Evil Genius Christmas Mouse and More Holiday Fun!

Having been a member of a family for 43 years, married for almost 12 (holy s*&$!!!), and a parent for almost seven, it occurred to me that I am taking part in traditions all over the place - some admittedly better than others. So for December, I was ambitiously picturing a series of posts talking about some of the treasured and not-so-treasured holiday traditions here on CloudEight. Well, being that it is December 21 and I have yet to post, it appears that my year-round tradition of procrastination and slow-writing have won out. Still, it is a season of hope, so I will take a stab at coughing up a couple of posts before year's end.

Even as the remains of the turkey carcass are still lukewarm, Deanna and I like to kick off the holidays by engaging in our first seasonal tradition each year - fighting over the amount of Christmas decorating that is about to take place. When we first married, we had but a handful of our own Christmas-related possessions. Mine consisted of a box full of ornaments made or possessed since childhood, kept in a gift box that had been hand-decorated by an ex-girlfriend years before (a bad marital move). Hers consisted of a similarly sized box of ornaments and an alarmingly large collection of miniature Christmas books, the charm of which eludes me to this day. Our first house had a full unfinished walk-up attic, as well as a full unfinished basement, with the predictable result that we rarely worried about storage. By the time we had moved to our current house three and a half years ago, our Christmas collection had swollen to fill five or six large storage bins. Now, helped along by the unabated Christmas enthusiasm generated by the increase in our collection of miniature humans since the arrival of the twins, our Christmas possessions have grown exponentially. The weekend following Thanksgiving has become a full-fledged tactical operation as our current non-walk up attic spews bin after bin after bin of Christmas paraphernalia down into the main part of the house already packed to the gills with all manner of toys and kid-related accessories deemed necessary to raising the young 'uns. While I can't argue with the end result, the work involved in festooning every square inch of already limited space with a layer of green and red can't help but leave me a bit crabby, with the result that I have a reputation as a Christmas scrooge with Deanna. This simmering tension usually comes to a head when we are decorating the tree - while Deanna's bizarre but strictly enforced edict that ONLY round ornaments can be placed on the tree gets a pass, my efforts to keep the kids from layering on even one of our six gazillion ornaments are shouted down by all. While really this is not even a fight worth having, you can rest assured that I will have forgotten that fact by next Christmas when I stand in the attic scowling at a wall of green and red bins that will have grown again since this year.

Another treasured seasonal tradition here on CloudEight are my periodic battles with an mouse and/or mice who have sought to join our family during the holiday season as a refuge from the cold. And who can blame them - with three young and endlessly eating boys wandering the house leaving trails of tasty crumbs, the floor of every room resembles a mouse-friendly buffet. Upon the first evidence of an infiltration, I break out my arsenal, which consists of a variety of types of traps accumulated over years of battle. This includes everything from the lowly but effective glue trap to the ultimate in mouse-fighting technology - the Rat Zapper 2000. While this year's mouse (or mice??) have proved to be worthy adversaries, including routinely cleaning out traps without tripping them, studiously avoiding the Rat Zapper, and, most alarmingly, mockingly pushing one of my own springtraps from where I had set it along a baseboard to the middle of a doorway leading to the kitchen where any unwary and barefooted family member could have easily stepped on it in the morning. Brilliant! He is obviously an evil genius. He still has a ways to go to match wits with the mouse of 2002, however, who got such a superiority complex during his month long running battle with me that he used to do things like taunt us by watching us watch TV. I got that one eventually, but only after upping my game by building a temporary wall out of cardboard bricks that left him only a narrow opening between the kitchen and dining room. He tried to run the gap in the middle of one memorable night, only to find that I had created an Indiana Jones-style tunnel of terror for him. A misstep into a glue trap ended the reign of that worthy adversary. I will get this one to, as I have recently come into some good intel on his hideout. That and a troop surge out to do the trick.

Christmas is a pretty awesome time to be a parent. This holiday season, as I have the last several, I set up my dad’s old electric train set from the 1950’s for the boys. They are simply crazy about it despite its sometimes spotty functionality and my struggles to get the various electric accessories (grade crossings, switch tracks, etc.) to operate. My ability to work with aging electrical components and electrical knowledge are not what they could be. This is despite the diligent efforts of my father-in-law, who is always “teaching” me to do life-threatening electrical projects around the house, and whom I imagine is rather frustrated with my seeming inability to retain even the most basic electrical knowledge. I have stuck with it this year though, with the result that the old Iron Horse and its various accessories (even the famously uncooperative barrel-loader!) are firing on all cylinders. And when it is all working, it is pretty damn cool, and the excitement of the boys as they watch it circle the track is one of my favorite holiday things.

The Continuing Adventures of RedPlanet: Kiddie Comedian, Part IV

New reader Christina in Aurora, Illinois sent me the following joke:

"Me: Knock, knock;
Miscellaneous child: Who's there?
Me: Banana.
Misc. Child: Banana who?
Me: Knock, knock.
Misc. Child: Who's there?
Me: Banana.
Misc. Child: Banana who?
Me: Knock, knock.
Misc. Child: Who's there?
Me: Orange.
Misc. Child: Orange who?
Me: Orange you glad I didn't say Banana again?"

A classic to be sure. And, unlike my previous jokes, it actually resulted in gales of laughter from the boys when I told it. Unfortunately, unlike the others, it did not result in any sort of amusing or otherwise interesting comments on their part. They merely made me repeat the joke another sixteen times, laughing hard each time.

Since then, however, they have been working this joke into their own comedy routines (such as they are), each putting their own indelible stamp on it. Their variations, with some of the repetition removed as indicated in brackets, are as follows:

The Owen Variation:

Owen: Knock, knock.
Me: Who's there?
Owen: Banana.
Me: Banana who?
[Repeat again]
Owen: Knock, knock.
Me: Who's there?
Owen: Orange.
Me: Orange who?
Owen: Aren't you glad I didn't say Banana again.
Me: Dude, it's "orange" you glad!
Owen: Oh yeah, yeah. Knock knock ..."

The Cooper Variation: Cooper does the traditional set-up but will repeat the banana section over and over and over. Literally, like eight times, chuckling all the while at the hilarity to come. Then, he hits you with his signature ending:

"Cooper: Knock knock.
Me: Who's there?
Cooper: Banana.
Me: Banana who?
Cooper: Aren't you glad I didn't say orange again [bellylaughs]."

I wish I could say that Cooper is purposely switching up the traditional ending with his own non sequitur ending, but it seems clear that he believes he is telling the joke verbatim. No future in stand-up for this one, as he seems to have inherited both mine and Deanna's awkward comedic timing and poor joke memory retention.

The Hayden Variation: Hayden, who has never been shy about working blue, does the traditional set-up followed by this killer ending:

"Hayden: Knock knock.
Me: Who's there?
Hayden: Banana.
Me: Banana who?
Hayden: Banana Poopyhead! [bellylaughs]."

And so it goes.

Hens in Your Backyard and Fresh Eggs Every Morning!

My mom grew up on a farm in downstate Illinois. While my sister and I have pressed her for childhood memories on a number of occasions, it appears that she was distracted and/or had her nose in a book for the majority of her childhood, leaving us largely with just the images we can conjure up from a handful of black and white photos. One thing she has always made clear however, is that she did not like gathering eggs from the henhouse. I have always regarded that dislike as no more remarkable than someone asserting, say, I don't like sardines. Nor, despite an abiding love of the State Fair and the fact that I find watching cows to be an oddly zen-like experience, have I ever felt an urge to farm or keep livestock, being instead content with my urban/suburban existence. That has all changed, however, now that I have discovered the EGLU!

Here is the EGLU. Marvel at its modern and aesthetically pleasing design! Available in green, orange, red, blue or pink! See the happy suburbanites enjoying freshly laid eggs practically every morning! Oh, and the copy writing. "A stylish and practical addition to any backyard." "Designed to be the house the chickens themselves would choose." Check out the "grub and glug" food and water dispenser! Did you know that a single hen can lay up to 300 eggs a year! No rooster needed! What a concept!

Seriously, within half an hour of discovering the Eglu, I was checking out chicken-breed discussion boards, picking out breeds, and deciding whether chickens would be happier on the backyard grass or the wood chipped area by the swing set. I was thinking about who would feed them next time we were on vacation and contemplating strategies for keeping them alive during the winter (despite the Eglu claims that that the twin-wall insulation keeps them warm in winter, I still can't ascertain whether that means they would survive if it was negative 20 out). I was also busying myself drawing up an egg-collecting schedule for the boys since, after all, the "eggport, on the side of the lid, gives easy access to the nesting box and makes looking for and collecting the eggs a daily pleasure." Heck, maybe even my mom would want to give it another go!

I had all but settled on a pair of either Rhode Island Reds or Gingernut Rangers when I checked our Village Code and learned that CHICKENS ARE BANNED. Despair! Indignation! Outrage! My dream dashed, I may have even told Deanna that we needed to relocate the family to a more chicken-friendly and enlightened Village.

Having since worked my way through the various stages of mourning, I have regained some sense of reality and am now able to verbalize these thoughts and concede that keeping chickens may not be in my immediate future. For now. I guess. Maybe. Cluck.

Pee At Sea

Recently, when I mentioned that so-and-so enjoys reading my blog, my mother sarcastically responded "that's got to be pretty time consuming." Ouch. Yep, time to get back to posting.

Last month we took a 7-day Disney cruise and spent an additional three nights at Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge. I returned relaxed, vaguely tan, and definitely poorer. A couple of weeks later and the tan and relaxed state are long gone, while the poorer part, unfortunately, appears to be sticking. There are the memories though too, and they were worth every one of the hundreds of thousands of pennies that were spent. Predictably, a great time was had by all. While I won't bore you with details of our many trips to the pool, beaches on Caribbean islands, the 90-something degree weather, trips to the spa, awesome workouts, the sumptuous feasts we were treated to each night, my brilliance on the shuffleboard court (skills honed during childhood summers in Door County, WI!), our $2,000 bingo jackpot (whoooo-hoooo!), or the warm milk and cookies delivered gratis to our cabin each night with just a call to room service, there are a few memories that I did want to share:

The RedPlanet Family Singers: Having never tried karaoke before, we attended a "family karaoke night" on the ship one night and gave it a whirl. Unfortunately, we selected "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious", foolishly forgetting that not only does the song increase in speed to its final frenetic pace, but that the words are actually sung backwards at one point. Disaster ensued.

Least Disney Moment: One night my father-in-law was trying to secure chairs on the top deck of the cruiseship only to find them being hogged up by various people. Approaching a man who was hoarding a large number of unoccupied chairs, my father-in-law inquired what the man needed all of the chairs for. The man began to explain and then said "I don't know why I am telling you all of that, this is Disney, we do whatever the hell we want." To which my father-in-law replied "OK then, I want your chairs" and proceeded to start taking them before my mother-in-law intervened to stave off a fistfight. Go Bob!

Most Disney Moment: While Disney employees are almost all outstanding, I was particularly impressed when one day while at sea I stopped by the sports bar hoping to watch the Bears game via satellite. As luck would have it, the ship sailed into an area with no satellite signal for the duration of the afternoon. I expressed my disappointment to one of the bar employees. Later that night, I returned to my room to find that she had slid a printout under my door that had not only the score, but all the statistics of the game. Awesome!

Regrets: The Animal Kingdom Lodge offers stunning views of free-ranging African wildlife on a savanna, some wandering as close as 25-feet from your balcony. What you saw at any given time depended on what particular animals had wandered within viewing distance of your balcony. As cool as this was, I quickly become a bit jaded and when Deanna suggested on the third morning that we sit on the balcony and watch for a bit while the kids were still asleep, I replied "why bother, there's nothing out there right now but giraffe and zebra." As I sit in my cold basement a month later, rain spitting against the window for the 7th day in a row, I am wishing I had bothered!

My most enduring memories of the cruiseship, however, will be of the bathrooms. While I bragged back in May about having changed my last diaper, I did not realize that leaving diaper changing behind would result in my hearing innumerable shouts of "Daddy, will you wipe my butt???" The twins are hyper-conscious of their need to use the bathroom, and, like a pair of 22-year old girls out at a club, one cannot possibly go to the bathroom without the other. One dinner on the ship we took both of them three times! As we were rarely in our cabin during the cruise, we were most often patronizing public bathrooms around the ship. While almost every public bathroom in the universe features urinals of varying heights, astonishingly, considering how utterly predictable it is that there would actually be children aboard a Disney cruise, every damn urinal on the ship was designed for use by men 6 feet and over, leaving the stalls as our only option. Since space is tight on a ship, there was almost always only one stall in each public bathroom, and it would, of course, usually be occupied. Hayden's modus operandi upon entering the men's room in this situation was to get down low to get a good look under the stall door and announce to all in a loud voice that "there's a man in there!". He would then alternate between repeating that phrase every 30 seconds, in case it didn't sink in the first five times, and loud speculation as to when the man would be out so he could go. This proved quite effective actually, at causing people to practically flee the stalls to avoid further embarrassment. Then Cooper, Hayden and I would crowd ourselves into the stall for ten minutes of business, chit-chat and butt-wiping (often while a line formed outside), followed by handwashing and, the most exciting time of all, use of the hand dryer (the twins love to talk about whether hand dryers are automatic or push button).

So, as I dry my chapped and cold hands this winter here in Chicago, I can always warm myself up with the memories of that bathroom on Deck 4, aft, on the starboard side. You know, the one with the manly industrial style toilets and sinks, the roomy single stall and only low urinal on the ship, and the nice automatic hand dryer. Ah, sweet vacation memories.

The Continuing Adventures of RedPlanet: Kiddie Comedian, Part III

Truthfully, I have a terrible memory for jokes, and never seem to get around to mining the Internet for good kids jokes. Oh yeah, and ya'll haven't helped matters by not sending any in this month. Anyway, for this installment of the CloudEight Comedy Club, I had to resort to the only joke everyone can remember, and which isn't even funny under the best of circumstances.

Me: "Joke time guys. Why did the chicken cross the road?"

Cooper: "What chicken Dad, what chicken??? Where is that chicken???"

Me: "Nowhere Cooper, its just a joke; a pretend chicken."

Cooper: "Oh."

Me: "So, why did the chicken cross the road?"

Owen: "I don't know, why."

Me: "To get to the other side."

[Silence; blank looks]

Me: "Its like the world's oldest joke."

[Owen shrugs]

Hayden: "I'm going to follow that chicken."

The guys then began to lay their own jokes on me, all of them knock-knock jokes, all of them involving gibberish, and all of them ending with one of two punchlines - "Putt-putt man" or "Poopyhead" - either one guaranteed to leave the other two brothers in stitches. Oy.

The Tooth Fairy: My Two Cents

Since I have managed not to lose any teeth for about thirty five years or so now, it has admittedly been some time since I gave the Tooth Fairy more than a passing thought. That has all changed, however, as she has suddenly become a hot topic at our place. Owen has been losing teeth at an alarming rate these past weeks, leading us to conclude either that he desperately wants to be a realistic looking jack o' lantern for Halloween or is secretly a crystal meth addict. I suppose an alternative explanation is that he is six years old.

Anyway, maybe its the economic times, maybe its that I recall my own youth through rose-colored glasses, or maybe the old girl is simply getting up their in years, but the quality of the Tooth Fairy's operation appears to me to have fallen off dramatically in these past three plus decades. Specifically, two out of the last three teeth Owen has lost took an alarming two nights for the Tooth Fairy to collect. This has put Deanna and I in the uncomfortable position of having to cover the Tooth Fairy's ass with made-up explanations to a crushed six-year old. After the first failure to appear, we used the "there must have been a ton of kids losing teeth yesterday and she just couldn't make it to every one's house in one night" excuse. A few weeks later, following yet another lost tooth and yet another inexcusable first night failure to appear, we were forced to reach a little more, actually suggesting that "maybe the Tooth Fairy doesn't work on weekends." Sure, that one smacks a little bit of desperation but how the hell are we supposed to know why she didn't show up.

I thought sure the Internet would yield some clues, but my on-line research on what may be going on with the Tooth Fairy failed to turn much up. My assumption was that she would at least have a website with contact information and an on-line Tooth Fairy visitation request form, or maybe some FAQ's about pick-up times, etc. Not finding her website, I then thought that at least I could find some speculation, news stories or discussion boards on what kind of problems the Tooth Fairy may be dealing with - union work slowdown, tough divorce, budget cutbacks, torn wing muscles, that sort of thing. Miraculously though, it appears that even in this information-driven age, the Tooth Fairy is able to operate under the same veil of secrecy she always has.

Rather than risk further disappointment, I have now laid in a supply of those awesome new presidential $1 gold-colored coins. Interestingly, I was only able to get my hands on James Polk and John Tyler coins, as apparently the coins with A-list presidents are saved for more prestigious institutions than our humble local bank. For those of you who are surprised that I was getting $1 coins, $1 appears to be the going Tooth Fairy reimbursement rate these days. Considering that Tooth Fairy reimbursement rates appear to have outstripped inflation since my childhood by the same approximate rate as college-tuition rate increases, I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that the Tooth Fairy was in dire financial straits, especially considering that the secondary-market in used children's teeth can't be great in this economy (or, frankly, at any time). If financial struggles are what is driving her delays, who can blame her for taking a little extra time to pick up teeth - when you think of all the additional interest she could earn on all her dollar coins by routinely delaying tooth pick-ups by a day or two, it boggles the mind.

With my supply of Polks and Tylers in hand, I am now ready to step up should the Tooth Fairy inexplicably fail to appear yet again. Crazy as it sounds, I might take a similar cautionary approach come Christmas by laying in some gifts to give from Santa, just in case he, in his similarly inscrutable fashion, decides not to show up. The look on one crestfallen child's face has been bad enough, and I imagine three crestfallen faces might just break my heart in two.

Cupcakes and Firetrucks

Hayden and Cooper commenced their educational careers today at their very first session of two-day a week pre-school. They were little bundles of nervous anticipation and excitement this morning, as we made our way the two long blocks to school. Typical boys, most of their pre-arrival questions centered around whether there would be a bathroom at the school and whether they would be getting anything to eat. Cooper's specific inquiry when he was informed there would be snacks, spoken in his most hopeful tone, was "Donuts???". As luck would have it, his wish was not that far off, as it was a classmates birthday right off the bat, resulting in cupcakes for the class at snack time. Score!!

Upon our eventual arrival at school, they both made a bee-line for the bathroom , so most of our pre-class time was spent in there while Cooper took care of number 1 and Hayden took care of number 2. While accompanying them, I was able to answer their usual press conference-like onslaught of bathroom questions, including classics such as why there are sinks in bathrooms, why we wash our hands with soap and warm water, and why some paper towels come out automatically and some toilets flush automatically and some don't, and, of course, the all-time most asked favorite, where do the poop and pee-pee go when they are flushed. They seemed no less fascinated at my answer to this last question at the school than they have been the 10,000 times they have asked me that same question at home. While modern plumbing systems are indeed amazing, especially when measured against human history as it relates to sewage, I really don't think it is that much more amazing than say, a microwave oven cooking food (something I frankly wouldn't be so hot at explaining (pun intended)). It strikes me now as I am writing this that my little teaching lesson in the bathroom was actually their first in-school student experience.

Anyway, we made it out of the bathroom just in time for parents to be kicked out of the classroom and after kisses goodbye, we left them happily playing with toy firetrucks. When asked what the two best parts of his school day were later, Hayden replied "cupcakes and firetrucks." To my two littlest guys, your proud dad wishes you many, many cupcake and firetruck days in your school career and in life. Godspeed.

Low-Tech Vacation Fun

As summer winds down, there are many things I never got around to writing about. Probably the biggest oversight was not posting anything about our late June week in Door County, Wisconsin, arguably the best week of the summer for all in the RedPlanet household.

Just two years ago, in fairly different economic times, there was talk about how tourism was way down in Door County, with many involved in their tourism industry wistfully theorizing it was because the times had passed it by. No waterparks, no movie theaters other than the charming old fashioned drive-in, no mega-malls or chain stores or chain restaurants, no rollercoasters or video arcades or any of the other things today's modern quick-cut, low attention-span kids are thought to need to have fun. Instead it is quiet and old-fashioned and full of low-tech fun, with endless cherry orchards, charming shops, friendly people, sunsets, art galleries, Lake Michigan, lighthouses, antiques, boats, fish boils, and boundless natural beauty. Two years later, while tourism is still down, now for economic reasons, its slower pace and throw-back retro-vacation style couldn't seem more perfect.

How can kids be bored when there is an endless supply of rocks to throw into the water? Or at the Fyr-Bal Festival in Ephraim where summer is welcomed by the lighting of bonfires at dusk in a ring around beautiful Eagle Harbor followed by low-tech old-fashioned fireworks. Where there is an endless supply of fried-perch sandwiches, cheese curds and ice cream. Not to mention Al Johnson's Swedish restaurant with its goats grazing on the grass roof, cherry stands with every kind of cherry-themed food you can imagine, the fish boil at the White Gull Inn, where the boil-over sends flames shooting ten feet into the air, the car ferry to the desolate beauty of sparsely-settled Washington Island, the Ephraim town-hall sing-a-long, on and on. We read in hammocks, scrambled down the rocks to watch the waves crash against the rocks at Cave Point, played miniature golf on a course that, though well-kept, looks exactly like the ones we played when we were kids ($4 and a free prize for the kids!), watched "Up" snuggled all together in the van at the Skyway Drive-In, checked out the yachts tied up in the harbors, caught fireflys, and meandered through the Anderson Dock museum.

One of the coolest experiences we had was when we came out of a store to find a crowd of people gathered around a small lake. A Golden-Crested Merganser duck mother had shoved her seven two-day old ducklings out of their nest in a tree 75-feet above the lake and was manically flying in circles and squawking in an effort to get the ducklings to come out of the lake and follow her 100 yards across a lawn, busy street, and parking lot to Lake Michigan. They eventually got the idea and trotted in a little group across the lawn towards the Lake as the onlookers dashed into the street to hold traffic while they passed. They all made it safely to the Lake and swam off behind their mother out farther than we could even see.

Best of all was the time just to be. Drinking wine with our parents after the kids went to bed, playing cards, talking and laughing, golfing, and just reconnecting with myself and as a husband, dad, son, brother, Uncle and son-in-law with Deanna and the boys, my parents, my sister and her family, and my in-laws. Priceless.

You know you have squeezed the most out of a day when, as we approached the door of our house one night and suggested to our usually sleep-adverse boys that the last one to bed would be a rotten egg (a lame motivational tact that has almost never worked), Owen responded "the last one to bed is crazy." Here are a few pictures:

Bonfires dot the perimeter of Eagle Harbor during the Fyr-Bal Festival

Eating outside with my Mom, Dad (obstructed view), Sister Suzanne, Brother-In-Law Bill, and lots of kids

Owen at sunset

Me and the guys.

The twins throw rocks, practicing for their fall-back careers as professional protesters.

Owen, with cousins Kurt, Emma and Kirsten. And a hammock.


Hayden takes his beach going very seriously.

Deanna and her mom on the car ferry to Washington Island.

The guys and their cousins on the playground at the drive-in movie theater.

Ice Cream at Wilson's!

Surfs (not) up!

Mom and two-day old ducklings.

Cooper after shooting the curl.

The Continuing Adventures of RedPlanet: Kiddie Comedian, Part II

This month's joke comes from dedicated Cloud Eight fan Gail. Thanks Gail! Your complimentary Cloud Eight logo mug is in the mail.

Me: "OK guys, I've got another joke."

[vague looks of anticipation]

Me: "What is brown and sticky???

Cooper: "Uhhhh..."

Me: "Any guesses?"

Owen: "A horse?"

Me: "Any other guesses, brown and sticky???"

Hayden: "Brown tape?"

Owen: "How about a butt??"

Me: "No, a STICK."

[Blank looks]

Owen: "Sticks aren't sticky. Oooohhhh."

Cooper: "How about a candle?"

Really, this was pretty good material, so now I am starting to think the problem must lie with my delivery. I guess I will have to refine the routine a bit before I start taking those birthday party gigs.

The RedPlanet Boy Band Project

We recently acquired a piano - a Hamilton upright - for free. Actually, free is relative, as it cost $280 to move it (a bargain compared to some of the quotes we got!) and another couple hundred for tuning (yet to come).

Anyway, the boys interest in our recent acquisition, as expressed by plinking on it at all hours, has me thinking about working on fashioning them into a “Hanson” type-juggernaut. As I read back over that last sentence, I realize I am badly dating myself with my Hanson reference. Strike that and substitute "Jonas Brothers." While sibling bands may come and go, I am reserving for myself the timeless role of bitter and demanding father driving them to success until they ditch me for a superstar agent/manager after making it big – see, e.g. the Jackson 5, Beach Boys, ummm, Jessica Simpson(?), etc. Could I be channeling my own frustrated musical ambitions in attempting to create a supergroup within the four walls of our little house??? Only time and speculation on an episode of VH1's Behind the Music 40 years from now will tell. Hmmm. Is that show even still on now? I may be dating myself again. I really need to get a better handle on pop culture if I am going to have this thing happen.

Days later.... The project is off to a slow start, as two of the boys appear to be fairly tone deaf. The third, Hayden, is more promising, as not only does he appear to be musically inclined, he also does nothing but play the CD soundtrack to Disney's Mary Poppins on a constant loop at loud volumes, chuckling to himself over what he finds to be clever turns of phrase like "spit spot." Clearly not troubled by an affiliation with the Mouse, he is my pick to click for the "talent" portion of the group as well as a starring role in an as yet to be determined TV series I will pitch to Disney. "That's So Hayden!", "Hayden Hawaii" or perhaps "The Suite Life of Cooper and Hayden" - still working on my treatments for these.

More days later... The room the piano is in, once called the "sunroom", I have now rechristened as the "music salon." It includes in addition to the piano, an accumulation of two boxes of rhythm instruments, a small electronic drum set (present from my parents two Christmas' ago - thanks Mom and Dad for continuing to indulge my impractical whims and gift requests even at age 43! You guys are the best!), a casiotone from the mid-80's (still functioning), two trombones, and an acoustic guitar. Sadly, other than a pair of cymbals and the piano, not many of the instruments are getting a vigorous workout. Having given up on any of them actually playing, I am busying myself taking photos of the room in anticipation of a request by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame to recreate it as part of their exhibit when the boys are inducted 40 or so years from now. While the prospects of this seem rather remote, better safe than sorry.

More days later... The project has been scrapped in favor of summer. May revisit in the winter. Stay tuned. See you at the pool!

Paige!

Six years ago, when Owen was about four months old, he started in day care. Some months later, a little girl named Paige joined him in the daycare baby room. They were soon fast friends and, except when separated by circumstances (Owen's move to the toddler room, their inability to drive, etc.), they were inseparable and seemed to share a special bond. We, likewise, became quite fond of Paige's parents, Betsey and Brent. After awhile, when they weren't preoccupied with stirring up trouble at the daycare, Paige and Owen were making plans to marry, with Owen going so far as to plan out such details as the names of their future twins (Coasterball & Googly-Goo). When our own twins were born three years ago, Owen left day care in favor of our current in-home care situation, and he and Paige saw each other less often. Then, last year, Brent got a job in Boston and the whole crew moved east, leaving Owen sadly behind. Separated by multiple states, a good many miles, and poor phone-talking skills, Paige and Owen have grown less close now, corresponding at first in dictated letters, then in handwritten giant-kid print letters, and now barely at all. Still, despite some passing infatuations with others (such as this), I know that Paige still holds a special place in Owen's heart. As Hayden was prattling on recently about marrying Cooper one day (while they say you should marry your best friend, there would have to be quite an evolution in the law to allow that particular marriage to happen!), Owen idly remarked that he would probably marry Paige.

Anyway, I write all of this now because on Saturday, Paige (along with her little sister and Betsey) are coming by for a visit during a Midwestern jaunt. Rather than tell Owen outright, we decided to play "Whose Coming to Visit 20 questions." Granted, it was his first time playing 20 questions, but he was alarmingly bad. He seemed to only vaguely grasp the concept of a "yes or no" question (he is smart, really he is). After 10 questions, he had only established that there were not 2, 5 or 6 people in the visiting family, that they did not live in Chicago, and did live in America. When he could conjure up yes or no questions, he would not ask logical things that would actually help narrow it down like "is it a girl?" despite some very obvious prodding and instruction from us. Instead, he would ask bizarre things like "do they live in Indiana?" (where he knows no one) or "do they have a British accent?" (again, knows no one with a British accent). Finally, with some serious help from Deanna, he ascertained it was Paige. Much excitement ensued, including his statement that there was no way he could go to sleep now and a wish that he had a time machine to flash forward to next weekend. His excitement and anticipation level have remained high all week.

So, it will be interesting to see what a year and a half absence and a year and a half of aging does to their bond. Will it seemed like they haven't missed a beat or will they be struggling for common ground? Details to follow next week. Meanwhile, here are a few photos from the Paige and Owen gallery:

Stars in their eyes.

Troublemakers. This one was taken moments after Paige and Owen knocked over our Christmas tree and moments before Owen whacked his head on a coffee table and was taken to the emergency room.

Their first house. Rather small, but when you are starting out, who needs a lot of room.

Halloween, 2005.

Cooking together.

BFFs!

Last night together, April 2008.

The Continuing Adventures of RedPlanet: Kiddie Comedian

Me: "OK boys, I've got a joke."

(three expectant little faces turn my way)

Me: "Two carrots are taking a bath. The first carrot says to the second carrot, please pass me the soap. The second carrot looks at him and says 'I can't, I'm a carrot.'"

(silence)

Me: "Get it? They're carrots, they don't have arms."

Owen: "Oh. Well maybe he could kick the soap over with his foot."

Hayden: "Or his knee."

Cooper: "Yeah, knee."

Owen: "Or they could put the soap in a well and it would come out of the shower with the water."

The Return

I have always set the posting bar low here at CloudEight, eking out an average of just over 2+ entries a month. So, given what has to be the modest expectations of my dedicated readers, when I start receiving e-mails from them asking what gives with the long absence, I take notice, dust-off the old keyboard, and start typing.

While I can offer any number of excuses for a lack of writing, and have not shied away from doing so in the past, my best bet this time around is simply to note that summer has, at long last, arrived here at our little outpost in the northern tundra. Given that summer in Chicago is approximately 4 weeks long, we tend to react when it does arrive like a ravenous dog that has been thrown a State-Fair sized turkey drumstick - attacking it with all the energy we can muster, ripping great gaping mouthfuls of tender meat from the bone.

For those of you who are literalists, "tender meat" = "summer fun." For those of you who are still struggling with this concept, I offer the following example: I kicked off the fourth of July weekend by going to the American Music Festival at Fitzgerald’s, where I was lucky enough to catch the Texas-blues of the Marcia Ball Band, the alt-country of Robbie Fulks, and the manic New Orleans funk of Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue, down a few cocktails and hang out with friends. During the course of the remainder of the three day weekend, we had a family bike ride, went out to eat, attended a town picnic/concert on Friday night, a parade, a family fun-fair, an all-day long party at my in-laws on the 4th followed by fireworks, and a Sunday brunch with friends. I also ran a 5K and we took a family trip to the pool. All this in addition to the more mundane but unavoidable tasks of child maintenance (including keeping them fed, their noses (and butts) wiped, and ensuring they don't stink so much that we aren't invited back places) and house maintenance (including grass cutting and the most recent installment of my weekly battle with the back license plate of our van, which persists in its taunting of me by hanging from one rusty bolt every time I think I have it securely reattached). Thankfully the weekend also included three family naps or I may have been dead at this point instead of merely exhausted.

From the "How Long Can I Get Away With This" file:
While we were driving to a 4th of July picnic in another of the seemingly endless bouts of pouring rain, Cooper asked from the back seat "Daddy, why is it raining?" He may have meant "why is it raining when we are supposed to be going to a fun picnic?", "what makes it rain?", or "what made you decide to raise us in the new Seattle of the Midwest?" Not in the mood for science or, frankly, for delving into the motivation behind his question, I gave it a theological and holiday spin by answering: "Because God hates America." That effectively shut him down for the rest of the ride.

Cold, Cars and Evil Cackles

Dropping by with some brief thoughts from a chilly CloudEight:

I am not sure which is more annoying: Having to wear coats in June or people who point to any spate of unseasonably cold or cool weather as some sort of "proof" that global warming is not occurring.

The boys have been entertaining themselves recently while we drive by enthusiastically shouting "C'mon lady, lets move!" at the cars ahead of us every time a traffic light turns green. This is allegedly a behavior they learned by hearing me shout it at a fellow driver(s). While the statement is maybe not the greatest behavior for the boys to be modeling, I comfort myself with the fact that they could certainly be repeating much, much worse statements I have made. So far, so good on that front - so don't cross me on the road.

Sharing is hard for three year olds and, I'm guessing, even harder for three-year old twins since there is not a lot that seems uniquely "yours." While the little guys are okay at it, they are constantly on guard for any perceived advantage one is being given over the other, as well as opportunities to assert their individuality. When I had just Cooper on errands recently, and a local business owner gave him a sucker, he promptly told me he was going to save it to show Owen and Hayden and then proceeded to let loose what can only be described as an evil cackle at the thought of lording it over them. His plan had the desired effect, resulting in jealous whining, tears and demands for suckers from his brothers. Meanwhile, Hayden, the more obviously selfish of the twins, has slowly come a long way in his sharing ability. Several times in the last couple of weeks, however, he has apparently been having twin-sharing nightmares that have caused him to shout out things in his sleep along the lines of "No, Cooper, No! Don't take the whole thing!"

Dell-Tastic!

We spent the long memorial day weekend at a water park in beautiful Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin. In my usual hardcore Vacation Dad way, I had the sleepy kids and sleepy wife loaded in the car and on the road prior to 6 a.m. on Saturday morning. At 10:04 a.m., an excited Owen announced his full transition into vacation-mode by declaring to all of us that he could no longer remember what our house looked like. In a sign that we had chosen our long weekend destination well, at 10:37 a.m., as we rolled past the first tacky and gargantuan water parks on the fringes of the Dells, Owen yelled "We're in Wisconsin Dells baby! I have to scream!"

By 12:30 p.m. we were waterparking it. You might say things went downhill (waterslide pun intended) after that, since by 2 p.m., I had a black eye (Owen's skull met my eye socket as he launched himself up out of the water for no apparent reason), a badly bruised foot (I'm a little fuzzy on the origins of that one) and was gagging into a toilet with motion sickness after Owen and I had a nasty run-in with one of those vortex water slides that sends you spinning around a giant bowl-like room a number of times before sucking you backwards down into the dark and then spitting you out of a tube back into the light. While the spinning portion of the ride that made me nauseous did not seem bad at the time, the drainpipe portion at the end definitely was a bit hairy, as I desperately tried to hold a screaming, low-swimming skills Owen in the raft during the dark backwards descent and our raft then flipped as we shot out into the pool at the bottom. Owen christened the ride "Mt. Death," announced to Deanna that it had "drowned" him. and quickly dialed down his water slide ambitions to a more manageable level.

The twins meanwhile, recovering from nasty colds, were still sporting ugly coughs throughout the weekend. While not an issue in the noise and chaos of the water park itself, it did not endear us in restaurants and shops, as I am sure a number of people subjected to their open mouthed fits were wondering why the boys were out and about with us rather than in a consumptive ward somewhere.

Other than those minor glitches, we had an awesome time. We took an olde-timey picture - formal western gear (including rifles!) in front of a stage coach, realizing a long-held but heretofore unvoiced dream of Deanna's to have an olde-timey family picture taken. We played mini-golf and arcade games. We took in the supremely cheesy Tommie Bartlett Water Show, which appeared to be unchanged from 30 years ago with the bizarre exception of a randomly inserted song by Lady Gaga. The boys played happily in the hot tub of our rented condo one night and ate mini-boxes of bad cereal for breakfast each morning (Cocoa Puffs still suck after 40 years!). We ate at a buffet where Owen fell in love with crab legs, a fine compliment to his long-established passion for shrimp. Swam in an outdoor wave pool. We watched bad TV, including one night when Deanna and I stayed up way too late after getting hooked on a terrible movie called "Head Over Heels" starring Monica Potter and Freddie Prinz, Jr. Feel free to google it - you can watch it free on the internet if you too have the urge to waste two hours of your life!

In one sign that the glorious cheesiness of the Dells may not hold sway over today's kids the way it did over our generation, when we suggested driving to the "Lost Canyon" attraction to take the half-hour horse and buggy tour through it, Owen asked why, if the canyon was really lost, we had a brochure about it and declared the whole thing to be nonsense. This moment of sober reflection was thankfully rare compared to his and the twins boundless enthusiasm at the rest of the trip, including their glee at playing on the ratty old mini-golf course that actually passed off a street light pole planted in the middle of a green as one of many "exciting" obstacles.

All in all, an awesome start to summer.

Here are a several photos of the trip:

Yes, the Dells actually ARE beautiful, despite the cheesiness of the town. This is the view from a river dock at our hotel.

Brothers and best friends.

Money saving vacation tip: While the kids are still young and gullible, you can convince them the oversized bathtub in your hotel room is actually a "waterpark."

How do you know you have crossed the border into Wisconsin? Giant cow statutes every 7 miles.

Apparently concerned about making a claim it could not back up, this business cautiously boasts that "Only in the Dells can you get a Polish Taco in a Caboose." Take your best shot, all you other polish taco stand in caboose owners.

Inside the polish taco caboose, the boys don railroad hats for a family photo snapped by the owner while our polish tacos were cooking. The hat makes Owen in particular look like he stepped out of a picture of Soviet youths circa 1936.

Me giving my usual rousing interpretation of "Bear Snores On," one of our all-time favorite children's books.

Ain't No Party Like a Pee-Pee Party

It appears that I have only been able to muster a single post in the last month. Where have I been? Well, there was that period where everyone was a little sick. And then there was that stuff at work. The refusal of Hayden to sleep except during a random two hour window every two weeks or so has also contributed. So, honestly, has the improving weather. Oh, and several times I was simply distracted by TV and just didn’t feel like posting.

So what has been going on on CloudEight, you ask?? Hmmm. To touch on a couple of our favorite themes, there have been two incidents of puking in the car since my last post, along with all of the post-puking clean-up fun that car puking incidents lead to. There has been one trip to the emergency room: Cooper v. coffee-table = 3 staples to the back of the head. Yuck. Second trip to the emergency room caused by this particular table, by the way, as it also sent Owen there with a wound to the forehead three years ago. Either we are slow learners or the coffee-table has blood-lust, not sure which. Cooper and Owen have since been engaging in sometimes heated arguments as to who was hurt worse by the coffee-table, and we would certainly be wise to move it before Hayden, who loves a good argument, intentionally self-inflicts some damage to his own head just to get in on the action.

Mostly, though, I have spent the past month hanging out in the bathroom. The good news on that front is that I may have actually changed my last diaper, retiring after a respectable career. I can’t say that I have put up hall-of-fame numbers, mind you, as I only have three kids after all, but I have certainly worked it hard. I have left it all on the changing table, so to speak, and have no regrets. Well, there was that one time I guess, that I regretted my lack of vigilance and failure to note a penis aimed at my head. And there were certainly times I regretted having a sense of smell. Other than that though, it has been tedious but sweet, as a swift change of a diaper has long been one of my parenting strengths.

Anyway, my career is coming to an end not due to me losing a little something on my fastball or some sort of marital decree laid down by me that henceforth, only the women in the family shall change diapers. Instead, the twins went from reluctant and seemingly unready to potty-train to wearing nothing but underwear in the space of a week. Seriously, it was that fast. That was three weeks ago and not an accident since.

My changing of diapers has been replaced, however, by endless trips to the bathroom, during which the guys proudly eek out the thimble full of pee that has trickled into their bladders since the last bathroom trip ten minutes ago. And so it goes. We read books, we sing songs, we chit-chat. There is dramatic grunting and bragging about the size of poop (they are actually quite generous in oohing and aahing over the size of each other poops; a mutual admiration and support society). There is endless wonder as to where everything disappears to when the toilet is flushed, complete with numerous questions and close examinations of areas of the toilet that no one has business examining. Then there is the rinsing out of their little potty seats, followed by extremely enthusiastic hand-washing, leaving our little bathrooms perpetually looking like a freak thunderstorm has just raged through. Leave bathroom for five to ten minutes, repeat ... and repeat ... and repeat. Still, much like bodily waste, this too shall pass - hopefully in time for me to catch a bit of out-of-the-bathroom sunshine before winter sets in again.

The Club Scene

While the rest of you have probably spent your recent Saturday nights maybe renting a movie or doing something equally tame, we have been out hitting the club scene. Well, one Club in particular. You would be in awe if you saw it - huge cavernous place, with a whole wall of flat screen TV's, all showing the same thing (hello mindfreak!). It is too hip to have a "theme" per se, but if you pinned me down, I would say that its theme is supersized consumer goods - with authentic reproductions of food and household items on steroids stacked in row upon row and rising towards the heavens in an effort to make you feel tiny - Alice in Wonderland style (mindfreak no. 2!). Some sort of ironic commentary on American consumer culture I suppose. And did I mention exclusive? I have a card that I flash at the door and am waived right in, but if you just showed up for the first time, no way you get in unless you are willing to pay. I keep my VIP status intact by dropping loads of cash at the place every time I go. This time, my night out cost about $500, and that was without even hitting the jewelry kiosk that they have on premises for those inclined to buy their significant other or new Club friend a bit of bling on the spot - a stroke of marketing genius. While Deanna and I have been known to hit the Club for a night out, we have recently gone with the whole family in tow, as kids appear to be a trendy Club accessory right now. I would have been wise to hit the jewelry kiosk during our last visit, because as our little accessories were gulping down some of the retro-chic hot dogs, I saw some dude with a funky American-flag hearing aid (as if the music wasn't already loud enough!) and crazy wisps of gray hair chatting up Deanna. He claimed he was only commenting on how cute our kids were, but I didn't buy it, and challenged him to a fight in the "radial room", a room of the club where the walls are stacked with tires (mindfreak no. 3!). He backed down and the night proceeded without further incident, other than the usual crazy fun. Anyway, I hear the owner of the Club, one Sam Walton, is opening these things everywhere, so keep your eyes open locally. If a Sam's Club opens near you, you can be as cool as me next Saturday night.

Seek and Go Seek

The twins and I are often busy here these days playing endless games of what others commonly refer to as "hide and seek," which goes in our house by its less common and more cumbersome name of "Daddy, you count and me and Cooper hide". The twins, in that twin way of theirs, always hide together, often arguing loudly about where while standing in the same room where I am counting. Once a consensus is reached, they charge off, leaving me to loudly search for them in rooms where I know they aren't before "finding" them. Often, the whole seeking process is just too much for them to bear, and they yell out helpful hints to me like "in here" in case the uncontrollable giggling emitting from their hiding spots aren't clue enough. Owen rarely joins us, as he does not appear to find it particularly fun that his brothers either insist on hiding with him or immediately out his spot upon being found themselves.

The current state of the game is a vague improvement over a recent phase, in which the twins would go to the trouble of running and hiding somewhere while I counted, but would then come charging towards me as soon as I finished counting, pointing at me and triumphantly yelling "I find you." Imagine that "seek and go seek" scenario playing out 10 times in a 10 minute period, interrupted only by my attempts to explain that they should stay in their spots until I find them, at which they would nod heartily and convince me they understood only to do the same thing again. I am also fascinated by the fact that they appear to believe that so long is they have buried there head in a blanket or the like, that I will not be able to see the rest of them. This puts them, by my calculation, at the approximate evolutionary par with the ostrich at the moment. Still, they are damn cute, and the pure joy they get from playing is so infectious that I would be hard pressed to think of a better way to spend my time than playing "Daddy, you count and me and Cooper hide" or "seek and go seek" with my little ostriches.

Jesus Row Your Boat Ashore, and Watch Out for Darth Vader

Church is always somewhat harrowing, especially since our current church sometimes tends to be on the button-downed, "children should be seen and not heard" side (or maybe even the "seen in pictures and not heard" side). I am proud to report that the boys did well on Easter Sunday, despite being hooked up to the functional equivalent of a sugar-IV in the form of Easter Baskets in the three hours immediately proceeding our worship. One favorite moment was Owen loudly humming the Imperial March from Star Wars (Darth Vader's theme song) to himself during one of the quieter patches. Another favorite was watching Hayden seriously thumb through the hymnal. Despite his lack of reading skills at age almost-three, he apparently understands that the hymnal has to do with songs, as he eventually stopped his thumbing, looked up and loudly inquired where "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" was in the book.

The Jesus Pirates

Proof that religious education may be somewhat lost on kindergarteners. I thought the skull and crossbones was an especially nice touch.

The Owen Show

Several readers have inquired as to how my big trombone performance at the kindergarten class went last month, so I am updating you all.

Keep in mind that while my blog entry was about me, I was not the only act on the bill that day. In fact, if there were a concert poster made up for the event, it would have gone something like this:

"OWENFEST '09!!!
Opening Acts:
"Owen's Twin Bros." - Living, Breathing Show and Tell Items
"Star Wars medley" - played by Owen's Daddy on Trombone, followed by short Q & A
"Watch Out for Jabba the Hutt" - a dramatic reading of Owen's favorite book by Owen's Daddy

Headliner:

"Flags!" - an educational presentation by Owen, the Star of the Week"

So, first we introduced the twins, who proved to be an exceptional warm up act. I suppose for extra effect, we could have told the class that we had octuplets and only had room for two in the van, as kindergartners are notoriously gullible. But really, two is enough. Twins make people smile, especially when they are being cute and not either whining or wreaking havoc and destruction.

Next, I broke out the trombone. No chance to warm up as there was no "green room" and I was self-conscious about noise as a lone trombone blaring out through the relatively quiet grade school was sure to garner more attention than I wanted. So, I dived right in. The song went well, with the exception of one clinker high note early on which caused an audible cringe from the crowd. The kids asked me a lot of questions afterwards and Owen told Deanna later that a lot of the kids thought he had a cool dad. So, having earned the adulation of such a discerning crowd, what more could I really ask for. No encore was demanded, by the way.

Next up, I read the class Owen's "favorite" book, "Watch Out for Jabba the Hutt!" which proved to be more violent than I recalled, so I ended up skipping a lot of pages when I saw teacher Mindy sort of grimacing at me. You know you are not reading a classic when you can skip approximately every other page and not have anyone lose the narrative thread (such as it is) or care. The class was not enthralled.

Last, Owen did a little presentation on flags using his extensive collection of miniature flags as props. While devoted readers of CloudEight are familiar with his love of flags, his peers were not. I like to think he wowed them with his ability to identify the flags of obscure countries like Trinidad and Tobago, but who really knows what impresses the kindergarten set. I can say that he was poised and we, his parents, were duly impressed and proud.

In case you are wondering where Deanna was during all this, she was "on twins" after their portion of the show - i.e. keeping them from grabbing the slide of my trombone while I was playing, etc. A difficult job, to be sure. It was actually a bit of a trick prying the twins out of there as they were rather enthralled with being in school at long last. Hayden in particular attempted to dash into several other classrooms on our way out, but we managed to corral him in time.

And that, dear readers, was the extent of the Owen Show. DVD's of the show and my reading of "Watch Out for Jabba the Hutt!!" in audio book format are of course available for download in the "ShopCloudEight!" portion of this blog. Buy both together and receive a discount.

Paddy O'Daddy

Another St. Patrick's Day is in the books. Aside from guzzling Shamrock Shakes and amusing myself by speaking in an Irish brogue and making the kids refer to me as "Paddy O'Daddy" and "Da", not too much celebratin' took place. Deanna and I hope to rectify that in the near future with a kid-free jaunt to New Orleans, where we will celebrate being in New Orleans without kids.

Another birthday in the books recently for me as well. From the things that make me feel old file:

1. I recently had to ask the bartender at a Wicker Park bar what the kids are drinking with the Red Bull these days. Vodka, as it turns out. Still, I guess I should get some style points for being in a Wicker Park bar at all, even if I needed Red Bull to stay out past 10.

2. The twins like to run their hands over my unshaven weekend face and say "rrrrooouuugh!" Then, to reinforce their point, they run their hands over my bald head and say "smooooooove."

Owen-Wan Kenobi's Last Home Birthday Party

Every other family in town sagely seems to host 6th birthday parties at an indoor playground, pool, gymnasium, etc. We, however, for the second year in a row, let Owen talk us into hosting his birthday party at our house. We are apparently slow learners.

As soon as we consented to Owen's request for a Star Wars themed party at our place, he began suggesting that we decorate each room of the house as a different planet in the Star Wars galaxy, including an ambitious request to turn the living room into the lava-covered planet from Episode III, and the dining room into the ice planet of Hoth from the Empire Strikes Back. Yikes!

We eventually scaled back his plans to something workable, and worked out a guest list of seven of his little friends. An expensive but fun trip to the party megastore followed, along with some long days of agonizing over a cake design by Deanna (the final decision: an unappetizing looking but tasty Jabba the Hutt, using, amusingly, an Easter lamb cake mold as its base foundation), and research regarding Star Wars party games by me. Finally, after some serious night-before decorating, we were ready to rock.

Entertaining eight six-year-olds for two hours is not a pleasant task under any circumstances. Still, despite dreading it for days, I think Deanna and I can both agree that it was actually worse than we imagined. While things generally hung together for the first five minutes or so, the situation started to deteriorate when they spread out to multiple floors, despite our best efforts to corral them. Then, at the outset of the first game, one kid, who we didn't much know and who seemed a bit out-of-sync with the others, simply disappeared. Once Deanna reported to me that she couldn't find him, we took turns quietly scouring the house for him while the other gamely attempted to hold the rest of the group's attention. Increasingly desperate, we learned later that we had both independently gone out to the mudroom and counted the kids shoes and coats - all there. Finally, convinced that he must have left I began searching outside, stunned that we could lose one of our eight charges just 10 minutes into the party. Deanna was just looking up his mom's number to call and say we couldn't find him - not a pleasant call to make - when she saw a shadow move behind a chair. The little bastard actually smirked as he acknowledged to Deanna that yes, he had heard us all calling for him - just didn't feel like coming out.

While the rest of the party was fairly unpleasant as well - fist fight, verbal altercations, crying, running out of games after the first hour - it all actually seemed delightful compared to our panic of thinking we had lost one of our guests.

While we may have had a tough go of it, the kids all actually seemed to have a blast, including making a giant space-themed mural, which, amusingly, including poorly spelled versions of risque six-year old terms like "fartsicle" and "poopy-head." The highlight for me was some Jedi-sensory training that consisted of having the kids stick their hands into cups to feel various things they couldn't see and then telling them they were gross things like "Darth Maul's eyeballs" (mandarin oranges) and "Bantha guts" (spaghetti). I knew this was a success when one of the kids told me later, upon finding out it had been mandarin oranges and not eyeballs, that he had been wondering how we gotten our hands on Darth Maul's eyeballs.

I will leave you with this photo of Deanna, attempting, to no avail, to summon Obi-Wan to help us watch the kids.

RedPlanet Live!

Owen is "Star of the Week" in his kindergarten class this week. Among the dubious benefits afforded to the Star of the Week is the chance to have your parents come into the class and embarrass themselves. While I could take the easy way out and simply read Owen's favorite book to the class (a charming little tome called "Watch Out for Jabba the Hutt!"), I have decided to immerse myself fully in the opportunity to embarrass myself by playing the Star Wars theme on the trombone. While I was pretty good in my high school heyday, I then took a 15-year hiatus. I took it up again for a couple of years some time ago when I joined an all-lawyers big band, which practiced every Monday night in the courtroom of a saxophone-playing federal judge in Chicago. We would play formally at our own concerts a couple of times a year, play at lunch outside in Daley plaza, and, increasingly, play at charity dance events and the like. Despite being made up of people who worked full time in the legal profession, they were, for the most part, pretty damn good. I was, however, less good. They got increasingly serious and played more and more about the time Owen was born and I decided to hang it up again. So, six more years on, tomorrow marks my auspicious return to public performing.

Nothing eases any concerns about performing after a six year layoff, however, like playing a song beloved by kindergarten boys who, I would guess, have no idea what a trombone is supposed to sound like. It reminds me of the easing in done by my first high school rock band. At the time we were called "Andromeda," later to be changed to "Circus" and then, alarmingly, "Drauma" - yes, with a "u", for reasons I can thankfully no longer recall. I played electric bass and occasionally sang (although I was never able to do both at the same time, a fact that a year later made me expendable and got me and my rock star attitude booted out of a different band, "The Wave," mere weeks before they went on to win my high school's Battle of the Bands). Anyway, Andromeda's first paying gig was playing a Christmas party for kids with mental disabilities. At the time, we knew about 9 songs, 5 or so of which were Judas Priest songs. Although it sounds like an unlikely recipe for success, I don't believe I have ever played for a more appreciative audience in my life. No matter how much a song sucked, they loved it, clamoring for more. Even after I blew out the speakers on our borrowed sound system with my trademark scream at the end of REO Speedwagon's "Ridin the Storm Out", they were loving us as we soldiered on with some acoustic Christmas carols that I am sure were almost unrecognizable.

So, here's hoping the kindergarten kids like my little performance tomorrow even half as much as the kids back then. Tomorrow's possible encore, in case you are wondering, is "Colors of the Wind" from Pocahontas, not Judas Priests' "Heading Out to the Highway." Signs of the time, I suppose.

2009 POTY Update No. 1: Deanna Squelches the Competition

A couple of nights ago, Deanna performed the Heimlich maneuver on Cooper, quite possibly saving his life. She is one cool chick under pressure, I tell you! Vegas bookmakers immediately dropped the odds on her winning the 2009 POTY award down to even money. Those of you smart enough to put money down on her in January back when the odds were still at 3:2 can give yourself a little pat on the back - or contact Deanna if you need more of a hearty whack or a fist to the diaphragm.

POTY Time

I have received several inquiries from readers as to the outcome of the race on CloudEight for the coveted Parent of the Year (POTY) award, timely reminders that it is high time for our annual award ceremony. For newer readers, the POTY is an award bestowed each year in our house since we embarked on our childrearing adventures. For those of you keeping score at home, Deanna has won three of the previous five contests (with the help, I might add, of an “automatic” victory rule for the two years she actually gave birth – a rule I wisely never choose to argue with). I was able to bring home the hardware in 2004 and last year, in a surprise win, the award went to Suzy the nanny. Returning to the winner’s circle this year, for the fourth time in six years, is none other than our very own Deanna. The trophy this year, for those who are curious, is a model of a puking child fashioned from scraps of old soap.

While I was solid throughout the year, Deanna was, in a word (or non-word, depending on how hung up on proper grammar and English you are), solider. She also had some game-changing moments. Long-concerned about the twins’ nighttime reliance on pacifiers, for example, she decided one summer weekend that we needed to suck it up (pun-intended) and make them go cold poult. It worked, and their lips have not graced rubber since (random chewing on hot wheels tires notwithstanding). And, frankly, it wasn’t even the weekend long hysterical-cry-fest I had anticipated and dreaded.

A more telling example occurred in mid-summer: Owen was in the middle of a four week run of every day swim lessons when he was unexpectedly promoted from Level 1 (populated by those at risk of drowning in a ½ inch-deep puddle) to Level 2 (populated by those with a 50% chance of survival if tossed into two feet of water despite being almost four feet tall). He was upset at leaving his beloved teacher, Ms. Colleen, as well as his little compatriots down at the shallow end, and being made to engage in life-risking behaviors such as putting his face in the water. There was crying and uncooperative behavior.

The next day found him back at Level 1. His grandparents, who had dropped him off, witnessed some disturbing behavior during the lesson: a fairly obvious lack of effort in an attempt to stay at the relative safety of Level 1 (I was working on some good swimming stuff here using “dog(paddl)ing it” and “throwing in the towel” but have given up and am moving on). That night, Deanna and I, advised of this behavior, sat him down for a little heart to heart. Before I could even start, Deanna launched into a firm, persistent but caring monologue to him about our expectations of him and the fact that a lack of effort was unacceptable. Those words don’t due it justice really - she had just the right touch and you could see the lesson seeping into what sometimes seems like the impenetrable skull of our little five-year-old. It was just a damn fine bit of parenting, the likes of which one doesn’t see every day. I sat by amazed and largely silent (other than the occasional shout of “Amen” following particular good turns of phrase). Damned if he didn’t go out and nail the “Swimmer of the Day” award at class the very next day. And, as summer wound its way on, his swimming progressed by l(e)aps and bounds. Simply brilliant.

So how does one compete with masterful parenting flourishes like that? There were really only two chances for me at that point. One was to single-handedly potty-train the twins. While I did actually focus on this for awhile, they seemed only vaguely interested, and in the end they simply weren’t ready.

The second was for Deanna to falter - to fall off the beam, to put it into Olympic terms in what was an Olympic year – but who wants to win like that in a parenting competition. While Deanna generously tried to give me a fighting chance by dropping Cooper on his head several days before the end of the year, a fact appreciated by me if not by Cooper, it was simply too little, too late.

So, while our annual POTY competition here on CloudEight is fierce, and the kids always willing to present new and exciting challenges to our parenting abilities, I, for one, am proud to be co-parenting with our household's four-time champion. Winter hats off to you, Sunny D! And now, on to this years competition...