Episode 52: Friendly? You bet we are!

As has been documented on this site, my employment history has not exactly been what the modern American male would consider 'ideal,' or really enjoyable in any way. My dreams of rock stardom, space travel and professional athleticism were dashed around the age of 13, when some solid family connections and a few sprouting lip hairs landed me a job hosing down dirty plates at Bonanza Steakhouse. Since then my life has been a series of restaurants, coffee shops, farm stands and one idiotic three-year period selling running shoes to yuppies for $9 an hour. There was the time I worked summers at the local Housing Authority, which was cool in the sense that all of the old burnouts use to let me under-aged drink and ride lawn mowers, and who could forget the three weeks I spent landscaping one summer? Nothing says 'I hate my life' quite like waking up at 6 a.m. to mulch some rich lady's front lawn. I still contend that I quit before I was fired from that job.

Sure, I legitimized myself a bit, using my communications degree to land a job at a few newspapers, but I was about 30 years too late in boarding that train and I quickly realized a life of pouring beer was exponentially more lucrative and, sadly and all too frequently, more interesting, too.

Ranking the jobs that I have had is kind of like ranking bodily excretions. The farm stand was shit, the shoe store was vomit, and the newspaper was blood- if you catch my drift. I tell you all of this only because I was reminded of one particularly bad employment venture late last week when, as I briefly described, I took the family to Friendly's to celebrate Av's first birthday.

Much like that fat clown from the TV show 'Man Vs. Food' I have held just about every job there is to hold in a restaurant. I have washed dishes, stocked salad bars, unloaded delivery trucks and served customers. At Friendly's I was a cook, and it remains hands down, no contest, the absolute worst of them all.

I am sure many of you have eaten at Friendly's more recently than I have, as I don't think I have been there for any reason other than to buy ice cream since I quit working there, but walking in to that place last Thursday sent two years of blocked-out memories rushing back, and I can't say they were happy ones.

While we waited for our table (yes, there was a 20 minute wait at 2 p.m. on a Thursday) I couldn't stop the memory flashes from creeping in to my head. I remembered stupid, random things like how long to cook mozzarella sticks (4 minutes in the fryer, or button number two for the cooks who couldn't read) or the name of the Portuguese dishwasher who used to eat Salisbury steak for dinner every night (Arthur).

The dynamic of that restaurant was strange. Employees ranged from grumpy, old, raspy waitresses who had worked there for 20-plus years to a group of kids from a local Christian college- a particularly entertaining bunch considering they were struggling with the whole 'I'm Christian but I am also 20-years-old and that waitress is really hot and wants to bang me' conflict. (The final score, if I remember correctly, was Sex 2- God 1).

*Just as an aside, the title of this post comes from the greeting we used to have to give when we answered the phone. 'Thank you for calling the Lee Friendly's. Friendly? You bet we are! This is Dan, how can I help you?' Yeah. It is also worth noting that I lived in Pittsfield, which is about a 25 minute drive from Lee, and I had to drive past four Friendly's just to get to the one that I worked at. This job ruled.

There are countless stories I could tell, but one sticks out in my mind more than any other. It involves one of our managers, some blood and a whole lot of ice cream.

Our head manager for a time that I worked there was a man by the name of John Owen. John was middle aged, single and about the grumpiest bastard I have ever met. He was ugly, he had a mustache and about 6-8 yellowed teeth. He lived in a trailer park and he always smelled like a combination of cat piss, coffee and weed. He was by all accounts mean, accusative and more often than not, down right evil to the customers. How the guy managed to hold down that job for more than three days, I have no idea. In addition to all of this he was also a diabetic, and could not have weighed more than 120 pounds. I tell you this last part for a reason.

One day I was starting up my shift when one of the Christian kids, Steve I think was his name, realized that John wasn't in yet. For the next hour or two, the GM tried getting a hold of him to see where he was to no avail. The shift continued for a few hours, another manager in to take his place, when the front door opened and in walked John. He was bleeding from the face, his shirt was torn in half, his jeans were covered in blood. He looked like he had been attacked by a bear. My hand to God, I shit you not, what happened next is true. Without saying a word to anyone, he walked in past the front counter and the kitchen, punched in, walked over to the ice cream stand and decided he was going to deliver a tray of ice cream to a table. He picked up the tray, took two steps and fell. Covering himself in a hodgepodge of Happy Endings, banana splits and Fribbles. It was hands down the most catastrophic fall I have ever seen take place in a restaurant. Legs up, ass down, tray of ice cream on the chest. Surreal.

Obviously, by this point someone had tipped off the the other manager who had rushed upstairs just in time to witness the accident. Steve and I did nothing. We couldn't do anything. All we could do was watch. It was too good.

Not knowing what the hell was happening, the other manager helped John up and brought him in to the back. A few moments later we heard yelling. It was John trying to use the phone and the other manager trying to stop him. As it turns out, John was not attacked by a bear. Rather, he had some sort of diabetic seizure and passed out while driving to work. He drove in to a tree and had to be cut from his car because the accident made it so the door wouldn't open. Supposedly he came to at the hospital, which was fairly close to the restaurant, pulled out his IV and walked to work. The phone call? He was trying to call the ambulance company to see if they were going to pay for the window they broke in extracting him from the car.

Friendly's has changed a bunch since I worked there. The menu is more diverse and the atmosphere is much more geared toward kids (aside from one or two sad, single diners, everyone in the restaurant last week was either with children or a retarded person) but walking in to that place brought it all back. I don't know what it all means, but I found myself not getting quite as irritated while I was at work this weekend. I suppose it could be a lot worse.

Episode 51: Friend!

Every once in a while someone special comes along and it just changes your life forever. Things are never quite the same and you can't picture living another day without that someone, let alone remember how you managed to even get out of bed before that someone came along. For the baby, that someone was 'born' yesterday, and his name is Felix.

Born from a bin of spinning stuffing and provided with his own tiny heart, the 17 inch, 11 ounce monkey was the shining light in a fun filled birthday celebration, and he has not left Av's side since. After a party that netted mountains of toys, clothing and attention, we decided that it would be best to plan a fun family day for her actual birthday yesterday, and scheduled trips to, among other places, the animal shelter and Friendly's.

Also on the agenda was a trip to every kid's favorite friend farm, Build a Bear. I had never been to Build a Bear before and, frankly, the concept always seemed like something I would not be in to, but it is funny how having kids forces you to be 'in to' certain things. I am sure many of you have had the Build a Bear experience before, so I won't describe it it too much detail. Lets just say the 'build' portion of the process is no joke.

We entered the store to find it bustling with kids on school vacation week and we were very quickly greeted by a bubbly middle aged woman who reminded me of an older version of Flo from the Progressive Insurance ads. She explained to us the process and sent us on our way to pick out our 'skin.' Of course, Build a Bear does not offer exclusively bear skin, you can choose from a wide variety of animals including lobsters, dogs, rabbits and I even saw one girl with a wolf. We carried the baby over to the selection area an decided the monkey got the biggest smile out of her, so we reached in and grabbed Felix's sagging, empty skin and brought it over to the next station. What followed was a series of tasks that included inserting a heart in to the skin, watching Felix get stuffed and then 'washing' him in the special washing area, which was really nothing more than air that is blown out of something that resembles a faucet. Now, I am told there is also an area where you are supposed to sing happy birthday to the bear, but luckily for us, no one was manning that station yesterday, so we got to skip it.

Next, you take your new friend to the 'dressing room' where you can proceed to increase the cost of your Build a Bear with ridiculous and hysterical outfits. For example, the girl with the wolf dressed him in a leather jacket. Awesome. Felix, being a monkey, was obviously open to any outfit, but given that we had a 1-year-old who had no idea what was really happening, I decided that the most appropriate (and inexpensive) piece of clothing would be a pair of tighty whities. Just like at the zoo. Although, I will say if they had a bell hop outfit I probably would have sprung for that. Ha. Monkeys carrying bags. Priceless.

Once we slid his briefs on it was time to name the monkey (Felix was my choice) and fill out his 'birth certificate,' the final step before the little guy 'comes to life.' It was at this point that Monica took the baby off to play in the store and I had the pleasure of waiting in an eight person deep line to pay for the scantily clad little guy. This, of course, meant that I had to hear the bubbly cashier lady give the same Build a Bear speech eight times.

'Ok, now what is our name here? Oooh that is a cute name. Ok now I'll put his birth certificate in his new home here...' you get the idea.

The one thing with Build a Bear that struck me as odd is that these people are so deep in the 'dealing with kids' mode that they don't really change their tone or attitude when they are dealing with adults. I would say the lady spoke to me pretty much the exact same way she would speak to a 9-year-old, and refused to cut down the speech even though I made it pretty clear that I just wanted her to ring the damn thing up. I actually got quite a bit of amusement out of the whole process.

So we left, on to the next adventure with a freshly stuffed monkey in a cardboard box. I was pretty surprised with how smooth the whole thing was and how much less irritating it was than I had expected. I figured that Felix would come home, get some attention now and then and end up in the toy bin next to all of the other toys she is sick of. Not so much.

Felix got to come out of his house while we were on a mall bench bundling her up to leave and the couple has been virtually inseparable ever since. He sat next to her at lunch and cuddled with her on the car ride home. Once we got home, she dragged him around and kept him with her everywhere she went. By the end of the day she had fallen asleep from birthday exhaustion, holding hands with Felix while watching Baby Einstein on the couch.

One of our goals as parents was to avoid getting Av hooked on things like binkies and blankies, and we have been pretty successful thus far, as she doesn't have either. Unfortunately, I think Felix may be the thing to take their place. I can just picture myself running out to Build a Bear like three years from now to build a new Felix before she realizes he has been lost or thrown away due to filth.

So the baby was happy with the Build a Bear trip and I have to say I was, too. Just a few observations. First, it was much cheaper than I had thought. One monkey in his underwear was only $23. Also, I was impressed with how efficiently they had set up the machinery. I mean, it makes sense as it is such a successful endeavor, but it was still impressive.
One thing I will never understand, however, is how any man can walk in to that place alone and build a bear for his girlfriend. Now, admittedly Monica is not a teddy bear and chocolate kind of girl so I don't have much experience with cheesy romantic gifts, but it just seems like it would be awkward to have to go in there and do that by yourself. But, hey, I am sure that move has gotten plenty of high school and college kids a little action on Valentines Day, so why knock it. You gotta do what you gotta do, right?

TBF toy review 2: Fisher Price Little People Animal Sounds Farm...

... Or as I like to call it the 'Fisher Price Little People's $40 Capitalist Rip off Disappointment Farm.'

Back by popular demand, it is time for another look at some of the toys the baby and I play with on a daily basis in an effort to unscientifically rate how useful, annoying and fun they may be. If you missed the first review, you can look here http://trialbyfireparenting.blogspot.com/2010/01/tbf-toy-review-1-tempo-tiger-singing.html.

Just a reminder of how my very well thought out, soon to be accredited rating system works. The toys will be rated on a scale of 1-5 in five different categories, 1. Child enjoyment, 2. Parent enjoyment, 3. Annoyance, 4. usefulness (in keeping my kid occupied and/or quiet) and finally 5. staying power- that is, will the toy last more than a few weeks before it gets cast aside to be tripped over and eventually hurled in the trash.

Today we will be looking at the Animal Sounds Farm shown above. A little bit of back ground. In charge of buying toys for Christmas, I had my eye on the farm for some time. The baby likes animal noises and farm things, and she also likes small, bubbly plastic toys to play with. It was a perfect match. I was putting the farm off until the end of my shopping, as it was an easy buy and I knew where it was. I purchased it from Target a few days before Christmas for $39.99. Yes. $39.99. I wasn't happy at the time, but I figured 'hey, it is for my kid. I am sure it will be worth it. Whether or not I was right is debatable.

The results were mixed when the toy was opened and eventually played with. The baby had a great time. She loved- and still loves to play with the farm. I, on the other hand, was pissed. For $39.99 this is what you get from Fisher Price. A barn attached to a silo with several animals inside as well as a farmer named Jed. The animals include a pig, sheep, goat, horse and cow. There is also a rooster attached to the farm that does not come off. Now, it is really the 'animal sounds' claim that I am upset with here. Most of the animals (excluding the goat for some reason) have their own specific place in the barn. Jed, for all of the work he does in running the farm, also does not have a home. He seemingly goes on the roof, where the suggested game is to slide the musical rooster across and knock him two-stories to the ground. Cool. The barn door swings open to make horse and cow noises, while the pig pen makes a pig noise. There is a random platform for the sheep and if you slide the rooster across the roof it makes a rooster noise. Slide it the other way, it plays a 20 second version of Old McDonald. Yeah. So that is five animal sounds and a 20 second song for $39.99? Really?

In any event, here we go.

1. Child enjoyment- As I mentioned, the baby loves this farm. She loves playing with the animals, sliding the rooster and tipping it over. Most of all, she loves to put toys inside the silo and open up the door on the bottom to take them out. I don't think that she really cares that the barn makes animal noises, as she barely acknowledges them, but all in all the toy keeps her fairly occupied if for no other reason than the silo game is really fun to her. 5 points.

2. Parent enjoyment- As I have already mentioned, my wallet was pissed about this purchase and despite her enjoyment, I can't help but feel completely ripped off. (I purchased a toy called the 'Alphabet Train' for $5 more that plays about 30 different songs, has five different characters, teaches a word for every letter of the alphabet and allows the child to ride on top of it. This has set the standard for toys over $20). Those feelings aside, the toy itself is fairly enjoyable from my perspective. It keeps her occupied and it is an easy distraction if she is playing with something else that I don't care for. It does, however, mess with my neurosis and anal retentive nature as I insist that each animal must be in its proper home before we put the toy away. 3 points.

3. Annoyance- I suppose the one bright side to being ripped of with very few animal sounds is that the toy is not very annoying at all. There are only a few sounds and they are not very loud, so this gets a full 5 points.

4. Usefulness- As I mentioned, the primary reason for buying the farm was the baby's interest in videos and other toys that include farm animals and animal sounds. From this perspective, the toy is not so useful. It isn't all that educational and the animal sounds do little to really catch the baby's attention. That said, the silo game has been a fun way for her to learn the concept of in and out and open and closed. 3 points.

5. Staying power- Here is the only place where the $39.99 price may pay itself off. I really don't see a time where she gets sick of the farm, again because of the silo game. The barn has become a staple in the corner of the play room and is visited a few times a day. Obviously, there will come a point where she out grows it and then we will have to get rid of it, but it certainly is not something that we look at and say 'she never plays with this.' 5 points.

So, for all of my disgruntled thoughts and angry swearing about paying $39.99 for a toy that does half of the things I wished it would, the Fisher Price Animal Sounds Farm scores 21 points. That is only four points off of a perfect score. The baby has gotten a lot of enjoyment out of the toy, and it is far from annoying, which are the two most important things on this scale. If it were a $9.99 toy it would probably be perfect. It is just the cost that keeps killing me. I just feel like it should do more.

Episode 50: Happy Birthday, kid. Enjoy some germs

Unbelievably it has been almost a full year since Av was introduced to the world under the bright lights of a Salem Hospital birthing room, and wouldn't you know it, I think it has been a relative success. If I take a look back at the last year it is pretty overwhelming how far we have come, but this isn't being submitted for publication in 'O' Magazine or Family Circle, so I'll spare you all of the inner reflection and sap.

Although the baby's real birthday is not until Thursday, we decided to hold her party a few days early and invited a hoard of family and friends to Monica's parents' house on Saturday. The day managed to fly by fairly smoothly, although the poor kid was definitely overwhelmed by all of the commotion. Thanks to all who came.

Unfortunately, all of the contact with other snotty, germ-filled, winter-ravaged children left her a bit under the weather in the days following. Amazingly, it took about 363 days of life before she got her first cold, but it is here and it isn't being very nice to her. Along with the lethargy, runny nose and sneezing has come an awful sounding cough, kind of like the ones that you hear from 65-year-old, half drunk waitresses sucking down cigarettes outside Major Magleashes (or insert local dive bar here, if you prefer). Still, the doctors insisted that the cough, and her 100.9 degree fever were just fine and said she would be back to normal in a day or two. All she needed was a little bit of Baby Tylenol and some love.

Lucky for me, the cold came smack in the middle of school vacation week, meaning Monica is home to take care of her. It is a good thing, too, because this kid wants nothing to do with me when she is sick. She literally attaches herself to Mom like a Koala bear and does not let go. The both of them have been covered in snot for days. Yesterday was the worst of the days so far, as she was up all night the night before (relegating me to an awful night's sleep on the couch while her an Mommy spooned) and was miserable and unmotivated due to her fever. Staying in the house wasn't too bad for the two of them, as it snowed all day anyway, but it was starting to drive me nuts.

After a walk to the Walgreens and some preemptive shoveling, I came back in to find the baby had rebounded slightly and was on the fast track to recovery. Thankfully the Tylenol and the pure exhaustion led to an almost full night's sleep last night and she woke up pretty energetic today. The cough is still there and the snotty nose is prevalent as well, but she should be back to being a normal kid by tomorrow.

As for that- the real first birthday- we have a fun-filled day planned. A trip to the animal shelter, some play time, and a family lunch at Friendly's so she can become addicted to fried food and ice cream at an early age. Just like I did. Really, it is just because we need a place where she can make a huge mess and it won't matter. There is no place better than Friendly's for that sort of thing.

Episode 49: Not my proudest parenting moment

As I have become more experienced with this parenting thing the follies and mistakes have become few and far between. A fall here and there, maybe a bottle or some lunch that is too hot, but for the most part I would like to think I have been pretty successful thus far. Unfortunately, I think I may have cost myself the 'Father of the Year' award yesterday.

I'll precede this story with a little bit of background. Our apartment, although very nice on the inside, is, in fact, located in the ghetto. This means that there are more than a few adverse things that we have to deal with on a daily basis. One of these things is an absentee landlord who lives in California and does literally nothing to improve the apartment. She just collects the rent and pretends we don't exist. When we moved in we had to paint, replace all of the window fixtures and replace most of the light bulbs. Our fridge broke this summer and it took two weeks to get a new one. Yeah. It's like that.

As a result, there are several minor problems with the apartment that we have not been able to take care of. Our bathtub leaks, our toilet is partially made of wood and we have the most deplorable, dangerous gas stove in America. In addition, for some reason we only have keys for about half of the locks on our doors. The back door to our apartment has three different dead bolts on it, but only one of them works- and we don't have a key for it. Our front door has a lock and a dead bolt, but we only have a key for the lock. Not the dead bolt. To make matters worse, we don't have keys to the back door on the first floor that lets us in to our stairwell or a key to the door that lets us in to the basement from outside. You can see where this is going.

Yesterday morning we were going about our normal routine. The baby had just eaten breakfast and was watching one of her videos while I was cleaning up and doing the dishes from the night before. This literally happens every day. She had taken a dump that morning and I had just cleaned the cat box, so rather than leave the trash in the back hall way like I normally would, I decided to take it out right away and put it in the out door trash barrel. I grabbed my coat and my keys and went downstairs. I left the bolt on my back door unlocked and the back door to the hallway wide open to ensure that I could get back in. This is not a long trip. One flight of stairs and five steps to the trash can. I brought the trash to the barrel and was walking back up the stairs to the door when a gust of wind blew it shut- just out of my reach.

I turned the knob, only to realize it was locked. Dammit. I knew deep down that the dead bolt on the front door was still locked but I decided to try it anyway. I was right. Uh oh. I frantically tried all of my keys on both doors. None of them worked. This is how I learned that the cellar door was locked as well.

I will admit that this was not the first time I had locked myself out of the house. I did the exact same thing about a month ago, but that time I was by myself and I did not have my keys. I was let in by my neighbor after just a few minutes. No such luck this time.

Now furious at my landlord and the Realtor that gave us the keys, I walked back to the front door and thought to myself 'The back door lock is held together with one screw. I have to be able to break in to my own house.'Nope.

I spent the next 10 minutes trying to break the lock to no avail. Now, at this point it is important to note that I was able to pry the door open enough to see the baby. She was calmly sitting in her seat, strapped in, in no danger. I knew I had about 15 minutes before the video ended, so the race was on.

I kept trying to get in through various methods, but I just couldn't get the door to budge. I was covered in sweat, extremely pissed off and pondering what would be cheaper to fix, the door if I broke it down or a basement window if I kicked it in and climbed down.

It is also important to note that when I had initially locked myself out I knocked on my downstairs neighbor's door right away with no luck. I went down and tried it again after failing at breaking the lock. Still nothing. I knew their kids were in school and their car was not there, so I assumed they were in work, or at class or something. Ha.

I was at the end of my rope and beginning to panic, ready to flag down a passing motorist to call a locksmith when I heard my neighbor open her door. I sprinted down the stairs only to see her quickly shut it when she saw me. I yelled 'HEY! HEY! (Neighbor) I need your help!' Visibly pissed she opened the door, groggy and wearing pajamas, and looked at me. She did not speak.

'I don't have a key to my dead bolt and I am locked out. Do you mind just unlocking that back door so I can get in?'

(Audible sigh) 'Ok.' Slams the door.

Wow. Ok. Really? I get that I may have woke you up and I get that you are lazy and anti-social and hide in your apartment when other people are around, but you know that I have a baby upstairs and you know that the back door is locked. Give me a break.

She unlocked the back door and went back inside before I had time to walk around the house, so I did not get a chance to thank her. Not that I was really that in to it at all anyway. I went back upstairs and the baby was clueless as to what had gone on and only a little upset because her video had ended and she wanted to get out of the chair.

So, there was a happy ending. No one got hurt, I didn't have to break down the door. Everything was cool, right? Wrong. For some reason for the rest of the day I could not shake the feeling that I had narrowly avoided disaster. What would I have done if the neighbor wasn't home? How does someone do something so dumb? Not a good moment on my parenting permanent record.

I also felt kind of bad for waking up the neighbor, as she was clearly not a happy woman because of it. You know what though? She deserves it. The woman does not have a job. Does not go to school more than a night or two a week. When her kids are home she makes a ton of noise and when they aren't she stays inside all day getting stoned and listening to Radiohead (something I used to do when I was like 22. She is at least 32). So sorry to interrupt. Proceed.

Anyway, calling the Realtor and getting more keys is now on my short list of things to do- although I doubt she will call me back. Just like with the fridge. That means it is time to call the slumlord in California, and you had better be damn sure that I'll 'forget' about that three hour time difference too.

Episode 48: What the hell is going on at the post office?

So, winter is still here and I hear it is supposed to keep coming with another four inches of snow tomorrow. This is not just affecting my mood at this point, it is making me down right miserable. I pace around the house, make up excuses to leave and go to the store. I am going utterly stir crazy.

The baby has been keeping me busy in the house now that she can fully walk around without holding on to anything. She is entertaining as hell but boy, is she a hand full. She is at a good height now to open up drawers and take things out and she has almost figured out how to open the fridge by herself. One cool thing that she does is run over and try to use the computer whenever either one of us is on it. This is cute, except for the fact that she just hammers on the keyboard and yells. As I look down now I see that the shift key and right arrow key are completely missing, and the 'N' button sticks, creating mistakes throughout every document that I type. (and you all know I do nothing but type documents all day).

Anyway, the weather has me at the end of my rope, but there is another source of frustration in my life that has completely trumped that lately. The U.S. Postal Service. There are a variety of organizations and businesses whom I have both had it out with and, in some cases, eventually boycotted. Phone battles include incidents with Comcast, the YMCA and T-Mobile, but the real vicious shouting matches and eventual boycotts came after conflicts with Ticketmaster and Eastern Bank. Like most people, I just don't like incompetence or corporations trying to rip me off. If Ticketmaster were a person, I'd be in jail. Probably for a while. That's all I'll say.

Putting those incidents aside for a moment, I have always been a loyal user of the USPS. Sure it takes a little bit longer and stamps seem like an outdated way of doing business, but they have always been reliable and there is something about paying bills online that I just don't trust. I have never owned a computer that hasn't completely failed on me at one point in time or another. I find the USPS to be a good alternative. I mean, what else do you know is going to happen every day no matter what- unless it is Sunday or a holiday? The mail is going to be there and be picked up whether rain, sleet or snow, or however their little motto goes. At least that is what I thought.

The problems first started in September. We had been living here for about three or four months and I hadn't noticed anything different about the mail other than the fact that it was delivered much later in the day than I was used to. The first incident happened when my mother mailed me tickets to a football game. She had sent them about two weeks early, but the game was quickly approaching and they still hadn't arrived. Without boring you with the details, a series of phone calls followed, the mail man at one point actually refused to go look for the package, and eventually the tickets arrived the day before the game in a tattered, wet envelope with a note that said 'some of your goods may have been damaged in transit.'

At this point I began to notice that my mail man was potentially worse at his job than anyone else in America. He arrives at 5 p.m. every day, despite the fact that I routinely see him starting his route around 8:30 a.m. just a few streets away. I still get mail for the woman who used to live here despite having told him 2-300 times that she does not live here any more, not to mention all of the mail I get for the people downstairs. The mail boxes are right next to each other and our names are on them. How do you mess that up?

The mail continued to arrive this way for some time, but the bills and things that I really needed were still showing up, so for the most part I let it go. Next came late December. The trouble bean around Christmas when a package I had ordered for Monica never arrived. I tracked it and the Internet told me it was delivered by the USPS so, of course, I had to call the USPS' 1-800 number. I spoke to a useless woman who was no help and eventually had to file a claim with the company I ordered from to have the gift replaced. That was just the beginning of the problems, too.

I have been living in Salem or the surrounding area for about seven years now, so I have a pretty good idea of the local utilities and when the bills are delivered each month. I like to stay on top of things. No one likes having a childhood memory of having the lights turned off.
Last month I noticed that the cable bill was not delivered at the end of the month like it was supposed to be. At about the same time, Comcast mistakenly turned off my cable (this was a whole different conflict that involved me yelling on the phone a few times as well). This was not because I hadn't paid, but during the two-week process of getting my service back to normal I realized that my payment was past due and I hadn't received the bill. I took care of the issue and paid it over the phone. Three days later, on January 10, my Comcast bill arrived. Due date: January 3.

It was at this point that I decided to confront the mail man again. I was nice and I simply said something like 'excuse me, I was just curious about something.' and then told him the Comcast story. His response? 'I don't sort it, I just deliver it.' I contained my anger until I went inside and called the 1-800 number for the postal service (which at this point, I almost know by heart) and filed my second complaint against the mail man ( the first coming after he refused to look for my tickets). In retrospect, it may not be a good idea to file complaints against the man who is in charge of my mail, but since the USPS is a government agency, there is no accountability anywhere.

Speaking to the woman was again useless and I left the phone conversation more aggravated than before. Infuriated, I started to think that perhaps the problem is not with the mail man and is with the USPS in general. Case and point. Late last month I went to the mail box to mail a large pile of letters. There were about 20-25 invites to the baby's birthday party and a few bills, including my electric bill.

I didn't think anything of it until yesterday when my new electric bill came and claimed that I did not pay last month. Mad at myself for being such an idiot and forgetting, I went in search of the bill, only to found that the stub had been ripped as if it were paid. Hmm. More investigating found that check numbers 250, 251, 253, 254 and 255 had been cashed, meaning that check 252 was missing. The electric bill check. Then I started to think back and I distinctly remember where and when I mailed this stuff. To make matters worse, I asked Monica if all of the invites had arrived, and she said no and that there were several people who id not get the invites or had them delivered much later than everyone else. One of them postmarked twice.

This is the crap that I have to deal with on a daily basis. I have no idea what to do. I have spoken to other people on my street who have had similar problems, but there is seemingly no solution because, as I mentioned before, the USPS is run by the government. This makes it both incompetent and corrupt by nature.

So, if there are any bill collectors out there looking for money, or anyone expecting a card or invite, blame the mail man. That is what I am doing. All of this frustration is going to boil over soon. My 1-year-old is more able to understand things and get things done than most people I encounter during the day, and those people are at work. Sad.

Episode 47: The soy sauce incident

I have had writer's block something fierce lately, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense because this kid has really been running me around and keeping me entertained since she has figured out how to walk. She still can't stroll around too independently, but she will do it just enough for me to have to stay two steps behind her at all times, and we spend a large part of our day strolling around the house with her holding my hand, grabbing on to stuff and stumbling like she'd been drinking since 6 a.m. Maybe it isn't writer's block. Maybe I am just dead tired.

Even with all of her new found tricks, the days have become more mundane as we have settled back in to a routine post-holidays. Most days consist of the wake-up, eat breakfast, nap, go to the store, eat lunch and then play for five straight hours routine. Damn winter is killing us. What we both wouldn't give to be able to walk to the park and get out of each other's personal space for a half hour.

Well, if it is excitement I am looking for I definitely found it yesterday as I had my very first injury scare as a stay at home dad. (Four months in isn't bad, if you ask me.) I think every parent can think back to a few times they had to deal with disaster. I remember my parents talking about the time I fell down the stairs and landed on my head as a baby, or the time I got the pea lodged in my nose only to sneeze it out on the way to the emergency room, and of course, the time I shattered my nose sledding and required reconstructive facial surgery. Yeah, that was a cool one. Luckily for me, aside from a few clumsy falls and head bumps, we have been able to avoid any real incidents so far with Av. So far.

In retrospect, yesterday's accident was not nearly as bad as I thought at first, but I'll tell the story anyway because there was a solid 10 minutes where I really felt like the most incompetent parent ever.

The problems started when I was cleaning the kitchen after we had eaten lunch. Nothing major, just some tidying up. Of course, throughout the process the baby was walking around at my feet trying to help. She likes to carry the broom around the kitchen now and pretend she is doing the sweeping. It is pretty adorable, I must say, although she will only do it with the real broom, not her toy broom, Tempo, which is a bit aggravating when you are actually trying to clean. Especially when she walks through the pile of dirt and proceeds to sweep it back in to a mess on the floor.

In any event, we had finished up sweeping and were going to go play and I realized that it was bottle time. She was getting a bit cranky so I was hoping for a bottle/ nap afternoon combo and opened the fridge to get her formula out.

As most of you know, this kid loves the fridge, so as soon as I opened the door she did her little drunk Frankenstein run and excitedly started grabbing at things. This is par for the course when you open up the fridge door, so my job became to make sure that she didn't grab anything heavy, dangerous or spicy and try to put it in her mouth. Since I am a full six feet taller than her, it is tough to keep a handle on her when we are both standing up and she is holding on to my legs, so I had all I could handle taking things out of her hands while I searched for the formula.

As the grabbing and pulling continued, she managed to knock over a few bottles of water, prompting me to bend over and pick them up. That, my friends, was an ill advised move. As soon as I bent over I heard several things fall in the fridge like dominoes, followed by a second crash and some crying. I looked up to find a jar of soy sauce with no top emptying all over the fridge, a can of Coke dented and rolling across the floor and the formula that I was attempting to find spilled at her feet. To make matters worse she now has a huge cut under her right eye and smells like leftover Crab Rangoon.

Here is what my investigative team has pieced together. While I was bending over to get the water, the baby pulled on something- believed to be yogurt- that was located in the middle of the second shelf behind several things, including the soy sauce. The pulling triggered the domino effect, knocking the can of Coke off of the shelf and in to the baby' face. When the Coke fell it hit the soy sauce, breaking off the top and spilling it everywhere, along with the formula.

Of course, I panicked when I saw the cut, as her eyes were squinted and she was crying.
"Great, now she has soy sauce in her eyes and a cut under her eye that is bleeding," I thought. "This is not going to be a fun trip to the ER, and it will be an even less fun call to make to Mom once we get there."

Luckily for me, Av took the hit pretty well. After I embraced her and cuddled her for a minute the crying stopped and I realized that the soy sauce was not, in fact in her eyes. The cut was smaller than it looked at first, although she does have a shiner now, but nothing to be too concerned about. I think the worst part of the situation was probably that I had to take out and wash two shelves and a drawer from the fridge and that I got soy sauce all over the only white sweater that I own.

After a bath and a bottle the baby was just fine. The kitchen still smells like soy sauce, though. I am sure this will be far from the last time that I have a 'shit, we are going to have to go to the ER' scare but it is the first one and we made it through with out having to explain what happened to a judgmental nurse. I think that is worth documenting.