Aging Baby Boomers making us nuts...

Right before I married my wife, I had a big fixation with the Baby Boomer generation. I had just read the book '13th Gen: Abort, Retry, Ignore, Fail?' by Neil Howe and William Strauss and I was pretty obsessed with Baby Boomers.

If you don't know what Baby Boomers are, they are the generation of people born between 1946 - 1964. The authors of '13th Gen' separated the generations by 20 years, so they considered it 1941 to 1960. They listed Generation X as those born between 1961 to 1980. Until I read that book, I never really thought about generations and how others perceive them. It's a pretty interesting book. They basically laid out the realization that history dictates that one generation is given heaps of praise and expections while the one after or before that one is ignored and scorned. To that extent, this ran true for Gen Xers. The Baby Boomers were supposed to change the world and make it a better place. They sort of did, but the book lays out a lot of instances in which they make things a lot worse.

So I started noticing every time a newspaper article highlighted something that Baby Boomers tend to do. I would talk about it with my wife and she'd quickly get irritated because her parents are Baby Boomers and since she was in her early 20s, she never really gave it much thought. She would call me obsessed as I would rant about how much I hate the Baby Boomers.

One article talked about how a lot of women in their late 40s to early 50s are now dressing on the beach a lot more revealing than they used to. I guess they're making up for lost time. One woman is described as purring that it's very sexy. My question would be: to who? Certainly not to us younger people having to look at that. One article I just read said that Sophia Loren at 73 has curves that someone in their 20s would dream about and that people are still swooning over Paul Newman at 83. Who are these people that think this? Probably Boomers that are getting old themselves.

Another article I read talked about how Baby Boomers were going to change how retirement is done (even sexier!) and certainly current ads make you think that they are currently trying to do that.

As Boomers have gotten older, we've been overwhelmed by commercials that appeal to the Boomer lifestyle. They're easy to spot. Take this SUV commercial from a few years ago. We see a couple of Baby Boomers driving the larger model SUV through woods and forests. They are frantically trying to find something. At the end of the commercial, you get the pay off. The lady Boomer takes a snap shot of a wolf with her big telephoto lens. The message being that you deserve to own a big SUV because you have important things to do.

If you contrast that with a commercial from the same company aimed at Gen Xers, you see a different message. A Gen Xer couple is driving the smaller model SUV. They are arguing... about a hat. That's right. The woman hates the man's hat so she throws it out the window. He hightails after his hat in his SUV, jumps out, grabs the dusty hat and puts it on. The message? You're going to do stupid shit anyway because you're young, so why not do it in our sporty SUV?

Even to this day, the commercials aimed at Boomers are becoming more and more pointed that they are not just doing mindless pursuits. A current commercial shows a lady getting out of sporty vehicle and putting on a wet suit. The young hunks are checking her out. She then has three other girls, her daughters get out of the car. All four head to the beach with their surfboards. The message being that you're old, but still sexy even with three kids in tow. By the way, you still surf, so look how cool you've become! Nothing says sexy like young guys checking you out in front of your kids. Who's with me? Okay, that one isn't so annoying as wishful thinking. It wouldn't look so great to see how they probably use the vehicle: to get to work, go shopping, the movies and the golf course.

Every night we see commercials aimed at Boomers retiring, which is only natural because they're all getting old and the first crop of them just retired.

These commercials drive my wife nuts.

Rather than point out that they need to save money for retirement, the commercials again point out that being important people with important stuff to do, they shouldn't be happy just retiring. They need to open their own business! They need to build a sail boat out of scratch! They need to skydive! They need to ski!

One commercial even shows two aging couples flying to the middle of nowhere to go fishing. The guy then tells his buddy that they'll be able to do this whenever they want when they retire.

Isn't this supposed to be time when they're supposed to slow down a little? And does it always have to be overly complicated and dramatic?

Then again, it does make a little sense. After all, they were always labeled as the people that get things done. On the other hand, my generation is alway portrayed as the slackers that get by with minimal work, which I guess is sort of true. It's not that we don't like to work. We just don't want to work all the time.

But think about this, if you are going to retire, do you really want to start over in a new career like farming? Starting a small business is one thing, but these commercials have people launching major business investments when they are more likely to be complaining about their bad hips or the food poisoning on their latest cruise.

What I'm really looking forward to is when my generation gets near retirement age. The generations below mine are going to go nuts watching us take retirement to an extreme level. You'll see commercials where a skater is finally taking the next step and putting down the board. Then you'll see him opening a skate park or starting his own skate shop. You'll see old ladies partaking in roller derby just for kicks. You'll see old sky divers engaging in even more dangerous stunts because just because your life span is almost gone, doesn't mean your thrill of danger is, too. Instead of playing regular curling, seniors my age will be seen using themselves as the puck with their four buddies furiously sliding him or sweeping a path to knock out the other seniors. Instead of seeing us take trips to take pictures that no one will see, we'll take that trip so we can take stupid pictures or video of ourselves doing senseless stunts to post to You Tube.

I'm ready to start taking my extreme cruises where people my age climb the rock wall on deck, but rather slowly, which is fine. I can wait.

Lots of news: Sanjaya still alive. We get a cat. The Easter Bunny leaves an 'ipod' for Julia. Bill's still a jerk.

Sanjaya is still alive on American Idol after the vote tonight, which is infuriating my wife. She really, really hates that kid, but now there's another person in favor of him in our household

Last night, we were watching American Idol with our daughter, Julia. Normally, she doesn't watch what we watch because by the time Laura gets home when we watch our programs, Julia's already in bed. Tuesday night, Laura was home early, so we watched American Idol.

I documented how I'm firmly on board the vote for Sanjaya bandwagon. What's interesting in how popular he seems to be with little kids in an article I read. Sure enough, when Sanjaya hit the stage, Julia was fixated on him. She beamed, "He was good!" and declared, "The last guy was my favorite!" Keep in mind, she's never seen him before. I guess his smoldering, yet innocent looks eased her mind.

...

We also have just gotten a cat today. As you know, our old cat, Moe, died a few weeks ago. Well, Laura couldn't take it any longer not have a cat that loved her and frankly, I couldn't take her not having one either because she seemed to openly resent any affection our other two cats, Murphy and Suzy, gave me.

So we picked out this cat tonight. He wasn't exactly our first choice (the one my wife was wanting was already gone), but it seemed like fate because he sprinted into our private room at the humane society. The volunteer said that the cat's sheet noted that he was a shy and timid cat. You could have fooled us. From the instant he was in the room, he was purring his heart out. While not the first choice, he definitely won Laura over, so it was homeward bound for him.

It was my duty to get the cat home, which turned out to be no easy feat. I placed his cardboard carrier box in the back seat with Julia. As soon as we started towards home, the cat was meowing and clawing at the box holes like crazy. Julia did her best at calming the poor thing, but he kept clawing. He managed to claw open a hole in the box and was starting to work on an escape when Julia grabbed one of her drawing notebooks and held it against the hole.

The cat stopped clawing while Julia held the notebook. Julia remarked, "Oh my gosh. This is the weirdest day of my life!"

...

Speaking of Julia, the Easter bunny gave Julia an ipod. Well, it's not exactly an ipod. It's a Target-brand MP3 player, but it does the job.

We decided to get an MP3 player for Julia because she's been rather insistent that we listen to her music, which lately is a rotation of five songs played over and over. One of them is Queen's "Somebody to Love" that gets played on an continuous loop that drives you insane. So we got her the mp3 player to listen to. Now we get to hear her lovely singing, which makes us laugh as she mangles the lyrics to every song.

...

Bill's still a jerk. For no reason... :)

Sanjaya on American Idol. I'm part of the problem...

Yes, I'll admit it. I watch American Idol, which isn't a far stretch since about 20 to 30 million people watch it every week.

I do remember that when I started watching it, I didn't really know if I would enjoy watching it, but I did. The singing coupled with the judges comments get you involved to the point where a person like me, who can't sing very well at all, is commenting during the show that someone is 'off key' or 'flat'.

In the past, I would watch in disgust as the least talented person in the competition would remain on the show while more talented people are voted off. Part of the reason for this happening is due to a site that sprung up four years ago called Vote For the Worst. Vote For the Worst's goal every week is to get all their readers to vote for the worst person and see how long they can keep them in the competition.

Initially, I was against this because I felt that it was unfair to those that were actually trying. Plus, it was keeping people that I hated to listen to around longer in the competition. This year, I'm embracing it.

Here's why. When I first started watching American Idol, I would be a little miffed when bad singers were chosen for the competition portion on the show. I would be even more annoyed when those singers continually made it through the competition while other, more talented singers went home.

Then I started to see the real picture. You see, American Idol really isn't about finding the most talented singer. If it was, they wouldn't subject you to the awful auditions during the audition weeks. If you do the math, it's literally impossible to hear every singer that shows up at the competition. They have thousands upon thousands of singers audition. Only a handful see the judges. It gets fishy when a lot of them suck really really bad, which means they are purposely chosen to sing for the judges, knowing that they are going to suck.

Sometimes, they take marginally talented people to go to the Hollywood tryouts. Then they take those marginally talented over more talented people for the real show (when it gets wittled down to the top 24) because they are prettier, more personable, or both. Why? Because they want variety. They want the bad singers. They want those with little range like a Sinatra-like singer trying to belt out Crocodile Rock or a Diva trying to sing a country song. They want the judges to wince and criticize because it adds variety.

Now that I've fully realized and accepted this I had a prediction when the show was whittling down singers to the final 12 that performs in front of the huge audience during the live show, that Sanjaya Malakar would make it to the top 12. Sure enough, to my wife's amazement, he did.

Why was I so sure? While he sucks, he has this very over the top charm that was sure to get him votes. Being half Indian doesn't hurt either as he gets the Indian vote. Getting a block of votes from an area or a segment of the population can take you far.

Two weeks ago, I started voting. We've voted in the past for certain contestants like Taylor Hicks (what were we thinking?), but never for the worst person. I decided to vote for him because of Vote For the Worst and for Howard Stern. Both want to see Sanjaya go far, which would be hilarious.

I voted about eight times that night for Sanjaya. My wife asked with a confused look, "Why are you doing this?"

I asked someone the next day at work if they watched American Idol. She said that she had and rattled off who she thought was good.

I proudly declared, "I voted for Sanjaya eight times."

A lady next to us whipped her head around so fast I thought she was going to pull a muscle.

"He's awful!" she said with a confused look.

"I know. It's funny."

That night, the results came and Sanjaya was safe. My wife looked over at me and in no polite terms threated me if I voted for him again. Normally, I don't take kindly to threats, but since I have to live with the threatener, I'm going to stop.

Besides, he's going to go far. This year, people are really fully embracing the vote for the worst guy mentality. He didn't even make the bottom three this week. Howard Stern had lots of his listeners calling in telling about how they voted hundreds of times for Sanjaya. Even Howard himself, who normally goes to bed at 9 pm stayed up late to vote for Sanjaya, all the while giggling.

Even my brother is voting for Sanjaya.

I think the time was right for someone like Sanjaya to get a movement behind him like this. It's not that people want mediocrity. I think that people are getting tired of the same formula that is American Idol. It's shaking things up.

They created this problem by purposely picking mediocre people amongst the two or three superior people. They alse created a problem wherein they ask people to vote for their favorite performer. This can splinter votes when a person that's like a superior performer gets voted off. Then the judges act shocked as if they can't believe that America did that.

Also, they don't show the voting numbers or ranks of the performers so you can't tell how well a person is doing. They want as many people to vote in each week, which isn't always possible.

If Sanjaya goes far, and I predict he will, you might expect some changes in American Idol. While the bad singers will still get in, I wouldn't be surprised if they started being more selective or even allowed people to vote for who they think should go home. That would solve part of the vote splintering problem

More pictures of Moe

Moe was a studly kitty...

We often made reference to how our cat, Moe, was a stud. He weighed a whopping 20 pounds and was as big as one my old dogs, Snoopy, who was a rat terrier/fox terrier mix.

We got Moe and his sister, Murphy, from a farm. My wife wanted a cat bad. She wanted just one because she had always grown up with just one cat. I insisted that we get two because I didn't want her to just have one cat that loved just her. I wanted a cat, too. Besides, I argued, the cats will have each other to play with.

We picked out our two cats from the farm. One was a gray tabby cat and the other was a mostly grayish-black cat with a front of white fur with white paws. We named them Moe and Murphy. We mainly picked those names because we had seen a George Carlin skit in which he had two cats and a dog name Moe, Murphy and Verne. In this skit, Moe (his dog) tries to get it on with the male cat named Verne. We laughed so hard at that skit that we were reminded of it when it was time to choose names.

Moe’s full name was Mulder Moe. The Mulder part came from the popular show, The X-Files. We were big fans, so that’s what we thought would be cool to name our cats, so Moe was Mulder and Murphy was Scully. After a week of that, I was worried that it would sound really dated years later (and it does). Mulder and Scully never did stick.

When we picked up the cats, one thing really surprised me. They were practically the size of a full grown cat. Laura assured me that both cats were 8 weeks old. We assumed that they were going to get a lot bigger. We were right.

From the start, we knew he was going to be quite the character.

As a kitten, Moe was built with the shoulders of a bull dog. He would do a kind of strut waddle when we ran into a room. Before too long, he would get the nickname, Studly, because of the way that he would announce his presence to you. If he wanted affection from you, he’d walk over you, butt his head into your chin and plop all 20 pounds of him on you chest.

Moe quickly established himself as the dominate kitten. He would often chase his sister around the apartment. When we got a mouse toy on an elastic string that’s attached over a door, Moe went to town on it. He was so determined to get the mouse down that he, after many attempts of batting it down, grabbed it with his teeth and started walking slowly towards us. Meanwhile, the elastic was stretching and the door overhand part was bending. Before I could stop him, his grip on the elastic broke and off the mouse flew in the opposite direction. It wasn’t long after that that Moe gave up on it. He may have been an animal, but he wasn’t stupid.

Moe’s demeanor changed when, a year later, we moved to California. We had packed up the moving van with all of our stuff and the last thing to go was Moe and Murphy. They had decided to hide on top of the refrigerator. Moe was drooling, which is what cats do when they are stressed. On the way to California stuck in a truck cab, Moe hid under the seat and wailed. It was only after I reached behind the seat and touched him that he calmed down. From that point on, Moe would be very dog-like in that he seemed to develop separation anxiety.

We would be up all night with Moe wailing and it was only until he had a hand on him, that he’d be happy. Sometimes, my wife Laura, would have to sleep on the couch with her hand on him to keep him quiet. In the end, I would play with him for 30 minutes every night to wear him out.

Laura called a vet about it and she suggested we talk to one of the local colleges because it sounded like Moe was suffering from separation anxiety and she had never heard of a cat having it.

From that point on, Moe became an attack cat, the muscle of the house. If he didn’t know you or knew you didn’t like him even if you knew him, he’d hiss, jump at you or both.

We went on vacation and our friend, Jeff, was to come by and feed our cats periodically. He reported that he was terrified as our cats jumped out at him from corners, chased him downstairs and out the door. He had to bring his girlfriend back to help. “They’re just cats!” she exclaimed at him.

When we were trying to sell our old house, we kept the cats in the garage with the note: “Please don’t open the garage. Cats in here.” Of course, some people wouldn’t listen, so invariably we’d come home to messages that read, “The customer opened the garage door and let the cats out. We tried to finish the tour with them in the house, but the cats chased us from room to room. We cut the tour short and fled the house. Great attack cats!” We even had a realtor open house cancelled because the cats were let out and lunging at realtors. From that point on, Moe and Murphy were locked in a big pet carrier.

When we moved to Omaha, we had to find a baby sitter, so a co-worker of my wife’s offered her daughter. We had her come over to get acquainted with Moe and Murphy while I was there. Thinking it was all right, we left Julia and the baby sitter alone on another night. The next day, it was reported by the mother that the cats on several occasions had chased the babysitter and blocked her in the kitchen and the bathroom. All the while, Julia giggled and laughed while exclaiming, “Moe doesn’t like you! He loves me!”

Another babysitter’s father commented that we could write them off on our taxes “As horses!”

You had to be careful what you left out around Moe. If you had a drink of water on a table, it’d better be in a solid, heavy glass or hidden because usually when you weren’t looking, Moe would walk up to it, sniff it, reach up his paw and pull the glass down. He’d lap up your water that was spilled all over the table while you cursed at him and cleaned it up. He’d fake you out by not doing it for a while and then just when you relaxed, ‘DUNK!’, he’d do it again.

Because of Moe’s protective, bruising nature, we were a little concerned when Laura gave birth to our daughter, Julia. We had read from some people that they would get rid of a cat that would try to jump in a crib with their baby. I knew that wasn’t going to be an option, so we installed a screen door on Julia’s room to keep the cats out.

When we brought Julia home from the hospital, we set her down in her car seat down in front of Moe. Moe froze in his tracks with wide eyes. He then crawled forward and sniffed Julia up and down. He didn’t hiss, but he seemed a little freaked out.

I was a little worried about Moe around Julia, but Laura was sure of him. She said, “I think Moe will be her protector.”

While he never had cause to run protection, he did act like he was guarding her. While Julia crawled or played on a blanket, Moe would sit there like a sphinx in front of her. As Julia got older, she’d grab on to his fur or his ears. Sometimes, she’d climb on him. Moe would always take it without even trying to nip at her. As Julia’s adventures took to the back yard, Moe would be out there with her following her around. Some of her first words were “Moe!” or “Moe Moe!” as she’d call out to him constantly when he’d walk away.

His patience towards Julia was almost never ending. One day, Julia draped a necklace on his neck. He walked around with it all day and ended up wearing it for several days before he snagged it on a table and the beads went everywhere.

To my wife, Moe was her ‘Baby’. He had to have access next to her on the couch. If he didn’t get it, he made noises of displeasure. Then again, he made noises of displeasure for anything: if he didn’t have water, if he didn’t have food, if he wanted to be rubbed.

My wife always made alone time for Moe. At night, he’d curl up beside her and she’d stroke him for a long time. He’d always have his eyes closed with pleasure.

Then he’d get to me. He also had to have alone time with him lying on my chest. Sometimes, I’d be barely lying down and he’d saunter up my torso, nudge me in the chin with his head and plop down. I gave him what would probably be a face massage as I rubbed his chin and face while he purred in contentment…

Last week, Moe jumped up on our breakfast bar and laid there for hours. When it came time for bed time, my wife noticed that he hadn’t come up for his alone time. I went downstairs and found him eating. I grabbed him and brought upstairs to bed. He didn’t stay long. He ran out and went back to the breakfast bar. He didn’t come back.

The next night, he sat again on the breakfast bar. He wasn’t sleeping and he looked a little irritated. My wife mentioned that he didn’t look good and that we should make an appointment for him.

By Wednesday, Moe was still heading for the kitchen counter, a place he never spent time at. He sat with his paws curled in towards his body. He also was starting to smell a little as if he hadn’t been cleaning himself. I just assumed that he had a virus. I made the vet appointment for Friday morning.

Thursday night, I came home and Moe was not on the kitchen counter. He was in our guest bedroom. He was drooling. His arm was crusted with it, which led me to assume that he’d been doing this for a long time. I rushed him to the emergency vet and they noticed right away that he was extremely dehydrated.

We got the call later that night that Moe’s blood work indicated that he had chronic kidney failure. Their suggestion was to run IV on him for a full day to flush him out and see if the levels come down. Most cats don’t recover from this. I had to break the news to my wife that her favorite cat was dying.

The next morning, I had to go pick him up. Moe didn’t look happy. He looked weak and unhealthy. I had to take him home for about 30 minutes while I waited for the vet to open. He managed to jump up on the kitchen counter again and curled up in the same place he had been most of the week.

Laura went to see him at the vet. She called in tears. She said, “He doesn’t look good at all. He looks horrible.”

The next morning, we talked to the vet. He informed us that the new blood work was back and his levels were still off the charts. He wasn’t recovering. The vet did note that they had to put him in a kitty bag to get him out of his cage because he was really mad at having been there all night! We laughed at that because even in his poor health he was feisty.

We made the decision to end his life because he wasn’t going to recover, and we didn’t want his final days to be ones of discomfort. I grabbed his head and looked him in the eyes. I rubbed his cheeks another time and gave him a hug. Our daughter also said goodbye.

My wife stayed in with him when it was over. The vet came out of the room and gave me a thumbs up (which I thought was odd). We did manage to laugh at that later. I wondered aloud what sort of signal would you give that an animal had passed away? The slash to the throat?

The day before we talked with our daughter that Moe would not be coming back. I don’t think she truly understands. As far as she knows, Moe is at the vet and isn’t coming back.

When my wife talked to her about it, Julia said, “I want to keep a picture of Moe, because I don’t want to forget him.”

When I talked with her about it, Julia said, “I’m going to miss him, because he’s a stud.”

I said through tears, “I know he is Sweetie. I know he is.”

I saw Saw III, but it this Saw is rusty

Here I am with my timely review of a DVD that came out several weeks ago...

I am kind of a fan of the Saw series. I saw the first one and was blown away by some of the twists and turns in the movie. I also liked the main villains plans to test people by playing games. In the movies, his victims are kidnapped and usually wake up to find themselves in a precarious position and a very short time to get themselves out of it. Most of the time, the game player has to do something very unappealing to get themselves out, but the end result if they don't is death.

It's a grim movie, but from time to time, I feel the need to watch grim movies like this. I think I get in the mood when I'm under some stress.

Another reason I watched them is because it's like driving by an accident. You wonder how it happened and who's hurt. I watch and wonder what I would do in these situations. Probably as well as the victims in the movies since I'm kind of a klutz and prone to injure myself at any mundane moment.

I thought Saw 1 was pretty good. Saw 2 was good, too. Then I rented Saw 3. From the get go, I'm a little uneasy about this Saw. Things just don't seem right. Stop reading if you don't want spoilers by the way.

It takes a long time to set up this movie. By the time we get to the actual game, the movie is well over 30 minutes in. The first set of games probably could have been set up in flashbacks.

So our villain Jigsaw is still testing people. He also has an understudy in the whiny Amanda. Amanda kidnaps a doctor to keep our Saw alive, who is suffering from brain tumor. The swelling on his brain is causing him very limited mobility. The game starts with a dual game of the doctor having to keep Jigsaw alive while wearing a trap tied to his heart rate. At the same time, a game is starting with a man that had his son killed by a driver. He can't get past it and even scolds his daughter for touching his 'things' in the kid's room. He wakes up in a crate and must go through a series of tests. In a twist on the first films, he's not stuck in a trap, people related to his son's death are in traps. He must decide to free them or let them die.

In my opinion, this was a huge mistake. The traps are too easy for him to get out of and yet he manages to mess them up.

This live-or-die scenario is only interesting for a short time. Much of the time is spent watching the traps move as the people that are strapped in edging closer to death while Jeff agonizes about saving them. To me, this would be a no brainer. As much as I would be angry about a family member's death, I'm not a killer and I could find it in my heart to forgive someone, especially when it was circumstances beyond my control. Jeff, as with all of Saw's protagonists, they never learn their lesson, so we are forced to watch Jeff, close his eyes, moan, curse the sky, agonize, yell, scream, cry, etc. You name the emotion, Jeff emotes it.

It was right at this spot when I realized why things didn't sit well with me. The man in the last test is strapped up in a large machine that will slowly twist his arms, legs and neck (in that order). This man is not a small man (probably around 230 pounds) and is off the ground a bit. Seeing him in that state suddenly made it clear, who in the hell put this guy up there? Jigsaw is a zombie and his assistant is barely 130 lbs. Besides the fact, Jeff, the "hero" in this movie, is no spring chicken himself.

Also, by my count, there were 6 people kidnapped and put in place for this test. How does one accomplish that in a big city and not get noticed? Amanda would literally have to have a large delivery truck complete with huge vials of chloroform to keep people knocked out. Think of all the planning that would have to go in this. You'd have to kidnap them one at a time in various locations around the city. One person gets kidnapped in a hospital locker room of all places. I'm sure the security guards and camera caught none of that.

So you have to break in to someone's place of residence, kidnap them, drag them to the van while avoiding detection, tie them up, drive to another place, kidnap that person, drag them to the van while avoiding detection, repeat until all are kidnapped, take them to their various places (all the while making sure they are chloroformed enough to avoid waking up too early) and getting all the traps in place without dying yourself. It's no wonder Amanda is freaking out at this point. She's running herself ragged!

So Saw tries hard to break their own molds in the third incarnation, but I think their emphasis on emotional traps runs a little hollow, especially since the only thing I found disturbing in this movie wasn't even violent. A little girl is scolded by her Dad for playing with her dead brother's toys and after all the gruesome incidents in the movie, all I can think of it how sad she looked.

If you like this sort of thing, I guess I'd recommend it, but if you aren't a fan of these types of movies, I'd avoid it.

Going stir crazy after this blizzard...

Wednesday night, I could have gone to the store and stocked up on some things that I was out of like Diet Mountain Dew, Diet Dr. Pepper and the like, but instead, I chose to wait until I got paid. I guess you could also say that I was procrastinating, which is kind of what I tend to do around my house.

For example, I had two shelves to hang in the bathroom. I hung one on Sunday and I finally hung the second one yesterday. The rest of the time, I kept walking past the toolbox next to the bathroom thinking about it. And boy did I have plenty of time to think about these past few days!

I mentioned to my wife that Wednesday night that it was supposed to snow about 6 inches and we may have Julia's day care canceled, which mirrors whatever the local school system does. Otherwise, I was thinking about coming in late anyway because I've been having this sort of virus that people have been getting around work. It's king of like a cold, but not really. It's not as annoying, but seems to stay with you longer. You're full of yellow mucus and you feel tired in the afternoon. Otherwise, it's tolerable. I was hoping to get some rest on Thursday so I had already cleared it with my boss that I was going to come late to try and shake it.

My wife grunted that it was only going to snow 1 to 3 inches and that she didn't think day care was going to be canceled.

So I wake up that morning to the winds howling and swirling. I look outside and it's like a scene out of John Carpenter's The Thing, in which a bunch of workers up north in very snowy conditions encounter a monster. It looked like that except no monster.

I tried to get a read on how deep it was but it was hard to tell. At first, it didn't look like it was going to be that deep because it didn't look that much snow on the driveway.

Sure enough, the public schools were closed and so was my work's day care, so I was homebound.

I can log into work from home, so I tried to get some work done before my wife had to go to work. She told me she was going to leave, so I quit for for a while and went to see if she'd need me to shovel her out. Sure enough, she did.

Laura walked out and then walked back in from the garage and muttered, "Yeah, you're going to have to help me get out."

I open the garage door (after getting bundled up) and sure enough, there was a lot of snow and why I couldn't tell how deep it was was obvious. The snow had drifted because of the strong winds. I got my snow blower working and cleared a huge drift off from in front of the garage (about 3 feet high) and the finished the rest of the driveway. Near the end of the driveway was a scary sight. The snow looked very deep. I thought that there was no way she was going to get out. But my wife, fresh from her fantastic weather prediction, said, "I can make it. My car is great in the snow."

So she backs out to the end of the driveway.... and promptly gets stuck.

Laura tried to go forward and backward to gain momentum, but there was no getting her out. I tell her to just forget it. Pushing on her car, I managed to get her unstuck and we get her car back in the garage. Inside, she calls work and secures a ride from a co-worker who's out west on an assignment.

While we wait for the ride, we watch the live weather coverage and it not only says that we've had a major winter storm, but that it's blizzard conditions.

I joke with my wife, "Boy, you really guessed that one right. I'd hate to have you as our weather person. 'Folks, it's only going to be 1 to 3 inches, so suck it up!'"

Laura gets to work and I'm stuck at home with Julia. Now don't get me wrong, I really love my daughter, but it can be a little much with her lately. She's on this question fix. She constantly asks what would be affirmative questions. For example, we watched Flushed Away while I made her lunch that day and it was non-stop questions like:
"Sid is a naughty rat, right?"
"Roddy doesn't like Sid, right?"
"Sid flushed him down the toilet, right?"
"He doesn't know how to swim, right?"
"Roddy thought he was falling, right?"
"He wants to get home, right?"
"He's trying to find a boat, right?"
"That fish was talking, right?"
"Those slugs are afraid of Roddy, right?"
"I like the slugs. The slugs are singing, right?"
and on and on...

After a while, I worked again and then had to play with Julia. I started to notice something disturbing, I was running out of supplies, mainly Diet Dr. Pepper and Diet Mountain Dew.

I like to mix up my diet pops. I usually have a Diet Dr. Pepper on the way to work, following by a Diet Mountain Dew bottle at my desk. For lunch, it's Diet Coke on ice. On the way home, it's another Diet Mountain Dew. Yes, I'm addicted and it was even more apparent these past few days.

I kept looking out the window for any signs of a snow plow, but there were none to come. I grabbed a Diet Dr. Pepper and noted the pop count, I was down to two after the one I just took. A quick check of the fridge showed an already open a few days ago Diet Dr. Pepper two liter bottle.

Conditions outside remained horrible and by noon that day, a minivan had gotten stuck on my street. Later, a Jeep Cherokee got stuck. Did I mention that this was in right in front of my house? Yes, both cars were stuck in the middle of the street in front of my house. The odds of plows coming was not looking good.

I tried to ration the pop, I really did, but when you drink as many as I do, you start jonesing for a pop fix fast. It wasn't long that early the next day, I was officially out of my stash of pop. I then had to start drinking my wife's awful Diet Cherry Pepsi.

Day Care was closed again that Friday as the winds had kept the plows from doing a decent job on the roads. People were encouraged to stay off the roads if they could.

By the end of the afternoon that Friday, I had had enough and so had my wife. Like me, she was off that Friday, but she couldn't go anywhere. As the day progressed, she reported some more bad news: we were down to our last role of toilet paper. This was getting serious! Who knew how long we would be stuck before we got out!

I started thinking how I would have had a hard time coping if I was stuck in New Orleans for Hurricane Katrina. I could barely muster the mental stamina to go without my usual soft drinks, so I wasn't thinking too positive on my survival skills at that moment. I'm sure I'd be stuck in my house when people in boats would paddle by asking me if I needed any supplies. I'm sure my request would be, "Do you have any Diet Mountain Dew in bottles? Oh and bring back some ice if you can. Thanks!"

I now realize why my Dad was always so diligent about stocking up before a storm. If bad weather was coming, he would go and buy a few more cases of Budweiser just in case.

One time, I came home from college to visit and my Dad asked me to get the beer out of his trunk and put it in the garage. I opened the trunk and pulled out 6 whole cases of beer.

After stocking his beer shelf, I went inside and said to my Mom, "You know, Dad just asked me to get his beer of his car and he had 6 cases in there."

My Mom looked confused. "Six? He usually buys, Nine," she said without kidding.

I'd be willing to bet that this practice was the result of our family being without power after Grand Island was decimated by a Tornado in June of 1980. A third of the city was destroyed and we were without power, so we toughed it out... for about a day. Then we packed it up 30 miles to the east where we had a trailer at a "lake". We'd always only spend time there Friday through Sunday during the summer, but it had electricity and running water so off we went. Plus, it was next to a small town that had the basics in food supplies, so we stocked up and was good to go. The big downside was that I had to endure about 2 weeks of no cable tv. I almost went insane trying to not to imagine all the great HBO entertainment I was missing. It was a tough time in the Homan household having to endure these basics while our fully intact house roasted in Grand Island, but we made it through some how.

...

My wife ever so gently reminded me that it may be possible to dig out and get to the store.

"Someone just passed by!"

Both cars had been dug out, but the path that was being driven on by cars was only one car wide and the only cars I had seen try it were trucks with those double wheels on the end. My car may be an SUV, but it's not a very tough one.

"I keep seeing someone passing by!" she said later. "We could totally make it out! Come on! Wuss boy!"

So now I was a wuss boy.

So we marched outside and started shoveling the end of the driveway to get our car out. Rather, I shoveled while my wife had to continually take cover from the blustery wind every two minutes it seemed. I started calling her Wuss Girl. Finally, I busted through the snow drift. We decided to chance it and got in the car. I made it out okay and we went to the store to get supplies.

I grabbed a 24-pack of toilet paper (just in case), a case of Diet Dr. Pepper and a 12-pack of Mountain Dew bottles because it was supposed to snow again and you never know...

We get back to our home subdivision and we promptly get stuck at the entrance. We get pushed out and my wife wants to drive because she feels she's the better driver. I let her and she promptly gets stuck in the driveway.