The Tanory Tantrum

Find Mickey Shunick

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sat, 26 May 2012 02:44:00 +0000

I know you've probably all seen this, but just in case you haven't or are from another state and this isn't being publicized there:

A 21 year-old girl named Mickey Shunick has gone missing from Lafayette, Louisiana, and everyone out here is trying to find her. She lives right around where I grew up, so to have this happen to her hits really close to home on multiple levels.

You can find out more information here:

http://findmickeynow.com

and on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/findmickeynow

If you happen to have any info, please call the official tip hotline at 337-291-8633.

Thanks everyone. I'm hoping for the best.

Two!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Thu, 24 May 2012 04:27:00 +0000

My son Peter just turned two!

It seems like just the other day that Betty and I were watching Lost on NetFlix when she started going into contractions. So we promptly packed up the van and I ended up hitting every single red light between my house and Women's Hospital. I mean, every read light! Betty almost had Peter in the van.

That probably would have hurt the resale value. But who knows in this economy?!

My little dude is taking after his big sister and is very mature for his age, because although he just turned two, he's been in the Terrible Twos now for about two months. He's a climber - it's his favorite hobby! - and he was finally able to climb out of his baby bed. He actually fell out one day after scaling up the side, but I was there to catch him.

His baby bed has mighty morphing powers, so we changed it into a regular bed by removing one of the sides and replacing it with a smaller attachment that acts as a rail. But this meant that he could then roam freely in his room, so we put up a pressure gate on his bedroom door. But, being the avid climber that he is, he quickly learned how to climb that as well.

So then we switched pressure gates to be one with a mesh net in the middle instead of hard plastic, so his feet don't have any purchase. So now he just screams while throwing toys, books and stuffed animals outside of his bedroom and into Annie's room.

We try to fuss at him to keep him in his room, but he's just too darn cute!

I'm very proud of my little man. For starters, he doesn't mind dressing up every once in a while. Gotta have a box full of costumes if you want to be a Tanory!

Second, he takes after his old man, as you can see below!

We both have green thumbs! (What were you thinking?!)

Well, actually I don't have a green thumb, but Betty does! She's been teaching the kids all about how to grow stuff, where food comes from, etc. I mainly just eat. I said before that Peter's hobby was climbing, but he also loves to help cook and bake. He might be a world famous chef one day... or a pro-wrestler, or a mountain climber. Definitely one of those three. He's also awesome at baseball, soccer and basketball. So maybe an athlete.

My little buddy is growing up so fast, and is quickly becoming a big boy. He's so much fun. I hope that we always have as much fun as we are having right now together. I was going to post more pictures of Peter but couldn't decide which ones to use - they're all so good! - so instead I'll just point you to Pete's website (pete.tanoryland.com) for some good memories that we've had in the past two years.

Love you, buddy!

Annie's Dance Recital

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sun, 20 May 2012 02:01:00 +0000

My daughter Annie had her first dance recital today. But it shouldn't have been called a dance "recital" - it was more like a dance "extravaganza-have-your-mind-blown-a-thon."

For starters, we didn't know if Annie would get up on stage and dance. She's been doing great at her dancing lessons, but she gets really shy whenever Betty or I are in the room. Secondly, we didn't know how our son Peter would do. I was pretty sure that he was going to run loose in the theater and climb up on random people's chairs. (Or as I've termed it, "free babysitting.")

Who knew that we'd have nothing to worry about?! Annie was fantastic! She was the best one of her group for her first dance. And while she only did a handful of moves for her second dance, she killed those few moves!

And Peter slept the whole first half. When he finally woke up, he woke up clapping. After he finished clapping, which was much longer and furious than a normal clap would last, he ate a Clif brownie bar, a pack of M&M's and a granola bar, then slept for a little while longer until he hit a sugar high two numbers before Annie's last dance.

Betty's parents and niece came to the performance, my parents came in from Lafayette, and my sister flew in from Houston. Pretty nice crowd! Very awesome of everyone to come in for this. They even hit up Annie's soccer game earlier in the day. (Annie decided to rest for her dance performance instead of playing soccer.)

Next year I'll be dancing in the "Daddy / Daughter Dance." They did it this year, and had a special moment when a senior who's been dancing at Annie's dance studio for several years got to dance with her dad since she apparently couldn't do it when she was younger for whatever reason. It was really sweet. My wife, mom and sister were all bawling. They all bawled again when Annie came out on the stage. Way too much estrogen in the room!

I'm so proud of my little sweetheart, Annie, for dancing so well today! I'm proud of her for getting up on stage, proud that she remembered all of her dance moves, and just proud of her for being so all-around awesome. Congratulations to all the girls for completing a year of dance. See you next year!

Winners!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Tue, 01 May 2012 01:46:00 +0000

I made two promises related to the Cajun Code Fest that I don't think I'll be able to keep. You might remember me saying that if Betty and I won that I would promptly forget that we know any of you. And if you're one of my Facebook friends, you probably saw me say that I'd go streaking if we won.

Well friends, we won! And I've decided that I can't forget any of you. I mean, if you're still reading this after I posted about Manly Satsuma Trees or family portraits made from Play-Doh, then you must either really love me, or you just don't know how to stop receiving the emails that I conned you into signing up for.

I might still go streaking, though. It would be good exercise.

So in case you don't know what Cajun Code Fest is, it was a code-a-thon held in Lafayette with the purpose of coming up with a technical solution to help combat Childhood Obesity. We were provided with data sets that we could choose to use, but weren't told what to do. Our job was to figure out what to do. And wow, we have some incredibly creative people in Louisiana (and around the country) because we saw some truly amazing ideas. We even had a guy attend from Germany and a woman attend from Canada. That's pretty awesome!

To give you a sense of what the Cajun Code Fest was about, I strongly encourage you to read Sean Nolan's blog about it. Sean is the head of the HealthVault team at Microsoft. It was extremely awesome that he showed up, but even cooler to see that he wrote about my team's product. Rock on!

My team made a system to create and manage pick-up games. We decided to focus on the exercise component of being healthy instead of eating right, because we figured that there's already calorie info for every restaurant available out on the web somewhere. We also knew, courtesy of a team member, that 9 out of 10 obese children have two obese parents and 8 out of 10 obese kids have at least 1 obese parent. We figured that the kids weren't the ones buying the food, so why focus on that component?

I'd say more about it, but we're going to be presenting our application in Washington, DC, on June 5th and 6th, so I don't want to give away any more details lest one of our competitors tries to steal our idea.

Betty and I worked with some super-talented people. We were introduced by Ramesh Kolluru, the man (the myth! the legend!) who orchestrated the entire Cajun Code Fest. Ramesh saw that we didn't have a team, so he thought that a handful of software developers, some educators and physicians would make a nice team. He was right!

We kind of just punted when asked for a team name. Nobody offered any ideas, until someone decided on "BE CAMP VB" - which was the letter of all of our first names put into some kind of order. Except that the "E" was really for one of our team members named Jackie. Nobody knew her name because her email address started with "evaluations." It's probably better that way, because then our name would have been "BJ CAMP VB." It just doesn't have the same ring to it. Although it sounds like a fun camp!

The members of my team were as follows, in order of their appearance in our team name, "BE CAMP VB":

B: Betty Tanory. Betty's my wife (which you knew). She's very sweet and nice, until you tick her off. Read about how she single-handedly conquered Wells Fargo's PMI division here. I still get goose bumps thinking about it! She told me that she "was going to be the first B in our team name," and who was I to argue?

E: Jackie Rowe. Jackie works at Southwest Louisiana AHEC in Lafayette. Her email address starts with "Evaluations" and we didn't have her name on the email threads getting our team together, so she became the "E."

C: Chris Burriss, a project manager for InfiniEDGE Software in Prairieville. InfiniEDGE does some cool stuff - because they obviously have talented people! Chris kept us all in line and on target.

A: Adebanjo (Banjo) Oriade, an Assistant Professor of Physics at Bethany College in Kansas. Banjo is quite possibly the coolest Physics Professor you will ever meet!

M: Meredith Warner, from Womans' Surgical Specialty Group in Baton Rouge. Meredith is pretty awesome. She's a surgeon who knew the ins-and-outs of Childhood Obesity from work. She also presented our application to the judges. She made us justify all of our ideas and decisions, which helped form our product. She knocked it out of the park in every aspect of the competition! I wouldn't have wanted to compete against her.

P: Peter Molnar, an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Clark Atlanta University in Atlanta. I never saw Peter without a smile on his face. He was really a pleasure to work with.

V: Vamsee Alla, a physician who works for the Dept. of Veterans Affairs. Vamsee lives in Connecticut and came down for the event. So I now have a connection to send me some good maple syrup every fall. Bonus!

B: Bobby Tanory. I have purple and gold pants that I wear to LSU functions. Fear me!

In the 36 hours of the competition, I think my entire team combined for about 10 hours of sleep. I got 4 hours of sleep after leaving the facility at 3 am, but realized the next day that I was one of the lucky ones: some of my friends / coworkers / arch-enemies (for the duration of the competition) didn't sleep at all.

There were three groups of 6 or 7 teams at the event, and the top 2 teams moved on to the finals. Our team was the top team out of our group. When the winning team was announced, we knew we'd won because the announcer had to pause to consider the winning team's name. "BE CAMP VB" doesn't just roll off the tongue, you know!

Our group will be meeting again in Washington, DC, for the Health Data Initiative Forum III (aka, the Health Datapalooza) in early June. Wish us luck! And once again, if you know anyone else competing the Healthapalooza, please sabotage their computers for me!

Cajun Code Fest

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 05:43:00 +0000

Betty and I are competing in the Cajun Code Fest in Lafayette this weekend. The winner gets $25K, so if we win, we will promptly forget that we know any of you.

Cajun Code Fest is a code-a-thon, which means we have roughly 2 days to come up with a cool technical solution to a given problem. This code-a-thon is attempting to tackle the issue of Childhood Obesity. We've been given access to a large number of data sets that the government has been accruing over the last several years, and now we get to try to come up with some innovative way of showing or using that data. We have info on the price of food, calorie info, locations of fast food restaurants, insurance information, toxicoligy maps... you name it, we've got it. Our main issue is that we have so much data that we don't know where to begin!

Cajun Code Fest's major sponsor is Microsoft, which has an electronic medical record application called HealthVault, which conveniently has several APIs that we can use. And at the event we'll get to hear from Joey Durel (Lafayette City Parish President, and more importantly, previous owner of Durel's Pet Shop in the Acadiana Mall) and Todd Park (US Chief Technology Officer). That's pretty cool.

Oh yeah, and they're having free crawfish. It's the little things in life that make me happy, people.

This event coincides with Festival International, which is a 5 day festival with great food and music in downtown Lafayette. People from all over the world will be in Lafayette this weekend.

Betty and I aren't in this alone. We've teamed up with 6 other people that we've never met before. On board we have an Assistant Professor of Physics whose domain of expertise is nano-magnets, micro-magnets and Computer modeling/simulations; as well as an Associate professor of Computer and Information Science with a PhD in theoretical/computational physics. I know, you're already thinking that we've won, I had the same thought. One of our members is an entrepreneur in the IT field. We've got a physician on board who can tell us what all of this data means, as well as an IT project manager who can keep us all in line and on task. But most importantly, we've got a guy with a cool German accent.

I've been cramming this past week on programming languages and methodologies that I've always wanted to learn but never really had a reason to use before now. I've realized again why I love programming so much - it's very satisfying to make something from scratch. And there's so much to learn! So even if we don't win this event, I still feel like I've already gained a lot out of just competing in it.

If you have any ideas on an application that you'd like to see made to help combat Childhood Obesity, please leave a comment. We've brainstormed a few ideas but don't have anything set yet. But most importantly, if you know of anyone else competing in the Cajun Code Fest, please, please, please... sabotage their computer for me. Just joking! Maybe.

Goal!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 04:40:00 +0000

Our first weekend of soccer was a great success! The kids were amazing!

Who knew that all you had to do to get kids to crush the other team was to tell them that the other kids were going to steal all their toys unless we beat them 10-0?

In all honesty, I had no idea how the kids would do. We've been practicing lots of fun games that are designed to get the kids as many touches on the ball as possible, but I wasn't sure how they would translate to the real game.

The one drill that we do at practice that seemed to really hit home was when we gave each kid the chance to take the ball down the field and score. During the game, whenever we'd kick the ball off, I'd get down to the kids' level, point at one of them and say, "I want YOU to take the ball all the way down the field and score." Occasionally a player would complain that the other team "wasn't sharing" the ball with them, and I'd say, "That's because the other team is made up of a bunch of egotistical a-holes. NOW GO KILL THEM!" Well, maybe something closer to, "They're not on your team - they're not going to share with you! NOW RIP THEIR HEADS OFF!"

We had two games on Saturday, and I think we won the first game. To be honest, I'm not really sure. Our team scored on a combination of plays whose legality is questionable. In one instance, one of my players dribbled the ball all the way down the field, weaving in and out of traffic like Diego Maradona, only to stop a foot from the goal, bend down and pick the ball up with his hands, then place it gently in front of the goal before kicking it in. In another instance, a player threw the ball into himself and then immediately scored. In yet another goal, the ball actually went behind the goal and then was kicked in from the far side, like a hockey highlight. Those plays were incredible but highly illegal, yet if the ref doesn't blow the whistle then who's to say that they are really fouls?

From where I was standing, Ref, they looked good to me!

The best part of the day was when one of my players, who has been extremely shy at practice, got on the field for a brief moment. He's barely kicked a ball at practice, but in the game he took the ball all the way down the field and down to the goal! He missed the actual shot, but it didn't matter. I was so proud of him!

Annie didn't play the entire first game. She got on the field right before the second half only to burst out into tears before kickoff. She did play in the second game for a little bit and was brilliant, until she decided to make snow angels in the clovers. But in her defense, they were incredible snow / clover angels.

As for me, I'm too old for this. I was so worn out by the end of the first game that I could barely walk. I barely made it through the second game, and I only made it because I got to rest in between games. I was so excited with my team's play that I was running up and down the field, shouting, and I don't think I've run that much in about 20 years. I went home after the second game and slept for three hours!

So I'll say that we're 1-1 even though I'm not sure if we won the first game. Next stop: The U4 Championship!

First Soccer Games

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 02:33:00 +0000

My daughter has her first soccer game on Saturday. Technically, it's her first two games because we have a double-header Saturday. It's also my first games as head coach.

I'm excited! We have a great team! And, I don't mean to brag, but my daughter has the killer instinct. Here's her at soccer practice, massacring flowers.

There is one main issue that the kids on our team need to get past if we're going to have any kind of success at all. And by "success" I mean "have all kids on the field actively engaged in the game at the same time, nobody using their hands, and nobody crying, for at least ten seconds." This is a tall order. That one thing is as follows:

Quit being so nice!

Here's the problem, people: we've all taught our kids to be loving little munchkins. We've taught them to not take other people's toys. We've taught them to share. We've taught them to not hit other people.

And now I'm asking them to throw all of that out of the window.

At practice all the kids have a ball. And I don't mean "have a ball" as in "have a party." No, they all have their own soccer ball. It's so that each kid can get as many touches on the ball during practice as possible. Kids my daughter's age don't really understand the concept of passing. They're not going to blast a shot from 20 yards out. They're not going to cross, head the ball or do give-and-go's. They just need to learn how to dribble and defend.

And that works great when everyone has one ball. But take anyone's ball away and then it's utter chaos. If there's only one ball on the field, nobody knows what to do. More importantly, nobody wants to take the ball from the other person, and nobody likes to have the ball taken away from them.

And, believe me, it doesn't matter how many times you yell, "Rip his head off!" at the top of your voice, or practice slide tackling techniques on one of the opposing team's parents. The kids are just too friendly at this age.

There's a great chance that we're going to be obliterated in both games on Saturday. There's also a great chance that none of the kids on my team will know what to do. As head coach, I take full responsibility for that.

I just hope they have fun. And, at the end of the day, if they have fun and are still loving, kind, sharing little munchkins, then maybe that's not so bad after all.

Wish us luck!

Happy Birthday, Annie!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 05:02:00 +0000

It seems like just the other day that my daughter Annie was born.

I remember going to work a couple of days after she was born. My mom was at the house, and Betty's mom was there, too, so I knew that both Betty and Annie were in good hands. And let's face it, with so many great people around, what was I to do? I figured I would take off a few weeks after. But leaving that first day to go back to work, I remember standing over Annie sleeping in her crib and just wondering, "What am I doing leaving her? How can I possibly go?!" It was heartbreaking to have to leave her!

She used to have to be rocked to sleep every night, and it was a multi-hours long process some nights. But I loved it! It was the only time I really got to spend with her during the week. I loved cuddling with her in my chair. She used to fit right across my belly!

Some nights I would fall asleep with her in my arms. I have to say... I really loved it!

I never imagined how much fun I would have playing dress-up with her. Even seeing her in her "duck towel" was just the cutest thing ever!

Before Annie was born, I was deathly afraid of holding a baby. I was always afraid of dropping it or hurting it. But after Annie was born, I was a natural! It was so easy! And there was never any danger of dropping her - I would never let anything bad happen to her.

I also quickly became an expert at changing diapers. You had to be quick, or at a minimum be out of the line of fire! Diaper duty became a regular blog topic.

I soon found that I not only had a daughter... but I also had a partner in crime! I learned that babies can't dress themselves so they're at your mercy. Moo-ha-ha!

After a while she developed her own personality. Thankfully she's a lot like her Mommy! She might look like me (and occasionally act like me when she throws a tantrum) but she's smart and usually pretty calm, just like Mommy. Let's hope she also have Mommy's sense of direction.

She even helped me place in a costume contest at work. I dressed up as Austin Powers and Annie was Mini-Me. (Betty was Felicity Shagwell, of course!) Oh, fine, nobody was voting for me... everyone was voting for Annie! Who can blame them?

She is my Princess Baby...

She's my little munchkin...

And just like that, she's all of a sudden FOUR!

Where has all the time gone?!?

Happy 4th birthday to my beautiful baby girl! You will always be my sweet little munchkin!

If you want to see more pictures of Annie, please check out her very own website, Anne of the Day. Her brother Peter has his own site, too, but we'll let today's day be Annie's!

The Last Tantrum

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 13:28:00 +0000

It's crazy to think it's been this long, but I've been writing the blog for SIX years! Not all of my posts have been worthy of being republished in the New York Times, but I've really enjoyed writing them. It's been great to hone my creative process, and even better to have friends and family to share my thoughts with.

But I'm older now, and I have different interests than I did six years ago. Back when I started this blog I didn't have kids; now I have two. I wasn't taking piano. I basically wasn't doing a lot of the stuff that I'm doing now which requires my attention. There's only so much of me to go around, and so I'm deciding to spend less and less time on the blog, as you've probably noticed.

Everything must come to an end, and so it is with this blog. I have enjoyed every minute writing it, and I hope you've enjoyed reading it. Thank you so much for all of the encouragement and support these last few years. I will keep the blog site up so my old writing can find new readers, but there won't be anything new.

It's a bittersweet day for me. I'm really proud of my writing, and the blog has filled me with a lot of joy. It's helped me to share my life, my thoughts and my family with the world. I will definitely miss it. But it's time to move on.

Thanks again for reading!

Fancy Annie's Birthday Spectacular!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 03:49:00 +0000

We threw a party for my daughter Annie on Saturday. Since she's fancy, the theme was Fancy Nancy. If you don't know who or what Fancy Nancy is, it's a series of children's books about a girl named Nancy who likes to dress and talk as fancily as possible. Every book is filled with great vocabulary lessons - e.g., "Posh is a fancy way of saying 'fancy.'" I love reading the books to her, and she loves being fancy, so it all works out.

So what makes a party "fancy?" How about a chocolate fountain, for one?

Not fancy enough for you? How about an inflatable?

Still not fancy enough? What about an art station with paint on one side and chalk on the other?

Still not floating your boat? Well, we also had another art station to make your own bookmarks, and another one to make your own necklaces...

"Pin the Tiara on Fancy Annie"...

Swings and slides...

Well, if none of that is fancy enough for you, then I know this will be: a fancy four-layered cake, since Annie turns four!

And as you all know, I take no credit for any of this. Betty did everything. And, by the way, she did it after a tornado ripped through our area last week and us having lost all of our food from the fridge and freezer. And she somehow managed to bake the fancy cake right before our oven's bake element burnt out. Betty is amazing!

The party was a smashing success. Annie had lots of friends and family come to see her. She loved seeing her cousins and friends, and enjoyed receiving and sharing some new loot!

Oh, I forgot to mention that we had a dress-up station for the kids with boas, hats, clothes, fancy shoes, etc. As expected, I dressed up as fancily as I could - with a tuxedo shirt and cummerbund that I found at the Purple Cow thrift store in Baton Rouge for $10. Betty wore a fancy outfit that I got her (because I have impeccable taste in other people's clothes but not my own - it's a gift and a curse at once). Annie wore fancy everything. And Peter borrowed a tuxedo from our friends - he just about stole the show!

Our families were fancy, too! Here's us with Betty's parents...

And here's us with mine. Fancy Tanorys!

It was a little on the warm and muggy side, and I probably kept Peter in his tuxedo a little too long. He was really hot and thirsty for most of the time. But it was tough to get him to come inside and change, since every time I went to get him he hopped on another mode of transportation and took off in his threads - Mission: Impossible style!

We had such a great time. Thanks to everyone who came and made Annie's birthday party so much fun!

We'll see you next year! Start getting your fancy things together, because next year's party has to be bigger and better than this year's, if that's possible. But try real hard, because you don't want to make this little munchkin mad at you:

She turns four this week! FOUR! Can you believe it???

A Twister!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 15:00:00 +0000

We had a tornado in Prairieville a few days ago. Not a tornado like, "My son Peter ate all the candy in the pantry and then frothed at the mouth while tearing up our house," kind of tornado. Like a real tornado.

It missed our house by two blocks on both sides.

I was at work when my coworker / friend / sometimes-running-and-gym partner Brannon came up to my desk. I'm not on Brannon's team any more so I rarely see him (even though he lives two blocks from me). He asked if I had heard from Betty and if everything was OK.

So at this point I was nervous and mentally preparing myself for a shock. What was wrong?

"Apparently there's been a tornado," Brannon said. "A tornado?" my face non-verbally asked. "Yeah, it sounds like it was bad all around us. You should call Betty and make sure she's OK."

It's great to have good friends, isn't it?

I called Betty and she was OK. Thankfully! She didn't even know there had been a tornado. She said it got really loud all of a sudden but she just thought it was due to the storm that was raging around her. Peter slept through it all. I told her to take him to the closet and sit there for a while, just to make sure. (Anne was at school.) Betty did that for a few minutes then went back to the recliner - it was worth it to keep Peter sleeping! Plus the tornado had already passed so it wasn't really necessary.

Everyone in Prairieville lucked out. Nobody was killed and we don't think anyone was hurt. A few trees landed in houses, and one landed on a car with people in it, but everyone got out OK. The firemen, ambulances and police were on the scene in minutes. Kudos to our first responders!

Nobody was hurt as far as we know, but there are several houses near ours that no longer have roofs. And our good friends Matt and Nicolvin, had they still been living out by us, would probably be staying with us right now because their old street is pretty much torn to shreds.

The sight of some of the houses around us make us sad. We used to see kids playing basketball on those driveways, and now there are tens of guys out frantically trying to fix up their houses. Some people out here probably don't have home insurance, ya know? Betty brought them donuts and muffins today, which was really sweet of her. Hopefully we'll be able to do more to help them, although I'm really awful with any kind of manual labor. (You do NOT want me helping to put your roof back on your house... just trust me on this, OK? Tornado or no, I'm not allowed to use power tools or scale construction projects.)

Our street was narrowly missed. Apparently the tornado started in a field on one side of our street, hit a few houses there, then receded... and passed right over us. Then it landed about a half mile away and destroyed some other houses there. We are so lucky.

Brannon's wife was actually outside on their patio when the tornado passed by, and when it went by it sucked all of the loose objects on their patio out and flung them all over their yard. She's really lucky that she didn't get sucked out.

So, we had a near miss, but we still feel like we've been through something incredibly stressful. And it makes us so thankful for all that we have, and it definitely makes us want to go out and help people - not just in our area who have been affected, but anywhere we can.

So the next time you're aggravated when stuck in traffic, dealing with a problem employee at work, or angry at Roger Goodell for suspending Sean Payton for a year... just remember, there are people out there that have it much worse than you do. Some of those people live two blocks from me. I'm going to see if I can do something about it. Please do the same for the people in your area!

Coach Bob

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 04:25:00 +0000

Every coach I've ever had, with the exception of my dad, is known to me simply as "Coach." (I call my dad "Coach Daddy.") My high school soccer coach? Coach. My little league baseball coach? Coach. My horse and buggy? Coach.

They can't all be good jokes, people.

Most of my coaches were doing more than just teaching us kids how to choke up on a bat, how to steal a base or making us run laps before practice. They were mentoring us. They invested their time not only into practice and games, but they also invested their time in us. They made a personal connection. Along the way we learned how to be gracious winners, to learn from every loss, and how to mentally prepare for the game. Basically, they taught us life lessons that I am forever thankful for.

And this Spring the Coach Torch is being passed onto yours truly. I am going to coach my daughter's soccer team.

I will henceforth be known forever as Coach Bob.

To be honest, I'm really excited and also slightly terrified. OK, very terrified. What if I am a bad coach? What if the kids don't have fun?

I'm not really concerned about winning and losing - I just want the kids to have fun. Hopefully they get to experience some wins along the way. But I really want to instill in them that soccer is a great and fun sport. I played for 14 years and was lucky to play in the Lafayette area, which when I was growing up was filled with some of the best players in the state. My high school, Acadiana High, won the state championship twice while I was on the team. Our rival high school, Lafayette High, won a few years later. STM was also a great soccer school. I haven't kept up with which team won which year, but my point is that we had a lot of great players.

So hopefully all those guys that I played with are now coaching their own kids... which my team will then crush. Game on!

Today Betty and I took the kids to Academy to buy some soccer balls (pink for Annie, blue for Peter), shin guards and cleats. When I was young we also wore knee guards, but I guess kids today are too cool for that. I also got some orange cones, which will come in handy for soccer practices as well as for Halloween this year.

But Academy... wow, I was like a kid in a candy store! Just walking through the aisles filled with cleats, balls, and bats made me really excited about our kids playing sports. Betty had to literally drag me by the arm to get me to focus on getting cleats for Annie. I kept wandering off. "But Betty, maybe we'll need this 6x3 soccer goal in the near future...."

But the best piece of soccer equipment that I bought was my whistle.

I decided to test my whistle out on my kids. So when I walked into the house tonight, I blew the whistle and yelled for my family to line up. Even Betty got in line!

"When I blow this whistle, you will each pick up toys in the living room and put them in the appropriate place. Ready?" Whistle!

Dude! It worked! My house is spotless! My kids were listening so well, and I didn't know when the novelty would wear off, so I had to keep going.

"When I blow this whistle, you will put on your PJs." Tweeeet! My kids miraculously put on their PJs with no fussing.

"When I blow this whistle, you will go brush your teeth." Tweeeeeet! Teeth brushed!

My whistle is magic!

The only person who doesn't respond to my every whistle command is Betty. My next purchase might have to be a bullhorn.

I can't wait to become Coach Bob. I just hope that I can do even half of what my former coaches have done for me. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for all of the great people who shared your love of the game, your time and your energy with us when we were kids. I really appreciate it. And I hope that I make you proud as I make my own way into the coaching world.

Look at me... still trying to make my coaches proud!

Relearning How to be a Kid

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 03:32:00 +0000

One of my favorite things about being a parent is that I get to be a kid again. Sure, there are games to be played, dirt piles to be climbed and Disney movies to be watched, but being a kid is much more than that. It's living in the moment, having no inhibitions, and wearing your emotions on your sleeve at full throttle.

And it comes very unnaturally to an adult. Even I, whose maturity level topped out at around 4 years old, have found that I've had to relearn how to be a kid.

Kids don't have any inhibitions. If my kids hear music that makes them want to dance, they dance. And they don't do the jitterbug, the waltz, a line dance or whatever minimalist grinding goes for dancing with today's youth. They fling their arms out, kick their legs each way, and generally look like the Tazmanian Devil on speed. And they're so happy when they're dancing!

And me, being old and having had society beat me down, have to stop singing and nodding my head to the music at every red light. What have I become?

I'm happy to "act the fool" when I'm with my kids in public. If they want to dance, I'll dance! Screw the onlookers! If my kids want to sing, I'll sing! If they want to scale a rock wall, I'll scale that rock wall with them! And I don't think they're "acting like fools," as we adults like to say. But if an adult, on his or her own, just started dancing in the middle of a restaurant because a great song with a funky beat comes on, other people would think that person should go to the looney bin.

Basically, adults are boring. Why is it so fashionable and acceptable to be mundane?

My kids are amazing, and I love being with them. I love their energy. I love how they show their emotions so freely. And I especially love that they don't give a crap about what other people think of them right now, because the only people they have to worry about are me and Betty, and we think the world of them. And that makes me want to dance!

Dealing with Bullies

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 06:02:00 +0000

I'd like to take the day off of pretending to be funny and instead focus on something that's serious: bullying.

Getting bullied sucks. You get nervous, you start to avoid people and places, your social status can be affected... it can affect your school life, your social life, your home life, etc. Some kids have even killed themselves from being bullied. I've read one too many of those kinds of articles, so I thought I'd throw in my two cents on how to deal with bullies - because in general I don't think there's a lot of good advice going around on how to stop from being bullied.

First, let's talk about cyberbullying since that seems to be pretty common. Cyberbullying is when someone bullies you over email, text message, instant message, etc.

How to deal with cyberbullies:

Good: Just delete the emails, block the user on IM, etc.

Better: Set up a rule to send any emails from that person into your trash bin.

Best: Set up a rule to send those emails into a folder on your email to store as evidence for when you complain to the school or police. Set your Instant Messaging app to store conversations locally so that you can retrieve them. The bully is essentially giving you a paper trail that you can then use against him or her. Turn on full headers on your email to capture the IP address and all that other good stuff, so that the aggressor can never claim that you've spoofed their communications. And remember, if you or your parents send any mail to another parent or to the school referencing of these files, send it as a certified letter so that you've got proof that the recipient received the notice.

Basically, anyone who bullies you online is an idiot because they're just incriminating themselves.

On to regular bullies.

How to deal with school bullies:

Good: Telling your parents, teacher, guidance counselor, etc. Adults have gone through this before and generally know how to deal with it. They might not do anything that very moment, and might just wait and see how it all plays out, ie, letting you stick up for yourself (which is a good thing, by the way). But they'll keep an eye out for you.

Better: Ignore the bully. They just want attention. Don't show fear, don't run away (but walk away from any confrontation). Act casual. Bullies like to get a rise out of people, and if you don't let things bother you then usually they'll get bored.

Best: Stand up for yourself. Bullies generally pick on people because they are insecure, and it makes them feel better when they're making someone else feel like crap. So don't let yourself be bullied. Practice a few insults to hurl back at a dimwitted bully who instigates things, and don't be afraid to throw a punch or kick a guy in the nuts if you get pushed around. Just make sure that you're faster than whoever you're hitting.

Honorable mention: Humans are social creatures, so make as many friends with as many people as you can. That way, when a bully is picking on you, he or she now has to deal with you plus everyone else. And that means sticking up for your friends when they're bullied as well. Bullies will usually single out an individual, so you're better off with a group.

Also, let me say this: it's OK to be different. Most kids don't realize this until they're in college. Whatever is different about you sets you apart and makes you stand out. That's what people will find interesting about you. That's why we have different types of music, different TV shows, etc. We all don't like the same thing, and that's a good thing. The world would be a pretty terrible place if we were all exactly the same (unless we were all hot Brazilian bikini models - I'm sure that would be a pretty cool world).

How to deal with bullies on social media sites:

The eHow site has some good info on how to deal with bullies on Facebook, and shows you how to block another user, report offensive posts, etc. Here's another site with info on Facebook's anti-bullying tools.

Last but not least:

How to deal with bullies at work:

Congrats! You've made it out of school and into the real world! No more bullies, right?

Sadly, some bullies eventually make it into the workforce. But if they're dumb enough to harass you over email, and if it's repetitive and is disturbing your work, save the emails and forward them to your manager, that person's manager, and to HR. Usually the issues will get handled appropriately.

Plus, if you eventually attempt to leave the company due to being bullied and nobody doing anything about it, the company might either:

1. Fail because they've lost you as an asset, which is only good as long as you've sold all your stocks from your Employee Stock Purchase Plan and rolled your 401K over; or

2. Offer you more money to stay. You could also give the ultimatum that the bully is let go, sent to some kind of training, etc, in order to stay. More money, less hassles... it all depends on how you deal with it.

Not sure if anyone finds this helpful. Feel free to leave comments with more useful tips, advice, success stories, etc. Oh, and if you think you can leave a comment and bully me, think again - I'll be capturing your IP address and will track you down, sucka!

The Cake That Keeps On Giving

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 06:06:00 +0000

A few days ago I baked two cakes for Betty's birthday with help from my kids. Then I wrote a blog about it to show how wonderful a husband I am.

An unintended consequence of that blog post was that my dad decided to bake a cake for my mom. And since he doesn't have a blog, he decided to text pictures of it to me. One can only assume that he meant for me to post them to my blog, to show the world that not only am I a great husband, but that I am inspiring great husbands everywhere. Thanks, Pop!

So that's my dad's cake above. It looks pretty tasty. More importantly, it made my mom happy. Here's a picture of her being happy with the cake in the picture, so we can only assume it was the cake that made her happy and not some hilarious joke that my dad just told her.

Here's what I think the conversation was that led up to my dad baking a cake. We'll see how well I know my parents.

Mom: Oh Richard, come check out this cake Bobby baked Betty for her birthday! Wasn't that so sweet?

Dad: Humph! How hard is it to bake a cake? He just poured the batter into a pan and put it in the oven! Anyone could do it!

Editor's note: I'm sure my dad said this sarcastically, not realizing what would come next.

Mom: Oh yeah, Mr. Hot Shot? Then why don't you bake me a cake?

Dad: I will! Baby, I'll make you the biggest, chocolate-ist cake you've ever seen! And I'll make it have three layers since Bobby's cakes only had one!

I'll let my parents weigh in on whether or not I got that right. But I can definitely picture my parents having this conversation... right after they both agree that I am their favorite child and that they love me more than both my brother and sister combined. (Just kidding... they love us each equally. Except for my brother, I'm sure he's third on the list.)

Speaking of my brother, he's now the only Tanory male to not bake a cake for his wife. You're on notice now, Bro!

Happy Birthday to Betty!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 06:21:00 +0000

Happy birthday to my beautiful wife, Betty!

My kids and I made Betty a cake for her birthday. It was my first time ever baking a cake on my own. And by "on my own" I mean with limited (read: lots of) help from Betty. I also watched a couple hours worth of YouTube videos showing me how to ice cakes.

My daughter was extremely helpful by pointing out all the things I was doing wrong, and then running to tell Betty about how awful I was doing. But she meant well, so she still go to eat some icing when it was all said and done.

I made two cakes - a circle cake and a heart-shaped cake. I thought I was being fancy by making two cakes out of a single box of cake batter, but apparently that's what you're supposed to do. My circle cake could have gone a couple of minutes longer, but I didn't realize that until I leveled it and found a small semi-gooey center. I thought I was going to have to start all over with it, but we tasted some of the parts that I had cut off and it was good, so Betty just cut out the center and replaced it with a cupcake.

The lesson here is to always undercook your cakes, kids.

Next came the fun part: icing the cake. Betty got out all the ingredients for me to make our own icing while I wrapped my head around the fact that Crisco looks like a blob of white butter. We mixed some red food coloring in with our confectioner's sugar, Crisco, water and almond extract to make a nice pink icing, and then my daughter Annie helped me ice the cakes. Her way of helping me ice the cakes was to attempt to eat all of my icing, thereby making me be more creative with whatever icing was left.

YouTube taught me how to make flowers out of icing by using a 2D tip and an icing bag, so I used my newfound skillz to flowerize both cakes. Then I mixed some blue icing in with the leftover pink icing and made a nice lavender color. This was a gamble, because things could have gone one of two ways: 1) it would either look great on the pink cake, or 2) it would look hideous and then Annie and I would have to eat all of the icing in order to hide the evidence. Luckily for my diet, the lavender came out well, so I piped that shizzle onto the cakes.

I thought the heart cake came out great. I'm going to give this one to Betty, and she can eat it alone just like our kids ate their own cakes at their birthday parties. Why not? It's fun to act like a kid, and why should we stop acting like kids now just because we're a year older?

I didn't space my letters out great on the circle cake, but I think it still came out OK. Next time I'll use molds that mark the letters in the icing as a guide instead of free-handing it.

Betty was excited when she saw the finished product. She had just finished bathing our son Peter, and he looked as hungry as a little tiger cub when he saw the cakes. Although he had just gotten a bath, he was soon covered in pink and purple icing and needed another good scrubbing.

As for me, I'm now a Cake Master... well, maybe a Cake Master's Apprentice. I think I want to follow in Duff's footsteps from Charm City Cakes, and bring my own attitude to cake baking. I'm thinking I'm going to thug out my cakes, like so:

Or maybe just stand by them and look pretty, like so:

Or maybe I'll practice a few more cakes before I let it go to my head. All I know is that it was a lot of fun, and I really hope Betty and the kids like the cake. I really enjoyed baking it for Betty. It also made me more appreciative of all the times that Betty makes us something special for our birthdays - or on just a regular day, since she always makes our day more special.

Happy birthday, Beebles! I love you!

The Dirty South

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 06:26:00 +0000

The term "Dirty South" may have originated as a rap term, but I think that Louisiana is really beginning to look like the actual Dirty South. It's generally a filthy place. You can't drive a tenth of a mile anywhere down here without seeing garbage flung around everywhere. It's as if our citizens don't have trash cans or are not smart enough to use them. It's disgusting and frankly I'm sick of it.

Betty and I like to travel, and we've been to some pretty great places: Manhattan, San Francisco, Napa / Sonoma, DC, Seattle, Charleston... and the one thing all of those places had in common was that they were spotless. The people there actually took care of the land. People thought twice before chunking a glass bottle out their car window into someone's yard. (I saw that happen down here just the other day.) Even Houston is pretty decent in regards to litter.

While in Charleston, I took a picture of the only piece of garbage that I found. That's how rare it was.

On the bright side, I was able to enter the code from that Coke bottle into my My Coke Rewards account. Jackpot!

Every so often our law enforcement officers will have a heightened litter awareness weekend. That's good and all, and very much appreciated. I know our law officers are busy. But I think what we truly need is better littering laws and a means to enforce them.

Here's a simplification of Louisiana's littering law (LSA-R.S. 30:2531), courtesy of NCSL.org:

Louisiana distinguishes between intentional and simple littering. First conviction for intentional littering: fine of $250 and eight hours of community service in a litter abatement work program; second conviction: $500 and sixteen hours; third or subsequent conviction: $1250, eighty hours, and one year suspension of driver's license.

First conviction for simple littering: $75 or eight hours of community; second or subsequent conviction: $500 or sixteen hours of community service. Those convicted under the statute must also pay for or repair any damages to the property and pay all reasonable investigative costs.

Let's be honest: if we had even the minimum $75 fine for just one in every 100 pieces of garbage out on the median of Airline Highway in Baton Rouge, Louisiana would be the richest state in the Union.

Here's what I propose:

1. We use the cameras at the red lights that capture speeders and people who run red lights, and use some of their power for catching people who litter. Sure, the range of littering that we could capture is limited, but it's a start.

2. You know those bums who are always asking for money at the corner of Airline and Sherwood? I saw one guy who was limping along on crutches, holding a sign asking for money, generally looking pathetic... until a cop told him to move. The guy literally picked up his crutches and ran off to the other side of the road. It was all a scam. BUT, since he's out there all day anyway, why not give him a real job and let him pick up trash off the side of the road? I'm not trying to say that there aren't homeless people who truly need help - I feel for them. It's just that once you see a guy who pretends like he can barely walk on crutches just to fleece you, only to get up and run from a cop (Forrest Gump-style), you start to wonder how well he'd do picking up Coke cans, milk cartons and the happy meals that people launch out their cars.

3. Outlaw smoking. Why is it not illegal to throw a cigarette butt on the ground? I think it should be legal to kick a person in the butt for however many cigarette butts you see them toss to the ground. This program could be called "Butts for butts." And if they're smoking menthols or Marlboro Reds, you should get to kick them twice.

4. Use shame as a deterrent. It used to be that when someone did something wrong, their name and picture appeared in the paper. I don't read the paper anymore so I don't know if that's still true. I doubt it is. I think nowadays they only show reality TV stars, Obama and whatever GOP candidate is leading the race this week in the news. But we should have a page devoted to people who litter that also states what they threw out. I bet that would deter people from throwing out the more bizarre items (or maybe it would just increase it after a while - who knows). It could also be like the "Want Ads" but flipped to be the "Do Not Want Ads" - instead of trying to find a job at a business advertising in the paper, a business could "hire" you for however long you're serving community service and make you do the jobs that nobody else wants to do, like clean toilets, clean sewage facilities, and manually collect sperm samples from horses. And finally...

5. The Department of Wildlife and Fisheries patrols for litterers, and they seriously need to up their game. According to their website, they issued 1,001 citations for littering for the 2009-2010 year. Seriously? I think there are 1,001 pieces of garbage on the grass from my house to my workplace. They do have the Litter Bug number (1-888-LITRBUG or 1-888-548-7284) that you can call toll free to report litterers, but I think they need a Facebook page or something so that we can snap pictures with our phones and then upload it to their website - preferably anonymously (unless there's a reward).

Realistically, the only people who are going to do anything about this are you and me. And I'm probably not going to call the Litter Bug hotline... instead, I'm going to write the license plate number down of whoever I see littering, find out where they live, and then haul a dumpster over to their house. Let them live in filth and see how they like it.

Party Gras!

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 05:29:00 +0000

Mardi Gras is my favorite holiday. What's not to love? You get to dress up, wander around New Orleans dressed up as a pirate or a flashing cow, drink heavily, eat Popeye's and king cake, and at the end of the day you have a big pile of beads (and, occasionally, herpes).

It's like everyone's favorite things all wrapped into one holiday!

But ever since Betty and I had kids, Mardi Gras has become extra fun... because we get to use our kids as props to get more beads. We still dress up, but now we're more like extensions of their costumes.

And it all starts with Betty.

She's the brains behind any operation dealing with the Tanory clan. I generally just write about stuff - but she's the one who thinks of it in the first place.

This year we went to Mardi Gras as characters from Peter Pan. My son, Peter, was Peter Pan (naturally). My daughter Anne was Tinkerbell. Betty was Wendy, her dad was Mr. Smee, her mom was the crocodile, and I was Captain Hook.

I should say that I was one of two Captain Hooks. Betty's cousin Julie dressed up as Izzy from Jake and the Never Land Pirates, and her son dressed up as a much better looking Captain Hook than I did.

I'm not too old to admit that I was jealous of his outfit.

We usually hang out on the neutral ground side of St. Charles near Napoleon or General Pershing. The good thing about that place is that there's a school - I think it's Sacred Heart - that's right behind us, and they have dozens of port-o-potties. $1 gets you a fast pass to the port-o-lets, and $5 gets you an all-day pass. This was the first year that I didn't have to use the restrooms a single time at Mardi Gras, but I'd like to take this time to apologize to the people standing in front of me - I think I ruined your tarp. When in New Orleans, right?

Thanks, New Orleans, for another great Mardi Gras! Or as we called it in Pirate talk, Maaaardi Graaaaaas! See you next year! By the way, my suggestion for next year's family theme is to make t-shirts that just say, "Boobies!" and then flash our shirts to random strangers. Why not? It's New Orleans!

Does Marvel Comics Hate Science?

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 04:53:00 +0000

I love comic books. I love reading them, I love movies based on comic books and graphic novels, and I love pretending to be Wolverine when my hair gets really long.

But I also love science. And that's why I'm disappointed that apparently Marvel Comics hates science even more than it hates logical story lines.

Let's look at the facts, shall we? For starters, nearly every super-villain got his or her powers as the result of some scientific experiment.

Dr. Doom built a machine to project the astral form of a person into another dimension, but it exploded in his face. Magneto wears a helmet that protects him from Professor X's psychic powers, so he's free to go rearranging all of your magnetic letters on your fridge at will. Norman Osborn ran Osborn Industries, which created chemicals and robotics, and he became the the first Green Goblin after he injected himself with a serum his company developed. Sabretooth was a product of the Weapon X Program.

And all of those guys were dicks. Thanks a lot, Science.

But you're probably thinking (if you're in nerd-mode like me), didn't many superheroes get their powers from scientific experiments gone awry as well?

Yes: Bruce Banner became the Hulk due to his exposure to gamma rays while testing an experimental gamma bomb at a nuclear facility. And the Hulk is always angry. You wouldn't like him when he's angry, by the way. Reed Richards became Mr. Fantastic due to something dealing with aliens - I don't know, it's really complicated, even for the comics. Plus you've got to be pretty arrogant to call yourself "Mr. Fantastic." (Although, if he had so chosen, he could have been called Dr. Fantastic.) Peter Parker becomes Spider-man after a radioactive spider bites him. Who would radiate a spider, anyway? Probably some ass-clown scientist, that's who. And Wolverine was also a byproduct of Weapon X, although to be fair, he was already pretty awesome before he joined Weapon X.

If we've learned anything from the comic book movies, it's that being a superhero is tough work. When everything is going well then everyone loves you, but when you don't stop every little super-villain from destroying city hall, everyone's on your case. Plus your loved ones get targeted and kidnapped by the bad guys, you can never stop to go to the bathroom for fear of someone needing your help, and you've always got to wear your spandex superhero costume under your regular work clothes.

Basically, being a superhero sucks. You know what all those superheroes are thinking: Thanks a lot, Science, for making us into superheroes.

There are a lot of aliens and galactic beings in the comics as well. All of these are basically there to tell you to not go into outer space. And even some of these galactic beings, such as Galactus, were scientists on their home planets.

I was about to say that I would never again be interested in science knowing now that it's so harmful to our lives, and could either turn us into super-villains or superheroes (and thus have to save people from super-villains all day), but then I got a look at some of the female superheroes and decided that maybe science is OK after all.

Thanks, Science!

The Symbology of Peter Pan

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 13:56:00 +0000

I love watching Peter Pan with my kids. I especially love the music that comes on whenever the crocodile appears. Tick, tock, tick, tock!

But is something else going on, maybe on a deeper level, with Peter Pan? I think so, only I've just realized it after having watched the Disney cartoon several hundred times with my kids.

Let's look at Peter Pan's name, specifically the "Pan" part. In Greek religion and mythology, Pan is the god of the wild, shepherds and flocks, nature, of mountain wilds, hunting and rustic music, as well as the companion of the nymphs. Does that sound familiar?

Peter Pan is sort of godlike in the fact that he can fly, never grows up, and can travel between the stars (well, at least from Earth back to Neverland). He plays a flute called a "pan flute" (also known as a pan pipe). He hangs out with nymphs - clearly Tinkerbell is a nymph if I've ever seen one, and I've looked at enough softcore Japanese anime to know a nymph when I've seen one. He wears all green, which is associated with nature. Pan is always characterized by being a lady's man (er, goat?), and Peter Pan loves the mermaids hanging out at Mermaid Lagoon. He's sort of like a shepherd to the Lost Boys, always keeping them together.

If Peter Pan indicates Pan, then who is everyone else?

For starts, I think Captain Hook could represent the devil. Hook is definitely evil. He's always trying to kill Peter Pan and the Lost Boys, and this is probably symbolic of trying to take a child's innocence. Hook dresses all in red, smokes, and has a mustache that ends in two sharp points, possibly indicating the horns of the devil or even a forked tongue. Hook only has one hand, which may indicate that he's not whole. Luckily for Peter Pan and the Lost Boys, Hook is surrounded by bumbling idiots. Hook is a pirate so is always on the sea, although it could easily be a lake of fire if we stretch this analogy out far enough.

And sure, I get that Captain Hook also symbolizes adulthood, and also that Captain Hook is the Neverland counterpart to Wendy's dad. The same actor even usually portrays both Wendy's dad and Captain Hook, even in the Disney movie. So maybe Wendy has daddy issues.

So Peter Pan is Pan, Captain Hook is the Devil, Tinkerbell is a sexy nymph... who is everyone else?

Wendy, although just a child who is about to be kicked out of the nursery by her father during the events of the movie, may represent the Earth Mother or Mother Goddess. After all, Peter Pan wants her to be a mom to all of the Lost Boys. And naturally enough (being nature spirit-ly and all that), she chooses to go back home and grow old.

Let's say that I'm grasping at straws here. Maybe it's nothing more than Peter Pan represents childhood and Captain Hook represents adulthood, and Wendy and her brothers are just caught in between. I think I'll have to do more research in order to really find out. So, I guess I'll go look at some more softcore Japanese anime and try to determine if I'm right. Wish me luck!

Proof That Every Idea Has Already Been Thought Of

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 05:23:00 +0000

There's a theory that every idea that could ever be possibly thought up already has been thought up by someone else. And in an effort to do something worthwhile, I decided to test this theory by thinking up horrible puns, and then determining if someone has already created one or more web pages about them.

Because, you know, if there's no web page dedicated to it then there's no proof that anybody actually thought about it.

I tried to think up something simple, something that everyone recognizes and then add a little twist to it. So I thought of how a golf ball has dimples. I decided to draw a golf ball, magnified so you can see the dimples, and then write something under it that says, "I love your dimples!" or "Dimples are cute!"

But it's been done.

My second idea was to have a salt shaker sitting next to a battery (preferably a C or a D, since they're thicker), with the words, "A Salt and Battery" under them. But that's been done, too.

I thought of a pack of Life Savers candy being actual life guards, and saving someone's life, and then that person looking up at the Life Savers candy and saying, "Thanks, man! You're a life-saver!" And although I didn't find that exactly, I did find a website that not only has anthropomorphic pictures of Life Savers dressed as people, but also explains how and why Life Savers give off a spark when you chew them (in case you didn't know).

I know these puns are awful, but I'm determined to think up even worse puns and then search for them online. If I find any, I'll let you know. But not before I make a website about them so that everyone else knows that it's already been done.

Super Bowl Super Foods

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 04:08:00 +0000

We decided to make Super Foods for the Super Bowl. And what's more super than pizza?

After all, New York is known for its pizzas, and I was pulling for the New York Giants because Victor Cruz and Jake Ballard were on my fantasy football team this year and they both play for the Giants. (Ben-Jarvis Green-Ellis - RB for the Pats - was also on my fantasy team, but he didn't give me as many points as Cruz and Ballard.)

Here's how you can make your own Super Pizzas:

Step 1. Get your wife to buy all of the ingredients for you ahead of time. You don't want to be stuck "making groceries" (as we say in South Louisiana, for no reason whatsoever other than it's funny) the day of the game.

Step 2. Get your wife to take out all of the ingredients for you. Also have her preheat the oven to the correct temperature.

You can optionally do these first two steps yourself. I'm basically not capable of doing this myself, and my wife knows this so she just handles it for me.

Step 3. Make the dough in advance. We used yeast from a California Pizza Kitchen package. We chose California Pizza Kitchen in order to make our pizza non-biased towards any particular football team, even though I was pulling for the Giants.

I was in charge of making dough for our pizza, and I screwed up royally: I used a whole cup of water instead of a half cup of water when mixing in the yeast. When I poured my water into the rest of the flour and mixed it in, it was all watery. The end result? We had to add more flour and yeast, which resulted in more dough, which resulted in MORE PIZZA.

See how I turned this tragedy into an inspiring story of perseverance? I'm like the Rudy of pizza.

After you've made your dough, put it in a bowl greased with Extra Virgin Olive Oil. We don't want that skank olive oil that's been all over the neighborhood - we want the Extra Virgin kind. We have to eat this thing, after all. Let the dough sit in the fridge for two hours, then "punch" it down (while insulting its mother), then put it back in the fridge again until it's time to use it.

Step 4. Roll out the dough for your pizza. Alternative name for this step: Make a gigantic mess in your kitchen.

This step is the most fun, because this is where you get to use a big roller. Holding a roller is a very manly thing to do. Think about it: If anyone comes by you while you're cooking, you can always bonk them on the head; or, if you prefer, you can simulate sex acts with it. Either way, both activities are what is to be expected from a male making pizza in his own kitchen.

Just be warned: your wife is equally capable of assaulting you with the roller. Stay at least six feet away while she's working, especially if she's helping you with your pizza because you are, like me, completely incapable of doing it yourself.

Because Betty fixed my watery dough by adding more flour, we had extra dough. That meant we could make extra pizzas. We decided to make some mini pizza pockets. They started out like this:

We just cut the dough into football-ish shapes, put some pizza sauce down, sprinkled on a few miniature peps, then added a dash of cheese. Then we covered the whole thing with another layer of dough. You can use a fork to make little bird's feet (as I call them) in the dough, to keep the top and bottom together. Here's what the insides looked like before we cooked them:

And here's what they looked like when they were finished:

Dip those tasty pigskins in pizza sauce and you've got yourself a party snack that both tastes great and can also be thrown in a spiral!

Step 5. Put the pizza in the oven for 10 minutes, then eat it. Most cookbooks leave off the part about eating it, but we here at the Tantrum have your back!

OK, so I said that we had more pizza dough due to my miscalculation with the yeasty water. It's true. We had enough dough to make three pizzas, so that's what we did. Our first pizza was in the form of pizza pockets, as shown above. The second pizza was a giant football.

Here's a "Before" picture, to show you what we were going for:

And here's our "After" picture:

Close enough for us!

In between was basically a lot of me asking Betty how to do stuff. Like, should I have put the Pam cooking spray on the pan before putting the dough on it? (Yes, she sighed, as she fixed my mistake for me.) Should I put the pizza on the top or bottom rack? (Bottom, she sighs, as she fixes my mistake for me.) Oh, I forgot to set the timer, can you check the pizza for me? (Yes, she sighs, as she handles this for me.) I asked another thousand questions, but can't remember them all, otherwise I would list them here. I was pretty pathetic about the whole thing.

Our third Super Food pizza was a pepperoni pizza with bacon. We had eaten grits earlier in the day, and Betty and I like to add torn up bacon to our grits. I made an insane amount of bacon, but my kids ate it all. I didn't mind because I was happy to see them eating at least something, but I was in the mood for bacon all day. And since Betty denied my request to smother her with bacon later in the evening, I had to go with bacon on my pizza.

For dessert we had strawberries and chocolate. If you're wondering, yes, Betty also denied my request to smother her with this later in the evening. (I wanted to make a life-sized chocolate statue - what were you thinking???)

The best part about making pizzas today was the quality time with my family. Betty helped me every step of the way, my kids helped to pour in all of the ingredients and mix everything in, and my parents helped to eat it while keeping the kids entertained.

As for me... well, we made three pizzas today and couldn't eat them all. But writing about them has made me hungry. So I guess it's off to have a late night snack! And the next time I make homemade pizzas, I'll need to remember to add that extra half cup of water to the yeast!

From the Mouth of Babies

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 04:04:00 +0000

Some of my family's most beloved sayings, phrases and names come from babies.

For example, we all call my grandmother "GaGa" (or Gaga if you prefer) because that's what my oldest cousin, Jeremy, called her when he was a baby. I always called her Gaga, until I felt I was too old for that (like 15-ish), and started calling her Grandma. She pulled me aside and said, "You know, Bobby, I really like it when you call me Gaga. That's what everyone knows me as."

So be it! I never again called her anything but Gaga. She was the original Lady Gaga, by the way.

My family calls donuts "do-buts" because that's what my cousin Jackie called them one time. She was really young - probably 3 or 4, around my daughter's age. I was pretty young then too so I didn't realize how big of a deal this was. As in, I didn't realize that everyone in my entire extended family would still be calling them do-buts to this day. (We sure do!)

So what's the point of all of this? Well, my son can't say "blueberries," so instead he calls them "bootahs." So now we all call them bootahs.

"Want some blueberries, Peter?" Mommy will ask.

"No!" Peter will scream, as he flings other food off his high char.

"Want some bootahs, Peter?" Mommy will ask again, sweetly.

"BOOTAHS!"

There you have it. Gaga, do-buts, bootahs. You're all now one step closer to being Tanorys. All it takes is getting the lingo down as well as growing out your unibrows.

New Levels of Nerdom

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 05:12:00 +0000

I have risen to new heights in nerdom this month. And you know what? I'm not ashamed of it.

Well, not yet anyway.

My first uber-nerdy thing was to get a strap for my glasses. My glasses keep almost falling off my face any time I look down, and my kids love to pull at them. So I asked Santa for a strap for my glasses, and he delivered.

I wore my strap at work for a month without anyone noticing it, because I had gone my usual three months without a haircut and was starting to look like I was a hobo. But once I got my hair cut, it became obvious that something was holding my glasses to my face, and I got a lot of comments on it.

Most of the comments were, "Uh... is that a strap on your glasses?" and "Uh... are you coming back from playing racquetball or something?" My answer to both was, "Yes."

The strap is not as obvious from the side...

But is much more obvious from the back. Although, let's be honest, if you're walking behind me then you're probably checking out my ass.

The other nerdy thing I've started doing is watching Battlestar Galactica. Well, actually, that's not really the nerdy part. I mean, sure, that's somewhat nerdy, but what I'm really watching is Caprica, the prequel to Battlestar Galactica. I haven't even started watching Battlestar Galactica yet and don't even know if I'll like it, but I'm investing 15 hours into watching the prequel on NetFlix. Caprica was even cancelled, but I don't care - I'm just that nerdy right now.

Finally, my last act of Nerdom was finishing Anathem by Neal Stephenson. Stephenson is one of my favorite authors, and I'm not really calling him or the book nerdy. But, there's a lot of math, physics and theology in Stephenson's work, and for the past few weeks I've been looking over some old geometry equations, reading about geodesics, etc. All inspired by Anathem. It was one of the most amazing books that I've read in a long time, and it's helped me catch up on all the geometrical calculations for triangles.

Betty was involved with both my glasses strap and my book, so I have to give her credit for my uber-nerdiness this month. And that's one of the things that I love about her: she gets me. Not only does she get me, but she encourages it and loves me for it.

Now if I could just get her into one of those Princess Leia slave outfits, then my nerdiness will be complete!

Rocking Out With Elmo

noreply@blogger.com (Bobby) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 06:24:00 +0000

My son, Peter, is in an Elmo stage right now. He's also in a Mickey Mouse stage, although he calls Mickey "Hot Dog" because they do the Hot Dog dance at the end of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. He also likes Abby Cadabby from Sesame Street, but I'll venture that it's because she's magic and not because she's a hot little muppet.

And although I like watching Mickey Mouse and Elmo, I'd rather do other things, like listen to music and play on the computer.

So I came up with a grand plan: I've combined my love for computers and music with Peter's love for Mickey and Muppets, and whenever Peter gets upset now, we watch Elmo videos on YouTube. But not just any videos - music videos!

We started off with Elmo's Song. Peter likes that one a lot. And who can blame him? It's so catchy!

Then, to be educational, we start on our ABC's. I particularly like The Alphabet With Elmo and India Arie. I've never really listened to India Arie before, but she rocks the crap out of her ABCs. I also like ABC Hip Hop with Miles. I don't know if Miles is a singer or just a regular dude, but I've been humming his rendition of the ABCs all day, and I love it.

If Peter hasn't completely calmed down then we start counting. I happen to like that Feist song "1, 2, 3, 4," and now Peter likes it - but he likes the Sesame Street version.

Then, if Peter's either sitting quietly or still upset (doesn't matter what the excuse is), we'll watch other Sesame Street clips with some of Daddy's favorite actors, like Adam Sandler and Joel McHale.

I don't like the Black Eyed Peas, but I like Will.i.am, and he has a great song on Sesame Street's YouTube channel called What I Am.

And don't worry, it's not like all we do is watch TV and music videos with Peter. We also do manly things, like play ball (in and outside of the house), chase skirts (literally - we throw the laundry around and then chase it), and hurl insults at the Teletubbies. Gotta teach our children right!