I found out about the belly-button game today. Apparently Beckie has known about this for quite some time. Apparently this is very 15 and half months. Apparently everyone and their mother are well-versed in the belly-button rules, and skills, and lore…familiar with the winners of epic belly-button duels, heroes and losers, great moments in belly-button history, subtleties and ettiquette dealing with appropriate booping and tickling…apparently all common knowledge, practically public-domain. Apparently I have fallen off the curve in just 2 weeks!
the longest yard, the stupidest blog
I watched the remake of The Longest Yard w. Adam Sandler. Some of it was funny, but it was the wrong role for Sandler. Cocky and dry humor is not his thing, Burt Reynolds stole the move as Nate Scarborough. Michael Irvin’s guest appearances was cool he is still in shape. a few parts better than the original I like how Crewe confesses to his team about throwing the game, and how they gatorade the warden at the end. A few places where they went bigger\sexier\moremoremore from the first movie was amusing like with the enormous convicts, but on the whole it wasnt much of a flick. It could have been a lot better. The Indian broadcaster alongside Chris Berman was a great idea wasted — what do you not have to do to play well off Chris Berman?
So why am I bothering to write a tepid summary of my thoughts about an average movie? The Blog made me do it!! OK its partly cause I wrote most of this over Memorial Day weekend when I was alone all weekend w. no one but a baby to talk to, but something about publishing your life is addicting, and not in a good way. I find myself watching things and thinking about how I will describe them, not just watching them. Its like a constant dialog in my head, what is going on along with what i will say about it. Its so contrived and so meta, its Scrubs and Ally McBeal and flashback-mashup storytelling all churned together. I don’t like it.
I am living online at the expense of living, and recording my experiences at the expense of experiencing them. Somehow because every experience can be recorded, you feel like you’ve lost something if you don’t record it. Even the ones that don’t really bare recording. And somehow because I can register a domain name and run WordPress, I feel I am the Quentin Tarantino and Ridley Scott of my own domain. Every lost post is now a lost masterpiece in my personal Oscar night.
Really most of this is just a mediocre movie.
this mess brought to you by the letter G
advice to my parents on babysitting next week
be prepared. i’m warning you, you need to get ready for this, goto an aerobics class, eat right. you need to work together, you need to be prepared. you need to think about getting sleep, strategies for distractions, pockets, drink some orange juice in the morning, rest stops and water breaks, you need to be vigilant, carry a cell phone. you will need some all-purpose shoes. don’t get me wrong, she’s a frickin’ trip, but she’ll kick your ass.
and read the manual before you drive the Prius. Maybe get a Cisco certification too just to be safe.
Stacking, sorting, and the general business of putting things into other things
G has taken to creating order in the universe. no, she is an agent of entropy, and anarchy. but she likes to bring order to household items. It started with lids and tupperware…she figured out to put like-minded containers into one another and the lids that go on them. I’m not sure why this surprises me; its a puzzle, whats not to like. But seeing the cognition go from coincidence to connection to contrivance is amazing. The tupperware thing has lately, in its own small way, been useful. I now have to pick up 14 things instead of 16, thank you G. Last week she enjoyed the red and yellow bottles of the pool test kit, and figured out the little container thing. Packing unpacking packing unpacking…i thought about putting a stop to it but its 4 bucks and i cant even get the bottle open. It hit a true funniness the other day at G’s 15 month peds appt. We’re hanging out in the green room, nekkid, typical quiet time…so she begins to tear apart and open everything in the room. Why a peds office would not have child proof latches on their cabinets, I do not know. Anyway, she pulls out a stck of dixie cups whic are in fact urine samplers. There was the first one, which she tried to drink out of, the second which she used double fisted with the first, the brief distraction, the 3rd and 4th to replace the retired 1st and 2nd, then the entire rest of the team ran out through the tunnel. I now knew, for a fact, she enjoyed stacking. Today was the peak, she picked up rocks from the yard and put em in a giant bucket. after every one, she looked at me and held up her arms and smiled: yeah!!!! this could last for hours. its a big bucket, a little girl, and a yard full of rocks. we can only hope!
beating the shit out of dad
the baby just pulled a pool brush down on my head. i was sitting in a chair, she was wreaking havoc on the porch. i need to stop writing to go remedy this…pole is away…lap_kljjlkj….TOP ,,,,,,,,,,,,in danger. I digress. So I jumped and grabbed the side of my head and went “owww!” And she turns and looked at me sheepishly and walked away from the pole (i hope that is not prophetic) and then went and sucked her thumb for good measure. I swear, in G speak, that was “oh shit…i’m sowwy.”
the tree in the forest
i don’t need a big audience, but if a tree falls in the forrest and no one hears it, it really doesnt make a sound. So many good lines this weekend, no one to hear them but G (and the Internet). Beckie is home now but needs to acknowledge my rockin the mic, its hard work saving all this funny up. i will not stand to be ignored! Dumbstruck Dad comedy tour is in the hizouse!
more silliness!
i am pretty sure beckie will testify that i am silly, have always been and shown a propensity for silly, work hard to bring the joy of silly into my day to day life. i will pant people, make fun of awkward noises, immitate Beavis and Butthead, prat fall, make funny faces, make funny-fake-scary faces, enjoy Jim Carey and Naked Gun, and pull your finger. whatever…a man can show confidence in his intelligence by enjoying the simple humors. the baby has inspired me to purposefully cultivate my silly. i like the payoff, its rewarding. its kinda like one of the best things i’ve heard in my yoga class “relax your face.” it really does relax you. never too old for silly.
Eating right
Just like w me, feeding G the right combination of stuff is hard work. I like giving her bad stuff now and then, why not, she loves it. she’s so active that doesnt bug me, it more making sure all along that the bulk of her diet is right. Most mornings its banana, yogurt and cheerios. Dinner is harder to work in veggies – I bought some frozen mixed veggies the other day, since they have that sweet taste I think she will dig em just like peas. Scrambled eggs worked yesterday, which was cool Beckie said G didnt like them the last time. Today at the veggie stand I picked up strawberries and blackberries just for the baby — good call. Between those, and grapes, I feel like its a good portion of a meal and I can always give her something like a snack to keep her mellow. And hydration — I’m always trying to offer her water bottles and sippy cups. She is pretty good about letting me know when she wants to hit the bottle, but I’ve taken to leaving a few on the floor around the house. It is summer in AZ after all.
gear up!
I keep slowly introducing G to the terrain. yesterday we walked for a while on the access road behind Red Mountain Ranch. she is getting it. couple times she headed to something steep and recognized when i told her “careful” or “no.” didnt stop her, but at least she got the message. She tried to scramble up the side of a little culvert — amusing in and of itself seeing tinyHuman struggle with a 2 ft culvert — and as she failed you could see she wasn’t really upset more accepting that it was out of her league. yeah she is definitely getting it.
the other day I decided no more open toed shoes if we’re doing anything interesting. I mean, duh, but its important. I noticed yesterday she was covered in scratches so I need to get her some light pants too for these instances of all-terrain-babying.