Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Several months ago, one of my friends posted something about sleep regression on Facebook, as it related to her infant. She graduated from the newborn stage, and her baby had finally begun to sleep with some degree of regularity. Then inexplicably, the baby started being a pain in the ass again. When I read about that, part of me sympathized, but a bigger part of me was relieved that young Nyles had seemingly evaded that dreaded part of being an infant. Clearly the joke was on my wife and me.

The past couple of weeks, the wife and I have abandoned swaddling and begun sleep training young Nyles all at the same time. His post daycare routine is as follows:

5-6pm: Eat, be happy, spit food on Mommy and Daddy

6-7: Have a violent mood swing from happy to evil, cheer up momentarily in the bathtub, then revert to angry man

7- 7:30: Drink a warm bottle, go to sleep, cry, sleep, cry, sleep, cry once more, then sleep

11-12a: whimper, toss and turn, fool Mommy and Daddy into thinking you're going to wake up, and then go back to sleep

2am: Wake up and scream bloody murder

3am: See 2am

4am: See 2am

5am: Trick Mommy into letting you in the bed (Daddy has given up sleep at this point and a)goes to workout or b) goes to work)

530am: Fall into a DEEP sleep until 6:45, when Mommy is already awake and pissed the f**k off

6:45am: Wake up smiling, joking and looking cute, just completely shunning the fact that he kept his parents up all night



The wife and I are sleep deprived, cranky, too tired for (regular) sex, and if this goes on, someone at our respective jobs will feel our wrath. As angry as this little boy makes me, when someone at work asks me how Nyles is doing, I smile and instantly start bragging about him, like he didn't cause me hell the night before. It's as if he's strong in the ways of the Force, and I have no power over him. I love him, but I'm not against crushing Ambien tablets in his bottle...

This song you see below has become my guilty pleasure song of the month. I've always appreciated Usher, but his recent material is boring. I don't like Rick Ross all that much, because he's just an average lyricist most of the time. But put them together, and for some mysterious reason I'm hooked...

Sunday, August 26, 2012

About three weeks ago I was on Facebook, when I noticed that one of my "Suggested friends" was an ex-girlfriend of mine from 2005. I ignored it at first, then I decided to click her page to see what she was up to. Instead of seeing pictures, corny status messages and a bunch of superfluous stuff that litters the facebook pages of everyone (present company excluded of course), I saw something much different.

The facebook had been started by her mother, because the ex died in her sleep back on June 3rd at age 43. Her mother wanted to start the page to keep her memory alive via her friends and family. I hadn't spoken to her in awhile, but her death still gave me pause for a few reasons.

One, it is always a little weird and creepy when someone you knew and lost touch with passes away. You expect your exes to disappear to move on, not die. Two, I remember breaking up with this ex back in April of 2005, because I had met another woman who I felt was way more promising. That promising woman ended up breaking it off with me in June of 2005, being my friend again in 2006, and my wife in 2010.

**sidebar*** My ex was a born again virgin who hadn't had sex in over 15 years, and initially I didn't care because she was cool people, and it was October, which meant football season had just started. While I prefer not to, I can go without sex during football season. But when the spring came around, and she still didn't seem to be giving it up, I became antsy. She went on a cruise with her girls for 10 days. On the fourth day she was gone, I met a girl (now my wife). On the sixth day she was gone, she called me to say hi, and I told her it was over, and then her phone cut off because she was on a cruise. On the 9th day she was gone I got a letter in the mail that she had written on the 1st day of her cruise, telling me how she was ready to "give it up". I felt terrible. **sidebar off**

I found it weird that in the midst of this beautiful life I have, I happened to read about the death of an ex who I dumped two days after meeting my wife. That is weird, which is why I didn't write about this until almost an entire month later. 90% of the time, you want your exes to go away forever, and you really don't care whether you speak to them again or not. They can find out about you through mutual friends, facebook or by reading your blog once or twice a month, but you'd rather not deal with them directly. But you really don't expect to read about their untimely demise..and definitely not at the age of 43.

Not trying to be morbid here, this was just on my mind today. The wife and I talked about this when it first happened, I'm just now getting around to writing it...



Saturday, August 25, 2012

Fear of a Black President.

I wish I had written this brilliant article

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

More videos..this one is an old interview with the Jacksons, Gamble and Huff
Work has been kicking my monkey ass, so I have nothing of eloquence to write. I just wanted to share this Anita Baker song, that I found out was co-written by Gerald Levert. This is one of my favorite Anita Baker songs..






Friday, August 17, 2012

I've had plenty of jobs where the concept of working home was a complete joke. I would have my laptop out for work, but it was entirely possible that I'd also have a glass of wine on hand, ESPN on tv, and music blaring through the speakers. 20% of me was working, 75% of me was chillin', and 5% of me was lost (as is always the case).

This current job takes my previous notion of working from home, and it shoves it all the way in my face. I'm at home now, but I feel like I am right in the office. People are sending me work IMs, I'm answering emails, I'm writing reports, making calculations, I'm eating onions and spotting dimes. I sat down to work at 8am, and I looked up, and it is now almost 10am, and there's still plenty of work to be done (which is why I'm blogging right now). Complaining about work is like complaining about fantasy sports..no one cares and no one has sympathy for you. I'm a bit overwhelmed but I am fully aware of the alternative, and I have no desire to be without employment. So I power thru.

This really wasn't worthy of an entry, but sometimes it feels better to vent. I thank you for reading. Plus no one wants to read about the terrible things happening in Nyles' diapers this week.


Monday, August 13, 2012

This past weekend I had the pleasure of visiting Ohio for my grandmother's 80th birthday and my uncle's marriage--on the same day. I saw lots of family, got lots of love, witnessed lots of questionable wedding attire choices, and I had an overall great time. It was also my first road trip with the wife and young Nyles, and to say the little fella tested our patience would be a supreme understatement.

First off, in order to leave D.C., we had to pack the car with our entire house. A portable crib, bottles, diapers, formula, a stroller, and this was before we got to our own stuff in the damn car. Then, the drive from D.C. to Cleveland usually takes me around 5 and a half hours with one or two stops at the most, but with a seven and a half month old, that just isn't possible. My trip took seven and a half hours there, and seven hours home, and I couldn't even complain about it. As my uncle said, "With infants you have to take your nice, efficient plans and throw them out of the window. And that's exactly what I did.

Anyway, one of the more depressing sights this weekend was my grandmother--specifically the effects dementia is starting to have on her. The last time I saw her was during her husband's funeral, and I couldn't see the dementia, because sadness seemed to be the prevailing emotion. But this weekend, there was nothing that could hide the dementia. Not even her birthday and the marriage of her son could hide what I saw. At one point, I saw her open the fridge, then open about 6 cupboards, close them all, open them up again, then scratch her head for about 5-7 minutes. Finally, I put her and the situation out of its misery, and I asked her what she was looking for, and she said she had no clue.

This went on the entire weekend. There were moments of clarity, like when she told me about her first husband (my grandfather) leaving her for a white woman in 1962 (this wouldn't be a big deal today, but when a black man left his black wife for a white woman in the heart of the Civil Rights movement, that took balls as big as church bells). But there were more moments of her rambling, talking about things that made no sense, and getting caught mid-sentence or mid-thought without knowing how to finish. It was sad to see, but millions of elders (and their family members) are going through this. My other grandmother battled this and cancer for about six months, and then she said enough is enough, and passed away on her own terms. Things don't always get tied in a neat little bow like that, but I wish there was a way to avoid this. Not to mention, this is taking a toll on my mother, who has taken on the yeoman

task of trying to take care of her (along with a caregiver, who is there while my mother works).

I'm stopping now, because this shit is absolutely depressing, but I wanted to at least get a partial thought out on the subject. I'll end on a high note

Wednesday, August 08, 2012

Tuesday, August 07, 2012

So last Thursday night, I worked a little over a 12-hour day, and I decided that I deserved a nice bottle of red wine. My father-in-law was staying with me still, so I was a little leery about him seeing me drink (I'm lying), especially since he's been sober for quite some time, but I powered thru that pseudo-guilt and bought the wine. I was getting ready to venture back in the house, when I remembered that the wife requested that I buy some formula for young Nyles, so I headed into Rite-Aid to do just that.

***Sidebar*** I can readily admit that there is a bit of guilt involved when you buy wine AND baby formula on the same run. The wine cost me $15 dollars, the formula cost me $21, and part of me thought that I should be spending that money on TWO bottles of formula, instead of wine and formula. Then I went to the-grown-ups-need-to-have-fun-too card that adults use to rationalize bad behavior and child neglect, and I bought that f**king wine with no regret with one caveat. Usually I shun the purchase of the bag when I buy wine because a) the liquor store is right across the street from my house (and I don't live in a "black" neighborhood, so picture that. and b)bags are five cents. This time I bought a bag, because I couldn't be seen purchasing wine with a bottle in my hand..that's just bad business right? right.***sidebar off**

So as I was looking for formula, I saw this familiar looking older man bending over and looking at dog food. I stared for a few seconds and wondered if it was who I thought it was, but I said nah, and kept walking. I went to pick up some deodorant, then I headed to the counter, and the old man was in front of me once again, and THIS time I knew exactly who it was. Former Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld. We had the following conversation:

Me: Mr. Rumsfeld?
Him: Yes sir
Me: I don't want to bother you and ask for a picture, but then again, there's no way in hell anyone will believe me if I say I saw you in a drugstore buying dog food
**big hearty laughter by both of us..more him though***
Him: Ah its ok
Me: No that's ok, I just wanted to say hello and shake your hand
Him: Oh ok
**We shake hands**
Me: Take care sir

Of course five minutes later, these two girls begged him for a picture, and he played along, smiled and took the picture (with dog food in his hand), but I could tell he didn't like it. Now I don't agree with the man's politics, and I'm sure he's masterminded some things that would downright piss me off (and vice versa). But this was a man who held a pretty political office, and that alone commands my respect.

I should have taken a picture...anyway, more Nyles:

Thursday, August 02, 2012

Yes I realize this video is 55 minutes long, and yes I'm aware that youtube may not let you watch it from my blog, because they want you to go their site directly. But this is a great documentary on Stevie Wonder's "Hotter Than July" album (back when you could call them albums without dating yourself). This wasn't Stevie's best album, but it had one of my favorite songs on there entitled "All I Do" (Mr. Michael Jackson sings background on it). But I digess..watch the video please: