complain complain complain

I played a game a few years ago where I had to take care of people as if I was a god. Of course I was a lower case g god and not very powerful. I seem to remember that I ran out of trees and without trees, well, you're up a creek without a paddle. I also remember how FREAKING WHINY the people were. Fast forward a few years and I can now relate to kids. Man they are whiny. But then I think about myself and man am I WHINY. So, acknowledging there is a problem is the first step to solving it. Or is the first step to solving a problem getting a big club. I'm not sure, but I think I prefer the latter. I think a big part of experience/wisdom is knowing when to whine and when not to. I probably only whine about 95% as much as I used to. I also think a big part of child rearing is beating, I mean training, the whine out of them. I was pondering entitlement the other day and I realized that we are born feeling entitled. My kids feel entitled to watch TV, play the Wii, eat Chinese food, etc. So, it's a constant effort to train them into learning that it's a right, not a privilege. Wait, I think it's the other way around. When I was at the college that will not be named, the authorities used to say that working was a privilege, not a right. Think about that for a second. Society treats work as if it's a burden and if your job sucks Indian Kosher Dill pickles then I get it. But not starving is nice too. Of course, I just found out that the poor can now get cell phones since that's a basic right. Only 70 minutes though. Just laugh. Just laugh or you'll cry.

Rebekah is off shopping. BTW, my touchpad wants to turn Rebekah into DEborah so if you see that in here, no I am not cheating. I don't have the desire, money, time, energy, desire, soul of a serpent, etc. To cheat. I'm sitting here with the girls watching Fineas and Pherby  or something. All I know is my touchpad keeps wanting to auto-correct it to something else. Sigh. Ain't technology great. But I was amused that the Platypus did a HALO jump which is high altitude low opening. See, you can learn things from inane cartoon shows. Liberty just said to me "I want more." No please, just a demand. See what I was saying about entitlement??

The boys and I went to Fairfield this last weekend and together with Melodie and her two Kids, Curtis and his boy, and Tyler and his two oldest and Mom and Dad we climbed up a hill and dug up a time capsule that we had buried a little over 20 years ago. In the process we learned how pirates lost their treasure. Dad made good instructions but it's amazing how 20 years later you can end up a few feet off digging through roots and rock for naught. Thankfully, Tyler saved the day with this memory and perception and found a rock that matched one in the picture. So, we only dug two holes. We left one as a "decoy" hole.  We meant to do that. Really. What do you mean you don't believe me? Aaah, Libby just "asked" me. Now she's saying please. I am such a mean Dad.

Let me leave you with a phrase I remember seeing on a sign in grade school: "Stupidity is not a virtue."

Bigger is better

wow. It's been a rough week for me. Work has been crazy stressful. Thankfully, I think I'm 95% ready for winter.

I was looking at Titus and noticed how big he's getting. It's a bit sad to be so busy and overwhelmed so much of the time I don't enjoy my kids like I would like to. Oh well, hopefully they'll take care of me when I'm old and infirm. I give that about two weeks. I guess I figure old age was something that didn't really start to happen until, well, older. But when I hit 30 I started having trouble with my tendons. That seems to be one of my biggest problems. My foot hurts pretty bad at times because the tendon is sore. Doesn't seem to want to heal. I  guess that's why some people start to live on ibuprofen. My brother Curtis' Father-in-law died before expected and I think one of the reasons was because he took a lot of ibuprofen. Most people get slowed down by stomach pain first.

Argh. I don't like winter. I don't like to say hate, or I probably would. But at least winter keeps bugs and weeds down. But kids are cooped up. Less sun, blah blah blah. I did hear about a light used for Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD. Somebody has a morbid sense of humor). I think it's called a blue light or something. But if you use that apparently it helps you wake up, so even if you're not "sad" you can use that for a natural boost. Go find it on amazon. It seems to work, the problem is it's expensive. Isn't that always the way?

Life is hard and getting harder. But, before we ever had kids I knew that I wanted my kids and my family to NOT have everything. When I was growing up I remember not having butter (or margarine) and drinking milk was a luxury. You'd think that would scar me. I spose it did, but in the reverse way. I was not spoiled & it was good for me to do without. It makes you push yourself & learn to do things yourself. And that means your kids have to participate in the family. Recently, I bought some fruit firewood. The boys worked hard with minimal yelling. Time was of the essence because daylight was waning. So, hopefully my kids learn and apply some of the great lessons that I was privileged to learn when I was growing up.

Yes Virginia, I am that awesome

So, nice to talk to you again. I've missed you. Why don't you call? Or write? Or text? I do have unlimited texts ya know. I mean, back in the day when it cost money to make a phone call outside of your city I understood that you were just cheap, but now? Now I just think you don't really  like me very much. But that's ok, because I don't like you very much either. I mean, I have a life you know. Why right now I'm sitting in my easy chair typing out a message on some bloggy thingy. I mean, I'm a busy man. I don't have time to say, put a stamp on a letter that's been written for over ten years. But even if I did, there's no way (no freaking way) that I could muster up the time to walk it out to my mail box. But even if I did have time, there's no way I have the energy to walk 50 feet and risk getting hit by a drunk Harley rider returning from the local steakhouse. I mean, are you really so selfish that you want my kids to go childless? How dare you! I am not sure how you sleep at night. Tell you what, let's just let our relationship atrophy into a dried husk of a once plump and juicy friendship. Just like that snake-skin we found outside by the wood pile.

[The preceding was a public service announcement meant to nobody and everybody about nothing (not everything) regarding nothing (not everything). It wasn't meant with malice aforethought unless I change my mind and then it was. Oh, and in case you're really really dense this is just a funny blog post in my twisted and corrupt mind. But if you're that dense,  you probably aren't reading this anyway which means I'm killing precious bits and bytes. I'm gonna stop now]