Last week I had an informal meeting with my client and the other party along with their attorney to attempt to settle a divorce.  The meeting took place at opposing counsel’s office in Allegan and when I walked in he shook my hand and asked “how are you doing Jim?”  I thought maybe I misheard him but when we ended up meeting with all of us to make sure we were on the same page with what the parties had agreed to he also called me Jim.  At that point there was no going back, if I corrected him it would be way more awkward than being called the wrong name in front of my client so I just let it slide.  The troubling thing is that this wasn’t the first time I had had a case with this particular attorney, nor was it the first time I had been called the wrong name and just let it go.  This week I was riding up the elevator from the basement of our building and I bumped into the guy in charge of maintenance for our building, he addressed me as Justin, not my favorite name but still much better than his name which was Stuart.

Being referred to as Justin brought up a range of emotions for me.  My therapist and I had made a lot of progress working through the trauma’s of my child hood, but all that progress was for not when Stuart called me Justin.  When I was in ninth grade I played football for South Christian’s ninth grade team.  At the time ninth graders were not part of the high school so I typically would get a ride home with my buddies cousin who was the assistant coach.  He had a Fu Manchu mustache, tore the sleeves off his dress shirts and chewed tobacco.  The entire season he called me Justin and I never once corrected him.  For some reason I decided to play football the next year and had a coach who was even more intimidating than my ninth grade coach.  We were doing some type of drill and he wanted me to be more aggressive so he had me do the drill with him, somehow my helmet caught him in the face and made him start bleeding.  It was the only memorable thing I did all season.

I suppose I have no problem being called Jim or Justin because I have been called a lot worse by a lot of people.  Would it be nice to be called other J names instead of Jim or Justin?  Of course it would, but if someone called me Julius I may have to correct them, as much as I like the sound of Julius Jansma, there’s no way I can allow someone to call me that name without me and that person looking like a fool.

Being called the wrong name is just one of the many odd things that I have had going on lately.  I misplaced my credit card, Y membership card, metal water bottle, and a Jordan tank top and another nike basketball tank top in the span of the past month.  On top of that I thought I lost my North Face gloves and Oakley hat last week but they were actually in my overcoat.  (Nike, North Face, and Oakley are not sponsors of my blog but if they were some day that would be truly amazing, probably need to push the readership into the double digits though if I want that to happen).  Am I losing my mind, it definitely seems like it, which sadly isn’t replaceable once you lose it.  The biggest problem about losing things is that I typically am so upset about it that I purchase the exact same thing to replace it, which is kind of waste of resources.  On my flight back from Phoenix in early November I left my water bottle on the plane. I bought a new one immediately and the only difference was that my new one had a rubber bottom so when I fill it with the water dispenser on our fridge it holds its place and the water dispenses automatically instead of me having to hold on to my water bottle as it fills  (it’s only overflowed once). Saturday I let Aiden use my water bottle for his basketball game and thought to myself, I’m probably going to leave it at the gym, and sure as shit, I did.  I plan on going back to the school where I left it to see if it is in the lost and found, but that water bottle was and is awesome so I am guessing someone took it home with them.

Another strange thing that happened to me occurred this morning.  When I got back from basketball both of my kids were in the shower singing a Spanish song.  Why are they taking a shower in our shower?  Why are they showering together?  Why are they singing in Spanish?  Those are all good questions and if you knew Shirley you would have the answer to those questions.  I had no idea what Dame Tu Cosita means until Shirley showed me this video as the kids were having a grand old time in our shower.

For those of you who don’t feel like Googling the translation, it means give it to me, and Aiden told Shirley he knew the song has something  to do with your weiner, even though the green guy in the video has no Weiner.  After the kids had gotten out of the shower and were getting ready I heard Aiden say “her Vagina looks like a weiner”.  Where does he get this stuff?  I’d like to say he is picking it up at school but the lion’s share of the blame goes on his parents.  However, using the proper term, vagina, in my mind points to solid parenting.  Are we saying vagina on a frequent basis?  I don’t think we are, although Vagina is such a great word that you can say it and not even realize it, it just rolls right off the tongue so easily.  The problem actually can be attributed to You Tube, my kids love You Tube even more than they love singing Spanish songs in the shower and they frequently watch other people playing video games on You Tube amongst other things.  I don’t understand this, I don’t like playing video games let alone watching other people play video games.  Shirley thinks them watching other people play video games is where they pick most of the inappropriate talk up from.

Shirley finally lowered the boom this past weekend and told them no more You Tube.  You would have thought she told them we weren’t celebrating Christmas the way they reacted (Super Dave who unfortunately is my brother in law actually is taking this stance based upon his belief that Christmas is a pagan holiday, I think my sister should ban him from the internet entirely).   The problem with the Shirley imposed ban is that my kids are like a couple of cat burglars when it comes to electronic devices.  All of a sudden my phone is gone and guess who has it, my fricken kids that’s who, and they jump right on You Tube when they have possession of my phone.  I’ll be honest, I haven’t heard a whole lot of objectionable material when they are watching youtube in my car and it is piped through blue tooth, but the people playing the games have even less likelihood of having sex with another human being than the people who work at the Apple Store.  If I want my kids to ever have any luck with the ladies I need to also enforce Shirely’s You Tube ban.  On top of that, the kids alternative is either Captain Underpants or Atomic Puppet, which are both highly entertaining Netflix shows.  If given the choice being subjected to a bunch of virgin dorks play video game or listening to George Beard and Harold Hutchins, I’m taking George and Harold all day.  Well, it looks like I gotta go, time to try and claim that water bottle out of the lost and found at Forest Hills Middle school on my way to the Kuyper old man basketball lunch run.

As I may have mentioned in previous blogs we do not have high speed cable internet, instead we are forced to utilize a satellite internet provider.  (we actually sent a rather large check to Spectrum/Charter to get them to bring cable internet to us but there may be some easement issues that keep cable internet from actually materializing).  So, we are unable to stream movies forcing us to rent from either Red Box or Family Video.  One positive about renting movies from Family Video is that my self esteem gets a significant boost when I’m rubbing elbows with Family Video patrons.  On Saturday the kids and I stopped in the Kentwood Family Video to rent some movies.  As I wandered through the video store in search of a watchable movie or two Parker followed me asking me what specific movies were.  “Dad, what’s Jeepers Creepers?”  “Dad what’s Saw?”  “Dad what’s Lake Placid?”  I had heard of Jeepers Creepers and made the mistake of actually seeing Saw in the Theatre, they are both horror movies and it is fairly obvious just by looking at the DVD case they come in.  However, I had never heard of Lake Placid, was it possible it was a romantic comedy starring Kevin James as a fat guy down on his luck when it comes to women but somehow managing to snag Jennifer Aniston after she temporarily loses her sight in a freak water skiing accident?  I’m in!  No such luck, the cover had an alligator with a severed hand in it’s mouth, and the hand wasn’t holding a hot dog so there’s no way it involved Kevin James.  Was I raising a serial killer?  When Jeffrey Dahmer’s parents took him to Blockbuster is this what he did?

Fortunately Parker picked out Strange Brew as the movie he wanted to watch and not The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, if he dismembers Oscar I will renew my concern about him being a future serial killer, but until that happens he’s free to wander Family Video inquisitively seeking out the darkest movies Hollywood can produce.  We also rented the third Indiana Jones and a Kevin James movie where he becomes an MMA fighter to raise money for the music program he teaches at and to get in Selma Hyack’s pants, he was a success in each endeavor.

We ended up watching Strange Brew last night and I had forgotten how awful that movie is primarily because I was in sixth grade when I saw it and probably didn’t realize how awful it was at the time I originally watched it.  However, it was awful in an entirely harmless way and Aiden kept asking through the entire movie if Doug and Bob McKenzie were drunk, my response was no they are just Canadian, that’s how Canadians are all the time, alcohol consumption has little to do with their behavior.

We were suppose to go pick out basketball shoes for Aiden last night but I didn’t get home in time and we decided to go tonight.  Originally we were going to hit Tanger to pick up his new shoes but I called an audible and we went to Woodland Mall, home of the Cheesecake Factory and VanMaur.  We went in to the mall through the Van Maur entrance and my Dutch alarm went off immediately “you have no place being in here, its way too expensive, turn back and go to Nordstrom Rack, don’t even look at any price tags it will make you vomit!”  I hustled through the store with Parker and Aiden lagging behind trying to avoid any eye contact with a sales associate.  Once we made it out into the actual mall I breathed a sigh of relief and headed towards Kid’s footlocker, even thought they have kids shoes in Footlocker I decided to opt for Kid’s footlocker.  Bingo, I saw a pair of Air Jordan’s even I would wear if they came in adult sizes at that price ($60) unfortunately that price was for kids up to size 3, Aiden is a 4.  I would have tried to squeeze him into a 3 but he has really wide feet and Nike’s are notoriously narrow.  The exact same shoe in his size was $100.  I pulled a VanMaur and got out of there as fast as I could.

JC Penney would have to do the only problem was that the kid’s department is on the second floor and there was an escalator between us and the kids section.  Basically I had to shove Aiden on to the escalator due to the fact that he was as terrified of it as I was of Saw when I viewed it in the theatre (I hate scary movies).  Parker was a bit more adventurous but it took him some coaxing to get on it as well.  Fortunately for me Aiden is nothing like me and he settled for some pretty unremarkable Nike’s that were on sale for $45 ($45 more than my parents ever spent on basketball shoes for me).  It was more of the same trying to get them to go down the escalator but eventually we made it to the ground floor and out of the JC Penney.

I had been meaning to stop at Barnes and Noble so I could take a look at the Farmer’s Almanac.  I always like to check it for the winter forecast.  It seems the almanac is typically spot on when it comes to predicting what type of winter weather we will encounter.  Last year it predicted a dry and mild December and beginning to January, which was spot on and it predicted an unbearable winter from there on which was also spot on.  I managed to talk my kids into going to Barnes and Noble against their strong objection and found out that this winter is suppose to be mild and wet.  Once again the escalator stood between the kids and the kids section but they managed to make it up a lot quicker this time.  The kids talked me into buying them each a book and as I checked out the clerk asked me if I was part of the Barnes and Noble rewards program, the way I answered his question kept him from asking me if I wanted to join.  He then asked me for my email, my response was “no”.  I made the mistake of giving Banana Republic my email as well as Dick’s Sporting Goods and I have 12,000 unread email in my inbox and at least 60 of them are from those two retailers.

As we were wandering in Barnes and Noble I spotted a familiar face, it was none other than Justin Amash.  I even recognized his wife because they sent my office a Christmas card for some strange reason.  Pretty sure no one in my office knowingly voted for him and I am certain no one likes him.  I was quite surprised to see no security detail protecting him or people trying to approach him and speak to him.  The lack of a security detail made no sense since he is likely to be our next president but the lack of interest from anyone at the mall is entirely understandable since he recently defected from the Republican Party, he could wear a T-shirt that read Jon Calvin is full of shit and he would have been more well received.  It got even weirder when we were on our way out of the mall and he and his family was suddenly behind us, do I say something, has God put him behind me for a reason?  Well, just like when I saw Suzanne Gehaw at Meijer and Terri Deboer at the Byron Center library, I chickened out and didn’t say a word.

As we made our way back through VanMaur I decided I would browse a bit.  There were a pair of red Vans in the shoe department identical to the ones I ordered on line from Kohl’s a week prior, I took a peek and discovered much to my surprise they were the same price at VanMaur.  I thought to myself, how do they afford to pay the piano player if they are charging the same price as Kohl’s?  Then I looked at a price tag of some apparel in the men’s department and just as I got the cold sweats a sales associate approached me to see if I was in need of any assistance.  “Run kids! Run!”  We never looked back.

We have had some close calls at the Jansma household when it comes to pets.  At one point Shirley insisted on getting a rabbit and prior to doing so she bought all the lumber to build a rabbit hutch.  While a lot of that lumber still sits in our garage some of it was put to use to construct planting boxes for our garden this summer and ultimately Shirley realized a rabbit was a bad idea.  However, when Aiden went to Camp Roger this summer they had various types of lizards there, including bearded dragons.  Well, that planted a seed in to Shirley’s head that we had to get a bearded dragon.  She told me when she brought it home “it was only ten dollars” my response was “maybe, but all the other shit probably cost at least $200” to which she said “I’m not telling you what it ended up costing”.  I do think she went a little over board by buying Oscar one of those massage lounge chairs that you typically see at the Sharper Image or other frivolous stores where people go in just to test their products but never end up buying anything,  which probably explains why there is a bunch of Sharper Image stuff for sale at TJ Maxx, Marshals, and Nordstrom Rack.  Oscar doesn’t have any back problems or stress though, so he’s go that going for him or her, hard to figure out the gender of a lizard their ding dong doesn’t hang out like most other animals.

The massage chair, aquarium, fake tree he hangs out in, water dish, light to keep him warm and other various items, while expensive, were a one time expenditure and totally worth it to have a pet who does….well absolutely nothing.  He just sits on his fake log and makes it look like he’s looking at you but he isn’t because he has even worse eye sight than Mr. Magoo.   On top of that, a couple weeks ago he was a bit sluggish and was moving around even less than normal.  Shirley was contemplating taking him to the vet while I thought about flushing his scaly ass down the toilet.  Turns out he was constipated as evidence by a huge dump he left in his cage for Shirley the following morning.  Probably need to get a little more fiber in his diet or put some coffee in his water dish.  Unfortunately the start up costs I mentioned pale in comparison to what it takes to keep Oscar alive and shitting.   Oscar survives primarily on crickets.  He/She loves Crickets and it is the only time he moves at any type of pace.  You throw a few crickets in his cage and he’s like Pac-man eating dots, just picking them off one by one as fast as he can.  The problem with Crickets is they don’t live very long so you have to stop at the local pet store on a regular basis to pick up the crickets and crickets don’t come cheap.  I guess it’s totally worth it for a pet who just sits in his cage and pretend stares at you and once in a while takes gigantic shits.  (reminds me of when my kids first started taking dumps on the toilet, I was always shocked at how big their turds were, it defied logic that that much poop could be contained in one little kid)

So, Oscar has been living the dream but the road has gotten a little bumpy lately, somehow Jasper (our cat who can pee in the toilet) has figured out there is some type of creature in the aquarium but he’s not sure what to make of it, is it food?  Entertainment? Possibly a companion?  I caught him a couple times sitting in front of the aquarium as if it were a television just staring at Oscar, he probably thought they were bonding since Oscar was fake staring right back at him.

Things came to a head on Saturday morning, I was just about to get out of bed when I heard a thud.  Seemed a bit unusual but I wasn’t too terribly alarmed by the noise.  I went in to Oscar’s room (he has his own room) to get some clothes out of the closet.  My clothes were in there because we had Critter Control take all of the insulation out of our attic because it was filled with bat shit from the 30 or so bats living in our attic and the access point to the attic was in my closet.  When I went in to the room Oscar had a friend in his cage with him.  Sitting next to him in his cage was Jasper with a “how the hell did I get in here?” look on his face and a “how the hell do I get out of her?” look as well.  I don’t think Oscar could see Jasper even though Jasper was two inches from him because he is the Mr. Magoo of the reptile world, but I think he knew something was amiss because his beard was out, which is a sign that he is agitated or constipated.  Oscar had a screen on the top of his cage that fat ass jasper fell through when he was climbing on his cage.  I’m starting to wonder how fat (he’s already quite fat) Jasper has to get before it infringes on his jumping ability and would it be worth the risk of feline diabetes to keep him from jumping on everything in our house?

I made Shirley get out of bed and look at the scene, it was something you would expect to see in a Norman Rockwell painting with Jasper and Oscar perched next to each other in Oscar’s cage.  Shirley grabbed Jasper by the Scruff with both hands and yanked him out of the cage, Jasper responded by making the noise most cats make when you try to stuff them in a cat carrier to take them to the humane society, kind of a blood curdling MRRROW.   The good news is Oscar has a new Jasper proof top on his cage and  Shirley’s next pet acquisition is going to be chickens and she assures me they will remain out side.

 

 

Normally I don’t do what I don’t want to do.  However, this past weekend was the exception where I attended a harvest party thrown by someone Shirley works with and attended a 50th birthday party for Shirley’s boss Neal (not his real name).  Shirley was quite excited about the harvest party and pretended to dread the birthday party although I knew deep down she couldn’t wait.  Her excitement for the 50th b-day party had nothing to do with her feelings about Neal but were more about the opportunity it presented to network and rub elbows with the who’s who of Spectrum Health.  Shirley, while often times stressed out about her job and frequently frustrated with the inter workings of Spectrum Health, loves doing what she does and I’ll be honest, I am somewhat jealous.  I endure my job, Shirley can’t get enough of her’s so much so that she closed down the birthday party (we drove separately because I was getting the hell out of there as quickly as I could).

Back to the harvest party.  I had to attend a conference in the morning and received a call from Shirley after the conference as I was getting a quick work out in asking me when I was going to be home so we could get to the party.  Ultimately, she decided to go separately with the kids and I met her there.  She was genuinely concerned that I would end up no showing, as she should have been, but I actually showed up and spent a decent amount of time at the party. The party was so painful that to avoid small talk I opted to carve my kids pumpkins.  The host of the party provided the pumpkin carving tool that has an orange handle and a blade made to look like a miniature hacksaw but with the cutting ability of a marshmallow.  It was cold on Saturday and the harvest party was in a barn, as I pulled the guts out of the pumpkins my hands began to freeze up to the point it was painful, but you know what it wasn’t quite as painful as?  Small talk with people I had never met before.  What’s even worse is Shirley knows I hate people and I hate small talk, so she really tries to compensate for my disdain for everything by trying to interject me into conversations she is having with people where I am nearby.  As if she can somehow force small talk on me, now I know how she feels when I get all handsy before bed time and she already has her bite splint in.  (There is only one thing sexier than a bite splint, a C-PAP).

Fortunately for me Aiden had a halloween party of his own that he had to attend with a friend who had invited him over for a sleepover.  Also, and this may pay off in spades in the future, Aiden hates being trapped at places he doesn’t want to be at almost as much as I do and he was quite antsy to leave the harvest party so he could go to his friends house.

As I was about to leave with Aiden I was introduced to Tim by Shirley, Tim seemed like a nice guy and he was also an attorney but we ended up caught in an awkward moment where it was just he and I.  I was struggling to come up with a topic of conversation and ended up asking him if the movie theatre was now open downtown, pretty fucking random if you ask me, but I panicked.  He said it was and that led to more conversation about downtown development and the overall growth of Grand Rapids.  It was the epitome of why I hate small talk, it was forced and completely boring.  Nothing against Tim, but there is a moniker of familiarity I need with someone before I can bust out the A material and really turn on the charm.

Sunday was fairly uneventful and it was good that I had over 48 hours to recover from the harvest party prior to attending Neal’s birthday party.  The party was at Vitale’s on Fulton and they had M-43 on tap, I was tempted to go buy a growler or two and have the bartender fill them up for me so I could truly get my money’s worth.  It was the rare occasion where I was punctual and Shirley was no where to be found when I walked into the party, nor was anyone else I knew, at least anyone that I wanted to see.  I ended up getting to Neal without the benefit of Shirley by my side to force the small talk in a completely lame direction.  So, I asked him about Disney, Neal loves Disney and admitted to going at least three times in one year, I bet he can’t wait for their streaming service to come out.  As the subject of Disney hung in the air Neal spotted someone much more important than me and was swooped away by their importance.  Nice talking to you Neal!

Neal and I attend the same church so it wasn’t the first time we had been caught in awkward conversation neither one of us knowing how to end it but both of us hoping it would end as soon as possible, and it was this common bond, Ada Bible Church that brought me great trepidation.  The head pastor of our church walked into the party, whenever I walk by him at church I get star struck and don’t know what to say to him so I just smile and make weird noises that could possibly be construed as a greeting.  It’s similar to what happened when I met Jay Mohr at a comedy show, celebrities and pastors are the worst.  At that point and until I left the party my main goal was to avoid talking to my pastor or coming within ten feet of him.  Mission accomplished.

Shortly after I made it home my in laws walked in the door, they were flying to Phoenix on Tuesday and obviously I put very little thought to the negative consequences of living 5 minutes from the airport when we bought our current house.  Shirley’s family fly more than a commercial pilot and there is always someone who needs a ride to the airport.  I don’t have a problem bringing people to the airport but for the fact that 99% of the time her family schedules their flight for 5am so they can get to wherever they are going and have a full day of leisure.  Waking up at the butt crack of dawn isn’t as painful when you are going on vacation, but when you have a full day of basketball, water skiing, and golf ahead of you it’s quite exhausting.

Ultimately I ended up in my bedroom listening to the Pistons game on my tune in app due to the fact that Dish Network is in a contract dispute with all the local fox sports stations so I couldn’t watch them on tv  (dish is almost as awful as pastors and celebrities).   I told the kids I was coming back down for them at 8:15 to get them for bed but once I got up to my room the solitary nature of my existence precluded me from getting my kids in a timely fashion.  Boy did I catch shit when I was still up in my room was Shirley arrived home.  After a tongue lashing (although when I come home from events and the kids are still up past what would be perceived a reasonable bedtime, I don’t give a shit) I was able to restrain myself from lashing out and just took the beating.  However, Parker came up to me a few minutes later and said “mom called you an asshole”.   Shirley claimed she mouthed it to her mom (I don’t know why that was necessary my mother in law already knows I am an asshole) and Parker saw her when she did it.  For some reason I was fine with it and was still able to maintain a level head.  However, a few minutes later she got on me about ignoring my in laws and going up to our bedroom.   While Shirley and I don’t fight that frequently and if we do I’m the one who brings the heat, on this particular occasion she brought me to my knees with mere words “way to go Seth”

For the most part I live a life where Shirley lets me do as I please.  On top of that my job provides me the flexibility to engage in my hobbies while Shirley is at work and has no idea what I am doing. Fortunately her job keeps her busy enough that she rarely utilizes the find my friends app during the day, because if she did there could be problems were she to discover I am at MVP sportsplex and the Thornapple River more than I am at my office.  Regardless, I still realize that it is special when my entire family leaves for an extended period of time, I would imagine it’s similar to how my life was when I was single, unfortunately that was so long ago I can’t generate any useful memories to help me appreciate how awesome life was without kids.  So, instead I have to base it upon a couple weeks back when Shirley left for the UP with the kids on a Tuesday night.  The next day I played 28 holes of golf with my buddy at Pilgrim’s run, lost $160 to him, broke my 4 and 7 iron, and told him on the way home I was never golfing again.   It was a great day.  (The following Monday before golf league I went to Dick’s sporting goods and picked up a new set of irons, they were half off and the guy asked me if I had tried them out some where else, my response was no should I have?  If you new my wife you would understand where my compulsive purchasing comes from)

On top of the golf I also went skiing the Tuesday night they left to celebrate their departure and make sure I got the most of their absence.  On that Thursday I went up to my buddies cottage and went wake boarding.  On top of all the activities I engaged in, I also slept like a baby, there is something to be said about sleeping in a house alone and I was deeply saddened when it all came to an end, and boy did it.

The reason I couldn’t join them for their trip to the UP was due to a hearing I had on a rape case out of Kalamazoo that Friday.  The case involves three guys allegedly raping a female student in her dorm in 2008, it’s complete bullshit and the alleged victim was a whore according to multiple sources (unfortunately that probably won’t get in at trial).  But that’s not the point of this all, the point is I had to head from Kalamazoo to Drummond Island to meet up with the fam.  We were staying at my buddies place on an Island just off Drummond and I arrived up there around 8pm.  I was immediately accosted by a 10 year old named Reece who for some reason took  a liking to me.  I had met Reece once before when I went for dinner at his parents house, I don’t remember him paying much attention to me that night but for some reason he couldn’t stop asking me question after question.

A common theme of his questioning was regarding my bro top.  One of his first questions was why I wear tank tops, at the time I didn’t respond but it seems fairly obvious, they are as comfortable as a bubble bath and they accentuate my chest hair.  That being said, I don’t particularly care for other people’s kids, to be honest I rarely care for adults and often times have trouble paying attention to what they say, kids have nothing worthwhile to say and as hard as it is for me to fein interest in adults, I don’t even bother trying with kids.  On top of that, I typically give off a vibe that is the opposite of welcoming, but this kid wasn’t getting it and he continued to hound me all weekend with his questions.  One of the highlights was when his parents and I were discussing Universal Studios and how much it suck.   The topic turned to Disney and how they have gone all in on Star Wars.  I said “who cares about Star Wars anymore?  My kids don’t, no one is interested in Star Wars”. Well my buddy Reese was donning a Star Wars swim shirt and standing 18 inches away from me when I made that statement.  Needless to say he went all Chewbacca on my ass, unfortunately it wasn’t enough to deter him from thinking I was the greatest person on the island that weekend.

The problem I have in going on these types of trips is that I am weird, my wiring is a little off and I always have to be doing something (I think my mom is to blame for this, thanks Ardis!). The place we went was set up for sitting around and relaxing, to get to it you had to take a boat from Drummond Island and there were no roads or trails, just a place to dock your boat.  Needless to say I felt trapped, where was I going to go for a run?  Eventually the writing on the wall became clear, I wasn’t going for a run and I was going to have to try and relax and enjoy the nothingness.  This may have been possible had there not been 6 boys on the Island ranging from 18 months to 10 years (Reese).  It was three families and one family (our host) had two boys, 18 months and another one two years older.  None of the older kids wanted to play with the 3 year old because he was a raging ass hole.  He would hit the kids and harass them and then he would flip out because they wouldn’t’ want to play with him.  One of the kids called him a jerk and he started singing “I’m a jerk, I’m a jerk” hopefully his self awareness improves with age.

Now, typically I am all about terrible parenting, but that is only when it makes me feel superior to other parents and has no impact on my actual life.  My buddies parenting style was putting a serious crimp on things.  It was so bad that when we were eating breakfast Aiden said to the entire table “you know what I hate about Sha….” I cut him off before he could reveal it to the entire table.  His brother I nicknamed Rooster because every morning the little fucker would wake up at 7 and start screaming at the top of his lungs waking everyone in the cabin up, what a dick.  One morning Parker started yelling at him to shut up, it told Parker it was pointless the kid is too little to understand that you hate him for what he is doing and it won’t deter his actions.

Having drove up by myself I could leave on Sunday as soon as someone was willing to ferry me over to Drummond Island, everyone could see I was quite antsy to get the hell out of there so my buddy brought me to Drummond fairly early. The original plan was for the kids to ride with Shirley and me to fly solo, however Aiden confided in me that he couldn’t wait to get off the Island either and was eager to return home to his electronics and newly purchased lizard named Oscar (that’s probably another blog).  So, we hit the road about three hours ahead of everyone else.  FREEDOM!

I have blogged more than once about how I despise camping, unfortunately my wife romanticizes her childhood camping experiences and thinks our kids, while being miserable during the actual camping experience, will look back fondly upon it when they are adults just like she does.  That being said, I decided to take one for the team and plan a camping trip to end the summer.  However, this camping trip was going to be on a lake with a slalom course and I was going to bring my boat, it had all the ingredients for  a successful camping trip?

We ended up getting to the campground on Wednesday night.  My father in law pulled the fifth wheel Shirley’s grandparents bought in 1998 with Shirley and the kids.  I drove separately because I was towing my boat and I managed to beat everyone to the campground.  The particular campground we were at was run by Muskegon County so my expectations were tempered to say the least, however it was the only campground right on the lake.  When I arrived I was pleasantly surprised to see the campground was sparsely populated.  There were tents at one end of the campground (the slums) and there were a few campers and fifth wheels at the other end.  However, there was no one in the office and I didn’t remember which lot we were on so we decided to just pick the best one and hope for the best.  (turns out we picked the wrong lot but they let us stay on it anyway)

The weather wasn’t great that night so we didn’t have a campfire but we were able to get set up.  However, Big Al (my father in law) didn’t get one of the front jacks all the way down so anytime I moved around when I was sleeping it felt like the fifth wheel was going to roll over on it’s side.  (Obviously sex was out of the question for a number of reasons but that was one of them). I woke up at 3 am and couldn’t get back to sleep for at least two hours, I was beginning to deeply regret the decision to camp.  The next day the we got up and cooked breakfast and the kids camping acquaintance, who would later go by the nickname Benjamin Button, rolled in to our campsite (he was quite portly) and the kids within minutes of hanging out with him told them he wasn’t their friend and they didn’t like him.  My kids aren’t very discerning so for them not to like someone usually means they are incredibly annoying (I don’t even think Shirley liked him and she likes everyone), and this kid was.  While I was happy that the campground was 40% full the downside was that other kids were not readily available to play with my kids meaning I had to entertain them.

There was a playground that consisted of a slide, a set of monkey bars, and a volleyball court with a net that was 4 and a half feet high (exactly what you would expect from a campground run by muskegon county).  The kids and I along with Benjamin Button took a stab at volleyball ( I bought a volleyball at Walmarts that morning because Parker wanted to play it, or so he said).  The volleyball scrimmage lasted roughly 3 minutes and then it was on to the monkey bars.  Parker was all over them climbing up and down with no problems, Aiden on the other hand has the upper body strength of Manatee and needed my help getting on the monkey bars, the same could be said for Benjamin Button.  He asked me to help him on the bars and there were two things that popped into my head: 1. he’s really fat and looks heavy 2. he’s not my kid.  In a moment of complete lack of foresight I lifted him on to the monkey bars and it was like trying to hoist a bag of concrete over my head.

Benjamin Button would go on to ride his scooter shirtless and shoeless and crash right by our campsite rendering him completely incapacitated but still able to follow us around and bug the shit out of us.  However, the crash would happen after he  stalked our campsite as we were leaving for Silver Lake sand dunes and proceed to hang out by our trailer as we left instead of going back to the slums.    Fortunately he wasn’t there when we got back from silver lake and his family was set to head back to Ohio the next day.  Ultimately I ended up heading back home for the night so I could get a decent nights sleep and retrieve some of the things we needed from home.  I didn’t wake up once during the night and was completely refreshed by the time I returned to the campground. We goofed around a bit more and ended up going fishing with Benjamin Button bothering us the entire time up until his departure back to the Buckeye state.  He actually asked both Parker and Aiden as well as myself  to go back to his tent and get his fishing pole for him because he was too injured to retrieve his rod.  We just ignored him.

With Benjamin Button out of our hair we decided to launch my boat and take advantage of the all sports lake we were camping on.  The weather wasn’t great but that didn’t stop the Jansma’s from tearing it up on the lake.  We first took the kids tubing but they grew  dissatisfied with the tubes in less than ten minutes.  However we also had a wakeboard and knee board on the boat and Aiden was the first one to take a crack at the wakeboard, managing to get up for an extended period of time after three tries.  Parker was next and instantly began to negotiate some type of reward for trying to wakeboard. Being exemplary parents we immediately told him we had a deal and that he could get a toy if he tried.  After three pretty weak attempts he was back in the boat crying about how hard it was.  We decided to bring the boat in and hang out at the campsite hoping that Parker could get a nap in before we hit the Getty 4 (drive in theatre in Muskegon).

Eventually he fell asleep and was down for a couple hours sleeping so long that we ate hobo pies made on the campfire without him.  Ultimately he woke up just as were finishing dinner.  While he was eating the song “Old Town Road” came up for some reason.  I asked Parker how he knew about that song and he said his friend Greyson likes it.  I had never fully listened to the song but thought that one of the lyrics was “going to take my horse to the old hotel, going to ride it until I can’t ride anymore”  due to the fact that I think about sex 99% of the time I figured it was in reference to the singer banging a prostitute at a hotel.  Boy was I off on that one.  On our way to the drive in we attempted to pull it up on youtube and play it on my blue tooth in the car, the lyrics are much more innocuous than I had originally thought and the video is quite solid.  Shirley watched it once an Parker watched it twice.

(The next morning I woke up with Old Town Road in my head and couldn’t get it out, the song is good but not Jonas brothers “sucker for you” good)

The Getty 4 if you haven’t been is like being put into a time capsule, if felt like the late 80’s possibly early 90’s, it was great.  The only problem is they don’t start the movie until it is as dark as your closet with the door shut and lights off, so 9:45 ish this time of year.  This meant that the movie didn’t get done until 11:15, all the movies are double features so we could have gone from Angry birds to Toy Story 4 but instead we went back to the campground quite exhausted, so exhausted that I had a decent nights sleep in the camper.  (on the day of the year with the most sunlight I am guessing the final movie is wrapping up right around dawn)

It was already Saturday (I don’t usually say already about anything when I am camping, it’s usually “it’s finally”) and time was flying by a bit too fast.  I had arranged to ski the slalom course with a guy I knew from the lake and when I got back there was a guy at the beach of the campground who asked if I was out there skiing.  I told him I was just as Shirley rolled up, I asked her if she could pull me bare footing (She had almost killed me once when she pulled me before we were married  so obviously I was desperate for a driver).  She hesitated a bit and the complete stranger piped in saying “I can pull you”.  I responded “sure”.  (you are only going 40mph on water with no skis, what could go wrong?  A lot of things have in the almost 30 years I have been bare footing).  I showed the guy where  the driver’s seat was and we were off, well that’s how I was going to do it, but he suggested he take the boat for a brief spin before he actually pulled me bare footing.  I was hesitant because I didn’t want him creating waves but I decided a test drive was probably in my best interest.  He passed the test drive portion of the exam and ended up pulling me bare footing without any problems.

 

After returning from the barefoot run we made breakfast and then we did what good parents do when kids are disenchanted with something they already have, we bought them something to replace it with.  The tubes were just not working for Aiden and Parker, they were single adult tubes and the kids (and Shirley) wanted the flat two person tubes.  Shirley located an online coupon for one that could be utilized at the Dunham’s in Fremont.  I took the kids with me so that Shirley could tidy up the campsite.  Unfortunately, the Dunhams in Fremont did not have the two person tubes but I was not going to let that stand in the way of my kid’s happiness, I bought a four person flat tube. Game On!  After stopping at Meijers for alcohol, supplies, and Starbucks we headed back to the campground for a delightful afternoon, the kids tubed for six minutes, Aiden wakeboarded, and Parker tried to kneeboard, only this time we didn’t incentivize it so he gave up even quicker than when he tried to wakeboard.  While trailering my boat back to GR in a monsoon the following day wasn’t much fun, the trip was a success, by no means will I agree to buy a camper (that doesn’t mean I won’t come home someday to find one parked in our driveway) but camping once a summer is right up my alley.

The last week of June the Jansma’s headed out west for a family vacation with all of Shirley’s immediate family.  Our family left on Friday and flew in to Bozeman Montana and stayed in the Big Sky area on Friday night.  Most people look forward to vacation, but I am not most people and I was somewhat dreading the trip since I hate leaving Michigan in the summer since that is the best time to be in Michigan.  On top of that I am quite into my routines, such as playing basketball every day, water skiing every day, and golfing in my golf league every week.  Being forced out of my routine when combined with having to stay in the same house with my Vegan brother-in-law was a recipe for disaster.  On top of the selflessness I was going to have to display if the trip was to have any hope of turning out well, the weather was going to be a key factor in determining the success of the vacation.  When we left Michigan on that Friday it was finally getting nice, what a surprise, and when we woke up in Montana on Saturday morning it was snowing.  That was a gut punch and my mood was worsening by the minute.  We loaded up to head to our place in Idaho and we were set to be the first family to arrive.  That was the one positive about arriving early, we would get to claim the best room.  When we arrived at the house I put our bags in the room that had it’s own bathroom.  There were three bedrooms and only one of them had its own bathroom.  The other bathroom was to be shared by everyone else.

When I go on vacation the first thing that needs to be figured out is what is the sex situation.  In my mind having my own on suite was going to give me the best opportunity for frequent sex on the vacation.  Unfortunately, Shirley is not nearly as focused on the vacation sex situation, she may actually be the exact opposite, and she immediately told me that Meth and Jori should get the on suite because they have a baby.  In my mind, and  said “fuck that” (it may have also been verbalized) and our first argument of the vacation ensued.  It isn’t so much that I though I should have the master suite, if my other sister in law and brother in law had claimed it I would have been fine with it, but Meth and Jori?  They do nothing to contribute and they are the cheapest people I know, always going the extra mile not to pay for shit.  However, Shirley dropped the bomb on me that her parents were paying for the house and even I couldn’t continue to argue against the room being given to someone else at that point.

What do you know, Meth and Jori, the most undeserving of all of us, ended up with the best room.  I went to bed Saturday night in a sour mood and it didn’t improve on Sunday when all 8 adults and six kids ventured off into Yellowstone.  I took the lead because I am a D, that’s a personality type where you are awesome and because you are awesome you need to be the leader.  On top of that, Shirley’s sister, Jori drives like a 95 year old women and there was no way I was letting her lead the way.  Surprisingly, we ended up getting separated and didn’t arrive at Old Faithful in a sequence.  This was troubling to certain people in the group regardless of how unrealistic it is to be able to remain sequential when you are traveling for an hour to get to your destination.  Of course the fact that we were separated was my fault because I am an awesome driver and was able to maneuver my way through slow moving traffic.  We ended up getting to our destination well before everyone else.  I was under whelmed by old faithful, it was a giant parking lot with a bunch of touristy shit, and the weather was 58 degrees and cloudy.  Eventually everyone made it and we ate sandwiches in the parking lot, but mainly everyone besides me just dip shitted around.  I was losing my mind, I can’t just sit around, I need to be doing things, accomplishing things, moving towards a goal, and that was not even close to happening.

I went ahead in an attempt to get people motivated to get moving but it did no good.  Old Faithful is a giant geyser  and there are a bunch of other hot springs geysers around it.  It’s pretty much barren land with hot springs all over the place.  The sad truth is once you see one hot spring you have pretty much seen them all and I wanted to move on to something more picturesque.  The problem was that Old Faithful wasn’t set to blow for another hour give or take 20 minutes so we were trapped there waiting for it to go off.  Ultimately I went on a short hike on my own to get a better vantage point that was roughly 200 feet above the geyser.  I did this for two reasons 1. To get a better vantage point.  2. to get away from everyone.   It took roughly another hour after the geyser went off to get everyone rounded up and heading to another attraction.  The next attraction was another hot spring, the grand prismatic hot spring, it was the quintessential hot spring for those who are in to hot springs, which I am not.  It was also very touristy and there were a ton of Asian tourists there.  I am just pointing out an observation about the Asian tourists, they don’t get out of your way, they are every where and they just push and shove and have no concept of what lines are meant for.  My brother spent a couple weeks in Beijing and told me there is no such thing as lines there.  Can you imagine not having lines?

Ultimately we made it back to our place and I was at an all time low.  Shirley headed up to sleep with the kids in the loft and I was about ready to book a return flight to GR for the next day.  She came back, we had it out, and I admitted I was being an asshole but told her I couldn’t climb out of the very dark place I was in due to the fact that I was on a vacation with her entire family and some of the logistics were making it intolerable.  The next day thanks to an early morning run and some CBD oil from my brother in law, things went much better and I was in a generally good mood the entire day.  My mood led to Shirley sleeping in our bedroom that night which put me in a good mood the next day as well.  We both decided that we needed some time with just our family and decided to do a 4 mile hike with our kids.  I was the bearer of bad news and went up to the loft to tell the kids.  Parker took it fairly well but you would have thought I told Aiden I was bringing him to wrestle a grizzly bear.  He lost his mind and said he wanted to be with Bennett (his 7 year old cousin who is almost as dorky as he is).  We made the kids go on the hike anyway and it was a success.

That entire day Meth was in his bedroom streaming television shows. He only left the room for meals and didn’t converse with any one.  Not only was the threat to sexy time problematic with me not getting that room, he was monopolizing one of the two bathrooms that were available.  On top of that, Meth and Jori wanted to go back to see the Grand Prismatic spring since it was hard to see on Sunday due to the cold temperatures that created a lot of steam.  I had looked at the weather and it wasn’t a real good forecast and besides if I saw another hot spring before I died it would be too soon.  I suggested to the group that we go down to the Grand Tetons and Jackson Hole where the weather was suppose to be 80 and sunny.  Jori immediately indicated that that wouldn’t work but still went in to the bedroom to discuss it with Meth.  She came out and instantly said no, we aren’t doing that.  Shirley and I were a unified front and had agreed we weren’t going back to Yellowstone.  So, my in laws along with the my cool brother in law and Shirley’s sister had a choice to make.  In my mind the choice was easy, hang out with a super fun guy or a moldy turd with so many psychological issues Freud wouldn’t even know where to begin.  Everyone decided to join us and we left early Wednesday morning for Jackson Hole.  Once we left I am quite certain Meth made his way out of the bedroom and was finally at ease.

It was an amazing day, we hiked around Jenny Lake in the Grand Tetons and had wonderful weather.   The in Laws took the kids on the ferry across the lake so they didn’t have to do the entire hike and we finished up the hike with just the four adults.  We had made the right choice coming to Jackson Hole and it was fairly obvious why the rich and famous gravitate towards Jackson Hole.  On the way home from Jackson Hole it was getting to be dusk as we approached where we were staying, I looked to the left and slammed on my brakes.  There was a moose in a marsh with a calf and it was the first legitimate wild life I had viewed on the trip, if you don’t count squirrels, buffalo, and chipmunks as legitimate wild life, which I don’t.  Luckily the guy behind me was able to avoid rear ending me and we stopped to get some pictures of the moose and its calf.  Bennett and Aiden were in the back seat playing on their devices and the only way we could have gotten them to put their tablets away and show any interest is if we had told them the Super Mario Bros. were out in the field.

That night we got back late and the moldy turd had already retreated to his bedroom making it an even better day than I thought was even possible.  However, it was my turn to sleep in the loft with the kids and I was about to experience one of the worst nights of sleep I had ever encountered.  It was me, Parker, Amy (Shirley’s sister) and Jori (Shirley’s other sister) along with her five year old daughter who still says “Momma, I hungry” (when I am criticizing your parenting you know you aren’t doing an adequate job). In addition, Bennett was also sleeping in the loft.  I fell asleep with my air pods in (most amazing purchase ever, I’m not sure how I made it through life before I had air pods) but woke up and took them out.  Unfortunately, Amy was snoring and so was Jori.  I tossed and turned for at least an hour if not more and decided to head to the main house to switch spots with Shirley.  Shirley begrudgingly went up to the loft since there was no way her, Aiden and I could all sleep in the bed together.  The only problem is her dad was on the pull out couch snoring his ass off and her brother in law was next door doing the same thing.  I am sure I am not alone in feeling this way, when you have someone snoring and they are keeping you from falling asleep, you hate that person immediately no matter who they are.

Shirley wears a C-Pap so that she doesn’t snore any more, but back in the day prior to the C-Pap when she use to snore I would dry hump the bed to get her to stop, couldn’t really do that with either of my sister in law’s, my father in law or my brother in law.  I managed to eventually fall asleep, but the next day was quite rough.  Fortunately, we didn’t really have any major plans the next day and I could go at my own pace, after a leisurely breakfast I  made my way out of the house and took off for a run around a nearby river.  As I was jogging and listening to the Bill Simmons podcast on my headphones something attacked me, or at least that is what I thought was happening.  An over exuberant Golden Retriever had come running up on me and with my headphones going I couldn’t hear it. When it’s wet nose hit my leg I thought it was a bear trying to maul me and that I was going to die.

Thursday night Meth and Jori headed to Bozeman where they had rented a hotel.  Their flight left at 11 am on Friday and the two hour drive was more than they could even dream of bearing  in the morning so they left the night before.  I wasn’t  going to try and convince them to stay, and freeing up the extra bedroom significantly improved the sleeping arrangements.  The next day was the whitewater rafting trip my brother in law Shawn and I had arranged prior to the trip.  We were rafting on the snake river outside of Jackson Hole in class 2 and 3 rapids.  The day was another glorious day, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and blue contrast of the sky with the mountains was majestic.  We took a 45 minute bus ride out to the launching spot and I noticed there was a fairly attractive mom with her husband and what appeared to be kids who were roughly in their late teens.  When we were assigned our rafts that family was put in ours and my brother in law and I were the bread for the hot mom sandwich, what a day!  Could our luck get any better?  Yes, it could, we landed an attractive river boat guide as well.  The only thing that could have improved the trip is if the Swedish bikini team magically appeared.  The whitewater rafting experience was beyond words, it was probably a top five all time day with the list as follows:

5. White water rafting trip

4 and 3 are a tie with the birth of both of my kids (Parker my youngest would probably be 3 knowing what I know now but at the time of both of their births it was a toss up)

2. My Wedding Day

1.Jerry Lykins leaving our law firm (biggest Douche ever)

Turns out the river boat guide married another guide who was one of the bus drivers.  Our bus had two 8 people boats and then a 20 person boat filled with teenage boys.  They weren’t as good about keeping their fondness for Heather to themselves as my brother in law and I were.  When we got back on the bus to head back they asked our bus driver if he was married to Heather (I think they were going to stampede him if he said yes) but he said no he wasn’t and that she had turned him down, all of them chimed in and said she had turned them down as well.  Teenage boys are the worst, hard to believe I am only a few years away from having a pair of my own.  When we got back in to Jackson Hole Shawn and I found a bar and as we were kicking back having a couple beers Shawn got a text from his wife Amy that they had saw a bear while hiking.  Apparently, everyone hiking on the trail had bear spray but them, and the kids were running off in front of the adults until Shirley, Amy and their mom finally realized that wasn’t such a good idea.   I would have had no reservations about being on the hike because I am 100% sure I could outrun my mother-in-law even if I was carrying both of my kids.

Friday is going to be a big day for the Jansma’s as well as many other families with school aged children, it’s the last day of school for many of the kids in West Michigan and Parker has been invited over to a friend’s “cottage”for an over night with some other friends of his.  Apparently the family has a shack on Lake Macatawa, a plane, and a boat with a basement where the kids can have pillow fights according to Parker.  In 10 years that boat basement will be used for a lot more than pillow fights.  Regardless, I like where Parker’s mind is at, make friends with the rich kids, while it will create a bit of jealousy that will be coupled with animosity down the road as Parker ages, the benefits of hanging out with a rich kid far surpass any ill will you may have for them for being born into a wealthy family.

When I was in high school I had a friend whose family was well off, he was kind of annoying and his mom was completely bonkers (so we had something in common) but he was rich so I was willing to overlook those shortcomings to get a window into the lifestyle of the well off, and his family had a satellite dish, not one of those that you put on your roof, no this thing was ginormous and looked liked something you would use to navigate an unmanned  spacecraft that was millions of miles away, we used to watch dirty channels, which in my mind was much better use.

On the way to school this week we were discussing Parker’s overnight and the question was asked about what his friend’s dad does for a living (his mom works at Amway so I wasn’t being a misogynist).  Parker piped in and said “his dad’s name is Rob and he probably rob’s banks.”  Well, I met Rob and no such luck, while I didn’t ask him what he does for a living, he doesn’t strike me as the type of guy who lives life on the edge robbing banks in dead president’s masks, surfing, and partying like Patrick Swayze did in Point Break, to say I was disappointed when I met Rob is a serious understatement.

With Parker being away with actual friends, we need to provide Aiden with the allusion that he also has friends so he invited one of his classmates over to our house for a play date.  The kid is the son of one of my buddies who I play basketball with and also occasionally go up to his cottage so I can utilize his super awesome wake surfing boat (the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree).  He also happens to be the husband of a certain “professional” photographer, but no need to rehash all of that, I never responded to her email and am hoping she has forgotten all about the photos shoot I signed up for.  So, while the kid coming over Friday is much cooler than Aiden, he has to come over for a number of obvious reasons despite the fact that he probably had much better offers on the table.

Speaking of doing something that you don’t want to do, Shirely’s entire immediate family, including my Vegan brother in law who is borderline agoraphobic, have signed up for an adventure to Yellowstone park where we will be staying in a house that allegedly sleeps 14 people.

https://evolvevacationrental.com/430143

I can already tell by the pictures that it is going to be cramped quarters in Yellowstone and the fact that I get annoyed by my wife’s family when they are staying at my house, which is significantly larger than the one we are renting, leaves me concerned about how this trip is going to play out.  I have already told my in laws that I will be blowing up at least once on this trip, if not more, so they shouldn’t be caught too off guard when it happens, but it really isn’t them that I am worried about.  It’s my neurotic brother in law.  I have tried as hard as I can to accept all of his many flaws (they are even more evident due to the fact that I am perfect) but the problem is he isn’t the type of person I would ever choose to spend time with and I am not someone he would want to spend time with, a fact that he has made abundantly clear.  Even when I have been at his fortress of solitude (his house) dropping something off or picking up one of our kids, he goes out of his way to hide so that he doesn’t have to interact with me.  So, why not spend an entire week with him, what could possibly go wrong?  You know what?  Fuck that guy, but the problem is I can’t have that attitude because it will result in to ruining a vacation that I am actually looking forward to despite some of the fairly obvious reasons I shouldn’t be.

My other brother in law who is married to Shirley’s other sister and lives in Phoenix, roughly 2,000 miles away, the brother in law whom I have interacted with more this year than the one who lives 12 miles from me, feels the same way I do. Conveniently, and out of no where, my mother in law started a group text with me, Shirley, my two brother in laws, and my two sister in laws about our upcoming trip.  My brother in law hates group texts almost as much as he hates meat and leaving his house, so it was a shock that my mother in law put him on the text string.  However, Shawn (my cool brother in law) and I saw this as an opportunity to try and convince my other brother in law that Yellowstone wasn’t the place for him.  I put a link to a Yellowstone helicopter tour and Shawn put a link to a place where you can go axe throwing near Yellowstone.  On top of that, we had already brought up Whitewater rafting as a day excursion we all could do.  Unfortunately, as of yesterday it appears that LFBIL (least favorite brother in law, not to be confused with MLFBIL most least favorite brother in law) will be going on the trip.  He had been setting the stage for a back out, but now it appears he is fully committed.  I think the only way he doesn’t go is if he somehow comes across this blog but based upon the fact there are more people going on the Yellowstone trip with me than actually read this blog, I don’t see that happening.  However, I am willing to suffer the consequences if it does.

 

 

Yesterday on the way to the Mary Free Bed YMCA Aiden asked me how to spell fought, I actually had to think about it for a second and my initial response was going to be fau… but then I caught myself and relayed the proper spelling to him.  He is in second grade and is starting to write, the story he was working on was about a restaurant called Ichiban where there is a horse that itches your butt for you.  Alarming that I would second guess myself when it comes to spelling a basic word like fought but the reality is that I would be in a real pickle if it weren’t for spell check.  At least once a week I try to type a word and the response when I click on it from spell check is “no suggestion”.  That’s bad when you’ve butchered a word to the point that not even a computer can figure out what you are trying to spell.  When this happens I typically Google my spelling and it will come up with the proper spelling of the word, or if I am feeling particularly lazy I will just use a different word that I can spell well enough to at least get a suggestion from spell check.

We were on our way to the Y for Aiden’s basketball class and for Parker’s T-ball game.  It was picture day and on picture day they want you to show up a half hour before the game’s scheduled start which was 5:15.  We showed up at 5:15 and I was able to run Parker out to the field for the team picture just in the nick of time.  The professional photographer was snapping a way while a few savvy parents (me included) were taking pics with their phones.  After the team photo the photographer said “those of you who haven’t had their individual pictures taken come on over here” yeah right, I can take a picture of my kid in his t-ball jersey whenever I want and that’s only if I want some memento of the complete cluster fuck that is 4-6 year old T-ball.  I only took the team picture with my phone because Shirley wanted me to, if Donald Trump threw banning T-ball on his platform along with getting rid of the USPS I’d vote for him this time around, even if he still thought the wall was plausible and continued to remind us all of its necessity on a daily basis. (that’s how much t-ball sucks)

In the beginning of the season I helped out with coaching.  The first half of the time spent was dedicated to teaching them the fundamentals.  One time I had Parker, his friend, and two random kids.  One of the randoms either had no dad or his dad was a quadriplegic because he had no idea how to throw a ball.  After multiple attempts of trying to show him the proper throwing technique I took his glove away and lit it on fire.  The funny thing is, the other random was smaller than him and claimed he was four years old, the kid was throwing missiles at me with perfect form.  The fielding practice would have been problematic for most but since I have the patience of Job it went smoothly.  However, even with my positive attitude and unlimited patience, it was a struggle during the batting portion of T-ball.  I was assigned to help the kids bat which meant getting them set up and putting their hands in the proper position to swing at the ball.  Some of the kids stood facing the opposite direction of the tee, those kids should have been sent straight to the special olympics tryouts.  Other kids would swing at the ball, which wasn’t moving it was on a tee, and miss the ball by eight inches to a foot and either swing over it or hit the tee so the ball  would only go a foot or two at the most.  All of the fielders would come running at the ball like a pack of hyenas and I would have to tell them to stop and go back so we could do it all over again.  However, with me being the guy handling the kids who were batting I was the one who decided if the play continued or if there would be a do over.  Whenever a kid hit it well, even if it was 30 feet foul my reaction would be “RUN! RUN! RUN!’ so that we could get through the entire lineup and get the hell out of there.

Of course there was another reason to expedite things other than trying to maintain the shred of sanity I still have, snack time, that’s right, every kids sporting event now is concluded with snack time.  How did this happen?  When I was growing up we didn’t have parents assigned to bringing snacks.  My parents rarely showed up to my games, so had they been assigned a snack time there would have been a lot of disappointed kids.  The only thing we had to look forward to was going out to ice cream once a season after a win.  Unfortunately, when I was on McDonald plumbing we didn’t have any wins, but we did have a tie and that was when we got to go out for ice cream.  The thing I don’t get about snack time is the shit parents bring is all the same shit my kids eat on a regular basis or turn their noses up on a regular basis, but its like Christmas for them every time snack time rolls around and they get a bag of skinny pop popcorn and a Capri sun.

I think a lot of parents are like me, they just aren’t as open about it, sporting activities for kids who can’t even read or write are a waste of time.  On top of it, spring sports are dicey when you are dealing with Michigan weather that is not conducive to any type of outdoor activity other than if you were to go outside and hang yourself.  I know I”m right because I have heard many parents say “I hope it gets rained out” in reference to a child’s sporting activity.  You would rather have shitty weather than go to your kid’s sporting event?  WOW!

I’m burying this part of my blog deep, just to make sure the person I am referencing doesn’t find out about this.  Back to the team photo, while the photo I took of the team was great for one reason and only one reason, it was free, the guy who was the professional undoubtedly took a much better photo than I did.  However, as indicated I don’t want a memory of t-ball.  The reality is it takes a lot of training and practice to be good at photography, a fact I wish I would have known a couple weeks ago.  Mothers day was this past weekend and in the past I have taken the kids for a photo shoot as a Mother’s Day present since Shirley is even more compulsive than I am when it comes to buying whatever her heart desires.  Sadly, my buddy’s wife decided to start her own “professional” photography business.  I emailed her and asked her to send me something I could put in a card for Cara and committed to a photo shoot with her.  Sunday morning on the way to church it was sitting on my seat so I gave it to Shirley and said “Happy Mother’s Day!”  The response was less than inspiring “I don’t want to do that, she doesn’t take good photos”.   Shirley then located some of her work contained in an online album and I immediately knew I had made an epic mistake.

I was really hoping in the chaos that is her life she would forget about the photo shoot, no such luck, I was sent an email with an invoice and a request for times that would work for the photo shoot.  Shit!  I give her credit for her entrepreneurial spirit and self confidence, but the reality is it takes a lot of training and experience to get good at taking photos professionally.  When we started our firm we had our secretary take photos for our website and then when we redid the website a few years later we decided to bring in a professional.  The difference between the quality was like the difference between Aiden’s book about a horse that itches your butt for you and a work by Hemingway.  So, do I just suck it up and do the photo shoot with my family?  That’s what Shirley wants to do, but the problem there is I will have endure two photo shoots.  This one and then one to get pictures that Shirley will actually like.  What a dilemma, I have a feeling that doing what I always do, sticking my head in the sand and hoping the problem goes away, isn’t going to work this time.

I have never addressed this topic with anyone so why not throw it out there on a blog?  On a typical morning I am dropping my kids off around 8 am at school give or take 15 to 20 minutes and it’s mostly give.  On my way I have a vente cold brew which will get my system moving if you know what I mean.  By the time I pull into my parking garage I don’t have really big window to get into the office and take care of business.  Frequently I will be on the phone or get a call when nature calls and have often wondered if the person on the other end of the line has any idea what I am up to?  On most occasions I will have completed my task but the conversation is till progressing.  Do I stay on the can until I am done with the call?  Do I leave and come back to flush?  Or, do  I just flush with my outstretched foot so that I put as much distance between the phone and the sound of the flush?

What was shitting like before the advent of the smart phone? I wish I could tell you, but I can’t remember back that far, I honestly wrote it was my 44th birthday this year in my blog yesterday and it was actually number 45.  However, I do recall my grandpa Jansma going into the bathroom to take a dump after work with a newspaper in his arm whenever I was around.  I’m pretty sure, and I could be imagining this, but I think he did the Castanza and took it all off when he was dropping a deuce.  However, he was so hairy that he still gave the appearance that he was wearing a short sleeve sweater (I still have no idea why people wear short sleeve or sleevless sweaters) when he was naked.  When is the last time you have taken a dump without your smart phone?  I’m pretty sure that no study has been done on this, but the occurrence of hemorrhoids has had have increased since Smart Phones came in to play due to the extra time spent on the can perusing your smart phone.  Back in the day you were limited to a newspaper or a magazine, once you completed reading it it was time to get off the shitter, now you can stay entertained for hours on the throne.

Somehow, my phone has gotten into the habit of updating me weekly on my average screen time per day.  The first time I received a notification it claimed I put in 3 hours of screen time per day that week, that seems like a lot, even if they are counting the hour a day my kids are on my phone watching Netflix.  The following week I had it down to under two hours and was feeling quite good about myself until the following week I clocked in at 4 hours a day of screen time.  What counts a screen time?  Am I being penalized for checking my phone every 33 seconds to see if someone has texted me or sent me a new email?  That’s normal right?  I’m not needy because I am constantly monitoring incoming text messages and emails as if there was some life altering news certain to be on its way via my smart phone?  I’d like to think that now that I am rewatching the Sopranos on Amazon Prime that that is why my screen time has jumped to a point where I am spending more time on my phone than everything else I do combined other than sleeping.  However, the four plus hour daily average began before I had the bright idea of rewatching the Sopranos.

What’s even more troubling is that my phone thinks it knows where I am going before I go there.  The sad thing is it is frequently correct in predicting my destination.  However, when I play lunch basketball at the MVP sportsplex it will send me a notification as I am leaving the parking lot that traffic is light and it is a 12 minute drive to the MVP metroplex, I may be in to exercise but even I’m not that compulsive that I would go from one health club to another without eating lunch first.

As indicated previously I am back on the Sopranos and there are a couple notable things that have hit me while doing the rewatch.  First of all, they use newspapers as a prop in many of the scenes.  Secondly, they use pay phones to do all of their privileged communications.  The smartphone has made both of these novelties all but extinct, the newspaper is in such dire need of readership that the Grand Rapids Sunday paper is showing up at my house now and I never subscribed.  Also, the payphone is about as prevalent as a leading female Marvel super hero, there may be one of them in the entire universe and it’s likely to be as useful as Captain Marvel.  Seriously, if you are in a jam who do you want coming to your rescue?  Thor or Captain Marvel?

The smart phone has also transformed the way families socialize with one another.  It use to be that a family would gather together to watch television as a form of socialization, regardless of what was on, you were stuck watching whatever the king of the house decided was going to be on television that night, your other option was to read a book or go to bed early, which explains why shows like Friends were able to be so successful, while the show was awful it beat reading a book or going to bed early.  Now, if you have multiple devices, and who doesn’t, every member of the family can watch their show of choice.  While I always swore I would never have a television in my bedroom because I was beyond stooping to such a level as watching the boob tube while I was in bed waiting to fall asleep, I now watch the Sopranos on my phone in bed trying to keep Shirley from waiting me out.  Advantage Shirley, I’m much more likely to fall asleep against my will when I am positioned in my own bed.  Damn you smart phone maybe you aren’t looking out for my best interest like I thought you were.