Don’t put anything past bone-breaking younger siblings

As a young boy of 3 or so, I broke my left wrist. According to my mother, I was climbing on the back of the couch and fell off. According to me, my younger sister, a newborn at the time, pushed me off. I’ll continue to use my version, despite its unlikeliness, as it comforts me to think my sister was messing with my life right from the get-go of hers.

I’ve managed to avoid my sister’s bone-breaking ways for the past 35 years, despite some of her best efforts during childhood. My fortune may have come to an end earlier this week, because while watering plants around my home, I tripped over the base to my son’s basketball hoop as I walked backwards to straighten out a garden house. To break the fall, I used my left wrist and in turn may have fractured a bone near my thumb.

I’m using the word “may” because the fracture that could be there can’t be detected by x-rays immediately. I’ll have to wait another week to find out if it’s broken. I was told, “If it still hurts, it’s broke.”

My wife’s cousin, an athletic trainer, put it in better terms:

“That lovely bone that takes a week to show up on x-rays happens to be the scaphoid bone. Which is located in the snuffbox, which is found on the radial dorsal aspect of hand. This fracture is usually the result of falling on an outstretched hand, or as we athletic trainers love to call it the FOOSH! Very common injury in such sports as: basketball, baseball, football and softball. Or in Scott’s case, tripping over basketball hoop and bracing the fall with an outstretched hand. Which one usually learns soon after bracing a fall with hands is not a good idea in most cases.”

I didn’t mean to trip over the basketball hoop. In fact, I may argue my sister moved it on me. She secretly came to my house from Ripon, moved it a few feet away from its normal location, and then patiently waited for me to walk backwards at that location.

And as I tripped, she knew my reflexes would cause me to use my left hand to break my fall, and then she could finish what she started nearly 35 years ago: damnation to my left wrist/hand/thumb.

Anyone with younger siblings probably understands this. They were put on this earth to mess with our lives.

My son, the owner of the basketball hoop my sister secretly moved on me, will soon understand this, too. His baby brother, born almost two weeks ago, hasn’t done anything to ruin his life, yet. But I’m guessing the baby will be blamed for something pretty quickly.

When that happens, I’ll have to tell him about my sister’s evil ways, just as his mother will tell him about her younger sisters’ malicious attempts to ruin her life. We older siblings all have to stick together.

****

Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, July 27, 2012.

Early and small, second child does well thanks to many caring people

In last Friday’s paper, I talked about the trouble my wife, Jenny, and I were having in coming up with a name for our son, who was due to arrive Aug. 23. I asked readers for suggestions, hoping someone might offer one we’d like and use. I thought we had a little time to get some suggestions. Boy, was I wrong.

Declan James Steuck arrived in the later evening hours of Saturday, July 14, almost six weeks early and weighing 4 lbs., 3 oz., which is just a little more than half the weight of our other son, Braden, when he was born seven years ago.

He’s early and small, but we’re thankful he’s alive. If he remained in his mother much longer, I probably wouldn’t be writing about a joyous event in our lives.

Declan’s journey to his birth began Friday night when Jenny mentioned to me that he didn’t seem like he was being very active, something he’d been for quite some time. As time passed, his mother’s observation turned into worry, which turned into insomnia. She stayed awake half the night, playing solitaire on the computer and looking up information about babies not moving during pregnancy.

The next morning she asked me if she should call the doctor, sort of afraid the doctor might think she’s foolishly worrying about something she shouldn’t worry about. I told her the doctor won’t think that, and if it makes her worry less, she should call.

When she called, a nurse told her to eat or drink something with some sugar, as this might jumpstart the baby. I thought her advice was perfect, as I’ve seen sugar’s effect on Braden.

An hour after drinking a sugary latte from McDonald’s to no results, we went into Ministry St. Michael’s Hospital. Nurse Bette, looking at Jenny, found the baby’s heartbeat, making it appear as though we were needlessly worrying about a healthy baby. But after monitoring my wife for a while, Bette determined the heartbeat was in sync with my wife’s heartbeat, which was cause for concern.

After conducting an ultrasound, Dr. Pavel Petkov determined Jenny needed to stay for a while and the baby needed to be monitored. It was at this time we realized our household may be getting larger sooner than we had expected.

Hours later, after watching the baby’s heart rate, he told us they would induce labor on Sunday, and if the stress was too much for the baby, they would take it by cesarean section.

A few hours later, at 10:15 p.m., he said they weren’t going to wait and they weren’t going to put the baby through the stress of a delivery. He needed to come out, Dr. Petkov said. The delivery team was being assembled, he said, and would be ready in half an hour. I wonder if The Avengers could be ready that quickly during a comic-book world emergency.

While Jenny was being prepared for the surgery, I waited in the hallway, suited up for the delivery room. Jenny’s mom arrived at this time, and she told me how she got pulled over in Plainfield going 70 miles an hour in a 35 mph zone. She dumped the contents of the purse on her car seat when the officer asked for her license, which was cause enough to let her go with a verbal warning. It’s probably the only time anyone I know will get off going double the speed limit.

I’m not someone who likes anything surgical. I once passed out in a hospital visiting my grandfather when he showed me x-rays of his heart surgery. I also nearly passed out several years ago when doctors were preparing Jenny for a surgery to have an ovary removed. Last year when I was being prepared for a colonoscopy, I nearly passed out.

The delivery room was no exception. While I held Jenny’s hand during the caesarian, I had to be wheeled out after I started getting light headed. All had started well, as the doctors and nurses in the delivery room enjoyed my telling about her mother’s speeding exploits, but when Jenny said them “pulling” her innards kind of hurt, all the blood went out of my head. I kept thinking about the last scene in “Braveheart” where William Wallace was vivisected.

Outside the delivery room, I drank juice and talked to my mother-in-law, which allowed the blood to return to my head, and when I heard Declan’s little kitten-like cry, I was quickly back in the delivery room.

He was crying and looked healthy, albeit smaller than all the babies I’ve ever handled. Dr. Ralph Locher, the pediatrician who came in for the delivery, said he looked healthy, despite being so early. In attempting to take a photo, I started to get light-headed again and had to be wheeled away a second time.

After recovering and after the doctors and nurses finished with Jenny, we had an opportunity to see little Declan for a few minutes before he was taken to the Marshfield Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at Ministry St. Joseph’s Hospital, for strictly precautionary reasons as Dr. Locher nicely explained to us.

Declan is doing well in Marshfield. After losing a little weight, as they expect babies to do, he’s gained an ounce in four days. He’s breathing and feeding well, and hopefully will come home soon. We were told premature babies can sometimes be in the NICU until their expected due date, but all we’ve talked to think it’ll be much sooner than that.

Dr. Petkov told us Jenny’s motherly instinct to come in was essential to him being in the good condition he is in now. Her placenta was failing, and his umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck. If she hadn’t, it’s likely he would not have survived.

Of course, we’re thankful for the incredible care we received at St. Michael’s. All the nurses and doctors have been extraordinary. At one point, between nearly passing out, I remember seeing the dozen or so people in the delivery room and thinking most of them had to be called in to help us. They were taking time out of their weekend schedule to do something very heroic. I can’t write anything that would thank them enough for their service. Thank you.

As for the name, Declan, it’s one I discovered at the hospital Saturday. I was reading some back issues of Rolling Stone magazine, and in an article about Danny McBride, an actor who plays Kenny Powers on HBO’s “Eastbound & Down,” it talked about his newborn son Declan. I suggested it to Jenny, and she said maybe.

After looking the name up, it became a definite. A Gaelic name that means “full of goodness,” it was the name of an Irish saint who immediately preceded St. Patrick. Half Irish, and with another son with an Irish name, it was a no-brainer. In addition, it’s not common, unlike Braden which seemed like every fourth kid was named after we chose that one.

My wife and I aren’t planning on having any more children. So if you have a name suggestion, send it to someone else you know who is expecting. Make sure you make the suggestion as soon as possible, as we discovered we needed one earlier than we had anticipated.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, July 20, 2012.

Coming up with child’s name could be perfect Christmas present

A conversation with my 7-year-old son, Braden, this morning:


Braden: I want a Wii U for Christmas. Do you think Santa will bring it for me?

Me (changing the subject a little bit): I don’t know. What do you think your baby brother will want?

Braden: A name.

While Braden’s baby brother is still a month or so away from being born, coming up with a name for the child seems to be a longer distance away. Every time my wife, Jenny, and I think we have one, we find a reason not to use it.

My suggestions – Thor, Conan, Kreese, Kurgan, Vader and Bruce – have all been rejected by Jenny. She doesn’t care much for superheroes, movie villains and musicians, apparently.

In turn, I’ve rejected some of her suggestions – Evan, Ethan, Owen, Ian and Andrew. I guess I’m not a fan of names starting with vowels.

Some names we’ve both liked we’ve secretly tested out with others – others being mainly Braden – didn’t pass muster. One name, which I’m not going to reveal due to the possibility we may still go with it, he quickly said was a “girl’s name,” although neither of us had thought so.

A few names are on our “strong possibility” list, but they haven’t made the “definite” list. This is worrisome because Braden’s name made that list early in our selection process, and it never came off it. While we like some of the names on the “strong possibility” list, the fact they haven’t made the “definite” list, yet, makes us think another name is out there waiting for us to find it.

Finding names is pretty easy, as they are all around us. Just browse through the pages of this paper and you’re sure to see dozens of different names, with a wide variety of spellings.

I’m a sucker for using names from movie characters or musicians, while Jenny is big on classic-sounding names that aren’t too popular, yet. Using these criteria, how we came up with Braden is anyone’s guess? It became popular, of course, as soon as we used it, but at the time we didn’t know any other Bradens.

At the time, we combined her father’s name, Brad, and my father’s name, Dennis, and liked the end result. I suppose we could combine our mothers’ names, Karen and Linda, for the new baby and come up with Kalin, Linren or Kada, but those names don’t seem to work as well as Braden did.

If we became desperate for a name, I could hold a contest and ask readers to submit suggestions. The prize simply being the honor of naming a newborn child. It’s not money, but it’s kind of cool.

Just don’t suggest Biff, Ringo, Chucky or Orson. They’re likely to get rejected.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, Jul y 13, 2012.

Improved Gazette website takes paper into the future

The new and much improved Portage County Gazette website debuted to the public Sunday, July 1, one day earlier than we promised in last week’s paper. It’s a site that’s been long in the works, as the staff debated about what it should include, not include and how it can be relevant in today’s digital world.


Associate Editor Matthew Brown, whose technology geekery far surpasses my own (I’m no slouch in that department, but I feel like an amateur next to him), has spent the past several months using our ideas to develop the website, and the end result is something we all like and hope you will like, too.

The new website offers headlines and the first few paragraphs of a large selection of news stories, features, columns and sports stories in the current edition of the paper, and once in a while it will feature an article in its entirety.

It also offers plenty of opportunities for users to interact with The Gazette. People can share headlines, stories and photos on various social media sites, including Facebook and Twitter. They can also submit articles, obituaries, announcements, story ideas and, most importantly, “What did you expect for a buck?” submissions.

The staff here, while usually a funny bunch, sometimes has trouble coming up with those tidbits, and we know the stories about a “7-year-old son of a staffer” can get a bit old sometimes, so we definitely welcome your funny thoughts and comments for one of our most popular pages.

People can also purchase or renew a subscription online, submit a classified ad (which in most cases are still free in our paper) and contact the various staff members at the paper.

The new website is still in its infancy, and Matthew is in the process of teaching the others how to update it. Once we’re all up to speed, it will be a place Gazette readers can go to see some of the material in the paper, the latest obituaries, photos from events we didn’t have room to publish in the print edition, and breaking stories as they happen.

We plan on sharing some of those stories on our Facebook page, so plan on “liking” us to receive updates to your newsfeed to make it convenient to access them.

We consider this new website a marvelous leap forward for The Gazette, and it’s coming at the 13th anniversary of the paper. While the print edition will continue to be our flagship, the website and our Facebook page will act as great supplements to it for our readers. We know those supplements are the future, and this website is our way of getting there.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, July 6, 2012.

Newly cut lawn provides refreshing smell

I love the smell of freshly cut lawn in the morning. It’s a smell I haven’t enjoyed for four years, until this past Tuesday morning after I mowed my lawn at my new house for the first time ever the previous evening.


When my wife, Jenny, and I sold our home in Wautoma four years ago, we rented an apartment in Plover while we decided whether to buy another home or build a new one. We went with the second option, and last summer moved into it after three years of apartment life.

Because the house wasn’t ready until June, we waited on installing a lawn, figuring the summer sun would bake any attempts to do so. Initially, we were going to wait until the fall, but the fall became spring because that’s what happens when you don’t plan right.

In April, a lawn guy installed one for us, and after some early downpours in the days after it was planted, the weather decided it didn’t want to cooperate. The sprinkler system, set to twice a day, didn’t provide enough water to make it grow as quickly as we wanted. So last week Jenny called the lawn guy and asked if there was anything we could do.

He showed up, changed the sprinkler system settings, and poked a bunch of holes in our yard. I’m not sure what the holes were for, but it worked wonders. Within a week, we went from having a yard with more dirt patches than grass patches to one primarily covered in grass.

It grew so quickly that I realized my four years of lawn-mowing freedom was about to come to an end. I wasn’t all that sad to see it end, though, as I’ve always enjoyed the exercise that comes with pushing a lawnmower around and around a yard. Unlike a treadmill, this exercise seems to serve a purpose and have an end goal.

After firing up the mower, I hoped to find some snakes in the grass as I was cutting it. I had found one the night before, and capturing one could make for a nice pet for our son, Braden. He got a gerbil over the weekend, and with the two cats we already have, a snake would help make for the start of the Steuck Zoo.

Jenny told me she would not appreciate a pet snake, though, and I know his grandmother would probably never visit if we had one. I’m not sure what the aversion is to such a harmless creature, but I’m not going to risk putting myself in the doghouse with both Jenny and my mother-in-law over a reptile that would rather be outdoors anyway.

We’ve got a big lawn, and I expected it to take a couple of hours to finish with a push mower. To my surprise, it only took an hour. The only trouble I had occurred after a break in which I restarted the mower. In pulling the drawstring back, I started the mower but also pulled the string right off the mower. I was able to finish the lawn, but I’ll need to fix this problem before I mow a second time, probably early next week.

I have no clue how to fix it, but that’s what YouTube is for. Google a question, “How to put drawstring back on lawnmower,” and you’ll find dozens of videos showing you how to do it. It’s nice living in an age where everyone can be a handyman.

Learning to solve this problem will enable me to fix another problem. The same thing happened to me with my snow blower during the final snowfall this winter.

I should probably try to keep my strength in check. Or else I won’t be able to enjoy the smell of freshly cut lawn in the morning, afternoon or evening.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, June 29, 2012.

Coming up with more nicknames is only reason to attend college reunion

I graduated from college 15 years ago, but I won’t be going to my class reunion next week. Why not? Because the only people I’d care to see are people I have regular contact with anyway.


My freshman year roommate, Jon Granberg, and I discussed this last Friday, when we met in Stevens Point for dinner when he was in town for a wedding the next day. He jokingly asked whether or not I’d be attending the reunion in Ripon, already knowing the answer. “That’s as likely as you going,” I answered, strongly suspecting he hadn’t made plans to attend.

Both of us agreed attending the reunion would be a waste of time because the college friends we’d want to see are people we already have contact with regularly, and the others there would just be people we’d struggle to remember. I’m terrible with names, so most likely I’d have to rely on having my wife introduce herself and asking for their names – a technique that has worked wonders for me over the years.

The only way I’d remember any of these people would be if my friends and I would have had nicknames for them. We amused ourselves greatly by coming up with nicknames for people. Those nicknames, and some of the stories behind them, include:

“Zeus,” who actually nicknamed himself. A senior when I was a freshman in 1993, Zeus didn’t receive his diploma until 1997, when I received mine. A self-proclaimed Greek god, Zeus had a mullet, wore neon shoes and wrote short stories about war machines pulled by giant teams of elephants. Once, I called him, proclaiming myself Apollo and telling him the campus wasn’t big enough for two gods. Even today, my friends and I can spend hours talking about him.

“I Brought This Sign Because I Like Miller,” who lived on my floor my freshman year. He received this nickname because, in introducing himself to the rest of the floor during an orientation exercise in which each guy had to bring an item describing him, he brought a Miller High Life sign and said those words, and nothing else. It fit him perfectly, as he really did like Miller and he was a man of few words. This was especially evident in history class, when he received a failing grade for plagiarizing a paper. He may have gotten away with it, but the professor noted it’s hard to do when you plagiarize the wrong assignment and hand it in.

“Pimp Daddy,” who liked to hang out with the ladies, despite them being completely oblivious to his presence. Pimp Daddy had a big head, which seemed twice the size of a normal person’s head, and he enjoyed running around in his pajamas. The group of girls he hung out with – which we dubbed “The Goodie Goodie Girls” for being, well, rather wholesome – didn’t even know he was there, despite our claims he enjoyed their company on a regular basis.

“Tinted,” who wore tinted glasses, thus earning him the nickname. Tinted was a really nice guy, but his tinted glasses made him appear as though he was always wearing sunglasses all the time. He was tragically killed in a farm accident a few years ago, but my friends and I will always remember him for his glasses.

“Triangle Circle Square,” who was in an art history class with me and several other friends. We had to sign in every class, and he signed in using a triangle, circle and square. We never understood why, and although I remember little else about him, he forever became known as the three-shape guy.

“Dad Woman,” who shared a dorm room with a much older guy. He was most likely her boyfriend, but we theorized it could have been her homeless dad.

The king of all nicknames, though, was Granberg himself. A little guy who liked to make fun of himself, we came up with nicknames for him on practically a daily basis, most of which he laughed at, making him one of the best sports I’ve ever known. Some of them, which I’m not going to bother explaining, included “Hey Sterling,” “The Little Red Guy in the Back of the Class,” “Heather Speaks of Eating Granberg,” “Granny,” “Graaaaaaaaaaaanbeeeeeeeeeeeeerg,” “Granberg Standing Outside in His Underwear,” “The Hamburglar” and a host of others I can’t print in a newspaper.

Granberg was smart enough to know we came up with nicknames for him because we liked him, and to protest would only take away from our fun with him. So he went along with the nicknames, as well as the practical jokes we pulled on him – most of which included late-night prank calls to him pretending to be characters spoofing on his various nicknames, such as Sterling Sharpe, an officer from the Milwaukee Police Department and the girl named Heather.

He was absolutely correct to realize the nicknames were sort of terms of endearment, as the people we didn’t like didn’t have nicknames or were simply known as jerks. For example, a guy from Minnesota was simply known as the biggest jerk on campus, and this guy’s girlfriend was known as the girl who dated the biggest jerk on campus.

Fifteen years after graduation, my friends and I still love talking about the nicknames we came up with in college. Going to a reunion may give us more fodder, but I’m more than happy to keep the memories as they were.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, June 22, 2012.

Even if everything was in black and white, some things never change

My 7-year-old son, Braden, went to Noah’s Ark in Wisconsin Dells for the first time in his young life earlier this week. His trip, taken with his daycare classmates, inspired plenty of chatter upon his return, and made me realize how old I’m getting.


My wife, Jenny, and I expected him to be worn out after the nine-hour trip there and back, as often is the case with little boys who spend the entire day playing in the sun. To our surprise, he was more energetic than he was before leaving that morning.

“Dad, have you ever been to Wisconsin Dells?” he asked after picking him up.

“I’ve been there a couple of times,” I replied, ready to ask him how he liked it. I didn’t have an opportunity to do so, as he fired a barrage of questions at me as though he were the host of a quiz show in which speed was a factor.

“How old were you? Did they have the giant snake slide? Did they have mini-golf? Did you go in the wave pool?”

The last time I went to Noah’s Ark was when I was in eighth grade, in 1989 – 23 years ago for people doing the math. Astonished it had been that long since I was last there, especially since the memory of the experience is so vivid in my mind, I tried to explain that many of those slides, rides and fun opportunities weren’t there when I was younger.

“Was everything in black and white then?” he asked.

I hesitated, and then laughed. It was the same question I asked my mother when I was a kid. Assuming color was a modern invention, as distinguished between old television shows and films that were black and white in the “olden days” and “modern era” shows and films that are in color, I thought, like he must have also, that cameras caught everything as it was.

My mom laughed at my question, which I repeated on many occasions later not because I didn’t genuinely know the answer but to elicit a laugh and also make fun of her being “old.” Hearing the same question from Braden made me realize history has a knack for repeating itself, even if the players change a little bit. Because I laughed at the question and because he’s smart enough to figure out he can tease me for being “old’ by asking it, I’m sure I will hear it again.

I told Braden about my last trip to Noah’s Ark 23 years ago. It had wave pools then, but they were pretty new at the time. It also had lots of slides and the lazy river, which it still has, although I’m sure many of the slides have been upgraded since then. I heard they had a slide that has a loop, although Braden didn’t know anything about it.

It cost about $12 back then to spend a day at the water park. We paid $19 for Braden to go, but both these costs are difficult to compare because one or both of them may have come with a group discount, and one of them may have been an adult price. The park’s website lists its undiscounted adult price as being $33.99. Regardless, inflation is definitely present at Noah’s Ark. I don’t even want to guess what food and beverage costs there are now.

For hours after picking him up, we heard about the greatness of Noah’s Ark. Thinking back, I’m sure I did the same. Some things never change.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, June 15, 2012, .

Handyman genes were there, waiting to be used

My handyman genes may have only been dormant, contrary to my belief that I never inherited any from a long line of blue collar do-it-yourselfers.

Growing up, I avoided anything requiring mechanical skills, mainly because my dad was an electrician by profession and a jack-of-all-trades by skill. If I ever needed anything built or something, like a 1979 Pontiac Sunbird, fixed, I relied on him to do it for me. “Why try something I know he can do better?” I thought.

And then he died when I was 21.

Since then it’s been a slow learning experience. I couldn’t turn to him when I had a problem. If my car broke down, I looked at it myself to formulate a little something about what the problem might be so when I took it to the shop I could sound reasonably intelligent. If I needed to assemble a furniture item I bought, I carefully studied the confusing instructions and then painstakingly tried to figure it out. For the most part I’ve been successful in that endeavor, although my wife likes to point to the upside down shelf in my son’s bookcase whenever I try to brag about my “assembly” skills.

I’ve managed to avoid any home projects requiring a major power tool, though, until this past weekend.

With the upcoming arrival of a new addition to the household, my wife developed a vision for the baby’s room. This vision did not just involve paint, which is something that I don’t get along with well. It involved refinishing an antique dresser and hanging chair rail, two projects I would never have fathomed tackling if given an option. My wife’s vision doesn’t come with options, as any married man probably understands.

I started the dresser project more than a month ago. After watching some YouTube videos, which I declare to be the greatest thing to happen to the home project industry since duct tape, I bought the supplies I needed and then started sanding the finish off the dresser.

It was time consuming but fun. The person at the hardware store recommended me to try some chemical that could strip it for me. I should have known that getting an outer layer off is never that easy. It requires patience, time and some sweet talk, all of which I was able to do and have while using a sander.

After it was completely sanded, I put on several coats of stain and several coats of some polyurethane to finish it. For the most part, I was successful. There are some spots where the stain was darker than it should have been, and in a few spots some dripping spots are noticeable, but I was happy to get it done. It’s also a little rougher than it probably could be, but both my wife and I thought it was good enough for a first time. Next time I won’t get this leniency.

The chair rail project was the one I feared more. Leniency wasn’t an option, and goofing up could mean spending more money than I wanted to spend.

I got some advice from a friend who also lent me his miter saw. When he explained how to use the saw, I just kept envisioning it removing one of my thumbs or fingers. “Doctors can sew them back on,” I kept thinking.

I could have asked him to help me with the project, but I knew I wanted to learn on my own. I carefully measured, thought out my cuts and then determined where to place the board and where to nail it so I hit the studs in the wall. When all this was done, with my wife’s help, I hung my first board – successfully.

Doing so inspired a victory dance. Fortunately my home project skills were better than my dancing abilities in this case.

My wife kept all her MacGyveresque friends and relatives informed about progress throughout the day by texting them. They were greatly amused. I didn’t mind, though, because it wasn’t a disaster.

My next project, a basement pantry, may be, though. I’ll have to remember to take the battery out of her phone.

****

Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, June 8, 2012.

Putting Jim Schuh on toilet is place he didn’t want to go

Jim Schuh is on the toilet. Jim Schuh is in the toilet.


The first sentence has one meaning: Jim Schuh is sitting on the toilet, taking care of Mother Nature’s business. But the second sentence could have multiple meanings: he could simply be in the bathroom, maybe on the toilet or maybe doing something else; or, if taken literally, some part of him like his foot, head or arm could be in the toilet. If it’s a giant toilet, then maybe his whole self could actually be in the toilet.

I bring this up following an email discussion Jim and I had earlier this week after he corrected me for a change I made to his column in last week’s Gazette.

Originally, Jim sent the column to me with a phrase stating that political robo calls often come to him when he’s “in the toilet.”

Nobody I know uses that phrase. Instead, they usually say “in the bathroom” or “in the restroom.” Assuming that if he had meant to say that, he would have used one of those phrases, I figured he must have meant that he was “on the toilet.” Because he often likes to make fun of himself in his column, and because his subject matter – political robo calls – was one that is even a step below normal bathroom humor, I made the editorial decision to put Jim Schuh on the toilet.

I don’t normally like to imagine Jim Schuh on the toilet, but in this case picturing him taking a political robo call on the toilet was really funny. It would be funny imagining anybody on the toilet taking such a call, but someone with his personality is especially funny.

Jim did not want to be on the toilet. He simply wanted to be in the bathroom. He said the corrected version made his comment seem more explicit than he intended.

I told Jim that being “on the toilet” may be the perfect place to take such phone calls.

He pointed out that in societies other than the U.S., “in the toilet” is quite prevalent. “It means being in what we Americans (as wusses) refer to as the ‘restroom.’ Nobody rests there – they relieve themselves. The word ‘toilet’ is somehow anathema to Americans, but for no good reason,” he responded.

That may be the case, but lest he forget, this is the U.S. And because it is, I put Jim Schuh on the toilet, and not in it.

Knowing Jim well enough, I’m pretty sure that my editorial decision didn’t put me “in the toilet” with him, although I wouldn’t be surprised if he finds a way to put me on one. He’s already tried, as he suggested I go “in the toilet” with a laptop to write this column – after I warned him I would – to give it real authenticity.

I’m not going to do that, mainly because I live in 2012 and use an iPad rather than a laptop. But using it “on the toilet” “in the bathroom” might rightfully disgust my wife, who has the power to put me “in the doghouse.” That’s a place no guy ever wants to be, and it’s a place I never want to write about in a future column.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, June 1, 2012.

Some gardeners may need to become plant whisperers to succeed

I am a master gardener.

Or at least I’d like to think I am after my first real foray into gardening this past weekend. My six-months-pregnant wife, Jenny, and I installed flower beds in front of our home, planting a large number of perennials to add some curb appeal to a yard that had been full of weeds just a month ago before we had a lawn planted.

The lawn is slowly growing – Mother Nature, we could use some rain – and edging has been placed all around the house as preparation for flower gardens.

I’ll admit I know little to nothing about planting flowers, vegetables, trees or any other growth that require water, sun and possibly a “whisperer” who will talk them into becoming full, colorful and vibrant. I’m just starting to understand the difference between a perennial and an annual, although I think better words could have been chosen for each as annual, to me at least, suggests it will come up annually.

It’s funny I know little about plants, because through high school and college I worked at Walmart in my hometown and spent hundreds of hours working in the lawn and garden department, advising people about the plants they wished to purchase. I knew nothing, but the customers didn’t know that, so I just told them what they wanted to hear. “Does this plant require a lot of sun, because it would go in a location without much sun?” someone might ask. “No, not much at all. You’d be fine getting it,” I replied. I’m sure a lot of plants probably died due to my advice.

My work experience there allowed me to hate plants. They came in by the truckload, and people bought them just as quickly. I spent hours moving them from one bin to the next, in order to make room for the next shipment, and just as many hours piling up bags of soil and manure that required just as much movement. Looking back now, it probably was fun, but back then I cursed every plant I saw. My harsh words probably killed many more plants.

Fast forward seven years to our first house in Wautoma. The plants were already there, so we didn’t have much to do to spruce it up. I remember planting a few, but Jenny took care of it as I tried not to kill them. We planted a vegetable garden, but it didn’t do well. Other then a few peas, tomatoes and some lettuce, most vegetables never made it to anybody’s stomach. They probably died because I looked at them wrong.

These flower gardens will be different. Scott “The Plant Killer” Steuck is hopefully dead, replaced by Scott “Plants Are His Friends” Steuck. We spent a great deal of time putting down yard fabric, selecting a wide variety of different plants from nearly every greenhouse in the Stevens Point/Plover area, and then planting them in specific locations in front of our house. All led to my favorite part of the endeavor: placing mulch. I discovered I love the smell of mulch, and hauling it from the truck to the flower gardens in my new wheelbarrow was a blast. In my next life, I’m going to be that guy who only does that for a living.

I’m also talking to the plants, and I think they are responding. “This guy seems rather simple,” they are probably thinking. “He’d probably be easily amused if we became full, colorful and vibrant.”

Time will judge as to whether or not I can also be called a plant whisperer.

****

Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, May 25, 2012.

‘Avengers’ sequel could make politicians superheroes

Marvel’s “The Avengers” is making millions at the box office, and deservedly so because it’s worth every over-inflated cent you’ll pay for the movie theater experience. Bringing a bunch of great superheroes together, the film has already been given the green light for a sequel.


Instead of Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Black Widow and Hulk in the sequel, I’d like to suggest one with some lesser known superheroes: politicians.

The film could include all the big names nationally from all political parties: President Barack Obama, as well as all of our living former presidents; all those who ran for president this year, including Gov. Mitt Romney, Sen. Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul and Rep. Michele Bachmann; Rep. John Boehner, Speaker of the House; and Sen. Harry Reid, Senate Majority Leader.

It would also include some of the more local ones: former governors Tommy Thompson and Jim Doyle, Sen. Herb Kohl and former senator Russ Feingold.

Leading the team would be Scott Walker, Wisconsin’s current governor for at least the next three weeks.

I know putting all these people on the same team seems more fiction than the current “Avengers” film in the theaters – one which features the superheroes battling foes from elsewhere in the universe – but that’s what makes it brilliant. It would portray something nobody ever thought possible: political teamwork.

Their nemeses would not be the American public, as it seems to be in real life, but just a bunch of cool villains that would make for seemingly impossible opposition. My list of villains for this film, which is my creation right now, would be Darth Vader, because he’s the ultimate villain; John Kreese, the evil sensei from “The Karate Kid” films who is the ultimate bad-ass; Kurgan, the ultimate underrated villain from the first “Highlander” film; the shark from “Jaws,” because it’s the ultimate revenge-seeking fish; and Freddy Krueger from the “Nightmare on Elm Street” series who is the ultimate horror film villain.

Defeating this team of villains would be difficult. Vader has the Dark Side behind him, Kreese relies on cheap tactics such as leg sweeps, Kurgan is good at chopping people’s heads off, the shark always seems to come back no matter how many times it is killed, and Krueger will terrorize people in their dreams.

It will take a good plan and lots of teamwork by this team of politicians to defeat these villains. Each politician will have to search deep to find the innermost strength they can offer in the battle, and all of those strengths will have to be used to their fullest potential to find the solution to win the fight.

While finding such strengths will be impossibly difficult, as politicians haven’t demonstrated this ability in years, maybe decades, the fact they have to work with people they don’t agree with will probably be the more difficult task. Normal people have been doing it forever, but politicians are a special breed who decided long ago they are not going to work nicely with people who have differing ideas. Compromise is a fictional word in their world.

In my “Avengers” sequel, the politicians would defeat the villains, mainly because nobody wants to see an ending in which the bad guys win.

While my idea for a film will never come to fruition, the politicians could attempt to recreate it in real life. Instead of ultimate villains, though, they would focus their attention on some of the real-world issues every one of us faces. Each one would determine their strengths and how they use them as best as possible, and then they could cross party lines to work nicely with the people who should all have a common goal of improving this country.

I know such a film probably isn’t in the cards anytime soon. But like “The Avengers,” maybe someday it will get made.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, May 18, 2012.

Never Forgotten Honor Flight perfects the day for veterans, many others.

I’ve never served in the military, and at 37 years old I never will. But on Monday, May 7, I came as close as I ever will to the experience, or at least to the very best part of the experience. As a media representative, I traveled with 89 veterans and their guardians, some of them veterans themselves, to Washington, D.C., as part of the Never Forgotten Honor Flight.

To say it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience would be to understate it, as little I do for the rest of my life will compare to what I saw, heard and felt during this trip.

The mission of the Never Forgotten Honor Flight is to take as many central Wisconsin World War II and now also Korean War veterans to Washington, D.C., for a one-day trip that will allow them to see the many national memorials in their honor, including the World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War, Air Force and Iwo Jima memorials.

The trip is designed to be like their tours of duty, minus all the bad parts. It begins with a send-off dinner the night before featuring entertainment authentic of the era, continues the next day with the flight and arrival in Washington, D.C., to an applauding audience at the airport and the tour of the many memorial sites, and ends with mail-call on the flight home and a “Welcome Home” ceremony that probably bested the ones they received more than 50 years ago.

I was among the many who watched news coverage of previous Honor Flights in central Wisconsin and thought it must be a life-changing experience for all people going on it, including the guardians who accompanied them. When Mike Thompson and Jim Campbell, some of the founders of the flight, contacted me last fall to ask if I’d like to go on it as a media representative, I was stunned, not believing this opportunity even existed.

It did, and after applying for the honor, I learned last month I’d be going on the May 7 flight. Whatever else may have been on my schedule that day was pushed aside when I learned I’d be going.

The month went past quickly, so much so that I didn’t even have a chance to tell many of my relatives about it. Now that I’m back, though, I plan on telling everybody I can about it.

With the experience of seven flights behind them, including one just two weeks ago, the 15-member Never Forgotten Honor Flight Board of Directors and their many volunteers have put together a smooth operation. During an hour-and-a-half long training session the day before, guardians accompanying veterans learn about all of their responsibilities on the trip, and everything they need to know to help make it successful. All people taking the flight are given a specific-colored polo shirt and jacket – green for guardians and yellow for veterans – and a hat and fanny pack as part of their registration material, as well as orders to ensure the flight takes off on time at 6:30 p.m. from the Central Wisconsin Airport in Mosinee.

The flight took off on schedule, and the two-hour trip in the air was smooth. One Korean war veteran had issues with his pacemaker and had to be taken to the hospital upon arrival at Reagan National Airport, but he rejoined the group later in the day after receiving treatment. “Darn pacemaker,” he told me after I asked how he was holding up. “But I’m glad to be back.”

Even the hardiest of travelers would have been worn out by the itinerary, as it included stops at the World War II Memorial; Korean, Vietnam and Lincoln memorials; the Air Force Memorial; Arlington National Cemetery to see the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier; Iwo Jima memorial; and a bus tour of the city. For heroes in their 80s and 90s, this trip should have been grueling, but all of them easily made it through the day without any bad incidents.

In fact, the tour stayed on schedule until Arlington National Cemetery. The delay there was understandable, though, as one of the guards came out and talked to the group and answered questions about his responsibilities for 15 minutes. Those guards don’t normally do this, but as Sgt. Vincent told them, it was a privilege to be able to do so for these veterans.

I talked to many of the veterans and learned their stories during the trip, including a few I wrote about in the page one story in this week’s paper, but it was the very last guy I talked to that was the most powerful. At the end of the day, a volunteer from Washington, D.C., had to leave the group and she asked if I could wheel him through the airport. This Korean War Navy veteran, John Mayer of Mosinee, couldn’t stop talking about how incredible the experience was. “I hope to have a glass of beer when I get home to complete a perfect day,” he said.

The scene at the airport back home was chaotic, with more than a thousand people there to greet them in a rousing fashion. I didn’t find Mayer in all the commotion, but I’m betting he didn’t need the beer to make his day perfect after receiving such a reception. I’m sure all 89 veterans, as well as all of us who accompanied them, had such a day.

****

Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, May 11, 2012.

UW-SP class goes beyond the norm, offers superb learning model for students

Per Henningsgaard stands in front of the classroom, looking more Billie Jo Armstrong of Green Day than Sting, for those of us who humanize professors by comparing them to rock stars.


But the words out of his mouth are more Sting – a former English teacher – than Armstrong – a high school dropout. “For those of you who don’t like to do work, this class isn’t for you,” Henningsgaard warns students in his English 349/549: Editing and Publishing class at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point (UW-SP) on the first day. “You will work harder in this class than any other you take at UW-SP.”

After taking the class for my graduate studies, I’d agree with him. Students spend a lot of time doing work for the class, and any slacking off can have grave repercussions to the end mission, which the whole class strives to reach.

That end mission is a book, as the class staffs Cornerstone Press, UW-SP’s publishing house, during the semester, and it is responsible for publishing one by the time finals begin. Each student becomes an “employee,” with each required to take on a role that corresponds to an actual job at a publishing house. Students vie for roles early in the semester, with classmates selecting who fills them through an election process.

I sought out the role of publicity manager, as it would give me experience in public relations, which is the focus of my graduate studies in the Department of Communication. Substance editor and copy editor positions would have been more logical choices for me, given my editorial role at The Gazette. I do those jobs on a daily basis at the newspaper, though, and wanted to get experience in an area that I don’t have much in. Because I interact with public relations practitioners on an almost daily basis, I realized knowing how they operate could be beneficial to my current job.

As a class, our first task was to select a manuscript. We received more than two dozen to choose from, including books of poems, guidebooks, essay collections and a variety of novels in several different genres.

For me, selecting a manuscript was the best part of the process. I enjoyed reading what authors submitted – including the ones that weren’t so good – and thinking about the possibilities of what each manuscript would look like as a finished product. In the end, the class selected the manuscript I most wanted published, “Syncopation: A Memoir of Adèle Hugo,” written by Elizabeth Caulfield Felt, an associate lecturer in English at UW-SP.

To tout the book, it’s a historical fiction novel about poet and playwright Victor Hugo’s daughter Adèle, a woman in real life who was committed to a mental hospital. Felt uses known facts, combined with some fiction to show readers how Adèle may have gotten to this place in her life. She does so in an exciting, and literate, manner in a book I believe any local book clubs would be wise to select (Felt is willing to meet with any book clubs to talk about the novel; it’s not often the author is available to do that).

Getting back to the class, though, students were required to work a minimum of 2.5 hours each week outside of the classroom on job duties related to the book’s publication, although most of us probably spent many more each week. The majority of my time was spent writing press releases, contacting other media about the book, and meeting with the marketing team to come up with interesting ways to promote the book. People may have noted “Syncopation” written on chalk throughout this community, as well as several others. That guerilla marketing technique was a way for us to promote the book.

In addition to our roles with the publishing house, we had other homework related to book publishing but separate from Cornerstone. Each student was required to write a letter to one of the rejected authors explaining the good points about his or her manuscript, as well as the area that needed improvement; and each student had to design and copy edit a short manuscript from another source. Both were fun, but time-consuming projects.

Taking a class where the work we did generated actual results was eye-opening. It’s a model every class should strive for, as it reaches beyond what one normally learns in an English class and offers valuable skill-building tools, such as communication, teamwork and the ability to meet deadlines.

I’m still struggling with the deadline thing, though. That’s relatively new to me.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, May 4, 2012.

Weight race wasn’t successful for every person taking challenge

I don’t fail often, but my attempt at the Community Weight Race was a spectacular disaster for me.


I entered in late January, along with 924 other people in Ministry Health Care’s fifth annual race, with a goal of losing 30 pounds. My hope was to get to a weight I had only been once in my adult life.

Previous to entering, I had lost 50 pounds over the course of 18 months, dropping from 310 to 260 pounds. I ran daily, I ate well and I made good choices. The race would motivate me to do these things better, so I thought.

Not so. The minute I entered a little voice in the back of my head told me to stop trying. “You don’t want to run today, and you want to eat that delicious donut,” it kept telling me. “Mmmm… donut,” I replied.

I’m not a competitive person, so the prizes Ministry was giving away to the people and teams who lost the most weight didn’t motivate me. I was doing this for myself, plain and simple.

“Myself” wanted other things, though, like the desire to bathe in laziness and the opportunity to eat cookies at every chance that came along. I partly blame the Girl Scouts and their annual sale.

I also blamed my graduate studies, and the guy taking my final weight last week, which was 10 pounds more than I started, said it should be a “free pass.” It’s tempting to take the pass, but the blame solely belongs to me. I wasn’t motivated and let other things take precedence.

Another member of my team did much better than me. Matthew Brown, an associate editor at The Gazette, lost 13 pounds during the contest, which was only three short of his 16-pound goal. He worked out, ate right and played a lot of indoor soccer during the duration of the race, noting the soccer was what allowed him to do well.

Overall, most people in the contest succeeded, with the average weight loss during the three-month race being 5.78-percent of body weight.

I have no idea how the other three members of my team did. At the halfway mark, I emailed them to see how they were doing, and none of them responded. Their lack of response indicated to me that they had either dropped out or they weren’t doing well.

It would be easy for me to not write about this, as I definitely would rather write about something else, but, as many of you know, the attempt to lose weight can often be a failure, such as my attempt.

Instead of ignoring it, though, I want people to know that failure does occur, and it should be used as motivation to succeed. I’m hoping my failure will be a catalyst to put me on the right track, especially since I know tomorrow will be a great day for a run.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, April 27, 2012.

‘Bro Code’ allows men to believe they are somewhat macho

A CBS television show I’ve casually watched for the past few years, “How I Met Your Mother,” cemented itself as a great show, in my opinion, after a recent episode.


The show focuses on a man telling his children how he met their mother. Each episode moves the story forward just a little bit as the man, Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor), recounts an event in his life that allowed him to eventually meet the mother, a woman viewers have yet to meet in seven seasons.

These events he recounts take place with his four best friends – married couple Marshall (Jason Segel) and Lily (Alyson Hannigan), former girlfriend Robin (Cobie Smulders), and ladies’ man Barney Stinson, played by the great Neil Patrick Harris (formerly known as Doogie Howser).

Ted, an architect, meets and dates many women, many who are meant to make viewers think will be the mother. Sometimes he breaks their hearts, but more often than not they break his, as one woman even left him at the altar.

Throughout most of the series, Barney has often bragged about the fact he doesn’t allow relationships to mess with his life like Ted allows them to do. Instead, he allows the “Bro Code” to guide most decisions he makes.

The “Bro Code” is a book, written by Barney, that contains the rules men, or bros, should follow to make sure they don’t obstruct other men from living a life that isn’t messed up by women. It currently contains 32 Articles, ranging from “Bro’s (sic) before Ho’s (sic)” to a “Bro doesn’t allow another Bro to get married until he’s at least thirty.” All of these Articles are available online at www.brocode.com.

Many guys from my generation would probably agree with many of these Articles, as they give some an opportunity to be macho, even though we live in an era where being macho is a bit outdated. Let’s face it – Fonzie stopped being cool in the early 1980s, and Tom Cruise will never get his “Top Guns” swagger back no matter how hard he tries.

Geeks and freaks have been the new cool for a good part of the last decade. If you don’t believe me, there’s a reason “The Big Bang Theory” is one of television’s top-rated shows.

The “Bro Code” allows men to at least pretend they are a little bit cool, especially around other men. Women will naturally laugh at them, as they should, but in our minds we can at least give ourselves a little dignity by following these rules.

I haven’t always been sold on “How I Met Your Mother,” mainly because the entire frame of Ted telling his children how he met their mother is taking forever. A recent episode in which the guys on the show had “Trilogy Night” made me realize the greatness of it, though.

“Trilogy Night” is something people are either going to understand immediately, or it’s something that will require explanation. To explain for those who don’t know: it’s a night in which people, usually guys, gather to watch the original three “Star Wars” movies. It’s spent talking about the greatness of those three movies, quoting lines right before they happen, and throwing out “What if” scenarios to the others in the group. “What if Luke had taken his relationship with Leia a little further?” would be a typical question people would talk about.

In the episode, Ted takes his children through five “Trilogy Nights” the gang had over a 12-year period in which each of them talks about how their lives will be three years in the future when they have the next “Trilogy Night.” Ambitions for future goals are much bigger when they are younger, but it’s Barney’s vision in 2012 for his future in 2015 that is a stunner. I won’t spoil it, but by making something as awesome as “Trilogy Night” so poignant is simply great television.

Someday, I hope Ted actually tells his children about the exact moment he meets their mother, but until then I’ll enjoy the narrative as I think about how macho the “Bro Code” makes me believe I am.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, April 20, 2012.

Parents may love egg hunts more than their kids

Kids like Easter egg hunts, but I’m beginning to think parents like them more.


I came to this conclusion after watching the Stevens Point/Plover Area Breakfast Optimists Club’s 26th Annual Easter Egg Hunts Saturday, April 7, at Pfiffner Pioneer Park in Stevens Point.

I attended the event so my 7-year-old son, Braden, could participate in the hunt for his age category, but also to take some pictures for The Gazette. I’ve been at past ones, although I never paid close attention to the parents like I did this year.

Waiting for the 0 to 4 hunt to begin, parents and kids took up every bit of space and then some surrounding the egg rink. Occasionally, a child broke through the rope barriers and started collecting eggs early, but in every case either the parent or a volunteer stopped them. As these were younger children, that type of behavior isn’t only acceptable, but kind of expected. What kid wants to wait when they are so readily available?

As a result, there were a lot of crying kids. The really young ones didn’t understand what all the commotion was about, and the older ones just wanted to collect eggs.

Crying kids meant unhappy parents. Several of the ones around me said the organizers should start it early so the kids can have their fun. I silently disagree with them, though, as it’s not fair to parents who don’t arrive early, and because the announcer talked about all the sponsors for the event – businesses and organizations that generously donated items so it can happen. They definitely deserved a few seconds of the parents’ time.

Once the event started, parents and kids collected eggs in a matter of a minute. Taking photos was difficult due to the shear amount of people.

The 4 to 6 hunt featured the craziest parents. I observed some telling their children to ignore the rule about not using baskets or bags to collect eggs. After the hunt began, some parents went into the ring with their kids, despite being told that was not allowed.

The announcer took notice of this blatant rule breaking. “Will the lady in pink please get out of the ring,” he nicely asked. After she didn’t comply, he repeated himself. After repeating it for more times, he finally said, “Will an adult volunteer please get the lady in pink out of the ring.”

I looked for the lady in pink, as I thought she would make for a good photo on the “What did you expect for a buck?” page, but I couldn’t find her. There were too many people around me, coaching their kids.

The 7 to 8 hunt was the most civil, and also the quickest. That’s probably because parents could coach their kids more easily, much like I did for my son. I told Braden to not be selective about the eggs he chooses, as he has been in the past.

To my surprise, he wasn’t. Any egg he came across he collected. Another parent told him prior to the start to tuck in his shirt and put the eggs down it. He followed these instructions perfectly and came away with a bunch of eggs, most of which contained jelly beans but two of which contained restaurant freebies.

Such freebies can explain parents’ crazy behavior. Had I known such great prizes were in those eggs, I would have made my kid practice prior to coming to the event, as I believe he could have gotten a lot more eggs.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, April 13, 2012.

One day can be full of a lot of surprises

Tuesday, April 3, was one strange day for me – the kind that comes with some expected happenings but also with some out-of-the-blue occurrences.


It started with a presentation I had to give in a graduate class I’m taking at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point (UW-SP). My partner and I were well prepared for the presentation, so it went well. The unusual part for me was how much at ease I was in giving it. Public speaking has never been my forte. I usually sweat fear and hope for a cancellation, but in this case those worries never came. I was comfortable. It gives me hope that I’ll live a long life because I may be able to choose speaking in public rather than dying, when I confront that choice.

After working for a couple of hours, I met my wife, Jenny, at our home where we met with a guy about installing a lawn, something we’ve been lacking since building our new home last summer. He walked through the details and set a date, April 16. To our surprise, he said I’ll be mowing a lawn this summer. I haven’t done that in four years, and I will be happy to do so, despite the fact it technically is a chore.

From there, Jenny and I went to Ministry St. Michael’s Hospital for an ultrasound to determine the sex of the baby we are having in August. Doctors need the ultrasound at 20 weeks for other purposes – make sure the baby is healthy, is growing correctly, etc. – but for us it was all about finding out whether or not we are going to have another son, or our first daughter.

I’d reveal what we are having, but since this column is all about surprises, I’m going to wait the reveal the sex until after we have the baby in August.

That didn’t stop us from revealing it to family and friends. Facebook came in handy for that endeavor, but our moms can spread the word just as quickly as the social network. Both our mothers informed non-Facebook relatives quicker than this year’s maple sugar harvest, which was over before it even started.

Facebook was part of another surprise for me. The news editor at the Waushara Argus, where I previously worked and which is in my hometown of Wautoma, posted a news story to my Facebook timeline about an endeavor I’m a part of at UW-SP. I’ll write more about this in the future, but it was a pleasant surprise that generated some “Friend” feedback – like our reveal of the baby’s sex – that made me feel good the rest of the day.

The last surprise of the day was both bad and good. It was bad for the people directly involved, but good for me because I was called something I never thought anyone would ever call me. I’ll explain.

After picking up my son from school, he and I decided to go out to eat, since Jenny had left for Minocqua for an overnight work trip. I turned from Center Street onto Michigan Avenue, following a long line of traffic. Immediately after turning, I witnessed the car directly in front of me rear end the vehicle in front of it, which was stopping for the long line of vehicles in front of it at a traffic light.

It wasn’t a typical rear-end collision in which both vehicles drive away unscathed. The colliding vehicle hit the other vehicle quite hard, rendering both vehicles unfit for driving. Both of the drivers said they were OK, although the driver of the colliding vehicle was expectedly emotional about the incident.

The driver of the vehicle that got hit was rather calm, though. An older gentleman, he didn’t get worked up about the accident and took it more as part of his day rather than an unwanted surprise. In fact, he was so calm about it he actually recognized me from my little photo in this column. “Hey, aren’t you the guy that writes for The Gazette?” he asked.

That surprised me, because I didn’t think anybody would ever recognize me from that little photo. “That’s me,” I told him, introducing him to the son I always write about. The gentleman was a little worried about how he’d get home, so I offered to take him home after the vehicles were towed away and the police officers got all the statements, including mine, they needed.

In the car, I learned the Whiting resident moved here about nine years ago to take care of his mother, and his employer allowed him to work from home rather than resigning, as he had initially planned to do. After dropping him off, he thanked me and said he’ll have to tell everybody he was given a ride home by someone “famous.”

Being called “famous” was the biggest surprise of a day full of surprises. I like to keep my ego in check, but surprises like that make it difficult. Seriously, when I’m grouped with famous people like Brad Pitt and George Clooney, how am I supposed to not smile?
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette Friday, April 6, 2012.

Yoda voice can make difficult readings easier to understand

When something is difficult to read, give it a Yoda voice. I guarantee you that it will make much more sense. Yoda, being the wise, old Jedi master he is, can make even the most difficult items understandable.


A former co-worker devised this theory in dealing with a writer that often was difficult to read. “Read it out loud in a Yoda voice,” he told me. “You can decipher it then.”

I laughed at his theory, but being a big fan of Yoda, I did so. Not only did my co-workers get a good laugh from my wicked Yoda impression, all of us were able to understand what was written.

For some reason I can’t understand, a Yoda voice adds a dimension to undecipherable writing that slows it down, brings the necessary words to the front and minimizes the unimportant ones. It takes the fear out of reading bad writing, and we all know fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. No one wants to suffer when they read.

I wish I knew about this theory back in college. Reading Chaucer, “The Last of the Mohicans” and Thomas Paine would have been much easier. I could have saved myself hundreds of dollars by buying less Mountain Dew, which I needed to keep myself awake when I read this material for my many English classes.

The Yoda theory works great for me now, not just with some of the material I have to read for the paper, but also with instruction manuals in putting together things. That’s probably because many of these manuals are actually written in Yoda dialect, so reading them the way they were written makes sense.

I put together a portable basketball hoop two weekends ago, and the first sentence was an entire paragraph long, referring to numbers for nouns instead of the actual part that was needed. Yoda voice made it easier to understand, especially since the illustrations included with it were made in Egyptian hieroglyphics.

Yoda may be a fictional character – undoubtedly George Lucas’ ultimate creation – but his value will extend centuries, especially if this theory becomes commonly used, as I propose it should. Schools could offer Yoda courses.

I can imagine it now: “OK class, today we are going to learn why size matters not, and why there is no try. But first, pull out your copy of ‘War and Peace.’ Today, when you read, make sure you put enough gruff in your ‘mmmmm’s at the beginning of each sentence.”

I hope people will make more use of Yoda, as it will make the world a better place. I just hope nobody comes up with a Jar Jar Binks theory. Then we will be in trouble.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, March 31, 2012.

March Madness has little meaning for tall, clumsy people

I’m 6’4” but of no use to anyone on a basketball court. Any team with me on its side would be doomed to failure because basketball and I go together like Jon Hamm and Kim Kardashian.


It’s not that I don’t like the sport, because I do believe it’s one of the better ones. It takes skill, it’s physical and it’s one that provides plenty of excitement to watch or play.

Growing up and watching Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Karl Malone and Charles Barkley in the prime of their careers was akin to a thousand Jeremy Lins or Lebron James today. I even bought a pair of Michael Jordan Nike shoes with my first real paycheck, as I liked him enough to do so.

Part of the reason I’m no good at basketball is because I’m a naturally clumsy person. I need to practice a lot to acquire the right balance to be just adequate at anything, and I’ve never practiced basketball to the extent most others have. My wife will attest to my clumsiness, as she got a good chuckle last week when I attempted to ride my son’s scooter and I flipped it and myself over during a walk.

But the main reason I’m no good at basketball, despite my height, is I never fully understood the game. I was never on a team, so I never learned the fine intricacies of the sport. Fouls confuse me, as do other rule violations. I can’t tell the difference between a well-played game and a sloppy, what-are-rules one.

Over the years I’ve tried to educate myself more about basketball. But playing “Double Dribble” on the original Nintendo Entertainment System doesn’t work well in those regards. I’m usually successful when I get myself in a mindset to learn about something more, but basketball truly stumps me.

As a result, when March Madness rolls around, I cross my fingers that bracket seedings are somewhat accurate because the majority of my picks are based on which team has the higher seed. I don’t want to be the guy that picks more wrong games than right ones, and someday I’d like to win a pool to at least claim back a little of the money I’ve spent on them over the years.

This past weekend, my son, Braden, received a portable basketball hoop from his grandmother and aunts for his seventh birthday. After putting the thing together with some help (as they are almost more complicated than the sport itself), I promptly missed nearly every basket I attempted. I was worse than Marquette in the first half of its game against Murray State Saturday. I do hope they improve in their coming games, as I picked them to win it all in the work pool.

Braden, on the other hand, was hitting every shot like it was second nature to him. His aunts on his mother’s side were both good basketball players in high school, so maybe he inherited some skills I never received. I’m hoping he inherits my height, because combining the two could be good for Stevens Point basketball in the not-so-distant future.

If he isn’t, I’ll completely understand. One more awkward basketball player isn’t going to hurt anyone. Unless he’s clumsy, accidentally knocks someone over on the court and prevents a future star from ever playing again. I’m almost sure I never did that, but my memory isn’t always the best. I’ve flipped over on a lot of scooters, bicycles and skateboards in my life.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette Friday, March 23, 2012.

Reality show klutzes steal dream of ‘Finding Bigfoot’

The green-eyed monster inside of me has been itching to come out because some dudes have found a way to make money at a career I didn’t think was possible. I’m referring to the four Sasquatch searchers on Animal Planet’s “Finding Bigfoot” television show who are making mad money looking for a creature I had hoped as a kid I could spend my adult life finding.


I was obsessed with Bigfoot as a kid, most likely because I watched a lot of “The Six Million Dollar Man” whose epic battles with the creature defined my television viewing experiences in the 1970s. While Steve Austin may have revealed Bigfoot was actually an alien android, I wasn’t quick to fall for that theory. I agonizingly studied any book I could find on the subject, and watched everything on television about it. Plus, I saw “Harry and the Hendersons” three times at the theater, instantly making me the world’s foremost expert on the legendary beast at the time.

Set on being a Bigfoot hunter (a term I use loosely because I could never bring myself to harm one should I find it) as a kid, I figured I simply needed to move to the West Coast states when I got older and then spend my days in the woods searching for it. I assumed some college education in science would give me enough ability to track it, and the government would be happy to pay me to do so.

Others pointed out the government would never pay anybody to search for Bigfoot, so I should give up this unachievable dream. The government certainly pays for less worthy endeavors, I thought, but as I got older, I realized these people were probably right. I then turned my attention to becoming a journalist and columnist, probably so I could write about these foolish goals. I do get paid to do so, but probably not much more than I would have as an unpaid Bigfoot hunter.

Over the years, my once undying belief in Bigfoot has disappeared. I’ve asked myself one question: In today’s technological world in which nearly everyone has camera and video camera abilities through their smartphones, why hasn’t anyone captured definitive proof of the beast? Go on YouTube and search for “Bigfoot.” With one exception, all you will find are horrible videos that all appear fake, blurry or distant.

The one exception is the 1967 Patterson-Gimlin video. This video is the famous one almost always shown during Bigfoot documentaries. While nobody has been able to prove it’s definitely authentic, no one has also demonstrated it’s fake.

Whether or not it’s real, it’s definitely better than anything those bozos have filmed on “Finding Bigfoot.” The three men on the show are all big believers in Bigfoot, some having encountered it before they began the show. The female on the show is the skeptic, who argues against nearly everything they bring forth as proof.

The weekly show follows them as they go to known Bigfoot sightings to investigate. They talk with the witnesses and then go to the location it was spotted. They recreate the scene for the witnesses, and use the recreation to determine if they did indeed spot Bigfoot.

At night, they return the scene to see if the creature will return. Using night cameras, some of which are equipped with heat sensors, they attempt to find the beast. Often they’ll make Sasquatch calls, some of which they claim are returned. Once in awhile they’ll point out night noises as coming from possible Bigfoots in the area, and sometimes they claim something is throwing rocks at them, because apparently Bigfoot has nothing better to do.

In the end, they leave believing they’ve uncovered enough evidence to claim Bigfoot was in the area. Viewers, like me, think otherwise.

Then again, I’m probably too jealous. Why didn’t I think to grab a camera and take to the woods at the start of the reality television boom to pursue my former dream? Back then, nearly everyone who proposed a reality show got one. These guys did well at the end of the boom.

I guess I should have been a little smarter. Then again, I’d like to think Bigfoot is really an alien android sent to Earth to spy on humans. It would definitely have the capability to avoid my clumsy pursuit.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, March 24, 2012.

Kids may want to become president, but parents will probably tell them ‘no'

Several weeks ago, on Presidents’ Day, my nearly 7-year-old son, Braden, told me he wanted to be president when he grows up.


At first I was proud of this statement. It showed me he was ambitious and was driven to be the best. Like him, I had similar thoughts when I was his age. Such noble goals helped drive me to success in school.

But then I thought about it some more. Why would anyone in his or her right mind want to ascend to a position where approximately half the people in the country don’t like you? And a good chunk of those people not only don’t like you, they despise you with a passion, refusing to give you any benefit of the doubt and criticizing every action you make without any acknowledge of the ones you do right.

When I was a kid more than 25 years ago, presidents seemed to receive a lot more respect than they do now. The detractors were there, as they should be in a well-functioning democratic society, but their voices didn’t drown out everyone around them.

Turn on any of the news channels and watch coverage of the president. It’s rarely unbiased, as depending on the channel it’s either heavily skewed against the president or heavily weighted in his favor. Neutrality in news coverage has disappeared.

Even worse, read online comments to news stories about the president. It’s easy to pick out those who back the president and those who don’t like him, as the passion of both is easily discernible. Constructive comments are quickly dismissed by both parties, even though they might carry more validity than the strongly biased comments.

Braden isn’t eligible to become president for another 28 years. The environment’s change in hostility toward the president in the past 25 years makes me fear how bad it will be in another quarter century. If I’m still around, I wouldn’t want to watch as people throw hatred his way, simply because they don’t agree with some of his politics.

This hatred is one of the reasons I rarely turn on news channels or read online stories about politics. The subject manner interests me, but its presentation has turned me away.

Reasonability needs to take precedence once again. Until it does, I don’t want my son to become president.

In fact, I’d rather have him become a garbage collector. Once a job associated with dirt, hard work and little intelligence, it’s now a well-respected and well-paid profession people rightfully now appreciate.

I would think the same type of appreciation would apply to the U.S. president, as the ability to handle that job far exceeds what nearly all of us are capable of, despite what some of us might think.

I gave up my presidential ambitions well before I got to junior high when I realized the amount of public speaking it would require. Most of us know statistics show most people would rather die than have to speak in public.

Maybe by showing a little appreciation for the president’s speaking ability we can start to bring some neutrality back and make it noble again for kids to want to be president.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, March 9, 2012.

Skating rinks haven’t changed much in 20 years, even without ‘YMCA’

It’s been more than 20 years since I last stepped foot inside a roller-skating rink, and with several minor exceptions, they haven’t changed a bit.

The rink itself is still wooden, although I skated on a concrete rink at one now long closed in Hancock, and the walls all on the outside are still lined with cheap carpet to cushion those crashes.

One side still acts as the loading and unloading dock where skaters enter or leave the rink. For reasons I can’t comprehend, this dock is one step higher than the bay, providing one more way for those with less balance to fall.

The lounge area leading up to the rink is still filled with a variety of vendor games. Some of these games are the same – air hockey and skee-ball will always remain classics. Traditional arcade games such as “Pac-Man” and “Donkey Kong” have been replaced by lesser skill games in which people can win tickets that can be traded for cheap carnival-type prizes.

The food stand still sells licorice ropes, popcorn, hot dogs and any other type of inexpensive and easy-to-make food that provide a high profit margin for the rink owners. Surprisingly, the prices aren’t nearly as bad as one might expect, especially when compared to the same items at a movie theater. A large box of popcorn at the roller-skating rink sells for $2, whereas the same box at the theater costs a house mortgage plus a pledge that half the money you leave behind when you die will go directly to Hollywood to finance the 17th installment of the “Twilight” series, which will still contain some of the worst special effects ever seen. But, hey, Edward will still be better than Jacob.

The same horrible music still plays as people skate, although I’m not sure if I admire or admonish the deejay for not playing “YMCA,” which I had fully expected to hear at least six times while I was there.

The biggest changes are the ramps in the middle of the rink – an awesome addition I’ll never go near – and the allowing of rollerblades and scooters on the rink. The last time I was at a rink rollerblades were relegated to the parking lot outside. And scooters were still skateboards with a pole handle.

I was at the rink in Wisconsin Rapids because my son, Braden, was invited to a double birthday party there for several of his classmates. It was his first experience skating so I stayed to show him how, not quite certain I would even remember myself. To my relief, my balance memory was intact and I was able to concentrate on helping him rather than myself.

Braden struggled with regular roller skates, much like I did when I was his age. Those things require little motion to move and a lot of balance to conquer. After watching a classmate of his quickly master rollerblades – something I’ve never tried myself – I switched him to those. Within half an hour he didn’t want my help anymore, freeing me up to enjoy the inexpensive carnival food.

The experience was a thrill we’ll return to soon. Next time, though, I’ll come dressed as a construction worker in anticipation “YMCA” will make its triumphant comeback.

****

Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, March 2, 2012.

World’s best birthday cake taunts those who can’t eat it

Every February my family and I go to my sister’s house in Ripon for my niece’s birthday party, and every year we get shafted.


Years ago it sort of upset me, but it’s been happening so long now that every year it’s become even more laughable. It’s reached the point where I have to share it with others, at the slight chance my sister might be offended and get mad at me.

My sister, Kelly, and her husband, Brian, hold a small party for their daughter, Samantha, and the only other ones who attend are my mother and stepfather and my grandparents. The party is fairly typical in that it consists of a potluck lunch, time for socialization, a gift opening and the singing of “Happy Birthday,” followed by cake and ice cream. The last part of this party is where the shafting occurs.

After we sing “Happy Birthday” to Samantha, she blows out the candles on the cake. The cake always looks delicious, as the frosting appears to be sweet yet not too heavy, and the decorating by the professional baker is enticing enough to make you want to put your face in the cake like a 1-year-old child and pig out.

But year after year, after the cake taunts us, it’s taken away and replaced by homemade cupcakes. Huh? The explanation is a bit complicated.

Years ago, I’m not sure exactly when, Kelly decided to hold two parties for Samantha – one with her family and one with Brian’s family. Neither family is particularly large, and one party with both sides used to be acceptable.

The separation forces our family to party first. We arrive around noon, and it’s over around 2:30 p.m. Brian’s family arrives about an hour after we leave.

Going first means the cake becomes only an object of lust for us. As we look at it and develop a want for it, it silently laughs at us, knowing we’re never going to taste its probably sweet, luscious outer coating and fluffy, moist chocolate or vanilla inside.

I honestly hope it suffers a horrible death when Brian’s family devours it.

We are relegated to cupcake eaters because I believe Kelly is embarrassed by her family – meaning us – so she separated the two sides to keep them from mingling from each other, thereby eliminating any chance we could humiliate her. In some ways, I don’t blame her. My mother and I both like to make people laugh, so we’re not afraid to bust out stupid humor or embarrass ourselves. If I were her, I’d probably want to separate the two families, too.

In separating them, though, she only gave us more fodder to potentially embarrass her. Need proof? You’re reading it.

And she will probably, too. I post this to my blogsite, allowing family members and friends who have no reason to subscribe to the paper to read my ramblings. A couple of months ago I would never have written this, purely out of the fact I wouldn’t want to embarrass or upset her, but I now know people need to chance it every once in a while and do crazy things like this.

I hope she realizes I’m doing so out of humor. When I’ve told others about it, they’ve laughed. I even had someone suggest I fill a syringe with alcohol next year and inject the cake with a little spice. It would probably be the first time any one has ever spiked a child’s birthday cake.

That’s a little too mean for my taste, though. Just because I can’t eat it, doesn’t mean I’ll ruin it for someone else. And who’s to say we won’t get the good cake someday. I wouldn’t want anybody ruining it for me.
****
Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, Feb. 24, 2012.