Blog Archives
It’s Holiday Season Again: Thanksgiving
Okay,
so I promised to complete the holiday series and by GOD I am going to do it! For those of you that have long since put the torturous memory of Thanksgiving out of its misery, I am happy to reopen that wound for you as I am doing so to myself by authoring this very entry.
As is often the case, we opt to travel for Thanksgiving this year. Only this time we are not on a 3-hour tour, we jump in head first and sign up for the 6-hour variety of road trip. Granted, if I roofie the wife and NyQuil the rug rats , I can make that trip in 5 hours flat. This being said, I am fresh out of roofies and at last check we have two wide-awake ankle-biters in the back seat. Begrudgingly, we head off to the windy, treeless prairies of the Texas panhandle.
Based on previous road trips (see https://genericdad.com/2010/09/21/were-no-donner-party/) you all know my children do not do well in the car over long periods of time. Now, in the past we would typically drive thru a fast food joint and scarf down a high calorie, deep-fried mystery meal while I would attempt to distractedly eat and drive. This is coupled with the wife riding reverse cowboy (on her knees in the front seat facing the back seat trying to force the kids to eat food that they don’t want in the first place)…maybe “Reverse Cowboy” is not the term…In fact, I know it’s not…I have Cinemax ya know. Needless to say, this is not the safest way to transport our precious cargo, so in recent trips we have been stopping at an actual restaurant with actual waiters. This, at the very least, allows the wife and I to enjoy decent food while our kids run around howling like banshees in whatever Small Town, TX eatery we bless with our noisy presence.
The meal goes without incident. I tip the poor 78 year-old woman who had to endure the ear-piercing shrieks of my kids and we are back on the road just as an icy rain starts to fall. Because the kids are somewhat behaving and because they actually ate some lunch we are inclined to let them have some candy while they watch their annoying movies (thank GOD for headphones!). I don’t know if is something that he ate at lunch, car sickness, or something else entirely, but Lil B lets out a painful sounding belch that would put Booger Presley to shame. That air bubble must have been serving as some makeshift cork because as soon as the cork blew, so did Lil B. The kids had each just plowed through a tasty sack of M&Ms, so naturally, what was currently being projectile-vomited all over the back of my seat had the look of a lovely chocolate fountain one might see at a decent reception. The comparison to the reception stops there because this is about the time that the smell hits the front seat. Of course, we are in the middle of nowhere by this time and it’s pouring rain. Luckily we see a roadside stop that we can at least have some cover to get Lil B. out of his Baby Gap Chocolate Fondue gear. Clean as I might, I am not able to rid the vehicle of the scent of chocolate mixed with stomach bile, but some creative directing of the air vents at least keeps the smell in back with the livestock…err kids.
By comparison, the rest of our journey goes swimmingly and we soon find ourselves in the dusty plains of the panhandle on the outskirts of Amarillo. There is not much to do in Amarillo other than binge drink and get pregnant. Since we are already saddled with two fun babies, we opt for binge drinking. We relax and visit with family in the days leading up to the turkey day feast(s).
Our first feast requires a short jaunt to the metropolis of Dumas, a small agribusiness-centered community in which the wife’s family resides. Dumas is filled with good people and…hispanics, but mostly good people and I do not mind our brief visits. It is actually a nice departure from the busyness of Dallas. Things are quiet and simple and there is not much to do and I kind of like it…if only I could get 4G to connect so that I could Facebook and watch internet porn…maybe I don’t like being out in the boonies after all…at least there’s binge drinking…
After a delicious Thanksgiving meal with the wife’s family we are forced to exit rather quickly as we are already running late for our 2nd feast at my folk’s house back in Amarillo. We arrive at my parent’s place just as my family is sitting down to eat. So as not to disappoint, I heap the fixin’s onto my plate as though I had not seen food in days. You can’t show up to mom’s and not eat after she has spent an entire day preparing a meal…So, the wife and I take one for the team and eat our second complete Thanksgiving meal within a two-hour span. I am a fat ass and this is not much of a feat for me to accomplish, but I give the wife credit as she made a great showing at both feasts. I am not positive, but I could swear I hear the sounds of a desperate woman purging her system later that day…it reminds me of high school and for a short time I bask in the nostalgia of my hometown.
The voyage home is uneventful. There is no projectile vomiting, no crying, and no rain. As we listen to an audiobook my mind drifts in and out of the story. My liver and colon wreaking havoc on me for a week’s worth of overeating…and drinking, I am left with a warm sensation knowing that we are blessed with such a great family…nope, that’s not it…I think I just sharted…where the hell is that roadside stop!
It’s Holiday Season Again: Halloween
Let’s face it. Halloween is one of those holidays that people either love or hate. There simply is no middle ground when it comes to All Hallows Eve. As I grow older I find myself in the crossroads of hating and loving Halloween.
When I was a kid I loved all things Halloween. The costumes, the trick-or-treating and especially all of the candy. It was the one time of the year that my folks would let me run loose around the neighborhood soliciting sugar high-enducing treats. My parents were so cool that they didn’t even go through my candy claiming to pull out the unsafe looking pieces while secretly culling out the good stuff for them selves. 
Nope, I was free to tear into every razor blade-infused apple, every drug-laced, unwrapped candy, and even those nasty ass candy corns. Although I have it on good authority that they would sneak into my stash once I finally crashed from my sugar high.
As I grew a little older the trick-or-treating would give way to just running wild through the neighborhood wreaking havoc on people’s Halloween yard art and kicking in the faces of their lovingly carved jack-o-lanterns. Rather than begging door to door for candy I would simply steal the candy of a younger ‘treater. Yes, I know this is wrong, but kids did it to me and by God, I was going to have my revenge. Plus, I couldn’t return home empty-handed and dressed like a zombie.
As I entered the high school scene Halloween would shift gears significantly. For me and my crew it was all about property damage. We would steal pumpkins and drive around hurling our loot at unsuspecting brick mailboxes and parked cars. 
Trick-or-treating would become underage drinking-themed house parties. This trend would continue on into college with the property damage portion of the evening eventually fading away. Call it maturation if you will, but I credit 
binge drinking and girls dressed in slutty costumes. Who wants to toss pumpkins when you can stare at coeds while drinking your way to tossing your cookies just before you pass out on a stranger’s couch. Man, I just realized how much I miss college. These first 3 phases of Halloween are what I always loved about the holiday.
In the years after college the fun would begin to fade. Dressing up for costume parties would become a source of stress to have the most kick-ass costume. Binge drinking would become a liability as we all had jobs and responsibilities. I would also develop a hatred for overaged trick-or-treaters. Why won’t those teenagers just move to the next phase? Get to a party, get to stealing other kids candy, or get to smashing pumpkins. Either way, just get off my porch you greedy little bastards! Essentially, I begin to hate Halloween at this point in life.
Enter marriage and babies and the cycle begins again. This time it’s my children entering phase one of Halloween. It is such a great feeling to see the pure joy on their faces as they are handed a piece of candy from a complete stranger. Their little eyes just light up at the sight of that dum-dum being dropped into their oversized plastic pumpkin buckets. Watching them fight through the completely ridiculous costumes that we force upon them while trying to run to the next house brings forth a hearty giggle. And perhaps the best part of the evening is when we have made our way home, candy buckets dumped onto the floor, and we drop the big one on them. We tell them that they can have one candy before bed, and one candy only. Their little, round faces become serious with the weight of the decision that is upon them. Despite their selection we all win. They get delicious and hopefully unlaced candy and we get to feel like good parents…for a night. I think it’s safe to say that I have come full circle on Halloween. Hell, I think I am gonna go smash my neighbor’s pumpkins and steal some poor kid’s candy just for the nostalgia.
My Little Zombies
Spew Me A River and Long Dong Chimp…Unrelated…Somewhat
I would love some input from you other parents on this one…Our kids seem to have developed some genetic mutation that has given them the super power of projectile vomiting at will. Of all the genes from the multitudes of generations gone by that are carried in my wife’s and my blood, our kids both get hair-trigger gag reflexes.
For instance, B has thrown up on a restaurant table all of the 3 times that we have taken him to a restaurant. You may be thinking, “Wow, they don’t get out much!” You would be correct. We clean enough toddler spew up at our own house. We don’t need the added cleanup duty coupled with the embarrassment that comes from seeing fellow patrons bury their faces in disgust or gasp out in astonishment as they watch our entire meal get glazed with a thin layer of milk spray. You can understand why I no longer eat donuts.
B's Future Career
Don’t think that I am leaving M out of this. The poor kid can get a little tickle in her throat, or have a little cough and que the chunk-works. On top of each of them having these separate issues, they both hose down a room with any period of prolonged crying. I recently purchased a John boat and fashioned strap-on buckets for both kids just to get around our own house. Our friggin’ carpet looks like a cheetah with all of the spots. We have been putting off getting wood floors for fear that they will warp under the constant layer of regurgitated food. I even went so far as to trace back our lineage on Ancestry.com to see if some distant relative mated with a fly…or an Irishman. I found a lot of the latter. Coincidence?
On a somewhat lighter note, we decide to take the kids to the Fort Worth Zoo last weekend. The weather is great, the crowds are low, and the kids seem to be holding down their food, so off we go in search of flamingos and elephants. (Don’t think for a second that I didn’t thow the puke buckets in the car) Nevertheless, things are going wonderfully when we happen upon the chimpanzee exhibit.
Like most kids, our kids like the chimps, and any monkeys for that matter.
Use Your Imagination
So we linger at this exhibit just enjoying watching the chimps chase each other around their habitat. It is about this time that I notice a small group of chimps that is up on a high rock above the rest of the group. There are about four or five of them hanging out up there. As my gaze begins to shift from them to the chimps down below something stops my eyes dead in their tracks. I quickly snap my head back up to the rocky outcrop. OMG! Is that what I think it is? Holy S@%*! There is a male chimp just kinda lying back against the rock similar to how a I might sit on the couch and watch a Rangers game.
The reason that I know it is a male is that this guy has the hugest erection that I have seen on an animal outside of a horse (different story…there was beer involved…a lot of beer). As I stand there in amazement of this chimp’s endowment, a female sitting next to him hops up and straddles “Mr. 3-legs”. Am I dreaming? Have I fallen asleep watching internet porn again? This female hops on, grabs the 2-footer that “Long Dong Chimp” is packing and sveltely guides it..well you know what happens next.
It is at this time that I practically blind M with a ninja-like hand to the eyes/headlock spin maneuver to set us down the path away from the chimps. I am almost wishing I had my own puke bucket…As we walk away I can help thinking about the schlong on that chimp. I guess if we consider that Man won the war of evolution with his opposable thumbs, I have to say that chimps won at least one battle…
Can’t We All Just Get…Well?
In order for you all to experience what it has been like at my house for the past couple of weeks, I need to take you on a cinematic trip down memory lane. Picture little Gordie LaChance sitting around the campfire regaling his pals with the “Barf-o-rama” story in the classic film, Stand By Me. “Lardass! Lardass, Lardass”, the crowd chants as David “Lardass” Hogan eats his way to victory in a pie-eating contest. Then it hits…the castor oil and raw egg make their comeback . “Slowly a sound started to build in Lardass’ stomach. A strange and scary sound like a log-truck coming at you at a hundred miles an hour. Suddenly, Lardass opened his mouth. And before Bill Travis knew it, he was covered with five pies worth of used blueberries. The women in the audience screamed. Bossman Bob Cormier took one look at Bill Travis and barfed on Principal Wiggins. Principal Wiggins barfed on the lumberjack that was sitting next to him. Mayor Grundy barfed on his wife’s tits. But when the smell hit the crowd, that’s when Lardass’ plan really started to work. Girlfriends barfed on boyfriends. Kids barfed on their parents. A fat lady barfed in her purse. The Donnelly-twins barfed on each other. And the women’s auxiliary barfed all over the Benevolent Order of Antelopes. And Lardass just sat back and enjoyed what he created. A complete and total Barf-A-Rama.”
Of course, this is a slight embellishment with regard to what has recently transpired in my house. We may not have had the Benevolent Order of Antelopes, but we had two toddlers and a mommy doing there best impressions of this classic movie scene. Part of me wishes that we had all concrete floors so that I could bring the hose in like they do at the zoo in the elephant cage. As it stands right now, I feel like I am constantly wading in vomit and feces remnants and it’s quite disgusting. I see little food items on the floor and I don’t know if they came from my toddlers dropping them, or projectile spewing them. I do know this: small trash cans make good barf buckets and baby diapers cannot hold back the full fury of an infant’s diarrhea bomb.
On a lighter note, I think that everyone is feeling much better. We rung in Lil B’s 1st birthday last weekend, and we are taking our first trip as a family unit this coming holiday weekend. We are headed to the mountains of New Mexico for some family time, fishing, and relaxation. I will post a mountain trip review upon our return…if we actually make it back. I encourage any of you to stop by our house and disinfect the dump while we are gone. I will understand if you have to chalk up a total loss and just set the place on fire. Until our return, I bid you all a happy Labor Day.
Generic Dad 