6 Months

Well it's been 6 months since I have written. I wonder, why has it been so long? and why 6 months, oh yeah, because 3 days before my last post, my wife gave birth to our daughter.

Needless to say, life has been busy, but not busy enough to justify my neglect of writing.

I try not to be a theologian in these posts because there are plenty of other blogs that I am sure are way better at the spiritual than I am, but when the scriptures describe children as submissive, I feel like there must have been something lost in translation. My children are not submissive, or at least, not as much as I would like. I understand why my parents eventually just tied us to our beds with rope (only happened once and I am pretty sure my mom felt horrible about it), but the more that Abe gets out of bed and refuses to sleep until 10:00 or 11:00, the more I wonder where in the garage I put my rope.

As a parent you know what's best for your child (mostly), but it's exasperating trying the same thing over and over and failing over and over. In adult life, if something doesn't work over and over again, we are told to find alternate solutions, but the resolve of some of these kids; it seems like trying something new only energizes them more. They know that soon enough you will run out of time, energy, and ideas. Then all you can do is give up or get out the rope.

Let's catch up. Evelyn was an experiment in patience for the first three months and I have the broken pacifiers (thrown against the wall (baby not attached)) to prove it. I don't need to tell anyone that it can be frustrating to have this helpless thing in your arms that is screaming and there is not a single thing in this world that will satisfy it.

She got better after 3 months, or at least she started laughing which is like antidote for rage. Actually, she got a lot better. I no longer have any right to complain. Perspective can be difficult; I can't console Evelyn when she is crying by reminding her that there are worse babies out there, but it helps me realize that this post will come off incredibly whiny for someone who has actually had a challenging child.

How, absolutely awful is that sound?

Work continues to be and I continue to not want to talk about

-so why'd you bring it up?

-shut up.

I do have one work anecdote to tell. Like most other working human beings, I am not a huge fan of my job or company, but I do know that I am incredibly fortunate to be able to work from home, and while it comes at the cost of my personal hygiene (I go about 7 months in between haircuts), the fact that I have no commute to speak of and can watch movies, play games, and surf the internet all day, makes me the envy of all of my friends. I was in the office for a training and was talking to coworker who had also worked from home.

She asked me if I liked working from home, to which I gave an honest answer, "I love it."

She responded that she was coming back into the office because she hated it. I was stunned. What could be better than waking up, realizing you have 5 minutes to get up and get to work, and still get there 3 minutes early?

She responded, "I miss the social aspect of the office." I choked on the words. If there is one thing that I don't miss (and hate every time I have to go in) about the office, it's the social aspect. Anyway, management hasn't even uttered the words "work from home" in well over a year, because apparently there are way more people that miss the office than social rejects like me who want nothing more than as little human contact (I should probably clarify that by saying, people I don't give a single crap about) as possible.

Here is why I loath people in the office, because they try to motivate. Listening to some random dude who's only experience is selling crap on the phone to strangers, try to motivate a team full of bitter, crass, down trodden adults, is soul wrenching. Today we had a meeting in which some big shot sales person tried to give us tips and he lost me with this:

"Do you know what the definition of insanity is? It is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results." I took the opportunity to look up the definition of insanity to keep my hands busy and away from the gun and here it is:

in·san·i·ty

   [in-san-i-tee] Show IPA

noun, plural in·san·i·ties.

1.

the condition of being insane; a derangement of the mind.Synonyms: dementia, lunacy, madness, craziness, mania,aberration.

2.

Law . such unsoundness of mind as frees one from legalresponsibility, as for committing a crime, or as signals one'slack of legal capacity, as for entering into a contractualagreement.

3.

Psychiatry . (formerly) psychosis.

4.

a.

extreme foolishness; folly; senselessness; foolhardiness:Trying to drive through that traffic would be pure insanity.

b.

a foolish or senseless action, policy, statement, etc.:We've heard decades of insanities in our political discourse.

(dictionary.com)

Four definitions and not a single one that even looks closely to that stupid quip. Here is a definition for you. How does someone immediately lose all credibility?

lie

¹    [lahy] Show IPA noun, verb, lied, ly·ing.

noun

1.

a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood.

(dictionary.com)

Selling tips are great, but leave the motivation for your kids little league games. This seems angry (I can tell because my hands are shaking), but when all is said and done, I was wearing basketball shorts and a ripped up t-shirt during that meeting, so there's that.

Enough about work for a while (read forever). I will be back soon (read never).