DadJack.com Blog

Life is a series of unanswered questions.  I don’t think you can debate that, but doesn’t it seem like sometimes these questions can pile up… Or maybe not that’s not the right way to think of it, It’s more like a back up.  It’s like the freeway, we are going 5 MPH just waiting to get by one accident, so we can go 15 MPH.

My life has been an accident, sometimes I drive and get right by and get back to 65 no prolem, and others the traffic just doesn’t seem to let up…  And I think sometimes I continue at that 5 MPH, just because it’s safe and I’m used to it.  It doesn’t matter how much honking there is or people flying by you, we continue at accident speed.

I have been afraid of getting stuck at a broken speed… But it might not be a bad thing.  You can’t floor it just because the road is open, or because your car can go faster.   Sometimes you have to drive at your own pace and just say f**k the rest of traffic.

I started dating someone a few months ago, first casually, but it soon got more involved…  I apparently can drive faster than I thought.  But things started to… For lack of a better words, just not feel right, but I was already on the track.  And now I have crashed, I didn’t handle it right, and I feel horrible.

I am not the first person to go through a divorce… and not the first to not have wanted it.  I’m not holding out for my ex or thinking about her… In fact, I find I am my happiest when I’m just hanging out with my kids.  Just the three of us, on adventures, making dinner, reading books, shopping for “big boy panties” or just sitting watching Simpson’s reruns.  Our recent vacation was great, it was mostly just us, spending time with us.  My ex was part of that us, so when we were together it made sense.. A random third party is not part of that us.

It’s been a year and a half, my Ex is engaged and I hear about how “I’m going to have a step-dad” all the time… I just don’t think I’m ready to introduce a “step-Mom”,  and I don’t think I can have a girlfriend that I really care about and not have her working towards that…  Trust me I like to have “adult time”, but I don’t think I can handle the results of having it, I am not ready to be controlled or put on a leash yet.  I am not being wild, but there are so many unknowns in my current life that having to answer to someone right now just seems beyond my ability.

I loved being a husband, especially Gretchen’s husband, I was very proud… I know I can be ________’s husband or boyfriend, but it has to feel right.  So until I can fill that blank, I am very happy to be Lucy and Bing’s Daddy….  A title that will never change!  I have no idea what I will ultimately do for a living, where I will end up, but in those tiny arms, the word “Daddy” filling my ears, I am always happy.

The hills are still on fire and the valley is still full of smoke… I know because I can hardly breathe.  The kids went to their Moms last night, so I am kidless today… Which is always a bummer.  It’s weird to not get up and figure out when we’ll be able to get to the pool… Although, there is only really a week of summer left anyway, where the heck did summer go?  I swear this year has flown by… And not in a good way, I wish it was because things were so good for us all that we lost track of time.  I have to deal with my burnt out brake light, it wasn’t the bulb, so that means I will spend about four hours trying to figure it out, give up and go see a professional.  No big plans this weekend, mainly just clean up my apartment… There is some kind of fire alarm inspection thing on Sunday, I hate it when random people come into your house!

No gum for Fido!  It’s a Go Gorilla weekend.  Guess what the “C” stands for now.  Hey, it’s not easy to ride a bike in a thong.  Meet The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.  Shirtless man hijacks school bus!  Smells like trouble.  Beware old criminals!  I swear, Stretch was not there!

Make the most of these last days of summer!

Rock On, Jack

To the new home of Jack’s blog, and Thank You to Myspace, without it I may have lost contact with many of you.  On it I have posted over 1300 blogs which were read over 5.5 million times, but it was time to move, so here we are.

Vacation was really fun, the kids and enjoyed ourselves!  We took the Amtrak to San Diego, which was so nice… way more relaxed than driving, we got to color and draw, play and look out the window at the ocean.  In SD we went to Balboa Park,  hit the museums and IMAX theater and visited an aquarium, which is a Lucy Fave.  All Bing cares about is the pool table at my Uncles… He would roll balls on it all day if we let him.  We also got in a bunch of swimming pool time, today is their last lesson and they have greatly improved… I’d say Lucy is officially a swimmer and Bing is very close.  We went to I.H.O.P. last night and it was good… Except we forgot Baby (Bing’s blanket), so I had to make an emergency run back before the CRN show to rescue him.  Bing was upset, but he was thrilled when Baby beat me home by a couple minutes and rang the door bell and waited for him to open the door and discover him… Lucy asked me, “Daddy, you put him there right?  He didn’t walk there by himself did he?”  I really feel the pressure now of finding a regular full time job… I keep hoping radio will start paying, but I can’t afford to wait!  Which leads to the question that has plagued me for the last year, what am I qualified to do?  If I figure it out I’ll let you know.  Anyway, we made chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast this morning… I must highly recommend the Quaker Oat’s Oatmeal Pancake mix, it’s really good.

This is one way to get your kid to school! Blinds recalled!  Which clunker do I serve red in?  I like that he had a schedule. Fall Out Boy arrested. A new drinking spot? Don’t leave your wax kids here.   X-Rated Andy! They can get anyone.  The mayor is a panty thief!

You are a hero to your kids… No pressure!

Rock On, Jack

Life is unfair… We’ve all heard it, heck we’ve all experienced it.  In the past year and a half I’ve had more disappointment than I care to recount, but you hate to see your kids realize this is how things go.  You don’t want them to be spoiled, but you also don’t want to see their little hearts broken.  So you try and handle the big ones as gently as possible… “Why can’t you and Mommy live together?” “Why did your Grandma in the wheel chair go to heaven?”  And trust me, I’m not perfect, I answered them the best I could.  But it seems lately there have been a wave of tiny disappointments, the type that put a damper on the fun you were looking forward too.  Oddly, they have really surrounded food.  I told you all on the CRN (and Twitter… and Myspace) how Mc Donald’s screwed the kids on the Happy Meals the other night…  The toy is the draw for those otherwise boring meals, so when they leave the kids with a box only containing the crappy food it’s a let down.  Then we went to Denny’s and they changed their kids menu, no more mini-hot dogs (Lucy’s favorite) or grilled cheese (A Bing must have), they were bummed, but I explained that sometimes they need to change the menu.  Then last night, Bob’s Big Boy… The Bob’s that has been Lucy’s favorite place to go since she was old enough to have an opinion, the place she and I would go for a “Daddy and Me” dinner while her Mom worked, the first real place she recognized on sight (Which ended our meals at Mo’s, it’s across the street within eyesight of Bob’s, so Lucy would have no part of being in the hood and not hitting BBB.)  When I asked them where the wanted to go eat last night the vote was 100% Bob’s.  We walked in, Lucy and Bing requested different color balloons and then we were sat by the “Bob” inside.  Two kids menus and one breakfast menu (I like their eggs)…  And no more hot dog on the kids menu.  I know hot dogs are unhealthy and generally full of gross stuff, but it was what Lucy ordered there for the last 4+ years.  She was really bummed, but I think I was more upset… I know things change, we get unmarried, we grow older, we lose things, but why this?  Why ruin the thing my children and I look forward too, an evening of laughs and full tummies at our favorite place.  Lucy was a trooper, after quizzing the server on where the hot dogs were she ordered plain noodles she looked at me and said “at least we can have fudge cake.”

We will have other favorites and menus will continue to change, but on that Monday evening on a warm August day we lost a tiny family tradition.

Rock On, Jack

I glanced over my right shoulder, Lucy’s hair was blowing in the wind, I forgot a hair tie today (No matter how long I’ve been doing this single Dad thing, hair ties always escape my memory as we run out the door), and her hand was out the window sailing with the flow of the air.  Bing was fast asleep, as I could see in the rear-view mirror, just 10 minutes earlier he was excitedly asking “Daddy window down?”, but he had since rolled it back up and drifted to sleep.  We were listening to the new Third Eye Blind album (I know I’m old, no one calls them albums anymore), so Lucy wasn’t really paying attention (if it’s not Taylor Swift or Black Eyed Peas she’s not interested), but she was really enjoying herself, just letting her hand sail in the wind created from our travels on the 5.  In her other hand was her Littlest Pet Shop lunch box… Which we all had some sense of satisfaction in finding, it took us two days and four Targets, but we finally found one that had it in stock (Burbank Target rules).  I wanted her to have something special for when she starts Kindergarten in a few weeks… To be honest, I don’t even know if she will be bringing a lunch, but we both kind of decided she needed a new lunch box (mainly for me because I didn’t know what other supplies she may need, and I remember I first lunch box… it was steel and housed a plastic Thermos and was decorated with the band Kiss – I didn’t like Kiss, my Mom got it on sale and so it was mine.  I wanted Lucy to have the exact one she wanted, thus 4 Targets we visited.)  The sun was hot by mid-afternoon so driving with the windows down felt good.  It was hard to not just stare at her, so young and happy just letting her hand fly (But someone had to drive!) And to be totally honest I think if I could have I just would have kept driving… We were all so happy, Bing peacefully resting, Lucy hair flowing, gazing out the window and me, my kids in tow without stress or worry at that moment.  It’s amazing how just catching your kids at the right time, they not even knowing you see them, can warm your heart.  We arrived at swim class, Bing awoke, the windows went back up, but that 30 minute drive was stuck in my head all day.

Tomorrow, we go on an adventure to San Diego… which just to start involves the subway and the train, and maybe later in the weekend, swimming with sharks.  So I’m sure that next week I’ll have much more to post.  The blog has been moved here from myspace so we can have more control and less problems… So hopefully that will be the way it works.  I know it will take me a feww posts to get used to it, but I really think in the long run it will be much better.  Have a great weekend… And if you get a chance, roll the windows down!

Rock On, Jack

P.S. Podcast, Crn Show and regular blog posts will return Thursday.