I just reached into my pants pocket hoping to scrape together enough coin for lunch. What I found wouldn’t buy a bag of honey mustard and onion Nibblers (mmmmm, honey mustard and onion Nibblers), but it did get me thinking about what its like being the father of two girls, age 2 and 6.
Here’s the inventory:
- Three cartoon character stickers: Swiper, Tinker Bell and Nemo. I have no idea who Swiper is. He appears to be a larcenous fox. Not sure what message that sends to kids. Maybe Swiper and the Hamburglar can get together and go on a good ol’ rip-roarin’ bloody crime spree.
Tinker Bell needs no introduction. Disney is starting a big marketing campaign around Tink, which is just fine with me. You know those racy adult Halloween costumes that everyone’s talking about? My favorite would be the naughty Tinker Bell, which is kind of redundant.
Nemo was a perfectly fine movie, but I didn’t love it. I always thought it was dreamed up by Disney marketers, who then called in a couple of hacks to toss together a leaving-the-nest plot. A hyper-cute tropical fish makes for hyper-popular merch. That’s what was so great about Shrek. I’m sure the marketers wanted to Nemo-ize the ogre a bit.
- Two Band-Aids. Young kids love Band-Aids. A sure way to stop the tears after a knee scrape, is to say "That’s going to need a Band-Aid." Then I would bring out these Band-Aids, but my kids would be psychologically damaged because they don’t have Nemo all over them.
- Some kind of cardboard game piece with the picture of a bear on it. I’m pretty sure it’s Corduroy the bear, but I have no idea what game it comes from. I probably found it somewhere completely improbable, like the refridgerator, and stuffed it in my pocket in case it’s the crucial missing piece from my kids’ favorite board game. Years from now, on my death bed, having never taken this game piece out of my pocket, it will be my Rosebud. Corduroy, Corduroy...
- Three hair clips, various styles. One is an elastic. One is a fancy bobby pin with a flower on one end. One is a cheap plastic clip. The Register once did a story on a local salon teaching dads how to handle their daughter’s hair. I thought that was a great idea, because my greatest failure as a father thus far is my inability to get these damn hair clips to stay in place. Which is why, when you see me out with the kids, they look like the Nick Nolte mug shot.
There you have it. I guess you can tell a lot about a person by what they have in their pockets. I just wish I had another quarter, because I really want some Nibblers. Honey mustard and onion.