this was the third thing i heard in my house yesterday morning. and it wasn't said by, to, or about me.

nursing homes freak me out.

my grandfather lives in one now. most times when we visit my folks, they bring my grandfather from the nursing home to the house. but times when he's not feeling well or doing good, we go there to visit him. the last time we went out was around christmas time. we arrived late on a saturday night. nursing home late is like 8pm. we set up with our presents in on...

yesterday was marty's birthday. she turned 38. the first words said in our home on the day of marty's 38th birthday was, "dad, i think i'm going to vomit." it was said by alex who was at the time of his utterance laid out next to me. we had both been cast from our usual sleeping spots and were sleeping on the futon in the ping pong room. i was displaced by anthony (who has been very camped out in my spot as of late) and alex by a rogue spider we're having problems locating.

after alex said he felt like he was going to puke i threw the sheets back and stumble-tripped downstairs pushing on the walls with my hands to keep me vertical. marty's brother taught me something about parenting. he said that when you hear the words THINK coupled with PUKE or VOMIT you should run. you should run very fast. and get a bowl. and put it in front of the complaining child as quickly as possible. the last time he heard those words and didn't run fast, he spent the next twenty minutes of his life spooning gelatinous chunks of mostly digested food out of the many creases and folds of his child's bed.

and for the more superstitious folks out there, this initial comment of the day did not dictate the day's mood. fortunately. and i think i did good on presents. there may be some she actually doesn't return.

marty went to a play with her mother last night thus putting me in the box with the kids. dinner (custard french toast) went well. immediately after dinner alex and anthony played trains while bella snuck in some computer time. a neighbor girl called asking if she and her brother could come over to play. whispering into the phone, i told her i didn't think it would be a good idea tonight. i whispered my response because i didn't want the natives to know i was nixing a play date. but it was getting late. and i was alone and greatly outnumbered already. i had reasons. to my whisper, the girl whined out a long 'pahhhlleeeezz' and added that they'd be no trouble at all. going against my better judgment i greenlit the visit.

i could picture the groan in bella's face when the knock rung through the house. computer time is sacred to child with no television. after being let in, the visiting girl immediately came upstairs and found me. she asked, "will you play ogre?" this time my face groaned. i said no. she asked why. i said because i didn't want to get everyone worked up just before bed. another whiny pahhhlleeeezz rolled out of her saggy-shouldered body. no trouble my ass.

after a short while of non-ogre play time the girl's mum called and the kids went home for bed. i ushered my kids to the bathroom for peeing, pooping, brushing and the hearing of the petitions to sleep in the clothes they'd been wearing all day. then anthony, alex and i moved to the upper bunk for reading. bella was below reading her own books. even though no one is listening to her story she reads out loud. i've asked her if she can read in her head when i'm reading to the boys because her reading when i'm reading is distracting. she argues that if i get to read out loud she shouldn't have to read in her brain (her words) and she doesn't care if her reading out loud is distracting when i'm reading out loud because my reading out loud is distracting to her trying to read in her brain. this girl could twist a physicist in knots in minutes.

alex starts fading first. i'm about three minutes behind him. staying awake at this moment is the hardest thing i've done all day. i always fall asleep after reading to alex. sometimes he goes first. sometimes i go first. but we both go and we usually do so within minutes of one another. i usually sleep for twenty minutes to an hour. it's my pre-night power nap that allows me to work until 2am. but tonight, tonight i can't fall asleep because i do have anthony and i don't have marty. but i do fall asleep. anthony, bored, leaves. i sense him leaving but can't open my eyes. i groggily hear bella call out "it's ok dad. i got him." more sleep. i hear anthony call out. it's been just minutes. not hours. i force myself up and down the bunk ladder. i walk to my bedroom where i hear voices. bella and anthony are snuggled, sitting up on the pillows with the covers pulled up over their laps. a mess of books are spread out before them, but they aren't reading. bella is holding anthony's fist out in front of him and is modeling his fingers in different poses. she's saying: i know it's possible to get through life without a village, but i gotta say life's much more pleasant with one.

why i work

my sunday began sometime after 8am but before 9am. marty had already been up for hours. i was taking the three kids on an errand to the hardware store to buy L-brackets to fix our living room's coffee table that had finally succumbed to having multiple children dance on it for more than three years. this was the only item i was buying at the hardware store because i know trips ...

my children's sphincters seem to be cosmically connected to my own because nothing makes theirs quiver and taughten more than the lowering of my own cheeks onto the toilet, our home's only toilet, for my ten minute daily constitutional. i've read of similar things happening to cohabitating women. is the same true or possible for digestive tracts?

and you want to talk about some fist-clenching-crotch-dancing-in-place-scrunched-up-face-pleading-urgently urgency. these kids got it.

my favorite family-mannerisms at the minute:

anthony
when anthony gets mad he flexes his entire body. he makes it so taught it arches in the middle as if her were a bow and the string was tied to his heels and the top of his head. his hands travel up his jutting stomach and search the clothing on his chest. he's looking for snaps or a zipper or buttons. if he finds th...

i began my first day of forty sick. i'm not in tune enough with my body to know if it was rebelling against leaving my thirties or being pissy about entering my forties. either way, the coughing and hacking kept me home. i wasn't about to go in public on my first day in a new decade sounding like a feeble old man.

marty spent much of her day out and about giving me an unusually quite house to recuperate in. i puttered about trying to catch up on my chores which piled up given my on-the-couch state the day before. intermittently i sat down at the piano. i'm learning to play jingle bells so i can support alex while he sings 'jingle bells, batman smells' on christmas day.

my folks were coming down for dinner. when they arrived marty and the children were still out. we sat and caught up for a bit. when marty and kids did arrive my dad told bella that it was thirty-nine years a some months ago that they went to the pound to get me. i added it was good they were ok with taking home a mutt. bella gave the two of us a practiced eye roll.

we went to my favorite eatery at the moment. it's a persian place on south grand called kabob international and their food is ridiculous. the maternal owner seems smitten with our children and dotes on us like we were kin. anthony was drawn to a ramp connecting two rooms that had beads hanging in the doorway. he kept animatedly running through them with his arms waving until he lost his balance and face-planted into the bar. also eating there was a neighbor with his two sons (a week earlier i saw his wife eating there as well). we exchanged pleasantries and our adoration for the food. when i said i was here for my birthday he said he was here a month earlier (nov 7th) when he turned forty. crazy little world.

for dessert we went to ted drewes. drewes sells custard year round and custard and christmas trees during the holidays. the place is a scene straight out of christmas story with old-school traditionalist on the hunt for that perfect christmas tree. they have everything but the barrel-fire to keep the workers warm. no matter how cold or late it is our kids always fight to eat their various concrete mixtures in the parking lot, lazing about on the car. this night we went home.

when we walked in the door the house was richly decorated with helium balloons. there were scores of them throughout each room. they weren't there when we left. marty and the kids had spent much of their day down the street at a friend's house. they were drawing my cards and readying these balloons which the mom agreed to decorate our house with while we were at dinner. these are the touches in life that let you know you are part of something.

after eating dessert and sending grandparents home and getting children to bed, i called my friend snake in colorado. he had sent me an email earlier in the day and i was months overdue in returning a call to him. we caught up and compared our thoughts on the boons and bites of aging. i ended the call by saying "see ya dave" which is probably the first time i haven't called him by his snake moniker since our friendship began some thirty years ago. this could be one of the bites of forty.

marty and i then sat in front of the fire, each looking minutes from bed. instead we held our comfy spots and talked for over two hours about when we were young and re-visiting how we met and the nuances and fortunate twists that surrounded our coming together. this more than any other component of my life makes being forty not only ok but actually better than being thirty-something or twenty-something. i think i'm going to be ok with this leg of the marathon.

summer at our house ends today in that next week we have kids starting back up at school. the biggest impact for me does not deal with resuming the fight to get kids out of bed, or the rush to get them to school or enduring the dinner table's long battle stories of recess trespasses, but what i will miss most is that my full entourage will no longer escort me to work.

i guess most know i walk to work. it's about a nine minute commute on foot. the family doesn't come the whole way. just down the street until i turn a corner. but when i do turn that corner they all stand there waving and bye-ing and wishing me a good day and alex always yells that if i see any broken glass i should walk around it. yesterday as i turned and looked back at my still pajama'd crew waving and shouting as they left my sight i had the sad realization that it will never be just like that again.

it seems a post from a few weeks ago has been causing a lot of confusion. first of all, marty is not pregnant and second of all marty is not pregnant. the first not pregnant clarification is for the people who felt the end of the previous post left things too uncertain. the last two lines read: i explained to marty that i was trying to be literary, not literal so hoped that by saying things had passed, i was implying that things had passed and we were out of the woods. sorry to have mislead some.

as for the second not pregnant disclaimer, marty recently got her hair cut short so anyone who knew of our ritual OR read that same post AND bumped into marty in the last few weeks was thinking that we were for real pregnant. now this confusion is certainly more justified and i'll say that even i was briefly duped by the circumstance of it all.

marty's stylist works a few doors down from our pediatrician so she booked anthony for a checkup and herself for a haircut in the same hour. we all drove to the doctor's office and then asked the kids if they wanted to go in with me and anthony or with mom. all voted for me and anthony (dumb luck that) so i escorted three rambunctious children into a cramped and spartan waiting room while marty took a peaceful stroll down the street.

surprisingly the kids and i got in and out quickly (you ever want to guarantee yourself good and fast service drag behind you three destructive and loud humans into places of business). upon getting into the car, we decided to go look for marty instead of waiting for her to return. i didn't know exactly where the salon was but figured if it was within walking distance we could find it. i drove down the road and soon spotted one and pulled into the lot. they had blinds up that prevented me from seeing the people inside so i told the kids to wait while i checked it out. i entered the lobby and stuck my head around the partition. i spied marty getting cut towards the back of the room. she and her hair lady were chatting lightly and i noticed that most of marty's hair was gone. i looked at the swaths of hair at the beautician's feet and ducked back behind the partition before marty could see me spying.

i somberly slid back into the driver's seat. the kids were going on furiously about if i saw her and was she in there and do they have candy for little kids who sit very still. i told them she was in there but that when she came out they wouldn't recognize her because she was getting a very different sort of haircut. for the first time they paused thinking on what i just said. after a few contemplative moments they started refuting my claim. i stuck to my guns saying they didn't know because they hadn't seen her and i did. right at this perfect moment, a hunched over elderly woman exited the salon. i pointed to her and said ...

TROY
there's mom guys.

BELLA/ALEX
what? where?

TROY
right there. she just came out.

ALEX
that isn't mom. that's an old lady.

TROY
i told you you wouldn't recognize her.

BELLA
we don't recognize her because THAT ISN'T HER!

TROY
of course it's her.

BELLA
if it's her why is she going to the car next to us.

TROY
she's just joking you. she's not really going to get in it. she's just playing.

(we all watch as the woman fumbles with her purse)

TROY
ahhh. she's tricking you good. in a moment she's going to come over here and say she tricked you.

ALEX
nuh-uh.

TROY
uh-huh.

(the woman found her keys, opened the door and got in.)

BELLA
see. she just got in.

TROY
man, she's really taking this far. she really want's to trick you big.

BELLA
nuh-uh.

TROY (i shouted at the window)
marty! get out of that car! you're going to get in trouble if someone sees you.

BELLA
dad! that's not her!

TROY
it is her. but she won't be able to start it so she's going to get out and come over any second.

the woman starts the car, backs out and drives off. somewhere during this the kids think that it may be their mother and are now concerned for her. with the kids twisted and craning their heads to watch the wayward woman drive off, marty emerged from the salon and got into the car while everyone else was peering out the back window. they spun around and excitedly caught marty up ...

BELLA
dad was joking us, saying you were some old lady. but then the old lady drove away. but it's ok because we knew it wasn't you and that dad was just joking us.

MARTY
yeah, he does that sometimes.

TROY
sooooo.

MARTY
sooooo what?

TROY
so, that's a pretty daring haircut.

MARTY
yeah, i decided to make it easy on myself.

TROY
there's nothing you want to tell me is there?

MARTY
no, i don't think so.

TROY
ok. because that is an awful short haircut.

MARTY
OH! NO! no! no. absolutely not.

TROY
ok. you gave me a bit of a start when i looked in there and saw you all demi moore'd up. i considered driving off without you.

MARTY
but you didn't.

TROY
yeah, it occurred to me i was getting the raw end given that i'd have three and you'd just have the one.

regular readers of this site know my home has only one bathroom. long-time readers of this site know i've never lived in a house with more than one bathroom. marty recently asked me if i've reached the point where this oddity is something i hope to maintain through my lifetime. in reflecting on it, i couldn't answer. having come this far, it would be a bit of a shame to soil such a distinctive record. distinctive to me at least in that i've never had anyone praise the achievement or tout the benefits of a single toilet home, which do exist, whether they are acknowledged or not. for instance ...

i don't like cleaning the one toilet i have so am pretty sure i'd dislike roaming the house with a bristle brush and bottle of soft scrub playing weekend janitor to a bevy of log catchers.

some of our family's best proclamations come out of our one bathroom. like if alex has to use the toilet and people are in there, he rushes in, brushes past all the occupants and starts unbuckling his pants while dancing in place. the moment before he fully drops trow he calls out in his most commanding voice, "I'm going pee and poop. no one see my penis or butt!"

high traffic times of day allow for fun games that would not otherwise happen. if i'm in the shower and hear someone come in to use the toilet, i call out in my ogre-voice, "who is using my toilet" to which bella or alex call back in their fearless voice, "bella/alex is! who is using my shower!" when i reply it's just me, their father, they often don't believe me and say mom is in there too, which she sometimes is, but usually isn't. playing along, i turn and scream as if just noticing her and from behind the curtain stage a struggle of trying to throw marty out of the shower. i yell out OUCH!'s and UHGH!'s and punch at the shower curtain in random spots. every now and then i pantingly poke my head out from behind the curtain to tell alex or bella i am alright and will have her out in a minute and will then feign the classic getting pulled back into the fracas and scream out that pulling there or biting that is against the rules. the kids sit on the toilet with wide eyes, swinging their dangling legs and titter preciously.

humanity happens in the single bathroom of a single-toilet home. especially when an urge sneaks up on someone and they can't wait for the room to clear. it is here that through clenched teeth and face you get to see/hear little people groan things like, 'i ... think ... i ... need ... privacy ...' most times the plop beats the end of the sentence. there's volumes of positive psychology out there on the merits of comfortable public plopping. it's truly an enviable and elusive life skill.

and lastly and most significantly, quality, family time happens in the smallest room of a one-bathroom house making it one of the most valuable assets a modern family can possess. except when your wife mistakes this closeness for permission to use your braun razor to shave her legs, bikini area and all, making it not quite a brazilian but close enough to one to make me a little hesitant the next morning before work. that pause always makes me think of the scene from friends where joey was trying to talk chandler into sharing a wash cloth. chandler asked joey to think of the last thing he (chandler) would wash during his shower and the first thing he (joey) would wash for his shower. joey's face stares off in contemplation a moment before grimacing painfully. while i don't know for certain the order in which a woman shaves her lower torso, i can imagine the end game is not in my favor.

marty woke up 20 minutes late. i woke up 30 minutes late. what we were waking up late for was sunday brunch. guests were arriving in less than an hour and we were still bleary, un-showered and food-less.

marty made it to the kitchen first but was slowed down because alex wanted to help her make the custard french toast and bran muffins. after getting the fire going, i was soon hobbled by anthony nipping at my heels while working on the bacon. bella was yelling something indecipherable down the stairwell. the phone rang. it was marty's mother calling from florida. marty left her food station to gab ... for twenty minutes .. while i juggled food and humans. bella appeared in front of me seemingly out of thin air. she stretched her hand out forcing on me a full-size sheet of paper. once in hand, she turned on a heel and marched back upstairs. i read enough of the page to see it was a set of demands. i tossed it to the side and continued my circus act. marty hung up the phone minutes before our guests arrived and when she walked them into the kitchen made some crack to the room about how i should be cooking the bacon differently. our new audience was about to get a marital show-down, and i said as much, but comically announcing the point brought enough levity to pull us out of the spousal nose-dive and we went on to have a wonderfully homey and smiley day with friends.

after stomachs were full and the general fervor ebbed, i noticed bella's note on the counter. she was now beyond her funk and running about the house with her visiting playmates. i took the moment to read her text in full.


translated:
i decided that my webkinz is being cramped in their bed so until i can play webkinz again i'm staying in my bed and i will only come out when a movie is in or to play on the computer.

p.s. if you want me to come out you'll have to let me play webkinz again.

i'm hungry.

BREAKFAST ORDER:
oatmeal
mcdonalds
waffles
toast
pancakes
daddy cereal

for mom and troy
from bella

the true source of her angst is apparent given her use of "mom and troy" in the closing. bella lost her computer privileges a few weeks back and has been fretting for the webkin horse she received for christmas. for the uninitiated (read spared), you care for your webkin pet in this online environment, routinely giving it love and food and toys. after meting out the restriction i had a premonition that when bella did again log onto the website, she'd be met by a decaying, fly-covered horse carcass with cartoony fumes coming out of its sunken abdomen. another parent told me this is not possible in that the site is quite liberal with children's oversights and the worst she'd find is a pouty and tearful version of her horse. i think this is just another example of how our society is coddling our children to unhealthy degrees and years from now when bella finds some neglected real-life-pet molding in the bottom of an aquarium she will surely express surprise if not complete shock. and when her crest-fallen face turns to me for answers i'm going to be the one that finally delivers her the truth, "you should have stuck with those bullshit webkinz."

last night i was on the tail end of reading books to alex and bella when marty rushed into the room. she went to the back window, peering out of it. after a moment she called us over to see the lunar eclipse in progress. the kids quickly scrambled out of bed joining her. marty began explaining what was occurring. bella and alex stood on the windowsill taking in the scene while marty and i looked on from behind. three-fourths of the moon was already dim.

while we waited marty and alex began a guessing-game about the people traveling on the walkway behind our house. he would call out when he saw someone approaching and we would first try to guess their gender and then their name. my guesses of cornelius and pumpernickel were met with chastising looks from bella. between pedestrians, i got some paper and sketched out for the kids what makes an eclipse an eclipse. intrigued bella started asking questions about what direction things were moving in and what other things were possible out of this (i.e. solar eclipse). marty interrupted my lesson to point out a man dancing in his third-story bedroom across the way. we all silently watched this older man gyrate and swivel to music we couldn't hear. while no one announced it, i'm sure all four of us were squintingly trying to see if he was naked. in time he paused, walked to the window, seemed to peer at us peering at him. his arm came up and he twisted his venetian blinds closed. we returned to the moon and watched the last slivers of brightness fade. when it was done it seemed anti-climactic. slowly, people drifted back to their routine spots resuming their routine acts.

for as uneventful as this unique diversion proved, i have a sense that the twenty minutes the four of us gathered around a window in a dark room to watch the earth roll between the moon and sun will hang in a framed picture in my head for much longer than one would think such a mild-mannered event should or would.

marty is the maker of breakfast in the morning. while i finish getting ready for work i can tell what kind of day it is by the smells wafting up the stairs. many times it is oatmeal or fresh bran muffins with yogurt. sometimes it's plain ole cereal. but on lucky days french toast or pancakes make the cut. i descended the stairs on a french toast day, speared a couple of slices and readied my plate. bella soon followed doing the same. marty was upstairs finishing with the boys. before bella dug in she said:

mom usually ties my hair back before i eat syrupy things.

oh. what does she use?

i don't know.

as it turns out, i don't know either, which marty was quick to smirkingly observe when she entered the room.

lately marty has been sending anthony in to wake me in the morning. reason is he is better at it than anyone else in the house. in trying to get me to play with him he hits me about the face, perches himself on top of my head hoping i'll try to make him fall and/or buries my face with books, toys and clothes. yesterday he woke me by trying to force a plastic car into my mouth. very effective that. i groggily sat up, patted him on the head and moved to the bathroom.

i mindlessly turned the shower on and walked to my office giving the hot water a chance to start its day. anthony waddled behind me at each stop hoping i'd toss him in the air or read him the book he held in his hand. as i leaned over my desk typing my password i felt something on my foot and looked down to see an arc of pee coming from beneath his unbuttoned onesie and landing on the top of my foot. he looked up at me proud and smiling. from my up-high view i didn't notice that he was diaper-less. my mind tried to remember if before cramming the matchbox in my mouth if he had sat on top of my head that morning. i couldn't be sure. while still watching the stream i let go a throaty "AAAAAAHHHHHHGGGGG!" hearing my exclamation marty innocently called from downstairs, "is anthony peeing?"

on the good side, i couldn't have been in a better place in my day to get pissed on. i was already naked and the running shower should have reached a steamy state by now. when i finished washing my foot five times (and my head twice just in case), i pulled the curtain back to find alex standing in the bathroom. his pants were around his knees and he was fumbling with the front of his underwear.

hey dad! look at this?

what am i looking at alex?

i can pull my penis out of this hole in my underwear.

well yes you can. and it's only 8:12 in the morning.

do you want to try to pull my penis out of my underwear?

not today pal. i gotta get ready for work.

standing in the kitchen, i quickly ate a bran muffin, got dressed and headed down to take the kids to school. as i descended the stairs alex was standing in the foyer with his pants, again, at his knees and showing his new trick to the rest of the family.

look mom. look della. i can take my penis out of my underwear through this hole.

(the girls bend and crouch to see the action)

i see that alex. now can you put your coat on for me.

no. wait. one minute mom. do you want to do it?

no. i don't need to do it alex.

della? do you want to do it?

yes!

no. bella doesn't need to do it either. please put your coat on alex. you're going to be late.

i wish i had a penis. (bella said in her saddest voice)

while not as noteworthy, this day held like surprises for me throughout. but i absorbed them all with a broad grin thinking at least these humans weren't smilingly dousing me in fresh urine, nor were they offering to let me bend and contort their penis through a too-small and not-straight-enough passage in their jockey briefs. you can't keep a man with this outlook down. it just can't be done.

it was on a thursday, August 23 to be precise, 5:42pm to be even more precise, that i carried our home's only television from the tv room to the basement. this was the first thing i did after arriving home from work. i did this namely because when i walked in the door and dropped my bag marty appeared before me and said, "i want you to put the tv in the basement" to which i said, "now?" to which s...

excerpt from hyrum smith's ten natural laws of successful time and life management ... a book i've read this time of year for seven years now.

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. adolescence

on saturday marty and bella went to a wedding. bella had the job of handing out hershey kisses to guests walking out of the church after the ceremony. as she dropped the foil wrapped sweets into the passing palms of exiting people she was instructed to say, "kisses from the bride and groom."

meanwhile back at home, i took the boys kite flying. it was a stupendous day for such an outing a...

the people i live with are sick. the whole lot of them. it started weeks ago and has been evolving through the ranks with great alacrity. when this happens i possess great skill at avoiding the funk my people carry. i wash my hands with greater frequency, interact with people using more care, pop echinacea like tic-tacs and sleep in remote parts of the house. last night while slumbering on my futon/couch something stirred me from sleep. i opened my eyes to find alex's awake face inches from my own. he had curled up next to me on the small futon space.

hey aleo.

hi dad.

what's up?

i had a bad dream.

i'm sorry to hear that.

then he quick-sneezed, dotting my face with phlegmy shrapnel. and just like that i joined the infected masses. in the future i'm going to start sleeping in the car ... and with it parked in a neighboring zip code.

at a weeknight dinner last week bella informed the table that our family needed a password. when asked what this was she went on to say that it's a secret word only our family knows and would use if we, the parents, sent someone to pick one of the children up. like if bella was walking home from school and someone pulled up saying, "bella, your mother asked that i take you home today." bella would ask them what the password was. if they knew it she would go with them. if they didn't she would not. this led to a lengthy discussion about what to do if the person didn't know the password. i suggested if the person was in a car, the child should turn and walk in the opposite direction and go to the closest home of someone we knew and ask for help. bella then asked what to do if someone didn't ask anything but just grabbed her. marty said, very succinctly, that she gave bella and alex full permission to do whatever they could to get away. kick, claw, bite, scream, punch, gouge eyes, you name it you can do it. bella then thoughtfully ranked her skills saying she was a great pincher and could kick hard and yell "YOU'RE NOT MY FATHER! THIS IS NOT MY FATHER!" louder than anyone else in the family. then she looked at alex and said "and alex is a great biter, especially with his zombie tooth." marty and i both turned our eyes to bella and said in unison "zombie tooth?" bella, getting her next bite of food together, said "yeah, his zombie tooth. that broken one in the front."

this would be his front-left tooth which bit the dust a few years back when bella, alex and i were leaving the pool. i mummy-wrapped a shivering alex in an adult sized beach towel and told him to follow me. when he took his first step, his feet got tangled in the towel and he fell forward. because his arms were pinned inside the towel given the snug wrap job i had done on him, the first thing to hit the pool-deck was his nose, the second was that unfortunate front tooth. when i picked him up he was a bloody mess and i didn't learn the extent of the damage until i delivered him to marty at home, still quite bloody. in the midst of her first aid she looked up and said "troy, his tooth is chipped." marty's a tooth-girl and was quite, well, pissed that i had wrecked her first-born son. she hot-lined the dentist and asked if there was anything we could do. while she was on the phone i was holding the still sobbing alex. she started relaying questions the doctor was asking. is it just the one tooth? is the gum-line bleeding? what color is the tooth?

MARTY
can you see a bloody-pulp?

TROY
a bloody what?

MARTY (to the phone)
did you say bloody pulp? yes. where?

TROY
marty, i think i'm going to puke.

MARTY
troy. look at the tooth. where it broke. are there blood and veins and stuff coming out of it?

TROY
oh my god, marty. tell them they're going to make me puke.

MARTY
just look at the damn tooth troy! is there a bloody pulp or not!?!?

there was no bloody-pulp on the tooth which kept my puke-free streak alive. seeing how upset marty was through the rest of the evening, the next morning on my way to work i stopped at the pool and found the missing tooth piece. i put it in my pocket where it lived all day at work. when i got home i told marty to hold out her hand and dropped the little shard into it. she called the doctor back and told them we had the tooth chip asking if they, or we, could glue it back on. they said they could but didn't recommend it saying the cement would age and it would break off at some point probably when the child was eating and he would then swallow it. by the time marty told me this news i said that was good because i forgot i put the tooth back in my shirt pocket and sent it through the washer. even though it wasn't of use, marty was non-plussed about my losing alex's tooth a second time.

marty can sometimes not see the bright side of a situation, like how her son now has a cool and jazzy weapon against would-be kidnappers; his razor-sharp and smart-looking zombie tooth.

we are on our third tivo remote. the first one just wore out. bella broke the second one. and the current one began flaking out after two weeks of use. as it is, if the new remote sits idle for more than five minutes you have to take the batteries out and put them back in before any of the buttons will work. this is slightly aided by the fact that the battery compartment door went missing in the first week thus granting easier and quicker access to this routine.

miffed at how soon the replacement had been compromised and in a fit of 'why won't this damn thing stop fast forwarding' furor, i chastised the children telling them i wasn't buying another remote and if this one broke we were done and would live without tv. three days later bella in a wordless rage because the remote wasn't working ricocheted it off the corner of a coffee table. all the rubbery push buttons mysteriously disappeared somewhere inside the plastic case leaving hollow holes where they had been.

with football season around the corner and wanting to stay true to my word, two nights after the fall of the remote i disassembled the device on my desk and painstakingly put it back together. when done, i popped the batteries in and tried it. it worked. it worked better than before because bella's outburst seemed to have fixed the battery issue as well. small gifts.

for the next few days the rest of the family secretly used the remote when bella wasn't around, wanting her to think the days of television were in fact over. but alex got caught when bella came in from outside to use the restroom. later that same day bella approached me:

BELLA
can i watch my show since i didn't really break the remote and it is working?

TROY
well bella, you did in fact break the remote and it is only working because your father is a great, great man.

BELLA
so ... does that mean i can watch now?

TROY
do you think you should be able to watch now?

BELLA
well, i haven't watched for three days and that's kind of a long time.

TROY
well, since when we thought you did break the remote you wouldn't be watching for infinity days, three days isn't so much.

BELLA (sadly)
yeah ... i guess so.

TROY
and for the sake of easier math let's say infinity days equals 1,000 days of which you are three days in. now what do you think is fair?

BELLA (contemplatively with finger on chin)
uhhm ... three weeks.

TROY
done.

since i was expecting her to say four days, i was pleased with her self-imposed twenty-one. and, if you're ever at our house and want to watch tv, the remote is stashed in marty's underwear drawer. we originally hid it in my desk but bella woke me up one morning with it in her hand asking if her days were over yet so we had to relocate it while she slept.

and, in fairness i must add in regard to how our kids treat electronics i got some insight from alex after he and i sat down to watch a show. when i turned the tv on, a horrible screeching sound came out of the speakers. without a moment of thought alex got up from the couch, walked to the tv and struck it hard on the side with his little fist. in a snit i asked him what he thought he was doing. walking back to the couch he simply said, "that's what mom does" and sat down next to me. to his and his mother's credit, the shrill screeching did stop.

we have a new ritual in our home, although we pass it off as more of a game really. it's called 'everything has a home'. we play 'everything has a home' after dinner. how it works is everyone walks through the house and anything that is out of place gets put where it is meant to go. we start in the dining room and move all the dinner stuff into the kitchen. then we set a timer for fifteen minutes ...

three things that put baby anthony immediately to sleep:

1. the car
2. the bike carrier
3. the television

three things that make alexander weep:

1. bleeding wounds
2. people leaving the house without letting him push them on the buttocks
3. bella touching him with an index finger

three things isabella does to agitate people:

1. poking them with an index finger
2. hiding their belongings
3. pinching them in the groin

three things that make marty sleep deprived:

1. her children
2. the neighbors wind chimes
3. season three of LOST

three things my kids do to wake me up:

1. whispering
2. tickling
3. suffocation

match the expression of disgust to the person.

A. dammit	1. troy
B. oh hecks	2. marty
C. (loud, wet flatulence)	3. bella
D. oh suck	4. alex
E. darnit	5. anthony