Brendan’s Journey

I now am the proud father of a baby boy!  Mommy and Brendan returned from the hospital today, and are sleeping in the other room right now.  I thought it might be neat, as well as informative, to write out a little timeline of the recent past so that everyone can see how things went:

9/31/2009 – Melissa visits doctor.  No dilation, nothing happening.  Melissa is ready to shoot doctor.

10/2/2009 - Melissa ends up in the hospital, thinking her water may have broken.  Doctor says no water broken, but dilated 3 cm.  Melissa is almost begging to be induced, but does not get her way. 

10/7/2009 – Melissa visits doctor again.  Doctor says she’s still at 3 cm, and makes appointment for the following week with the reservation that she’ll probably have the baby before then.

10/8/2009 -

4:00 am – Melissa wakes up to go to bathroom, and mentions that she is feeling a little stronger contractions.  My eyes pop wide open.  I mention that maybe I’ll get up and take a shower.  You know, just in case.

4:30 am – Melissa tells me “Maybe you’d better hurry up and get that shower.”  I get up so fast I get dizzy, and careen into the bathroom to shower. 

4:58 am – Melissa calls my mother and father, and asks them to come over to watch the kids.  I call doctor’s office immediately after, leave message.  Doctor calls back, speaks to Melissa, and tells her to get to the hospital.  Contractions are now painful and 10 minutes apart.

5:25 am – My parents arrive.  I get her bag into the van, and make sure I have my cell phone and camera.  Melissa yells at me for not having the van started.  I start the van, pull it to the door to the house, and then wait until the contraction ends so she can get off the kitchen floor and into the van.

5:50 am - We arrive at the hospital.  I’ve averaged speeds about 20 mph over the posted limit, and blown two red lights and a couple insignificant stop signs.  I take wife to Labor and Delivery, and stay with her until the anesthesiologist arrives to give epidural.  I then go park the car and hustle my ass back up to the delivery room. 

6:45 am – The epidural is done.  Melissa instructs me to add the anesthesiologist to our Christmas card list.  Contractions are 1-2 minutes apart.

6:55 am – Hard labor and pushing begins.  Melissa crushes my fingers;  nurse advises me to only give her two fingers to crush at a time, and I appreciate the information.  I continue to hold Melissa’s foot while the nurse holds the other, and I realize that I am really and truly a part of this whole thing and I just about cry over the joy and privilege of being there.

7:00 am – Melissa is informed her mother is in the waiting room.  Melissa tells the nurse to send her in.  2 minutes later, Melissa’s mom sees more than she bargained for.

7:17 am – Brendan William McLaughlin pops into the world at 7 lbs. 10 ounces, and 20.5 inches. 

7:18 am – I cut the umbilical cord.  Brendan is officially on his own.

7:25 am – I move out of the way of the nurse, and as I back up I bump into something.  I turn to look, and it’s a small table with a plastic tray containing the placenta.  For the third time, I look at the thing they told me not to look at because lots of people get sick or pass out if they see it.  I nonchalantly turn away, unfazed.  Sort of.

7:40 am – I hold my newborn son for the first time.  Sweet. 

10/10/2009 – We leave the hospital at about 11:00 am.  I return home the same route we took to the hospital, not once exceeding the speed limit.

Same Old Story

I’m a fan of the Buffalo Bills. It’s my hometown team. I grew up only a mile or two from Ralph Wilson Stadium. I’ve been following the team pretty closely for about 20 years, and I am not sure that I have ever felt the way about the Bills the way I feel now.

I feel doomed.  I feel like no matter what the team does or doesn’t do, it’s not going to matter.  I feel like the defense will never be quite as dominant as it needs to be to cover for an offense that is going to just suck forever.  Since Jim Kelly retired, Buffalo’s been searching for a quarterback that could be a consistent winner.  They’ve never quite found anyone; not Todd Collins, Rob Johnson, Doug Flutie, Drew Bledsoe, JP Losman, Kelly Holcomb, and not even Trent Edwards.  There have been running backs, but no one spectacular.  Receivers?  Who the hell knows, considering who’s been throwing. 

I keep hoping that somehow, despite all the problems with the guidance and leadership of this franchise, the Bills will get the combo right through sheer luck.  And for one glorious year we could have a playoff team again.

What’s sad is that is how far my expectations have fallen.

Any Day Now

My baby boy is due to greet the world on October 13th.  My wife, Melissa, is very ready to evict him from his current residence, and I am eager to meet the boy after all this time.  I have a feeling we might meet him a little earlier than his due date, but not by a whole lot.  And so we wait. 

I’ve been sitting around the house for almost a month.  We had a little scare a few weeks ago that involved a trip to the hospital for some early contractions, and since even a week before that little episode Melissa hasn’t wanted me too far out of earshot.  This is perfectly normal.  To be honest, I’m not too comfortable any time that she’s not home or near people that could help in the case that the big show starts without warning.  I know, she’s a grown up, and she’s a remarkable independent and intelligent woman who can take care of herself.  I still worry.  I’m a Dad and Husband.  It’s what I do.

I admit, I’m going a little crazy.  I miss my late night weekend walks with my brother Sean and his boxer, Gunther.  We’d tour Elmwood up by Lexington and the backstreets and see all the beautiful houses in the still of the night while Gunther peed on every tree and bush along the way.  Sometimes we’d see Lance Diamond outside the Elmwood Lounge and stop for a quick chat.  Other times we’d meet some of his neighborhood friends out of Faherty’s and get a quick drink and shoot the breeze.  I’ll be back there soon enough, but I do miss it a little.

It’s all worth it and more.  While I sit here and type this, my beautiful wife is putting the finishing touches on a beautiful addition to our family.  Soon enough there will be plenty of excitement.  Right now there’s a certain peace and serenity, even as the girls hoot and holler and play princess and mess up the house and seem kind of oblivious to the immediacy of it all.  They’re excited, but not worried or anxious.  I’m all of that.  Melissa is fussing over the rest of us and not really herself.  She’s stocked the house with easy food for me to make for us, gotten all the cleaning done, gotten her bag ready, made sure that everything will be OK while she’s bringing new life into the world.  I think we’re as ready as can be.  Right down to the boy’s name and the clothes he’ll wear home.  And so we wait.

Any day now…

Off The Leash – Summer Fall Nights

OK, so here are some random thoughts for your late night or early morning or when the hell ever consumption and contemplation:

It is August 31st, soon to be September 1st, and the last few nights have already felt like autumn has arrived.  This summer has been a complete failure, weather-wise.  Heh.  Weather-wise.  That reminds me…

Billy Wilder has quietly become one of my favorite director/producer/writers in film, and I probably haven’t even seen half of his movies.  Right now, high on my list of all-time favorites are “The Seven Year Itch”, “Stalag 17″, and “The Apartment”.  I haven’t even seen “Sunset Boulevard” or “Some Like It Hot” so I may not even have experienced the best he had to offer.  Is it strange that many of my favorite movies are older than me?

My wife is going to give birth to my 4th child, our 3rd, and my first son in just about a month and a half.  I can’t even begin to explain how absolutely and all-consumingly excited I am about this. 

Someone I worked with a few years back has passed away.  That’s the second former co-worker to die in the last year.  Neither of them made it past 50.  Damn.

The Truth About Favre

Why didn’t he just tell the truth…sort of like this:

“Hi, my name is Brett Favre.  I used to be the starting quarterback for the Green Bay Packers of the NFL.  Under my leadership, I turned the Packers from an also-ran to one of the elite franchises in NFL history.  After a bunch of years of messing with the GM over whether or not I was going to retire, those bastards decided that they could do without me and handed the starting job to that other dude.  What’s his name, Derek or Ray or something? 

Anyways, I’m still mad that they did that.  After all, I’m the MAN.  How dare they not let me unretire for the second or third time?  They should know that the real issue is that the new coach didn’t let me make all the decisions, and that riled me, and I was just trying to assert my rightful place as the unquestioned leader of the franchise.  Plus, I don’t really like training camp.  Give me three warm-up throws and a couple 11 on 11 drills, and I’m good to go.   That’s how awesome a player and person I really am.

So now you understand why I got mad.  I am DYING to get back into that stadium and soak up all of the wild cheering of my adoring fans.  Plus, I want to show those lousy bastards in Green Bay’s front office that they messed with the wrong dude; that I am NOT washed up and they shouldn’t have let me go in the first place.  And please, don’t judge me based on that year in New York.  I wasn’t really motivated enough there.  I only even agreed to go there because it was the easiest way to keep my name in the news.  Plus, there were all these restrictions in the agreement between the Packers and the Jets that prevented me from going to the Vikings like I wanted to, so I had to play SOMEWHERE for a year. 

Now that my year in purgatory is over, I am psyched to play against the Packers for the Vikings.  I know, I know, it seems that this is kinda late in the summer to finally make the move, but who really needs training camp anyways?    I can’t wait to walk into Lambeau Field and light it up.  So to all of my fans, I say watch me!  It’s going to be an awesome year!  And to the Green Bay Packers’ coaches and management:  SCREW YOU!!!”

No Margin For Error

Pat Kane ends up in the klink after being arrested for beating up a taxi driver and robbing him.  OK, this sounds crazy but barely plausible.  Next thing you know, everyone is yelling for Kane’s head and wondering how a big name dude does something so stupid.  The inevitable “privileged asshole athlete” theme begins to overtake the commentary.  Sandy Beach is calling for him to go to jail (with the snide comment “if he’s guilty, of course”).

But wait.

Turns out Kane and cousin may have been locked in the cab by the driver, who thought they were just a couple college kids who might skip out on a fare.   The driver’s lawyer is now trying to downplay the incident.  Reports that the driver has gotten into spats with customers before are beginning to make their way to the media.  Hmmm.

What this sounds like is a couple kids that are probably a little intoxicated and one of whom is a pretty rich and famous hometown boy ran into a surly cab driver with a temper who was going to teach a couple college boys a lesson.  Then all hell – or, as is seemingly more likely, a smaller incident – broke loose and everyone ends up looking dumb.  People arrested, stories on the news and talk radio and every online media outlet in town, people who don’t know a hockey puck from a doughnut shouting their opinions at each other.  What this so clearly illustrates is that there is little room for error for those in the public eye, or even those who either inadvertently or purposely get caught in the glare of the media spotlight.

As a student of people – and who really isn’t? – I have a few questions.   Is this a new phenomenon?  Certainly the sheer size, reach, and ubiquity of media coverage is at an all time high.  Is it too much?  Are we expecting an level of behavior from our celebrities that is simply out of touch with the reality of their status as human beings, mere mortals, people who were born just like us?  I think that the money accorded these folks comes with an awful and almost unfulfillabe expectation.  Should we dial it back a bit?  Can we?  Or is this the bell that cannot be unrung?

A (Not So) New Car

So, I’ve got a Ford minivan, and a Saturn.  Nice enough cars, but since I drive the van  – my wife gets the Saturn due to a longer commute – I get to pay a lot of money every week for gas.  With 17 or so miles a gallon and a 22 gallon tank, the $60 tank fills tend to get my blood boiling.  But what to do? 

Apparently, what to do is just be in the right place at the right time.  Through a confluence of circumstances that worked out very well for me, I now have myself another car.  I got it at an excellent price, and it’s much more fuel-efficient than the van.  It’s not something I would have normally thought of driving, but sometimes fate makes the choice for you.  Here it is…

That’s right…a 1989 Ford Festiva L with a 1.3 liter 4-cylinder motor and a 4-speed manual transmission.  I haven’t documented it myself yet, but it’s said I’ll get about 35-40 miles per gallon.  Not bad for a 20 year old car.  It’s pretty spare all the way around, from the 12″ rims to the AM/FM 2 speaker radio.  But what the hell, there’s barely the slightest hint of rust, it’s clean, it has enough leg room for my 6′ 1″ size,  and it’s got only 56,000 miles on the clock.  Another view:

It’s practical.  It’s plain.  It’s old.  But it’s perfect!

Maybe We Should Hope it FAILs

As we are all painfully aware, the NY Senate has done nothing but further their reputation for dysfunction for over a week now.  In the last 5 days, we’ver had a Democrat majority, a Republican “coalition” majority, and now we’ve got a stalemate.   I heard somewhere that a judge has ordered the two sides to find a way to decide who’s in charge of things so that they can get on with their work and actually do the shit they’re supposed to do.

Sadly, I think that judge is seriously misguided.  I think it would be hilarious for the whole damned government to screech to a painful halt, and for every one of the fools in the Senate to demonstrate just how little support they deserve from the people that they fail on a consistent basis.  The entire Senate runs like a fraternity with pettiness, patronage, and power plays the major factors in the decisions made.  The people, through their own apathy, have become secondary to the narrow interests of the political parties, their benefactors, and the furtherance of their aspirations.  I know that if the government shut down, there would be some undesirable consequences.  Vital services could be interrupted, and surely some unfortunate situations may occur.  I don’t ask for disaster, but if some minor chaos in regular peoples’ lives is what it takes, so be it.

I know that this probably won’t happen, and even if it did I wonder if it would be enough to sound the death knell of our bloated, inefficient, and irresponsible government.  I fear that it will take something drastic, and possibly tragic, to wake up enough people to finally make a difference.

A Sticker Situation

One of my friends at work came in today with an interesting story.  His automobile inspection is past due, and like 99.7% of the population, he waited until it was actually late to get the inspection done.  The first place scheduled was the actual VW dealer where he bought the car.  Strangely, they couldn’t do the inspection because they were out of inspection stickers.  Happens.

So then it was off to a local oil change place.  Oddly enough, they were out of the stickers as well.  Not only that, they called several other of their locations, and they were all out.  WTF?

I know this sounds a little paranoid, but it makes you wonder.  Is NY so desperate for revenue that they can’t afford to print the damned things?  Or is this a planned shortage that will be quickly resolved – right after a week-long ticketing blitz?  Hmmmm…..

Fourth Time’s A Charm

Well, we went to the hospital for the sonogram the other day, and it’s official: My wife is pregnant with our first son! It’s a boy!  He’s all healthy, and due to hit the stage on October 13th!

Some random thoughts on this:

• Knowing that the family name will live on for another generation is actually a weirdly huge deal. 
• I get to buy toys that I would have played with when I was little, instead of feeling out of place buying dolls and princess outfits. 
• There will be someone to hide out in the basement with when all the women in the house are screaming at each other (just kidding.  sort of.). 
• Finally I can contribute a boy to marry off to one of my friends’ daughters.  Seems that the group I hang with and know has a disproportionately high number of girls compared to boys.  Kind of like my family. 

More to come, once I think about it some more…

Day Of Reckoning

OK, so not exactly reckoning.  Tomorrow my wife goes for another sonogram, and this is the one where we most likely will find out whether we’re  having a boy or another girl.  My first hope is that the child is healthy, as always.  After that, well, I would sure love to even up the sides a little bit.  I have three girls, so a boy could help balance things a little.  But another girl would be pretty cool too.  Either way, I find out for sure tomorrow, and we’ll be a step closer.

Windy

Last night all I heard was the wind whistling through the trees outside.  Oh, and the front door humming again.  I wonder if, here in WNY anyways, that’s going to be the biggest symptom of global warming climate change natural climate cylcles whaetever is going on with our weather that Al Gore is trying to fix by making movies and growing his beard occasionally.  It seems like IT IS ALWAYS WINDY.  This must be wreaking havoc with golf games, but is probably working out pretty well for the wind turbines in Lackawanna.  See, there’s an upside!