Man, out of the last 3 updates, 2 are about having pizza on a Thursday. Must make for some edge-of-your-seat reading, eh?

Tonight I crossed the street to my folks house, as I often do, to see what sort of scraps I can dig up for dinner. When I opened the door, two things immediately caught my attention:

1) There was a single lonely pizza slice sitting on the kitchen counter, but no other evidence that there was ever anything but that one slice - no box, no discarded crusts, no saucy plates, nada

2) My dad was laying down on the couch in the living room, head in hand, watching my 6ish year old neighbor energetically dancing around

I really, really wish the story ended there but it really, really doesn’t which is really kind of a bummer, really. Why is this girl here? Why is dad watching her dance? Why didn’t anyone tell me they bought pizza? What else aren’t they telling me?!?

Figuring I oughta get control of the situation I’d just stumbled on, I prioritized (read: I opened the fridge to see if there was still some secret pizza scraps sneaking around).

There were.

Still room temperature, I took a bite and looked back into the living room to take stock of what exactly was happening. As I said, dad was lying on the couch which I’ve seen him do exactly twice, both times a begrudged response to my mom asking to snuggle while he makes her watch Marvel Studios movies.

He was watching my neighbor play a dancing Wii game which she was quietly, if vigorously, enjoying.

‘Dad must be helping mom babysit,’ I thought to myself as I tossed a slice of pizza into the microwave. She often babysits for the neighbors and I’m assuming she was at their house with the other 2 kiddos.

As I munched on my now nicely warmed dinner, I was soothed by the sounds of a happy child dancing to a song about Rasputin, and the increasingly angry interjections of my dad.

‘Move back, MOVE BACK!’ he berated, ‘Slow down!’ as if he were a reigning champion training the neophytes at a Russian prison/Olympic training center.

‘You’re moving too fast - back UP!’

I’m all for masters teaching their craft, but I’ve seen my dad attempt to navigate the labyrinth that is the Wii interface. I’ve seen first hand how ineffective a remote can be in the right hands. And I assure you dad had no business shouting ‘You’re supposed to be using yourarms’ at a 6 year old girl.

This was made ever more evident when she, in her manic quest for precision, for perfection, accidentally paused the game. Dad, sounding as though he just watched his prodigy biff the landing on an otherwise perfect routine, sullenly demanded ‘Whathappened?’

Ever the pro, the young’un unpaused and got right back into the thick of her routine.

A short while later, as I was finishing my meal, the lil lady was ready to return home. Dad, in some kind of weird role reversal experiment, couldn’t find his shoes. She got sick of waiting and just left him behind. Wherever she is now, she is in a better, happier place.

It was the best episode of Toddlers and Tiaras I’ve ever seen.

Today my dad and I got to spend quality time together, just me and my old man, helping my cousin move into their new house. This is a fairly rare occurrence, and because I found out about this bonding time via a 8am wakeup call, I really wasn’t looking forward to it.

The morning started off on a decent enough foot, however, when dad mentioned that he had met a real life Urkuel. Intrigued, I took the bait - and began my solo journey through long pauses, stammering, countless “ya know’s,” and just generally poor story telling.

‘Urkuel?’ I asked.

‘Yea ya know the one from….oh what was the name of that show….’

‘Family Matters?’ I helpfully supplied

Dad said ‘Ya I guess so’ but didn’t sound at all convinced.

Anyway, the story, turned out to be as funny as it was meandering. Mom and dad were kayaking with a large charity group. At one point in the river, there was a fallen tree that dad went around, but mom attempted to go under it. As she was carefully guiding her way under the tree, ducked and struggling to paddle, a fellow kayaker collided with her, throwing her off balance. He then hooked his paddle in her life jacket, flipping my mom into the river.

Afterwards, my dad tells me (using the absolute worst impression I’ve ever heard), the gentleman said ‘Did I do that?’

Cute story, but not worth the grating 18 minutes it took to tell.

He went on to tell me about some hill going into the river. ‘There was wood I mean metal I mean steel I mean rock!’ he said. Then, realizing it took him 3 complete misses to get to what he was talking about, he made that noise that overweight girls in middle school make when they get flustered.

You know what I’m talking about.

At this point we’ve been on the road for almost 30 minutes and I notice that we are not headed at all in the direction of our destination. I asked dad where we were going, to politely point out the fact that he wasn’t really going the right way.

He responded, mostly to himself, saying ‘I don’t know why I went this way (unintelligible) some stupid reason ya dummy.’

One second after calling himself a dummy, we took a turn and he screamed ‘SHIT.’ I don’t know why.

Once we finally did make it to my cousins place dad was pretty low key, lugging boxes, telling my cousins friends who are otherwise total strangers very specific information about the boxes we were using to pack shit in (he worked in a box factory for 26 years), and being surprisingly normal.

After the trucks had been emptied and the job was all but done, my cousin put on a Dr. Seuss movie to entertain her very young children. The kid, age 2 or so, was sitting on the couch enjoying the lessons taught by star bellied vs regular bellied birds when dad rolled in.

Completely oblivious to the tiny child, dad steps in front of him so he can get a good look at the excitement on the TV, completely blocking the kid’s view. At 2, the child wasn’t able to effectively communicate with my dad that he was cruelly taking Seuss away, but my cousin saw the situation and said to my dad that he was in the way.

Dad however was truly engrossed and blocking out almost all forms of communication. In response he took a half-step sideways, further blocking the child’s view of the star bellied birds.

Eventually that sticky situation was settled and we were on our way home. Dad made a wrong turn and pulled into a quiet residential street with a park on one side. Some young women were enjoy the day’s great weather, pushing their strollers down this quiet street. Their dog was following them on the opposite side of the street, unleashed. He too was enjoying the sunshine and freedom.

Dad however was disgusted with these happenings, spitting out ‘Damn thing should be on a leash!’

Less than 2 minutes later we were back on track, on a busier but still quiet road with a bike lane on our side of the street. There were 2 younger teens also enjoying the weather, skateboarding down the bike lane. This too upset dad, so much so that I only get a few words out of his garbled reaction ‘(Unintelligible) bikes not fricken (unintelligible) dumb fucks.’

Overall, the day went better than expected.

I was really craving pizza tonight and literally moments after a tasty pizza-filled daydream I got a call from home saying pizza was on its way. So that was an awesome and soon to be tasty surprise.

For some reason I thought it was Tuesday and upon arriving made a comment on how great cheap pizza Tuesdays are - a local pizza place sells cheese pizza dirt cheap every Tuesday. Because it’s actually Thursday, we didn’t get that deal. Instead, we got what we otherwise normally get - the ‘house special’ which is loaded with toppings and, as mom was very quick to point out tonight “Not cheap at all!”

We’ve gotten these ‘house special’ pies since I can remember and they put so many toppings on there you really get overwhelmed with greasy meats and veggies. I’m more of a 2 topping max guy, but I can’t really complain about free pizza.

Em can and does, and she continued the ritual that started when she was about 5. She grabs her slices, then picks off every ingredient except the meatball and pepperoni. That means that the extra cash our parents pay is literally thrown in the trash, but not before being ritually stacked in some disgusting sacrificial pile of onions, peppers, ham, and olive.

So between Em’s fear of flavor and dad’s disgust for crust, I’d say a pretty significant portion of pizza ends up in the garbage every time we order one. Sorry, starving kids - no hard feeling eh?

Aaaaanyway, dinner started with Dad grabbing a Sam Adams Winter Lager off the porch because in the winter porches turn into a massive, free, slightly inconvenient extra fridge. I’ve seen my dad buy alcohol free O’Doul’s maybe twice a year in the past. I’ve given my dad a sip of some exotic tasty beers maybe a few times in my life. I’ve never, ever seen dad have more than a sip of anything with alcohol in it, nevermind a full beer. I actually had to ask if he bought them or if they were my brothers. He said he bought them and really, I still don’t believe it. He did give my mom half so technically I’ve, to this day, never seen dad drink an entire beer.

Dinner progressed and dad asked if I’d gotten a piece of mail that came from the State of Alaska and presumably is important. This was interesting for two reasons. One, dad usually only asks if I’ve seen a piece of mail within 30 seconds of watching me open said mail, so him bringing up relevant items happens about as often as him drinking a beer. The second interesting thing, and the reason I wrote ‘presumably important’ is that dad asked me about it without knowing where it was. Mom, who can actually be trusted with important information, knew nothing of the letter and so dad got up from the table, plate still lathered in hot ‘za, to look for it.

Once he left the room Em shouted ‘You can look after you finish eating, you know’ to which dad said nothing and mom said ‘He’ll forget by then,’ which, to be fair, I would have forgotten by then, too. He never did find the letter, and I’m not sure if it ever actually existed. If it does, I hope it’s not important. Sorry, State of Alaska - no hard feelings, eh?

By the time I finished eating, mom started to spark conversation with dad, asking about overtime hours at his job. He said he didn’t have any coming and mom commented how weird it is that he only ever got overtime during the holidays. Dad, squirming under the pressure of having to respond to simple, polite conversation changed the subject to cats, and how weird our cat, a girl named Clark, is.

Mom asked how she was weird and dad said  because she was rubbing her face on the boxes of xmas stuff we normally keep in the attic, which isn’t a weird thing for a cat to do at all. But then dad, clearly shit-housed from his single half beer, began miming a cat rubbing its face on boxes, which is an extraordinarily weird thing for a man to do at all. He made what I can only describe as ‘happy cat faces’ to go along with his daytime emmy-worthy performance.

He then parlayed the cat talk/mime into something about a hippo that farts when squeezed, which, upon asking for clarification, is something from that show NCIS which mom then added dad knew about because ‘That’s where he lives most of the day’ which I thought was a pretty epic burn, and also a little sad.

Hey gang, it’s that time of year again!

For dinner tonight we had tacos which has long been one of the few meals with any sort of taste that my sister actually enjoys, so the family was in full force at the table tonight. Dad was growling of course, because why wouldn’t he be. Jesus.

My mom likes to display the xmas cards we get in the window right behind the kitchen table, and she started giving a walkthrough of them to no one in particular. “The one with the train is from the Faits’, that one is from Judy. I’m not sure who the one with the wreath is from. Dianne maybe.”

Dad, speaking for the first time, chimed in “We got one from the Faits.” And while he was absolutely correct, he was really slow on the draw, too. Mom spouted a shrill “Peter!” to which dad said “What?,” being completely oblivious to the world happening around him.

Em added “That’s why you should wear your hearing aid.”

Later, mom told me I could have the last of the beef, but having already had 3 tacos I told her I was good. Ever the opportunist, dad went for it, poaching his 6th taco of the evening. As he attempted to take the very last hints of beef out of the pan he dropped it onto his plate making a small mess and a large bang. Within moments however, the tattered, greasy scraps of countless fallen napkins surrounding dad’s plate was the only evidence a crime had even taken place.

I, for one, am glad nothing’s changed.

My gramma on my dad’s side came to dinner tonight so mom pulled out all the stops for dinner - steamed veggies, applesauce, homemade gravy, potatoes, and two kinds of pork roast. It was a magnificent spread. During dinner nothing too outrageous happened, though I was surprised that dad didn’t reach for the ranch to top off his taters.

He did however share several work stories on such rousing topics as bushings, jack mills, things he wasn’t quite sure about, machine channels, and deeper machine channels.

My gramma complimented the serving fork prompting mom to tell her how much she liked it, and that it even came with a matching carving knife and cutting board. Dad chimed in saying he thought that forks like that were called carving forks. Mom told him that yes, of course it was, that’s why it came with a carving knife and cutting board.

As he reached for thirds (or sixths I guess, what with the dual meats going on) mom stopped him, reminding him dessert was on the way. He poked at one of the pork roasts halfheartedly and then put down the ‘carving’ fork.

Dessert was quite a treat - peanut ‘n chocolate pie with real bits of peanuts and bits of chocolate and shit. It was delicious. As mom was cutting it into pieces, she kind of misjudged and 2 of the pieces ending up a good 50% bigger than the rest - just massive pieces of sweet, sweet pie. Since mom was cutting, I was plating and serving and as she gave me the monstrous piece she asked it I thought it was too big. I told her that I didn’t know but that dad would eat it anyway, which got a laugh out of my gramma.

The enormous slice prompted mom to mention that dad was taking part in a ‘biggest loser’ weight loss contest at work because, honestly, what work place doesn’t host a bigger loser weight loss contest.

Once everyone had finished their pie, we noticed not everyone actually had. Dad still had a piece essentially the same size was what everyone else at the table had started with. Mom told him he could possibly save it for later, because he’d want more later and it was just too much to eat at once. You’d make yourself sick, she told him.

He seemed to agree because while he didn’t say anything, he did stop eating.

1 minute later, he started eating more pie. Em spotted him and bitchily said ‘you can stop you know’ to which dad, whose brain had clearly exploded, said ‘NOOO!!!’

He took two more (large) bites before mom put a stop to the madness. ‘Wrap it up’ she said, and to his credit, he did.

I’m home from NYC for exactly 6 days before I fly west for the summer - like one of those, what do ya call ums, uhhh, ya know, boyds. Squeezing in a genuine sit down meal in that time is pretty unlikely. But I wanted to do something nice for myself and tearing apart my dad from the comfort of the couch he bought is basically the only thing in life I still enjoy.

Also I know it’s not Tuesday but I have a theme going, alright?

Many of you know that dad has a hearing aid that he chooses to forget/lose/break/refuse to use. All of you know Dad also loves watching TV. So much so that he’s mentioned on more than one occasion that he’d one day like to get a nice surround sound system for the TV. Dad, however, is not generally a man of action so when I came home, I did not suspect for a second the technological journey I was to embark on.

When I turned on the TV, my show (SVU) had this obnoxious echo effect going on with the sound. I muted the TV to see if that helped, and, viola, the echo was gone - but I could still hear the TV. On the end table next to dad’s seat sat a large black box with a comically large dial - he had finally gotten himself a surround system.

Content, I continued to enjoy watching Det. Benson wrangle pedos. It was as enjoyable as ever (read: fucking great). Though I did notice the sound wasn’t anything to write home about.

When dad got home that night, he joined my mom for some sweet on demand sci fi action from the netflix they have on their wii. Dad was very carefully navigating the very cluttered, confusing wii homescreen when he belched out an ‘ahhhhhhh shit’ that had me genuinely concerned that my father had lost control of his bowels. It was that serious of an ah shit. So I looked at the TV and saw he clicked the Play Game option which is right next to the netflix option. He screwed up! Ah shit indeed!

But as I watched the inflated glove of a hand the wii uses as a pointer flutter aimlessly, helplessly around the screen trying to click the back button, I could see the cause of concern. Dad’s trembling wii glove was a direct mirror of his own trembling claw struggling to move both down AND to the left, at the same time - all while pointing a remote at the tv! His movements were so sluggish, impaired and devastatingly ineffective  that I was at once flabbergasted at how well the wii followed dad’s flailing and at the same time utterly depressed that the wii would bother to acknowledge, to waste the time processing his miserable shakes and wags.

When netflix was finally up and running, I immediately noticed that dad watched it without the TV on mute. Which meant that he was choosing to watch a show with unsynced audio. I’ve gotten mad at free 720p rips of movies still in theatres for having unsynced audio. So as I sat there stewing, pondering what I’ve done to deserve hearing the sound of two breathy, TV 14 rated alien sex scenes milliseconds apart, I had to admit this device had me frustrated and yet oh so intrigued. So I dug deeper. I investigated. I pulled a fucking Elliot Stabler sans locker punching. And I didn’t like what I found.

1) TV Ears is expensive. It costs $130 on Amazon, and because I know amazon prices are very, very had to beat and I know that my dad has never, ever bought anything online, I’m fairly certain he payed even more for it.

2) TV Ears is wireless. Pretty fucking cool, right? I mean can you imagine that? A device only slightly smaller than a toaster oven capable of wirelessly moving audio from a television nearly 10 feet across the room??

3) You can buy TV Ears in a wired version with 30 feet of tangled, ugly wire. It costs $80. Also amazon seems to have a habit of sending the wired version to people that ordered the wireless version. Man those guys are great/thoughtful.

4) The wireless TV Ears uses infrared. I had a wireless controller for my NES. From the earlier 90’s - remember? You had to put this ugly box on top of your nintendo, and your nintendo had to be on the top of the TV so that the controller and this gnarly box were at the exact same coordinates, elevation, time zone, wavelength, etc etc. You basically had to be holding the controller in such a way that whispering instructions directly into your nintendo was more comfortable. And after all that work, the whispering would probably be a more reliable way to jump your man across the lava pit cuz that fucking wireless piece of shit never worked.

If you thought technology came a long way since then, you’re right. Of course it has. But people still make things the same old shitty way because they are just awful people. The infrared wireless system on TV Ears needs a DIRECT line of sight at all times with this smaller but uglier box you plug into your TV. If you stoop down in front of it to put a movie in the DVD player, you get feedback. Loud, annoying feedback. If your cat jumps onto the windowsill near the TV Ears and it’s tail goes through the infrared, you don’t get to find out you murdered that poor little boy on SVU, you hear feedback instead. If a ceiling fan blows a particularly large piece of dust within a 6 foot radius of either the TV Ears or its receiver, well, you get the idea. Infrared in such an application is nonsense. The thing even generates feedback when the TV isn’t on, and I’m not kidding. Miserable.

5) TV Ears has no remote. No fucking remote. This godforsaken thing can’t be adjusted without physically turning a knob. Of all the functions on a remote, I’m pretty sure ‘volume’ is the one control everyone can agree is the most necessary. But those guys at TV Ears outdid themselves. They invented a wireless sound device that can’t be controlled wirelessly.

6) Doctor Recommended Voice Clarifying Circuitry

That’s what the box says. The target market for this thing is gray haired bitties that can’t hear their TVs. And who think the way wire is placed on a circuit board does anything to make that guy on House sound any clearer. The CEO of TV Ears has said TV Ears isn’t about surround sound. It’s about making voices easier to hear. What TV Ears is actually about is selling a speaker that is so useless it can’t exist and market that speaker to people that spend 40% or more of their fixed income on things so useless they shouldn’t exist. Also my dad.

To backup my claim, here are excerpts from actual (these are legit, look them up if you don’t believe me) amazon reviews.

“I bought this item for my Dad’s 80th birthday”
“My 89 year old father was having a hard time picking up the voices on some television shows”
“This is a great speaker for those of us having a hard time understand words in a movie. I am not hard of hearing but I cannot get some words”
“I bought this for my parents. It looked great… just what they needed given that they’re in their 80s.
But…
You can tell as soon as you open the box… this item is absolute junk.”

This post is a bit delayed but whats 2 days after a three month hiatus, amiright?

Mom really outdid herself for the meal, making a St. Pattys day dinner of corned beef, cabbage, taters and carrots. It was fantastic.

My family calls corned beef ‘grassy meat’ because of the unmistakable texture it has. Growing up, mom invented the name to make it sound fun, tricking us into eating it. The name stuck for 20 years because my family doesn’t like to let such traditions die. Another example: when I was 11 I was eating dinner with my grandparents and afterward I asked if there was going to be ‘a planned dessert’ because I was a fat shit even then and wanted some cake and ice cream. Because of that, literally anytime we have a sit down meal with my grandparents, they bring it up. Every time, to this day. Still funny.

Aaaaanway, dinner was actually fairly pleasant. Grassy meat is one of the few meals my sister still eats, so she joined us and shared work stories. This included the tale of Splenda Man, a guy that once a week goes to the grocery store service desk Em works at to return a giant box of splenda packets with no receipt. He uses a different excuse each time, but the best one is that the picnic he had bought them for had been rained out.

This is a lie because I’m pretty sure any gatherings he holds 1) take place entirely in his basement and can’t get rained out and 2) he only invites stray cats and 3) they dont fucking eat splenda, you god damn nutter.

While em was on the top of her game, dad was unsurprisingly struggling to keep up. We have a lot of really nice glassware, but when dad sat down at the table we saw he chose a leaded glass mcdonalds cup with mayor mccheese on it. Mom totally noticed. She was not thrilled.

Additionally, while em was talking up the town, dad, in lieu of engaging in normal conversation, spent most of his meal making weird faces at em. Three different times I noticed him rolling his eyes, scrunching his cheeks, and doing other weird shit before looking to em for approval.

She never came him any.

To top it off, dad left the table momentarily and upon his return, came up behind em who was clearing her plate. He started doing a ridiculous robot like dance with her, using his hands and everything, as em struggled to get around him to the dishwasher.

At the end of the meal, dad said “good supper dear” and for the first time in 4 years it genuinely sounded like he meant it. All and all, it was a pretty good meal experience.

Thanksgiving update:

My dad is not a good story teller, but he loves to tell stories. My family knows this and at family events, they strive to avoid getting stuck listening to dad talk (very poorly) about screws. But dad has talents of his own and, much like a trapdoor spider, lies in wait, springing his trap (read: boring tale) with expert skill at just the right time. This was the case this past Thanksgiving.

This audio is of the tail end of one of those stories and is unique because in a very short time, many elements of a conversation with dad emerge, outlined below. Also, for the record, the lady singing is from the Macy’s parade, not Em.

The person receiving the story is my great aunt and you hear her respond to dad’s story, commenting on what he’s saying. This completely throws him off. After regaining his footing, she tries to change the subject, bringing up the new TV my parents got. Mom tries to help the transition, but dad simply waits for a split second pause in their new conversation before diving back in, undeterred.

He is a professional.

Dad is not the only person in my house with intriguing eating habits. While everyone out there has quirks, my sister Em in perhaps the one person odd enough to rival dad when it comes to meal time etiquette. Not joining us at meals and instead eating frozen entrees alone in her room has become a common phenomenon for her. Refusing to eat anything ‘that has been touched by someone’ as well as being sure her meal choices are all but void of taste is also quite common. Her lunch today, though, has set a new bar.

Em had just put some food in the microwave and went back to play WoW while it cooked when I wen to throw out the saltine sleeve I’d just finished. In the trash I noticed the wrapper from Em’s lunch, an Asian noodle thing from Maruchan, the guys I fell in love with during college because they created delicious, filling Cup of Noodles, that had any number of wild ingredients and you could get 2 for a dollar. On top of the large pink wrapper was the little clear plastic packet full of tiny baby shrimplets and herbs and other seasoning that you are meant to put on the noodles so they get a little bit of flavor.

She had thrown it out as well. I wasn’t super surprised because I know she doesn’t eat shrimp (or any seafood, period) but she easily could have picked around the lil guys and still enjoyed some solid flavor. But then I saw the small silver pouch that was full of sauce. While the shrimps and herbs add some flavor and nice texture, this sauce packet was absolutely required to ensure your noodle dish didn’t kill you through boredom.

I was so concerned that I actually asked Em if she’d meant to throw out the shrimps AND the saucy packet.

She had, she said, and told me she eats them plain with salad dressing. For the record, she also eats spaghetti plain with salad dressing. So basically she paid for a  tasty microwave noodle dish, threw out the things that keep it from being just noodles that cost almost nothing, and enjoyed the luxury of pasta without having the difficult task of boiling it.

Once again we had a pasta dish for dinner, just noodles, sauce and meatballs. Because mom limited the meal to three ingredients, it was acceptable to my sister, and so she shared the meal with us, for the first time in over a week.

I was grabbing a plate from the pantry and looked up to see dad attempting to shovel a steamer truck sized helping onto a plate my mom was holding. Attempting is the key word because my mom stop him, and told him ‘Don’t get carried away.’

Em, noticing the incident, focused not on the embarrassing exchange between a woman and her long term husband who still doesn’t understand how to properly serve her a meal,  but rather on very minute detail - the scoop dad was desperately failing to use helpfully.

Apparently my sister enjoys pasta, but only when it’s served from a very specific spoon. ‘Why is he using that spoon?’ She demanded. I’m not at all sure why this caused a problem for her, and mom quickly answered ‘Because he likes that one.’

This is a common theme in my house - em gets really mad about something inane, and  demands answers from dad but never actually directs her concerns at him. She instead aims the questions at my mom, who answers in his stead.

I’m pretty sure that is how normal families communicate - using misguided rage channeled through proxies.

After finally getting a humane portion of food onto my moms plate, dad served himself. He sang a song about spaghetti to himself while piling meatballs onto his trough.

While we were in fact eating pasta, it was not spaghetti.

Last in line, I was still getting food when I heard my mom laughing at the table. I turned around but didn’t see anything peculiar so I asked her what was so funny.

‘Your father opening the wrong end of the cheese,’ she said.

I looked at him and saw him still struggling with the Parmesan cheese, the kind that you pop the top on and shake out powdered cheese. There is only one way to open it.

The meal was quiet as ever but about halfway through I looked up to see dad holding a watch. He looked it over at arms length before moving it right up to his face, peering over his thick lenses to really inspect this plain, black watch. He held it about two inches from his face for about 45 seconds, while the entire time his other hand held a fork heavy with pasta. He apparently noticed the watch mid bite and was so taken with this bland, black watches beauty that he forgot all about the saucy morsels on his fork.

Eventually the watch made it back to the table and the fork made it back to his mouth.

While I was putting my dish in the washer, I saw lights in the driveway and excitedly said ‘Alright, UPS is here!’

I went outside to grab the package because our UPS guy never rings the bell. When I got back in, mom was arguing with dad. I asked her what was up and mom said ‘I was just saying to your father that UPS never knocks but he thinks they do.’

They don’t, ever, and I’m not sure why

1 dad would bother to make it a point to say they do, because he had no incentive to do so

2 why he would try to make this argument literally 3 seconds after the UPS guy dropped off a package without making a peep.

Concerned with my dad’s ever faltering mental health, but not so concerned as to chime in to their argument, I grabbed a knife to open mah box. While I grabbed one from the kitchen drawer, I couldn’t help but notice dad had picked the watch up again, struck by its entrancing gleam (read: blandness).