College Prep

Before I get in to the story I need to give a little background to the older demographic.  Those of us in our 40s grew up with a set of drinking games that apparently no longer exist (well, outside of retirement homes I guess).  We played the good old games like quarters, Mexican, Bullshit, that crazy counting game, etc.  I never really considered it, but as each successive generation feels an obligation to break from the past in terms of clothing, music, etc., the same is apparently also true for drinking games.

Today's drinking games are a touch more active.  Which I think it great!  Nothing more entertaining than active drunks!  A few I've become familiar with (by hanging our with the current crop of college students) are baseball, beer pong, and flip cup.  They're mostly team games, and involve tossing ping-pong balls into cups of beer, drinking the beer, and (optionally) flipping the cups so they land upside down.  I've spent a couple good nights observing these next-generation games at recent parties at the college boy's house.  Boatloads of fun!

OK.  So the stage is set.

Denis got invited to a sleepover party at the house of one of his 6th grade classmates.  The boy's name is Joey, and he's the youngest of 3 (or 4) brothers.  I think the oldest brother is in college and there's 1 or 2 in HS.  Denis was very happy to be invited, as he and Joey aren't always the best of friends.

I dropped him off around 6 on a Saturday night.  I stayed up fairly late just in case there was a phone call, but none ever came.  So it appeared he had a good time.  I picked him up the following morning after church.  Denis was a wreck.  According to him they had stayed up all night, not falling asleep until about 7am.  And they got up at 10.  Rough night!

I asked him what they did.  In true pre-teen fashion he gave me a couple grunted answers.  Watched movies.  Played video games.  That didn't last us the whole ride home, so I pressed a bit,  What else did you do?  Anything else that was fun?

Oh yeah, he said, brightening up: we played marshmallow pong!!  Now of course I wasn't familiar with the game, so I asked him to describe it.  And as he did the most curious thing happened.  It all seemed so familiar.  The game is played on a ping-pong table.  You pour a bit of soda into several cups and arrange them on your end of the table while your opponents do the same on their side.  Then you take turns tossing marshmallows into the cups; and when one goes in the opponent has to drink the soda in the cup.

Is this sounding slightly familiar to anyone?  If not, go back and re-read the second paragraph.  Yup.  They were practicing kiddie-version drinking games!!  Isn't that great?  You send the boy off to a sleepover and he comes back with some real life skills.  I was so proud.  But I wasn't nearly as proud as I was happy.  That I picked him up instead of Mimi.  She would have exploded!

So here's the dilemma.  He says he was good at it.  Does that mean I should bring him to Bobby's next party?  Tough call...

Not a white person

I had just picked Denis up from his piano lesson and was taking him to his VB match.  He was sitting in the front seat next to me.  It was a pretty nice day, and he was wearing shorts.  As I looked over I noticed that his legs looked really dry.  Naturally, being the dad, I just can't let it go.

So I look over and say to him "Damn!  Your legs look really dry!"  OK, so maybe I said 'Darn.'  Generally a volley like this is met with resistance.  This time it was more like defeat.  The essence of the response I got back was resignation.  'Yeah, they're always dry."  Those of you who have kids will recognize this as a strategy to give up in the face of inevitability.  Nothing I can do about it pops!  Just going to have to live with them being dry.

Naturally I don't buy that.  So I ask him if he put lotion on them after his shower in the morning.  And of course the answer is no.  Too rushed in the morning.  This brings me into full dad mode - well of course they're going to be dry if you don't put lotion on them!

Silence follows.  He's working on perfecting the surly teen thing, and this is a great time to practice.  Eventually he pipes in with a question: "Why don't white people's legs get dry?"  At first I thought he had simply mis-worded the question.  He of course wanted to know why white people's legs got so dry all the time.  I was all prepared to deliver and answer.  But then it hit me.  He did word the question correctly - he just doesn't consider himself to be White!

I mean it really hit me.  I damn near missed my next shift.  He doesn't consider himself to be white.  And why should he - he's 1/2 White 1/2 Asian.  So he's really neither.  But he's light skinned and has brown hair, and I guess unconsciously I've always thought of him as white.  But he's not.  At least he's not in his mind.  Wild!

Once I recovered we talked about my friend Chris.  Chris is black, and during the winters in Wisconsin would always complain about his legs being ashy.  And that every race gets dry skin, but the darker your skin tone the more obvious it is.

So I think I recovered OK.  But the whole time I'm thinking: Denis isn't White!  Who knew?

Those of you who know the family history know that I am not a fan of children skipping grades.  I just don't see the benefit.  Sure, they get to college a year or two faster, but it doesn't make them smarter.  And in many cases they're not mature enough to handle the environment and suffer as a result.  I offer by way of example my oldest brother (skipped 2 grades) and oldest sister (skipped one grade).  After the experiences with those two my parents did not allow the rest of us to skip.  Thank God!

I have passed this philosophy into my parenting.  I do not try to teach my kids topics ahead of when they learn them in class.  If I did, when the class learned the topic they'd be bored.  And would likely misbehave and get into trouble.  So again; what's the point?

But try as I might to hold them back, somehow the slippery buggers get away from me.  It appears that this has just happened with Seamus.

It wasn't malicious or spiteful learning (is there such a thing?)  He just happened to be in a room when the older kids were doing some math exercises.  And he couldn't help but overhear what they were doing.  This is how he learned to add.  Mandy was working with Tara, drilling her on basic addition.  She's in 2nd grade, so this is what she should be learning.  It wasn't sticking right away, so they went over it several times.  Think of Tara as Teflon when it comes to math and Seamus as glue.  Gorilla glue.

Now Seamus is in kindergarten.  I don't think they're even talking about basic addition.  It's more numbers, number line etc.  The fact that he picked up addition wasn't a big concern as he would get that instruction soon enough.  But it's gone just a bit beyond that.

Mandy came home today and announced that she was quizzing Seamus on addition facts in the van.  OK.  How'd he do?  Well, she was impressed that he could do the problems from his seat in the van.  No numbers in front of him, it was all in his head.  Again I discounted it, as I figured he had memorized the single number addition chart.

No, Mandy says.  It wasn't single number addition.  "Really?"  I asked?  "He's on double-digit addition already?  Wow.  That is advanced for kindergarten."  No again.  

He's doing triple digit addition.  In his head.  And getting them right.  As a kindergartener.

Holy cow!  Mimi can't do that!  I am just going to get myself mentally prepared now for behavioral problems in the next few years.  Like there wouldn't have been enough of those regardless.

Good with the bad I suppose.

Fun with Facial Hair

I am lazy over the Winter Holidays.  Well actually I'm lazy all of the time.  But I really go all out (if that can be said about laziness - it's sounds too active but you get the idea) over Christmas.  One of my lazy rituals is that I stop shaving.  I shower and all.  I'm clean.  I just don't shave,

When the holidays are over and it's time to be moderately presentable and go back to work I do try to tidy the facial hair up a bit.  I trim it here and there.  But it's hard for my to jump back in to daily shaving, so I keep a 'beard' for a while.

I use quotes because anyone who has seen the sparsely populated follicles across my face will tell you I'm simply not capable of growing a true beard.  But I let the hair grow anyway and hope that someday it will fill in.  It hasn't yet, but I've only been doing this 20 years now.  One must show some patience.

After it's grown as much as it's going to I try to have a little fun with it by removing it in stages.  The sideburns generally go first as they are just awful.  They never fill in and it looks like I started to shave on each side and gave up after one stroke.  So to save us all a little embarrassment I take that off early.

I'll lose a bit of the excess off the neck next.  I keep just enough so I can continue to get by with an electric razor every couple of days, but otherwise trim it back a bit as it generally looks pretty bad too.

The next stage is the goatee.  I keep everything about moustache-wide down through the chin and just a bit underneath.  This - well, in my humble opinion (which I should point out is not shared by my wife) - actually looks decent.  So I stick at this stage for a few weeks.  

This year when I made it to the goatee stage I announced it to the world via my FaceBook status.  Really have to learn to be more careful about that.  I phrased it as "Denis touched razor to cheek for the first time in 5 weeks. Smooooth! [And no cuts]."

Of course my friends just couldn't let that one go without comment (and let's be honest.  I phrased it in exactly that way so as to generate some comments.  I do try to entertain).  What I didn't expect is that the first comment would come from my business partner in Geneva.  That's cool, because Andy's a good guy.  But what worried me was how little it takes for some of my VB friends to get rolling.  Here's how the exchange went:

Andy - I dearly hope you're talking about your face.

Jonesy (from VB) - I don't know you Andy, but I like the way you think! I always pictured Denis pretty much hairless anyway

Andy again - Hi David. Who'd have thought the McGrath's hairy arse would become a topic for international debate? I must admit I haven't given his naked body as much thought as you clearly have, but if in your head he's nice and smooth, then who am I to disagree?

Luckily (very luckily!) they found new posts to respond to and let it lie there.  That's a combination I don't want to encourage too much!

Over the weekend I decided it was time to trim it back again.  I had never done the "connected Fu Manchu" before.  Essentially a moustache, then straight down on the sides, to connecting underneath by a thin patch.  I thought it would look kinda cool.

I was wrong!  Oh Lord it looked horrible.  So after trimming out the middle I quickly lost the under-chin connection.  It looked like a training bra for an Amish beard.  That had to go.  But after it went I noticed that the downspouts of the remaining Fu were terribly uneven.  And in attempting to drive some equality I ended up killing them altogether.  

So now I have a moustache.

I did all this while everyone else was at the boy's BB games.  So they had a nice surprise waiting for them when they got home.  Liam was first.  "Ewww"  quickly followed by "Yuck" was the verdict.  No surprise there.  But the question that followed did catch me off guard.  After looking it over and deciding that yes, he in fact didn't like it at all, Liam looked at me with a puzzle on his face.  "Dad" he asked "when did you grow the moustache?"

When did I grow it?  Now that's an odd question given the fact that I'd been sporting a goatee for 3 weeks.  Near as I can tell he got used to the goatee - that was just how dad looked.  And in his mind it was just one thing.  All together.  And that was gone.  So clearly in the span of 2 hours I had shaved off the goatee and grown a new moustache!

How's that for hormones?

Looking back I'm really glad it doesn't work that way - I'd be shaving every hour!

No pictures this time, maybe next year!

Basketball!

It's Winter.  That brings a lot of indoor time with it.  But in the last couple years the kids have decided another sport was in order so they're all playing basketball.  ALL of them.  Even 6-year-old Seamus!

I think Tara is playing too.  She keeps telling me she's on a team.  But I've yet to take her to a practice or a game yet.  So I'm not certain what the deal is there.  This is the kind of attention you get in a 4-child household.  You want undivided attention then go be an only child somewhere!

Anyway.  Basketball.  Both Denis and Liam play a brand of BB that would at least be recognizable.  They dribble, pass, shoot, etc.  Sure they take free throws from a spot a foot or more closer to the basket, but that's about it.  Essentially the same game you see on TV.

For Seamus?  Well.  What he plays is about as close to basketball as throwing a tennis ball around the community pool is close to water polo.  In other words not so close at all.  First of all, dribbling is clearly optional.  Some kids try to give it an effort - usually with two hands at a time - and that's not so bad.  But other kids forget it completely.  They just pick the ball up and run!  Secondly; the ball.  It's about the size of a decent melon.  And about the same color come to think of it!  It's small enough that your average 5th grader could palm it.  What else?  Lesse, Thirdly there's the defense.  You're familiar with a "3 second" violation?  When the offense camps out under the basket for too long?  When in the bizarro world of Kindergarten BB the defense is required to camp out!  They can't come outside the box to defend at all.  So you end up with 5 kids all acting like chained up junkyard dogs.  If any kid is crazy enough to venture near the box with the ball they jump at him gnashing their teeth as he/she stops just outside their reach.  Oh, and finally the basket is lowered 2 feet to 8 feet.

So in other words it's about an much entertainment as anyone could possibly stand at 9am on Saturday morning.  I go to the game tired and grumpy and leave with a huge grin on my face.

Seamus joined the team late.  They were already halfway through their season when I relented and let him join.  I'm not really a fan of organized sports at that age, but after a month of snow anything that gets him out of the house and lets him run around and burn off steam is a good thing!  So he's never played before, and the team is already fully formed.  No worries according to the coach.  He'll fit right in.

I picked him up after the first practice, and the coach happily announced to me that (of the 10 players they had) Seamus was one of the top 4!  This was a little bit of a surprise to me.  I know he's a mean soccer player, but for his first practice that is pretty impressive.  Coach went on to tell me that he made this assessment by watching him shoot.  Until Seamus arrived they only had 3 kids who could get the ball all the way up to the rim.  And Seamus can do that just fine.  So Voila!  He's in the top 4!

This last weekend everyone had games.  Mimi and I split duties.  I took Seamus to the early game, and she took Liam and Denis to the later ones (so I could stay home and work on taxes - yay).

It was a banner weekend for the McGrath boys.  Seamus' team (though they don't keep score) won handily, and Seamus scored his first ever basket!  Liam's team lost a close battle, 24-22, but Liam scored as well.  He probably scores in 1/3 of the games.  So that's pretty cool.  Denis' team won easily also, and while Denis very rarely scores (gets that from Dad!) he picked up a point in this one!  There was much rejoicing!  Next weekend will bring new excitement to be sure, but for now I'm just going to enjoy one weekend of success for all my boys!

Where am I?

I am convinced that sometimes the kids just forget which environment they are in and as a result slip up.  Liam in particular is bad with this.  He'll regularly come up with a comment at the dinner table that is well suited for his 4th grade classmates on the playground (as they try to impress each other with how rude they can be).  So I just remind him where he is and who he's speaking to and we get back on track.

I don't know if I'm pleased or sad, but it appears this phenomena bleeds over into school as well.  Liam had an assignment to write a letter to Santa.  The front is beautiful.  Standard cute kid writing to the big guy.  But when he turned the page over he clearly lost his focus and forgot where he was.

He starts by asking for 3 presents.  And that's not bad - I think every kid puts that in.  But I'd hazard a guess that most kids don’t put in the next part.  And I quote:

"If you don't, I'll show the president my picture of you drunk, standing on Rudolph, with a bottle of beer on your head!  This is serious!"

To her credit, the teach very nicely circled that part in red and wrote "Threats are no part of a friendly letter."

No shit!  No punishment for this one, but a lot of disappointed head shaking.

Patience

One of the things that's always confounded me about the kids is their level of patience.  Specifically their incredibly varied levels of patience.  In some situations if you tell them that something won't take place for 25 minutes they'll act like it's the end of the world - they can never possibly wait that long.

And then of course by the time they're done whining about it the time is up.

But on the other hand they can perform tasks that could make a piece-work factory floor guy go mad with the repetitions.  Like when Denis was maybe 3 and he 'rode' his tricycle up the driveway.  He wouldn't get off the bike and walk it up.  He wanted to stay in the seat.  And so he reached his little legs forward, pulled the bike up 6 inches, lifted up to pull forward again and lost 4 of the 6 he gained, and then did it again.  Must have taken him 45 minutes to make it 30 yards.  But it didn't bother him one bit.  It drove me crazy to watch him, but he didn't seem to mind at all.

Liam had one of these events over the summer.  The larger McGrath clan went up to Michigan Adventure amusement park for a day.  Everyone had a great time.  In the middle of a hot afternoon I gave Liam a 20oz. water bottle and asked him to fill it up.  This was a standard single-use screw top water bottle: Absopure, Poland Springs, something like that.  Well he runs off with the bottle to refill it.

There's a lot going on so I don't even realize how long he's been gone until he comes back with the bottle filled up.  It must have taken him 30 minutes, and the fountain is all of 1 minute away from our spot.  I asked him what he'd been doing and he answered that he had been filling up the bottle.  And sure enough, the bottle was full.  OK, whatever.  We're on vacation and I'm in no mood to start a fight.  We drink the water pretty quickly (much faster than it took to fill it up!) and this time I decide that I'll fill it up.

So I walk off to the fountain and immediately run into problems.  The shape of the bottle and the curve of the fountain are clearly incompatible.  I can cram the neck of the bottle on it, but can only get it to fill about 20% that way.  I look around for another fountain - there isn't one.  I look for a spigot or some other source of water - none to be found.  Now I'm really confused.  How did Liam fill it up?  I drank my fill from the fountain and returned with a mostly-empty bottle of water for the family.

When I got back I tracked down Liam.  I asked him where he filled up the bottle.  And of course he points to the fountain I've just come from.  So then I ask him - Well how is it that you were able to fill it up, it doesn't fit?  Oh, he says, I noticed it wouldn't fit right away, so I used the cap.  What do you mean, I say, you put the cap into the stream of water to shoot it into the bottle?  No, he replies, I'd just fill the cap with water and pour it into the bottle.

I'm sure my brain simply didn't comprehend what he was saying the first time he said it.  It was too outrageous.  When I finally understood I was no less astounded.  The cap must hold 1/4 oz. or less.  He likely never filled it completely.  And every time he poured I'm sure he spilled some.  It must have taken him filling the cap 150-200 times to get the water bottle full.  And yet that's what he did.  While at an amusement park full of fun rides.  With no complaint and no bragging.  He in fact didn't even seem to think anything about it.  I asked for it to be filled, this was the only way to fill it, and so he filled it up.

150 thimble-sized caps worth.  Amazing.

What I want to know is where is that patience when it's time for piano lessons?

Not Reading

Tim and Kathy were over with Declan last night. Kathy was reading to Tara (good luck coming to our house and not getting caught by Tara for at least one book!) She was reading a Dora story. And of course they always sprinkle a little Spanish in to make it educational. Like putting Vitamin C in a Little Debbie Nutty Bar makes it nutritious.

Anyway, Kathy reads the word Abuelo. Now Tim is fluent in Spanish, so he asked Seamus if he knows what it means. Seamus says sure - it means Grandmother!

Tim is surprised, and asks where he learned that. In Spanish class he responds. Really? You have a Spanish class he asks? No! Says Seamus. He's just messing with him.

Kathy keeps reading and keeps throwing out words. Of course Seamus knows very few. But they fall into a routine.

Eventually as Kathy asks about a word Seamus moves towards the book. Of course Kathy pulls it away from him so he can't cheat. This goes on for a while, and I can tell that Seamus is confused. But it keeps playing out this way.

Finally you can see that Seamus understands what is happening, and yet he still doesn't understand it. That is he knows she's hiding the book from him, he just doesn't know why. So when he can't take it anymore he runs up to Kathy (who is hiding the book) and says "But Aunt Kathy - I don't know how to read!" Oh! Right!

The look on her face was priceless.

Sleeping arrangements

We have a 4 bedroom house. Mimi and I get one, and the other three go for the kids. For the longest time Denis and Tara have shared a room. The reason behind this is they're the best sleepers. They both go to bed easily, and they both sleep long and deep. So matching them seemed a smart idea. That left Liam with his own room (the smallest one) and Seamus with his own (the largest one, previously the nursery).

Denis finally started making noise about having his own room about a year ago. I didn't pay any attention - they always need something to complain about! But after he mentioned it a few times I figured it was time. He is the oldest, and he's shared a room for 6 years. And Tara's the only girl, so presumably at some point she's going to need her own space.

So I made the case to Mimi that Liam and Seamus should bunk together (Liam actually has a bunk bed in his room!) and Denis and Tara should get their own places. Resistant to change as always she initially said no, but eventually she saw the light and agreed.

Step one was testing out the new arrangement. I mean, could Liam and Seamus, our two, um, 'active' kids co-exist in the same room? That was far from guaranteed! So we moved Seamus into Liam's room to give it a shot.

We were pleasantly surprised when it seemed to work pretty well. Liam really does love being an older brother, and Seamus is a pretty social boy. So putting them in together far exceeded our expectations.

The next step was moving Tara into her own space. We were still a bit tentative, just testing it out. So instead of making the big move (putting bunk bed and furniture into the large room) I just moved Tara to the old nursery. She seemed happy about it, and took to the new room right away.

Tara goes to bed earliest, and she was immediately asleep in her new room. An hour later it was time for Denis to go to bed. So he went back to his old room and laid down to sleep. Only he didn't sleep. About 30 minutes later a sheepish-looking Denis appeared in front of me.

"I'm lonely" he said. This was new. He's never voiced that concept before. "Do you want me to stay with you for a bit?" I asked. "No." I was initially confused, but then it came to me. "Do you want me to move Tara back into your room?" "Yes."

I just about cried.

I mean, the kid never ones says a word about Tara. Nothing good or bad. Most times it's like she's not even there. But I guess there is some love there.

So I went into her new room, picked her up (yikes she's getting heavy!) and brought her into her bed in their old room. And they slept like they always do.

The next night again Tara went to sleep in the nursery, and again Denis asked for her to be moved. Finally on the third night I just put her back in the old room (I was getting tired of hauling her around!) And that's where they've stayed since.

It's been about 5 months since the initial move and return. And finally just yesterday Denis asked about having his own room.

You'll excuse me if I don't rearrange the furniture just yet.

Now *that's* a good boy!

I came home from work last night totally beat. The combination of a win in the competitive VB tournament, a late-night bar celebration, and an early morning phone call with my global team was a trifecta I didn't just bounce back from. So by the time I got back from a full day at work I was asleep on my feet.

To cap it off, Mimi was at a work dinner, so it was up to me to feed the monsters. Like any good dad in this situation I called for a pizza! Once my family obligations were out of the way I headed for my lazy-boy. Liam asked me if we could play pool. I felt guilty, but I said no. I was too tired (I'll make it up to him today).

I grabbed the remote and flipped on some women's college VB.

At this point Denis piped up. I expected some kind of request. Can I do this? Can I get your help with that. Something that would require me either saying no or moving (and the smart money would be on saying no).

But it wasn't that kind of request at all. What he did say was "Dad - can I get you a beer?"

He has never made that offer before. But he knew I was beat, and that I just wanted to kick back and relax. And he knows when I'm just done and relaxing that often (well, occasionally) I'll grab a beer. I didn't really want one at that point, but how could I turn that offer down? That unsolicited offer. I couldn't.

"Thanks Denis. Yes, please."

And somehow it just tasted better than normal.

Liam's team has had quite a run this season, but the season came to a close Saturday afternoon. As most of you know, they made it to the state tournament. Something like 40 teams qualified for the tournament. They had one game last week, then up to 4 games this weekend.

I still can't understand why last week's team didn't show for the game. That's a little crazy. To qualify then not show up. I'm thinking the coach got the game time wrong. Oh man he must be getting some kind of hate form the parents on that squad! I am glad I'm not in his shoes!

In any case, Liam's team made it to week two. You'll also recall that right before the forfeit game Liam sprained his ankle. He was so thrilled when they won; thinking that for sure he'd be healed by the time the next weekend came around. I'll save the suspense. It wasn't. When Saturday came he was still wrapped up. He was off his crutches, but was limping noticeably. He was so sad.

But if he was sad the rest of his team was crushed. They were sure they'd have him back. And they're no dummies. They know who the top players are. And when they found out he wasn't going to be able to go there were some long faces.

The sad faces were nicely matched by the weather. The weekend dawned cold and rainy. Essentially the worst possible weather. I actually prefer 28 and snow to 37 and rain. But no, I got the latter. It's sometimes worth it to sit in that weather and see your child do well. But when your son isn't even playing? That's no fun!

And yet there we were. Liam cheering on his team, me just taking up space, on a cold and windy Saturday.

Their first game was at 11:45. We got there about 11:35. Plenty of time! I got a parking space in front of the field they played at the previous week and sat and waited. When I didn't see them I called the coach's wife to ask if we were on the right field. No answer. I started to convince myself that game time was 12:45, and that I had gotten us there early for warm-up time. But then that didn't work either as there were no other kids from Liam's team warming up. Hmmm. I called the coach's wife again - and this time I got an answer. Yup - it is 11:45. But a different field. Damn! Well at least Liam wasn't playing! He would have killed me.

We finally got there towards the end of the 3rd period. There was no score. So I stood in the rain and watched as Liam tried to motivate his team. The 4th period started, and while his team had some great chances they couldn't convert them. And so the game ended in a 0-0 tie. But of course it didn't *end* like that. It couldn't. Someone had to go on. So they went on to penalty shots.

They grabbed 5 kids from each team and each of them, alternating by team, got a chance to convert a penalty kick. Our first one missed high. Then theirs missed too. Our next one missed, but they scored. 0-1. We both missed on the next round. The 4th round we scored and they didn't. 1-1. The 5th and final round we missed, and then our goalie made an amazing stop on a great shot. So we again tied, 1-1.

But of course it can't end on that. So they got the next 3 players from each team (they only play with 9 on the field, and they take all of the non-goalie player into penalty kicks, so that leaves 8, which they split up 5 and 3). So they get the next 3 and try it again. And again we get behind, but again pull even (but not ahead). So once more it ends 1-1. And the game isn't over yet.

So we go to a third round of kicks, with the original 5 players. This time we got off to the fast start. We got up 1-0. Then two misses. And then 2-1 in round 3. From there neither team scored and we won! Oh joy! So now I can't go home and instead have to come back for another 90 minutes in the rain. Lovely. On the other hand the kids were ecstatic, and it's impossible to be grumpy in that situation.

So Liam and I ran off to get some lunch. As we walked in to Wendy's I noticed my blue jeans. They were a nice pale blue in front, and a lovely dark blue in the back. Now I didn’t recall buying them two-toned. So I looked again and realized that the entire back on my pants were soaking wet. Ugh. Not comfortable. At this point I vowed to take a nice long bath when I got home. I told Liam and he looked at me incredulously. At his age baths are still a form of punishment for having too much fun. So he can't imagine someone taking one of purpose. But I was already picturing it. I finally smiled.

We got our lunch and got back to the fields. Liam had only brought a light jacket, and I happened to have an extra in the car, so I gave it to him to wear. And as chance would have it the jacket he got was my old HS letter jacket! The one with State Champs written across the front. He looked at it and thought it was a good sign. Several of his teammates commented on it. Liam told them that his dad's team won their state championship. "In soccer?" they asked. You could see them picturing me as a 9 year old dribbling up the field! Too funny. No, Liam said, some kind of running. Oh well, I guess my 25 year old exploits have somehow failed to impress the next generation.

Liam's team was now in the top 8 in the state. Pretty impressive, especially since they were missing their #2 player and best defender. They started the next game, and early on in the 1st period got behind one goal. I could see Liam seethe. I knew he was thinking that if he had been in they wouldn't have scored. And he was probably right! But he wasn't in, and they did score.

The rest of the game was a slug-fest. A few opportunities on both side, but no more goals. Eventually they lost 1-0. There were sad faces, and some tears (including Liam), but the parents were thrilled. And not just because they didn't have to come back to these cursed field the next day! They were amazed that there little boys had gone so far and done so well. There was a lot of pride there, even in a loss.

And I am certain they'll be back next year. All I have to do is keep Liam healthy! Wish me luck!

Seamus the 5-year-old soccer god

I just wanted to take a minute to recap Seamus' soccer season. As you know from my note back in July. Seamus had an amazing year on the field. I think it is safe to say that every parent of a 4-6 year old child who plays soccer now knows who Seamus is. And mostly for good reasons.
His team didn't lose a game all season. I think they played 10 times. They scored something like 60 goals in total. Pretty good for only 10 games.

Oh yeah, and Seamus scored over 50 of the 60 goals.

His coach came over the other night to drop off his and Tara's trophies. While he was there we reminisced about the season. He was telling me a story about the last game. It's a very relaxed league, and the coaches work together to make sure everyone has a good time. So at one point, after Seamus had scored his normal 4 goals in a single quarter, his coach put him in goal. And naturally as soon as he went in there the other team couldn't find the net. Finally the opposing coach asked our coach to pull Seamus from goal so his kids would have a chance to score. Our coach answered, sure, but where can I put him? If I put him on defense your kids won't get near the goal. And if I put him on offense your kids won't see the ball. And I have to let him play - he's already sat out a full quarter! So he stayed in goal. And the other team didn't score.

Just last night Seamus was talking about the season. And when it came to the overall results he said "I won every game." But Seamus, don't you mean your team won every game? "No." he said "I won them." I wanted to say he was a part of a team, that he can't win without his teammates, etc. And some day that will be true. But for today the honest truth is that he probably would go undefeated as a 1-man team. Crazy!

This is his last season of instructional play (thank goodness). I am very interested to see what he does on the bigger fields with the bigger kids. You can bet I'll be bringing my camera!

It's Fall.

The way you can tell this is that it's impossible to see the lawn any more for the carpet of leaves covering it.

This does not bother me. You see, I've got a fairly large yard. So I have one of those riding lawn mowers to cut the grass. And a few years back, my old college roommate Chris Brown (aka CB, aka Cool Breeze), who had a lawn service company at the time, gave me an amazing tip. "Just put the bagging attachment onto your tractor" he said. "It'll suck the leaves up like a vacuum." Best lawn care advice I ever got! On top of bringing up all the leaves it also mulches them, so they take less space. What a deal!

I've been doing this for the last 5 years and I love it. It takes what used to be an incredibly tedious job and makes it just another day mowing the lawn.

Well it was Saturday, and the leaves were out there waiting, so I prepared to go vacuum the lawn.

As I was getting my clothes together little Seamus came up. He was very excited! "Dad!!" He said. "The lawn is covered in leaves" [I knew that part] "Let's make a leaf pile we can jump in!"

Damn!

What do you say to your 5 year old? "Sorry son - I've found a much more efficient way of dealing with the leaves that doesn't result in leaf piles"? Not that I wasn't tempted. But I just couldn't do it.

So instead of riding on the tractor for 45 minutes I spent 2 hours raking leaves so the kids could jump in them for 3 minutes.

And it was worth it.

Go figure.

Liam's continued soccer success

Liam has had another great season of soccer. His team has again done extremely well. They actually had a loss this time around in league play. They lost 4-2 to St. Mike's. But they didn't have their top goal scorer and they had their weakest goalie in the net. So they were caught on a less that stellar day and lost.

They got to play St. Mike's again in the finals of the league tournament. This was a high stakes game. The winner would go on to the state tournament. Liam's team was totally fired up. And they struck quickly and decisively, scoring fast to go up with a 3-0 lead. They did allow some goals, but finished the game 4-2.

Which meant that they were on to the state tourney.

They made it last year as well. But the weather was terrible. They had one game called for weather. Another one delayed then finally cancelled. When the second week came around they finally got the chance to play and lost to the previous year's tournament champion. They had higher hopes for this year.

Yesterday was Saturday, and their first game was today, Sunday. Liam was playing in the yard with the neighbor boy. They were climbing trees, running around, the usual boy stuff. I was raking leaves. Eventually Seamus came up and told me that Liam was hurt.

Kids at that age simply haven't developed the gift of understanding severity. "Liam is hurt" could mean anything from he has a scratch on his cheek to his legs are no longer attached to his body. And I have a policy of not overreacting when the kids get hurt. I think they take their cues on concern from their parents. And when the parents freak out they do as well. So I don't freak out. In this case I didn't even stop raking leaves!

Eventually I see Liam hopping in my direction. Oh shit. My first thought is of the game today. He is not looking good.

He makes it to me and I ask him what happened. His answer is the same as always - a distracted "What?" like I had awakened him from a nap. Um, you can't walk, you hopped to me on one leg, what the hell do you expect me to ask you?

Well he was chasing his buddy, who ran down the patio stairs of the neighbor's house, slipped, fell, and rolled his ankle. Not good.

I got him inside and took a look at it. It was already huge! Really not good. I immediately put ice on it. I left the ice on for 30 minutes, and then compressed it in an ACE wrap. Later in the evening we iced it again.

Around bedtime I asked him how it felt. He still couldn't even put weight on it. It was then that it finally struck him - there was no way he was going to be able to play today. He was devastated. I guess he just assumed that 15 or so hours would be plenty for a badly sprained ankle. I wanted to tell him "Wait 'til you're 40, it'll be 15 days!" But I didn't. He was pretty distraught already.

Morning came and he still couldn't do anything. I got out the crutches, iced him again, and went off to the fields with him. Even though he couldn't play I wanted him to be able to cheer his team on. I had called his coach the previous night to let him know the scoop. Liam is one of the best defenders, so he'd need to re-think his lineup well in advance.

We got to the field late - the traffic was incredible. There is no good way to get 20 teams worth of kids/parents/grandparents into a park smoothly. When we finally did show up the game hadn't started yet. And why hadn't it started? Because the other team hadn't shown up yet!! Liam was beside himself with joy. He was so worried they'd lose because he couldn't play. But with no competition that wasn't going to be an issue.

We hung out for 15 minutes and they finally called the game. So they will advance. They'll play up to 4 games next weekend. With any luck he'll be healed by then. I'm not 100% sure he will be. I'm going to keep icing and wrapping every hour to maximize his chances. At this point all I can do is keep my fingers crossed. But (give his bad luck) he's been pretty lucky so far!

Denis (no longer) the grouch
For about the last 6 months (year? 18 months?) Denis has been a realy pain. Nothing is ever perfect and all he would seem to focus on were the parts that weren't perfect. Seriously. We could have the world's best day. We could do 20 awesome things. And if there was one shitty one in there it would be a bad day. It was very frustrating. He was turning into a moody teen at age 10/11.

And then someone flipped a switch. Still don't have any idea what it was. Did he have a near-death experience and not tell me about it? Seems unlikely. But then the attitude change was pretty unlikely as well. So who knows.

Lately the guy has just been a joy to be around. He's more physical - he gives hugs when a year ago he wouldn't. He helps out around the house. Sometimes without being asked. He doesn’t grumble much at the tasks he used to complain about previously. I am loving it!

And I *really* wish I knew what brought the change one. I'd like to market it!

Denis and Death

There has been a lot of death hovering over the house lately. Most of it not horrific, but it's always a tough topic. Mimi's sister's dog had to be put down recently. Denis' pet fish died. And Mimi's father has been very ill and has recently come out of a rough heart surgery.

Each one individually is a tough thing to have. Together they got to the point where they were weighing heavily on Denis' mind. I didn't really have any idea that it was affecting him until after getting out of the shower the other night he was waiting for me. He was very quiet and subdued. I asked him what was going on and he choked out "I'm scared of death!"

That's a tough one! What kind of answer do you give an 11 year old on that topic? I tried the "everything lives and everything dies" approach with little success. I tried the "You'll see everything again in Heaven" approach. That worked a little better when I confirmed that yes, his fish will be waiting for him there.

In the end I think he just realized that I didn't have the perfect answer on this one, but that talking it out made him feel a little better. I am glad he felt better, but I have to say I feel like I failed him a bit on this one.

Anyone else have any ideas?

Mile Swim

Denis went on a scouting trip with the rest of his troop for an entire week over the summer. It was really his first ever time away from home (really far away from home) without either parent. He did very well. He told me later that he was a little homesick for home, but it wasn't until the day they were driving back!

While he was there the troop did a ton of badges and advancements. And on top of that they did one major event - the mile swim.

Now as you all know, Denis has a small disability that makes things like swimming very challenging for him. He is on the pool swim team, but in 3 years of racing the only position that he's every finished in was last. So he clearly has no speed whatsoever.

What he does have is determination! He decided that he was going to do the mile swim. I'm glad I wasn't there. I probably would have tried to talk him out of it. But I wasn't, so he went on with it.

And against my prediction he finished. He was one of only 2 11 year olds who finished. It took him 75 minutes!! I think that amazed me even more. Being in the water for 75 minutes gives you a ton of opportunity to quit. But he didn't quit.

I don't know that I could keep my head above water for 75 minutes. I am so proud of him!

Poker fascination


I guess it's because it's all over TV these days, but Liam has become completely fascinated with poker. Not that we've ever watched it ourselves in our house. But it seems you can't get away from it in some restaurants.

Specifically he loves Texas Hold 'em. Now I grew up playing poker with my broithers and the boys in the neighborhood. But I have never played that game before. So that made it kind of fun. He was able to teach me something, which I'm sure for him was a nice change of pace from being constantly instructed by me!

After he learned he decided he simply *must* have a poker set of his own. A couple hundred clay chips, a couple decks of cards, and a case to carry it all in. I thought it was crazy - why all the ornamentation? Just play the game! But he really wanted it.

I certainly wouldn't buy it for him, but he had saved enough allowance money to get it. So he did. And unlike so many other things he buys, he's actually stayed interested in it. He brought it on our family vacation. Not just a desk of cards - the whole case! And we used it several times.
So I guess there is something about letting him get things on his own.

Amazingly he knows what he likes better than I do!

Calling Peter Pan

Last night Mimi and I were off playing VB again (and winning the league tournament, I might add - yay for us!) When we got home, Lima (9) had the following story for us:

Tara (7) is obsessed with Peter Pan. She reads the book, listens to the tapes, and wants to see the movies. She is totally in love. At various times she's told me she's going to marry John, Michael, and Peter. Too cute.

Last night while we were away it got to be more than cute. She decided she needed to speak to the characters. It seems she got every worked up about it, on the edge of being hysterical! She was yelling and crying and making life hard for everyone home.

So Liam got an idea. He told the babysitter to go out into the garage with his (the sitter's) cell phone. Then he got out phone out and called the garage. He handed the phone to Tara and told her he had called Peter Pan. She was ecstatic! She talked to 'Peter' and the rest and had a great night the rest of the night.

I don't know how the sitter pulled off the voices so well, but there may be a career on the stage for him after this!

An American in Poland

I was in Poland for business this week. There were 4 days of someone else's meetings, then 1 day for my global team to meet. Since I'm a very informal guy I made a point to my team that dress for the day was casual.

Before I leave for a trip to Europe I make a decision. Do I want to try to blend in (pack earth toned clothes) or not (my normal stuff). On this trip - for no real reason - I decided not. So I just packed whatever was on top in my closets.

As I came down for the Friday meeting I had basic clothes on. Nothing special. Well, at least not to me.

I turned the corner and ran into Andy. He's my business partner. He's an Irish who grew up in England. He take a quick look at me, gives me the kind of look that suggests I should maybe check my zipper, then says in his very cool English accent "Denis! Could you *possibly* look any more American?"

I took a moment to look at myself. American flag motif polo short, blue jeans, bright yellow running shoes I won in a race a few years back, and a black Starbury baseball cap. Hmm. He may have a point.

Andy was still incredulous. He went on "Really! I mean it. This is the equivalent of a French guy coming down with a vest covering a blue and white striped shirt wearing a beret!"

That was pretty funny. But it had no effect on me - I headed of to the meeting with me team softly humming the "I'm proud to be an American" song. Now of course I'm not always that proud, but in this situation I really couldn't escape it.

Now I really have to think hard about what I pack next time over...