SATURDAY NIGHT TUNEAGE

And with a local angle, too! Rhinebeck's own Marshall Crenshaw:

ANOTHER PERFECT DAY

Noodle loses her first tooth, as noted earlier:

That will be the cover of Noodle's first solo album, Fathe Value.

After that blessed dental event it was rather quickly downhill.

(Update: things as described below were not quite as lurid as had originally been perceived, thus the edit.)

Wife loses her first car - hooray for Route 9 traffic lights that operate when malls aren't even open, and double hooray for people who don't know what to do at said lights, especially when an emergency vehicle is trying to get through. Hint: panicked leaping on the brakes and screeching to a halt when everybody else is expecting to slow down and pull over is NOT the move. The oil slick on 9 didn't help matters any. So, bye-bye to Ol' Red. New Red (the minivan) becomes Ol' Red. For reasons known only to them, the rental-car company has provided Her Awesomeness with an enormous truck she needs a step-stool to climb into, and as we speak she's at Ruge's in Rhinebeck lining up a new ride. In the meantime, we're going to use the truck to pick up a few day laborers and threaten to turn them in to La Migra unless they come across with some scratch for Beast's nursery school.

All this leaves me working on the best doggone cobbled-together spaghetti-and-meatball combo you ever did see, but I'm trying to time it out so that it'll still be warm when my beloved comes back home.

Barring a deer jumping out in front of her truck, that is.

Please eat tonight, kids. And no throwing fits at bathtime or bedtime. Daddy's begging. Give us three hours of Stepford-Child behavior and for you, dear children, it's ponies and Camaros and all the Yo Gabba Gabba you can handle.

THEY USED TO SHOOT RATS 'ROUND HERE, SON

I am totally bringing a camera with me next time I take Beast to the Rhinebeck dump.

Transfer station, sorry. Even after all these years I'm not used to bringing my garbage - recyclables, sorry - to someplace that's clean and dry and paved. I grew up on trips to the old town dump next door to the transfer station, where my dad would attempt to get the Ford Fairlane wagon down the rutted dirt one-lane road to the dump, where there'd be fascinatingly colossal piles of reeking garbage on one side, mountains of scrap metal on another, and maybe a small trash fire burning in the back. Everybody take a deeeeep breath now!

Nowadays it's a whole lot neater and cleaner. The regular garbage goes into special bags in one place, the cans and bottles go over yonder, the newspapers and coupons and flyers and such go into this bin...but it's the cardboard that Beast wants to see, because cardboard goes into

THE CRUSHER!



Wrong crusher, obviously, but a worthy excuse for some classic WB. This is the cardboard crusher we're talking about here. Beast helps me toss the cardboard in the collection box, the contents of the box go into the crusher, the man flips the switch and WHOA. WHOA DADDY WHOA WHOA WHOA THAT'S COOL DADDY! WHOA.

Obviously I'm going to have to find some massive construction site for this kid to visit.

ALL ARMS, LEGS REMAIN ATTACHED SO FAR

After this weekend's toil, I strongly believe that there is no more manly yard implement than the wood-chipper. In goes the tree, and after some delighfully loud chomping and grinding out shoots itty bitty pieces of former tree. OM NOM NOM NOM NOM. The kids have been spellbound, especially since they'll have a bit more back yard to play in once my labors are concluded.

Many thanks to Rhinebeck Rentals for helping me have a productive weekend of pure fun.

And so far no ticks have latched on to my flesh, although I do believe that Her Awesomeness will have to check me later this evening after a glass or two of wine.

FLIPPED

Last year my mom sold my childhood home in Rhinebeck, and while I loved growing up there with all the woods out back and so much countryside to explore, mom and dad were clueless on how to maintain it and whatever retro early-60's charm it had either fell apart or was long since painted/carpeted/built over. I barely recognize the place what with the improvements the new owners made. Looks like they added over an acre and a half to the property as well.

Nice.

So I'm buying lottery tickets here and there for as long as the place is on the market, and if I hit big you best stay clear because I'll be exercising my sentimental-doofus clause and buying it back, even if only to rent it to summer folk.

http://www.paularedmond.com/mlsListingDetail.php?MLSNumber=265047&propertyType=r&county

NIGHT NUMBER TEN

This is it. Noodle attempts to go for the big prize by falling asleep by herself for the tenth night.

I missed the success of night nine due to a voice-over seminar at my old high school in Rhinebeck - a place I completely don't recognize since its expansion a few years ago, even though I attended school there for five years and even ran the summertime paint crew for a couple years. The paint jobs are holding up nicely after 22 years, too. I wandered around disoriented like one of the grouchy alte kackers who only sets foot in the school once a year to vote "no" on the school budget. ("I don't have kids in the schools, why should I pay?" To which on the AM station's old talk show I would respond "My dad's dead and never collected a dime from Social Security - where's my 50% payroll tax cut?" Just to rile them and listen to them splutter.)

And then a couple of the friendly students? teachers? pointed me in the right direction.

Bottom line from the seminar: voiceover work is a pretty sweet gig if you can get it, but it takes a lot of hustle to get over that first big hump and my area of expertise doesn't necessarily give me that much of an edge.

(Welcome to my Wall Street Journal forum readers! There are more than one of you, yes?)

WHAT I'VE GOT TO LOOK FORWARD TO IN 12 YEARS OR SO

This is how not to react when you get dumped:

While patrols were en route, police received information it was not a domestic dispute, but a dispute involving the homeowner’s daughter’s ex-boyfriend, who had allegedly forcibly entered the home armed with machete-style knives. When Sheriff’s patrols arrived at the scene, they found the girl’s mother and father suffering knife wounds, as well as the suspect — Nicholas Usuriello, 17, of Clinton Corners. Police said he was still armed with two knives.After a short time, Usuriello was disarmed and taken into custody without further incident. While the investigation is continuing, initial investigation revealed Usuriello had planned the incident, and had entered the home when he was confronted by his ex-girlfriend’s parents, police said. The girl’s father suffered a cut on the head and a severed thumb...

Best wishes to the girl's mom and especially the dad; looks like your daughter turned out to be rather a good judge of character and got out while the gettin' was good. This is the kind of situation I'm going to dread seeing my daughter in once she becomes a teenager, even though we like to think she won't be the type to take any guff from any boy - and on a selfish note, by the time Noodle is 17 I'm not going to be a spring chicken and was pretty well useless in physical confrontations even in my youth. Still, a kick to the groin will always work wonders with a violently intransigent failed suitor.

In the meantime, please - no Pope of Greenwich Village jokes until the dad's recovered.