October 2006 Archives

I got a neat e-mail the other day, from the mother of a girl I went to elementary school with back in Virginia. Turns out her daughter lives in the city I work in and was reading the newspaper and happened to see my name. She e-mailed me wondering if it was "me" because she knew of a T-bone who had moved to Texas. Was I that same me? Why yes I was. And I remembered her daughter, too.

What makes it even funnier, is that her daughter remembers attending one of my birthday parties back in the day. My mom took a bunch of us kids to a local pizza place (It was a Shakey's) and we had a great time. There was some leftover pie my mom intended to take home with us, but in order to ensure all of us were properly seated and belted into the car, she had to put the pizza on the roof. You might be able to see where this is going. She forgot the pizza, and in memorable fashion (I can still here the cardboard-on-metal slide) it slipped off the roof, off the back glass and kurplunked on the parking lot. Some guy behind us got out and started yelling for my mom to go get her pizza, which of course she wasn't going to do at that point.

I forwarded the pizza-reminisce to my mom, and she replied that she guessed she'd never live that incident down. I say it was fair game because someone outside the family brought it up.

it doesn't give you the right to drive your ugly car so fast through the neighborhood, because it reminds me of the shoplifter-chick who was speeding through the Wal-Mart parking lot the other day

I'd like to discuss a lot of things, but I'll limit it to one considering the excessively long and unrelated title of this post.

Have you heard about the rat in the McSalad? Don't know how national this story went, because it's local to me, but a Dallas Cowboys coach, his wife and their au pair (fancy word for "live-in babysitter") are suing the McFastFoodCompany with claims they found a rodent in a salad. Ever since the unfortunate, alleged incident they have been unable to eat out and must prepare their own food at home from scratch. I think a lot of people who eat at that McPlace end up the same way.

Anyhow, I find it just a little fishy. And here's why ...

would you call me a Sucker? Or would you finish taking the garbage out, buy the Gilmore Girls Season 2 boxed set, get a mini-makeover and join me? Cool!

Hi everybody! The time has come to have a ridiculous "theme week" for Oct. 30-Nov. 5 here at Texas T-bone. It's something I like to call "Texas T-bone's Excessively Long Blog Post Titles That Have Nothing To Do With The Posts Week."

Here's the rub ... anybody who has a blog is encouraged to participate, if only for a day. No matter what you post about, write a really long, unrelated title for it. You are also encouraged to let people know what you're doing, and feel free to download my ridiculous "graphic" to post with your unaptly named entry. Also, you are encouraged to direct people to this site if they need further explanation.

You may also resize the graphic if you wish.

If you come up with something especially clever (or heinous), come back here and post a comment with your long title included. Together we can change the world, one confused blog-reader at a time.

Ever done it? Participated in National Novel Writing Month, where through a handy Web site, e-mail reminders and some friendly peer pressure, you too can write a composition the length of the average novel?

I tried once, three years ago, but then I got too busy and went too far off the mini outline I had in mind for the plot. I'm also not convinced that writing a novel in a month – the main purpose of the site to just get you to actually start and finish it – would provide anything remotely publishable. Sell the rights to a screenplay? Yeah, right. But aside from that, this might be my year.

Here's why ...

T-bone, Petite Filet, Cutlet, Baby (arriving Dec. 11) and Max. We "carved" them with a Sharpie® and have them sitting on a shelf under the TV. What a fun time of the year!

Hey, does my butt look orange? And why is it so round?

Made a new unfriend in the 'hood last night because Max had to pee in the wrong yard at the wrong time.

We were taking our evening walk, a little after 9 p.m. My neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks, so if a car approaches – especially at night – I step up on the curb and out of the street, taking the dog with me. As I did this last night, Max decided he had to pee, and the coming car happened to be the owner of the yard we were in. We passed the driveway, but it wasn't over then.

Sure, you can talk all day about how smart, funny, fluffy, obnoxious your cat is, but I hope that means you keep it inside all day. Some of my neighbors let theirs loose in the neighborhood. The ones unfortunate enough to wander into our back yard when a dog is back there lose two or three of their nine lives if Max gets a hold of them. He's a faster dog than Gypsy, who not only had gotten a mouthful of cat (before I intervened) but had caught squirrels, too.

One of the neighborhood cats gives me a creepy feeling. I got a picture of the offending kitty last night. It reminds me of someone ... but who?

We'll be moving the Cutlet into his new room this weekend. Just got to go get the moulding to finish off the floor. Above is the road motif that drives around all four walls. What car-loving boy could resist it? Glad I'm almost done with it.

The Petite Filet went to the doctor yesterday, and the baby's doing well in there. Not that we had any doubts; sometimes when he kicks I can feel it across the room. Maybe it's just the pointed stare I get from my lovely, glowing wife that says nonverbally, "You did this to me, and you are going to pay."

During our first sonogram, the technician was pretty positive it was a boy. With yesterday's look-see, any lingering doubt was erased. Looming large in the image is the little guy's franks and beans. That's my boy!

We also found out he'll be arriving Dec. 11, a week earlier than anticipated. At least that puts a few more days' distance between his birthday, Christmas and then the Cutlet's on Dec. 26. I thought we had it bad, but I met a dude yesterday whose birthday is also on Dec. 26, and his two kids were born in December. They have three reasons to celebrate half-birthdays, but he said they never get around to it. For the Cutlet, his half-birthday would be June 26, which is my sister's birthday. And June 25 is my parents' wedding anniversary.

If we weren't such bad (alternately, "oblivious") planners we could have given our first son his own special day. But, looking at him, he arrived right on time, and we couldn't imagine life without him.

So, I've been losing my mind lately. At least that's got to be the explanation. Let me try to explain.

Scenario No. 1: Pregnant wife wants Chick-fil-A. Accommodating husband gets ready to drive to Chick-fil-A, and emulating and daddy-worshiping toddler wants to tag along. Fine and alrighty. Order food. Pay for food using debit card, get receipt and debit card in return, get food, drive off. Stop at light and reach for debit card to put back in wallet. Could not do so immediately because tagalonging (er, taggingalong) toddler wanted his lemonade right then. Turn around. Make sure debit card isn't on the ground in the drive-thru lane. Get home. Do frantic search. Eat chicken sandwich but don't enjoy it. Use flashlight to search car again. Find debit card wedged between impossibly tight quarters between driver's seat and front console. Crisis averted.

Scenario 2: While driving home from lunch (my, we seem to always be eating something), when tired toddler falls asleep. Pregnant wife has bright idea to go to Braum's (here we go again) and get some soft-serve frozen yogurt cones (in "twist" flavor). Go in, use restroom because I had way too much water at lunch. Little freaked out about using the doorknob on the way out so I use my shirt in opening the door. Order cones. Move wallet from secure location near my butt to front pocket for easy access. Get two cones. Suavely pull out debit card and pay, receive receipt and debit card and place them in my front pocket once again. Go to car. Hand wife her cone. Eat, enjoy, drive around until we're done eating and then we go home. Get home. Extract toddler from car seat and transplant into his bed without waking him up. Do other household stuff. Realize, suddenly, that my wallet is gone. Get in car (without a driver's license on my person!) and see if missing wallet was in the Braum's parking lot (this, after we called to see if they'd found a wallet). No dice. Went back home and searched everywhere!!! for multiple times. Went as far as making a list of what I remembered was in the wallet so we could blitz the phone with card-canceling abandone. Was rechecking our bathroom, pulled out the laundry bin and didn't find it. Turned around to head out and WHAM! there was my wallet on the floor. I'm still not sure where it was, but I found it. The only explanation: aliens abducted my wallet. They also took a piece of my mind with them.

Oh, and after getting groceries at Wal-Mart, I got back to my car, unloaded the groceries and then realized I really had to pee. Like right now! No time to limp carefully back into the store. Home is 12 minutes away. So I opened the driver's and rear passenger door and whizzed in the parking lot while using both doors for cover. Wonder what I would have done had a vehicle or person had approached from my left, unprotected flank. A first for me (at Wal-Mart). Word to the wise: those little security golf-cart thingees have a way of sneaking up on you. Look both ways before letting loose.

The Cutlet's favorite thing to do at the fair was ride various things that go 'round and 'round. Thankfully for me, he's not too keen (yet) on tackling rollercoasters or things that shoot way up into the air. It's coming, dear people, and I'll be the one to go along for the ride.

Boys love trucks!

Boys love boats!

Boys love cars!

Boys wear themselves out, won't take a nap and then throw fits until you strap them into a stroller and roll them to another part of the fair. Then, after buying them some candy, you can see the results.

We had packed the stroller into the attic because he is getting too big for it and normally we didn't have much use for it. Unpacking it, though, he got all excited and wanted to sit in it as it lay in pieces in the living room. We are glad that we took it with us because at nearly 40 pounds, the Cutlet is getting too heavy to carry around. And because pregnant women can't live such weight, I would have been awarded the lugging honors.

And now, for boys and girls who also like trucks ...

OK, not totally floored, but mostly. This is the Cutlet "helping" install flooring in his new ... drumroll please ... car-themed room. He loves cars, and it's an interest we guess (and are hoping) won't go out of style any time soon. I don't really want to ever have to paint over the bright colors I applied to the walls. There will be more photos as the project edges toward completion.

I also have some pictures from the State Fair of Texas, but they're on the other camera, so you'll just have to wait. In the meantime, as discussed previously, to get the feeling that you're there, just roll random food items in batter and deep-fry them. Cook up the strangest item (that doesn't already exist) and win some sort of prize (maybe a year's supply of antacid).

Texas conducts the United State's largest state fair every year, and we're going tomorrow. Besides the exhibits, the large auto show, the thrill rides, the limitless people-watching, there's the feast of feasts that goes hand in hand with any such festival, only bigger.

It's an Outer Limits for the tummy. Wait, shouldn't that be Inner Limits?? It's Cirque de Sogood. It's the Greatest Chow on Earth. And it's reason enough to immerse oneself in a vat of Alka Seltzer afterward. So, not wanting to indulge in the gastronomic pyrotechnics that can result, or ride the greased lightning that surely follows, I'm committed to NOT eating the following things at the fair:

Long ago, it was customary for a woman to leave her father's house to live in her husband's. Thankfully, for today's modern ladies, this is not only unnecessary but getting much less common (if you don't count my sister). Women today not only don't need a man, many simply don't want one.

I was reminded of the process in my own life, whereupon there were only a few years (seven to be exact) of freedom for me. I have a feeling many guys experience the same phenomenon. Basically, I went from my mom buying my underwear to my wife buying my underwear. Why is this?

Is it because some of us men don't recognize when our briefs have become too brief? Do we not feel time-worn elastic slipping to our ankles ... when we have pants on? Has too much wear and tear knocked our boxers to the mat, where they are down for the count? Don't we know there's a problem when we mistake our undies for dental floss? There is a danger, besides being painfully uncomfortable: red-blooded males in the world tend to leave "skid marks." It's much cheaper to mark one's underwear than one's favorite pair of pants. Less conspicuous, too.

Well, people, I'm taking my underwear matters into my own hands. I'm going to buy some before my wife can! Don't anybody tell her before I can make it to Target.