Well that suct

For nearly 8 months, Wes’s left eye produced more goop than a lame celebrity blog. Which is why, during a recent trip to the pediatrician, we were told it was time to clear out the blocked tear duct we’d been hoping would correct itself. Dr. Dehovitz assured us it was a painless procedure, and recommended we go see her colleague Dr. Eyeballstabber* in Midtown.

The first time we visited Dr. Eyeballstabber, he seemed like a nice enough guy, very professional, good bedside manner, complimentary of Wes’ dashing good looks. But there was just something a little off about him…maybe he was a little too complimentary, or a little too casual…something. Anyway, he gave us some eye-drops to dilate Wes’ eyes before the procedure and told us to come back in a week.

So last Thursday, we took Wes back to the office in Midtown, eyes dilated like a rich kid at a Phish show. Knowing how squeamish Crissy can be about these things, we both agreed it would be best if I accompanied Wes into the procedure.

The first thing Dr. Eyeballstabber did was peer into Wes’ retinas and compliment him. “Ooh, great eyes. No glasses for this guy.” Okay pal, I thought. Kindly dispense with the flattery and get on with it.

He reassured me that this is a very quick and painless process. There are very few nerve endings in the tear duct, and the entire process is only a couple minutes. In fact, Dr. Eyeballstabber said, the worst part will be strapping him into the little padded straightjacket. “They never like that part.”

The weird thing is, I remember that little straightjacket. My brother Tommy pushed me lips-first into a coffee table while dancing to Saturday Night Fever when I was three, and they strapped me into one of those things for the stitches. It’s just one of the few, random memories I have left from my childhood, and I actually remember it not being that painful or scary.

It’s worth noting here that I have the world’s least dependable memory.

As soon as Dr. Eyeballstabber pulled the strap tight across Wes’ forehead, he started crying. Hard. Suddenly my neck got all clammy and my palms moistened. “Whoo! Sweatin’ over here,” I said. Dr. Eyeballstabber assured me that everything would be fine. Then he pulled out a 6-inch syringe.

Dammit. I knew there was something about this guy.

To be fair, he didn’t actually stab Wes’ eyeball. He inserted the needle into his tear duct, which is right next to his eyeball.
To a new dad on the verge of a panic attack, it was definitely his eyeball.

Just as the good doctor promised, it was all over in a matter of seconds. A couple quick pokes of the tear duct, and they swept him out of the straightjacket and back into Dad’s arms, happy and cuddly as ever.

I’m happy to report that the little dude has been 100% goop-free, 5 days and counting. And Wes, if you’re reading this in 20 years, and you still remember this event, I hope your memory is as inaccurate as your old man’s.


*There’s a chance I’m remembering his name wrong.

Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Hazel

My sister Heather and her husband Tom had a baby girl yesterday named Hazel Nicole Guillen. We haven’t met her yet, but, like everyone else, we’re already smitten with her luxurious locks, pouty lips, and glamorous eyelashes.

Although it’s not her looks we’re most interested in. I’m counting on her big brain to discourage Wes from doing stupid things like sneaking out of our futurehouse or stealing my futurecar.

You hear that boy? No drinking my futurebeer, either.

Anyway, yesterday was Hazel’s day. We love you already, little girl. Do Uncle Kev a favor and go easy on your parents. They love you more than you’ll ever understand.

Expanding the repertoire

Christine’s in town this weekend, so I’ve been solo with Wes most of the day. Which means I’ve been free to suck my teeth and clear my throat with impunity. It also means I can play my guitar as much as I want, since Wes and Franny don’t speak English well enough to tell me I suck.

When people ask me to describe how good of a guitar player I am, I tell them I sound like I’m awesome for 7 minutes. At first, I rule. Then I run out of material. So I’m trying to expand my repertoire.

Ideally, I’d like to play Wes songs to sleep, instead of reading him stories. In part to satisfy the rockstar oblongata in every dude’s brain. In part so I don’t have to read the same story over and over again. But mainly to brainwash my son into liking my music.

So I spent most of the day crooning my way through a bunch of Stones songs that I can hack out on the guitar. Midway through my 14th rendition of Loving Cup, Franny looked up at me sharply, jumped off the couch, and trotted over to the farthest point across the room from me.

Which is the universal language for you suck.

My new Thanksgiving joke

Stop me if you’ve heard this one:

Two Canadians, two Americans, and a dog sit down to Thanksgiving dinner.

Canadian dude says, “Where does your dog poop, eh?”
American guy says, “No, she poops on the rug.”

What do you mean you don't get it?

I’ll explain. Thanksgiving dinner was at our place this year. Crissy prepared her 3rd consecutive ridiculously delicious Thanksgiving meal. Except this year we invited our hilarious Canadian friends over to celebrate the day that the Pilgrims and the Indians invented sausage gravy. As I understand it.

Anyway, Jesse and Holly brought their 7-month old daughter Pippa over just after noon, which meant that Jesse and I were legally allowed to begin consuming alcohol thanks to the Holiday loophole. I cracked a bottle of red, babies were sprawled on the floor like squirmy landmines, Franny disapproved from afar, and we were off to the races.

And then, for some reason, out of the blue, Wes decided to deliver a Christmas miracle early this year. He busted out a 2.5 hour nap… Right. Through. Thanksgiving. Dinner.



It was truly amazing. Crissy and I were positive he’d be up any minute, so we touched wine glasses and swallowed our turkey whole like seagulls. Which left 2.4 hours to sigh deeply, groan, and drink wine. Also invented by the Pilgrims.

Eating so fast also meant that there were plenty of table scraps left over for Franny. Too many.



Once the Holy Nap, Forgiver of Sins finally ended, we all went for a great walk along Brooklyn Bridge Park. The sun was setting, the kids were happy, and all was right in the world.

Jesse, Holly, and Pippa were troopers. We put Wes to bed around 7, they put Pippa in Wes' swing, and they both slept soundly in the next room while the grownups contributed to the obesity epidemic. They stuck around until around 11 o’clock, chatting and laughing while the kids slept, which is about as close as you get to an adult pajama party. It was a fantastic time.



The next morning, Crissy was awakened by the smell of fresh corpse. She asked me to investigate. I tiptoed out into the main room to discover that Franny had absolutely destroyed two of the Flor rug squares, which she hasn't done in a really long time. She was very sorry, and very worried. We assured her it was ok, it was our fault for giving her so much food. But that smell...my god the smell. It was indescribable. Is decomposition-ey a word? It should be.

As we searched for replacement squares at the new Flor store in Brooklyn, the employee asked us what happened. I pointed to Franny. “Too much turkey for the mutt.”

The employee looked concerned.

“I don’t think you’re supposed to feed dogs turkey. It’s really bad for them.”
“Noo, I don’t think that’s right. Is it? We just ahh… that can’t be right.”

Yes. It is right. Don’t feed your dog turkey. It can actually be very, very dangerous for them. The skin and bones can even kill them. Or at least make their poop smell dead. Which is almost as bad.

Get it? The Canadian is saying “eh,” but the American thinks he’s saying “hay.”

Forget it.

Halloween #1

Yes, I know it’s December 5th, but I figured it’s time to catch up on some oldies but goodies. Like Halloween.

First of all, Wes’s first two teeth came in just in time for Halloween, aka our nation’s collective middle finger to the American Dental Association. His little blade-like teeth jut out of his lower gum, so when he smiles, he looks like a liquored up hobo riding a boxcar to Fresno. We contemplated giving the teeth names, but we never did decide on anything. So let’s do it right now:

Henceforth, Wes’ two bottom teeth shall be referred to as Tin Pan Jeb and Harlan “Scrappie” Jenkins. And so it was.

Anyway, Halloween fell on a Monday this year, and if anyone remembers, things get a little crazy on our block. This year was no exception. Well, two exceptions. We were slightly more prepared for the insanity thanks to 1. The $50 bucks we spent on candy, and 2. The booze. Neither was any match for the voracious hordes of trick or treaters that descended on our stoop like a flock of adorable zombie vultures.

We invited a bunch of our new parent friends over for the festivities, who all seemed a little overwhelmed by the mania. Not that I blamed them. Costume highlights included our friend Ashley who was dressed a the Empire State Building, and her 11-month old Roman who went as King Kong, Jessie/Holly/Pippa who went as a trio of astronauts, Leslie and her son Owen, who went as Teen Wolf and Frauke/Jeff’s son Julian who went as a pocket-sized Springsteen.

Crissy, Wes, and I went as Run DMC this year, with Wes owning his role as a mini Jam Master Jay. Since Crissy’s mom was in town for the weekend, we all met at my office for a quick photo shoot on Friday night, before Crissy and I headed off to a couple adult (get your mind out of the gutter) Halloween parties in the city. Wes responded to this plan by instantly barfing all over his costume.

Not to be outdone, Crissy and I felt like barfing all day Saturday. Thank god for mothers-in-law.

sir barfsalot

The other day Wes barfed three times over brunch at Bocca Lupo with some new parent friends of ours. It was nice of him to contribute to the conversation. I think that’s what it was. He kept trying to make interesting and insightful counterpoints, but puke just kept coming out.

He’s a good barfer, the boy. It just falls out of his face, and he’s right back in his groove, like, what? I’m good. I think the nonchalance is working for him. Isn't that what they say about doing bad things in public? The more obvious you are, the less people notice. Like crack smoking. Or adults on razor scooters.

I barf and tell people for the next two hours to get sympathy, or to leave work, or to not have to do chores. Not Wes. He just blasts away. And he’ll do it anywhere too. The couch, the bed, the favorite t-shirts, over brunch, wherever.

Anyway, the waitresses were very nice about it, supplying us with plenty of extra napkins. And they had nice, thick, barf-cleaning napkins, come to think of it.

We should go back to that place. So we can tell them how well their napkins clean up barf.

the first three months

Aaaaand, we’re back.

It’s hard to describe the first three months of your first child’s life to someone who’s never experienced it. If I have one piece of advice, it’s never rent a room to a newborn. They're loud, messy, and slow with the rent.

Wes’ first three months were defined by lukewarm takeout and prisoner lighting. Crissy and I rarely spoke. We lived in constant fear. We wept openly, but silently.

One of the worst things about the first three months is the conflicting Internet advice. Make sure he’s eating enough, but never let them overeat, unless he’s going through a growth spurt, which could happen between 1-2 weeks, 2-4 weeks, or 4-12 weeks. Keep him tightly swaddled unless he doesn’t want to be swaddled, which you’ll know when he either cries or doesn’t cry.

It was tough for us. We kept waiting for a sign that it was going to get better. And the longer it took, the more we wanted to punch all the people who told us it would get better.

By the time Wes was about 5 weeks, our days were loaded with weapons-grade frustration. If they could load that level of frustration into airplanes, and spray it all over Afghanistan, everyone would just quit. It would actually eradicate the concept of war as we know it.

It was probably the most painful for Wes, who was having a hard time swallowing and digesting his food, and therefore having a hard time sleeping.

Ever.

In my bleary-eyed, zombie-like state, I started to think of my son as a tiny terminator sent back to earth to eradicate sleep for all mankind. I felt like Linda Hamilton every night, sweaty and filthy, desperately trying to extinguish the red light behind the evil machine’s eyes and avoid two crappy sequels.

And then one night, at about three in the morning, Wes looked me square in the eye, registered who he was looking at, and smiled so brightly I thought I was hallucinating.

Never has a smile seemed so extra-terrestrial. It felt like I was witnessing something I wasn’t supposed to see. Like I was catching a glimpse of the Loch Ness Monster, alone, after a week-long whiskey bender, and nobody was ever going to believe me.

Suddenly, a wave of understanding gushed through me…

Everything’s going to be just fine.

weston john mulroy

here was kevin's announcement to friends and family:

"At exactly 9:59 am this morning, Weston "Wes" John Mulroy karate kicked his way into the world, kissed both biceps, drank a cup of nails, and wrestled a small boar.

He's 7.4 ounces, has a clearly defined chin dimple, and is currently accepting feats of strength requests."

and up above is a pic of the little guy taken yesterday, almost 6 weeks later!

Life in Brooklyn

I guess we’re not doing a very good job of convincing the Brooklynphobes that we didn’t go off the grid when we moved to Brooklyn Heights. We were back home recently when a family member asked, “So does that mean you live with the Puerto Ricans now?” Not exactly.

Our landlords in Brooklyn live in the apartment above us. Ed is a shuffling, nebbish ex–lawyer in his early eighties with coke-bottle glasses and an endless supply of slow-to-develop stories. Anne is a scrappy, 70-something, sharp-faced woman who writes instructions and emergency phone numbers with perfect penmanship. They are very nice people who, once we declined multiple invitations to Sunday mass, decided to stop letting us use their over-sized washing machine.

Ed told us his family has owned the building since it was built in 1902, and informed us that he was born in the very room that we’re planning on turning into the nursery. I tried not to think of Ed in diapers, and failed. Crissy responded politely.

As for the neighborhood, it’s a lot like Sesame Street, if Sesame Street were gentrified by young urban professionals and old Jewish retirees, and invaded by a nation of baby strollers and dogs. For some reason, our street turns into the Bourbon St of trick-or-treating on Halloween, with considerably less boobs.





I think I mentioned that our place is far bigger than the shoebox we left behind in Tribeca. Which meant that we had to buy new furniture to fill up the extra space. Thankfully, Crissy and I don’t argue very often. Apparently, we like to save it all up for IKEA.

So to avoid clawing each other’s eyes out over particleboard dressers and rice paper lamps, I dragged Crissy into a series of filthy, asthma-inspiring furniture stores all over Brooklyn to look for “deals” on old furniture. We flirted with hepatitis at least ten times before settling on a couple chairs from Urban Outfitters and calling it a day.

So here we are, just a few months away from the must-have Brooklyn Heights accessory: Baby #1. Our place is really coming along and starting to feel like home. The nursery is beginning to fill up with boxes of baby furniture that I’ll have to get off my ass and put together one of these days. Which is fine. It’s the thought of future trips to IKEA that’s making my back sweat.

The official announcement

So it’s been nearly two months since we moved to Brooklyn Heights. Highlights of the move included the previous tenant’s shit all over the apartment the day we moved in, resulting in our 80 year old landlord’s inability to get inside to clean the place, resulting in eight years worth of refracted pee on the wall next to the toilet.

But that’s ancient history now. Our place is big and clean and (mostly) pee-free.

Then there’s our neighborhood. In Tribeca, our window was right at the intersection of two one-way streets and a dead end. Nearly everyone driving down our street discovered this fact 10 feet below our window, and decided that the most effective way to correct the problem was to hold the horn. Not honk. Hold.

Now? The silence is almost holy. It’s angelic. Now when I walk Franny at midnight in my underpants, there are no homeless people to scoff at how slovenly I’m dressed, no blacked out strip club patrons, no Fresh Direct trucks idling outside our bedroom window, no dim-witted protesters, no sketchy Fox news vans, no quote unquote mosques as a next door neighbor.

It’s nothing but tree lined streets and brownstones and dogs and babies. In short, people just like us…

Well, almost like us.

Our baby boy isn't due until May.

change of pace

Well, we did it. We found a new apartment. After a monthlong search, Crissy’s organizational booster rockets exploded out of her eyeballs, and she rode both of our brokers’ lazy nutsacks right into a beautiful three flat in Brooklyn Heights.

It was really impressive the way she pitted these bastards against each other, ramping up the competition, and lighting a fire under both of their asses by doing our own simultaneous Craigslist search. If we’re paying these sons of bitches six thousand dollars to find us a god damn rental unit, Crissy was gonna make them work for their money.

We haven’t covered this much in the blog yet, but we decided to move to Brooklyn almost a year ago. Since then, everyone in Manhattan has been trying to give us a big city pep talk, like moving to Brooklyn means we’re throwing in the towel and moving to South Dakota.

Have you looked on the Lower East Side?? Have you considered the Upper West Side?? Have you considered a refrigerator box alongside the West Side Highway?

The answer is yes, we have. We’d love to stay in Manhattan. But we want more space, and last I checked, we don’t manage hedge funds. Because the starting rent for a clean, bedbug-free 2 bedroom in any decent neighborhood is just over four grand a month. That’s if your broker is lucky enough to find you one, after you’ve been anal raped by…er…paid them their fifteen percent cut.

On top of that, it’s starting to feel like TriBeCa is conspiring to drive us out of the city. The anti-Park51 community center demonstrations are heating up (the loudest and dumbest was this past weekend on September 11th), the sound of the construction surrounding our building can only be described as warlike, and NYC’s hottest summer on record served up every foul, repulsive, soul-melting stench this city has to offer.

Don’t get us wrong. We love you Manhattan. But we’re ready.

P.S. Here's a pic of some of the horses asses parked outside our apartment this past weekend. More on that later...

details, details

They had to go there, didn't they.

curve-breakin'

A lot of people ask for money on the subway. All of those people should be pissed at this guy's group of curve-busting panhandlers, who bust out full-on breakdancing routines on moving trains.

I'm not talking about some half-assed robot either. I'm talking backspins, handstands, backflips.

Yes, backflips.

all fun and games till dad gets gunned with a hose

bedbuggin' out

Crissy’s been trying to get me to freak out about bedbugs for about a year now. I wasn’t having it.

I thought bedbugs were the stuff of nursery rhymes until I Googled them. Not a good plan in the middle of August. Suddenly this scuzzy-ass city seems mighty bedbug-friendly.

And it is. They’re everywhere.

First they shut down the Hollister store on Broadway. Then they popped up in Victoria’s Secret and Abercrombie & Fitch. They shut down a couple advertising agencies for a few days, including Euro RSCG Worldwide.

They’ve popped up in the New York Public library, the Empire State Building, and the Time Warner Center. Most recently, they’ve begun shutting down movie theaters.

But you know how they really know it’s an epidemic? Because rich people get them too. Which is the only good thing about bedbugs. Everything else sucks.

I guess you have to pay NASA eight billion dollars to burn your house down and shave your head if you have them. They’re like cockroaches. Except they live in your bed. And drink your blood.

So now we’re all freaked out, because we’re planning on moving to Brooklyn in October, and our new apartment is obviously going to have them. And even if it doesn’t, I can’t stop shopping at Victoria’s Secret.

P.S. This is a picture of my wife and dog, surrounded by bedbugs.

hey, that's great

There’s been a lot of controversy over this proposed Ground Zero Mosque lately. Except, of course, it’s not exactly at Ground Zero. It’s a couple blocks north, at 51 Park Place.

Our address? 53 Park Place.

Having a national debate as a next-door neighbor has been very interesting. And by interesting, I mean supremely annoying.

Of course, nobody seemed to care about the community center/mosque/ex-Burlington coat factory back in December. But now that elections are coming up? It’s been a steady stream of news vans, overly-coiffed newscasters, and weirdo protesters with very little drawing/spelling ability.

The newscasters are usually there until roughly midnight, which means, at the very least, our late night walks with Franny are blindingly well lit. It also serves to remind us that, according to Fox news, Franny’s apparently been peeing on hallowed ground for the last year and a half.

But none of that was any match for the powerful annoyingness that was the anti mosque demonstration yesterday. Luckily, we were properly forewarned and left town, heading up to my friend Kurt’s house in Newburgh for the day.

It was, by all accounts, exactly as advertised: loud, dumb, and ugly.

And at the risk of getting all political here, I’ll just say this: the towers were not attacked by a religion. They were attacked by a small group of psychos who are slavish to fanatical dogma.

But, of course, that’s Micky Mouse stuff compared to our own corporate sociopaths; the people who are actively poisoning our food and water, f*cking our financial system, taking out life insurance policies on ailing employees, and spraying cancer all over the Gulf of Mexico, all in the name of Corporate America’s one true religion…

The Bottom Line.

Sorry to get all preachy. It’s just that, when it’s so in your face, it’s hard to forget that this is exactly the kind of bullshit controversy drummed up to distract people from actual problems just before elections. The bad guy needs a face, and it really helps if that face looks different than ours.

July 4th, a retrospective

While we’re on the subject of missing our favorite people from Chicago, my sister Heather and brother-in-law Tom came to visit us on the 4th of July (god we haven’t posted in a long time)

If you don’t know my sister, she writes an infinitely braver and more inspiring (not to mention 10 times more prolific) blog here. She and Tom were in desperate need of a little impromptu vacationing. We were thrilled they picked NYC as one of their destinations.

Friday night was pizza at a new Mario Batali joint, where the waiter incorrectly corrected my pronunciation of the wine. Then, off to drinks at my current favorite 19th century Victorian bar Lillie’s in Union Square, where Heather noted how much more pleasant it is to be waited on by attractive people. We all agreed.

Saturday morning was a hike through Central Park, where we drank vodka lemonades at the boathouse to fuel our rowboat rental adventure. It turns out rowing a boat is hard work. And, according to the number of times we rammed other boats, sort of confusing.

After Central Park, we took a cab to Num Pang, a stupidly delicious Vietnamese sandwich joint near my office, where we crushed our sandwiches, discussed the porn movie theater across the street, and discovered I’d left my phone in the cab. Most. Rookie. Move. Ever.

When I called my phone, the cab driver answered. “I left my phone in your cab,” I enlightened him. “You left your phone in my cab,” he replied.

Apparently god wanted to prove to Heather and Tom that New Yorkers weren’t all dicks, because the next thing the cab driver said to me was, “I’ll drive it back to you.”

Huh?

10 minutes later, the cab driver pulled up and handed me my phone. A drunken homeless guy passed by right at that moment to remind me, in case I hadn’t fully grasped the enormity of the event, “You a lucky motherf*cker.” I couldn’t agree more.

That night, we were hoping to catch a show at the Comedy Cellar, but it was sold out…yet again. So we improvised by going to an excellent Cuban restaurant in the East Village with crazy awesome weirdo mixed drinks, and freakishly good food. We ended the night at a new bar called 9th Ward, where Tom and I took turns scoffing at a sleeveless bartender.

Sunday was the 4th, so we took it easy, and did a little sneaker shopping for Tom. Heather picked out two pairs of super-Euro Puma slippers, before we decided men’s sneaker shopping was not her strong suit. We found Tom two pairs of sweet kicks and hit the road.

That evening was the big event-the fireworks. We bought tickets for a water taxi that takes you right out onto the Hudson, a couple hundred yards from the barge where they launch the fireworks. The show was incredible, I’m pretty sure. Anyway, we drank a ton of canned beer.

After a sloppy meal of Halal street meat right outside Heather and Tom’s hotel, Crissy and Heather decided the night should be over. And they were right. But just to be sure, Tom and I went to a local dive to play some pool. When we almost got our asses handed to us by obvious high school kids, we realized it was time to go home.

When they took off the following morning, Crissy and I were both sorry to see them go. But despite our sadness, their visit reminded me of the sage words a man once said to me:

“You a lucky motherf*cker.”

Brighton Beach

We met up with Alex’s parents’ friends back in Brighton Beach around 5ish. Vitaly and Alla were an older couple in their 70s. She spoke English, he didn’t. Alex spoke to them in Russian, and translated for us. It was fascinating watching him switch back and forth from English to Russian. I asked them if Alex spoke Russian with an American accent. They said no, he speaks like a 20 year old. I decided that must mean he tells a lot of inappropriate dick jokes.



We sat down for a meal at Tatiana’s, an outdoor restaurant on the Boardwalk. Our large, shave-headed waiter Sasha wore knockoff Carrera sunglasses, only spoke in Russian, and obviously broke people’s kneecaps as a side gig. It was all very exciting.

Vitaly snapped his fingers a few times, and people started bringing things to our table. The first thing they brought was a chilled liter of vodka on ice, which Sasha began pouring into small, shot sized glasses to the right of everyone’s plate. Vitaly and Alla held up their glasses. Nazdaróvye! To your health! Nothing healthy followed.



The food came in mountains. Piles of pickled items- pickled tomatoes, pickled beets, pickled pickles. Wagonfuls of lamb, chicken, cured meats, cow’s tongue, yes cow’s tongue, breads, sauces, potatoes…

And vodka. So much vodka.

Every 10 minutes, we toasted. Can you believe what a gorgeous day it is? Nazdaróvye! This lamb is incredible. Nazdaróvye! Does anyone want any more sauce? Nazdaróvye! I have to go to the bathroom. Nazdaróvye!

The weird thing is, when you stuff that much food into your face, the vodka doesn’t crush you like you think it’s going to. I mean, don’t get me wrong, we were hammered. But nobody was taking pictures with lamps yet. So we ordered more vodka.



After two more half-size bottles, we decided to call a van to take us back to Manhattan. The mountains of food and presence of elders had kept our drunkenness pretty much in check until that point. But as soon as they put us in that van and sent us on our way, things got ugly.



The first thing we needed, obviously, was more vodka. You know, for the ride. The next thing we needed, were Russian ice cream cones. I don’t remember what they’re called, but god damn it they were good. The Russian driver drove us safely back to our apartment, talking Alex’s ear off in Russian about his kids.

What followed in our apartment was such an embarrassing display of sloppy idiocy that nobody should have to re-experience it, even in blog form. Suffice it to say there was a lot of bad dancing, loud singing, fighting over what song should be played next, and high decibel, low IQ conversations. Alex rode a bike through our apartment wearing a helmet. Christine’s brother Don drunk texted a girl he wanted to ask out. We all weighed in on what it should say.

Somewhere, videos of this liver-aching nightmare exist. The world would be a smarter, happier place if they un-existed.

We miss you already guys. Come back soon.

Coney Island

I know...we suck.

Sometimes, no matter how hard we try to avoid it, homesickness sneaks up on us. It crawls out of the most unlikely of places to remind us how much we miss our favorite people back in Chicago.

Its latest insidious tactic is to slither out of the toilet bowl and crawl out from behind the couch cushions to remind us that we pay 3k a month for a 600 square foot apartment. Yeah, you read that right.

Which is why Alex and Christine coming to visit us a couple weeks back couldn’t have come at a better time.



I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but one of the best things about friends and family coming to visit us in New York is that we get to try out all the New Yorky stuff we wouldn’t normally do by ourselves. This time, we got to check two of them off our list: Coney Island, and Brighton Beach.

Let’s start with Coney Island.



You know how sometimes aggressively unattractive people wear skin-tight crop-tops that read In Your Dreams? That’s Coney Island. It’s also crazy and weird and awesome, but it’s tons of In Your Dreams.

The first thing we noticed was a small, semi-pornographic dance party in broad daylight, with a healthy mix of three year old children dancing alongside shirtless gentlemen simulating slow, passionate lovemaking with the boardwalk. We shuffled along.



Next we checked out an attraction called “Shoot the Freak,” which was a paint ball shooting range advertising “live human targets.” We watched a man pay his money and step up to the gun, as a shirtless Mexican dude donned a helmet, picked up a garbage lid shield, and sadly shuffled from side to side. The shooter bided his time for the kill shot. We moved along.



Next was Luna Park. That’s the part with all the actual rides. I’m riding the Cyclone! I’m riding that spinny pukey thing! I…eh… you have to buy tickets. Let’s just drink beer.



So we drank beers in the blazing sun, thought about standing in line for a Nathan’s dog, sauntered out on the pier, watched people fish with chicken wings for bait, and watched a family enjoy a pork chop picnic on the beach. It was pretty awesome.

Then suddenly, without warning, Alex stopped drinking beer.

It was a very curious thing. But we pretended we didn’t notice. Besides, we were heading back to Brighton Beach soon for an early dinner, so he had plenty of time to catch up.

Hi Tom

Kevin's dad is threatening to never read the blog again if we don't update soon. This is my lame attempt to tide him over until Kevin writes about our trip to Brighton Beach, NY this past weekend...