Tidings of comfort and joy

Happy holidays, everyone! Just had to take time away from our seasonal celebrations to share two quick anecdotes:

1) Being that Ann's family is Jewish, we went to the in-laws' house last weekend for Hanukkah... lunch, to gorge ourselves on latkes and that most Judaic of foods, meatloaf. (Which was delicious, by the way.) Ann's parents also gave us our gifts, and Molly's was a kind of "My First Hanukkah" set for kids. Darn thing is pretty in depth, with a menorah complete with wooden candles and even detachable wooden flames so you can "light" them, as well as a pan and wooden latkes. It's sort of a bizarre hybrid of a child's cooking set and Hebrew school, but whatever, it's pretty cool. Also included with the set were 6 pieces of gelt and a dreidel, so that very night Ann decided to educate this ignorant gentile on the ways of the Jew through an epic dreidel smackdown the likes of which the world has never seen. Things got pretty heated, to be honest; I don't think gangbangers throwing dice in South Central are as aggressive as Ann was when her non-Jewish husband started winning. All I'll say is this: you haven't lived until you've heard the mother of your child yelling "Gimel, mother[bleep]er!"

2) On Christmas Day we fed Molly and then brought her over to the Christmas tree, where I helped her open her present (several Dr. Seuss books and The 12 Days of Christmas in New Jersey... keeping it real, Garden State) while Ann snapped plenty of pictures. What neither of us realized until Ann started uploading the photos to our computer is that my choice of attire would require a little skillful PhotoShopping. Let me explain: back in college a friend of mine went home to India over winter break, and when she returned she brought Christmas presents for a few of her closer friends. I received a t-shirt with a picture of an Arabian-style palace and the words "Via Agra (Man's greatest erection for a woman)." Juvenile, for sure, and not really acceptable for me to wear in public, but it's super comfy and I sleep in it all the time, to the point where I barely remember what it says anymore. However... not necessarily the shirt you want immortalized in cherished family photos that your daughter may well be looking at 5 or 6 years down the line. There are certain questions you just don't want to have to answer unless absolutely necessary, y'know?

A perfectly cromulent word

As an addendum to my last post, I feel obligated to note that a friend of Ann's read it and emailed me to say that she couldn't understand why anyone wouldn't know all three of those words/phrases. She did admit, however, to not knowing whether that was the result of growing up in the same county as Ann, attending the same college, or just hanging around Ann long enough to have absorbed them through osmosis and become subconsciously (though quite erroneously) convinced that they are, in fact, real sayings. Personally my money's on the latter, but it's anyone's guess. Either way, I thank her for embiggening my previous post with her contribution.

On Beyond Zebra

One of the things I love most about my wife is the fact that she makes up new words. Much like Italian director Sergio Leone, who named one of his movies "Duck, You Sucker!" because he somehow got it in his head that this was a common phrase in English and wouldn't be told otherwise; much like this, Ann not only invents words and phrases, but also has learned how to convince herself that they've always existed and you're the weirdo for not knowing them. A small sampling, just to give you an idea of what we're dealing with here:

-"Housing." That's as a verb, not a noun, and it has nothing to do with where you live. To house one's food means to consume it very quickly, as in "Wow, you totally housed that taco!" I have no idea if it's meant to imply that you quickly made a home for the food in your stomach or what.

-"Rammy." To be rammy is to be restless, not satisfied with what you're doing. If we're sitting on the couch watching TV and I keep suggesting that maybe we should go out and run some errands or take a walk, I'm being rammy. I've often wondered if it's a bastardized form of rambunctious, but if Ann knows she isn't telling.

-Then there's my personal favorite. If you asked "What do you want to do for dinner?" and I replied "Let's just pick something up," your reaction would be "Okay, he's saying we should grab a pizza or some Chinese food on the way home, bring it back to the house, and eat it." And that's why it never would have worked between us, baby, because I hate Chinese food. You know that. Nonetheless, that's what any normal person would think, right? Nope. Uh-uh. Because if your wife is Ann and she says "Let's pick up dinner," what she means is let's just eat whatever leftovers or ready-made food we have lying around the house rather than cooking a big main course. The "pick up" dinner is a thing unto chaos, a casual meal wherein one eats whenever and whatever he wants, independent of what or when the other person is eating.

So where did this stuff come from? I honestly have no idea. I know it's not a regional thing, because Ann and I grew up within 30 miles of each other. So unless these are language tropes commonly employed at Penn State, I have no choice but to conclude that she just made them up herself. In which case, major props for the creativity, but whenever Molly starts talking, you'd best believe I'm going to be keeping an ear open for any sign of new words. I'm already the only male in the household, I don't need them developing their own language too.

Potty humor

Hey, everyone. Apologies for the lack of recent updates... beyond Molly keeping us busy, I've been under the weather and exams are coming up next week. More updates to come in the near future, but in the meantime, I thought last night merited a quick mention. Ann and I decided Molly could stand to be cleaned, so Ann got in the tub to administer said bath while I undressed the squirming little demon. Off came the sleeper, off came the diaper, I brought her over to the tub and lifted her up... and that's when I felt the warmth. Yep, our darling little girl had decided to mark her territory on my arm approximately two seconds before entering a place where no one would have even noticed if she peed. Awesome.

Naturally, Ann couldn't stop laughing. Once I passed Molly off to her and cleaned off my arm (and the floor, and the edge of the toilet), we got down to the business of cleaning her royal urinator. Molly actually doesn't mind the warm water as long as we cover her with a washcloth to keep her warm (and also, I hope for my sanity in, say, sixteen years, for modesty's sake), so everything was going fine. Fine, that is, until... yeah. Need I say more? Let's leave it at the fact that suddenly the tables were turned and I was the one laughing uproariously while Ann cried out in disgust. And no, it wasn't pee.

Who says there's no such thing as karma?

Back to school

My high school reunion is taking place this week, the day after Thanksgiving. I know the standard thing to say is that I can't believe it's been 10 years, but actually, high school does feel like a LONG time ago. Now college, that I can't believe was 6 years ago, but then again I enjoyed college a lot more than high school too. Also, had more friends. Also, made jokes and drank more. [Note to self: investigate possible drinking/jokes/friends/enjoyment correlation. Also, check Nobel committee deadline.]

But anyway, I don't really know what to expect going into it. It's a cash bar, so right away we're starting off at a deficit. Plus, to make a personal confession, I was a bit of a nerd in high school. No, no, I know, but suspend your disbelief. Not at all what you'd expect to hear from a 28-year-old who blogs about comics and bad movies, of course, but the world is a strange place sometimes. To give my alma mater credit, there wasn't a ton of bullying or ostracization of smart kids, possibly because it was an academically competitive school where the cool kids were the smart kids, and our football team blew. Nonetheless, there were still nerds, and my specific dilemma was always that most of my friends were nerds, but I spent most of my non-school time doing sports. An outgoing person would have used that unique situation to become Ferris Bueller, but sadly I, sir, am no Ferris Bueller. The long and the short of it all became that while there were plenty of people I was friendly with and who were friendly to me, I didn't stay in touch with any of them past graduation. With the exception of three old classmates I reconnected with last year and met for drinks once, I'm going into this sucker completely cold.

However! That does give me the advantage that I'm actually much the better for wear a decade later. Obviously I don't wish misfortune on anyone, and I hope everyone's just as attractive as they were back then, if not more so. But candidly speaking, you and I both know that some of these people reached their physical peak in 1998 and it's been all downhill from there. Some of the guys are going to be fatter, some of the girls won't be as cute as I remember. Whereas I can honestly say that I've gone nowhere but up since then, and before you roll your eyes at my shameless self-flattery, allow me to clarify: there was a lot of room for improvement. I cannot fault a single one of my female classmates for never having dragged me under the bleachers or gotten lightheaded upon seeing me at swim practice. Acne + no muscles + an inexplicable attachment to long hair was not a good combination. Plus I didn't learn until college that if you say jokes out loud instead of just in your head, other people can enjoy them too. Funny, that.

Anyway, the long and the short of it is that in college I gained a few muscles, lost the acne, and finally (finally, finally, finally) in my senior year, ditched the quasi-mullet. THAT was a long time coming. So I'm looking forward to seeing what's what this weekend. I still don't expect any of the women to drag me into the coat closet, but at least now I can pretend that they're stopped from doing so solely by my wedding band and the incredibly cute pictures of my daughter that I'll be showing to everyone within reach. Other than that, we'll just hope no one remembers any embarrassing stories about me that I've managed to block out of my memory.

Oh, and my money's on "Glory Days" getting played within the first hour. Mark it down.

Isn't the preferred term "ladies of the night"?

Tonight, while talking about the baby weight she still has to lose, my wife complained that her bellybutton is "like a hooker's vagina."

God help me, that's why I love her.

The ways of the ninja

First, two quick things. Last night I come home from work, and because the little scream machine has been fraying Ann's nerves all day, I take her upstairs to change her so that Ann can mainline some tequila or something. Anyway, I get the squirt on the changing table and say "You remember Daddy, don't you? Are you happy to see Daddy?"... and no sooner have the words left my mouth when the little angel scrunches up her face and lets out a mighty fart. Yep, she's my daughter.

Second, later that night I was feeding her when she suddenly, with no prompting whatsoever, let loose with a literal geyser of spit-up. Oh, she's puked plenty of times and gotten our carpets and couch more than once, but in the past it's always been (relatively) constrained... a bit of distance, sure, but no world records. But I kid you not that for a brief moment, it looked like Old Faithful. A fountain of spew erupted out of this tiny creature, soaking my shirt and pants but also hitting Ann, who was sitting a good three feet away and probably thought she was in the safe zone. Nope, apparently my daughter is like those dolphin shows at Sea World: first three rows may get wet.

Anyway, I've always been a night owl. As a kid I used to stay up past my bedtime reading books by flashlight (yes, I was a nerd); these days it more often takes the form of playing video games or working on reviews far past the time more sensible people have gone to bed. It's not at all uncommon for 1:00 AM to find me just getting changed and taking out my contacts for bed. This has taught me to be fairly silent over the years, to avoid waking up parents, roommates, and Ann with my nocturnal ways. But I tell you, now that there's a baby in the house, it's an entirely different level of stealth. Creaking floors, bumping into furniture, squeaky hinges... these are my sworn enemies, to be avoided at all costs. I was always quiet, but forget about it- in the old days, the worst that could happen would be I'd awaken Ann crawling into bed and have a slightly grumpy wife to contend with. Now there's a gently slumbering infant ready to awaken and cry her head off at the slightest noise, and unlike Ann, she doesn't roll over and go back to sleep after complaining to me for a minute. It's like living in a library filled with land mines. But I'm learning quickly, and soon I'll be confident in my ability to infiltrate high level government buildings and art galleries with nary a sound. So if you've been looking for someone to enter the home of your rival crime lord and leave him a message while he sleeps, hey... got you covered.

I'm... lovin' it?

You know how I can tell McDonalds' goal has finally shifted from "Maximize profits at all cost" to "Fuck it, just make everyone in America as fat as possible"? I was driving in to work today and heard an ad on the radio for their newest deal. The announcer could barely contain her glee as she spread the word about the latest promotion: two triple cheeseburgers for $3.

I'm going to repeat that just to make sure it sinks in: two triple cheeseburgers. For $3. Although at that point, it might as well be $2.50 for the first and 50 cents for each additional one, because who in their right mind is going to eat a fucking triple cheeseburger, burp, and immediately think, "Yeah, that was pretty filling, but you know what would really hit the spot? Another triple cheeseburger." Are you kidding me? Wouldn't it be quicker to grab a letter opener and repeatedly stab your heart while drinking a gallon of liposuctioned fat?

Look, I'm about the farthest thing in the world from a healthy eater. I like fast food, and I'm not going to begrudge anyone indulging in flame-broiled goodness every so often... hey, it tastes good. But this? This is literally McDonalds saying to your face, "Yeah, you're a fat pig, and you're never going to be thin again. Now open wide, porky, while we cram another Egg McMuffin down your throat- that'll be eight dollars and three months off your life. Ronald McDonald will be over there molesting your kids."

My daughter is losing pieces

Well, Molly's umbilical stump fell off yesterday. No big deal; I was running errands at the time, but apparently it happened during a diaper change and she didn't even notice. Still, it is kind of a milestone, albeit a minor and really pretty icky one. I guess now it's official, though- we can't return her. Once you cut off that tag or umbilical stump or what have you, man, it's yours.

Not-so-wee one

On Monday we took Molly to the doctor for her first check-up. All in all a pretty painless experience - with the exception of a brush with one of those annoying people who feel justified in coming up to your child and sticking her face right in the car seat without asking permission (and letting her grandson do same), the rest went remarkably well. The kiddo apparently checks out to the doctor's standards and Ann and I were not detained at the door while child services was called, so I guess we managed not to completely eff up the first week, anyway. It's a nice feeling.

We also learned that Molly is in the 50th percentile for weight, but only the 25th for head size. This doesn't worry me, as once she gains some self-awareness she'll realize what breeding stock she comes from, at which point her head will swell to massive proportions and never come back down. I was pretty shocked to hear that she's in the 90th percentile for length, however- I'm only 5'9" and Ann is 5'3" or thereabouts, so I don't know where this prodigious height is coming from. But hell, if she can be the first member of either of our families to crack the "above average" height barrier when she's fully grown, more power to her. The rest of us will be over here hanging out with the leprechauns.

I'm so proud

Today Ann decided to wake the baby up for her feeding by unzippering her sleeper, exposing Molly's bare chest to the open air, and yelling "Babies gone wild! Woooo!!!" to the world at large.

So wrong, yet so very, very hilarious. That's why I married her.

The baby has landed

Well, as you might have guessed, the reason I haven't updated in forever is that the little poop machine angel finally made her appearance. And... yeah. Wow. It's cliched and trite as anything, but still true- you can read all the books and watch all the movies you want, but nothing really prepares you for what it's like to actually have a child. As an example, the day after my wife gave birth, I downloaded "That's My Daughter" off of iTunes. You know the song, it's the one that played over the end credits of Knocked Up. Yeah, I'm that lame.

I know that every parent thinks their child is the cutest one who's ever existed, but let's be honest- more than once you've told a parent their baby was adorable, then on the car ride home made with the "Oh my God, did you see the kid on that nose?" We've all done it, no shame in that. I was worried that might happen with our baby, but fortunately the wee one is quantifiably cute, no questions asked. (Feel free to disagree, of course. It's just that you'll be wrong.) I am amused that both sets of new grandparents have commented on how she looks exactly like Ann and I respectively when we were babies. Only time will tell who she ends up taking after most in terms of looks and personality, but one thing's for sure- I can't wait to find out.

Seriously, baby...

It's not funny anymore. GET OUT.

Love,
Dad

Bathroom amenities

Since I know you've all been waiting with bated breath for me to talk about toilets some more, I won't disappoint. Here goes: tonight I was at grad school, heading to the bathroom again at the break, when I noticed my professor just ahead of me on his way there. Having no desire for us to become pee buddies (thank you, Scrubs), I decided to go to the second floor to search out alternate facilities. I found one pretty quickly, but as soon as I walked in I noticed something odd: the side wall had a small shelf with four hooks on it to hang coats off of.

Now, you may be thinking this is not so very strange. You may even be wishing more bathrooms would offer a place to hang your jacket while you're otherwise occupied. I couldn't agree with you more. Except for one tiny detail: it was a single bathroom. One toilet, one sink... that's it. So would someone please explain the logic to me of providing for four entirely different coats at once? Are they holding private faculty functions in there, or is it just in case of really, really, really cold weather?

Sometimes the mind boggles. Yes it does.

Crofting dialogue

(I know, that was terrible.)

One of the things I really like about the gym Ann and I go to is the Cardio Cinema. If your gym doesn't have one of these (poor, poor bastard), it's basically a dark room with a bunch of machines -- exercise bikes, elliptical machines, treadmills -- all facing a theater-sized screen, where a movie plays on continuous loop all day. They show a different movie every day, which does lead to the CC's biggest drawback, namely that it's a total crapshoot. One day you might stumble onto Die Hard and exercise until your legs fall off just to watch the whole thing, but then it'll be three straight days of chick flicks and Tim Allen movies, exiling you to the magazine rack for alternate entertainment.

But today the rack held nothing but muscle magazines and Vibe, sending me up to the Cardio Cinema to discover that the film du jour was Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life. Hmmm... tough call, but the lure of possibly seeing Angelina Jolie in a fitted aqua green tanktop was enough to tip the scales slightly in that direction, and I reasoned I could always block out the dialogue with my iPod if it got bad enough.

Now, I only caught 20 minutes of the film, but two scenes stuck out at me. The first finds Angelina Jolie pensively staring off into space, probably wondering how much a hit on Jennifer Aniston would cost and whether it's tax deductible. She's clad in some kind of daishiki thing, the kind that shows exactly enough cleavage to make teenage boys think maybe they're about to see a glimpse of nipple that somehow eluded the team of 82 censors who pre-screened the movie. Sadly, this does not happen. (Although it would have made the movie five hundred times better.) Instead, her love interest, played by Gerard Butler, decides a bright idea would be to sneak up on this extremely angry, trigger-happy woman, as characters in movies so often think. So he steals up and touches her shoulder, whereupon Lara busts out some hardcore ninjitsu move that ends with her clamping his wrist and Gerard Butler on his knees in front of her, a situation I'm fairly certain is not the most unpleasant one Ms. Jolie has ever found herself in. He then says -- and this is true, I'm not making it up -- "You can break my wrist if you want to, I'm still going to kiss you."

At this point, naturally, I and the rest of the rational world get excited by the fact that she's clearly going to forcefeed him his testicles. But instead, she lets him up and kisses him passionately, like he didn't just utter the single most asinine seduction line in the history of seduction, or lines. And then it occurs to me that if this is the kind of crap repartee that flies with rich, attractive adventurers with British accents, well, I just might be willing to take that hit. Can anyone confirm this?

Anyway, the second stupid moment occurs a couple of scenes after that. Angelina has recruited the help of a native African tribe, as one does in such situations, to help recover the special treasure. To help lead her to it, she's got a special glowing orb thingie that doubles as a bowling ball on Thursday nights. She and the primitive African tribe who still think spears are a pretty good weapon are hiking toward the location of the treasure, and apropos of nothing, Angelina busts out with "We're getting closer." The Wise Old Black Man (WOBM) feels compelled to ask how she knows that. I feel that his sarcasm is implicit, but Angelina apparently doesn't pick up on it, because she responds quite matter-of-factly "I can feel it." Instead of laughing in her face, the WOBM just kind of nods sagely, but you can tell he's thinking, Uh, I think the reason you know we're getting closer is because we told you we're taking you to it, and we have, in fact, traveled some distance since we started. Ergo, yes, we are getting closer. Dumb bitch. However, since she's Angelina and him saying so would minimize the chances that she'll ever adopt him, he just remains silent.

So that was my experience with Tomb Raider. I doubt that I'll ever see the rest of it, unless someone can confirm that it ends with her coming across an empty cavern and a guardian who tells her that a rugged, stubbly archaeologist absconded with it over half a century ago, complaining about being too old all the while. That, I will pay good money to go rent.

Potty talk

Last night I was in class, and at the 8:00 break I headed to the bathroom. Nothing out of the ordinary there, except no sooner had I gotten into position when the professor of the class came in and stood at the next urinal over. (In his defense, there were only two.) Thankfully he obeyed the Code of Silence throughout, but the entire time my mind kept frantically wondering: what if he doesn't? If he starts talking, am I obliged to try to make conversation? That's weird enough with friends, let alone someone who's going to be grading me. (On my classwork, perv. Mind out of the gutter.) So the question I pose to you, dear readers, is this: what would you say to your professor while standing at the urinal/sitting in a stall next to them?

I'll get you started:

-Whew... good thing this divider's here, huh? I hate accidental sightings.
-Well, I THOUGHT I had to go.
-So speaking of finance, did I mention how glad I am these aren't pay toilets?
-NARF! [See what he does.]
-Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior?
-For extra credit, I will never speak a word of this to the class.
Etc.

Shine yer [bleep]in' shoes, guvnor?

I went over to a friend's house to watch the Phillies game tonight, and while I was there, he insisted on playing for me this new Ashlee Simpson song he's got stuck in his head. (Yes, he's kind of a girl.) Anyway, the main hook of the song consists of Ashlee singing "L-O-L-O-L-O-L-O-Love" eight gazillion times. But it's the way she said it that intrigued me, like the word "'ello" spoken in a Cockney accent. To test my theory, I mentioned Lily Allen's song "Smile" to my friend, how sultry she sounds throughout the entire song but especially when describing what her boyfriend did to the girl next door. He agreed, and came back with a comment about his trip to Brazil last year. Apparently one of the numerous people he met down there was an English girl who smoked and had an unimaginably filthy mouth, so even though she was only moderately attractive, she became the most desirable person there in his mind. (I have to assume he was also drinking heavily, but still.) Anyway, we both arrived at the conclusion that while we don't exactly know why, there is something about that type of accent that makes swear words unbelievably hot.

So if there are any English chicks... sorry, "birds" out there who'd like to record themselves cursing randomly into a microphone for an hour and send it along, well, that would just be swell.

A letter to my daughter

Baby - we need to talk. Or rather, since you're still in the womb, I'll do all the talking and you can just listen. But as your father, I do expect you to listen closely, even if it sounds a bit burbly.

See, that's the problem: you're still in the womb. This is not ideal. Your mother and I have gone to great pains to get everything ready for you ahead of time. In fact, not to brag, but I'm pretty sure we've had everything prepared for over two months. Now, that may come naturally to your mother, but for me it's a feat of nigh biblical proportions. I'm not looking for accolades, but it would be nice if you could recognize the lengths to which we've gone and cooperate by, you know, vacating the premises.

And yes, I know what your response would be if your lungs weren't full of amniotic fluid- that it's not time yet, it's not technically forty weeks until October 20th. This is true. And maybe that excuse would fly if you were just my child, since I'm constantly late. But you and I both know your mother is perennially early to everything, gets mildly peevish if it looks like we'll be a full 30 seconds late to work, and eats lunch and dinner at times normally reserved for blue-haired Florida retirees. So you can't tell me you don't have any early genes in you, and while God knows I'm glad to know you have some of my traits too, this is one instance where I'd really be happy to have you take more after your mother.

Understand, I'm not asking this purely out of impatience. I mean of course we're eager to meet you, but there are some important logistical factors involved too. For instance, your grandfather is being honored for his contributions and years of service to the high school as a track coach by being inducted into the hall of fame. This is a big deal, with a ceremony and everything. Daddy is attending, along with your aunt and grandma and even your great-grandfather, but Daddy would really like to have Mommy there too, and maybe even you if you're old enough. But see, the ceremony is taking place in early November, so if there's even going to be a chance of that, you really need to get on the ball and get born as soon as possible.

And then there's Mommy's friend who's getting married in early November. This friend has been extremely accommodating and is letting Mommy wait until the very last minute before RSVPing, but the sooner you're born, the greater the chance Mommy might feel comfortable attending. Otherwise Daddy may have to attend alone, and while he's always a fan of an open bar and no one around to make him be reasonable, it would not be in anyone's best interest for Daddy to be at a wedding where he only knows 3 people and spends the entire night drinking alone. This is how episodes of COPS start.

So you see, baby, it really would be better for everyone if you could arrive sooner rather than later. Your mother and I are ready, no thanks to Daddy, your nursery is set up, the bags are packed, Daddy has practiced with his video camera and is pretty sure he can keep from accidentally recording 30 minutes of his shoes... everything's taken care of. And let's face it, your living space isn't getting any larger; things have to be pretty cramped in there. So let's get a move on, huh? I promise, there's a great big, wonderful world out here that's full of people waiting to meet you.

And only some of them are Jehovah's Witnesses.

I want my XMR

I bought Ann a satellite radio for her birthday last week. She had gotten me one a couple of years back, and I really like it a lot, use it all the time. So when she expressed interest in having one of her own, I jumped at the chance to get her one. In addition to making her happy, though, I'm also hoping that having one of her own will put into context two behaviors I've observed over the last two years in relation to mine. Namely:

1) She turns the radio off when we're still a half mile from wherever we're going. Don't ask me why, but invariably we'll be pulling up to the road that leads to our neighborhood -- not even IN our neighborhood yet -- and she'll hit the power button, then put the radio back in the glove compartment. This is problematic because, woman, Jon Bon Jovi has not finished telling me what kind of horse he rides... what are you doing? But it never fails. Is she worried the music will distract me from the final stages of a route I've driven every day for the last 3 years, and we'll wind up in Scranton? It defies comprehension.

2) She turns the radio off, period. Much like a normal car radio, the way the satellite radio works is that when you turn off the car, it automatically powers down. Then, even if you remove the unit from the cradle to store in your glove compartment and then plug it back in later, it will automatically turn back on when you start the car. Nice, right? Right. Except even on those rare occasions when Ann lets us get all the way to our destination before cutting the music off, she'll still hit the power button before I can turn the car off. Why? Why not just let the radio shut down when I turn off the car so it will automatically start back up next time? Yes, you may very well be thinking "It's two steps, you lazy bitch... suck it up." My counterpoint is, it's two completely unnecessary steps. Why bother turning the radio off at all? You don't turn your regular radio off before you get out of the car, do you? (Please note, that's a rhetorical question. If you do, you're a freak and I don't want to hear about it.) It just doesn't make sense.

So there you have it. We're just going to monitor the situation for a little while and see if Ann continues this inexplicable behavior with her own satellite radio. Check back in for regular updates.

In which I turn into a girl

No entry today, just pictures of random cuteness. Never fear, the usual trenchant, biting commentary on how they're messing up Spider-Man or whatever will resume next time.





Looking at this photo, you would think she's a well-behaved rabbit who loves having her picture taken. You would be dead wrong.




Laundry is soft, but not as soft as meeee!

Coveting thy neighbor's newly hot wife

Let me set the stage for you: Ann and I are chilling out in the living room... I'm studying for a quiz tomorrow, she's watching TV. The show she's watching is called What Not To Wear -- if you've never seen it, the premise is that a gay guy and a fashionista woman find some poor, misguided girl who dresses... well, like me, really, that is to say like a homeless person who went completely blind in 1987, and then they point out her fashion sins in minute detail in front of full length mirrors. Afterward they make up for completely dismantling her self esteem by giving her money to buy better clothes and throwing in a badly needed makeover. So, whatever... at the end of the show they always have the victim return home to a party thrown by her friends and family so they can gawk over how tragic she no longer is. Like I said, I'm studying, but I happen to look up and notice that in this episode, one of the people being interviewed, right after the woman's husband, is the pastor of the church she attends. He comments -- to be fair, in a nice rather than a creepy way -- that now they'll have no problem filling the pews every Sunday, thanks to how good she looks.

So my question is, do you think this man ever looks at the nine commandments and thinks, You know, it just feels like something's missing? Or is he good?

Important safety tip, Egon

If you and your extremely pregnant wife are out on a walk and she starts complaining about all her aches and asking why you made her take a walk in the first place, and you point out that your mother kept jogging throughout her entire pregnancy, up to and including the day she gave birth to you...

Well, let's just say that's very much The Wrong Answer, okay?

Was it ever?

There's this commercial that's been on lately, maybe you've seen it; I think it's for investment banking or guns, something like that. Anyway, this young guy stands in a darkened hospital room cradling a baby in his arms. From a nearby bed, his wife looks on adoringly, all "Hey, I know I just shoved a 7-pound person out my vagina, but I couldn't have done it without your moral support, honey." An expression of awe on his face, perhaps because the baby is actually sleeping for the first time in 37 hours, the dude looks at the camera and says something like, "You know that place where 'I can't be such a douchebag' meets 'It's not just about me anymore'? I'm there." Then we pan out from this tender scene and learn we should invest in mutual funds or whatever.

Normally I mock commercials like this, mock them with all my snarky little heart and soul. But as I opened my mouth to do just that, it suddenly dawned on me that, hey... in two to five weeks, this was me. Now I'm the guy who can't be such an ass anymore. That dude looked pretty young, a year ago he was probably just like me- kicking back on the couch, making fun of cheesy commercials. Now he's in one, and he totally couldn't care less.

So I guess I need to buy their life insurance or whatever it was. I hate bowing to popular demand, but apparently it's the only way to prove I love my soon-to-be-here daughter. Because, hey- it's not just about me anymore.

Who'll crack first?

Ann and I are currently embroiled in a Mexican standoff over who's going to clean the cage of Gizmo, our bunny. This is serious stuff, really. For those of you who've never had the pleasure of owning a rabbit, let me elaborate. In many way, they're pretty convenient pets. They never need to be walked or to go outside at all, really. The only noises they make are happy grunts, occasional sneezing fits (cutest thing ever), and apparently a high-pitched screaming noise when they're terrified or dying... we've been fortunate enough never to hear that last one. When they poop it's in little pellets that they usually eat the first time around (more than once Ann has said "Hey, wasn't there a poop over... oh, GROSS!"), and then the second time around are dried-up little things that look exactly like Cocoa Puffs (a ringing endorsement, I'm sure) and, if you're not squeamish, can just be picked up and flicked in the garbage or at your wife as the situation requires. Easy, right?

BUT. With this simplicity comes one chore that no one wants to handle, and that is cleaning the cage. Rabbits are pretty good about getting toilet trained to pee only in their cage, but let me tell you, bunny urine is rank, and all the litter and newspapers in the world won't disguise that stench for long. It's also a pain to clean the cage, and neither Ann nor I likes doing it, so inevitably it becomes a game of who can outlast who before one of us breaks down and cleans it. My advantage is that, as a man, I have a much higher tolerance for foul odors and general filth in my living area; Ann's is that I'm a big softie and she knows if she asks the right way, I'll probably sigh mightily and then do it. But at the current moment we've left the cage dirty and smelling for longer than usual, locked in an unspoken contest of wills to see who'll crack first. It doesn't hurt Gizmo any, but the two of us can now barely sit on the couch to watch a half-hour TV show without passing out from the visible fumes of rabbit pee pervading the family room. It's not a pretty scene. Tuesday and Wednesday I had grad school classes and returned home each night convinced that, during the three hours when she was sitting home alone with nothing to do, she would have taken care of it. Her position seems to be that, hey asshole, I'm 8 months pregnant -- you do it. The question is, how long can this epic battle of stubborness continue before we both die of asphyxiation? Only time will tell...

On a related note, I'm just now realizing that I haven't posted any pictures of Gizmo yet. This is inexcusable, because even I, with my heart of stone, cannot help but admit that she is possibly the cutest animal ever, or at least cracking the top five. However, be not deceived, because the beast uses this overwhelming cuteness to mask the fact that she is Pure Evil. It's true. Anytime you get up to walk anywhere, she'll scamper exactly underfoot, forcing you to either accidentally kick her and hate yourself forever or to wrench your body violently sideways. At first you think this is cute, like "Aw, she just wants to be close to me!", but gradually you come to realize that she is in fact hoping you will fall and break your neck so that she can eat your eyelids. Another of her favorite activities is gnawing at the mesh baby gate that keeps her confined to the family room and away from the freeeedom! of the kitchen. She will do this incessantly until you finally look up from American Gladiators (shut up, you watch it too) and bark "Gizmo!", at which point she will jump two feet in the air, bolt away from the gate, and then fix you with a look of feigned nonchalance, mixed with just a hint of wounded indignation, as if to say "What? I wasn't anywhere near that baby gate, in fact I don't think I've ever even seen it before. Say, whose teeth marks are those?" And while she's doing this she will inch closer and closer to the gate, watching you the entire time, until you finally get bored and go back to watching TV. And .003 seconds later, she will start chewing again. Repeat ad infinitum.


You wound me, sir, with your accusations.

So there she is, in all her fuzzy glory. Just don't let the adorable floppy ears fool you; if that rabbit ever got the chance, she'd kill you and everyone you cared about. Or at least poop in your lap.


EDIT: As an addendum, I won the standoff. Ann read this post and thought it was funny, so as a reward she cleaned the cage. Score! Stay tuned for future entries about cleaning the gutters and taking out the garbage.

Way #139 I can tell I'm getting old...

When I heard there was a new song getting a lot of airplay called "I Kissed A Girl," I immediately thought, "Huh... I wonder if it's a cover of that mid 90s song that caused all the controversy." Then I found out that no, it isn't. And that nobody else remembers there was a mid 90s song called "I Kissed A Girl."

Yeah. I'm old.

Lazy Saturday

After spending most of the day watching Michigan win (barely) and Penn State win (handily), the wife and I rode out the rest of the terrible weather by getting a pizza and idly flipping through channels. Eventually, God knows how, we landed on some show that seemed devoted to depicting the lives of hypothetical animals that might exist in the far future, after humans have all died off. The particular segment concerned these hamster-like creatures (descended from birds, though... pay attention, there will be a quiz later) that were trying to have their mating season, except they had to do it while these other bat-type things tried to swoop down and eat them. And it suddenly dawned on me that I was spending my Saturday night watching one kind of fictional animal hump while hoping it wouldn't get scarfed by another fictional animal.

I know people say that when you have a kid, all your free time just goes away; but honestly, what am I really giving up?

Like The Biggest Loser in reverse

Well, my wife is making me gain weight. And you may be rolling your eyes skyward and thinking, "Ah yes, the old 'I'm only fat because my wife made me do it' bit," but honestly, it's true. I didn't know this, but apparently there comes a point where the pregnant mind puts aside all prior rational notions of "I know I'm thin in real life and I'm only gaining this tiny, miniscule amount of weight because of the baby, I'm not actually getting fat" and reaches a breaking point. And when this point is reached, the pregnant person's spouse becomes the number one basis of comparison/resentment, particularly if he (not to flatter himself or anything) happens to be, if not Michael Phelps-ian, at least in reasonably good shape. This typically leads to a situation in which the pregnant party issues an ultimatum that if he doesn't stop going to the gym and drinking Coke Zero and losing that bleeping weight, he is going to be sorry, mister.

So now you know why I had to have four beers tonight. It's a tough life, but no sacrifice is too great for the mental wellbeing of a man's wife.

Words, words, words

Time for a word game! The other day Ann and I were playing Scrabble -- the game she always wins when we're playing alone, and I always win whenever there's a third person playing -- when she brought to the table not one, but two sexually themed words. We've all been there, right? You're just cruising along, playing a friendly round with your in-laws, and the next thing you know you're faced with a dilemma: lose the game or put down "boobs" on a triple word score in front of your father-in-law. Tough call.

In the interest of keeping it classy, I'll just give a couple of hints, and you can work out on your own what words that trollop used to beat my ass. (By 3 points. 3. Points.)


-One of the words, if you add "up" to it, describes what a student might have done regarding his subject matter the day before an exam.

-The other rhymes with the past tense of what you might do with a match if the power suddenly went out.


And just in case you were thinking it was one of these situations... yeah, no. (Trust me, I checked.)

The Scarlet Letter

Yesterday my wife went to the women's center for her monthly pregnancy checkup. The problem was that she forgot her engagement and wedding rings at home. (At the risk of sounding smug, if she'd just had them welded on like I suggested...) That in and of itself would not be a major issue, except that as she told me later, this visit she happened to get a doctor she'd never met before. At which point, given her lack of digital accoutrements of any kind, she started worrying that he would think she was an unwed mother or Satan or something.

As you can guess, she got back to the house without being stoned in the street, but it was a near thing. And I had to ask, given the circumstances, whether the doctor made her lay on the "hussy table" or not.

Goodbye, expertise

Well, the Olympics are over. I'm always sad to see the Olympics end, partially for the same reason most people are: the end for another four years of watching history being made and legends being born. The end of watching the greatest athletes in the world competing and imagining yourself in their shoes, if only stupid Mr. Crandall in 6th grade had given you just a bit more of a chance in track, I mean come on, you'd think the old bastard was paying for the cleats himself. And the end, of course, of Morgan Freeman voiceovers.

Those are all valid reasons for being sorry the Olympics are over, but my more personal disappointment is that it marks the end, for another four long years, of me being a sports expert. See, I'm not one of those guys who follows professional sports closely or memorizes statistics. Oh, I'm a pretty athletic person, and I'm always happy to go see a football or baseball game a couple of times a season. (They have beer there. Sudsy, watered down, $9 beer.) But I've never been the guy to closely follow trades, lineups, and win/loss records. Maybe I'm worried it will push other knowledge out of my brain, like the secret identities of Earth's five Green Lanterns (Alan Scott, Hal Jordan, Guy Gardner, John Stewart, Kyle Rayner), because God knows I'm going to need that someday. But the fact is I'd just usually rather be playing sports than watching them. No one ever calls me to find out the outcome of the Phillies game last night, or whether the Eagles covered the spread. I'm happy when Michigan wins, I'm happier when OSU loses, and that's about as far as it goes.

But. The one exception to this phenomenon is swimming, because listen: I know my swimming. It's not that I follow the stats any closer than I do other sports, but I can answer most any question someone raises about the differences between strokes, why they're using the butterfly kick off the wall, whether that was a good start or not, etc. If it's within reason, I probably know it, and if I don't I'm at least knowledgeable enough to fake it. So for a glorious week and a half, I get to feel incredibly manly while my wife, who knows more about college football than I ever will, sits beside me and asks questions about how realistic it is that Phelps might conceivably win gold in all 8 events, and how on earth he managed to win the fly even though it really looked like Cavic touched him out. (A: who knows, but while those electronic touch pads are pretty sensitive, just brushing one lightly won't always set it off; you really have to push them. Phelps slammed into his, while Cavic was reaching at the end of his stroke, so Phelps' weight would have registered first even if they technically touched at the exact same time.) And that is just... awesome. If someone at work asks how in the world people don't go crazy during the 1500 free, I can answer them. (You sing songs in your head, preferably something from the AC/DC or Green Day catalogs.)

But now it's over. Back to another 4 years of listening to my friends talk about Detroit's chances this year while I sit there and vainly hope someone asks what happened to Captain America after World War II. So please, everyone- if you're ever out at a bar and you see a group of guys having a heated argument over their fantasy football teams, with one lone dude sitting there quietly nursing his beer... go over and ask him the Vegas odds on the X-Men beating Magneto next Wednesday. Trust me, he'll appreciate it.

Pop quiz, hotshot...

It's the day of your wife's baby shower, so while she's being fawned over by friends and relatives at her mother's house, her father and brother take you out to the movies. The three of you see Pineapple Express (decent, no Knocked Up), then afterward they take you to a bar for a drink, because none of you are particularly enthused about going back to the house and beginning the process of loading 8 thousand boxes of Baby Bjorn accessories into your car. As you sit down at the bar, you can't help but notice the two large screen TVs located straight across from you, directly in your line of sight. More specifically, the reason you can't help but notice them is because one is tuned to the Spanish Channel. As it turns out, the Spanish Channel is a bizarre network filled with shows wherein bikini-clad girls and Abercrombie douchebags spend an hour gyrating to music on a fake beach. Ten seconds of careful study reveals to you that the total cost of surgical enhancements among the women is approximately equal to the annual gross national product of Finland, and that none of them have apparently kept down a meal in the last five months. This is, as it turns out, the entire program: fifteen seconds of stripper trainees jiggling in the general direction of the camera, interspersed with two seconds of gelled-up 'roidheads scowling. Repeat as necessary. Being as your brother- and father-in-law are seated directly beside you, and the TV being located, as aforementioned, straight ahead, this presents an obvious dilemma. Do you:

A) Studiously ignore the TV, pretending you haven't even noticed it's there while suddenly finding the inside of your beer glass to be the most intensely fascinating thing you've ever seen;

B) Wait till the bartender is out of earshot, then make several calculated snide remarks about the choice of programming, and is there anything else to this show, I mean it's like spring break in Cancun meets a Budweiser commercial, for God's sake;

C) Go wait in the car, where the summer sun basting down on the nearby dumpster creates a pungent odor only too reminiscent of the soiled diapers you'll soon be encountering firsthand; or

D) Whoop and holler, chug your beer, then flag down a passing (skanky) (read: all of them) waitress and ask if she'd care to make an extra five bucks by trying to shake it like the chicas on TV.


If you know the correct answer, feel free to hop in your DeLorean, head on back to last Saturday and let me know. I'm still trying to figure it out.

It's harder to be elitist when you're drinking. And yet, also easier.

You know how you can tell I'm an English nerd? As if there was ever any doubt. The other day I'm out at a bar with my friend watching the Olympics, and a commercial comes on for that new Christian Slater show -- the one where he's a boring family man by day and some kind of bad-ass secret agent by night, I guess, but each identity is unaware the other exists. Anyway, the ad happens to mention the names of the two alter egos: Henry and Edward. At that point I turn to my friend and say (probably snidely... being pretentious is standard homework for English majors), "I suppose they think they're being sooo clever with those names. You know, what with the whole dual identity thing... like, Dr. Henry Jekyll and Edward Hyde?" My friend (an extremely smart guy, mind you) just looks back at me and replies, "Wow, uh, yeah. I never would have made that connection."

And doctor, that's when I knew I wasn't like all the other children.

That could be difficult...

Today at work we got an email stating that "due to a lack of participation, there will be no Bring Your Kids to Work Day this year."

I asked Ann if she thinks that means she's just not allowed to come in to the office. I mean, right?

Mucus Plug: great name for a band

One of my personal heroes, Dave Barry, began his career as a humorist by writing a column about his wife's pregnancy and the eventual birth of his son. Even though it's his first ever column, it still reads like vintage Barry- witty, self-deprecating, deceptively insightful. In one of the funnier segments he describes the childbirth class he and his wife attended, specifically the graphic videos of women actually giving birth that they were forced to watch. He hastens to add that he can't give many specific details about the videos, since during them he had to go out to the hall twenty or thirty times to get a drink of water.

Well, Ann and I attended our first childbirth class tonight. And yes, they showed videos of actual women actually giving birth to actual babies. (So much for starting slow and ramping up to that.) But I, unlike Mr. Barry, decided to remain strong and support my wife by watching the entire thing without getting up once. That's just the kind of guy I am. So I did.

You may notice that one of us is a famous, highly respected and almost universally beloved journalist and author whose work has spawned a television show and a movie, with more on the way; and that one of us is stuck in corporate America writing movie reviews and blog posts on the side to keep his brain from atrophying. I'll leave it to you as to who makes better choices.

It's not the years, honey...

One of my best friends turned 30 yesterday. In fact, he's the first of my really close friends to hit that milestone; I have other friends who reached that age long ago, of course, but none that I grew up with. And even though he's two years and some odd weeks older than me, it's still a rather sobering reminder that the big three decade mark is closer than I like to think. It's not even that big a deal... I mean, just an arbitrary number, right? I could have a heart attack tomorrow (but please, Lord, do me a solid and forget about all those bacon cheeseburgers, 'kay?), whereas there are 70-year-old grandparents out there who've never been sick a day in their lives. I think it's just the change in attitude that goes along with it, y'know? It brings the whole aging/maturity thing home in a way that going to your 10-year high school reunion or, oh, having a child somehow don't. Maybe it's the comforting mindset of "Sure, I've been out of college for 6 years and I have a job and I'm married, but I'm still young. I never would, but technically I could start over from scratch if I wanted to. Nobody calls me 'sir' yet." But once you hit 30 you're no longer a promising anything (statement void for doctors), you're not a youngster whose mistakes can be forgiven, nobody expects you to show up for work bleary-eyed because they just assume you were out drinking last night. Now you have to face the horrible, gut-wrenching realization that the interns you're giving instructions to don't remember where they were when Kurt Cobain died because it probably involved apple juice and Duck Duck Goose. Oh, and those Playboy centerfolds? Remember when their dates of birth were, like, in the '70s and that was pretty cool because they were older women? Well, now they would look at your younger siblings and say, "Ew, way too ancient for me. No thanks, LOL!" Enjoy.

It's still a couple years down the line, so I'll continue to enjoy my late 20s secure in the knowledge that no way, my hairline is definitely not receding, uh-uh. But I swear, the next time I don't get carded at the liquor store, I'm reaching over the counter and grabbing that smug punk who doesn't even know who He-Man is for God's sake, and giving him a piece of my mind. As long as I don't trip over my walker.

If you ain't first, you're last

A couple more random thoughts on Mario Kart Wii:

-One of the vehicles you can unlock in the game is a motorcycle shaped like a dolphin. It happens to be the type of bike one leans forward to drive, commonly known as a "crotch rocket." The game also features numerous characters to play as, some of them prominent members of the animal kingdom. Perhaps you see where this is going.

All I'll say is, if you can't appreciate the simple pleasure of watching a monkey humping a dolphin, it's possible you and I are very different people.


-Ann and I enjoy racing against each other, but we've recently decided that the game's team mode, in which you compete as a team with five other computer-controlled players, is definitely the way to go. That way if you lose, you have someone else to blame it on.

Me: Eff you, computer! I would have won the whole damn cup if not for these losers dragging me down!
Ann: You, uh... personally finished eighth in every race.
Me: Stupid team!


-Ann has a tendency to get especially frustrated when her computer teammates aren't performing to their fullest potential.

Ann: Look at that! Your guys got, like, five of the top six spots! What the hell, team?!
Me: Maybe it's a morale problem. They might have moral issues with their leader engaging in bestiality during races.
Ann: Learn to appreciate interspecies erotica and get your heads in the game!

Judgey McJudgeypants

If nothing else, impending parenthood is great for triggering every judgmental bone in your body with regard to other people's children. Frankly, my wife and I were critical of other people's parenting at the best of times, long before we decided to spawn one ourselves... sorry, but if you let your 5-year-old run around with a pair of toy binoculars staring at the crotches of everyone seated around the deck while your 13-year-old walks around in a bikini top and microskirt because Moooom, geez, don't be so uncool, then am I as a reasonable human being expected to heartily endorse your candidacy for Parent of the Year? Exactly. Only if I've been drinking.

But forget all that, because having one on the way yourself takes it to a whole different level. Ann and I attended a birthday party this weekend for the 1-year-old daughter of one of Ann's friends. (As an aside: 85-100% of Ann's close friends are married or in a long-term relationship. 25% of mine are, which makes me feel like the Weird Old Guy when we all get together. It also virtually guarantees that at future gatherings, my teenager will get stuck babysitting between 3-5 youngsters while the adults go get drinks. Sorry, kid.) The party was about what you'd expect, a number of children ranging from 6 months to 5 years motoring around while a bunch of adults talked with each other about parenting and gave Ann and I advice. It was enjoyable, and even though I was convinced I'd hate the stuff, damned if that gluten-free cake wasn't really good. Who knew? But my point (I had one originally, didn't I?) is that a couple of the older kids were, shall we say, less than well behaved. Now, I mean, they're kids... you can't rule them with an iron fist or anything (around strangers). They're going to run around and be rambunctious, that's a given. But I think I draw the line at letting them open the gifts. Sure, the baby has no idea what presents are, she's more interested in the paper, but it's the principle of the thing. You can't totally blame the kids... I mean, they're 4- or 5-year-olds at a baby's birthday party, of course they're going to get bored. But as the parent, you've got to be involved enough to hold them in your lap or something; whatever, just keep them out of the camera angle so I can get pictures of my kid's first birthday party without having to add "...and her cousins/our neighbor's progeny/our friend's kids" to every shot. The birthday girl's mother was extremely graceful about the whole thing, which I give her a ton of credit for, because I'm not sure I could have resisted the urge to say something.

Anyway, Ann and I couldn't stop talking about it afterward, clearly demonstrating that our judgmental meter has migrated from "pretty damn," right on past "uh, you're not perfect either, you know" and all the way to "hyper sensitive, you realize your child won't have ANY friends, right?" Here's hoping we can get it in check before I start administering 6-part written questionnaires to other parents wanting to schedule play dates with our little girl.

Really, I'm thinking just the urine sample should be enough.

More casual comic racism

Just a short post today... frankly, I'm not sure what I could add to this one. To set the stage for you, Pat has been captured by (who else?) pirates who will shoot any whiteys they see, so Terry decides to go undercover by -- you ready for this? -- painting his body with iodine and using adhesive tape to make his eyes slant. Oh, and pinning some hair to his turban that they cut off an actual Chinese guy while he slept. The worst part is that Connie encourages this bullshit with the following ultra-progressive remark: "As one darn clever Chinee to 'nother - you pooty smart feller!" You're a credit to your people, Connie.

Words fail me.

You can picture Jeffy from Family Circus doing the same thing, right? That little scamp.

Always the place you least expect...

My wife and I are the proud owners of a Nintendo Wii. Neither of us much cares that it's not the most powerful system on the market, or that hardcore, "leet" gamers roll their eyes at it... it's the most accessible and overall fun system out there, and if Nintendo can get our parents to tentatively play a game, they're certainly doing something right. In particular, we're both huge fans of the ability to download games from past Nintendo systems- it lets my wife play Wario's Woods and Dr. Mario and all the other puzzle games she holds so dear, and for my part, I can finally beat Castlevania without my mom telling me to shut that damn thing off, it's time for dinner.

But we also like some of the games actually designed for the Wii itself, and the one we've been pining for lately is Mario Kart Wii. The N64 version is far and away the most popular video game I've ever introduced my wife to, and since she's currently pregnant, if it's the Wii version she wants, the Wii version she shall have. Simple, right? You'd think, except Mario Kart Wii is currently sold out everywhere. Ev-ery-where. Over the last week I've visited every Target, Best Buy, Circuit City, Toys R' Us, and even (*shudder*) Wal-Mart near our house and work, trying to find the frickin' thing. Nada. Zilch. A helpful employee of EB Games informed me that there's a huge shortage right now, but that Nintendo is expected to ship more out by late July. That's "late July" as in a month from now. Of course, eBay is teeming with copies, as long as you're willing to pay an extra $20 for the game plus shipping. I'm not, which has left me up the proverbial creek sans visible means of propulsion.

So in the midst of my utter failure to appease my wife's Mario Kart cravings, the other day I visited the campus bookstore to pick up materials for my latest MBA class. And what do you suppose I happened to run across, brazenly sitting there on a shelf? It just stared out at me as if to say, "Well, duh... I don't know why you didn't just come to this repository of textbooks, pencils, and notepads first, instead of visiting all those electronics stores. Fool." I don't know either, but you'd best believe I snatched that bitch up and brought it triumphantly home to my wife, and was rewarded with the biggest, most heartwarming smile you've ever seen in your life. Granted, it lasted exactly 7 minutes, at which point she placed fifth overall and angrily declared she didn't want to play anymore; but mister, that was 7 minutes well worth it. And that's the truth.

Dodging the issue

Here's a question for the class: have you ever been in the position of having to pretend you didn't hear something, just so you could get out of responding to it?

Surprisingly, there's a story behind that question. A few weeks back my sister and I were talking, and she happened to mention that she liked John Cho, who I guess is appearing on Ugly Betty now. Anyway, I nodded and said, "Oh yeah, I remember him... the 'MILF' guy from American Pie." My sister didn't know what I was talking about (youth), but the problem was my mother, who overheard the conversation and asked point blank, "The 'milf' guy? What's a milf?"

So I ask you, friends- what would you have done? I did the only thing I could think of: pretended I hadn't heard her and hastily changed the subject. Thank God she didn't press the issue.

"Well, Mom, y'see, it's when a lady of a certain age..."

Betrayal

I think it's quite unfortunate that my daughter will now never know her father. I mean, God knows I want to be there at the birth of my baby girl, and to be involved in raising her. What father wouldn't? But then last night Ann and I were playing Mario Kart on the Wii, I was in first place and literally about five feet from the finish line... and she nailed me with a blue turtle shell, letting both her and a computer player cross the finish line first. I got third. Third.

Like I said, I'd really like to see my little daughter grow up, but I just don't see how I could be expected to stay with a woman who would do something like that to her husband. I mean, really.

Songs to rock out/rock your baby by

Don't have a lot of time today, so just 2 quick thoughts:

1) As of last Tuesday, it's official: we're having a girl! Ann and I are both thrilled, but of course this brings new complications into the picture, namely my impending need for a gun license. I feel sort of bad for my unborn daughter, because I'm going to be the most overprotective father ever. It'll be a real pain for her when all her high school friends are wearing cute miniskirts and she's stuck in snowpants and a trenchcoat, but c'est la vie.

2) Ann clued me in to this while composing the baby shower registry: they now have "Rockabye!" CDs containing soft, orchestral renditions of songs by classic pop/rock artists. Each one is devoted to a particular artist, and apparently they consist of "soothing instrumental lullaby" versions of that artist's songs. I'll admit it's a cool idea (though I never quite associated Nirvana with calming happy feelings, myself), a way for parents to get their kids to sleep while gleaning a smidgen of enjoyment out of the songs as well. There's a lot of the big names you'd expect: U2, the Beatles, the Stones, Led Zeppelin, even Green Day. My one quibble? No R.E.M.

Hey, I see you rolling your eyes. Yes, I'm a wee bit obsessed. Guilty. And I know, it's been almost two decades since R.E.M. was as popular as U2. It's just that a couple of the bands are ones I wouldn't consider either massively popular or as musically influential. I mean, Coldplay? Bjork? Nothing against those guys, but you'll never convince me they've made as significant a contribution to modern music. Or that the first band you think of when you hear "lullaby" is Radiohead. (If you do, email me, we should get some drinks.) True, there are a ton of other deserving bands that, as of yet, have no lullaby CD either -- Gn'R? Bruce and the E Street Band? -- I just won't count my life as complete if I never get to hear a lullaby version of "It's The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)." And that will be sad.

Oh well. At the very least, my little girl will now be able to nod off to sleep to the strains of "Inbetween Days." That's worth the price of admission right there.

The Ass-Tilt

So as long as we're on the subject and everything, here's what's been bugging me: why is it that in movies and TV shows, guys invariably cock their head to the side when looking at a woman's rear? Have you ever noticed that? It never fails - if you need to signify that your male lead is entranced by the hard-to-get love interest's derriere while she sassily struts away, he's invariably gonna do the head tilt. Who determined that was going to be the universal signal for ass gazing? It's reached the point where we don't even think about, we just automatically accept it; I've even found myself (back in my single days, of course, dear) doing the tilt while appreciating, in a completely respectful and non-sexist manner, the keister of a passing girl. I mean woman. I mean womyn. Damn!

Anyway, my point is, I've done the same thing, but then I stop and think: What am I doing? Is a 37 degree neck pivot going to help me more fully appreciate the majesty of these hindquarters? If I get the angle just right, will I spontaneously manifest the ability to see up her skirt, as if by magic? (No.) Or am I just doing it because it's what we always see people doing on TV?

And, of course, the answer is yes. Seriously, why do we do that?

The Law of Inverse Attractiveness

Just recently, a bunch of my former high school classmates have started friending me (and you know we're living in the Internet age when "friend" becomes a perfectly acceptable verb) on Facebook. The reason is obvious: we're coming up on the tenth anniversary of our graduation, so our reunion is being organized and people start getting nostalgic. Perfectly understandable... I'm not sure I'll personally be attending, since it's in November and I'll have a newborn and a barely postpartum wife to contend with, but we'll see. Nevertheless, all this friending has brought to light an interesting phenomenon: almost across the board, those people who were a bit, ah, less than supermodels back in high school have gotten significantly more attractive, while those who were the greatest eye candy back then have generally gotten... well, a bit homelier. Not everyone, of course, but more often than not, and across both genders. Funny how that works, isn't it? Some people who you remember being not exactly knockouts, you now look at their Facebook photos and squint to see whether they've somehow been digitally altered; whereas others you think, "Wow, I used to have a crush on you? I'm embarrassed for both of us." Maybe there's such a thing as karma after all.

(And in case you were wondering, yes, I count myself among those who have improved since high school. Not to say I was completely hideous back then [I hope], but I was deluded into thinking long hair = cool. In reality, long hair might have been, but a quasi-mullet most certainly was not, and adding acne, braces, and oversized clothing into the mix didn't exactly add up to a ladykiller. Now, of course, I'm regularly mistaken for Brad Pitt's younger brother, but it was a rough couple of years there for a while.)

Oh, and if you happen to be one of the people I went to school with, don't worry- you're totally one of the people who've improved since then. Go you!

Guitar Hero: [insert band here]

I just found out a few days ago that they're coming out with Guitar Hero: Aerosmith. That's right, an entire game devoted to Steven Tyler and co. teaching us how to walk this way on our little plastic guitars. (Okay, technically it's 60% Aerosmith, 40% bands who have covered, opened for, or are friends of Aerosmith, like Cheap Trick, Joan Jett, and Run DMC.) That sounds pretty sweet, and the article I read said Aerosmith was one of the top 5 bands that fans said they'd want to see a Guitar Hero game devoted to. Which immediately begs the question, who were the other 4? The article didn't say, but it got me thinking about the wisdom of devoting GH games to other famous bands.


Guitar Hero: The Beatles
The kooky quartet from Liverpool, comprised of two unquestionable creative geniuses and two... other guys who could play their instruments pretty well.
Pros: Hard to argue merit -- with the exception of the King, no one was more instrumental in bringing the sweet rhythms of rock 'n roll to whitey. Probably the most famous band in the world, decades after their break-up.
Cons: Brilliant innovaters though they were, it's difficult to associate the Fab Four with hard rock. No one ever smashed a guitar or flipped off fans during a raw performance of "Yellow Submarine" or "Paperback Writer."
Conclusion: Let it be.


Guitar Hero: The Rolling Stones
The original hard-partying, groupie-groping, substance-abusing rockers in whose footsteps all others must follow. (No, Elvis doesn't count.) Also wrote a few songs here and there.
Pros: A career spanning decades, with a catalog unmatched for pure number of great songs and hits. Also, the respect and admiration of nearly every musician and rock fan in the world.
Cons: Mick Jagger still thinks video games involve eating ghosts while saying "wakka wakka," and Keith Richards might try to smoke the motion capture camera.
Conclusion: Give Mick some satisfaction, this one's a no brainer.


Guitar Hero: Jefferson Starship
They built this city.
Pros: ...
Cons: Entire game consists of one song.
Conclusion: Uh, no.


Guitar Hero: U2
Some nice blokes from Ireland who do a couple songs you might have heard of. Apparently they're starting to get a bit of press outside their native country. Good for them.
Pros: Have been cranking out hits since the early '80s, and every single person on Earth can hum a good 70% of their catalog. Old enough that baby boomers know who they are, yet young people still like their music. Nice combination.
Cons: Save the preaching for Sunday, Churchy LaFemme.
Conclusion: Even people who don't own a video game system would buy a copy. They're just that damn popular.


Guitar Hero: R.E.M.
The band who could make you laugh and make you cry, all while not understanding a single verse. Consistently vie with U2 for "most influential band of the last 25 years" status among serious music fans. Inserted political messages into music when it wasn't the thing to do.
Pros: Not lacking in recognizable tunes, and early albums have plenty of deep but lesser-known songs and B-sides to round out the setlists. Also, they rule.
Cons: Despite plethora of hits, not really mainstream friendly in the way U2 is, which could drive away casual players. Bono = sunglassed and messianic, Michael Stipe = bald and bisexual. Checkmate.
Conclusion: The one I'd love.


Guitar Hero: Automatic Baby
In 1993, members of R.E.M. and U2 joined forces to create Automatic Baby (Automatic For The People + Achtung Baby), performing an acoustic version of "One" at an MTV concert for President Clinton.
Pros: Uh... the indisputable two greatest bands of the '80s teaming up for the purpose of one legendary video game?
Cons: Only ever played one song together. Also, gamers' heads might explode from sheer awesomeness.
Conclusion: Drew's on drugs.

Synchronicity

It's a funny world, isn't it? Not to get faux philosophical or anything (and believe me, faux is the best one semester of Comparative Philosophy allows me to do), but it's strange how random events in your life can intersect in meaningful ways. Last post I talked about how I've been reading Terry and the Pirates lately. To give you slightly more background: Terry is considered one of the seminal comic strips of all time, THE adventure comic in whose path all others follow. In a medium known for cheap one-liners, simplistic artwork, and sanitized romances, creator Milton Caniff changed all that with epic, continuing narratives, incredibly lush, detailed backgrounds, and racy female figures in sexually charged scenarios. Culturally insensitive he might have been (at least early on), but there's a reason Caniff is known as "the Rembrandt of the comic strip"; and while comics may still strive vainly for acceptance by mainstream society, it's impossible to deny the man's talent.


All of which is leading up to what, you ask? Good question. This past weekend Ann and I attended my sister's college graduation. A good time was had by all (followed by a not-quite-so-good time helping her move out of her dorm), and on Sunday night we ended up at the home of one of her friends for dinner. At one point I happened to overhear this friend's father mention the name "Milt Caniff," so I tuned in to hear what he was saying. And, well... what he was saying was that his uncle had been a close friend of Caniff's, to the point where Caniff had done original artwork of some of his Terry and the Pirates characters and given them to the uncle; and he in turn had, upon his passing, bequeathed them to the man in whose house I was standing.


I was floored. What kind of a coincidence is that? Even so, I'll admit I thought, "Well, odds are he's either mistaken, his uncle just TOLD him it was Caniff, or else they're a few quick pencil sketches, barely recognizable as much of anything." Nonetheless, I followed along as he led us into his dining room, the very place where not 20 minutes earlier I'd loaded up my plate with lasagna and breadsticks without once glancing at the walls. And. Oh, my God. Hanging there were 3 of the most beautiful pieces of comic art I've ever seen in my life. Fully colored, amazingly preserved, undoubtedly genuine. I mean, I'm no expert and I certainly couldn't swear on my life, but Caniff has a pretty distinctive style and these definitely looked the part. (One looked quite similar to the image shown below, which I scanned out of the Terry book I'm reading. In fact, I might have thought it was the same if not for the personal message written on this one.) Once I picked my jaw up off the floor, I complimented my amused host about a thousand times on each of the pieces. He seemed to really get a kick out of it, as it sounded like (understandably) most guests to their home didn't recognize just how exceptional the art was or the artist's importance in the history of comics.


But geez, it just goes to show you. Next time you think clunky "coincidences" like that only happen in sitcoms and bad movies, take a look around the room where you're deciding between brownies or cake. You just might be surprised by what you find.

Those wacky, racist '30s

In case the last post didn't make it obvious, I'm kind of a comic nerd. Traditionally that's been comic books (no, I don't think there's anything hopelessly adolescent about misunderstood outcasts gaining superpowers, beating people up, and dating women with gravity-defying chests... why?), but lately I've been drifting more toward classic comic strips -- Peanuts, Popeye and the like. Just recently I started reading Terry and the Pirates, and holy Lord -- would you like to talk about incredibly demeaning stereotypes in popular entertainment?

You would? Great! How about a comic strip -- one that ran in hundreds of newspapers and was read by millions of people, remember -- set in China and in which all the villains are Chinese, as well as Connie, the sidekick of (need I say... white?) heroes Terry and Pat. Every single Chinese character talks with a horribly stereotypical accent, calling Americans "Melicans" and crap like that. Terry and Pat both casually refer to Chinese people as "chinks," and even Connie himself - a Chinese man - calls the villains "dumb chinks." To say nothing of Terry taunting a Chinese thug as a "rice burner" in one strip... I guess racism is okay if it's only directed at bad guys, right? And even though they hire him as their translator, Terry and Pat both treat Connie like their manservant -- at one point they send him to check on an explosion they heard, telling him to fire his gun three times if there's trouble. (Because as everyone knows, two shots of a pistol is nothing to worry about, but three shots... well, that means shit is on.) When Terry dares to voice that maybe they shouldn't have sent Connie alone, Pat offers the ultra-sensitive rationale of "Maybe it's a trap! If we are to be attacked we'll need full strength - and we can spare him better than any of us!"

Oh, can you, Pat? I wonder how Connie feels that his friend would rather have a woman and a prepubescent kid along in a fight instead of him. +10 points for chivalry and gender equality, -500 for casual racism. Of course, the stereotyping isn't limited to the Chinese, thank God, as at one point Terry and Connie spill soot on a criminal, then joke with Pat that he's practicing for his blackface routine. Terry, take a lesson from Ted Danson- not cool, man. Not cool.

In fairness to Milt Caniff, I know that stereotypes were widely accepted back then, and I'm told Connie evolves into a less demeaning stereotype in later strips. But man, that is some funny, incredibly sad shit right there. Hell, it's almost as bad as giving your superhero an Eskimo sidekick and giving him the nickname "Pieface."

Oh, wait...

FCBD '08

Just a quick reminder to everyone that this Saturday, May 3rd is Free Comic Book Day. For those unaware (as in, non-nerds), every year a number of publishers send copies of one or more comic offerings to stores around the country to be given away for free. The goal is to attract new readers, and in that interest the issues are always new reader friendly, not part 5 of a 19 part crossover or whatever. But the real benefit is to you, Young Adult With Nothing Better To Do or Mr. or Mrs. Harried Parent. Need something to keep little Johnny occupied while you get groceries and (it's okay, we won't tell) hit the liquor store? Hey, the price is right!

Now, I know what you're thinking. "Drew," you say, "aren't comic books just adolescent power fantasies about juiced-up steroid freaks invariably solving problems through swift, unflinching violence? Why would I want to/want my kids reading that?" To which I reply: ha! Because come on now, that's really... absolutely correct in 75% of the cases, actually. Maybe 80%. BUT! There are also plenty of age-appropriate offerings for youngsters, and for older audiences a variety of independent comics that have nothing to do with crossdressers hitting each other. I mean, if you're into that. For the kids there'll be offerings of the Simpsons, Archie (which: come on, man. It's Betty, dammit! Screw Veronica, she's only slumming with you to make daddy mad), and Uncle Scrooge, among others. For adults there'll be a bitchin' Hellboy story, some more standard superhero offerings (but good; as you'd expect, the companies try to showcase their best stuff for this), and if I've been really extra nice this year, maybe even something to do with Scott Pilgrim. Probably not, but you never know.

So anyway, that's the scoop. If you're out on Saturday, whether it's with the kids or on your own, stop by your local comic book store: they'll give you at least one free comic, and if you buy something, often more than one. Hard to beat that deal, and you just might find something you end up really liking.

No Time For Love, Dr. Jones

Ann got mad at me the other day for buying an issue of Maxim. Not mad mad, just the quirked eyebrow, "You are NOT dumb enough to buy this right in front of me... are you?" exasperation. It isn't that she minds me buying Maxim -- I get it every month and I honestly think she reads it more than I do -- it's just that this particular issue had Elisha Cuthbert on the cover. To clarify: the possibly attractive, I've never really noticed Miss Cuthbert holds the position of the one movie star I'm allowed to, er, date when I become famous. (So if you want to go ahead and recommend this blog to your friends, you know. Just saying.) When I pointed out that, honestly, I barely even noticed she was on the cover, and really that bedsheet is awfully conservative after all, the only response was a truly epic eyeroll.

Yes, those jealous pregnancy hormones have well and truly taken over her mind, I'm afraid. Sad.

Dryly Demented Drew

So apparently I'm going to be a father. I know, I didn't believe it either, but there was this blog with my wife's name on it and I know the internet would never lie to me, so... yeah. Evidently babies are one of those side effects of sex, much like the urge to do a victory dance and then fall asleep, that they fail to tell you about in high school. I blame my father most of all. I mean, the man's a health teacher, you'd think that might have come up. "Drew, I want you to mow the lawn this afternoon, don't forget to lock the door if you go out, oh, and sex leads to babies. I'm late for work, have a good one." Way to drop the ball, Dad.

I'm just kidding, we were definitely trying to get pregnant. (Some of us might have been trying harder than others, but I'm not here to cast judgment.) I do feel slightly misled about the time frame... Ann said all the articles she read indicated it can take up to a year to get pregnant the first time. Apparently I am far more studly than anyone would have suspected, because the second month rolled around and bam! -- there was that pink, urine-covered stick with two lines on it. I blame myself more than anything. Myself, and also milk. It does a body too good, if you ask me.

But anyway, that's where we stand: excited and happy and wondering if it's possible to develop self-esteem issues in utero by constantly being referred to as "Sea Monkey." Hopefully not. Fortunately for Ann, I'm not as cool or attractive as Jason Bateman in Juno, and thus won't be running off to pursue my music dreams and score groupies anytime soon. That's okay, I understand Guitar Hero is pretty much the same thing.