Your favorite child

I often hear other authors say they couldn't name a favorite among their own books. Why, that would be like picking your favorite child, they say, and we love all our children equally (if for different reasons, perhaps).

I don't believe it. We're all trying to write the book we'd like to read, and some come closer than others to hitting the mark. Every novel is a disappointment in some way. The final product never lives up to the expectations we had when we started. But authors know which ones almost hit the bullseye.

Yes, it's a matter of personal taste. I like a rollicking tale full of laughs. One of my fans regularly urges me to stick with suspense and leave out the (eye roll, sigh) "funny stuff."

I'm happy to name a personal favorite among my 17 novels. It's "Bullets," which came out in 2003 to terrific reviews. It's my Vegas book, featuring a contract killer named Lily, a former homicide cop who's chasing her and a cast of hilarious (if deadly) bad guys. I just read it again, getting it ready for publication on Kindle (only $2.99!), and it still cracks me up.

Also freshly published on Kindle (and coming soon to other formats via Smashwords) is the fifth Bubba Mabry adventure, "Dirty Pool." I enjoyed reading this one again, too. Bubba goes up against his arch-nemesis, Texas private eye William Pool, in a race for a ransom. Fun stuff.

Check 'em out!

I knew it

Scientists find that people who are cheerful and optimistic tend to die younger.

Researchers in the Longevity Project studied 1,500 bright children who were around 10 years old when the study began in 1921. They found, over the subjects' lifetimes, that happy-go-lucky types took more risks with their health, trusting that everything would turn out fine.

Prudent, persistent types tended to live longer and be healthier, the researchers found.

Full story here.

(Thanks to Bill Crider for the link.)

You bet your halibut

Word here in Santa Cruz, CA, is that the halibut migration that results in hauls of the yummy fish has arrived early this year. I'm no fisherman, but this news did remind me of one of my favorite Home Front columns from a few years ago. Read it here.

Re-reading it made me miss my sons. Hope it makes you laugh.

Nest is never quite empty

I was digging around in a file cabinet in my home office when I found a cowboy tucked into one corner of a drawer. He's quite the frontiersman, armed with a rifle, a pistol and a knife, and crouched in a kneeling position perfect for sniping.

Been a long time since our sons -- ages 21 and nearly 19 -- played with little plastic cowboys. Wonder how long that cowboy has been waiting in that drawer for someone to rescue him?

You can't tell it from my stellar cellphone photography, but the cowboy is pretty detailed, with windswept bandana, fringed shirt and the words, on his base, "Made in China."

I'm keeping him on my desk, a reminder that my sons are never as far away as they seem.

Boys will be chefs

Nothing says “Merry Christmas” like a young boy playing with his new train set, his baseball glove and his toy kitchen.

That’s right. Kitchen. As in junior-sized appliances, where the lad can pretend to cook and do dishes.

According to an article from The Associated Press, boys increasingly are playing “chef” with toy kitchens, even though the thought of it can make uptight fathers dash out into the yard and roll in the flowerbeds.

Many modern dads are OK with their sons playing with toy kitchens, the article said, partly because the dads themselves spend more time in the real kitchen. Boys see their fathers whipping up dinner, or they see male chefs on the many food shows on TV, and they want to emulate those activities. Toy companies are catering (ha!) to that interest by making gender-neutral kitchens for kids, the article said.

“Men are reshaping and rethinking their roles,” said Dr. Michael Kaplan, an assistant clinical professor at the Yale Child Study Center. “They are doing much more (cooking and housework) than they ever have.”

Kaplan said boys shouldn’t be discouraged from playing with toys usually associated with girls because it can lead to self-esteem problems.

That’s where he lost me. I’m a living, breathing example of a man who played with a toy kitchen, over his father’s objections, and, as anyone who knows me will tell you, “self-esteem” is the least of my problems. Just the opposite, in fact.

My toy kitchen was a little turquoise-colored number -- a stove, a sink and a refrigerator with food items and condiments painted on the inside -- where I whiled away many hours making mud pies that I insisted all the grown-ups actually eat.

I was 4 years old at the time, which would’ve made it around 1961. Not an era when men spent much time in the kitchen.

I vaguely recall my dad expressing concern over his firstborn son spending so much time baking mud pies and what that might do to my developing male psyche. At least I think that’s what he was saying as he rolled in the flowerbeds.

Clearly, everything turned out fine, as I grew up to be a housewife. Kidding! I grew up to be a work-at-home dad, who doesn’t mind spending time in the kitchen. Still not much of a chef, but at least I don’t serve up mud pies anymore.

Today’s toymakers can appease all the worried dads and still make a buck off the toy kitchen market. It’s simply a matter of tailoring the appliances to men.

For instance, toy kitchens for boys shouldn’t come in colors like pink or turquoise that might “feminize” them. They should be made of stainless steel. Like a DeLorean.

Manufacturers could make macho dads happy by designing a toy fridge that holds nothing but beer. For the garage.

Microwave ovens didn’t exist when I was a child, but now we can’t get along without them. Every boy’s kitchen should come with a microwave, preferably one that can actually make live cats explode. (Kidding some more! Take it easy, cat-lovers. Sheesh.)

Even the most manly man thinks it’s OK to cook outdoors. Most will, in fact, hip-check their wives away from the barbecue grill so they can char their own steaks.

If toymakers want to make a really authentic barbecue grill, they should rig it up with a 10-foot-tall blaze that will singe off hair and eyebrows. Then Junior can look just like Dad.

To extinguish the flames, they can roll in the flowerbeds together.

Frightening children for fun and profit

Halloween may be my favorite holiday, but not for the reasons you might guess.

Yes, there’s candy, and I’m all for that. Yes, there’s a sense of community from all the kiddies and their chaperones prowling the chilly night together. And, yes, it’s a lazy man’s holiday, requiring little preparation, perspiration or shopping.

But here’s the reason I enjoy Halloween: I love scaring the bejeebers out of little kids.

Sick, I know, but I can’t help myself. I get caught up in the spirit of the holiday, wolfing down candy and greeting trick-or-treaters, and next thing you know, small children are running AWAY from my house rather than toward it.

I’m not a nut for Halloween like some grown-ups, those who decorate their yards in fake cobwebs and plastic skeletons and flickering jack o’ lanterns. (See “lazy man’s holiday” above.) I don’t host a “haunted house” where children gross each other out, handling “eyeball” grapes or cold spaghetti “guts.” I never wear a costume myself because a) they don’t make them in my size, and b) I’m scary enough in street clothes.

My Halloween enthusiasms are more spur-of-the-moment, fueled by the traditional sugar buzz and a Pavlovian response to the doorbell. Costumed children show up at my door, and I’m compelled to put a little “boo” in their holiday.

Years ago, when our sons were small, we lived on a street that was so popular with trick-or-treaters that some neighbors were forced to take out home equity loans to fund the annual candy giveaway. I was in charge of answering the door and handing out treats. As the night wore on, I found myself itching to do a little tricking myself. Thus was born the Evil Laugh.

Kids would ring the doorbell. I’d open the door slowly, standing behind it so they couldn’t see who was there. Then I’d unleash the Evil Laugh, which goes like this: “BWAH-hah-hah-ha-ha-ha-HAH.”

Most trick-or-treaters weren’t fazed, but some were startled by the Evil Laugh. Occasionally, terrified kids would sprint all the way to the sidewalk where their frowning parents waited. Those poor children got extra candy, if they could work up the nerve to return to the porch.

A few years ago, my wife brought home a Halloween decoration: A giant, fuzzy, orange-and-black spider. You’re supposed to hang the spider on your door or make it a centerpiece, but I hooked it to the back of my shirt.

I’d answer the doorbell, hand out the candy and then, before the kids could head for the street, I’d turn and ask, “Is there a bug on me?” The shrieks still echo in my ears.

The best one ever was when my kids where in grade school. They had several friends over for Halloween, and my older son led them into his darkened room for a “séance.”

I went outside and slipped around to his window. Just as the kids were fairly certain they were on the verge of conjuring up the dead, I used my fingernails to scratch on the window screen.

That’s all it took. No “boo,” no decorations, no costume. Just scritch-scritch on the screen. Screaming kids nearly killed each other, stampeding for the exits. (Most of them don’t twitch anymore, and their parents have since forgiven me.)

I think word has gotten out about my antics. The number of trick-or-treaters has declined in recent years. Maybe parents are warning each other away from that weird guy’s house.

Good. More leftover candy for me. BWAH-hah-hah-ha-ha-ha-HAH

Woodstock?

I look out the patio windows and there in our relatively small in-ground pool is our oldest son, the wandering minstrel with the blond dreadlocks, and five of his equally filthy freak-flag-flying friends, swimming and splashing and having the time of their lives.

I turned to my wife and said, "Hippie soup."

Ho-ho-ho, Merry August

Back-to-school shopping always seems like a summertime taste of Christmas.

Such a haul. New clothes, new sneakers, new backpack, new lunchbox. Bright yellow pencils and crisp white paper.

For the kids, it's as if Santa came to visit in his vacation clothes. For the parents, though, it can be a nail-biting, heartburn-inducing exercise in breaking the bank.

Small kids demand that all clothes and school supplies come decorated with trademarked characters from Marvel or Mattel or Disney or Nintendo. No matter which character your child loves best, all the goods bearing that likeness sold out last February.

If parents try to inflict anything else -- plain T-shirts, for example, or a notebook decorated with Barney instead of Pikachu -- the children will roll on the floor and howl and kick their little feet.
It's easy to spot those kids' parents. They're the nomads wandering from store to store, weeping and clutching handfuls of their own hair.

If you're lucky enough to stumble upon a hoard of the correct goods, the sticker shock will make your eyes jump out of your head and roll around the floor. Ten bucks for a binder? Thirty bucks for little bitty jeans? Sixty dollars for sneakers?

Holy slide rule, Batman. Before you know it, you've racked up a credit card debt that won't be paid off until the little beggars are off to college.

And for what? Clothes the children will ruin or outgrow by winter break. School supplies that will be lost or destroyed. (Has any kid, anywhere, ever made it through the school year with an intact protractor?) A backpack that produces an odd, musty smell you can't eradicate. And, of course, after a month or two, the kids will decide Pokemon is passe (or so all the parents pray).

By the time Christmas does roll around, it's time to replace everything. And it's hard to fit a new NASCAR lunchbox in a stocking.

I'd like to say it gets easier as kids get older, but that would be lying. Fashions change, but the demands are much the same. Instead of screaming for a pink Barbie lunchbox, your daughter will insist on a pink Paris Hilton crop top. Your son will object to any pants that aren't large enough to house a family of six.

And the sneakers just keep getting pricier.

Some parents of teens simply hand over a credit card and lie down in a dimly lit room until it's over. Others participate in the shopping, but must budget for stress remedies such as bourbon.

There is hope. Eventually, the kids' growth slows, so they might wear a garment more than, say, twice. The household fills up with so many backpacks and lunchboxes and binders, a child might actually re-use one, assuming it doesn't smell too funky.

Our two teen-age sons show little interest in back-to-school shopping. The older one, who's in the seventh year of his ratty rock-and-roller phase, refuses to wear clothes unless they have more holes than a screen door. The younger one never throws anything out, so his closet is overflowing. They both own relatively new, stink-free backpacks.

So I left the boys at home when I did the back-to-school shopping. I returned with a sackful of composition books and pens and said, "Here you go. You're all set."

I know it's not over. Teachers will demand specialized goods. Backpacks will be lost. Tattered clothing will turn to dust.

But I'm hoping we can hold out until Christmas.

Litterbugs and housewreckers

Ever notice how dirty dishes multiply? Or the way one wayward sock on the floor soon results in a room’s total disarray?

Dutch scientists have proven the civic equivalent. A messy neighborhood, they found, led to an overall decline in behavior.

Lead author Kees Keizer of the University of Groningen reported in the journal “Science” that most people act appropriately to the circumstances, but some act lazy or selfish. When their actions are allowed to stand, others soon follow suit.

This is related to what law enforcement officials have long called the “broken window theory,” which says that signs of urban decay -- broken windows, graffiti, litter -- encourage petty crime.
Keizer told The Associated Press that while the researchers weren’t surprised that the theory held up, “we were, however, surprised by the size of the effect.”

For example, the scientists found an alley in a Dutch shopping area where people parked their bicycles. A “no littering” sign was on the wall. The researchers attached store flyers to the handlebars of the bikes, then watched to see what happened.

They found that 33 percent of the riders littered the alley with the flyers. But after the researchers sprayed the alley wall with graffiti, the number who littered jumped to 69 percent.

While such tests no doubt provided special insight into human behavior, the Dutch scientists could’ve skipped all that work. They could’ve simply asked those of us who are responsible for housework. We’re quite familiar with the broken window syndrome.

Take your kitchen, for example. If it’s clean and tidy, most people who use it are more likely to keep it that way. They’ll pick up after themselves, put their dishes in the dishwasher and mop up spluts on the countertops.

But leave your coffee spoon sitting out on the counter and see what happens. Within minutes, dishes and greasy utensils litter every surface, the sink is full and the floor’s freckled with sticky spots.

Say you move into the living room for some televised sports viewing. It’s lovely in there. The furniture gleams and the carpet is clean. But maybe it’s a little warm. So you remove your socks and set them in a tidy pile by your bare feet. Aah, that’s better.

By halftime, every horizontal surface is covered by open bags of pork rinds and pretzels, spilled salsa, random peanuts. The coffee table has more rings on it than the Olympic Games symbol. The carpet bears a fine coating of orange Cheetos dust. Perfect strangers have wandered into the room and are drinking your beer.

One little slip leads to a little mess, which results in ever-bigger messes until finally someone calls the Health Department and you have to move.

The slippery slope is steeper if there are children or teen-agers in the household. They go from “broken window” to complete slum faster than you can say “Pick that up!” One toy hits the floor, and the house soon looks like Santa’s sleigh blew up. Allow one stray sneaker and you’ll come back to a room that looks as if it’s been ransacked by looters.

Next thing you know, the children are engaged in petty crime. Then they’ll really be in Dutch.

Advice for Father's Day

This Father’s Day, let’s remember the best of all parental admonitions: “Do as I say, not as I do.”

Sure, that sounds hypocritical (especially to smart-aleck kids who think they know everything), but it’s really the only way for dads to approach parenting.

Fathers are deluged with advice about setting good examples for our children. We’re told that we’re role models, that we should have no bad habits, or at least should keep them carefully concealed. Otherwise, the children will grow up to be just as messed up as we are.

This puts a lot of pressure on guys. Good behavior goes against our nature. If you don’t believe me, check out any group of guys watching the Super Bowl together. Men quickly devolve into hooting primitives when they’re not observed by those who might disapprove, particularly if violent sports, beer and/or cheerleaders are involved.

This bad behavior can be overlooked when men are young, single and free-spirited. The very word “bachelor” comes from the Latin root for “keg party.” Which explains the origin of the “bachelor’s degree” on college campuses.

But once we become dads, we’re expected to chuck all our bad habits and behave. Especially if the kids are watching. And they’re ALWAYS watching, even when you think they’re asleep.

Let’s say, for example, that you smoke cigarettes. Your children will hold this against you. They will nag you to stop, complain about the smell and leave you newspaper clippings about the health hazards. Even if you only smoke outside when the children are asleep in a location miles away, they’ll still nail you. They will wear you down until you quit smoking, even if it takes years.

As soon as you’ve adjusted to the idea that you’re no longer a smoker, the kids will take up the habit. Guaranteed.

Why? Because you were their role model and you misbehaved. Plus, they know it’ll drive you crazy.

No matter that you told them all along that they shouldn’t smoke. No matter that you said all the right things. They’ll do as you do, not as you say, because it’s the shortest route to the Asylum for Insane Parents.

The whole say/do conundrum is even worse for fathers like me, who work at home. For more than a decade, I was the one who spent the most time with our two sons, ferrying them to school and overseeing homework, while my wife brought home the bacon. If our sons had a role model, I was it, which explains a lot about how they turned out.

No matter what I say to our teens, they call my bluff because they’ve seen how I’ve behaved over the years.

I’ve told them they should get jobs and dress nicer and think about careers. But how can I expect them to take me seriously when, for most of their lives, they’ve seen me working at home in my pajamas?

Why should they have a regular job, the argument goes, when dad doesn’t have one? Why should they go the suit-and-tie route when their barefoot father takes great pride in the fact he hasn’t worn a necktie in a dozen years? And a boss, what’s that about?

I’ve set a bad example. If only the boys had listened to me instead of watching me. As it is, they’re in danger of becoming work-at-home types themselves. Which translates to “poor.” Who will look after me in my old age?

On the other hand, no one will give me a necktie for Father’s Day. How can I be sure? Because I said so.

School's out

The end of the school year can be a tough time for parents.

In the summer months, we parents no longer have a taxpayer-funded place to store our children for seven hours a day. We must find ways to keep the kids safe, fed and amused while we work. We must transport them from place to place in oven-like minivans. We pay more for summer camp than we might pay for tuition at Yale. We must plan a (gulp!) vacation trip with the kids.

But let’s not focus on the complaints. Let’s take a moment to look at the benefits of school-free summers.

No more pencils, notebooks or other school supplies are necessary in summer. Children (especially boys) tend to lose those items repeatedly during the school year, along with their jackets, gloves and random shoes. Replacement costs go way down until fall, when we must completely outfit the students all over again.

No more books other than those of the children’s choosing. I recommend that kids spend as much time as possible in a nice, air-conditioned library.

No more teachers’ dirty looks. Parents suffer just as much as the kids when misbehavior, failing grades or other bad news require teacher meetings throughout the school year. Sure, the kids might still be little vandals during the summer, but your neighbors can’t force a face-to-face meeting the way teachers can. Just don’t answer the doorbell.

No more calls from the principal. (See above paragraph.) Plus, no more of those automated calls where the principal’s disembodied voice informs parents of minimum days, STAR testing, truancies, emergency lockdowns, etc.

No school means no homework which may mean fewer arguments around the house. Instead of standing over the offspring, forcing them to do their homework, we parents can force them to do yard work.

Summer means lots less laundry. Youngsters need to wear fresh clothes to school every day (whether they like it or not), but in summer they can go around in the same swimsuit, T-shirt and flip-flops for days on end. Swimming puts more towels in the mix, but at least those are easy to fold. Since the kids are home for the summer, maybe you can even get them to do the laundry. (Hahaha. Just kidding.)

School-related fundraising comes to a halt in summer. For three months, parents won’t have to foist band candy, bake sales or raffle tickets on their co-workers, neighbors and former friends.

Summer gives children more free time to climb trees, ride bicycles and skateboards, wrestle the family dog and engage in other dangerous activities. This gives parents the opportunity to get re-acquainted with the family doctor, insurance providers and the staffs at local emergency rooms.

(A parenting tip: Remind your children that “Look, Ma, no hands!” is a boast, not a medical condition.)

Most of all, summer vacation means parents can spend more “quality time” with their kids, aside from the hours spent in emergency rooms.

Take the children on a picnic, take them fishing, go to a ballgame, play games together or spend hot afternoons in air-conditioned matinees. Family activities are where memories are made, and summer is the best time for them. The kids will thank you (someday) for devoting your summer months to their welfare and amusement.

One final benefit: The more time the family spends together, the more eager the children will be to return to school next fall.

The noise of summer

Now that warm weather is upon us, we can annoy our neighbors much more than we did in winter.

We spend more time outside. We work in the yard. We throw open our windows to summer breezes. And we share with our neighbors all the ballgame-cheering, door-slamming, music-playing, loud burping and intrahousehold shouting that we'd normally keep to ourselves.

In many neighborhoods, houses are built so close together that residents can reach out their windows and shake hands with people next door. When those windows are open, neighbors hear conversations and spats and other interactions they'd really, really rather not hear.

In such places, you must be careful when you call your children inside for dinner. You can end up feeding every kid on the block.

In my current suburb, there are fences between houses and the facing windows mostly aren't the kind that open. But I remember once, a couple of houses ago, when I thought a neighbor was shouting for help, when she really was hollering at her daughter. Fortunately, I realized my mistake before I dialed 911.

Years ago, when I lived in an apartment, a concerned neighbor knocked on the door while I had friends over.

"Is everything all right over here?" he asked. "I heard screaming."

My answer: "Dude. It's the playoffs."

In such close quarters, you learn which TV shows your neighbors enjoy, what music they like, which teams they root for. Almost always, these tastes will be the direct opposite of your own. If you're considering a relocation, you should ask potential neighbors: "Do you like bagpipe music?" If the answer is yes, immediately look elsewhere.

Those of us who work at home are especially susceptible to these warm-weather disturbances. We're trying to concentrate, trying to conduct business, and all we can hear are the kids down the street shrieking in a swimming pool. Yes, those kids are cute and, yes, that water's cold, but dang, we're trying to work here.

In my neighborhood, many people use lawn services. These services naturally operate during business hours, which is perfect for the residents who go to regular jobs. They never even see their lawn people. They come home from work, and, shazam, their grass is magically shorter and well-groomed.

But we work-at-home types get to hear all the mowers and blowers and weed-whackers. As those old TV commercials used to say, "That's not helping my headache."

Once, I was trying to write when a construction crew showed up down the street to install a swimming pool. The workers spent the day heaving large rocks into the back of a dump truck. Boom, boom, bang. As if that weren't bad enough, one burly worker entertained his colleagues by singing at the top of his lungs all day, and let's just say you won't see him on "American Idol" anytime soon. It was one of those times when I was glad I don't own a gun.

Not that we're guilt-free at my house. My sons crank up the volume when they're playing guitars, and their, um, performances probably aren't to the taste of the neighbors, if you get my drift. We've been known to throw noisy patio parties. And we have the loudest air conditioner in the neighborhood; it apparently wants to be a 747 when it grows up. Fortunately, our neighbors are tolerant types.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go back out to the patio. I'm barbecuing a bagpipe.

Tykes on a plane

The skies are less friendly when you’re flying with children.

Air travel these days is tough enough, what with all the canceled flights and baggage charges and people who insist on barbecuing goats for their in-flight meals. Throw a few screaming children into the mix, and you can soon find your brains leaking out your ears.

Or, you could get thrown off the plane altogether.

That happened to a Seattle family last year. A woman and her four children (including two with disabilities) were flying Southwest Airlines from Detroit to Seattle, changing planes in Phoenix. The mom admitted her children had been unruly on the Detroit-to-Phoenix leg, but she was shocked when Phoenix police told her the family wouldn’t be allowed on the Southwest flight to Seattle.

Wendy Slaughter and her kids were stranded in Phoenix until the children’s grandmother ponied up $2,000 to get them last-minute tickets on Alaska Airlines. After the news media got hold of the story, Southwest Airlines contacted the family and said it would refund the entire cost of their one-way tickets.

Several things about that story reflect the troubling state of air travel:

--The family said they were warned twice about the disruptive children, but were never told they could get booted from their next flight.

--The police were called because of unruly children?

--These people were flying from Detroit to Seattle via Phoenix. That’s approximately 42,000 miles out of the way. No wonder the kids got antsy.

--The airline offered a refund only after the family was safely back home.

Though it probably was no joy to be sitting near them, my sympathies are with the family. I’ve traveled with small children and it’s no picnic even when the kids are on their best behavior.

In fact, air travel presents one of the few occasions where I concede that it’s much easier to be the parents of teens than of smaller children. At least teens can put on their I-Pods and tune everybody out and be their usual inert, surly selves for the duration of the flight.

With little kids, everything about flying goes against the grain:

--They have to sit still.

--They’re supposed to be quiet.

--Pressurized cabins make their ears hurt, resulting in shrieking.

--They’re surrounded by strangers.

--Their parents act weird because they’re worried about the children disturbing others. Kids sense that discomfort, the same way horses sense fear, and react accordingly.

When I fly these days, I usually jam foam noise-suppressors into my ears so the shrieking kids (and chattering adults) don’t bother me. But I’m still reminded occasionally how much easier it is to travel without the little beggars along.

Recently, I was sitting in an airport across from a dad and his five-year-old son. Dad, sensing that something was wrong, patted the kid’s back, asking him if he felt okay. The boy responded by throwing up. A lot.

Dad suddenly had several problems to solve. His day had taken a difficult turn.

Since I was traveling alone, I performed the Business Traveler’s Special: I offered a sympathetic look, then picked up my briefcase and relocated to a different part of the terminal, pausing only to thank my lucky stars that my kids have grown up.

Monkeying around

Ever notice how households seize upon crazes? Everybody gets the same mania at the same time, a shared insanity, an inside joke.

These family fads can go on for years before something else distracts us, or the kids go off to college, or the family dynamic is fractured by some other tragedy, such as certain people becoming aloof teen-agers.

One goofy fad at our house concerned a Christmas gag gift called the Monkey Toy. It’s the simplest of dime-store toys. A round plastic box with a picture of a monkey on it, connected by a wire to a large push-button. When you push the button, the box makes a high-pitched monkey sound: “Oo-oo-ooh-ah-hah!” One of those silly, do-nothing toys that makes you laugh the first 30 times you hear it, even while driving you crazy.

The joy of the Monkey Toy comes from triggering it at inopportune moments, such as during serious discussions of, say, curfews.

Dad: “And that’s the last time I’ll tell you--”
Monkey: “Oo-oo-ooh-ah-hah!”
Everyone: Helpless laughter.

My younger son thinks it’s extremely humorous to hide the Monkey Toy in furniture, with the trigger button under the seat cushion. When a perfectly innocent person sits, it goes, “Oo-oo-ooh-ah-hah!” This is even better than a whoopee cushion, when you consider the possible whereabouts of that monkey.

Just the sort of nonsense that can overtake a family. Pretty soon, everywhere you turn, you’re stepping/sitting/lying/bumping into that button. “Oo-oo-ooh-ah-hah!”

My brother and I spent a large portion of our teen years jumping into my dad’s big reclining chair whenever he left the room. We had a hierarchy of chairs. Dad’s was best, then Mom’s, then the couch. Beyond that, you might as well go upstairs. Every time Dad returned to the living room and demanded his usual chair-that-he-paid-for, it would cause hilarious shock waves in the pecking order.

Sometimes, whole families get captivated by a particular TV show or computer game, so that everyone’s on the same page for a while, hooked on “The Simpsons” or “The Sims” or Yahtzee.
When our sons were small, we lost years of our lives to Pokemon. Once in a while, I still stumble across a card or a plastic figurine, and I’ll remember fondly the way the folks at Nintendo milked us all.

Sometimes, family quirks stick around long enough to become traditions. In my wife’s family, it’s required that you surprise other family members on Christmas Eve, preferably before they’ve had time to wake up properly, by shouting “Christmas Eve gift!” The original idea was that by doing this, you’d entitle yourself to open a gift one day early. Nobody actually opens gifts early, of course. It’s all about saying it, getting the jump on your siblings. Counting coup.

The best family craze I’ve heard lately came from a friend who returned from visiting his grandkids in Texas. They had these popguns that fired miniature marshmallows. Intended for the children, of course, but soon full-grown adults were laughing and running around the house, shooting marshmallows.

With repeated use, he reported, the marshmallows would get gummy, and once in a while, you could make one stick to your opponent’s cheek or forehead. I believe this was extra points.

The visit soon came to an end, so the Marshmallow Wars were settled by treaty and the weapons will end up retired in a toy box.

But something else will come along to jazz the family and bring it closer together. I recommend the Monkey Toy.

Singing the parenting blues

The dramas of the ancient Greeks often featured a chorus that stood off to one side, commenting on the actions of the lead players, bemoaning mistakes and foretelling disasters.

This chorus parallels the modern lifestyle known as “parenting.”

We parents watch from the sidelines as our children make boneheaded decisions and rush headlong into dangerous situations, and all we can do is sing out warnings. The children are the stars of the show, and they’ll make their own mistakes, no matter how loudly we parents sing the blues.

Many of these songs are standards, the same ones our parents sang to us: “Go to Sleep, Little Baby” and “Don’t Put That in Your Mouth” and “What Do You Mean (You’ve Lost Your Shoes)?”

Others are situation-specific: “No Monsters Under the Bed” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand (When We Cross the Street)” and “O, Brother, Where Art Thou Sister’s Barbies?”

Then there are the novelty tunes, the unintentionally comic songs blurted in the heat of the moment: “Don’t Pet That End of the Dog” or “Three Coins Up Your Nostril” and “That’s Not a Helmet, That’s a Bra.”

Some parental laments make no sense. I’ll never forget, when I was about 12, as I worked up my courage to swing on a rope into the local swimming hole, my mother sang out: “If You Swing Off There and Kill Yourself, Don’t Come Crying to Me.”

We parents change our tunes as the children grow older. When they’re babies, we coo lullabyes and delight in their grossest activities and sing their praises for having a full set of toes. Our hit parade consists of “My Baby’s Cuter than Yours” and “Cry Me a River“ and “Spit-up Rag” and “Ooh, That Smell.”

When they reach the toddler stage and go mobile, the warnings begin in earnest: “Don’t Go Out of the Backyard, Dear, With Anyone Else But Me” and “Put That Down, It’s Nasty” and “Electric Shocks Are No Fun” and “(On Everything) Germs, Germs, Germs.”

Then it’s off to kindergarten, and we parents moan all the louder because the children are out of sight, and we hope our many admonitions echo inside their darling heads. Many songs of this era come in the form of questions or pleas: “Did You Go?” and “One More Bite?” and “Oh, Dirty Boy (the Bath, the Bath is Calling)” and that old favorite, “Hurry Up, We’re Late, It Doesn’t Matter If You Have Your Superman Underwear.”

The school years reinforce the notion that we parents have less control over our offspring all the time. “If Johnny Jumped Off a Cliff,” we sing, and “Don’t Bite the Teacher” and “How Can You Mend a Broken Arm?” and “A Lost Lunchbox and a Pink Consternation.”

The parental chorus grows frantic in the teen years, as we try to squeeze last-minute warnings into unheeding ears: “This Ain’t No Party” and “You Call that Music?” and “Get a Job” and “One Tattoo’s Too Many For Me.”

Finally, the kids leave the nest (“Bye-bye, Birdie”) and strike off on their own (“Save Your Knowledge for College” or “You’re in the Army Now”), and we parents can finally stop singing and sit in the wings, quietly worrying instead.

One day, our children will have kids of their own, and they’ll start singing the parenting blues themselves.

I don’t know about you, but I plan to say, “Don’t come crying to me.”

Yuck-a-doo, it's a splut

Do you have spluts at your house?

Bet you do. You might not know it. Or, you might know spluts by another name. But you've got 'em.

Go look in the kitchen. Somewhere on that floor, no matter how recently you've mopped, there'll be a little splash-shaped sticky spot. That's a splut.

A splut begins its life as a simple drop. Juice, maybe. Spaghetti sauce. Some other substance produced by pets and/or teen-agers. Because of that old devil gravity, the substance reaches the floor, where it accumulates passing grime. Eventually, the splut becomes a noticeable smudge, growing ever blacker until somebody scrubs it away.

You won't find "splut" in the dictionary, but that's what we call those sticky spots at our house. Maybe you do, too. Or maybe you have your own word for spluts.

Families tend to accumulate made-up words like "splut" over time. Individual incidents inspire them, as do the peculiar behaviors of friends and relatives. If I said somebody "pulled an Uncle Charlie," many of you would smile and nod. Most of you would be thinking about different Charlies (presumably), but something each Charlie did slipped into the family vernacular, and it's been called an Uncle Charlie ever since.

Some families have secret languages of nonsense words, used to identify everything from favorite toys to favorite body parts. "Booboo" might mean "injury" at your house, but to your neighbors it's a bodily function and to the people across the street, it's their sweet immigrant grandma. Put these families together and say, "I gave their Booboo a booboo while she was taking a booboo," and it could mean most anything.

My family adopted "wobblywad" from a magazine. You know when a table wobbles, and you fold up a napkin or a matchbook cover and you put it under one leg to steady the table? That wadded-up leveling device is a "wobblywad."

Years ago, after a small electrical fire in the condo we rented, the landlord hired a cleaning service to get the smoke smell out of everything. The cleaning service owner took one look at our smoky home, threw his hands in the air and exclaimed, "Yuck-a-doo!"

We've used "yuck-a-doo" to respond to every gross or disgusting thing that's happened around our home since. It's gotten used a lot; we have boys.

The strangest one goes back to before we had kids, to when my wife and I lived in San Francisco. Our apartment's kitchen was small, but it was lined with more ceramic tile than the space shuttle. My wife was in the kitchen. I was around the corner, in my traditional spot, sprawled on the living room sofa.

My wife shouted something. I didn't hear her clearly, so I said, "What?" She repeated it. I still couldn't make it out. "What?"

This went on a few more times before she stalked into the living room and said, "What do you THINK I said?"

"I don't know, hon," I said, carefully. "From in here, it sounded like 'Eep-a-deep.'"

Situation defused. She fell out, laughing.

Ever since, when people yell at each other from opposite ends of the house, with resulting miscommunications, we call that "Eep-a-deep."

Only one problem: Neither of us can remember now what the original phrase was. What was she yelling from the kitchen? "Time to eat?" "Need a treat?" "Eat a beet?" "Beep a beef?"

Who knows? But "eep-a-deep" lives on.

Next week: How to clean up spluts with a "footrag."

Exemplary work

All parents worry about setting a good example for their children, and it isn't always easy.

Children are watchful little rascals, and they have impeccable timing. Do something you've cautioned them against -- drinking directly from the milk carton, for instance -- and they will walk in on you in mid-guzzle. Guaranteed. If you drop a brick on your foot, and unleash a string of curses, you can bet your child will be within earshot. If you're drunkenly watching porn late at night, long after they should be asleep -- well, you get the idea.

Being a parent is more than not getting caught engaging in bad habits, however. It's also teaching good behavior to the kids. Personal hygiene, for instance. Good study habits. Using one's blinker. Avoiding a life of crime.

One important area is teaching them how to work. We want our kids to become responsible, job-holding adults, so they can afford high-quality elder care for us in years to come.

We teach our kids to work by showing them how we work hard ourselves, and that’s where I’ve got a problem.

I spent more than twenty years toiling at newspapers, but our two sons barely remember those days. What they know is that Dad has survived the past decade by pecking away at a home computer, doing household chores and sponging off their hard-working Mom. Sure, Dad has written a whole shelf full of books, and he travels a lot and gives lectures and his columns have appeared in newspapers all over, but the boys don't register all that. What they see is a grown man who has no job.

To them, that's a role model to emulate.

Our younger son came home from school to find me pounding the keyboard, trying to meet a deadline. He didn't notice the frantic nature of the work. What he noted was that I was still in my pajamas.

"You never got dressed today?" he asked.

I muttered something about how I hadn't showered, either.

"That's a good day right there!" he crowed, and he sounded exactly like me.

Egging 'em on

Across America, the "morning scramble" is not a breakfast dish. It's the mad dash to get the kids out the door to school.

In a fit of blind optimism, parents start each day with the notion that everyone in the family will be on schedule, and we won't have to race around crazily at the last minute. Each school day, we hopeful parents watch those expectations dashed.

As is the case with so many things, the children hold an opposing viewpoint. The children do not care if they are late. They're not thrilled about spending the day in school anyway. They maintain that they would happily live forever as uneducated goatherds if they could be allowed to sleep for only five more minutes. Thus it begins. Every day.

Once they're up, younger children tend to wander off. Teens are too busy text-messaging their friends to actually get ready for school. Sleepy kids of any age seem to have difficulty with the question, "Where are your shoes?"

When our two sons were small, the culprit was distraction. They'd forget they were supposed to be, say, rounding up socks that weren't crunchy. Instead, I would find them watching cartoons, or barefoot in the yard with the dog. Or dressing in a ninja costume, "just to try it out," five minutes before departure to school.

And there was always a last-second disaster of some sort. I spilled my milk. I can't find my homework. The dog won't give me my shoe. We'd scramble about, solving crises, until the last possible moment, then zoom out the door, trying to reach school before the final bell, weaving through traffic like an ambulance on Saturday night.

Now that they're older, our boys require only minimal overseeing. The struggle is at the front end -- getting them out of bed -- rather than forcing breakfast down their gullets or locating their missing science project. It goes like this:

5:45 a.m.
Mom: "Good morning! Time to get up. Here comes the light! Get up!"
5:55 a.m.
Dad: "Good morning! Rise and shine there, boys!"
6 a.m.
Mom: "You guys must get up now. You're going to be late."
6:10 a.m.
Dad: "Hey, come on. What's the matter with you? Did you stay up all night?"
6:15 a.m.
Dad: "Get. Up. Now."
6:20 a.m.
Mom: "I'm coming back here in two minutes with a pitcher of ice water. Whoever's still in bed gets it."
6:30 a.m.
Boys reel around house, yawning and sniffling, wolfing food and throwing on the rags that pass for their clothes. Mom and Dad nervously hound them with questions -- "Did you brush your teeth?" or "You call that breakfast?" or "Is that the way you WANT your hair to look?" -- all the way out the door.

One day, as younger son sprinted to his room to fetch something he'd forgotten, the older one waited by the front door. A veteran of years of racing off to school, he gave his parents a wry smile and said, "We were almost on time today."

As a hopeful parent, I thought: There's always tomorrow.

The turkey says gobble

Now I know why we have the Full Turkey Dinner only once or twice a year. The leftovers last three months.

The holiday season is one long graze, an endless smorgasbord of cookies and cakes and turkey and dressing and egg nog. Everywhere you turn, there's more food, more booze, more festive calories.

No wonder the average American gains 137 pounds during the period between Halloween and Jan. 1. No wonder most people's New Year's resolutions focus on diet and exercise. We have to work off all that cheery holiday gluttony. Call it The Turkey's Revenge.

A friend remarked the other day that obese people always have food within easy reach. They're in front of the TV and they have chips and beer and candy and pork rinds all around them. All they need is a funnel.

During the holidays, this situation applies to us all. Food is everywhere and you can't avoid it, even if you try. There's too much peer pressure. Fail to partake of holiday fare, and people will think something's wrong with you, that you're sick or depressed.

Try this one at Thanksgiving sometime: "No turkey for me, thanks." Your family will want to feel your forehead for fever. Your host will glare at you, because that's one serving of turkey that will be left over, and your host simply can't fit another thing into the freezer.

There's so much food during the holidays that some folks become desperate to get rid of it. They do this by forcing it down the throats of their friends and co-workers. People bring Halloween candy and Santa cookies to the office to "get them out of the house." You can't stop by a friend's house without being offered a seven-course dessert tray. And you have to lock the car to keep neighbors from stashing Zip-Loc bags of leftover turkey in the glove compartment.

We're guilty within our own homes. We leave plastic-wrapped plates of desserts sitting out, hoping others will consume them before they spoil or before Easter, whichever comes first. Eventually, all these goodies migrate to the nearest TV, where they are within easy reach. Next thing you know, it's February and we're investing in a Stairmaster.

I'd like to say this dire situation is confined to the holidays, but that's not the case at my house. We have two growing boys and they think the entire house is an open-air buffet. Boxes of cereal and bags of chips and granola bars and Popsicles wander about our house, seemingly of their own accord, following our boys wherever they go. Always within easy reach.

We parents don't encourage this behavior. Indeed, we've tried to confine food to the kitchen, where there's no carpet to catch spills. But food is portable and the boys have a full of agenda of running around to accomplish every day. They can't help it if the food chooses to go with them.

The part I find most alarming is that they aren't even stealthy about their disobedience. They leave a trail of candy wrappers and apple cores in their wake.

Imagine this scenario repeated, with variations, oh, 42 times a day:

Son: "Dad, can I have a Popsicle?"
Dad: "Sure. Eat it in the kitchen."
Son: "Okay."
Hours later, I'll find the sticky Popsicle stick on my bedside table.
Dad: "How did that get in here?"
Son, wide-eyed: "I have no idea."
Dad: (Grumble, grumble.)

And it's not just the remains they leave. They also have packages of food stashed all over the house in case of emergency.

One day, I pulled into our driveway. The shades were up in one son's bedroom window and there, sitting on the sill, facing out at the world, was a bright orange jumbo box of Cheese Nips. It looked like a billboard or a political poster, as if our household had decided to come out in favor of Cheese Nips and we wanted the whole world to know it.

I was mortified, of course. I don't even like Cheese Nips. If we're going to endorse a food product, it should be leftover turkey.

Keeping the kids busy

Christmas vacation from school now is known in most places by the secular euphemism "winter break," but they ought to call it "winter breakdown."

Parents everywhere already are pushed to the breaking point, harried and hassled by the annual madness of holiday preparation. Just when the schedule couldn't get any busier, our children are sent home to drive us crazy.

For three weeks or so, in the dead of winter, the kids are trapped indoors, making demands and wreaking havoc and tossing the house in search of hidden gifts.

The latter half of winter break isn't so bad because the kids have new Christmas toys to keep them occupied, assuming we've remembered to stock enough batteries. But those days between "school's out" and "Merry Christmas" can be trying. The children are all wound up, excited about the holidays, and before long, we parents have visions of padded cells dancing in our heads.

The trick to surviving winter break is to involve the children in the Christmas preparations. Make them a part of the shopping and cooking and cleaning and gift-wrapping. Let them see just how much work goes into making a happy holiday. Then maybe the little ingrates will be more appreciative and go play quietly somewhere and give your frazzled nerves a rest.

Here are some suggestions for including the kids in the holiday fun:

--Decorations. Children can be very helpful when it comes to decking the halls and stringing the tinsel. Just remember that they can't reach as high as you. And they see nothing wrong with putting all the decorations on the same Christmas tree branch.

--Homemade gifts. Set the kids down with construction paper and crayons and glue and they'll make a really huge mess, just in time for the relatives' visit. No, seriously, kids can produce wonderful keepsakes while experiencing the giving spirit of Christmas. These handmade gifts are particularly appropriate for recipients willing to overlook globs of glue and glitter everywhere. I'm thinking here of grandparents.

--Gift-wrapping. Older children can wield scissors and ribbons and help prepare the holiday gifts. One caution: Kids who help with the wrapping know what everyone will be getting Christmas morning, and will feel compelled to shout it out and ruin the surprise.

--Cooking. Many children enjoy helping in the kitchen, particularly if you're making sweets for the holidays. They love "licking the spoon," sometimes even before you're finished with it. But if you can overlook such unsanitary foibles, you can have a wonderful time cooking together. Let the kids help prepare the cookies and milk that will be set out for Santa's visit on Christmas Eve. Just make sure "Santa" doesn't actually eat them by mistake.

(One advantage to letting kids help in the kitchen: They're less likely to complain about food they cooked themselves. My two sons once made brownies from a mix that didn't turn out right. I said, "Sorry, guys, but this looks like black goo." My younger son immediately replied: "Black goo! I LOVE black goo!")

--Housework. Force the little urchins to help you get the house ready for holiday company. After all, they made the mess, they should help clean it up. Besides, they need to pick up all their toys so they'll have room to strew the new toys they get for Christmas.

Remember, parents: Get some work out of those kids before Christmas. Once they've opened their presents, you can no longer play the "Santa is watching you" card.