@#%&*!

Aww....whats better then hearing your child first saying one of those magic four letter words they've heard you say? Not knowing that what they're doing is actually wrong, and saying it in the most embarrassing moment?  Fortunately that hasn't happened to me, and knock on wood it wont, but I've seen it happen to people before, and really, its one of those small hurdles to get over when your child's brain is like a sponge on crack, absorbing everything it can and spitting it right back out.
Actually, saying I've not had to deal with the cussing issue yet is something of a misleading statement.  I've had to deal with a wide array of circumstances when it comes to young children cussing. I have my nephew, while helping my father, his Pappy, run cattle, yell a colorful profanity filled statement, something he has heard my father yell, and was repeating it, simply thinking he was helping, not knowing it was wrong. It's one of those nice, innocent circumstance that people enjoy telling the story of and laughing about, while also enforcing on him, that he shouldn't say "those words".  Something you can make fun of in later years, nothing something you feel you should go hide your head over.
Then we have my son, who lives with his mother mostly 12 out of a 14 day span, with small hits and misses of an extra day for myself here and there. He's heard me cuss, he's heard me cuss under my breath about his mother, I won't sit and lie or act like he hasn't, but he's not around it a lot, or any familiar situations.  He's never once repeated me, never once caught me and told me I was saying bad words, to him, he's oblivious that they are anything but words, something I'm grateful of, unsure of its just him or the raising he has with his mother, but hoping it stays that way for a few more years.
Then, we have my step daughter, 8 going on 20, and a masters degree in all things.  She hears me cuss, admittedly, she hears me cuss more then she should, and is aware that select words are "bad words" either by being told by us or the school system. She is so knowledgeable that they're "bad" that she nearly had a breakdown over saying the word "piss" and being told she shouldn't say that, that it was a bad word.  Well, last night a curious event. She asked what the bad words were. Not metaphorically or in any other sense, but just that, asked what they were. So I told her, listed out the 4 lettered kings of cussing, emphasizing the mother of all words, and said hey, these are the worst, don't say them.  I mean how else are you going to learn, right?
I explained to her that they are not good to say and she shouldn't, that even my mom will still get on my case if I get into a good cussing rant, which has been known to happen on occasions, something my step daughter found comical, but also seems to hit home the fact that they're bad, regardless of age or circumstances.
So I mark it off as having 2 out of the 3 taken care of in the cussing department. No worries of a child embarrassing me by throwing an F-bomb in the middle of Walmart or anything like that. One of those small hurdles jumped and small victories celebrated.  Hell yeah!

A geek in a small town: Mt. Vernon USA

Okay, so its time for a little rant I suppose.  I live in Mt. Vernon, Kentucky.  Most people that come to this blog probably don’t even know where that is, or when they read Kentucky, they develop their own opinions rather quickly.  Well the fact is, its a rather small town, not exactly in the rural parts of Eastern Kentucky, but at the same time, not far out of it.  Now of course, some people might find that thought calming and peaceful, and think it sounds like a nice place to be.  I’m not saying its not!!  I’m not condemning Mt. Vernon, or Rockcastle County, or anything like that, far from it!  Sure, it has its flaws, what place doesn’t?  And obviously If parts of me didn’t enjoy living here, I wouldn’t be, but it does makes things more challenging for me at times.

Okay, so obviously I’m a geek.  I know, that’s a huge shocker considering the name of the page is Geekasms, so I definitely don’t hide from it or try to dress it up as anything else.  I’m a tech geek, movie geek, comic geek, I hit the high notes of most things in the realm of Geekdom at one point or another, and most that know me wouldn’t argue that point.  Unfortunately, Mt.Vernon doesn’t exactly lend itself to the expansion of certain elements of my geekery.  (I realize I keep making up words using ‘geek’, but hey, I’m entertaining myself!).  There are plenty of examples I can pull from.  One  from a few years back, being Gmail.  I adapted to Gmail as soon as I was able to.  Grabbed an invite from a messaging board, and have never looked back since, and although Google has gradually adapted Gmail with new functions and aspects including chat and others, its been of no use to me because well…..not many people I know have yet to use Gmail, or even consider it, even with me trying to get them to try it.  They have no interest in changing what they already have, and leave me alone in my Gmail Geekground (play on playground….I know, starting to get sad already)

More up to date examples would be things like Twitter, LinkedIn and social iPhone apps.  On Twitter, I have less then 100 followers, even today, and a very small handful of them are actually from Rockcastle County, and even fewer still live anywhere close!  The worst part about that is, I’ve almost reached 1000 tweets!  Those are a whole bunch of lonely tweets, no doubt.  I’m also on LinkedIn.  A website that is obviously picked up in other parts, but no where around me.  I have very few connections on LinkedIn, and nearly all of them come from people I work with, not anyone from home.

Then we have the iPhone.  Yes, many, many adapters to the iPhone, but very little usage in the world of apps I reside in.  No one local uses foursquare at all.  I still play with it, but its more of a self entertainment then anything else.  Even using apps or searches on foursquare or twitter to find users close, its always just me, and people that have traveled  up or down I75.

I live in an area of either very slow adapters, or people that do not adapt at all, while I do my best to be on the front lines and cutting edge of everything going on.  Plus, don’t even get me started on the difficulties of finding graphic design work anywhere close!  (Possible rant for PCS site later on)

So why am I ranting?  I have no idea.  Maybe I hope to get a few sympathetic followers (@Michael_Parsons) or some comments, or I simply have no goal in this but to simply voice my frustration out on the fact that I feel like I’m alone in the world of Geekdom in my general area.  But, it is what it is, and I shall continue to fight the good fight, with my army of 1!!

Spaghetti Hair

Okay, this just might be with my kids in my home, but I have a feeling this isn’t isolated, so I throw this question out to you:  Why do kids want to put spaghetti in their hair and on top of their heads?!  At least for me, this seems to be the only food that gets the privilege of being carefully and purposefully placed on the top of ones cranium.  Sure, others will be thrown, smashed, played with and anything else those little minds can come up with, but spaghetti, with or without sauce, is thought out, calmly placed.  A calculated action by one so small.

I realize the argument could be made that food manages to make its way into kids hair all the time, and I don’t disagree.  I was just having to clean cookie out from behind Bug’s ear just the other day and wondering how she managed to get it there.  I’m not arguing or questioning that, because that can happen with a simple arm movement or having to scratch ones head.  That is a common occurrence.

No, I’m asking, why is it spaghetti that gets the special treatment of intentionally, not accidently or randomly place, but intentionally place on top of the head?  I cannot being to question one’s motives when it comes to such, but all I can do is submit the follow picture as evidence…

I rest my case your honor.  The Spaghetti Hair Monster is alive and well at the Geekasm household. (Until the bathwater is ran, of course)

The heat…..

I sit and look at the thermostat at 3am, it looks back at me, telling me that it is 80 degrees in my house.  The air conditioner unit is out, something completely and totally out of my control and it still has the ability to make me feel like the biggest loser and failure as a father and provider for my family. 

Why?  Why something, so completely out of my control have such a hold on me?  Simple: Pride.  This is my family, my complete family as this is my weekend to have my son.  So I have an 8, 3, and 1 year old, in a house, with no air conditioning except for two window units I was able to borrow.  Yes, the repair man has already been called and yes I left a message, but still, doesn’t help resolve my self loathing.

See, what you don’t know yet, is that this makes #3 for the air conditioning  to not function as advertised during this summer alone!  We started with being out of freon/coolant, which is fine, we purchase this house as half finished and knew ahead of time that there would be unknown problems the first few years, as we’re unaware of the comings and goings of the property before we moved in.  Problem is, after dropping a few hundred to recharge the unit, it failed again within the week, due to what was described as a crack in the coil.  So, after checking on warranties and such, and being patient for nearly a month, AND dropping over 5 on getting the new unit in, we were set, good to go!  New unit in that works great, electric bill going down with a more efficient unit, everything seems to be going up, then BAM, the new unit shows signs of running low on coolant.  Well that can’t be right can it?  It just froze over for some other reason, right?  Sure!  So, as I left work, being the last one out, I turned the unit off, giving it a rest.  Its been in the low 90s, with rain everyday, so my plan was to come home that evening, after letting the unit rest and defrost, kick it on again and in about an hour or so, be sitting in my nice cool house again. 

Well that was nearly 8 hours ago, and we sit at 80.  Obviously the coolant has found another area to leak its way out, or we have other problems, I will not know until later on in the day, but regardless, I sit here, knowing my family is hot, and it frustrates me beyond understanding.  Something, completely out of my control, has made me feel like I’ve let everyone down and disappointed them all.

Oh well, just chalk it up to another day as the irredeemable dad I suppose

Corruption of the young...with Wonder Woman #600

So my 8 year old has currently been asking questions regarding collecting.  She wants to collect something, she’s wanting to make something her own.  Basically she’s trying to find who she is and develop her own identity, but currently has trouble letting go of the desire to make everyone around her happy with her.  Well the other day, she just randomly starting sorting through some of my old comic books I have up stairs.  Now first off, you have to understand I used to be a HUGE comic geek back in the day, I mean huge!  Was a heavy collector of all things Spider-man, well before the movies, and I had a great collection too, unfortunately I really don’t have any of it left, through circumstances I’m not proud of at all.  Anyway, she started asking question, like how long did I buy them, where did I buy them, etc. and actually sat down and started reading an issue of JLA.

Well today, I did something that gave me a small spark of pride, and a large chunk of questioning motives.  Fortunately my job takes me many places throughout the state, and when coming home, I was able to pass what used to be my main stop for all things comics back in the day in Somerset, Ky.  The store is Collector’s Comics, and fortunately for myself, the place was still there.  Well I walked in with the determination to find 2-3 comics that would give a good range of what my 8 year old might or might not enjoy reading and/or collecting.  A task that I found was not as smooth and easy as I had hoped, as I found out, and explained to the man working the store, its not that easy to shop for comics for someone else!!

So after much browsing and fighting the urge to buy a large group of books for myself, I came away with 3, those being Tiny Titans, the current Supergirl (#54 I believe) and the recently released Wonder Woman #600.  I had already read WW through a different means, so I knew the issue, not only being a starting point for a story for her, but also gave her a few separate stories she could read and get a feel for how comics are.

Where this will lead, I have no clue as she hasn’t sat down to read any yet, but already has one of my unused bags and boards to place her WW #600 in once she’s completed with it, and she already plans on going through my books and pulling ones she’d like to look at.  So either I will soon have what will be an avid comic fan (and my new excuse for running to the local store on Weds) or this will be a phase that burns out as quickly as it was ignited.  Only time will tell, so we can only sit back and wait (and read the news headlines coming in from SDCC)

Related Articles

• Comic Book Legends Revealed #277 (goodcomics.comicbookresources.com)


• Wonder Woman gets new outfit in 600th issue of comic book series - BBC News (news.google.com)

Evolution of the diaper change

I was changing my daughter’s diaper this evening, just like any parent with a young infant would be doing, when it dawned on me.  A process, which should be evolving towards eventual potty training and the disappearance of the diaper, has become something similar to a dance or a wrestling match between myself and the ever elusive Bug!

You may laugh, but think back to when you first get your brand new baby, fresh out of the package.  They’re so fragile, so tiny, you’re almost afraid to touch them, or if you’re holding them, to lay them down, afraid they’ll bruise like a soft peach.  Any action is a delicate processes, including the diaper change.  Especially those first few days, it’s a process all its own.  Your baby is swaddle in their blanket keeping them warm, you have to slowly unwrap them, which eventually just pisses them off, but then you have to take off the small diaper and clean them of their small mess, apply baby powder and a fresh diaper.  A processes, especially while still in the hospital, seems to be enjoyed by grandmothers for whatever reason.  (You might find it strange, but I have stood back and watched a number of different grandmothers all but jump at the chance to change those tiny diapers while at the hospital.  Possibly because they know of the nightmares to come?  Hmmmm….).

Eventually after you get home, your baby grows and you become more comfortable around them, and the diaper changing process, to where your hand/eye coordination is top notch!  You can get your baby’s butt clean and dry before anyone even realizes what you’re doing.  During this time, your baby is still content with simply lying there, possibly fussing, but you feel confident in your diaper changing abilities.  You can wipe a small butt with the best of them, and you zoom through the processes like nothing.  You can change a diaper from nearly any position or situation and still have it looking perfect.  You’re a master of your diaper domain, and you’re not ashamed to stand tall and say it!

Then suddenly, at some point, things change.  So far you have been making forward progress, getting more efficient, knowing your baby’s patterns, and when you finally have it down to where you can effortlessly change a diaper in the dark, BAM!!  They turn into the Ric Flair of the infant world!  Turning, squirming, screaming, grabbing, slinging, throwing, absolutely anything and everything they can do to try and prevent you from either removing the diaper, or cleaning them.  What used to be a simple process for just you, now requires 3 Navy Seals, a tranquilizer gun and a spot light!  And if they have a diaper rash and you have to put on any cream….oh boy!  All I can say is “God speed brave soul.”

What I don’t get is, why?!  They’re getting older, the messes are getting bigger and well you’d think they’d want it off them.  Only it seems like the opposite.  You can have your baby girl in your arms, loving on you, being happy and smiling, until she realizes what you plan on doing to do, at that point, the horns come out, the bell rings to start the match, and ITS ON!!  Don’t get me wrong, sometimes she’s still my perfect little girl, but typically….shew!  And I realize some might be laughing, saying its just a normal thing, and I’m not saying its not.  Its just, even though I have 3 kids, this is the first one I’ve really been around where I’m having to change diapers everyday, and well….the behavior just seems backwards to me.

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