Check this shit out. Church Punk Mom said she’d send some cookies on Twitter. I figured she said that shit to everybody. I asked Pretty Bride a couple times if I’d received any mail from Iowa. The answer was always “no.” Then, a few days later, I got mail from Iowa. It was these:
Isn’t blogging the best?
Apparently, if you have a blog and sometimes metion your having little creatures in your house that resulted from a druken few minutes in your closet during a party at your house, then you’re supposed to write a post about fatherhood on Father’s Day. At least, that’s what the good daddy bloggers do. After commenting on a good example of such, I figured I should do a little typing of my own.
Aspects of fatherhood I have enjoyed over the past few years:
Over Memorial Day weekend, we drove to Great Smoky Mountains National Park for some hiking and bonding. On the way, we saw this place somewhere in North Carolina:
I decided this a great place to pull over, so, without warning anyone else in the car (to include 3 sleeping children, a dog, and an oblivious bride), I went inside, slammed my fist on the glass display holding old watches, pens, and necklaces, and addressed the cashier with,”I wanna rock!”
The cashier/presumed owner looked to be about 103 and, clearly, was not as familiar as she should’ve been with Dee Snider.
Cashier: You looking for a pet rock?
Me (raising fist): I Want…To…Rock. ROCK!
Cashier:
Me: Don’t you want to know what I want to do with my life?
Cashier: No. In fact, I think I’d like you to leave.
So, I walked out, reentered the minivan, and continued down the road in pursuit of more pop culture references that would be lost on rural North Carolinians. Then, I saw this:
Again, I pulled over and exited the van. I grabbed a bucket from the pile outside the door, put some gravel in it from the parking lot, dropped my wedding band on top of the heap, and walked inside. A man resembling the midget Santa on the billboard was behind a table next to a wall with a list of prices tacked to it.
Me: (showing him the bucket and pulling out my ring): I’m rich, bitch!
MidgetSanta: That’s someone’s ring. You didn’t pan for that.
Me: Like Hell! I’m rich, bitch!
MidgetSanta: I don’t like your language, son.
Me: I dislike your lack of enthusiasm regarding my recent fortune. You better recognize!
MidgetSanta: I think you should leave.
Me: I think you need anger management counseling. You’re obviously not dealing well with being surrounded by the nouveau riche. That pretty much makes you an asshole, considering your profession.
MidgetSanta: GET THE HELL OUT!
At this point, I decided it best to continue on towards the mountains without additional stops, content that I’d created enough blog fodder for one afternoon. Plus, Pretty Bride was wondering why I kept stopping for directions (despite the Garmin), sprinting out a few seconds later, and peeling out without explanation. Not that she’s surprised any more.
The first time I tried to meet a friend I made through blogging was in 2007 when I was writing from Iraq and befriended a doctor who was writing from the same location, shortly after he gave me a “shout out” following his getting a New York Times link to his blog, sending me several hundred new visitors. However, he flew home before we could coordinate our schedules, and it never happened.
The second time I tried to meet bloggers whom I knew online was when I flew to Wisconsin for work and hoped to meet Maggie Dammit and Sarah Pare. Maggie told me she lived in the “boonies” and couldn’t come to Madison, and Sarah failed to respond to my intoxicated twitters asking her and hers to come out to the Great Dane (oddly enough).
The third time I looked forward to meeting a blogger I liked was when Tanis was in Nashville, the city in which I grew up, for Blissdom. But, I had a trial that week and National Guard that weekend, so I recommended a good BBQ joint for her to visit in lieu of meeting.
The fourth time I tried to meet a blogging friend was when Pretty Bride had a booth at the Inman Park festival, and Kristen said she’d come by to say “hi.” She came to the festival but never quite made it by our booth, due to a meltdown by some or all of her three children.
So, I was a little pessimistic about my fifth attempt, in which I’d hoped to take advantage of what has so far been a horrendously dull and rainy military-sponsored conference in Orlando by meeting Avitable and Miss Britt.
Shame on me for my pessimism. Despite the El Yunque conditions tonight, they showed up, wet but cheerful at a cantina a few blocks from my hotel. And let me clear up a few misconceptions you may have if you only know these people from their blogs:
1-Adam is not a dick. He’s like Hagrid, but without the adoring little wizards. Sardonic wit, yes, but never mean or belittling. He insisted on picking up the tab and even drove me back, so I wouldn’t have to stand in the rain hailing a cab again.
2-Britt is full of shit. She writes with self-deprecating humor about being overweight, under-educated, inadequate, etc. She’s not. She’s small; she’s thin; she’s witty; she’s smart.
In any event, thanks for sparing me from another evening alone at a bar this week, you two! I hope to hang out again at the infamous Avitable Halloween party in a few months.
This is an actual request to be dropped from a jury pool. It’s even been notarized. What I want to know is….how many wrinkles does this guy’s dog’s balls have? And, did it work? Was he released from jury duty or not?
-Getting a call from my neighbor, a detective with the Atlanta Police Dept, and finding out my daughter is in his yard and naked, just in case I was looking for her. Meanwhile, I’m upstairs with the infant and have no idea she’s cable of opening doors on her own.
-Getting a call from the preschool about my daughter’s habitual yelling, “Oh shit!” when she drops things. At least it was used in the correct context.
-Watching our 5-year-old black dog, Winnie, develop gray hair on her face from her regular hazings games like “cover the dog in jelly” or “teach the dog to slide down stairs” or “jump on Winnie from the sofa” or “feed Winnie small plastic people via her asshole.”
-Holding on to her inevitably fleeting belief that our house is a castle, that she’s its princess, and that I’m her prince. And that every fairy tale ends with, “and then she went on to lawschool and practiced with Prince Daddy for ever and ever.”