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.

You Asked and Ken Answered!

A little while back I asked you, my beloved readers, to ask me some personal questions so that you can get to know your favorite blogger a little better. I was blown away by all the responses filling up my inbox. It looks like you really want to know more about what makes me tick, and that is very flattering. I chose some of the most interesting ones and put some serious thought into my responses. I hope you enjoy . . .

Okay, I'm full of shit. I never actually asked that you guys ask any questions because there are only like 7 of you that read, tops. Truth be told, I just scrolled around the internet for interesting questions to ask myself because I had no blog topic ideas today. So, now I do have a topic, but it's kind of a crummy one. Whatever, we will make the best of it here at The Gancer. Away we go . . .

1. What do you do if you can’t sleep at night? Do you count sheep? Toss and Turn? Try to get up and do something productive?

I usually read, but when I'm in between books or need a break from reading I play the name game in my head. For example, I'll pick a topic such as "heavy metal bands," and then I'll name a band for every letter of the alphabet. Usually by the time I get to N or so, I'm out cold. My dad also told me that when you are having trouble sleeping, get up to go pee even if you don't have to. That works sometimes too. Thanks for the pee pee trick, dad! You're the best. Also, it sometimes helps when I try to sync my breathing up to someone else's. Now that my wife is pregnant she is snoring like a snow blower (sorry to announce that to all seven of my readers, honey. You're still beautiful!) so it's really easy to get the timing of her breathing down given the volume of the snoring. Pretty soon we're both sound asleep, only she is far louder than me (Sorry again, darling. You're still the sex pot of my dreams).



2. Who performs the most random acts of kindness out of everyone you know?

That would have to go to my good buddy, Night Train. I went to a concert with him the other night, and we were partying in the parking lot with three random middle aged weirdos who were a little rough around the edges. When we walked by they said, "Hey, come hang out with us!" Odd that they wanted new friends so badly, right? We had written on our white styrofoam cooler full of beer that we were selling one concert ticket for face value that came with a free adult beverage. One of our new friends who invited us to hang out took it upon herself to help sell one of the tickets. She seemed to have trouble getting through any sentence without saying "motherfucker," and she didn't make exceptions even when it came to her sales approach. I for one wouldn't want to imply that someone had intercourse with their own mother as part of a first impression, but she had a style all her own. Someone would come around the corner and she would say, "Hey, motherfucker! We got a ticket here for sale, motherfucker!"*

*You see, MF'er appears in both sentences She never missed a chance.

(In case you don't know what a styrofoam cooler looks like)

We were all a little embarrassed by our new friend and were doubting the fact that she could help sell the spare ticket. As a matter of fact, we were convinced she was scaring the shit out of any "motherfuckers" who came near us. Nigh Train never doubted her for a minute, and he even offered her a $20 commission on any leads she brought in that led to a sale. Sure enough, she found someone who paid full price. After the transaction was complete and Night Train paid crazy lady her commission, he noticed that the customer had paid $20 too much. So, he ran after him to give him the money. Then it dawned on him that he forgot to get his free beer, so he ran him down to give him that as well. Night Train is just a solid dude, and that is all there is to it.

3. What are the top three qualities that draw you to someone new?

      3. Not selfish. The person cares about others, and the person actually listens to what others say - doesn't just wait for his/her turn to talk.

     2. An interesting conversationalist. If we've been conversing for the first time and over 5 minutes have elapsed without us extending things beyond the weather, what we do for jobs, where we live, and how many kids we have, then it's just not going to work out for us as new friends.

     1. Funny. It really helps if you're funny. Even if you're not actually saying funny stuff, it helps if you laugh at the super funny stuff that I'm saying to you.
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How about you, Seven Readers? Do you want to answer any of these questions or just comment upon my wildly (mildly) entertaining responses?

Each of these men is either selfless (Andre), a good conversationalist (Wilt), and funny (Arnold). Wilt would have to be a decent conversationalist to bed 10,000 women, or whatever.