A Dad Working on Emergency Reaction Time

In a brand new hotel in Chapel Hill, N.C., I realized something this summer: My family is woefully un-prepared should disaster strike. In the wee hours of the night, as we slept on virgin pillows and virgin sheets, we were suddenly awoken by the most wretched of noises. It sounded as if a pterodactyl was throwing up in the bathroom. Loud and rancorous, it assaulted the ears — a pulsing, throbbing, piercing noise. BLURT-BLURT-BLURT. My first reaction was anger. How dare some North Carolina pterodactyl disturb my slumber. The nerve! There’s nothing like, and nothing worse, than the disorientating fog of being awoken in the middle of the night. You slowly come to your senses — grab a bit of awareness out of the air — and then remember that pterodactyls are long-since extinct. The blaring noise was really a fire alarm. “How dare the hotel be on fire!” I remember thinking.

Continue Reading

Feeling Old and Out of Touch: Thanks Mindset List

You want to take a trip down memory lane, and feel really old at the same time? Here’s how you do it. Get on the Web and search out Beloit College’s Mindset List for the Class of 2014. A small college that dates back to when Wisconsin was still a territory, Beloit puts together a fascinating list every year to give us some insight into “the cultural touchstones that shape the lives of students entering college this fall.” You know, stuff that we older folk used to find commonplace, but today’s incoming freshmen will scratch their heads and say, “What you talkin’ ‘bout, grandpa?” Because, think about this, most freshman now hitting college campuses like the one I work at were born in 1992. NINETEEN-NINETY-TWO!!! As the list points out, these little dudes and dudettes never had to worry about a Russian nuclear missile hitting the U.S. A read through it gives you an idea of how much things have changed, and how quickly. What was once standard in our lives are now little more than historical relics or forgotten pieces of the past.

Continue Reading

I’m Trying … I’m really Trying! … to Eat Healthier

Whoever thought eating healthy would be so dang hard? It’s enough to make you throw up your hands and scream, “Bring on the Pop-Tart sushi!” (In case you were looking for signs of the end of civilization as we know it, I give you Pop-Tarts World — the nutritional apocalypse. It’s opening in Times Square and will sell, I kid you not, Pop-Tart sushi. I gained a pound and lost a year off my life just reading about it online.) Thanks for kicking us while we’re making progress, food companies. Here we are becoming interested in what we eat, and adjusting to organic squash and multi-grain pasta. Then you have to go and give us that. I’ve always been a relatively healthy eater, but in the past year I’ve turned even more so. Or at least I’m trying.

Continue Reading

Submariner for a Day

As you stand atop the ballistic missile doors of a nuclear-powered submarine it suddenly occurs to you … I’M STANDING ATOP THE MISSILE DOORS OF A NUCLEAR-POWERED SUBMARINE!!! And the shock is almost enough to send you jumping into the water. Well, if not for the patrol boat down there with the front and back 50-caliber machine guns. But the thought of 24 Trident intercontinental missiles sitting just below your tennis shoes will send a shiver down your spine and get your teeth a chattering. I think I chipped one. The back story: I got the chance this past weekend to tour the USS Alaska, which calls Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base in Georgia home. He’s a big boy, that Alaska.

Continue Reading

A Man in Search of a Hobby

Maybe I need a hobby. I was thinking about this as I sat listening to my brother. He collects vintage motorcycles, restores them, loses sleep over them, caresses them lovingly like Kobe beef, says things like, “you sure have a pretty tail pipe,” and then spends most of his waking hours buying parts from far-off lands so he can get them to run for all of 13 seconds. Then they stall and the engine has to be rebuilt. These are really old bikes. When I say “vintage,” I’m not talking about 20-30 years old. I’m talking about the kind of motorcycles the Hun used to invade China back in 176 B.C. Well, maybe not that old. But these British bikes certainly pre-date me. I don’t typically pay attention to all these conversations with my brother about timing chains and oil gasket breaches, so I can only guess they hail from around World War II. With my brother, though, it’s not enough to merely collect and restore bikes. And it’s not enough just to ride them. So instead he has taken up racing — what you call “hobby expansion” or “hobby extreme.” That’s when putting something on a shelf or in a garage simply won’t do. This way you can consume more time and money on your hobby, and further infuriate your wife. (Guys who want to prove that they’re really into their hobbies have steel plates holding their legs together. My brother does. That way people know you’re hardcore about […]

Continue Reading

A Dad in Need of a Hug

I’ve been told that a daughter needs a father’s affection. That it is essential — vital even — to growing up right and not bringing home guys who look like alien biker thugs with gum disease. I never thought of myself as an entirely affectionate guy, but that all changed when I had a daughter. I became a puddle of mud. A bottle of syrup. A big soft-serve ice cream. A loving, doting, slobbering, hugging, kissing, sweet-mouth talking lump of sappy blubber. But here’s the thing: I might be affectionate — a sad sack of Mr. Snuggles — but getting the little partner to join in ain’t so easy. When it comes to her dear old dad, she’s affection-resistant. She’s the type of girl many dad’s dream about — adorable, sweet and pretty, yet at the same time a rough-and-tumble, high-energy, grade-A tree climber. She’s strong and agile for a 4-1/2-year-old, and can dole out a mean punch.

Continue Reading