SMELLS LIKE 1985 IN HERE

Just made the mistake of using some hand lotion a previous reporter left behind who knows how long ago. Hemp hand lotion. It smells...hempy, but not in a good way. Smells like my college dorm roommate's mattress did after the guy down the hall spilled bongwater on it.

Protip for moisturizer marketers: skip the 50-dollar-a-tube metrosexual stuff and come up with lotions for men that smell like motor oil, sawdust or tobacco and maybe you'll have something.

DISHWASHER FRUSTRATION

The new machine's in. But ach, the learning curve involved in adapting to the new tine pattern. Complain though I might about the old Kenmore, I was able to fit a typical dinner's worth of beschmutzed plates and such into the dishwasher in such a way that everything would be clean and nicely dry in the morning without having to run the heated-dry cycle. I was able to tilt various cups and glasses just enough so that water would not collect in their recessed bottoms. A thing of beauty, it was.

This new Maytag...hmm. Too many horizontal surfaces, and the tines aren't long enough to place a coffee mug so that it'll tilt like it did in the Kenmore.

Shall I do the non-guy thing and actually read the manual?

IN WHICH YOUR HOST IS EASILY DISTRACTED BY OBSCURE B-SIDES

Oh, my. A learned treatise on one of my favorite songs.

True Love Travels on a Gravel Road.

And the blog from which that comes is just SICK. It's being added to my Tuneage links as we speak.

I'VE GOT A THOUGHT...FORMING IN MY BRAIN

Thanks for the help on the WHUD podcasts...got a couple ideas brewing that I'm going to run by the powers that be for their thoughts. We should be hearing something shortly!

AN ASIDE

This bizarre and tragic episode with poor Natasha Richardson should tell us one thing: do NOT mess around with head injuries, even the ones that appear innocuous enough like hers did at first. And heaven knows kids do go around bonking their heads on things at an alarming rate. Yay. One more thing for mom and dad to freak out about. I'm hoping some reassuring Sanjay Gupta type shows up right quick on TV tomorrow to explain when the head injury can be dealt with at home and when it's time to call 911, because right now dad is about to go buy three thousand dollars' worth of corner padding if he doesn't get some answers.

Your author has firsthand experience, having taken a surprise ambulance ride to Saint Francis a couple years back after fainting at work and smacking my face but good against a doorjamb on my way down. When I came to it looked like all I had was a split lip and broken eyeglasses, but the good people at Saint Francis scanned me nine ways from Sunday just to be sure. They found nothing, which is precisely what my wife expected (baDUMbump / here all week / try the veal).

On the other hand, many years ago I lost a very dear co-worker under similar strange circumstances. He also fainted at work, was sent to the hospital, then sent home...and a few hours later died in his sleep at the age of 24. I do not recall all the details or whether scanning technology was in use locally at the time that might have saved him, but suffice to say that between these two deaths and my own experience the lesson is well and truly sunk in.

GENIUS WANTED

Been racking my brain on what kind of parenting topics would work in a potential WHUD podcast. Your ideas, as always, are welcome!

FROM THE "WHY BOTHER?" DEPARTMENT

Playing outside with the kids this afternoon, I dutifully told them NOT to play in the mud since they didn't have their mud-boots on. I'm pretty sure that no child on the face of this planet has ever obeyed that instruction.

IN WHICH WE DISCOVER ELMO IS A KILLER STRAIGHT MAN

Ricky's got a point. Why does Elmo wear pajamas when he's going to sleep but go naked the rest of the time?

IN WHICH MY LITTLE GIRL CALLS SHENANIGANS

So I'm reading "Little Red Riding Hood" to Noodle this evening, and it crosses her mind that the Big Bad Wolf could have dispensed with the pleasantries in the forest and simply eaten Little Red the moment he laid eyes on her. But instead he hauls it over to grandma's place and eats her? Without even marinating the old bird?! Philistine. And thus did we get these words of wisdom from my daughter:

I'm much yummier than an old lady.

Girl's got a point, one must admit.

THAT'S RIGHT (UH!) THE WOMAN IS...SMARTER

We both get tired, my wife and I.

She, however, can stop herself before pouring Ovaltine into the coffee machine.

Noodle had herself a midnight hurl last night, and so she has a day with the Memere and the Pepere to be pampered and spoiled and otherwise coddled. The girl is just shy of four feet tall at age five and a half, and the charts say...well, just look for the black dot.

For those who didn't click to enlarge, she's still 97th percentile for height. And 99th percentile for wisenheimery.

DISCONCERTING YET FUNNY VIDEO OF THE DAY

What we have here is a mashup of sorts, involving a British toddler, his baby brother, Eric Roberts and Mickey Rourke. If you haven't seen The Pope of Greenwich Village it'll go over your head, but if you have seen it you may giggle a bit, or a lot. Anyway:

THE BATHROOM CATCH-22

So we didn't get around to cleaning up the kids' bath toys last night, something I didn't notice until I was about to enter the shower for my morning hosing-off. Thought that seeing as my shower happens at 2:45 in the morning, it would be quieter for all concerned if I didn't try moving any toys until after getting into the shower because inevitably I drop something so maybe the shower will cover the noise and...

...okay, Her Awesomeness is out of bed and giving me That Look. So much for my theory. Another fine mess created by yours truly.

PROTIP FOR DADS

If you want to be the coolest dad on the block for one night, learn how to make walrus noises. Don't ask, just do it.