MarriedandWhatnot

What a topic for hump day. Approximately 247 days ago my wife and I had this conversation about men in relationships, and why they don’t commit. She gave me the female perspective and what women think, and of course I told her the truth (lol). In any case, she called my bluff stating I tend to think different from most men, so I created this survey titled “Why men won’t commit”. I received 40 responses when I initially did it, and for the women out there, the answers may surprise you.

WHY MEN WON’T COMMIT SURVEY

Maybe the results were skewed since these were a group of men I knew, so here is the deal. Men visiting this blog, just take a second to complete the survey. It is completely anonymous. Women, forward to any male you know. If I get over 100 survey responses then I will post a Part II to this blog and share the results.

This is dedicated to all the stay at home moms and dads…single mom and dads….who spend years of their lives staring down the barrel of a baby butt-hole. Ok, that was gross, but thought it would help get your attention. I am sure you can appreciate this. This is also dedicated to my dude The Great Zebra Caper…aka Will Hunting. Every time I call him, he puts the phone to the side and screams “Matt, stop it I said!” Our sons are the same age. For those who don’t have children…no, for those who don’t have boys, this is 40 mins in the life of a little 2 year old terrorist.

I wrote a blog a while back about why I call my son a terrorist. Dude is cute as he wants to be, but pushes his brothers off their bikes or trampoline, takes any toy they have, throws stuff at them, yells at them, hits them, tackles them…and they just tolerate him and shower him with hugs. He also runs, screams, and jumps off stuff with no regard to his life. One time I he climbed up on their trundle bunk bed, shimmied across like Splinter Cell, and was just swinging yelling, “Weee!” It is like all 2 years olds have a terrorist network or something. Bad thing is we never experienced the terrible two’s before…they were just terrible from birth. No seriously, our kids usually didn’t start getting bad until age 3. This one is a different breed.

I have the utmost respect for single moms. I came from a single family home, but there was only two of us…and she (older sibling) got married when I was 7. I know I was probably bad when I was little, but man did it really have to come back on me ten fold? Why wife was at a retreat this weekend, and I was left alone with these crazy boys. I tell you, I have so much respect for my wife and what she does on a day in, day out basis. Just trying to keep the house clean is a task. With this many kids, literally one meal can destroy the kitchen…and take you 45 minutes to clean.

Back to this particular episode. Keep in mind that this only documents the activities of the mini-ring leader. I will not discuss how during the course of these events, the other three boys were screaming and fighting one another. (NOTE – For those of you new to my blog, my wife and I have four boys all under age 9. To avoid confusion we number them 1-4). Having this many children is interesting. They all have different personalities which mesh well at times, but when they clash it is epic. They are all very giving, caring, and affectionate (at different levels), but they just have their times. For instance 1 & 3 always fight. Well, 3 tries and 1 just plays with him (6 yr age difference). Number 3 also fights with 2 a lot. He is basically a brat in a lot of ways. During this 40 minutes, there were a couple times when two of our three boys were rolling around on the floor kicking and punching each other. I couldn’t tell who was who, but they were sliding blows in-between me turning my head and making them stop. Ended up just making them sit on separate pieces of furniture. I don’t mind them wrestling and getting their frustration out, but these were one of those times you could sense some body part being bruised, swollen, or bleeding by the end of it. Not that that ever happens in my house (note to CPS), just from what I have seen on TV…lol.

Enough of 1-3, this blog is dedicated to #4. It started with him waking me up screaming at the top of his lungs. I get up, and he is mad because he wanted another apple bar. I instructed his brother to feed him one. Took him about 2 mins to eat it, so afterwards I changed him since he was wet. I promise no sooner than I changed him, 10 mins later he was smelling like a warm Ninja Turtle. I mean like he just crawled out a fresh sewer. Those who have kids and budgeted funds know that sometimes you have to leave a diaper on for a little bit. People without kids tend to have limited patience, and think you change kids immediately. You can, but heck you’d better have a Costco box of diapers in the garage. Especially with my son. He has a habit of grunting every time he gets a fresh diaper on his rump. If you changed him every time he dropped a pebble, I promise you he’d go through a pack and 2 days flat. Kid is super regular. Or heck, premium.

I let him simmer for a second figuring I’d change him after I feed him (since most likely he would need a bath after he ate). I start to clean the kitchen. Yea, all domesticated and stuff ( I’m housebroken). Turn around and baby is pulling the blinds on patio. I tell him to stop. He goes from that, to playing some game under the table with #3 (the brat who taught him all his tactics) where he kept bumping his head. Told him to stop to prevent him from getting a concussion. I get up and load the dishwasher. Turn around and he is clicking on the laptop (which is on the kitchen table). I mean just clicking away. At this point I am tired, so I just smile. About 5 mins later he is sitting in the chair like the hell with it…if you going to let me click, I will go full force. I walked over and pulled up starfall.com and let him play around. Next time I look around, he is behind the recliner (where are Wii controllers charge) pressing the button messing up his brothers game. They made him stop, then he ran off. I finally received a break. Scratch that daydream when I hear a cry. Go to look, and dude was in my office pulling out all the supplies out the drawer. He frustrated because he can’t get the tops off, or get them back in the box. Heck, I don’t know what he was crying about, but I just went in at the right time because he had all the markers out on the floor. Just imagine what he could have done. I tell #1 to come clean up, and go back in the living room and sit down for a second. I mean literally, it couldn’t have been more than 5 mins and BAM…dude threw this NCAA sized football directly into the fireplace. I mean he threw it hard too. I just told him to come give daddy a kiss. He runs over, and as he leaned up, he jumped (being silly) and head butted me in my nose. And I don’t know why, but I have a super soft spot for this kid…and went ahead and kissed his snotty, sweet lips.

Keep in mind, this was all within 40 mins. I go back to the kitchen to finish cleaning and preparing their breakfast, I sat down at the kitchen table for 5 mins to write a draft of this blog before I forgot these events. This is a true story, and the icing on the cake. Obaby bin badboy starts tapping my thigh. He does that when he wants something and is too lazy to talk. I look at him, and he points to the back patio. I am really zoning out at this point because these kids are yelling, and we have vaulted ceilings, so I felt my brain slowly oozing out of my ears. I didn’t know if he wanted to go outside, or if he saw some animal in the backyard, therefore I didn’t pay him any attention. Well in traditional terrorist form, when you ignore their threats, they make you pay!

I write the first draft of this blog (thinking it was over), and go back in the kitchen to cook. I hear the oldest with his dramatic, “Baby nooooooo!” I look over and this kid grabbed the sidewalk chalk, and started drawing on the kitchen floor (near the back door). I mean this kid got at least three colors down before we got to him. Not only was it all over the floor, but his hands, legs, pants and nose. All I could do is laugh. I made his brothers get baby wipes and two tackled him and wiped him down while the other cleaned the floor. He somehow freed himself, and took off running across the living room floor…with chalk on the bottom of his feet. He has wheels too, so they straight didn’t catch him. As I stood there shaking my head, I looked in the backyard at the patio. I saw the art from the kids drawing the other day. I began to chuckle thinking about what he was thinking. I guess he said the hell with it, I will just draw right here then.

I have to admire him though. Kid knows what he wants. He is so cute I can’t even get mad. As I close this, he is sitting on my lap absorbing all my affection. Guess you can call me a lil terrorist lover.

Ok, I am a PSU fan, so before I give credit to this hit, let me pause for a moment so Bucks can let this marinate…

I had to hear all these jokes about JoePa wearing diapers and having accidents. I can’t tell you how belligerent OSU fans are. When they won that championship vs Miami, my phone rang all night and answering machine was full of drunken retards. I will say this though. I like and repect Tressell, and that Pryor is nice. It is scary what OSU will do with that kid. I actually felt sorry for him…for 30 secs.

Ok, enough of that. My buddy Jug sent this YouTube link below last Friday. I told him I was going to post it, but only after the game this weekend (lol). I went to Ohio State and am not a Buck fan, but my goodness you have to give respect to this hit. This is #21 Zack Dumas in 1989. I guarantee you will replay it more than once. Make sure to check out the Reggie Bush one too. Wow!

When I first started this blog, my intention was to speak about married life with kids. The good and bad. Well, not so much the bad as I am a private guy, but I can share some stuff. Of course I don’t have all the answers, and there are many things that boggle my mind as I attempt to learn about my better half. There are some things that intrigue me and I will never understand about women. Sometimes do you ever wonder why someone of the opposite sex feels a certain way? For instance, what is it about females that makes them wake up and cook a huge breakfast, clean, and hug all over their man when he hits her spot right that night before? It’s like you break open a geyser that releases this desire in her to…

I’ll leave that thought there. Enough of that though, I want to talk about my children. First you need to understand a tad bit about me. I am a simple guy. I like to dip my pizza in ranch, love any type of hot wings, eat spicy foods with the best of them, and can devour E.L. Fudge cookies like a fat girl whose boyfriend just left her. That seems normal enough, however I have many quirks. I like to get dirty outside…wood staining, painting, mud, cars, fishing, sex, sports, whatever…however, I am an absolute clean freak indoors. I wash my hands before and after (you can figure that one out). I also have certain words that I just DO NOT like to say. I don’t know if it is how it sounds coming out or what, but the short list of words I never ever ever say are – penis, boo boo, doo doo, poo poo, child support & certain peoples names (I can’t even type). I am sure there are more words, but for the most part I can’t stand those. I find any other creative way to word it without saying those words (lol). Among my many internal issues (personalities), I mention my vocabulary and clean freak tendancies for a reason. How I absolute LOVE having boys, they are so disgusting!!

I label them 1-4. One (9 yrs old) is pretty cool however he has tendencies that I will discuss later. Two (6 yrs old) is the one we dub Mr. Clean. Homeboy don’t play. His skin literally squeaks when he gets out the tub, and he is clean from behind his ears to his feet. Three (3 yrs old) is just the opposite. He is one nasty child. And four (2 yrs old) is still a BeBe kid in diapers. I call him our little terrorist as he has been prone to push people off trampolines, off bikes, punch em in the face when they carry away to his solitaire chamber (aka the playpen).

Before I dive in, I just want to put a DISCLAIMER. If you just ate, or about to eat stop reading now.

My sons have cute mannerisms, but they are absolutely disgusting at times. They have a tendency to bond while performing a BM (bowel movement). They start joking and laughing…talking about each other. Like this is the appropriate place. My bathroom is my office slash sanctuary. Theirs is a comedy club. When we first started teaching them to wipe, we had ‘em using baby wipes. Well that was a disaster as they clogged the toilet. Please don’t get me started on how disgusting that day was when they flooded the bathroom floor. No disrespect to the survivors, but that joker looked like the streets of Katrina. Mrs and I was going off (verbal assassins) as it took us forever to clean. So we changed it up and had them put it in the trash can, then tie up and empty when done. Another failed experiment as they would go through a box of wipes in 2-3 days. That stuff adds up. We go to change baby, and these cats done used every wipe in the house. They are just…UGH. So now we got them on TP. This is so wrong because I promise I will share this with them when they get older.

For starters, I had to go completely off on them (again) because they have a tendency to wipe their little tail, while standing near the bathroom door (and sometimes the hallway) to talk to their brothers or see what they are doing. I can’t tell you how many times I told them to shut the door. So what do boys do? Make a game out of opening and slamming the door while one is on the toilet. Opening the door just to throw balls in like grenades. So we had this chat about not being by the door, and they STILL walk over by the mirror. Like take your little s___y tail over by the toilet, and stop looking in the mirror. Wiping ain’t cute!!

Number 1 is pretty good at cleaning up, but he has a tendency to take my favorite books (for example Tony Dungy’s book) in there with him. I don’t want to discourage he kid from reading, but come on now. I just let him have the book like forget it. I don’t even want that joker now. Number #2 I really don’t have any complaints about. He cleans well, and washes his hands thoroughly. But that third joker? Wow. First of all he tears off ONE sheet of TP. Yes, the the tiny square. Granted his booty small, but he be laying some construction worker logs. I mean seriously, one time he was just in there giggling. Mrs said, “J, come here and look at this child.” I swear this joker was so unreal I have no idea how it stayed up in his body. All his brothers came to see like it was a big family event. And yes, I am so so ignorant because I took a picture with my cell phone so we can add it to his babybook (hahaha). That had to break a Guinness record for his size because as old as I am, I never achieved a feat like that. It must have felt so good out his system that he couldn’t stop laughing (hence the middle name Isaac). Thing is he was acting like a little batch for a couple days, so apparently he was backed up.

Back to the story…he is just nasty. I can’t tell you how many times we have to say, “Did you wash your hands?” and he pauses and responds,“Opps!” Absolutely disgusting child. We always make him take a bath afterwards just in case. He also is prone to have minor accidents due to either not getting there on time, mistaking it for gas, or just being lazy wiping. So this cat will hide his underwear in the laundry…deep in there…with chunks in there. Boy, the mrs be going OFF!!! She wears gloves when doing their laundry because it is so disgusting. And dude good for going through all his clean underwear, then finding his older brothers and wearing them. I’d punch him if I were them. Like I told my old lady, it is amazing I still hug and kiss that child as much as I do. I tell you sometimes kids make you crazy. One minute you want to just put packaging tape on their forehead and leave them on the front lawn for UPS to ship them to Kuwait, then want to hug and kiss them the next minute.

Went in the living room, my 2 yr old standing on the couch straight ROCKIN’ to Hip Hop Harry. He loves this dude. Crank ya speakers up baby!!! lol.