Entry 265: Merry Sickmas

There is some sort of zombie stomach flu going around, and I seem to be the only person not getting it.  I feel like Rick on The Walking Dead.  I think that's the correct analogy; I've actually only seen part of one episode of that show.  S and I started the series, and then about halfway through the first episode, we realized that it really was all about zombies, which neither of us has much interest in, so we turned it off.  I, for one, don't know what I was expecting; it's not like they hide the fact that it's a zombie show.  I did something similar with Game of Thrones.  I watched a few episodes because everybody loves it, and then I started getting confused and annoyed by the story lines.  I couldn't tell why there were undead albinos walking around in the snow, and why a woman was shooting a smoke monster from her vag, and why some people had magical powers and others didn't, and why everybody fought with medieval weaponry despite there being something called "firewater" from which it seemed one could fashion bombs and guns.  And when I was explaining all this to a friend who loves the show, he said, "So ... your complaint about a fantasy show is that it contains fantasy?"  Yes, exactly.  And yes, I realized how silly that is.  It's a bit like going to a baseball game and complaining because of "all the throwing" -- nobody would ever do that.  Well, S might, but nobody else.

[Getting this song stuck in your head is more tortuous than really zombies -- if real zombies existed, of course.]

But the purpose of this entry isn't to talk about TV.  Although, I would like to give that Alex Gansa a piece of my mind for the abject atrocity that was the Homeland season finale.  I don't know what he was thinking.  It's like he was intentionally trolling fans who were finally back on board this season after an unwatchable third season (I literally didn't watch the second half of it).  It's like somebody at the pitch meeting said, "OK, should we tie things up with Haqqani, or should we end with a thrilling cliffhanger to set us up for next season?"  And Gansa responded, "Neither.  We're going to do an incredibly underwhelming season finale about Carrie's boring parents with a punchless, slightly confusing secondary story about internal CIA politics -- that'll show 'em."  Well, I'll tell you one thing, if Homeland doesn't reel me back in immediately next season, I am absolutely going to stop streaming it for free off that shady, offshore free-TV site we use.

Anyway ...

So S got sick Christmas Eve and was bedridden almost the entire day, leaving me to take care of the little man on my own, so it wasn't exactly the world's most relaxing holiday.  It was OK though.  I got in some quality father-son bonding time (he's started doing yoga with me; he tries to imitate the poses, which is super cute), and then after I put him to bed, I had the night to myself.  I would have rather spent it watching bad season finales with my wife, but, hey, free time is free time.  Anytime you get a chance to spend an hour or two watching highlights of old football games that you've seen a hundred times already, you gotta do it, right?

In the morning, we were greeted by a pile of vomit on Lil' S's pillow: Merry Christmas!  I would've preferred a stocking filled with sports magazines and candy like I used to get as a kid, but nope -- vomit.  This wasn't little baby spittle either; this was full-on, stomach-emptying chunks.  It was gross.  He threw up again in the early afternoon, which was enough to get us to cancel our plans to our friends' house for dinner.  The thing is, he was acting perfectly normally, just as energetic as always, but he was just throwing up, for some reason.  I went over to our friends' house by myself for an hour to exchange gifts and have a Christmas cocktail and some h'ordeuvres.  And then we opened gifts with my family over Skype, so there were a few Christmas-y activities, at least.

Actually, it would have been a fine day, except Lil' S couldn't stop throwing up in bed.  He would fall asleep for an hour or so, and then puke and start crying, and we would have to get him.  And not just get him, but we would have to clean him up and prepare the bed again for him to go back to sleep -- all while he's half asleep and bawling and fighting us at every turn ("I don't want you clean me!").  I spent half the night shuttling towels and blankets and clothing (and a few stuffed animals) to and from the laundry room trying to keep everything fresh and clean in his bedroom.  The one thing you can't swap out, however, is the smell.  Poopy diapers can be bad, but I think on the hobo power scale, the effluvium of stale vomit is worse.

The first time he threw up at night, it was a heart-wrenching moment.  He was groaning in his room; not crying, he was making more of lowing sound.  So I went in and asked him what was wrong, and he pointed down to the disgusting egestion in front of him and said, "this."  There was just something about seeing him there, sitting in his own filth, not knowing what it was, or why it was coming out of him, that made my heart drop to the pit of my stomach.  It was such a sad site.

But the good thing about kids is that they have short memories.  (Remember being a kid and one minute you'd be so mad, swearing that you would never be happy again just to teach the world a lesson, and then somebody would mention popsicles, and you'd forget everything and run to the kitchen so that you could call dibs on the grape flavor?)   This morning, he was up like normal.  Eating toast in our bed for some reason, and asking, "Daddy, are you sleeping, Daddy?  Are you sleeping?"  I was, until he asked.

OK, that's all I have time for today.  Until next time ...

Entry 264: Songs and Anecdotes of Christmas Past

Is there a better time to reminisce than the holidays?  Yes, there is -- high school reunions, for one -- but the holidays are definitely in the top-10.  So for this entry, I'm going to relay an anecdote and a song from five ghosts of Christmas past.  They aren't necessarily the best or the most interesting Christmases I ever had -- just ones I remember for some reason.  It's a slice-of-life thing.

1987

In 1987, my parents bought a cassette called A Very Special Christmas featuring various big-name artists of the day -- Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, The Pointer Sisters, etc. -- singing Christmas songs.  I remember listening to it ad nauseum on a little hand-held tape recorded.  This was back when people still bought cassettes, of course (remember when supermarkets like Safeway had a little electronics section where you could buy tapes and videos?), but the more profound difference in musical consumption between then and now is that back then everybody was listening to more or less the same thing.  A Very Special Christmas went Quadruple Platinum, and I remember talking about it at school with my friends -- I was in third grade.  I can't imaging elementary school kids caring about a Christmas album today, not when they can battle each other online with their accessorized avatars and whatnot.

The only other thing I remember from this Christmas is that we made ornaments out of clay, and with the leftovers my dad and I made a weird, gross-looking replica of a human brain that creeped my sister out.  So, of course, I put it in a shoebox, and wrapped it up and put it under the tree for her, "From: Santa".  When she noticed it, she sized it up, shook it, and said to me, "You put that brain in here, didn't you?"  I said I didn't, but the prank was completely spoiled.

1993

This was perhaps my most miserable Christmas.  I was 16, and as you might know, that can be a pretty miserable time, in general -- especially so when you are experiencing your first heartbreak.  There was this girl at school name JP whom I started hanging around with as part of a new little group we had going on.  She was really kind, but also irreverent, mouthy, and raunchy -- the perfect combination for teenage me.

Initially it was my friend JHP who had a crush on her, but then she liked my other friend JY, so it was this awkward, very-high-school love rectangle.  Eventually JHP tired of waiting for her and turned his attention to her more-available friend LN, and they started "going together".  Then JP tired of waiting for JY (who, despite being able to attract girls in droves, was terrible at making a move for some reason).  And that meant I was the only one left.  Perfect.  By the way, being the only one left, is not such an awful dating strategy.  I once heard a guy on This American Life say that anybody can hook up on any night, if they follow two basic rules: 1) Don't give up; stay at the bar until it closes, 2) Significantly lower your standards.

But anyway, JP and I were officially boyfriend and girlfriend for two days before she dumped me sometime in mid-November.  I was still carrying the torch big time at Christmas.  So I spent a decent part of the Yule season driving around in my sister's Chevrolet Cavalier, with no place to go, listening to Elvis' Blue Christmas, and thinking, "This is so me."  

By the way, I'm now Facebook friends with JP.  She got fat.

2002

I was living on the east side of Capitol Hill, in DC, on winter break from The George Washington University, at the time.  My friend DK had lived in Atlanta the past year, but was moving back to Seattle.  He drove up to DC and picked me up, and then we drove cross-country together.  It was a relatively short trip -- I think we did it in four days -- and it was fun.  But 100 hours straight in a confined space with another human being with whom you aren't having sexual relations ... let's just say I was happy when I finally saw the Space Needle the morning of Christmas Eve.  

It looked sketchy for a while too.  We were somewhere in eastern Montana when we hit a snow storm, and had to pull over and wait it out for the night.  To make matters worse, we had just taken these really strong caffeine pills (brilliant, I know) as our plan was to not stop until we reached Missoula, which was still five hours away.  

So we ended up shacked up together in a hotel room with a single bed somewhere near Billings revved out of our minds.  To makes matters even worse, the caffeine pills made DK nauseous, so he was vociferously throwing up in the toilet of our bandbox hotel room.  I remember lying on the bed with my head spinning, unable to even think about sleep, listening my buddy yak approximately five feet from me, thinking, "Dear Lord, don't let me spend Christmas this way."  The next morning the snow had stopped and the highway was plowed.  Maybe prayer really does work.  Or maybe snow flurries are a very common weather phenomenon, and municipalities in places like Montana know how to respond appropriately.  It's impossible to say which.

2004

This was a rare Christmas for which my parents came to the East Coast to celebrate.  I was in my first year at UMD and living in an absolute sty* with four other dudes in Greenbelt, MD.  My parents visited me and then left to see other family in New York state.  I was going to drive up, as well, a few days later.  However, a massive snow storm came through, and I decided not to risk it.  I spent Christmas day completely alone -- and happy.  All my roommates were gone for the first time ever, and I just vegged out on the sofa, drank red wine, and watched college football.  Huh ... I remember watching Hawaii beat Alabama-Birmingham in the Hawaii Bowl on Christmas Night, but that game was actually played on Christmas Eve.  Another example of how sports helps set the record straight.  

*My original place fell through and left me scrambling for somewhere, anywhere to live before classes started.  This place was awful, and I think for two weeks, I lived with an actual drug dealer.  Thankfully -- for lack of a better word -- he got into a minor physical altercation with another roommate who went to the police, and an agreement was reached whereby no charges would be pressed if he (the drug dealer) moved out immediately.

2013

It's weird that I can remember details from a Christmas that happened almost 30 years ago, and yet I literally couldn't remember what I did on Christmas last year.  Or maybe it's not weird.  Apparently, I didn't do much.  I have a feeling this year will be the same.  One thing that is cute though is that Lil' S is learning to sing Christmas songs.  Most recently, I heard him doing a line from Feliz Navidad: "I 'ant 'ish you ... Mare-wee Kwiss-mass."  It's adorable.  Underrate song too, Feliz Navidad.  I feel like it doesn't get it's full due.

Well, until next time...

Entry 263: Tis the Season

Okay, S is out running some errands, and I just put the little guy down for a nap.  Let's see if I can crank out an entry here.  I had to resort to the pacifier to get Lil' S to go to sleep without major protest -- and by "resort to" I mean I gave it to him as soon as he asked.  We've been trying to ween him off of them, but haven't had much success.  (It's mostly on me.  S is better about it than I am.)  The problem is that they work too well.  If he really needs to sleep (or more to the point, I really need him to sleep), and he's throwing a major tantrum, and I have this thing that I know will instantly make him go down (and it's not drugs), how do I not use it?  Plus, yeah, he's getting a bit old for pacifiers, but what's really the harm?  It's not like he's going to be a grown man and using them.  At some point he will stop, right?  I mean, at all the sleepovers I attended in grade school, I don't remember any kid still using a pacifier.  Although, I did know some who still sucked their thumbs.  Hmm ... I wonder if that's related.

Speaking of bad habits, we have another one going with the iPad during meals.  This one, however, is 90% on S.  She was (and still is to a slightly lesser degree) so worried about him being underweight that she would turn on the iPad so that he would zone out, and then she could scoop food into his gaping maw unabatedly.  Now he insists on the iPad every time he eats.  (And not only that he wants a specific iPad.  That's when you know your kid is spoiled.  When he has multiple iPads to make demands about.)  The only meal he doesn't eat with the iPad is breakfast, which, not coincidentally, is the meal I usually serve him.  We justify it by a) knowing that he doesn't get any screen time at daycare where he is most the day, and b) only letting him play "educational" games.  I use quotes because I don't know if these games really are educational or not.  Does a giant anthropomorphic R saying "Ar, ar, ar, ar, ar, ar, ar, ar" over and over, while images of rain and radios and rats flash on the screen, really help a kid learn to read and write?  I'm dubious.  Although, his teacher at daycare told S, completely unprompted, that he is the smartest kid in his class, in part because he knows his letters and numbers pretty well.  So maybe it is helpful.  Who knows?

Actually the incident with the teacher led to a (very) small quarrel between S and I.  She was beaming with pride after it happened, and apparently I didn't give an enthusiastic enough response to her when she told me about it.  So she got annoyed with me, and then I got annoyed that she was annoyed for such a (to me) silly reason.  And that was pretty much that.  The thing is, I am happy that he's progressing nicely, but being a bit ahead of the curve at a very young age doesn't necessarily mean anything.  Kids mature differently.  Plus, I don't want to be one of those dads who acts like his son solved the Riemann Hypothesis because he learned to count to 12.  I'd much rather be the type of parent for whom nothing is ever good enough, so that Lil' S will achieve extraordinary success, but still feel like an insecure failure and resent me for the rest of my life and perhaps act out in inappropriate and embarrassing ways because of it.  That's the dad I want to be.  You know, just like Brain Bosworth and his dad.  (This joke makes a lot more sense if you, like me, just watched the 30 for 30 documentary Brian and the Boz.)

Anyway, in other news, we went to S's office holiday party last night.  It was pretty fun.  For me it was a lot of standing around, sipping wine, nodding my head, and pretending to be interested in a conservation I wasn't really a part of.  The thing about office parties is that people almost always talk about their work (shocking), and the background noise is often quite loud, so it can be difficult to hear people unless they are talking directly to you.  For spouses, this means you only really understand about 60% of what's going on, so it's difficult to contribute anything other than the occasional "yeah", "right", and "huh, how 'bout that?".  It didn't help things that they were blasting the techno music.  Yes, that's right, somebody decided the most appropriate music for a corporate holiday gig in which the average person was 48-years-old was techno. *ootz, ootz, ootz, ootz, ootz ...*  It was giving me a headache, and I thought to myself, "How about a little Bing Crosby?  Would that be so bad?"



To be fair, there was a dance floor, but when they were bumping the techno, nobody was actually dancing.  Later, when they started playing decent music -- Michael Jackson, George Benson, Prince (well, two out of three isn't bad) -- music middle-aged people actually know and think is fun, instead of stuff 19-year-olds at raves would listen to (or at least what I assume they would listen to; I don't actually know much about the 19-year-old rave scene; I don't even know if it is a scene anymore), people actually started dancing.  But at that point, S and I had to leave to relieve the sitter and put Lil' S to bed.

The food was pretty good though -- as was the red wine, of course.  They had all different sorts of cuisines -- pasta bar, taco bar, southern food station (shrimp and grits), sushi bar, and it all looked delicious.  I didn't go too crazy with the food and the drink though.  My body just doesn't like bingeing anymore (sad, I know).  I told myself, "Okay, D, you can stuff yourself silly and regret it later.  Or you can enjoy a normal-sized meal and not feel like shit later tonight."  I mostly managed to do the latter.  I still overdid it, but I didn't overoverdo it.  For example, I only had two desserts, not five.

On the way home, we drove past a miles-long vigil/protest for Michael Brown and Eric Garner.  Hundreds of people, the vast majority of whom were black, lined the sidewalks with candles, held up homemade signs of solidarity, and chanted things like "Black lives matter" and "I can't breathe".  They were peaceful and didn't disrupt traffic.  And I can guarantee you today they were not shown on any Fox News program.

Until next time ...

Entry 262: South Carolina Vacation Part II

For part one, click here.

Friday, November 28
Other than a 30-minute, after-dinner constitutional around the lake, I don't go outside at all today.  It's Black Friday.  There is no better day to stay home.  I hate shopping with a normal crowd, let alone throngs of people beating each other with pots and pans and other hard objects from the home furnishings aisle to get that last $50 tablet (or at least that's how I assume things goes down).  But S's family is pretty into it, so I'm the only adult at the house for much of the day.  Part of it is that they're all into shopping; another part of it is that they're Indian, and I think there is some sort of ordinance in the Indian community that mandates that you must constantly be on the look out for deals at all times.  Deal talk is a large part of the conversation among S's family and their friends.  I know this is mainly a Jewish stereotype, but I've found that it applies to Indians as well -- it's versatilely racist.

One thing that S's family does that I find funny is they buy things for other people -- not like as a gift, but as a I-have-access-to-a-sale type of thing.  For instance, S's cousin's wife bought 10 comforters.  When I asked why, she said it's because they're only $10 a piece.  When I followed up by asking what she was going to do with them all, she said that some of them were for friends back home.  OK, not something I would do, but cool, I guess.  I can't imagine procuring blankets for my friends.  Honestly, I can't even imagine having a conversation about it.  How does that go down?  Do your friends say to you, "Hey if you see any cheap duvets, keep me in mind?"  Or do you see cheap duvets and just think of certain friends?

Anyway, because I'm the only one who doesn't like shopping, I spend much of the day as the de facto baby sitter.  I don't mind because I like playing with Lil' S and his two little cousins (second cousins, technically) A and Sh.  A is in, I'm gonna say, fourth grade or so, and Sh is around Kindergarten-age, so they are significantly older than Lil' S, but he does his best to keep up with them.  They're all really into being chased, so much of our time together is me chasing them, which I enjoy -- for the first 20 minutes or so at least.  After that I'm like, "Let's sit down and play this game called crossword puzzle.  Quick Lil' S, who's 'Broadway star Hagen'?"  Actually, A really likes playing Family Feud on the iPad, and Family Feud is my favorite game show (as long as it's being hosted by John O'Hurley and not Steve Harvey or that flanneled guy from Home Improvement), so that was a thankful respite from the little kid whirlwind.

One thing that can be really tiring is that A and Sh bicker constantly (what? siblings bickering?); they are always pushing each others buttons in ways they think are sneaky, but are, of course, completely obvious.  Also, Lil' S occasionally gets too excited and bites somebody (and often that somebody is me), or just goes berserk and starts throwing things and hitting people.  At one point, he hits A with some of those big block Legos -- not hard, but hard enough that I have to address it -- so I give him a timeout and tell him he has to be gentle.  And then I ask, "Do you know what gentle means?"  And he says yes, and then runs over to Sh and hugs her and says, "Saw-wee".  The execution is off, but at least he has the right idea.

Actually, come to think of it, I'm not the only one who doesn't go shopping.  S's dad is home with me pretty much all day.  I forgot about him because he doesn't have the energy or patience to keep up with the young 'uns.  He spends most the time in his office playing that powers of two game on his iPad.  At one point the kids all go in there and after about three minutes he says, "C'mon!  Can't you give me some break!", which I find amusing because I've just been entertaining them all for the past hour.  But I get it.  He's old, he's already raised two kids, and he's worked hard to pay for everything around us.  I might be the same way when I'm that age ... but probably not.

Saturday, November 29
The big event for the day: breakfast at IHOP.  S's family doesn't go out to eat very often, so when they do, it can be an amusing experience.  Here are the highlights.

• S's cousin asks the waitress more questions about the menu than I asked our broker about our mortgage contract: "This 'Pick 2', that's two of what? ... Three flavored pancakes -- is that three pancakes each one of a different flavor? ... Is there egg in the roasted red pepper omelet sandwich? ... "
• S's mom orders an omelet with nothing in it but jalapeno peppers and then eats it with hot sauce.
• S clandestinely pays the bill and everybody gets mad at her when they find out.
• I notice under the table that S's cousin is wearing those individual toe shoes that I made fun of in a previous entry.  I hate it when I find out somebody I like or respect is doing something that I previously mocked.
• And my personal favorite: S's cousin's wife orders a single pancake -- not a single stack of pancakes, but a single, solitary pancake.  This cracks me up now just thinking about it -- very reminiscent of Chris Rock's famous scene in I'm Gonna Get You Sucka.
  

After breakfast, we do some more lazing around the house, and then I head back to Blacksburg to see E and F and Lil' E again before driving back to DC.

In Blacksburg, F is out of the hospital and in good spirits which is nice.  She stays home with Lil' E and let's E and I go out again for dinner and a beer.  Unfortunately, it's not Monday this time, it's the weekend, so we have to deal with the throngs of undergrads out about town.  We go to one place, but it's too crowded, so we go to a different place, which seems decent -- and is, at first.  We get a table that's in an enclave with another empty table.  It's essentially one long table with a foot gap in it.  I recognize that this is a risky proposition -- who knows who might sit down next to us? -- but it's the only open two-person table.

We then promptly lose the co-patron roulette.  Instead of getting a nice, quiet couple who keeps to themselves, we get a group of seven bros who all try to cram around a table that seats four, max.  And these aren't just your typical bros, these are some of the bro-iest bros who ever bro-ed -- just drunk, loud idiots (and I say this knowing full well that I've been the drunk, loud idiot before).  They are so loud that I literally can't hear E, even though he himself has a booming voice and his mouth is only 18 inches from my ears.  All I can hear is an obnoxious 21-year-old holding court on what makes a good IPA ("You can't be too IPA.  Most breweries try to be too IPA, and it ends up tasting like hoppy shit...").  We can't just leave either because we already ordered food, so we just have to make the best of it.  I wasn't planning on spending my evening among a bunch of college dudes toasting each other with lines like "fuck her right in the pussy" -- I actually just wanted to have a beer and some conversation with E -- but so it goes.

Back at E's, we watch a few episodes of this British sitcom Peep Show.  It's certainly no The Office, but it's pretty funny.  It's really weird, in a good way.

Sunday, November 30

We all wake up pretty early (two-year-old, remember), and Lil' E and I goof off together a bit before we go out for breakfast.  He's so behaved during breakfast I can't believe it.  He just sits there and eats his pancakes the entire time.  E says he's hit or miss, which is better than Lil' S who is miss or miss.  There is a 0% chance Lil' S will sit still in a restaurant for longer than five minutes without an iPhone or an iPad or a screen of some sort, so watching a kid his age do so is mind-boggling.

Breakfast is over a little before 10, and I'm on the road back to DC immediately.  It's a nice drive actually.  I keep waiting to hit traffic, but I never do.  I make great time (back before halftime of the early games), and most importantly, I do not get a speeding ticket.

And that was my vacation.

Until next time ...