Dad Tip: The Hulkster Test

Sometimes when you're rocking a baby in an attempt to get them to fall asleep, you lay them down and they're instantly awake again the second their head touches the crib. It is like they feel the gravity of being lowered down and say, "I'm up! I got more crying to do! Nobody is sleeping around here!" As the nights go on, you start to get a sense of if they're just momentarily sleeping or if they're out cold sleeping. There is a difference.

This leads me to another Dad Tip, this time referencing something any dad worth a damn can relate to: professional wrestling. What you do is give your youngster the Hulkster test. Remember when Hulk Hogan got locked in a sleeper hold*, perhaps Ted Dibiase's Million Dollar Dream, but really any finishing move that causes the opponent to lose consciousness? What the referee would do to see if Hogan could continue after the choke hold is lift Hulk's arm up in the air, and it would flop lifelessly down on the mat. Then he would do it a second time with the same result. Now, on the third hoisting of Mr. Hogan's python, if his arm hit the floor again the match would end in a victory for his opponent. Of course this would never happen because just before that hand would hit the floor he would stop it dead in its tracks and start shaking it. Then he would shake his head no, as if to say, "I'm not out yet." His opponent would then look all scared because if his finishing move wasn't enough, what chance did he have now?



So punches would be thrown at the Hulk in desperation, but The Hulkster would just keep shaking his head. And I think you know how the rest goes. Hogan throws the dude off the ropes, guy bounces and runs back towards him defenselessly for some reason, eats a boot to the face, Hulk gets a running start by bouncing himself off the ropes, and then he does a flying leg drop, landing 300 pounds on the guy's face via that overly tanned thigh meat, pins him, and that's the match.

So what I'm suggesting for today's Dad Tip** is lifting the baby's arm like a WWE referee to see if the kid is ready to sleep for real or just trying to bring some drama and excitement into the bedtime match that he knows he is going to win.

________________________________________

*I saw an interview of Hulk Hogan where he said that he wished he did a sleeper hold as his own finishing move instead of his leg drop because all that weight crashing down ended up doing irreparable damage to his spine.

**Hulk Hogan had somewhat of a Dad Tip of his own: "To all of my Hulkamaniacs out there, say your prayers and eat your vitamins and you'll never go wrong."

Too Much Butt Cream Is Better Than None At All

Tomorrow Mrs. Noisewater needs the car, so immediately after work I have to take Erik Noisewater in an Uber to make it on time for his gymnastics class. To do this legally I could lug a heavy and awkward travel car seat or I could buy a booster seat since the young man is now over 40 pounds. I found a good and cheap booster at Target, which was open until 10pm, so after getting the kids to bed, I ducked out to pick it up. JESUS THIS STORY SOUNDS BORING, but just stay with me here. So while I'm there I had to pick up eggs, orange juice, and diaper rash cream. The cream looked to be buy one get one free, but when I got to the register she informed me that it was buy THREE get one free. I tried to explain to her that no one needs to walk out of Target with FOUR tubes of butt cream. I said, "Do you know how small a baby's butt crack is? It's like this (and used my fingers to show an inch long butt crack). By the time I'm anywhere near finished four tubes of this stuff, the kid won't be in diapers anymore." She asked if I just wanted the one, and I said yes, now thinking that maybe my baby booty crack lecture was perhaps a bit much.

When I came home Mrs. Noisewater was on the couch feeding our second born who had already woken up, and the first born pooped his pants so she had to deal with that too. Neither one of us was having too awesome of a night as it turns out. When I put the eggs and orange juice into the fridge I noticed there were ZERO tubes of butt cream in the bag. Are you kidding me? Then Mrs. Noisewater pointed out that I had picked out a booster seat with pink trim, and it was a little obnoxious. I would have noticed an entirely pink one, but since I was a little bit tired tonight and always a little bit color blind every night, the trim went unnoticed. Don't get me wrong, we don't assign gender colors or toys or anything else to our kids. As a matter of fact, Erik Noisewater has a pink unicorn back pack, and he rocks that fucker every day like a God damned champion. This booster seat was just tacky as all get out, so it had to go back. Plus I needed to go back for the chap-ass ointment that they had forgotten anyway.  

I got back to the store to see the two tubes of Desitin sitting on the counter, which vindicated me because a little part of me wondered if maybe I had dropped it somehow. They got me a very bland but not gaudy gray car seat instead, which was fine, until I got it home and noticed that it had a stain. I'm not going back. To hell with it. It will get more stains. 

So those are the kinds of stories I'll be telling from now on if anyone is still around. Sorry, no more drunk tales full of crazy nights and loose women. Nope. Angry dad with two Target trips on a school night - that sort of thing. Also, I should have a vasectomy coming up later this month for more dad blog fodder. Stay tuned. 

Since I Haven't Blogged In Like 5 Weeks, Here Are 5 Updates.

1. I scrolled through some old posts to check, but I don't think that I've told all of you that we are due for our second kiddo in September. It's actually the same due date as Erik Noisewater, so there is a possibility they could have the same birthday. I suppose that would be the most important update for me, creating more human life and all, but let's move onto the random stupid items because if any of you have been reading a while, you know that is what I'm better at reporting on.



2. I've been doing the intermittent fasting about 4 to 6 days a week. I'll stop eating around 630pm and not eat again until 10:30AM the next day. I have to say I feel a lot better when I stick to it, and when I do I'm regular as a the sun, since you asked. It is also a good fit for me because I can get in bad patterns, such as knocking out entire rows of Girl Scout cookies. Mrs. Noisewater was all excited about a cookie after work only to find that after a few too many IPA's one Saturday evening I had ingested my standard entire row amount to polish off a box. Now it is a battle of wills. I bought another couple boxes to make it up to her and to prove to myself that I can control my inner fat kid impulses. So now when I need that little jolt of chocolate I'll open up the fridge and squirt a small amount of Hershey's syrup directly into my mouth like an uncivilized pile of crap human. Essentially it is like going to the methadone clinic for the heroin addict. Nowhere near as good as eating a row of cookies/mainlining smack, but it gets you through.



3. My good friend HLP (Heterosexual Life Partner) and I have been hitting a concert every month or every other month as our music tastes have aligned to a lot of the same doom/stoner/desert/fuzz bands. One thing we do is switching off who buys the tickets, and the other system is kind of a genius strategy that I am now sharing with you, my friends. What we do is look up the setlists of the one or two, sometimes three bands that we like on the bill on setlist.fm. You'll find that most bands these days don't stray from the exact same songs night after night, so we will take all those songs and make them into one giant (especially if it's three bands) mixed up Spotify playlist that we can share with one another. And we alternate who does that task too. And viola! Now we can listen to that playlist over the course of a few weeks and will be totally familiar with all of the songs the bands will play without wasting any time at all with songs that won't be in the set list. Feel free to steal this system for yourself because, while I do admit it's pretty darn ingenious, I see no possible way to monetize it.



4. And speaking of the rock and roll music, the wife and kid joined me for one of my favorite days of the year, Record Store Day, and we had one heck of a good time (at least I did). What I did is look up which stores were giving out free donuts and coffee and such and made a nice route to hit around four stores. Erik Noisewater had his heart set on a pink donut with sprinkles, and by god I found one for him and four records for under twenty bucks for the old man. While at one tiny store I noticed that there was a good deal of sections for hip hop, trance, drums and bass . . . . But where in the hell was the damn rock music? Then I saw around thirty or fifty vinyls filed under "Dad Rock." That is where they file their very limited actual rock music with guitars. And sure enough the dad with the kid running around the store asking for donuts picked himself up some very, very dad-like rock, a Jerry Rafferty album.



5. Do you all feel like you get smarter or dumber as the years roll on? Recently I started getting the notion that my wits were going in the wrong direction. There was a time where I walked into a room and fancied myself one of the sharpest blokes in the room, and sadly I just don't feel that way quite as much anymore. This is something I feel like I have to turn around, so I started some new habits like reading the newspaper cover-to-cover, doing crossword puzzles, and limiting my social media time. And hopefully writing more. I gotta write more, guys. I'm sorry I have slowed up so much with my output, but that is just another step I have to take to avoid gradually growing duller like the rest of America.

Okay, friends. You got any input on any of these five items listed above? If not, then just tell me something else that will make me laugh because laughing is good for the soul and the gall bladder. Mostly the soul.  

Just some random updates, some funny things and things that are going on with with Dr. Kenneth Noisewater . . .

1. Mrs. Noisewater, Erik Noisewater, and myself just got back from Pittsburgh. We like to visit cities that we feel might be misunderstood and/or underrated. Cleveland really surprised us not too long ago, and Pittsburgh is similar. I'm a big Cubs fan, so we caught a Pirates versus Cubs game at PNC Park. The view from our seats with the backdrop of the skyline was breathtaking. I bought myself one of those old school Pirates hats with the yellow stripes going around because I have always dug that look, perhaps more due to Rocky George from Suicidal Tendencies than because of Willie Stargell and the like.

That's Rocky on the far right, obviously

Willie wore it well too.

We also took Baby Noisewater to a children's museum with a Thomas the Train exhibit, and he just about lost his mind. We don't let him watch all that much television, but when you're you're stuck on an airplane or need to get some stuff done around the house, you got to put Thomas on for the kid. He only has a handful of toy Thomas trains, and one of them is a random white train that has magnets to connect to Thomas but does not seem to be officially affiliated with the franchise. I felt bad that he didn't have a name on his underbelly like the other guys, so I started calling him Steve. Now Baby Noisewater refers to him as "Steve" or "Big Steve," and it's hilarious. I keep telling him that it's bullshit that Big Steve is never featured on the cartoon show. Maybe we had best pen a letter to the network upon Steve's behalf to get him some damn air time. 

2. Sometimes when I come home late at night with too many beers in my belly and need to stay up drinking some water before heading to bed so I don't have a 3 day old man hangover I will watch a bunch of Youtube videos. Sometimes it will be a comedian I like and a million of his/her routines or talk show appearances. Sometimes it will be guitar solos from a band I like, especially when there is very limited footage of them and I have to do detective missions. And most recently it is two Black guys who are self-proclaimed hip hop fans with very limited knowledge of heavy metal music having live reactions to metal music for the first time. 

They blow me away because I have heard some of these songs a million times and don't even think of an observation that occurs to them the first time they hear it. They are very likable dudes, they listen to everything with an open mind, and they really seems to know about and appreciate all kinds of music. Below are a couple of good examples. I like the Megadeth one because the one guy says the song kicks like a porno with zero dialogue or foreplay, just smashing, and then he does a graphic sex noise with his hands. 

Then I like the Mercyful Fate one because of their reaction to King Diamond's high pitched otherworldly voice. It's not a sound you would expect someone to love the first time, so I like how they keep it real, admit it's weird and funny for them, but still give the song a chance.

3. So the other day Mrs. Noisewater are driving home from a BBQ, and I hear a not quite 2-year-old Erik Noisewater in the backseat saying "vagina, vagina, vagina" like 10 times in a row. I asked the Mrs, "Is he saying vagina?" She said that he came in while she was changing the other day and started pointing at her and asking questions. She thought it best to just tell him the real terms, but what we didn't know is that he would be obsessed with all the naughty parts. Every time I lay him down to change him, without fail, he says "wiener and butt," pointing to the correct places. Then one day I take my shirt off in front of him and he says "boobies." That was a blow to my confidence for sure. So anyway, he's in the backseat saying vagina 19 times, and then he says pizza around 12 times. I said to Mrs. Noisewater, "Vagina and pizza? He's planning one hell of a weekend back there." Mrs. Noisewater laughed and said that should go in the blog, so there it is.

Fare thee well, Blog Buddies. 

My Day Up Until Now

I used a website called Random Subject Prompts and the one that popped up was: "Write about your day so far." So, let's do that.

5:30AM - I wake up to hear the cutest voice ever saying "dada" in the next room. Sorry to disappoint you, Little Man, but it's Momma's turn; we switch off mornings. I couldn't get back to sleep so I picked up where I left off in my Jim Henson biography. Basically that dude changed the face of children's television and pretty much invented it in terms of the format we still see today. Previous puppet shows on television had a little stage where the puppets moved about, but what he and his female partner did in the 1950's (while he was in college) was look at a little monitor and let that space that the viewers could see be the boundaries of the stage. He was the first to let the puppets themselves be the stars of the show and brought those characters to life.

I was trying to explain to Mrs. Noisewater when we were watching a modern "Sesame Street" that it was no good because the kids in the show were clearly actors. Corny as all hell. Back in the 1970's it was an organic experience of the kids just having conversations with the puppets as if they were real people. The kiddos reacted to what the puppet was saying, and the puppeteer fed off of the spontaneity and whimsy that the children brought to the scene. This scene below is the best example of what I'm talking about. The girl had her little joke and was cracking herself up, so Jim made Kermit pretend to get all frustrated. And then the unexpected pull at the heart strings at the end brings it all home for a truly magic moment.



7:00AM - Fell back asleep eventually and got up feeling like a million bucks. 7AM is really sleeping in during the baby days. I made myself a French press cup of coffee with my birthday gift of a press and a grinder. If you don't have one, I recommend it. I'm amped with fuel for the whole day, and I just kind of love the whole process of brewing it.

Cat mug not included.

9:00AM - Went for a run with my buddy Night Train who lives down the street. He is training for his first marathon in the Spring in Big Sur, California, and I have my 2nd one in September here in Chicago. Topics discussed that I can remember were: Parenting styles, break ups, our upcoming Man Night get together with friends, whether or not Tom Brady is faking an injury to play head games with his opponents, and what makes an ideal roommate. If you're anything like me, you do your best thinking when you run, and it really helps to have someone with you to hash out all of life's problems and reflect on the minutia of all things off of the running path.

10:30AM - Mrs. Noisewater was meeting a friend at the Women's March, and she made this terrific sign. The other side has a clock that says "Time's Up." What is funny is that she showed the boy the typical way of protesting with a sign by shaking it up and down and doing a ra-ra chant, so Baby Noisewater did the same and babbled about what may or may not have been about women's rights but more likely was about Thomas the Train and his rights in the rail yard.



12:10 - We are currently on a major budget restriction, trying to save for a more proper home for the family, somewhere with in-unit washer/dryer, a dishwasher, and a proper bedroom for the Little Man. For this entire month we are tracking everything we spend on a spreadsheet. If either of us buys something, even a can of soda at the gas station, it has to go onto our spreadsheet. Believe it or not, it really does make you more conscious of what you need and don't need to buy. Hence, I opted for a free activity for the baby and took him to the library. Here he is playing with a random girl that was there. He is so social, but mostly with the ladies. It was impressive that he recognized that his partner had more advanced fine motor skills, so he opted to be the guy who fetched the bricks for her to carefully put into place. He has the brute strength and cute strength.

And that about takes us to the current time. Tonight we will stay in and continue to spend zero dollars. There is some movie about a mute gal falling for a merman that is supposed to be quite good, so we may stream that one free and illegally.

I rather liked this writing activity because when you take the time to write about your day, you find yourself a little more convinced that it was all time well spent.

Be well, Blog Buddies.

Dr. Kenneth Noisewater's Baby Book Review

I thought I would help other parents out there by letting you all know which books have been helpful when putting Baby Erik to sleep and which ones totally suck. Some of the pictures came in sideways, but whatever. My web master is on vacation.

Knitting and listening to ZZ Top

"Goodnight Moon" was written in the 1940's, and it has been used steadily by parents to put kids to sleep all these years for a reason. All babies seem to love it, I am finding in my limited exposure to my baby and a few others. You basically say goodnight to everything in the "great green room," and at one point there is a little old lady whispering "hush." When I say hush and put my finger up in the hush-motion, Erik always looks up to me for that part. It's all about routines for babies when you're putting them down to sleep, but sometimes I mix it up and go with the ZZ Top version and say she's the little old lady just looking for some tush. It's also all about keeping yourself sane.

"Go on! Take everything! Take everything from me!"

This kid in "The Giving Tree" is a real turd, right? Take, take, take. That's all he ever does. The rat bastard robs the tree of everything over the years to the point where the tree is just a stump and the boy sits his now old ass down on the tree when the tree has nothing else left to offer. You could just as easily have called it "The Taking Boy."

You can't tell me that monkey isn't up to something sinister.

Swiper will pay for his crimes against the lemonade stand.

I have two books with Dora the Explorer. They're cute, and I like to expose the young man to a little bit of Spanish. I will say there are a few too many words, which will lead to the baby trying to turn the page or reach for another book. This is when you have to make up a more abbreviated narrative for each page, or if you're a psycho like me, make a sick joke. For example, you'll see the picture of Dora and Boots the monkey having a sleepover, but look at the evil and maybe a little drunk look on that monkey. He's up to something just as the mom is turning out the lights. Sometimes for kicks I'll say, "Mom, don't turn out the lights for a human and monkey sleepover! That's how AIDS got started!" Yeah, I'm nuts. Sorry. Then you will see Dora and her monkey friend picking lemons to make lemonade while the evil little weasel with the lone ranger mask, Swiper, is stealing the lemons. This is when every once in a while I will say, "So for stealing the lemons, boots held him down while Dora beat Swiper about the head shoulders with a bicycle pump. 

The tear jerker.

Let's move onto a serious note. This is the book that you will read to your kid, and you will cry. Every single time. The worst of these times for me was when Mrs. Noisewater was getting her appendix out right around Christmas time only a few months after Baby Erik was born. My family was nice enough to hold off on the Christmas activities until she was out of the hospital and feeling better. So, one night Erik and I had just left the hospital to go home, go to bed, and come in the next morning. When I read this line to him I cried like no other:

"And if someday you're lonely,
or someday you're sad
or you strike out at baseball
or think you've been bad . . .

just lift up your face, feel the wind in your hair.
That's me, my sweet baby, my love is right there."

I since have bought this book for two other new parent friends of mine, and they loved it too. I highly recommend this one.

Star Wars: A Daddy's Perspective

A good friend of mine got Erik this Star Wars book with original artist renderings of what they envisioned the movie would look like. I spoke earlier about having to make up quick things to say when there are too many words, and here is another great example. There's almost more space for words than pictures. So, for example, in the picture above I will say, "And then the ungrateful Luke Skywalker so hastily attacks his father who had just so generously offered to rule the galaxy side-by-side with his only son." I like to give the story that daddy perspective.

Alexander came to wish you an unhappy birthday. In Australia. 

Here is a classic that I also read as a little kid. I think it's cute that Alexander is obsessed with Australia. But I will say, he seems like somewhat of the brooding emo pessimist type. I would wager he listened to The Smiths in his teenage years. He's a good kid. 

"Try it and you will see!"

Here is the takeaway from "Green Eggs and Ham": Sam-I-Am is the best salesman ever. He approaches a customer with a product that the customer completely hates and tries every angle to find a way to make it work for the customer, be it eating those eggs on a plane, on a boat, or (my favorite), with a goat. Cracks me up every time. What would a goat bring to the table aside from spitting, howling, and smelling bad? Yet he tries that angle anyway to exhaust all the possibilities. Without a doubt the salesman of the year over there and Green Eggs and Ham, INC.

Dinosaurs actually became extinct at the hands of giant babies.

Kids go bananas over pop-up books, but that is also the problem. In their excitement they will beat the shit out of pop-up books. Just look at that once mighty dinosaur. No match for Erik's fat finger beat-down. 

Where the jerks are

Here is another classic, "Where the Wild Things Are." And here is another pretty awful little kid, chasing the dog around the house with a God damned fork, and hammering nails in the wall. So, his mother sends him off to bed with no supper, which is when he envisions going off to an imaginary land with monsters. There he becomes their king and sends them off to bed without their supper. Jeez. Rather spiteful, right? 

My kind of town

We have many friends who got us Chicago related books, and those are a lot of fun for a baby growing up in the Windy City. The Cubs one is especially fun, and that "C Is For Chicago" one has amazing drawings. I only read the Cubs one after a win. S is for "sore loser." 

I'm sure many of you remember "The Very Hungry Caterpillar." I had not seen it in a number of years and got to the end to find the last page was the one on the right. So, that's it? The caterpillar ate too damn much and got fat? That's the lesson for the youngsters out there? Don't eat like a pig or you'll be a fat-assed caterpillar of a kid? No, that's not how it ends. The final page where he becomes a butterfly was ripped out by my nephew. It's a darker and more cautionary tale without that last part. 

And here you see Erik at his office carefully helping his dad write this blog during his lunch break. It was no-pants Friday at his work. They have fun days like that over there. Hope you enjoyed the book reviews and it can be helpful to some of you with kiddos of your own.

Any other children's books recommendations that you care to leave in the comments?

He's a Good Dude

First off, sorry about not posting for over a month. That's messed up. Having this kiddo is not an excuse to drop blogging all together. I'm going to make a better effort. I have him in daycare every Wednesday this summer, so I'll try to make that my automatic posting day.

Today at the gym two goofy things happened. The first one was when I looked up at a guy who was hollering at me from his treadmill. I was blaring an album by stoner rock legends Sleep at that moment so I couldn't hear what he was saying. When I took out my ear buds I ascertained that he was hollering at someone on his headphones phone device. But why look right at me when you're berating someone else? I was scared for a second there because I don't know how to fight and the dude was big.

The other odd duck was a middle aged man who stopped a young Asian woman to ask if she was using a machine. That is normal gym behavior. Then he said, "Can I work in with you?" That is also an okay request, I think. But then he asked, "Do you have a sister?" I'm not sure about that last one.

The other thing is that I have a pretty awesome kid. We are all a little biased, right? But from where I'm standing, he's a good dude. Erik is 10 months now, and he likes to do little tricks all the time. He waves, points, sniffs, does mouth popping noises, flaps his arms, and shakes his head. Those are the ones I can think of right now. I'll ask him to do "sniffies," for example, and without seeing me for a cue, he starts sniffing away. And the sniff face is mean-looking so it looks like he is mean-mugging people and everyone has a good laugh. He will do one or more of these things and then look at you to see your reaction, and when you do it back to him, he thinks it's hilarious. This kid is going to be funny. His mom and dad are funny too, so I think there are going to be a lot of good times ahead.

Erik also smiles at everyone, which makes everyone he meets feel special. "He smiled at me!" I don't tell them that he does that for everybody because why spoil their moment? He also likes to share, he likes to laugh, and he can dunk a basketball. Sort of. And in that video he hadn't quite learned how to crawl, so he was doing the worm. So break dancing is something I can add to his list of tricks. Talking? Not really. Just "Mama" and "Dada" thus far and not always in context. But I got this little man doing tricks like a dog. His mom gets mad at me because he will growl/grunt and I'll do it back to him, and we will be on the floor together grunting like a couple of cavemen. Mom thinks that I should be saying more words to him instead, and while she is probably right, the growling is a blast. It's a good life.

How about you, readers? What makes you proud of your kids? And if you don't have kids, who are you proud of? Or if you aren't proud of anyone at all, have you seen any weirdos at the gym or elsewhere lately?

The Captain Costco Kid

While I'm pushing Baby Erik in a shopping cart into my local Costco today I see a family of four coming in as well. They consisted of a father, a mother, a son dressed in every day little kid clothes . . . and then another boy in a full God damned Captain America costume. I'm not saying that he had a t-shirt with the emblem on it because that would be completely acceptable.

(That one hand in the pocket with the thumb out always lets the ladies know you're a man about town and a little dangerous. In fact, the thumb of this Captain America points right to his very own "captain" if you look closely.)

No, I'm talking head-to-toe tights with built in fake muscles and a mask. A mask! Your kid isn't Zoro, The Lone Ranger, or any other masked avenger. He is a scrawny little son of urban yuppies, and you're allowing him to make a decision to break all social norms for no better reason than he thinks he's special. Well, he's not. Let's put it this way: Do you want him doing his grocery shopping in an outfit like that when he is 30? No, because then he would likely be insane or some sort of village idiot.

This wasn't exactly the costume, but it was the closest I could find. The kid had no shield, but if he did I would have thrown some cheese at him to test his blocking skills.

Here are the scenarios I came up with that could explain why a family would allow their son to run around thinking he is a pint-sized crime fighter on an otherwise typical Saturday morning in Chicago.

1. It's his birthday.
At first I thought maybe it's cool to let the young man wear the get-up of his favorite comic book hero once a year, but then it occurred to me that there already is a day that the little rascal can do that; It's called Hallo-Fricking-Ween. One day is enough, kid. Don't push it. Halloween is the day where tons of kids, and even adults, are out in costume. So on that day you look perfectly normal dressed like that. But on days that don't fall on October 31st you look like a little dork. I'm sorry, but it's true.

2. Maybe the kid has severe behavior problems and wouldn't leave the house unless he got to dress as Captain America.
Well, if this is what is going on, mommy and daddy might as well piss on the fire and call in the dogs because this young man is running that household. Why can't they just say no to his outfit choice for the day? Are they scared he will throw his plastic shield at them? He's 7 for Christ's sakes. Just because he dresses like one does not mean he is that captain of that family.

3. He wants to have big muscles.
You're just going to have to put in the time at the gym like the rest of us, little fella. We all can't just slip on a muscle suit. What kind of message does it send to him if he thinks he can skip all those sit-ups for those wash board abs and just key up and rush deliver a muscle suit on Amazon? I read once where Sylvester Stallone commented on when action movies took a turn for the worse: "It was the first Batman movie. The action movies changed radically when it became possible to Velcro your muscles on. I wish I had thought of Velcro muscles myself. I didn't have to go to the gym for all those years." So, you want to know why you suck, kid? Just ask Sly.

So what to you think, friends? Would you allow this sort of clothing choice for your kid? Also, what are you up to this weekend, oh captain my captains? . . .

So here is a picture from today of Erik (on the right) and his homeboy Diego (on the left).  Earlier, Erik saw the Captain America Kid. Hardly a good excuse to post a baby photo, but they're cute, huh?

Two Random Weird-Ass Topics After a Month Off of Blogging? The Balls On This Guy!

1. Too Much Empathy Ruins Childhood Programming for Young Boy in Chicagoland Area

Some of you may know this, but I work with kids for a living. This may come as a surprise if you have read older blog posts from my crazier days, but you'll just have to take my word for it. I got thinking the other day how I have always had a pretty strong empathy even as a very young boy. I remember liking "The Munsters" because the mom was hotter than the "Adam's Family," they had a dragon living under their stairs, and Grandpa Munster had that bitchin' car, The Dragula. But what I just couldn't get past was how sad I felt for Herman Munster who so desperately wanted to live a normal life in the suburbs and interact with his neighbors, but he frightened the living daylights out of anyone he came into contact with. Had Herman just said "the hell with it" and holed himself up in his castle in the cul-de-sac, I may have been fine, but he just kept putting his best giant boot forward, experiencing that screaming in fear and rejection over-and-over. I just couldn't take it.

Then when I would try to watch "Tom and Jerry" it wasn't the violence specifically that bothered me - violence I'm okay with - it's that I felt so bad for Tom getting his ass beat, chopped up, and exploded time and time again by a little mouse that was just too smart for him. I yelled at my TV (not unlike I now yell at my Chicago sports teams as an adult) for Tom to just find a dumber and slower mouse or even eat out of the garbage cans in the alleys like Top Cat. Ol' Top Cat lived a pretty luxurious and awesome life when you think about it. Believe it or not, I was excited when they would air those rare episodes where Tom and Jerry got along and didn't fight. Those ones are likely unwatchable like when "The Three Stooges" didn't poke each other's eyes out, but I just wanted there to be peace in the valley on Saturday mornings.

2. Birdy Num-Num

When I first fed my son, Baby Erik, with a bottle, I was amazed. I was thinking, "He's drinking it! He loves it! I am helping this baby LIVE!" Then at 6 months (he's now 7 months) we started with solid foods, and that is even cooler to me. Mrs. Noisewater and I mix up crazy concoctions like spinach, banana, and cherries, and he knocks it down and cannot get enough of it. The little guy starts banging on his high chair tray demanding more. So the other day as I'm spooning it in, I say, "Do you want some num-nums?" Then I started saying "birdy num-num." Then I said it with an Asian Indian accent, and I'm trying to think why in the hell I'm saying that. Finally I remembered that it is from "The Party" starring Peter Sellers. It's not that great of a movie, but it does have that awesome phrase that has been so fun to say during solid food feedings with my boy. In "The Party," Peter Sellers plays an Asian Indian actor who gets invited to an exclusive Hollywood party on accident and screws everything up. At one point he sees the bird food labeled "Birdy num-nums" and starts saying it over-and-over. Then he says it into the intercom system for all the confused guests to hear. I watched the movie around 20 years ago, and that is just about the only scene I remember. And I barely remember it at all. It's something that may have never came to the surface of my brain to be lost forever had I not blurted it out while feeding Baby Erik the other day. Try saying it a few times, readers, and don't forget the accent. Ready? Birdy num-nums. Fun, right?

1. Here is the vicious cycle I go through when I'm watching my son during the day and he won't fall asleep for a nap:

"Jesus, Lord would you just go the F to sleep already! I can't take this crying any more. Even if you just sleep for 30 minutes, I know like 8 things I could get done really quick before you get up. Wait, he is rubbing his ears - this is good. Those blinks are getting slower and slower - this is very good. And there, eyes closed. Okay, I'll just set him down slowly like Indiana Jones changing out that sand for the artifact thing or whatever the heck was going on there . . . Now slip my arm out without jostling his head too much. Shhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Okay, he's out."



"I love that boy. He's just the cutest. I can't wait until he wakes up again so I can play with him."

Repeat.

2. Mrs. Noisewater and I are collecting all the good Disney movies on Blu-Ray so that Erik can watch them some day, but mostly so her and I can watch them on rainy afternoons. Believe or not, Mrs. Noisewater has never seen the original cartoon "Jungle Book." She has only seen the live action version, which wasn't too bad, but you can't beat the original. It has the classic songs "Bear Necessities," "I Wanna Be Like You," and then at the very end you hear what I would argue is the worst damn song in any animated film in the history of the world: "My Own Home."



This is the song Mogli overhears a little girl singing as she fetches water from a stream for her family. The lyrics are her saying that now she is getting water, but some day she will be cooking for everyone in the safety of her own home, sending some other poor sap little girl to fend off wild jungle snakes to get the water. It is not unlike when Louie Anderson is talking about the fast food progression of washing the lettuce up through the two year grind to make that assistant manger position in "Coming To America."



Also, I can't help but think that the song is a little sexist with all those gender roles. This is not the most empowering female character either. Also, (SPOILER ALERT) I always hated her for being the jezebel temptress drawing the man-cub Mogli out of the jungle and into the life of those darned villagers. His boys Balu, Bagheera, and whatever the vulture guys names are got in a scrap with the most feared tiger in the jungle and nearly died for him, only for Mogli to split on his jungle friends the minute he sees his first potential piece of ass. I took that hard as a kid. I grew up early with a bro's before ho's mentality. Never mind what I said a minute ago about what is and is not sexist if I'm going to be tossing out the phrase bro's before ho's, but it's just funny to say goofy things like that about Disney films. Wait, I made reference to a cartoon girl as a "piece of ass" too. Okay, I'm messed up.

3. One last thing. We have noticed that Erik is much more likely to fall asleep with me than he is with Mrs. Noisewater. The problem is that when she is holding him, he burrows into her boobs looking for milk whether he is hungry or not. I told her not to take offense that he doesn't want to just snuggle and sleep with her because who could fall asleep at a 24-hour buffet? If I'm trying to sleep at the Sizzler, I'd be like, "Okay, I am stuffed to the gills. Let's get some shut eye. Oh snap, are they putting out the breakfast stuff already? I think I can get down some biscuits and gravy even if I'm completely bloated. Because . . . Biscuits and gravy. Am I right or am I right? Or maybe a better analogy is like when my buddies and I hung out at the Taco Bell for hours-and-hours, filling up our soda cups with endless cups of Mountain Dew. Either way, I don't fault my boy for indulging himself.

See you next time, friends. You go and Indulge yourself in something good too.

I saw my good friend, Oates, at a Super Bowl party. It had been a long time since I had seen him. He is that guy who gets a girlfriend and then completely disappears, and he has demonstrated that it is a consistent pattern in all three of the committed relationships I have seen him in. Also, he typically likes mean and nasty princess bitch types. You see, Oates can be a little vain. He dresses very nicely, his hair is always styled perfectly with every hair right in place, and he expects the same from the women he chooses. Oates is a great guy, but the problem is, those types of women are sometimes terrible people. When he has one of those girlfriends in his life, he never brings them out around us, and in the rare cases when he does, he acts completely different - not himself.

But on Super Bowl Sunday the one he has been seeing is there, she is a great-looking gal, and she could not be nicer. And Oates was completely acting like good-old-Oates, being himself. There were a lot of babies crawling around the joint, and one of his former ladies would not agree to commit to a baby party. Probably partly out of fear of getting spit-up on her posh clothing (I wanted to use a name brand here, but I have no idea what is nice these days). Oates' lady could not get enough babies, as a matter of fact. She must have held four or five babies through the course of the four quarters, Lady Gaga's bungee jumping halftime performance, and the overtime.

The party was over at my buddy Haircut's place, and Haircut's son who just turned three was examining his foxy patient (Oates' Lady), checking her heart beat (but maybe more to check her boobies?), giving her shots and laughing hysterically, and trying to amputate her toes with a pair of scissors. Haircut said that his boy actually likes the company of pretty ladies. He is no dummy.

At one point I am walking around holding my guy, Baby Erik, sipping my Zombie Dust (that's a beer) and dipping things into crab dip with my spare hand, and I notice Oates' female companion smiling and staring at me. I walked over to the fridge to get a fresh beer, popped it open, looked up, and there she was again gawking at me with that smile. "Dang, Dr. Ken," I thought, "You still got it, you old dog, you." Must have been my new jeans, or maybe those long jogs or all those laps I swam had really payed off. Then it dawned on me that it was what I was holding that was the object of her affection. Baby Erik had charmed another one. I asked Oates' lady if she wanted to hold him, and she jumped off the couch as if she had been waiting forever for me to ask. Waiting for me to catch on that Erik is the cute one.

"Hey, girl. You staring at that line in my fat wrist?"

This kid is quite the charmer, I must say. And Doctor Kenneth and Doctor Haircut's Son both say so.

Roll Call

Okay, let's get after a blog in the moments this kid takes a nap.

So a package arrived recently that was covered in Chinese writing, and the only English on there was my address and my son's name. As I opened the package I noticed that it was expanding. A giant plush stuffed elephant was mashed in there! Erik seemed to really like it, but first I had to spray it down to remove any SARS or bird flu.

There was no note inside, and my attempts to post a picture of it on Facebook did not yield any results as to who sent the unusual gift. I believe there were close to 100 comments and "likes," so that's 100 suspects eliminated. I figure if I ask the countless readers of this blog for some resolution, that's another . . . seven suspects I can cross off the list. I'm faced with the sad realization that the mystery of the adorable stuffed elephant has been moved into the cold case files and may never be solved.

You know those parents that post a million pictures a day of their kid? Well, we post a lot of them, but we are not under the impression that he is the cutest kid of all time in every single picture. Take this one that Mrs. Noisewater took of him at the doctor's office a while back, for example.

This morning we had Baby Erik in bed with us, and Mrs. Noisewater was doing roll calls. Remember that?

Sha-Booya! Sha-Sha-Sha-Booya Roll call!
His name is Erk (Yeah!)
And he's super cute (Yeah!)
Sometimes he fart (Yeah!)
And sometimes he poot (Roll call!)



But then I tried to do one about Mrs. Noiswater bringing back pastries from the bakery when she got back from the gym.

Sha-Booya! Sha-Sha-Sha-Booya Roll call!
Her name is Mommy (Yeah!)
She brings daddy a danish (Yeah!)
She didn't like "The Phantom" (Yeah!)
Said it's too Billy Zane-ish (Roll Call!)

Mrs. Noisewater and I are going out for a "romantical" night at a fancy-pants restaurant and overnight at a hotel downtown. It will be the first night the two of us have been away from our boy overnight. My first drink (and let's be honest, my first time going number 2) without worrying about a baby waking up will be for you, my beloved Seven Readers.

Dr. Ken Turns 40

Well, it's my 40th birthday today, so I figured I might as well do a blog post. I have the day off of work, and I'm spending it with my 4-month-old little buddy, Erik. The only thing I had to get done today was drive out to Toys R Us and Carter's to return some of Baby Erik's Christmas stuff. I don't know a lot about parenting, but here is a good tip: Don't buy anything for babies that has buttons all the way up and down. The very idea that people are still making, buying, and selling button-up and snap-up baby clothes when the zipper is 10 times faster is astounding.

Speed is of the utmost importance when you're changing 30 diapers a day. Snapping one-by-one with a baby crying and squirming all over the place . . . Why would you put yourself through that? So, yeah, the button-up jammies had to be returned. Instead I got him some of those sweet sweatpants that look like jeans. Mrs. Noisewater was saying she is okay with all of his sweatpants, but daddy insisted that the boy have some jeans when he is out in public (or at least give the outward appearance of jeans). My boy is no everyday sweatpants fella, and I intend on being sure of it. I dig those jeans/sweats so much that I spent the extra 8 bucks to get one that is one size bigger that he can wear when he outgrow the first pair. I considered buying a pair for myself because I like comfort as much as the next guy.

Okay, as it turns out you all haven't been missing much by me not blogging anymore as evidenced by these topics. But I have decided that I need to try to write more. My good friend's father just died, and every time I think about my own mortality I immediately think that one of my biggest regrets would be not writing more. Weird, right? Well, have no fear. When I'm dead and gone there will be brilliant pieces of work out here on the inter-webs about my son's magical jeans that have the comfort of sweatpants.

I know it's wrong, but I watch some television with my infant. What? The horror! Well, when you have kids, you tell me if you can do doctor recommended play crap all day long. Believe me, it's nice when daddy wants to watch the Bulls and he will sit next to me with that beautiful blank stare of his into the glowing beautiful light. So the other day Erik and I were watching Robotech. Anyone ever watch that as a kid? I know a couple of you are right around my age, but to be honest, a lot of friends who I talk to don't remember it. It's a Japanimation cartoon from the 80's about a time in the future where an alien spaceship crashes into earth, and humans use the technology to develop their own weapons (such as jets that transform into robots), and then years later the aliens come down to earth to retrieve the spaceship and kick ass and stuff. There are some love stories going on and some major characters dying, which was really heavy when you were a kid. Here's a clip of Robotech below.



Another thing going on is that my mother-in-law is flying in from the San Francisco area to stay with us for 3 months to help watch Baby Erik while Mrs. Noisewater and I are at work. It's a small apartment for the four of us, but it will be really great to have her here. She grew up in Japan. I wonder if she will watch Robotech with me . . .

Tonight Mrs. Noisewater and I are making pizzas and maybe having a beer or two for my birthday evening. We don't go out as much anymore, but we really don't miss it that much. It's a more simple life, and our little guy brings us a lot of joy. Like the other day my son is on the couch with me and I got a hold of his ankles, making his feet clap like a pair of hands, doing stuff that dads do when they run out of shit to do. I thought I smelled some poop, and just as I move my nose right up to his little butt, he cuts loose with a whopper fart. Expert timing. I laughed my ass off. He just kept farting.

See you next time, friends.

Baby Erik's Birth Story

I wanted to sit down and write the story about the day Mrs. Noisewater gave birth to Baby Erik because I thought it would be cool to have it all on record to look at years down the line. Two months have gone by, and I'm finally sitting down to write it. I figured out that I couldn't wait until I would have lots of time or when I'm not super tired because I NEVER have any time, and I'm ALWAYS super tired. So while he takes an hour nap right now, this is the time to write it all down. It's a long a long one so I understand if you skim through it.

Our doctor kept telling us every visit that the baby was basically ready to go because Mrs. Noisewater was dilating, and the baby's head was right there, knocking on the door. She told us just to come in on Thursday, September 8th and she could induce, even though the due date was on the 12th. We thought it would be a good idea to go out for dinner the night before the induction so that we would have a nice night out together, just the two of us, before the baby came. We had Tapas, so who knows which item it was because you sample so many with that type of cuisine, but something likely gave Mrs. Noisewater food poisoning. Bad idea eating anything risky around the time of labor. Now we know. Our appointment was around 8AM, but at 5AM Mrs. Noisewater was throwing up and had daihrrea. I called up the hospital, and they said to get her in right away so that they could get her on an IV so that she wouldn't get dehydrated. I was in a panic when I drove her into the hospital, but it was go time.

Here's my big homie at 2 months old.

It turns out all those stomach problems induced the labor on its own. Erik was due on the 11th, but he was coming out on the 8th one way or another. Things were very, very scary for quite a while because Mrs. Noisewater was still having to get up to go to the bathroom to throw up and go number two quite often, and even after multiple IV bags had pumped into her, the nurses were surprised that she wasn't more hydrated. We could see the heart rate of mommy and baby up on the screens, and both of them were too high. I was a nervous wreck watching those monitors and spoon feeding my wife ice chips. Mrs. Noiswater's body temperature and heart rate eventually came back down to normal levels, and so did baby's.

Our doctor is a really laid back cool hippy type of doctor. She makes you feel very relaxed when you're around her. I felt like I have known her all my life, and she seems like the kind of gal you just want to sit on a back porch with and drink wine all night and contemplate the universe. We had a baby birthing mix on, and when the doctor heard a Wilco song, she said, "Oh, I can't believe you have this Wilco song on here. I delivered both of Jeff Tweedy's kids." What!? How amazing is that?

This is us out for some tiny beers. We are starting to have lives again.

The doctor said, "Okay, dad. It's time for mom to start pushing. You'll be grabbing that leg and pushing her knee back towards her shoulders each time she pushes." What? I mean, I know it's not the old days where the men smoke cigars in the lobby, but I had no idea that the daddies got so hands on nowadays! Mrs. Noisewater was to push as much as she could for the duration of each contraction when the monitor said a contraction was coming (because we couldn't tell at all if she was having contractions because she an epidural. Get one of those by the way, everyone. It's the only way to have a baby). Mommy is really fit, so she was good at doing a stomach crunch/sit-up while the nurse and I pushed her legs up, and baby came out quite quick once she started pushing.

Once the head is out, the rest just slides right out because the shoulders can wiggle from side to side. I just remember seeing how long his torso was and how his legs just kept going and going as the doctor slid him out. A number of people said, "What a big boy!" He was 9 pounds and 20 and 1/2 inches long at birth. We didn't know going in if we were having a boy or a girl, and I remember looking at his beautiful little face, not even having taken a glance towards his genitals when the doctor announced, "It's a boy!" God damn. Everyone always says it's the best moment of your life, and it is. No doubt.

But then they said there was fluid in his lungs, and they had to rush him to the NICU to get that taken care of. I thought that would be a quick process, and they would bring him back. It turns out Erik stayed the night of the 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th before finally going home the afternoon of the 12th (his actual due date). We would sleep in our room in the hospital, but every other minute we could, we were with little Erik in the NICU, holding his hand, rocking him, and feeding him. I remember the first time Mrs. Noisewater saw him with all those tubes hooked up to him, she started crying. I wanted to be strong for everyone, but when she cried I wanted to as well. Erik's breaths per minute were still a little high, so he had to get some assistance with his breathing for a while. Even when that finally came down, he still wasn't eating enough. They wanted him to reach a certain number of milliliters, and if he didn't get it all down, they shot it up his nose. This was just a sad process to see our little guy go through. It made me think of a force fed farm animal or something.

Remember how I said that his mommy saw him  in the NICU, and it made her cry? Well, when I put him in this Halloween costume and came out of the bedroom, she cried again - only from cuteness! 

We got an extra day to stay after the usual time allowed for new mothers because of Mrs. Noisewater's illness - they had to keep giving her antibiotics through an IV. Then that day ran out and they still didn't want to release Erik. So they found a little room on another wing that only had a single bed, but at least we could be in the same room with Erik and all the machines he was hooked up to. For that last night, Mrs. Noisewater stayed in the room with him in the single bed, and because there was no room for me, I drove home, slept for 4 hours, and came right back. It was unusual to have a baby of Erik's size in there because all of his neighbors in the NICU were very undersized. Any time I was getting too down about the situation, I would look around to some of the babies around him who couldn't have weighed more than 3 pounds, and their visitors could only stick their hands into the sides of the incubators when they would visit (they couldn't even hold their baby).

Erik's grandma was too scared to pick him up with all the tubes hooked up, but look how thrilled she was to hold him for the first time. This is one of the best pictures I've ever taken.

I'm not a real doctor, you may know by now, but I had to play the part of Dr. Hardass to get my boy sprung from the joint. The doctors only make the rounds once a day, and I essentially had to say, "Listen, can you get the doctor over here? Because our boy's levels are all good, right? He's just not breast feeding quite enough, but we are fine supplementing with formula. If the doctor isn't going to be coming by, we'll just be unhooking him and walking out of this joint." That worked. The doctor came by to clear him, and off we went.

My heart goes out to anyone who has complications with their babies. I vowed to become a better friend to anyone who is in that situation. I'll be johnny-on-the-spot with anything I can do for those families because it really is a stressful situation where you feel totally powerless and helpless when all you want to do is protect your new little person.

The night we got home, 9/11/2016, Kyle Hendricks of the Chicago Cubs had a perfect game going until the 9th inning. I was bummed he didn't finish that one out for Erik's first night, but then the Cubs won their first world series in over 100 years a couple months later in his first year of life, so that's still pretty damn awesome.

Go Cubs Go! This was his good luck onesie.

People ask me all the time what it's like to be a father, and what I tell them now is that I've never been so tired, but I've never been so happy. And it's hard to explain, but everything I do now is for a purpose. I had all this freedom before, but all that freedom afforded me time to sit around get worried about dumb shit. Now I'm just on the go and getting things done for my beautiful wife and cute little man, and I'm good at it. I don't always feel like I'm good at much, but it turns out I'm a good dad. So far. And I enjoy it. Being a dad is way more fun than I thought it would be. I absolutely love it.

By the looks of it, Erik seems to think I'm doing an okay job. Look at us in our matching sweatshirts! Thanks for reading, friends.

Fatherhood Has Changed Chicago Man, But He Still Won't Eat Camel Meat

My wife dropped me off at work today because she needed our car to take our baby boy to a doctor visit. I packed a lunch for myself and left it in the refrigerator. Isn't that the worst? This is even more of a problem than any other day because where I work on Mondays has nothing nearby to walk to for lunch options. For those of you not from the Chicago area, the neighborhood of Devon street near Damen Avenue has a milieu of cultures ranging from Nigerian, Pakistani, Indian, and you name it. I found a middle eastern restaurant, and I must admit it didn't look very clean and didn't smell too great either. I think I may have actually given it a shot, but then I saw a sign that was happily announcing "Camel meet on Fridays!" That actually scared me off, so snuck out and walked another few blocks to a McDonald's. My stomach was upset from the synthetic food, so I may have been better off with the camel meat.

Why not on Wednesdays? Hump Day!

My tummy was in knots as I worked my way back down Devon to get back to work in time when an elderly Caucasian gentleman walking in the opposite direction stopped to talk to me. Only he didn't appear to be speaking English. I listened hard to see if maybe it was just a thick accent and actually English. I told him, "I don't know the language you're trying to speak to me in." He said some things and I think I heard "Bosnian" in there somewhere. So I said, "Yeah, I don't speak Bosnian. Sorry." Maybe I just have a Bosnian look to me? Or maybe if he sees a white guy in the area, he just assumes Bosnian? Whatever the case, it's too bad I don't speak his language because he seemed very excited about the prospect of conversing with a fellow Bosnian buddy.

So, like I mentioned in paragraph one (if you're still reading), the wife and I have a baby boy now. When Mrs. Noisewater was very, very pregnant we went to a Chicago Cubs game together. She met me after work at a nearby bar and told me that some random drunk had just stopped her on the street and said, "That's a boy!" and pointed at her belly. I think people are going with the old wive's tale that if you carry your baby all up front and not in many other places, then that means it's a boy. So, we left the bar to head into the game and another random drunk homeless man said, "You' havin' a boy!" Well, the drunk homeless prophets were right; He's a boy, and he's beautiful.

They say it's good to talk and to sing to your babies, so he already has some go-to songs that we sing to him. One is "Beautiful Boy" by John Lennon. I think that is a song I would have thought was totally corny in my pre-daddy days, but now I absolutely love it.



The other song is "He's Misstra Know It All" by Stevie Wonder, only I sing "He's Mister Cutie Man." Yes. Mister Cutie Man. You read that correctly. I am no longer the least bit cool, and I fully accept this as fact and as a way of life.



Sincerly,

Mr. Bloggie Man

The other day just about the only thing I had to do for the entire day was put a baby crib together. How long could that really take? Well, little did you know I got a C- in Industrial Arts in Junior High, and I suck at this sort of thing. If there is anything that could have been done wrong, I did it wrong. Two different times I figured out way too late that I had put something on backwards and had to take apart just about everything to get it put on right. Believe it or not, I woke up all sore the next day from sitting on the floor in awkward positions screwing screws into stubborn bolts. 

This was my first real dad task, and I'm not going to say it was a complete failure. Sure, there were a lot of bumps in the road and a lot of swearing, but I stuck with it and got it done. I think it was a metaphor for what parenting is going to be like from what I hear from my friends: You have to figure it out as you go, you're going to suck at it at times, but you just stick with it and stay positive. And they'll be lots of extra parts. Okay, that makes no sense. I suck at carpentry and metaphors. 

I ran the Chicago Rock and Roll Half Marathon last weekend. I have figured out that halves are plenty for me. No more full ones because those destroy perfectly good bodies. My good buddy, Night Train, and I run around 10 miles once every weekend, and it's been great for keeping weight off and gives us time to recover. Also, that way you don't get sick of running when it's just once a week. The race went really well for us, and they had live music along the way. They also had rock impersonators, and I tested the Blues Brothers guys and said to them as I ran by "Orange whip . . . Orange whip . . .," I was very pleased and impressed that they both responded with "Three orange whips!" and did the proper hand motion. The Elvis impersonator looked very hot, sweaty, and hungover, so I didn't engage him with any fun pop quizzes. He looked busy concentrating on not throwing up on himself. 

Hot yoga has been a great way for me to recover from running way too far and taking entirely too long to assemble things with seemingly simple instructions. Usually I'm just about the worst yogi (that's what they call yoga participants) in the class, and that's fine. You have to be willing to be the suckiest guy in the room before you can get better at anything. I'll tell you right now that I'm in decent shape but can't touch my toes. Not even close. Slowly I'm getting more flexible, and I always leave feeling refreshed and thinking with a clear head. However, yesterday right when the class ended, some country music kicked in and continued for at least four songs while I was in the locker room. I would prefer they play any innocuous new age wind chime music music that just blends into the background. That's fine and expected. But, I can't relax when I'm listening to a song about some guys drinking a six pack of beer in the back of a pick-up truck. Unless I'm right there in the back of that truck with them. Country makes me angry, and I can't tune that crap out. 

Always good to have a spotter

When I was in high school I left my alarm clock-radio alarm (I'm old) on the other end of the room and had it set on the country station. That way I knew I wouldn't lie in bed and listen to the music because I knew I would have to run across the room to turn it off or slowly lose my mind. So, it's been a long history of hating country music. I was thinking of leaving a complaint with the yoga studio, but I'll just complain to you guys instead because that's what I've always done.

So running, volleyball, and yoga have been about it as far as exercise goes lately, and I have been losing some muscle tone. I have been avoiding doing any kind of weight training due to an elbow problem, but today the elbow felt pretty good so I pumped some (really light-weight) iron. You know that debate kids have on the playground where they say "My dad could beat up your dad?" Well, what I don't want is some kid saying that to Kenny Jr. and poor Kenny is left saying, "You're probably right. My dad has pipe cleaner arms and can't even screw together simple wooden structures with directions that even a chimp can follow. He's hardly a man at all, but he can do a downward facing dog in his hot yoga class that will make your head spin!" That won't score him any points at all out there on that playground. 

No segue at all here, but I was at work not too long ago, and a coworker said, "Kenneth, I saw on Facebook that we have a mutual friend." She said the friend's name, and the name meant nothing to me. I looked it up, and it is a blog buddy. She was saying what a great dude he is, and it made me happy to hear that. I said he is an excellent writer, and she said that he helped everyone write their term papers in college. This pleased me too for some reason. I was proud of this dude I have never met. Then I had to explain to this coworker that I had never met him, and I'm a grown-ass man with pen pals. 

One blog buddy I have met is SO@24, and I was reminded recently of the time we first met in L.A., and for reasons I can't remember, we recreated the suggestive cover art from Hall and Oates' 1982 release, "H20." I thought of this because I went to an outdoor Hall & Oates show last night on a very hot and humid Chicago night with my sister, her boyfriend, and my very pregnant and sweaty wife. Believe it or not, we were actually just as sweaty as Daryl Hall and John Oates were in the picture! 

(Hall & Oates)

(Dr. Ken and SO@24. We should have got sweatier or just spritzed water on our faces. It will always be one of my biggest regrets.)

There has been no real rhyme or reason to where this post has been headed, and I'll just end it here. Go ahead and leave a comment related to any of the scatter shot of topics I have run down in this rambling stream of consciousness, or just say hello to your insane pen pal buddy from Chicago. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to admire the glorious crib that big daddy built with his own. bare. hands!