Working through the dead zone between Christmas and New Year's

 

Years ago when I would plan my vacation days for the year, the first thing I would block out was the week between Christmas Day and New Year's Day. This was mostly to take advantage of the kids being home on holiday break so we could do things together and I could assemble heir toys while cleaning up the mess we had made in the living room opening presents.

Even now, with four older kids having moved out, I still like to take that week off to relax and recharge before returning to work in the midst of the cold and gray of January in Northeast Ohio.

This year, however, I've been working this week thanks to having used up all of my vacation days early.

There were a few reasons for this, the biggest of which was the week I took in March to accompany the Wickliffe Swing Band on its once-every-four-years trip to Disney World.

I wouldn't normally take a week off in March, and truth be told, I wasn't thrilled about burning a week of vacation that included a combined 40+ hours on a bus.

In retrospect, though, I'm glad I did it. It was a fun adventure, and it felt like the least I could do to give back to an organization that has given me so much over the years.

But those were the days I would normally reserve until the end of the year. Throw in the week I took in late June/early July for our family beach vacation, plus another summer week for our annual church retreat, plus the standard assortment of one-off personal days here and there for various reasons, and I found myself essentially out of PTO by September.

I'm whining about a first-world problem, of course, but it makes for an 8- to 9-month stretch between weeks off. That's a long grind, though one that's made easier this week by the fact that (a) I can work from home, and (b) most of my co-workers are on vacation right now, so it's very quiet and I'm getting a lot done.

Still, I do miss the slower, carefree days that normally make up late December for me. I can't do quite as much non-work stuff as I would like this week, though all in all I really shouldn't complain.

I will complain, of course, but I really shouldn't.

Getting your wisdom teeth out: A rite of passage

Depending on which source you believe, upwards of 85-90% of people get their wisdom teeth extracted at some point.

That "some point" is, for most patients, sometime in their late teens. Our son Jack had his out a month ago, marking the seventh and final person in our household to have undergone the procedure.

As "surgeries" go it's a minor one, to be sure, but it does involve general anesthesia, pain meds, and the looming possibility of dry socket, which by all accounts you really don't want to get.

I remember two things about getting my wisdom teeth out in October 1988:

(1) That evening, maybe 6 or 7 hours after the procedure, I went with Terry to watch the Wickliffe homecoming parade. I'm sure I didn't feel 100%, but I was well enough to leave the house for a little while, albeit a little disheveled in a backwards baseball cap and a pair of sweatpants pulled up to my knees, as was the style at the time.

(2) The other thing I "remember" is actually something I don't remember at all. According to my dad, I repeatedly asked what time it was as we drove home and I was still feeling the effects of whatever they used to put me to sleep. There would apparently be long silences broken only by me looking over at him and, my mouth stuffed with cotton, asking what time it was. Over and over. I find this funny.

Indeed, the only really entertaining aspect of wisdom teeth removal is the unpredictable stuff your kids will say or do as they're coming out of anesthesia. For our family, this has ranged from funny questions to unexplained tears.

Being kind and caring parents, we have more than once captured these moments on video and shared the hilarious clips freely through the family text chat.

Having been through (and paid for) so many wisdom teeth extractions, it strikes me that it's an unheralded but very real milestone on the parenting journey. It's not a big deal in the grand scheme, but it's yet another reminder that your child isn't as little as they used to be.

And that you, as the one sharing video of their drug-induced, post-anesthetic verbal ravings, are not nearly as good a parent as you thought you were.

This Commodore 64 Christmas program brings back all the feels

 

I have mentioned before that the greatest Christmas gift of my childhood was a Commodore 64 computer, which my parents gave me in 1982. The C64 taught me to write basic code, gave me hours of gaming enjoyment, and was the machine I first used to go online.

That same year, the Commodore folks created and released the Christmas demo shown in the video above. More than once in '82 I remember walking into a store, going to the Commodore display, and seeing this demo playing. It was the perfect way to showcase the computer's then-powerful video and sound capabilities.

I offer you the chance to watch and listen to it now as a sort of holiday gift. For those my age who remember it, it's a wonderful bit of nostalgia. For those who have never seen it, it's a history lesson in early-80s home computing technology.

Either way, I hope it brightens what is already a bright Christmas Day for you. Thank you for reading this blog, and Merry Christmas!

Putting up the Christmas tree is one thing that brings the kids back home

The day we set up our Christmas tree and decorate the house for the holidays is always a big deal. It often happens the weekend after Thanksgiving, but this year it was the first weekend of December.

And as expected, it doubled our house population, even if only for a few hours.

Four of our five kids have moved out and are on their own, but that day we had two of them home (plus Jack, who still lives with us) to drag out the Christmas stuff, get the artificial tree upright and relatively straight, dig through boxes, hang ornaments, and perhaps most fun of all, reminisce about Christmases past.

When they were little, Christmas tree day was never difficult to schedule. We just picked a Saturday or a Sunday and they would all be there because, until they got to be teenagers, it wasn't like they had especially full social calendars.

Now, however, as is the case when we try to get family birthday celebrations scheduled, there are all sorts of factors that come into play. Vacations, work schedules, commitments with their significant others' families, and general young adult stuff can make it difficult to find a day and time that works for everyone.

This year, for instance, we put the tree up on a Sunday evening, which I'm guessing was a first. Jack was scheduled to work until 6pm, so we delayed the decorating from it's usual early-afternoon slot.

When you have little ones, the idea of a permanently quiet, empty house can be appealing. And believe me, it is kind of nice. But there are still times when you just wish you had your kid/kids at home for a little while, which is where the holidays really come in handy.

We'll see them all again in a few days on Christmas, but I have a feeling that, by the time I'm old and gray and can't see straight, memories of those Christmas tree setup days will be just as valuable as memories of the holiday itself.

My daughter is a master gift giver and this little painting proves it

 

I'm a month and a half late with this post, but with all the gift giving happening five days from now, it's probably still relevant.

Back in October, I posted here about the list of "50 Things Every Guy Should Own" as compiled by the staff at CoolMaterial.com. I made note of the fact that I personally owned maybe half the items on the list.

My birthday occurred a week after that post, and it inspired my daughter Elissa and her boyfriend Mark to give me a few items off the list.

Elissa is, without a doubt, the most thoughtful gift giver I know. When you get something from her, whether it's for your birthday or Christmas, you can be sure it's going to be personal and relevant.

In fact, thanks to their mother, all of my kids are really good with gifts. From her they learned to put thought and effort into a present, and it shows on every family holiday.

Elissa is likely the best at it among all of us, and that's saying something. When I opened the three small packages from her and Mark, they were:

• The painting you see above, which Elissa created herself. It's my view from the press box when I serve as the public address announcer for events held at Wickliffe Memorial Stadium. It checks off the list entry "a piece of art that means something to you."
  
  
• A beautiful Scriveiner pen, fulfilling CoolMaterial.com's directive to own "a good pen."
  
  
• A pair of saxophone cufflinks, since I play the sax and the list calls for guys to own a pair of cufflinks. I ordered a French cuff shirt that week just for the chance to show them off.
  
  

One key to successful gift giving, I find, is being observant. Elissa saw that blog post and reacted to it.

I am not a particularly observant person. I don't always pay attention to my surroundings, so I miss even less-than-subtle hints and clues about what a person might want or need. 

Thus, I am probably the worst gift giver in our family. It's my little cross to bear, and I work every year to overcome it.

For what it's worth, though, I'm an outstanding gift receiver. I am excited about anything you want to give me and will make you feel proud of your choice in presents.

And I think that's worth something.

My dad would have loved (and maybe occasionally hated) 2023

This was our living room tech set-up in the 80s, featuring a big old Curtis Mathis VCR and a cable box resting on top of a wood cabinet RCA TV. Displayed on the screen is the 24-hour weather data feed Continental Cablevision used to broadcast. It was a hot, hot day in Wickliffe by the looks of it.

My father was a gadget guy.

He embraced technology, particularly in his later years. Thus, we were fairly early adopters of everything from VCRs to home computers.

Dad hoped to live well into the 21st century, if only to be there for The Next Big Tech Development, whatever that turned out to be. Unfortunately, he died in October 1999, just a little shy of the digital revolution that has irrevocably changed all of our lives.

He would have given almost anything to have witnessed it, I'm sure.

On the other hand, being politically somewhere just to the right of Archie Bunker, I don't know that he would have been thrilled with everything that has happened in the world socially over the last quarter century. And I don't say that judgmentally – positive or negative – but simply as an observation with which anyone who knew him would very likely agree.

As I've mentioned before, we were among the first people in our town to get cable TV in 1980. As I recall, Dad walked a couple of streets over to talk with the Continental Cablevision work crew and find out when they would make it to Harding Drive and what day was the absolute earliest he could sign up.

He bought us a VCR around that same time, and I'm not talking about one of the lightweight, sleek units that would be in vogue a decade later. I mean a big, heavy-duty Curtis Mathis job that could be used equally to watch a movie, record an episode of "M*A*S*H*," or throw at a would-be intruder as a show of deadly force.

We had a home video game system as far back as 1977, when he sprang for a black-and-white Radio Shack Pong console. We also got an Atari 2600 before almost any of my friends. Same with the Commodore 64 and my green-screen IBM XT computer.

The man loved new hardware, and I benefitted from it all as an equally tech-crazy teenage boy.

The first time I used a cell phone was when Terry was pregnant with Elissa in 1994 and I had to be reachable at a moment's notice in case she went into labor. I received the phone on a day I was covering a wrestling match a half-hour's drive away for my then-employer, The News-Herald (which as I recall lent me the phone).

I got into my car, and the first person I called was my dad.

He and I were amazed that we could carry on a conversation while one of us was driving and no CB radio was involved.

Now cell phones are everywhere, and it's sometimes difficult to tell how much of a good thing that really is.

Regardless, if my dad was still around, he would probably own both an iPhone AND an Android.

You know, just in case.

All these years later, I still miss the guy.

I'm prepping for my one and only gig as an audiobook narrator

This would be me recording an audio version of my book if I was younger. And better looking. And had more hair.

Over the years, I've listened to dozens and dozens of audiobooks. I discovered early on that just as important as the quality of the book itself is the quality of the narrator.

My favorite audiobook narrator is the late Frank Muller. I can't think of "The Great Gatsby" or "A Tale of Two Cities" without hearing his voice. He brought those works to life for me.

Which is why, when several people suggested I record an audio version of my book "5 Kids, 1 Wife," I initially balked.

Yes, I'm the guy who wrote it, and yes, having had some experience with a microphone, you would think I'm the ideal candidate to narrate it.

But good audiobook narration requires more than just a decent voice and a knowledge of the text. The best narrators are also actors. They understand inflection, dynamics and pace.

Especially pace. I'm a fast talker. You can't be overly fast when you narrate an audiobook. Then again, you don't want to be too slow, either. I'm afraid I'll be so self-conscious about the speed at which I'm talking that I'll forget everything else that goes into making an audiobook listenable.

Still, despite these misgivings, I'm going to give it a go. It turns out you can record, edit and distribute your own audiobook just as easily as you can self-publish a paperback these days. The folks at Amazon make it especially easy through their ACX audiobook platform.

You do need to know how to set your audio recording software to fit within certain ACX-prescribed parameters to make it sound good, but I think I'm just technically savvy enough to manage it.

My goal is to record the audiobook in January and have it edited and available for sale by the end of Q1 2024. It will go right onto the "5 Kids, 1 Wife" Amazon page, which already offers print and Kindle versions of the book.

All I'm saying is, don't expect perfection. And if I end up talking too fast, you can slow down the playback speed on your device.

With all of these caveats, it's starting to feel like any price point for this audiobook above, say, $2 will be a ripoff.

We grew up in such an analog world that the digital one can be a little jarring

One of my favorite subplots in the Harry Potter series is Arthur Weasley's continuous fascination with muggles (non-wizards). He is forever impressed by how they manage to live their lives without the use of magic.

I feel much the same way about the 1980s and 90s. How, I sometimes wonder, did we ever get by without today's technology?

The answer, of course, is that we did just fine. But there's no denying you and I have lived through – and indeed are still living through – a digital revolution that has transformed nearly everything. What we're experiencing is historic in its speed and scope.

I often think about the everyday gizmos and gadgets with which I grew up that are all but obsolete now. Cassettes, for example, are laughably ancient. So are paper maps. And the clock you kept on your nightstand with the little flippy numbers. And Rolodexes.

None of these things has completely disappeared, but they have mostly been replaced by faster digital alternatives. Whereas the old stuff was solid and physical, now so much is virtual. It "exists," but not in the same tangible way typewriters and landline phones and VHS tapes used to exist.

I often think about the early part of my career when I worked in newspapers. I was a print journalist right up until the end of the era in which editors would draw page layouts in pencil on pieces of paper. They would give these sketches to back shop folks, who would then take long strips of typeset text, run them through a hot wax machine, cut them into strips, and physically paste them onto large sheets of cardboard to match the editor's vision of the page.

That's how your daily newspaper was created. It seems slow and crude, but it worked.

Just as I got out of the business, it all went digital. I can't imagine how much faster and efficient it is now.

Time marches on and things change, of course, but the speed of that change in recent decades has been breathtaking. Day-to-day existence now is in many ways nothing at all like it was just 30 years ago.

To the point that I think our generation's experience of rapid technological change is unique in history.

I'm all for progress, but I do wish it would slow down every once in a while and let me catch my breath.

I didn't pose naked for the cover like Britney, and nine other reasons you should buy my book this holiday season

1. You will laugh, either at the content or at the fact I think I'm so funny.
   
   
2. You will cry, either over the content or over the fact I think I'm so funny.
   
   
3. I will agree not to sign the book for you, thus preserving its value.
   
   
4. It has a beautiful cover with which I had almost nothing to do. The best parts of the book admittedly do not involve me.
   
   
5. I make $3.42 per paperback copy sold, which I pledge to use to buy myself apples. This doesn't really benefit you, but as noted here many times before, I like apples.
   
   
6. You can either buy Stephen King's new book or you can buy mine. I was a contestant on two game shows. Stephen's game show count? To my knowledge it's zero. Advantage: me.
   
   
7. It would make my wife Terry happy. Imagine how good you'll feel making her happy.
   
   
8. My book explains in earnest detail why Chuck E. Cheese plays a vital role in preventing a worldwide revolt among young children. You're not going to get that kind of insight from, say, Britney Spears' memoir.
   
   
9. Speaking of Britney, unlike her, I did not pose nearly naked for the cover of my book, which I consider a great favor to you. The least you can do in return is to buy the book.
   
   
10. In buying my book, you're propping up the economy. I don't want to imply that worldwide financial collapse would be your fault if you choose not to buy my book, but I'm also not saying that's not the case. Just to be on the safe side, you should probably just buy the book.

Click here to purchase the book on Amazon, either in paperback or Kindle/eBook format.

(Since this list likely did more to talk you out of buying the book than anything else, thank you for even considering it!)

The man-boy upstairs

There was a time when seven people lived in our house. It was loud, chaotic, fun, occasionally frustrating, and always exhausting.

Now there are three of us left here: Terry, me, and our youngest son, Jack, a wickedly smart and funny kid.

Or should I say "wickedly smart and funny young man?" Or just "man?" I don't know how to classify Jack. On one hand, he's 6-feet-2 and has had a voice like James Earl Jones since he was about 13. He looks and sounds like a young adult.

But there are times when he seems very much like the 17-year-old boy he is. That's not a knock against him. 17-year-old boys are what they are. Generally speaking, they're not as responsible or as mature as 17-year-old girls, at least in my experience.

Still, Jack has it together in ways I simply didn't when I was his age, and I admire him for that. In other ways, however, he's still trying to figure out a direction in life, which is perfectly fine. He is, after all, only 17.

He's in the process of learning about money and jobs and responsibility and everything that comes with being a legal adult, which again it should be noted he is not yet. Having skipped a grade many years ago, he graduated high school in May at 17 years, 3 1/2 months old.

Given his status as a younger graduate, Terry, Jack and I decided early on that a year of community college would be good for him. If nothing else, it would help him get used to managing his own affairs in a somewhat low-pressure environment before taking on the challenge of a four-year university.

Given his laudable performance on the high school AP Calculus exam, Jack got put into a college calc II/physics class at Lakeland Community College this past fall for which he was not at all ready. He quickly dropped that course and instead enrolled in a regular calc I class, but even that proved challenging for him despite having taken the subject before.

Jack's academic confidence was shot. Like many a smart kid before him, he had never really learned how to study, how to ask for and get help, and how to deal with a daunting academic challenge.

So he dropped both of his community college courses and instead started working to earn some money while figuring out an alternative path for his future. He eventually decided on a career in the trades, and as I type this, he's specifically targeting becoming an electrician.

That's a laudable goal. This country needs tradespeople, and as everyone is quick to point out to him, the money is good.

Is Jack suited to a career in electrical work? I have no idea. I hope he is, because as a parent, all you want is for them to be healthy, happy and fueled by purpose. You can have all three of those things in any sort of career, as they're in no way dependent on exactly how you make a living.

I just wish I could be of more help to him. I wish I could give him better guidance through what I'm sure is an uncertain and perhaps even unsettling time in his life. Whatever he chooses to do, I just want the path to become clear to him.

Jack is in the process of becoming whatever Jack is going to be. As someone who has been down that road already many years ago myself, I think a lot about the emerging man living in the first bedroom on the right at the top of the stairs.

There will come a time when it will all work out for him, I know.

Until then, his dad prays for him a lot.

I've reached the age when, like many dads, I cannot think of anything I want or need for Christmas

Every year until I was well into my 20s, I would ask my dad what he wanted for Christmas.

And every year he would say the same thing: "Case of beer."

He was always just kidding (he gave up drinking in the early 80s), and I always knew that would be his response, but it was like a little ritual we had to go through.

As I got older, this routine of ours got somewhat annoying because I really, truly did need to know what he wanted for Christmas. It seemed so hard for him to come up with something.

Now I get it.

Let it be known that, as I enter my mid-50s, I have no idea what I want for Christmas.

Clothes, I guess. And Amazon gift cards always work. And maybe the occasional classical CD?

The reality is, I have just about everything I could want. I don't have expensive tastes, and any time I want something, I just buy it for myself.

If I were particularly smart, which I am not, I would hold off on these types of purchases from, say, September onward and allow my family to get these items for me.

But of course I forget and just buy whatever I want whenever I want it. Then this time of year rolls around and someone in the family asks what they can get me and I'm stumped.

I suspect something similar happened to my dad all those years ago.

Which is why he always ended up getting the cheap plastic desk set or picture frame I would buy from the elementary school Santa Shop. (Come to think of it, that's probably the stuff he loved the most.)

The point is, I hate making a Christmas list because I don't need anything and I really don't even want anything. Peace on earth, goodwill toward men. I'll take a heaping helping of that, if you can swing it.

Otherwise, I don't know...case of beer, I guess.

Three days in the office, two days working from home = perfect (for me anyway)

Back when I was in high school, the only reason you were ever home at 10 in the morning was if you were sick or if it was a holiday.

Then I had kids of my own, and as time went on I watched as they enjoyed the benefits of increasingly flexible school scheduling. It culminated with our youngest, Jack, spending far more of his senior year in his room than he did in a school building.

COVID was largely responsible for the shift in scheduling philosophies, of course. But I was still amazed at how late Jack would wake up some days and still be at school in plenty of time. He would drive to school, attend one class, and be back home less than an hour later.

When I was a lad many moons ago, I left for high school at 7:10 in the morning and it would be at least eight hours before my parents saw me again. Even longer if I had football or track practice.

Being at home in the middle of the day felt weird.

The same has been true for most of my working life. I came into the professional world in the early 90s, when we still worked in an office five days a week for 9 or 10 hours at a time and only came home sometime after 5pm.

AND WE LIKED IT THAT WAY.

Actually, I don't know that we "liked" it that way, but it was the only way we knew. Our parents had worked the same sort of schedule, so we figured it was just how things were.

Then along came the pandemic, and suddenly those of us in the white-collar world had options. For a period of time we only worked at home. Then, when the restrictions lifted, our employers started bringing us back to the office a day or two each week.

Now remote work is the norm. Or I should say "hybrid" work is the norm, with many (most?) professionals working some combination of days each week in the office and other days from home.

For those of us at Materion Corporation, our in-office days are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Which of course leaves Monday and Friday as work-from-home days.

Again, maybe it's just the world in which I grew up, but I find this to be an almost unbelievable setup. On Mondays and Fridays, I can be productive working from my upstairs home office while having the flexibility of doing laundry, emptying the dishwasher, running a quick errand, etc.

Then I can see, interact, and generally bond with my co-workers in person during those mid-week in-office days.

Two days a week I'm home when "The Price Is Right" comes on and I don't even have the flu. That's mind-boggling for a card-carrying Gen X-er.

Having experienced so many five-days-in-the-office years, this balance of two days home and three in the office feels ideal to me. Some of my younger co-workers think the ratio should be flipped, or that we should be four days (or even fully) remote.

And maybe they're right. All I know is that Jack's wacky school schedule seems less and less bizarre to me as we get deeper into the Age of Remote Work.

I must be getting older and softer when it comes to the extended celebration of Christmas

For many years, I stuck to a hard and fast rule whereby I would never, under any circumstances, listen to Christmas music before December 1st.

I wasn't being a Scrooge or anything. I just felt the tendency to extend the celebration of Christmas back into November (or, in some cases, even starting in October) kind of cheapened the holiday. I have a lot of great memories from Decembers past and didn't want to water down future memories by making Christmas two months long.

If that makes sense.

Now, however, I'm not so strict. I've been listening to Christmas music since Thanksgiving Day. I haven't minded seeing decorations go up "early" on houses and in stores. And I've generally been much more OK with a somewhat longer holiday season than I was in the past.

So what changed? What switch flipped?

I hate to say it, but I think it's an age thing. Not that I'm ancient at 54, but there are a lot fewer things on which I'm "hard and fast" than there used to be.

If people want to listen to Christmas music in October or November – or July, for that matter – where's the harm?

Heck, if I want to listen to Christmas music any time of year, who cares? Christmas is what you make of it, and a rousing chorus of "Sleigh Ride" six weeks before December 25th will only negatively affect my experience of the holiday if I allow it to.

Granted, "Jingle Bells" in mid-summer still feels a little strange to me. But hey, you do you.