This evening we had a steady stream of electricity into the house. This is only remarkable due to the weather, and the fact that my parents and some friends did not. We got a call asking us if our power was out. It wasn’t. Naturally, Cheryl became concerned that our power might go out sometime in the next 24 hours. A light bulb went on in that part of Cheryl’s brain responsible for…
Tomorrow, August 26, 2004 – a date that will live in infamy – the Kauffman household will be visited by men who will take away our extra king sized bed. As many of you may know, this is an event we have not come upon lightly. Opposing forces have repeatedly skirmished over the fate of that precious space: the baby’s room. Neutral arbiters have weighed in with their opinions, both…
The husband in this episode is going through his sock drawer, looking to pack some socks for his bicycle ride to work the next morning,
“Cheryl, where did all of these dress socks come from?”
“They were preserved in their original packaging, nestled safely in the back of your closet.”
“Hmm, those are pretty cool.”
Cheryl, filled nearly to bursting with baby, was…
Cheryl and I have been looking forward to having another child for several years now. If all goes well, that wait will end sometime in the next eight weeks. Sometime, two months from now, we’ll be getting out of bed prematurely thinking: “what the hell were we thinking?” We’ll be sitting on the couch relaxing with a baby in our arms, enjoying a moment of peace unlike any…
Despite my damn near traitorous political disagreements with our president (I’m sure it keeps him up a night), in many ways I am the consummate American. Like many of my freedom loving brothers and sisters living in the American dreamscape, I suffer from a short attention span. One week, I exercise with the zeal of Lance himself. The next? I’m no better than millions of meat and potato…
When was the last time you came home to find your sock drawer rearranged? This is the horror of a nesting mother.
“Cheryl, why does my sock drawer look different?”
“Because I was sick of seeing you walk around in socks with holes in them when you’ve got packages of unopened socks in your closet.”
I was really tired from a long day at the office, followed by the death…
On the first day of second grade my daughter said to me: “I liked my teacher, but she asked me to stop raising my hand so much.” Now my curiosity was piqued. “What were you saying to your teacher when you raised your hand Beth?” “Well, one time I told her I liked her shoes.” It was like the fog cleared from the shore and I could see for miles. The image of Beth…
“John, did you clean off the stove when you cleaned up after dinner?”
(John is currently responsible for lots of domestic duties, not just because his wife is incapacitated with child, but because he is a swell guy.)
“No.”
“Why not. You know that this is part of the agreed upon dinner clean-up procedure.”
“Well Cheryl, I’m an imperfect man living in…
I’m looking out the window that someone at my salary level has no right having. I’m looking at the sun peaking out from between the clouds, and it’s like being smacked in the face with a metaphor. This morning, unlike the mornings of the last three weeks, was a ’50s sitcom morning. The only missing image was me in a suit and tie. The only mismatched image was Cheryl’s…
Beth is a tough nut to crack, but she’s even harder to read. The lead into the new school year had all the emotion of a new pair of socks. (What do I have against socks? Why am I picking on socks in general? As a child, I was permanently scarred by the cruel and unusual gift of socks on Christmas morning.) It was so unlike my experience. I remember the first day of elementary school with all…