Top 10 Things I Freakishly Enjoy

Yesterday I pulled up to the gas station to piss away even more money to “the man.” I did my usual dumping of my car garbage, then grabbed the squeegee and started cleaning my windows.

Completely soaked in 22-day-old non-soapy water, my windows were ready to be squeegeed off. As I slowly pulled that first line of water off I felt the day’s tenseness go away. The second line I felt even more relaxed. By the time the entire windshield was done I felt like a badass and the entire day’s insanity slip away!

OK, not that good, but damn it was a weird spooky kind of relief.

I got back in the car completely freaked out by myself and thought, “that’s just one of those uncommon satisfying things in life that you just kinda secretly enjoy.”

So what are 10 other weird and spooky things that satisfy which I probably shouldn’t reveal?

1) Wiping down the bathroom sink so it’s absolutely spotless. Little dinky hairs, puddles of water, toothpaste globs, boogers…you name it. They collect in the most bizarre places of the sink. Taking my wet hand and cleaning it down is therapeutic in a freaky way.

2) Armor Alling my car dashboard. Seriously…when it’s done and the smell is in the car…I just want to put Led Zeppelin Physical Graffitti in the CD player, go for a ride with the windows down and blare the hell out of the radio.

3) Lawn dances. I won’t lie…I love them. Give me a wedding, eight beers, a shot of Jager, a good song and a dance floor and I’m in heaven. I’ll be doing the “lawn mower” and “weed eater” all night.

4) Speaking of weed-eating…creating perfectly trimmed grass along sidewalks and boarders makes me literally need to take a cold shower afterwards. It’s lawn maintenance porn.

5) Crossing the finish line of a half-marathon race. It’s indescribable. You’re happy, elated, sick, exhausted, motivated, and humbled all at once.

6) Turning my fan to the number 3 setting and sliding my dumb-ass into bed.

7) After 12 minutes of digging, cutting, digging deeper, and almost giving up, finally pulling that damn splinter from your body.

8) Holy shit do I love corn on the cob. The greatest thing ever invented. But damn those stringy annoying thingies that jam ever so strategically in-between your teeth! So when a toothpick slides one of those out from in-between my fucked-up teeth it’s so amazing!

9) Sliding a key along the spine of a new music CD to cut the cellophane that wraps it. Pulling it off, opening the case and the smell that tickles your nose of the freshly printed CD jacket and all the awesomeness it holds.

10) Clipping that annoying toenail. You know…the one that sticks out ever-so-slightly so that it rubs against the toe next to it and makes you want to rip someone’s head off?! Yeah…smoothing that bad-boy out is so freakin’ awesome!

That’s it for today’s freak-show. That’s just a few of my weirdness that is o-so-satisfying in a “daddy, you’re weird!!!” kinda way.

What’s yours?!!! Leave a comment.

If I Were A Parental Crack Dealer

“Daddy!!! I can’t go to sleep!!”

Holy mother of all things that make me want to slam my head in the door…that one ranks up there near the top.

Every time the wifey and I hear that, our first response is to pound the pause button on the remote of whatever mindless insanity we’re watching, look at each other and drop our heads in that position that screams “are you fucking kidding me?”

We quickly draw straws (or actually the wife gives me that look like “you better take your ass up there chump!”) and  I make my way upstairs to explain to the children that “daddy has no magical pixy dust to toss in the air allowing my sweet SWEET children to fall patiently and quietly into slumber land.”

This is often met by, “aaawwww come on daddy…my eyes don’t want to shut!!!”

Or, “But it’s not night time yet!!!”

Or my favorite, “can’t I just have dinner?”

As if I didn’t just spend the past hour fighting them to chow their nighttime morsels.

Wouldn’t it be fantasticly awesome if we, as parents, had nighttime flakes allowing anyone we sprinkle them on to experience an eight-hour blissful sleep?

It would be the parental crack we’ve all been searching for.

No longer would Friday nights be filled with fathers surrounding grills, wives sipping wine and laughing in a corner while the kids destroy house and home.

Instead wives would be sipping wine and glaring at their watches like hawks as husbands flocked to their favorite dealer in the hopes of scoring even a dime-bag of the “I Cant’ Sleep Daddy” dust.

Parental mobs would storm the streets burning down businesses and taking over governmental positions to make sure “I Can’t Sleep Daddy” dust was considered “medicinal.”

Then “clicks” would form along the school playground as parents divide themselves amongst “those who have kids addicted to the ‘Sleepy Daddy’ dust,” and those who simply kiss their parents on the forehead, thank them for providing them with the greatest life ever, and nod quietly off to sleep.

Eventually all hell would break loose on the football field as the favorite quarterback, who according to Susan is a “Daddy Dust” user, throws the game-losing touchdown and suddenly it becomes a city-wide school board issue.

Actually, now that I think about it…it’s not worth it. I guess I’ll just stick to the old fashioned parental rhetoric of explaining to the children that daddy’s only magical power is to piss off their mother in 2.1 seconds flat.

And, I’ll save the magical sleeping dust for myself.

I Sleep Naked

Grab your puke buckets kids cause it's true.

I sleep naked.

Call it being sexually hopeful mixed with trying to be comfortable and add a dash of hating to wear clothes and walla! You’ve got a 35-year-old douche with back-hair his wife won’t shave for him who occasionally gets sweaty-ass syndrome when he’s nervous sleeping like a neurotic bear.

I remember in college when my roommate used to go home for the weekend I double and triple checked the door to make sure it was locked, slid out of my boxers, climbed into bed, and dozed off into slumber land with a huge stupid grin on my face.

When the wifey moved in with me I spent a few months being hesitant about revealing my love for sleeping naked.

“What if she thinks I’m gonna try and molest her in the middle of the night and gets all Lorena Bobbit on me?” I thought.

Shortly after, I dropped trou and never looked back.

Then we had kids.

When they were babies all was good. They had no idea at 2:16 a.m. as they screamed and cried while I changed their diaper and the wife dropped a boob in their mouth that daddy’s ding-a-ling was swinging free.

As wee toddlers they’d come in the bedroom but were too small to actually make the long-distance journey to the peak of the bed which gave me ample time to do a pillow tuck and cover.

Then…they got older.

This past weekend I woke-up and followed-through with my religious morning routine which encompasses time alone kidless and wifeless as they lay slumber above my head. A couple hours later as the wife came to life she said, “you really need to start wearing underwear when you sleep.”

I was all, “over my dead body woman!”

“Well, your daughter came into our bedroom last night and you were laying buck-naked on top of the sheets, on your back, with your entire package presented for the world and your daughter to see. And she saw… She saw it all.”

And that’s when it hit home. Sure there’s the occasional turn the corner while daddy’s getting out of the shower and see a split second of his pecker before the towel blocks the horror. There’s the walking in while daddy’s just finishing pulling up the undies and seeing a milla-second shot of his ass before boxer-briefs do their job.

But nothing. NOTHING. Is like the scaring of a young girl sleepily walking into her parents’ bedroom at 2 in the morning and finding her father counting sheep with his “sheers” laying flaccid for the world to see.

Well…I guess the only other worse scenario is if she caught her daddy actually using those “sheers” on mommy.

So chalk-up another long-loved comfort gone out the window. I now sleep clad in cotton and am none-to-happy about it.



Alcohol Filled Grenades

Remember those days when you used to be able to pour a beer or glass of wine or both, and leave them sitting on the counter or coffee table and they would be there when you got back?

Since the infestation of children in our lives, alcoholic beverages have been like grenades throughout the house.

You place them down and walking away is like pulling the pin. You have just seconds before it’s knocked over, shattered, kicked, or used because, “my horsey wanted some water.”

And literally making matters worse…my damn cat is obsessed with knocking over full glasses of liquid.

I have a mental list of areas throughout the house that are not only out of the reach of the kids, but tight enough that my fat-ass cat has no chance in cat-hell to get anywhere near it.

Those spots are almost as precious as those along the wooden steps in our house that don’t creak in the early morning when the children are on the brink of cock-blocking a solid hour of silence, coffee, and the newspaper.

The trouble is always remembering if I’d finished that beer or placed it in one of my sacred kid-free places.

If it’s a particular late night with friends I’ll spend a good half-hour on a scavenger hunt searching for half-full beers or overflowing glasses of wine. Somewhere in the middle I’d ultimately get completely turned around checking and re-checking spots.

Eventually, our guests will find me in the fetal position, sucking my thumb, crying and carving messages into the wall with my jagged thumbnail.

But I guess everything in the house suffers the same possible destruction.

When I was dating the wifey in high school I was notorious for breaking lamps, vases and chairs in her mom’s house. Clumsy, no self control and stupidity were the main culprits.

So who am I to judge the nippers for being who they are and just flat out flailing around the house in the midst of a giggle-filled tickle rages and taking down beers, wine and lamps in their wake?

Maybe I should just attach flashing beacons to my beers. That way I’d always know where I left them.

Either that or I’d spend way too much time having seizures.

It's What's For Dinner

Son: “Dad, what’s for dinner?”

Me: “Pork chops in a pineapple-glazed honey sauce with jasmine rice and edamame .”

Son: “AWWWWWW!!! NOOOO Dad!!! Aw come-on!! Can’t we have pizza?”

And that’s how our nights begin these days.

The kids love rice. They love honey. They love pineapple. And if you put a bowl of edamame in the middle of a room and unleash the little bastards they’ll literally fight to the death until it’s all gone.

Feeding edamame to them is like tying down a small child and throwing it into a room full of zombies. Yeah…like that.

But when you lovingly toss it all together on a plate, gleefully place it in front of the troops, stand back and wait for the overwhelming cheers…all we get is the kid’s version of Chef Ramsay.

“Dad! What the fuck is this you donkey? Come here…taste this! It’s crap dad! Crap!”

I absolutely love cooking. There’s nothing better than cranking the radio, pouring a full glass of red wine and knocking out a killer meal. But with the birth of two little rug-rats we’ve fallen victim to the lure of eating out.

Sitting at a table, having beer brought to you on demand without having to lift a finger while plates of goodness are brought is such a wonderful thing. But damn that’s expensive.

And sushi is…make that “was”…our weakness. We LOVE sushi!!! But damn it’s expensive.

The boy has to learn to eat food that costs less than $50 to create. The girl…well, she would eat chicken nuggets and chicken noodle soup until the world ended.

So, we’ve taken the old school “we used to walk to school uphill both ways” philosophy of parenting.

Last night we fed them pork chops. They tried it. They hated it. They went to bed with empty stomachs. And, yes…I showed them the trash can with their food in it and said, “daddy listened to a story on the radio today where a lady who struggles for food said a good day for her is when she gets half a glass of goat milk and cornmeal soup for the day.”

To help the message sink in further, maybe weekend we’ll take the boy to a soup kitchen.

I won’t categorize the experience as learning through guilt. Instead, I chalk it up as teaching through reality.

I’ll know I’m successful when he cleans his plate and then says, “dad, can we volunteer at the soup kitchen again this weekend?”

OK, now I’m dreaming. So I’ll lower my goals and just shoot for the clean plate.