Timing

Mom flew out today for two days of meetings. So you know what that means?

That’s right a puking second grader.

The timing is simply amazing. Astounding. There is no logical explanation as to why whenever Mom must go out of town, there is something that blows up the daily routine like Scott Brown blows up health care bills.

God evidently didn’t think that Riley’s orchestra concert Thursday evening was enough of a challenge. He needed to add vomit.

Last night, about the time we see the temple during the season premiere of LOST, Kinsey comes downstairs holding her tummy with the whiny look. This does not draw any kind of reaction from Mom or I. Kinsey exhibiting the whiny look is like french fries looking tasty.

So we get her a blanket and have her lay down next to us. Because neither one of us is willing to miss any part of LOST by doing some actual parenting. Plus Kinsey normally falls asleep within minutes of laying down. Its really sort of remarkable how fast she can fall asleep. She’s like the Carl Lewis of narcolepsy.

Except right when you’d expect her to be falling asleep, she breaks out in dead sprint for the bathroom. When kids know they are about to throw up several things happen. First, they panic because they’re kids and they haven’t had enough math to do an accurate and quick estimate on the level of speed needed to be beat the flow of barf. Second, the on set of panic blows their fire control all to hell so rarely do they hit the water when they are talking to Ralph on the big white telephone. Thankfully, however, Kinsey managed to do this.

But then she went upstairs to bed. And not her bed but Riley’s bed. We go upstairs to bed and I notice something.

“Man, it smells like Kinsey honked again…and by that vomit trail on the carpet and the spatter pattern on the toilet, it looks like I’m right.”

So we clean that up. I feel her forehead. No fever. Hmm…maybe its just a quick stomach bug and she’ll be fine in the morning and I won’t have to miss work.

And maybe Breakin 2: Electric Boogaloo was a good idea…

We get her a bucket, a sleeping bag and a pillow and Mom puts her on the floor in our room – on my side of the bed. Several rounds of dry heaves later, Kinz finally falls asleep for good.

But I was at home all day today because I’m pretty sure if your kid is throwing up 7 hours before school starts, you’re supposed to keep them home.

So we were vomit free today which means Kinsey is back to school tomorrow. Tomorrow is dance day too. But we have to bug out of dance early to make it to Riley’s concert. A performance of which she is unconcerned. My evidence? This conversation:

Dad: Rye, your first concert is Thursday, you need to practice your violin.

Riley: Why? I already know everything.

Betcha General Custer said something similar when he charged down that hill in Montana…

Activities and Jose Lind

When the girls were really little and all three of them were still in daycare all day, I used to tell Mom that when they get into school we’re not over scheduling them. They aren’t going to have something going on every night and all day on the weekends. Too many times I’d sit there and listen to parents with kids older than ours talk about how they had some activity every night and then soccer all day on Saturday. And nobody wants to be at a soccer game on a Saturday. Ever. Saturday and Sunday afternoons in the fall are already sacred and I’m not going to let some European socialist endeavor soil them. That would be like cheering for the Hessians when General Washington crossed the Delaware.

Anyway, I came to a realization however. If we don’t sign the girls up for some things, then they won’t really know if they like it. They’ve been in dance and gymnastics since Obama was just some crazy Bolshevik in the Illinois senate who liked to vote “present” instead of taking a stand. But not really anything else.

So we signed them up for softball this spring. And I signed Rye and Kinz up for a Saturday morning basketball camp. First hoops practice was this morning. Ten kids between 7-10. Four girls. One little girl wanted no part of the camp until she saw Kinsey in there. You could really sense the frustration her Mom was feeling too. I could see that they had been having the same conversation all week about how she’d like basketball if she tried it. How there would be other girls her age in there. How it was only 45 minutes long. But her Mom was still on the verge of pulling the rip cord on the kid and just heaving her into the gym and sprinting in the other direction. Hey, we’ve all had our hand on the pin to that grenade one time or another. Sometimes we pull it and sometimes you get saved. Like North Carolina when Fred Brown passed the ball to James Worthy in the ’83 NCAA Finals.

“Mom, I don’t want to go…hey that’s Kinsey. She goes to my school. Remember I went to her birthday party last year. Okay, bye.”

It was a fairly non-eventful deal for me however. Although it was interesting watching them do some things. Kinz really seem to enjoy it and took very seriously her defensive stance and hand placement for shooting the ball. And saying Rye was a little strong with her shots is like saying that woman from “What Not to Wear” is kind of annoying.

Not as annoying as the parents who are telling me that, “wow, Riley is in 4th grade. Hmm, it might be too late to get her involved in basketball and way too late for softball. Most girls have been playing since they were 5. Why did you wait so long?”

Really? Too late? She’s 10. I didn’t realize that a full ride scholarship was the goal here. Not that I’d mind if that happened. But damn, she’s a kid. It’s supposed to be fun. If she misses a grounder, its not like she’s going to be branded Bill Buckner. Or Jose Lind. Damn you MLB Network for airing Game 7 of the ’92 NLCS today! Six errors all season and then two in Game 7 Jose!

So I realized that I turned into that parent who signed their kids up for everything. Rye has violin Monday mornings before school and Tuesday during school. Gymnastics Wednesday night. Dance Thursday night. And now basketball Saturday mornings. But they’re not even breaking a sweat really in basketball so I’m not sure that counts. And it keeps them from watching The Disney Channel for an hour.

Of course in April softball starts for all three of them. I have no idea how we’re going to fit practices in there along with games. The girls are going to be in the backseat wearing a leotard, tights with cleats and a softball mitt on one hand.

The Doctor of Romance

So I’m talking to my buddy at work the other day. He says he has a story I’d appreciate. Which means it’s a story about demographic and voting trends or a discussion on General Lee’s decision to attack the Union center on the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg. Turns out its about his daughter. She’s in first grade.

Her mom is picking her up the other day at a friend’s house and she suddenly needs to run back inside to get her “cards.” My buddy’s daughter and her friend had evidently been busy cutting up some paper into triangle and square shaped cards. If you have little kids, you know how they love to use scissors to cut up just about everything. Paper, magazines, your detailed notes on the NFL’s best teams of the 1970’s.

She gets in the car and her mom notices that the cards are two different shapes.

Why do you have triangle cards and square cards her mom distractedly asks.

“Well, triangle cards are kiss cards. If you are in a relationship, you get to kiss someone.”

Naturally her mom then asks what do you get with the square cards.

“Well if you are having problems with your relationship, you can give the square card to me and I’ll talk to you about it.”

Just like the rest of us, the next question is why would anyone want to talk to this particular first grader about their relationship should it be experiencing turbulence.

“Because I’m the doctor of romance.”

Which, if you think about it, isn’t a bad gig. If you’ve earned a doctorate degree in romance, you probably know what the heck you’re talking about when it comes to relationships. And if you’ve done it before you’re 8, then you’ve probably earned the benefit of the doubt when it comes to skepticism. Plus if your only overhead is some paper cards that you cut up yourself, your business model ain’t so bad either.

Being Nimble at Dinner

My job gets much busier every January. Its usually a substantial shock to the daily routine for all of us especially since that up tick in work coincides with the girls going back to school after Christmas vacation…errr…I mean Winter Break. Not even Holiday Break but Winter Break. You’d think the left would have more things to argue about than titling vacations. But they don’t.

Anyway, we’re getting up a little earlier, getting home a little later and rushing everything a bit more. For example, I pick the girls up a few days ago after school from daycare. We get home and since we don’t have much time between home arrival and bedtime we have to get a lot accomplished. I’m making dinner which consists of the normal selections from Dad’s Deli – ham and turkey sandwich, choice of melon slices, milk and sometimes, if I can swing it – peas or corn. At the same time Kinz and Bails are at the kitchen table doing their “homework.” Kinz has math and Bails has to measure things. And to provide a soundtrack, Rye is practicing her violin. In the middle of the kitchen. Complete with the music sheet stand which she strategically placed within the swing radius of the refrigerator door. You open the fridge for some cantaloupe and you knock over some sheet music.

Okay, to fully appreciate this, think of a violin. Now do your best impression of what a violin sounds like. Next, using that sound, do “Mary had a little lamb.” Now do it off key.

Set up three plates on the counter and start making some sandwiches. Run back and forth to the fridge for milk and some other stuff. Tape off a section right in the middle to represent the sheet music stand. You can’t step in there or violate any of its airspace up to about three and a-half feet. Now place a ten year old next to that space.

In the meantime, have a second grader constantly ask you math problems related to rounding. Go over and check every other problem for accuracy. Don’t hit the music stand. Ignore “Mary had a little lamb.”

Bails decides the kitchen table isn’t a good surface on which for her to work. She picks a spot on the floor that blocks one of the access points which you can use to reach the far side of the kitchen table. That means as your turn to your right from the counter, you have to jab step with your right foot, cut to your left to avoid the ten year old, dip your left shoulder to absorb the impact of the counter, plant your right foot again and do a vintage Gale Sayers before the knee injury backspin to avoid crushing the kindergartener on the floor using quarters and Hershey’s Kisses to measure the differences between her shoe and a pencil.

Fast forward a few minutes and Bails is done measuring and you’re putting dinner on the table. Kinz and Rye are cleaning up their stuff and coming to the table. This goes as smoothly Mark McGuire’s congressional testimony. And is constantly interrupted by this:

Bailey: Dad how do you spell “think?”

Dad: “T-H-I-N-K.”

Riley: “Why do I have to set the table?”

Dad: “Because I’m a benevolent dictator.”

Bailey: Dad how do you spell “weird?”

Dad: “W-E-I-R-D.”

Kinsey: “Dad, Riley is putting my plate on top of my homework and I’m not done yet.”

Dad: “Work faster.”

Bailey: “What is the little thing you put at the end when you’re done writing?”

Dad: “Do you mean a period? Hey, wait what are you writing?”

Bailey: “A note to Kinsey.”

Dad: “What does it say?”

Bailey: “I think Kinsey is weird. Period.”

So…at least it was a real sentence with punctuation and everything.

New Year’s Rockin’ Eve

I think New Year’s Eve was more fun as a kid. It just seemed a little cooler. Like New Year’s Eve 1979 when I feel asleep watching Purdue and Tennessee in the Bluebonnet Bowl only to wake up after midnight and suddenly realize that it was 1980. As a kid, its pretty cool to walk around saying, “hey I went to sleep in 1979 and woke up in 1980.”

The girls get all jacked up to stay up until midnight even though they have yet to watch the ball drop live on Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve. Who else remembers Frank Poncherello and Julie McCoy hosting the 1978 version with Chuck Mangione playing his horn?

I’m not really looking forward to four days at home with the girls though. We just endured five days at home with girls over Christmas. Got to see both The Princess and the Frog and Chipmunks 2. Princess and the Frog was pretty good. It was a vintage, traditional Disney princess story. No computer graphics which was cool and no social commentary which was cooler. But skip the Chipmunks. How you can have Amy Poehler, Anna Faris and Christina Applegate all in the same movie and completely waste their talent? Have them voice chipmunks, that’s how.

Anyway, I was happy to get the girls back into daycare yesterday. Mostly because I was tired of hearing things like, “After you, your ugliness,” as the girls climbed past each other into the car. And although I appreciate Bailey’s creativity, I really don’t need to hear “Jingle Bells” sung in chicken.

Not kidding.

She sang “Jingle Bells” as we walked through the grocery store yesterday using only one word – “bawk.” That’s right. Go ahead and hum that to yourself.

If she had done it in pig or cow, I probably would have thought it was funny. In sheep it might even been enjoyable, but “Jingle Bells” in chicken, as we were ironically going past the eggs, had me ready to slam my face into a cinder block.

Oh and here’s a tip for next Christmas – if you put chocolate in the kids’ stockings, monitor their consumption levels. Especially if you’ve also put beef jerky in their stockings. Yeah, for some reason the girls wanted beef jerky in their stockings. Together, however, they don’t really get along. Like the Steelers and Raiders in the 70’s, like Cliff Barnes and the Ewings, like Gargamel and the Smurfs – they just don’t mix.

Riley had an emergency evacuation of all personnel on the stomach level about midnight Christmas night.

“Feel better kiddo?”

“Yeah, but this smells really bad, its gonna make me throw-up again!”

“Um…flush it.”

“Oh…thanks Dad.”

See experience is valuable.

Christmas Eve

Here’s a couple things I noticed at the 3:00 Mass at church.

1-I think if you have boys you just give up on having them wear anything other than sneakers. Kind of like if your team is owned by Daniel Snyder you just give up on hopes of winning games. Nearly every boy is wearing khakis along with some kid of Christmas sweater or sweater vest and their Nikes. The ones that somehow gave in to their Moms and wore the dress shoes look like Franco Harris in a Seahawks uniform.

2-Its difficult not to smile when you hear a whole choir of children sing “Away in a Manger.” Doesn’t have to be a big full smile, might be just that smirk using just half your face. But you can’t help it.

3-Little kids are just mesmerized by the Nativity scene. You can’t take a 3 year-old by it without them trying to see the baby Jesus or grab hold of a cow. If you try to usher them along to quickly they’ll act up. And there is no place to take them on Christmas Eve. Upon witnessing this, I immediately thanked the Dear Lord for not having babies anymore.

4-It doesn’t matter how many Catholics you pack into mass on Christmas Eve, we can go through the communion line faster than Brett Favre throws interceptions. You can add people, seating, change the traffic patterns, divide us up among three different rooms – doesn’t matter. We’ll line up in an orderly fashion, take communion and return to our seats faster than Harry Reid can bribe a Democrat from Nebraska.

5-Catholics are physically incapable of standing up and lifting the kneeler quietly. The Pope himself could be saying mass and it would still sound like kids jumping out of bunk beds.

Anyhow, Merry Christmas and thanks for reading this blog. I need to go and make sure the girls get out the kind of cookies Santa likes…

Christmas, etc.

A couple weekends ago we had the Christmas program at church. I distinctly remember my 7th grade Christmas program. We did The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. I was Claude. I’m pretty sure that I’ll remember this year’s program too. Why? Well, its not because the \"boing\" kid was in the top row on the riser screwing around. Its because we made the mistake of putting the girls in the new velour dresses they got from Grandma at our first Christmas a couple weeks ago. Velour evidently doesn’t breathe well under the lights.

Riley gets off the stage and says, “Oh man Dad, it was hot up there. I’m all sweaty, feel my pits.”

I declined.

Anyway, I was home yesterday with the girls. And I was home today with them too. Let me know if you heard any of this over the last 48 hours.

“Dad, what’s in peas? Green mashed potatoes?”

“You smell like oatmeal.”

“Teenage boys are weird. They pull their pants down really low and their underwear shows.”

Somehow from that we transitioned into a discussion about kissing. As in, “Dad, did you kiss Mommy before you were married?”

It instantly occurred to me that my answer here would be lasting and have an effect. Most of the time when I face these kinds of situations I just tell the girls to stay away from boys because they are gross and smell like feet. With one in kindergarten and one in second grade, that’s usually good enough. But Riley is 10. She’s in 4th grade. So I need to start with some type of logic.

“Yes, people can kiss each other before they are married. “

Bailey, not unexpectedly, has a comment. Bailey is just 6 years old and we’re already sure that at some point during her high school years we’ll get a call or two from local law enforcement regarding her whereabouts.

“That’s why being a teenager is so cool, they get to kiss. And have phones.”

Have I mentioned I’m dreading the teenage years?

Christmas Confusion

It’s a Wonderful Life is my second favorite movie of all time – right between Hoosiers and Patton. Ever since NBC got the rights to it 16 years ago, you have to make sure you don’t miss it. It’s on Christmas Eve. Has anybody else noticed that there are at least five actors in It’s a Wonderful Life that are also in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington?

No? Well, have you noticed that several of the Christmas classics aren’t all about goodness and light? It’s a Wonderful Life is really kind of a dark movie. George is about to commit suicide before Clarence Oddbody, Angel Second Class (AS2) saves him. Suicide. On Christmas Eve. That’s cheery.

What about Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer? Santa isn’t exactly the jolly old fat man with the snowy white beard when he gives Donner the beat down about his kid having that unacceptable physical deformity. How about Coment telling Rudolph’s pals that since he looks different he can’t play any games with them? None of that however compares to the toys Santa leaves on an isolated island hidden north of the Arctic Circle. Toys that have been rejected by children around the world and then herded up and locked away in an internment camp. Not all comfy cozy is it?

Rankin-Bass has some others that are weird too – Santa Claus is Coming to Town and The Year Without a Santa Claus. Santa Claus is Coming to Town tells the story of how Santa became Santa. His folks leave him on a doorstep when he’s just a baby. Instantly, you’re forced to explain abandonment to your kids. Which is not a subject I’m especially fond of explaining around Christmas. Although it is a little easier now that you can use what Congress is doing to the Constitution as an example.

Anyway, Santa is raised by an elf family luckily named Kringle. Evidently, the Kringles have the same powers that Snow White and Dr. Doolittle have since baby Santa is brought to them by the animals through the forest of the Whispering Winds. Which really sounds like an exclusive golf course. The Winter Warlock, bearing a striking resemblence to Judge Smails in a wizard costume, is evidently the honcho who rules the forest and all the animals live in fear of him. Which is what is going on in the nearby town where the baby Santa was left on a doorstep. Rankin-Bass developed this special in 1970 which is only 25 years after WW 2. Which might explain the anti-German bias in there. How else can you explain the Burgermeisters? Why are the Germans cast as the villans anyway? They don’t hate Christmas. They aren’t fun-loathers. They invented Octoberfest for cripes-sake!

Anyhow, Santa not only befriends the Winter Warlock and melts his icy heart but he outwits the Burgermeisters as they do everything they can to stop him from delivering toys to the children. Many of their efforts lead to explanations as to why we have stockings, why Santa comes down the chimney, why he grew his beard, why Santa lives at the North Pole and why reindeer fly. Its all pretty logical and easy for kids to understand. Except for the parts where the Burgermeisters capture Santa, throw him in jail and burn all toys he’s delivered to the children. I use that as a lesson to the girls about what happens when you put a San Francisco liberal in charge of banks.

In The Year Without a Santa Claus, Santa gets sick and is told to take a break as not many people still believe in him anyway. So two of his elves, Jingle and Jangle, who we’ve never heard of before or since, travel to America to find some folks who still believe. They go south and avoid the northeast because, unless its subsidized by the government, they don’t believe in anything out there. But this story does takes place in the 20’s when America was still America and wasn’t beaten down by 90 years of the income tax and other subtle forms of wealth redistribution. But Jingle and Jangle screw up and lose Vixen who ends up in the dog pound in a place called Southtown. This, I tell the girls, is why we don’t have a dog. The mayor of Southtown goes all Ray Nagin and says he doesn’t believe in Santa or Christmas and it never ever snows in Southtown anyway. But if the elves can make it snow, he’ll free Vixen. Which means during a Christmas special intended for children you have an elected official clearly violating the basic rights of Vixen and engaging in blackmail.

So the bumbling elves go to Mrs. Claus for help. She turns to Heat Miser, who bears a striking resemblance to Dan Rostenkowski, and Snow Miser. Turns out for it to snow in Southtown, Heat Miser has to allow it. He says no deal unless he can get some of that action Ben Nelson got to vote for the health care bill. Result?

Gridlock.

So Mrs. Claus, in a nod to 70’s environmentalism, asks their Mom, Mother Nature, to lay the smack down. At this point, Santa has had it with the Pelosi-like pace of his health care and sheds the Santa gear and goes to Southtown to get Vixen himself. While he’s there, he discovers that people do still believe in him and in Christmas. In fact, the children get together and decide if Santa needs a break, well that’s just fine and they’ll make presents for him this year. Which, if I’m not mistaken, is the plot to the Phineas and Ferb Christmas Special too. Well, Santa decides he’s fine, flies to Southtown and makes a rare public appearance in what is now a snow covered Southtown. Then Al Gore verbally accosts Santa for speeding up global climate change through this unprecedented snowfall in Southtown, berates the townsfolk for having faith in something other than Mother Earth and then starts waving around his Oscar statue.

Or something like that.

At any rate, I’m looking forward to watching It’s a Wonderful Life Thursday evening. Mixed messages or not.

PJ Day

You know what call I dread receiving? I mean aside from the one I get from my buddy after a Cyclone loss where he blames everything from a low completion percentage to the failure of Operation Market Garden in September of 1944 on Iowa State’s quarterback.

I dread the one I get about 5 minutes after Mom leaves to take the girls to day care before school.

Why?

Because it means we forgot something important to the girls that has them in a panic resembling Tom Brokaw’s reaction when he realized Florida didn’t go to Al Gore on election night 2000. This morning I received that call.

“Hey its PJ and blanket day for Kinsey. Can you grab some jammies and her blanket and run them up to daycare?”

I hate PJ day. In fact, I think it sucks. That’s right – sucks. I said it. Its not like I don’t already have to remember to sign three permission slips so the kids can go see The Nutcracker or that Riley has violin on Mondays, and that Kinsey has to bring a sack lunch on Tuesday and that Bailey has some some weird art day on Wednesday. Add some random unscheduled activities that significantly change our morning routine. And make sure that those random activities involve some type of wardrobe modifications or lunch adjustments so it is widely apparent to the rest of the kids in class who the few are who forgot about it. Sure, no problem. While you’re at it how about Celtic Dance Day? Or dress like a Viking Day? Scandinavian armor is easy to find.

And do it during the last few days before Christmas, excuse me I mean “winter,” vacation. I mean its not like there isn’t anything else going on this time of year. Its not like I am already mad because the Direct TV guy won’t get on the roof to install my HD so I can watch the college football bowl games. Stupid snow. Plus its not like we don’t have a lot going on this weekend like a rehearsal dinner tonight, a wedding tomorrow and Christmas with Mom’s family on Saturday. Plus the only organization on a longer losing streak than the Steelers is the French Army.

Hey, but its cool. No problem. I can remember freaking PJ day…

Slumber Parties and Santa

We ended up with six 4th graders for the slumber party Friday night. But one couldn’t sleep over, so only five actually stayed overnight. It went smoothly. Loudly but smoothly. Is there something genetic that happens to 4th grade girls when you put a small group of them in close proximity that they are forced to speed up their rate of speech? Then does that increased rate of speech actually fuel their energy levels? We could have powered most of the upper Midwest with the energy produced in our house Friday night. We may have fractured a few noise ordinances too. Not to mention they lose their ability to sit. And if they do, they can’t sit on the parts of the couch that are meant for sitting. I look over into the family room and four of them are lined up sitting on the back of the couch leaning against the wall. Speaking rapidly.

Luckily, at least it appeared to be lucky at the time, Mom suggested that I take Kinsey and Bailey out to dinner to get them out of the way of the older girls. So not only do I avoid discussions about who is the smelliest boy in class but I also get to have nachos.

Kinz and Bails, however were not as excited as I was to leave the house. I’m not real sure why though. Rye was armed with a whole bandolier full of “go away’s” and “leave us alone’s” and was fully prepared to fire them off faster than Jesse Ventura and his mini-gun in Predator. Rye didn’t want them “ruining her slumber party.” And she said so with such conviction that you’d have thought the two little girls had some sort of detailed Kevin McCallister-esque plan to destroy the party.

On the way to the restaurant Kinsey confidently tells me that when she has her own slumber party, she won’t be mean to Bailey like Riley is being to the two of them. She’ll let Bailey play with her friends the whole time. I smiled the grizzled smile of experience. Then I quickly noted the date, time and location and had Kinsey repeat it into a digital voice recorder.

We get to the restaurant and Kinsey, realizing that she’s the biggest sister at the table, tells me that she’ll sit by herself on one side while Bailey and I can sit on the other. Hmm, this is a good sign. Normally they disagree on seating faster than Bo and Luke disagree on which dirt road to take to lose Roscoe.

They transition to debriefing me on some last minute additions to their Christmas lists. Typical stuff: webkinz, barbies, shoes. Again, no Steelers gear. But I rectified that issue by calling Santa up on my cell phone right there at the table and telling him that the girls could use some new Steelers t-shirts.

Kinsey asks, “Did you just talk to Santa!?”

“No, he was too busy, I got some middle manager in the sports merchandise section. Said he was a Master Elf Second Class. Whatever that means. But he added the Steelers stuff to your list so we’ll have to wait until Christmas to see if you get it.”

“Wow,” says Kinsey barely able to form words through her smile.

“So you talked to an elf?” asks Bailey in a slightly puzzled tone.

“Yup.”

“Was his voice squeaky?”

“A little bit and it was really noisy. Sounds like they are really busy.”

“Oh man, Christmas is so awesome.”

Anyway, Kinz ordered a hamburger and fries. Bails ordered a pizza which she gets to make herself. The restaurant lets the kids spread the sauce and cheese and then individually place the pepperonis. Bails gives the pepperonis to her sisters because she likes cheese pizza.

Usually when we’re at the restaurant we let Rye take the other two to the bathroom. But I didn’t have Rye. So they went by themselves. Aside from them racing each other back to the table which included Bails using the Henry Hudson searching for the northwest passage strategy of navigating her way through the bar and then back to the table, we didn’t have any issues.

Well, I mean except for the fact that they made Kinz a cheeseburger instead of a hamburger and they lost Bails’ pizza and had to make her a new one. Importance? Kinz evidently doesn’t like cheeseburgers. And Bails doesn’t like pepperonis. Oh and it added an extra 30 minutes to our normal 60 minute restaurant time limit. The girls begin losing access to their behavioral systems controls at about 65 minutes and completely lose volume and motor control at 75 minutes. At 80 minutes something happens to the neural transmitters that communicate the ability to sit on any kind of chair.

Most parents have several strategies to deal with a restaurant screwing up your kid’s food. The first thing to avoid is any sign of panic or distress. You need to be like Marino on 4th down with :42 left in the ’82 Sugar Bowl. Steely eyed and focused.

And lucky. Turns out that while Bailey doesn’t like pepperoni on or near her pizza, she likes cheeseburgers. And while Kinsey doesn’t like cheese on her burgers, she likes pepperoni on her pizza.

Could I really be this lucky?

No.

See even though a logical and simple resolution to our dilemma had presented itself, this resolution involved something known as “sharing.”

So faster than MacGyver can build a hang-glider out of toothpicks and turkey baster, I cut the cheeseburger in half and scraped the cheese off one half and handed to Kinz and gave the other half to Bails. I grabbed all the pizza with pepperoni and gave it to Kinz and left the rest for Bails.

“There. Problem solved. Now eat.”

“Dad, can we have some of your nachos?”

Grrrr…