Go Ask Daddy About Undergear, Chinese Manufacturing and the Battles That Can Rage in Our Mouths

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We’ll get our new kits today.

That’s soccer lingo for new uniforms. We’ll play our opener Monday. New kits, new coach, new season. I have a good feeling about it all. Every time I think it’s time to retire, something like this happens. Some place asks me if I’ll teach. And I say yes.

I’m particular when it comes to kits – I don’t have a say in this case, so I hope for the best.

I have a few hang-ups. Quirks, really. Harmless. I’m partial to prime numbers. That’s not so strange, but perhaps that I was once a fan of multiples of threes, then made the switch to prime numbers? Maybe that makes it strange.

Who We’d Switch Places with (and What We’d do), in 6 Words

Catching up on blog and work while Grace kicks ass in training. Huntersville, NC.

How great would it be … not to be me.

Who hasn’t thought this? In those moments we’re out of gas, out of time or out of toilet paper (or all three). At times when we follow our favorite adorable pro golfer just to see she has three names now, just like those old-school 80s Olympic sprinters.

I like being me, though.

So much so that I would hate to not be me, to miss out on late-night ginger snaps and Sunlounger and Cher Lloyd on Pandora. On coaching my girls, raising my kids or writing my blog. Did I mention ginger snaps?

On Positivity, Peace, and not Politics (Not Really, Anyway)

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I tried to hop back in the news cycle over the weekend.

Not a full-fledged jump, but just a peek, just a bit of what’s going on in the world beyond the scope of my new glasses frames. I’m out of practice, the as you know. I’ve traded in my NPR loves and headlines everywhere for audiobooks and meditation.

Y’all’s world? It’s nuts.

I haven’t felt that lost since … well, any math class I’ve ever taken. Severe lack of comprehension. I didn’t recognize the hashtags and references, the shots and pans. I saw little room for light and peace.

Go Ask Daddy About Device Diversions, Writing Weaknesses and Couponing Questions That Shall Never Be Asked

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A kid will call a dad out.

The younger the kid, the rawer (is that a word?) the call-out. I’ve navigated three daughters through the unfiltered years, without many stings. There was that day on the Barbie doll aisle with one daughter, who, noting Mattel’s plastic diversity, asked, “why would I want a black Barbie, dad?”

I sailed through that one with honesty, not damage control.

“I think little girls like to play with dolls, no matter what,” I explained. “But sometimes, we want toys that look like us. These dolls look like different people.” And it was true. I remember complaining that there were no Mexican kids on Peanuts.

#GirlsRock: An Interview with Life Enthusiast Britt Skrabanek

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Most of us live.

Some of us LIVE. Britt Skrabanek is one like this. She’s a life enthusiast, and for the unitiated, that doesn’t mean she runs with the bulls or skydives (without that goofy guide guy strapped to your back, either.)

(She doesn’t do those things, but she could.)

Britt is classic and new all at once. She writes to live and lives to write, always hopeful, never satisfied, forever pushing her own boundaries and exploring the outer reaches of others’. She’s been with me for much of this blogular journey.

5 Words I Know (That My Kids Know I Shouldn’t Know)

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Here’s the thing – I don’t know what a story is.

It’s on Instagram and SnapChat. Right? Maybe What’sApp, but that’s less likely. Anyway, I know it’s like a place where people can, I don’t know, write something like a blog post? It’s kind of a big deal, I gather. Yet, no, I don’t know its parameters.

That’s okay – I’m 45 after all.

Like the Washington Redskins, I sometimes get lucky, with the terminology. I coach teenagers and work with millennials. The most awkward thing I can think of this side of Elizabeth Banks reading my mind would be to appear to try to be acting young.

I’m not young.

Go Ask Daddy About Tunes, Cephalopods and the Dirty Origins of Mankind

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What do you call someone who is post-Millennial?

I know I could find it on Google, but that’s not important. See, that’s where my kids are. That next generation. They’ll be the ones poking fun at you, millennials, for your antiquated ways. At least, their kids will be the ones.

So when a kid of mine travels with me, beside me in the front seat because the youngest among them is now 12, the conversations between Generation X and Generation Next happen anyway.

Sometimes, with Marie, it’s welcomed silence. On mountain roads coming from or going to Warren Wilson with Elise, it’s one really long story, interrupted by snack breaks and naps (her, not me.) With Grace, it’s a combination of those.

Guest Post: Tianna, of Storybook Apothecary, on Books She’d Share With the World

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The beauty of Tianna’s blog is far more than skin deep.

Storybook Apothecary is a beauty blog, that goes far deeper than concealers and eye pencils (I might or might not have checked one of her posts to procure actual examples of makeup things. I’m a dad of three girls, but I’m no expert.)

Tianna’s words and wisdom extend to wellness and life at large.

We crossed paths on a blog linkup, ideal conditions for a Gen X dad blogger and a millennial beauty blogger to share some space. She’s a reader and a thinker and you’ll love the way she has about her writing, as I do.

My Day, in Photos and Time Stamps

Stormtrooper crashes RV talent show in Cancun. (It’s okay. I already ate.)

I got this idea from a favorite blog – About 100%, by Andrea Mowry. You document a day – in nothing but photos and time stamps. You really should give it a try.

Go Ask Daddy About The Olympiad, Stuffed Animals and How Many Horses One Dude Really Needs

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Mexico isn’t known particularly for its ultra-fast Wi-Fi.

At least, not in room 101 of the Fiestamericana Resort, and it’s 4 a.m., and you’ve just questioned the wisdom of having just called room service for a bacon cheeseburger. You root around your email and answer blog comments, but not much more.

Not at the end of a day that you’d kind of wish would never end.

Some moments in life can become transformative before you even realize there’s room to transform. During our company trip, leaders challenged us to #challengewhatspossible. Although that sounds an awful lot like business speak, there’s more to it than that.