diStraction Saturday Six

Terribly sorry for the lack of Friday Five.

No excuses, I just got super lazy. Seems to be a particularly seasonal pattern of mine. I notice readerships drops dramatically during the holidays and then I notice that the number and length of my posts are responsible and then I eat more pie.

Pumpkin pie is my favorite. It's a breakfast, lunch, and dinner dessert as far as I'm concerned, so I can totally understand why people want to put it on everything from lattes to candles.

But I also understand meth addiction and trickle down economics.

I did a Super Sunday Seven last year to make up for the super lazy Friday, but nothing, nothing, not even all the people I love and admire are going to come between me, trays upon trays of hot wings and twelve hours of football tomorrow.

What have I become?

A work in progress, I guess.

Leonardo Da Vinci carried the Mona Lisa with him for most of his whole life making minor adjustments throughout the decades. The most valuable object in the world and was completed not because of it's perfection, but because of the artist's death.

I can imagine Leo on a super lazy friday, standing in the hallway between his bedroom and studio, staring at the particular angle at which the sun is dancing upon her elusive smile and thinking "I'd love to get back to work, but the History Channel is having a 'Pawn Stars' marathon."

Did they have the History Channel during the renaissance? 

I'm sure they did, but it was mostly rediscovered footage of the crusades.

Colorized for the first time.

Which might have taken longer to do had Leo dedicated more time to Mona.

But we all need distractions.

Here are six of my favorite:

Number one: Tea

Green, black, white, oolong, whatever. Tea is unlike coffee in that you can't set a timer for it and have it ready by the time you make your way from the bedroom floor to the kitchen sink. Tea requires deliberate manipulation. The right water, the right tea, the right pot. Temperature is a factor, steeping time is a factor. This ain't no set it and forget it, it is a full seven minutes of constant care, and producing it requires that you drop whatever it is you were previously doing, or previously thinking of doing. It'll never replace a cigarette, but you can do it indoors.

Number Two: Books I've already read.

Starting a new book is hard. There are too many characters to remember and modern authors are constantly trying to push the intellectual envelope, which I applaud, but secretly hate. I need you to trick me with eye candy and falling in love before I realize I've made a commitment. Rereading an old book is like having friends over for dinner. Good friends. The kind that bring cheap wine and already know what's in your medicine cabinet.

Number Three: Helping Calvin with video games.

I can't honestly say I'm much help anymore, but there was a land before time in which I had magical powers. Somewhere between the Sega Genesis and the Xbox 360 my skills have diminished and followed the elves to the gray havens. But I will stop in the middle of whatever I'm doing to at least have a look and in some cases be able to offer suggestions. I will get sucked in, and in doing so eventually have to create my own file, so I can play after he has gone to bed.

Number Four: Chores.

Sometimes, doing anything is better than doing something, and right now I'm sitting here wondering when the grass is going to need to be mowed next.

Number Five: Personal Hygiene.

It may sound gross, but I do my best work in the morning between my first and second cup of coffee. But sometimes it takes longer than that. Sometimes I'm looking up at the clock and thinking that I should probably put on pants because I have to start dinner soon. A hot shower between paragraphs makes a real difference.

Number Six: Social Media.

I have yet to find the balance between social media as a tool and social media as heroine. And I'm active on so many different platforms that by the time I've cycled through them all, it becomes almost necessary to start again from the beginning to see if any of my posts, likes, and comments have been reposted, liked, or commented upon. I'm not alone. There are ten bazillion of us, and more natural born surfers are being squeezed out every minute. I have a friend who has given up Facebook for the holidays and a niece who has deleted her account entirely. I envy them in the way I envy anyone who can drink a single glass of wine. Which is to be both admiring and find them ridiculous at the same time. Coupling social media and fantasy football and it is a miracle I've gotten any work done at all since September.

And as I close out this week's list, I hope you all have had a wonderful coma inducing holiday weekend, sorry you have to go back to work/school, Hunger Games:Catching Fire is well worth the price of admission and go Niners!

Pregaming the turkey

On the bill

What time is it?

If ever a wonderful wiz there was.

I don't remember hold old he was.

Four or five, maybe?

I had snuck back stage during a production of The Wizard of Oz to surprise my friends and load up on some hugs from a cast I should have been a part of.

It was the middle of a terrible summer where I had run away to join a repertory company, thinking this wold be the beginning of a great career, but instead was mislead, mistreated, and worst of all, miscast.

Actually, the worst part is that my host family did not believe in using air conditioning.

And it was a hot summer.

Maybe I'm a terrible person, but I would let my children starve before I suffered a living room above 75 degrees. It's just inhuman.

Thank God (big G) for libraries cause I was too poor for coffee shops.

It was the rare Sunday where the rep company had a matinee but no evening performance, so I pulled a total jerk move and skipped the curtain call so I could shuck out of my sweaty Nazi uniform and head home before anyone noticed I was gone.

(The show was The Sound of Music, and my last costume was Nazi browns. Just so you know I wasn't attending some kind of rally)

The drive took a little over an hour and I got hungry and grabbed a sandwich at the deli near campus. The girls at the counter would always load up the meats for me so that I could turn one meal into three, but most of it was devoured by the time I got to the theater.

Waiting in the wings, being very patient, was a little boy I had never seen before.

Munchkin? I guessed.

I didn't have much time for small talk, for I wanted to make a grand entrance and feel loved again, so I placed my half eaten sandwich down on the bench, pointed at it, and in a stern voice I said "Stay" Then I backed out of the room slowly, never taking my eyes off the sandwich.

"Mommy?" I heard him say.

"Yes?"

"That man just told his sandwich to stay."

"Did he?"

"Uh huh. . . . Mommy?"

"Yes?"

"Is the sandwich going to move?"

"I doubt it."

Thus, not only did I end up meeting Caitlin for the first time, I also solidified myself as being the kind of person that frightens young children into thinking they're going to be attacked by food.

There's a very sad story that could possibly follow, several really,  but I don't want to go there, except to tell about this one time.

So, this one time, we were over at Caitlin's house, which was the coolest place to be cause Caitlin was a wife and a mother and practically our age. There wasn't anyone coming home who would catch us being bad or frown upon our elicit activities. It got very late, and we were all very stoned and going through her DVD and CD collection when someone got the great idea of watching the Wizard of Oz with the sound off while playing Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon"

There was this wonderful urban legend about Dark Side being scored to the movie, which accounts for all the irregular time signatures, but was untestable while the album was still trapped on vinyl.

It's a total myth, but there are some uncanny moments where the songs align with the visual narrative.

It's referred to as "The Dark Side of the Rainbow" and has quite a following.

God bless the internet.

Yet, after being wowed for thirty minutes, everyone else fell asleep in their corners and couches, while Caitlin and I tried experimenting with different albums.

Turns out you can do the same thing with The Cure and the cast recording of Rent.

Which is where we too called it a night.

It was 1998 and what was amazing about that moment was that it was my first glimpse of what adulthood looked like for my generation. We were the first children of the internet, we'd seen the rise and fall of grunge, MTV, floppy discs, Crystal Pepsi, and VHS tapes.

I was filled with so much hope that night, for it was possible I too could grow up to be cool and sophisticated, fun and responsible, that I can be the kind of adult that drinks good beer and smokes cheap pot, owns and enjoys The Wizard of Oz and Pink Floyd and The Cure and cast recordings of musicals.

It was like that moment when Kansas becomes OZ and the world goes from black and white to full technicolor.

If every little blue bird flies beyond the rainbow, why oh why can't I?

Adulthood was going to be amazing and I couldn't wait.

I still can't.

I'm somewhere between the Lollipop Guild and a quest for a witch's broom.

So, the movie comes on last night, I hadn't really been paying attention, and Calvin asked me a question.

"Wait . . . Dad?"

"Yeah?"

"Didn't you know that I can tell this is an old movie cause it's all brown?"

"It's called Black and White."

"Then why is it all brown?"

Which is when I looked up for the first time and realized that the opening farm scenes in The Wizard of Oz weren't the stark black and white of my memories. Instead I saw the dusty warm browns of sepia tone.

Hmm?

I could close my eyes and see very clearly Dorothy Gale in black and white.

Yet, there it is.

Brown.

And thanks to the internet, I could just roll over to IMDB and watch the original trailer, and confirm or deny some very vivid visual memories.

Yet, again, brown.

Not black and white.

Huh.

This changes everything.

Well, no, it changes nothing.

But it does bring up a few memories that I haven't thought about in a long time. So I'm thankful for the reminder, but a little irked that some sacred memories have to be adjusted to the new now.

Yet, whenever I see The Wizard of Oz, I will always think of terrible summers, heat waves, Caitlin, Pink Floyd, the cast recording of Rent, and some of the purest optimism I've ever felt.

I was thinking about little holiday rituals, "The Wizard of Oz" being to Thanksgiving as "It's a Wonderful Life" is to Christmas.

You have network television to blame for that.

And one of the most common rituals is to tell all the dinner guests what you're thankful for this year. Yet, instead of being thankful for things, spend some time and think about the moments that you're thankful for.

Cause people come and go. Treasures fall in and out of fashion and your health will only get worse, but those moments, even the ones that change from black and white to sepia tone, you get to keep for always.

They're the ones that define who you are.

Even if you're the kind of guy that talks to roast beef sandwiches.

Shopping Maul Five

I really had to get out of the house.

Really, really.

The walls were starting to close in on me and I had forgotten how many days I'd been wearing the same underwear.

The answer was only one, but I wasn't sure, and that scared me.

This week and the last were all about getting ready for Wednesday's show. And for those of you that missed it (which is all of you), it went very well. The venue was very nice, the beer was very good, the staff were fantastic, I had just enough material and I only forgot the lyrics to my originals, so no one would have known the difference.

But four hours in the car, two hours set up and tear down, and three hours on stage, that's like a full time job right there. Feels good to say that.

But two things are clear; One, I'm outta shape, and two, I need to learn more happy songs. Both easily in my grasp.

Yet after two weeks of cramming, rehearsing, preparing, and pacing nervously, I woke up yesterday and decided to give up on life. I ventured away from the couch only twice. Once to refill my coffee cup and then again to eat dinner four movies later. Suffice it to say I got up this morning feeling extremely cow like.

So when the opportunity arose to get Calvin a new pair of sneakers, it seemed like a golden opportunity to stop all the blood from coagulating in my extremities and maybe generate some fodder for today's five.

And when it comes to fodder, the mall never disappoints.

Five Things Shopping Maul:

One: Americans can't handle roundabouts.

The distance between my house and the nearest J.C.Penny's is barely a half mile, but of course we had to drive and that half mile of street contains four stop signs, one traffic light, and three roundabouts. The american brain is a very complicated thing. And one thing I've noticed over the years is that when the american brain is confused it essentially forces the user to make the worst decision possible and then over correct in a ridiculous hail storm of bad maneuvers.

Now, I'm a proponent of roundabouts, on paper.

In practice, however, in the age of soccer moms and suburban assault vehicles, a funny thing happens. Nine out of ten drivers aren't mentally prepared for the roundabout and find themselves in the middle of it before realizing it, and again, when americans are confused, they don't slow down and proceed with caution, they speed up and just aim their cars in the direction they think they want to go.

Roundabouts are safer and more efficient, but damn, they're scary.

Two: Shopping will forever remain a mystery to me

I just don't understand how we can spend twenty minutes looking through racks of blue jeans and dress shirts when we clearly came for sneakers. It just breaks all the physical, mathematical, and evolutionary laws that I know of and will forever force me to renegotiate my terms with reality.

Three: Calvin's starting to become a man.

It didn't take him longer than three seconds to pick out a pair of shoes. He looked up from his new Nintendo game, said he wanted the orange ones and only the orange ones, that was what he wanted, and when it turned out there wasn't a pair in his size, he looked up from his game again and said he wanted the green ones and only the green ones.

I liked the green ones too. They're velcro.

Four: I don't remember why I ever disliked velcro.

I do remember feeling like it was important for Calvin to learn how to tie his shoes. I do remember, so vividly, that amazing moment when he stopped me in the aisle of a supermarket so he could tie them all by himself, and I do remember it taking a very long time but I was oblivious to the fact, for I was in that moment of Parental Bliss when the child takes another step toward independence. But ever since that moment, I have hated laces with the heat of a thousand flaming suns.

Putting on shoes to go anywhere or do anything is quite possibly the reason why parents kill their children.

That, and buckling up.

Five: Paying the full retail price suddenly feels very wrong.

I don't know what happened. I have never felt bad about paying anything for anything. If I need it, I buy it. If I want it, and I've already paid for the things I need, I buy it. I used to just assume that things cost what they cost.

But retailers have shot themselves in the face by skewing the value of just about everything. Sale prices, markdowns, door busters, bogos, coupons, groupons, and membership cards.

I honestly don't know what the price of sneakers are.

Joann told me the price of the green sneakers and I had no idea what it meant, but judging by her face I could tell that it was ridiculous.

Not high.

I've paid more for an overcooked 8oz steak and soggy broccoli.

Just ridiculous.

We actually had to stop and talk it through.

It seemed so terribly wrong to pay full price, but there were other factors to consider. Like, we would have to go to another store and there's no guarantee that the prices would be lower, and we might not find something that he likes, and the attention span of an eight year old has steep curve into super irritating after the half hour mark. There was a time factor, wear and tear on the SUV, and our very sanity at stake.

In the end, we bought the shoes, but felt terrible about it.

And now I have to go learn a Katie Perry song.

Cause that's my job.

Raising Successful Children