I generally don’t recommend smacking people, Anthony, but there are always exceptions:

On the other hand, I did get to hang out a little with Liam Clancy who is apparently some sort of musician. I was never into the whole Oirish eidelee eidelee music scene, but he seems to have been a significant figure in it. He seemed like a nice guy, although I really wasn’t talking to him much. Alan Gilsenan was in New York for a couple of days, and he bought Liam and his wife out to Molly’s for a few, along with his researcher Anna. Although Liam wasn’t drinking.

Some sort of musician?

SOME SORT OF MUSICIAN?

I mean, I’m not even going to mention “Oirish eidelee eidelee“. I thought it was eidelee deedelee, myself.

Then again, when the company you work for is best known for some mildly successful video game where you get to run over hookers…

Oh well, I was never into the thuglife gotz my gat video game scene.

Since I have no other place to put this stuff, I’m just going to shoot it out Mark Sullivan style:

I’m driving my son (the six year old), and his nine year old friend to go ice skating. They’re talking in the back when out of nowhere he decides to go over all the stuff he’s learned being taught catechism by me.

That’s when his friend continues at one point for him, “That’s right, and Jesus died on the cross so we could all live in peace.”

And my little guy turns around and says, “That’s not right. Jesus died on the cross because He loves us. He died on the cross to open the gates of heaven for us. They were closed because Adam and Eve sinned. If Jesus didn’t die on the cross, no one could go to heaven.”

“Really?”

“Uh-huh.”

So I get to the ice rink, and I call my wife. “You need to get here now. I have to go.”

“Go? Go where? You just got there!”

“I need to buy a pony.” *click*

———-

He’s also earned his Glorious Mysteries and Sorrowful Mysteries cub scout patches. He’s working on the Luminous Mysteries one as well. He’s also earned his International Awareness award and is working on the Light of Christ medal.

———-

Our car, the one thing that was going right for us in life, was officially pronounced “totalled” this week. My wife was hit while sitting in line at a red light by a guy who was doing forty miles an hour. He managed to drive the minivan a full car length from where it was stopped into the pickup that was in front of her.

Fortunately, I wasn’t there at the time. Unfortunately, I arrived a few minutes later and went into full “likes to fight guy” mode.

Officer: Sir, you can’t park your car there. You’ll have to move it.

Me: That’s my family right there, in the accident.

Officer: Sir, you can’t park there, you’ll have to move the car.

Me: Uhh..that’s my family, with the EMT’s. Tell me where you want the car so I can go see if they’re ok.

Officer: Sir, you can’t park there. Please move the car, sir.

Me: (stepping forward) Where?

Officer: Move the car, sir.

Me: Where do you want the car?

Officer: Move the car, sir.

Me: Move the car? Yeah, I’ll move the car. I’m gonna move it right up…

Second Officer: (coming over from talking with an EMT) Whoa! Let’s settle down everyone. If you can just move the car over here, sir, people won’t think there’s a line of cars waiting to move on. Thank you.

————————————–

Guy Who Could Have Possibly Caused The Death of My Wife and Children: I’m really sorry.

Me: It’s ok, these things happen.

Guy Who Could Have Possibly Caused The Death of My Wife and Children: You know though, she stopped suddenly, and it really wasn’t my fault.

[My wife had been stopped in line at the light for twenty seconds.]

Me: Ok. You’re gonna go away now, because you really don’t want me to get the bat out of the back of the car and start beating you with it, right?”

—————–

So our Venture is gone, and I’m sad. No, seriously. I was more attached to that Venture than any man has a right to be attached to a minivan. It was the first thing in the last three years that just…did what it was supposed to. We bought it. It worked. We had no troubles with it. It was like, “Well, at least we’ve gotten ourselves a good car for the family. That’s something to work on.”

Yeah, until Speed Racer decided to take it away.

——————

The wife has had severe whiplash since then. She really can’t bend over to well or do a ton of stuff. When I get home, it’s time for her to take the valium and the percocet and the other forty things they got her on and just sail away to Katmandu for a good ten hours. The upshot of all this is, the house looks like a bomb went off.

Now, it’s not that I’m lazy or not good at cleaning (ok, I know you’re reading this; you can stop laughing any time now, sweetheart) I just don’t know where anything belongs.

Me: Kids, let’s clean up for mommy.

Primus: (holding up random object) Daddy? Where does this go?

Me: Uh…dunno. Leave it where you found it, and we’ll get to that later.

Primus: And this?

Me: Leave that there for now.

Secundus: (silently holding up another thing and staring at me with a “where does this go?” look)

Me: Ok, who wants to watch the Incredibles?
——————————

A consequence of this is, we didn’t have Thanksgiving Dinner at home; we were invited to spend it with friends. Now, this was very nice of our friends and I’m really happy to have spent the day there, because they’re great people that I love and all but….well…this stinks. I have no leftovers. I have no mushrooms. I have no yams. I have no stuffings or carrots or cranberry sauce or biscuits or dinner rolls. I have no pie. Let’s make sure we are all clear on this. I. Have. No. Pie.

This cannot be allowed to stand.

That means I am going out now (I had to make an appearance at the office today) and I am going to load up a shopping cart with all those trimmings and a boneless turkey. And then, God help us all, I’m going to try and cook.

Thanks to my man Steve Terrell for cluing us into the newest New Mexican blog:

The Wednesday Morning Quarterback, by Whitney Cheshire.

First play from scrimmage, she throws deep:

You’ve kept a running tally on how many times Joe Monahan was wrong.

Oh…that one burned the D deep for some serious yardage. Will we be able to go to Enterprise Rent-A-Car now? Too late! I’ve already rented one after the accident. That’s a totally different story, though.

Welcome to the blogosphere, Miss Chesire. More importantly, welcome to my blogroll, which is quite an honor. Just remember, that being in there is a difficult responsibility, just like being First Toymaker to the King.

The Beav tagged me with the Confiteor Meme:

Confiteor Deo omnipotenti, beatae Mariae semper Virgini, beato Michaeli Archangelo, beato Joanni Baptistae, sanctis Apostolis Petro et Paulo, et omnibus Sanctis, quia peccavi nimis cogitatione, verbo, et opere: mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Ideo precor beatum Mariam semper Virginem, beatum Michaelem Archangelum, beatum Joannem Baptistam, sanctos Apostolos Petrum et Paulum, et omnes Sanctos, orare pro me ad Dominum Deum nostrum.

Misereatur nostri omnipotens Deus, et, dimissis peccatis nostris, perducat nos ad vitam aeternam. Amen.

Indulgentiam, + absolutionem, et remissionem peccatorum nostrorum tribuat nobis omnipotens et misericora Dominus. Amen.

This goes to the other Steve, Paul, K@os, Julia Goldberg (because getting drunk and passing out is the BEST way to be a supportive girlfriend), and…uhm…Charles Coulombe.

Much respect, Don Goomba:

Castro said hard currency stores could be targeted next in the drive to stop stolen goods and also subsidized medicines being sold on the black market.

Dear Citizens of the Socialist Paradise of Cuba:

What are you doing? You have FREE HEALTH CARE! Don’t you remember? You don’t need to buy “subsidized medicines”, you have that ultimate dream. You are THERE. After all, isn’t your medical system far superior to our greedy American health system? Viva la Revolucion!

While we’re on the subject, can someone explain to me why wealthy Canadians drive down here for medical treatman? I am baffled!

What say you, Kender?

From the hardest working letters in the blogosphere, T and W:

On the occasion of the 100th Anniversary of the birthday of His Excellency Archbshop Marcel Lefebvre (1905-1991) the Austrian post office has published a special memento stamp. The stamp, which can be bought in sheets of 20, has a large image of the Traditional Bishop against a background of the Seminary Church in Ecône, the famous Seminary for priests which Monseigneur created in the 70’s in order to preserve the Priesthood of the Catholic Church.

This has given me the idea for my first meme. Here we go:

Name one person you’d send a Christmas Card to with the Archbishop Lefebvre stamp (if you could):

I pick Rocco from Whispers in the Loggia.

Pick it up and spread as you will.

Adult partners don’t have to wear a uniform, but it is highly recommended that they wear a Tiger Cub orange T- shirt or sweatshirt.

Yeah, I’ll get right on that.

H/T Nickie Goomba:

The glimpse we have into North Korea’s delivery rooms is into those at detention centers for political prisoners, as described to Marie Claire magazine in 2002 by Lee Young Suk, a 65-year-old grandmother who was deported back to North Korea after she defected to China. At a detention center in South Sinuiju province, Lee Young was assigned to help deliver babies of other prisoners.

When she delivered the baby of the first woman under her care and reached for a blanket, a guard stopped her: “You crazy hag, are you out of your mind? What are you doing with the baby? Just put it in the box!” He grabbed the baby by a leg and dumped him into a wooden box that was sitting on the floor. He hit Lee Young’s arm with a leather strap.

“North Korea is short of food already,” the chief medical officer explained. “Why do we have to feed the offspring of foreign fathers? Since China is an open country, they could even be babies of American sperm, so then we’d be feeding Americans.”

The procedure was as follows: Once the box was filled with infants, it would be taken to the mountains and buried. Most of the babies would die within four days, but Lee Young recalled two particularly healthy ones who took longer, moving their heads left to right, opening and closing their eyes and making froglike croaks. Their skin turned yellow and their lips blue until the medical officer finally stabbed them through the skull. Lee Young was reassigned when her heart weakened from what she was witnessing. She eventually bribed her way out of prison and into South Korea.

We share the planet with North Korea and its ilk. As many intellectuals, academics and literary and Hollywood luminaries commented soon after 9/11–with some vindication in their tone–we do not live in a vacuum. Yet for the most part they, along with the isolationist right, seem indifferent to the suffering of tyranny’s victims. They blithely champion the status quo, or in the case of Iraq the status quo ante, repeating only that Saddam Hussein wasn’t a threat to us.

Eternal Father, I offer You the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Your dearly beloved Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, in atonement for our sins and those of the whole world.

Maureen Martin is with child. Since I am all about being positive, I thought I would do what I could to be helpful. Therefore, I’m dedicating this post to Mr. Martin.

I understand this is your first child, so I’m here to help. You’ve probably heard some silly stories, and are under the impression that you should have some apprehension about dealing with a pregnant wife. Nothing could be further from the truth!

You should be feeling abject terror.

The good news is, you can successfully navigate this stressful period in your life by following three simple rules.

1. Run
2. Hide
3. Cower and scurry to obey any command given, no matter how insane

Little known fact: If you also like Jerry Lewis, you are now an official citizen of the Illustrious French Republic.

I’ll also try to help you through some situations you may very well experience:

Scenario: Your pregnant wife has just realized the electricity bill wasn’t paid on time. It is now a day late. She starts to shriek about how your credit rating is now ruined, and how you will never be approved for any type of loan ever again.

WRONG RESPONSE: Aren’t you being a bit over dramatic?

CORRECT RESPONSE: “My God, what have I done to us?” Then start to smash your head against a wall, “I shouldn’t be allowed to live….I shouldn’t be allowed to live….I shouldn’t be allowed to live.”

Scenario: Your wife is getting ready to take a bath. You are walking down the hallway, and happen to glance in the bathroom to make sure everything is OK. You do this just in time to see her slip and fall all of four inches into the tub, causing a wall of water to advance halfway across the bathroom towards you.

CORRECT RESPONSE: “This room is dangerous! I will find the men who designed it, and I will KILL THEM.”

INCORRECT RESPONSE: “Wow. That looked like Sea World there.”

My man, do you realize how many deadly objects are within the reach of a pregnant woman in a bathtub?

“So you’re saying I’m Orca now, right?” *whiz* *smash* “I’M ORCA, I’M A WHALE, RIGHT?”

You’ll find yourself backing out of the room, hands in front of your face saying stuff you’d never in your entire life imagine you’d be saying.

“I meant: Playful, frolicking dolphin. PLAYFUL, FROLICKING DOLPHIN!”

This is the stuff they need to tell kids in those abstinence classes.

Please read Irish Pennants. Not only is Jack Kelly a great writer, he could kill you with his pinkies. You doubt me? Go read his bio.

Maybe we could start a league of bloggers with Irish storefront header images. That would be cool.