I'm Batman

This weekend we rented Batman Begins. With 6 and 5-year old boys in the house, Batman is a pretty popular character. William would be ashamed of my fathering ideals if he knew that I let my kids watch Batman, you know with the Thomas the Tank Engine scandal still fresh in everyone’s mind. So I am not going to tell Bill that we watched it. I am not going to tell him that I also got the Batman Begins XBOX game. The boys and I played it this weekend a couple of times, and it is pretty cool. As I was watching this movie, and playing the game, I realized that I am very similar to Batman. Yes, Batman and I have some similar traits.

Bruce Wayne is a very rich guy. I am not a very rich guy, but I would not mind being one. See, similar. Bruce is afraid of bats. I am afraid of dogs. Do you see where I am going here? This character and I are on a similar path. Batman goes out in the night dressed up all in black so that he cannot be seen. If I go out in the night, I have a flashlight, with back-up batteries, and I wear a fluorescent orange vest with strobe lights attached. This way, I will be seen. He likes the dark night, I hate the dark night. Actually, it is scary how much we have in common. Batman will go into an alley to fight off crime. I will avoid dark alleys because there is crime.

I was watching the movie and marveling at how graceful Batman is when he jumps from building to building. His cape extends like a hang glider and he soars through the air. Well, one time, I fell out of bed, and managed to pull the comforter over top of me and use it as a cushion. It was a neat little move, and I avoided injury. I now realize why my boys love me so much. It is because they think I am like Batman. I am a super hero, and they love super heroes. I am just like Batman. Can you see the similarities? It’s uncanny.

48 Hours Investigates...

Last night I watched 48 Hours. I like these investigator shows. These shows are usually about murder and stuff, and how they did or didn’t find the bad guy. Investigative reporting is the basic concept. I want to hire this 48 Hours crew to come to my house. I have some things that I need straightened out. Granted, it is not murder that I am talking about, but the issues that I have need to be addressed by somebody. I believe that 48 Hours can help.

Following are the issues that I want investigated.

My wife does not shop very often, and she cooks even less. Why the hell then, am I still a fat ass? There is no food in the house, and nobody cooking it, yet I can gain weight. It’s a mystery worth looking into.

Next, I need to know if my wife really has a headache, everyday. “Not now, I have a headache.” If we find out that she really does have a headache, then she should go see a doctor. There has to be someone out there that could help her with this problem, and I am only concerned about her health. If the 48 Hours team finds incriminating evidence that shows she is lying, then she has some explaining to do.

I would also like the team to take a look into Luke. I was a quiet, reserved, shy young kid. I did not get into trouble. I did not antagonize my brothers, or my sister. I was nice and calm. That being said, why is Luke such a piece of work? Did any of my genes even make it into his make-up? Is a DNA test required here?

Kyle should also be investigated. He is a smart little guy. He reads like a champ. He thinks things through. He is pleasant to others. He only really fights with his brother, but that is normal. He is far more intelligent than I ever was, so again I have to ask, did any of my genes make it into his make-up? Is a DNA test required?

I have a question about Kristin that needs some extra attention as well. Does she know that she has me wrapped around her finger? I try to hide this fact, but she plays me well. She gets all sweet, and brings me stuff home, like chips and dip, and then I’m buying her Ipods and stuff. She is a sweetie by nature, then she turns it up a notch, and she’s getting away with everything. I need 48 Hours to investigate if my cover is blown or not.

So, as you can see, there are some true issues over here that I would like a quality investigative team to get involved in. I am a guy that doesn’t have any food, yet am a fat ass, and a guy that gets very little action, yet has three kids. How are these things possible? It came down to 48 Hours or Magnum P.I., and I think Magnum is retired, so 48 Hours it is.

Of Mice and Men

I finally got serious about my pest problems. I finally took the first step towards ridding my lawn of unwanted quests. My wife refers to our place as The Lawn for Unwed Mothers. Every animal comes to my place, and it appears that they come to have babies. At first she found this to be cute, when it was rabbits, but now she is even getting annoyed. It took the baby groundhog on the patio to finally admit that it was time for me to go on a killing spree. I have started my quest. I have my orders from the boss. She wants me to get rid of them, and get rid of them all.

I am fertilizing the yard. I am putting my Scott’s Summer Guard down. I use Scott’s because as all Lawnwhisperer’s know, this is the best product available. I am going through the lawn in a distinct pattern. In order to do it properly, there has to be a charted plan. You can’t miss any spots, and you can’t use too much in one spot. I have this chart locked away in a safe. I can’t have anyone steal my secrets to fertilizing, so I have to keep it secure. Kyle and Luke have the combination, just in case anything would happen to me, they could carry on the whispering. I am walking along the thirty- third parallel, 23 degrees north-northwest. I have my Ipod on and am enjoying the sunshine. I believe the song is Paradise City, from Gun’s and Roses. This song is like my house’s theme song. “Take me down to the paradise city, where the grass is green and the girls are pretty.” This is a perfect song as my wife and daughter are very pretty, and well my grass is green. I am pushing my spreader at a decent pace when suddenly I see something dart under the wheel. The wheel bumps, and I stop.

Lying there is a field mouse. He is still alive, but injured. I was not even trying, and I hit the thing. That is like the needle in a haystack saying. I couldn’t leave the stupid thing there. I had to kill it, cause I already had one pest revive itself and run, and that wasn’t happening again. So I ran him over a few more times. I am going to use Marvin the Mouse as an example to all of the other critters. I tied him to a string, and hung him from a fence post. He is on display, for all to see, No More Mr. Nice Guy it says underneath of him. I am kicking ass and taking names later. Look out critters. The Fertilizer Man is on the prowl.


Ok, the last part isn’t true. I didn’t hang him from a string. I wouldn’t get near a dead mouse with a ten-foot pole. So I did what all great Lawnwhisperer’s do, I took an eleven-foot pole, and flung him into my neighbors yard.

Lukatic

It is pretty well chronicled here on DVD, and most that know him, know that Luke is a bit of a nut. He is not a nut in a really bad way, but in a mischievous, cute, little boy way. Ok, some times it is not so cute, but he is a little Steve Martin. He’s a wild and crazy guy. The kid is only 5 and he already has more nicknames than Shaquille O’neal. (NBA basketball player with multiple nicknames.) His latest nickname came from his swimming lessons instructor.

After his swim lesson the other day, the guy was giving my wife the run down on how the kids did. He went through Kyle’s lesson and where he stands, and then he said, “And Lukatic is getting better too.” He caught himself, and was a little embarrassed. Most parents would probably be upset at an instructor calling their kid a lunatic, but not us. My wife, took it and stride, and just told the guy, “I know what you mean, you don’t have to tell me.”

When she got home, she told me what the guy had said, and we both just started laughing. I have to admit that I was a little upset at the fact that his teacher called him Lukatic. I was not upset at the name, but by the fact that I didn’t think of it first. It is what it is; my son is a lunatic. Lukatic, it has a nice ring to it.

It's Either Me, or The Wicker

The storm appeared out of nowhere. It was sunny and clear, and in what felt like 5 seconds, it looked ominous. The wind picked up, and lightning was striking from all directions. My wife called out to me that she thought that it looked like a tornado was coming. This freaked the kids out, and had us in a scramble. Now, I have never seen a tornado, but I have seen enough episodes of Storm Stories on The Weather Channel to know what one looks like. I will say, that it was pretty scary. This was one of those storms that have your kids totally beside themselves. They want you to hold them, and comfort them. They won’t let you leave their side. This is a very difficult task for a guy like me. How the hell am I supposed to hold and comfort Luke, while I am curled up in the fetal position, behind the sofa, and sucking my thumb?

The winds got up there in speed. Trees in the back yard were bending at 90-degree angles. The rain was just starting to fall. There were potted plants flying into the neighbors yard. I did not see any flying cows, but the wind was wicked. I was just getting everything situated, when I heard this, “Oh my god, my wicker table. You have to go get it. It will blow over and break, you can’t leave it out there.”

In my head, just before she said that, I was already writing my thank you note to the storm.

Dear Storm,

Thank you for breaking that wicker set that my wife bought. I am not a big fan of wicker, and because of your destruction, I am now able to go buy something more comfortable. I will be forever indebted to you…

Then Vick interrupted with her statement. I responded to her, almost in disbelief, “You want me to go out there in this, and move the wicker table into the garage?” She said yes. Now, it came down to me being struck by lightning, or the wicker table being broken, and she chose the safety of the wicker table. Where does that leave me in her order of important things in life? The only saving grace in this incident is that I realize now, that I may not be last. Cause after she yelled for me to go out there she said, “Kristin, you go help him.” So, my daughter and I braved the storm and moved that damn table inside.

We lost power for 12 hours. Our entire town was out for most of the next day. The company that I work for was out for the entire next day, and is still out at this very point. The boys seem to be ok, although they were pretty scared. The wicker table is resting comfortably in the garage. Kristin and I are ok for now. We both now know where we stand. I think she still ranks ahead of me on my wife’s list, but it was never so close before. I’m gaining ground. I may not be last for much longer. Thank you storm, for showing me the light.

The Vole Hunter starring Brad Pitt

I was blowing off the walkway and driveway after doing some lawn whispering. All good Lawnwhisperers clean up after they are done. This adds to the beauty and precision of a finely groomed lawn. My leaf blower is a craftsman, and it claims to force the air at 200 miles per hour. I normally do not care how fast the thing blows, but this day was different; cause on this day, I came face to face with that little Vole that lives under my front porch.

I was just about finished my work on the front walkway, and something caught my attention in the garden bed. I took a quick look, and there he was. The Vole was standing about two feet from me, and was starting to scurry towards its home. I had little time to react. I did not have a shotgun, or a howitzer on me, I only had my leaf blower. With instincts that have only ever been matched by Clint Eastwood in one of those Outlaw Josey Wales films, I spun and pointed my blower at the little bastard. Vinny the Vole (I named all of the creatures living in my yard) tried to run, but the air forced him sideways. He was starting to make a run towards the porch, when I cranked up the air output. This 200-mile an hour leaf blower lived up to its billing, cause it knocked Vinny into the house. Vinny lay motionless. I got him.

At first, I was shocked. Then my shock turned to elation. I started singing, “Ding Dong the Vole is dead, the Vole is dead, the Vole is dead.” You know the song. Then I started thinking about the movie rights. This could be a screenplay. Written by me, of course, The Vole Hunter. Then I started thinking about who would play me in the movie. Brad Pitt was the first name that came to mind. It is a natural fit. He’s good looking, and I am good looking. Maybe I could get Harrison Ford to play the older me. After all, he is good looking and distinguished, and I am good looking. For a brief moment, I thought about Tom Cruise, but he gets into that Scientology shit, and I find that to be strange, so I went back to Brad.

As I was finalizing the ending to the movie, something moved. I turned to look, and there was Vinny, getting up. While I was in the middle of my daydream about the movie, I turned my blower off. I tried to get it started, but I was fumbling with the controls. Vinny looked me right in the eye. He stood there for a second, and then scurried to his hole. Here’s the worst part, I think he was laughing, and I believe he flipped me the bird as he dived into his home. Vinny lived, and my screenplay went to hell. I am going out this weekend to buy a bigger leaf blower. 200 miles an hour isn’t enough to kill Vinny the Vole. No, I need bigger.

Perverted Magic

I don’t know if I can do this story justice. I do not know if I can put into words just how this transpired, and how funny it was at the time, but I am going to try.

Luke turned 5 yesterday. We knew that keeping him happy was going to be hard, because nobody was around to help celebrate his day. 3 of his 4 grandparents were out of town. Both of his godparents were out of town. His bestest buddy cousin, who is only one day older than him, was out of town. In other words, there was no party going on. Then to make matters worse, Mike and Cybil had their baby girl on the 13th. This news did not go over well with Luke, as he is the world’s worst sharer. When I told him that he had a new cousin Molly, and she was born on his day he said, “She is stupid. She is stupid, and when I see her, I am going to tell her she is stupid.” So already Luke doesn’t like Molly.

Back on Kyle’s birthday we threw him one of those little kid parties. One of my friends is a Magician, so he came and put on a show. He had the 13 kids totally mesmerized, and they loved it. One of his tricks had to do with underwear. I do not remember the details of the trick, I just remember that the kids laughed and laughed. Luke decided to reminisce about this trick during dinner last night. He told the 6 of us that were with him, as well as the rest of the crowded restaurant about the trick. He totally changed the trick, and let me tell you that this is not the way the trick went, but the rest of the restaurant may be calling child services on us right now.

“ So the magician has this rope of scarves. Then he rapped it up into a ball and said some magic words. When he let the scarves out, his underwear was attached to it. It was so funny. Then the magician pulled down his pants and he did not have any underwear on.”
At this point, Uncle Russ, and about 15 other people looked over at my wife and I. I jumped in and said, “Luke, the magician did not pull down his pants, stop making up stories.” Luke was having none of it. He continued with his version of the story. “Yes he did, he pulled down his pants and was not wearing any underwear. Then he started saying, It Is Alive. He was acting like when monsters come to life.”

Luke started walking around the table like Frankenstein. He was showing the people how the magician was supposedly walking around the party. Can you picture us hiring a magician for a 6-year old birthday party, and having him walking around the joint with no pants on, and saying, “It is Alive.” Most of the people in the place must have thought that we hired a perverted magician. I could not hold back the tears from the laughter. None of us could, so we left.

Perspective

Most of you see this picture as two cute kids playing on a beautiful lawn.
A Lawnwhisperer sees this as a Beautiful lawn, with some cute kids playing on it

I am important, no really I am

It’s a matter of trust. That’s pretty much it. There are only so many people in the world that you can trust with your kids. I have recently been called upon for this very purpose. I accepted this responsibility with pride and honor. My brother Mike and his wife Cybil are expecting. Actually, they are over expected. The due date is past, and they need someone on late night call. I am that someone. If she goes into labor in the middle of the night, I have to go to their house and take care of their 18-month-old son, Marcus.

I have planned out my route. It will take me exactly 13 minutes and 22 seconds to get from door to door. I have been working on this time all week, in an effort to improve on it. If I don’t do the typical left, right, left at each stop sign, I can shave a few seconds off. If I don’t stop at Wawa for coffee, I can save a minute. I am looking into having a fire pole installed from my bedroom to the driveway. This way I don’t have to take the time going through the house. I have hired a guy to help. His name is Paul. Paul will be outside waiting for my bedroom lights as a signal. I made up this code. If he sees one light in the window, that means the baby is coming by land. If he sees two lights, that means the baby is coming by sea. Then my buddy will ride his horse through the neighborhood screaming, The Baby is coming, the Baby is coming. This will clear the roads, and allow me to get there faster. See, with all of this thought, who would be a better pick than me?

The truth of the matter is, everyone was on the call list before me. Yeah, I made it by default. It seems that nobody else will be around but me. That is why I was chosen for this honor. My mom and dad are going to visit some clown in Florida, so they won’t be around. Jim, Dennis and Sharon are all going on a little vacation together. Kevin is also going to be visiting some clown in Florida. Bill, can’t do it, cause he is the clown in Florida. Dan will be at the shore. Pat is going on vacation. Apparently a couple of neighbors were asked before me, but they had to back down. I’m sure Mike contacted the local law enforcement to see if there was anybody available for community service this weekend. So, it came down to me. Apparently, I am the last one on Mike’s call list. Not only am I last on that list, but also I missed all the lists for family vacation week. My entire family is going on vacation together except for Mike and I. What the hell is that? Mike and Cybil are having a baby, so that is why they can’t go, but where is my invite?

Anyway, I have an important job to do this weekend. I must go and fill my car with gas. I am going to get the high test. That is a better performance gasoline, and may make my vehicle go faster. That should shave a few seconds off the commute.

Can I catch something, please.

It is getting more ridiculous as every month passes. I can’t catch a break. Actually, I can’t catch a freaking thing. I got more wildlife living at my house than the Philadelphia Zoo. My latest pest is a vole. What is a vole, you may ask? I have no freaking idea, is my answer. I spoke to an exterminator, and he confirmed that I have voles living under my front porch. They don’t really do anything, except scare the heck out of me when I am turning the hose on. One ran right over my foot the other week, and if there were a chair in my garden, I would have been up on it. No, I didn’t take any action until my wife encountered a vole. Now I am forced to take measures to rid my front porch of the voles.

For those of you that are up to speed on my pest issues, yes, this is a typical women double standard. It is OK for a rabbit to dig a hole in my front yard, and breed like, well, a rabbit, but it is not OK to let the voles live in peace. Her reason is that voles are ugly little mouse like creatures, but rabbits are cute and cuddly little wild animals. Like all good husbands do, I decided to take action, about a week later. I probably have an entire colony of voles at this time, but the more there are, the more I get to kill. I have no problem killing these pesky little wildlife. My problem comes with having to pick up and throw out the wildlife. But at the rate I am going, this won’t happen, cause I can’t catch the little bastards.

I was told to put plain old mousetraps out. Put some peanut butter on the thing, set it, and snap, I will have them. So I did this. I checked the traps when I got home. The first trap I checked was not tripped, but something black was covering it. When I got down closer I saw what was covering the trap. It was all of the ants from the freaking neighborhood. There were more ants there than in a scene from A Bugs Life. I couldn’t do anything to that trap, cause it skeeved me out. It felt like the ants were crawling on me before I even tried to pick it up, so I left it there. I went around to check the other trap, and it was gone. The trap was missing. I searched the area, and it was not there. I eventually found it, in my back yard. I set that trap in my front garden, and found it in my back yard. The peanut butter was all gone, and the thing was tripped. The animals in the yard are fucking with me. There is a conspiracy going on, and I am getting a bit pissed. The animals are winning. Can I catch a break please, or at least a vole.

Christmas in July

The smiles were precious. The fun, the excitement! The boys and me were dancing. The boys were singing joyous songs. The songs did not make any sense, but they were happy songs. Vic came home on July 1st, bearing gifts. It was Christmas in July, and I didn’t expect it. That’s right, she surprised us all. She went grocery shopping. After weeks of complaining from both the boys, and me she finally cracked.

Don’t get me wrong; we had some food in the house. But it was only healthy stuff. I got news for you; there is only so much healthy stuff a guy can take. This day, this was special, cause wherever it is she shopped, there was the buy one get one deal going. So now instead of one bag of chips, I got two. We got cookies too. Chocolate chip, with M&M’s. Two bags people. Count ‘em, two. She got the kids some popsicles and some ice cream. She got them multiple kinds of these frozen treats. Two of each. It looked like the frozen treat version of Noah’s Ark. The kids, they are in for some happy nights.

Occasionally I think I saw some carrots and stuff, but I paid no attention to them. I went right past them and went to the sausage links and pork roll. That stuff is so unhealthy, that I can taste it. Can I stress that we got two of each? Two! Anyway, it was a joyous day. Christmas in July. I have to go now; I want to go check on the fridge. I still can’t believe that it is full.