puzzles come with a difficulty rating. puzzles made in our home go through an additional bit of math called the anthony factor. with this, you multiply any difficulty rating by seven, then you have the adjusted anthony scale. as for what sorts of things necessitate this tweak, here are a few of things you might expect to happen between your puzzle-building sessions:

1. having large groups of the facing-up pieces flipped face-down.
2. having your neatly parted edge pieces mixed back in with the middle pieces.
3. having pieces moved from the puzzle table to other tables or the floor.
4. having pieces put together that have no business being together.
5. and lastly, and surely the most effective of his tactics, he takes apart already completed swaths of the puzzle.

but, on the good side:

1. you get a lot more puzzle for your dollar given the time spent assembling it
2. and you have a true and immense sense of achievement when you are able to outpace anthony's counter-measures and finally complete a puzzle.

the five house rule changes anthony, age 5, would make were he given the power.

1. three hours of computer every day.
2. eat more unhealthy things.
3. kids can be grownups.
4. go to ted drewes (custard) everyday.
5. everyday is my birthday.

i know more than a few adults who would answer similarly.

at our nightly dinner table, i try, hard, to have a question at the ready to ask my family over our meal. sometimes the question turns a quiet and distracted group into a lively, engaged one. sometimes a question is not needed because the table is already full of life and vigor. sometimes the kids remember before me and ask if i have a question. and some days we all forget about the dad question like it never existed at all. back in november, one of the nightly questions was "this time next year what is something you hope you can say have accomplished or completed?". i added that it should be something that you think would make you proud or happy to be able to say. as some people struggled to settle on just one thing, the question was modified, probably by a challenge-thirsty bella, so each person had to list three things. for reasons i haven't fully figured out or intended, something about this exercise escaped the stigma of a new year's resolution (which i feel is good and helpful). in typical form, i quickly recorded everyone's answers in my next moment alone.

ANFER

1. ride a 2-wheeler bike
2. swim lessons
3. learn how to roller skate (w/ dad and alex)

ALEO

1. piano lessons
2. goto water world (in denver, colorado)
3. learn how to rollerblade (w/ dad)

BAYA

1. renovate back yard (making if dog-ready)
2. singing lessons
3. goto horse camp

MARTA

1. camp at onandoga
2. install new french doors
3. ???

TROY

1. learn how to roller blade
2. restore the everyman
3. do a 100 mile, 2-canyon (poudre & big thompson) bike ride in colorado

one excluded answer from anthony's list was "pee on dad's eye".

the hole in marty's list is quite typical for her. such list are near impossible for people who are genetically blessed to be content and fulfilled with they things they have attained and achieved. secretly, i couldn't be more envious of the serenity she and others like her quietly possess.

i've had my present job for five years.

i've been a parent for ten years.

i've had my current car for twelve years.

i've been married for thirteen years.

i've ridden the same bike for fifteen years.

and as of this past summer, i've been pals with bookpimp for twenty years.

the only troy-things older than my chum-status with bookpimp michael are:

• my original gameboy,
• a bottle of paco rabanne cologne on my bathroom shelf,
• a smithereens concert tee,
• and a faint scar across my right nipple obtained before i stopped hitting the bottle, and by bottle i mean festive-toned, wine-coolers.

here's to twenty more years of saying funny shit just as the other takes a large pull from their laggard-size sweet tea in hopes of making them spit up on themselves.

a year or two back i was in a large bathroom stall of a public toilet with all three of my kids. one of them had just gone to the rest room and i leaned over to flush the toilet. bella put her hand on my arm and said in an alarmed tone:

BELLA
whoa! what are you doing?

TROY
what? i'm flushing the toilet.

BELLA
you can't do it like that.

TROY
like what?

BELLA
standing like that.

TROY
why not?

BELLA
don't you know that a toilet can shoot spray from the bowl, like, twenty five feet into the air when it is flushed.

TROY (straightening back up)
uh. no. i didn't know that.

BELLA
uhhh. yeah.

TROY
where'd you hear that?

BELLA
at school.

TROY
oh.

BELLA
and just think if there is pee or pooh in there.

some things:

1. what bella doesn't know is that while i'm surely fearful of pee or pooh being jettisoned at me in the form of a fine mist, clean water from a public bowl disturbs me almost to the same degree.
2. since that day, i have never flushed a public toilet without thinking of that moment with bella (not to mention using an outstretched foot and turning away as soon as the flush begins).
3. also since then, i've come to believe that she (and her teachers) are right in that a few times after flushing the toilet in my office, thanks to a bright frosted window in the stall, i can see small droplets flying through the air in volcanic-like antics.
4. and, by the way, where the hell was that lesson in my sixteen years of schooling?
5. i will confess that, as a grown man, it sucks to have your eight year old child so effortlessly place more obstacles for your neurotic mind to navigate. she's exerted more energy asking to have the potatoes passed her way.

marty and i have finally begun (begun!) working on a will. when we told the kids they would be spending the morning with their grandma nat, bella asked what we were doing. we told her. the rest of the morning she was asking me if she could have certain things, like my ipod and computer. i told her not to worry and that i was leaving her my wardrobe, every last stitch of it, or all 32 articles of it. she screwed her face up and told me she was being serious, and then after a pause she added, $25 dollars to her list, as if it were a penalty for my being flip.

days later i came upon this document on the cluttered breakfast room table. it read: so what if my daughter's will looks a bit more humanistic than mine. locks of love would never take my hair. is that somehow my fault? and i still stand by my argument that organ donation could be a rookie move as we don't know what we may or may not need in subsequent realms. although, now that we've had to put pen to paper, marty did get me to soften my request to be cryogenically preserved, a position that until this point i've stood resolute in, even though it compromised our children's college funds. when discussing such things, one can get a bit tunnel-visioned.

not sure if the self-portrait and the drawing of a "mopheaded" aleo were meant to be part of the document or just there incidentally. and last i checked, it isn't cruel to call someone mop-headed if they are mopheaded.



click to enlarge

click to enlarge

TRANSCRIBED:
Bella DeArmitt or Bella D lives here!

No Anthony's!!!
home of 1,000,000 animals.

only come in if have permission and dressed properly.

if unsure of rules:

1. no anthonys!
2. need permission to come in.
3. need heavy clothing, helmet, hiking boots, and nose plug to come in!

( all rules listed above. )

i have no idea what the nose-plug bit is about. perhaps it is to scare folks off. unsure.

my three all-time favorite-ever movie lines:

---

john candy is driving the car the wrong way on the highway. steve martin just woke up form a nap. martin straightens around trying to orient where he is and notices people on the other side of the highway median yelling and waving at them. martin rolls down his window to see what they're saying. he turns to john candy and tells him that the people over there are saying we're going the wrong way. john candy casually dismisses the accusation with a shrug saying, "how do they know where we're going." you see martin think on this for a moment and then you see candy's logic wash over his groggy face. he then turns and waves a polite thank you in the other cars direction while john candy is in the background making wild drinking gestures their way.

---

a major thread of this movie chronicles a crush jason schwartzman (lead role, student) has on one of his young female prep school teachers. in this scene he is having dinner with the teacher and her boyfriend. miffed at his presence schwartzman works to insult the boyfriend. in one swipe he mocks the man's hospital scrubs (and i'm working from memory here):

SCHWARTZMAN
i like your nurse's uniform.

BOYFRIEND
these are O.R. scrubs

SCHWARTZMAN (sarcastically and slowly)
OH ARE they? [spoken "O.R. they?]

---

when arnold schwarzenegger learns that bill paxton is having an affair with his wife, jaime lee curtis, schwarzenegger goes to the car dealership where paxton works. while test driving a car, schwarzenegger gets paxton to talk about having affairs with women and specifically his wife. paxton is more than eager to talk about his exaggerated skills at wooing the lonely wives of over-working men. paxton then lights into a long-winded description of how beautiful the woman he was currently working on was. in the midst of his long description on her features, one of the lines slipped in the middle was, "she's got an ass like a ten year old boy."

i to this day still remember sitting dumbfounded in the audience at this unorthodox, unconventional, and unexpected description of a beautiful woman.

---

i almost added a line from zombieland to the list but i just watched it for the first time while in chicago and i need to let it steep awhile to see if it sticks in my head as much as the above lines do.

for marty's 40th birthday, the kids and i gave her a framed picture collage titled 40 things we love about you. in a couple of the panes we put lists citing ten things each of us appreciated about marty. the left-over panes were peppered with pictures of the kids and i.

the lists were crafted during my wednesday lunches with the kids (i eat lunch with one of my kids each wednesday in a rotating fashion). for these lunches i pick them up from school and we walk to a nearby restaurant of their choosing. it was during these lunches that i coaxed and cajoled these points from their minds onto a napkin. it is possible the process of collecting the points from them could be as curious as the results themselves.

a key that may help you. nummies are nursing breast and biscuits are butts.

1. nummies!
2. when you give me shoulder rides.
3. you smell good when you put that stuff in your armpits.
4. when you comb my hair.
5. when you give me backscratches!
6. you eatin' with me.
7. going to playgrounds with you.
8. asking you if i can jump on beds.
9. helping you make food.
10. you playing checker games with me.

1. you cuddle us.
2. you give us computer time.
3. you bring us to places to eat.
4. you make us dinner.
5. you read to us.
6. you make me lunch everyday.
7. you take us camping.
8. you go hiking with us.
9. you wipe our biscuits.
10. you help make science experiments.

1. you are patient.
2. you help me get my schoolwork done.
3. you take care of our family.
4. you are always honest.
5. you can pretty much read minds.
6. you always try your best.
7. you cuddle and talk with me every night at bedtime.
8. you always pay attention to our opinions.
9. you try to make our dreams come true.
10. you are my one and only mom.

1. that you said yes.
2. the curl of your upper lip.
3. your natural charisma.
4. that you do not shy away from any challenge or trial.
5. that your are the most conscientious mother humanly possible.
6. that you could take me in a fight.
7. your laugh.
8. that you are still as naturally beautiful as the moment i fell in love with you.
9. that you routinely pause the whirl of your life to tell me you love and appreciate me.
10. that i am the one that gets to plan another forty years with you.

oh, and just so she didn't feel totally ripped off, she also got a pink tech 3 pen, my all-time favorite pen thus far, as every person over forty should own a proper writing instrument. here's where you can get one for yourself. and here's one of the more curious pen reviews you'll possibly ever read.

i mentioned that we recently potty trained anthony. he has recently entered phase three of the potty training process. in the event you have never potty trained a human and aren't sure what the evolution of a developing toddler looks like, it is this.

phase 0 : not potty trained. totally comfortably deucing in their diaper and sitting with said feces in direct, warm contact with their ski...

if you haven't read PART 1 yet, i'd consider doing so before continuing as this will seem incomplete without it.

yesterday i shared my personal values. something i didn't share was that in addition to the written definition of my values, i also have a set of images that go with them. i'm a visual guy and somewhere along the way i learned that these images had a power to reach me in a different way and added a depth my written words alone lacked which is how the addition of photos to my simple written values came to be.

again, before the share, a few things about the pictures:

• i use one image per value.
• like the words, these sometimes change. but i've been pretty happy with the current set for awhile.
• how it works is these images reside just under the written portion, so every morning i first read through the text posted yesterday and then i take a moment to glance at these photos, reflecting on each as i move through them.
• aside from two of the images, the actual people in the photos are not the significant part of the story. it is the emotion the image elicits that makes them powerful for me.
• i don't know who sgt joe hall is. it just seemed like a quintessential photo all family scrapbooks might have. oddly, it is the name in its elderly scrawl across the top that makes this picture not so pedestrian for me, or perhaps it is that it makes it perfectly pedestrian.
• i reckon some folks might like an explanation for my selection for the professional value. i'm not going to explain. it's not important. it's the picture i have chosen and i have my reasons. were you to do something similar, you'd pick a picture that speaks to you.
• the equip my children for life one could also possibly use some explanation too. that is one i might one day speak to but i'm not going to today.

unbuttons shirt ... again ...



now i'm naked, really.

Goto PART 3

for the last few years, i've been posting my daily and weekly regiment. this is the schedule i created to help me meet my personal goals. to be truthful, there have only been a handful of times where i've come close to a perfect week. but to be truthful again, hitting my marks or not, my weeks prove far more fruitful trying to adhere to this plan than if i entered life's fray without it.

it occurred to me very recently that i have never shared the counterpart to that schedule. this would be a list of the things that i, in long periods of contemplation, have come to know are important to me. some folks would call them my values. without this list also in hand, the schedule would be rather pointless and the same would be true the other way around.

before i share, a few things about my list:

• i've been working on this document for about thirteen years. that would be three years longer than i've spent producing all of the content for this website.
• there is no other block of text that i have ever spent anything near this amount of time and effort on.
• the list does see edits but changes at this late point are usually fairly minor and have more of a nuanced effect rather than massive shifts in thought.
• without this list, it is very possible my life would be in a complete shambles.
• i read this document just about every morning.
• i sometimes read this document twice in a day.
• the most i've ever looked at this document in one day is five times. and it wasn't the day that was trying, it was me trying not to wreck something i'd later regret.
• the red text is what i read if i only have a minute or two for my morning review.
• i would liken this text to a daily chiropractic adjustment for my mind and soul.

unbuttons shirt ... the list:



pants dropped...

Goto PART 2

list of about two straight weeks worth of hannah Montana movies found in my daughter's bedroom which bodes about seven sorts of evil for me.

click to enlarge

it's that time of year again when i join the rest of blog-free america for a month. this year, i almost decided to not take my usual sabbatical but then a few things happened, three things to be exact. the first thing i wasn't around for personally, i just heard about it afterwards but when i heard what i missed i was beyond bummed. i thought if i had more time perhaps i could have seen it first-hand. the event in question dealt with a mother's outing (yeah, i know i'm a natural fit for that group) from the neighborhood. one of the women, who was quite drunk, turned to another one of the women, who is a hard-bodied, personal trainer, and told her that if she were a lesbian she'd be really, very attracted to her (the personal trainer lady). why can't the drunk people i'm around ever say classic, sexy stuff like that. instead, the drunk people i see say nothing but inane, bumbling, and predictable nonsense not worth remembering or repeating.

the second thing making me decide to take the month off is the last few days. usually i say i need time away because i'm getting hammered by life and am tired and burned out and spent and fed up. but this time it is the complete opposite. i'm none of those things. i'm stoked about my work, my kids, my wife, my days, my challenges. and i feel like i'm making ground and progress on all fronts and spending my days as i want to. this can very much be seen in my last four days which saw the following:

• i made big ground on a long-standing work to-do
• i received multiple, disconnected professional kudos and compliments
• my kids began their summer break
• alex and i went on a great end-of-school adventure (go-karting)
• three great-weather days (!!!) at our community pool (a pool i love to spiritual degrees) just opened up
• i made amazing progress on my mission to swim a mile (a goal currently two-years overdue but not forgotten or dashed)
• a family tennis outing
• great quality time with family
• time with friends i haven't seen much of
• time with marty (someone i also haven't seen enough of recently)

simply put, life is crazy good at the minute and i want more, more, more of it and want to live as distraction-free as possible for a bit.

and the third item is a blend of the above two and deals in time and in family. yesterday anthony was helping me do laundry and, more importantly, i had the time to let him help. he's actually a surprisingly good assistant. to begin, i deliver the laundry to the upstairs laundry chute. anthony's job is to send it all down the chute to the basement. granted you get a couple of bonus items like alex's shoes and anthony's train cars and bella's books but you also get all of the soiled clothes through his efforts. then downstairs anthony climbs into the laundry chute collector and pushes the clothes out onto the sorting table. when done there, he stands at the end of the table where i hand him the clothes an article at a time and say 'near one' (whites), 'middle one' (lights), or 'far one' (darks) and he throws them in the designated basket. the proper delivery of each article is met with great celebration and i can assure you a more exuberant laundry-man could not be found. during yesterday's laundry sorting when anthony was in the laundry chute pushing the clothes out, he paused for a moment to look up the hole as if something caught his attention. after a moment and as if he was speaking to someone he saw, he yelled, "if you're up there and can hear me, you are a pee-face."

it was at that precise moment i knew i needed to take my monthly sabbatical to BE with my family because while i'm always present i'm not always there and that is the very last thing i want to be remembered for. as always, i leave you with the monthly vomit:

what i'm eating
what i'm reading
sassafras tea
june gallery

i'll be back on tuesday, july 6th hopefully with many great stories and experiences to share and tell

the third thing marty said to me the other morning was, "tonight i think you should get an erection at the dinner table and then show it to everyone."

if you're wondering how such a request comes to pass, this is how.

1. it begins with an unfinished patio project in the backyard.
2. this is followed by a two-hour game of boats and moats which involves the muddy patio pit, a running garden hose, and my three children (as well as a few neighbor kids).
3. then comes a dinner call.
4. before children may enter the home, they must be hosed off. for the older children, this can be done by them holding hands out and pulling pant cuffs upward. for the three year old, nothing is salvageable and he must be stripped of everything and hosed down like a reluctant prisoner being processed for incarceration.
5. next comes the three year old's very usual reluctance to put a diaper back on which results with him eating dinner naked.
6. shortly after thankfuls, the three year old looks at his lap and says his penis is 'giant'. to this, his biology teacher mother flatly says, "that is called an erection anthony which means a lot of blood has gone to your penis but you don't usually see it because it is usually hidden in your underwear" to which he says a reflective "kewl" and to which his brother who is already keen to the giant penis condition says nothing but his sister (who is not so keen on the condition) says, "neat, can i see."
7. to this anthony says sure, stands up on his chair, juts his groin forward making his miniature staff hover over his prepared dinner plate of french toast and syrup.
8. alex and marty paid him no mind. bella craned forward to see better. i sat taking the whole scene in and guessed this very scenario had probably never gone down in our eighty year old dining room and thought it was super cool (kewl) it was unfolding (pun prop) right before me. standing there as he was, he looked like a miniature gladiator home from expanding the empire, and for me conjured images of roman decadence and pride.
9. without looking up, and while stabbing a few bits of french toast marty said (again flatly), "boys at my dinner table don't show off their penises while the family is eating so please sit down and finish your meal."
10. and once again, marty earns our home's title of 'spoilsport'.

a 2009 father's day card i found in my desk that somehow didn't get posted here yet. it was made by my daughter, to me, her father, who was adopted, which, as noted, was sad and good.









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i need to make a clarification about yesterday's post. while i did receive an email about it, the email i received was sent from facebook because grammar-dave posted the message on something called "my wall". i'm not entirely certain what my wall is. i've been told by more than one person that if i'm going to have a wall, i should at least know what it is. i told them that having or not having a wall was never a choice i was asked to make and it was only emails like this one that even made me aware of my wall-ownership.

and speaking of facebook, i bet you cash-money i can summarize my facebook thoughts and experiences in seven sentences or less:

1. in april of 2006 i created a facebook account after i was hired by a university because i was told that everyone at the university had a one and it was the proper thing to do.
2. in 2008 i used my facebook account for the first time to look up 40 students i was teaching and then told them in class there were five of them i wouldn't hire for a job based solely upon what i found on their facebook pages.
3. i've never seen more blood leave more faces more quickly, like ever.
4. i log onto face book every three to four months and accept every friend request that has been made of me whether i know the person or not.
5. when asked by someone why i friended everyone, i said because it just didn't matter enough not to.
6. a female student at my school had a job with facebook where she received the questionable material reports and had to make decisions about if the material was questionable enough to be stricken from the record.
7. it's very possible the questionable material job is the only job i might enjoy more than the job i presently have.
8. the last time i looked in on my page a woman i know asked a question about my photo contest and when i didn't answer after a few weeks, another friend, who knew me but not the woman, answered the question for me after saying he was pretty sure i never looked at the page.
9. when i saw that that exchange had occurred, i experienced my first ever warm feeling towards facebook.

ok. so i couldn't swing it in less than seven sentences. de-friend me. and if you're wondering what this might have looked like for myspace, i'm reasonably confident i could have wrapped that up in one sentence.

my sunday was to begin at 3:50am. i can count the days that i have begun at 3:50am on one finger of one hand. i was ready for this particular day though because it was to mark the beginning of a twelve hour trek that would return me to my people.

the day started with the alarm of my iphone ringing one hour early due to daylight savings time which means the day that already had a gruesome start time now had an even more gruesome start time. sadly i didn't realize this miscue until i had taken a shower and went to wake bookguy. for one hundred reasons i was afraid to go back to sleep so groggily waited the hour out in preparation of the two hour car ride to calgary that would officially set our journey in motion.

instead of boring you with the litany of missteps that occurred throughout the day, i'll just add how it all ended because if you sprinkled ten more equally fated dots on the page, you'd have a fine picture of this travel experience. the day concluded, after a three hour delay at o'hare (an airport i was not originally supposed to pass through at all and a full six hours after i was supposed to have been home based on my original itinerary), with the pilot saying over the garbled intercom that there would be a brief delay because the plane was over-fueled and we had to wait for the suck-extra-fuel-back-out-of-the-plane truck to come and suck-extra-fuel-back-out-of-the-plane (as you can imagine, airports, even ones the size of o'hare, aren't exactly teeming with such specialized equipment). the word "brief" in o'hare-speak turns out to be thirty-five minutes and these were just a few more drops in the bucket that culminated in my crossing my home's threshold at 12:40am (mon) instead of 4:30pm (sun) as i was originally scheduled to, or if you prefer twenty-two hours instead of fourteen.

i try to not gripe about such pedestrian matters in this space and i know i run the risk of sounding like one of the douche-bags so expertly dissected by louis ck but i'm taking this moment to rededicate myself to some long-held convictions:

• avoid u.s. customs (post 9-11)
• avoid connecting flights
• avoid checking bags
• avoid flying (post 9-11)

and don't get me wrong. i love flying. i love traveling. and i love the ease in which both of those things are possible via today's knowledge and technology. but the love of those things is irrefutably trumped by my complete lack of patience for thoughtless reactionary, partially-cooked processes which are mindlessly implemented and heartlessly administered. it's tragically sad and we're capable of so much more.

in case you're in a pinch for something good to do, i thought i'd share bella's LIST OF THINGS TO DO. that #1 wasn't to "make a list of things to do" was a little disappointing to me but she more than made up for it in the long run.

28 and 23 would be my first two picks were i pushed to select.

tactic #32 from the moms and kitchens section

STEP 1 unravel a complete ball of twine.

STEP 2 pour full glass of milk on unraveled twine.

STEP 3 walk away.

STEP 4 wait.

RULES FOR KIDS FOR WHEN I GET OLDER AM A MOM

1. as much computer time as wanted but have to buy laptop and get great grades. 1 minus and my computer (is gone) for a week.
2. no spankins.
3. have as many pets as you want. you buy them and we have 2 family pets.
4. each child gets 2 rooms. one for your pets and one for yourself.
5. every week of the summer i get you a challenge but we stop when school starts.
6. every month we go to fro-yos and you can buy as much ice cream as you want as long as you pay for your own fro-yo.
7. each night friday we have a movie night.

if you think i'm snooping into my daughter's life, i think you don't know my daughter.

if you think this open journal was left so accidentally, i think, again, you don't know my daughter.

if you think i'm not bustin' this series of pictures out after bella has kids, i think you don't know me.

religious folks spreading joy through accidental church bulletins.

• The Fasting & Prayer Conference includes meals.
• The sermon this morning: 'Jesus Walks on the Water.' The sermon tonight: 'Searching for Jesus.'
• Ladies, don't forget the rummage sale. It's a chance to get rid of those things not worth keeping around the house. Bring your husbands.
• The peacemaking meeting scheduled for today has been canceled due to a conflict.
• Don't let worry kill you off - let the Church help.
• Miss Charlene Mason sang 'I will not pass this way again,' giving obvious pleasure to the congregation.
• For those of you who have children and don't know it, we have a nursery downstairs.
• The Rector will preach his farewell message after which the choir will sing: 'Break Forth Into Joy.'
• Irving Benson and Jessie Carter were married on October 24 in the church. So ends a friendship that began in their school days.
• At the evening service tonight, the sermon topic will be 'What Is Hell?' Come early and listen to our choir practice.
• Please place your donation in the envelope along with the deceased person you want remembered.
• The church will host an evening of fine dining, super entertainment and gracious hostility.
• Potluck supper Sunday at 5:00 PM - prayer and medication to follow.
• The ladies of the Church have cast off clothing of every kind. They may be seen in the basement on Friday afternoon.
• This evening at 7 PM there will be hymn singing in the park across from the Church. Bring a blanket and come prepared to sin.
• Ladies Bible Study will be held Thursday morning at 10 AM. All ladies are invited to lunch in the Fellowship Hall after the B. S. is done.
• The pastor would appreciate it if the ladies of the congregation would lend him their electric girdles for the pancake breakfast next Sunday.
• Low Self Esteem Support Group will meet Thursday at 7 PM. Please use the back door.
• The eighth-graders will be presenting Shakespeare's Hamlet in the Church basement Friday at 7 PM. The congregation is invited to attend this tragedy.
• Weight Watchers will meet at 7 PM at the First Presbyterian Church. Please use large double door at the side entrance.
• The Associate Minister unveiled the church's new tithing campaign slogan last Sunday: 'I Upped My Pledge - Up Yours!

1:30 i stood up from my desk to go to bed. marty was sleeping diagonally on the ping pong room futon. anthony was sleeping diagonally in my bed. i chose my bed. anthony is easier to push around than marty.

2:22 i woke up to anthony lifting my head with great effort and saying, "no you! ma-ma. no you! ma-ma." squinting my eyes, i lifted my head and had the following conversation with my blonde-headed 2 year old.

anthony, what are you doing?

no you. mama.

no me? no you. i'm sleeping here. mom is in the ping-pong room. if you want to sleep with her, go there. (with this i laid my head back down)

(anthony starts wailing and continues trying to push my head out of the bed) no! mama. mama! MaMa! MAMA!

i get up, carry him like a sack of potatoes under my arm to his crib and leave there wailing. i return to my bed, collapse in and am back asleep within 20 seconds.

2:50 alex whispers in my ear. he says he scared in his bed. wordlessly i lift the covers inviting him into my bed. he crawls in and snuggles into me.

3:43 alex wakes me again and says he really wants to sleep in his bed. i tell him to go sleep in his bed then.

3:47 alex wakes me again and says he still really wants to sleep in his bed but he's scared to alone and wants me to sleep in his bed with him. i tell him i can't because i'm already sleeping in this bed.

3:53 i'm climbing a bunkbed ladder with a sheet and comforter draped over my back like a deranged batman.

7:40 i stir to the sound of bella asking why she doesn't have any shorts in her drawer. as i open my eyes i realize i'm not lieing flat on my back. alex's head is under my right shoulder blade causing a large void beneath me and leaving me propped at an angle and pinned to the side safety railing of the bunk bed.

7:47 i gingerly rise to a sitting position and feel bones i never knew i had in my back rub together abrasively. a new day is underway.

if i had to buy the life story of someone i know i would choose a friend of marty's. i would do so based upon the following facts.

1. she grew up with the last name of Grief in a small, midwestern town.
2. in her family there were six girls and one boy, born last, which made them known around town as The Grief Girls, even after the arrival of the seventh.
3. her home had a communal underwear drawer which meant on any given day you could be wearing a lean pair of jockey briefs or a tattered pair of hip-huggers worn by your mother the week before.

if you don't think the above points to a house, a home, or a group of lives of interest, you and i do not agree on what is note-worthy.

a friend of mine who teaches second grade in colorado sent out an email a few weeks back sharing some results of a test she gives her incoming kids. this particular test evaluates the students giving insight to what kind of year she has ahead of her. i thought about giving the test to bella but the other night at the dinner table she used the word 'tavern' in a story after which i asked her if she just used the word 'tavern' to which she said yes. i then asked her if she knew what a tavern was and she exasperatedly said that of course she knew what a 'tavern' was ... father. i'm not looking for any more reasons to document how bella is going to be far smarter than me before she's driving a car, so no unnecessary testing for her.

this question/answer bit also reminded me of how much i adored (and now miss) the old candid camera interviews allen funt used to do with elementary kids. truly wonderful.

note: (my friend's comments are in the parens)

Question: Don't cry over____________________.
Hoping for: "spilled milk"
Instead, some of the responses:

• who gets to go first
• the rodeo
• "hoo took the last cookee" (the spelling made it funnier to me)

Question: Keep your____________________.
Hoping for: "fingers crossed"
Instead, some of the responses:

• hands to yourself (most common)
• shirt tucked in
• hair neat
• backpack zipped

Question: Two heads____________________.
Hoping for: "are better than one"
Instead, some of the responses:

• over one head
• make two
• bumping
• are funny
• looks weird
• is a double
• better seeing

Question: Eaten out of____________________.
Hoping for: "house and home"
Instead, some of the responses:

• eggs
• the wrong plate
• a bowl
• a bag

Question: Better late than____________________.
Hoping for: "never"
Instead, some of the responses:

• ham (???)
• than early
• than sorry
• for the train
• "I always say"
• nothing

Question: You can't teach____________________.
Hoping for: "an old dog new tricks"
Instead, some of the responses:

• a chicken
• someone how to eat
• a teacher when they're teaching you (deep)
• fish
• a wild bull
• yourself
• "divizzinn" (division)

Question: Where there's a will____________________.
Hoping for: "there's a way"
Instead, some of the responses:

• there's a will not (my favorite)
• there's a pill (hmmm?)
• there's hope
• there is happiness
• there's a try

Question: Don't judge____________________.
Hoping for: "a book by its cover"
Instead, some of the responses:

• fair people
• talent
• a judge

Question: Easier____________________.
Hoping for: "said than done"
Instead, some of the responses:

• than pie
• is good
• than harder
• than going to bed
• to play
• the better
• is easier than hard

Question: Turn over____________________.
Hoping for: "a new leaf"
Instead, some of the responses:

• and roll
• and wake up
• the pancake
• papers
• on your side
• and turn around
• your life