Oh no! Not again. Countinuing tales from the diaper pail.

 Yes ladies and gentlemen it's time for another stomach churning installment of 'Tales from the Diaper Pail'. While picking up my youngest to make room for the 8 year old to get out the door and catch the school bus I became aware of a none to nice odoriferousness wafting from his tiny self. So I take him to the changing table and clean him up, not a pleasant thing mind you but run of the mill, nothing like what was to come. Instead of sliding his pj's back on I thought I'd be a good thoughtful husband and go ahead and get the little one dressed. So the two of us go upstairs, he's walking around  in his diaper playing while I pick out an outfit for him. A minute passes, a minute, he walks around the side of the bed looking as though he is a native of some deep Congo tribe, his body painted with war paint. I say, "What have you got all over you?" He doesn't say anything but looks at me with this funny look on his face as if he were saying, "Well, I've never tried this before. It seems a little strange. What do you think?"
To which I answer, "Is that... (oh god, please don't let it be) poop?". Oh holy mother of God, it is poop!
I grab him by the arm and lead him around the side of the bed and to my utmost horror there lies a puddle, yes puddle, of poop. My gag reflex kicks in and I almost loose my breakfast, but I'm an old hand at this by now, so I bite back down the rising bile and spring into action. It's a triage. First remove the fecal body paint from the little monster, second get him diapered (and dressed this time), third clean. And then clean some more, and still a little more. Not the way I wanted to start my day, but thus is the joy of parent-hood, I just hope my pain and nausea can entertain and amuse my readers.

Karma Cat

    July 2007 a dedicated dental doctor named Donnie Deadmon died of a deadly disease. For three years he remained in limbo pleading his case to the powers that be before being assigned a lower reincarnation. Yes, a lower incarnation for while he had indeed been a dedicated dental doctor he had sacrificed his family and friends in pursuit of professional gratification. So three years to the day of his horrible death he reappeared upon this earth as a tiny little kitten. One of three in a litter born to an orphaned cat. His early lot in this new life did not proceed to nicely, his mother while out foraging for food to feed her children was struck down in her prime by a UPS truck, many animals I am told believe the UPS stands not for United Parcel Service but for Under these Wheels pets will Scream. Then in another blow of fate to his newly young life one of his sisters, already handicapped by the cruel machinations of destiny, perished. So this kitten and his surviving sibling wondered alone in the world until the day they were taken in and fed and cared for by a kindly grandfather. This grandfather of six new that his grandchildren would love and care for these lonely kittens and they did, immediately and exuberantly. Now several of the grandchildren all lived under one roof and they persuaded their already overtaxed parents to take in these two wayward kittens and like the Darlings accepting the Lost Boys they welcomed them to their home. Fate had finished dealing harshly with the former Mr. Deadmon and he found himself renamed Domino and living the luxurious life of a house cat. While his past life had all but faded from his mind and he was now occupied with chasing his tail and following the youngest child around waiting for him to drop some food he did maintain a curious fascination with teeth.
   While this tale may be a bit mendacious it will at least explain why this cat is always trying to jump on my chest and get in my grille.

www wendesday

I'm not even going to try and catch up on ones I've missed but today I thought I'd start afresh.
What did I last read? Flush by Carl Hiassen. I was under the impression, the impression given to me from the book jacket, that this was a comedy. I had hoped for a sort of Christopher Moore kind of romp, but it wasn't. About a 1/3 of the way into it I was disappointed to find it wasn't a comedy but an action/mystery and was on the very tame side of the road, which when I complained of this my daughter pointed out that Hiassen was a juvenile fiction writer, I hadn't know this. I was already invested in the who/what/when and where so I continued reading and once I had adjusted my expectations it was actually a pretty good story.

What am I reading now? Well I've been reading Clive Barker's Books of Blood volumes one to three but I believe I'm done with it. I read all the first volume and about half the second one and while some of them are good macabre stories there all a little much on the blood and guts side of horror for my taste. I'm not a fan of horror movies but being the month for Halloween I thought I'd read some scary stories, which I do occasionally like. While I liked some of these and couldn't stop reading others, it was kind of like driving past and accident and feeling bad for staring but not being able to help it. I began to feel a little uncomfortable with the stories, a little unclean, if you will. So I've decided to give up on the Books of Blood.

What am I reading next? Neil Gaimans Anansi Boys. It was the only other Gaiman book the library had other than American Gods which I just read a few weeks back, so I thought I'd give it a spin (spin, you know, like a spiders web?).

man there's a lot of red trucks in the world

The other day waiting in an exam room for a doctor to come in I'm holding the one year old up to look out the tiny little exam room windows. Trying to occupy and entertain him while the doctor apparently travels from some other time zone to get to us and I start pointing out the color and types of vehicles traversing the street in front of us. "Look Sam there's a black car and there's a red truck, and there's a blue mini-van, and there's a red truck, and there's a white Cleveland County van, and there's a red truck, and there's a blue car, etc..." So then on the way home we start counting red trucks (not blue cars like in that song where the kid says he's going to meet God. And then he calls God a she which I'm sure some people believe but I think most that say it are just trying to rebel against the status quot. I think if we believe in God and believe that God is all that and a bag of chips then we have to agree that God is not a sexually reproductive entity and would therefore not actually be male or female. Which is something the Judeo/Christian God has over the old Greek/Roman Gods, I mean you never knew when one of them my fly down and rape you. Of course the J/C God might allow your whole family to be killed off, rob you of all your possessions and cover you with boils just to prove how faithful you are but he's never raped anyone. Hmmm, I guess believers can't be choosers.) So, back on point. We counted, okay I counted Rainey turned it into a punch bug game and wore my arm out, about 30 red trucks between the doctors office to Wal-Mart and then to home. So like I said, there are a lot of red trucks in town. I'm still trying to get Rainey to stop punching me every time we see a red truck. And a beetle, and a convertible, and a p.t. cruiser, and a Jeep and God help if it's a red, beetle convertible.

top 3

You know how sometimes you just start thinking about random things. You do that don't you? It's not just me? Right? So tonight I was listening to an old tape copy of Randy Travis' Storm's of Life, which I think it's neat to note was Rainey's back before we got together, after 22 years of togetherness there's not much left that once belonged to only one of us. So anyway, I got to thinking that while there are a couple not so great songs on the tape for the most part this was a great country album. I don't know if it was Randy's first but it was definitely his break out album. It's got Digging Up Bones, On the Other Hand, 1982, Reasons I Cheat and of course Storms of Life, all of which are great songs. So this put me to thinking of my favorite albums, not counting greatest hits and so here is the culmination of my pick of the 3 greatest country albums (please note I reserve the right to change my mind in the future).

Top 3 county albums- Willie Nelson's On the Road Again, Randy Travis' The Storms of Life and George Strait's Pure Country soundtrack.

There's a lot of artists that I have a number of their cd's- Tim Mcgraw, Kenny Chesney, Garth Brooks, Brad Paisley, Blake Shelton, Gary Allan, Dierks Bentley, Billy Currington but I couldn't think of one particular cd I could just think of songs. One glaring omission here is of course Cash's Folsom Prison Blues but as much as I love that album there are a lot of not so great songs on there and number of great songs is what I used as my criteria in this case.

Biggest Loser

Okay so I know I carry it fairly well and don't look all that big, but I am (according to a number of sources) grossly obese, was once even referred to by a medical facilitator as morbidly obese. I've battled weight since high school, or more to the point I've occasionally battled weight and occasionally rolled over and played dead, which may keep you from getting mauled by a bear but does nothing to keep you from looking quite ursine. Twice in my adult life I've gotten down to what doctors would consider a healthy weight. During basic training I lost down to actually 10 pounds below my goal weight and looked somewhat sickly (as my wife and mother put it), but it wasn't long till I left the safe eating habits of basic that I started packing the weight back on. The second time was about 7 to 9 years ago (I can't remember exactly) following the Atkins diet and I did really good for awhile but when I got the weight off I got careless and thought I could eat whatever and it wasn't long before, you guessed it, the weight was back. I joke about going on the biggest loser but the 55 pounds I needed to loose was no where near the 100's of pounds the average biggest loser contestant needs to shed and besides I don't know how these people go off and leave their jobs & their families for weeks. I couldn't do it. Well, I could leave my job for weeks if it weren't for the financial ruin it would cause, but not my wife and babies (I say babies but my oldest will in all probability be getting his driving permit this week). I've tried other diet and exercise plans to little or no success so I've decided to go back to what I know works- I'm going back to basic training. Just kidding. I'm way to old for that. I'm going back on Atkins, actually I've already started, two weeks in and I've lost 10 pounds. What I've figured out about myself is that I've got a terrible sugar addiction and I'm using Atkins to try and break it. I'm going to try and follow the progression outlined by the diet- you start by severely limiting carb intake (getting the majority of these carbs in the form of salad vegetables) and then you slowly build back up eating good healthy fruits and vegetables. I believe I can loose the weight again, what scares me is going back to my old, Coke-a-cola and chocolate pie behavior once I get there. It's hard to get rid of sugar from you diet it's in so many things we eat, but I'm trying.
'Hello my names Chad and I'm a sugar-aholic, it's been two weeks since I've knowingly eaten sugar.'

Best song ev-er. (Well one of them any way.)

So this morning I'm washing up breakfast dishes and staring out the window into my back yard and I think I need some John Denver. Now it's not often that a thought like that crosses your mind and even less often when you have the means to satisfy that desire. So I pop in the greatest hits cd and listen to some classics like Country Roads and Annie's Song and even demonstrated to the one year old how to dance a jig to Thank God I'm a Country Boy but then I called the children to silence and told them to listen to one of the greatest songs ever recorded- Sunshine on My Shoulders. This song evokes emotion in me and I believe that's a hallmark of greatest in any art. I imagine John sitting somewhere far away from the sun as he pens this wistful, melancholy ode to sunshine and the way it 'almost all the time gets me high'.