I could have sworn my daughter moved away and is now attending college. She packed her bags. She took a flight. She displayed photos on Facebook of her new dorm room.
And yet…
So many things are the same, it doesn’t feel like she left at all.
For instance, here are the things she still does:
- She texts me daily about little things. Random things. Dorky things. Just letting me know she’s alive, stuff is happening, and she thinks of me what it all goes nutty.
- She calls me and starts talking mid-sentence, as if we were already engaged in conversation. Then she hangs up before I’m through saying what I want to say. (Typical teen daughter and dad relationship. I hope.)
- She gives us occasional face time (right now via skype, but hey, she could be at her friend’s house for all I know. Where’s the proof she’s in college!)
- She posts photos on Facebook showing all the fun outdoor activities she’s doing. Swimming, running, hanging out. She could be anywhere!
Dirty Text Message Jokes
And here are the things she still doesn’t do:
- She’s not here for breakfast. Hey, back in her high school days, her classes started early. She’d get up and go to school, and her brother and I would rise an hour later.
- She’s not here after school. Hey, back in her high school days, she ran track and played soccer, and hung out with friends. She had her drivers license and her own truck, and we never saw her!
- She’s not here for dinner. Hey, back in her high school days, she’d run off to eat Mongolian BBQ with friends, or do a pasta feed with her track team, or find her meals some other way. Plus, she was at her mom’s half the week, so who can keep track? (Okay, I admit, she ate with us on occasion. But she also avoided us a lot. Teen freedom!)
I related all these things to my son, and suggested she didn’t actually go to college. Maybe she’s still living with us, and we just haven’t noticed.
“Your theory is solid, except for one thing,” he said. “We painted her room and I moved into it.”
Okay! She’s off at college. Go State!
Either that, or she’s living with a boyfriend I don’t yet know about… Oy!
If you liked this college girl post, you might also enjoy:
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September 2nd, 2010
Posted in
parenting |
5 comments
At the end of a long week, or even in the middle, I enjoy a nice cocktail. Lately, though, there have been nights when I can’t decide between a gin martini, dirty with olives, or a vodka martini with a lemon twist. (Oh, the dilemmas of a modern parent!) If I make the wrong choice, I can usually tell after the first sip. And who wants the wrong drink when you need something to go down just right?
The bartender at a nice restaurant in Santa Barbara recently inspired this solution: make a martini with gin and vodka both. He called it a Fat Cat martini, and served it with two blue cheese stuffed olives.
I have to say, the gin and vodka combination is brilliant. The gin gives the drink some bite, and the ice cold vodka keeps it smooth. I enjoy a Fat Cat martini that’s not dirty (i.e. without any olive juice.) I do like the blue cheese stuffed olives. Here’s my recipe:
Fat Cat Martini Recipe
1 ½ oz. Plymouth Gin
1 ½ oz. Ketel One Vodka (from the freezer)
½ oz. dry vermouth
Shake sharply over ice. Strain into a chilled martini glass. Garnish with a blue-cheese stuffed olive.
Enjoy your Fat Cat Martini responsibly.
If you liked this Fat Cat Martini post, you might also enjoy:
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September 1st, 2010
Posted in
cocktail recipes |
7 comments
“I’ve been through hell. It’s hard to think you have this life, and then all of a sudden – was it a lie? You’re struggling because it wasn’t real. But I survived. It was hard, but it didn’t kill me.”
Those are the words of Elin Nordegren, the ex-wife of Tiger Woods, now that their divorce is final. Tiger Woods, of course, had a string of tawdry affairs, complete with sexy text messages, behind Elin Nordegren’s back. He kept them secret, and maintained a very public image as a family man, with Elin unwittingly playing a starring role as his partner.
Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren Divorce Agreement
Her words could have been said by anyone who’s gotten divorced.
For that matter, her words could have been said by any person, period.
All of us go through experiences where we wake up at the end, and wonder – was it a lie? Maybe it was a marriage gone bad, or a promising investment that fell short, or a job that didn’t fulfill you in the way you hoped. You expect one thing, and then something entirely else manifested. You struggle with the experience, and only after the fact can you make sense of it.
You struggle to make sense because the experience in and of itself wasn’t real.
I’m not Buddhist, but years ago I spent three days at a seminar led by the Dalai Lama where he taught the Heart of Buddhist wisdom. Nothing has intrinsic meaning. i.e. No thing has meaning in and of itself. Any meaning we attach to an object or event is an illusion created by our minds. How we view the world is based on everything we’ve ever been through. No two people have the same perspective. Any meaning we attach to the world is our own imagining.
Buddhism is heady stuff. If you’ve never dabbled in Buddhist teachings, these concepts can be hard to accept.
The Game of Life and How to Play it
I taught my kids the nothing has meaning concept this way: say my daughter brings home a piece of candy and sets it on the table for later. My son comes home, sees the candy, and eats it. What is the intrinsic meaning of his act? There is none…. My daughter is upset (that’s the meaning she attaches to him eating her candy). My son is delighted (he got a piece of candy for free!) or maybe guilty (once he realizes how his sister feels). I am frustrated that my son didn’t respect his sister’s candy, and they are quarreling because of it. Once again – the act had no meaning in and of itself. Any meaning is something we each individually attached to the act, in our minds.
I know my mind spent six months after that three-day seminar raging against the Dalai Lama’s teachings. I was a successful Silicon Valley engineer. My ego was king, and logic ruled my days. I was in charge of my own destiny, and I could create any meaningful life I desired. My career, my accomplishments, my home, my life – all had meaning!
Or so I thought.
Eventually, I came to understand the timeless wisdom of the Buddhists – that no thing has intrinsic meaning. It’s all in our minds.
Or, as the band Tool might say: we’re all wallowing in our own chaotic insecure delusions.
The reality of Elin Nordegren’s marriage would be painful for anyone to experience. No one wants to be betrayed by their most intimate relation. That said, I think we fall short if we simply blame Tiger for Elin’s plight. Tiger Woods was Tiger Woods. Elin Nordegren and much of the rest of the world had a view of her marriage that didn’t match that marriage’s reality. Our view, and Elin’s view, was an illusion. (That doesn’t give Tiger a pass for his actions.)
Tiger and Elin – Can Marriage Survive an Affair?
The same can be said about our views toward anything in life.
It’s hard to think you have this life, and then all of a sudden – was it a lie? You’re struggling because it wasn’t real.
We all are struggling against our own views of the world that aren’t real. So many of our fears and worries never pan out. They’re just noise in our head. Even when the shit hits the fan, and our marriage turns out to be not what we wanted, or our jobs turn out to be not as stable as we hoped, or our romantic relations turn out to be more trouble than they are worth.
All the pain attached to those problems are due to our mindsets. We play things over in our minds, time and again, searching for the thread that will magically set things right. But there is no magic thread. Nothing has meaning in and of itself.
But wait! I’ve lost everything! All I held dear is gone! I have nothing left!
Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth – Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose
Let go of your attachments. Let be what will be. Maybe you’re not supposed to be living the lifestyle you’re currently clutching, the one you have a stranglehold on. Maybe you were meant for a different calling.
You can still be happy.
In the case of Elin Nordegren and Tiger Woods – if Elin clings to the image of her marriage, wondering why it fell apart, she’ll struggle to make sense of Tiger’s world. If she lets go and moves on, she’ll have a chance to heal.
The Dalai Lama suggests that the purpose of life is to be happy, and the way to happiness is by giving love from a compassionate heart.
That’s it.
If you liked this Elin Nordegren divorce has Buddhis lessons post, you might also enjoy:
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August 31st, 2010
Posted in
life |
10 comments
This past weekend, I went for a massage at a spa I’d never visited before. The place was nice, and the people there were friendly.
Best of all, there was a very fit and attractive 20-something female therapist waiting for a client like me to walk in the door.
Now, now, get your head out of the gutter. This wasn’t a seedy massage parlor.
Where’s the Happy Ending?
It was a reputable spa with certified massage therapists. But if there’s going to be nothing between me and my massage therapist’s hands except for a towel and some oil, I figure there’s nothing wrong with the therapist being a fit and healthy woman. In fact, I sort of prefer it.
The spa manager asked what sort of massage I wanted – medium pressure? Light? Strong? The place offered hot stone, Thai, Swedish, and a handful of other modalities.
I was tempted to say “light touch with the hottie therapist over there!” A pampering touch from her would be nice. But I knew my body really needed a good deep tissue massage. Either way, I wanted this 20-something woman to work on me. She was fit and healthy, and I figured she’d have a nice strong touch. (Okay, and maybe I wanted to date her. So sue me! Haha)
Older Men and Younger Women – What’s the Allure?
I told the manager “deep tissue.” I didn’t get into details of which therapist should do the work. The 20-something woman in the waiting room was the only soul around, so why bother? The manager showed me to a room and left me to get on the table. But when the therapist walked in, it wasn’t the fit young 20-something hottie…
An old woman walked in. Gray hair, thick glasses, tons of wrinkles, petite but strong. I swear, she looked like Yoda.
“Do you want me to walk on your back?” she asked.
Interesting start to a massage. My kids have walked on my back before, but never a massage therapist.
“Sure, go for it,” I said.
Yoda hopped up on the table, and started walking on my back. No, she didn’t walk – she danced on my back. Like a Cirque du Soleil aerialist, she waltzed and twirled and tumbled her way up and down my spine. It was unreal! Turns out there were bars on the ceiling for her to hold onto, so she could control how much weight she put on my back.
Or rather, so she could pirouette and put all her weight onto just one toe. Damn, she gave my back a workout.
After fifteen minutes of back walking, Yoda got down onto the floor and started working on my back with her hands.
“There’s so much tension here,” she said. “You have tiny little stones in your muscles.”
Ya think?! She’d just jack-hammered my back with her feet, so I wasn’t too surprised.
She went to work, using hands, elbows, arms, until the pebbles were putty. I was almost starting to relax, when all of a sudden, I coughed. Once.
Yoda stopped. “Hang on, I’ll get you some tea,” she said.
She left the room and came back with Chinese tea. Not only did it cure my dry throat and keep me from coughing, but it helped me relax even more. She kept working, and finally put a hot towel on my back.
At that point, I was nearing bliss.
By the time she finished, I no longer minded that she wasn’t the lithe young hottie I had seen when I entered the place. In fact, next time I go to that spa, I’ll be sure to ask for Yoda.
Knows she massage. Thanks her my back.
If you liked this massage therapy post, you might also enjoy:
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August 30th, 2010
Posted in
life |
9 comments
I pride myself on being plugged into the alt-rock scene, going on thirty years. When a song comes on the Bay Area’s one and only Live 105, I can usually name that tune in seven notes (more or less). When it came to music, my teens didn’t realize how cool I was until some high school boys reacted when my daughter told them I liked some bands they knew.
“Your dad’s so cool!” they said.
Ah, yes. Cool Dad points scored.
I eventually took my daughter to see Smashing Pumpkins at the Fillmore. I bought tickets to take my kids to U2 (the show was postponed a year after Bono hurt his back. Why couldn’t he perform in a wheelchair, my son wondered?) I’ve seen Pearl Jam perform five times. I listen to Muse.
I wasn’t scoring more cool points, but that wasn’t the point. My daughter has her own taste in music. Hip-pop, pop, and the occasional alt-rock band she likes on her own terms. (Like Muse. I stole my taste for that band from her.)
One thing I do to keep my alt-rock coolness in tact is to learn at least one random fact about each band I hear.
Take Phoenix, for instance, with their song “1901″. Very catchy tune. Random fact: their lead singer Thomas Mars is married to filmmaker Sofia Coppola. My daughter asked how on earth I know so much about the band Phoenix. I admitted I actually know almost nothing – except that one song, and the marital tidbit. But spouting pithy comments makes me sound uber-plugged-in.
My daughter is off at college now. Not a week into university life, she texted me out of the blue:
Guess what band is coming to play at my school! Phoenix!!! I’m gonna go!
Okay, I admit. I’m jealous. I’d like to see that band play.
And on that note, I must say – Cool Daughter points scored. In spades.
Band Phoenix, 1901 official video
If you liked this Phoenix band post, you might also enjoy:
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August 27th, 2010
Posted in
music |
8 comments
I daily get emails from PR firms “reaching out” to inform me about a “study” or to ask me to mention a “worthy cause” that is associated with their name-brand client. Sometimes the Public Relations firm skips the charity angle completely and tells me about a new product or service from their client that “would be of interest to Dad’s House blog readers.”
I have to admit, some of these products and services sound pretty nice. Dream vacations in tropical resorts. Cutting edge safety products to protect the kids. Selective auctions and giveaways and online-only deals.
The problem? The PR firms aren’t asking me to advertise for their client. Instead, they’re operating “word of mouth” and “social media marketing” campaigns, and trying to get me to blog about their client’s offerings with no payment to me.
i.e. the PR firm is getting paid handsomely to ask me to pimp their client’s products for free.
Can we all say it together? WTF!?!?
The companies hiring the PR firms are clearly interested in the demographic reach of parenting blogs like Dad’s House. The companies want to connect with a blog’s built-in reader base. Blog visitors tend to arrive at a blog ready, willing, and wanting to be engaged by a blog post. There’s value in that. Companies know. As a blogger, I have “sway”.
What those companies conveniently forget is that I’ve worked my ass off to build up my readership and demographic reach. They like that I’ve been interviewed by CNN.com, ABC News Now video, CBS radio, and the Toronto Globe & Mail – yet, the companies and their Public Relations lackeys want to leverage what I’ve built without giving me a dime.
Even blogs with a small readership can offer value to businesses. Every blogger has a sphere of influence over their readers, and businesses covet that. Readers tend to trust their favorite bloggers, at lesst to a certain extent. If a blogger says a product is good, those readers are more likely to believe that the product actually is good.
Blogger Happy Hour – Bloggers I’ve Met in Real Life
Corporate America knows that. And they want to profit on our hard labor, for free.
Can we all say it again? WTF!!!!
It’s not as if these companies don’t have money to spend. Many of them are multi-billion-dollar corporations. They’re paying the Public Relations people, including some of the highest-end PR firms in New York. The companies pay celebrities huge amounts to endorse their products. Why can’t they throw some money to bloggers, too?
(NOTE: if someone offers to pay you to set up a text link from your blog to their site, don’t do it. Paid links violate search engine guidelines. You can report paid links to Google.)
One recent PR firm asked me to promote a new water bottle for their client. What was in it for me, I asked? A free water bottle, of course! To which I wondered: who can afford to work for a free bottle of water? I asked the PR contact if she was giving away her professional services in exchange for nothing more than a water bottle.
She never wrote back.
A Teen Boy’s Voss Water Addiction
I’m not the only blogger being asked to promote corporate products and services for free. Two years ago, Queen of Spain blogged about this very topic with her post, The Business of Mommy Blogging. The post reminded parent bloggers that our personal blogs are our brand. And businesses value the blogging brands we’ve built. Case in point: Disney paid Queen of Spain “$6,000 for what essentially amounted to a few emails, a survey, and a meeting.” Talk about valuing her insights as a blogger!
Why do businesses value the reader demographics of a blog like Queen of Spain or Dad’s House or any other parenting blog? Bloggers have something these companies desperately want for themselves – namely, an audience, an opinion, a pulse on some corner of the world.
To all the PR firms “reaching out” and asking me to pimp their client’s products for free – save your breath and pass me along to your client’s advertising team. I’m happy to provide banner ad space, or pen a sponsored post, for a fee that reflects my demographic reach. My blog is worth more than free.
To all you bloggers, it’s time to conduct our own word-of-mouth campaign. Let it be known that PR firms and their corporate clients are trying to get something valuable from bloggers for nothing. And that ain’t right.
If you liked this parenting blogger post, link to it! Like it on Facebook! Tweet it! Tell your friends! Start our own “word of mouth” campaign. And meanwhile, you might also enjoy these…
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August 26th, 2010
Posted in
blog tips |
25 comments
As a blogging single dad who’s been on the dating scene for some ten years, I’ve come in contact with a lot of single women. And let me tell you, a fair number of them are obsessed with their own breasts.
To which I say: WTF?!?!?!?!?!
I was reminded of this boob obsession when I recently engaged in an email chat with a woman who I had only just met online.
Besides giving me 2 or 3 details about herself – enough for me to find everything about her via google – she mentioned her breasts as early and often as possible. Among the things she wrote in our 30 minutes of chatting:
- “I’m a 36DD”
- “I’m stacked”
- “I have a nice rack”
Okay, I get it! She only had to say it once. And actually, she didn’t have to say it at all. Wouldn’t I notice her big boobs as soon as I met her?
A Blind Date Asks: Do You Find Me Attractive?
I’ve encountered other women who are the opposite – they have a lack of cleavage, and wonder aloud if they should get some artificial augmentation. After all, men like big breats. Right?
Wrong. (Sigh.) Some of us like the whole woman. Or, when focusing only on the physical, some of us like women who are slender and fit, or big and voluptuous, or height weight proportionate… Bust size doesn’t matter.
Why are some women so obsessed with their breasts?
For the record, I’m an ass man. I like a woman with hips, and a firm butt – a runner or cyclist will turn my head every day. If she’s smaller up top? I don’t care!! In fact, I prefer it. The smaller-busted women I’ve met tend to be more wiling to go for a run or a hike than the women with bigger breasts.
The men I know don’t talk about their size of their ____. At least not constantly. And they don’t ask publicly in a blog: should I get my ____ enhanced? (Fill in the ____ with whatever term you like. But you know what I’m talking about. Just trying to keep things PG-13!)
God gave each of us different body types and different gifts. A woman’s worth isn’t wrapped up in her cleavage. The next time a woman I meet tells me her bra size, I’ll heave a WTF sigh, wonder why she brought it up…
then see how quickly (and easily!) I can get into her pants…. ha!
Just kidding!!! Sort of. Or not…
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August 24th, 2010
Posted in
dating |
27 comments
