The Ugly Truth about Love

Sometimes I am astounded by the lengths I will go to in the name of Love.
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It all started with a moment of weakness about a week and a half ago at our local video store. I was alone with Lukas trying to find a video for that evening. Mrs. LIAYF and I had just finished the entire series of "Battlestar Gallactica" - as well as pretty much every other TV series (we cancelled our cable, remember?). We both thought we would enjoy "The West Wing," and I believed I could pop into the store and get it on my way home.

Lukas hadn't slept well at daycare and was particularly fussy. Of course, no "West Wing" was on the shelves. Lukas began to whine and squirm mightily wanting down. I, overdressed in a fleece and overcoat, began to sweat as I quickly scanned the other selections. Lukas crying out a bit louder, and pushing away from my chest with his arms wanting to be put down while the moisture built under my arms. There was NOTHING we hadn't already watched.

I spotted it. And had a moment of weakness. And I took it home because my sweet wife had once mentioned she thought it looked funny.

Fighting my squirming boy, I sheepishly laid "Ugly Betty" down on the counter. The 20-something clerk, who a moment ago had been having an animated conversation with another male customer about the movie "Appaloosa," looked at me, my kid, and my selection and flashed me a brief look of pity. Without saying a word or looking in my general direction, he quickly rang me up. Yes, I could tell what he was thinking. However, fighting the sudden feeling that I had just hit a new low on the Guy-o-Meter, I confidently grabbed the disc head held high and walked out.

"Ugly Betty" sat on our shelf for that whole week and a half, while I convinced Mrs. LIAYF that we needed to watch other shows. Up until Friday night, when we had nothing else to watch that wasn't dark and depressing. So, I relented and asked if she wanted to watch "Ugly Betty." O.k. It wasn't the worst show in the world. And, her smile made it all worth while! Yes, love will make you do some strange things. Some things you would never imagine yourself doing. But then again, it can also be rewarding and make you wonder why you waited so long.

Queue the purple dinosaur, I am on a roll.

How to Count the Ways?

Sweets,
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You mean the world to the men in your life (me and the little one). Without you we would be lost and aimless in this crazy, whirlwind of an experience. We both love you with every ounce of what we are, and are extremely lucky you are ours exclusively. We are selfish that way.
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Yes, it's impossible to adequately articulate what you mean to us, however I will risk sounding like a big cheeseball here, and say this:

"To Lukas and I, Love is not a word, spoken or spelled out. It is simply our conception of you."

Happy Valentines Day!

H&L

Bits and Pieces

I haven't done a random post in a while, however there are just too many different things floating around upstairs for me to chose to blog about. I'm guessing that is what Twitter is for, but I don't do Twitter yet (in case you are looking for me), so therefore today you get random.


Lukas had a tough weekend on the changing table. Mrs. LIAYF and I spent most of the weekend in a pitched battle with our son each and every time we would lay him down in his room to be changed. He would scream and yell, twist and turn, cry and weep like we were subjecting him to a cruel and unusual form of toddler torture. We couldn't figure out what was up until Mrs. LIAYF finally asked him if he was afraid he was going to fall. A whimpering "yeah" confirmed it. After a backwards fall off the bed a few days ago where he wasn't physically hurt, Lukas seems to have developed a fear of falling. We are now reassuring him and hoping it passes soon.

With each passing day, Luke's vocal skills continue to improve. He clearly repeats dozens of words throughout a given day, and has started to put groups of words together regularly to inquire about the world around him. However, in true toddler form, he has running conversations with us where we just can't figure out what the words he is using represent. He will be jabbering and suddenly, displaying what seems like a form of toddler torrets, emphatically shout out a 'word' or two at the top of his lungs to which we are left clueless. Tonight it was CAPEESH! But sadly, no, we didn't understand.

With Valentines Day fast approaching, Lukas seems to have recovered nicely from his bout with a broken heart. As I arrived to pick him up from daycare today, Lukas' caregiver took time to relate to me the story of how one of the two little girls left in his room after the departure of Venus, we will call her Aphrodite, spent ample amounts of time today giving him lingering hugs. "She seems to have been the instigator" commented the provider. And as I held him in my arms ready to walk out the door, she came over with an outstretched hand. I obligingly leaned over so he could take her hand for a passing moment, and take in her bright eyes and big smile. Again, the other boys in the room stared vacantly at this exchange.

Thanks goes out to DC Urban Dad, who bestowed upon me today, yet another blogger award. Though I am a bit fuzzy on what it is called, I really do appreciate it.




This award shows the values that every blogger shows in his or her effort to transmit cultural, literal, ethical and personal values every day.

Oh and of course, the award comes with rules:

1) Accept the award and post it on your blog along with the name of the person who gave you the award.

(Done.)

2) Pass it on to (15) bloggers that you know who deserve it.

(The award is great but I just can't keep giving these awards to the same small group of bloggers who I interact with, so I am passing on the 2nd rule. Capeesh?)

Divergent Paths

We may very well one day look back on this time period as definable for Lukas.

If he continues to take after Mrs. LIAYF, the sky's the limit for our son's career potential:

Nuclear Physicist
Astronaut
President
Brain Surgeon
CEO
Rocket Scientist

However, if he begins to pick up my inherent qualities, who knows what he might end up doing...

Halloween haunted house 'extra' ??

Burger joint spokesman??

Nursing home magician??

Birthday cake "Surprise" guy??

Thank God for mothers. At least with Mrs. LIAYF around, I know Lukas will be just fine.

Whatever the heck he decides to be when he grows up!

In Case You Missed it on CNN

I announced a while back, to understandably mediocre fanfare, that I am now writing travel posts over at the UpTake vacations blog. Well, today UpTake has launched its official press release. For those interested, you can read the press release here.

Perhaps more interesting, will be the official About Us page for the entire team of bloggers currently writing for UpTake Vacations. They are a talented group of writers, so I encourage you to read all about them (and me). You can also follow the embedded links, and thus be rewarded with hours of extended reading pleasure. You'll laugh. You'll cry. You'll secretly curse us because you won't get anything else done.

Why read a travel blog? Because, even if you currently can't afford to travel to all the fun and fascinating destinations covered weekly on the blog, you will certainly enjoy reading about them as well as anticipating the day you will eventually visit. You know, when you win the Lotto.

Anyway, if you haven't already done so, go ahead and add us to your RSS. It'll be one of the easier things you'll do today, and we all like easy.

Love Sick Blues

(My Baby Done Left Me: Da, Duh, Da, Da... )

It is a tale too often told. But what makes it hurt all that much worse has to be the timing. Saint Valentine, upon learning of this development, will surely be turning in his grave. Likewise, Cupid must be beside himself, realizing that all his recent overtime on this project might have been for naught. But hey, the breaks don’t always fall your way.

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Try explaining that to a 19 month old.

Venus, has left the building. Well, she hasn’t actually left the building per say, but she has bid adieu to the pre-toddler program and has taken up residence with the toddlers in a nearby room. For all intents and purposes though, she is gone from Luke’s daily circle of friends for what could be up to 4 or 5 months. No more Hugs. No more heart stickers. No more helping him off with his coat.

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Long distance relationship? Haven’t we all been there? I proposed to Mrs. LIAYF after enduring an excruciating 3 month hiatus when she left this state for Grad School. Best thing I ever did. The kids though, are still a smidge too young for that option, so it looks like heartbreak city for our little Casanova.

Mrs. LIAYF and I will need to be all the more sensitive to his emotions in the coming days. Be there with extra hugs and words of encouragement to remedy Love's lost promise. This could be serious. I wonder if it is just mere coincidence that today, the first day of her absence, I was called to take Lukas home before noon with a high fever. He is clearly not feeling well.

Yes, the fever will pass. But the emptiness will take some time to fill. Of course, in a room bursting with boys, there are still a couple of little girls who are looking for a Valentine.

Reality TV??

First things first. Someone please poke me in the eye with a fork to divert the pain. Although done lovingly, I must have read 'Max Drives Away' 30 times today.

And now on to the post:

Mrs. LIAYF and I rented the first couple of Battlestar Galactica Season 4 Dvd's a few nights ago and have been enjoying catching up on this series, which we left off on a couple of years ago before we canceled our cable subscription.

Now I do realize that this is a Science Fiction series and you are supposed to suspend disbelief to a certain extent when watching, but what happened on last night's episode 'Escape Velocity' took things so far away from reality that I almost had to turn it off.

The scene in question took place after a funeral for Cally, who was uncerimoniously dispensed of through an air lock in the previous episode. Grizzled old Colonel Saul Tigh, and Tory come to visit "Chief," Cally's husband and also a Cylon (machine/human hybrid for those who are unfamiliar with the show).

Anyway, when they arrive, the Chief's now motherless toddler Nicolas, perhaps 15 or so months old, is crying inconsolably while the Chief sits at a table distraught and doing nothing about it. Saul looks at him and says "You gonna do anything about the kid?" Chief responds "Probably needs changed." To which Saul says "I'll get it". He goes to another room and the crying immediately stops.

As Tory starts talking with Chief, not 15 seconds later Saul returns obviously having magically calmed and changed the previously inconsolable toddler who remains unseen in another room.

(Would you trust this guy to change your toddlers messy diaper?)

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Now, I can suspend disbelief for most of this show because the possibility of a fleet of Humans searching through the galaxy for Earth, while being chased by the Cylons who are intent on wiping out all of humanity.......hey, it could happen.

But a grizzled old one eyed Colonel, calming and changing an inconsolable little boy in 15 seconds flat? How naive do they think the viewers really are? I guess we are not the target audience anymore.

Just to think . . . a couple of years ago I would have blissfully missed that sticky little detail.

Invest in this GM Right Away

Hey there all. Want a sure fire stock tip in these turbulent economic times? Well, turn your attention away from the sage advice of Warren Buffet for just a few moments, and I will let you in on a little golden secret.

General Mills.

While everyone else is out there trying to salvage what is left of their Golden years by dabbling in energy, tech, and coffee shares, I plan on making a killing in cereal. Why cereal? Because friends, the smart investor will buy what he sees flying off the shelves. And personally, I see cereal.

Specifically, Corn Chex and Cheerios. They are a hot, hot commodity in my sphere and thus I predict the stock prices will soon soar.

These days we are feeding Lukas volumes of these little circles and squares. So much so, that other parents in our Seattle neighborhood could find the shelves bare on their next trip to the local market. Ok, so he is not eating all of this cereal. But he does like to take a snack cup with him wherever he goes filled with his favorite breakfast gorp (we also add raisins and cranberries).

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What makes it go so much faster is that when dad or mom are not looking, he enjoys ripping off the lid and tossing all that cereal around said location (usually the back seat of the car) like crispy confetti. Yet, we keep filling the cup back up like the suckers that we are. Naturally, this leads to a back seat full of sticky cereal, and an obvious conundrum

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(Why do these cursed birds keep following me?)

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With no time to keep up on the important things, much less cleaning this otherwise hidden mess up, how do we reconcile looking at this crunchy mess during each trip to the car seat?

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Let's just say that a quick swipe or two leaves me with a clean conscience and a satisfying knowledge that our feathered friends scattered all over the city are nestling down to sleep that night with a full tummy. At times I amaze myself with my benevolence.

Now get online and by some General Mills stock, pronto!

Music Can't Soothe the Savage Beast

(Lukas at the instrument petting zoo before the show)

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Lukas demonstrated this weekend that he is a boy with broad and diverse musical interests. Be they ever so enthusiastic! From punk, to metal, to country, to the blues and almost everything in between, Lukas has been exposed, through our music collection, local record store, and farmer's market musicians, to a broad range of interesting musical genres and has completely enjoyed all of them.

However, one of the musical genres which doesn’t get a lot of air time at our house is classical music. With the note-able exception of a recent holiday party where we had a good friend who is a cellist in a local symphony (and a cello instructor) graciously give an impromptu ‘concert’ for the little ones in attendance, Lukas has not been exposed to music which could be classified as classical or ‘chamber’.

Until this past Saturday.

Mrs. LIAYF and I took Lukas, accompanied by 3 other boys his age and their parents, to the Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Winter Festival at Seattle’s swanky Benaroya Hall. The specific concert we attended, which was geared towards families with young children and thus only 45 minutes long, was held in a moderately packed auditorium which seated 500 guests. It seemed like the perfect introduction to a new kind of music in a concert setting. But, since this was Luke’s first public event of this sort, and given that he normally doesn’t sit still for more than a ten minutes at a time, we had no idea what to expect from him.

I smartly secured us seats by the aisle nearest the exit door.

Lukas loved the music! Perhaps a bit too much. It started with a short narration after the lights were dimmed. We became nervous as Lukas began to fidget. However, once the music began he became rapt and was obviously enjoying himself as he stood tiptoes to look over the unoccupied seat in front of him. We settled back to enjoy the performance ourselves, more than a bit relieved that things were going well.

Then the first musical number ended in a dramatic crescendo and with the crowd still silent Lukas, at the top of his lungs, yelled out “YEEEAHHH!” and began to clap wildly! This, of course, immediately caused bursts of laughter from the crowd and several rows of head quickly turned in our direction, trying to make out the source of the enthusiasm. Even the Flutist on stage snorted out a stifled laugh visible to all in attendance, which only lead to more chuckles amongst the crowd. At least his timing was dead on.

Oh, but the fun did not end there friends. Not by a long shot. Lukas, very aware that he had garnered such attention, belted out yet another high decibel “YEEEAHHH!” which brought additional laughter as well as sympathetic looks from those close by. Mrs. LIAYF and I oscilated between being mortified and laughing outloud ourselves.

Thankfully the music began again and diverted the attention away from us. Mrs. LIAYF, thinking quickly, motioned for me to pull out the lunch we had packed for after the concert. This diversionary tactic worked perfectly...that is if you consider a toddler dipping a hardboiled egg into dried vegetables and stuffing his face while fidgeting on his mom’s lap to actually be diversionary! At least it was only those around us who witnessed this show.

Then with Lukas done eating and loudly calling out “All done!” “All done!”, the music stopped a second time. A boisterous “YEEEAHHH!” and clapping ensued, but this time accompanied by audience applause for the performers which, thankfully, slightly drowned it out. Mrs. LIAYF, then tried to muffle Luke and we both tried to shhhsh him, but he is a boy that is not accustomed to being shhhsed, so didn’t quite grasp the concept. A second and third half muffled “YEEEAHHH!” proved just too distracting to the crowd. Glad at being next to the aisle, I quickly got up and let Lukas go for the run he had also wanted, which I directed towards the back of the auditorium and out the exit doors.

We did make it back in to the show a couple of more times, but had to exit each time to keep our little guy occupied, and quiet, for the rest of the performance. We did let him "YEEEAHHH" and applause at the end, standing in mom's lap and excited that everyone was joining in. We were then able to go on stage and meet the musicians and narrator. We fessed up to being the perpetrators of all the commotion, to which the performers all chuckled and lauded his impeccable comedic timing.

Perhaps we need to take him out more, so we can work on the quiet voice!

3' Tall and He's Got it All

Seattle, we have a problem. I don't want to sound the alarm bells too early here, seeing how certain media outlets derided guys like 'Peter Schiff'. But hey, I feel that someone needs to step up and let the folks in Seattle know about the problem I envision, so that some strategic plans can be forged to deal with the issue that this city will have to face in, say 20 years or so.

It is eerily strange but boys are everywhere around here. In our birthclasss: 10 out of 12 babies were boys! Our block: 20 out of 24 kids under the age of 10 are boys! Our daycare: 9 out of the 12 toddlers in Luke's room are boys! Just walking down the sidewalks of our neighborhood, it is hard not to run into new parents who are not toting around, or following behind at least one little boy. Mrs. LIAYF heard a story a while back which suggested that more boys are born in times of war. It seems to be over the top in our neighborhood.

Boys, boys, boys. Fun, yes. But 20 years from now there are going to be a lot of very restless men occupying Seattle streets. And they will be lonely! Clearly, this is not a good combination and someone needs to come up with a plan. I even began to worry about Luke's future dating prospects.

(Lukas, dashing with his 8:00 shadow - who could resist?)

Therefore, I was extremely relieved at what has transpired over the past couple of days at daycare. It seems that my boy has caught discerning eye of one of those 3 little girls in his room. This fetching little blond, whom I will call Venus for purposes of anonymity, seems to be genuinely smitten with Lukas. She is a month older - he must like the more mature women. Here is what I have witnessed firsthand at drop off and pickup (who knows what happens for those hours on end while I am at work!):

Event #1 - Three days ago, as we leaving to go home, Venus ran across the play room to give a full body, lingering embrace to Lukas when it was apparent he was going home, which he returned in kind. The other boys in the room all just stood (or sat) there, their mouths agape, watching these events unfold.

Event #2 - As I picked up Lukas the next day the daycare staff relayed that he had fallen and hurt himself and was a little upset. However, he was much recovered when Venus came over to hug and kiss his "owies." He felt better right away. Again, the other little boys sat and stared, amazed at his magnetic attraction to members of the fairer gender.
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Event #3 - Yesterday morning when we arrived, Venus once again ran to meet Lukas, grabbing him by the arm and leading him to the center of the room. She then proceeded to unzip his coat and underlying fleece hoodie and pull them off for him, before leading him over to an awaiting pile of inviting toys. Lukas, demonstrating that he is indeed his father's son, took his cue and allowed Venus to dote over him while he amicably agreed to her instructions.

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It certainly helps that Lukas has learned to agree verbally recently.

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I can hear it now... "Lu-Lu, play?"

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"Yeth, Dear!"