My daughter digs the old school rap.

We’ve been told to play music for her which in this house, believe me, is not a problem. Her mother is practically a walking Disney album and may actually be the real Little Mermaid. I cannot sing, but I’m a federally licensed commercial broadcaster, which means I feel entitled to steal music off the internet.

Anyway, we’ve been through a wide assortment of genres and nothing moves her like old school beats. She likes Eric B and Rakim, she grooves on some Doug E. Fresh, and sheds a tear for ‘Pac. Sinatra, Zeppelin, Elvis… they matter not. This kid likes beats and drooling. Nothing more. She even tends to favor West Coast over East Coast, which blows my mind. I can barely tell the difference, and I speak roughly the same language the rappers do. How the hell is she figuring it out?

It’s more clear to me now than ever that she is a Native Californian, and there’s nothing I can do about it. While I will always be a South Sider, she will always be a California Girl. Lately, the Redhead and I have been talking of moving, because fuck Hollywood. Seriously, this place sucks. Choppers and drag races all night long… it’s madness, I tellz ya. But move where? I hate the 818. That’s where people go to have kids and picket fences and shit. You know: Squaresville. Do we willingly make our daughter a (gasp!) Valley Girl?

Yeah, probably.

The sounds my 6 week old daughter Fyona has made over the past few days have been described thusly:

1. A red colobus monkey.
2. The Vulture in Clash Of The Titans calling for Andromeda. (The original one. The REAL one.)
3. The Velociraptor in Jurassic Park calling for his buddy in the kitchen while hunting children.
4. Wayne Knight in Jurassic Park seeing the incubator/shaving cream can for the first time.
5. C-3PO doing Darth Vader’s breathing sound for the Ewoks.
6. Did anybody ever see the The Ewok Adventure? You know the little pixie that shows up before they go to the big cave? Skywalker Sound used a similar sound for Cherlindrea, the fairy queen of the forest in Willow, but there’s a subtle difference. Anyway, just like that.
7. Gollum.
8. Quint’s nails on the Amity City Hall chalkboard in Jaws.
9. Goofy’s holler.
10. Navi from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, but mainly just the hey!

It’s starting to get noisy up in this mug.

If you ask me, this parenting stuff is pretty easy so far. Sure, it’s messy (and smelly and exhausting and scratchy and wet and INSANE), but in the first month all a baby really does is sleep, eat, poop, and occasionally grumble. It’s kind of like having a pug.

But there are many things to do while the kid is too little to crawl away. Shots, vaccinations, and the ultimate preventative measure: Baptism.

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My mom is here. Here in Los Angeles. Here, as in sleeping on my couch a few feet from my daughter. My sister arrives in a few hours.

Let’s sum up: I, Tucker Blogs, Ruler of Australia, will be spending the next week in a one bedroom apartment with my mother, my wife, my sister, and my daughter.

Suddenly, the hammock on the patio looks beautiful. I opened the fridge to grab a beer, and accidentally clanked another bottle. The ripple effect caused by that sound not only woke up the baby, but alerted my mom and my baby mamma that I was drinking (and not including them). I quickly adjourned to the roof. Sometimes a man needs to get away… and given the crowd, I dare you to blame me.

The biggest issue we’re facing however, is what to call my mom. She has gone on record as hating the title, “Grandma.” My dad is ready to go as “Papa,” leaving the obvious partner title of “Nana” to my mom, but she won’t have that either. My dad’s parents were always “Nana and Papa” and my mom’s parents were always “Grandma and Grandpa,” but we pronounced it Nana (Nə-na, as in about). My mom decided after careful thought, that she would prefer Nana (Nă-na, as in and), stating that Peter Pan had a Năna, to which my sister (at a different time) immediately retorted, “yeah, the dog.” Mom later rescinded.

We don’t know what to call her. Dad is Papa, Sister is Aunty Itty (as in itty bitty Liddy), Brother is Nuncle Ned (too much to go into now), but what is to be the title of her father’s mother? Sure, Fyona’s about 18 days old, but we can’t wait for her to sound out some “mee maw goo ma” bunk, as is my mom’s plan. That’s at least 2 years away. I’m pushing Năna, since it seemed to last for awhile, and as of now, anything’s better than the current title, “Cheryl.”

Suggestions?

Okay…. that was a little scary. Actually, it’s one of the scariest things I’ve ever experienced, including watching the Exorcist while stoned in high school. That gave me nightmares for days. This I’ll never forget.

Fyona burped, and then Fyona was choking. Her color went from pink to red in moments, then she sneezed a big old snot ball and farted a White Castle caliber bomb. I grabbed her and started doing the burp maneuver, then immediately went to work with a nasal aspirator. She quickly calmed down, gave a little smile, and contentedly fell asleep. Mom and Dad stood over her frozen but with heart rates like hummingbirds for the next hour. Now I say, “immediately” when I refer to my life saving work (I saved MOM’s life; Fyona was always okay) with the aspirator, but that’s not accurate. We had to find it first. Lesson learned: keep that little bastard where it can be seen. 

Everything was okay, and we were right there to catch it. We remained collected and in charge during a crisis, even if that crisis was more in our heads than in reality. In retrospect I know that it actually wasn’t that scary of a scenario, but HOLY SHIT.

This is going to be one wild New Years Weekend.

We have been moved to the Britney Spears Room, a nice corner LDR with a view of Jerry’s Deli and a slightly larger couch for me to try and sleep on. As of this press time, I have been awake for 32 1/2 hours and we’re not even in official “labor.” It looks like Jerry’s Deli is hopping….

It’s also dawned on me that we’re not making the Christmas Due date. I was very excited to have my daughter share her birthday with White Sox Hall of Famer Nellie Fox, especially since my daughter is going to be the first female US President to play Short Stop for the White Sox. That’s a two pronged goal, by the way. Someone else may be the first female president, and someone else may break the gender barrier in MLB, but only my daughter will do BOTH. Well as it turns out, she is now in line to share a birthday with Carlton Fisk. This is… exceptional.

I hope I don’t have to look up birthdays for the 27th. Let’s do this!