Headline from the recent tech industry trade publication, Really Wired:
“Savvy IT Jock Uses Social Networking to Find his Idiot Boss “Better” Gig, Avoids Being Fired”
The following was taken from our reporter’s recent interview with “Mike” the IT guy:
Look, although I think I’m pretty justified in my actions, some of the things I did could be construed as illegal, or at least really unprofessional, so I don’t want to use my real name. Let’s call me “Mike,” and let’s call my idiot ex-boss “Frank.”
This all happened last Wednesday at the office. I was in the hallway on a ladder with my head up above the acoustical tiles re-routing some network cables in the ceiling near the wall of the break room. I heard my idiot boss, Frank, go into the break room for some coffee, and I overheard him mention in confidence to one of his idiot cronies that the IT staff was bloated, and he was cutting me loose at the end of the day, since I was the last one hired. The IT department was actually hopelessly understaffed, and Frank had been robbing our budget pretty regularly to cover the cost overruns from the marketing department’s monthly “Team Building Trips” to Las Vegas.
Now, I could have probably landed another job at a better company in a heartbeat, but I couldn’t bear the thought of this yahoo slamming my already overloaded IT buddies with the extra burden. I decided to get rid of him. The way I saw it, it was either him or me, and he messed with the wrong geek.
I put my network cable project on hold and went back to my terminal, logged on to GoDaddy.com, and bought the domain “TRGCorp.com.” I then banged out some really quick HTML code to create a dummy corporation’s home page, “about us” page, and “contact us” page. It was really third-grade type stuff. The whole thing took me twelve minutes. For the “corporate vision statement,” I just used the word synergy nineteen times in a paragraph with a bunch of other corporate-speak. “TRG Corporation has a synergistic, forward-focused, strategic synergy,” etcetera, etcetera. Frank eats that crap up.
Then I created two LinkedIn accounts. The first was Chet Manley, TRG’s Director of Global Development. For Chet’s profile picture, I scanned in the face of a male model from Cindy in accounting’s Abercrombie and Fitch shopping bag. Besides kicking butt internationally at TRG, Chet also enjoys golf, scuba diving, heli-skiing and triathlons. The next fake LinkedIn account was a corporate headhunter, Jennifer Fetching, from a major New York placement agency that Frank was sure to have heard of. For Jennifer’s profile picture I just used a Victoria’s Secret model from the active wear section of their website.
I then hit Frank’s LinkedIn account with five e-mails from Jennifer and four from Chet, back-dating them so it appeared as if they had both been trying to get ahold of him for a week. Jennifer was seriously considering him for a VP position at another top-rated global company, and she was very anxious to speak with him, because she knew he was being heavily recruited by TRG. Her last e-mail was deflated, as she explained that the position she had sought him for was gobbled up by another executive. If only they had been able to get in touch with each other earlier.
Chet couldn’t wait to talk with Frank, and was really “pumped” at the opportunity to get him on board with TRG. He had asked around with “everyone who matters,” and Frank was the perfect guy for their new VP slot.
Then I went to Facebook and found Frank’s friend list. I found the name of one of the guys I had heard him talk about playing golf with pretty regularly. His friend, Bob, was offline, so I quickly hacked his account by cloning the email address he had listed and resetting his password. Once I was in Bob’s account, I made sure that my boss was at his desk, and sent him an instant message from Bob saying, “Wow, Frank. I just heard through the grapevine that you were the top pick for the new VP slot at TRG. I’ve been watching them for years. That company is golden. Congratulations on the move! You’re a smart man!”
I then drafted a quick, fake inter-office memo from the CEO to all the upper management stating that “as we all know, TRG Corporation has been a thorn in our side for years, but lately they have been gaining some serious ground on us.” We needed to forward-focus our core competencies, harness our synergies, etcetera, “or TRG is going to end up owning us and all of our clients!”
I e-mailed the memo to Frank from the CEO’s mailbox, and counted to fifty. Then I made a call to Frank’s office and told him that the IT department had just updated the falangy valve on the McGruder switch, and some people were reporting problems logging into their company e-mail. Other people had reported problems with internet services like LinkedIn and other business-related networking sites. “Please check and make sure you are good, and get back to me if you have any problems.” Then I left the building.
I walked three blocks to the 7-11 and paid cash for a disposable cell phone. Then I went to the Starbucks on the next block and sat down in the corner, activated the phone, and called the office.
“Chet Manley for Frank Dumkopf”
Frank was very eager to talk with Chet. Chet explained that he had been out of the country, tying up some Chinese contracts, and was “totally slammed” until now with no time for a phone call. He had done his due diligence on Frank and wanted him on the TRG team, ASAP. Chet explained that he was a mover, not a sideline sitter, and knew that Frank was a man of action as well. Frank gushed about how he had been following TRG for years, and was totally in sync with their corporate vision statement. Chet explained that he was not big on a lot of interviews and meet-and-greets. If Chet sees something Chet wants, Chet gets it. Frank agreed that was the only way to operate. Chet told Frank to name his price. Frank did. Chet stifled a laugh, then told Frank, “Hell, Frank, a man’s gotta eat. Let’s double that! Welcome aboard. I want you at corporate tomorrow morning. Can you do that?”
Frank excitedly told Chet he would be there. I hung up the phone, wiped it down with a napkin, and threw it in the trash. I ordered a coffee and waited about a half-hour, then headed back to the office.
When I arrived, the receptionists and the Human Resources department were buzzing with the scuttlebutt. Frank had cleaned out his desk, sent a one-sentence resignation e-mail to the CEO and the head of HR, and walked out the door ten minutes ago.
“Weird,” I said, as I shrugged my shoulders and headed back to my desk. I logged into the company e-mail server and sent an e-mail from the generic “info@” address to our CEO with the subject line “Frank.” In the body I wrote, “Inconsistencies with marketing budget ‘team building’ expenses and IT budget reason for sudden departure?”
Then I deleted the fake website, cancelled the two fake LinkedIn accounts, logged off, and got back to my network cable project.
Like I said, he messed with the wrong geek.
The really funny thing was, I never put a corporate address on the website. I wonder where my idiot ex-boss tried to report to the next morning?
All of us here at Really Wired say, nice one, “Mike.”
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Garage Sales
Last Saturday we had roughly 3000 garage sales in my neighborhood. We have a local real estate broker named Kiki who takes it upon herself to organize garage sales for five or six adjoining neighborhoods all at once. She provides the marketing and advertising, complete with teenage sign wavers at every street corner inside a six mile radius, all handing out maps to the sales, free water, and wearing matching red “Team Kiki” shirts. It is really something.
Obviously, she puts in so much of her own time, energy and money in order to find clients, either by contact with the local homeowners who might want to host a garage sale, or the shoppers. After witnessing the clientele that arrived in my neighborhood on Saturday, I’ve got to assume she’s in it more for the homeowner contacts than the garage sale shoppers. I didn’t see too many garage sale shoppers that looked like they might be in the market to buy my house. Rob my house… maybe. Buy my house? No.
If you have ever hosted a garage sale, then you know what I’m talking about. There is a certain element that is instantly attracted to the prospect of buying someone’s used shirt for twenty-five cents. Now, don’t get me wrong. My wife is an avid garage saler. She loves a good bargain on kid’s toys and floor lamps. You have met her, too, if you have ever had a garage sale. She was one of the 6 people out of the 200 that showed up that day that didn’t park on your lawn or walk through your flower bed.
We were not having a garage sale this weekend, but two of our immediate neighbors were, so I had the opportunity to sit leisurely and observe some of the shoppers in their natural bargain hunting environment.
The thing that struck me first about people’s garage sale day behavior was the driving. For starters, there were easily 20 times more cars on our street Saturday morning than on a normal day. This only seemed to encourage some of the drivers to go faster than they normally would on a deserted street. Apparently, cars parked at 45 degree angles out into the middle of the street with crowds of people darting back and forth through traffic says to some folks, “I’d better drive really fast into that mess and park hurriedly at a precarious angle to avoid having these other people get all the good deals before I do.”
And I’m not sure what it is about garage sales, but if there is more than one sale on a particular street, that is apparently viewed by the shoppers as an open license to park in front of anyone’s driveway. There is no other day when anyone would find that even a remotely acceptable option, but on garage sale day, anything goes.
On the other end of the traffic hazard spectrum, I also witnessed some incredibly slow moving vehicles that were perhaps more of a danger. Garage sales tend to bring more octogenarians to your street than a church parking lot on bingo night. Many of the older crowd perform what I like to call the “rolling recon” maneuver, where the wife walks in and out of the sales, while the husband, who may or may not want to be there, judging by the expression on his face, stays behind the wheel and rolls slowly down the side of the street, a car-length behind her. He’s the one you really have to watch out for when you’re crossing the street, because he nods off every once in a while.
If you see a large panel van or U-haul truck, these are the professionals. You probably won’t see them though, because they don’t just stumble upon your neighbor’s house at 10:00 in the morning. They plan a very precise route the night before and assault your neighbor’s house at 6:00 am while Bob is still in his jammies and just pouring his first cup of coffee. They knock on his door, apologize profusely for the early hour, and buy every last tool and piece of furniture that Bob has to sell. They were already selling Bob’s stuff at the flea market in the next town by the time you got out of bed.
Now, besides the professionals and the folks like my wife who browse your trinkets and happily give you your full dollar asking price for your kid’s old set of Star Wars action figures, you will find two main groups of buyers. We will call the first group the English as a Second Language crowd, and the second group the Employment as an Unappealing Lifestyle crowd. The ESLs and the EULs.
The ESLs tend to be made up of decent, hardworking, low-wage couples with thirteen kids and questionable immigration status. They buy your old clothes and shoes, and occasionally any furniture or tools that the professionals missed. For the most part they are polite and fair, but occasionally someone will employ the “no habla ingles” negotiating tactic of handing you half of your asking price for a certain item, saying “Is good, yes?” and then pretending not to understand the word “No,” even though it translates perfectly. Do not be fooled. Or, just take $2 for the mirror. Who cares? It’s leaving your garage for good. Any haggling that has occurred does tend to lose its luster when the ESL father comes to pay for the pile of shirts and shoes and starts peeling bills off a stack of money the size of a Stephen King paperback. Just remember, he only has that much cash on him because he doesn’t like banks and all of their questions.
The EULs are the real winners of the day. This is the crowd that thinks Wal Mart is super-fancy. This is the lady with the lit Menthol 100 dangling from her bright pink upper lip as she tries on your winter coats and complains about how hot it is on your driveway. These are the people that will not pay your asking price for anything, under any circumstance. “You want ten cents for this baseball mitt? It’s all worn out! I’ll give you a nickel.” These are the people who get indignant that you would ask fifty cents for a pair of jeans, because they have a hole in the knee, “and they’re not even acid-washed or nothin’.” These are the people who go to their car and bring back an old hair dryer and a pack of Marlboros and try to trade you for the blender you’re selling. These are the people that make you never want to have a garage sale again.
“You want two dollars for this coat? It’s got pink lipstick stains and cigarette burns on it!”
Thanks, Kiki, for making my Saturday a little more interesting. And for inadvertently inviting so many EULs into my neighborhood. They were a real treat. Many of them seemed to take a real interest in our cars, and I even saw a few of them peering inside some of the unattended garages, perhaps looking for bargains of a different kind.
Maybe I will be getting in touch with you sooner than I thought about my next move. Perhaps a neighborhood with a gate, and a no garage sale policy.
Naw! Where would the fun be in that?
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Obviously, she puts in so much of her own time, energy and money in order to find clients, either by contact with the local homeowners who might want to host a garage sale, or the shoppers. After witnessing the clientele that arrived in my neighborhood on Saturday, I’ve got to assume she’s in it more for the homeowner contacts than the garage sale shoppers. I didn’t see too many garage sale shoppers that looked like they might be in the market to buy my house. Rob my house… maybe. Buy my house? No.
If you have ever hosted a garage sale, then you know what I’m talking about. There is a certain element that is instantly attracted to the prospect of buying someone’s used shirt for twenty-five cents. Now, don’t get me wrong. My wife is an avid garage saler. She loves a good bargain on kid’s toys and floor lamps. You have met her, too, if you have ever had a garage sale. She was one of the 6 people out of the 200 that showed up that day that didn’t park on your lawn or walk through your flower bed.
We were not having a garage sale this weekend, but two of our immediate neighbors were, so I had the opportunity to sit leisurely and observe some of the shoppers in their natural bargain hunting environment.
The thing that struck me first about people’s garage sale day behavior was the driving. For starters, there were easily 20 times more cars on our street Saturday morning than on a normal day. This only seemed to encourage some of the drivers to go faster than they normally would on a deserted street. Apparently, cars parked at 45 degree angles out into the middle of the street with crowds of people darting back and forth through traffic says to some folks, “I’d better drive really fast into that mess and park hurriedly at a precarious angle to avoid having these other people get all the good deals before I do.”
And I’m not sure what it is about garage sales, but if there is more than one sale on a particular street, that is apparently viewed by the shoppers as an open license to park in front of anyone’s driveway. There is no other day when anyone would find that even a remotely acceptable option, but on garage sale day, anything goes.
On the other end of the traffic hazard spectrum, I also witnessed some incredibly slow moving vehicles that were perhaps more of a danger. Garage sales tend to bring more octogenarians to your street than a church parking lot on bingo night. Many of the older crowd perform what I like to call the “rolling recon” maneuver, where the wife walks in and out of the sales, while the husband, who may or may not want to be there, judging by the expression on his face, stays behind the wheel and rolls slowly down the side of the street, a car-length behind her. He’s the one you really have to watch out for when you’re crossing the street, because he nods off every once in a while.
If you see a large panel van or U-haul truck, these are the professionals. You probably won’t see them though, because they don’t just stumble upon your neighbor’s house at 10:00 in the morning. They plan a very precise route the night before and assault your neighbor’s house at 6:00 am while Bob is still in his jammies and just pouring his first cup of coffee. They knock on his door, apologize profusely for the early hour, and buy every last tool and piece of furniture that Bob has to sell. They were already selling Bob’s stuff at the flea market in the next town by the time you got out of bed.
Now, besides the professionals and the folks like my wife who browse your trinkets and happily give you your full dollar asking price for your kid’s old set of Star Wars action figures, you will find two main groups of buyers. We will call the first group the English as a Second Language crowd, and the second group the Employment as an Unappealing Lifestyle crowd. The ESLs and the EULs.
The ESLs tend to be made up of decent, hardworking, low-wage couples with thirteen kids and questionable immigration status. They buy your old clothes and shoes, and occasionally any furniture or tools that the professionals missed. For the most part they are polite and fair, but occasionally someone will employ the “no habla ingles” negotiating tactic of handing you half of your asking price for a certain item, saying “Is good, yes?” and then pretending not to understand the word “No,” even though it translates perfectly. Do not be fooled. Or, just take $2 for the mirror. Who cares? It’s leaving your garage for good. Any haggling that has occurred does tend to lose its luster when the ESL father comes to pay for the pile of shirts and shoes and starts peeling bills off a stack of money the size of a Stephen King paperback. Just remember, he only has that much cash on him because he doesn’t like banks and all of their questions.
The EULs are the real winners of the day. This is the crowd that thinks Wal Mart is super-fancy. This is the lady with the lit Menthol 100 dangling from her bright pink upper lip as she tries on your winter coats and complains about how hot it is on your driveway. These are the people that will not pay your asking price for anything, under any circumstance. “You want ten cents for this baseball mitt? It’s all worn out! I’ll give you a nickel.” These are the people who get indignant that you would ask fifty cents for a pair of jeans, because they have a hole in the knee, “and they’re not even acid-washed or nothin’.” These are the people who go to their car and bring back an old hair dryer and a pack of Marlboros and try to trade you for the blender you’re selling. These are the people that make you never want to have a garage sale again.
“You want two dollars for this coat? It’s got pink lipstick stains and cigarette burns on it!”
Thanks, Kiki, for making my Saturday a little more interesting. And for inadvertently inviting so many EULs into my neighborhood. They were a real treat. Many of them seemed to take a real interest in our cars, and I even saw a few of them peering inside some of the unattended garages, perhaps looking for bargains of a different kind.
Maybe I will be getting in touch with you sooner than I thought about my next move. Perhaps a neighborhood with a gate, and a no garage sale policy.
Naw! Where would the fun be in that?
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Golfing with Bob
Bob is 93 years old. He can't hear, can't see very well anymore, and can't walk very fast. He has his own golf cart, and when we drive up to the first tee, the starter knows him by name.
I am 39 years old. I can hear and see just fine, and I can run when I need to. I don't own my own golf cart, and the starter doesn't know me from Adam.
We step up onto the first tee box at Morro Bay on a beautiful summer morning with the slight ocean breeze making a gorgeous day just that much better. Bob has lived in this idyllic beach paradise for 60 years. I just visit occasionally.
I swing my club back and forth in large exaggerated arcs, trying to stretch the muscles in my back. Bob laughs at me and says that I'm wasting a lot of precious energy. He does not warm up.
It is the 4th of July weekend, and my family and I are in town to celebrate our nation’s independence with my wife’s family. Bob knows a thing or two about liberty, and what it takes to keep it. He was the pilot of a Navy bomber at an early age during WWII. He fought for the freedom of the civilized world, and returned home in one piece to tell about it.
His commitment to liberty has remained strong his entire life. He has been retired for many, many years now, never having had a boss. He worked for himself his whole life, free to schedule in as much golf as he could get away with. He scheduled in a lot of golf! I only manage to find time for golf when I’m on vacation. I don’t play much.
It’s time for us to tee off on the 480-yard par-five. I'm up first. I square up with my driver and let it rip. My backswing comes way over my head with the club shaft coming parallel with the ground, and my follow through comes all the way around so the club's shaft is vertical behind my back. It's a picture-perfect amateur’s swing. My ball takes flight and rockets out away from the tee box. As I admire its trajectory, it defies my wishes, slicing to the right, leaving the airspace over my own fairway and ending up coming to rest 270 yards away under a small tree on the other side of the cart path. Bob laughs at me and says, "Boy, if I could hit the ball as far as you do, I'd be unstoppable." He takes his driver out of the bag and shuffles up to the box. His backswing barely gets more than 10 degrees behind his legs, and his follow through is non-existent. He hits it 100 yards. It goes straight up the middle of the fairway.
We hop in Bob's cart and drive to his ball. He gets the 3-wood out of his bag and hits it again, 100 yards, straight up the middle of the fairway. He keeps the 3-wood handy as he gets back in the cart, knowing he'll need it again. We drive straight up the middle of the fairway to his ball, which he hits again, 100 yards, again, right up the middle of the fairway.
We then take a sharp right turn off the fairway to find my ball. My ball is under a tree and the tree is between my ball and the green. The smart move is to hit a short sideways shot back onto the safety of my own fairway. Not always one for the smart move, I opt to try and knock down a 3-iron, under the tree, at a slight angle to the green, making up some ground and possibly getting to the edge of the green for a chance at birdie. I let it rip. I am an idiot. My ball skips off the side of the tree I was under, and hits the neighboring tree square in the trunk, sending my ball ricocheting backward at a 45- degree angle onto my own fairway. I have lost 50 yards with my second shot. Bob chuckles and tells me that I’m going the wrong way. I thank him.
We drive the cart away from the green toward my ball. I really get ahold of my 3-wood on my third shot and hit the ball almost 250 yards again, slicing to the right again, landing almost pin-high, but to the extreme right of the green, almost on the tee box of Hole 2.
Bob hits his fourth shot 100 yards, straight up the middle of the fairway.
Bob hits his fifth shot 70 yards, onto the green, 5 feet from the pin.
I chip my fourth shot all the way over the green, landing near, but luckily not in, the sand trap on the left side of the green.
I re-chip for my fifth shot, onto the green, 17 feet from the pin.
I putt my sixth shot to within 6 feet of the hole.
Bob easily makes his 5- foot putt for a bogie six.
I miraculously toilet-bowl my 6-foot putt into the hole for a double-bogie seven.
Bob has beaten me by a stroke on the first hole. This continued all morning.
He never hit the ball more than 100 yards at a time the entire round. I got ahold of one drive on Hole 13 that I swear went 320 yards. Big deal. He beat me by 11 strokes.
Bob shot his age. At 93 years old, he shot a 93. I don't want to talk about my score.
Bob has shot his age every year of his life since he was in his 60's. If you aren't a golfer, suffice it to say, that is something that all golfers – including the pros - wish they could do.
I have had the pleasure of getting beat by the old man for quite some time now. Bob is my wife’s grandpa, and a fantastic Great Grandpa to my boys. When I started playing golf with him, he was in his early 80’s and he beat me by 20 strokes or more every game. I’m not getting any better.
He teaches my boys to putt whenever they slow down long enough for him to hand them one of his ancient wood-shafted putters and show them how to line up to play the break of the game room carpet. Maybe they’ll be good.
On this Independence Day weekend, when I reflect on my many blessings as an American, getting to spend time with Bob is on my top-ten list. He is one of the people in my life that I hold in the highest regard.
He has taught me a lot about the importance of controlling the golf ball over the years, and one day I might just start listening.
He has taught me much more about the importance of liberty over the years, and I have hung on every word.
He has never needed to lecture me greatly about either subject. His actions, his happiness, his success, and the story of his life do the majority of the talking for him.
Thanks, Bob. Happy 4th of July!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
I am 39 years old. I can hear and see just fine, and I can run when I need to. I don't own my own golf cart, and the starter doesn't know me from Adam.
We step up onto the first tee box at Morro Bay on a beautiful summer morning with the slight ocean breeze making a gorgeous day just that much better. Bob has lived in this idyllic beach paradise for 60 years. I just visit occasionally.
I swing my club back and forth in large exaggerated arcs, trying to stretch the muscles in my back. Bob laughs at me and says that I'm wasting a lot of precious energy. He does not warm up.
It is the 4th of July weekend, and my family and I are in town to celebrate our nation’s independence with my wife’s family. Bob knows a thing or two about liberty, and what it takes to keep it. He was the pilot of a Navy bomber at an early age during WWII. He fought for the freedom of the civilized world, and returned home in one piece to tell about it.
His commitment to liberty has remained strong his entire life. He has been retired for many, many years now, never having had a boss. He worked for himself his whole life, free to schedule in as much golf as he could get away with. He scheduled in a lot of golf! I only manage to find time for golf when I’m on vacation. I don’t play much.
It’s time for us to tee off on the 480-yard par-five. I'm up first. I square up with my driver and let it rip. My backswing comes way over my head with the club shaft coming parallel with the ground, and my follow through comes all the way around so the club's shaft is vertical behind my back. It's a picture-perfect amateur’s swing. My ball takes flight and rockets out away from the tee box. As I admire its trajectory, it defies my wishes, slicing to the right, leaving the airspace over my own fairway and ending up coming to rest 270 yards away under a small tree on the other side of the cart path. Bob laughs at me and says, "Boy, if I could hit the ball as far as you do, I'd be unstoppable." He takes his driver out of the bag and shuffles up to the box. His backswing barely gets more than 10 degrees behind his legs, and his follow through is non-existent. He hits it 100 yards. It goes straight up the middle of the fairway.
We hop in Bob's cart and drive to his ball. He gets the 3-wood out of his bag and hits it again, 100 yards, straight up the middle of the fairway. He keeps the 3-wood handy as he gets back in the cart, knowing he'll need it again. We drive straight up the middle of the fairway to his ball, which he hits again, 100 yards, again, right up the middle of the fairway.
We then take a sharp right turn off the fairway to find my ball. My ball is under a tree and the tree is between my ball and the green. The smart move is to hit a short sideways shot back onto the safety of my own fairway. Not always one for the smart move, I opt to try and knock down a 3-iron, under the tree, at a slight angle to the green, making up some ground and possibly getting to the edge of the green for a chance at birdie. I let it rip. I am an idiot. My ball skips off the side of the tree I was under, and hits the neighboring tree square in the trunk, sending my ball ricocheting backward at a 45- degree angle onto my own fairway. I have lost 50 yards with my second shot. Bob chuckles and tells me that I’m going the wrong way. I thank him.
We drive the cart away from the green toward my ball. I really get ahold of my 3-wood on my third shot and hit the ball almost 250 yards again, slicing to the right again, landing almost pin-high, but to the extreme right of the green, almost on the tee box of Hole 2.
Bob hits his fourth shot 100 yards, straight up the middle of the fairway.
Bob hits his fifth shot 70 yards, onto the green, 5 feet from the pin.
I chip my fourth shot all the way over the green, landing near, but luckily not in, the sand trap on the left side of the green.
I re-chip for my fifth shot, onto the green, 17 feet from the pin.
I putt my sixth shot to within 6 feet of the hole.
Bob easily makes his 5- foot putt for a bogie six.
I miraculously toilet-bowl my 6-foot putt into the hole for a double-bogie seven.
Bob has beaten me by a stroke on the first hole. This continued all morning.
He never hit the ball more than 100 yards at a time the entire round. I got ahold of one drive on Hole 13 that I swear went 320 yards. Big deal. He beat me by 11 strokes.
Bob shot his age. At 93 years old, he shot a 93. I don't want to talk about my score.
Bob has shot his age every year of his life since he was in his 60's. If you aren't a golfer, suffice it to say, that is something that all golfers – including the pros - wish they could do.
I have had the pleasure of getting beat by the old man for quite some time now. Bob is my wife’s grandpa, and a fantastic Great Grandpa to my boys. When I started playing golf with him, he was in his early 80’s and he beat me by 20 strokes or more every game. I’m not getting any better.
He teaches my boys to putt whenever they slow down long enough for him to hand them one of his ancient wood-shafted putters and show them how to line up to play the break of the game room carpet. Maybe they’ll be good.
On this Independence Day weekend, when I reflect on my many blessings as an American, getting to spend time with Bob is on my top-ten list. He is one of the people in my life that I hold in the highest regard.
He has taught me a lot about the importance of controlling the golf ball over the years, and one day I might just start listening.
He has taught me much more about the importance of liberty over the years, and I have hung on every word.
He has never needed to lecture me greatly about either subject. His actions, his happiness, his success, and the story of his life do the majority of the talking for him.
Thanks, Bob. Happy 4th of July!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
A Typical Evening at Home
I had a pretty annoying day at work today, so I wasn’t in the greatest mood I’ve ever been in my whole life when I got home tonight. My wife had a “mom’s night out” scheduled with a couple of her girlfriends, so it was just me and the three boys, ages six, five and three, home for dinner. I cooked breakfast for dinner (bacon, eggs and bagels), we split a cupcake for dessert, had a bath, played Legos and went to sleep. I walked in the door from work at 5:15pm and put the boys in bed at 7:45pm. Here is what I heard in between those two times:
Hi Daddy. Did you know that I’m using a sword to fight bad guys? Can we have dinner now? How about now? How about now? I’m really hungry. What are we having for dinner? Can we have over easy eggs? Boo hoo. I don’t want scrambled. My Lego guy has no pants. Can I help crack the eggs? Can I stir them? No, I get to stir them. What makes eggs runny instead of a bird? Why do the eggs cook? How come the flame is blue and not yellow? Wow it’s really raining. I hope our acorn plant grows. My Lego guy has no head. Can I butter my bagel? Wesley has a Chihuahua. Can we go surfing? Can you unlock my light saber? It’s green. That means I’m a good guy. Why can’t I sit there? I don’t want to wash my hands. He just had an accident. He peed on the chair. I don’t want to sit on the pee chair. These eggs are yummy, Daddy! All eggs have a tiny bird in them, you just can’t see it. Do the eggs have cheese in them? These eggs taste like a burrito. Why do I have to sit in the pee chair? What happens when you get bit by a rattlesnake? Hang on, I’m going to eat this pig first. Pig is yummy! Did you know a hawk’s egg is this big? Dinosaur eggs are huge. How big is a brachiosaurus egg? Look, I made a pig and egg pizza. Can you make more bacon? At the movie today, the zucchini and the carrot had invisible hands. He pushed the button on the guy with one eye and down popped a rowboat. Why do mommies sometimes go to dinner with just mommies? When they’re there, there aren’t any kids or daddies. I’ll bet they order bacon. May I please have more burrito eggs? Why don’t daddies take baths? Can we watch TV? This cupcake is so good, it’s my favorite kind. When I have a birthday, I’m going to get this kind of cupcake. Or, just next time we go to the cupcake store. This frosting is delicious! When is my birthday? I’m first for bath. Booty-butt. Booty-butt. How come I have hair like a duck? Don’t wash my owie. What happens when you see a shark? Look how big my feet are. I know who the first president was. He had fake hair. Why do I have to get out? Booty-butt. Booty-butt. My Lego guy needs hands. Have you seen my propeller? I need that piece!! Boo hoo. Yellow is not the same as blue. If you ate Legos, your poop would be funny colors. Legos wouldn’t be as good as pig and burrito eggs. I have to go poop. Good night.
Now, please keep in mind, this was just what came out of my six-year-old’s mouth. Multiply what you just read by three, and you’ve got my evening.
Hmm… I wonder why mommies sometimes go to dinner with just other mommies?
The good news is, I totally forgot all about how annoying work was, and with this fresh perspective on life, I’m in a much better mood.
Pig is yummy!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Hi Daddy. Did you know that I’m using a sword to fight bad guys? Can we have dinner now? How about now? How about now? I’m really hungry. What are we having for dinner? Can we have over easy eggs? Boo hoo. I don’t want scrambled. My Lego guy has no pants. Can I help crack the eggs? Can I stir them? No, I get to stir them. What makes eggs runny instead of a bird? Why do the eggs cook? How come the flame is blue and not yellow? Wow it’s really raining. I hope our acorn plant grows. My Lego guy has no head. Can I butter my bagel? Wesley has a Chihuahua. Can we go surfing? Can you unlock my light saber? It’s green. That means I’m a good guy. Why can’t I sit there? I don’t want to wash my hands. He just had an accident. He peed on the chair. I don’t want to sit on the pee chair. These eggs are yummy, Daddy! All eggs have a tiny bird in them, you just can’t see it. Do the eggs have cheese in them? These eggs taste like a burrito. Why do I have to sit in the pee chair? What happens when you get bit by a rattlesnake? Hang on, I’m going to eat this pig first. Pig is yummy! Did you know a hawk’s egg is this big? Dinosaur eggs are huge. How big is a brachiosaurus egg? Look, I made a pig and egg pizza. Can you make more bacon? At the movie today, the zucchini and the carrot had invisible hands. He pushed the button on the guy with one eye and down popped a rowboat. Why do mommies sometimes go to dinner with just mommies? When they’re there, there aren’t any kids or daddies. I’ll bet they order bacon. May I please have more burrito eggs? Why don’t daddies take baths? Can we watch TV? This cupcake is so good, it’s my favorite kind. When I have a birthday, I’m going to get this kind of cupcake. Or, just next time we go to the cupcake store. This frosting is delicious! When is my birthday? I’m first for bath. Booty-butt. Booty-butt. How come I have hair like a duck? Don’t wash my owie. What happens when you see a shark? Look how big my feet are. I know who the first president was. He had fake hair. Why do I have to get out? Booty-butt. Booty-butt. My Lego guy needs hands. Have you seen my propeller? I need that piece!! Boo hoo. Yellow is not the same as blue. If you ate Legos, your poop would be funny colors. Legos wouldn’t be as good as pig and burrito eggs. I have to go poop. Good night.
Now, please keep in mind, this was just what came out of my six-year-old’s mouth. Multiply what you just read by three, and you’ve got my evening.
Hmm… I wonder why mommies sometimes go to dinner with just other mommies?
The good news is, I totally forgot all about how annoying work was, and with this fresh perspective on life, I’m in a much better mood.
Pig is yummy!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
The Mama Bear
We went camping with friends this past weekend at Sugar Pine Point State Park at Lake Tahoe. We were expecting a fun weekend of campfires, hiking, and swimming, but we ended up getting much more than we bargained for. By the time the weekend was through, our kids had some great bear stories and I had a brand new wife.
We arrived Friday afternoon and listened to a ten-minute bear advisory lecture from the park ranger, complete with an affidavit we were required to sign, stating that we understood the bear rules and would gladly be subject to a $1000 fine if we did not keep our food and toiletries locked in the big, green, steel bear lockers provided at the campsites.
OK, OK, we get it. There are bears here. We’ll put the food away. Can we go to our campsites now?
We set up camp in two adjoining campsites and had a fun evening of men setting up tents and making fires, women laughing at the men’s lack of skill in the tent and fire-making departments, and little boys playing in the woods and peeing on trees. Dinner and s’mores and off to bed without a bear in sight. Good times.
I had a book signing back in our home town the next day, so I got up early and drove the two hours back to our house to take a shower. I went off to the bookstore and occasionally received a text message from my wife about something or other to bring back with me that afternoon. When my phone rang around two o’clock, I was expecting to hear about another camping-related item that we’d left behind. Not so.
What I heard my wife say was, “We’ve had some bears. They’re stalking our campsite.”
Hmmm. That’s different than what I thought you were going to say, honey. As the ever-concerned father figure, my first question was, “Is everyone OK?”
After she assured me that everyone was safe and in good spirits I switched to ever-financially-vigilant breadwinner mode. “Is the State Parks Service going to fine us $1000?”
Luckily, the answer to the first question was yes and the second question was no. She then had to hang up because the park rangers had just arrived at our campsite for the second time that afternoon to get the latest bear report. I drove really fast back to the lake.
When I arrived back at the campsite, the rangers were still there. “Have they been here the whole time?” I asked.
“No, we just had a third bear about ten minutes ago,” my wife answered casually, as if close bear encounters were a common occurrence in her life. “I tracked him through the woods until they got here.”
Excuse me? You did what? I have been away for nine and a half hours and when I get back you are tracking bears? What in the hell happened while I was gone?
Here’s the condensed version my wife and our friends, Jeff and Carrie, told me:
They woke up shortly after I had left, had a leisurely breakfast, went on a long hike, and came back to camp and made lunch. They were all assembled together eating at the picnic table in Jeff and Carrie’s campsite, but my wife had left one of our plastic storage bins out of the bear locker and on top of the table in our campsite. No one thought anything of it, since they were close by, until Jeff saw the bear coming through the woods. They watched in awe as the 300-pound black bear walked into our campsite, a mere 25 yards away, and knocked the bin off the table. He (or she) grabbed our big bag of marshmallows and sat down for a delicious and delightfully fluffy snack.
By this time, three adults and five boys had been shoehorned into Jeff and Carrie’s midsize SUV, and were driving away from the bear and toward the ranger station. While they were busy alerting the ranger to their predicament, the bear devoured our entire box of graham crackers.
The rangers came back to the campsite with them and shooed the bear away by yelling at it and banging pots and pans together. When the bear had retreated, the rangers explained the “no food left out farther away than arm’s reach” rule which we had missed during bear orientation the day before. It was at this point that my wife asked the ranger, while crying, if the bear would come back. They reassuringly said, “No.”
Apparently the rangers don’t speak for the bears. They obviously did not take into account the fact that the bear had unfinished business, because he came back about a half-hour later looking for the crucial third and final ingredient to his lunch of s’mores. To the bruin’s dismay, the chocolate bars were locked up tight, and he was out of luck.
Over the initial shock of their close proximity to long-clawed wildlife, Jeff and my wife shooed him away on their own this time while Carrie took the five boys for a nice ride back to the ranger station. Knowing my wife, I think at this point she had gone from being scared to being aggravated that this thing was threatening the safety of her children, not to mention putting a severe damper on the night’s dessert.
When the rangers arrived back at our campsite, they questioned my wife on which way the bear had gone after she and Jeff had shooed it away. Unbeknownst to the rangers, by involving my wife in the hunt for the bear, they had apparently deputized her as an assistant park ranger in her own mind. This became shockingly obvious to everyone a few hours later when a new bear showed up near our campsite. Upon spotting the interloping omnivore, my wife casually asked Jeff and Carrie if they would keep an eye on the boys while she went off and made sure this pesky varmint didn’t cause any trouble around these here parts.
Into the woods she went, armed with the formidable defensive weapons of choice, the universally-feared pot and pan combo. She quietly stalked the bear through the underbrush, making sure she could relay the beast’s exact coordinates to her new comrades-in-arms when they arrived. I guess her plan was to fall back on her extensive deputy park ranger training by banging the pot and pan together if the bear showed any signs of annoyance at being followed.
Thankfully, the actual rangers with actual guns showed up and took over before she was forced to make a move with her deadly cookware. What a difference a few bear sightings can make! My wife went from suburban housewife to Grizzly Adams in the span of two hours. I am convinced that if a fourth bear had showed up before I had arrived, she surely would have slipped off her shoes, clamped a kitchen knife between her teeth, and tried to sneak up on it from behind to teach it a lesson about messing with her kids and her meal plans.
The really funny part is, if I had been there and even hinted at wanting to shoo the bear off, either by myself, or with Jeff by my side, she would have asked in an exasperated and slightly panicked voice, “Are you crazy? Do you want your boys to grow up without a father?”
It just goes to show you, there’s no telling what a mama bear is going to do.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
We arrived Friday afternoon and listened to a ten-minute bear advisory lecture from the park ranger, complete with an affidavit we were required to sign, stating that we understood the bear rules and would gladly be subject to a $1000 fine if we did not keep our food and toiletries locked in the big, green, steel bear lockers provided at the campsites.
OK, OK, we get it. There are bears here. We’ll put the food away. Can we go to our campsites now?
We set up camp in two adjoining campsites and had a fun evening of men setting up tents and making fires, women laughing at the men’s lack of skill in the tent and fire-making departments, and little boys playing in the woods and peeing on trees. Dinner and s’mores and off to bed without a bear in sight. Good times.
I had a book signing back in our home town the next day, so I got up early and drove the two hours back to our house to take a shower. I went off to the bookstore and occasionally received a text message from my wife about something or other to bring back with me that afternoon. When my phone rang around two o’clock, I was expecting to hear about another camping-related item that we’d left behind. Not so.
What I heard my wife say was, “We’ve had some bears. They’re stalking our campsite.”
Hmmm. That’s different than what I thought you were going to say, honey. As the ever-concerned father figure, my first question was, “Is everyone OK?”
After she assured me that everyone was safe and in good spirits I switched to ever-financially-vigilant breadwinner mode. “Is the State Parks Service going to fine us $1000?”
Luckily, the answer to the first question was yes and the second question was no. She then had to hang up because the park rangers had just arrived at our campsite for the second time that afternoon to get the latest bear report. I drove really fast back to the lake.
When I arrived back at the campsite, the rangers were still there. “Have they been here the whole time?” I asked.
“No, we just had a third bear about ten minutes ago,” my wife answered casually, as if close bear encounters were a common occurrence in her life. “I tracked him through the woods until they got here.”
Excuse me? You did what? I have been away for nine and a half hours and when I get back you are tracking bears? What in the hell happened while I was gone?
Here’s the condensed version my wife and our friends, Jeff and Carrie, told me:
They woke up shortly after I had left, had a leisurely breakfast, went on a long hike, and came back to camp and made lunch. They were all assembled together eating at the picnic table in Jeff and Carrie’s campsite, but my wife had left one of our plastic storage bins out of the bear locker and on top of the table in our campsite. No one thought anything of it, since they were close by, until Jeff saw the bear coming through the woods. They watched in awe as the 300-pound black bear walked into our campsite, a mere 25 yards away, and knocked the bin off the table. He (or she) grabbed our big bag of marshmallows and sat down for a delicious and delightfully fluffy snack.
By this time, three adults and five boys had been shoehorned into Jeff and Carrie’s midsize SUV, and were driving away from the bear and toward the ranger station. While they were busy alerting the ranger to their predicament, the bear devoured our entire box of graham crackers.
The rangers came back to the campsite with them and shooed the bear away by yelling at it and banging pots and pans together. When the bear had retreated, the rangers explained the “no food left out farther away than arm’s reach” rule which we had missed during bear orientation the day before. It was at this point that my wife asked the ranger, while crying, if the bear would come back. They reassuringly said, “No.”
Apparently the rangers don’t speak for the bears. They obviously did not take into account the fact that the bear had unfinished business, because he came back about a half-hour later looking for the crucial third and final ingredient to his lunch of s’mores. To the bruin’s dismay, the chocolate bars were locked up tight, and he was out of luck.
Over the initial shock of their close proximity to long-clawed wildlife, Jeff and my wife shooed him away on their own this time while Carrie took the five boys for a nice ride back to the ranger station. Knowing my wife, I think at this point she had gone from being scared to being aggravated that this thing was threatening the safety of her children, not to mention putting a severe damper on the night’s dessert.
When the rangers arrived back at our campsite, they questioned my wife on which way the bear had gone after she and Jeff had shooed it away. Unbeknownst to the rangers, by involving my wife in the hunt for the bear, they had apparently deputized her as an assistant park ranger in her own mind. This became shockingly obvious to everyone a few hours later when a new bear showed up near our campsite. Upon spotting the interloping omnivore, my wife casually asked Jeff and Carrie if they would keep an eye on the boys while she went off and made sure this pesky varmint didn’t cause any trouble around these here parts.
Into the woods she went, armed with the formidable defensive weapons of choice, the universally-feared pot and pan combo. She quietly stalked the bear through the underbrush, making sure she could relay the beast’s exact coordinates to her new comrades-in-arms when they arrived. I guess her plan was to fall back on her extensive deputy park ranger training by banging the pot and pan together if the bear showed any signs of annoyance at being followed.
Thankfully, the actual rangers with actual guns showed up and took over before she was forced to make a move with her deadly cookware. What a difference a few bear sightings can make! My wife went from suburban housewife to Grizzly Adams in the span of two hours. I am convinced that if a fourth bear had showed up before I had arrived, she surely would have slipped off her shoes, clamped a kitchen knife between her teeth, and tried to sneak up on it from behind to teach it a lesson about messing with her kids and her meal plans.
The really funny part is, if I had been there and even hinted at wanting to shoo the bear off, either by myself, or with Jeff by my side, she would have asked in an exasperated and slightly panicked voice, “Are you crazy? Do you want your boys to grow up without a father?”
It just goes to show you, there’s no telling what a mama bear is going to do.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Low-Tech Babies
As I sit down to write this, I am also intermittently texting back and forth on my phone with my good friend whose wife is actually giving birth right now. We have their two kids sleeping over at our house tonight, and I’m getting text updates on the progress of their third child’s entrance into the world. I’m currently receiving a blow-by-blow of the dilation. Fourteen minutes ago she was at 8 centimeters and feeling like she needed to push. Eight minutes ago she was already at 10cm, and I think we all know, 10cm is go time!
I’m not sure why I know the significance of 10cm dilation, because all three of my kids were C-section babies. As I sit here instant-messaging with a man in a hospital delivery room, and marveling at the miracle of my own children’s unconventional births, I can’t help but laugh at some of the disparities in our technological progress or lack thereof. On the one hand, as evidenced by how much instantaneous information about dilation progress I’m able to receive on my Blackberry, we have come a long, long way from the days of Caesar’s birth. On the other hand, in the midst of all these amazing gadgets and technology, whether it be a C-section or a natural birth, the endeavor of having a baby has stayed pretty much how it always has been. Low tech and messy.
By the way, they just had the baby. She showed up eight minutes after the last text message. A happy, healthy, 8-pound, 9-ounce beautiful little girl. I just got the first pictures of her and mom via Facebook. Hello, little Colette, welcome to the high-tech online party!
Colette’s parents “knew” they were having a girl, because, like most expecting couples in this high-tech world of ours, they had one or more ultrasounds during the pregnancy. The reason I say “knew” is that the modern ultrasound is one of the blends of high and low technology that I find so amusing. The proclamation of, “You’re having a girl” seems iffy.
We had ultrasounds during each of my wife’s three pregnancies. With each kid, we wanted to find out ahead of time if we were having a boy or a girl. I laughed out loud during the first ultrasound when I learned the method for identifying the sex of the baby. In the midst of all of the wonderful technology allowing the ultrasound technician to measure the baby’s size, organ development, heart rate, head size and general developmental progress, the only way they had to tell if it was a boy or a girl was to look for a penis on the little TV screen.
Really? You have this $200,000 machine at your disposal that can apparently measure my unborn child’s spleen density, and the only way you have to tell me if we should be buying pink or blue blankies is by scooting the gel-covered “whoosh-whoosh-whoosh” wand around on my wife’s stomach and squinting at the monitor?
It just really seems to me that there would be an easier, more high-tech method of boy/girl identification by now than a nice lady in surgical scrubs with her face really close to a tiny video screen saying, “That looks like a penis right there. I’m pretty sure it’s a boy… yep, he just rolled over. There it is!”
We had three boys, so ours were pretty definite answers from the ultrasounds. At least I think they were definite. They went three for three, but I’m not convinced they weren’t guessing. I mean, they’re obviously very well trained, but every picture we ever received as proof we were having a boy looked to me like a grainy black and white satellite photo of two potatoes in a dust storm.
“Hey, Bob, we’re having a boy! Look at the picture they gave us from the ultrasound.”
“What am I looking at, here?”
“That’s the head, and there’s a leg, and there’s the evidence… no, wait. I have it upside down. I think this is the head, and that is the… hmm. I forget what she told us.”
Now, keep in mind, I’m not speaking from experience here, but it just seems a little more wishy-washy to me for the ultrasound technician to say, “It’s a girl.” The old adage of “You can’t prove a negative” seems to come into play.
“I didn’t see a penis, so you’re having a girl.”
“You didn’t see one, or there isn’t one?”
“Yes.”
I have witnessed a much more accurate system. Back when my middle sister was pregnant with her daughter, they had not found out if they were having a boy or a girl yet. While we were all together on vacation, a family friend offered to run a time-tested experiment that would yield the results. She put her wedding ring on a necklace and held it like a pendulum over the baby. The ring began to spin clockwise, so it was obvious that my sister was having a girl. Lo and behold, a few months later, out pops a girl. One hundred percent accuracy rate for the low-tech ring test!
Jewelry harbingers aside, there seems to be a glaring void of technology just screaming to be filled in the baby identification arena. What we need is to deploy the full force of the tech world and come up with an app. There is an app for everything else, so why not an app to figure out what you’re having? Get on that, will you guys? We can already find every coffee shop within 100 square miles in 0.23 seconds. Design something really useful for a change. I don’t even like coffee.
Anyway, welcome to the world, Colette. By the time you’re old enough to have a phone of your own, it will probably have a self-ultrasound app. But I’d better not hear about you needing to use it until after you’re married!!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
I’m not sure why I know the significance of 10cm dilation, because all three of my kids were C-section babies. As I sit here instant-messaging with a man in a hospital delivery room, and marveling at the miracle of my own children’s unconventional births, I can’t help but laugh at some of the disparities in our technological progress or lack thereof. On the one hand, as evidenced by how much instantaneous information about dilation progress I’m able to receive on my Blackberry, we have come a long, long way from the days of Caesar’s birth. On the other hand, in the midst of all these amazing gadgets and technology, whether it be a C-section or a natural birth, the endeavor of having a baby has stayed pretty much how it always has been. Low tech and messy.
By the way, they just had the baby. She showed up eight minutes after the last text message. A happy, healthy, 8-pound, 9-ounce beautiful little girl. I just got the first pictures of her and mom via Facebook. Hello, little Colette, welcome to the high-tech online party!
Colette’s parents “knew” they were having a girl, because, like most expecting couples in this high-tech world of ours, they had one or more ultrasounds during the pregnancy. The reason I say “knew” is that the modern ultrasound is one of the blends of high and low technology that I find so amusing. The proclamation of, “You’re having a girl” seems iffy.
We had ultrasounds during each of my wife’s three pregnancies. With each kid, we wanted to find out ahead of time if we were having a boy or a girl. I laughed out loud during the first ultrasound when I learned the method for identifying the sex of the baby. In the midst of all of the wonderful technology allowing the ultrasound technician to measure the baby’s size, organ development, heart rate, head size and general developmental progress, the only way they had to tell if it was a boy or a girl was to look for a penis on the little TV screen.
Really? You have this $200,000 machine at your disposal that can apparently measure my unborn child’s spleen density, and the only way you have to tell me if we should be buying pink or blue blankies is by scooting the gel-covered “whoosh-whoosh-whoosh” wand around on my wife’s stomach and squinting at the monitor?
It just really seems to me that there would be an easier, more high-tech method of boy/girl identification by now than a nice lady in surgical scrubs with her face really close to a tiny video screen saying, “That looks like a penis right there. I’m pretty sure it’s a boy… yep, he just rolled over. There it is!”
We had three boys, so ours were pretty definite answers from the ultrasounds. At least I think they were definite. They went three for three, but I’m not convinced they weren’t guessing. I mean, they’re obviously very well trained, but every picture we ever received as proof we were having a boy looked to me like a grainy black and white satellite photo of two potatoes in a dust storm.
“Hey, Bob, we’re having a boy! Look at the picture they gave us from the ultrasound.”
“What am I looking at, here?”
“That’s the head, and there’s a leg, and there’s the evidence… no, wait. I have it upside down. I think this is the head, and that is the… hmm. I forget what she told us.”
Now, keep in mind, I’m not speaking from experience here, but it just seems a little more wishy-washy to me for the ultrasound technician to say, “It’s a girl.” The old adage of “You can’t prove a negative” seems to come into play.
“I didn’t see a penis, so you’re having a girl.”
“You didn’t see one, or there isn’t one?”
“Yes.”
I have witnessed a much more accurate system. Back when my middle sister was pregnant with her daughter, they had not found out if they were having a boy or a girl yet. While we were all together on vacation, a family friend offered to run a time-tested experiment that would yield the results. She put her wedding ring on a necklace and held it like a pendulum over the baby. The ring began to spin clockwise, so it was obvious that my sister was having a girl. Lo and behold, a few months later, out pops a girl. One hundred percent accuracy rate for the low-tech ring test!
Jewelry harbingers aside, there seems to be a glaring void of technology just screaming to be filled in the baby identification arena. What we need is to deploy the full force of the tech world and come up with an app. There is an app for everything else, so why not an app to figure out what you’re having? Get on that, will you guys? We can already find every coffee shop within 100 square miles in 0.23 seconds. Design something really useful for a change. I don’t even like coffee.
Anyway, welcome to the world, Colette. By the time you’re old enough to have a phone of your own, it will probably have a self-ultrasound app. But I’d better not hear about you needing to use it until after you’re married!!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Gradual Decline
I have only graduated twice. Back when I was growing up, I had a lot of last days of school, but only two graduations. Once from high school, and once from college.
(There was some question about the validity of one of them, but I can assure you, it was cleared up. Really! There is no need to check any records. Let’s all just let it go.)
Nowadays, it seems as if kids graduate from everything. For instance, this past Saturday night, I attended Son Number Two’s preschool graduation ceremony. Yes, preschool. By the age of five, my two oldest boys have already graduated half as much as I have my entire life.
I know some of you parents out there are asking, “What’s wrong with that?”
I know this, because I have seen pictures of your children on Facebook graduating from preschool in full cap-and-gown. Thankfully, my boy’s preschool did not take the “graduation” that far, but I still thought having a ceremony was a little much.
Seeing those pictures got me thinking. First of all, where on earth do you get miniature preschool-sized mortar boards and robes? Graduates-R-Us? Does the Baby Gap have a Baby Grad section?
Secondly, why are we making such a big deal out of events that used to be non-events? Is making it all the way through preschool nowadays such an achievement that it requires public recognition of each student by name? And does it require said public recognition to take place on a precious weekend evening? As near as I can tell, my boys’ greatest accomplishment during their years at preschool was learning to keep over 50% of the paint on the paper. And being in charge of the laundry, my wife is pretty sure it never got much better than a 60/40 split.
Now, maybe you cap-and-gown preschools have students matriculating that are reading Dostoevsky, interpreting the constitution and reciting the quadratic equation, but I doubt it. Let’s be serious, here. These are five-year-olds. My guess is the main reason we feel the need for any kind of ceremony is merely the photo op. It is obviously an event that is only for the parents, since the kids that are doing the graduating could really care less. They don’t know what graduating means, they don’t know why they have to stand in line, they don’t know what to do when their name is called, and all they really want to do is make fart noises and eat cupcakes. (Come to think of it, that actually sounds a lot like my high school graduation. Hmm…)
Anyway, our need for graduation photo ops has obviously gotten out of hand. I was grateful that my oldest son’s kindergarten didn’t have a graduation, but the sixth grade classes at his school had a large ceremony at the end of the year, with parents in suits and dresses, cheering and snapping photo after photo as their children graduated from elementary school.
At least a sixth-grader can understand the concept of graduation, but that fact, in and of itself, is one of the problems. We’re celebrating and recognizing an “achievement” that didn’t used to be quite such a big deal. That sends the same message as the ever-popular “participant” ribbon. Those kids have already graduated from preschool, possibly also kindergarten and the third grade, and will now go on to graduate again in a few years from junior high school, with another ceremony honoring their wonderful awesomeness, making sure that they are fully recognized by name for their amazing ability to show up.
My wife is pretty sure that all this preemptive graduating is one of the reasons that high school drop-out rates have risen in our lifetime. By the time they get to the ninth grade, many kids have already “graduated” five times. A lot of them probably figure, “What’s the point of one more? Been there, done that.”
Anyway, the more I thought about the oddity of a preschool graduation ceremony, the more I got to thinking about how the school system has changed over the years. Not only are we celebrating smaller non-achievements, but we have the opportunity to do it more often now.
We didn’t even used to have preschool. Or kindergarten for that matter. Those things are a relatively new phenomenon in our country’s history. Kids used to play outside until they were six, then start school in the first grade. That’s why it’s called the first grade.
At this point, with an average of two years of preschool and a year of kindergarten, we should really re-number the grades. First grade should be changed to fourth grade and so on.
I started out wondering why we had preschool graduation, but now I’m wondering why we have preschool at all? Is it just for the graduation photo op at the end of the year? If so, that is a pretty expensive picture! If that’s all it is, I’m just going to Photoshop Boy Number Three into one of the other two’s graduation photos and save some money.
We’ll just keep him home and throw paint on him in the backyard, and send him directly to kindergarten (third grade) when he’s five. We’ll take pictures of him in a cap and gown when he successfully completes the fifteenth grade and graduates from high school.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
(There was some question about the validity of one of them, but I can assure you, it was cleared up. Really! There is no need to check any records. Let’s all just let it go.)
Nowadays, it seems as if kids graduate from everything. For instance, this past Saturday night, I attended Son Number Two’s preschool graduation ceremony. Yes, preschool. By the age of five, my two oldest boys have already graduated half as much as I have my entire life.
I know some of you parents out there are asking, “What’s wrong with that?”
I know this, because I have seen pictures of your children on Facebook graduating from preschool in full cap-and-gown. Thankfully, my boy’s preschool did not take the “graduation” that far, but I still thought having a ceremony was a little much.
Seeing those pictures got me thinking. First of all, where on earth do you get miniature preschool-sized mortar boards and robes? Graduates-R-Us? Does the Baby Gap have a Baby Grad section?
Secondly, why are we making such a big deal out of events that used to be non-events? Is making it all the way through preschool nowadays such an achievement that it requires public recognition of each student by name? And does it require said public recognition to take place on a precious weekend evening? As near as I can tell, my boys’ greatest accomplishment during their years at preschool was learning to keep over 50% of the paint on the paper. And being in charge of the laundry, my wife is pretty sure it never got much better than a 60/40 split.
Now, maybe you cap-and-gown preschools have students matriculating that are reading Dostoevsky, interpreting the constitution and reciting the quadratic equation, but I doubt it. Let’s be serious, here. These are five-year-olds. My guess is the main reason we feel the need for any kind of ceremony is merely the photo op. It is obviously an event that is only for the parents, since the kids that are doing the graduating could really care less. They don’t know what graduating means, they don’t know why they have to stand in line, they don’t know what to do when their name is called, and all they really want to do is make fart noises and eat cupcakes. (Come to think of it, that actually sounds a lot like my high school graduation. Hmm…)
Anyway, our need for graduation photo ops has obviously gotten out of hand. I was grateful that my oldest son’s kindergarten didn’t have a graduation, but the sixth grade classes at his school had a large ceremony at the end of the year, with parents in suits and dresses, cheering and snapping photo after photo as their children graduated from elementary school.
At least a sixth-grader can understand the concept of graduation, but that fact, in and of itself, is one of the problems. We’re celebrating and recognizing an “achievement” that didn’t used to be quite such a big deal. That sends the same message as the ever-popular “participant” ribbon. Those kids have already graduated from preschool, possibly also kindergarten and the third grade, and will now go on to graduate again in a few years from junior high school, with another ceremony honoring their wonderful awesomeness, making sure that they are fully recognized by name for their amazing ability to show up.
My wife is pretty sure that all this preemptive graduating is one of the reasons that high school drop-out rates have risen in our lifetime. By the time they get to the ninth grade, many kids have already “graduated” five times. A lot of them probably figure, “What’s the point of one more? Been there, done that.”
Anyway, the more I thought about the oddity of a preschool graduation ceremony, the more I got to thinking about how the school system has changed over the years. Not only are we celebrating smaller non-achievements, but we have the opportunity to do it more often now.
We didn’t even used to have preschool. Or kindergarten for that matter. Those things are a relatively new phenomenon in our country’s history. Kids used to play outside until they were six, then start school in the first grade. That’s why it’s called the first grade.
At this point, with an average of two years of preschool and a year of kindergarten, we should really re-number the grades. First grade should be changed to fourth grade and so on.
I started out wondering why we had preschool graduation, but now I’m wondering why we have preschool at all? Is it just for the graduation photo op at the end of the year? If so, that is a pretty expensive picture! If that’s all it is, I’m just going to Photoshop Boy Number Three into one of the other two’s graduation photos and save some money.
We’ll just keep him home and throw paint on him in the backyard, and send him directly to kindergarten (third grade) when he’s five. We’ll take pictures of him in a cap and gown when he successfully completes the fifteenth grade and graduates from high school.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Better Living Through Mediocrity
This was my second year as an assistant T-ball coach, and this year we had two of our three boys playing. Thankfully, they were on the same team. Our regular season activities ended last Saturday, and would have ended a full week earlier had we not been making up some early-season rain-outs. It was a pretty busy year for us, sports-wise, but I’m almost positive that every year from now on will be busier. Next year, all three boys will play, and they will all be on different teams. The parental logistics of that will be interesting, to say the least.
This year, we had four players on our T-ball team that stood out head and shoulders above the rest in terms of skill. Thankfully, I was not related to any of them. My boys were mediocre, and that’s just how we like them. Allow me to explain.
The four best players from our team were recruited toward the end of the season to play on championship teams. (Keep in mind that these are five and six-year-olds. We take our baseball pretty seriously in Rocklin, California.) Those four kids were going to extra practices during the tail end of our season, and they all played in a Memorial Day weekend tournament.
Now, you may hear “Memorial Day weekend tournament,” and think, “Sounds like fun.” We went to watch a few of the games, and while there were many fun and exciting moments, the tournament was also very time-consuming. Not for my family, mind you, but for the families of the all-stars.
My family and I were free to do whatever we wanted over the long weekend. We ended up at the ballpark to watch a few games, but we also slept late in the mornings, made two trips to friends’ houses for dinners, and generally set our own schedule. The families of the all-stars were not so lucky. The tournament ruled their schedules. When asked what they had planned for the weekend, they were forced to answer, “I don’t know. It depends on how we do in the tournament.”
These scheduling woes didn’t apply to just the baseball families, either. On Sunday afternoon, we stopped by a local college to meet one of my wife’s good friends. Her daughter was playing in a youth soccer tournament, and her whole family had been there, and hour’s drive from their home, for two full days. I asked her how her daughter was doing in the tournament, and in an antithetically dejected voice she replied, “They keep winning. We were supposed to be at a friend’s house for dinner, but we have to stay for the championship game. The other two kids are bummed out because they wanted to see their friends, but instead, we all need to stay here.”
Long weekends aside, kids’ sports can also affect vacation plans. About a week ago, our good friends from college had to send us regrets and cancel their plans to come up from Southern California to go to Lake Tahoe for a week. We were planning on meeting up with them there at the end of June, but their oldest son ended up being one of 12 eight-year-olds picked out of 130 to be in an all-star baseball tournament.
Witnessing this all-star ball-and-chain effect that so many of our friends are going through got me thinking. Kids’ hopes and dreams are one thing, but what about mine? I have hopes and dreams, too. One of them is to be able to sit down every once in a while, and not have every Saturday for the rest of my life already booked with one of my kid’s sporting events. I am the father of what appear to be three rather promising-looking boys in the sports and athletics department. So far, they are a little too young to be shining, but I fear that it is only a matter of time.
Back when they were born and I was a proud and naïve papa, I was no doubt looking forward to them holding the trophy high above their heads one day. Now, the more I see, the more I think mediocrity might be the ticket.
“Maybe we don’t need to practice so much in the backyard, Son. Why don’t you go burn leaves and ants with a magnifying glass instead?”
Don’t get me wrong. I still want them to play sports, just not in an outstanding manner that may cause the seasons to be extended in any way. My new plan is to shoot for third place. That way, I might actually get to go fishing every once in a while.
“What are you doing this summer, Bob?”
“We’re committed through August with Junior’s baseball Champions Bracket. How about you, Smidge?”
“Not us! Did you see my kid drop that grounder at shortstop during the last game? No way he was going to make the post-season. We’re going to Cabo!”
“Hey, Smidge. Did you hear about the baseball clinic that the Sierra College baseball coach is putting on for the kids? Only $130 for three days!”
“Not interested, Phil. My boys aren’t big league material. No sense fighting facts.”
“Hey Smidge, want to enroll your kids in Taekwondo?”
“What are they going to be, the next Jackie Chan? No, thanks. I’d like to keep at least some of my money, and maybe a few of my evenings and weekends free.”
“Want to enroll your kids in our two-week soccer camp?”
“No, thanks. The regular soccer season is painful enough. And let’s face it, soccer as a professional sport is never going to catch on in America, so I don’t really see the point in the first place.”
I think I am going to extend my third place approach into their academics as well. Based on the size of their heads, their mom’s DNA, and their incredible Lego skills, my kids will probably end up being pretty smart. That being said, I plan to encourage and nurture their education only to the point that it does not interfere with my life.
They will be required to maintain good grades, but will be expressly forbidden from joining any sort of academic club that has extra-curricular activities. The last thing I want is to have successfully thwarted post-season athletics and accidentally end up stuck at a chess tournament or a debate club’s weekend rebuttal-o-rama.
The problem is, holding them back might end up being more difficult than I think. We may be able to keep them at bay with enough TV, but it’s going to be touch-and-go. Boy Number One is proving to be a pretty good piano player, Number Two is quite a little over-achiever, both academically and physically, and Number Three is already a wicked switch hitter at three years old. It’s not looking good.
If you’ll excuse me now, I have to go hide the bats and balls and turn on the TV. Forget your homework, boys, let’s watch some Disney channel!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
This year, we had four players on our T-ball team that stood out head and shoulders above the rest in terms of skill. Thankfully, I was not related to any of them. My boys were mediocre, and that’s just how we like them. Allow me to explain.
The four best players from our team were recruited toward the end of the season to play on championship teams. (Keep in mind that these are five and six-year-olds. We take our baseball pretty seriously in Rocklin, California.) Those four kids were going to extra practices during the tail end of our season, and they all played in a Memorial Day weekend tournament.
Now, you may hear “Memorial Day weekend tournament,” and think, “Sounds like fun.” We went to watch a few of the games, and while there were many fun and exciting moments, the tournament was also very time-consuming. Not for my family, mind you, but for the families of the all-stars.
My family and I were free to do whatever we wanted over the long weekend. We ended up at the ballpark to watch a few games, but we also slept late in the mornings, made two trips to friends’ houses for dinners, and generally set our own schedule. The families of the all-stars were not so lucky. The tournament ruled their schedules. When asked what they had planned for the weekend, they were forced to answer, “I don’t know. It depends on how we do in the tournament.”
These scheduling woes didn’t apply to just the baseball families, either. On Sunday afternoon, we stopped by a local college to meet one of my wife’s good friends. Her daughter was playing in a youth soccer tournament, and her whole family had been there, and hour’s drive from their home, for two full days. I asked her how her daughter was doing in the tournament, and in an antithetically dejected voice she replied, “They keep winning. We were supposed to be at a friend’s house for dinner, but we have to stay for the championship game. The other two kids are bummed out because they wanted to see their friends, but instead, we all need to stay here.”
Long weekends aside, kids’ sports can also affect vacation plans. About a week ago, our good friends from college had to send us regrets and cancel their plans to come up from Southern California to go to Lake Tahoe for a week. We were planning on meeting up with them there at the end of June, but their oldest son ended up being one of 12 eight-year-olds picked out of 130 to be in an all-star baseball tournament.
Witnessing this all-star ball-and-chain effect that so many of our friends are going through got me thinking. Kids’ hopes and dreams are one thing, but what about mine? I have hopes and dreams, too. One of them is to be able to sit down every once in a while, and not have every Saturday for the rest of my life already booked with one of my kid’s sporting events. I am the father of what appear to be three rather promising-looking boys in the sports and athletics department. So far, they are a little too young to be shining, but I fear that it is only a matter of time.
Back when they were born and I was a proud and naïve papa, I was no doubt looking forward to them holding the trophy high above their heads one day. Now, the more I see, the more I think mediocrity might be the ticket.
“Maybe we don’t need to practice so much in the backyard, Son. Why don’t you go burn leaves and ants with a magnifying glass instead?”
Don’t get me wrong. I still want them to play sports, just not in an outstanding manner that may cause the seasons to be extended in any way. My new plan is to shoot for third place. That way, I might actually get to go fishing every once in a while.
“What are you doing this summer, Bob?”
“We’re committed through August with Junior’s baseball Champions Bracket. How about you, Smidge?”
“Not us! Did you see my kid drop that grounder at shortstop during the last game? No way he was going to make the post-season. We’re going to Cabo!”
“Hey, Smidge. Did you hear about the baseball clinic that the Sierra College baseball coach is putting on for the kids? Only $130 for three days!”
“Not interested, Phil. My boys aren’t big league material. No sense fighting facts.”
“Hey Smidge, want to enroll your kids in Taekwondo?”
“What are they going to be, the next Jackie Chan? No, thanks. I’d like to keep at least some of my money, and maybe a few of my evenings and weekends free.”
“Want to enroll your kids in our two-week soccer camp?”
“No, thanks. The regular soccer season is painful enough. And let’s face it, soccer as a professional sport is never going to catch on in America, so I don’t really see the point in the first place.”
I think I am going to extend my third place approach into their academics as well. Based on the size of their heads, their mom’s DNA, and their incredible Lego skills, my kids will probably end up being pretty smart. That being said, I plan to encourage and nurture their education only to the point that it does not interfere with my life.
They will be required to maintain good grades, but will be expressly forbidden from joining any sort of academic club that has extra-curricular activities. The last thing I want is to have successfully thwarted post-season athletics and accidentally end up stuck at a chess tournament or a debate club’s weekend rebuttal-o-rama.
The problem is, holding them back might end up being more difficult than I think. We may be able to keep them at bay with enough TV, but it’s going to be touch-and-go. Boy Number One is proving to be a pretty good piano player, Number Two is quite a little over-achiever, both academically and physically, and Number Three is already a wicked switch hitter at three years old. It’s not looking good.
If you’ll excuse me now, I have to go hide the bats and balls and turn on the TV. Forget your homework, boys, let’s watch some Disney channel!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
It's Elementary, My Dear
I have officially been an author for just over a year now. While I have been a writer for a long time, being an “author” requires having a published book. My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh came out in April of 2010, and it has been a wild ride ever since.
The most fun I have had with the book so far has been visiting elementary schools. Last September, my wonderfully brilliant wife was brainstorming with a friend and came up with the idea to use the book as a fundraiser for our oldest son’s elementary school. The plan was for me to read the book to the kindergarten and first grade classes, then sell the book to the parents of said children, and make the school millions of dollars. We pitched the idea to the school, and their response was, “We’d LOVE to have you come read your book to the kids. And I guess it would be OK with us if you want to sell it, too.”
I didn’t think they were really grasping what a financial boon this would be to their school, but we were nonetheless very happy that they said yes. Well, we went and did the fundraiser, and I can report with absolute certainty that they knew EXACTLY what kind of financial boon I would be for their school. We raised $38.
They had a jog-a-thon the week before that raised $10,000.
You’re welcome!
Wild financial successes aside, I had a very eye-opening experience when I read to the first class. I discovered that there is nothing I like better than reading to 6-year-olds, and teaching them things. Prior to the fundraiser, we figured I’d better have something up my sleeve besides just the book, because reading it only takes about five minutes. I sat down and came up with some fun facts about each one of the ten African animals in the book. The “reading” consisted of five minutes with the book and twenty-five minutes of crazy antics and funny noises as the kids learned how strong monkeys are, how hippos floss their teeth and what porcupine quills are made of.
It was such a success in terms of the children’s and teacher’s reactions to the presentation that the head of the school district’s libraries asked me to visit the rest of the elementary schools in our town. Over the last year, I have read my book to 14 local elementary schools.
I have visited 71 kindergarten and first-grade classes and read to about 1420 kids. I bring a little stuffed animal giraffe that I toss to the kid who gets to pick the next animal we talk about. Since there are ten animals in the book, just over 700 different kids have handled that little stuffed giraffe. I should probably burn it now.
Before we go any farther, we need to be clear about something. When I said that there is nothing I like better than reading to 6-year-olds, and teaching them things, please don’t mistake that for a desire to become a kindergarten teacher. That is not going to happen. I am not tough enough, mentally or physically. I have a better shot at becoming a Navy SEAL.
All I can say after this past year, is God bless every single elementary school teacher in this world. I have no idea how they do it! They have to spend all day with them! I was wiped out after the first class I read to. By the end of the first morning of reading to five classes, I was so mentally exhausted, I could barely remember how to drive when I finally found my car in the parking lot.
And I now know for a fact that women are 100% mentally tougher than men, because of the 71 classes I visited, 70 of them had female teachers. Every one of those ladies was in complete control, and the one male teacher I met looked as frazzled as I was. We owe elementary school teachers a huge debt of gratitude, because without them, hoards of 6 and 7-year-olds would be unleashed upon the world to constantly ask us, “Why?” during the middle of the day. They are our first, last, and only line of defense.
Actually, one thing that I immediately liked about my time in the classrooms was the random comments from the children. Here are some of the highlights:
From a first-grader in the front row during the hippo facts – “You have lots of fillings in your teeth.” – Yes I do, son. Remember to floss, kids.
From a boy in a kindergarten class during the jackal facts – “I rode a jackal once.”
Same kid, when I was discussing deer during the antelope facts – “I shot a deer once. With a bb gun... No one was around, though. It was at night.” – OK, well, if no one was around, I guess I won’t try to verify your story.
While waiting for some other kids to arrive, I was asking a kindergarten class what they were going to do over the long weekend. One little girl answered, "I'm going to the snow this weekend, because our dog is getting spayed." – Well, sure. That makes sense.
When discussing why elephants flap their ears, I would say, "An elephant's ears are full of..." - Two boys sitting next to each other in one class blurted out, "Vitamins!" "Ear wax!" - (The correct answer is, of course, blood vessels.) - Other popular answers have been air, dirt, hair, bugs, water and noise.
When discussing porcupines, I ask the class if any of them can shoot the hair out of their heads at me. (Leading up to debunking the common myth that porcupines can shoot their quills.) One girl said to me, "You don't have any hair on your head, because you're bald." - Her teacher turned beet red, and I just about fell out of my chair laughing.
I ended the lion facts by adding the little aside, “Did you know that daddy lions are really lazy? They just lay around in the shade all day and the mommy lions do all the work.” – One boy piped up and said, “Yeah. My dad’s lazy, too. He just lies on the couch all day.” – Well, son, not everyone is cut out to be the president.
My favorite random comment of the year was from a first-grader. I was always pressed for time, since my presentation took the full half-hour, and I was usually running between classrooms, so I didn’t have much time to field unscheduled questions. Almost immediately when I entered one of the first-grade classes at Valley View Elementary, one of the student’s hands shot up in the air. He kept his hand up, straining into the air for the entire half-hour, despite his teacher’s protests. When I finished up, I finally said, "OK, what is your question?" – He said, "I have a pet goldfish."
We ended up raising just under $500 for the elementary schools here in town, and over the course of the last year I was able to donate 220 of my books to classrooms, libraries, day cares, preschools, doctor’s offices, dental offices, hospitals, and any kid I could find that just looked like they needed a good book.
Visiting that many schools while holding down a regular job presented a few challenges, but in the end, I wouldn’t have traded it for anything, and I hope I get to keep doing it. I have received quite a few thank-you notes and some amazing 6 and 7-year-old artistic renderings of favorite pages from the book. Every one of them made my day, but in the end, it was one little girl that stole my heart.
I was having a great time all year, and every school I visited was a wonderful experience, but it wasn’t until the second-to-last school of the year that I really figured out why I was there. We had just finished the reading and the fun facts in Mrs. Hungerford’s kindergarten class at Breen Elementary, and after saying our goodbyes, I was gathering my things and preparing to sprint to the next classroom. All the children were still sitting in their places on the floor at the front of the room, and I was almost out the door when one little girl got up off the carpet and ran over to me. She never said a word. She just hugged my leg and then ran back to her seat.
That was payment in full for my efforts all year long.
Thanks, sweetheart, and thanks again to all the Rocklin elementary schools for letting me pursue my dream!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
The most fun I have had with the book so far has been visiting elementary schools. Last September, my wonderfully brilliant wife was brainstorming with a friend and came up with the idea to use the book as a fundraiser for our oldest son’s elementary school. The plan was for me to read the book to the kindergarten and first grade classes, then sell the book to the parents of said children, and make the school millions of dollars. We pitched the idea to the school, and their response was, “We’d LOVE to have you come read your book to the kids. And I guess it would be OK with us if you want to sell it, too.”
I didn’t think they were really grasping what a financial boon this would be to their school, but we were nonetheless very happy that they said yes. Well, we went and did the fundraiser, and I can report with absolute certainty that they knew EXACTLY what kind of financial boon I would be for their school. We raised $38.
They had a jog-a-thon the week before that raised $10,000.
You’re welcome!
Wild financial successes aside, I had a very eye-opening experience when I read to the first class. I discovered that there is nothing I like better than reading to 6-year-olds, and teaching them things. Prior to the fundraiser, we figured I’d better have something up my sleeve besides just the book, because reading it only takes about five minutes. I sat down and came up with some fun facts about each one of the ten African animals in the book. The “reading” consisted of five minutes with the book and twenty-five minutes of crazy antics and funny noises as the kids learned how strong monkeys are, how hippos floss their teeth and what porcupine quills are made of.
It was such a success in terms of the children’s and teacher’s reactions to the presentation that the head of the school district’s libraries asked me to visit the rest of the elementary schools in our town. Over the last year, I have read my book to 14 local elementary schools.
I have visited 71 kindergarten and first-grade classes and read to about 1420 kids. I bring a little stuffed animal giraffe that I toss to the kid who gets to pick the next animal we talk about. Since there are ten animals in the book, just over 700 different kids have handled that little stuffed giraffe. I should probably burn it now.
Before we go any farther, we need to be clear about something. When I said that there is nothing I like better than reading to 6-year-olds, and teaching them things, please don’t mistake that for a desire to become a kindergarten teacher. That is not going to happen. I am not tough enough, mentally or physically. I have a better shot at becoming a Navy SEAL.
All I can say after this past year, is God bless every single elementary school teacher in this world. I have no idea how they do it! They have to spend all day with them! I was wiped out after the first class I read to. By the end of the first morning of reading to five classes, I was so mentally exhausted, I could barely remember how to drive when I finally found my car in the parking lot.
And I now know for a fact that women are 100% mentally tougher than men, because of the 71 classes I visited, 70 of them had female teachers. Every one of those ladies was in complete control, and the one male teacher I met looked as frazzled as I was. We owe elementary school teachers a huge debt of gratitude, because without them, hoards of 6 and 7-year-olds would be unleashed upon the world to constantly ask us, “Why?” during the middle of the day. They are our first, last, and only line of defense.
Actually, one thing that I immediately liked about my time in the classrooms was the random comments from the children. Here are some of the highlights:
From a first-grader in the front row during the hippo facts – “You have lots of fillings in your teeth.” – Yes I do, son. Remember to floss, kids.
From a boy in a kindergarten class during the jackal facts – “I rode a jackal once.”
Same kid, when I was discussing deer during the antelope facts – “I shot a deer once. With a bb gun... No one was around, though. It was at night.” – OK, well, if no one was around, I guess I won’t try to verify your story.
While waiting for some other kids to arrive, I was asking a kindergarten class what they were going to do over the long weekend. One little girl answered, "I'm going to the snow this weekend, because our dog is getting spayed." – Well, sure. That makes sense.
When discussing why elephants flap their ears, I would say, "An elephant's ears are full of..." - Two boys sitting next to each other in one class blurted out, "Vitamins!" "Ear wax!" - (The correct answer is, of course, blood vessels.) - Other popular answers have been air, dirt, hair, bugs, water and noise.
When discussing porcupines, I ask the class if any of them can shoot the hair out of their heads at me. (Leading up to debunking the common myth that porcupines can shoot their quills.) One girl said to me, "You don't have any hair on your head, because you're bald." - Her teacher turned beet red, and I just about fell out of my chair laughing.
I ended the lion facts by adding the little aside, “Did you know that daddy lions are really lazy? They just lay around in the shade all day and the mommy lions do all the work.” – One boy piped up and said, “Yeah. My dad’s lazy, too. He just lies on the couch all day.” – Well, son, not everyone is cut out to be the president.
My favorite random comment of the year was from a first-grader. I was always pressed for time, since my presentation took the full half-hour, and I was usually running between classrooms, so I didn’t have much time to field unscheduled questions. Almost immediately when I entered one of the first-grade classes at Valley View Elementary, one of the student’s hands shot up in the air. He kept his hand up, straining into the air for the entire half-hour, despite his teacher’s protests. When I finished up, I finally said, "OK, what is your question?" – He said, "I have a pet goldfish."
We ended up raising just under $500 for the elementary schools here in town, and over the course of the last year I was able to donate 220 of my books to classrooms, libraries, day cares, preschools, doctor’s offices, dental offices, hospitals, and any kid I could find that just looked like they needed a good book.
Visiting that many schools while holding down a regular job presented a few challenges, but in the end, I wouldn’t have traded it for anything, and I hope I get to keep doing it. I have received quite a few thank-you notes and some amazing 6 and 7-year-old artistic renderings of favorite pages from the book. Every one of them made my day, but in the end, it was one little girl that stole my heart.
I was having a great time all year, and every school I visited was a wonderful experience, but it wasn’t until the second-to-last school of the year that I really figured out why I was there. We had just finished the reading and the fun facts in Mrs. Hungerford’s kindergarten class at Breen Elementary, and after saying our goodbyes, I was gathering my things and preparing to sprint to the next classroom. All the children were still sitting in their places on the floor at the front of the room, and I was almost out the door when one little girl got up off the carpet and ran over to me. She never said a word. She just hugged my leg and then ran back to her seat.
That was payment in full for my efforts all year long.
Thanks, sweetheart, and thanks again to all the Rocklin elementary schools for letting me pursue my dream!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
No Respect
I’m starting to feel like my wife. At least, how I think she must feel, when she’s dealing with our kids. She gets no respect.
Now, let’s be clear. She does get the kind of respect that is required of children by their parents. For the most part they come when called and do what they are asked. Some days they are on the ball, and some days they give her just enough respect in the right areas to avoid physical harm, but on the whole, they behave themselves for her. It’s in the area of knowledge and opinion that she gets the short end of the stick. They will not take her word for anything, but they will believe anything I tell them.
Neither of us knows why that is, but it has been the case for as long as we can remember. At least it had until a few days ago. Apparently, God is finally feeling sorry for my wife, and has sent our third child, Boy Number Three, to set things straight.
The turning point occurred the other day when my three-year-old son sat down on the floor to put his flip-flops on. He gets one on his foot, looks up at me, and asks, “Is this the right foot?” I tell him no… and he argues with me.
Excuse me? I am your father. I know which foot is which, and which shoe goes on which foot, thank you very much!
“No, Son, that is not the right foot.”
“Yes it is.”
(Not only was it the wrong flip-flop for the chosen foot, but it was also his left foot, so there was no way I was misinterpreting his question. He was just flat-out wrong.)
“No it isn’t. That one goes on the other foot.”
“Mommy!”
“You don’t need to ask Mommy. I know which is which.”
“No you don’t. Mommy!”
“I assure you, I know all about shoes and feet. We don’t need to consult Mommy.”
“Mommy!”
I was dumbfounded. Not only was my three-year-old ignoring my shoe advice, but he was blatantly telling me I didn’t know what I was talking about. We were in brand-new territory for me, here. Up until this point, my knowledge and opinion on any subject had stood without question. Not with my wife, mind you, (or any other adult for that matter), but with my kids.
With the first two, I could tell them anything and they would believe me. I told them Jell-O was made out of cow bones, and they just said, “Cool." If their mom told them that the sky was blue, they would run and check with me. (Both of those things are true, but which one would you question?)
When Mommy showed up to help out with the shoe debate, I was forced to stand there and listen while my wife explained to our third child that Daddy knows how shoes work, just like she does, and it’s OK to listen to me about which foot is which. Then she stood up, and with a wry smile, gave me a consoling kiss on the cheek, and a not-so-consoling giggle.
Later that day, my wife was going to be gone for a few hours at dinner time. She cooked us a pizza before she left, kissed the boys, and headed out the door. Five minutes later, I told the boys it was time for dinner. Boy Number One and Two headed for the table, but Number Three argued with me.
"No! Mommy said it wasn’t dinner time yet. Mommy said we have to wait. Mommy said her chart sayed below for drain." (Sometimes he’s pretty hard to understand, especially when he’s worked up.) I actually had to pick him up to keep him from trying to drag me out of the kitchen, calm him down, and show him the cooked pizza before he would believe me.
Now, I guess it wouldn't be so bad if I thought that Son Number Three just didn't trust my opinion on certain subjects. It would be weird, but it would at least be semi-tolerable. The problem is, I'm getting the feeling he doesn't think I have any authority in any matters. I have received some pretty clear evidence that this is the case in the last few days.
We have a rule in our house. No answer shopping. If you don’t like daddy’s answer to your question of, “May I go play with this real sword I just found,” you are not allowed to go ask your mother the same question in hopes of a better answer. (That’s actually a bad example, because I would have probably said, “Yes.”) Anyway, the rule is, you take the answer you get and don't go looking for a better one somewhere else.
Boy Number Three is apparently so off the rails with his lack of trust in my ability to parent him that he has actually started reverse answer shopping. Here is an actual conversation I had with him the other day:
“Daddy, can I have a cookie?”
“Yes.”
“Mommy! Can I have a cookie?”
I mean, seriously! What kind of logic is that? Is he honestly thinking, "Well, OK. This man here just gave me the answer I was looking for, but I'm not confident that he has my best interests at heart. I'm not sure that I trust his judgment, and as such, even though I really want that delicious cookie, I think I will consult an adult that I know loves and cares for me."
This newfound situation has me thrown for a loop. My wife thinks it is endlessly humorous, but I am at a loss. Why doesn't my third child trust me? What have I done to bring this on?
Maybe... Just maybe, like his mom, he doesn't think that kids should play with real swords?
Naw! That can't be it.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Now, let’s be clear. She does get the kind of respect that is required of children by their parents. For the most part they come when called and do what they are asked. Some days they are on the ball, and some days they give her just enough respect in the right areas to avoid physical harm, but on the whole, they behave themselves for her. It’s in the area of knowledge and opinion that she gets the short end of the stick. They will not take her word for anything, but they will believe anything I tell them.
Neither of us knows why that is, but it has been the case for as long as we can remember. At least it had until a few days ago. Apparently, God is finally feeling sorry for my wife, and has sent our third child, Boy Number Three, to set things straight.
The turning point occurred the other day when my three-year-old son sat down on the floor to put his flip-flops on. He gets one on his foot, looks up at me, and asks, “Is this the right foot?” I tell him no… and he argues with me.
Excuse me? I am your father. I know which foot is which, and which shoe goes on which foot, thank you very much!
“No, Son, that is not the right foot.”
“Yes it is.”
(Not only was it the wrong flip-flop for the chosen foot, but it was also his left foot, so there was no way I was misinterpreting his question. He was just flat-out wrong.)
“No it isn’t. That one goes on the other foot.”
“Mommy!”
“You don’t need to ask Mommy. I know which is which.”
“No you don’t. Mommy!”
“I assure you, I know all about shoes and feet. We don’t need to consult Mommy.”
“Mommy!”
I was dumbfounded. Not only was my three-year-old ignoring my shoe advice, but he was blatantly telling me I didn’t know what I was talking about. We were in brand-new territory for me, here. Up until this point, my knowledge and opinion on any subject had stood without question. Not with my wife, mind you, (or any other adult for that matter), but with my kids.
With the first two, I could tell them anything and they would believe me. I told them Jell-O was made out of cow bones, and they just said, “Cool." If their mom told them that the sky was blue, they would run and check with me. (Both of those things are true, but which one would you question?)
When Mommy showed up to help out with the shoe debate, I was forced to stand there and listen while my wife explained to our third child that Daddy knows how shoes work, just like she does, and it’s OK to listen to me about which foot is which. Then she stood up, and with a wry smile, gave me a consoling kiss on the cheek, and a not-so-consoling giggle.
Later that day, my wife was going to be gone for a few hours at dinner time. She cooked us a pizza before she left, kissed the boys, and headed out the door. Five minutes later, I told the boys it was time for dinner. Boy Number One and Two headed for the table, but Number Three argued with me.
"No! Mommy said it wasn’t dinner time yet. Mommy said we have to wait. Mommy said her chart sayed below for drain." (Sometimes he’s pretty hard to understand, especially when he’s worked up.) I actually had to pick him up to keep him from trying to drag me out of the kitchen, calm him down, and show him the cooked pizza before he would believe me.
Now, I guess it wouldn't be so bad if I thought that Son Number Three just didn't trust my opinion on certain subjects. It would be weird, but it would at least be semi-tolerable. The problem is, I'm getting the feeling he doesn't think I have any authority in any matters. I have received some pretty clear evidence that this is the case in the last few days.
We have a rule in our house. No answer shopping. If you don’t like daddy’s answer to your question of, “May I go play with this real sword I just found,” you are not allowed to go ask your mother the same question in hopes of a better answer. (That’s actually a bad example, because I would have probably said, “Yes.”) Anyway, the rule is, you take the answer you get and don't go looking for a better one somewhere else.
Boy Number Three is apparently so off the rails with his lack of trust in my ability to parent him that he has actually started reverse answer shopping. Here is an actual conversation I had with him the other day:
“Daddy, can I have a cookie?”
“Yes.”
“Mommy! Can I have a cookie?”
I mean, seriously! What kind of logic is that? Is he honestly thinking, "Well, OK. This man here just gave me the answer I was looking for, but I'm not confident that he has my best interests at heart. I'm not sure that I trust his judgment, and as such, even though I really want that delicious cookie, I think I will consult an adult that I know loves and cares for me."
This newfound situation has me thrown for a loop. My wife thinks it is endlessly humorous, but I am at a loss. Why doesn't my third child trust me? What have I done to bring this on?
Maybe... Just maybe, like his mom, he doesn't think that kids should play with real swords?
Naw! That can't be it.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Potty Training Out Loud
My wife and I have three boys. Boy Number Three just turned three years old and is the last one in diapers. We started potty training him last week. I don’t know if you have ever potty trained anyone or anything, but let me tell you, it can get exciting for a whole bunch of different reasons.
For starters, my wife and I are excited at the prospect of being done with diapers for good. We’ve been knee-deep in them for six and a half years now, and we can finally see the light at the end of the dark and stinky tunnel. It’s such a wonderful thought that we almost dare not speak it, for fear of jinxing it.
No more expensive diapers! No more expensive wipes. No more disgusting diapers! No more used wipes. No more storing used diapers and their nefarious contents in my garage. No more storing eight-foot-square Costco-sized cases of diapers in my garage. No more packages of diapers and wipes falling out at me from every closet in the house.
No more questioning Boy Number Three about the current situation in his pants. No more needing to check the validity of said boy's answer. (He has never been very reliable.) Never again will we need to bend down and go sniffing around his butt like an ill-mannered hound dog. No more stomach-over-the-forearm, pull-up-the-back-of-the-shorts visual poop checks. We are mere days away from becoming a civilized family that fully utilizes their indoor plumbing. It’s all very exciting!
Then there is the other kind of excitement. Part of the deal with potty training involves gambling. This is when you put the child in “big boy underwear” and let them roam freely around the house, while you chew your nails and inquire with them every 10-12 seconds if they need to go sit on the potty. About every half-hour or so, your nerves are so frayed that you just go set them on the potty as a preemptive measure.
At our house, if you pee on the potty, you get five M&Ms. For our kids who don’t get candy on a regular basis, that tends to be a big deal. If you poop on the potty, you get a whole bunch of M&Ms. The amount varies depending on how excited the parent is that they just dodged a bullet. I give him the whole bag.
Most of the time, however, you end up cleaning up a mess instead of handing out congratulatory candy-coated chocolate. With Boy Number Three, this has been quite an ordeal. Not due to the messes so much as the raw emotion involved. You see, Number Three is either not very smart, or a super-genius. I haven’t decided which yet. He either can’t seem to get his terminology right, or he is so brilliant that at age three, he has already mastered reverse psychology and corporate level negotiating techniques. Allow me to explain.
He keeps mixing up the terms “poop” and “pee.” He will be in big boy underwear upstairs and yell down in a sad voice that he is poopy. You run upstairs in a panic, expecting the worst, only to find that he has peed, but not pooped.
Because you were mentally prepared for the worst, after you realize the real situation at hand, you are actually happy to only be cleaning up pee. You are so happy not to be scrubbing something far worse out of the upholstery that you almost thank him for peeing in his pants and on the couch. Go figure.
Like I said, he may be the smartest kid on the planet, or he may just be really bad with terminology. I’m leaning toward the latter, because I can’t really see any upside to peeing all over yourself and missing out on free candy, and a genius would have probably figured that out by now, three years old or not.
Anyway, we’re in the midst of it all, and we’re excited that we’re so close to being diaperless. My wife is so excited about the prospect of a carefree life without poopy pants that she temporarily lost her mind the other day, and inadvertently gave me the opportunity to discover just how excited I really am about living a diaper-free life.
I was at the office and my cell phone rang. It was my wife, who in an excited voice announced that Number Three had just pooped on the potty, and then immediately put Number Three on the phone. She didn't ask me where I was or if I could talk, she just put him on the phone. Then, my three-year-old tells me he just pooped on the potty, FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME IN HIS WHOLE LIFE.
I am standing in the middle of my office. My co-workers are all around, and my son is breathlessly awaiting my response. I need to make a very quick decision. On the one hand, I obviously need to be very excited and congratulatory. This is a huge deal and needs to be treated that way. We need to joyously convey the message to him that we are very happy and he has done a great thing.
On the other hand, I am at the office, and would like to maintain a certain level of decorum. I am standing next to the boss’s office. There are people on the phone with customers. On the whole, I would like to keep things with my colleagues on a professional level, and joyous congratulations about pooping aren’t exactly professional.
I learned something about myself that day. I realized, almost instantly, that my distain for dirty diapers greatly outweighs my desire to remain professional.
"GREAT JOB POOPING ON THE POTTY, BUDDY!" I yelled into the phone.
Work is a little weird now, but I don’t care. I really want to be done with diapers!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
For starters, my wife and I are excited at the prospect of being done with diapers for good. We’ve been knee-deep in them for six and a half years now, and we can finally see the light at the end of the dark and stinky tunnel. It’s such a wonderful thought that we almost dare not speak it, for fear of jinxing it.
No more expensive diapers! No more expensive wipes. No more disgusting diapers! No more used wipes. No more storing used diapers and their nefarious contents in my garage. No more storing eight-foot-square Costco-sized cases of diapers in my garage. No more packages of diapers and wipes falling out at me from every closet in the house.
No more questioning Boy Number Three about the current situation in his pants. No more needing to check the validity of said boy's answer. (He has never been very reliable.) Never again will we need to bend down and go sniffing around his butt like an ill-mannered hound dog. No more stomach-over-the-forearm, pull-up-the-back-of-the-shorts visual poop checks. We are mere days away from becoming a civilized family that fully utilizes their indoor plumbing. It’s all very exciting!
Then there is the other kind of excitement. Part of the deal with potty training involves gambling. This is when you put the child in “big boy underwear” and let them roam freely around the house, while you chew your nails and inquire with them every 10-12 seconds if they need to go sit on the potty. About every half-hour or so, your nerves are so frayed that you just go set them on the potty as a preemptive measure.
At our house, if you pee on the potty, you get five M&Ms. For our kids who don’t get candy on a regular basis, that tends to be a big deal. If you poop on the potty, you get a whole bunch of M&Ms. The amount varies depending on how excited the parent is that they just dodged a bullet. I give him the whole bag.
Most of the time, however, you end up cleaning up a mess instead of handing out congratulatory candy-coated chocolate. With Boy Number Three, this has been quite an ordeal. Not due to the messes so much as the raw emotion involved. You see, Number Three is either not very smart, or a super-genius. I haven’t decided which yet. He either can’t seem to get his terminology right, or he is so brilliant that at age three, he has already mastered reverse psychology and corporate level negotiating techniques. Allow me to explain.
He keeps mixing up the terms “poop” and “pee.” He will be in big boy underwear upstairs and yell down in a sad voice that he is poopy. You run upstairs in a panic, expecting the worst, only to find that he has peed, but not pooped.
Because you were mentally prepared for the worst, after you realize the real situation at hand, you are actually happy to only be cleaning up pee. You are so happy not to be scrubbing something far worse out of the upholstery that you almost thank him for peeing in his pants and on the couch. Go figure.
Like I said, he may be the smartest kid on the planet, or he may just be really bad with terminology. I’m leaning toward the latter, because I can’t really see any upside to peeing all over yourself and missing out on free candy, and a genius would have probably figured that out by now, three years old or not.
Anyway, we’re in the midst of it all, and we’re excited that we’re so close to being diaperless. My wife is so excited about the prospect of a carefree life without poopy pants that she temporarily lost her mind the other day, and inadvertently gave me the opportunity to discover just how excited I really am about living a diaper-free life.
I was at the office and my cell phone rang. It was my wife, who in an excited voice announced that Number Three had just pooped on the potty, and then immediately put Number Three on the phone. She didn't ask me where I was or if I could talk, she just put him on the phone. Then, my three-year-old tells me he just pooped on the potty, FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME IN HIS WHOLE LIFE.
I am standing in the middle of my office. My co-workers are all around, and my son is breathlessly awaiting my response. I need to make a very quick decision. On the one hand, I obviously need to be very excited and congratulatory. This is a huge deal and needs to be treated that way. We need to joyously convey the message to him that we are very happy and he has done a great thing.
On the other hand, I am at the office, and would like to maintain a certain level of decorum. I am standing next to the boss’s office. There are people on the phone with customers. On the whole, I would like to keep things with my colleagues on a professional level, and joyous congratulations about pooping aren’t exactly professional.
I learned something about myself that day. I realized, almost instantly, that my distain for dirty diapers greatly outweighs my desire to remain professional.
"GREAT JOB POOPING ON THE POTTY, BUDDY!" I yelled into the phone.
Work is a little weird now, but I don’t care. I really want to be done with diapers!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Mother's Day Done Better
If you have been following my weekly ramblings for any length of time, you might recall the tale of my impeccable handling of last Mother’s Day.
I had skillfully purchased tickets to a demolition derby that happened to be scheduled on the same day that America was holding Mother’s Day. The derby promoters refused my requests to move the event up a day, so I was forced to explain to my wife why it would be a good thing for me to take the boys away to a car smashing event on her special day. To add a slight level of difficulty, I had to explain my reasoning while dodging cookware being thrown at my head.
I broke the news of my inadvertent double-booking a week or so before Mother’s Day. By “broke the news,” I of course mean that she told me what I had done. Then she threw a saucepan at me. Anyway, she was able to calm down in a day or three, and finally saw the error in her initial reaction, or so I thought. She acquiesced and agreed that the gift of relative solitude (I was leaving her with Boy Number Three while the other two went to the derby with me) that I had so thoughtfully provided her was indeed a fine Mother’s Day gift from a loving husband. A few days later she even helped me figure out what the boys could get her for Mother’s Day, since their dad obviously had no clue.
Going so far as to tell me that she had found an “easy and fun” way to have the boys make her gifts, she presented me with the news that I would be going to our local home improvement store on the coming Saturday morning. They were having a kid’s craft event for Mother’s Day, where the kids could make their mothers a flower pot holder. Better yet, it was free!
My initial reaction was, “Oh, OK, great. That should be fun.”
I am a stupid, stupid man. Obviously it was a trap. A trap of retribution.
Off I drove with the boys on Saturday morning, oblivious to my real situation. Fortunately for me, Boy Number Three was deemed too young to come to this event as well, so he stayed home with mom. I am convinced that is the only reason why I made it out of there alive. I barely made it through the ordeal with two boys, but adding the third youngest one would have surely been the coup de grace.
It started off innocently enough. We were greeted by teenage store employees who outfitted the boys with kid-size orange store aprons with their names written on the front in black Sharpie marker, which they thought were really cool. Then they handed us our flower pot holder kits, and invited us to pick any open spot at one of the many workbenches set up for the occasion. That’s where things began to go south.
My first question caught them off guard. “Where are the kid’s workbenches?” I asked.
“Those are the kid’s workbenches, sir.”
“Why are there hammers on the workbenches?”
“To hammer the nails, sir.”
“Nails!?!”
“Yes, sir. They’re included in your kit. You’re supposed to glue the joints and then nail them together.”
“Glue!?!”
“Yes, sir. Is there a problem?”
“Is it real glue and real nails?”
“Of course, sir.”
“Then, yes. We have a problem. You mean to tell me that these things don’t just snap together like Legos? You want my four-year-old to be swinging a hammer?”
“Well, we don’t think they should swing them, so much as just tap the nails into place.”
“Have you ever met a four-year-old boy?”
Oh, well. There was no going home empty handed, so to the workbench we went.
Two minutes later, as I had predicted, I was refereeing a tug-of-war over an erupting bottle of Elmer’s wood glue and desperately dodging the claw ends of two fast moving hammers.
I found myself holding miniature nails upright between my thumb and index finger, praying the first blow would be to the head of the nail, and not to the head of the dad, or to the fingers, hand, arm, or face of the dad.
I spent a considerable amount of time fighting back the onslaught of excess glue with almost an entire roll of paper towels, all the while trying to decipher the steadily more glue-ridden assembly instructions before my boys had nailed or glued something to the wrong spot.
It was a lot like trying to do a crossword puzzle while trapped inside a spinning dryer full of open glue bottles and claw hammers. And nails.
After we had somehow managed to complete two fairly intact and somewhat recognizable flower pot stands, and the employees had found me some extra-large gauze pads and an ice pack, we made our way to the garden section to find some nice Mother’s Day flowers to adorn our new creations.
I foolishly thought that this would be the easy part. How hard could it be to find a couple of small flowers in pots? Ha! You have obviously never shopped for flowers with my boys! Neither had I.
Apparently my children are not very impressed with ordinary, everyday, run-of-the-mill flowers. They seem to only be attracted to the high-dollar exotic breed flowers. No azaleas or daisies for their mommy! No, they just had to buy mom the Madagascar crouching tiger orchid and the greenhouse-raised Turkish gold river lilac, each costing about the same amount as an entire pallet of rose bushes, and both guaranteed to last about 1.7 hours under our family’s expert horticultural care.
Again, I couldn’t go home with two boys telling their already emotionally iffy mother that Daddy wouldn’t let them buy the pretty flowers for her, so out came the credit card. Ka-ching.
The whole experience hurt. Physically, financially, emotionally, you name it, it hurt. All things considered, I think I would have rather gone to the mall, and you know how I feel about the mall.
When we got home, my wife gave me a sly smile and said, “How did the project go, sweety?”
I knew right then and there that this had been payback for my demolition derby scheduling blunder and lack of believable spin on the reason why. As I went to get a fresh ice pack, I vowed not to make that same mistake again. She is way too smart for me.
True to my vow, this year I learned from last year’s mistakes. This year I won’t fall into any of those traps. This year there is absolutely no way for me to get into any trouble!
This year, I have planned absolutely nothing for Mother’s Day.
Smooth sailing ahead!
Right?
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
I had skillfully purchased tickets to a demolition derby that happened to be scheduled on the same day that America was holding Mother’s Day. The derby promoters refused my requests to move the event up a day, so I was forced to explain to my wife why it would be a good thing for me to take the boys away to a car smashing event on her special day. To add a slight level of difficulty, I had to explain my reasoning while dodging cookware being thrown at my head.
I broke the news of my inadvertent double-booking a week or so before Mother’s Day. By “broke the news,” I of course mean that she told me what I had done. Then she threw a saucepan at me. Anyway, she was able to calm down in a day or three, and finally saw the error in her initial reaction, or so I thought. She acquiesced and agreed that the gift of relative solitude (I was leaving her with Boy Number Three while the other two went to the derby with me) that I had so thoughtfully provided her was indeed a fine Mother’s Day gift from a loving husband. A few days later she even helped me figure out what the boys could get her for Mother’s Day, since their dad obviously had no clue.
Going so far as to tell me that she had found an “easy and fun” way to have the boys make her gifts, she presented me with the news that I would be going to our local home improvement store on the coming Saturday morning. They were having a kid’s craft event for Mother’s Day, where the kids could make their mothers a flower pot holder. Better yet, it was free!
My initial reaction was, “Oh, OK, great. That should be fun.”
I am a stupid, stupid man. Obviously it was a trap. A trap of retribution.
Off I drove with the boys on Saturday morning, oblivious to my real situation. Fortunately for me, Boy Number Three was deemed too young to come to this event as well, so he stayed home with mom. I am convinced that is the only reason why I made it out of there alive. I barely made it through the ordeal with two boys, but adding the third youngest one would have surely been the coup de grace.
It started off innocently enough. We were greeted by teenage store employees who outfitted the boys with kid-size orange store aprons with their names written on the front in black Sharpie marker, which they thought were really cool. Then they handed us our flower pot holder kits, and invited us to pick any open spot at one of the many workbenches set up for the occasion. That’s where things began to go south.
My first question caught them off guard. “Where are the kid’s workbenches?” I asked.
“Those are the kid’s workbenches, sir.”
“Why are there hammers on the workbenches?”
“To hammer the nails, sir.”
“Nails!?!”
“Yes, sir. They’re included in your kit. You’re supposed to glue the joints and then nail them together.”
“Glue!?!”
“Yes, sir. Is there a problem?”
“Is it real glue and real nails?”
“Of course, sir.”
“Then, yes. We have a problem. You mean to tell me that these things don’t just snap together like Legos? You want my four-year-old to be swinging a hammer?”
“Well, we don’t think they should swing them, so much as just tap the nails into place.”
“Have you ever met a four-year-old boy?”
Oh, well. There was no going home empty handed, so to the workbench we went.
Two minutes later, as I had predicted, I was refereeing a tug-of-war over an erupting bottle of Elmer’s wood glue and desperately dodging the claw ends of two fast moving hammers.
I found myself holding miniature nails upright between my thumb and index finger, praying the first blow would be to the head of the nail, and not to the head of the dad, or to the fingers, hand, arm, or face of the dad.
I spent a considerable amount of time fighting back the onslaught of excess glue with almost an entire roll of paper towels, all the while trying to decipher the steadily more glue-ridden assembly instructions before my boys had nailed or glued something to the wrong spot.
It was a lot like trying to do a crossword puzzle while trapped inside a spinning dryer full of open glue bottles and claw hammers. And nails.
After we had somehow managed to complete two fairly intact and somewhat recognizable flower pot stands, and the employees had found me some extra-large gauze pads and an ice pack, we made our way to the garden section to find some nice Mother’s Day flowers to adorn our new creations.
I foolishly thought that this would be the easy part. How hard could it be to find a couple of small flowers in pots? Ha! You have obviously never shopped for flowers with my boys! Neither had I.
Apparently my children are not very impressed with ordinary, everyday, run-of-the-mill flowers. They seem to only be attracted to the high-dollar exotic breed flowers. No azaleas or daisies for their mommy! No, they just had to buy mom the Madagascar crouching tiger orchid and the greenhouse-raised Turkish gold river lilac, each costing about the same amount as an entire pallet of rose bushes, and both guaranteed to last about 1.7 hours under our family’s expert horticultural care.
Again, I couldn’t go home with two boys telling their already emotionally iffy mother that Daddy wouldn’t let them buy the pretty flowers for her, so out came the credit card. Ka-ching.
The whole experience hurt. Physically, financially, emotionally, you name it, it hurt. All things considered, I think I would have rather gone to the mall, and you know how I feel about the mall.
When we got home, my wife gave me a sly smile and said, “How did the project go, sweety?”
I knew right then and there that this had been payback for my demolition derby scheduling blunder and lack of believable spin on the reason why. As I went to get a fresh ice pack, I vowed not to make that same mistake again. She is way too smart for me.
True to my vow, this year I learned from last year’s mistakes. This year I won’t fall into any of those traps. This year there is absolutely no way for me to get into any trouble!
This year, I have planned absolutely nothing for Mother’s Day.
Smooth sailing ahead!
Right?
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
The Post-Easter Egg Hunt
We learned a few things this year when we had our annual Easter egg hunt. We do a traditional event with a few real hardboiled eggs that the kids colored the day before, and then a lot of snap-together brightly colored hollow plastic eggs filled with jelly beans, M&Ms, and miniature candy bars. The eggs are hidden by the Easter Bunny, and the kids go haywire trying to procure as much sugar as possible in a limited timeframe.
The first thing we realized was our kids are surprisingly bad at finding small semi-hidden things. I always figured they would be really good at it, since they are closer to the ground. Not so. Most of the time, we had to stand over the egg, pointing to it, because verbal directions were just not cutting it. “It’s the only bright pink thing in that otherwise completely green and brown bush! Come on, dude! How hard is that? I can see it from all the way across the lawn!”
Maybe they’re all colorblind? That would explain a lot of the shirt/shorts/socks combinations that Son Number Two comes up with. My wife thinks their lack of ability to find things stems from the fact that they share my DNA. Many times she has accused me of going completely blind as soon as I open the door to the refrigerator or the pantry.
“Honey, where’s the hot sauce?”
“In the door, right in front of your face.”
“No, I already looked there. It’s not in here.”
(Sound of wife coming to the refrigerator, sighing heavily)
“Here it is.” (Handing me the hot sauce 0.13 seconds after arriving at the open refrigerator)
I have been certified completely un-blind by the DMV, so it is obvious to me that she has these things ingeniously hidden somewhere and then pulls a David Copperfield when she steps in front of me to retrieve the obviously hidden item, magically making it seem as if I am a doofus and it was right in front of my nose the whole time. I have no idea why she does that, but she’s good at it. She could have her own gig in Vegas.
Anyway, the second lesson we learned this Easter is to count the eggs before you hide them. If we had done that, we would at least have some idea of how many are still missing, because we have no idea where they were all hidden. That brings us to the third lesson we learned: Be careful who you have doing the egg hiding.
My wife and mother-in-law had spent the night before Easter filling the plastic eggs with candy, and as previously stated, neglecting to keep a count. On Easter morning, we all woke up, had breakfast, and headed for church. Not really one for a lot of churchin’, my father-in-law volunteered to stay behind and play the part of the Easter bunny. It had been on-again off-again rain in the early morning, and it was not clear which direction the weather was headed, so to be safe he opted to hide half of the eggs inside the house, and half of them outside. He did a very thorough job. The only problem was that apparently, as soon as an egg was hidden, its location was immediately erased from his memory.
Well, we got home from church and the kids immediately went at it, gathering as many eggs as they could while running at top speed. It was like watching a polo match without the horses or giant croquet mallets. Little colorful eggs getting kicked everywhere by children too excited to slow down long enough to actually pick them up on the first try.
When we had seemingly run out of places to look, the kids finally slowed down enough that we thought we could get a rough count of the findings.
“How many have we found?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t trust the boy’s math.”
“How many did we make?”
“I don’t know. A lot.”
“Dad, how many did you hide?”
“I have no idea.”
“Do you think we got them all?”
“I have no idea.”
“Does this look like how many we made?”
“I can’t tell. They’re all open now so it looks like twice as many.”
After some conferencing by my wife and her mom, and some rough guesses as to how many the kids had found, and some unanswered questions to the hider remaining unanswered, we decided we had probably not found all of them. The kids were already knee-deep in candy, so they didn’t really care, and we were getting hungry, so the Easter egg hunt unofficially ended with some debate about whether or not it was really finished.
I am here today to tell you that it was not.
We had rounded up and bagged all of the kid’s candy after they had devoured as much as they could get away with, and put it in the pantry for safekeeping and future orderly distribution. Later that day, however, the kids were a little too quiet upstairs and I went to investigate. I found them sitting silently around a pile of plastic egg shells and empty candy wrappers, chocolate smeared on their faces, dazed looks in their eyes, just one or two milligrams of sucrose away from three simultaneous diabetic comas. They had stumbled upon a previously unexplored section of the game room, and came up with two or three eggs each. So much for dinner.
The next morning as I was heading out the door to go to work, I found about six neighborhood kids in my front yard shrubbery. Most of them scattered like roaches when the light comes on, but the few brave souls who didn’t make a break for it informed me that a kid on his way to school had noticed a plastic Easter egg under one of our whatchamacallit bushes, and upon further investigation, had apparently hit the mother lode. It wasn’t too long before we had nine or ten kids searching our front yard and by all accounts, doing quite well for themselves. My apologies to their teachers that day!
After work that evening, I made a concerted sweep of both the front and back yards and came up with another basket full of eggs that had gone undiscovered the previous morning. Much to the boy’s dismay, those went into the trash under the guise of candy going bad if it stays outside too long, what with all the ants and ticks and fleas and whatnot. Everything except any mini Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, of course. Those don’t go bad, and need to go into Daddy’s tummy.
Well, I thought that was that. I had surely found them all.
I am here today to tell you that I had not.
The next evening I mowed the grass. The front lawn was uneventful, but the back lawn was downright exciting. In a surprising and painful kind of way.
About midway through the back lawn I ran over what I can only guess were two or three candy-filled plastic Easter eggs that had somehow remained hidden through all the various searches. If you have never hit a plastic Easter egg with a lawn mower blade spinning at 3600 RPM, I can assure you it is eventful.
Any chocolate that was in the eggs was instantly vaporized into a cloud of shiny gold and silver tinfoil dust. The plastic egg shells splintered into roughly 8000 individual shards of pastel-colored shrapnel and assaulted my shins and ankles with a fury that any military superpower would envy. Luckily, this all happened very quickly, so the other projectiles were away from the energy source and heading for their targets before the egg shell shrapnel had dropped me fully to the ground. It was the jelly beans that were the real weapon. Thankfully, I only took a direct hit from one of them, and it was on the side of my shoe where it was only able to cause major damage to one of the bones in my foot. The rest of the jelly beans dispersed from the bottom of the mower at about 400 MPH in all directions. Thankfully, our wooden picnic table took the majority of the beans heading toward the house, saving our sliding glass door from certain death. Many of the others were slowed slightly below lethal velocity by ricocheting off of nearby toys, trees, and bushes, but one or two of them got away clean and had a straight shot at the fence.
There are at least two holes in the fence that I’m pretty sure were not there prior to the jelly bean Claymore mine touching off under my mower. I’m pretty sure at least one of the high-velocity treats hit the neighbor’s dog… or one of their kids. I heard a high-pitched yelp, anyway. I would have investigated further, but I was down and crawling for cover.
The moral of the story is simple: If you’re going to hide eggs, people, keep an accurate count! And a map! And shinguards.
Besides my injuries, and possible unknown injuries to our neighbor’s pet or offspring, I have one more real concern. We know for a fact that there were eighteen hardboiled eggs that the kids colored, and we have only accounted for thirteen of them.
We are just praying they are all outside. We’ll find out soon enough.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
The first thing we realized was our kids are surprisingly bad at finding small semi-hidden things. I always figured they would be really good at it, since they are closer to the ground. Not so. Most of the time, we had to stand over the egg, pointing to it, because verbal directions were just not cutting it. “It’s the only bright pink thing in that otherwise completely green and brown bush! Come on, dude! How hard is that? I can see it from all the way across the lawn!”
Maybe they’re all colorblind? That would explain a lot of the shirt/shorts/socks combinations that Son Number Two comes up with. My wife thinks their lack of ability to find things stems from the fact that they share my DNA. Many times she has accused me of going completely blind as soon as I open the door to the refrigerator or the pantry.
“Honey, where’s the hot sauce?”
“In the door, right in front of your face.”
“No, I already looked there. It’s not in here.”
(Sound of wife coming to the refrigerator, sighing heavily)
“Here it is.” (Handing me the hot sauce 0.13 seconds after arriving at the open refrigerator)
I have been certified completely un-blind by the DMV, so it is obvious to me that she has these things ingeniously hidden somewhere and then pulls a David Copperfield when she steps in front of me to retrieve the obviously hidden item, magically making it seem as if I am a doofus and it was right in front of my nose the whole time. I have no idea why she does that, but she’s good at it. She could have her own gig in Vegas.
Anyway, the second lesson we learned this Easter is to count the eggs before you hide them. If we had done that, we would at least have some idea of how many are still missing, because we have no idea where they were all hidden. That brings us to the third lesson we learned: Be careful who you have doing the egg hiding.
My wife and mother-in-law had spent the night before Easter filling the plastic eggs with candy, and as previously stated, neglecting to keep a count. On Easter morning, we all woke up, had breakfast, and headed for church. Not really one for a lot of churchin’, my father-in-law volunteered to stay behind and play the part of the Easter bunny. It had been on-again off-again rain in the early morning, and it was not clear which direction the weather was headed, so to be safe he opted to hide half of the eggs inside the house, and half of them outside. He did a very thorough job. The only problem was that apparently, as soon as an egg was hidden, its location was immediately erased from his memory.
Well, we got home from church and the kids immediately went at it, gathering as many eggs as they could while running at top speed. It was like watching a polo match without the horses or giant croquet mallets. Little colorful eggs getting kicked everywhere by children too excited to slow down long enough to actually pick them up on the first try.
When we had seemingly run out of places to look, the kids finally slowed down enough that we thought we could get a rough count of the findings.
“How many have we found?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t trust the boy’s math.”
“How many did we make?”
“I don’t know. A lot.”
“Dad, how many did you hide?”
“I have no idea.”
“Do you think we got them all?”
“I have no idea.”
“Does this look like how many we made?”
“I can’t tell. They’re all open now so it looks like twice as many.”
After some conferencing by my wife and her mom, and some rough guesses as to how many the kids had found, and some unanswered questions to the hider remaining unanswered, we decided we had probably not found all of them. The kids were already knee-deep in candy, so they didn’t really care, and we were getting hungry, so the Easter egg hunt unofficially ended with some debate about whether or not it was really finished.
I am here today to tell you that it was not.
We had rounded up and bagged all of the kid’s candy after they had devoured as much as they could get away with, and put it in the pantry for safekeeping and future orderly distribution. Later that day, however, the kids were a little too quiet upstairs and I went to investigate. I found them sitting silently around a pile of plastic egg shells and empty candy wrappers, chocolate smeared on their faces, dazed looks in their eyes, just one or two milligrams of sucrose away from three simultaneous diabetic comas. They had stumbled upon a previously unexplored section of the game room, and came up with two or three eggs each. So much for dinner.
The next morning as I was heading out the door to go to work, I found about six neighborhood kids in my front yard shrubbery. Most of them scattered like roaches when the light comes on, but the few brave souls who didn’t make a break for it informed me that a kid on his way to school had noticed a plastic Easter egg under one of our whatchamacallit bushes, and upon further investigation, had apparently hit the mother lode. It wasn’t too long before we had nine or ten kids searching our front yard and by all accounts, doing quite well for themselves. My apologies to their teachers that day!
After work that evening, I made a concerted sweep of both the front and back yards and came up with another basket full of eggs that had gone undiscovered the previous morning. Much to the boy’s dismay, those went into the trash under the guise of candy going bad if it stays outside too long, what with all the ants and ticks and fleas and whatnot. Everything except any mini Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, of course. Those don’t go bad, and need to go into Daddy’s tummy.
Well, I thought that was that. I had surely found them all.
I am here today to tell you that I had not.
The next evening I mowed the grass. The front lawn was uneventful, but the back lawn was downright exciting. In a surprising and painful kind of way.
About midway through the back lawn I ran over what I can only guess were two or three candy-filled plastic Easter eggs that had somehow remained hidden through all the various searches. If you have never hit a plastic Easter egg with a lawn mower blade spinning at 3600 RPM, I can assure you it is eventful.
Any chocolate that was in the eggs was instantly vaporized into a cloud of shiny gold and silver tinfoil dust. The plastic egg shells splintered into roughly 8000 individual shards of pastel-colored shrapnel and assaulted my shins and ankles with a fury that any military superpower would envy. Luckily, this all happened very quickly, so the other projectiles were away from the energy source and heading for their targets before the egg shell shrapnel had dropped me fully to the ground. It was the jelly beans that were the real weapon. Thankfully, I only took a direct hit from one of them, and it was on the side of my shoe where it was only able to cause major damage to one of the bones in my foot. The rest of the jelly beans dispersed from the bottom of the mower at about 400 MPH in all directions. Thankfully, our wooden picnic table took the majority of the beans heading toward the house, saving our sliding glass door from certain death. Many of the others were slowed slightly below lethal velocity by ricocheting off of nearby toys, trees, and bushes, but one or two of them got away clean and had a straight shot at the fence.
There are at least two holes in the fence that I’m pretty sure were not there prior to the jelly bean Claymore mine touching off under my mower. I’m pretty sure at least one of the high-velocity treats hit the neighbor’s dog… or one of their kids. I heard a high-pitched yelp, anyway. I would have investigated further, but I was down and crawling for cover.
The moral of the story is simple: If you’re going to hide eggs, people, keep an accurate count! And a map! And shinguards.
Besides my injuries, and possible unknown injuries to our neighbor’s pet or offspring, I have one more real concern. We know for a fact that there were eighteen hardboiled eggs that the kids colored, and we have only accounted for thirteen of them.
We are just praying they are all outside. We’ll find out soon enough.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Wordy Endings
We all know about the dreaded “Dear John” letter, and maybe you have even received one in your day. Chances are, if you have, it went something like this:
Dear John,
When we first started dating I thought we would be together forever. But, as the months have passed, I have found us growing farther and farther apart. I have tried my best to work through our differences, but it is clear to me now that we just want different things out of life.
I don’t want to drag out a failing relationship any longer than necessary, so I am leaving you. You will always have a spot in my heart, but I must move on. I wish only the best for you in your life without me.
Jane
Things are a little different these days, with more and more segments of our population seeming to have their own languages. Among other things, these new forms of communication have drastically altered the way some of us say goodbye.
As an example, here is a recent “Dear John” letter from a corporate executive:
Dear John,
As we efforted to leverage our core competencies to grow a win-win valueship, at first I was convinced we had a winning solution set with massive back-end upside.
However, as mission-critical as your role has been in the framework of our enterprise, it seems that I am tasked with the lion’s share of the heavy lifting. Even in times of narrow bandwidth and actionable strike points, when we needed to be “all hands on deck,” you remained unincentivized. At the end of the day, we need to effort to be future-proof, and our current paradigm cannot be scaled to leverage a win-win without a dynamic, value-add synergy.
I have “opened the kimono” on our valueship and actioned to effort a paradigm shift in our synergy, but to no avail. After gaining some tribal knowledge from our core associates, it seems we are at a tipping point with our core values and core principles, and despite my immersion in the efforting, at the end of the day, without buy-in from your side, our valueship just doesn’t have a long tail.
Therefore, I am hereby diverging our win paths and dissolving our current enterprise. Going forward, I will be efforting to leverage my core competencies in new markets.
Best regards,
Jane
If you thought that was cryptic, get a load of this “Dear John” letter from a local realtor:
Dear John,
When we first started dating, I thought our relationship was as solid as granite. You had fantastic curb appeal, you were well maintained, low maintenance, and very well appointed. We were both “original owners,” and I thought that meant our relationship would be a great investment.
As the months went buy, however, I have begun to notice some quaint features about you that are too numerous to mention. When I realized our relationship needed TLC, I was willing to negotiate. Maybe I was just being a motivated buyer, or maybe it was a seller’s market, I don’t know which, but I was willing to put in the sweat equity to keep us from being back on the market.
I had thought you were a gourmet, but it turns out you are more “granite feel” than “sub-zero.” I thought you were a low-maintenance man who was in move-in condition. In reality, you seem to have a lot of deferred maintenance and are more of a fixer-upper than I had anticipated.
At this point, with what I have found after the initial inspection period, I am going to “back out of escrow” and make an offer on another fully furnished model. He’s a ranch style guy who has gorgeous features and really shows well. Sorry for the short sale on our relationship, but I have to move quickly. He’s priced to sell and going fast!
Bringing your dreams home,
Jane
Yikes! If you thought that was hard to follow, wait until you read this recent example of a “Dear John” text from an unidentified teenager:
To: Jonny327
From: cool-jane-girl99
u used 2 m8k me :)
u used 2 m8k me LOL
now u m8k me :(
i m de-friending u on fb and xing u from my contacts
:( :( :(
As much as I don’t like the new abbreviated texting language, all things considered, I like the third option the best. You can’t understand any of them, so if you’re being dumped, at least the text is a faster read. They say brevity is the soul of wit. It may also be the soul of breaking it off!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Dear John,
When we first started dating I thought we would be together forever. But, as the months have passed, I have found us growing farther and farther apart. I have tried my best to work through our differences, but it is clear to me now that we just want different things out of life.
I don’t want to drag out a failing relationship any longer than necessary, so I am leaving you. You will always have a spot in my heart, but I must move on. I wish only the best for you in your life without me.
Jane
Things are a little different these days, with more and more segments of our population seeming to have their own languages. Among other things, these new forms of communication have drastically altered the way some of us say goodbye.
As an example, here is a recent “Dear John” letter from a corporate executive:
Dear John,
As we efforted to leverage our core competencies to grow a win-win valueship, at first I was convinced we had a winning solution set with massive back-end upside.
However, as mission-critical as your role has been in the framework of our enterprise, it seems that I am tasked with the lion’s share of the heavy lifting. Even in times of narrow bandwidth and actionable strike points, when we needed to be “all hands on deck,” you remained unincentivized. At the end of the day, we need to effort to be future-proof, and our current paradigm cannot be scaled to leverage a win-win without a dynamic, value-add synergy.
I have “opened the kimono” on our valueship and actioned to effort a paradigm shift in our synergy, but to no avail. After gaining some tribal knowledge from our core associates, it seems we are at a tipping point with our core values and core principles, and despite my immersion in the efforting, at the end of the day, without buy-in from your side, our valueship just doesn’t have a long tail.
Therefore, I am hereby diverging our win paths and dissolving our current enterprise. Going forward, I will be efforting to leverage my core competencies in new markets.
Best regards,
Jane
If you thought that was cryptic, get a load of this “Dear John” letter from a local realtor:
Dear John,
When we first started dating, I thought our relationship was as solid as granite. You had fantastic curb appeal, you were well maintained, low maintenance, and very well appointed. We were both “original owners,” and I thought that meant our relationship would be a great investment.
As the months went buy, however, I have begun to notice some quaint features about you that are too numerous to mention. When I realized our relationship needed TLC, I was willing to negotiate. Maybe I was just being a motivated buyer, or maybe it was a seller’s market, I don’t know which, but I was willing to put in the sweat equity to keep us from being back on the market.
I had thought you were a gourmet, but it turns out you are more “granite feel” than “sub-zero.” I thought you were a low-maintenance man who was in move-in condition. In reality, you seem to have a lot of deferred maintenance and are more of a fixer-upper than I had anticipated.
At this point, with what I have found after the initial inspection period, I am going to “back out of escrow” and make an offer on another fully furnished model. He’s a ranch style guy who has gorgeous features and really shows well. Sorry for the short sale on our relationship, but I have to move quickly. He’s priced to sell and going fast!
Bringing your dreams home,
Jane
Yikes! If you thought that was hard to follow, wait until you read this recent example of a “Dear John” text from an unidentified teenager:
To: Jonny327
From: cool-jane-girl99
u used 2 m8k me :)
u used 2 m8k me LOL
now u m8k me :(
i m de-friending u on fb and xing u from my contacts
:( :( :(
As much as I don’t like the new abbreviated texting language, all things considered, I like the third option the best. You can’t understand any of them, so if you’re being dumped, at least the text is a faster read. They say brevity is the soul of wit. It may also be the soul of breaking it off!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
SWITCHEROO
If you have been on a freeway in the last 20 years, I think you’ll agree that we need a better solution to the obvious problem of rush hour traffic congestion. You may be someone who believes that the gasoline automobile is a detriment to the environment in some way, or you may be someone who just really doesn’t like only going 7 MPH on a road that was designed for 70 MPH. You may even be both. Whatever your point of view, I think we can all agree that there are just too many cars on the freeways during commute hours.
It seems pretty obvious at this point that our governments – on a city, state or federal level – have become far too cumbersome to do much of anything worthwhile on a public works basis anymore. I doubt any government entity anywhere could get a 10-foot by 10-foot backyard redwood deck built inside of a year, so simply building us some new or wider freeways to relieve the congestion is probably out of the question.
Fortunately, as with most of life’s little quandaries, I have a plan. It’s called Smidge’s Wonton Interstate Traffic Congestion Household Employee Relocation and Optimization Operation, or SWITCHEROO. And, like almost every other aspect of your life, the IRS can help with this, too. The fact that we must drive to work is not going to go away, so let’s all just severely decrease the amount of miles we need to drive. The IRS already has very detailed records of who goes to work, where they work, and where they live, so the math is almost done already. We simply link up the IRS databases with the new SWITCHEROO algorithm, and let the computer tell us where to go.
Here’s how it will work: The computer will crunch the data and find matched pairs of gainfully employed people. To keep things on a somewhat equal footing, the computer will match men with men and women with women. I’ll explain why in a minute. The algorithm will note that Joe Blow works within one mile of John Smith’s house, and John works within one mile of Joe’s house, but they both live over twenty miles away from their own jobs. Since Joe could be the CEO of a bank, and John could be in charge of the sour cream gun at a Taco Bell, switching jobs doesn’t make any sense. I mean, can you imagine if a bank had someone in charge who was making risky decisions? Unthinkable!
The smart thing to do is to have Joe and John switch houses.
Now, this program is meant to ease freeway congestion, not to cause a nationwide family upheaval, so the families will stay put. Only the workers will move. This is why we have matched men with men and women with women. Joe and John will switch houses, and inherit whatever family situation comes with the house. John may be a lifelong bachelor who suddenly finds himself with a wife and three kids. Joe may instantly become single again after many years of marriage. Who knows what new and exciting home life may await you when you get your SWITCHEROO relocation notice in the mail!
Every attempt will be made to match the switching pair’s ages as well, but there can be no guarantees. It will be quite a challenge just to keep the pairs the same sex, so age may become an issue in some instances. But what is life without fun challenges, right? The twenty-one-year-old single girl from the big city may suddenly find herself as the mother of a nineteen-year-old. If that teenager happens to be a girl, a wonderful friendship could result. If the teenager is male, all we can do is just hope his father has control of the situation.
Suzy, the twenty-something newlywed may suddenly find herself married to Fred, the eighty-something widowed Wal-Mart greeter. In that case, I think we all need to look on the bright side and say, good news for Fred!
Besides the age issue, sexual orientation is simply too complicated a subject to be entered as a parameter in the SWITCHEROO program. Also, as far as I know, the government wouldn’t have any record of this kind of personal data anyway, would they? Probably not. As with all large-scale operations such as this, there will be some unavoidable hiccups. A husband and father of four kids may suddenly find himself living with a gay man. Again, I think it’s best to look upon these unforeseen consequences as fun little challenges. This could be an opportunity for both of them to start dating again, or an opportunity for one of them to discover a whole new lifestyle. Who knows!
Besides the fun new interpersonal relationships that will develop from the program, an unexpected and pleasing change in your financial situation may result as well. Since the IRS has loads of data on your finances, as with the age issue, the SWITCHEROO program will make every effort to match income levels whenever possible. We must not lose sight of the main goal of the program, however, which is traffic elimination. For that reason, the program will optimize the moves based first on commute distance, and then attempt to factor in all the other ancillary issues such as age and tax bracket. Again, I think we need to keep sight of the goal, and take whatever disparities are inadvertently caused in stride.
Your 850-square-foot dark and gloomy apartment might suddenly become a sprawling 8000-square-foot estate house with a full-time maid. On the other hand, your overwhelming $5000 monthly mortgage payment might instantly become a trifling $150/month space fee for your new double-wide at Shady Acres Mobile Estates. It will be important to focus on the positives as we move forward with this invaluable operation.
Speaking of positives, the possibilities are almost limitless for unexpected and interesting changes in the lives of our commuting workforce.
Do you have massive personal debt? It could be wiped away forever.
Hate your neighbors? Get new ones!
Unsuccessful in raising your own kids? Get a fresh start with a new batch.
Only time will tell what powerful and inspiring stories will result from this much needed program.
SWITCHEROO should be a boon for our economy as well, since untold millions of hours will be freed up each day to devote to work instead of driving. No doubt, each and every one of us will use this new found time wisely and in the best interest of our employer, helping spur on a vibrant and flourishing America.
I know what you’re thinking. “It will never work. It will be too messy. I won’t be able to understand the forms.” Not to worry, folks. We have thought of everything. The IRS will handle all the paperwork for you. There won’t be one single form for you to fill out, because you don’t even have to apply for the program. You’re already signed up! All you have to do is report to the address shown on the SWITCHEROO relocation notice that you will be receiving shortly, and you’re done. Your transition to your new life will be seamless, effortless, and a whole lot smoother every morning without all that driving!
Have fun with it, America, and enjoy your new life! I can’t wait to see where I’m going!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
It seems pretty obvious at this point that our governments – on a city, state or federal level – have become far too cumbersome to do much of anything worthwhile on a public works basis anymore. I doubt any government entity anywhere could get a 10-foot by 10-foot backyard redwood deck built inside of a year, so simply building us some new or wider freeways to relieve the congestion is probably out of the question.
Fortunately, as with most of life’s little quandaries, I have a plan. It’s called Smidge’s Wonton Interstate Traffic Congestion Household Employee Relocation and Optimization Operation, or SWITCHEROO. And, like almost every other aspect of your life, the IRS can help with this, too. The fact that we must drive to work is not going to go away, so let’s all just severely decrease the amount of miles we need to drive. The IRS already has very detailed records of who goes to work, where they work, and where they live, so the math is almost done already. We simply link up the IRS databases with the new SWITCHEROO algorithm, and let the computer tell us where to go.
Here’s how it will work: The computer will crunch the data and find matched pairs of gainfully employed people. To keep things on a somewhat equal footing, the computer will match men with men and women with women. I’ll explain why in a minute. The algorithm will note that Joe Blow works within one mile of John Smith’s house, and John works within one mile of Joe’s house, but they both live over twenty miles away from their own jobs. Since Joe could be the CEO of a bank, and John could be in charge of the sour cream gun at a Taco Bell, switching jobs doesn’t make any sense. I mean, can you imagine if a bank had someone in charge who was making risky decisions? Unthinkable!
The smart thing to do is to have Joe and John switch houses.
Now, this program is meant to ease freeway congestion, not to cause a nationwide family upheaval, so the families will stay put. Only the workers will move. This is why we have matched men with men and women with women. Joe and John will switch houses, and inherit whatever family situation comes with the house. John may be a lifelong bachelor who suddenly finds himself with a wife and three kids. Joe may instantly become single again after many years of marriage. Who knows what new and exciting home life may await you when you get your SWITCHEROO relocation notice in the mail!
Every attempt will be made to match the switching pair’s ages as well, but there can be no guarantees. It will be quite a challenge just to keep the pairs the same sex, so age may become an issue in some instances. But what is life without fun challenges, right? The twenty-one-year-old single girl from the big city may suddenly find herself as the mother of a nineteen-year-old. If that teenager happens to be a girl, a wonderful friendship could result. If the teenager is male, all we can do is just hope his father has control of the situation.
Suzy, the twenty-something newlywed may suddenly find herself married to Fred, the eighty-something widowed Wal-Mart greeter. In that case, I think we all need to look on the bright side and say, good news for Fred!
Besides the age issue, sexual orientation is simply too complicated a subject to be entered as a parameter in the SWITCHEROO program. Also, as far as I know, the government wouldn’t have any record of this kind of personal data anyway, would they? Probably not. As with all large-scale operations such as this, there will be some unavoidable hiccups. A husband and father of four kids may suddenly find himself living with a gay man. Again, I think it’s best to look upon these unforeseen consequences as fun little challenges. This could be an opportunity for both of them to start dating again, or an opportunity for one of them to discover a whole new lifestyle. Who knows!
Besides the fun new interpersonal relationships that will develop from the program, an unexpected and pleasing change in your financial situation may result as well. Since the IRS has loads of data on your finances, as with the age issue, the SWITCHEROO program will make every effort to match income levels whenever possible. We must not lose sight of the main goal of the program, however, which is traffic elimination. For that reason, the program will optimize the moves based first on commute distance, and then attempt to factor in all the other ancillary issues such as age and tax bracket. Again, I think we need to keep sight of the goal, and take whatever disparities are inadvertently caused in stride.
Your 850-square-foot dark and gloomy apartment might suddenly become a sprawling 8000-square-foot estate house with a full-time maid. On the other hand, your overwhelming $5000 monthly mortgage payment might instantly become a trifling $150/month space fee for your new double-wide at Shady Acres Mobile Estates. It will be important to focus on the positives as we move forward with this invaluable operation.
Speaking of positives, the possibilities are almost limitless for unexpected and interesting changes in the lives of our commuting workforce.
Do you have massive personal debt? It could be wiped away forever.
Hate your neighbors? Get new ones!
Unsuccessful in raising your own kids? Get a fresh start with a new batch.
Only time will tell what powerful and inspiring stories will result from this much needed program.
SWITCHEROO should be a boon for our economy as well, since untold millions of hours will be freed up each day to devote to work instead of driving. No doubt, each and every one of us will use this new found time wisely and in the best interest of our employer, helping spur on a vibrant and flourishing America.
I know what you’re thinking. “It will never work. It will be too messy. I won’t be able to understand the forms.” Not to worry, folks. We have thought of everything. The IRS will handle all the paperwork for you. There won’t be one single form for you to fill out, because you don’t even have to apply for the program. You’re already signed up! All you have to do is report to the address shown on the SWITCHEROO relocation notice that you will be receiving shortly, and you’re done. Your transition to your new life will be seamless, effortless, and a whole lot smoother every morning without all that driving!
Have fun with it, America, and enjoy your new life! I can’t wait to see where I’m going!
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Don't Keep the Change
Lately, when I go to the local 7-11 to get my daily tanker-truck-sized barrel of soda, a strange thing has been happening. They have been resisting giving me my change. For a while now, if they owe me a penny back in change, instead of giving it to me, they will simply close the cash register drawer and look at me as if the transaction is complete. Sometimes if I stand there long enough with my hand out, they will hand over the copper coin, but often they will just continue to stare at me with a blank expression. In those cases I simply retrieve my rightful change from the "give penny - get a penny" change dish on the counter. Invariably, if it is a certain male clerk working the register that day, he will laugh at me!
The other day, one of the female clerks stepped it up a notch. She owed me two cents back and did the same thing. Register closed, blank stare.
Now I know what they’re thinking. It’s just a penny and we all shouldn’t have to bother with it. And I know what you’re thinking. Take it easy, Scrooge McSmidge! It’s just a penny. Loosen up a little!
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not such a miser that I am incredulous about being shorted a penny. What I am is logical, and what I am incredulous about is the lack of logic associated with beginning to ignore change in any form. If you take a minute to think it through, you have to ask, “Where does it end?”
We have already clearly delineated the end point in the dividing up of the dollar. We all decided not to go any further than 1/100 of a dollar. One cent. That’s where we stop. (With the exception of gas stations which use 9/10 of a cent in a ridiculous attempt to trick you into thinking their gas is one cent less than the other guy’s. Seriously, fellas, you’re not fooling anyone!) So if we all decided that one cent is where we’re going to draw the line, then what happens when someone starts ignoring the lowly penny? The logical progression is easy to follow.
There are two possible motivations for the anti-penny behavior. Either they are ignoring the penny because it is a physical coin that they don’t want to deal with, or they are ignoring one cent because it is an amount they do not want to deal with. Both scenarios are fraught with problems.
Problem Number One: If you are attempting to ignore pennies because you don’t want to deal with the physical coin, then you have a legal problem. As long as pennies are still in circulation, then it is legally OK for me to pay you with pennies, and therefore your convenience store penny phase-out program is doomed. You don’t feel the need to give me my penny back in change, but I am quite sure you won’t just give me a case of beer for free because I want to pay with 2000 pennies. So you are both philosophically and legally in a bind.
On the other hand, if you are attempting to ignore the idea of one cent, based on its perceived smallness or insignificance, you run into an even stranger dilemma. Problem Number Two: Besides the obvious problem of deeming the building block of the entire monetary system as invalid or worthless, there is a math problem that is ugly. If you deny me my one cent, you are saying in essence that we are only working with whole dollars, because the dollar is the only logical end to the anti-cent sentiment. They have already begun the progression by trying to ignore my two cents change, so why couldn’t I make the case that if I’m five cents short, or ten cents short, what’s the big deal? It’s just ten cents. Two cents, ten cents, what’s the difference? Give me my soda! If I can ignore ten cents, why not twenty-five, and so on, and so on. As soon as you are willing to ignore cents in any amount, you are defaulting to whole dollars.
The whole dollar system would work fine in theory, as long as everything in the store is priced in one dollar increments. The big problem is, that isn’t going to happen any time soon. I’m not willing to pay a dollar more for the 44-ounce soda than I would for the 32-ounce one, and the store won’t sell them both at the same price, so here is the dilemma my local 7-11 is faced with. If they really want to start ignoring cents, then they must be willing to deal in whole dollars. If they can’t price everything in increments of a dollar, then they must be willing to round. That’s where it gets ugly.
Rounding will not work for one very obvious reason: If you are going to round up, you must be willing to round down. I am not willing to pay a dollar for something that is priced at 51 cents, and I’m quite sure that 7-11 is not prepared to accommodate the hordes of bums and teenagers that would flood their stores to “buy” all the items priced under 50 cents for free.
I might try to spend an extra three minutes or so one morning explaining to the clerk why their change ignore-ance program isn’t going to work, but there’s a problem with that, too. At my 7-11 there is enough of a language barrier across the counter that I will never be able to adequately convey my point. My only hope is that this written explanation gets circulated through my store as well as every other convenience store in America, and someone can properly translate it when necessary.
Until then, I guess I will just have to keep my hand out and demand my pennies, until the clerk gets around to reading my two cents.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
The other day, one of the female clerks stepped it up a notch. She owed me two cents back and did the same thing. Register closed, blank stare.
Now I know what they’re thinking. It’s just a penny and we all shouldn’t have to bother with it. And I know what you’re thinking. Take it easy, Scrooge McSmidge! It’s just a penny. Loosen up a little!
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not such a miser that I am incredulous about being shorted a penny. What I am is logical, and what I am incredulous about is the lack of logic associated with beginning to ignore change in any form. If you take a minute to think it through, you have to ask, “Where does it end?”
We have already clearly delineated the end point in the dividing up of the dollar. We all decided not to go any further than 1/100 of a dollar. One cent. That’s where we stop. (With the exception of gas stations which use 9/10 of a cent in a ridiculous attempt to trick you into thinking their gas is one cent less than the other guy’s. Seriously, fellas, you’re not fooling anyone!) So if we all decided that one cent is where we’re going to draw the line, then what happens when someone starts ignoring the lowly penny? The logical progression is easy to follow.
There are two possible motivations for the anti-penny behavior. Either they are ignoring the penny because it is a physical coin that they don’t want to deal with, or they are ignoring one cent because it is an amount they do not want to deal with. Both scenarios are fraught with problems.
Problem Number One: If you are attempting to ignore pennies because you don’t want to deal with the physical coin, then you have a legal problem. As long as pennies are still in circulation, then it is legally OK for me to pay you with pennies, and therefore your convenience store penny phase-out program is doomed. You don’t feel the need to give me my penny back in change, but I am quite sure you won’t just give me a case of beer for free because I want to pay with 2000 pennies. So you are both philosophically and legally in a bind.
On the other hand, if you are attempting to ignore the idea of one cent, based on its perceived smallness or insignificance, you run into an even stranger dilemma. Problem Number Two: Besides the obvious problem of deeming the building block of the entire monetary system as invalid or worthless, there is a math problem that is ugly. If you deny me my one cent, you are saying in essence that we are only working with whole dollars, because the dollar is the only logical end to the anti-cent sentiment. They have already begun the progression by trying to ignore my two cents change, so why couldn’t I make the case that if I’m five cents short, or ten cents short, what’s the big deal? It’s just ten cents. Two cents, ten cents, what’s the difference? Give me my soda! If I can ignore ten cents, why not twenty-five, and so on, and so on. As soon as you are willing to ignore cents in any amount, you are defaulting to whole dollars.
The whole dollar system would work fine in theory, as long as everything in the store is priced in one dollar increments. The big problem is, that isn’t going to happen any time soon. I’m not willing to pay a dollar more for the 44-ounce soda than I would for the 32-ounce one, and the store won’t sell them both at the same price, so here is the dilemma my local 7-11 is faced with. If they really want to start ignoring cents, then they must be willing to deal in whole dollars. If they can’t price everything in increments of a dollar, then they must be willing to round. That’s where it gets ugly.
Rounding will not work for one very obvious reason: If you are going to round up, you must be willing to round down. I am not willing to pay a dollar for something that is priced at 51 cents, and I’m quite sure that 7-11 is not prepared to accommodate the hordes of bums and teenagers that would flood their stores to “buy” all the items priced under 50 cents for free.
I might try to spend an extra three minutes or so one morning explaining to the clerk why their change ignore-ance program isn’t going to work, but there’s a problem with that, too. At my 7-11 there is enough of a language barrier across the counter that I will never be able to adequately convey my point. My only hope is that this written explanation gets circulated through my store as well as every other convenience store in America, and someone can properly translate it when necessary.
Until then, I guess I will just have to keep my hand out and demand my pennies, until the clerk gets around to reading my two cents.
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2011 Marc Schmatjen
Have kids? Have grandkids? Need a great gift?
Go to www.smidgebooks.com today and get your copy of My Giraffe Makes Me Laugh, Marc’s exciting new children’s book. Get ready for a wild rhyming adventure!
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