Is a House a Home?
When the housing bubble burst, it was probably the first time I felt okay about being somewhat destitute as a child. Finally, being “descended from Irish working class immigrants” and the whole “salt of the earth” thing would work to my advantage. Growing up, the mindset just made me feel bad during my fancier life […]
I Wanna WRECK-IT TOO, Ralph.
There’s a film coming out next month that you should go see. And I did some voiceover on it! No, besides Christmas in Compton. I mean Wreck-It Ralph! When I heard I was going to see the movie more than a month before it arrives in theaters, the video game fanatic in me was thrilled. […]
Turning the Tables on Family Dinner
So, I’m an okay cook but by Friday night, my whole family are a bunch of zombie meatsacks. I decided to write about how to remove the stress out of family dinners by week’s end because I know so many families are dealing with the same problem. I wrote about it for Annie’s Homegrown, a […]
Banana Added for Scale (A New, More Forgiving Unit of Measure)
The banana is not a standard or scientific unit of measure. It isn’t even accurate. But isn’t accuracy really for people who build bridges and count how many eyebrow hairs they have? Let’s face it, not everything in the world needs a laser scan that can tell you the shoe size of a molecule. People […]
A Teenager’s Bucket List
This is completely true and unaltered and unbelievable. And yet, totally believable. One day a friend of mine went insane and decided to clean up the apocalypse of his fourteen-year-old boy’s room. Amid all the aftermath, he discovered something amazing. And since he’s the type of guy who covers this his son’s toilet bowl opening […]
Her Lipstick
I found something. A few days ago I was rifling through some rarely-opened filing cabinets, looking for something; something boring enough that I forgot about it the second I opened up a folder that was bloated with odd, crinkled contents. Memories beamed out at me. Cards from my kids in brightly-colored construction paper, saved scribbles […]
The Bee Whisperer
Watching our toddler flit from flower to flower like a giddy garden gnome stalking the little flying honey-makers, Lizzie and I have exchanged many a stressed look and repeated, “Why bees? Why did it have to be bees!” Bees have been a wealth of lessons so far for Lucas (3yo). Lessons about nature, dependence, purpose, […]
(I Swear) My Wife Just Said… #65
“So glad you’re my husband! I am a lucky woman.” -Elizabeth This was made more moving by the fact that I didn’t do anything especially spectacular and it also wasn’t an opener to informing me about a particularly juicy sale she was interested in. Just love. Sweet heart-getting-gooey-in-your-shirt-pocket love. ““ Previous “My Wife Just Said…”
Overreaction Toast (True Story)
Sometimes my wife overreacts in ways that freak me out. False alarms. While they turn out to be false, they really really really seem like legit alarms when they’re going off. Hypothetically, I’ll be driving us along and she’ll grab my arm in a near bone-shattering grip and shout “LOOK!!!” Later, when we retell the […]
Lives Flashing Before Your Eyes
They say when you have a near death experience, your life flashes before your eyes. I’ve never had that. Don’t mistake my meaning though, I’ve had near death experiences aplently. Hair standing on end, mouth flooded with the metallic taste of adrenaline, testicles making an emergency evacuation up inside my body. Yes. But never the […]
