DOD15: Failure to Dad

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:29 Tom: Dear Old Dads, the podcast that's going to make you come to the parent teacher conferences and sit there and listen, I'm Tom Curry and I'm joined as always by Thomas Smith and Eli Bosnick, hello gentlemen,

0:00:34 Eli: HAHAHAHAHAHA, HEEEY,

0:00:42 Thomas: Why hello there, yeah, so here's the funny thing about that is we're not allowed to bring the kids to that, at least at my school, it's probably varies by, no, it said fucking thing, it was like, okay, well, this is a great way already to launch into the story I want to tell today, because like the main theme of this story in school is I am trying, I don't, I'm trying so hard, guys, I am trying I don't here's what I'm trying at I don'T WANT TO BE THE FUCKING STEREOTYPICAL DAD THAT'S JUST LIKE YEAH LET THE FUCKIN GIVE THE MOM ALL THE EVERYTHING AND HANDLE EVERYTHING AND SHE'D BECAUSE LIKE LYDIA'S I SAY IT BEFORE AND IT'S EVEN MORE TRUE NOW SHE'S WORKING SO HARD SHE'S LIKE AT THIS DEMANDING JOB AND I'M LIKE I WANTTO BE THE GOOD DAD I WANNA BE THE INVOLVED DAD WELL THE PARENT TEACHER WHATEVER COMES UP THERE'S LIKE A PRE GOING TO SCHOOL ONE WE DID SO LIKE getting ready for school one,

0:00:52 Eli: Hehehehe,

0:00:52 Tom: You're not allowed to, right,

0:01:08 Eli: HAHAHAHAHAHA, mhm,

0:01:35 Thomas: Which seems weird. I don't know what the hell. And, you know, going into it, I was like, I want to be this participatory dad. I'm going to go there. I mean, whatever. And then they tell us you can't bring your kids. So that would mean we'd have to hire a fucking babysitter and like peak hours to go to a thing. That's probably an email. You know, it's probably just them being like, here's the thing you got to. And I was busy with a bunch of fucking work. So I was, like, God, as much as I didn't want to do this. Yeah, I'll stay home kids and work and you go to that thing. And so that was the first failure. And then that brings me to the current failure. So we teased it last week. Phoebe has started kindergarten. She has not even turned.

0:01:52 Tom: Yep,

0:01:53 Eli: Yup, first

0:02:14 Thomas: Day. She hasn't even turned five yet. She turns five. Oh, tomorrow. Shit. Her birthday is tomorrow as we're recording this.

0:02:13 Eli: Day, HA

0:02:14 Tom: First, that was

0:02:22 Eli: HA HA, if you hear clicking and like, cutting in the background, that's Thomas making a gift for his daughter, while we record,

0:02:24 Tom: Delicious, that That was so good right there.

0:02:32 Thomas: Well, Oh, no, that's all well in hand. The reason I forgot is because the birthday party is Saturday. So like that's the thing I've been like, you know, prepping for. That's a good thing about kids is they don't fucking know anything. You don't have to tell them anything. She has no idea when her birthday is or if she does. She doesn't know what date it is. It is so funny how little they know about any of that for a long time.

0:02:37 Eli: Aww,

0:02:38 Tom: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I to convince my family as an assign. I try and convince my son to let me just change Finn's birthday. Finn's Birthday is terrible. His birthday is December 21st. That's a terrible birthday.

0:02:56 Thomas: There you go.

0:03:01 Tom: It's a horrible birthday. Like, we have a...

0:03:00 Eli: Aw, it's a sucky birthday,

0:03:03 Thomas: Hey, you no scombart's due date?

0:03:03 Tom: Oh, is it December 21th?

0:03:07 Thomas: December 23rd.

0:03:08 Tom: Oh, terrible.

0:03:10 Thomas: The worst.

0:03:10 Tom: Poor scumbert.

0:03:12 Thomas: Poor scombard.

0:03:08 Eli: HA, the Worst! Oh, that's yeah that's the second worst. Christmas is anything within a week of Christmas is the second worse birthday. 9

0:03:17 Tom: Wait, what's worse than that?

0:03:18 Thomas: 9 -11.

0:03:19 Eli: 11 of course.

0:03:20 Thomas: Here, I thought I was doing the joke. Damn it. I thought you had the different answer.

0:03:25 Eli: Should

0:03:20 Tom: Oh, yeah, Oh, God. I, I try to convince family to just let me like push it to August. I'm like, come on, we'll just move it to August. Like he won't fucking know, like, he'll never know. He'll know when he gets a driver's license, and he's like, yeah, my birthday's August 3rd. And I'll be like, actually, it's not like he won't fuck. He he knows his birthday because I fucking told him. But nobody would, would let me do it. I was, I was actually surprised, I was like, this is a great idea. Yes.

0:03:31 Thomas: That is a good idea. You wouldn't tell him until then?

0:03:47 Eli: Have done it. It's A great idea, it's a great idea, and now every relationship he has for the rest of his life, his girlfriend, boyfriend, or a partner is going to be like, so this is your Christmas present slash birthday present. And he's going to be like, this is bullshit. This is bullshit, I hate you, Suzanne. I hate it.

0:04:01 Thomas: Yep. Well, you know what? This is, Tom, you bring up a good idea. I mean, I might do, maybe we do this experiment on scomber.

0:04:07 Tom: Just do it just do you gotta

0:04:13 Thomas: Maybe run this

0:04:14 Tom: Do it. Change his birthday. Please, oh, Thomas Smith, you owe this to me. I don't know why, though.

0:04:15 Eli: Yes.

0:04:16 Thomas: Scom... Okay. How much should I change it? It. How much

0:04:19 Tom: But you do. You you gotta move it out of the winter. Everyone's, here's the problem with Christmas, everyone's broke, everyone's busy, everyone's stressed, it, work, it's a garbage time.

0:04:20 Thomas: Should I change it by? You this is, this is dastardly,

0:04:29 Tom: Just move

0:04:30 Thomas: But I think it's a good idea.

0:04:30 Eli: Yeah, when is the perfect birthday? Let me throw this out there. Suggestion for perfect birthday. May 14th.

0:04:31 Tom: It. Move it

0:04:37 Thomas: Okay. Okay.

0:04:39 Tom: I love it.

0:04:42 Eli: Let me tell you why.

0:04:42 Tom: He's not wrong, right?

0:04:43 Eli: I shall tell you Why. Late enough in the school year that they'll know who their friends are. But it's not so late in the school year, that it's summer vacation and it's hard to, like, get the invitations out?

0:04:53 Thomas: Not to mention this always sucked. I'm a July 30th birthday. Never once did I get a single birthday recognition at school. You know how devastating that is as a kid? You Don't, we don't have, okay. We don't have the caste system here, but you know what? In a way we do. Cause if your birthday, if you're a fucking seven year old or eight year old and your birthday is is in the summer and you see your friends all year, all year. Oh, it's Anthony's birthday today. He gets all this shit.

0:05:01 Eli: Right, because you weren't there. Yeah.

0:05:02 Tom: Yeah. Yeah.

0:05:22 Eli: Let's sing him a song and put him a special hat.

0:05:24 Thomas: Yeah, he's a king. That fucker was a king for a day.

0:05:25 Tom: And You're just like fucking Where's my cupcake? Yeah,

0:05:28 Thomas: And I never got that. Not a single time.

0:05:29 Tom: Eli?

0:05:31 Eli: Thomas just showed up to every new year. So is there a hat for me anywhere? Shut the fuck up. Sit down.

0:05:36 Tom: Right,

0:05:38 Thomas: Yeah, you're worthless if you're born in the sun.

0:05:39 Tom: Thomas, close your ears. Close your ears, Eli. We gotta have a surprise party for Thomas Smith, you know, we have to do this, yeah.

0:05:40 Thomas: Okay, okay.

0:05:44 Eli: Surprise? Yes, But here's the twist on it. Are you ready? We're gonna do it a school themed birthday party so we'll

0:05:49 Tom: Yeah, Well, well, yeah, we're going to have little cupcakes. Don't you laugh, Thomas Smith. You're not listening. This is going to be, we are going to invite, oh, yes.

0:05:56 Thomas: Oh, sorry. All right.

0:05:54 Eli: Go to. Yep, you can't hear this everything has to be allergen free and he has to invite everyone in podcasting including the people we hate yeah

0:06:06 Tom: Streamers and shit, little gift bags. This Is Happening. We are doing this.

0:06:07 Eli: Exactly yes yep

0:06:09 Thomas: Do have a policy. And I think this is a good policy. They do have policy that if you are going to bring invites to school, you have to invite your whole class. And we've got, we've gone through it because Phoebe's, like I said, her birthday's tomorrow. And so Phoebe, we asked her, here's another question I have for you before I get to kindergarten. How much should I listen to Phoebe on this thing? Because I listen to my kids, obviously, but like there are some things where you ask ask them their preference or their whatever. And their answer is just fucking insane, you know? And you gotta be like, okay, we'll do it. You're like, what do you want for dinner for your birthday? And they'll just say something nonsense, lobster. And you're like alright, well we're not doing that. But like, we asked her, who do you want at your party? Mind you, she's gone through massive transition. Like this has been tough. Already talked about it, she graduated from another school, we've moved away from that. She's at a new school with new people that she doesn't really know.

And over the summer school, school those people were all ages so she doesn't even have she only has like one of them in her class so she's she's on another transition now it's been pretty tough so we ask her who do you want to come to school to your birthday party and she says her two other friends from her old daycare who she loves and it's great I'm glad we have them and then she says hmm so she says this one this one and our adult friends so she just wants our like mine and lydia's friends that we we have over from time to time that's

0:06:40 Eli: Right nice yeah

0:07:31 Thomas: How much of a dork my poor little phoebe is she's just like okay couple friends and the adults yeah

0:07:30 Tom: I would 100% listen to that. Yeah, I would 100 listen to that

0:07:37 Eli: You gotta reinforce that here's the thing If you're going to have a weirdo friends with adults kid, right? And I'm not saying you are because nobody wants that, right. It's like going blind or getting in a car crash. But if you're gonna have a weirdo friends with adult's child, you need to enforce that and make sure it's adults you trust sooner rather than later, because they will find grownups on the internet who want to be their friend.

0:07:48 Tom: This man has a point this man has a also

0:08:00 Thomas: Well that's interesting that hold on though like let me let so you really think I should 100 listen to that because my thinking was all right she's just being a little shy with her new class but wouldn't she really like you in the long long run to have some of her new little friends at her birthday party, but she just can't quite, you muster up the courage right now.

0:08:07 Tom: Oh no

0:08:21 Eli: Here's the down. That's possible. Here's The Downside, right, because kids don't have a social filter. Filter so the downside to that is that you invite all the kids from the new class and in the middle of the party she's like I don't even want to invite all of you I hate you yeah

0:08:22 Tom: She's four yeah what also like she won't know what she's for she won' know what she's missing like she wont like reflect back on it at any point what what she'll have instead is a party with the people she she loves the most and then also not incidentally thomas smith it will be a party with the people you enjoy spending time with so everybody wins you don't have to have like fucking five -year -olds running around sneezing on your house like that's something you can avoid

0:08:44 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:08:57 Eli: I was gonna say

0:08:54 Thomas: It's way nicer for me. It is way, way better for me, yeah. That's what I got COVID from is her other little friend's birthday party that we went to. Then the hour after we got home, he was like the guy just took a test and he's positive like the hour after the party I was like wow that's that's incredible cool

0:09:07 Tom: Yeah yeah man yeah Yeah. Oh

0:09:09 Eli: Yep mm -hmm covid absolutely okay I also tell you another disadvantage to inviting strange children over to your home is the terrifying moment where a child talks to you like you're its parent right it'll be like I pooped and you'll be like hey man I'm the worst possible person for you to ask for help right now I poopped alright we're in a tie let's go find an adult together

0:09:24 Thomas: Oh yeah yeah

0:09:29 Tom: My God. Yes.

0:09:41 Thomas: He looks yeah oh

0:09:39 Tom: Yeah, man. I also like, I would add to that. So like a little, little older story, but like my stepdaughter had a friend that like, I would go pick this little girl up to bring her over here to have a play date. And she would tell me these like crazy, horrifying stories about like, yeah, my mom cheated on my dad and this and that, like to the point where like we called CPS yes and you're just like like shit was like for real and you'RE just like holy shit and cps of course was utterly fucking useless by the way they fucking did nothing at all they're just like I will file a report I'm like great that's neat

0:10:01 Thomas: Oh shit wait Oh, wow.

0:10:19 Eli: Now tom tom I want you to look deep into your heart do you think maybe you were one of those kids do you thinking were you were you riding in the back of someone's car and you were like well the monkey kicked me out of my room so right now I have a fort I made

0:10:20 Tom: Yeah no I

0:10:30 Thomas: But that's okay, because I stole the rum right out of its hand. So we're even.

0:10:38 Eli: It into a molotov cocktail and I threw it at the new guy she stated

0:10:41 Tom: I elay I grew up in the 80s this was standard shit like in the 80s like you got in a car it didn't have seatbelts you didn't know who was driving okay

0:10:48 Thomas: No, I'm sorry. It was not standard shit for your mom to kill a monkey with alcohol.

0:10:54 Tom: That was a little okay you're

0:10:55 Thomas: That is, raise your hand, show of hands, listeners. I would like the listeners, if there's anybody listening, Thomas, you email me, bypass the show. Thomas the Serious Bot. But if your mom killed a monkey with alcohol, email thomasatseriespod .com. I want to know if there's a single, I don't want your story about how she killed a hedgehog with alcohol or whatever, just specifically a monkey, some sort of like simian creature that's like almost a person, you know, so it feels extra bad. Okay,

0:10:54 Eli: With Alcohol poisoning

0:10:56 Tom: All right are you all right all right like I'm the only one

0:11:25 Eli: Yeah.

0:11:26 Thomas: Email.

0:11:26 Tom: I tell you guys the story this is just a funny aside did I say the story my mom used to tell like gleefully she's telling this story about like what a deep sleeper I was and how how it was so funny that it wasso hard to wake me up so so this is so

0:11:35 Thomas: Oh God, I'm already horrified by whatever this is.

0:11:38 Eli: No. I'm So terrified. I feel like I'm in a horror movie I'm grabbing the arms of my chair so tight you

0:11:42 Thomas: I know.

0:11:44 Tom: I'm I'm this this is terrible so i'M TELLING THIS STORY AGAIN AS THE SAME CONTEXT I'M TOLD THE STORY TO HAYLEY THINKING THIS IS A FUNNY STORY RIGHT SO AND LIKE SO THE THE STory IS LIKE MY MOM WOULD ALWAYS LIKE SHE WOULD TELL PEOPLE OH TOM IS SUCH A SLEEPY HEAD YOU KNOW HE'D FALL ASLEEP you know at the breakfast table while he's eating and he was he's so hard to wake up in the morning even since he was a kid he was so hard wake up the morning one time when we were living in New Jersey our house caught on fire and the house caught fire and Tom was sleeping upstairs in the bedroom and so I ran I ran outside and the neighbors called the fire department yeah the neighbors call the fire department and the fire Department came in and she said in the house it was just really going and tom slept through the whole thing until the fire department woke him up and I'm just like telling this story this is a story that like she tells and I like so I've absorbed this my whole life

0:11:51 Thomas: Oh God. Oh, my god, what the a delightful yarn that she shares With her friends, yeah, yeah.

0:12:42 Tom: Right and so I'm talking to her and she's like I'm like I don't know what to do telling this storied there's like this dead silence on the other side on the other end of the phone and I am like yeah so I like sleep really deeply and then I was and then And then Haley's like, your mom should have gotten you out of that house. You know that, like, a terrible story. And I'm like, oh, yeah. Oh. And it was like, guys, I was like 37 years old before I was like, wait a minute.

0:13:07 Eli: Were looking forward to your 40th birthday when you realized your mom should have rescued you from the house fire? You know, some moms get super strength rescuing their kids, right?

0:13:18 Tom: Yeah.

0:13:15 Thomas: Oh, my God, I a Yeah, she, she rescued the monkey, though. She probably rescued the monkey.

0:13:25 Eli: Yeah, She lifted a truck off the monkey. Actually, it was the monkey's bottle of rum. She's doing the abyss. Yeah.

0:13:27 Thomas: She was the Firefighters bring you out, she's doing CPR on the monkey. Damn, live, damn you.

0:13:35 Tom: Don't Die on me, Gilligan, don't die on me.

0:13:37 Thomas: I need to Kill you with alcohol later. This is not how you're supposed to go. Yeah, okay. I have a similar story branching off from that, Tom, because I don't get to tell enough stories about my horrible dad. I can't remember if I mentioned this one, but I had the same moment. And mind you, I wasn't 40. that's a little, you know, no judgment, but like that's, that's about it. That's a bit late, yeah.

0:13:42 Tom: Yeah. Okay, I was 37. That's 38. Somewhere

0:13:58 Thomas: When I was at my high school girlfriend's parents' house, and she had real parents, so that was cool. That was my first exposure to real parents, that was fun, like extended exposure because I'd be just at her house all the time. I was like, "Geez, this is weird, your parents like take you to go to eat places instead." What the fuck, weirdest thing. And uh, I just, I said, and this is also the sad part of this, is as I've said before, kids normalize everything. So I had this sense of, as you do as a kid of a volatile parent, I had the sense of, I can't put it into words, but I know my dad's reaction to everything. You, the thing is, I've already internalized how my dad is going to react to anything, because

0:13:58 Tom: Around there. Right.

0:14:15 Eli: Right. Right.

0:14:40 Thomas: That's what controls the household. That's what the thing as a kid, that's the thing you have to be aware of. And so I, I just knew, had my dad's behavior internalized and it was totally normal to me and anybody else was like abnormal. And so I was talking about something, I don't remember how we got onto it, but I told, I I just blurted out to my girlfriend's parents. I was like, yeah, well, my dad told us he's not going to come to any of our weddings. And they were like, what? We're probably talking about weddings or something. I don't know what we were talking about. Yeah, I was, like, no, he's just not going come. And I was – they were, like – they, they were questioning me. And my attitude was, Like, what the fuck are you asking questions for? Like, that – what the hell? What – yeah, he is not – what aren't you getting? He is not coming to anyone's weddings.

0:15:20 Tom: Why

0:15:23 Eli: It's not coming in the way. He doesn't feel like it. He doesn'T want to.

0:15:24 Thomas: He is – he is told – yeah. He's told us that since my, but nevermind me, like I didn't give a shit or my brother, but like my sisters, he's told my sisters from the time they were like, I don't know, eight, I can't, that they would never go. I have no fucking idea.

0:15:39 Tom: Like, I understand.

0:15:41 Thomas: I know this is very

0:15:42 Tom: I guess being a shithead and not doing something, but like telegraphing it decades in advance. I'm gonna hurt your feelings real bad one day, right?

0:15:50 Thomas: Weird, very weird. I one, it was the agoraphobia, but it was also the, like Like my dad couldn't sit through attention on other people in a way, you know, like there's not, there's just, there'S many levels on which it makes sense to be them, but my dad couldn't possibly manage doing that. But yeah, that was the thing he, I didn't realize until, you know, I was 40. No, I don't realize it until later that like, yeah, that's a weird fucking thing to like, just on hand, is it better to like pre tell Tell your daughters this so that they know.

0:16:20 Eli: Yeah. He's like a precog douchebag. He's, like, I see myself sitting at home during your college graduation. The Oracle at Delphi with McDonald's loaded into the thing instead of incense.

0:16:23 Thomas: Yeah.

0:16:35 Tom: If you're

0:16:37 Thomas: Honestly, I wonder, like, given the fact, like if you can't change the fact that you're fucking terrible and not going to go to your kids' weddings, is it better than to not do it like on the day or like when they're planning the wedding or whatever and be like, hey, you know, I can't come. That would be much more devastating. It's almost better that he told him earlier, I guess.

0:16:56 Eli: Yeah.

0:16:56 Tom: Not gonna go, just, just like get food poisoning the day of?

0:17:00 Eli: Yeah.

0:17:00 Thomas: Nah.

0:17:01 Tom: And then nobody's like that way What?

0:17:02 Eli: No, that's that seems too other centric. I gotta say, one of the interesting things that has developed over this show is I've gotten a sense of Tom's dad. Like, I feel like I know how Tom's dad is going to react to every situation. And be like, what if Tom's dad didn't like a steak? He would eat it anyways because he promised he would, and then he'd throw the, the dish into the garbage because he's done with that dish.

0:17:23 Thomas: Yep.

0:17:23 Eli: Right, like, I could, I could do that with any situation, but your dad is like fucking Golem from Lord of the Rings. It's Just, I don't know, maybe he would come on like nine tenths of the journey and then bite my finger off. There's no way of knowing. Birthday.

0:17:30 Thomas: Yeah. It's tough, could be, could be, how did we get on to this? Uh, oh, the birthday, oh yeah.

0:17:39 Tom: The Birthday.

0:17:42 Thomas: So, so may, okay, so, I, I I feel bad moving, this is weird, but I feel about moving it too much, like I feel like I owe a little bit to Scombert to be in the neighborhood of his, like ballpark.

0:17:42 Tom: Yeah. So You got to move the birthday kick

0:17:42 Eli: Yeah.

0:17:54 Tom: That Shit to February. Man, everybody's financially recovered, he'll get some good shit, don't

0:17:58 Thomas: I why I was going to say I think Februari or even late, late January, like a little bit like, like late January. And then do you think we just don't tell them at all?

0:18:08 Tom: Tell him till he's like getting his driver's license, that's the funniest part.

0:18:10 Thomas: 10. That's okay.

0:18:13 Tom: That's that's funny, that's the best part. But

0:18:14 Thomas: I'm not

0:18:11 Eli: Yeah. That's a fun but

0:18:15 Thomas: Trying to prank my child. This is I'm trying to help scum.

0:18:17 Eli: It's a fan goof you get them at a goof at the same time, they

0:18:17 Tom: This is you but

0:18:21 Thomas: You know, there's lots of things in school that you like tell your birthday, you write your birthday, they verify their birthday. There's lots OF ways. This'll come.

0:18:28 Tom: Nobody checks it against anything, no one's like pulling out his birth certificate and giving like, oh, did he, did Scombert say it was Februari 4th, let's fucking check the paperwork? Nobody checks wait,

0:18:32 Eli: Okay

0:18:36 Thomas: No, but you, okay. You take, no, this would, this will not last beyond like maybe age six. Cause you take the kid to get his vaccines and every single five seconds, like verify the birth date. Okay.

0:18:48 Tom: It wouldn't work at the doctor, but it would work socially, socially, you could do this. He could have his birthday party

0:18:49 Eli: Okay well

0:18:49 Thomas: Right. But I mean, little scomber, it's going to be with me and he's going to hear me say his birthday is different. So we'll

0:18:58 Eli: No, see, this is, is the best part. This is the best part, this gives you an air of mystery. The doctor will be like, and I'm just confirming the birthday, and you'd be like, doc, doc, can I speak to you outside for a second? And you just take him outside and be like, his birthday is February 14th. Okay, it's very important. And the guy will be like, what? And then you just, I don't want to talk about it, you go back inside, and that doctor, I promise you, for the rest of his life will be like, why, why did they move his birthday.

0:19:19 Thomas: Call CPS. Yeah.

0:19:03 Tom: Yes, yes, just just like, we have a family rule, we actually don't, we don't say birthdays out loud, I'll write it down, I'll sleep a paper and I'll pass it over to you, like I'm buying a fucking used car, that's

0:19:33 Thomas: That's so much effort.

0:19:34 Eli: That's great. Also Also, Thomas, you got to make it February 14th.

0:19:38 Thomas: What's what's February. Oh, is that Valentine's? What's February?

0:19:40 Eli: It's Valentine's Day. And it also, it means that if he ever forgets a Valentine's day gift for his partner, he can be like, well, it's my birthday. It's the, it'S at the very least, someone has to get him something for Valentine's day every year. Uh, itS never sad that he never has to go out to dinner on his birthday. People will generally not have plans. Like there's a bunch of benefits.

0:19:41 Thomas: Oh, okay. Okay

0:19:41 Tom: Valentine's

0:20:05 Thomas: That's True, that's true, yeah. I'm gonna talk it through but

0:20:06 Tom: I feel like you can do at least one thing like that for your kid, like you can do just like there's like one moment, like my oldest son, like his middle name is actually Danger, so his name is Finnegan Danger Curry, and it's just like, yeah, man, that's for you, buddy. Like at some point down the road, like you'll have a driver's license, that shit says danger on it. He's the least dangerous person you'll ever meet in your life, but it's baller. This is a moment, this is where you can, you can, you can change Scumbird's life. What if Lydia goes two days late, dude, you've got to change it

0:20:22 Thomas: Yeah.

0:20:24 Eli: Yeah. Yeah, then

0:20:36 Thomas: I know, I know, well yeah

0:20:40 Eli: It's Christmas. Then he's the newborn son of Christ.

0:20:45 Thomas: That's fine, we could do that. I just think this is the kind of thing that Scomber, it's gonna be telling his buddy on his podcast later on, though. You know and he whispered to the doctor yeah it was. Fucking, we would never say, he had a rule, he would never say my birthday, was weirdest guy.

0:20:47 Eli: You It's possible.

0:20:52 Tom: My dad would never say my birthday out loud

0:20:59 Thomas: I don't understand

0:20:59 Eli: You know what? My Thomas's dad sense is going off because honestly, I'm now picturing Thomas being like, oh, and here's another weird thing about my dad. He would never say when our birthday was out loud. I don't know why. He just never would. Just never would, honestly, if you told me right now because, like, Tom's mom doesn't know his birthday, Tom's dad gives him another brick in the house to build himself out in the backyard on his 18th birthday, and I could believe that Thomas's dad just was like, one doesn't speak of the days that are not for me, there is only my birthday and mine alone. You were in college the first time someone wished you a happy birthday, you're just like, oh no, it's not my dad's birthday, my dad is the only one who gets a birthday, birthday are

0:21:08 Thomas: Yep yeah do you want to actually guess, that not that my dad would ever really do anything for anyone's birthday or anything, but he would very, he very much knew every, all that, everyone's birthdays. He, he probably, here's what he probably did, he probably kept a fucking like diary that had all the dates in it, but I would never see it or know anything about it. That's actually, when he died my mom was like, do you want to, like, he has a bunch of, you, he kept for like decades. I was like, what the fuck, what. That's guess that won't sound too weird to maybe you fellows who, you some writing or had some introspective writing dads or something, but I, this is the first I've heard of this, I had no idea that he always right

0:21:54 Tom: Jesus Christ everybody keeps a diary. Now it's your, social media is your diary.

0:22:26 Eli: They still open because I would love to crack open those diaries

0:22:27 Tom: Yeah dude we should have a can we have a segment on the show where you read a diary entry, might, might be a little rough. Okay.

0:22:30 Eli: Yeah

0:22:30 Thomas: I that well that's what I was gonna ask you. I'm not sure I can do, don't, it, I know if I can do it, that's a little tough, yeah.

0:22:39 Eli: Hey

0:22:39 Thomas: But for weird reasons though, like I just don't, I feel like would be overstepping the relationship he

0:22:39 Tom: All right it would be I

0:22:48 Eli: Thomas hey Thomass, hey Thommass.

0:22:54 Thomas: Never let me in to that, we weren't that close, we weren'T close enough.

0:22:57 Eli: Yeah you're breaking in, buddy, hack into that safe he's dead

0:22:59 Tom: Love

0:23:00 Thomas: No it would be like, okay hold on, what, Eli, let's say, what if you died, and you had, all this is not that hard to imagine, what if you did your scheduled death in a few months, and you had all this intimate writing that you had, and then you're like, okay, but, but, like, should Bryce Blankenagle go through all your diaries, you know, you know

0:23:12 Eli: First of all, if my wife chooses to give my diaries to Bryce Blakenangle, they are his to do with what he wishes, that's true yeah, friendly relationship with Bryce.

0:23:33 Thomas: It was a bad example because you, you're, and Bryce are closer than me and my dad. I

0:23:38 Eli: I like Bryce James

0:23:38 Tom: Yeah

0:23:40 Thomas: Gotta I gotta think of somebody I can't think of anybody good, that's, it's not going to be a joke. Yeah, I

0:23:47 Tom: I agree.

0:23:45 Eli: Lindsay honestly yeah, I want James Lindsay reading. First of all, I think that dead people's shit is a complete and total free-for-all, like if there's someone's dead, you could just do whatever you want with it, it's yours, they're not real anymore, just like, get in there. You could turn it into a blog. Ah

0:24:01 Tom: With this, I

0:24:06 Thomas: Agree with that. It's just there's something weird about. I just don't. It's also it's more for me.

0:24:13 Tom: Yeah, man, I get it though, like you don't want to have a pretend at intimacy by reading these that you didn't actually have in life. I talk, I come, I do understand that, like if my, like at some point, like my mom will die, and if she has diaries, they'll rot where she rots, like I don't want to like zip out and grab a hold of and be like, oh, I should read about what she thought, fucking, we weren't close, like I dont like there's nothing more banal than reading about someone I'm not connected to.

0:24:20 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, it's You know read a bunch of entries that make it seem like he actually gave a shit and I'll be like, oh, great. Yeah, he really did give a shit. He just had no fucking idea how to express it, which might end up being true. And then I'll have to feel bad about that. What's the best case scenario here? Here. That's not...

0:24:56 Eli: Man, so you're saying that I might accidentally find out that my dad had a deep and abiding love for me, but a disability that prevented him from telling me, also

0:25:04 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. I don't want to find that out. I don't wanna find that... What, you think that's a good eventuality? Well, I already know... I mean, yeah, I already know that he cared in some way, just not enough to change his behavior in any way, shape, or form. He felt a love in an intellectual sense that had no impact on anything he did or said

0:25:30 Tom: Thomas, almost certainly these diaries are filled with gas mileage, birthdates. Like

0:25:35 Eli: Thomas

0:25:35 Thomas: Yep, there's gonna be some of that, yep, mm

0:25:37 Tom: It's gonna be, it's going to be like, you know, something like, uh, the oil changed today. Didn't need it.

0:25:43 Thomas: -hmm. Well, he was, it, no, so you're going, your dad, I it has the wrong date on it, it's a different birthday, no, I knew it, that's why he would never say my birthday out loud, no. He, um, my dad, he have very thoughtful, I bet you there's very, very thoughtful stuff in there, uh, from a certain perspective. Like, and I don't mean thoughtful in like, oh, I, you bought a thoughtful gift for, I mean, I mean like lots of thinking going on. Like he would have, it wouldn't be like gas five dot, like he would probably have some practical stuff too, but I bet you he was very intellectual, and he would, he, he probably wrote a lot of his thoughts about things. Ah, maybe I'll fucking crack, I'll ask my mom.

0:25:47 Eli: Born

0:25:47 Tom: Okay. Yeah. Oh, really?

0:26:28 Eli: Release

0:26:28 Thomas: I'm I'll take a look.

0:26:28 Tom: We're going to change

0:26:28 Eli: The diaries release

0:26:29 Tom: His life right here on the, this show. Oh,

0:26:31 Eli: The diaries been

0:26:32 Thomas: Yeah, cool. And then if I just have an emotional breakdown that ruins my ability to, you know, function in society, it'll be good because it's for a podcast. You know, it'd be good. It'll be gut.

0:26:41 Eli: There, done that, buddy, it's okay, you come out the other side, it's fine, you just gained a bunch of weight, don't worry about it, it's fine, it think I mentioned this before, you know, I did this with my dad's laptop when he died, yeah.

0:26:46 Thomas: Well, Yes. Yeah. You have the uncle

0:26:42 Tom: My god oh

0:26:53 Thomas: That like keeps the records of everything in the world somehow it's

0:26:53 Tom: You did what was that like

0:26:53 Eli: So yeah Yeah. And so my mom gave me my dad's laptop when he passed away, and I downloaded and have read 99% of its contents. And I know again, much more positive relationship, but I loved it. I read all of his class notes. So my dad also had terrible ADHD. Um, and so like really couldn't manage anything. Uh, all of the notes he ever typed for himself in class, partly because he was too proud to wear his glasses. And partly because like, if he wrote more than a bullet point, he couldn't pay attention to it, were in all caps bullet points. So he has entire books that he taught, but it's like 60 pages of all caps, bullet pointed notes for him to teach like Crime and Punishment at the college level. Yeah. There's a ton of his writing. He started a bunch of stories. He started to play, which my mother finished for him, which is very, very funny because the writing very clearly changes halfway

0:27:06 Thomas: Fucking nuts oh

0:27:33 Tom: Oh

0:27:34 Thomas: Wow oh

0:27:50 Eli: Through. There's a, like, oh, there's so much amazing stuff, there's a ton of letters and emails and stuff to me, um, yeah.

0:27:59 Eli: I I keep all his emails because he's, my dad didn't have a blog, I don't think he would have been the kind of person to do a blog, but one of the reasons why I love Dangerous Essays is because they remind me so much of my dad's emails, right, like I would get in a fight with my mom about, I don't know, fucking what color the the fence post was, and I would just get an email and the subject was like, "On Color," and I'd get, I would get like seven pages, yeah, no, it's uh, but yeah, I, I adored it, I went through

0:27:59 Tom: That's so sweet

0:28:22 Thomas: Wait hold on, I just found... whoa, this is weird. I just find every phone call, letter, email, book, anything my dad ever wrote to me. I just found it, right? Whoa, it's right here. Whoa, every voicemail, every text. Wow. I'm... oh, that's my hand. Oh, never mind.

0:28:43 Eli: It's all in the diaries, Thomas. It's Oh, this is your PS I Love You.

0:28:45 Thomas: It probably is. I wouldn't be surprised if there was something sort of like that in the diaries. I would not be surprised, but I also have no fucking idea. I do not know. I feel like if there is anything too major, like my mom probably would have mentioned it, you know, if there's anything like, oh, you something you should see here. Your dad, you never wanted you or something. No, I do.

0:28:47 Tom: Oh my god I Oh

0:29:06 Eli: Oh, by the way, Curly's treasure is in this, k, dad left you a map. I'll, we'll talk about it at Thanksgiving.

0:29:08 Tom: Wait

0:29:12 Thomas: Wait, hold on. This is not a joke. Have I told you we have a cave on our property?

0:29:16 Eli: No.

0:29:16 Thomas: I grew up with a cave and I was just about to make a joke. Like, yeah, there's some gold in the cave that he tells us about that we have. Yeah. We have a, we have bullshit like, uh, you know, cause I'm from where the gold happened, the gold rush, like I'm in the gold Rush.

0:29:16 Tom: You have a cave where

0:29:18 Eli: You

0:29:29 Thomas: And So we have little cave that look, our best guess was that they tried to do, it was like a, you know, check if anything's there type cave, like, oh, maybe see if there's any fucking shit in this mountain. And then they're like, no, there there's was just a place where poor assholes will live later, that's all it is, and then they left, and so it's this little cave that terrified the daylights out of me as a kid.

0:29:29 Tom: The gold happened Yeah It's probably full of snakes, you had to chop their fucking heads off with pickaxes and shovels or whatever the fuck you had you

0:29:54 Thomas: That Actually, it was respite from the snakes. Believe it or not, it was, uh, it was a good place to to cower, uh, from the snakes and mountain lions and bears and shit because it's very, it was this very smooth dirt cave, but there's one, there's like a hole in the back that to this day I never went far enough have to see. Like I got to go, I meant to as an adult, but then a tree like fell in front of it and we can't get in it really anymore.

0:30:17 Eli: Your dad has secret diaries and there's a cave on your property with a hole in it that you've never gone through. Your dad is D .B. Cooper, 100 % D.P. Cooper obviously D .K.B I

0:30:25 Tom: Lived on

0:30:22 Thomas: Yeah. Oh, that, that would be so cool. That that would, that that would make me feel better about my dad.

0:30:36 Tom: The most dangerous property in all. All of California, by the way.

0:30:37 Thomas: Oh a hundred fucking percent.

0:30:39 Tom: The most dangerous property in California.

0:30:42 Thomas: Hundred percent. I there, We would just go down there like as kids, like we would just by ourselves, like just go, let's go check out the death hole that's in our property.

0:30:50 Tom: Jesus Christ.

0:30:52 Thomas: Yeah, we just go there. So there could, yeah, there's nothing in there. We looked, I want to go back in, but you know, it's

0:30:57 Tom: Well, you didn't look all the way, though. You didn't go back into the...

0:30:59 Thomas: True.

0:30:59 Eli: Didn't look knowing which tile to press from the diaries

0:31:05 Thomas: Yeah, I just hear this. There's like a fucking part of the Triforce's in there?

0:31:07 Eli: Yes Yes. Cave full of gold. Bunch of photos of you all over the wall that he took in secret.

0:31:14 Tom: Right.

0:31:16 Thomas: All right, so this, this cheered me up because I genuinely had a bad experience this morning I want to tell you about with the kindergarten. So, as I've already sort of introduced, I'm trying to, I want to be the fucking real dad. I don't, the last thing I want in my life is for be have that stereotype of the dad, the aloof dad who doesn't fucking know shit that's going on.

If they tell me something at the school, I'll be like, oh, I'm telling my wife, I don't, hey, do anything, I, I can't understand information about children. That's every dad. I don't want to do that. Don't want it. I don't want it to do it. And yet this morning, inadvertently, I fucking couldn't have. It was comical how badly I was that dad accidentally today, like my first time.

So I hadn't dropped Phoebe off at kindergarten yet because she's on the way to school, she's only had two days. So she only had last Thursday and Friday, and we tend to do the drop off schedules like I do Monday, Wednesdays, and Friday is kind of a, you know, like a jump ball, whoever kind of has the time on Fridays, because for some reason there's an odd number of fucking days in the week.

So she, she started Thursday and then Lydia did Friday because I was super busy with some work. So I hadn't done it yet. So here comes Monday, and I already told you guys how we were trying to get there on time. We're doing the fucking thing.

0:32:24 Thomas: And I, and, uh. And I gotta say, look, I've, I, I vented a little bit in the Facebook group about Phoebe's behavioral problems, and she, it's really not that bad, but like, there are just things that sets her off and then she's impossible.

And I got a whole lot of people offering unsolicited advice that, I, I get it, I don't mean this in too negative a way, but all of it is like, um, what we do is we sit and we paint her feelings for three hours, and then we tell her, you know, then we go through it, and I have her identify which feelings we painted. And I'm like, I would fucking love to do that, I, I have to get her to school. And no, no advice.

Anyone had had anything to do with kindergarten starts in three minutes, and I fucking have to get her to fucking get it. I have two, they'll have to go there. Every single thing was like, well, first meditate for 25 minutes together, separate. I'm like, I get I would love to a weekend. Yes, we do all that shit. I do, patient as could be on the weekend in the morning, a fucking kindergarten, we have to give her there. I don't.

And it turns out it's like a goddamn, it's a mystery, because when we had that bad meltdown I kind of told you about, we ended up, after we recorded, we ended up talking to her about it and trying to like resolve it, and she said something that, that really, I think it's worth sharing, because I think it's interesting and it kind of hit me a little bit.

We were, she came home because we record while she was at school, you know, like that, that day, I think I told you, you about that thing. And when she came back, we were like, yeah, you know, you can't watch TV tonight because you were so bad. And, by the way, we were going to give her TV back. But then when she got home, she was horrible and like yell

0:32:24 Eli: Yes, you told us.

0:32:27 Tom: How'd it go?

0:34:00 Eli: I

0:34:00 Thomas: Hit hit.

0:34:01 Eli: Don't think you told us about the meltdown. Can you tell us about the.

0:34:03 Thomas: Oh, well, I think I think I did. I because I talked about how I was trying to get her to practice going to kindergarten on time. Remember, like we're practicing the first two.

0:34:11 Eli: Yes, I know. I remember that. Yeah. And that you were going to try the racing thing.

0:34:13 Tom: I I Remember that it didn't work yeah you're gonna try you're gonna try the racing trick

0:34:16 Thomas: Yeah. Oh. OK. Yeah, maybe this was the next Yeah, well, it to get her to get ready and she just wouldn't and lost it and like ran away and did. And meanwhile, clock is ticking kind of thing. And it just it didn't go well, you know, and it and so what what she said the next day or whatever, we were talking about it. And I just asked her, I was like, Phoebe, you Know, the rules are we have to get you there at a certain time.

Like, I, I don't know. Can you tell me like, what can we do? Like, what can I do? How do we, how do we not have this tantrum thing or whatever? How do we not have this happen? You know, essentially. And she's like, she was thinking and she was, you know, and then she says, I just, I don't, I don't want to be bossed around. And I was like, Oh, man. Yeah, that's not a, that's a, That's fair. You know?

I was like, Damn, that's so once it gets, and the problem is I don't boss her around the first time, the second time, the third time, the fifth time, the ninth time I

0:35:19 Thomas: don'T boss around him. Phoebe, can you get your shoes on? Hey, hey, can you get your shoes on? We gotta go. You know, very, very calmly, softly. It's the 18th time when it's now four minutes away from being late. That's when I'm like, Phoebe GET YOUR SHOES ON! You know? And then she shuts down and leaves and goes and hides in the cave on my property.

0:35:18 Tom: Yeah yep

0:35:31 Eli: Right. Exactly. Right. Then it's a then it's a battle right, then it, then it becomes a battle of wills and they don't have the memory moment of when you were like, no, but remember when I was a good parent before, do you remember do you remember how hard I worked to control the asshole inside me up until this second, I deal with it

0:35:45 Tom: Yep. Yeah.

0:35:38 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. For 30 minutes yeah yeah if you open your register, I think you'll see a lot of entries in the positive side of the ledger, yeah.

0:36:01 Eli: If you notice I was filming. I have that when Max tantrums all the time, because my instincts are, are very mean-spirited and very angry. I'm naturally a very angry person. But there's only so many times I can say, like, be careful with your body before just a little edge, just a li - And you can tell, his eyes get light up, because he's like, Ooh!

0:36:03 Thomas: Yeah

0:36:23 Tom: Yeah.

0:36:24 Eli: Ooh! There's a bear in the cave! I must continue to poke!

0:36:30 Thomas: And So this morning, so that really hit me though, like, I don't want to be lost around, is what she said. And I, I, that hit me. And so I was like, okay, I will, will try to, and you know, mind you, it's stuff we're already trying to do, but you know how it is with kids. Like, something doesn't go right. And then they lose the attention, and then you have to do it again. And again,

0:36:50 Eli: Right. And so often, it's the exact same thing, but you said it in the way they want you to say it,

0:36:58 Tom: Or you said it at the right time to say it for them Like, that's half of it, too. It's like, I, I just said the same thing, but you were more prepared to hear it.

0:37:00 Eli: Mm -hmm Right.

0:37:00 Thomas: Yeah. And as I said, every single bit of advice that I didn't ask for in the group was the same, you five-hour process that had nothing to do with getting my kid to school on time. And

0:37:13 Tom: Right.

0:37:14 Eli: And And I'll just point out that time that it works, it's the worst possible moment, because you've now got to be grateful and positive. Reinforce, you can't be like, fucking finally, you've got to me like, oh my goodness, what a good, oh, I'm so bad, let me give you some positive words that I, I know. Yeah.

0:37:25 Thomas: I very much, as funny as that is, I very strongly believe in that. Like whenever there's a meltdown because I, right.

0:37:41 Eli: Yeah.

0:37:42 Tom: Yeah. Of course you do, because you're not a monster, but it's still a son of a bitch to do.

0:37:45 Thomas: Well, it's something. Yeah. I can't remember if we've talked about that, but it's something I saw someone write about early early on with the kids where it was like, yeah, doing the like, oh, look who decided to stop fucking being a piece of shit and come down to eat dinner. And that was, you know, that's exactly what I got times 10 in my family. And I read this little fucking, I don't know, Tumblr entry that I saw randomly on the internet. And I was like man that is I'm glad I saw this because that really puts it in perspective.

What is the op? What happened to me? You know, the couldn't be worse. And then as a kid, you get this, then you get in defiance mode of like, well, fuck you. Like, what the hell? You know, like you're going to, I finally come out of my room after my meltdown and then you're gonna make fun of me for it. Like, and then it just, it just gets worse and worse and worst and worse. And so I very much do believe in the, like, you know, I'll tell Phoebe, like hey, Phoebe I'm so happy you, you, joining are us again. That's great.

0:37:59 Tom: Uh -huh. Yeah.

0:38:32 Eli: Yeah. Oh

0:38:42 Thomas: You know? Like I just full positive, whatever. And, but the comedy stands though. It is funny when you're just like, oh my God. God, you know, yeah,

0:38:46 Eli: On the inside yeah on the inside, what of, the ones that I have to do all the time, is I'm like, hey, good job calming down, buddy, because, because Max is tantruming right. And so when he's done fucking terrorizing the house like Attila the Hun for an hour, also I should point out, I don't know if either of your guys, if any of your broods have done this, my son tantrums until he makes himself throw up. So So yeah, so there's... there's a water sports element to it, that if you don't if you're like, if you don't maintain the time bomb that is my son, he'll vomit all over himself, and then there there's also a vomit element to the tantrum now, yeah. So after that, often after he has vomited on himself, and perhaps me, I have to be like, hey, good job calming down, buddy. Daddy's going to go out in the backyard and yell some stuff, but don't you worry. That's about the squirrels. All right. I love you. You're safe. Motherfucker.

0:39:11 Tom: Jesus. Oh my god fucking hell

0:39:11 Thomas: Wow. Oh my God.

0:39:48 Thomas: Oh man, I didn't have the vomit. I always feared that would happen because sometimes they do get that worked up enough to where they start kind of like, you know like they can't breathe right. It's terrifying. But my, yeah I guess I lucked out. No full vomit. Did yours do that Tom?

0:39:49 Tom: Oh god oh

0:39:57 Eli: Mm -hmm.

0:40:03 Tom: God, I feel so bad right now, like, I'm kind of just like, I'll just laugh, because like, my, my boys, they didn't really tantrum too bad at all, like really at all. I just, got real, Finn was the easiest kid ever. Like, he just was, a he still is, like, he's a, he's delightful kid, he's a people pleaser, and he was always a people pleaser. So, like, I mean, occasionally he'd lose his shit because he was a kid, like, I'm not saying he didn't ever do it, but like, he was fairly swiftly back in control. And like, I, I, I probably do, I'm fucking old. And now, like, you guys, are you guys have a way different approach, because my approach to tantruming was I would just walk away, I just, like, I don't give any attention to

0:40:10 Thomas: Oh, that's nice.

0:40:44 Thomas: That's not bad.

0:40:45 Tom: A tantrum. So I don't know that, like, all the books probably say something different now, but like, I literally would just leave the room. Like, I don't, I would not be physically present for a tantrum, I just get up, I'm gonna leave the room. And thing is, like, the tantrum, once it, like, for my two, once it, like, kind of petered itself out, they'd get up and come look for you, and then it was all the hugs in the world, you know, but like, I'm not gonna be here for this. Like this is your space and you need it.

0:40:45 Thomas: It's So Your kid did tantrum himself into throwing up, but you were just never in the room. You never saw it and then

0:41:12 Eli: You ever knew?

0:41:12 Tom: Yeah. I think I would have noticed, though, but but

0:41:13 Eli: Yeah.

0:41:14 Thomas: Like you're like, wow, it was always killing a puke, I don't know, they were drinking too much.

0:41:18 Tom: I, I will say, like, um, Hayley and, and I were dating, and her daughter, my, my stepdaughter, um, she had these great big epic meltdowns kicking the door, screaming, they'd last for a really long time, and it was something I was woefully unprepared to even encounter. And I remember being on the phone with Hayley when we were dating, I'm like, hearing this in the background, but Hayley's response, that was very much like mine, she just go out, sit outside, and like, not give that any attention or reinforcement. Like that's just like

0:41:28 Thomas: Yeah yeah No that is what you're supposed to do, yeah. Definitely not match their level, you know, like, because then that turns it into this dynamic that, that reinforces itself. If you, if you think, and Eli, correct me if I'm wrong, what you've seen. But I think the approach is to try to not award it with attention, not to validate, not to give them the feedback that this creates attention for them and they get what they want kind of thing, where they get, you know what I mean? I think you're supposed. So like, turning away works good.

0:41:52 Tom: Yeah Yeah, so

0:42:17 Eli: Opposite. Opposite, I read, I'm now thinking, Happiest Toddler on the Block, like, toddler-ese and the fast food rule, um, the idea that you, like, repeat back what they're giving you, um, so that they feel heard, because kids when you

0:42:31 Thomas: So you yell and throw stuff at Max and barf on him.

0:42:31 Eli: No no but you're like, oh you're he's like, he's, you're supposed to be like, oh, Max is mad, Max is bad, mad, mad, mad, and that if you repeat that enough it will like get through their anger to at least according to Happiest Toddler on the Block, I don't fucking know, but it'll get through their anger and like help them calm down and you, you do kind of match their energy because it helps them feel heard, because if it, well, according to him was Toddler on a Block, uh you walk away or ignore it, they ramp up the behavior in an attempt to get your attention of

0:42:34 Tom: I can throw a lot fucking harder than you can mad Max right

0:42:47 Thomas: Oh, interesting. Hmm.

0:43:01 Tom: Yeah

0:43:08 Thomas: I think in a lot of this too, is there's a huge balance in all this parenting stuff. There's a big, big difference. There is a huge difficulty. And the main difficulty is balancing the long-term goals with the short -term need. I mean, that's the whole thing. So it may be true that, and I don't know, maybe we should have people be curious to, if we get some emails on this, I'm not sure. I'll have to go back and look at what I was reading. But like, it may be that that does ramp up the tantrum in the short term, but in the long term, if they learned that that doesn't get your attention, then maybe that works long-term. I don't know. I think that might be the theory, but I don't know.

0:43:08 Tom: Yeah yeah

0:43:17 Eli: Course

0:43:40 Tom: I I, I really guess, I, you know, like, I take all those like baby, and this is not shitting on any of that, but there's, my, like, I takes all that sort of stuff with a huge grain of salt, and I'm just sort of like, look, my experience, and it's, it's anecdotal, but my experience with four kids is they all just really needed different things. And there was no, like, like, there was no approach that works for this behavior, there is an approach that works for Finn, and then there was an approach that works for Amen, and then there's a different approach that works for Aislinn.

You, to me, like the biggest takeaway from parenting that I have, at for sixteen years and being bad at it the whole time, but it's like, it's really, like, if you, if the question is like, how do you deal with a tantrum, that's like the wrong question. It's, it's like, how do you deal with a tantrum for Finn? Well, okay, that's a good question. How do I deal with the tantrum from Finn needs to be different than how do I deal with tantrums from Aislinn?

Because they're having a tantram for very different emotional reasons. And what they want from that, and what they need in that space, is really different. And if I respond to it because this is how I respond this kind of behavior, then I'm categorizing a behavior instead of seeing who my kids are and understanding what they need. And that's something that, like, I really have come to feel fairly strongly on.

0:43:58 Eli: Yeah

0:45:00 Thomas: Well, all that aside, that portion of the morning, not terrible. So, I think we' ve worked Through this for the most part. Now, it's still hard. We're doing a thing where we're playing it by ear. We might just take Phoebe to kindergarten because she has the firm time sometimes if Arlo isn't ready in time and then come back and get him because, because honestly,

0:45:06 Tom: Oh, good.

0:45:22 Eli: Arlo, We'll see you in a bit, man, we gotta fucking

0:45:23 Tom: Just just, dude, we got some shit to deal with, kid.

0:45:24 Eli: Yup,

0:45:25 Thomas: Yeah, I mean, one of us, one of us is here, but yeah, like, honestly, we do that and it doesn't even matter. Like he just goes and does whatever. But, but also the other reason is because school Phoebe is right, you know, right down the block. She's a mile away at most. And Arlo is like across town. So it takes, you know, like at least 10 minutes to get there in 10 minutes back. So it's like, okay, run and do Phoebe real quick. But here's the thing. Okay. Also, I've told you about the birthday party coming up. I've been building this fucking, here's another problem about these summer birthdays in California, it's fucking 110, god.

Last year, and I don't blame my poor wife for this, but last year she did Phoebe's birthday party at a park, and and it was just like, this is not going to be good, yes it was, it's literally fucking on my poor I have I have pictures of it, but my poor daughter, she wanted to wear this pirate costume. I don't remember why. No, actually, I think she asked for a pirate theme. That's right. I think we did a pirate theme party and she had this delightful pirate costume, is the fucking cutest thing I've ever seen in my life. I treasure the pictures. But within a minute, she's just pouring sweat. She's red,

0:46:07 Eli: And it was on fire yup

0:46:11 Tom: Was it really?

0:46:34 Tom: Oh,

0:46:34 Thomas: You know, and they because kids don't understand like they don't. It's so funny how much they don't know about their. Yeah, they will.

0:46:35 Tom: Yeah. No, they'll just overheat and die. They'll just overeat like a dog in a car.

0:46:42 Eli: Yup.

0:46:42 Thomas: Exactly. And so we, I remember being like, Phoebe, can we take your costume off? She, and meanwhile, her red dripping sweat looking out of it. She's like, what, why I want my costume. I'm like, no dude, you're dying. Like you gotta get out of this costume. And so that after that, we're like, we're never doing that again.

Um, but this year we're doing, the uh, party at our house, you now, and we'll be able to kind of do indoor outdoor, but there's also, there's not enough shade in my yard. And we also, mind you, we, you known, we moved here somewhat recently and we wanted to get like a gazebo thing, like a big shade structure kind of thing. And we get it. And I've got, you know, I've been balancing a lot lately.

As you guys know, I've got a lot to do, but it's okay. I was like, I will put this together. It's only 947,000 pieces of wood that came in six boxes that weighs four tons. And I will do it. I'll do all that. Sure. I took one two hour session to just move the shit to the backyard. It's that big of a pain in the ass.

Like I had to take out the stuff out of the boxes and because I hate packaging material and boxes so much and my life feels like it's just, do do you feel like you work at a recycling plant? Anybody is just

0:46:42 Eli: Absolutely.

0:47:52 Tom: Oh, 100%. My part -time job is not podcasting. It's breaking down cardboard boxes.

0:47:54 Thomas: Me. I Yeah. Yeah. A hundred percent.

0:47:58 Tom: That's it. Yeah.

0:48:00 Thomas: I, it is my real job. I expect a paycheck someday. Like I should get in the mail, like just a paycheck from the city or something. Just like, good job. You spent fucking all day breaking down boxes. Boxes because that's our economy now. It's just boxes. Everything is boxes. And so I did that. First day of work was, I mean, it was a couple hours, but mind you, that's about as much as you can do in this heat until you die. So I've been doing it a couple, a couple of hours at a time, you know? And so I'm just dead. I'm fucking, I am a dead body. I did, I did like two, two hour sessions yesterday in the a hundred degree heat, you know, and I'm just, I'm fucking dead. But I wake up, I barely wake up at eight 30. Phoebe's got to get to school. No, not eight 30, eight 20. Phoebe's got to get to school by 8 40 so that's the, that's the fucking picture. Like, remember 24 where the clock shows up Yeah.

0:48:12 Eli: Yeah.

0:48:44 Eli: I was gonna gonna say 20 fucking

0:48:46 Thomas: I woke up and the clock in my what's the music and that was like some weird tone that would go yeah yeah Yeah.

0:48:47 Tom: No.

0:48:53 Thomas: It was that and I was and I had a thought of maybe Lydia's already up maybe I will you know just ask if she can do it I'm like nope you're the fucking you're not gonna be that guy you're gonna be the dad that pulls his fucking weight Lydia probably has plenty of shit to do too. You got to pull your weight, even though you're a dead body and you can't walk and your back is broken.

0:48:46 Eli: Minutes. Yeah. Do do do yeah No.

0:49:12 Thomas: It's fine. And oh, the other thing I left out is Arlo woke us up at 1am last night, 3am last night.

0:49:19 Tom: No.

0:49:19 Thomas: And then, yep.

0:49:19 Eli: Hal?

0:49:20 Tom: No.

0:49:21 Thomas: And Lydia is an absolute trooper. She usually handles it because she just wakes up and goes to bed easier, as I've mentioned before. Like she can just bam, out like a light. If I get up, I'm up for the rest of the fucking night. And so she's amazing. She handles that stuff. But because he came in twice, the second time she just gave up and let him sleep in our bed.

0:49:40 Tom: How it starts, Thomas. That's his home now. He's having his fucking mail forwarded to your bed. It's over. That's it.

0:49:47 Thomas: Man, who I love to death, is the fucking snottiest boogeriest sleeper.

0:49:52 Eli: Jordan.

0:49:53 Thomas: It's just all night. So like by the time he was, I wasn't even sleeping. I'm fucking exhausted. I think I was dehydrated from yesterday working in the sun. And even though I tried to drink water, so I'm dead. I have a headache. I wake up, but I'm like, I'm doing it. I'm going to be that dad. I'mdoing it. And so, yes, it's a little tight, you know, because we only have like 15 minutes or so. Mind you, again, the drive is, you know, it is a minute max. It is like right, it is through our neighborhood and then the school, bam, it is right there.

And and you know I do a good job of not bossing phoebe around we get them to pretty much cooperate we get him in the car it's 8 36 and I was like I'm doing it I'm fucking I'm doing and and Lydia by the way she handed me some form that we she filled out you know because I fucking suck and actually she is The best and does everything so some form it was like a questionnaire to get to know your kid or something beginning of the year that I'm supposed to hand you know give to the kindergarten teacher so I have it got the kids I drive over here's the fucking thing here's what gets me the fucking school drop -off

0:50:12 Eli: Yes oh

0:50:38 Tom: Crushing

0:51:02 Thomas: Situation: The.

0:51:02 Eli: The drop -off line.

0:51:05 Thomas: Fucking drop -of line and to make it worse to make matters worse the school is under construction I think specifically for this fact they're building like a whole the school's actually going to be just a parking lot with one building it's going to be just the full the whole thing will be for cars and then they'll pile all the kids into one tiny shack in the middle of vast parking lot because it's america and that's what you have to fucking do in this shit country because everybody drives a car and parks and lives there the parents just live there do you know this they just live go ahead TOM: do Do you have experience with this?

0:51:03 Tom: Oh do I: know this? Yes Dude, I, the, here's the the thing about Illinois that is, I hope, I think, think it's different just about everywhere, but in Illinois nobody can understand how to work a merge with cars, like the zipper they don't do it. Our drivers are ridiculously aggressive in all circumstances, including the pickup and drop off line. So when you go to drop off a kid and there's a natural, there's a requirement for these two lanes by the elementary school to merge into to the one lane that goes, they'll, they'll fucking creep up and block you from the people, people fucking, like, they won't let you in, you're like, we're all dropping off our

0:51:54 Thomas: Oh my God. Yeah. Yeah. They'll refuse to merge. It's one car length.

0:52:25 Tom: Foot we're in the same place what did everybody lets one person in, that's how a fucking do, you are you Amish, do you not have zippers, that's it right

0:52:25 Thomas: That gets me so much. It's a car. It's just one car. Yeah. Yeah. It's you let One guy in you're 10 miles behind. No, you're right there. Like you're, you see the person that you're Right behind. Okay. Congratulations. You would have been 15 feet ahead of me. Great. Amazing.

0:52:37 Tom: Yeah and and then, and then by the elementary school by us, all the other chuckle fucks who can't figure out, they're like, they're like, oh, I've got the fucking hack, for those fucking life hack fucking Elon Musk bros, and you know who they fucking are, because what they do is, instead of going through that fucking hell of the drop off or pickup line what they does, they park right by the signs that say no stopping, standing, or parking, and they park on the street, and they do it on both sides, but there's a fucking suburban street, so now there's not enough room for two cars to go through and And it's winter here, 11 and a half months out of the year. So there's fucking snow on the ground and you can't see anything. And there's kids darting in and out between these fucking cars. And if you hit one, it's your fault. Never mind that they're going to dent your fucking car. Those kids don't have insurance. It's your fall. It's their fault. It's the worst.

0:53:01 Thomas: Yep. Yep. Mm-hmm. Oh, wow. Oh God. Yeah. Yep. Oh. Oh god.

0:53:38 Thomas: It's the worst. And so this situation, it sounds very similar to that. Street, and here's what's funny. This will be good later on because we have some neighbors whose kids are old enough to walk to the school and we're going to do that immediately. This the problem is we could almost walk now, but another thing you don't realize until you have a three-year-old and a four-year-old is trying to walk any sort of long distance with them, is just

0:54:03 Tom: No, no,

0:54:03 Eli: No, you can't do it, can't. You can't walk a block with him. You can't walk a bloc-

0:54:04 Tom: No. No, you did it. It

0:54:04 Thomas: Oh my God. It's they can't do it. They can't do it. You-

0:54:08 Tom: No, It takes two hours to get the fucking mail with a three-year-old.

0:54:13 Thomas: You know, that the first scene in the Les Mis movie where they're, they're pulling that, that ship. It's that it was, I was just that you're just pulling two kids. They want to do anything, but the thing they they're supposed to do. Oh, look, a flower. Oh bug. Oh a fucking, it just sails back out five miles.

0:54:19 Tom: Yeah. Yeah.

0:54:26 Eli: Right. If the sheep could get distracted by a pinecone, it's the beginning of the lamest ship. Pulls

0:54:35 Thomas: Oh fuck. God damn it. Got to pull it back in.

0:54:38 Eli: Jean Valjean back. "I want to tell you a secret." "No, you don't." "Ship, you don't want to tell me a secret. You just want to stop walking." "Tell me, you can tell me." "Literally, you tell me who shot JFK once we get to school."

0:54:49 Thomas: The ship makes the rope into like a new, a wet noodle, dead rope, and peels it out of your hand. God, they do the thing where they try to, like, "No, I'm not gonna hold your hand," and they just, they just fucking, you know that thing they do, they peel it, like, like I don't know how to even describe it, they just, like, you're pulling it out a fucking cow's ass or something. They just pull their arm just out of your hand, weird, limply. And you're just, you're hanging on to like two of their fingers way too hard to try to make sure they don't get left behind. And so I was like, we can't walk. I passed the neighbor kids, by the way, I pass them. And I'm like, oh, that'll be fun someday. I make I it. I can making it. It's 837. It's a short drive. You know, it's right there. Not short enough, but it's short. And the entire fucking place, all the parking is taken. And the kindergarten is a little bit, a little bit ahead of everything else.

So it's not in the main, like, you know, horseshoe type thing. I don't have to go through that, but there's limited spots. And to add insult to injury, there was about three cars parked each, you Know, about five a car length minus one foot apart,

0:55:09 Tom: Yeah. Yes. Oh.

0:55:54 Thomas: Basically, whatever that nine feet, something like that. And they took up, you now, six spots between the three of them. So that was fucking great. I almost just, I'll park straight in. I'll drive straight into the fucking curb to prove a point of your bad parking. I almost did that. I looked around. I was like, this is, there is no breathing room in this. I don't have time for any of this. Like I'm fucked. And I look around, not a single spot, nowhere, goddamn nowhere.

So I turn, I, I turned back to where I came from and end up parking, you know, not fully to my house. Cause that is, you Know, that's, that is like a three quarters of a mile or mile or whatever, but I have to park down the street of where we went. And I'm like, wow, we're almost fucking back home. I'm exaggerating. And again, I'm out and now I have to walk them. Now I got to walk these kids like Jean Valjean with the ship.

I got, this is a good, you know, this is, could have been two tenths of a mile. Like it was, it was it's a walk, you know, I had to drive

0:55:53 Eli: Oh, yeah. Sure. Yeah.

0:55:55 Tom: Yeah.

0:56:49 Thomas: Pretty far away and now it's eight 39. I am like, God, I have no concept of how long it takes to get two fucking kids that are toddlers that it took forever, man. It took forever and I am out of it. I'm getting on there. I'm mad that I'm late, but then I'm thinking, okay, here's what I know about kindergarten. She said, there's weird rules about, she's supposed to get in line. I've been given very specific instructions that sound like the soup Nazi or something. She was like, yeah, yeah.

0:56:56 Eli: Yeah.

0:57:10 Eli: There's very it's very fascistic, it's like, "You will stand on your color group, and then you will go. Do not go in before the blues are called or there will be consequences." Also, the principal just stands out there staring at everybody. "Hey, man, go inside, go to your office. The fuck are you doing out here?" Yeah.

0:57:30 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. He might as well have a baton that he's like tapping his hand with. Might as well.

0:57:33 Eli: Yeah. It's real benty. Yeah.

0:57:36 Thomas: Yeah, and so I've been told, I've been told that she's got to stand in line with her backpack on and say the exact order of soup she wants and then, or whatever the fuck, and I have to stand by her. I'm like, this sounds really weird, but all right, whatever, I'll fucking, I'll do it, I'm not gonna be an asshole, I'll do whatever.

And so I'm again in my fucking dehydrated dead brain, I'm just barely hanging on, pulling the shit behind me like Jean Valjean, and I'm, okay, where's the line, I know her classrooms, classroom one, and I know she has to, a fucking waiting line. So I'm walking, I see a line of kids. I'm like, and I, you know, it's right by where classroom one is. And I'm like, okay. So I go walk toward that line.

And then the teacher that I've met before from, like, the summer school stuff that she's done, she gives me a, like I've used the wrong fork on the dining room. You know, she goes, "Hey, aren't you taking her to school?" "Yep, yep." "No, it is that one." And it turns out the fucking classroom number one and number two, the doors are right next to each other, and this line was for class, remember, fucking two, and I thought I had to get into that.

So now, step one, I'm late by five minutes and I look like a fucking asshole trying to take his kids to the wrong class. I'm trying to put my kid in a class she's not in. I'm, I was so mad, I was like, oh my God, I'm not this bad of a dad, I'm not, I'm not this bad of a dad, but I've now tried to put my kid in the wrong fucking class because I'm an asshole.

And so she's, and and this teacher, to her credit, she's like, you know that one, I think she, she kind of saw it on me. And mind you, I also am dressed like the dude at all times because this is, I'm not a morning person, I've just woken

0:59:09 Thomas: Up and put on whatever the fuck was nearby and gone straight into this. I've had no time, you know, as I already covered. And so I'm wearing my sunglasses and my fucking nothing, like shorts and a bullshit, might as well be a bathrobe, not quite. And so I am like, yeah, okay, that's the classroom. I open up the classroom and her friends are already all in a circle time.

0:59:29 Tom: Of course.

0:59:29 Thomas: And Yeah, of course they are, because they don't have loser fucking asshole dads. That's why. And teacher is like, "All right, okay, yeah," and I was like, "Yeah, all right, fine, fuck, I'm a failure." And so I go and trounce off, and, uh, what did I forget?

0:59:30 Tom: They are.

0:59:34 Eli: My, can park you.

0:59:50 Eli: Forgot the paper.

0:59:51 Thomas: The fucking paper, yes.

0:59:52 Tom: Well, Oh. Oh.

0:59:53 Eli: Paper.

0:59:53 Thomas: Eli, you're better. I am walking with this pink piece of paper in my hand, by the way. It's been in my hand the whole time.

0:59:59 Thomas: I've done the thing where I've got the rope pulling the ship and the paper is in one of those hands that's also holding two kids, dragging them as fast as they will go, which is not fast. It is not vast. And so I walk fucking, you know, almost back to the car. I'm like, oh, the fucking, the paper.

0:59:59 Tom: My god. I would do this. Yeah.

1:00:15 Thomas: Oh my God. And I'm like, dude, what's worse? Is it worse to not have done it? I don't know how important it is. And I was like, you know what? Swallow your fucking pride, man. Just go give them the paper. I walk back looking again, like the fucking dude, and my sunglasses, barely alive shitty dad tried to put his kid in the wrong classroom, and now guess what, he's back, it's fucking idiot, and he's got a paper. And I'm like, this is, hello, this is a fucking, I don't know, I don't know what this is. And luckily there's eight teachers in there, somehow I don't, but it's a good school, there's a lot of somehow teachers.

And instead of having to walk all the way through the room like an embarrassment to the main teacher, there was somebody right next to the door and she took, took the form. I was like, oh, thank God. And then I left and I felt like the biggest fucking piece of shit. I couldn't have done more the opposite of what I wanted to do. I already, day one, I have gone down in every teacher's mind that witnessed that as, okay, that's one of those dads. All right, hey, if you got to

1:00:15 Eli: This, fucking paper.

1:00:32 Tom: Well.

1:01:10 Eli: Okay.

1:01:10 Thomas: Tell Phoebe something, tell the mom, you know, just tell, yeah.

1:01:12 Eli: Tell the mom. Yeah. You know, we'll need, we all know, they're gonna say, like, well, we all know what's going on at home. Oh,

1:01:19 Thomas: God, I was so mad.

1:01:19 Tom: It was a dad weekend. Then

1:01:21 Thomas: I Was so mad, yep, yep. Oh, I forgot to add the minor detail of after I'd circle around, look for parking, you know, done the thing. When I got back to the car, the kids that I had seen walking past us. So the kids that I'd seen as I left my house, the neighborhood kids, now they're probably just confused. Like, why the fuck did you even bother driving?

1:01:21 Tom: I guess it was a dad weekend.

1:01:37 Tom: Did they flip you off as this uh, you

1:01:43 Thomas: Well, it's because I have to pull a ship behind me. That's why.

1:01:44 Tom: Waste a lot of time and fucking why.

1:01:54 Eli: All Well, gentlemen, before we go, important question. Why did the crab cross the road? He didn't, he used the sidewalk. And

1:02:02 Tom: Oh, oh, oh.

1:02:11 Thomas: Our show. Thank you so much for listening. You what's on the patron feed each and every time but I've got a special plug this week because if you're a patron, if you were to pledge hypothetically right now on Patreon, you would get not one episode but two extra episodes that That the normies haven't heard. That's because we released an extra one. Now, if you can't become a patron, that's okay. You're going to hear that extra one next week. But if you're really itching for some dad content, jump on that Patreon. And you could listen to two additional episodes right now. It's rare. It's an astrology thing. I don't know. Mercury retrograde to podcast of something. As always, if You Can't Do That, no big deal. Maybe share out the show and keep listening. And we love you so much. And we'll see you soon.

1:02:58 Clip: Want to meet sexy DILFs in your area? Email the dads at DearOldDads.com or, better yet, send us a message on Patreon. You can follow us on all social media by checking the links in the show notes. And if you need more podcasts in your life, you can find Tom on Cognitive Dissonance, Thomas on Serious Inquiries Only, and Eli on Godawful Movies and all the Puzzle in the Thunderstorm shows. Dear Old Dads is edited and produced by my favorite DILF, Tom Smith, who also wrote and recorded the intro music, which is used with his permission. This podcast is a production of Daddy Issues LLC. Copyright 2022. All rights reserved.