Chewy Goats—Or How to Have a Hilarious Time With Your Kids

My son Jamie got a game called Apples to Apples Jr for his birthday last Friday. This game is so fun to play that our family has played it almost everyday since. Several times a day in fact. It’s as easy as comparing “apples to apples” … just open the box, deal the cards, and you’re ready for instant family fun! Select the red noun card from your hand that you think is most like the adjective green card played by the judge. If the judge picks your card, you win that round. And, everyone gets a chance to be the judge! The more players the better. Some of the combinations that come up kept us laughing for hours on end. Clumsy aliens, smelly teenagers, harmful vanilla pudding, these just had the kids busting up. If you are looking a great family time game this is it. Highly recommended!

Dodger Blues

Jamie and I went into enemy territory today. We suited up in our Angel gear and drove 30 miles north up the 110 fwy to Dodger Stadium. Yes, a freeway series between our first place Angels and the “thankfully the NL West is so weak” Dodgers. I got tickets from a co-worker and they were smack dab in the middle of Dodger season ticket holders. However there were a few us red-clad Angels. Overall the Dodger fans were pretty meek. Especially compared to the Red Sox & Yankee fans that we get at Anaheim Stadium. Though there was one fan who kept screaming, “Dodger Blue!” Unfortunately for him he left a little blue—Angels won!

Never Alone—Song Breaks Through Autism to Help My Son Speak

I have a son, Tommy, who has Autism and up until he was six or so, was not very verbal. Whenever we go someplace in our car we always “have to” play some type of music when Tommy is with us. He insists on it! Autism parents know what I am talking about. While in the car he is always exposed to different types of music. Children songs, classical, Christian, and many others. Well, one day we were driving in our car and listening to Mercyme, one of our favorite Christian bands. Their song “Never Alone” was playing and I was brought out of a daydream by what sounded like an angel.  I heard this sweet voice singing,

Then a voice comes calling out to me
You’re never alone cause I am with you
And I will always be
I will hold you cause you belong to me
You’re never alone cause I’ll be with you
For all eternity

I could not believe what I was hearing. For the first time ever, Tommy was singing!  If you don’t know about autism, it is about being alone in a world of your own. For a boy who could barely say a few words to sing so beautifully, so clearly, I really believe he was feeling the presence of God. I know I was. That it was this particular verse and song, it brought tears to my eyes. It still does.  Any doubts about the power of God instantly ended that day. I am still in awe when I think that it was a song about God always being with you, even inside the world of autism, that the Lord chose to help Tommy reach out to the outside world around him.

Since singing that first song—Tommy’s Song as I call it now—he loves to hear and sing to Christian music, especially Third Day. Which is why I like that band so much.  He can belt out a mean “I Can Feel It” and likes “Creed” very much. Also, we have discovered that Tommy has a knack for music. He taught himself to play chords on our piano and can play some songs just from hearing the music. He also puts words to the actual melodies and beats, which is hard to describe without hearing it. He just hears things much differently then we do.

Tommy can speak today. He still has trouble trying to express himself but he is fully verbal. My wife and I briefly got to meet Bart Millard of Mercy Me at a show at Crossroads Church in Corona, California but we did not have the chance to tell him about Tommy’s singing. Hopefully, somehow, someday both bands will get to know how their music has helped our son to become fully verbal and how much it means to us. Because their music is much more than some words or melody playing. It is God’s work through those He has blessed with the talent to spread His word. I have seen His amazing music work in my life. Tommy’s too.

Install MAC OSX—So Easy Even a Six-Year-Old Can Do It!

The CFO of the company where I work had a Mac that was un-bootable and wanted me to fix it for him. People are always asking me to fix their computers and sometimes I just don’t have the time or frankly just don’t want to. I told the CFO, come on, its so easy to install MAC OSX that my six-year-old son could do it. Resigned to the fact, he is the money guy after all, that I was going to have to fix the computer, I thought “hey why not have Jamie install the software.”

I asked Jamie if he was interested and he was excited to try. Now, you need to know that while Jamie is six, he can read very well and I believed he could understand the instructions. He is exposed to the MAC and PC. Plus, we have a Linux computer (Ubuntu) for the family computer. So this weekend we sat down and attempted to install MAC OSX on a Macbook Pro laptop.

Jamie sat down, with a big wad of Bazooka Bubble Gum, turned on the computer and sure enough it would not boot. So he inserted the operating system disk. The disk was improperly formatted and Jamie speaking about the laptop’s owner said, “He messed up, seriously!”

So Jamie’s first step was to re-format the drive. He carefully read the instructions and completed the task without any assistance from me. Although he did ask why a disk had to be formatted and why there were different ways to format and on, and on. He always asks a lot of questions!

The next step was the OS install itself. The process basically walks you through the steps and Jamie had no problem once again. Well, the one problem he did have is it takes about 45 minutes to load the software so we went outside and hit a few baseballs.

Once installed, Jamie setup the computer login, password, user and left a picture of himself at the login screen. The last step, which I did have to tell him about, was to do the software updates. Again he followed the instructions and did it without a hitch. Overall, it was very easy for Jamie to install the software. I asked him, “How easy was it?” In between chewing his gum and talking he said, “It was super duper easy, that everybody could do it!” Then I asked, “What was the hardest?”. “There wasn’t anything!” he replied. Finally, I asked him, “What do you like better, Windows or MAC? Without hesitation, he said, “I like MAC, but I like Linux better than MAC or Windows!” Ah, that’s my boy!

Music with Meaning

Music has been there for me. In good times and bad, happy times and sad, in youth and as I get older it has provided me so much. Celebration, solace, inspiration, memories of joy and even pain. But mostly, it helps define a particular time or event in my life.

Here’s a rundown of my musical inclinations through out the years. Although I listen to much more than this, these are the ones that influenced me the most. Each with a story of its own in my life. I’ll get to why next time. The one’s in bold are my favorites. What artists, bands or songs have the most meaning in your life?

How to Spend a Weekend

This is how I spent this past weekend. What did you do?

FRIDAY

6pm-9pm
Went to a church meeting. It is a regular meeting for me and lets me wind down after a long week of work.

9:30pm- 12:30am
Entertained my daughter, Kaitie, and her friend during their sleep-over at our house. Watched Shrek, made popcorn, watched them dance to the Shrek ending over and over. Finished the night with scary stories like Bloody Finger, the chasing eye ball, and Once Bitten.

SATURDAY

7:30am-10:00am
Made breakfast for the kids. Made muddy mess in the back yard. Hosed down my six-year-old son from muddy mess in the backyard.

10:30am-2:00pm
Went to the First Annual Long Beach Civil War Reenactment. Took the kids to a Gettysburg reenactment. They actually had a good time. Cannons firing, cavalry, Yanks and Rebs strolling through their camps. Spent some time with “General George Pickett“, before his fateful charge. He told the kids some great history about the war, gave them some Confederate money and homemade ginger snaps. I think the kids learned more from the ten minutes we spent with him then they would have reading a book on the real General. Even so, my son wanted a Union cap so I bought him one.

3:00pm-4:30pm
After taking the kids to McDonalds for a bite to eat and ice cream cones, we went home and I wanted to rest before church. However, my wife told me about this house for sale and that I needed to go see it right now. So I jumped back into my car and saw the house. We put a bid on it.

5:00pm-8:00pm
Went to church with the kids. Met some friends and went to Chic-filet for dinner. My friend’s kids wanted ice cream so we went to Baskin Robbins. It was a lucky day for my kids. Ice cream, twice in one day!

8:30pm-10:30pm
Watched The Incredibles with my son Jamie. For the fifth time.

SUNDAY

9:00am-10:30
Took my son Tommy to his hyperbaric therapy treatment. Sat in the chamber with him. He takes a dvd player with him into it but always wants to play Woody Woodpecker cartoons. Or I should say a Woody Woodpecker cartoon as he plays the same one over and over. I can’t stand Woody Woodpecker.

11:00am-5:00pm
Rushed home and the whole family went to the Talk About Curing Autism annual picnic in Irvine, Ca. We’ve been going for four years now and the kids have a blast. They get to go on rides, jumpers, eat more junk, while my wife gets to explore the booths, talk with other moms. Me, I am a gopher. You know, go for this, go for that. But it is a fun time. Besides, Jenny McCarthy, who is the spokesperson for the organization, was there.

6:00pm-9:00pm
Went to a celebration for our church’s lead pastor at the CSULB Pyramid. He is retiring after 38 years of service to the church. It was a nice night and made all the more pleasant as the kids behaved very nicely. I think they were to tired to cause trouble! Although my one son did like running up and down the stadium stairs. The cake at the end helped too!

10:00pm-
Got the kids to bed. They all passed out within minutes. That never happens. All-in-all it was a fun weekend and I don’t know how I have the energy to write this. Just hope I have enough to get up to go to work tomorrow morning.