Wakey-wakey, puny human!

This morning, Drew was up early. He's always up early. Every night around 4 A.M. we hear, "Is it daytime yet?" from what sounds like a disembodied voice in our room. No it's just Drew either in a sleeping bag on the floor next to our bed or in our bed (which means kicking me repeatedly until I move to where I have about 14 inches of our King Size bed to myself). As long as he's comfortable. Right.

Lately, he's been taking great joy in waking up Clay, who still gets his 11 hours in most nights and is usually only awoken with promises of french toast sticks, or threats of buckets of cold water being poured on him. The boy like his sleep; except of course at bedtime.

So this morning I hear "I'm Optimus Prime!" coming from Clay's room. I go in to find Drew in his Transformed state, shaking his brother's bed with the menacing, electronically processed voice of a 3 year old screaming, "I'm Optimus Prime! Wakey-wakey Clay!"

For a moment, in the half-darkness, Clay wasn't sure what was going on. Then he let out a little yelp and threw the covers back over his head. After a second, he realized what was going on and got up and started telling Drew that this was not funny.

Maybe tomorrow, I make sure Drew finds the Incredible Hulk Smash Hands before he goes in to wake Clay. Wake up, puny human!

UPDATE: He came into our bedroom this morning as a pajamaed Darth Vader to wake us up. And so it goes.

Forty-Five

I can't believe it's Fall already. So much has happened in the past month. Last weekend, we saw the most impressive fireworks display celebrating Pittsburgh's 250th birthday. It was the largest display ever; and Pittsburgh's a fireworks crazy town. This was a more impressive display than any I ever saw in Washington, D.C. Baseball has finished (thank goodness); the Pirates are in last place... again. Football has started; more importantly Hockey has started. I love the Steelers, but I love and admire the Penguins. Drew turned 2 and I turned 45.

45. It doesn't really bother me, except I'm no longer in that 35-44 year old demographic. I received an invitation to join AARP. Doesn't the "R" stand for retired? I also fill out surveys for the Harris Poll. I don't get any money, but I earn points that I can exchange for gifts. (So far I earned a radio and a crock pot; it took two and a half years of surveys for that). Last month I was getting surveys like, "Tell us about your online music purchases" and "Help us develop the next great electronic gadget". Now I get ones like, "Tell us about your favorite men's hair coloring product" and "Adult diapers; function or fashion?"

The other day I heard a commercial playing "Mr. Blue Sky" by the Electric Light Orchestra; one of my favorite groups during my high school years. I started singing along and told Clay that was one of my favorite songs. He said, "Who sings that song, daddy?" "E.L.O. I used to have all their records." Without missing a beat, he says, "What's a record?" Nancy giggles. I start, "Well, before their were CDs, you used to have to buy music on these big plastic discs and spin them on a table and put a needle on it." As the words come out of my mouth, I already see Clay's expression start to change,as if he's thinking, "What the hell are you talking about old man?"

Yes, and phones didn't have buttons, and milk was delivered to the house, and we had 13 channels on TV and 11 of those were in color; Car seats? The back seat was my playground; my internet was 24 volumes of the World Book Encyclopedia and my Facebook was a Radio Shack walkie-talkie that reached my friend Billy's house on a good day.

Maybe I am getting old.

School Days

It's hard to believe, but the first day of school is here already. Clay didn't look back; he was so looking forward to school. All day, flashes of my time in school have been coming back to me. The good memories and the bad; the excitement; the angst. It seemed that time dragged. Every school year was a lifetime; every month a decade. It seemed like summer was always so far away, and then it was gone.

To Clay, the next 13 years will see like an eternity, with milestones like first grade, middle school, junior high, driver's license, graduation and college. To me it will fly by much too quickly.

Popcorn

"Space Chimps". What could be wrong with that. It has two of my favorite things; Space and Chimps. The only thing that could be better would be "Space Chimps delivering Hooters' Wings with a free MacBook Pro". Heaven.

Clay has wanted to see this movie since he saw the first commercial months ago. So I decided to give Nancy a few hours of peace and quiet while I took him to see this potential Academy Award winning flick. As we enter the theater lobby, Clay immediately is disinterested in the movie and wants to play video games. All the games he wants to play are racing games and he is far too short to reach the pedals; thankfully.

I break him from the trance of quarter-swallowing electronic crack by telling him that we needed to get some snacks for the movie. "Clay do you want any popcorn?"

"No, I want that Batman thing!", as he points to Malted Milk Balls with the Batman logo on it.

"You're not going to like Malted Milk Balls. How 'bout some popcorn?"

"No Daddy, I want that Batman thing!", as he points to Milk Duds.

"No, Clay, you're no going to like those. How about some popcorn?"

"I don't want any popcorn!"

"OK, how about M&Ms or Twizzelers?"

"I want Starburst!"

"OK, you can get some Starburst. Are you sure you don't want any popcorn?"

"Goddammit Daddy! No Freakin' Popcorn!!!"

OK, well he didn't say that, but he again told me of his lack of desire for any type of warm, buttery corn-based snack product. So, I order a small one for myself. As we pass the "Popcorn Flavoring Station" I start sprinkling on cheddar cheese flavored salt. "Daddy, what's that?" "Cheddar cheese flavored salt". "Yuck! I hate cheddar cheese salt!" I tell him that since he doesn't want any popcorn, he shouldn't care what I put on it.

We settle in for the movie, and just as the first preview is about to start Clay says, "Daddy, I want some popcorn!" FIne. By the time "Space Chimps" starts, he has devoured most of the bag. "I guess I don't like cheddar cheese salt too much, but I'll eat the popcorn anyway", he says. I'll learn next time.

Oh, and the movie. Awful is not a strong enough word. It looks like it was made on cutting edge animation software that Pixar threw away in the early 90's. But Clay and I did both laugh when the big chimp slipped on the banana peel on the treadmill. Can't help it; Monkeys=Funny.