Brown out

Turn the power off in Cleveland. It's time to start thinking about the draft. The only NFL event in which the Browns are always a "top" team.

It's tough being a Browns fan these days. First Elway, then Byner, and now the Bengals (our only reason to feel better about ourselves) are even playing well. A friend once laughingly told me that it was child abuse to put my kids in Browns clothing and raise them as Browns fans. I'm not sure I can disagree at this point. It's been almost 20 years since we've had anything real to cheer about. Cleveland in general is just a tough town to cheer for. The Indians haven't won a world series since the 50's, and I don't think the Cavs have ever won anything. I watched the White Sox and Red Sox win the world series the last two years after over 80 years of waiting and it makes me wonder. Will my Grandchildren witness the first Browns super bowl victory? By then the NFL could be a very different league. Here's to waiting, and you never know, they could always suprise me.

My pick: Year 2047 - Cleveland Browns 34 - Beijing Bulldogs 13

Thy carseat runneth over

Tonight Kylie and I went to the Zoo together for a special Daddy daughter night out. Crystal and the baby went to my moms for a craft party so it seemed like a good idea for us to spend some time together, and since we have zoo memberships this year, it was free for us to go. This weekend they are having a special Boo at the Zoo promotion, which basically just means that they've decorated a little and the kids can all wear their costumes and get some free candy here and there.

Kylie was all decked out in her cow costume which was mighty cute, and we headed off to the zoo. She absolutely loves animals and had a great time going from place to place and checking them all out. I scored some major Daddy bonus points for taking her.

Now here is where things got interesting (read funny). Things have a tendency to do that when kids are involved. Especially ones that didn't get naps today. Our time at the zoo was done so we headed home. Kylie was very tired and very ready to be home. She had her pacifier (or nuk as she calls it) so I figured that she would drift off to sleep. However, she managed to lose it somehow, and as most of you can guess, this was a calamity fit for the end of the world to a tired child. I think the 4th trumpet of the apocolypse in the Bible is something about "and thy nuk shall be lost, and all the world will tremble...". Probably not, but you can see how she might feel that way.

So here was my dilemna. She wanted out of her seat and she wanted her nuk. If I stopped to find her nuk, she would just be more upset about my not taking her out of the seat. If I just kept going, she would be mad about not having the nuk. I chose to just try and get home, and thus attempted to placate and distract her as much as I could with conversation. It wasn't working and I could tell that she was starting to really make herself mad. She was working herself into a frenzy and I knew that no good could come from this. Town was in site, only a couple more minutes and we would be home.

And then it happened. The sound no parent wants to hear. It sounded like someone took the lid off a big gulp and just dumped it in the back seat. Puke was spraying and splashing everywhere. All over her, the car seat and the back of my seat. TWO minutes from home. Nothing like a nasty mess to clean up to make your day. Chunks, need I say more? I think you get the picture. I spent a good bit of time cleaning before I could do much else once we got home.

So anyway, it was still a fun evening and I guess that kids will be kids till the cows come home, and sometimes the little cows are pretty messy by the time they get there.

Kylie, in the living room, with the pliers

Last night was pumpkin carving night. My wife took the year off, so it will just be my creative genious gracing our front stoop over the weekend. Kylie, my oldest daughter who is almost two, is in that stage now where she really wants to help with anything we do. Her help, however, generally consists of making a mess of whatever I'm working on and making me stressed that she is going to really hurt something, namely herself. She just can't resist being a "Big Hepper" though.

So I have these pumpkin carving tools now.


My wife bought them for me last year along with some really cool patterns which have greatly increased the coolness of my carvings. The bad part, was that Kylie was extremely bent on playing with whatever saw I happened to be needing at the time. She had quite a fit when I took them from her but I was eventually able to placate her by giving her the needle nose pliers that I had been useing to pull out the carved pieces to play with. She proceded to "help" by pounding on the back of the pumpkin with those. In the end it was pretty cute, and I was glad that she was able to feel like she was a part of it. Being a big kid myself I can see the entertainment value of banging on a pumpkin with a pair of needle nose plyers.

Crystal and I agreed on a scary looking black cat for this year's carving. It turned out pretty cool, and I'm sure that the three people that drive down our middle of nowhere road in the next few days will love it!

Bigfoot? Aliens? Taquitos?

For the second time, I went to a Taco Bell looking for the newly advertised Taquitos (the ones with the lions in the commercial), and once again came up empty. The first time I just figured that my small town store just wasn't up on the newest things, but this time I was in the city. So is this a fast food bait and switch or just some sort of corporate screw up? I looked on the Taco Bell website and it isn't even listed on the menu. Did I dream this food up? Please tell me that someone else saw this commercial. Not that I care that much about fast food. Frankly I can't afford to eat it very often, but this just smells like a mystery to me, and I can't resist a good mystery. Good thing there weren't any Taco Bell's around when Conan Doyle was writing or we might have to read Sherlock Holmes and The Case of The Bean Burrito in english class. In Taco Bell's case, I guess the Hound of The Baskerville's ate their homework.

Forget coffee, try a cradle

So I read somewhere that babies sleep 16-18 hours a day. Is there an unwritten rule somewhere that says that none of them can be at night? I love Kerrigan to pieces but no matter how hard I try, I end up getting frustrated when she gets up 50 times. Last night I rocked her for 45 minutes and had her good and asleep and as soon as I laid her down in her cradle, WAAAAAA!!!! She seems to be able to sleep just about anywhere but there. Just the other day we were trying to feed her and couldn't get her awake enough and my wife jokingly suggesting laying her in her cradle for a while. We didn't try it but I still bet that it would have worked. :)

....and we're back

So as you can see I haven't updated my blog in a while, but I intend to change that. Hopefully I can turn it into something worth reading. I'm just going to lay down whatever comes to mind and hopefully I can entertain a few people. To fill the gaps, our first daughter is now almost two, and her name is Kylie. Our second daughter was born three weeks ago tomorrow, and her name is Kerrigan. We really like that name but worry about the link it might have with Nancy Kerrigan. I figured that by the time she is old enough to be in school that no one will have heard of Nancy Kerrigan so it shouldn't be a problem. I imagine that a lot of my stories will be about being a Dad, since that is most of what I'm doing these days. With two little girls to chase around, I don't have time for much else.