Dad Brag

I've got a bit of a super-dad complex going today.

1. This morning Pete found two of his trains outside. These particular trains are motorized, and have been sitting outside in the weather for months. Needless to say, they didn't run, regardless of attempted battery replacement. Pete really wanted them to run, so I figured I had nothing to lose by trying to take them apart and clean them out. I took apart most of my toys when I was a kid; most of them were dismantled closer to purchase than my parents probably would have preferred. So, I have a lot of experience with the small electric motors used to power this type of toy. I fondly remember the little gear on the end working particularly well as a GI Joe mangler, once the motor was hooked up to a 9-volt battery. I had big plans to build a life sized robot using these motors.

Anyone who has taken apart their toys knows that the "apart" part is easy. It's the "back together" that never quite works out. Surprisingly, my skills have improved since age 8, and I was able to get both trains apart, cleaned, WD-40'd, and back together in working order. Flush from my success, I even souped one of them up, rigging it up to the trusty old 9-volt instead of the AA. Pete played with them the rest of the day, and I felt like a king. He calls the souped-up version "super-fast train".

2. Right now, I'm home with Pete while Heather and Nora are attending a dinner show event sponsored by her workplace. It was going to be steak and drinks, and cowboy music, which I've heard is shockingly entertaining.

Pete and I have to stay home because he's contracted a bit of a stomach bug, and really isn't in going-out shape. This afternoon, it became clear that it was not a minor issue when he went in his sleep and suddenly, everything within a 15 foot radius had poop on it. I literally did a crapload of laundry.

There's nothing more embarrassing than having your kid exhibit his explosive diarrhea in the middle of that song about the fiddle and the devil (fire on moutain, run boy run...), so he and I are sitting at home, watching "Finding Nemo", and baking a frozen pizza, and it's grand.