A Few Good Men

Due to less-than-stellar acclaim, Kerri is forcing me to contribute to her blog. Personally, I think things have been going fine without me; but, I have to admit that the endless stream of cutesy-wutesy pictures and videos must be sickening to all but the sappiest among you, so it's time to add a man's perspective to things.

When I come home from work, Kerri usually has a list of (a) grievances involving the evil things our two boys have done in the course of the day, or (b) the kids have done something that makes her particularly proud. Many of these things that make her happy have been meticulously captured on film and shared with you readers as well.

Yes, I admit, these things that make a mother proud are "nice" and "pleasing", but what I have to share with you today are things that mothers may place in category (a) but that I, as the father, feel belong in category (b) as a sign that my boys are well on their way to becoming real men.

After a year of life generally being a lump, leaving me to fret about his manhood, Tyler began showing masculine qualities at his 1 year birthday party, when we placed a whole chocolate cake in front of him. The speed with which he devoured it, leaving a trail of destruction from the high chair to the bathtub where Mommy bathed him, pretty much confirmed the fact that my son was descended from club-wielding caveman ancestors. We knew we didn't have a prissy son.











From there, Tyler has demonstrated an amazing knack to "out-man" even his father. From the infamous "eating shredder contents" incident (where one day we found him consuming remnants of old credit card bills) to the full-blown frat party whipped cream chugging contest (thanks Uncle Aaron and Andrew), our son's energy has never left a doubt that we would find him cavorting with Barbie dolls.










Another pleasing sign: Tyler doesn't have the time nor energy to be consumed by his own appearance, as evidenced by these two hair occasions. As anyone who has seen my hair can attest to, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

In this next set of virile shots, Tyler is showing his no-nonsense macho fashion. Thanks to Uncle Aaron, Tyler can be seen about town in his bomber jacket and airman sunglasses. Next, thanks to me, Tyler shows off his newly acquired tattoo - hopefully a sign of things to come, except I encourage him to get more becoming tattoos - stuff like motorcycles and anchors.











What is a man without a gun? Tyler doesn't even know what a gun is; unfortunately, I have never brought him to the shooting range. But, in the hands of a natural man, a plastic toy drill inherently is a weapon that must be aimed and pointed at people.

Finally, a couple of images and stories that would have never seen the light of blogdom if Kerri continued on her way. On the left, looks like an innocent picture of a sink, right? Well, look a little closer. On this day, Tyler pulled a booger out of his nose and started chasing me with it to put it on me. Note: I've never chased Tyler around with a booger, so the whole time I was running around, it was secretly with delight that he passed this rite of passage - being a disgusting boy. Finally, I managed to convince him to wash his finger in the sink like all decent booger wielding men, but he had to do one last thing - wipe it on the sink for someone to wash. I enclose this picture because blogs need more pictures like this, and less giggling sumo babies.


By now, everyone who is a regular visitor to this blog has seen our Florida vacation pictures. Nice and sweet, right? They paint an image of a perfect beach vacation of a middle class family reunion enjoying picturesque walks along the Florida coastline. What Kerri "forgot" to tell you was about incidents like this, where Tyler insisted on pointing out delightful sights to us on our beach walks, like this "big poopoo" (driftwood). Way to go, son!


Finally, I would like to leave you with some last images of our other son Dylan, who is still pretty much in his lump phase, but has begun to show some signs of masculine virtues.

In Exhibit A, I present to you an image of a one-week old gangster-to-be:










Exhibit B, Dylan recently began speaking his first words. As we strained our ears in anxious anticipation to hear his first words of wisdom, what did we hear? The secret of life? Mommy? Daddy? I think it's quite clear from this video that Dylan's first word is going down in history as "butt":



Readers, I hate to toot my own horn, but I think my job as a father is almost done. I think it's clear from these images that my job in raising the next generation of men is on the righteous path to success.

I am so proud of my boys! <sniff>