Entry 478: Promotional Material

I haven't been able to post anything here for a few weeks, because I've busy with work.  It's a strange, unsettling feeling, being busy with work, but it might become the new norm.  We just landed a huge (by our standards) contract, and it means more work for me, for everybody, so for me too.  It also means, I've been told, a promotion.  Over the next year or so, we are hiring more staff in my department, and I'm going to be the director of the team.  I'll get more money and an office, which is cool (the former more so than the latter).

The work itself, eh, I'm not super excited about it.  I'm not unexcited about it, but I'm not stoked either.  I'm open to it -- that's the best way to put it.  It's likely going to be a lot more managing and a lot less in-the-weeds work.  I've never really been a manager before, but from what I know about myself, I think I will like it less than what I do now.  But I'll still get to do some of what I do now, and when we do expand, there's really no way I can stay at my current position anyway.  Somebody has to be the department director, and I'm literally the only person in the world who can do it without a substantial learning curve.  Even if I said no, I would end up doing it anyway, because I'd be the only person in the office who could do it for, like, the two years.  So, if I going to end up doing anyway, I might as well do it right and get the benefits that come along with.

Also, I might like it -- I dunno.  It's a way I can come out of my comfort zone a little bit and try something slightly different without totally tipping my life over.  I actually kind of enjoyed negotiating the parameters of my new position with my bosses.  (Advocating for yourself and getting what you asked for feels pretty good.)  And it's fun to look over résumés of prospective hires.  Plus, I'm going to get to "represent" the company more now, which is working out in my favor in the short-term, because they're sending me to Seattle for a conference, so I'll get a free trip to see friends.  Although, it's just luck the conference is in Seattle.  If it was in Akron, Ohio, I wouldn't be as excited about it.  (No offense to the fine people of Akron.  I rocked a Zips shirt for many years -- it was one of my favorite tees.)

In other news, things have just been floating along normally here at the G&G household.  The kids seem to be doing well at their new school, and the commute (five minutes driving, 20 minutes walking) is easy on my schedule.  Lil' S1 is kinda obsessed with Pokémon and Super Smash Bros.  He pretty much just wants to play Nintendo whenever he's home.  He's pretty good too.  He beats me about two-thirds of the time, maybe more.  S isn't really into him playing video games.  She says it's because I get caught up playing them too, and then she has to be the "bad guy" to get us to quit.  It's father-son bonding, I tell her.  Actually, that might be part of it: She feels a bit left out when we play.

Lil' S2 is kinda into video games, but doesn't have the motor skills to play yet.  His brother got him to play against him once, and of course, he showed no mercy and just destroyed him.  He started crying, but it was kinda cute because he said, "I'm only four!  I don't know how to push the buttons right yet!"

Let's see... what else... S and I started watching a new show, which is probably the most exciting other thing I have to report.  It's called Black Monday, and it's set at a sleazy stock brokerage in the months immediate prior to the big Big Monday crash of 1987.  Don Cheadle and Regina Hall play the two principal owners of the firm, and they are both frickin' hysterical.  Andrew Rannells and Paul Scheer are also really funny in it.  Kadeem Hardison makes an appearance as Regina Hall's husband, and I couldn't believe it was him when I saw his name.  He's unrecognizable from his days as Dwayne Wayne.  He definitely put on some weight, but facially I didn't even recognize him.  I mean, Sean Astin put on some weight too, and I instantly knew it was him watching Stranger Things.

One thing about the show, however, is that I can only handle one episode a night.  It's not a binge-watch for me.  The excesses of the '80s are a key theme, and comedy styling mirrors this, so the jokes are rapid-fire and offensive.  It feels hedonistic to watch.  Also, it's one of those shows where nobody is a good person, so you can't really root for anybody.  But what it lacks in humanity, it makes up for in hilarity.  They throw in a lot of pop culture Easter eggs, which mostly go over S's head ('80s pop culture isn't her jam), but which I greatly appreciate.  My favorite one so far (paraphrase):

Person 1: I'm going to go as Darth Vader for Halloween.  I just got the mask.  It's the actual one from the film!
Person 2: What?!  You got a Darth Vader mask used in a Star Wars movie?!
Person 1: No.  It's the one from the rape scene in Revenge of the Nerds.

Now that is totally problematic comedy gold.

Until next time...

Entry 477: The Fake End of Summer

Labor Day is often considered the end of summer, but due to global warming, the hot days just keep on coming.  Forecasts have us in the 90s next week.  This used to be my favorite time of the year weather-wise -- when it's t-shirt and jeans during the day and a light jacket at night -- but that period inches back a little bit more with each passing year, and it lasts a little bit longer.  In a few years, we are going to be trick-or-treating in tank tops.  My boys will go as cavemen every year, because it will be too hot to wear anything other than a loincloth.  It's depressing when good weather makes you feel so bad.

We had a nice holiday weekend, at least.  On Saturday, S and Lil' S1 went to the National Book Fair, which they thoroughly enjoyed, and I took Lil' S2 on a "hike" to Rock Creek with a friend and his five-year-old twins.  It's probably good to hang out with them once in while without Lil' S1 there, as he tends to just dominate the activities.  This way they can do more of the "little kid things" that they probably want to do, but don't do, because Lil' S1 has them doing something else.  For instance, after we went to the creek, we went to a playground, and everybody spent almost the entire time on the swings.  That likely wouldn't have happened with Lil' S1 there, because he gets bored on the swings, and he would have convinced everybody to do want he wants.

After we got back, we watched The Goonies, which was not my choice.  It's a nostalgia-inducing cult classic for people my age, but it's a pretty terrible movie, and it has some problematic parts for little kids.  For example, there's a relatively graphic scene in which Chunk is trapped in a freezer with the corpse of a murder victim, and the gag is that the body keeps falling on him.  And how do you even explain Sloth to a little kid?  Oh, he's just a severely disfigured, intellectually disabled guy who gets imprisoned and tortured by his family because he's different.  That's all.  Interestingly, however, that wasn't what Lil' S1 was bothered by -- he didn't like how the other kids treated Chunk.  At one point he asked me, "Are they mean to Chunk the entire movie?"  And I replied, "Yeah, actually, they kinda are."  But, he liked the movie, and I learned about Lupe Ontiveros, so overall it was a success, I guess.

The next day, Lil' S2 went to a friend's house and then S took him out to run some errands, so I switched things up and spent most the day alone with Lil' S1.  I promised S that I wouldn't just play video games with him the entire time, so we played a long game of Monopoly instead.  I like Monopoly, but it's so long, and it's not much fun with two players, especially when one of them doesn't yet understand how to evaluate the properties on the game correctly.  He gets excited when you land on his single property for $15, even if it means you skipped his corner with a bunch of houses and hotels.  But at least he gets to practice his arithmetic and think strategically and whatnot.  It probably is more intellectually stimulating then playing video games, and it's definitely better than watching iPad.  (Also, we did play the Nintendo Switch a bit, because a new game came -- Super Smash Bros.  It's a more ornate, more cartoonish Street Fighter II.  It's pretty fun.)

When it comes to Lil' S2's learning I've gotten pretty into the technique espoused in the book Range, which is basically that it's almost always better in the long-run for the student to suffer through a task or problem on their own, even if they do it "wrong" and get the wrong answer, than it is for them to be guided by a teacher to do things the "right way" and get the right answer.  There's way more value in exploration than there is in learning the "proper technique."  This so rings true to me based on my own experience.  I got really good at math in college by sitting in a quiet room by myself and staring at a bunch of seemingly incomprehensible symbols until they made sense to me.  And I inadvertently built the foundation for thinking this way at a younger age by not being tethered to the "right way" of doing things.  I had an absent computer science teacher in high school*, and I wonder if that actually helped me, because it forced me to do everything on my own.  So, I'm trying to take a hands-off approach with my kids.  S isn't as zealous about this idea as I am, but she seems to be mostly on board, so we shall see.

*He was in some sort of course to be an administrator so he frequently missed class and his substitute literally didn't know how to code.

Anyway, we capped of Labor Day weekend with a terrific day at this water park owned by the city of Gaithersburg, MD.  I had no idea this place even existed, but we went for the birthday party of our friends' kid, and it was so nice.  It wasn't crowded at all, and the water slides were actually pretty fun.  Lil' S1 is finally tall enough for thing like this, and he must have gone down those slides 15 times.  You could basically just go down and go right back up without waiting in line.  I went down a few times, but I'm mostly too old for that shit.  (Later in the day, I actually felt kinda seasick from it -- pathetic but true.)  Lil' S1 is pretty good in the water in general.  He still doggy paddles a lot, and he looks like he's struggling, but then he will submerge himself and swim underwater when he needs a big burst.  It can be nerve-wracking to watch, but it's somehow effective.

Lil' S2 is making progress too, but he still has a long way to go.  The thing about that kid, though, is that he's pretty much fearless, when it comes to things like that.  He jumps in the water and tries to swim, but he just can't do it yet.  He'll get the hang of it though.  Very few kids learn before five and most (like his brother) don't learn until six or seven.

Alright, I gotta cut this post off kinda abruptly.  The boys are at a friends' house, and I have to go pick them up.

Until next time...

[Lil' S1 took his book outside this morning to try to "sell it."  (I think he wanted S to buy him something online.)  But he didn't find any takers, so he just sat down and started reading it instead, and his brother decided to join him.]

Entry 476: An Explosion and a Party

Crazy week, this past one; a lot going on, which is why I haven't posted anything in a while.  For one thing, my Krav Maga gym exploded -- literally.  There was a massive gas leak near the gym's building -- apparently you could heard the gas hissing out of a hole in the pavement -- and something sparked it.  Nobody was hurt, thankfully.  It was early Sunday morning, so there were only a few people in the entire retail center.  Somebody smelled gas and called the fire department, and they had the area cordoned off a few hours before it blew.  Last I heard, nobody was sure what caused the spark.  It's across the street from my office building (which is unaffected), so I snapped the pic below from my car as I slowly drove by.  Scary stuff.

That building ain't getting fixed anytime soon -- I doubt it ever does -- so the status of the classes are in flux.  To the gym's management's credit, they were on it immediately.  They posted a video on Facebook saying they would still offer classes in the area one way or another.  The past few days, they've had "pop-up" classes in a soccer center.  It's a space, but they need something better.  People aren't going to shell out $50 a week to do Krav Maga on an indoor soccer field for very long -- and by people I mean me.  They also need to find somewhere close to where the old facility was.  The convenience of being able to leave work at 4:45 and be in class by 5:00 was a huge selling point.  If I have to drive too far I'm out.  We shall see.

In happier news, we had a joint birthday party for the kids on Saturday.  It was madness: about 35 kids, 70 total people.  Although, to be honest, it was less mad than I thought it was going to be.  We rented a bouncy castle, which was one of the greatest ideas we've ever had.  (Actually, S deserves sole credit for it, I think -- pretty sure it was her idea.)  For one thing, it's just cool to have one of those things in your yard -- mega parenting props, right there.  For another thing, it disperses the craziness.  Half the kids can play in it, and then with "just" the other half running around, it doesn't seem quite as frenzied.

I bought way too much food and drink.  I knew I bought too much, but I figured it would just be normal too much, but it was well beyond normal too much.  The leftovers include: three bags of tortilla chips, one bag of potato chips, one bag of popcorn, one entire veggie tray, a fourth of a giant birthday cake, two full large pizzas (and we gave three away), half a box of chardonnay, one case of beer.  Most of this stuff we can save for later -- the chips are unopened and we froze the pizza -- so it's not a completely waste, but still.  We started composting, and I already dumped the cake in the compost bin, and I think the veggies are next.  I've been doing my best, but I'm one man taking on an entire party tray.  The kids won't eat the stuff, and S doesn't really like raw vegetables like that.

I did the shopping for the food, because S always buys the wrong thing, but then I pulled an S and got the wrong thing.  She sent a text asking for wine in a can -- apparently this is the trendy new thing -- but I accidentally bought cans of rosé-flavored beer.  WTF?  Who even brews that?  Yuck.  I'm turning into a crotchety old man when it comes to beer.  I'm sick of all these fancy microbrews.  I usually just want watered-down yellow beer now, especially on a hot day, especially when I'm having more than one.  Give me a PBR or a Modelo, and I'm good.  If I'm feeling classy maybe I'll step it up to a Kronenbourg or a Stella.  I just don't enjoy the craft IPAs like I used to.  Anyway, the guy at the liquor store was really cool and let me exchange the rosé beer for actual bottles of rosé wine (they didn't have it in a can), and it's a good thing he did because nobody would have drunk the beer, but the rosé wine was one of the few items that didn't survive the party.

For his birthday, I bought Lil' S1 a Nintendo Switch.  He's been loving it, needless to say.  I've been having fun with it too.  There was a period in my life when I played a ton of Mario Kart, so I've been getting back into the groove with the latest version.  It's crazy how that muscle memory stays with you.  I haven't played it in 20 years, literally, and I'm still pretty good at it.  It's become our new family activity.  For a half-hour every night, Lil' S1 and I play and Lil' S2 watches us -- I think he has the most fun too.  I always let him pick my character and my vehicle.  He picks Donkey Kong every time.  And then he follows us on map and does running commentary, "Daddy, you got a red shell!  Oh, take that Bowser Jr.!"

I don't think S is that into it.  For one thing, she doesn't play video games much, so I think she feels a bit left out, and then she also thinks video games are bad for kids, which, I dunno, they might be, they certain are in excess, but everything is bad in excess, and I'd much, much rather have my kids play video games than watch TV.  Video games are more interactive, and you can play them with other people, so it's a social thing.  Also, they are fun.

Alright, I think it's time to wrap up this entry.  The kids started school this week and somehow I'm exhausted because of it.

Until next time...

Entry 475: Quality Time Alone

S and the kids return tonight, so my sojourn in a house of my own is coming to an end.  Originally they were going to come back on Monday, but S moved the flight to tonight.  She was getting worn out being with the kids by herself at her parents' new place in Tampa.  It's in a gated retirement community, so there aren't many (any?) other kids around, and if you want to go anywhere to do anything off the premises, you have to drive for like 20 minutes.  There is a pool there, which is great, but pools are exhausting for parents of kids under 10.  Young kids don't want to lay in the shade and relax; they want to go-go-go constantly, and you can't just zone out and let them do their thing, because you have to play the role of lifeguard.  I like going to pools, because the kids have so much fun, but they also stress me out.

S's parents try to help out, especially her mom, but she has trouble physically keeping up with them.  S's dad will hang out with them, but only on his terms.  Once they start getting a little bit rambunctious (i.e., act like normal kids their age), he gets frustrated and gets upset or retreats to another room.  So, it's mostly on us when we visit her parents, and when you're alone, it can be trying, to say the least.  S's cousin was supposed to come with his kids from Jacksonville, but he had to cancel, and when he did, S started looking into changing their flight.

I'm not sure exactly what this portends for our future visits, but it probably means there will be fewer of them and they will be shorter.  It's not like Columbia, South Carolina, where S's parents used to live, is a hub of activity, but there are other kids in the neighborhood, and we easily could take the boys to playgrounds and indoor fun centers, and we could visit friends in Charlotte.  Also, we could drive there.  It's more convenient/better suited for little kids.

I just don't see how we can afford -- time-wise, money-wise, and mental health-wise -- to spend as much time in Tampa as we did in Columbia.  It's too bad for S's parents, but overall I think they will be happier in their new place, so... it is what is.  I hate that saying, but sometimes it's very apt.

My time alone was seriously some time alone.  I mean, I went to work and the gym and stuff.  But I didn't do anything "fun."  I realized that my social life is 95% family activities -- cookouts, birthday parties, play dates, all with other parents with kids.  I play trivia on Sunday nights sometimes, but if that's off (as it was the past two weeks), then I don't really do anything social without kids.  This isn't necessarily a bad thing.  It's a simple matter of resource allocation.  I just don't have the capacity in my life right now for a robust non-kid social life.  If I didn't have a family, then I would build one, but I do have a family, so I don't.  It also doesn't help that my O.G. DC friends, the ones I could always count on for sports watching and beer drinking, have all moved away.  Most recently, my friend R moved to Columbus, Ohio to be with her boyfriend, and I doubt she's ever coming back, since they're getting married in November -- so selfish of her, huh?

Actually, I was in the process of getting a poker game going for tonight, when S changed her ticket, prompting me to cancel it, so that I could pick them up at the airport.  She said that they could take an Uber back, but she'd have to get one with car seats, which is a pain, and it would be expensive (from Dulles), and, I dunno, it just feels weird to make my family, whom I haven't seen in two weeks, take an Uber back from the airport, while I play poker.  I would feel guilty about it, even if it's because S changed her ticket.  Also, some people were being wishy-washy or non-responsive about the game, which was annoying me, and by going to the airport tonight, I will accumulate goodwill, so that I can play trivia with emotional impunity tomorrow night.  So, it's not entirely a selfless act by me -- but it is mostly one.

Come to think of it, I did do one social thing this week.  I went to dinner with a bunch of Krav Maga folks on Thursday.  The wrestling instructor is leaving for college this weekend (he's only 18 years old!), and so some of the longtime students planned a going away dinner for him.  I happened to be around when everybody was leaving, because I took his last class, so I just tagged along.  We went to a barbecue joint, and I got a half-rack of pork ribs and a loaded baked potato.  It definitely beat the scrambled eggs I would have eaten.  (Actually, I make some bomb scrambled eggs.  I put peppers, onions, and sausage in them and top it with cheese.  Add a let little hot sauce, and that's good eatin'.)

It's one of those things that's kinda awkward, where I've seen everybody hundreds of times before, because we've all been taking classes together for the past three years or whatever, but a lot of the people I haven't really ever talked to, and I don't know their names, or if I do, it's only because I've heard other people say it.  Also, there's a sizable age gap.  I think I was the oldest person there by at least ten years, and some of the people, like the instructor, are barely out of high school.  (I think one girl there is still in high school.)  I heard somebody on a podcast say, "We all think of ourselves as being 15 years younger than we actually are," and that is so true.  In my mind, high school wasn't all that long ago.  I feel like I just finished it five or six years ago.  In actuality, it was literally a generation ago.  I'm the same age as the parents of many high school kids -- and not super young parents.  If I had a kid at 27, well within the range of normal, they would be in high school by now.  This is absolutely mind-boggling to me.  My best friend has a kid in high school, and it's still absolutely mind-boggling to me.  I can never not be amazed, and more than slightly freaked out, by how fast time has moved for me since I turned 14.  Before then time went so slowly.  I remember visiting my older teenage cousins when I was 10 -- they looked like behemoths to me, full-grown men, with muscles and facial hair -- and thinking to myself how far out of reach that seemed.  The four years between ten and 14 took longer than the 28 years from 14 to 42.  It's the paradox of aging.

But who cares, right?  People are people, and it's fun to interact with people of all ages.  I'm never going to be one of those snobs who gets off on denigrating other generations.  I absolutely despise it when people do this.  I hate it when people my age bash millennials, and I hate it just as much when young 'uns make fun of old people for no other reason than being old.  As Sarah Silverman once said, "I'm sorry I haven't died yet."  And not to get all Marianne Williamson on you, but it's an amazing cosmic quirk that we all exist together, right now, on this minuscule speck of rock, orbiting one of hundreds of billions of stars in the known universe.  Why can't we recognize that and live with love, in unity?

And with that I think I will exit now.  I'm going to watch an episode of Stranger Things from season two.  I'm not all that into it,* to be honest, but S wants me to watch season three with her, so I need to catch up.

Until next time...

*My problem with this show, and it's why I'm not a huge fantasy guy in general, is that there's way too much unexplained shit going on.  It's fine to have suspense and mystery, but they need to start bringing it together.  What is the Upside-Down, and how can one get into it?  There's that portal in the lab, but then that kid Will gets sucked into when he doesn't want to -- how does that happen?  And now there's something living in him Zuul-style?  Is that the same type of creature as that gremlin that ate that kid's cat?  And where does Eleven go when she transports to visit people?  Is that the Upside-Down?  If so, why doesn't she go fight that monster and help Will?  Actually, why is Eleven even in this season?  She hasn't done anything but eaten waffles and broken windows in a cabin.  Her story line couldn't be more boring.  They probably should have killed her off last season.  I know she's popular, but great shows recognize when a character, even a beloved character, has run their course, and she's apparently run her course.  Anyway, the last episode left me hopeful that some things will starting getting resolved, so I'll keep watching.  I just hope there is some sort of payoff soon.

Entry 474: Conflicting Feelings

It's a weird time for me right now.  I feel like my personal trajectory and that of society are intersecting, but one is on the way up and one is on the way down.  Things in my life are going pretty well -- I have a great family and friends, a good job, a nice house, and enough time and money to indulge most of my hobbies.  I get to play trivia, make and solve crossword puzzles, listen to great podcasts, and workout regularly.  I get to lie next to my beautiful wife each night and watch my beautiful children grow up.  I get to sit on the porch of the house I own and eat good food and sip cold beer with people whose company I enjoy.

And yet I live my life feeling an underlying anxiety for the state of society.  It's not like I'm constantly sad or angry or anything like that (on the contrary, I'm happy and laid back by nature); it's more like there's always something in the back of my mind nagging me -- a thin but extant pall cloaking my mood at all times.  And it has to do with two things: the resilience of white supremacy and our failure to act on climate change.  Every time I start to feel too good, one of these things rears its ugly head.  Last weekend it was the former, obviously, with two mass shootings, at least one of which was carried out by a wacko white supremacist.  But even before that news broke I was already in a funk because a friend told me climate scientists project that by 2050, which is not all that far away -- my oldest child will be five years younger than I am now in 2050 -- DC will have 40 days a year in which temperatures reach over 100.  That's insane.  Currently we have around seven and that's way up from "normal."  We're cooking the planet, and half the country is either in denial about it or doesn't care.  The steady warming of our climate is not as viscerally jarring as our seemingly biweekly mass shootings, but it's a much grander and less tractable problem to solve -- especially when a lot of powerful people don't want to solve it.

I do this thing a lot where I'm thinking an unhappy thought and then I move on to a normal thought, and then I forget momentarily what the unhappy thought is, but I do remember it was unhappy.  Then when I actually remember it, it's either a relief because it's something trivial -- the Seahawks lost -- or it's a stressor because it's something serious -- my friend told me they have cancer.  These days, I have that going on constantly, but the final remembrance is never a relief.

But, nobody gets to live a stress-free life.  There is no perfect spacetime in history to be alive, and there probably never will be.  We struggle along, subject to the cruelties of our day, and eventually the sun will burn out.  I haven't died of bubonic plague; I haven't been displaced from my homeland; and my teeth haven't rotted out of my mouth.

Here are some more things I have going for me at the moment.

• I got to visit my family and friends in the PNW a few weeks ago, mainly the former.  Before everybody had kids, I would split my time between UP (family) and Seattle (friends) roughly 50-50.  Now it's like 90-10.  I spend most my time with my boys and their closest (age-wise) cousin Lil' Q.  I'm lucky if I get a night and a day to spend with my pals.  I'm not complaining, just saying.  Overall, it was a great trip.
• I'm still the wrestling champion at my gym (self-proclaimed).  I have yet to be bested in any live drill in the class.  A week ago I got a pretty good challenge from a kid in his late teens or early twenties who said he had been wrestling since he was in grade school, but ultimately I got the better of him too.  I kinda sandbagged him.  I went really easy during warm-ups -- I always do, because I'm old and can't go full-out the entire class anymore -- and then I turned it on when we went live.  He was pretty pissed after class -- at least in my head he was.  In actuality, he might not have cared much at all.
• My oldest son is getting really smart, especially when it comes to animals.  The other day a friend was over, and he pointed out a Pileated Woodpecker in my yard.  I said I didn't know what that was, and he said it was a woodpecker with an identifiable red head.  I told him he should tell Lil' S1 about it, so when he saw him he said, "Hey Lil' S1, I saw woodpecker in your yard.  One with a bright red head."  And Lil' S1 replied, "Oh, that means it's a Pileated Woodpecker."
• On Wednesday, S took the kids to her parents' new place in Florida for almost two weeks.  I miss them already, but it's so nice to not be awoken at 6:00 am every morning.  Before I had kids, I didn't consider just waking up and going to work on my own schedule a privilege, but it so is.
• Atlanta, the only TV show I'm watching regularly right now, has gotten really dark and surreal, and I'm loving every minute of it.  It's kinda like hip-hop David Lynch.  I have a man-crush on the actor Lakeith Stanfield and a crush-crush on the actress Zazie Beetz.  The only problem with it getting so bizarre is that S is losing interest.  It's not real her bag.  In general our weirdness-versus-enjoyability graphs are correlated in opposite directions, and so it's hard to find shows we both like.
• I had a dream last night in which I went on a major bender, and then I woke up with cottonmouth and thought to myself, Shit!  I'm gonna be hungover all day.  But then I remembered that I didn't have a drop of alcohol last night -- I was just thirsty -- and thought, Yes!  I actually won't be sick today.  At least, I have that.  I'm not sick today

Until next time...

Entry 473: Separate Vacations

Busy weekend, this, so I'll bang out as much as I can in the short time I have to blog.  We're preparing to go away for a few weeks -- the boys and I are going to visit my family in Washington (the state), and S is going somewhere, Indonesia, I think, for work.  The way things worked out this summer, with our move and the boys switching school from a year-round school to a non-year-round school, separate vacations were the most practical course of action when it comes to childcare.  This way I can cover two weeks, and S can cover two weeks (she's taking them to her parents' without me, when we get back), and then we get a month of coverage.  It's just for this summer -- once we have an established schedule, and we replenish our household coffers, we will vacation together again.

It's funny, I was listening to the latest episode of The Weeds podcast, and they were talking about finding childcare for the summer when school is out, and it was like they had secret cameras set up in S's and my house -- Tennis camp starts on the 10th and runs through the 24th; then culture camp starts on the 30th; they have Silver Stars on the 28th; so we will just need somebody to cover that Monday and Wednesday.  I can call Brianna for Monday and work a half-day on Wednesday...  You need a scheduling algorithm just to figure it all out.  The thing about The Weeds is that most the hosts live in DC, so their real-world examples are actually real-world to me.

S tends to get stressed out a bit before we travel, and apparently this is true even if we take separate trips.  I'm the opposite.  She's totally laid-back about the actual traveling, because she does it so often, but she's really controlling with the packing and preparation.  I dread the actual flight (actually it's more the to-and-from the airport I find particularly stressful, not the actual flight itself), and I don't even give much thought to the packing.  She has already made several "requests" about things I put in their carry-ons -- snacks and books and the like -- and she wants to pack the suitcase for them herself.  I don't really want her to -- I want to pack things how I like them -- but it gives her peace of mind, so sometimes it's best to just say "thanks" and then rearrange things to my liking when she's not looking.  Of course, I wish S was coming with us, but there are advantages to solo-dadding.  If you are married with kids, think about how many of your little spousal fights have to do with disagreements in parenting tactics.  It's nice to not have to worry about that once in a while.

Things were extra busy this weekend because we had some friends over to our new house.  It was really nice.  I finally feel like we have the perfect hang-out house.  We have a big open upstairs that leads out to the deck and a sizable backyard.  It's not like our old house, which was sectioned off into small rooms, and the deck was downstairs and across the lawn from the actual house.  Also, we have a big basement filled with toys, so we can send the kids downstairs and have actual adult conversations about important things like playlists at early '90s junior high dances (staples: Boyz II Men, Timmy T, Vanessa Williams).

We also have a decent-sized open kitchen, which is an underrated aspect of entertaining.  People always congregate in the kitchen, at least for part of the night, because it's where the refrigerator is (and so it's usually where the alcohol is) and also because the hosts are often finishing up some food preparation, so people come in to talk to them.  If your kitchen isn't open, things almost always split into a kitchen group and a non-kitchen group.

I think a good time was had by all last night.  I had fun.  S messed up a couple of the dishes, but she noticed it with enough time to fix things, so it was much more funny than it was tragic.  She put too much salt in the potato salad, because the recipe called for "2 tablespoons of salt (used while boiling potatoes)," and she didn't notice the last part, so she put in two tablespoons of salt after the potato salad had already been made.  That is a fucking lot of salt.  It straight-up ruined the entire batch.  I tried it, and it wasn't eh, a little salty for my taste; it was oh my god, it tastes like I chugged water straight from the Dead Sea!  We had to chuck it.  (The second batch was delicious, though.)

Before that she made a peanut butter, pretzel, and chocolate pie for dessert. But some of the kids are allergic to nuts, so she used sunflower seed butter (SunButter) instead of peanut butter.  I sampled it, and it tasted funky, like, really funky.  I chalked it up to the SunButter, but the taste lingered and a familiar flavor started to distinguish itself:

"For some reason, I'm tasting garlic," I said to S.  "It's really weird."
"Oh," S replied, "that's because I accidentally used garlic-flavored pretzels."

Needless to say, that went in the trash too.  We bought ice cream sandwiches instead.

50% of me felt bad for my wife, because she was legit disappointed, at least a little bit; 45% of me just thought it was funny; and 5% of me was annoyed because this is a common problem for S.  She doesn't read things like labels or directions carefully, so she makes more mistakes than she should.  It's a speed thing.  I see how she does things, and she just charges though, without double-checking or verifying anything.  It's the exact opposite of how I do things.  I'm as slow as a Bob Rafelson movie (there's a deep cut), but I almost never make mistakes like this.

The flip-side, however, is that maybe with all the time she saves on a regularly basis, she still comes out ahead in the end, despite the occasional big mistake.  Maybe it's more efficient to race through everything, and then pay a sizable lump-sum price every once in a while.  It's kinda like solving crossword puzzles in a tournament setting.  If you race through as fast you can, you're more likely to make mistakes. But if you solve carefully, then you're more likely to be beaten by faster solvers.  You can't be cautious and solve at your top speed.  You always have to comprise one or the other (or a little bit of both).  And different great solvers do it differently.  There's no right or wrong way.

In conclusion, S gets to make fun of me a little bit each day when I take 15 minutes to load three dishes in the dishwasher (I like it done right), and I get to make fun of her a lot every once in a while, when she puts garlic in the dessert.

Until next time...

Entry 472: Surviving the 4th

My parents and sister and her family are all in Europe at the moment, and I am very jealous of the pictures they are sending.  In part, it's because it just looks like fun; in part, it's because they could easily escape the 4th of July festivities.  It's not a particularly enjoyable holiday these days -- especially not when our Grinch president is doing his best to spoil it for the residents of my current city.  The only good thing is that it rained almost the entire night of the 4th.  Rain always ruins outdoor events like these.  Attendees can say they still had fun, but it's not the same, and they know it.  That's why idioms like "don't rain on my parade" and "cast a dark cloud over" exist.  It makes it not so fun.  But if you don't want the event to be fun, because you are politically and morally opposed to it, then it's good.

I also like it when the festivities get tampered down a bit, because it's not so loud late into the night, so it's easier to put the kids to bed and to go to sleep myself.  I actually like big firework shows, and I could kinda see one through my window (not on the National Mall; it was in Silver Spring, MD, I think), but the kids aren't old enough to stay up that late yet, especially not when they still have to wake up and go to daycare the next day.  So, the past few years, my 4th of July evenings have consisted of me sitting inside while my wife and kids sleep, doing crossword puzzles and listening to podcasts -- pretty much like every other night except with background explosions.  That reminds me of another good thing about rain: Fire safety.

On that point, it's funny to think back on my 4ths as a kid, and how lax things were back then.  We used to go to our family friends' house, and the whole neighborhood would be lighting off fireworks.  I distinctly remember adults doing things like lighting Jumping Jacks from cigarette cherries and throwing them before they popped.  The only safety precaution I remember was a garden hose that could barely reach the street.

I look back on those days fondly, because nostalgia is a powerful emotion, but I'm not one of those things-were-so-much-better-in-my-day, kids-are-soft-and-coddled-now type of person.  It was just different, and it was a lot less safe.  A spark from a firework once burned a hole in my jeans, and another time one singed my eye socket, not enough to do any lasting damage, but enough to put me in agony for a few days, and if it would have hit a half inch over, I might have lost an eye.  I really don't think my kids are missing out on anything major by not being inundate with fireworks on the 4th.

And I think they had a pretty good day.  The weather was actually decent through the early afternoon, so we had some friends over for some grilling of tube meats and some kiddie pool fun.  Then, once the rain started to fall, we went inside and had a huge wrestling battle, and at night we watched Jeopardy!, which has become a new family activity.  Lil' S1 will actually get some of the answers (questions) right.  It's pretty cute.  He got one the other day that I didn't know.  It was Teen Titans, which apparently is a cartoon he's watched, but I haven't.

In other news, I did a number on my left shin something awful.  It started a few months ago when I slipped doing a box jump and scraped it on the edge of the box.  It seemed like a little nick, but it turned out to go pretty deep, and it took a long time to heel.  Then, as it was finally starting to get better, somebody kicked me right on the button, and even though I had on a pad, it cut through and stung me to the bone.  After that, I slipped doing a box jump again and added a couple of new cuts and bruises.  It hurts pretty bad, truth be told.

[It's the bruises that really smart.]

Obviously, I have to be more cautious with the box jumps.  This last one was just me overdoing it.  The exercise was to do a bunch of dead-lifts followed by a bunch of box jumps.  Toward the end of the set, I could feel my legs starting to go, and I should have either gone more slowly or scaled the exercises by using less weight and/or a smaller box.  But I didn't, and this is the result.  That's the downside of "pushing it" that seldom gets mention.  Everything is always "rah-rah," "you can do it," "don't give up."  But this is where it's totally counterproductive.  I'm going to be very limited for a few weeks, and I won't be able to work out nearly as hard as I would if I was completely healthy.  So, because I wanted ten minutes of "pushing it," I've subtracted hours of good, healthy workout time.  That's a terribly inefficient trade-off.

The flip-side, of course, is that you don't know where the line is, and if you don't go hard, you deprive yourself of a lot of the satisfaction (and probably some of the health benefits) that come with vigorous exercise.  When you are actually in it, it's hard to know when and by how much to scale.  That's why when I spar, I don't like training with people who are much smaller than me.  It's hard for me to gauge what the appropriate level is for me to go to make it "fair."

I especially don't like sparring with smaller women.  I feel worse punching them than I do punching similarly sized dudes.  Maybe this is sexist, but so it goes.  (And if the main way I'm sexist is that I prefer not to beat on small women, well, that doesn't sound like the worst thing in the world.)  The other day I had to spar this woman who is really petite, like, close to 100 pounds.  She's an excellent fighter; she's actually an instructor.  Her hands are so fast, and she's technically precise.  She would come in and deliver a flurry that felt like a swarm of bees attacking my head.  So, I had to fight back, but I'm not fast, and I'm not technically sound, so I had to use my advantages, which is really a singular advantage: brute force.  But that's often the trump card.  I kicked the inside of her calf once when she came in, not my hardest, but pretty hard, and after that she didn't come in anymore.  Afterward, she told me that was a good move on my part, but, I dunno, it kinda felt like cheating.

Another time, I hit a woman with a straight left jab and dazed her a bit.  She actually said to me, "Uh... can you not hit so hard?"  It kinda made me feel like shit, honestly.  (Part of me still does, but another part of me is like -- Why are you taking this class then?  There are dozens of other non-contact classes.  This one is literally called "Fight."  What do you expect?)  And I definitely would not have felt that way if it was a guy who said this to me.  I would have been proud, because in this case I thought I was hitting softly.  It would have made me think -- Damn, maybe I don't even know my own strength!

As you can probably tell, I've become overly obsessed with my "training."  I've even been having fantasies of actually fighting somebody in a real MMA-style match.  I mean, I hold my own in sparring, and I've literally never been bested in a single wrestling drill.  An actual match is super unlikely, though.  I'm probably not good enough, and I'm solidly on the downside of my physical peak.  So, I can learn more, sure, but I'm getting older and slower as I do.  I often wish I had started this when I was 19, not 39, but it's possible that would not have been a good thing.  Against hobbyists who aren't really trying to hurt each other, I'm fine; against actual fighters, who actually want to fight, I would surely get bludgeoned.  And getting bludgeoned is not that good for your brain.  So, it's probably good I didn't discover my passion for fighting as a young man.  It's better to be able to think straight long into old age than it is to have once been a mediocre amateur fighter.  But still, a guy can dream.

Until next time...