I've got a super new weight-loss plan! I should write a book and make a million bucks! It's this simple: have a miserable toothache for a couple weeks, and watch the pounds melt off!

Despite three trips to the dentist, I have a tooth that is extra sensitive to the following:

Cold

Hot

Sweet

Pressure

Breathing

Fog

Games of chance

Conversation

Reality TV 

 Anyway, my two greatest weeknesses (for those plotting my eventual downfall) are Oreos and Mountain Dew. It's entirely possible that those are the cause of both my toothache and the extra couple pounds I picked up over the last few months. But with my new Dr. Brucey's Toothache Diet, my secret, un-natural urges to chew or eat anything have completely disappeared, and so has that man-muffin-top!

In fact, you know what sounds good right now? Some room temperature mashed-potatoes, and a small glass of lukewarm water! But not too much!

Try it, you'll see!

My wife Lisa cooks and I wash the dishes. I know I got the better end of this deal, but don't tell her that!

One thing that's made dishwashing especially nice is the constant parade of hummingbirds right outside our kitchen window. I put a feeder out there for them and make my own hummingbird food (1 cup sugar, 4 cups water, boil.). Hey, I guess I do cook something!

It's been a great spring for hummingbirds around here, and we have several different kinds.

I taped a little stick on the bottom of the feeder, which gives them a place to stop and rest for a minute! It's fun to see them fly while they eat, but they seem to stay longer with the stick to stand on!

Maybe there's a little lesson there! We all just need a stick to stand on and a little sugar water!

It kinda-sorta sounded like a good idea. We tried to go all day Sunday without any computers, ipods or other similar electronics.

8:00am The kids cover everything electric, including light switches, the microwave and the refrigerator with "violation" notices. We like that they were get into the spirit of the thing, but explain that we weren't becoming Amish, growing beards or putting on bonnets.

10:00 Jackson and I wash the cars. No electronics needed. Then I caught him reading a book!

1:00 Lauren and I went ice skating. Everybody happy so far, and the world hasn't ended.

6:30 After dinner. the complaining starts. "I'm bored. This is dumb."

8:00 The screaming begins. "You're ruining my life!  My friends now think you're weird! Are you happy now?"

8:30 Screaming at full-throttle. Lisa is the first to cave. "Should we let her watch her iPod before bed?"

8:45 I cave. The screaming ends. Life returns to normal.

Okay, so we didn't make it, but I think we all learned a valuable lesson that day. That Lisa and I have no backbone!

I'm not quite sure how to use my cel-phone for anything other than calling someone. I don't like to brag about this sort of thing, but I've got a Pantech which cost me nearly FIFTY dollars. Yeah, I know; wow!

I was pushing away at random buttons, trying to delete this picture, (yes, it has a camera!) when it suddenly told me "Sent."

Sent? Whatthe..? Sent to whom? I frantically started stabbing more buttons, going through more menus. I was thinking through all the people in my "contacts" list, trying to guess which one had gotten this picture, with no explaination. It could have been:

My boss

My former boss

A corporate guy in our New York office

The guy we sold our yogurt store to last year

A neighbor from our old house in Indiana.

My daughter's school

And on and on. This was going to take some 'splainin!

Finally, I got to the "sent messages" menu, where I was relieved to learn that the lucky recipients of this lovely self-portrait were the good people at AT&T Customer Care.  I hope they like it! Glad I didn't try to delete any of the nudie pics!

I was washing dishes the other night, when the first housefly of spring started buzzing around my head. I reached for the first thing I could use as a swatter, which happened to be the "Watchtower" pamphlet, given to my wife by some friendly Jehovah's Witnesses at our door.

After a few noisy swats against the kitchen cupboards, my daughter, who loves animals, came in and yelled "What are you doing? No! No!"

The scene just got uglier as I jumped around the kitchen, using a religious pamphlet to try to flatten an insect into oblivion, while my 10-year-old screamed "Murderer!  Murderer!" At this point it occurred to me that this whole thing just didn't feel right. I opened the back door, and with some effort, managed to shoo the thing out to the back yard.

For those offended by the thought of trying to use the Watchtower as the instrument of death for a housefly, please note that it, instead, became the means by which the creature was shooshed out to safety.

My daughter was happy with the outcome, and I didn't mention anything to her about the many hungry birds in our yard looking for a nice, juicy insect dinner.

And if it means anything, here's the headline on the pamphlet!

My son and I went to a warehouse store yesterday and picked out the following items: two "take 'n bake" pizzas, a case of canned pineapple and one large bag of prunes. In my world, that's a shopping cart that says par-tay!

We carefully picked out our checkout lane. There's an art to this. You can't just pick the shortest line; you also have to look at how many items are in other people's carts. I'll take a long line where people only have a couple items (like us) over a shorter line with 2 carts that are loaded up like the Beverly Hillbillies truck.

However, shortly after we got in line, a "gentleman" with a hugely overstuffed cart said "excuse me" and shoved his cart right in front of us! His wife was standing in line in front of us without a cart, saving a spot for them! I'd seen her, but thought she was with the group with a cart ahead of us!

Not wanting to get into a "shopping cart rumble" in front of my impressionable teenager, I made a confused face, then just moved over to a better line.

Now, I ask you; is this fair?  Can you hold a place in line for somebody with a shopping cart? It's my position that the cart itself has to be in line in order for you to officially be "in-line."  Am I wrong on this?  Was this guy right? And do you want some prunes, pizza and pineapple?

Today was supposed to be casual friday around here, so I put on the new jeans I bought a couple weeks ago. (Not shown here! But this is the idea!) Unfortunately, I'd just washed them for the first time, and now they are way too tight!  They also lost an inch or two in length, so not only am I stuffed into tight jeans, I also have exposed ankles.

Just off the phone with my wife Lisa, who said "Yeah, right. The jeans shrunk. That's my excuse too."

"They DID," I insisted,

"Yeah, that's what every woman says; 'the jeans shrunk!'"

But in my case, it's true. And all that Mountain Dew and Oreos the last few weeks had NOTHING to do with it!