Greetings from sunny Chattanooga, Teneessee! The last time I was in this state, Jim, his Cherokee Territory wife (Christina), and me were ascending its highpoint, Clingmans Dome, along a snow-strewn access road under a bright midnight moon. Following this summit, Jim got really, really sick from gas station Cheetos and we hunkered down at a truck stop just outside of Pigeon Forge (home to Dollywood and all things super classy) and I had the pleasure of using a truck stop pay-by-the-hour shower stall. Over vending machine peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, while Jim might have been dying in the back of the van, Christina and I spent the evening watching Top Gun on a ridiculously huge television in the trucker rumpus room. The year was 1998 and it was the first time I saw that movie. I was a deprived child.

Speaking of deprived children, Hazel should not be counted among their swarthy lot. She spent Saturday Running Errands With Daddy and had a hoot, as did I. We went to the post office and the grocery store and still had enough time (and baby energy) left over for a quick trip to buy Mommy a brand new Red Sox hat. Hazel bought it with her allowance, which I bestowed upon her as we waited in line at the register and summarily suspended before we had crossed the parking lot to our car. While Hazel is very sensitive to the fact of our taking away tangible things (toys she insists on banging against each other, our cell phones she likes to chew upon, nigh swallowed cat food) intangibles like the concept of allowance can be turned on and off like a faucet without any tantrumic repercussions. Until she figures out that money is special paper, things should be just fine.

After Hazel was put to bed and the rain delay was lifted, Megan and I settled in for a nice night of televised Major League baseball. I am no august sports fan by far, but seeing as how I own a Red Sox hat, and had bought a second one for my wife (Hazel somehow has the king’s share of Red Sox paraphernalia in our house with two hats and one outgrown onesie), I make the effort to watch a game when it is on a channel our rabbit ears antenna picks up (ABC, PBS, or FOX - CBS should the atmosphere by particularly benevolent). Saturday’s game was pretty tense; both the Sox and their dread rivals the Yankees played excellently in the field and kept the score low and close. After a second rain delay, we arrived at the top of the 9th with 2 outs, Papelbon on the mound. Just as he was to throw what could have been a game ending strike, FOX cut the feed and switched to stupid NASCAR. With a pox cast on Bill France, Sr., I shook my fist angrily toward the heavens before realizing that I could just check the live feed of the game online. Technology fixes everything.

Since watching car racing on television is tantamount to torture in our house, we turned the channel to PBS out of desperation and the Saturday evening movie was just starting: Penny Serenade starring Cary Grant and Irene Dunne. The entire movie is couched as a series of tedious flashbacks sparked by different songs being played on the phonograph in deliberate succession by Dunne’s character. I can’t remember her name, as another character’s fictional moniker far outshone her, that of the “aw shucks” best friend of Grant, Applejack Carney. I’m not officially calling dibs on that name should we have a boy next, but consider this a penciled in dibs. Beyond his name, Applejack is a fantastic guy, capable of fixing printing presses with his fist (à la the Fonz), bathtubs using no tools, and marriages with adopted babies. All in all, the movie features loads of chauvinism, a miscarriage, purchased Japanese children, and that great clomping around sound effect made famous by the Three Stooges. You can watch Penny Serenade in its entirety online — consider it for your next rainy day distraction or betting device.

Anyway, by the length of this post, can you tell that I’ve been cooped up on three separate plane flights today? I’m off to see what Chattanooga has in store for a simple Mainer. If I make it to Rock City or a Lookouts game, I’ll let you know.

Having been born in November of 1978, I had to wait a long time for several of my first holiday experiences. Independence Day, Halloween, Thanksgiving – I didn’t get to them until 1979, which is a real shame. Hazel’s lucky in that she was born before the boatload of important annual festivities. All she really missed out on were Groundhog’s Day, Cinco de Mayo, and Valentine’s Day; all acceptable losses though missing Henry Rollins’s Birthday was a bit of a kicker.

So, in preparation for her first Halloween, we had a pumpkin carving party over the weekend. Hazel was more of an observer than actual participant, as giving a five-and-a-half-month-old a large knife would probably wind up badly for all concerned. Megan went for a nature scene on her pumpkin and cut out some gently falling leaves. To juxtapose Megan’s tranquil scene, I freehanded an evil, uni-browed reptilian demon pun’kin – complete with forked tongue, protruding lower fangs, and a general bad attitude. After all, we want Hazel to be well-rounded (and not just physically like she is right now).

But I’m afraid that any manner of fancy gourd slicing couldn’t draw Hazel’s attention away from her hero: two-year-old Thomas, the son of Megan’s friend Becky. Hazel thrilled as she watched Thomas walk, eat things, have teeth, stab one of our chairs with a pumpkin carving knife, and begin to color our hallway a nice shade of Crayola mauve. A rule of kids that I learned real quickly is that they are always mesmerized by what slightly older kids can do. Before Hazel could sit up on her own, any child that could complete this feat was stared at agog like an earthbound saint. But of all the things that Thomas can do, I think the biggest source of Hazel’s envy was his ability to get at our cats whenever he felt like it. For her, trying to catch Casey Jones or Fleabag is like trying to net the wind. I keep telling her that soon enough, she’ll be hustling those felines around our house like Benny Hill after young British ingénue.

Obligatory Halloween costume pics coming up next!