Hi Mom! Happy Mothers Day! How are things in Iowa?
Here’s a recent picture of me at the dog park. You can see I have an underbite just like Dad. Some people tease me about it but I don’t care.
You would be so proud of me. I’m the alpha dog of my whole neighborhood!
People think that dogs don’t remember their families but of course I remember you and I always love you even though you’re far away.
Your son,
Lightning 
The joys of parents are secret, and so are their griefs and fears.
Happy Mothers Day to my wife, who shares my secrets . . .
This has been making the rounds of my Facebook friends so I thought I’d repost my answers here:
A – Age: Extremely late 30s
B – Bed Size: Procrustean
C – Chore You Hate? If it’s a chore, I hate it
D – Dogs Name? Lightning
E – Essential Daily Items? Nothing is essential
F – Favorite Color? Blue. No, yell– AUUUUUUUUGH!
G – Gold Or Silver? Whatever
H – Height? 6-0, give or take
I – Instruments You Play? Drums and piano, both poorly
J – Job Title? Lord of Logic
K – Kids? Son, age 15
L – Living Arrangements? Wife, kid and dog, in a rapidly depreciating house
M – Mom’s Name? Good question…I only knew her as “Mom”
N – Nicknames? Like Charlie Brown, I always wanted to be called “Flash”
O – Overnight hospital stay other than birth? Burst fracture, L1 (i.e. broken back); laparascopic cholecystectomy (i.e. gall bladder out)
P – Pet Peeves? Other people and their pet peeves
Q – Quote From A Movie? “I am letting you into the secret of all secrets, mirrors are gates through which death comes and goes. Moreover if you see your whole life in a mirror you will see death at work as you see bees behind the glass in a hive.” — Jean Cocteau, Orphée
R – Right Or Left Handed? Right
S – Siblings? One sister, two brothers, and two more sisters
T – Time You Wake Up? Weekdays 5 AM, weekends whenever
U – Underwear? To paraphrase the Dos Equis guy, “I don’t always wear underwear, but when I do, I prefer boxer briefs.”
V – Vegetable You Dislike? “Sex is good, but not as good as fresh, sweet corn.” — Garrison Keillor. Oh wait, DIS-like? Are yams a vegetable? If not, lima beans or squash.
W – Ways You Run Late? Spending too much time on the Internet
X – X-Rays You’ve Had? Dental, foot, wrist, back, head, finger, blah blah blah…do MRIs count too?
Y – Yummy Food You Make? Bourbon and coke. Is that a food? Sometimes I combine two kinds of cereal and it comes out really good.
Z – Zoo Favorites? Meerkats probably
I’m reading a USC alumni magazine when I notice a mosquito flying around the living room ceiling. So I roll up the magazine, wait for the mosquito to drop down the wall a little bit, and crush it on the first swing.
I tell my son, “I knew my USC education would come in handy.”
A couple of days ago, I saw one of our senior managers walking down the hallway with her hands clasped behind her back.
I’d never seen her do that before — the hands thing, I mean. It gave her a different look — in fact, it gave her a different sort of presence — so I decided to try it myself.
I immediately felt more thoughtful — or at least I felt like I looked more thoughtful — like a professor strolling across the quad.
Today I was doing it again when I happened to meet up with the woman I copied it from.
I told her I was trying to emulate her hands-behind-the-back leadership technique.
She said the only reason she’d been doing that is her shoulders were sore from Pilates class and she was trying to stretch them out . . .
It seems we’ve hired on a passive-aggressive cleaning crew at the office . . .
Every morning this week, I’ve come in and my wastebasket is under the desk in front of my chair, instead of under the desk to my right where I always keep it.
I appreciate that they empty it before moving it, but where am I supposed to put my legs if there’s a wastebasket right in front of my chair?
This cat now has almost half a million followers on Twitter. Including me. What can I say, he’s a funny cat . . .
London’s Evening Standard from 1966: “Three girls, one of them named Twyla Tharp, appeared at the Albert Hall last evening and threatened to do the same tonight.” So what? Thirty-seven years later I’m still here.
I was at Borders over the weekend and found the Twyla Tharp book. I wasn’t looking for it. It was on the Software Development shelf. It shouldn’t have been there but it was, so I felt that it was my destiny to buy it and read it.
It was meant to be . . .
My son’s roller hockey team is going to Toronto in July for NARCh. We’re batting around fundraising ideas to help defray the cost of the trip.
How about an old-fashioned kissing booth? Kiss a hockey mom for $10!
Or a pie toss! Throw a pie in the face of a hockey mom for $10!
Better yet — dealer’s choice! Kiss a hockey mom or throw a pie in her face — $10. And we’ll throw in a package deal: A kiss and a pie — in either order! — for only $15!
Surprisingly, only one of the moms thinks this is a good idea . . .
I’m driving my son to hockey practice . . . at Barranca and Culver, an Asian kid is holding a sign with an arrow and something written in Chinese. Or Korean maybe.
“Wow,” I say, “that is racist. I’m being totally excluded from the activity, whatever it is. If he had a sign saying ‘No Whites Allowed,’ it couldn’t be any more racist.”
“Maybe that’s what it says,” my son suggests.
“Good point.”
Do not do what someone else could do as well as you. Do not say, do not write what someone else could say, could write as well as you. Care for nothing in yourself but what you feel exists nowhere else. And, out of yourself create, impatiently or patiently, the most irreplaceable of beings.
