3 Reasons I May Lose My Man Card

Sorry guys.
Based on my actions of the past few days, I may be required to turn in my membership card to the "man" club. I hate to admit these things, but the bible says we should confess our sins to one another. So with a humble heart, I submit these and am willing to endure the repercussions.

1) I recently started checking out a website/app called Get Glue. Basically you "check in" and log what you're watching, reading, listening to, etc. Through it you can get discounts and coupons and free stickers once a month. I don't care about stickers. But the coupons and discounts, I'm a fan of..
I guess my first confession is that I watch Glee. I'd rather call it "The Sue Sylvester Show". But some of the singing ain't bad either. But worse than watching Glee, I "checked in" that I watched Glee. The pic below shows what posted on Twitter and Facebook without me knowing. So, I encourage everyone to be careful what you allow apps to post about you. Am I unicorn? Hmm?

2) I have a bunch of songs on my iPhone.
4,278 to be exact. Most are from CD's I own. But a few I got because someone loaded them onto the network at church and somehow they transferred into my iTunes file.
Today, while at work listening to songs in shuffle mode, a song by the Jonas Brothers came on. My first concern was why was a Jones Bros song on my iPhone? So that is my confession. I have a Jonas Brothers song on my iPhone. It's not there on purpose, but it is there.
But one even more interesting questions is why did iTunes pic the below pic as the album cover?!?

On a related note..."Umm Bop" by Hanson is on my playlist on purpose. (Wow the confessions are really flowing now.)


3) I recently went into Hobby Lobby, by myself, and bought supplies for embroidering. I've only felt less masculine when I've gone into Walmart to buy feminine products for my wife.

I know these are pretty rough offenses against my manliness.
All I have to offer to make up for it is a little advice:
Guys, if you're ever having to buy feminine products, be sure to add other items. Even if you don't need anything else, grab something, anything. My "go to" items are magazines and gum. Because nothing says "I am a real man" to a cashier more than a guy who has clearly bought items as if he's going home to chew gum, read, and menstruate.

Testing The Blogger App

Today Google announced the new iPhone app for Blogger. So I had to try it.
I'm on my lunch break, sitting in a fast-food parking lot with the windows rolled down, (Thank you, Lord, for this glorious weather.) writing this blog entry on my phone. There's been plenty of ways to do this before, but I'm hoping this app will reduce some of the problems I've had with those other ways.
So today I don't have much to say. Just testing out this new app. Just so you have something to see, here's a couple pics of my cool kids from our recent trip to the gulf.

What apps are you loving right now?

The Adventures of "That Guy" - Days 4, 5 & 6

Today is Thursday August 4th.
I am just now sitting to blog about my 4th day of vacation which actually was 11 days ago.
I guess this series has gone on long enough, so today I am finally wrapping up these tales by combining some of the highlights of our last few days...



Not us. Just an image borrowed from Google.

 1.) The Boat (first attempt)
Day 4 we went to Shipwreck Island water park (in spite of my tailbone injury.)
If you've never been to a water park, just imagine an amusement park with a lot more sunscreen and a lot less clothing. Our day started in line for a boat ride. The basic idea is that you walk up a bunch of stairs, then get in a big inflatable boat with up to 3 friends and ride together down a waterslide while laughing all the way.  At first, both boys were excited about riding, but then as we got higher up the stairs, Gavin decided he wasn't interested anymore. Unfortunately, he backed out and Kristi had to take him  back down in tears. Poor guy.

2.) Name Tags
After that, Ethan and I rode down and then tried to find Kristi and Gavin again.
While we were looking for them, I heard a very memorable speech from a father to his 4yr old daughter.
Apparently she had gotten out of his sight and he very loudly gave her this speech....
"Do you know what a pedophile looks like?!? Well, neither do I! Pedohiles don't wear name tags!!!"
Did I mention she's 4?
"That fence is not very high! It's the perfect height for someone to jump over, grab you up, jump back over, and throw you in a trunk so I'll never see you again!!"
At this point I heard this little girl say something that sounded like "squeak, squeak, squeak." That's what little crying girls sound like sometimes. I'm not sure exactly what she said but her dad responded even louder than before with..."I don't care if you were with your cousin Madison right over there!! I didn't know where you were and I'm the one that matters!"
At this point I'd heard enough and walked off imagining the trouble that this little girl is going to get into in her teens as she rebels from anything her father wants her to do.

3.) A little freaked out
We finally found Kristi and Gavin and our splashing and sliding continued all day. At another point we got separated again and while we were apart Gavin decided he was ready to ride that boat ride he'd attempted earlier in the day. So Kristi and Gavin rode and he loved it. When I saw him again he was so excited. He wanted me to ride it with him. We began the climb up the stairs talking and laughing. As we got closer to the top, he got quiet. He was looking down towards the ground. Apparently, Gavin is afraid of heights. That's why he'd backed out the first time. He looked up at me and with that sweet little voice said "Daddy, this is where I get a wittle fweaked out." I had a sudden urge to laugh at that phrase and to take care of my son. I picked him up quickly and pointed his attention to the top of the stairs and how close we were to riding. Once his focus was shifted, he was fine. But I'll never forget him saying that phrase to me.
It was a great day.

4.) And...
As with any trip, there is a phrase that managed to creep up over and over and brought laughs almost every time. Our running joke this trip was the word "And". Apparently "And" is a perfect way to start the song  "O Holy Night".

Seriously.

You see, repeatedly, my sons wanted to hear the song "O Holy Night." They recently discovered Eric Cartman's version from South Park on my iPhone. I'm not sure where I got this MP3 from, but I have to admit, I make sure to play it at least once every Christmas just for a laugh. We listened to it so much, all I have to do now is say "And..." in my best Cartman voice and the boys will jump in with their best impression of Cartman singing. I know this isn't the best thing in the world to expose my boys to. (I make sure to edit out the inappropriate word towards the end.) but you gotta admit, this is pretty funny.

Parents may want to mute at the 1:46 mark for 2 seconds.



Our trip was full of fun and laughs. These have been just a few of our fun stories. There's no way you've enjoyed them as much as we did.

The Adventures of "That Guy" - Day 3

Ok, I know. Day 3 of my vacation was 5 days ago.
But I know you're just dying to hear about the rest of the trip, so I figured I should finish telling these tales.

And this one is one of the more memorable tales from our trip.

In life, every man faces challenges.
When given the opportunity, are you going to try to ride a bull named "Fu Man Chu"?
When standing at the top of a cliff over a body of water, are you going to have the guts to dive?
And when you face a water slide a grand as this one, are you going to have what it takes to give it a shot?

Quite a scary slide, I know.

One of the things I love about being a father is playing the role of Superdad. Some dads may be the type that would sit by the pool reading a book and say "You boys go play. Have fun." I'm not that guy. I try to play with them as much as possible. I try to introduce new games or fun ideas to them. This year one of my bright ideas was to play with them in the kiddie waterpark. There was a sign that said "You must be under 14 to play in the water park." but there was also a sign that said this...

Is that last line not common knowledge?

so I didn't really trust their judgement in what signs they posted.and chose to ignore their age limit advice.

The waterpark was like a splashpad with a couple of slides. I slid down the red slide beside Ethan, racing him to the bottom. Of course I left him in my dust. He didn't have a chance of winning against my speed and agility.

Ethan enjoying the red slide.

But things didn't go quite as smooth when I followed him down the blue tube slide. As every good slider knows, you can't just sit and push yourself down. If you want to reach maximum sliding velocity you have to grab the bar above the slide and swing yourself down the slide helping you gain momentum before you even hit the slide. Knowing all these great tips, I grabbed the bar.... felt the sea breeze blowing lightly across my face.....pushed back on my heels, ready to charge into the tube slide...lifted my feet and used every bit of upper body strength I have to force myself into a fast swing into the tube....saw the top of the tunnel and realized I might crash my head into it and slightly lowered my body to avoid such a collision.... then the tradgedy happened. I felt a shocking thud as my tailbone crashed into the bottom of the slide. Somehow I had overcompensated trying to miss the top of the tube and instead used all my strength to force myself down onto my tailbone instead of into the slide.
It was painful to say the least.
As I slid down the slide in a semi-fetal position, I knew the pain I was feeling wasn't going to go away quickly.
I was right.

I have either bruised or broken my tailbone. As I write this, now 5 days later I am still hurting. I feel fine standing or seated, but moving from one position to the other is not fun.

Thankfully, this injury didn't ruin the trip
It did make me uncomfortable at times and I quickly became the butt of every joke (pun intended), but mostly It just gave me yet another reason to laugh at myself.

The Adventures of "That Guy" - Day 2

Well, the adventures continue.
Friday was great here in Panama City with the family.

Lots of time was spent playing, laughing, and eating.
Here are some of the more interesting details...

Friday...
1. Lights On
We didn't get the boys in bed until after midnight Thursday night. So when I woke up at 8:45 Friday morning, I wasn't all that surprised to find that everyone was still asleep. But just the fact that both our boys slept past 8am is a first. I'm looking forward to the day when they both decide that "sleeping in" is a good idea.

2. Gavin's Attention Span
We knew when we arrived that Gavin doesn't have a very long attention span. But we were reminded of this fact quickly when  we started our water fun for the day. The condos we're staying in have 3 pools, a lazy river, a small water park area for the kids, and of course beach access. We never really planted ourselves at any one of them because Gavin (or Ethan) would say "Let's go to the lazy river" then 5 minutes later, "lets go to the pool". There were times it felt like we were traveling between areas more than enjoying the areas themselves. But the boys we're happy. So we were too.

3. The Lazy River
When we first got in the lazy river we were just chillin', letting the current carry us around as we floated. Then I heard someone say "Shawn Stinson!". To my surprise, I turned to see a friend from high school, Matt Hardemon, floating by. It was good to see him and talk for a little while. There is some commentary that could be made about the fact that we ran into each other in the "lazy" river. But I'll just leave that alone.

4. Pea Soup
Unfortunately, the ocean looks like this, minus the leaf.

The ocean is full of what they call "june grass". We call it algae, seaweed, and grossness. So our ocean swimming has been very limited. But it hasn't stopped our fun.

5. Captain Anderson's

I could say a lot about this restaurant. It is easily my absolute favorite restaurant anywhere, ever, period.
The waitress did steal some of our joy when she said "I'm sorry, but we're out of crab claws." (You should have seen the sad look on Ethan's face. Pitiful, just pitiful.) But we survived. We're going back Monday night , so we're hoping by then they've found more crabs whose claws we can devour.


Well, that's it for now. My tailbone is hurting as I sit here typing.
I'll tell you why when I post again tonight about our adventures from Day 3.