As our time in Florida neared an end I became increasingly depressed and distraught.  I had been paying attention to the forecast in Michigan and it appeared I would be heading back to January like weather even though it was April.  While the high 60’s and low 70’s that I was experiencing in the Florida panhandle weren’t as warm as I would have liked, it was a thousand times better than snow, wind, and temperatures in the 20’s. The Friday night/ Saturday morning we were suppose to depart for Michigan I woke up at around 3am and couldn’t get back to sleep so we decided to wake up the kids and shove off even though no one was all that excited about returning to the frosty north.  We managed to get on the road at 4:15am.  This likely saved us about two hours of sitting in gridlock and we were able to make it home by 10pm.   Fairly efficient traveling in light of the fact that we had a five and seven year old on board, but in hind sight they were the least of our problems.  Unlimited movies and video games?  Had they not fallen asleep about an hour before we made it home they probably would have been fine continuing to drive around and watch movies or play video games.  (Aiden actually conquered a video game on the way home)

Much to my disappointment the fifteen day forecast that I had been keeping an eye on in Florida was fairly accurate and since our return from the sunshine state there has been very little of that.  The kids actually did not leave the house from Friday night until Monday morning this past weekend (other than an ill fated trip to the public library which I will get into later) a fact that exacerbated my intolerance for their behavior as they got ready for Colt Care on Monday morning (their school decided to call a snow day on Sunday at noon because they could).  Things had gotten so bad on Saturday that I was actually playing scrabble against Shirley and her sister out of a pure lack of better options.  My state of depression had become interminable, and dominating scrabble was just the thing I needed to brighten my mood.  There are two things that when coupled together were likely to be catastrophic for those involved in the scrabble contest, snow and me losing.  I had an inkling it was going to snow, but I had no idea Shirley’s sister would have every triple word score opened up for her thanks to Shirley, and would have such scrabble luck to be able to create three new words utilizing only three letters while scoring 30 points.  Why would I give a shit about scrabble?  Why would I give a shit about anything?  Because I am a competitive asshole that’s why.  I have been genetically predisposed to wanting to win every competition I engage in, and I behave poorly when I don’t prevail. (This makes beating me a particularly satisfying event for my opponents)  When I got down by an insurmountable margin I began to question every play by Shirley’s sister and snapped when she said a move I made was illegal. Ultimately I was trounced by over 100 points and also lost to Shirley.  They decided to play again, I envisioned myself flipping over the scrabble board mid game when Shirley’s sister played all of her letters including, X,Z,Q, and J on a triple word score to set the all time single hand scrabble score record,  and decided in the interest of domestic harmony to go make the kids lunch instead.  (it was also date night later on and I wasn’t going to jeopardize business time, it was the only remaining think that could possibly get me out of my funk).

After preparing lunch for my kids and Shirley’s niece I decided I needed to get out of the house or this was likely to happen:

I made my way to MVP to get a work out in and took my sweet time getting back home.  Upon my return Shirley and the kids were on their way out to go to the library (that’s how bad it has gotten, they willingly went to the library). When they returned Shirley had a clarinet and Aiden had a guitar, I figured the library was stepping up its game to attract more than just pedophiles and people who were too cheap to spring for internet to their branches.  Turns out the library was closed due to the weather so Shirley did the logical thing, instead of going to Barnes and Noble she went to Meyer Music and rented a couple of instruments.  If being relegated to the inside of your home isn’t torture enough, throwing in a Clarinet for Shirley, an instrument she hasn’t played since high school, and a guitar for Aiden led me to contemplate going into my garage turning on my car and letting the sweet odorless gas take me to a place void of bad weather and a compulsive spouse.  Shirley started playing, immediately saying that the clarinet playing was giving her a sore mouth, I wasn’t too worried, date night would have to go extraordinarily well for that to matter.  While Shirley blew on the Clarinet Aiden randomly plucked the guitar strings and pounded on the front of the guitar as if it were a set of bongos.  After three minutes he lost interest and the kids ended up watching a Scooby Doo DVD Shirley had purchased for them.  I’m quite certain neither instrument will receive any attention moving forward, and adding insult to injury they won’t be returned on time resulting in even more of a monetary outlay.  Now I realize that the rental of a clarinet and guitar seems somewhat random, but Shirley has been watching Mozart in the Jungle which I think is on Netflix and is about the New York music scene, so why not revisit your musical roots?  Especially considering she was first chair in middle school (out of 3 people).

Shirley isn’t the only one who has been turned on to this streaming thing, Sunday night I actually went up to bed at about 6:30 while Shirley and the kids watched a movie.  I fell asleep and woke up at about 8 knowing that it would be a while before I could fall back asleep.  I decided to search the best shows on Netflix and decided on Bojack Horesman which is their highest ranked show according to google, never mind that it’s a cartoon, it’s got Will Arnett as the voice of Bojack and sounded delightful.  The only problem is that when I jumped on my Netflix ap it was set to the kids profile and Shirley had put some type of child safety parameters on what could be streamed.  Damn you Shirley!  I was getting frustrated, but not frustrated enough to ask for Shirley’s assistance or to throw my phone against the wall.  I noticed that you could set up an additional profile, could that solve the problem?  Seemed to simple to actually work but it actually did.  Being the creative person that I am I titled the new profile Me (the other profile is titled Kids).  Yahtzee!  All the adult content anyone could want was at my fingertips.  It should be troubling to me, because if I can figure out how to usurp the parental controls on Netflix, then my kids most certainly can as well.  Fortunately, they are not at an age where they are dying for adult content, they are perfectly happy with the Netflix show Boss Baby (their current favorite) but I am sure there will come a day in the next couple of years where they want to see boobies and then it will be all over, the need to see naked women will consume their every thought and every action, rendering them incapable of being productive members of society.  I don’t want to know what my adolescence would have been like had the internet been around and had I had access to the countless streaming services that exist today, I’d say there’s a pretty good chance I would have never left my room.

Why am I not upset or troubled by what lies ahead for my kids? first of all I was exposed to good ole fashion porno as a kid, Penthouse to be exact, Penthouse from the early 80’s when the motto was the thicker the better.  The images I saw were quite harrowing and changed my perspective, but I turned out just fine.  Secondly, my kids are already technologically more savvy than I am, so other than not allowing them access to technology, which would probably require some type of sacrifice on my part if we were to eliminate all technology that could lead our kids astray, they are going to get their eyes on some inappropriate material.  (possibly the sole advantage to having only girls is that this is not a problem, very few girls want to see naked men, and if they do seek it out they typically don’t ever want to see naked dude porno again).   Had I held on to those Penthouse magazines I probably could have frightened them away from digging too deep into porn on the internet, claiming that if they made a wrong turn on the internet there was gigantic bush lurking around every corner.  So, what is the answer to have at least a some control over what your kids see on the internet?    There isn’t one, you just have to hope that your kids don’t stumble on the real nasty stuff, which I hope by the time my kids reach that age can only be accessed monetarily with a credit or debit card, which in theory should handcuff them from accessing the truly nasty sights.  I’m too much of a realist to think I can short circuit my kids attempts to see raunchy shit on the internet, it’s going to happen, but my hope, and this may be a bit naive, is that they know where to draw the line, or at least are smart enough to not do anything illegal, I don’t think that is asking or expecting too much.  (You show me yours and I’ll show you mine could have gotten me in a lot of trouble back in the day if it could have been done as easily as just a text message with a photo attached).

The question that I have often asked myself is are we better off as technology continues to evolve and make our life seemingly better?  I’m quite certain any road trip I ever went on as a child that was more than 45 minutes was complete hell for me and my parents. But now kids can watch movies and play video games non stop.  Is that a good thing? Part of me says no because my kids don’t have to endure the same shitty car rides I had to as a kid, but on the flip side I don’t have to endure the same shitty car rides as a parent that my parents did either.  Similarly, my kids should have to find porn the hard way, haphazardly stumbling upon tangible pictures of naked women in magazines.  Is the internet and streaming a good thing, of course it is?  No more trips to blockbuster only to find that every copy of  the one movie you wanted to watch was all gone, settling for some other movie you only had a half hearted interest in and ultimately never watched, returning it days late and having to pay a late fee.  However, there for every advancement we make there always seems to be a price.  Oh well, I need to get back to BoJack Horseman, I’m already on season 1 episode 6.

 

Been a rough week.  Last Sunday I thought I was going to be the last person in West Michigan to get that nasty flu bug that was going around all winter, still something I could brag about right?  I was so awesome that it didn’t break down my immune system until flu season was technically over.  Unfortunately it was worse, much worse.  My lower leg hurt but I hadn’t engaged in any type of activity that would result in a lower leg injury.  Something told me the pain in my leg, low grade fever, and fatigue were intertwined but there was a chance they were completely unrelated.  I decided to continue to try and plod on, hoping it would just go away.  Monday morning I felt a bit better, but by that afternoon I started feeling like ass again and realized this felt exactly like an incident I had about eight years ago where I almost lost my right foot to an infection.  A trip to the ER didn’t confirm or deny my suspicions, the ER doc was going to send me away empty handed.  However, I insisted that he give me antibiotics because I knew I had an infection due to the fact that this was playing out just like my previous infection, other than the fact that I ignored that one, kept playing basketball on an infected foot, attended a golf weekend in Saugatuck where the vast quantities of alcohol I consumed didn’t counter the infection but likely exacerbated.  Fortunately, when I woke up that Saturday morning at 6am and couldn’t put any weight on my right foot I realized it was time to stop being a hero and get some much needed medical attention.  I had to drive from Saugatuck to GR on one foot, that’s how badly my right foot had deteriorated.  When I finally arrived to the ER they put me in the front of the line and whisked me into emergency surgery.  I could have easily woke up with out an appendage, but the surgeon did a great job of cleaning it out and saved my foot.

This time I wasn’t about to go through that experience.  I started taking antibiotics on Monday afternoon and slept from Monday at 6 until Tuesday morning at 8am.  I sweat out a minimum of a dozen gallons of fluid Sunday and Monday night but by Tuesday I was feeling a bit better.  Wednesday rolled around and my mobility changed from that of a 95year old to a 75 year old so I figured I should play lunch basketball at MVP.  I’m glad I did, well sort of, I played amazingly well for a 75 year old.  However, the basketball may have compromised my immune system somewhat.  That night when I got home with the kids after a trip to Tanger Outlet for new water shoes (another blog topic for the future) Cara asked how my leg was, I said fine, unfortunately it wasn’t the infection was spreading and my leg was as hot as New Kids on the Block were in the 90’s.   Fortunately my mother in law was there picking up the dog and she stayed with the kids.  Shirley dropped me off at the ER and parked and I limped into the ER, holy shit, it looked like the scene from Walking Dead the one where the zombies try to eat you, everyone in there looked like they had been a zombie for at least a couple weeks and there was one guy moaning in pain in the waiting room.  I wanted to go over and tell the guy to quit being such a pussy, but didn’t want to lose my place in line.  I was actually behind a guy who was on crutches trying to push a women who looked like the crypt keeper in her wheelchair.  Needless to say, my glass half full approach to life was taking a serious hit, I don’t even think Mr. Rogers could find a silver lining to this evening.  Eventually I was wheeled to a private room and as I made my way through a number of hallways it was remarkable how each hallway was lined with people on medical beds who looked just about as bad as the guy who was screaming like a giant pussy in the waiting room.  I thought to myself “this would be a great place to find cast members for the Walking Dead, they wouldn’t even need makeup, and probably already have a hankering for human flesh so their acting will be spot on.”  Ultimately, I was admitted and given two IV’s of antibiotics which really did the trick.  What I didn’t see coming is that I would be released at 10:45 am the next day, it was like God wanted me to play basketball at lunch, which I did.  My partner called me when I was in the parking lot of Kuyper college and we were talking and I asked if I could call him back.  He asked me “Hey you’re not playing basketball are you?  Wait you wouldn’t play basketball would you?”  I may have responded with a “why would I do that?”  However, if I said no and you read this Mark, sorry.

Once again, an amazing performance by someone who was eligible to retire from the work force a decade ago.  I chose not to shower at Kuyper because I am pretty sure that’s where I picked up this flesh eating bacterial infection.  I was able to accomplish a few things at the office and then hit a quick spray tan before I went home.  I go completely naked and I will say this, I am a confident guy, but a spray tanned penis doubles my amount of self confidence.  When I got home I saw my father in law coming the opposite way out of our house.  Damn it!  I was hoping for some business time, Shirley had told me he was picking up the kids, I thought that meant and bringing them to his house but he was merely dropping them at our house.  When I got through the door I could instantly tell my kids were already amped up for the Florida trip that we were hoping to depart on at 3am Friday morning, likely an unreasonable goal, but Loyola made it to the final four so the Jansmas could conceivably get out the door by 3am.

My kids doubled down on annoying, it was my over confidence with a spray tan times ten.  What was perplexing was the fact that I would be spending the majority of the next ten days with them on a trip. People are full of shit if they actually pretend like they enjoy family “vacations” just as much as real vacations.  Oh yeah, why would I want to be able to drink as much as I want whenever I want, lay by the pool, read book(s), drink while I do that if I feel up  to it, have extravagant dinners and a LOT of sex?  The alternative sounds way better, yelling at my kids, yelling at my wife because the kids are driving both of us crazy and we take it out on whomever happens to be around, and then catering an entire vacation to someone else’s needs (my kids)  fucked up right?  One of my buddies is married and he and his wife made the conscious decision not to have kids, I use to think he was crazy, now I know who is crazy, everyone who actually tries to have kids.  I can see accidentally having a kid because you are horny and in the spur of the moment didn’t take the necessary precautions to avoid such a catastrophic mistake, but to actually plan it out, that’s just idiocy.

While I am not sure if I responded to my partner “why would I do that?”  There is one person who I did:

“I tried calling you this morning when you said you were being released”

“You did?”

“and you didn’t answer” (I saw her missed calls when I left basketball but didn’t think much of it, in hindsight I’m glad I didn’t call her back)

“I was kind of busy”

“Did you play basketball today?”

“Why would I do that?”

“When you didn’t answer I tracked you since we are on the same plan and you were at Kuyper college.”

(OH SHIT!)

The good news is, and this isn’t because I am an attorney by trade, its innate, when faced with answering a question that answering truthfully is against my self interest, instead of lying, I follow it up with another question and see where it goes.  That way,  if it appears that the lie would have been detected, I am not compounding the problem.  Obviously, this conversation didn’t go the proper direction.  Shirley took it better than I thought and I actually managed to get some business time under my belt prior to our long road trip.  It went better for me than her because:

1. My leg infection creeped her out.  (not sure why it’s not contagious)
2. I smelled like spray tan, a smell that should make everyone Randy.
3. I also smelled like a black bean burger.

apparently I was the trifecta of unsexy even more than normal

 

Guess what?  The apocalypse is near, how do I know that? The zombies at the ER?  No, the Jansma’s were on the road at 3:15 am making their way to the sunshine state.  The ironic thing is it had nothing to do with their parents and can be attributed to my eldest and his annoying habit that has replaced him sleeping on the floor next to Shirley’s bed.  He now wakes up in the middle of the night and pushes our door open, the light is on in the hallway and I am a light sleeper so this wakes me up.  I need pitch black typically but at that time in the morning I have no desire to get up out of bed and traverse the three feet needed to close the door, and typically when I do this Aiden gets up again and opens it.    Friday morning Aiden did it again and both kids were there and wide awake, this woke me up and the ensuing arguing resulted in me deciding to just get out of bed so we could actually shove off on time.

Friday’s travels were fairly uneventful.  I laid the groundwork for zero tolerance early with Shirley.  She immediately started critiquing my driving, ordering me to slow down.  She is so fanatical about it you would think that me being pulled over for speeding would result in the officer pulling me out of the car and shooting me execution style in front of my family instead of the small fine and points to my driver’s license.  I fought back and told her it was 3am we would be fine.  The reality is, there is a shift change with law enforcement, not sure when it is, but you have a window when you can speed your ass off without the fear of being caught.  Ultimately we made it to our hotel in Montgomery in about 16 hours, my sweatpants were 90% saturated with farts and sweat, but we made it.  The next day we were back on the road around 8 am EST and the only thing initially that went wrong is that a Starbucks, which was actually on our route, was completely ignored by the people we were following.  I just figured that he knew of one up ahead that was on our side of the street instead of having to make a left hand turn into the Starbucks.  What are the odds of there being another Starbucks somewhere in the next 90 miles?  100% unless you are traveling in Alabama then it is more like 0%.

Fortunately the Starbucks void in Alabama is filled by Chick-Fil-A and they serve an amazing breakfast as well as cold brew.  Going there for breakfast rectified the situation to a degree.  Even though I was satisfied with the Chick-Fil-A Starbucks trade off I was still on edge due to the fact that I had just spent more consecutive hours with my family than I had ever before.  As I was traveling I was stuck behind a Prevost and blinkered to get over to the left where there was plenty of room, this old bag in a PT cruiser sped up and started going nuts on me.  I yelled “Let me in you BITCH!”   Obviously, this didn’t sit well with Shirley even though the kids had headphones on and were watching the first Jumanji and I could have thrown Shirley out of the car without them noticing.  “The kids shouldn’t be hearing that.”  Boy was she right.

The kids are a bit too young to understand how the rules of the road work when using the word Bitch.  I was referring to this women as a bitch, and well within my right to do so, but bitch is a versatile word.  Furthermore, had it been a male driver I would have had to use the word asshole instead of bitch.  Exposing my kids to bitch this early would likely result in a complete mis understanding and mis use of the word by them.  What if they heard a guy referring to another guy as a bitch?  “You’re my bitch!”   That could be quite confusing.  Or, on the off chance that I referred to Shirley, my wife as a bitch when we were arguing and they just happen to be in ear shot?  Maybe once a year I get to pull out the bitch card, I don’t get to directly refer to her as a bitch, I tone it down.  “Why are you being such a bitch?”  It doesn’t result in divorce, because when she gets to this level  and looks at thinks retrospectively, she realizes she was being a bitch.

I guess I will have to find a movie for the ride home for the kids that uses the word bitch in its many different contexts and then have a sit down with Aiden and Parker to discuss how the word bitch actually works.  Knowledge is power.