There's this guy in his forties and his wife gets pregnant with twins and he builds an addition on their house but before he's done his wife has the babies and then he has to stay home and take care of the kids and finish the house and do a bunch of other stuff too. Also there's a really big dog with emotional problems.
Me: So, like, sometime late Friday, or maybe early Saturday? Is that what you're telling me?
Butterbean: I talk about--BABBIO!
Cobra: Bab-bi-o!
If anyone can tell me who the eff Babbio is and what I can expect of him as a houseguest, I'll give you a dollar.
My best guess is that these kids are budding absurdists, and Babbio is their Godot. He also may be Fabio's second cousin.
***
I made some other things on the interwebs this week. I will list them in their order of interestingness, "1" being "mind-blowing," and "5" being "meh."
It's been a really busy week, so that's why I haven't been able to post until now, Friday night, when nobody will read this. Oh, well.
Some of our best friends from the East Coast came to visit for a few days, so we did all kinds of fun family stuff with them; and in between and during our excursions I wrote posts for other sites, and tried to take care of some nagging "real world" issues as well. It was great to see our friends, and our girls loved hanging out with the "big kids," their grade-school age girls.
During most of the time our friends were here, we were able to relax, catch up, and let the kids entertain themselves. But every once in a while, worlds collided, and things got a little hectic. Our trip to Legoland, for instance, was a bit touch-and-go at times. (Of course, almost nothing could have spoiled the trip, since the admission was FREE, thanks to my friend Beth at San Diego MOMfia!)
This post is for the entertainment of readers who aren't deeply involved in the blogosphere. If you follow a lot of parenting-ish blogs, and especially if you went to the humongous BlogHer 11 conference, then you're probably sick to death of this story and you should go read something else. If not, I hope you will find it hilarious. I do.
BlogHer 11, which I attended for a number of reasons, not the least of which being it was staged five miles from my house, seems to have been a big success. About 3,000 people attended, probably 2960 of whom were women, and I haven't heard many complaints about the content of the actual conference.
It was a little weird being there as a dude; but in that respect, it was much like the first parent-blogging conference I went to, Mom 2.0, in New Orleans, which I wrote about here. I also wrote about some funny stuff that happened to me at BlogHer 11 here.
Let me just continue to preface this (I'll stop prefacing soon, I swear) by saying that the bloggers who are the main characters in this drama ("teh dramaz" in bloglish) are people I know(ish) and who have always been helpful and kind to me in any interaction I've had with them. So I'm not trying to bash on any of them.
For the last three years, the BlogHer conference has featured a big ol' throwdown called Sparklecorn, a dance party hosted by MamaPop, that pop culture site I briefly wrote for. Past Sparklecorns are the stuff of legend, and every year, they get more outrageous and extravagant.
This year, they hired a super-famous DJ, called DJ Skribble, to keep the mommyblogger rumps shaking.
But the centerpiece of the whole party was undeniably the EPIC cake, made by Charm City Cakes, which is on some TV show or something. Naturally, I failed to take a decent picture of this cake, and in fact it was kind of hard to see the damn thing in the low light of the party, so all I can do is share (without permission) this pretty crappy picture my friend took.
There was a time in my blogging life when I used to be coy about what city I lived in. Because, you know, I didn't want to end up like all those other parentbloggers who get stalked and harassed by rabid fans and psychotic haters.
I always just said I lived in Southern California, but not L.A. And my particular strain of snobbery made it clear that I would not have anything to do with Orange County. If anyone who knew the region ever thought about it for like 20 seconds or more, they would have realized that I live in San Diego. So now the cat's out of the bag. Please don't kidnap me.
I'm not from here, but I've lived here long enough to know what's up. So I would be remiss if I didn't set straight all my bloggy friends who will be descending on San Diego for the BlogHer 2011 "Mother of All Mommyblogging Conferences" on what to do and what to avoid while visiting "America's Finest City" (yep--that's our motto...or at least what it says on the sides of the cop cars).
History
Everything you need to know about the history of San Diaaahhgo can be found in the movie Anchorman.
Demographics
San Diego is actually a pretty big city (just over 3 million residents), but it's sprawling, so you don't feel like you're in a metropolis. People often call it "a city of neighborhoods." At least I think I've heard people say that. Anyway, they should say it, because it's true. There are dozens of different neighborhoods, and they each have a specific character. People can be pretty loyal, defensive, or even snobby about their neighborhoods, which is really stupid unless you happen to live within a 2-mile radius of my house, in which case you are perfectly entitled to feel superior to the poor chumps who live in the other, God-forsaken parts of town.
The city is pretty diverse ethnically, but the distinct neighborhoods also tend to keep people somewhat culturally segregated. This is kind of a shame on one hand; but it's also cool that there are certain blocks where most of the signs on the stores and restaurants are in Vietnamese, or Somali, or Korean.
Anyway, what do you care about the cultural landscape of San Diego? You're just coming here for a couple days.
I only bring this stuff up because what you will experience while hanging out in downtown San Diego (especially the Gaslamp Quarter) will not necessarily provide you with a good idea of what the city is like. You could very well leave town thinking that we are a city of douchebags and hussies, which would only be partially true.
In what follows, I'll give you some general advice for how to negotiate the myriad options this very fun city offers, a few specific suggestions, and some warnings that might save you both money and heartbreak. I'm assuming that you are only here for 4 days, tops, and that you don't have a car; so I'll leave out a lot of the popular and/or cool things that require a lot of time or travel.
