A Snail's pace

I'm really into teaching my children new things. I like the way their eyes light up when they discover an object or a new way of doing something. I think some of the most fascinating stuff is just in your backyard. Luckily, here in Glendale, we have quite a huge backyard.

Yesterday was our first Thanksgiving dinner here. As I was going to get the hose spout to wash down the outdoor furniture, I noticed a little snail crawling across the brick walkway in the backyard. S was out with me and she was playing with her tricycle in the driveway. I called her over to show her the snail and told her that it doesn't have a shell like the pictures she has seen in the books.

She was very interested in the little thing and asked me a bunch of questions. Then she said "...and we can't touch it because it's yucky." or something like that. I told her that she could touch it if she wanted to but then she'd have to go wash her hands. As she sat there on the walk, she extended her finger and touched the snail very gently. "Slimy eh". I agreed and told her to go wash up.

I then continued on toward the hose. The stupid nozzle was on too tight. So I went back into the garage and got a wrench. I went back to the hose, undid the nozzle, and walked back to the garage and put the wrench back.

As I was coming out of the garage, I realized that the snail was still on the path and I wasn't careful about NOT stepping on it when I was going back and forth. ... Just then, S came back from inside, having washed her hands. "Oor eh khekhounjuh". Flat as a pancake under my sneakers?

I told her that it had crawled into the lawn and had gone home. Upon investigating whereabouts of the snail, she came across the tail-end of its remnants. Oh, a little snail. Yup, but it's sleeping now, so don't wake it up.

I love my kids. They are both smart and personable. Above all, they love learning new things from their old man. Even if I tell them a white lie every now and then.

iPod-itty

I managed to upload all the 300+ CD's I had onto my iPod last year. It took me a while, but I was very pleased with the clutter that the iPod replaced. I have created a playlist for S and play it often for the kids. On occasion, I let the thing go nuts on random, playing jazz, rap, metal, and whatever else I have on there.

As background: I call S my little monkey. About a year ago, while the iPod was on free-flow mode, Brass Monkey by the Beastie Boys came on. Although not a song in her repertoire, S recognized the word "monkey" in the lyrics and took a liking to the song. Ever since, she asks for me to put on "Chunky Monkey" on the iPod. What happens is that I select "Licensed to Ill" and Brass Monkey and we proceed to dance to it.

Last night was another Chunky Monkey night, but this time S had her drum that she had made in pre-school. It's basically a formula can with some stuff that she glued on during their music session. So she starts banging on the drum, dancing and having a merry old time. Of course, I have to play the song at least 5 times, before it's ok for the random function to select the next song on the album.

The next song that came on was Girls. S told me to stop the music. As I did, she ran out of the room and I could tell she was rummaging in her room. I went after her to see what was up. She told me she's looking for her xylophone!!! Can you believe that? She likened the beginning notes of the song to a xylophone and wanted to play along. This kid's a genius, I tells ya.

For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about...


It makes a papa proud. sniff...

Brush with Greatness

I don't know if any of you remember the old David Letterman show on NBC. That was when he was on at 12:30 after Carson. He had some great skits with Chris Elliot and Larry Bud Melman. He also had a section, similar to Know Your Cuts of Meat, that he called Brush with Greatness but it was not scripted and people were more believable. It was basically people telling their stories of how they accidentally met someone famous, someone famous gave them the finger, so silly things like that.

So my brush with greatness occurred last Saturday night at the AYF reunion dance in Montabello. I was talking to a friend from the east coast, when this pudgy guy walks behind me and says hi to the person I was talking to. Then he keeps on walking. You know who the pudgy guy was? Ken Davitian. And for all of you who are too lazy to click on the hyperlink, he's Borat's sidekick.

So there you have it. I'm in LA less than 2 months and famous actors are saying hi to people that I'm chatting up. I know I'll be beating up the paparazzi staking my house soon. That's because Nicole Richi lives up the street from me. All I got in New York City was the bum on the stoop of the Russian church asking me for change every Saturday and Sunday. You've come a long way, baby!

For all you new readers of Armodad (there's at least 1 of you), if you didn't get the sarcasm in the above paragraph, please re-read it and roll your eyes as you're doing so. That should give you the full effect.

Drowning in "culture"

I have visited LA many, many times and I don't mean as a tourist. I had done grocery shopping, both at the chains as well as the mom & pop Arme stores. So it wasn't like I didn't know that shopkeepers and the people they hire converse in Armenian as their main trade language.

I have to preface this post by reiterating that I grew up on the east coast and, although fluent in Armenian, I conduct business in English. Unless I know that the person across the counter does not understand a word I'm saying. I get it that the person who has opened a deli and sells lavash or ghormeh sabzee may not necessarily be as comfortable with English as I.

But my recent experience at Supercuts has stuck with me. Like many people living in Glendale, I need to get my haircut from time to time. I don't need a fancy-shmancy salon to cut my hair. The Puerto Rican lady around the corner in NY did a great job and I figured Supercuts would be as good. Being new to the area, I looked up the nearest location on the web. Glendale Ave in Glendale (the double whammy), less than 3 miles from our home.

Let me back into the data here. Of the almost 200K residents of Glendale, 46% are non-white. If we then say that half of the rest are Armenian, we can safely asy that at least 25% of the city's population is Armo. Even simpler, if a while guy walks into you store, there's a 50-50 chance he's Armo.

So there I am walking into Supercuts and giving my REAL name. Odds are looking better for Supercuts lady to guess my ethnic origin. I get a copy of last decade's Sports Illustrated and start reading about how Lance Armstrong won the Tour de France.

"Armodad, jahn?"

I lookup, thinking that a friend/relative that I haven't seen since I was 8 has come into Supercuts and has recognized me. This was pre Halloween Freakout, but it could happen. It's the haircut lady! Quick, quick. Do I know this woman? Did she recognize me from my blog picture (LOL, ROTF)?

Nothing's registering. I get up and walk to the chair. She has obviously engaged me in Armenian, so what do I do? She asks me how I want my hair cut (in Armenian). I tell her number 3 on the sides and even out the top. I had to force it out in Armenian. What the hell?! I double check the sign on the door: "SUPERCUTS" not Armocuts, not Supermahz, nor anything like that. Whatever, go with the flow, dude. This is Cali...

Don't want to get into the conversation, but luckily it was minimal. I missed the Puerto Rican lady who speaks very little English. "You like numero tres on side. ¿No?" Then silence for 10 minutes. "okay". Love it!

The Supercuts lady actually does a good job, but she's not done. She takes a fistfull of jell and is coming towards me.

Armodad: No jell, please
Supercut Lady: No jell?
A: No
S: ok

She then wipes of most of the jell on a towel and then runs her fingers through my hair before I can say anything. I wonder if she would have done that if this had been NY, Boston OR if I was not Armenian. My guess is probably not.

What is up with that, people. Anyone care to comment?

Freaky Halloween story

Everyone has been telling us about Halloween on Kenneth Road. "It's huge!", "a big deal", "tons of people" they said. So I got 5 bags of candy instead of the usual 4. The 5th being a bag of Whoppers which I like. We're ready to go with S dressed as Cinderella and G as a frog. I decided to stay home and dole out the candy.

As a side note, Halloween is my least favorite commercial holiday. It's not because of the candy, the scary masks, or the death-centric theme of the whole day. It boils down to the fact that I'm a lazy bastard and don't want to get up every 2 minutes to answer the door bell. ESPECIALLY, when the older kids make no effort to get creative with their costumes; and I'm even less tolerant of the slackers who just show up with a pillowcase and a Freddy Kruger mask. At least wear a fucking striped shirt to show me you care. Horizontal stripes, you moron!!!

Kenneth Road on Halloween is like the Vegas strip on a weekend. No joke. A lot of scary/ugly looking people walking around with their kids. I even saw 2 Elvises (or is that Elvi). Needless to say we ran out of candy. I was going to go out trick-or-treating with S again just to get some more candy. Not to give out, silly, but to keep for me!

The road was packed. People drive here to go trick or treating. That's really lame! C'mon folks. Too cheap to make your own neighborhood attractive for ONE evening? So there are cars all over the place and this guy is blocking my driveway just as our guests are leaving. When I approach the car to ged rid of him, he says "Hey Armodad! How are you doing?" It's someone who I hadn't seen in over 10 years. We were good friends growing up in Boston, but then he moved away and I moved 3 times after that. What are the chances of that happening? Freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaky!

... OK, so he's Armo, too, and I now live in the middle (Northwest actually) of Armoville, CA. I suppose the odds aren't that off (7:5, maybe 5:3). Happy day after Halloween. Go wipe the chocolate off the keyboard.