Fun Loving – How I Hope we are Remembered (not like F’ing Amateurs)
The Coolest Vampire – I Need your Blood Now
As I’m sitting down to begin writing this week’s story, Christmas has just ended for 2016. This time of the year is associated with a spirit of giving. I’ve always believed that we each receive so much more when we give. As a matter of fact, I received the most memorable switching as a result of giving away a can of my dad’s soup without asking first, (a not so fun memory related to giving – link). But this week’s story about ‘giving’ is a funny memory for me.
El elefante es grande, muy grande
My wife is one of those lucky people born with great core balance and hand to eye coordination. Something most people don’t know about her though is her amazing linguistic ability. On one of our fun vacations, a couple of friends of ours got to witness this incredible attribute firsthand.
Nice and Dry
One of the activities my wife and I used to do with our kids was camping. Kim’s family was a weekend camping family, she grew up with frequent trips to Hueston Woods as a kid. I didn’t, I had my first exposure to the trailer camping experience with Kim when we were dating. I liked it. I liked all of it, the getting away from the regular routine, the no phone calls, (there were no cell phones yet), the grilling out, the hiking and creeking and the nighttime s’more making. I would do it again, (not sure about my wife).
Mmm….yummy!
I admit it – I like to cook. I hate the cleanup stage, but I like to cook, always have. In this short phase of being ‘house husband’, (I say short because I don’t know how long it will last), I am doing all the cooking. This makes me King of What to Eat Tonight.
The dishes I make fall into just a few simple categories:
* recipes all 3 of us love (only 3 of us left in the house)
* recipes Kim and I both love
* recipes only I love Continue reading
Holy Cow, Can’t we Watch Batman Dad?
In my specific kid generation you were either a Batman or a Lost in Space kid. Maybe it had to do with how old we were in 1966 because most of the big kids told us Lost in Space was way cooler than Batman, but for me and my friend Timmy, it was Batman and Robin all the way. BAMM! POW! It was the only show on TV as far as we 3rd graders were concerned, (ok so maybe Dark Shadows ran a close second). Continue reading
A clear violation and possible capital punishment
I’m not sure if you girls out there have your own set of secret rules of public bathroom etiquette, but we men do. I might be breaking several regulations of ‘maledom’ here by sharing these secrets which have been guarded for centuries, but my story blog site is about growing up and when I started this venture I promised to share all aspects of my growing up.
Unless you come from one of those progressive families where the parents have the sex talk, (for example), most of these rules aren’t verbally shared with us, we’re just expected to assimilate, to learn them via osmosis. We go to the bathrooms, we witness a protocol and we’re expected to repeat it. Violating a couple of these more important protocols can deliver serious consequences, (shudder), I don’t even want to think about it. Continue reading
Yeahhh Baby….
Dental appointments…don’t you love them? I don’t have great teeth, they’re just average. Don’t get me wrong, they’re not British-never-seen-a-dentist bad and they’re not Miss America white either. They’re ‘just teeth’. Up until the age of 30 or so I think I must have had like a hundred cavities. Ok, so maybe it wasn’t 100, but my dentist used to drive a Yugo when I started seeing him as a kid and then quickly moved up to a BMW. It just can’t be coincidence – I was helping to keep America working.
Hamiltucky in its glory
Although I was born in California and I live here today, I grew up in the medium sized town of Hamilton, Ohio. Like a lot of towns, Hamilton was originally founded as a fort. By the mid 19th century it had become a significant manufacturing town and it has a colorful history. It was even once affectionately known as Little Chicago. If you read the Wiki link here, you’ll even read that the entire town was off limits to military personnel due to the prevalence of gambling and prostitution. In my own lifetime, there were a few events that occurred there which most of us would have preferred did not. We that grew up in Hamilton sometimes affectionately refer to it as “Hamiltucky”.
This week’s story is a funny memory from way back when Kim and I had been married only a few years. The year was 1985 and Kim was pregnant with our second son, Corey. We lived in Hamiltucky at the time. Kim was an LPN and I was still working for the foundry, HP Deuscher. To begin this story, I want to share a spotty memory from my very early childhood. Continue reading
Honey Flies
As I am writing this story, I am down in Phoenix, only 3 days after my retirement from P&G (read me). Kim and I are trying to ensure at least one of us is visiting monthly to maintain the house before we one day move here on a more permanent basis. I have a car here, my 2001 Ford Escape so one of my chores on this trip is to get it registered and titled in AZ. That was supposed to be yesterday’s chore but the blower motor on the home HVAC system chose this day to go out. That was 6:30 pm. I spent the night sleeping on the couch, with a fan blowing directly on me all evening. The house got up to a balmy 90 degrees. Ah, retirement….ain’t she sweet!
This morning was spent at the AZ DMV. There were two offices equidistant from my house. I drove to one and saw a huge long line outside before the office opened so I drove home, waited an hour and then headed over to DMV, choice B. Continue reading
