A Chip Off the Old Crawling Chaos

I got nuthin'...I mean I got more nuthin' than mortgage-backed securities. But still, press ahead I must. Think, write, try to put something down, even though I don't have to, to keep the blog-fires burning.

So when all else fails, tell a story about your kids that only you would be interested in. Yeah! That's it! Tell some mundane story about something cute or cool or silly...

...or insidious...or evil...or chaotic...

So while frantically running through the house this morning trying to transition from the Mother's Day breakfast and presents in bed for the wife to getting ready to jump in the car and head south for an hour to meet everyone for brunch and talk about the same old shit I notice something is different. I can't say wrong, but different. It's coming from downstairs where we have our kids corralled by plastic gates and waiting for the inevitable departure among their toys and a Comcast channel blaring kids music.

It's a weird noise. Muffled, crunching, pounding...strangely musical. The running around, jumping and general destruction of the living room has stopped. Wondering what is going on, I cautiously approach the stairs. A voice...strangely monotone, as though reading from some ancient tome, comes drifting up the stairs in snippets. I grow afraid, wondering what sinister fate has befallen my spawn, or - worse yet - what sinister deeds they may be performing on some poor passer-by, who was just coming through this historic landmark for a Sunday morning walk. The swift, grinding, screaming sounds swell and invade my brain, almost inducing panic as I reach the bottom of the stairs, turn around, and behold the genesis of what I was certain was fueling a ritual I did not want to witness...


The oldest...who answers to a range of nicknames, is sitting between his sisters, The Songbird and Rocker-Girl, reading to them the sacred text of Archie and Jughead while the youngest, whom I have previously referred to as Chub-Niggurath, bounces and practices his newly-found jumping skills to the newly-found metal.

My firstborn looks up at my puzzled face, "What? It's metal. You know."

I smile. He has come a long way...his education is almost complete, and he has earned himself a new name, one that commands fear and respect for the path of insanity that he is ushering his younger siblings down. I will now call him Nyarlathotep.