Spidey Sense: Failure

"Who was that rubbing my shoulders when I was on the phone?" I asked the boss.

"The Chief of Staff."

"...huh."

I mean, I knew he was in the office and all, having stood at attention when he entered, but still. Had work to do. Arrangements to make.

Four-star generals to snub.

I had to brief him later on that day. Very pleasant gentleman. Easy to talk to. Got out of work at 6:02, a record for the week. My daughter takes a few seconds to study my face before smiling when I get home. Ryan is already in pajamas.
Erin had slept 8 hours straight the night before, after being up all day battling a cold and any attempts to nap. 8 hours! I saw Ainsley smile in the morning! It was like two suns rising!

Back to work today for six hours, battling a missing R: drive and misspelled Turkish names and nonresponsive restaurant group sales managers and a chilling photograph of Michael Jackson at age 50 before getting picked up by the fam to go out to Dulles and meet a friend enjoying a five-hour layover before flying to...Turkey.
It's been a gobbilicious couple of weeks.

Country Fried Bacon Strips

WHY I have never heard of these before?

Ah, yes. Married to a vegetarian.

Also have yet to visit a Texas State Fair.

Tesekker ederim

Brigadier General Demirarslan was nice enough to invite several hundred of his closest friends and fellow Massachusetts Avenue Embassy Row-denizens to his crib in honor of Turkish Armed Forces Day, and I weasled myself into an invite to score some free doner kebab.
It was my first Embassy Function, and a very classy affair, with generals hobnobbing with ladies, navy guys, army guys, foreign guys. Several that I met back on the trip to the Pacific Northwest, as well as their spouses. That was the worst part of the night, actually: I didn't have mine to play with. Weaved from group to group, bottled water in hand, sighing alone. Ainsley was too sick and tending to two even sicker children, so was unable to make it. The Turkish Attache sent her his regards, as did the assistant attache's wife, Azoo, which her husband said meant 'Desire." She was very charming, and they were nice enough to hang out with me all evening, since the General and his wife had to stand at the front the Entire Two Hours shaking hands with attendees. I felt bad. Wanted to throw them a shrimp or something.
But I tried to be charming, asking Azoo when she started learning English. She said it was when she was about 16, so I said, "Oh, so about three years ago, then?"
Apparently flattery is the universal language.

Tectonic toddler

Well, I saw my son last night after all. At 10:30 and again at 11:40, when he woke up with his throat on fire, feverish, crying, head stuffier than a Delta flight. I was able to rock him back to sleep on my lap as he switched one side of the head or the other onto my chest. He was up again at 1:45, but I was in unsuccessfully trying to get Erin back down to sleep then. Mommy to the rescue yet again.
She was able to get him in to see a nurse, who diagnosed in technical terms something called a 'bad head cold.' And ruled out strep. He was in better spirits when I got home, though still sniffing and snuffing like a hippo. His mother on the other hand, was zombieing around sounding like Isaac Hayes, and went to bed almost immediately after I arrived.
I fed the two mites, then got them into the tub, Erin kicking and splashing away, Ryan trying to remember the names of his foam dinosaurs. I got Erin out, dried, and dressed for bed while Ryan soaked some more, then brought her in and put her on the floor next to the musical Russian churches box she seems to enjoy, while turning to get Ryan to gingerly apply a soapy sponge to his bad road rash owies on his legs. It then occurred to me that Erin was a good 18 inches closer to me than where I'd put her.
"Do that again!" I told her, so of course she wouldn't.
But later, she was right back up next to Ryan getting dried on the toilet, when I had distinctly put her about a yard away in the center of the carpet.
So she's not crawling, but has got a good butt scoot going, there.

The Pocomoke Plague

The twelve-hour work day, she has returned.
Necessary evil, unfortunately, and today's office time was interrupted by an office going-away breakfast and a trip to an Embassy, but I left at 7:25 because I wanted to try to get home before my kids went to bed, not because I was done with work for the day. I'd wanted to leave at 7. Fail. Kids asleep when I got home. Fail fail. Son sick, daughter sick, wife sick. Yahtzee.

Just stinks to be TDY-like when I get up before my son and get home after he's down. I even told him yesterday that I'd see him tomorrow. Nertz. Didn't help that Ainsley was up with daughter at 3:30, unable to get her to sleep until I'd done showering at 5:45. And apparently there was some sort of bloody skinned-knee incident on the sidewalk by the park. Need to get the scoop from the toddler.

Andrew Jackson died on I-95

I was again volun-told to work late after getting to work, meaning, since I slugged in to work, I had to find an alternate means to get home (since slugging stops just before 6). I tried the bus for the first time last week, and it wasn't too bad, even in moderate traffic. But tonight the first bus filled up quickly, and the second one took a while to load up the long line of people and stragglers racing down the concourse. At least it goes directly to my park-n-ride lot first.
But I didn't realize I was near the end of my Andrew Jackson biography, so I was left with nothing to do mid-ride. I started deleting old random numbers off my cell phone just to kill time.

This morning I escorted the new Swedish Air Attache to his accreditation ceremony, joining the gentlemen from Rwanda, Burma, Japan, and Nigeria. Seemed a very decent fellow. While walking him around the Pentagon in my Service Dress uniform, some guy asked if he could show his visiting family what an Air Force uniform looked like, so I held out my arms model-style while he pointed out my ribbons and badges until our elevator arrived.

I loaned my 3-star general 20 bucks at the drugstore, as he had forgotten his wallet. He introduced me to the Vice Chief of Staff on the way back to the office, so that was cool. Then back to the all-encompassing work, planning my next event. I go to bed thinking about it, often dream about it, and wake up with false epiphanies about it ("General Owens doesn't need a room, he lives in town!" I say to my pillow, before realizing there is no General Owens).
Stupid pillow.

No Rest for the Wigged

Not sure who thought cake, pizza, and apple juice was a good idea before naptime, but there we were at yet another munchkin-centric foam-heavy ball-intensive barefoot dancin' party, celebrating yet another 3-year-old's birthday in a romptastic manner. Though not as well organized or engaging as the last one, Ryan still seemed to have a blast, following instructions very well, not minding when other kids snatched balls from him ("Oh, um, sorry," he would say), and smashing the hell out of bubbles with his face.

Jazzed up, he would not fall asleep on his floor this time, nor in his bed where I beckoned him four times, snatching whatever book, toy, or nick-knack he'd crawled out to get and make noise with. His sister fared no better, sans a thirty-minute head-askew power nap in the van on the way home, so I fed her some peas between claps while Ryan ran around the house screaming at imaginary trees or whatever. I finally just got him outside to play in the sprinkler, since the grass (and he) needed it.

His neighbor friend Jonathan came over close to when he was good and done, but he ran around in his swimtrunks for another half-hour, enticing his friend to plop in a puddle, even though he was wearing his new red shoes and Ryan was barefoot, making footprints on the asphalt (he also leaned over in the puddle and made the occasional "hand footprint!" as he called them). I and Jonathan's parents were glad they would be burning off more steam, but it was finally time to go to bed. Ryan hugged Jonathan and told him he loved him, then told his parents he loved them individually.

To reciprocate, I told Jonathan I respected him as an individual.

Pooping with a plum

Grandpa was his usual self, replacing a termite-ridden fence post, drilling holes into our foundation to hang candle holders by the hot tub, re-working a shoddily done electrical box. Your typical vacation duties.

The laws-in-law went off to a party tonight, leaving us to our Chipotle and crappy preseason football. We got everyone upstairs, and Ryan started this lap down the hallway, running into Erin's room, announcing he had to pee, then running into the bathroom and sitting on his itty bitty pitty potty. He did it 9 or 12 times. Lost count. He was whizzing like a male dog. Only seated and in a bowl. He finally sat down and stayed to catch his breath, or so we thought, but he sprang up and pointed at his organic handiwork. "Look!"

Well, huzzahs and hoorays all around, to include three time zones away. After telling a confused grandad, I decided his Aunt should also hear about this, but then Ryan wanted to talk to his 7-year-old cousin, David, who was nice enough to pretend it was cool, and then Elina and Kyla wanted to congratulate him, too, so of course his Uncle had to be told, along with a hardy "Go Redskins" for that lifelong Cowboys fan. It was just so silly to witness my son's conversation with these people over that there stuff there and the new special wipes mommy got just for him.

He was so ess-kye-tid that he decided he should sleep on the floor. Which makes sense to a 2.75-year old.

Diet Starts Tomorrow, Take 6

Being anatomically demonstrative, Ryan likes to lift up his shirt at the table. Perhaps to see the where the food goes. Perhaps to invite a tickle that never comes. Perhaps to keep his mother from having to wash napkins (shirt'll do fine, thanks).

But we always tell him to put his shirt down, lest the Pope or Janet Jackson or someone is over for dinner.

"I have a belly!" he told us today at breakfast.

"Yes," said his grandmother. "We all do. Some big, some small."

He pointed at me.

"BIGGEST!"

What Window Where

I feel accomplished at the end of this here work week, not only because I got to inform a Lieutenant General that Quick-Draw McGraw's sidekick Baba Louee was some sort of donkey, not a horse, but also because I was sufficiently able to stick the song "I Feel Pretty" deep enough into my boss' head that he was singing it in his office four hours later.

I mean, I'm keeping America safe for Democracy and honing my diplomatic ambassador skills as a Foreign Liaison. Is what I do all day every day.

Also perusing restaurant menus to find better options than $32 hamburgers.

Maybe he's a mule.

Wikipedia says he's a burro. The hat does sort of give it away.

Seeing stars

Met the Air Force Chief of Staff today. Highest-ranking four-star general we've got. Very pleasant fellow. Goes by Norty to those who use his go-by.

....What a cool job!

All You Need is Celery

Ryan has found love.
He loves naps, he says.
He loves me, he says, blink blink. Along with other sucking-up random things he's been popping out. "I'm very glad to see you!" Good. Get your feet off the couch.

We know he means well, but it's still out of left field:
"Where's Asha?"
"Ryan, she got sick and died. She doesn't live here anymore."
"....but I LOVE her!"

And apparently he will tell anyone who will listen that his daddy loves celery.

Of all things.

Peristaltic Anomalies

Got home earlier than usual (after going in earlier than usual), so I thought I might take the family out to dinner. The family had other plans, involving very small pairs of underwear and the practice of wearing them thereof herein himon.
Erin was also learning how to wave.
Not having a thingywhatsit, I'm not sure how she goes to the bathroom.
But because Ryan had requested his "Cars" big-kid underpants, Ainsley decided to stay home all day and let him practice telling her when he needed to use the toilet, which only turned out to be the rug three or four times.
We have noticed that we have an awful lot of animals on the floor when we want to rapidly carry a kid to the bathroom.

It's a process.

Spay your dogs, Spray your children

You'd think that an hour at the vet's with two dogs a cat a sister and two Maters would tire out a kid, but Ryan Would Not Be Napped on Saturday, killing our plans to go to the county fair after he'd woken up since he had never gone to a sleep from which to wake up and we're a very literal couple of folks when it comes to planning our days (we watched Favre's silly pre-season debut as a Jet against the Redskins, instead).
The dogs smell like a funky honey-flavored cajun swamp after a long-overdue bath in the backyard, with my trusty assistant failing to both (1) warn me that I was kneeling on a wasp and (2) remind me that mosquitoes think he tastes like a lemon meringue pie:

"Daddy, I have a bug bite on my knee!" he calls from the treehouse deep in the 'woods'.
"Yeah, well, come on down and we'll compare with my bee sting."
He trods over, looking like a leper with acne. So I did what any conscientious father would do:
Carried him to Mommy.
She said she counted 17 bites on his hands, arms, and legs.

I'm expecting a letter in the mail from Child Services. Although he didn't seem all that bothered by them. He seems more proud of his owies than concerned.

Sunday the entire family took a nice long stroll with Grandad, with Erin enjoying herself both in the wagon and on Mommy's nuzzlepods. After a lovely lunch on the front porch featuring gespacho and broccoli in Erin's hair, it was Erin's turn to not nap, aided by the neighbor's rented slip-n-screech water slide tower thing for a half-million birthday-celebrating children. I hung out with her downstairs watching "The Incredibles" to give Ainsley 45 minutes of snoozers before I had to go out to Bolling DV quarters for more new-job orientation, which entailed me finding a dead mouse behind our guests' rooms, as well as sweeping and picking weeds out of the side yard to pretty it up before they arrived. I also got to drive a three-star general's car back to the base (the security guards tend to stand a little straighter when they see his sticker in the window).
I got home late to learn that Ryan had taken a half-gainer off the side of the couch and landed on his head and bloodied his nose. So we're pretty much going to keep him inside in a deet-soaked plastic bubble until he's 22 and a half.

Lightfoot and Littleshorts

You know you've got a good grandad when he's willing to teach you how to skip gayfully on the driveway in front of God and everyone in the cul de sac with the neighbor kid's pink jump rope she'd left in your yard.

My kingdom for a garage-mounted security camera, so I could keep (and share) these images for posterity.

Two score and counting

After a day and a half layover at the Barn, letting Ryan watch some Big Yellow Cun-Struc-Shun vehicles move rocks around in the creek for some conservationist preservationist project and running around the property naked as a jay bird sans feathers, we arrived home to a happy household full of pets wondering where the HELL we've been. But we saw the Fouldsi again the next day, as they graciously volun-told to babysit our kids so we could go eat two-hundred-year-old gingerbread.
Our dear friends the Boivins were celebrating 40 years of betrothous bliss, and their youngest threw them a small party at a historical restaurant in Olde Towne Alexandriae, where Washington slept and Adams drank and Jefferson pooped and Monroe played the cello and Madison ate a frog and the other Adams danced a jig and Andrew Jackson stayed before his inauguration, as reported by the page in his biography I had just read two days prior.
Sadly, the beard had to go, the bags had to be re-packed, the morning commute tea made (need to start making it smaller or colder, since I usually end up pounding the second half of my togo mug in the parking lot, sweat bubbling down my brow), and 141 e-mails to go through to start prepping for a busy fall of high-level visits from people with silly names.
Not that Americans are much better: found among the list of recent Colonel-selects, a Czzizack, a Kmon, and a lady named Roquemore.

In casa ration

Spent three and a half days in one hotel room together. Lived to tell the tale.
= successful vacation.
The Mohican State Park Resort & Conference Center & Playground & Stuffed Bird Emporium is a standard 70s-era lodge in a beautiful wooded setting by a horseshoe-shaped lake; it was just the right our-family size for walking about and enjoying a dip in one of two pools or looking for deer or watching the sunset. While Erin found two new talents: (1) clapping and (2) spinning around 360-degrees on her butt (even in high chairs in restaurants), Ryan also honed his new skill: being annoying at the table. Granted, his patience may have been used up after eating at the same restaurant and dealing with us dealing with him 24/7, but he really is getting 2 in his old age.
The saving grace was that we taught him our room number and allowed him to 'find' it for us. Check out his pride in this video -- sorry that you have to tilt your head sideways; I keep forgetting not to hold the camera that way when I'm capturing video.



On Monday we drove a short distance through the state park, past a dam, over a covered bridge, lovely scenes, and on to Loudenville, the local town that time forgot. It was a little disappointing. It didn't even raise to the level of "quaint". It was just "there". A main street of maybe three blocks, with stores that have been around since the fifties, and some newer habadasheries trying to combine, say, bicycle repair with trinket sales. I did buy a Hawaiin shirt that only cost me $3, which I shared with anyone who cared (or didn't) to hear it. Plus I almost bought a sign in my window for my Dad's upcoming retirement:

Old Cowboys Never Die
They Just Smell That Way

Toasted, red skin

I don't know why I expected something reserved, respectful, and quiet, but the tailgate atmosphere at the Hall of Fame really threw me for a loop. I didn't even think to bring a hat to use while sitting in the blazing sun inside the stadium, so I was forced to buy a souvenir to prevent nasal blistering. It felt like 20,000 people were there, and maybe six of them weren't Redskins fans.
We bought a tray full of crappy stadium food to eat before the stands got full, and then Ainsley and I took turns taking one of the kids down into the concourse just to keep them entertained with something other than a filling stadium. As it was, I was down under with Erin when everyone decided it was time to file in, using a gangway the width of a refrigerator. Erin started crying, being cramped in a loud, sweaty line* that wasn't moving, so I tried putting my mouth right up to her ear and gently singing "Hail to the Redskins", and Holy Mr. Rogers if that didn't soothe her.
*generous term. I've seen six-year-old soccer games that were more orderly.
We missed the National Anthem and the Army helicopter fly-over, but eventually made it up to see the introductions of the six enshrinees -- the biggest applause, naturally, for Darrell Green and Art Monk. And big boos for any former Cowboys announced. Poor Tony Dorsett.
The organizers wisely put Green and Monk 4th and last, respectively, as the stadium would have emptied if they'd gone any earlier. But Erin was done, zonked out asleep in Mama's sling at 8:45, and with two more speakers to go and the prospect of waiting in long shuttle bus lines and parking lot traffic jams, we decided to head to the next portion of our adventure.
After stopping for a veggie burger. See 'crap' line from above.

"Where we going?"

That was a fun question all day, let me tell you. Almost as fun as my son reverting to calling me "Mister Driver" whenever he wanted to listen to a CD. With eight "i"s. "Oh, mister drIIIIIIIIIverrrr...." *kick* *kick* *kick*
Next trip, the lad with the rock'em-sock'em robot feet sits in the third row of the van.

But considering it was about 5 hours to Canton, certainly Erin's longest trip in the car, and Ryan's longest since he had anything resembling an attention span, they did very well. We left nice and early, so we wouldn't be in a terrible hurry and add to the stress. Erin slept the first hour and a half or so, leaving us to only have to keep Ryan entertained, pointing out the cows and the horses and the barns and the wind turbines and the tunnels and all the other Redskins fans heading out to the Hall of Fame ceremony. Even the rest area in western Pennsylvania we utilized for lunch was chock full o' nuts in burgundy and gold, pointing thumbs up and sports-dude double-points in my "81"jersey-wearing direction.

After both kids napped in their seats in the afternoon, we stopped about a half-hour away from the HOF to gas up and switch the family into their Redskins paraphernalia and mount the flags on the windows and slap the Redskins tattoos on and install the eight electronically controlled three-yard long roof-mountain horns that played "Hail to the Redskins" when you honk the horn.

Okay, no, but there's a gift idea for Ainsley.

After the nineteenth time of asking where we were going, the answer seemed to finally sink in to Ryan cranium:

"Where we going?"

"We told you, Ryan. To the Hall of Fame to see Mr. Green and Mr. Monk."

"Oh."

pause pause pause

"What color is Mr. Monk?"

Curse-ory Rhyme

I am starting to detest the very existence of Twinkle Twinkle Little Frickin Star.

Yardwork

I understand that a hundred acres is a lot, but seriously: can't they tidy up a bit once in a while?

It's a good thing Ryan wanted to take a tromp through the woods, because we had a trail to maintain. Paths needed to be re-swathed, brush cut, felled trees unfelled, deer sighted, lanes of operation rediscovered. We also got to show him large patches of moss, which was a little confusing since he had just met a Redskin we told him was moss, too.

He then found an L-shaped stick that he used to tap tap tap on every single large rock or tree limb along the path. So the second leg took a bit longer than the first. But he was doing his duty, he felt. Daddy and Grandpa are messing with stuff; he'd join in.

After lunch, during which Erin had her first sampling of pickle, which turned out to be a disappointingly but ultimately unsurprising non-video-worthy event since, like everything in her life, she studied it rather than reacted to it (Ex: Grandad makes goo-goo face at her. Erin: do I like this person? What makes one go goo? Should I smile? Hmm. *stare stare stare*), we again split up for nap, this time with me only pretending (honest!) to go to sleep until Ryan actually did (on his back, legs crossed), while I read an entire Smithsonian magazine, no small feat.

Grilled pork chops out on the gazebo, sun setting behind the hills, Ryan learning how to pee in the bushes...the perfect setting for the perfect start to a vacation.

We'll skip the part about neither of our kids sleeping much that night.