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  • Notes from the Forbidden Northlands, Part II

    • If you’re a woman in your 60s driving a large, American car with the license plate KDDK – and you happen to be a terrible, terrible driver – please know that the angry couple with three howling children in the SUV trapped behind you on the looooooong 2-lane road to Vacationland will refer to you as “Kook” as they curse you until the end of time.
    • Nothing smells worse than kids’ Tevas that have gotten soaked in salt water and then dried wrong. Putting them on the next day is like strapping rotting moose asses to your kids’ feet. 
    • Old Maine joke but still my favorite Maine joke: “Bangor? Hardly know ‘er!” (It only works if you say it with a thick Maine accent.) 
    • We took a horse-drawn carriage ride through the park, which actually turned out to be one of the high points of the trip — a surprisingly scream-free experience in which I discovered the rationale behind the phrase “pissing like a racehorse.” Wow. I’m pretty sure I’ve never been that impressed by gallons of urine before. 
    • On that ride, we were pulled by two huge horses named, homonymically, Dick and Vic. Which led to this conversation on our drive home afterwards: TheWife: “Did you guys have a good time?” Rabbit & Butterfly: “Yeah!” TheWife: “Did you like the horses?” All three kids: “Yeah!” TheWife: “Do you remember their names?” (brief pause w/o answers) TheWife: “They were named Dick and Vic.” Butterfly: “Yeah! Mommy, do you like Dick?” 
    • At that point, I came thisclose to driving into a tree. 
    • Possibly my favorite part of the entire week: meeting my friend ScienceGuy, his wife and adorable just-turned-1 daughter at the same restaurant where TheWife and I had our wedding rehearsal dinner about a million years ago. Two-plus hours of sitting in open air in one of my favorite places in the world, good food, a couple-two-t’ree blueberry ales, my kids miraculously deciding to behave themselves the entire time, catching up with old friends… damn, that’s what a vacation is all about.    

  • Notes from the Forbidden Northlands, Part I

    • Four days down, three to go. All children still intact. So far.
    • Apparently, when you go on vacation with young kids, that means you're going to the beach. Every. Fucking. Day.
    • Cranky old people will not be shy at all about shoving both you and your young children out of the way – and I mean shoving in the style of an old-school hockey check – if you stand between them and a restaurant restroom
    • Blueberry ale = a pint of heaven. Honestly.
    • Was I smart enough to rent a house with wireless internet access? Oh, yes. Is my wife happy about it? Not really.
    • Bugs in the Maine woods are big. Like, Cloverland big.
    • In about an hour, we're going on a horse-drawn carriage ride. Odds that it will end in tears: 80%.

  • 2×3

    This Sunday marks three years since these little mammals arrived, and signaled the end of the world as I know it. Please join me in celebrating the twinpocalypse…

    PerfectPair
    BeachkissShesellsseashells

  • It was all downhill from there

    High point of my work day yesterday: a long and passionate discussion in which I made a very real attempt to persuade my colleagues on the strategic benefits of a photo shoot involving the stomping of baby ducks.

    (Note: They chose to go in another direction.)

  • Let us speak of journeys in the non-Steve Perry sense

    Celtics17
    1. First things first: my Celtics. If you'd have told me a year ago that they'd be celebrating a championship – never mind an honest-to-god blowout of the artist formerly known as Kobe & co. – I'd have stepped back slowly (making no sudden moves) before asking gently if you'd forgotten your antipsychotics. Seriously… at this point last June, we were looking forward to Odom/Durant and another 3-4 years of rebuilding before the Celts could become a serious contender again.

    Un. Fucking. Believable.

    2. Btw: have you ever seen a team in a championship situation give up the way the Lakers did last night? Seriously — it's like Phil Jackson's halftime speech consisted of nothing but repeated kicks to the groin… by four minutes into the third quarter, they'd stopped playing defense and had abandoned any semblance of an offensive strategy. They weren't even contesting open threes by Ray Allen… and Ray Allen… and Ray Allen…

    It just became abusive (although I'd be lying if I didn't say that I enjoyed it thoroughly). And as Mr. Big Dubya pointed out in an in-game e-mail to me, that hard foul KG put on Odom in the fourth quarter – when Odom tried to drive to the basket and KG responded by putting him unequivocally on his ass – was one of the greatest F-U sports moments of all time.

    To get a little Bill Walton for a moment, they were terrible — just terrible. An awful display from any organization competing for a title. And Kobe? Forget about "becoming the next Jordan." I don't think you've even got the right to the title of "best player in the game" anymore. Look at the way LeBron fought the Celts down to the wire in the 2nd round — that's how you play the game, you colossal jackass.

    3. But on to more important things: a vacation. To be more specific… a family vacation. To be even more specific… our first full-week-away-from-home-vacation in four years. And to be even more specificer than even that… our first-ever family vacation with our full starting five.

    I don't know whether to be excited or apprehensive. All I know is that in Maine… no one can hear you scream.

    4. Speaking of potentially life-changing journeys… TheWife is finally beginning her job hunt in earnest, after 10 years with the same company. Please join me in impassioned prayer for a job that will not only motivate and reward her, but one that will pay her enough money to enable me to leave my job, send my kids off to boarding school, and begin enjoying the life of sloth that I so richly deserve.

  • Words fail me

    Wontyoubemyneighbor
    Why yes, that is my neighbor painting over the duct tape that he wrapped around his front porch. Why do you ask?

  • Slow roast

    SpiritofSummer
    Have a nice weekend, everyone. We'll be roasting in 90+ degree brutal humidity —without benefit of our long-awaited central A/C system, which apparently will not be completed until next week.

    (Fortunately, not everyone hates summer as much as I do.)

  • Love of the Masses

    KGpassion
    As my beloved Commonwealth prepares for its newest edition of sports-induced euphoria – and to be clear, we're talking about the entirely legal kind – I'd like to take a moment to express my gratitude for the following things:

    * Danny Ainge, who last summer transcended years of fantastic drafting coupled with terrible trades and free agent signings (Brian Scalabrine? Sebastian Telfair for Brandon Roy? Raef LaFrentz? The list goes on… and it's just fucking horrifying.) to have a championship-caliber team fall into his lap. Good job!

    * Kevin McHale, for apparently still being a Celtic at heart. (I'll add that I hope he's making the most of his annual early start to the summer.)

    * David Stern, for scheduling every game in the 2008 NBA Finals to maximize west coast ad revenues — thereby ensuring that no game will end before midnight on the eastern seaboard. Oh, wait… that actually sucks. Never mind.

    * The fact that even as I type – and look forward to Boston's first 90-degree day of the year, which should arrive on Saturday – the miracle of central air conditioning is being installed in my home. I can't even being to imagine how much this is going to transform my quality of life in the summertime… although I'm really looking forward to finding out.

    * The fact that in three weeks, TheFamily and I will be taking our first official, week-long, family-style vacation in four years. Five of us will go up… only time and fate can determine how many of us will return.

  • Love hurts

    This morning, like most weekday mornings, I took my kids to school. My girls are in the same daycare class, and so this morning – like most mornings – I walked them in, took off their coats, and hung them in their cubbies next to their lunchboxes and backpacks. Several of their little friends were already there, playing some 3-year old game about a dozen feet away, and called my girls over to play. But this morning, like many mornings, they decided to hang on to me for a last fleeting moment or two before the school day began. They clamored for my attention as I hung their items with care. They clung to my legs as I crossed the room and signed them in for the day.

    And then, like many weekday mornings, they demanded a hug and a kiss from me before I departed for work. So first I picked up Rabbit – sweet, rascally little Rabbit – who made a face at me as I picked her up… and so, I rewarded her with not only a hug but a huge and energetic raspberry to the side of the neck. She squealed and howled with glee, and then demanded that I do the same to the other side of her neck. I obliged.

    As I set her down, Butterfly – gentle, brilliant Butterfly – demanded her two minutes of attention. "Daddy, Daddy! My turn! Do me!" And so, dutiful and caring father that I am, I picked her up and prepared to launch a raspberry of epic propotions onto her waiting, rosy cheeks. As I approached, she began squealing with glee, thrashing her head back and forth as if trying to escape some horrible, wonderful fate… and then, she suddenly kicked out and smashed me full in the nuts with her shiny little pink sneaker.

    It seemed to happen almost in slow motion. In a heartbeat, my world turned white and I began gasping for breath, struggling not to drop Butterfly from where I'd held her elevated above the floor. I almost crumpled as I lowered her down, a low, awful moan escaping from my lips as eight three-year old kids looked on in wild-eyed wonder… and no less than three daycare teachers watched silently, afraid to make a sound or issue a comment at this moment of infinite parental vulnerability.

    When Butterfly's feet met the floor, she reached up and gave my forehead – by now, I'm sure it was something close to purple – a full, gentle hug, and then kissed my hair as she said, "Bye bye, Daddy. See you tonight!" Then she grabbed Rabbit's hand and together they walked over to their friends.

    A minute later, I left. I did not make eye contact with the daycare staff; they did not make eye contact with me.
    Such are the sacrifices we make for love.

  • A Chilly Night in May

    LesternohitterAny time you get a chance to see a game at Fenway, you jump on the opportunity — even if it’s a Monday night game against Kansas City on a chilly May evening.

    To be honest, as TheCEO and I wandered up Beacon Street toward the park last night with the wind howling and the temperature dropping like a rock, I was thinking that the insanely strong mararitas we’d just downed would be the high point of the evening.

    Fortunately, I was mistaken.