Category: Daily Life

Ramblings, often stream of conscious, journaling the events of my life.

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The 53 Car..er..Van

Dodge Grand Caravan"I see you everywhere!" I hear that from my friends often. With five children in five different schools and only one working vehicle, we are on the road a lot. My response is almost always, "If the driving was bad, it was one of the teenagers…even if it was really me." Why would they notice us? We drive a white Dodge Grand Caravan. These white Caravans are so ubiquitous that you often have to look twice to assure you are getting in the correct one.

Did you know that Regal Entertainment Group is headquartered in Knoxville? Yes that Regal Cinemas. What this means is that b-flicks premier in Knoxville. When Herbie Fully Loaded came out in 2005, we took the family to see it. Turkey Creek was giving out lots of swag. We ended up with at least two 53 magnets. One went to a friend with an actual Volkswagen bug and the other lived on our refrigerator.

Herbie 53The day we got our white Dodge Grand Caravan, I thought I was being funny and slapped the 53 magnet on the hood thinking it would last 3 days. I was amazed at the number of people who smiled, pointed, and giggled as they walked past the van. They’d quiz, "Herbie right?" It’s a van, not a Volkswagen bug, so I’d reply, "Herbie hits middle age" (fatter in the middle) or "Herbie gets a family." I once tried to remove the magnet and found it bonded to the paint.

Last week, I noticed Herbie Van was showing its age. The freeze had cracked the 53 magnet. Now I’m left with some choices.

  1. Leave it as it..cracked.
  2. Try to remove the magnet which is bonded to the paint and risk tearing the paint off the hood
  3. Have a professional remove it and repaint the hood with an actual 53 (and perhaps a stripe).
  4. remove the magnet and repaint the whole van with daisies.
  5. Buy a new van. (okay.. that’s not a realistic option..)
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Clot II – Return of the Nosebleed

Producer: Amy
Lead role: Amy
Supporting cast: Dad
Clot summary: At 2:30am, 7 year old girl will erupt from bed with nose gushing blood leaving small drip on favorite pink pillow and a bit of a puddle on the sheets. She will try to deal with the problem herself by sitting on the toilet (lid down) and rocking in a half daze to make sure that blood drips cover as much of the wooden, where linoleum was before the dogs tore it up, bathroom floor as possible. Only when nose bleed subsides will she wander downstairs to rouse the sleeping father who will don his bio-hazard suit and begin to console the weary child…
Planned releases: Rumor has it that Colt III – Revenge of the O Positive is in production and scheduled for an early release.

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From the mouths of babes

I dropped the milk. The cap popped off and poured all over the floor.

Me: "DAMMIT!"
Evan, 4 years old: "Dad said dammit."
Mom: * gives Dad eyeballs *
Amy, 7 years old: "Moooom! Evan said dammit!"
Evan: "No, Dad said dammit."
Amy: "Don’t say dammit."
Noah, 13 years old: "Evan, don’t say that. It’s a dirty word."
Evan: "No! Dammit. Dammitdammitdammitdamitdamitdamitdamtdatmdaaaaammmmmmmit!"
Mom: covering her face in towels to hide her laughter.
Dad: hiding in the fridge unable to breath laughing.

Uncle already! I get the message. Mouth meet soap.

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From the mouths of babes

Moments after I posted Dad Fail, Evan walked up to me with a question.

Evan, 4 years old: "Dad, why do you always say…" He bent over at the waist at a 45 degree angle with his arms hanging straight down and in a deepened gruff voice, "crap crap crap crap crap crap crap…"

It just went on and on but in the end, it turned out he was repeating a noise from the Nintendo DS Mario game.

Please excuse the screwed up aspect ratio on the video but I did that in haste.