"Question The Answer"

A fellow blogger "tagged" me a few weeks ago with a pop quiz of sorts, and I've been putting off doing it ever since. In my defense, I've been furiously Craigslisting some of my extra guitar gear, and I managed to scrape enough together to buy a decent tube amp and have been spending a bit too much time playing my guitar in the evenings.

So, after much delay, here are my answers to the three most crucial issues in the entire world (yeah, us stay-at-home dads tackle some world-changing stuff):

1) What was your biggest surprise when you became a parent?

At no point during the official discussions concerning pregnancy did I ever assume that I'd be the one staying at home "raising" the offspring instead of being out in the working world and bringing home the bacon (bits)—nor was it ever discussed as a posibility. Unexpected though it was, I have enjoyed my now-numbered days of lounging around the house, playground-hopping and swapping rump roast recipes with the neighborhood gals (hey-ohhhh!!).

2) Name some things you vowed you'd never do, but find yourself doing now.

I didn't exactly take a "vow," per se, but I somehow convinced myself that I wouldn't have to change dirty diapers—ever. I vaguely recall Stacey including this perk in her pitch to get pregnant, and, like a sucker, I fell for it. I did manage to abstain from changing the brown trout-filled diapers until Connor was eating solid food. But, in hindsight, it would have been immeasurably smarter to have started changing the diapers when they didn't smell like a turd covered in burnt hair—if I may steal a line from Anchorman.

3) What's the one thing you thought you would do, but actually don't?

Does "be financially stable" count? I never would have imagined, after Stacey's thoroughly researched PowerPoint presentation on why we should get pregnant, that we'd still be in financial and professional transition nearly four years (come August) after this process first started. After grad school, internship and post-doc fellowship, we might finally be moving toward stability, but by now, I've quit thinking too much about it. My goal now is to be able to afford to send Connor to high school—maybe.