Chicken and Ribs

Can you guess what I did on the 4th? I AM the grill-master! This is the barbeque my wife gave me for Christmas. It rocks. Its called the Perfect Flame and it is sold at Lowe’s. Being an ex Home Depot guy my wife felt kind of bad buying from my old competitor, but the service was so crappy at our Home Depot she had no choice. I’m glad she did. I used to sell barbeques in the garden department, and for the money we had nothing this nice. It’s hard to get 4 burners, natural gas hook up, and stainless steel for under $450. I think this was about $425. It was also very easy to put together. If you are looking for a new barbeque, I highly recommend it.

On a side note, my daughter thinks I’m weird for taking pictures of the barbeque.

“Daddy, why are you taking pictures of your meat?”
“Uhhh no, actually I’m taking pictures of the barbeque.”
“Why are you doing…oh I know, it’s for your blooooggg.”
“Yyyeeesss it iiissss.”
“That’s silly, you blog about everything. Look, there’s a piece of dog poo. Why don’t you take a picture of that and blog about it?”

I’ll have to think about that.

Malathion Induced Statements

The Malationkids always have something important to say. This week all three of them had “blog worthy” quotes.

Let’s start with the youngest, Alissa. It is always a battle to get her to eat all of her food. Half the time she asks for what’s on her plate then she says she is full and the food goes to waste. This morning she didn’t want to eat the toast that she had requested. Sherri pulled the “There are starving kids in Africa" card. Alissa’s response, “If I eat that toast will those kids stop starving?”

Next up will be the middle child, Austin. This summer we are working on his language arts skills. This book we have him working in has an exercise on metaphors. The exercise was simple; make up a metaphor for the list of words provided. Here is Austin’s metaphor for friend, “Friends are like meat and cheese, they always stick together.”

Last but not least will be the oldest Sarah. When asked about why she got in a fight this was her reply, “Bitch had it coming.” Nice.

There's No Place Like Home, I Thought.

I usually keep the posts on this blog light. Wearing ladies shoes, pierced privates, and boob licking are the kind of posts associated with my little corner of the Internet. When I have something serious to get off my chest it is usually about my oldest daughter Sarah.

Sarah is currently living in a residential treatment home for teenagers. She has been there about 15 months now. It looks like she has turned the corner and is on her way to possibly coming home.

About 2 months ago a light must have went off in Sarah’s head. I guess she decided it was time to start working on getting out of that place. She is now in a program at the school that is starting to get her ready for just that, coming home. If she works hard and stays focused she may actually be home for Thanksgiving. It is all pretty exciting.

I am actually writing this post while waiting for a phone call from Sarah and her therapist. We have a therapy session once a week…….

I kid you not; I just got off the phone with Sarah’s therapist. She is off the program. Earlier today she started a fight in one of her classes. She pulled a hand full of hair out of her opponent and she possibly has a broken nose. WTF. He asked if I wanted to talk to her. I said no. I did tell him to ask her a question, “What was so important about that fight? It probably means she will be spending another Christmas in Utah.”

I gotta tell ya, it is times like this that make me think to my self, “What the hell was I thinking?” Did I just adopt a whole lot of trouble for the next 18 years? It really scares me sometimes. I see an awful lot of Sarah in Alissa. Is a lot of this stuff genetic? The girls do have the same father. Austin has a different father, and he has different issues.

I'm just pissed and I feel like blowing off some steam right now. I know I could have the same problems or worse if Sherri gave birth to some of my own evil spawn. I guess this is just all part of being a parent. Yea.

Sometimes Less Is More

I’m not sure what to make of the message my son is trying to send me. I don’t think my wife would appreciate his suggestion.

Father’s Day this year was uneventful, the way I wanted it. I got up early to do the yard work before the temperature outside hit triple digits. Then I came inside and kicked the kids outside. I got to watch most of the U.S. Open, I watched a movie (Slither- very gross, very funny), and Sherri made me dinner.

Sweet.

We Are Family!

I think dinner is a great time for families to spend time together. My family sits down at the kitchen table almost every night for dinner. When I was a kid, more often than not, I ate dinner in the living room, in front of the T.V. Sometimes my mom would join me, my dad was never home and my sister was busy screwing up her teenage life. I didn’t plan on fixing that when I became a parent, we just started doing it from the first day the older kids came into the house and it stuck.

Dinnertime has produced some fine stories that will be used as ammunition against my children at a later date.

An annoying fly is buzzing around the table.
Wife, “Aw man who let the fly in the house?”
Austin grabs the fly swatter, “I’ll get it!”
Austin tries, but misses badly each time, “Daaannngg, that fly jacked me off!”
Trying not to choke on my Costco Chicken Alfredo, “Excuse me?”
“That fly jacked me off!”
“Where did you hear that phrase Austin?”
“School.”
“Don’t you mean jacked up?”
“Maybe.”
“Austin, jacking off is a bad way to say you are touching your private parts.”
I smile at Sherri and roll my eyes.
“Oh yeah mom, you mean like that time you walked in on me in my room!”
“What?’
“OMG”
Alissa chimes in, “Austin was jacking off!”
“What? We are all family. Right?”
Heavy sigh, “Yes Austin, yes we are.”