Recent Events at 'the Playground'

So here at the Playground life has continued to move forward, even though the blog process has been somewhat stagnant (my apologies).

Wife.Imp's youngest sister is stopping by for a brief visit and today I took her out for a road trip (ok, I gave her the keys to my car and told her that she gets to drive me around). Because the one thing I have learned when visiting wife.imp's family is that if you have no means of going out and about, then things can get boring.

SIL brought gifts from the family, of which a baseball hat with an Iron Man logo on it was given to boy.imp. Since getting the hat boy.imp wears it around the house fighting the 'bad guys'. The fights are terrible, with lots of shouting, jumping and falling down. However b.imp always gains the upper hand with a knock-out blow. Which he has to describe to me.

'I hit him in the eye!' 'I hit three of them in the teeth!' 'I hit him in the chest and two of them in the eye!' 'I hit five in a row here!' (this is where boy.imp points to the lower abdominal/higher thigh area of his body and will continue to point there until you have viewed the area of damage and acknowledged his fighting prowess...)

Concerning aging...
I went to my s0mewhat-annual (ok, 1st time in 3 years) checkup today because I felt I had enough info to make the doctor's effort in the examination more than just routine. I have a very nice back rash (the result of a hair-removal waxing--Oddly enough when I found out a year or so ago that I did have hair on my back, I have never been able to put that thought out of my mind. It actually bothered me. I finally pulled the trigger and it barely tingled. It felt like someone had spread masking tape on my back and pulled it off. But the rash kind of puts a damper on repeat procedures), a pain in one of my knees and a phantom ache in one of my arms.

I also had (the first of what is now an annual event (yea me!)) the prostate exam! I am not certain, but I am fairly postive that procedures conducted in the family-care doctor's office should include the patient's continued ability to, oh say, breathe during said procedures!

'You Asked'...

Tony at 'Creative Type Dads' and Diana from 'Stuck in Elmo's World' have inquired as to how I managed such a drastic rash from Poison Ivy.

First let me say that my reaction to contact with the Ivy is nothing new. In high school, on two separate occassions, I had to rub ice on my eyelids just so I could open them to go to school in the morning. I, who burn faster than paper soaked with lighter fluid, would spend weeks at the public pool because the chlorine content in the water was the second fastest non-medical remedy to an Ivy rash I found. The first was using the juice from the stem of a Jewelweed plant. That stuff is a factual miracle in nature!

So knowing my history, one might guess my reaction to being invited to help my sister clear some of her land would be a resounding 'No.'

Instead, I promised to help. So I showed up in shirt-sleeves and dragged vines from trees to be burned with brush pulled out of the ground. It was a lot of fun and, yes, I was aware that the vines, some almost as thick as my wrist, were Poison Ivy vines. Yet, I still wrapped them around my wrist and dragged them to the ground or wrapped chains around them and pulled them out of the trees and lugged them to the bonfire to be burned.

Yes, I am aware that burning Ivy is also not the ideal way of disposal.

Yes, I spent the last 2 weeks with my arms and abdomen covered in salves and lotions. Until I had enough and visited the local family practioner. There I obtained the 3rd most effective cure for this rash.

Now I am merely days and not week(s) away from overcoming this abysmal rash.

Over the weekend...

Girl.Imp had her First Communion.
While standing in line, waiting file into the Church:
me: Settle down!
g.imp: blahblahblah (it was as if she had drunk 7-8 cups of sugar in her coffee that a.m.)
me: stand still...settle down
g.imp: blahblahblahblabblabblab, daddy, you have skin hanging out of your nose..!
(mind you we are standing in line with over 80 imps and their parents)
me:uhh, how's that?
g.imp: fine...blabblabblabbberdyblabblab, no, it's still there! You have a booger hanging out of your nose!

Yep, right before heading into Church for G.imp's big day, daddy is standing in line picking boogers out of his nose!


Daddy also spent the last week sleeping alone. Not one member of the family was interested in sleeping in the same bed, sharing a hug or even sitting on my lap.

Of course the rampant spread of Poison Ivy on my arms, neck and abdomen might be a small part of the isolationism...

And She is only 8-years-old...

...our across the road neighbor was using a hand-powered edger on his sidewalk when the tool caught girl.imp's eye. She walked across the road and watched the work in progress then looked back across the street toward our yard. While I could not hear the words, I could read her lips and could see that look in her eyes. Girl.Imp had seen the potential of such a tool and instantly realized it could be useful in my yard...

...so boys, this is fair warning...

Playground events

I have not mentioned this in the past but we have been without any real furniture in our Family Room since last Fall (I gave our couches to my brother when he moved out of state). Since losing the sofas, we had been utilizing a futon. That broke recently and I moved the futon's skeletal remains out of the house and we sat on the futon pad for a few weeks. But now we have new furuniture!! 1 sofa and 2 armchairs!!

Girl.Imp Speaks:
my eldest younger sister (nka: Sis1) and her husband recently stopped at the house on their way to a concert (don't know who) and had a brief conversation with girl.imp:

blahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblah
g.imp: boy.imp and I have different bodies. b.imp has a ting-ting and I have a ping-ping, just like mommy's--only hers has hair on it...

In the week that followed this conversation, (I understand that Sis1's husband's jaw bounced off of the floor) I know that now both my parent's have heard this conversation and knowing my sister, I would bet that her co-workers are also 'In-the-Know!'

On another night that I was working late, the imps were encouraged to imitate each other and, I am reliably informed, could earn livings as professional mimics. however it was when they were asked to imitate mommy:
imps: IT IS BEDTIME!! GO TO BED! NOW!

and then daddy:
imps: BEDTIME! GO TO SLEEP! NOW!

boy.imp speaks on how to earn $$ (thank you webkinz, you will be receiving the imps collegiate tuition bills):
wife.imp: So how do mommy and daddy make money?
b.imp: you go online and you play games and then you get money!

Stomp and Bill Cosby...

before I get to 'Stomp' and Mr. Cosby, I have to admit that wife.imp's radio alarm is probably the most annoying device ever made. Not, however, that the way she has it set makes it annoying--the alarm goes off by playing a pre-set radio station, NPR. No, I incorporate the news broadcast in my dreams every morning and only get up when she digs her elbow into my ribs.

So today, I have stayed home with the onset of a cold...or as I feel better, the imminent recovery from a cold. Anywho, the point is I tried to sleep in and the alarm (and this is why it is the most most annoying device ever made) kept going off and off and off. No matter the number of times I hit the snooze button the alarm always returned. I even got so annoyed that I considered beating it against the floor until it broke.

Instead, I called wife.imp at work to complain and her first questions was, "did I ever think to turn it (the alarm) off?"

I'll post more on 'Stomp' and Bill Cosby later...

A Little 'Jerk and Tug' in the Bathroom--Where is the Harm in That?

Yesterday as I contemplated life and family and work, whislt astride the Porcelain Throne (I had finished the comics and sports section) I reached for some All-Purpose paper. In order to, comfortably, reach said roll in our bathroom, one must lean forward and it was a new roll, so no worries there.

Until I jerked on the end of the paper and a tiny bit tore off. I jerked again. Again a tiny bit tore free.

WTF? The paper is wrapped around a tube that rolls on a spindle...I'll be damned if I was going to shift one iota from my current position (now on the leading edge of the seat). So, I grabbed at the paper and Jerked and tugged and jerked and tugged and got to sit in my own personal toilet paper confetti blizzard (and I did not even have to travel to the Canyon of Heroes in NYC).

Turns out that if the cardboard tube (in a full roll of toilet paper) is not perfectly rounded, the roll won't roll. I had to turn the paper (using both hands) to secure the desired amount of quilted softness.

It is moments like this that can ruin a perfectly glorious morning!!