Tattoo You

So, I was reading my Sunday morning Free Press the other morning and saw that the new cool, hip, hot trend is getting your baby's picture tattooed on your body. The Free Press featured this photo of someone's arm(?) and their sweet little salty peanut:

Aww....how cute is that? I'm sure Salty Peanut will be so proud when her mom can whip out the tattoo and show all of her friends at her 16th birthday party or at her high school graduation.

I really think that Duncan deserves no less than the best from his parents. He certainly shouldn't feel left out when such a cool new trend is on the horizon, so I have decided to endure the pain and suffering of the local ink shop's needle to get a tattoo of my own. I have decided to get it on my belly. There are several reasons for this. First off, it will hide my unsightly stretch marks. Second, I think it will look awesome when it's all stretched out if I ever decide to have another baby.

Okay. I have to admit that when I started writing this blog, I was hoping to have a picture that would be just as ridiculous as the salty peanut picture, but Duncan's picture just doesn't look the same. That's probably good though. :-)

Niagara Falls is Ridiculous

I just realized that I promised to update you on our trip to Connecticut and then bailed on my promise. Sorry. Here's the update. All went much better than expected with Duncan. We probably had a total in-car cry time of 73 minutes, which is not too bad for 22 hours of driving (not counting stops at restaurants and hotels). Our visit with Daryl's aunt and uncle was also very nice. Duncan got to go to the beach. What a spoiled baby!




On the way home from Connecticut, we stopped at Niagara Falls. We got there at night and decided to stay at a hotel so that we could see the falls at night with the colored lights and during the day...um..with the big yellow light. The night we arrived, we walked the ten minute walk to the falls and were quite surprised to find that we had somehow teleported to Las Vegas.... Oh wait, nope, we were still in Niagara Falls. What is going on with Canada? What is all this crap?



Luckily, the craziness stops when you get down to the falls and then it's really beautiful. When you actually see the falls in person, it is hard to believe that even the dumbest of knuckleheads would ever contemplate trying to go over them in a barrel let alone actually try it. So much water going oh so fast.

Of course, we went back in the day time to see if the falls looked any cooler, and of course, they did. On our way out of the hotel, Daryl and I noticed that there was a nice view of the falls out the window at the end of the hallway. But wait, what is that sticking up high into the air? An observation tower? Oh, no...that's the WWE Pile-Driver ride. What was I thinking? Why shouldn't the WWE Pile-Driver be impeding my view of one of nature's most awesome spectacles? (Check out the picture to your left. Yup, that's it next to the Hard Rock sign.)

After taking our daytime trip to the falls, we were walking back to the car, we had to walk up the crazy street with all the neon lights. It was daytime, so the neon wasn't nearly as crazy. But there was one thing that was really crazy. There were Mennonites all over the place! Eating ice cream, starring at all the signs for the wax museums, looking ponderously at the Pile-Driver ride. The Mennonites were quizzical to be sure. I wanted to run up and grab one of them by his beard and say...."NOOOOO!!! This isn't it. This isn't really how all of contemporary society is. We DON'T have WWE Pile-Driver rides on every corner normally. This is not normal." But I didn't. I let them wonder. I let them eat their ice creams in peace. I really wanted to take a picture too. But, I restrained myself. Everyone would have accused me of photoshopping it anyway.

What the Kids are Watching

I always thought that Teletubbies was the scariest kids show on television. I guess it wouldn't be so scary if it wasn't aimed at kids. Little did I know, there is a much, much more frightening show on these days. I came across is while searching for something for Duncan to watch while I was trying to prepare my lunch (please see my last blog and you'll understand why he needs to be entertained while I'm in the kitchen). The show is called Boohbah and I think the show could best be described as is "trippy." I don't know about you, but I don't think our kids need to be watching anything trippy when they're preschool aged...or probably any age for that matter.

From what I can discern, the main characters are the Boohbah and they seem to speak a similar language to the Teletubbies (maybe they're relatives?). They seem to live in nests and have some sort of physic/alien quality to them that makes their heads pop up and their eyes light up.

My favorite character on Boohbah BY FAR is Mr. Man. This is Mr. Man:



























Nice shirt, Mr. Man.

My second favorite character is Grandmamma. Grandmamma looks like she's been through some pretty tough times. Maybe Grandmamma went through rehab a few times or did a stint in the slammer.
Here she is:


























Here's a fashion tip for you, Grandmamma: Buy your clothes two sizes smaller. And no more perms. Also, technically, I think only little kids and streetwalkers are entitled to wear red shoes.

I think the only thing that could make Boohbah scarier is to add the song "Smack My Bitch Up" by Prodigy to the intro. Oh wait, someone's already done that for us on YouTube:

How to Make Dinner While Caring for a Cranky Baby

1. Set baby in his chair.
2. Give baby his toy.
3. Turn around and start unloading the dishwasher.
4. Turn back around and pick up the baby toy from the ground.
5. Wash the dirty toy.
6. Give the toy back to baby.
7. Turn around and start unloading the dishwasher.
8. Turn around again and pick the toy up off the ground again.
9. Give the dirty toy to baby.
10. Ask baby to shhhh and tell baby you're trying to cook a delicious dinner.
11. Let the dogs out.
12. Start unloading the dishwasher.
13. Give the baby his pacifier.
14. Let the dogs back in.
15. Push the dogs back outside.
16. Go get a towel to dry off their muddy paws (it is raining outside, you doofus).
17. Pick the pacifier up from the floor and wash it off.
18. Give the pacifier back to baby.
19. Open the door to let the dogs in.
20. Where are the dogs?
21. Go outside to herd the dogs in toward the door.
22. Make funny faces at baby through the kitchen window so that he stops crying.
23. Dry off the dogs' feet.
24. Let the dogs inside.
25. Pick the pacifier and the toy up from the ground and place on counter top next to sink for future washing.
26. Start unloading the dishwasher.
27. Remind the dogs that no matter how much they beg, they will not be going outside again for a while.
28. Remember that you need to boil water to cook the pasta.
29. Get a pot out and fill with water.
30. Put the pot on the stove.
31. Make silly faces at the baby so that he stops cranking for a little while.
32. Realize that the song "Pump up the Jam" by Technotronic has come on the Music Choice Channel on the TV.
33. Consider walking over to shut the TV off but then change your mind because it's already taken you 20 minutes to unload the dishwasher and you just can't waste that kind of time.
34. Begin loading dirty dishes into the dishwasher.
35. Begin dancing around the kitchen like a nut because the baby thinks this is funny and stops crying for it.
36. Wonder what the heck they're singing about in this song. Are they saying "Oh I...a place to stay"? Oooh...remember the song "Pump Up the Volume"...also a mega dance hit from the 90s...it seems they were trying to pump everything up back then...but I digress.
37. Wonder why the water in the pot on the stove isn't boiling.
38. Check the stove to find out that the burner is still in the off position. A cold pot never boils.
39. Bust out a few more moves because the baby is fussing.

Remarkably, I did get the dinner cooked, the baby fed, the dogs fed, and myself fed. Ah....