One Dad's Life

Rain Out

As many of you know, we attend the Whitaker Music Festival most weeks during the summer. Last night in St. Louis, it was quite rainy.  Since the Whitaker Music Festival is outside, it ended up getting canceled.  I think we were all a little bummed out by this. However, to be honest, I had mixed feelings about the cancellation. On the one hand, these performances have been universally excellent.  On the other hand, I was incredibly tired after a long day at work, and staying up way too late the night before reading and writing (no arithmetic this time around!).

Since we already had all the picnic fixings together (we eat dinner at the concerts, on a picnic blanket and all), we decided we would still have the picnic for dinner. What was slightly less clear was if we would still hit the giant beach ball around during dinner.

OK, I can tell I derailed a couple of you there.  The giant beach ball is the giant beach ball you hit around at concerts with all the other concert goers!  You know, of course, that this isn't funny if I have to explain everything, right?  To be honest, though, I don't remember ever seeing anyone play with a giant beach ball out there...probably because it would knock over all the candles and wine glasses that are so common at the festival. 

I was so glad to finally make it home, after picking up my youngest daughter from dance class, as I was tired and very hungry.  When I walked in the door, I found the following glorious scene:

Candles and wine glasses!

My wife had set up candles everywhere in the house (not just in this front room), and had all the picnic fixings ready.  Naturally, I sort of delayed things while I grabbed the camera and took a ton of pictures of the candles.  (more tomorrow for the Photo Friday/Friday Photo thing). I love candles! My daughter Rachel squealed, "this is going to be the greatest night ever!"  Any thought of disappointment over missing the concert evaporated right then and there!

The rest of the family had decided that since the concert was canceled, we should just eat our picnic dinner like "normal" and watch a DVD of a band. This was a great idea!  Rachel insisted on watching a Peter Gabriel concert...the one with the song "Downside Up" in it, which both of my kids love.  So, I retrieved the DVD of "Peter Gabriel - Growing Up Live", we moved a lantern from the table to the picnic blanket (set up in the living room) and we settled in for an inside picnic dinner and the concert.

I'll have to admit, it turned out to be a fun evening with the music playing and the rest of us sitting around and talking. I think maybe we'll have more inside picnic dinners!

Life is good.

Photo notes: The top mini-photo of the lantern and wine glass can be enlarged slightly by clicking on it.  It is kind of hard to see in its miniature form.  The bottom photo features (l-r) Rachel, Rebecca, and a very rare shot of Gregg - proprietor of "One Dad's Life."

I Know What You are Thinking - When Will He Grow Up?

The other day, I posted the following on twitter:

Am I the only 40+ dad that wants to decorate his home office with these?

Sure, other dads may dream of rich mahogany paneling and velvet tapestries, but I'm looking for Mario, a bunch of brick blocks, mushrooms, and those spiny things!  (Plus Princess Peach) However, it's apparent that at least at the time of that posting, I was in fact the only 40+ dad looking to decorate with those decals. 

No one responded. Not one.

I was shocked. Have all the rest of you forgotten how to play?  I suppose you are going to tell me next that you don't have mullet wigs and suction cup dart guns in your desk at work, either.  What's the matter? Are you afraid to play? Are you chicken? 

Isn't the point of going to college to get a decent job so that you can do all that fun stuff you wanted to do as a kid...without your parents telling you it was bedtime!  LIVE A LITTLE PEOPLE!

I did spot one glimmer of hope, though.  I came across a guy on twitter last night that has a real live Super Mario Bros. arcade game in his basement.  That's probably just as cool, if not cooler, than having your own Kiss pinball game!

So to answer the question of "When will he grow up?"  I don't know.  It seems unlikely to occur at this point.  You're talking to a guy that has Micky Mouse as a wizard, the Taco Bell chihuahua, A.L.F., a skeleton with a tie-dye shirt, Opus, and Scrooge McDuck stuffed animals sitting on his desk!

Growing up is over-rated. Admit it. If you don't I'll give you an Indian rope-burn until you cry "uncle!"

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Readers of "One Dad's Life." Yesterday, we received some scary news regarding "motherofbun", a regular visitor of this website.  Please read the post below for more information and please show her some support, if you haven't already! Thank you very much. - Gregg

Please show "motherofbun" your support

Yesterday, a member of the St. Louis blogging community and new acquaintance of mine received the kind of news that takes your breath away and stops your heart for a moment.

She has cancer. 

She is just in her mid-30's, and is one of those beautiful people that would appear to be the picture of health.  She has a young son and husband...and thankfully a large network of friends and family in the area to help her out.

She is regular visitor and commentor on this site, and is known here as "motherofbun." She writes the blog "Midwestern Mommy."

You can read about her situation here.

Many people mention they wish there is something they could do.  There is.

First, add her and her family to your prayer list. Nothing is more powerful!

Second, stop by her blog, and leave some words of support and encouragement.  You'll see that she already has a HUGE outpouring from St. Louis, and beyond.  We have an incredible blogging community here in this wonderful city

Third, you can donate money to the American Cancer Society here.  Please do!  You can even do it in her name, but as I'm unsure if she really wants her real name given out, I'm not going to list it here.  Just flag your donation in the name of "motherofbun" or "Midwesternmommy.com" if you wish.

See the Advantage Having a Six-year-old Gives You?

Having a child or two gives you some incredible advantages if you are an alltop.com daddy blogger. (yeah, me!) 

Author's note: OK. Hold on just for a second.  I'm going to have to comment on my very first sentence, already.  First, I kind of cringed just a little when I called myself a "daddy blogger."  Not that there is anything wrong with it, mind you.  It's just that prior to this weekend, I never really pigeon-holed myself as regards to this blog.  Of course, with a name like "One Dad's Life" you'd think I had, but really it was a case of that name not being taken, and I'm a dad...

However, I love hearing my daughters calling me "daddy" and there are definitely worse things I've been called!  This past weekend, my blog was also listed on alltop.com, in the "dads" section. (yeah, me!)  So, I'm a 'daddy blogger.' I'm still just a little bit excited. I totally promise this is the last time I brag about this (yeah, me!).  After all, I wouldn't want my head to actually pop!  (See yesterday's post).

Back to my original topic:

Sometimes, having a child causes posts to magically write themselves.  This is one of those posts.

Ever since my youngest daughter, Rachel, was a baby, she loved to watch concerts on TV.  Rock concerts.  So, we frequently cuddled on the couch and watched bands on DVD.  Since she started school, and had to have an actual bedtime, we haven't had much time to do this. Friday night, however, her older sister was out at a party, so we let her stay up and watch a concert with me.

We chose Pink Floyd - Pulse, and settled in for some tasty rock goodness.  Naturally, as Rachel is a motormouth, she talked constantly about what she was watching.  Listed below, in no particular order, are the Rachel quotes I could remember after watching the video, picking up her sister from the party, playing Guitar Hero III on the Wii, and probably some Mario Kart DS. 

Enjoy.

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Rachel (R): You have to turn up the stereo really loud for a rock concert DVD, don't you dad?

Gregg (G): You sure do, sweetie.

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(on watching David Gilmour using a guitar talkbox)

R: What's that tube he's putting in his mouth?

G: That's a tube that's hooked to a guitar amp. It funnels all the sound from the amp into his mouth.  When he moves his mouth, it makes it sound like the guitar is talking.

R:  I didn't know that where that weird sound was coming from!  What if he accidentally swallows the sound?  It's so loud, that would hurt him!

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(While listening to the song "Sorrow")

R: This would be a great song for Guitar Hero!

G: Yes it would!

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R: I want an electric guitar.  How much are electric guitars?  Are they more than pierced ears? (This is a major statement, Rachel wants pierced ears more than anything)

G: Oh yes, quite a bit more.

R: Why?

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( While watching a percussionist jumping around, playing his drums)

(Rachel jumps off the couch and imitates the percussionist)

R:  He has to jump around like this for two reasons, dad.  One, to look really cool, and two to reach the drums.

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(While listening to "Another Brick in the Wall part 2.  In part - "no more teachers.... teacher, leave those kids alone!")

R: They must have written this song about when they were in school and didn't like it as kids.

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(While listening to "Shine On You Crazy Diamond")

R: They wrote this about someone who used to play with them?  I bet that person is sad they aren't playing with them anymore when they hear this, it's a sad song.

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R: Those lasers are really cool.  Except you wouldn't want them on the stage, it would be dangerous. They are so bright and sharp they could hurt you!

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R: There are so many lights on the crowd in the stadium, it looks like intermission!

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(chanting under her breath when the first DVD ended, and afraid I would turn it off and send her to bed)

R: Don't turn it off, don't turn it off, don't turn it off...

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(When told that this whole extravaganza with the lighting, lasers, and video is what she missed at Rush.)

R: Well, this is better than live because they can show the whole stage and the guitar closeup at the same time on top of each other!

R: Anyway, I'll get to go next time, depending on how I behave, right dad?

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R: This is like the real thing, except the real thing is MUCH MUCH MUCH louder, and the stage is huge instead of being on a small screen.

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(In rationalizing why it would be better for herto go to a big concert rather than her sister, Rebecca)

R: Rebecca has problems with the very bright lights and loud sound.  (This is actually true, but she didn't seem bothered by Rush!)

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R: What's with the flying pig?

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(when hearing I have actually seen Pink Floyd live)

R: When you came out of the concert, were you so happy that you were crying?

G: No.  I won't admit to crying at a concert.

R:  Where you happy?

G:  Oh yes, it was one of the best concerts I had ever seen.

R:  'cause I saw on tv, some girls coming out of the Jonas Brothers concert and they were so happy they were crying.

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G: Life is good.

Is My Head Noticeably Larger?

In the beginning, back in September of 2007, this little way-station on the information super highway struggled to life.  Those were exciting times! I would write a post, and wait expectantly for someone to read it...and comment.  In the beginning, if there even was a comment, it was from a couple of friends who knew about the blog, or my wife, or my parents. Soon, however, the first comment came from someone I didn't actually know!  It was amazing to me that someone would even be interested.

My head swelled, ever so slightly.

Over the past ten months, the traffic and number of visitors increased steadily, to the point where there is now a steady group of (mostly) local readers.  As life frequently does, things have started coming full-circle in that I have begun to venture out from behind the keyboard and actually meet many of these people.  St. Louis has a pretty incredible blogging community! 

One of these local bloggers, abunslife, even asked me to write a guest post on her very popular blog!

My head swelled just a little bit more. Just enough that I had to adjust the baseball caps I wear to keep out the nasty solar radiation from Mr. Sun. (I'm not referring to a college friend's cat that also went by this name, either! I'm talking about that big bright ball of fire in the sky. I would need more of a helmet to keep out the other Mr. Sun.)

Then, "One Dad's Life" was the featured "local blog o' the week" in a local paper, The Riverfront Times. 

Again, a slight swelling of the head.

Now, early this past Saturday morning, I learned that "One Dad's Life" was now being included in the listings at Alltop.com, a nice blog aggregator that purports to contain only the "Best of the Best." 

This is where my head swelled right up into one of those twisted balloon animals things.  That's right, my head is now a twisted balloon caricature of the old head.  I'm in danger of popping my swollen balloon head the next time I bump it when I get into my car.  So, I guess in a way, that is a mini confession.  A "best of the best" writer can't actually get into his own car - that he's had for 14 years - without regularly bumping his head.  The talent literally oozes out of me.

So.  Wow.  No pressure and all...just continue being your normal and funny self!  Oh, and by the way, can you do that right now?  Just turn on the funny.  Write some dad stuff.  We'll watch.

Fortunately, I'm not listed in the humor section, I'm listed in the dad section.  Humor is hard.  Dad stuff just happens to you - you're basically along for the ride much of the time.  As it turns out, I was also wrong in a recent post where I mentioned that perhaps there were only like 5 or 6 dad blogs, compared to the millions of mom blogs.  There are at least a few dozen dad blogs listed along-side me in the Alltop.com dads section.  A bigger community!

Still, I'm now likely reaching an audience in a larger region...at least nation-wide and likely world-wide.  Have you ever tried doing something with just one person looking over your shoulder?  It doesn't work.  Now, I can imagine thousands looking over my shoulder...well at least they'll look once. If I'm no good, they leave. Then I'm back where I started.

So, now I'm waiting for my first alltop.com listed funny dad idea to occur to me.  I've got absolutely nothing to say.  I can't think with all these people looking over my shoulder, jockeying for the best spot to see.  They keep bumping into me and stuff.  The only thing I have, isn't really funny, but it is insightful:

Yesterday, my daughter asked me why you pay first at places like McDonald's while at real restaurants, you pay last.  (Good observation, Rachel!) The answer came to me like a flash. I replied, "You pay first at fast-food restaurants, because if they let people pay at the end, after you ate the 'food', no one would pay for this junk!"

Oh, yeah.  Sometimes I amaze myself.  Expect more of this.

So, if you'd like to see what is going on on some of the other "best" dad bloggers, cick herefor alltop.com's dad section.  To see what they consider the best in a hundred other categories, click my shiny new Alltop.com button on the top right of the website.  That's right, the one that says , "All the Cool Kids - (and me)."   That just about sums it up.

Still, the recognition is good, it is very nice.  I'm floating on cloud nine.  Apparently, my new balloon head is filled with helium.

Life is good.

Note to new alltop.com readers.  Thanks for coming by! "One Dad's Life" is published every weekday morning, even if I have to skip work to get it out.  How's that for priorities?  Topics are all the normal dad stuff that happens with 6 and 12 year old daughters, as well as stuff my talented wife does, as well as the 100 or so hobbies that I have, as well as.... well, you get it.  So bookmark me, blogroll me, put me in your readers, leave comments, stroke my ego, all that good stuff. I hope to see you back!

Friday Photos - Whitaker Music Festival - July 23, 2008

As I mentioned yesterday, on Wednesday we went to the Whitaker Music Festival and saw "The Poor People of Paris" perform.  As usual, I took our dSLR with me, as the Missouri Botanical Garden is by far my favorite place to take pictures.  You could spend your whole life taking pictures in this garden!

We got to the garden a little earlier in the evening than we usually do, and the sky was very interesting with nice clouds.  Usually, by the time we arrive, the sun is setting and the sky is uninteresting in the east.  I took some more pictures of a fence I'm obsessed with (but still haven't shared the photos!) and snapped this picture of the front of Henry Shaw's house.

After eating a picnic dinner at this site and celebrating "Sister's Day", we made our way to the stage to watch the band.  This shot is a pretty close crop of the hands and sticks of drummer Alan Schilling.  I'm actually a big fan of "blur" in pictures, and if you stick around for long you'll probably see a lot of examples of this in my photography. Unfortunately, due to the tight cropping, this photo is probably not suitable for printing.  As soon as I get a case for the new camera, I'll be able to bring longer lenses with me as well.  Converted to grayscale using GIMP.

A couple of weeks ago, I published a shot I took of the River Des Peres Footbridge, which featured a blurring technique that combines a sharp layer and a VERY blurred layer.  I've been wanting to try the technique in color ever since, and it seemed like a shot of the band was as good a sample as any to work with.  The result is seen above.  It was a little harder to get exactly the effect I was looking for in color, but I'm again very happy with the result.  This is a different kind of blur than motion blur, but again I think this is another case of effectively using blur in your photographs.  I also like the composition in this shot...all eyes are on bassist Wayne Coniglio....including yours, since I framed it so Wayne was right at one of those "thirds" intersections.

During one of the songs, vocalist Elsie Parker encouraged audience members to wave candles, lighters, or even cell phones in the air for a particular piece.  I'd tell you what the song was, but since they were all in French, you are out of luck!  My youngest daughter Rachel - the biggest music fan of our family, I think - really got into this as well and waved her sister's cell phone in the air with great gusto!  I think this picture accurately captures the feel, even with the low light and obvious blur of both the phone and my daughter.  You can tell that Rachel didn't care that the singing was in French!  She seriously loves all music, and is always either this excited, or completely mesmerized at concerts.

From our vantage point at the corner of the stage, we had a great view of both the band and the lighting against the bandstand ceiling.  I took this shot just because I liked the contrast and the color.  My wife pointed out that this photo may also make an excellent background for advertising some of our musicals.  I just thought it was "purdy."

Photography notes: All photos taken on Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008 using a Nikon D60 dSLR with 17-55mm f3.5-5.6 lens. All editing/cropping/conversion to grayscale done in GIMP.

Note: I noticed that I didn't mention keyboardist Michael Carosello. This was not a slight in any way! I primarily play keyboards myself. He was excellent as was the entire band.  I just didn't have a good vantage point to get shots of him or Wayne!

Sister's Day

First, there was Mother's Day - Yeah moms!!!

Then, there was Father's Day - Yeah dads!!!

Then, well, then there was nothing.  So, in 2002 when my youngest daughter was about to turn one (1), and after we celebrated Father's Day, we decided that our family should have the very first ever "Sister's Day" and that it would be celebrated the third Sunday in July each year.

Wow, that just about sounded like a decree from Caesar Augustus, didn't it?

Our brilliant idea, (and it was brilliant, just so you know) was that since we celebrated individually moms and dads, we should also celebrate what makes them moms and dads.  In our family, we called this "Sister's Day" since we have two daughters.   Our daughter would then exchange small gifts on this day every year.  If you take one thing away from this post, it should be the whole Sister's Day concept.  You should do it!  You could call it Sibling Day, Brother's and Sister's day, or just Son/Daughter/Offspring Day if you lavish all your attention on a single child.  Just do it!  Give them a special day, too.

Interestingly, the kids never seem to forget about Sister's Day!  I wonder what triggers their memory?  Could it be, getting to give PRESENTS?  I think so.

Well, this year, both our daughters were out of town with Grandma and Grandpa during the official observance of "Sister's Day", so we decided to hold the still official, yet delayed, celebration at the Whitaker Music Festival at the Missouri Botanical Garden - our usual Wednesday evening haunt.  BTW, this week "The Poor People of Paris" were playing, and they were excellent!  Check out their website (click on their name) for information about future appearances. 

We made our way to Shaw's House for the picnic portion of the evening, as well as the gift opening. Rachel, the six year old, wanted to give her gift first, and gave Rebecca a matching earing and necklace set. Rebecca is all about jewelry these days.

Then Rebecca gave Rachel her gift - a gift certificate card to Target.  Believe it or not, this gift has fulfilled a "lifelong dream" of Rachel's to have her own gift card to go shopping with.

Girls!

BTW, I can explain the very disturbing bottle of spray-able cheese.  That's Rebecca's.  Rebecca apparently hasn't developed taste buds, yet, so no hassling from the foodies!  My wife and I had real cheese...several varieties.

After the meal, a bottle of German Riesling (for the adults, of course!) and the presents, we packed everything up and moved the party to the stage area.  As it turns out, there was a large area RIGHT IN FRONT that was perfect for people on a blanket.  This is where we spent the rest of the night, and I took probably 150 pictures of the band.  A couple of these I will use for Friday's picture post.

It was another fun night at the garden, with good food, a good band, and Sister's Day!

Life is good.

Losing the "Paper War"

There are so many things I want to spend my time on, the trouble I’m having is eliminating as many of the things I don’t want to spend my time on as possible.  If you’ve been reading here for awhile, you know that I have a super abundance of hobbies and time consuming activities that I enjoy.  Just doing this daily blog and related photography consumes a large part of my non-work time!  I’m guessing that since you are reading this, your vote would be that I don’t reduce the time I spend on these particular activities!  So clearly something else has to go.

 

Since I'm also not able to eliminate my time-consuming job, one area that I have attacked with a vengeance is the amount of effort I spend on bills and paperwork.  These are two things I despise!  Actually, anything financial, I despise, yet paperwork and just handling paper still seems to consume a lot of my time.  So, I’ve declared war on handling paper.

 

I think I am losing the battle.

 

Don’t get me wrong, over the years, I feel like I have made tremendous strides in these areas.  The first major inroad I made in this war was bill-paying using Checkfree and Quicken software.  I was already using Quicken to budget and track expenses and spending trends, and adding Checkfree made it possible to track an expense and pay it at the same time!  I even set up automatic payments for recurring expenses.  It was incredible!

 

This continued for many years, and then all the utilities, cable, phone, etc. began offering automatic payments that would withdraw funds from the account of your choosing on the due date.  I started signing up for these, as well.  It was more incredible!

 

I still had a bunch of financial paperwork to sift through, though.  The next step was eliminating the bill paper all-together, going with paperless statements (online) and automatic payments.  As a result, bill-paying has nearly become a thing of the past.  This is beyond incredible!  As a side benefit, this step also eliminated nearly 100% of the bill paperwork and envelopes clogging my workspace.

 

Somehow, I still had piles of paper stuff to deal with, though.

 

So, I did all the steps it takes to reduce or eliminate junk mail.  I’ve eliminated credit card offers (which used to get 2-3 a DAY), phone switch offers, mortgage offers, etc. and only get the occasional catalog in the mail.

 

Still the paper pile grows.  I think I’ve even heard it growl once or twice.  It scares me.  I don’t want to go down to my office late at night, anymore!

 

This year, our daughters’ school has even switched to just sending things either via email or posting on their website.  This should also help, but still the paper monster is taking over my desk. 

 

How is this possible?  Aren't we in the "paper-less" era?

 

How can I still be losing the paper war after all this effort?  I shudder to imagine what the problem would be like if I hadn’t been waging war on the Paper Monster all these years!

 

What are the next steps?  I think I need help from some paper elimination mercenary out there. What actions do you take to destroy the Paper Monster?

Post Delayed

I apologize to my regular readers, but due to circumstances not entirely in my control, today's post is (obviously) delayed from its normal 7:00AM release!  Please come back in the 5:00-6:00 PM CDT hour.  Thanks!

Twelve Reasons I'm Ready for the Kids to Come Home

Yesterday, I wrote briefly about all the fun things my wife and I could do since my kids were on a vacation with my parents.  Today, they are coming home, so in honor of their homecoming, I wrote a companion list to yesterday's.  Here are the "Top Twelve Reasons I'm Ready for the Kids to Come Home" in no particular order:

1. I can't wait for them to find the scary rubber bugs we hid in their room! (See item #10 here.)
2. I've had to feed and water the pets all by myself. I'm ready for Rebecca to be back on the job.
3. It's slightly less satisfying to be doing all the things that embarrass your kids without them being around to embarrass!
4. The same $20 has been in my wallet for a week.  I'm confused by this.
5. They have my Mario Kart DS game cartridge and I need it back! Mario Kart rocks!
6. I miss their hugs.
7. I'm pretty sure that if I want my parents to speak to me again, I need to get the squabbling kids away from them!
8. I haven't had to use the word "no" for some time, I'm afraid I'm getting rusty.
9. We can usually tell what time of night it is by when Rachel stops getting out of her bed, coming upstairs, and telling us her latest reasons why she should get to stay up.  She has very creative reasons!
10. I've written a "Top Ten Reasons I'm ready for the Kids To Go on Vacation" post, and it just won't make sense unless they come home first.
11. They have my "carry with me" camera, and I need it back!
12. I love my kids and the house just doesn't seem right without them.