High tea, cowboys, and dental hygiene

Here are some pictures just to let everyone know that it isn't all possum killing and blacksmithing at the foster household. the first is of the kids while I personally held a "high tea" (at least as high as it can get at the Foster Farmlet) yesterday while the ladies were shopping.


This is a shot at a good looking cowboy smoking a cigar with colorful sprinkles on the end. Apparently it is all the rage with cowboys nowadays. Below that is a picture of our desperate attempt of getting a handle on our bad dental hygiene.

Part II of Varmit Wars...

After officially declaring war on varmints everywhere after an earlier event where I come up a few hens shy of a full coop, I think that they have either given up and are throwing themselves upon my mercy, or more likely, they have decided upon a suicide attack method. Twice now in recent evenings, with all lights blazing, people talking and kids running around making noise, we have noticed a possum sitting on the back step, actually leaning against the glass of the sliding door. I'm not sure what they are doing, maybe trying to activate the little bomb hidden under their fur, but they didn't pull it off, I assure you.


So last weekend the kids came running in to inform me that there is a chicken that doesn't have a face. Never having seen a chicken without a face, I decided to investigate. Sure enough, just like they said, a live chicken, standing up (with where its nose would have been) in a corner, because without a face it couldn't see where it was going. Darned possums, no mercy at all. A raccoon would at least killed it before eating it.



But anyway, about 1500 hrs, Wifey makes that universally feminine gasp and exclaims with usual exuberance "AHHHHHH, DANIEL LOOOOOK OUTSIDEEEEEE! So I look fully expecting to see Christ himself triumphantly returning or maybe a mushroom cloud billowing over where Wichita used to be, and see: what else but a nasty old possum. The interesting thing is not that he is there, even though it is in broad daylight, but what he is doing, which is eating his 2-week dead, quite frozen fallen comrade. I guess this is the I.C.U.POOP version of "No Man Left Behind", except it would be called "no possum left uneaten". Anyway, Wifey didn't like the gleeful look on my face as I shot him too. She knows me all too well; she could just see it in my face how sweet it would be to be able to have a small mountain of dead possums used as bait for live possums. How perfect would that be? Shoot one, and leave it lay; then another comes to eat it, shoot it, etc, etc, etc. That is what I call the circle of life! Wifey, of course, the quintessential killjoy, informed me that she wasn't thrilled with the concept of a mountain of dead varmints in the back yard that close to the house. Whatever! Where is that Christmas spirit of giving?

winter wonderland

So last tuesday it snowed about 4 inches, a beautiful blanket of perfect work stopping snow. What else can you do but call your brother up and see if he wants to bring his family out to go sledding? The only problem is, neither of us own a sled, but thats no problem for 2 guys that own a plasic 55 gallon barrel, a skil saw, several chunks of #10 rebar, and a welder. The end result was more fun than a barrel of Foster monkies, mostly because the kiddos could hunker down and not worry at all about getting blasted by the snow. Oldest LOVED it and she usually isnt too into "cold and wet fun". Even my dog Sam got into the action...

stop, drop, and slap...

So, Wife encouraged me to post this about the girls; if you don't know them, it wont amount to much to you, but the deal is this; the Oldest is so much like Wife it is startling. The interesting thing about that is while many of her traits will be admirable as an adult, some are so very irritating coming from a little girl. She works really hard to get everything "just so" in order to maximize comfort and pleasure.



The Second Oldest is much more like "good old dad" here. Sleeps anywhere, wears anything, and she just cant be bothered with little details that have anything to do with the silly notion of personal comfort. If that means your underwear are on backwards when you pull them on in the morning; hey, no problem... its not worth changing them around, she's got stuff to do!



Then there is the pain vs. fun ration factor for both... Oldest is very sensitive to pain, and wants nothing to do with anything fun if it involves pain, before, during or after (like on her bottom). Second Oldest however, is quite different. I would NOT say that she assesses the situation, and decides to do wrong anyway, even if she gets a spank (that would require forethought), but when it happens, she rarely cries, and just shrugs it off and moves on.



All this is to back up a small story that happened the other night. Some time ago, after being frustrated with the girls perpetually coming out of their bedroom for "something really important to ask you" or "just need a drink"... etc, etc, ad infinitum, they started asking about what legit reasons they could go out of their room for. My response was "Nobody comes out of this room unless you are ON FIRE!!! That is the only reason I want ANYONE to come out of this room!!! Clear?" "Yes-sir, OK Daddy".



OK, so the other night Oldest comes out of her room with "Just one really important question, Daddy". I think that I will just nip this in the bud, turn this evening into a lesson, so I jumped up and told Wifey: "Look out! She's on fire!" (obviously; she came out of her room, you know) Then I picked her up and tossed her on the couch and started slapping the "fire" out from all over her, while hearing screams of "stop it daddy, its not funny, ow www, please stop..." After I stopped, I explained how I was sure she was on fire (she was out of her room) so I must slap the fire out! She was quite unimpressed and turned around and went straight back to bed, upset with me. Heh, Mission Accomplished! I felt pretty darned good about my parenting, I showed her, didn't I? Funny, too, even though she didn't think so.



Just about the time I sat back down and was feeling pretty good about myself, something struck me: I leaned over to Wifwy and said "you know what, we're not done here. As much as she hated that, I bet Second Oldest will be out here for some "fire-slapping"." I no more than said it and the door opens and here she comes with a great big smile on her face, and while I sat there trying not to smile as my little prophecy became true in front of my eyes, she says: "look at me daddy, I'm on fire." And I am here to tell you, the smile hardly faded into winces at all during an intense "fire-slapping".

concerning the last post...

Just a thought, after you study the earlier post, if anyone has any ideas for a digitially programmable thermastat that would regulate (kick on or off) the pump when the water in the boiler reaches a certain temp, so that it doesn't pump cold water through a nice warm floor, I would be glad to hear of it. (cheap, of course, like something scavaged off of an old piece of equipment). And, by the way, the new pump is working great!

Some of you have commented that I've been posting less frequently lately and wondered what i've been up to. I have been pretty busy with the usual stuff, but I will show you with some pictures below of my project I was able to work on with the long weekend. I utilized my extra time this weekend to plumb in my pipe system that I had installed in the concrete basement floor when we built the house, using a boiler system to heat the water pumping throught the pipes in the basement floor.
To do this, I just use the wood/coal burning furnace that I already use (to heat the house) to heat the "boiler" water, so I am not using any extra energy to heat the basement floor, just the extra electricity required to run the pump. If you look closely, I have labeled some things in the pictures. All I need now is a pump that works regularly.

american children

After the trip home from church wed. night; all four of my kids (ages 7 to 1) were either asleep or pretending to be asleep and trying not to smile while faking it. In one of my rare moments of compassion and consideration for my children I decided that i would just go ahead and carry them in whether they were really asleep or not. As I made the fourth trip out to the van after the last child, I had kind of a flashback moment to a similar experience of being carried by my parents my own youth.

I remember the drowsy, delicious feeling of having no real responsibility, even for my very self; that I could just continue to "slump" and that someone would put me where I belonged and I could trust that those in charge would take care of me. Then I realized that the same feeling must of washed over more than half of Americans earlier that same day when they opened their newspapers. Think about it... Subtle, huh?

investors wanted!

So I think I've hit on a hot new money making idea, but I will need a few investors. I need a producer, directer, and a camera crew, a lighting crew (etc) to follow me and "the boys" around while we gutter people's houses. I plan on calling this prime time network television show: "Gutters of the Rich and Famous". This idea was spawned while guttering Ted Turner's personal resort and ranch-house/hunting lodge this morning, after a 3 1/2 hour drive from my shop. I think that after this idea catches on, celebs everywhere will be clamouring to have me gutter their homes. I can see it all now; first Ted, then maybe Oprah, then probably Bill Gates, after that I'm sure Paris Hilton will want on board, then the snowball effect will take place and we will just have to open a branch in Hollywood. I'm also taking applications for strong silent "Lead Men" to hang gutter. I'm thinking George Clooney. Let me know if you have any better ideas.

An important emergency health care option

I just hope that whoever is our next president will bring us up to these rigorous UK health care standards.

just another weekend...

So on mondays, (especially after the gunpower/eyebrow event) the guys at work always ask: "did you have an interesting weekend?" Tomorrow, I will answer; "Not really, just like everybody else's weekend, probably did the same thing everybody did: went to church, watched the kids bury a live chicken,



then a cat; then I dragged up some coal from out back and fired up the old forge

and smelted down some aluminium, (for casting purposes) just like millions of other people most likely did all over the country. Today, I am going to try something different than most, though. Sean and I are going to try to melt copper, which requires an additional 420 degrees Fahrenheit... wish us luck!

Beauty-marks?

A small announcement about a new “look” that I have been sporting this week. Many of you will be used to my old “look”; the rough and rugged “Construction Dan.” No more, though... Many of you may have heard of the “Metro-sexual”, men who are heterosexual, but care greatly about their appearances, and are very interested in the grooming of one’s self. I took a few radical steps in that direction this last weekend. Allow me to describe the new me:

I got a new hairdo, one that is considerably shorter in front. I also had the eyebrows “sculpted” and even my eyelashes, and yes, also my beard. I had a facial treatment done, from my collar up, to darken my appearance. Directly after my treatment, my eyeglasses were “smoked” so dark that I could barely see through them. And yes, I am sure that you all are asking yourselves if I treated myself to that ultimate luxury of self-pampering; the manicure. Of course, I did; I got the very latest in manicure fashion, one that makes your fingernails appear whitish-yellow without actually applying fingernail polish, and has the added benefit of making your first three fingers and thumb red and look like bratwurst over the grill about to pop. And to crown the new me, I topped it off with a favorite scent: the Odour de la Singed Hair.

You might be asking your self “how can a busy guy like Dan, business owner, husband, father of four, active church member, maintainer of 20 acre Farmlet manage to still find the time to pamper himself?” Easy! Let me introduce my new self care beauty treatment product: “Flash Make-Over”. It’s perfect for every busy person looking for a quick spruce-up. Included in every kit comes 2 small kegs of gunpowder to pour out and light on your driveway, one slow burning to give you confidence, and then one that Flashes instantly when lit, turning your complexion into a lovely charcoal-gray tone, and trims your hair, including beard, mustache, nose, head, and ear hair! Tired of meticulous hair trimming? Let “Flash Make-Over” do it! It takes less than a second! Also has been known to produce charming pit-marks in your glasses to add individual personality to your new look! Don’t forget that with this purchase comes the instant mani-cure, (one hand only) that turns your fingers into delicious looking bratwursts! Guaranteed that pus wont start oozing from blisters for at least 48 hours. Where else can you find all this beauty treatment in low priced kit?!

Remember, result may vary and past performance is no indicator of future results.

2 16 oz. kegs of gunpowder: $19.95
1 Lighter : $ .79
Medicated burn ointment: $4.98
Having your new employees mock you because your "sausage fingers" won't let you squeeze together a set of 'snips at work?: Priceless!

Ditch drivers

So I've been catching flack from friends and family about the "used car salesman" posting lately. Apparently, some people are upset about me not describing how I tore the guy's head off and spit down the hole. I am unsure if I should apologize for that or not, but I personally took it as growth on my own part that I didn't unload on him, but point taken; it doesn't make a very good blog posting. Ironic, though, one friend just came up to me and named the place of business without even asking, he knew very well how they do business.

So anyway, today I decided to put the old '49 International truck back into storage, which is a bit of an ordeal, when you have to start out by jumping it, then driving it 30 miles to Abbyville with out even so much as sniff of any kind of brakes, in the rain; without windshield wipers. As I was driving there and my wife following me, I was thinking how some people would frown at me for putting my children at risk by having them in such a vehicle with me, but I thought of my own childhood and realized how much safer my kids were riding in this truck rather some of the trucks we rode around in. My truck may not have brakes or windshield wipers but it did have the advantage of other luxuries, like say; a clutch, and even frivolous accessories such as doors: they even latch! I am not exaggerating when I say that the truck I learned how to drive in was a wheat truck, and I was five years old. The training course was short and the instructor was brief. My dad put it in gear, opened the door, and said: "just drive it around the field in circles while I kick the hay out the back", and jumped out. It wasn't very long later that I suddenly realized that he must have been talking to me, as there wasn't anyone else in the truck anymore, and that if I didn’t move over and start steering, I would end up going through a fence, so I did. That didn't stop me from still going through a fence later, though, but he wasn't even too upset about the truck getting all scratched up. Now that I am a father, I can see the value in having higher expectations than what is typically thought OK. If you tell a child that "you probably won't be able to do this, but try anyway" they most likely won't be able to.

So, anyway we get to Abbyville in one piece and decide to surprise my mom with a family of six for lunch and see if she will rise to the occasion of feeding us out of the blue; she of course does. Our lunch is cut short by a phone call from a hunter from Wichita that frequents all the ditches in the neighborhood, saying that once again, he was stuck. Mom informs me that she or dad has pulled him out no less than at least 10 times before, and that he called last night from Wichita to ask how the roads were. Dad had informed him that they were really bad, and under NO circumstances should he go down this certain one, that he WOULD get stuck if he did. Guess where he was calling from? You got it... the one stretch of road that he was warned away from. I had to ask; what point is there in calling about the condition of the roads if you don't heed any warnings? He must just love the ditches, I guess. But what advantage do the ditches around here have over the ones in Wichita? They had more rain than we did even; why drive 60 miles to get stuck when you can do it in your own back yard? I've known for a long time the fascination that Wichita citizens have with ditches, anytime that there is any little bit of ice on the roads, you'll notice that nearly every one apparently decides that they would rather drive in the ditch. I'm not real sure of the logic behind this, but apparently it works for them.

So I grabbed a couple of nephews and jumped into the 1086 tractor and went to pull him out. After backing up to his pickup, he tied a little sissy knot in the rope attached to it and after I stared at it dubiously for a while, then at him, then at the knot again, I decided to give it a try. It of course just slipped out instantly. My nephews said in harmony, "he should have tied a bow-line". To his credit, he was very ashamed of his horrible attempt at a knot and I really wondered how anyone could make it to manhood without learning one real knot. I wish now that I would have just told one of the nephews to go show the city-slicker how to tie a decent knot, but didn't. We got him out easily enough, and I am very sorry to say to the more morbid of you all that enjoy hearing about me yelling at people that there was none of that. But I did think about how to prevent further episodes such as this. Since he did at least show some shame, I think the best way of treating him is if this ever happens again, I would just say; "Grace, go down and pull that grown man out of the ditch". After all, she IS seven... But I suppose that part of the novelty of driving in ditches is the stories you get to tell when you finally make it back into the City, (“I got soooo stuck yesterday!!!”) so getting pulled out by a seven year old girl rustic would only draw a whole flood of ditch-drivers from Wichita.

eternal perspective

Let’s see if I can put my thoughts into something that resembles logic. Last weekend we did something wild and spontaneous (which I am told is about 180 degrees away from my normal) and went to Village Inn for breakfast. It was as is to be expected, the usual food, the usual white trash help (people whom I usually relate to) in maroon shirts with polo collars that fail to hide the prison tats serving gray-haired customers that studiously try to avoid noticing the “ink” and, in this case, the 2 girls with green streaked hair, and the one girl with bright neon red bangs bussing tables.
So anyway, it struck me going in that there was this nice big clean table for our family of six, just sitting there empty and waiting for us to claim it. I did feel a little intrusive to the people directly next to our empty table, though, because they had a sort of “prior right” to that space, which was previously unoccupied. As we settled in and the people who were there before us finished their meals and started to leave, I began to feel more as if I were the one who belonged. Then after the people who were sitting in the table next to us left, and the very efficient green haired bus-girl swept away dirty dishes and wiped the table off, the hostess led in a new small family to it. We were just sitting there waiting for Isaiah to finish eating his “pam-pake” as he calls it when I recognized something in the customers coming to sit next to us.
First, I noticed the expression of small joy that “here is an empty clean table just waiting for us,” as if it were they that invented it. Then as they approached it, I saw them looking at us, sort of wondering if they were going to be an annoyance to us with their little family. I gave the dad the old one sided half-smile “don’t you worry about that, I’ve got a mess-o-kids me own self look” to reassure him he wasn’t infringing on any territorial rights. That’s when I realized how we as humans develop what I would call a “proprietary” feeling around the things we are comfortable with. How trivial it is that we cling tightly to things that are not even really ours, and that we are only briefly using; sometimes just an hour or less.
So, of course, I think the Lord moved me to look into my own life as a flash in the pan, a brief moment in the scope of eternity, or maybe as a short breakfast at V.I., to look for the things that I cling to. Funny how important it seems that my grass is kept short, that my fence is painted, that my front porch gable gets siding installed, when things that are eternal, like people, are left behind for things just as silly as feeling possessive about certain square footage around a borrowed table. Just like today, I felt temporarily proud of myself for being able to “duck” out of conversation with a talkative gentleman that I knew has been going through an extremely tough time in his life, including the loss of several loved ones in a matter of weeks. And to what purpose? To go back to my shop and get back to what seemed very important at the time. A good opportunity to help someone, passed up, like many others. Lord, give me wisdom to glean what is eternal from what is temporal, and to act accordingly. And while you are at it Lord, teach me to express my thoughts in a short, concise manner, so as not to bore everyone to tears.

a Muse well stifled...

Last night I had an unfamiliar but welcome Muse come upon me. I was inspired to draw out my future idealistic backyard (with all the trimmings) from the perspective of sitting on my not-yet-existent back porch. It was meant to be an exercise in sketching, but rapidly digressed into an exercise in futility. I loaded the CD player with Carla Bruni and the Zambian Boys a capella Gospel Choir, a seemingly dichotomous pair that doesn't clash at all when you don't speak any french or any indigenous African languages, even if their world views are polar opposites.

So, as I felt the inspiration come on me, eerily reminiscent of days before I knew my Savior, when my Muses were most often escorted to me by illegal substances, I welcomed it; glad for the temporary solace from perpetually being obligated to consider level, plumb, square, and watertight, though I seldom seek such relief, I thought it would feel good to pour out some of my right brain out onto paper. I gathered together a few supplies, paper and pencil; and began drawing, and was actually pleased to see it coming together similar to how I saw it in my mind's eye. I didn't get very far before I ran out of eraser, though. Not that I over-used it, mind you, but it was just a rough stump on the end of the pencil.

"Hmmmm," I thought, "how odd for a nearly brand-new pencil to have so little eraser on it." No sweat though, it would take more than this little setback to shake my Muse. I got up and dug through our writing utensil basket that contains literally close to 100+ pens and pencils. I soon discovered that not ONE STINKING LOUSY pencil had even a sniff of eraser on it!!! My irritation mounting, I start yanking drawers and baskets as I realize what has happened. It dawned on me that one of my little precious ones has developed an obsession for eating pencil erasers! And all the many times I have seen Stu come in the office and dump out the basket, it wasn't just messy childishness, he was really trying to appease the big monkey on his back, the little junky! Does this just happen to everybody? Come on; can't I even escape for a little while after they are all in bed???

So I am pleased to announce the formation of a new support group that I intend to start online. It will be called P.E.N.C.I.L. It stands for: Pencil Eraser are Not for Consumption In Littl'uns. We will focus on making sure that pencils are well out of reach of all children, and ensure that all will be equipped with "eraser locks". We will lobby for a minimum age limit for being able to purchase pencils that carry erasers, (I'm thinking 8 years old ought to do it) and most importantly, people: Parents, please sit your children down at an early age and have that "talk" about pencil erasers! Below is a small example of what your household pencil drawer will look like if this habit is left unchecked. And worst of all, if your children's eraser habit is left unchecked, you may be left wasting a 1/2 hour writing a stupid blog instead of drawing a sketch of your back yard. Daniel

Foster Family Babysitting Service, LLC

Hello,

Our names are Grace, Emma, and Isaiah. We are pleased to announce our new babysitting service. We take good care of our baby brother while Mom goes to garage sales, and while our most excellent, intelligent, good-looking, caring, and diligent father does really important stuff around the house. We specialize in multitasking; we pride ourselves in being able to focus intensely on taking excellent care of the child while paying very slight attention to "Tom and Jerry." Please inspect these photos of our babysitting prowess. Thank you, and give us a call if we can serve you.

Used Car Salesmen

Just when I thought that I was scraping the bottom of the barrel talking about safety moniters, I had a recent run in with a used car salesman (from here on, I will refer to them as U.C.S.). While it seems cliche to talk trash on how smug and sleazy UCS's are, doesn't it seem more cliche to be a UCS that is really smug and sleazy? It isnt at all that I think that the job itself is a bad one, and could see if one were really a "car guy" that it would be a fun job. I got stuck in one of our big dealerships with a guy that obviously thought he was holding all the cards.

I made him an offer, and he told me that the "way we do it is you sign a bunch of papers to show us you're interested and committed and then we negotiate". Of all the cheeky morons! I asked him if he was serious, that I showed that I was commited, then I asked him to lower the price? He gave a big UCS smile, leaned his chair back with his hands over his head and stated "That is just how it is done anymore". It made me so mad that he didn't even feel obligated to try to not appear like a sleaze-ball, that I didn't even feel the same obligation that I felt toword the gentleman in Wal-mart mentioned in a much earlier post. I just told him "you can keep it, thank you so much" and left.

Safety Bully!

In my previous post about corporate safety monkeys, I rail against the moronic mindset of large corporations that use the supposition that if a person gets injured performing a task, then that task or the tools he was using to perform that task must be inherently evil and therefore requires a a rule banning said task or said tools. At this rate, in another 20 years we will all be lying down on our backs 24/7, too scared to roll over in order to prevent bed sores for fear of straining muscles. Hmmm, but what if I could harness that power and use it for good? Well, at least for MY good...

In a similar experience I had with a large energy corporation (Con-Edison) I realized that I needed a good deal of room in order to unload a semi, and then load the roof with the crane. I suggested that we close the parking lot in order to do so. I was told very bluntly: "No way are we closing this parking lot for your convenience." I just threw out sort of half-heartedly that it "might just be a little safer?" and THEN stuff started to happen, by golly!! Seriously, 20 minutes later the parking lot was completely empty, they had gone around all over the campus and found the owners of each car, and got them to move them. AHAHAHAHHAHA!!! Feel the Power!!! FEEL the SAFETY!!!!!

All because I mentioned the "S" word; if something went wrong, they would fear liability. Well anyway, enough about safety and stupidity, I'll try to find something funny to write about. Maybe I will fall into a big vat of poop or something. That would be amusing, right?

sissification of us...

My last post made me think of other things that were different than they are today. One thing we had were large and small chunks of broken asphalt in our playground from what apparently used to be a parking lot. We found that these worked nicely for hurling at each other when engrossed in a battle. We also had steel monkey bars, steel slides, wood and steel teeter-totters with real dirt underneath, and swings without seat belts. Of course, that was about all we had, but we didn't think it strange. I drove by the old schoolhouse recently and there is literally nothing there that was there a mere 2o+ years ago, and not because it wore out, I'm sure. I feel confident that the safety police decided that all the students' IQ would raise 40-50 points if they were sliding down brightly colored plastic slides very slowly, rather than galvanized steel slides very quickly.

The reason I mention these things is because I spent about 2 hours inside a local food-grade manufacturing plant the other day, doing a 15 minute repair. Well, I should say that I spent 15 minutes doing the repair, and the other 1 & 3/4 hours doing a safety course/orientation class so that I know the basics of how not to hurt myself. Included in these things were: (and remember: 15 minute repair, and never once going inside the building to do it!)

1. any electrical devise I plug in must be "locked, GFCI'ed, and tagged out" (whatever that means).

2. at all times, I need hard hat, safety glasses, and gloves. The orientator did actually specify that it was OK to remove gloves to go to restroom. No other safety equipment is to be removed during restroom exercises.

3. any work done more than 4' off the ground requires a safety harness.

4. here is the real kicker: the weapons policy. Of course we couldn't take guns in there, but NO KNIVES!!! Construction workers-no knives!!! No pocketknife, no utility knife, either! the only sharp object I was allowed to have was a backwards-loaded spring action utility knife that automatically retracts when you aren't holding the blade out. Then he urged us repetitively to "cut away from your body".

Now I am all in favor of not getting hurt, but I think it is a ridiculous notion to say that grown men, professionals in their trades are not responsible enough to handle pocket knives. As I thought of how these corporate safety monkeys thought up these rules for people who are trying to get things done, it occurred to me the expressions of shock that would have registered on their faces had they seen the recesses at A.G.S. Unharnessed and unsecured minors climbing a ladder to the top of a 12' slide, carelessly flinging aside the "3 points of contact to the ladder at all times rule". As they get to the top, they have no guard rail, then as the other children are carelessly stacked up on the ladder behind the first one, they recklessly take the plunge done the incredibly steep slide with out any more than a few inches of protective railing on either side, coming to a complete drop off of about 24" at the bottom. From there, they race to a veritable paradise of potential cranial concussions: the Jungle Gym or Monkey bars, a 10' tall, towering edifice to honor the god of dangerous living for little kids. And then the teeter-totter: how safety officers all over the world would shudder if they saw children disembark from the low side of the teeter-totter without making a request for a written permit from corporate, and without signing out? Not to mention, that all was often done with a knife in our pocket... just like I did that day. I just kept my mouth shut through orientation, though; there's a part of me that just enjoys a little rebellion. Anyway, it wasn't very sharp. I guess I get that rebellion from my late Uncle Sam that once proudly showed me how he got a nice sized pocket knife through airport security in a post 9/11 world. Shh...

cell phones and such

This afternoon at lunch time, my kids spent a good deal of time trying to wrap their heads around how old and how stupid us "old people" are. They were telling each other that back when I was a kid, that "phones were just nailed to the wall" and "that they didn't even know that they could just unplug them and take them with them." It was also discussed that we didn't even have computers. That isn't entirely true, though; I think I was in 4Th or 5Th grade when we got the world's first computer at Arlington Grade School. It was really exciting at first, but the polish sort of wore off when it just sat there in the hallway for a couple years until Jon Trembley figured out how to turn it on. Then a year after that, the eight-graders made a program that let you vote on who was going to be president. All the students filed by our single computer and pressed either "y" or "n", then at the end of the day, it gave us the results. Whoa, soooo amazing; how we were impressed when Reagan really did win the election, just as our green glowing computer prophesied.

But then we also were permitted to get out and drag the limbs off the road when they fell down in the way of the school bus, and sometimes I was allowed to divvy out corporal punishment to younger kids that badly needed it. That is maybe the beginning of my "social obligation" spoken of in the Walmart Post in the archives. There was one bus driver that seemed to love it when you got up out of your seat and into the aisle: he would just lock up the brakes and send you flying. My bus driver would threaten me by raising an eyebrow while reaching for, then shaking at me (what seemed like at the time) a 48 oz. ball peen hammer while looking you in the eye through the big mirror. It was enough to keep me in check, but he informed me later that he used it to check air pressure on the inside tires of rear dually. Well, duh, sure, when I think about it, now... but could you imagine a bus driver waving a hammer in a threatening way now at kids? They would shoot him on the site (well, actually that would be way too violent; more likely they would prop his eyelids open and show him repetitive pictures of violence and make him listen to L. V. Beethoven very loudly like in "A Clockwork Orange") Anyway, that's probably enough reminiscing about the "old days" from someone only 33 years old. Maybe more on this later, though.

On Projectile vomiting...

For those of you who find pleasure in the misfortunes of others, this posting is for you. For those of you that wonder if the sole point of this blog is to gross everyone out with stories about the unfortunate accidents of my children, let me assure you that is not the point; it just happens to be the dominate (and recurrent) theme in my life right now, and since I am sure that most people fall into the first category above, I relate to you my misfortunes, for your pleasure.

We have been inundated with company lately; we hosted my wife's family reunion last weekend here at the Foster Farmlet, and besides distant relatives, we have had many in-laws, their children, and applicable spouses along with them staying with us. Mercifully, many of them were able to stay with the in-laws across the road. It isn’t at all that I dislike any of them; it is just merely a matter of different schedules, and different priorities. The main problem has been that I am an early riser, and most of my in-laws are not. That, and it seems the primary objective is to try to successfully pull off what I call a “nap-chain”, which is where there is always someone trying to “catch a little nap” at all times during the day, so as to maintain at least one person sleeping at all hours of the day. All of which isn’t a big deal to me, albeit completely foreign, but makes it difficult to do anything when you are trying to be quiet and have to step over bodies all over your house. Kind of gives you that “Funeral-Home” feeling.

But anyway, one sister-in-law generously brought with her some kind of bug that rapidly attacks the intestines, and affects the both ends of its victim. This bug has torn through my family like so many children through strawberry wedding cake. So far, the current count is (just my own immediate family) 6 vomitings in 2 days, which is why I am at home posting blogs, instead of sitting at church right now. But the worst by anyone’s standards was last night after we put the kids to bed: Grace complained about not feeling very well after going to the big wedding yesterday morning, but reveled in how much punch and strawberry cake she got to eat. Not too surprising that she didn’t feel that well, huh? Well, she was the least of our worries as she has always done well at getting up and making it to the bathroom when she gets sick.

Just an hour after putting the kids to bed, we are all sitting around chatting, me being mostly quiet, as I don’t feel that well myself, when we hear a gagging sound, the tell-tale sound of a child vomiting. We instantly go to the boys’ room, and look around but can find no sign of any activity. We convince ourselves we must have misheard, and it was just a cough, but decided to check on the girls, just to be sure. I walked into their room, bent down to check Emma, found she was OK, then straightened up to check out Grace. Now, those of you who know me well will remember my less-than-impressive stature. The top of the top bunk bed is just about dead level with the bottom of my chin. When I look at Gracie, it sinks in that she is sleeping hard, but with a pool of vomit close to her head. I stare stupidly, trying to take it all in, as she rolls slightly, faces me, and vomits violently, directly in my face, without ever opening her eyes. As I am calmly deciding what I would rather more; getting a very pink coating of vomit or being gutted and dragged behind horses, she does it again. This finally jerks me out of my deep thoughts, and we whisk her off to the bath. Luckily for her, she remembers nothing of it, except a nice late-night bath, and a really aggressive tooth-brushing. Less luckily for me, I have the image of my head and front of my shirt being covered with recycled strawberry cake and punch burned into my memory and olfactory senses. My wife commented that least I took the brunt of it and we didn’t have to clean too much carpet. That’s me, Human Vomit Shield Man. Great! What a slogan: “Protecting carpets everywhere from vomiting children!! Up and away!!!!” That’s not nearly as glamorous as Haircut Harry, the Backwards Cape Boy. I ought to wear a full-body form fitting latex cape.

Oh, and by the way, just for the record, even though Grace actually threw up three times in her bed, I only counted it as once. There have been six completely separate and independent incidents. People keep asking me if what I write about is true, and all I can say is, after a certain point “you just can’t make this stuff up…” and since we are on the “gross-out theme;” if the Ropers will write up their vomit story (just about the only story that I can imagine that would out-do mine) I will post that, too.

Adventures of a lesser known Super-Hero...

In our house, haircuts are a big problem, and the problem keeps getting bigger the more people (boys, that is) that need them. I haven't had a "store-bought" haircut since I got married, and I shudder at the thought of paying someone $60.00 an hour to try to make me look any better. (Well, $15.00 for a 15 minute job equals $60.00 per hour) Regardless, in my case, it seems like I would be throwing good money after bad, so my wife does a good enough job for a job-slob construction type like me, anyway.

The problem is this: nobody likes to get their hair cut, and nobody wants to cut the hair, and nobody has time to do either. This is why from time to time the male members of my family often are mistaken for family sheepdogs, rather than proper family members. After weeks of waiting for just the right moment, we finally broke down Sunday and decided to do it. After listening to the usual whining and crying and tantrum throwing about "I hate hair-cuts" and "I don't like getting hair all over me", I finally told Brynn to quiet down, and that she was setting a bad example for the kids.

What we usually do is sit Isaiah down and let him watch ol' dad get his hair cut first. Sometimes after I let him inspect me and when he sees that I have survived with only minimal ear loss and often have suffered very little blood letting, he is OK with getting in the chair. This time he was adamantly, vehemently opposed to it. It took some quick thinking on my part; I knew that like most kids, he has a fondness for super heroes. This was most likely first fostered by family friend Jeremy Goering giving us the "punching bag" that stands upright and has the bottom filled with sand so that it keeps popping up. The one that Jeremy gave my kids had Spider Man on it. Isaiah was so fascinated with it that dragged it everywhere he went, for the entire week before it got destroyed, even though he couldn't keep the name straight. He kept calling it "Mosquito Man." Heh, some things you just can't make yourself correct...

But anyway, I finally talked him into the chair, because I convinced him that he was really the lesser known super-hero known as "Haircut Harry, the Backwards Cape Boy." (you know, the haircut cape...) Some of H.H. the B.C.B.'s adventures that we discussed include: flying backwards everywhere (bottom first, to prevent the cape flapping up over his face of course), making sure that kittens everywhere had the shortest hair possible, and at the end of every adventure: a bath with dad, which for some reason unknown to me is the pinnacle of fun for my little H.H. the B.C.B. Then we practiced making good super-hero poses in our tighty-whities and saying "Up and AWAY!!!" and stuff like that. I think that maybe the next haircut may not be quite so bad...

boy oh boy

I'll admit it; sometimes i struggle as a parent. I feel as if i am somewhat disconnected from my kids, at least from their thought process. There are times when it is really hard for me to come up with a explanation for their behavior. I think it is a personality thing, but it has been emphasized by being the youngest kid, and not being around many little kids as I was growing up. I have one recollection when I was in junior high of my grandmother and an aunt thrusting someone's baby onto me, and telling me to burp it. You couldn't imagine my horror, and they were quite shocked at my reticence to hold my little relative. I didn't even know they burped. But all this is to say that there are times as a parent that I can really nod and say; "yeah, right on, I know how you feel". I have recently realized that more and more it is Isaiah that I am identifying with. Now, I am sure there are all kinds of psychological assumptions that go along with that statement; like me being a little boy at heart, never growing up, etc., but we're not going to go into that today. It is just a bit of a relief to realize that these little people might really be my own offspring and have put serious dents in my ever-growing conviction that i was an unknown surrogate father for some alien spawn-farm for growing their young while the real parents go conquering galaxies far away, only returning to collect their mostly matured larva's and destroying my wife and and me to get rid of any evidence of their existence. (actually, I still had not formed a real solid opinion of which side Brynn was on) Not to say that I don't like my girls, of course, even if they are little alien larvae, but there are just things that boggle me, time after time. For instance: "The Jungle Book" is really sad at the point when you think that "Baloe" is dead, right? Sure, but how many times do you have to watch it before you realize that HE AIN'T GONNA DIE???? You don't have to cry every time!!! That is so obviously something alien going on there! Another case in point: what is it about really old, stoved up, gray-muzzled labs that necessitate you holding their poor old heads and weeping incessantly over them? And there is really something strange about these girls' fascination with finding little human figurines and almost obsessively dressing and undressing them. I don't know what that is all about, but it must be something alien. But take the boy, now. Now I can relate to him. He is just so "surface" and shallow that I can really identify with him. Like his "big" complex: he doesn't know he's actually a little fella; and I have to be perpetually told myself. I don't think of myself as short. Sometimes when people make short jokes, I look around for a little before I realize they are directed at me. And when he gets hurt, he doesn't to be fawned over and showered with kisses, he just wants to be left alone for a little while until he gets over it. Brynn says that he just wants some time alone so that he can be mad about it for a little while, then he's ready to go again. He is also really into peeing outside standing up; "it's what big boys do." He also has a singular delight in (as we call it in construction) "Big Iron". I've coached him as well as I could in the differences between front loaders and skid-steers, in back-hoes and track-hoes, and of course the difference between a crane and a boom-truck. I was quite taken aback the other day when he told me, quite crossly I might add, that he didn't want me messing with his 'grader. I didn't really think we had gone over that road building part of equipment. Oh, well, what could be better than the student someday surpassing the teacher? Young Grasshopper and all that. One thing that really warms my heart towards my little boy is how he loves animals. I also have a somewhat abstract or hard to define relationship with animals. Isiah loves toads; he sometimes literally loves them to death. He doesn't mind their ordinarily beady eyes starting, even bulging from their head as he firmly brings them to his lips to give them a nice little toady kiss. He does love to spit on cats, too. His riotous laughter that rolls out of his little body usually scares the cat away when he makes a direct hit, then he has to start all over, talking nice to the kitty in order to get close enough to do it again. Today he put a small plastic potting cup (that seedlings come out of) over the head of a kitten. To his delight, the kitten just backed up all over the place, until it fell off of what he was standing on. Again, after the first time, you have to talk nice to the kitty. I can so relate... I remember being a boy, too. Dogs are never as anxious to come to you after they have been tossed over the bridge the first time. Anyway, I'm sure that some of you wont understand any of this, but then, you probably don't pee outside standing up, either. Goodnight,

the fulfillment of boy-hood dreams

One reason I enjoy construction work is that there are so many ample opportunities for fulfilling boyhood dreams, like running big pieces of equipment; cranes, forklifts, backhoes, and I even got to run the penultimate in construction equipment, (albeit briefly) a track-hoe. This morning was a new experience, and a good one. In a search for leaks on a certain city roof, I suggested that we abandon the sissy garden hose and bring over the fire truck to flood the metal roof. In less than 20 minutes, here came several of the city's Bravest, in stereotypical boyish-but-bored, waiting-for-something-exciting-to-happen fireman attitude. They pulled right up to the building, hooked up to the hydrant, and cut loose. This was great fun for all; er- at least all that knew what was going on. The firemen, with typical zeal and wanton lust for excitement didn't tell anyone that actually occupied the building what was going on. As we saw streams of telemarketers (headsets still attached) pouring from every fire escape, we only then realized that they thought their building was burning down around them. Not that I wish ill on anyone, but as they milled around catching up on what was going on, I did have to chuckle to myself and felt compelled to ask them "how do you like YOUR day getting interrupted" I refrained, of course, exercising my exemplary self-control as usual.

While the firemen selfishly didn't let me actually let me run the hose, I did take great pleasure in watching the 1200 gallon per minute hose blast water all over the roof, even clear over the ridge of the roof and down the other side. This also provided excitement, as the telemarketers figured that while they were shut down for a while they might as well go to their cars for a smoke. Let me just say that when they walk around, those who had left their windows down, well, they wished they hadn't. 1200 gallons per minute, baby!!! There were some very unhappy citizens that weren't too impressed with the local fire department today.

My fun was cut short by a sweltering trip in the crawl space between the metal roof and the old asphalt roof; and i use the term "space" quite loosely. Let it suffice to say that I was the obvious choice for the job due to my specific physical appearance, and leave it at that, other than to say I don't think that my dashing good looks had much to do with it. In an area that has no movement of air and in near triple digit temperature outside, it makes it very much triple digit temperature inside. I also learned that, disturbingly enough, that sheet metal can get hot enough that when pressed against bare skin that you can actually wonder "who is cooking what smells so delicious", before you realize that it is YOU cooking. That's alright, it was all worth it to be the guy responsible for interrupting a telemarketers day, then ruining it (and possibly some upholstery). I "heart "construction!!!

In regards to an earlier post mentioning that someone paid for my family's meal, I've had several people ask me if that really happened. I think I will save that for another day; it is sorta long, but kinda funny.

just peachy...

heh, tonight during supper, Isaiah was eating his peach, and noticed for the first time certain anatomical similarities to the human bottom and his peach. He briefly commented, gave his maniacal chuckle, took a huge bite out it, then pronounced that he "chomped the peach bottom". I thought that it was pretty astute for a 3 year old, as I remember discussing the same similarities in a college British Literature class under the tutelage of one of my favorite profs, Mr. Keller. I have no claims as a prophet, but I foresee a lot more head-shaking at dinner time in my wife's future...

On Parenthood.

On Parenthood.

I can’t image anything that is both as rewarding and frustrating as parenthood. There has been nothing in my life that compares to it in relation to learning about myself. I remember previous to marriage, that I felt that I was this well adjusted adult, and would benefit not only my spouse, but also the institute of marriage and therefore the world and our society in general just by getting married. Permanently attaching yourself to another human and committing the remainder of your lives to each other before God is an excellent tool to provide a magnifying glass for some of your otherwise imperceptible character flaws. We both did a lot of growing that first year or so and emerged from our 1st anniversary feeling as if we had this whole thing licked, and were looking forward to also benefiting the institution of marriage (and therefore the world and our society) with several well behaved children that would be potty-trained by 9 months of age, that would grow up very calmly, marry well, and support their parents in their dotage. At this point, none of these expectations have been realized, and I have wondered at a society and world that would just let an absent-minded near-lunatic person such as I even reproduce, for fear of what the offspring would bring to said society.

This is not to be meant as a discouragement, though; and as I alluded to earlier, I can’t really think of anything else in life that has frustrated me as much but that I would be still so willing to give my life for. I often think how similar our relationship with our children is with our own “Heavenly Father”. Don’t you think that He often shakes his head one moment; then is nearly bursting with pride the next, just as we do with our own children? I remember one child was having a difficult time learning the lesson of staying away from the toilet. Emma always liked to splash in it, and whenever the opportunity arose, she would make a bee-line for the bathroom, despite very consistent and insistent disciplinary actions. Of course, as in many parenting situations, there is always the oblivious relative that makes statements such as “Why don’t you just teach her not to do that?” This from the same person that can’t even remember to at least flush the thing when he was done with it, much less put the lid down over it.

Anyway, I happened to be there when she really “got it”. Unseen, I was watching (with a spoon) as she crawled over to the toilet, pulled herself up and looked into her favorite toy, and you could just see the turmoil of making that decision go all over her face. Finally, she sat back down, and started crawling off, away from the temptation. It struck me then, how pleased our Father must feel when we make a similar decision to do what is right, despite how pleasurable it must seem to indulge ourselves in such luxuries as splashing in dirty toilet water, juxtaposed with the disgust of watching us revel in filth when we choose to disobey and give into whatever temptation is before us.

But I often think that it is in our own failures that we really get to know the mind of God. In our house, we struggle with anger. Unfortunately, as you may have already guessed, our children aren’t privileged with having perfect examples for parents. When we see our children react in a negative way to a stressful situation in a manner that brings to mind how we as parents react, it is a painful reminder that we are still always responsible for how we act. This is not something like “oh I wish we were more organized”, or “our kids make our house so messy” but something that will affect our children, and our children’s children from this point forward. This is sin that is in our very nature, and left unattended will not only fester, but if I know anything of human nature, will grow. This is something that is only remedied by being brought before our God with constant prayer, begging Him for help, asking forgiveness from our children, and sometimes the saturation of the Word by copying relevant verses onto note-cards and posting them all over the house, where it is perpetually brought to mind, and the Lord is faithful, and gracious, and we have seen progress.

On the more positive side, it also becomes obvious when you are doing something right. Social norms and mores doesn’t come very naturally to children ages 1 through 7, and it’s a very good thing that we can always just fall back onto the simple, catch-all explanation of “its just rude”. Not that we have it all figured out, by any means, but I think it would be considered unusual for a perfect stranger to approach you at a restaurant and tell you that he was so impressed by your kids’ manners and discipline that he had already paid your bill. I tell this not to brag, but to say that (again) like our relationship with our Heavenly Father, our children are emissaries of ourselves, and when they behave in a righteous manner, it brings glory to us. Now as far as free meals go, we have the benefit of an ever-downward-spiraling society that no longer any grasp what-so-ever of propriety, dignity, self-control, or just plain “manners” especially in small children, so it is pretty easy to look good.

We have delighted in our children, we have yelled at them, we have kissed them, we have hugged them, we have prayed for them-and with them all, we have literally seen the power that prayer has for them and on them, and we have mourned and still do mourn for one very small one, but most of all we give praise for them.

But looking back at our first child’s birth, I can still quite vividly recall the flood of relief that washed over me after a difficult delivery, when the doctor and all the nurses were gone from the room, the lights were dimmed and it was just us and this brand-new, nearly blind, very pink, healthy wriggly thing that was obviously uncomfortable in her new surroundings, understandably quite bewildered with what had just happened to her. All the anxiety that had built up over the course of the last 24 hours just broke away as I lay back with this gift and breathed a scrap of a prayer to a gracious God, “thank you Lord”. And yet even at that point, I had no idea at that time how very much I had to be thankful for.


List of frustrations
· Children finger-painting with poop
· Slow moving children
· A house that clearly demonstrates the principle of accelerated entropy.
· Kids get in the way of “getting stuff done!”

List of joys
· Obedience when they don’t know your looking
· Seeing siblings being best friends
· Seeing spiritual interest in your children
· Eating together
· Kids that love to snuggle, even though YOU know you really are a jerk

Super-poly-feline-kitten-saturation

Here at the Foster Farmlet, we are currently experiencing a phenomenon known to many who live in rural areas, but is relatively new to us. I think the official word for it is Super-poly-feline-kitten-saturation. Basically, for those of you who are unsure of what exactly that entails, it is a remarkable thing how in a time period of just one week, two innocuous cats can (apparently) spontaneously self-generate into a small herd of 10 mostly black, hairy, scrabbling mewing pests. This would ordinarily be a non-issue with me, as the cats and I have a sort of truce going on, where they don’t bother me, and I don’t bother them, but when you have 10 cats on your front porch, and you are attempting to work on that front porch, you cant help but interfere in each other’s lives.
Of course the kids are thrilled with all this and are always also on the front porch, building little structures for the “pwecioush wittle tings”, utilizing my tools and other things that I typically discourage them from messing with, such as the small step ladder that I used to climb up onto the railing with, was found necessary to be utilized as a barrier to keep the villainous dog that harasses the kittens off of the porch. That would have been fine, except it all happened in such a short time period that I climbed up the step ladder, onto the railing, and then stepped right back down with the expectation of it still being there. It wasn’t, and the little fur-balls didn’t even have the decency to attempt to soften my fall.
These kittens have the usual names for cats. I’m sure every household has cats named Fighter, Fighter Socks, Snotty, Snotty-Eyes, Black, Todd, Runtie, and Wolfie. I have a fool-proof method that I have had great success for changing cat’s names with in the past. If I say “no, we’re gonna call that cat Such-and-Such” it is met with great protest and complaint. But if I just start calling it a new name, my children will ask me why I call the cat by that name. My response? I just tell them that is what The Chickens call her. The children all are fully aware that I am fluent in Chickenese, and while I cant actually speak it, I can understand it quite well. They take all this as naturally as if I told them that “ticks are bad”, as I have been telling them this ever since we first got chickens. It works great, works every time. After all, who are they to argue with the chickens? It stands to reason that if the chickens call the cats by a name, that the cats must be in communication with the chickens, right?
I personally believe that every father should have at least a few chickens around, if just to share a little blame with at certain awkward moments. We currently have one kitten that I feel obliged to change its name to “Skunky”. The thing is, I was painting the colomns of the porch down low, and this black kitten thought my paintbrush a delightful toy, while I was using it. What can I say; I succumbed to the terrible, heavy-pressing temptation. My problem now is even my children, who fully believe that I am a very gifted “Chicken Whisperer” refuse to believe that the chickens were able to wield the paint-brush well enough to paint the bright white stripe down “Black’s” back. I would be pleased to hear from any of you some other methods of avoiding culpability in such situations.
It is so hard to be the responsible parent when you get such a delightful variety of responses to your irresponsibility. Just this morning, we had such a moment when I made an encouraging statement to my kids about the fun of eating great quantities of fresh beets wouldn’t always be found until much later away from the table (to put it delicately). I look around after such a statement, and I see the cold, disapproving stare of my eldest, the sweet, accepting smile of my next oldest, the rolling eyes of my wife, and then the mischievous, infectious cackle of the three year boy. A regular cornucopia of emotional responses. How can a daddy resist? It was just like the time that I felt prompted to eat an entire table napkin at the dinner table in front of my kids. At least it was a Wendy’s napkin (brown) and I could claim it was whole wheat. It was hysterical at the moment, but now I have to keep explaining to them why it isn’t ok for them to eat napkins. And it can be quite embarrassing to be forever explaining to other adults why my kids are perpetually trying to eat their and everyone else’s napkins. It just doesn’t look good, any way you slice it. I’ve tried blaming it on the chickens, but I haven’t had a lot of success convincing adults of that yet. Later, Dan Foster

about a book SOMEONE should write...

Here is a spin on an old joke: Question: what do you call a white guy in the middle of 8 mexicans? Answer: Dan. Ahhhh, summer time on the roof-tops. The smell of asphalt cooking in the kettle, the smoke wafting off of the "hot-mop" as you hear shouts of "Mas caliente,- ahora!!" and "ia-yi-yi-yi!," singing and generally happy chatter. The two white guys are in the corner of the roof working together, glum and morose, seldom talking even to each other. I always enjoy the opportunity to actually work with my guys, at least the hispanic ones, maybe cause I dont fully understand what they are saying about me. It is so interesting how their culture is in some ways more "chauvanistic" than ours, and in some ways, not so much. I am still learning much about the culture. One funny thing as we were loading the roof, 80 foot in the air (over a retirement rest home) with the crane, I was going over some stuff with Eloy, my crew leader. I told him not to set a whole pallet down on the roof at once because I was unsure of the soundness of it. His broken reply: "Yeah, 'cause if we break old people; we have to pay like they new".
Something much, much, much less fun than mopping hot asphalt on a roof 80' high in the air with people who speak a different language is working in the bathroom with a three year old. You see, there are certain things that are taboo to us adults that are just unimportant to people under three years old or three feet tall. Isaiah is quite potty-trained; he's a good little pooper, and the other morning he did his little #2 in the toilet first thing. "Good boy, way to poop! Nobody poops like you, boy! You are the poopingest!!" Ummm, I might interject something here, a warning or disclaimer that if you are eating lunch, or are somewhat squeemish, you might want to just quit reading this right now, as from here on I describe quite graphic illustrations of the incompetence of the local helpless father.
So, as usual, Brynn leaves to go running just about dawn, foolishly leaving me in charge of children. Tsk, tsk, when WILL she learn? I am in the living room, trying to watch the weather, so that I can tell my guys what to do, when I hear Isiah yelling something from the bathroom. I tell him "Just a few more minutes, when I get done watching the weather, I'll be right in there." Now in retrospect, the smart thing to do probably would have been to hustle right in, making this Unwise action: #1, the first in a series. Yes, that's right, he had pooped in his pants, 10 minutes after pooping in the toilet, and had done quite the number at it, too. But being the helpful lad that he is, he got impatient and had contrived to help get it off and started cleaning it up. Needless to say even Daddies who dont do diapers (it was in the pre-nup) dont need help from people less than 3' tall cleaning up poop. Appearently they have a tendency to step in their dirty underwear and walk around in the bathroom. (thank the Lord for vinal flooring!) So the first thing I do is scoop up underwear and chuck it into the sink. This was Unwise Action: # 2. Again, in retrospect, I'm thinking that the toilet would be a good place for large chuncks of fecal matter, rather than the sink. As I am trying desperately to rinse the abomination down the insignificant sink drain, Isaiah is getting impatient, so I ask if he needs to poop still, he says "yes", so in my frustration, I told him to get on the toilet and poop. Unwise Action: #3. Poop is sticky, and it smears. A LOT!! A more experienced father would have realized that little people who poop in their pants often have poop all over their back side too. And the difficultly of approaching the toilet for people who are less than 3' tall makes a mess however you do it, if your backside is sticky. How was I supposed to know all this? Brynn never told me that... I never read this anywhere, people just dont talk about it!! It seems like it would be appropriate to put some notes up above the toilet stating something to that effect if you are planning on being absent during prime pooping times of the day.
Well, the next thing I did was the first wise thing that I had done all morning. Well, sort of. I should have shut the door behind me when I did it, but anyway, I very clearly and firmly told the boy to sit and not move a muscle. Then I went outside and hailed my jogging wife in a voice that will probably cause the chickens to stop laying for a week, "BRYNN, I NEED YOU IN HERE!!!!!!!!!!" Then as she sprinted into the house I discovered Stu had crawled into the bathroom and had discovered the joys of freestyle fecal fingerpainting using an all-organic brown color. I guess it is all the rage with kids 2' tall and less. As I took turns pointing and staring, I suddenly remembered an early appointment at my office that I urgently wanted to get to. Every thing must have turned out OK, though. When I returned home from work (a few days later) the bathroom still smelled strongly of Clorox.
As I write this letter, I have arranged babysitting for the 4 children, and plan on taking my lovely, sweet, hard-working wife out for a little wining and dining. I think she deserves it, dont you? Maybe after dinner and perhaps a movie, she will talk to me again, after leaving her in that bathroom. You know, I'm am all about sucking it up and getting it done, but a man has to draw a line somewhere. After our meal, we may discuss publishing a booklet or some sort of resourse for dads. I am thinking of calling it the "Feckless Father's Guide to Feces". Hasta luego, mi amigos!

Cowboy Up!!!

Here is a news flash for you all (at least it was news to me): I am a cowboy. I didn’t even know it, but I found out just today. The worst part of it is that I apparently I am the worst kind (in my mind) of cowboy, the “faux” cowboy. It isn’t that I have anything against real cowboys; it is just that in today’s world it seems all you have to do to call yourself a cowboy is listen to country music. Well, turns out that you don’t even have to do that! I’ve always had the somewhat antiquated belief that if you want to call yourself a cowboy, you should at least have ONE cow. More than one is fine, although then maybe you should refer to yourself as a cowsboy; eh, maybe not… Cattle-boy might be alright though. Anyway, I always reckoned that if I was to be at all honest about my livestock of choice, I should be a “Chicken-boy”, which also lacks that certain panache, if you know what I mean.
Well, anyway, my mom is planning a big “cowboy-western” style “shin-ding” (is that a cowboy word?) at their place and she asked my wife to help with the decorations. It worked out pretty well; Brynn had just finished up on scrap-booking and was casting around for something to throw herself into. She found it, alright. When I came home that evening, she was bringing loads of trash IN the house from her grandpa’s old dump behind our “back 40”. I try not to ask very many questions when I see this very specific kind of behavior, but I inevitably get dragged into it, and get pounded with questions about how this looks; what do I think about this, etc. The problem with all these questions about my opinion is this: I often don’t have the right answer. Example as follows: when asked if I thought the denim decorations were cool for this party; I answered “no” for the following reasons. I wear denim, but I don’t have cows. Exactly everybody I know wears denim, but very few of them own cows, thereby giving denim wearers an exemption from cowboy-hood.
That was soooo very left-brained of me. I was instantly bombarded with Better Homes and Gardens, Mary Engelbright, and Country Living magazines; all proving to me how wrong I was by the scores of glossy pages showing western themed denim-decorated walls and such. What could I say in the presence of such well studied experts? Humph, and me growing up on a farm with real cows and horses. I guess that wearing denim not only makes me a cowboy; it makes me dumb too, since I wear it almost exclusively for the lower half of me. I will allow that in the old west days most cowboys probably wore denim, but most cowboys also picked their boogers too, so could we not draw the same conclusion about people who pick boogers? Welcome to the club, everybody who is over the age of 1. All I have to say is: Saddle up, pardnuhs!
Got a pretty good quote of the day, too, from my wife Brynnie Berra, or maybe I should call her Yogi Brynna: “If it weren’t for the kids, I’d be a pretty good parent.”

the walmart pharmacy

So here we go again... We finally broke down and went to the Dr.'s office last Monday, because it just seems like we were never very well, and got Rx's for all of us boys. Isaiah had some really nasty yellow pus-like substance oozing out of one ear, and Dr Barker gave him some stuff to take care of it. Well, it didn't and so back Brynn went to Dr. and the general idea is that there is likely something in there, like a small Lego, a peanut M&M, or perhaps an Easter egg for all I know. He would do it, too, if he thought he would get a laugh out of you for it. Well, after listening to Brynn recount the Boy's Dr. office visit, I was really proud of him... without ever admitting it hurt, even adamantly denying that it did, he still wouldn't let the Dr. get even close to that one ear, while letting him tug on the other one. That's my little tough 3 year old boy, (though he would be quite offended by the title of "little boy"). His little independent spirit came to mind later as I was in line at the Wal-mart pharmacy. I'll come back to that a little later; but first I'd like to dwell a little on Wal-mart itself.
How I despise Wal-mart!! Well, not really Wal-mart, but mostly the people that go there... Not all of them, of course, but it does seem to be the perfect catalyst for producing a great place for the worst people from our planet to come together and show each other their quirks, their tattoos, and WAY too much of their obese bodies. I saw one young gal with that seemingly obvious fashion gaff of wearing a low slung pair of pants with a shirt that didn't come down nearly far enough, revealing a bludgeoning view of skin directly above a remarkably too tight belt that brought to mind things such as... oh say, huge doughnuts, tubing the river, or maybe the "Michelin teenager". Its just the sort of thing that makes me want to go up to the person and tell them that they aren't required by anybody to go forth and publicly disgrace themselves, that a shirt that fit, and pants that were made to actually fit something besides a railroad tie, could cover acres of love handles. but, you know, my social obligations only go so far, and, as my wife is perpetually telling me; I have a rather narrow world view, and despite my recent liberal education completion, it has not really yet proved me liberal-minded.
So let me back up a little. I was on that end of town anyway, so I thought "I'll save some time and beat the after-five crowd at Wal-mart and avoid some weirdos." So I go to the photo place that sent me the email last Tuesday to tell me they had my pictures, only to be told in person that they didn't have my pictures. Well, actually the guy went to the file and looked and then when he didn't find them, he just quietly turned around and started winding film through a machine, not even telling me he didn't find them. I didn't even know that people still used film, and was dazzled briefly by it until I realized that i had (for some reason) ceased to exist to this man behind the counter at the photo counter. After talking to some one else who seemed to have a longer attention span, he searched in vain for my photos, explaining to me briefly the somewhat mystic and awe inspiring powers associated with Wal-mart.com. So, getting skunked there, and feeling somewhat dazed, I turned to go get my Rx from the pharmacy. Imagine my joy when i see a line reaching from the pharmacy counter clear into the main aisle. "ah", I tell myself, "here is a great chance to pause and reflect on the delicacies of being in close contact with my fellow man"... or something like that. After waiting about 20-30 minutes, I am next in line, finally!
Just then a guy comes to the front of the line and exclaims loudly that "wow, what a long line! Oh, man, I'm never going to get to work on time, now... blah, blah, blah" giving the not-at-all-vague impression that it would be much appreciated if I would let him go ahead in front of me. Now, I have always leaned towards punctuality myself, so I had some small amount of concern for this young fella who apparently had never been to walmart before in his life, but i did feel that same "social obligation" rising in my throat. My first, and no doubt, incorrect, inclination was to let him coast on in, but after a moment's reflection i realized that here is a young guy who has had the misfortune of a society that has led him to believe that there is something special about him besides the remarkable "unremarkible-ness" of him. The special-ness he felt was in direct contrast to what the Lord sees in us as valuable created independent beings; in other words, he was very unique, just like everybody else. I thought that perhaps he never had a daddy, just a very doting mama, that was perpetually whispering that he could do anything he wanted to, and instead of being the president, or say, an astronaut, he opted for getting good at cutting through lines at Walmart. So, obeying my "social" conscience, as I am likely to do, I told him where to go...The back of the line of course. It didn't take very long, though before I could hear him again, going through the whole thing to several people behind me, alternating stories between worrying about losing his job if he shows up late, and worrying about the food he had in the oven at home, and sure enough, there he was right behind me, talking this time to him self as my eyes are fixed straight ahead at the now all-too-familiar pharmacist. And since he obviously is not talking to me, since I am obviously not listening, he is telling himself out loud how worried he is becoming about making it on time. So here comes my pesky conscience again, and thinking about my little independent 3-year old stoic patient, I cut the guy some slack, and did him a favor. I turned to him and (to the great pleasure of the old guy sitting at the bench nearby) gave him a gentle, well couched response about exactly how much of my personal obligation and responsibility he was entitled to, to ensure that he get "whatever" out of the oven, or get to work on time, and maybe even gave him a small lesson about working the ETA out and figuring where you want to be when, subtract the time it takes to get there, subtract the time you'll need there, then subtract travel time again, add 10% for each time slot for unexpected events, and then go do it really fast, so that you can go do something else really fast. At least, that's how it comes to mind now, my "social conscience" rises so very quickly sometimes that it has the unfortunate effect of bringing up levels of adrenaline with it, and thereby diminishing my memory, since i cant both remember and yell at the same time. That may be handy at times, but it is just as unhandy at other times. Anyway that was most of my day, the rest of it was spent wondering what kind of medicine could be so important to a guy under thirty that if he is going to burn the food in the oven, or if he will lose his job if he doesn't get to the front of the line wouldn't just wait until tomorrow? oh, well I hope the 6 minutes that i made him wait didn't kill him... I should turn on the news and see if anyone fell dead just outside of walmart. here's to self-sufficiency and independent spirits in our young. They will stand out like a sore thumb in the future. (or at least like a bulbous midriff...) Daniel.

chickens, soap, and toilets

Just a quick note about another day at the Foster farm… So maybe I over did it a little, I spent (relative) big bucks on a bunch of baby chicks that we don’t need, so that we can have even more eggs that we can’t eat. Too bad there isn’t a small horde of protein starved orphans living in a van “down by Gar creek.” The problem is, I just can’t resist the nearly continuous, almost agony-filled “aaaaaaaaaaaahh!” from my girls that is so nearly continuous, it sounds like a neo-fugue or a demented song round, intermixed with “They are SOOOO cute!!!” So I slammed together a tiny little brooder house, in my tiny little shed, for my tiny little chickens with my tiny little chicks and my big boy watching. Yup, all of us, including the big dumb dog working on it. They were all quite impressed.
So that was fun and all went well as we went inside and stressed the importance of washing up after handling poultry only to be shocked to see how many bubbles come from 3 really jazzed up kids out of one bathroom with a pump-style liquid soap dispenser. A question to you more experienced parents; at what point does it all become less shocking? Because, well, I’m tired of feeling like I have to manually lower my eyebrows occasionally in order to prevent rumors circulating around the Haven-Yoder area about me getting a facelift that pulled a little too tight.
Well, what’s a little soap anyway; it cleans up nicely… you don’t even need to use any cleaners. Unfortunately, the same could NOT be said about the next event, which involves Isiaih cupping toilet water with his hands and drinking his fill—Yup, that’s right, straight out of the toilet. That’s my boy. Anyway goodnight all, I think I am going to wash my mouth out with soap just thinking about it.

(end of Nov, '07)

Started snowing about 3:00 yesterday and and just stopped early this morning. Got about 2-3 inches total. Nice and gentle, and lows in the low 20's with highs in the mid 30's for the last couple of days. I spent a little time yesterday "prepping" for winter; cleaning up, winterizing the chicken shed with a heat lamp to warm the chickens and their water. I wondered if the chickens would sleep with a bright light on in their roost, or if we would have a bunch of really sleepy wide-eyed insomiac chickens running around if it never got dark for them. Speaking of chickens, the other night we were sitting around the house with the sliding door open and I heard a great squawking, so I grabbed my little .22 pistol and flashlight and ran out to check it out. Sure enough, there was a nasty old possem sitting there eye-balling my mobile egg factories, fixing on disassembling them piece by piece. So I blasted him, but good. Then after I threw him in a hole, I thought "that would have been a lot more fun with a .357 mag", so I got one. Possems; Look out! You may not be any deader after being shot with my new gun, but you will have larger holes in you! The day after I told Brynn to send Isaiah out to check out the dead possum and take his new toy 6-shooter (so cute, we match now). He was delighted! He was a little scared at first, so he spent a little time warming up to it by yelling at it and shooting at it with his gun. Finally he lost all fear and really started poking it in the eye with sticks and hitting it, dancing around the hole, calling it a monster.
The day before T-day, Brynn was here at the house planning on cooking up a storm, about eight different dishes to take to my parents, when we lost electricity about 5:00 in the Morning. Our stove is electric, as is our water pump, our Microwave, our blenders, our lights and many other things that we get pretty used to being available to us. Luckily for Brynn the power kicked back on for about 10 minutes, enough to run the pump and Cuisinart and half cook some stuff. It finally came back on around 2:00, just barely enough time to get everything cooked before we left for my folks. The crazy thing is that once we got to my parents, we were there for an hour or so and then THEY lost power. Dad was a little more prepared, and we went and started the generator. I had to talk dad into starting it, but it was a good thing, cause the power didn't come back on for several hours. Can you imagine a house with no lights and 16 little kids running around? All that excitement? WOW!
Well, I had better go, Izzy is up and helping brynny make pancakes for his birthday breakfast. We have more presents for him than we ought, but they are almost all from garage sale, and so very cheap. He really resisted having a birthday, though,insisting that 1) he didn't want a birthday, then 2) he had already had one, but I think he will come around yet! Bye

Rules of Engagement on Foster Farm (or Farmlet, as the case may be)

Well, let me start by just saying that THEY started it. last summer, the coons (RACcoons, rather, not Uncle Ray and Aunt Mim) took action against me and mine by deliberately and methodically destroying the entire 4 100' rows of sweet coon that I had planted, watered and fertilized, (this being hauled in specially from a neighbor who by all appearences, specializes in fertilizer production and little else, since he has 8 horses on 1 acre of pasture) all leaving us with exactly 4 ears of unripe corn I had picked before they decided to go General Sherman on me and try the "Scorched Earth" wartime policy, presumedly to get me to leave. Of course I didn't, and true to the laws of escalation, I retaliated and killed 2 of their own. That was all fine and good, but I guess that I.C.U.R.V. (the International Council Uv Rodents and Varmits -they are not the best spellers, I guess) conspired with IPOOP (International Purlioners Of Other's Poultry) against my helpless mobile egg factories, (since the lack of real opposible thumbs prevents them breaking and entering my house and doing any real harm to me), and so one chilly evening we were sitting around the house with the door open and we heard a great squawking. I proceded to do a check up and discovered that we were indeed being invaded by a hostile enemy. I made short work of him; I had a military tribunal right there in the chicken house, found that nasty old 'possom guilty of conspiring to attack a non-combative civilian entity (chickens are about as non-combative as it gets, which most likely would be the reason behind the name calling), and sentenced him to death, all in as long as it took me to cock my gun.
I realized that things would likely only get uglier from here, so i upgraded my firepower to something that would intimidate the enemy into submission. Well, it didnt work. Brynn woke me up about 1:30 to tell me that the ducks were going nuts outside. I sat up and thought about it (not too clearly, though as 1:30 happens to be one of my very favorite times to not think too clearly) and decided that I had done such an excellent job of "demonstrating" the effectiveness of my new gun in my backyard (note: Thanks to N. Korea for that idea) that I.C.U.R.V./IPOOP wouldn't dream of another attack. But either I.C.U.R.V./IPOOP . inteligence is too lacking to discover that i had much supierior firepower, or perhaps they lacked the basic education to have learned about the US/USSR relations during the Cold War period in regards to military deterance. Or maybe they have just declared holy jihad against the infidle poultry, but regardless, I woke to find, yes, a dead duck and oddly enough, one of my sentries disabled and under restraints. (Cat was stuck in the live trap.) Clever little devils!!
BUT, this ain't over yet! I've got the chicken house under full time night survailence now (the baby moniter), reset my traps, loaded my "superior firepower", put my boots and pants by the door (pretty chilly outside and I want to avoid the "cold nosing" incident that Jerry Clower speaks of), and taped a flashlight under my gun. So; Bring it ON, I.C.U.R.V./IPOOP!!! I'm ready for you....

So Far:
Dan Foster 3
I.C.U.R.V./IPOOP 1 (and a bunch of corn)
P.S. My intelligence tells me that the I.C.U.R.V./IPOOP union has been so successful that they have decided to have a semi-permenate union... they are now refering to themselves as :I.C.U. POOP