Unbelievably stressful day planned today!
Category: Daily Life
Ramblings, often stream of conscious, journaling the events of my life.
SuperDad
Tonight was the elementary school’s open house. It may have been only the kindergarten open house but the cub scout troop was meeting so there were enough cars at the school that a couple of people parked on the lower branches of some of the trees and a couple of SUVs managed to find some space on the roof. Cathy went early and helped sell year books. I caravaned the children around town as we picked up Sarah, Sarah’s friend, and Tommy from high school activities. We ended up at McDonald’s having dinner with some cub scout friends of ours. In due time, we dropped Molly and Tommy off at the house with hopes Tommy would do some chores and the rest of us deploy to the school. Look out! Chaos coming!
We had a wonderful time, saw some friends, had pleasant chats with teachers, Sarah fell chasing Evan and bled all over the new kindergarten rug, and Amy was able to show off her school. As we came to a close, I noticed the volunteer form horribly empty so I inquired and put our names down. In that time, already-over-volunteered-Cathy stared on in dread as I swiped another bit of time out of her life with a few strokes of a #2 pencil. While she was entranced with my unsanctioned scheduling, Sarah and Evan departed, followed shortly by Amy. As the ever confident Amy found herself alone in the hallway, she took it upon herself to walk out the front of the school, through the dark parking lot, and off to the playground. The parents got a frowny face tonight. Sarah and Evan took one hall of the school. Cathy raced to the gym. A couple of scout dads joined in the search with one commenting "my child is missing too…but he’s old enough to walk home!" The teacher joined the posse. Amy was found on the playground and as she was walked into the school, her name blared across the school intercom so that all visitors became away that the McCaughans lose their children.
Didn’t Noah go with us? Anyone seen Noah?
Of Being Dad
"So, do you have plans to go to school today?"
When Online Friends Go Missing
You know, last week I had my withdrawal. I received no comments, questions, or phone calls. It was a little discouraging. I vanished and no one cared (of course, they probably just looked at Cathy’s blog and knew exactly what was going on) Toward the end of the week, I did receive a “you still alive?” email and for that I was very thankful.
With that said, What’s happen to Phillip?!Bluesloth is redesigned!
The Machine is Broken
I feel so beat up. I just want to sleep. My body is sore all over. My brain aches.
Last Night’s Dream
I remember two dreams. Both involved Tommy. One was about camping. But this post is about the other one.
We are in a car. I am in the back seat against the door on the passenger side. Cathy is sharing the seat with me just to my left. Some girl is in the middle but it is kind of like an opening to another row of seats so perhaps she is in the back-back and leaning forward to the middle row of seats; she is holding an unlit joint between her thumb and index finger but mostly concealing it in her hand. Then a shadow of a person is in the other middle seat on the driver’s side. Tommy is driving. A police officer pulls him over. We all sit there stunned. We make no attempt to get the girl to conceal her illegal substance as the officer approaches the car and makes eye contact with her. He comes to my side of the car and takes the joint from her, makes a comment and hands it to me. As he walks away Cathy points out that the police officer is going to arrest me so I eat it.
Now I ask you, what the hell was Tommy doing driving?!
What do I do?
Today I am calculating distances between UK postcodes so if someone says they live in the SW1A 0AA postcode and they want to find information within 3000 meters of that postcode, I’m doing the math for that.
Did you know that the UK postcode system is copyrighted? That means there are very few tools available for this so the wheel has to be constantly reinvented. http://www.freethepostcode.org/ is trying to help. Copyrights are not always a good thing.
Don’t you have better things to do?
I blog a lot. Apparently I’m a noisy Twitter also. Some people take smoke breaks. I publish something. I am a juggler. A natural born multi-tasker. When I get some code block, I distract myself with a post then usually I can get back into the grind. Since I work constantly, and strange hours, I am at the keyboard perpetually which lends to being able to produce more posts. Blogging is not something that detracts from my day nor consumes quantities simply because I have built blogging into the rhythm of my life.
Last week I said some things in jest which offended Cathy … fill in some blanks … we got angry with each otherapparently only I got mad and I quit posting. The quantity of work on my plate was inhuman (and light compared to the ungodly amount on my plate this week). I withdrew from everything but work which probably wasn’t a terrible thing. But it knocked my rhythm out of whack. My blogging habit broke. I’ll get it back in sync but it may not be until next week after this work is done. If I survive this week and October I’m seriously thinking of taking November or December off completely.
Btw, Cathy and I have since made up. Married people know what that means.
As an interesting sidebar, I thought with no posting my readership would vanish. According to Google Analytics the number of visitors increased!
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From the mouths of babes
Evan, from his crib: "I’m not going to sleep and you cannot make me. I have been studying constitutional law on the History Channel and PBS along with escape tactics used by Wonder Pets on Noggin and tactical planning on Family Guy. You cannot legally nor forcefully hold me in this cell any longer. I am two years old for God’s sake! I don’t need to NAP! Release me now or I shall POO!"
From the mouths of babes
Dad: "Evan time to take a nap!"
Evan, the littlest con artist: *cries out* then squints really hard trying to force tears
Seduced
Last night I decided to not sleep until January but the Sirens called and I decided to grab just a couple of hours rest. That’s where my seductress got me. Despite having the stolen covers between her skin and mine, her warmth was soothing and the weight of her body leaning against my back anchoring. We were not cuddling but she lay partially across my legs further assuring I would stay in the bed and it worked. Each time I jolted awake, I dared not leave the bed for fear of disturbing her…at least that was my rationalization. Shouldn’t the dog be sleeping at the foot of the bed?!
Evan of Tasmania
Take two and a half minutes of your life and experience ten minutes of shopping at Border’s with Evan!
From the mouths of babes
Evan reminds me of Max (btw, that link autoplays a Max and Ruby snippet and Evan bee lined it to my lap so we had to watch all of them as he identified characters and objects in the movie. What fun!)
Dad: "What do you want for breakfast?"
Evan bolts over to the food shelf and points at Cinnamon Toast Crunch: "ONE!"
Dad says NO…so what
We are dog sitting this weekend. No, let’s call it like it is. We traded 3 children for one Corgi. Granted, I think the children are more well behaved. This is still a welcomed change of pace for the holiday weekend.
We wake this morning and Crystal has mined the floor so I put Evan on the indoor slide and he watches from the safety of the loft as I clean. Crystal has a special diet so I lock her in Tommy’s room then feed Molly in the kitchen. This is my first moment to use the restroom. Yes, I leave the door open because I have to keep an eye on the pixie and you know the modeling thing.
Here’s a thought for you non-parents. How does toilet training begin? This will make your head reel. The word is modeling. Let me tell you! A dog growling at you during a special moment is nothing as disturbing as a toddler handing you toilet paper! [Source]
I see Evan place his hand on the doorknob to Tommy’s room. "No!" Evil grin. I repeat "No" and even get intellectual offering him an explanation. Click. Squeak. Slam! Ok. The door definitely opened while I looked down. Perhaps he peeked and closed it before Crystal escaped. Then I hear the jingling of her collar against Molly’s metal food bowl.
Does anyone listen to Dad’s lectures of no? The 14 year old went to her first after high school football party then spent the night at a friend’s house. Talk about nerve wrecking for Dad! Please think about Dad saying, "No!"
