Halloween

I am old enough to remember way back when Halloween was a holiday for kids. It has now been completely hijacked by two separate adult groups, the partiers and the worriers. The partiers use Halloween as an excuse to dress up and go get drunk. I have been a part of this crowd, and they are a fun people. Many women in the partier group use the Halloween costume as an excuse to dress, let’s just say, a little more provocatively than their normal persona.

Vampire? No. Sexy Elvira vampire? Yes.

Witch? No. Sexy bikini top-wearing witch? Yes.

The guys’ costumes can vary, but are usually pretty low-effort. Guys are basically just there to see the sexy bikini top witch. One year in college I went to a party as a Christmas tree. I put on a green shirt and brown pants, wrapped myself in miniature Christmas lights, headed to the party and plugged myself in. Since I needed to stay within three feet of an outlet, I plugged myself in near the beer keg and offered to run it all night so I could serve everyone and mingle from a stationary position. Looking back on that, it’s amazing I didn’t electrocute myself.

The worriers are the parents. I am now part of this crowd, although many times these two crowds can overlap.

“Be on your best behavior for the babysitter, kids. Mommy and Daddy are going to a grown up costume party. Daddy is going as a cowboy and mommy is going as a smokin’ hot zombie with cleavage.”

Halloween used to be a night where kids went out, expecting to trade the possibility of being scared to death for the opportunity to score some free candy, and maybe pull a few harmless pranks on the neighbors. These days, the worriers have scrubbed this “holiday” clean of any actual fright or mischief, and turned it instead into a three-week-long event that far more resembles a cheery Disney parade than a foggy night ride through Sleepy Hollow. Our job, as parents - as we now see it - is to suck all the “I can’t believe I lived through that!” out of Halloween night and replace it with the October equivalent of July Fourth “Safe and Sane” fireworks, which suck, plain and simple.

As an example of how sanitized Halloween night has become, we received this handy set of safety tips for tomorrow’s big event from our local police department:

HALLOWEEN SAFETY TIPS             

Select a safe area for trick-or-treating.  Choose streets that are well lighted and landscaped so you can be seen.  Avoid trick-or-treating on streets you are unfamiliar with, and try to go out before it gets dark.

Oh, boy! Let’s trick-or-treat before dark. That should be really scary. What is your jack-o’-lantern supposed to be? I can’t tell because it is still daytime. How come you don’t have the candy ready yet, lady? It’s already 3:30 P.M.!

Always keep the adult who is watching you in sight.  Never go into a stranger’s home while trick-or-treating.  Never get into a stranger’s car or go anywhere with a stranger.

Cross the street only at intersections and crosswalks.  Do not walk out from behind parked cars or try to cross in the middle of the block.

Use the buddy system.  Parents or older brothers and sisters should go with young children.  Older children who are going out with their friends should be given a specific time to return home.  Parents should know who their children are with and where they are going.

Most of these helpful instructions are written as if the kids are the ones reading them, which totally renders the whole thing useless. If a kid is about to go out trick-or-treating from a home that doesn’t give a rat’s hindquarters where he goes or what he does, I seriously doubt he is going to seek out these helpful tips on safety from the local police department. And vice-versa, if the adults need to be reminded to pay attention to where their children are and who they are with, they’re probably not doing a lot of reading police safety tips, unless this list was included with their bail hearing notice.

Wait until you get home to eat your treats.  Your parents should inspect each item carefully, looking for needles, open packages and other signs of tampering.  Do not eat homemade items prepared by strangers.

Because this is the year we’re finally going to start seeing all those needles and razor blades in the apples!

Costumes should be light-colored so motorists can see them.  Use reflectorized tape to increase visibility. Costumes should not be too long or too restrictive.  Masks can make it difficult for children to see or hear.  Consider using make-up instead of masks.

Do not carry or wear sharp objects that may poke others or damage eyes.  Objects like swords, wands, canes, etc., should be left at home.  Do not carry toy guns that look like real guns.  A citizen or a police officer can mistake a toy gun for a real gun.

So, our miniature soldiers and policemen will all be unarmed? I guess they could all go as U.N. soldiers and British cops, which would also explain the reflectorized tape. (Is reflectorized even a word? What happened to reflective?) Our superheroes will not have capes or masks, so you kids should just feel free to wear loose-fitting, yet properly-sized business suits and go as Clark Kent and millionaire Bruce Wayne, instead. No ties, though, since ties are both long and restrictive. You need to go with more of a ‘Clark and Bruce on casual Friday at the office’ kind of thing. You want to be Harry Potter, instead? No cloak, wand, or Nimbus 2000 for you. Have fun, kids!

Carry a flashlight to light the way and to alert motorists of your presence.  Never carry candles or any other flammable object.  Do not use candles for decorations or displays.  They can easily be knocked down or can set fire to a nearby curtain or costume.

So, no candles in my jack-o’-lanterns? Hmm… And why are you, as a police department, concerned about my indoor candle usage? Unless you meant the very real possibility of setting fire to my large array of front porch outdoor curtains with my dangerous jack-o’-lantern candles? And I mean, come on, setting fire to a costume? Has there ever been a safer burning candle than the jack-o’-lantern candle, each one completely housed inside a rotting, sticky, hollowed-out gourd? I dare you to try and burn something with that one-inch-tall candle buried inside its protective, organic, fire-proof shroud. I double dare you.

Motorists need to be extra careful on Halloween.  Watch out for careless children who may run into the street without looking.  Expect the unexpected, and anticipate the actions of others.

In order to decrease vandalism and improve pedestrian safety, avoid parking cars on the street.  Whenever possible, park vehicles in the garage and light up your front yard.

Ah, the always helpful, but completely impossible “expect the unexpected” advice. Yes, I will try that again this year. While I try that, if you guys could please give me a list of all the unforeseen issues that might arise, that would be great. And I should light up my front yard? Really? On Halloween night? Why don’t we just have Halloween in June?

Have fun out there kids! Remember to wrap yourself in bubble wrap and Styrofoam, tape yourself to your buddy using reflectorized tape, don’t eat any candy or carry any pointy objects, stay away from any house that has one of those dangerous candles inside a pumpkin, and get home before the sun goes down. Enjoy!

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Driving Ages

I’ve got a problem with the DMV. Actually, I have many, many problems with the DMV, but I really don’t have the time or energy to cover them all here. The specific problem I want to discuss today is the lack of safety programs with driver’s licenses. For starters, the expiration dates. My license expired on my 41^st birthday this year, and my new one is only valid for five years. I had my previous license for at least 10 years. Here’s the problem with that - The renewal period is backward. I was a terrible driver when I first got my license. Only now am I getting any good at it.

Progression of Driving Safety Level as an Adult:

Age 16 – You are the worst driver on the planet. You are more of a safety hazard than a Jamaican bus driver on meth, but every fiber of your being is so intent on acquiring an official license to drive a car that you are able to concentrate for hours at a time with laser-like focus in order to pass the tests. Truth be told, it would be safer if we gave your license to an untrained 10-year-old, because at least they would be scared to be behind the wheel once set free.

(Side note - Do you school officials and PTAs out there want to solve all of your low test score issues? Simple. Tie every high school subject to the driver’s license. No ticket to ride unless you get a B or higher in every class. You’ll have to constantly raise the state standards just to keep up with the level of effort you’ll see pouring out of every pimple-faced knucklehead at City High.)

Ages 17-24 – You are a true menace to society, but you are convinced that you are the best driver that has ever lived, ever, anywhere. You feel that you are the only one on the road who knows anything at all about driving, and you are amazed that you are not automatically allowed to drive as fast as you want to because you can totally control this car like a boss. (The only reason you manage to not actually kill anyone is that you are still young and have reflexes like a cheetah.) You are in constant awe about how bad everyone else is at driving, and you are beside yourself as to why this old idiot in the fast lane won’t get out of your way, and, like, why is he doing like only 75 mph? You’d better drive less than five feet off his rear bumper, NASCAR-style, to make the point that he needs to move over, and you should definitely text someone right now about this problem. OMG!

Ages 25-39 – You have your first real job and can finally afford a nicer, newer car. This newer car has more torque and horsepower than your previous car, so the bigger paycheck also comes in handy when you need to pay for the extra speeding tickets and inevitable insurance rate increases. You still suck at driving safely, and you still think you are God’s gift to motor vehicle control and handling. Then, usually somewhere in this age range you have your first child. The day you put them in the car to drive them home for the first time, all your previous attitudes about driving safety are thrown out the window, and your driving life drastically changes. This is your first step to becoming a mediocre driver.

Ages 40-44 – You are just learning how to actually drive safely. You are aware of your surroundings, you actually watch for children at play, and you agree with speed limits for the first time in your whole life. In fact, you wish that many speed limits were lower, especially on that crazy-busy street near your neighborhood. You are starting to say things like, “Damn kids!” and “That kid driving that car looked like he was 12,” and “Slow down! What the hell?”

Ages 45-65 – These are your prime driving years. You are as safe as you will ever be behind the wheel. That is not to say that you yourself are automatically a good driver. This age range is just the only chance you have to be a good driver. You may still be an idiot. It happens. Often.

Ages 66-75 – Your neck doesn’t work as well as it used to, and neither do your eyes, so you are pulling out into traffic now more by feel than actual visual knowledge. You spend most of your time behind the wheel either yelling at the other drivers or muttering to yourself about traffic laws, speed limits, and immigration policies.

Ages 76-84 – You are not fully back to being a menace to society yet, but you’re getting close. You have dropped your average speed in any situation by at least 15-20 MPH, and you are yet again constantly amazed that no one on the road knows how to drive except you.

Age 85 and up – You are back to being a full menace to society, but in a much slower and strangely more annoying way. At some point, you will hopefully have a low-speed collision with your own house, and your children will use this incident as the reason for taking your keys away and selling your car, an action they know they should have taken at least five years earlier.

So, you see, the driver’s license should be good without renewal from age 40 until 65. Before and after that, from age 16 to 40 and from 65 on, it should be required to be renewed every year, or even every six months, with comprehensive testing, lots of hoops to jump through, long lines to wait in, and prohibitive fees. That would help to make the roads a lot safer.

In addition to license renewal changes, there should also be a drastic change in the type and size of vehicle that you are actually licensed to operate. No more one size fits all policy.

Age-Based Vehicle Class Licensing System:

Age 16 – Class F - Licensed only to ride a one-person, stand-up motorized Razor scooter

Ages 17-24 – Class D - You may graduate to a Vespa scooter with a gas engine, but only if you put down a $20,000 cash insurance deposit.

Ages 25-39 – Class C - If you managed to live to be 25 you can now drive a car with four wheels, but only a small two-seater under 150 horsepower. If you have your first child while in this age range, you may graduate up to a minivan with proof of birth certificate and car seat. If you have your first child when you are still in the 17 to 24-year-old age range, too bad. Buy a good stroller and a bus pass.

Ages 40-65 – Class A - Go get yourself a full-size SUV and have a ball.

Ages 66-75 – Class B - You’re back to a mid-sized sedan under 150 horsepower.

Ages 76-84 – Class D/G - You’re back to the Vespa scooter, but this time, we will waive the insurance deposit requirement, providing you still have a valid insurance policy. You will also have golf cart privileges, but only on designated retirement community streets and actual golf courses. Mini Coopers and those tiny Smart Cars are also acceptable substitutes for the Vespa in this age category.

Age 85 and up – Class LR - Your only choice is a Little Rascal motorized scooter with a speed-limiter. If you can get yourself to it, on it, and get it going, go nuts.

There, don’t you feel safer already?

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Pet Sitting

We are currently “pet sitting” a friend’s dwarf hamster, and I am nervous. We don’t have a particularly good track record in the pet sitting department. Our family is relatively free from any wrongdoing or mayhem, but a number of our former pets have been murdered by others while we were on vacation. A small measure of comfort can be found in the fact that all of them were fish, and actually, technically, one of them committed suicide.

Our very first pet was a betta fish from PetSmart. I named him Alpha, because I am just witty like that. I really don’t have any idea how we ended up with a betta fish that I didn’t want in the first place. It started when we made the mistake of strolling into PetSmart one sunny afternoon when the boys were very young, just killing time and thinking it would be fun for them to see some of the animals. Sort of like a really low-budget zoo with no admission fee. As it turns out, the admission fee was whatever I spent an hour later on a fish, a fishbowl, and special betta fish food. I still have no idea how that happened.

The boys were super-interested in Alpha for about the first thirty minutes that he was at our house, then he lived out his remaining days being roundly ignored by everyone except for me, who was in charge of feeding him. Actually, technically, he lived out his remaining days at our friends’ house, before he gave into despair and ended his own life by launching himself out of the top of his little round bowl, and suffocating on their countertop. They came home from the grocery store to witness the horrific scene, and were beside themselves with grief and VERY misplaced feelings of guilt.

We got a call from them while we were still on vacation, saying there had been a tragic accident. Alpha had perished. My first thought was, “Great!” Then I was given the really bad news. Without consulting his next of kin, they had foolishly rushed to PetSmart and replaced him with an almost identically-colored betta fish, Alpha 2.0. Not only that, they had purchased a little green fish net, and a few other aquarium supplies, for some unknown reason.

“What were you thinking?” I yelled into the phone. “This was our chance to be done with him. I was a few days away from flushing him myself, and you bought a new one?!?”

I don’t think I took the “bad news” the way they were expecting. Alpha 2.0 lived out his remaining years being completely ignored by everyone in the house except me. I fed him with contempt in my heart every day until his last gasp, then pushed the toilet handle down without the least bit of ceremony. One of the boys casually inquired, “Where’s the fish?” about a month and a half later.

Because my boys were so enamored with our first (two) fish, it was a little bit of a surprise to me when a year or so later they came home from the carnival with grandma holding a bag full of goldfish. I set up the goldfish bowl, all the while giving grandma the evil eye. I don’t really remember how many fish she allowed into my home that day, but after the standard carnival goldfish die-off period, we were left with four good fish. I fed them each day while the children failed to care or even remember they were in the house. Then one day we went on vacation again. The four goldfish went to our next door neighbors’ house, this time with very explicit instructions that if any or all of them were to die, they were not to be replaced under any circumstances.

I’m very glad I remembered to express our no replacement policy, because the Great California Goldfish Cleaning Massacre took place while we were out of town. Their son, who was only one or two years old at the time, decided to feed our fish one evening. He climbed up on the counter, and grabbed the big bottle of “fish food,” which was actually Comet, and shook a liberal amount into their bowl. It turns out that Comet is not very good for goldfish. Instead of just getting really clean, they die. Unfortunately, his older sister realized what had happened a little too early, and managed to save one of the fish.

When we came home, they returned to us one very sparkling-clean fishbowl with one very mangy-looking fish. The chemicals hadn’t done him any favors, but he was one tough little carnival goldfish. He managed to hang on for a few more weeks and finally rode the porcelain highway to goldfish Heaven.

With all of our past pet sitting issues, needless to say, we are a little afraid to own anything larger or more emotionally valuable than a goldfish. We do have a pair of small garter snakes as pets now, but they live in a large fish tank and can go for weeks without eating, so they don’t require any sitting when we leave town. Their food does, though. Guess what we keep in the house to feed the snakes? Yes, goldfish.

I’m back to feeding goldfish twice a day, but at least this time, since they are snake food, I don’t expect the kids to pay attention to them. If one of these goldfish dies, I don’t flush it. They only cost eleven cents each, but I can’t stand to just throw them away, since their ultimate purpose is to expire anyway. Plus, our snakes are actually pretty lazy and prefer the dead ones. So besides the bowl full of live goldfish on my kitchen counter, I have a plastic jug, half full of water and floating dead goldfish in my refrigerator. Let’s just say, you don’t want to go exploring for a refreshing drink at our house without a tour guide.

Anyway, back to the hamster. I am nervous because this is our first real pet sitting experience watching someone else’s animal, and I don’t know if the cloud of pet sitting death that hangs above us is only reserved for our own pets, or if we are universally cursed. We have managed to keep our own snakes alive for months now, but they are very low maintenance. A while ago we watched a hermit crab for a week, but again, how hard can that be? We could have accidentally left it in the car all week and it wouldn’t have known the difference.

Hamsters are a whole new ball game. They are cuddly and furry and soft and cute. They require food and water at regular intervals, and my three boys constantly want to hold him. I’m afraid for the little guy’s life when they start arguing about who gets him next.

The two little boys who own this hamster will notice if they don’t get it back. They might also notice if they get a different one back, so we are playing a high-stakes game here. One reason they might notice a covert hamster switch-out, is this one seems to have a bald spot on its right side. Also, its butt looks a little swollen and funny looking. Hmm… That almost looks like it could be a tumor. Crap!

Was it like that when we got him? Did he already have that bald spot, or is his fur falling out because of the curse? Is he even a he? His/her/its name is Hammie. That could go either way. How do you even tell if a dwarf hamster is a boy or a girl? I guess I’ll Google it.

Whoa!!!! OK, forget it, I don’t want to know! We only have him until tonight, so I’ll just feed him a little more food, refill his water bottle, pray that he gets picked up soon, and pray that I never accidentally Google “dwarf sexing” again.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

The Hello Kitty Biker Gang

Here’s something I don’t quite understand: An elementary school student riding a motorcycle to school. I’m not talking about in China or Cuba, or one of those other fun countries like France where little kids smoke unfiltered cigarettes and have full-time jobs. I’m talking about my kids’ elementary school here in America. Now, I’m also not talking about a big, heavy, Harley-Davidson either, but the kid rides a motorcycle to school, no question. Actually, there are two kids that do. I think they might be a gang.

The motorcycles in question are the Vespa scooter type, with the platform for your feet in front of the seat so you don’t straddle the bike, you sit with your knees together and bent at a 90 degree angle, with your feet flat on the floorboard. Much like how elementary school children are supposed to sit at their desks or the dinner table, but don’t.

The Vespa-type scooters in question do not have gasoline engines, either. They have electric motors. I’m guessing that’s because an elementary school kid these days can’t afford to buy gas. Elementary school teachers can’t even afford to buy gas these days. I’m also guessing that’s the reason the two kids are allowed to ride the scooters in the first place; because they are rechargeable electric scooters, and not “motorcycles.”

That logic probably explains the brand names on the two scooters in question. One of them is made by Razor, the company that pioneered the two-wheeled stand-up scooter that recently assaulted my middle son’s left wrist, and consequently, my wallet. The other scooter is a Hello Kitty model. You heard me. Hello Kitty. Way back when I was a young kid and saw a Hello Kitty notebook for the first time, I didn’t understand it. Now that they make motorcycles, I still don’t understand it. Nothing has changed with regard to my understanding of the Hello Kitty empire in the last 35 years.

So here we have two elementary school kids riding motorcycles to school.

Well, not motorcycles. They’re more like Vespa-type scooters.

Well, not really Vespa-type scooters, because they don’t have engines.

They’re electric, so they’re like pretend Vespa-type scooters. Toy Vespas, if you will.

Hmm…

Truth be told, the Hello Kitty “toy Vespa” scooter is probably no more dangerous than a bicycle, but I have to draw the line somewhere. A while ago I started seeing kids riding Razor-type two-wheeled stand-up scooters that someone had retrofitted with small gasoline engines, probably off a leaf blower or an edger. It’s technically still just a scooter, but I always thought, “That kid is riding a homemade, really crappy version of a motorcycle, without a license, on the sidewalk. If he was actually on a commercially-built motorcycle, he’d be stopped by the police and marched back home to his parents. Why is the motorized scooter any different?”

If having or not having a gasoline engine is our benchmark for motorized vehicle versus toy, then I have a few questions:

My children cannot legally operate an airplane, but under the new rules, should they now be able to fly a glider or a hot-air balloon to school?

Well, of course not. That would be silly. My kids are terrible at aerial landmark navigation, plus there’s no good place to land at their school.

So flying is off limits. How about one of those new Teslas? Stays on the ground? Check. No gas engine? Check. Can do 0 to 60 in 3.7 seconds? Check. Whoops... That kind of raw torque might be a little much for any elementary school student whose last name is not Andretti.

So, if the lack of a gasoline engine is not the deciding factor, what is? Size? The Hello Kitty scooter isn’t as big as a regular Vespa scooter. It’s kid-sized.

Well, a Toyota Prius isn’t as big as a Camry, and when compared to my Ford Expedition, a Prius is kid-sized, too. Of course a Prius has a gas engine, so that’s obviously out, and the Tesla, while small, is way too powerful… but what about a golf cart? They’re really small compared to cars, kids can reach the pedals easily, and they’re electric. Check, check, and check.

No, you say? Why not? If the Hello Kitty scooter can be considered a toy Vespa, a golf cart would have to be considered a toy car, wouldn’t it? That argument could easily be adopted by the logic-savvy middle-schooler.

“You let me ride this electric toy scooter to school, so why can’t I drive your Nissan Leaf? It’s an electric toy car.”

“No it’s not. It’s a real car.”

“OK, then I’ll just take the golf cart.”

“Uhhh…”

Like I said, the Hello Kitty scooter is probably no more dangerous than a bicycle, but I have to draw the line somewhere. One thing that helped me draw the line at electric scooters was the complete lack of exercise. If I’m going to give my kids a mode of transportation, I want it to tire them out. They are far too difficult to deal with when they have an excess of energy. I prefer them lethargic.

Another thing that swayed my opinion was when I saw the kid with the Razor brand scooter try to ride it with his trombone case tucked under his feet, balancing on the floorboard, wildly protruding out both sides of the scooter. He got going, and I lost sight of him, but I knew if he leaned into a turn, the trombone was definitely going to drag. I doubt that ended well.

I am having enough financial issues with injuries from the regular non-powered Razor scooters. I don’t need to add broken ‘bones into the mix. Trom or otherwise.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

We Interrupt This Column for a Dose of Reality

There is nothing funny about your wife leaving you. Mine left me on Saturday morning. She claims she’s just on vacation with her mom, and they’ll be back this coming Saturday, but I remain skeptical. The boys and I are on day four of mom-less-ness, and things are looking bleak. Actually, we were doing OK until yesterday.

Yesterday Son Number Two played chicken with a sidewalk crack on his Razor scooter, and the crack won. It managed to grab his front wheel and hold it tight, stopping his scooter instantly and sending him head-first over the handle bars. He was able to save the sidewalk from any further damage by protecting it with his left hand.

Yesterday was October 1^st, which happened to be the same day that our brand new health insurance plan went into effect. I wonder what our new insurance provider will think about us using our new policy on the very first day it was active? A few x-rays later, and I’m happy to report that no bones were harmed in the making of this story. Some ligaments and tendons took a beating, though. I’m guessing I won’t have any trouble with the insurance company, since I doubt they will suspect that a sprained wrist was a preexisting condition.

I was planning to start writing this column on Monday, like I normally do, but something else came up in the morning. I would have begun Monday evening, but evening follows afternoon, and the afternoon is homework time. Homework time is the worst time in the whole wide world, ever. I think I would rather go to war naked with a stick than sit down with my three sons and try to get them to finish – or even start – their homework. It’s so bad I don’t even want to keep talking about it, because my left eye is beginning to twitch.

After the three hours it takes us to do fifteen minutes of homework, it is dinnertime. Right around dinnertime is usually when I realize that I need to make something for dinner. We eat cereal a lot. Right after dinnertime is bedtime, since homework time runs into dinnertime, and dinnertime runs into all the time we would have had to do anything else before bedtime. Someday we’ll have enough time to have bath time. I hope.

After bedtime, I had another opportunity to begin this column, but due to the existence of homework time, all I am able to do after bedtime is sit and stare at a blank wall, and whimper softly. When I am done with that, it is my bedtime, because breakfast time is coming up fast.

So I figured I would start this column on Tuesday. I would have, except I went ahead and spent most of Tuesday sitting in a waiting room with Son Number Two and his swollen left wrist, next to a lady who sounded as if she had tuberculosis, whooping cough, and pneumonia all in one.

We managed to get home – hopefully tuberculosis-free - in time for homework time, and you can imagine how my day went from there.

So here we are on Wednesday, and I was all set to get the kids off to school and bang this column out. Then, when Son Number Three woke up this morning, he came out of the bathroom and informed me that his heart hurt. When I asked him to point to it, I deduced that his stomach was really the offending internal organ, and he confirmed that for me about a half-hour later when he threw up his breakfast.

He was kind enough to throw up as he was passing through the door into the garage, so the majority of his bagel ended up halfway out of the house. As a result, the cleanup was the industrial tile and concrete hose-down type that I prefer to the more delicate indoor variety. I am happy to report that our garage doorway threshold has never been cleaner.

So, here I am, after a morning of janitorial service, writing this column in between trips to the bathroom, and laundry loads. Like I told you, there is nothing funny about your wife leaving you. I completely forgot what I was even planning to write about on Monday, so this is what you get today.

This week has been a little off to say the least, but today is really highlighting for me why the Mr. Mom job is not more widely adopted across this great country. Women are just better at this kind of thing. I truly believe that moms come with a naturally larger tolerance for listening to whining than men have. This is probably a result of years of listening to men whine about how loud the baby is whining. When the kids get older, that increased tolerance helps women deal with homework time way better than men can.

Illness is another good example. It would never occur to me to get down on the bathroom floor and hug someone when they’re throwing up, but that’s exactly what a sick five-year-old kid wants. My first instinct is to get as far away from them as possible. Moms just naturally hug them. Go figure.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go burn our garage welcome mat, and pray for my wife’s safe and willing return.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

The Rainbow Loom

Just when you thought that video games and smartphones were going to render an entire generation of youngsters completely socially retarded, I may have found a glimmer of hope. I think I just came up with a way to save them from themselves. It involves sweatshops and forced labor. We’ll get to that in a minute.

I volunteer in Son Number One’s third grade class every week. By “volunteer,” I of course mean that my wife forces me to go. Any healthy, sane, adult male would never enter a room full of 25 eight and nine-year-olds willingly. The other day I took the Xanax she provides me to steady my nerves, and in I went. I was tasked by the wide-eyed, frazzled-looking teacher to help the children with their subject and predicate worksheets. Being a professional writer, I had to quickly Google what the hell a predicate was, and once I re-learned that, I was ready to help them. The assignment was to come up with a subject to go with the provided predicate, and make a complete sentence. For instance, if the predicate provided was “jumped into the lake,” you would provide the subject “I,” or “The frog,” and then write the sentence “The frog jumped into the lake.” Simple.

Most of the children came up with subjects for all the different predicates that you would expect, such as “Sally,” “My sister,” “My mother,” “The boys,” etc. One kid, however, was on a slightly different wavelength than the rest of the class. When I went to correct his worksheet, I thought at first he might have been writing in some language other than English. The first subject he had come up with was Ratblaster1879. The next one was MegaMinecraftOne, and so on. After a second, I asked him, “Are these user names for video games?”

“Yes.”

“OK. Can you please sit back down in your seat? Everyone else was going with things like actual people and actual animals. MonsterBattle595 isn’t really a very good subject. It isn’t even English, actually, without the spaces.”

“How come your son doesn’t have any video games? I asked him what he had and he told me he didn’t have any at all. Do you really not have any video games at your house?”

“Nope. None. Can you please sit back down in your seat?”

“Why not?”

I fought off the urge to say, “Your worksheet here is the reason,” and instead just went with, “We don’t like them very much at our house. We have books instead. Can you please sit back down in your seat?”

He just stared at me blankly. I don’t think his little eight-year-old brain full of far-too-rapidly-vibrating electrons could comprehend a world without hand-held controllers and 950 gigabytes of input per second.

Hmm… This kid is not going to be able to carry on a normal conversation in a few years if his video game habit keeps up. Which brings us to my plan…

The glimmer of hope I have found is the Rainbow Loom. It seems to have the same transfixing properties on children that video games have, but without the negative side effects. If “looming” has not hit your town yet, rest assured that it is looming right around the corner. The Rainbow Loom is roughly 59 cents worth of plastic that sells for $19.95 at a store near you. It consists of 3 rows of pegs, 39 pegs in all, that you stretch tiny colored rubber bands over, weaving them into ornate patterns by hooking and unhooking them over each other with a 10-cent plastic crochet hook. Add a 1/2-cent “C” clip to hook the ends together when you’re done, and voila, you have an ornate bracelet made out of rubber bands.

My boys got their little plastic loom on Saturday, and have made approximately 300 bracelets in four days. I consider it to be a pretty decent use of their time, since it is a craft, and since it enhances fine motor skills. Also, I now have some pretty killer rubber band bling on my wrists. You’re jealous. The only problem I can find with looming is the expense. Apparently, rubber band looms are like computer printers. The initial cost of the device is low, but the ongoing supplies are expensive. In fact, the little colored rubber bands make printer ink look cheap. My kids are cranking though about $2000 worth of rubber bands per minute. Add into that the inevitable vacuum cleaner repairs in my future when enough of the little bands get sucked from their hiding places and wrapped around the beater bar, and looming might be a bank-breaker.

The negative financial aspects of owning a Rainbow Loom are not the glimmer of hope I spoke of earlier. The glimmer came when my wife first used the word “crochet” to describe to one of our sons what he was really doing when he hooked together the individual rubber bands to form a braid. Wait a second, I said to myself, these boys are learning to crochet with this thing?

Dollar signs lit up in my head. Not the outgoing dollars signs from the apparently gold-plated little rubber bands, but incoming dollar signs from my brilliant, partially formed new plan. You see, my wife is a lightning-fast crochet-er. She can whip out a baby blanket in a few short hours, and if you gave her a few days and enough yarn, she could probably make you a boat cozy. She runs the hook without even looking at it. She also happens to be pretty impressive with a sewing machine.

Kids get the hang of bracelet making in no time on these plastic looms, so why couldn’t they just as easily learn to crochet a blanket, or a sweater? And if crocheting comes so easily to them, why couldn’t they run a sewing machine with a little instruction? The Rainbow Loom has the magical power to keep them mesmerized and busily occupied for hours, so why wouldn’t kids have just as much fun sewing together a pair of knock-off designer jeans?

Just think of all that positive creative energy that could be channeled away from video games and silly rubber band bracelets and put to good use making counterfeit clothing that I can sell on the black market at a ridiculous profit. Simple. I am off to get 30 or 40 used sewing machines and supplies. You can send your kids over after school on weekdays and all day on weekends, and we’ll have them back to you before bed time.

Freedom from mind-altering video games, learning a new skill, and no more rubber band expenses should be payment enough for their time, don’t you think? Plus, I will read them classic literature over a loudspeaker, expanding their brains while their little fingers work to make me millions. It’s a win-win-win.

That kid in Son Number One’s class can thank me later.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Fun Dip

You can’t always know what is in your food. Anyone who is foolish enough to believe that they always know every single ingredient that goes into their body has obviously forgotten about all the times they ate Chinese food. There is simply no way to identify all the weird meats and vegetables that are in chow mein. There are things in there that are completely unidentifiable as to domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, etc., like the thin, black, rubbery, squiggly things. Meat? Vegetable? Thinly-sliced seaweed or thinly-sliced fish liver? No telling.

Then there are times when you can know what’s in your food, but you choose not to. Chorizo is a good example of this for me. I loved chorizo and eggs for a long time, and I didn’t ask any questions. Then last month I accidentally read the ingredients on the package:

Pork (salivary glands, lymph nodes, and fat (cheeks)), pork, paprika, soy flour, vinegar, salt, spices, red pepper, garlic, sodium nitrate.

Well, that’s it for me and chorizo. I’m no health expert, but I’m pretty sure God didn’t install salivary glands and lymph nodes into pigs because they were savory treats. Never mind the cheek fat, how come you guys didn’t use the pituitary glands, too. Do pigs not have them, or were they all snatched up by the guys who make the discount hotdogs? I guess chorizo just goes to show you, if you have enough sodium nitrate in anything, you can make it taste good.

My chorizo scare has led me to start reading the labels on a few more of my shadier culinary loves. Turns out ingredient lists can be pretty handy if you are concerned about what goes into your body. Who knew?

As laissez-faire as I have been with my ingredient intake, there is one group of “foods” that I have always avoided, and I keep my kids away from as often as possible. That would be any food or drink that is neon in color. This includes Froot Loops, sports drinks, and most types of hard candy. Basically, if the color doesn’t exist in nature, I’m not eating it. I have never had to read a label to figure that one out.

“Dad, can we get a Gatorade?”

“You mean the electric blue drink over there?”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Aw, man. What about the orange one?”

“Let me ask you a question. What makes it orange? Do you think it has actual oranges or bell peppers in it?”

“No.”

“Then, no.”

“Aw, man.”

When did we decide that the only way kids will like something is if it’s a scary, unnaturally bright color? What’s wrong with brown food? What’s wrong with normal colored drinks? Apple juice and beer both look like pee, and they’re delicious.

I am used to fending my kids off at the baseball park snack bar, or at places like the county fair or the movie theatre, but I had some nutritional issues arise from an unexpected source the other day. Son Number Two came home from piano practice with Fun Dip.

In case you are unfamiliar, Fun Dip is a bag of unnaturally-colored granulated sugar. The delivery method is a white, solidified sugar stick that you suck on to get wet, then stick into the metallic-purple sugar crystals to coat it, then lick it off and start over. He came home with the bonus pack, which includes two sugar sticks and three different pouches of lab-created death sugar. Yum.

His piano teacher doesn’t normally give out sugary treats, but he won a prize for being most improved in his group for the week, and he got to pick something out of the prize box. For whatever reason, Fun Dip happened to be one of the prizes, and our kids never miss an opportunity to try and get away with eating something we don’t normally let them have.

Up until that point I hadn’t thought too much about the piano prize box, but I guess I would have expected prizes from piano practice to be a little more cerebral. Maybe a pack of crayons, or a small coloring book, or even a miniature plastic Beethoven bust. Getting a bag of colored sugar for doing well at a music class struck me funny, sort of like getting a bobble head as a giveaway item from the opera.

“Welcome to the Metropolitan Opera House. You are in the orchestra section, row E, seats 23 and 24. Here are your complimentary Puccini bobble heads. I see you have brought your giant foam fingers with you tonight. Bravissimo! Can I interest you in one of our Met dogs? They are a full foot-long all beef kosher dog, with mustard and relish. How about a Miller Lite? We have three sizes: The 12-ounce Madame Butterfly, the 16-ounce Carmen, and the 24-ounce Barber of Seville, which comes with a commemorative plastic cup for only $18.50.”

Anyway… He was really excited about his Fun Dip, and since he won it as a prize I didn’t want to simply take it away from him. I offered to trade him for a Ziploc bag full of white granulated sugar from the pantry, seeing as that would be healthier, but apparently sugar is more fun to a kid if it glows like a 120-watt purple light bulb. I told him since he got the big bonus pack he would have to share with his brothers, in part to help our ongoing efforts to instill a sense of sharing and fairness in our children, but mostly because I wanted to reduce his exposure to Irradium Blue # 40 by a third.

I kept trying to find a good time to let him eat half a pound of nuclear sugar isotopes.

“Can I have it now?”

“No, you have baseball practice in an hour and I like your coach.”

“Can I have it now?”

“No, your brother has soccer practice in an hour and I’m not willing to sit next to you after you eat it.”

“Can I have it now?”

“Right before homework? You must be joking.”

I managed to put it off a whole week, but the pressure was building. Each day his desire to devour his insanely unhealthy treat grew stronger. Finally the perfect time occurred to me.

“Hey, buddy, it’s fifteen minutes until piano practice. Come eat your Fun Dip.”

As I sent him whirling toward the door of the piano studio with his wild-eyed stare and his stained blue lips, I could see it all playing out in my head. He’d be like a miniature Jerry Lee Lewis on crack, kicking over the piano bench and trying to play the keys with his feet, and maybe even his head.

That’ll teach her to have Fun Dip in the prize box.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

The Bear Box

We’re going camping again, and I really don’t know why. You may recall my June 22, 2011 column entitled “The Mama Bear,” recanting the harrowing tale of my wife’s brave battle with some bat guano-crazy bears at Lake Tahoe. If you have not read it, please do so now. We’ll wait for you.

Just a Smidge: "The Mama Bear" - 2011-06

OK, now that you’re back, we’ll continue. My wife and our friend Carrie have not fully recovered from that incident, and I’m not sure they ever will. After the Tahoe trip, my wife quickly abandoned her Rambo-like bear hunting persona, and reverted back to a more recognizable version of her old self, complete with her former healthy respect for bears, and now an additional non-healthy fear and loathing of bears, brought on presumably by some sort of bear encounter PTSD.

We have been “camping” since the Tahoe trip, but only in cabins. Our last adventure with Carrie and Jeff was earlier this summer at Manzanita Lake in Lassen National Park. Our cabins had four thick wooden walls, a roof, and a door that closed and locked, so the ladies were moderately at ease. Each cabin also had a large steel bear box, located outside the cabin, just like the one we didn’t use quite right in Tahoe two years earlier, so the ladies were also moderately on edge. I figured the Lassen bears were probably just regular black bears, and not the Cheetos and hotdog eating, quasi-domesticated, lethal house pets posing as bears that roam the campgrounds of Lake Tahoe and Yosemite, so I tried to put their minds at ease.

“We’re far more likely to be killed in the night by that giant volcano right there than by a bear. There have been a lot of little earthquakes here in the last few months. This place is ready to blow its top. The bears probably already left.”

They didn’t seem any more comfortable after that pep talk. Go figure.

Since there was no way I was going to get away with any type of behavior regarding the bear box other than strict adherence to the policies that my wife is now intimately familiar with, I began my Lassen trip by “cleansing” our vehicle of any food, food related products, and anything that has a smell of any kind. That was easy. The hard part was figuring out what to do with the kids’ car seats. If you had enough glue, time, and patience, you could reconstruct an entire case of granola bars from the crumbs hidden in the fabric and crevices of each seat. Even though the ten pounds of crumbs are old and stale, they still qualify as food to a bear, so what do I do with these seats? Cleaning them out is not an option. If I was ambitious enough to do that, they wouldn’t be full of crumbs in the first place. I can’t fit all three of them in the bear box and still have room for the actual food, so now what? I finally decided to just remove them from the car and set them on the ground. I figured if a bear wanted them, he could have them, but at least he wouldn’t total the car in the process.

I foolishly assumed I was done with the bear box and other bear-related issues after I had finished unpacking the car and cleaning up after dinner. Boy was I wrong. We stowed all the food and coolers back in the big steel locker with the creaky door hinges and locked ourselves safely in the cabin for the night. Or so I thought.

3:00 A.M.

"Dad, wake up. I need to pee."

“OK, go for it.”

"Don't you dare send him out there alone!!!"

“Hey, buddy, why don’t I come with you?”

Creak, groan (the sound of my body moving at night)

“Dad, do we have to walk all the way to the bathrooms?”

“No, of course not. We’re camping. Pee on that tree.”

“OK… Dad, my foot got pee on it.”

“Important lesson here, son. When you’re wearing flip-flops and peeing on a tree in the dark, stand on the uphill side.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind.”

Back to bed

3:30 A.M.

"Honey, wake up. I totally forgot about the Tupperware container in one of the tubs. It has dish soap in it. We need to put it in the bear box right now."
"No we don't. The bears aren't going to do dishes."
"Yes we do, it's scented. Plus I really have to pee, and you need to come with me."
"These are Lassen bears, sweetheart. Not Tahoe bears. The Tahoe bears were certifiably insane. These bears are normal. They don't want to eat dish soap, and they don't want to get you when you pee."
"Wake up!"
"Oh, well. I have to pee too, anyway."

Creak, groan

“Go to the uphill side of the tree.”

“What tree?”

“Never mind.”

“Get the Tupperware into the bear box and then walk me to the bathrooms. Hurry up, I’m cold!”

Whap. Creeeeeeeeeeak. Slam. Creeeeeeeeak. Bang.

“Be quiet!”

“It’s a bear box, honey. It’s not a quiet thing.”

“Shhhh!”

“OK. The soap is safely in the bear box. Let’s go to the bathroom. Watch out for bears.”

“Shut up, that’s not funny!”

Back to bed

4:00 A.M.

“Honey, wake up. I have ChapStick in my purse!”

“No thanks, I don’t need any. Why are you waking me up to offer me ChapStick, anyway? Wait, do you want to make out or something? Sure, I’ll take some.”

“It’s not for you, idiot! It needs to go in the bear box!”

“No it doesn’t. It will be fine in here.”

“My purse isn’t in here. It’s in the car.”

“It’ll be fine. The smell of your rosy hand lotion will overpower the ChapStick, anyway.”

“I forgot about the lotion! You need to go get them both!”

Damn you, mouth. Listen to it inside the brain before you just say it!

“OK. I’ll go take care of it.”

Creak, groan

“Did you put them in the bear box?”

“No, the bear box is too loud. I didn’t want to wake everyone up again, or worse yet, attract the bears. They know what the bear boxes sound like, you know.”

“Shut up, that’s not funny. What did you do with them?”

“I put them on one of the car seats.”

“Great, now the bears are going to eat our car seats.”

“If they haven’t come for the granola bar crumbs yet, they’re not going to show up for ChapStick and hand lotion.”

Back to bed

4:30 A.M.

“Are you sure it’s going to be OK to leave the lotion outside?”

“Honey, I love you, but I’m going to pull all the food out and make you sleep in the bear box if you don’t stop waking me up!”

This next trip coming up is going to be an actual camping trip, where we sleep in tents, not cabins. That should be great.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Health Care?

Have you ever applied for health insurance on your own? If not, let me suggest you never do. The application process is enough to give you a health condition.

I am applying for a health insurance plan for my whole family, and there are five of us. That meant that when I filled out the 28 page online form, I filled it out five times. I can’t even do that math, but I know it’s a lot of pages. Lord help you if you answer yes to any of the questions, because down drops another page with 56 follow-up questions.

There was all sorts of stuff that made no sense to me, like the height and weight questions. I understand asking about the adults’ dimensions, but the form was the same for the kids.

Son Number One - 8 years old - height and weight?

There was no button for “standard.”

I don’t know how tall he is, he’s 8. He’s short on me, but the same as every kid in his third grade class. Weight? Too heavy to carry, still light enough to knock over easily.

They wanted actual numbers, so I had to leave my computer and round up the boys.

“Get my tape measure from the garage and meet me at the bathroom scale.”

Son Number One – 8 years old – 4’-5” tall, 70 pounds. Like those numbers mean anything to anyone.

After I had gone through each family member’s complete medical history, explaining every cough and sneeze we’ve had in the last 5-10 years, they asked, “Has any person on this application, for any reason, seen a physician in the last 5 years? If so, please explain.”

There was no button to click for “see above,” so off I went again down medical memory lane. Multiple hours, and all my medical records later, I hit send, only to get an email a few days later asking me to call them to answer a few additional questions.

I innocently dialed the number thinking, this should only take a minute, since I answered 6000 pages of questions online. What more could they possibly ask me?

“Thank you for calling. My name is Nancy and I am a doctor. The underwriters have a few follow-up questions regarding your health, as well as that of your sons.”

“OK, shoot.”

“Please state your address, including city and ZIP code.”

What does my address have to do with my health?

“Has your weight fluctuated by more than 10 pounds in the last two years?”

I’m a 6’-1”, 210-pound man. My weight fluctuates more than 10 pounds if I forget to eat breakfast.

“Are you currently expecting a child with anyone besides your wife?”

If I am, you’re going to need to sell me life insurance, not health insurance.

“So, the last time you were at the doctor was October of 2012, for a chest cold, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“What was your blood pressure at that visit?”

“I have no idea.”

“Was it normal or abnormal?”

“Uhhh… normal I guess. No one said anything.”

“And did the symptoms clear up?”

“Of my blood pressure?”

“No, the chest cold.”

Are you asking if I still have the chest cold I had a year ago? I thought you said you were a doctor?

“Has your health situation changed in any way since you completed this application?”

You mean, besides my blood pressure during this call?

“Let’s move on to Son Number One. Please state his address, including city and ZIP code.”

“The same as mine.”

“I need you to state it for the record.”

I just did. Same as mine. He’s 8 years old. He lives with us. He doesn’t have his own apartment.

“You say that Son Number One takes Flonase, is that correct?”

“Yes, for seasonal allergies.”

“What is he allergic to?”

“Spring.”

“I mean, is it grasses, pollen, pets, dust, or mold?”

“Whatever comes out in spring. Grasses and pollen, I guess.”

“How often does he have symptoms?”

“Every spring.”

“No, I mean how often in the spring?”

“Once, then we give him the Flonase.”

“OK. Has Son Number One, in the last 12 months, used tobacco or nicotine patches or any kind of nicotine substitute? And I apologize for that question, since I know he’s 8 years old.”

If you know he’s 8 years old, why are you asking the question? If any of your underwriters are parents, I’m calling Child Protective Services.

“Let’s move on to Son Number Two. Please state his address, including city and ZIP code.”

Grumble

“Does he live with you?”

You just made me say the entire address again. It’s the same as the last two times. If you would just accept “the same as mine” as an answer, you wouldn’t have to ask the stupid follow-up question. Yes, he’s my 7-year-old son, so we keep him here at the house.

“You stated that his last doctor’s visit was in 2012 for a flu shot. Was everything normal at that time?”

“Yes, it seemed like a pretty normal flu shot.”

“OK. Has his weight fluctuated more than 10 pounds in the last year?”

“Uh… maybe. He might have gained 10 pounds in the last year, but he’s 7 years old. I don’t know how much he weighed when he was 6.”

“OK, let’s move on to Son Number Three. Please state his address, including city and ZIP code.”

Grumble

“Son Number Three broke his right femur in October of 2011, correct?”

“Yes.”

“We have a claim for an office visit with the orthopedic surgeon in 2012. If he broke his leg in 2011, why were you visiting his doctor in 2012?”

“Because he broke his leg in October. His cast came off at the end of November. The year 2012 was only a month later.”

“So this was a follow up visit?”

Yes, I guess the orthopedic surgeon figured he might not be doing his job if he just sawed the cast off our 3-year-old and said, “Good luck!”

“There were x-rays at that same time. Were those also for the follow-up visit?”

Yes, the way I understand it, the doctor has a hard time seeing the bone without them.

“OK, thank you, Mr. Schmatjen. You should hear something back in 10 to 15 days.”

That seems like a reasonable amount of time to look up the proper weight for the average 8-year-old, cross-match all our addresses, and do the math on the 2011-2012 broken femur time discrepancy.

“Thanks.”

Strangely, the underwriters did not have a single question regarding the lady who gave birth to these three children. I guess they figure if she’s still alive, she’s plenty tough enough.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Red Solo Cup

Initially when I agreed to take on the role of Mr. Mom, I may have been lied to about how much work it is to take care of three young boys and one big house. Either that or I was just nodding my head while thinking about baseball. Tough to say.

The bottom line is, after a few weeks at the helm, the ship is taking on water and starting to drift off course.

“Why are you walking there? I just cleaned that!”

“Why are you eating again? I just fed you, and I just cleaned that.”

“Why are you wearing clothes again? I just washed clothes.”

“You want me to bathe them how often?”

“You want me to make them lunch every day? They just come home expecting more food!”

As I adjust to this wiping/rinsing/preparing/feeding/washing/wiping/rinsing endless circle of crumbs and stains, I am looking for places to trim the fat and lean out the engine, if you will. One area I noticed that was an easy place to gain some efficiency was cups. My wife has a kitchen cupboard filled with nothing but plastic children’s drink cups. Foolishly, it’s a low one, so the kids can get their own cups anytime they want. She probably thought this was saving her time by not having to help them get a drink. Boy was she wrong!

The first thing I noticed about my dishwasher loads was the entire top rack was nothing but plastic cups. I did some quick math and realized that each boy was probably using anywhere from 4 to 2000 cups per day, depending on how hot it was outside. To make matters even worse, plastic cups have that annoying habit of never fully drying in the dishwasher, storing little pools of water on their inverted bottoms, and raining it down all over the perfectly dry dishes below if you so much as look at the top rack wrong when you open the door. Why am I having to hand-dry all the dishes after they went through the automatic dry cycle? This is madness. This must end.

Easy solution. Each kid gets one cup with their name on it, and if they want a drink, they need to use their own personal cup. That should put an end to the former practice of filling a new cup with water, taking a sip, then throwing the cup over their shoulder and running away. At least, I assume that’s what they were doing based on the cup usage statistics and the water all over the floor near the refrigerator.

My wife and mother-in-law recently bought me a hard-plastic, insulated “red Solo cup” as a gag gift. It looks just like the famous white-on-the-inside, beer-from-the-tap-at-a-keg-party, 16-ounce red Solo cup, but it is super-sturdy and infinitely reusable. They found it at a big beverage store and thought it was funny, but I loved it. It’s a great cup. It’s insulated so it doesn’t sweat as much as a glass, and when I drink out of it, I feel like I’m at a party, so it puts me in a good mood. I instantly adopted it as my regular daily ice water cup.

When I made the decision to go to a one-cup-only system with the boys, the sturdy red Solo cup was a no-brainer. I immediately bought three more of them, and wrote their names in black Sharpie marker on the sides. I even wrote “Daddy” on mine to avoid ending up with warm milk in it and half-dissolved granola bar chunks stuck to the rim.

The boys adopted the new plan with ease, and even sing Toby Keith’s “Red Solo Cup” song occasionally. When they talk about them, they say, “redsolocup” as one word. Kids are cute. I could see nothing wrong with my new plan… until the other morning.

Grandpa and Grandma were visiting, and Grandpa’s evening drink is bourbon. When I came downstairs in the morning, sitting on the counter next to the refrigerator were four red Solo cups with names written on them in Sharpie, the remains of a 1.75-liter bottle of Jim Beam, a teddy bear, and an empty bag of tortilla chips.

Hmm…

As I was pondering the scene, in stumbles a sleepy-eyed seven-year-old kid in boxer shorts, munching on a tortilla chip, scratching himself, and singing, “Red Solo cup, I fill you up, let’s have a party, let’s have a party…”

I have what appears to be the aftermath of an elementary school frat party in my kitchen. That can’t be good.

As long as we can keep the Child Protective Services Department out of here, we should be OK. One thing is for sure, though; with Mr. Mom at the helm, my boys are going to have no trouble adjusting to life at college.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Back to School

When I was a kid, we didn’t go back to school until after Labor Day. Nowadays here in California, our kids return in August. My boys went back yesterday. I was always opposed to starting school before Labor Day, but only on the grounds of it being different than my childhood. I am just now beginning to understand the thinking behind moving it up.

I have been holding down my post here as the new Mr. Mom since mid-July, and as such, I have been forced to be within a few feet of all three of our boys for every single minute of every waking hour of every single week and weekend day for a whole lot of days in a row. I have to tell you, I might not be cut out for this.

I used to get to leave. Sure, when I did I had to go to an office and work, but still, I got to leave. I never realized how much they fight with each other. It’s not the fighting that I mind so much, it’s the whining about it that annoys me.

(Son in whiny, sniffle-ly voice) “He punched me in the stomach!”

(Other son in whiny defensive voice) “He wouldn’t get off my face!”

(Me in annoyed voice) “You were wrestling with each other for five minutes. What did you think would happen?!? Go read a book. You hardly ever get punched when you’re doing that.”

(Two ultra-whiny voices in stereo) “I don’t want to read!”

(Me in even more annoyed voice) “Then why don’t you move to North Korea.”

“What?”

grumble, grumble

“Can we watch TV instead?”

“No. I want you to be sharper, not duller.”

“Huh?”

“GO FIND A BOOK!!”

I don’t know when they start school in the far northern and far southern regions of California, where the weather is mild in the summer, and frankly I don’t care. Here in the Sacramento region it gets hotter than the hinges of hell in July and August. I would gladly take them outside for an enjoyable activity where we could bond and grow stronger and happier as father and sons, but it’s like the surface of the sun out there. It was 106 degrees a few days ago. That’s just stupid.

The other day, when I simply couldn’t stand being inside the same building as my three sons for another moment, I broke down and took them on a bike ride. Since it was 104 degrees, the plan was to ride to the water park, run around in the refreshing spray for a while, then ride back in our wet clothes, feeling nice and cool. No such luck. We arrived, sweaty and partially cooked, to a dry water park. A little red girl in a swimsuit with heat waves coming off her shoulders informed us that the plumbing was broken.

They should send out a warning signal or something. Son Number Three nearly exploded from the heat on the way back. He’s much blonder than the other two. Son Number One and Two used up all the available swarthy DNA my wife and I had to offer, and all that was left for Number Three was the blond-haired, blue-eyed, translucent-skinned Nordic genes. We usually just hold him upside down by his ankles and dip him into a 55-gallon drum of sunscreen before we leave the house.

Number One’s tire went flat halfway home. I briefly considered leaving him and saving the other two. My wife would understand that there was nothing I could do, right? After reconsidering, we stuck together and walked our bikes back, just making it to our door as our shoes began to melt. Son Number Three had stopped sweating, which is a bad sign, so we all took emergency cold baths and showers while drinking ice water. Close call.

So, what did the boys want to do after we had all cooled off and returned to the proper color? They wanted to set up a lemonade stand. Are you kidding me? We just narrowly escaped that furnace, and you want to go back? Look out at our street, son. Look through those heat waves coming off the asphalt and tell me what you see. You know what you see? Nothing. Nobody. Nada. Everyone is indoors. If I let you sit out there trying to sell lemonade, you will die long before the first customer happens by in their air-conditioned vehicle. And if by chance someone is dumb enough to be outside right now, do you know what they don’t want? They don’t want to buy a shot glass-sized Dixie cup of hot lemonade from a red, flaming kid with heat stroke. Go find a book.

Not only is summer too hot, it is also too long. I’m fine with school getting out at the beginning of June, but we don’t need ten weeks to “rest.” Now that I am Mr. Mom, I fully support an early start, and suggest that next year we have a nice four-week break and send them back right after the Fourth of July.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2013 Marc Schmatjen

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