Breests

Well the house buying is going agonizingly slow (typical). It looks like next week is when things will finally start rolling (with all the mortgage paperwork). My best guess at a move date is now somewhere around the 22nd (two weeks from now).

Yesterday was my son Jake's 10th birthday. We celebrated his and his brother Trevor's (8) B-days together (their B-days are about a week part) at this place called "Super Jump Zone". The place has three big inflatable things for the kids to play on - a "boxing ring" where the kids don giant boxing gloves and wail on each other, a obstacle course and a giant double slide. There were about 20 kids total that attended and by the end of it they were all just a sweaty mess. They loved it.

We brought a couple of the boy's friends back home with us after the party and as I was driving home with them they, like young boys do, were getting obnoxiously silly. At some point one of them starting talking about "boobs" and I finally had to say "Alright - enough of the boob talk!". Trevor then spoke up and in a serious voice he said "Yeah, and you guys are not calling them by the right name - they are called "Breests". I started laughing to myself because I realized he must have been reading one of the "Where did I come from" books I had given Jake (after he had started asking some questions) and came across the word "Breasts" and he was mis-pronouncing it "Breests". The more he said it the more it was cracking me up. Finally I said "They are called "breasts" Trev and he said "Ohhhhhh, breasts...well what are "man-boobs" called then?"

My eye's were watering from laughing so hard I could barely drive.

The New House

It's looking more and more that I will be moving into my new house soon. Still have to go through all the mortgage stuff but the owners of the house have accepted my offer and we've had the appraisal done and it came in at a good price (slightly higher than the asking price on the house) and I had the house inspection done Thursday and the house passed with flying colors. SO now it's just a matter of jumping through the usual mortgage hoops.


A little about the house I am buying: It's 1920 "Craftsman" home that was completely rebuilt from the foundation up in 1989. It's in outstanding shape and everyone who sees it immediately falls in love with it. The yard is full of really cool plants and tons of fruit bearing trees (Cherry, Apple, Pear). Quit honestly the yard scares the hell out of me - I love a nice looking yard, but I just don't have time to work in it everyday. The owners insist it's established enough where there is not a lot of weekly maintenance (beyond mowing the grass), but it'll take a couple of weekends of "wacking" to get some of it knocked back to a reasonable level (It's a tad overgrown in my opinion). It's an awesome yard though and like I said I just love the house (I love older houses...especially older houses that have been totally updated). I'm hoping to be in by the 3rd week in Aug.

The boys are excited to check it out the new house (I will have them evey other week). The neighborhood will be perfect for them. It's one of those neighborhoods that it seems time has forgot...neighbors are friendly, everyone keeps their yard looking nice (without being forced to by a local covenant) and you actaully see kids out riding their bikes and people jogging or walking their dogs - and there are sidewalks! (and it's all very flat). We even have a nice park nearby where I see families or other large groups of people having BBQ's almost every weekend (I even saw a wedding going on there the other day). And get this - from time to time the local Highschool marching band will march through the neighborhood to practice. I swear to god that June and Ward Cleaver will probably bring an apple pie by when I move in.

This is very different from the current house, where the neighbors are all spaced apart on large acre-plus lots and walking on the streets in the area is not recommened because of the hills, no shoulders, no street lights and cars that go flying by 100 mph (in a 25 mph zone). I always liked the privacy of the house, but I kinda feel the boys have been jipped (sp?) from not growing up in a neighborhood - granted that can bring problems too. But hey, I still hang out with my friends from the neighborhood I grew up in from when I was my son Trevor's age (he just turned 8). So I think it'll be great for them.

The Lord of Suburbia has found a new kingdom to rule over...or make fun of anyways...

Divorce

I have not updated this blog in quite some time due to the fact that I did not want to shock any family or friends who had not yet heard that my wife and I are in the final stages of getting a divorce. I will not use this blog to talk about specifics of my divorce, though I may from time to time discuss how much is sucks.

Going forward it's hard to tell what the lies ahead in the future. Anytime kids are involved in a divorce it just makes things that much harder...much, much, much harder. But as difficult as it is we will all survive, though the scars will remain forever.

Right now it's just a day to day struggle. With my mother dying this past spring followed shortly by the reality that I would be getting divorced, to say I am "a little stressed out" would be the understatement of the millennium. What's worse is that I am now in the process of trying to buy a house, and as anyone who has purchased a house before can tell you that alone is enough to send most people over the edge. It's a good thing I am bald because if I did have hair it would surely be gone by now. But I try to take it day by day and not let it overwhelm me or get me down. If there is one thing my mom taught me it was to never dwell on the negative and always look to the positive. If she can do that while facing terminal cancer I can surely do this.

He's Dead Jim

I have had a really hard time thinking of anything worthy of blogging about lately. I'm just bored silly with the whole Barack-Hillary thing. I feel like if I post something about how much I hate the weather I think people will begin to think I have a weather obsession (I do) and I'm sure people are tired of me talking about my boys…but unfortunately that's all I can think of to write about so here goes:

Our neighbors bought our boys a "Tinker Toy" set for Christmas last year and just like "Legos" the damn things tend to get scattered everywhere. The other day I found a pile of them in our living room and because I was bored I grabbed some of them and started building "something" with them. Jake (9 year old son) came into the room just as I had finished putting all the pieces together and he asked me "What is that?" and although I had no idea what it was supposed to be I quickly said "It's a shield to ward off evil powers". Jake grabbed it out of my hand and turned it over and inspected it from all sides and then said "This is all wrong". Offended, I said "What do you mean it's all wrong!?" and Jake said (very seriously) "See these holes here? An evil death ray would just slip right through that…you would be dead in seconds". Then with an almost imperceptible air of superiority he handed it back to me and walked out of the room.

The real problem is - if he thinks I'm dumb now, wait until he's a teenager.

I'm not going first!!

Getting my boys to take a shower is always a challenge. As soon as I mention it they start with their "I'm not going first!" argument. This usually results in me suggesting a coin toss - which almost always devolves into another argument - "I get to call it!" "No! I get to call it!" or arguments that lead to even more arguments - "You called heads, it came up heads, that means you go first!!!"

While all this is going on the shower is running and I find myself yelling "You are wasting water! Somebody get in there now!!" This time however Trevor (7) decided to challenge me... "How is this wasting water?" he asked. "Trev, the water has been running for like 5 minutes and you still have not got in the shower yet. (At this point I decided to step up my rhetoric a bit) Wasting water is like killing the planet!". The following conversation then ensued:

Trevor: Where does water come from?
Me: The Mountains.
Trevor: How does it get there?
Me: From the snow.
Trevor: Where does the snow come from?
Me: (starting to roll my eyes) The sky!
Trevor: (smiling 'cause he knows he's bugging me) Where does the sky come from?
Me: God! God makes the sky, okay! So in other words you are wasting God's water - and you're pissing him off!"
Trevor: Jake - you need to get in the shower right now because dad says you're killing the planet and God is getting really mad!!

Jake: I'm not going first!

Me: Trev, get your butt in that shower now or no more video games!!!

Trevor: Okay...

Angry God, killing the planet - no problem...but they draw the line at Nintendo.

Back to the routine

Well it was a hard week last week (with the passing and funeral of my mother), but we all made it through (we had no choice). So now I'm going through all my work emails and trying to figure out what I can ignore and what I need to work on now. Kinda hard to get back in the routine though, hence the reason I took a short break to write this blog.

The weather here reeeeeally needs to improve. When I was in Alabama last week the daily high temperature was close, if not above, 70. It felt sooo nice. Now I've come back to exactly what I left - cold and wet. This does not make me look forward to my boy's baseball pratices/games this week. Apparently the weekend is supposed to be fairly nice, according to the often wrong weather geeks. We'll see.

For once I don't have too much to complain about - which is usually the inspiration for most of my blog postings. I must say that something like the passing of a loved one does tend to bring into focus what is important in life. It's kinda like getting whacked with a big club - but instead of making you dizzy and unfocused it does the exact opposite. I suppose it's a little like rebooting a computer (am I a geek or what) - it purges all those temporary files that tend to bog you down with unnecessary crap.

Oh sure, it won't take long for me to get back into my routine. There is comfort in routine. But hopefully I can hold onto the clarity of the moment for a while...even though I'm looking forward to someone doing something to inspire me to make fun of them. It won't take long I'm sure.

Ernestine 1935 - 2008

Late Friday night, March 28, my mother passed away. She was diagnosed with renal (kidney) cancer two years ago. Despite a courageous battle against the cancer, it finally took her life. Never once during this battle did her spirit ever falter. She left this world with the same dignity and grace that she had shown all her life.

Damn it's hard to type through tears...

Ever since I was told she was gone I keep having this mental picture of her pop-up in my mind. It 's actually from a real picture I recall seeing in an old family photo album. There's little girl in a white dress, skinny legs, curls in her hair and a shy happy smile on her face because she's holding the new bike she just got for her birthday.

This little girl does not know what lies ahead of her.
She does not know that in few short years she will marry her high school sweetheart on her 17th birthday.
She doesn't know that she will give birth to 4 children who will cherish her every breath.
She doesn't know that in this picture she bears a striking resemblance to at least two of her children.
She doesn't know that she will experience the joy of birth and endure the sorrow of death.
She has no idea that her gift of endless humor will be passed on to her youngest son and that they will laugh together for years to come.

No, all she knows is she just got a new bike - and she's really, really happy about it.

Over nine years ago my older sister Nancy died (from complications of an allergic reaction to a bee sting). Just prior to her passing my oldest son Jake was born. Just prior to my mother's passing my brother-n-law Dave and his soon-to-be wife Lynn had a baby. Also, my niece Jennifer (daughter of my sister Nancy) is pregnant with what would have been my mother's great grandchild. Now...read what you will into this birth/death cycle that seems to coincide with the passing of my immediate relatives, but alls I know is there is nothing that helps a person deal with the grief of death more than holding a baby. Not just because they are all cute and cuddly - but for the possibilities they represent.

I'm telling you, they should rent babies out for such occasions.

Anyways, with that in mind, the "ying and yang" of life now befalls me as I type this, the day before my mother's funeral.

A Sunrise, a Sunset.
Beginning and End.
The passing of 72 year old woman and a smiling little girl in a billowy white dress.



Thanks for the memories mom.