I recently had the remote starter installed and the idea was to keep it a secret from now till Christmas, which is less than a week away. Sounds easy enough right? Apparently not. The starter that I installed allows you to use the factory key fob to remote start the car through some button sequence. And therein lies the problem. The sequence is amazingly simple to randomly discover. So easy in fact, that tonight Mary had accidentally remote started her car as we walked away to attend a family party. 

Door lock. Door lock. Confirming alarm horn beep. A few more button presses on the fob. Starter turning the engine: Ch ch ch…vrooooom! 

“What just happened?”, she said in a state of confusion. 

Quick on my feet I had to act. Two choices came to mind:

A) Play it off and act just as confused a her. “You car is broken! Shit.” 

or 

B) Tell her about the remote starter.

I went with option B. I rationalized that she’s most likely going to repeat the key press sequence on Monday. And discover it on her own. I might as well break the surprise now and see her reaction face to face rather than her excited phone call on Monday.

I had my surprise presentation all lined up. It was going to be something cute, but I’ll still use it to share the secret of how to remote start it. Although I have to believe come Monday that she’ll already know. Which brings me to my point: She already knows what my surprise gift is to to her, yet I have no idea what her gift is to me. Is it only fair that she tells me her gift to me. Eye for an eye right?

I enjoy home cooking, it’s just that it’s not convenient for either of us. Mary comes home late each night due to her commute. And if I took on cooking duty I would be making pancakes, a la IHOP, for dinner every night. On the scale of diversity, I think our palates would be happier with a steady visit from Ronald McDonald and the chihuahua than Aunt Jemima.

Perhaps a change in our menu carousel would be better suited for our healths. Is the food from T.G.I. Friday’s or Ruby Tuesday much more healthier? (On a side note, who are the marketing guys that decided to name their restaurants after name days?) If so, this is going to put a hurting on my wallet like Ryan Clark did to Wes Welker. I suggest that these chain restaurants call on Bragelina and adopt a 99¢ menu.

No, we need to Obamonize our economic situation. Spending $40 for dinner each night isn’t a long term solution. Perhaps I should expand my home cooking repertoire beyond one dish. I don’t want my name next to Souja Boy on the exclusive one hit wonder list. I’ve read a slew of recipes with the recent Thanksgiving holiday, but they all seem too complicated for my “Bubba Shrimp”-esque culinary mind. There must be a Cooking For Dummies book out there, but I can’t imagine it having a variety of dishes that is on par with the complexity of a peanut butter & jelly sandwich.

This diet solution needs to be addressed sooner than later. When Jagger graduates from pea & carrot smoothies, I don’t want him feasting on McNuggets and french fries. I don’t want his baby frame to support obesity. That would end his sports stardom like how Pollard ended Brady’s.

Any tips? Cash or verbal will do. In the meantime, I’m going to finish off my bacon double cheeseburger.

Mary and I kicked off the start of the holiday season with a trip to a few local stores on Black Friday. Broke and exhausted, we came back with several stockings for every member of the family. 

My parents and I have never celebrated Christmas with holiday stockings. So this is a first for me. And what better way to start than with my favorite football team, the New York Football Giants.

From left to right the stockings belong to: Me, Jagger, the Bears, Oreo, and Mary. The Pooh Bear (2nd from left) sings too.

Behind the lamp, just above my stocking, it’s a little dancing New York Football Giants bear.

Pretty slick huh? I think Jagger will get tons of entertainment from these. Now I just have to stock up on AA batteries.

Warning #1: Discharging

Expect to have discharging throughout the whole pregnancy. I have known from the beginning of the pregnancy that discharging is normal as long is it is not reddish. But what I did not know was that this discharging occurs throughout the whole 9(although really, 10) months! It came to a point that I really started freaking out about it a few weeks ago. I had to finally ask my sister-in-law if this was normal, which she of course said yes to. Soon after I asked her, I saw an article in a pregnancy magazine about it. A little late huh? But it calmed me down even more. So to the future expectant mothers out there, this is normal so don’t freak out.

Warning #2: Stuffiness and Bloody Nose

One day at work my sinuses started to bother me. I hated it. It doesn’t make me feel good at all. I happened to be talking to my sister-in-law on the phone and she told me that she had it throughout her whole pregnancy with my nephew. Great, just what I wanted to hear. Luckily though, my sinus pain went away. However, I have had constant stuffiness and a bloody nose. Every time I blew my nose, there was blood on the tissue. I figured it was just my allergies and the Claritin I was taking caused my nose to dry up. So I stopped taking Claritin but the problem continued.

So then I started using my humidifier and it stopped for a few days but continued up again. I then brought a nasal spray/drops with just saline to moisten my nose. So with a combination of all these, it finally eased the bleeding a bit. But I was still constantly wondering if this was all normal.

Last week I told my husband that if the bleeding doesn’t stop, I would go see my regular doctor about it. But then, as fate would have it, I was reading one of those pregnancy magazines and it stated that a bloody nose is normal. This is because the respiratory tract lining receives more blood. Something about hormones causing it. I am glad to have read this before going to the doctor. It saved me $25!

Warning #3: Sex

This is really a no brainer but I just wanted to put it out there. Your husband will want you even more. And he won’t understand as to why your sex life may become none existent at times during the pregnancy. He may feel like you don’t want him anymore and you try your best to reassure him that you still do. I have learned that no matter how many times you give in, he still will constantly complain about it.

Attention to all fathers-to-be: Take no offense if your wife does not want to sleep with you as much as she did before pregnancy! Not having sex with you as much as before does not mean we have lost our interest. The thing is, we feel fat, unattractive, and tired all the time that sex is the last thing in our mind. Plus the fact that we have this heavy thing in front of our body and our breasts are always sore. You as husbands really need to understand this! No matter how many times you compliment us (which we do appreciate although we may not show it at times), we still feel the way we feel. Sorry!

This is all the warnings I can think of so far. I am only at the end of my 6th month. I am sure there will be more and I will post as soon as I experience them.

The holidays are around the bend and you’ve got two sets of families. If you’re lucky (or should I say unlucky) and live in the neighborhood, then you can easily visit both . Otherwise you have to work out a schedule with the spouse.

I’ve been there and done that. We have a loose rotation of who to visit, while I’m more a creature of habit and I am used to visiting specific people depending on the holiday. I had that weird aunt that lived in boredom. No video games, no snacks, no toys. She had a 13″ telly with rabbit antenna ears. Awful.

Now a married man, Mary and I travel up and down the state visiting family members where you stay there just long enough to stuff down a bite or two, all the while checking the clock when you need to leave to get to the next family household.

This year is a little odd as my family’s host is away. So lunch is at the museum…the parents. I enjoy their company, it’s just that it’s always cold and everything is considered on display, as in do not touch. I’m surprised they don’t rope off areas of the house.

I’m guessing tradition trumps my wishes and we’ll spend Christmas at an aunt/uncle’s place. But wait, why not take over hosting responsibilities from the aging and welcome the next generation of traditions? This Christmas I’d like to celebrate it in our home. This will be our first Christmas together with the 16 of us: Oreo, Bear Bear, Koala, Baby Bear, Farrell, Mila, Lila, Teddy Ruxpin, Cinnamon, Pooh, Pooh, Doggy, Panda, Mary, Jagger (in mommy), and me. This way when we open gifts we can play with it right away. It’s such a tease to open the video game you’ve been wanting, only to be at your aunt’s house — the no fun zone.

But returning to my tradition coup d’état, having it in our home allows us to have both families together. No argument between you and the spouse where we need to be or how much fun it is at the other house. Problem solved. And most importantly, when you unwrap Gears of War 2, your XBOX 360 is in the next room.