The Big DumpTruck

Junior has become my little outdoorsman. If he could play GameCube outside, he could die happy. Yesterday was tee ball in the morning, then a bike ride with his cousins in the afternoon, followed by a little pickup tee ball and then some basketball. Today he rode his bike a bit, and then, something I wouldn’t have suspected, my parents took us to BJs where they picked up a kid’s fishing pole and my dad (who has a fishing license) taught him how to cast down at Whalom. Amazing. He really got the hang of it pretty quickly, and we won’t even talk about the driving rain. It was just not a day to be standing out there, but my dad was pretty into it, or he faked it very well. Now Junior wants to go back tomorrow.

Man, this is really pushing the limits of what his father and I consider a fun way to spend the weekend. I’ll take him fishing as long as I don’t have to bait hooks or remove them from fish (or humans). I have limits.

The following photos are of Junior airborn playing basketball, and the other is of the abandoned rollercoaster at Whalom. My camera batteries died right after I took these so I didn’t get any pictures of Junior fishing. I’ll get some another time.

Man, do I love maple syrup. Not that fake crap. That stuff should be outlawed. I’m talking tree juice, baby. Boiled tree juice. We chose Eggo homestyle waffles as our method of ingesting our maple syrup.

Game 2 of tee ball was a success.

I’m not wearing socks today. Or Sox, as I started to type. People who write it that way are probably either from Boston or Chicago, I suspect.

That means it’s summer. I know it isn’t really summer, it’s just the last day of April, but if I go to work without socks, I’m in summer vacation mode, my friend.

The quote I put up last night (keep reading down)? I want that on a t-shirt. I think I’m going to find a picture of Chuckles on the web, put the text over the picture, and print that puppy out. If we were allowed to have screensavers (there’s a corporate one everyone gets) I’d use that image. I wish I had written that…it’s just so…absurd, and so me. It’s great, and if you don’t think so, well, I won’t be able to explain it.

“I’m not a moose, I’m a pig wearing an origami hat with antlers!”

– The Dark Lord Chuckles, the Silly Piggy on Dave the Barbarian

As a follow-up to yesterday’s accident coverage here at the dump, I wanted to take a moment to mention that as a parent, I want my son to see these things himself so he can be scared to death of the thought of driving a car.

Because quite frankly, it’s that “invincibility” factor that makes a 17 year old boy the equivalent of a large, junkfood-eating torpedo.

I want him to be properly respectful of other drivers. I want him to realize that it only takes two seconds for death and destruction to occur. I want him to realize that even if he is a good driver, chances are the person in the next lane is not, so get the hell out of his blind spot, and always assume someone is going to pull out in front of you. Never assume people will stop for a red light. And if it’s late out, beware of the tired, drunk, or both.

He has hazy memories of the Halloween Eve accident where Mr. Dump hit a truck that had run a stop sign, but not enough for it to be useful for scaring him. And he remembers the guy who backed into us at the YMCA, but he had no concept that this small fender-bender did $1500 worth of damage and caused me no end of phone calls dealing with insurance and the rental agency.

I think he’s getting the idea, that people who don’t pay attention and follow the rules are “bad” people who shouldn’t be driving because they could cause an accident and hurt someone. I want him to be a good driver, or I’m never ever going to let him leave the house without me. And you can quote me on that.