Now I Know How Male Porn Stars Feel

Haven't posted for a week. Wow. That's the problem with having a blog which purports to provide amusement (even if the only person being amused is... myself). If you have a dry spell, where you're not actually feeling terribly funny, then, well, it's hard to generate it spontaneously. Kind of like when you're a male porn star. It's all fun and games until you *have* to do it.

But I'm back in the saddle now. In fact, I have several ideas which have percolated long enough that they are starting to pop up in my brain as "hey! that would make a good blog post!" ideas.

And I still have some of my favourite stories which I haven't told yet. Like "The Best Practical Joke I Played on my Grandmother Shortly Before She Died." That's a pretty good one. And the photo I have of my 13-year-old from this past summer, taken the instant before he learned a very powerful lesson regarding the harsh response that a male's body provides to certain aggressive stimuli. In fact I have a pretty good story of my own on that same topic.

Ok, I'm all charged up and ready to go!

Hmm. Except I wrote an entire post and didn't talk about anything. Oh, well, it worked for "Seinfeld." Let's hope my fans are as devoted. All 2 of them.

Kid Stuff

Disclaimer: If you are not either a parent or a very "kid-friendly" person, you might have trouble getting through this entire post. Don't say I didn't warn you.

1. Babies love me. I can't say why exactly. Maybe they look at my bald head and think I'm one of them.

2. Taking care of my friends' kids today. One of those kids is a baby. Who, incidentally, loves me. This child has an actual belly button. No, wait, I know, but *really*, this child has an actual belly BUTTON. It's shaped like a real button. Perfectly circular, flat on top, evenly raised with defined edges and everything. After 39 years of life, and having seen many belly buttons in that time, I finally see why they called it that.

3. My four-year-old has re-ignited an ongoing debate within our family. He has taken to singing about the little spider that goes up the water spout. Here's where the debate begins. My wife sings "itsy-bitsy." However, I contend that the best version is "inky-dinky" (which, I concede, is a dark horse contender, as very few others agree with me... but it's how my dad taught it to me, so I'm sticking with it). In fact, in the interest of fairness, I must acknowlege a large faction of the population that leans towards "eensy-weensy." You know, and this just occurred to me now, if my lovely spouse doesn't start coming around to my way of thinking, I might try to push her buttons a bit by singing "achy-breaky." The achy-breaky spider... I like the sound of that.

4. When I was younger, Ernie was my clear favourite. Over the years, however, I've also developed a fondness for Bert's subtle, nuanced style of performing.

5. The most interesting thing I ever discovered in a child's diaper:

An earwig.

(Many have asked me 'was it dead?' I can only reply, 'I don't know if it was going in, but it sure was coming out!')

I'm Growing an Afro

Received an e-mail from the principal of my children's school recently. Wasn't to me directly; it was directed to all school staff and school community groups. He wanted to let people know about a concern that was brought to his attention by a parent. Apparently, this parent witnessed a gentleman who was standing in a wooded area about 10 feet away from a well travelled street in our neighbourhood. The man in question was, um... how shall I put this politely... 'choking the chicken.'

I have a couple of areas of concern here. First and foremost, naturally, everybody should be concerned for the welfare of our neighbourhood children. It goes without saying that the children should be cautioned on how to react if they come upon a freaky stranger, and neighbourhood people should be on the alert too. Luckily, they have a good general description of the person: White male, between 30 and 40, with a shaved head.

Which brings me to my second area of concern. You see, I, myself, am ALSO a WHITE MALE BETWEEN THIRTY AND FORTY WITH A SHAVED HEAD. Aaaack.

Perhaps I'm being a little paranoid. I don't THINK anybody has been crossing the street when they see me coming yet... I don't THINK cars have started driving by me very slowly, drivers staring at me intently, then frantically punching buttons on their cell phones... but I think maybe it's time to take some pre-emptive action.

I'm growing an afro.

Of course, it will take some work. I do have that male pattern baldness thing working against me, so I'm concerned that it will only come out on the sides. And it's red. It may end up as a "Bozo the Clown" kind of hairdo. Then I'd have to go out and chuck good money on a red bulb nose and floppy shoes... man, this is getting worse and worse the more I think about it.

Maybe I'll have to reconsider the afro thing. In fact, the school principal I mentioned earlier, bless his heart, already e-mailed me that he knows where I can get some good wigs. Sweet man.

And you know, I can't help but thinking:

All it takes is ONE BAD EGG to go ahead and ruin public masturbation for all the rest of us. Hmph.

Classic Moments in Family History, part 1

Welcome to the first chapter in a potentially semi-regular feature. This one is called:
"The Day Two 3-Year-Olds Discovered a Big Container of Flour."



It could also be called "The Day that Something Amusing Became Less and Less Amusing as it Became Apparent How Difficult It Is to Clean Up Flour." But that's a little too long. Though quite accurate.

Isn't It Strange...

... that of all the kids in this 'first day of school' picture, the happiest one of all is the four-year-old who *isn't* going???

(Actually, he *is* sort of going this year... tomorrow he starts a 'preschool' program on Tuesday and Thursday mornings... and boy, is he excited.)

p.s. To ensure that I got my 16-year-old daughter in this picture, I told her that if she didn't pose for this picture, I was going to take one of her and her friend at high school. Worked like a charm. She even smiled. (Sure it was forced, but to her credit, it *was* 8am... and she's like her mother... not exactly a morning person.)

The Evil Summer of 2005

Well, that's it. It's September, everyone's getting ready for school to start next week. The summer is gone. The weather today is trying to trick us, but there's no doubt. It's really gone.

We had a good summer as a family. Made some fun side trips here and there. Got away camping for the very first time, which can only be called a spectacular success if compared to how it could have turned out. Also, my wife and I got away with friends for an amazing kayaking weekend, which will certainly lead to more.

However, despite all this good weather and good experiences, this summer will forever be known as "the Evil Summer of 2005." Why, you ask?

That's because this was the summer that our eight-year-old daughter grew a fraction of an inch taller than her twin brother.

Which, under ordinary circumstances, would not make a whit of difference in the world.

However, this particular fraction of an inch was the difference, at every amusement park we visited, and particularly at Crystal Palace in Moncton, New Brunswick, between a STANDARD pass, where you can ride all the BIG PEOPLE rides, and the KIDDIE pass, where you CAN'T.

I won't go into any more detail, but rest assured that it was very painful.



(our 8-year-old girl on a big people ride... where I have already promised our 8-year-old boy that we will return to NEXT year)

MYSTified

Take a look at this picture.

Now, is the first thing you ask yourself, "What the HELL is the purpose of this thing???" If so, you may be ideally suited to play MYST games. This scene is actually from MYST III: Exile, which my wife and I are currently partway through.

She and I have played these games together for years now. They are full of quiet music, hauntingly beautiful worlds and designs, and frustratingly challenging puzzles. Luckily, our brains work in very different ways, so we make a good team... between us, we can generally work through the challenges.

Not terribly quickly though.

We played the first one, simply called MYST, back around 1996 or 97. The second game, RIVEN, we started around 1998, hit a wall, then returned to and finished around 2000. This third game we started in 2001, hit a wall again, and then picked back up a couple months ago. Happily, we've made lots of headway in this recent period. Hopefully we will finish this one off at some point soon, since we have the next game waiting patiently on our shelf... MYST IV: Revelation. Oh, and a fifth game is due to come out in the next couple of months.

So, assuming there will be no MORE in the series... we should have the whole thing licked by about.... um.... 2011.

Wish us luck.