Geez! Where have I been?

I can't believe it has been a month since I added an entry... I guess it has been due to a few things... 1) Work has been off the hook and I simply have had virtually no time to add anything... 2) As most of you know, I am an Xbox, um, "aficionado".... yeah, that's it... and so I have been delving deep into info on the Xbox successor - the Xbox 360 - due out in November.... So no entries have come from valid, responsible reasons (work) and not-so-responsible reasons (my hobby/waste-of-time)...LOL

Kel's parents were in town this past weekend so they could be here for Connor and Luke's baptism at church. That was so cool! To be IN THE BAPTISTRY with them as they were baptized, proclaiming their newfound faith in Jesus Christ, to the congregation and having my parents and in-laws there was so awesome! Unfortunately I have no pics of it since Kel said the camera wasn't working right.... Gotta teach her to check the "record/preview" switch before trying to snap any shots....

The boys are continuing to have a great time at our community pool, and getting darker by the day. hey are getting that bleach blonde, surfer dude hair color now too. Kel, on the other hand, seems to just be turning red! I think my niece and nephews are coming over today for a splash at the pool... maybe they will get pics! Upcoming events include taking Connor and Luke to a DCI (Drum and Bugle Corps) show in Atlanta in June. Since Luke loves music so much and Connor has started drum lessons, they should have a blast! And last thing I can think of... I think I am gonna surprise everyone at home with a trip to Florida soon... maybe even this weekend. One of my fondest memories as a kid was my dad spontaneously loading us up EARLY in the morning, driving to Florida, spending the whole day at the beach, then heading back home... Apart from gas and food, a really fun and CHEAP day trip! Now if only I can convince Kel... she is more of a plan-it-out kind of gal... probably not too keen on a spur of the moment tip to Florida...LOL

Well, I just had to add SOMETHING here... it has been too long! Back to work now...

The pain and joy of being a daddy...

Tonight I experienced overwhelming emotions across the entire spectrum with my two older boys, Connor and Luke. They each have their own pets - Connor a parakeet, and Luke a hamster. Well, tonight as we were getting the boys ready for bed, Luke came in the room in a panic. "Mom," he said, "I reached in to pet Spot and she didn't move. Is she sick?!" Kelly and I both go in there not expecting anything wrong, and sure enough, Spot is not moving. Luke, who loved this hamster more than anything, just broke down sobbing. We got her out, and she was just barely breathing and had her eyes open. We tried to give her water, but she would not even open her mouth. Of course seeing her eyes open gave Luke unrealistic hope, and we had to tell him that she was dying. He could not talk he was in so much pain and sorrow. I had brought the cage downstairs so it wouldn't be in his room, and he came down and asked if he could say goodbye. Kelly and I just sobbed as we watched our little 6 year old boy hold and cuddle his hamster and rub it against his cheek saying he loved her and telling her goodbye.

Then I was filled with pride and emotion as I watched Connor, Luke's older brother, walk in with a wad of cash. "Luke," he says, "here's my money out of my bank. You can use it to buy another hamster if you want." And Connor hands Luke almost $40 he has saved for months. They hug each other and as Luke says, "Thank you," Connor replies with, "It's okay, that's what big brothers are for."

As I am tucking Connor in bed and telling him how proud I was with what he did, he simply said, "Dad, I had to do something, it just hurt my heart watching Luke so sad."

For those of ya'll that know me and my boys, and how nuts they can drive me sometimes, right now I am having a hard time remembering any of that right now....

Who's on first...

Below is something I HAD to share with everyone who stops by. Here is a transcript of an email my wife Kelly sent out to family describing a conversation she had with Connor, our 8 year old son....

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What a frustrating day in our house. Mitchell has clogged the toilet twice, Connor and I have been working on homework for 2 hours, and Luke has changed clothes twice...all since about 3:00. This conversation struck me as so idiotic, I had to share it.

I had just unclogged the toilet for the second time and then while vacuuming I heard a strange thumping noise. No one screamed so I figured all was well and kept vacuuming. A little while later I walked past the 1/2 bath and saw a very large hammer on the floor. I braced myself for absolutely anything and asked what I thought was a straightforward, clear question with one of two answers:

"Who brought a hammer into the bathroom?" I asked.

"There was a spider," said Connor.

I said, "OK, but who brought a hammer into the bathroom?"

"I did," Connor said.

"Why did you need a hammer?"

"I told you. There was a spider."

"Where did you hit with the hammer?"

"I told you. On the spider."

"Yes, sweetheart, but where was the spider?"

"In the bathroom."

(Starting to grit my teeth a bit) "Yes, but where did you actually hit the hammer?"

"I told you. On the spider."

(I start looking around for cracks in the sink, holes in the wall, cracked toilet...)

Turning red..."Where was the spider when you hit him with the hammer?"

"I told you. In the bathroom."

"Yes, dear, but where was the spider crawling when you were hitting him with the hammer? Did you hammer the sink, the cabinet, the walls, WHAT?"

"No."

"Where did you hammer?"

"Around in here," pointing in a general area next to the toilet.

"Did you just hammer the floor?"

"Yes."

Starting to lose it a bit..."Could you please take the hammer and just pretending to hammer, please show me exactly what you did with the hammer on the spider?"

Connor proceeds to pretend to hammer all around the floor around the toilet.

I said, "Thank you. Now, where did you get this huge hammer?"

"Dad was going to hang a clock."

"OK, but when you decided to hammer the spider, where did you go to get the hammer?"

"My room."

"Take it back there, please."

I go into the bathroom to clean up the water around the toilet from it overflowing and guess what I saw on the wall next to the toilet? A curled up spider...on the wall...not the floor. At least there weren't any holes in the wall.

Figured I'd give you a laugh. That's what I have to do to keep from crying.

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Some of the just wonderfully stupid silly moments we have in our house... you gotta admit... they always keep us entertained...

Charmin is evidently evil...

...so we bought this 10 year old nice house in a nice upper middle class residential community just outside the city limits. Since we're not in the city, we do not have sewage, but instead have septic systems. Well, lately we have noticed that flushing just ain't working like it is supposed to, and as of yesterday, nothing, I MEAN NOTHING, was going anywhere but back up and onto our floor....

...so today Kelly gets the septic tank guys out and they find the tank, open it up, and it is literally full to the top... an 8 foot deep septic tank, FULL TO THE TOP. He said it needed to be drained every 3 to 5 years, and he guessed it had never been pumped in the 10 years of its existence. Then he said, "Ya'll use Charmin don't ya?" Kelly, said, "Yeah we do." "Naw... don't use Charmin... it's BAD! Just soaks it all up and swells up like a tick. It'll just fill your tank up with paper. Use AngelSoft instead. Good stuff."

So there you have it. Pump them septic tanks every 3-5 years. And for all that is good and wholesome, DON'T USE CHARMIN.

This Public Service Announcement was brought to you by "I had to take a spit bath in the sink this morning 'cos everything was stopped up."

A haunted house?

There is always a lot of confusion in our house after church. We walk in, Sunday shoes and clothes start flying and everyone starts crying for lunch. It is feeding time at the zoo and the animals can get testy. Once everyone is fed and watered and have retired to their respective dens, I start cleaning up.

Well, today was no different. It was quiet upstairs as everyone had retreated downstairs. How typical...when there's work to do. As I was in the kitchen, I heard something hit the floor and turning around toward the sound I saw something amazingly terrifying. A toy without a child nearby. One of the bathtub toys was laying just outside the bathroom door as if it had been thrown out of the bathroom. I stood there motionless....which doesn't happen often... wondering how the toy had come flying out of the bathroom on it's own. I dismissed it and went about my work, but I kept seeing it out of the corner of my eye. Luke and I have been enjoying playing lots of "hide and go seek" in the house every day and one of his favorite places is in the bathtub. I slowly walked into the bathroom fully expecting to see him standing there with a big grin on his face. Nothing. The room was empty, as was the entire upstairs.

After I got the kitchen cleaned up, the incident just kept gnawing at me. I went downstairs and found Sean. I cleared the room of little ears and told him that the weirdest thing just happened. As I explained that I saw a toy come flying out of an unoccupied bathroom, he smiled and said, "No dear. The toy was down here in the office and I threw it upstairs. You must have heard it hit the wall and saw it laying on the floor outside the door."

Sean just looked at me, grinned, and said, "Blogger material."

Holiday confusion...solved.

Hello all. I know it's been a while since you've heard anything interesting about happenings at "the zoo," and believe me it's not because the "animals" are exceptionally good these days. No. In fact, it is simply that the "keeper" has been exceptionally busy.

Connor has been really confused these days about the holidays this time of year. At school, they have been studying how different people celebrate. The school prepared us for the fact that they would be studying Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, one that I didn't even recognize, and Christmas. One day he came home doing Kwanzaa dancing and wanted me to play the bongo drums for him while he danced. Another day he came home saying, "Then they all sit around and drink a warm drink in honor of their ancestors and play with a cradle." He then proceeded to tell me the name/meaning of a few of the Hebrew symbols on the "cradle."

While the purpose of these lessons was for political correctness, it certainly gave me a wonderful teaching opportunity. The boys are very familiar with the true meaning of Christmas and the reason God came to earth in human form. Now, they are acutely aware that there are people in the world who do not understand or accept the greatest gift we will ever receive. The gift of salvation through Jesus Christ. Don't leave Christ out of your Christmas holiday season. Merry Christmas!

Slicker than snot!

I know it has been forever since we have blogged! But that's just the way it's gonna be sometimes, so get used to it people! LOL...

Okay. So I leave last night for a conference in Fargo today. Spend the night, do the conference, and head straight back. I get home a couple of hours ago. Connor meets me at the garage door and says, "Daddy! Luke sprayed the stuff in the holes on the TV. In the big holes AND the little holes!" Of course, this is Greek to me and I am wondering what in the heck is going on. Regardless of the details, I KNOW it ain't good. SO I walk in to find Luke sitting in his bed, sobbing loudly, saying "Daddy.... I did something sooooo baaaaaad today and it's really baaaad." I'm thinking... "Ok. so my big screen has been spray painted!" I calmly walk downstairs to find Kelly, also sobbing, sitting on the floor in front of the big screen, armed with Qtips and rubbing alcohol. I come to find out that, as usual, Luke grabbed one of the compressed air cans and was playing with it.... or so he thought. What he actually grabbed was a can of spray silicon! And he proceeded to spray the walls... all the pictures in my office... the CARPET... my TV screen... and even the audio/video connectors on the front of the TV (Connor's "big holes and little holes")... Of course, that stuff was generally able to be cleaned off the pictures, the TV casing, and TV screen, and it seems that those audio/video connectors still work... but we still have this stuff on our carpet and walls in the office. In other words, we basically have grease stains all over the walls and carpet now. The carpet can be cleaned if we rent one of those carpet cleaners. However, only alcohol really gets it clean, especially on hard surfaces like the walls. Of course the walls are painted in latex, so as soon as we use alcohol to clean these spots off the wall, we will take the paint off too. So what would you do? Leave the stains (which you can really only see when the light hits them a certain way), or clean them and have to re-paint the entire room?

Welcome to the daily decisions that must be made in the McKay Wildlife Preserve....

The Beasts are on the loose...

...so I'm driving home yesterday at around 5:15 and, pulling up to my driveway, I see Connor, Luke, and their friend Nathaniel playing in our front yard. They are actually enjoying raking the leaves! "Great!" I think, as I then see Nathaniel and Luke begin walking across the street to our neighbor's pile of leaves. Nathaniel with a shovel, and Luke with a rake, proceed to scoop up leaves from my neighbor's yard and start walking to my front yard. I stop the car and say, "Boys? What are you doing?" To which Nathaniel says, "We're just making a pile of leaves and we want a really big pile!" Of course I say, "Guys! Don't drag leaves from other yards into mine!" But Nathaniel just keeps walking! I say "stop" three more times as he continues to look at me as he walks to my yard with the shovel full of leaves. I finally have to stop the car in the middle of my street, get out, and walk directly to my children to get them to stop dumping the leaves o' the neighborhood into my yard! But it was my error... I forgot that the animal kingdom doesn't understand English.... and besides, they were probably just nesting... In the meantime, I guess I have begun a yard raking service for the rest of the neighborhood... wonder if I can make any money doing it.

...so I am walking into my house, and I tell Kelly how maddening the "leaf incident" was, and she says, "Want to get REAL mad? Come look at this." She leads me to the floor beside our (relatively new) couch, where we had recently put down a new bed for our OTHER beasts of the house (Max and Butch the beagles), and shows me about a three-inch diameter hole they had chewed in the upholstery on the side of the couch at the bottom! We now have the decision of leaving it blaringly damaged, patching it with non-matching fabric, or tearing up one of the couch's throw-pillows to use some of its matching upholstery fabric.

...and as we are walking back to the kitchen, simply laughing because there's really no other mentally healthy option at this point, Mitch comes walking up the stairs completely naked. Kelly simply says in a tone of utter defeat and learned helplessness, "That's at least the 10th time today he's done that. But it has been a good day... at least he hasn't pee'd on anything yet."