I’m going to take a shot at something here. I know, I’m not the most serious guy. This column is better known for stories about my daughter or how a neighbor’s cat threw up on my car and it resembled Elvis. But I feel like with a titanic presidential election shaking our country, I can’t just sit here and waste this opportunity to share my own unique insight. So this week I want to use this space to speak directly to our candidates and offer them some much-needed advice: • Stop promising little things, like walls across the Mexican border or minimum wage increases to $135 an hour. Americans don’t like small. We don’t want practical and realistic. We want ginormous! We want promises so big that you sit back and think a 5-year-old must be running the campaign. Like a proposal to start printing all U.S. currency on Mars. Or a promise to make the next U.S. Supreme Court nominee a character from “Game of Thrones.” Or better yet: That we will end global warming by requiring all houses and offices to open their windows during the summer so the air conditioning collectively cools the planet. You want the country to embrace you? Start thinking big! • From polls I’ve read, these are some of the most unpopular candidates in a very long time. Their favorability ratings are so low — on both sides — that we all have to wonder, “Do their mommas even like them?” Which is […]
A newswoman in the family
“You’re going to be a newscaster!” I blurted out, beaming with pride. I had just been told something that will warm the heart of any former journalist: My daughter had earned a spot on her elementary school’s crack morning news crew. She gave me the kind of 10-year-old look that screams: “Why do I tell you ANYTHING?” But I just can’t help it. It’s so exciting! I’ve never actually seen the show. I think it comes on for morning announcements and is broadcasted to TV sets in the classrooms throughout her school. There’s an anchor and a camerakid and cue cards and the whole lot. I picture a “60 Minutes” format with exposés on why the hand-dryers in the bathroom don’t dry your hands quicker. Or maybe tough interviews with the physical ed teacher about why Medieval torture techniques like sit-ups are still being inflicted on children. “Now, in our research, we found a child in Nebraska who snapped in half while doing these archaic exercises. How do you respond to this?”
Full-on vacation planning … like the old days
When I was little, my father, brother and I used to trek off to the Rockies for long, extended vacations during the summer. We spent most of our time camping, hiking, eating questionable stuff out of tin cans, listening to questionable comedians on cassette tapes, chasing chipmunks and generally being awed by the monstrous beauty of a range of mountains that had erupted from the earth. As Florida boys — where elevation was measured by how high your front porch was — it was a dizzying sight to behold. Behemoths topping out at 13,000 feet, or more. In Durango, we two little kids and our bearded father would board the narrow-gauge Durango & Silverton Railroad with nothing but hiking packs and a couple of hiking sticks. We would sit amongst the sightseers as smoke-stack ashes rained down on us and the train crept deeper and deeper into the mountains. At some point it would come to an abrupt stop in the middle of a lonely gorge. Off we would hop, grabbing our packs and sticks from the freight car as puzzled tourists hung out the windows watching us, saying things to each other like, “Look Martha, that strange man is leading his two children off to be eaten by bears. We’re going to read about this in the newspaper!” Then we would disappear up the pass as the sounds of the huffing train echoed through mountains and slowly chugged away. We would camp near a beaver den and spend the next few […]
Ballad of a spring break sad dad
“Dad, I’ve got to show you this video,” said the child to her poor, worn-out father who had just returned from work. He collapsed in a heap upon the couch and was pounced upon immediately by the 10-year-old. She shoved an iPhone in his face and hit play. “Another spring break video?” he questioned. “Don’t you realize I’m a working stiff and the sight of so much unbridled fun could cause your poor father’s heart to squeeze itself to death?” “I’ll chance it,” she said, “because you’ve got to see THIS!” “This” involved two kids twirling each other in a chair while a classic song from the 80s played in the background. Oh, and there was a pillow with a smiley face. (It had something to do with the plot.) “Child,” this father said, “this is nothing more than two kids twirling each other in a chair.”