So, Do You Like ... Stuff?

During a phone conversation with my dad, he mentioned that he and my mom had sent my wife a gift for her birthday. Did we get it? “I don’t think so,” I said. “I got the mail yesterday and there was nothing from you guys … and nothing at the front door either.” “Well, they said it should have arrived yesterday,” he said. (Note that “they” are my dad’s No. 1 news source. I don’t know who “they” are, but my dad trusts them even though their information is iffy. Last year my dad claimed that “they” had discovered that tilapia is not an actual fish, but a manufactured combination of fish parts, like a fish hot dog.) “You know how they are with those things.” Indeed, even considering how little I know about “they,” I do know how they are with these things (liars). Anyway, that was how we ended our conversation, with me telling him that I’d get in touch to let them know when she got the gift, which I totally would have forgotten to do if given the chance. In fact, I compl...

My parents weren’t supposed to visit this year. Instead, they were going to the Bahamas. For reasons that aren’t worth getting into but that involve a travel agent, an airline voucher, a healthy dose of miscommunication, and my Catholic deacon father fearing an influence of Rastafarian culture, the Bahamas turned into Jamaica, which immediately turned into Arizona. Still, my parents desired to get some sort of traditional vacation out of their annual visit. Something more extravagant, if you can imagine, than going to the same place for lunch for 10 days straight and watching Dateline NBC every night while drinking green tea before going to bed at 8:30. (Which, by the way, is exactly what they would do in the Bahamas.) As such, we all made a weekend getaway trip to the “Bahamas of the north”—Sedona. Sedona is seriously one of the most beautiful, weirdest places on Earth. My wife and I love going up there, and no matter how many times we do, the sheer beauty of the surroundings never...