I'm funny how, you mean funny like a clown?

The dude pictured with the Goodfellas works with me. Paul recruits people and he's good at it.

But he's wasting himself. He should be in Hollywood right now. He'd be "that guy". You know him but you don't know his name. He plays the Mob's strongman in one movie and Reese Witherspoon's funny boyfriend in a romantic comedy.

Then after a few years of toiling in the background of some great movies he'd be given the chance to star in a prison movie where he's serving 20 years for a crime he didn't commit. But he's not bitter. He shows us how to handle adversity with grace. His performance gets him Oscar buzz. But our Paul, he doesn't changes who he is. Fame and fortune doesn't change the kid from Portsmouth, NH.

(Dude, if this really happens some day, get me a lunch with Reese Witherspoon. I'm a big fan.)

Euphonium, you say?

Tonight was the last "All Bands" concert we'll see our kids perform in. The kids from fifth to twelfth grade perform together for one concert a year. When Joey and Bret were in the fifth grade we thought it was great that our little kids got to perform songs with 18 year olds. The difference between listening to the fifth and twelfth grade is like the difference between taking a few swings against me versus taking a few swings versus 100mph pitcher Daniel Bard. (Opening day is here .... seemed the right time for a baseball reference)

Said another way, the fifth grade sound is an assault on your ears like Liz Taylor's White Diamond perfume is an assault on your nose. Despite the punishing sound, it's a great tradition.

Joey dominated on the euphonium. Never heard of the euphonium until a few weeks ago when Joey casually told us that he no longer played the trumpet and the band leader had asked him to pick up the euphonium.

Louie Armstrong, Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie ... all trumpeters.

Google "famous euphonium players" and you get people like Timothy Pelletier of the "Euphony Fonies" and Lyndon Baglin of the "Fairy Band".

Seems like the euphonium field is ripe for a new star.

11 years ago today many of our readers were molesting cherubs in Scotland....you all know who you are!

Sure, its our anniversary. And most people do celebrate these special occasions with a night out on the town, a card, maybe even a small gift. We celebrated by being Joey. We decided to embrace all that is Joseph Robert MacKay. We played video games, we dressed as Joey (Bill's in his Larry Bird shirt, I'm wearing his monkey snuggie), we played in his room, we sat on his bed, we befriended his gnome.

Bill's colleague, a man of discerning taste, requested more Jen and Joey in this blog - so here is Jen AS Joey. Your cup runneth over, Fletcher!

Peeping Scotch

Tomorrow is Jen and my 11th anniversary. Let's assume the post will be better than tonight.

Jennie went to a Literary Festival meeting, leaving me alone.

Being a person with little will power I had a scotch and a cigar while I grilled chicken.

These are the pictures you take when you have a glass of scotch on a Monday. First, another pictures of my rocks. Then I took picture of Laura's house as she watched The Office. Her cat Mickey is in the window. It's a good thing that Laura is a good friend or she would have called Newburyport's finest when she saw me with a camera outside of her house.

Schooled

Jennie and I sharing a Smithwicks over dinner.

Tonights question was what country would we least like to live in right now. Jen and I mentioned the usual Middle East countries. We were thinking of the miserable places Karl Pilkington went on the "An Idiot Abroad" series.

Joey trumped us with Darfur. He also said they are learning about the genocide in the early 90's in Bosnia. Tuesday he goes to Boston to hear the story of a survivor of the conflict. Conflict.... seems far too watered down a word for that event.

I thought Jen and I had conflict tonight about what type of pasta we cook tonight. Joey is good for giving us perspective.

We Gather To Prepare for Shaq Manfredini

Today was our baby shower for Stacey and Dave. Lynn, other Jen, Diane and I hosted the Manfredini and Cohen families in Tewksbury. My contribution was the cupcake and flower tower. (cupcakes are very in)

Here's a shot of the girls early in the afternoon. Before the gargantuan pile of presents was opened.

Giraffes were the animal of the day. There seems to be a giraffe toy that is the "it" baby shower present - Stacey and Dave received 4. They only got 2 of these giant giraffes. I'm wondering if I can get my hands on one of them for Petey.

Meanwhile Bill and Joey spent the day checking out Wheelock College. Joey's pros are its Boston location and girl to guy ratio. One of his cons is that he doesn't think there will be many kids in his class that will want to play Madden Football on PS2.

Feedback Friday

One of the good things about being married to a man in HR is that he is able to take feedback. (And as you can imagine, I can dish out as much as he can take.) My recent feedback was that he needed to eat better. I know I'm not a nutrition expert but I'm pretty sure that Cap'n Crunch is not considered a healthy breakfast. Generally any food that has a contraction in it's name and is marketed with a cartoon is probably not on the pyramid.

I'm happy to say that since delivering my feedback, Bill has not had a Coke and has decided to upgrade to a healthy breakfast cereal. We would like to endorse Me & Goji - a site where you create and name your own cereal mix of healthy little taste sensations. His crate of 5 canisters arrived today.

Bill made two flavors that I'm sure will soon be sweeping the national cereal scene:

Mandate, Get It On: A tantalizing toss up of flakes, flax, goji berries, golden raisins, mulberry and pumpkin seeds.

Shut Up, Felix: A crunchy cornucopia of granola, multigrain O's cranberry, nutmeg and flax.

Tomorrow morning will you be wishing you were enjoying a tasty dish of Shut Up, Felix?

At least the food was ... wait, never mind

(Brenda makes the blog for the first time.)

It was Basketball banquet night this evening. I was at once nostalgic for the rituals of middle America, while at the same time bored and irritated. I wish I could just appreciate it for what it was.

Oh well, since I'm not going to change in the time I write this post, let me make fun of it.

The Freshman coach gave the best speech. He was charmingly touching and nerdy. Then the JV coach got up and made fun of how long the the Freshman's speech was. He's the former Varsity coach and has hosted a lifetime of these events. His speech rambled and swerved and bored and ultimately went way longer than the Freshman coach.

Then Joey's coach got up and made the JV's rambling speech look like it was scripted by Aaron Sorkin.

His first attempt at humor brought out the crickets and it was downhill from there. He teared up when he thanked his wife for her help. I know that sounds nice but it was totally random and awkward.

The night ended with the awards and my kid got stiffed. If it sounds like I'm being a protective Dad, yeah, I am.

This is Joey's favorite coach in high school, i.e not his current coach.

If I were Coach

Joey's co-ed intramural volleyball team dominated yesterday. Joey needs a taste of victory after his varsity basketball team was squashed like bugs this year.

Thursday is the basketball banquet. What do you say to the team with two wins.

My speech might go something like "Do you remember that game against Georgetown when we strung together three straight baskets! That was basketball! That was teamwork! The final score didn't tell the story of that game! You really didn't lose by 36 points. For three minutes you shut them out! You DOMINATED!"

Then I'd say something about making sure everyone took home the left over pasta and call it a night. The basketball banquet is e n d l e s s ..... My basketball banquet would be quick and inspirational....

Help me, Obi Wan, you're my only hope

Laura looked like she was fighting the evil empire today as she started work on the 2nd floor bathroom. Soon I'll be showering surrounded by dill pickle walls.

Pure Evil

This is me if I were a comic book bad guy.

My story is that I was a normal HR guy until they turned the game around on me. My boss came in to my office at the end of a day that we had a big layoff. He was carrying the blue folder (pink slips are so 60's, we use blue folders). It's a complete breech of HR etiquette. You never have the HR guy do all the work to fire people and at the end, fire them. You tell the HR guy well ahead of time what's going on and give him the choice to participate in the RIF (reduction in force) in exchange for something.... anyway, back to my story.

The breech of etiquette turns me bad. I decide to use my HR background for evil. I go from company to company as an HR consultant. Everyone thinks I'm just a friendly, helpful HR guy, but what they don't know is that while no one else is looking...... I set all the adjustable office chairs to the lowest setting!!! No one likes sitting in the low chair.....

Stay tuned for the dastardlys adventure of Decumbent Chair Man (I gotta get a new badass name....)

Sunday is a Drag

It's drag show Sunday! Bill, Stacey, Dave, Di and I went to see the Gold Dust Orphan's latest production of "Pussy on the House". Ryan Landry was stunning as Suki - the lesbian matriarch of the Pollup clan.

It was at the last GDO show ("Mrs Grinchley's Christmas") that we found out Stacey and Dave were expecting a little bundle of joy. A picture of two proud parents to be at a drag show is always a heartwarming image.

Popover for a bite

That's the medium popover?

and that's why you never gamble ....

The NCAA Men's basketball tournament is off and running..... Joey, Jen and Bill are pumped and jacked.

All of us have visions of winning the bracket challenge, taking home the $150 in the work pool and earning the privilege of taunting the other losers.

We are getting killed in the pool..... we hate NCAA basketball....

When symbols cry

In the early 80's Prince was on top of the music world. He toured with another Minneapolis band, Morris Day and the Time. Their biggest hit was Jungle Love. Joey and Mathias pay tribute to Morris and band 30 years later.

(I loved "When Doves Cry". I used to think Prince and I would be good friends if we ever grew up together. That is until he changed his name to the symbol. I couldn't get on board with a friend with a symbol for a name.

I mean what do you say when it is his turn in dice baseball? "Symbol, your turn, man" It doesn't work. I'd have to drop him.)

Blacking out and a Havana Omelette

Joey gave blood today for the first time. He passed out. He was revived by a teacher slapping his face.

He told us the story at dinner, where we were at first worried about him, but quickly wanted to joke about it. We made him reenact the event in the living room.

Mom came over for dinner so we had our usual nonsensical conversation. When asked if she could teleport anywhere, but knew she would throw up after the trip, Mom said she'd go to Switzerland. She said "no way" when given the same power to teleport but it would give her a day of diarrhea (one of the slangs for diarrhea is "Havana Omelette").

Happy Birthday, Shelly

Shelly and I go waaaaay back (picture wavy lines a la Wayne's World)

• Almost 12 years ago I made my first call to tech support at Rational from my safe, non-technial role in contracts. I was terrified because I had no idea what I was talking about but the really nice girl who answered the phone made me feel like it wasn't so scary after all.
• Only a few short months later I was told that my role was being moved into tech support. I had to re-interview for the management job I thought I already had. That really nice girl was going to be part of my team! Luckily, we hit it off in the interview and she picked me for her new boss. (It was a much better interview with her than the Nazi interrogation that Dale put me through sitting in a hard back chair in the center of an empty office. More Power!)
• A year later I'm off to Scotland to get married. Michelle organizes the rice-like bottle cap throwing walk down the aisle in the middle of our office for me to make a fabulous exit.
• Then Michelle married Tres (Joey's future referee and our football picnic MVP) and Bill and I were there to cheer them on.
• We've changed jobs, moved to Littleton, hired (Todd! Tracey! Patrick!) and fired ("Andy, I'm going to get my hair cut and I expect you to be GONE when I get back!!") , gossiped, lunched, and laughed. Thanks for a terrific 12 years, Poopsie. Happy Birthday xoxo

Me, 40 years ago

This is Bill at 9 years old. Nine year old Bill would have never guessed that in the year 2011 he would be a two time grandfather. He would have never guessed that he would be married twice. He would have never guessed that he'd have gotten his drink on with his fellow Human Resource mates after work on a Monday night.

If nine year Bill was sitting here with me tonight I would tell him that he's going to have a good life, with great friends and a wonderful family. I would have told him that, even though his Dad died too early, that he had parents that loved him and would do anything for him.

Nine year old Bill wouldn't have really cared about my speech. Nine year old Bill would have wanted to go back to playing dice baseball.

Nine year old Bill. What a little shit.

Chasing Swank

I told Jennie to run like Hilary Swank.

See below.... Hilary doesn't have the flair (or flail) that my Jennie has....

If only we saw Paul Blart there today .....

Jennie is so happy when she's shopping. Seeing her happy like this almost makes it ok to be at the mall.

The mall sucks. It makes me hate people when I'm at the mall. I bet if I brought all my loved ones; family and friends, to the mall I'd end up hating them too. We'd drive over in a big school bus, laughing, telling jokes, maybe have some beers and singing Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody together. Everyone would be in a great mood .... then it turns to shit. We'd never find a parking spot with our big bus. We'd get separated in the mall and have to page each other to round us up. No one would agree on what store to go in. We'd be screaming to each other to be heard above the noise of the other miserable wretches. We wouldn't find any deals. We would be ignored by the disinterested help.

I'm going to go online and buy myself something from my favorite place to shop, bed.

Bill In Training

I'd like to start by saying that Bill TOLD me to wash and tumble dry the sweater to shrink it - he just didn't expect it to get as small as it did. So when the boys came home we realized that it was just the right size for Kieran. All he needed was a flowery shirt to go under it...check!

"I can keep these?!?! It's just like Christmas!"

If Bill ever starts a little club, this can be the uniform.

Bed Terminator

I'm definitely wearing Jennie down. We've been watching Karl Pilkington (An Idiot Abroad) while eating dinner in bed. Previously, bed meals were strictly verboten. I think a turkey terrific sandwich, a Boddington's ale and a cigar in bed is the perfect next step.

I'm working toward the day I fire people while in bed. I don't mean being on the phone. I mean I give the sales guy with the performance issue my address. He marches upstairs, shuffling along looking at his feet. He knows what's coming because my reputation as the bed terminator precedes me. I'll nod at him and point toward the bed. The bed will take away some of the sting of the message that he's just been fired.

I think this will make me more marketable. I'll be the guy who invented axing employees while comfy in bed.

Fat Nudists Playing the Euphonium with Hairy Pits

We had a whistling contest tonight at dinner. Not that I don't trust Judge Trudi, but she may want to investigate some hearing aids in the not too distant future because she seemed to feel that Joey was louder than me. I'm sure it was the acoustics of the room and the unfair advantage of being her grandson that tipped him into the winner's circle.

Other dinner conversation topics included but were not limited to:

• Joey was forced to change his instrument in band from trumpet to the euphonium (a small tuba) against his will but he actually plays it better than the trumpet
• What would you do if you went to a friend's house and the family were all nudists? Why do I always picture nudists to be fat?
• The likelihood of Joey going organic if he attends school in Portland, OR. Would it be worth it to pick up earthy crunchy chicks? And would they shave their arm pits?
• How Bill's beard resembles an Oregon chick's unshaven arm pit
• The Wooden Spoon Trick video on YouTube. View it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXPQY_VRP6M

We ended the night trying to pick a dates for college visits - a sad reminder that we have very few Wednesday night family dinners with Joey left so we have to pack more quality conversations like these (above) into every week!

Jen's worst nightmare

Bill, Jen's boss, Beth and alcohol.....

(one) Armed and Dangerous

Laura and Jen rented 120-something hours, the movie where James Franco cuts his arm off after getting stuck in a mountain crevasse. The girls wanted to empathize with the character so they pretended they they lost an arm.

Jen ended the game when it became inconvenient to drink her wine.

Supreme Court Ruling

Michael Cox and his novel, The Meaning of Night, was put to the test tonight when a jury of seven gave it a definitive 'thumbs-sideways'.

"It was no Georgette Heyer" said Newbury intellectual, Alison Gibbs. The rest of the perusing posse provided similar pronouncements.

Other items up for judgement - Charlie Sheen (bi-polar!!), the Oscars (worst EVER!) and Dr Dan (homeopathic hogwash or guiding light?). Joppa cheese, pizza (imported from New Haven) and wine were a hit, however.

Newburyport's answer to the Algonquin Round table took a slight respite from their fascinating repertoire to admire Bill's striped socks. Everyone enjoys a comfy sock.

The Name Game

We had a nice dinner with Stacey and Dave. We played the game all couples do when they go out with someone expecting a baby by coming up with stupid names. I don't think we made any headway with helping them name him/her.

Jen said it doesn't matter what name they come up with because she'll attach a ridiculous nickname to the kid.

She said Nicky Catsinpolous nicknamed himself "Nicholos Julius HondaChopper GreaserBaby Leather-is-good-for-jackets Catsinpolous Jr."

She also knew a guy whose sister nicknamed him "Mark Pepi Peterson Poopy Walkie Talkie Slowly Peppers".

She's starting the naming process now in preparation for an April delivery. She'll need every day she can to compete with those beauties.

Found this on the world wide interweb:

The United Kingdom's Deed Poll Service has said that a 23-year-old James Bond Fan has a 69-word name, which is the longest in the country.

David Fearn has changed his name, to all 21 official 007 film titles.

He is now called, "James Dr No From Russia With Love Goldfinger Thunderball You Only Live Twice On Her Majesty's Secret Service Diamonds Are Forever Live And Let Die The Man With The Golden Gun The Spy Who Loved Me Moonraker For Your Eyes Only Octopussy A View To A Kill The Living Daylights Licence To Kill Golden Eye Tomorrow Never Dies The World Is Not Enough Die Another Day Casino Royale Bond."

Pitching Wu

Just another gala event for Jen and Bill. Here we are with Janet Wu (Channel 7's Janet Wu - not Channel 5's Janet Wu). She emceed a ball to raise money for the Franciscan Children's Hospital. She was excellent. And tiny. Jen put Janet in her pocketbook and brought her home.

Things got a bit out of hand when Jennie and Didi stripped down to their no-clothes outfit, covering themselves with only feathers.

Jennie stirred just as much attention wearing this hot outfit as she did just wearing feathers.

Meanwhile, I stood out in a light colored suit while the rest of the guys wore black. Those fashion following sheep.

We made new friends, Emma and Connor. They are from Ireland and ironically, live a few houses down from where Jen lived in Needham. They bored me with Needham stories.

Connor was fun. He did some drunk silent auction bidding on his way to the bathroom several times and ended up spending a couple grand on some sports pictures. Good for him. Emma didn't agree.

All in all another fabulous night out for the jetsetting fashionistas, Jen and Bill.

Thanks Didi for inviting us. Totally impressed watching you in action working the room.

xxxooo