Horse Manure Park

It is the eve of Christmas Eve. We are preparing for the big day here, running around the house, frolicking and laughing, telling tales of Christmas, baking cookies and writing letters to that Jolly Old Elf.  In the evening, we sip steaming mugs of hot chocolate and sing Christmas carols around the tree. Yeah, right. Sorry, but our life isn't this Facebook idyllic.  It's not even frickin' close. In the 1600's, people used to paint a black cross the doors of dwellings occupied by those infected with the Black Plague.  For the past couple of weeks, that black cross has been on our door. We just can't get healthy around here. The Boy and The Girl have each taken turns with respiratory infections, trips to the doctor, negative tests, stomach flu (and all the involuntary spillages that go with it).  The Boy contracted Fifth disease.  The Speaker of the House has had a persistent cough since before Thanksgiving.  I've had a persistent so...

I always chuckle at those who consider themselves morally supreme to others.  When you look down your nose at others, you eventually run smack into a wall because you are not watching where you're going. Here's an excellent example. Today I read an article about a safe driving campaign launched by the state of South Dakota which had the slogan "Don't Jerk and Drive." What do you think of when you read that? What the state of South Dakota meant was don't jerk your steering wheel on icy roads. But the morally transcendent had other ideas.  "Jerk" can mean "masturbate." South Dakota subsequently dropped the campaign for fear of offending those with divine principles. But here's my question:   Why would the phrase "don't jerk and drive" be offensive unless your mind is in the gutter?  The moral of the story?  Those who are holier-than-thou are just as perverted as everyone else. They probably fart, too. ...

We are all conditioned to think a certain way, act a certain way, observe the world in a certain way.  It starts at an early age, when we are told to color inside the lines; scribbling over the picture is unacceptable.  Eventually we become "programmed," not unlike lab rats. Most people live inside that box of robotic, predictable thought their entire lives.  Look around you.  You see it everywhere. But children have fresh eyes.  Their point of view comes from a completely different perspective; their thoughts have not yet been clouded or limited by stupid, unwritten rules.  One of the joys of parenting is when your child says something completely outside the box of conventional thinking. And The Boy had one of those moments this week. Almost all of you know that I am a football nut.  My dad loved football and he passed that love down to me. Now, I'm passing it along to The Boy. So last week I started teaching him all of the NFL teams based...

When I glanced at the calendar this morning, I realized that Christmas Day is just 18 days away. In fact, we are already a week into December and I hadn't even noticed.  I guess I should start paying attention to stuff like months and days.  It all just seems to mush together in one big, sloppy mish-mash of time. I should have known that Father Time was getting ahead of me when I ended up at the Boy's very first Christmas program on Friday.  Could it really be that time of year already? Anyway, it was an enjoyable show.  The Boy is easy to pick out of the crowd.  He's a head taller than his classmates and he looks like his old man. Case in point: at the concert, I ran into a old co-worker who I hadn't seen in over five years, who said, "There is no doubt whose boy that is.  He's practically a clone!" Singing "Away in a Manger." The Boy with a pair of drumsticks in his hands.  Seems perfectly natural if you ask me. Yours tr...

Parenting is a tough job.  But I am determined to teach the Tax Deductions good from bad, as evidenced by this video demonstration of the Boy.  He learns quickly.  In fact, he goes so fast, you might have to watch it twice. Still, he's a keeper.

Being a dad is a reciprocal thing.  I teach my children well their father's hell (to borrow a line from an old song) and they, in turn, teach me. A delightful aspect of having Tax Deductions is they tell you the truth.   They don't filter anything. "Dad, you smell bad." "Dad, you look nice." "Dad, you need to shave." "Dad, you have a booger on your chin." I appreciate the truth.  I like to be told how it is.  This is true in all aspects of my life; I dislike political correctness with a passion.  Over the years, Americans have hidden Truth (with an intentional capital "T") behind a wall of euphemisms and it is partly the reason why our country is in its current condition.   It has made us soft as a people.  We no longer face issues head-on.  The raw, naked truth hurts.  And Americans don't like to hear the truth. Fat people are no longer fat.  They are "metabolically challenged."  Ug...

We are nearing Thanksgiving.  The madness of the Christmas rush is just a few days away.  The snow is here to stay.  The cold is unforgiving.  The sun sets around 4:30 PM.  Vitamin D is at a premium. Our first snowmen of the year.  Actually, they more of a dirt/snow hybrid.  Probably some dog crap in there, too. We are approaching that time of year where sun and sandals can only be found in distant lands, thousands of miles away.   Blech. Still, it is important to keep your focus on the goodness of life.  A couple of situations involving friends and family over the past few weeks have reminded me to never take life -- or happiness -- for granted. Don't take your health for granted. Don't take your relationships for granted. Don't take tomorrow for granted. I know that's all easily said.  It's much more difficult to practice, especially if things are going well for you. Remember, happiness and good fortune may not last v...

Ever have one of those mornings when you have absolutely nothing planned for the day except to whip up a tasty Bloody Mary, watch a  Hogan's Heroes  marathon, and eat as much bacon as humanly possible? Then something totally unexpected comes up and, without warning, you find yourself knee-deep in the hoopla (to borrow a terrible line from a terrible song by a terrible band). Has that ever happened to you? Such was the case for me last Sunday. It started innocently enough.  The Girl and I were spending some quality father/daughter time early in the morning, snuggling in my easy chair with a blanket.  We talked about school, types of wolves, crayons vs. colored pencils vs. markers, the virtues of cheese pizza, how far away the moon was from the earth... You know, your typical eight year-old idle chatter. Then she suggested that we watch t.v. and said, "Let's watch one of your shows, Dad." It was too early for football, so I turned on the Science ...

This might be just another day to most people, but it is special to me.  Even though she can't read this blog -- actually, she would have called the whole concept of the internet "science fiction" -- I want to wish my guardian angel the happiest of birthdays. My mom would have been 86 years old today. I have precious few photos of her, mostly because she was always the one taking pictures; she was always behind the camera.  Anyone in my family can attest to that. Many of the pictures I personally took of her aren't very flattering.  Most capture her scowling at the camera with her mouth wide open, most likely yelling at me to "hold the camera still!" or to get my "damn finger off the lens!"  Hey, I was just a kid.  And those Polaroids were huge... and tricky. But today I started rummaging through some of my old photos, determined to find a couple that captured Mom as she really was.  I actually had some luck. This first one was taken...

The phone is silent tonight.  No one is ringing the doorbell.  The mailbox is empty. Yep, election day must be over.  I'm no longer the most important person in the world.  I've gone back to being a frickin' number.  Just like you. Americans have made voiced their two biggest concerns:  1) We don't want to catch Ebola. 2) We want to smoke pot. Duly noted. I reckon. Yes, the people have spoken.  And the politicians have said what you've wanted to hear to get your vote.  The lucky ones have been elected.  Now they can start concentrating on their personal agendas and their special interests.   That's politics.  Always has been, always will be.   I don't think there is a single Representative or Senator who truly cares for his/her constituency.  You don't become an elected official because you are a caring person.  Politics is a nasty, dirty, cut-throat business.  Only the dirtiest wi...

I knew it's going to be an adventurous day when I saw this... The short bus was parked in front of my favorite hang out.  Yee-haw! Okay, so I'm not exactly what you'd call politically correct, although I've usually got a pretty good filter.  The problem, as I see it, is we live in an ultra-sensitive, entitled society which has made us into a country overflowing with lazy, thin-skinned crybabies. That's strictly my opinion and it's probably an unpopular one, but the truth hurts. I'm saying all of this because today I had to go to Walmart.  And it's never pretty when I go to Walmart. However, today I tried to adopt the perspective of my niece, Stacy, who said recently (on Facebook) that she loved Walmart because it "displays an array of unique beautiful individuals of God's creation." Stacy is a good, kind soul.  She's also an ordained minister and I'm very proud of her and her accomplishments.  But my faith in the hum...

I've uncovered all sorts of treasures while organizing our new storage unit. As I've sorted through old photographs, one thing has really stood out to me.  And I've realized -- surprisingly -- that I've rarely written about it here on my blog. It is something that was (and is) a huge part of my life: my love of drumming . I hope someday the Tax Deductions read this, and if they do, they need to know that drumming was a massive part of their old man's life when he was kid. Now, I confess as I write this I do run the risk of sounding boastful. That's not my intention at all. The truth is, I used to play drums a lot .  In fact, when I was growing up, drumming was all I thought about.  It was all I wanted to do. It was obvious to me that I would grow up to be a famous musician some day. Well, at least famous in my own ZIP code... By the time I was four or five, the drumming bug had bit me hard.  I practiced and practiced, teaching myself along...

At 4:21 PM on Wednesday I officially became closer to 50 than 40.  But I still feel the same.  So far, I've been blessed with reasonably good health and I'm still pretty much psychologically sound. Age is just a number.  A shitty, dirty, no-good number. Yes, it was a watershed week. We got all kinds of things accomplished this week, including yard work, splitting wood, winterizing the house and - oh, yeah - installing a new furnace.  Well, I didn't install it, but it was installed nevertheless. So, no Valley Forge this winter.  I was kind of looking forward to it. We also moved into a new storage unit this past week.  While doing so, the Speaker of the House and I decided to bring some of our old high school/elementary stuff home and weed through it.  The idea was to throw a lot of it away.  I mean, who keeps this stuff ? I ended up going through all of it and not throwing a solitary thing away.  I just didn't have the heart. On...

Ugh. 'Twas a windy, wet, cold October day.  It rather reflects my mood right now. No, it has nothing to do with the Vikings getting shellacked by the Packers last night.  I was expecting that.  I was prepared, and being prepared is a good thing. That leads me to my news of the day. Over the last couple of winters, we've had a few problems with our furnace.  It has had several parts replaced, including last winter.  In fact, it was one of those brutal -35°F nights last December when our furnace simply stopped working. Luckily, a technician came out in the middle of the night and fixed it.  All seemed to work fine during the remainder of last year's painful winter. Then a couple weeks ago, after running for a day or two when it was chilly outside, the furnace went kaput again. This time we weren't so lucky. Two days, two technicians and five hours of diagnostics/processes of elimination/new parts later, including checking the vents ...