Do you know what happens when your daughter’s new boyfriend accidentally fills your car’s six-cylinder, fuel-injected gasoline engine with diesel? Because I do. The car continues to run just fine. But only briefly. After a few hundred yards, it will start sputtering. The sputtering then turns to clanking which quickly degenerates to violent shaking. It… Continue reading Last First Date
My youngest son and I tried wake surfing for the first time last week. Despite all the helpful advice I kept shouting at him from the boat like “Try sinking less quickly!” and “You probably need more sunscreen!”, he just couldn’t get up. But the more he failed, the more impressed I became with his… Continue reading Trying, Still
My employer deployed an autonomous robotic mower to the front lawn of my building this week. It’s like a Roomba vacuum cleaner, but with considerably worse collision consequences for sleeping cats. I think it’s awesome, though not just for that reason. If you know me at all, then you know I despise mowing more than… Continue reading The Future of My Dreams
I’m helping to plan a wedding. It’s not for me. I already have a wife. It’s for my son and his fiancé, who is from Boston of all places. I was skeptical about their engagement for a long time because I didn’t believe it was possible to love someone who didn’t fervently hate the Patriots.… Continue reading The Price of Love
My 11-year-old son and I slept in a tent on the snow last night. On purpose. It was all part of the Klondike Derby, an event that was started by the Boy Scouts of America in 1949 because they hated to be warm and dry back then. The picture above shows my son’s troop slogging… Continue reading Decapitation Merit Badge
My oldest daughter turned 18 today. She’ll be graduating high school in June, then leaving for college in August. All this growing-up and moving-away stuff is expected, I guess, but it’s sure happening faster than I’d like. Those who’ve already sent a child off into The Great Big World know I’m muddling my way through… Continue reading Owie
Bad News: There’s smoke coming out from underneath our car.Good News: The car is no longer on fire. If you’ve never been at the epicenter of an explosion before (this was my second time), I assure you it’s nothing like the movies. There’s no accompanying thematic music, for example, or a slow-motion action sequence, or… Continue reading The Exploding Snot
I am not a fisherman. Somehow this fact didn’t deter my son’s scout leader from placing me in charge of the fishing merit badges this spring. I’m not exactly sure how I ended up in this role, but I imagine he started with a list of qualified candidates (e.g. the crew from the Deadliest Catch,… Continue reading Teach a Man to Teach to Fish
Let me explain. My 19-year-old son sent a family text last Sunday night confirming our weekly video call. He’d been working on a project all day at A.S.U. but was getting ready to walk back to his apartment so he could join us online at 9pm. Less than 30-minutes later, I was on the phone… Continue reading This Holiday Season, I’m Grateful for a Candy Bar
My 57-year-old neighbor lost his life in a heinous crime that has left our community reeling. The sound woke me from a deep sleep, but I really didn’t think much about it at the time. I listened just long enough to confirm it wasn’t coming from inside the house, then rolled over and went back… Continue reading I Heard a Murder this Week
