THE THING THAT WOULDN'T SLEEP

Alright...

Ever since we got back from Nashville a week ago, Andy's been waking up at least once at night, crying.

We think it's because he and Mama shared a bed in Nashville while I slept on the floor for two nights straight. My spinal column's twisted like Timothy McVeigh and ANDY'S the one waking up and crying every couple of hours.

So last night Andy doesn't fall asleep until 11:45 p.m. Susie and I are exhausted but we feel good, knowing that he'll sleep through the night now.

Ahem.

12:45 a.m.

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

"You wanna get him or you want me to get him?"

"Snoooooore"

So I got up to go pat the kid's ass a while.

He just cried even louder when I came in. I think he was wanting Mama since he's technically a Mama's Boy.

I got a little irritated with him and swabbed some nightime Orajel on his upper gum and teeth. This made him cry even more but at least I KNEW that this would knock the lil' bastard out.

No such luck.

I picked him up and we sat down in his glider. I patted his ass while he cried (complete with the REAL crying hiccups that kids get) and I softly sang "Rock-A-Bye Baby" to him, hoping it would calm him down.

After ten minutes of my off-key singing, he submitted to my voice and crumbled in my arms.

I laid him back down in his crib, face down ... but his ass was sticking WAYYY up in the air. I tried to stretch his legs out very gently so that he would be laying flat, but his sleepy ass wouldn't allow it.

This was not a good sign. If he was going to sleep on his knees, he'd wake up eventually.

I went and laid down on the guest bedroom bed which is closer to his room than our bed. I slept for about 90 minutes when he started doing the WAH thing again.

Susie, bless her heart, stumbled to his room and started passing the ass.

Once again, he's past ass patting. He wants full blown contact.

Susie picked him up, took him out to the den and that's all I know because I passed out.

At 3:45 this morning, he's like a fucking smoke alarm going off.

This time we both go to pat the ass and we collide in the hallway which must have amused God as he looked down on us.

"You want?" I mumbled.

"Uhhh," Susie mumbled back.

"I don't know what his problem is," I said like a really stupid doctor.

"Neither," Susie mumbled in her "The Less Words I Actually Say, The Quicker I'll Get Back To Sleep" mode.

That was the last time we heard him cry.

Now it's 7:30 and the lil' angel is sleeping peacefully.

But as his Daddy, I'm laying down the law.

This shit has GOT to stop.

Part of the reason that Andy couldn't sleep last night can be blamed on his goddamned shitass $6,000-owing Uncle Larry.

Our kitchen sink's faucet handle came off last week. So for the last several days, we've been turning on the water very carefully while we waited for Dipshit Larry to come fix it.

I'd fix it, but I wouldn't know where to start since I'm about as mechanically inclined as a blind hamster.

Larry, who's gotten pretty good at fixing things since he breaks everything in sight, was recruited by my wife to come fix the faucet.

He told her he'd be over on Saturday to fix it.

What time does Larry get here?

What time??

Try 8:00 at night.

To some of you young'uns out there, 8:00 is still pretty early to you. But when you've got a baby who needs to be calmed down and in his crib by 10 p.m., it's actually kinda late.

Especially when you were expecting the guy eight hours earlier.

Anyway...Larry takes a look at the situation and announces "This won't take but a minute."

Famous last words, you nerdy fuck.

An hour later, he's almost done when a drop of water hits him in the face as he's under the sink.

"You have a leak here," he deducts.

"It's okay," I say, staring at the clock. "We'll get it fixed another time."

Larry had other plans. By God...he's an honest man and it's about time he greased up his elbows and worked a little around the house to pay off those cases and cases of Cokes that he's just stolen from me over the years.

Larry decides that he's going to Home Depot to get some pipes that he can replace the old pipes with.

"This won't take but a minute," he says as he straps on his tool belt around his too-tight t-shirt, pulling his colored socks to his knees as he slips on his sandals.

I cringe.

At 10:15, he walks through the front door. Andy's half awake, Susie's asleep on the floor and I'm watching the Gong Show Marathon on Game Show Network, chuckling to myself.

Uncle Larry makes the prerequisite loud fucking announcements as he details in its entirety his adventures at Home Depot.

It was worse than your average Uncle Bob entry about going to the grocery store.

I've gotten to the point where I have trouble looking Larry in the face. It just irritates me to see his shaven head, his Amish beard and his ... his....well...I don't know of any other facial feature because I refuse to look at him in the face.

He finishes the whole pipe replacing thing quicker than I would have imagined. Took him about 20 minutes.

Now then....where's that ice cold Coca-Cola he's been working for???

He opens up the refridge and ...heh, heh, heh....no Coke!!!

Oh...there WERE cokes in there. Just hidden behind several jars of pickles on the second shelf!!!

WHOOOOHOOOOOOO!!! I DEFEATED THE IDIOT!!!

He then reached for an A&W Root Beer which he claimed to like "better" than Coke anyway.

Wonderful. Root Beer's much cheaper than Cokes right now.

So he cracks open a Root Beer, does his loud slurping sound on the can which wakes several of our neighbors and then heads for my computer.

What the fuck?!?

It's close to 11 p.m. and without even asking, he jumps on my computer to check his email, check the IRL racing results and generally surf the Web while we have been waiting anxiously for him to fix the fucking sink and then LEAVE so we can put the baby to bed and we can go to bed ourselves.

Susie and I sat in the den while he sat out in the living room, surfing the web.

"What is he doing?" I mouthed silently to Susie.

"I don't know," she mouthed back.

I pointed at her and then pointed toward the living room which meant "Go check on your stupid fucking brother and make sure he's not downloading beastiality porn."

So she walked out to the computer room and asked Larry what he was doing and he told her "Surfing the Web".

"It's 11 o'clock," she said. "We've gotta go to bed."

I wanted to cheer when I heard her say that. My gal finally got some balls when dealing with her stupid assed older brother.

He gets off the computer and starts to leave when he remembers to ask me a question.

THE question.

He walks back to the den, tool belt just a' jangling, and says "Uncle Bob...can I borrow your camera next weekend?"

"Which camera," I say quietly, hoping against hope that by saying this, it will confuse him and he won't remember to ask for my camcorder and just shuffle out the door.

"Your camcorder," he says.

D'OH!!

He then explains it's his 20 year reunion and he wants to get some shots of the "old gang".

Oh. You mean the "old gang" that used to throw rocks at you as you exited the school bus every day??

Or the "old gang" that used to call you "Larry The Fucking Nerd Who Eats His Own Snot"??

Please clarify because I must know which "old gang" you're talking about, you fucking cretin, you.

Okay.

I had told Susie there was NO WAY he was borrowing the camcorder.

NO WAY.

But...how do you tell someone who just spent their Saturday evening repairing your sink and seemed to do a pretty good job that they can't borrow something?

I mean..."Thanks for fixing the sink, I really needed that. And no, you can't have something of mine that YOU really need."

That don't fly.

I grilled him on the thing. I asked him if he "really" thought he needed to take my camcorder and he said he wanted to make copies of the video for people, blah blah blah.

I told him how much the camcorder cost and that it was a very expensive item.

He understood.

I told him that if he broke it, there were no ifs, ands or buts, he was buying a new one. Because when I handed it to him, it was going to be in perfect working shape. If some jocks grabbed it out of his hands and went and tied it to their truck bumpers and then drove around the parking lot, dragging my camcorder behind the truck...he was paying for it.

He understood.

I told him he'd have to put a big neon bumpersticker across the camera saying "This is NOT Larry's camcorder, he's just borrowing it. Please do not try to steal, damage or submerge in water because he can't afford to buy a new one."

He understood.

I told him that maybe he should look into renting a large cage on wheels that he could stay in at the reunion and pay some neighbor to wheel him around the reunion in this cage so that nobody can get to him and there's no way my camcorder could then be stolen.

He understood.

I then told him as I gulped long and loud...that he could borrow the camcorder.

He thanked me and finally left.

I then told Susie if he fucks up my camcorder in any way, shape or form, she buys me a new one, no questions asked. And her brother is then banned from ever coming into our home again, because then he will be $7,500 in the hole with us.

She understood.

I then told Andy to go to sleep this instant, since I was getting pretty good at bossing people around at this stage.

He looked at me and gave me his sparkly, dimpled smile as if to say "Uhhh...Pops. You think it's been a long night already?? Wait til you see what I've got in store for you!"

And I've already covered that so I'll end this bee-yotch now.