Author: Mike Gibbons

My wife and I bought our first home in 1997. It was a wonderful home, a lovely three-bedroom with a great room that, when we first toured the home, had a big elk head mounted on the wall.

Despite the homeowner’s effort to include the elk in the sale, SOMEONE in my camp insisted the giant animal head be removed upon closing, despite the fact that I could have gotten miles out of “the rest of the elk is on the other side of the wall” joke.

When we moved into our house it was an exciting time, despite it being devoid of a giant elk head. But we didn’t have a lot of stuff. We began embarking on the exciting journey of what we would need now that we were homeowners.

We added the obvious things that you don’t have when you live in an apartment: a rake, shovel, lawnmower, and the like. 

But of all the things we got for the house, we omitted one very important purchase that I recommend all new homeowners make sure they have. And current homeowners – if you do not have this item, I bet you can think of times when you wish you did. Everyone should have at least one five gallon bucket.

I don’t know what you will need it for. I don’t know when you will need it. But you will. And it can be for a wide array of uses. Among the many ways I have put bucket to use over the past two decades:

• Collecting water from a leak, giving me time to focus my panic on why water was coming out of our ceiling without being distracted with panicking about it pooling on the floor
• Helping me out while changing out the …. the … um …. toilet thingee inside the tank that makes the flush happen. Oh, like all of you know what’s called. 
• Emergency possum storage. I admit this may be a rather small percentage of homeowners.
• Step stool for changing a light I could almost reach.
• Drum. Admittedly, this is one of my least favorite uses of the bucket.
• Covering a spider that my wife really didn’t want to kill, because hey, spiders are great pest control. But she’d REALLY like it to go do its job outside and so let’s just put this bucket over it until someone gets home who is cool with relocating it.

 

When we bought our second home in 2001, we had a pool, so we had several buckets. We would buy chlorine for the pool, and it often came in five gallon buckets. There does come a point where you can have far more buckets than you need. When we moved to our new house, I decided that the ideal bucket number is three. I stand by that proclamation. On a side note, I was really glad to have had a pool. My kids were 13 and 11 when we moved to a non-pool location, and they are great swimmers who spent many of their childhood summers splashing around in the pool. That said, I am glad I have not had to clean a pool in five years, in particular in the middle of a super cold storm that is dumping tons of leaves in your pool all the while Mother Nature is laughing maniacally at your futile efforts to keep up.

I keep my buckets in strategic locations where they are always accessible. Well, I try to do that. They often get relocated when my son liberates one to go fishing or pitching his cast net. But as long as it makes it home, it is ready to be deployed at a moment’s notice. Theoretically, I could use it to get a little closer and clean our elk head. If we had one.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.

 

I recently sat on a plane with a child – maybe three – who cried for the duration of our two hour flight to Dallas.

And I mean wailed. Hollered as if she were caught in a bear trap. At the top of her lungs. Relentless.

Before you get any preconceived notions about the nature of this column, this is not about the child.

It’s about having been there. And about the gentleman sitting next to this crying child.

More than a decade ago, my wife and I were flying out of Fort Lauderdale. Our kids were three and six at the time. As we sat on the tarmac waiting to depart, an enormously unsettling thump hit the plan. Apparently, we got struck by lightning. All of the power on the plane went out, and that included whatever magical creation keeps air circulation on a big metal tube sitting on asphalt in the summer in South Florida.

We were told that we had to stay put, as they were seeking a replacement part. I am not an airline mechanic, but I was a little skeptical, as I don’t think there is a part to cure “Yeah, everything’s broke…”

My wife and daughter were a few rows back from my son and me. My son was in a car seat at the time, and so I did my best to keep him occupied. That lasted about 11 minutes. 

After a while of sitting there trying to jiggle giant plastic keys and read books – all the while the very still air temperature inside the plane was slowly climbing – I decided to free him.

I plopped him on the floor and I wedged myself down with him so we could play some games. What games, you may ask. Answer? I was making it all up on the fly. Nothing in the parenting classes my wife and I attended prepared me for any of this. 

I did my best, but after a while, he had had enough. And he started wailing. Bear trap wailing. I tried to comfort him. I tried to distract him. I even considered swooping him up and delivering him to his mom, but then I remembered she was on the same mission with a six year old, and I opted to stay married and solve it myself.

But the guy next to me was not having it. He huffed. He sighed. He rolled his eyes. I tried to make eye contact and offer him a shrug and apology, but he was busy having his eyes stuck at the top of his skull.

The dude next to me eventually pressed the button to call for the flight attendant. I’m not sure what he was aiming for, but if his goal was to get my son and me booted off the plane – trust me – I would have gladly taken that.

He told her that he could not deal with the noise on the plane. She smiled, said she understood, and then handed the man some of the airline earphones they used to sell many moons ago. She said they were on the house, and then turned to me and said, “It’s OK. Ignore him.”

Bless you, ma’am.

Fast forward to my recent flight.

The gentleman sitting next to the crying child was not with the child. Mom was doing what she could at 38,000 feet. But let’s be honest – options are limited. And the man sat there and just stared forward. He occasionally closed his eyes, maybe dozing off. I don’t know. But he never showed any signs of exasperation or loathing. He just dealt with it.

I know it’s not fun to be next to a crying child. It wasn’t fun on this flight. (Yay, earbuds!) But it’s not fun for mom either. And losing your cool over it isn’t going to help the situation. I want to channel that guy’s inner-zen at all things in life. When the plane landed and we started to leave, the child was no longer crying. She was laughing, actually, at who knows what. The gentleman stood up, turned to another passenger in the row behind us, gave a smile, and said, “I’ll see you at the meeting tomorrow, Robert.”

Robert, I don’t know you or what you do. But at the meeting, I hope you sat next to that dude and got in on some of his sweet chill karma.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.

 

I don’t watch a lot of TV. At least, I used to not.

It’s not a statement or anything. I just find my evenings get packed with other things that keep me away from regularly tuning in to shows. I do tune in most every night for Jeopardy!, which is a tough thing to include in any written form because of the exclamation point in the title, as those who are not familiar with the official title think I am just REALLY excited about a game show.

I used to watch lots of shows. My wife and I would tune in regularly for Friends, Melrose Place, Seinfeld, etc. I can fairly well identify the time I quit watching shows on a regular basis. It’s Aug. 6, 2000. That’s when our first child was born.

Throw in the reinforcement date of March 17, 2003, when our second was born, and that sealed the deal on not being tuned in to TV.

For the last 18 or so years, most of my evenings have been geared towards doing things with them in the evenings. And if that included TV, it was things that were family friendly. So a lot of pop culture passed me by.

I’ve started catching up on some shows that are relatively new. I’ve enjoyed The Umbrella Academy and The Good Place. Fun stuff. But when I harken back to the early 2000s, I realize I missed some shows. And apparently I have missed A LOT of classics. Sopranos. Breaking Bad. One of the shows I heard about often was The Wire. One reason that is resonated in my circles was that the fifth season has a good bit set in a newsroom, where I spent a good chunk of my professional career. 

My kids are now teens, and they often are doing their own things in the evening. A few months back, they were both off doing their own things, and I had a quiet evening at home. So I decided I would fire up the old TV machine and watch an episode of The Wire. And man did I get hooked quick.

Even though the newsroom part was still four seasons away, the show drew me in. I watched the first episode and told my wife that it looked like I’m in for the long haul. She asked me how long the series ran for. I told her that it was five seasons, so I had about 60 hours in front of me.

And now, a couple of months later, I have run the gauntlet, and I have logged every bit of The Wire, and it is probably my favorite show of all time. A few thoughts:

• It’s definitely not for everyone. It’s hard hitting. It’s raw. It’s coarse. 
• The storylines are tough to swallow, as it presents a part of the world that we often don’t see, and I think that’s healthy to see that part of the world.
• When I made it to season five, the newsroom scenes resonated with me in a way I’ve never experienced. While I never worked at a newspaper the size of the Baltimore Sun, it’s clear to me that all newsrooms are kinda the same. 
• If you’ve watched the series and (a) if Bubble isn’t your most cherished character and (b) Omar isn’t the most fascinating antihero character of the series, I don’t know what to say.

So I’ve put The Wire to bed. I guess I need to go and find some new shows to catch up on, all the while trying to stay current on new shows. Please let me know of any shows I’m missing. Otherwise, next stop, Sopranos.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.

 

Sometimes, you’ve got to unleash Operation Scuba Steve.

For those of you who are wondering what in the world I am talking about, Scuba Steve was a fictional action hero in the movie Big Daddy. He is the favorite toy of the young man who, in the movie, suddenly becomes left in Adam Sandler’s character’s charge. When the youngster is refusing to take a bath, Adam Sandler comes to the door in a scuba costume, and tells the kid he’s Scuba Sam, Scuba Steve’s dad. The five-year-old is wide-eyed and listens intently instructs him that he needs to take a bath, etc. Mission accomplished.

My son has never seen this movie, and I am fairly sure he’s never seen this scene. Which makes me all the more proud that he initiated a similar tactic while watching two youngsters recently.

My son is 16, and he is great with kids. He loves to teach them things such as fishing and throwing a cast net, and he’s super patient when playing games or sports with them. We have some friends with a four- and six-old, and Parker will often visit them to spend time with them to provide a little distraction action for the boys.

Recently, he was at their house around lunchtime. I got a text from my son. It read, “Pretend to be Aquaman when I call you please.”

I was busy cleaning my garage at the time, but I knew anytime you are called on to be Aquaman, garage cleaning could wait.

A few short moments later, the phone rang. Channeling my deepest, superhero voice, I answered and said, “Hello, this is Aquaman. Do you have an aquamergency?”

My son was on the other end. I could tell he was on speaker phone. He said, “Yes, Aquaman, Jude doesn’t want to eat his lunch, and I was wondering if you eat your lunch every day.”

Well played, son.

I responded. “Why, lunch is one of my most important meals! Please tell Jude that not only should he eat his lunch, I make my personal Aquaman policy that without eating my whole lunch, no swimming, fishing or pool time. That’s how superheroes do it. And I’m sure Jude hopes to be a superhero some day.”

My son said, “Thank you, Aquaman. Have a great day.” And he hung up.

A few minutes later, I got a text. “Thank you so much! It worked!”

I know there is a small window where this type of subterfuge will work. But having had kids that age, I am fully in favor of anything that can get a child’s attention and get them to do the right thing. I know there are plenty of folks who believe you should never utilize this kind of trick to get a child to eat or dp something, and that it is just lying. Fine. You be you. Go try and have an earnest, logical debate on the merits of a four-year-old eating all of his lunch. And I wish you the best of luck with getting a four-year-old to stop and say, “You know, when you put it that way, you do have a point. Pass the peanut butter and jelly, please.”

The rest of us will let superheroes save the day.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.

 

There are a lot of things people in the same household can’t agree on. Which way is the toilet paper supposed to go on the roll? How often should you use a towel before it goes in the wash? Should toothpaste be squeezed from the bottom or randomly each time throughout the tube creating a disastrous amorphic blob of disgusting? (Answers: Over the top; meh, two or three; and obviously from the bottom unless you are clearly a monster.)

But all households have some disagreements that are distinct to them. And mine is no exception. So today I present to you the Distinctly Gibbons Disagreements:

What color is Lemon-lime Gatorade?

By far the greatest Gatorade of them all, this is a debate that started many moons ago when my wife asked if I wanted anything from the store, and I responded, “Green Gatorade.” When she got home, she told me that they did not have green Gatorade, but she hoped I liked the yellow. I looked at her purchase, and said, “That’s the green.” She said, “It’s yellow.” And neither of us have budged since. And I would like to say that while we are a house divided, but she has clearly poisoned the minds of our children, who also insist it’s yellow.

Is the proper way to eat corn on the cob typewriter style or the burn-it-all-down method of rotating the corn and then moving on to the next chunk?

This another debate that goes down party lines. You are either with mom or dad. Granted, our son does flip his allegiance on occasion just to keep things interesting. I think he’s just testing to see who will lobby him for support.

Is the Lil Nas X’s song Old Town Road featuring Billy Ray Cyrus a hip-hop song or a rap song? While the duo may seem a unique pairing, they have crafted a song that can generate this seemingly unanswerable question. They have also recorded a song the likes of which will stay in your head for what I am currently estimating at half past forever.

Should Jolly Ranchers be consumed by humans ever?

No. I don’t care what anyone else in my house thinks. They’re wrong. Gross.

What is the ideal temperature for inside of the house?

Generally, the debate on this lands somewhere in the 68-72 range. I’m fairly flexible in what temperature I find comfortable, so this is one that I will always side with my wife. My kids sometimes complain that the house is kinda cold, but I remind them that my wife’s propensity for a colder house started when our daughter was 11 days past her due date in August of 2000, and my wife found a setting on our thermostat called “January in Saskatchewan.” I pick my battles, and I’m certainly not picking one on temperature with a woman who has carried two people inside of her over the course of summer pregnancies. I can always put on a coat.

Is a child’s room their private space and therefore it’s their decision on whether or not to clean it, even if that includes a floor covered in clothes about four feet high?

Guessing you can see where the sides of this argument fall. And guess what one side has? The ability to turn off WiFi and cell phones and commandeer car keys. Clean your room.

If your family has unique internal debates, please feel free to share them with me at the email below. I’d love to know where sides are drawn in your household. I’d be happy to settle it for you, if you’d like. Unless it’s about Gatorade. Because I’ve already settled that. It’s green.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.

 

Today’s column is a reflection on two fronts: Common courtesy and plastic bag bans. And first, my usual disclaimer when I dip a toe anywhere near political issues: I’m not going to get political. In 20-plus years of writing this column, I don’t get political. I did write a column once about 15 years ago about how maybe we’d all be better served by ignoring vicious political attack ads, and that didn’t end well for my inbox, so if you have a strong opinion on plastic bag bans, super! But I’m not really here to debate that.

First, let’s talk common courtesy. I was in line at a store recently and was ready to check out, with about a dozen items cradled in my arms. I did not have a basket or cart, because as usual I came for only a couple of items and my hubris got the better of me.

As I approached the open lanes, I saw that two were lit up. One had a backlog of three people. The other, on the right, had one. As I approached the open aisle, I noticed that the woman checking out on the left was having some issues with her purchase, and the clerk was on the intercom trying to get some assistance. It was clear there was going to be a delay on the left.

I stopped short of the conveyer belt and made eye contact with the second person in line on the left. I said, “You can go in front of me.” She smiled politely and said, “It’s fine. I’m in no hurry.” Same offer to the third person in line. Same answer.

So be it.

As I stepped up to my spot in line, I set my order down on the belt. The person in front of me also began having some checkout issues, so both of our lines were stalled. More shoppers began backing up behind us. After several minutes of zero progress, a clerk emerged from somewhere and took a spot to my right, behind another register. She said to me, “Sir, I can take you here.”

Now some of you may be thinking Fast Pass jackpot! And my response is NO! Bad shopper! I said to the clerk, as I motioned to the folks standing still on the left, “They’ve been waiting longer than I have. Can you get them?”

The second woman in the left line was very appreciative and took me up on the offer. As far I know, she could have been there for hours. The third woman said she would just wait it out.

Assuming my line would be moving along soon enough, I sat patiently. And nothing happened. As the woman who had been in the left checked out to my right, I noticed motion behind me. It was the woman who had come up behind me in line and had absolutely heard and seen what all was transpiring with the stalling lines. Did she offer the spot to me? To the woman in the left lane who was still waiting? Of course not. She darted like a greyhound to get that open spot.

And the other folks behind me? Scurried like rats to line up in the only functioning lane in the store. Every shopper for himself, I guess.

Eventually, my lane and the left lane figured out their issues and started moving forward. As I was checking out, the clerk asked me, “Did you bring your own bag? Because otherwise we have to charge you for a bag.”

I normally bring my own bags to the store, but had not on this trip. But the way she phrased this kind of annoyed me. I said, “Look, I know you don’t make the policies, but you don’t HAVE to charge me for a bag. Corporate chooses to charge me for a bag. But no. I’ll just carry everything.”

At that point, the woman who had been third in line on the left lane and patiently waiting as the jackals swarmed to the functioning lane, extended a hand with a bag in it. “Here…” she said, handing me a bag. I smiled and told her thank you. She nodded back. She gets it.

At the end of the day, the episode just reminded me of two things we should all remind ourselves: (1) Be mindful and courteous of other people and (2) Remember to bring your bags.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.

 

Here’s a fun little game I recommend you not play: Driving 65 mph on a crowded interstate with a big chunk of particle board wedged against your front bumper.

I took part in this exciting endeavor recently on my way home from work. I travel about 12 miles on interstate to get to my job, and while traffic is usually fairly thick, I’m fortunate to be on the preferred side both coming and going, as the traffic on the opposite side is usually at stand-still at both morning and evening at various points along the journey.

So I was cruising along at my usual speed, with usual traffic. While normally I advocate for the left lane being only for passing, that’s not practical in thick commuter traffic, so I usually stay in the left lane so as not to get caught in back-ups near exits.

As I topped one of the two big bridges I cross, I was behind an 18-wheeler. And in a flash, I heard a weird crunching sound and then saw something shoot out from under its back left tire.

And said something was coming at me. Fast.

In a split second, it smacked against the front my car. And it must have been perfectly balanced, because it just stayed there, peaking about eight inches about the hood of my car. And from what it sounded like, the bottom must have been right at the road because my car was not make that sound similar to when you drive over a tree branch and you drag it along the underside of your car.

Now, admittedly, when the board came flying out, I flinched. But thankfully I only flinched a smidge, and did not jerk the wheel or completely duck out of the picture, both of which would have yielded bad results.

I blame my relative calm on my years of walking through spider webs. Stick with me on this. Most people, when they walk through spiderwebs, do an entertaining (to others) dance/flail designed to get the spiderweb (and more importantly, the spider) away. However, I’ve spent a lifetime in the woods, and I’ve walked through more spiderwebs that I can count. And when I do walk through, my brain is just trained to calmly say, “Hey, spiderweb. May wanna get that off you at some point. Also, maybe we can ID the spider, ok?”

So I’d like to think spiderweb brain kicked in.

I stayed steady, keeping in my lane, and watching the piece of plywood, knowing that if it somehow came up a smidge and started heading toward my windshield, I was going to have go beyond spider brain and channel full-on Spider-man to dodge it. But keep in mind I was on a bridge. A very crowded bridge. And since all of the physics factors in play were keeping the board in place, I figured I was OK for the time-being if I kept all of that the same. And by my estimate, the next exit was about two miles away. Two minutes of holding steady. We can do this.

After about a minute and a half, I approached the exit. There was a decent gap in traffic, so I eased over to the right lane. As I slowed, the physics changed, and the board lost its perfect balance. I saw the protruding eight inches start to descend, and then woosh – it was gone. For whatever reason, my car didn’t kick it up, fortunately, but rather shot it to the shoulder.

I considered getting off at this destination and checking the damage, but opted to skip to mine a mile or so down the road. Might as well wait until I’m home to see the carnage.

And when I got home, I exited my car and saw, well, not much. A couple of small scrapes and some big, dusty splotches that were wiped off by hand.

In the end, it turned out OK. That said, I don’t want to do it again. I’ll find a different game to play on my commute home.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.

 

Let’s be honest – when you have a bandage anywhere on your head, people REALLY want to ask you what it’s about.

Bandages other places? Usually, no big deal. One on your knee? Obviously just a scuff from a fall. Back of the heel? Duh, blister. But prominently on your ear? Yeah, curiosity is coming out on that one.

Such was my day recently when I had to venture out with a great big Band-aid slapped on my right ear.

And why was I wearing a bandage on my right ear? Well, unfortunately, if I gave you the briefest of answers of why, you would stare at me and probably have more questions. Because the simple and brief answer is, “I cut myself shaving.”

So the first question that naturally would come out of that is, “Are your ears hairy, like, hairy enough you to shave them?”

And the answer is no, they are not. I have normal ears and normal hair and normal everything.

Your next question would most likely be, “Well, then how did you cut yourself shaving, if your ears aren’t super weird hairy things?”

To which I would reply (a) you’re being a little judgy and (b) sigh. OK, so I was in the shower. I have a shaving mirror in my shower, mounted on the wall. I prefer to shave in the shower, as that eliminates having to shave over a sink, which leaves two gross byproducts: Shave remnants and washcloths that will in no time be crusty dried washcloths.

As I was shaving, I noticed that the water was not coming down at exactly the angle I wanted it to. I’m a particular creature, and I like it a certain way. So I decided I would reach back and adjust the shower head. And that’s when I decided to use the hand that held the razor, and as I reached back, I ran it right across my ear and gashed myself with a cut that would have made Van Gogh proud.

Just as I hit my ear, I knew I had erred. I said, actually out loud to no one, “Oh, that’s gonna bleed…”

And bleed it did. I tried to see if standing under the water would make it stop. It did not. Rather, it made my shower floor look like one from a horror movie. As I got out of the shower, I decided I did not want to stop the bleeding with my towel, so I would dry off as much as I could prior to getting some tissue to put on my ear.

Fun fact: It’s a lot harder to dry off than you’d think while trying to avoid the dripping stream of blood coming from your ear.

Eventually, I got mostly dry, but then realized I had left a lovely trail of red splotches on the bathroom floor as I crossed the bathroom to retrieve a tissue.

Once I had the tissue in place, I thought I would be in the clear, and it would clear up like any shaving cut. Nope. Apparently, ears are, like, direct pipelines to the heart or something, and it was in no mood to stop bleeding.

I brought my wife into the situation, as she is a pro at handling these types of things. She applied some Neosporin to it, and properly attached a bandage to it. She also was the one who came to me every few minutes and reminded me to stop touching it to see if it was still bleeding. She’s good like that.

I have now gotten to the point where I don’t have to wear the Band-aid, although the cut is still fairly visible on my ear. But at the end of the day, I think we’ve all learned a very important lesson: Never adjust the shower with the hand that’s holding the razor.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike or at www.mikeslife.us.