Tidy Husband

Eligible for the seniors discount and the Happy Meal deal at the same time.

  1. When the Rubber Hits the Road

    A story about rubber, and running and ice cream and moons and everything else.

    First, the behavior update: Pretty Good.

    Not 10/10 good - but about an 8 and that’s all that can be asked of her.

    Hey Dad! It looks like the moon is having a party!

    I think she realized the punishment could be worse. At dinner today we got to talking about why she has no fun days and we asked if Carson got into trouble for his part of the fiasco on Monday night and it turns out he got grounded for a week!

    And she thought her Dad was strict. She apparently hasn’t met Carson’s family.

    And I’m not sure how - but on day 2 of the supposed no fun sentence there was dessert from the supermarket that Mommy bought. Yes, not Dad. MOMMY!

    For shame, mommy!

    It seems as the rules have slackened a bit here but we’re halfway through our sentence and as long as she’s well behaved and learns to listen better we’ll call the ice cream a momentary lapse of reason.

    The plan this morning was I was to go out the door in the early hours and drive strangers to work, but the universe had other plans as I had a flat tire on the car.

    This meant I was home to make French toast for breakfast and have fun outside on the driveway with my little troublemaker before the bus showed up for school.

    Today we made videos. She thinks it was for fun but I was actually checking her stride and see if she’s any better with the walking on tippy toes thing that we can’t seem to get past:

    If you watch, she does fairly well with the heel strikes so that’s good news and when there’s shoes on her feet the toe walking is less and that’s a good thing.

    And then because we can’t NOT have fun when we get together we made another ~~movie~~ video, but this time it was ~~j~~ ust for fun:

    Boy is she fast! She loved this one!

    And before you knew it, the bus was here and we both had to start the day of no fun that both started and ended with fun for her regardless.

    I guess I’m just not cut out for law enforcement.

    Until next time,

    TH and Co.

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  2. The Secret

    At least it was. Now her reputation is ruined.

    After yesterday’s disaster, today was a piece of cake when it came to parenting.

    Maybe we should put the fear of a life without YouTube Kids into her more often

    Photo by Stefan Steinbauer on Unsplash

    She was good as gold for most of the day today and after yesterday all we can say is thank god.

    She went to school without issue. Well, she did say she didn’t feel like going to school today and that’s understandable. We all have days like that.

    When she came home from school if she wasn’t in her current status we would break a rule or two because it’s just the child and I on Tuesday nights but she’s in the doghouse and she knows it.

    She came home and played with magnetic blocks alone and then when she was done she put them away and that never, ever happens. She must know she was in trouble.

    Anyway, about the secret:

    We were on our way out to the backyard to pick up dog poo when her little friend Ethel came over and wanted to play. I told her she couldn’t because the child is grounded and being punished.

    The child overheard me say this and she burst bright red and started crying “Daddy, that was a secret”! “ She was embarrassed of her current status here and didn’t want anybody to know.

    Well…She should have thought about that when she was screaming the entire 2 block walk home yesterday when the crime happened.

    The embarrassment was short lived and then we got to the task at hand: picking up dog poo - we’re a great team as dear old Dad’s eyesight isn’t the best and hers is, so we got the backyard picked up in no time.

    I tell you, maybe we should put the fear of God (and no YouTube) into her more often as she was good as gold all day save for the minor embarrassment from her Dad.

    Get used to be embarrassed by your Dad, kid.

    Lastly, tonight was the first night of homework!

    We polished that off while she had a little snack before bed and then off to bed was so smooth it was eerie. I told her if she was good for Mommy in the mornings the rest of the week, I will take a day off for good behavior.

    One day down….

    Until next time,

    TH and Co.

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  3. No Fun Days Are No Fun

    A story about misbehaving and the consequences

    Sigh.

    As I was on my way home BW texted me that our little charge was not in charge of her emotions today and misbehaved seriously at another person’s house.

    Photo by Traci Milimo on Unsplash

    It’s one thing to misbehave at our house but to do it at another’s house that’s really, really bad.

    You see, it started as soon as she got home from school. She and her friend Carson asked for a Popsicle. This was starting to become a regular thing and it’s one thing on a nice summer day but completely different on some random schoolday.

    They then went over to Carson’s house and when it was time to go home, our perfect little child would not and had a right fit about having to go home. This fit was so bad that BW had to go and get her in the car, and even then the child refused to get in the car and walked home screaming all the way with BW driving beside her in the car.

    She gets inside and then proceeds to scream for close to an hour and would not listen at all for a good hour until I got home.

    Under normal circumstances, a mis-behave might range from some idle threat to having 3 “no fun days” as we call them here. It’s the 2025 version of being grounded.

    But, because she acted up out in the world and had to have Mommy come and get her then it’s now an automatic five days of no fun days.

    Folks, we have never had her misbehave so bad. I don’t know what’s going on.

    I think there were a few variables at play here:

    1. She was tired. It was Monday and she didn’t want to go to bed at a good time.

    1. She had an influence. I’m not saying that Carson is at fault, but I think they fed off each other because Carson’s grounded too.
    2. She’s six? Still, it’s no excuse.

    So, now we’re looking down a long week of no fun days. The no fun days are the hardest on the parent because we want to play with them and have fun, but we can’t because our child acted like a little shit.

    Instead, she gets to come home from school and entertain herself. We will feed her dinner and she can have a hug before bed but that’s about it. NO fun means no scooter and no youtube kids for however long it takes for this to get sorted.

    I raised the bar of punishment and am making her make an apology card and we are going to walk it over to Carson’s mom. Carson’s mom has her own misbehaving child and she sure as hell doesn’t need to deal with ours too.

    This did not go over well.

    “I’m” not going to do that”

    OH YES YOU ARE, I replied.

    She HATES to get embarrassed, and having to write a thank you card and then go apologize in person is pretty embarrassing. This is the real learning moment and not the fact that she’s banned from the tablet for a few days.

    It’s one thing to screw up. It’s another (and harder) to say you’re sorry. And she will be apologizing.

    Once things settled down I told her that when we are invited to somebody elses home we are to act on our best bahaviour, and I gave some examples about how when we go to other’s homes we abide by their rules. And that she’s over at Carson’s house she’s representing the entire family and she has to be polite and behave. I’m not sure how much sunk in, but I tried.

    And when Carson’s mom says it’s time to go home, YOU GO THE FUCK HOME.

    It’s going to be a loooooong week for all of us.

    Until Next Time,

    TH and Co.

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  4. Stories, Sundays and Scraped Knees

    A story about a story that makes no sense and how accidents happen.

    She skinned her knee while running to the garage to get her scooter. I blame her crocs:

    I think I found the problem.

    They are worn out because she just drags her toe to stop her scooter and after a summer of scooting, there’s not much left of these.

    Today the crocs got retired.

    Of course there were tears and fear of the Neosporin spray. And we needed a band-aid and it was a pretty good scrape - about the size of a quarter - so she has a huge bandage on her knee from the fall.

    There was a bit of concern about having a bath with the fresh injury but I told her that warm water would make it feel better and just to be sure I gave her a shot of Tylenol to keep the ouchies at bay.

    Our goal this weekend was to survive. Thursday PM, BW came down with a killer cold and didn’t get out of bed for 3 days so I was in charge and we just laid low. Today after too much video watching we decided that we should go to the park and she’s still afraid of the fireman pole and the monkey bars so I have to help.

    The park is on the edge of a creek so we found some bull rushes and played some game with them that made me the King and her the Queen. I’m not sure what the game was exactly, because she’s not the best choreographer and just gets frustrated when I am not doing exactly what’s in her head.

    the queen, before the scraped knee.

    Earlier this morning I was at the computer and she told me she wanted to write a book on a computer too. So, I grabbed an old ancient mac that takes like 20 minutes to start up and fired up google docs and let her go to town:

    quiet please. I’m writing!

    And as a tidy husband exclusive I am the first to publish this soon to be best-seller:

    hfjhfhttjhkkkkkggkou8yuy,tg9yuvkcotvhjiykh;iiuoyiykhuuuioyytrrtttuygjkfkkkggmgjjh098765432yryrydejgqujmnpmmgrh0hurfh8rhfkjkkqwweeccxzbbnjuhdyduujdueuyeyfteygyghdjdfvhydyddhd6dyfjyegfei6irg6i4rt56rtddffhfgjghfyruytufigjkfjrjfghgjinuvmbnbvbccdyheiumhrymtfuymhim8juthghbgn,vmvijdkjfirifjjukrfituygdhjfmkgggggggggjhhjmnbvccxxmm,,nm,nyyyyttqwertyiop[asdfghjkl;’zxcvbnm,./vvmo

    Momkijthhnmbitogtihnyijngipbuytubynhbnthiigut

    Daduhrtijrht5u8ommmmmmmthyhuyghrfiryguhfnfnvvbbvhhhgcvbvnnvcbnvnbcnncbvncbvnbnvbnvbcnbcnbcnbbcbcnbvnncnbbcbv1234567891011121314151617181920egyhfuehtnfgtjfhftjhdjgrrhrfhbffdfugufuhyufhjghfgjehrjthrtgthty57yfrtk89rjtrjjtfjtgjgjgjhrtf5ftyhgrrhfjgr\][puyrew qwerui5t6ryfdhtrfjythjktjkf

    teddyjcnnmcjirnnnnnnohugfknbbbhgddxsssdfhjjkhfkiomi,h8th6myr74t74t58ymt49ytryg59ypmpmy9yyjjgjfgjhthjggjjjjhdfdddfddre4weffftdr

    She calls this writing The Book of Nonsense which coincidentally explains what I write about here.:)

    If you look hard you will see the words MOM and DAD tucked in there somewhere.

    And with that we won the battle against the common cold, boredom, cooler temperatures and skinned knees complete with tears this weekend. Oh, and laundry. There’s always laundry.

    Also, I kept the dog alive.

    Simply put, I’m done with this nonsense and am very happy that BW is feeling better and school starts again in the morning.

    The knee? That’s a rite of passage for six year old. She’ll be fine.

    Until Next Time,

    TH and Co.

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  5. A Trip to the Tariff Tree

    It’s like the dollar store - but now with more expense.

    Hey, remember when you could go to the dollar store and actually buy stuff for a dollar?

    Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash | You’re going to need more and more of these.

    Yeah, me too.

    But - that was then and this is now.

    I guess we knew this was coming but now it’s real and on our doorstep. It’s not in China, it’s here - in aisle 3.

    That crap from China? The price went up. Considerably.

    Today the child and I went to the dollar store to buy something orange and something yellow for a game called coincidentally “the Cheeto challenge’.

    This game was in her head and I’m still unsure of the actual rules but she bought some orange ribbon and I had to have yellow ribbon. Back in the day this would have cost 2 bucks. Now? You have to dig deeper and find three dollars. Plus tax.

    When we got home she got to eat some Cheetos, and I still have no idea what that was all about, but it killed an hour so there’s that. Also, she got some Cheetos out of me which was the trick all along.

    Like the tariffs, she made me think that I was getting a deal when I wasn’t.

    We had to pick up a few other items but now even though you are at the dollar store: you have to pay attention to the prices. Gone are the days where you might see some crap on the shelf and toss it in the cart because it’s only a dollar. Now you have to read the prices because that thing you have in your hand could be anywhere from a little over a buck to 8 bucks or more.

    Now the dollar store is really just a messy Wal-Mart now, but smaller and with less selection. But if you need the stuff for back to school, or some band-aids or a bit of painters tape or crazy glue be careful because you ~~could~~ will be paying more than you had in the past.

    As of today, there really is no dollar store where you can pop in and pick up some cheap toothbrush or the like and that’s sad.

    I’m not sure where this extra money is coming from, so I guess we’ll have to cut back on the Cheetos.

    And that is the real challenge.

    Until next time,

    TH and Co.

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