s so sad, really. I used to like bars. Not clubs but bars where you could drink and talk to your friends. But as I have been stamped “old” by this crowd I don’t think that I would have the same experience.

First, I wasn’t drinking. Do you have any idea how bad it sucks to be in a bar and not drink? I tell you what, you don’t go for the atmosphere. I mean, hey, I enjoy smokey rooms and vomit stink as much as anyone else. And as this was a college bar it was on the lower end of veneral diseaseville. I do remember these bars: cheap drinks and cheap women, that’s all I was looking for when I was 21. This bar is not different.

I wasn’t drinking because Hossmom and I made a deal when she became pregnant. For the next year of our life Hossmom would be the designated driver and I could drink my ass off where ever we went. When I made this deal it sounded great because I am instant gratification man. I get to drink and never have to worry about driving, how great is that. It’s great until Hossmom calls in to collect.

And tonight she was collecting. She was having her first cocktails in over a year. That meant I had to drive which meant that I had to stay sober because I have a family and I don’t trust my mother in law to raise them without me in the picture because who would teach them how to be hoss? No one would, that’s who. They would be taught to eat green peppers and enjoy Oprah. So as you can see, I have a higher calling—namely being the only one in my family that can teach my daughter all the signs in a football game. We’ve got three down.

But at least Hossmom is a cheap date. She has no tolerance after a year of not drinking so after 2 drinks she was pretty much done for the night.

What I really wanted to do in the bar was to watch my college football game. That was my redeaming moment. That and friends of course but I only say that because I know that many of them read this blog.

I went to Texas Tech University and tonight we were playing Oklahoma. Not to sound like a bad fan here, but I was shocked that we were actually in the game and had a good chance to win. Please god, let this happen tonight. Please let there be touchdowns and field storming so I can have something meaningful in my life tonight. Again, no drinking in a bar sucks ass.

We find our seats in the bar and I get a pretty decent seat where I can see the TV screen. There are conversations going on around me but to be honest with you, I have no idea what they were about. I’m a better listener when I’m drinking to.

The place is not to packed but is busy with college students sipping on their Zima and Keystone. Many are laughing and walking around, probably talking about old professor Rogers and his murderous tests. Then the college students will get deeper into philosophy the drunker they get because everyone that age is smarter when they drink, I certainly was.

They wax poetic about things that they just now noticed about life and how the generation before them just doesn’t know man, they just don’t know. They envision themselves as high powered executives at the age of 24 and a hot secretary. This is before they have discovered the greatness of mortgages and sexual harassment lawsuits. I will not be a dream killer tonight, let them have their future. Besides, the game is on.

The women are in packs which I very much remember from my college days. They spent hours getting their look just right before coming to a very dark and smokey bar where you are barely able to see the ebola covered peanuts infront of you. They have short skirts on and the boobs have seemed to bloomed like springtime.

I also remember that during this time in my life I would sit at my table and wait for any one of the members of these packs to have to bend over so I could get a free shot of the panty life. I quickly fall back into this role but added with the creepy older guy vibe as I have a good 10 years on just about everyone here. However, I am oddly comfortable with this new persona.

The packs of girls attract the single lone wolf man. I call them the lone wolf because I have no doubt that this is how they see themselves because this is how I saw myself. Now that I have some experience and am watching this ritual from my protected nature blind I can say that it more closely resembles not that of a lone wolf but of a raccoon sneaking up to a garbage can at night. He’s not sure if he can get in but if he can just work his little raccoon like charm he might be able to convince her that he is pitiful enough to give a morsel of table scrap to. Secretly, I root for him because I know how hard it is to do this.

I root for him for all of about 2 seconds when the pack and the raccoon decided to move their conversation right in front of my eye line for the TV. And there they make their little nest as the male of the species continues to determine if any of the pack like long walks on the beach, sensitive conversation and awkward sex with minimul drooling.
As is my nature when I walk into any bar, I took a mental assessment as soon as I sat down and decided that if a bar brawl broke out I would probably win. I don’t know why I do this but it is seeming like a better idea now that they are standing in front of my football game. It’s in the fourth quarter and Tech is still winning. This could be the biggest win and as a fan I want to be a part of it. I want to be able to say that I cheered them on and then talk about it for the rest of the year. But I can’t do that while the TV is blocked.

One of the friends that we went with is a District Attorney and I am trying to convince her to whip out her badge and start checking some I.D.s. I’m guessing that would clear this dive out pretty damn quick and allow me to watch my game as my wife finishes her second drink and is clearly at her limit.

But it would appear that she has ethics and said something about abuse of power. I make a mental note to hang out more with drug dealers in the future so that this will not be a problem again. My friend also went to Tech and is also watching the game. Lucky for me, she is resourceful and tells me there is a Better TV away from the pack and the raccoon.

We get there in time to see it end and my night is saved. I again secretly root for the raccoon and the pack to find the same happiness that I have sitting there with a slightly inebriated Hossmom, good friends and an upset win over a top 5 team. This is why I liked coming to bars in the first place. Sure, I’m not drinking but I make up for it because I went home to my daughter and woke her up at 2 am.

“Touchdown, baby” I say, a big smile on my face.

“Touchdown, daddy” she says and goes back to sleep. Life is good.

11/19/07

Spiders

I post the following story strictly because I know that it will freak out Hossmom. We live in Dallas and she hates spiders although hate may be to polite a word for how she truly feels about them.

"In August, entomologists found a spider web in a state park about 45 miles east of Dallas, covering trees, shrubs and the ground along a 200-yard stretch. The originally white web had turned brownish because "millions" of mosquitoes had been trapped in it. [Dallas Morning News-AP, 8-30-07]"

11/16/07

My Birthday

I have a Christmas birthday. You may think this sucks and you will want to pity me.

Good, you should because it does suck and I will gladly take your pity.

I mean, come on, how am I supposed to compete with Jesus. Sure, I think that I can be a pretty great guy most times but the last miracle that I performed was getting Little Hoss to cram one more green bean down her piehole. And it’s not like I just snapped my fingers to do that either, I had to work at my miracle. It was done with full on chants of “just one more, just one more, just one more” as I twirled the green bean in front of her mouth like a magic wand. I find it amazing that when it comes to dog food, that little trap of hers can open up and chomp down like a croc. But when it comes to dinner time it’s like she is reminding me that I have forgotten to get her a tetanus shot and this lock jaw is the result. Good times.

It’s hard to say if my birthday has always been overshadowed and I don’t want you to take this blog as me whining, even though I fully acknowledge that I am. I’m just trying to tell you where I’m coming from. As a kid my mom went to great lengths to celebrate my birthday. For my parties, we usually had them on Dec 1 so that the kids would come to my party. Otherwise no one would come during the Christmas breaks. I would just be that sad little kid with the cake and a hat and the mandatory present from my parents. Umm, pity, umm, soak it in buddy.

Around the age of 13 is when I realized that my birthday could no longer compete. I was no longer kid cute and slumber parties for teenage boys are usually a bad idea. Shit gets broken and someone somewhere is going to find some inappropriate porn. It got to the point that I made my own balloons for myself and woke up and sang my own song.

My mother has always tried though but even after a while you have to ask, What’s the point? Just give me my birthday presents with my Christmas presents and we’ll call it a day. Not only do I have a Christmas birthday but I have the unfortunate placing of having my birthday between Christmas and New Years. So as an adult I can’t even go out and get plastered because everyone knows that the good parties are just a couple of days away.

You would think that these moments would be enough to shape me and they were but they weren’t the worst. The worst is thanks to Evil Queen Kate, good bless her evil ways.

In college I still held onto the hope that my birthday was important and special and that at least someone outside of my mother would remember and make it special. I should also point out that my first couple of years of college I was a very pathetic duddard. I have no problem admitting that. I wasn’t a nerd, I wasn’t cool, women didn’t want me, men didn’t want me, the next door neighbors dog wouldn’t even want me. But on my birthday I held out the hope that maybe this year it would be great.
The evil queen promised it would be great and followed up by some sex. I love sex. It’s great. In fact, it’s fantastic and I couldn’t think of anything I would want more especially since the queen had been holding out on me. I didn’t know why but it would appear at the time that she was busy getting penicillin shots due to her midnight rendezvous with homeless people.

So over Christmas break I make sure that I have no plans on my birthday, which wasn’t hard for the stated reasons above. The queen said she would call, we’d go out and then rent a hotel room for freaky action. I’m in.

I get up and decide to start a tradition. On my birthday, I buy myself a present. This is not as pathetic as it sounds. Ok, it is but I still don’t care because I shop great for myself. I see a movie by myself to kill time and come home and wait for the call.

I wait, wait, wait, play some monopoly by myself, check the dog for fleas, eat some dinner and wait. I wait for something that never comes. She never calls. There were no messages. There were no “I’m sorry I missed you” on the answering machine. There wasn’t even a freaking card that came in the mail from her to say “sorry you are such a chump, have a coke.” Nothing.

I wasn’t furious because pathetic guys don’t get furious. We just wallow deeper in our crapulence. Hello my good friend, do you mind if I spend the night with you one more time as the evil queen does this yet again to us? This is what I had been reduced to. I even called her, very bad idea. 20 phone calls and no answers. Pathetic and creepy, is there any better combination??

The night ended with me getting extremely drunk which would basically continue for several months in which I failed a class called The Care and Management of Companion Animals. The final was an open book test and I still failed the class. It would appear not going to class was a very bad idea.

Christmas break is about over and I finally get a call from the evil queen. She wants me to ride back to college with her because she is afraid to go on road trips by herself.

I inquire as to why I have not heard from her and perhaps she would like to explain why on my birthday I was drinking gallons of scotch.

“Oh yea, I forgot about that. I went to a club with someone.”

Really I say. With who?

“A guy she met a couple of days ago.” “He’s in a show and asked me to come so I went.”

What kind of show?

“Well” she says “It was a show of drag queens and he’s in it.”

That thud that you may hear is the last shred of my dignity and confidence falling through the floor and being sucked in by the evil queen overlord of the 9th circle.

So just so I get this straight, I got stood up for a drag queen that she just met before coming home. Jesus, at least lie to me. Tell me something that wouldn’t make me not only question our relationship (ha!) but also my manhood. In one shrewd move she was able to castrate me and make me look like even more of a pathetic ass. Honestly, you gotta respect that kind of ingenuity. And to make it even better, being the doormat that I was, I still took her back to college. I pretty much decided that then and there that I would no longer count on anyone to celebrate my birthday with anyone else, ever. Fuck em.

And I did this for quite a while. But what I see now was that this was necessary for me to go through because it made me the spineless blob that Hossmom would one day find passed out in tighty whities on my dorm room bed. For some reason she thought that I had hit rock bottom enough that I could be rebuilt in her image, which she did. And it gets better because Hossmom has never forgotten my birthday, not once, and has always made a big deal out of it. It kinda makes you appreciate her even more.

On my birthdays now though I always count on one person to be there more than anyone else. Little Hoss hasn’t let me down yet and I doubt she ever will.

11/14/07

Moment #3: I am a Rock God

For moment #3, let’s again go back into my distant past.

Picture it: Senior in High school. I had hair and a letter jacket—hands down the best combo to picking up chicks that age short of being a misunderstood 21 year old rebel that could buy beer.

I was cocky beyond belief but did not know it yet. If I had a rock band, which I didn’t, I’m sure I would have described myself as a rock god because I have always wanted to be described as a rock god. I wouldn’t describe myself as popular by any means. But I wasn’t unpopular. In truth, I don’t know what I was because my entire world was consumed with playing High School football.

You’ve got to understand high school football in the state of Texas to understand my mindset. We were coddled and worshiped like you wouldn’t believe and I wasn’t even any kind of prospect. I would say that I was decent but not a player that college scouts were waiting to see play. But it didn’t matter because in the state of Texas, if you are on the Varsity football team, you are loved without question.

I was assigned a little hottie who’s major job each week was to make me cookies and other assorted goodies. People knew who you were around our town. People that you had never even seen would know you. Before each game hundreds of people would surround you and cheer you as you came out of the locker room. And on Fridays, sweet Fridays, we were allowed to skip glass for the entire morning after the pep rally so that the local church could get the privilege, yes privilege!, of cooking us a 20 course breakfast. And all this was school sponsored and encouraged.

In short, the hero worship was disgusting but good lord do I still miss it sometimes. At least I’m honest.

I took it all for granted because I was 17 and did not realize how good that I had it. Pretty much all I cared about was playing football. I devoted my entire year to it. I dropped out of other sports, I worked out year round. I ignored just about everything else. I had 2 friends ( they didn’t play football) that I hung out with and that was about it. I don’t think I was a snob or even a “jock”, I was just unattached to the other people. Fuck it, sure, I was an ass.

Everyone though wants popularity in High school and I suppose I was no different. As a peon freshman I dreamed that one day the entire school would want to be me, to know me, to touch me in the bathing suit zones. Who wants to be my friend, the line starts to the right. That was the dream.

As a senior, I was as close as I ever was going to be to being that person. All I needed was that final recognition, that final acknowledgment of my greatness that would be shattered so soon the moment you step on a college campus and realize that you are nothing but shit.

I got the chance when in the middle of the year I was asked to speak at a pep rally. I’m sure you have seen this in countless movies. The football player gets up to the microphone while the band plays kick ass drums. You hold your hands up as if to say People, I am hither, flock to me!!

This was my moment. This was the time where I would finally get to be that guy that everyone loved and wanted to be. Women would not only throw their panties at me, they would bring their mother’s panties to throw as well. Rock God, here I come.

The appointed day comes and we I slip on my letter jacket even though it is close to 90 degrees outside, as is our custom among dipshit high schoolers. We line up just outside the gym and the doors fling open. The light blazes on us as we enter, boy gods. The crowd is screaming, the band is playing those kick ass drums that celebrate our greatness as we strut to our places of glory in the middle of the floor.

Our school had about 2000 people. Of course not all of them attended the pep rally because I am assuming they could not bear the sight of such magnificence in person but it was a good turn out none the less. We take our seats and the crowd is still screaming in ectasy. These are my people, these are my subjects. Please ladies, hold the panties until I speak.

The principle and the football coach gave their speeches which I knew were just a warm up to the onslaught of school spirit that I was about to spew fourth. Yes, little ones, get yourselves into a frenzy for the Hossman!

Finally our moment came and I and 3 others strolled to the microphone. I spoke first, best to start out with something strong so as to keep the people entertained.

This is what I came up with: “We’ve worked real hard to bring in a win. Come out and support us. Keller High School football rules!”

That’s all I had. It’s one of the major disappointments in my life that with all my quick thinking that that was the best I came up with. Christ, it’s straight from a cereal box. But I couldn’t help it because as soon as I got up there the crowd just looked so massive, so huge. The Rock God in me had not realized that public speaking could be such an issue. For some reason I thought that maybe I would have something meaningful to say, something on the same level as say Chaucer. If Braveheart had come out by that time, I would have given the Mel Gibson speech. That would have been cool. But nope, I came up with the cliché speech and couldn’t say another thing as the crowd waited. And waited. And waited.

But then I passed the mike off to one of the lesser Rock Gods as is to signify that I was to good to say anything else. The crowd erupted, they were satisfied with the speech and in hindsight I don’t think they expected anything else. The rest gave their speeches, pretty much saying the same thing.

We were done with them and started the required strut back to our places of honor. I was looking at the floor, trying to relish the moment and realizing that I was an idiot and in way over my head with the whole Rock God thing. I was immersed in my own thoughts.

That is probably why I didn’t see the cheerleader doing the back handsprings right towards me. And it’s also probably the reason why I didn’t slow my speed down or at least avert my path so that I wouldn’t collide with her. I just kept on walking straight while she wind milled towards me.

I didn’t even realize what happened until it was to late. It would appear, if newspaper reports are accurate, that the cheerleader’s foot kicked me in the side of the head on one of her final handsprings. The result being that she lost all kinds of balance and went uncontrolled 30 feet into the air with arms and legs flailing about like she was a rag doll. I’m also assuming that there was a big thud when she hit the ground, but again, I have blacked all this out so that I cannot be sure.

My moment, my time to shine, and I bull over a cheerleader in front of 1000 people. There was a collective moan from the crowd and then a hush as people were seeing if she was hurt. I would have no idea if she was because I didn’t even bother to go check on her as I just fast walked back to my seat to hide. I left her lying on the ground, agreed—not very Hoss.

I have no idea if she was ok or not because I have never asked and rarely speak of that moment in my life now. 20 minutes later the whole school knew about it and knew who had did it. Even my mom heard about it for Christ’s sake. My moment has now become a nightmare but one that I have used since that time.

Because now I am no longer afraid to speak in front of crowds. I relish the opportunity because I pretty much know that it can never be that bad again. All I have to do now after I speak in front of crowds is to keep my eyes out for cheerleaders doing back handsprings.

I will once again have the opportunity to have my Rock God moment and when it comes, I will watch where I am going.

11/13/07

Moment #2: The Bottles and Being a Grown Up

Empty bottles. Thousands and thousands of empty bottles.

And not the cool type of bottles. Not the bottles that tell everyone that visits your home that you just had a kick ass party and that the assorted stank bottles are evidence of your greatness. None of these bottles contain the worm. Not the type of bottles that contain some herbal supplement because you are a believer in alternative therapy—at least then you would have something to talk about even if you are a nut job.

My bottles are baby bottles. And there seems to be thousands of them staring up at me from the sink. Smug little bastards, that’s all they are.

It wouldn’t be so bad maybe if there were only bottles in my dirty sink. You may not know this, but bottles come with accessories like some Machiavellian Hillfiger designed these fucking things. Each bottle comes with a nipple that is entirely separate. And each bottle comes with a cap that attaches the nipple to the bottle itself. They all have to be washed, every single piece of crap that comes with the bottle has to be washed.

Why don’t you just put them in the dishwasher you may be saying? Blow me, that’s my reply because you have no idea. Babies eat all. The. Freaking. Time. And if you supplement on occasion, like my wife and I do, that means that you have enough bottles that if they were currency you would be loaded. I want to move to that land and hire someone to wash my bottles.

When we first started using bottles we thought we were going to be those responsible uber parents. We were going to sterilize everything, all the time! We would boil everything, every time! I had a big pot! We had a stove! Nothing would stand in our way!

Except for the massive amount of bottles that you use.

We quickly abandoned this idea when we realized that we would have to be constantly sterilizing, by the hour rather than by the week. If I was an army sergeant, I would force those on KP to wash bottles rather than peel potatoes.

Now I will freely admit that I have never been the cleanest person around. In fact, I’m sure that some of my friends will tell you horrible stories about disgusting things that may or may not include a glass of milk being under my bed for a year before being thrown away. They lie, just keep that in mind. But other than that, sure, I don’t like to clean. I pity those that do like to clean. Seriously man, that’s all you got? Go outside and look up, that’s called the sun. Get to enjoy it a little.

I even hired a maid to make up for my lazy ways. It’s win, win. She gets to clean my house and go through my underwear drawer and I get to lay around, how could you not love that?

Every parent has taken that parent short cut from time to time. It’s nothing to be ashamed about. I’m sure that every parent has let their child have cake for dinner rather than just fight it out. Or I’m sure that every parent has decided fuck it, let the kid run around naked instead of fighting to get them dressed. If you haven’t then it’s obvious that you don’t have kids and you make me jealous because that also means you don’t have bottles.

So soon after we discovered that we would need a hospital sized sterilizing machine we decided to just wash the bottles by hand because they would accrue so fast that there is no way you could run the dishwasher 4 times a day with only 3 bottles and accessories at a time.

But sometimes life gets in the way and the bottles stack up. Maybe you go a day without washing them or maybe you find one that was stuffed in the cushions of the couch for a week without your knowledge. They stack up and soon you are asking yourself how in God’s green earth does a kid eat this much? Where the hell is she putting all this stuff? There is no way all of it is going down that gullet because if it was then she would be as big as a John Deer tractor. But she is and you are stuck with your bottles.

And so comes that moment when all the bottles are in the sink and you have no more clean bottles. This takes about a day and a half in our household and I never seem to notice it until around 8 pm at night when I’m exhausted and ready for bed. And yes, parents of children under 2 go to bed that early because we have nothing left. Sleep, once nice but was a luxury is now rarer than the pink diamond.

There comes one of those defining moments again, almost like the lesbians, that shapes your outlook and who you are. Do you A: wash the bottles so your kid can eat at 3am. B: go watch the football game and unwind. C: sleep, sweet precious sleep.

Basically, this is the moment in my life when I truly realized that I had to grow up and be the responsible adult. Sure I had played at before and maybe even gave the appearance of responsibility. I paid bills, I got married, I bought a house. But I was basically just doing what my wife told me to do and still screwed around a lot. It was great.

But now I was at the point where I had to make a conscious decision. Do I want to become that grown up and wash the bottles or do I want to be that teenager that just goes back to the couch and finishes Monday Night Football while holding my junk. The teenager mind then comes out fighting when it sees a chance to be irresponsible. It says, hey man, this ain’t no big deal. When the kid gets hungry just use a bottle you already used. I mean, what’s the big deal, it’s his spit anyway, why not? For a second you listen to this voice. Is it really a big deal? I mean, who ever heard of a child getting a disease from a once used bottle? It’s not like I’m sharing needles here man, maybe it’s not to bad.

And then you realize that you have never heard of a child getting sick from this because they are all dead. You make your choice: I am now an adult and a grown up strictly because I have a kid that forces me to. If I were single, I’d be a screw up, I have no doubt. But I’m not and someone relies on me and I am very big on not letting my kids down. Dad = Hero, that’s what I want them to always grow up knowing.

So you dive right in to the massive amount of bottles. And each one you open stinks like 2 dollar hooker crotch and the fumes burn your eyes. It’s not a pleasant job and you are a little bit disgusted that you even considered using this bottle again without washing it. So you scrub each bottle in near boiling water as you attempt to scrub away your failures. Your hands blister but this is justice and you accept it.

You make the choice to be the adult but you didn’t realize that there are benefits that come from being an adult rather than a teenager. An adult is smarter and knows the importance of multitasking. So using my adult sized brain I came up with a solution that would placate my teenager self.

Our kitchen is directly across from the living room and TV. To wash bottles I have to turn my back to the TV and I vow to one day by a TV with cable in the kitchen. But until then, I use my plan B. When it is dark outside the kitchen window is very reflective. So reflective that I can open the blinds and have the TV reflect off the window. Now I am able to wash the bottles while I watch my football. I also find that it’s nice and quiet in the house and I can do this in peace and quite, which is what all fathers really want. If you want to get your father a good present for father’s day, just be quite. That’s all. It’s free but yet priceless.

We may go back to sterilizing everything in the future but I don’t want to be that grown up yet. Give me a decade or two first.

11/9/07

The Lesbians

Sex sells. So here is my story.

I have never been much of a party type person. If the truth really be known, I secretly hate them. I hate them because like a lot of people I can be socially awkward and a massive tool. I hate mingling because I never have anything good to say. As such, I have decided that from now on when I met someone at a party that doesn’t know me I will introduce myself as Johnny Ringo, stunt car driver.

But for some reason when I was 19 several friends and I decided that we would throw a party on our summer break from college. This has some precedent and I think we were trying to relive our glory days. The summer before college we threw a party but it was a special party. It was special because we had a stripper. Now that I am older I can tell you several things: 1—as strippers go she was butt ugly. 2—what she lacked in looks she made up for in inverted nipples. 3—the uglier they are the more they like to touch. This was pretty good situation for a bunch of 18 year old igmos. 150 bucks and she came to my house. I was working delivery pizza at the time and so my pockets were full of 1 dollar bills from a week of tips. It was great.

So this time we thought we would recapture some of that. Not that the first party was legendary, but it was. People would talk about it. I also think that I wanted to throw a party to feel like the center of attention because like a lot of people, I was a nobody in college. I had no identity and was basically a pathetic hanger-on type person. It may be shocking, but I was no good with the ladies and felt very out of place. For the most part, I thought a lot of the guys that I was hanging out with were a bunch of dicks. None were Hoss, none had any sense of loyalty and most of them were banging the evil Queen Kate, my girlfriend. It had not been a good year.

But this party was to get me back on my feet, back in the swing of things. It would rock, my old friends that didn’t go to my college would be there and once again I would be a legend. So sad, so pathetic. Looking back now I want to punch myself for being a pussy.

We had a year to revise our plans for this party. First and foremost, we knew what a quality stripper looked like. It wasn’t good enough to have just a stripper, we needed a good stripper. Second, we needed more space than the last time. It just so happened that one our friends parents were going out of town, so that was taken care of. Finally, through the experience in college we had learned about the great and powerful Keg. Yes, this time we would get a keg of beer. It would be great. I would be great. Bards will compose epic poems of me and our little band of brethren. In hindsight—group of pathetic guys trying to be cool. But seriously, a stripper, that was cool.

So we began to make preparations for this party. Another thing we learned in college was that strippers and kegs were expensive. We decided that the select few people that we had invited we would ask for donations. This was said with tact and taste: “If you want beer and a stripper, give me money.” We thought that a 10 buck cover charge at the door would pretty much cause us to break even.

We spent the whole day preparing for the party. We got someone to get the keg. We took the entire afternoon putting up the assorted glass knick knacks that mothers gather and placing them with anything of value in a locked room. We moved furniture and cleaned the pool incase any sexy ladies wanted to go skinny dipping. This was no half assed effort, this was a full on organized assault. All contingency plans were covered.

We were so stupid. God help us, we just were.

The party started off pretty good. 15 guys showed up. 15 of our most trusted friends who would have a great time, give us money and then sing our praises tomorrow morning. We hoped the chicks would come after the stripper had done her thing. This party was to be in stages, we are party Gods.

Even our surprise guest showed up behind door #1: The Lesbian.

I had never met a real Lesbian before that time and was interested to see her. Mainly because she was freaking hot. Seriously man, she was like porn Lesbian hot. Of course, I was 19 so maybe all young Lesbians were hot then that didn’t have a mullet. This is Texas, after all. But no, I refuse to believe that, she was hot.

And she brought her girlfriend which made her doubly hot. A lesbian is hot. An actively practicing lesbian is even hotter.

One of my co-sponsors of the party worked with her and was on pretty good terms. He invited her just on the off chance that she would come. I don’t think I would have had the stones to invite her, I’m a dork. I didn’t have very much confidence at the time because of Evil Queen Kate and her Saturday morning circle jerks with my college friends. Hello Pathetic, I’m Hossman, glad to meet you.

But back to the Lesbian, she was hot.

We had gathered enough money to pay for the beer and some of the stripper so we were pretty much feeling good. We knew we would lose out on some of the money but that is the price you pay for immortality.

An hour into it is when things got out of hand. Bad. It would appear that the 15 or 20 of our most trusted friends should not be trusted. Because they let everyone in town know that we were having a party and that party would have paid for nudity.

However, we were a flexible bunch so we turned no one away at first. Just give me your 10 bucks and you can come in. That worked until we reached about 50 people. But people kept coming and coming until the point I was starting to turn people away. Mainly, out of spite perhaps, I turned away the people that didn’t want to pay. They said they would just mingle. I called bullshit and told them to go mingle down by the 7/11 and to get gone. In hindsight, I should have just said Hello Madness, welcome to my party and wreck my shit.

Which is what happened. People started climbing the back fence until they got to tired to do that and just tore ½ the fence down. While they were tearing up the fence they thought they might as well tear down the basketball goal as well. And just for good measure, let’s break your Mom’s glass top patio table as well, how would that be? Fucking seriously people, this is why you were not invited.

I wish that would be the worst of it but it wasn’t. By now the stripper was 3 hours late and we did not appear to be delivering on our promise. The crowd was pissed. So pissed in fact that several decided to try and steal the keg. Now I’m not a small man and I was at the point where I had just decided to start punching people. The night was a disaster already so I didn’t really care who got in the way of my fist. They had the keg in the back of a truck before I was able to get there. I threw a couple people aside and then threw MY keg back out. Choice words followed. No stripper, a tapped keg and a riot brewing. My plan was to punch a couple of small guys first and send them down thus sending a message. It would be my Spartacus moment and at least I would always have that.

It was go time. Time to man up and lay down the law. I was in over my head. We all were. This was going to be bad and even I, in all my Hossness, could not hope to whip 20 dudes.

“Dude! The Lesbians are making out!”

That is the statement that saved us, the house and our legacy.

Immediately the fight and keg was forgotten as we all rushed back inside. This stuff only happens on Penthouse Forums, not in real life. No way this could be happening.

But it was. The two Lesbians were making out, right on the couch. Right in front of all of us. It was like we weren’t even there. There was groping and kissing and butt grabbing. Clothes stayed on, but still. Can you imagine? Let me paint the scene. The 15 original guys sat silently around the room. No one said anything for the fear that if we did we would ruin this magical moment. No one even breathed as we all took in the scene that would sustain us all for the next 10 years through lonely nights and scrambled cable porn. The Lesbians were making out. 15 of us, 18 to 19 years old, now reduced to peeping like 13 year olds, which truth be told is how we acted anyway.

Suddenly all grudges were forgiven. All bad blood melted away as the Lesbians got it on. It counts as one of the top five moments of my young life. I put it higher than my college graduation. One word folks, amazing.

The Lesbians stopped and laughed. We didn’t move for the rest of the night for the fear that if they decided to go at it again we would miss it. We didn’t talk, it was just understood that no one was leaving their spot.

The party broke up and eventually everyone went home. We spent the next two days repairing or replacing everything that was broken. We built a new fence and passed it off as just a couple of guys helping out their parents. We were the all American boys. We spent all of our money that we had made and then some. Unfortunately one of the douche bags broke into the locked room and stole credit cards and other valuables so we were eventually found out. But I don’t think his parents were all that upset since, they did have a new fence after all.

Like any good story this one to has a moral and a lesson:

Lesbians are superheros. God bless them. God bless them all.

The Experiment

Each man’s life is defined by a series of important events. These events may not seem to have any significance to anyone but the person that they happen to but these events mold our minds and personalities until what you are left with is a 32 year old Adonis blogger who is bald.

Some are your personal victories, no matter how small, that have somehow given you that drive to be who you are. Some are the failures that you wish would hide away forever so that you can forget that you were ever that screwed up. Maybe the events that shape you are embarrassing moments that you will always remember but others forget shortly. Or maybe some of these events are so mundane that no one even thought about them in the first place besides you.

Either way, these are the experiences that make each of us unique and shape our outlook on life. When recounting such things, they can be painful as you look back and wonder how you were ever such a dumbass in the first place. You may see yourself in a more pathetic light than what you portray now. But deep down, you still have to own up to what you did or what happened. This is what makes your victories sweeter. And life is about the victories. The big or the small, that’s what we all strive for.

I’m going to try a little experiment over the next week, beginning at 4:00pm today. I’m going to get some of my victories, failures or other events that I believe have affected me over the years. I invite all of my readers to leave tidbits of their own stories in the comments section. Or, if you wish to truly go all out and write 3 pages worth, email them to me and I will post them with your permission. At the very least our collective Oh Crap moments will serve as daily entertainment to everyone else as they muddle through their work week looking for something to distract them from responsibility.

My email is Zounka@hotmail.com, send what you got when the topic is up and running.

And as a teaser, as my advertising wife says works, today’s story is titled “The Lesbians.”

11/7/07

Why being a Dad Kicks Ass

A friend once told me being a Dad was one of the greatest things in the world.

He said that he couldn’t really explain it. He tried and we talked about it for awhile. At the end of it, my response was “Well, that’s good for you.” I could tell that he didn’t think I understood. As I was a bit younger and a hell of a lot more cocky, I thought no problem man, I get it, you like being a Dad. He talked about how his daughters would run to the door for him when he got home and hug him. Secretly I thought, hmm, my dog does that. That’s pretty good I suppose.

Now I realize that the truth is that you can never fully explain the greatness that being a father is to someone who hasn’t been through it. You just can’t explain the all encompassing emotion that hits you no matter where you are at. Even at work, all I have to do is look at my daughter’s picture and I feel like a freaking stud. Yes, I have made that and she is greatness.

But how to explain it to someone? How do you convey the true greatness of fatherhood? As a perceptive dude who feels like he can communicate with many dudes on many dude levels, I think that I have found a way. It’s gonna be simple. Being a dad is great because:

When my daughter watches football with me and sees me yell at the screen, she yells “touchdown” and throws her hands in the air. I know that she will grow up watching every game with me and loving every team that I love. As no one else in the house has the passion for sports that I do, this kicks major ass. So basically, I have created my own bleacher section of rednecks who yell “You gotta make that play!”

4 or 5 times during dinner my daughter will grab her glass and smile up at me. I say “cheers” and then we toast. She laughs, I laugh. Dinner with a child seems much more refined when you toast the dog several times in 30 minutes.

When we brush our teeth at night and I take off my shirt, my daughter flexes her muscles and growls. I then flex my muscles and growls. We spend the next 10 minutes doing this.

A friend taught my daughter how to do a fist bump. We do this constantly.

When my son was screaming last night. I said, “Let me see your war face.” Every boy needs a war face and I am happy with his. It terrifies me.

My daughter was sitting in my lap yesterday and farted. She started to laugh. It was freaking hilarious. I took the opportunity to show her the pull Daddy’s finger game. I am nothing if not a teacher first.

My son’s farts make my daughter’s sound like a flute. Seriously, that boy has some volume. He sounds like a Tuba through a megaphone.

I shoot my finger at my daughter’s feet and say “Dance!” She does and then does the same to me. We could do this for hours.

My daughter took a header off the footstool. I thought we were in store for a screaming fit. She got up and laughed. It’s good to see that she is in fact Little Hoss.

My son had to get a biopsy and some of his skin was peeled off of him like an orange. He barely cried. The Hoss gene runs deep.

My daughter tries to ride the dog. He out weighs her by a good 30 pounds but she keeps on trying to live the dream.

When my daughter gets pissed she scowls and it looks like mine. Together we could intimidate the Pope.

My daughter was trying to teach my 6 week old son how to high five.

No one will ever rock out to White Zombie except for my daughter. And when she does it, she goes all out. Head banging, mosh pit with the cats, the whole 9 yards.

My son has monkey toes but has promised to only use them for good.

My daughter will cause havoc when I get in trouble to distract Hossmom from my actions.

My daughter likes to play video games with me. We go online and dominate.

Yesterday my daughter wanted to wear her Halloween costume again, all day. We let her.

When salesmen call the house, I give the phone to my daughter and she says “poop” over and over again.

I know that my son and daughter will never be communist pigs.

I have a plan that when my daughter is 13 and having a slumber party, I’m going to walk out in my worst pair of tight underwear and belch constantly as I go drink milk from the fridge. She understands that this is only pay back for the countless hours of sleep that she took from me.

My daughter loves to sweep. Thank you Jesus, I will never do this chore again.

My daughter has this uncanny ability to find the remote no matter where it is hidden. I will never have to look for it again for as long as I live.

My children do not like Barney and I make a sacrifice of goats to the gods for this gracious gift.

Next week we are going to give a shot at finger painting. I’m going to let Little Hoss attempt to paint her little brother to see what sort of abstract Picasso we can get. Then I’m going to let Bubba Hoss roll around on a canvas for about an hour. We will then sell this human art for millions.

Chicks dig guys that are good fathers, especially to little 2 year old girls. I’m not saying that I am looking, but it’s good to know that I can still get the panties to drop.

My daughter grabs crayons and tries to color in my tattoo. I like her version of it better than mine.

My son gets more boob action than I do at the moment.

I like it when I do my daughters hair and dress her. We look like we just stepped off a life boat after 2 months in the Pacific. I think it’s funny.

I hope that I have done an adequate job of telling you why it so great to be a Dad and why I love it so much. In a nutshell, you have a mini you that you can actually have fun with. There are no inhibitions or embarrassments. It’s like you get to do all the fun stuff that you can’t do as an adult anymore, just with minions that you can send out into the world to spite people.

Although maybe I’ll do some finger painting by myself next week

Living with the Chimps

I am a screaming and crying connoisseur.

I am the a savant when it comes to children under two screaming. I have a sixth sense that immediately lets me know exactly what that scream means. I should hire myself to translate out to new parents as my skill could very well cure all the ills of the world.

Wars could be avoided if I offered my skill and I am a little shocked that no one has come calling yet. WWII was caused because some low level beurocrat had a kid at home who was screaming for 3 hours straight and they just couldn’t fucking take it anymore. Their mind went to mush so instead of pulling out the “Please don’t invade” stamp they accidently pulled out the stamp that said “kill everyone” because they wanted to share their bad mood with everyone.

Through 2 kids I have honed this skill. I am the Jane Goodall of toddlers and babies. I have immersed myself in their culture. It has taken some time but they have accepted my presence and now I am part of the scenery. Through constant vigilance and scientific study I have actually been promoted within this society as Chief of Poop where several times a day I get my crap on my hands. Also, I am required to change on of 3 different diaper genies that we have through out the house. Seriously, we have 3 of those damn things. Two upstairs (each kids room) and one downstairs. They all seem to fill up daily and weigh close to 50 pounds each. Unfortunatly, the Chief of Poop position does not come with biohazard gear.

I have used my tenuous position within this tribe of 2 children to decipher their language and I am finally pleased to offer my results to all the parents out there.

Let’s start with the basic 2 year old midnight scream. You are in your bed and have just laid your head down after spending the last 2 hours trying to calm down your infant. You hear a “thump”. It is then followed by a low level whine that gradually increases in volume and intensity. It reaches its apex where the dogs begin to howl in unison with the scream.

A less experience person may believe that this would mean that your daughter just fell out of her new toddler bed, thus the “thump” sound, and is confused on to what is going on. However, after two years of study I have determined the true nature of this scream. What it really means is Daddy, I just fell out of my toddler bed and why don’t you love me enough to sleep on the floor right next to my bed to make sure I don’t hit the ground when I fall out of my toddler bed. And as Daddy, you are hereby given 3 demerits and are demoted into the worthless father category.

Now this scream is not to be confused with the infant midnight scream, because this is completely different. This scream is usually preceded by 3 coughs and then goes immediately into the chorus of wayyyyyyyyyy. It is all about the shock and awe as that is what is required to wake you from your slumber. If you listen for about 2 minutes, you may find that this scream will take care of itself as another member of the tribe, called Mommy, may finally give in and issue commands to remedy this scream while letting Daddy fake sleep for just a little longer. However, this is not always the case.

What this scream means is that Daddy, I’m hungry now so get your lazy ass up and make me a bottle before I call Child Protective Services. Seriously man, I weigh only like 9 pounds and I’m sure they would believe me when I say that the dog is so fat because YOU give her all my food. Don’t whine about sleep to me bucko. Do you thing the fighting airborne whined about sleep on D-day? Hell no! Now get cracking with the frozen breast milk, chubs.

Lets move on to the day time screams and cries for both the 2 year old and the infant, or as they shall now be referred to as Smokey and the crying Bandit.

You and your wife sit down to have a nice dinner that you just spent the last 20 minutes cooking. You have your nice cold glass of milk in front of you and can’t wait to eat your tombstone pizza and of course then fall asleep where you stand. Suddenly, you hear a couple of coughs that are coming from the infant swing. Instinctively, both Mommy and Daddy freeze as if the slightest movement or eyelash rustle will cause a full onslaught of infant terrorism. Now we all laugh because we know that this will make no difference as the infant will begin to scream anyway.

It sounds like an elk has just broken it’s leg on highway 95 somewhere in Montana. It’s kind of a long drawn out eeeeeeeewaaaaaaaaayyy followed by a series of hiccups as the kid has over extended himself. But don’t be to concerned, he will find his second wind in a minute.

Both parents freeze, each fork just inches from their mouth as both pray that they will get one hot meal today. They stare at each other like High Noon, he who flinches loses. There is only one way to settle this and the game of Rock, paper, scissors begins. Daddy loses and tries to get a best 2 out of 3 going or a 5 out of 7 but he knows that his is nothing more than a delay tactic so he gets up to tend to the war cry of his son.

By this time, as the kid was ignored for an additional 30 seconds he has increased the volume of his cry and this is where the translation comes in. This cry does not mean that he is hungry, wet or in any pain what so ever. That is the rookie mistake that a lot of new parents make. No, this cry means that they don’t want you to eat a hot meal. Its no more complicated than that. Infants have this deep instinct knowledge of when dinner time is and they are sworn in the womb to never let you eat it when it is hot. A lot of parents will spend the next 30 minutes trying various techniques where they can quickly put the kid down. What happens is a ritualistic dance where the parent gets within 2 feet of warm dinner before kid cries again. My advice is to forget anything resembling a hot dinner. Sit down, put on some sportscenter, and cuss your wife for knowing you so well that she always beats you at paper rock scissors.

Our final cry/scream breakdown is going to be courtesy of the 2 year old. I know that several of my readers have a 2 year old so they might want to pay particular attention to this section.

This scream/cry comes right in the middle when you are trying to do something and therefore not paying attention to your 2 year old. It is at this point that your two year old will decided that this is not acceptable and will immediately go into her game plan. First, she yells and screams, followed by running right in front of your path and throwing your arms up. You have two choices: either run her over and keep walking or pick her up. Of course you pick her up which is exactly what she wanted because now she is right in your grill and you must focus on her. She then takes this opportunity to kick you right in the nuts with her little steel toe shoes that some one who hates you got her.

Don’t worry, there is a way to decipher this and handle it. First, notice that there are no actually tears coming from your daughter and this is just a ploy to get you to pick her up while you are trying to cook dinner over a hot stove. Do not be fooled! But if you are weak willed and have to pick her up make sure you pat her down first and remove any shanks she may have made and the steel toe boots. Once up she will continue to scream right in your face. What this really means is that she can’t wait for you to make fun of her and ridicule is a very good parenting tool.

I suggest immediate role reversal on this one. What I do is I start to scream and cry. I match my voice to the exact same pitch and make the exact same face as my daughter. She does not know what to do with this and gets confused. Once she is confused, that’s when you have her.

Put her on the ground and whisper into her ear: Mommy has candy in her pocket. Now watch your minion run off and try to strip down Mommy while you perhaps suggest that maybe she should let you win in rock, paper scissors from time to time.

11/2/07

I Hate

I hate everything. Today, I have decided that the world is a shithole of a place and it’s sole design is to screw me over. Fuck em.

I hate that this week I have left from my house at 4 different times in order to miss traffic. I have done this for the one and only hope of avoiding the douchebag that I know is going to have a wreck because they cut some other douchebag off. Then douchebag #1 is going to get mad at douchebag #2 and not pay attention and rear end then sorry sack in front of him. You would think that I would have some empathy for at least the guy that got rear ended by accident. I don’t. I hate them all and truly wish that they cannot afford to fix their cars because after 4 days of being stuck behind these people has completely erased any feelings of mercy that I have left in me at all.

I hate the semi truck that must and always must ride in the left lane at 7:54am every god damn morning. There is not a single car ahead of him but there are 3000 of use behind him. We are all going 40 mph and silently cursing him because none of us have any real balls and won’t honk at a huge truck. But we all fucking hate him. We hate him even more as he appears to have teamed up with the twatwaffle on her cell phone in the right lane and now we have a Mexican roadblock going on at 40 mph. Wait, someone just sneezed, we are now down to 35mph on the ever loving freeway. In a perfect world instead of following behind these two rejects you would be following behind the bus in Speed. At least then you got somewhere and I could care less about the people that remained stuck on that bus. Best of luck to you chumps. I bet if I was the Bandit none of the semi’s would be treating me like this. It would be all “Ten-4 good buddy, watch out for the Smokey.”

I hate the weird people in the bottom of my office building who show up three days a week and turn our hallways into some bazaar like you would see in some remote part of India. I have no doubt that in one of the third world crap baskets the lady from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is hiding while some bearded guy looks for her with a sword. And I know that today , if I saw which basket she was hiding in, I would so kick it over and scream so the guy with the sword could find her. Seriously man, I just want to go up to my office and put in a good days work. I do not want to buy a fake jade necklace that looks about as fancy as what my cat threw up this morning.

I hate the two birds outside of my office window. There is no real reason to hate them other than they get to be outside while I get to be stuck in an icebox reading pointless shit on the computer screen. And once I’ve read that pointless shit I will have nothing else to read because I’ve already read everything on the internet. That’s right. I’ve read the entire internet as envisioned by Al Gore. Please don’t take that to mean that I’m an Al Gore supporter, I hate him to. Seriously, what does it say about you that you were once less popular than George W. Bush? How do you go on living with yourself knowing that a goofball whipped you like a rented mule? I’ll tell you how, you make a pseudo movie about something that no one can really define or understand and then stand on your high horse while you continue to pay a $3000 a month for your “green footprint.” Let me tell you something jackass, there is no way I’m using cloth diapers so I can save a rainforest and recycle. Come a little closer, let me show you my footprint. It’s covered in poop.

And while we are on the subject and I’m being hateful today: I hate all politicians. I yearn for the days when I could have just one, just one person who actually gave a shit about changing things for the better and not about how they can fuck over someone they have never met. I yearn for the politician that says “Hey, I’m gay and I love being gay. But even though I’m gay, I’m going to gay bash.” At least then you could appreciate that they were an honest hypocrite. But we can’t even get that, no way. Instead we get politicians that insist on having an amendment on flag burning and banning gay marriage. News flash buttholes—neither one of those things actually matter. You are just pushing some trumped up emotional issue out there that actually doesn’t effect the real world at all while at the same time passing a law for a 3 billion dollar bridge that ACTUALLY GOES NO WHERE. Who gives a shit about who marries who, honestly? You think I walk around all day thinking, Man, this is a good country except for all that gay marriage ceremonies where they burn the flag. No, I walk around thinking how the shit am I going to put 2 kids through college while at the same time trying not to rob anyone to do it.

I hate Emo-rock above all other forms of music. I have no idea why this has been decided to be the pop music at this time. Grunge is dead, I know this. But believe me, Grunge is currently rolling over in it’s flannel covered grave every time John Mayer tells me how beautiful this chick is. I try to be open minded until I watch VH1’s top 20 countdown every Sunday and then I say fuck it, it’s not me that is out of touch it’s the world that is out of touch with me. Fucking Dautry. Seriously, fucking Dautry has had 3 top songs. But do me a favor when you listen to them next time: they are really just remakes of old Montley Crue songs. That’s right, it’s a fucking rip off but at least the crew didn’t take themselves so seriously and I dig the crue’s song Coming Home a hell of a lot better. They basically came out and said we are making music to get some ass. It was honest and straight to the point. They never held themselves to be out more than they were. And if they changed your life, then great. Otherwise they were busy showing their corks while dinging Pam.

I hate the church teams that we play softball against. They field about 8 teams in our league and what they really do is just have players switch from one roster to the next instead of having a solid team. So when they are short the just go to there gray team and recruit the best players after their game. Grow some balls man and just field one fucking team. Look, every time I play you assholes it gets me farther away from God. Are you happy, you are killing God. Maybe if you weren’t such whiney pussies half the time I could manage a small amount of respect for you. But since you have to fucking argue every close call or whine every time things don’t go your way, I have nothing but contempt for you. So go take your Jesus stick to some other park and let’s just not be friends. I swear to all that is holy, you are the reason I don’t go to church at all.

I hate that Barry Bonds is an asshole but I hate it for completely personal reasons. I have never met the man and I have no idea what is going on in that huge head of his. What I do know is that as a kid I bought his rookie baseball card. And as time went on, I noticed that this mint condition card was going up in value. I kept it in a very safe place and it is practically new and has never, ever been handled by human hands other than the dude who originally put it in the Tops baseball package. Once he broke the homerun record, a card like this should only increase in value like Hank Aaron’s or Mr. Wagner. But because he is such an asshole that popped the “cream” or the “clear” like it was a Rogan hair pill, we all know his record is tainted. As such, this mint condition baseball card that I have had since I was 10 will be worth exactly shit by the time my son goes to college. In 18 years I will try to sell the card to put my son through college and will only get 25 cents and a slap when I try to sell it. I would only sell it because I can’t bear to give it to my son. Fathers are supposed to pass down these things with words of wisdom. They say, son, this is the rookie card for Mickey Mantle. He was many things, some good, some bad, but he was my hero. What am I supposed to say? Son, this guy cheated and got all the accolades, lied about it all and then got elected to the Hall of Fame, because we all know he will. It’s better if I just picked up a rock and said son, you might as look up to this more than any baseball player.

I hate all insurance companies. Why? Because it’s the biggest fucking racket ever. They make the Mafia look like a god damn boy scout troop. My wife is on my insurance but she also has insurance through her work, which is her secondary insurance. But right now neither insurance company wants to pay for the delivery of my son saying that it is the responsibility of the other insurance company to pay for it. Then they say that my son can only be on my wife’s insurance and not mine because my wife was born earlier in the year than I was. Does that make sense to anyone, at all? So now the hospital is calling me wanting their 40,000 bucks. How is it possible at all to have 2 separate insurances and yet have no fucking coverage. Can someone please explain that to me??? And the catch is that I have been paying for both of these fucking things for over a year! Don’t give me that shit about fiscal responsibility or the cost of healthcare, I don’t fucking care. What I care about is that you rip people off and find that ok and you damn well know that the only way I’m going to get any resolution to this is to take a day off of work and spend 12 hours on the phone with some flunkie that can’t even hold my jock. Look, you made a deal and you took my money, now nut up and pay the hospital before I TP your house.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, now I feel so much better. Blog therapy, it’s the best.

I love everyone again, life is good.

11/1/07

Captain Caveman

Last night my daughter went as a lion for Halloween. It was a very cute little outfit, I’ll admit. It had a hood with a mane, big ears and a tail. The little costume was sleeveless and came down to her waist. Basically, it was a fur parka.

She looked very cute and my dad heart just soaked it up. Then my daughter decided that she was hot and took off the hood. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing but seeing it I was. Without the hood on it looked like my daughter was wearing some fur poncho, but remember it was sleeveless. So now she looked like she was a white trash hippy wearing a sleeveless poncho. And then it hit me: She looked exactly like Captain Caveman.

I ushered Hossmom over and pointed at my daughter. “Look!” I said, “She looks just like Captain Caveman!” It was one of the funniest things because I think it was so unexpected. Seriously, all I had to do was give her a club and she would be Captain Caveman. She was about the right size and her hair was all frizzy from the hood. I couldn’t stop laughing, it was great. Captain Caveman, right in my house, I’m so honored.

Then my wife said: “Who’s Captain Caveman?”

I was speechless. What do you mean who’s captain caveman?? Immediately I felt sorry for my wife and the child hood that she must have had. I remembered that she was to busy reading Flowers in the Attic and not enough time in front of the TV watching the Hanna Barbarah Cartoon Hour.

Out of the both of us, it’s universally agreed that my childhood was a little bit more rugged. I grew up in southern Arkansas, got licks daily, got into real fist fights with my big brother, had to pick acres of squash by hand, stacked bricks and lumber until my arms would fall off, mowed 3 acres of lawn with a push mower, slaughtered hogs and chickens and basically lived in the woods before we got civilized. My wife on the other hand was not allowed to eat sugar cereal.

I think that at that moment I felt more pity for my wife and decided that I would never have swapped childhoods, not in a heartbeat. My wife, the pop culture queen, had no idea who Captain Caveman was. I would place money that she also doesn’t know who the Grape Ape was either. Seriously, these were some of my childhood fixtures and I find it sad that Hossmom had no idea who it was.

And I found it even more sad that she couldn’t see the resemblance of my daughter in her costume to Captain Caveman. For me, I was voting that we keep the hood off all night and she go as Captain Caveman which is way cuter than a silly old Lion. I mean, come on, maybe I go out into the back yard and get her a stick for a club, put a little cape on her and whammo, we have the Neanderthal right here in my house. My daughter already eats dirt and dog food and with the sleeveless fur, how far away from caveman are we really? All she need to do now is learn how to make fire and carve out a wheel from stone and we are basically at that level