Don't Eat Soggy Waffles!

An interchange that happened this afternoon on the way home from work & daycare:

Lil Phez: Don't eat soggy waffles, right daddy?
Me: Huh? What baby?
Lil Phez: I told to you, "Don't eat soggy waffles". That's right, right daddy?
Me: Surrrrre. Okay, sweetie.
(About 10 minutes later; closer to our home)
Lil Phez: That way is eat, right daddy? And that way is waffles.
Me: (not hearing him completely) That's right, left is that way and right is that way.
Lil Phez: No daddy, soggy is there and don't is there. I know because 'don't eat soggy waffles.
Me: Ohhhh, baby it's not 'Don't', it's never. You're saying "Never Eat Soggy Waffles". That's neat that you know that. Who told you that?
Lil Phez: Diana at school. It was on her t=shirt with arrows.
Me: Cool. I learned it as "Never Eat Shredded Wheat"...it helps you remember directions.
Lil Phez: Yep.

Say What?

As a dad, there are words and phrases that you never think you'll hear yourself say to your little ones. Take for example, "If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times...it's okay to smoke pot - recreationaly", or "I've had my doubts before, but now I know for sure...you're way too smart to be my offspring". These are things I can go to my grave without ever saying. Tonight I said something though that was almost as alarming:

Stop brushing your teeth, already!

Mrs. Phez bought Lil' Phez a new tooth brush this past weekend that when the operator of said hygienic cleaning device squeezes it, the thing will light up & start flashing a tacky & obtrusive fun & creative pattern of lights for the mandated suggested period of time allotted for brushing ones teeth that will provide for the sufficient removal of calcified sap from an 800 year old Sequoia bits of Cheetos from the youngsters teeth.

It was upon the occasion of my child squeezing the ?!@#?#@! toothbrush for the 4th time that I begged the Gods from the heavens above for the benevolent mercy to cease the antics of the toothbrush and in exchange I would offer my internal organs to be served at the nearest Benihana asked the kid to knock it off. Because, by this point in the evening, I wasn't sure which was to come first: (a)the end of the tooth brushing so my kid would go to bed, or (b)the apocalypse. I was betting on the latter.

Just for the Halibut

Some will say I am a very punny guy. Of course, most folks wouldn't dare say such a thing. But in an effort to get more people into that camp, I am bringing you some really punny stuff.

This first set comes from my memory of when I used to be in AOL chat rooms - do they still have those? Anyway, we used to think of iconic phrases or names and do a switcheroo with the word "spam". This was done as a tribute to the mystery meat of all mystery meats. Oh, oh...I just thought of a pun: What did the butcher say to the whole cow that arrived at his shop? Nice to meat you. Get it? Meat you, instead of meet you. Meat you. He's a butcher. He said meat you. Oh my Gawd, I crack myself up!

Okay, so here we go:
10. Duck! It's a drive by spamming!
9. Introducing: Spammy Davis Junior!
8. Just for the spam of it.
7. Here's spam in your eye.
6. It's all fun & games until someone loses a spam.
5. I'm so hungry I could eat a spam.
4. Let's run it up the spam pole to see if any one salutes.
3. Even a blind pig will find a spam sometimes.
2. It's so hot outside that I could fry a spam on the sidewalk.
1. All we are sayyyyinnnnng, is give spam a chaaaance!

Which brings me to one of my favorite things to do in mixed company. No, not that! I like to sing the lyric "All we are sayyyyinnnnng, is give peace a chaaaance!" But I change the word peace to whatever suits my fancy. One of my favorites:
All we are sayyyyinnnnng, is give crack a chaaaance!
All we are sayyyyinnnnng, is give necrophilia a chaaaance!
All we are sayyyyinnnnng, is give sex with your cousin a chaaaance!

And another head turner I just discovered while blogging at work: Go up to a bunch of your coworkers and say: "...and how do you spell necrophilia?".

Okay, I think I'm done now. I hope this posting was enjoyable for you as it was me. Oh, and if you want to leave a comment with some more spam phrases, be my guest!

Things You Never Thought You'd Hear

This morning, Lil Phez crawled into bed and joined me, Mama Phez, and Baby Phez, who beat Lil Phez by 5 minutes, for some wake up cuddle time. I was really enjoying it. That's when Lil Phez looked towards the foot of the bed and said, "Daddy, your feet are red. Just like a Princess!".

Little Known Facts About Hillary

Probably more entertaining than the facts I am about to share with you is the reason that I came across them. I work in a I.T. department of about 400 people and we have quarterly departmental meetings. While flow charts and schematic drawings might pique the interest of the few, it certainly doesn't do it for most of us - so, for a few years now, we've had a group within the dept. responsible for a bit of entertainment to break the monotony of the 4 hour meeting.

It wasn't supposed to be our turn this time around, but no one would do it so with two days to plan, we found out today that our VP agreed that we'd fill in. We are doing a spoof on a Presidential Debate but we are making the questions and answers relative to our work environment. You'll never guess who they talked into portraying Hillary! I'll give you a clue...one of the times we did this before, we did a spoof on American Idol and I was Troyjaya. Well, Troyjaya and Hillary will look a lot like.

So, in researching for my part, here are some interesting facts (okay, maybe not all of them are facts - some are allegations) about our next President - maybe.

1. In 1969, after Hillary Diane Rodham graduated with departmental honors in political science, she worked her way across Alaska, washing dishes in Mount McKinley National Park and sliming salmon in a fish processing cannery in Valdez (which fired her and shut down overnight when she complained about unhealthy conditions).




2. It took Bill Clinton 4 years to make Hilary become his wife. They started dating in 1971. Hillary Rodham and Bill Clinton were married on October 11, 1975, in a Methodist ceremony in their living room





3. Bill Clinton returned to the Governor's office in1982. Only then Hillary Diane Rodham began to use the name Hillary Clinton, or sometimes "Mrs. Bill Clinton", in order to have greater appeal to voters.







4. From 1986 to 1992 Hillary Clinton was enjoying six-year tenure as a director of Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest company. Fellow board members and company executives say Mrs. Clinton used her position to champion personal causes, like the need for more women in management and a comprehensive environmental program.




5. Hillary Clinton became involved in a scandal about having a lesbian affair with her personal aide Huma Abedin.

A new book by Edward Klein, ‘The Truth About Hillary’ is said to make some claims about Hillary Clinton having lesbian relationships.





I have to go now and practice making funny faces in front of the mirror. Wish me luck!

A Benefit of Living in South Florida

You can smack your child, or anyone else for that matter, and get away with it. What's more...you'll likely be lauded as a helper of the downtrodden rather than an assailant. I'm talking about mosquito control, folks. Yesterday, at Lil' Phez's birthday pool party, he walked up to me and was telling something about what another kid at the party was doing when I smacked him on his forehead. I caught him in mid-sentence. The look of stun on his face was amazing. I explained to him that he had a big fat juicy mosquito on his forehead and I still had the squished evidence in the palm of my hand. He said, "Oh, okay." and went back off to his buds.

How many of you that live where it snows can say that, hmmm?

Would you like some Kibble with that?

Several days ago, I was helping Lil Phez with his nightly chore: feeding the fish when something peculiar happened. But before I go into the incident let me, to quote Desi Arnaz, ecksplang.

When feeding the fish, Lil Phez needs my help, at age 3 & 11/12, because it is large tank and it requires that he climb up on a dining room chair - something he knows not to do without permission/supervision. At his tender age, I must say that Lil Phez is very good at knowing what his boundaries are, i.e. what he should & shouldn't do, and he doesn't test those boundaries.

Which is why I was shocked several days ago when he reached into the fish food, grabbed one sole morsel of fish food and with what seemed like an executed decision, slowly opened his mouth and brought this new snack to his lips.


This is when with all of my parental skills, grabbed the wrist of the offending hand and, with love and concern in my voice that would make Dr. Spock proud, I asked ,"What in the world are you doing!" My startled toddler blinked, regained his composure, and replied, "I was going to eat it, Daddy" very matter-of-factly.

So began the lecture. I explained why he shouldn't eat the fish food. I told him that fish food is for fish. I explained that he would grow a fin if he ate it (okay, not really). And I said all of the things one should say to their child when trying to keep them from eating pet food. He said he understood and we agreed that it would never happen again. Then came last night.

I was helping him feed the fish when he repeated the slow purposeful act of trying to partake of, what is apparently the nectar of the Gods, also known as fish food. At first I went into lecture mode but quickly caught myself. "Self", I said to myself, "This didn't work last time. Try a new approach." And so this is how I handled it:

Me: Son, didn't we agree you shouldn't eat fish food?
Lil Phez: Yes.
Me: Would you like to try one piece?
(This is when Mama Phez's right eyebrow shot up so far it practically joined her bangs.)
Lil Phez: It would be okay?
Me: I wouldn't eat the stuff but you want to try it, so go ahead...one piece, just this once.
(Lil Phez takes a piece, puts it in his mouth, and begins to chew)
Me: It's pretty gross, huh?
Lil Phez: Yeah.
Me: Yucky!
Lil Phez: Yucky!
Me: Let's go brush your teeth again and get that nasty taste out of your mouth, okay?
Lil Phez: Okay, daddy.

Next week, we try the dog food.

My Own Favorite Post

I wouldn't have thought of this post today but it showed up as the Google search results for someone in Warsaw who was searching for "son big feet".

To take a queue from Dave Barry, it sounds like a good name for a rock band. But it also happens to be a very fond memory for me that brought a smile to me as I reread it, so I thought I'd share it with you.

Memmmmmmmories...

...like the cobwebs in my - ack ack! Man, the mental cleaning lady hasn't been around in a while.

My favorite memories are the ones that pop up out of nowhere. You're sittin' there at light waiting for it to change when you are suddenly transported back to Driver's Ed class. Oh, wait, that's not you, that's me. Okay, here is my memory:

So as I said, I was in Driver's Ed class. They were selecting who in the class was going to get to drive with the Coach / Driver's Ed instructor - side thought here: Who else went to a school where the Driver's Ed teacher wasn't their sole job at the school? Okay, back to the memory...so 3 kids get picked to take turns behind the wheel for the class period while the rest of us watch a safety video under the supervision of the Science teacher. They head out, the films starts, 45 minutes later the film ends, the period is over and no word from the 3 kids & the coach. We found out the next the day that the coach had fallen asleep and the kid that was driving at the time kept driving. When the coach woke up, they were in the next county.

Oh, the light's green, gotta go.

(Note to self: Must stop blogging while commuting)

Funny Is as Funny Does

So I'm over there at The Geek Inside and I decided to check out her......blogroll. Again. This time I go to Electronic Replicant. Funny guy. Prove it, you say? Well, simply click here, my blogging friends and take a gander, or some geese, for yourself! Note: My favorite is number 33!

So, this leads me to two questions:

1) How many of you cringed at my use of mixed tenses? Ha, you should see my messed up elevenses!

2) Which is your current all time-favorite blog entry? And no, you can't select one of your own! Post about it and let me know in my comments.

Say What?

This morning, we were all getting ready for the day and Mrs. Pheasantly was playing with son # 1 in the kitchen. She was speaking really silly and getting our son to laugh when he turned to her and said, "Mommy, talk nor-bul-ly, please".

So, do any of you happen to speak Norbul? Would you know if it is a romance language?

Couldn't Resist

While I'd love to take credit, this is from an email sent by a friend:

A chicken crossing the road: poultry in motion.

The Should We Stay or Should We Go Friday Shuffle

This is a question that we'll be asking at work today in reference to whether or not our project team has to work the weekend (again) in order to support a recent deployment. So, hoping for the best, take 'er away Fred.

1. "Sweet Potato Pie", by Ray Charles with James Taylor. Way to hit it out of the park with your first pick, Fred!
2. "My Father's Gun", by Elton John off of the soundtrack for Elizabethtown. Great song. Good movie. Awesome soundtrack.
3. "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing", by Mantovani. Woops.
4. "Trynna Find a New Way", by Nelly Furtado
5. "Ticket to Ride", by the Beatles. Anybody know what they're singin' about?
6. "Dead Man's Hill", by the Indigo Girls
7. "Thank You", by Led Zepellin. A very sweet & poetic love song.
8. "He Went to Paris", by Jimmy Buffett. Fred knows 98 Buffett tunes and went with this one. Is this a sign?
9. "Money Changes Everything", by Cyndi Lauper
10. "Sense of Purpose", by The Pretenders (Okay these guys, the Indigo Girlos, & 10,000 Maniacs - they all seem interchangeable to me...is that wrong?)

Hmmm, and the Clash did not grace our shuffle. Oh well.

In closing, let me share with you an interchange I just had with son # 1. He was changing out of his night time diaper into underwear and he said to me, "When you don't have clothes, you're naked. And when you do, you're not." Thank you, Captain Obvious! Still cute though, huh?

Got Cados?

Yesterday morning, Sunday, it was time to harvest the crops from the back 5.

That would be 5 square feet, not acres, and the crops consist of two strawberry plants, a tomato plant, 2 herb plants, and a fruit tree. Son and I walked over to the strawberry plants which yielded for us ...wait for it... three entire ripe strawberries. We took them inside, washed them, and shared our bounty with Mrs. Pheasantly Fascinating.

Now it was time to check out the fruit tree, which is an Avocado tree. So I asked for help:

Me: Hey buddy, would you like to help look for Avocados?
Son # 1: Sure!
Me: Okay, let's go.
Son # 1: Let me tell mommy.
Me: Um, Okay.
Son # 1: Mommy!!!!
Mrs. Pheasantly Fascinating: Yes, sweety?
Son # 1: We're going to look for All-the-Cados.
Mrs. Pheasantly Fascinating: All the Cados, huh?
Son # 1: Yep, all of them!

He had really big feet!

Son # 1: He had really big feet!
(at 7:05 am, pre-coffee for mommy & me)

Me: What? Who, baby? Who had really big feet?

Son # 1: I was hungry so I looked under my door. He was putting my cereal for me at my table. He had really big feet.

Son # 1 looks down at the floor where I'm standing and and then his little face takes an expression so proud as if had he discovered the theory of relativity.

Son # 1: It was you, daddy! You got my cereal for me.

PS: My feet aren't really all that big, by the way.

Mr. Slick - Not!

So there I was...on a hot date! I was nineteen years old and was on a date with a girl from college. Yes...she had a name - I just don't recall what it was. Our date consisted of hanging out at my dad and step-mom's home. We'd have dinner with them and would swim in their pool. I know that the idea of taking someone home to meet the parents relatively soon in the relationship, i.e. on our first date, sounds perilous to a relationship, but when you're on a limited budget, it can be very appealling. Maybe it was the proverbial nail-in-the-coffin...that was our only date. Of course, that could have been on account of my not-so-slick-moves at the beginning of the date.

I drove over to her house, an hour away, to pick her up and on the way to my dad's house, stopped at an incredible bakery to get desert. This young lady was very attractive and I was very excited (read as: akwardly nervous). We went into the bakery, I bought the desert and escorted her out to the car whilst holding the cheesecake. I placed the cheesecake on top of the car at the passenger side of the car so that I could open the car door for her. Now I know what you're thinking...no, I did not leave it on top of the car. I shut her door, grabbed the cheese cake, opened the passenger side back door, placed the cake on the floorboard so it wouldn't slide of the seat - hey, I was thinking here! I then closed the back passenger door, walked around the back of the car, opened the driver's side car door, slid inside, and closed the door.

And while it was the driver's side door...it was the wrong one. I was sitting in the back seat.

On the bright side...I had made it to the back seat on our first date - sorta.

PS Mrs Pheasantly finds this story very, very funny.

The Better To Eat You With!

"Mommy, you're little...but you have really big teeth".

That's what our 3 year old told Mrs. Pheasantly Fascinating this evening while he was getting ready for bed.

She responded, "Okayyyy". Which I guess is better than "The Better To Eat You With" on account of nightmares and all, but that would have been my retort.

A lesson in Spanish

I was just going down memory lane and reviewing past jobs before I began working for my current employer, for whom I've worked for thirteen years. Considering the number of jobs I held prior to this one, it was more like a memory super highway. Anyway, I had this one job in college where I worked at a photo lab for a large drugstore chain. One of my tasks was to call customers when their pictures were ready.

I live in a culturally diverse community (aka Miami, it's only 30 miles from the U.S.) and one of the customers I called didn't speak any English. She answered the phone saying, "Oygo". Not knowing the correct spelling, I am spelling it phonetically. At a loss for words, well a loss for words in Spanish, I tried my best to recall the little I knew and I said "Pierdete". I then when to get a spanish speaking coworker who went to the phone only to discover the lady had hung up. He asked me what I had said and I told him that I had asked her to wait a minute in Spanish. "Ang how deed jew say et?", my colleague asked. So I told him: "Pierdete".

When he finished laughing he explained to me that I had meant to say "esperate", which when pronounced has the r come out like a soft d and the s gets swallowed a bit: "ehpeda-te". It turns out that piederte, which sounds a lot like "esperate" to a non-Spanish speaking native, means "get lost".

So she did!

I wasn't allowed to call customers anymore...for the remainder of my career with that employer, which was about two more weeks.

Funny

I was blurfing (means to surf blogs, or to vomit out of a fast moving train, plane or automobile) and I came across a cartoonist's blog: Basic Instructions. Here is a link to a funny strip on his blog:
http://www.basicinstructions.net/2007/08/how-to-open-snack-quietly.html