A Christmas Branch

We have not had a Christmas tree in several years, well not one that met the minimum standards of the wife and kids.  During our first Christmas in Texas (2006), we lived in a second floor apartment.  We did not have a tree for Christmas.  We put the presents in a pile by the couch if I remember correctly.  I don’t even think we wrapped most of them.  It was our first Christmas without a big family gathering though my cousin and (then) fiancé came over for Christmas breakfast.  The day after Christmas, my mother arrived from Indiana and brought us a 3’ tall Christmas tree that she purchased on clearance at a Cracker Barrel restaurant on the way down.  It had Christmas lights built into it and came apart in (2) pieces for easy storage.

By 2007 we had moved into a house that we were leasing.  We re-used the 3’ Christmas tree but still stacked the presents up near the couch (there was not much room under that small of a tree).  I think we tried to repeat this same set up in 2008 (we were still in the same leased house) but by that time we had either lost the little tree or it was broken.  The next Christmas (2009) had us back in Indiana again and in a house that we purchased but we still did not put up a tree.

Previous to 2006 we had always had a tree (even before our children were born).  Early in our marriage (when we lived in a house with tall ceilings) we bought a 9’ real tree and put it in the front entry way.  I remember that I had to climb up the stairway to decorate the top 1/3 of it.  We bought an artificial tree after that and drug it out year after year.  So, our current draught of Christmas trees is (4) years as we decided not to pack the tree in the moving van on our way to Texas.

If I had my way, we would continue this glorious run of no Christmas trees.  As you can probably tell, I am no big fan of Christmas trees.  They are a pain to put up, a pain to decorate, a pain to maintain (e.g. keep the pets off them) and a pain to take down and put away (a sad reminder that the Christmas season is gone).  I am no Scrooge, I just don’t get into Christmas trees.  The wife and kids have (unsuccessfully) lobbied for a tree each of the last (4) years.  They use the same bullet points each year (evidently using the “let’s wear Daddy down” technique).  This year they are starting early (last week) but they appear that they do not have anything new to bring to the table for their side of the argument.

As I was thinking about this recently, I remembered a made for TV, Christmas special called “Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas” that I watched over and over when I was young.  I seem to recall it being on HBO quite a lot so there were opportunities to watch it 10+ times each year.  I even found a copy on DVD at the local library a few years back and made the kids watch it (they were not impressed).  Anyway, the reason I remember this show is that Emmet Otter and his mother (Ma Otter) did not have a Christmas tree.  Apparently Emmit’s father (who evidently had died some years earlier) always meant to go out and cut down a Christmas tree each year but instead always returned with only a branch, a Christmas branch.  He just could not bring himself to kill a tree in honor of the holiday.  I like this idea.  I like this idea a lot.

I offered this concept to the wife as a compromise.  We have plenty of evergreen trees on our property and we could even make it a family tradition.  She was cold to the idea initially and still is.  However, if I use their technique against them (the “wear them down” technique) I might be successful.  I have high hopes.  There is still plenty of time for more arguments to be made, more appeals to tradition, more sad and pitiful children’s eyes looking up at me begging.  I will have to be strong.

I will keep you posted and share pictures of either our tree or our branch (hopefully our Christmas branch).

Jon

The Least I Can Do

The wife came home from work yesterday in a pretty good mood.  She had just came from the chiropractor’s office for her bi-weekly visit (that’s every 2 weeks, not twice a week) as her appointment was right after work.  She was a little more affectionate than normal towards me (not that she is normally not affectionate).  A extra touch on the shoulder here, an extra hug there, etc.  This usually only means one thing, namely she dealt with or spoke to a woman during the day whose husband did or said something wrong.

Over the years I have been the benefactor of other bad husband’s actions.  This is great for me as I don’t even have to to anything to appear above standard (husband-wise) but reap the benefits of this status anyway.  I have to endure the “story” of a husband’s or boyfriend’s actions and of course appear sympathetic but that is all that is required of me.  Other than that, I only need to maintain the normal husband behavior.

It is particularly good for me if one of the wife’s friends are the ones having the husband issues.  The updates on the behavior(s) are more frequent and thus I look all the better for it.  Over the years she has had several friends who have had husbands that do not live up to the husbandly standard.  The infractions could be husbandly or fatherly (not being a good father to their child / children).  Evidently I also meet the standard for fatherly duties so compared to these other, substandard fathers I compare favorably.  Again, as a father I just do what comes naturally, no more or no less.

I would like to tell you that I try very hard to be a good husband / father but honestly I really do the least of what is required of me with an occasional over the top performance (you know, to break the monotony).  My standards are based on some unknown list of requirements that I must have picked up from somewhere over the years.  I mean, there are the socially agreed upon minimum requirements of course: provide for the family, etc, but beyond that I don’t do much else.  But I do look pretty good compared to those who don’t even do the minimum.

In a few weeks I am scheduled to sing a special song in church service.  I chose a song that talks about what wives and children expect of their husband / father and the singer’s admitted short comings in those areas.  Ultimately he realizes he will need help from elsewhere (in this song, God) to know what to do.  It is a very emotional song for me so I hope I can get through it.  This song helps to remind me that I just cannot run on autopilot most of the time but really do need to realize that there are those that look up to me and depend on me daily to be the leader.  I hope I can remember that.

http://www.sanctusreal.com/ – you can hear the song and watch the video / story behind the song at the band’s website

Jon

Can’t Undo

The wife went to the grocery store the other day (actually it was Tuesday).  Tuesday is the normal grocery day.  It is also the day we pick up our milk at the dairy farm (our assigned pick up day).  Invariably she will ask me if I need anything while she is shopping.  I rarely think of anything (in time) to tell her but even when I do, there are not good odds that it will be remembered (at least not the first time I ask).  I tend to ask for bathroom products like shampoo, deodorant or shaving cream.  Last week I asked for cotton swaps (Q-tips) but did not get them.  I was forced to dig around the bathroom cupboard for q-tips that had fell out of the container and settled on the shelves.  A new box was purchased but it was touch and go as the next grocery day approached as I had to look harder and harder each day.

This week I asked for (and did not receive) toothpaste.  I could head up front to the kid’s bathroom and borrow some of theirs but I am a little concerned that it might not be hygienically wise to do so.  My only other choice was to try to squeeze more toothpaste out of our near empty container.  I forget the name of the brand we currently use but the tube is quite hard and difficult to roll up to free up the last of the liquid inside.  I worked at it for a few minutes with little progress until the last turn produced toothpaste.  Too much toothpaste actually and I ended up with a large glob on the end of my tooth brush.  Anyone who has tried can tell you that you cannot put toothpaste back in the container.  You just can’t undo this, sort of like cutting your fingernails too short.  Now by “large glob” I mean the normal amount that they show in the toothpaste commercials on TV.

Sorry for the small picture size but I didn’t take a picture of my toothbrush this morning nor did I spend a lot of time with Senor Google searching for a comparable picture.  I was always amazed at the amount of product placed on the toothbrush in those commercials.  Does anyone use this much toothpaste really?  It seems like overkill.  Your mouth would foam up and you would look like a rabid dog after a little scrubbing.  Well today, not wanting to waste anything, I actually used this much toothpaste.  At first it felt odd, like I had taken a bite of some bad dessert.  Then the foaming began.  My mouth could not contain the foam as it rapidly multiplied in my mouth.  I pressed on though hitting the back teeth scrubbing away (and producing even more foam).  My foam creating kept going as I made another pass around the 27 teeth I have left (4 were pulled when I was younger right before I got braces and 1 was pulled a few years ago as it was a back tooth and was cheaper than getting a cap).  Anyway, it finally ended and my teeth were no more clean than normal brushing usually produces.  I am hopeful that the wife will remember toothpaste soon so this incident is not reproduced.

Jon

No Boxed Dinners

A long standing joke between the wife and I while we are shopping is for me to throw a box of Hamburger Helper in the cart.  This is usually met with “The Look” (married guys, you know what I mean) and then followed by me putting the box back on the shelf (quickly).  Early in our marriage (and even when we were dating), we went through many a hamburger helper box.  I seem to recall that being a positive for the argument to marry me (that I could cook, a little).  Since we became more educated about nutrition, items like hamburger helper started to be weeded out of our diet.  Some of my favorite flavors were Potato Stroganoff, Cheeseburger Macaroni, and Zesty Italian.  We probably tried them all at one time or another I imagine.  But that life (and culinary pleasure) is a distant memory for me since our ecu-ma-cation about nutrition.

You would be hard pressed to look in our cupboards and find even a can (let alone a box) of anything.  All our vegetables are either fresh or frozen.  If we make any meal, it is usually from the ground up, nothing pre-packaged.  Even cheese has to come in block form and we either slice it or shred it as needed…

This is the lunch I made for the daughter last Saturday.  I got this grilled cheese just right (according to her) which entailed the correct thickness of cheese slice and the correct amount of butter on the outside of the bread and the correct temperature for the pan / duration of grilling time per side.  The “ants on a log” took some prep time as well (using all natural peanut butter).  These raisons DO come from a can but I am not sure if you can get them in anything other than a can or box.  Even the tea is freshly brewed (not instant) and lightly sweetened with raw sugar.  Up until just recently (before the wife started working part time) we even made most if not all of the bread that we ate (sigh, honey, please, can you get the bread machine back down and teach me how to use it?).

We have big plans next year to expand our gardening.  This year we just planted a few things, to see if we could do it.  I have blogged in the past about some of the things we pulled from the garden but next year will make this year’s produce look pretty paltry.  We have dreams of canning and / or freezing items for the winter like many other people do.  It seems we are just throwing away money at the grocery store due to our ignorance or lack of effort in gardening / canning.  I know my grandmother used to can items as I remember watching her and her daughters do it one summer and I could always go to the basement and see rows and rows of green beans, etc, on the shelves.  She even had a bumper crop of raspberry bushes one year and made (17) raspberry pies (which, by the way, I was sick of around number 10 or so).  Anyway, we have big plans for next year.

Well the wife and daughter are about home from gymnastics so I had better get dinner started.

Jon

Where Are You Going With That

The kids get up awful early on weekday mornings.  The son is up by 6:15 and the daughter by 6:30.  They don’t need to be up that early really as we do not leave the house to take them to school until around 8:00.  So, when I say they get up early I mean in comparison to how early they need to get up in order to be ready to leave by 8:00.  Anyway, the wife and I (and the dogs) are not up much earlier than 6:00.  I think we chose that time originally so we would have time to make some coffee and enjoy some quiet alone time on the couch before the kiddos got up.  That plan is not working out this school year thus far.  We still sit on the couch and we still enjoy coffee, it is just that we are neither alone nor is it quiet.  We could get up earlier I suppose but I fear that that reaction would only be met with the kids upping their alarm clocks too.  For now, this will have to do.

Since the kids get up so early, then tend to be ready (lunches packed, dressed and ready to go) with plenty of time to spare.  The son hops on the laptop to kill his time and the daughter usually spends a little of her extra time out in the garage or back yard with the kittens that have made our garage their home.  This morning she came bounding back in the house announcing that she had found a frog.  Now we have plenty of frogs and toads in the yard.  In fact I blogged about one such frog about 1 year ago.  Also, I tend to find toads in the yard while I am mowing the lawn.  They are frantically trying to get out of my way so I try to corral them toward the portion of the grass that has already been mowed.  So, her announcement seemed a little over the top.  She then went into the kitchen and grabbed a drinking glass and was heading back out side.  I wondered what she was going to do with the glass but then realized that she intended to capture this frog.  I was busy setting up my work computer so I could get logged on and work from home so the wife went out to inspect this frog.  This is what she found…

This is not a camera trick.  This very flat frog was about 3 foot off of the ground and hanging on to the side of our unfinished sun room.  It was not that big and I am not sure what the daughter was planning on doing with it after capturing it in the glass but we did manage to get a few pictures in lieu of making it a specimen.  By the time I went outside a few hours later he was no where to be seen.

The kids did go on a field trip to Koh Koh Mah today with their school.  You can click on the link to their website for more details but they had a great time.  The daughter brought home some sarsaparilla flavored rock candy.  She had never heard of this flavor before and found it hard to pronounce so she just called it root beer.  I did learn that the sarsaparilla plant was used as a treatment for syphilis up until 1910.  You learn something new everyday.  I remember having some sarsaparilla when we were on vacation one summer as a kid.  I forget where we were but I think it was out west.  That was over 30 years ago but I remember the flavor.  I think I might even have resorted to calling it root beer as well.

I hit the treadmill for the first time in a few months on Monday and then again on Tuesday but have yet to get back on it since then.  I fear my weight has picked back up due to inactivity and bad eating habits creeping back into my life.  So I had better get off here and into bed since this rock candy is right next to me here on the dining room table calling my name.  Hopefully the frog doesn’t scare me when I get up early and head out the treadmill tomorrow morning.

Jon

Fighting Carbon

I got an email the other day from my power company.  I don’t mean that I own a power company, I mean that it is the power company that I use to provide power to my house.  Anyway, they sent me an email.  I usually only get one email from them and that is when they want money.  I don’t mean that they need a loan, I mean that they want me to pay my bill for the power that they supply to my house.  Anyway, I had already got the normal, “hey buddy, you owe us money” email for the month so this one was not about my indebtedness to them but it did involve money.  They were suggesting that I consider purchasing Carbon Offsets.  Carbon Offsets (if you are too lazy to click on the link I provided) are…

a financial instrument aimed at a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions

I perused the Wikipedia article (unlike you) and found it quite interesting.  My favorite part was the Controversies section, especially this part…

Some activists disagree with the principle of carbon offsets, likening them to papal indulgences, a way for the guilty to pay for absolution rather than changing their behavior.  George Monbiot, an English environmentalist and writer, says that carbon offsets are an excuse for business as usual with regards to pollution.  Proponents hold that the indulgence analogy is flawed because they claim carbon offsets actually reduce carbon emissions, changing the business as usual, and therefore address the root cause of climate change.

I bolded my favorite phrase.  Talk about trying to respond to one group only using terminology that might offend another.  To disagree with the comparison in one thing, to “dis” the group used in the comparison is another.  Now I know that papal indulgences have not been recognized since the 1500’s, but still.  Overall, I just found it funny.

So back to my email, there was this environmentally friendly looking background picture…

Also, there was a link to the main carbon offset page along with a calculator to determine how many carbon offsets I would need to purchase in order to negate my carbon footprint.  I went through the calculator steps using the typical amount for their customers for a single family home < 1,500 sq ft and selecting that I heat my house with gas.  This told me that I put the equivalent of 2,461 lbs of carbon into the air.  Next I put in both my car’s mileage (15k for the van, 6k for the Buick) which brought my total to 3,876 lbs.  Next I entered that I travel exactly 0 miles (on airplanes) and I was told that I needed to buy 8 carbon offsets at $4 / month to offset my entire carbon production.  So a clean conscious can be had for $32 / month (a little less than $400 per year).  This is about 50% of my bill as is so I think I will pass for now.

This site offers more information if you are interested (don’t think I know that you won’t be clicking on this link even though I spent minutes finding it for you).  Well, I better power down the laptop and stop emitting for now.

Jon

Saying No To NFL

I have decided not to follow the Indianapolis Colts this year or for that matter any football (high school, college or professional).  I actually toyed with this idea in the off season but figured it would be a game time decision once the season started.  I was still undecided heading into the weekend.  I have read the stories of how the sport is too violent and then there are the few bad apples of players that bring the sport down.  I also (for whatever reason) do not like the emotional ride that occurs during a typical game (Colts games anyways).  I’m happy, I’m mad, I’m upset, I’m ecstatic then I am disappointed only to be lifted up again.  To some that is part of the joy of watching football but I don’t like the ride.  I think in the end it is the injuries that bother me the most (interesting site discussing, among other things, the lasting effect of ex nfl player’s injuries).  I know these guys choose on their own to play but I feel partly guilty in encouraging them to do so.  Anyway, I thought about all these things over the summer (with the bitter taste of a Colt’s super bowl loss still in my mouth).

Fast forward to this past weekend.  The Colts (being in the AFC) are typically broadcast on CBS.  I have never been able to pick up the Indianapolis CBS station with my Radio Shack rabbit ears.  I can get ABC and NBC and even Fox out of Indianapolis but never CBS.  I have been able to get the CBS affiliate out of Lafayette (a city about 30 miles to our west) but only if I put the rabbit ears about 3 foot in front of the tv and a few feet to the left of it.  They also have to be suspended about 5 to 6 foot in the air.  I usually accomplish this by scooting the coffee table over and then stacking all 9 seasons of Little House on the Prairie DVD sets on top of a few board game boxes (Yahtzee and Rummikub work well for this).  Even then the signal is weak and if anyone is in the hallway bathroom, the signal is interrupted.  I usually have to allow 30 minutes to set up my structure for my CBS reception in case I need to move it left or right or need to add or remove DVD sets.

I have not needed to use the CBS setup all summer long (I think I used it in April for The Masters golf tournament) so maybe I am a little out of practice or maybe the trees have grown between Lafayette and my house or maybe some other obstruction has been erected but I could not get even the weakest of signals.  And just like that my decision was made for me (for week 1 of the NFL season anyway).  The wife had the van so I could not drive to somewhere else to watch the game so I assumed the fates had made my decision.

I am not sure what I am supposed to do with my Sunday afternoons once the weather turns cold.  For now I will be OK as the outside can be enjoyed.  Soon though the temperature will turn colder and I will have to decide whether or not to stick with my decision (assuming the rabbit ears start picking up the station again).  I will have to keep you posted.

Jon