House of Laughter

2012-01-29T14:44:00.001-08:00

A Few Words in Defense of St. Nick

2011-12-22T21:02:00.000-08:00

My two cents on “The Fat Man in Red”

Last night, Nancy asked “If Isaac asked you ‘Why did you let me believe in Santa Claus?’ what would you say?”

My response was truthful. “I try not to lie about Santa. I say things like ‘Well I am too old to believe, but what have you heard?’ and then listen to him tell me about reindeer and the north pole like this is all news to me.”

This did not satisfy Nancy.

I think that belief in Santa is a “sliding scale” proposition. Eventually we all end up realizing that there are real world explanations for seemingly supernatural problems. (This is not necessarily a bad lesson to learn.) However for a very short period of time, we get to believe in the possibility of magic in our world.

Some scoff at the idea and think it is cruel to allow your child to be emotionally involved in a lie. This is a fair concern. However if a small child fell in love with Elmo on Sesame Street, would you make an effort to explain that it is just puppeteer Kevin Clash’s hand and funny voice? If you took a child to see the play “Peter Pan” would you explain that Tinker Bell is just a little flash of light and that you did not really have to clap to save her life? Would you tell them that at Disneyworld, “That’s not really Buzz Lightyear, it’s just a person in a costume?” Would you tell them how the magic trick is done as it is being performed so they don’t accidentally believe that the rabbit really appeared out of nowhere?

They will eventually figure it out on their own, and when they do, will they stop loving Elmo, or stop clapping to save Tink, or not run up and high five the local baseball team’s mascot? I hope not. I know I don’t.

How is Santa different?

Once you know that it is a trick….does it lose all of it’s meaning?

My friends Steve and Anna Marie had two college age daughters who were home from school for Christmas. Santa visited on Christmas Eve night and left a few presents for the girls. When the girls got out of bed they went and woke their parents up and said, “There are no boot prints around the fireplace and the cookies aren’t gone. We are going back to bed for 10 minutes. Santa can try a little harder.”

When I think back on the things that Santa brought to me as a kid, I realize how closely my parents paid attention to my sister and I. I still remember laying my eyes on “Bug World” under the tree on Christmas morning. That was the one big present I wanted that year and Santa nailed it. I have heard stories about my mom looking in every toy store in Orlando and Gainesville to find a “Little house on the Prairie” doll for my sister. I remember the Christmas of Atari 2600 games when I received the “Empire Strikes Back” game for my cutting edge gaming console. I know now that there were a number of lean years, but we never went without. I was way too old to truly “Believe”, but still was just wowed by the G.I. Joe Tactical Battle platform when it showed up one Christmas.

In retrospect, I realize that my parents allowed me to believe for a few short years that there really is magic in this world.

I remember the first time my suspicion was confirmed. I was playing in the creek next to Douglas Maxwell’s house and he said “You know that Santa is really your parents, right?” Now of course I knew it, but had never heard the words out loud. I don’t remember being mad or upset. It was just another milestone in growing up like losing a tooth, first day of school or first crush. The world did not end, and even though I knew the trick, I still played along, and was still amazed every single time.

Isaac is smart. He is sliding towards the truth, and that is okay. He told me once that I brought all of the presents downstairs on Christmas Eve night (A fair observation since presents from the family are mixed in with “Old St. Nick’s”). In the spirit of “Mythbusters” I offered him a way to test his theory scientifically. I told him that if he wanted me to, I would promise him that I would not bring any presents downstairs at all on Christmas Eve. He thought about it and decided that he didn’t think that was a good idea.

I try not to play up “Santa” much. There are many other things going on at Christmas that I want to emphasize, although the way the radio, TV, and stores ram him down your throat oversaturation is almost unavoidable. I never threaten bad behavior with “Santa” is watching. I play the part of the skeptic who always seems a little bit clueless as to how the “magic” happened.

A couple of Christmas Eves ago, I tucked a very excited Isaac into bed and we talked for a while about Santa and opened the window and looked at the sky…trying to catch a glimpse of a red streak across the sky. We snuggled and talked and looked and waited and for just a second, I thought to myself “I wish he would hurry up and fly by because I have to get downstairs and put together a bike tonight.” It was then that I realized that even though I know how the trick works….it still catches me off guard.

There are of course the troubling parts of the story…why some kids don’t get anything, why some kids will always get much much more than they do, and why the Cohen family goes out for Chinese instead. I remember getting into a schoolyard shouting match with kids who kept trying to convince me how much better Hanukah was. These can be teachable moments about greed, sharing, wealth, poverty, charity, other religions, and our world.

There is a group in New York called “Improv Everywhere”. They played a prank called “Best Gig Ever”. They picked a new band called “Ghosts of Pasha” and 35 of IE’s agents downloaded and memorized the band’s first CD. They showed up on masse to the show (of which there were 3 paying customers) and screamed requests, sang along, wore home made “Ghosts of Pasha” t shirts and generally acted like G.O.P. were one of their favorite bands.

The band was stoked and played a high energy if somewhat bewildered set. At the end, the agents quietly left the bar. The band found out later it was all a hoax, and had to ask themselves the question, “Is it better to have one night of being insanely famous and loved and finding out later it wasn’t real, or to never have a night like that ever.

“I don’t know about you, but I feel like I have one life to live, and I choose to forever believe in what I felt that night. It’s my memory, and just because I was told it wasn’t real, doesn’t mean it didn’t feel real TO ME. What do I care just as long as I had a GREAT TIME?”
-Chris Partyka, GOP

I like to think that to be able to believe in magic for a very short time is better than never believing at all.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Day 8 (In Which We Celebrate Our Safe Arrival Home with Traditional American Homecoming Feast at Taco Bell)

2011-07-02T20:18:00.000-07:00

Day 8 (In Which We Celebrate Our Safe Arrival Home with Traditional American Homecoming Feast at Taco Bell)

I woke up to the tightly controlled chaos of Nancy making final preparations for our departure. Almost all of the packing was done the night before. I recall getting a phone call in the middle of the night. We had left an interior light on in the car. Isaac and I generally take about 20 minutes to fully wake up and realize what is going on, so thankfully Nancy went out to address the problem.

We called for housekeeping to inspect our room. This was to make sure we didn’t steal the toaster oven I suppose. During the hectic check in, we did not understand that we needed to inventory the room upon arrival. It was only at final inspection that we learned we were short a towel and a bowl. I explained that two other towels had been stolen the night before at the pool (I was completely paranoid about or cameras, cash, passports and GPS the whole time we were there and always kept one eye on them whenever we were off of the resort property. It was only on the last night, inside the resort compound that someone stole our crappy hotel pool towels.)

When the inspection was over, the housekeeper made it clear that we were to leave right then and turn in our keys immediately. We checked out and were billed for the purloined towels. (Almost $20. It was too early in the morning to argue in broken Spanish.) We grabbed a quick bite at the grocery store (no veiny bottle openers there either…..I looked.), gassed up/ returned the rental car and arrived at the airport.

The porter at the airport worked only for tips, but knew the system well. He carried our bags, made sure we had the correct customs forms, provided us with pens, and directed us to the correct desk to pay our $26 per head exit tax. You read that right….Costa Rica charges you money to leave the country. (I don’t know if the tax is waved if you show proof that you purchased a wooden frog or not.) The entry fee is at least embedded in the cost of the plane ticket.

The waiting area and most of the airport was made of logs and a tin roof. (They were building a larger airport about a half a block away.) Within an hour, the place was packed with Americans who naturally wedged into every square inch of the gift shop to spend their last few colones. The little restaurant proved to be too much of a temptation (they had an honest to goodness grill next to the counter with shrimp and steak in the waiting area for Pete’s sake.) and I enjoyed the last Tico meal with an Imperial lager.

Shortly before our plane arrived, a great rain storm commenced. Thankfully American Airlines provided us with umbrellas for the walk across the tarmac to the plane.

We arrived in Miami and literally ran through the elaborate system of trains, moving sidewalks, customs, immigration, baggage claim, re-checking the bag, going through security a second time (where we got to watch an amusing little piece of improv theater in which a traveler was trying to convince a TSA agent to let him bring his bag of duty free liquor on the plane. I hope the janitorial staff at Miami International had a nice party that night when they found his unopened bottles next to the trashcan.), another train back out to our gate where we arrived halfway through the boarding process. Total plane transfer time was 45 minutes of non stop, full speed motion to end up two gates down from where we arrived.

Our plane left the gate and was fourth in line from taking off when the pilot explained that our route had changed. We were now going to travel up the west coast of Florida which was not only going to be a longer flight, but we had to go back to the gate to get more fuel. At this point I was actually a little grateful that we were not all seated together. The last of the granola bars were gone and we were exhausted. A large youth group was returning from their mission trip to Trinidad and treated the plane like their own private church van. Thankfully for everyone involved, I did not overhear the young woman seated behind Nancy and Isaac reviewing her pictures from the previous week and loudly commenting to her friend how this person looked “So Gay” and this other guy was “such a faggot.” I was so tired, hungry, and pissed off that their church would have held a special service to pray for my soul by the time I was done. (My sister and I have no tolerance for youth groups who behave poorly in public. If your sponsor isn’t keeping you in line, we will step up and help them out.)

We arrived in Greensboro well after 10:30. We stumbled to the car and found the only take out restaurant that was open, Taco Bell. Neither Nancy nor Isaac will normally go to Taco Bell for any reason, but they were both indulged me. Nancy laughed at the size of my order, but I explained 1) I had not eaten in 12 hours 2) I was ordering for them because even though they said they weren’t hungry, as soon as I started eating they were both going to want something and 3)It is Taco Bell. They are inevitably going to forget something. (All three things proved to be true.)

The next day while Nancy did laundry and worked on a trip web page, and Isaac overloaded on Phineas and Ferb (in glorious English), I wandered off to help with a locally made movie. We had lots of time together the previous day and were happy to be in our own little worlds for a while..

What did I learn? It is hard to say. I know that we had the most exciting experiences when we were trying new things that we normally would never do. I was also surprised at how much we enjoyed hiking over rugged terrain. The trip made me want to learn and practice more Spanish. I learned that without a computer to keep me awake at night, I tend to follow my body’s natural sleep habits. Isaac has an incredible knack for finding animals in the wild. Nancy takes very good care of Isaac and I. She surprises herself at what she can do. She trusted my Spanish and other times when things were out of her control.

Thanks for reading and for the kind comments. If you will excuse me, I have to go find something to open this bottle with.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Day 7 ( In Which We Take All of the Lessons That We Learned in the Previous Week and Have a Grand Day Out).

2011-07-01T23:14:00.000-07:00

Day 7 ( In Which We Take All of the Lessons That We Learned in the Previous Week and Have a Grand Day Out).

Since we started planning this trip months ago, Nancy declared that our last day was to be spent lounging by the pool, relaxing, and preparing for the return trip home, but when she got up that morning, she decided that there would be time enough to rest when we got home. We were going to check out Rincon de la Vieja volcano National Park.

We had been hesitant to venture out so far on our own since we knew that we would have to return to Liberia, and in all likelihood spend a good deal of time on unmarked dirt roads.

We drove for an hour on the Pan American highway towards Nicaragua and missed the dirt road exit to the national park. We wrongly assumed that since it was one of the largest tourist draws in the area that it would be clearly marked.

We drove for about an hour on a two lane dirt road through the country side and up the mountain, sometimes going 20 minutes at a time without seeing another car or house. (Had we tried this earlier in the week, we would have been fighting since we both would just naturally assume that we were lost.) I took the potholes slowly and carefully like Carlos would have. About 40 minutes up the mountain, we hit a traffic jam.

Part of the road to the National Park goes through private property. A while back, a toll keeper with a gate appeared at the border of the private property and started collecting 700 colones per head for anyone coming in. No one seems to know if his toll is legal or not, but I wasn’t going to argue. The line to pay the gatekeeper was about 12 cars long.

Another 15 minutes past the gatekeeper, we came to a small hotel with a gift shop, (no penis shaped bottle openers….I looked.) and an adventure tours desk offering tubing, zip lining, ATVs, horseback riding etc. There were busloads of American tourists everywhere. It did not seem like a National Park, so we kept driving another 10 minutes. We came to a sign that said “Safe Parking for Rincon De La Vieja” and so we pulled in and parked. I walked up to the building which also did not look like a National Park office and a bored teen sitting at the counter playing with his Iphone told me that the National Park was still further up the road.

We pulled into the nearly empty parking lot (I guess most out of towners never made it past the zip lines.) for the national park and checked in at the Ranger’s station. The trail we were taking was 3km (a little over a mile and a half) and was marked “High Difficulty”. There were signs urging us not to feed the coatis. (We never saw any, it was to early in the season, but I like the fact that the coati density in this park is such that it requires numerous signs to remind curb snack sharing with them.)

The first part of the trail led us through thick jungle. There were giant banyan trees that looked like they were out of a science fiction movie. Long lines of leaf cutter ants would cross the trails. We had to climb steep ravine walls using roots and rocks as foot steps. At one point, it seemed like the trail ended because a tree had fallen across the trail. We back tracked, found a way around and saw that the tree had carved notches in it and was now a bridge over a creak. Several times we crossed creeks one at a time on slippery rocks holding onto ropes for balance. Isaac loved the physical challenge of climbing and exploring but did not care for the thick mud which we occasionally had to muck through.

Isaac insisted on leading the expedition with Nancy behind and I brought up the rear. At one point a large black bird swooped through the trees and landed on a tree behind me. I maneuvered myself to get a better look and saw two toucans in the canopy; their enormous, brightly colored bills were unmistakable and impressive in a way that pictures don’t do justice..

Isaac spotted numerous lizards and another agouti.

About half way through the trail we came to a waterfall where we rested and explored. The second half of the trail took us through a starkly different environment, the volcanic mud pots and geysers. The trees gave way to low brush and brightly colored rocks. Every few 100 meters we would come to another geological vent spewing mud, steam, geysers and always the overwhelming smell of sulphur.

On the way to the park we saw where the Costa Rican’s were trying to tap this geothermal energy to make electricity while still maintaining the natural beauty.

By the end of the hike we were exhausted and stopped back at the ziplining place since it also had the one restaurant in the area. Isaac filled up on watermelon while Nancy and I watched the caballeros heard horses down the street out front.

On the trip back down the mountain, we got stuck in another traffic jam. Several hundred head of cattle meandering the other way down the street completely surrounded our car. It was a surreal moment to be completely surrounded by giant slobbering cows while safely in our air-conditioned rental Kia.

A little further down the road, we slowed down in a small village where a construction crew was working on the road. I had noticed several people staring at our car, as we drove through town, but now the entire road crew had stopped work and were pointing at the front of the car.

I felt sick, sure that we were a victim of the punctured tire scam, but if I was going to be robbed, it was going to be in full view of the village at least. I asked the workmen what was wrong and they replied in Spanish. I pulled on to the shoulder and walked around the front of the car where I saw a plastic frame of the car hanging down almost to the ground. I panicked a little and considered just ripping the plastic off. Before I could tell Nancy what was wrong, one of the construction crew was on his belly in front of our car snapping the piece back into place.

I thanked him and we returned home.

Isaac and I swam while Nancy packed. (I know this sounds bad, but it works out better for everyone this way.) While we were swimming, someone stole Isaac and my towels. I did not know this would matter until the next day.

Rincon De LaViaje was hand’s down our favorite day of the vacation.

Strength and Honor,
Big Matt

Day 6 (In Which After the Consumption of Rum, Nancy and I Debate Which of our Friends should get the Bottle Opener with a Wooden Penis Shaped Handle)

2011-06-30T20:42:00.001-07:00

Day 6 (In Which After the Consumption of Rum, Nancy and I Debate Which of our Friends should get the Bottle Opener with the Wooden Penis Shaped Handle)

After two days of road trips, we planned a day of rest, although sleeping in was never really a choice. We rode into Coco again and found a different Soda to eat breakfast at. We sat on the porch with several other dining couples. We could tell something was wrong since there seemed to be only two people and a 2 year old behind the counter. After a long wait, the owner, an American expat came out and confessed that neither the cook nor the babysitter showed up for work, but he was working on making us some breakfast.

When the food arrived it was fantastic, but the guava jelly that came with it made the sun shine brighter and the iguanas in the tree wink and smile. When the morning rush died down the owner told us stories of moving to this beach 40 years ago when it was a hippie commune. He also took us back into his office to look at pictures of his gnome.

A Swedish advertising company had brought two garden gnomes to Costa Rica to shoot a magazine advertisement. He hosted the company and helped the secure locations for their photo shoot. As a reward, he got to keep one of the gnomes.

After breakfast we wandered down to the souvenir shops where we learned that Costa Rica is not exempt from the first Universal Law of Tourist Areas. “If an item is popular in one souvenir store, you will find the exact same thing in every souvenir store in the city.” We saw every color and size of strokable wooden frog imaginable. Duplicates of wooden bowls, masks, puzzle boxes, and coasters were in every store.

The second Universal of Law of Tourist Areas states that “Every T-shirt shop should have at least one shirt showing a local animal, one with a joke about drinking beer, one with a Christian message, and one with Marijuana leaves.” The exact ratio can vary by site, but all of the groups have to be represented and intermixed. Again, in this respect, we were not disappointed.

We saw many of the same items we had seen at the roadside stands marked up 30-40%. We also noticed that the prices in town were in dollars, not colones, a sure sign that you are getting gouged even further since change is always in colones and can vary from 520-1 to 480-1.

We bought a few knick knacks for friends and were heading back to the car, when I found, placed among the wooden crocodiles and brightly painted yo-yos, a bottle opener with a wooden handle lovingly carved to resemble a giant penis. It was $10 which seemed a bit steep for an item that, while being fully functional and hysterical is not something you are going to leave in the drawer next to the can opener and the little sharpened handles that you stick into corn on the cob so you don’t get your hand messy.

As discreetly as I could, I tried to get Nancy’s attention by yelling her name and waving it over my head. She asked me who I intended to by that for, and under that sort of pressure I was stumped. (I already have a “Sea World” bottle opener that works just fine, so I did not need it.)

It was only later after Nancy and I were drinking rum mixed with tropical fruit juice that Nancy came up with the ideal recipient for such a prize. (I won’t tell who since Christmas is right around the corner.)

Most of the day was spent climbing on the volcanic rock formations at the beach, lazing by the pool, and eating chocolate and orange ice cream while watching the afternoon thunderstorms.

After dinner at the Asian-fusion-tapas restaurant down the street, Nancy and Isaac went to bed, and I wandered up to the pool area because Wednesday was movie and karaoke night in the open air dance hall. By the time I showed up, the movie was almost over which was okay because it was “An Inconvenient Truth” dubbed in Spanish. Somehow they found a voice actor to recreate the excitement in Al Gore’s voice in Spanish.

Our neighbors were there with their kids. The younger had fallen asleep, the older was playing his DS. When the time came for karaoke, I was excited. I knew that the crowd would be dazzled, by my mastery of the Johnny Cash canon, but when I looked through the list, 99% of the songs were in Spanish. The English ones were an odd collection including songs by Metallica and “Bohemian Rhapsody”, a difficult one to pull off by oneself. I finally settled on “Don’t Be Cruel” and did “Kokomo” as an encore. In between I sat through half a dozen cheesy love ballads in Spanish which actually sounded pretty good after a round of 2 for 1 Imperials with my neighbor David.

The crowd seemed appreciative of my effort and after taking my bow went back to room 411 to get some rest for the next day’s adventure.

Strength and Honor.
Big Matt

Day 5 (In Which We Learn That Water That Comes Out of Volcanoes is “Scientifically Speaking” Incredibly Freaking Hot)

2011-06-29T19:43:00.000-07:00

Day 5 (In Which We Learn That Water That Comes Out of Volcanoes is “Scientifically Speaking” Incredibly Freaking Hot)

On Tuesday morning, Carlos once again picked up at 7:30 in the morning for a day trip to Arenal Volcano. Even though it was over two hours by car away I wanted to see it because up until a few months ago it was one of the world’s most active volcanoes, with lava visible from the base almost ever night. It was this constant erupting that actually made it slightly safer to visit than the volcanoes that keep it all bottled up until having a little too much wine at Thanksgiving dinner and exploding and wrecking havoc on anything in the immediate vicinity.

The Arenal area also was at a higher elevation and was in a rain forest which would give us the opportunity to see other animals. The trip described on the website involved some strenuous hiking, and Nancy and I were a little concerned about Isaac, but Carlos had already altered the day’s schedule to make sure we got to see plenty of animals without pushing Isaac to exhaustion.

We drove towards Liberia and turned right on the Pan American Highway, a road that theoretically could be driven from Alaska to Southern Argentina. A few miles behind us was Nicaragua, and a couple hours ahead, Panama. (Costa Rica is about the same size as West Virginia.) We drove south for about an hour and then turned left towards the middle of the country. After another hour, we arrived at Lake Arenal. The top of the volcano was shrouded in clouds. We stopped at a roadside stand in the middle of nowhere to stretch our legs, admire the view, and haggle over the price of wooden frogs with wooden ridges on their back that you stroke with a stick and they make a noise similar to what a frog would sound like if he was rubbing a stick against a jagged wooden statue of a frog.

Shortly after we got back in the car, Nancy felt a sharp pain in her back. I had time to either, kill the wasp on her back or take a picture. Carlos, ever the “nature loving bad ass” that he is, caught the wasp and let it go out the car window.

The car trip was probably almost three hours, but there was so much to see, and we were having so much fun talking and looking for animals, it didn’t seem long at all. When we arrived at the tourist area of Arenal, the jungle gave way to hotels, internet cafes, and a shop boasting “Hand made Costa Rican crafts and German bakery”. We could tell that this tourist area was a little higher end than Playa Hermosa. Carlos took us to a fancy hotel for lunch where we had steak and then got back into his truck and headed even closer to the Volcano.

Instead of taking us into a National Park, we went to a wildlife preserve where the land had been allowed to return from farmland to its natural state. Carlos immediately pointed out sloths up in the canopy. Isaac found a red arrow frog under some leaves. Carlos showed us cacao and banana trees and identified local birds for us. We interrupted an Agouti in the middle of his lunch. Isaac did his best to herd a Jesus Christ lizard toward the little pond in the area to see if he would really walk on water.

We packed up just as the sky opened up and Carlos took us to another hotel/spa that had a series of gardens and pools fed by the naturally occurring hot springs. Carlos got us checked in and told us that we could go up to the buffet and have dinner under the volcano at 5:30. I asked if we should wait for him, and he told us that he had to run some errands, but would meet us after dinner.

The hotel was pretty much how I picture the garden of Eden. Stone paths meandered through thick, well manicured, tropical vegetation. Humming and other birds sampled fruit and nectar in open areas. Dozens of pools were spaced up the side of the mountain. Also in this “Matt specific” version of the garden of Eden there were three particularly dangerous looking waterslides, college co-eds on summer vacation, and half a dozen swim up bars.

The first pool we came to had partially submerged, tile recliners. It looked perfect. I stepped into the pool, completely ignoring the sign which warned that the water was 113 degrees Celsius (235.4 Fahrenheit). Every bug bite around my ankles lit up. I eventually made it over the lounge chair and sat for about 20 seconds before getting out. Isaac preferred the adjacent cold pool.

We tried different pools and hot tubs and found a few that we all enjoyed. I decided to try one of the water slides. Normally water slides are cool, splashy, twisty fun. The water in this one was a relatively cool 100 degrees Celsius (to remind you, this is the boiling point of water.) The slide was pitch black, and just for fun that had random blasts of 100 degree water interspersed throughout the darkness in case you were breathing too easily or moving to slowly. The slide dumped you a very deep pool of 100 degree C water.

It was a lot like what I remember about being born.

As the thunder clouds closed in for a second time, we changed and walked up to the buffet. The food was fancy versions of typical Tico fare and spaghetti. Isaac was most impressed with the chocolate fountain. Like most restaurants that we had been to, it was open air offering a great view of the volcano. The thunder in the distance was not too hard to mistake for rumbling in the mountain next to us, but that didn’t make me nervous. What made me nervous was the realization that I was three hours from my hotel and rental car. I had no cell phone, and at that point did not know Carlos’s number anyway, much less his last name.

I felt a huge wave of relief (and a more than a little guilt) when we ultimately found Carlos down at the lobby drinking coffee waiting for us, just like he said he would.

I was sure that the ride home would be uneventful; perhaps we would all fall asleep. It turns out that riding through the rainforest during a thunderstorm is exhilarating. Carlos had wanted us to see a red eyed tree frog all day, but never found one. In his last ditch effort, he would stop any time he saw a frog in the road, pull over, back up and run out with a flashlight, and umbrella to see what it was.

At one point we passed a snake in the road. Carlos stopped for us and explained that it was a Fer-de-lance viper. He explained that herpetologists don’t like to use the word “aggressive”, but the Fer-de-lance would not deviate from its course if it was coming towards you. Naturally he wanted to get out in the rain so we could get a better look.

When you are in a thunderstorm in a rainforest and a guy wants you to get out and look at a really misunderstood viper in the road, you do it because when the hell is that ever going to happen again?

He found a second snake in the road and he wanted my help to make sure that got safely off into the bushes. He grabbed a branch and started pushing the snake off into the brush when the snake jumped. Normally you would not associate an activity such as jumping with a legless animal, but there we were.

Carlos looked genuinely surprised that I was back the S.U.V. instead of helping him shepherd a jumping viper to safety. Carlos drove us safely home and we said our good byes. I really hope that someday I will get a chance to show him around North Carolina or Florida..

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

If you are ever in Guanacaste, Costa Rica, contact Carlos at http://www.ecoexplorercr.com/ or look up Carlos Jiminez in my friends on Facebook.

Day 4 (In which we meet the man who should be in charge of all tourism in Costa Rica)

2011-06-28T19:24:00.000-07:00

Day 4 (In which we meet the man who should be in charge of all tourism in Costa Rica)

Before we left for Costa Rica, I found a website called Eco Adventures. There were quite a few day trips available. I made reservations for a river boat cruise through a national park and a day trip to Arenal volcano. The guide named Carlos told me in an e-mail to meet him at the gate of our resort at 7:30 a.m.

The Costa Rican 5:45 a.m. sunrise made this much easier than it sounds.

I had no idea what to expect, but suspected that we would be crammed into a hot, crowded school bus with a handful of obnoxious American families for a miserable drive. I could not have been more wrong. Carlos pulls up in a new, immaculately clean 4x4 and introduces himself. We all take a seat and we assume that he is taking us to a meeting point for a large group and again we are wrong. We are his only family for the day.

He starts the drive to Palo Verde national park, but stops at a supermarket to buy some snacks and drinks for us. (He would not let me pay for anything.) He bought Isaac a little bag of chocolate covered raisins and a can if Imperial lager for me (it was like he knew us both for years!) in addition to fruit juice and other snacks.

We started the long drive toward Palo Verde. Carlos spoke impeccable English and was a funny and amicable host. He answered even the most odd ball questions about Costa Rica that we lobbed at him. (The woman on the 10,000 colones bill was a children’s author. The Motmot’s tail feathers don’t grow that way, they actually groom them into that shape. He also taught us how to tell the difference between the green and black iguanas and the two toe and three toe sloths.)

The car ride to Palo Verde was much longer than I expected. Much of the rode was along long straight dirt roads through sugarcane fields. Whenever we came to the edge of one of Costa Rica’s world famous potholes, Carlos would slow down and strategically pick the route which would do the least damage to his vehicle’s suspension.

We talked for a long time and I learned that although he had never been to America, he did have two things on his itinerary when he does visit. 1) He wants to grow a long beard and get into a bar fight in Texas and 2) He wants to go for a ride in a cab in New York City with a daredevil driver of Middle Eastern descent.

Carlos would stop frequently to point out local birds. I don’t mean slow down the car and point them out, but stop the car, get out a telescope that we could use to take pictures, and tell us about whatever it was we were looking at. He was never in a hurry, and seemed to really savor being outside and sharing the beauty of his home country with us.

When we arrived at the river, a small boy greeted us and pointed out some howler monkeys and iguanas to Isaac. There actually were about a dozen other people on the boat with three or four other guides, but Carlos took the lead in pointing out the local animals. We saw numerous birds, a larger gathering of iguanas, howlers, and a tree covered with bats. The other guides shared fresh pineapple with us.

We stopped near a gathering of Capuchins and the other guides gave out pieces of banana for us to feed the monkeys. Nancy later asked Carlos about feeding wild animals in a National Park. He told us that it is not something he would ever do, but as long as the other guides bring the animals food that they would find in the wild naturally, he doesn’t make a big deal out of it.

Near the end of our river tour, our boat drifted up to a crocodile on the banks. I could have reached out and touched it. Isaac immediately moved from his waterside seat to a more comfortable aisle seat. I will admit I was pretty excited, but when one of the other guides attached a piece of chicken to a stick and started feeding him, my heart rate definitely picked up. The feeding attracted a second and then a third croc, each one bigger than the last.

As the crocs jostled for the chicken inches away from me and the guide’s stick got progressively shorter with each chomp, I did a quick mental tally of the subtle differences between this crocodile feeding and the still interesting but 100% less terrifying alligator feedings I had seen from behind Plexiglas in Florida.

Carlos took us to very cool restaurant/ boat tour staging area for lunch. The food was fantastic. I recall beans, rice, beets, beef, cassava, spicy vegetables, and finished up with mango ice cream. By this time in the day, Carlos was like an old family friend. Isaac had certainly taken a shine to him (in fact Carlos was the first person that Isaac used a little bit of Spanish for.)

We went back to the hotel to watch the parakeets roost and the sun set over the ocean. Out at the beach we ran into the couple that we had ziplined with the day before. They had actually been staying at a different hotel in a different city, but missed their plane back to America that morning and went from hotel to hotel trying to find a room until that wound up at ours.

We walked down the beach to find dinner. The next hotel down had a restaurant on the beach that was completely empty except for a bored waiter, chef, and bartender. This should have been our first clue. The second should have been that they were out of shrimp…..100 yards from the ocean…..with no other visible diners. I still decided to be daring and ordered the catch of the day, “Red Snapper” not realizing that I would get it in pretty much the same shape (minus a few organs) it was in when it was pulled from the ocean. Isaac ordered ice cream for dessert and although I’m pretty sure the day and month on the expiration date was safe; one mouthful suggested that it was perhaps the year which may have been a bit off.

Although I had the communication advantage over Nancy with my limited command of Spanish, she could speak fluently with two of our neighbors. To our right was a family from Colorado (She was Tico, their two sons became Isaac’s friends during the week and he taught school). He and Nancy spoke the special “Teacher’s Language”, casually dropping a dizzying number of acronym titled standardized test and teaching methods that each seemed to disapprove of. Two doors down was Joe who was taking his son on a trip as a graduation present. He and Nancy both spoke New York/ Jersey (which is a lot like English, only much louder.)

Isaac and I watched the first 20 minutes of Rocky Horror Picture Show (in English) before falling asleep. The last thought before I blacked out was, “This vacation is going by too damned fast.”

Strength and Honor,
Big Matt

Day 3 (In which I have the best Father’s Day that I will ever have in my life.)

2011-06-27T19:55:00.000-07:00

Day 3 (In which I have the best Father’s Day that I will ever have in my life.)

The sun is at full attention at 5:49 in the morning. The hastily re-scheduled zip-line adventure outfitter is called “Extreme Adventures” and is very close to our hotel according to the standard issue caricature map featuring local hotels and restaurants which you can find in any city which fancies itself a tourist destination. We simply turn left out of the resort’s parking lot, pass the boat catching a swordfish and the two bikini clad women playing volleyball, and when we get to the family of howler monkeys wearing T-shirts make a right and we are there.

The caricature map did not convey the poverty in the area around “Extreme Adventures” headquarters. On the map, it was located right next to “Papagayo tours”. Both companies were in fact in the same front room of someone’s house. It dawned on me that all of tour companies in the area were not completely independent businesses, but more like a network. A company would splice together whatever you wanted to do out of what they had available to them. 6 different companies might advertise canopy tours, but they might all take you to the same ziplines.

Papagayo tours and Extreme Adventures shared a fleet of ATVs. Our contact at Extreme Advenutres took us to one of the neighbor’s houses where a couple of Ticos were saddling up three horses. The guy who seemed to be in charge of the horses told me that he was going to be riding bulls in a rodeo later that day (I think.) The horses did not look like the robust steeds that we had seen at farms or circuses in America, but by this point a) we had paid to ride horses b) the only person who spoke English was back at the office c) Isaac was already mounted and d) the remaining caballeros assured me that the white horse was very strong and could carry me. (I told them in advance how much I weighed and how tall I was in case they were worried about the horse. Their response? “No problem”)

Our guide, who spoke no English at all, led us down the narrow two lane road that we had previously gotten lost on looking for “Extreme Adventures”. We passed where the pavement ended and a group of locals hung out at a dusty turn around waiting for the bus. Our guide led Isaac’s horse and Nancy and I did our best to negotiate with our steeds to follow as closely as they were cool with….if they want to stop and eat some leaves, that is cool too….you know….whatever. We learned some important facts about native flora that none of us could understand since they were in Spanish. We smiled and nodded politely while we tried to get our horses to get back on the path.

We wandered through some back country and plodded through some streams. I would love to tell you about the magical bond I developed with the animal, but it was more of a magical tolerance. For the short period of time that we rode, I definitely understood how riding horses could become someone’s obsession in life.

The ATV training consisted of pointing to the key, the gear shift, the accelerator, and a reminder to brake with front brakes when going uphill, back brakes when going down (or was that the other way around? And which is the front brake? Left or Right? We will figure it out on the way I guess.)

Isaac rode on the lap of our guide while Nancy and I each rode our own 4 wheel All Terrain Vehicle. It took much less than an hour for me to grasp the mystical bond between a rider and his ATV. We basically lived in a truck commercial for an hour. We climbed hills, rode through streams, crossed farm land, and explored the dirt roads in small villages. We drove past an open air church that was holding Sunday morning worship. Nancy and I felt bad that we were making so much noise while someone else was having church.. I am pretty sure that the guide told us not to worry, they weren’t Catholic; they were Evangelical.

Another interesting thing about riding ATVs in Costa Rica is that howler monkeys seem to really hate the sound of their engines. The only thing louder then the ATV engine is a group of howler monkeys yelling at you when you drive past. If you have never heard a howler monkey before it is a sustained loud deep grunt and whoop that will definitely get your attention.

After an hour ride, we made it to the Congo ziplines (Congo is a local name for the howlers). We rode with a couple from Dallas and two Tico boys who were on vacation. The zip lines were impressive but the views were spectacular. I have to say Congo had the business of throwing Gringos out of trees down to a science complete with bathrooms and water coolers out in the woods.

It took another hour to ride back. When we were almost back to the car the guide said, “We can go the short way, or over the mountain.” We were all tired, but to my surprise, Nancy opted for the “over the mountain” method and we back riding through creeks and up and down muddy, rock strewn ravines. It was wildly fun and terrifying at the same time.

We arrived back at the hotel and while Nancy read her nook, Isaac and I fell asleep watching Lucha Libre wrestling and 80’s comedies dubbed into Spanish.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Day 2 (In which I wake up in a foreign country)

2011-06-26T20:47:00.000-07:00

Day 2 (In which I wake up in a foreign country)

There were no clocks in our room and the only time keeping device which I had with me was my cell phone which would turn out to be insanely expensive to answer or get texts on, so I mainly kept it off.

The good and bad thing about this is that I went to bed and woke up when my body felt like it which in the case of day 1 was about 8:00 p.m. local time. Funny thing about western Costa Rica….it is bright and sunny just before 6:00 a.m. and the Ticos are early risers…quite content to weed whack just after getting out of bed.

Saturday was going to be a decompression day…a time to just relax after a stressful day of travel. I had heard from the guide books and our friends the Olsons that to get an authentic Tico breakfast, you had to look for a sign that said “Soda” and stop there. We made the ten minute drive to Playa Coco and stopped at the first Soda we saw, “Soda Los Pelones”.

We had an incredible breakfast of beans and rice, eggs, sausage, juice, and coffee. We ran across the street to the bakery to get a loaf of bread. We drove down the dusty, unpaved street to the shoreline and doubled back stopping at a supermarket. There are two obvious differences in American and Tico supermarkets. The first is that the Tico supermarkets are basically open air warehouses. The second striking thing is that every grocery store had at least one aisle with hard liquor.

We bought a few essentials (rum is essential by the way) and a few costa Rican beers. We bought some cheese, ham, and some lime flavored mayonnaise in a giant toothpaste tube. I also bought what I suspected was skim milk, but later turned out to be due to a mistranslation two quarts of buttermilk.

We went to the beach again, and took a dip in the pools. After relaxing a few hours, we decided to check out a trail we found behind one of the buildings at the resort. We hiked through a valley (where there were a surprising number of tall cactus plants), and through the wooded section of the property where we saw howler monkeys and crabs. We meandered back to the room where we saw several hundred orange throated parakeets roost in the tree in front of our room.

While Nancy read, and Isaac watched movies, I used my limited Spanish and the international language of beer to make friends with the neighbors. One was in real estate and came from a family of 15 brothers and sisters. The other was an engineer for the Bimbo bread company. (Bimbo bread is huge in CR. I didn’t have the heart or the Spanish vocabulary to explain what “Bimbo” meant in English.). Thankfully my friend “Little Matt” had told me a few funny stories about visits to Costa Rica that I could share. At one point, one of my new friends offered the toast “Poura Beera” (a twist on the Tico saying of “Pura Vida” which I thought was clever until I saw it on about a hundred shirts over the next 6 days.)

As we were settling down for the night, I got a call from the company that we were ziplining with the next day, “Pura Aventura”. For some reason or another, they were going to have to be closed for the next few days. Thankfully, you can’t throw a dead cat without hitting a zipline company in Costa Rica and so a quick phone call later we had a reservation to ride horses, ATVs and ziplines the next day at a place that was 10 minutes down the road instead of a two hour drive.

We all fell asleep shortly after 8:00 that night.
Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Costa Rica Day 1(In which I have the frightening realization that I know nothing)

2011-06-25T20:29:00.000-07:00

Day 1 (In which I have the frightening realization that I know nothing)

I woke up to Nancy asking me, “What time did you set your alarm for?”
My response “4:00 a.m.”
Her response, “It’s 4:45” opened the floodgates of adrenaline with the realization that I was running 45 minutes later than I wanted to in order to be at the airport on time to leave for Costa Rica. I dressed quickly and woke the boy up. We had the foresight to stop by Donut World the night before and so the Apple Fritter I had for breakfast mellowed me out and helped me think clearly.

If you are the first person to arrive at Piedmont Triad “International” airport in the morning, it is generally expected that you find the key under the planter outside, turn on all the lights and warm up the X-ray machines.

The flight to Miami was un-eventful. I really wanted a Cuban sandwich while we waited for our second plane, but Nancy had carefully budgeted for the week and did not want to have to skip two meals in the future to pay for one “airport” sandwich.

The second plane ride featured the first magic moment when I realized how very far we were going. After about 45 minutes heading south over the ocean, I looked down at the coastline and realized that I was looking at Cuba. It was a great moment to see something which I had heard about all of my life…something mysterious and foreign..right underneath me. It looked just like any other country side, but still it was the first real moment where my brain started thinking about my surroundings in a different way.

I would like to make a disclaimer here. These writings are only my perception of a small part of Costa Rica. I don’t claim to know everything about the whole country, I only report my experience, and my experience involves a lot of the “Gee-Whiz-We-aren’t-in-Kansas-anymore” moments that I expect a lot of people travelling abroad for the first time have.

We touched down in Costa Rica and my senses were overloaded. Everything I looked at, heard, touched, and smelled, even the most mundane things like the landscaping at the airport was drawn in deeply. We disembarked and walked into a large warehouse to get our passports stamped and claim our luggage….not at all the giant hassle I expected (That would come one week later in Miami.)

The mini-bus took us to “Avis” car rental where a friendly man who spoke English very well showed us the sparkling Kia we had rented. There was an ominous warning on the Avis desk about the “Flat Tire” scam I mentioned in the last blog. I was prepared. I had the rental agent show me where the jack was, and I carefully inspected all four tires.

We were on our way.

We took a right towards the relatively large city of Liberia. We passed large areas of farmland, schools with uniformed children playing soccer in the yards, and small industrial businesses. It wasn’t just the barbed wire around the fence of every building we saw that made me the most nervous. It was the realization that I can only read about 2/3 of the street signs For example, the frequently seen “Interseccion Adelante” had me worried. I knew that “interseccion” meant “intersection” but it took me a while to realize that “adelante” did not mean “dangerous”, “busy”, or “flammable” but simply “ahead”.

The other surprisingly disorienting thing about driving was that all speed limits are in kilometers per hour, which is fine on paper, but in reality, if I see a sign that says “40 kph”, my brain automatically goes into a panic because it knows what “40 mph” should feel like, and we are no where near that fast. Throw in the occasional “25 kph cuando scholars presente” and I am panicking even more because there are almost always kids out on bikes around schools and I know how going even a few miles over the speed limit in a US school zone results in a hefty fine.

While I am going slowly and carefully, Tico drivers are whizzing past.

We finally arrive at a shopping center with a bank and a grocery store. We go into the bank to change money and are stopped and asked for our passports. I think “This is a little odd since really all we are doing is getting change.” I am also searched with a metal detector. At this point, the exhaustion and culture shock take over and I start to panic.

Right or wrong, if I am in a part of town where everything is surrounded by barbed wire, nobody speaks English, and I am searched with a metal detector when I walk into a bank, I know it is time to move on, and I had to be very deliberate about not losing my cool. We changed $200 into 100,000 colones in bills of 10,000 each.

I was now walking around with money that I could not quickly tell you what it was worth. It was at this point that I found a new level of respect for anyone that does not speak English coming to US for the first time.

We walked to the grocery store which had a small ice cream shop in the back. I bought an ice cream for Isaac, a small ham biscuit for myself, and a custard pastry. I tried to pay with a 10,000 colones note and the woman looked at me like I was crazy and asked if I had anything smaller. Just then a very thin woman walked over, patted Isaac on the head and asked me for money. I smiled politely and sat down. The cashier managed to get change for me and we ate, the beggar staring at us the entire time. I really felt bad about not giving her anything, but at the same time, I could not quickly process how much anything was, and more importantly I could not open my wallet with out showing a lot more money. We ate quickly and went back to the car.

We were all tired and tense. I checked the tires again before we left and drove to the coast. Getting out into the country side helped calm everyone down a lot. We even saw a huge iguana basking on the road when we came around a corner. We found the hotel and tried to check in. We were early. We wandered around the facility. The view was incredible. They had about six pools set into different levels connected by waterfalls overlooking the bay including an “infinity pool” where it looks like the water touches the horizon and a bar you could swim up to.

We grabbed a quick bite to eat at the restaurant (It is a universal truth that all hotel restaurants are overpriced with mediocre food. I found it oddly reassuring to find that this was the case at Condovac as well.)

Another cultural/technological difference in Costa Rica is that toilet paper is not flushed, but placed in a garbage can next to the toilet. The less said about that, the better.

We wandered down to the beach and we looked at the boats in the bay. We walked along the black, volcanic sand beach until we saw a guy in a ladder poking at coconuts with a stick. A young man about 18 years old grabbed one, cut the top off, put a straw in it and offered it to Isaac. The young man introduced himself and told us that if there was anything we needed, Jet Skis, tours of town, snorkeling, that we should come talk to him and he would take care of us. It was clear that he did not work for the hotel and was just trying to make a buck, but he was very friendly and when I politely declined, he stayed and talked for a while and reminded me that he would be down on the beach if we thought of anything.

After several hours, our room was ready. We checked into a very nice, air conditioned, two room suite with a kitchen, and fell asleep around nine o’clock local time.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Prologue (in which I thank people who have no idea that they are responsible for me wandering into a jungle)

2011-06-16T19:34:00.001-07:00

The van’s exhaust was thick, black, and menacing but it smelled pleasantly like doughnuts and French fries. Gabe’s “Veggie Van” ran on used cooking oil and was careening down I-95 carrying it’s owner, our friend Tim, my son Isaac (henceforth to be referred to as “The Boy”) and myself.

We were on our way to Gainesville to see a football game the week before Thanksgiving. During the 8 hour drive, Gabe told us a story about a trip he had recently made. It was a good story. He told about a place where he drove from the Atlantic to the Pacific in four hours crossing through rainforests and passing volcanoes. He stayed in small hostels on the beach which cost less than $20 a night. The water was safe to drink. The locals liked Americans. The surfing was world class. There were monkeys, sea turtles, and prostitutes everywhere. Costa Rica sounded like it had a little something for everyone.

I love the show “The Amazing Race” and am enamored with the idea of going on it with my friend and pastor Michael. When I watch the show I often imagine how I would react in certain situations. The exotic scenery and people would certainly be thrilling, but I don’t know if I would ever make it out of the airport. My brain could not handle something that was both so immediately familiar and foreign at the same time.

This is not to say that I don’t have experience in international travel. As a child, my parents once took us in to deepest darkest heart of Canada. Shortly after arriving, to the village that the locals called “Niagara Falls” we hired a local guide to take us on a tour. We loaded onto a powder blue school bus with several other frightened American families and drove to see what the site that the city was famous for. That’s right, we went to the “Niagara Falls School of Horticulture” home of the world’s largest floral clock (I would just like to point out that my mother and sister will verify that this story is entirely true. My father does not want to talk about it.)

In the middle of the night some Canadian hoodlum tried to break into our empty luggage trailer. We fled the country the next day and barely made it out alive.

I tell that story just so you don’t think I am some naïve yokel. Oh yes, I have international travel under my belt. In college I also went on a mission trip to Jamaica because most Jamaicans have never seen a mostly white group of college kids sing along to pre-recorded to tapes about Jesus. I like to think we made a difference.

I have also been on several day visits to exotic countries while on cruise ships. I spent almost six hours each in Grand Cayman, Cozumel, Nassau, Pirate Island (a subsidiary of Disney), Key West and New Orleans. This would explain the “world weary” look in my eye that those who know me well often comment on.

I have a friend Jeremy O who has hiked the Appalachian Trail, and backpacked solo around New Zealand. He thinks nothing of wandering by himself to a desolate part of the world just to see what is there, no matter what hardship he has to overcome to get there.

Last year, we spent a week at Dollywood.

My friend Roland who is in his sixties has recently spent months teaching English in Mongolia and Mauritania. He fell in love with one country, and was pleasantly surprised that he wasn’t abducted and sold as meat in another.

I’ve been to Germany in Epcot and Busch Gardens.

I love the idea of travelling to a place where I don’t speak the language and instead of squirrels they have monkeys, but I need to get back on to the cruise ship by 6:00 so I don’t miss the early dinner.

Back to the veggie van.

During our Thanksgiving week in Florida, I took the boy to Disney and Universal Studios. We had a great time on the rides, but the families who were there were incredibly mean to each other. On top of that, the theme parks found every way possible to get as much money from each tourist, even selling tickets that let you skip the lines. The tourist parents pushed as hard as they could to get every last ounce of fun out of their overtired, heat exhausted families, and if they missed anything, the exact same “adventure” could be had the next day, at 11:00, 3:00 and 5:30.

It was a little depressing. Nancy and I were in the planning stages of a California vacation for this summer, but I didn’t want to have the same experience that I saw the miserable families in Orlando having.

Christmas came and went quickly like it does every year. Nancy and I had no firm plans yet for summer vacation. The previous year’s trip to Key West had been abruptly cancelled when several family emergencies made it impractical to go.

The sensible vacation would have been to rent a place at St. Augustine Beach for a week in the summer so we could see family and see the same sites we saw since we were kids, but then my mother in law went swimming with sting rays.

After going through a really rough year of family turmoil, my mother in law went on a cruise with her sister to get away from it all. During her cruise she took an excursion to swim with the stingrays (something I would never in a million years have expected her to do voluntarily), and she loved it. Since then she has seized life and I am grateful that she has found her footing once again.

If my mother in law can jump in with the sting rays, we can do something bold as well.

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure.- Helen Keller

We declared our intention to go to Costa Rica. We had no idea where we were going or how we would get there, but we were going. Shortly after we made our decision, our friends Kevin and Lisa (who actually are regular world travelers) offered to transfer a week at a timeshare in Cost Rica to us.

It is one thing to say that you want to go to a foreign country, it is quite another to have paid for a real honest to goodness resort with real hard and fast dates (no address though…Ticos don’t “do” addresses.)

After paying for the resort and the airfare we had that exciting and panicked thought “What have we done?”. The day the passports came in the mail, I texted Nancy a picture of them at work. This was real

At work, conversations would drift to the “What are you doing this summer?” variety. Most were going to the beach: Myrtle or the Outer Banks.

“How about you Matt?”

“I think we are going to Costa Rica.” I was surprised at how often the next question immediately followed.

“Are you going on a mission trip?”

“No. I am going with my family.”

“You are taking Isaac?”

“Technically yes he is part of the family, and please…call him “The Boy”.

A good number of people that I told about out plan had never left the country. Some had never been outside of the Carolinas. One had never even been on a plane. It wasn’t because they didn’t want to. On the contrary, most of them wanted to go somewhere exotic, they were just afraid. I will be honest. I am nervous as well, but I do not want to be old and think about all the things I was afraid to do. I do not want to set an example to the boy of living a life controlled by fear. Our grandparents travelled all over the world before they were in their 20s either serving in armed forces or searching for a better home for their families. I’m sure that they were afraid as well.

I almost didn’t go to one of my dearest friend’s wedding in New York City because I was certain that I would be mugged and quite possibly raped the minute I stepped off the plane.

We bought a guide book and tackled the overwhelming amount of information available about Costa Rica. We narrowed down our excursions to a volcano/hot springs day trip, a river boat cruise where we get to deliver school supplies to a rural school (a moderate Baptist’s wet dream vacation trip “Not only is it a fun adventure but I get to feel righteous since I even help people on vacation!”), and a combination Horseback/zip line trip.

Quick story on the zip lines…after deciding we were going to Costa Rica, I had a vision of climbing through the jungle to the top of a zip line platform and Isaac flaking out and screaming that he was not going to do it. We went to a local zip line place in Asheboro for a test run and after the first few, we all had such a good time, we came back with about 60 of our closest friends from church to do it again.

We continued to research and study and read until we found the site “Visit Costa Rica Now.com” last night. It was different from the other sites in that it was hosted by an American who lived there and didn’t always paint the rosy picture from the guide books. Specifically we watched a video about a scam where villains (possibly Canadian) puncture the tire of your rental car and then offer to help you change it shortly before robbing you.

I told my friend “Little Matt” who is a veteran of numerous trips to Costa Rica that we were renting a car and he immediately laughed and said, “Good luck with that.”

There were also charming videos about Dengue fever and Costa Rican jails.

I was feeling extremely anxious this morning on the way to work, when I had a moment of clarity. I realized that if we always stay where we are comfortable and safe and know exactly what to expect, we never grow or evolve. It is precisely that element of danger or the unknown that make you rely on your own wits and common sense. At the end of your journey you learn that you could survive, or you learn how to do it differently in the future: two lessons you simply can not learn by sitting at home. This is the difference between going abroad, and exiting the log flume through the gift shop.

We leave at 4:00 in the morning. I know my mind is going to be racing as I try to drift off to sleep. I wrote this to try and clear my head so I can get some rest.

The Ticos have a saying “Pura Vida”. It is the equivalent of “Aloha” and can mean hello, good bye, cool, or let me help you change that tire. The literal translation is “Pure Life”. I like that. (At least now I do….ask me again in a week.) I hope we get an idea of what that means this week. I hope the boy gets a real sense that there is more to this world than America, and comes back with an appreciation for what he has and a desire to see what else is out there.

Until next time, “Pura Vida!”

Strength and Honor,
Big Matt

Thanksgiving in January (HOL 111)

2011-01-17T17:22:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 111

How do you pick up after five months of not writing? Halloween, Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Year’s Day, and now Martin Luther King Day have all come and gone and there has not been an update to the blog. A friend of mine at church, Jennifer, told me that she started reading it and gently chided me for no writing anything in a while.

Here’s the deal. I’m going to start writing tonight and see if anything worth while comes out.

In November, Isaac and I rode with our friends Tim and Gabe down to Florida to see a football game. Florida was playing one of the smaller schools that pad out the schedule (I think it was UNC Wilmington) so I was reasonably sure that Isaac would get to see a Gator victory.

I was worried how he would do with the crowd, noise, heat, and length of the game, but he did really well and even was good for a post game walk to Lake Alice to see the alligators.

I asked Isaac what he wanted to do on Sunday and he told me that he wanted to go to the St. Augustine Alligator Farm (which is a little over an hour away). My folks, in an all time classic grandparenting moment, took Isaac and myself to the St. Augustine Alligator farm after church Sunday afternoon. We watched the zookeepers toss giant frozen rats to the big gators, fed the little ones “gator chow”, and watched a crazy lady dance seductively for an audience consisting of one disinterested king cobra. This was perfect time spent with my folks. I know that my mom wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of watching giant reptiles fight over hunks of rat, and dad spends almost every work day driving around North Florida, however they knew how much Isaac loves alligators and never once gave the impression that they would have preferred to do anything else with their Sunday.

On Monday, the boy and I went to Epcot and Magic Kingdom. He has developed a taste for wild rides and at the end of the day, he declared his favorites to be “Mission Space” and “Space Mountain”.

Nancy came down later in the week and we had multiple giant family meals and Isaac had lots of cousin time. On Friday, we got up early in the morning to go down to Universal Studios. Isaac complained that his stomach was a little upset when we arrived, but he perked up after a couple of rides on the “Woody Woodpecker” roller coaster. We watched the animal show and afterwards he asked to go to the bathroom where he promptly vomited all over the floor. We wondered if the sickness was motion sickness or did he catch the 48 hour “Two Exits No Waiting” bug that had been working it’s way through the rest of the family?

Several projectile vomits later, the suspicion was confirmed that this was no rehash of the “David-Cravey-New-Years-Eve-Back-to-the-Future-Ride-Memorial” motion sickness, but something much worse.

There comes a time when you just have to say, “I know we spent money and made a long trip, but staying here is not going to be fun for anyone.” He just looked and felt pitiful and besides that the line for the new Harry Potter ride was really long.”

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Hey! Teachers! Leave those kids alone! (HOL 110)

2010-08-25T19:50:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 110

The last few weeks have been a time of change in my life. I have a new job and am currently experiencing the anxiety and thrill of no longer being a senior employee but instead having to learn new rhythms, personalities, and skills. I’ve started playing softball which has become a much larger and rewarding commitment than I anticipated.

The biggest change though is that Isaac has started school. Nancy has been worried about this day since before Isaac was born. I on the other hand am mildly annoyed that I will have to get up early and go to sleep at a sensible time for the next 13 years.

We went to an open house Sunday night where we learned who his teacher would be. She is new to Isaac’s school, but a seasoned veteran of teaching. I didn’t have much of a chance to meet her as the building was packed with busy small children and parents who look much older than I feel.

His teacher was a last minute addition to the staff, so her room wasn’t particularly prepared, and was relatively Spartan compared to other kindergarten classrooms that I had seen. She is an older woman with grandchildren of her own. Isaac does have two friends from his daycare including one little girl that we have known since she was in the infant room with Isaac at Little Mouse playhouse.

This morning, I parked across the street from the school and walked him to the front door. It was raining and the administration decided it would be better to make the parents wait outside for a mysterious bell which never rang to let us know that we were allowed inside out of the rain.

At the open house, I made Isaac practice finding his way from the front door to his classroom. He led me to the room, put his things in his locker, found his desk (next to his buddy from daycare), and sat down and without hesitation dumped a puzzle that was on his desk upside down to amuse himself.

I knew walking in that he was ready for school. Isaac had been excited about it for months. I had gently ribbed Nancy for years when she said that she would cry on his first day of school. He was showing initiative and comfort in a new environment that as an adult I can’t even muster. So why did I have the completely unexpected lump in my throat as I did a fist pump, shook his hand, and told him “Strength and Honor” before I left?

It wasn’t that “My baby was grown up”, or “I will miss him” or even anxiety about the bullies, administrators, stupid rules, and other assorted bullshit he will have to deal with being a part of any institution for the next 13 years.

My emotions came from a deep sense of pride that I had helped prepare him for this moment. I was proud of the time, care, and love that Nancy had given to nurture his interests and help develop self discipline. Mostly I was proud of Isaac who was entering a completely new phase of life with no fear or anxiety, but excitement at his new found independence and adventure ahead.

Through out the morning, I sent Nancy pictures. She sent me a text inquiring as to how he was. I replied “He sobbed uncontrollably for you and begged me not to leave.” She replied, “Not funny.” (Although later she admitted it was a little.)

Tomorrow will be the second day of school, then the third, fourth, fifth…..etc. Eventually it will be less of an adventure and more of a chore. Not every day is the first day of school. Why shouldn’t it be? We all learn something new each day. We have the potential to make new friends and go new places every day.

To all the students I say, “Learn everything you can this year.” To the teachers, “Don’t underestimate your influence on even your least favorite child in the small moments between formal lessons.”

To the rest I say, “I have got to get in bed. I have to get a kid to school in the morning.”

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

You Can Hang Out With All The Boys (HOL 109)

2010-05-04T19:15:00.000-07:00

HOL 109

Nancy and I decided we were tired of having all of that free time so we signed Isaac up for Y.M.C.A. T-ball. As genetically unlikely as it may be, he is pretty good, works hard at it, and really loves it. When I get home from work, he asks to go out and throw or hit baseballs. He then asks to throw or hit more after dinner. He will keep playing until it is dark or Nancy calls us in.

During practices and games, he squats down and watches the batter intently. If a ball rolls by him, he will chase it into the outfield to get it, even if other faster kids are going for it. I try and help the coach on practice days. I figure it won’t be very long before I will be less than helpful in teaching most sports. For now I enjoy playing with the kids and trying to motivate the ones rolling in the dirt.

We only have one batting tee for the team to practice with. Using the ingenuity that has made my family famous, I made three more tees out of toilet plungers and cardboard tubes. Papa would be disappointed that I went out and bought new plungers instead of using “Slightly used” ones.

We did not get into any of the magnet programs for elementary school that we wanted, but the school we are zoned for it pretty good from what I understand.

We took Isaac to Merlefest last weekend. I didn’t know there were so many Country-hippies-with-money in the world. We heard a lot of great music including Bearfoot, The Greencards, Steve Martin with Steep Canyon Rangers, and Elvis Costello. My favorite moment of the whole day was watching Elvis Costello after the sun had set with a sleepy boy curled up on my lap. Isaac’s favorite show was the world famous “Alberti Flea Circus”. The enthusiasm in the crowd rapidly evaporates when they realize exactly what a flea circus is, and they wonder out loud why this show has to be out in the sun during the hottest part of the day. The crowd had dissipated to about a dozen sweaty kids by the end, most were either mildly disappointed or just didn’t get it.

In contrast, Isaac still excitedly talks about the girl flea that dove off the high dive and splashed the audience.

Isaac has taken up Stratego and has gotten pretty good at it. Be sure and ask Nancy about the time we made a bet that if he could beat her, he could stay up as late as he wanted one Friday night.

Isaac has always enjoyed comics of any type and has recently been requesting to read my old “Far Side” books. He will laugh out loud and explain what is going on in each panel. I have to skip some of them, but we read a lot of the dark material too. Bears, sharks, aliens, and dinosaurs are all fascinating to boys and Larson’s art has connected with him like it did with me when I was young.

The last few items were posted on Facebook, but they still make me chuckle.

On the way to school one morning, Isaac informed me that you can’t talk about elephant butts at school….unless you are reading a book about elephant butts.

I woke up one morning to see Isaac standing at my bedside looking me in the eye. “Dad you should never touch a porcupine because you could get spines in your hands, face, or testicles.”

One morning, on the drive to school, completely out of left field…”Dad, do you remember the time that Tim Tebow got hurt real bad and threw up?”

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Sleighbells, Reindeer, and Snow (HOl 108)

2010-01-22T15:30:00.000-08:00

HOL 108

It dawned on me in the middle of December that between Charlie Brown’s Christmas special, the Advent liturgies at church, and Delilah, I was hearing more about how people get depressed at Christmas than enjoy it, and I found it was rubbing off on me.

It dawned on me that I had a four year old, and was in the middle of a precious few years where reindeer really fly, and Santa really visits. We had a great snowy shut-in weekend before Christmas. We called it our “Practice Christmas”.

Christmas Eve was incredible. Isaac was asked to bring in the Christ candle for the service. This was also the first time I let him light and hold his own candle for the candlelight sing along at the end of the service.

We had Christmas Eve dinner with our friends David and Debbie at one our favorite restaurants, Phoenix Asian cuisine. We then met Mike and Kari at our house to watch Charlie Brown and the Grinch and to enjoy liquor store cupcakes. (They were called Irish car bombs and they were incredible.)

Bed time came, cookies were set out. The celery we had planned for reindeer food had gone bad, so we left out an apple. We read our stories and said our prayers and then Isaac and I sat in his bed looking out the window for Santa. I stayed for a lot longer than I expected at one point I even thought to myself, “I wish Santa would hurry up and fly by, because I have to get some presents out.” Lying in bed with Isaac and looking out that window with anticipation will be one of the moments I remember as long as I live.

Santa came and left toys and books (for some reason Santa always leaves books at our house!). After all of the presents were opened and played with, Isaac found a big present down stairs by the chimney, a battery operated scooter. (Do not call it a motorcycle, or Isaac will correct you….it is in fact a scooter.)

Santa even gave Nancy and I tickets to Avenue Q and Merlefest which makes us even more excited about the slowly approaching spring.

The next few weeks were a blur of family visits, road trips, spending time with friends, and going to see one of my favorite new movies, “The Fantastic Mr. Fox.”

It was a great Christmas.

Hang in there Dick Clark.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

P.S. Right now Isaac is singing "Ants on the ground! Ants on the ground!"

Por favor Mantegan Si Alejado de las Puertas (HOL 107)

2010-01-21T17:47:00.000-08:00

HOL 107

I decided that when we went to Florida for Thanksgiving, Isaac and I were going to go to a theme park. No one with any sense would go with us knowing that all of the theme parks in central Florida would be at full capacity the day after Thanksgiving. I could not help myself. Isaac is at the perfect age, where a chance to meet Lightning McQueen, Spiderman, Brer Bear, or Darth Vader would not just be a photo-op with a sweaty teen in a filthy costume, but a chance for him to meet the heroes and villains from books, movies and his dreams in real life.

Saint Andrew (patron saint of theme parks) gave Isaac and I two parkhopper tickets to Disney. We drove down early Friday morning and hit Disney Studios right when it opened. It was not a good sign when I overheard one astonished cast member tell another, “I’ve never seen a line that long!” referring to ever growing queue for the Toy Story ride. Isaac and I got in line.

We waited and waited, but we were never bored. Isaac and I talked and looked at the scenery. He never once asked me to buy him anything or how much longer we were going to have to wait. It was easier than waiting in line with Nancy.

The boy and I had a blast on the new ride launching 3-D darts and pies at Buzz, Woody and the rest of Toy Story gang. We wandered down the street to the 3-D Muppetvision movie which was also a big hit with the boy. The crowd was really starting to get thick, so we retreated to the Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground and Isaac found a slide made out of a giant roll of Kodak film (what the hell is film?) He climbed the hill and slid down the giant roll of film again and again. I started to round him up to leave, and realized, everywhere else in the park was going to be packed, and he was happy, and I was happy. Why bother?

We explored and ran around the playground until the Star Wars Jedi training show started. I had packed a light saber in my back pack just in case we saw Darth Vader. The show consists of pulling kids out of the audience, dressing them in Jedi robes, handing them a light saber, and giving them a chance to take a whack a guy in an extremely realistic Vader costume, while a Disney photographer snaps away. Isaac didn’t want to take part, but I did feel like Dad of the year with him sitting on my shoulder waving his light saber at the Darth Vader on stage. This went well until the bright red, horned, Darth Maul jumped down into the audience and wandered around sneering at tourists.

Isaac tapped me on the head and said, “Let’s go now!” He made sure he put the light saber away so Maul would not feel threatened. We then rode the flight simulator, Star Tours, which Isaac really enjoyed.

Our next stop was the Tower of Terror. We talked about what to expect in the creepy haunted tower while we waited in line. I kept reassuring him that it was going to be scary, but I would not let anything hurt him, and I would hold on to him tightly the whole time. I also promised after the ride, we would go and buy a Star Wars matchbox car. After 20 minutes in line, the little girl in front of us who had been listening to our conversation pulled her mom close and asked, “Are you going to hold on to ME while we ride?”.

The ride went well until the freefall portion. I looked over at Isaac and could see his leg trembling. My exact thoughts were,”He is either having a seizure or peeing himself, either way, I can’t stop this ride.” I told him to hold on, and that it would be just one more drop. When we arrived at the station, he had a glazed look on his face.

I told him, “It’s over. You did good.”

He shook his head a little bit and smiled.

We went to pick out his matchbox car and on the way to the store, we passed a photo op area with Mike Wazoski and James Sullivan from Monsters Inc. When I got to the display with the cars, I didn’t see Isaac anywhere. I immediately went into full on panic mode yelling at the top of my lungs “Isaac! Where are you?” I was so loud that people on the other side of busy open air plaza stopped and looked at me.

I was surprised how quickly I panicked. There was no gradual transition from mild concern to “Let’s stare at the crazy man.” I truly did not care if I looked like the biggest idiot in the world. Isaac had stopped just beyond my field of vision to watch Mike and Sully, but came running when he heard me call. When my heart rate settled back down, Isaac and I split a big bucket of Caramel corn and watched people. I felt sorry for the families who were clearly exhausted, but had an over eager parent forcing them to see everything, no matter how miserable everyone was.

There were Christmas decorations up already all over the park which made for some surreal sites like the blue Power Ranger posing in front of a Nativity Scene.

Isaac insisted on watching the Automobile stunt show, and then we drove over to The Kingdom to ride “Pirates”. Isaac has seen a Japanese copy of “Song of the South” and was excited to finally ride Splash Mountain. He made me pack rain ponchos, and I am glad that he did because it was so cold, that everything else in the park had an hour wait, except Splash Mountain, which you could walk right on.

We waited halfway through the line of Thunder Mountain and he said, “Dad, I’m tired, I want to go home.” We got out of line, and I asked if he wanted to do something else.
“Nope, I just want to go home”.

He was asleep before we officially left the Reedy Creek improvement district.

We had a remarkable day, which I will never forget. Hopefully next time, Darth Maul will be gone, and a shepherd will chase off the Power Ranger.

Strength and Honor,
Big Matt

Say "Uncle!" (HOL 106)

2010-01-20T17:16:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter106

Being an Uncle is having all of the fun stuff of being a parent, but with considerably less effort. I will probably not have any more kids of my own, but I love all four of my nieces and my nephew.

My sister’s daughter, Lily, makes me laugh out loud. Her personality and wit remind me so much of my grandmother. Her brother Eli is so gentle and tenderhearted and is always so excited to see Isaac.

There are three nieces on Nancy’s side of the family. Cassidy will always have a special place in my heart. She is the dancer, performer, and princess. Faith is extremely clever and full of spunk. She is feisty and energetic. Jordyn, being the youngest, has adapted by being strong willed and independent. She and Isaac, the closest in age, have always had a love/hate relationship.

I see so much of not just their parents, but the extended family in each child.

I taught Lily the “Alpha-butt” song to her delight, and my sister’s chagrin. I flip Faith in the air and wrestle. I answer Cassidy’s call to play again and again until I am tired or dizzy. I make a point to tell each child I love them and miss them.

I won’t pretend things always work out perfectly. Kids fight. I get tired and snap. I want to have uninterrupted time with my adult family and in-laws without having to stop everything to get juice. The noise and mess created goes up exponentially with each child in the house.

I have to keep reminding myself that someday they will eat their Thanksgiving dinner and then go out with their friends. They will be too busy studying for finals to make a trip up to North Carolina.

Each time I see them, I am reminded of how fast time moves and that we have to enjoy every moment.

My dad comes from a big family and so I have a mixed bag of uncles to choose as role models, but at one point or another in my life each have been important to me. Some are long gone, some have set examples with their lives by being strong family men and hard workers, and one is earnestly trying to make up for past mistakes.

I hope one day I can be a trusted mentor and friend to each of these kids. For now, I will settle for being a monster, pony, sweaty dolphin (don’t ask), magician, singer, ballet attendee, knock-knock joke teller, dive watcher, bad impressionist, roller coaster buddy, but mostly co-conspirator in making their parents crazy.

Strength and Honor,
Big Matt

Hello, I’m Johnny Effing Cash. (HOL 105)

2010-01-19T19:22:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 105

I take some measure of pride that Isaac can pick out a Johnny Cash, White Stripes or Mountain Goats song even if he has never heard it before just by listening to the instruments and voices. This will be an important skill for his future geekdom.

We were listening to Sirius radio on the way home from Florida Monday night, and the Cash song, “Big River” came on. I didn’t think Isaac was familiar with it, so I waited until the end and asked, “Isaac, do you know who that was singing?”

As soon as I asked, the “Outlaw Country” DJ, Mojo Nixon announced, “That was “Johnny fucking Cash!”

Isaac piped up from the back seat, “It was Johnny Cash, but he said it was ‘Johnny fucking Cash”.

As much as I appreciate Mojo’s enthusiasm for Cash’s body of work, I didn’t realize it was he was going to voice it in such a colorful manner. Thanks Mojo!

I looked at Nancy and could tell she was going to be no help at all. She was doing everything she could to stifle laughter. I was just flabbergasted, not just at the word coming out of my son’s mouth, but the impeccable comedic timing of the universe.

I calmly explained that he was not in trouble, but that was an adult word. If he ever said it at church, school, or around us, he would get in trouble. (Maybe not church, Depends on who is doing the children’s sermon I suppose.)

Last week Isaac came downstairs and told me that he found a picture of the hole monster in one of his books. I gave him a puzzled look and asked, “What is a hole monster?’ The look he gave me conveyed a sense of pity for his poor simpleton father.

“You know, the hole monster that ate Boba Fett!”

“Sarlacc son….use the scientific name.”

For Christmas, my folks gave Isaac a stuffed grizzly bear two pack: A mother and baby bear. I can’t tell you how much joy I have gotten watching Isaac introduce the two bears two his favorite sleep toy, “Blackie Bear”. Evidently they are all cousins.

Strength and Honor.
Big Matt

P.S. Come back later this week. I am planning on posting more stories about the holidays.

Time Flies like an Arrow. Fruit Flies Like a Banana (HOL 104)

2010-01-18T19:55:00.000-08:00

Time Flies Like an Arrow. Fruit Flies Like a Banana. (HOL 104)

Forgive me reader it has been three months since my last blog. A couple of recent comments from readers prompted me to look back at some of my old blogs. I was a little surprised that I laughed out loud at my own writing.

In the last few months, we have done a lot of travelling, and I have tried to dedicate more of my free time to exercise and practicing the guitar. It is also hard to concentrate on writing when your muse wants to play Batman, watch a movie, or have a lightsaber fight with you.

I found a sheet of paper on my desk with some notes for a blog that never got written back in October.

This morning Isaac asked me to sing, “The Monster Song”. I assumed he meant, “Monster Mash”, but that wasn’t what he was looking for. After a dozen questions, I realized he was referring to the clip from “Young Frankenstein” we had watched on youtube a couple of nights before.

I went to another Chuck E Cheese party for one of Isaac’s classmates. I found another dad to sit and drink beer with. Isaac was much bolder with his buddy, “Sam” around. I normally can’t get him to climb in the tunnels especially if it is busy and wild (which it was that night.) With his partner in crime, he was fearless. This was both encouraging and slightly nerve racking.

Isaac won a bag of cotton candy and on the way home from Chuck E. Cheese enthusiastically reported to me, “Dad, this Cotton Candy is so good…. I can’t feel my mouth.”

I will write more about the holidays and our trip to Disney later this week.

Strength and Honor.

Big Matt

Cleaning up the Counter (HOL 103)

2009-10-19T19:06:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 103

I can’t tell you how many times in the last 12 years of marriage I have had to dig through the recycle bin or the trash looking for one of the hundreds of scraps of paper that I write myself notes on through the day. Nancy seems to think that a torn edged piece of paper with a hastily scrawled list like: 1) Alligator 2) Batman 3) Coffee 4) Anteater 5) Gun 6) Zookeeper along with a half dozen other scraps of paper with similar seemingly unrelated words stacked in the middle of the kitchen counter are garbage.

Most of the time they are, but the ones with kernels of stories about Isaac are the ones I will dig through the trash to find.

I’ve recently read some of my old blogs and realize how many little moments I have forgotten, so I want to get as many in writing as possible.

1) I’ve written before about Isaac and my arriving home from work ritual, “Playing Alligator”. I change clothes, we make the bed, and then wrestle. Alligator has now evolved into a scripted play every afternoon.

Isaac: “Daddy Alligator, I’m Hungry! What is in the refrigerator?”

I look under the pillow and can’t seem to find anything.

Isaac: “Let’s go to the store!”

We then drive motorcycles, fire trucks, or trash trucks to the store where we “Shop” for all of the food we need. (Cookies, Peppers, Milk, Cheese, Dragonflies, Hamburger.) We then “Drive” back home, “Fill” the refrigerator, and I “Feed” him. Only then can the wrestling commence.

2) After much debate, we have decided that Isaac will be Batman for Halloween. I will play the Joker. Isaac and I are trying to convince Nancy that she pretty much has to dress up as Catwoman or Halloween will be ruined for everyone.

(As far as the Joker Costume goes, the makeup is fairly inexpensive, but finding a purple shirt and green vest is a little tricky, I have decided that a nurse is outfit will probably be easier to find, funnier, and let’s face it…..pretty terrifying.).

3) Nancy has mentioned Isaac’s love of Curious George on her blog. Isaac loves it when I read about how George was a “good little anteater and always very curious”. “NO!”, Isaac yells through laughter, “He is a monkey!” I think all kids love having a chance to correct an adult. I’m sure his teachers will adore this quality later on.

4) Isaac has also decided what he wants to be when he grows up. After he plays football and baseball, he is going to be a zookeeper, and Nancy and I can work at his zoo through our retirement. Luckily his old man is an alumnus from a prestigious zookeeper school. I may be able to pull some strings.

5) We drove past a wooded area near my office the other day, and I told Isaac that I sometimes walk through the woods on my lunch breaks. He asked if I carried a gun for bears. I told him, “No.” He told me, “You should go to Hollywood and buy a gun. That is where Holly lives.” I have no idea what that means either, buy it made me laugh.

6) This summer when Isaac was staying with my folks, Nancy got busted by the boy. My mother was making Isaac some chocolate milk, when he said, “Mom makes chocolate milk for herself every morning, but she calls it coffee. I know its chocolate milk though.” I guess the cartoon rabbit on the label was a tip off as well.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Well Dog my Cats! (HOL 102)

2009-10-13T19:32:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 102.

Despite the current climate of calm, rational, respectful debate about religion and politics, I don’t talk about either much on this blog. Whenever I do say anything about religion, I can’t help but feel like I set myself up to be compared as either more liberal or conservative than whoever is reading (The only people you should ever discuss religion with are the ones who hold the exact same beliefs as you. It’s better that way.) For example, if I mention my belief that God loves my gay or lesbian friends as much as anyone else, I‘m sure some people paint me into the “Hippy Dippy Southern California Anything Goes Moonbat” side of the aisle (or even worse….Methodist). If I write about God who I believe created all and lives within each of us, or Jesus who I believe to be fully human and Divine, I am relegated by some to the “Superstitious, Fundamentalist, Halloween Banning, Repeat in Unison with Fox News” side of the room (or even worse….Southern Baptist).

I like most of you are somewhere in the middle, trying to stake out my own piece of theological real estate while being influenced by people I respect on both sides of me urging me to move my family “just a little further down the street in their direction.”

What does this have to do with Coralline?

A friend of mine had warned me that Coralline was pretty intense for children. (Her two boys, older than Isaac, were scared for weeks after seeing it.) Isaac is a huge fan of “A Nightmare Before Christmas” which is in the same style and directed by the same person that created Coralline, so Nancy and I screened it to try and anticipate if it would be too intense for Isaac. Isaac has seen all of the Star Wars movies, Ironman, Fantastic Four, Willy Wonka, and a few select scenes from Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park , Lord of the Rings and Batman Returns. I watch with him, finger hovering above the fast forward button lest it get too scary. Good Guys, Bad Guys, and Heroes are really important to him right now.

Ultimately Coralline didn’t make the cut. Although there were some scary parts, and some almost nude women, I thought he could handle it. I just didn’t think he would like the story or the characters. Since I was watching the movie with Isaac, something else stuck out. Several times during the movie characters said “Oh my God!”

To be clear, I don’t think they are “Magic Words” that give God a migraine whenever they are uttered aloud. In fact, (Hypocrisy alert) I am guilty of saying the name aloud in moments of frustration or anger (including the middle initial, “H”). I have on more than one occasion slipped up and apologized to Isaac when I said it in front of him. On the rare occasion he has said it (in an exaggerated Valley Girl cadence which I’m sure he picked up at day care) a quick look from me spurs him to offer the correct “Oh my goodness….goodness!”

It seems the general consensus that “Oh my God” and “Jesus Christ” are acceptable, even in a children’s movie, while dozens of other usable scatological words and phrases still carry a forbidden aura. For those of us who take our children to church and want to teach them about our faith, what do our kids learn when we break the one rule in the Bible about swearing? When we trivialize the mystery of life, death, and all creation whenever someone in the room farts or the Panthers block a field goal (okay the second one never happens….bad example.)

Even if you don’t claim any faith, I’m sure you have experienced a moment of awe considering the millions of cells, atoms, and sub-atomic particles that had to fall together in order for you to be you, and wondered what your place in the universe is (Probably at three in the morning after watching “The Wall” laser show at the planetarium.)

I’m not calling for any movies to be banned, or shows to be cancelled. I would probably still let the boy watch Coralline if I really thought it would interest him. I don’t want to change the rest of the world.

I still think sacred cows make the best hamburger, and there are lots of colorful phrases I am looking forward to teaching the boy as he grows up (“’Bout useless as tits on a boar hog” being one of them). I want Isaac to get the feeling that there is more to existence than what we see and hear and that it is okay to be in awe. When he gets older, and can form his own ideas about what that bigger picture is, I hope his little piece of theological real estate is in the same neighborhood as mine.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Wet and Wild Delayed (HOL 101)

2009-10-05T20:05:00.001-07:00

House of Laughter 101
(I started writing this in early September. I wouldn’t let myself delete it until I finished it.)
School is in and we are back on a “schedule”. I always feel mildly depressed when school starts even though it doesn’t change my work schedule at all. The big difference is that I don’t see Nancy in the morning and I have to drop Isaac off at daycare. Unlike Nancy, I’m not obsessing over my reaction to him going to kindergarten next year. Unlike some of the other children at his daycare, Isaac doesn’t cry when I drop him off.
On the way to school Isaac and I listen to music, tell stories about times we visited parks and restaurants that we pass, wonder when the new Haloween store will open, count how many sleeps until Gammy and G-Daddy come visit (three), check out the progress of the new tunnel being dug under Cone blvd, and decide what we are going to do that afternoon when I get home from work. Then I drop him off.
And I go back to a quiet truck.
And I think about how for the next eight hours I will have to pretend to be interested in cell phone plans, and gyms, and how bad people’s retirement accounts look now, and how the world is going to end because of health care reform.
And I think about Isaac yelling “Daddy!” and running to hug me and calling me to play Alligator. I consider myself fortunate to realize now how every one of these moments is a treasure.
I know there are people who don’t see the appeal in having a child. It’s like an enthusiast trying to explain a love for golf, or opera, or heroin.
Isaac and I had one last “Hurrah” for summer last weekend when we visited the local Wet and Wild. Nancy hates water parks. One of the main reasons we have a child is that I can once again go to water parks without looking like the local perv.
Water parks aren’t just about E-coli poisoning and overpriced hot dogs. There are a lot of important life lessons to be learned.
1) Stop and enjoy. We weren’t in any hurry to see everything. We rode the Lazy river three laps in a row. We also stopped and watched the riders make the crash landing at the base of the nearly vertical slide for a good deal of time.
2) Don’t obsess. When we found a slide Isaac liked, he would ride again and again, and not want to do anything else. I assured him we could come back after we explored and tried some other rides (which it turned out he liked just as well.)
3) Be brave. Isaac was a little scared to try some of the big slides, but I told him, “You only have to try it once. If you don’t like it, we won’t do it again.” The biggest slide was our favorite for the day. We ride it twice. For the smaller slides, I would help him get on the slide the first time, and gradually give him more and more freedom. With a few tries, the thing he was terrified of became a source of pride and independence.
5) How to wait in line. Instead of whining about how his feet hurt, or how long it was taking, or wanting a drink, he and I talked about what slide we would do next, look for airplanes, tell knock knock jokes, and amused each other. The lines went pretty quickly.
6) Daddy will keep you safe, but be prepared just in case. Isaac wore a life jacket on most of the slides. I assured him that I would hold on to him as we rode, but if I fell off the back of the tube, he was still going to be okay. He understood that if he fell in the water he would pop right back up and he should swim to the side.
We had a fine day, and I look forward to taking him again next year.
One last story from early September…….
Nancy brought Isaac home from school and gave him a light snack. When he was done, he told Nancy that he wanted a cereal bar. She told him, “No” dinner was going to be soon. Nancy had some work to do at her computer, and Isaac played quietly for a while….then took a cereal bar out of the cupboard and put it on the table in front of him. He didn’t unwrap it, he just played with it. Nancy asked what he was doing, and he said he was “going to eat it after dinner.” This lasted right up until he heard the my truck pull up in front of the house at which point his eyes got big, he ran to cupboard, put the cereal bar away, slammed the door and ran upstairs to play.
Turns out I’m not just the “Fun” parent.

Strength and Honor.
Big Matt

The Sporting Life* (HOL 100)

2009-08-20T18:09:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 100
Last night I played pool volleyball with a group of men who have played twice a week throughout the summer for years. I played a couple of times earlier in the summer, and generally have a good time. Most of the guys have known each other for years, and a couple of them have college age sons that play as well. I get my hands on the ball a couple of times each game, although I miss as many as I hit.
There are a couple of guys who take the game much more seriously then they need to. I found myself becoming frustrated when I would miss a shot, get unsolicited coaching from another player (i.e. “Don’t go for it if you can’t hit it.” or “You need to hit those.” ), and then watch the “coach” miss the next shot. Just when I get to the place where I enjoy playing for the sake of playing, I’m reminded of why I disliked sports so much as a kid.
I don’t ever recall either of my folks playing a team sport. I went to a couple of Gator football games as a kid, but never really understood the game until high school. My dad lifted weights and jogged, and he tried to get me interested in either, but I never understood the appeal. I couldn’t run fast, I couldn’t catch, I couldn’t throw. I was always picked last or next to last for a team. (There was a handicapped kid in our class. He and I alternated for who got picked last.) I always felt guilty for the person who had mercy on me and picked me earlier or attempted to throw the ball to me. There was no chance I was going to help the team, and therefore his act of pity would invariably bring his teammate’s retribution on him.
My youth soccer coach asked my folks if I was retarded.
I learned early on that if I did my best and pushed as hard as I could, I would still be grossly outperformed by the second slowest kid out on the field.
There were only two times I was athletically successful as a kid and ironically, they reinforced the message that I belonged inside in the air-conditioning playing Atari. I was the Indian leg wrestling champion of my Cub Scout troop. Is it really any surprise that the kid who outweighed everyone else by twenty pounds could easily flip pin all comers? At a county track meet, my elementary school’s tug-of-war team, which I was a member of, easily dominated every other team. A quick glance at our lineup made it clear that Coach Washington didn’t pick this team for its speed and agility.
So the question is, “How do I raise a kid to enjoy physical activity when genetically speaking he has a snowball’s chance in hell of having and ability?” I’m sure he will have other kids and coaches who treat every game of kickball as a gladiatorial death match. I also don’t want him to turn up his nose at all sports as a distraction and waste of time. I want to instill in him a desire to win, but a greater desire to enjoy playing.
My friend Scott (a sports fanatic and former athlete known for his cat-like agility) assures me that we are on the right track. Isaac enjoys watching Grasshopper baseball and Panther and Gator football. He really enjoys it when I tie a ball to a string in a tree and let him hit it with his bat. I’m surprised at ho well he can throw a Frisbee. He loves to go outside and catch and throw a football. We’ve taken him to play golf a couple of times (mini and par three.)
After writing and then reading the last paragraph, I actually feel like we are doing a pretty good job on this front after all. Still if he has no athletic skills at all, he will at least get a little exercise playing Wii.

Strength and Honor,

Big Matt

Staycation all I ever wanted (HOL 99)

2009-08-14T20:25:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 99

The two most important, rewarding, and frustrating roles in my life are that of husband and father. Unlike many other professions, my job doesn’t bleed over into my private life very often. (Rarely do I use a change in transmitted acousitc energy to diagnose changes in fluid dynamics when I’m home, unless I hear the toilet running long after a flush.)

Whenever Isaac and Nancy go to Florida in the summer, I ask myself an intimidating question, “Who am I when I am not a father or husband?” I find it intimidating because there were only about 6 months of my life between the time I was living with my parents and the time I was married. My assumption is that left to my own devices, I would be the living embodiment of “Comic Book Guy” from the Simpsons.

It took about two days to become tired of Tombstone pizza and video games. I was surprised that I never went out to eat or to the movies by myself. I didn’t play nearly as much X-box or Wii as I thought I would. I exercised slightly more than I thought I would (none). After destroying our second hand elliptical machine, I did take a number of long walks in addition to the weekly game of ultimate Frisbee. I joined a great three hour game of pool volleyball which I both enjoyed and didn’t suck at….a rarity in my athletic career. Life was a lot more spontaneous. I went and saw several movies with friends (Hurt Locker, Bruno, and Raising Arizona). I had lunch at Indian Restaurant with folks I normally don’t hang out with, and enjoyed dollar taco night with the Olsons. I went to a Sunday night concert with a mix of friends from church. I also got to re-connect with a family that I hadn’t seen in years when they spent the night at our place on their way through Greensboro to the beach.

I had a busy and rewarding week, but at the same time I really missed Isaac and Nancy especially when they had a birthday party for the boy down in Florida. I mentally went through the logistics of driving to Florida to surprise them, but ultimately knew it would not have been worth the expense and hassle.

They arrived home on Saturday and we spent the week doing all of the fun things a family intends to do, but never get around to. We went to Carowinds where Isaac and I rode the wooden “Fairly Odd Coaster” on the front row (Afterwards he said it was his favorite, but he only liked the little hills.) We also rode the Scooby Doo Haunted mansion about 6 times. The big thrill for the day though was the water park.

Isaac would not ride any of the slides the week before at Wild Waters in Florida. I used Daddy magic to work up his courage to ride the “Platypus plunge”, and after one trip down the water slide, he was hooked. Nancy and I sat in chairs and watched him get in line by himself, wait his turn, slide to the bottom and run right back around and get in line again.

On his birthday, we opened his presents first thing in the morning and then our friend Gabe took us to a day baseball game (When the thermometer reads higher than the speed gun for the pitches…..you know it is hot.) Isaac was disappointed that we didn’t have all of his friends over for his birthday, so we invited over a handful of his grown up friends for cake that night.

One afternoon of our “Staycation” we all bought white shirts at Goodwill and took them home to Tie Dye them. There is a reason they provide gloves with tie dye kits. My hands looked like I had strangled the Joker. Isaac was actually scared of my hands and run away screaming whenever he could see my rainbow colored palms.

At the end of the week, we went down to the Lazy 5 ranch near Charlotte. It is a large farm where you can drive through an enormous open area filled with deer, sheep, cattle, pigs, zebras, rhinos, giraffes, emu, ostriches, and dozens of other friendly ungulates that will stick their head into your car window, eat goat chow out of a bucket on your wife’s lap, slobber all over everything, and then chase your car while you gasp for air laughing hysterically and try to capture the look of terror and disgust on your wife’s face with the digital camera. Yeah it was that awesome.

Life is getting back to normal. Schools are starting, and instead of mourning the end of summer I’m trying to look forward to the cool things that come with fall. Halloween, Corn Mazes, colorful leaves, last minute weekend trips to coaster parks before they close for the season, and the inevitable mad rush which is Our anniversary, Nancy’s birthday, My birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years, and the whirlwind trips to Florida that come with the season. Time flies like an arrow….Fruit flies like a banana.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

Creeper pics

2009-07-15T18:22:00.001-07:00

Vacation All I ever Wanted (HOL 98)

2009-07-15T18:13:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 98

When planning a vacation with a three year old, you have to include visits to places that are appropriate to the child’s interests, limit excessive amount of walking through un shaded, crowded areas, and schedule a reasonable end to a day so your child can rest. We did none of those things. We went to Washington DC.

Last year we planned an extensive road trip to New York City for our vacation. As summer drew closer, we scaled back our plans to renting a beach house. We then realized that most of the fun of having a beach house is being able swim throughout the day, something we can do at home for considerably less money. Isaac is also not a huge fan of sand.

We were content to sit home for a week when we got a very generous offer from a friend in DC to stay at her place. We planned for the last week of June.

Nancy was gone for the weekend before so Isaac and I did guy stuff. We went to garage sales where Isaac smartly purchase a Darth Vader mask, and talked the seller of a 12 inch Spiderman doll down from ten dollars to fifty cents. Isaac confided he liked going to garage sales with me better than Mom because I let him get stuff. We also went to Burlington city park where we rode the train, merry go round, and other carnival rides.

When Nancy returned, we packed up for the big trip Monday morning. When we travel, one of us drives, the other navigates. On this trip, I was driving and Nancy was navigating. After leaving Greensboro…(My attorney advises me to skip the part about the drive into Washington DC if I want to remain married to Nancy. We will pick up the story just after parking at George Washington University.)…..finally finished crying and cleaned up the blood, we decided to explore the city.

Washington is a city that is constantly under construction. Isaac made sure to point out every construction crane in the city. Isaac also made sure we noticed every squirrel. It turns out that they were all Obama’s pet squirrels.

Since I was traveling with Guilford County’s Media Specialist of the Year, a trip to the Library of Congress was not optional. I assumed they would have recognized Nancy when she walked in and whisked her back to the special “VIP Librarian” room where they hand out original hand written copies of “Pride and Prejudice”, swap war stories about shushing large groups of people, and keeping copies of “Harry Potter”, “Huckleberry Finn”, and “Daddy’s Roommate” in their collections despite the howls of concerned parents.

It turns out that the Library of Congress was a remarkable building with a collection of important American artifacts including Jefferson’s personal library. Isaac really liked the squirrel out front who was so fearless due to dropped tourist popcorn, he actually let Isaac pet him. The secret to touring a museum with Isaac is for one parent (the father) to find an exhibit that Isaac is interested in to distract him like a looping video of old vaudeville acts, and the other parent (the mother) to enjoy the rich tapestry of American history by actually spending more than 45 seconds at each display case.

This was the case at “The International Spy Museum”. I did the “Operation Spy” attraction while Nancy and Isaac toured the museum (which according to some guide books can take three or four hours to see) in about 20 minutes. When I finished the “Operation Spy” attraction, I found my family in the Snack Bar at the cupcake exhibit. On the second run through the museum, Isaac and I found an air conditioner vent that you could crawl through and “spy” on other visitors in the museum. After crawling through the tunnel a dozen times with Isaac, he and I found our way to a small theater showing old propaganda films including an old Donald Duck Cartoon where he fights Hitler. The spy museum was cool, but needs to be updated a bit. The “Cutting Edge” technology in the last room showing satellite images from around the world was pretty much the same thing as “Google Maps”.

The International Spy Museum had exhibits on espionage in battle throughout history and literature. Isaac and I admired a large model of “The Trojan Horse.” I tried to intrigue him by telling him the story, “Once long ago, some bad guys called ‘The Trojans’ kidnapped the most beautiful princess in the world named Helen. They took her back to their city and locked her up. The good guys, ‘The Greeks’ and their superhero ‘Achilles’ tried to rescue her. They fought and fought, but could not rescue the princess, so the Greeks built a big wooden horse to try to trick the Trojans. The Trojans brought the horse inside their city .”

At this point we walk around to the back of the horse and can see all the soldiers hiding inside.

“And Isaac, guess who was inside of that big wooden horse?”

Isaac answered, “Jesus?”.

The folks around us were amused.

Another highlight of our visit was during our visit to the Air and Space Museum. We were walking along the crowded second floor when Nancy stopped me and pointed out a famous, Oscar winning actress that we had just walked past. I asked her to point the person out. She pointed to a woman with three kids, bent over rifling through her bag looking for a camera. The thing we both noticed immediately was the three inches of white thong sticking out the top of her jeans. I walked back to where the actress was and verified that it was in fact who Nancy said it was. I made eye CONTACT, but didn’t want to be ACCUSED of harassing her. (I’m not going to say who the actress is to keep this blog from showing up when people Google her name and “thong”.)

Late one evening we were out on the National Mall. (Which was lined with vendors already selling Michael Jackson Memorial T-shirts by the way.) The sky was overcast and the wooded area between the Washington Monument and Vietnam Memorial was filled with thousands of fireflies. As the rain began, Isaac darted around the trees, catching fireflies and laughing…..180 proof childhood magic. Like all magic, it didn’t last. The gentle sprinkling of rain turned into a full force gully washer and we were 15 minutes from the nearest Metro station. It rained so hard that we didn’t hesitate walking through three inch puddles. Everything in my wallet was saturated. The hot shower I took when we finally made it home was one of my top 10 of all time.

Upon leaving DC, we drove across the state of Virginia to Abingdon. This was to be base camp for our trip up into the Appalachian mountains. In the morning a can drove us along with two bikes and a trailer to the top of the mountain where we spent the next few hours leisurely riding the 15 miles downhill back to our car. It was early July but still quite chilly. We stopped frequently to look at old railroad depots and throw rocks into rivers. The trail meandered over old railroad bridges spanning huge gorges and through canyons. We stopped and had lunch at a little café that catered to bikers on the trail.

We made it back to the bike rental place just as my front tire lost all of it’s air.
With only half a day left to our vacation and it almost being the 4th of July, we celebrated American life in the traditional way. We ordered pizza and watched hotel cable in bed for the rest of the night.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Hard Rock er...Freestyle Music Park (HOL 97)

2009-06-24T18:14:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 97

We borrowed a friend’s beach house for Father’s Day weekend. We arrived Friday afternoon and decided to explore the area. I looked up local mini-golf places in nearby Shallote on my cell phone. The web page described an “indoor black light” mini golf course, bowling alleys and go-cart tracks. We followed the directions out to a two lane road that cut through a forest and over a creek, but had a serious lack of go karts, bowling alleys or mini golf. We drove up and down the road several times until we saw a sign notifying us of the opening date in late 2009. Just one more reason to dislike GPS.

On the way out to Holden Beach in search of mini-golf, we saw a house covered in lights, with dozens of brightly painted signs and a network of tree houses in the front yard. After 18 holes amongst fiberglass crocodiles and giraffes down at the beach, we decided to check out what we later found out was called “The Bottle House” on the return trip.

We parked out front, and I wandered around the grounds to let someone know we were there. I wandered into the garage/ junk store hybrid. There were stacks of dishes and board games everywhere. It was clear that someone lived there, but I didn’t see anyone around. I wandered out into the front yard where there was a maze of ramps connecting a series of tree houses filled with dolls and sculptures and paintings of cartoon characters on every imaginable surface. It was completely overwhelming, and I was a little freaked out when the whole thing lit up suddenly with Christmas lights.

Meanwhile, Nancy and Isaac were waiting out in the car. She could not see me in the front yard 10 yards away from her. It was starting to get dark, and although the Christmas lights unexpectedly turning on startled Nancy, it wasn’t nearly as bad as when the owner of the house quietly walked up to the side of the car and knocked on the window.

We explored the grounds and talked with the artist. The pictures don’t really do it justice. We donated a little money to the artist’s charity. She raises money to feed hungry children. Isaac really like running on the ramps that spanned the tree houses like an Ewok village.

We slept well that night, and the next morning we went to the “Freestyle Music Park.” Last year, the park had opened as “Hard Rock Park” and went bankrupt a week and a half before we were scheduled to go. We arrived at opening time and there were less than 50 cars in the parking lot (about 200,000 less than Disney at opening time.) For around $80, Nancy, Isaac and I bought our tickets (about $200 less than Disney) .

Our first stop in the park was a pleasant surprise. The park had a wine shop that featured Nancy’s favorite, “Key Lime Wine”. We had only ever found it for sale at one place before in Key West. The women at the store offered us free samples of banana, kiwi, grapefruit, cherry, and orange wines along with tasty orange blossom mead. On the walk to our first coaster we hear “Somewhere over the Rainbow/ What a wonderful world” by Israel Kamakawiwo Ole. All day long, we heard really great music all over the park. Our first coaster of the morning, “The Time Machine” had no line what-so-ever. As Isaac and I waited for Nancy to ride, we watched “The Time Warp” from Rocky Horror Picture Show on a video monitor. It was then I knew the day was going to be forever known as “The Best Theme Park Day Ever”.

Most of the coasters at Freestyle music park have speakers built into the cars that play music synched to the ride. During my ride on “The Time Machine”, I got to hear the opening riff of “Foxy Lady” as I plummeted down the first hill which morphed into “Help”.

Isaac was more interested in “The Garage”, a huge room filled with foam balls and pneumatic cannons lined up around a balcony to pelt anyone running around below. Even Nancy couldn’t help launching an arsenal of balls at helpless children and husbands. Isaac was also a big fan of the dark ride “The Mon-stars of Rock”. (When the park opened originally, they had an LSD inspired ride set to the song “Nights in White Satin” which they lost the rights to when they went bankrupt.) “Monstars” made “Mr. Toads Wild Ride” look like “The Adventures of Spiderman”, but the boy asked to ride it again, and seeing how it was air conditioned, we were happy to oblige.

At the hottest point of the day, theme park magic happened. We were waiting to see the skateboarding show, and I went to get Isaac an ice cream and Nancy some water (the park was giving away water at every concession stand!). I also ordered a beer for myself. The young woman at the stand filled a glass with beer, said, “Go ahead and finish that, I’ll get you your ice cream.” She rang me up, but did not charge for the beer. We came back to the stand several times to buy other items. Each time, she gave me a free beer. I don’t know if it was because I was so incredibly good looking in my sweat soaked T-shirt, or if she was just honked off at her bosses, and frankly, I don’t care. What I witnessed that day was a theme park miracle.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

"The name is Seuss....Blackie B. Seuss" (HOL 96)

2009-05-26T17:48:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 96

Growing up, my sister had a large menagerie of stuffed animals. She named almost everyone of them. I still remember the names of her three main monkeys, Sam (of which my niece Lily received a clone for Christmas one year. A rubber faced monkey with a yellow shirt and rubber banana affixed in his left hand.), Precious White, and Fat Monk.

It is important that your main stuffed animals have good names. Out of nowhere this weekend, Isaac announced the last names of two of his regulars. From now on, Blackie Bear will be known as “Blackie Bear Seuss”. (I thought it was pretty cool that the Isaac gave a shout out to the good Dr.) Blackie Bear’s friend, a small white monkey with velcro on his paws that he received for Christmas, in now known as, “Monkey Rick Jones”. Since only the comic geeks reading this know who “Rick Jones” is, I will explain to those of you have kissed a girl. Incredible Hulk has two sidekicks, a wayward teen named Rick Jones (who later helps Captain America), and a lab monkey named, “Monkey”. Isaac came up with these names on his own out of nowhere.

Sunday, we took Isaac and Aiden to see Sesame Street Live. (Isaac had won tickets at an Easter egg hunt a while ago.) I will say this…it was not as bad as Nemo on Ice. It was loud, and the four ibuprofen I took as a precaution did nothing to prevent a crushing headache. The plot revolved around a new music teacher (The sensibly dressed Jenny) moving to Sesame Street and losing her instruments. The Sesame street gang team up to surprise her with new ones made from garbage. Bert, Ernie, Big Bird , Elmo ( who to my delight Oscar referred to as “The Red Menace”), and Cookie Monster all made appearances, although it was clear that there were more costumes than dancers as many of the characters made only brief appearances. It was the minor characters who were most unsettling though.

Nancy had the aisle seat and was treated to an up close visit with “Prairie Dawn”. Evidently they don’t Febreeze the costumes that often, because Nancy told me that she reeked of B.O. There was another character I was unfamiliar with. There was a girl grouch with a tattered pink dress and ribbons twisted up in wild dreadlocks. She reminded me a lot of Marla from Fight Club. I half expected her to ask the Count to check her for lumps.

As the lights from the first act went up, a person with about 60 enormous Elmo foil balloons walked into the middle of the theater. Nancy asked if we should get some for the boys. I suspected they would have been overpriced and told her that they were probably six or seven dollars each. I was wrong. 10 dollars. Every single one of those balloons was sold. That is over 500 dollars worth of helium and foil. At least thirty dollars worth was stuck on the ceiling by the end of the show. The punch line though is that right before the second act began, they announced that you needed to store these two foot long balloons under your seat for the remainder of the show.

Monday was terrific. I started the morning doing a radio show with some friends at WQFS, and then in the afternoon, Nancy suggested we go kayaking. It was a perfect day. Isaac and I rode in a tandem, and Nancy stretched out in her own kayak. We watched turtles sunning themselves, and huge birds swoop over the water. The sun was bright, but just when it was starting to burn, it would hide behind a cloud. Isaac dangled his hand in the water and splashed around once I assured him that there were no gators, and that the fish wouldn’t bite him. Near the end of our trip, we all just laid back and drifted around the lake watching the clouds. It was a perfect trip.

This morning on the way to daycare, Isaac stopped me to look at a snail on the sidewalk. I asked him if he wanted to pick it up. He was hesitant at first, but picked up and held him in his hand the whole trip to school. I was really surprised that he didn’t panic when he told me that the snail was giving him kisses. I was never that fond of slimy things when I was a kid. When we arrived at daycare, his teacher went up even further in my book when she not only welcomed Isaac’s snail into her class room, but wrote “Snail” on a plate, put a wet piece of paper towel on the plate and encouraged the children to come over and watch. Isaac was the coolest kid in the room this morning.

I never did write about our recent camping trip/ coaster road trip. We went to King’s Dominion with some friends and the brave ones among us spent the night in two cabins near the park. I spent most of the night accidentally swearing at Isaac’s friend Aiden (He who is known at all Greensboro emergency rooms), because he was determined to burn himself on either the grill or the fire pit. Isaac and Aiden slept hard after a night of Smores and lightsaber fights under the stars. The day at the park was pretty good considering we had two small children, two folks without children, three parents who loved riding coasters, and one parent who loved checking the hockey scores on his Iphone. Isaac rode three coasters including Avalanche, and the Scooby Doo Ghoster Coaster…his first woodie. (Oh grow up it’s coaster geekspeak.)

He bravely rode on each one, although the Scooby one was admittedly pretty rough. I want him to get used to them now, so I don’t have to suffer the same embarrassment my own parents did at the tremendous temper tantrums my sister Alison would throw because she was afraid of Big Thunder Mountain and Pirates of the Caribbean.

Strength and Honor.
Big Matt

P.S. And of course by “Alison” I mean me at age 12.

Color in the Lines, She is watching! (HOL 95)

2009-05-12T19:24:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 95

Every once in a while, I get caught off guard when Isaac does something so “gosh-darn-Lifetime-movie-of-the-week-cute”, I can’t’ help but get a lump in my throat.

Monday morning was rainy and cold. I was not in the mood to go to work and Isaac was not in the mood to go to school, so during the commute, we talked about what we would do that day if we didn’t have to go to school. We agreed that playing games, making strawberry milkshakes, playing with racecars, and watching movies would be a much better way to spend a cold wet Monday.

I told Isaac, “ I don’t want to go to work today either.”

He responded, “But Daddy, you have to take care of the sick people.”

Every time I got frustrated at work, I remembered Isaac telling me why I was here, and I became much less frustrated.

At night, after we read our books, we say a prayer. We thank God for foods we like, animals we saw that day, friends who are sick. Usually Nancy and or I prays out loud, while Isaac does his best to be still and quiet, but a couple of days ago he interrupted Nancy in mid –prayer and said “Thank you for my family.”

Monday afternoon I had a conference with Isaac’s teacher. It is strange to me to talk to someone who only a year ago was a stranger, but she has a more detailed analysis of how my child is developing than I ever would have come up with on my own. She showed me how the muscles in his hands are developing by comparing the difference in how dark his coloring was at the beginning of the year and the end of the year. She knew what letters he could identify. She reported on the progression of his athletic abilities, his communication skills, and social interactions.

It was odd to realize how many facets of his development were being not only tracked but documented with his school work even at three years old. (They did not offer a midicholorian count. I asked.) The meeting was a good mix of Isaac analysis and “we really do love your kid”. If the tone had swung to far one way or the other, it would have been uncomfortable, but I came out of the meeting feeling like he is at the right day care for our family.

Last weekend I asked Isaac if he had any dreams. He told me “The bears came and took my dreams. They took them back to the woods.” Creepy? Cute? You make the call.

Last night at a pizza restaurant, Isaac was coloring the placemat. It was a picture of a dog riding in a van. Isaac drew red lines coming out of the dogs eyes. I asked why the dogs eyes were red and he told me that the dog had “Cyclops Power”. We’ve been reading a lot of comic books lately and saw Wolverine in the theater a couple of weeks ago. Isaac’s favorite good guy right now is “Hulk”. When we get to the fighting parts of the comic, I point to the words on the page and Isaac growls , “HULK SMASH!”. Isaac decided that since Batman has a theme song (lyrics…Duh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh BATMAN!) and Spiderman has a theme song (lyrics…does whatever a Spider can), Hulk should have a theme song as well. The lyrics to Hulk’s theme song are, “Hulk or Banner, Hulk or Banner, Hulk or Banner” to the tune of Spiderman’s theme song. (Funny side story…I heard a kid at Isaac’s school singing “Spiderpig, Spiderpig, does whatever a spiderpig does.” The teacher told me that all of the kids at daycare sing it. You guessed it, Isaac taught them. I’m a little proud.)

Finally I leave you with some helpful advice for any trips you take this summer from the North Carolina Zoo quarterly magazine. This tip is for making the most of a day at the zoo, “The minute you arrive, collect everyone’s cell phones, drop them in a bag, and lock them in the trunk of your car. Spend the day talking to the ones you are with, not the ones on the line, and you will enjoy the zoo, it’s nature, and it’s animals all the more.”

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

Where does Sausage Come From? (HOL 94)

2009-04-09T20:26:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 94

My office is closed for Good Friday tomorrow, as is Isaac’s daycare. Guilford County Schools are still open. This means Isaac and I have to go do something awesome since all of the big kids are still in school.

If it doesn’t rain, I’m planning on taking him out to the Homeland Creamery. We can tour the dairy farm on a hay wagon, watch how ice cream is made, and then sample the different flavors.

I think this will be a much more positive agricultural experience than my own childhood tour of the slaughterhouse in Quincy, Florida. There are three distinct images I remember: whole, gutted, headless pigs hanging from hooks from the ceiling, a 55 gallon garbage can filled with the skin of a cow, and the slippery, moist, slanted floor leading to a drain. Mentally conjuring those images also brings up the memory of the smell. I remember cutting the tour short on the way to the killing room because I just knew I was going to slip, slide down the floor and end up underneath one of those pigs. (By the way, I am not making this up…..Ask my family.)

Later on Friday we will probably watch Star Wars and Mystery Science Theater 3000: Santa Claus Conquers the Martians.

A couple of nights ago, I was up late playing Mario Kart and I heard a clatter outside on the porch. I looked outside and saw two raccoons involved in a heated turf war over the remaining cat food. I tried to scare them off, but they were too concerned with each other to pay me any attention.

The next morning I told Isaac about the epic raccoon battle. He told me, “You should have woke me up Dad.” I assured him it was too late to wake him up, but I promised I would take pictures next time I saw them.

It turns out he had a practical reason for wanting me to wake him up.

“Next time, wake me up. We will chase em, catch em, and make raccoon pie!”.

His daycare teacher pulled me aside Wednesday morning to show me something Isaac drew. (After watching lots of TV and movies, I knew that this is always a reason to be concerned. TV children always draw pictures of ghosts at their schools which concern the teacher, and leads to a concerned conference with the TV parent.) Isaac’s class had drawn Easter baskets, and the teacher asked them what they wanted in their baskets. Isaac wanted a chocolate bunny, a lightsaber, and a new umbrella. The teacher was just telling me in case I talked to the Easter bunny. Isaac had created a pretty good lightsaber as far as I was concerned by connecting two plastic drill bits from a toy drill set.

Isaac and I went to our church’s Maundy Thursday service tonight (Don’t feel bad if you grew up in church and had never heard of Maundy Thursday. It’s the evening of the Last Supper.) Typically we have a small intimate service and take Communion. This year we also followed the biblical example and washed each other’s feet as part of the service.

Yes it sounds weird, and yes it was slightly odd and uncomfortable. Who says church is always supposed to be safe and comfortable? Isaac and I washed each other’s feet, and immediately afterwards, we went and had Communion. Isaac had never taken Communion before, and I was planning to have him stand and watch, but he was offered bread and he took it. As I watched him eat the bread, I thought about how different denominations and churches celebrate this moment. I know that most are very formal and only happen after a child is at an age where they understand more about what is going on symbolically.

Isaac saw that people he loved and trusted were eating at a table, and he wanted to have a part. Some day he will understand the bread and wine better, but tonight he learned that he is welcome at the table.

Happy Easter. He is Risen
Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Egg Hunt Madness (HOL 93)

2009-04-04T20:53:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 93

Last year we went to an Easter egg hunt at the North Carolina Transportation museum. There was a good size crowd, but there were plenty of eggs, and even the smallest children had plenty of time to get a basket full of goodies.

There were three separate Easter egg hunts going on today. The coolest sounding one by far was the one at the local minor league ball field where 2000 eggs were going to be dropped from a helicopter (I am curious how that was done without creating 200,000 pieces of plastic shrapnel raining down on children.) The earliest hunt was out at the Farmer’s Market just west of town.

We arrived 20 minutes before the 2 and 3 year old egg hunt began. Cars were parked everywhere. The ring around the egg hunt area was about six people deep all around. They announced that there was one “Golden Egg” that contained the grand prize….tickets to Sesame Street Live. I jokingly told Isaac if he found a gold egg to drop it and let another child have it.

We counted down to complete loss of civilization (In honor of the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ no less.) One parent in particular just raised my hackles. She was on her knees, using both arms to “bulldoze” eggs toward her child who was barely paying attention. My initial plan was to let Isaac go it alone, but when I saw how fast the eggs were disappearing off the field, I gently suggested to him to start picking them up before crazy bulldozer lady sacrificed her last shred of dignity to make sure her kid got a few extra tootsie rolls.

When the dust settled, Isaac had three plastic Easter eggs in his basket. I was miffed that people would be so greedy, and that my child received less because I wouldn’t be an asshole. I told Isaac that I would get something for him at the store. Nancy corrected me, “It’s not about getting the most, it’s about having a good time, and he is.” She was right.

A tow trunk company that sponsored the event had a setup where children could operate the wench on a real tow truck to flip a car up on it’s side and back down with a satisfying crunch. (In honor of the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.) Isaac and I watched it several times, and the world was good.

We decided to drive back to Greensboro to watch the helicopter drop eggs. The people running the event gave a free ticket to every single child in Guilford County Schools, and when we arrived, the pandemonium made the Farmer’s Market look like afternoon tea at the O Henry. The line to get into the already packed stadium extended for several blocks.

While we were driving and pondering what to do, Isaac was in the back of the truck enjoying the morning hunt’s bounty: four tootsie rolls and a yellow piece of paper.

“Mommy, what is this paper?” He handed the slip up to Nancy.

He had a golden ticket, and we were 30 minutes away from the egg hunt.

We thought about just foregoing the prize, because if you’ve seen one group of costumed young people lip synching and dancing, you’ve seen them all. I tried to call the sponsoring radio station, but just got a voice mailbox where I left a message which will surely be played for every employee at 107.5’s amusement Monday morning. “Hi this is Matt, I won tickets, well Isaac won tickets to Sesame street, Sonofabitch watch what you are doing!, but we aren’t there, and we want, you can send us the tickets or whatever, he is three, and we opened it after we, Oh hell no we aren’t stopping at the ball park, just look at the line, (Nancy “Matt you are still leaving a message”), Okay then call me goodbye.”

We decided that my voicemail could have probably been clearer.

We made our way back to the Farmer’s market where we found out that we won four tickets to Sesame Street Live, and a $50 gift card to Once Upon a Child consignment store, where we bought Isaac his Easter outfit, and a Cranium game, and Cars racetrack. It’s easily over a hundred dollars worth of loot. And I’m sure Isaac and Nancy will have a great time each taking a friend to see Elmo sing about his feelings.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

Manly Weekend (HOL 92)

2009-01-19T15:41:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 92

Nancy was in South Carolina last weekend to work on her national boards. That meant Isaac and I got to spend the weekend together doing “guy stuff”. I love spending time with Isaac, but it can be a little frustrating. I am grateful that he almost always wants to play or read books with me, and I try to accommodate him as much as possible. He got a Matchbox Car race track for Christmas, and we setup up his jungle, barn, and fire station play sets so the cars have a little scenery during their race.

He has also become a fan of Mo Willems books. We checked out “Don’t let the Pigeon Stay up late” from the library a couple of weeks ago, and Nancy brought home several others like “Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus”, and “Knuffle Bunny”. The books are very funny, and the illustrations are very simple, but expressive. On more than one night recently we’ve found him asleep in his chair with one of those books on his lap.

My frustration comes when he wants to play, and I have to do things like make breakfast, or put away laundry, or empty the dishwasher. I would rather play with him than whatever I am doing at the time, but our house would be waste high in dirty laundry, dishes, and garbage. My other frustration is that I get bored after the third or fourth game of Candy land, and want some time to myself. I try to find something to keep him occupied while I try to read or check e-mail. This rarely works, and I end up answering the same questions three or four times, I get frustrated, feel guilty for getting frustrated, and go back and play Candy land again. This doesn’t happen when Nancy is around, because if she needs time alone, I can watch him and vice versa.

We watched Clone Wars three times this weekend (He also watched it Monday as well.). I read through first viewing, and slept through most of the second and third viewings. I just can’t help but think that Ahsoka’s daddy must have a heart attack seeing how his daughter dresses to fight the droid army. I also can’t get used to the idea of the stormtroopers being the good guys.

We also watched some classic Looney Tunes as well, and we both agreed that they were excellent.

In a move that is sure to confound teachers for years to come, I have taught Isaac in the litany of animal sounds that a cow says, “moo”, a cat says “meow”, and a walrus says, “goo goo g'joob”. The recent trip to Sea World was a little disappointing since we didn’t see any walruses to verify this fact scientifically, but whenever one is on TV or in a book, Isaac will yell “goo goo g'joob!”.

Isaac is a fan of Mario Kart on Wii. I let him choose which character I race as. He usually picks the smaller gorilla, Diddy Kong (a.k.a Isaac Kong). The larger gorilla is Donkey Kong (a.k.a. Daddy Kong). He cheers for me as I play, and gets upset if I lose. It’s pretty great to have my own cheering section. When he gets bored, he climbs on back or asks to sit on my lap. I was in the middle of an online race, when he decided that he wanted to sit on my lap. I couldn’t pause the game, because there were 10 other people playing, so he just slid under my arms onto my lap. For those of you unfamiliar with WII, to play Mario Kart, you hold a remote in front of you in the air like a steering wheel. You occasionally jerk it up quickly to do tricks or get speed boosts, or in my case to clock my three year old right in the face.

Surprisingly, he didn’t cry. He got up and gave me this look like, “Okay dude, I won’t interrupt your game. You didn’t have to hit me in the face with the controller” That was even worse than crying. At least with crying, you could apologize and kiss him and be the good guy. He got a couple of rounds of Candyland out of me after that.

Isaac knows a pretty good joke that he likes to tell. “What is brown and sticky?” “A stick”. When we were down in Florida, my buddy Danny’s little girl told the joke, “What does a gay snake say?”…..”Hithh”. Yeah….we had to explain to Isaac that that although the joke was pretty good, we could not tell that one at school. (Church is another matter entirely).

There is a rumor of snow in Greensboro today, and this morning Nancy and I were discussing school/work/daycare closures/delays/and unexcused occurrences. Isaac overheard us, and then added his two cents, “The water starts on the ground, then it goes up into the sky, and then it comes down as rain and snow.” Nancy’s jaw hung open and she just stared at me. We can only take partial credit for him being so damned smart. A lot of it goes to his great teachers at daycare.

Strength and Honor.
Big Matt

Bike video

2008-12-31T15:28:00.000-08:00

Isaac enjoying his new bike On Christmas Day.

Christmas in Florida (HOL 91)

2008-12-31T15:20:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 91

Nine hour drive down and ten hours back. We have a dog with bad breath, a three year old, and a DVD player with three hours worth of battery life in the back seat. It still beats going to work.

We made the mostly annual trip to Florida for Christmas last week. Santa came to our house on Christmas Eve. He left Isaac a roomful of toys, a big bike, and about $20 worth of junk from Wal-Mart in Nancy and my stockings (As is our Christmas custom instead of “real” gifts for each other. It all started that year I bought her some silver combs and she bought me a chain for my pocket watch…)

We drove through Christmas Day and made it to Gainesville in nine hours (pretty good time.) Isaac opened more presents from Gammy and G-Daddy, and then settled down to sleep. My friend “Little Matt” walked over from his Dad’s place and we shared some beers. He took a ceramics class earlier this year and I harassed him no end about it. For Christmas, he gave me a really cool handmade mug and homemade orange marmalade. That is one of the best gifts I got this year.

The next day, we had lunch at Leonardo’s pizza at Millhopper (One of our favorite places in town. Chicago style pizza with heart attack inducing garlic rolls). We were joined by “Little Matt” and his wife Christina, and one of our friends from high school, Sarah, that we hadn’t seen in over ten years, and her husband Preston. While we were enjoying pizza, beer and old frienships, Mom and Dad took Isaac to Camp Blanding to look at old jets, jeeps, tanks, and troop transports.

Friday night Nancy and I were introduced to out newest Wii addiction called “Boom Blocks”. It is a insanely fun mix of Jenga, the old atari game “Warlords”, and that game at the carnival where you throw baseballs to knock over milk bottles.

Saturday we took our niece Cassidy to meet our old friends the Leibachs at Silver Springs in Ocala. My mom has old photos of Danny and I as little boys petting deer and riding the glass bottom boats there. It was cool to watch Riley, Cassidy, and Isaac play together and marvel at the alligators, bears, and snakes on display. Silver Springs has seen better days, but the kids had a great time.

We took the kids on the “Lighthouse” ride. It’s supposed to be a gentle ride up in an observation car for a birds eye view of the springs. Unfortunately, when we reached the top, something went wrong, and the ride down was a might bouncier on the return trip than expected. It was one of the few times I’ve genuinely been terrified on a ride. It was obvious that the ride was malfunctioning, and I was relieved when we were low enough that I knew that a sudden drop would only maim instead of kill us.

Sunday we met my sister and her family at Sea World in Orlando. For those of you who never lived in Florida, here is a tip…..Never go to Orlando theme parks in July or in the week between Christmas and New Years. Sea World ( A definite “B” class theme park in an “A” class neighborhood of parks) was swimming with people. Not only that, but the recent trend of “premium” theme park experiences was in full effect pissing me off little by little throughout the day. About 2/3 of the dolphin pool’s edge was only for people who paid the price to feed them. Riding up on the observation deck cost an extra couple of bucks. Instead of a Fastpass system like at Disney, they had and even simpler solution. For $30 you can just skip to the front of the line.

As cynical as it all is, I can’t help but smile watching Eli, Lily, and Isaac walking around and holding hands. I also couldn’t help but laugh like a little kid when at the finale of the dolphin show, there were fountains, dolphins, spandex clad high divers and about a dozen macaws flying, leaping, spraying, and dancing all around. (To be clear, the macaws were thankfully not spraying.)

Over by the seal feeding area, Isaac took a fall and skinned both knees. That was really hard on me to see him crying so hard. Thankfully one of the Sea World workers called first aid, and the man who gave Isaac a couple of band aids was very kind and patient.

Nancy and I skipped out on the Elmo show to go an ride The Kraken together. (We used to ride coasters together all the time….what happened?) The Kraken is my buddy Gabe’s favorite coaster, and I see why. Incredibly smooth and fast.

We went to the kid’s area, and Eli and Lily wanted to climb in the nets. Isaac decided he wanted to as well. I knew this wouldn’t end well, so I went along. Somewhat surprisingly, my dad went too. I was pretty impressed. To get onto the cargo nets, we had to climb a flight of stairs. The nets extended upwards another two stories. I was a little nervous when we started climbing. Isaac started crying. I told him that it was okay to be scared, but we were going to do it together. Ryan had Eli, Dad had Lily and I had Isaac. It would have been hard enough climbing by myself, but balancing and holding Isaac’s hand while climbing proved to be a greater challenge. We all made it safely to the top and climbed back down via the stairs.

While the kids rode the tea cups, Ryan, Dad, and I decided to sample some of Anheiser Busch’s products. If you are ever tempted to sample bourbon flavored Budweiser, I can save you the trouble….don’t bother.

After watching the Shamu show, we decided to take in one last ride for the day, Journey to Atlantis. I’ve wanted to ride it since it was built ten years ago. It is a cool hybrid of dark ride, splash down boat ride, and indoor dark roller coaster. It is now known as the saddest ride in the world by my family, because my niece and nephew lost it in the first few minutes of the ride when one of the mermaids who live in Atlantis turned into Medusa. There was much crying for the rest of the ride.

Upon disembarking, a soaking wet and sobbing Eli and Lily summed up the ride for Ali, “There were mermaids and witches who were making bad choices.” Mercifully, Isaac wasn’t tall enough to ride.

We spent most of Monday chilling out with our other nieces and feeding ducks. Monday night mom and dad watched Isaac so Nancy and I could go and see “The Wrestler”. (We will take advantage of free babysitting any time we can!)

The trip back took ten hours, but the stop for Krystal hamburgers was well worth the extra time (Have you ever been to a fast food restaurant where the speaker doesn’t work at the drive through, and they don’t have chocolate shakes, or straws, and their pumpkin shake has small mysterious crumbs floating around that could be either pie crust or fried chicken breading?)

All in all we had a great trip, and wish everyone a happy and safe new year. Thanks to everyone who made Christmas such a special time for my family this year. Thanks to the Baumans for coming over Christmas Eve and being family for us. Thanks to Rydell for your hospitality. Thanks to Roland for a special present that will be a constant reminder to Isaac about bravery and love. Thanks to my folks for hosting us in Florida, and for the sweet day at Sea World. Thanks for my in-laws for laughing and playing Wii with us.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

Scattered Christmas Thoughts (HOL 80)

2008-12-18T19:36:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 90

Isaac was extremely concerned this morning when he came downstairs. “Daddy, we don’t have a fireplace!”, he notified me as I ate my Food Lion knock off Cheerios. Isaac had evidently been pondering how Santa was going to get into our house. I assured him that we did have a fireplace, we just didn’t use it that often, and showed him where the gas logs are.

He examined it carefully then gave me a skeptical look. I assured him that even though it looked small, Santa managed to bring presents in through it last year, so not to worry. I don’t know how Santa will get a bike down there though.

Later while I was in the shower, he brought his toy gun into the bathroom and closed the door behind him. He told me that Mr. Oogey Boogey was driving his car to our house and had a possum with him. Isaac was going to pull his string and then step on all of the bugs inside him. Such is the moment by moment surrealism of life with a three year old. (Mr. Oogey Boogey is the bad guy from Nightmare Before Christmas…he looks like a burlap sack filled with insects, and tries to eat Santa Claus…..yeah that’s some fine parenting there Matt)

We went out to see a display of Christmas lights (3007 Kilkenny, Greensboro) with some friends tonight, and on the way home, we listened to our 2008 Christmas C.D. featuring the all time classic, “Santa Claus is a Black Man”. Isaac asked me to crank up the music, then after a few minutes said, “She is singing that Santa Claus is a Black man, but he’s not.” As I was driving through thick fog at the time, I didn’t have time to come up with an acceptable explanation on the fly. Nancy responded, “When did you see him?” This seemed to appease him. He then used his toy gun to shoot at some bears that were at McDonalds. I guess you only get three, maybe four Christmas with Santa.

I’ve been teaching Isaac how to play checkers, and he seems to really enjoy it. He especially likes chanting “King Me! King Me!” When he makes it across the board.

Isaac watched “The Wizard of OZ” for the first time Sunday. It was the first time I had seen it in several years, but seeing it with Isaac was special. I had the old videotape from when Ali and I were kids and taped it off a C.B.S. broadcast with the occasional cheesy 80’s commercial thrown in. I didn’t tell Isaac much about it before we began ( I wanted the switch to color to be a surprise.)

He wasn’t scared, but he did sit on my lap the whole time, and my hands had to be wrapped around his waist. Watching with him reminded me of what a big deal it was to see Wizard of OZ on TV when I was a kid. It only came on once or twice a year, and if we were lucky, Ali and I got to stay up late to watch it even if it was a school night. I remember being more afraid of the Wizard than of the Witch, (a point that Isaac agrees with strongly).

I also remembered the movie incorrectly. I thought that the bulk of the movie was Dorothy traveling from Munchkin land to OZ, when that’s really only about four scenes long. It was really cool to see it again from a child’s perspective.

I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas. Fair winds and calm seas to those of you traveling. Peace to those who see Christmas as a reminder of what is missing in their lives. Dona Nobis Pacem

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

P.S. Happy Birthday Alex Wayne!

What's This? (HOL 89)

2008-12-09T16:59:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 89

In case you don’t read the Greensboro News and Record or have a Facebook account, Isaac was on the front page of the paper Saturday. Our church collects and distributes food discreetly on Friday afternoons at local schools to kids who night otherwise go hungry that weekend. The article explains it in greater detail. Isaac adores Wendy Smithey who coordinates the program and looks forward to helping fill the backpacks with canned goods on Wednesday nights.

Thanksgiving was pretty laid back. We stayed home had a few friends over for dinner and decorated the house for Christmas. Isaac did not get his usual afternoon nap, and it showed. While helping Nancy decorate, he had a full on kicking, screaming, crying temper tantrum because we did not have brown lights to hang in the tree out front. (He got his nap and a couple of spanks that afternoon.)

The next day he told me that he didn’t love me. It broke my heart and upset me, but I knew I had to be keep my head. What do you do when your child says “I don’t love you?” Spanking him or punishing him doesn’t seem to fit. I wanted him to be able to talk about how he feels, and at the same time I want him to realize the gravity of saying that and to keep him from making it his “Go to” phrase when he is mad and wants attention. I tried to think, “What would Mr. Rogers do?”

I told him it hurt my feelings, and he shouldn’t say that. I didn’t punish him for saying it. I just didn’t play with him until he apologized and told me that he loved me. He only said it one other time out of anger. I’m sure he will grow out of this by the time he is 13 or 14.

Unfortunately last year, one of my co-workers gave us a small animatronic Santa that reads the whole “Twas the Night Before Christmas” poem. The batteries have mercifully ran out of juice. It may have something to do with Isaac’s inability to go up or down the stairs without turning it on. If Isaac hears the poem end, he immediately gets up from what he is doing (eating dinner, playing with cars, sitting on the toilet) and runs to re-start Santa. The good thing is we can tell when he wakes up, since the first order of business every morning is to hear “Twas the night Before Christmas”. He reminds several times a day that we need to buy Santa some new batteries. They don’t make C batteries anymore do they?

I made a Christmas C.D. again this year. Isaac’s favorite track is “The La La song”, also known as “Deck the Halls in 7/8 Time” by Triad Pride Men’s Chorus.

Speaking of music, the new morning ritual is to listen to the song “House of Bamboo” by Southern Culture on the Skids twice and then “Carve that Possum” a.k.a. “The Lily Song” (So called for his cousin’s widely known and deep seated suspicion of the Southern marsupial) on the way to school. Isaac is very particular….”House of Bamboo” must be played twice…..never three times. He then requests “The Lily Song” which is the next track on the disk, and that takes us through the rest of the ride to daycare.

As Nancy was picking the boy up at daycare last week, he asked if he could watch, “What’s This?” when the got home. Nancy asked several times what he was talking about, and he said he wanted to watch the movie, “What’s This?”

Evidently it was a long frustrating car ride home for both of them. Thankfully I knew that he was talking about “Nightmare Before Christmas.” (It’s the song sung when Jack Skellington, the king of Halloweentown visits Christmastown.)He and I watched it Sunday afternoon. We also watched the Brendan Frazier version of “Journey to the Center of the Earth” Thursday. He did okay with the dinosaurs, and the falling scenes, but we had to fast forward through the giant Venus flytraps.

I picked a great book at the library (Nancy calls it propoganda.) It’s called “You Can Do Anything Daddy”. In it, a little boy gets kidnapped by “Robot Gorilla Pirates from Mars”, and his Daddy rescues him. Isaac has picked it for the last few nights, and brought it to church with him last week. He will put his finger near the pictures of snakes in the book and pull it back quickly yelping, like the snake had bit him. We’ve also been feeding the Curious George habit. We checked out one of the old ones (Curious George Rides a Bike) and I forgot how they just go on and on! I’ve taken to telling the wrong Curious George adventure for the book we are reading, and Isaac will correct me, laugh and then tell me to do it again. For example, while looking at pictures in “Bike”, I will tell him the story from “Curious George Makes Pancakes” or “Curious George visits the Chocolate Factory.”

Hope everyone has a great week.

Strength and Honor,

Big Matt

Black Bears, Dead Industries, and Pancake Houses (HOL 88)

2008-11-24T18:37:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 88

I’ve had my fill of Christmas for the year already. Last weekend we went to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee (Motto: Myrtle Beach with Ski Lifts and no beach.), to cash in the free tickets to Dollywood I won earlier this fall. Pigeon Forge, Gatlinburg, and Dollywood were already completely decked out for Christmas in direct violation of Baumann’s law, (No Christmas music shall be played nor decoration put on display prior to the day after Thanksgiving.)

We arrived Friday evening and decided to ride the Christmas trolley to view the light displays around town. The only trolley ride available was 9:00 p.m., so we had plenty of time for a leisurely dinner and wandering through souvenir stores selling hundreds of “Hillbilly” and “Black Bear” shaped bric-a-brac.

We dined at a restaurant which was evidently very popular with the octogenarian and hyper obesity tour groups. Isaac is a connoisseur of Grilled Cheese sammichs, and gave the restaurant high marks for it’s playful blending of American Cheese and White Bread.

We also shared an appetizer of fried chicken strips, fried dill pickles, fried green tomatoes, and a surprisingly not fried orange.

Isaac was starting to get tired and cranky, but the promise of riding a trolley and the box of Christmas Peeps we picked up at the candy store kept him in a presentable state. The trolley turned out to be a tour bus, and most of the Christmas lights were in the median strip of the six lane highway that runs through town. It was hard to tell where the blinking lights from the Arby’s sign ended and the giant eight maids a milking began because the bus’s windows kept fogging up. The tour guide also kept us entertained with fascinating facts about Pigeon Forge like (I’m not making this up.)” There are four Cracker Barrel restaurants within a 15 mile radius, and they are almost always busy”.

Isaac fell asleep about 20 minutes into the bus ride leaving Nancy and I to exchange sarcastic remarks and count pancake houses for the remaining forty minutes of our dark foggy bus ride in heavy traffic.

We arrived at Dollywood the next morning bundled up in thermal underwear, pajamas, jeans, jackets, hats and mittens. We went and made reservations for the shows we wanted to see (Part of the package I won was a free rental of a Q-bot….sort of like an electronic beeper/ fast pass gizmo.) Our first scheduled show was called “Christmas in the Smokies.” (actually most of the shows were variations on the theme of Christmas/ Holiday/ Hanukkah in the Smokies/ Mountains/ Appalachians.)

The show was about 45 minutes, and it had all the subtlety of a lampshade in a Chinese whorehouse. They had a mountain cabin that unfolded like a greeting card, two guys in a horse costume, smoke machines, Frosty the Snowman, Mary, Joseph, an Angel, a church choir, and at one point, it snowed in the theater. It was so over the top, that after fifteen minutes, I just shut down the cynical side of my brain and enjoyed both the “Hey Gang Let’s Put on a Show” aesthetic, and Isaac’s complete and total captivation with the whole spectacle.

After the show, we rode the Carousel, the Train (featuring plastic penguins scattered around broken down moonshine stills), and Isaac’s favorite, the “Race Cars”. My little beeper buzzed to let us know it was time for the second show, “Babes in Toyland”.

“Babes” features all of the left over Christmas show ideas that were deemed to weird or over the top for the “Smokey Mountain Christmas”. It featured bears, pirates, Chinese Acrobats, a zepplin that flew over the audience raining confetti, and a giant mechanical spider. Isaac really liked the giant spider.

We were hungry after the show and had a late lunch at “Aunt Granny’s” (Don’t think about the restaurant’s name to much, or you will go down a rabbit hole of stereotypes about mountain inbreeding.) We ate in “Dolly’s room”, a small room off the main dining room plastered with some of Parton’s lesser known accolades like the key to the city of Burbank, California and a certificate thanking her for her participation in the 1973 Cooterscratch, Arkansas Apple Festival. One corner of the room featured a stuffed leather chair surrounded by toys. This is where Santa greeted the children earlier in the day.

Some children sitting at an adjacent table became bored and started playing with the Mr. Potato Head by the chair until an older waitress came in and snapped at the children and their parents (How could the children possibly have gotten the idea that it was okay to play with toys that Santa had left behind earlier that morning?) The family sheepishly finished their meal when a second waitress came to them and apologized in hushed tones. I realized that with the outbursts, awkward moments, and sullen dessert course, Dollywood truly captured the essence of a holiday meal with the extended family.

After stuffing ourselves with turkey, mashed potatoes, pot roast, catfish, green beans, cranberry sauce, sweet potato pie, and (for some reason) churros, Nancy, Isaac, and I headed toward the big roller coasters in the back of the park.

The big coasters were themed to the big industries in the area, logging and mining. Unfortunately, the newest coaster wasn’t open due to the fact that the hydraulic fluid in the brakes doesn’t work properly unless it is over forty degrees outside. (It never got over forty degrees). We finished our day with a visit to Santa, and a trip to the gift shop where after over three years of holding steady, Nancy finally relented and let Isaac buy a toy gun.

Isaac fell asleep on the way back to the hotel with the navy blue gun, clutched in his hands, on the lookout for bears.

Sunday morning we got up early and went to a scary interactive attraction themed to a zombie invasion, called Tanger Outlet Mall. Nancy was brave, but I was terrified and had to leave after 20 minutes. On the ride home we decided to take the scenic route through the Great Smokey Mountain National Park. As we drove up the mountain, the 50 degree sunny day made me scoff at the “Watch for Ice” warning signs. Twenty minutes and 15 degrees later, I realized those signs weren’t just for show. It was an incredible drive home through snow and frozen waterfalls.

On the far side of the mountain, we drove through the Cherokee reservation. Poverty surrounded the enormous Harrah’s casino in the middle of town. Billboards showed a Cherokee family with the ominous slogan “Domestic Violence is not part of our Heritage”. Our family has problems too, but thankfully they aren’t on billboards for every visitor to town to see.

We arrived home exhausted Sunday night, grateful that we have a short week ahead, and are now sufficiently armed in case of bear a attack at our house.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

The Good, The Bad, and the Flightless (HOL 87)

2008-11-13T17:09:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 87

As I was getting ready for work this morning, Isaac came into my room to inform me that he was taking his “Batman” action figure with him to school today. I told him that would be fine.

Isaac explained, “Batman hits the Joker. The Joker says, ‘Why so serious?’” (For those of you concerned, no he has not seen “The Dark Knight”, but he and I visited plenty of Halloween costume stores during October, and “The Joker” costumes and cardboard cutouts were every where.)

Isaac continued, “Batman is a good guy, Joker is the bad guy.”

I told Isaac that Batman fought with other bad guys as well, like The Riddler, Catwoman, and The Penguin.

Isaac was skeptical, “Penguin is a badguy?” He seemed genuinely puzzled that the cute small flightless birds that we read and watch movies about could ever be “Bad guys.”

“Most Penguins are good guys, but there is at least one bad penguin.”

“Are there good Jokers?”

“I’m sure there are some good jokers too, but Batman only catches the bad one.”

Isaac then made a list of good guys and bad guys.

The good guys included : Batman, Pee Wee, Superman, Gandalf, Spiderman, Chewbacca, Samwise, Hulk, Mr. Incredible, Iron Man and most Penguins.

The bad guys were: Golem, Frances, Venom, Abomination, Sandman, Joker, Doc Ock, Darth Vader, and Bears. (He really has a love/ hate relationship with bears lately. His favorite toy is “Blackie Bear”, his favorite books are about bears, but bears also wake him up at night walking through his room…..it’s complicated.)

The whole exchange this morning reminded me of a story my pastor told about setting up his nativity set with his sons. In the Usey nativity set that year, Luke Skywalker, Batman, and several other action figures joined the more traditional Shepherds and Wise men. Eventually the Dracula figure killed everyone else that holy night in Bethlehem. There is a reason I go to my church.

On the way out, the door, Isaac and I found a dead mouse that one of our cats had left for us. I told him that the mouse was trying to get into our house, and that the cats killed him before he could. Isaac looked at it and said, “That’s probably a bad mouse. He would have eaten my toys if he had gotten in.”

Gammy and G.Daddy visited this weekend. It’s fun to have company, but Isaac was a little over stimulated. We stayed up late and went to the airport to pick them up, and then went to the Farmer’s Market, Transportation Museum, Natural Science Center, and a church picnic. G-daddy, Isaac and I celebrated our Scottish heritage by playing golf together. I’m pretty sure Isaac’s favorite thing all weekend though was getting chicken nuggets at Chik Fil A.

Strength and Honor

Matt

Brother bought a Cocoa Bean (HOL 86(

2008-11-03T17:12:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 86

Friday morning, my beautiful wife Nancy, sat on the edge of our bed and shook me gently to wake me up.

“Matt, Isaac has a fever of 100 and they won’t let him go to school, and I have the librarian conference today, and I may be able to leave early, but you could check his temperature again in about thirty minutes, and take a half day, but I have to leave right now since I am meeting my car pool……So what are you going to do?”

“Well honey, seeing as I’ve only been aware of a the situation now for ten seconds, I will defer to your judgment.” Nancy left for her conference, and I went up stairs to check on the boy.

His forehead was warm to touch. I placed the electronic thermometer thing in his ear and pressed the button. The display flashed 95.1. I’m no doctor, but I assumed this was incorrect. For the next ten minutes I debated the merits of getting an accurate temperature vs. waking up a potentially ill and therefore cranky three year old by shoving something deeply into his ear. I finally managed to get a second 100.0 reading and concluded that it was accurate. I also managed to wake up a cranky sick boy who wanted to go to school.

Eventually he fell back asleep until almost 11:00 that morning. I heard the toilet lid slam shut, and Isaac be-bopped down the stairs happy as a clam. We watched “Nightmare Before Christmas”, and played “Wii”.

After Nancy came home, he had a tantrum and said he didn’t want to go trick or treating. I made him come downstairs and sat him behind a half of a grilled cheese sandwich. Nancy and I definitely swap off being the disciplinarian. That night I told him if he didn’t eat his sandwich he wouldn’t have any treats that night. He refused to eat, so he did not get a treat the whole night. (On the way home from visiting friends, I finally let him have one Tootsie Pop since he had been perfectly behaved at two different friends’ houses.)

The next morning, it was Nancy’s turn to be the heavy. By the time I crawled out of bed at 9:00, Isaac and Nancy had already had breakfast. I asked if he had any treats. Nancy said, “No it’s still morning”. To which I asked, “Weren’t you ever a child?”

Isaac if you are reading this, I went to bat for you, and you got treats the morning after Halloween..

Saturday night we were watching the Florida/ Georgia game at a restaurant, when a campaign commercial came on one of the muted TVs. Isaac jumped up, pointed and yelled, “There’s Obama!” in the same excited voice he uses when he sees Mickey Mouse on TV.

Sunday morning, Isaac came down to make sure we were up on time despite the clocks moving back. He came to our room, and noticing, Nancy’s sexy pink flannel pajamas with sock monkeys said, “I’ll be right back” and ran up stairs. He returned with a stuffed Curious George, handed it to Nancy and said, “You need this since you have monkeys on your pajamas.”

This morning on the way to Daycare, Isaac and I were listening to Southern Culture on the Skid’s song “Banana Pudding”. He and I sang the chorus out loud together”

“Banana Pudding! Banana Pudding!”

When I went to get him out of the truck at daycare, his song had morphed to

“Banana in Cocoa bean! Banana in Cocoa bean!”

At first I thought this was something from “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” (Cocoa beans are mentioned several times in the movie), but then he sang,

“Banana in Cocoa bean Banana in Cocoa bean…Call the doctor woke him up”

And I realized he was singing the newly created second verse to “Coconut” (Put the lime in the coconut, drink the bowl up.)

When I got home tonight, I told Nancy about a phone call to my sister. My nephew had been bit by another little boy at his school. Isaac overheard our conversation and about halfway through dinner he started asking questions:

“Did Eli get bit?”

“Was the other little boy bad?”

“Which arm did he get bit on?”

“Did he get bit on the cheek?”

“Did the skin come off?”

The questions kept coming until Isaac talked to Eli on the phone. As best I can tell the conversation consisted of Eli telling Isaac to talk louder, and Isaac telling a story about falling on his stroller yesterday and bloodying up his own knee.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

The Dog of Peace (HOL 85)

2008-10-27T19:35:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 85

Last Wednesday night at two fifty a.m., I woke up to, “click click click click….pause…..click click…..pause….click…..click click click click click click click click click click click click click click click..pause…click click…pause.” I stumble out of bed, and politely ask our dog Max to “Pick a damn place to lie down already!”

In the interest of keeping my marriage together I decided to go get the dog’s nails trimmed the next day. For those of you who don’t have a dog, you have to be very careful trimming their nails or else you could cut the “quick” which causes blood to exit from the dog’s foot all over your floor.

For a couple of bucks, the folks at Petsmart will perform this potentially unsavory task for you. Isaac, Max, and I get in the pick up truck Thursday after work and head to the shopping center. I put Max on a leash, and as I am unloading Isaac from his car seat, I hear vicious barking. I look in the next row of parked cars and I see a sedan with a man, a small boy and a pit-bull (a.k.a “The Dogs of Peace”) as passengers. The pit bull has seen Max and is barking wildly at us and frantically jumping around the car.

Isaac Max and I go into Pet Smart and head to the grooming area. There is a small 4 x 12 foot waiting area separated from the grooming area by a low wall. They take Max to the first table about three feet away where Isaac and I can watch. The clipping is proceeding just fine when in walks the man, his son, and the wildly aggressive “Dog of Peace”, now straining against a leash, and barking loudly incessantly at my son, Max, myself, the cash register, the groomers, anything and anyone is a target of this dog’s wrath. Isaac grabs my hand and wedges himself between me and the wall. We are pretty much pinned in this small waiting area while the owner fills out paper work. The “dog of peace” is between us and the door, otherwise we would have bolted.

One of the groomers tries to take the pit bull back to the grooming area. The woman clipping Max’s nails puts her back to the dog to block it’s view, but as soon as the little gate is open, the dog lunges, barking at Max, and then get out of it’s collar!

My mind immediately thought “I have a Leatherman tool in my pocket. If the dog is going to attack, I do not have time to get it out and unfolded. If I do, what tool would I pick? Would I use the file? After the dog eats my Leatherman and my hand, what next? Clearly the Leatherman tool…..not the way to go. If he tries to bite, I will put Isaac up on the counter and grab the fire extinguisher from the wall and use that to defend myself.”

As my mind was vividly re-imagining the end of Jaws with a pit bull in place of a Great White Shark the dog’s owner managed to get the collar back on him. Isaac was definitely freaked out now, and I was a little myself.

After two more attempts, they managed to guide “Bitey” back to the back room. Isaac and I grabbed Max and slipped out. Only later from across the store did I see a store manager firmly but politely explains something to the dog owner who left with what I guess is a still dirty dog.

We still aren’t a hundred percent sure what Isaac is going to be for Halloween, but right now, we are thinking “Albert the Alligator” (mmmmm Buckeyes..) He has at different times asked to be a pirate with a sword, an ant eater, a cowboy with a hat, a lamp, a tiger, a spider and a witch. Nancy shot down my idea of dressing him as Pee Wee Herman.

Once again, Isaac is obsessed with fishing. Nancy fixed Isaac’s toy fishing pole after the fateful night when one of our music minister’s kids successfully cast into a ceiling fan operating at top speed. Nancy managed to untangle about 300 feet of fishing line. Now both Isaac’s bed and our living room couch are his boats. If you go on a fishing trip with him, you have to stay completely on the bed or couch, or else you get wet. I am really impressed with how well he takes turns with his pole. He casts once, and then hands the pole to me and says, “Your turn”. He also has a rule that you have to eat whatever you catch.

Finally, tonight as we were saying our prayers, I asked Isaac if there was anyone special he would like to pray for. Only a sweet innocent child would have replied, “Julius Peppers”. (I am not making that up.)

Strength and Honor

Matt

Hey! Teacher! Leave Those Kids Alone! (HOL 84)

2008-10-21T17:57:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 84

I had a parent/teacher conference yesterday with Isaac’s teacher Ms Peggy. They try to meet with parents at least twice a year to talk about their child’s development, point out strengths and weakness, and address any issues that the parents have.

There weren’t any real surprises. It turns out that Isaac has exceptional communications skills, but is still a little awkward athletically and socially. Actually, that accurately describes me and most of my family as well.

Peggy told me that when Isaac tells her a story, she can understand exactly what he is talking about. She confessed that it was a guessing game about half of the time with many of the other children.

When she listed Isaac’s weaknesses, it was a fun to pick which neurotic habits he got from Nancy, and which were mine.

“He dislikes chaos” that would be Nancy.

“He has trouble holding his pencil correctly”: that would be me.

There was a note in his chart “Isaac refuses to use finger paint. Will only paint with a toothbrush”: hmmmm…neat freak? Score 2 Nancy 1 Matt

“Is standoffish in the morning, and takes a while to warm up to new people”: Guilty.

Over all he is doing well, and I’m certainly not freaking out about things he needs to work on.

She did tell me something that made me smile. There is corner of the playground that is wooded. The kids can still be seen all the way to the back fence, but there are enough trees to make it feel like a forest. (This is one of the reasons we picked this daycare as opposed to the cedar chip and no shade version of playgrounds at most other daycares.) His teacher told me that this was Isaac’s favorite part of the playground.

Isaac did something the other night that he had never done before. He has a small three page plastic book in his bath tub. He offered to read it to me. Now the only printed words in the book are, “Cat, Cow, and Dog,”, but he told me a short story about each one of them complete with “Once upon a time”, and “The End”. (Once upon a time there was cat who lived in that house by himself and he was lonely. The end.)

Before I end this dispatch, I would like to remind you that it was three years ago on October 20 that Lance Cpl Andrew Russoli was killed in Iraq. Please remember the families of fallen solders and pray for peace.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

She got a pair of eyes, just like two apple pies (HOL 83)

2008-10-15T17:34:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 83

The acceptable level of coarse language for children varies wildly from school to school. I heard a story recently about a child who came home and tearfully confessed to his mother that he got in trouble for using the “ ‘S’ word, ‘F’ word, and ‘C’ word.” The mother went to speak with the teacher about it, and only during the conference several days later did she learn that the ”S”word was “Stupid”, the “F” word was “Fat”, and the teacher didn’t even remember what the “C” word was.

Contrast this to the blog entry on my sister Alison’s page about some of the delightful things her children from public housing in Gainesville used say (I love the movie "Player's Club". They got sex, drugs and chicken head.)

If Isaac is being disagreeable about bath time, I try to convince him that he does in fact stink. I tell him , “You stink like an elephant’s butt.” Evidently he let slip the dreaded “B” word at school because the next night when I told him he smelled like an “Elephant’s butt”, he corrected me, “No Dad, I smell like an elephant’s trunk.”

Normally I would be slightly miffed at how prudish someone is, but I have to admit, that the phrase, “You smell like an elephant’s trunk” is funny, absurd, and a pretty good pun, so I’ve started saying it as well.

Isaac loves to sing. His repertoire of songs include, “Happy Birthday”, “Take me Out to the Ball Game”, “Jimmy Crack Corn”, “Ring of Fire”, and the chorus of a song by She and Him. I’m trying to teach him an old song my dad used to sing before he visits next month. My father probably sang it a hundred thousand times during my childhood, “My gal’s a corker, she’s a New Yorker, I buy her everything to keep her in style.” The next line is a rhyme about one of the “Corker’s” body parts. Nancy is so pleased.

Last weekend we took a walk in the woods near the Science Center. A boy scout troop had just rebuilt a bridge over a small creek. The creek was low enough that we could stand on a rocky sand bar. Isaac, and I climbed down the creek bank and threw rocks in the water. Nancy stood patiently on the trail, waiting to move on. Isaac then started looking for big sticks to break by hitting them against trees.

I sat on the bridge and watched. I asked Nancy to sit with me. She realized that if you are going to preach the “Last child in the Woods” sermons, you have to be able to stop and throw rocks and hit trees with sticks. She finally decided to join us throwing rocks into the water. It was a perfect day. The leaves had started to change, there was a coolness and slight breeze to the air.

I couldn’t help but contrast hanging out in the woods with going to the zoo later that day. At the zoo, you must stay on a path, everything is neatly labeled, you are guaranteed to see at least a few animals, anything you can climb on or touch has padding underneath or an alcohol dispenser right next to it. Also, the zoo is swimming with people who are in a hurry to move quickly from exhibit to exhibit to “see” everything.

I hope Isaac grows up to love our science center as much as I loved the Florida State Museum as a kid, but after spending unstructured time in the woods, and then going to the zoo back to back, I hope he develops a true love for the “real” outdoors as well.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

Zoo visit 2008 (HOL 81)

2008-10-10T18:34:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter

Nancy has an uncanny ability to tune Isaac out. I usually can not. If I am the middle of writing or checking e-mail, and he wants to sit on my lap or asks to read a book or wants to throw the football it’s hard for me to say, “No”. Every time I try to say “No”, I hear the opening chords of “Cat’s in the Cradle” start up on the Ipod in my mind, and I end up stopping what I am doing pre-maturely to go and play.

I’m not a complete pushover. If he asks to watch TV. or get a snack, I will make him wait, but nothing I do at home is more important than building a racetrack for Matchbox cars.

Isaac and I have an understanding that when I get home, I kiss him and Nancy. I spend a few minutes seeing how everyone is doing, then he and I go and play “Alligator”. “Alligator” is a highly ritualized game we play that to the untrained eye looks like wrestling on my bed. Ali and I used to play a version called “Giant Squab” with my father.

Isaac will only play if the bed is made, and the window is open. I can hop on the bed and call him up, but he will say, “No. We have to fix the bed first!”. He and I make the bed. He will then explain that the window has to be opened before he will play. We open the window, and only then can “Alligator” commence. The game lasts until dinner is ready.

Isaac has obsessed over two library books which unfortunately have both had to go back after two renewals. “Ivan the Terrier” was read almost every night for three weeks, and I will admit it was a lot of fun to read. A small Jack Russell terrier, Ivan, interupts the stories about and chases off the three pigs, bears, billy goats gruff, and eats the little gingerbread man. His other favorite was a strange wordless book called “Hogwash”. Through pictures it shows a large group of small pigs playing in mud and paint and then getting placed into a large “Rube Goldberg” type machine to get cleaned up. The book’s abstractness and Isaac’s fascination with it frustrated Nancy to no end.

Last night, I bought a bottle of off brand Febreeze at Food Lion. You may not know this, but off brand Febreeze works as a terrific “Monster/ Bear/ Robot “ repellent. We have had a tremendous problem recently with Monsters, Bears, and Robots, coming in and sitting on the corner of Isaac’s bed (usually around 4 in the morning.) I brought home the spray and told Isaac, “Three sprays of this will keep monsters and bears out of your room all night. They can’t stand the smell (vaguely coconut and banana.)”

He asked with deep concern, “What about Robots?”

I perused the small print on the back of the bottle. “Yep keeps away robots as well.”

The pictures are from a recent trip that Isaac and I took to the zoo. This is what I learned at the zoo.

1) Instead of waiting for Isaac to whine about wanting to be carried, ask him if you could please carry him. You are going to end up carrying him anyway, might as well be after the word “Please” from you then from a whine from him.

2) The Sponge Bob 3-D moving theater ride is more terrifying then the Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean put together if it is too loud and we are sitting right next to a speaker.

3) If you take Isaac to the North Carolina Zoo, use the “North America” entrance because the first thing Isaac wants to see is the alligators which are a mile and a half away from the “Africa” entrance.

4) If the only animal visible near the fence is the ostrich, stick around and watch the ostrich. He is pretty cool.

5) You can either have a thick small town Southern accent or say really stupid things, but please don’t do both at the same time. It’s like nails on a blackboard to me.

6) If you are hungry enough, overpriced “Corn dog nuggets” are like manna from heaven.

7) The 75 cent light up dinosaur necklace is a better souvenir than the $40 stuffed tiger.

8) Isaac is right about the alligators…they are pretty sweet.

9) Don’t expect a three year old to keep you awake with conversation on the ride home. (He will be asleep before you leave zoo property.)

10) Isaac gets to climb on a lot more things when Nancy doesn’t come with us.

One last thing. If Isaac wakes up before me, he now comes into my room, and says, “Get up! The blue sky is awake!” Try to hear that when you wake up and not smile.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

P.S. I added a link to my sister Alison's blog. You only need to read a little to see that a dark sense of humor is genetic. Look on the top right of this page.

Tweetsie Ride

2008-07-01T15:34:00.000-07:00

The only exercise I got all weekend

More Tweetsie Pictures

2008-06-30T18:55:00.001-07:00

Out in the Boonies (HOL 80)

2008-06-30T18:35:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 80

Isaac is becoming more reliable about telling us when he needs to “spill”. The ritual involves a brisk, heated discussion between Nancy and I about who’s turn it is to take him, and then I take him to the nearest Men’s room. Isaac and I head for the largest empty stall, and without fail, as soon as I lock the door, Isaac has both hands gripping the toilet seat. It doesn’t matter how filthy the bathroom is, he feels compelled to touch the toilet seat with both hands. Nancy has seen him cross his arms and put his head down on it as well.

He should have a pretty damned healthy immune system by now.

We took a small vacation last weekend to Boone, NC ( For non-North Carolinians, it’s up in the mountains. There is a college there called Appalachian State. They are very proud of a recent “Football Championship.” As Florida Gator fans, we thought it was just adorable.) We spent most of Saturday at a small theme park called “Tweetsie Railroad” (Motto: Fun for ages 2-8).

The park is supposed to remind you of an old frontier town out west in the 1800’s that just happens to have a lot of carnival rides. The star attraction of the park is an old coal fired train that takes a 30 minute ride through the woods and canyons around the mountain. There are two stops where poorly microphoned teenagers dressed as cowboys and Indians shoot cap guns at each other until a middle aged guy rides in on a horse and fires a shotgun. They have also peppered the railway with life size fiberglass animals to try and distract from all of the tacky showiness of “Nature” all around.

We had to ride it twice.

The other highlight of the day was the chair lift up the side of the mountain which I would guess was built just before the first personal injury lawsuit was ever filed. I think Nancy was truly terrified.

Isaac petted the goats, deer, and emus at the petting farm. He rode the go-karts, and jets. He even rode the Tilt a Whirl and Scrambler rides. We watched a magic show, and the “World Famous” Tweetsie cloggers.

After a busy, fun day, we went back to the hotel for some well deserved rest. It wasn’t until about 1:00 a.m. that the non-stop uncontrollable screaming began. Thankfully it only lasted about 40 minutes. The screaming at 3:00 a.m. went on for almost an hour. Why was Isaac screaming? Was he in an unfamiliar place? Was he scared of Caucasian teens dressed in stereotypical Native American clothing and war paint yelling garbled insults at him?

Any question asked of him resulted in an angry “No!” and an intensified round of screaming. We don’t know for sure, but we suspect he may have had slight abdominal discomfort from not crapping for four days.

He doesn’t like sitting on public toilets you know….those things are disgusting!

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

No Free Toys on Sunday Either! (HOL 79)

2008-06-15T19:03:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 79

Thank you to all the people who ask me if I am still blogging. I’ve started to write several entries in the last month, but am either uninspired, or read what I wrote and feel like such a whiner. The other main reason I haven’t written is that we are in the transition to real underpants. Now don’t get me wrong, there is plenty of drama, suspense, tragedy, and hilarious body functions when it comes to Isaac wearing his new underwear, but A) I hate it when other people talk about their kids or animals crapping and B) All of the pervs on the internet googling terms like “underwear” and “poop” could end up here, and that is just creepy.

We had a lovely weekend. On Thursday night, Nancy and I got a babysitter and went to see the new play at Triad Stage called “Bloody Blackbeard” Evidently the sitter read the Dr. Seuss story about the Scary Green pants, because that is one of his new favorites. It’s a goofy little story about a pair on uninhabited green pants that are a little scary at first, but turn out to be okay once you get to know them. When I read it, I try to make it as scary and serious as possible, and Isaac loves it.

Friday night, we went to a friends house for a little party. We arrived around six, and the party was mostly breaking up by 8:00 because many of the attendees have children. I remember when we used to be fun….

Saturday morning we went and worked around the church for a couple of hours, and when we were done, we went downtown to “Chik-Fil-A” because they were having “Superhero Day”. We met Ironman and Hulk out in front of the restaurant. There were comic book posters decorating the walls, and a spider web with your friendly neighborhood spiderman hanging from it. Up near the registers there was a basket of candy, a box of free comic books, and a large plastic tub filled with dollar store bric-a-brac adorned with comic book characters. There were coloring books, kites, masks, and other small treats. The other kids in the restaurant were helping themselves to the toys. I told Isaac if he finished his meal, he could pick out a treat as well. He finished his meal, and we went up to the bucket to pick out a treat, and the woman behind the counter said “You can’t take those.”

“Excuse me?”

“I don’t know what they are doing with them. I think they are having a drawing or something.”

“Every other kid who has been here has taken something out of this basket. There aren’t any signs or anything, and it’s sitting on the floor right next to the box of free comics!” My voice raised slightly, and Nancy started to get embarrassed. There were maybe a dozen people in the store. I told Isaac loudly, “Sorry buddy, you aren’t allowed to get a treat, the other kids were, but not you.”

“Well he can have some candy from on top of the table”

“I don’t want to accidentally pick something he can’t have.” At this point, Nancy is heading for the door. A kid sheepishly offered Isaac a package of Batman candy and we left. As we left, the employees were hiding the basket of treats under a table.

We walked down Elm street to Triad Stage. They were having “Pirate Day”. In addition to “Bloody Blackbeard”, they are doing a kid’s show called “Redbeard’s School for Pirates”. They had pirate related activities, a story teller, music, people in elaborate pirate costumes, and we got to go show Isaac the really incredible “Shipwreck” set from “Blackbeard”.

In case you are wondering, no we didn’t have a camera for any of the above. The day just unfolded, and it’s just as well I didn’t have a camera, as I would have been worried about trying to “capture” the moment instead of living in it.

After church Sunday, we went to some friends’ house for lunch, and since it was Father’s day, I got to pick what we did for the afternoon. We went to Celebration Station and played mini-golf, and rode Go-Karts. Isaac and I rode the two person Kart, and that was really the highlight of my day. He was both terrified and excited all at the same time, and for just a few minutes it was crystal clear what it meant to be a father. Even though he was scared, he was still having the time of his life because he was sitting next to his Daddy. I’m not Ironman, or Chewbacca, or even Edna Turnblad, but he was elated to be riding with me, because he knew we were driving fast and wild, but I wouldn’t let him get hurt.

I didn’t need a camera to remember that moment for the rest of my life.

We finished the day by going to see “The Incredible Hulk” movie. Near the end of the movie, Hulk fights with a giant monster called “Abomination” in the comic books. Nancy was confused when Isaac was summarizing the movie later and said “Hulk was fighting a Rancor Monster.”

I explained to Nancy that the Rancor was the monster that lived under Jabba the Hutt’s throne room. “He came up with that on his own?” I nodded semi-proudly. Nancy said “Our poor son will never have a date or get married.” Later I confided to him, “Just find a really cute smart girl who doesn’t know how cute or smart she is. It worked for your old man.”

Strength and Honor.

Big Matt

Easter PIctures

2008-03-23T16:18:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from Easter Day.

Isaac had a special snack this afternoon he made himself.

Matt

Two Can Be as Bad as One (HOL 78)

2008-03-22T12:43:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 78

Nancy has a new pat answer for whenever she is asked “How’s Isaac?”

“He’s Two”.

For those unfamiliar with two year olds, this means that within a five minute span, a child could ask for a cheese sandwich, upon receiving the cheese sandwich cry because he wants a pancake, when the sandwich is removed from the table, cry because he wants the cheese sandwich, and throughout the ordeal ask for a cookie every 20 seconds. When you explain “If you eat your sandwich, you can have a cookie”, there are equal chances that the child will flop on the floor sobbing uncontrollably and that he will quietly and happily consume the sandwich.

Every waking moment is a crapshoot of emotion.

Friday morning, Isaac and I bummed around the house playing with cars, construction toys, and watching movies. After watching the Pee Wee’s playhouse DVD again, I asked, “What else do you want to watch?” I was expecting him to suggest favorites such as “Spiderman” or “Chewbacca Movie”.

The movie he wanted to see? “I wanna watch Hairspray.” Well, at least we won’t have to change churches.

After Nancy came home, we walked to the theater to see “Horton Hears a Who.” During the previews, Nancy and I got a quick glimpse into what will be the dominant fashion/ decorating trend in our home for late 2008/ 2009. It turns out there is going to be a Speed Racer movie coming out later this year. It is brightly colored, loud, fast paced, features dozens of race cars, and I have never seen Isaac focus on something so intently for the two minutes that the preview lasted.

Horton was a decent kids movie. It was impressive visually, and the humor was really sharp. It also had a great message for kids. Isaac explained to me who the good guys and bad guys were through most of the movie. He wasn’t a big fan of Vlad the Vulture.

This morning, Isaac and I went and visited our friend Ed Smithey who had to work this weekend. Lucky for us, he is a fireman and Isaac and I went to the station to look at the trucks. Isaac and I dressed Blackie Bear up in his fireman outfit and brought him with us. All of the firemen were very nice to Isaac, and Isaac was more than happy to show his bear to all of them.

Happy Easter! I will post some pictures later in our Easter clothes in front of our church’s annual “Flowering Cross” We plan to spend the rest of the day in a sugar coma watching Peter Parker fight and sing with Tracey Turnblad thanks to the Easter Bunny.

Strength and Honor,
Matt

Isaac's first Jackass video

2008-03-15T16:52:00.000-07:00

The other morning, Isaac came into the kitchen to show me his new trick. Coffee exited my nose. Also, there is one more cool picture I couldn't fit on my last post.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

Building Blackie (HOL 77)

2008-03-15T16:32:00.000-07:00

House of Laughter 77

A couple of weeks ago, my parents flew up from Florida to spend some time with Isaac. Mom had recently bought Isaac’s cousins Eli and Lily each a “Build a Bear”. She wanted to get one for Isaac as well.

I should clarify. You don’t just go to the “Build-A-Bear Workshop” and buy a stuffed animal. No, you buy the skin, pick out a small satin heart to put inside the skin, pick out a “voice” for your new pet, help fill it with stuffing, “fluff it”, and then register your new animal at a computer in the store. (With all other toys, most of these steps are performed by children in Chinese sweatshops.)

When you first arrive at the store, there are two dozen bins filled with a rotating variety of different animal pelts. There are mostly bears, but the occasional beaver, dinosaur, or tiger are thrown in to the mix for diversity’s sake. The first bear Isaac picked was a hideous white bear covered with Kelly green shamrocks. No amount of persuasion seemed to change his mind about it. This was the bear he wanted: the one that no doubt would be marked down 75% on March 18th.

Thankfully my Dad found a handsome black bear for Isaac, and Nancy discreetly put Bono bearskin back into the proper bin. Mom wanted a recording of she and Dad saying, “We Love You Isaac”, but Isaac preferred the vicious growl recording instead. Isaac stuffed and fluffed his bear.

End of story right? Not quite. You see, you have to buy the bear an outfit and accessories. There were several hundred different choices for Isaac’s new ursine friend’s wardrobe. There were also dozens of accessories like cell phones, sunglasses, and jewelry. Dad and I were extremely helpful offering Isaac the “Bear Wheelchair” and Pink “Hannah Montana” Panties. What really blew my mind was that there are hundreds of these stores across the country. Stores that over 70% of their merchandise is clothing for stuffed animals. Not only that, but the place was packed! There was a birthday party with a dozen kids in the back room, and each child had their own critter!

Isaac was going into sensory overload. He wasn’t interested in the Carolina Panthers outfit or the Spiderman outfit. (They also had a well stocked “Charlotte Bobcats” outfit.) We settled on a Fireman outfit that the bear has worn twice now.

Registering the bear was only slightly simpler than applying for financial aid. We had to choose a name right then, which is a lot of pressure for a little guy who is out past his bed time, and has spent the last hour building a bear. In honor of my grandmother’s memory, I suggested the name “Schvatza”. Isaac picked the name “Blackie” instead.

“Blackie” is now the number one stuffed animal at our house. His growler box died after two weeks, but he is still Isaac’s favorite. When Isaac is really mad or pouting, I will hold Blackie up to my ear like he is whispering and then tell Isaac, “Blackie bear asked why you are sad.”
He will usually talk to the bear when he won’t talk to Nancy or I.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Librarian Mother...Who would have thought? (HOL 76)

2008-03-08T14:18:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 76

Isaac cycles through certain books obsessively. He will happily listen to you read them three or four times consecutively.

The number one book right now is “Going on a Bear Hunt”. I remember my pre-school teachers leading the class on “Bear Hunts” when I was a child. The premise is that “We are going on a bear hunt. We are going to catch a big one. What a beautiful day. We’re not scared.”

The group then encounters a series of obstacles that can’t be gone over or under, eventually ending up at a bear’s cave. Upon finding the bear, they run back home with the bear chasing closely behind.

I love this book for two reasons. 1) I only have to say the first word of every sentence. Isaac “reads” the rest of the book to me. 2) Every single damn time I read the book, Isaac has a gleeful look of anticipation as the family approaches the bear’s cave. When I read the part about “Two big furry ears….One shiny black nose….Two Big Googly eyes….It’s a Bear!” He looks at me like I am about to tell the funniest joke in the whole world and he is just dying to hear the punch line.

Isaac’s enthusiasm for “The Marvel Comics Guide to the Incredible Hulk Universe” is thankfully ebbing somewhat. The Guide is a large colorful directory of every hero and villain associated with Dr. Bruce Banner and The Incredible Hulk since he was first exposed to gamma radiation. Isaac routinely identifies each character as a “Good Guy” or “Bad Guy”. Isaac and I have gotten into intense debates over whether or not the Hulk is a “Good Guy” (my stance), or a “Bad Guy” (Isaac’s position). After reading the history of the Russian equivalent of the Fantastic Four that the Hulk battled in the early 80’s for the sixth time in a week, I realize why girls didn’t like me in middle school.

The only real plus to the book is that Stan Lee never created a female superhero who’s secret weakness was gravity.

Isaac’s most intense obsession is over a book my mother gave me for Valentine’s Day when I was a child. “The Wookie Story Book” tells the story of Chewbacca’s family. For being set on a distant planet inhabited with strange life forms, it is one dull read. The upshot of the story is that Chewie’s son Lumpy wanders away from his family’s tree house to find some berries in the dangerous swamp below. He gets lost, Chewbacca rescues him, and then they have a big Wookie party.

When my folks were visiting a couple of weeks ago, my dad started off reading the actual text in the book, and then deviated in to his own version of the story. My father’s version was much funnier, and featured many more hysterical bodily functions then the original. Since then, I’ve never read that book the same way twice. One night, the story will be about Chewie’s son learning to use the potty, the next night it will be about Momma Chewbacca buying Daddy Chewbacca a Wii.

My mom told me that when I was Isaac’s age, I was obsessed with Dr. Seuss’s “The Foot Book”. I recently bought a copy for Isaac. Inspired by a photoshop of the book’s cover I had seen on the internet, I changed every repetition of the word “Foot” to another very funny word with the same first and last letter that has to do with a bodily function. Needless to say, Isaac and I could barely finish the book we were laughing so hard.

Up in the Air Feet, Over a Chair Feet
Slow Feet Quick Feet, Here Come Pig Feet
Wet Feet Dry Feet
Up Feet Down Feet, Here Come Clown Feet.

Nancy came in to see what good clean family fun we were having. She warned me yet again, that he would say this hilarious word at day care, and I would be blamed. (I somehow think that anything off color he says in the future will be attributed to me.)
Nancy took the book and tried to read the “Original Version”. She read, “Left Foot, Right Foot, Feet, Feet, Feet.”

Isaac interrupted “NO! Daddy reads this book!”

I love it when my wife wants to give me a disapproving look, but she can’t do it because she is concentrating all of her effort on not laughing.

Strength and Honor
Big Matt

Christmas Pictures

2007-12-25T14:07:00.000-08:00

There is a full post below, I had to create a new one for a few more Christmas Pictures.

I Got Your Christmas Letter Right Here (HOL75)

2007-12-25T13:30:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 75

Merry Christmas! It will be eleven months until I have to hear the Amy Grant Christmas C.D. at work, or that maudlin Christmas Shoe song on the radio again! Rejoice all creatures in heaven and on Earth! (Seriously does anyone actually like that song?)

Like everyone else, we have been busy the last few weeks. We've had work parties, Church parties, School Parties, a visit from Gammy and G-Daddy where we visited Santa's Castle, along with the normal busyness of life. Unlike most, we have also been preparing to sell our house. (I wasn’t allowed to blog about it until the deed was done, and it finally closed last Friday.) To celebrate, we took a quick trip to Myrtle Beach for the weekend.

We visited Ripley’s Aquarium Saturday. Isaac was fascinated by the sharks and sea turtle. For some reason, he was also obsessed with a tank featuring clownfish and regal blue tangs (He never really explained why.) I was really proud when we walked into a small education room featuring what I thought was an aquarium full of only seaweed, and he immediately correctly identified that it in fact was a display of “Seahorses!”

When we came to the ray tank, Isaac decided it was time to growl at anything that swam by. Isaac and I petted the rays and baby hammerhead shark, while Nancy kept a safe distance from the tank. (She remembered what happened to Steve Irwin and wasn’t taking any chances.)

Our hotel featured a small indoor water park with a couple of slides, kiddie pool and a lazy river. Isaac found a raft shaped like a car that he “Drove” around the lazy river race track about 700 times.

Sunday morning, we went to the “House of Blues Sunday Morning Gospel Brunch.” There was a three piece gospel band playing old time hymns and the kitchen door was wide open with a buffet of great food inside. The Banana Bread Pudding was the clear winner at our table. The band played “Do Lord”, “I’ll Fly Away”, and “Give Me That Old Time Religion”. Isaac was being ugly to Nancy when the band began “This Little Light of Mine.” The singer walked around the tables as he sang, so I used that to scare Isaac into behaving.

“Isaac, that man saw you being ugly to your mom, and he is coming over to talk to you.”

Isaac looked at me incredulously as the man came towards out table.

“Isaac you made him mad by being ugly to your mom in his restaurant.”

The man was singing loudly and heading toward our table. Isaac ran over to me and climbed up on my lap, now seriously concerned. Nancy was smirking and clapping along as the man came right up to our table. Isaac was terrified, but being very quiet. The man stopped at our table and said, “Now this big guy here, he acts like he is babysitting, but he aint clapping, and if you aint clapping, that means you singing. What’s your name? Where you from?”

I told him, and then he gave me the mike and I belted out my best version of “This Little Light of Mine” to a receptive audience. It was the highlight of the trip for me. Isaac was very good for the rest of the day.

We left “House of Blues” with full bellies. Isaac took an extra biscuit with him and slowly ate it for the next hour, while pinching off little bits to feed to birds and fish. Nancy bought him a small stuffed tiger that he named “Biscuit Tiger”. Biscuit Tiger has a feature that most stuffed animals lack, small magnets in his paws and forehead that let him play “Peek a Boo”. For the rest of the day we heard “Where’s Biscuit Tiger?.....There he is!” Every few minutes. This is why no one you know with children is sane.

We drove back on Christmas Eve and went to church. Isaac was well behaved through the service. At the end of the Service, we stood in a circle around the inside of the church and sang “Silent Night”, and “Joy to the World” as we lit candles. That is the moment when Christmas is real to me. Isaac wanted to sing Happy Birthday, and so after everyone else sang, he and I sang Happy Birthday as well.

Santa came last night and ate the cookies we left out for him and left some presents for Isaac, Nancy and I. My folks gave him a camera, and when he learns to use it I will post some of the pictures here for you.

One of the traditions at our house is that baby Jesus is not placed in our nativity until Christmas Eve night. This morning at breakfast, Isaac commented “There’s Baby Jesus!” when he saw the new addition at the crèche.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and be sure to enjoy Boxing Day and have a Kwazy Kwanzaa!

Peace on Earth, Good will to all people.
Big Matt

P.S. Thanks for all of the Christmas cards! We haven’t managed to send any, so it’s not that we forgot you, we forgot everyone. Consider this our boring ass Christmas letter!

Sleeps With Fishes (HOL 74)

2007-12-09T18:52:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 74

It was inevitable. When I woke up last Saturday morning, I knew I was going to get sick some time this week. We had just replaced Isaac’s crib with a full size bed Friday night after a trial period of using the crib with one of the sides removed resulted in Isaac falling out of bed in the middle of the night for several nights in a row.

We set the full size bed and box spring on the floor with the cool “Eric Carle” sheets my mother had given him for his birthday. On Saturday morning, Nancy went to check on him and found that he had thrown up in the middle of the night and slept/ rolled around in it. After stripping the bed and bathing the boy, Nancy gave Isaac a small amount of apple juice which was immediately returned to sender.

Several days later, Nancy came home in the middle of the day with similar symptoms. I knew I couldn’t be far behind. My turn lasted from Thursday through Friday. It is amazing what thirteen hours of sleep and a steady diet of ibuprofen and Pepto will do for you.

Nancy and I have been thinking about our vacation for 2008. We both love Key West, and are thinking about leaving Isaac with Nancy’s folks and spending a couple of days there together. (As a local once told me, “Key West is not a place to bring kids on a vacation. There are no playgrounds here, no theme parks here.” He then launched into an almost perfect one man rendition of “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” on the violin, butt naked. Again, not a place for the wee ones.) As we pondered the details of our trip, we realized that we haven’t spent a night together without Isaac since he was born.

Without family nearby, it has just never come up. We’ve had babysitters and friends watch him, but we still have to prepare beforehand and then be home by a certain time. You can’t just go, stay out late, and then sleep in the next morning. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not complaining. Nancy and I still make time for each other, we are just more aware of that one small advantage that most of our friends with kids have.

Our friends, the McMullen’s had their son this week. I visited mother and son in the hospital on my lunch break. On the way back to work, I couldn’t get the songs “I Was There to Hear Your Borning Cry”, and “Circle of Life” out of my head.

Since I was feeling better Saturday morning, I took Isaac out on some errands. Shortly after leaving the house, we stopped at a traffic light. As soon as it turned green, I heard a little voice behind me say “Come on people!”. (He must have learned this from Nancy.)

We stopped at a garage sale where I found a two gallon aquarium with pump and fish food for three dollars. Isaac and I set it up in his room, and went to Wal-Mart to buy a couple of goldfish. The lady in the pet department sealed them in the bag, and as we were walking out, Isaac kept asking “Are we going to eat them?”. Anyone with a small child is probably laughing right now. Don’t worry, it took Nancy a minute to figure out why he was asking that too.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt

Check Out the Tail on That Moonfish (HOL 73)

2007-11-28T19:32:00.000-08:00

House of Laughter 73

This morning’s comic strip “Pearls Before Swine” had this to say about blogging. “You know, I like Blogs, I really do….You know why? Because they provide their frustrated creator with the delusional outlet of being a published author. Sort of like how the prison warden lets the psychotic inmate scribble ‘Poetry’ on the cell wall so he doesn’t beat his bunkmate with a toilet seat.” Couldn’t have said it better myself, although the same sentiment was expressed almost verbatim in last week’s Family Circus.

Monday morning I woke up to Isaac asking, “Daddy, do you need a donkey in bed with you?” (I knew I shouldn’t have let him watch Clerks 2 this weekend.) He dropped a stuffed donkey into bed, and I drifted back to sleep. Two minutes later, “Daddy, do you need a camel in bed with you?”. Flash forward 15 minutes and the entire Nativity scene is in bed with me. It was like having a snooze button on a Sunday School class.

When I get home from work in the afternoon, I will sometimes stretch out in bed. Isaac will tell me to lay down on my stomach and he will climb on my back. He then bounces up and down. It turns out, I am the turtle, Crush, from Finding Nemo, and he is the baby turtle Squirt riding the East Australia Current. I know he learned that from TV, but damn it’s pretty cute.

Speaking of Nemo, we just came back from “Disney/ Pixar’s Nemo on Ice”. Crap-tacular. They played sound clips from the “Finding Nemo” while people in costumes skated in circles waving at the kids for two hours. There are occasional special effects like a thick green cloud of smoke that they evidently make out of paper mill waste and ground up dead skunks. At the beginning of the show there was even an explicit announcement that the smoke was most certainly “Not Toxic”.

From the minute we walked in the coliseum doors, we passed dozens of stands selling remarkably expensive Nemo bric-a-brac. I assured Isaac that I would buy him some of the stuff next year at a garage sale.

I realized the most unsettling part of the show though right after it started. My mind was drifting early on in the show, thinking about work, and the dozen different things I’m already doing this weekend, when one of the skaters whizzed by and the little monkey part of my brain clicked on and thought…..”cute well toned athletic butt in spandex”. Immediately the higher brain part of the brain knew something was amiss, and did a quick check, and issued an emergency broadcast “Attention all parts of the brain! Preliminary reports suggest, that is a dude.”

I had to stare at the floor for most of the rest of the night.

Would I go see Nemo on Ice again? Yes, because every penny we spent on tickets and awkward moments of gender confusion while staring at a toned skater in a lobster costume was worth it for Isaac’s smiles, laughing, wonder, applause, and unbridled enthusiasm about the whole damned thing.
Strength and Honor,

Matt