A Family Who Blogs Together, Gets to Blog About Eachother Together

My dad called me this weekend, while he was at the park with my little bro & sis. That means he was using his CELL PHONE, a relatively new and exciting addition to his life in the last year. I thought this would be great because my dad & Janae SCREEN ALL THEIR CALLS--as in, they never, under any circumstances, actually ANSWER their phone. When I got engaged about four years ago (before I broke it off about a year later), I called them to tell them the BIG NEWS, and predictably got their answering machine. My message said something along the lines of: CALL ME IMMEDIATELY! BIG NEWS! I finally heard from them about 2 weeks later. My first words to them were: Well, at least I wasn't DYING. Let's just say, it's HARD to get ahold of them. So, when my dad got a cellphone I thought, EUREKA! Only, it turns out that in the year he's had it, he's only answered the phone ONCE, and that was when he was waiting to hear from me if he got to go to see BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN. Let me tell you, he was QUICK TO ANSWER. Next time I get engaged, I'll just leave a message that says, Big News! Bruce Springsteen! I'll also have to leave the message on his HOME answering machine, because I just learned HE STILL DOESN'T KNOW HOW TO CHECK THE MESSAGES.

Anyway, the last couple times he's called it's been all about his blog. I knew he was PERFECT for the blogging world, being that he is an incredible artist and musician, and always has something interesting to talk about, but I hadn't bargained on how much he would TAKE to it. Let's just say, it's his NEW OBSESSION. Janae told me that after he got off the phone with me last time, she asked what I was up to and he said, "I don't know, we just talked about my blogging."

He hasn't posted in a week, because they got the new digital camera, and it's been his new focus. He said, "I haven't even checked your blog at all." I never in a million years thought I'd be having these types of blog obsessive, technology-type conversations with my dad. Up until recently, his idea of fancy technology was the multi-color Bic ballpoint pens--and being a near cast-off from him, I still get excited over ELECTRIC pencil sharpeners, so you can imagine how NEW and FRAGILE it all is, as we say words like "blog" and "digital camera" and "computer." Oh, it feels FUNNY on my TONGUE!

"It sure takes up a lot of time, all this typing and searching and posting." My dad said, as he wound up the conversation. I answered, "Yes it does, dad." What I should have added was, "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go write this conversation down, so that I can tell countless others about it."