Boy, They Sure Learn Early

After Lily got up from her nap today I decided to go to Wild Birds Unlimited to pick out some new birdfeeders and accessories for the back yard. I got a gift certificate from my mom for Christmas and it was burning a hole in my pocket. I spent an hour this afternoon figuring out what I wanted to buy and how I could maximize my gift. So I loaded the girls up in the car and we went to the mall. As we walked in I asked Avery to help me keep Lily occupied while I talked to the salespeople about how to best maximize a couple of discount coupons I'd gotten. The lady suggested they sit on the floor near where we were talking and read Lily's book. I loved the idea and asked the girls to sit down. Much to my dismay Avery very matter-of-factly looked at me and said "I don't want to!" I was mortified that she was acting like that, and after a couple more denied requests I just told the sales lady that I'd have to leave and come back another time without the girls.

The drive home, while short, was markedly tense. Avery sobbed about my threats to punish her the entire way and Lily asked about 25 times "Why's Avery crying Daddy?" How pleasant. When we got home I expressed my displeasure to Avery again about her selfish behavior and told her to go to her room and leave the TV off. I was hoping to just calm down until dinner and then get over it. Little did I know that her plan was to go into full-blown recovery mode while she was sequestered in her room. I've gotta tell you, they learn the art of manipulation (which is what I choose to call it) awfully early. Here's what she sneakily delivered to the kitchen a few minutes later:

Notice how she included the sweet and innocent little dance picture from 2 years ago? That kid sure knows how to tug at my heart strings, I'll tell you what. I almost completely lost it when I read it. Not that I let her know that. I forgive her, but I'm definitely going to let her sweat it out a little longer. If she knew her little notes had that kind of power it'd be rough sailing for a lot of years.

One Word . .

Douchebag. It may sound highly judgmental to assign someone a moniker like that after only a brief interaction like the one I'm about to recount, but I will personally guarantee you that this guy deserves every bit of it. In fact, other than the guy my sister dated last weekend, this particular individual may actually be the world's foremost douchebag.

Mandi and I were heading from her Mom's house to our dinner downtown yesterday when we decided to stop at the local CVS. As I slowed down and signaled to turn right I was almost t-bone'd by a guy in a white pick-up trying to make a left into the same driveway. I made eye contact and prepared for the worst while continuing my turn. I had the right of way and wasn't about to stop and let this jerk think I was the one doing something wrong. Such is my machismo. Anyway, he slowed down just enough to avoid me but then immediately pulled into the crowded parking lot and alongside me, heading directly into what would have been oncoming traffic if there had been anyone trying to exit the lot. I went straight and found a spot near the back, while he lurched to the right and parked crookedly in the closest handicapped spot to the door. I made a comment about getting out and punching him in the neck, but Mandi talked me out of it. Had she known then what we know now about him, she probably would have let me go ahead and clock him.

As we walked by his truck, parked crookedly and at least 2 feet into the driveway, Mandi wondered if he was really handicapped. I opined that I highly doubted it, unless they've recently made a-hole an official disorder. We walked in through the door and watched as our buddy grabbed a basket from the stack, in the process pulling it out so hastily that the entire stack toppled over and hit the floor. He cussed and flailed as he reluctantly cleaned up his mess. A few minutes passed and we didn't see him so our attention turned to the task at hand, which in this case was attempting to get our personalized Christmas cards printed out. The attendant we asked for help promptly disappeared and buried her head in some other menial tasks in a weak attempt to appear like she was busy, but in reality we are pretty sure she just had no idea how to do what we wanted done. Frustrated and wanting to get to dinner we headed toward the door, and on the way out our jerk-off friend from the parking lot hustled past us. He had a CVS bag in one hand as he triggered the automatic door, but instead of tearing out into the lot to move his illegally parked truck, he made one last stop that vaulted him to the top of the douchebag list. In a move that appeared premeditated due to its fluidity of motion, he stopped between the two sets of doors and knelt down in front of the store's Christmas tree. Then, as if they were parting gifts for random shoppers, he picked up one of the wrapped prop-gifts under the tree and shook it in an attempt, we assumed, to determine its contents. Mandi and I stood there in bewildered awe and just stared at him, then looked at each other and simultaneously asked "Did he just do what I think he did?"

For whatever reason, he put the gift back down under the tree and walked the rest of the way out of the store. He then got into his truck and nearly backed over a customer walking toward the entrance. When we got over our dumbfoundedness, Mandi and I tried to think of a time when we had encountered someone so utterly ridiculous. We couldn't think of even one.

When Good Ideas Go Bad

I made some muffins for the girls today for their afternoon snack, not because I really felt like baking (okay I know it's not really baking, but cut me a little slack) but because we're running the food supplies down before our trip this weekend and they were giving me more than a little bit of pushback about the Wheatables I was offering. As Lily sat down to eat her fresh-from-the-oven mini blueberry muffins she asked most politely for some juice. She typically doesn't drink juice, but since she'd been sick and I wanted her to get plenty of fluids I caved. Thinking I was saving myself from cleaning up huge messes later, I cut the corner off of the Capri Sun pouch and poured it into a cup for her.

There's a little bit of back-story here that I think is necessary for the full humor of the moment to be appreciated. Earlier Lily and I were talking about fruit as she was eating some Mandarin orange slices with her lunch. We went through the whole list of different fruits she liked, and when I could think of no more she looked at me and said "And I like donuts Daddy!" I almost died laughing, but I of course asked her why and she promptly replied "I like to dunk them." You'll understand why this is pertinent in a few minutes.

So there she sat, two muffins on a plate and a big-girl cup about half full of juice, and the look on her face was unmistakable. The wheels were obviously turning a mile a minute, and right away Lil looked at me for approval as she held the first muffin over the cup. "No", I told her, "that will be yucky." That was not the answer she wanted to hear, so I quickly caved in and gave her the old "Whatever, if you want to dunk it in the juice go right ahead." She stuck the muffin in the juice and took a little bite, and at first she seemed pleased with what she'd done. But , in the words of Nicholas Cage in Raising Arizona, then the roof caved in. The muffin literally disintegrated the next time she dunked it, and the resulting tantrum looked like this:


Well, as funny as I found it, I had to make it stop. I assessed the situation and quickly remembered an old trick from the restaurant business. If you've ever ordered rare scotch or a really random fru-fru drink at a restaurant's bar you've probably been affected by this, although you probably didn't know it. Often times fruit flies would make their way into the bottoms of the bottles of the sweetest liquors. Bourbon, scotch, and anything that has 'creme de' in the name were the most common culprits, and instead of throwing the spirits away we would take it to the kitchen and pour the contents of the bottle through a coffee filter to remove the pests. Voila, ma'am, here's your Pink Squirrel. That'll be $6.75. But I digress . . so I grabbed Lily's juice and ran over to the sink. I poured the tainted juice through a sieve and into a new cup, and the crisis was over. I'll admit, I pulled an Emeril and said "Bam!" as I set it back down on the table. I actually think it was the loud noise, and not the clean juice, that snapped her out of the tantrum, but I suppose we'll never know. Suffice it to say, she did not continue dunking her muffins. Give her this, she learns from her mistakes, especially when they involve her snack!

Docs Earn Their Money

. . this time anyway, we came away from the doctor's office not feeling like we'd been totally jobbed. The last few times we've taken either of the kids to the doctor we were sent away empty-handed, so to speak. You take them in because you can just sense or tell that something's not right, only to be told there's nothing that can be done. Except of course for emptying your bank account. That's the one thing the folks in the medical field can always fall back on if you have complaints about your care. "Well, we did take all of your money, so you can't accuse us of not doing anything." Touche.

But yesterday was different. We took Lily in to see if we could get to the bottom of the diarrhea issue you no doubt remember from an earlier post. When the doctor told me that kids often develop a temporary lactose intolerance when fighting a common stomach virus I felt like she had earned her money. No more cheese and yogurt, no more explosive poops! YES!!! Then, as we always said in the restaurant business, she went above and beyond the call of duty to really provide value for the customer . . me.

Upon inspection of Lil's ears the doc discovered not one but two nasty ear infections. Huh? Would that explain her recent tendency to shout "WHAT?" whenever anyone spoke in her general direction? Is that why she'd been feverish? Did the bad cough and runny nose she had a week and a half ago cause the ear infections? Has she been wanting to snuggle a lot because she wasn't feeling well? According to the doc, "Maybe, yes, probably, and it's difficult to say." Well you know what, I'm thrilled with one affirmative, two educated guesses and one coin flip. That's a thousand-percent improvement from our last visit, and we even got to go get a prescription filled for our troubles! Twenty minutes of wandering aimlessly around the grocery store waiting for the uber-pharmacist to put our yummy orange-liquid antibiotics back into their original containers was a small price to pay for such medical satisfaction. We're currently on dose number two of said orange-flavored goodness, and hopefully it will have done its work by this weekend. There's nothing I dread more than a sick, cranky, irritable Lily confined to a small space with lots of family members for 3 days. Oh well, cross your fingers!

History Repeats, Take II

How crazy would I have called you if you'd ever told me that the words "Hold me Daddy, hold me" would have ever come from Lily's mouth? Crazier than a shithouse rat. She's the most anti-snuggling kid anyone's ever met, especially when compared to Avery, who was a cuddle machine. One of our favorite Avery-isms from the early days was that she would walk up to one or the other of us and just say "Hold-a me, hold-a me!" Ironically, it got annoying rather quickly back then, mostly because we were worried that Ave might be a little too clingy. The exact opposite has been true of Lily until recently. We joke that she doesn't sit still to snuggle or even be held for any significant length of time, and she certainly doesn't request it. Then a few days ago, maybe because she heard us joking with Avery about what she used to do, or maybe because a switch flipped, Lil walked up to Mandi while she was sitting on the computer and said "You want to hold me Mommy?" We both stood silently in slack-jawed disbelief. Who are you and what have you done with our child? The funniest part about this dramatic change in demeanor is that it coincides almost perfectly to the age at which Avery did it. It's like Mandi's passing it down in her DNA or something. Whatever the case, we'll definitely take what we can get. As of yet it's only been annoying when I'm wielding a kitchen knife or something, but even dinner can wait for a chance to snuggle that Beaner, they certainly don't come often enough.

Sometimes Poop Is Comical

I will admit to having the typical-male penchant for dick-and-fart jokes. And while these pages may not be filled with them, for obvious reasons, sometimes the best stories revolve around the most revolting subjects.

Yesterday as we were pulling off the highway at an unfamiliar exit, I noticed a foul odor in the car. Its arrival coincided so precisely with my arrival at the end of the off-ramp that my first instinct was that a stagnant river or nearby paper mill must be the culprit. But, being the crass individual that I am I blurted out the old standby "Did one of you girls poot?" Of course since it wasn't directly asked of either child they both ignored me, so I started the direct interrogations. "Avery, did you poot?" While her response was sheepish and embarassed, I can generally tell when she's lying, and I believed her denial in this case. So I asked Lily, first if she pooted, and although she said "mmhmm", she generally announces her gas with pride, making me think she just said yes to make me happy. Then I asked her if she had pooped, which unlike the previous question she almost always gives accurate answers to. But she denied it confidently, so we motored on toward our destination. As the smell wore down, I found myself thinking it must have been something outside that was just lingering inside the car. When we got to the gas station, that's when the shit hit the proverbial fan . . or in this case, hit absolutely everything else in the vicinity of the back seat.

As I retrieved Lily from her carseat, I was again overwhelmed by the stench, and at this point I knew she'd need to be changed. It wasn't until I put her down on the pavement and went to examine the damage (why do we do that, by the way?) that I was struck by the impending dilemma. As I lifted her coat and went to grab her waistband, I literally jumped backwards after seeing the amount of fecal matter that was covering the child and her clothing. Talk about ridin' dirty . .

The trip to the restroom was extremely tenuous, mainly because there was no changing table and I no longer carry the little floor mat in my bag that is designed for exactly these situations. I guess I've gotten a little cocky about not needing those type of things now that there are far fewer diaper changes needed while we're in public. Lesson learned . . it goes back in the bag today. Anyway, so I drag both girls into this restroom and I send Avery over into a corner and tell her to stay put. She is handed Lil's jacket to hold while I perform the operation, instructed to hold it with two fingers way up by the collar and at arms' length, so as to avoid poo transfer to her own clothes. She reluctantly complies, holding her nose with the other hand the entire time. I begin the careful rolling up of Lily's shirt to avoid spreading the mess to her hair as I remove the shirt. This is necessary in order to clean her back, which is about 1/3 covered in feces. Then I stretch the elastic waistband of her pants as far as it will go, utilizing the type of steady-handedness a brain surgeon would be proud of to lower them to the floor and over her shoes without smearing poo all over her legs. The diaper was next, and this was where it got really dicey. Lily is notoriously a fidgety individual, not prone to long spells of time being still unless she's strapped into something. I spread her feet out for her and emphatically told her to be very still, and surprisingly she complied. The pull-up came off to reveal one of the three biggest non-mine poops I've ever seen, and it was literally everywhere. Luckily I had just recently re-loaded the bag with baby wipes, so I had just enough supplies to get this thing cleaned up. I have to admit something here . . I was a little perturbed by the woman inside the gas station, she was very short and rude with me when I went in and asked for the key to the restroom, so I exacted a little bit of payback just because I could. I left that diaper in the restroom's trash can . . and I didn't bother to fold it up. Was that really wrong of me?

But it doesn't end there. I thought the worst was over as we made our way back to the car. I opened Lily's door for her and allowed her to just climb into her seat as I usually do, myself preparing to finish up getting gas and getting back on the road. As she ascended into her perch she let out a blood-curdling scream, "Poopy daddy, poopy!" Sure enough, the back of the carseat had fallen victim to the explosion, and now we had a quandary. The cleanup effort in the restroom had used up my last baby wipes. Alas, I had a package of apple-cinnamon scented hand wipes that Mandi had given me for the bag, and they would have to get the job done. It reminded me of The Diary of Anne Frank and the vitamin oil that seemed on the verge of running out for the longest time but never did. Just when I thought the roll was going to be finished, one more wipe came out and I was able to get the seat cleaned. Thankfully we were able to get back on the road without further incident, and as we speak the soiled outfit is emerging from the dryer, free from any evidence of the debacle. In addition to the floor mat, I might be adding an emergency change of clothes to my bag, just in case.

Four New Recipes

I've added a few new recipes this morning to our collection. The Swedish Meatballs are my favorite of the group, they take me back to those dinners at our Swedish friends' house in Clarks Summit all those years ago. Mandi put the Italian Chicken with Chickpeas immediately atop her list of favorites, and it was super easy to boot. Try them out and let us know what you think!