International Brotherhood of Grinches

The day is fast approaching when I will have to turn in my member’s card for the International Brotherhood of Grinches.  The pressure from my wife to decorate the outside of the house has now been compounded by questions from Griffin and Gage as to why we don’t have outdoor Christmas lights of our own.  My mother has not been helping, with her offers of left over lights from their own decoration efforts.

I long for the earlier days when I could misdirect the young ones by saying things like, “Don’t you think it’s cooler to look at our neighbors decorations?”  And, “Which decorations on our street do you think are the best?”  Now, they won’t stray from the point that we are one of the few homes left with no visible holiday adornments.

It’s not that I hate Christmas decorations, by any means.  I simply don’t want to spend the time, money, and effort of draping the house with lights that will be turned on for 14 or 15 evenings at best.  I don’t understand what drives our neighbors to invest so much in their own displays, unless it would be competition with the family next door.

 

Christmas Deer

In my experience, these things evolve over the years.  Many that began as tasteful and elegant displays of holiday cheer now simply look like Christmas threw up on the neighbor’s lawn.  They are a hodge-podge of light strands and plywood Santa cut-outs that slowly but surely multiply until you start to wonder if they are massing for an invasion of your own property.  And what’s with the deer?  Is this going on all over the nation, or is it just a southern thing?

Sad Little Christmas Tree

I’m sad to say that we have already taken our first foray into this mad world of competitive decorating.  Tamara bought a sad little sprig of a lighted tree and stuck it on our front porch.  I think we’ve turned it on about three times.  A disheartening part is knowing that each step taken down this road of decoration can never be taken back.  We will no longer be “that family who only has a wreath on the door.”  We are now “the family who only has a wreath on the door and a sad little Christmas tree in front of it.”

I know that many of you guys out there have experienced the same thing with your families.  My question to you:  Is there any hope that I can hold out a little longer, or is it time to throw in the poinsettia embroidered towel?

Down the Drain

FACT:  The bathtub drain was not designed to funnel away an entire tub full of water and toilet paper.

“How can you be so sure,” you might ask.  Well, just sit right back and I’ll explain how I have firsthand knowledge of this scenario.

On Thursday night, I spent a little extra time playing with the boys before sending them to bed.  It has been an extremely stressful week, what with all the things going on at work, and I’m afraid the boys have been feeling a bit of fallout from that stress.  Griffin made up some crazy monster game where I chase them and try to tickle them, and they shoot me with various plastic toy missiles.  It’s a hoot!  I get to lie in the floor and rest a lot while pretending to be dead.

Anyway, I made the nightly announcement that it was time for a bath and was met with the normal chorus of ‘awww, man’.  Then Griffin quickly added, “Can we play with the bath paints?”  I thought for a moment and decided that it was something special that would make bath time fun, and they had been a little short on fun this week, so I said “Sure.”

I dumped some red, yellow, and green bath paint on the soap shelf in the tub, and Griffin immediately mixed them into a color I like to call ‘puke’.  While I went to get Gage ready, he spread the entire puke tinted amalgamation over three walls of the tub.  When I got back with little brother, I poured some more paint out and left the room to take care of some other important things (like trying to beat Lorra Taylor’s score on Bejeweled Blitz).

After a while, I heard Griffin tell his little brother, “Let’s clean this up.”  It made my heart swell with pride!  My son was displaying a level of responsibility that seems to be devoid in children twice or even three times his age.  I kept playing.

My first clue that something had gone south was when I heard Griffin say, “Gage, Daddy’s not going to be very happy with us…Daddy’s not going to be very happy with me, at all.”  I foolishly thought, “How bad could it be, they probably splashed some water out of the tub.” 

I left my post at the computer and headed in to finish up the bath.  When I came through the door, I saw that the floor was a little wet, so I told the boys that they needed to keep the water inside the tub, and I sat down to help them finish cleaning up.  I was a bit surprised to see something long, white, and fibrous plastered to Gage’s leg when he stood up.  “What is this,” I asked, pointing to the mass.

I got no immediate answer, but as I looked closer, I noticed that the stuff was floating everywhere in the tub.  “We got some toilet paper to clean the paint off,” my eldest finally explained.

“Oh…well that’s…umm…that’s not really the best way to wipe it off,” I stuttered.  I threw the cleaning into high gear and pulled the boys out of the tub.  Crossing my fingers, I opened the drain and listened as the water emptied out.  It only took a few seconds before the pipe choked and the water completely quit moving.

Once the kids were in bed, I spent another 20 minutes bailing water out of the tub and getting it ready for a shot of clog remover.  In all that time, I never saw a hint of movement around the drain, and that, my dear people, is how I know bathtubs and toilet paper don’t mix.

Diaper Gremlins

We seem to have a clan of Diaper Gremlins lurking in our house.  I have looked everywhere trying to find their hiding place.  I’ve explored the attic, searched through the garage, and even poked around in the heating/air ducts, but have yet to see any trace of the little pranksters.

The tell-tale symptoms started showing up a little while after we brought Haven home from the hospital, so I assume they got into her diaper bag or Tamara’s duffle bag while we were there.  Normally, it wouldn’t vex me so much, but these creatures seem bent on making me look foolish in front of my wife.

No matter how much I pay attention to detail at the changing table, the problems continually crop up.  I take off the old diaper, clean up the baby, put on the new diaper, clean the umbilical stump, put the used cotton ball in the old diaper, CLOSE it up, and then throw it in the Diaper Genie.  When I come back later, the old diaper is lying there on the changing table, still opened.  It’s beyond annoying.

Through experimentation, I’ve determined that Diaper Gremlins are mostly nocturnal creatures, though they’re not above pulling the diaper back out and putting on the changing table in broad daylight if given a chance.  However, their absolute favorite time to work seems to be right after those diaper changes that occur between two and five a.m.

It’s hard to find the bright side about a whimsical pest taking up residence in your home, but I can at least be thankful that they don’t mess with the soiled diapers.  Those always manage to stay safely sealed away in the Diaper Genie.  I guess that goes to show that there are things too gross for even a Diaper Gremlin.  I’m also glad they don’t fling them about the room or hide them in some unseemly place.  It turns out that they like to put the diapers in the same location I set them when changing Haven, so you can see how there is a natural assumption that I just didn’t finish the job.

Following that line of thought, my wife is convinced that I’m just forgetting to throw them away.  This is particularly annoying since gremlins are a slippery sort and I can’t get any hard proof to show that they are responsible.  Motion detecting cameras are far too slow to catch the movement of this whimsical creature, and I’d try high-speed video, but everyone knows that gremlins can just alter the film to make it look like I was the one who left it there.

Last night, I tried covering the changing table with glue trap paper to snag them in the act, but it only made the baby mad when I had to pull her off of it.  So, at this point I’m stumped, and definitely open to any ideas.

________________________

Note:  Gremlins are mythical creatures.  They don’t exist.  If this entry has in any way confused you, let me explain:  I keep forgetting to put the diapers in the Diaper Genie.  The End.

Company 4 Sale

I do my best to keep this BLOG on the humorous side of life.  Many times, the things that frustrate us and try us are funny to look back on.  That being said, there are some moments in life that are too big and scary to find the humor in, and that’s where I find myself today.

The company I’ve worked at for the past six years is in the process of being bought by an international corporation that is 95% larger than us.  It’s a good thing for my company and shareholders to be part of this buyout.  The jury is still out on whether it’s good for me personally.

The specific part of the business that I work in was a small percentage of our company before we were bought out.  Now that we will be part of ABB, not only is my section small, but we provide a product that our new parent company already has covered.  For all intents and purposes, it seems that my job may be unneeded.

Our company claims that no job will be lost, ‘employees will be offered a job, though it may not be what they were previously doing, or it may be in a new location.’  Does this mean we’ve moved back home from Maryland to stay for only 6 years before we’re off to some other place?  Possibly.

So many questions are on my mind, but the answers won’t come until 2011 is well underway. 

There are many times in life where we play the waiting game.  We wait to hear about the results of a lab test from the doctor, we wait to hear if we’re going to get a job offer from that company we interviewed with, we wait to reach that wedding date when we can begin the rest of our lives together.  I don’t know anyone who likes to wait when big issues like this are up in the air.  But sometimes we don’t have a choice.

To those of you reading this BLOG, I’d ask that you pray for us to clearly see the direction God would have us go.

I know this is one of those “watershed” moments that turn our lives and personalities into what they are.  I just want to take our family the right way.

I Hate Golf

I hate golf.  I’m sure that sentiment stems entirely from the fact that I'm not good at it.  In my early college days, a few friends and I would occasionally head up to the cheapest golf course in the area and play a scramble.  For those of you uneducated in the sport, it is a golf game where you split into teams and always use the position of the best shot for the next swing.  This was a requisite, because left on my own I’d never make it to the green.  I was deadly once I got there, but as far as driving the ball on the fairway, I only hit “worm burners”.  I can probably count, on one hand, the number of times I’ve managed to loft the ball off the tee.

That being said, I’m told that follow through is a very important part of the swing. From what I’ve read, it has a great effect on ball velocity and direction.  The physics of it makes sense to me.  But this isn’t isolated to golf only.  If you look into almost any sport you’ll find that the follow through is a universally important concept.

This is one of those things that I think extend into our lives as parents.  Follow through is integral to establishing authority and training obedience in kids from toddler age on up.  Unfortunately, it’s one of those things that is easy to let slip if you aren’t vigilant about it.  Often times, it’s combined with a threat against some behavior that young ones are engaged in, “If you don’t stop _____, I’m going to _______.”  The temptation to relent is seeded in the fact that we don’t really want to punish our children, or maybe that were too tired to enforce it.  We’d rather that they just obey.  Unfortunately, a lack of follow through is always interpreted as condoning from that child’s point of view.

Let’s take a real world example…the McDonald’s playground.  I would submit that there is no other place on earth that you will hear people breathe out more threats.  I’ve heard some parents engage in saber rattling so outlandish that it would have made Kim Jong Il sit up and take notes. 

“Susie!  Get down here right now, or we’re going to leave you!”  And guess, what.  Little Susie doesn’t even make a move to get out of the tunnels.  Do you know why?  It was a useless threat.  She knows mommy won’t leave her there alone. 

“Charlie!  I said get down here!  Don’t make me come up and get you!”  And Charlie ignores his daddy and plays on.  He knows you probably can’t even fit in the tunnels, much less make it up to where he is.  Even if you could, he can maneuver through the playground faster than you could ever hope to.

Now, lest someone get all bent out of shape, I’m not advocating that you leave your child alone at McDonalds, or even that you go flailing through the tunnels in a bid to snag your youngster.  What I am suggesting is that you stick with threats that CAN be enforced.  For instance:

·         If you don’t _______, we won’t come back for the rest of the month.

·         If you don’t _______, you will forfeit your TV time.

·         If you don’t _______, you won’t play Xbox the rest of the day.

You get the picture.  The main thing your child needs to understand is that every word you speak is fact.  If daddy says something, then it’s going to happen.  Once they believe that everything you say is God’s honest truth, it will segue into more complex thoughts like Cause and Effect.  You can actually teach your child that every action they perform has a consequence.  It’s a concept that has far reaching benefits:

·         I need to brush my teeth, or I’ll get cavities.

·         I shouldn’t speed, or I might get a ticket.

·         I need to focus on my study time, or I might lose my scholarship.

Follow through might seem like it’s hardly worth the effort sometimes, but that line we choose to enforce is a basic building block for things our children will experience further down the road.  We are the authority in their lives.  If a child won’t obey their parents, who will they obey?  Or more importantly, if a child won’t obey their parents, what other authority will they disobey?

Oh, Happy Day

Maybe I have too much time to think, but the significance of this holiday is really eating at me.  You know, as well as I, that this time of year has become closely associated with family get-togethers, over-eating, football games, and shopping.  In my heart, it just feels like there should be more to it than this.

You see, the most integral part of this holiday is something called ‘Thankfulness’.  Being “thankful” is a multi-party interaction.  You can be glad you have a job, without ever involving someone else, but if you are “thankful” for your job, then you are thankful to somebody (most likely your employer).  You can be glad you have health, but if you want to be thankful for your health, then you are thankful to someone (let’s say your doctor).  At its very heart, Thanksgiving is a day set aside for us to be thankful to someone for what we have, be it job, health, family, possessions, or whatever.

The question naturally follows, “Who should we be thankful to?”

In my opinion, it’s useless to be grateful to your employer for your job.  Unless you’re self-employed, your upper management would probably drop you like a rabid squirrel if the company got in a stiff enough financial bind.  Even if you are self-employed, it merely takes your customers deciding that they no longer need your services, and you’re in trouble.

What about health?  There’s only so much you can do to keep yourself healthy.  Walgreens would like you to think that hand sanitizer will solve your problems, but no matter how much you drink, you can still get sick.  The doctors you routinely see may or may not be able to figure out what your illness is, and even then, there are some things our physicians can’t heal.

The things we have, be it house, car, furniture, etc, are only one disaster away from being gone.  And even more than that, our precious families are just as fragile as our possessions.

If this day, set aside by our government, is to be a day of thanks, then let it be to the One who gives us the health, knowledge, ability, and in some cases sanity to perform our job.  Let it be to the One who guards us and those we love as we go about our days.  It can best be summed up in the words of James:

James 1:16-18 (New Living Translation)

 ¹⁶ So don’t be misled, my dear brothers and sisters. ¹⁷ Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. ¹⁸ He chose to give birth to us by giving us his true word. And we, out of all creation, became his prized possession.

It’s amazing how we become so entitled about our lives.  Most of us walk around every day, never giving a second thought to what we’re doing, but take a person who’s been paralyzed in a car accident, and they would give almost anything to stand and move on their own again.  We take our children for granted, yet if we had one taken away from us, we’d never cease to be thankful for the ones we still have.

The biggest trick to this whole holiday is finding a way to express true thankfulness while we still have these good things we’ve been given.  I think if we got to a place where we honestly believed that everything we have is a gift from God and could be taken away at any moment, then we would be thankful as we should be.

I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving, and hope that you will be able to reach that point where you can whole-heartedly express gratefulness to God for all He’s given you and continues to give to you.

A Guide On Brownie Points

I have finished an exhaustive search of the Internet, trying to find a guide on the collection and use of Brownie Points.  After googling it and looking through the first 10 hits, it was apparent that no such guide exists.  I will attempt to rectify this in 800 or less words.

Brownie Point (BROW-knee poi-nt)

-noun Informal

a credit toward advancement or good standing gained especially by currying favor.

Origin:

1960-65; from the point system based on good behavior and performance used by Girl Scout Brownies for advancement

In modern times, the Brownie Point system has morphed into a way of storing up good will toward another person.  On rare occasions that good will can spill over into an act of kindness for the accumulator.  For example, an entire month of thoughtful actions toward the lady of the house might result in an evening of kicking back on the computer and playing Starcraft 2 all night without a stitch of guilt or negative repercussions.

(A note of warning here, indulging in a reward activity before accumulating the required amount of Brownie Points will most often result in nullifying the current stash of points, and in some cases cause a negative balance.  Extreme caution is advised!)

Collection

Brownie Point collection can be confusing at best.  The service rendered that may earn you 100 BP this week, may net you zero the next week.  Or even worse, you may lose points from your balance if the same service is expected and not performed the second week. For instance, if I empty all the trashcans in the house before trash day this week, Brownie Points!  If I fail to do the same next week, brownie point deduction.

Also, there is no set pay scale in the brownie point system.  This morning, I stayed up and fed the baby a bottle.  I knew my wife was tired and that she would appreciate me letting her get back to bed, so I probably earned about a bazillion Brownie Points.  That exact same offer, made during the afternoon, might only net me 10 to 15 BP.

As far as collection of points goes, I can sum it up thusly:

Points are earned for actions that meet a need, want, or desire in your partner.  The larger the need, the bigger the reward will be.  The amount of points will also vary on willingness to offer said service.

            Service Offered Out of the Blue – Mondo Point Reward

            Service Offered with few hints – Point Reward

            Service Offered at request – Meager (if at all) Point Reward

            Service Offered after nagging – You done blew your Brownie Point stash

Storage and Retention

Brownie Points are accumulated and held by the party receiving the service.  This can be a great disadvantage if that person is prone to transient global amnesia or some other mild cognitive impairment.  Basically, if they forget, you lose all your points.

To combat these occurrences, it’s best to keep a small but steady trickle of good-will going.  That way the ‘Brownie Bank’ is always open and making transactions.

Use of Points

Finally, we make it to the end game.  Stored Brownie Points can be used in one of two ways, intentional or unintentional.  Both are good in their own right, but intentional use is the best.

Unintentional use amounts to about the same as a ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ card, if you’re familiar with Monopoly vernacular.  For example, the wife walks into the room holding a small scrap of cloth in her angrily shaking fist, saying, “You threw my brand new drip-dry sweater into the dryer, and now it’s shrunk beyond all practical use.”  If you have a stash of Brownie Points built up, answering with “I’m so sorry” will usually diffuse the situation at the cost of your current Brownie Point tally.

Intentional use is the crème de la crème.  This is where good will is heaped back upon you, once you reach the overflow point at the Brownie Bank.  Unfortunately, the tipping point is also on a sliding scale that may or may not be related to the moon cycle and local ambient temperature.

I’m a numbers person, so it pains me greatly that I can’t lay figures to actions and provide you a complete table on how to earn the most Brownie Points in the smallest amount of time.  That being said, I think this guide is mildly informative and can be useful.  Please feel free to add to it or redistribute it where you think is necessary.