Da Youngsters

Let's preface this post with, 'I love my kids.'  There, now I can talk about anything I want with impunity; free from any quick intakes of breath (GASP) or accusations of terrible parenting.

One of the funniest thing about parenthood is that unless you are the older sibling in a large family or worked with kids your whole life NOTHING PREPARES YOU FOR IT!!  No one takes you aside when your wife is pregnant and says, 'Hey listen, this raisin' kids business is really flippin' hard and you will start aging in dog years about 15 seconds after your first kid is born.  You know that life thing you have now?  It's gone.  Say goodbye to your friends and disposable income for the next two decades.  Having sex?  HA!  Don't even think about it.  You are now a slave to miniature humans! '

Maybe it's our displaced family lifestyle now or many of our parents are from the 'didn't talk about it much' generation but damn, raising a family has got to be the craziest on-the-job training known to mankind.  I'm sure I could wear my fingers to the nub going on about the highs and lows of being a parent but maybe I'll cover a few things that might have been worth knowing 'BC.'  That means, 'Before Children.'

-Where you aware that getting out of the house is probably a 3 hour ordeal, all told?  I used to be able to grab my stuff and split at a moments notice, now I have to get up at 6am to get me and two kids out of the house before 10.  Who knew putting on shoes would be such a major point of conversation?  This could have been useful knowledge.

-Cooking is one of my joys in life, but did you know it could actually be done semi-successfully with one arm?  I might have called bullshit on that one but I surprised myself here.

-Did you know when baby girls poop, it goes straight up their vaginas?  I couldn't have imagined this fact back when I frequently fantasized about the female's anatomy 'BC.'  It's like some indomitable law of physics or something.  A girl poops, and then it goes up their vagina.  A really big drawback to having a daughter with a big appetite is that I get to relive this fact over and over and over again.  Maybe if someone filled me in on this ahead of time I'd would have been prepared to see this body part defaced on a daily basis.

-I wasn't aware that furniture isn't just a place to sit, it is now just a fort waiting to happen.  If a couch had feelings, it would just be biding it's time before our son appeared and stripped it of it's cushions and transformed it into something much cooler.  I'm sure the couch would be okay with that unless it was an uppity couch.  No one told me!

Oh man, I've gotta stop before this can of worms gets out of hand.  Kids are crazy; they're all weird and funny and grumpy and silly and stoic and snuggly and pouty and etc etc etc.  It's nuts.  Kids, wha?

But talk about unconditional love though, hey?  Amazing.  I love my kids.

G...

Mornings

I've been a morning person for most of my life and being a firefighter  definitely helped develop that side of me.  For a while there I wasn't getting to bed early enough so I'd try to 'sleep in' until 7 but that just wasn't working.  I like to get up around 6, which gives me an hour to myself and to get ready for the day.  Sleep is so important, which is why babies do so much of it.  I bet we could blame lack of sleep on a vast amount of health issues prevalent these days.

Today is going to be unique and busy because Brogan has two separate appointments with specialists in different parts of the city.  Thursdays are usually a quieter day with the kids going to the day home but that ain't happening so I have to get the me time in now because that's pretty much all I'll get today.  Deeeeep breath.  The madness begins in about 14 minutes...

In Hiding

So Brogan is at the stage where he's really into 'games.'  He just comes up with these wacky ideas and they become games and we try to play along the best we can.  He's hilarious.  One actual game he's exceptionally bad at is hide-and-go-seek.  I own him at this game.  When I count he runs behind the comfy chair and hides there every flippin' time.  I have to act like I'm searching high and low for him while he giggles maniacally in his hiding place.  I'm pretty sure he's worn a hole into the floor from crouching there for so long.

Not to toot my own horn, but I'm awesome at hide-and-go-seek.  I had a hiding spot growing up that literally no one found me in from like 1982 to maybe the early 90's.  I spent so much time camped out in that spot I could have written novels or invented the internet while hanging out in there.  It occurred to me maybe my fellow hide-and-go-seekers thought I was an asshole and just let me rot there but it was usually my younger siblings so I've since ruled out that thought.  It just may have been the best hiding spot of all times.

Regardless, when it's my turn to count he tries to tell me where to hide (behind the chair, huge shocker) and I have none of this so I go try to hide in the most creative but mildly obvious place.  I'm pretty sure I could just stand behind him while he looks for me and he'd eventually have to give up because either it's bed time or the next Rapture is coming.  So today I hide behind his chalkboard easel and of course this stumps him, even with mommy's help.  He's standing right there, he can practically feel the heat of my breath on his neck, and he still can't see me.  This must be a 4-year-old thing, at least I hope it is because if he was an animal in the wild he'd be eaten in like 0.3 seconds.

Anyways, can you guess what my next move is?  I shoot my hand out to grab him, scream bloody murder and I scare the living bejesus out of him.  I've always loved to jump out and scare people.  I used to wait outside our bathroom back home until my brother came out and I'd scream so loud I swear to god he'd piss himself even though that was his whole reason for being in there in the first place.  So Brogan jumps out of his skin and collapses on the floor like a fainting goat and Amy and I just start crying with laughter.  I haven't gotten someone like that in ages and man it felt good.  I'm pretty sure it won't be the last time...

Happy hiding,

G

miTunes

After a semi-hectic morning Maisie and I are hanging out while Amy brings Brogan to pre-school and helps out with a pumpkin hunt with the kiddies.  I'm enjoying a cup of coffee, Maisie is playing nicely and we're listening to the Chili Peppers new album.  I love the Peppers, I've loved them since Blood Sugar Sex Magic (not an impressive stat) but there's something about their music that just resonates with my very soul.  Music is so primal and powerful for me; it just takes me away, sets my moods, fills in the blanks, and inspires me.

I'm a musician at heart but I never had the work ethic to pursue it.  It takes a lot of courage to do that; the willingness to go without, to hear 'no' so many times you grow immune to it, to believe so much in yourself that you won't be denied.  I listen to Calgary's 90.9FM every day  (CJSW, U of C's student-run station) and I hear so much new music that I'm constantly experiencing different things you'd never hear on stale corporate radio.  The music on CJSW is dominated by the obscure, unknown brave musicians that may have not made it and may never will but have the courage to chase that dream.  Brogan has more musical talent in his pinkie finger than most people have in their whole body; I know that if he chooses to go into music that I will support him as much as humanly possible, if that is what he wants.

I effing love music.  Love it.

Man I love cashews.

Man I love cashews, it could be a problem.  I get a big bulk bag of them from Planet Organic and I eat them by the handful as a snack around 8 at night.  Occasionally I'll get them roasted and salted for a treat and I can eat waaaay more than should be humanly possible.  I'm pretty sure I'll develop a food sensitivity to them but I don't think I care, they just taste so good.  Anyone else like cashews as much as me.  They're not really nuts, you know!

I'M BACK!

Good lord, I guess it's time to try this again.  I think since I first tried I wasn't 'into it' enough to keep it going.  Lots has changed since 2009; we've got a little girl named Maisie (who is now almost 18 months old), Brogan is in his second year of pre-school, I've retired from CrossFit and I'm pretty sure I've aged about 10 years overall.

Everyone and their dog has a blog now, which is possibly why I lost interest, but I can see it's validity as a means to reach out to anyone and everyone.  Peoples lives are different now, it's hard to maintain relationships because we're all so bloody busy.  Maybe a blog makes it easier to talk about things and communicate what you're feeling without having to take full responsibility for the outcome.

I intend to post more often now about anything on my mind.  I suspect I'm going to rant about what's going on around me or in the world.  I piss and moan a lot and I'm pretty sure the people around me have heard me piss and moan enough so now I can continue to do that without feeling like the people that are 'listening' aren't rolling their eyes and saying something like, 'there goes Aucoin, pissin' and moanin' about stuff again.'  Now if they miss my pissing and moaning they can read it!

So that's it, I'm back.  I think I'd like to call this a 'blag' rather than a 'blog.'  It seems to fit into my Newfie roots a little better.  Blag, I likes dat.

Smell ya later.

G

Nothing to say

Well the grounds crew for my condo complex is outside blowing and raking up leaves and all I can think is, 'WHY?' It's fall and it's windy out, unless you sweep up all the leaves in a 10 mile square radius your work is all for naught. I mean, the place is going to be covered in leaves mere minutes after they leave. Why not plant some bushes or hedges that don't look like rejects from a haunted house yard or re-plant some grass? I don't get it.

It's October 16th and I don't have a lot to say. My workout today was a bit of a bummer but the sun is shining and I have an amazing wife and son to keep me happy. Life is good.