House of Mouse

As a parent, I spend many, many hours weekly immersed in the antics of animated characters. I've been quite upfront in this space about my lack of regard for Mickey, so I won't rehash that opinion here.

I will concede that he ranks higher than he once did, since I got forcibly exposed to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, which is at least cheerful and attempts to engage the kids -- and features some of the catchiest music.

It's also worthwhile to note that Mickey's and Minnie's houses -- note carefully, houses; no hint of impropriety in this relationship -- were among the highlights for the kids during our Disney Visit, and they were genuinely pretty thrilled to meet the Great Mouse in, um, person. Mickey made a big deal out of my daughter wearing a Mickey t-shirt... however, both kids were a mite puzzled by one thing: on TV, Mickey is chatty to the point you'd like to stuff a sock in his snout (?) on occasion, but in person he resorted to pantomime and could not be induced to squeak out a single word. Disney should have pamphlets available with advice on how best to handle those types of questions.

Seemingly of a different species altogether is the rodent half of the Tom & Jerry comedy duo. I have to say that I've always harbored a real prejudice against these two as a result of childhood exposure to a lot of Hanna-Barbera dreck such as Magilla Gorilla, Quick Draw McGraw, and Huckleberry Hound (aka the Not Funny Crew), and it's only in the past year I've really studied them closely, albeit involuntarily, every night on Boomerang from 7:30-8:00 pm ET.

I'm compelled to admit that even after repeated (and repeated, and RE-repeated) viewing of Boomerang's Tom & Jerry repertoire, rare is the evening that I don't admit at least once (sotto voce), "OK, that's funny." I do sometimes wonder why Tom sings at times, but seemingly can't speak; Spike the dog, and Nibbles the other little mouse, and that little Yakky-Doodle fellow rarely shut up, but T&J remain resolutely silent.

Of course, hardly anything in the cartoon world makes any less "internal" sense than almost any episode of Heroes (or for that matter, the fact that "According to Jim" is still on), so I suppose it's pointless to quibble.

Animated hijinx aside, I haven't found our last few trips to camp all that amusing. Since our camp is only sporadically occupied, and not exactly hermetically sealed, we've been aware that we're at risk for four-footed visitors. It hasn't been that uncommon to find upon arrival a scattering of very tiny droppings; once we found that a jar of peanut butter had had its top gnawed. Mostly, however, I've been successfully pretending that we're doing a kind of woodlands timeshare where they leave long before we arrive.

A couple of visits back, just after lights-out, we heard dishes being bumped around, so I stepped out into the kitchen to find a frightened mouse scurrying back and forth in confusion. No, wait -- that was me. Anyway, as we both scurried, he dove off the counter behind the stove and disappeared. All I could do, really, was to plug the gap with a big mug and go to bed -- but before we left the next day, I set out 2 traps loaded with (what else?) peanut butter.

The next time we returned, my wife went ahead earlier, and when I arrived with the kids, she said, "Remember the, um, things on the counter? Well, they were, uh, you know... but I took care of them." And having claimed two victims enabled me to return to my deluded state.

That night after lights-out, we did hear the pitter-patter of little feet (and I knew it wasn't my daughter, because she just lies in bed and yells, "DADDY!!"), which we eventually concluded was inside the wall and hence not fixable in any case.

This last time when we went back, I moved some throw-pillows on the bed... and found an acorn. I'm not sure whether the mice are getting bolder, or whether they're inviting the squirrels to party with them, or what. I am a bit concerned, though, that the next time we're going to find red shorts and a pair of white, 4-fingered gloves in the laundry basket, though.

Bloglet #1: Chickening Out

It has also occurred to me, to resume my previous thought, that not every post has to be War and Peace... in the old days when I was very concerned about my stats, I tried to make every post 'legitimate'. I think I may experiment a bit with smaller posts, although the real issue for me is the time it takes me, not the number of words I put out. So here goes...

This evening, my daughter & I had a little "date"-- her brother was at their grandmother's, and mom was out for the evening, so we decided to have a little adventure. We took advantage of one of the great inventions of recent years: the fast-food location with two franchises. I suppose it's mostly that the food business has consolidated lately, but I sure wish they'd had this when I was a kid. In our area we have an A&W/KFC, a Taco Bell/Long John Silver's, and a KFC/Taco Bell, so plenty of fat & calories available in many varieties.

We chose the latter tonight; Taco Bell has a 99-cent taco that qualifies as a feast for her at a price it's not hard for me to love. And I am all about the fried chicken... ok, I know it's not really fried, it's Pressure-Cooked. With zero-trans-fat oil. So really, it's almost health food. You probably know that they don't use "fried" in their name any more -- it's just plain KFC -- but I really enjoy the way they get the subliminal benefit from the Implied Fried while at the same time sort of disavowing it.

When you go out for fast food, it's probably better not to think about the nutritional angle, and frankly I probably wouldn't have except in visiting the KFC website to see whether they really play up the pressure-cooking angle (I couldn't find a mention), I discovered a nifty nutrition calculator.

Here's the scoop on my relatively modest meal (2 pc thigh & drumstick, extra crispy; mac & cheese, a biscuit and a Pepsi):

• 1110 calories
• 87% of the recommended daily value for fat
• 51% for cholesterol
• 113% for sodium
• 5% for dietary fiber (that's almost all the biscuit, of which I only ate about half)

I should probably pause here to request that if I die before I finish this post, please tell my family I loved them...

After eating and before my arteries hardened all the way, I took my daughter to the rest room. Rather than turning her loose in what I'm sure was an absolutely pristine ladies' room, I took her into the men's room. As I opened the door, I was confronted face-to-face with the "men's products" vending machine. I got her settled into what she needed to do and sort of sidled over to the machine to begin to prepare the spiel for the inevitable... she always notices everything and wants to know why and how and who and where.

Here's what KFC thinks every man needs: (1) a small pack of Tylenol (2) a pack of temporary tattoos (although the label was actually spelled 'tatoos') and (3) a pack of glow sticks. By the way, the glow sticks had a disclaimer: should not be taken internally. In case you were feeling really literal about trying to get that 'inner glow'.

And of course, since I was prepared with an answer to "Daddy, what's that?" (although I would have been absolutely stumped by the inevitable follow-up, "Why do they have glow sticks in the bathroom?"), she didn't even notice.

I'm pretty sure the conversations are going to get worse anyway...

Time Keeps On Tickin' Tickin' Tickin'

My wife loves to make lists. There's almost always a legal pad lying about somewhere, covered from top to bottom with all the things she wants to get done in the next day/week/lifetime. Quite often there's a second column with my name at the top with a separate list. Sometimes it's actually the first column.

I don't tend to write anything down, but I do make mental lists as well. Of course, one problem with a mental list is that it's pretty painful to try to cross something off. For me, in any case, a lot of the list is taken up with standing items anyway... stuff I always have pending and that never gets crossed off. Things that hang over my head like the anvil over Wile E. Coyote's.

Many's the evening when, after finishing off my daily tasks -- and that's a whole different list, by the way, and sometimes it's pretty late before they're complete -- I sit down on the couch and think to myself: how should I pass the rest of my evening? Should I read, or watch TV, or simply spend time with my wife? I could surf the net, or rip some of the music I have recorded on my hard drive to my iPod. There's always e-mail to catch up on...

As I run through the options, I always bump into at least one item on the master list: the blog. I can tell you that it's a very rare day when I don't stop and ask myself, "How long has it been since I posted?" I do feel an obligation to post often enough that anyone checking in semi-regularly won't have to wait too long to find something new. I'm well aware that if someone tries a couple times and comes up empty, they're probably not coming back. And I'm not so swamped with visitors that I can spare any.

Here's the rub: it won't be worth bothering if I just write something to fill up a date. As I've said before, I've only had like about a half-dozen original ideas in my whole life -- so considering I've got what, 130+ posts, I may be in danger of repeating myself.

On the other hand, I don't want to shut the thing down. I do still have things I want to say, at intervals, and I've put too much effort into this -- too much of myself -- to just walk away.

So this is what I want to do. I want to keep the blog going, and I want to post when I have something to say. But I want to declare independence from the notion that I need to post on schedule 'X'. Frankly I feel it pulling me toward writing crappy stuff. And I certainly don't need any extra push in that direction.

I hope you will keep coming back to visit when the spirit moves you, but I hope you will give me the grace to be somewhat erratic in my schedule. I do have some ideas for some things I want to write, which I believe will be better if I take the time to write them as they sort of ripen in my head rather than because oh no it's been 3 weeks and if I don't post something now no one will ever come read me again.

After all, I do have well over 100 posts and I would bet good money that no one but me has ever read all of them... so browse the back issues while you're waiting to be served! Kind of like the doctor's office.