Episode 134: Two hours at Monkey Joe's

We go to Monkey Joe's all the time. Like, once a week usually. Unless there is a blizzard, which there has been about every day this winter so far. But we still manage to make it over there enough. Never in my entire Monkey Joehood have I had the pleasure of spending two solid hours there, and I hope that I never will again.

Maybe it was her cabin fever, or maybe she was just having a really good time, but Av didn't want to leave today. I don't blame her, really, it isn't like we had anything else to do. The point is that a lot can happen in two hours when you are trapped inside a 100 square foot carpeted warehouse filled with giant inflatable mazes. And a lot happened, indeed.

The MJ's trip actually got off to such a poor start that it looked like we were 10 minutes and done, but somehow we managed to rally. Av decided that she was going to try out one of the bigger kid apparatus, which I supported given her lack of coordination and ability to tackle challenges with confidence. I figured she could handle the big guy thing and everything would be ok. We were good for a while until she decided that she wanted to go in to what she called the 'house' but was really just a long tube that led to a maze that led out the other side. In order to get to the 'house' she had to climb over some tiny inflated squares that were tightly placed together. In other words, they were impassable unless she scaled them. Getting over the tiny squares went surprisingly well, but when she realized she wasn't tall enough to climb in to the house panic set in. Disappointed and a little tired she turned around and tried to go back, but for some reason felt like she was trapped.

For some unknown reason this time she decided that she didn't have it in her to scale the inflated cubes and she decided she was going to wedge herself through them. Of course, she got stuck. Keep in mind that I am watching this through a mesh window. I can't help her as I have no way of physically getting to her unless I climb in to the maze myself from the other side, a strict no-no at MJ's. She started to cry when she realized I couldn't help her and I thought for sure I was going to have to go get the 'referee' to come get her out. But then I remembered that she made it over to that side herself, so I wasn't going to let her give up. Like Mick training Rocky I encouraged her through her tears and her unwillingness to scale the cubes. She was literally stuck and crying for over 10 minutes, no exaggeration. I somehow stayed supportive and didn't let the fact that she was making a scene bother me. 10 minutes. 10. She was stuck on the cubes crying for 10 minutes. She finally got over them, fell flat on her face and struggled to get out, snot running down her face and tears in her eyes. I thought we were done. But as she emerged from the apparatus she greeted me simply with 'Hi Daddy!' and ran over to another one that she had never been in before. Confused, yet proud, I wiped her nose and we went on our way.

We were having a fun time in the new, yet less challenging bouncer for some time when some other kids decided to come up. Most of you are aware that other people's children are my worst nightmare. I don't like associating with them, I don't like befriending them and I certainly don't like it when I have to touch them. Unfortunately for me, I appeared to be the only adult adhering to MJ's 'adult supervision' rule, and the entrance to this particular apparatus was very slippery.

It started with one polite little boy who was struggling to get up. Her turned to me and said, very nicely, "Hi. Can you help me?" So I looked around, saw that it was cool and gave him a boost. This opened up the flood waters. For the next five minutes I became the designated booster of small children in to the bouncy thing. Sweet. I was just waiting for the moms to start scolding me. Luckily for me, none of them were paying any attention anyway.

It was at or about this time that Av made a friend. A real life, met at MJ's friend. This girl was probably three or four, a little busted, kind of chubby with a purple sweat suit and Ramen Noodle hair. Yes, I am aware that the previous sentence is extremely mean, especially when referring to a toddler. No, I don't care. I know that this girl and Av were 'friends' because the girl told me, several times, and then gave Av a hug. The hug was very sweet. The first time.

The girl followed Av around for a bit, talking her ear off, apparently not noticing that she was a 2-year-old who only puts together sentence fragments. Av seemed ok enough with her, so it was cool but the hugging. Oh, the hugging was constant. After a bit I started to look around for this one's mother. At one point another lady asked her where her mother was because she wanted a lift to the water fountain. She pointed to a bench where an old woman was seated and said, 'That's Grandma."

Now, I am sure that Grandma was very nice, but she looked like Mac's mom on It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.
She was wearing a hoodless sweatshirt, wind pants, sketchers and a permanent scowl. She never spoke, but I imagine if she did she would have sounded like she swallowed a box of nails in the back room of a cigar shop. Again, could have been the nicest lady in the world, but that is what she looked like.

Av and the other girl frolicked around for a bit, having fun. Tom Petty's 'In to the Great Wide Open' started playing as they bounced around and laughed and it seemed eerily appropriate. Everyone was having a good time.



Then the hugging went to far. It was borderline toddler sexual assault, actually. Every time someone would come over to play the little girl would grab Av, squeeze her in a bear hug and say she is MY friend. It reminded me of those commercials warning teenagers not to date controlling dudes who text you all day (yeah, because it is always the teenage dude who is the crazy possessive one, right? Have these people ever BEEN to a high school?). The final straw was when the little girl went to give Av a kiss. Av turned away, the girl grabbed her arm and pulled her, kissing the first available place on my struggling daughter. Humorously enough, this was on her giant, diaper- effect bubble ass because Av was in the process of diving in to the fetal position to ward off the advances.

It was at this point that Av turned to be and said 'bye bye Monkey Joe's" and made me pick her up. I said to the little girl "It was nice meeting you, but we have to go now." She ran over to her grandmother and she was gone. Then Av said "No home? Monkey Joe's?" and I realized that her 2-year-old brain just formulated a lie to get out of an uncomfortable situation. This makes me proud, again. I will feel slightly more comfortable when she goes to high school.

As time went on I started to feel a little bad for the other kid, who clearly lacks affection and friendship. Still, no one goes to MJ's to make out on the toddler bounce, so she needs to back off.

The stay was smooth from there and we briefly encountered the rapist again on the carousel, but everything was under control there. Hard to hug when you are spinning on a horse.

Episode 133: Living with Rain Man

It's snowing again, which means I am again destined to spend the next few days inside the house, with no relief in sight, trying to entertain a 2-year-old. Every day Av does or says something new, and as her personality begins to take shape she has really become quite a character. I have always found her to be quite funny, but lately she has really been cracking me up. It is a good thing, too, because she has also started to drive me crazy. Like literally insane. Some days I just want to lock myself in an empty room.

See, she does this thing now- which I am told is completely normal- where she just constantly repeats words over and over and over again, and she usually won't stop until you repeat it back to her, and sometimes that doesn't even help. She is getting much better at speaking, so she can now form sentences, like when she hears a dog outside and says 'Do you hear that doggy?" Over and over and over again. Yes, it is adorable, but often times there is no doggy. Sometimes she just makes it up. She also does it with other things. "Do you hear that car?" Do you hear that noise?" and my personal favorite, "Do you hear that fire?" which she says ever time she hears a siren or sees a fire truck. This is all very adorable, at first. After a while, it becomes irritating. Extremely, extremely irritating. The worst is when she starts saying words that you can't understand. Then it becomes a battle of me trying to decipher the word and repeat it correctly, and her getting angry when I cannot. This happens at least once, usually more, every single day.

Like I said, this is one of her very cute traits. When she says certain things it is just hilarious. But it can get intolerable at times, too. Another thing is that she has not figured out how to say 'yes'. She just says 'OK' to everything. So, most mornings go something like this.

Me: 'DO you want some breakfast?"

Av: "Ok. Peanut butter toast?"

Me: "Ok, you want some peanut butter toast?"

Av: "No"

Me: "Ok, what do you want? Cereal? A banana? Peanut butter toast?"

Av: "Toast?

Me "Ok, toast."

Av: "Ok."

Me: DO you want peanut butter toast?

Av: "No"

Me "What do you want on your toast?"

Av: "Peanut butter? Ok. Peanut butter."

Me: Peanut butter toast?"

Av: "Ok."

Yeah. That is just about every morning. She always wants peanut butter toast. Except for when she doesn't, and then the battle is on again.

She appears to be very smart, but I am worried about her coordination and her social skills. Sometimes she acts retarded, especially around other kids her age. She has problems with falling over, handling stairs and walking in to things. I think this is because she is freakishly large for her age, but it is still troubling. Like when she gets passed by kids smaller than her trying to climb up the foam stairs at Monkey Joe's. She will never be able to climb those stairs. I'm convinced. She also has a terrible time listening to and following directions, which she does pretty much never. This creates problems at home but even more problems at dance class, where she has already been moved from ballet to tap for not following directions. (Personally, I think it is absolutely absurd to expect a 2-year-old to stand in a line and follow dance directions. All she wants to do is wear a tu tu and jump around. But, hey, I'm not a snobby dance teacher. What do I know?) In any event, Av is either brilliant or retarded. Or both. Like an idiot savant.

One thing that we have managed to avoid for the most part is any sort of sick dependency on a binkie or blankie or toy of any kind. She has always had her favorites, but there has never really been any one toy that she has obsessed over to the point that it is a problem.

This is hand cat.


Hand cat comes from Ikea and has been buried under a pile of toys for probably a year. It was unearthed a few weeks ago and has since become her new best friend. When she isn't making one of us ear it on our hand, she is carrying him around or asking where he is. Last night she wouldn't go to sleep without him. I don't really see anything wrong with hand cat, but he is kind of creepy and now he always has his nose in on everything. He is always around, always seeing everything. Always involved. Weird. The creepiest part is that she gets some sort of sick sensational pleasure from rubbing hand cat on her face. Like she is on drugs or something. We are now officially at the point where Monica has decided to purchase a backup hand cat just in case something happens to the first one. I guess we made it this far...

If anyone out there is wondering what the exact definition of "comedy" is, this is a video example. Forget that it is for kids and just enjoy the pure, innocent, primal humor throughout. I promise you that if you forget your age this will be the best part of your day.

Episode 132: Child supervision is not optional

Av and I have been spending a lot of time at Monkey Joe's this winter, mostly because there is no real opportunity to go outside and have fun when it is 27 degrees out and windy, which it has pretty much been here every day since December started. At least that is how it feels. Anyway, the indoor inflatable play place has been a blessing for us and Av is starting to put together a little more gumption and vary away from the toddler apparatus on to the big girl jumps. Putting aside the fact that she has little to no coordination and completely lacks the ability to climb a set of plastic, inflated stairs, the new bravery is a pretty good thing. Especially since there was a time that she would break down in tears every time she wandered too closely to another human being.

There is something going on at Monkey Joe's, and I suspect a lot of other places, too, that is disturbing to me. That is the rampant, inappropriate use of Facebook, specifically by parents who should be paying attention to their kids. It is a fact that over 80 percent of Americans, myself included, use Facebook way, way too much. It is a toxic waste of a website that is flooding the minds of Americans with trash, invading our privacy, exposing our flaws and entertaining the crap out of anyone who likes to stalk people they used to make fun of in high school. It ruins relationships, costs people jobs and, on more than one occasion, has brightened my day when someone whose life is exponentially more miserable than mine makes that fact known for all of his friends to see. There is money to be made from Facebook and I will make that money some day, probably by exposing these very same, whiny, pathetic individuals who spill their tragic lives in their status updates on a daily basis. This is not the issue that I am speaking of. The issue that I am speaking of involves caddy moms and their attachment to a social life that no longer exists.

Today at Monkey Joe's the place was very busy. Apparently a lot of people had Friday off this week, I don't know. There were kids everywhere and just as many parents. The nice folks at MJ's as a courtesy provide two free computers for parents to use while their kids arr playing. I like to think that these parents are using the computers to send timely emails or at the very least, casually web surf for celebrity gossip. Apparently, I was giving society too much credit- again. Today i was disturbed to find moms just lazily sitting around, chatting, not paying any attention to their kids or even their basic surroundings. Meanwhile the rambunctious little bastards were running each other over in the aisles and leaping off of apparatus and fighting over balloons.

About 10 minutes in to our stay I heard a child crying and then watched in horror as he ran over to his mom, who was sitting at one of the computers, and was immediately ignored. Annoyed, the mother eventually looked up and meanly asked what was wrong. What was on her screen? Facebook. Not just Facebook, but her Facebook page, complete with slutty profile photo and two, yes two, active chats going. I looked over to the computer next to her and saw the same thing, only this mom's picture was slightly less slutty.

First off, I don't remember the last Facebook chat that I had. Chances are it was unprompted and I was annoyed when I got it. Second, even if I did have all of these friends in the multimedia world, I would have the common decency to wait on the gossip until after my kid left Monkey Joe's. You know, so she didn't have to run over to me crying. And what is with the slutty photos? I know that a lot of people look pretty slutty on Facebook, but you are a mom. With an at least 3-year-old kid. Who are you trying to turn on?

Look, I am all for trying to rediscover your youth or getting back in the dating game if you are a single mom. Go for it. But for Christ sake, go easy on the Facebook. I mean, your kid just took a header off of a giant inflatable monkey and you are annoyed that he interrupted your Facebook chat? Come on, lady.

In which I return to my old life

A year and a half ago when I left my job as a newspaper reporter I vowed never to return to that life of snooping, harassing phone calls and stressing over deadlines. Then somewhere along the way I realized that writing and reporting were pretty much my only skills, so something had to give. About a month ago news came down that the bar I work at would be closing for close to a month, maybe longer, for renovations. Aside from a few shifts at other locations, we would all be headed to the poor house. So, with that in mind and my savings account begging me not to drain it, I reluctantly re-entered the world of reporting.

Yesterday I became potentially the most overqualified person to ever interview for a job, forgetting my previous vows and passing along my experienced resume for a freelance position with AOL Patch, a new online newspaper that exists in several communities throughout Massachusetts, the east coast and other well-populated areas of the country. I will be covering the same community that I did when I first started my full time job at the Item. I will essentially be writing the same stories on a contract basis. Basically, I will be using my kick ass resume to overachieve at a job usually reserved for college graduates. I despise the fact that I just typed that sentence.

Yes, overall I don't care for the stress of reporting, and yes, I am selling my soul to the future working for an Internet only publication. But I am happy to have the position, and so is the editor, who appears relieved that I know what I am doing. At the same time, I am not happy to be thrown back in to the world of reporting. The opportunity is great, the company has room for advancement and I need money. So I'm going to make the best of it. So far on my first day I have called 13 different people for comment on two stories. I have heard back from exactly two. Ahhh, life as a reporter. At least now I don't have to space out in front of a computer screen for six hours a day or deal with the crazy custodian singing Foreigner songs while he empties my trash. I can just play blocks with my kid and work when I need to. We'll see how long until I start to lose it. I hope it is a long time, because I don't think I am going to win the lottery any time soon, and I am probably going to get too old for this bar tending thing before too long.

I am in the process of deciding which head shot I should add to the website. OUCH! Technology is starting to beat the shit out of me already.

Episode 131: You're not allergic to mushrooms

As a child and later a pre-teen/ teenager, I have always been plagued by allergies. I had inhalers, nose sprays, pills and syrups. I always had a runny nose and just about every January from the ages of 7-17 I would get a sinus infection, complete with green mucus. As many of you can imagine, I was not exactly ruling school at that point in my life anyway, and being the kid with allergies and a perpetual runny nose did nothing to help me.

At or around the age of 15 my parents finally sent me to an allergy specific doctor and I underwent a test. I am not sure if anyone out there has ever had an allergy test before, but it is rough. They essentially take needles and inject a small sampling of everything you can imagine in to your arms and back. You get something like 30 shots, which makes for 30 track marks all over your arms and back. Once the shots are given, you go home, don't shower for two days and come back. If an injection area is irritated after two days you are allergic to that thing. Well, my test results came back positive. For, like, all of them. Trees, grass, pollen, dust, dogs, cats, leaves... pretty much whatever I was tested for I was allergic to. I am pretty sure that I am allergic to air. The good news was that I managed to avoid any food allergies, with the exception of one. Because I tested positive for a fungus allergy, the doctor said it was best not to eat mushrooms. Fine, cool. I hate mushrooms anyway. Well, at the time of the test my mother was very skeptical. Since we had both a dog and a cat and I spent most of my childhood outdoors amongst the trees and grass she assumed that the test was bogus, not keeping in mind that through all of this I have been suffering from horrible allergies.

Also during this time I was waging a war against broccoli. As a child, and still for the most part today, I hated broccoli. It is just a shitty vegetable, hands down. As a result, I would often lie to people who tried to feed me broccoli and tell them I was allergic to it. I was not. My mother knew I was lying but never really tried to get me to eat it because it was futile anyway. Anyway, because of the broccoli incident no one believed that I was also allergic to mushrooms. No one really tried to get me to eat them, but whenever I pointed it out I would get an eye roll. I tell you all for a reason.

My mother and sister made the annual pilgrimage to my apartment from Western Mass over the weekend. Monica put together a homemade chicken pot pie for the occasion, one of my favorites. I mean, really, who doesn't like chicken pot pie? I was eating the pie when I found what I believed to be a mushroom and calmly asked Monica if there were any in the pie. Now, I have not actually knowingly consumed a mushroom since finding out I was allergic. On a few occasions I ended up getting sick after eating some things that my or may not have had mushrooms in them, but it was unconfirmed as to whether or not that was the cause. When I asked about the mushroom at the table I was, like always, ridiculed and made to look like a faker which, admittedly, is kind of my own fault because of the multi-decade broccoli scam. Monica said there were no mushrooms and wee moved on. Long story short, I killed like three more pieces of pot pie and finished my day normal.

The next morning I woke up and wondered why the hell I was so itchy. A brief examination determined that I had hives covering my arms. It quickly spread throughout my body until I was almost completely covered. I was the itchiest person alive and I didn't feel all that well.
I started to think about what it could be and got all sorts of paranoid. At one point I was positive that a spider had laid eggs in my wrist that eventually hatched and were now eating my skin from the inside out. Another time I got out of the shower and started to fear that my eyes were swelling shut. In reality, I just had some sort of dust particle in my eye and it was twitching. As the hives continued to get worse I went to CVS and got some Benadryl in the hopes that it would do the job. I don't know if any of you have ever taken Benadryl before, but it isn't pretty. It zonks you out and makes you jittery at the same time. Because nothing is more fun that being uncontrollably tired and shaking with cold sweats at the same time. This must be what it is like doing meth.

I again asked Monica about the mushrooms and she again denied it, although she was not very convincing the second time around.

"If there were, I picked them out." Great. I totally ate a mushroom. Sure enough, when I made her read the ingredients there were mushrooms in the veggie mix she used. Now does everyone believe me?

The best part of my whole experience was that yesterday afternoon was the day that Monica and I were forced to take three giant loads of laundry to the laundromat because out washing machine has broken. Per usual, our California slumlord is not getting back to us regarding the situation, just like with the fire alarms, so we have to go mingle with college kids, single people and struggling old people again. Just like the old days. Great. Standing in a crowded laundromat for two hours when it is 28 degrees out and your entire body is covered in hives may be one of the worst experiences of my life. happy 2011. I can see nothing is going to change here.

Speaking of 2011, I hope that all of you had a lovely, festive New Years Eve. When you have a kid your party options are pretty much nonexistent so I decided that I would work the night and try to make a little money. The night at work was uneventful and there were only three people still in the restaurant when Dick Clark's paralyzed, wax-looking face counted us down from midnight. At least they didn't make the poor bastard start at 20 like they did last year.

A coworker of mine and myself were stuck at work late putting away new stuff that we were adding to the menu for 2011 and left around 2. I waled in the parking garage with my friend, hit my remote to unlock my doors and heard someone yell "Oh, fuck, dude."

I turned the corner to find three dudes standing in front of my car and a girl who looked like she was about to die slumped against the wall. " I told you someone was going to show up!"

We walked up to the car kind of half ready for a fight and one of the panicked kids explained that he and his friends were "Just going to blow a couple of lines and get out of the way." I looked at my hood- my dirty, dust, snow, salt, sand and parking garage roof drip-covered hood and saw a pile of cocaine. "You want some?" The kid asked.

"Dude, no. I don't want any."

"Are you pissed? We'll get out of here.

"No, dude, I'm not pissed. You already have your cocaine out on my hood. Just do it and get the hell out of here so I can go home, OK?"

"Dude, that's so awesome!"

Yeah, I'm awesome. happy new year. I hope that road salt is easy on your nostrils. Like, seriously? It is New Years Eve and your partying, I get that. If you want to do cocaine all night, get no sleep and feel like you want to kill yourself in about 8 hours go for it. More power to you. I don't care, but at least have enough dignity to do it indoors. Or maybe off the hood of your own car. Thanks. Again, happy 2011. It really isn't shaping up to be the greatest year. At least not judging from the broken appliances, hives and potential arrests for being an accessory to elicit drug use in a parking garage. Go team!

As for the baby, she has a house full of toys and continues to be spoiled by someone on a weekly basis. My New Years resolution is to update the blog more. Stick with me.

This is the baby's favorite song. Completely inexplicable, yet hilarious. It is a decent song, but nothing about it stands out. It is pretty much on my iPod by mistake. If you saw the dance she does in the back seat you would never delete it, either.