Grill

Every summer, Diana’s store holds a “Pink Wine and Swine” event, which features chicken and piping hot coffee. Nope. Strike that. They serve Rose and pork. In order to make the whole thing profitable, they team up with a local butcher and cook the Babe’s and Porky’s on site.

Which means we have to haul our grill from our yard to the store. Getting the thing into our car is an amazingly messy pain in the butt. The manufacturers also did us the favor of making all the edges of the grill razor sharp. Last year, we snapped off one of the wheels dragging it across the parking lot. It’s one of the three times a year Diana and I fight.

This year, as we were swearing and smearing a year’s worth of grill juice on our pants, Diana suggested we just leave the old junky grill at the store and I go buy a new grill. My frustration outweighed my frugality, so I agreed.

Elijah, sensing I was about to spend a lot of money, appeared out of nowhere and asked to tag along to the hardware store.

We went to the big old orange building and found ourselves in front of the gleaming fire makers. I was immediately at a loss for which one to buy. My plan was just to get the third most expensive one. Eli simply wanted one with a little side burner. “You know, so you don’t have to go all the way inside to make baked beans.”

Seemed like a reasonable request for an item we make 1.5 times a year.

Eventually, we flagged down a worker guy and asked if he knew anything about grills. “Sure, why not?” he said. He told us that the third most expensive one was a real disaster and if we wanted to have perfectly cooked food we should go with the second most expensive one. Oh, and look. It had a little side burner. Eli nodded so hard I thought his head was going to fly off into the lighting fixtures section.

Fine. I asked if they had any already built or if they could come set it up today.

“Well, we could get out to your house in 2075. Or we can just give you a box with a billion pieces in it and you put it together.”

“How long does something like this take to put together?” I asked.

“It takes our guys about fifteen minutes.”

That sounded easy enough. I made Eli promise to help me put it together. For bonding purposes. Eyeing the little side burner, he said, “Yeah yeah, bonding.”

We got the giant grill box home and I spread out the billion pieces on our deck. After 15 minutes of intense building, I realized I was roughly 1/928547567^th of the way done. Eli backed away and said, “I feel like this is one of those times when you might yell at me and I think it’s best if I leave you alone.”

“Yes. You are correct.”

Just then, Diana’s Dad, Stepmom and sister from France arrived. Oh yeah, did I mention the grill was supposed to be done for dinner with Diana’s Dad, Stepmom, and sister from France? They kept handing me white wine and saying, “Yay Rick!”

The encouragement was helpful. The white wine was not.

As the sun set, I finished my project and connected the propane. With a click and a tick it whooshed to life and we had delicious burgers a half hour later.

Come on. How many of you were thinking I was never going to get the thing together? How many of you were thinking I was going to set myself on fire? Shame on you.

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Ball Foul

In the weeks leading up to Father’s Day, Luca and I would be watching a Cubs game and he’d say, “Dad. I wish I could tell you what we got you for Father’s Day.” Or we’d be talking about the Cubs and he’d say, “By the way, your Father’s Day present is sooo great.” Or he’d be wearing a Cubs shirt and he’d say, “My shirt sure wants to tell you something about Father’s Day.”

They got me Cubs tickets.

The morning of the game, we all put on our favorite Cubs stuff and headed down to Wrigley. Our seats were fantastic, right behind the dugout. Which is what happens when Diana is put in charge of tickets. We were close enough that the players could hear Luca shrieking out their names. We had to do that thing where you need to duck when you are going up the aisle to get food or else people will yell at you.

After we had hot dogs and I had a bottle of water to see if baseball is enjoyable without beer (it isn’t), the Cubs players all headed to the dugout for last minute coaching and chewing tobacco application. A few of them started throwing baseballs into the stands. Souvenirs for happy kids, attractive people and people drunk enough to elbow out happy kids and attractive people.

Suddenly, a Cub locked eyes with Diana, who was aggressively pointing at Elijah and Luca. Her expression said, “Come on. Look at these kids. They’re genetically engineered for cuteness. If you give them a ball, their heads may literally explode like the movie “Scanners.”

The player, whose name Luca has told me no less than 7 times, will hereby be known as Carl Yastrzemski, 1980’s left fielder and Simpsons reference.

Carl threw a ball right at Diana. No one else could be the target. Mr. Yastrzemski’s form was perfect and hit Diana’s outstretched hand with pinpoint accuracy. Carl threw it so Diana didn’t even have to rise from her seat to catch the ball.

The ball careened off her hand and into the stands three rows behind us.

Now, before we all start making fun of Diana’s terrible catch, remember she is technically blind in one eye. And she was holding a Pepsi in her other hand. Plus, her catching hand is made from concrete.

The boys were apoplectic. “How you could miss that? That was for us! You blew it! How hard is it to catch a ball?” Diana and I decided maybe beers weren’t such a bad idea after all. In order to restore peace, Diana promised to buy Eli and Luca a jersey from the Cubs store.

The game itself was awesome and the Cubs won simply because we were in attendance. Our day ended with Luca and Eli being invited to run the bases by a generous usher.

Later, when we brought the jerseys to the cashier, the price caused Diana to make that rare sound of someone swearing and laughing at the same time.

"I Call The Big One ‘Bitey’"

Remember our newest HamannEgg, Trouper? The white fluffy mutt we got from my brother? It’s been a rough couple months for the little guy. First off, he spent a week ejecting the most horrifying sludge ever to see the inside of a dog after we made the mistake of feeding him some Grover food. The stuff’s intensity of smell was only matched by its viscosity.  

Secondly, we’ve found that Trouper has a little bit of a rage issue. I don’t think he was prepared for living with a giant black food competitor and two screaming children. Plus Elijah and Luca (rim shot).

If Trouper thinks he’s about to get stepped on or thinks you’re going to eat his food or thinks you’re looking at him side eyed, he’ll hiss like a cat and lunge at your feet. This move turned our neighbor Paul into a tap dancer the likes of which would make Gregory Hines jealous.

Trouper has officially bitten every member of our family except me. What’s this scar on my foot? Oh, I got that running into a wall. I deserved it. Actually, he did nip me early in our relationship, but I put such a fear of God into him that I can now carry him around like a little baby, to which Diana says, “He’s going to bite your face off.” And then I reply, “You’re still legally obligated to love my face scars.”

But the family enemy number one is Eli. I don’t know what it is about that kid. Trouper HATES him. Any time Eli walks near Trouper or speaks to Trouper or thinks about Trouper, the dog bites him. Thankfully, he’s never really broken the skin. But it still sucks to live in fear of a little sharp tooth-ed fluff ball every day. Trouper trapped Eli in our pantry the other day for the offense of eating a turkey sandwich.

This hasn’t helped Diana and Trouper’s relationship. Aside from getting bitten herself, she has the prerequisite motherly instinct to protect her young. I just say things like, “You gotta just dominate him!” Luca says helpful things like, “I love getting bitten by Trouper.”

Luckily for us, our contractor is in the market for a dog and he has a great kid who loves animals. We think the combination of less people and less dogs will be better for Trouper. We are going to officially hand him off next week for a trail run. If it doesn’t work out, we’ll take him back and buy Eli some steel toed boots.