Graham crackers for the masses!

     I consider myself to be rather tech savvy.  I’m not a computer genius, but I’ve got enough wits about me to figure out most electronic gadgetry thrown my way.  Twenty-seven years ago, however, I was still drooling on myself(more than I do now, at least), and was completely amazed by the structures I could erect by placing one block of wood on top of another.  Fast forward to the present day, I look in the back seat of the car and I see a three year old boy flipping through my iPhone picking out which cartoon he is going to watch on Netflix while we drive.  Take this same device, place it in my hands when I was three and I would think that I’ve got a shiny hammer for hitting my older brother with, or maybe I’ll just chew on it for a while then stick it in my diaper and save it for later.  Not Jordan, he’s back there looking through photo albums, watching videos of his cousins, playing Chop Chop Ninja and texting Aunt Nikki.  Don’t tell Jodi, but I’m pretty sure Jordan is more iPhone savvy than she is.  Thank God that you have to enter in a password in order to purchase anything on iTunes, because Jordan has figured out how to shop for games and songs online too.
     I just had an epiphany!  I’m going to start two businesses.  The first business will be a computer repair shop where people bring me their broken down or virus ridden machines and I’ll send them back good as new.  The second business will be a daycare, which is where I will get the employees for my computer repair business, and the best part, I can pay them in graham crackers!

Mmmmm... Bread Butts!

     All of these LEGO spaceships I’ve had to build lately look like Rainbow Brite vomit.  Our current LEGO collection is very…eclectic.  We don’t have a particular set of LEGOs, just a conglomeration of different shapes, colors and sizes that have been acquired from Grandma and Grandpa Smiths collection.  I’m quite sure that if we were ever engaged in a real space battle with these ships we would win.  Not because our ships are so powerful but because the bad guys would be too busy laughing or just plain dumbfounded at our lack of color coordination.  That’s all that’s really important when it comes to spaceships, color coordination right?  Making sure your wings are some color that isn’t completely and embarrassingly out of season and God forbid you show up to a war in a white spaceship after Labor Day.  Such a fashion faux pas would surely have you blacklisted from all the upper class space battles for the better half of a decade. 

     Jordan doesn’t seem to mind what color the ships are that Jodi and I build.  He shouldn’t; after all, he is the reason they look like confetti.  He picks out all of the pieces of a couple different colors then leaves the leftovers to us.   He then builds something that is completely one color but has no aerodynamics whatsoever and I build something that could probably very smoothly fly a million miles per hour but looks hideous doing it.  I think these LEGOs are setting the theme for the rest of my life.  I’m going to be wearing second hand clothes, driving a beater of a car and eating the butt of the bread for the next 15 years so he can have the best that Jodi and I can offer.  You know what though?  I’m going to love every minute of it.

Beware The Giraffe!

     We are safe in here.  We’ve built this structure to withstand all forms of inclement weather.  Our loyal soldiers protect us on all sides; we have an infinite supply of food…we even have a kitchen sink.  When we get bored we have books to read or we can just sit around and tell stories of the old days.  Unfortunately, we have no indoor plumbing so we’ll occasionally have to venture into the outside world where danger lurks around every corner.  No worries, though, we have our swords and shields… and an Ironman Repulse Blaster?!  Figures, just when I think Jordan is going play fair he Ironman blasts me in the face, and I thought he was on my team.  I guess all is fair in our imaginary world.

     The structure we built is actually a few sheets attached with tape, tacks and clips to the furniture, ceiling and walls.  Not exactly weather proof, it actually breaks about every twenty-seven seconds.  The soldiers that protect us are stuffed animals of various shape and sizes including:  a bear(with one eye, I believe, he’s definitely battle hardened), Goofy, a blue reindeer, an obese horse, Buzz Lightyear, a wingless and toothless dragon, a tiger and a five foot giraffe, who’s legs you must crawl through to enter the fort.  The reason our food supply is infinite is because, well, it’s plastic and you can’t really eat it.  But, on the plus side, we will never run out of ice cream and hidden inside the cone is a reservoir that holds bubble solution.  When Jordan talks about the old days it usually consists of him quoting his favorite lines from his Ironman and Spiderman cartoons.  There also aren’t any corners for danger to lurk behind on the way to the bathroom; it’s about eight feet straight down the hall.  The biggest danger I encounter is my rear end getting stuck in the giraffe’s legs when I’m trying to exit the fort, if I’m not careful the whole structure will come down on top of me.

     We’ve had this fort up for a few days now.  There is something magical about it.  When you are inside of it you can be where ever you want; a desert, a jungle or a spaceship.  The possibilities are only limited by your imagination; luckily, Jordan and I have that in spades.  Maybe you should give it a try, but watch your back; you never know when your partner will turn on you and Ironman blast you in the face.

Vegetable Battlecruiser

     I got beat by a 3 year old in an epic dogfight between two custom made Lego spaceships.  It wasn’t a fair fight, though, and I’ll explain why: 

1.  He is shorter than me, therefore, providing him with a lot more easily accessible areas to escape pursuit.  

2.  He doesn’t understand the laws of physics as I do, so he believes that even though I shot his spaceship multiple times with photon laser cannons, that his ship is undamaged.  He also admits to not having any sort of energy shielding, so by my calculations his ship should have been demolished. 

3.  His feet are smaller and he is not as likely to stub one of his toes and fall to the floor.  But, if he had stubbed his toe and fallen to the floor, I would not have taken advantage of the opportunity to sit on him and break off one of his ships photon cannons. 

4.  I built a new and improved spaceship with high intensity laser beams for point defense, energy shielding with Photon Laser Displacement Technology, cloaking field, and a magnetic accelerator cannon.  Upon seeing my new ship Jordan promptly traded with me.  Grrrrr….

     As you can see, I really had no chance.  It’s time for me to cut my losses and redouble my efforts.  He’ll be napping soon and that gives me two hours to build an invincible machine of mass destruction.  I think I need to run to the store and buy enough Legos to build a ship too big for him to steal from me.  Or, maybe I will just make it out of vegetables, he’ll never touch it then!  Victory is so close I can smell it now, and it smells like…broccoli!

Ninjas? Yes Please!

     When I was younger I was a G.I. Joe, my favorite character to pretend to be was Snake Eyes.   My brothers and I would build a fortress and battle invisible enemies.  We would strategize, plot, plan and build our armory.  A stick could be a sniper rifle, a big stick would be a bazooka, rocks were hand grenades and where we lived we had a limitless supply of all.  We lived on sixty four acres of trees, fields and water, the perfect playground for our imaginations.  Some days we were GI Joes, other days Transformers, or Ninja Turtles, or just ourselves…but with super powers!  I miss those days, the golden years of my childhood.  Anytime I look back on those days I smile and get flooded with the memories:  mud fights, tree forts, bonfires, BB guns, climbing trees, and skipping rocks.  All of these activities were enhanced by our active imaginations.  Were weren’t just throwing mud, we were throwing hot lava;  we weren’t just shooting BB guns, we were saving a village full of people from bandits;  we weren’t just climbing trees; we were climbing mountains to sneak behind enemy lines.  
     The adventures I lived out during these years were a direct reflection of the person I am at my core.  I wanted to be the hero, the good guy, the one everybody looks up to and cheers for.  Now, as a dad, I get to be all these things again.  I get to unleash my inner child!  I get to build a fort, put together a train set, wear a towel as a cape, play with Lego’s again!  Of course, I say that it’s all for the kid, and part of it is, but I have a secret…I’ve really just missed being a ninja.