Variousness

Tough week in madtownpatsfan life. I'll itemize below, so you can skip to what you feel best fits.

Death of a Parent

So my mom has been sick for months now, and while it wasn't tough to connect-the-dots, it's pretty clear that there is little time left. I buried my dad about seven years ago, and that sucked, but now the realization that I will have no parents on the Earth is hitting hard. When Dad died, Mom and I worked together on awful things like the funeral, the announcement, the music, the flowers. I'm at a complete loss as to what I need to do, who to call, when to plan, etc. In a way, we were allied in death; we could figure out stuff together, and divvy the crap to who could handle it best. It feels more final now. I've gone through a couple of tough years, with a painful divorce, but having parental love and support was immense now that I realize that will be going away. I will never forget the fact that Mom came out and lived with me for two weeks after my Ex left. Probably couldn't make it through that phase. Although I still can't cross-stitch.

I am a parent nowt, constantly freaking on to traffic, thrown objects, and drunken miscreants on the sidewalks who may or may not want to grope/kidnap/murder my kids. It is baffling, however, at how much I still have to grow up. I have a savings account, an IRA, a pension plan, and maybe some stock options somewhere, but where do I go when I have life questions? Mom. She knows (or pretends to know) the answers and has so forth not done wrong. I guess I'm the one now to answers these questions. Frankly, it terrifies me.


Telling My Kids About Grandma Dying

Any good advice? My son currently wants 6 - 8 Ninjago LEGO sets and seems to feel that if Santa won't bring them, then Grandma will come through. He's 7, so the Santa-land will end in another (I hope) 2 - 3 years, but Daddy doesn't have the nerve to let him and his sister know that Grandma may not be able to pick up the slack. So, what do you say at the holidays when a loved one isn't there anymore, and worse, that you are an agnostic so you can't fall on the "pearly gates" shit Christians get away with. This may be a spoilable year, which also sets terrible precedents.

Death of an iPhone

To make insult of of injury, my iPhone 3Gs shit the bed on Monday. One minute, looking at NFL fake-referee crap, then the screen dies. My neighbor in our company cube farm gave suggestions, but that did nothing and possibly cleared all of my data. Good news was I backed up shit on iTunes in August, so hopefully that will come through. However, I'm now living in 1996 with a pseudo-Razr phone that has me realized how much Steve Jobs (RIP, bro) has warped my being. No Words With Friends. No Cribbage. No Work e-mail asap. I have to tap the "9" key three times to get the letter "x" when I send a quick message to the new She Who Must Not Be Avoided When Calling. Honestly, get me a fax machine, it goes faster.

I'm done. Thanks for reading, or disregarding. Sure more to come. JD

Yo, It's Halfway Through 2012, Y'all!

Wow hey, been busy and lots of apologies to those of you (7 and growing!) who follow this absolutely ridiculous blog. Apologies for the delay. Why?

Good news: Gotta a wonderful girlfriend. Not naming her here, but if you live most of your life at 6000 American Parkway you're in the know, and jealous of curly hair. Me, I'm happy of my string-y grey stuff now because it happens to stay on my head. If you want to completely go off-topic, I could kill you with exploits of the things that are now coming out of my chest. Let's just say that hair removal, a la Steve Carell in "The 40 Year Old Virgin" should be considered by this hairy scribe.

Also good news: Finally close to my 50-50% of my kids. July the deal is sealed, yay! Cannot honestly believe this took almost two years, but that's how the stupid system works. First, have to prove that I'm solvent (which I am); second, have to attend multiple co-parenting classes (which I did), and third, have to endure a step-based program that is due to the age of the kids. I'll vent now: why did I as a father in a divorced marriage have to go through this? Answer: Because the state assumes that the Father did all the wrong. I would say Go Scott Walker or Go Tom Barrett but both have no input on this inane beauracracy. Hmmm.....

I'm off my soapbox now.

So, back to the stupid:

- I'm switching to Gronk. You all know my old love, but now I've decided, since my divorce, that it is not a bad thing to move on. Even my new hottie (I'm now officially in trouble) has agreed that Gronk is waaaaayyyyy hotter than TB and his questionable hair. Plus, he hasn't responded since my photos were posted on tmz.

- Can't wait for "Promethius." Nuff' said.

- Big fan of "Game of Thrones" on HBO and stunned at the amount of full-frontal nudity. Nudity good. I've been pitching this for an ice breaker at all-day meetings for years. Think of how much you'd get done with someone's junk flapping around the whiteboard? And, yes dear ladies, your ta-ta's can flop with the best of them.

- Recommend "The Pirates!" as a family film. I've only sees 2 - 3 3D movies and this one used the technology well.

Cheers and hope all is well!

JD