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OK, smarties, when was the last time you tried to roller skate? It’s not like riding a bike — or falling off a log. Though falling was most definitely involved.

Sunday was yet another of my daughter’s many social engagements — the fifth birthday of a pre-school buddy. The venue: a roller skating rink. The main amusement: Me, in size 12 rented roller skates.

Did I dread the event? Not nearly as much as the princess party last year. After all, like most kids of my era, roller skating was how we spent many a Saturday afternoon.

I fondly remember rolling round a darkened rink to the sparkle of a disco ball while “YMCA” blared through the poorly tuned P.A.  I could hokey-pokey with the best of them. Heck, I used to go backward.

But those muscles haven’t been used in a long, long, long time.

So while I was trying to show my daughter how to skate, I was surrepticiously trying to remember myself. And I did OK for a while, till I began to wonder about how much I could trust my bum knee. And I couldn’t quite remember how I used to stop — though I think it had something to do with crashing into the nearest wall.

The killer came during a game of “Red Light, Green Light.” With Claire pretty much incaple of going or stopping at will, I had to be the one to zip us away on green and stop us on a dime on red.

We did well, actually, till we hit the three-quarters mark and got told “red light” far faster than I was ready for. I could tell Claire was going to go down, so I did the honorable thing.

I dropped like a rock.

My wife said people outside we’re trying to figure out where the explosion came from.

One old lady hopped to her feet, far more nimbly than I, and inquired if I were OK.

Fortunately, I landed on my … pride, which has endured much worse. ‘Course, in falling, I did happen to drag Claire down with me, but gently. Happily, she was back on her feet in a jiffy and we scored fourth — winning the last of the coveted glow-sticks.

All, nostalgia.

Now, excuse me while I soak the blisters on my feet and the bruises to my … pride.

If nothing else, I got a reminder that flexibility after 40 is critical. It is the Summer of Fitness, after all.

The past few weeks have been quite busy for Renee, Sydney and I. Highlights include swim lessons, Tom Petty and making a big decision.

Saturday Sydney started swim lessons. She was a bit frightened, but did OK after awhile. She was completely unsure of what to do with the kick board though. Hopefully the next lesson will be better.

June 25 my dad and I and 18,000 of our closest friends, including Ben, were serenaded by Top Petty and the Heartbreakers at the Hollywood Bowl. Check out Ben’s review of the show here. Turns out Dad had an even better time than he expected and enjoyed his birthday present. As for me, turns out I’m a musical dork. In last week’s blog I mentioned I’d buy tickets to see Robert Palmer if he came back to town. Um yeah. I didn’t realize he died five years ago. Guess I need to brush up on my music knowledge a bit before I try and swipe Ben’s gig.

And about that big change.

We’re moving to St. Louis. We love California, but enough is enough. We realized that if we want to own a home and provide a life for Sydney that doesn’t revolve around moving  from apartment to apartment every year while being financially strained, we have to move out of the Golden State. Why St. Louis? I grew there, and a majority of my family still lives there.

Yes I’m a bit nervous about the whole thing, but I’m also really excited about it because Sydney will get to experience all the things I loved to do as a kid. The zoo and the science center, which have free admission every day. Then there are Cardinals baseball games, the famous Arch and yummy Ted Drewes frozen custard.

We don’t have an exact move date set yet. First step was to decide to move for sure. Now it’s a matter of me finding a job and then getting things settled while Renee finishes her degree. Then in December she and Sydney will meet me in St. Louis.

Wish us luck!

(The photo of St. Louis skyline is from www.cityinsights.com. Check it out if you want to learn more about a city make travel arrangements to get there.)

Being a parent, I think my daughter is cute and smart, call me biased.

All kids can’t have Bradjalina looks. Are all babies considered cute, or are people just being nice? That question struck me when a piece by CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman tried to explain the bias with his son George.

Watch the video here

It’s hard to say what empirical evidence we judge a “cute” baby. Our readers were incredibly fervent during the Register’s “My Incredibly Cute Baby” contest…with over 2,200 entries this year. See what baby won this year’s contest, and the 189 pages of runner ups.

It’s not that I never cry. I’m not one of those guys who’s afraid to — who thinks it’s somehow less than manly to let heavy emotions show.

But lately, quick as a snap of the fingers, I can turn into such a blubbering, barely-holding-it-back wreck, you’d think I was the pregnant one. Maybe they’re sympathy tears.

• Whenever I used to see babies born on television — on one of those TLC programs, I mean, not Grey’s Anatomy or the like — I used to get slightly repulsed. Now I well up.

• When, via a 3D/4D ultrasound at Before the Stork in Anaheim Hills (read more about that experience here), I finally saw Sam’s small, pouting face for the first time … and I could instantly recognize some of my own features emerging from the golden alien blob I was witnessing … I couldn’t control the tears no matter how much I tried.

• Whenever I see my mom’s bottom lip start to quiver when it hits her how soon she’s gonna be a grandma … well, you’d think I’d steel up and be strong for her. But instead I get knots in my stomach that tell me it’s gonna be hard not to collapse into a heap in front of my family once Labor Day arrives.

• Whenever I’m busy writing and Roxanne is watching Jon and Kate Plus 8, and I look up to see one of those cute kids bawling about who-knows-what, I notice I sometimes get choked up a little. How on earth will I cope with a crying baby?

• And whenever I think about something going wrong … something happening to him … something I can’t stop or control or make better … well, I just can’t go there.

Tricky news, people:

My wife - a spectacularly beautiful, smart, sweet-hearted woman; a woman I love and respect and, yes, (I’m man enough to admit this), a woman I sometimes fear - has learned about my secret:

This blog.

The rat was one of her college roomies. She called to tell my wife that she’d read something in this blog. I wasn’t there for the conversation but, knowing the woman I’ve been married to since dinosaurs roamed the - well, awhile - I’m guessing my wife didn’t let on that my blog was news to her.

The truth is I didn’t hide this blog from my wife. At least, not on purpose. See, she has a blog too. It’s about our family. And it’s done almost entirely to let other family members check out whatever is happening in our lives. It’s like a really long Christmas card, with room for commentary.

At least, I think that’s what she blogs about. I don’t know, technically, because, technically, I don’t read it.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ok, there’s nothing worse than the boring couple at the dinner party, gushing on and on about their darling angels, described as God’s gift to civilization but who, in reality, are probably just as smelly, whiny and dirty as mine as the end of a long summer day.

And then they bring out the photos. Flash to Ricky and Lucy and Charlie and Caroline Appleby.

Fortunately for me, I have a blog, and so I get to gush about my darling angels in public. And, unlike at the dinner party, when you tune out, I’ll never know.

Of course, when I bring out the photos, it’s more than a paean to my kids — it’s also a celebration of a) my wife’s super photography skills and b) me, for being the genius who bought her the wonderful new digital camera for her birthday (yes, I did get her an iron for Mother’s Day, but sometimes I do get it right).

Click on a photo below to get a bigger version.

For the camera folks out there, these shots were all shot with my wife’s new Canon Powershot, SX100. At first, she thought the camera was too bulky (it is hard to slip into a pocket) but she’s decided the image quality and zoom abilities are worth it. And she likes that she can shoot video on it, too. Here’s an online review on the camera.

“The Talk” — that most dreaded of conversations with any teen. It’s every parent’s nightmare and every teen’s agony.

I remember my talk with my dad. He sat sternly in his chair, glared, cleared his throat, then uttered the words every high schooler fears: “So, what are you going to do after you graduate? What about college? Where do you think you might wanna go? What do you think you might wanna study?”

And there it was.

My free-wheeling, unmapped future was now in need of direction and purpose. And, as my dad waited for my answer, I struggled to come up with a suitable response to this ambush.

“Uh-huh, well … I don’t know. I guess so. Sure. Yeah,” was all I could muster.

Dad, a guy who demanded literate, intelligent responses to all of his inquiries, sat motionless, staring.

“Have you even thought about going to college?” he inquired.

“Yep,” was my little-white-lie reply to his cross-examination.

The next 15 minutes where a blur as my mind whirled and I struggled to dodge questions about what I wanted to do with my life beyond the next weekend.

Fast forward some three decades, a marriage and two children later, to when I found myself in my father’s role last weekend.

Read the rest of this entry »

Today is the first day of Sydney’s swim lessons. Will she sink like a rock or swim like a fish? If any past experience with water is a guide, she’ll swim like a fish. Our previous apartment had a pool, and she enjoyed playing and splashing in the water. On a trip to Palm Springs last summer, pictured right, she was excited about the water, quickly adjusted to the crowded pool and didn’t want to leave. Granted she was five months old then and didn’t have the diva attitude she does now.

I don’t know of a kid who doesn’t like to spend a day in the pool. Renee must have been part mermaid as a child, because her parents always had to fight with her to get out of the pool when it was time to leave. Hopefully some of those genes got passed along to Syd.

Wish us luck.

For no apparent reason — other than, you know, I’m about to be a dad — I got to thinking the other night about great baby songs.

How charming Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely” is, for instance, though I can rarely sit through the full version of it, when for several minutes we hear Stevie’s baby girl Aisha laughing and splashing around the bathtub. Glad they never play that part on K-EARTH.

“You Are My Sunshine” — that’s a given. The Supremes’ “Baby Love” — seems logical, but actually a terrible baby song, if you ask me.

But how ’bout the way people adapt love songs as hymns for their kiddies?

Frankie Valli’s “Can’t Take My Eyes Off of You” is a common one (must be all those boisterous “I love you, baby!” choruses), and reading Suzanne Broughton’s post about her daughter’s birthday on the Mom Blog made me realize just how many parents prefer Elton John’s timeless “Your Song.” Although Garth Brooks‘ rendition of Dylan’s “To Make You Feel My Love,” as one commenter suggested — OK, that one mostly works, and I sing the Carpenters‘ “Close to You” to my boy, so who am I to judge? But there’s something about a few of those lines that conveys so much passion … I dunno … I might have a hard time singing it to a baby.

Ultimately, the more I pondered it, the more I kept coming back to the most obvious — the most sheerly moving, the most lullaby perfect — of all baby songs: “Baby Mine.”

Originally from Walt Disney’s Dumbo – which, if you can get through without crying, indicates that you have a heart of stone — the song has been covered and covered and covered. And not just by the folks you know — Bette Midler, whose take is the epitome of motherly, or Alison Krauss, angelic as ever, or my fave choice, Bonnie Raitt’s gently soulful take, which strolls out like a lazy afternoon in a rocking chair.

Search the song on YouTube, however, and you’ll find scores of montages set to it. Which kinda makes me hate “Baby Mine” a little. But then I watched the above clip, with the Divine Miss M singing so tenderly … and I started to feel my eyes well up all over again.

I’m gonna be such a bawling mess once Sam actually gets here.