Merry Stressmas

Merry Stressmas, everyone. It’s the happiest time of year - yes, if you're 10 years old. For the rest of us, the holidays are the most stressful time of year - more so than all the other holidays combined. I'd put it up there with a tax audit or getting laid off.

Yesterday, the kids were off from school due to a blizzard that hit Long Island Saturday night. Naturally, I did what any responsible grown up would do on a Monday morning - I stayed home to take the kids sleigh riding. On the way to the park, Dawn gave me a few errands - return a rented movie and quick stop at the Post Office to drop off a package. No problem, it was not really on our way but life is all about the little detours we take - right?

So, I've got the three youngest with me as we head into town. The movie rental store and the Post Office are in close proximity but different shopping centers. Son #1 is old enough to jump out of the car and make the drops. This means no parking and everything else that goes along with getting three children in and out of a car in a busy parking lot right before Christmas. The first stop is the movie rental return which happens to be located in probably the busiest shopping center in town. The parking spaces seem to be tight and the driving isles are very narrow. I usually avoid this lot and park in a much smaller quieter lot behind the stores, but I have an assistant with me. As our first errand is complete, I head to our next stop before the slopes. I begin to maneuver slowly past the parked cars as one begins to back out of its spot. Not seeing that he is backing into the path of my vehicle I come to an abrupt stop. By this time, my vehicle was quite close to his car. Apparently too close because as we past each other the kids told me he was yelling - at me! “Really?” I said, “I don't hear a thing.” It's about 34 degrees outside, car windows are closed tight and the radio is on and believe it or not, the song playing was “It's the hap – hap - happiest time of year.....”! So I started to sing along and the kids start laughing.

Next stop was across the road - another tight parking lot. As we sat at the intersection, waiting for traffic to pass so we could cross the road and enter the parking lot, I saw that many had the same idea. Cars were trying to enter, cars were trying to leave but no one was moving - then the car horns started blowing. Son #2 thought they were intended for me and laughed "Everyone hates Daddy!" meanwhile, the song on the radio continued, 'It’s the merrrrriest season of all......”

Yes, Merry Stressmas. Less than a week to go, everyone is losing their minds and I’m going sleigh riding. Sure, there are still presents to buy and even more to wrap – the house needs cleaning, groceries to be bought and cookies to bake but the kids are home and there is snow on the ground – everything else can wait. That goes for projects at home as well. This year, I put my foot down and for once it didn’t wind up in my mouth. Sometime around Thanksgiving, I proclaimed - “No renovation projects will be started before Christmas.” I’ve learned my lesson. Last year, in an attempt to complete a basement renovation, I spent over 12 hours on my butt laying a floating wood floor on Christmas Eve. The year before was the dining room renovation started and completed the week immediately prior to Christmas. No, I’m not complaining about the work – the problem is not being able to help prepare for the big day - so, everything is on Dawn – shopping, wrapping, cooking, cleaning…. (not that I would actually do any of that but there’s always a first.) Actually, I took off last Friday just to wrap gifts – putting a mere dent in the pile.
I’ve also learned that nothing makes my wife happier than the sound of a running vacuum that she’s not steering. So, instead of making a mess with sheetrock and saw dust, I’m cleaning. Instead of working late into the night on another renovation before the company arrives on Christmas day, Dawn and I went shopping together and had lunch out – alone.

So, I’ve done my part to take the stress out of our holiday this year. I’m staying away from the malls and the shopping centers in town, I drive 5 mph slower than the speed limit and smile while I sing along with the radio – ‘it’s the haaaaaapiest time of the year…..’

Happy Holidays
Merry Christmas
Happy New Year

A woman's work...

In true Paul Harvey fashion (www.paulharvey.com), I thought I’d share “the other side of the story” regarding Dawn’s first business trip – alone. Last November, Dawn had a business trip to Williamsburg, Virginia while I stayed at home with the kids – four days and three nights. Needless to say, no house projects will be getting done this weekend! Before she left, Dawn had my itinerary all mapped out - where - when - why and how. All I needed to do is enter everything into my PDA which gives me an alarm 15 minues before I need to leave. I'm all set - this is going to be a piece of cake – hahaha!, yeh, right!

Thursday morning, we brought Dawn to the train - here we go!
Luckily, I can work remotely from home and didn't need to take any time off. Dawn made it even easier for me by doing food shopping - all I needed to do was make marinara sauce that would give me a couple of nights of pasta dinners.
Thursday night’s schedule was pretty tight - my son(chickie2) had soccer practice from 4:30 to 6pm and our oldest(chickie 1) would need to be at religion class from 7 to 8:30pm. This meant I would need to drop off chickie2 at soccer, go home, feed everybody else, go pick up chickie2, bring him home to eat quickly, get everyone back in the car, drop the chickie1 at church, go back home to give the chickie4 a bath, get back in the car and pickup at the church – now I see why her car is over the leased mileage limit. As we were leaving to pickup chickie1, I accidentally locked the house keys in the house. Dawn hasn't been gone for 12 hours and I've already locked us out! Luckily, chickie1 had her house key.

The next morning at breakfast, chickie3 said, "Day Two - Mommy's gone." Even though Dawn is hundreds of miles away, does not mean we can't still torment each other. I emailed Dawn a picture of chickie1 standing under the clock ready for school 5 minutes early - with a caption "How does he do it!?" Her response back was a picture of her room service breakfast, "Today, I am served!" Touché!

After dropping chickie4 and the boys at school, I had about 2 hours to get done as much work as possible before picking up chickie4. As fate would have it, I had a major proposal for my office due on Monday - I knew I had to squeeze it in between everything going on at home - great timing. I thought Friday would be an easy afternoon because of no athletic activities. Instead, I get a call from chickie1 right about the time she's to get on the bus at school to bring her home - she want's to go home with a girlfriend. No big deal, right? Wrong! This is a big deal, I don't normally make these decisions, I'm not prepared for this, I don't know this girl, I don't know if Dawn knows her mom - THIS IS NOT ON MY AGENDA! Ok, so I stuck my neck out and let her go - after speaking to the dad. This just added one more trip out with the gang to get chickie1 back home so she could get ready and we all get back in the car to bring her to the dance studio. She’s in there for an hour, so we stayed in the car and the kids all fell asleep while they were watching a movie.

Saturday morning - the grand finale! Before Dawn left, she told me to make sure the boys have their soccer uniforms - and I did. What she didn't say was anything about the other equipment they need - like shin guards. As we're about to leave, there's a mad search for chickie3's shin guards. So I ask " where are your shin guards?" "I don't know." "When did you use them last?" "I don't know." "When did you see them last?" "I don't know." At this point I made the irrational decision to call my wife - she'll know where they are - she knows everything! Big mistake. She saved my frantic voicemail message so I - and everyone else she played it for - can hear what a lunatic I am.

So, here's the schedule - I wanted to get out of the house by 8 am and stop for bagels, instead we were searching for equipment that was not put back where it should be. Chickie2 needs to be at the soccer field at 9:15 for a game that will start at 10 ending at 11am. Chickie3 needs to be at a different soccer field at 11:30 for an 11:45 game ending at 12:45. Chickie4 has to be at yet another field at 1:45 for her "game" (4 year old girls) that will end at 3pm. Taylor has dance from 3 to 5, so she will have to be left at the studio during chickie4's game. I feed everyone pizza between 1:00 - 1:15 and we were off again. WOW! I need to point out here that Dawn does this - EVERYDAY!
We all celebrated making it to Saturday night without a single trip to the hospital or any calls to missing persons, by having popcorn and watching a movie - AT HOME!

Sunday morning I woke to a mountain of laundry - oh no, better do something about that. Three loads of sheets and towels later, the mountain was a mere hill.
I had planned to get the house in some order this morning - it wasn't that bad, we were hardly home. But, the floors needed to be mopped and the boys room condemned. After the house was presentable we would pick up Dawn in Huntington where we would have dinner.
Dawn calls about 8:30am and is dreading the 7 hour train ride home, so she asks me to pick her up at Penn Station (that’s in the middle of Manhattan). I would have rather cleaned up and scrubbed toilets all day than drive into the city and back, which would have been at least 4 hours in the car. So, when I told chickie4 we had to get mommy in the city, she said "On the train?" - "No, by car." Then I thought for a minute and said "Yes, by the train - great idea!" The kids love the train - it would be fun. I checked the schedule and we could get into Penn Station 15 minutes before Dawn's train arrives and get on the LIRR to be back in Huntington by 6:15 for dinner as originally planned.
What a weekend! And that, my friends, is “the other side of the story”.
(Note to self – increase Dawn’s life insurance.)

Time for a new van

After 10 years and 95000 miles, it was time to replace our van - a white Ford Windstar I had purchased new in 1998. Actually, the decision to buy this minivan was left to our then 2 year old, - I simply had to sign the paperwork. As chickie1 climbed into what would be our first family van, I told the salesman - "If she likes it, we'll take it." With that, she turned to me and said "Good!".
Why do I bring this up? Simple, that van has been as useful as any tool I've ever owned or used. Over the years, it has hauled more building material that can be listed here. If you are planning to remodel, renovate or even just repair, how do you plan to bring stuff home? If folding down the two rear bench seats didn't give me the height inside the vehicle, I could just remove the seats completely - which explains my many trips to the chiropractor. There's nothing like lifting an 80 pound seat while bent over inside a minivan.
Yep, 4' x 8' panels of sheetrock slid flat, right into the back of the van - can't do that in anything else but a pickup truck, but you can't fit four kids in the back of a pickup truck - legally. I was almost sorry to see it go - it's been a part of the family for as long as my oldest son. But, I knew its days were numbered and we were living on borrowed time.
The day before I was to trade in the old Windstar, I began cleaning it out. In the back, behind the rear seat, was one of chickie2's baseballs- it's been two years since he's played. Under the first bench was chickie3's new soccer ball from last spring, don't want to leave that. In the compartment between the front seats were a stack of old cassette tapes Dawn and I used to listen to prechildren. When I found the roll of paper towels and the disinfectant wipes in a rear hidden compartment, I recalled the one item no family with small children ever left home without - the porta-potty. It fit perfectly under the bench seats, never in the way and always ready for an emergency. I won't go into why the wipes were necessary but let me just say that on one occasion, I found out that I have a very strong stomach.
Yes, I came across so many items that brought back just as many memories that I started to get choked up – then, I realized it was just caused by 10 years of dirt and dust – I never cleaned that vehicle.

Getting Away

At about 5pm last Monday, I’m preparing to leave the office for a few days away with the family, before the kids go back to school. I had booked a couple of days in Hershey, PA. I love Hershey Park - very family oriented, reasonably priced and not too far of a drive – about 4 hours. Well, my office phone rings and I see from the caller ID that it’s my wife. She probably wants to know what train I’ll be on, obviously excited about taking the kids away - I was only half right. Yes, it was Dawn but she was upset because of the car. On her way home, just about every light on the dash was lit. She thought we would have to postpone the trip a day or two. I booked the hotel a month ago. It was very unlikely we would be able to find another room for the 6 of us at the last minute. “Not an option, I told her – we’re going!” Extremely upset, she demands -“You need to call Eddie, right now - see what he says!” I very calmly replied, “No, Eddie will not be able to tell us anything about the problem just by dashboard warning lights. I’ll take a look at it when I get home.” You see, Eddie is our local car mechanic. I told Dawn I’d take it to him first thing in the morning.
I must mention something very important here. As much as I know about house construction, repairs and remodeling, I know absolutely nothing about cars. Not that I haven’t tried, you see automobiles require a whole different set of tools and knowledge – of which I never acquired. My only memory of my father working under the hood of our family wagon was when the light he was using to see fell and broke on the engine requiring him to pick broken glass out of the carburetor with needle-nose pliers. I’m not laughing because I’m no better. My automotive expertise is limited to changing the engine oil and I don’t even do that anymore. I decided to hang up my oil wrench after a single drop of motor oil flew from the oil can landing in my eye as I spun it onto the underside of the engine. I was wearing contact lenses which are plastic and plastic is a petroleum based product. Well, when oil and plastic are combined, the plastic kind of melts – right on my eye!
So, back to our trip. When I finally arrived home, I could see the vehicle information book was out of the glove compartment and open on the kitchen table. “We have no ‘Stabil-i-Trac’. The book says not to drive the car – it’s not safe – what’s ‘Stabil-i-Trac?” I don’t know what it is and I really don’t care. What I do know is that I’ve been driving vehicles for over 30 years without it and it was not going to keep me from taking the kids to Hershey Park!
The next morning I got to the gas station where Eddie hooked up a small computer to the car. One of the seven computers in the car was not communicating with the other computers. That would make all the dashboard lights come on. Eddie thought it would be safe to drive to Hershey. That was all I wanted to hear. I got home and told Dawn what Eddie said which only seemed to slightly appease her. Then, the questions – “Does he know we’re going to Hershey?” “Yes.” “He said it’s OK?” “Yes.” “…to go all the way to Hershey?” “Yes.” She usually runs out of ways to ask the same question. The trick is not to answer any differently – she would have made a great trial attorney!
The car is loaded with bags, kids and a bottle of wine (that’s for me if we break down half way there!) and we’re off. We didn’t get out of our development before Dawn started telling me how nervous all the lights on the dash was making her. So, I took a piece of paper and covered the instrument panel. But not before she could see the Brake lights were on as well. “Now, the brakes!?! Are we going to lose the brakes?” “No.” “Are you sure? How do you know?” “Because the brakes are not computer operated.” “Did Eddie see the brake light?” “Yes.” “He did?” “Yes.” “What did he say?” “Nothing, it’s not a problem.” “How do you know? I’m very nervous about this.” At this point I stated that I would no longer discuss anything else about the car.
Everything was going along fine. After about an hour, we were approaching the Whitestone Bridge that will take us off Long Island and into the Bronx and I realized the air conditioning is not working. Now, I’m getting nervous, what next? Reluctantly, I told Dawn. Prepared for her shock, I said, “We’re turning around to go back and get the mini-van.” To which she replies, “I’m not comfortable with the van either.” At this point I believe I said something about leaving her in Queens, but I decided instead to open the windows and attempt crossing the bridge. You see, I’m not as scared to break down on a very busy, major New York bridge with 4 kids and no shoulder as I am to hear Dawn say “I told you so.” for the rest of my life.
Yes, we made it to Hershey and back. The kids had a great time – we all did. So, this morning, as I’m telling my boss about the trip and why I was late due to dropping the car at the dealer, Dawn calls me from our driveway – “I can’t get the van out of park!” What can I say; she just keeps giving me great material!