Nuclear Family Warhead

It shouldn’t take long to unpack; it’s not like we went to Europe or anything.  While I’m getting everything back to normal, head on over to Scrivel.com and check out my latest contribution.  It’s a sordid tale of misplaced assumptions and prejudice; tonight, on a very special Blossom.  Once the laundry is done and the dogs are hosed off I’ll put up some pictures and tell you all about Alabama.  It was great.

When you see this post, I’ll already be in Alabama.  NukeMom’s brother is getting married this weekend.  The greatest part about the wedding invitation?  When I looked down bottom and read these two glorious words; “Picnic Casual”.  The thought of having to wear a suit or tux in the August heat of Alabama was like getting excited for a trip to the dentist to have my gums scrapped.  Thankfully, Wil and Nancy were thinking of everyone when they made the decision on the dress code. 

Nukegirl is excited to see her new Aunt Nancy again.  So excited, in fact, that she can’t get it out of her mouth fast enough.  Which is why to Nukegirl, Aunt Nancy is actually “Antsy”.  Works for her.  I wasn’t able to make the trip up when NukeMom and the Nukekids met Nancy for the first time, so I’m looking forward to meeting my new sister in law.  I don’t know much about Alabama other than I know it’s hot there in August.  It’s gotta be; it’s close enough to Arkansas, which is like a broken convection oven in August, so I kind of know what to expect.  I was in Arkansas once in August (yes, it was on purpose), it made me overly sweaty and I swore I would never do it again.  And now I’m getting ready to do it again, only this time, I’ll be picnic casual and carrying a really big jug of water. 

My knowledge of Alabama is limited to knowing that Lynyrd Skynyrd wrote a pretty good song about how Sweet of a Home it was, Forrest Gump is from Greenbow and Paul “Bear” Bryant once had a nice little football dynasty going down there.  I’ll be bringing plenty of new facts and stories home, so I’ll let you know all about it when we get back.

BWW returns after a 1 week sabbatical.  In recognition of the Olympics, we’ll feature some words that are influenced either by China or the Olympics.  Seemed like a simple enough plan, until I started looking for big words exclusive to the Olympics and China.  So, rather than big words, we’ll just give you some interesting words this week.  You know, Nixon went to China once.  The results of the trip?  We got a couple of Panda bears; they got missle technology and access to Wal-Mart’s shelves.  Oh, and Hong Kong; we gave them Hong Kong too.  Nixon forgot to tell the English about that part of the deal. 

Doesn’t seem fair all these years later, does it?  13 Trillion dollars in exportable consumer goods and a city in exchange for two sterile Panda bears.  So much for that zoo breeding program.  I still wonder how the Chinese are able to extract all that lead from their polluted air and put it in things like dog food and paint for children’s toys.  Maybe that was one of the things that Nixon gave them that the government never told us about; Lead technology.  Erstwhiles.

Our first word this week is Yangtze.  The Yangtze river is the third longest river in the world, but it is one of the deadliest.  Floods have claimed over half a million lives since 1911 alone.  To control flooding, the Chinese are building The Three Gorges Dam.  When they are done in 2009, it will be one and a quarter miles across and over 600 feet high, making it the largest dam in the world.  All the Chinese had to do to accomplish this is displace over 1.3 million people, submerge over 1,500 cities, towns and villages, and put between 20,000 and 30,000 men to work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for 15 years.  THAT is some serious overtime.  Oh, yeah, almost forgot; some say it will be the biggest environmental disaster ever.  Guess that’s not Inconvenient enough for Al Gore.  Wow.  I went all Robert Kennedy Jr. there for a minute, sorry.  Whether you are for it or against it, it is an amazing project; what the future holds is anyone’s guess.     

After searching for a good word related to the Olympics, I come up empty.  So I made one up.  Phelped will soon enter the lexicon as a verb meaning; to get beaten soundly; trounced; obliterated.  Seemed like a logical word to make up seeing how the only competition Michael Phelps has is dolphins and Cuban refugees.  Don’t send hate mail, I’m friends with some Cubans and they laughed when I tested it on them.  So there you have it; an unconventional BWW, but interesting still the same.  I’ll provide you with a link for Phelped once Urban Dictionary puts it up.  Provided; that is, that they accept it.  Check out the BWW Home Page for your Medal of vocabulary Gold.

So I kind of got a job.  Nukegirl starts school this year and the “Stay at Home” part of SAH Dad is about to fade out of my job title.  I had my first official event in my new job on Friday.  It was a lot harder than I thought it would be.  Going back to work, I mean.  The first client I met gave me a funny look when I asked him what his favorite Nicktoon was.  The second was even more perplexed when I mentioned that our product was filled with 8 essential vitamins and minerals; probably because our product has nothing to do with food.  At lunch, I was able to turn the conversation into a debate over who was cooler; Drake and Josh, or Zach and Cody.  I don’t know if my mind is ready for stimulation that isn’t aimed at the 5 to 12 year old demographic. 

It felt weird to actually be wearing pants again.  I haven’t worn anything other than shorts or sweat pants for the last 3 and a half years.  I had to leave myself a note to remember that I had to shave in the morning.  And put on a clean pair of underwear.  Not really, but it was close.  Re-inserting myself into the adult world is going to take a little time, I think.  It is a new experience for me.  It’s not restaurants (Thank God), and I’ll have a chance to be a part of something that has the potential to be big.  It involves Child safety and the market for it is almost un-tapped.  The thought of being able to move between full time parent and working professional is a godsend to my psyche.  I’ve loved being at home with the kids, but I’m ready for more adult interaction.  I’ll be working from home, so I’ll still have my Stay at Home Dad pants to fill, but after the kids have gone to school, I’ll be able to put on my career shorts and t-shirt pants. 

I’m trying to brush up on all that I’ve missed the past few years.  I’ve tried to stay in tune with the real world, but it’s hard sometimes when you have Spongebob assaulting your senses four hours a day.  Cable news and the Internet have kept me up on a lot of things but it’s different when you’re not able to get involved in the discussion “at work”.  Nukeboy1 hasn’t really been interested in hearing my take on the election and Nukegirl just looks at me with consternation when I mention gas prices and the domestic drilling debate. 

So, a new chapter begins in the book of NukeDad.  I hope the editor’s take a good hard look at it and tweak it into a best seller.  I’m ready for the challenge and can’t wait to see what the future holds.  If it turns out poorly, don’t expect to see any links back to this post in future ones.  If, however; it turns out to be a great turn of events, please feel free to tell me to shut the hell up when I go on and on and on about how great everything is.  A good slap upside the head is needed every once in a while.

I made a joke about during cartwheels in my underwear to celebrate my 100th post, and someone called me on it.  And then so did some other people.  So, here it is; the 100th post.  Big Whoop.  Enjoy.  Thanks to Eric Johnson for the music.  Also, I’m up again over at Scrivel.  Go check it out.  You’ll get to see how ugly my tux was on prom night.

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

I survived tax free weekend.  I didn’t go willingly, mind you, I just happened to be in the car when NukeMom announced that we were going to “pick up  a few things” for school.  First stop was Kohl’s.  They had a rack of t-shirts that had been picked through more than William Shatner’s girdle drawer.  All of the “folders” were on strike, apparently, so we just glanced and tossed like everybody else.  We managed to come away with 6 shirts, only one of them with skulls on it.  Not that skulls are a huge issue, but everything in the young men’s department looked like it came from Black Sabbath’s 70’s t-shirt storage warehouse.  Nukeboy1 already has an AC/DC Highway to Hell shirt, a Black Sabbath skull and bones shirt and a Kiss Debut Album shirt; the evil end of the clothing spectrum is pretty full.   

Next stop was the shoe section.  Nukeboy2 wears a size 2.  Guess what I found in boy’s shoes?  A stunning lack of size 2’s.  I realize that we weren’t there at 8am when the doors opened and that the crowds had been huge, but come on, if K-Mart can keep the toilet paper aisle stocked on Cinco de Mayo weekend, then I think Kohl’s should be able to do it on their number one shoe selling weekend.  He wanted Tony Hawk’s, but they didn’t have any (or so I thought), so he went with some Nike’s.  The NukeFamily has been cursed with extra wide feet and since Nike’s are made to fit the Kate Moss’s of the world, it was size 3 before he could even stand up in the shoes without falling over.  Thankfully Nukegirl spotted some Tony Hawk’s around the corner.  I perused the remaining boxes by size; his choice of style was irrelevant at this point.  We found a pair and put them on his feet.  The fit was great.  I guess skateboarders are known for having floppy feet also.  It was then that I noticed that the shoes had 2 pairs of laces.  The bottom 3 eyelets were laced with a black shoe lace, the top 3 with a white shoe lace.  We had about 5 feet of extra laces after tying them in a triple knot.  I looked at the poster they had hanging up and there was no sign of a knot anywhere.  The laces (both shades) were tucked inside the shoes.  Now I’m really confused.  Stupefied or not, they went into the basket, this endeavor had gone on long enough.  I’ll hit the website to figure out how to tie them.  Next stop: Wal-Mart.  Think about that as you go to the next paragraph.

Walking into a Wal-Mart on tax free weekend is akin to hiking in Denali National Park in salmon flavored boxer briefs; the bite in the ass is of your own doing.  We live in NASCAR country, so cart drafting was frowned upon and restrictor plates were in use.  We jockied for position and soon found ourselves in the blue box  nirvana of school supplies.  Glue sticks were only .22 cents for a packet of 2.  We bought 8 of them.  Hey!  They were tax free!   Report folders?  We got 22.  After we get the Nukekids set up for their classes I’ll take the extra 14 and put them on the book shelf next to the 12 extras from last year and the 10 extras from 2006.  Pencils?  We could donate 1 to every child in India and China.  Crayola’s?  Enough boxes to color every placard and banner at next years Gay Pride parade in San Francisco.  Loose leaf paper?  I’ll be making paper airplanes until I’m 84.  That’s after filling the 36 extra folders on the book shelf.  We’re set for school.  So are your kids; just send them by to pick up their supplies.

Welcome to the Thursday edition of Big Word Wednesday.  Hopefully this won’t become a habit.  One of our resident Wordsmith’s, Tom from Being Michael’s Daddy contributes our first word in this week’s edition of Big Word Wednesday: cromulent.  It means fine, acceptable, normal.  It is used quite frequently on The Simpsons.  Homer used it once, but that doesn’t mean he knew what it meant.  He probably thought it was some new kind of donut; or the new villain on Battlestar Galactica.  Principal Skinner uses it more often and seems to have a handle on it’s usage.  Our second word this week is eukaryote.  The definition is about 12 sentences long, but in layman’s terms, they are organisms who have complex cell structures enclosed within membranes.  Click here for more info.  Why the science slant, you may ask?  Well, as some of you may recall, I wrote this post and in it I mentioned that I had a lurker at Iowa State University.  She de-lurked and left me a comment and we exchanged a couple of e-mails.  In one of those e-mails I suggested that perhaps she should become a blogger.  Fast forward a few weeks and Karen has started My Microscopic Life, a blog that will chronicle her adventures as a Microbiology Grad Student.  Please stop by and welcome her to the blogosphere!  I’m a closet science nerd and even though I did poorly in High School chemistry, it was mainly due to the teacher, not the material.  He didn’t like me, I didn’t like him.  We had no chemistry whatsoever, thus; no chemistry grade.  Well, not a grade that I could take home, anyway.  Don’t forget to visit the BWW Home Page for a listing of all of the verbal organisms.

I am 4 posts-well, 3 now, away from my 100th post.  I know, I know, hard to believe.  Alert the media and call my Web Host, I could get dozens of hits.  I’m trying to remember exactly what it is I’m supposed to do for my 100th post, other than turn cartwheels in my underwear, and I’ve already pre-warned the Nukekids to not eat breakfast until that portion of the celebration is over.  Am I supposed to make a $100 donation to my own PayPal account from my own PayPal account and see how long it takes for them to catch up with me?  If I make it past 100 hours, do I get a prize?  Am I supposed to watch the last third of the movie 300?  Do I need to go out and murder 1 Dalmatian?  Subscribe to Billboard magazine?  Host a Centennial parade down my street?  I think you get the picture.  Here I am without my bus pass (Clue or Short, take your pick), am I supposed to list 100 things about me; interesting or otherwise?  Cuz if that’s the case, then I should have done this back around number 31 or 32; Barbara Walters material I am not.  If the answer is yes, that I in fact DO have to come up with at least 100 things (interesting or otherwise), then I’d better get busy.  Look for me to post twice before Friday, then come back in October, maybe I’ll be done by then, if the aneurysm doesn’t get me first.  Please advise; I’m dyin’ here.      

George Washington.  Paul Revere.  William Wallace.  The 300.  Nukegirl.  Each of these are examples of people who will live throughout history as being the bravest of the brave.  Those who when faced with adversity and challenge rose to the occasion and said; “I’ll do it”, who stood steadfast in the shadow of fear and said; “Go bug someone else, I’m not afraid anymore”.  Well, I guess Macaulay Culkin said that in Home Alone too, but I didn’t buy it.  Nukegirl, on the other hand, didn’t say anything except; “Oooh! Oooh! I want to hold it! Can I Daddy, please?”  The 14 year old Volunteer working the ridiculously over sized insect table had already mocked the Nukeboys into shame; Nukegirl was the last chance to return honor to the family name.  “So, just the little girl wants to hold the TOTALLY LIVING, CRAWLING 9 inch Giant African Millipede?”, he said.  Jerk.  “Are you sure you want to hold it honey?” I asked from across the room, under a chair.  “Yes Daddy, I think he’s cute!”  Cute.  Not the first emotion Nukeboy1 felt before he fell to the floor and curled up into the fetal position.  “It tickles!” she said as Nukeboy2 retreated to find a paper bag to get his hyperventilation under control.  I ventured out from the sanctuary of the chair long enough to snap these two photographs.  Proof positive that the largest amount of testicular fortitude in our house resides in a 4 year old little girl.  Burglars beware.

Sister Stacey Sent The Best Birthday Card Ever: 

And on the inside:

And From Mom:

 Inside: