You'd Think I'd Have Learned

Some things never change. Other things don't change even though we wish they would. Today's missive falls under the category of the latter.

Since Mom and I are both home during the afternoons, we've had to become accustomed to each other's habits. Me, I like keeping to myself. I'll run errands in the morning, but when it's afternoon, I want to sit my fat ass down and apply for jobs, fuck around on the Internet, watch TV, read, and write. It's me time.

Mom's version of me time consists of watching TV on the big screen in the living room. And while she is more than entitled to do so, it becomes somewhat inconvenient because Mom's hearing ain't what it used to be. So she watches TV loudly. Really loudly.

Which is fine if she's watching Mystery Diagnosis or Little People, Big World or afternoon baseball.

Not so much if it's A Baby Story.

The other day, I heard screams coming from that TV the likes of which I'd never heard before. And, like an idiot, I went out to see what all the ruckus was about. So I opened the door of my room, turned left, and stared directly at the largest TV in my house.

And what did I see? Why, a baby crowning, of course!

Naturally, I ran screaming back into my room, which my mother just couldn't understand. Quoth her, "You're going to see that eventually someday!" Exactly, Mom. Someday. When it's my wife, and my own flesh and blood protruding from her loins. Not some crazed stranger who consented to be on TV, and an unwilling newborn half-hanging out of her mercifully pixelated cooch.

All of which confirmed for me that it's best if we leave each other be in the afternoons. That is, until this afternoon, as I was playing poker on my BlackBerry and getting my ass handed to me. In my frustration, I naturally swore a few times and got the rage out of me, but my mother overheard me and asked me what was wrong. I told her she'd laugh if I explained, but she insisted, so I again left my room to go tell her.

And after I told the story, what was the first thing I heard from the TV? "This will involve dilating her cervix so that the doctor can use this needle to puncture the amniotic sac and break her water."

GAH!

All of which has me convinced that when it is my wife, and it is my flesh and blood entering the world, the first thing Daddy's gonna do is hire someone else to work the video camera.