Attack of the Fun-Sucker!

 

Like most women, Mrs. Nostrikethat went through the phase in our relationship where she would randomly ask, “So… what are you thinking about right now?” Like most women, she soon realized she really, really didn’t want to know the answer.

Personality-wise, I have a hard time doing anything I even moderately care about with anything less than Total Commitment and Singular Focus. I am selectively obsessive.

So… watchya thinking about?

I was just wondering if I could generate infinite saprolings consistently by turn 3 or not. Why, what were you thinking about?

I was thinking about us.

Oh yeah… um, it’s funny like two minutes ago I was thinking about how happy I was, right? But now I’m thinking about a Turn 3 kill. Did you want to talk about something?

Unless I have something constantly rolling around in my head, it feels a little empty in there. I need to obsess over something like a Kardashian needs a tabloid industry. At the same time, I am almost reluctantly putting off getting started on things because I know the energy it will take because obsession is Serious Business. For example, TV-watching is now really hard.

There are a handful of  TV series that I want to watch but can’t bring myself to start on. I live near D.C., so House of Cards is almost mandatory. Baltimore is not far away either, so I should catch up on The Wire.  Most people are just happy to watch an episode here or there, but the last time I tried to catch up I found myself at 4AM on a Wednesday finishing up the 6th episode of Dr. Who.

Upon further reflection, I discovered I could actually break my life down into phases defined by the obession du jour.

The Larval Geek Phase

Some boys were into baseball cards, I used to memorize Dungeons and Dragons rulebooks. I had my small circle of friends in middle school and we would get together whenever our parents would drop us off. I was the Dungeon Master, which as an adult sounds way worse than what it actually was: a lot of work organizing everything.

I was so into being the “DM” that I started signing things at school “DM”, until this popular kid Zach caught wind. He said, “Hey why are you doing that? Is that like, Dungeon Master?” DAMMIT! HOW DID HE FIGURE THAT OUT?

Fortunately, even then I was good at thinking on my feet. “Um, NO! It stands for ‘Da Man’, because I’m Da Man, man.”

“Whatever. Nerd.”

Screw you Zach. I heard you went bald in your 20’s and got really fat. Or I just imagined I heard that to feel better. Whatever. Jerk.

Later I got into Magic: the Gathering. In case you’re not familiar with the game, all you really need to know is that it’s competitive and that even the people that like it call it “Paper Crack.”

As in “Crack Cocaine.”

As in “Hey man let’s go smoke some crack!” “Sorry man I spent all of my crack money on Magic: the Gathering cards.”

What started as a fun way for my circle of friends to hang out quickly morphed into my next bona-fide binge. I learned to play tournament-level Magic and tried to convince my friends to do the same. Then I would bring my “professional” kit to play against their “amateur” kit, which turned out a lot like your high school Field Hockey team suiting up against the Oakland Raiders.

To this day, that group of friends still call me “The Fun-Sucker.”

freaky-friday-funsucker

 

During this phase I met the beautiful and patient eventually-to-be-Mrs. Nostrikethat.

The House-Hermit Phase

Despite all of my best efforts to sabotage our relationship, Mrs. Nostrikethat foolishly agreed to marry me. Somewhere between Magic tournaments a baby was born and I was cast out of the ranks of the young and nerdly for having incontrovertible evidence that I had actually touched a girl. I sold my cards for a few hundred bucks and floundered around for a while in a new-dad haze of sleep deprivation while snorting espresso powder and wondering what was the best way to get baby hork out of my leather jacket.

BTW- It’s “fire.”

One day a friend of mine said “Hey, I started playing this game, it looks like fun. It’s called World of Warcraft. You should check it out!”

What are we doing here, anyway?
What are we doing here, anyway? I mean besides playing a game that was designed to get us to play more and more so we would keep paying $15 a month?

5 years and hundreds of dollars later I awoke at the computer with a gaming headset on, clutching my mouse and screaming at the dog to heal the DPS.

My wife introduced me to the other two children she assured me we had.

They seemed nice.

I thought perhaps I should step away from the computer for a bit.

Post-PC Era

The day I sold my WoW account something inside of me broke. I have tried playing other games since then, but nothing has really stuck the same way. I even tried WoW again, but it was like going to your high school reunion only to find that your old crush did not age well at all and you dodged a major bullet there.

These days most of my commitments involve a lot more fresh air. I was, for a time, overly involved in scouting and ended up as Committee Chair, which as an adult sounds way worse than what it actually was: a lot of work organizing everything. Depending on how you look at it, I either went camping a lot or just got really bad at sleeping indoors.

14-06-20(1)

Then there’s this thing with the kids’ swimming. I can’t just be happy with working the concessions at the swim meet. Noooo…. Concessions reeks of settling. No leadership opportunities in Concessions, no sir. What can you aspire to, Head Donut-hander? Not me, I am going to pick something with upward mobility, like officiating. Sure, the time commitment is about one hundred times more. And I have to wear a uniform. But I look smarter in a uniform, which is always a benefit when you are telling an irate parent their little Emma didn’t touch the wall with both hands at the same time.

So House of Cards? I’m sorry, It’s not you, it’s me. I’m just not ready for a serious relationship yet, where I can watch you every minute of every day until we are both consumed. Like Edward from Twilight, if I can’t have you… I’ll just suck the fun right out of you.

To my neighbor with the giant chalk weiner on her driveway

Dear Neighbor,

Please do not be alarmed by the construction scene in your driveway. I had to take immediate and urgent action to preserve what may be the most important artifact in American folk art since Arlo Guthrie’s early draft of Alice’s Socialist Revolution Restaurant was uncovered in a Topeka grain silo. I’m trying hard to be modest, but you’ll have to excuse me if I sound a little braggy because I’m just so gosh darn proud– unbeknownst to us, we have another artist in the family! I guess that extra dollar in the church donation envelope really paid off! As we speak, a crew is now carefully excavating my son’s work to ensure the creation survives intact. We’re calling it: Giant Chalk Weiner.

MoMA is expecting the concrete slab to arrive Thursday so they can work around the clock to have it ready for display on Monday because (quoting the director) “a weiner this significant just can’t be hidden from the public.” We are, of course, super excited to have our second artist in the family with a gallery opening, but this means that unfortunately we are going to miss your cookout this weekend. Of course, if you wanted to reschedule your shindig in light of this seminal moment in the art world, I could probably score you some tickets to the premier, on account of it being your driveway and all.

I wish I could take some credit here, but this is really all my son’s doing. You see, state law requires that I “attend” my children under 8, so I was strategically positioned in the cul-de-sac to where I could probably monitor what my children were doing, but definitely finish my Fat Tire Amber Ale. Therefore, when the words “Hey, I can draw a weiner–watch!” drifted to my ear, I didn’t immediately leap up to capture the moment for posterity, or at least a humorous Tweet, because I was fostering independence in my children by ignoring them completely.

Thanks for being so understanding about the mess. Katie Couric is going to stop by later to shoot an interview, can we use your house as a backdrop? Not the driveway of course, they won’t have the new cement poured until next Tuesday, maybe Thursday tops. We’d do the GMA shoot in our yard but my azeleas are a hot mess this year what with the long winter and all. Also, your new siding looks great!

Sincerely,

The Nostrikethat family

hotdog

9 Kinds of Dads at the Pool

I really enjoyed the Scary Mommy post “Types of Moms you Meet at the Pool” and I was a little disappointed that there wasn’t very much diversity in the Dad ecosystem at my favorite aquatic habitat. So I donned my trusty fedora and set off to do a little field research, and now I can safely say I’m wrong. I present the results of my findings, complete with fake Latin names because I watched a lot of Wile E. Coyote cartoons as a kid.

Road-Runner-Latin

1) Just-came-from-work Dad

Paternis inasuiticus

This Dad is typically a nocturnal species, emerging as the sun starts to set. He appears, usually at swim practice, in full office garb, instead of going home to change first like a sensible person. This appears to be a remnant of behavior from pre-Dad days, as it advertises his fitness to reproduce by showing that he has a Real Job. If the mate is already present, it is definitely a show-off move designed to allow his mate to demonstrate her success at garnering a suitable breeding partner.

2) Yelling Dad

Paternis bellowsalota

This species’s primary habitat is on the shores of chlorinated bodies of water. This species is notable for a wide range of calls it performs at maximum volume. No one is sure why the Yelling Dad does this, but some researchers theorize he is attempting to use the air from his lungs to propel his offspring across the water. Yelling Dads are usually wearing athletic clothing from some other sport, frequently football, which leads other researchers to believe that perhaps this is not a distinct species at all and just some dudes who are lost on the way to a sports bar.

3) Statistician Dad

Paternis pencilpocketus

The “Stat Dad” is frequently found perched somewhere above chlorinated bodies of water, quietly but intently observing every activity in the pool. This dad is most known for his detailed, multi-tabbed, color-coded spreadsheet showing his offspring’s relative rankings at the club, state, district, and national levels. Statistician dads favor baseball caps and actually care about baseball. Do not make the mistake of assuming that their lack of volume does not equal ferocity: many a rival has woken in the hospital recovering from mechanical pencil stab wounds and a clipboard-induced concussion.

4) Fun Dad

Paternis throwthekidicus

Paternis throwthekidicus is the only observed aquatic species of Pool Dads. Fun Dads seem to prefer repeatedly ejecting their offspring from the water in what appears to be an attempt to get their offspring to swim away and start their own family. This never seems to work, however, as the offspring continue to return, only to be thrown again and again. Paternis throwthekdicus is easily identified by the outrageously bad pair of swimming trunks that were obviously purchased by his mate in an attempt to disguise his suitability for breeding and ward off competition. Sometimes Fun Dads can be found in the more shallow bodies of chlorinated water, in which case they can be identified by nearby pink or blue-colored offspring and/or an abundance of pool toys and flotation devices.

5) Granddad Dad

Paternis granpaternis

Grandad Dad is a close relative of Fun Dad and engages in similar behaviors, just a little more slowly and with more attendant grunts of effort. Paternis granpaternis frequently displays black markings on the feet up to knee height, and may also have a large floppy hat. Late in the day, although sometimes as early as lunch time, some are observed to turn bright red in coloring, because back in his day he didn’t wear sunscreen and he turned out just fine, no matter what your grandmother might say.

6) Office Dad

Paternis gottaworkus

Office Dad appears to be a relative of Paternis inasuitacus, and some researchers believe they might be the same. Office Dads are normally only found at indoor pools on the weekends, usually with the laptop, inkjet printer, folding desk, wheelie chair, and Nespresso machine. They can also be identified by their detachment from their surroundings, conversations with imaginary friends, and shortened life expectancy. Researchers theorize this may be an evolutionary  “dead end”.

7) Slacker Dad

Paternis notthatmucha

Paternis notthatmucha’s habitat is any shady spot near the pool which enhances the visibility of his smartphone. Noted for their drab plumage such as flip flops, shorts, and a faded Dead Milkmen t-shirt. Slacker Dads are notable for the lack of accessories associated with their (probably) nearby offspring, including pool toys, sunscreen, towels, and frequently bathing suits.

8) Hercules Dad

Paternis toofiticus

Paternis toofiticus is notable for being the most muscular of the Paternis family. Attire is usually a pair of Oakley sunglasses that are welded to his cranium. Females are advised to maintain at least a 10 foot separation as spontaneous, airborne pregnancies have been documented arising from close contact with Hercules Dad. Also avoid eye contact as that may cause leg weakening and uncontrollable lip-wetting. Researchers are unable to determine how this species can maintain a state of physical near perfection and be good with his kids because he’s obviously a giant d-bag I mean just look at him.

9) Mom Dad

Paternis nurtura

Paternis nurtura is a recent discovery but researchers are startled to find these members of the Paternis family in ever-greater numbers. Unlike every other member of the genus, the Paternis nurtura bears the primary responsibility for raising the offspring. This mystifying behavior has led some to believe that this species is actually not actually of genus Paternis at all, because everyone knows boys can’t be be loving, nurturing, or responsible. Mom Dads are identified by their multitude of pouches which contain an assortment of wipes, snacks, drinks, toys, and burbons.

Further research is recommended until Labor Day, ideally with a cooler containing beverages of an uncertain nature. If you spot any new species, let me know!