Damn, I’m old. And I feel every bit of my 29 years. Or was it 39? Oh, no… it’s more than that. But I’m still pretty!

A lot has been going on. I’m about to make my annual trip back to Los Angeles. I’m flying out on Tuesday for work and our holiday party. It’s going to be a busy week as I catch up with my co-workers (some who I’ve never even met yet!) and with my old L.A. friends.

On Monday morning, my youngest (who just turned 2), hit another milestone. I got her out of bed to take her to daycare and noticed her diaper was completely dry. It’s something she does quite often so I took her into her bathroom and put her on her training potty. She sat there for a few minutes and finally she let it all come out. And there was a lot. The look of surprise on her face was priceless - her mouth was a big O and her eyes were as wide as they could be.

But, being the idiot I am, I couldn’t have let this perfect moment go by without screwing something up. I pulled the top off the training potty to dump it in the toilet. With my other hand, I put up the toilet seat… but didn’t put it up all the way. When I went to dump it, the toilet seat came crashing back down. It slapped the training potty and splashed pee all over the poor child and the bathroom floor.

She looked at me the way my wife’s mother used to look at me. The “stink eye.” The kind of look that burns a hole in your soul. I quickly dunked her in the bath and scrambled to get the floor cleaned up before all that pee sunk into the floor tiles. My fear is that she’ll think that every time you have to take a piss, you need to dump it on yourself and then take a bath…

And now for something completely different…
In time for the holidays, I managed to get my Christmas lights up this past weekend. This was my first time - ever - to hang lights on a two-story house.

I pulled out my four-hundred pound ladder and dragged it over to the side of our house. I managed to get into quite a groove and got the side of the house done. But I was really worried about hanging the lights up on the front, where the roof goes up to its highest peak.

I knew the ladder was shorter than this peak, but I’m also 6′3″ with really long oranguatan arms and knew I could reach. But it meant putting the ladder up as far as it would go. And I was worried.

You see, I’m every bit of 260 pounds so I had to buy a special “husky boy” ladder that would hold up to 300 lbs. But I didn’t really trust extending it all the way out and climbing up on it. I was quite sure it would snap in half when I got all the way up. But being the stubborn old mule that I am, I powered through.

I went up very slowly. Very. And still the thing bounced like a kids jumper at a birthday party.

Stretching out, I got the Christmas lights onto the peak and carefully climbed down. I had done it! I didn’t fall! I didn’t die in a freak “husky boy” ladder incident that would have surely been on the evening news! (I had told my wife to sue the ladder manufacturer had such an incident occurred…)

But when I got down, I had still had a problem. The ladder was extended beyond my reach and it was going to be impossible to get it back down to earth… So, being the idiot that I am, I tried anyway.

I started to pull the ladder away from the house, rung by rung, hoping to be able to strong-arm it back down to the ground. But once it was over my head, I quickly realized I was over my head. It swayed and bucked and then pulled up some grass and finally… it toppled over.

Onto me.

All four hundred pounds of “husky boy” ladder fell on my face.

I’m quite sure every one of my neighbors were home and saw this comical catastrophe. But none came out to help. For fear of me being too embarrassed and losing even more face. Literally. But I’m okay. I’m a stubborn old mule. Besides, it only hurts when I breathe…

Happy Holidays!