Scariest. Clown. Ever.

My buddy Matt has this little hobby. There's one of those "Everything's a Dollar" stores near his gym, and for some reason this particular bargain palace seems to specialize in weird little cast resin figures and statues. If he spots something he thinks will annoy or discomfit you, he'll drop a buck and leave a little gift on your desk. He did this to a co-worker of mine for the better part of a year, after the co-worker had been repeatedly accosted by a Christian neighbor who had decided it was her mission to "save" him. Every week or two, my buddy would arrive at his cube to find Yet Another Hideous Christ Figuring, poorly cast, the figure almost always slightly (sometimes grotesquely) disproportionate or -- more disturbingly -- with Christ's body outrageously buff and tan, looking like something off the cover of a romance novel, the facial details often painted so heavily that Mary looked as though she had stooped by to comfort him between turning tricks.

Hysterical, really.

But I made a mistake. I mentioned over lunch one day that I am absurdly disturbed by clowns. Not all clowns -- the ones in cirque du soleil (which are really more mime-ish that clown-ish) don't bother me a bit. But your basic Barnum n' Bailer dime-store paint-by-numbers art clowns give me the heebiejeebies.

Sigh. And now Matt has a new hobby.

While talking to my wife on the phone this morning, I glanced up and saw this on top of my monitor:



I literally jumped in my chair and gasped, like I got stung by a bee. It's terrifying. I mean, all of these things are hideous, but this one: WHAT IS THE DEAL WITH THE BIG PURPLE HAND?



The popular theory is that the clown head is actually a decoy, meant to distract you from the Big Purple Hand of the Devil.

You know somewhere, some half-blind grandma saw one of these in a store and thought it would be perfect for their little grandson. And that, Virginia, is where serial killers come from.

Mood: Seriously creeped out, man
Now Playing: Nada

ACLFizzle....

Sigh. Sometimes it sucks being a dad. It sucks even more trying to be a good one.

Let me explain. Anyone who knows me knows I adore my kids. Not in the fawning obnoxious my-child-can-do-no-wrong sense, but in the sense that I don't know who I'd be without them, and it bring tears to my eyes to even try to imagine such an eventuality. They are the most important thing in my life, bar none, followed closely by my marriage.

So, let's just say I take being a dad seriously. At least part of this is due to not having a father since I was 6. I'm like a textbook case study of the psychological effects of tragic parental loss at a young age. It's all terribly fascinating on some level, I'm sure.

But anyhow, that doesn't mean I can't be a selfish jerk on occasion. I don't sit around trying to find ways to indulge and spoil my kids at every turn, at the expense of my own happiness. The long suffering martyr parent I am most certainly not. I go out, I party, I have drinks with friends, we'll take vacations with and without the kids, whatever. My wife and I have a relationship with and without our kids, and I have plenty of stuff I like to do that doesn't have to include my wife OR my kids. I just try to balance it all out.

Mostly, this works. But unfortunately sometimes the balancing act just doesn't work out too well, and something's gotta fall off the scales to get things to work.

Meaning, well, ACL Fest.

Not that we didn't DO the fest. We did. We went Friday evening, and after a 90 minute ordeal of trying to find a parking space downtown before the state offices closed we finally got on a shuttle bus and got to the park. We had a blast on Friday: Miranda and I dancing our asses off to Grupo Fantasma, me and Trevor boppin' along to Thievery Corporation, chowing some tasty vittles (crawfish enchiladas from Prejeans and Crispy Chicken in a Cone from Hudson's ... yummmm), drinking expensive, nasty canned beer (just how long ago was it that I realized Heineken was, in fact, really bad beer? Well, it still is), and ending the night with a nice set of Lyle Lovett and his Large Band. Friday was essentially flawless.

But Saturday, it all started to go wrong. We went too early -- hustled downtown to be there by 1:00 to catch Aqualung, only to decide once we arrived that they would have been way more enjoyable without the 105+ degree heat, scorching sunlight, and crowds. Hung with Ray and his daughter for too little time -- was hoping to catch up later in the day once things got less unbearable -- then hung at the Austin Kiddie Limits for about 2 hours with my kids, listened to some kid-friendly acts in the shade there (The Biscuit Brothers were a hoot), did the face-painting/balloon animal boogie, etc. Then, we decided to head back onto the surface of the sun.

Big mistake.

30 minutes of walking in the scorching heat (and I mean SCORCHING. I'm not a lightweight, but this was killer heat) and the kids started wilting. We tried to find some shade, but had little luck -- most every square inch of shade had already been claimed by some of the 60K+ other people there. We drank lots of water, grabbed cold snacks, stood in front of misting fans, etc. NOTHING helped. The kids started getting that flushed look that sets the parental warning lights blinking, and then Trevor had a full-out meltdown when his balloon sword popped.

It was time to cut our losses, before things got hairy. So we bailed at about 5:00.

And then, there was today. I had my heart set on seeing Bob Mould, but we had some obstacles to overcome. The most significant of which was, simply, that today is Miranda's birthday. She's been having fun at the fest, but I could tell she was starting to get a bit worn out. I didn't want to force her to go down there again if she really didn't want to. This was our first festival/live music experience as a family, and I didn't want to endanger the memory of the experience by creating any negatives, if possible.

At first, this morning, she seemed cool with heading down in the late afternoon to catch Jason Mraz and Bob Mould. But, well, I could tell she was playing along at least a bit. She could tell how much *I* wanted to go, so she figured she'd go too. And well, that's just not fair. I mean, it's the kid's birthday, ferchrissakes. If she's worn out on the whole festival thing, then she shouldn't have to go. I'm not a fan of compulsory fun, no matter how expensive it may be.

So, we have ditched day 3. Instead, we're having my mom and my brother's family over for BBQ and ice cream.

It'll be nice.

I'm trying to not be a dick about this. But it's kinda tough. On any other day, I'd have just gone downtown by myself, met up with Ray or my buddy Baba and his friends -- Christine would have been totally cool with it, the kids would have been fine, no blame and no worries.

But not today. Today is my daughter's birthday. Christine even tried to tell me it was OK for me to go, but I know it's not. Of course it's not. If it were after bedtime, then sure, but the shows worth seeing start at 4:00. No way in hell am I skipping out on own daughter's 7th birthday to stand around in the sweat and dust and heat with 60K people, alone.

I can be a selfish jerk, but that would be beyond the pale.

And yet, damn it if there isn't a little pissy voice in my head saying do it... do it... do it. Lucky for me it's just a little voice, and I can ignore it. It'll shut up before long.

I love being a dad, but I'd be lying if I didn't acknowledge that sometimes it can be a real pain in the ass trying to be a good one.

Mood: A tad cranky
Now Playing: Thievery Corporation, "Cosmic Joke"

Hey Chum!

OK, confession time. I've apparently become a serial killer. The angel of death. Destroyer of worlds. Riding a pale horse. Wielding my scythe. The grim reaper.

OK, well, only for fish. But man, I seem to have the kiss of death when it comes to fish, lately.

My kids each have a fish tank in their rooms. Miranda's is larger -- about 7.5 gallons, with one calico fantail and one moorish fantail -- while Trevor has the basic small betta bowl. The betta's of course, tend to live forever, but the goldfish are, well, a bit more delicate. However, the two we had in Miranda's room were hanging in there. After going through 3 or 4 fish, we'd finally wound up with a couple that seemed to be hardy enough to withstand my tendency to let the tank get pretty dirty before I'd do anything about it.

Well, that all changed Sunday. I'm thinking that that's when my diabolical and nefarious powers first manifested themselves.

First, the calico ("Spot") goes belly up. Miranda cries and sobs "he was my little buddy!" Very sad, although she was over it in about 5 minutes -- the promise of a new fish seemed to be sufficient. So, I took the corpse out of the tank, changed the water out, cleaned the tank, and put the moor ("Luna") back in.

Hmmm. He doesn't look so good. Less glossy-black than coppery-gray looking. Well, perhaps the cleaner water will help.

Nope. Dead two hours later, after the kids went to sleep. So I sneak the lifeless body out of the tank, hoping Miranda won't notice that he's gone when she gets up for school in the morning. As luck has it, she does not notice and I resolve to try to replace "Luna" with an identical twin later in the day. We have some meetings at her school that afternoon, so I'vetaken a half-day of vacation and will have time to make the switch when she and her brother head to karate class.

Well, I hit the pet store, talk to the fish dude, explain what happened, and he recommends getting another tank. I agree, because the current tank is one of those plastic jobs that has the lid attached and that uses the under-the-gravel filtration system. The tank is continually filthy, and it's a bitch to clean, so enough is enough. So, I drop $50 on a new 10 gallon tank started kit, with light and basic over-the-side filter. Plus, I grab a new moor and a basic medium fantail goldfish to replace the calico. They look hale and hearty.

I sneak the new tank upstairs, and wait for the kids to leave for karate. Well, Miranda runs up to her room to grab some sandals and notices that"Luna" is gone.

More tears.

OK, so now we have to spill the beans -- Daddy is setting up a new tank, and we have some new fish. They go to karate I set up the tank. I follow the directions exactly. I let the fish hang out in their little bags, floating in the water, to minimize the shock of the new environment. Finally, an hour later, I release them into the tank.

The moor seems fine -- he's swimming about, wildly active. The fantail, though, swims quite a bit initially and then ... settles to the bottom of the tank.

Uh oh.

I'm trying to figure out what's up. His gills are going, but he's not really moving around all that much. I drop a few flakes of food in and he perks up, eats and swims around, and then ... settles to the bottom again.

Hrrrm.

Of course, at this point the kids come home. Miranda, excited, immediately christens my latest victi... errr... I mean "purchases" with names, thereby setting the stage for the next tragedy. Hey everyone, meet "Midnight" and "Goldy"!

Try not to get, you know, too attached.

Now, as I said, "Goldy" was once again just sort of sitting at the bottom of the tank, where as "Midnight" was still swimming about the tank wildly. Concerned, I kind of shush Miranda out of the room and decide to check back in a little while. Well, a little while later, "Midnight" was no more, his lifeless corpse clinging to the water intake for the filter. Apparently, what I took to be Midnight's "enthusiastic swimming and exploring" was more akin to "panicked attempts to escape from impending doom."

And "Goldy" wasn't looking to swell, either. But he was still alive, at least.

So, I scoop "Midnight" out, break the news to Miranda (less tears this time -- great, now she's getting calloused by the recurrent tragedies), and take the dead fish and a water sample back to the pet store, along with my daughter so she can learn a little bit more about what's going on.

Well, the guy at the store runs a test on the tank water and it comes back fine -- pH a bit high, but nothing terrible. The water is kind of hard, but not enough that it should kill fish on contact. So the fish dude tells me that it was probably just shock -- the water temperature in the bags hadn't equalized well enough yet, and the fish freaked. I let him know that "Goldy" ain't doing so well, either, and he' says she might be OK, she might not. He also recommends pulling the charcoal filter out of the filter system for a few weeks to help encourage the growth of the various beneficial bacteria in the water that helps keep fish happy and healthy. He then recommends against getting another moor at this time (they're delicate, he says) and instead suggests getting a couple of mollys. They're sturdy fish.

You know, tough to kill. Heh.

So, of course, Miranda picks out a couple of pretty red ones and off we go. On the way home she names them. I suggest that maybe naming them isn't such a great idea considering how the day is going, and if she really wants to do so maybe she should name them both "Lucky" just in case. She ignores me, instead dubbing them "Speedy" and "Pokey."

We arrive home, head to the tank, and of course "Goldy" has now expired as well. So that's 4 fish in less than 24 hours. Out comes "Goldy," in go "Speedy" and "Pokey." And they seem to be fine. I figure they're tough enough, and we'll just leave them in there to establish the environment for a couple of weeks (in fish talk, "establishing the environment" apparently means "pissing and shitting to pollute the water to a satisfactory level") and then we'll go back to bigger fish.

This morning, 6:30, I'm awoken by my daughter crying out "Speedy! Pokey! OH NO!!!" Two more down. 6 dead fish and 2 trips to the pet store in less than 36 hours. I surrender.

So yeah, the fish tank is getting a few days of rest. No fish until the weekend, and then we'll try again. I imagine that when I enter the pet store on Saturday Bernard Herrmann's theme from "Psycho" will be thrumming through a lot of fishy minds. Oh great. Here's comes the fish killer.

Mood: Annoyed
Now Playing: The Call, "Into the Woods"