Reach Out, Reach Out and Strangle Someone

Holy shnikies! It’s a post!

Ummmm, yeah. Sorry about that, gang. You’re favorite neurotic, teetering over the precipice of full-blown alcoholism daddy of two has been the travelling.

As they say on the street, “I’ve been handlin’ my bidness.” More to the point, to quote poet laureate Jay-Z, “I’m not a businessman, I’m a business man.”

Word. Dope stuff.

I mention that I have been travelling because apparently I can never do that again. It seems when I go out of town, all hell breaks loose at home.

Dads, you leave the hen house unguarded for one godforsaken minute and I’ll be damned if the foxes don’t make themselves right at home.

So, I’m eating dinner last night, partaking in some fried chicken from the Krog’er and some smashed potatoes (because that sounds fancier than “mashed potatoes”) when the phone rings. My wife answers it and soon a puzzled look spreads across her face. Then she hands the phone to Weirdo.

WAIT JUST A DING DONG DANG MINUTE. You just hand the phone to 6-year-old? …the eff? As Weirdo immerses herself in the conversation, I am frantically gesturing at my wife, trying to figure out who is on the other end of the phone, asking to speak with my daughter.

Her answer was simple: A boy

A BOY?!?!? I’m not even going to go down the road of debating what the most potent concoction of liquor and anti-depressants is to deal with that whole scenario. Let’s get down to brass tacks here, people. Isn’t there some sort of unwritten law of nature that states the boy has to go through the father first before speaking to the daughter? Apparently my wife is not aware of this law or she just chose to ignore it.

Let me put this in perspective for my female readers (you know, the ones Googling “tampax” and were mistakenly directed to my sight – it is still one of the top search terms driving traffic): Suppose your daughter and husband went out and picked the wedding dress without you.

It’s that egregious…times 10.

Well, now that I have been robbed of the pure, unadulterated joy of licking fried chicken grease off my fingers. All I can do is hang on every word. Which, by the way, has to be reeeaaaal comfortable for Weirdo. She’s trying to have a conversation and I’m leaning in three inches from her face.

All I am able to pick up is that “maybe the day after tomorrow” she can come over and “watch a movie.”

I am eventually able to calm myself and keep the rapidly ascending bile down as I continually assure myself that “watch a movie” at age six actually involves just watching a movie.

Now the grilling begins. Who was that? What did he want? How do we know this boy?

Turns out it was “Bill” (names changed to protect the innocent, as always), a boy in Weirdo’s kindergarten, who is also her bo-

Her buh-

(I can do this)

Her b-b-b-b-b

Oh, screw you people. You know what I’m getting at.

(TANGENT: I am far too lazy to keep track of the fake names I assign the young men in my children’s lives, so the same kid could presumably have 10 different names. Just want to clarify that lest you think my daughters are whores. Thank you for indulging me.)

Yeah, so Bill, her…you know…wants her to come over Saturday afternoon and watch a movie. Essentially a date. At age 6.

And then it hits me. I remember begging my mom to call the mother of a little girl in my kindergarten class, Tennille, and asking if she could come over and play. I distinctly remember my mom calling Tennille’s mom and saying “I think we have a little love affair going on.”

So, there you go. My past, my very genes, have risen up against me. Why couldn’t it have just been Diabetes? That’s in my genes. I can deal with that. Saw off my foot. Eff it. Whatever. But being into the opposite sex at such a young age? Screw you, Darwin. You can take your Punnett square and shove it up your ass. Prick.

I wish my tale ended there, but because God hates me, it only got worse as the night progressed.

Later on Weirdo was quick to point out that Bill was not her only “friend.” There was also “Stuart” and “Bob.” At least I heard of Stuart. I’m like, “Who the hell is Bob?”

Oh, you know. Just another boy in her class. So at what point do we go all Lord of the Flies and the boys fight over her? I’d actually be for that. It would make my job easier. You ever try to cover a four wide receiver set with nine guys in the box? It can’t be done!

Then, after Weirdo and Crazy are in bed, the wife and I are going through Weirdo’s school bag. Inside it is a massive drawing of two stick figures holding hands, drawn by Weirdo, with a heart and the words “Bill” and “Weirdo.” Also contained in the bag, apparently my own private Pandora’s Box, is a drawing of a heart with the words “Bill” and “Weirdo,” this one drawn by Bill.

I don’t think I want to be sober until after Valentines Day…