as you may have noticed from my unintentionally, unannounced absence last week, i pulled the car off the highway (the car being my mind and the highway being my life ... cliff note for my closer friends). and not only did i pull the car onto an onramp, i actually removed the key from the ignition, tossing the small ring onto the dashboard where it sat all week, with one notable exception.

the hiatus was medicinal. and i'm not talking about your three-aspirin variety but a count backwards from ten caliber of narcotic. the topper ... i slept outside all week. have you ever slept outside? and i don't mean tent-outside. i mean outside-outside. my naked feet poked between the slats and over the edge of our beach house's second-story deck, the ocean winds massaging my triple-E soles. only one night did i sleep alone. all other nights, i had bella or alex or both nestled in an armpit or sprawled across my chest (marty and sassafras slept indoors, enjoying the bountiful real estate their bed offered).

one night after reading books on the porch-bed alex was drawing on a piece of paper with a bic pen. he set the page down and the wind lifted it off the deck sweeping it away. he immediately pointed at the lost parchment and sent me packing.

ALEX
daddy, my paper.

TROY
yeah, your paper blew away alex. you should have held onto it better.

ALEX
you get it.

TROY
no, me not get it. i'm in bed and it's probably a mile away by now.

ALEX
get my paper daddy.

TROY
alex it's gone. i can't get it. here, finish your picture on my hand.

he looked at the the back of the hand i set in his lap, shrugged indifferently and resumed his artwork. thirty minutes later my hand, arm, chest and stomach looked like a drunk tattoo artist was pissed at me. i mostly didn't mind serving as little man's canvass but alex became obsessed with fully covering my nipples with the blue ink of the pen. do you know how hard you have to press a ball point pen against a flaccid male-nipple to actually color it? allow me to answer; hard enough to make the full-grown owner of that male-nipple wince ... repeatedly.

i was eating breakfast, marty was making lunches, bella was elsewhere and alex was sitting on a portable mini-toilet in the corner of the kitchen. an impressive burst of gas reverberated in the plastic compartment beneath alex's bum breaking the morning still of the room. he smiled widely at the echoing noise, marty grinned and i chuckled. we are a house of innocent pleasures.

ten seconds later alex made a face, pinched his nose and asked 'what's THAT smell?'. marty, never even looking away from her cut orange, naturally and medically responded 'that's your gas alex'. at this news his body slumped incredulously in the chair 'noooohhhhhh mom ... ' and then he pointed to me saying ' ... daddy gas'.

having my children associate all foul and wafting odors in the home back to me is not exactly how i envisioned my fatherhood. i cannot say why i position myself above such stereotypical unfairness, especially since 19 times out of 20 they'd be right in their aromatic hunch. this admitted, i still find the notion that i must quietly accept blame for every bout of flatulence that happens between my bouts of flatulence quite unjust.

alex has expanded his most most used phrases (previously why and no). i present, in order of frequency ...

• i no want to go home
• i no want to go to bed
• della ... della ... where are you della?

and on that last one it is great to see bella pop her head from around a corner and yell "i'm over here alex" with a big and sunny wave of her arm. alex then head-down runs with full swinging arms to join his big and super-fly sister.

granted, five minutes after that warming scene alex returns using using a phrase which is unfortunately climbing the ranks ...

• della hit me daddy

on the positive side, it's cheaper than speech therapy.

alex has two toys of choice at the moment. one of them is a six foot inflatable alligator and the other is a three-inch high space-cowboy he calls 'cool guy'.

let's begin with the object that inflicts the most physical pain upon me, the life-sized gator. to date i've walked my groin into its upright tail four times. sure you'd think something this large would be easy to spot but it's a sn...

question. do you know the two words most used by a three year old? they are 'no' and 'why'. another question. do you know how demoralizing it is to get whittled down in an argument by an opponent who refuses to say anything other than 'why'? it is the equivalent of losing a chess game to someone who moves nothing but pawns, which for those who don't play chess is pretty sucky.

another que...

it's that time of year again, that time when i step away for a month of down-time and disconnectedness. truth is it's never been more necessary than it is right now, as some of you may have noticed from the last few weeks worth of sporadic activity.

and as always, i leave you with a bevy of last moment content (eating, alex, gallery). additionally, this year i have made arrangements for you while i'm away by implementing a random post generator. you'll notice in a couple of different spots on this page the word RANDOM ([a] third item in the right hand menu [b] above this section and to the right of '2 years ago' and also [c] at the base of the page). clicking this link will present you with a random post from the past six years worth of entries. i've taken measures to see that what is presented contains less drivel than most but this is not to say that you still wont find yourself completely disappointed.

in practice this is just a little helper in the event you find yourself missing your daily ritual of laughing with/at me and being reasonably ocd myself, i respect your rituals be they driven by compassion or malice. give it a spin and let me know what you think, unless you simply think i think a bit too much of myself. no need to send feedback in that regard because i'm well aware of this, although i usually try not to so overtly advertise the point.

so for the month of may i bid you adieu. be well.

about a year ago, my family attended a carnival put on by a university near our home. we just kicked around and rode some rides and had a pleasant family afternoon. about two months later while walking through another part of our community this young guy stopped us and asked if we had been at that carnival. we told him we had. he said he thought he had a picture of me and my son he thought was pretty good and wanted to share it with us. i gave him my email address but never heard from him (i think what i wrote on the scrap of paper, later proved unintelligible to him ... shocking that).

last weekend, and almost a full year later, we were at another university function and he appeared again. he confirmed we were still those folks and said the previous mailing was returned but he still wanted to get it to us. this time i let him do the writing and good to his word this showed up in my inbox the very next day.

turns out he is a student photographer working for the school's paper. in additionally looking at his other work it is clear he has some serious skills. rachit, i sincerely thank you for making the effort to place in my hands a moment that will always warm me. hat tipped.


click to enlarge

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. a gooder name

yesterday i had two at-home jobs. the first was making dinner. after toiling to prepare wholesome and tasty sustenance for mi familia, bella sang a song through the meal, chin on palms, annie the orphan style that partially went something like this:

i hate being a kid
because everyone is mean
i hate being a kid
i wish i were a kitten
because everyone loves kittens
and father is so mean
father is so mean

we received this ten-minute, off-the-cuff serenade because i didn't serve her milk to her in a bowl. unbeknownst to me she was playing kittens and kittens don't drink milk out of cups, they drink milk out of bowls and fathers who don't know this are stupid-heads (child speak for priggish asses) and deserve, yep you guessed it, to be fired.

my second job was washing towels and rugs (because i didn't complete my chores on sunday). so i finished them and brought our fluffy yellow bathroom rug up. the kids were the first to get the benefit of the dryer-warm carpet, alex in particular. the second i pulled his diaper off for his bath he loosed a ten-inch long torrent of urine diagonally across the rug, smiling broadly at the arcing stream. not a drop hit the tile which could have been easily dealt with. all of it was perfectly placed and then absorbed into my freshly laundered mat.

but to be comprehensive about the day, while i was making dinner bella and i were playing prison-break. how prison-break works is she sneaks up behind me and bear hugs the bottom half of my legs together so i can't move. this is the prison part. then i have to use the keys, my tickle fingers, to try to get out of prison. this is the break part. when bella was three prison was fun. now that bella is five and quite strong, having her lock on unannounced is akin to someone duct-taping my feet together, hanging a fifty pound weight around my neck and giving me a hearty shove at the top of a stairwell. alex has watched this production a number of times, thumb-in-mouth and always standing a safe distance away. tonight he decided to step up and while bella was gigglingly bear-hugging my calves from behind and i was trying to tickle her loose i heard a quick, sharp crack, immediately followed by bella wailing. i turned to find alex with the biggest, proudest smile, resting a wiffle ball bat on his shoulder as if he's between walk-the-batter pitches. bella is holding the crown of her head with both hands screaming childs' curses towards him. this is one of those parental moments where the best you can do is simply not laugh out loud.

so obviously for a guy who gets heckled through the dinner he prepared AND has someone piss all over his day's labor moments after its completion, it's not shocking to learn the highlight of my march 14 was when my two-year old brained my five-year old with a long, yellow club. i mean, at least it was a plastic club and to be fair we were playing a game named prison-break.

when bella was about two and eating not much more than a rod of melba toast, we ate out with some friends. during the meal their four year old consumed three plastic containers of cream cheese and nothing else. no bagel. no crackers. no fruit roll-up. just three smallish cups of cream cheese. upon leaving the restaurant walt and i had the 'did you see that kid inhale that bagel spread? my gawd! thank goodness that isn't our kid!' conversation about what we witnessed.

three short years later in our home, a 16 ounce brick of cream cheese is deemed a single serving. a stick of butter a half-serving. and a tub of crisco lard, reserved for special occasions, like saturdays, is considered a family size, although with so many little hands scooping the gelatinous, white goodness out you sometimes leave the table still craving more. and our salt, well, we have to keep that locked up in the home's fire-proof safe with our wills, swiss account ledgers and childhood photos because alex could eat his weight in salt, and that is without a drink. give the boy a simple glass of water and i'd comfortably pit him against a herd of bull elk.

we have defiant children. i'm told by some this is good. i'm told by others it is bad. good or bad, it is what it is. and, while i see they both have spit and vinegar, it is curious to watch the different ways in which they exercise their will.

bella is cunning. if you tell her to stop doing something she wants to continue doing she will say "ok. but i will stop only after you leave the room." i will let you surmise what happens after we leave the room.

alex is direct. if you tell him to stop doing something he wants to continue doing, he will turn, look you in the eye and sharply say "NOH!". if you repeat your direction the only thing that changes is the volume of his resistance. as i watch his tiny aggression my mind plays sound clips of how this dance may evolve as his vocabulary and confidence grow.

the simple NO will one day become ...
NO! I WILL NOT STOP DOING THIS!

which will become ...
I SAID NO DAMMIT! NOW STOP ASKING!

which will one day fully mature into ...
LISTEN HERE YOU SLACK-JAWED WHELP, TAKE THIS NO AND ACCEPT IT, SWALLOW IT, MAKE IT YOUR OWN OR ELSE I'M GOING TO WALK OVER THERE AND HELP YOU BEGIN THE DIGESTION OF MY RESPONSE TO YOUR QUESTION.

i just hope he's out of the house by the time he reaches this final stage. i can barely shoulder the wispy little NO's he throws at me today.

so, i've been a little bit out of commission as of late. i have a few weeks off work and within four hours of clocking out, i began deconstructing my office. my office occupies the smallest part of the smallest room of our house. fact is, my office is in a closet. granted it's a double door closet, but it's still a closet.

i've learned over the last few days that this miniscule space is the most coveted real estate in my home. once i had it emptied, marty stood in the room eyeing the double wide clothes receptacle. i didn't like the look. i asked her if something was wrong. she simply commented that a girl could spread a wardrobe out quite nicely in such a large closet. i told her not to even think about it, it was mine, i called it fair and square when we moved in. when bella saw the vast expanse she told me not to put my desk back in it because she and the defecator could play house in it. and by told, i mean instructed, harshly. when alex saw it, he just looked around and said NUNNEL which is how he says the word tunnel which is how he sought to claim my space because his favorite architectural structures are nunnels.

after making the modifications i planned (paint, more shelves, lighting) i had to reclaim the nook in the wee-est hours of the night. my plan would have been foiled had a single person been awake to obstruct my maneuver.

additionally, i'm not sure how connected i'll be next week either. so many engagements, so little bandwidth.

at the conclusion of each year's everyman photo contest, i invite the judges to my home for dinner and discussion. this year, every judge within a six-hour driving radius attended. that number gets to be so great because of one fella who trekked in from kentucky. add to that, i've never met him and he'd never met me which makes the gesture that much more noteworthy.

in addition to my kentucky boondoggler, one of my international judges, the one representing italy, called my home during the party to discuss the contest and give his feedback. it was a very neat moment for me. and this guy lives, of all places, in the region of italy i consider the most beautiful piece of the world i've ever stood upon, la spezia, which is in northwestern italy and part of the cinqua terra stretch of coastline. he was also kind enough to open his home to my family should we ever be in the region again. i hope he is serious because there is little doubt we will one day be darkening his doorway.

another contest-related thought; i've noticed since i've increased the number of judges, i no longer get hate-mail when winners are announced. i'm going to take that as a positive sign (it did occur to me that maybe no one was chatting because no one was looking, but november bested the everyman's previous traffic record, racking up 1.2 million requests.)

and, i'll leave you with the partygoer's highlight of the evening. alex woke up from his nap and descended the steps wearing one of bella's black velour dresses. since it was his older sisters', it went all the way to the floor and for-sure looked like an evening gown. earlier he had been wearing a really festive pair of red overalls but insisted on the dress for his nap. i intended on changing him before his grand appearance but was tied up in the kitchen and didn't know he woke up. marty was talking with one of the judges when they saw alex round the corner:

joe : hey look at alex in his basketball jersey.
marty : that's not a basketball jersey joe, it's a dress.
joe: i know. i was just trying to help you out.

and lastly, everyone i owe work, email, money or affection to can it expect it in the near future now that my life is again my life. thanks to all who supported, tolerated and enjoyed this year's event. as always, i'm in your debt.

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. marcher

a curiosity about my family; they've all got impulse control issues. wether it is marty straightening the counter in your home's kitchen or alex eating your six month supply of potato chips in a single sitting or bella arranging the books on your bookshelf by size (and then color), they've, collectively, got some real and identifiable problems.

you'll notice my name missing from the above inventory. this is because i'm the only member of the clan without such an affliction. of course, i'm also the one responsible for repeatedly clicking my tongue against the roof of my mouth so the universe doesn't collapse upon itself.

no need to thank me, i'm doing it to save my ass, not yours.

how three people in my home enunciate the same five words:

MARTY	BELLA	ALEX
hospital	hostipal	noh
forgot	regot	noh
interesting	instring	noh
practice	prastice	noh
breakfast	bresfast	dink

it took me awhile to identify where regotted came from. i believe it to be derived from the word 'remember' as in the opposite of remember is regot (instead of forgot). witnessing a child's mind try to assimilate and make sense of the english language is for sure something to hear.

i'm laying face-down in bed being woken, prematurely, from a strong sleep by a relentless alarm clock.

through the stupor i realize the object on my back is my sleeping two-year old, himself unmoved by the grate of the alarm clock.

it was at this exact moment that my mind experienced its most lucid thought ever.

the sensation lasted less than a second but in this blip, ...

marty is holidaying in florida with her sister, spring break-style for sure. she deserves it. this is her first vacation away from her children since she's had children. bella just turned four if you need perspective. fact is, i kicked her out, i said the words 'leave. get out. we don't need you. go. have fun. we'll be fine.' i want to be clear, those words were formed by me and under my own volit...

i had a meeting with some potential web customers last night. wanting to appear deceptively alert, i took a quick power nap before rushing out the door to meet them. upon getting home marty asked me why i had marker all over the side of my face. further inspection found that alex scrawled his first red-permanent marker mural on the right half of my head while i was dozing. on the good side, the kid shows promise. on the better side, even with my face all marked up, i got the gig. i'm thankful to be in an industry where the talent is expected to be more on the bent side than not.

alex has left the lump stage. for any who've not yet had the pleasure of living with small children, the lump stage can be defined by the three CCC's; crying, crapping and caterwauling in the night. for the most part these three behaviors represent the full extent of their meager abilities.

when i leave for work in the morning i say goodbye to bella and alex. for the last few months while...

if you recall, marty and bella were in nyc last weekend. marty went there for two reasons:

1. so bella could see her long time friend, grace, who moved there earlier this year and,
2. to get the hell away from alex.

marty had been commenting on how clingy he'd been since she started the weaning process. i didn't notice it, but then again i'm at work for 3 hours a day so i'm not the fixture in the house walt is. with marty gone and me on little man duty, allow me summarize the weekend as such:

alex's attention requirements make the needs of my third girlfriend look like care instructions for a pet rock.

on a positive note, at least i didn't wake up to find him attempting to draw milk from my itty-bitty, one-haired, man-nipple, as i did with his sister.

alex is walking. aside from the fact that in perambulation little man most closely resembles the orangutan that starred opposite eastwood in the the Every Which Way But Loose series, everything is good. and good except for we now have doubled the number of people padding about the house at any given hour.

really not a problem if you remove the intimate requirements of marriage. yea...

so yesterday's post showed alex in one of his calmer moments with the corn. the below image gives a more accurate sense of what that meal really looked like.

if you think he looks quite possessed, consider this ... i never took the below picture. it was just on the flash card when i uploaded the images.

on sabbatical ... see you june 1.

in the meantime, enjoy this and this and this and this and then of course there is always this.

can i get a hoo-wah for little man alexander who turns 1 year old today.

mostly, this celebration is not as much about him simply being 1 as it is about homaging how he successfully navigated the perils that come with being kid number two ... especially when kid number one is bella.

and somehow, someway he always gives smiles because that just seems to be what this little man is all about.


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