Dudes Weekend

For years, pre-Elijah, I felt the media’s portrayal of dads was unfair and inaccurate. Sitcoms, movies and commercials (natch) make us out to be buffoons who are one step away from drying our baby’s bottoms using bathroom hand dryers.

Well, I am here to declare once and for all that these characterizations are pretty much right on the button.

Diana flew to California to attend her good friend’s wedding with her hippie crew. Originally, I thought I’d be either in Germany or stuck in my office veal fattening pen, but as it turned out this was the last weekend before my summer of insane hours. So rather than spend $10,000 booking a last second ticket, I opted to have a Dude’s Weekend with the child.

Now, I didn’t put the kid in danger or burn the house down. But from the moment Di got on the plane, I was out of my league.

The house was so filthy by Sunday that we gave up the kitchen to the raccoons and fought them off in the living room using old diapers and pizza boxes.

I realized about midday yesterday that Eli hadn’t had much water and got scared about dehydration. I bought a case of Gatorade and gave him the contents in his sippie cup, not reading the label, which states that Gatorade is about 90% sugar. I had to pry Eli off the ceiling with a broom handle.

It was only after the third consecutive hot dog meal in a row that it dawned on me hotdogs weren’t exactly well rounded. So I carted him off to my friend Chris’s BBQ, where he ate loose taco meat, extra spicy ribs and bean dip. Today, I buried his Diaper Genie in the backyard.

I decided to let Eli set his own nap hours, which was none. So by tonight’s bedtime, he was shifting back and forth between screaming with rage and swaying back and forth, zombie style.

I filled his baby pool with water yesterday, but then gave him exactly four centimeters of room while I rubbed my fat belly and listened to the ballgame. I tried for three straight hours to train Grover to fetch me a beer out of the fridge.

Eli and I made it almost all the way though the grocery store before I realized he wasn't wearing shoes. Or pants.

It’s no lie that Eli spent the whole weekend saying, “Mama? Mama? Mama?”

p.s. I’ll try my best to keep up, but blogging is gonna be rare during the summer of late hours.