Vacation: conclusion

We arrived home around 2pm. Stopped in Lincoln and did a nice little hike along the Pemigewasett river. Long day, with lots of driving. I'm glad to be back. Nice trip overall, the kids had fun.

Vaction: continued, in the field

Sunday 5pm
Exhausting ride up to the hotel. My wife and I couldn't hate each other more. Living is pointless. We just got in from shopping in North Conway. "They" are playing some Colorform game on the bed. I'm sitting in the corner with my back to the window and feet up on a chair. Iced coffee(my only friend in the world) sits by my side. I had a hot dog with bacon and cheese for lunch. It was fantastic. I'm thinking of sleeping in the bathtub like John Lennon in "Norwegian Wood". They sell clam chowder next door. I wish my family was a sniper rifle. I should have brought my banjo. Swine is the only meat I dig. It's funny because it's the only animal I have empathy for. While pumping gas a few years back, a hog on its way to slaughter called out to me, as it drove by in the back of a pick up truck. Kind of a wee wee wee sound as it passed me. To me it translated into, " I don't want to die, do something D.O.M". OK, now I have to go get them Wendy's.

Monday 7pm
Tension eased up from yesterday. We are winding down in the hotel room. This morning's breakfast had a Katrina disaster victim feel to it. It was "served" buffet style, in what looked like a make-shift relief center. The food was set up on tables on one side and a bunch of folding tables with not nearly enough chairs to go around. Lots of parents just milling around drinking coffee while children and the elderly sat and ate their cereal. No hotel staff to be seen,just a couple of hobos who kept the coffee and bagels coming. I was half expecting a spokesman from F.E.M.A. to come in with some kind of de-briefing. Good coffee though. Storyland was OK, I got to ride on a train. The kids liked it too. At dinner tonight we all stormed out of a restaurant before our dinner arrived because they had no diet Coke and Vicki lost it. We had a Mickey D picnic back at the hotel. I felt that I had a better grasp of reality today.

Tuesday

Slept on floor, to shut family up. Went to Santa's Village. Absolute highlight of the trip(maybe the year!) was when this annoying little girl, could not have been more than two, smacked her head on some cement stairs and started crying. I was behind the little beast for a half an hour, her mother let her run all over the place. She had a, isnt my daughter so cute as she tears appart your stuff attitude. After she bashed her head, her Mom picked her up. The little girl was rubbing her ear and crying. I was grining ear to ear with the biggest smile, looking right at the mother. It was all I could do to keep from laughing. I wish I had a megaphone so I could laugh right in the girls crying face.

D.O.M. Portrait

The Calm Before the Storm.

Still quiet, people running around getting ready. Do we really want to do this? I'm sitting here, trying to learn "Will the Circle Be Unbroken", on the banjo. Taking a little break. Some idiot just flew by the house in one of those go-cart parachute airplanes. I told them it was Mary Poppins.

Vacation: Day 2

What's it do to your brain to be constantly in the company of two six year old girls? They view me as their own personal Jerry Lewis. What are we gonna do now? Do something silly. Go run into that tree again. I'm hungry. Put on a puppet show. Put that chicken down. What would be great is, if I had one of those circus cannons. I could escape by getting in it and shooting myself into the forest. "Hold that thought girls, let me just climb in here". Then, BLAM, see ya. Giving them the finger as I rocket to certain doom. Then there's the up coming trip to Storyland, it's looming over me, like a five hundred foot Charles Nelson Reiley. He has a gift for me. Madness. Maybe that's what I need. Embrace the inevitable.

Missy the Chicken

Leo , The African Sulcata

Sushi Drawing (Our dog)

Developing Story

I got one of the chickens to eat out of my mouth!

Vacation: Day 1

Boy it's quiet. They're all upstairs, either sleeping or reading. Electrocuted myself at my sister's house earlier, like I've done hundreds of times before. Nothing else even comes close to that feeling. It actually makes me stronger. Anyway, today I found out that a mouse I was trying to make friends with passed away. Taylor found it in the chicken food bin, dead. I was planning on catching it. Shit, I'm starting to cry again(no I'M not, I never cry. Yes you do, you cried when Elvis died, and at the end of True Grit when the Big Duke shoots it out with Lucky Ned Pepper). Also made friends(real friends) with a spider that is setting up shop on my bulkhead stairs. Pretty big spider. You can tell a spider almost anything, great listeners, not like my human wife. I caught Leo, the giant tortoise, eating fox crap today. I think it's OK for them to eat such things. When he was done, I put him back in his pen and tossed him a zucchini from the garden. He devoured that as well. I'M a little worried about the upcoming vacation with the family. It's been only one day and I can feel myself turning. Lots of babbling in my head. They sent me to Pizza Hut to get food and I actually said out loud while driving, "Please God, let me get into a fistfight here." Actually I say that whenever I go to any place where there are people. You know what, that's not true. I love all living beings. And for that matter, it may be true, because swapping fist sandwiches with someone doesn't have to be about hate. Just a bit of unconventional fun. Besides I only pummel people in my head, for my own amusement. What is the point of all this, I know not. Might have something to do with the two hour nap I had today.

Vacation: Hour 1

Hour 1 of my vacation. Already bored. I have the next six days off. Trying to get the chickens to come in the house. They're having no part of it. Thinking of making another cup of coffee. I've had too much today already. Could that last sentence be any more UN-American? Pardon me while I go Keurig myself another cup. OK, I'm back. If you don't know what Keurig is, it's the official coffee maker of The Doctor of Manliness. If you don't have one, consider yourself sickening. I've got to go out in the workshop to cut some wood for Verde to paint on. Bare foot and shirtless, Tom Jones cranking, table saw shredding lumber, caffeine rage, covered in a cloud of sawdust, and loving it.

The D.O.M. Roadshow

So today I found out that I get to spend my last few vacation days, of the year, at Storyland, with the fam. Oh gee, can I really? I wish I knew someone who could shoot a cannonball into my belly. How about I spend a few days by myself in the woods, go on a little vision quest. Starve myself, get naked and chain myself to a tree. Maybe getting into a drunken fistfight with a thorn bush. After a few days, come crashing out of the woods and sprint right into an oncoming Greyhound bus. No, I'm sure I'll be fine, Storyland will be fantastic. I'll make it so, me, my huge arms and sledgehammer fists.

Sunday With The D.O.M.

I'm at an antique shop this afternoon, on the hunt for some manly goodies. The items I covet the most are canes, banjos, any kind of puppet, pipes, straight razors and, any and all things Bozo. I'll wet myself if I see anything with the Fonz on it. I want to find a vintage pipe, so I can start smoking. I also love the smell of old stuff. Anyway, the two owners were bickering with each other, which I found very entertaining. I was half listening to them and half day dreaming when all of a sudden an older gentleman with one of those electronic voice boxes comes in and starts talking. I almost crapped myself I was so scared. I frantically looked around for Vicki. The bitch was nowhere to be seen, probably watching me from a hidden location and getting a good laugh. He was between me and the door, I thought about crashing through the window. What would the Fonz do? I crouched down around some furniture and ducked through a side door before he could see me. That was close. Back to the mission. I found my wife who was carrying some stupid metal birdbath, that she just had to have. I found a pig marionette, but I couldn't get it to work. I also found a Captain Kirk doll, that was the balls, but Vicki said no. I hate her.

The Water Guy(Ghost Dog) continued.

So I pretend to take a sip from my water, for the fourth time. I notice the guy at the next table is staring at me. Does he know I'm not really drinking water? I'm just trying to get the water guys attention, so he will come over and check my glass, only to find that it's still full. Vicki is next to me babbling away. The water guy has filled up my glass twice already. There are actually two of them, it looks like Ghost Dog (my nemesis) is training a new guy. My trick hasn't worked, so I take a real sip. Vicki keeps interrupting me. Ghost Dog comes out and like a blur that no one else sees, but me, he tops off everyone in the room's water glass but mine. I want to pound my fist into his face. MY WATER NEEDS TO BE REFRESHED OVER HERE, HELLO! Five minutes later the rookie comes by and tops off my water, which I immediately drink. I watch the rookie leave the room, I turn to reach for the water and Ghost Dog has just filled it again. Is this all going on in my head, or do we really have some kind of game going on here. It's real to me, and that's all that matters.

We got tom toms

I was out "weeding" the "World Manliness Headquarters" garden and I noticed that we have some tom toms sprouting. I was just about to rip the weed out of the ground when I noticed a couple of baby tomatoes on it, so I cleared all the other weeds around it. This is the first time, since planting, that I have done anything except watering. I buffed up the weeds around the zucchini and carrots as well. All the pulled weeds got tossed into Leo, the African Sulcatta's pen(that pig will eat anything including excrement).