Comics Relief...

The Old Lady and I split the day today, as the spawn began their inexplicable two-days-before-spring-break-break. At one point, Mr. Z and I decided to create a comic together by alternating frames until it was finished. We came up with "Cheez Man & Vic vs. General Pea & His Angry Pea Warriors, Pt. I."



I could do a million of these with him. It was a blast.

Woodpeckers... Come out and Play-yay...

The pie tins are down and I'm back in my own bed, once again. Last night was fucking miserable. I woke up (on the couch, if you'll remember from our last episode) at about 3:30 as the wind was performing a tin-foil cymbal recital that was echoing throughout our largely furniture-less abode. I sat there for a solid two hours, wide-awake and doing my best pissed-off-Moe-from-the-Three-Stooges slow burn. I fell back to sleep sometime around 6:00, and was up for the day by 7. All in all a diarrhea-milkshake of a night.

I went around the side of the house, after I got up, and noticed that one strand of the tins had actually blown been blown off at some point, while the other was still clanging away. I zombie-walked to the garage, got out the ladder, climbed up and ripped the other strand off of its hook. The pie tin experiment was no more. In the end, no one was a winner, and I may never eat pie again.

We'll see if the bird comes back tomorrow morning. I sure hope it does, 'cuz I just got an e-mail confirmation that my Crosman VTS Vortex wrist-rocked has shipped, along with my box of 250 ct 1/4" b.b.'s. I think I may have crossed over to a potentially unsettling, yet ultimately fulfilling gray area of sanity. Perhaps a little of the Michigan-Nugent-mojo has seeped into my consciousness. I may just give myself over to it, and show that bird a little "Full Bluntal Nugity."

Hmm... I wonder if Amazon sells crossbows?

I Think Go Time Went...

Well, here's what it has come to -- the pie tins are clanging against the side of the house, they're 10 times louder than the woodpecker ever was, the fucking bird still shows up when there's no wind to blow the tins around, and I'm downstairs sleeping on the motherfucking couch. You win, bird. I give the fuck up.

See, it has been kinda stormy lately, so the wind has really been slamming those pie tins against the siding. Personally, I think everyone in the fucking neighborhood can hear them and they're all ready to wring my scrawny neck, but the Old Lady disagrees and/or doesn't care and so this FUCKING BIRD HAS US ARGUING ABOUT WHETHER OR NOT TO REMOVE THE ALUMINUM PIE PLATES THAT ARE NAILED TO THE SIDE OF THE GODDAMN HOUSE!!!!

Apparently, tonight, she won. That's why I've decided to sleep on the couch. I'd wear earplugs like she does, but I can't because then all I can hear is my heart pounding, and then I start focusing on my heart and then I hear weird murmurs and pops and clicks, and then I start focusing on my breathing and I start fucking that up and, well, I can't wear fucking earplugs, okay?!

This goddamn flying rat is killing me. That's it -- I'm ordering the wrist-rocket tonight. And a shitload of b.b.'s. I don't care that it's illegal to kill birds protected under the Federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act! Bring on the fines, mofos. You know what? Send me to prison -- I don't give a shit. Maybe I'd get a good night's sleep in the big house. Although there are other peckers to contend with there so... yeah... I'll just pay the fine, thank you very much.

Who's the asshole who convinced me to buy a goddamn house?! Whoever it was is gonna get a b.b. in the ass.

I've Now Lived for Six Years, Seven Times...

Sometimes, it's just too impossible to stay crabby:





Every birthday I'm reminded of the greatest work of toilet stall graffiti I ever saw. It looked a little something like this:



Makes me smile every time.

Bird: 100, Me: Horse's Ass...

Okay, so the sheet metal patch I drilled over the woodpecker holes yesterday seemed to be somewhat successful. I say "somewhat" because, yes, it did prevent the little fucker from pecking in that spot, BUTT, the asshole just moved over about 10 feet and started pecking anew in a fresh locale. Of course, he didn't start pecking until 9:00 this morning, so at least I forced his dingleberry-sized brain to mull the whole thing over for a couple of hours... yeah, who's laughing now, ya peckerhead?!

So, it was on to plan "R" today -- pie tins. It's now official -- we've become the scourge of the neighborhood. Bought a shitload of aluminum pie tins today, strung them together and nailed the fuckers onto the side of the house. I'm just nailing shit to the house now -- don't care what it is... if a nail will go through it, it's goin' up there. And these things are loud as ass!



I'm sitting here in the basement, 10:17 p.m., and it basically sounds like an insane bear is trapped outside in a giant, hermetically-sealed aluminum closet, and it's trying to punch its way out. I'm convinced that when I walk out the front door tomorrow to get the paper, the entire neighborhood is going to be standing in my driveway with pitchforks and flaming torches. I might as well just finish the scene and go find a tire-less 72 Cutlass and put it up on cinder-blocks on the front lawn.

We are so now "that family."

I Smell Varmint Pecker...

Didn't post last night/today/tonight because of this:

Shutdown Day

It was very cleansing... kind of like a digital enema. Really helped clean out all the virtual dingle-doodies. Gave me plenty of time to focus on Woody Woodfucker, who was back a-tap-tapping this morning at 5:30 a-fucking-m. I can't even get into it right now because I'm busy searching the innernecks for a camouflage jumpsuit and a b.b. gun.

We're having teensy roasted squab for dinner tomorrow night, or my name isn't Shooty McPeckerson.

Stupid Lightning...

What a shit-ass fuckturd pissdick day... with a big cock on it. It started out carpy when I dragged my ass out of bed to go swimming, got to the Y and was told that the pool was closed due to the thunderstorm. What the shit?! It's an indoor pool! What, is there some kind of sneaky, snakey Anaconda lightning that I don't know about? Apparently, they only open it back up 1/2 hour after the last lightning strike. Crazy Y bastards. What does the "Y" stand for... "yignoramus"?

So I drove back home, all pissy, and had to record voice-over stuff all day (and night) until I sounded like Brenda Vaccaro after a laryngectomy. And then I couldn't watch that Andy Richter show tonight 'cuz I'm still recording the voice shit.

Waaaah-waaaaah... yeah, I know I'm a fucking crybaby but when I don't get to swim, my gills get all dried out and I get extra vinegary.

The only thing that saved the day happened tonight, when I was talking to Mr. Z as he was going to sleep.

MR. Z: Guess what, Dad? Today in class, I accidentally called my teacher "Mom."

ME: Really? That's hilarious. You know what, though? It probably made her feel really good.

MR. Z: Yeah, probably. Goodnight Dad.

ME: Goodnight, Miss O.

MR. Z: Very funny.

My Son, The Gearhead...

Poor Mr. Z's chin. So, the dude's been wearing this headgear at night that, seriously, makes that Hannibal Lecter rawhide face-plate seem like some sort of organic honey/papaya facial mask. Here's a pic:



That's not him in the photo. I'm pretty sure that's a shot of the greasy, bastard child of Patrick Dempsey and Perry Ferrell. Anywhich, Mr. Z's chin has been totally raw from this facial iron-maiden, and we've been at kind of a loss for what to do. I tried swapping in a new pad, but that didn't help -- the pads are all burlappy and stiff. I mean, who designed this fucking thing... Chinny Ripperton?

So then I had this brilliant mind thing... when your mind gets a thing in it... like an... IDEA. Right, idea. Whew, touch of the Oldtimers right there. So, yeah, I had this idea to find some lambswool and just shove it in the ol' chin cup. Brilliant, right? Thank you. But I couldn't find any, of course. Million fucking farms within a five mile radius and a guy can't find any goddamn lambswool. Nothing over at JoAnne's Fabrics or the Hobby Lobby... except, of course, a lot of horsey looking women wearing baggy denim shirts with that quilty looking needle-pointy shit all over them.

I ended up finding a bag of the shit over at "The Meijers," as they say. Pulled out a wad, shoved it into the chin cup and, voyla, let the healing begin. Of course, had I gotten my bright idea about two months ago, the boy wouldn't have had to walk around looking like Johnny Redchin, but what are you gonna do.

So I learned something, today. One, orthodontists are sick fuckers. B, Mr. Z puts up with a lot of bullshit from grownups, like being forced to wear facial torture devices, just because we ask him to, and he doesn't question it for a second, even when it starts rubbing his face off. And third, lambswool is REALLY soft and I think I'd like someone to knit me something made out of it. Perhaps a smart vest, or a pair of jodhpurs.

Going Through a Ruff Patch...

All right, so we're not getting a dog... yet. We're thinking about just talking about getting one for awhile and then seeing if everyone's interest just kinda wanes, and then we move on to wanting something else, like a hot tub. In the meantime, I'm gonna ask the Old Lady to douche and massage my wiener to practice, just in case we do end up getting one. [Thanks for the tip, Rita!]

Today kinda blew, as it was supposed to be the Old Lady's afternoon to hang with the spawnage, but she had to go to some early dinner with a prospective prof candidate, so I had them for the second day in a row. Mr. Z was in a shitass mood and was openly defying me at every turn. Miss O, who is in the throes of another phlegmy cough/cold was mighty cranky, as well, and just kinda whined in my general direction all afternoon. Oh, and she also fell down the stairs. Yeah. She was running up to her room to get a book and she was wearing tights with no shoes and I heard an "AIIEEEEEEE!" and then a short (thank Zeus!) tumbling sound, then quiet, then bawling. I ran in from the kitchen and saw her sitting at the bottom of the stairs, rubbing her head and holding her wrist. I think she only fell down a few steps and she was more scared than injured. I got the "boo-boo buddy" and soon she was back to her old self -- projecting cranky at me.

I'm amazed that that was actually the first time either one of them has fallen down the stairs. They're both constantly fucking around on the steps -- sliding down, having races, doing cartwheels. I'm sure at least 35 of the 420 holes that have been burned into my colon by bubbling stomach acid are due to near fatalities on the stairs. Hopefully, Miss O will tread a little more daintily from now on as she ascends/descends. But she won't.

Oh, and instead of dinner tonight, I ate about 42 girl-scout cookies. And some pretzels. And a bun. I have this fucking giant bolus of dough stuck in my esophogullet and it ain't moving for shit.

Which, of course, leads me to one of my all time favorite jokes that I've said everytime someone mentions scouting, since, probably, fifth grade. "Yeah, I was in boy-scouts once, but I was kicked out for eating a brownie."

Hey, in 1976, that was comedy gold!

What Are We... Cur-azy?!

Well, the old lady used the "D-word" in front of the spawn.

Dog.

The day started innocently enough -- we went to Target to buy $100 worth of nothing, and as we parked, we noticed an extremely adorable dog in the SUV next to us. It was curly and caramel colored -- I'm thinking it was some sort of terrier/poodle mix, maybe a Whoodle (Wheaten Terrier + poodle). Although, if it were up to me, it'd be called a "Pooten." We stood there and marveled at how fucking cute it was and its amazingly docile temperament, and went on our way to buy a cart full of "we don't need this."

Then, a couple hours later, out of fucking nowhere, the Old Lady (a notorious feline-supporter) blurts out, "How would you guys like to get a DOG?!!!" What the shit?! Thanks for discussing such a life-altering utterance with the old man, first, woman. Of course, the spawn lost their shit and started doing the "we're getting a dog jig," as I sat there bow-wowldered. What possessed this woman who, a mere 20 or so years ago, took an alarmingly long time to decide between moving in with me, or continuing to live with her evil, me-hating cats.

But there we sat, coming up with potential names for our future third child. Here were their choices:

Mr. Z's Top 3:
Male
1.Russell
2. Hermes
3. Arthur

Female:
1. Juno
2. Medusa
3. Mouselet Chamberlain

Miss O's Top 3:
Male
1. Jeffrey
2. Bob
3. Tinkle-toot

Female:
1. Guinevere
2. Vivian
3. Roof-roof

And as we sat there, having this ridiculous conversation, I came to a realization. I love dogs, but I can't stand it when people get dogs and are then never around to hang with them. There are some people down the street who have this great Australian Border Collie that just sits in the fucking driveway, tied to the basketball hoop, all fucking day. This a dog that's bred to chase, I don't know, kangaroos or some weird Australian shit, but it's sitting in the fucking driveway all goddamn day, poor fucker. So, my realization, right. I'm at home all fucking day, sitting in the goddamn basement freezing my affenpinschers off. I have no friends. I never go outside.

A dog would be perfect! An office mate, someone to go out to lunch with and, best of all, a friend. A friend I don't even really have to talk to, or call, or do all that other bullshit you have to do to make/keep real friends. This friend would like me simply because I'd feed it and occasionally pick up its turds in a plastic grocery bag. It would be like being friends with Charles Bukowski.

But shit, a dog. Are we really ready to become a "dog family"? Stained carpets, all the pristine wood floors would get all scratched up, dog sputum on all the furniture, the whole house would smell like dog ass, instead of spawn ass, like it does now. Is that us? Are we they?!

I told the spawn today, "Now, if we were to get a dog, you guys would have to clean up your rooms a lot better. All those tiny Polly Pockets clothes, Miss O, and Mr. Z, all your pens and stuffed animals, they'd have to be put away, 'cuz a dog would chew on all that stuff and could get really sick." There was a momentary silence, followed by Mr. Z saying, "On second thought, maybe we shouldn't get a dog." I'm telling ya, that kid would sell us all into indentured servitude to get out of cleaning his fucking room.

So, will it happen? I don't fucking know. If we can find a legit breeder in this state, it just might. In the meantime, searching the web for pics of Whoodle/Pooten pups sure the fuck isn't helping:



Damn.

Why So Crabby, Dad?

Well, my sore throat has plateaued, so far... maybe it's not strep. Maybe just a touch of the cancer. Miss O is still coughing, but she's not really phlegmish yet. Maybe the weekend's not totally sh--NO... I shan't jinx it. Cut. Cut.

I did notice that someone from New Jersey did a Google search at 9:17 tonight for "why dads are crabby," and they ended up here. Number one result for why dad's are crabby, I am. Who performed such a search? Was it a flustered spouse: "Oh why is the sweet man I once married so darn crabby now?!" Perhaps it was a crabby dad himself: "Fucking shitturds! I wonder if there are any more fuckers out there like me who might have the answer for why I'm such a dick?" Or maybe it was a child, cowering in a closet with a laptop: "Maybe if I find the answer online, daddy will let me out of here and then I can help Mommy fix him." Ooh, that's kinda depressing. Ah, I'm sure it's just a college student doing a research paper on Patriarchal Crabbytosity in the 21st century.

So, to answer their question -- why dads are crabby?

That's a toughie, but I've gotta go with playing tag.

Strep Yourself In...

[interior, crabby-bedroom, 11:09 p.m.]

OLD LADY: Wow, thanks to those antibiotics, my throat feels a lot better.

ME: Huh. Now mine's kinda killing me.

[distant coughing coming from Miss O's room]

This weekend's gonna suck shitballs.

Okay, Last Post about Boston... probably...

Well, I guess there's finally some closure to the whole Brad Delp from Boston death jag I've been on of late. Apparently, he locked himself in the bathroom with two charcoal grills, lit them up and died of carbon monoxide poisoning. This turn of events certainly doesn't make me feel any better about the whole thing. I mean, is it sadder that he was so deeply depressed that he killed himself, or would it have been worse if he had a faulty furnace and died accidentally in his sleep. Frankly, I think it's pretty much fucking depressing any way you look at it.

I did come to one realization, though. I've had to get up for the last couple of days with the kids because the Old Lady has strep throat, and lemme tell ya, that deal where I was going to get up with them every morning? Fuck that noise. I haven't been able to swim since Sunday, I'm tired as fuckshit and my crabbitudinousness is reaching lethal levels. I think we'll leave it as the every-other-morning-switcheroo we have in place now, thank you.

I love how when I type "fuckshit," blogger suggests "fucks hit" as an alternative. In what context would that ever make sense? Let's see... "Johnny enjoyed 12 fucks, hit the bars and was back home and in bed by 10:30 p.m." Well, I had to use a comma, but it worked.

Blogger also recommended "pulchritudinous's" for "crabbitudinousness," and "witchery" for "switcheroo." Silly Blogger.

Well, I guess I'm realizing that sure, I get exhausted and crabby and I don't always get to exercise when I want to, but you know, I've never even gotten remotely close to the point where I want to take a couple of Weber grills into the bathroom to off myself. And while I guarantee that I'll still be tired and cranky tomorrow morning as I'm making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, I really wouldn't want it any other way.

Actually, that's a lie. I'd rather sleep in and then go swimming.

Push Me on the Mood Swing...set

Miss O has been so belligerent of late, it'd be funny if it weren't so, I don't know, loud? She vacillates between yelling, laughing and bawling and she seems as unsettled by it as we are. Is she too young to be going through "the change"?

Por ejemplo, the other day, she pulled out this marble-run building thing they got for Xmas that they've never played with, and she decided to build something. Unfortunately, she was trying to stack stuff up on the rug and it kept toppling over 'cuz it was... on the fucking rug! I attempted to go in there a couple of times to suggest that she might want to build on the nice, smooth walnut floors, but she gave me the "go fuck yourself" look and I skee-daddled. Of course, she kept asking for help after that, so I'd come back in to tell her that it wasn't going to work on the rug and then she'd tell me to fuck off again. This continued until her lid flipped and the tears started a-flowin'.

Eventually, she decided, on her own of course, to move everything onto the wood floors, and what do you know, it worked. She finally allowed me to help out, and we ended up building a pretty awesome setup:



The end of the run was her idea:



So, all worked out fairly well in that scenario. Tonight, however, was a whole 'nother egg. We went upstairs after dinner to get ready for bed. I honestly cannot remember what made her start crying, aside from the fact that she's nuts. But there she sat, on her bed, bawling her ass off. I sat down next to her, she climbed on my lap and I rocked her a little bit, asking her what was going on. She kept crying and then said, "You don't treat me very well when I'm crying. You're not a very good parent." Excuse me?! What wall did that bounce off of?!

Of course, I couldn't let that one just go by unchallenged, so I asked her to give me an example of how I wasn't a very good parent. She said I yelled at her whenever she cried. I said, "You mean like right now, while I'm rocking you in my lap and speaking to you in hushed tones?"

Silence.

Then more crying. Then she said "You won't read me a story!" I replied, "Actually, about 10 minutes ago, I said that once you stopped crying and we brushed your teeth, we could read a book."

Silence. Strike two.

Then more crying, but her heart really wasn't in it at this point. Then she said this great thing. She said, "I feel guilty." I laughed to myself and asked, "What about?" She said, "I feel guilty because you're not very nice to me when I cry." Well, there's nothing cuter to me than a child using a word incorrectly, so all was instantly forgiven. I blew her nose, wiped her tears, and we went in to brush her teeth. After that, everything was just peachy.

Oh, and I just remembered why she started crying. She had walked up to Mr. Z, who was peacefully reading a book, and she punched him in the back, twice. I told her that she can't go around punching people in the back and that she had to say she was sorry and sit in her room for a couple of minutes as a time-out. So yeah, that's what started it.

Although she probably would've started crying if, instead, I had rewarded her punches with a giant box of ice cream sundaes, Groovy Girls and puppies. She's just fucking on edge, that one.

I've said it before and I'll say it again -- it's a good thing she's adorable.

Airin' Out the Ol' Mothballs...

Well, I still haven't gotten over Brad Delp's untimely demise yet, but I've been listening to non-stop Boston since Saturday and I think I'm on my way to "cool[ing] the engines." I have discovered that Miss O really digs their tunes, though. She and I were jamming to "Smokin'" yesterday and she did this hilarious/amazing air-organ solo that I wish I had videotaped. She was wiggling her fingers on an imaginary keyboard and was doing that contorted mouth thing that guitarists do during particularly whammyriffic solos. She has some serious arena-rock potential, that kid. RAWK!!!

Luckily, the thaw has begun out here and we were all able to enjoy an "outside day" today. I think it's our first since, oh, Octover, as Miss O would say. The thing I forgot about outside days, though, is that I have to start playing goddamn games of tag again. I don't know why, but I really DESPISE tag. My knees are shot to shit, Mr. Z has all these fucking rules about where I've got to stand and which trees are "time-outs," and Miss O doesn't like to be "it," so I have to help her, which Mr. Z always claims is "NOT FAIR!," and I always say that life's not fair and the sooner you accept that, dude, the sooner all our lives will get easier, and when they DO get tagged, they're always yelling "I WASN'T READY" and it all invariably leads to games of "Statue Maker," which is almost worse because I've gotta be the spinner and the customer, and then I have to pretend to be interested in their statues, which, come on, they're pretty shitty and are always just them running around flailing their arms and screaming "BLAAAHHHHHHH!" and it echoes all over the goddamn neighborhood, and I mean can't they display just an inkling of creativity, say, a "The Thinker" or a Henry Moore, or even a Botero, for fuck's sake, but by then someone always wipes out and starts crying and they both end up with grass stains on their pants that I have to fucking clean, by the way.

Did I mention that I hate tag?

So we rode bikes.

Guess He Looked Back...

I'm strangely devastated by the news that Brad Delp, former lead singer of Boston, is dead. Maybe it's because Boston's music was the soundtrack to a good chunk of my youth, maybe it's because the dude was only 14 years older than I am, maybe it's because I didn't get any sleep last night, but it's bumming my shit hard.

I've always been kind of a serial monogomist when it comes to music -- I tend to "hook up" with a band, listen to the shit out of it, then kind of tire of its whining and toss it aside for the next catchy hook to slink on by. Oh sure, I may call that band up, late one night, and ask it to come on over for a quickie listen, for old time's sake, but it'll never be as good as that first time. Only two bands transcended that scenario: the Ramones and Boston.

To this day, when I hear a song by either band, it's as if I'm hearing it for the first time. On Michigan radio, the only music they play more than Seger and Nugent is Boston. When I get in the car to go anywhere, if I switch on a classic rock station (and there are about 460) I will hear a Boston song before I leave that car. And I swear to shit, I never turn the dial. I crank it up and I belt out every goddamn lyric... an octave lower. That fucker could sing the fuck out those fucking tunes. Fuck.

I always wanted to start a Boston cover band but I knew I'd never be able to find anyone who could sing those songs. And they were pretty fucking stupid songs -- "Smokin'," "A Man I'll Never Be," "Cool the Engines"?! Goofy shit, but his vocals made them classics. And now he's on a slab, getting his fluids drained. I guess it's that feeling that the chapter on Boston is now closed forever. And it's not like I was waiting for the next Boston album to come out or anything. I think it's just a big ol' "Hey dude, you're fucking old and all the shit from your childhood is now ancient and dying" kind of moment. I guess I felt the same way when Joey Ramone and Joe Strummer died, too.

I think part of it is that, being an emotionless husk of a person, some of the only times I can conjure up quasi-emotional moments is when I listen to certain music. Journey reminds me of high school girlfriends. The Clash reminds me of getting drunk in Jim Kanter's basement. The Replacements remind me of college. The Smiths remind me of when I was gay. And Boston reminds me of summer and driving and cutting the lawn and Old Style beer and not being a goddamn old man.



R.I.P.: Brad Delp and my youth.

Wakey, Wakey, Eggs & Bakee!

So, the Old Lady had an interesting proposition for me this morning. No, not that kind of proposition -- she doesn't "do" morning propositions. No, she suggested that, if I were to get up with the kids every weekday morning, she would take care of dinner duty with them every night. Now, on the surface, this sounds like a bullfuck deal -- who the shit wants to get up with the spawn every fucking morning? I dasn't.

But here's the deal -- it is physically impossible for me to sleep in past 7:30 a.m. It just doesn't happen. I may want it to happen, if I were able to weep, I would weep over the fact that it doesn't happen, but it's fucking reality. So, I'm up already. All I really have to deal with is getting the spawnage out of bed, dressed, brushed, fed and off to school. Mr. Z is at the point where he gets up on his own and dresses himself. Miss O is a fucking pain-in-the-ass to rouse/clothe, but if you play your cards right, it's not impossible.

Giving them dinner, on the other hand, can be a fucking pain-in-the-shit. It's at the end of the day, when I'm at my crabbalabbinest, and it often times ends in someone's tears. Not mine, 'cuz I have no tears, but either/both of theirs. And we're not at the point where we have dinner together every night. We do on the weekends, but during the week we pretty much feed them at 6:30 and then we eat after they go to sleep, around 8:30 or so.

So shit, I'm up early, the Old Lady likes to sleep in, I don't like to give them dinner, and I'd get to work an extra hour instead. Sounds like a fucking deal. The problem is, on the days that the Old Lady gets up with the spawn, I go swimming. The Y only has open lap swimming until 8:45 a.m., and I can't swim during the day 'cuz I'm not 900 years old and I have a fucking job. So, if I take them to school every morning, I'll never be able to swim.

AIEEEE! Curse you, Zeus! Why must you test me with such vexing predicashits?!

Does This Skirt Make My Dad Look Like an Ass?

So, I had this great idea last night where I was going to take a photo of the outfit I picked out for Miss O, and then I'd take a picture today of the actual outfit Miss O wore to school, after the Old Lady changed it. See, every other night, I pick out Miss O's clothes for school and, nine times out of ten, the Old Lady changes things around the next morning "so they actually go together" and, well, there you have it. Here's the outfit I picked out last night:

See, now I think that goes together great. The shirt's kind of a creamy white with a maroony pattern. The skirt is brown with kinda creamy/pinky mini polkadots, and the tights are black. What the shit?! It goes, goddammit.

So, this morning, as the Old Lady was getting Miss O ready, I hear the girl start screaming at the top of her lungs about how she wanted to wear the outfit the DADDY picked out for her and how she REFUSED to wear anything else. It was insanity. MAJOR lid-flippage.

Of course, the Old Lady just thinks Miss O was being her normal, contrarian self, but I think she had finally had enough of poor old Dad being undermined by Ms. Fucking Blackwell every other day. She was putting her foot down, goddammit, and that foot had better be in the tights that Dad picked out! The screamfest went back and forth for awhile, so I high-tailed it outta there and bolted to the Y for a swim.

I didn't find out how things turned out until after school. Here's what Miss O ended up in:

She managed to keep the shirt and the skirt, but fuck if the Old Lady didn't get her outta those black tights. I'll take it as a minor victory for the clothes-tarded, though. NEVER SURRENDER, MISS O! REMEMBER, DADDY'S ALWAYS RIGHT!

I still think the original outfit went together, goddammit.

Okay, Boy, Now You're Starting to Scare Me...

Well, it appears that our little Barbie Girl has turned into a bit of a Bratz doll of late. We got an email from Mr. Z's teacher today that mentioned that the boy was a little disruptive in class today. She said, "He arrived this morning singing during our morning opening activity and disturbing others."

I don't think I have to mention the song he was singing.

We had a little talking to after school today, but something's up with that boy. He sat in his room for most of the afternoon drawing and listening, repeatedly, to "The Song." Repeatedly as in ALL FUCKING AFTERNOON. He told me, "I don't know what it is, but that song really helps me come up with some great stuff to write about!" He's insane. If this keeps up, I may have to call that Jeff VanVonderhoovenvanvooven guy from that "Intervention" show on A&E. (If you haven't watched that, by the by, do. Riveting. There was this self-mutilator last night that freaked out my shiznizzie.)

On a positive note, Miss O sat in her room this afternoon and listened to ALL the songs on her copy of the mix CD. The highlight of my day was right before dinner, when she repeatedly sprinted around the kitchen-hallway-living room-dining room loop singing "S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y NIGHT!" And I'm not making any promises, but there could be a chance that a version of "Xanadu," with Miss O handling the vocals, might just make its way onto the next disk.

Maybe when Mr. Z wakes up tomorrow, this whole "Barbie Girl" fetish will be behind him. Maybe he'll have moved onto another song. Something more benign... like "Wang Dang Sweet Poontang."

I Guess He's A Barbie Girl...

So, Mr. Z came home from school a coupla weeks ago singing the song "Barbie Girl," by Aqua. Not a bad tune, really, but it was such a random song for him to be singing -- the song came out in '97, a year before he was born. I guess some kid at school turned him on to it, and now, lemme tell ya, the boy is hooked. It's like his black tar heroin. He sings it non-stop, knows all the words, and now has Miss O singing it, too. They keep wanting to watch the video on YouTube. It's all very surreal.

Anywhich, I realized that I haven't made them a mix CD in forever, so this morning I whipped one together. I promised him I would make "Barbie Girl" the first song as long as he let me pick out the rest of the songs. He obliged like the little junkie that he is. I decided that I would load the disk mostly with songs that I obsessed about as a young lad. Looking at the tunes I chose, I can see that the boy comes by his obsessions honestly. The 19 songs on this mix, minus a few outliers, are a perfect smattering of my musical influences. It's a heady, poppy stew that will either enlighten the spawn or, more likely, fuck them up as musically as I am. Here 'tis:

1. "Barbie Girl" -- Aqua
2. "Xanadu" -- Olivia Newton-John
3. "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" -- The Tokens (Mr. Z's choice)
4. "King Tut" -- Steve Martin
5. "Little Saint Nick" -- The Beach Boys
6. "Yoda" -- "Weird Al" Yankovic (Mr. Z's choice, again)
7. "Yellow Submarine" -- The Beatles (Miss O's choice)
8. "Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band" -- Meco
9. "Peek-A-Boo!" -- Devo
10. "Sugar Sugar" -- The Archies
11. "Snoopy for President" -- The Royal Guardsmen
12. "ABC" -- The Jackson 5
13. "Particle Man" -- They Might Be Giants
14. "Love Everybody" -- The Presidents of the USA
15. "Honey, Honey" -- ABBA
16. "The Beat Goes On" -- Sonny & Cher
17. "Saturday Night" -- Bay City Rollers
18. "Hold On Tight" -- ELO
19. "Love Will Keep Us Together" -- Captain & Tennille

Yeah, that's gonna fuck them up.

Eye-Eye, Miss O!

I'm fucking ecstatic tonight, however, I didn't think I would be when the day started. I had to pick up Miss O early today from school to drive about an hour away for her eye doctor appointment. See, the girl has had some eye issues since she was a wee spawnlet. She had this strabismus early on and actually had to have eye surgery when she was about nine months old. Fucking ripped my heart out, but the surgery was successful and her eyes were straightened.

So, she's worn glasses since forever. When we moved out here to Michigan, or what I like to call "The Birthplace of My Impending Death," there was pretty much only this one pediatric ophthalmologist in town, so we went to her. This woman, in all her schoolmarm-meets-Olive-Oyl glory, was from the "I don't like to share information about my patients with parents" school of doctorin', and every time we went there, we would attempt, futilely, to get just a fucking kernel of info about Miss O's eye status from this broad. Bupkus. She ran a fucking puppy mill, but for children... with eye problems. "Oh she looks fine... come on back in sixth months. NEXT!"

Anywhich, we finally heard about this great doc who works through University of Michigan. We took Miss O to see her a few months ago, and she says, "Hmmm... you should really be patching Miss O's stronger eye to strengthen the weak one. If it doesn't improve, we're probably going to have to do another surgery." Mother-fucker! By doing nothing, ol' Schoolmarmy-Oyl was basically making Miss O's eyes revert back to their old crossing ways and now we're hearing the girl might have to go back under the knife?! And if we didn't do the surgery, Miss O might never have depth-perception and then, well, there goes her fucking boxing career.

So, we patched her religiously for the last three months -- four hours a day, after school. At first Miss O was really fucking pissed... like pirate-pissed, ARRRRR!, and rightly so. Her weak eye couldn't really see shit, thanks to "Dr. I'm-not-a-doctor." But we could tell, after awhile, that the eye started getting a lot stronger and she didn't seem to be bitching anymore. Plus, we got her these patches that had really cute things on them like flowers and smiley faces which, compared to the flesh-colored patches I remember seeing on kids growing up that would make me fucking dry-heave my larynx out, are almost hip. Almost.

Cut to today, we go in, the doc checks her look, has her read some letters, look at some pictures and lights, put on some wacky colored lenses and, bingo, she says, "Wow. Things are looking great! Ya know, I think a little more patching and things will be right on track. Looks like she's not going to be needing that surgery after all." In your wrinkly, pinched face, Quacky VonEyedoctorimpersonatorson!

Miss O, rockin' the ophthalmologizzie with her eye muscle skizzies. Now if you'll excuse me, there's a doctor's office I need to egg.