The Squirrelly Dad

These dads won't be as good as me.

These dads here, here in this whole park, I’ll be better than all of them put together. Won’t even be close. Not that it’s saying much, cause right now, this assemblage of dads here is a piss poor one, at best.

That dad over there? I got him beat without even trying very hard. I don’t even hafta lift a finger to be a better dad than him. Look at him over there. Pushing his girl in a swing with one hand, farting around on his Blackberry with the other. When my kid needs pushing on a swing, I’m gonna use both hands. I’m gonna push my kid high. Not like this dad right here. How high’s his kid going? Not very. Just medium-height. Not even above the crossbar. What’s the point of swinging if you’re not even going above the crossbar? I can’t think of one and neither can his kid, from the looks of her. She looks bored. Like she’s crying out to be pushed with both hands. He should notice stuff like that. He should pay attention. A large part of parenting is paying attention.

And there’s that dad over there. On the blanket. He’s not a very good dad either. I’ll be better than him. I just know I will. I won’t play my music so loud. I won’t even mention the fact the music he’s playing sucks so bad. It’s crappy music but to each his own, right? One man’s crappy music’s another man’s not crappy music at all. But it’s so loud it’s gotta be piercing his kid’s eardrums. You know how you can feel the heavy bass in the ground when it’s real loud? That’s what’s going on right now. Booming outta the … outta the boombox. Kid’s like eight inches away from it. Kid’s gotta be deaf as a post. Not smart, dad. Not smart. I’m already smarter than him, and I’m an idiot.

Yep. Sure. I’m an idiot. I know this. But ever since I started identifying all the dads I’m gonna be better than, I gotta tell you. I’m still an idiot, a big fat one most of the time, but I could be a lot worse.

Like that guy trying to teach his kid how to ride a bike. He’s worse than me. Even if you take into account I know the guy, I know what he does for a living, and he makes way more money than I do, I got him beat. Even if you value all that money shit and financial security garbage and providing peace of mind and well being crap, I’m a better dad and I’m not even a dadyet. When I actually get to be a dad (end of October), then I’ll really blow the doors off that lousy dad.

Teaching his kid how to ride a bike by letting him fall over. Can you imagine? Who told him that that’s the way you teach a kid how to ride a bike. That’s not how you teach a kid how to ride a bike.

You teach a kid how to ride a bike by making sure that you only take the training wheels off when you’re sure he/she really only needs the training wheels not very often at all. If the kid can make it almost all the way down to … oh, I dunno … say, way over there, that corner there without relying on training wheels to keep him/her from wiping out, then it’s time to take off the training wheels. Then and only then. This guy took his kid’s training wheels off way too early. Kid can’t even make it ten feet without wobbling over to the ground all of a sudden like he’s doing now. Man. And the kid is getting no coaching whatsoever. Bad parenting. That’s what that is.

Kid clearly never had anyone instruct him on the finer points of what you gotta do is pedal through the wobbly parts. The only way to stay upright is to pedal. Soon as you hesitate or halter, you’re falling over. He doesn’t know that. My kid will. My kid will know that. Because I will teach him. Or Wife-asaurus. One of us will.

Look. I’m never winning Father of the Year. I’m not deluding myself into thinking I’m gonna win any kinda prize ever. I won’t even get nominated. But those dads right over there have no idea where their kids are, and I can flat out guarantee you I will never lose my kid in a big huge city park. The kind that’s so big it has a clubhouse, fieldhouse, baseball diamonds, tennis courts, a big park, a hot dog stand and a couple trails for jogging or walking. I won’t ever lose my kid like those guys have perhaps lost theirs.

Seriously. Where’d their kids go. They were just right close by. Scampering around chasing after each other playing some kinda game whose only rule seemed to be slap someone else on the butt but don’t get slapped yourself.

All these dads, not a single one of ‘em realizes their kids have vamoosed. Just standing there, arms folded and smug, talking bout whatever it is bad dads talk about. What if their kids’re halfway up a real dangerous tree? These guys wouldn’t know it. So wrapped up in their own little … you know, being a dad means you can’t exactly just get wrapped up in your own little world whenever you feel like it. You gotta pay attention. You gotta be aware. You gotta remember that it’s no longer you and your …

Oh. Okay. There they are. The kids. Okay. Right over there, waiting at theice cream man. But they coulda gone off somewhere. They coulda. And they were not within eyeshot. This park has lotsa hiding places. These dads wouldn’t’ve known, so my point remains. I’m a better dad than all of them.

Better dad than that guy idling in his convertible too. Who gives their kid a cappuccino, anyway? Other than that guy, I mean. It’s only a sip or two outta the dad’s super big cappuccino, but still. That’s how kids get hooked. When I worked at the railroad, almost twenty years ago (!!), there was this woman who gave her three year old all the soda he wanted to drink and sure enough, within like a month, that kid would only drink soda. Soda and nothing but soda. Kid turned into a holy terror. Spazzing over every little thing like the world was coming to an end then collapsing to sleep just like that. I gotta think that the caffeine in a cappuccino functions in much the same way sugar in soda does.

Freaking the hell outta the kid, that’s how it functions. This kid right here’s gonna be hooked soon too. Just like that poor railroad coworker’s kid. Never catch me letting that happen. Are you kidding? Are you serious? Have you lost your mind? The last thing I want to have happen is me being kept up all night by a kid crying and running around and talking nonsense gibberish cause he had a shot of espresso, basically. No way. This dad here should be more responsible. Juice or water or milk or maybe a sno-cone.

And is it really worth me mentioning the Little League dad over there too? What a dick that guy is. How’d you like to have a dick like that for a dad? That’d be terrible. Have your dad yell at you in front of everyone, from the stands, cause you charged a fly that wound up sailing over your head. Kid feels bad enough as it is cause a couple runs scored and now his teammates think he sucks. (Which he does, cause it was a real easy fly he misjudged.)

But right field is lonely. You’re out there all by yourself, and you feel … exiled or on an island or some kinda gulag when you mess up real bad and everyone’s looking at you even though they’re pretending they’re not. Trust me, I should know. I got stuck in right field once I grew out of my coordination. Once I went from short, agile and quick to gangly, loping and weird, there was nowhere for me to go but right field. Right field is where you inflict the least damage. But I hold no grudges. It’s not like I’m gonna try to live vicariously through my kid, like this dick’s doing, and if my kid messes up (which he did, no doubt about it, the kid screwed up real big), I’m gonna yell at my kid and call him all kindsa swear words. I’m not gonna do that, which makes me a far better dad than that dick.

It's like I married the Archbishop of Can't-erbury.

All the things I can’t do suddenly all of a sudden. Can’t do this, can’t dothat. What happened to the Wife-asaurus I knew and loved. Where’d she go. I mourn her passing.

Because apparently, my wife the Archbishop of Can’t-erbury says I can’t do things like have affairs when I feel like having affairs. Not that I’ve ever done it before, nor have I ever felt like it much. But I won’t even get to see how much having a ring on my finger helps me have an affair I wouldn’t otherwise have had. Or how much of an ... infidelity aid pushing a kid around in his stroller is. I’ll hafta leave it at flirty looks and wondering what could have been. This sucks.

Can’t have any more lazy mornings. Wow. Will I miss my lazy mornings. Internet. Coffee. Doing nothing much at all until nine thirty. (The things they don’t tell you til after you knock her up and marry her to make everything nice and legit, huh?) But PokeyHef’s gonna need things round the clock, gonna demand attention at all hours. Including those hours where I wasn’t really doing things. Now, by the time I get to work and the annoying things really commence forthwith, I will have already been run ragged for a few hours. To those people who think I’m impatient as it is, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Wait til November rolls around.

Another thing the Archbishop of Can’t-erbury is riding me about is I can’t let laundry pile up til it’s a waist high pile in the closet. Cause PokeyHef’s gonna need clean clothes. All the clean clothes he’s gonna need. My argument that we could just buy PokeyHef more clothes could gain no traction. So I gotta do laundry a couple times a week.

Speaking of laundry. My socks can’t be left on the coffee table anymore. Nor can random plates of sandwich crusts or potato chip crumbs. My god, when will it ever end.

Being lazy bout keeping a clean house is a thing of the past. This is even worse than the thing before of laundry and leaving stuff all over the place. Cause she’s talking bout sweeping and mopping and keeping the tub and toilet scrubbed. A couple times a week is what she has in mind. She wouldn’t’ve been of this opinion before. The fact that she now is makes her the Archbishop of Can’t-erbury, all right. (I wonder if she might be a germophobe in the making. Christ almighty, I hope not.)

Fine. Okay. Fine. If I gotta do that, keep a clean house, then she’s gotta not shed so much. Big long hairs everywhere which need to be swept up. I know they’re not my big long hairs, cause my hairs are short. Two or three inches, max.

I can’t buy things just cause I feel like buying them. Why just the other day, I was standing in line at Target, with a nice new router. She wondered why we needed another one, and wouldn’t you know it, the fact that this particular router was a better, stronger one wasn’t enough of a reason to buy it and neither was the fact that it was on sale. Next thing I know, I’m walking all the way back to Electronics to put it back on the shelves. On the way home, she tells me we gotta be wiser bout our money. Here, I might’ve pointed out she had just wasted almost twenty bucks on towels, Meyer’s cleaning products and bananas, but I didn’t.

Swearing to the extent I swear will soon be off limits. Cording to the Archbishop of Can’t-erbury, kids pick up swears at a very early age. Way earlier than you’d think. Also cording to her, I swear too fucking much sometimes. So, I guess I gotta replace them with words or phrases that when exclaimed with the proper oomph give the same satisfaction as letting loose with a real blue streak of swears. I’ve just started recently. If you ever see a tall gangly gentleman of small distinction yelling random things for no apparent reason, things like ‘Geez Louise!’ or ‘Cork Knocker!’ or ‘Piddly Widdly Hop-Hop!’ or (and this is my current favorite) ‘Apples!,’ know that you have found me. But also know that right then is most definitely not the time to go up to me and tell me that you have found me.

This one’s mine all mine, though luckily she is in agreement, so we’re both the Archbishops of Can’t-erbury on this one. We have a big heavy cedar trunk that’s been in her family for seventy years or so. We were thinking bout using it for a toy chest. (Right now it just holds spare blankets.) Just this past weekend, we realized it wasn’t at all kid safe, so we can’t use it as a toy chest. There’s metal brackets on the corners of the lid and they’re sharp and the lid itself is heavy as sin.

The thought of the big heavy trunk lid with its sharp corners slamming down on PokeyHef’s curious fingers, wrists or forearms fills me with terror which catches in my throat. We must change the subject now. Back to the trifling superfluous things I can’t do anymore, much to my chagrin.

“Because I said so” won’t cut it much longer, according to Wife-asaurus, AKA the Archbishop of Can’t-erbury. I got a few years to wean myself off it, cause … well, it’s not like you gotta explain yourself to a three-month old. But … eventually, there will come a time when PokeyHef will need to have certain things explained to him. It emerges now that she wants to be a parent who actually explains things, and would really greatly appreciate it if I joined her in trying to be that kind of parent. Great. Just great. Now I’m gonna hafta … articulate things. Crap. Losing this phrase will be like losing an arm or a leg. I will feel amputated.

It seems as though me polishing off half a bottle of Early Times at the Music Box midnight movie is verboten as soon as PokeyHef arrives. I don’t know how I feel about this, frankly. It’s not the thing itself I will miss. There’s only so many times in one’s life when one feels like drinking through a midnight movie, and Early Times I will never ever ever drink again. I think what I object to, or push back against, is the opportunity being denied. I want to have the opportunity. It’s called self-determination.

Oh, and that night I left my pants in the stairwell. Who knows why. Most likely, I just got sick of wearing ‘em before I was through our front door and I couldn’t wait. Even more most likely, a few of our neighbors passed my crumpled pants on the way up or down before I woke up and realized. Well, at least they know what kinda pants I wear, huh? (Occasionally jeans, but most nights and that night khakis.) Which segues rather nicely to …

According to Her Eminence the Archbishop of Can’t-erbury, I really, really, really, really, really can’t be hungover so bad I’m out of commission all day. (On this, I happen to agree with her.) I can barely make peanut butter toast when I’m doubled over from the night before. You know how you can’t stand up straight cause it’ll make you throw up if you do? And you’re real wobbly also, so you gotta hold on tight to something otherwise you’ll fall over? So you stand there feet real far apart, hands grabbing the kitchen counter for all it’s worth, possibly dry-heaving, waiting for the … coffee to finish? That’s me.

Now imagine me doing that while a baby’s yelling or screaming or crying or hungry or just wants a cuddle. Not a pretty picture. I don’t much relish the thought of trying to survive one of those days. I plan on cutting back on my booze intake. Shouldn’t be a problem. Not at all. I’ll start cutting back … next week. Do it right after the holiday weekend, and the barbecues and the parties and the drinking that goes so well with both.

Stop staring at Wife-asaurus' boobs.

I’ve tried to be cool, and ‘share the wealth,’ and everything. I consider myself a pretty open-minded guy, and I don’t get hung up or possessive or jealous or anything. I think she’s just now getting that pregnant lady glow, so she’s damn pretty (not that she wasn’t before. It’s just that it was a different kinda pretty. This kind, the pregnant kind, is … aura-like, I guess). I can understand that you might not be able to control yourself and your eyes and where your eyes are looking/fixating, but if you don’t mind, I gotta ask you to stop staring right at her boobs like that.

It’s not that she’s my wife, and how dare you objectify her (more accurately, her boobs). It’s not that you stare at my wife at the expense of yours, who’s only a few feet away, decidedly un-stared at. It’s that you’ve been doing it for at least a minute now, and it’s perplexing me no end. You’ve had your fill of what Wife-asaurus’ boobs look like so maybe it’s time to check something else out. We’re at a Kohl’s in Lincolnwood, so you’re not exactly spoilt for choices. Not too many other things to stare at, but ...

Luggage? There’s some luggage right over there. Kid’s clothes? You could maybe look at those kid’s clothes. The line at the register? Someone’s freaking out at the register, trying to get a vacuum cleaner for twenty bucks cause the cardboard box’s all wanged up. You could maybe go look at that.

I guess you’re lucky that your wife’s over there, more concerned with finding a pair of shoes that fit her and are attractive and at a price she can live with. You’re lucky. Better hope she doesn’t find that pair before you’re done with the …

Oh. Hold on, hold on. Hold on. She …

Okay. I thought she mighta been looking your way but actually all she was doing was looking at a pair of shoes that were right between her eyes and you. You’re safe. On with the ogling, I guess, huh?

Another aspect of this that rankles is you’re not even hiding it. You are open and brazen in your ogling. Right smack dab in the middle of the aisle. In your t-shirt that doesn’t entirely cover your stomach, doesn’t even come close to meeting the waistband of your sweatpants, so your big fat belly is hanging out, like a big thing of bread dough rising. Why, now that I think of it, you’re almost pregnant yourself. In a way. If you think about it. (Well done on your belly button, by the way. That thing’s huge. Wide and deep. Thing’s like a bowl. At a party, you’d come in real handy, I bet. You could lay on your back and use that belly button for dip. That thing’d hold guacamole or salsa or that French onion dip every family party I ever went to as a kid had.)

Can’t decide if I’d rather you tried to sneak a peek, be surreptitious and all that. Is it better that you’re openly ogling? To the point of being a bit of a letch? Or would I prefer you thinking you can get away with an undetected long hard look at those two big bazongas she’s now got happening. Hm. That’s a tough one. I’ll hafta think about that and let you know. Might take a while, for me to arrive at my conclusion, but that’s okay. She’s gonna be shopping for a while still and I’ve no doubt you’ll be staring as long as she’s shopping.

Not that I blame you though. I find myself staring myself. Mouth agape, jaw hanging slack, Stupefaction on my face. Where did they come from, these bazongas? A couple weeks ago, they were just your run-of-the-mill, ordinary, average everyday hooters. Just a coupla bongos which (while quite nice, don’t get me wrong, she had quite a nice pair of bongos there, pre-pregnant) one could gaze upon without being stopped in one’s tracks. A pair just hanging around doing their own thing.

But now, barely a fortnight later, Ka-POW. Ka-BLAM. Ba-ZOOM. When she gets dressed for work every morning, I think ‘Holy Smokes!’ Then, I ogle some more. If she wasn’t my wife, it’d be a bit … pervy. So, nah, I don’t blame you. Not for the impulse, the urge, to ogle. But, I should point out that she is not your wife. So your ogling is, in fact, a bit pervy. The longer you stare, the more pervy it gets.

And man oh man. You just keep staring. Even after you know you’ve been caught. By me. By her. We both caught you. She even said to you, ‘Easy there, easy.’ Didn’t matter. You kept right on staring. Was it that you were hypnotized? Did they mesmerize you? Were you powerless?

Your eyes tracked her from the shoes to the onesies aisle. What I wanted to do was go round the corner, out of sight, over to the candles and weird trinkets, to see if you’d follow. Have her boobies got so big that you would leave your section to keep looking? That’s what I wanted to find out. She wouldn’t go for it, though. She told me to grow up.

So then I thought an acceptable compromise woulda been if I had her bounce up and down a little bit. Not a lot, just a little. To make ‘em bounce a bit. I wanted to see if your eyes would track them. If eyes and boobs would bounce in unison, basically. She didn’t go for that either. Then I thought maybe she could swing ‘em from side to side. Cause I bet your eyes would follow like you were getting hypnotized by a pendulum. She refused, asking if I was enjoying this as much as he was. (Sometimes, she just steadfastly refuses to be any fun.) I told her you started this. You meaning you, not you meaning her. Though I spose a case could be made that she started this, not you. Since it was she who sprouted those big huge hypnotic things in the first place.

If you think they’re a coupla formidable opponents right now, you shoulda saw how they looked in the top she wanted to wear. She put on this green tank top kinda top. Like a tank top, but not. I dunno what it’s called, there’s a name for what the top’s called. Anyway, she said “Is this obscene?” I couldn’t speak. She changed into something a wee bit more … demure. The fact that I could speak when looking at her in the top she changed into and was able to more or less form words signaled to her that yes, it was safe for public consumption.

But … get a hold of yourself, please. It’d be nice if you closed your mouth. It’s been hanging open so long, your tongue’s gotta be bone dry, and you’re gonna get cottonmouth and hafta head out to the food court for a …

Oooh, your wife’s catching you. Careful, now, you wanna avert your eyes before your wife catches wind that what you’re doing is …

Too late. She figured it out. You’re in for it. Better get in some kinda defensive position, better kinda lift your arms and make yourself harder to hit by covering up with your …

God, look at you. Your wife’s storming over to thump the holy hell outta you, but you still can’t stop staring. You’re still looking. Maybe they’re the first pregnant lady knockers you’ve ever seen. Maybe that’s it. You’ve never seen any before so that’s why you’re gonna allow yourself to be defenseless as your very own wife wails on you with her big heavy purse/handbag thing.

Questions and matters of utmost importance at two in the morning.

In the sober, more rational light of morning, these seem less ... utmostly important. However, eight in the morning isn't two. Two's an entirely different can of worms.

- Is it true kids're expensive? Or is it just something they say to terrify the crap outta me.

- Cause have I been this terrified before in all my whole entire life?

- How are we ever gonna pay for all this kid's gonna need?

- We can't afford this kid.

- Will we have enough money?

- Lots of times. I've been this terrified before, lots of times.

- We won't have enough money.

- What're we gonna do bout money?

- I can open up my own eBay store. Everyone loves a good eBay store. Who doesn't love a good eBay store?

- I would sell things. I think I would be very good at selling things.

- I should sign up for the two in the morning walk around and feed the kid his bottle shift. I'm usually up, anyway.

- Lately, I've been not wanting to be one of those fathers who only has one leg. I think it'd be difficult to keep up with your kid if you only have one leg.

- How much're braces running these days? Or, what I'd rather know is: How much'll braces be running in about twelve years?

- How can I make more money?

- I like beer. Will I still be able to afford beer?

Babies 'R Us makes me grumpy.

I got outta bed early for this? I ran outta the house before coffee and a shower to be met by only this? I never run outta the house before coffee and a shower. I never run outta the house before anything. You know how much I love my lazy hazy mornings. You know how much.

Nine-twenty in the morning, I am wandering round a Babies ‘R Us. I swear.

My god, it’s like we’re those morons who go out shopping at four in the morning the day after Thanksgiving. Least those morons get bargains and a selection. We don’t even get that. There’s nothing here. Everything seems picked over.  (You’d think with all that Toys ‘R Us money behind them, they’d be able to keep things stocked around here.) These are some barren shelves we’re looking at. These are some empty aisles. This open floor space in the middle sure doesn’t have too many cribs and bassinets and dressers and chairs and ottomans and gliders. Sure is a lotta open floor space in the middle. They should have more … merchandise.

I mean, all the chairs look the same. The bassinets, who can tell the difference in all of those. Not sure what the ottomans are there for, and the gliders? You seen one glider, you’ve seen ‘em all. As far as the cribs go, thanks but no thanks. What’re we gonna do, use this spindly job here in the corner? It’s rickety like it’s made of balsa, it shakes too easy, not nearly sturdy enough. You said it yourself. No way in hell we’re putting any son of ours in some rickety crib. You said it yourself. So it looks like we gotta buy our crib at another store. Good thing we got here crack of dawn almost, just so we could establish that this will not be the place from which we purchase our crib.

Seriously. Is there something wrong with this place? Is it going belly up? Why is there hundreds of square feet going wasted. They have a whole aisle of detergent, but they have one mobile. One. I did not see more than one mobile. This doesn’t make sense. It’s goofy.

No, I’m fine, I just need a coffee. Soon’s we get outta here, I’m driving over to that Corner Bakery. It’s the closest place. Even if it involves making three left turns just to get one parking lot over. It’s where I gotta go. Get a big tall coffee.

Then you can have decaf, then. I’ll get you a breakfast, as well. Bout time for your second breakfast of the morning, isn’t it? A parfait and toast? Or a full-on scrambler platter? They got everything, Corner Bakery. We’ll sit and you can eat while I nurse a coffee til I shake off the grumps.

Babies ‘R Us. I ask you, what’s the point. This here bedding aisle ain’t exactly what anyone’d call thorough, now is it. I find it sorely lacking. (Or maybe we arrived just after the stampede.) Everything’s cutesy pie. Everything’s … well, it’s all got a dog or a bunny or a bear or a lamb or a cat or a duck or a little boy or a squirrel or a fox or a little girl or a frog or some incarnation of Winnie the Pooh. What happened to just plain colors or stripes or …

Well, I was hoping to just buy a big set or two and be done with it, but if all the sets have stupid animals all over ‘em, looks like we’re gonna hafta do this all over again elsewhere. Some other place. Like, say, the Target up the road. Do we still have that gift card from there or did we spend it?

Then looks like we’ll be able to buy a nice set of sheets for the little nipper. Little ankle-biter. When’re we gonna come up with a nickname for him. So I can just call him the nickname instead of boy or son or kid or nipper or ankle-biter. Just some nickname for the interim. Then when he’s born we’ll name him something then forget all bout the nickname. Something good. Something good.

And that woman, that clerk that helped us. What exactly was wrong withher. All she did was say ‘What you see is what we got’ when I asked if they had a stroller we could adjust up so I won’t wrench my neck bending over cause I’m so tall. She just walked away. Didn’t even gimme a chance to ask about the car seat, which was my next question. If all the employees’re like her, no wonder this place is going belly-up. I can’t be the only six foot whatever guy pushing his kid round in a stroller, can I? I can’t be the only one with a delicate neck. She was bristly, all right. She bristled. Like a porcupine with a nametag and one of those walkie-talkie things.

Babies ‘R Us sure does know how to bring out the grumpy in me. I ain’t the only one either. Look at all those dads in the checkout line. All of them over there, the dads. They all look like they spent last night getting wailed on by a pillowcase fulla oranges. They all look … battered. See the one at the front? He does not look happy. That is not one happy dad. Least his kid finally shut the hell up. I’ve never seen a kid want to get back to Wal-Mart so bad. What’s at Wal-Mart for a kid. They got a big toy section there? Or pizza or donuts or Slurpees?

(Please Lord, let me never have a child who likes Wal-Mart.)

All right, thank you, thank you thank you thank you, let’s get outta here already. Let’s get to fun places like Target and Costco and Barnes andNoble. Okay? Cause I don’t have anywhere to be til … til … hold on. Hold on. Hold on.

Hey, can we get him one of these? This Nintendo DS? One of these’s sure to make his life better. Like cause they have … brain increasing games. Like teasers and uh … you know … puzzles and lessons and plans and educational things …

I dunno, maybe his brain’ll get stronger? He’ll need a stronger brain than I have, that’s for sure. Much much much stronger. Maybe his reading will get stronger, or the … brain’ll be able to process what the eye sees more … efficiently and correctly. I prolly coulda used one of these things when I was a kid. (I was born before my time.) Cause there was this one exam I failed in college, completely failed it, completely tanked it, cause the professor wanted an essay on the causal link between such and such, but I did a whole essay on the casual link. I did casual not causal. Try explaining your way outta that one. Can’t be done. Can’t be done.

Nah, it wasn’t the final, just an exam. Still, though. I wound up getting a C. If I had read causal instead of casual, who knows what I woulda wound up getting. Maybe even a B.

Well, I’m not saying my son’s gonna go round mixing up words, I’m just saying that it’d be nice if my son had every opportunity and maybe my son needs a Nintendo DS.

See? See? I had to do it again. Call him my son, when if he had a nickname, I wouldn’t’ve had to. Coulda just used the nickname. He really needs one. I think it’s high time. Something short and sweet. Something to which we won’t grow too attached. Cause we’ll hafta forget all about it, once we’re in the maternity thing at the hospital. Something easily dismissed. Something like … something like …

Something like Hef.

9 things I'm gonna eat the crap outta with my son.

Now this is a few years into the future. What we’re doing is peering, foretelling. Cause none of this will happen until he is old enough to appreciate what he’s eating, old enough to voice his pleasure and old enough to have a memory which will last, if not a lifetime, then certainly for a few months at least. I’m not using up my Saturday and Sunday afternoons, or precious weeknights off, for something the kid’s not even gonna remember. Oh, and also, none of this can take place til he has teeth.

Please keep in mind, it’s preliminary, subject to change, unofficial and anything but set in stone. (And the list is in no order other than in which it occurred to me.) Though, also keep in mind, I would never ever ever list anything that I really wasn’t dying to eat with my kid. Why waste your time reading bout something I wasn’t crazy bout? Your time’s way too precious a commodity. Mine’s not, but I bet yours sometimes is.

1. Chocolate donuts from Dinkel’s. I know they’re prolly not the best donuts in Chicago (there’s a place on the South side that most likely’s the best), but dang if a Dinkel’s chocolate donut doesn’t hit whatever spot’s beggin to get hit. We’ll sit there at one of their little tables with a bag in between us. He’ll have chocolate smeared all over his face, and so will I. What a lovely way to spend a morning. Though it’ll wind up in some kinda yelly-whiny-moany-cry-cry-cry fight with the kid cause he’ll want chocolate milk to wash down the chocolate donuts, and I’ll hafta be stern with him (cause that’s too much chocolate, really) and only let him get regular plain non-chocolate milk. He’ll spaz and I’ll pretend to not hear him and he’ll spaz louder and I’ll pretend harder and a true battle royale of wills shall ensue.

2. Pepperoni pizza from Marie’s over on Lawrence over there. The pizza is good, really good, but I like the place cause it’s an institution. Been there since the dawn of time, since like the forties, I think. You get the thin crust, and ask for it well done. It comes on a rectangular cookie sheet even though the pizza itself is round and therefore a little bit hangs over each side. (I have no clue why they use the cookie sheets.)

And if the kid doesn’t like pepperoni, I won’t say anything to him. No, I will bite my tongue. Until I get home and can confront Wife-asaurus with who’s the real biological father, cause no blood son of mine’d ever not love pepperoni on pizza.

3. Pancakes from some kinda father/son pancake breakfast. He’s gonna think he lucked into the best dad ever, throughout all written history. Father/son pancake breakfasts are invariably all you can eat. They come with juice or coffee (he’d get the juice, I’d get the coffee). And the pancakes usually are on the thinner side, closer to the European kind, which is never a bad thing. Thick pancakes strike me as overly … thick. Oh, and there’s usually some kinda charity involved, so the whole two birds with one stone thing applies.

4. Burgers and an onion brick from Hackney’s or I’d settle for tater tots at the place right around the corner from Hackney’s. Granted, it’s a bit of a hike, bit of a half hour drive at least, but it’d be worth it. The burgers are good (not great, but good). The onion brick from Hackney’s is something everyone should try at least once before they die.

If it’s too busy, there’s this place round the corner called Meier’s Tavern. You go there for the tater tots. But it’s a tavern, so I’ll hafta be careful with the drinking. Apparently, Meier’s sits right on a town line, so there’s often a cop just idling waiting to pull over some guy who can’t stay in his lane. Can you imagine how much trouble I’d be in if I got a DUI with the kid riding along? Me neither. Not only with Wife-asaurus, but with myconscience.

5. We might move between now and when he’s old enough to appreciate a bike ride to the ice cream place as much as I do. (Stranger things have happened.) But right now, we’re like a fifteen minute ride to a very good place, Margie’s, on Montrose. We’ll peddle our legs off, split a sundae, then maybe another, different one. We’ll barely make it home cause of all that ice cream and hot fudge and whipped cream and whatever other toppings, then have stomach aches for days. Who knows, we might even throw up. Can’t wait.

6. Hotdogs. Let’s just admit right now here off the bat that the kid’s gonna have upwards of seventy thousand hotdogs before he’s got his learner’s permit. Okay? This I freely admit. The kid’s gonna get his share, cause I’m not such a horrible torturous dad that I’ll eat something terrific in front of him without allowing him to share.

The thing that woulda made my dad spin in his grave if we hadn’t cremated him is I am looking forward to the hotdogs not just from various stands all over town but also those from Wrigley Field. They’re no good, overpriced, never as hot as they should be, and the condiment choice isn’t much of a choice at all, but … they have an appeal. I can’t say no. So I’m sure we’ll make a trip or two to the Friendly Confines. Plus, he’s gonna hafta learn bout disappointment, defeat and failure (specially considering his dad is me), and what better place to learn than at Wrigley Field, watching theCubs?

7. I don’t like snow cones so I hope the kid doesn’t, but if he loves ‘em, he wouldn’t have gotten that from me. That would have to have come from Wife-asaurus, who has a certain fondness. And if he does, I'll choke a few down every now and then, just to make him happy. (Parenting is all bout being selfless.)

8. Whatever fries they have at zoos and museums. But only cause it’s a fine excuse to get our hands on those wax mold things. You know the things I’m talking about. Those hot wax mold things. And not only zoos and museums, but aquariums and planetariums as well. There’s always those hot wax things to buy. I loved those when I was a kid. I collected them. Animals or dinosaurs or rockets or fish or whatever’d be the planetary equivalent if you were at the planetarium. Our kid shall have a collection of his very own. Though I’m sure they’ve gone up in price. I’m sure they’re no longer only two quarters.

9. Corned beef sandwiches. But not just any corned beef sandwiches. No, my corned beef house has not so many rooms. Only a few. It has to be corned beef from one of the Jewish delis I could drive to (the closest one is on Clark). The sandwiches must be on pumpernickel, but I’d settle for rye. Mustard only, no other condiments, and in a perfect world, it’d be brown or spicy mustard. Since the world is decidedly imperfect, I’ll settle for boring yellow. And we have to have those little cups of cole slaw on the side, as well as individual bags of potato chips. Then we hafta go to a park and eat them like we’re having a picnic. When I was a kid, we used to do this. Once we went to Grant Park, where my brother and I wound up feeding some of our potato chips to squirrels. Then my dad asked why he spent his hard-earned money on that which we were wasting on squirrels. So we stopped. One of the squirrels sniffed around closer to our blanket. When he didn’t get any more chips, he took a snapping, biting leap at my finger. Startled the hell outta me. I mighta even cried a bit. I should have a thing against squirrels now, but I don’t. Clearly.

Now we know.

So we found out the other day that the thing she has inside her will be a boy once it comes out. Not sure what it means, or how I feel about it, or what the implications of son rather than daughter might be, but we were happy. Girl or boy, we woulda been happy. Also, I think what initially felt like happiness might in fact have been relief, cause now that we know, we can start decorating its room. It’s very important it comes into this world with a fully and properly decorated room.

After the doctor, I walked the wife-asaurus halfway to work then wandered around for a while. No real reason, just felt like wandering. Wound up at a mall on Michigan Avenue and bought the kid some socks and a stuffed doll thing, like a plush toy. The clerk behind the counter asked if I was the uncle or the godparent or merely a relative. I said, ‘No, no, these are for me, these are for mine, these are for my son.’

He didn’t seem to believe me, and it looked like he was searching for signs of me putting him on. Like there would be an ironic twinkle in my eyes or something. I had to assure him another time or two, and then he rang me up. I was a few blocks away before I realized I might have been insulted just there. I look less like a dad than some of those other jerks who were walking round in there? There was that guy on the cell phone, talking to some clown in Atlanta, while the second clerk was ringing him up. I’m less of a dad than that guy? That guy?

If this is the way it’s gonna be, me and the world are gonna have some problems. Some serious problems. Cause I might in fact wind up being a lousy dad (it’s possible, who knows, it might happen), but the objective truth is, it’s impossible to tell that just by looking at me. By all outward appearances, I seem like a perfectly adequate dad. Except that day, I hadn’t shaved since the weekend, so I looked a little ragged/rough round the edges.

That night, I had my first specific son-related dream. All the earlier dreams were … uh … we just had a baby and life was peaches and cream. But last night’s dream, we were in Welles Park, in the playground part, and I was pushing my son in a swing. I pushed him high but not too high, and he had that face that babies get where they’re having a good time and everything, but they also have no idea what to make of this good time they’re having. It’s puzzled and pleased at the same time. And drool was flying everywhere. His drool. Getting all over me and Wife-asaurus and her parents who had just magically appeared at our side.

And in the dream, we headed over to Tina’s, for a hot dog and fries, Tina’s Beef right there on the corner there. The kid was still a baby, we hadn’t even named it yet, and I was ordering dogs and fries for everyone, and the baby said he wanted one too, only he wanted his with ketchup.

Didn’t occur to me it was odd his first words were ‘ketchup not mustard.’ Flew right past me. I was just bowled over he’d want something so fucked up on his hot dog. Ketchup, my lord. I looked at him and thought, ‘Where did you learn to put ketchup on a hot dog, who taught you that was acceptable, how can you be my kid when you’re so unlike me about something as basic and profound as what not to put on your damn hot dog.’ But then I realized I wasn’t thinking it, I was saying it, and the kid had heard me, and he was looking at me and god love him, he wasn’t backing down. He was getting ketchup on his hotdog and who cares what I thought. I didn’t know what to make of it or him. I just … regarded him.

That was it. That was the dream.

The Special Lady Friend is no more.

Say so long to the Special Lady Friend for the Special Lady Friend is Special Lady Friend no more. That's right, Tuna Can, that's a hundred percent right. We’re gonna hafta come up with a new handle for her round these parts. And since she doesn't like me using her name round these parts, it’ll hafta be something else I refer to her as when I refer to her. Something like … like … like Wifey.

Yep. That’s it. Wifey. From now on, stead of using her name, I won’t be calling her Special Lady Friend. I’ll be calling her Wifey. Or Wifey-poo or Wifey-kins or Wife-asaurus.

So, my dear Tuna Can, when the phone rings and Jason’s not here to answer it, cause he’s at the far end of the bar pretending to be deaf, so you hafta answer it, and it’s the Wife on the phone asking why I’m not home yet, I will wave and shake my head and mouth ‘You haven’t seen me’ because I am hiding from my wife and not merely the woman I’ve been living with for almost ten years anyway so we might as well have been married all along.

Okay? Tuna? You got that? It’s important that you remember this, now, Tuna. Cause the day will come when you gotta answer that phone and I need you to know who precisely it is you’re bullshitting and the relationship of that person you’re bullshitting to me. Wife-Husband. That’s the relationship. Okay?

I shit you not. You are not being shat. I’m just not wearing the ring cause it doesn’t stay on my boney maroney fingers, that’s all. Soon as I get it sized, I’ll wear it all the time. Cause I am married now.

Married to the woman who I don’t let come around here very often cause you guys are ill-behaved and the last time she did, this was a couple years ago, she walked in and before I could greet her and introduce her, Stinkhead remarked “She’s got legs all the way up to her ass.” And King Turd said “Nice cans, approaching from the west.”

So she doesn’t come round so much anymore. And now that she’s been elevated to the exalted position of my spouse, you can forget about seeing her traipse through these doors. Nope. Sorry. Save your breath, there, Tuna. You wanna see her, you’re gonna hafta go to the picnic we have, end of summer.

Oh, no, that’s not why we did it. No, it’s … well, I mean, I … no, no, we did not get married simply to ensure the Bastard Child wouldn’t be a bastard after all. That’s a valid reason to get hitched and all, but … that alone’s not gonna get me down to city hall to get married in marriage court.

(Though I’ll tell you one thing, Tuna. Just between you and me, Tuna. Don’t go telling anyone this now, Tuna. But she’s got a few family members, slightly extended family members who … uh … know some folks with … uh … mafia connections. One of ‘em, a second cousin, made a joke bout I better marry her or I should say so long to the use of my knees and thumbs. Sure, he was joking, but not entirely. His eyes weren’t joking, I can tell you that much. They contained no mirth. And I like my knees and thumbs. I use them all the time. Bending, holding sandwiches.)

Just ran downtown, to the City Hall Marriage Court. You know underneath Randolph there? The lower level at Randolph and Clark, basically? That’s where we went, and seriously, it was like getting married in a sea of Puerto Ricans. All we could see was Puerto Ricans. It was weird. But the judge was fine, he was very nice, only he was wearing a lotta gold and I’m almost positive he didn’t have a shirt on underneath his robe cause of all the chest hairs I saw sprouting up fron underneath. And when he did the vows he messed up her name.

No, he didn’t mispronounce it. He … what he did was fuck up the syllables. I’m not telling you her name, cause I don’t want you to know her name, but say for example her name was … Catherine. Instead of saying Catherine, he said Thecarine. Yeah. Like … like The Karen. Uh-huh. Just like that. He did it a few times, too. But then he went back and pronounced it the right way. He caught himself, smiled and started again from the beginning. It was a civil service, so we were out in a jiffy just the same.

And for the honeymoon part, we went for the weekend to this small little town a couple hours west. This nice little bed and breakfast resort complex thing where they give you lots of food and she can get a massage or spa session and he can have a big-ass brandy in this library they have in the main building.

Expensive as hell, sure, but … in theory, I’m only gonna have a few honeymoons at most, during my time here on earth, so … what the hell, spare no expense, right? Live it up, right? Nothing’s too good for the lady who finally figured out how to snag me, right?

All she had to do was get pregnant. Yep, big changes are afoot. Lifechanges, Tuna Can.

Oh, I’m not blushing. It’s just … it’s hot in here. I should … uh … aren’t you hot? I’m gonna open the door, get some cool air in. can’t believe you’re not hot. I’m so hot it looks like I’m blushing even though I’m not, cause why would I be?

I dunno, I guess a little. Maybe it’s just I didn’t think it’d be so weird to tell people I’m married now. It’s one of those things I wouldn’t’ve predicted in a million years. Cause … cause … cause I’m happy. I am. It just seems lilke there’s never a right moment, there’s never a smooth segue, and round here, anyway, people are so up their own asses bout their own business that it seems a bit … intrusive or spotlight-seeking on my part. So it’s you and Jimmy who know. That’s it. That’s the list of people who know that the Special Lady Friend isn’t anymore. Wife-asaurus, nee Special Lady Friend.

Oh, well, yeah, I called my mom. Course I did that. First one I called was my mom. But I hung up like the first three times I tried. Hadn’t even rung a full ring before I hung up. Finally, I went into the bathroom, looked in the mirror, called myself a chicken shit asshole, told myself to quit being such a chicken shit asshole and let the phone ring long enough for her to answer it.

I called again. She did in fact answer and almost as soon as I told her, she kinda choked a bit. All happiness and congratulations and she’s so thrilled for us both but right after that, she said she wished dad was around for a piece of news like this. I said, yeah, me too, mom, me too. Then she went silent and I just let her stay silent.

After a couple seconds, she tried to continue but it wasn’t much use. I could hear the hitch in her voice. You know, the halting break when it’s all you can do to not cry. She asked if she could call me back in a bit. I said sure, but she’d already hung up.

Here's hoping.

I hope this woman cutting my hair right now remembers I hate the clippers. Just stick with the scissors and things won’t get too wonky. No use trying for any kinda fanciness. My head is what it is, at this point. Cowlicks galore. Got one here, one here, one over here and one back there. Hair tufting this way and that. The best anyone can ever do with me is make it so I walk outta here looking like Beaker-Muppet’s older, slouchier, grayer, more hungover, hangdog uncle.

I hope that very attractive twenty-something who sat at nine last night stops calling me ‘Sir.’ It robs me of my ‘enthusiasm’ every time she calls me as ‘Sir.’ She does it every time she comes in (last night was not the first), and each time, I feel the ‘enthusiasm’ waning, if only a bit, and if there’s one thing I need, one thing that’s in short supply round my general vicinity, it’s ‘enthusiasm.’

If that guy who comes in every other night comes in tonight, I really hope he doesn’t beg me to complain to our local alderman about the mayor. I don’t think he realizes that … uh … the local alderman doesn’t like me because I told him I didn’t really give a shit that he’s our local alderman, that being our local alderman didn’t in and of itself merit us giving him whatever he wants whenever he wants it. If he wants that kinda preferential treatment, he needs to spend a helluva lot more money here, and it’d be nice if he saw to it our sidewalk and potholes got fixed. (Besides, what’s the alderman gonna do bout Daley. Daley’s not going anywhere. That guy’s entrenched.)

I hope the kid in her belly decides to poke when I’m feeling her belly. Least fourteen times a day, she emails me or calls me to tell me Pokey’s poking again. But every time I’m there pressing my hand against the belly, Pokey goes shy/silent. It’d be nice for Pokey to poke when I’m within reach. Cause I’m dying to feel it. I think that’d be all right.

It’d be nice if the kid wasn’t afflicted with the two-thirty in the morning frets like I am. Glen too. We got it from the old man. Who got it from his old man, and so on and so forth, back up the family tree. (The only reason his brother, our uncle Pete doesn’t have it anymore is cause he’s … uh … a wee bit senile now.) I hope my kid is spared, cause it’s no fun.

I hope one of three things happens before I get my nose broken. EITHER the Special Lady Friend stops getting crazy-furious when I use the verb ‘waddle’ to describe her walking, so much so that I could swear she’s close to breaking my nose, OR she realizes I’m only kidding when I use the verb ‘waddle’ to describe her walking, OR I stop using the verb ‘waddle’ to describe her walking.

Speaking of waddling, I really hope she likes the big pregnant lady pants I just got her from Target. They were twenty-seven dollars But that’s not why I hope she likes them. I hope she likes them because they’re capris, they’re just what she’s been looking for. (And just what she’s been dragging me all over creation in search of.)

I hope the kid grows up to have a spine before it’s too late. I didn’t get a spine til … uh … later in life. I was over thirty before I stood up for myself. Then I did, and I couldn’t figure out why I hadn’t years earlier. I wondered what I was afraid of.

A follow-up to that is I hope the kid isn’t scared too much. Or lets fear rule his/her life for very long. I’m not arguing in favor of recklessness or immaturity or doing whatever the fuck he/she feels like, never mind the consequences. I am saying that a lot of things I now wish I’d done, I didn’t, out of fear, and there’s more than a few things I missed out on. (Travelling Europe for six months right after college is one. Why didn’t I? Cause I thought the job offer I had from the bank was the only one I’d ever get, so I better take it fore they change their minds.)

I hope the kid grows up to be braver than me. I guess that’s what I’m getting at.

I hope whatever accumulated wisdom I have to impart (which ain’t much, but hey) doesn’t come off as … accumulated wisdom. There’s the pompous, high-handed, bloviating, pontificating tone people sometimes get when they’re granting you the benefits of all their life experience that I'd like to avoid. Even my old man was not immune and there was a guy who wasn’t much for the sound of his own voice.

And speaking of the old man, he was infatuated for years, for years, with what was and was not the perfect meatloaf. He’d subject Glen, mom and I to a dinner of whatever new he was trying on the meatloaf front. If we happened to not be in the mood for meatloaf (because, say, it was the fourth straight night of meatloaf, and a few extra tablespoons of Worcestershire didn’t really count as ‘back to the drawing board,’ so why make all four of us eat something you’re only fiddling around with), and wanted something non-meatloaf for dinner, he’d simply say ‘You don’t like it, find another restaurant.’ And it made me so fucking crazy. Drove me right up the wall. It wasn’t until my late-twenties that I actually got a kick out of hearing him say it. ‘You don’t like it, find another restaurant’ became a bit of sorts. (As did ‘There’s the door,’ ‘Oh, boo-fucking-hoo,’ and ‘No gots.’)

I hope I find something like that, something innocent enough on its surface, but still drives my kid apeshit when I say it over and over and over. I’ll say it over and over and over, knowing damn well it drives the kid bonkers. Hell, half the shit the old man said, he said just to get my goat a bit. He knew how to gimme a little tweak now and then. There is part of me that looks forward to discovering how and why the kid gets angry at me. I am dying to see how that anger manifests itself. (Glen would swear at the old man then take off out the front door before he could get caught. I made fun of the old man til I got grounded.)

Then my kid’ll grow up and (hopefully, if I’ve done it right) he/she won’t mind it so much. Then it’ll become a thing which he/she remembers fondly, and who knows, maybe it’ll become a bit of our very own. The two of us, sharing a wink and a smile, if not a laugh. At least a wink and a smile.

And now that I think about it, now that I’m sitting here thinking about it, I get mad, I get very mad, when I realize my kid comes into the world with one less grandparent. It seems a goddamn shame the kid will only know him second-hand, through us chewing the fat about him, then breaking out what few pictures he allowed us to take of him.

(You know who woulda took my kid to get all the hot dogs and chips that kid cared to eat? The grandpa on the dad’s side, that’s who. A barnstorming tour of stands, wagons and carts all over Cook and parts of Kane, Will and DuPage counties. The far flung corners.)

I just need tofu and a few other things ...

Excuse me. Sorry. Just … pardon … pardon the reach. Need to get at the … yeah, the tofu. Thanks, sorry, uh-huh, no, yeah, no, the extra firm. I come home with a kind that’s less firm than extra firm, all she’s gonna do is send my ass back out to the store and as it is, I’m dog tired. I just wanna make her some food so I can get back to sleep.

Thanks. ‘Preciate it.

No, I was fast asleep. You can tell by the fact that my hair is clearly the hair of a man who was very recently very asleep. See the flings here on the right side here? How the hair flings up like that? That’s how you can tell I was asleep. On my right side. Facing the wall.

Dead asleep until right when I woke up. I heard her rustling about in the kitchen. Got me right outta bed to make sure everything was okay. You know, ever since she told me she was pregnant, I haven’t been able to sleep a wink if she’s not sleeping. If I’m asleep and she’s awake, I wake up. Wake up with a start, cause I’m convinced it’s cause she’s in trouble or pain or something’s wrong with the baby-thing.

Nah, nothing was wrong, nothing’s ever wrong, I just freak out that something always is. I'm just a worrywart. She was merely looking for something to eat and though we’ve a whole kitchen that’s fully stocked, and an entire pantry, it seems as though we didn’t have the things that would exactly precisely hit her spot here at … three in the morning.

Which way’s the rice wine vinegar at. Four? You sure? It’s not aisle five? Cause I thought I checked aisle four already. Oh. Right. Of course. No, no, no, I … I musta spaced right past it. (Right past it.)

What the hell’d they hafta go and rearrange everything for. All the aisles got flip-flopped. I knew where everything was til they went and basically scrambled it all up. Now I don’t even know where the rice wine vinegar is.

And what about the rice pudding. I’d normally get it outta the deli counter cause you just can’t beat Jewel deli counter rice pudding but even the Jewel deli counter has sense enough to not be open at this ungodly hour. Three in the goddamn morning, and now I gotta search high and low for where they keep the rice pudding.

Last time I saw three o’clock in the goddamn morning, I was drunk as a skunk and crawling home. I fell into a construction hole, stumbled right over the pylon sawhorse thing and tumbled right into this small ditch. Then this guy I work with threatened to take a leak all over me, cause I couldn’t get up. I thought this was funny as shit, for some reason, the thought of getting tinkled on by Jason. I laughed and I laughed and I laughed. Right up til he took out his pecker. Then it ceased beinghumorous.

Since then, three o’clock in the morning has been ‘unbeknownst to me.’ But now? Here I am. Shit. This pregnancy business, I tell you.

Oh, you better believe it was a shock. Not like we were … trying, or anything. Just … you know, it just … happened. So yeah, so she told me and so yeah, it was a shock. Since then, all kindsa shocks’ve been headed my way. The shock of hearing its heartbeat on the speaker radio thing. The shock of some nosy know-it-all telling me how much kids’ll cost you fore it’s all said and done. (That was shocking.) The shock of how big her uterus gets.

Well, it’s already big as a cantaloupe! She told me it’s as big as acantaloupe, right now. Smiling, like it’s no big deal to have a uterus so big they compare it to a large melon! I mean, a pear or an apple or an orange? I could grasp the concept of that. That wouldn’t seem so … outlandish, but a cantaloupe? I can’t believe her uterus is that … big.

No, she’s only starting to show, so you can imagine how much bigger her uterus is gonna get. A honeydew? A watermelon? A beach ball? The sky’s the limit, it seems. She’s only gonna get more pregnant.

Wanna know what the pregnant woman in my life is having for her late night snack? (Of course you do, why wouldn’t you.) Here it is, here you go, catch a load of this.

Cucumbers and carrots in rice wine vinegar. Grilled tofu (extra firm, the firmest I can find) that I grill for a few minutes on both sides. Cheese, quince, rosemary crackers. Steamed broccoli with parmesan. Fritos with sour cream. Frosted chocolate cake with rice pudding on the side. Ice cream. (Moose tracks if I can get it. If not, mint chocolate chip or strawberry cheesecake or just plain old sandwiches.)

I know. I know I know I know. But what’m I gonna say. ‘No’? I should say ‘No’ to her when she’s freaking out for food? Good luck with that. That'd be my dying word. All I hafta get is the rice wine vinegar and the rice pudding and the ice cream and the Fritos then I can feed her and put her to bed and hopefully get some sleep myself.

No, we had Fritos, we always have Fritos, but she ate the last of ‘em right before she passed out asleep. Nine fifteen. And I told her. She had Frito crumbs and grease all over her face, was lifting the bag up to her head to get every last bit and I told her: We don’t have anymore Fritos, you know, so … so when they’re gone, they’re gone, so …

Eh, of course she ate ‘em anyway. It’s difficult to stop eating Fritos once you start. I can’t begrudge her that cause I often do the same damn thing and I’m not even pregnant. Just I sometimes forget to eat dinner then I’m too hungry and lazy to cook anything so I just head for the snack cupboard. So I don’t mind getting Fritos. Long as I get some fore she polishes ‘em off.