The Explanation

Stef is a cheerleader for the football team, but she's admitted that she doesn't really understand the game at all. I've offered for her to watch the Giants with me but she repeatedly declined, until this past Sunday. Having to explain why there are four downs, why they are called downs, why the first down is called first down, why they need to go 10 yards and not more or less became a little exhausting, and that was just in the first five minutes. Trying to explain why a quarterback runs or throws (hint - it has to do with the 10 yard thing), why yellow flags are thrown, what a punt is; it all became a little much for the both of us. Stef slowly stopped asking questions and left after I yelled at Eli for throwing an interception that was returned 101 yards for a Cowboys touchdown. She doesn't understand why I hate the Cowboys so much (it's like asking why does the sun rises in the East - I don't know, it just does).

The whole thing reminded me of one of George Carlin's best routines - the difference between baseball and football. I can't figure out how to link to it here - just search George Carlin baseball versus football and it will pop up.

Halloween

This Halloween was bittersweet, and not just because a neighbor handed out grapefruits and sweet tarts (okay I'm kidding. It was grapefruits and twizzlers). This was the first Halloween where Stef did the friend trick-or-treating thing. Because I was with Stef a lot on Friday and Saturday, I was privy to the extensive texting, phone calls, and in-person meetings necessary to get five pre-teen girls to agree (eventually) on a meeting spot. I didn't even ask her if she wanted to trick or treat with Jess and I, fearing it would shoot me into some type of Halloween-induced fourth dimension for interfering with the sanctity of the first ever friend-trick-or-treating-without-my-parents-plan.

I still vividly remember walking a 16 month old Stef through the Scotch Plains Municipal Building, her Blues Clues tail wagging back and forth as I tried to explain to her that if she held out her bag a stranger would drop a piece of candy in it. This was her first official active participation in trick or treating; at 4 months old we pushed her around in her stroller up the block for all of 5 minutes, her annoyance with an itchy pumpkin costume soon abundantly transparent.

It's another example of the "they grow up so fast" axiom, although she still isn't too old to share a tootsie roll with the old man.