Merry Christmas

Here's some old Christmas photos I came across while going through photo albums at my mom and dad's for the last few weeks.

30 years ago I looked good.



Yes that's a Sit-n-Spin. Eff you cheesecakehor. Also I apparently got a shark which I have been saving for Hor-K-Seriously


I had a Fisher Price House and awesome bedhead in '73.


Here's one of me and my 2 older brothers. Apparently haircuts were optional in '73.

Nothing I write could do this justice

Maybe a blog isn't the best place for this but it's what I have and I've been wanting to write this for awhile. A month ago today I turned 35 and without a doubt it was the worst birthday of my life. It was a Friday, it was unseasonably warm, and as I remember it was a really nice day which is unusual for my birthday. Unfortunately on my 35th birthday I hugged my dad for the last time. For the first time ever he didn't hug me back and it was the worst feeling in the world.

My dad died November 8th while driving with my mom to a meeting at the church and on my birthday we were at the funeral home planning the service. I got to see my dad and hug him one last time and in that instant I was 7 years old again. That's the last time I would get to see him. I know it's cliche' but he really was the greatest man I ever met. He was humble but confident, gentle but strong, uneducated but brilliant. There are so many things I could say about my dad and I know what I write here won't do him justice but I need to put it in writing for therapeutic reasons. I also wanted to write it down somewhere so that I can look back at it when I need to.

Here's what I will miss the most.

• My parents have lived in the same house since I was 4 years old. As long as I can remember, I could show up there anytime anyday and my dad would be sitting at the kitchen table reading. I want him to be there now so badly it really makes me physically ill when I allow myself to understand that he will never be there again.
• I got my dad his first computer 5 years ago. Since that day he's never ceased to amaze me with his ability to use it. He burned CD's, scanned all of our family photos, completed an electonic version of our family tree back 4 or 5 generations before him and figured out and understood things even I didn't know. But why this one hurts so bad is that practically every day I talked to him on AOL instant messenger. When I allow myself to understand that he will never be on the other end of that chat window, it makes me physically sick with grief.
• His love of my mom
• His love of my brothers and me and our families
  
• His love of his grandchildren
• His love of our extended family and friends
  
• His love of music

If you knew my dad you would've loved him. He was funny, sincere honest and good. So many people owed him so much, not in money but in ways that can never be calculated. He and my mom provided a home for someone other than me and my 2 brothers for their first 25 years of marriage. They spent their first 25 years of marriage fully supporting somebody other than their own children!

He and his mom built the first house they actually owned from the time he was 13 until he was 15. He worked during that same period of time as a laborer for a brick mason. He supported his mom and siblings because his dad was too sick to do it and eventually became a gifted bricklayer whose work is still viewable practically everywhere you look in my hometown.

He sent me to college knowing we couldn't afford it but knowing he couldn't afford not to. He couldn't pay for it all but he paid enough to get me where I needed him to.

My dad wasn't without faults, but he was aware of those faults and spent a lifetime trying to overcome them and to help his sons learn from his mistakes. He was proud of all 3 of us and his legacy lives on through us. You may not have been fortunate enough to know my dad but if you know me, you know what he stood for.

Fortunately or unfortunately my dad had to face his mortality in the last few years in dealing with cancer, congestive heart failure(CHF) and the problems that arose from those things. He knew that he was kind of on borrowed time and that knowledge allowed him to open up in the last few years more than all the years before. I was fortunate that all of our chats ended with each telling the other we loved them and we said it every time we saw each other. I'd hate to have to deal with not having said I loved him on top of the unbearable grief of missing him. In the end he beat cancer, and he managed the CHF but the complications of those were more than his body could handle and man could it handle a lot. I know he was in pain and in some really miniscule way it makes it a little easier for me to know that he doesn't have to be in pain anymore.

I love you dad, I miss you more than you can possibly imagine. I hope I manage to do everything you ever thought I could or hoped I would and that I make you proud doing it.

-Jake

BFHX DAY BIRTH

Happy Birthday OKSS

I woke up this morning in a bathtub full of ice. A note in my hand read "look in the mirror." There, written backwards on my chest but now forward and readable in the mirror, were these words written in red lipstick "Douchebag, you got really wasted and we had to remove your liver to save it. Just kidding, ass." Holy crap honestly I couldn't even remember where my blog was. Maybe it was hanging out with my liver in a tub of ice. I'm not going to lie to you guys, I had a few gin and tonics saturday night at Sarah's birthday party and, well, they done me wrong. They treated me shitty. In short I got jobbed. What I did not do was puke. What I did do is drive a carload of people home at least 50% of which puked. Dammit that was a great party.

This is me in the women's restroom. This is normal for me when I'm donning a sweet sweet 70's porn 'stache.



This is me and horface trying to reproduce the profile shot but at the bar. My wife is in the back there looking pretty hot but making a weird cheese smile face and trying to sabotage my profile shot.


Today I should be hanging out all creepylike in the women's restroom or I should be a pizza delivery guy delivering a pizza "with sausage" to a bachelorette party and some awesome bow chikka bow bow music.

Highlights of the day:

• Sarah being asked by her friends who've never met me "who is that guy with the mustache" and for real telling them "I have no idea."
• Danielle inviting me to the ladies room for a photoshoot and spinoff party.
• And the following conversation
  

Sharda: "where are we now?"
Danielle: "2 minutes from your house"
Sharda: "oh ok good"
John drives for 20 min
Sharda: "where are we now?"
Danielle: "2 minutes from your house"
Sharda: "oh ok good"

BFHX DAY 4

BFHX DAY 4 really didn't leave many options and so I thought it might be a letdown. That is until I remembered I had an offsite today with my entire division. That in and of itself would have been enough to keep OKS laughing but then the most amazing thing ever happened. See the lone highlight of the day below to find out what happened.



The profile shot basically yesterday without the L's on the sides and with a much crazier look from Cheesecakehor.



Today I should be gay or marking people off my "list of people I've wronged" while I try to get Karma back on my side.

Highlights of the day:

• While waiting for the elevator to leave the building to go meet Sarah for lunch, Danielle and I decided to try to avoid the crowd and use the executive elevators. Karma must have been on my side because the CEO, CFO, CIO et al were in the elevator we chose. I asked the CEO if the elevator was going down and then I asked him if it would even take us to the first floor. He said it might but the only way to know was if we got in and pushed the button for the 1st floor, if the light for 1 wouldn't stay lit to get the H out because it was going to take us back up. So we got out because it didn't stay lit and then I said "seems like it should take us down, we know insert_CEO_Name_Here" to which he replies the totally awesome "I AM insert_CEO_Name_Here and it doesn't work for me either"

Goddammit this couldn't have happened on a better day.

Tonight is OKSS's party. Tomorrow is the end. It was fun.