Donkey Racing Gone Wrong

There is no witty comment or snarky remark that could possibly make this any more hilarious. 

 All props to Kari for finding this.

Gopherpocalypse Now

Gophers are one of those things that you only notice if you have grass to take care of. Scourge of suburban dads everywhere, the little S.O.B.s wreak havoc on lawns, and are almost impossible to get rid of.

I am a pretty peaceful guy- I’ve never hunted or anything like that, and am not really down for the whole cruelty-to-animals thing, but I have (more than once) stood silently over a gopher mound in my backyard, poised with my shovel over the hole like a Masai warrior with a spear waiting for a kill. I never get the little bastards, and always come back in the house muttering and cursing like an old man. It was cause for celebration recently when my neighbor told me that he saw one of the neighborhood cats stalk and kill a gopher in his backyard. It made me want to plant catnip.

Now, I hate gophers, but I’ve got nothing on these guys, who engaged in their very own Caddyshack moment. Wow. I wonder how many Molson’s were consumed before they came up with that idea…

The Secret of Blog (with apologies to Mrs. Brisby)

I have finally figured out the reason for this whole blogging phenomenon- it is the perfect thing to do when you know you should be doing something else.

Normally, like many people, when I have a paper due or have to get my taxes finished or call my grandparents or rescue a super-intelligent colony of rodents from diesel-powered farm equipment or whatever, I look for something “productive” that I can do instead. I typically start sorting things on my bookshelves (I do love to sort things) or organizing my garage. If I am really desperate, I might clean the kitchen.

This type of activity seems somehow morally superior to classic procrastination activities like watching Night Court reruns, checking Craigslist for left-handed guitars I can’t afford (or play), or researching backup second basemen for the Chicago White Sox.

The great thing about blogging is that it feels like you are doing something (at least marginally) useful, but requires no more effort than playing Knights of the Old Republic II on your X-Box.

I suspect that when I no longer have papers I should be grading (Tuesday afternoon at 2:00PM is the deadline), my blogging output will diminish considerably. Unless I have something else to do.

 

Thank goodness that they didn’t have a T-1 connection in the rosebush along with the Christmas lights.

18 Wheelers (or, A Defense of Cheap Beer)

I have always been something of a beer snob. “None of that domestic rubbish for me, thank you, I’ll have a Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout.” Now don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy good beer, and prefer it in most instances.

Lately though I have come to see the beauty of cheap American beer. Miller Lite, in particular, is big for me right now. It has any number of distinguishing merits, including:

• It costs about half of what I am used to paying – about $10.99 for an 18-pack
• The whole concept of the 18-pack… now that’s what I’m talkin’ about! Plus, the term “18-wheeler” for an 18-pack is the coolest thing ever.
• Aluminum cans are easily smashable, and thus take up less space in the trash can. (I was going to say “in the recycle bin”, but really, who am I kidding?) They also weigh less, and are far less likely to cause the plastic trash bag to rip. Plus, smashing beer cans always provides a certain satisfaction.
• It tastes great, and is less filling. C’mon… I had to. There really is something to the whole “less filling” thing, though. I mean, after a hard day’s work in the sun does anybody really want a Guinness?

Miller Lite is also responsible for this, the greatest commercial of all time:

It isn’t like I’m the first person to figure this out or anything. My buddy Morty up in Portland (microbrew capital of the universe) tells me that the locals up there have zero interest in craft beers. Instead, everyone drinks Pabst Blue Ribbon. According to Morty, if a bar doesn’t have good ol’ PBR on draft, the place won’t be around for long.

Restatement of Purpose

After talking with my wife, I realize that I didn’t do a very good job explaining what it is I am trying to write about here. Well, technically she realized it and told me that she won’t be reading my blog unless I can do a better job.

Let me try again.

What is fascinating to me about my suburban life is not that the suburbs themselves are particularly strange or interesting. I mean, they kind of are, but that isn’t what I am trying to get at. I really want to avoid a detached, ironic take on things, as if I were some cool urban hipster describing the quaint cultural activities of the locals. The fact is, I am a suburbanite through and through. I was born and raised in the ‘burbs, and have lived here all my life. Like a lot of kids from the suburbs, I always thought about doing something different, more exciting, more extreme. A significant amount of my adolescence and young adulthood was filled with dreams of escape and adventure.

To me now, however, the prospect of adventure as I would have defined it when I was 15 pales in comparison with the simple joy of sitting on my couch watching The Backyardigans with The Littledoo. It turns out that I like it here. A lot.

I grow tomatoes in my backyard.

I hang out in my garage with my power tools.

I play fantasy football. And baseball. And NASCAR.

I volunteer in the nursery at my church.

I talk about baseball with my next door neighbor over the back fence.

It is amazing to me how much satisfaction I derive from this stuff. I can’t get enough of it. I am fully bought in, in a way that I have never been at any time in my life. Being a suburban dad works for me in ways I never expected. It is deeply satisfying on a really fundamental level. What I intend to do here is to try and give an account of how cool this all is, and to write about the little (and the big) things that I take such unexpected delight in.

Ni-Hao!

These days it seems I spend a lot of time watching Noggin. If you don’t know what that is, you don’t have a 2-year-old. The latest and greatest show is called Ni-hao Kai-Lan.

[note: I think this show is actually on Nick Jr. Whatever.]

It should be insufferably and offensively cute, the kind of cute that makes you want to go kick a small animal just to balance out the cosmic scale, but actually it is just plain cute. Stupidly so. I love it. My entire household is obsessed with it, and we all have our favorite characters. I like Tolee, a koala bear who is obsessed with pandas. He wears panda shirts, and panda slippers. The Littledoo is into Ho-Ho the monkey.

Plus, we’re all learning Mandarin.

On Blogging and such

I am not entirely sure what to make of the whole blogging thing. Setting aside blogs that deal with really useful things like economic debates or NASCAR updates, the whole concept of public personal documentation strikes me as mildly embarrassing. That being said, I do enjoy reading the well-written daily adventures of my long-lost literary friends.

Writing is not really something I do, although I do take a great interest in my own personal life, which appears to be the main qualification for blog authorship. I think it might be worth trying.

It strikes me that the most interesting thing going on with me right now is my gleeful embrace of the prototypical American suburban existence and all of its trappings. It is strange and wonderful, and I am fascinated by it.