A Very Ninja Christmas

It's been nice having some of the family over for Christmas, but it's also good that I can rest a little now. I put on about 10 lbs over the past few days from stress-eating. Since most of my family is in Florida or NY (and until now I have lived in a 450 sq foot studio), I would always go there for Xmass. This is the first time I have had people over to my place for the holidays. This is stressfull enough, but my house is only half finished and there were waaaaay more people than I am used to here. My brother's youngest kid is really cute but a handfull. He really stresses me out when he drops chairs (or spills coke) on my new hardwood floors, but my brother said not to tell him NOT to do something, because it will just encourage him to do it more. (this seems like a strange theory, but it's his kid, so what the hell?).


Here is a picture of the culprit. He's got a little too much energy, if you ask me. I don't think ritalin would help him. Maybe some valium would do him some good though.





Although from looking at him when he's sleeping, you would never know how high strung he is.






They left to spend New Years at my aunt's in NY, so the first thing I did when they left was to take a long, much-needed nap. My dad and brother ended up doing a LOT of work with me over a few days that they were here and to be honest we got more done than I normally would've done in a month (pics to follow).

His older son reminds me of myself when I was 15 (lazy and bad at fixing things). My brother yells and berates him when he does something wrong, just like my dad did to me when I was his age. This is typical of what went on when we were installing the wood floors. (We'll call my brother the Fat Ninja, because if I use his real name, he might sue me someday)

Me: Why don't you let your son use the flooring nailer so he learns how to install the floor?

Fat Ninja: Because when he screws it up, it will take me 10 times as long to fix it.

Son: Thanks, dad!


This is what is was like when I was his age:

[Dad installing drywall]

Ninja: Can I try it?

Dad: Okay...but don't screw it up!

Ninja: Ummm, thanks for the vote of confidence, Dad.

[I try to screw in a piece of drywall, and there is a horrible grinding sound]

Dad: Give me that, you moron! Go unload some drywall from the delivery truck or sweep or something.


I'd like to think that I would use positive reinforcement on my kids, but my brother says I shouldn't. Traditions must live on! Besides, if it weren't for my father being so demanding, I probably wouldn't be a lawyer right now. I might be a drug dealer, a traffic cop, a politician or some other form of low life.*

Anyway, on the first day, my brother and I finished the hardwood in the living/dining room while Ninja Daddy added a coat of compound to even out the terrible drywall job that the fired contractor (Osni the Plumbing Monkey) had done. My dad has some type of preternatural ability with drywall compound. He could probably fix a car, repair the New Orleans Levees or bring about world peace with the stuff. He did the job better than I could (and a lot faster).

Well, I'll post some pics of the work little by little. I think too much got done to include it all in one post, plus I still have to play around with uploading the pics to Photobucket.com. I am uploading all my pics to Photobucket now, b/c my computer is acting up and may need to be repaired, or put out of it's misery. I thought iMacs were indestructable, but I guess I was wrong.


At any rate, here is a pic of the happy ninja clan. That's The Fat Ninja and wife, Daddy Ninja and his girlfriend, The Home Improvement Ninja and the Toolbelt Diva.






And here is a pic of the (almost finished) floor. I'll put some pics of the finished product in the next post. I still have to upload them and it takes me longer to do computer stuff than it does for me to do construction stuff (even on an iMac my computer skillz aren't great).


*The ninja is due for an appearance in Traffic court in a few days so he is bitter at traffic cops and politicians who write traffice laws right now.