EMO In Training

This sounds like a great way to insure your boy grows up to be a big sissy. Thank God for the father.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/10/AR2006121000932.html

When my son was about to turn 8, he announced that he wanted a World War II birthday party. More specifically, he wanted to reenact the paratrooper drop into Normandy on D-Day, just like he'd seen on the HBO series he watched with his dad, over my objections, called "Band of Brothers."

So Very Wrong...

on so many levels.

MPTR

Who says SUV's aren't fuel efficient enough? I get 9200 miles highway (6900 city) per Tyrannosaurus Rex in my Explorer.

The Toy of Christmas Past

I really wish I still had my old toys, and not just because it went for $74 bucks on E-Bay, but because the 24" Raydeen Shogun Warrior w/Delta Winged Missles and Flying Cutter Fist was, is, and always will totally kick-ass!

Don't even get me started on my old comic books.....

Traffic Control In the South

I love living in Nashville/Franklin and a big part of the charm is Southern Hospitality which really does exist. For instance,turning the blinker on and having the car behind you slow down to let you in, as opposed to speeding up to cut you off, is still a novelty to me after having lived so long in Northern VA. Sometime though I do pine for a little Yankee efficiency. Specifically, why is it that the police in this part of the country can't figure out that clearing a wreck from the highway, as opposed to writing up the reports in the middle of traffic/rush hour is a detriment to all us hard-working folk arriving to the job on time?

An Inland North Accent

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
The Midland
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Well I was born in Chicago, specifically Harvey but I do speak English straight out of the dictionary and all carbonated beverages are pops. It's the rest of you that're wrong.

Me As A South Park Chracter

Pickles made me into a South Park Character. You can do one of yourself here.

I rarely wear a tie anymore, and when I do, I don't leave the collar open. The orange pants I do have, however they're more of a burnt-umber than orange. Admittedly an unusual color.

Tis The Season

Family trip to get the Christmas tree yesterday. I grew up w/fake trees but I won't have one in my house now that it's my name on the mortgage payment. Sure it's always cold and wet when I'm tying it to the roof (much easier now that we've the Explorer instead of to my Accord), I inadvertently end up w/tree sap on my hands and clothes, and have to make a million adjustments to get it straight in the tree stand, but it's worth it. It's a Christmas Tree, not a Christmas form-molded. Sure it's easier, my neighbors comes right out of the box and the "limbs" drop in place automatically with lights pre-attached; but where're the memories in that?

For the past few years I've been going to Home Depot; large selection and low price. (The drawback being that all their trees are wrapped tighter than mummies and you have to slice open the twine to make sure you're getting a Charlie Brown tree.) Since it was only the 4th I assumed we'd have a sizable selection, but the tree area at the Franklin HD was 2/3's empty and those left were either misshapen or had large bare spots. The Douglas Firs were even turning brown already (though I always go w/the shorter needled Frasiers). To me it's just one more sign of the over-commercialization and premature beginning of Christmas.

The Thanksgiving plates aren't even cleared from the table now before it's time to hang the lights and hit the stores (some had sales Thanksgiving Day!). The town square/circle in Franklin was on the same schedule for their Christmas lights and when I was at Target the day after Halloween they'd cleared the costumes and had put up displays for wreathes and lights already!

Now I'm pro-capitalism. I've nothing against Wal-Mart, oil and pharmaceutical companies or the other boogie-men of industry, but when we sacrifice a holiday like Thanksgiving with its deep historical and spiritual meanings to our nation to get an earlier start on an additional $10 off a crappy portable DVD player than we've a problem.

Long story short, we went up the road to the Cool Springs Home Depot (how's that for brand loyalty?) and bought the first tree we saw.

Super Star

The little monkey's kindergarten class was assigned a project to tell why they were a star. The other children answered things like "I know how to tie my shoes" or "I can run really fast" not my child though, oh no. He answered, w/a straight face because this is how he tells you these lines, that he was a star because he had saved his Daddy from a burning fire.

Now back in college I once set the street in front of the Sig House on fire (by accident) and the van I was in during a trip to Berlin for a wrestling tournament caught on fire because we ignored the "engine oil low" indicator light for several hundred miles during my Army days; but I've never been in a house fire and certainly not in my own home.

I thought it was pretty funny though (and more than a little scary for what the future holds) that he's already pulling these fast ones at the tender age of 5. His Star now proudly hangs on the wall in front of my desk.