Functionally ReTodded

The morning was relatively uneventful, with the exception of me running up and down the stairs logging into servers at work finding out why backups failed and configuring Treo handhelds. Some vacation.

The upside is that the frequent trips on the stairs helped my sinuses…a little. Christ, how I hate sinus infections.

Anywho, a little after ten, we’d been laying around doing a whole lot of nothing, so I decided that Lauren and Mr. Mom were going to the Mall. Hooray for us.

We got there, played around the coin fountain near Galyans, and headed for the food court, where we promptly got in the elevator and rode round trip floor to ceiling for about half an hour.

Then, when my “shit it’s hot in this elevator” had about hit its zenith, we got out and saw aunt Heather and her friend Miss Mandy. From then on, it was a whirlwind of activity.

We went to stride rite and bought the under four version of the little black dress: white leather tennis shoes. You can’t go wrong and you can’t go without them. She’s now wearing a 7.5, by the way.

A quick change in the family bathrooms and Lauren was a ton lighter and ready to go again.

Then, it was off to the Disney store where Mandy wanted to buy Lauren anything and everything. I said no more to Mandy than I did my daughter. We then headed to Galyans where I promptly stole my baby a balloon and we shopped for shoes and clothes. Actually, Heather and Mandy shopped. Lauren hid in the clothing racks.

Finally, it was the food court for Chik-fil-a nuggets, fries and a sprite, followed by “any cookie Lauren wants.” (Thanks Mandy). Lauren picked the double stuffed, icing filled double chocolate thingy, and proceeded to pull it in half and eat the icing.

Mandy looked at us quizically, but that’s just Lauren.

In the car, home at 12:30 and a nap at 1:oopm. Hopefully I’ve done my job and she’s worn out and ready for a nap. I know I’m ready for some X-Box casino games and a little NASCAR column writing.

More to follow after naptime.

By the way, you can check out my columns at the following link:

http://www.anomieacres.com/markbackerindex.htm

Let me know what you think…

The wife has an off-site meeting all day tomorrow, so I have to babysit all day. I actually say “babysit” just to make people mad, since whenever I do say it, they scream “It’s not babysitting!! It’s called parenting!!”

Whatever. In the end of the day, it’s an adult taking care of a 2-year old all day, so it’s babysitting. When I say “Lauren, don’t run around with the new Cutco chef knife,” then THAT’S parenting. But changing pullups and cleaning up fingerpaint and flipping around to the various kid’s shows on tv, that’s just babysitting.

I don’t want you to think I don’t appreciate how hard it is to be a stay at home mom that also works out of the home. My wife is a saint in more ways than you know, and being home for ten days thru the holidays reminded me of how tough it can be. It can also be rewarding, especially if you aren’t looking for it.

Anywho, I get to do this once in a while, so I thought I would run down the list of things I will probably get to (or have to) do during my day home with Lauren.

1) Remind her that “we” don’t throw things over our heads in the house. While doing it with a balloon is okay, doing it with a miniature stroller is not.

2) Eat butter, or at least give her butter to eat. I remember liking butter and margarine as a kid, but not like this. If she even hears the lid come off the butter dish, she’s at my hip like a police dog, index finger extended, saying “butter please daddy.” So I cut her off a pat of butter, put it on her finger, pat her on the head, and send her on her way.

3) Taking a leisurely walk thru our neighborhood Super WalMart. This is good for killing an hour or so, and she especially enjoys the lobster tank and the WalMart pet department, which consists of about 30 tanks of common fish, frogs and snails that are all demonstrating about a 65% mortality rate. By the way, we are quiet there, so as not to wake all of the “sleeping” fishes.

4) Play-do. I do not recall liking it so much as a kid or hating it so much as an adult, but that stuff is terrible. It’s tough to clean up, impossible to get out of carpet, and the parts are all impossible to clean. but it’ll kill 45 minutes, so why not?

5) At some point, I will be asked to vacate whatever sofa we are both sitting on at the time. Lauren is famous for her moments of me time, and I’m sure tomorrow will have several of them.

6) This will be the bane of my existence all day: “Me watch new Dora.” I’ve watched that new damned Dora the Explorer movie approximately 648 times since Christmas Day, and I hate it very very much. However, she loves it, so we watch it. The upside of Dora is that Lauren is accidentally learning Spanish. When she is jumping over something, she looks at us and says “Salto.” It impresses strangers, and I guess that makes it worth it.

7) We will most assuredly brush and fingerpaint. This is far easier to clean up than the play-do, although you wouldn’t think that it is. If the weather’s nice (which except for cloudiness, it’s supposed to be), we will probably spend several hours on the deck and in the driveway doing this.

Napping. God willing, she will take a nap tomorrow. She has taken one for five days in a row, which is a record as of late. She is to the point now where she is only napping about 3 or 4 out of 7 days, so you never know. But even if she doesn’t, she’ll sit and play in her crib for an hour and a half or so, and that’s good for both of us at the midpoint of the day.

9) We will most assuredly play the guitar. She got a fabulous blue guitar with flowers on it for christmas, and she loves (LOVES) to play it and sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star for us. It’s very funny and very sweet.

10) At some point, I hope we have 10 minutes like we did last night where I can lay on the sofa and she will just climb up and lay on me and watch tv. Maybe right before naptime or something, but those are the ten minutes that I cherish more than any other. They’re rare, which makes them greater, but that is easily my favorite part of being a parent.

So there’s my Friday. I’ll let you know if something different happens, but I doubt it will.

(Actually, i think tomorrow may be either a running blog or an hourly update about what we’re doing).

Thanks for reading…

The college football season is finally over. On one hand, I am a bit sad because years like this only happen for Auburn every 15 or 20 years, so it’s a little disappointing.

On the other hand, this worked out about as well as it could. If you asked me at the beginning of the year if I’d rather be 8-3 and playing in the liberty bowl or 12-0 with a chance to win the Sugar Bowl, go 13-0 and finish second, I’d say hell yeah to the latter.

The fact that pundits put OU ahead of Auburn based on their out of conference schedule being tougher than ours is laughable now. In the end, playing Bowling Green over us playing The Citadel didn’t make the Sooners much better. Man, I’ve seen softer takedowns on Cops. USC came on to the field, gave up a TD, then decided to make Choke-lahoma their collective bitches, and they did just that.

38-10 at the half meant that I didn’t even have to hear that dying hyena Ashlee “no, I’m the one with dark hair and no boobs” Simpson butcher yet another song on tv. Hell, I read it on Fark this morning. Hooray for big first half beatings that get me an extra hour of sleep.

We might not have won, but we wouldn’t have let Leinert go long on us all night either. Our db’s would have had something to say about that. And, it turns out that when playing a decent team, OU can’t do shit on offense. That was just plain terrible. Jason White looked like Jason Voorhees out there, stomping around getting caught from every direction any time he didn’t hand of to Peterson for a three yard loss.

In five years, Oklahoma has played in four huge games, and lost three of them…badly. That must feel like being a Sox fan before this year, I’d imagine.

Anyway, I feel great. Think about this. A year ago, Tuberville was one reporter’s abililty to find an out of place airplane in Ohio away from being fired BEFORE the Alabama game. Then, the AD and President get canned, a booster starts down the long road to shun-ville, and Tuberville keeps smiling and saying the right things.

He talks his two running backs and two stellar DB’s into staying, then knocks out 15 straight wins and signs one of those super iron-clad contracts that will pay him 14 million over seven years, and if Auburn even thinks…THINKS about letting him go, they owe him every penny. I don’t even think there’s a morality clause. He could have sex with an endangered Bald Eagle, and they’d STILL have to pay him. And that’s the way it should be.

Meanwhile, Auburn fans can spend the next six months saying “yeah, but we’d have done this” or “We were 13-0, won the sec, beat five top ten teams, three of them on the road, and became the only undefeated SEC team in the BCS’s history to NOT play for the title.” And coincidentally, Oklahoma’s played in it this year, last year, and in 2000. You won in 2000, but you got punked the last two years, and last year you got to play for the title even though you didn’t even win your conference. You got embarassed by Kansas State and LSU last year, and humiliated this year. But the little 12 is SOOO much better than the SEC. That’s why you played a four-loss team for your conference title this year. And, considering the BCS is run by the head of the Big 12, it’s no wonder you get the benefit of the doubt.

Don’t think so? How about the fact that only two teams that didn’t win their conference have ever played for the national title? You and Nebraska in 2001. Oh, the other thing you two Big 12 teams have in common is that you got your asses kicked on the sport’s biggest stage.

So yes, we are disappointed. But all you can do is play the schedule in front of you. Auburn did that with class and dignity, they won every game, faced down every challenge, and made every Auburn fan in the country and the world proud.

War Eagle!!

Now, can someone get the Auburn cheerleaders some of those USC sweaters? Meow!