Can’t complain too much. We got exactly five years out of that Wii. Scored one the day they were released in 2006 and had it under the tree for Christmas that year. That thing got played an obscene amount. Back then the kids were 5 and 9. It was pretty perfect. I liked that it was mostly breezy, non-commitment type stuff. Nintendo changed the fucking game with the system. Everyone pointed and laughed at first, but Sony and Microsoft sure did rush to do motion control of their own. I don’t think either of them would have if the Wii hadn’t come along. It was nice to see Nintendo on top again. I’m a fanboy – always had Nintendo systems. When they’re on, they’re the best.

One of my favorite bands was Saigon Kick (unfortunately famous for “Love Is On The Way” in the early 90′s). Owl Stretching is their Guitarist/Vocalist and a few other guys who’d been officially or unofficially in the band (or not) making new tunes and it really sounds a lot like old SK.

My wife and daughter were on rake and removal. Little man had the shovel and wheelbarrow and did a great job going down the curb. I fired up the lawn mower and made a mess with a combo of its mulching ability, bagging capability and general ease of spitting leaves into the woods. Then I doubled over the entire yard – essentially mowing the week before Christmas.

It was still pretty wet. Leaves were packed and stuck. The yard was a mess, but we made an impact. It at least looks like we care now. It’s really only three months (probably less) until we need to start thinking about maintaining outside again. I hope we can get on top of it. That’s the one place I feel like we’ve let things go since we moved it. We started off strong that first spring/summer and then just petered out. It really needs some attention. I’d like to get some curb appeal going.

For the record, 80′s hair band White Lion had Vito power.

2. Daughter’s party went well. This year we didn’t have the adult support and it was a little crazier for us. Next year we need to make sure we have that covered.

3. We got a total of two trick-or-treaters this year…and they came 85 minutes in to the two hours. I even put the fog machine and lights and stuff from the party out to try to attract them and pull them down the cul-de-sac. Not sure if I should step it up with full-sized candy bars and full decor and try to build a following or just say fuck it and accept that kids don’t want to come down our cul-de-sac.

We’re busy right now with the annual halloween/birthday party for my daughter. My son usually has a friend over too and they run around the yard and the woods trying to scare the older kids. Last year was a ‘generic’ halloween theme – standard scary stuff – titled “Lucky 13″ for her 13th Birthday. This year it’s a research lab accident/mad scientist/shit has gone bad theme. We did invitations that we’re all official sounding – as if you we’re privvy to inside info. Very subtlely at the bottom in small font we put: www.researchfacility14.com password:number14

The kids seem to dig it. We’re in the process of setting the garage and deck up and getting it all into theme. Hopefully, I get some photos or video or something. The bad news is that the Camaro doesn’t get to sleep in the garage for the next 4 nights.

I’m also semi-simultaneously working on this year’s DVD set for the football team. Last year’s was such a hit that I think I’ve become the guy who does this for the team. Recording the games is cool and I know the coaches use it as a tool, so I’m contributing in my own special way. The parents and boys love the DVD’s. The entire season’s games are on there along with highlights, music videos and more candid stuff. It’s my job to make 10 year old boys look like rock stars. Amazing how some decent football plays edited in sync to some pump-up music can achieve this to great effect. I have less than three weeks to deliever a finished product to everyone at the end-of-season party. The weird thing is that I actually feel some pressure to up the ante, so to speak. You kinda have to outdo the last one, right?

Then it’s Thanksgiving…and holiday shopping and X-mas and New Year’s and stuff.

I, personally, don’t understand the concept of going ‘too far’ with most things and Halloween is certainly not the exception. Hell, it’s the rule. It’s the one time when it’s kind of okay to go a little too far. What can I say? I like things to be all or nothing.

We had heard a lot about a Haunt in Columbus called the Haunted Hoochie. The idea whas that it’s a bit more extreme than your standard Haunt fare (which is usually midly humorous at best). Here’s a quick video:

Honestly, the video show the best of it all. That’s not to say it wasn’t cool. It was. But I think I had myself expecting a little more. On a scale of 1-to-10 with 1 being family friendly and 10 being the extreme end of things, I’d put this in the 5 or 6 range. Crazy stuff. The actors touched you, which was neat. I think a few with the chainsaws were getting kind of ‘friendly’ when the girls came through too…and I think that’s all totally cool as long as you understand as a visitor what you’re getting into.

For comparison, the average theme park haunt stuff is probably a 2, maybe 3 for the better things on my scale.

Like, really. I don’t get the idea that this stuff is any more than silly, forgettable fun. We kep saying we’d like to see someone really push it and do an 18+ haunt and really fuck with you. Face it, as an intelligent adult, nothing they do can truly ‘scare’ me. It’s a show. I’m not a moron. But you can do things that will stick with me. Show me fucked up stuff. Or totally fuck with my head. A friend on Facebook recently posted a promo video for a Haunt in NYC that seems to be taking the latter approach and really trying to mind fuck people:

It’s cool because there’s a set of rules attached to visiting:

1. YOU MUST WALK THROUGH ALONE.
2. You must be over 18.
3. Stay on the marked path at all times.
4. You will be prompted to do certain actions. Please do exactly as you’re told. This is for your safety.
5. There is absolutely no speaking allowed inside. You can, however, scream as loud as you’d like.
6. Do not ever touch the actors.
7. Do not ever touch the walls.
8. You must wear a protective mask and carry a flashlight at all times.

That’s a pretty good start. Although I think my approach would be almost entirely the other direction. I’d want to leave you with imagery that would take a while to shake.

Interestingly, we’ve started a yearly tradition with a Halloween party for my daughter’s birthday and we hope to keep doing it for my son once she gets too old. I’ve been checking out different forums for ideas, inspiration and tips. One post caught my eye recently on one forum that was titled, “Over the Top? WARNING, graphic image”

I clicked eagerly thinking this was my kind of thing and it might be something I could incorporate for our party. So I click it and what do I see? This:

Whadda you think, is this over the top? I don’t mind pushing the comfort zone, but there are limits.

For real? On my scale this is a 1. Completely harmless, silly and forgettable.

The most interesting thing were the replies. Oddly enough (to me, at least), there were people who thought this was too extreme. No one seemed to find it uninteresting, boring and trite as I thought.

Then today on Facebook, Cedar Point posted something about their Halloweekends event and one of the replies to the photo posted (of a character getting makeup done) basically complained of the actors getting too close. I’m thinking, “My God. The experience at Cedar Point is as tame as it gets. It’s a fun, silly vibe that I’m totally ok with taking my kids through.” and here’s what I believe to be an adult saying they feel like it goes a little too far.

I have no point really – that’s the case with a lot of crap I post here. Just a random concept. An idea. A realization. It’s funny how different we all are and where we draw those lines.

…and, how fucked up am I really?

Or more correctly – how fucked up is everyone else?

On a side note, when I mentioned the idea to my son, he was concerned that we’d go to jail if we got fireworks. Which was really cute and made me realize that we’re doing something right. I’d be lying if I said a small smile and a bit of a tear didn’t come to my eye.

Then I told him, “Fuck the police!”

The wife had to work, so we decided to be a little unorthodox this year. We figured we’d give the kids Easter baskets (and the over-gifting gifts we’ve become guilty of) in the afternoon. This was interesting because my son is alarmingly late in figuring out the fantasy characters of our youth (Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus) are not real. I don’t want to have to physically say, “Look…” so between today’s weirdness and a few well placed comments I think the light bulb is starting to click…a little…maybe.

Speaking of being unorthodox and bucking tradition, this year we’ve made a semi-conscious effort to do untraditional meals on traditional meal days. Most people do pork on New Year’s. This year we did Sushi. Easter dinner usually means ham. Today we did rack of lamb. Turned out fucking terrific. We did garlic and rosemary frenched rack of lamb and I fucking crushed it. Seared them perfectly. We also tried two other new-to-us recipes and paired that lamb with French Onions (I’m becoming a worcestershire sauce fiend) and simple scalloped potatoes that may have been among the best potatoes we’ve ever made…hell, among the best we’ve ever had. Some simple green bean casserole and garlic/cheese rolls rounded out things. We also took the 20-some odd egges we colored and turned them into 4 different flavors of deviled eggs. Who knew you could get so creative with a simple deviled egg? Awesome fucking dinner.

We overgifted the kids again considering it was Easter. We always do. My son scored a basketball hoop and new ball and some lego shit. My daughter got a new phone and a bunch of jewelry and accessories.

On the plus side, we now look like every douchey house on every douchey cul-de-sac with a douchey hoop in the douchey driveway standing there all douchily.

Now that I talked about them, I think I want some of those deviled eggs…

This year we didn’t go apeshit like last year. We still got great gifts, but did it with more laser-like precision as opposed to last years bulldozer-of-goodies mentality. My son got the laptop he’d been begging for since summer. (we’re now a three laptop/one desktop family) My daughter got the iPod upgrade she’d wanted. She now has a sweet new 16GB nano that she loves. And we finally moved totally into the present and replaced the last old-school CRT TV (in our bedroom) with a sweet 42″ LCD. Now every TV in the house is HD.

It was a very efficient Xmas. Stuff went up (admittedly half-heartedly) on the 11th and it came down the 27th. 16 days.

It always seems weird to me that people totally redecorate their house for 8 weeks out of the year. This year we cut it very short, but I’ve never been a “Thanksgiving to New Year’s” kind of guy.

We’ve done real trees since moving to Ohio (before that it was usually fake) and this year’s was the saddest of all. We waited so long that unless we were willing to pay a small fortune, we got stuck with an undersized, underloved piece of shit tree…and that’s what we got. I’ll maintain until the end of time that it was the worst tree ever. And I felt kinda bad because my son seemed so into it this year, but we’re finally getting to the point where we can drop the Santa pretense next year and I think that’s going to shift the focus and tone of the holidays for us. We’re becoming older as a family.

I already want to go back to the artificial tree, but I want a really nice one and I want at least a 12-footer and I want to put it in the entry and I want decorate the fuck out of it next year. And everyone can grab presents from the tree and bring them into the office/sitting room or the living room and open them. I’m creating a new level of Christmas in my mind. And upon sharing that thought with the wife (and kids to lesser degree) I can see the light bulb going off.

It feels like change is in the air. 2011 starts with my wife beginning her new job. (her last day at her current job is Friday the 31st) and she starts by flying to St. Louis for two weeks. This is the first year we have no plans to buy a season pass for any amusement park and no plans to travel in any meaningful way during the summer. We hopes to finally get a lot of stuff done around the house and spend more time outside. We’re going to get back on track with our weight (which we semi-abandoned in the fall). I haven’t had a haircut in months and am sporting a beard. My wife just went from her natural color with blonde highlights to a darker base with beautiful red streaks throughout and a modified style. My daughter continues to excel in school and is on the yearbook staff and joined a group that does competitive writing. She’ll find out if she made the actual team that travels to compete in mid-January. My son continues to enjoy artistic pursuits (he’s already gunning to get something in this year’s district art show again at school) and is evolving with his interest in football wanting to actively prepare for the 2011 season.

None of it was conscious either. It just seems like this is all happening and when I sit back and assess it, it’s all coming together organically. On all levels from big important things to little stupid things. I’m not sure what it means or that it matters. But there’s something there.

2011 motherfuckers.

Hoping it will turn into this kind of bearded situation for me soon: