What's This Fantasy Nonsense About?

I have just gotten over one obsession. Now my seasonal obsession has started.  Here in the US (for my overseas readers) American Football is about to start.  And, though, clinically this alone could be considered my obsession... sadly, it's not.  Don't get me wrong.  I LOVE everything about football (minus the rules on end zone celebrations).  I watch college games on Saturday.  I watch the NFL on Sunday and Monday (sometimes Thursday).  Then I watch the highlights of both on ESPN.  And now, during the week, I get to watch the rebroadcast of all of the NFL games on the NFL network.  And with all of that... It's STILL not my seasonal obsession.  My seasonal obsession is Fantasy Football.

I just heard the GROAN from 85% (more like 98% but who's counting) of my readers.  And they are all saying, "Not you, too?!? How could such an awesome husband and father get sucked up into a web of deception, intrigue and just utter silly nonsense???" Easy... My wife plays in the league, too!  It's always easier to live with a vice if you are with someone who enjoys the same vices.  Granted... she is not at my level of obsesstitude but she is trying and that's what really counts.

This post, however, is not for me to defend my FFO (Fantasy Footbal Obsession).  This post is another in a series (that I didn't know I was writing) about what men are thinking.  A lot of my posts have let the female mind into the simple but oft believed complex inner workings of the male mind.  This one is no different.  I was asked what is it about Fantasy Football that makes men want to sell their first born child to hold up the plastic trophy (worth $25 - $3 if you go by how much it costs to make)?  And I'm not sure we like it THAT much, but it's close.  My second or third born are completely acceptable trades for the trophy.  (But not both.  I'm not a monster.)

During this time of year a lot of my fellow male bloggers are being asked why we like Fantasy Football so much.  That is in no way meant to disrespect the female bloggers who play Fantasy Football.  But I'm sure you don't hear it as much as we do.  So I decided to see if I could explain it my way.

Let's change it from Fantasy Football to Fantasy Monopoly.  Now instead of the sheer chance of you landing on a property (like say Boardwalk), in Fantasy Monopoly you get to go around the room and CHOOSE which (unchosen) property you want.  So the first person is going to pick Boardwalk.  The next person will get Park Place and so on until all of the property is chosen.  Now that all of the property is chosen, you get to hire someone to play the game for you but you get to keep all of the money.  So THEY roll the dice and move the little dog, or boot or car around the board.  When someone lands on your property, YOU get the money.

Now some of rules have been changed.  I mean, who doesn't play Monopoly with house rules?  It has been changed so that now you can add houses and hotels to ANY property whether you own the whole set of colors or not.  Some of you play that way already!  So you are used to the house rules.  But now you can even put houses and hotels on the railroads and utilities.  And any time someone lands on those you get even MORE money.  Then you play this for about 14 weeks.  The person who has the most money wins!!!  Really, this is not much different than middle management at a Fortune 100 company (minus all of the zeros in the salary).  So it's a life-skill.

Ok... Now that I have explained that... I'm sure the questioning people have even more questions.  So let me try this another way.  Let's play a game of Fantasy School.

In this game, you get to use your child's school.  If you don't have a child you can really choose ANY school at random.  It doesn't matter as long as everyone playing uses the same school.  Before you play this game, you are given access to EVERY child's current grade level, test scores, I.Q. scores, last year's attendance records, medical records, current families' income, teachers notes, disciplinary records, after school activities, class schedule and, really, just about any piece other of information you would need to know about that child.

The point of Fantasy School is to take all of those factors and choose the children you think will make the highest grades week after week.  So you begin to do a kickball style "draft" of the "players" you want on  your Fantasy Team.  The good news is that you don't even have to pick your own kid!  This is Fantasy Sports!  They will never know.  (That has to at least peak the interest of some.)  You are purely picking the kids that you think will perform at the highest level.  And by highest level, I mean the highest test scores.

So now on to the scoring.  We all know that everyone can't get straight A's in school.  So there is a scoring system based on that.  A = 5 points, B = 4 points, C = 3 points... (You get the picture here.)  But you can't just draft people based on that.  Because in this league, you lose 3 points anytime the teacher has to "verbally" correct the student.  You lose 4 points if your child gets sent to the principal office.  You lose 7 points if your child gets expelled.  Then at the end of every semester of school (or whatever time frame you want (It's your league.  Get wild with the rules!)) you add (or subtract) the total points.  The person who ends up with most points, wins!

NOW you can see how addictive this can be (whatever).  But you have to enjoy the REAL sport behind the FANTASY sport.  And since I love football, I'm addicted to Fantasy Football.  And if you didn't like my explanation, I, at the very least, have made up 2 NEW games that I'm going to try to trademark next season.  Maybe that will take my mind off of my current 4-month long addiction.  Honestly, I'm not sure it can be counted as a real addiction because I'm only in 4 leagues this year.  I think it takes 5 or more leagues for you to call it an addiction.  (That's my story and I'm sticking to it.) Plus I'm playing with my wife so this is definitely going to be logged as family time (whether she likes it or not).  She loves to play.  But more importantly she loves to beat ME.  And we are not even going to talk about that one.  That's another blog for another day.

Seek and Ye MIGHT find

I would like to report a situation.  This is something new so I know that most of you will not have ANY idea what I'm talking about here.  But I wanted to warn you because I fear it's spreading.  For some reason (and again this is a RECENT development) men can't seem to find missing items.

I can tell by your silence that you don't believe me.  I'm telling you the truth!  You MUST trust me on this one.  I wouldn't lie to you about something as serious as this.  And (not to scare anyone from my blog, but...) it's probably coming to a home near you.

I don't know how this will begin in your home.  But here's how I noticed it in mine.  My wife asked me to get some typed of canned vegetable do go with dinner.  I went to the cabinet where we keep the canned veggies (spell checker says that's a real word).  I looked through ALL of the cans and there were NO VEGGIES. (Which is fine for me because I'm not a big fan of veggies.)  I let my wife know and she told me there was something in there.  I told her I looked through all of the cans (which I did) and there were no veggies.  I inform my wife that we will NOT be having any veggies today because there are NONE in the cabinet.  I reiterated that I looked through ALL of the cans and there were ZERO veggies.

For the men who didn't know
what I was looking for.

So, what does she do?  She goes over to the cabinet, moves 2 cans and there it was... a can of corn!!!  WHAT???  Where did that come from???  I was just in there a minute ago and I looked in the exact same spots and I PROMISE there was no corn in there before.  What kind of Harry Potter Cloak of Invisibility can of corn is this?!?!  And so you have borne witness to my realization that there is a problem.  It's not MY fault.  I have a disorder.

If I had thought about it, I would have noticed it before.  There were other times in the past that I had been looking for something and this disorder presented itself.  Those previous times I just passed it off as normal.  Well this is not normal!  And the sooner we defeat this the better.

I realize that most of you haven't experienced this with the men in your lives. But he may or may not still have the disorder.  So let me give you a few warning signs to look for just in case.  If you see ANY of these issues please stay calm and attempt to work through this (if he's worth it).

1. The initial symptom is that something is lost in the house (duh) and the 2 of you are looking for it.  After 10 minutes of not finding it, you find him back on the sofa watching TV, playing Play Station 3 or on the computer (whatever he was doing before you started looking for the lost item). He doesn't REALLY want to be there but the trauma of not finding the lost item has taken its toll on him.  So the best way for his mind to get centered is to go to a Happy Place.
2. He seems distracted while searching.  If you ask him what's on his mind.  He will tell you nothing.  Again, this is not his fault.  He is really thinking about the Fantasy Football Draft he has this weekend.  Now, he knows one of the kids has an event this weekend too.  But at the kids event all he has to do is watch.  In Fantasy Football, he's the OWNER.  He has to make decisions that will affect the fantasy lives of real players on FAKE team and control their FAKE destiny to win a FAKE championship.  This is serious stuff!
3. He REFUSES to look in the same place twice.  If you ask if he has looked in {insert name of most obvious spot missing item could be} and he tells you 'yes' but you go there and IT'S THERE... This one is a biggie (spell checker likes this one too).  Odds are he looked there but didn't see it.  And he will NOT go back there for the same reason I didn't go back for the veggies. If that item magically appears in that same spot we just looked then it does something to our mind.  We can't mentally handle that.  We feel that someone (maybe the can itself) is playing a joke on us and it's not even remotely funny.
4. Also, you'll notice that the chances of him finding the missing item change depending on the external factors around him.  The chances of failure are doubled (in the case of thinking about fantasy football) or even tripled (in the case of vegetables (especially lima beans)) depending on these external factors. (My disorder is so bad, I can go through an entire grocery store while shopping for the family and not find a single can of those nasty lima beans.  It's not my fault.  It's the disorder.) 

After describing these symptoms, some of you may just now realize that you are living with someone with a little known disorder.  This is a very serious issues and should be treated as such.  It doesn't mean that life a you know it is over.  It just means that things can be almost normal if you identify there is an issue and work around it.  'How can I do that, Dr. Que?' Well, I'm glad you asked.  Follow THESE few and simple rules and you won't even notice there is a problem.

1. Don't EVER ask him to help you find anything.  If you want it found, go look for it yourself.  Remember, it's not his fault.  It's the disorder.  Plus, odds are you will find it first anyway. (The rest of the rules are only for those who try to defy the only rule you really need.  And I'm sure some of you will.)
2. Don't ask him to help you find anything if he's in the middle of doing something important like playing Madden 11 on the XBox or playing World of Warcraft on the computer or watching Desperate Housewives... I mean... CSI (any of them).  You are just setting him up for failure.
3. If he doesn't find something (which he won't), don't get upset with him.  Remember, you are mad at the disorder not the individual.  Just make sure you give him encouragement, support and most of all... LOVE.  Let him know that he is still the M.O.T.H. and it was a nearly impossible task that couldn't be accomplished by even the greatest of heroes.  Then send him back to the Xbox.
4. If you DO ask him to help you find something, make sure he has an attachment to it.  (For example: All of the ingredients for grilling out.  He can find those.  Regular everyday cooking ingredients... not so much.  He can also find a present you bought for him that you can't seem to find.  He doesn't even need to know what he's looking for on that one.  He WILL find it.  Also, birth control...  He can find that even if you encased it in lead, drove 40 miles away and hidit 10ft deep in the back yard of a stranger.  I'm not exactly sure why, but it will be found as if it had a GPS locator on it!)

Because of the seriousness of this issue I've decided to start a charitable foundation.  I WILL be accepting donations for Men Against Deceptive Disorders Ending Niceties (or M.A.D.D.E.N. for short).  It will be a subsidiary of Wildly Interesting Investments (or W.I.I.). With this foundation I will be committing to a cause that is close to my heart.  So lets work together make this world in which our little boys are not afraid or ashamed to grow up to be wonderfully raised semi-productive men.  (I'm taking donations today.... as soon as I finish playing World of Warcraft.)

Another Year Better

Today is my wife's birthday.  And I know that she hates that fact that she is one year older.  I, on the other hand, love it.  It means much more to me than the number that's attached to it.  My wife's birthday and our anniversary remind me of several things that don't have anything to do with her age.

My wife's birthday reminds me that I just spent another year with the most wonderful woman I could ever find.  Many people in life don't have that kind of blessing.  So I don't take that gift for granted.  And no matter what happens now, I have all of the great memories of the previous year that will last a lifetime.

My wife's birthday reminds me that each year we celebrate it, it becomes more special than the last.  I was talking to her the other night about how certain things in life lose their value the more you have.  No matter how much you love banana pudding (and I love banana pudding), you can only eat so much of it before it starts to lose it's magic.  Well... each year with my wife brings upon itself a new magic that doesn't diminish with age.

My wife's birthday also reminds me that love truly can grow with the passing of time.  The longer we are together, I have a better understand of who she is and what she stands for.  And knowing all of that make me love her even more.  I love her more now than I did a year ago because I know her better.

My wife's birthday reminds me that I'm getting a life-long lesson of what love really means.  Before her, I had a different definition of love and how it applies to me.  And each year I find that my definition changes.  It changes in my heart and in my mind.  And it's this constant changing that makes everything fresh and new but with better understanding and clarity.

So my wife's birthday means much more than her age.  And if I could, I would give her the world and everything in it on this special day.  As broke as we are, I couldn't even give her a globe or even a map of Wyoming for that matter.  But also knowing her like I do, I know she wouldn't want the world.   So I will give her something of more value.

Sweetie... For your birthday this year, I will give you a few promises that I will defend in the face of any and all opposition.  I promise that I will always be there for you.  That holds true even when I know I'm going to have to stand between you and our 4-year old little girl having a fit.  I promise that I will always give you everything I can even down to my last breath.  That is including but not limited to colds and flus.  (Some things can't be helped.) And above all, I promise to love you so much more than banana pudding (and my mother's Spaghetti) until my dying day.  And if those don't make the short list of the best birthday presents ever than I guess I just don't know what a birthday means.

Happy Birthday, Mrs. Que!  I love you!

Cyberflu!!!

This might be the first time in the history of world that something like this has ever happened.  I have heard of catching a virus on your computer.  But I think I have received the first case of receiving a virus FROM my computer.

I really think I caught the flu reading this blog. I know, I know... It sounds ridiculous!  I can hardly believe it myself.  All I know is that I was feeling fine.  Then I read about a fellow blogger getting the flu during the Summer months.  And I thought to myself, "Man, that sucks!"  Then a few days later... BAM!!!!  I was sick.  Some may say it's coincidental or completely circumstantial evidence.  But to those people I just say that people used to think the world was flat. But look at it now!  And SOMEONE had to be the first to question the impossible.  (I know that doesn't mean anything toward my argument but I really can't prove what I believe.  So instead of an insightful debate, all you get is the equivalent of a digital tongue being stuck out in your general direction. :-P <----tongue).

Being sick and home alone with my 4-year old made me appreciate single parents more, though.  I don't know how single parents handle being sick with the kids at home.  I know you just have to deal with it but it has to be one of the toughest things ever.  That's even more so when the oldest child in the house is not old enough to take care of themselves let alone the other kids.  I only had one child at home. (The others were in school.  That's another post all together.) I had to spend the day with our 4-year old (did I mention crazy school schedules) and it was NOT fun at all.  First off, she kept putting me in timeout.  She would ask if I was still sick.  When I responded with a "yes" she would say, "No! No! No! You are NOT sick. Now go to timeout!"  If only it were that simple, sweetie. (Words I said as I was going to timeout.)

Secondly... As I'm battling this evil disease from the seventh layer of hell (men always exaggerate... everything), she wouldn't stop calling, "Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!" until I acknowledged she was talking directly to me. I did understand that she was a little nervous.  She doesn't see daddy sick a lot so she didn't know how to react. Knowing that, I tried to not get frustrated or upset.  Plus, I couldn't even if I wanted.  In the state I was in, she could have easily taken me with what she learned for just her few lessons of Taekwondo.

But I am getting better.  I'm able to move, talk, breathe (almost without problems), and eat.  So all should be well.  I will be back to normal in no time.  Plus, I have to get better soon.  It's my wife's birthday tomorrow.  We, of course, are too broke to really do anything.  SO it would doubly suck if I was sick on top of that.  My best bet is to will myself well one way or another.  I really don't think I want to spend another minute in timeout.

Fool Me Once....

With football season starting in the US, I have noticed a little verbal football being played in the homes.  And it's not the normal football we are used to seeing on the TV.  This football is more like a Charlie Brown and Lucy Van Pelt football game going on in relationships.  How many of you out there can relate (on either side) to this scenario?

The following may or may not be an actual conversation that happens more than once a month in my house.  Change the characters to fit your particular home:

Lucy Van Pelt
Character by Charles Schulz

Wife (or otherwise significant other): I'm hungry. What are we eating tonight? (Lucy)

Husband (or otherwise significant other on the other side of the other): I don't know.  What do you want to eat? (Charlie Brown).

Wife: I'm hungry but I don't know what I'm hungry for.  You decide. (Lucy getting the football and asking Charlie Brown to kick it.)

Husband: I really don't care either.  Just let me know what you want and I'll go get it. (Charlie Brown realizing what is going on and deciding to not become a victim of this "football kicking" scheme yet once again.)

20 minutes goes by...

Wife: I'm hungry.  Have you decided where you are going to get something? I really don't care where we eat. (Oh, Brother... Lucy telling Charlie Brown that she knows she has swiped the football away EVERY OTHER time Charlie Brown has tried to kick it but assures him that this time it's going to be different.)

Husband: I don't care where we eat either.  You pick. (You must think I'm stupid... Charlie Brown seeing this a mile away.  He knows that as soon as he tries to go kick the football it is going to be pulled away like always.  So he is standing his ground.)

10 more minutes go by...

Charlie Brown
Character by Charles Schulz

Wife: The kids are getting hungry.  You really need to decide on a place to eat.  I'm so hungry right now I will eat from anywhere. (Oh, come on Charlie Brown... Lucy being nice and promising to not pull the football away while submitting the signed document stating as such.)

Husband: Fine!  I will pick a place.  We are going to eat at [insert closest restaurant to the house]. (Charlie Brown, knowing in his heart how this is going to end because it happens this way every single time but deciding to give it a chance because there is a "signed document".)

Husband goes and gets wallet.  Husband goes and gets keys.  Husband gets ready to walk out the door. (Charlie Brown takes a running start and decides if he runs fast enough he can beat Lucy hand from pulling the ball out of the way.)

Just before the husband gets to the door:

Wife: You know what?  Let's eat at [insert restaurant MUCH farther out of the way].  I don't think I want anything from [the restaurant the husband picked]. (Lucy, ONCE AGAIN, snatching the ball right out from the swinging foot of Charlie Brown... Good Grief!)

If you are reading this and it applies to your home,
would you mind letting me know if you are the Lucy or the Charlie of the situation.

Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Post

My wife was feeling a little exposed after her surgery.  I'm sure most of us feel that way when we are in a state of vulnerability.  You find yourself hurting and you can't do for yourself and others like you once did.  So I'm about to do something that only a good husband would do.  I'm going to expose myself! That's right.  My wife shouldn't be the only one exposed!

I'm also going to explain myself here (now) before I have some explaining to do to my wife (later).  You don't have to divert your eyes.  It's not that kind of exposure. (You are welcome, BTW.)  I'm going to tell everyone a fear that I have.  I'm pretty sure that my wife doesn't even know this.  But before I tell you what my fear is, I going to tell you what I think about fear.  (Don't worry.  I got my Degree in Psychology from a Cracker Jack box.  So this will be quick (and completely inaccurate).)

There are 3 kinds of fear.  There is regular, plain old fear.  This fear is like when a child is afraid of the dark...  or thunder and lightning... or the bully at school.  Most fear is lumped in this category.  Then you have phobias.  That's like when you are afraid of heights and you want climb a ladder to save your life.  Or when you are so afraid of crawling bugs (like spiders) or flying bugs (like moths (Yeah, I said moths.)) that you do insanely irrational things to even avoid eye contact with the evil little creatures that weigh less than a quarter and couldn't even lift your shoe if you placed it on them.  In the first fear, you can probably be talked down from this and function normally if the fear presented itself.  The second fear... not so much.

The 3rd fear is a little different.  It's not a regular fear and it's not a phobia.  I call it a situational fear.  For example...  I'm not afraid of spiders, snakes or moths.  But if I rolled over in my bed and I noticed either of them (minus the moth) next to me, I would probably exit the bed rather quickly (like a phobia) and think of how to fix the issue (like a regular fear).  So you see, it can be both or something else all together.


Now, I'm not sure why I gave that lesson on fear.  I guess I did it so it wouldn't make my fear seem as bad.  Maybe I did it because I'm stalling so I don't have to tell you what I agreed to tell you at the beginning of the blog.  Actually, if I play this one right, I might be able to completely change the focus of this blog and have you forget what I was even talking about.  Say, if I... I don't know.... threw out a random statement. Like...

Hey, did you know that there's a new Pirates of the Caribbean coming out?!?


See, now that was great!  That Johnny Depp is one awesome actor.  There isn't role he can't play.  And can you believe they are making a 4th installment of series called Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (coming out in 2011).

What's that you say???  You didn't like the random statement or the Johnny Depp pic?  You really just want me to get to my fear. (Hmmm.... I really need to rethink my plans.)  OK. Fine.  I will just come out and say it.


I'm afraid of horses. I'm not even sure how to categorize this fear.  It's not a phobia because I can be around horses.  I just don't like being "around" horses.  But here's the oddest thing about it.  I LOVE horses!  I think they are beautiful, majestic creatures.  Some might ask how can I like something and be afraid of it at the same time.  I'm not sure how that works but I'm like that with law enforcement too!  So, this issue of mine is not isolated.

I know I'm not the only one afraid of horses.  I know it for a fact because I'm friends with a few people who are afraid but may or may not admit it.  And I'm not going to mention any names to protect the guilty.  But several years back there were 5 or 6 of us at another friends house.  His father owned horses.  We had always seen the horses but were never asked to be around the horses.

On one visit, however, he asked us to meet him at the barn because he had to feed the wonderful (scary) creatures.  (I guess they have to eat too.)  So all of us fellas made our way to the gate that led to the field that led to the barn (that Jack built).  Now, keep in mind it was VERY dark outside.  I don't know if you have ever been in the country where there are NO streetlights (or any other lights for that matter) at night.  If you haven't... Go into your bathroom, turn off all of your lights, put some sunglasses on, close your eyes and pretend you are in Wyoming.  That's about how dark it is.

Our goal was just to go from the gate to the barn.  But NONE of us wanted to be the first to open the gate.  We must have thought that a herd of wild stallions were just waiting for some poor soul to open the gate just a little and provide them the one moment they needed to make their great escape.  That wasn't the case because there wasn't that many horses there.  But when you are afraid, you think of silly crap like that.

We finally got enough courage to open the gate and make our way to the barn. (We made sure to close the back because we didn't want those stallions to crush our cars on the way to their sweet freedom.)  If you can imaging 5 or 6 manly men tip-toeing through the tulips to keep from making a sound.  We didn't want to startle the man-eating horse beasts that were in this HUGE (several acres) enclosed area.  Plus we knew the horses were hungry because it was feeding time.  And no one wanted make a mistake and become horse food.

The other thing that made this situation look pretty funny is that all of us manly men were standing VERY close together (tight formation).  That was for safety as well.  Horses will try to pick you off one at a time.  But they become confused around large groups of humans.  So we bunched together to make sure that no man was left behind.  You might laugh but the plan worked!  We didn't lose a single soldier to those belligerent broncos.

Well, we make it to the barn (where there was light) and we watch our friend and his father put out the horse feed.  When it was all done, we were told to head back up to the house.  I don't remember what they had to do, but our friend and his father wouldn't be joining us on the journey back either.  The fear that was gone for about 10 minutes inside the barn soon came back when we realized that were going to have to do the same thing again!

So we get to the barn door and try to push it open.  But it won't move.  Something is blocking the door.  I'll bet you will NEVER guess what that was.  YEP! A horse decided that he had us right where he wanted us.  And he wasn't moving!  We didn't want to tell our friend an his father that we were afraid so one of us (wasn't me) walked up to the door and tried pushing it and the horse.  For those who don't know (like us), the average horse weighs about 1000lbs.  So neither the door nor the horse moved.

Another one of us realized that the door wasn't going to move until the horse got out of the way.  So he started reasoning with the horse.  "Move horse.  We are trying to get back to the house.  Just get out of the way. Go."  I guess this horse was from another country because it didn't understand English.  Either that or it didn't really care what we had to do that night.  And even with a few of us reasoning with him, the horse just stood there.

Finally, the biggest one of us was fed up.  He decided to express his dominance over the beast of burden and show the horse that man is the top of the food chain and they would do well to remember that.  So he pushed through us to get to the door and started clapping and yelling, "GO! NOW YOU GET OUT OF HERE! MOVE! MOVE! MOVE!"  The yelling along with the clapping sent that horse running.  It was awesome!  My friend turned around and looked at the rest of us and said, "Now THAT'S how you do it."

But what he (and the rest of us) failed to realize was that there was more than one horse on the other side of that door.  So as we started to walk out of the door, the second horse stuck his head into the door way.  EVERY SINGLE ONE OF US screamed like little schoolgirls!!! (No offense to little girls. But I have 3 so I know what I'm talking about there.)  I promise you, if the horse had said BOO we would all died right then and there.  He knew what he was doing.  He smelled our fear.  And I'm sure he and his other horse buddies planned the whole thing and laughed about it for months after we left.  Needless to say, that confirmed what I thought about horses and helped fuel my fear.

Since then I have come to grips with the whole fear of horses.  I have even agreed to go horseback riding with my wife... one day. :)  It was my idea and I actually look forward to it (sorta).  So, there ya go.  That was me exposing myself to you.  I hope we can all still be friends.  I probably exposed more than I had planned to when I originally started this post.  But, hey... what's a little overexposure between friends. And, Honey... Just forget everything you just read.  You know it's not true.  I'm not afraid of anything (including, but not limited to, moths).


P.S. If you are reading this and were a part of this little adventure, you have the option to make yourself known or stay quite.  But facing your fear head-on is liberating.  I didn't name names but if you choose to name yourself you will be taking the first step to taming your fear.

Sometimes Life Just Gets in the Way

I just wanted to let my usual readers know that I have not stopped blogging (or reading everyone else's blog).  This past week we have received a bad case of the "lifes".  You know what I'm talking about.  You are walking down the street minding your own business and then out of the blue someone gets a case of the lifes.

This particular case of the lifes was call surgery.  My wife had surgery a few days ago.  I'm not going to get into the details but the whole ordeal has made me change my wife's name to "1-percenter".  The reason she is known as the 1-percenter is because the post surgery issues she is having happens to only 1 percent or less of the patients.

The surgery itself went fine.  But the recovery has been everything but fine.  We were told that there was the chance of 2 possible complications but each of them has a 1 percent or less chance of occurring.  So the odds of getting one are slim but the odds of getting BOTH probably have the same odds as getting struck by lightning... in a snowstorm... in a desert... in Australia... on the 29th of February.  (Maybe not that slim but pretty close.) But my wife won the lottery and got them both!

Of course there are other things going on in life that take your focus away from some of the things you like to do.  Sometimes good.  Sometimes bad.  But no matter what you are doing to occupy your time and keep your spirits up, watching someone you love suffer is a horrible experience.

I know others have it worse so I'm not complaining.  But I AM acknowledging the fact that when someone you love is hurting, you hurt too.  It can be as little as a paper-cut or a big as fighting a terminal illness.  You can't help but want to at least share the pain if it meant the person you love could have one moment without it.

I know my wife will be fine in a few days.  I have no worries.  But for a little tiny moment of selfishness... She really needs to stop hurting so that I will stop hurting too.

:-(