As a criminal defense attorney I receive quite a few alerts via standard mail and email as to various “awards” I have won.  100% of the time there is a fee associated with claiming the award and most attorneys immediately discard the award notice in to the trash or delete it from their inbox.   However, there are a small segment of attorneys who pay for these awards and tout them on their website.  The crazy thing is I have three partners and all four of us received notification via mail that we were determined to be top ten criminal defense attorneys in the entire US.   I felt sorry for the rest of the country having only six available spots for thousands of eligible and likely well deserving attorneys.  While awards and accolades can be earned and bought in most professions, (I just now answered my phone even though I knew it was a solicitor, turns out it was Jeanie from Top Attorneys in North America) you only have to have your kids buy you a T-shirt or Coffee Mug to be labeled the World’s Greatest Dad.  However, if you want to be in the running for Dad of the Year it isn’t that simple.

While being a great dad like I am can be a thankless job, teaching them is even less gratifying.  On top of that, my kid’s respective room parents recently sent out emails about teacher appreciation week, I was shocked to find out they were still doing that.  Granted, having to take on the role of my children’s teacher (at least in theory)  has given me a new appreciation for teachers as a whole, I’m not that appreciative of them right now.   Furthermore, due to the hard  work I have been putting in with the kids I was expecting a dual award this year, not only would I be receiving dad of the year for 2020 but also teacher of the year.  However, my dreams of either came crashing down last week.  Last week was a catch up week, why do they need a catch up week I thought to myself, we have been killing the distance learning thing (other than the two panic attacks I suffered the first week of distance learning).   Well, it turns out Aiden failed to “turn in” a number of his assignments via see saw (an app that allows them to take photos of their work or do the work on the app and send it to their teacher, not to be confused with Schoology which is the online learning platform where all of their lesson plans are placed for them to access and complete).  To avoid having a third panic attack I pretended like I was going to gather his assignments and waited for Shirley to do it, granted it resulted in me having to endure a lot of nagging and pestering, but it was worth every second to not have to try and organize his assignments and try to figure out how to utilize the see saw app.

For those of you who don’t know me, technology is an even fiercer enemy of mine than Governor Whitmer, and watching Shirley navigate see saw as she tried to explain how it works made my head spin and was the rare occasion where I felt as insecure as my teenage self when I sported, acne, braces, and a mullet.  With Shirley haven finally shipped off Aiden’s assignments to his teacher I was quite confident that last four weeks of distance learning were going to be a breeze, boy was I living in my own Private Idaho.  Turns out Parker had failed to complete 14 of his assignments and it wasn’t until Friday of catch up week that we (Shirley) discovered this.  On top of the incomplete assignments, his work product was questionable at best on the things he actually had the where with all to somewhat complete.  Apparently first grade is where you learn how to tell time and one of Parker’s workbooks had clocks and he was suppose to write down what time each clock displayed.  To say he doesn’t know the difference between night and day doesn’t begin to explain how woeful he is at telling time.

Shirley asked me what I had been doing the entire time I was suppose to be helping the kids with their distance learning, and to be honest I had no idea, my mind was blank, as in I couldn’t point to a specific thing that distracted me from properly checking their work, organizing it, and passing the completed assignments to their teachers.  She asked what I was doing last Tuesday, she may as well have asked me what I did on March 12, 2010.  I have officially become Phil Connors and Gretchen Whitmer is my Punxsutawney Phil, every time my alarm clock goes off (figuratively, since I haven’t needed an alarm clock in six weeks) I feel like I am about to relive the exact same day and the only thing that is going to be different from the prior day is my level of ambivalence.  Should we even tell people to have a good weekend since every day feels exactly the same and there is little difference between a Tuesday and a Saturday?

While it is quite obvious I am failing at distance learning, I still can win DOY, even Gretchen and the Rona can’t take that away from me.   My mom had been pestering me to go out to Green Lake and mow the lawn (son of the year is also in sight).  There use to be a community mower but it took a dump so I had to trailer my rider out there.  I threw the kids bikes on the trailer but didn’t have room for mine.  No problem, I will just run while the kids ride their bikes, I should have no problem keeping up with them, right?  Wrong!  As much as they suck at climbing hills, going down hills is such an advantage that I was struggling to stay with them for most of the ride around Green Lake.  When we made our way to the first intersection Aiden was somehow well behind Parker and I even though he had the advantage of going down a number of hills.  Parker and I had made a left at the stop sign and I was instructing Aiden when to make his turn as Parker kept going and I tried to keep running, but backwards so I could watch Aiden.  However, a car decided to stop so that Aiden could catch up, Aiden can only deal with pressure in virtual situations such as video games and froze up, I yelled “Come on Aiden!” and then saw a car try to pass the car that was yielding to Aiden.  Fortunately, the idiot driving the Prius heard everyone yell and slammed on its brakes as Aiden crept out past the stopped car.  Not sure who wins the battle of the Prius v the kids bike, but I am glad I didn’t find out.

We ended up at my sister’s house and chatted with her for a bit.  I had a 1:48 tee time and needed to get moving to avoid having to run up to the tee box and hit (that never goes well).  Parker and I took off figuring Aiden would eventually catch up, he didn’t, I had run roughly 3 to four hundred yards when I realized something must be wrong with Aiden and circled back to find him sitting with his bike complaining that the chain had fallen off.  I immediately started yelling at him and took one of the gatorade bottles (I had one in each hand for the kids) and hurled it as hard as I could at the ground.  “Sorry dad” Aiden meekly said in response to my much needed outburst.  In hindsight I partially blame myself for thinking Aiden would catch up, (even though I blamed him entirely at the time) the kid takes 20 minutes to drop a deuce, he wouldn’t have been able to catch up to Parker and I if we were walking on our hands back to our cottage.  Even though it wasn’t surprising that Aiden ended up stalled at my sisters, it didn’t stop me from questioning/yelling “WHY DID YOUR CHAIN FALL OFF!”

I was in a mild state of panic because Parker was riding by himself and didn’t hear me tell him I was going back to get Aiden.  In my distressed state there was no way I would be able to get Aiden’s chain back on without breaking the bike out of anger so I had my sister throw it in her car (along with her 12 kids) and give Aiden a ride so that I could sprint after Parker.  It took me about a mile to catch up with him and he asked me where I had been, common sense  would tell someone to turn around at some point, but I was dealing with a kid who couldn’t even tell time in Spanish or English, so I wasn’t that surprised that he kept on trucking along.  As I ran to try and catch up to him (I really wish I hand’t forgotten my Apple Watch so I could have figured out my pace, it had to be the fastest I have ran in years) I kept worrying that he would take a wrong turn somewhere and either end up in Wayland or Middleville.  While we had just taken the exact same route on Tuesday he still had no idea where he was going even though all he had to do was follow the lake, can’t believe I trusted him to get all of his assignments completed and completed well with minimal supervision (I thought he was the responsible one).

Upon returning home with the kids Shirley came down from her office and asked/ordered me to unload and reload the dishwasher before I left for golf.  I could have ignored it but it would have been placed in the ledger had I not completed the task.  When I was just about done Aiden asked me to make him lunch, well I have to do that, can’t have the kids disturbing Shirley while she’s working so that I can get to the golf course on time.  Two Quesidillas later I was on my way and only ended up three minutes late for my tee time.  Now I just need to figure out if I want a 2020  DOY T-Shirt, coffee mug, or both.

When I was growing up a bicycle was a necessary part of a kid’s everyday life, I remember my first bike and taking it for my an intial voyage down Edna avenue in Alger Heights.  I banged my balls on the bar beneath the seat because the bike was a bit too big for me, a quick lesson that I needed to keep my head on a swivel when riding my bike to avoid any impromptu dismounts that would jeopardize my nuts.  It had a banana seat and my bike was a one speed and there was no way my parents paid over $10 for it (roughly $6,000 in today’s currency after the  inevitable inflation from this corona virus takes full hold of our monetary system).  Did I ever have anything really nice as a kid, not really, my parents married young and there never was a ton of money to go around.  That fact was compounded by them putting me and my three siblings through Christian education.  They acted like we were the ones who requested this, you mean I could have at least a little bit of cool shit if we go to public school?  Sign me up!

So, when it came to bikes it was always a garage sale special or some type of hand me down ten speed.  Not quite on topic here but a really cool story related to bikes, I was riding to Dome World (now Tanger Outlet Mall) with two buddies and one of my buddies bikes brakes locked up causing him to do a somersault over the handle bars but he kept a firm grasp on the handlebars instead of letting go, causing the bike to land on top of him as he hit the street.  In light of my friends incident my hand me down bike didn’t seem that bad.  Regardless, our trip to Dome World was an illustration of why you had to have a bike, no matter how shitty it was, it was your primary mode of transportation and typically I would get on my bike at 8 or 9 on a Saturday morning and my parents wouldn’t see me again until 5 or 6 that day.  Pretty sure it was a case of out of sight out of mind with my parents.

Last spring Shirley and Aiden bought brand new bikes from the Village bike shop along with a brand new bike rack that weighs roughly 7,000 pounds.  However Parker was too small to be able to justify a brand new bike and I refused to get one.  A year later Parker is now tall enough to have his own bike and he and Shirley went and ordered one for him on Saturday.  I left Aiden at home and went to get my father in law’s truck so I could get some yard work done in light of the lessening of restrictions with a pit stop to play one one one against one of my buddies to keep my skills sharp, the six foot social distancing rules make lock down D a bit of a challenge but boy do you get some wide open looks.   When I returned with the truck Shirley was loading up the bikes, no idea how she was able to get the bike rack into her trailer hitch.  Shirley went after me about not having a bike and I told her I would pick up a pair of roller blades so  that I could be super cool while accompanying her and the kids on the family “bike” rides.  While not going to Disney (which seems quite achievable since Disney may never open again) is the ultimate hill I am prepared to die on, getting a bike was right up there.  If I didn’t have a bike it would free up at least 2 hours a year where I could be away from my family.  However, I realized this wasn’t a camper situation, often times with Shirley when she gets an idea in her head I just let her chase her tail until she grows tired of it and typically it never ends up coming to fruition.  I dodged a bullet with the camper when the salesperson threw in undercoating for $200 causing her to nix the deal at the last second.  As the family drove away I logged on to my computer to find bikes on Craig’s list and texted someone who had a vintage ten speed at a reasonable  price.  He had a guy coming to look at the one I was also interested in but if that guy passed on it he was going to shoot me a text.  Ultimately I went to pick up the bike and when I pulled up in front of his house he had a saw horse set up with a sign that read “don’t go past this point”.  So it figured that each of his vehicles had Bernie Sanders bumper sticker that were now covered by Biden stickers.

I venmoed the guy for the bike and drove off happy with my purchase, until Shirley shot it down upon my arrival home.  I texted the guy back and asked if he had any roller blades, hybrid bikes, or mountain bikes I could trade my vintage ten speed for.  I was in luck, he had a Specialized Mountain Bike, this also did not meet Shirley’s high standards but was fine by me, no sense buying a brand new bike for two hours of biking per season.  (Shirley bought a wave runner the day of the morning the idea popped in her head, we didn’t even use a full tank of gas last summer)  On Monday Parker’s bike was ready to go, I was not involved in the bike purchases for Shirley and Aiden so I had no idea what the cost was for their bikes, when I picked up the bike it still needed to be paid for and the cost was more than what my parents had spent on me for every single non essential purchase they ever made on my behalf during my childhood.  While Shirley claimed that it would have made more sense for me to get a brand new bike, based upon the price for a kid’s bike, going the Craig’s List route was the right call, even if the seller was a pony tailed Bernie supporter.

After getting mulch down Tuesday morning and the correlating Covid 19 test to make sure I didn’t get the virus from laying mulch, I loaded up the bikes and the kids and headed out to Green Lake for a bike ride.  On Sunday I had sworn to myself that if I didn’t break fifty on the back nine at thornapple I was done with golf FOREVER.  Shirley was less than excited when I told her I had some terrific news, I was done with golf.  Her frustration lay in the fact that I allegedly do this every year, swear off golf, only to go back to it like a crazy ex girlfriend who is entirely nuts but great at one particular thing.  After a stop at Davenport for a quick tennis match on the way back from Green Lake, I dropped the kids off and made my way to Thornapple Point, I just can’t quit you Golf!  It was the rare day, actually the only day since lock down that Shirley had to go into the office.  So, the kids were on their own, left to their own devices, literally.  On the second hole of the back nine Shirley texted me that the neighbor kids were coming over, OH SHIT!  It was too late to run back to my car and high tail it home, especially since there is an indefinite ban on golf carts.  So, I texted Shirley and told her I wasn’t home and that the neighbor kids should not be allowed at our house.  Immediately, she questioned where I was, this was problematic for two reasons, one I had sworn a life long self imposed ban on golf less than 48 hours ago, two I only had golf clothes so I couldn’t change into something before I got back home to make it look like I was doing something else, even though I have no idea what that would be.  My initial text indicated I was going to my in laws to drop the truck off and retrieve my Jeep.  However, if I did actually play nine (and likely a few extra holes) Shirley would be home and immediately smell a rat when I walked in the house in my well coordinated golf outfit.

Two valuable take away’s from my experience.  The first is that honesty is always the best policy, Shirley wasn’t at all upset with me when I arrived home around 8pm last night, it may have helped that I put in my text that I was mowing her parent’s lawn (genius).  Secondly, quitting is for losers, taking a couple “pro” tips from my buddies I was able to put together my best round of the spring, putting up a 44, and obviously it could have easily been a 41 if I would have caught a few breaks.  I love golf!

 

 

 

Un-knowingly I was placed on the election committee for a friend of mine who is running for Circuit Court Judge.  While she would make a great candidate for judge, she may have her shit together even less than I do.  When it comes to procrastinating, its an art form for me and my friend isn’t too far behind as evidenced by the fact that she only had roughly 900 signatures going into this past weekend….and she needed two thousand by today.  Friday morning a zoom call was scheduled for the committee members to coordinate a plan of attack to attempt to gather more signatures in a weekend than my friend had managed to get in the prior 4 months.  I jumped into the call like a ninja and none of the other participants (all liberal women) knew I had joined.  They were talking about makeup, when they rolled out of bed, and running out of shampoo (It’s been decades since I actually purchased shampoo).  I was hoping for a virtual pillow fight where they stripped down to their undergarments, but before that could happen they discovered I had logged in.  The Zoom experiment has been going on for a while now and I still hate it, when you are a D it’s hard to sit back and listen to other people’s terrible ideas and Zoom doesn’t effectively portray my non verbal cues indicating I think the speaker is an idiot.  On top of that, as opposed to in person meetings, it’s hard to determine comedic timing and if a joke truly succeeds.  A couple weeks ago, when it was my buddy’s 41st birthday (he wasn’t making a big deal about it, but I know my Mother-in-law did when she turned 41) we had a zoom happy hour.  I was throwing out some zingers and keeping everyone laughing.  However, one of the guys on the call referenced a friend who owned a national chain of hearing aid stores and was getting crushed by not being able to remain open. I made a joke about all of his clients being wiped out by the corona and the call disbanded immediately.  I thought I was the reason, but my buddies in a later text exchange said that had little to do with it.  However, what didn’t helped was Shirley overhearing the joke and rebuking me for it while I was still on the call.

While the zoom meeting on Friday went well and ended without any awkward joke on my part, I wasn’t real excited about going out and getting signatures from random strangers.  I am not use to getting rejected, and soliciting strangers for signatures to put someone on a ballot when they know nothing about that potential candidate is fraught with potential rejection.  Although, Shirly does give me the Heisman every once in a while, she is a fairly compliant wife in the department that matters most and I didn’t need this petition drive killing my bedroom mojo.  That being said, and whether I wanted to or not, I was on the committee and needed to get signatures.  Saturday morning I drove to a home and dropped a petition in someone’s mailbox and then went back home to get ready for golf (in hindsight I should have brought petitions with me and sat at the second hole after my round to get signatures).  My plan was to go out to Byron Center after golf and get signatures at the Family Fare and then go to a Hungry Howies that my buddy owned (I was playing phone tag with him about where he would let me go, crazy he didn’t seem to want to respond to my texts or answer my call).  When I returned from golf I still hadn’t heard back from my buddy so I called a local pizza place, I may as well have asked them if I could sell five dollar hot and readies in their parking lot.  Look, I get what’s going on right now and understand why they would be apprehensive, but there aren’t many places where you can find people these days.  So, with that response I figured it best to call Family Fare, fortunately I had an ace in the hole having done the manager of the stores divorce.  Luckily, he was working and I was able to speak with him, while he was nicer about it than the pizza place, the only people they let peddle wares at their stores are the girl scouts and the salvation army.  I say if you are going to exclude some groups, exclude them all, then I wouldn’t be forced to use the fire exit when the girl scouts are trying to sell thin mints at the grocery store.  Do I like thin mints?  of course I do, but there’s at least a 300% mark up on those things.

So, I implemented plan B and accomplished something productive by cleaning out my storage barn and organizing it.  I was hoping no one would ask how many signatures I had totaled during our Zoom call that night, but inevitably someone asked me where I was at.  Fortunately I had gone out to Sparta on Friday and managed to secure 3 signatures so I wasn’t sitting on goose egg.  Ultimately, it was discovered that I only had 4  and I took a considerable amount of ribbing from other committee members, but you know what, screw them, I was the only realist on the committee, there was a better chance of Bernie Sanders becoming president than there was of my friend getting on the ballot.  (every committee needs a realist on it to set off the “everything is rainbows and lollipops people”).  However, I had to put forth somewhat of an effort to make it seem like I tried when all of the signatures were counted and we were only at 1300.  So, a friend of mine who knows my friend running for judge and I went to a Starbucks drive thru, set up a table with signage on it and went to work.  You would have thought we were trying to put a proposal to outlaw caffeinated beverages on the next ballot, no one would even look at us, maybe 1 out of 12 vehicles rolled down their window and engaged us.  After two hours we managed a paltry 15 signatures.

While the number of signatures was disappointing, it was totally worth it to hang out and watch my friend in action.  She is the type of person who will say anything to anyone, I am only that type of person when I am competing against someone, she’s that way all the time.  She also doesn’t give a shit about social distancing which was refreshing to see.  She would get right up by the people’s window and basically lean on their car and chat them up.  One of the signees was hoping the petition was to recall Whitmer, and had that been the case I am confident we would have easily hit the 100 signature mark.  In addition to my friend, there was another women on the committee who was literally a signature garnering rock star.  Her and another attorney who also has an outgoing, I’m not afraid of rejection attitude were the people able to get er done the most effectively.

When I stand back and watch these types of people I am in awe, not my personality, I am outgoing once I know someone and am comfortable with those people in my presence, but I am not going out of my way to chat complete strangers up as if they were my best friend growing up.  In my mind it’s a skill you either have or you don’t, but that could be because I grew up in a Dutch household that frowned upon showing your emotions and engaging people so maybe there is a nature vs. nurture argument here.  One other thing I picked up is how people can be so positive and disregard fact an logic when attempting to achieve a goal.  Again the Dutch upbringing may have a role in this, but I stood back and looked at the numbers and knew there was no way were getting 2,000 signatures.  However, everyone on the committee during every zoom call was like a high school cheer leading squad, exuberant and full of positivity.  I really could have used someone else who had the negative outlook I typically possess to point out we were the Titanic when it comes to getting signatures, that would have allowed me to pile on and cleanse my negativity pallet.  The reality is it has to be great to be positive and misguided all the time, but as I have stated before a tiger can’t change its stripes.

Did I want to point out to the committee that they were akin to the Lion’s cheerleaders and all the hip hip hoorah was a waste of time and energy?  Of course I did, and there would have been no better way to do this than relay my story of what happened to me on Sunday afternoon when I had the brilliant idea of going to the Kent trails trail entrance in Byron Center.  I set up my table at the trail head and the looks I initially received from people would have made one think that I was trying to sell a magical elixir that remedied constipation, diarrhea, ED, and COVID-19.  In the first five minutes on the trail I was able to lure one person over to sign the petition as well as commiserate with me as to how awful our governor is.  I’m with my people this is going to go splendidly!  Unfortunately, I was with my people, and that made it go terribly.  I couldn’t even get people to look at me, I now know how the Direct Tv guy at Costco feels, I managed to get one women who was with her husband to engage with me and as I was “chatting” her up her husband prompted her to disregard me by  saying “Let’s get Moving!”  what a dick.  When the dust had settled I managed 3 signatures and two of them were from people I knew.  While I wanted to be the Grinch of Whoville I withheld my story and merely stated the number of signatures I had gathered.  While the number was under whelming, my positive liberal friends still cheered, treating me like a kid who comes in last in a 40 yard dash by 35 yards.

As of Sunday night we were at roughly 1650 signatures, what was problematic is Monday was likely going to see a reduced amount of traffic out and about as everyone was returning to work at home.  Initially I was planning on going back to Starbucks with my friend, but we both decided that was not the best plan of attack primarily because we didn’t want to go through another morning of humiliation.  Instead I made a list of all the people I know who I could likely get to sign and came up with roughly 35 people. Monday morning I began texting various people and had a number of them lined up to visit with my petition when a tweet came out that the deadline had been extended as well as a reduction in the number of required signatures.  What a relief, I wasn’t going to have to drive to every corner of Kent County to make it look like I tried (even though I had nothing better to do other than teach my kids, and it was kind of refreshing to have a purpose for once)  Unfortunately this was a committee with all attorneys on it and someone texted their concerns about an appeal of the Federal Judge’s ruling that altered things.  Damn attorneys!  Seriously, there was roughly an hour where it felt like I was on the world’s tallest and hilliest roller coaster.  Eventually it was determined that there was little likelihood of appeal but that those of us still tasked with getting signatures should do their best.

Well, I decided to get some signatures and use that as an excuse to catch up with some people who I had not seen in a while, killing two birds with one stone.  I picked up 8 additional signatures while also acquiring some much needed socialization.  One of the interactions I had stands out more than the others.  I finally connected with Wild Pizza Bill (the Hungry Howies guy) and he said he was going to be at his office.  His wife was at their house and I was close by so I asked if he could text her about signing.  Suddenly a text pops up from a foreign number asking if there is a website where she can check my friend out.  Immediately I knew it was my friend’s wife (she drives a Prius and may be more left than Bernie Sanders).  I was able to get her to sign but not without her questioning the fact I wasn’t wearing a face mask, to which my response was basically fuck that, then telling me that I shouldn’t try to organize any outdoor pick up basketball games.  Seriously, why does every liberal think they know what is best for everyone?

I’ll say this, I wasn’t looking forward to doing the signature drive, and every hour of the weekend spent not attempting to fill up petitions with signatures from registered voters in Kent County (which was a lot) was clouded with guilt as I golfed, did chores, or hung out with my family.  However, in hind sight it was a rewarding experience and something to spice up what would have been just another  ho hum weekend in lock down.  One last observation, I encountered one family on my signature drive who have two kids the same age as mine and they are also both boys, when I entered their house it was spotless and there was no sign of clutter.  You guys should be ashamed of yourselves! (for making me feel even worse about what a shit show my house is)

It was bound to happen at some point, and that point was Saturday morning.  I attempted to do something productive with the family and get my family time out of the way so that I could golf by organizing a hike.  Rounding up the troops was like trying to herd cats and Shirley was of little help.  She wondered why I was in such a hurry and asked/stated “You aren’t golfing today are you?”  Hmmm, how should I answer that questions/statement?  The reality was that I had already made arrangements to play at 2:30 and Saturday was the last day for at least a week where the weather was going to cooperate.   “Well, I was planning on playing this afternoon” I responded meekly.  Shirley unloaded on me stating that she doesn’t ever get to do anything and that I am rubbing this golf thing in everyone’s face.  While I had a valid argument against the rubbing golf in everyone’s face since I typically try to sneak out of the house to golf without anyone noticing me, I decided to pull a Ned Beatty from Deliverance and just sit and take it hoping that without any resistance it would be over rather quickly.  Just sit and take it, don’t fight back, while that is normally against my nature, it seemed to be the best way to deal with the unavoidable barrage.

On top of the fact that I am not flaunting golf in anyone’s face (other than my buddies who are on a group text and unable to golf because their respective courses don’t have the balls to stand up to Whitler) it also isn’t my fault that women on whole don’t do much of anything hobby wise.  Seriously, other than having to work at home and not being able to get her haircut, this hasn’t changed Shirly’s life all that dramatically.  Granted, she now has to zoom video conference with her family to see them (probably a win for me due to the fact that I can disengage much easier from those as opposed to when her family gathering is at our house, which is basically 100% of the time).  I even told  her that if she wanted to go golfing I would gladly golf with her knowing there was a 99% chance she would rebuff my offer.  Turns out keeping my mouth shut was the correct play and I was able to shove off with the family towards the Ionia area a little after 10 am.  A couple weeks back, I think, I’m having trouble marking time, I took the kids to Ionia to go to the park we had previously gone sledding at so that we could go for a hike.  Turns out the park was closed due to the Cronona but the sign said they would reopen April 5.  So, I went back to that park hoping it would be open, once again I was turned away due to the Corona but the park is supposedly going to reopen April 15 according to the sign on the closed gate.  This is yet another example of how ridiculous this whole thing has gotten, just open the damn gate and let people use the park.

While the park we tried to go to initially is an Ionia County park, the Ionia State Recreation area is a state park and for whatever reason remains open, or at least it was open a couple weeks ago.  So, we headed over there, I had a bad feeling that it was going to be closed and that I would end up ramming the Chrysler Pacifica into the closed gate out of frustration.  Fortunately for the Pacifica and the gate the park was open.  We managed to persuade the kids into a hike with the promise of Jimmy Johns if they made it all the way back without being dickheads.  While the requirement is a bit subjective, they did fairly well on the hike and we headed to JJ”s after hiking.  What was noteworthy about the hike was that whenever we encountered other people on the trail they would move away from us as if we the evil villains from Hellraiser (a truly terrifying movie from my high school days).  Another complete over reaction from all the hysteria, pretty sure when they do figure all of this out they will let us know that the chances of getting the Corona outdoors is even less likely than the Lions ever winning the super bowl.

My kids loving JJ”s and being able to curb their behavior with the promise of it it is something I have yet to figure out.  Hey, I like JJ”s just as much as anyone, but its just a sandwich.  Regardless, JJ”s was not in the cards for us due to the fact that the location closest to our house was closed until further notice based upon Whitler’s latest executive order.  Fortunately, Culver’s was near by so Butter Burgers were going to have to do.  I managed to make it to the course in time and get my 18 holes in, when I returned home I discovered that Shirley had invited our neighbors over for a campfire in direct violation of the Executive Order in play, it was too bad I couldn’t find a place to sell me paint and landscaping materials so we could triple down on the violation.  Some of this stuff made sense at one point, but now it just seems like she is being a bitch to be a bitch, which rarely works out for anyone.  There’s something you need to know about my neighbor, his name is Joe and he is a man’s man. He is about 6’3 and has a brush cut, he has an awesome 4 wheeler, a lot of guns that he kills a ton of shit with, and he seems like the type of guy who can fix pretty much anything.  I  on the other hand am not a man’s man.   When I get out my chainsaw and cut shit up I typically am amazed that I haven’t accidentally chopped off an appendage. I also don’t cut anything up that is still standing because that would probably go terribly wrong.  My grandfather was a carpenter which makes me think I was adopted, because I have no DIY skills what so ever.  Unfortunately, God played a cruel joke on me and gave me an excessive amount of back and chest hair to make up for my over all lack of  manliness in every other area.

So, the pressure was on, I had to make a kick ass camp fire to impress Joe, which wasn’t a given.  I have had multiple miss haps with gasoline when trying to start a campfire due to my lack of confidence that the fire will continue to burn (me dumping way too much gas on an already lit fire).   My latest trick has been to take a beer can and cut it in half and put gas in the bottom half and light it on fire and put it in my firepit under all the kindling and logs.  Typically this works well but wouldn’t you know it just as they arrived it looked like my fire was going to crap out.  So, I grabbed a bunch of dead ornamental grass to throw on the fire and put an additional beer can of gas on the fire.  I realized that it exposed me as someone who would never make it on one of those survivor shows (pretty sure they don’t give you five gallons of gas and an aim and flame for fire starting purposes) to my neighbor, but having the fire go completely out would have been much worse and likely resulted in an additional therapy session.

With the fire going full force after the additional gas and grass, we began to converse about various things.  Wouldn’t you know it, they were starting to question the stay at home order and struggling with their two boys as well.  It was refreshing to spend some time with another couple in person and just talk about things other than Corona.  To be honest, there are very few people I have spoken with who don’t think this whole thing has gotten out of hand.  I even had a buddy who was full on board with everything that was implemented by the authorities, only to admit that I was right all along and that there was no need to take the extreme measures that were implemented.

Being right is great, I am right most of the time just ask me.  However, what does another couple week of having my liberties taken away really matter?  There is no need to extend this to April 30 but having gone this far we may as well keep it going now.  That’s not to say I am mentally capable of coming out of this with all my faculties fully in tact.  I’ll be honest, I can’t even remember what normal life was like, what was it like for Shirley to get a haircut and for me to either love it or hope her hair would grow extra fast before the next one?  What was it like to go into my garage and not see a constant reminder of how excessive my drinking has become (I may need to move my empties to the third stall so I don’t see them on my way to the fridge in the garage to get another beer)?

This morning was a painful reminder of how on edge things have gotten for me after what seems like months of quarantine.  What exacerbates things is that 2020 already feels like it should be over.  January seemed to drag on, February went fast but only because I was in Costa Rica for 10 days, March felt like 3 months by itself, and April is going slower than the automatic check out line filled with senior citizens.  My brother and his wife finally had their baby and there was a text string with the Jansmas sending well wishes.  They didn’t have a name yet so I suggested Corona May Jansma.  Eventually after a number of texts the name Destiny popped into my head and I thought I would send a list of stripper names for them to work off from.  Shirley immediately came down stairs and chastised me for being so snarky (she knew what she was getting into).  Well, if there’s one thing I don’t like being curtailed it’s my ability to be snarky.  I snapped and for the first time in recent memory told her to F off.  Not good, even in light of how awful Gretchen has been.

Fortunately, I actually had court this morning and I was able to clear my head on my way over to court.  On my way back I realized that I was mostly in the wrong, even though the stripper name list was gold, even if my mom was on the text.  So, I apologized to Shirly for losing my temper and responding to her instruction inappropriately.  Maybe there are some positives from this whole ordeal.

Spring break week normally involves warm weather vacations for most people, to be honest I can’t  tell you what we did last year, but I know we didn’t go on a trip.  My guess is the weather here was also brutal and what makes that suck is 90% of the people you know are gone to warm weather destinations and either texting you photos or posting on social media, a painful reminder of how awful Michigan can be in early spring.  This year pretty much everyone is in the same boat, we are stuck in Michigan on spring break.  However, the weather has been exceptional so far.  This has made life with Aiden and Parker much more manageable.  While I did go into the office on Monday, which I can barley remember and it was only 3 days ago, I ended up spending some time with the kids when I got home before I headed out to golf.   We found some old water balloons that were left over from last year and had a water ballon fight.  We went through the water balloons quicker than a hospital goes through protective gear so I ordered some more on Amazon thinking with Shirley’s Prime account they would arrive in 15 to 30 minutes.  However, after I finalized and paid for the order the shipment date of April 11 was provided.

I loaded up the kids and headed to Wal Marts (I know I hate Wal Marts but I had already ventured to Meijer that day and I am trying to spread things out as a way to avoid being detected for violating the executive order).  I was not overly optimistic about the chances of finding water balloons at a store in early April.  (these aren’t the water balloons we grew up with, you attach a hose to a bunch of roughly 30 of them and they instantly fill up with water and tie themselves). My unfamiliarity with Wal Marts led to me roaming the aisles in search of the water balloons while trying to stay 6 feet away from the 4 other people in the store.  After almost giving up I found the water balloons and also grabbed some popsicles for the kids.  I raced home and put my golf gear on, there was no way to avoid Shirley and she instantly said “you’re golfing again!”   It wasn’t really a question, I just kept my head down and said “yep”.  I had thrown a couple chickens on the smoker before I left and instructed Shirley to take them off in a couple hours. (I’m always putting my family first)

I could have easily golfed 18 holes but decided to stop after 11 so that I could make it home in time to have dinner with my family (I haven’t been spending enough time with them lately, while it’s about 450% more than normal, it’s still not enough).  The next morning I cleaned up the kitchen (I’ve lost count of times I have done this, just as I have lost track of the number of days I have been in captivity) and did some other things as the kids played video games with one of Aiden’s classmates online.  Whenever the kids log on he is there, whenever they log off he is there.  Shirley was sitting on the couch doing something and she heard Conrad talking, apparently one of the kids had not logged off their I pad before leaving it behind.  She said “good night Conrad”.   I am pretty sure he spends 100% of his waking life online gaming.

I pulled the kids off their devices around 10 and we headed out to play tennis but before we could hit the ball around I went to a park to scout a potential outdoor basketball court for some potential outdoor hoops.  Tennis went fairly well but to get the intensity and interest up a bit I incentivized the game.  If they were able to get a certain number of returns back to me I would buy them candy.  That went fairly well but they wanted to up the stakes.  So, I told them candy and a slushee (later realizing all fountain drinks have been shut down due to Corona).  Finally, I put the ultimate prize on the line, Jimmy John’s.  They had to get 15 balls back to me and the final point had to actually be a real point and they had to do it in the number of balls I had in the basket (roughly 45). Parker returned the first 3 that were hit to him and Aiden missed or mishit all of his, Parker began yelling at Aiden and telling him he sucked.  (it’s an approach I use in basketball when my teammates let me down) Eventually Aiden began to get about 3% of the balls hit to him over and ended up hitting the game winner.  (it felt like the ending to a Disney movie). During that time Parker threw his racket 3 times out of over all frustration and anger (serenity now doesn’t work for me and it probably won’t work for him).

I ran them home and was going to meet up with my buddy to shoot hoops but had yet to find a court that was open that had a 3 point line.  So, instead the kids and I headed towards the East Kentwood track which had a potential court I could scout on the way.  Shirley called as we pulled up to the track to “check in” and I was going to just leave the kids on their devices while I got my work out in.  However, her call made me feel guilty so I decided to take them in with me and have them run suicides with me, sort of.  The latest toy that has caught their eye is the nerf guns that shoot the round bullets and are pretty fucking sweet if you ask me.  After we ran a few suicides I told them that they could race one another and the winner would get to pick out a new gun.  For a proper suicide you run 25 yards out and back, 50 yards out and back, 75 yards out and back, 100 yards out and back.  They took off running and Parker was in the lead, Aiden gave up 20 yards in and said he really didn’t need another gun.  Parker kept going and when he made it to the other goal lien I told him he had to beat me back.  He gave it his all and managed to earn a new gun.

Once again I had to hustle to the golf course and Shirley was less than pleased.  Parker face timed me when I was still on the front nine ordering me to come home immediately so we could have a water balloon fight.  As I made the turn I got a call from Shirley asking me where the water balloons were (she has no idea how to properly run a water balloon fight) and I told her they were in my car.  Fortunately I live five minutes from the course and was close to my car so I could unlock it so she could come get the balloons.  However, for some reason when I though I remotely unlocked it it didn’t unlock, at least according to Shirley, it’s entirely possible she was trying to open a different Jeep Grand Cherokee.  Regardless, no water balloon fight took place and I received another call on the back nine asking me when I was going to be home.  I really need to be more of a dick to my wife and kids so they let me golf in peace and don’t want me around.  I was overly optimistic about how long it would take to play the last four holes and assured them I would be home in 20 minutes it was similar to when you are late and tell someone you will be there in five minutes only to show up a half hour later to your destination. It took me roughly an hour to get home. Fortunately,  I was able to have a proper water balloon fight with the kids as I got the grill going and grilled some burgers.  Just as we were wrapping things up the rain started to come down, talk about timing.

Yesterday I warned Shirley early in the morning that I was planning on golfing so that I would avoid the brush back when she saw me in my golf gear.  My alternative was to hide my golf clothes in my car and just change at the course and claim some work related activity that was going to take 4 hours but I’m pretty sure Shirley wouldn’t fall for that one. (I did dress up in a suit once pretending to go to court when Shirley was home on maternity leave with Aiden and I worked out of the house, only to actually go to the gym and play basketball) but Shirley has become much wiser to my ways having been married to me for 10 plus years.  My morning errands involved me going to Pet Smart to get crickets for Oscar (our bearded dragon) as well as scout Target’s nerf gun selection and grab a pair of flip flops as well.  The kids were on their screens the entire time I was running errands but I was hopeful that when I met up with my buddy (I finally found a court with a 3 point line) the kids would play outside.  My buddy brought his son and daughter and they had two remote control cars, my kids feigned interest for five minutes and then retreated to my Jeep to get back on their devices. (it’s hopeless)  When we returned home Shirley was in the kitchen preparing herself lunch (I didn’t realize she could prepare food) and Aiden slipped up and told her I was playing basketball and they were on their devices, when she interrogated him as to what we had been up to that morning.  She immediately gave me the look and lit into me about how they are on their screens too much.  I pretended like I was concerned and apologized and snuck in another water balloon fight to make up for my transgressions prior to heading to golf.

As I was getting ready for golf Aiden was getting into the shower and saw a sign that read Parking For Dad Only that Parker had bought me for a Christmas present.  He said to Parker “we should put this on mom’s butt” and started laughing.  He didn’t mean it in the sexual way, at least I hope he isn’t at that level of sexual intuitiveness yet, but he did think it was hilarious.  I have to admit it was quite funny, the sad thing is Shirley is close to becoming a no parking zone with all the time we are spending together.

Not sure how many of you are familiar with the Old Testament but there are two stories that involve a 40 days which are of major importance to the plight of humanity, specifically the Israelites.  The first was the world wide flood where Noah built a boat that could house two of every single animal as well as his family and all the food for those animals (It could happen).  It rained for 40 days and 40 nights and the inhabitants of the arc were traversing the flooded earth for over a year.  The second instance of the mention of 40 days in the Old Testament was when the twelve spies went into Canaan for 40 days to scout out the future promised land of the Israelites (it ultimately ended in a 40 year exile in the dessert because the Israelites doubted God’s ability to deliver on his guarantee of a Promised Land for them). The New Testament has two significant  40 day time periods involving Jesus, the first being when the Devil tempted Jesus in the desert for 40 days and the second being the 40 day period between Jesus’ resurrection to his ascension into heaven.

While 40 days seems to be a significant number to God, our fearless leader Gretchen Whitmer would like to see the majority of her executive order extended 70 days, almost twice the length of time Jesus had the devil nipping at his heels.  I don’t even know if Jesus could handle a 70 day shelter in place order if he were stuck with my wife and kids while having to home school them the entire time while also cleaning the kitchen an average of 4 times a day, cook all meals, and field Shirley’s phone calls when she wants to make sure Jesus is parenting by the book and limiting the screen time of the kids.

A lot can happen in 70 days.  Why does it have to be 70 days?  Can’t we take it two weeks at a time?  No, get this, Whitmer doesn’t want to put the legislature at risk by having them meet every two weeks to reevaluate things.  Are you kidding me?  Health care workers are on the front lines every day risking their health to do everything they can to combat this virus but the legislature can’t meet twice a month?  What a bunch of horse shit.  The legislators are also complaining about having to meet, just what I thought they are non essential.  The only problem is if they were eliminated Whitmer would likely extend her executive order until she was certain she would be added to the Democratic ticket for 2020.

I am not typically a conspiracy theory guy, as evidenced by the fact that when Super Dave (my brother in law) suggested that the Obama’s were behind Joan River’s death (I think she was 97 but when you factor in all of the plastic surgery she was 113 in actual years) I didn’t buy in, even though he made some very compelling arguments.   However, I wouldn’t be surprised if Whitmer is being directed by the democrats on the national level to keep Michigan shut down as long as possible due to the fact that they are the home of the Big 3 (not the 3 on 3 tournament started by Ice Cube, I’d even watch that right now, that’s how much I miss sports) and continuing to cripple the National economy is the only way they can unseat Trump due to the fact that they have a presidential candidate who puts the S in senility.  Furthermore, the only way Whitmer gets reelected in this state is if she also takes over as Lion’s GM and leads them to the super bowl in her first year on the job (this could end up being too late though due to the fact that the NFL may not resume until after she is up for reelection) and that still may not be enough for her to overcome the complete goat fuck she has turned this into.

Why is it a goat fuck?  The reason is that the west side of the state and the east side of the state are two completely different regions when it comes to population demographics and density rates.  The things that are happening in Detroit would never happen here, even if we didn’t have the shelter in place order to thrust upon us.  We don’t have the population density for this to spread as rapidly as it is in Detroit, nor do we have as many people with underlying health concerns that exacerbate the symptoms of the Corona Virus.  Could the governor have put certain restrictions on counties with high population densities and lessened them on others?  Seems like she can do whatever she wants at this point so my guess would be yes she can.  On top of that, hospitals on this side of the state have been cleared out in anticipation of the 1,000’s of patients that will be storming ER’s seeking treatment for the virus.  Guess what we aren’t getting any where close to that number of cases, patients requiring hospitalization, or deaths, and canceling all of the procedures and anything that wasn’t corona related was a complete over reaction in line with many of the other over reactions that have been part of this thing.

Is this serious?  Is this so serious that we should completely shut down our economy and not take a common sense approach to who can work and who can’t, hamstringing seasonal workers who rely on this time of the year to make most of their earnings?  Of course not, and if the governor is actually looking out for the best interest of the state and not her own political interests, she will open things up now and make sure that the complete lack of common sense in some of the things ordered by her is addressed immediately.  High density areas are a shit show, I get it, but that only applies to a small fraction of this state as well as our entire country.  Why should those who have made the choice to live elsewhere be treated the same?  This was my rant blog for today, I needed to get it off my chest so that Shirley doesn’t have to hear all of this again either directly or  “inadvertently” when she is listening to one of my many phone conversations about this. Now on to what the Jansma’s have been up to on spring break.

 

 

TONY THE TIGER URGES FELLOW FELINES TO SOCIAL DISTANCE

Tony the Tiger at his press conference in Battle Creek Michigan

By: Randy Coitus  (AP contributor)

April 6, 2020 at 6:21 a.m. EDT

On the heels of a family of tigers at the Bronx Zoo testing positive for the Corona Virus, Tony the Tiger held a press conference yesterday to emphasize the importance of social distancing not only for humans but also for Tigers.  Surprisingly, due to the fact that the only words anyone thought Mr Tony Tiger knew were “They’re Great”, Mr. Tiger came off as quite articulate at the press conference.

“It’s quite disturbing that four Tigers have tested positive for the Corona Virus, there are roughly 4,000 Tigers in the wild and 10,000 in captivity globally, we really need to make sure we are responsible felines and stay six feet away from one another.  While I doubt we will, as a feline community, need to rush to the grocery store to get our paws on as much toilet paper as we possibly can, there are things we need to be cognizant of that may be in short supply, especially our domesticated cousins.  Cat litter and Nip are the first two things I would be rushing to the store to purchase if I were held captive in someone’s home.”

The call from Mr. Tiger was met with mixed results in the Tiger community.  One Tiger who preferred to remain anonymous responded “What a hypocrite, you see that red handkerchief around his neck? shouldn’t it be over his mouth, fuck that guy!”  However, Buster, the Tiger formerly owned by Mike Tyson sympathized with Mr. Tiger (Tony) and could easily understand why he would be so concerned.  “The guy has been living on breakfast cereal for 50 years, no way he doesn’t have type 2 diabetes at this point, and while he appeared to be in shape at his press conference, they say the cameras can hide at least 60lbs if they shoot you from the proper angles.  If I had diabetes and was over weight I’d be calling for social distancing as well as all the other protective measures that the humans are putting in place.”

At press time it was reported that a number of zoos were taking down tire swings and other obstacles that attracted the tigers and caused them to congregate and ignore proper social distancing requirements.  In addition, zoos have been trying to get the Tigers to wear rubber gloves and masks when going anywhere that would expose them to those outside of their household.  This has been a bit problematic because the claws easily penetrate even the thickets of rubber gloves and when the workers try to put masks on the Tigers it typically results in the loss of a finger or even a hand.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer a fellow resident of Tony the Tiger in the state of Michigan and someone who has been mentioned as a possible democratic vice presidential candidate had this to say.  “We all have to make sacrifices during these trying times.  I want to emphasize that when I said no leisurely drives to clear your head or just get out of the house, I also meant it for Toonces the Driving cat, these restriction apply to all living creatures not just humans.  Even if you are thinking of murdering your family, do not go for a drive to clear your head, just lock yourself in the basement until the urge passes.”

Exotic Joe had yet to be reached for his thoughts on social distancing by Tigers.  However, however a source close to him (his cell mate and if things go right his fourth husband) indicated that Exotic Joe is quite certain Carol Baskin is behind the infection of the family of Tigers at the Bronx Zoo with the Corona Virus (aka The Carol Baskin Virus).

The struggle is real and last week I almost hit my breaking point.  I don’t even remember what day it was nor do I know what day it is today, everything is melding into one overly saturated Corona Virus experience that can not be dissected or distinguished.  Now I like to think I have it the worst, but the reason I think that is because I had the most to lose.  I played basketball pretty much every day (sometimes twice) and my job afforded me quite a bit of freedom and flexibility.  However, the reality is that I don’t have it that bad in comparison to some people.  One of those people contacted me last week via text and our text string led to the plan to meet up at Cascade Township Park to shoot some hoops. The park has the closest thing to an indoor court you can find outdoors, with soft rims and a nice surface that includes a three point line.  As I was loading up the kids to go to the park and meet up with my buddy he texted me this; “they are taking the rims down what do you want to do?”  I thought it was a joke but called him just to make sure.  Wasn’t a joke they were taking everything down at the park that could allow a person to have fun.  The only thing that remained was the frisbee golf course, which in my opinion would not be fun even if it was the last competitive activity left on the planet.

I called an audible and had him meet me at a church parking lot where there was a basketball hoop.  This was problematic because my plan was to have the kids ride their bikes at the park, eventually leading to them telling me they were bored which would lead to me allowing them to sit in the car and play on devices.  So, taking out the part where they ride their bikes for 3 minutes and skipping right to the electronics really wasn’t that big of a deal the way I saw it.  When I got to the church parking lot there was some guy shooting buckets with his pre-pubescent son.  While I was desperate for some hoop action, me and my buddy going 2 on 2 against the father son duo was not an option.  So, we just stood outside our respective vehicles and conversed while giving them dirty looks every 3 seconds.  Eventually it worked and they left.  After hoops I dropped the kids at home and hustled to thornapple point for some golf.  While most courses are shut down the Watermark group has raised a middle finger at the governor’s office (Heil Whitmer!) and remained open to members who are willing to walk.

The next day I had to be in the office (my day is Thursdays, so the day I played one one one in the church parking lot was a Wednesday) and as it turns out my day of the week was the nicest day up to that point.  However, since there is very little going on in the criminal defense world due to a serious lack of criminals, I didn’t have a ton to do and would be able to golf another 18.  The only thing on the calendar was a zoom partner’s meeting to discuss some firm issues and catch up post Corona Virus shut down.  This is where I have to admit that Shirley was right about 3 things that I was resistant to try (obviously none of them were sexual):

• Air Pods, they are amazing, I never realized how liberating being wireless could be and now I routinely panic four to five times a day thinking I have lost them (they are so tiny).
• Apple Watch, I always attributed the smart watch to be for people who worked at the Apple Store or wished they worked there but the reality is my Apple Watch is also amazing and when I don’t have it on my wrist I feel naked.
• Audio books.  I would always tell Shirley that I preferred reading not listening, like I was somehow better than her because I actually read books not just merely listened to them (which I looked at as cheating).  However, with the lack of sports my podcast world has shrunk so I was forced to listen to an audio book as I re-painted our down stairs.  I listened to the Nix by Nathan Hill and it was fantastic.  I had tried to read it a while back and couldn’t get into it but the narrator made it a great experience.

So, why bring these three things up? While the Apple Watch has come in handy for the tracking my runs (not diarrhea but it can probably track that as well) but it also tracked how far it was to walk 18 holes (it was roughly 7 miles, but I tend to go in the woods more than the average golfer to look for balls so my mileage is a bit on the high side).  While the Apple Watch has been mostly positive there are some things about it that I don’t appreciate, like it telling me when to breathe, when to stand up (I’m driving across the state of Michigan can’t really stand right now) and is a bit passive aggressive when it thinks I am not exercising enough.  It’s a good thing it can’t monitor how much I allow my kids to be on their screens because I don’t need someone besides Shirley on my back about that, she’s relentless.

I also brought up the Apple Watch because it put me in a precarious position when I got home from golf on Thursday.  While I didn’t tell Shirley I was golfing Thursday, she knew and when I got home I told her “I walked 7 miles yesterday and 7 miles today” I immediately regretted saying this because her response was “you went golfing yesterday too?”  This whole shelter in place thing has me off my game, no way I make that misstep under normal circumstances.  This led to a discussion about how Shirley wished she would have known I was golfing due to the fact that she didn’t even realize I had dropped the kids off, her being so immersed in her work and all, which led to them not making a noise and being on their devices for at least 3 straight hours.  Admittedly, 3 straight hours on devices is not ideal but I try to look at the positives and the fact they were smart enough not to bug their mom and risk her taking the devices away and ultimately making them actually play means I am winning as a parent.  Besides me golfing again was just what the doctor ordered and I know there is no husbandry equivalent to the saying “happy wife happy life” because no one really give’s a shit about a husband being happy, but the Jansma house runs much smoother when I get some much needed me time.

This whole experience is akin to a frog in warm water.  The saying goes you turn up the water incrementally and the frog doesn’t notice it until it’s too late and they are boiled and dead.  Well, that’s what is happening right now, we are having all of our freedoms and liberties taken away incrementally and eventually they will all be gone.  Every time something is taken away (like the basketball rims at a park) I think back to Seinfeld when Newman would do something that was diabolical and meant to harm Jerry.

“WHITMER!”

The day after word came down that all schools were going to be shut down indefinitely (not permanently) Aiden was sitting on the can as he does every morning in preparation to get his day kick started.  He typically takes twenty minutes to pinch a loaf, it’s unfortunate he’s not a fan of coffee and that newspapers have become obsolete because he could really use both to not only speed things up but also entertain him while he does his business.  While our kids have their own bathroom, Aiden prefers shitting in ours, and that morning he was crying on the toilet.  Constipation can be a bitch (or so I have been told, never really had an issue with regularity) but tearing up about it seemed a bit much to me, even in light of the fact that he is a bit of a delicate flower.  It turned out he was crying about the fact that Shirley was ranting and raving about how things were going to go in the Jansma house moving forward during the hiatus from school.  “Mom is going to teach us and she doesn’t know anything!”  were his exact words.  Shirley told them no devices amongst some of the other threats that would be nearly impossible for her to actually follow through on since she was going to be working full time.  Once Shirley left the room I had a heart to heart with Aiden, I said to Aiden “you know your mom, when has she ever actually followed through on any of the stuff she claims she is going to do? you have nothing to worry about, everything will be just fine, no way mom is going to teach you and you know I would never let her teach you math, right?”  Aiden immediately rallied, his demeanor was as if he dropped a 5 pound turd into the toilet.  “You’re right dad, and theres no way I want her teaching me math, she thought 3 times 0 was 3” (true story).

That morning I went into my office, it seems like years ago, in light of all of the things that have been taken away from me since that Friday morning.  Shirley called me mid morning to let me know she had bought I pads for both of the kids, I almost asked her to put Aiden on the phone just so I could tell him that I told him so.  When you have been with someone for 13 years, regardless of how much you pay attention to them, you are going to be able to predict most of their behaviors merely through osmosis.  Fast forward to now and it’s me who is responsible for “teaching” them.  Shirley actually asked me today before dinner if I thought she wanted to work 11 hours a day, my response was yes, yes you do because it gets you out of having to do what I do every day.  Parker and Aiden agreed with me, and they, mainly through osmosis, have realized what I have known for years, Shirley fucking loves her job.  I”m not faulting her for it, but I will admit I am a bit jealous, I hate my job and can’t imagine getting that much satisfaction and enjoyment out of my job.

So, basically I have turned into a stay at home parent with one draw back, my kids never fucking leave the house so I can watch soap operas and have an affair with the mail carrier (preferably a hot blonde with big cans, though I have never seen anyone resembling that description delivering mail or Amazon packages for that matter).  So, I cook, I clean, I painted the entire downstairs this weekend, and I am responsible for teaching the kids, or at the very least trying to keep them on task.  That’s why I also almost completely lost my shit this morning when Shirley criticized me for a purchase I had made.  You see, after watching Blackwater a couple weeks ago Shirley purged our house of all of our teflon pans because it turns out teflon causes just about every imaginable cancer and health malady possible, granted the pan has to reach the heat of the center of the sun to release the harmful chemicals that cause such cancer, but just to be on the safe side she threw out those pans almost as fast as I threw out all of her granny panties when I had the opportunity to do so.  So, yesterday I was at Walmarts (that what her grandma calls it) to see if they had any golf pull carts (I will probably address the need for that at some point down the road) and immediately regretted my decision to enter the store, the only time I go to Walmarts is if I am somewhere that doesn’t have a Meijer.  Regardless, striking out on the golf pull cart should have been my indication that it wasn’t meant to be but I decided to buy a set of ceramic pans that said they were PFAS free to replace our pans that were now leaking PFAS all over some land fill in Kent county.

This morning I was unpacking the pans when Shirley came down from her home office and immediately criticized the pans for being ugly.  To be honest, I thought they were benign but they offended Shirley’s sophisticated tastes.  Immediately I wanted to snap back and tell her she didn’t have any say in the matter due to the fact that she never cooks, however Parker beat me to it asking her why she was so upset about it since she never does any of the cooking?  He was my favorite before but now the only way Aiden surpasses him is if he comes up with the Coronavirus vaccine.

Admittedly, before I had been forced into the task of home schooling my kids I had no idea where they were at academically nor did I really care.  They are in Spanish immersion so for the most part I am like a guy forced to run into the store to buy feminine hygiene products for his significant other, totally lost and entirely clueless.  Unfortunately, whoever came up with the phrase ignorance is bliss was spot on, I didn’t need to know where my kids were at scholastically just like I didn’t need to know that there were different types of feminine hygiene products.  While I have an incredible amount of solid genetic material to pass along to my kids, spelling is not one of those things.  I am a terrible speller and one of my tasks is to go over Aiden’s spelling words every day.  The aple has not falen too far from the tree (I use to think Gym was spelled Gymn).  He’s on my trajectory when it comes to spelling.  However, he really has no need to sweat it for the most part, spell check will solve most of his deficiencies.  But, I am going to let you in on a dirty secret of mine, I am such a bad speller that sometimes the spell check software can’t even come up with a suggestion due to the fact that  I am so far off on the spelling on my intended word, so I have to come up with a different word with a similar meaning to replace the word I wanted to use.

While things have been going along as well as can be expected for someone who has no patience or background in education, there have been a couple bumps in the road.  Both last week and today I had anxiety/panic attacks when I was trying to teach both kids at the same time.  I hate legos, always have always will.  The reason I hate them is it’s almost impossible to put them away in an organized fashion and when I see them spilled out all over the floor or a kitchen table it causes me severe angst.  Well, trying to come up with an organized way to attack my kids lesson plans and keep all of their work organized so they could be submitted to their respective teachers was as if someone had dropped 150 lbs of random legos in my living room.  Last week I was so paralyzed by the attack that I had to call an impromptu recess (about the only time my kids actually listen to me in my role as their teacher) but today I powered through and kept teaching Aiden about the civil war as Parker finished up his math homework.

After a brief overview of the civil war and a recitation of the history of Michigan I called it for the day and retreated to the couch to try and nap off the anxiety attack.   Unfortunately that didn’t get the job done (I’ve been routinely sleeping until 8 am with no real reason to get out of bed) so I headed to the Kentwood high school track to exercise off the anxiety.  This was just what the doctor ordered resulting in a game of Stratego (Aiden beat me so maybe there is hope for him after all) upon my return home followed by tater tot casserole and a game of Azul with Aiden and Shirley.  I highly recommend Azul for those of you who enjoy strategy games, it’s a ton of fun and fairly easy to play.   While I can handle 3 more weeks of this without having to resort to recreational marijuana or some type of violence against an inanimate object, if it goes any further than that I’m going to either need a punching bag or some high octane brownies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday was suppose to be my first day on the job teaching my kids.  With the courts basically shut down and the cops tasked with merely keeping the uprising of the citizenry at bay, there isn’t a whole lot for the West Michigan Defense Team to do at this point.  I did have a court hearing scheduled for tomorrow that I was hoping would remain on the docket but was adjourned indefinitely.  I wasn’t sure who to feel more sorry for in this teacher pupil scenario, me or my kids.  That being said I was awoken to find out from Shirley that Whitmer was shutting down the state at 9am.  Holy shit I thought to myself, I only have until 9am to shop for everything I need to keep myself from going insane.  What those items were primarily revolved around me painting our entire downstairs.  I sped off to Repco Lite (they carry Benjamin Moore products) and picked up 6 gallons of paint and a pair of 18 inch rollers.  Midway through my paint purchasing trip Shirley informed me that that press conference was actually at 11am my thought was good that will buy the businesses that have not completely shuttered yet a couple more hours to remain open.  I like to think of myself as a free thinker, and I like to think of all the governors who followed one another into implementing this remain home policy as the opposite of free thinkers.  Granted, maybe it is necessary in some states, but for the most part Michigan, from what I can tell is taking this seriously and there really isn’t a need for an executive order requiring everyone to remain home unless you are essential (pool cleaners are deemed essential).

Part of me wanted to go to the grocery store because we were out of milk and a few essentials, but I thought better of it due to the fact that word had probably gotten out to the hoarding community (I”m pretty sure they have their own message board) and they were all likely at the store making sure they had 8 weeks worth of fresh chicken and a 3 month supply of kitty litter. The reality was hitting me hard, I needed to go home and teach my kids, and by teach I mean yell at them.   Upon my return home they were already on their first recess and playing on electronics.  I made a few phone calls and quickly realized the only word that comes out of my mouth that my kids pay attention to is fuck.  I dropped an F bomb on the phone and Parker immediately proclaimed to Aiden that I had dropped an F bomb.  A few minutes later another one came spewing out of my mouth garnering an identical reaction by Parker.  This has led me to believe that when I want them to do something I need to get their attention by first dropping  the F bomb “Listen here you Fucking maggots…..”

Will there be a day where I end up telling them I just like to say the F word and I say it a lot?  Of course that day will come, but until then I am quite apologetic about it when they overhear me cussing like a sailor.  The first problem I encountered in my new role as teacher was that my kids have no respect for me as a teacher, look they have little respect for me as a parent either, but at least they have some, I was telling them what they needed to do and they flat out told me they weren’t doing that, I don’t even think throwing a few f bombs in would have helped to get them to obey my commands.  Both kids have lesson plans that they need to get through and then when these are completed it is my job to fill in the blanks for them and teach them about science (I know nothing) Language Arts (I’m learning on the fly) and one that was not on Shirley’s schedule (she actually made a schedule for them) Social Studies (I was a history major in college).

The schedule is in half hour blocks and a bit aggressive if you ask me, it has them in school from 9 to 4, which is easy for Shirley because she is busy all day running Spectrum Hospital (it’s the impression I get when I over hear her on the phone, there is no way we could ever work together).  Aiden was good about picking up where he left off after recess was over but Parker claimed he had nothing to do, turns out he was full of shit and that he had a slate of lesson plans the he hadn’t even touched.  With Aiden working away on his own, Bible was the only thing that I could free style and that was our subject to tackle before lunch.  I read the story of David and Goliath and asked Parker how many stones David pulled out of the river in anticipation of his take down of Goliath with his sling shot.  Parker responded with the number 5.  Teaching was obviously becoming second nature to me and I was really starting to get through to my most problematic student.

Five Tacitos and an hour of screen time later it was time to reconvene.   Aiden had completed all of his online work so it was up to me to create the curriculum for the afternoon session.   Language arts was on the calendar from 1pm to 1:30.   Unfortunately my kids are in Spanish immersion leaving me at even more of a disadvantage than parents trying to teach their kids who are in an English speaking curriculum.  So, instead of pulling out Rosetta Stone (Shirley was going to learn Spanish once upon a time) I decided language arts was going to be taught in English.  I took two years of Spanish in high school and the only thing I remember is my Spanish teacher having the hot girls in my class (I think there were one and a half) Salta Alta (jump up and down).  Parts of speech were on the table, initially I thought there were four parts of speech but there are actually 8, possibly 10 depending on who you ask.  However, there are a couple that could easily be done away with if you ask me.  I went over all 8 of them and discussed them with the kids until I felt like they had a firm grasp on verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs.  Pronouns were fairly easy to explain but prepositions were akin to what Spanish is to me.

One of the tricks to this whole teaching thing is attempting to determine where the kids are when it comes to learning.  Parts of speech and diagraming sentences may be a bit beyond a 9 year old and are definitely out of the reach for a 7 year old but I need to start somewhere.  With language arts out of the way the remaining schedule looked like this:

• 1:30-2:00 Art
• 2:00-2:30 Science
• 2:30-3:00 Recess
• 3:00-3:30 Gym (aren’t recess and gym basically the same thing?)
• 3:30-4:00 Music

One thing was obvious to me, art and music aren’t real subjects so the kids and I could turn our backs on art and music for the time being.  So, I decided to fill the void created by those two items on the calendar with a social studies lesson covering early explorers.  Parker refused to engage in a social studies lesson so it was just me and Aiden learning about the Silk Road and Marco Polo, this lead to questions about Christopher Columbus due to the fact that the Silk Road was eventually shut down by the Chinese (as if there wren’t enough reasons to hate the Chinese right now) leading to explorers seeking alternative routes to the Far East.  Columbus thought the Bahamas and eventually Latin America were actually China, hard to believe we have an annual holiday for that guy that in some areas of the world actually entails parade.

After we concluded social studies I decided it was time for gym class so we loaded up and headed to Cascade Township park.  I told the kids to head over to the playground while I shot hoops by myself trying to keep my game tight so that I would be ready to play again in August when they reopen everything.  Eventually my kids grew tired of the playground (after roughly three minutes) so I let them take my phone and watch it in the car, I still had to work on my left handed layups and corner 3″s.  Initially we were going to play tennis but there was water on the court and the windchill made it feel like it was still early February.  Instead I went to D n W to finally get some of the essentials we were out of (including beer) followed by a trip to Home Depot to get a quart of paint and check out their electric chainsaws.  I know, electric chainsaws?  However, the reviews are quite stellar and I had my eye on a Milwaukee due to the fact that I already had two batteries for it.  Not only would it come in handy for cutting up firewood it would also be great for the impending and inevitable  zombie apocalypse, instead of struggling to start my gas chainsaw to ward off would be pursuers I could get right to dismembering the attackers by just hitting the throttle.

I assumed the executive order put in place would shut down every retail business but grocery stores and pharmacies.  However, reading my email when I returned home from gym class told me otherwise.  Greenwell sent an email to it’s subscribers indicating they were still open for delivery and take out with the email also laying out some of this upcoming week’s specials.  That morning I had hustled out to get paint under the assumption the stores would be shut down for 3 weeks but I was probably wrong about that.   I had glanced over the executive order, but didn’t actually go in depth enough to determine what the consequences were for disregarding the executive order.  My second read through revealed that willful disobedience of the executive order will result in a misdemeanor.  So, for those of you who wish to keep a clean record but also maintain some level of sanity here are some helpful hints:

• One can leave one’s home to exercise, I’m paraphrasing, but it wouldn’t be a bad idea to keep a tennis racket or a pair of running shoes in your vehicle and claim that you were going to go exercise should you be pulled over by law enforcement or the National Guard.  It wouldn’t hurt to be wearing sweat pants either, I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t wearing sweat pants, one of the few benefits of this pandemic and the resulting quarantine.
• You can also leave home to acquire essential supplies.  Always have a bag of groceries in your car containing eggs, bread, toilet paper (if you have some) and a fifth of liquor.  If you are pulled over point to that and tell whoever pulled you over that you are returning from the store.
• There is also a clause about leaving home for the welfare of others.  This seems to be what we in the legal business would call a catch all.  If you really get into a pinch just tell whoever pulls you over that you were 30 seconds from dismembering your family and that you had to leave home to clear your head.

Typically, I take the approach that what is good for me is good for everyone. Unfortunately, the powers that be have not taken that approach in handling the Corona Virus and I have no choice but to step in line in the hopes that this will all be over in the three week time frame laid out by the Governor.  I realize that the there will still be cases of the Corona Virus, but my hope is that this quarantine will allow the medical industry to catch up and be prepared for whatever happens once things open back up in three weeks(Yeah right).   While this will likely be the longest three weeks of my life, the one good thing is that it didn’t happen in the middle of January because in all likelihood my kids would have stumbled upon me with my car running and the garage doors shut.