Why Singing to Oliver is Great

1. He is only 21 months old so I am the first live act he has seen.
2. It's always for laughs.
3. He always laughs.
4. I love seeing the look in his eyes that says, "I don't know what you're doing but I love it."
5. He always wants to dance to it no matter how foul the beat is.
6. He sings back to me and he is better than I am.
7. Unlike his older siblings, he never tells daddy to be quiet.
8. He is my little man and is always my sidekick.
9. You can always find something he is doing to sing about.
10. He is Oliver.

My little man riding his pony across the open range wearing his daddy's hat.

Four Days Until Christmas.

December 21st, just four days away from our Savior's Birthday celebration. Notice I am not saying it is His exact birthday because that doesn't matter. What matters is that we are celebrating His coming to our world and showing a Grace unseen before. We (my wife and I) are done with Christmas shopping and that feels great. I fully admit that my Boo, Christina did 99.999 % of the work in this and makes it happen. That is one of her many amazing qualities. She makes good things happen. Of course others helped in the hunt for the perfect Christmas presents, so thank you Carol A.K.A. Mom Z. As a man, I feel fine with not knowing what they hell they were talking about when they started talking about Zhu Zhu pets. "It's a hamster that doesn't eat or poop." "So it's dead?" I ask. No they are not dead but apparently John Conner has it wrong, we are not going to be overrun with intelligent computer driven human replicates, but rather mindless bump and go robotic hamsters. The kids are nuts for them so that is all that matters.

I spoke the other day about that show I watched without sound while running on the treadmill, "Jersey Shores". I am at a loss to describe it. I thought that they were clowning about these stereotypes until my brother-in-law Aaron (www.twitter.com/aaronburrows) sent me a link that shows just how many of Guidonaughts there are running around

http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.barstoolsports.com%2Farticle%2Fnew_jersey_freakshows%2F1958%2F&h=49ec9e2ab3f5940569516a8bb4becda2

The above version is not so far off of what I am talking about. OK, enough giving more time to this show.

My new favorite teaching aid from the wonderful land of online video is Drunk History. A series of videos created by Derek Waters in which he has comedians actually get tanked on their drink of choice and then discuss an event in history. Oh the fun does not stop there because then today's funniest comedians and actors act out the tipsy tales of olden times.

Drunk History Vol. 1 - Featuring Michael Cera from Michael Cera

Do yourself a favor and check this one out.

Well, it is a light hearted blog today as I am about to go clean house. Yay for Brian, right? Time to start getting ready for the big day of wrapping paper destruction. I hope everyone out there has a great and Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

The Package

So, this past week, my mother sent a Christmas package to me from the land of Kentucky. Not really for me but for my kids. She's doing the Grandmom thing and making sure the presents are here to be put under the tree for the little darlings. The process started out as one would expect from my mother....

MOM: Brian, I don't know where I wrote your address so I need you to give it to me again so I can write it down this time.

ME: Alright, here it goes, 9993 Blah blah lane, Creve Coeur MO 63132.

MOM: 9..9..2..4..

ME: No, mom, 9993

MOM: 9933...

ME: No, 9 9 9 3!

MOM: Oh, Ok I got it 9993 Bloo Bloo Lane, Sleave Corn MO 65432

ME: No, no, it is....

(this went on for some time)

So she called me once again the morning that she was shipping the package to ask me my address again as she could not read what she had written, so we basically went through the above dialog all over again with my dad in the background talking to her. I am not sure what he was saying, all I heard was the occasional, "no damn it Vickie". Now, if you did not know, my mother has been seriously ill over the last year. She is fighting small cell lung cancer. When she called, I had left my cell phone in my office and was out in my restaurant doing that restaurant thing that I do, when Idalia my head cook comes to get me saying that my phone would not stop making noise. My mom had called two times in short order from her phone and once from her cell. She left me a voice mail saying it was important and I needed to call her cell phone right away. Hearing this, I start thinking worse case scenario for her and maybe even my father so of course I called right away only to find I had been trapped in the address discussion again.

After they got the package sent off via UPS, my mom called and left a voice mail on my phone to tell me it should be here by Monday and if it was not to let her know. She had them set it up so that it required an adult signature. This was not enough insurance so she called back to talk to me personally so that she was 100% sure that I would be there on Monday to receive the package.

Monday came and went with no delivery. She called a few times through the day to see if it had arrived. I told her it had not but not to worry that they often are running a day late or so. Tuesday came and went, once again no package. She was beside herself now, and gave me the tracking number so that I could check online for her. After two or three attempts to get the correct tracking number from her I found it's travel log online. According to it, they had tried to deliver it on Monday and Tuesday but that just could not be as I was home and never saw delivery man one. Upon closer look at the details we find that my mom had mailed it to 9933 blah blah lane. Of course she swears that she gave the woman the piece of paper with the address I gave her so they screwed up. Of course they did, I tell my mother and I will have to go pick it up from their customer center in Earth City just ten minutes away. I tell her I will go on Wednesday when my wife gets home from school so no worries.

Wednesday, my mother calls me three times in the morning to see if I have gone to get it yet. I tell her no as my wife is not home yet and I am not taking the kids solo on this adventure. My wife ends up handling an errand for her mother so she does not get home until almost 8:30 at night. My mother calls twice that night after I have already told her about the change in plans and that I will get it on Thursday after work. By this point I am feeling a bit harassed.

Thursday, and the calls start at about 9:00 AM even though I told her that I would not be going until after work. Her voice mails sound pretty much the same, "Brian,....it's mom. I was just wondering if you have picked up that package yet. I was just worried about it. Call me to let me know you got it, ok?" and I had a busy day so I did not return her calls because I was just going to call once the package was in hand and squash this whole process. At 3:00 my phone rings again and I see it is my mother again. I answer to, "Brian, ....it's mom. Have you got the package? Did they lose it?" to which I reminded her that I have not left work yet but will absolutely call her to let her know I have "THE PACKAGE". I am starting to feel like I am part of some shady deal gone wrong and have to get possession of "THE PACKAGE" by any means possible. End of story is I picked up the package and all is safe and sound. My mom is funny in her worries but I wanted to write this to help me remember in the future how funny she is with her quirks and how no matter how annoying she is sometimes with these habits, I need to treasure her just the way she is. I love you Mom.

(on a diferent note)Kid Shows are the reason for all this A.DD. ....

So after being held hostage by my children's television choices once again on my day off, I have come to a conclusion. The conclusion is this, these damn shows are poison, most likely lead to A.D.D., A.D.H.D., and possibly even H1N1. They try to feed knowledge in these little burst and segments but the shows are so far away from any kind of sensibility that I am not sure how any child can gain the information without taking a fair amount of the bizarre atmosphere with it. From Bert & Ernie doing the "Dingalong" song to a red dog the size of a T-Rex playing with normal size dogs (You know he would get excited and eat one of them). I can on some level see why kids watch them so intently as they are like visual train wrecks that you have a hard time turning away from. Dragon tales? You know that one of those kids would be burned to a crisp when one of the dragons sneezed or eaten in a fit of hunger. At the bare minimum it teaches our kids to go up and hug a strange creature should they come across one. If my kid sees a dinosaur walking around or say stumbles upon giant dog, I want them to run for safety, not try to engage in a sing along dance number with them about making friends. Maybe this is a little over the top but I have four children, all under the age of 9 so I have endured so many dumb kid shows over the years, that I have bad thoughts about what a cool serial killer would be one that tracks down and slays costume wearing members of Kid shows (no I will not be doing this). But man I can see the headlines.

Lack of warmth is always worse than cold

I rarely sit down and write when i am in a funk because usually when i read it later, I will dislike to the point of hating whatever I wrote. I am not a very emotional person and I do not say this as a badge of merit. I am sure it is just a scar from long ago that gets in thew way sometimes. It is the holiday season and I used to be a amped around this time of year but that is not the case anymore. I enjoy what it means for my kids but the anxiety and memories are to much for me sometimes. I will find my way through, I know I will as I always do. I compiled all of this once before in a journal, I titled, "Look to December". The journal started with one meaning and by the time I stopped writing in it, it had a far less warm and loving meaning. I know we can't change the past and if we let ourselves become locked there, we are no better off than a prisoner in a real jail, because you can't enjoy life. I have done much better in the last year but sometimes it is like some sort of post traumatic stress flash back and you feel everything just as if it were happening today instead of years ago. Enough of this, as I said, I will find my way through and God will be there to help me.

Video Blog to Start Soon I Hope...

I am about to start messing with my YouTube channel some more. I have left it untouched for some years and I have lately been inspired to play around with it some more. Charlotte especially wants to do vlogs. I was going to start some months back when I was making my way back to Kentucky to visit my mom and go to my high school reunion but once I got there and got a video of my mom and three things happened.

1. My mom was mortified that I had caught her on video without her wig. She was embarrassed that someone would see her like that.
2. I was so shocked at how frail and sick she looked that I felt bad for catching her on video unprepared.
3. I put the video camera up and didn't touch it for the rest of the trip, thus ending the vlog I was going to start.

I may dig the footage out and make use of it or I may just let it rot. My mom is doing better by the way. The doctor told her that all the current masses seemed to be handled but with small cell lung cancer that is not a bill of clean health yet. She is putting on weight and feeling much stronger so those are blessings.

Getting Ready for Wintergeddon....

I am currently being a lazy ass and not on my game work out wise by a long shot. I am not eating crazy but I am not being very disciplined in regards to working out on schedule and making it intense like I should. I need to kick myself in the ass and get back on the pony. I am still a world better health wise than I was this time last year. I only have one month to go before we do WINTERGEDDON with the Zombie Squad. It is winter camping with hiking, and survival practice. I have about three key pieces of equipment left to obtain and I will be fully ready. I want it to be really cold even though it will suck for that weekend, it will make it mean more when it's over.

I hope you all have a nice holiday season.

Merry Christmas
and
(insert other holiday that you celebrate here)