At Least I Still Have a Job, Right?!

Well….at least I still have a job, right?! That’s what I keep telling myself.

Yesterday I was told by my employer that I had a choice. I could take a significant salary decrease—my salary will be cut in half—or, I could resign effective December 1, and continue to receive my regular pay check through the end of February.

At least I still have a job right?

I haven’t felt emotion like that in years. My boss sounded like Charlie Brown’s teacher as he talked to me and my head was spinning as I thought about our mortgage, car payment, bills, food, my impending drug habit, and of course, my kids.

I moved my family from Virginia to Chicago for this job—one of the biggest decisions of my life. I lived in an empty house by myself on an air mattress for 6 months while my wife and kids stayed in Virginia trying to sell our house. I saw them once a month during that time, if I was lucky. I’ve busted my ass, taken the organization to a new level on many fronts……and now….

But, at least I still have a job, right?

People all over the world are being handed pink slips today, tomorrow….. People who’ve probably worked twice as hard and long as me are now sitting at home fretting over how to pull the pieces together. And my heart breaks for them.

Yesterday as I sat there I was shaking. I wanted to cry. I wanted to beat the ever loving shit out of something. I wanted my mommy. I wanted to go back in time. I wanted to give my boss shaken-baby syndrome. I wanted to never feel this helpless again.

I stood up, tucked my tail between my legs, packed my shit up, walked out of the building, grabbed a beer and shot of Jager and started my journey home. The longest walk of shame in my life. There’s nothing less manly than coming home to your family, wearing the “bread-winner” hat, and having to explain that our lives will significantly alter and that we have a major decision to make.

I’m beginning to see potential paths appearing in front of me. Some are riddled with obstacles and have risk written all over them. Others are straight, smooth roads and make the most sense. The difficult part will be thumping myself hard enough in the nuts to buck-up, pick a path and start walking down it. The other difficult part will be not letting this beat me mentally….not taking it personally….not letting it affect the way I view myself as a person, worker, father, husband. And I won’t….

So I’ll rally, figure this shit out and hope for the best. At least I still have a job, right?

Earning Coins for the Bank of Nookie

“All right kids – you ready?”

“Daddy, we’re gonna miss it – lets’ go!!” my son screams with a tear literally creeping from his eye.

“Dude, we’re good. We’re gonna be early….let’s just go!”

Thirty minutes earlier the wifey had just left in one of our two cars to arrive early to my son’s elementary school. Tonight is the holiday play for  1^st graders, starring none only than my little red-headed rock star. The wifey bit the bullet to volunteer as an usher so that we could be guaranteed front row seats. A kick-ass move, promising nothing but great vantage points for pictures and a stunning view of all the MILFy moms scrambling to get pictures of their littler ones on stage. I promise I wasn’t looking.

So I’m at the door, fumbling through my “key bowl” looking for the one and only key to the car. And…yeah, it’s not there. Despite my repeated request that the car key serve as a stand-alone key from the wifey’s massive key-ring of no return, so that it will be free for use by whoever needs it….it has yet to happen. As a result, she took the only key we have for the car she DIDN'T take. The one I need in order to get my child to the play he’s supposed to be in for which this entire night centers around.

“We’re gonna miss it daddy!!! I knew it. I knew we’d never make it and that I’d miss it after all this practicing,” the boy screams as he kicks make-believe mommies and daddies in the air, turns red-faced, and somewhere in his mind imagines blowing us all to pieces.

“Dude…I’m on it…have I ever let you down?” The little angel on my right shoulder immediately says, “yes…remember that time that…”

“Shut up bitch!” I scream at right shoulder angel.

My son’s still crying, my daughter couldn’t care less and is pumped to score more time playing with her Lil Pet Shop critters. Me? Well I do the natural thing and call the wifey on her cell phone.

Now…out of all our monthly expenditures, the wifey’s cell phone is by far the biggest waste of money. Why? Well that’s a damn fine question…because she never freakin’ answers it. There’s been times where I’ve been with her and she opens her phone, see’s she has 8 missed phone calls and 5 voicemails and she goes, “huh?” Like she's amazed 1) someone called her, and 2) she missed it. She’ll go to work without it. She’ll plug it in to charge while it’s fucking off. She’ll have it soooo buried in her purse that it’s such a pain to dig out that she’ll just hear it ring and give up in pre-exhaustion of trying to fish it out.

Long story short…after five calls…there’s no answer.

That’s when I feel a thought coming on and coming on strong.....And then it hits!

“I’ll call @momomatic!!,” I yell!

Her son’s in the exact same play my boy’s in and they live only a few blocks away. So I call, she answers, and they agree to pick us up! Score for me!!

Outside the boy is pacing up and down the sidewalk, mumbling, crying, informing the world there’s no possible way in hell we’ll make the play, we should have all listened to him and left hours ago, and everyone within earshot is mean.

“Grayson! Do you have a watch?”

“No!”

“Do you know what time it is right now?”

“No Daddy!”

“Do you know what time your play starts?”

“DADDY!!!! No!!!”

“Then how in the name of all things SpongeBob, do you know that you’re going to be freakin’ late?”

“Cause…daddy!!! Cause it’s dark outside!!!”

We made it to the show with plenty of time to spare. My wife seated my daughter and I in our rock-star front row seats. As she handed us our program I said, “Oh…hey, before you leave…can I have the car key to the Nissan? I'd sure hate for you to leave me stranded at home without it!”

It took a sec to sink in, but when it did….I immediately deposited that “oh shit I fucked up” coin into the bank of nookie. Only 23 more coins and it’s go time!!!

Back to My Southern Roots

So I’ll start off by apologizing to my blog readers who’ve given me shit (rightfully-so) for ignoring their giggle needs. I’ve had a rough 4 days…but I’m back!!!

So, my grandmother died. She was 90…I grew up with her as a huge part of my life….she rocked….and now she’s gone. But, she’s happier now so it was more of a celebration. Except, the celebration happened in Anderson, S.C.

Now let me just toss in there that I grew up in North Carolina. Born, raised, went to college, got my first job, first blow job, first relationship with a “little person and his pet horse,” first beer, first throw-up in front of my mom after drinking a whole bottle of MD 20/20 and trying to play it off like I had the stomach flu, first masturbation scene and first girlfriend who still journals about how badly I messed herup…all in North Carolina. So I love the state, SOME of its people, hate its ideals, wish the tobacco industry would rot in hell, and wish all racist bastards would burn a slow death. But other than that…I love it!

So my grandmother’s funeral was on Sunday at 3 p.m. An extremely convenient time for someone who lives in Chicago and has a boss that…well, let’s just say, gets inconvenienced by his worker’s personal life’s problems. But I sucked it up.

Saturday I hopped a plane to Raleigh, N.C., where my brother lives. My bro is just over 2 years older than me and has turned into one kick-ass friend. He’s got a wife who should be knighted for what she’s had to put up with, and two insane boys, 1 and 5 years old.

Long story short, we decide to drive to S.C. on Saturday (4.5 hour drive). We get there at 9 p.m. and meet my mother, her husband, and my godmother for dinner at Applebees. The Clemson game is on, everyone’s in orange, I desperately want a beer but no one else is drinking at the dinner table. Oh…and I’m also a vegetarian.

This seems to surprise a shit-ton of people, I’m not sure why, I’m guessing because I’m such an asshole they think I’ll tackle, kill, and maul any living thing that comes my way, but not so kids…it’s not so.

So the waitress doesn’t know this little tid-bit about me yet, which my step-dad loves to point out. So everyone’s ordering and it gets to my brother’s 5 year old who says, “I’ll have macaroni and cheese, and celery sticks.”

Silence.

Then the waitress looks up from her pad with a horrified look and says, “You ain’t gonna eeaaat no meeeeeat?” in the worst southern accent you could imagine. Immediately my very southern step-dad says, “wait till you get to the numbskull next to him. He eats lettuce and beats too cause he’s a vegetarian!!!”

And the amazement ensued. How could anyone live a life with no meat?!!!!

The next day, we’re on our way to the funeral - me, my brother, sister-in-law, their 2 kids, my mom, step-dad, uncle, and his two kids (teenagers). We have about an hour before we need to be at the church for the family-only graveside service. So we decide to go eat and we’re following my uncle who claims he “knows where to go” for some eats. I shit you not…we pull into a fucking McDonalds.

Wearing suits, on our way to bury a loved one, we eat our lunch at McDonald’s. On top of it…again, I’m a vegetarian…at ……Mc….Donald’s.

After arguing with the zit-faced douche on how simple it is to just NOT put the chicken on my salad and how yes, “picking it off” is not OK with me, I finally got a bowl of lettuce, two carrot skins, what looked to be the boil off a tomatoe’s ass, and dressing for the low-low price of $8.

To top the entire weekend off, I decided on the 4.5 hour drive back to Raleigh starting at 6 p.m., I’d count the number of redneck-ass cars I’d pass that have Truck Nutz. Eight…yes…eight idiots felt they needed to overcompensate for their douchebagness by purchasing a pair of rubber nuts they could hang from their rear trailer-hitch to make sure everyone driving within a 40 foot radius knew their wheels were in fact a dude.

So to recap… I love the south…I’m from the south…..southern women are incredibly hot…my wifey is a southern woman….truck nutz…..McDonald’s…..I fucking hate Snuggies…..vegetarians should never try to live in the south…..Deliverance……inbreeding……..I have an alarm on my house so don’t try to break in and kill me, I love the south, I voted for Obama!!

Enough with the Candy!

Candy, candy, contstant candy…

In the morning, “Daddy can I have a piece of candy if I eat ALL my cereal?”

And that’s followed by the sincere, but to-the-point explanation of why the candy cannot be taken from the bowl unless it’s following a lunch or dinner. And since the majority of lunches are at school, and we don’t want to be bothered at work from the principal claiming our children have climbed the flagpole 32 times in 5 minutes and are hitting up bums for pieces of chocolate and have the shakes…we reserve the right to dish out 2 pieces of candy following a delicious, nutritious dinner made with love by the wifey or I.

But…they…just…don’t….fucking…..get…..it…..

 So, we continue to deal with the fighting.

Yesterday I’m upstairs trying to iron my clothes cause it’s 2009 and I can’t rightfully say to my wife: “Woman….my work clothes have a wrinkle. Get in there and slap some heat on em!!” And I’m watching the Today Show cause …yeah, I watch the Today Show!!!... and I hear all holy hell breaking lose downstairs.

“But IIIIII should get a piece mommy,” this shrill little girly voice bounces its way upstairs pounding my ears and bringing me to my knees.

“I didn’t give him any candy Macy!!!” Now I know this voice well. This is the same voice that says things to me like:

“I asked you twice to please wash the dishes, yet you made the decision to….”

And – “Why is all this CLEAN laundry on the bedroom floor. You could have folded it with the time it took you to toss it on the floor.”

And – “Oh really? REALLY? I look ‘fine’ in this outfit? Not hot…or hawt…or sexy…or MILFy…but ‘fine?’ That’s what this has come to?!’”

So, fearing for my children’s lives, I decide to get involved. So with towel wrapped around my waste, shaving cream in my face, I bust all up in the argument.

“Hey – hey-HEY!!!!! What’s going on?!!”

Now I’ve been trying like hell for over a decade to break this woman…this saint…this goddess I call my wifey. And not even for a damn second have I seen the underside of that thick-ass shell she’s encrusted in that keeps us all shivering at night. But my kids…who have collectively been alive less than the number of years the wifey and I have been married…managed to do it.

Like a freakin 4-year-old…the wifey turns to me, holding an empty candy package and says, “Grayson picked up this old empty candy wrapper and Macy saw him holding it and thought I gave him candy, but I didn’t……I really didn’t and now everyone’s yelling at ME and I don’t like it and I didn’t do ANYTHING!!!”

Most people would have shat themselves…a few would have slowly sat down on the steps and started crying. If I was dressed, I would have said nothing and headed off to the train a few minutes early. But I manned up. I took control. I grabbed my virtual crown, threw that bitch on my head, put on the “look out cause the wrath of hell is coming down on your now” look on my face and I said, “The candy shall be thrown……AWAY!!!!”

And holy mother of shit did that unleash tears…. Even I had to bite my lip from crying at what a dick I’d become.

After pleading and negotiating, and reconfiguring the written contract originally drawn-up…we came to a conclusion. Candy will be given when the crying becomes too much, the parents can’t take anymore, and it’s the only thing that will shut everyone the fuck up.

After everything was signed, heads were in bead, snores were heard throughout sleepy land…I crept out to the ally with an evil grin on my face and threw everything but 12 pieces of candy away. Standing in the ally with my SpongeBob undies and undershirt with armpit holes I realized I’ve become that guy that hates candy, and therefore children, and therefore Halloween, and therefore all the awesomeness that comes with it. So I snatched the candy back out…ran inside…threw it back in their bowls and righted what was wronged.

I slept peacefull last night….but for shit-sake, don’t tell the wifey I accidentally dropped her favorite Twizzlers in our neighbor’s dog’s……

I'm A Little Uncomfortable With This!

I was totally thrown out of my element on Friday. Wifey had booked-up my morning by volunteering me to work both my son’s and my daughter’s Halloween classroom parties. Luckily the schools are across the street from each other…unluckily Mother Nature was on the rag that day and decided to unleash a deluge of water all morning long. It was kind of her way of saying – “here…take this you gap-toothed idiot. Yeah…how would you like to be in charge of all weather all the time and get blamed for deaths, and ruining Timmy’s birthday party, or Suzie’s wedding which will ultimately end up in a divorce cause she got caught with her sister’s husband and goat on his birthday….” That woman seriously needs therapy.

So I get to the boy’s classroom and there’s about 28 seven-year-olds sitting around dressed up as race car drivers, princesses, a lion, White Sox player, a Bears player, and…well, I don’t know what the hell this one kid was, but I’m pretty sure I saw him in a porno once.

I’m all, “Hey – I’m Grayson’s dad. My wife volunteered me to help with the party”

“Hi Grayson’s daddy! Everyone – this is Grayson’s daddy. Say hello!”

It took me a second to realize I should quickly switch into “Grayson’s daddy” mode where everyone talks to everyone else like their 7 years old. So I quickly imagined all my conversations being in 1^st grade teacher lingo…

“Hey sweet wifey…how was your day pretty little girl.”

“Uhh..fine?!”

“Awesome, give me high fives!! Hey, you wanna juice box and a snack?”

“Fuck you…give me a beer and walk away from me.”

“Uh oh…does someone need a tickle? I think so!!! Someone needs their frown turned upside down!!!”

“Touch me and I’ll cut you!”

Now that I was in the mindset – in comes the ringleader…the classroom volunteer head-mother-in-charge. Dressed in a girl-scout outfit, just to prove she was “in the spirit,” she proceeded to gather her tiny gaggle of parents together to begin informing us of our tasks.

Girl Scout Mom delegated tasks like a fucking general. And when she got to me, “and you…you get the game activity. I brought a small pumpkin. Take it – figure it out. Your station’s over there.”

Now, I’ve led a pretty successful career so far and I’ve prided myself on needing little to no supervision or management. I’m a freakin’ strategy creating and implementing machine. But I was literally stumped. If a tree were placed immediately in front of me just then, I would have spent the next hour walking into it repeatedly while pissing myself.

So the little bastards are split up in four groups of approximately 6 kids each. The first group I get is staring at me. I’m killing time by having them explain what characters they’re dressed as while I fake nod like I’m listening (the wifey knows this nod well) but all the while I’m going through my childhood memories trying to remember a cool game we can play with this damn pumpkin.

Then little Franky says, “are well gonna play hot potato with that pumpkin?”

I was so damn relieved I caught myself just as I was about to scream, “fuck yeah we are!” and high five the little bastard through a wall.

So each group of approximately 6 kids came to my station for a total of 12-minutes each. And during that time, one kid looked at me like I was an idiot cause I didn’t know what Star Wars character he was, another kid clearly has no father at home and insisted on sitting in my lap and rubbing my back making me the most uncomfortable I’ve been since the time I watched Michael Jackson with that kid when….well pretty much anytime he was with a kid….., another girl thought it was the funniest thing in the world to stomp my damn foot, and the most memorable little bastard was the one who thought it was hilarious to cough in my face!

When it was over I returned the bruised and beaten small pumpkin to Girl Scout Mom…thanked her for her leadership…slipped my phone number in her purse….and ran into the pouring rain to the daughter’s classroom party so I could do it all over again.

In the end, I did survive…the kids did have fun…and I did get acknowledgement from the wife that at some point in the very distant future, I would be rewarded with sex for my deeds.