Don't Learn These Things on Your Own; Take It From Me.

I like to think that in life, some things you have to learn for yourself, and some things are better to let other people experience and you learn from their fallout of why you shouldn't try the same thing. Here are some recent happenings in my life that I hope you will be able to learn from and not repeat. Unless, of course, you can think of a way to improve them...

• First:  So last week, my sister and her family were visiting, and we happened to have two slip-n-slides (it's sort of a convoluted story about how got two of them, we actually only paid for one, though, so that's good, I guess). Afterwards, my sister had this idea to combine them into one long slip-n-slide, and so we did that Sunday (when my niece was visiting) but SPOILER ALERT, Michelle: it didn't work. Why? Who knows.  Maybe the girls didn't weigh enough. Or maybe they don't know how to slide that well. We did put some baby shampoo on there like some people said to do, but they were only able to slide a short way into the second one. Disappointment. 

This set-up worked the best. Photo credit: My sister, Michelle.

• Secondly: If you leave your garage door open at night (not on purpose), it is too much temptation for some sort of animal to resist and he will sneak in there and rip open a bag of garbage that you didn't take to the dump on Saturday. Then there will be maggots.  And you will have to clean everything up because you're the Dad and you handle the garbage.  And, maggots. Lots of maggots.

(Do you really want to see a picture of this?  Well, sorry to disappoint you, but I didn't take one. I was too busy trying not to be completely grossed out. Remember... maggots.)

• Thirdly: If you post on your blog about remaining hopeful despite adverse circumstances, you will be challenged in a most cruel way when you take your van to get a state inspection and the mechanics will only pass it if you fork over at least $700 to them for repairs (they wanted $1000, but said the brakes could wait a while longer. Well, those brakes will be waiting a while longer... ) So, before you start to write that blog post about overcoming adversity, you may want to think again. Or, maybe you actually need to write it because it will be clearer in your mind when the adversity happens that day, because inevitably it will. 

Yes, this van.

I end this informative post with a thought-provoking, philosophical question... If a child has a temper tantrum in the middle of her bedroom, but no one is in the house to hear it, does she really make a sound?

(Ponder away.)