An Ode to My the Adhesives in My Life

Glue-All? ALL? EVERYTHING?

This week the carpet in the hallway near my work area is being replaced, and the new flooring consists of large patterned squares that needed to be glued to the floor.

My co-workers in other areas of the building have asked me, jokingly (I hope), "Have you gotten high off the smell?"

I've never been a huffer, though there have been certain aromas that are both toxic and alluring, including:

• Sharpies
• Dry-erase markers
• Gasoline
• The leather jacket my high school girlfriend wore during our first date, to see the Bill Murray movie Scrooged
• The orange-infused cleaner I would employ to sanitize the restrooms during my high school janitorial job

I could have (and, due to the boredom I was experiencing today, should have) gotten high off the carpet glue, but there was one problem: the smell was loathsome.

But as the fumes started to destroy my brain cells, my memory was also prodded to recall various glues that I've used throughout my life.

That sounds like an exciting blog topic, right? Read on!

The End of My Token Friendship

And where an adult can be a bankrupt adult.

I've been in a casual relationship for about five years — and this was after a break of about 20 years. Like most relationships I've had, sometimes I hated it, and sometimes I was thankful for it. Other times, I didn't think about it.

But now I'm aware that it's going to be over very soon. It won't end with any speeches, nor will it end abruptly; it will, like some relationships I've had, just fade away.

I'm talking about my relationship with Chuck E. Cheese.

A BIT OF NOT-SO-BRIEF BACKGROUND

I was a big video game fan, so when a Chuck E. Cheese arcade opened in my town while I was in sixth grade, it was the equivalent of putting a liquor store within walking distance of my house today. Or, for some of the kids in my sixth grade class, it was like putting in a liquor store.

Back then...

Broken Homes

I wish.

The kids are spending a month at Camp Grandma in Florida for the second consecutive year.

I have some plans to execute during their absence. Fortunately, these plans do not include painting, a chore that almost resulted in my corpse rotting in an empty house for several days.

The wife took a one-day trip to visit her old camp upstate, so I had the house to myself. Instead of getting drunk on the couch while running over GTA IV pedestrians in a car that I would never be able to afford in real life, I chose to knock off a couple of items from the to-do list.

The first job was to disassemble and then drag to the curb select pieces from our eclectic collection of backyard playground amusements.

A Clean Basement Can Be a Sad Basement

Lots of memories in that bag.

This is one of those posts where you'd read something sappy like: "I threw out their old toys, but I didn't throw out the memories."

Though I'm loath to write things like that (I'm also loath to use the word loath), I do believe that I feel the pangs of sentimental nostalgia as much as — if not more than — the average person.

Anyway. This week I attempted my latest basement cleanup, a task that often feels as Sisyphean as sweeping a dirt floor.

My basement floors are Pergo, not dirt, at least, but I had plenty of work ahead of me. For the past year we've allowed the kids to sleep in the basement on the weekend — mainly so they'll leave us alone (note: they don't always leave us alone, regardless) — and I've been too lazy to deflate the air mattresses every Monday, since they have to be inflated again on Friday night.

The inflated mattresses consume about 90 percent of the space that's not already covered with furniture (not counting the basement office, which is a Black Hole of Calcutta in its own right), so for a long time the area has built up a considerable amount of detritus that anthropologists classify as "crap."

No, Really, YOU Go First

It gives me a headache.

I've been thinking about my last post, which was like a hundred years ago, in which I discussed the chaos that occurred when I tried to play a simple (but in reality, not so simple) game of Sorry! with my kids and they fought over who was going to be red, or maybe it was blue, or whatever.

I forgot to add this tidbit: once we're able sort out which color each player is going to be and repair the broken furniture, a new battle begins over who goes first. As I type this, I realize I could possibly achieve harmony if, for instance, Son chose the color and Daughter got to go first, like how they decide who gets the ball and which side of the field to start a football game.

It's a solution worthy of the wisdom of King Solomon! But I also know that both children will want to pick the color, or vice versa, and like King Solomon, I'll want to pull out a sword and just split the game in two.

The point of this story, to paraphrase the tagline to Alien vs. Predator: whoever wins, I lose.

Who's SORRY Now?

There is no forgiveness.

Because my children are now 5 and 7 years old, Mrs. The Anthony Show and I felt it was time to supplement their collection of board games.

Last year we bought our son (the older one) Battleship and Trouble, and this year we picked up Sorry! and Stratego. Both of these new games reacquainted me with old memories passing lazy summer days with neighborhood friends, gathered 'round a board game on a picnic table or stoop or garage floor.

It also reminded me that young siblings can be major pains in the ass — to themselves, and, more importantly, to me.

I Hope This Father/Son Activity Will CATCH ON

When he turns 7, I'll show him
how to hook up with cougars.

This weekend I experienced a father/son milestone: having a catch for the first time.

That's not to say Son and I haven't thrown things at each other in the past, but Saturday was the first time we had an official grab-the-glove, go-to-the-park, toss-the-ball-around event.

I wasn't the kind of dad-to-be who already picked out a glove and bat even before the kid was born, though watching some of Son's fellow 6-year-olds throw and hit like they're already ready to be scouted, I wonder whether I should have been reading up on how to adjust the kid's in utero pitching mechanics.

We went to this cozy, newly renovated park that contained a small playground area and a full-size little league field, with fresh grass and lines and everything. Son, who is on a little league team, wanted to take some practice swings, but

• We had only one ball
• He doesn't hit pitched balls very well yet

These two factors would create a situation with this formula...