Birthday Cake & Boobies

Last night I laid in bed with the boy like I always do, shooting the shit, making him laugh, making up stories...

Ten minutes later the wife hopped in bed to say good night. One minute later the daughter jumped in too.

For the next 10 minutes “boobs” were focus of this unique impromptu family gathering. And here’s how it went:

Daughter: “Grayson, you remember the story about you pooping and getting a birthday cake?”

Me: “You mean when we promised brother we’d give him a whole cake if he ever pooped in the toilet instead of his diaper?”

Wife: “And he did!”

Daughter: “Why didn’t I get any of that cake daddy?!!”

Me: “You did. Trust me…you were a baby, mommy chowed down on that cake and you got it through mommy’s milk!”

Son: “Hahaha you drank birthday cake through mommy’s boobies!! Haha”

Me: “Umm soo did you chief. For 13 months you drank from mom’s boob.”

Son: “NO I DIDN’T!!!”

Daughter: “Haha Grayson drank mommy’s boobie!”

Wife: “So did you dear…for six months you drank from my boobies.”

Son: “Yeah!!!!! See Macy…haha…you drank on mommy’s boobs, too!”

Daughter: “Yeah, but I got birthday cake!”

Son: “Daddy did you get any birthday cake through mommy’s boobies?”

Despite my natural desire to want to answer the question with exaggerated stories surrounding the glories breasts of my wife, I (for once) looked at my wife and reacted accordingly to her “say one word and I’ll cut you” glare.

Me: “No son…I have never, nor will I ever have cake from mommy’s boobies.”

Wife: “That was one of the most painful things you’ve ever done wasn’t it?”

Me: “You have no idea. I need to be alone for a while.”

Wife: “Just make sure you clean-up afterwards.”

Son: “Why does daddy need to be alone mommy?”

Wife: “Your daddy really really LOVES birthday cake and talking about it really made him want some.”

Daughter: “Do you have birthday cake in your boobies right now mommy?”

Wife: “No dear, mommy’s boobies have all dried up and are purely ornamental at this point.”

Son: “Your boobs are like ornaments on a tree?”

Wife: “Ummm…yeah, I guess that’s one way to put it.”

Son: “You’ve got big ornaments mommy.”

Wife: “OK…and with that let’s go to bed kids!!”

Our Neighbors Think We're Heathens

My neighbors think we’re horrific parents.

I’m convinced of this is fact.

It’s spring, everyone’s outside, windows are open, wind’s blowing in the right direction…life couldn’t be better. We live in a very urban area – I can almost touch my house and my neighbor’s house at the same time.

So, I’m outside drinking wine and watching the kids live-out their childhood. Occasionally I’ll wave to a neighbor with that calm, collective, “what’s up man! Life’s good…just relaxing with the family” kinda wave.

Usually that’s the kid’s cue to go absolutely ballistic.

Immediately the boy yells “I said no Macy now STOOOOOP!!!!” Then rides away on his bicycle towards the corner of the street inches from going into traffic.

As I’m running down the sidewalk carrying wine, yelling “HONEY…GRAB MACY…SHE’S BLEEDING” I happen to notice half the neighborhood stopping mid-discussion and turning towards our rabid family.

“WHAT?!” my wife screeches from inside the house.

“GRAB MACY…GRAYSON MADE HER BLEED AND NOW HE’S RIDING HIS BIKE INTO TRAFFIC!!”

This is where I bring the scene to a screeching halt and reveal that we are actually the “older” family on the block. My kids are almost 6 and 8. The average age of the rest of the block’s children… 1.7 years old. So they’re standing there in horror as they watch elements of parenthood unfold that they have yet to experience.

As they gather their children and herd them away from the scene with disappointing looks on their faces I can almost hear them mumbling “we’ll never be like that will we George?”

“Never Marcia. We’ll never parent like those heathens!”

The neighborhood air is consistently filled with the loving ramblings of our family-of-four as sentiments such as these come flying out our house windows regularly:

 “I said GO BRUSH YOUR TEETH!!! How many times do I have to ask you?”

“I AAAMMMM finishing in the shower…geeeeze!!”

“OOOOWWWW daddy!!! Your pulling my hair, let me comb it!!!”

“Mooooommmyyyyyyy Macy won’t stop snoring!!”

“NO! You cannot have a chocolate bar while you go to sleep!! That’s just insane! Now go to bed!!”

“But honey!!! I thought tonight was really going to be ‘the’ night!?”

I think back to before we had kids and I remember the many times in the grocery seeing the mother say to the little boy, “stop touching things on the shelf. Do you hear me?! One more time Mr. and you’re in BIG trouble.”

And I always thought…I’d never, NEVER talk to MY kids like that. Guess it goes to show the number one rule as a parent is never say “I’ll never.”

Now if I can get my wife to stop talking to me like that in the grocery…

WARNING: You Are Experiencing Children

Most mornings I watch the Today Show in the a.m. Not sure why, but I do.

The other day I’m metro-sexually ironing my clothes, watching the Today Show while thinking to myself, “damn they have a ton of drug commercials on here.”

Naturally…this led me to wonder, “wouldn’t it have been great if my little bastards were born with a warning label like those seen on drug commercials?

All parents would have to agree– hell yes it would. Here’s how my kids’ labels would have read…

(Background image – perfect family, wearing J. Crew clothes, beautiful kids running around an immaculate yard, very clean dog leaping around playfully with the children who are getting along gleefully as the parents enjoy wine in peace, while wearing stylish clothes, and sporting huge smiles because they know they’ll have intense, uninterrupted sex later that night)

Meanwhile, the following is being read by some out-of-work, douchebag ex-dj announcer guy:

“Children are not for everyone. Children may cause you to want to harm mass groups of people for no apparent reason. While pregnant with children you may notice a very drastic impact to your sexual relationship causing you to spend more time than normal naked, in a corner, crying and rocking back-and-forth.

While “making” children you will enjoy yourself. This will be the last “enjoyment” of your life.

If living with children you experience excessive drinking, yelling, kicking of inanimate objects, mumbling to one’s self, hatred of Caillou, hallucinations of Barney taking shots with Big Bird, or the increased love of silence, please consult a doctor.

Those experiencing children should stay away from those without children as it will help increase their unrealistic belief children are great.

Children may cause you to lose excessive amounts of sleep, eat while standing, repeat yourself excessively, and create intricate lies as to why you “must go to the store alone, RIGHT NOW!”

Children are evil.

You will eventually label your children as “cock-blocks.”

While living with children you may puke, experience diarrhea, always have a runny nose, buy stock in hand sanitizer, contemplate muzzles, experiment with shock-collars, and find yourself repetitively walking into walls.

If you find boogers, dried food, spilt milk, un-flushed toilets, skid-marks on underwear, and sheets being used as Kleenex in your house then you are currently experiencing children.

Children can kill you.

(End with the kids quietly building a fort out of rubber blocks while the parents continue to kiss, hug, sip their wine and retire to the bedroom knowing Susie and Mark are safe to play on their own.)

The Boy & His Poop

Two days and counting. That’s how long it’s been since the boy has pooped.

Yes, I’m going to blab about poop and my son. Before kids, it’s an unspoken topic. Well, that is unless you’re in a dorm room drinking and passing around stories that start with “dude, this one time…”

But then when you have kids…it seems so common to walk up to two parents at the playground after school lets out and hear:

“and so he’s taking this massive poop and it’s blue! And so I freak, right? I mean, the boy’s poop is blue! But then I remember…we ate cotton-candy flavored ice cream last night and it totally makes sense that his poop was dyed Smurf.”

My boy has done nothing but poop pellets for a couple days now. And the complaints that his stomach aches are running rampant. And he’s got all the bad genes I could have possibly passed along…the most notorious being the “worry/obsessive gene.” So if he’s home, he’s sitting on the toilet. And afterwards we get the detailed blow by blow.

He comes creeping down, looking over his shoulder to see where his sister is while pulling us into a secluded corner. In the almost most perfect drug dealer talk he keeps checking over his shoulders while engaging the wife and I in a dialogue about the size and girth of the mini-poop he just unleashed.

Then he quickly ends it with, “and I left it for you to go look at.”

 “That’s awesome Grayson. Umm… how about you start flushing the toilet since you’re giving us such accurate detailed descriptions of your mini creations,” I quickly tell him.

Yesterday we called the doctor who said we should buy glycerin suppositories, slide them in, tell him to fight the urge to poop till he can’t hold it anymore, then let it ride.

SUPPOSITORIES!!

I laughed at the wife when she uttered that sphincter-tightening word.

After she calmly explained I was never to laugh at her again I headed to the store. Standing in the “laxative” isle looking for these damn suppositories was the equivalent of being announced over the loud speaker “customer in the blue hat can’t drop a deuce and I’m gonna assume it’s because he’s got a Star Wars figure or hairbrush stuck up there.”

Along with my purchase I acquired “Rubber Finger Protectors” which according to the package “are ideal for inserting suppositories, applying hemorrhoidal cream and medication to open wounds.”

None of which I had any desire, what-so-ever to do. That’s when I laid the smack-down.

“I refuse,” I told the wife.

The boy roughly said the same thing to the idea.

Apple juice, 1 ton of raisins ingested, and a whole lot of poop coercing of the boy and he finally gave birth to a healthy, happy turd named “Colon Blow.”

Yes he still obsesses about his poops and I’m sure he will be for some time. It’s in the family genes. In fact, I’d be shocked if he ever pooped regularly again.

But I guess what I’ve learned from this experience is…hell, I don’t know what I learned from this experience. I’m just glad the boy finally pooped and I'm pretty confident this blog post will be found through some very disgusting Google search words.

Geeze Daddy!!

Grayson: “OK Daddy!! Geeeze!!!”

That’s the shit I’ve been hearing religiously these days.

All it takes is me telling the boy for the second time to please put his shoes on so we can take him to school.

Or to please take a bite of his cereal that’s been sitting there for the past 10 minutes.

Or to stop telling his 5-year-old sister that he knows she’s lying about the fact she dreamt about a unicorn and when she woke up it was standing in her room.

It’s contagious as hell too. Yesterday the wife happened to catch me walking naked to the bathroom so she immediately threw what she was carrying to the ground and screamed, “fine – let’s do this, let’s just knock it out – geeeeze!!!”

The life of a 7-year-old can be so hard, having to always feel entitled enough to throw-down in a split second claiming you’re owed so much more than what you’re getting.

The boy honestly believes the world is against him these days.

Grayson: “What’s for dinner tonight daddy?”

Me: “Hamburgers chief. Hamburgers, salad and corn-on-the-cob. Good eats my man!”

Grayson: “Awwww come on daddy!! You know I don’t like hamburger…geeeze”

At this point he’s walking out of the room like I told him I was going to run over his bike, kill his fish, and smash all is trophies.

Me: “Grayson…seriously? It’s hamburger. What kid doesn’t want a nice, juicy organic meat hamburger? I’ll even throw some cheese on that bad boy for ya!”

Grayson: “Can’t we have sushi?”

Me: “Seriously? Really Grayson, sushi? Are you buying? We can’t afford that Monsieur! Would you like some champagne with your meal?”

Grayson: “STOP DADDY!!! Not everyone likes the same thing!! Macy likes hamburger, I like sushi! GEEEZE!!!”

I don’t know what the solution is.

We put the smack-down on the boy from ever saying “geeeze” ever again. We’ve told him the world is not holding a major conference in downtown Chicago under the theme “How To Make Grayson’s Life Unfair, Unjust and Just Down Right Sucky.”

He’s a work in progress…like the girl…like the wife…like myself…like the blow-up doll in my basement that still wants me to take her out for dinner before we “get it on.”

A work in progress…