MetroDad

Caveat Emptor!

I'm going to take a brief hiatus from writing about parenthood to discuss my absolute love of E-Bay. Because, truth be told, there are very few things I love as much as E-Bay. Here are some brief thoughts on my love for E-Bay...

(1) The absolute weirdness and individuality of it all is just awesome. Truly, more than anything, E-Bay really proves Locke's Theory of Individuality. No matter how weird you think you are, there's always someone out there weirder than you. After all, one man's toe nail clippings are another man's fortune.

(2) I've never been judgmental about the items sold on E-Bay. As long as it's legal, who are we to interfere in commercial transactions between two consenting adults? You want to auction off the name of your baby? Tattoo your forehead? Sell your virginity? Go right ahead, my friends. This is America. Who am I to cast judgment? After all, I live in a city that was bought for $24 in glass beads.

(3) The Virgin Mary on a Grilled Cheese Sandwich! This cracked me up. I thought it was so funny that I actually bid on it. I could not believe my eyes when it ended up going for over $28,000. Other classic E-Bay auctions? Ghost in a jar, Air guitar, Brett Favre's house and an Ex-wife's wedding dress (shown being worn by the jilted husband).

(4) My early fascination with E-Bay led me to become a shareholder in the company. Unfortunately, my investment wasn't large enough for me to retire early, sit on a beach, drink martinis and discuss sports all day with my foodtaster. Nor was it enough for me to pay for the Peanut's college tuition...unless she wants to go to a state school in Guam.

Anyway, I started thinking about my love for E-bay tonight because the BossLady has been selling quite a few items there lately. Every since the Peanut was born, we've been avid E-Bay users. We buy virtually everything for the Peanut off E-bay...toys, books, clothes, everything! For any parents-to-be out there, I highly recommend it.

But tonight, I wasn't searching E-Bay for anything specific. I was just browsing randomly around the site and happened to find a few items that only reaffirmed my love for E-Bay, such as...

The original statue from the movie "Rocky". (How great would it be to place this in your backyard, run laps around it every morning and then swallow a dozen raw eggs?)

A Vampire Killing Kit. (As some of you may know, there are a lot of vampires in New York. You can never be too well-prepared)

Your very own Redneck family. (Growing up in New York, I've always had an anthropological fascination with Rednecks. What's with the fucked-up teeth? Why the banjo? Does possum taste good?)

Santa Claus' Beard Hairs. (Dude, it's Santa!)

And according to this article, starting on Friday, E-Bay will be having an auction to buy a summer romance with Jennifer Aniston. Having never really liked "Friends," I couldn't really care less. But I am interested in buying that Rocky statue. I can't stop thinking about it. It would look great in my apartment. And talk about a conversation starter! Anyone want to lend me a million bucks?

What a cute dog you have!

Before the Peanut was born, I sat up here very haughtily on my high horse and silently castigated the parents that I would see on the streets.  From my golden perch made of moral rectitude, I would point out all their many flaws and declare them as examples of the kind of parent that I would never become.  Silently, I would witness their behavior and cast judgment on their erroneous actions.

I think you know I'm kidding.  I think you also know that I'm hardly one to be judgmental.  I've always thought people were better off minding their own business.  Unfortunately, it's sad how rarely this occurs.  Especially when it comes to parenting, I've always believed that there are many "correct" ways to raise a child.  And if we're to believe that our children will become the sum total of their experiences, than I tend to also think we're not going to fuck them up too bad with our individual and multi-varied approaches.   

But I will admit that one thing that always got me semi-riled up was seeing kids with leashes on them.  Now don't get me wrong.  You want to put handcuffs on your girlfriend or a dog collar on your husband, you go right ahead.  This is America, people.  Land of the free and home of the brave.  But leashes on kids?  Man, I always thought that was unduly obdurate behavior.  The entire concept just seems so Abu Ghraib-ish.

Don't get me wrong. I can see the chain of events and dialectic reasoning that could lead one to believe that it's perfectly logical and acceptable to leash ones kid.  You see, my little 9-month old daughter, the Peanut, has proved to be an amazingly fast crawler.  Extraordinary, considering the fact that she just learned how to crawl a few weeks ago.  Now?  Not only can she crawl but she can stand herself up and, with the help of furniture, can walk around the living room.  We're only slightly exaggerating when we say that we're terrified that she's going to be able to walk by herself within the next few weeks. But my point is that, right now, she's like a little kitten on steroids.  Turn your back for a second...and she's gone!  The adjustment has been tough for me and the BossLady. 

A few days ago, the Peanut was by my side as I was washing some of her bottles in the sink.  I look up a second later, only to see her putting dog food in her mouth and splashing the water from our dog's water bowl. 

Yesterday, I put her on the floor to go get her bib.  I think I turned my back on her for literally 10 seconds.  Next thing I know, she's crawled about 20 feet over to the living room and pulled down a stack of DVDs. 

So yeah.  On the one hand, I could probably child-proof my entire existence.  Or, on the other hand, I could just put a leash on her.  But I'm afraid that this type of reasoning could lead too far.  What's next?  Crate-training?  Electronic collars?  Halters?  Exercise pens?  Muzzles?  Choker chains?

We live in a dangerous world, my friends.  Kids run into traffic, get abducted or fall down wells every day.  So I understand and empathize with any parent's concerns in regard to his/her child's safety.  If anything, ensuring our child's safety and well-being should be any parent's paramount concern.  But, in MY opinion, leashing my kid just doesn't feel right.  It feels cruel and barbaric.  And I don't like the implications of it.  So for now, if I need to employ extreme diligence and concentration in order to keep a constant eye on my daughter, that's what I'm going to do.

But, having been a father for only 9 months, I have yet to experience the stress of chasing after a 4-year old Tasmanian devil.  So who knows?  In a few years, it wouldn't be beyond the realm of my imagination to see me at Prada, inquiring whether they make child leashes in black suede.  As always, when it comes to parenting, I reserve the right to change my mind at any given moment.

But I'm curious, internet.  What do you think?  Am I being naive in thinking that leashing a kid is somewhat bizarre behavior?  Will I change my mind in a few years?  Do you leash your kids?  How do the kids feel about them?  Does the dog get confused?  Let's hear it, folks.  We haven't had a good old-fashioned, hash-it-out melee since that whole spanking debate.  Let's bring it on.

Ch-Check It Out

The Supreme Mack Daddy of the Daddy blogs, Jay Allen of Zero Boss has apparently been getting crushed at his job working for the Evil Empire. So in a fit of what I would imagine to be job-related stress and massive sleep deprivation, Jay asked me whether I would kindly guest blog on his site for the day. Now, I'm not entirely sure what my exact reply was but I believe it was something to the effect of "Fuck yeah!"

See, on the one hand, my humble little site doesn't get nearly as much traffic as Jay's does so I figured it'd be nice to have a louder microphone on a bigger stage. But also, somewhere in the back of my devious mind, it felt like my parents were going out of town for the weekend and they were leaving me the keys to the car and the liquor cabinet.

The whole guest blogging thing feels so "Risky Business" to me. I'm honored that Jay has entrusted me with his site. And I'm going to try hard to leave it in the same condition it was before I got there. But metaphorically speaking, I hope he doesn't notice the crack in the Steuben egg. I guess sometimes, you've just got to say "what the fuck!"

Anyway, come by and visit me at Zero Boss. And leave a comment over there so I don't feel like I've done irreparable damage to Jay's site.

2 Beers, a Vodka Martini & some Breast Milk, Please

You know, this whole baby-raising thing can get pretty fucking confusing. If you start listening to all the voices giving you advice, it's only a matter of time before all the voices start bouncing around in your head and you start feeling like the Son of Sam.

I bring this up because apparently the BossLady and I have completely screwed up the Peanut's natural progression to solid food. We were so reliant on breast milk and formula that we kind of spaced out on the whole introduction to alternative forms of nutrition. Now, we're convinced that the Peanut is only going to drink formula for the rest of her life. I picture her in college getting strange looks from her dorm mates as she stocks her little mini-fridge with Costco-sized containers of Similac.

For the first 4 months of her life, our little girl was hooked on breast milk (as was I). It was titty juice all day, all night and all the time. But gradually we started having the Peanut get used to formula. Every once in awhile, we'd give her some baby cereal or a jar of organic baby food. But we were pretty inconsistent and often a week would go by when she'd consume nothing but formula.

So imagine our surprise when we were browsing through our massive library of baby books the other day. Dr. Spock says infants can have fruit and juice as early as 4 months old. Dr. Sears says certain solid foods should certainly be introduced by the age of 6 months. Even our own personal pediatrician, the famed Dr. Michel Cohen, says that we can feed the Peanut virtually anything (except dairy) as early as 6 months.

Well, the Peanut is now 9 months old. So to make up for lost time, we spent the past week letting her enjoy everything that her parents ate. Our doc suggested that we feed the Peanut everything we were eating. This would not only make our life easier in the future but also it would ensure that we wouldn't have to prepare two sets of meals all the time. So we did. And well, tickle me Emeril! Turns out my daughter eats everything! Just in the past three days alone, we've fed her kalamata olives, potato gnocchi, steak, cayenne-peppered corn, crab meat, apple strudel, miso-crusted black cod, croissants, steamed pork dumplings and sesame bread. The only thing she didn't like? Blueberries.

As a self-confessed "foodie", I couldn't be happier. It's like getting a positive result from a paternity test (she's MY daughter, world! You hear that?) Food is one of my many passions and I spend an inordinate amount of time, energy and resources devoted to it. To think that my daughter and I already have a shared passion almost brings tears to my eyes. Not really. But you know what I'm talking about.

Another funny aspect of feeding the Peanut all this adult food? Seeing my lovely wife's heart swell with pride as she proudly announced that our daughter laid her very first turd the other day. We were going to photograph it so we could embarass her during her teenage years but we decided against it. Instead, we chose to stick the turd in the freezer until it petrifies. That way, the Peanut will really be able to appreciate it many years from now.

I'm kidding, people. What kind of sick fuck do you think I am? Wait, don't answer that. Just do me a favor and pass me a cold bottle of breast milk, will ya?

'Fess up!

When the BossLady and I started dating, we got into a ridiculous debate about something or other. As usual, neither one of us was willing to yield. And so in the heat of the argument, I casually mentioned how much smarter I was than her. To her credit, the BossLady turned to me and said, "Oh yeah, wiseguy? What'd you get on your SATs?" Immediately, my devious mind started thinking that she wouldn't pull that particular question out of the hat unless she had scored really well. And even though I did fairly well on my SATs, I figured that I'd have to do a little grade inflation in order to retain some credibiliy in the current debate. So I blabbered back "1400." Unfortunately, the plan backfired due to the fact that my lovely wife actually scored 1450 on her SATs. Ever since then, whenever we've gotten into an argument, she'll just look me in the eye and say, "1450." Pretty much shuts me up every time.

Last week, in an e-mail that I sent to someone else but c.c.'ed the BossLady on, I wrote that I scored a 1340 on my SATs. I'd lost track of my own little white lie and I got completely busted. It's just one more reason that I don't lie. My memory's not good enough to keep track of anything, much less imaginary stories. Much better to always go with the truth.

Anyway, the experience got me thinking. Not about lying to one's spouse (which I'm obviously adamantly against). But it got me thinking about things that our spouses might not know about us. I'm not talking about the deep, dark secrets of one's past. I'm talking about the little private parts of the world that you carve out for yourself and that nobody else knows about. It could be things that you do when nobody else is looking. Or things you think about that nobody else knows. It could be anything!

So that being said, I've decided that, in the interests of full disclosure, I'm going to reveal a few secrets that I've been keeping from the BossLady (up until now). So here you go, honey. Here are a few things about me that you might not have known...

-The other day, the Peanut farted on my hand while I was holding her. So I put her hand near my butt and farted back on her. We both thought it was pretty funny and had a good laugh together. For some reason, I didn't think you'd find it as funny as we did.

-Many moons ago (back in the pre-child days), I got high with our dog. That's right, honey. I'm not proud of admitting this but I actually smoked pot with our dog. We both got the munchies, ate a whole bag of peanuts together and watched a baseball game. Remember, honey? You walked him the next morning and his poop looked like a giant Babe Ruth bar.

-I've always had a little thing for Kate Winslet, Zhang Ziyi, Diane Sawyer, Michelle Yeoh, and Uma Thurman. I don't feel bad about this because your obsession with Colin Firth far outweighs any of my secret crushes. Seriously, honey. Do we really need to watch the 5-hour BBC version of "Pride and Prejudice" every six months? Mistahhh Daahhhcy!

-As you know, I'm a morning pooper. As you also know, the Peanut is a non-stop crawling machine who needs to be watched on a constant basis. Sometimes when it's my turn to get her in the morning, these two aforementioned facts have collided. To make a long story short, there have been more than a few occasions where I've sat her on my lap while I'm "dropping the kids off at the pool."

-Since you tend to fall asleep several hours before me every night, I often stay up late to read, do some work or write an entry for the blog. But most of the time? I pour myself a glass of scotch and watch ESPN's Sportscenter. This you knew about me. What you didn't know? Sometimes before I go to bed, I set the channel to CNN so when you wake up in the morning and turn the TV on to check the weather, it looks like I stayed up late watching Lou Dobbs. This way I hope you don't think I'm as much of a sports nut as I actually am.

-I know we already have 5 digital cameras, 4 ipods, and a video camera. Don't kill me, honey. But I bought another new gadget. It's being shipped now and we'll get it next week. I know. I have a problem. But it could be worse! I could be spending our retirement money on crystal meth, hookers and gambling, right? Look at the bright side!

So that's all I can think of for now, honey. I'm sure my phone will be ringing as soon as you read this post. But really, I think my little secrets are pretty innocuos, don't you? Fairly harmless. I don't have a secret life. That's not to say that I'm an angel. It's just that you already know the true depths of my depravity. And you still love me for it. But secrets? Not much. This is pretty much the sum of all my secrets. What about you? Anything you want to get off your chest? We'll speak later.

As for the rest of you? Talk to me, people. Spill it. If not here, then where? An inquiring mind wants to know. What doesn't your spouse know about you? C'mon and confess. You'll feel better. If your spouse reads this blog, post anonymously. But really, what are the things (major or minor) that your spouse doesn't know about you? The time you posed nude in college for beer money? The time you went skinny dipping with the drummer from Kajigoogoo back in '82? Your secret fetish of wearing women's panties? Doesn't have to be anything sordid, scandalous or depraved. Just come clean.

Because here at MetroDad, absolution is available 24 hours/day. Except on Sundays. So 'fess up!

MetroDad's gonna do what MetroDad's gotta do

As a life-long baseball fan, one of the things I've always loved about the game was the character of the players.  Actually, I should probably rephrase that. It's not that baseball players have shown a lot of character over the years, it's just that baseball has produced some of the greatest characters known to mankind.  And of all the people who have played this illustrious game, there's probably nobody out there who has been as consistently entertaining as Rickey Henderson. 

Aside from the fact that he's been known to talk to his bats and ask them which one feels like they've got a hit in them that day, Rickey has also been famous for always referring to himself in the third-person.  He always has.  And probably always will.  Here are some classic Rickey stories:

Whereas most ballplayers have professional agents handling their business, Ricky liked to make calls on his own.  He once left the following message on Padres General Manager Kevin Tower's machine when he was out of work:  "Dude!  This is Rickey representing Rickey!  Dude, you need an outfielder.  Rickey thinks you need to sign Rickey!"

After hitting a 2-run pinch-hit homer, Rickey ran around the bases and into the clubhouse, leaving the stadium in the 8th inning of a 14-7 Padres victory over the Mets.  When asked why he left the stadium before the game was over, he said, "Rickey had to get to this Chinese restaurant.  They closed at midnight.  Best Chinese food Rickey ever had."

And finally, before every game, Rickey stands in front of a mirror taking practice swings.  Naked!  After each swing, he says, "Rickey's the best!  Rickey's the best!  Rickey's the best!"

I started thinking about Rickey Henderson because I actually found myself checking my own blog today.  Who the fuck checks their own blog?  And although I knew I hadn't written anything new in almost two weeks, there was a small part of me that was thinking there would be a new post up there.  Ridiculous, isn't it?  So I've decided that I've got to be more consistent with my posts.  Otherwise, you'll all find someone smarter, richer or thinner than me.  Wait, I'm sorry.  That's just my insecurity speaking. 

But seriously...I have ideas for posts all the time.  It's just that I seem to file those ideas in the part of my cerebral cortex that's most affected by short-term memory loss.  Actually, it's not the cerebral cortex, is it?  I think it's either the hippo campus or the thalamus.  Anyway, as you can see, aside from having a crappy memory, I get distracted pretty easily as well.  Blame it on the 80's.  Nevertheless, I promise to post more.  So come back again soon. 

Because while you won't see me swinging a bat naked in front of the mirror, MetroDad's gonna do what MetroDad's gotta do. 

A Midsummer Night's Dream

So...it's the 4th of July weekend. The time of year when families celebrate our nation's independence by packing up their cars or heading to the airport for a much-needed vacation. Here in Manhattan, people seem to be already leaving in droves. Everyone's off to visit relatives, to sit on a beach or to lounge by a pool.

But Clan MetroDad doesn't really play like that. Nope, we will be staying here in the urban jungle for the holiday weekend. We did explore ideas about taking the Peanut to Puerto Rico. Or maybe spending a few days up at beautiful Mt. Tremblant. In the end, we decided that none of it was worth the hassle.

But the BossLady and I are in desperate need of some relaxation. We've been running in circles for the past few weeks and feel as if we haven't had a moment to ourselves in ages. So in lieu of travelling anywhere, we've decided that we're going to spend 24 hours being lazy-ass tourists in our own city. By that, I mean that we've hired a nanny to take care of the Peanut for 24 hours. She's going to stay in our apartment and spend the night with our little girl. Meanwhile, BossLady and I will be comfortably ensconced in a nice hotel room uptown, overlooking Central Park and feeding each other grapes.

At first, we thought that we should make a big night out of it. Go to a romantic dinner. Catch a Broadway show. But we decided that we'd end up running ourselves ragged. So like I said, we're going to be lazy-ass tourists. Seriously lazy. We're going to check into the hotel room after we put the Peanut to bed, order some room service and maybe catch a late showing of Batman Begins. And more than anything else? We're going to sleep. Oh Lord, we're going to sleep. I'm talking the sleep of the dead. We've requested a late check-out and don't plan on waking up until the maid comes to clean the room. Even then, we might not leave!

Tomorrow afternoon, we'll head back downtown to be with our little one. But for the rest of the weekend, we don't have much more planned than that. Maybe see some family on Sunday. Maybe go for some long walks along the river. Maybe head out to a museum. Basically, the weekend's game plan is to have no game plan. Because right now? That's the most relaxing weekend that the BossLady and I can envision.

What about the rest of you, America? What's your plan for the long weekend? Hot dogs, baseball, apple pie and mom? A land-locked urbanite wants to know.