Whoremongers and Role Models

While watching morning television this morning the program I was watching was interrupted by Tiger Woods press conference.

Personally, I would rather watch the Curling competition, so I turned the channel to another morning show and it was on that channel. Tiger Woods press conference was on every major network this morning.

Really?

Am I the only person that thinks this is ridiculous?

Tiger Woods admitted to cheating on his wife and apologized for "disappointing" his fans and those who saw him as a role model.

If you think athletes or actors or celebrities are role models for your children, you shouldn't have children.

Tiger Woods can hit a small ball into a small hole, and for whatever reason our culture thinks this is exceptional and has rewarded him with billions of dollars. The monitory value placed on athletes is absurd, the value placed on actors and celebrities is nothing short of repugnant.

Granted, Tiger not only had one affair, he had many, as in double digits, yet I'm still unsure how its any one's business.

Tiger Woods is definitely a liar, but most of his sponsors have not dropped him at this point. Apparently, veracity is not a requirement to sell sports drinks or razors, or cars...or sports equipment.

Faith

I've been thinking about religion a great deal lately.

Since the birth of the girls I had committed myself to finding a "religion" (for lack of a better word) in which the girls could be raised.

I mean, its pretty easy to eliminate, I am left with a total of maybe 6 when you count Scientology and other cults- are the Moonies still around or those guys that used to be at the airport wearing gaze and playing tambourines, that scared the shit out of me when I was a kid. Nether of us is Jewish, or Muslim so there go that...

Gioconda had raised the boys Catholic, and for obvious reasons, we will not be raising the girls Catholic (unless we can get a really good deal on a terrific private school).

I would really like to be a Buddhist, but I am way to angry, resentful and petty.

My family is Presbyterian, whatever that means. My whole hang up is the whole Christ as God's son thing. The way I understand it you pretty much have to buy this entire concept if you are Christian, so I am thinking I'm not a Christian.

I so want to believe, and I have really tried, but no matter how hard I try I just can't get my head around it. It could also be that so many Christians fucking hate Gay people and it is difficult to reconcile being a member of that group. I tend to think its more of the former, because there are also many Christians who love and accept all people.

So I'm left with is, I just don't think Christ was the Son of God...there I have said it.

A friend of ours told us she was raising her children within a religion because she didn't want to leave that space. I think she's right.

Down the road is a terrific Episcopal Church, and I think that is ultimately where we will land, yet it feels insincere.

I have a tattoo on my right ankle of a Chinese Character. Gioconda used to tease me about it.

" That character says Stupid White Girl," she would say.

I got it right after law school in 1992- the character- Faith.

Alexandre and Frederic

As I get older I tend to cry more often.

Change of hormone levels, realization I am mid-life ( yes I do plan on living to 92), becoming a parent for the first time, its been a perfect emotional storm for me.

The end result, I cry almost every day.

"Did you cry today?," Aidan will ask every night when he remembers.

I consider his question, and frequently answer in the affirmative.

"Do you want to know why?," I'll answer.

He always wants to know. I have gone almost 48 hours without crying, but I did cry on Monday.

The first thing Alexandre Bilodeau did after he won his gold medal in the mens mogul skiing competition was to hug his brother Frederic. His brother was born with cerebral palsy.

" I never heard him once in my life complain about his condition- never," he told reporters after his victory.

Watching him share the moment with his brother it was clear, they both had won.

It made me cry.

Tents, Huts and Forts

I have come to the conclusion I like the same things I liked when I was ten.

I came to this conclusion tonight while sitting in the tent I set up for Camille and Sadie.

I bought it at Costco when the girls were about three days old. It was just something they both really needed. It been a long 375 days without the tent (and two crawl thru tubes), so finally, after a great amount of whining ( mostly on my part) , I finally set it up for them...

And then I sat it in all night. Camille stayed in it with me for a while, but she tired of it after a few minutes. Sadie actually used the crawl tubes and I even got the Yorkie to run through one side. But overall, I seemed to enjoy it more than anyone else.

Sensing my disappointment Christian tried to console me, " They will play with it more when they are older," he said. Or maybe not.

If this was my tent I would so be sleeping in it tonight.

I love tents, forts and huts. I even got a water bottle for us to use if we got thirsty. Camille wasn't thirsty, Sadie only had a little sip.

"Having something to drink and eat is part of the experience, " I tried to explain to them both. Although I can't be 100%, I don't think they get it.

It is absolutely possible my daughters will not share my enthusiasm for the tent, or for their two other tents I have not opened yet.

When I was a kid, my life would have been so totally complete had I had a tent like this one...set up in the LIVING ROOM...

Although Gioconda did not appear to oppose the tent, I noticed she didn't spend any significant time sitting in it.

"Now we have THAT house," she said while I was rearranging the furniture to allow for the crawl tubes on both sides.

She's right. We do have THAT house now. There was a time we didn't even have a television in the living room, now a foot tall Alice in Wonderland sits on top of one of the three push vehicles which are filled with little plastic toys, most of which make sound, then there are the stuffed animals, and a set of menacing "twin" dolls Gioconda's mother bought the girls for Christmas...and that is just the living room.

It's difficult to go ape shit over a pair of shoes left in the living room when there is an actual temporary structure taking up the majority of the space.

The day after my daughters were born a colleague told me the best part of having kids was that you get to live your childhood over again, but this time you get to do it your way. He was right. Everything is more fun.

So now I get to set up a tent in my living room and sit in as long as I want...I'm just not clear how much of my childhood my daughters will actually enjoy reliving with me, but while I can still overpower them we will all be spending time enjoying the inside of the tent.

Clifford The Big Red Dog

Last week Camille took a little plastic Clifford the Big Red Dog action figure out of Sadie's hand and she got so upset she stopped breathing for what seemed to be four hours.

There was a dramatic heaving cry and then silence. She was in such distress her respiratory system actually seemed to fail for a few seconds. Her lips turned a little bit blue before she finally inhaled.

"What happened," Gioconda asked.

"She lost Clifford to Camille," I replied.

"Give her the right side of the pink door from the house, she likes the door it calms her," she replied. Since the pink door was actually attached to the house I carefully removed it and handed it to Sadie. It did work to normalize her breathing.

I have no idea how Gioconda knew the pink door off the Fisher Price Little People Cottage was a fair trade from the Clifford action figure, yet apparently in baby currency these two items have the same value.

Its been a year now I have been living with the music of Johnny Cash played as lullaby(s) floating around in my auditory memory. It seemed like a good idea at the time we bought the CD, but "I Walk The Line" is really not a comfort tune.

Sadie really loves music and so whenever we are in the car, we play " their music".

The side effect being I find myself thinking about the words of the songs, all the time.

"Mama called the doctor and the doctor said, no more monkey's jumping on the bed...".

The good thing about Johnny Cash lullaby is there are no words, just instrumental Johnny Cash music, played to sound like a lullaby...and in all honesty, its a little creepy.

Creepy in that kind of evil children of the corn kind of way.

"We have to stop playing this music, I think they find it confusing, and it's causing Camille to lash out at her sister," I told Gioconda yesterday.

I have no idea if that is the basis for Camille's recent "behavior" , but that guess is as good as any other. Since she turned one, I have completely lost all control. Keeping in mind, I didn't have a very strong handle on what I did control and so my loss of all control was a predictable inevitability.

"Maybe we should stop wearing lotion with any kind of cucumber scent, I am thinking she doesn't like the smell of cucumber," I suggested the other day.

"Maybe we should Feng Shui their room," I added.

It's hard to know. Everything seems fine and then someone stops breathing over an action figure.

There is no dearth of toys, in fact we are very close to our toy capacity yet somehow there is constant bickering over the front cover of the ripped apart book about kittens, the duck piece of the farm animal puzzle, or the star fish that bull dog chewed the left hand corner.

Then there is any remote. The remote is definitely the most sought after item in our entire house.

There is no fair trade for the remote. Taking away the could result in cardiac arrest if not approached properly.

Its all these little things no one bothers to tell you....

Don't Know Dick about Dick

I just read Jon Gosslin's ex-girlfriend claims he has a very small wiener.

I have no idea why I love this revelation, but I really do. I am, by no means, the arbiter of peens, or really anything male for that matter. Ironically, I was just telling Dylan today, if I was a guy and had the choice to have a small penis but have a ton of money, or a big penis and be broke, I would choose the former.

Dylan said he would rather be broke and have a average wiener, than be rich and have a small wiener.

"If you have a small one it will effect every aspect of your life," he said. I tend to believe him, it made sense on some level to me.

I have always thought any man who drives a Corvett has a small penis, although there it no empirical evidence to support this assertion.

Putting aside the (arguably) inappropriate nature of the comment to Dylan, I can't help but wonder, as a person who has no real interest in the male genitalia, why do would I even contemplate the importance of a big vs. small peenie?

The answer came to me in the form of The Housewives of Orange County.

At one of their gatherings, (which all involve massive consumption of alcohol follow by a wicked cat fight), one of the "housewives" claimed her husband was "hung like a horse".

I have no recollection of ever discussing my sexual partners private areas with anyone. Sure, along the way there were some "situations" I may have discussed after consumption of one too many beers at dollar draft night at Club Broadway, yet generally, not so into talking about vagina sizes with anyone.

Yet still, I find myself considering what would be more important to me as a man. There is a really nice attorney I see at court every once in a while and a woman whom he was dating informed me his penis was the size of her pinky.

"Is that small?," I asked.

"Very," she replied.

Now every time I see him I think of his substandard dick. Its completely locked in my brain, I try to forget about it and it becomes worse. Why do women talk about this stuff?

It just causes others to have to contemplate things they really have no desire to contemplate.

Its nothing less than a cultural preoccupation. My spam mail is chalked full of ads to increase my penis size.

In the end, I would still rather have a ton of money and a small peen....but I would never drive a Corvett.

Happy Birthday...hand over the bottle

Tomorrow the girls- the babies- are going to be a year old.

I honestly can't remember what life was like...without diapers...without toys all over the living room...without bottles....

Without bottles....

At some point, Gioconda decided the girls would stop using bottles by their first birthday. Their first birthday is tomorrow. I have been dreading this day like property tax day.

At 5:30 AM the girls wake up and cry, I get them both bottles and they go back to sleep until about 7:00 AM, and every one is happy. I get to sleep two more hours, they get to have a refreshing snack and then a little nap...its a win/win.

But now, there will be crying but no bottles- so that leaves us with just crying, no snack...no nap...just crying.

"They wake up starving, not giving them the bottles is a cruel form of torture," I pled with her last week.

" They can drink out of their sippy cups," Gioconda replied.

As if.

You don't have to be a baby to know a sippy cup is definitely NOT a bottle, it isn't really even close.

My mother says she has never seen a kindergartner with a bottle, I have thrown that out to Gioconda as well, but she doesn't buy it.

A few weeks back we saw a little boy with silver capped teeth. In truth, it was sobering, seeing a little kid with huge shiny chompers.

"That is what is going to happen to our daughters if they stay on the bottle," Gioconda said.

Although I tend not to believe her entirely, the mere thought of the girls having a mouth full of metal was enough for me to rethink my position at least for a moment.

At this point, the girls both have four little nub teeth each , two on the top, two on the bottom. Is oral hygiene an issue?

Really?

I mean, it just doesn't seem as though when you clearly don't have teeth you should have to stress out about losing your teeth, I mean, can you loose something you don't have yet?

Granted there are things I have done with the girls in the last year I would reconsider.

Giving Camille a sip of Dr. Pepper about a month ago is certainly on the list. Now, every single time I am drinking- well anything- we become engaged in a wrestling match. It has become somewhat disruptive to my enjoyment of any beverage.

There were a few close calls, however, I didn't drop anyone, although Sadie did take a roll off the couch on my watch.

We made it through the last year without an major disasters...and for that I am forever thankful...

But tomorrow morning at 5:30 AM there will be crying...no bottles...just crying - all three of us.