Juvenile Guy Bonding

July was a cruel month for the Geek Boy family, resulting in me seeing the rest of the brood for literally three hours over the course of three weeks. At the end of it all, WonderWife™ needed some solitude and sanity and I desperately needed to reconnect with the kids. Thus the plans for a road trip were hatched. I loaded the kids into the ol’ Family Truckster* and we headed south to the San Diego Zoo.

It was a great whirlwind of a weekend that involved sightseeing, junk food, laughter, room service, swimming and inexplicably waking Daddy up at 5:45am. It was such a jam-packed outing that it took approximately 10 minutes into the drive home for both kids to pass out in the back seat.

The Bean began to stir 45 minutes later.

I was excited.  "Buddy…Buddy,” I whispered trying to roust him out of his groggy state.

“What?”

“Look.” I pointed to a sight just over the horizon. “Keep watching that as we get closer.”

He leaned forward as much as his seat belt would allow and squinted. In a few minutes he smiled and suppressed a quiet giggle.

“Should we wake Sprout to see?” he asked.

“No. Let her sleep. This one’s just for you.”

This is what he saw**:

*In real life, the Truckster may more closely resemble a well-worn Camry. 

**I am nothing if not predictable.

Traveling Again

Although the trip had been planned for many months, the kids only found out about it a few days ago. Time moves slowly when you’re a kid and weeks can feel endless. Not telling them was an act of mercy.

They found out three days before the trip was to commence and they immediately started to pack their bags, trying to cram as many of their toys and stuffed animals as their small backpacks would carry. They spent the next few hours debating which items would be the most essential on the long flight.

I sat back and gleefully watched them scurry around, flush with the adrenaline rush that comes with being told you’re about to go to Disney World. Inside I was as excited as they were.

The night before the trip I packed my bag, unable to shake the feeling that I was forgetting something, that my routine had been shaken. I had traveled many, many times during the year and the trips had become rote, carrying the same bags to the same airport and arriving at the same destination. But this trip was different. This trip was a vacation—the only one I was taking all year…to a magical place…with the people that I love.

In a few days I would be riding roller coasters with the Bean and boats with Sprout. We would be shaking hands with over-sized rodents and smiling at princesses. We would be having the time of our lives.

New Products: Canadian Edition

I used to write a lot about new food products. Not so much these days. In fact, the last time I wrote about something with the label “new” (my favorite label, followed closely by “limited edition”) was July 2010, and I got lambasted by my wife. Truthfully, there has seemingly been a lack of exciting new food products out there. Nothing worth writing about, at least. That was until I strolled into a Canadian branch of my beloved convenience store and found a few interesting items.

Let's start with this one:

 

Reese's Peanut Butter Cups are my undisputed favorite candy of all time.  I'm a sucker for peanut butter.  So it was with great excitement that I spotted this bar.  Notice the "limited edition" at the top?  Unfortunately the bar has nothing on the cup, which has the perfect chocolate to peanut butter ratio.  The bar is too heavy on chocolate, which was a bit waxy.  As they say, close but no...something.

Ketchup is not one of those flavors I seek when craving chips.  Outside of fries, onion rings and the occasional burger, ketchup doesn't make many appearances in my food repertoire--let alone spicy ketchup.  But far be it for me to resist a package of junk food that says "new" so I bought 'em and ate 'em.  Thankfully the ketchup flavor wasn't overpowering, and they weren't that spicy, but I'll take a bbq potato chip over these any day.

The last package didn't say "new", but falls under the category of "if they don't sell it in your country, it's new to you."  As with ketchup, pickle isn't a flavor I would associate with snack food.  This was the first time I'd seen it in a Dorito.  Normally Doritos all kind of taste the same, no mater what flavor.  Unlike their cheesy cousins, the pickle Doritos did have the unique tangy taste of a pickle.  Initially, this was startling. But after a handful, the flavor stared to grow on me and I nearly finished the bag.

Who knew there was such a snack food bounty hiding within my neighbors to the north?  Nice snacks you have there, Canada.

Jealousy

I know that summer is a stressful time for parents. Robbed of the structure of school, the long, hot summer days can descend into lethargy and crankiness. To combat this, WonderWife™ plotted out her summer with more strategy and cunning than everybody I’ve played in Risk. She's jam packed her days with outings and playdates in order to keep the kids, and to keep herself, from losing their minds.

Stuff like:

Zoos
Ice cream cones
Swimming
Roller Coasters
Cotton Candy
Wooter Ice
Sprinkles
Ferris Wheels
Spinny Rides
Demolition Derby

Part of this means leaving me to my own devices while they go play on the other coast. Because summer is a busy season for me too--my work hours ramp up and travel becomes more extensive.

I’m a little jealous of their exploits--a little left out. But I’m glad they’re all having a good time. Me? I’m just happy that there’s Netflix streaming and that there was a wine sale this weekend.

Traditions

If you've noticed it's been rather quiet around here, it's because I'm getting into my busy season again. As a result, I've been doing a lot of traveling. I've realized that there are some very specific things I do when I travel. I call them traditions, but they very well could be a product of neurosis.

Here is a list of things I must do when traveling on a plane:

Always call WonderWife™ before getting on the flight.

Must email a picture of the plane I am about to get on to WW™, so she can show it to the kids. (A picture of me sitting inside the plane is optional, but appreciated.)

Must touch the outside of the plane as I board. (I have no idea of the origin of this or why I do it.)

As soon as possible, open up the airline magazine in the front pocket and check what will be the in flight movie, regardless if I am watching it or not.

Upon approaching landing, count down from 10 trying to time "1" with the wheels touching down. If the count is early, continue to count back up to 10 until the wheels touch down. If sitting next to loved one, such as wife or child, whisper the count to them. Prepare to be mocked by wife if the count is off by more than 1.

Unbuckle seat beat while taxiing to the terminal. Why?  I don't need your rules, man!

Much Ado About Nothing?

Despite getting worked up about airport security, both legs of my trip were using old school scanners. The new scanners were in place, but dormant in Ft. Lauderdale. In fact, a TSA agent told us that when they do use them they don't put small kids in them--not because of safety, but because "kids can't keep still for 10 seconds."

As result, WonderWife™ and I were left with a lot of displaced anger. We had whipped up a nice frothy head of agitation in the days leading to our trip. I decided to take mine out on Florida drivers, whom I've come to realize over the years are just about the most inconsiderate in the country. I'm not sure how WW™ ultimately coped. Maybe that's why she was "accidentally" kicking me in the middle of the night.

So at the end of it all, we survived a grand total of 11 hours in airplanes, 4 hours in terminals, 7 hours in the car, two great-grandparents, 2 grandparents, 2 siblings, 2 spouses and 4 kids under 5.

I still contend that the TSA thing is a big issue that will continue to be hashed out both publicly and privately, but for now I've got to shake off the tryptophan coma and let go of my dreams of my mom's candied sweet potatoes and get back to my normal life.

Scanners

It didn’t dawn on me that our annual Thanksgiving family trek across the country would be more difficult this year until WonderWife™ brought it up.

“What are your thoughts on the new airport scanners?” she asked me one morning over breakfast.

She was referring to the new TSA full body scanners that bounce x-rays off the body in order to take a full, revealing image of airline passengers. Many people are up in arms over the invasion of privacy. Passengers can forgo the scanner, but are then subjected to a rigorous pat down that is reported to be so invasive, some who have gone through it are threatening to sue for sexual misconduct.

Personally, it’s not the the picture that bothers me. I don’t care if there’s some anonymous image of the outline of my stuff in some back room of an airport. I’m sure out there somewhere there is clear footage of me picking me nose while speeding along the freeway. What gets me is the safety issue and how it affects my kids.

The TSA says they’ve done studies and the findings show that there is “minimal risk” from the machines. Depending on whom you listen to the scanners give anywhere from one thousandth to one fiftieth the amount of radiation one would receive from a standard chest x-ray.

I want to believe that these machines are safe, but the cynical part of me doesn’t know if I should be so sure. Airport security has been a frustrating joke over the last decade. Our government’s reaction, over-reaction and sensitivity to any threat to national security have only made things worse. Its like they don’t really know how to keep us safe, but they’re really good at making it look like they’re keeping us safe.

In September 2001, I was working at a building where there was a security booth to the entrance of the building’s parking lot. Employees had company-issued ID cards that granted us access to the facility. After the shock of 9/11 wore away and the panic set in, security got tight. Suddenly our ID cards weren’t enough. We had to show photo IDs while the guards used mirrors to check under our cars. What used to take anywhere from 15 seconds to 2 minutes to enter the lot would now take 30 to 45 minutes.

This was back in the pre-kid days when I actually worked out instead of making excuses why I couldn’t. I showered at the gym and would drape my towel over the front seat of my car so it wouldn’t get all funky inside my gym bag, which I placed on the front seat. As a result, the bag would end up being covered by the towel. Despite all of the newly installed “security measures” at the building, not once did the guards ever ask to see what was under the lump that was obscured by the towel in the front seat of my car. If I had wanted to do damage to that facility, it would have been laughably easy. It incensed me that all of the security that was eating up precious time was all for show.

I find myself thinking about this whenever I’m queued up in the terminal, shoes and belt in hand, pants sagging, digging through my bags to fish out my electronics. I realize that there are real stakes when it comes to airport security. I would be naive to think that there isn't a need for it. However, from the vantage point of the average passenger, modern airport security seems like it’s all defense and no offense. It can also be frustratingly inconsistent from location to location. I can't help but stand there in line wondering how much of it is like the security of my former workplace—just for show.

The new big, scary scanners aren’t helping. They make a bold statement about the lengths being taken to keep us safe, but are they really safe? Was the old system so flawed that we have to go to these measures? Or are we being asked to trade our health for perceived safety? There’s no way to be sure that sometime in the future these machines won’t be found to be bad for us. It wasn't too long ago that people thought cigarettes were ok.

This is really the crux of my problem—it boils down to the safety of my kids. I care less about x-rays bouncing off my middle aged skin, but how will it affect my young children? It feels like us parents are facing a Sophie’s choice this holiday season: Do we expose our children and ourselves, both literally and figuratively, to potentially harmful rays? WonderWife™ and I strongly believe that the alternative—having our kids fondled by some bored TSA agent in rubber gloves—is actually more harmful.

There are people who say that the solution is not to fly. But that’s incredibly impractical when you live 3000 miles away from your closest family and only have a scant few days off in which to see them. It’s a shortsighted solution that would rob my kids of their grandparents and cousins. Sadly, the TSA and the airlines know that we passengers don’t have any other choice and they don’t seem to be making it any easier on any of us.

But they put on a good show, don’t they?

Favorite Dad and the Statue of Liberties

It was just after midnight as I crept quietly into the darkened house, weary from my trip. From the hallway, I heard the Bean’s bedroom door open. He padded out, rubbing his sleepy eyes.

“Hi daddy!”

“What are you doing up, buddy?” I asked already knowing the answer.

“I wanted to come give you a hug.”

“I’m glad you did, but it’s really late.”

He gave me a solid squeeze, took a few steps towards his room and stopped. “Um…can I…um…have my gift now?”

The night before my business trip, I told the Bean I was headed to New York City and his eyes got wide. Predictably he asked me for a Statue of Liberty. The Bean's obsessed with the Statue of Liberty and since this was my second trip to NYC this year, I already knew I was required to get him one.

As I was tucking him in, the Bean got quiet and contemplative for a moment. “Are there a lot of statues there?” he asked in a hushed voice.

“Yes, they have lots of different kinds of Statues of Liberties.”

“Are they going to run out?”

“Of Statues of Liberty souvenirs in New York City? I’m pretty sure I'll be able to find at least one." I told him as I turned off the light.

The promised Statue of Liberty figurine was residing in my suitcase, tenderly shoved into my shoe with my socks. But it was late and we were both very tired. The gift would have to wait until the morning.

I smiled thinking about the Bean, who is ordinarily a heavy sleeper, excited enough to see me that the sound of the front door opening was enough to stir him.

As I tucked in the Bean he half-yawned, half-spoke, “You’re my favorite dad.”

“You’re my favorite son.”

A few minutes later, I was in bed too.

How I Spend My Commute

A little while ago, Sci Fi Dad posted this comment on one of my posts:

My challenge is on days where work is particularly shit-encrusted I have to both push that out and transform into "Daddy" on my commute home (my commute, mind you, with every stupid person who should never have been given a license in the first place).

I hear you loud and clear, SciFi. Most evenings, I spend 30-35 minutes in the car driving across the San Fernando Valley from my office to my house. I depend on that time to clear my head and get myself into daddy mode. Every so often, my commute gets congested like a nose during flu season and it takes me considerably longer to get to and from work. This is a lot of time to spend in the car, especially if you have a “shit-encrusted day.”

In my query for reader requests, I was asked what I listened to on my commute. I love music. There is nothing better than blasting some great music in the car, singing top notch in the audio cocoon that is the cab of your automobile. But the problem is when I listen to music my brain is still churning. Thoughts about work and the day creep into my head. I replay bad moments over and over. I worry about a project or plan for an upcoming meeting. These are the demons that will prevent me from being a good dad and husband when I'm off the clock.

This is why I don't often listen to music on my commute. I listen to podcasts. Words. Stories. News. Anything that forces my brain to process the ideas it's hearing and keeps it too busy to focus on anything else.

There are hundreds of podcasts out there and I have one for just about every mood I'm in. I find them to be nice, bite-sized pieces of radio, just the right length to finish in a drive or two. Here are a few of my favorites:

• This American Life – The granddaddy of modern public radio. I only jumped on this bandwagon a few years ago. Don’t know what kept me so long.

• Radio Lab – This American Life’s nerdy cousin. It’s a slickly edited, science geek-y show that covers science, music and so much more. You will learn things that will blow your mind and force you to rethink some things. (My favorite fun fact from the show: the amount of time you spend with your eyelids closed due to a blink while watching a typical movie is 15 minutes.)

• I Love Movies – Stoner comedian Doug Benson invites a few fellow comedians on stage to talk about movies. Sometimes they actually get around to talking about movies.

• The Moth – Stories told live in front of audiences by people from all walks of life. Some are riveting. Some are hilarious. All are true.

• SModcast – Director Kevin Smith (who is the king of all fanboys) and his buddy, Scott Mosier, sit around and talk about stupid shit for an hour. Sometimes it’s gross and sometimes it’s misinformed. But it’s always really funny. It reminds me of sitting around bullshitting with my friends.

Add a few shows from NPR and you've got my recipe to clear my head to and from work.

If you have trouble letting go at the end of the day, try listening to words instead of music. Maybe they too will help.

Of Wawa, Kakes and Cheeses of Bacon

I have the east coast in my blood and it's always good to go home, even if it means a total of over 10 hours of plane time with two small children and a wife who hates to fly. My wife, thankfully, is an east coaster as well. One of the pleasures of WonderWife's™ hometown are the many Wawa convenience stores sprinkled throughout.

I did not grow up with Wawas. My hometown had 7-11, as we do here in Southern California. While my love for the 'Sev is strong and unabated, I must confess that Wawa gives it a run for its money. It could be the made-to-order sandwich bar, where you can put together your masterpiece using a touch screen that has detailed options like "a little bit of mayo" or "extra oil". Perhaps it's the fresh baked Philly style pretzels sold at the register. But most definitely, it's the entire aisle dedicated to the greatest snack cakes in the history of junk food.

"Nobody bakes a cake as tasty as a..."

(If you can finish that line, than you know what I'm talking about.)

I was fortunate to grow up in a state that had access to the sugary goodness known as Tastykake. They are made in Philadelphia and are only sold in surrounding areas (though their reach keeps expanding). Tastykakes are one of the touches of home that I miss now that I live on the opposite coast. And at the Wawa, they have a whole bunch of them.

So imagine my surprise when I was perusing the Tastykake aisle of a Wawa, while the sandwich artisan behind the counter was preparing my Shorti, and I found this:

Not only is it a Tastykake, but it displayed two words that I love to see on any snack food, "limited edition."

Cheesecake Tastykake pie is exactly what you want it to be. It has a graham crust, thick enough not to get soggy and thin enough so that you don't get a mouth full of dry crust when you eat the pie. The filling has a rich, creamy texture and does a pretty good job of replicating an actual cheesecake. Good stuff indeed.

Speaking of good stuff, my mom-in-law (who in the past has provided me with experiments in bacony goodness) came through again this Thanksgiving by serving bacon cheese before the big meal.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that bacon cheese is cheese with bacon in it. While I think the cheese itself was cheddar, it tasted more like deeply smoked gouda. It was really good on it's own, but it was downright excellent when placed upon a garlic cracker. I almost didn't have room for turkey.

But of course, I had room for turkey. Cause it was Thanksgiving. And I was on the east coast. My true home.

Flashback Friday: Quiet Moment on a Family Vacation

Everyone was asleep but me. The sun, and some powerful margaritas, had drained the energy of the rest of my family, but it was early and I wasn’t yet tired so I figured the only sensible thing to do was to slowly make my way towards the bottom of a bottle of wine.

I crept out to the patio and curled up on a lounge chair, soaking in the solace of the night. The sky was inky black and dotted with stars—a view usually kept hidden by the bright sky of the city. The moon cast just enough light to see. In the distance sprinklers watered the lawn, sounding like a heavy rainstorm that reminded me of an east coast summer shower.

I drained my glass and crept back into the kitchen, which was adjacent to the couch where my brother-in-law was sleeping. The room was dark and I was craving another glass of wine. I felt my way towards the bottle and poured another round. I thought it was a brilliant move when I stuck my finger near the top edge of the glass, so I could feel when to stop pouring. However, I soon realized that this was probably one of the first tricks ever learned by any blind person.

I returned to the patio and sat in silence. Stealing a private moment in the midst of a family vacation and basking in the comfort of having everyone that I love in the rooms around me. It wasn't long before the bottle was empty, and I was asleep.

View From an Island, Part 3

Day 5: Eight is Enough
Today was the day when we realized that 8 days of vacation might be too much for a pre-schooler and an infant. Cries of, "I want to go home!" filled the air as we pulled back on some of our planned adventures for fear that we over-scheduled our kids.

However, the bittersweet knowledge that we wouldn't be able to do everything we wanted was easier to take by the gorgeous sunset.


Day 6: The Way the Whistle Blew
Because the ticket booth for the Sugar Cane Train was in the back of the gift shop, I had no choice but to buy the Bean a toy train. As the cashier was ringing it up, she said, “It plays music if you press this button.” Damn, I thought. She must not be a parent. She pushed down on the smokestack, but nothing happened. She offered to get me another one, but I quickly said the broken one would be great. She even took a few bucks off the price.

The next day, the Bean pushed the button and the train lit up and began playing highly annoying, tinny music and train sounds. It had miraculously been resurrected, much to the collective chagrin of WW™ and me. The Bean pushed that button over and over and over... Later, when he was out with WonderWife™, I took out the batteries and told him that it was broken again. The people on the plane ride home would've thanked me.


Day 7: “Yes, married.”
Oh yeah, we were there for a wedding. We had all but forgotten as the day approached.

It was held at a stunning oceanside plantation. I snuck off with my bride and we danced next to the waves as the sun was going down. This was by far the best moment of the entire vacation.


Day 8: As Luck Would Have It
Between check out and our flight, we had time to kill. A visit to the sugar museum did away with 20 of those minutes and resulted in the Bean getting a tablespoon worth of sugar in a small ziplock bag. He refused to put it away and carried it around, making it look like he was toting a drug stash. Later on the plane when he said, “I want sugar! I want sugar!” and I poured a little in his hand and he lapped it up, the drug metaphor still seemed apt.

The vacation gods were benevolent on this day as the plane was miraculously only a third full. I cannot remember a recently flight that has not been overstuffed to the gills. We spread our tired selves over six seats and had an uneventful, stress-free flight.

Every time we left the door of our condo in Maui, the Bean would ask, “On ramp?” (The kid loves going up on ramps. Don’t ask me why.) We would tell him that there were no on ramps on the island. In fact, there were no freeways on the island.

When we got in the car and headed for home the Bean told me, “I’m so happy there’s an on ramp.”

Welcome home, family. Welcome home.

View From an Island, Part 2

Day 2: “Lighten up, Francis.”
The Bean dubbed the Black Sand Beach “Coffee Beach”, which to me was actually a better and more accurate name.

After trying all of last summer to get the Bean to swim, he finally spent an enthusiastic 20 minutes in the pool at our hotel. Huzzah! He was captivated by a water jet which was aimed upwards and sent a geyser of water over the stairs. When the jet shut itself off, I joked to the Bean, “Why did you break the pool, buddy?”

His eyes got really big when he looked at me. They started to water. “I didn’t break the pool!”

The rest of the morning I was inundated with comments like, “That was mean, Daddy, to say I broke the pool. I Did. Not. Break. The. Pool. That was a bad trick!”

We got the swimming down, next we need to work on his sense of humor.


Day 3: This is Why I’m Fat
This was breakfast - the Loco Moco


A hamburger patty topped with an egg, sitting on a bed of bacon fried rice, covered with gravy. I can't begin to tell you how good this was.

View From an Island, Part 1

Day 1: “Now let us never speak of the shortcut again."
It took approximately 15 minutes into our Hawaiian vacation before I turned into Clark Griswold. I stood in the car rental line, slick from the humidity with the purple petals from a flower lei pasted to the back of my neck. On the counter, a Garmin GPS system was beckoning me...no, daring me. An extra 50 bones and it was soon mounted on the dash of the sweet rental car (no wait, it was a Chevy, not so sweet). It was an insurance policy that guaranteed we would never get lost on the island.

In what has become her signature move, WonderWife™ rolled her eyes when she saw it. I programmed it to speak in a voice called “Karen”, a saucy girl with an Australian accent who was oddly seductive for a computer.

“Make a left in 200 feet,” Karen prompted.

“Sure thing baby,” I replied.

“Oh this isn’t going to do.” WW™ said. Karen and WW’s™ relationship was off to a rocky start.

You have to understand that WW™ loves maps. She’s like Magellan with a map. So she wasn't thrilled that instead of a map, we had some gadget that the Bean called “the little TV”. But WW™ kept her opinions in check and we were on our way. Karen soon led us up a windy, fog covered road that made Lombard Street look like the 10 freeway. WW™ and curvy roads get along like WW™ and Karen. I could sense some tension coming from my wife.

An hour later Karen told us that our destination was in 500 feet, but there wasn’t anything remotely close to a hotel anywhere in eyesight, nor had there been the whole way up. Karen had taken us to the crater in the middle of the island.

Now I’m not going to say it’s my fault that Karen was incorrectly programmed. After all, the woman behind the counter of the rental car place had also touched a few buttons on the GPS screen. If our court systems demand proof beyond a reasonable doubt for somebody to be declared guilty, I think I deserve the same.

WW™ ripped the GPS from the dashboard, bolted out of the car, opened the trunk and started digging through the suitcases for the guidebook. She quickly determined that we had two options to get to the hotel: one was to keep driving forward until we hit an unpaved road not suited for automobiles or we could turn around and crawl back down the twisty road with the zero visibility.

It was right at this moment when the kids lost their shit.

I drove back down sitting next to a seething wife, listening to the tortured screams of a baby girl, and a boy who, after sitting on a plane for nearly 6 hours and in the car for another hour on top of that, was making it well known that he wanted out of the car.

As we pulled into the road of our hotel an hour and a half later, I made sure to put on my cheeriest grin and shout, “Look everyone, we’re here!” And with that, our vacation had officially begun.

Vay Kay Shun

It's really happening. After talking about it and planning it for what seems like several years (even though it's only been 9 months or so), the Geek Boy family is taking our first vacation. I've been trying not to be all Clark Griswold about it, but I have gone out and bought a vacation guide so we'll know how to best navigate the island of Maui with the kids in tow. Oh yeah, did I mention we're going to Hawaii?

Thankfully, Southern California is only a 5 hour plane ride from the magical islands of one of our best states. WonderWife™ and I are east coasters, so we've done the 5 hour plane ride before. (Okay, I'll admit that I personally have not done it with two kids, that honor goes to WW™ who did it by herself--twice.) But once we're on vacation, what then? Are the kids going to go crazy with the general lethargy and lack of structure that comes with a vacation? Or somehow will they get into the spirit and kick back with us? Only time will tell.

So all of you awesome readers, I open up the comment section for you to discuss your family vacation strategies, stories and tips. I've got to go finish packing. Now where did I leave my sunscreen and Speedos? *

Fear not, through the magic of technology (and the scheduling feature on Blogger), I'll be posting even when I'm gone. You won't even miss me.


*Kidding of course. I never use sunscreen.

The All-Nighter(s)

It was an unusual trip in that I had to stay up all night for three nights in a row. Surprisingly, it wasn’t so bad. My mind was engaged and the time went quickly. It’s much easier to pull an all-nighter when you know there will be opportunity to sleep on the other side. When I was single (and younger) there was nothing to keep me awake after staying out all night. But kids are like an alarm clock without a snooze bar, so when I’m up late these days I’m constantly and unavoidably doing the sleep math—if I go home now, I’ll only be “this” tired. Knowing that I had opportunity to catch 7 hours this time left me stress free about whittling away the wee hours.

It’s a bizarre thing to live against the flow of the natural rhythms of the world. After the first night, my body felt heavy and thick, as if I were walking on tub of oobleck. The night gives a calm, eerie stillness to the world that can be unsettling at first, but sort of liberating once you get used to it. I started thinking about what other people were up with me—the insomniacs watching infomercials or the young couples passionately sweating the night away. Where were the people going who were driving on the roads at 4am?

Thankfully, daylight savings time had passed so it was still dark when I got back to my hotel. I detest going to sleep after the sun has come up. Even in the party days of yore I always have, though I don’t know why. So each morning was a race to seal off my hotel room and drift to sleep before the first rays of light peeked around the gaps in the window shade. I imagined this is what a vampire must feel like.

-----------------

As I was packing up on my last morning, the phone rang. WonderWife™ was crying. A mechanical problem grounded her plane and the throngs of spring breakers made getting another flight to Florida impossible. Everyone was disappointed. The Bean didn’t get to take his plane ride, WW™ didn’t get to attend her grandma’s 85th birthday party and I didn’t get my weekend of solitude. Sprout remained indifferent to our plight, as long as somebody was feeding her mashed bananas and Cheerios every few hours. We collectively cursed the airlines and drunken college students.

With our plans now shattered, I decided that we couldn’t loaf around the house all weekend. We needed to do something as a family, something fun to keep us from wallowing in the thoughts of the weekend we were all supposed to be having.

I texted WW™, “How about we got to Disneyland this weekend?”

Since WW™ has still reeling from her less-than-pleasant experience to and from the airport, I wasn’t sure how she was going to take this suggestion. When she gets stressed, my wife gets tunnel vision and can usually only focus on one thing at a time. I braced my sleep-deprived body for her reaction. Theme parks were my thing. Would she see this as a selfish request?

The phone rang.

“You just made my day,” she said. “That is an excellent suggestion.”

Wish You Were Here

The trouble with having a baby is that people always want to meet her. WonderWife’s™ grandparents are no exception. So plans were made for WW™ to fly back east and spend some time with them. Simultaneously, we learned that there was a big 85th birthday party being thrown for WW’s™ other grandmother and the kids’ presences were strongly requested. The end result is two back-to-back trips to the east cost for WW™ and the kids, while I stay home and work. While these trips were inauspicious for her, selfishly they were good for me. Or so I thought.

I am painfully aware of the sacrifice WW™ is making to visit her grandparents. To put it eloquently, her travel is going to suck. And while she is struggling to keep a pre-schooler and an infant occupied in a big metal tube for 5 hours straight only to land in order to deal with Florida drivers and extended family all weekend, I will have the house completely to myself.

I’ve been fantasizing about a weekend alone for long enough to worry why I’m not fantasizing about things like hot monkey sex with Eliza Dushku. I’ve dreamed about having no rules and no schedule, where I can sleep as late as I want, watch a marathon of Blu Rays with the sound turned up real loud, and not have to close the bathroom door when I’m doing some “thinking.” (I’m not sure why that last one is on the fantasy list, other than it’s something that I used to do when I was single and living alone.) So as bad as it makes me seem to admit it, the first time with the family gone is going to be paradise. It’s the second one, however, that gives me pause.

About a week after WW™ and the kids get home, they have to pack up and do it all over again. But this time they are going to be away for 10 days. 10 days all alone in the house. No kids. No wife. Just me. This is entirely too much time for me to spend with myself. I have been cohabitating with WW™ for way too long to properly subsist by myself for an extended period. I go stir crazy really easily. My friends aren’t going to be much help. Most of them have kids themselves, which means they’re locked down by the very schedule from which I’ve been temporarily set free. I’m going to lose my mind. I imagine by the end of the trip, I’ll be like a guy who’s spent too much time in a sensory deprivation tank.

To further amp up the situation, an unexpected and last minute business trip has taken me out of town for the days leading up to my family’s first trip. Later this week, I am literally going to be criss-crossing them in the air and coming home to an empty house. It doesn’t help that I had a more action-packed weekend than normal, having spent the last three nights staying out way too late and building up a nice sleep-deficit. All of this means that I didn’t get to spend enough time with WW™ before I left and wouldn’t see her, or the kids, for a week.

I know that there are worse problems to have. I know that me whining about being alone shouldn’t obscure the awful travel schedule of my wife. I know that I’m lucky to have a job at all, let alone one where I travel every once in a while. I know that WonderWife™ and I chose to move 3000 miles away from our families, therefore bringing this all on ourselves. I guess it’s a testament to our kids that our extended family actually wants to spend time with them. Most importantly, I’m glad that my family means so much to me that the thought of spending so much time away from them sends me into a catatonic state. But the plain fact is that staring down a month where I only get to spend a quarter of it with my family makes me kind of cranky—no matter how nice that first weekend alone is going to be.

Welcome Home

I wearily walked through the door, returning home after a three day business trip. WW™ is standing there, holding Sprout. The baby gives me a series of the biggest, gummiest smiles (save for her one tooth, which I call "Chomper") I think I have ever seen from her. Later I woke the Bean from his nap. As soon as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes, he said to me, "I'm glad you're home daddy."

"I am too, buddy boy. I am too."

Pig in the City

It had probably been five or six years since I’d been to New York City. This fact not only stood as a betrayal of my east coast roots, but was severely depressing in and of itself. Last week that was all fixed, when I found myself on a plane to that proverbial city that never sleeps, which is the perfect place for a sleep-deprived dad who can’t manage to stay awake until the 11pm “Simpsons” rerun.

I was in New York to once again congregate with my fellow nerds at a comic book convention. Unlike the pop culture orgy that is the San Diego Comic Con, the NYCC has a different vibe, much like the city itself. New York City brings out the intensity in people like salt brings out the flavor in food. This was abundantly evident in the fans who dressed up for the show. Not only did they take great care in crafting their costumes, but many of them had developed signature super hero poses that were instantly struck whenever a camera was waved in front of them.

The costumed folk also created some interesting people watching. Unique parings popped up all over the convention center. Two wookies were being led by Snake Plisskin. Mario and Luigi hung out with Hagar the Horrible. Lara Croft strolled hand and hand with Indiana Jones. And in a scene eerily reminiscent of “West Side Story”, there was palpable tension between the wizards from Harry Potter and the Twilight vampires.

Thankfully I didn’t spend all of my time in the convention center. New York is a walking town, and even though I live in LA, where we are forced to sign wavers promising that we will drive everywhere we go, I walked and soaked in the city.

I never realized how much food there is in NYC. Just about every other storefront was a bodega or café or sandwich shop or fancy restaurant. This is so profoundly different from the skuzzy strip mall Chinese food and Donut emporiums that litter the City of Angels. I also took great pleasure in seeing more Dunkin’ Donuts than Starbucks.

While I ate in an excellent restaurant or two, I really enjoyed the street vendors. I grew up thinking that one should never eat food from a cart on the street. I think it may have been my dad who instilled this disdain in me. Hot dogs from carts were referred to as DWD’s (dirty water dogs). Though I had been to NYC many times with my family, we never got food from a street vendor. But here I was on my own in the big city and since I’m a grownup (at least this is what the kids in my neighborhood tell me), I figured it was time to take a chance.

Walking back to my hotel after a few drinks on my first night, I stopped at a cart and bought a dog. Turns out it was one of the best hot dogs I’ve ever had. It had been grilled on the same surface where gyros and kabobs had been cooking, probably all day, giving it an extra burst of meaty flavor. As a bonus, the bun was also lightly grilled on the same cook top, providing extra goodness. My only complaint about this dog was that I didn’t buy two of them. This was so far from the culinary abomination that I had been led to expect. I needed to explore more.

I ate some great food in New York. I was compelled to stop at the legendary Gray’s Papaya, which I’ve been curious to try ever since it showed up on an episode of “Seinfeld” along with its numerous appearances on the Food Network. I also made sure to by some honey roasted nuts from a street cart—the smell of which ranks up there with campfires and vanilla extract as one of my all time favorite olfactory sensations.

But this orgy of eating couldn’t last forever. I was soon on a very long flight back home, filled with a longing for my family, only to find WonderWife™ laid up in bed with a virus so nasty she could barely speak in coherent sentences. Sprout greeted me with a bunch of smiles, but really she’ll smile at an unplugged lamp if it’s placed in front of her. I was really looking forward to how the Bean would greet me, but he was engrossed in his 157th viewing of “Cars” and couldn’t be bothered.

Oh well, I’ll always have that hot dog.

Musings From a Week in the Sunshine State

Six adults + Two Toddlers + One Infant / One Computer (with limited battery power) = No Time for Blogging.

When is a vacation not a vacation? When it’s spent carting a toddler and an infant across the country, across the state of Florida and back again.

I have no idea how or why anyone with more than two kids travels anywhere.

The journey from the gate to baggage claim in the Miami airport is epic in length.

Alamo Rent-A-Car does not clean their vehicles after each rental, which is why there was a half empty bottle of Maker’s Mark in the trunk of the first one I tried to rent.

There’s a lot of talk about the drivers in LA being crazy, but they have nothing on the ones driving Alligator Alley.

My mom loves nothing more than a Thanksgiving morning where the house smells like roasted turkey and the Macy’s Parade is on TV. And I love her for that.

It’s very difficult to teach a bunch of retired goys the proper way to pronounce “kugel”, especially when there is drinking involved.

In a house with eight people, you have to really fight for leftovers.

After a bit of gentle coaxing, finally, finally, finally the Bean goes swimming.

There is nothing better than seeing grandparents gush over their great-grandchildren.

Given the chance, Sprout will charm the pants off of complete strangers.

I now have a fishing tale about “the one that got away.” (It was a big one, I promise you!)

WALL-E is not an engaging movie for toddlers, even if it’s projected on a giant outdoor inflatable screen. BOLT, on the other hand, will keep them riveted.

If you’re going to have a press conference in an airport about how well-run said airport is, it would be best not to have it cause congestion in the middle of the terminal. (Thanks Miami.)

If you’re in the middle of a five and a half hour flight with a (nearly) three year old and your DVD player stops working, don’t panic. Make sure you have lots of snacks and lots of Play Doh and you may survive with your sanity intact.