Learning to live in the now...now

As I type this, I'm sitting in Starbucks with a mocha light frappuchino and a piece of coffee cake, and all is right with the world.

It has taken me the better part of four decades to learn that. Dozens of times a day, I get to do things that make me happy, and for most of my life I've been utterly incapable of appreciating them. It has always been about accomplishing The Next Big Thing, whatever that may be...a new job, another child, running a marathon, whatever. I always find myself on the way to doing something, rather than enjoying what I'm doing at the time.

Does anyone else have trouble with the whole Living in the Moment thing? I do, but I'm happy to say that if nothing else, the year 2011 has made me (a) recognize what I was missing, and (b) start to learn how to enjoy the present.

Terry always says I don't know how to relax, and honestly, she's right. I'm always moving, always planning, always restless. What's wrong with just sitting? Why can't I do nothing at all and not feel guilty about it? Well, I'll tell you what, that's going to change. The only goal I'm setting for 2012 is that by this time next year, I'm going to be a pro at doing nothing. I'll be the king of inactivity.

That's not to say that productivity is bad. We all lead busy lives, and stuff has to get done. Nothing wrong there. But being in Accomplishment Mode 100% of the time is bad for you in so many ways, as I've learned over the last several months (funny what an E.R. visit for chest pains will do for you). Slowing down is not the same as slacking.

Of course, having the option to relax is a byproduct of living in a crazily affluent society like ours. If you're constantly worrying where your next meal is coming from, sitting under a tree reading poetry isn't as much of a viable choice. So simply living where we do is a reason to be thankful, and I am.

I suppose these are the kinds of things we think about on the cusp of a new year. It's a good time for reassessment, reflection and planning. We set New Year's resolutions, and if you're as tightly wound as I am, they're usually laughably unrealistic and you're forced to give up on them by mid-January. I've finally come to the realization that one modest resolution fulfilled is a thousand times more valuable than 10 crazy resolutions left to die.

How come nobody told me that 20 years ago? Well, actually, my mom did, and still does. I always thought I was one of those people who was good at listening to what their mother tells them, but I suppose not. My mom's constant admonitions to slow down and relax have, for the most part, gone unheeded.

But not this year. Not this time around. For my family's sake, and for my own sake, I guess, it's time to learn how to dial it down a notch or ten. What worries me, though, is that even as I write those words, I'm thinking to myself, "I've spent too long on this post. Gotta finish up and get some other stuff done."

Apparently this isn't going to be easy...

Ten random thoughts on a Friday

1. Crayon colors I could do without: Burnt sienna, cornflower, pine green, either red orange or orange red (one or the other...we don't need both).
   
   
2. Crayon colors I like: Silver, brick red, forest green, cerulean, raw umber.
   
   
3. This week between Christmas and New Year's Day is the strangest one of the year. Some people are working, some aren't. Some businesses are open, some aren't. My inclination is to say that everyone and everything should just shut down, but there are certain stores I need to stay open this week because I want to shop there. If we could all just agree to make me Holiday Czar, the whole thing would work out fine.
   
   
4. This is sort of awkward, but how come no one bothered to tell me that Ernest Borgnine and Abe Vigoda were still alive? And while we're on the subject, how can that be?
   
   
5. If I'm flipping through channels and I come across an episode of "M*A*S*H," I will always stop and watch. Always.
   
   
6. Every Tuesday, Terry babysits a little girl named Ava. It's a nice way for her to earn some extra cash, and our whole family just loves little Ava. Chloe has taken on Ava-watching responsibilities during this Christmas break, and the other day I saw her changing Ava's diaper. And do you know what? I realized I miss changing diapers. Never in a million years did I think I would ever say that, but it has been awhile since we had any diaper-wearers in the house, and I actually miss it. It was always a nice little bonding time with the child in question. Of course, I understand perfectly that if given the responsibility of changing diapers again, I would get sick of it after maybe two changings. I know that. But for now, I officially (sort of) miss it.
   
   
7. I wish I had time to read magazines. I've always thought that magazine readers were smarter than the rest of us. Maybe I'm wrong there.
   
   
8. This will almost certainly be the first time in history that someone has typed this sentence, but it's true: I wish I had learned to play the bassoon.
   
   
9. Because of my big head, I don't often wear hats of any kind. They just don't look good on me. I am deeply envious of all you tiny-headed hat-wearers.
   
   
10. For the second Christmas in a row, we gave Jared a gift card to Baker's Square to buy his own pie. The boy loves pie, LOVES it. Last year he got a pumpkin pie and ate the whole thing by himself in less than 24 hours. I'm sure he'll do it again this year. He eats like this all the time, and I doubt he weighs more than a buck-30. I understand the whole teenage-boy-metabolism thing, but seriously, how can he not be 300 pounds? He defies all known laws of physics and biology. Again, I'm jealous and baffled.

Driving Daddy crazy

Exactly 116 days from today, my daughter Chloe can get her temporary driver's license.

I know this because Chloe takes it upon herself to keep me updated on the Chloe Driving Countdown. This has been going on for the last year or so. We'll pass each other in the house and she'll casually mention, "You know, I can drive in four months." As if this is the single greatest thing that will ever happen to me and my life will be complete once she gets that learner's permit.

(QUESTION: Am I dating myself by calling it a "learner's permit?" Does anyone call it that anymore? Or did that phrase go out with the last episode of the "Love Boat?")

Anyway, having already taught Elissa to drive, I'm fairly confident I know what I'm doing. I took Elissa down to the high school parking lot on Sunday evenings for her first few times behind the wheel. The parking lot is undertstandably deserted on Sundays, which is good when you're trying to give the widest possible berth to someone whose grasp of which one is the gas pedal and which one is the brake pedal isn't exactly solid.

I would have Elissa drive around and around and around the school, just to give her a feel for accelerating, steering, stopping, parking, not running into stationary objects, etc. Then, just to mix it up and really live on the wild side, we would turn around and drive the other way around the school. It was almost too much for her to take in.

I was telling someone recently about the first time I had Elissa drive in traffic. We were near the end of one of our circle-the-high-school-57-times sessions when I said, "OK, now drive home." And her response was classic: "You mean on the road?" Yes, on the road. You'll find that that's the generally accepted method of traveling from one location to another: on a paved road.

Now understand, it's not like I was asking her to drive across the country or anything. It's maybe three-quarters of a mile from where we were parked to our house. But it's up a big hill and there are stop signs and yellow lines involved, and the whole thing can be a little intimidating to a newbie driver, I suppose. But Elissa was game, so she pulled out onto Rockefeller Road slowly, just as I had instructed her.

Actually, she took the "slowly" part a little too seriously. As we started climbing the hill to get back to our house, Elissa pushed the gas pedal down a full one-sixteenth of an inch, bringing us up to the mind-boggling speed of 12 MPH. And of course there was a car behind us. (As it turned out, the driver was our friend Jim McIntyre, who was actually on his way to our house, too, so it was OK. But he was required by the Guy's Code of Sarcasm to let Elissa know that she was a reckless driver who really needed to slow down out there.)

Anyway, we did eventually get home, though as I recall it took about an hour. And Elissa did eventually learn to break the 20-MPH mark and is now a licensed driver...a pretty good one, too. Having a third driver in the house is a handy thing when you have young kids, we find. Which is why I don't mind Chloe getting her license.

Whenever I'm out driving and Chloe is in the car with me, she likes to make these "vroom vroom" sounds, like she's 5 years old and pretending to drive the car herself. This makes me think that we're going to have the opposite problem with her and that staying under the speed limit may be a challenge. Maybe we need to institute a "no vroom vroom" rule.

All I'm saying is, if you happen to be in Wickliffe on a Sunday evening this spring, you might want to stay away from the high school parking lot. Consider this your warning.

What your choice of board game says about you

We're a board game kind of family.

And by "board" game, I don't just mean the ones where you roll a dice and move a little piece around a sheet of pressed cardboard, though Lord knows we have dozens of those. I also mean checkers, chess, cribbage, Scrabble, and Yahtzee, and oodles and oodles of card games.

In our downstairs storage room is a seven-foot cabinet filled top to bottom with almost every game you can imagine. We never lack for choices.

One reason we like board games is because we like winning. If there's one thing I've passed down to my kids, it's a competitive streak. I like to win. They like to win. There is little mercy expected and almost none shown during one of our family board game sessions. You might think, "But isn't it about having fun?" And we would respond, "Yes, but isn't the greatest kind of fun seeing an opponent land on Boardwalk and Park Place when you own them with hotels, and watching the other person burst into tears as they hand over the small fortune in Monopoly money they've spent 2 1/2 hours accumulating?"

We like to play virtually anything, but there's a subtle message conveyed in the specific board game you select. Like the car you drive or the clothes you wear, a board game says something about you. Here's what I'm talking about:

CLUE
People who like to play Clue are violent sociopaths. They have no interest in free-market real estate (Monopoly), choosing a career and raising a family (Life), or out-and-out lying (Balderdash). They want a game that involves the gruesome bludgeoning or stabbing death of a rich guy, and the subsequent trial, conviction and execution of the murderer (who, by the way, always seems to be Colonel Mustard when I play). Be careful, because if you beat them at Clue, they're liable to reenact the murder scene with you playing the part of Mr. Boddy. Just saying.

BATTLESHIP
Battleship is a game of luck. Winning is random, unless you're playing a little kid who packs their ships into that compact "I have no idea what I'm doing" square of doom. I'm not saying that being a good Battleship player is the equivalent of being a good slot machine player, but....well, yes, actually I am saying that. They're both hit and miss. But hey, there's no shame in the fact that you lack deductive reasoning or any other socially redeemable skills.

MONOPOLY
Like Monopoly? Then you're a cheater. Yes, you heard me, you're a cheater. No honest person genuinely enjoys Monopoly, because an honestly played game of Monopoly takes 14 hours. The game only ends in a reasonable amount of time if the banker is giving himself interest-free loans on the sly, or if someone else grabs a deed they didn't pay for in order to complete a monopoly ("Wait, you have Marvin Gardens? I don't remember you buying that." "Oh yeah, it was an hour ago. You must not have noticed.") You might be saying, "Well, I never do either of those. I don't cheat at Monopoly." Yeah? Do you do that thing where you put money on Free Parking and give it to the next person who lands there? Then you're a cheater. It's not in the rules. Look it up.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT
If Trivial Pursuit is your first choice, you're an insufferable, overly competitive know-it-all. I should know, because I'M an insufferable, overly competitive know-it-all, and Trivial Pursuit is always my first choice. Why? Because I know that no matter who you are, I'll probably destroy you. My mind is filled with useless knowledge. Rarely is it of much use unless  I'm playing Trivial Pursuit or appearing on the occasional television game show. Never play Trivial Pursuit with someone who wants to play Trivial Pursuit, that's my advice to you.

CHESS, CHECKERS, SCRABBLE, BOGGLE, STRATEGO AND ANY OTHER OF THOSE GAMES I'M NOT VERY GOOD AT
People who choose these games are all smarter than me. I can do random trivia, sure, but that's no indication of intelligence. That's just having a photographic memory and the gift of instant recall. These are games of strategy that require clear thinking, a quick mind, and the ability to anticipate your opponent's moves. I lack those skills, and the people who have them are exactly what I want to be when I grow up. But let me get them on the other side of a Candyland board and I'll wipe the floor with them. I have five kids, man. I'll be past Queen Frostine and on my way to victory before they even know what hit them.

I'm an old guy in training

I am 42 years old, which puts me pretty solidly into the category of "middle age," I suppose. It's early middle age, but middle age nonetheless.

There are actually some advantages to this. For example, the only people who think of you as a dumb kid anymore are the ones in their 80's, and there are fewer and fewer of them left to worry about anyway. You also command a little respect from your co-workers, who are forced to acknowledge that while you are clearly a dope, you are a dope who has managed to survive for four decades, so you must have at least a few smarts in that head of yours.

Of course, the early 40's are also when most of us start to experience the physical signs of aging. There are crow's feet, some graying at the temples (and more than just the temples in my case), flab around the middle...that sort of thing. My favorite moments, though, are the memory lapses. Yes, they're frustrating, but they're also hilarious.

I regularly do that thing where I walk into a room and then have no idea what I'm doing there. I'll be strolling through the house thinking about the 1979 Cleveland Indians (I often think about the 1979 Cleveland Indians...in some future blog post I'll explain why) when suddenly one part of my brain will ask another part why we're in the basement. And the brain section being tasked to formulate an answer will instead freeze up.
"The basement? I'm in the basement? Why am I in the basement? Was it something to do with laundry? No, no, that's not it. How about the treadmill? Was I coming downstairs to run on the treadmill? Well, no, I've never once run on the treadmill, so that can't be it. Did I come to get extra rolls of toilet paper? Maybe to get something out of the freezer? How about the kids' old McDonald's  playset? Did I come to spend a few minutes pretending to be a minimum-wage fast food worker? No, no, probably not."

And so it goes, sometimes for a solid two or three minutes, during which I'll stand helplessly in the middle of the front room of the basement trying to figure out the purpose of my existence for that particular moment. Most of the time it will eventually to come me, but other times I have to admit defeat and trudge back upstairs, troubled that my short-term memory is rapidly fading.

Then there's the fact that I'm no longer The Fast Kid. For many years -- from about 6th grade through college -- my main athletic attribute was that I had foot speed. I could run, and I could run fast. These days I'll try picking up the pace when I'm out for a jog, just to regain the awesome feeling that only the competitive sprinter knows. But the gear I used to shift into just isn't there anymore. I search and search for it, but I rarely get past Chunky Suburban Dad on the velocity scale.

Not to be missed for many guys is the joy that is male pattern baldness. Ever since my early 20's, I've been steadily losing hair in a patch on top of my head. I don't think about it often because I don't usually look at the crown of my own head. But when I do, or when I see a picture of myself from the back, I'm momentarily stunned as I think, "Good Lord! Is that Bruce Willis?" And then I realize it's actually me, and I'm a little depressed for just a few seconds before I decide it's not worth worrying about and I move on.

I've never been one to look at other women much, but nowadays I do it even less. This isn't so much because I can't appreciate an attractive women anymore than the fact that I'm just too darned tired to care. "Oh look, is that Scarlett Johansson naked? Yeah, OK, fine. More importantly, do I have time for a nap?"

I don't mean to make it sound like I'm on death's door or anything. If the average life expectancy for men continues to rise, there's a good chance I'm not even halfway through my allotted span of years. Which is good, considering all of the great memories I have yet to make with my wife, my kids, my future grandkids, etc. The only thing that really scares me is that I'll die without ever having celebrated a major Cleveland sports championship, something that's truly frightening and a very real possibility.

This is the point when I generally come to some sort of conclusion and wrap up the blog post, but for the life of me, I can't remember what I was typing about in the first place...

Division of labor - marriage style

Paul Reiser, one of my favorite comedians and a guy who has sort of faded away in recent years, wrote the best description I've ever read of the way household tasks are divvied up in a marriage.

In his book "Couplehood" -- a great and funny read, I recommend it -- Reiser explained that there will always be tasks neither the husband nor the wife (nor the kids, for that matter) really want to handle. But there's also always one of you who hates a given job more than the other, so generally speaking, it should be assigned to the person who hates it less. This makes a lot of sense to me.

For example, as I've mentioned, I don't relish the thought of cleaning the cat litter boxes every morning. But ever since June 1993, when Terry became pregnant with Elissa, it has been my job. This is because cat waste poses a real health threat to pregnant woman, and especially with that first baby, you don't take any chances. I think the disease is called toxoplasmosis, though I didn't look it up and as far as I know, it may not actually be a disease but rather a concept pregnant women made up to get out of doing stuff around the house.

Five children later, Terry is no longer in danger of getting pregnant, thanks mostly to the fine work of Dr. Kurt Schneider, my de facto urologist and the guy who made me permanently sterile in one, swift 45-minute procedure. The man was good. At some point, I'll have to tell you about it because, really, I enjoyed the whole process. (Yes, I know that's weird. That's why it will make a good blog post.)

Anyway, Terry will be having no more babies, at least none fathered by me. Therefore, one could surmise that she is yet again a candidate to clean the litter boxes. But she doesn't, and that's fine with me. There are plenty of other things she does that I wouldn't want anything to do with, and I've been married long enough to know when to leave well enough alone.

For the record, the other jobs I usually (not always, but usually) take on in our house include lawn maintenance, cleaning the master bathroom, and washing the kitchen floor. Being a stay-at-home mom, Terry does more than her share of unpleasant tasks while I'm at work, and that's not even taking into account the cooking (of which she does virtually 100%), laundry and general pick-up duties she handles that would exhaust me if I had them every day.

I do remember one area in which we never did come to any sort of compromise, though. This was back in the days when we had babies in the house and one would wake up crying in the middle of the night. Neither of us is particularly proud of this, but we both now admit to faking not hearing the crying child and instead pretending to be asleep, hoping that would prompt the other person to get out of bed, fetch the tot, change his or her diaper, and either restore order or prep them for breastfeeding time.

That last point is key. Terry breastfed all of the kids. This is a job, again as Paul Reiser so deftly points out, that only female persons are equipped to handle. To me, this is one of God's greatest design inspirations. But in all fairness, it should have been me who got up, changed the diaper and brought the baby downstairs, since in all cases it was Terry who did the subsequent feeding while I fell back asleep in approximately 7 seconds.

In my defense, I DID have to get up for work the next morning, and I milked that excuse relentlessly to the point that, in the end, while I bet I got up and attended to the babies more often than Terry, it wasn't by much...maybe a 55-45 split.

If I were a good person and a skilled writer, I would bring this to a close by offering some sort of inspiration and advice to young married couples or those thinking about marriage. But I am neither, so let me just say that if you're going to do the pretend-to-be-asleep thing, don't let your spouse catch you opening one eye to see if they're awake. Then you're busted and your whole night is ruined. You're welcome.

A pointless Christmas story, just for you

It's Christmas Day, and the last thing you need is to read more of my drivel. So just a quick Christmas story that may be of interest only to me...

I must have been 6 or 7 years old. We had an old manual typewriter with which I was just fascinated. I loved playing with it. This was long before word processing and personal printers, so I enjoyed the fact that I could create something semi-professional-looking just by smashing on a few keys.

I would type on that thing for an hour at a time. Sometimes I would type real words. Other times I would type my name (over and over and over). And other times I would fill whole sheets of notebook paper with random letters. That's all I used, of course, was lined notebook paper. We didn't have typing paper in the house, and the only place I ever saw blank white paper was at school

Anyway, I used this typewriter a lot. We kept it in a burnt orange plastic case (this was the 70's, after all). One Christmas Eve, I had a dream that I came out of my room on Christmas morning and ran to the living room. But instead of my presents being laid out on the couch like they normally were, all I saw was a small square of that lined notebook paper taped -- yes, taped, like with Scotch tape -- to one of the couch cushions. And typed on that paper was an all-caps message from Santa:

"SORRY, NO PRESENTS FOR YOU THIS YEAR."

Not sure what I did at that point in the dream. Probably screamed or something. Terry says all of my stories from when I was a kid end with the phrase, "...and then I cried." Which isn't true, but for purposes of this dream, it probably was.

Of course I woke up and it was still Christmas morning, and Santa HAD left me presents so all was well. I even got the Evel Knievel Stunt and Crash Car I had been hoping for. That was awesome.

There's no real point to this story other than: (1) It's Christmas and that's about the only Yuletide nugget I could think of, and (2) I'm even stranger than I thought, and I've been that way for a long, long time.

Merry Christmas, blog readers. Your comments and feedback over the first two weeks of this venture have been greatly appreciated. Here's hoping I can think up enough material to keep it going into 2012...

Who's better at four random activities: Me or my wife?

Activity #1: Putting up a tent
I used to sleep over my friend Todd Donnelly's house quite a bit. In the summer, we would sleep in a tent in his backyard. I always felt much better when I arrived at Todd's house and the tent was already up. Otherwise I would have to help him put it together, and I'm terrible at that kind of thing. Todd was very good at it. So is my wife. Terry and her family all seem to possess the skills necessary for wilderness survival, so tent construction is nothing to them.

Don't get me wrong: If given some canvas and ropes and a set of instructions, I could eventually mold the pieces into some tent-related shape. I mean, it's not like I would fail completely. But it would take a long time. Like hours, maybe. Terry, on the other hand, instinctively knows that Pole A slides into Tab B and is secured by Line C to Stake D. She just knows, and thus tent assembly is a breeze when she's there. Terry will have a tent up and will be crawling into her sleeping bag by the time I figure out how to remove all the parts from the storage bag.
ADVANTAGE: Terry

Activity #2:Killing spiders
I grew up watching old cartoons that perpetuated hilarious stereotypes. As it turns out, some of those stereotypes are actually true. One is that women are afraid of insects and small woodland creatures. In my experience, yeah, that's pretty well dead on.

My wife and my daughters are strong, confident women. They can do absolutely anything they put their minds to. But plop a daddy longlegs in front of them and they become helpless. This is both hilarious and annoying. I'll be minding my own business in one part of the house when suddenly I hear screams of terror coming from the kitchen. I race down to see what the problem is, and I find a mother and daughter huddled in abject fear while a spider -- MAYBE three-quarters of an inch long -- crawls across the counter.

Never mind that on a straight scale of weight and overall potential to cause harm, these women could destroy the daddy longlegs. They want nothing to do with the arachnid, and it's clearly my job to dispose of it. Now. So I grab a paper towel and crush the spider, and order is restored.

I'll never understand it -- and clearly there are many women for whom spiders are no problem -- but score this one a clear victory for my side.
ADVANTAGE: Me

Activity #3: Parallel parking
As a man, I am expected to be able to parallel park. Most guys can do it well...something to do with spatial thinking and the ability to judge distances or some such. Yeah, well, I must have been sick the day they taught this particular skill in Man Class because I'm not especially good at it.

Again, though, it's like the tent thing: I can do it, just not quickly or in any really skilled way. Terry does it well, and I attribute it to the fact that she learned to drive in a station wagon. And I'm talking about one of those late 70's gunboat-sized station wagons that were 47 feet wide. Her parents' driveway was narrow, and to navigate it you had to squeeze the car between the house on one side and a chain link fence on the other. It was hard enough going forward, almost possible backing up (at least for me).

One time I was backing Terry's 1988 Chevy Beretta out of that driveway. This, you understand, was her pride and joy -- the first car she ever bought and to this day still the only new car she has owned. I had seen her take the station wagon through this tricky little passage a hundred times. How hard, I wondered, could it be in a smaller vehicle?

So for whatever reason, I was backing the Beretta out of the driveway. At some point of the operation, the part of my brain that monitors direction, angles, clearance and all of the other data you need to move a car successfully from Point A to Point B decided to take a little break. I was so worried about hitting the fence on the right side that I forgot about the extremely immovable house on the left.

You can pretty much guess what happened next. As it turns out, those driver's side mirrors tear off the car in surprisingly easy fashion. You'd think they'd reinforce those things.

Anyway, yet again, there's no contest here.
ADVANTAGE: Terry

Activity #4: Building and successfully detonating an atomic bomb
This is a tough one to call. On the one hand, Terry never took chemistry, so I have to think I have the advantage when it comes to figuring out how to harvest and enrich the uranium fuel. But a bomb requires a whole bunch of parts and the knowledge of how they fit together. Terry does jigsaw puzzles really well. I don't.

The cop-out would be to call this one a draw and say something about how we would have to work together. But I'm not going that route. This is a competition, and there has to be a winner and a loser. That's how we roll on this blog.

So assuming we each had to work alone, it comes down to who is more persevering -- the one who's more willing to stick it out. Inevitably, no matter how hard I concentrated, I would be distracted by some shiny object and would eventually wander off to watch an episode of The Flintstones while Terry kept working. In time, I'm sure, she would figure it out and find herself with the power to wipe out all of Wickliffe with the press of a button...assuming a spider didn't come along and chase her away.
ADVANTAGE: Terry (but just barely)


FINAL SCORE: I don't want to talk about it.

Man in tights

I run. That's what I do for exercise -- I run. Some people don't like running. It's too boring, they say, or their knees can't take it. And I can't argue with that. For them, running doesn't work. For me, it does.

I've run competitive races at distances ranging from 5K (3.1 miles) to a full marathon (26.2 miles). I only run 12 miles a week these days, not so much as a function of age but simply time. Training for and running races is time-consuming. I've got five kids, a job with responsibility, and a million other things to do. Leisurely three-hour long runs on Saturday mornings aren't an option the way they used to be.

Which is fine. And by "fine" I mean, "I live with it because I have to, but I really, really wish I could get back into doing a lot more miles every week." Because not only are there health benefits to running -- a good thing in my heart-disease-prone family -- but I actually enjoy it. I love the feeling of getting out there and settling into a steady pace. I love having my iPod going and a nice cool breeze in my face. I love being the only one on the road at 6 in the morning.

I love the gear, too: Running shoes, winter hats, gloves, different types and weights of undershirts, special running shorts, my GPS running watch, and even the tube of skin lubricant that Terry lovingly refers to as my "booby lubey."

I also love the record-keeping. Yes, there's record-keeping in running, at least if you're doing it right. I keep a log book in which I record every run: date, distance, time, temperature, and general comments on how it went. There's also a column in which I keep a running tally of how many miles I've put on a particular pair of shoes, since you're supposed to replace your shoes every 350 to 500 miles. I wait until the 600- or 700-mile mark, to be honest, but that's only because I'm cheap and don't want to shell out another 100 bucks for running shoes.

I don't skip a beat in winter. It's just a matter of dressing right. I have three pairs of what I like to call lycras but that my kids simply call "Daddy's running tights." They're not tights! Well, maybe they are tights, but the rule is that we do not call them tights. Rarely do I exercise fatherly authority in cases of semantics, but in this instance I do. They all ignore me, of course, but officially they're Daddy's lyrcras, not his "tights."

Anyway, the lycras keep my warm, even on the coldest of Northeast Ohio days. I've run in single-digit temperatures and I've run when it's in the 80's. I prefer the single digits since heat and I don't get along well, but I'll do the occasional hot-day run when necessary.

Running, as you may have gathered, can be an addiction. You're not supposed to run every day, but once you start building up those miles and get into a regular rhythm, the scheduled rest days can be torture. Your body wants to get out there and run. It's what it has become accustomed to, and it likes when you treat it to a run.

There will come a time over the next couple of decades when the running isn't as fun anymore, I'm sure. The joints will ache, the muscle tears will become more common, and the booby lubey will be replaced by Ben Gay. All of which is fine. When that happens, I'll switch to power walking or something. In the meantime, I'll continue following my 12-miles-a-week running schedule.

But the most important thing to remember is this: They're not tights. They're lycras.

Yes, I still read a newspaper every day

Every morning I follow essentially the same routine: I get up, I feed the cats, I go downstairs and clean out their litter boxes, and then I go outside and get the newspaper. Only one of these things truly makes me happy.

The getting up part I don't mind but I don't love. The cat-related jobs are necessary evils, the kind of thing you do because over the years it has become your job and there's no real need to change. But the newspaper...that's one of the highlights of my day.

Seriously. I love getting the paper. I love taking it out of the bag and scanning the headlines. No matter that the news may already be 12 hours old (or more) and I could have found the same information online soon after it happened. The point is, there's nothing like holding and reading a real newspaper.

I understand that I am a dying breed. Relatively few people read physical, hard-copy newspapers anymore. And in no way am I a technophobe. I still get a lot of my news online. But you have to understand, I started my career in a newsroom. Night after night, I got the thrill of producing a publication that would be distributed to thousands of people within hours after we finished it. It was a rush.

Of course this was back in the 80's and 90's. Even then people were predicting the downfall of print journalism,  but I wanted to make a career out of being a sports writer. I loved covering a game, writing about it, and knowing that my work was being read at breakfast tables around the area the next morning. Or would end up being pasted into some kid's high school scrapbook. That was a natural high.

In time, I realized that a career in journalism wasn't to be. I had a growing family to support, and honestly, you ain't gonna get rich as a newspaper reporter. So I eventually moved into marketing and public relations, a move a lot of reporters make when they decide it's time to get a "real" job, for whatever reason.

But I hang on to my newspaper addiction. The paper shows up every day, rain or shine, in front of my house, and I read it cover to cover. I still read the comics and do the little word puzzle that runs next to them when I have time. I scour the sports pages, especially, but I also read every story in the metro and business sections to make sure I haven't missed anything work-related.

There will come a time in the not-so-distant future when newspapers will go away, and I'm actually OK with that. I know it's unstoppable, and progress is progress. But I think back to the days when I delivered the Lake County News-Herald and practically every house along my route got the paper at least on Sundays, if not every day.

Nowadays, the paper is delivered by adults with huge routes and hundreds of customers. The routes HAVE to be huge, because the vast majority of houses don't subscribe any more. I used to ride my bike and place the paper inside people's front doors or in their side milk chutes. Now it's thrown from moving cars, though sometimes (as in our case) you can ask for a delivery tube to be placed in front of your house and the paper will be stuffed in there every morning.

This is the second nostalgic blog post in two days, if you're keeping track. I guess that's another sign of advancing age -- when you start talking about the "old" days. But I'll tell you one thing: If reading a newspaper is a sign of old fogey-hood, you can book my ticket on the Geezer Bus today.

Waxing nostalgic over Barbie dolls

Terry, Chloe and I were reminiscing yesterday morning. We do that a lot these days. I guess when your kids are in high school, you start thinking fondly of the days when they were toddlers and said funny things and never asked for the keys to the car.

We were talking about the times when Elissa and Chloe would play Barbies together. We had one African-American doll, which Elissa very appropriately named Kesha. She did that innocently, aware of the fact that many of the kids she knew with darker skin had names her little white friends didn't. That always made me laugh.

Elissa, being the older sister, had the final say as to which Barbies were hers and which were assigned to Chloe. Kesha always ended up with Chloe. Nice job, racist Elissa! Elissa would claim (this is true) that her dolls had something called "obedience dust," and that when they sprinkled it on Chloe's dolls, they would have to do anything Elissa's dolls told them to do. That made me laugh, too.

Saturday mornings were the time when I would be pulled into playing Barbies. I didn't mind, though I quickly came to realize that "playing Barbies" consisted of 45 minutes of getting the Barbies dressed and maybe 5 minutes of actually playing with them. I was always Ken, of course, and Ken only had like three outfits. So I didn't need the full 45 minutes to get Ken dressed. I needed maybe 4 minutes.

In the remaining 41 minutes while Elissa and Chloe put their army of dolls into several of the 987 sparkly pink outfits we owned, I would usually lay on the floor and fall asleep. This was because I was working as a sports writer at the time, and on Friday nights I would be in the office until 2 a.m. The Barbie games would often start at 8 or 9 a.m. I was tired. The girls didn't like that. "Daddy, wake up!" they would yell as I opened one eye to look at the clock and figure out how much more Dressing Time was left.

Eventually, we would get to Actual Barbie Play Time. As I said, this never lasted very long, and that was for two very good reasons: (1) Dressing Time was a lot more fun for the girls, and (2) Under my influence, Actual Barbie Play Time always always ALWAYS ended quickly and violently.

The scenarios for Actual Barbie Play Time varied widely. Sometimes the dolls would be going to a wedding. Sometimes they would drive to the mall. Sometimes they would just walk around the Barbie Dream House in their mismatched outfits. One way or another, I would ensure that the whole thing resulted in death and gore.

In the mall scenario, for example, I would orchestrate a plane crash with explosions that would blow the Barbie Pink Corvette to smithereens just as they drove into the mall parking lot. Other times, I would start a fight among the Barbies that would escalate quickly and result in multiple fatal injuries. Whatever the situation, I would always steer it toward some terrible accident.

This was not only fun to do, it also sped up Actual Barbie Play Time. Even the all-powerful Barbie master Elissa could not resurrect a Barbie whose head had been sliced off by a rogue buzzsaw. The girls would laugh every time I did this. They would put on the appearance of objecting ("Daddy, noooooo!!!!"), but I knew they loved it. Plus, by this time, they were bored of Barbies, too. Like I said, the fun was in the dress-up.

So after about 5 minutes of death Barbie-style, it would be time to clean up. We would put the Barbies and their accessories into the cool plastic bins that Mommy had bought for them and go our separate ways. The girls would find something else to play and I would go off to tackle some chore or another. Then we'd do it again, sometimes later that same day and sometimes not until the following Saturday.

Looking back on it, as much fun as giving compound fractures to Tea Party Barbie was, I sort of wish I had dragged those games out a little more. The girls are in high school now and obviously not all that interested in Barbies any more. Even little Melanie is 11 years old and has moved on to other things. I'm not even sure where the Barbies are these days. Shoved under someone's bed, I guess, but still in their cool plastic bins.

Seriously, though, what I wouldn't give for one more chance to snap a plastic Barbie leg in half...

I am such a woman...

I have many skills and interests that you would identify as "masculine." I love hockey, football and boxing, all sports in which beating your opponent to a pulp (or at least smashing into him at a very high rate of speed) is key. When I shop, I do it with the goal of getting everything on my list as quickly as possible and getting out of the store. I will watch every episode of the Three Stooges twice over if you let me.

But there is also a side of me that my wife likes to make fun of. You can call it my feminine side, my inner woman or whatever, but with each passing day I am clearly becoming a female.

This occurred to me this morning when I was looking at the Christmas gifts my co-workers Lilia and Marcella gave me. I was sipping the orange spice tea from Lilia while trying to figure out the best time to burn the aromatherapy candle from Marcella.

Sipping tea. Planning to burn a scented candle. Seriously? Why didn't I just get a mani and a pedi while I was at it?

With each passing year, I find myself turning into a woman. There's the fact that the only people who ever hit on me are male (there have been long Facebook comment threads on this subject). And my penchant for movies on the Hallmark channel. And the stuff I find on my iPod: Spandau Ballet and Pet Shop Boys?!? Who put those on there? I did? Just shoot me now.

I can actually pinpoint the moment when it all started. It was eight or nine years ago when, for whatever reason, I was home on a weekday with Terry. I walked through the living room while she was watching "Regis & Kelly." I stopped, looked at the TV and casually said, "Oh look, Kelly changed her hair." My wife stared at me for a second and then said something to effect that I was clearly on my way to joining the other team.

It doesn't help that she's 10 times more mechanically minded than me. When something breaks in the house, most guys start wondering whether they have the right tools to fix it. I think to myself, "Oh man, I hope Terry can fix that." Usually she can. Or at least she knows when to hand it off to my very handy father-in-law, Tom, a saint of man who has earned my eternal gratitude 10 times over with the home repairs he does for us.

I do believe we'd all be better off if we got a little more in touch with whatever elements of the opposite gender we have within us. It's just that I've gone beyond getting in touch with my feminine side and have instead embraced and caressed it lovingly.

There's only one way around this. Tonight, I'm taking my son out for beers and a hockey game, after which we'll go shoot some wild animals and listen to death metal music for three hours. Maybe we'll have some tea afterward.

The nobility of sports fandom

I actually had a little free time yesterday afternoon, which is a rarity, especially for a Sunday. I had a choice between two activities: Watching the Browns game, or pounding myself in the head repeatedly with a hammer.

In the end, I chose the Browns game, which I realized was more painful but also probably more of a character builder.

I was born a Browns fan. I grew up a Browns fan. I am a Browns fan now. I will always be a Browns fan, at least as long as there is a team of non-athletic individuals who wear orange helmets on Sunday afternoons in existence to root for.

For those who may not be football fans -- or sports fans in general -- you have to understand the utter futility of being a Cleveland Browns supporter. The Browns lose, and they lose a lot. Sometimes they lose in spectacular fashion. Other times they just lose in a mundane way, falling behind early and never really appearing to be playing the same sport as the opposing team.

The Browns have not won a championship since 1964. In fact, NO major Cleveland sports team has won a championship since 1964. I was born in 1969. I root for Cleveland sports teams. You do the math.

There was a time when the Browns were good, and I remember it well. For about 15 minutes in 1987, we were one of the best teams in the league. Not THE best team, mind you, but still one of the best. Did we ever actually win anything? Did we ever make it to the Super Bowl? Well, no, but we did get a lot of merchandising and marketing mileage out of calling the part of our stadium where the drunk fans sit "The Dawg Pound."

Why, then, do I put myself through this every Sunday during the football season? Because the Browns are my team. They represent my city. And I am NOT a fair-weather fan. There are many people in Cleveland who root for our hated rival, a team I dislike greatly and whose name I don't even like to type. Let's just call them the Spitsburgh Squealers.

I have no problem with people from Pittsburgh -- or Spitsburgh, whatever -- supporting the Squealers. They SHOULD. It's their team. But when you grow up in Cleveland and defect to them, no matter how successful they've been over the years, you are to be scorned. You have no backbone. You need to fast-forward to the 1:10 mark of this video for a better understanding of your true nature.

There is a certain honor in backing a perennial loser. There is strength of character that is to be praised. In supporting the athletic doormat, you show yourself to be loyal and true, a paragon of sports virtue.

Or at least that's what I want to believe. And because I'm doing the writing here, I declare it to be so. If you're looking for someone who deals in reality, you've come to the wrong blog, buddy.

Five Things I Could Probably Handle If Something Ever Happened To My Wife, But Not Nearly As Well As She Does

(1) Children's fingernail and toenail maintenance
Actually we're almost past this stage, as the older ones handle their own nails and Jack is only a few years away from taking over for himself. But ever since they were babies, Terry was always the one who trimmed their nails. I could have, of course, but it would never EVER occur to me to do it. They would have seven-inch-long fingernails before the very thought even entered my brain that somebody -- I don't know who, but somebody -- should do something about that kid's nails.

(2) Directing the set-up of holiday decorations
As I mentioned recently on Facebook, my job here is merely to cart things up from the basement and generally supervise the manual labor portion. After that, I'm pretty much optional. I couldn't even tell you everything that's inside those boxes. "We have a turkey flag for Thanksgiving? That's so cool! When did we get it? Oh, 1996? OK, I should have known that."

(3) The girls' hair
Again, this is almost a moot point now, given their age, but if Terry had been hit by a bus, say, 10 years ago, there would have been trouble. She taught me once how to do a ponytail, and I did manage to craft a decent one for Elissa when she was 4 and I took her to Niagara Falls. But for the most part, I'm mystified by braids, pigtails, scrunchies and the like.

(4) Having babies
OK, I know I couldn't do this anyway, but I need to point out how well Terry does it. I've watched her push out five kids -- well, technically she pushed out four and the last one was cut out of her -- and in all that time I think I heard her grunt once. Barely a peep from her. Just amazing, especially when you consider the physics of what's going on. I would manage to get the kid out, but with a lot more complaining than Terry ever did.

(5) Folding stuff
If Terry were gone (it's getting really morbid the way I keep talking about it, isn't it?), the laundry would get done, believe me. But it might not be pretty. I try and try to fold things as well as she does with no success. You can instantly tell the difference between a shirt folded by me and one folded by her. She does it using what is commonly referred to as the "right" way, while I tend to lean toward doing it the "wrong" way.

CONCLUSION: I need to die first, no question about it.

I love things that are great!

One of the good things about being me -- and honestly there are precious few, but this is one -- is the fact that I'm so easily impressed. The phrase "it's all good" was designed especially for me, I think, because other than the Pittsburgh Steelers and sauerkraut, I like just about everything.

(By the way, if the title of this post didn't ring a bell with you, check out the first minute or two of this Saturday Night Live clip, in which Alec Baldwin does his excellent Tony Bennett impression with a song that pretty well sums up my personal creed.)

It's useless to try and get my opinion on something, or to ask me to choose between two things, because I'll invariably give some response along the lines of, "I like them both!" When I arrange to meet someone for lunch and they ask me where I want to eat, I always come back with, "You pick. I'm good with anything." And it's true: I am!

Now let me say this to you unmarried young fellas (you can tell I'm getting old because I just used the word "fellas" in a non-ironic fashion): Not having an opinion is unacceptable if you ever decide to get married. Your bride-to-be will expect you to have an opinion when it comes to wedding stuff. ANY opinion. Just have one.

When Terry and I were planning our wedding almost 20 years ago, she would show me things like napkins or centerpieces or fabric swatches for God knows what, and she would ask which ones I liked best. At first I deferred to her far better judgment. But then it became apparent that that wasn't an option, so I started picking whatever she was holding in her left hand. I don't think I've ever told her this, but it seemed like the one she preferred was always in her left hand. So I would pick that one. And more often than not, it was the correct answer. Score one for Mr. Undecided!

Rarely, and I mean rarely, do I see a movie I don't enjoy. Doesn't matter what the critics or friends and family say about it, I like almost every movie I see. Are there actors involved? Can I eat popcorn while watching it? Does it require me to solve complex math problems? Yes, yes and no? Then I'm in! Cue up "Gigli" in the blu-ray player!

Music? I like it all (even country). Art? I can't create it, so naturally it all impresses me. Sure, there are some things I like better than others, but for the most part -- say it with me -- it's all good.

The positive consequence of this is that I enjoy every day of my life. Even in the middle of bland routine, I'm bound to find something new that impresses me. "Look, there's a new email program installed on my computer at work. THAT IS SO COOL! It has icons and buttons and colors and everything!" I'll be occupied for the next six hours just playing with it.

The negative consequence, of course, is that I have no discernable taste. Which isn't good for a guy who makes his living in the marketing/PR field and is expected, from time to time, to evaluate visual design elements like logos. I have no talent at graphic arts, so anything a designer comes up with is cool with me. (This, incidentally, is why I hired the infinitely talented Ms. Lillia Lipps. She decides my taste FOR me, which I like.)

Same thing goes with home decorating. Terry could propose that we put a rusty old 55-gallon drum in the middle of the living room, and I would think, "Cool, now we can have fires INDOORS!" As you might imagine, she doesn't seek out my opinion on stuff like that anymore.

You don't want to know, he says

The other day, I wrote about the fact that my three oldest kids all have "significant others." What I didn't mention was that Jack, our 5-year-old, also has a girlfriend. He's very open about this relationship, as is the girl in question, Gracie.

If you had ever met Gracie, you would not blame Jack for his choice. She's just about the cutest little thing you'll ever see in your life. The boy clearly has good taste.

As I said, Jack does not try to hide his love for Gracie in any way. Most boys his age would never admit to liking a girl, but Jack is cool with it.

One of my favorite Gracie-related stories: Jack likes to walk around the house with his shirt off. I often come home from work to find him wearing only pants...no shirt, no socks, just his pants. It's his thing. One time Terry asked him, "You wouldn't take your shirt off at school, would you?" To which Jack replied, "Well, I'd take it off for Gracie!"

Both Jack and Gracie have made clear that they want to meet under the mistletoe this Christmas season. I don't know if we're talking about any specific sprig of mistletoe, or whether they're just in the market for some mistletoe in general. I'm also not sure they would know mistletoe if they saw it. I'm not sure I would know mistletoe if I saw it.

The point is, there is a mutual desire to meet under some nonspecfic mistletoe. Gracie's mom, Lynn, asked her exactly what she planned to do with Jack under the mistletoe. She smiled that little Gracie smile and said, "You know! Stuff that boyfriends and girlfriends do!" You can imagine Lynn's delight.

We asked Jack the same question as we were tucking him into bed the other night. At first he just smiled, and then he said, "You don't want to know." Well, actually, yes, we DO want to know. When pressed, he revealed that when you meet underneath mistletoe, you're supposed to kiss the other person on the cheek.

That's a relief compared to the possibilities that were running through my mind. But I still think we need to have a conversation about the inappropriateness of 5-year-olds kissing each other, and that a heartfelt pat on the back is probably as far as this should go.

We're only 14 kids behind

I was sad when I heard that Michelle Duggar, the mom from that show "19 Kids and Counting," miscarried child #20 a couple of weeks ago. Losing a baby is not something Terry and I have experienced, but I imagine it's a source of sorrow and pain that doesn't go away very easily.

Say what you will about the Duggars (and people say a lot about them), but they do live by their principles, don't they? They've decided to let God determine the number of children they should have. And so far, He has determined they should have nine girls and 10 boys.

Like almost everything in this country nowadays, the very existence of these kids is polarizing. Most of the people I run across are horrified by the Duggars, even angered. They'll tell you it's selfish to have that many children, and that they can't possibly give each one the individual attention he/she deserves.

Jim Bob and Michelle probably hear that a lot, and it can seem even worse when you learn that they have instituted a "buddy system" whereby an older child in the family is responsible for caring for a younger child. It's efficient, yes, but it almost makes Michelle seem like more of a CEO than a mom, though I'm sure she is plenty involved in the day-to-day operations of Duggar Offspring, Inc.

I don't know that I have an opinion one way or another. I have enough to worry about with my own brood, which is only a quarter the size of the Duggars'. Like any set of parents, Terry and I make sacrifices to ensure our kids get the things they need, including time and attention. As I've often said, having five kids like we do is pretty uncommon these days, but it wouldn't have been all that remarkable in the time and place where I grew up.

Still, we personally know plenty of larger families. Blog reader Patti Marn and her husband Don have six kids, as did at least one former Wickliffe family I can think of (the O'Neills). Terry's cousin Brian and his wife Laura have 10 children -- six biological and four adopted from Africa. But for the most part, big families aren't the norm in 21st-century America.

One of the reasons I'm glad we're out of the baby game is that I honestly wouldn't know what to name another child. The Duggars opted to give all of their kids J-initialed names (in order: Josh, Jana, John-David, Jill, Jessa, Jinger, Joseph, Josiah, Joy-Anna, Jedidiah, Jeremiah, Jason, James, Justin, Jackson, Johannah, Jennifer, Jordyn-Grace, and Josie).

Two of my favorite things about that list:

(1) True story -- When I first saw the name "Jinger," I pronounced it with a hard "g," like "finger." Terry very gently pointed out that it's probably pronounced the same as "Ginger," just spelled with a "J." Oh.

(2) As many of my friends and family have heard me say, I absolutely love the fact that it wasn't until kid #17 (and girl #7) that they went with "Jennifer." Really? One of the most common female "J" names, and it took you 17 kids to get around to it? You thought of Jessa, Jinger and Joy-Anna ahead of Jennifer? OK, fine, but according to the White Person's Guide to Naming Babies, "Jennifer" trumps all of those names and should have come first. Just saying.

In the end, as far as I'm concerned, the Duggars can have 30 kids if the spirit moves them. Jim Bob is a successful real estate developer who can apparently afford to support a whole football team, if it comes to that. But given the course of Michelle's last two pregnancies (a miscarriage and an emergency C-section), they might want to consider the possibility that God -- as well as Michelle's uterus -- may be telling them it's time to quit. Again, just saying.

Four Things That Mystify Me About Daughters

(1) Ponytail Holders
Well, not the ponytail holders themselves. I know what they're for. I'm just amazed at the quantity of them around the house, and the fact that they always, always, always end up on the floor. Not just the bathroom floor, any floor. I find them everywhere. Are my daughters randomly pulling these things out of their hair and just whipping them onto the floor regardless of where they are? I don't know, but I estimate that we own 14 trillion ponytail holders, and I have picked up each and every one at least once.

(2) They Know Things
This isn't just my daughters, it's women in general. They have secret knowledge they pass down to each other. Little girls do these intricate handclapping/rhyming games I can't begin to figure out. They know how to do things to their hair -- and to their friends' hair -- that escape me. They instinctively fold clothes better than I do. I don't understand any of it, and my wife won't tell me what the secret is. Mark my words, though, ladies...one of these days I'm going find out where you hold your meetings and I'm sneaking in through the back door. Then you'll be sorry!

(3) Their Capacity For Love...and Anger
I have two sons. They're simple to understand, in part because they have a very narrow range of emotions. Only with delicate scientific instruments can you successfully tell Angry Jared from Happy Jared. Their only real needs are food, water, shelter and video games. Rarely do they do anything unexpected. I like that. But my girls? I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to get from them day to day. Could be ectastic joy, could be fire-breathing rage. Could be both. Your guess is as good as mine. One of these days I'll do a post on the bizarre biological phenomenon known as menstrual synchrony, and those of you without female offspring will have a better idea of what I'm talking about.

(4) They Can Get Me To Do Anything For Them
I've been aware of this since March 24, 1994, the day Elissa was born. She came out of the womb, looked me right in the face, and with those sad, pleading, puppy dog eyes, asked me to buy her a car. And I did. (Well, not really, but I WOULD have.) People often talk about daughters having fathers wrapped around their little fingers, and oh believe me, it's true. It's the strongest of their powers, and they wisely keep it in reserve until they need it most. It's not that I never tell them "no," but when they really want something, they know how to get it from me. They may have learned this from their mother.


BONUS MATERIAL: Four things that mystify me about sons
Nothing. Nothing mystifies me about my sons. I told you, they're simple creatures and easy to understand. This could be good or bad, depending on how you look at it. I'm thinking a little of both.

The Legend of Johnny Flipperhands

"Johnny hands." That's what I've always called my hands, because they look like they should be attached to a little 5-foot-tall guy named Johnny.

Seriously, I have the smallest hands. They don't look like they should belong to someone my age and body size. It's even weirder because the rest of me is fairly proportional. Well, except for my head. My head is freakishly large. I don't know why, but I've always had a large noggin. And my feet, while reasonable in length (size 10 1/2), are quadruple-E in width. And in some models of shoes, 4E isn't even wide enough.

So that's me in a nutshell: Large head, small hands, fat feet. Picture Fred Flintstone. That's me.

I have always had small hands. But now that my kids are growing up, my tiny appendages have become almost embarrassing. My daughter Melanie is 11 years old. If we hold our hands up against each other, palm to palm, my fingers are MAYBE an eighth of an inch longer than hers. And Elissa, my petite little 17-year-old who has trouble making the minimum weight to give blood, has fingers that are clearly longer than mine.

Don't even get me started on Jared, our 13-year-old man-child. He is not only taller than me, but his fingers are longer than mine by a full knuckle. It's amazing. Where did I get these little digits? My dad had short fingers, but they were at least bulky. They had some width to them. Mine? They're the fingers of a third-grader, and I'm guessing they're not growing any time soon.

Actually, I think they're shrinking. I don't remember them ever being this tiny before. I just measured the nail on my pinky finger, and it's 3/8" across. Three-eighths of an inch! There's going to come a point when my fingernails will disappear altogether -- a process I have admittedly helped along because I chew them all the time.

Sometime in the next 5-10 years, I would say, my fingers themselves will just vanish. Then I'll be left with tiny flippers and no opposable thumbs, making even the most rudimentary tasks impossible. I'll need to hire a full-time assistant just to pick things up for me.

Yes, this is the fate that awaits me. Just call me Johnny Flipperhands -- Master of the Large Head, Fat Feet and Tiny Mitts.

Vinegar and feet

I have more than 700 Facebook friends.

I don't say that to boast, because there's nothing really impressive about it. Anyone who wants a lot of Facebook friends can have them, either by throwing out friend requests left and right or accepting any request that comes their way.

I fall into the second group. I have Facebook friends with whom I'm only passingly familiar, but I really hate to reject anyone's friend request, so I always figure, "Well, I must know this person somehow. Though honestly, I can't remember the last time I was in Nigeria."

Anyway, I have a lot of Facebook friends, which means there's always a lot of activity in my FB news feed. And at least once day, one of those friends (usually female, usually about my age or a little older) will post something to the effect of, "Sitting on the couch drinking a glass of Chardonnay and relaxing. Wonderful!"

And I get jealous. Not necessarily of the "relaxing" part, though that would be nice. But of the Chardonnay part. I am envious of anyone who drinks and enjoys wine, because I cannot stand the taste of it. It's revolting to me. All of it.

But understand, I really, really WANT to like wine. I wish I enjoyed it, because it just sounds so much fun. To me, all wine -- and I mean ALL wine -- tastes like vinegar, or feet, or some combination of the two.

Interestingly, the same is true for Terry. Neither of us even much likes the smell of wine, let alone the taste. I realize we're in the minority here. And believe me, we've tried and tried, but neither of us has ever tasted any wine we've liked. Ever.

Some people seem genuinely offended when they hear that. They're convinced they can "fix" us. "Have you ever tried this wine or that one?" they'll ask. And we'll usually say yes and yes, and both made us want to throw up. "How about a sweet wine? A dry wine? Cabernet? Zinfandel? Merlot? Red wines? White wines? Dessert wines? Mad Dog?" Yes, yes, yes, yes, YES, YES, YES! They're all terrible, do you hear me? VINEGAR AND FEET!

Our church serves Welch's grape juice for communion, so that's what we have every Sunday. But occasionally we'll visit a sister church that uses real wine, and we won't know about it. I'll take a hefty swig and then do that involuntary shutter thing you do when you've ingested something that disgusts you.

But again, I really wish this wasn't the case. I attend plenty of business events where people are walking around carrying their glasses of wine, looking all adult-like and sophisticated. I'll usually have a beer, because I like beer. But only one beer. More than one and the appeal drops away quickly for me.

Plus, I start to get woozy after more than one beer. Seriously. I'm a 42-year-old man and more than one beer starts sending me over the edge. You can't call me a lightweight drinker. I'm whatever is under lightweight. "Featherweight," maybe? So after that first beer I'll usually have water or something while everyone else is drinking their Bordeaux or Fauxfaux or HoHoHo or whatever it is that grown-ups drink.

If you have wine suggestions, I'll gladly accept them. But I'm telling you, my wife and I are wine-proof. It's sad, really.

Hate the boyfriend! Hate the boyfriend!

I don't own a shotgun, which apparently marks me as a failure of a father.

The prevailing wisdom is that, as someone with daughters, I should be automatically distrustful of any boy they bring home. When it comes to my girls' suitors (an awesome word that I'm fully aware hasn't been used in any non-ironic sense in more than 100 years), my expected role as "Dad" is to project an air of suspicion and even borderline hatred. Maybe show them my gun collection, casting vague hints of retribution should they try anything with my female offspring.

Confession time: I like my daughters' boyfriends. I really do. They're nice guys, and they seem to treat Elissa and Chloe well. What's not to like?

The one who has been around the longest -- something like 9 months now? -- is Chris. Or, as he's referred to in our house, "Chris Dorazio." We always refer to Chris Dorazio as "Chris Dorazio," first and last name both. I don't know why, it's just something we do.

Anyway, Chris Dorazio is Chloe's significant other. He's Vietnamese-Italian, of course, a combination that could only happen in Wickliffe, Ohio. Chris Dorazio is a great athlete and a smart kid, but more importantly, he's Asian. Chris Dorazio constantly makes fun of himself for being Asian. This endears him to me because I also like to make fun of Chris Dorazio for being Asian. Not that there's anything wrong with being Asian, of course. It's just that, as a white suburbanite, I have a mandate from nature to make fun of anyone who doesn't look like me. Again, it's what we do.

So Chris Dorazio, who comes to church with us every Sunday and then spends the day hanging around the house like the honorary family member he is, will crack a joke about his eyes being slanted, his skin being yellow, or about being uber-smart, and I like him for it.

Elissa's beau (another awesome, seldom-used word from antiquity) is Sean. Sean is just Sean, because his last name is Matanowitsch. "Sean Matanowitsch" doesn't flow nearly as well as "Chris Dorazio," so he's just Sean. Which is fine. Whereas Chris Dorazio's greatest attribute is the fact that he was born in Vietnam, Sean automatically endears himself to me because he plays the saxophone. I play the saxophone, too.

ADVICE TO HIGH SCHOOL BOYS: Find something in common with your girlfriend's father. Trust me on this.

Sean is a nice kid who happens to be two years younger than Elissa. I think this bothers her more than it bothers me. I would be a lot more nervous if Sean were two years older than Elissa.
I should mention that my 13-year-old son, Jared, has a girlfriend, so the roles are reversed there. Her name is Marissa, and though I don't get to see her as often as Chris Dorazio or Sean, I know her mother, Kelly. And Kelly is awesome. I can only assume, then, that Marissa is the same. I know Jared likes her anyway, and since Jared and I tend to look alike, we probably also have the same taste in women.

I know fathers of young girls who are scared to death of that moment when their daughters bring home that first boy. They joke about pulling the young lad aside and telling him what will happen if he crosses the line with their precious little girl. And I get that. But really, fellas, you don't have to be so uptight. If you raise your daughters to be smart, sensible and self-confident, you won't have to worry as much when the dating thing begins.

And between you and me? Try and get them to go out with an Asian guy. The humor potential is unlimited.