I was at the library with the family yesterday. At the Chicago Public Library you can get museum passes for free entries for your entire family. Nice tip right there for the 4 people still reading this page. Anyway, so I'm diddling around on my phone while my 3-year-old son is playing with other kids and another (and better) random dad, and I hear young Erik Noisewater say, "Let's make a Transformer!" The kids and the random dad were building things out of giant Legos that were about a foot across. I hear the random dad say in a slightly effeminate voice, "Does this look like a Transformer?" I look up to see that the son of a bitch had whipped up an amazing five foot tall robot in a matter of a couple minutes, and Erik was smiling ear-to-ear. This guy looked like gay Ryan Reynolds, he was in better shape than me, better looking than me, and on this day for sure, a better dad than me. He was on the floor with everyone's kids like the Deadpool Pied Piper Super Father doing all these creative things and with boundless energy. I'm so glad that this dude exists in the time he does so that he can get legally married to another man and have a family without judgement from anyone. Just think, if he were born 50 years ago he may never have been able to be the super dad he was born to be.
The face you make at other dads when you just made the perfect Lego Transformer.
2. Bane!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The other night I'm putting Erik to bed and he says to me, "Daddy, why don't you have muscles like Bane? Then he starts squeezing my pathetic arms, searching everywhere on them and saying, "Where are your muscles?" Thanks a lot, kid. I mean, I can't live up to the standard of cartoon super hero physiques, but he is right that I could certainly stand to put on a touch more muscle up top. He's like my little personal trainer now. I did some push-ups with him on my back yesterday, so he and I are working on it.
Overdeveloped the trap muscles a touch, if you ask me.
3. The 1980's, the Decade of Amazing Walkie Talkies
Do you ever notice in 80's movies the kids all seemed to have walkie talkies where they could talk to their friends from their respective bedrooms from a mile away? I was a kid in the 1980's, and I didn't know one kid who had those. We had the G.I. Joe ones where you were lucky to hear your friend in the next room, and even then it was like a bad McDonald's drive through sound so you couldn't make out what the F he was saying, as if it what he was saying was anything more important than "Can you hear me?"
We have the Jolt cola. Repeat. We have the Jolt cola!!
4. How was everyone's holiday?
Mine was pretty awesome. It was our first one waking up in our own house with Santa coming for the kids, so pretty exciting stuff. We discovered a new drink too: Captain Morgan and egg nog. We call it Captain Nog. I just love that name. Captain Nog sounds like a ruthless cutthroat gangster on the high seas. Drunk with white goop all over his beard.
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?
Saturday, July 23, 2016
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!
