A nice meal

When Jeff tells people that he's a sports writer and has to go to football, basketball and baseball games, they usually all say the same thing, "I wish I had a job going to sporting events."

What they don't understand is that he has to get to the stadium or gym two hours before the game starts. Then he has a ton of paperwork to go through — rosters, quotes, notes, etc. Then as he's watching the game, he's constantly taking notes and posting on social media sites. He's not sitting back enjoying the game. He's watching for patterns, standout players, trying to figure out how this game will affect the upcoming ones. It's mentally hard work.

Then after the game, he has to do interviews, often jockeying position with other writers, TV reporters and others. That can take about half an hour. He's also gathering quotes and information for future stories.

Then he finally gets to sit down and start writing.

Depending on how close the print deadlines are, he might have spent the last part of the game writing ahead. Within 5 minutes of the game ending, he posts several paragraphs with just the basics. Then he expands the story for print. Then he adds quotes and other information for the full version, which goes on the website.

Tired yet?

So when we were in Atlanta, the game Jeff had to cover was an all-day thing. Biscuit and I were on our own from 10 a.m. until 8:30 that evening.

Jeff called about 4:30 to say the game was over, and he was going to start writing.

Almost four hours later, he was ready to leave the stadium. Except he realized that he was the last media person there, and he was locked inside. He had to find one of the maintenance crew members to help him get out.

The guy finally showed him a back way out, then Jeff had to walk all the way around the stadium to get to his car.

He called to say he was on his way back to the hotel. After we got off the phone, I said to Biscuit, "We need to take Dad somewhere good for dinner."

I had found an Italian restaurant that was well-known for its pizza. It had started raining again, so we traveled through our newly found inside passageway.

The restaurant was on the second floor of an old warehouse building. You come in off the street, walk through a short hallway with fountains and plants, then up a staircase. They've left a lot of the warehouse-looking features — exposed beams and brick walls, etc.

Don't worry. Biscuit wasn't drinking wine. The blue glasses were for water.

Biscuit hit it off with the server. She asked him how old he was, and when he told her, she said she has a son his same age. And that's all it took to get the two of them chatting.

The kitchen is open, so you can see them making the pizzas. All their ingredients are fresh and local. And you can tell it. It was some of the best pizza I've ever had.

Jeff got the stuffed crust. Each of the points had homemade ricotta in it.

As we talked and laughed and ate, I could see Jeff relaxing. I was really glad that Biscuit and I were there. I would've hated to think he was alone after such a long day.

And if we do go back to do touristy things, we will definitely go back to the pizza place.

Name and eye color

The first night we were in Atlanta, it was pouring rain.

The hotel has a covered entrance, and you have to give your car to a valet when you arrive. So we were quickly grabbing everything we needed to take inside, but it didn't occur to us to grab umbrellas.

So when we went out to dinner Friday night, we got rained on to and from the diner we went to. We were wet and cold. But then, you know, we got cake!

I've told Biscuit that if a restaurant server tells you his or her name, you should remember it and use it if you need something.

I also told him about something I recently decided.

I completed a transaction at a store one day, and when I got back to the car, I realized that I couldn't have picked the cashier out of a lineup. I don't think I ever even looked at her.

So I told Biscuit that I decided then that whenever I interacted with somebody, when I walked away, I would know what color his or her eyes were. That would make sure that I looked him or her in the eyes.

So we were sitting at the restaurant, and the server came over, introduced herself and took our drink orders. 

As she walked away, Biscuit leaned over to me and whispered, "Nancy. Brown."

Jeff had no idea what we were talking about, so we had to explain.

"See, Dad," Biscuit said, "Nancy is her name, and her eyes are brown."

When she brought the cake at the end of dinner, she set mine and Biscuit's down, and he looked up and said, "Thank you, Nancy." I wish I had a picture of her face. She seemed so surprised. So then they started a full-fledged conversation.

By the time we left, we knew a great deal about Nancy. She was a nice lady, and she treated us, especially our boy, very well.

We were dreading walking back in the rain. It was only a block and a half, but that seems a lot farther when it's cold and raining.

But as we were walking toward the door, we saw some people taking a right down a hallway. They were wearing jackets and shirts for the team we were there for. 

"Let's follow them," Jeff said.

"We don't know where they're going," I said.

"They're headed in the general direction of the hotel," Jeff said.

So we followed them.

Sure enough, they were going back to our same hotel. But instead of walking in the rain like we did, they walked through a small mall, across a covered pedestrian bridge and right into the hotel lobby.

Once we got to the hotel, we told them that we saw what they were wearing and followed them. Turns out they were from our town.

It was really weird meeting so many people from our town so far away from home.

Trip to Atlanta

Jeff had to cover a football bowl game in Atlanta, and his hotel room had two beds. So Biscuit and I hitched a ride with him. I figured that even if we never left the room, it would still be a fun little getaway.

We drove down Friday. Jeff worked all day Saturday. Then we drove home Sunday. I told Biscuit that we would have all day Saturday to ourselves and gave him some options of tourist things that were close enough for us to walk to.

"They all look like fun, Mom," Biscuit said, "but I'd rather take another trip down here when Dad can do things with us."

That was fine by me.

The hotel was 50 stories tall. It had 47 floors of rooms (the 47th floor was all suites) and three lower floors (atrium, lobby, lower lobby). Since Biscuit had never stayed in a building that tall, Jeff asked if we could get a room pretty high up. They put us on the 28th floor. The hotel was so big that they had different banks of elevators to get to different floors. And the elevators were packed every time we got on them.

Well, almost every time. Since our hotel was the fan hotel, there were some big parties and events Friday evening. That left the elevators pretty free.

Friday night, we went to a dinner up the street from the hotel. It was an evil place! As the hostess took us to our table, she led us right past this display case of CAKE! You can't walk past a case like this and not plan to eat cake for dessert.

Biscuit and I split a piece of Oreo cake and still couldn't finish it. We took it back to the hotel and had it for breakfast Saturday morning.

As we finished off our cake, Biscuit and I watched a superhero movie. After that, we went downstairs to the indoor heated swimming pool.

Biscuit and I walked into the hallway, which is not so much a hallway as a balcony that overlooked the 31 floors below us. It was really cool looking until someone said it look like a monster's rib cage from the inside.

Biscuit pushed the button to call and elevator car, and it took about 30 seconds for one to arrive. It had been taking at least 5 or so minutes, sometimes longer.

When the doors opened, Biscuit and I were stunned. There was nobody in there. It was completely empty.

We rode from the 28th floor to the lobby with no stops!

The door opened, and the place was deserted.

"Where is everybody?" Biscuit asked.

"They're all at the game," I told him. It was a little eerie.

Biscuit was the only person in the pool for most of the time we were down there.

The whole time Biscuit played, I was watching the score of the game. It was close several times, but the team Jeff went to cover came out victorious. And since our hotel was also the fan hotel, we were really glad the team won.

Here are some other pictures from our trip:

I squatted down to take this so you could see the structure of the place inside. But it makes Biscuit look like a giant! See the elevator in the background? They had glass walls so you could look out as you rode up and down.

The view from our room. See the two tall buildings on the right? The top floors lit up at night. Since it was in December, one was red and the other one was green.

The building with the gold dome is the state capital.

This parking lot was straight down from our window. Biscuit said when the cars were moving around it looked like a video game.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, everybody! I hope it's off to a good start for you all.

Things have been in a whirlwind around here.

Normally, my rush is earlier. This year, my rush came and never went away!

It starts with Halloween. We enjoy making costumes, so we put some effort into it. Then a little over a week later, it's Biscuit's birthday. Then everyone comes from out of town to our house for Thanksgiving.

After Thanksgiving, I'm usually in the clear. I just get to relax and enjoy the rest of the year.

But this year, there was Thanksgiving, then an unexpected trip, then my mama had hip replacement surgery, and I went down to stay a week with her. (The surgery was successful, and she's traded in her walker for a cane!)

Jeff had to go to Atlanta to cover a football bowl game in the middle of December. He was going by himself, but his hotel room had two beds. So Biscuit and I hitched a ride. We stayed at the hotel the while Jeff went to the game. 

On the way home Sunday, Jeff and Biscuit dropped me off at my parents' house so I could be there for mama's Monday morning surgery and stay with her several days after that.

I came home on Thursday, went to work Friday morning, then went back down to my parents' house Friday evening for Christmas. It's about 2 1/2 hours, so it's not just down the road. We spent the weekend there.

Then on Christmas Eve, we went to Jeff's brother's house. That's about 1 1/2 hours from us.

On the way home, I asked Biscuit, "Hey, guess where we're going tomorrow?"

"Where?" he asked.

"NOWHERE!" I yelled.

"YAY!" he yelled.

We had a great Christmas.

I ordered two action figures from an anime (Japanese cartoons) show Biscuit watches. They were hard to find. I finally found some that would ship from China. 

I wrapped them and put them under the tree. Biscuit was so excited, he told two or three people that they were shipped "all the way from Japan." I guess he figured since they're Japanese characters, they came from Japan. I didn't have the heart to correct him.

Things are finally starting to settle back down. Jeff's mom is here with us, so we're enjoying her company. Jeff and I got two restaurant gift cards for Christmas, so we're gonna have to plan a couple of date nights while Grandma is here!

In pictures

Here are some photos from the past few weeks:

The slices at this place are bigger than Biscuit's head!

I love that Biscuit is still game to do these kinds of photos. It won't be long until these cutesy photos are SO not cool.

And speaking of cool ... Biscuit wanted a leather jacket, but they're so dang expensive! So Jeff found one on eBay. The guy was asking for a specific price or best offer. Jeff made him and offer, and the guy said he was hoping to get more than that. Jeff said, "Here's the deal. My son is 10. He's going to outgrow the thing in no time." So he took about half what he was asking for. The boy paired it with new jeans, favorite tennis shoes and aviator sunglasses. He was quite pleased with his look. 

My brother brought Jeff a late birthday present. And I got one, too.

Out of the mouth of my babe

A couple of things Biscuit has said recently:

Electric wheels: A while back, a company scattered electric scooters around downtown. You use your cellphone to scan a code to pay for riding them. People were zipping around everywhere.

Some people were zipping around places they weren't supposed to be, so a lot of cities are banning them now.

Anyway, Biscuit saw somebody riding one, and said, "Hey, check that out!"

I explained to him how they worked.

He said, "The future is a wonderful place, you know."


Using tools: We were eating at a Mexican restaurant, and Biscuit was using a knife and fork to eat his enchilada. They're made from flour tortillas, so he could've just used his fork.

"That's soft enough that you could just cut it with your fork," I told Biscuit.

"I guess," Biscuit said, "but I just feel the need to be fancy pants tonight."

Winter Concert

Biscuit and his fellow fourth-graders put on a really nice holiday concert this evening.

He decided he wanted to dress up, so he picked some navy pants, a white shirt, a red and blue striped tie and a Santa hat. He looked really nice.

They did some fun songs with choreographed movements. The kids got to play air guitar at one point, and I wish I could've gotten a video of Biscuit. He was getting down!

Here's a little bit of the first song they did.

Biscuit had a small speaking role, and he did a really good job. He was actually the first one to talk.

It reminded me of a conversation I had a few years ago with his kindergarten teacher.

Each grade does a musical show of some kind each year. In the first grade, he had to dress up like a chicken. Remember that?

There were some speaking parts in that show, too. And the music teacher had asked Biscuit to be a speaker. I don't know if you remember, but Biscuit had a stutter that he grew out of by second grade. But in kindergarten, it was pretty bad.

I went in for a parent-teacher conference, and the teacher started laughing. "She had him listed for a speaking part, and all I could think about was him up there on that stage going, "Um, um, um, um, we, we, we are all fr- fr- friends."

And she was right. His stutter would get even worse if he was mad, nervous or upset. Can you imagine?!

So I was really proud of him tonight for being able to speak clearly and being brave enough to do it.

It was about 7:15 as we were leaving the school, so we stopped by a pizza place near the house for dinner.

These are my special boys.

When we got home, Biscuit had to go straight to the shower.

As he was heading upstairs, I said, "I'm proud of you. I think you did a really good job tonight."

Biscuit stopped, looked at me and grinned. "Thank you," he said. "I'll be here all night ... literally." And then he gave himself a rimshot. "Buh-dum-chhhh!"

That boy makes me smile every single day.

Hugs are okay, until ....

Biscuit has always been a lovey-dovey boy. And I've always loved it.

Except ...

Sometimes he picks the most inopportune times to grab me into a hug. Like when we're in the grocery store or getting other shopping done. I like to shop, but when I'm getting groceries and household stuff, I want to get it done as quickly as possible. And it's hard to do that when you've got a kid invading your space.

So last weekend, Biscuit crawled into bed between Jeff and me, and we had some cuddle and talk time. Jeff is usually still asleep, but Biscuit and I have had some pretty good talks on those mornings.

"Mom," he asked, "can I hug you?"

"Of course you can," I told him.

"Anytime I want?" he asked. And I just looked at him and smiled. "Anytime except in the grocery store?"

And we laughed about it.

"I love hugging you anytime you'll hug me, dude," I told him. "Sometimes I get in a hurry trying to get stuff done, but I don't want you to ever think that I don't like hugging you."

"Okay," he said.

"One day, I'm not going to be cool anymore, and you won't want me to hug you as much," I told him.

And then he said something that made me laugh out loud.

"From what I understand ..." he said. From what I understand? Like he's read a book on the subject!

"From what I understand," he said, "you can hug me anytime you want until I'm in middle school. Then, you can only hug me at home."

"Oh, okay," I told him. "I'm glad to know the rules. I'll try to get in as many hugs as I can until then."

Out of the mouth of my babe

I love Biscuit's sense of humor. Not necessarily the jokes and riddles he makes up, mind you. Some of them just aren't funny, despite what he says.

But his sense of humor is fun.

One recent example centers on his @#$% snack containers and water bottles!

I pack a snack and a sports bottle of water for Biscuit every day. His backpack has a mesh pocket on each side, which is the perfect size for a container and bottle.

But the problem is that he never, ever, ever, EVER remembers to take the container and bottle out of the mesh pockets and put them in the kitchen. So I go to pack his snack and water, and I have nothing to put them in.

I nag him about it all the time. But it still happens. Now, this isn't a life or death thing. I don't make a huge deal about it. But it is frustrating.

Biscuit was sitting at the dining room table one morning having his breakfast as I was packing his snack and lunch. I went to where I keep his containers, and you guessed it, there weren't any.

Biscuit's backpack was sitting near the front door. I walked over and checked the mesh pockets and found exactly what I was looking for.

So I started play yelling at Biscuit from the front door toward the dining room. 

"So I'm trying to pack a snack, but is there a container to put a snack in? Nooooo," I said with a lot of drama. "There are no clean containers. And WHY are there no clean containers? Wait for it ... THEY'RE STILL IN THIS BACKPACK!!!"

I could hear Biscuit giggling.

"Do you hear what I'm screaming at you?" I hollered. "There's supposed to be a snack, but how can there be a snack when there's nothing to pack a snack in. What do you have to say for yourself?!"

A few seconds went by.

Then I heard, "Griffin is not available right now, but if you leave your name and a number, he'll get back to you."

Even if I had been yelling for real, I don't know if I could've kept a straight face.

Birthday cake and sleepover

The morning of Biscuit's birthday, he was excited to find that he was going to have pop-tarts for breakfast. Those are usually a weekend treat, but he got two chocolate pop-tarts with sprinkles, and a candle, of course.

There was a bit of torture, though. I didn't let him open his presents until that evening!

Biscuit decided he wanted to have a sleepover for his birthday this year. So two of his closest friends came over after school on his birthday, which happened to fall on a Friday this year.

We fed them pizza, and I had made little baskets of goodies for them with glow sticks, snacks, cups, flashlights and some other fun little things.

After the pizza, we lit the candles on his cake, sang to him and finally let him open his presents.

The cake looks huge, and it is tall, but even though it has five layers, they're only five inches in diameter.

I didn't occur to me until the three boys were bouncing off the walls that I gave them chocolate cake with chocolate icing and chocolate M&Ms!

The boys played well together, and I made them go to sleep about midnight. The parents picked them up at 11:30 the next morning, and Biscuit and I chilled that day while Jeff went off to cover a football game.

This boy is just growing up too fast!

Spiffed-up bathroom

I mentioned in the previous post that we had done a little redecorating in Biscuit's bathroom.

I decorated it with a beach theme when we first bought the house. My father-in-law bought me this awful, ugly shower curtain with fish all over it. He bought it for a joke, but I hung it. Mainly because that's the bathroom he used when he was here! I showed him!

I swapped it out for a more sedate curtain after I couldn't handle all the loud colors in the fish one.

But when Biscuit got up to get ready on his birthday, he saw a whole new look in there.

"Star Wars."

Shower curtain with "Star Wars" characters.

I made some pictures to hang of bathroom chores in the voice of some of the characters.

Don't tell Mama that I didn't iron the curtain before I put it up! I painted a dowel rod and stuck it in the handle of a light saber for the curtain rod.

The Darth Vader wash mitt came with the bath towel I got to hang, so I just stood him up on the counter. The soaps are in the shapes of some of the vehicles from the movies. The ball is the Death Star, the place where the bad guy lived.

Don't worry if you don't get some of the references on this sign. But you can bet the boy did.

The good guys said to be on the Light Side and the bad guys are on the Dark Side, so I thought this light switch plate was cute.

Luke was holding a light saber, but I replaced it with a toothbrush.

It might be hard to picture it, but there's a huge mirror that runs across the wall over the sink and counter. So without much wall space, I had Jeff put nails right above the mirror and hung the pictures from them with string.

The trash can looks like R2-D2, a droid from the movie.

Most people will probably think this is gross, but Jeff and I think it's pretty funny. There's a long-standing joke about how the Stormtroopers (the soldiers on the bad side) never hit anything they shoot at, but the Jedi take out anything they aim for.

Biscuit loves the new look in his bathroom. And everything I did is temporary, so when his tastes move on, we can update again.

Happy birthday, Biscuit!

Jeff and I just finished redecorating Biscuit's bathroom for his birthday. When he gets up in the morning, he'll see a few cool changes in there (pictures and post to come).

Biscuit decided to have a sleepover for his birthday this year. I told him he could invite as many as he wanted for a party, but for a sleepover, three kids was the limit. So tomorrow night, we'll have a handful of boys here. Cross your fingers for us!

Biscuit loves a Mexican restaurant near us, mainly for the food, but also because of what they do for birthdays. The servers all march from the kitchen banging trays and containers together, making all kinds of noise. Then they sing and give you a free sopapilla (fried tortilla with honey, chocolate drizzle, whipped cream and sprinkles).

So of course we had to go there tonight.

Anybody who knows Biscuit knows how he loves to talk to people. We're regulars at the restaurant, so he's made friends with the servers and the owner. So tonight after they cleared our dinner dishes, the banging started and the singing group marched to our table.

Biscuit has always hated loud noises, so he has his fingers stuck in his ears.

The guy who runs the place is the one who put the whipped cream on Biscuit's nose.

"You knew I couldn't just hand you a dessert without doing something, didn't you?" he said.

So Biscuit got his loud noises, his birthday song, TWO desserts and a T-shirt. That kid is a charmer!

Childhood memory

We always had a big garden growing up. 

Mama and Daddy would plant corn, okra, tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, green beans, several kinds of peas and more.

But they always left one row on the end for my brother and me. We would get to go to the feed and seed and pick something for our row.

We planted watermelons one year, pumpkins another year. But our favorite was Indian corn (aka flint corn or ornamental corn). We loved the bright colors of the kernels, and it was always a big reveal when it was ready to pick and we pulled back the husks. We never knew what the color combination would be.

I went to the farmers market with friends a couple of weeks ago. And I walked through a booth that had Indian corn. It was three ears for $5, and I decided that $5 wasn't a bad price to bring back a little of my childhood. And I wanted to show it to Biscuit and tell him about us growing it when we were his age.

I originally thought about doing some fancy arrangement with a big ribbon or something, but when I put them together, I realized that I just wanted to see if hanging on the porch, all by itself.

Isn't it pretty?

Sweet treats

Biscuit and I made our annual Halloween candy again this year. The child loves sprinkles.

And just like the candy he gets from trick-or-treating, he doesn't eat a lot of the candy we make, either. The chocolate-covered pretzel rods are his favorite. I think they're lots of people's favorite.

Chocolate-covered Oreos.

Nutter Butter ghosts and pretzel knot mummies. Biscuit made three ghosts that were supposed to represent us. Two of them had mini M&M eyes in blue with a red mouth for Biscuit and me and one with green eyes and a red mouth for Jeff.

Chocolate bark with pretzels, Oreos, candy corn and sprinkles.

White chocolate bark with pretzels, Oreos, candy corn and sprinkles.

Jeff liked everything. But when he ate the bark, he picked around the candy corn.

"What is your problem with candy corn?" I asked him.

He made a face and said, "It tastes like sadness."

That didn't deserve a response, so I just rolled my eyes at him.

Happy Halloween

I miss the days of firefighters, superheroes and other simple Halloween costumes. At least ones that I know and understand.

This year, Biscuit was a Pokemon character. It's a dragon-kind of thing that can breathe fire and throw fire with his tail.

His closest friends go to fall festivals instead of trick-or-treating, so I offered to take him to one of those. But he said he's rather go trick-or-treating.

Early Wednesday morning, his friend's Mom texted me to ask if Biscuit might like to go trick-or-treating with her daughter. I knew he would enjoy the company, so I told them to come on over.

I hadn't done a good job of preparing coordinating costumes for Jeff and me. I came up with the idea of costumes to match Biscuit's, but I just hadn't followed through.

So when I found out his friend and her mom were coming, I said, "I don't think her Mom is going to be dressed up, and Dad and I wouldn't want her to feel left out, so I think we'll skip wearing costumes for trick-or-treating."

He said that was fine. Whew!

So Biscuit and his friend started down the street, trailed by me, Jeff and his friend's mom. We had a nice chat.

Then we noticed how much the kids were talking. Other kids were moving right along from house to house, but our kids were like an old married couple, just strolling along talking like they had nowhere to be!

The 4-year-old from next door moved faster, and he was a giant slice of pepperoni pizza that partially hindered his little legs.

They finally got tired and said they were ready to go home. They ended up with more candy than I thought they got. It didn't seem like they went to that many houses.

Of course, our neighbors always give Biscuit WAY too much. All their kids are grown, so they enjoy getting to see Biscuit.

Here are some pictures of Biscuit:

Biscuit strikes a pose with his friend. She had her face painted like a zombie under the big cat head. That way, if she got hot or tired, she could take off the head and still be dressed up.

Here are a couple of houses they visited in our neighborhood:

There's a creepy thing standing on the porch that starts talking when you get close. His eyes light up red. Very creepy.

This giant pumpkin was definitely not a happy jack-o-lantern.

And here's Biscuit's haul:

The funny thing is that he won't eat half of this. He's not much of a candy guy. He eats at meal times, but a piece of chocolate every once in a while, and he's good to go.