Week 59: Pumpkin Hill Gov'ner

Happy Halloween!! Today's featured car is a limited edition Hot Wheels from last Halloween which I have saved, well.. for a year. Eh, packaging is overrated.

Halloween is one of my favorite times of the year, but is also a yardstick time I use to remind myself to keep tabs on my burgeoning stodginess.

Many years ago I tended to overdo Halloween with costumes and decorations, but for the past few years those Halloween decorations have seemed more inaccessible (the attic crawl space? I need a LADDER!!) and the work for a Halloween costume more work work, compared to fun work. I didn't even get one invite to a Halloween party this year.

Yet down deep I still miss the hoopla of Halloween, which is why having kids dressing up is great. Even if I don't get around to a costume, there is still the spooky pageantry for the kids.

This year, Baby G was a vampire, and Racer A was a ninja type guy. Baby G added a bit of of warrior attitude to his dark prince getup, but I believe that is because he thought he was a vampower. I didn't have the heart to correct him. Either way, both kids did a bit of method acting and stayed in character (see below).

The above costumes were pre-assembled, but Racer Z had a custom costume that was a group effort, with my wife doing most of the work.

His costume was Finn the Human from the cartoon Adventure Time with Finn and Jake, a bonding time cartoon for all the boys (myself included) in the family as we all love it. My wife doesn't quite get into Adventure Time like we all do, but she is soundly outnumbered.

Adventure Time, Come On Grab Your Friends...

We even matched the colors on Finn's backpack (which unfortunately doesn't show in the above pic).

So looking at these pics, I realize I have a few days before October 31, plenty of time to cobble together a costume for myself. I can be stodgy next year, but for this year,

Happy Halloween from Daddy's Tiny Cars!!!


Halloween car picture courtesy of Phil Pekarcik. Thanks, Gov'ner.

Week 58: Infinity G37 Coupe

My four year old son, affectionately known on this blog as Racer A, recently started with the county's Head Start pre-school program, but classes are a few towns over so it means driving 20 minutes to get him to the bus. 

That short ride gives us time to talk about important things, like today:

ME: You know what? I'm glad deer don't drive cars. I don't think they would be good drivers.

RACER A: (Unphased by comment) Uh-huh, I don't think so either. I'm glad deer don't drive too.


(We drive a minute or two in silence.)

ME: You know what else? I'm glad squirrels don't drive. I would have a difficult time seeing their tiny cars.

RACER A: I'm glad squirrels don't drive, too, but they could drive big cars, you know.

ME: True, but they would probably need tiny seats in their big cars.

RACER A:  Yes. Hey, you know what I'm glad of? I'm glad cats don't drive cars.

ME: Me too. I would never know what the cars would do next if cats were driving. They might suddenly turn left, and then spin around or something.

RACER A:  How do you think dogs would drive?

ME: I'm not certain. They might goof around a lot, go slow, then fast, and they might play chase in cars.

RACER A: That would not be good.

ME: No, definitely not.

(We ride again in silence.)

ME: You know what I'm really glad about?

RACER A:  What?

ME: That fish don't drive cars.

RACER A:  Me too. How would they do that?

ME: They'd have to fill their cars with water.

RACER A:  Maybe they would drive in their fishbowl.

ME: You mean a fishbowl with wheels?

RACER A:  No, I mean their fishbowl would sit on the seat, with a seatbelt around it.

ME: But how would they reach the steering wheel? They'd need to hang out of the top.

RACER A:  Yup. But wait!! How would they reach those...um, those things you push down on the bottom?

ME: The gas and break petals?

RACER A:  Yes.

ME: I don't know. They would need someone to help. Maybe a lizard.

RACER A:  Yes, or maybe a sheep, but the sheep would hop over the fish, but only once, and then settle down. No, wait, maybe a frog can help.

ME: A frog would be a good helper.

RACER A:  Or a cat.

ME: No, the cat would eat the fish. Or at least tease it.

(We pass a transport truck hauling new cars.)

ME: Look at that that!

RACER A:  COOL!

What kind of animal would drive that?

RACER A:  Maybe a cow?

ME: Maybe, or maybe a horse. Horses are used to hauling things.

RACER A:  Yes, that's it. A horse would be perfect. (He adds a slight pause between "per" and "fect.")

ME: I think a horse might be a good driver.

RACER A:  Oh yes. A horse would definitely be a good driver.

(We approach the drop off spot).

ME: What if we get there and your bus is being driven by an animal, like a moose or something, although I guess a moose would have a hard time fitting its antlers through the bus door.

RACER A:  The bus driver would probably be a goat.

ME: Yes, a goat would fit better.

RACER A:  Wait a second. Animals don't drive cars. Only grownups. And teenagers. How do teenagers drive cars?

ME: Kind of like cats.






Photo of Matchbox Infinity G37 and red sky of impending doom courtesy of Phil Pekarcik, perhaps inspired by Week 57's dark tone.

Speaking of which, I considered whether or not to publish Week 57 as I try to keep this blog light, but Daddy's Tiny Cars is after all a time capsule diary that would be incomplete if I didn't express elements from my real life, including the downs. I don't mean giving every rough detail, but rather capturing essences of the week. I hope you all understand

Now I must go. There appears to be a fruit fly swimming in my wine.

Week 57: 1954 Jaguar XK120 SE

Today's Daddy's Tiny Car is a return to the initial concept of the blog -- an affordable fantasy removed from concerns of reality and practicality, because, while a lot can happen in the blink of an eye, I'm thinking a real '54 Jaguar probably isn't likely to show up in the near future no matter how many times I work those eyelids.

Not that other things haven't occurred between blinks this week -- I blink, ill placed words split my foundation sending emotional tsunamis roaring over my shores, blink again, my middle son is running a fever of 103 (he is fine now), and blink yet again and I'm on the phone listening to the tinkling sound of stress fractures  spiderwebbing cracks throughout the emotional wellbeing of a friend and hoping he's equipped with safety glass, because that window glass of the soul is shattering.

This week was enough to make me want to keep my eyes shut and let the world blink without me for awhile.

But the challenge and beauty of having children is of course you need to keep your eyes open, because if you don't, you'll open them to find the kids standing on the kitchen table flinging oatmeal at the ceiling fan.

So I've kept my eyes open, taken care of business (even if I did skimp on yard work), read stories to the kids, cooked dinners, and overall bucked up.

Nonetheless, in the deep dark when I can't tell if my eyes are open or not, I'm taking a few moments to visualize  this wonderful Jaguar (said to have been the world's fastest standard production car at the time it was launched) while listening to ELO and smelling the comforting odor of a strange-scented candle in the other room (is it Fresh Bamboo?) -- a sensory concoction that might not do much for anyone else, but is custom built by me to recharge my battery and prepare me for a new day of blinking.

Come morning, my eyes and I will be ready.

Photo courtesy of Phil Pekarcik.

Week 56: Mystery Car: Hemi Cuda

My eyes have become fussy four year olds at dinnertime.

TOO CLOSE, I can't See! That's TOO FAR, it's Blurry!! I kinda see that, but my right eye doesn't like it, only my left eye! I can't read that!! I want something larger!!

The Kraft macaroni and cheese to my fussy eyes is my progressive lens eyeglasses,  trifocal lens meant to keep all my failing ranges of vision happy, even if it means flipping my eyes around like a kid's fingers on an X-Box controller in order to see, or, as is more often the case, tilting my head like a curious dog in order to read the sign to the men's room.

Trifocals are an amazing gift to diminishing vision, when they can be found.

Even with how great they are, I still take them off to read, as I did yesterday to read Racer A and Baby G a picture book about Jamaica.

The problem was, I neglected to put them back on.

And Baby G found them. And toddled off with them.

Losing your eyeglasses is a singular aggravation unlike other irritating circumstances. You can't see well enough to see them again, some type of anti-zen koan, and even though you take those glasses for granted every second of the day, once they are gone, you feel like some rogue suddenly sneaked in and stole your teeth, they are that much a part of you.

My glasses were gone. I looked and looked and looked. Gone.

Finally, there was no other choice.

I had to look under the couch.

Today's Daddy's Tiny Cars is a 2011 Mystery Car, one of the cars you pick that is encased in a black blisterpack that hides the vehicle. The car turned out to be a most awesome Hemi Cuda. Mystery Car is significant, because with three kids in the house, looking under the couch is a mystery, and not something anyone takes lightly. There be monsters.

The first thing I encountered under the couch was some type of raisin. Without the benefit of trifocal technology I wasn't sure what was going on, but this raisin seemed wrong, a distorted dried fruit dweller of the underworld.

That raisin was a warning.

I kept going, looking for a familiar outline of eyeglasses, but the more I looked, the more I found the forgotten oddities of the toddler world -- Cheerios, fruit rinds, Lego people assembled with arms for heads, sparkly stickers on anything and everything, a surreal landscape of crunchy, textural filth art.

How does this stuff get under there? Why? How? My god, how afraid my eyeglasses must be.

But they were never found.

I went a whole day using a spare pair of glasses, ones with a single focus. I felt seasick most of the day, but at least there was at least one distance when everything was crystal clear, regardless of how I moved my head or eyes. Now if I could just get everything to stand there, I would be fine.

My trifocals did show up today, sitting peacefully on a toybox. At the time of this writing I have yet to put them on as it has taken a day to adjust to the single focus lens, but the relief of finding them is immense.

I may have my glasses, but I won't use them to look under the couch.

There are some things that are best left to the shadows and blurriness.

Photo of awesome Cuda by Phil Pekarcik.