I'm trying to run a respectable patio here...

In which your humble narrator cleans up the garbage heap of vice, fornication and sin that sits outside his side door.

At 4:40 this morning I woke up to a persistent yowling. As I emerged from sleep I was fairly sure it was feline in nature and my thoughts turned immediately to our emergency back-up cat, Akbar. He only has two brain cells and if one of them goes on the fritz he frequently gets "stuck" in whatever activity he was pursuing when half his cognitive function blinkered out. I figured, eyes still heavy, that he was downstairs yowling at phantoms. But it kept up.

I rolled over to make Wife-a-roo go deal with her retarded cat (Akbar is why Wife-a-roo is no longer allowed to pick pets independently) when I noticed that Akbar was sitting by the bed, not making any noise at all. Our main cat, Harold was asleep at the foot of the bed as usual.

So I stumbled out of bed to investigate the yowling. It was loud. It was punctuated by wild shrieks. I went downstairs to the kitchen. The window was slightly open and the noise was louder. I opened the side door to see a guilty looking tom cat shuffle off into the front yard. An irritated pair of yellow eyes peered back from under the raspberry canes. A saucy looking little lady cat had apparently decided to turn our patio into an early morning niche d'amour. She had tags on but was clearly on the prowl for some lovin', making me wonder about whatever neighborhood yahoos hadn't spayed their little darling. She was also clearly peeved about my arrival on the scene.

It took much more effort to dislodge her from her little hissy-hussy den than I anticipated. Which is how I ended up in a bathrobe chasing a spitting mad, hot 'n' bothered lady cat out of my yard with a broom at 4:45 in the morning. As I trudged back into the house, Venus was particularly bright in a cloudless sky.

Heat Melts Brains

In which your humble narrator shares some weird.

Last Thursday I left my modest but well-appointed home at seven o'clock in the morning to make my way to the University to enlighten the minds our our nation's youth while simultaneously crushing their young spirits. I took the bus to the train and stood waiting at the station as the various over-perfumed junior account executives milled about fidgeting with their phones, when a large middle-aged woman wearing cargo pants walked onto the platform.

She proceeded to reach into the mid-thigh, velcro-secured cargo pocket and withdrew a piece of buttered toast. No wrapper, container nor napkin was evident. She took one bite, placed the toast back in the cargo pocket, chewed thoughtfully and stared out into space for about a minute until she repeated the procedure to procure another delicious morsel of toast.

Realpolitik

In which your humble narrator tries to tamp down the smoldering embers of sibling conflict which could flare into a full scale war of mutual destruction at any moment.

I should say as a caveat, both children are doing quite well. Each is charming, mostly well-behaved and pretty much delightful now that everyone has gotten over the long-lasting summer cold that's been going around.

Here are the little darlings on a recent outing to Gold Medal Park in downtown Minneapolis, conveniently located three blocks from Wife-a-roo's office. Child #1 is now using the toilet like a pro and Child #2 has found a new love of being upright and verbal.

Our recent conflict involves the unfortunate issue that Child #2 is interested only in whatever Child #1 is playing with at any given moment. Since Child #1 has a flair for melodrama, he provides massive reinforcement for Child #2's meddlesome nature by obligingly caterwauling whenever she interferes with his play things. Child #2, of course, finds his vocal histrionics absolutely enchanting and rarely misses an opportunity to irritate him. Child #1 no longer even waits for Child #2 to start messing up his train set. He simply begins fussing whenever she enters the room. Drawn to his siren-song of constant complaint, even if she wasn't in a mood to mess up his railroad, she usually cannot resist the invitation to battle over brio train tracks and Thomas the Tank Engine figures. 

Sadly, I have little interest or patience for this particular sibling ritual and usually just end up taking whatever toy has become the object of their concentrated desire away from both of them. This results in both of them howling at me instead of each other. I'm pretty sure there's a reason that I do this, but for the life of me I can't remember what it is.

It's August, When a Young Man's Thought Turns to Things He Hates

In which your humble narrator lists the vexations of high summer.

• The unmistakable odor of cheap cologne which wafts off of the business-type business people who ride the train downtown early in the morning.
• Being shiny all the time since it's so damn hot.
• The lack of four hour parking meters anywhere near the University now that the river road has been dug up for insufficiently explained reasons. "Utility work" indeed.
• The barely restrained glee of local newscasters when describing some fresh 'n' juicy, new double murder.
• Summer watchband stink.

Hooray for using the Potty

In which your humble narrator closes a door of complain and opens a window of kvetch.

Child #1 is reliably using the toilet. Hooray! No more poopy diapers of a 2.75 year-old thrashing around while screaming "No! Don't clean my testicles! I don't like testicle poo!"

Yeah, well Buddy, this hasn't exactly been a picnic for me either.

Now that he goes to the potty, he goes all the time. Today I think he went 38 times between 8:00 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. I've spent more time in my downstairs bathroom over the past three weeks than in the preceding six months. It's really not a big deal, unless the adult to child in home ratio reaches 1:2. In that case, making sure Child #1 gets to do his business without interference means perching on the end of the tub in an unnaturally twisted position to assist him while using my right foot to repel the marauding advances of Child #2 who wishes to be intimately involved in the experience, mostly by pinching the bare thighs of Child #1 whilst he attempts to urinate.

Public bathrooms are another boondoggle since they are both wonderfully exotic but full of dangerous menaces like loud flushing toilets and electric hand dryers.

We're packing the children and my Mom into the car on Friday to drive to Iowa for a friend's wedding. This will be the first "potty-trained" trip.

We who are about to get peed on salute you.

100th Post Spectacular

In which your humble narrator celebrates one hundred instances of bloggy goodness with a list of lessons learned.

Here is a list of lessons recently learned that don't promise much applicability in the future.

• Terry cloth seems to be an acceptable fabric for clothing worn (in public!) by women under the age of 22.
• Presbyterians all look the same.
• Summer gives me a headache.
• People fear couscous. 
• Babies love banjos.
• There's not a noticeable difference between reading the Pioneer Press and then recycling it, and just recycling it immediately.
• The French brew beer. (Sacre brew!)
• Ohio is like, the place to be this summer, at least judging by the airfares.
• Twitter is still stupid.

Best Veep Ever

In which your humble narrator jests about our beloved vice president.

Hey, it's so hot and windy today that I feel like I'm standing near Joe Biden's mouth!

Just kidding, Joe. You know I loves me some Biden. From that one time I met you on the Amtrak between Wilmington and D.C. to last week when you told some pissant in an ice cream store to maybe not be such a bilious tax-obsessed wingnut jerk. You are the best vice-president ever, and that includes such memorable heavy-weights as Garret Hobart and John Nance Garner.