A Bedtime Story with Spiderman & Pop

When GoofBoy was little, the Spiderman movies were still new and he was fascinated. I didn’t want him to see the movies (he wasn’t ready) but he got the gist by osmosis – just like he learned the Star Wars movies before seeing them. Also, one time, at Costco we watched enough of Spiderman Two that GoofBoy had a pretty good handle on it. He would regale strangers, “Dr. Octopus is trying to build a fu-shion reactor and Spiderman has to stop him. Dr. Octopus has robot arms, and he has issues.”

I started telling him stories about another super-hero:

”Bubbe, I want some ice cream and we are all out!” Pop whined.

Why are you talking about Bubbe and Pop? You promised me a Spiderman story!

I just started, give it a minute.

“So go to the Wawa and get more,” Bubbe replied.

“But there’s too much traffic!”

“So fly!” Bubbe said, exasperated.

What’s zacerbated?

What I’m going to be if you don’t let me tell this story!

So Pop went down to his workshop and built a jetpack. He went upstairs, strapped it on, pushed the bottom and zoomed off to the Wawa to get some ChubbyHubby ice cream. When he got back home, Bubbe was furious! Pop’s jetpack had left ashes all over the house. So, after Bubbe was done yelling at him, Pop finished his ice cream and went back to his workshop.

He stayed down there a long time. When he finally came up, he had done it. He made, not a jetpack – but a heli-pack, powered by eating ice cream. Pop was having the best time, flying around town - thuk, thuk, thuk and eating ice cream. The best thing about it was that the ice cream went to power the heli-pack so Pop wasn’t getting chubby – in fact he was losing weight.

But one day, he went flying and he heard something pop in the propeller over his head. Suddenly he couldn’t steer, he was just flying around in giant circles – and he was running out of ice cream, which meant the heli-pack would run out of power. Just as he was on his last scoop of ChunkyMonkey, suddenly Spiderman swung by!

“Having some trouble?” the friendly neighborhood Spiderman asked?

“I am, my gyroscope is busted and I just keep flying in circles.”

Spiderman sat on the side of a nearby building and fired a web at the propeller. It stopped spinning, and Spiderman put Pop down on the sidewalk – right next to a Wawa.

“Thanks Spidey!” Pop yelled.

“No problem, Pop, you ok from here?”

“I think so, I owe you one!”

So Pop went into the Wawa where the store clerk yelled, “Hey Pop – what flavor ice cream today?”

All the Wawa clerks knew Pop. Pop got his ice cream, and some duct tape (you can fix anything with duct tape) and flew home.

A few days later, Spiderman was battling the Green Goblin by the Bay Bridge. The Green Goblin had captured Spiderman’s girlfriend and had her tied up and dangling over the water. But he also had rockets pointed at the bridge so that cars were going to fall into the Bay. There was no way he could save his girlfriend and the bridge.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere thuk, thuk, thuk, thuk, thuk.

It was Pop on his heli-pak eating rum raisin ice cream. He had followed the blinking lights. Spidey looked at Pop and nodded. Pop put down the ice cream and switched to reserve power.

Spidey moved in and slugged the Green Goblin with one hand and shot webs at the rockets with the other. When he dropped Spiderman’s girlfriend, Pop swooped in and grabbed her.

When they landed, Spiderman and Pop shook hands.

“Thanks Pop,” Spiderman said.

“Anytime!” Pop answered and he flew off into the night.

”Does Bubbe have adventures?” GoofBoy asked, hoping for yet another bedtime story.

The idea for this story had come to me in a vision of my father flying around town in a heli-pack, possibly inspired by images of Baron Harkonnen in the movie Dune. Suddenly, I had another vision, of my mom in aviatrix gear (bomber jacket, goggles, and scarf) flipping Amelia Earhart the bird.

“Oh yeah, when Pop gets lost, which happens a lot, Bubbe has to fly out and look for him.”

“Bubbe flies?”

“Sure, she flies an old Spitfire. Winston Churchill gave it to her.”

“Tell me! Tell me!”

As much as I wanted to do my Winston Churchill impression, it was enough.

“Another night Buddy.”

GoofBoy's Love/Hate Relationship with P.E.

GoofBoy is distraught.

“Dad, I’m having a problem at school”

“What is it?” I ask, ready for anything.

“I don’t like phys-ed.”

“I know what you mean,” he smiled. We always called it gym, but at orientation day, when I said that the teachers got all huffy. Just like everything else in our society, gym teachers are prone to title inflation. So I have learned to call them phys-ed teachers so they won’t push me up against the lockers and give me wedgies.

“I didn’t like phys-ed when I was your age. We always played dodgeball and somehow I always got hit in the head and the lenses in my glasses would pop out.”

“I wish we could play dodgeball. No, the problem is we are always doing drills and never actually playing anything. Phys-ed used to be my favorite, now I hate it.”

“Are you sure you are my son?”

I hated gym as a kid, it involved everything I disliked - competition, sports, sweat, other children, and big people yelling at me. I can't shoot a basket, climb a rope, or remember not to use my hands playing soccer.

MamaGoof had similar feelings. Is it possible MamaGoof and I – two awkward, strange people – have some recessive normal chromosomes? Like when two dark-haired people have a blond kid? I ended my reverie on genetics and focused on my son. “Trust me buddy, it could be worse.”

“How, I am a boy, I need to play sports.”

“I had a square dancing unit in gym when I was your age.”

GoofBoy’s eyes grew wide.

“It was the worst. First you had to pick a girl to dance with and everyone would say you liked that girl. Then she would yell at you for doing everything wrong. Plus you had to hold her hand.”

“Dad, you were soooo lucky!" GoofBoy exclaimed, "I love to dance and at least we’d be moving!”

The kid is so normal - it’s weird.

Cats are too Dangerous

“Daddy, why don’t we have a cat? You always say you love cats,” GoofGirl asked.

“But I love mommy more and she has allergies,” I explained for the two hundred thousandth time.

“Really?” she looked skeptical, so finally I leveled with her.

“Cats are very, very dangerous.”

“No, they are cute and fluffy and cuddly,” GoofGirl protested.

“Remember how I always tell you stories about my cat in Boston?”

“Right, Kitty,” she grinned.

“His name was Teddy Roosevelt. My roommate called him Teddy because he was cute and I called him Roosevelt because of his patrician mien.” We were strange guys – we brewed beer, baked bread, played with Legos, and occasionally juggled fire.

“But you called him Kitty?”

“Yes. Anyway, Mommy was getting very friendly with him and I had to speak her firmly about this. I told her, ‘Do not give that cat any money.’"

"Why can't you give cats money, what would they do with it?" GoofGirl asked, just as her mother did almost two decades ago.

"Cats use money to buy guns."

“Daddy, that’s ridiculous, how could a cat use a gun?”

“No one knows, because if you see a cat with a gun, it is the last thing you will ever see!”

GoofGirl rolled her eyes at me, just like her mom did almost two decades ago.

Whose Daughter

She sure is your daughter, I tell MamaGoof when I get home from synagogue where GoofGirl made straight for the kitchen to help prepare after-service snacks.

Come talk to your daughter, MamaGoof calls when GoofGirl won't accept MamaGoof's answer to a question. GoofGirl wanted to know why our bones were on the inside of our body, not the outside. I told her bones on the outside would be too crunchy, and bit her. That would dissuade most children, but not GoofGirl. So I tried to explain evolution, but her follow-up questions quickly outstripped my knowledge.

Look what your daughter did, I told MamaGoof when I came downstairs to find GoofGirl had packed the lunches and made breakfast for herself and her brother. "Should we let her make dinner, I wonder what she can make without knives or heat?"

Then, while studying her atlas, she asks MamaGoof why they mostly speak Spanish in America. "Come talk to your daughter," MamaGoof calls. I tell her about Columbus, but that isn't enough. Why didn't the Native American make people in Europe speak their language? I explain about the missionaries, technology, and disease.

"Your daughter says laundry looks like fun, you should take advantage of this," I tell MamaGoof.

Upon receipt of her allowance, GoofGirl asked, "Where does money come from?" MamaGoof answered, "The bank."

But that wasn't good enough. "Go ask your father!"

We talked about gold and the Federal Reserve.

"Mi Nina, I know you want to help. But please, just let me make dinner," I pleaded as GoofGirl tried to hustle me out of the kitchen.

"But daddy, I need to know how to do these things, for when I'm a mommy."

"I'll make a deal, stay out of the kitchen and while I fix dinner, I'll tell you how the solar system works."

"Sweetheart, I don't know why dogs bark and cats meow. If you wait until your father gets home and ask him, I'll let you help me do the dishes. Deal?"

Inevitable Top Ten List

In honor of Leap Day I put together a little Top Ten list of my favorite posts since I started this back in 2005(!) These are my favorites and the choices are entirely subjective. Are these the funniest? Cleverest? Sappiest? Most insightful?

In a word, “Yes.”

If I have any readers with strong feelings about slighted posts, let me know – I’d love the feedback (hell, I’d just be happy to know I have reader!)

Top Ten Father Goof Posts of All Time – So Far

10. I consider my duty to teach the little Goofs comedy classics, and sometimes the set-up is just too perfect, such as here where the morning paper helped me riff on “Who’s on First.

9. Telling kids old jokes is nice, but it is really satisfying when they can turn them around on you.

8. Here is my Nobel nominated plan to re-start the economy, centered on mandatory show & tell..

7. This post is a short guide to a crucial subject all parents must understand, the economics of babysitting.

6. GoofGirl gave me a a report card on my fathering.

5. Caffeine is the fuel of parenting, but it is not always an ally – more like a frenemy.

4. A mommy-blogger extraordinaire asked my thoughts on first days at a new school.

3. You won’t believe what I find to be the biggest single surprise of parenthood.

2. This entry tells the story of How I met Mama Goof, the kids thought it was gross.

1. This is a letter I wrote my brother on his first Fathers Day as a dad, where – for once – I told him the real truth about fatherhood.

Gross Gift from Grandpa Goof

I don't know what has happened to my father in his dotage. He actually paid money for this sculpture - loves it. He says it makes him think of coral.

I think it looks like something else (use a bit of imagination), and I kind of don't like being in the same room with it. So I did what any sensible son would do. I casually mentioned to my parents how much my brother liked it.

"You should definitely leave it to him in the will," I tell them, frequently.

"Funny," my dad responded, "Just the other day, your brother was telling me how much he liked it but that you liked it even more and I should definitely leave it to you in the will."

"I don't know what to say." I didn't know what to say.

"Isn't it great, how all three of us appreciate the same sculpture. You know, I have an idea?"

"Bury it deep underground so it doesn't become a point of contention between your children?"

"No, I'll get in touch with the artist and commission one for each of you. I plan to be around for awhile, and I hate to deprive you both of sculptures you like."

"Great?"

"And you know what else is neat," my father continued, oblivous, "When you own a sculpture you can touch it, you can appreciate its feel. Come, feel this part, it's like coral..."