Be safe.

Say a Prayer for Our Military.

Have a happy Fourth of July!

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So, the Boss has decided that my recent success in winning contests (two in one year) means that I should enter more of them.  I went to Lavender Fields and entered their bedroom make-over contest.  It’s a small contest, really, not one that you’d be interested in.  I mean, you really don’t want to win a $3000.00 bedroom make-over, complete with a Pine Cone Hill bed set, decorative pillows, lighting, a Dash and Albert rug, wall art and accessories, or the paint selection assistance and general room layout assistance from Lavender Fields designers. First, you’d have to be willing to post two pictures of your bedroom on-line (here) and admit publicly that your bedroom is actually in the condition that it appears in the pictures.  Secondly, you’d have to fess up to your real name and the location of your home.  Most of us use pseudonyms here, so that’s another discouragement.  Then you’d have to go through the tedious prospect of culling through family and friends for votes.  Who wants that hassle? Besides, the designers who help you design your new room will not help you actually remodel your room.  If you win, you’ll have to do all that work yourself!

Rather than bothering with all of that, the easiest thing for you to do is to click this LINK, scroll down to the picture of my bedroom (Richard B., Lansing, Kansas), read a mildly entertaining paragraph about why you should vote for me NOW!, and click on “Vote for Richard B.”  Cast your votes for me NOW!   Remembering that since it is always better to give than to receive, you should give me your vote NOW!, since I gave you the information about how to give me your vote NOW!  Your kindness will be repaid with eternal gratitude and warm thoughts when I lay my head down on new pillows and peacefully drift off to sleep.

Next to the Boss.  

Who will undoubtedly poke me in the ribs and tell me to roll over because I’m snoring.  

Thanks for help!  

P.S.  Please consider voting for me, NOW!

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So, "I was looking for bedroom furniture and found great selection of Mission style oak and wood beds for my home at Barn Furniture Mart.”  Well, not really.  That’s what I am supposed to say in order to participate in a contest over at the Barn Furniture Mart. 

 

Let me repeat that.

 

Barn Furniture Mart!

 

 

You can find them over at www.barnfurnituremart.com.  

 

It’s not just any furniture that you can find at

 

Barn Furniture Mart.

 

You can find Amish Furniture at

 

Barn Furniture Mart,

 

as well as Dining Furniture at

 

Barn Furniture Mart.

 

 

Now that I have introduced you to the

 

Barn Furniture Mart,

 

 

you should head on over to www.barnfurnituremart.com, give a cursory look at their product lines, and then blog to enter the contest that brought about this inspired post.   Please remember that if you win the contest instead of me after learning about the contest from me you should really consider sharing the prize with me.  So, if you win the oak hope chest you might wish to give me the lid, or if you win the book shelves, I could use one shelf in my living room.

 

Just a thought.

 

Thanks, Twisted Sister, for sharing this contest on your blog!

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I’m not one to scare easily, unless you jump out from behind a door and yell, “Boo!”  Oh, I do have a healthy case of Ballistophobia.  If a bullet is heading my way, I usually duck.  Whenever someone points a bazooka at me I tend to scramble for cover.    Like most people, I am a bit Bolshephobic.  I have a fear of Bolsheviks.   I will also admit here and now that I have one darned good case of Politicophobia.  This probably comes from living in Chicago where you learn early in life that if a politician pats you on the back with their left hand you can be certain that their right hand is reaching for your wallet.   My fear of politicians only increased this morning when the Boss sent me a link to a news article about our cousins across the pond.  The UK’s Telegraph, “Britain’s #1 Quality Newspaper Website,” is reporting that the Tunbridge Wells Borough Council in Kent has banned the term “brainstorming” from use by borough staff.  The preferred terms are “thought showers” or “blue-sky thinking.”  In an excellent use of taxpayer’s pounds, the council already put staff through formal training to remove the offending verbiage from their lexicon.

 

I like the term “brainstorming.”  I use it in my writing instruction all of the time.  I used it in my classroom regularly.  Never once did I have a problem resulting from using the term “brainstorming.”   Maybe the problem was that I didn’t have any epileptics or mentally ill people in my classroom to complain that the use of the term “brainstorming” was offensive to them.  Apparently, the Tunbridge Wells Borough Council in Kent has had such complaints.  But, I take umbrage at the substitute terms suggested by the borough in Kent.  On behalf of Ombrophobes, Lilapsophobes, and Cyanophobes the world over, I protest!  The new terms are insensitive to people with genuine fears. 

 

How can we justifiably ask someone with a fear of being rained on to engage in “thought showers?”   That is horrendously insensitive to people who suffer from Ombrophobia.  They might drown in a pool of their own thoughts.   Equally appalling is asking a Cyanophobe, some one who is afraid of the color blue, to engage in “blue-sky thinking.”   It would be like asking Chicken Little to look up!  If we are to abolish anything, we must abolish the entire concept of generating ideas, as Lilapsophobes, people who fear tornadoes and hurricanes, might not be capable of brainstorming, an idea that the esteemed Tunbridge Wells Borough Council never developed in their extended original thinking sessions.

 

I’m sure that by now many of you are thinking, “Hey, Arby, You are being unfair.  You’re obviously a moronophobe.”  I may be guilty as charged, but I see insanity spreading in this world.  It’s a communicable disease that is well on its way to becoming a pandemic.  That makes me an Agateophobe. 

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Steph over at My Crazy Life: True Stories of a Home School Mom has a contest.  Head over to her blog and read about how you can win the new The Schoolhouse Planner from The Old Schoolhouse.   She ahs a lot of good things to say about this planner.  Thanks for the contest, Steph!

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Well, she did it.  She finally did it. She left me.  I must admit that I saw signs that this was coming, but I didn’t pay close attention.  Sometimes, we only see what we want to see.  Wednesday morning she packed a bag, put the boys in the car, and left.  For someone who leans so far to the right, this was a big move.  She left me and drove to her parent’s Wisconsin summer house. 

 

On vacation. 

 

Yep, the Boss headed through the rain soaked Midwest to spend a few days with her parents before deploying.  The boys are spending their time swimming in the lake behind the in-laws’ home.  When the boys are not swimming they are swimming.  Before bed, as a treat, they usually go swimming. 

 

I’m here at home with Captain Chaos, which is both peaceful and difficult.  She misses her brothers, and asks for Major Havoc. They briefly spoke on the phone yesterday.  It was fun to watch.  The Captain and the Major are 18 months apart in age.  They get along very well.  She wants me to fill his vacancy as play mate of choice (not to be confused with Playmate of choice, which is an entirely different subject!).  Two people living in this house is much quieter than five people living in this house, but I wouldn’t want it to be this way for very long.

 

Our family will be reunited tomorrow night, but not before I smoke a few pounds of (you know, I should leave that sentence hanging just to make you wonder) pork ribs for dinner tonight.  I caught a sale at our local grocery store, and I didn't have to play charades to get my pork. 

 

I hope you have a good weekend. 

 

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I decided yesterday that chickens are the rodents of the avian community.  I decided this while cleaning their cage.  Cleaning their cage gave me the opportunity to take some pictures.  Let me introduce

Clumsy

 

Newbie

 

Yoshi

 

And Trouble!

The first three birds sat peacefully for their photos.  Trouble ran around the top of the cage like a mad hen, chirping and flapping until she flew off into the recesses of the garage.  This made Captain Chaos quite agitated. 

And on a completely different note, General Mayhem's loft.  Nope, we don't require him to clean it.  It's his.  And no, Kellieann, there is no Va-Va-Voom in this room!

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A few years ago we decided to build a loft for the General in the room that he shares with the Major.  It was a project that the Boss had wanted to accomplish for a long time, and moving into a three bedroom house with five people gave her the perfect reason to build it.  The loft gave the oldest a place of his own, and effectively doubled the living space of the boys’ bedroom.   It was off-limits to the Major and the Captain unless they were specifically invited up by their older brother.

 

At that time, Major Havoc slept on a Little Tikes fire truck bed.  We decided to make the loft a fire station designed after the Waveland Avenue fire station  that stands on the north side of Waveland Avenue directly across from the left field bleachers at Wrigley Field in Chicago.  If you’ve ever watched a Cub pitcher serve up the long ball to an opponent and sat in awe of the majesty of a towering blast that sailed down the left field line, you’ve watched it bounce off of that fire station.  I know I have.  Too many times.   We were going to make a brick facade with open double doors and windows.  The Boss even thought of painting the wall opposite the fire station loft to look like the back side of Wrigley Field, complete with the giant green score board. To make it even more fun, we searched for a brass fire pole to install in the room.  We thought General Mayhem would have the best loft ever made if he had a real ladder to climb up to his loft and a fire pole to slide down. 

 

Ever try to buy a fire pole? 

 

We brainstormed ways to build a fire pole.  We could have installed galvanized pipe painted gold.  We could have tried a thick PVC pipe.  Neither looked like a good option.  I searched on-line and found manufacturers of genuine brass fire poles, but the prices were horrendously high.  Most manufacturers would not sell to a private citizen.  One guy told me that he was required to sell me the safety equipment, including the safety door for the floor of fire house, if he sold me the pole.   It was too much money and effort for a drop of four feet. 

 

Then Vita stepped into the picture. 

 

Vita was a co-worker at Midwest Airlines.  Vita’s dad, it turned out, managed an establishment that utilized genuine brass poles as stationary dance partners for the ladies who danced for their dollars.   She did not own one herself, but she was more than willing to provide me with catalogues from manufacturers who made and sold the brass poles.  Apparently, there is quite the industry selling brass poles to couples who install them in their bedroom. 

 

Who knew? 

 

I have to be entirely honest and say right here and now that it did not matter that the brass pole would have been used solely as a fire pole for a ten-year-old boy’s fire station loft.  I had a young daughter.  I would not have the adult entertainment industry’s equivalent of the merry-go-round’s brass ring in my house.   I just couldn’t do it. 

 

This all came to mind today when Captain Chaos came prancing into the room after having gone to the bathroom.  For months we’ve battled the young nudist on remaining dressed while she potties herself.  She’s in that phase where bathroom obligations can only be performed sans clothing.  Combine that necessity with a bladder the size of a snap pea and we find that every time we turn around there’s a little girl standing in front of us pointing at herself and saying, “Look!  Me, nakee girl!”  It has only been in the last few days that she decided to pick up her pants and carry them to us for our assistance in getting redressed.  When she streaks up to us, underwear in hand, she’s frequently twirling them in the air on one finger.  She did this just yesterday, running up to me with her size four Hanes spinning around an index finger, delightfully and uninhibitedly naked.  

 

“Look!  It’s me!  Nakee girl!” she shouted with glee. 

 

I looked down at her and thought to myself, “Thank God we didn’t buy the stripper pole!” 

 

So, we have a loft for the General.  Artistically, it isn’t anything special.  It’s a big hunk of plain wood held together by screws and lag bolts.  It holds a twin sized mattress, a book shelf, a bean bag chair and a reading light, and has room for a guest to sleep on a small mattress.  There is enough room for all of General Mayhem’s treasures.  It’s sibling proof.  And he loves it. 

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I was recently posed an interesting question by a fellow blogger.  She asked, “Where do you get your ideas for your Homeschool projects?”  The answer to that question comes from the answer to another question.

 

“We have aboslutely nothing to do this weekend.  We don’t have to be anywhere or do anything.  What would you like to do?” I asked the Boss last Friday.

 

“I want to sit back and watch you make progress on building our chicken coop,” she answered. 

 

That answers the original question.   Most of my ideas aren’t mine at all.  If truth be told, I’m fairly boring.  The Boss has all of the creative ideas, like hatching and KEEPING chickens.  

 

I built the chicken coop, not that I have a clue how to design or build a chicken coop, and sent the Boss to the store to pick a paint color and purchase a can of paint. 

 

“Barn Red is too brown,” she told me when she returned home.  “I picked another red.” 

 

I looked at the label on the can of paint.  “Va-Va-Voom?” 

 

The Boss looked at me sheepishly.  “The guy put the clear tape over the color spot before it dried, so it looks pink.  It’s really red.”

 

“Va-Va-Voom?”  I asked.  “You picked the color Va-Va-Voom?”  Who, in their right mind, would make an exterior house color named Va-VaVoom?  I would wonder who in their right mind would buy an exterior house color by that name, but the answer was standing in front of me. 

 

“It’s red,” she explained.  Then she added, “It’s really, really red.” 

 

After carefully painting the frame of the chicken coop, I prepared to apply a coat of “Va-Va-Voom.”  That was when Major Havoc and General Mayhem began petitioning me to allow them to paint.

 

“Canwepaintthechickenhouse, dad, pleeeeeeeease.  Huh? Dad? Canwepaintthe chickenhouse, dad, puh-leeeeeeeease.  Huh? Dad? Canwepaintthechickenhouse, dad, puh-leeeeeeeease.  Huh? Dad?”

 

Now I faced a parenting dilemma.  My children wanted to take part in the painting process, a job that I planned on doing myself.  I knew that if I painted, the chicken coop would look neat and clean.   I also knew that I had to allow them to assist me in this project.  So, I did what any fool dad should do, I gave my sons each a paint brush and a small jar of Va-Va-Voom.  I explained where they were to paint, where to stop, and then turned them loose.  I knew better than to stand over them and give directions watch.  That would have lead to frustration for all of us.  It would have killed their fun.  So, I went inside and added a double shot to my coffee, just to deaden the coming pain.

 

They had fun.

 

You can’t tell from these pictures, but not only did they paint below the line where I wanted them to stop, slopping Va-Va-Voom over my previously painted frame, but they painted willy-nilly over the hardware.  All the hinges are red, as well as a new gate latch securing the large door on one side.  It sticks.  It should.   There’s about an inch of paint on that sucker, compliments of an enthusiastic five-year-old Major Havoc.  And you wonder where their names come from. 

 

Ever wonder what a Va-Va-Voom chicken coop looks like?  It looks like...

 

“We have a chicken bordello in our back yard,” I told the Boss after the kids finished painting.   “It’s a house of chicken ill repute.  The Chicken Bordello: Where the Roosters Come to Crow!”

 

She winced.  “It’s a bit red, isn’t it?”

 

“Ya think?” 

 

“Okay, go get the barn red.” 

 

I purchased a can of barn red and repainted.  Now The Best Little Chicken House in Kansas looks like this: 

 

The hardware remains as is.  I haven’t decided whether or not to repaint the frame.  I’d hate to cover the kid’s endeavors.   The chickens get their new home next week. 

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I recently found a January 2008 article by Jane Gross in the New York Times that called for more regulation of home schoolers, another knee-jerk reaction from the crowd that really wants to deny Americans the freedom to teach their own children.  The article was a result of the Bonita Jacks case.  Ms. Jacks killed her four children last year after removing them from their public schools and claiming to be home schooling them.  I’d bet good money she’s never heard of A Beka, Bob Jones, Charlotte Mason, or Love and Logic.  The children’s bodies were discovered by US Marshals serving an eviction notice.  The bodies had been decomposing for two weeks prior to their discovery, and Ms. Jacks was still living there!  Apparently, she didn’t entertain very often. 

 

I find it difficult to understand the reaction to this case.  Bonita had been under the eagle eyes of the Department of Child Welfare Services, of Washington, D.C. District Public Schools, and of the city police department prior to this event taking place.  None of those agencies were able to prevent this heinous crime.  That didn’t stop the ever vigilant anti-home schooling writer from noting that, “The lack of supervision of the home-schooling process, some experts say, may have made it easier last year for Ms. Jacks to withdraw her children from school and the prying eyes of teachers, social workers and other professionals who otherwise might have detected signs of abuse and neglect of the girls.”  Do I really need to elaborate on the obvious here? 

 

Oh, let’s do it anyway. 

 

If the “prying eyes of teachers, social workers and other professionals” are so good, why did these children die?  If the “prying eyes of teachers, social workers and other professionals” are so good, why do thousands of public school children get abused every year?  What is it about forcing a child to plant his or her rear end on a public school chair that makes people think that the child will be safe or saved?  Are children only abused, tortured, and murdered while school is in session?   Don’t evil doers, perverts, and ne’er-do-wells ever practice their endeavors on a sunny July morning, or on Spring break?  And which kid is going to answer his “What did you do over summer vacation?” essay with, “Daddy tried to burn the lyrics to ‘Highway to Hell’ on my bum with cigarettes?” 

 

In 1991, the District of Columbia attempted to regulate home schoolers with rules that included unannounced home visits.  I’d like to know why no one is suggesting the same type of treatment for lesbians.  Just this month in Los Angeles, Starkeisha Brown and her partner Krystal Matthews were accused of torturing Ms. Brown’s 5-year-old son, including burning him all over his body with cigarettes (including his genitals), food depravation, and placing his flat open hands on a hot stove.  Currently, the boy is unable to open his hands.  Not once since this story broke in the news have I seen a New York Times article calling for the regulation of lesbians.  I haven’t heard one cry of the need for unannounced home visits of lesbian parents.  At age five, the young man might not have started kindergarten.  Maybe we need unannounced home visits of lesbian parents with children who are not yet in attendance at a public school, where “prying eyes of...social workers and other professionals” might prevent horrible acts of this nature from occurring.   In the words of Nebraska State Senator Schimek, who recently attempted to increase state regulation of home schoolers, we need these unannounced visits of lesbian parents because “we don’t know what is going on” and we need to “catch kids who fall through the cracks.”

 

You may be wondering if I’m hitting the ol’ coffee pot a bit too hard lately.  I’m not.  I just crave continuity of thought from our politicians and the people who report on them.  Instead, I find insanity.  And I’m not certain whose is worse, theirs or mine. 

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I’m certain that I’ve shared this before, but early in my marriage to the Boss I was a middle school teacher and she was an airline employee trying to become a supervisor.  We were very happy.  We figured that with our combined incomes, we would have a comfortable lifestyle.  She made $7.00 an hour loading airplanes and dispensing airline tickets and that was okay.  If you would have told me that 13 years later I would be waving to her as she left for work in the morning and then heading to the basement to clean popcorn out of the Lincoln Log bucket (Captain Chaos) I would have laughed.  I didn’t know what home schooling was.  I would be teaching for 30 years before retiring, and having a Captain Chaos didn’t appear on my radar screen. 

 

It was amusing to see the course of events unfold as they did, leading to my staying home with General Mayhem (he was an only child then) while the Boss went to work.  One of the first things that she discovered upon taking her job with the army was that they paid for 90% of a master’s degree through K State.  Go.  Wildcats.  Go.  Rah.  (Sometimes, I get so excited about college sports I just can’t control myself.)  The degree was an Operations Research degree, and it was expected that if you took the job you would work towards the degree.  It had the added benefit of being something that was done completely on company time.  There were no evening courses or long commutes to Manhattan, Kansas, for classes.  Everything was accomplished via video tape or video conferencing.  The Boss began her program. 

 

Graduate studies were difficult to complete.  Her coursework was interrupted by a Major Havoc and a Captain Chaos and the ensuing maternity leaves.  There was an 18 month gap in studies when the Captain became sick.    She restarted her degree studies and plugged on until November of 2006 when the Boss sat me down and told me that she absolutely despised her course of studies and did not want to finish.  I said, “Okay.”  She needed to get her Master’s degree, but she could get one in something that she enjoyed (like math).  If we put her through her undergraduate degree we could put her through an advanced degree.  So, I was more than a little surprised when I called her at work one afternoon in January of 2007 and was told by one of her office mates that she was in class.  She had changed her mind and resumed studies.  This was when I realized that my wife had a secret life at work that I was unaware of, and her co-workers knew more about that life than I did.    She’d go shopping on her lunch hour, go out to eat at a restaurant, or go bowling with co-workers, and I’d either find out from an office worker when I called and she wasn’t there or she’d casually mention it hours, days, weeks, or months later.  Honestly, she could have a nooner and I’d never know. 

 

Class work ended last year.  The Boss chose to complete oral boards for her degree, as opposed to taking a few more classes and writing a thesis.  I’m passably fair at writing, so I voted for the paper. I could help her.  She opted for the boards, and then came up with every reason under the sun to put off scheduling the boards and studying.  It became a taboo subject, as the mere mention created tension.   I do believe that going to Iraq was her last great excuse for putting off the boards.  It would have worked, too, had one of her professors not contacted her four weeks ago and asked, “When are you going to do your boards?”  Remembering that she was scheduled to deploy on June 20^th, the Boss went ahead and scheduled this tension-filled experience for Tuesday, June 17^th.

 

I hear from co-workers that she became fairly tense by the end of last week.  I think she told a couple of people that they were not allowed to speak to her unless spoken to first.   A few heads were bitten off and sent rolling down the hallway.   I do not know where the other bodies were buried.  I do know that on Tuesday afternoon I received a phone call from the Boss.  She was in Manhattan, and she had good news.  She successfully completed her oral boards for a Master of Science in Operations Research from K State.  Go.  Wildcats.  Go.  Yeah.  She did it!  Yes, she did it without wasting any of that down time since the end of coursework last year on unnecessary study and preparation.  Why do that?  She crammed it all in, in four weeks and “Viola!”  A degree! 

 

We are all very happy for her, even if we really don’t understand what she does for a living or how this degree helps.  And, her deployment was pushed back by one month, so we have time to relax before she goes. 

 

Congratulations, Boss!

 

And for those of your following the chicken bone study, here they are.  It's day four.  No real. change.  I have no idea what is going to happen. 

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Day Three. 

There's a bone in that jar of water on the right.  It occurred to me this morning that I will have to open the water jar outside.  Does the word "rancid" mean anything to you?  The bone in vinegar looks relatively the same. 

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“Are you putting a chicken bone in a jar of water?” General Mayhem asked.

 

Yes.

 

“Why?” he inquired.

 

To see what happens after it sits for two weeks.

 

“It will get wet,” he informed me.

 

Thank you for that moment of brilliance.  

 

“No problem, dad.”

 

What do you think will happen when I take this second chicken bone and put it in a jar of vinegar?

 

“Vinegar is an acid,” he told me.

 

Very good.  Tell me, what important mineral do bones contain?

 

General Mayhem thought for a moment.  “Calcium.”

 

Yes.  What will happen when we soak the chicken bone in vinegar for two weeks?

 

“We’ll have pickled chicken bone for dinner?”

 

Where do you get this from?

 

“It will break down.”  He paused.  “And the water jar is used as a comparison.”

 

 

That was my conversation with General Mayhem yesterday when we started Crossview’s chicken bone in vinegar science experiment that she wrote about here.  The first picture shows the chicken bone in vinegar on the left, and the chicken bone in water on the right.   

Prior to beginning this experiment is was necessary for us to remove a rather tasty layer of teriyaki glazed Samoan grilled chicken leg meat provided by my neighbor.  That man can grill! 

 

This second picture shows the same two bones, (vinegar on the left, water on the right).  Note how cloudy the water is.  I thought this might have been due, in part, to having left both jars in the window all day yesterday.  I moved both jars to a shady part of the kitchen this morning. 

 

 

Thanks for the idea, Crossview!   We will continue to document the experiment here.  

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The First Mate of a pirate ship nervously ran up to the Captain.

 

“Captain, there is a vessel coming our way over the horizon.  It intends to attack us.  What should we do?”

 

The Captain looked at the oncoming ship and replied, “Get me my red shirt.  If I get injured in battle, I do not want the men to see me bleed.”

 

The First Mate fulfilled the Captain’s order.  They went into battle with the lone vessel and won. 

 

The following day, the First Mate ran up to the Captain, fear clearly etched on his face.

 

“Captain, there are ten ships coming our way over the horizon.  They intend to attack us.  What should we do?”

 

The Captain looked at the oncoming ships and replied, “Get me my red shirt.  If I get injured in battle, I do not want the men to see me bleed.”

 

The First Mate fulfilled the Captain’s order.  They went into battle outnumbered ten-to-one, and miraculously defeated every enemy ship.

 

On the third day, the First Mate ran up to the Captain in complete panic. 

 

“Captain, there are 100 enemy ships coming our way over the horizon.  They are going to attack us!  What should we do?”

 

The Captain looked at the oncoming ships and replied, “Get me my yellow pants.”

 

 

This joke signals the end of one of the more painful periods of parenthood.  It signals the end because this joke was told to me by General Mayhem.  And it’s funny.  It’s very funny.   It is his graduation diploma.  He has a real sense of humor.  He heard it at the Mars Academy last weekend.  Finally, we are moving past the days of made-up jokes that made no sense at all, of knock-knock jokes without punch lines, of humor that does not involve recreating excretory noises with his mouth, armpit, or the back of his knee.  Now, if I can only get him past his desire to belch, “Luke, I am your father!” every ten seconds, I’ll be able to take him out in public again. 

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Major Havoc woke up this morning complaining that Captain Chaos went into his room last night and stole his Buzz Lightyear action figure. 

 

“It was Shadow Captain,” he told me. 

 

“Shadow Link” and “Shadow Mario” are evil twins of the main characters “Link” and “Mario” in the Zelda and Mario video games that we have.  Link must fight and defeat his shadow self, and Mario must fight and defeat his shadow self, in order to advance through their respective games.  Apparently, my daughter has a shadow self, and said shadow enjoys playing with her older brother’s toys without first asking for permission. 

 

“Yeah,” he continued, a serious expression on his face.  “This house is getting pretty scary!” 

 

The Captain’s evil shadow escaping to play with Disney toys was not the scariest part of this week.  Scary was the Captain launching herself across the room at the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center in Hutchinson, Kansas, because I would not allow her to play on a staircase.   General Mayhem was participating in the closing ceremonies for his Mars Academy weekend, and the Boss was watching.  I took the Major and the Captain down stairs into the museum to look around.  The museum is an extremely well produced look at the history of rocketry and space exploration, at least the part of it that I briefly saw before Captain Chaos dove head-first into the corner of a display holding a full-size mock-up of Chuck Yeager’s “Glamorous Glennis,” the Bell X-1 aircraft that he flew when he became the first man to break the sound barrier. She hit the display hard enough to give herself a bloody nose and split the skin over her right nostril.  If she had hit the display any harder she would have broken her nose and the cut would have required stitches.  Instead, she produced just enough blood, snot, and tears to make it look like she was in a bar room brawl.   She followed her first instincts when I picked her off the floor, that being to wipe her face on my shoulder.  As the blood and snot continued to flow she wiped it off of her face, curiously considering the red map that she was playing with, before wiping it all over both her shirt and mine.  I returned up stairs to find the Boss. 

 

“Is that blood?” she asked.  

 

“I need your help.”

 

“She looks like she was in a bar fight.”

 

We were in our last set of clean clothes, so father and daughter spent the rest of the day caked with dried blood while the girl complained that she “hurka my nose.” 

 

Yep, your nose will hurk when you dive into a museum display. 

 

The rest of our clothes smelled like camp fire.  This was because the four of us camped at Cheney Lake State Park while the General enjoyed the luxurious accommodations at space camp.  Camping is not, as is well known here at Arby’s Archives, my first choice of things to do.  This weekend was no different, as we camped through near-continuous 35 mph straight line winds that made maintaining a campfire rather difficult.  The tent rocked and danced all night long due to the wind.  The kids slept well.  The Boss and I lay awake, wondering whether or not we were going to visit OZ. 

 

The most interesting moment of this week came when the Boss woke me up this morning and handed me a telephone.  The producer of the 710 AM Chris Stigall Radio Show called to tell me that I won the Father’s Day contest.  They put me on the air with Chris Stigall before I had my first cup of coffee.  I was coherent.  I think.  

 

The contest was the “The Who's Your Daddy Father's Day Giveaway.”  It required contestants to “Tell us why you or the dad in your life deserves two rounds of golf at Deer Creek, fine cigars from Cigar and Tabac, "The Executive" gift pack of quality meats from Rancher's Gourmet, a $200 Steak Gift Set from Ranchers Gourmet at 135th & Metcalf or ranchersgourmet.com and a Cobb Grill. To register click HERE.”  (http://www.710kcmo.com/)

 

I won with an entry that is typical of what you read here regularly.  In fact, most of it you have read before.   It was fun to write, fun to have read on the air (they were laughing as they read it) and has the added benefit of a prize that contains BEEF.  The Boss told me when we were dating, “If you buy me beef I will follow you anywhere.”   I’m hoping that my favorite golf partner will be able to join me for a round before she deploys. 

 

I wrote:

 

A long, long time ago, I had a golf game.  I had a career, too.  That was before I had children.  I gave it all up to become the man I am today, a 43-year-old full time, stay-at-home, home schooling father of three children: General Mayhem, Major Havoc, and Captain Chaos.  It occurred to me recently that at age 43 General George Washington took control of the Continental Army.  At age 43, John F. Kennedy told this nation to “ask not what the country could do for you.”  At age 43 you’re likely to find me carrying my daughter’s princess wand in public after two ounces of molded plastic becomes too heavy for her to carry.  It’s quite the sight to see, all 6’2”/240 pounds of me running through the mall, princes wand in hand, chasing after the kids.  Women smile politely.  Men avert their eyes.   I know that my man card can be revoked for this. 

 

It’s not uncommon for my children to follow me through the house, one room behind, un-cleaning.  In between teaching lessons to my fifth grader, I perform all of the household duties, only to discover that previously organized rooms have been unpacked by the Major and the Captain.  One of Captain Chaos’ favorite pastimes is to add as many toys as she can to our aquarium.  Her record is 12 colored pencils, five wooden stringing beads, 2 View Master Discs and a Pez Dispenser.  I frequently find the goldfish cowering in the corner of the tank.  Life with the Captain has been an unending string of doctor’s appointments, therapist visits, and medicinal schedules.  When she was four months old she suffered a heart attack and a stroke due an undiagnosed congenital heart defect.  We’ve worked hard to bring her through her recovery, but I still have to remind myself that when she acts like a normal four year old and draws on my freshly painted living room walls with a purple crayon, I should be grateful.  I prayed for this.  I scrub the walls and chalk it up to successful therapy. 

 

In July my wife deploys to Iraq for a five month tour as a civilian Operations Research Analyst for the US Army.  I get to do this dad –thing without the break of having my spouse return home in the evening.  On a tough day she arrives at home to find me talking to myself in the corner of the kitchen.  “Having a parent-teacher conference?” she asks.  Her biggest fear is that I will finish each day that she is gone by diving into a 40 ounce bottle of Old English 800, which you can still find at the local distillery for a buck forty, complete with the mandatory brown paper bag.  It’s tempting. 

 

Do I deserve to win two rounds of golf and the other assorted prizes in this contest?  I don’t know.   I haven’t golfed in so long I might be dangerous on the golf course.  I’ll be the one yelling “Watch you ankles!” instead of “Four!” when I tee-off, for all of the worm burners I’m certain to hit.   There may be fathers who do more for their children, who lead more interesting lives, who have more to offer their children.  I do know that my days are both chaotic and fulfilling, and I wouldn’t have them any other way. 

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Our number three hatched last night about 10pm. We let the kids stay up late to watch. It was really cool.

Here's what he looked like this morning when I left for work at about 7:15.

He's the cute one with the yellow hat looking feathers. The Major named him Yoshi, after the Mario Brothers character because of the way the egg moved around so much before he cracked open.

About 8:30 I got a call at work saying number four hatched. We were really surprised because we saw no indication that any more would hatch! It's our surprise chicken. I wanted to name it Isaac because he was unexpected and late. Maybe we can name him "Day Late" since he came the day after his siblings.

Any ideas?

 

~ The Boss, a.k.a Tatersmom

 

 

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The Boss and I are the parents who sit in church and watch other parents holding perfectly calm children, who sit peacefully throughout service while our children do cartwheels under the pews, asking ourselves, “How do we get one of those?”  But I shouldn’t ask that question.  We can’t even get a calm chicken. 

 

Meet “Troublemaker,” the first chicken to hatch. 

This fowl addition to our family, which currently claims three children, a six-year-old goldfish I’m thinking of naming Methuselah, a big fuzzy dog, and a gerbil, kicked off his/her shell and promptly began to roll the other eggs around the incubator in a big game of poultry soccer.  The second chick hatched this afternoon, a little dizzy but otherwise fine, and Major Havoc was there to watch it pop out of its shell.  Two more eggs are cracked.  We have chickens!

 

The Boss is very happy. 

 

Now, it’s three children, a big fuzzy dog, Methuselah the goldfish, a gerbil, Troublemaker, and another chick. 

 

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Parade Magazine is taking an online poll that asks the question, "Should parents need teaching credentials to home-school their kids?"

Go to http://www.parade.com/articles/editions/2008/edition_06-01-2008/Intelligence_Report

and answer the simple "Yes" or "No" poll question, and pass the word to all of your home schooling friends.  

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Chris, over at A Mountain Homeschool, recently wrote a blog about his three children and their different learning abilities that raised some interesting questions about home schooling multiple children.  If you are not a regular reader of Chris’ blog, you should be.  He doesn’t write as much as I’d like due to something called a “job,” but when he does it is always a good read, and I have faith that he’ll get his priorities straight sooner or later. His children are “Belle,” “Tink,” and “The Boy,” ages 8, 6, and 4, respectively.  Belle and Tink are one year apart in school, and what took Belle 12 months to learn, Tink absorbed in 9 months.  Tink is very good at math.  The Boy came along and learned reading at a faster rate than Tink.  He almost caught up to his older sister Tink in Phonics instruction. 

 

Chris posed several questions in his blog, the first being, “Why?”  Why does one child learn the same subject faster than the other child?   Could it be that Tink spent so much time in the same room while Belle was being taught math that she quietly learned along with her sister as the year progressed?   Since The Boy spent two days each week in Mom’s Day Out, away from his sister Tink as she was being taught Phonics, why did he catch up with her in Phonics instruction?  Chris wrote:

 

“What various factors might be at play? I don't know all of them, but my guess is that homeschool families, where children of different ages and skills learn together (at least a lot of the time) see younger children gain some skills faster than the trail-blazing older kids.”

 

So, how is it in your home school?

 

In our family, General Mayhem takes after his mother more than me, and Major Havoc takes after me more than his mother (with the exception, of course, of the freckles).  The General understands math.  He picks up new concepts quickly.  We cannot count on him to apply his understanding of math to his math work, but we can see from his errors that his problems come from sloppiness and not from a lack of understanding.  Major Havoc is tearing through his Phonics instruction.  He is learning how to read at a faster rate than General Mayhem did.  Their six year age difference coupled with the fact that the Major does not hang around during the General’s lessons precludes Chris’ learning through osmosis theory for these two children. 

 

I suspect that the Major’s success with reading is due to two factors.  The first is that we are using an actual Hooked on Phonics program with him, where we used home made flash cards and enormous amounts of time reading books with his older brother.  The second is that the Major’s natural abilities tend to indicate strength in reading.   If he takes after his father, this is no surprise.  I have the English degree in our family.  General Mayhem gets math.  This is no surprise as he tends to be more like his mother, the mathematician in our family.   Her degrees are in math, computer science, and a soon-to-be-completed MS in Operations Research from K State’s College of Engineering.   It will take a few years before we know whether or not the Major has an aptitude for math.