Dr. Strangemusic or how I learned to love (tolerate) the Bieber

Justin Bieber has a monkey on his back

It must be almost a year ago from this writing that for some reason an acquaintance was suddenly commiserating to me or into his Dixie cup beer that his son wasn't enjoying the same things he had enjoyed with his own father when he had been his son`s age.  I thought that was strange.  I guess I hadn't heard of any movies the guy was talking about that he said he used to watch with his father.  I have a feeling they were like ultra artsy movies for kids.  Whatever that is.  His son got the nickname "hooligan" when he was in nursery school, so I didn't think he would be watching intellectual English movies.  His son was 10 years old at this time.  Hmmm.

Anyway, that got me thinking on the merits of your kids growing up in the exact same tennis shoes that you grew up in.  I mean it seems akin to cultural incest or at least in-grown toe nails to give your kids the exact SAME that you grew up on.  Unless you are a teen age parent, do you really want your kids listening to the same music that you did, 20 or 30 or 40 years ago?  Shouldn't they listen to their own stuff, discover their own music and arts and crafts and their own path in life?

Another anecdote.  I remember a greaser classic rocker type proclaiming to me proudly that his children didn't listen to anything past 1977, and mostly Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin.  I think he was a closet racist and was glad his kids weren't listening to hip hop like everyone else in the neighborhood was.

How weird is that?

But wait, people who live in glass houses shouldn't denounce Billy Joel.

I realized that off and on for the past several years Santa Claus, wink wink nudge nudge, was giving my young kids CDs of either the Beatles or the Ramones.  The two most famous and original bands in the universe.  I mean how smart is that Santa that he tried to turn my kids on to the modern classics?

On the other hand, how weird is that?  To have your six year old humming around the house, "I'm living on Chinese rock.  All my best things are in hock.  I'm living on Chinese Rock.  All my things are in the pawn shop".  Or, "The KKK took my baby away, they took her away, away from me".  Songs written by Dee Dee Ramone and Joey Ramone respectively.  If you know what those songs are about, well, not stuff for a six year old, even though they are great tunes.

It was just last Sunday that I was sitting on the couch with my daughters, one messing on her mobile telephone playing some car race video game, the other with the computer watching music videos by some pre teen teeny bopper girl band called the Hackensack Sisters or something like that.  I watched one or two videos, one where the group tried out for the "cheer dance squad" and another where they sing that boys (11 year olds) are so terrible and lame.

I walked away and went to the kitchen to clean the dishes and I thought, wow, I am not bringing up my kids well.  I have to get them away from this junk.  I am not a good father.

Then I thought, well you know, how many quarters did you waste when Missile Command and Asteroids came out?  And when PAC Man came out, my grades slipped and I had serious holes in my pockets where no money could stay.  And I recalled the biggest band of the early or mid 90s was probably the Spice Girls.  Not that I watched them, but this Hackensack girl band is just an updated, younger version of the Spice Girls and how many people loved the Spice Girls?  If my girls would have been around at the time, they would have watched the Spice Girls. No big deal.

I mean,  both things are true.  Every generation has to find its own path and or create it.  Or do they RE create it?  Because, there is nothing new under the sun.  In a way, Elvis was the first boy band and its all been repeating itself every twenty years.  Sort of.  On top of that, each generation thinks that their pop culture they grew up on is the REAL sh.. stuff.

Is this the Life we Really Want?

Roger Waters (formerly of Pink Floyd) has a great album out in 2017, but I am not going to push it on
my kids.  When they get to their teenage years they will discover some music which is just as great or better than Pink Floyd but within their own generation.  And you know what?  If I get bothered by it or say it is crap, listen to this... then I ought to be pinned up on the wall and they should throw shoes at me.

So, I am going to let them play video games on their telephone, well, as long as they don't get addicted to it and they have their homework and studying and guitar practicing done and have cleaned their room first.  And they can watch the Hackensack Sisters videos too.  A bit cheesy, but hey, so were the early Beatles, "So pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese ... love me do", sheesh how corny can you get?

Uh... just this Christmas will be the last time.  I have word that Santa already got them a CD of the Ramones last album "Adios Amigos" and the Beatles "Magical Mystery Tour".  I can`t tell Santa to throw them away can I? But this will be the last time.  It  may be the last time, I don't know.

Universal Kids

Well, now that it is the end of October and the last survivor of summer, my Mother, left the summer house in mid October, boarded it up, there is still time for me to reminisce about August.

It was pretty much last year at this time that I wrote a blog announcing the new trend of my two girls to fight with each other.  That has not changed since then.  It has only continued.  I wouldn't say it has gotten worse, but, the song remains the same, and so have my girls.

Also, several summers ago I wrote a blog on the universal Mommy's and now I would like to add to that, universal kids.

Remember the guy who impressed the US government in the 1800s because he brought several guns to the military, took them all apart and put them all together again with pieces from whichever gun? I knew you remembered that incident.  It was the beginning of industrialization, mechanized universal parts.  Kids are... probably also universal kids. In other words, pretty much, you can go over to your friends house or your neighbor down the street with kids, or some strangers house 3000 kilometers away with kids like the age of yours and pretty much expect the same behavior and know what to do in all the houses with the different kids but with the same age as yours.  In other words kids are interchangeable too.

You know that if you have siblings they are going to fight.  My wife didn't know that because she is an only child.  But I knew it.  I brush their fighting off like dandruff on the shoulder now.  You know they are going to be hard to get to bed most nights and you have to keep them moving and ... broccoli and spinach, forget it.  Don't even try that stuff with any kid, ANYWHERE in the world.

And you know, unfortunately, for the most part, they will be doing something or other which will bug the effing innards out of you.  My pet peeve with my older child is her smart phone. I don't have one myself, because i don't want one or need one. For some reason it still gets me unnerved all the people not paying attention to anything except swiping this or that and reading something stupid or watching something on their phone, swiping again, putting it in their pocket, taking it out and swiping again after one minute.  Now I have to watch my 9 year old daughter messing with that sh.. too.  What a pain.  But no matter, if it wasn't the phone, it would be listening to Justin Bieber (who surprisingly, I can take with out much pain) or it would be fashion daughters or not doing homework, or, whatever.  There will be one or several things that your kids do, that just drive you batty.

Deal wi` it.
Without hurting anyone!

Kids are just not going to put away their stuff right away.

In the intro to the TV show the Simpsons there are two bicycles left sitting on the lawn I think, or some big mess outside.  I always laughed at that and thought, those low class Simpsons, you only have messy front yards in the front of lower class people because they just let their kids throw all their toys all over the front yard and don't yell at them to pick it up, or it just sits there.  Boy, did I put the biggest shoe into my mouth learning that that is just kids being kids . Po` fokes, or rich bastards, it doesn't matter.  I am somewhere in between the bastard and the po foke, but sure enough... sloppy front yard.

We don't have a front yard for the rest of the year, we live in an apartment complex.  But this last summer when both the girls got bikes, boom, at least once a day both bikes are thrown on the front area just sitting there just as in the Simpsons, waiting for Daddy to yell at them to put them away, or to put them away himself, more likely.

Back in our apartment, I count myself lucky that at least one daughter makes her bed, for some reason these days right before bedtime, but all the same, I am thankful for that.  The other unmade bed, well it stays a mess.  fagetaboutit.

And so expecting parents and parents of toddlers who will soon be "older kids", get ready to deal wi`it.  In other words, be a duck and let the water run off your back.  Your kids are going to fight, they are going to be messy, something they do is going to upset you nearly every day, and a string of other antics which I didn't go into.  It just will be.  And that's the way it is.  As I said, the song remains the same.  Universal, interchangeable kids.  But....

Gotta love them all the same.

Thanks for reading my banal meanderings.

The boring routine of summer vacation was paradise

The second week of school is starting at the time of this writing and it is getting into cold Fall weather.  Good time to write a post about the middle of summer.  Obviously.

I got so behind on my writing because I never seem to get to my blog in the summer.  Frankly I just don't want to write the blog in the summer.  I am having too much tired fun being with the kids all day and then sitting with my Mom watching news or talking after the kids go to bed, and of course they go to bed later.   Summer is important for doing THESE things.  It more than often got to be mid night before the day was done, and then I wanted to read a big long book too.  So.... blog gets behind.

However, to put me and the blog back on track..... here goes....

I notice two trends from my vacation that I would like to go into in this post.  First though, I am talking about the second half of the summer, August.  We got to our usual summer house abode at my Mother`s end of July this year.

Swim in the lake

1.  Continuing on the theme of the last post, I really think a routine, even a very boring routine, is the way life should be; is better for us all and even very nice and pleasant.  In my summer house place I don't need to go anywhere.  Its all right there, swimming, biking, playing, walking in the woods if someone wants..  So here is the routine, brace yourselves for some brutal boringness.

Riding bikes

building sandcastles

Three or four games a day

The kids would get up around 8.30 am and watch an hour of GOOD cartoons.  Well, Curious George is OK.  PBS Television generally.  At one point my older daughter asked if they could watch the Disney channel and I strictly forbade that one.  No way,  Disney, even if you offered me a stipend for my blog, I could not recommend your morning cartoons for kids.   Sorry Roy.  Then we do some bike riding, or this or that around the house.  Many times we would go out in the mid to late morning to go food shopping, or go do the laundry and I took the kids to the splash park down the street from the laundry place. I wrote about the wonderful splash park in the very small village of Kingsley, Michigan some years ago and I have to repeat how wonderful it is that a small little village can do something very big and nice for kids.  Respect.  Or in the later weeks I was playing a new game with the girls which I taught them (Clue) and they went gaga over it and we played it all morning.  Or some mornings we would play other paper games my Mom invented with words and numbers.

Somehow, it was after 1pm when we ate lunch outside on the deck and finished at 2.30.  Then if we weren't out at some park in the afternoon, we might take our first swim at 2.30. In fact I am not sure what we did at this time, it must have been very routine and boring.  Somehow we get to 3.30 at which time they watched very good cartoons again, the Kratt brothers in the Wild Kratts. I strongly recommend this wonderful cartoon show of the Kratt brothers exploring every habitat and all animals great and small and giving them all respect.  (disclosure, no advertisement money paid)

Then we would swim from 5.30pm till 7 or there abouts.  And then it was supper outside after that.  And then it is 8 or even later and sometimes we had time for a row or some bike riding around the circle, but in the later weeks it was getting dark already and we would have to go inside.  But friends from down the way would often come over in the night with their dog for a short visit and the girls would fight over who got to sit next to the dog.  I would do some language training EVERY EVENING (try to get YOUR kids to study every day during summer) with my older girl, and Grandma would read to my younger girl.  We would be in bed with lights out by 10 or 10.30 pm after I read them a story, which is late and I don't recommend for little kids, but you know, summer.  They could sleep as long as they wanted in the morning.

And that's about it.  A day boiled down to three paragraphs.  Oh sure, we had special events during the week, going to a fast food restaurant (I don't want to say which one, I am not getting paid) which had a nice playground inside, and going to the big beach downtown, to the park.

East Bay swimming

 To other parks too, nearby.  There was usually something "special" every day, from food shopping (my kids loved to go to the supermarket, I have to say.  It was special to them to shop with Grandma) to the beach, to the eclipse if you recall that event, but for the most part, our days were as I wrote above.

The routine was boring right?  No, no no. On the contrary, it was paradise.  I wrote every day down in a journal and when I am 80 years old, I will say and I will know that those summer days were paradise and I am and will be thankful and grateful for them for ever.  For ever.

2.  The second thing that I have to mention about the summer, is it was quite enjoyable being both a Father and a son at the same time.  My Mother was taking care of things she always took care of since I was small, like the laundry,  cooking and preparing lunch and dinner and doing the shopping, I was being a responsible Father and spending nearly every minute of the waking day with my kids.  Two hours free time when they were watching TV.  Besides that I was in control and in charge of the agenda, or okayed what they wanted to do.  And then I was always there, from riding bikes and swimming with them to eating and going to the parks with them and then playing games and reading in the night.

One of the points of this that formulates in my mind, is that parenting is a two parent job.  One person has to be taking care of the structural foundational elements of the day, cooking, cleaning, keeping things in order.  The other parent has to be taking part / care of the kids and being hands down in the dirt along side them.  I have said it before and I say it again now,  I don't see how a single parent can play both roles necessary, and they are both necessary.  Or else, they are very very busy. Or else they also have grandma, or sister or someone to help them.  One parent households.... well, they lose out, and this is very sad for me, because two pillars are needed to hold up the household and if you just have one pillar holding everything up, the household just is not so strong.  Not strong at all. And everyone suffers.

Please folks, for the better all around health of your kids AND you,  .... two parents is really the best. Lets stop fighting and start compromising and ironing our differences out and stay together and emphasize our commonalities of being together as parents.

The other point is, is that it is really great being a kid again.  Relax, open up and be care free and re live childhood by being with your kids, especially in the summer.

I love summer.  I am one lucky guy folks.  Despite all the problems, I am very lucky.  Why don't you look at your life too and see how lucky you are and how much you have.  Don't look at the things you don't have, look at what you`ve got.

Thanks for enduring my routine, banal, boring, soapboxing post.

Pre School end. End of a segment

So at the end of June my littlest girl graduated... from pre school.  She spent three years there.  Before  that her older sister spent three years there.  It was 6 straight years, they are three years apart.  The point of this post is to say that you cant dwell and remember every day of the past, things keep going forward.. sort of.  But there is something about the ending of each segment of life which gets us to reminiscing and, well, dwelling on the past.

The pre school was so nice.  The kids were doing such nice arts and crafts which stopped when my older girl entered grade school.   It was really nice that our daughters brought home these really creative pictures of collages and trees with leaves and multiple things made out of toilet paper cardboard rolls, of which we saved our own to give to the pre school, and just lots of nice pictures and crafts.

Exhibition of Art from my 5 year old daughter,
Future Jackson Pollack

Granted by grade school the kids have to start on the "three Rs" and there are other classes that
become priority, but it seems they could include a regular arts class.  But, silly me, I don't know how the money situation of schools is today and whether they have had to cut out all that "extraneous" stuff.  In my day, we had music class twice a week and physical exercise twice a week. We had art class even till the higher grades.  Did all this stuff get cut?  Budget problems?  Although I struggled through Art class, because I am not very artistic, I remember Mrs. Highfield as a very energetic Arts teacher who seemed to love to teach us, even us little snot nose brats.  

Both my wife and I were teary eyed as we went on the last day of June to give 6 teachers small presents.  Six years, end of an era. Pre school is in the past.  A kind of open age when they are not restricted and time was not of the essence.  From hence on there is always some sort of perimeters, fences or "guidelines" predicting their arrow of study.  It is all so much more CONstricted now.  Well whatever, I guess for better or worse.

I tend to dwell on the past.

Recently a post was written on the "Unfit Father" here, one of my blogs I recommend and have on the side bar of my posts, in which he criticizes those who tell you basically to pay attention to every day of life with your kids.  I agree with him for the most part.  I think if you paid attention to every day of your life, you would go crazy.  I wrote a journal for a good ten years starting from a pre teen. I think I can go back to any day I wrote in those journals and remember that day.  I used to write my dreams down.  I had clear dreams every night (still do) and I wrote them daily.  I could go back and re read them and remember at least 80 per cent of them as if they had been a part of my memory bank.

You really dont want a lobotomy

But I think if a human had the capability to remember from recall (and not from writings or pictures) every day of his or her life they would either commit suicide after a while from the boredom of the memories or become lobotomized vegetables.

Lets face it, most of our lives are pretty much similar day to day and not much out of the ordinary happens.  Sure we come home from work in the evening and our spouse asks, "Hi honey how was your day" and your answer, "well it was quite interesting, I had a meeting, I wrote some interesting paragraphs and I talked to some interesting people who I have never met before and oh, I realized someone has been peeing in the public drinking fountain"  "Oh wow, that is a busy interesting day, wow, strange, great, interesting!"  But really it wasn't. It was just like most days at work, wherever you work.  I can only think that the president of the United States of America has a different day every day, all the rest of us, even other leaders and Senators and politicians and even firefighters and police people mostly have the same day at work, day after day.

Don't get me wrong, I love my work and find it interesting and still fun after twenty years (even though it doesn't pay the bills), but day to day, if I recounted a week at my job to you hour by hour, you would feel as if I had been performing lobotomization on you.  I have a couple high points in some of my days in which I sell some good music and talk to some interesting people.  That accounts for about 30 minutes of my day at the most.

The point being is, do you really want to remember every day and be aware of the whole time with your kids?  Not only can you not do that, but I don't think you really would want to.

We remember the special times, the big events, or even the events we want to remember.  By writing this blog I put in words certain events I want to remember in the growth of my kids and the passing of our lives together.  Writing this blog is kind of a once a month (I swear I am trying to get it to twice a month and even weekly like others and how it used to be) adult journal.  These events propel our lives and are stored in our memory and that is enough.

Really if you lived your life where you had to do something "special" every day, something "memorable" you would only live to be twenty.  It would be like taking cocaine or speed every day of your life. Except for William Burroughs and Keith Richards, we know how long drug addicts can live if they take hard drugs every day.

Thus, if we hear someone say, "I`ve lived a full life", it really means they have had enough special and memorable memories that was equivalent to 30 minutes of a day, whatever percentage of your life that works out to be (the equation would be .5 of 24 hours = x of 80 years, go figure).

So when you sit back at the end of each segment of your kids growth, you don't have to recall every day (even if you could do that, do you really want to do that?  As I have said two times already, I think that would drive you to suicide when you realized how boring your life was).  Don't remember the bad times, push them out of your head and make the past a nice rosy place it was meant to be.

And then enjoy your summer and get ready for the next segment of life and hopefully progress.

Thanks for reading and hopefully not being bored.

I have been listening to the new GAS album called Narko Pop, and it is really boring ambient music. But fitting for this blog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fr-IC8ezynE

Cheating

OK,  hopefully I am uncluttered now and can write about life and being a Father again.

As a friend once told me, I am very good at writing about the banal.  I am not sure whether that was a compliment or he was laughing at me,  I took it as a compliment.  I am happy to write about the little things in life.  No great plans or ideas here, just small things that happen in life every day.  Thanks Tim. I will continue on my mission.

Actually everything I write can be tied into big concepts.  Cheating!  That has implications all the way up the line in every line of work.  But here I am writing about cheating in a game.

In fact, cheating against me.

My older daughter, 8 years old at this writing, not even 10, gets into games with a fervor, or a fever.  She learns a new game and wants to play it ... lots.  I think that is normal,  probably even for adults.

Well, the problem is, I have played these games for 30 years, or learned them 30 years ago and know all the ins and outs and strategic minutiae of these past times.  The question I pose myself is: should I let her win once in a while?  Cheat against myself and lose on purpose?

Checkers  Another fine, fun boardgame

I remember now when I was about 8 and I learned how to play checkers.  Sheesh, I couldn't even beat
my Mother, let alone my Father.  That got me down. But I kept at it.  I ask myself now, did they break down and let me win some games after we played checkers about 103 times?  I remember how I had a friend over and we played several games of checkers and by the last he was getting nasty because I was beating him all the time.  He did some trick and cheated and I said so and he
ended up running out from my house real angry and demanded that I acquiesce that he beat me.  It sticks in my memory as a bad moment.

At our last vacation at my Mothers I found some games from my youth.  My absolute favorite was Stratego.  I mean besides matchbox cars and rock em sock em robot, which didn't last that long in playing, Stratego was the chess for kids.  The picture at the top of the post is indeed a picture of Stratego.  The game is made up of deep blue and red pieces on a green board moving pieces around like checkers or chess, it was so so stimulating to several of the senses.  I loved playing it.

And now,  I found it at my Mothers, dusted it off and taught my older girl how to play.  Its a very involving game, as much as checkers or even chess.  It can be very complicated.  On the box it says, "Ages 10 to adult".   Well my daughter is 8 as I said.  She is still two years off.  Its not for her.  But what? Am I going to wait and say, "you cant play it yet, we have to wait two years"?  I mean its not like alcohol which you cant drink before 18.  At least I don't think it is going to kill her brain cells or something.  Just the opposite.  And some things, I agree, they cant be done by kids because they don't have the motor skills or dexterity.  But this is none of that.  Except that maybe she doesn`t have her reasoning skills, strategic skills well developed.  Well, no time like the present.

So I taught her.
Trouble.

The game takes at least 45 minutes to play.  I mean it takes 10 to 15 just to set it up.  So when we play we cant play before school, playing before bedtime has gotten me yelled at by Mom,  so the only time is just after school.  And I am not home every day for her after school.  So this leaves her pent up and wanting to play with a big desire.

I wouldn't say we have played 103 times.  In fact maybe 10, but she is getting frustrated.  I don't really want to play anymore because each game ends with me winning and she is in tears.  I try to teach her that the whole game is fun, playing it is just as much fun.  It is the journey that is fun, not the arrival, if she could learn this, she will be happy in life.  But sadly,  not very many people at all learn this and they are failures, yes failures as a result in their life, because death is the ultimate end of the journey when we arrive and finish.  If I could teach her to be satisfied with the playing IT WOULD HAVE GREAT CONSEQUENCES IN HER WELL BEING.

Nope.  She just mostly likes the end when someone wins.
And,
that has always been me.
So she doesn't like it.
She cries.

So what can I do?

Brings me back to my original banal question of the week, Tim.  Should I cheat against myself and lose?  This is an important question to answer, oh Dads of the world 1 per centers to 100 per centers.  Should you lose on purpose? And how much and how often?  I have to take a break and ponder this question for a while. Be back with you soon.

After thinking about that all week, I have decided that it is important to let thw kisa win sometimes.  Losing ALL the time really destroys them.  You have to give them a bit of confidence in themselves.  This can come about by them winning, or it can be destroyed in them, utterly when they lose all the time.  I don't want to destroy my girls self confidence.  I can destroy my own self confidence, or maybe it was already destroyed by losing so much on the stock market and the casting jobs I have tried to get.  But to destroy my little girl`s self confidence, I think a little cheating is worth it so as not to break her heart.  That would break my heart as well.  Two broken hearts with one stone, so to speak.

You can disagree if you want.  But I have made my decision.


Epilogue
In the end it didn't really matter if I had decided to let her win.  She won the next game we played.  I blew up both my 1 and 2, the lowest, strongest numbers, on bombs.  Me and my short term bad memory got the best of me and she won.  You should have seen how happy she was.  She was dancing all over and jumping on me.  Wow.  Mm, now I have taught her 5 year old sister how to play the game..... she is even worse.  What should I do?  Oh no, here we go again.

I got my amplifier fixed and that was the last component I had to get fixed, so I was listening to various techno singles with the volume at 11 on my stereo system pictured here.  I have slowly been getting things fixed for a year or so.
One favorite track I have listened to about as many times as I have played Stratego recently is this one
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRnIsALNrgg
It sounds like crap on the You tube link here, compared to the vinyl single I have.  Buy and listen to vinyl.   Ditch your weak strained youtube s..t
I can imagine Charlie Chaplain doing his work happily in the factory in the movie MODERN TIMES as this music is played in the background.  Everybody would even start doing a robotic, mechanical dance.

A Modest Proposal : A New Tradition

This  post isn't really singular to being a stay at home Dad or anything to do with Fathers particularly.  A little bit with children.  But it has been on my mind.  It does have some connections with parenting in general.

Two weeks ago from this writing was Witches day.  April 30th.  I cant go into the background of this tradition, this day, perhaps there is more to it that I am missing.  I should provide a link of a history of witches day, but for the time being, the short of it is the town gets together in the community center or the local soccer field and sets up a cloth witch stuffed with paper or hay and decked out as an emblem of the real witch.  She, and yes all these witches are she, is on a pyre of wood beams and chips.  The town gathers and ... the witch is burned.

In our town some people dress up as witches.  Children also can dress up as witches.  I am not sure whether this is to mimic the witch or make a joke of the witch, but none of these people are burned.

I watched this year as the flames climbed.  When they reached the dress of the witch, the crowd

cheered.  When they hit her face the crowd cheered again, especially the children.  I couldn't help but feel sadness when I heard the children cheer when her face was burned.  I started to think that we were burning the wrong person and we were out of touch with reality and we should update this outdated tradition.  After all I think we have learned that many witches are very good with using natural healing processes and cultivating bio food, and perhaps also being vegetarians, though I am not sure of that last point, as they might use animals in other harmful methods.  Also because I have read so many Terry Pratchett books, I have come to view witches as good.

I propose we change the witch burning tradition and modernize it.

Pedophile in Big Lebowski film

I propose instead we make an effigy of a child molester, a pedophile and burn them.  For instance the likeness of the convicted killer of Etan Patz, as now his killer has been convicted.  Or maybe we don't even need an effigy.  We can have a real life child molester hooked up to the stack of wood and burn him, as long as it was 100 per cent clear he was a convicted molester.  I think that is something burned that even I could cheer and for sure kids could cheer the burning man too with a clear conscience.

If this would be difficult or objectionable, we could burn a likeness of Adolf Hitler, although perhaps kids wouldn't understand yet, especially the young ones.  Or again, we could find some local Neo Nazi and burn him, unless he promised to convert to the local centrist political party.

The point being that, really folks, some of these traditions have to die and or be modernized and galvanized.  I really have nothing against witches, whereas even in 100 years Adolf Hitler should be recognized as evil incarnate that can be burned in effigy every year.  Or child molesters.

Also maybe some of our children's stories should be changed.  I really don't want to read Brothers Grimm fairy tales to my kids as they are too violent and not understandable to kids these days.  Again, we can emphasize to our kids to stay away from lollipop soda pop giving adults and change the witch in Hansel and Gretal to a pedophile.  Push him in the fire kids and never eat sweet sugary snacks, especially those offered by strange men.

I digress now and branch out on too big a topic.  But I have a year to ponder it and plan.  I think next year at the annual witch burning I am going to sneak a Nazi flag into the witches dress, or else make my own "witch" to be burned that has an oversized groin section with a hairy chest sticking out from his flannel shirt.

Then again, if this is a witch it would be wise  to burn it

At the end of the Witch burning we all roast wursts on sticks over the fire and eat them.
Food for thought.

I have been listening to a lot of new music this week, but,
Today during this writing I was listening to an old band
Band of Susans "Wired for Sound 1986-1993".
One of the members is from my town I grew up in.  Susan.
I saw them in 1993 in my local club.  Great guitar band.

Devil on my Shoulder, Easter Egg in my Tummy

They really do exist.  Really.  Believe it.

All those cartoon shows that had the little devil pop up on the characters shoulder, holding a pitchfork and telling the "hero" not to be a hero and indulge, in fact do the wrong thing, which will be much more pleasant than doing the right thing.  For some reason it is usually a wolf as the bad devil.  But that is beside the point.

The point is, he does exist. I saw him just a week ago from this writing on Easter Sunday.   He really did pop up on my shoulder.  Here is what happened.

We were out at my Mother in Laws little cottage, luckily sans Mother in law, for the Easter weekend, just the Sunday and Monday.  Easter is on Monday here.  Sunday night I was sleeping by myself in a little room.  Everyone else was asleep.  I don't think this has ANYTHING to do with anything, but I had just finished watching one of the all time best movies ever made,  "The Big Lebovski" for the 4th or 5th time in my life.  Nope nothing to do with anything.  Except that I had my late night hankering for some snack.  Preferably Chocolate or potato chips.

I really don't know why my body metabolism is so lopsided, but it is.  I am never hungry in the morning and cant stop eating in the night.  I just like to eat when the day is done and you can relax and, well, eat in peace.  And a dessert is the most necessary part of that eating.  I mean I do have a sweet tooth, but it comes out the most in the late evening after a meal.  I need a dessert. It is like closure to the day.

So what is staring me in the face in my bedroom as a logical conclusion to the days end?  Of course my youngest daughters bag of chocolate Easter eggs wrapped in different colors of tin foil.

Pop!  That little miniature devil dressed up as a wolf with a pitchfork appeared on my shoulder.  Was it my left or right shoulder?  I think it was my left shoulder.

"Eat the chocolate dude.  Just one chocolate.  So what.  She has a whole bag of them.  So what if she misses one.  It is just exactly what you need right now for the end of the day.  Eat one chocolate egg dude.  Mmmm, chocolate.  Just one egg."

It was so wrong.  It was the wrong thing to do.  I knew that.  Way wrong.  Where was the good angel?  I guess my conscience was there and that was good enough to tell me that it was the bad choice and show some restraint. Parents always have to show restraint and patience.  C`mon show your strength and DON'T eat the chocolate and do the right thing!  These small incidents really mean a lot to little kids.  Missing one chocolate egg  DOES make a difference.  They notice it, it hurts them.

I just ask myself even now, maybe even next year, or years in the future, for crying out loud why did I have to pick the most obvious chocolate that she would notice was gone?  Stupid.  I had to have done it on purpose, like I wanted to be found out.  I took the only egg wrapped in green tin foil.  There were so many other eggs wrapped in yellow tin foil, she might not have noticed if I had taken one of those.  But I didn't.  I did the dumb ass, devil thing and took the only chocolate egg wrapped in green tin foil.

I took it out of the bag.  Unwrapped it.  Put the green tin foil wrapper in my pants pocket and ate the whole thing down.    Yes, I have to say, in a matter of fact, intellectual tone that I can hear my Father speaking in,  it was a good egg.


6 o clock in the morning my youngest daughter comes into my room.  Why she came at this time, I have no idea.  But she did.  Could the missing egg have been calling her, like a ghost calls the living from the grave? She noticed the bag of chocolate eggs on the book case and she noticed... the missing green egg.

"Where is the green egg, Daddy?"

"I hid that one.  You will have to find it".

"Did you eat it?"

"No no.  I hid it for Easter. That one.  You have to find it".

And she ran off and woke up her Mother and promptly went into a monologue on how the green egg was missing and how Daddy said it was hidden, but where was it?  Phew.  I got out of that one.

But I didn't.  All morning she asked me where was the green egg.  She couldn't find it.  Where was it?

The devil popped up on my shoulder again - why didn't anyone see him? - and I went to the kitchen and came back to the living room and gave my youngest daughter the chocolate egg wrapped in green tin foil as if I had taken it from its hiding place.  She opened it up and ate it and it was gone.  End of problem.  Um,  No.


Long about 5 in the afternoon, my older daughter came running into the living room where again we had gathered.

"My only chocolate egg in green is missing.  Has anyone seen it?"

If ever there was a case of two wrongs DO NOT make a right, this was it.
Shame, shame on you bad Daddy.

No. 9: Walking my daughter to school.... not any more

As I wrote in my last post here, it was all whirlwind, heat and flash. Within an hour the parents were made to stay at home and the daughter hit the road to school on her own.

What I mean to say is that my wife was late taking our daughter to school one day and in a minute she decided that our daughter would go to school on her own starting the next day. My daughter was perfect with that.   I,  was not.  In fact the next day I did go with her as she was late in getting off and I said you cant go by yourself when you are late.  Because I KNOW how to get there on time when we are running late.  She does not.

Look how awful that grey car is driving crossing the line

But the point being that now she would be going to school on her own.  I lost out on that argument.  I thought that in this post Etan Patz world, I think it is better if girls are in 4th or 5th grade or 10 years old when they start going to school by themselves.  My daughter is 8 in the third grade.  And she doesn't go with anyone, just by herself. I don't know if it is a good idea. I just don't know.

We did some test runs at the end of 2016, following 20 yards behind her.  At first she didn't know.  Then she did.  But then we didn't continue with this, with the next step and let her go by herself. I don't know why not.  Until my wife had a fit and decided in early February this year that our daughter would go by herself.

After that next day I went with her I was expecting to go with her also the following day, but as I said in my last post, it didn't work out.  They wouldn't let me.  So I took my coat off which I had thrown on over my Homer Simpson pajamas and went to the window to watch her walk up the street.  We live on the fifth floor and have a little alcove over the street so we can have a nice view all the way up the street.  The problem was that I didn't have time to put on my contact lenses and my glasses are old and my eyes are worse, so I couldn't really see much.  I saw several dots walking up the street and although she has a big red and blue back pack which is nearly as big as she is, I had trouble figuring out which dot was her.  I am looking out the window like a blind mole trying to figure out which moving dot was my daughter, trying to see the people crossing the street at the end of the block.

That just didn't work.

I think that was Wednesday.

By Friday she asked me to walk with her to school and I was relieved and thrilled.  It is kind of boring walking by yourself to school.

On the way home I walked very slowly and looked at all the store fronts and garages and looked for any basement type work shops that mysterious, nefarious men could jump out of to grab her. I recall that Number 9 on that street looked... hauntingly scary.  I repeated it in my head for further investigation one day.  "Number 9 Number 9 Number 9.  You become naked."  Wait a sec, where did that come
from?    I am going to take some pictures of "unsafe" looking doorways to keep on hand, to check out sometime.

Of course I am half joking.  But only half.  The other half I am serious.  I joke on one half of the equation because I find myself acting ridiculously that I have to look for some bogeyman that doesn't exist.  Most of the child nappers, abusers are friends or relatives of the family and are "known people".  This is statistically true.  The smallest percentage of child kidnappers, under 10 per cent if I can give that number without looking it up (in other words, don't take my word for it on that number), are "dark strangers" from the street.

ON THE OTHER HAND, even with the slight possibility, the low percentage that something could happen, I would rather play it safe than sorry of course.  I would rather still walk with my daughter to school, also because its nice to do this, but if she doesn't want me to, at least I can make sure it is a safe journey every day.   I would rather err on the side of safety and caution than be sorry for the rest of my life.

At the time of this writing it is the end of February and slowly I am getting used to sending her off by herself.  I suppose I needed time myself to make that leap of letting my daughter go by herself.  Sometimes I put my contacts on and watch her walk all the way up the street till she is a small red and blue and brown haired dot somewhere at the end of the block.

Child to Teenager in one easy step : Hate your Father

Let the record show that on this week in February 2017 my 8 year old girl became a proto teenager.

How is that possible you may ask?  An 8 year old?  Maybe a ten or twelve, but not an eight year old.  Well, I go by the definition that a teen ager, besides being in their teens a) likes to do things on their own without the responsibility that comes with doing things on your own and b) dislikes what their Fathers say and do and tries to disassociate themselves from their Fathers who tell way bad jokes, are old stinky farts (no matter if he is 30 or 50) and embarrass them in front of their friends.

Let me explain and you be the judge.

Earlier this week stemming from an incident last week (which I will be writing about soon), my daughter started going to school by herself.  We thought we would start in the new year, but we didn't right away, then my wife decided rather abruptly in a fit of misplaced anger that our daughter would go to school on her own.  I was rather taken aback and scared at the prospect.  I still thought we should wait till she reached 4th grade or even till she was ten years old.  I thought 8 years in a post Etan Patz world is still a bit young.  But my daughter grabbed the opportunity and demanded to go by herself.  She  didn't even want me stalk.. uh shadowing her twenty yards or meters behind.  She would go by herself.  Completely. 

I found this a bit unnerving, also because she demanded it.  She demanded to go by herself! She yelled AT ME when I started putting on my coat over my Homer Simpson pyjamas to go with her.  It Sounds like she is going to demand to drive the car by herself when she is older too (good thing I dont own a car).  Or is she going to demand we leave the house so she can have sex with her boyfriend too (not now, I mean several decades in the future, silly) ?

In my opinion she was demanding to do it on her own without FULLY understanding the minute, fine points of reading cars and learning where and when to cross the street.  True I had been teaching her this for two years now, but this is a very intricate knowledge which can only be understood by over 40 year olds, ergo Hugo I should still walk her to school.

Didn't happen.  She won out.  The 8 year old won the disagreement.

And a small note, in the morning when I was brushing her teeth, she said I was totally smelly and she had to hold her nose while I was brushing.  That was unfair, I had only been wearing those pajamas a week and I had only had a couple sweat dripping dreams of killing Frankenstein (actually Herman Munster of the Adams Family) and yelling at people, nothing unusual like my waking up screaming dreams or waking up pounding on the wall.  Had I become an old stinky fart Grandpa for her already?  Unfair.  Untrue.  Foul I yell.

 I took a long bath and washed my hair just in case.  Maybe I shouldn't eat those onion and cheese sandwiches before bedtime though.   

But the real clincher came that evening around bedtime.

My younger daughter asked to watch one cartoon of "Martha Speaks" before bed.  Since it is a PBS
kids good programming with word education I rather like it when they watch this show.  Better than Barbie (r)(c)(Mattel).  So we watched two shows and it was after 9pm when they finished and they had to get in bed quickly.  Their regular late bedtime is 9pm. 

My older daughter started to read and that got me angry.  Reading got me angry?  No no, it got me angry that it was after 9pm and we had watched TV and NOW she was going to read.  I said, "you cant read now, it is bed time."  She refused to stop and demanded to read.  I said, "Look if you wanted to read you shouldn't have watched Martha Speaks about the talking dog."  "Daddy is right," said my youngest daughter.  But my older daughter persisted in reading and I turned out the light.  But she continued to read because the night light was on.  I repeated that she should have read earlier and not watched TV.  I turned it out and made it completely dark and she got ALL angry and started yelling at me.

I thought that was unfair.  Didn't she see the sense of it?  SORREE, but you have to go to bed and you cant read now.  You chose TV earlier.  Cant choose reading now.

But the logic escaped her and she turned away from me and wouldn't let me hold her hand before falling asleep or even let me kiss her good night.  "Go hold my sisters hand," she yelled.

It really wasn't fair.  I was devastated.  But there you have it.  She wanted to do her thing AND do her thing, watch TV and then read.  And on top of it all, I was the evil one.  Well, hate the police and hate Daddy too.  I am the baddy.  And thus did my 8 year old daughter turn into a proto teenager hating her Father for turning out the light and not letting her read and making her go to sleep.

Look, I don't drink alcohol and I definitely don't believe in drowning out your sorrows or problems in liquor.  It usually makes the sorrow and problems worse.  HOWEVER, at this moment I was not averse to trying to lift my spirits with my little cat nip of Irish Cream in hot milk. Pictured here.

I became so tired from that drink, that I couldn't finish this post and had to finish it my next free night.

Epilogue:  I had finished the milk with my cat nip and in the morning my girls were all angry there was no milk so they couldn't have a morning cocoa.  They started putting the puzzle together and said, Daddy drank it, he always eats our stuff or drinks our drinks.  Bad Daddy.  I had just wanted a bit of nice friendly hot milk to cheer me up.  

Jeez, hated Daddy.   Not looking forward to teenagers in the house.

2 more kilo overweight and three months of debt: post Christmas blues

Christmas is long gone, but the debt is not.  The debt will be with me for another month or two.  Why is that it can take such a short time to fall in a hole which takes three months to dig out of?  I am sure it happens the other way too, but for me more bad things come to mind than good things.

Let me explain.

 It takes a week to buy Christmas gifts and Christmas lasts a day.  It takes three months to pay off the debt.  You have a couple days off at Christmas and you eat a lot and sit around, maybe watch TV, play a lot with the kids, relax and don't do much.... and gain 2 kilos or 5 lbs.   It takes three months to lose the same 2 kilos, if not longer.  I never lost the 5 lbs I gained Christmas 2015 and I gained 5 more Christmas 2016.  I better work on it.  That is the thing.  You have to work on it for three months what took one week to appear. 

The problem is, is that January and February are such contrarian, "anti working" months.  They work against you.

Let me explain.

Everybody wants to make changes in January.  Everyone is making those resolutions that now they are going to do something and make things happen.  For a small business owner,  that can only mean bad things.  January started off very badly for me.

The land lord

The landlord of my store comes in in the first week, and says something like, `you know, its been a year that the space next to you has been empty with no renters and I am losing too much money.  What I am going to do is give you a contract that says I can kick you out with three months notice.  See, because if someone wants the space next to you AND your space for a good price, then I want to give it to them.  Look, I know you have rented here a long long time, but you know, business is business.`  what he didn't say was that the space next to me was empty because he was asking too much money for it all year.  And he didn't say that people had made offers for the full space including mine but for the same price as what he wanted for two thirds the space.  The point is that it was a new year and it had been a full year with no rent from the other space, NOW he was going to do something about it.

The next week my worker sends me a text message that says he will only be working till the end of February.  Its a new year after all and he decided that he makes more money at his other job and he will do that job more and quit his job with me.  Fair enough. I cant pay a lot because I am paying too much to the landlord.  But the point is, the worker, a pretty good guy who I trusted and who knew his job fairly well, and I trusted him, I did mention that, decided its time to make a move in the new year.

See, if you are a boss, or manager, you want things to run smoothly, rational and routine like.  But what happens is that in January everyone and everything decides the opposite of running smoothly and routine.  The computer in the office broke and the computer fixers try to Jack me because hey they know people, as their logo says, and they know I know absolutely little about computers and hey, they have to fleece more because its January and no one is buying.   EVERY THING goes against you just because, well, its a new year, things have to change.

January just works against you.

And February...  February always reminded me of a copycat lazy brother of January.  It wants to be bad ass just like its January brother, but, its just too lazy and tired. So all the resolutions are still in place, but nothing more happens with them, but the problems are still there.  The problems are still there, but they are sleeping.  People mostly sleep in February. Or go on long weekends and ski.  It doesn't get worse, but it doesn't get better.  And you resign yourself to thinking forward to tackling the problems in March and the Spring. February is just a sleeper.

I resolved last Fall that I would start my swimming again for exercise.  And I did.  I had to break it for Christmas time, but I figured I would start it back up in January. And I did. Then my daughters started off another round of sickness.  Starting with my youngest daughter who of course got sick after we had a very nice weekend outside skating.  Six hours of weekend enjoyment landed her at home sick for the whole week.  I was home with her much of the week. On Saturday my other daughter and my wife were on a ski weekend.  For some reason my older girl got a stomach flu on the Saturday night and cut the weekend short and landed herself in bed for three days.  The very next Saturday I new something was wrong when I had no desire to eat chocolate or potato chips in the evening.  By 11 pm I too was sitting on the bathroom floor head deep in the toilet bowl.  Man that stuff burns when it comes up the other way. It just leaves me gasping for breath. 

I ended the month with a total of one swimming day.

January just works against you.  February is a sleeper.   

Pay off debt

Finally in March you can start to pay off your bills and do your exercise and maybe lose a kilo and get out of debt.  Start.  Maybe.  If you dont have enough to pay off from there being no business in January and February. 

One week of Christmas, three months of digging yourself out of the hole from Christmas.  

The Importance of Doing Something which is Probably Wrong

Just before the Christmas holiday I started to prepare myself. Namely I started to turn myself into an eating machine/ lazy sloth.  Not to degrade the sloth, it is just a saying.  Sloths are quite good.  I intended to be a lazy pig.  Oh wait a sec.. another good animal.

Here I am sitting in front of a table that is devoid of food because it is in my stomach. There used to be a roast of some sort there in the middle of the table, but.. lo and behold it is not anymore.  I really wanted to sit there for another half an hour in front of the imagined fireplace, so the roast could find its proper place in my internal being and we could, together, achieve an equilibrium of zen and harmony, before I shat it out.

As I said, I was preparing myself for Christmas. 

Not to be.

 I was told by my wife that the girls wanted to go out and ice skate.  As much as I love my daughters, there are two times of the day that I would rather do my own thing than my daughters thing.  That is, in the morning when I still need to sleep and after a meal when I uh,, need to sleep.  But my great love for my daughters and the realization that I would be in the dog house with my wife if I didn't, got me off my ass and into my winter clothes.  Time to turn my slothfulness around and be a Father.

When I was growing up I was a very lucky child.  We had a backyard which froze over in the winter. We had a private ice rink to do whatever or make whatever mistakes in learning or playing that we needed to.  The irony of this is that no one in our family learned to ice skate.  But all the same, the possibility was there.

Now when we go to the public ice rink, which is still a luxury which I am grateful for,  there are all types of skaters of all different levels.  I should say that most of the people are polite there and all types of skaters are accommodated.  But like the general populace, there are usually one or two bad apples.

I think this is the second winter my older girl has been skating.  My older girl is taller and more like myself, she is afraid of falling down.  She is getting to the point where it is kind of far to fall down and she doesn't want to fall on her back.  As a result she is a bit stiff legged and "upright" in her skating.  She needs to loosen up a bit.  She walks skates.  It is pretty good, for a beginner.  But of course the local six year old future starlet who is an ugly little rat, comes up to her,  she doesn't even know her for Pete s sake, and says, "you skate all wrong, you cant skate".  in that mean voice, not in the "here I want to help you" voice. I was standing at the side of the rink watching.  My daughter comes skating up to me and told me what the girl said. My girl was crying her heart out. 

Now here comes the tough part. You have to act.  You have to tell her both that it doesn't mean anything and it shouldn't make her cry and who is that other girl anyway? BUT you have to act, you have to pull off a retaliation.  Say Something. Start a war.  Well, that is how wars are started, aren't they? 

Now any parent would know that its no big deal.  Little kids say these bragging, mean things all the time.  But any parent also knows, or should know, that these things, as silly or small as they seem to parents, mean a lot to our small kids just starting up.  I also remember that sometimes these little mean digs stick in our brains and can keep us from going forward and totally destroy us when we are small.  "You cant sing, you are ugly, hah hah", can have such a terrible impact on our young life.  I was determined not to let that happen to my little girl.  I wanted her to continue skating, no matter if she would be a professional, or just do it once a year for fun. 

Did you know that John Lennon was so profoundly affected when he was labeled "the Fat Beatle" that in the 70s he was on some strange diet of one sort or another for most of the decade that curtailed his full potential and probably didn't help him with his nutrition or mental well being at all? (reference Albert Goldmans book "the many lives of John Lennon" which admittedly is a very negative picture of John Lennon)

The girl of evil nature came skating up to a woman and starting talking to her. they skated together too for a bit.  I gathered that this was the mother.  When the girl skated away, my daughter was still standing crying next to me on the edge of the rink, I started talking to this Mother. I said, "look your daughter said a mean thing to my daughter, that she couldn't skate and it has totally upset her."  You know how hard it was to say this, and it came out rather in a gobbledy gook and not very coherent and I was shaking in my voice because I was scared, but it probably sounded that i was shaking with anger.  My daughter started to cry all over again, but i wasn't sure if it was because I was making a fool of myself and her or that she was still sad that this girl had told her she couldn't skate.  For better or worse, I decided on the second.

The Mother kind of looked at me as if she didn't totally understand my words.  Well understandable as I don't think I had said them correctly. (Looking back, I am not even sure of what I said)  And then she said, "I'm not her Mother, I m her Aunt.  Her Father is over there, he works here".

Oh.

The Aunt seemed to make some contact with the Father and said something, but after that nothing happened.  The only thing I could tell is that the Father seemed to be ready for something bad to happen, he watched his girl and was ready to skate on the ice and ... do something, as far as I could tell.  He seemed to hold his daughter closer to his attention.  But to protect her, not to yell at her.  He looked like a professional skater.

Well, that worked out as well as cooking a lobster in a pail of cold water.

My daughter watched the evil culprit skate around a little more.  Slowly my daughter got back on the ice rink, but made sure she was always on the other side of the rink from the mean one.  And my daughter kept coming up to me and saying, "that s the girl"  and glared at her, or started crying again.  Curses on that mean girls future. 

I wondered if this would dampen my daughter s desire to skate?  I wondered if I had accomplished any thing what so ever by talking to the Mother who turned out to be the Aunt?  I wondered if maybe for all involved it would`nt have been better if I had just sat at the table like a log as I had intended after lunch and let my meal properly digest into my internal being, like the Buddha.

Basically I still wonder if I did the right thing at all.

Ah, the love and labor of being a Father.  Sometimes you just don't know if you are doing it right. In fact many times you are not sure if you are doing it right. 

For a successful outcome of something similar you should read Raymond Carvers story called "Bicycles, Muscles and Cigarets" .  Or you should listen to Louis CK s account of how he got back at a little boy who was being mean to his daughter, "you gotta protect your children".