Week of February 7th, 2014

Not sure what today (Friday, February 7th) is in the whole New Year calendar of events, but they are currently blowing bricks of fireworks off in front of our apartment.  I told the kids the old joke that goes, "If your brains were dynamite, you couldn't blow your nose", and they were stumped by it saying that it didn't make sense as you "blow-up" dynamite.  We went a few laps about how funny that gag is versus how dumb they thought it was.  They even asked their friends at school if it made sense to them and they all said no.  Seriously, I fear for the youth of today.

At least they shot off the fireworks today at 9:30am...last Monday morning, which was a work/school holiday for nearly everybody, the neighborhood store thought it necessary to let off a couple thousand firecrackers at gawdamn 6AM. Such buttholes.  That said, the day of the Seahawk/Niner NFC Championship game, which was a 5:30am kickoff on a Sunday morning, about 20 of us gathered at our friend's Mexican restaurant to eat breakfast burritos, drink beer and cheer on the Seahawks.  A great game it was and we were in full throat, enough so that the neighbors called the cops on us.  While we were proud (and drunk) that we had 5-0 called, it was a bit inconsiderate/douchey of us too. 

As for the Hawks...one of the most interesting teams and great runs ever?  In my experience, for sure.  Preseason favorites rarely live up to expectations.  The cast of characters was across the board but meshed into this lovable highly functional dysfunctional family.  Adversity, injuries, comeback wins, a regional arch rival...all in a city that has been beaten down by crappy teams, national dismissal and hadn't tasted communal joy on this level since 1979.  We watched the parade on Wednesday when 750,000 people came out to throw Skittles at the duck boats carrying the team, and not have one arrest.  While the family felt some regret not being there to explode with the city, we have all been buzzing for days.  I love you Seattle.

So it's been all about the football for the last few days and haven't really noticed much else about what's goin' on around here, other than looking at all these Taiwanese and not understanding why they aren't freaking out too.  I will share a funny (non-football) thing that happened this week, and that was Paul asking me to help him shave.  He's been sprouting a tiny baby moustache, but thought it wasn't ready to go yet.  What I hadn't noticed was him sprouting a patch of long hairs off of his chin and he wanted them gone as they were bugging him.  I'm a little prejudiced...okay, a lot prejudiced...but as a hairy man, have been hoping that he will be able to grow a real beard/have non-scraggly body hair/be a real man, and not get cursed with Asian hairlessness.  I was able to grow a full beard at 16, able to buy booze at a tender young age, and the chicks (some, the right ones of course) dig it.  In my salad days, whenever I had the facial hair going, I used to get more pussy than a North Korean butcher.  However, it is also a curse, having 5 o'clock shadow at 10AM, copious amounts of back, nose, ear hair, basically appearing to be less evolved.  Guess it is just a basic animal desire to have ones spawn resemble oneself.  Early signs for Paul had been positive...the aforementioned tiny baby mustache, bushy leg hair, etc., but this Sensei Master Pai Mei (from Kill Bill) sprouting has me worried. 

 

Anyway, with a little shaving cream and a couple of gently passes with the Gillette Ultra, we tiptoed across a threshold into manhood.