Let's hope he/she isn't a mommy/daddy

I think I have a new nemesis. The slightly androgynous, but mostly female, bagger at the new grocery store. Two days in a row she has asked about The Princess.

Yesterday went something like this:
"How old is he? 10?"
"Who? HER? She is 3!"
"Wow, she is big. What grade is he in?"
"That is OK. I'll carry the groceries out myself."


Today's trip did not start off any closer to reality, even though The Princess was wearing enough pink to camouflage herself at a Victoria's Secret. You just can't see the pink pants, pink socks or pink and white shoes in this pic...

The carryout person started off strong, but wrong. "So he is 3, huh?"
"Yep. SHE is 3."
"Oh he is a girl?"
"No, it is fine. I can carry out my own groceries."


After this exchange, I am assuming this person at the store is an expert in confusing gender roles. Thus the dangling earrings and hiking boots he/she wears.

Strike two - Yer OUT!

So the dealership should have delivered my car this morning. But I was still waiting on a call from them at 9:15. So we took the loaner car back to the dealership.

I did tell the service manager that they could help make things right by hooking me up with a free oil change or a detail job. He offered up two oil changes.

See what happens...

I was all ready to abandon this blog. Then I took my car to the shop. No I will have fodder for this site for years.

The back story:

Wife comes in Wednesday and lets me know that the low coolant light is on in my new car. My Saturn Vue is 7 or 8 months old, but it only has 7300 miles on it. It has also had a problem with the ignition key and a couple of other minor things, so we ran up to the dealership, less than 2 miles away.

No problem there.

But all hell sorta broke loose when I went to pick the car up yesterday afternoon. The service writer called at 3 to say it was ready. The wife got in about 5 and we went straight to the dealership.

I wasn't very happy when I saw that some of the work the writer said had been done, was not noted on the service receipt. So I assume that work wasn't done. It wasn't a major deal, but don't lie about it.

Then it took them almost 30 minutes to deliver the car from the back lot. GRRRRRR.

When I hopped in to drive home, I made it less than halfway off of the dealership lot when the coolant light came on. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

The service manager dicked around with it in the driveway for a few minutes before he finally sent it back to a mechanic. 30 minutes later and they came to show me that they had accidentally sliced the wiring on the coolant sensor when they had installed a new coolant reservoir. So they were splicing the wires back together. And I would be out of there "in 10 minutes".

I told the service manager that I understood about the repair, but I wasn't happy. The car has 7300 miles on it. And now it has a patched wiring system. GRRRRR.

30 minutes later GRRRRRRRRRRRR! they offer me a loaner car. When I go to pick up the kid's car seats out of my car, they guy is rushing to finish the repair. I grab the car seats and pull up front again.

The service manager tells me he wants to test my car out in the morning and they will bring it to me to swap out cars. So I took the loaner car home. GRRRR.

ADHDaddy - nothing new to say

But I am not going to retire this blog just yet. Mainly because I don't want you to have it.

I knew a SAHD who deleted his blog and blogger account. Within a day or two someone had taken his blog site name and URL listing. So those of us who did not know he had canned his blog thought he was suddenly linking to a little too much p()rn to be doing anyone much good.

So I won't delete this drivel, mainly because it gets a few hits once on a while. And I don't want someone else thinking that I have gone into the p()rn link referral bidness.

Anyways, I might need to come back to bitch later. That is the great thing about New Years. So many possibilities before us...

By the way, if you care to know, the new grocery store rules. The old ones can all suck it.

Grocery woes

I am officially ready for our newest neighborhood grocery store to open. The girl and I needed to make a quick run this morning to our usual store. We hit the doors at the crack of 10:15 am. Yeah, early risers, we are.

Anyways, the store looked like a WalMart at 3 am. You know, pallets and carts of groceries blocking every aisle. It did not take me long to decide that this store isn't really needing my business today.

Still, I was not wanting to make another grocery run later today. So we compromised. I put back everything that was not essential. Milk, nanners, Dr Pepper. The rest of the stuff in my cart went into a pile in the middle of the cereal aisle. We did not really need the beer, chips, salsa or other goodies.

Cashier saw me and asked why I pulled everything out of the cart. Honesty is the best policy, right? So I told him "There is so much junk piled up back there that I don't really think it could make the store look any worse. Do you?" He wanted to get a manager for me to complain. I just wanted to get out of there before some of the crap they had piled up fell over on us and we were crushed under a mountain of Pringles.

First you get the money...

So back in April, the third child was born. Err, bought. And since then I have been stocking up on a few games.

All but one or two have come from the used game store, including all of the favorites, Madden 07 football, Simpson's Road Rage and as of last night, Grand Theft Auto - Vice City.

I spent the entire night whooping up on street thugs, cops and hookers and stealing their cars and money. Good Times! And then I realized that this is a lot like an over the top and overly dramatic view of life on the preschool playground.

So the next kid that makes The Princess cry out there better watch himself.

Annoying Callers Redux

More than a year ago we were getting calls from an unidentified 800 number. So I handled it like an adult. I just ignored the problem and eventually it went away.

This summer I have found a new phone nemesis. Identified on Caller ID as 18006787720W&A. The big problem? Besides the three or four calls a day, every @#$) day? They claim to be from a law firm but they are using one of those computerized phone dialing and answering services. So I hung up on them.

And now these jokers have ruined it for everyone. So pass the word. AtHomeDaddy will no longer accept computer generated phone calls. I won't talk to the computer or listen to the computer. I WILL hang up on the computer-caller, though.

And NEVER again will I answer an unidentified call. THAT'S why we HAVE caller ID in the first place, right.

I'm one step closer to the Father of the Year

And this is the guy who put LOSER in closer...

Check this great dad out...

I wonder if they will let him eat his sack lunch outside.

A side note, is it always nice to see someone from my home county making something of himself. First Jessica Simpson, then Kelly Clarkson. Now Paul Scott Schmidtke. Keep reppin' for the home town, guys!

It may have been a rough start to the fall,

but at least I am doing better than THIS GUY!

I wouldn't wear it, but I'll laugh for days if you do...

Thanks Terry, for the great laughs today. Drive yourself over to Texas and get a sack lunch any time you want.


I wasted enough time laughing about this t-shirt that I just had to know where I could buy one if I were so inclined.

But just for the record, I don't laugh when I see those things hanging underneath a truck's rear bumper.

Dr. Not So Smart, I presume.

This morning I got an message in my personal mail that I just really did not need to see before... well, ever.

For some reason I ended up on a group email that a Dr was sending out to some of his cohorts. He was discussing a recent surgery he had done and graciously provided some really disgusting pictures of the inside of some college student's ankle.

I wondered what the hell was going on, but I pretty quickly deleted the email and figured that was the end of my involvement in ankle reconstructions. As we were leaving for a play date, more than 20 email responses came from the others who were evidently supposed to get this email. So I fired off a quick email and I used the reply all function, just like these REAL Doctors had done.

Hi. i am not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV. Please remove my email address from further discussions on broken ankles, knees, or anything else that might give me the heebie jeebies.

And Dr Joe, Those pictures were a little too graphic for me before I have had a couple of cups of coffee, but thanks for sharing.

Thanks

If nothing else, maybe this guys buddies can razz him a little bit about the creepy guy who chimed in during the middle of their busted ankle email chat. And now, after we got home, I found that one of the Docs on the list responded directly to me, asking if I was the Mike that he knew.

So I replied to him.

I am a pretty popular guy. SO you may know me. But I don't think I know you. Still, will you give me a discount on surgery if I blow out my knee while playing backyard soccer with the kids?

Hopefully this guy will get a chuckle out of my response. But if he ever cuts into my knee, I don't want to see the pictures.

I caused it myself but that does not mean I won't whine about it...

The downside to letting the kids listen to Radio Disney in the new car has become perfectly apparent today. The boy has been hearing promos for High School Musical 2 for months. And I decided that he could stay up late last night and watch the premier showing. Now I have had all those damn songs stuck in my head ALL DAY LONG.

The next person who asks "What Time Is It?" might get stabbed in the freaking head with a screwdriver. Got it?



That's right, Disney bitches, it's time to do some bodily harm for getting your catchy pop tunes all jammed up in my brain.

But the upside is Zac and his pals have given me a new reason to whine about life. So this blog must live on a while longer.

Time to let go?

I think I am going to put this blog to bed. I'll decide soon. It looks like I have only made 25 or so posts over here since January 1st. Probably not enough to keep messing around with it. Sadly, I just don't seem to have a lot to bitch about lately.

Sucks, don't it?

What a nice pile

Our neighborhood is getting a new a-hole. Or at least I assume we are, since a whole house full of 'em just moved out.

There are a couple of 5 bedroom houses up the street from us and a couple of genius landlords decided that it was as good idea to start renting them out to college kids. Now living in a college town is great. And I always loved working around the students. It kept me feeling young.

But our neighborhood is across town from the university. And it definitely isn't a party zone. In one of the houses, the parties were fairly manageable. We had a pact. If they were too loud, I yelled over the fence and they shut the hell up. It worked for us all. Even better that after one school year they had trashed the inside of the house, so the owner decided to boot those guys and re-hab the house for rental to families. Problem solved.

But in the other house, the jerks lived like you would assume a 5 bedroom house full of dudes would live. Loud parties, lots of trash, loose dogs and stray women all over the place... It was A LOT of fun to have those guys in the 'hood. Yeah, right. When we begged them to keep the noise down, they just got louder.

Now that house is trashed outside and I can't imagine the inside is any better. The junk-i-ness was compounded by the fact that the jerks stayed there for 3 years. They must have graduated last year, though. The parties did not seem to be as loud or to go all weekend anymore.

I was running around this morning and I saw a great thing, a mountain of trash and junk at the curb. They have all moved out! Now the whole neighborhood has a reason to party!

Sitting on yer ass makes yer back ouchie

I spent the whole weekend being lazy and relaxing. Nice, huh? Well, during all of that couch time I must have tweaked my back, 'cause it hurts.

The only real physical work I did all weekend was a little tree trimming yesterday. But that was over in like 15 minutes. I did a little bit of laundry, too. But mainly I watched racing. Formula 1, Indy Cars, Drag Racing, NASCAR Cup and Busch series. I caught them all this weekend.

Maybe it was all the G Forces. Those Formula 1 cars pull some wicked Gs.

Uncle!

Not one to air dirty laundry in public, today I feel like complaining about clean laundry...

I give up! I surrender. She wins.

Two weeks ago The Boss lady folded some laundry. That isn't a huge surprise. Nor do I have a problem with it. For goodness sakes, there is nothing I hate worse than folding and putting away the laundry. (Which are two steps of the same process, by the way.) But after the folded clothes sat in a chair in the living room for a week, I moved them out of the way. I just never got around to putting them away.

Finally they got pushed to the side of the living room for another week or so. As far as I was concerned, they could just live there. Have I ever told you how much I hate folding AND putting away the laundry...

Anyways, I gave up. The laundry is now put away. And I feel like such a quitter.

Of course, the couch is covered in clothes waiting to be folded, so I guess I won in the end.

Learn CPR. You might save your daughter's life.

I am taking a quick break from the usual silliness and whining that inhabits my blog. Also, this is going up on all the blogs. Sorry for the repition, but it is the only important thing I've had to say in a long time.

Tonight we went to our first AAA minor league baseball game of the season. We were having a great time, hanging out on the left field berm. The kids were going crazy. And they cheered when an 8 or 10 year old girl near us caught a foul ball that the left fielder flipped up to the crowd.

Less than 5 minutes later that girl was unconscious and not breathing. We have no idea what happened. EMTs made it around pretty quickly. But not before the girl's dad had to start rescue breathing. She was out for several looooong minutes. Not just passed out from excitement, mind you. This was blue all over, motionless on the ground not breathing.

How scary is that? Your kid is having a great time and then a couple of minutes later she stops breathing.

When we left the park the girl was sitting upright with loads of attention coming at her from the Fire Fighters and Paramedics that had responded. Looks like she was lucky, She has a hero for a dad. Here's hoping I never have to be my daughter's breath.

So anyways, here is a quick online CPR reference. Please review it in case it has been a while since you took a class. Then please, please, PLEASE take a class to get more familiar with CPR procedures. Go here or go here to get help finding a class in your area. I'll be looking for a refresher course in the morning.

Modem move

Since our desktop and the wife's laptop both use our wireless router for an internet connection, I moved the modem and router away from the computer cabinet a while back.

I did it for two reasons. One, we were out of power in the living room. Every outlet is filled and I am already running a power strip/surge protector for the computer system and entertainment center. The other reason, our phone line in the living room died and it cost more to replace the line than to install a wireless card into our desktop. So that is what I did. We already had the wireless router running for the wife's computer.

Anyways, I did not have a good spot for the router and modem, so they ended up plugged into a phone jack behind our bed. A neighbor convinced me yesterday that might not be the best place for it. He says the radio frequencies might not be good for you. So I moved everything to the kitchen yesterday.

I did not want the modem and router sitting on the kitchen counter, so I set them up inside one of our cabinets. I just had to drill a hole for the phone line to pass through. Seems like a good idea. Nothing under the bed and nothing cluttering up the kitchen either.

Of course, once I tried to log back into the system, our internet connection would not work. I had to deal with the tech service guys to get them to reset my password. I had already figured out that was the glitch.

Anyways, the guy reset my password easily enough. But when I tried to get off the phone after that he wanted to walk me through a bunch of other steps to ensure everything was set-up properly. I ended up spending more time on the phone convincing him, and eventually one of his supervisors that I was capable of setting up my own dang wireless network, than I did getting the problem taken care of.

Anyways, now that everything is running right again, I thought I would send out a gripe to the over-friendly tech support guys. Dude, just let it go. I'll be OK. I swear. And if not, you gave me a work order number and a callback number to get right to your desk just in case.

Thanks for the password reset. Can I have my half hour back now?

Maraka

Funny stuff! Thanks to Cubicle Dad for posting it up.

I have a new arch enemy

two of them, actually. Which is kind of nice. Now I have some guys to blame all of the world's problems on.

The morons who run the soccer league that The Talker is in are going to be the death of me. It wasn't too bad last year as a parent, but now I am the coach and I have to hear from these guys several times a week.

We are now a week into the season and they just sent out all new schedules. Seems they decided to change things up at the last minute. So I spent an hour making sense of their emails and trying to get good information out to the parents. Grrrrrr.

These geniuses say they don't want anyone coaching kids without a team shirt on, but they forgot to include adult sized shirts in their order. So I am still without a uniform that they require and supply. Guess I'll be the coach in the blue Hawaiian shirt all season.

The soccer brain trust did not even get the field OK'd until last Saturday morning. We ended up playing at a High School, on their marching band's practice field. Which is where we were supposed to play all along, but they did not know if the school would allow it or not this season. Can you say "Call the damn Principal and ask if we can use the field?"

Anyways, 7 more weeks to go, unless I kill the geniuses and end up dealing with a life sentence instead.