Big Daddy Paul

Those of you who know Amy and I remember that we had a hard time getting pregnant. We tried many things to get pregnant, most notably having sex with one another, but to little avail. (I can honestly tell you it is the most enjoyable thing that I have ever failed at!) As the months turned to years, we realized having a baby the old fashioned way just wasn’t in the cards for us. We were serious about becoming parents, so, instead of throwing in the towel and remaining DINKies, we opted for the horribly invasive, often painful and outrageously expensive option of in vitro fertilization. To do this, Amy had to submit to daily hormone injections, ovular extraction and finally, uterine injection. (For my part, I watched some porn and whacked off in a cup.)

We have a portrait of Malcolm at 100 cells, how cool is that? Right after this pic was taken, Malcolm murdered and ate his brother.

This process left us with a handful of viable embryos, two of which were inserted into Amy’s lady business, and one of which developed into the big bundle of joy we now refer to as “Malcolm.” We really didn’t know what to do with the extra embryos at the time, and opted to store them in a cryogenic freezer. (I heard rumors that our fertilized eggs sat on a shelf next to Ted Williams’ head, a perk I found revolting and yet, at the same time, paid extra for.) The people who operate the freezer now want to charge us $125 a month for the luxury box seats of the cryogenic freezer world, causing us to really consider what we want out of those eggs.

For a while, the embryos served as an insurance policy. We were secure in the knowledge that if something terrible were to happen to little Malkie, like not enjoying sports, we could always just defrost the backups and start over. (In case you are ever in need of a good line to give your kid extra motivation to pay attention to you, “If you don’t start behaving, we’re going to replace you with the embryos we’ve got at the clinic” works wonders!)

It now appears that Malcolm mostly behaves himself and is deeply dedicated to the following of sports. As such, those embryos are unnecessary for this family to function properly. We think the idea of having another child is completely insane, and even though some of you gladly tackle the insanity, we are perfectly content to give all our love and attention to the one kid we got. I would suspect that almost every couple that is happy with the number of children that they have would think that adding another would be a disaster. Our bar is just lower than everyone else’s (a fact made known to me prior to our marriage, when everyone tried to talk Amy out of marrying me in the first place!)

In a perfect world, we would keep Malcolm’s putative kin frozen in perpetuity. (Sentence of the year? Maybe!) The sizable fee for such frozen nostalgia, however, makes it unrealistic for us. The real question for us now, is what do we do with the eggs. Here are the options:

1. Eat them. I have been advised by the scientific community that this is a stupid idea, as the eggs have little to do with their counterparts in the chicken world. Besides, we wouldn’t have the right bacon to go with them. Nope, can’t eat ‘em.

2. Donate them to a couple. Assuming the other couple wouldn’t eat them, they would eventually turn the eggs into a baby. That’s just fucking weird, having your DNA in some other family. What if they raise the kid better? What if the kid becomes president one day and Malcolm works fast food his whole life? Or, what if it turns out that we just got lucky and the other couple had a kid that became the next Hitler, or, worse, Pat Sajak? Nope, too much weird shit, can’t let people make babies out of ‘em.

3. Donate them to science. This seems like a great idea, as early signs indicate that embryonic stem cells can be used to cure spinal cord injuries, Alzheimer’s disease and strokes. Looking up uses for these cells, however, I found that researchers are currently injecting stem cells into rat’s tails. You gotta love researchers. I know that this is the groundwork for great stuff later on, but it hardly seems worthwhile for Amy to put up with all that shit just to have it all injected into some rat’s hiney. Maybe it’s just me. If the only alternative is throwing the cells away, though, I’ll guess we’ll go with this option, however unsightly it may seem. Enjoy little rats, enjoy. We hope your tails feel better.

Even though we have been so certain about our family choices, the decision has been a little weird for us. I guess it’s because of the finality of it all. This kid is going to be our only kid. There is no longer any safety net, there’ll be no redos or second chances. (Yes, that’s now a word.) When I look at our little family, though, and think of our life together, it feels just right.

Every once in a while, I think, “Whatever happened to X?” with X being anything from an old girlfriend to Malcolm, when I hadn’t seen him at a park in a while. I made some stock picks way back in 2007, and after seeing our credit card bill from December and becoming concerned over the state of our financial health, wondered whether those picks had helped or hurt our cause. For a disturbing look at how my financial brain works, you can check out the post related to my picks here. Please forbive all the tipos I made in the post. I was steel getting used to blogging back then.

Before we get into the nitty gritty detail, I want to remind you all of a few things. First, the biggest financial disaster since the Great Depression happened after I invested the money. More people lost their shirts during this time than at a Ricky Martin concert in Palm Springs. (After reading that joke I am pleased with the general theme, but think it is just a little off. I will try again later.) I also want to note that I was an absolute novice at picking stocks. I did not (nor do I now!) understand market fundamentals, like “Why you shouldn’t start investing your money right before the largest financial disaster since the Great Depression.” The sole basis for my investing decisions were to invest in companies listed on Forbes, “Best Companies to Work For” list. Remember, happy employees are productive employees. Let’s see how I did:

As a baseline, we shall compare my picks to the Dow Jones Industrials. If you are lazy, like me, and don’t want to find out just what the Dow Jones Industrials, you may assume that Dow Jones is a distant relative of Star Jones (and, oddly enough, former Dallas Cowboys defensive end Ed ‘Too Tall’ Jones) and s/he picks their favorite restaurants that are publicly traded companies. Also, Dow Jones loves cats and keeps track of companies in the ever-growing feline leisure industry. Needless to say, I hate Dow Jones. On October 19, 2007, the Dow Jones sat at 13,806. Right now, it is at 12, 259, meaning if you had invested $10,000 dollars in the companies that Dow and his cats like, you would have lost 10% of your money. Yikes!

OK, let’s try this one: more people lost their shirts during this time than when the Jersey Shore cast went to Palm Springs. Still a bit off, I think. I’ll keep trying.

Surprisingly, my picks were pretty good. Nordstroms went up 24%. The tech firms on the list not named Google went up between 12 and 37%. Whole Foods went up 50%. Holy crap! Sure, American Express and Google both went down, but it wasn’t much worse than if I had given the money to Dow and his stupid cats. All in all, I turned my $10,000 into $11,916, a 19% increase. Boo ya!

From this, I learned the following:

You don’t have to shower regularly to make money in the stock market.

You can make lots of money off of rich people. If rich folk want to pay $12 for grapes and $1,200 on shoes. Let them. Buy company stocks that make a habit of overcharging the rich and soon you’ll be rich too. (Just don’t shit where you eat and go buying $12 grapes yourself. That defeats the purpose.) This strategy works ever during dire economic times because rich people will ALWAYS buy $12 grapes to show their neighbors how well off they are.

Don’t buy a stock do anything because you think it’s cool. I bought the Google shares, knowing that they were pricey, at $625 a share. I figured that Google was cool and that I shouldn’t worry about the hefty price tag. I was wrong. Let the Jersey Shore kids be cool. You be you.

Lastly, treat your employees well. These stocks kicked butt while employees at other companies were busy taking off their shirts. Put your money where the employees are treated well and you will be treated well yourself.

OK, last one: More people lost their shirts during this time than when Siegfried and Roy went to the Cat Fancy New Year’s Eve Ball.

Damn, 0 for 3. Some jokes just don’t work. Unless one of you want to take a run at it…

OK, it looks like we can pay our December credit card bill. Yay! I’ll let you know when I make any new picks, for I am sure you will be waiting with baited breath.

Hello everyone! You may have been asking yourself, “Where has Big Daddy Paul gone?” I say to you, “Mind you own damn business. I ask the questions around here.”

I know the holidays are the cruelest time to leave you all without the linguistic nuggets that so wonderfully color your days, but the truth is, I was perfectly content to not write on this blog. And then, I had the best day a parent can have and had to share it with you.

It wasn’t Thanksgiving, mind you. Thanksgiving was fun, owing mainly to the arrival of a large amount of gravy that no one, not even your spouse, can tell you to take it easy on. (I like gravy so much that I put it cold on sandwiches the next day and then revel in slurping it between my teeth.) We spent Gravy Turkey day in Reno with grandparents, aunties and family friends, impressing and freaking the hell out of everyone by quizzing Malcolm on the number of Atlanta Falcons receivers that he knows.

It wasn’t Christmas either, despite the large number of awesome things my dad got me from the Guinness factory in Ireland (I have a Guinness hat with a bottle opener and a Guinness Piccolo. I am rad. You are jealous). We got Malcolm a Kindle fire this year, and now he can surf the internet and send emails to his grandparents. He might be too young for such things, but I will try to keep an eye out for emails promising P3nis enlargement and large Amazon orders for movies and cartoons. See, I’m a good dad! I will also throw in the joy of winning my fantasy football championship on Christmas Eve, Christmas Night and the day after. Good times indeed, but not the best.

It wasn’t New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day either. We spent good times with friends eating large amounts of cheese and bacon, explaining both why we are such good friends with Jon and Dayna and why I am fatter right now than I have ever been before. Ever. Right now, I am “the back of my neck looks like a pack of hot dogs” fat. New Years Day was fun for me as I got to watch NFL football (boo Raiders! I hate you for losing,) Malcolm got to play Wii baseball AND real baseball and Amy got to go shopping. It was a great day for all of us, but not the Most Wonderful Day of the Year.

At this point, you may have already had enough of me. No one likes to have a subject introduced, only to be lead down a plethora of dead ends. I just wanted you to make sure you really missed me. Sometimes you think you want something, like a nacho bath, and then when you actually get it, you are left with sticky body hair and a trail of curious mice. Yep, you missed me.

Easily, the Most Wonderful Day of the Year is “The Day Your Kids Go Back To School.” It should be a national holiday, only that would mean your kids wouldn’t go to school and it would just be another shitty day where you gotta find stuff to do. Summer can be grueling, considering it lasts for what seems like 6 months, but at least you can go run around outside or stick them in camps. The holidays are filled with long nights, travel, loads of sugar and things that Santa/Hannuka Harry DIDN’T get your kid. This results in your perfectly nice little child being turned into an angry badger. During the holiday, you can’t even deal with the angry badger like you normally would, fearing that the family staying with you might frown on you whacking your child over the head with an Elf on a Shelf and threatening to strap them to the furnace. As much fun as the holidays are, there is a certain amount of stress involved for parents.

You know I love your goofy little face. Now get out of the car and get in that classroom!

And that, my friends is why yesterday was so awesome. Malcolm told me that he didn’t want to go to school, and I thought to myself, “Good, I didn’t particularly want to watch you melt down for an hour after I asked you to take five minutes to clean up after a game we just played.” As I sat in an empty house, tweaking the nacho bath idea (tortilla chip Speedo? No, that’s just weird. Or IS it?”) I enjoyed a quiet moment. And. Just. Did. Nothing.

Except figure out a way to use more sentence fragments. I’m back, baby!

Kids grow up, it’s a fact. For some parents, this is a good thing. For others, not so much. Around here, I take every sign of progress as a merit badge. Every step he takes in the march toward full-fledged personhood is a sign that I am doing my job adequately. (I just got my “No Skid Marks” patch!) Amy, on the other hand, sees this march as a transformation from someone who likes to cuddle to someone who thinks his parents are squares. She is, needless to say, not so found of each new step in Malcolm’s development.

Whether you like it or not, there are many ways to mark your child’s progress in life. You can count tantrums. You can tally the number of times they say, “Thank you,” or “I’m sorry I hit you in the face with the bat” without being prompted. You can mark their height on the wall or compare how their voice has changed from something similar to a squeaky mouse to something more like an old rat. They read longer, more complicated books and occasionally catch you when you get the math wrong. The signs of growing up are everywhere, and they have the effect of making you proud and scaring the shit of you, sometimes at the same time.

One of the funnest benchmarks of where your kids are at in life is their selection of Halloween costumes. Without any research behind this, I would venture to guess that most kids start out their Halloween careers with costumes that are more in the cute and cuddly variety, consisting of things like bunnies and adorable root vegetables. Have you ever seen a one-year-old dressed up as a ninja? I haven’t. As they get older, though, their taste in outfits gets a little more sophisticated. Your sweet little baby trades in their farm animal fetish to become Batman or similar ass-kicking hero. Your child’s taste in Halloween attire demonstrates as much about where they are in life as the cleanliness of their underpants. (If you are looking for a sentence to use in your submission for my blog as “blog of the year,” go ahead and use that last one.)

Grandma Jean made this costume and, if I dare say, nailed it!

For this reason, Amy is delighted in Malcolm’s Halloween costume selection every year. He is unabashedly sweet in his preferences, and always has been. When he was three, he wanted to be an elephant. I have pictures of him at school surrounded by three Batmans, two Spidermans and a couple of race car drivers. At four he selected a salami sandwich as his preferred candy obtaining vessel. (He was easy to spot in the crowd of Jedis and stormtroopers at the Halloween parade.) This year? He chose a horse. Of course! After seeing the different type of horse costumes available on the internet, he didn’t even go with the menacing war horse costumes available. He wanted to be a cute, fuzzy horse. We were ecstatic, for while he reads fancy books and does some fancy math, he showed us that the cute stuff is still in there somewhere.

At some point, his Halloween decisions will betray his status as a big boy, (one kid this year said that Malcolm’s costume the worst at the school.) He will inevitably give in to the peer pressure and want to look like Dale Earnhardt, Jr. or Skeletor. His transformation will be complete, and, with some mixed feelings, I will get my merit badge for “bad-ass costume” in addition to the badges for I already have for being “precious” and “nutritious” (I put lettuce in his salami sandwich.) Until then, and like all glimpses of the little boy we used to have, we will take what we can get.

This does not mean, however, that I will enjoy the occasional skidmark.