Functionally ReTodded

I was in line at Kroger the other day, and I thought  to myself, "Man, there have been a lot of changes in the grocery shopping experience over the years."

Years ago, the clerk unpacked your cart, they had to enter the price, they put your stuff in big paper bags (double-bagged if necessary), took your cash and made change or took your check, wrote down everything off the front of your driver’s license, and you led the bag boy to your car where you got to have the secret tip transaction that felt more like a drug deal than a gratuity.

Now, it’s debit cards, credit cards, unpack your own, get formula from the service desk because people can’t be trusted to have that shit on a shelf lest they steal it, half the time bagging your own groceries and walking them out to your car and unpacking the cart and packing your car by yourself.  That’s all (more or less) fine.

Way back then, I used to have ideas about making that process better.  One involved the express lane (10 items or less) or even, God willing, a self check line.

Those both became a reality.

The trouble is, like everything else in society today, people don’t think the rules apply to them.  It doesn’t seem like much, but if I’m buy a rotisserie chicken and diapers and hit the express lane, I shouldn’t have to wait behind the jerkoff that came there with 37 items thinking I wouldn’t count.  (I always do, by the way.  And then I make snarky remarks about you to the clerk after you pay).

But the self check line seemed mostly bulletproof.  You have 3 or 10 or 15 items, you scan them and bag them yourself and go on your way.

Then a day like Friday happens where you get in line and can’t help but notice that there are about seven folks waiting for the self scan.  "WTF?" I’m thinking to myself.  I look past the lady holding the balloons in front of me, and I see this:

And a couple of notes here.  Notice that there are several bags already scanned.  This cart was spilling over when she got to the self check.

Secondly, she didn’t know how to scan.  She’d take a box and lay it down on the scanner, wait 10 seconds and put it in the bag.  She’s probably STILL trying to check out.

Oh, and watching her try to find the barcode on each item was hilariously frustrating.  It was like she was looking for The Holy Grail or something.

GAAHHHHHHH!!!

I’m still reeling from my loss of digital and internet entertainment last Thursday night.  No internet and no television meant that I missed the Auburn game (which I should send a thank you note to Charter for), I missed a World Series game and I missed Thursday night tv.  My wife said I could watch what I missed online, but frankly, when you have a 55 inch HD television, watching Survivor on your 14 inch laptop sucks.  (Unless you’re watching it at work).

Saturday I was sitting on the couch with my eldest child watching some ESPN.  A commercial for a particular establishment that uses an owl as their only excuse for not calling their chain "Titties" came on and my precious child looked at me and said "Daddy, I think I know what they mean by "Hooters."

Me:  (silently scared)  What’s that?

Her:  (Raising one eyebrow and generally pointing at her torso) These.

Me:  Unconscious on the floor and twitching.

Saturday we were to go to my friend’s "I finally built my house" party at about 2pm.  Sadly, young PK’s altered nap schedule didn’t acommodate that, so I left GBD at home with the lad and an appointment with AAA and I took mein fahja’s car and took the girls up to Jefferson.

Her house is on 10 acres, and as they are DINK’s in their early 40’s, they have lots of toys (four wheelers, jet skis, motorcycles, hot tub, etc.), and she is the classic WAY over do it host, so I knew it’d be fun.

There were hayrides to a pasture where she had put out 40 or so pumpkins for the kids to "pick," then return to the garage to carve/paint/decorate said pumpkins.  She also has four donkeys (one that was adorable and only five months old) a few labradors, roosters and a dozen or so goats.  Needless to say the kids were LOVING feeding mini carrots to the donkeys, cockadoodledoo-ing at the roosters, and generally causing mayhem.

I also got to see some friends I hadn’t seen in a while, including my pre-DHB boss, who took a gash on the head when he quickly turned around and hit it on a curio shelf thingy in Susan’s entryway.  High comedy.

The ride home was mostly unpleasant as 1doh was spinning a plastic slinky around (which I knew was gonna put both kids’ eyes out) and 2doh was whining because I couldn’t move the sun so it wouldn’t shine in her eyes.

We also had LONG talks about "How does the garmin talk daddy?" and "I’m hungry" despite the children having eaten about 55 chocolate fountain-covered marshmallows, 100 grand bars, etc.  I guess maybe they were hungry for nutrition…

Sunday brought much joy and I got much done.  Cleaned, got the kids fed, 2doh went to church (and Home Depot and Waffle House) with poppy for four hours, then I took 1doh with me to get groceries, a car wash, and then we cleaned the windows on the truck (she cleaned the rims and made them shiny).

And when my sis-in-law and mother-in-law arrived, I was given permission to hit the basement to watch football and the race.  Two hours of moderately uninterrupted bliss as I watched the Falcons get screwed by the refs in Philly.

The race was fairly boring as well as the six week coronation / media blow job for Jimmie Johnson is now in full effect.  I’m going to have to watch the remaining races on mute or I may have to blow up a Lowe’s along with many of its employee owners.

And lastly, I’d like to say something about Facebook.  Although I registered quite a while ago, up until about two weeks ago I thought Facebook was gay.  Not MySpace gay, but pretty gay nonetheless.

That all changed when long lost friends and acquaintances from high school and college and old jobs started showing up and inviting you to be their friends and stuff.  Then viewing hilarious old and new pictures and just re-connecting with those folks was icing on the cake.

So thank you Facebook.  Now I just hope NBC and Chris Hansen don’t find a reason to show up there and do a show on internet pervs like he’s done with MySpace.

BTW, does anyone want to join my mob in Facebook’s Mob Wars ?

Warning:  If you read past this point, you are not allowed to judge me.  Well, actually you can.  But then I’ll know and I’ll just quietly, like inside my head, tell you to go fuck yourself.

It’s been pretty stressful lately.  At home.  At work.  Everywhere.  Kids have been sick.  Spouses are upset with their jobs.  I got a new boss.  My role at work is changing.  I had to fire someone this week.  I had to interview and hire someone this week.  I have to train someone next week.  It just goes on and on.

And let me say that I love my kids THIS much (arms spread way wide).  I love them all the way to the moon and back infinity.  (That one is Lauren’s).

I get up between five and six in the morning, depending on who’s crying, hungry, not sleeping.  I dress and feed kids and sometimes clean and I go to work.  I love my job but it’s still work.  I get home around 5:30-6pm and the second I get out of the car is absolutely joyous.

Fia will scream "DADDY!!!!!"

Then "DADDY!!!!! DADDY!!!!! DADDY!!!!! DADDY!!!!!"

Then a great big leg hug.

That’s followed by Lauren running over screaming "DADDY!"

Heck, even PK waddles over and grabs both knees, rams his head just under my wedding tackle and says "Brtgvnkzwrkijhk."

It’s great.

And 30 seconds later two kids are whining / crying because I won’t hold / carry both of them at the same time, while the eldest child is inviting all the neighbor kids to eat with us or asking if she can eat with all the neighbor kids or if she can ride her scooter in the street or if I can teach her to ride a bike right now or if someone can spend the night two weeks from now, etc.  Ugh.

I say ugh because when I get home, after the greetings and hugs and kisses are over, I want to do three things:

1) Unload my stuff in the house.

2) Change clothes.

3) Take about 7-10 minutes relaxing and taking a shit.

Doesn’t sound like too much to ask, does it?

But usually it is too much to ask.   The wife does everything she can to afford me that luxury, but inevitably there’s a kid or two beating on the door or crying at the door or shoving their fingers and hands under the door.  That is not only NOT relaxing, it’s not at all conducive to a successful and relaxing bowel movement.

I’m a once a day guy.  And that once is when I get home.  It’s been that way since I had to do the poop walk / run once I got off the bus all the way back in elementary school.  It’s how I roll.

Fast forward to last night.  It’s Wednesday and that usually means volleyball night and the two eldest kids go to church with my folks for some crafts and dinner.  It’s my wife’s day off so she gets some peace in the evening when PK is the only one she has to deal with.

But yesterday she had to work from 2-10.  So I decided to skip volleyball and hang out with her and tend to the boy so she could work or whatever.

I got home at a very early 5:25pm.  Kissed the wife, sat down on the couch and waited for PK to notice I was home.  When he did, he ran over, gave me a hug, said "ghksegczsdriglerucgh," and climbed up into my lap.  Then, he just sat.  We just sat.  For twenty minutes no one said a word.  I just snuggled with my little guy, sniffing his hair and rubbing his head while he mindlessly held my hand and repeated bent my fingers one at a time, straightened them out, over and over and over.

It was awesome.

Then, the wife put the lad to bed, I went downstairs and played NCAA 2008 for about 45 minutes and had a beer.  Okay two.

The girls got home right about 7:30, and we talked, snuggled, got them into their pajamas, and I took them upstairs, told them a story about squirrels with the same names as them but starting with the letter D (Dophia and Dauren) that saved the day by driving the kids to school on the bus, and kissed them goodnight.

No yelling.  No timeouts.  No being ignored or disobeyed.  It was heaven.

As I said before, I love my three kids to death, but there are days when you think to yourself "MAN, would it be nice to just have one kid."

And if you don’t think that, it’s because you’re either crazy or you only have one or two or no kids.  So fuck you again.

Have a great day everybody!