Category: Fatherhood

Being a father and dad in America.

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When is a Vacation…not REALLY a Vacation?

There are times in every man’s life, when he just has to suck it up and take one for the team. I understand that…even expect it as part of having a family…I just didn’t expect to have to do it so often.

Ok, so here’s the story. My wife’s grandmother is in her 80s and her health is fairly rapidly deteriorating. However, despite the best efforts of her local parish to milk her out of every dime her deceased husband left her, (“Um, yes we went ahead and signed you up to donate $20K this year, OK?“) she still has a good bit of money left. With more children and grandchildren than she can count, I figure she thinks she should just spend the money now and have fun, rather than try and figure out whom to give it to when she passes on. So, about every year or two, she pays for the core family to all get together for a vacation. When Megan and I got married, she paid for everyone to go to Disney. We did a beach house a couple of years later. The trend continues this year. Last year it was Disney again (we opted out along with a couple of other siblings) and lo’, this year it’s a beach house again. This one to be more precise.

But wait! A fairly free vacation at the beach…what could be so bad about that? I dunno, let’s see:

  • This house sleeps 34 people. We’re going to fill it up and overflow into a second condo down the street (folks, that’s 34 people, including several crying babies and more than a dozen grandchildren all in one house!)
  • The 8 hour drive with two children in a car-seats
  • Usually, we all take turns cooking for the night. What? Am I running a restaurant here?
  • There will be no rest. There will be no one who wants to help watch our youngun’s cause they’ll all have their own.
  • Logistics, logistics, logistics. OHMYGOD! You mean all four of us are going to have to sleep in a single room for a week? Seriously? You do know that newborns (by then he’ll be 4 months old) don’t sleep well at night.

What makes it even worse is that instead of it just being the core family (her children and their families), they’ve also invited cousins and families. Seriously, I can’t see this being fun at all. In fact, I remember a couple of years ago when we first did this, my being in a decidedly constant bad mood and my wife and I getting in fights over it. She knows I hate crowds, yet again, she asks me to participate in what can only become a major problem for me. And it’s not like I can just go home and get away for a while. At the beach in July, there’s no getting away. Even a walk on the beach won’t be getting away. There’ll be hundreds of other people…

I know I’m just complaining here, but this is a week of vacation I’m blowing to go do something that I’m not just “not” looking forward to…I’m physically dreading this “vacation.”

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Dad Blogs Family Fatherhood

Roxanne!…You Don’t Have to Put on your Red Light…

Landscaper Update: After having a heart-to-heart with my landscaper on Sunday morning, he finally admitted that he wasn’t holding to the letter of our agreement, which was that, once started, the job was finished in sequential days. Not this, “show up one day, skip a day and show up at 2 p.m. the next day.” He “feels really bad” about his behavior and I’ve given him another chance to make it up. As if me and the $2,000 of mine that he has really has a choice.
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And now a Haiku:
Generation “Y”
There are things that you must learn
About your MySpace

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After a rather revealing conversation with one of the few daycare workers that we actually like, we learned that she only makes $8 p/hour. My wife and I immediately looked at each other and thought, “Damn! We pay more than that for our childcare each week.” This immediately prompted a conversation about, “Can we afford a nanny after all?” Which led inevitably to the Internet.

Now, apparently, we aren’t the only people to have this brilliant idea as there are literally dozens of Nanny sites out there all claiming to have “highly qualified WhiteBread Nannys for Hire.” Ok, I made up the “WhiteBread” part, but really, it’s in there between the lines if you look closely enough.

However, not wanting to shuck out $150 for every Nanny for Hire Web site, we turned to everyone’s favorite “Craig’s List” here in Atlanta. I posted an ad and within a day I’ve gotten two replies. The e-mail were both very lucent and they seemed like good candidates. But being the savvy techno-Taurus that I am, I went a lookin’ on the Internet.

A Google search of the Web revealed minimal details…mostly just their e-mail with some generic correspondence. No images to speak of either…what would I do? Then, in a flash of Gen-X brilliance, I remembered, “Ah, MySpace.”
GOLDMINE! I found them both!

Let’s review them as a group shall we?
My comments in yellow Italics

The first potential Nanny…
Name Witheld
Orientation: Straight
Here for: Friends
Gender: Female (yeah, sorry guys, wouldn’t hire ya)
Age: 21

Opening line in her Intro: “Wuz good ya’ll this Ashley aka Goldie. Im 21 years old and I live in Stone Mountain. I have a 1 year old son… Carson aka Nuk that is the love of my life.”

Hmm, she didn’t say in her e-mail that she has a child. I might be willing to overlook that though. A playmate for my sons might be welcome.
Continuing…

Some answers to those random questions that apparently MySpace posts:

Q. Are you close to any family members?
A. My Little brothers (aw, that’s sweet!)

Q.What’s the best feeling in the world:
A. Being a Mommy (good answer for a possible Nanny!)

Q. Let’s walk on the:
A. WILDSIDE ha ha (um, what?)

Q. Ran away from home:
A. Yes (ok, you were probably young…whatever…)

Q. Done a drug:
A. I plead the fif (wait what…what just happened here????)

Q.What makes you scream?
A. Bad Ass Kids (Ok, I think that’ll just about do it…)

Folks, I can’t make this stuff up…it’s all true. Maybe tomorrow, I’ll post the 2nd one’s details. They are equally interesting I promise.

Ya’ll come back soon now, ya hear!

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Dad Blogs Family Fatherhood

Yearly Pediatrician Check Ups

Not mine thank you…the kids. In a moment of what could only be described as insanity, I volunteered to take both boys (simultaneously) to the Drs. office for their yearly checkup. Ethan was due for his yearly and Aiden for his monthly.

We arrived at the scheduled time of 8:30 as we were supposed to, and were behind probably 4-5 others who were there with their sick kids, ranging in age from infant up to at least 15. This one mother acted as I imagine my adopted mom would have if suddenly faced with actually having to care for a child. She didn’t have a clue. I mean, come on, anyone who goes to the doctor knows the routine right?

…you walk in…you sign in…they give you a chart to fill out and you hand them your insurance card…sometimes you immediately pay your co-pay, and you get the heck outta the way. Not so this mom. She fumbled, she mumbled, she SET HER PURSE ON THE FLOOR TO LOOK FOR HER INSURANCE CARD. And then…and then, when all that was done, she just stood there in front of the sign-in sheet and wouldn’t move. The kicker was that her kid was a teenager and here she is acting like it’s the first time she’s been to the Dr. Lay off the Prozac lady and plug into reality.

Here I am, holding a not-too-light infant and carrier, while trying to herd my older son away from the sick kids and into the “Well children” side of the office.

Luckily, before there was an evisceration, the lady finally moved and things proceeded as normally. We were called back…well, actually my youngest son was called back and then when I explained they both had appointments, well…I think I just completely threw her for a loop. She placed us in a room while they “sort it all out,” with a sickly sweet smile that makes you just want to say, “Don’t bother, I’ll find another Pediatrician.” Which I won’t because it’s way too difficult a proposition.

So finally about 20 minutes later, two ladies come in to tag-team us and they proceed to ask for my oldest son’s cooperation, and in response he stuck his finger up his nose and proceeded to hide behind a chair. Now normally, this is where I’d grab an arm and drag him out kicking and screaming all the while threatening a spanking, but I’m in pubic, so instead I use the old, “You won’t got to the train show today unless you do this” argument. And it works a little; at least enough that they do what they need to do. My youngest son was easy…all they had to do was remove his clothes and he was ready to go.

So, when they left, they told me to take off all my oldest son’s clothes down to his underwear (you mean diaper?) and wait for el doctor. Thirty minutes later, I’m out of soothing bottle for the infant, my oldest son has run through his gamut of toys and I’m getting steamed. I stick my head out the door and start complaining to the first lackey I could find, who actually stood her ground fairly well, until I used the, “I don’t care how many sick kids came in ahead of me, we had an appointment. If you can’t staff enough to meet your obligations, then don’t make any.” There was nothing she could say to that really, so I win!

Finally the doctor came in, one of the few we really like there, and that really saved the day. The kids are healthy, the Dr. used his authority to tell my older son that “Picking your nose is an ugly habit,” and “You should use the potty ALL the time.” We’ll see how well that works.

At any rate, I got out with my sanity (just barely) and major brownie points with my wife, which is really worth gold in these days of precious few moments of “me” time. So, all’s well that ends well, at least until next year.