• Can’t we all just get along.

    “Daddy, I hate Anthony.”
    “What’s wrong with Anthony?”
    “He says mean things and I don’t like him”
    “Sounds like you and Anthony don’t get along.”
    “I get along just fine daddy. Anthony doesn’t.”

  • Groundbreaking.

    Another first is upon us! We, the members of the Florida Kauffman Family Household (version 2.2**), are intimately familiar with the warm air blowing in the summer phenomenon. Having air conditioning in Florida is like having a public defender when you are falsely accused of a crime and you’re dead broke; you know you need it but you wouldn’t trust it any further than you could carry it. We have just such a relationship with our air conditioner. Rarely has our distrust risen to such heights! On a chilly afternoon, we came home and opened the door. As is the custom, we opened the door and we were greeted with a blast of cold air. But wait, didn’t I say it was a chilly afternoon? Holy wind chill factor Batman, it’s colder inside! How can this be? Elementary, my dear reader; you simply pay someone good money to wire a thermostat incorrectly. You turn on the heat in the morning when you wake up, thinking it is a little chilly. Sure, it’s cold when you wake up, but then you get up and start moving around. You warm yourself up and you don’t even notice that it’s a little cooler inside when you leave. By the time you get home the house is a good ten degrees cooler than it is outside, a crisp 62 degrees (yes, 72 qualifies as chilly in Florida, give it a rest). That’s brisk baby! Our air system was in a feedback loop from hell. The thermostat drops below a temperature, prompting it to turn on the heat. Instead, the cool air comes on, dropping the temperature, ensuring that the “heat” would stay on – FOR ALL ETERNITY (or until we got home).

    Who would have guessed that our air conditioning bill would go through the roof in November? In Florida?***

    ** Note to readers everywhere: due to budget cuts, the fact checker had to be laid off some time ago. Consequently, the author’s current family domicile has been mistakenly referred to as version 2.0, when it is, in fact, version 2.2. The author offers his sincerest apologies.

    *** The author is well aware of the fact that it is more costly, minute to minute, to run the heater than the air conditioner. The key is that this is November and this is Florida. If we run the heat twice in November, it qualifies as a November cold spell of historic proportions.

  • Riding a bike to work.

    Bonk. v. To exercise to the point of exhaustion. To go until your body won’t go anymore.

    I was riding over the crest of a hill. Yes, I was in Florida. Three quarters of a mile – up to a mile away, I notice a traffic signal going from yellow to red. This is a signal known to be rather long. I resolve to make the next light. I do some quick math in my head… at twenty miles an hour I should cover a mile in about three minutes. I figure that should put me at the light at just about the right time. There are just two problems with this equation. One, I am in terrible shape. Twenty miles an hour over three minutes represents an all out sprint in my current (woefully out of shape) condition. Two, the last quarter of a mile is an incline (for prospective readers who may be verbally challenged, that’s up hill). One out of shape, thirty-two age male, 30 pounds over his ideal riding weight. One mile. Three minutes. Twenty miles an hour. Almost one minute sprinting up hill. I didn’t need a calculator, I needed a clue.

    With about an eight of a mile to go the light turns green. I’ve got a fighting chance to make the light, so I stand up and charge. There’s just one more problem… my legs give out from underneath me and I have to sit back down. Wheezing and slumped over the handlebars, I coast up to the recently turned red light in defeat.

    We’ll get ’em next year.