I Love Being a Dad

People who know me well know that I do a lot of things... I've always been someone who changes hobbies rather frequently. Throughout my life at one point or another, I've been consumed by basketball, tennis, raquetball, fantasty football, reading, songwriting, practicing guitar, vintage keyboards, selling on ebay, theremins, accordions, baseball cards, girls, PCs, macs, pie making, darts, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, you get the idea.

All that to say, nothing tops being a dad. If you don't know my son Connor, he's completely awesome and we have the best times together. A couple of funny things happened in the past two days I thought I would share.

1) Yesterday I took him to the Fountain City Duck Pond to feed the ducks. We've been many times and it's always a lot of fun... the ducks swim around and swarm to eat the bread we throw in the nasty pond. Anyway, on this day the ducks weren't hungry and we saw four big geese over in a grassy area. I told Connor we should go try to feed them and Connor took off towards them. I think the geese saw this as a threat because one of them went into full on attack mode. It was one of those "I wish I had my video camera" moments... that goose went absolutely berserk on Connor. It started hissing and squawking and charged straight into Connor knocking him to the ground. The goose then started pecking Connor in the stomach... it happened so fast I didn't know whether to laugh or scream. I swung my big garbage bag full of bread around my head slingshot style and slapped the goose gone wild right in the neck. It knocked him down and I was able to scoop Connor up and we ran back to safety. That probably sounds more heroic than it looked... I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to hit the ducks but I'm also pretty sure they're not supposed to eat your children... as Ben would say on Lost "They changed the rules".

Connor was obviously completely freaked out and was crying pretty hard... he threw his bread in the direction of the ducks and screamed "You ducks are mean! I'm not a snack!" Traumatic, but also completely hilarious.

2) Tonight when Connor and I got home from school, Jessica wasn't home yet. I asked Connor what he wanted to do and he said he wanted to play hide and seek. We both hid a couple of times in all the usual places. Most times, on about the 3rd round or so, I try to pick a really good spot he wouldn't think of and then I jump out and scare him. Pretty standard hide-and-seek with a 4 year old technique.

Tonight I decided to hide behind a pile of pillows in the living room and when Connor came around the corner, I jumped out and roared my very best monster roar. I thought that would be pretty funny. Well, Connor's hands immediately went to his bottom and a look of terror broke out on his face. He ran as fast as he could to the bathroom and by the time I got in there he was already on the potty filling it up. His pants were... well, let's just say they're in the washer now. So yes, I quite literally scared the crap out of him.

So yeah... two stories that Connor probably isn't laughing at too much but I just can't help it... both of them were totally hilarious. Like I said... I love being a dad!

(note to Jessica: I also love being a husband!)

Comments

[Betsy]

despite the fact that i'm still mad at you for making me bawl my eyes out, that is really funny. i'm glad you find so much humor in the pain of others....

[Paula]

Does DCS monitor this site? You'd better follow our financial plan-- college fund AND therapy fund. --Paula

[bill]

i also hope peta doesn't monitor this site. i am pretty sure they would not find beating geese with garbage bags to be "ethical treatment".

[Greg]

That goose had it comin!