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Package Check

Men love their penises. This cannot be denied. We remain ever vigilant to size, girth, performance, and usage quotas. We give them names, haircuts, dress them in raincoats, and polish them frequently. But when does a man become aware of his penis? I think most men would admit around age 10 but then go on to lie horribly about the history of their penis, its statistics, the number and frequency of polishings, and the date of first use. Like a used car, you cannot trust the odometer nor the salesman!

All parents of male children know that the adult male’s memory does not serve him well. That penis works from birth. Children bring many shocking things into your life but nothing quite prepares you for the morning salut when changing that diaper within the first 6 months. Then suddenly between 9 months and a year, he discovers it! Opening the diaper invites a package check! You have to rapidly clean the area and then give in to letting him make sure all parts are intact.

Nearing 1 year old, Evan not only does his daily package check, he utters a sound that is hard not to mistake for "Mine!" I assure you, he won’t let go it it until he gets married and hands it over to his wife to keep in a jar.

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From the mouths of babes

Dad: "How were your TCAPs?"
Sarah: "Boring!"
Dad: "I know they were boring. How did you do?"
Sarah: "I don’t know. They don’t tell us."
Dad: "How do you feel like you did? Good. Bad. Questions were hard. Made you think."
Sarah: "I don’t know"
Dad: WWASD

Mom: "Noah, can Granny and Granddaddy come to your graduation?"
Noah, confused: "Did they come to graduation?"
Mom: "Can they come to graduation?"
Noah, still confused: "We haven’t had graduation yet."
Mom: "CAN!"
Noah: *blink* *blink*
Dad: "Noah. _Can_ Granny and Granddaddy come to graduation?"
Noah: "I don’t know if they can."
Dad, shouting: "Do you want them to come?!"
Dad, regrouping: WWASD WWASD

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From the mouths of babes

This goes hand in hand with my earlier post.

Dad, asking nicely: "Why are you crying?"
Sarah: sits silently with chin on fist
Dad, asking nicely: "Why are you crying?"
Sarah: sits silently with chin on fist
Dad, becoming frustrated and gruff: "Why are you crying?"
Sarah: "Because you won’t let me tell you why I am crying!"
Dad: blink. blink.

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Could you, would you save a life?

Yesterday a 13 year old girl, Megan, on Sarah’s Bearden Middle School bus fell over with a heart attack. The girl beside the victom screamed. The bus stopped, students evacuated the bus, paramedics brought in a AED, rushed the girl away, and that’s all we know.

Poor Sarah. Bomb threats, lock downs, and possibly death. Too much reality for a 12 year old. The sad thing is Sarah keeps everything locked inside of her and I can’t get anything but stoic, short answers from her. I was the same way at her age and it pains me because I know that keeping things bottled up can only last so long and eventually it all has to come out; the longer she waits, the harder it will be to deal with the bottled up emotions. I bet she thinks she is being strong; strength would be talking. At least she has caught blog fever and perhaps we can communicate that way. She shared more information about the incident in her blog than I could have dragged out of her with any other means.

Taking advantage of the situation we had this dialog:

Dad: "So Sarah, would you have liked to known CPR to be able help?"
Sarah: "They taught us CPR at camp."
Dad: "So did you try to help?"
Sarah: "She didn’t need CPR. She needed those paddle thingys."
Dad: "An AED? A defibrillator?"
Dad takes a moment to explain CPR, the functions of the heart, lungs and brain, and why CPR saves lives until an AED can be brought on the scene.
Sarah glazes over and tunes Dad out.
Dad asks: "Would you like to be trained in CPR?"
Sarah, exasperated: " I don’t want to learn that medical stuff!"
Dad, starts to explain how she could have helped the girl today, or perhaps her grandparents or even parents.
*Ring ring*
Saved by the bell. The phone rings to end the conversation.

I have to say I found the conversation a little disheartening. More people should be trained with the American Red Cross.