The real meaning of NoShavember

Thirty days had NoShavember.  I made it through eleven.  It just got too itchy. (That's what she said?)

There shall be no pictures because, well, that would only serve to embarrass myself, as well as possibly some of my family.  Also, I did not take any.  That's a lie.  I took a couple, but the hair wasn't showing up to my satisfaction, so I deleted them.  Must've been bad lighting.

However, the entire experience has given me a new-found respect for the guys in ZZ Top, Duck Dynasty, and my uncle Carl.

I saw that many of the people participating in NoShavember were doing so to raise awareness for some charity or cause.  This sounded like an excellent idea.  So I dedicated my NoShavember to raising awareness of my own laziness, which was, ironically, the main reason I was even participating in the first place!

But it wasn't the only reason.

Once in a while a guy just needs to grow some hair on his face.  Amiright, guys?  Just to prove he can, or maybe for no reason at all. 

You see, those fertile facial fields are the last bastion of male expression and self-experimentation.  Sure, we still have the toilet, but no one gets to see what we do in there.  (FYI, it's mostly reading and pondering our how our life turned out like this.  Maybe an occasional nap.)

These little beard and moustache excursions?  This is all we have. 

We understand women are ultimately going to get their way in pretty much every other decision.  (I'm sorry my future son that I hope to have, if you're reading this, but it's true.)  We know your little ploys.  We know you got rid of our favorite shirt from 1987 and then pretended to be all dismayed and you "don't know WHAT could have possibly happened to it."

But somewhere along the way, a deal must have been struck, perhaps a line drawn.   Men said, "Enough!" 

You can put your frilly rugs and decorative lamps and froufrou throw pillows all over the house.  You can throw away our twenty-year-old clothes when we're at work.  You can even force us to begrudgingly pose for pictures and post them to your precious Facebook wall.  But this -- *admiringly rubbing my chin* -- this is where it ends.

So next time you see a guy sporting facial hair, no matter how hideous or 1970's-porn-star-ish it may be -- and it will be -- perhaps you'll have a little more compassion, maybe even a modicum of respect for those amber waves of keratin. 

Remember, he's just exercising his right to be a man.  In the only way that he knows.  The only way that he has.  Putting his manhood on display for all the world to see.

"They come runnin' just as fast as they can / 'Cause every girl crazy 'bout a sharp-dressed man..."

Kids, it's not that difficult

As my blog has evolved, I have gone from posting at near Twitter-speed anytime a thought wafted through my mind, to posting a day or two after an event happened, and now to this.  "This" being some sort of massive blog slowdown wherein I am just now getting around to blogging about Nephew Bone's birthday party.  Which took place in August.  Of 2012.

OK, 2013.  But still.

Is evolved the right word?

Devolved?  Decomposed?

Nephew Bone turned five this year.  Ah, five...  I don't actually remember much about being five.  I think that may have been the year I got my Starsky & Hutch matchbox car.  Nephew Bone had a Duck Dynasty party.

Boy, this post really isn't going anywhere.  I think I will instead make this a general info post on how to throw a proper birthday party for a child under seven.  Yes, that's what I shall do.  I decided that just now, on the fly.

Bone: Making virtually every life decision on the fly since 1980-something.  This explains oh so much.

I know what you're thinking: Bone, you don't even have any kids that we know of.  How would you know anything about throwing a birthday party for one?

Exhibit A: I, Bone, have attended somewhere around EIGHT of these little germ fests over the past five years, so... yeah.

Exhibit B: One of my sister's favorite sayings is "I can't wait 'til you have kids."  I can only take this to mean she knows what an excellent rearer of children I will be and she is anxiously awaiting it, probably in much the same way Houdini's sister anxiously awaited his escape the first time she buried him alive.

(I also wrote a post several years ago wherein I may have poked a little fun at the time-out method of discipline and a couple of people took it to mean I was advocating spanking children.  Yeah, that cost me about half my readers at that time, so I no longer include it on my parenting resume.  I was even reprimanded by the World Order of Mommy Bloggers, aka WOMB.  Ironically, my punishment wound up being, you guessed it, a 15-minute time-out.  Oh well, live and learn.  Or, in my case, just live.  Not all of this paragraph is factual, but probably more than you think.)

Now that we've established my credentials, let's get this party started... in a manner of speaking.

The first thing you're gonna want to do is minimize the number of kids you invite to this party.  This is because of Bone's Theorem of Kids and Fun, which states:  The number of kids at the party is inversely proportional to the amount of fun your child's "adult" friends will have at said party.  And really, what's more important than that?

Chances are your child isn't going to remember this party anyway.  I mean, how many of your birthday parties before the age of seven do you remember?  And besides, are these really your child's friends?  Or are they, more likely, children of your friends whom you have forced upon your child in some sort of medieval-esque arranged friendship.  Hmm?

Mmhmm, stepping on some toes now, am I?

Now personally, I prefer a 1:1 child-to-parent ratio.  I wouldn't go any higher than 2:1.  If someone shows up with more than two kids, I recommend scolding their child in front of them.  It has been my experience that they will leave fairly soon after that.

The second ingredient for a successful children's party is renting one of those cool, inflatable water slides.  Nephew Bone had one of these at his party.  Actually, he's had an inflatable slide at two of his parties, and those were two of the funnest days of my admittedly not-all-that-exciting life.

Going down an inflatable water slide at 40-years-old dressed as Uncle Si from Duck Dynasty... I'm just not sure where else my life has to go after that.

Now, there is one danger of which you should be aware with these inflatable slides.  Inevitably, one of the smaller kids winds up getting hurt by one of the bigger kids and starts crying.  This also happened at Nephew Bone's party.  And no, the "bigger kid" in this instance wasn't me, thankyouverymuch.

Although I did make two kids cry on the trampoline.

But it's not my fault!  I have to do my high jumps!  It's family tradition.

And that's it.  Two simple steps to hosting a successful kids birthday party, from a guy who's never even hosted one. 

If I could proffer one final piece of advice, it would be this:  No one's perfect.  Actually, that's not really advice, is it?

Hmph.  Let's try something else.

Kids are a crapshoot.  We're all gonna make mistakes.  (Well, you're gonna make mistakes. As stated earlier I've not had kids yet, so...)  They're resilient.  They'll adjust.

And if they question you, respond as my Dad always did to me: "Because I said so."  (Bonus side note:  This works OK with kids.  Not as well with girls you may be dating.)

Besides, your kids have most likely figured out by now that you control the flow of Goldfish and juice in the household.  And once that pecking order has been established, what could go possibly go wrong?  And if they're still getting on your nerves, just send them up to bed early.  Problem solved.

Wow, if I already have this much knowledge about kids, once I get a couple years of actual experience, I'm gonna be a scary good parent.

No wonder my sister can't wait.

"Do you think for one minute that this is it / Your party is bogus, yo, it ain't legit / You better put on the Hammer and you will be rewarded / My beat is ever boomin' and you know I get it started..."