I Didn’t Die From Writing a Post About a Book I’m in Called ‘But Did You Die?’

I’m just not good at some stuff.

Some stuff you know about. You know, portion control and getting my hair cut at regular intervals. Okay, and there’s that keeping-your-car-clean thing, too. I’m also not good at promoting a book that I have a small part in.

And it’s a book an author who knows her way around the New York Times best-seller list has compiled, with a ton of marquee names.

The book is But Did You Die: Setting the Parenting Bar Low, and it features names many of you know. Jen Mann of the blog People I Want to Punch in the Throat has compiled a series of New York Times Best Sellers in the series I Just Want to Pee Alone.

3+ Uncommonly Good Gifts for a Happy Father’s Day

Stormtrooper in a pickle at Brookgreen Gardens in Murrells Inlet, S.C.

I just wanted them to pretend.

Kids are busy, though. There are church camps and chicken fajitas with friends in restaurants way past the dinner rush. There’s a whole day spent with a friend from school, laying out at the pool and baking chocolate chip cookies.

Kids my kids’ age don’t have time to pretend anymore.

So I will. My friends at Uncommon Goods have the coolest stuff you could possibly get your dad (outside of one of those sweet Rockies jerseys.) Uncommon Goods has some uncommon traits going for them as a company, too, in an effort for sustainability.

Go Ask (Someone Else’s) Daddy About Childhood Aspirations, Returns from Blog Vacations and How to Make a Bit of Sense of the Wacked-out Universe We Live in

The kids get a break this week.

Courtney of Baking in my Bathing Suit suggested I extend an invitation to the grown-up world for Go Ask Daddy. A handful of readers submitted questions, so there was enough to set the girls’ questions back on the shelf for today.

Mimi of Messy Mimi’s Meanderings asked me to tell the story of when I broke big-league news at a small-town paper.

I covered racing for the Hickory (N.C.) Daily Record. It was my second job out of college. A racing writer at a tiny paper doesn’t make enough to pay country club dues. Hell, it barely pays enough to buy a club sandwich. In the country.

Guest Post: Rebecca of Ninja Librarian, on How to Get Kids Outside

One of my players will study in college to become a librarian.

I think it’s quite cool. She’s a studious sort, who found herself determined to try out for soccer in high school – and make it. She did just that and even scored a few goals along the way. She was inspirational to her teammates and to me.

Today’s guest writer is a librarian – but a ninja variety.

Rebecca writes the blog The Ninja Librarian. She’s the coolest librarian you’ll ever know. (Even cooler than that dreamy one at the Mint Hill Library.) Rebecca writes about writing, and of course reviews books for kids and adults.

Dear News: I Used to Think That We Were Forever Ever

Dear News,

Hi. It’s me. Eli. How’ve you been? Yeah, I noticed you. No, I wasn’t trying to avoid you. I was … hey, we can be honest, right? Yeah, I was ducking you. It’s just … it’s just that I’m happy, you know? No, I haven’t gotten a raise, and I haven’t really replaced you.

I mean, I’m doing things, mingling.

That space you once occupied in my life? It doesn’t really exist anymore. I can’t say that I’ve replaced you, one for one. My life is different right now. It doesn’t involve trying to get the most of you, or understanding you, or making a case for or against you.

5 Blog Post I’d Recommend You Read

I gave blood on Sunday.

Not a big deal. I love that I can. I’m O positive and have some special particles or sorcery in my blood that makes it good to give babies. Who doesn’t want to give good stuff to babies? I’d rather give baby crackers or baby nunchucks than my blood, but …

If they need it, I’m glad mine is compatible.

I watched my blood – which looks not surprisingly like barbecue sauce, in those little bags – go out of my arm, and clear saline solution flow in. I do something called double red cell donations, so they take the red stuff out and wash me out with the saline.

Go Ask Daddy About Spherical Worlds, Housekeeping Tips, and the Truth Behind Democrat Food

I argued with a friend about politics while she waited for her egg, sausage, and cheese English muffin at work on Thursday.

I know. I’m so far removed from politics since my media purge in October, but now and then, a news story works its way to my attention, between audiobooks and Matchbox 20 on Pandora and Yahoo! Sports updates on Colorado Rockies games. Much of current events are foreign to me.

The subject of our disagreement isn’t the point.

It’s the fact that our belief systems can feel right as rain and can change and sometimes can’t be changed. Where does belief even come from? It’s in conviction, what we know to be right, but what if others know it to be wrong? That doesn’t change it for us.

Alphabet Recap, Mindfulness Challenges, and 7 Random Smartphone Photos

Seems as if there’s room for just one challenge in this coach’s bag at a time.

Those of you not participating (and probably a percentage who are) probably turned the calendar to May with a touch of gratitude. We’re cultish, we A to Z knuckleheads. We flood your inbox and social media feeds with sorcery and daily posts and crazy rules.

And who the hell blogs every dad-burn day? We do.

The cleverest among us have compiled posts of their favorite posts from each of 26 days of the challenge. Others have shared their most viewed and commented-on posts. I’m not among those cleverest, but you can bet 10 publish buttons I will next year.

#AtoZChallenge: U is for Unconventional Loves

I’d wanted to write, during this A to Z Challenge, about my girls’ stuffed animals.

All three have one that has meant something to them over the years. Haven’t we all? I had a stuffed dog I found in a park when I was a boy. I named him … boy. I loved him until he fell apart.

One of my girls loved a German Shepherd, so big she could use him as a pillow.

Another slept with a bear named Daddy. I last saw him tucked behind her headboard. Unceremoniously. A third girl kept a rasta monkey I won her at her bedside. I scrapped the idea, although to read the first four paragraphs here, you wouldn’t know it, right?

#AtoZChallenge: E is for Eight Things I’ve Left Behind

If only it was only eight.

It’s eight – times something. Eighty? Eight thousand? Eighty-eight thousand? That depends on if you count car keys and wallet as two things, left behind regularly, or one for every time. I wouldn’t want to do that math.

If God had a cosmic lost-and-found bin, even The Great I Am would assess me a storage fee.

I’ll forego listing the plastic dinosaurs I buried beside my house just before dad put on a sidewalk, or the UNC Charlotte sweatshirt left on the bus in Louisville. Same, too, for the stormtrooper Tervis, the actual stormtrooper from my youth, a few tons of innocence …