Wallet is not a football

Son who loves to throw the football was in the process of getting my wallet for me. My wallet is the Harley Davis size and packed to the brim. In other words, about the size of a small football. I see his arm go back with the wallet and I screamed No!!! but hey what can happen, just a bush between me and dad. As the wallet is sailing through the air, the snaps open up right as it passes over the bush. Like a NY parade with confetti the contents came raining down on the bush. All 17 credit credit cards, doc appts, gift cards, and cash. To this day I still will look over in the bush and say "oh there's a credit card I have been missing" sigh

Family picnic

It was the eighth annual outdoor picnic party at the bank. Blow up rides, band all the grilled food you can eat. Just sat down with my load of food and trying to decide which to eat first, polish brat or the hamburger when daughter Molly came up behind Gunnar who was busy eating. Molly had that look of "I've got ya" when she pulled from behind her back a snow cone. Before I could say "don't think about it" she smashed it Gunnar's head. Pretty much got the hulk reflex out of him as he grabbed his cone and slung ice and juice back across him. All I could say to the affect people was "he will be dealt with harshly if he makes it back home alive." sigh

Cheap Groceries

When I unexpectedly came home for lunch I noticed my daughter coming out of the house loaded with grocery sacks. I asked WTF is this. She said I needed groceries such as chicken, cereal, sugar and cheese and by the way, you are getting low on cheese. I asked whats wrong with going to the store. Response, "Its cheaper going to your house." Sigh

First Broken Heart

To counter the teasing Gunnar received in 1st grade from siblings and others that "Gunnars got a girlfriend" chant, explained to him that is the goal of a guy, to get girlfriends. Wife blames me for this carry over to now 3rd grade. Apparently it was now the thing for a guy to have as many girlfriends as possible amoung the males in the glassroom. Wife gets a call from a concerned teacher if Gunnar was all right. After school was let out she found the guy with his head on the desk in tears. In his out stretch hand she found a crumpled up note from a girl that said it could never be and had a broken heart drawn. In his desk he had several other notes that he was going to send to said girl but not now, not ever.

Red Light

Wife and Joe are in the car sitting at a busy intersection waiting for ever for the traffic light to change to green. Wife was taking son to the base ball field complex where they have gold, blue, red, green fields. With out much thought into the response, she asks where is he playing. He a says "Green". Thinking somehow she daydreamed through the wait light, she shoots forward through the intersection. My son told me later that between the screams, screeching tires and honks, he was going to die. Asked wife, response, "No more using the word "Green" while in the car", sigh.

Bleeding on the Brain

My sister who is an MD was telling me cases where low impact injuries to the head had caused bleeding on the brain and in some cases people during sleep would suffocate on their own vomit. While we were on vacation we had connecting rooms between our two families at the hotel. My sister was in the other room vegging out on the bed. Me being the neat freak was on my hands and knees straightening the shoes between the dresser and the connecting door between the rooms. Unbeknownst to me, my wife who was in the other room along with my sister, had decided to come in to tell me some important news. For such a small girl she was able to swing the connecting solid core 90 lb door open with great velocity. I think I may have seen the door out of my peripheral before I heard the crash as it slammed into my head. The impact caused me to reel backwards. My arm in desperation to right myself, cleared off the dresser contents before I came to rest on my back on the floor. I must have screamed "Knights of Columbus" because the only sympathy I got from my sister was laughter from the other room. Wife, who actually seemed concerned, especially after hearing stories on how people succumb to their head injuries, asked "Should we have that checked out?" Sister after establishing with my wife that I had good life insurance responded …… "Just let nature take its course", sigh.

Retro, First Pregnancy

We were in about 8 mos of the pregnancy with our first child or I should say my wife was. Stuck in typical LA traffic we were heading home from dinner. Wife was giving me instructions on how I needed to get her home since morning sickness was happening. Like what honk my horn and the 8 lanes of traffic are going to part I said. I don’t know if it was going to happen anyway or it was a response to my blunt but realistic comment. She turned looking at me then grab my shirt to pull me closer. “What”, I said. She responded with a projectile vomit starting with my face then running down my side. This was not good and the stench was over helming. I quickly rolled down the window and like a dog held my head out the window all while trying to wipe the chunks off my face and keep my dinner down. Needles to say the vomit stayed with the car for years as it seeped down between seats and any other open crevice. I asked in later life wtf, why didn’t you stick your head out the window or on the floor board, response, “I wasn’t feeling well and I needn’t help.” Little did I know, as documented in my previous stories, vomit, # 2's and I were going to get to know each other. Sigh

Friday 13th Date Night

Once and maybe twice a year my wife gets Friday and Saturday off from work which means we can have a date night. For 5 weeks I was counting the days that we would go to Chili’s, Movie, Cold Stone Ice-cream and maybe get the wife liquored up before we went home and maybe I would get lucky that night.

Even though the day was Friday the 13th my work morning was calm. Had Pandora classic 70s rock going and had just settled down for a leisurely yet somewhat productive quite morning. 9:00am wife calls me at work saying she is in big trouble. I ask like how big, she tells me the collection agency is calling Ashley regarding the uncollected funds from the hospital, $200bucks which was from a drunken Ashley ER visit. So what’s the problem, it’s her problem. Yes but then she tells the collection agent she is Ashley in order to gain more insight into the problem. When she finally confesses that she is not Ashley, the agent becomes angry ant tells her that what she is doing is illegal and will be reported, then my wife hears a dial tone. Not a problem, wife is going to drain my grocery account and go pay the hundreds to pay off my daughters account. Never mind the fact I just gave my daughter hundreds to take care of the bill last month. Sigh, hopefully wife will be settled down by date night. 10min later daughter calls to say she over slept and was late opening the store. Told the angry boss that her dog had health issues and was close to death and that is why she was not at work. Ashley tells me that when her boss calls mom, mom needs to go along with her lie about the dog being sick. Wife becomes frazzled with all the lies she has to deal with but the morning is young, plenty of time to get back on the date night theme. 20 min later wife calls and says Joe base ball cleats are no good, needs baseball pants and a new bat bag because his is bag now looks old but the bus taking his team to AZ training is leaving in 90 min and would I give her the credit card. Hell, what’s another 2 hundred to the bill so long as we can have date night.. 45 min later mechanic calls about my wife’s car, coils, rotor, brakes and belt, $1,000 please. Wife is upset saying now we can’t afford to go out. I remind her that we have gift cards so I think we are still on. 3:00 with 2 more hours to date night. 3:05 wife calls to say Gunnar sprained/broke ankle in school. Not looking good for date night. Leave docs office on crutches at 5:30. Okay dinner is out but we can make 7:05 movie. 6:05 Ashley calls to say she is at her work 10 mi outside of Manhattan and she locked her keys in. Since road side service is only good with wife’s phone, someone would have to rush out there with it. I tell wife that we can do this if I go now we will only miss 30 of the movie and trailers. Wife says forget it and she is now out of the mood. Somehow my relaxing day at the office is now watching $1,628 being drained from my account and I get no date night. I went from exciting date night to another cold shower night. Sigh

Dad and Son the mechanics

Wife calls me to tell me what a wonderful meal she has made and to hurry home. Can't believe it, my wife has cooked me a hot meal for a change. 5min later as I am driving home I am told not to come home but to now help the 18year old who's car is stranded on the roadside. I went over to my parents house where Joe was to give me an in depth problem description. Something about it took awhile to warm up and it drove like in 3rd gear while in 1st. He also had let the battery go mostly dead but was able get it started. Me being mechanically inclined and my son have taking 2 course of advanced car mechanics were looking at the possibilities, alternator, fuel pump or maybe a clogged fuel filter. Grandpa ever once in awhile from his chair would pipe in, "Did you try putting gas in it?" Joe countered he only had 150mi on a 350mi tank so that couldn't be it. After 30 min of diagnose, I called the tow truck anyway but to humor my dad we took some gas. As we are waiting for the tow truck, I told Joe to throw some gas in to kill some time. 2 min later his car fires to life and he speeds off. 2 hours of trouble shooting and a missed hot meal. I really would like to know what they're teaching in that mechanic school other than how to figure accurately how much your gas tank really holds, 11.31gal in this case. sigh

Colorado Roads are to die for

We are coming back from San Diego but need to get to my wife's mother who is in a hospital in Luvland Co. Which makes it about a 1,200 mile one day outing. Everything was going fine until we got to the last leg of the trip, going through the mountains on I-70 in the dark. No big deal, I have head lights and the poor reflective lane divider markers. But then some cloud of rain starting following us over the state. So now I have poor reflective markers that in rain are worthless, lanes with ruts that are filling up with water, no shoulders, 1 foot guard rails and 100' shear drop offs. I slow down to a nice 30mph with only slight hydroplaning and not a f'n clue where the road is. Cars are now whizzing past me as I am white knuckled clutching the wheel. I soon realized that it didn't matter if I couldn't see the lanes as everyone else made it one giant free for all. I tell the wife that if I find a shoulder I'm pullin off but from here deep sleep she mutters, "keep going". With her full support I hydro plane on. 1 mile later I see 2 cars in the side of the mountain, 15 miles later a SUV is hanging by the back axle on the bridge's guard rail with a 100 foot drop to no where and yet the cars keeping whizzing by me. I have had a lot of stress but that 70 miles of white knuckle hell was the worst.
PS Wife slept through it all only wake up and say "you don' make very good time when you drive" I'm thinkin, "Ya but we are alive aren't we?" sigh.

Get the bread kids don't like.

I seem to have this problem of no bread to make sandwiches. So I tried getting the most unappealing bread there was, something the kids would scour and say "yuck", something like brown pumpernickel round loaf. Got home and made a small test pastrami sandwich on it, outstanding it was. Couldn't wait to make my full blown sandwich with hydroponic tomato on it for my lunch the next day. When I get home I am horrified to see only one heal left. I ask my wife wtf happen to my nasty looking loaf. Oh the kids have decided they love your bread. I rush back to Wal-mart to reload only to find out that they just sold the last one for the season. Apparently its seasonal item. So now I am left with Angus pastrami, baby Swiss cheese and tomato with a sliver of onion to go on 3 day old bargain bread.
sigh, wasn't the 21yr old daughter suppose to have moved out????

Daugher, vacation = ER

My wife and I went on our vacation that we do every 10 years. Things were going well as I was smoothly talking my way to a night of romance. Romance was in the air and I don't think I was going to need the cold shower that night. Then at 6:07pm the phone rings. "Ya this is Ashley's friend and she drank so much that she is passed out in the ER and we think you should come back to pick her up."

That conversation with my wife resulted in her freaking out over the $500 ER bill and a possible dead daughter. Time to take a cold shower and head back to Kansas.
sigh, kids.

How many abulances does it take??

I was in the middle of a big fund raiser event located on main street. I had 20 customers waiting in line and I was cooking as fast as i could when the phone rang. 21yr old calls and says there has been an accident, there is police and ambulances. I said is this a joke cause I am really busy here. Luck would have it my wife was getting off work and she likes these kinds of projects.
Turns out
1. Daughter's foot slipped off and she bumps van in front.
2. No damage on bumpers but women jumps out and screams that all of her family is injured and needs ambulances.
3. With 3 cop cars and 2 ambulances taking people in for massive neck injuries, police are still trying to figure out if they are at the correct accident scene.
4. 6 mos later the letter from the attorney is warning us that his client is still determining the damages.
5. More to come on this one.

sigh

Son's new car, maybe

Son was getting his first car, a 86 rebuilt Honda civic but it about did survive.
1. On the way home in the badlands of New Mexico it his hit by a coyote that takes out the bumper and cracks the windshield.
2. While its in the body shop it misses out on the 200mph baseball size hail that does 2.8 million damage to town. Hail was so strong it was putting holes through cars and barns.
3. Month later once out of the shop a tornado misses our house by 2 miles.

Car survives and Joe has his new car and dad gets whats left of his old car back.

How to fix water damaged cell phone

21yr daughter comes in announcing that she dropped her cell phone in the snow but don't worry she knows how to dry it off. She reports that her good friend at the customer service says to put the cell phone in the dryer. As I was thinking how you would position the hair dryer to blow on the cell phone, I hear the clothes dryer door slam shut. I screamed "Nooooo" only to hear "don't worry dad, the lady says this works" The single clunking becomes multiple clunking as I screamed "STOP!!" As daughter is assembling the phone back together, I explained if she meant dryer then you need to insert the rack in the dryer and put the phone on the rack so it isn't smashed into oblivion.

Not much of a lesson learned as she got a new phone under a new contract which I found out meant I was paying more. So maybe there was a purpose in smashing the phone after all.
sigh.

New year's romance

Its new year's eve and I am ready to make something of it. Older son is spending the night at a friends, 11yr is at cousins, 21 yr daughter hopefully is not coming home to crash which only leaves the 9yr old home but sick.

Its 11:30pm and I have the basket with special towels, soap and lotions. As I am heading to the jacuzzi, I am hit with the smell of puke when I open our bedroom door. Son has crawled onto my side of the bed and has puked all over himself and my bed. Wife says " romance night is off, go wash the sheets" as she heads to the couch, leaving my standing there with my basket of romance paraphernalia thinking wtf just happened here. 90 min later bed is made, taken cold shower and to go I go bed.

Sigh, kids.

Why dad did not go to the talent show.

Apparently I volunteered to be the first to take in the stomach flu at our house. I started getting chest pains but attributed the pains to the fact I hadn't eaten in 3 days. Later that evening around 7:00pm I was resting comfortable in the recliner up at my sister's party watching the Denver playoffs. Shortly afterward it was announced that my kids and their cousins would be doing a talent show in the basement and thus the migration started to the stairs. At this point I was concentrating on the fact the tightness in my chess was making it hard to breath let alone yell out, "we have a situation here." The room cleared and I was left alone rubbing my chest. Oh well how long can a kids talent show last? ONE hour later my daughter is the first back up and starts in on the tongue lashing on how bad a father I am. Sis, who is in the medical field looks at me and ask if I am okay? No not with a 100 pounds on my chest. So with an aspirin under the tongue I am heading toward the Regional hospital to the heart unit. I still think I was hearing from the 11yr old as I was going out the door, "You are the worst dad for not coming to my show."

Get to the ER and checked in only to hear that the Regional heart unit was closed for the holidays and I would need to be off by ambulance to the next city so please no heart attacks until you are the responsibility of the next hospital. By the time I get checked in its 2:30am, I am told there will be tests will start at 4:30am so rest what you can. 2:31am, call from my concerned 19yr old, concerned that someone needs to come home now because, the 11yr is in my bed puking all over it. Great, that will be nice to come home to, dried puke in the bed.

$20,000 worth of tests later it turns out the ECG abnormality was normal and no heart attack. Since I started the flu bug, I was vote to scrape puke off when we got back.
Gotta love the family.

New way to get ice off the drive way

Typical winter in Kansas, it rained then froze ice all over the road ways. As I am coming into the house, I notice by the door my 10lb sledge hammer. Before I could ask my 18yr son if he knew why it was left out there, he reports "hey dad the sledge hammer works real good on getting the ice off the driveway." So at least I will not be wondering how tf did these chips get into my driveway last winter.

Auto Tech 101

So I come out of the house only to see my son with the hood to my car popped up. I should have treated this situation like that of a suspicious person in a restricted area of an airplane but no. I entertained all his questions of "What’s this" and "What does this do" He became especially interested in the battery and how to clean the terminals. Knowing he was taking Auto Tech 101, I thought this was a legitimate question. He removed the terminal cables and proceeded to clean connectors and terminals. 5 min later he was done and the hood is down. “You are good to go sir.” Great, because I had an errand to run. I was merrily heading to my destination when I reached the main artery where I needed to turn on to. It’s a 4 lane road with high speed traffic. I looked to my left and see only a semi but plenty of time to pull in front of. I do so or at least start/commit to my turn. But then there is literally no power. I pump the accelerator but realize all lights are off. At this point I sense I need to accelerate or be a grill decoration of the semi that is bearing down on me. Luck was with me as I had enough adrenalin to turn a powerless steering wheel to the edge of the road. This was quickly followed by an irritated blast from the Semi's horn as he missed me by inches. As I am standing there under the hood thinking WTF, it dawns on me what had transpired 30min earlier. I checked the cables and sure enough they pull off easily. Apparently next week in Auto Tech 101, they were going to cover tightening bolts that you loosen. Being a mile from home, I call home but no answer, son has now fled the crime scene. A quick walk home and back earns me a socket and wrench that don't fit each other. Socket work good enough to tighten it so I can drive about 200 feet before I have to jiggle the cable, drive 200feet jiggle cable, drive..... When son finally gets home I ask “what about tightening the bolts back.” Response "Oh". Sigh

Dog and New Medication = Project

I will admit that this situation was my fault for not posting a sign. 75# dog was on new arthritis medication and apparently she was not reacting to it well and thus the reason I was keeping her outside for the day as I went to work. Molly calls me at 8:30am at work to say Samantha does not want to go back outside. I said how could she go back outside if she was out to begin with. She reported that she was looking sympathetic and whimpering. I said didn't you read the note, wait thats right I forgot the note. What the hey, Samantha the dog always stays in the kitchen.

Come home and open the door to a wall of stench like that of a pail of fermented diapers. Quick scan shows no mess upstairs I head down stairs to see Joe at the computer who is unaffected by the toxic fumes and says nothing when he sees me so mess must not be down here. But wait he is entrenched with MySpace and oblivious to the shit around him, literally. I scream as I see vomit not less than 8 feet from him. A quick look to my right reveals 8 piles, er pools of diahria on the carpet. I yell at Joe did you not see the mines of fecal as you left your room. Puzzle look from him as looks at me and my pointing finger. His focus pulls away from the MySpace and his smell sensors verify what he was seeing. He screamed and exclaims, "I almost step in that stuff. I wondered what it was." The power of observation of a teenager, simple amazing.

Standard cleanup procedures, alcohol, steam cleaner, Resolve, Frebreeze, and a shower. Sigh