May 2003 Musing

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Today is
May 5, 2003. It's Cinco deMayo or something like that. More importantly,
it's my Dad's birthday. Of course, he's dead now, but I think he'd have been
64 if he was still alive.

 

So, I'm
thinking about my Dad some today.  

 

I never
think about Cinco deMayo. In my humble opinion (IMHO), Cinco deMayo is just
an excuse for Mexican restaurants to sell lots of food and alcohol. I don't
need any particular excuse to eat lots of food. Notice I avoided the whole alcohol
issue.

 

Well, April
came and went. Was it eventful? I can't remember. Now, I know
Benjamin Kris Van Der Werken turned 10 years old in April on the 11th. I recall
perhaps that we had a party and he got lots of gifts and cash.

 

In fact,
we (Evil -- for the newbs at reading my musings, I refer to my wife as The Evil Overlord
or Evil -- and I) gave Ben $100.00 to spend as he should so choose. Immediately,
Ben wanted me to take him to the local Electronics Boutique games store and get the
PS2 game, Dragon Ball Z Budakai. So, I did. He played it. I've played
it.

 

Note:
Ben's "twitch reflexes" are now more developed than mine. He's better than I
am at these games. Of course, Bobby is the best, but Bobby's had years to practice
on Ben. I didn't start playing "twitch reflex" games until after I was married,
so I don't have the innate early training necessary to really "compete."
This situation is "just that way."

 

I rather
suspect Bekah will out-reflex me by the time she's 10 years old also. Again,
"just that way."

 

Well, the
game I bought Ben only cost $54.00, so I pocketed the $46.00, hoping he'd forget about
it. He didn't. Barb paid him back and put that and some other cash he
had from his birthday into his bank account. Somehow, I still ended up with
that extra $46.00, I think. Good for me!

 

Ben can't
handle money well. He gambles with it. He bet the neighbor kid he could
beat the kid down the hill on a bike, even though the kid is two years older than
Ben and has been riding his bike for much longer than Ben has. So, Ben had to
pay this guy $2.00. Of course, I let him pay up. Then, we took all his
money away from Ben and put it in his bank account.

 

We defnitely
have our work cut out for us with Benjamin. There are other issues with Ben,
things I can't mention in a public forum, that indicate we really, really have our
work cut out for us with Ben. In fact, he's on restriction today. No t.v.
and no video games. We really have our work cut out for us.