4/29/08

Dad's Night Out

Hossmom came to me last week and informed me that she had to go on a “business” trip for 4 days. As such, she needed me to stay with the kids again, alone.

My first reaction: Bullshit.

No fucking way. I just did a 30 day stint of doing this by myself, has my parole been revoked? It has only been about 6 weeks since that ended and I was not looking forward to doing it some more.

Look, I know that I am a stay at home dad. I know that the kids and the house are my primary job responsibilities. I get up at 6 am with the kids and quitting time is 12 hours later. At 6 pm, I’m done. Then I become just regular dad again. I have no idea how single parents do it.

That 30 days was lonely, depressing and overwhelming. During that 30 days not only did I take care of the kids but I sold our house as well.

Nothing says that you are negotiating from a power position like having two kids on your lap while you discuss the final sales price of your home. There were a lot of “bullcrap”s and “darn it”s said where usually I would be cussing like a sailor. Every time someone wanted to see the house or the inspector needed 5 hours of uninterrupted time, it was me with two kids and two dogs, in the car. Not fun. I would often be talking to my real estate agent as my son vomited on my crotch.

So yes, my initial reaction was no fucking way. I’m not even recovered yet. I moved us for Christ’s sake. I drove 8 hours with Farty McFart-Fart, the amazing farting dog.

I asked for more details. Hossmom informed me that this was a team building exercise for her company. She assured me that she would be having absolutely no fun and working the entire time. She then mentioned that it was at a resort and there was going to be an open bar.

Again, I claim bullshit rights.

But she maintained that it was work related and that she had to go. As I am dependent on her for my salary I didn’t have much choice and this is one of the reasons that we wanted a stay at home parent.

But still……………

Hossmom continued to convince me that although there was an open bar it won’t be much fun.

Sure, right. And I only “watch” porn. No problem, I completely understand what you are saying. I too enjoy the well scripted plot lines and superb acting of “Girl with the Sex Ray Eyes”. I can’t believe it didn’t win an Oscar.

But what choice did I have?

The first day that she was gone was the day that we actually finished the negotiations for the new house. We had to have a cashier’s check in the hand of the title company by 10am that morning. We haven’t changed our bank yet so it was up to me to go find a bank willing to do this for me quickly while not having an account with them.

The third bank was pretty cool and helped me out. That’s good because Little Hoss decided to trash the first two banks by knocking over every billboard they had and I had no idea what kind of hell she was about to unleash here. You think that I would feel bad about this, but I didn’t. I was whipped and didn’t much give a rat’s ass.

Let me point this out: I just sold a house by myself now I was buying one by myself. With two kids and two dogs in tow. Bullshit I say, bullshit.

Hossmom called from her hotel right after we finished the banks. I admit, I tore into her a little bit. She kept trying to reassure me that she knew that it was tough. I let her know that tough doesn’t even come close to fucking describing it. I believe I threatened to give both of our kids some road money and told her to be on the look out in the next couple of days for her children. Sure, I was upset.

But at the end an idea came to me. I was going on strike. Well, not totally, but for one day. I let her know that she needed to be home by Friday by 5:00pm because at that time, I wasn’t going to be. I was taking a man night. I should have taken a man weekend but being the great dad I am, we had family outings planned for the weekend and there is just something about a little girl not riding on the shoulders of her dad through the zoo that I find very sad.

But that night, I’m out.

Hossmom made it home by Friday and preceded to tell me how tough it was at the resort, with the open bar, late night bull sessions and meals cooked where someone else cleans up for you. After hearing that, my plans for Dad’s night out was pretty much decided.

I admit it, I just needed a break. Hossmom did what she had to do to get ahead at work and do a good job. I know that she didn’t have a choice so I don’t blame her. It’s just life and you got to take it. But then you blog about it and that makes it ok.

Where is the one place that I could go that would just scream manhood. Where are children not allowed? Where can I go to get into some trouble that perhaps my wife wouldn’t approve of? I don’t know why that last part, it’s not Hossmom’s fault, but doing something that she didn’t approve of seemed very manly to me.

I know, a strip club immediately comes to mind. Don’t think I didn’t think about it, I did. But sadly, I can’t do it. Hossmom doesn’t actually disapprove of strip clubs all that much and now that I have a daughter, well, it’s just not the same when coked-up hottie calls me Daddy.

But there was somewhere else. Somewhere almost as good. Somewhere that I haven’t been to in a long time that Hossmom would not really like.

The Casino.

That’s right baby, my new town has several Casino’s. They are “riverboat” casinos although 20 bucks says that my left nutsack floats more than these things do. I can’t believe that the stream that I saw next to them is classified as a river. Back in Texas we’d call that a crick.

So off I went, to gamble and mindlessly throw away money. Maybe I’ll unbutton the top two buttons of my shirt, let the chest hair breath a little while I throw some dice? How about that!

I got there and it is a pretty nice Casino. But something was missing and the more I thought about it, the worse it got. My family wasn’t with me. How fucked up is that? I take a night off from the family and the first thing I miss is my family.

I admit it, my head wasn’t into it. I shuffled 80 bucks into slots and thought about what my family was doing. What’s more jacked up is that I HATE slot machines, I never play them. Part of the fun of going to a casino is making fun of the people there. From the blue haired chain smoker to the fact that as soon as I walk in the word “mark” must flash right on my forehead.

I had always gone with Hossmom and then it is when it was fun. Now it was no better than me playing a computer game.

The whole night I called Hossmom to tell her what I was seeing. It was basically a virtual date. She updated me on the kids and I was sad that I didn’t get to talk to my daughter and son before they went to bed.

After about 2 hours, I called it quits. I lost most of my money but had enough to see a movie. So I went and saw Leatherheads and called Hossmom from the theater. I am one sad sack.

It did recharge my batteries a little. I realized how much I love my family and want them with me. I think that next time I’ll just hire a bartender to come to my house and put the baby gates up around the living room while I “watch” some more porn. That way I can see what they are doing while I have a little guy time.

4/28/08

Boundaries

13 years of being with my wife. 13 years. And now they are down the tube.

Being with someone for so long you learn the ins and outs of that person. I got with Hossmom when she was 18. I love the teens.

We have been through many things since then and now have 2 kids, a mortgage and the occasional hemorrhoid. We have a good marriage. In fact, I would say that we have a great marriage.

We have always gotten along great, rarely fight and respect each other. I even get the nookie when I want it. Except when she’s pregnant, then not so much. We are not having any more kids.

It’s a good marriage, not so much of convenience except for the before mentioned nookie on demand. Our marriage is golden and it is really because of one specific thing: Boundaries.

For 13 years we lived by this. You would think that married people, especially people that have been through childbirth together, would have no boundaries.

I have seen my wife at her absolute worst. Let me tell you, it’s not pretty when you are in that operating room watching your wife give birth. The beauty of the miracle of life. Bullshit. It’s disgusting. There’s blood and a lot of slim over everything. And both of you are there with a dumbass look on your face.

And my wife has seen me at my absolute worst. Not so much physically, but emotionally. That’s the part of me that I don’t like showing a whole lot. Let me tell you, it’s not a pretty sight when 250 pound Hossman breaks down. The term “blubbering whale” comes to mind. Let me amend that: Sissy Blubbering Whale. There, that’s much better. I’m a pussy.

But our marriage, believe it or not, is based on boundaries. Specifically, one boundary.

Never, under any circumstances, poop in front of each other.

That’s the secret to a good marriage. That’s what will make the difference from you coming home to your wife at night to living at the local shithole motel. Because, let’s face it, divorced wives are vindictive and they will all claim that you kicked new born puppies while emailing state secrets to Iran.

By living with the “no poop” in front of me rule, I have been able to avoid any unfounded accusations.

I have lived by it for 13 years. I have taken dumps in backyards and on fences rather than poop in front of my wife. I have eaten 3 pound blocks of cheese to avoid it. I have deliberately pulled fire alarms to get her out of the way so that I could poop in private.

Unfortunately, THE HUT that I now live in has finally broken me. This 1,000 square feet of crapdom has done me in. It has smashed the boundary.

This rent house has only one bathroom. But it’s not so much a bathroom as a death trap. The shower squirts water from the top onto whatever blow-dryers you have laying around. I have brained myself twice, hard, by just sitting down on the toilet. The door is so close that you have to sit up straight back on the crapper or risk a hematoma. And I swear to god that the walls bleed.

We are stuck in this house until the end of May, that’s when our new home closes and we can move in. Just about 3 weeks away and we move into a home with 2 and ½ baths.

In my old house I had my own “pooping” bathroom. It was to always remain open and unused until I needed it. Sometimes I miss that house so very, very much.

This is probably a good time to mention that I have a slight case of IBS, mostly with greasy foods. For example, I will die of hunger before I eat popcorn at a movie.

To my ever-loving nightmare, a couple of days ago I ate a greasy burrito. I knew that I shouldn’t do it but I wrongly thought that hey, we are going to be home, we are not going anywhere, Mr. Poopster was going to be right there, no need to worry. Not smart, I know.

This is why I could never be president. I would be shaking the hand with the Russians, showing Hossman strength, and all of a sudden I would have to run out of the room with little greasy farts following me out. I would nuke them just so that I would never have to face them again.

A couple hours after the burrito incident, I was sitting quietly while my wife was in the shower. I felt a slight rumble in my stomach. Then the rumble got worse. It got loud enough that it spooked my dog. This is the same dog that farts at least 13 times a day. He knows what is coming. When I started to let it go it wasn’t pretty. It smelled. I admit it. It smelled bad enough that I actually seemed to offend the farting dog. Thanks dude, that makes me feel so much better, man’s best friend and all that.

My stomach clenched and I knew that we were at threat level red. We had received the “go” code and nothing was going to stop it. Oh, I tried. I squeezed and started doing some Yoga breathing. But Yoga relaxes things, so that probably wasn’t such a good call.

I prayed, Dear God in Heaven, please take away this poop so that I don’t have to poop in front of my wife. Our very marriage, our sacred marriage, depends on this. 13 years of marriage depends on this.

The good lord, in all his wisdom, decided to smite me.

Fuck it, I had to roll. I ran to the bathroom and kicked open the door. My wife started turn off the water and ask me what was going on.

I had my pants down to about my knees and was only hovering over Mr. Pooper when it came. I screamed at my wife “Don’t Look!” but it was too late, she had seen.

I begged her to get back into the shower and turn the water on. Then I turned on the faucet to the sink to cover up the accompanied orchestra that was playing from my ass. The water sound was not enough to mask it. I then asked my wife to sing, very loudly, hoping that this would do it.

I joined in but only between grunts and wheezes. Is it love when your wife serenades you while you poop or is this the beginning of the end of our marriage?

This was a ten minute variety and my wife stayed in the shower. I’m sure terrified at her first glimpse of the hell that I was unleashing. The steam from the hot shower started to mix with my own fumes and…………….

Well, it just wasn’t pretty. My wife was laughing so hard that I am also pretty sure that she peed herself.

13 years and that was the only barrier that remained between us. It was the Great Wall of China of our marriage and now the huns of my weak stomach have felled it.

I hate this house and I blame it for ruining my marriage.

4/25/08

I Have Gas

I watch CNN every morning. It is my respite from Elmo’s constant reminder that this is his world and he will have your allegiance.

Watching CNN every morning keeps me up to date so that if I by chance have the opportunity to actually talk to an adult about anything other than kid’s poop, then I will be prepared. You want to know what is happening with Lohan, I’m in the know.

What has been the big story is the price of oil. At118 bucks per barrel, it’s hitting everyone’s pocket book. It’s close to the top story every day because people are pissed off, and I think rightly so. The national average of gas is hovering around 3.50 a gallon.

This sends me into the wistful musings of an old man as I remember that when I graduated college gas was 98 cents a gallon. My knees also hurt which means rains a’ comin’. That was 10 years ago and now gas is pretty much out of control.

But I’m not going to rant today, not in the mood and it certainly doesn’t help my poor, poor readers who have to drive everyday to read my blog. Fess up, all you sons of bitches read this at work rather than actually working, admit it. I’m proud to be part of the problem.

So everyone’s hurting pretty bad right about now. It’s tough, people are canceling vacations, budgets are getting strained and I haven’t seen a Hollywood starlet get out of a car without underwear in a while. It’s just not the same seeing Lohan pull this stunt walking off the bus.

But I’m going to give you some advice. It’s some money savers that hopefully get us through this tough time. And when we are out of this “recession”, Schooner Tuna will go back to its full price.

A couple words of advice: Chicks. Dig. Mopeds.

For your vacations, just switch houses with your neighbors. Hire a donkey to sit in the backyard and tell your kids that you are at a “Dude Ranch”. Tell them that cleaning poop is part of the experience. Then, keep the donkey and ride that to work and to the grocery store. Nothing says high class like a donkey at the Gap.

Ride a bike, you hippie.

Energize me. Who’s laughing at the Trekkie now?!

Let’s go back to the dark ages. It’s time to get back to our roots. I propose that we all ditch our cars and take the extra money to build Catapults. Seriously, it’s wood and ropes. How much can it cost? Maybe a big spring but it’s still gotta be cheaper than a gallon of gas.

The bus from the movie Speed. First off, everyone on that bus seems pretty cool. Not creepy or have the homeless stink. Seems like a bunch of nice people to ride to work with in the morning. Except the guy with the gun, he wasn’t very cool but that was all just a big misunderstanding, I’m not here for you man. Second, no stops. There, your commute is cut in half.

And from another great movie that I watched today, we need to switch to the flux capasiter. Not the one from the first movie but the second one, where they use garbage as fuel. Fantastic.

Carpool with strippers. I advocate this much more than just plain old carpooling. This is way hotter. There’s always a chance that Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar On Me” will come on the radio. Who wouldn’t want to be in that carpool. Of course, you’ll have to find a job with the hours of 12 am to 4 am.

Build a methane collection tank in your backyard. Alternative fuels, it’s the wave of the future.

Hitchhike. Make sure you carry a hatchet for self defense.

Don’t fly anywhere. This one is here because basically I think that all the airlines are a racket and it wouldn’t bother me a bit if they lost money. Douchebags.

Pay the neighborhood kids to go shopping for you on their bikes. It’ll probably cost 20 bucks to hire them and of course you won’t get your change back but it’s still cheaper than driving there yourself.

Carjacking. And when you get caught, the state has to pay to drive you to all your court appointments. Appeal everything. See you in 3 to 5.

Telecommute. Don’t ask permission, just do it. Money says that no one will notice you are gone anyway. If anyone does say anything, just tell them you were with that guy doing that thing. They won’t say anything to cover their own stupidity. No one wants to be out of the loop.

Catch a ride with the pizza delivery guy but you’ll have to tip him pretty big.

Skateboard and a long rope. Lasso a truck and off you go. Rad.


I hope that this helps everyone out as summer is coming up which also means that gas will probably hit 4 bucks a gallon. We are all screwed.

4/21/08

Hero Family

Please enjoy this posting while The Hossman Family takes a slight break to enjoy a week of work-related travel.

I broke down and bought Guitar Hero for my Xbox 360.

Let’s recap my realm of dorkness: I am a Trekkie, I used to collect comic books, I played Dungeons and Dragons and I am a fanatic of fantasy football. Now let’s go ahead and add to it Guitar Hero: a plastic and fake guitar in my hands rocking out with my two dogs as my groupies.

Hossmom judged me. She judged me hard.

I didn’t care, I needed something that I could play to without connecting to the internet and what better way than to live out my fantasies of rock stardom. I asked Hossmom to take off her panties and throw them at me. Nada. I tried to get the cats to dance on stripper poles and in cages. Denied. I tried to get Little Hoss to rock out.

And she did.

Kids are demanding. I personally think that my kids are pretty much some of the best behaved kids that I have ever seen. That doesn’t mean that they don’t get to me to the point that I want to stick my head in the blinder.

Daddy I want this, Daddy I want that, Daddy why don’t you buy me more toys that I see and then will not like as soon as we get home. Sometimes, my two kids just drive me fucking insane.

But then the amazing happens and everything is forgiven. Something truly wonderful is given to me by my kids and I swear I have cried when it’s happened. I’m man enough to admit it.

And this was one of those times.

Little Hoss had never seen Guitar Hero before or me play it as I just got it. After Hossmom’s refusal to throw her undergarments at me, I thought that I would just have to forgo the rest of the fantasy.

But Little Hoss walked in, looked at the screen and I swear to you she said “Daddy, Rock Out?”

I was shocked, so I said “What baby?”

“Daddy, Little Hoss Rock!”

She then came and set on my lap. This moment was magical, I was acting on pure instinct. I took the fake guitar strap off my shoulders and draped it over Little Hoss. She snuggled in and gave me her hand. I took it, still not sure what was going to happen.

I plugged in a song—Welcome to the Jungle.

Could this be more perfect? Was this really going to happen? Was I going to forgo any and all father’s days presents for this one? You bet your ass I was.

The song started and I took Little Hoss’s hand. The riffs started coming and we got ready.

I started counting down for her and she joined in. “1, 2, 3!”

And then we strummed the fake guitar.

Her laughter was infectious. We wailed on that little fake Gibson. It was smoking as we both were laughing and rocking out to some classic G n’ R. I worked the fake frets and she worked the body, adding to each note her own laughter and her father’s admiration.

Again and again we played the different songs. We started throwing in moves. She started bobbing her head up and down and grunting. I started tilting the guitar back and throwing out some Gene Simmons tongue action. We had our first jam section and it was everything you would think it would be. She was on my lap, letting me hold her hand so she knew when to strum and me loving every minute of it.

Eventually she got tired of the rock and roll lifestyle and retreated. I thought that it was over. The dream was over and you can only ask for so much in a miracle. It was done. But it wasn’t, she had one more present for Hossdad.

“Daddy, get Bubba Hoss” she said.

Now, we were a band.

With Bubba Hoss working the strumming with his 6 month old fingers and Little Hoss saying “Rock! Rock! Rock! Rock!”, I have never been so proud of my kids. Both of them on my lap, rocking out to grunge, living a dream. We weren’t pretty, we butchered most of the songs but cut us a break, she’s only two.

I put the kids down for a nap and came back into the living room.

Hossmom picked up the fake guitar. Sat back in the chair and put on a little Poison. I haven’t seen Hossman play a video game in 10 years, but there she was, asking me how to play.

If the Partridge family did heavy metal, that’s who we would be.

Only someone would be throwing some panties at me during my solos.

4/14/08

My Kids Are Buttholes

For those that have kids, I want you to be honest about yourselves in today’s blog. It might be a little hard and there is a small chance that you may end up in jail. But it’s ok, they like young fresh meat like you. Use a little extra eye shadow though to cover up those tears because Bubba doesn’t like it when you cry. Just drink a lot of toilet wine and it’ll be ok. Keep telling yourself that until your parole hearing gets denied.

If you do get arrested for being honest in today’s blog, I’ll make sure I send you a carton of cigarettes a month so you can buy your own bitch.

Hossmom was approached the other day by an expectant mother. It seems that she called her dog a “butthole” and this was cause for concern. It appears that the expectant mother’s dog was misbehaving and then ignoring her. She was hurt, and emotional because she is pregnant and therefore crazy, so she said “Hey, don’t be a butthole” to her dog. Her husband told her not to call the dog a butthole because you wouldn’t call the baby a butthole. To which of course expectant mom’s response was that she would never call her own child a butthole, she is going to shower the child with love and every thing will be peaceful. I should mention that this is their first child.

You hear that in the background? That sound that is getting louder and louder? That’s the sound of every parent laughing and thinking that if all you call your kid is a “butthole”, then you will be ahead of the game.

Here’s my piece of honesty for today’s blog, which I’m sure will come up in some future divorce hearing: Hell, yes I’ve called my kids a butthole.

Look, we all know we love our kids very, very much. We would move heaven and earth to make them happy. We would gladly step in front of a moving train to save our kids and not even think twice about it.

But that doesn’t mean that our kids are always nice people. My 2 year old, and I do love her very much, is currently completely ruled by her id. She wants it and she wants it now.

“Daddy, Jack.” She says. This is 2-year-old code for “Father, it would give me much pleasure to watch the educational, yet highly entertaining show “Jack’s Big Music Show” currently running on the Noggin channel.”

“We are not watching Jack right now sweetheart, we are watching the news so Stay at Home Dad is not a moron.” I reply

This is when she picked up the remote and threw it at the dog. Now let me ask you, do you think she was being a butthole or an angel?

And this is not the only thing that she did that caused me to think this either. She can be a holy terror if she doesn’t get what she wants. And this is not a new thing either.

When Little Hoss was brand new into this world she was a handful. She wouldn’t sleep and she would scream her bloody head off. After a month of this, at 3 in the morning, I decided I would smack-talk her until she went back to sleep.

I told her that she could scream until the cows came home and that I would out-last her. I promised her that at her first slumber party I would walk out in my tighty whitey underwear with the greasy holes and embarrass her in front of all her friends. I told her that if she didn’t go to bed and let dad get at least 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep I would never ever take her to the mall. I told her she couldn’t drive until she was 18, she couldn’t date until she was 25 and that if she didn’t close her eyes right the hell now I was going to be proactive and start deducting her future allowance.

Two hours later she finally understood that I was serious. Then I took a shower and went to work so I could go buy her a new toy. Because I’m her dad and I love her more than anything and no matter what I will love her. But she can be a butthole.

I know it, you know it and everyone on aisle 12 of the grocery store knows it because she jerked down a jar of spaghetti sauce which, of course, shattered because I wouldn’t let her eat a banana before we paid for it. You think those poor guys who had to clean up her mess while she pulls a Gandhi, sitting in the middle of the aisle until I finally have to go over there and drag her away by her arm, yup, they think she was being a butthole.

And I’m sure that nice lady shopping for her nice little dinner thinks that she is a butthole too, because my daughter also decided that while I dragged her by her arm away from the candy aisle that she would go limp and not have any spine except when she had enough and kicked the innocent shopping lady. The lady was just minding her own business until Little Hoss kicked her while as I drug her away. The only guy in the whole store who didn’t think she was a butthole was the guy who has to dry-mop because we were doing a pretty damn good job of it.

That’s when I promised my little butthole that I would buy her a shovel so she could learn to dig ditches because there was no way in hell I was sending her to college now.

There’s this romantic idea of having kids. Your baby pops out, it holds your hand and then looks at you. It says “momma or dada” way before the charts say they should so she is obviously a genius. You go to school plays and your little angel sings the solo that gets her noticed by Julliard. She goes on a scholarship and then eventually goes on to fame and fortune and wins in a landslide the presidential election and names you the cabinet post on family values because you are the best parent. Ever.

You may be the best parent and those things may happen. But to get to that point, you have to be a good parent in the first place. And that means that there are going to be times when you have to lay down the boundaries. And she is going to hate you for it. And in hating you for it she is going to steal your wallet, go buy herself a tongue piercing and then shack up with Chester, her deadbeat boyfriend (who isn’t even in the band, but is just a roadie) for a day until you go and get her.

And when you find out, your first response is going to be: “Man, my daughter is being such a butthole.”

That’s not the worst thing you are going to think about your kids. You are going to think a lot more than that. There are going to be times when you are actually going to question whether this child actually came from your loins as she takes those juicy 15 oz steaks you were going to cook for a special dinner and feeds them to the dogs.

Hossmom and I had a good laugh at the expectant mom’s story and her husband’s worry. I wish them the best and I hope that they never think that their child is being a butthole. I hope that they get to sleep through the night immediately. I hope that this new child doesn’t think that the dog’s balls are a great thing to whack with a toy hammer. I really hope all these things for these people.

Now if you will excuse me, my two little buttholes keep getting out of bed, blissfully unaware that I am tracking each instance and will make sure that each transgression is paid back in spades.

4/10/08

Xbox: Off The Grid

When we moved to Kansas, we of course lost our internet connection. As we are in a rent house, from here out known as The Hut, until we buy a house (hurry the hell up already!), we will not be getting the connection here to save money for the next move.

I’m sure that there is mystery then about how I am continuing to post my blogs while I don’t have any connection. Let’s just say that I am dedicated and bribes were involved. Don’t ask me about my business again.

However, the true victim to all this is my Xbox and the lack of online justice I have been able to distribute.

This worries me. Who is going to smack down the 14 year-old jackass? He is out there laying down havoc on the defenseless older gamers and I am no where to be found. The over-30 crowd needs there Gandolf but I am currently fighting the Balrog of buying a foreclosed house.

Where is the arm of justice and the chainsaw of righteousness? Well, currently it is stuck watching “family TV” like America’s Next Top Model. My soul dies a little bit more every day.

They’re out there, I can see them in my sleep. I can see them ganging up some decrepit old fool who cries out “Lord Hoss, please help me!” only to have his prayers go unanswered.

And I can do nothing about it. I can do nothing because currently on my TV is the recap episode of the before mentioned America’s Next Top Model. You no longer see the flicker to my eyes, they have dimmed.

I need to get back online. I crave it, I hunger for it but there is nothing I can do about it. Oh, I tried. I’m not above a little trickery and back door dealing. I fired up the old laptop and did a search for any possible wireless connections that I may be able to get from my house.

I was an invisible signal in the night, looking to piggy back my greatness onto your broad band, my dear neighbors.

To my astonishment, there are 6 possible wireless connections. Gentlemen, we are in business.

It was not to be though. Because besides people stealing hubcaps in the ghetto, people are used to people jumping onto their connection. Everyone has wheel locks on their tires and password enabled connections. I was thwarted.

So I am once again foiled from joining the online gaming world once, to the detriment of the young people out there. They don’t realize this, but they need me. I am their digital father, they are my virtual children and I must teach them.

I will teach them the crushing swiftness of my vengeance. I will teach them the brutality of my virtue. I will teach them what it means to be a Knight of Hoss.

But most importantly, I will teach them not to be so god damn stupid. Seriously. You have no idea what I have heard these kids saying online. You know how they say that kids are our future? We should be terrified, we are fucked. Save money, don’t save money, it doesn’t really matter because in about 30 years one of these dumbshits is going to pass out from a bong hit directly on the red button and then we are done.

Unless I get on line, and soon, to teach them.

I once heard two gamers online discussing what the difference between Judaism and Christianity was. There final decision: Jews don’t celebrate Christmas. I wish to god I was making that up, but I’m not. They really said that. They really believed that. And I wish that is as far as it went. Listening to the conversation, it turns out that one gamer was a youth pastor at his church. I couldn’t take it. I lectured them for a good 10 minutes on the many differences and similarities on the two. I’m not religious and don’t claim to be a scholar, but god damn, what was I supposed to do? Where the hell are these kids parents?!

But that’s not all. Other conversations I’ve had to lay my wisdom down on:

A very serious discussion on Morphine and how the only way you can be given it is by injection. I would at least think that this generation would know their shit about drugs.

The bill of rights. As in how many amendments there are. They came up with 8. Hello, welcome to Papa Hoss’s American History 101.

L. Ron Hubbard vs. Gene Rodenberry. I swear to you, I didn’t start this topic but I just happen to be a Trekkie. As soon as they proclaimed that Gene started Scientology I screamed and then I cried. For punishment, after I set the record straight, I then gave them the genealogy of Captain Kirk.

Which band did Slash play with (past and current) because they were talking about Guitar Hero III. I couldn’t take this one, I just shut the Xbox off and walked away.

So you see, they need me. They need me for your sakes unless you want to eventually end up with Jimbo your local neighborhood heart surgeon who believes that your left ventricle is located just below your right knee. Face it, you need me. GET ME BACK ONLINE!!

But no, instead I’m watching Top Chef because America’s Next Top Model is over. I tried to at least play Xbox offline but no, I was ruined there as well. We only hooked up one TV where I can play but it does not appear that I can play during chick night.

Alexander the Great never had these problems.

When the time comes though, and believe me it will come, I will be rested and prepared. I will paint my face like Braveheart. I will tell my digital characters that Aye, fight and you may die. Run, and you'll live... at least a while. And dying in your beds, many years from now, would you be willin' to trade ALL the days, from this day to that, for one chance, just one chance, to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they'll never take... OUR FREEDOM!

They may take our internet connection, but they will never take our CONTROLERS!

4/8/08

The Stem Fell Off The Apple

We have friends who are having a girl. It’s his first girl and I hope to impart some wisdom onto him from what I have learned having a girl. I will tell him the things that no one told me. I took all the classes, was at every doctors appointment and was very active right up to the point of birth.

My wife and I decided not to find out what the sex of our first child was going to be so when they pulled out a little girl, I was shocked.

I had prepared for a boy. I was 99% sure that I was having a boy. I was so sure that my wife and I just picked out the name the night before for a girl. I figured that my uber-Hoss sperm would produce a male. It’s strong and virile, how could I not have a boy?

So when they pulled out a little girl, I was completely unprepared. Like every expectant father I had gone to the toy store. The first toy I bought my unborn child was a hammer. The second was a football. I had my bases covered, I was ready for a boy. I was not ready for a girl. But that didn’t matter much because here she was, Little Hoss was in the world and it was my job to be a kickass Dad.

That was two years ago and I have learned a lot. It was tough and there was a lot of guess work involved but I feel that my daughter and I have made it through the rough times and are on the solid track for her to hate me when she turns 13. It’s expected and I bear her no ill will.

First things first, the plumbing. With my son (six months), I have no problem with what is going on in the low blow area. I know how that works, I have been dealing with that for 33 years so I consider myself somewhat of an authority on it. Changing him is just like cleaning myself after a drunken night in college.

With a girl, it’s different and no one tells you shit. This is what you need to know my friend—girls pee differently. Sounds simple? Not so much.

There came a day the first month of Little Hoss’s life that I hadn’t changed a diaper in 5 or 6 hours. This did not seem normal to me. The doctors had imparted the knowledge that we should be doing this at least 8 times a day and so far we were well behind the quota. I was starting to freak out.

This couldn’t be normal so I called the after hours nurse. She asked me if she was eating normally. I said I think so, but in the first month, none of this was normal so what the hell do I know? She then asked me if my daughters mouth was dry.

How do the hell are you supposed to know? What’s dry and what isn’t? She wasn’t currently drooling, so possibly, maybe? I stuck my finger in my daughter’s mouth and it felt dryer than my slobbering dog’s mouth, so I said maybe.

The nurse then told us to go to the emergency room because it sounded like our young delicate child was dehydrated and this was very serious. Not news that a first time parent wants, so I pack up the Hossman family and off we go.

The nurse at the hospital looks at us in our panic and then lays Little Hoss on the table. She takes off her diaper and then starts laughing. I wonder why the medical emergency of my daughter is so god damn funny and I start to think maybe I should pop the nurse a good one to get her under control. She then calls me over and asks me to feel the back of the diaper.

So I did. It weighed about five pounds and was soaking wet. This is when I learned my first lesson about having a girl and their pee. All their pee settles in the back of their diaper, not the front. To me, this defies the laws of physics but it is none the less true.

The nurse was having a ball. I got the bill for that later. I call it my 60 dollar diaper change. It is now in our family lore. You think that this would be covered somewhere, but it wasn’t.

Second lesson that my friend should know about girls. In the first month, while they are breast feeding, blood will show up in their diaper. The first time I saw this, I again freaked.

All boys everywhere know that blood in urine is a very, very bad thing for us. It means that the Me Suckie Suckie hooker you got wasn’t as clean as you had hoped and you now have a very bad case of crotch rot.

But for a new born girl, this is completely normal. It appears, and they should really tell fathers this, that this is completely normal and that it is caused by the hormones mom is passing along. Hossmom told me this right before I was about to chew the doctor out on the phone. I have no idea how she knew this as I attended every same class as her. For the next 3 days though I was hovering over that child looking for any sign of herpes that I could see, ready to spring into action. So, my friend, when your girl has blood in her urine, it’s ok. It does not mean that some unclean ugly baby in the nursery next to your daughter gave her gonorrhea from the toilet seat.

Moving on. There will come a time, somewhere when you daughter can learn to grab for stuff, that you will be walking into a store. 5 minutes in and she will grab something off the shelf. She won’t even be that interested in it but this is what will go through your mind: “She’s my princess. If I don’t buy this for her then she will think I am a bad father. I’ll think I’m a bad father. I’m going to buy it.”

So you’ll buy whatever she grabbed off the shelf in order to buy your daughters affection. It may be a new toy, it may be a power washer, you are going to buy it. Father’s can’t help it. NEVER, under any circumstances, take your daughter to a jewelry store. This is the precise moment that you will realize that you are not all that “strict” and that your daughter has got you completely wrapped around her finger. Just remember this: clear cut diamonds are EXPENSIVE, you deadbeat.

Finally, never, under any circumstances, should you dress your daughter by yourself without having mom pick out the clothes first. Trust me on this, I have tried many times. She ends up looking like some extra in the movie Mad Max. Everyone knows that we mean well, but we just can’t do it. Mismatching socks will be the least of your concerns. No one will notice that as they call child welfare because your daughter has on a pajama top that you mistook for normal daytime wear.

I could go on and on here for my friend. The 2 and ½ years that I have had my daughter has been one of the greatest pleasures of my life but has also let me know what a complete idiot I am. Every moment that goes by with her I am grateful that I had her first. Each day she finds a way to break my heart just a little bit more and make me even more proud of her.

In the beginning I was a little rough around the edges, a little too hard for my own good. Visions of my son playing linebacker needed to be replaced. She needed to knock me down a few pegs so that I could be a truly caring father, one that had to learn that my expectations of my kids should not exceed who they are.

Now if you will excuse me for a moment, the circus is in town and I have to go talk to a guy about buying an elephant.

4/7/08

Cribs

Welcome MTV, this is my home.

Yup, this is just temporary but we hope to able to pimp it out as much as possible. Let me show you around Ghetto Loving, as we call it.

Right here in the front room is the living room/dining room/play room/reading room/foyer/octagon/sun room. Since we don’t want to say that every time we show our home, we just call it The Great Room. This room shows the level of our pimpage by being able to combine so many rooms into just this one small room. At 1000 square feet for a family of 4 and 4 pets, we make sure everything is utilized to the maximum.

What I want to point out in this room is the big power chair in the middle. You see, not only do I make my godfather like decisions from this chair daily, such as what flavor we are going to go with at snack time, but we also use the chair to split the room in two so that the table is in the “dining room” and not the “living room.” I know, pretty cool, you don’t see that every day, do you?

If you look to the right you will see the armoire that we usually keep in the master bedroom but for reasons that will become clear, we have to keep it out here. Instead of keeping my TV and my Xbox in there, we use it for toys, books and the occasional cat puke that her highness deposits late at night.

If you come just past the great room you will enter our kitchen. How’s that for counter space? We might be able to fit a whole watermelon up there if we take the microwave off of it first. And yup, that’s the oven right over there in the corner, where there are no counters. Because honestly, who needs counter space when you cook?

Let’s take a look in the fridge. This is the best fridge that money could buy in 1979. Notice the lack of any cold air coming from the freezer, nice huh? Now what do I have in here, I know MTV always wants to know.

This here is the Cristal of powdered drinks. Crystal Light is cheap and comes 5 to a can. We drink this all week. Back in the middle there we also have the lunch meats mixed in with the vegetables and left over tomato soup. It’s what we call a space saving fridge, we try to be green in this house.

Let’s check out the one bathroom in the house, shall we? Please, don’t shut the door because it sticks and we might not be able to get back out. Not that we have made that mistake often because the bathroom is small enough that you can’t shut the door while you are making poops in here. So most of the time we leave it open and turn on the water so no one can hear our business. But be careful when you flush because when the dishwasher runs, the toilet won’t flush and overflows, so we have to be careful of that.

That’s also true of the shower. Whatever is washed down the kitchen sink has the potential to come up from the shower drain when the dishwasher runs so we just try to work around that.

Just outside the bathroom is the “master bedroom.” The mattress on the floor is so pimp, don’t you think? That’s were all the magic happens. Yeah, we couldn’t fit our actual bed in here so we just had to use the box springs and the mattress. It’s good for the circulation though, at least that’s what my wife tells me each morning as I roll to the floor to find my shoes.

The closet is almost big enough to fit a hanger, so we try to hang up a few things but as you can see we fold up most of our stuff and just put in on a shelf. It’s tough to get socks to stay up there but we manage.

Right across from room is the kid’s room. Say hi Little Hoss. “What’s up, homey?”

We keep both kids in here. We figure that it will make them closer as they grow up. This room actually works out pretty well. Sure the kids wake each other up each night around 3 am but competition to see who can scream louder really shows the bonds they are building.

Hey, MTV! Don’t go in that room!

We don’t go in that room much. See, we had planned to move into a bigger house but Hossmom’s company wanted us up here pretty quick so we just had to rent the first house we could. We decided to go on the cheap and save some money while we looked for a house. So here we are. This room here is used for storage, as well as the garage. I think it gives us a nice fire hazard look that I know the neighbors are just green over.

Let’s go to the backyard. Watch your head though, the electrical wires are very low strung so you have to duck a little or you are going to get shocked. My daughter has started to imitate me so that every time we go to the backyard we duck down together in a sweet father/daughter ballet.

Ok MTV, that’s my house. Hopefully we’ll be in our new house in a month as soon as Hossmom picks out one she likes. But that could take a while.

Now, GET OUT!

4/4/08

Cat-tastic

She comes out to her backyard every day around 10:00 am. She’s dressed in a green coat with the hood pulled up so that we can’t see her face. Our backyards connect to each other and by now she has got to know that I watch her every morning.

She looks to be an older lady, maybe in her late 50’s but it’s hard to tell because sometimes the trees block my view. I have to go out and trim them soon so my neighbor stalking can be more efficient. I do the dishes and watch her, entranced.

As she walks out of the house she has a little ball on a string. It’s a brightly colored ball, I think rainbow colors. But then again, I’m slightly color blind, so it could be plaid for all I know.

I see her step out into her yard and begin to play with her pet. It jumps, runs around the yard, sometimes even stops at her feet and looks up to her for a treat.

It’s a weird looking little dog. Very puffy with a weird face that’s hard to see because of the extra puff that surrounds it face. It’s a pretty quick little thing, probably has to be to catch that ball every morning and leave me spellbound by my morning visits.

It’s on the third day in our new neighborhood in ghetto-loving bliss, that I notice that it’s not a dog at all.

It’s a cat.

In Texas we had neighbors that were ex-meth users. But hey, addiction is a day by day battle; I just don’t want my neighbors to battle it in my front yard. These are the same neighbors that the wife came over to my house at midnight to say “hi.”

Neither of them worked and I wasn’t sure how they could afford to live in the house. After they built the 10 foot high fence, my wife was absolutely sure that they had an open field of the best hydroponics and a group of Umpa Lompa’s working for “special brownies.” The smell of their weekend Pink Floyd concerts would waft over our fence.

Flat out, they were weird.

Leaving Texas, I thought that we were done with the whole screwball neighbor thing. We were going to Kansas, rolling hills of amber grain, clear open skies and apparently people who play with their cats like they are dogs.

Seriously, I don’t think I have seen anything weirder from my backyard.

I have tried to understand this. I have tried to watch and see what kind of forbidden dance this is, I have tried to understand, but God help me I just can’t.

What the hell is going on? Every morning this happens and I just can’t figure it out.

I have two cats and I don’t play with them in the backyard at all. In fact, I try to stay away from one of them as much as possible because she is constantly trying to kneecap me.

Cats are evil and I wonder if this cat lady neighbor knows this as she throws the ball across the lawn for her cat. My cat would go after the ball, dig up her Glock that she had buried there and then come back and kneecap me.

I know that my cat is constantly plotting against me, trying to figure ways to rub me out. In her closet, which she rarely leaves, I once found a dead rat hooked up to some wires and a car battery I see nothing and the game goes on. Her trying to tear my Achilles and me trying to pretend that she does not exist.

So what’s this game that the cat in the backyard is playing, what’s his angle? Is he confusing the women, masquerading as a dog to lull this woman into a false level of security so that she thinks she is safe from someone breaking into her house only to open the door herself and letting the marauders in? There’s an angle here, I know it and everyday that I watch, I fear for the lady’s safety. Should I do something? Should I put a contract out on the cat? That may be my only option.

But it wouldn’t do any good because cats can’t die. Nine lives is the estimate but it’s on the low side.

I have another cat that basically uses me and my house like it’s a youth hostel. He goes away for days at a time, comes home to eat, poops and then leaves again. On occasion he’ll throw up in the hallway in the middle of the night so that I step in it the first thing in the morning. He spent a lot of time over at the Texas neighbor’s house on the weekends and would come home very stinky and craving Doritos.

This cat has cheated death on numerous times. A couple of years ago he was running from a dog and pulled his Achilles heel as he just narrowly missed gaping jaws. That little injury cost me 2,000 bucks to fix. I had to keep him in a cast and in a kennel for 2 months. For 2 months he was not allowed to move and he used that time to further plot against me.

As soon as I let him out he attacked a bird but he lost. I heard him screeching under the car as he got repeatedly dive bombed by something that he couldn’t attack from behind. He’s sneaky and my car got dented.

A week ago he was out in the ghetto hood that we live in scoping out places that he could snipe me when he was hit by a car. Don’t worry, he’s fine. He ain’t so pretty anymore, but he’s fine. He’s fine because we had to make an emergency trip to the vet and spend another 500 bucks. He’s got a skinned head, a bloody nose and lost some teeth but that’s it.

He’s the terminator, you can’t stop him. But he’s not the brains behind this operation. The closet cat remains the godfather and I know what they are trying to do.

I went over my vet bills for the last couple of years and I have spent 4,000 bucks on the outside cat. They are trying to bleed me dry, weaken me financially and disrupt the Hossman economy to create discord, then they will attack.

So I watch this lady and her cat every morning trying to figure out what scheme is being played out. Although I don’t want to watch to closely, they don’t like witnesses. She tosses the ball, he goes and gets it. She twirls the ball on the stick, he chases it.

I miss the meth neighbors.

4/1/08

Middle America

I am a 33 year old white male living in middle America. I honest to God mean that I live right in the smack dab middle of the country.

You know what this means, right? This means that I am America. I am in the key demographic that everyone wants. I am the exact guy that they want in the polls. That means that my opinion matters and therefore I rule the country in a very backdoor way.

I am the puppet master that pulls the strings. I just sit around and wait for the call.

“Hi sir, we are conducting a survey for the upcoming elections. Are you a white male in middle America?”

“Why yes, yes I am.”

“Good sir. Today’s question is: Do you believe that pink hearts should remain in Lucky Charms?”

“You damn right I do!” I say with middle American authority.

“Understood sir. I’ll call the CEO and make sure that they don’t remove them.”

“And make them bigger, I want bigger marshmellows!”

“Consider it done, sir.”

Dance monkeys. Dance.

I try to wield my power with wisdom and grace. I have a bald cat that I stroke only occasionally when I make my decisions so none of this goes to my head.

It is with that attitude that I try restrain myself so the little people can decide what they want to do for themselves, as long as the marshmellows in my Lucky Charms don’t change. I am more than willing to sit back and let the world run itself while me and my evil cat, she’s very, very evil—this is not a joke, eat chocolate covered babies.

As a result of my wisdom, usually I stay out of politics on the blog. I don’t want to sway millions of people into becoming mindless sheep. I want to encourage free thought and independence, to make a choice for themselves and for the first time in over a hundred years: don’t listen to middle America.

Besides, if you write about politics you become another mind numbing political blogger, and do we really need more of those dipshits? Right wing, left wing, Libertarian. Nutjobs, nutjobs, nutjobs. The extreme on any side of any issue is usually a bad idea which is why I also started the Common Sense Party (read the blog about border fences.)

But I find myself not being able to hold back with these up coming elections. I believe that it is time for middle America to speak and for the monkeys to tango. I run the risk of sounding just like another political blog but I’ll correct that tomorrow with a blog about my daughter licking everything in sight like she is a dog. That should get me right on track again.

Now with any political blog you are going to piss off about half the people that read it, sometimes more, sometimes less. You will get the other half praising your insight and ready to name their children “ESPN” if you ask them to. There is no “bridge” building. It’s just name calling and accusations of being a traitor to your country if you don’t support what ever ideal you’re supposed to support.

My goal is to go beyond all in today’s blog and piss off just about everyone. I believe that it is in my power. But remember, I’m a 33 year old white male living in middle America, I have to be right, traitor.

Who are you going to vote for? Republican, democrat, some other schmo that we all know really doesn’t have a chance in hell of winning. Keep going Al Sharpton, you make things fun.

Well, here’s my take on it. You all are a bunch of dipshits.

What? No, he couldn’t have said that?? This guy is crazy, take away his middle America card, move him back to Texas!

Piss and moan all you want, it’s basically true. People spend so much time trying to identify themselves with one specific party that they forget to ask themselves, is this good for the country? Somehow that gets lost in the analyzing process and it bugs the crap out of me.

But take a good look at things and ask yourself, what the hell, man? That’s all you need to do this time around. Go outside your front door, sit on your porch and ask yourself what the hell. That’s where we should all start and that’s where I started when I thought about writing this blog.

This is what I came up with.

I’m not entirely happy with the way the country is being run. I have some Republican leanings, some democratic leanings and I’m sure you could pigeon hole me into some weird UFO cult as well. But the basic answer to my “what the hell” question is still the same: I’m just not to happy with what’s occurred.

You can blame it on Republicans or you can blame it on Democrats and you can even blame it on that weird guy that dances on the corner for money to some Techno tune with the rasta beat that you pass by everyday as you go to work.

The truth is that they are all to blame. Every single politician currently holding office is to blame regardless of what party he is affiliated with. It’s just that simple. I know you think I am now a nutjob which puts me well within the realm of a political blogger. But look, we elected these people, all of them, to do a job. We basically said make my life better. They failed. In the real world, this means we would fire them. That’s what I intend to do with my vote this time around. Whoever the incumbent is, I’m not voting for him. I don’t care about party affiliation. It’s just that they fucked up, so they got to go.

Harsh and extreme, I know and I’m sure that by adopting my strategy that a few good politicians will be pushed out as well. Tough tittie. Sorry, go get a real job. When I played football, if a fellow player fucked up in class, we all had to run laps until we puked. The coaches’ reason was that we didn’t do enough to stop him and his behavior is a direct result of our inaction. We decided that the coach was right so we pounded the guy and he was smiley Charlie from then on out.

You want a real world example. Sure, no problem. The Patriot Act.

There you go. There is a piece of legislation that they (all parities) pushed through by pandering and fear mongering. Go ahead and argue against that viewpoint, I would love to hear it, then go back to your D&D board game while the rest of us try to fix this shit.

Is it any wonder that the powers that be exceeded their authority , several thousand times, using that law as a basis. Go ahead, Google “National Security Letters” and let me know what you find out.

In the meantime, I will be enjoying my new and enlarged Lucky Charm’s pink hearts.