The Plague

'Twas a bad, bad couple of days, folks.

If you didn't know better, you'd think God had it out for the Houghs. Apparently we refused to release the Israelites from slavery. Who knows.

What I do know, friends, is that there are twelve or thirteen of the Houghs/Waites who have fallen ill over the last three days, and the degree of ailment ranges from violent bouts of vomiting, to headaches, to just plain 'not feeling good.'

What caused this plague upon our house? We're not entirely sure, but the fact of the matter is that nearly every, last relative that was over at my dad's house the day after Christmas for the annual Hough/Waite extended Christmas fell ill. Only my two nephews, Kris, and the Cannonball prevailed.

Everyone else got sick. What was crazy about this sudden onslaught of grossness was the fact that it didn't kick in until nearly 24 hours later. Allow me to backtrack some...

The morning after our clan celebrated the holidays, my old compatriot Seloske drove up to Clare to pick me up. He was to transport me back down to Kalamazoo for a Sausage Pad reunion with the members that still resided in the general area, and we were both looking forward to a day of bar-hopping and revisiting the ol' stomping ground of our college years.


Once we rolled into town, I had to swing by a T-Mobile store and pick up a new phone. My old Blackberry Pearl Flip had been a reliable sidearm for the last two years, but had lately fallen into the habit of dying on me. A full night's charge would last me four hours, and that would be without even using the damn thing. Obviously, the phone had to be destroyed, and so I had to take it out back and give it the Ol' Yeller treatment.

My replacement was the HTC MyTouch 4G, which runs Android and is arguably smarter than I am.

I haven't figured out how to operate the Holo-deck or activate the Teleportation device, but the user manual seems pretty straight-forward, so I'm sure it's only a matter of time.


Anyway, after we picked up my new super-phone, we headed to Zack Smith's bachelor pad. From there, it was off to Bell's brewery downtown, where we had a few lunch beers and passed the time staring at all the young, bearded hipsters that love to frequent establishments like Bell's and wear corduroys and sports coats.

Seriously, what's up with young guys wearing beards now - is this a new trend? Young dudes sporting beards hasn't been popular since the '60s, and before that, the Civil War - are we really doing this again?

I wore a pretty bitchin' beard towards the end of my service in Africa, and it sure as hell looked way sweeter than the ones I saw at Bell's.


Maybe its time for a good ol' fashioned Beard-Off. I'd take those jerks to school, for real.

Anyway, after Bell's Beardo Emporium, we met up with Smitty at another bar, Shakespeare's, and had a few more drinks before heading back to Zack's for the annual bout of Risk.

The plan for the night was to bar-hop between a few different places - Bilbo's, BW3s, Waldo's, and a couple other places I can't remember the name of - meeting up with my cousin, Mackenzie, some of our old collegiate associates, and people Smith and Smitty worked with.


...but that didn't happen.

By the time we got to the first bar, I wasn't feeling well. We were at this first bar for, say, two hours, and during that period of time I had two pints. That's it. Nothing crazy. My stomach was pissed, and I had heartburn so bad it felt as if a knife was lodged in my chest. Couple that with a whopping four hours of sleep the night before (thanks, daughters), and I was not the Broam K. that once tromped across Kalamazoo like a Viking Berserker.

The next two stops weren't any better, and so the rest of the long, drawn-out, horribly uneventful evening was spent sick as a dog and pissed that such a rare and fine opportunity for old school shenanigans was wasted.

If that wasn't enough, the next day after Smith drove me back up to Clare, I returned only to find our entire clan in shambles. Everyone was sick. I don't know if you guys are aware of this thing called 'salmonella.' Its gross. I never really hung out around raw chicken, so I was kind of curious as to how it had decimated our family. As of right now, I think it's been narrowed down to a plate that my Aunt Lucy made and brought to dinner, but who knows.


I had intended to go out to the Doherty to hang out with the old high school crew - Trevor, Grit, Sean, Lee, etc. - but had to force myself out the door. After a couple hours and a couple drinks, I had to return to my dad's house... at 9:30pm.

I don't think I've returned home that early from going out with friends since I was in 5th grade.

The following morning, it was time for the Houghs to once again brave I-75. It was time to venture southbound in our Tactical Family Transport Vehicle. This time, however, we were traveling as a bunch of sick people... so morale, to say the least, was far from high...

To be continued...

- Brian

Christmas 2010

Christmas 2010 was a whirlwind, but we prevailed.

I 'd go into a long-winded shpeel about each, individual family Christmas celebrated - the Jordan/O'Conner/Laginess Christmas, the Hough Christmas, the Congleton Christmas, and the Hough/Waite Christmas - but it'd take forever, and no one outside our family would find any of it amusing. Nay, readers, instead, I figured I'd direct you here, and give you a quick glimpse into our hurried tour de force throughout mid-Michigan. Not quite a relaxing, White Christmas, but time with the family - as chaotic as it can be at times (and it often is with our family) - is always welcome.

Looking forward to the madness next year. Definitely.

Enjoy.

New Ink, Vol. II

Hi players,

So, once again, a trip back home to Michigan for Christmas meant my brother Chris and I were off to get more ink done at Intricate Decor in Mt. Pleasant.

Last year, I had the Hough family coat of arms done on my the inside of my left forearm, while I had a shamrock and the Gaellic word for 'Cannonball' done on the inside of my right.

When I had those designs done last year, I knew there was additional work that needed to be done in order for either sleeve design in order to look right. Not being one who flips through a design board at a Tattoo parlor and says "That Chinese symbol for 'strength' is sweet - I want that on my arm!," I decided that I needed to put some research into what - and how - I was going to go about adding to my existing designs.

I figured that since Alayna's design was prominently Irish, Abby's should be prominently Saxon English. That's both sides of the family's ethnic background right there.


I came up with a design for an Irminsul and had that done directly below Cannonball's existing Shamrock on the inside of my right forearm. Then, in order to match the existing design, I had Athas Athar, which is Gaellic for 'Father's Joy' (the meaning of Abigail) added across the top.

The right arm isn't done - I don't necessarily care for three, individual and independent designs in succession down the forearm. I'd much rather have them blended together into something, and that, dear readers, will probably be next year's installment.

The left arm this year was, once again, the bulk majority of my time in the chair. I had laurels added to the outside of the existing coat of arms, as you can see here:



...and then had a band done around my left bicep of an Anglo-Saxon design taken of a 7th century Saxon shield that was unearthed in England, close from where the Hough family originated. Designs like this were engraved into weapons and armament in order to bring good fortune to those that carried them into combat, and are unique to the native English people.

Usually, when it comes to bands like this, you see folks get something Celtic, but I wanted something that more accurate to our family's background. Besides, that Celtic crap is played out for me... everybody does it.

Kris had some work done this time around as well, and she, too, opted to add to existing work. She has an Ankh at the small of her back, so she had meanings of both girls' names (Alayna - peace, Abby - joy) added in Gaellic on either side. She's pretty happy with what she had done, but, unlike yours truly, I think she's done with the whole tattooing thing from here on out.


While she was getting her work done, Chris, Jenna and I got to drive across town and check out a record store that just popped up in Mt. Pleasant, wherein I managed to snatch up 26 records for $10. The store was pretty small, and the selection wasn't that great, but the prices were great, and I was able to fill in a few holes in my record collection, while also picking up some rarities (Dukes of Dixieland?! Booya!). Not as great a score as the sort one can obtain during, say, the Hunter's Creek Community Garage Sale, sure - but still not too shabby at all.

- Brian

Back in the Mid

Well gang, we're home. We finally made it up and into the Mid... though frazzled, smelly, strung out, and spent.

From the bowels of Ohio, we managed to reach Mom and John's house just before noon, so we ended up making decent time up that last stretch of I-75. Lot of this has to do with the whole 'second win' thing: once you hit the Michigan border, and are out of that aforementioned crap-hole state, the drive isn't so bad anymore. You're on home ground, and the nostalgia of passing familiarity is more than enough to distract you from the fact that you've been on the road for two, horrifying days.


Mom's house has been awesome so far. Spare rooms were set up for both Kris and I as well as the girls, so that we were able to dump our luggage and relax.

Alayna got to play with a snowman, make some Christmas cookies, and engage in other seasonal activities that she was too young to enjoy last year when we were up. She's become a pretty big fan of snow since she's been up here.

...she doesn't have to drive in it herself, so that probably helps some.

My Grandma and Grandpa Chinery swung over from Saginaw and were able to visit with their great-grandchildren for awhile, which was cool (as they don't get to see our kids much), and we got to hang out in front of a fireplace throughout the day. Low-key and slow-paced, unlike the previous 48 hours.


Awesomeness.


Lt. Jeff and his newly-acquired wife, Annie, also rolled into town around the same time we did, so we were able to see him for a bit (though not for very long, as he had some crap luck with his flights due to that nasty weather the East Coast is dealing with right now). They had to head back out to Virginia pretty early, as Jeff can't be over a certain distance from Langley AFB for a long duration of time (however that works, I don't know), but a short visit with Maverick's better than nothing.


Abby finally got to meet Santa Claus, too... which proved to be a little more of a pain in the ass than we would've preferred. We took her to that Santa's House in downtown next to the courthouse in Midland (yes, evidently the beloved fellow resides in Midland, MI. during the peak season). A pretty cool set-up downtown for a fat, old volunteer dressed up like Santa Claus having strangers' kids sit on his costumed lap.


'Tis the season.


Of course, before we got to see this magical gentleman, we had to endure a hellish outdoor line through biting winds and freezing temperatures. The line itself wasn't so long, per se, but this ended up being somewhat of an optical illusion of sorts. Those brave souls that stood in line alongside us were really only the tip of the iceberg: they were, in fact, only those hardy enough to hold their party's space in line. As soon as they approached the front of the line, their numbers would swell, lengthening up the line as their much larger entourages emerged from their positions in nearby, heated vehicles.


Probably a smart move on their part, but it pissed us off not knowing how long the damn line was.


Anyway, it took about an hour before we finally got to meet Mr. Claus, and the result was to be expected: Abby was oblivious to the whole thing, and probably mistook the volunteer dressed up as Santa for me or Kris, while the Cannonball writhed and wailed in terror until she was released from his jolly, plump grasp. A few hurried pictures were snapped, if only to assure future generations that we were decent parents back in the day, if only for having our children sit on a fake Santa's lap during the 2010 holiday season.


Hooray for us.


I managed to dump off some records to Chris and Jeff this weekend, too. Both have recently taken up the celebrated Hough family past time of collecting vinyl LPs. Now, I myself love collecting records - love it - and, as you'll remember, recently got my hands on 187 of 'em during the Fall Hunter's Creek Community Garage Sale. After I picked out the ones I had, I boxed up the ones I already owned - as well as the ones I just didn't want - and brought them up in the trunk of the van for Chris and Jeff.

Surprisingly enough, neither one of them went for the Streisand.


We head to my Dad's house in Clare tomorrow, for this birthday, and then proceed from there onto future Christmas shenanigans with Kris' family, my Dad's side of the family, my Mom's side of the family, and ultimately our collective high school and college friends. This year's going to entail driving around a lot, shuffling our kids around like child traffickers, and constantly living out of suitcases, but it's a small price to pay in order to see all of our people and fully enjoy the holidays.

It's good being back in the Mid.

- Brian

The Houghs vs. I-75, Pt. I

It's been a hell of a 36 hours, folks.


We're currently at a Super 8 motel about an hour north of Dayton, Ohio. It smells like stale cigarette smoke and unwashed buttholes, and the four of us don't smell any better after being stuck in the van for the last day and a half. As we take turns bathing and changing into clean clothes, allow me to spin a yarn about what the Houghs have been through on I-75 thus far...


Yesterday after work, I drove home and began locking up the house and packing up last-minute items (Kris had been loading up the van throughout the day, so by the time I got back it was practicaly done). Unfortunately, we couldn't find the charger for the GameBoy Advance SP, which meant we could only play the damn thing for the duration of its charge (not cool for a 24 hour trek in the car).

We set off out of Orlando around 6pm, and, with the exception of having to watch Finding Nemo back to back, it was smooth sailing all the way out of Florida into Georgia. We had reserved a room at a Super 8 Motel in a town an hour north of Atlanta, and we were making pretty good time so we were anticipating pulling in for the night around 2am.

When we got about 10 miles away from the motel - where showers, beds, and television awaited us - disaster struck. A back-up on I-75 had caused a gridlock miles deep, all caused by two semi-trucks which had crashed into each other around 5pm that evening. There was evidently 'freezing rain,' which had caused the two trucks to smash into each other and cause a complete shutdown of I-75 from 5pm, when the accident happened, to 2:3oam, when the Houghs arrived on the scene. We saw absolutely no rain, nor ice, to speak of, and knowing that our motel was only ten miles away (literally, the next exit), was torture.

We were stuck in our van, lodged between several semis, for three and half hours. Both girls were hysterical, as they couldn't fall asleep in the van, and Kris and I were exhausted and pissed from having to put them through such hell when our motel was ten miles away. Eventually, after we watched Finding Nemo and Frosty the Snowman a few more times, Alayna managed to fall asleep on my chest in the back seat, while Abby slept on the floor of the van between the two pilot seats.

Sometime around 5am, we started moving again. For about an hour, we were chugging along at a solid 10mph, and then traffic slowly started to return to normal. After a series of failed attempts at finding a place to stay at the next exit (even our reserved motel was filled up - they gave away our room due to our no-show, and only refunded our money when we threw a tantrum), we continued north until we came to a rest stop south of the Tennessee border. There, we all took a two-hour power nap in the van before, once again, setting off on ol' I-75.

Driving through Tennessee and Kentucky is a lot easier than Georgia. Georgia is boring, and I'm convinced there's something in the water down there that makes folks retarded. While the mountain folk of Tennessee and Kentucky are by no means the scholarly sort, their mountains sure are scenic, so driving through them is a little easier on one's stamina behind the wheel. The road conditions were beginning to worsen, but being seasoned winter drivers (from a land where 'winter' means mountains of snow, and not a 2-inch dusting that creates miles of back-ups on a major interstate), it wasn't anything Kris and I couldn't handle.


Having cleared the mountains (after some confusion as to how far along we were, what state we were in, etc. etc.), we broke into the "Butthole of the U.S.A." (Ohio) and really got into crap driving conditions. It wasn't so much the weather, per se, but instead the fact that our windshield wiper fluid sprayer-thing stopped spraying windshield wiper fluid. Completely. That meant that the accumulation of salt and grime from the roads made visibility next to nothing, so these last four or five of driving were pure hell.


And that brings us to Bumblescum, Ohio, where we're currently hosing down and decompressing from what has been a pretty typical adventure up I-75.

Here's hoping the last five hours up to Midland go well...

- Brian

Abby's 1st Christmas (Observed)

Well, with Black Friday over with, despite the holiday season going into the final stretch, things have been relatively laid back and calm around here lately. As I told you folks before, we've been over and done with 95% of your holiday shopping for over a month, so with the exception of Black Friday and a few random items Kris picked up while braving the morning's madness, we haven't had to pick anything else up.



We're leaving for Michigan in three days. Once I get out of work on Wednesday, I'm going to head back to the house, we're going to do a once-over of the house making sure everything's locked up and shut off, and we're going to set out for northern Georgia where we've reserved a hotel room (my goal is to get there by 2am).


Seeing how our trip is a few days off and all, we've been preparing like crazy for the two days in a car with a toddler and an infant. I've created a few different custom DVDs for the girls in order to keep them occupied on the road, made up of all the old school, classic Christmas specials from back in the 80s. Old Disney cartoons, the Muppets, Sesame Street, etc. The usual. We're bringing a case full of movies for them, too - Disney movies, SpongeBob, Yo Gabba Gabba, Christmas classics, etc.



I'm being an optimist and am also throwing in the Indiana Jones and original Star Wars trilogies, as well as the Arrested Development series... but more likely than not I'm never going to get a chance of watching them.



Anyway, seeing how we're leaving in a few days for a slew of family Christmases, we opted to have our own, immediate family Christmas at home with the girls. Something low key that would prevent us from having to haul all of our presents for the girls all the way up to Michigan just to turn around and bring them all the way back.

That would've been stupid.

So we had the girls open up their stockings and their gifts from us. Abby probably didn't know anything was out of the ordinary when she got up in the morning, but Cannonball sure enough freaked out when she saw everything under the tree. Always cool to see kids have fun celebrating the true meaning of Christmas...




Kris and I, according to Hough tradition, exchanged this year's annual Christmas ornaments. Every year since we came back from Shittsville (a.k.a. Ghana), we've bought each other a Hallmark ornament for our tree. At first, this came from necessity, as we had no ornaments ourselves and were in need of building up a collection.

Now, as we've abolished our Charlie Brown Christmas tree to Hades and have upgraded to a fancy, taller tree, we're still in need of additional ornaments to fill in all the new space. This year, I got Kris a UNICEF ornament (fitting her personality), and she got me a Muppets ornament (fitting to my personality). Everybody wins.

I had no idea a two year old could take so long opening presents. We were sitting on the floor in front of that stupid tree for a solid two hours opening gifts.


As can be expected, the boxes the presents came from were as big a hit as the gifts themselves... and every time a gift was opened, it had to be played with and mauled until one of us tore it away from them and kept the gift-giving momentum going. This isn't a huge deal if one kid's doing it, and everybody else has stuff to open, but after awhile it all came down to two adults waiting on a two year old to open her next gift, while the 7 month old shoved copious amounts of wrapping paper in her mouth.


Abby didn't get a whole hell of a lot to open Christmas morning (observed) from us this year (no offense, kid). Like I said before, we put about 80% of the money we spent on her this year directly into her credit union savings account. Maybe not a 'fun' thing to do, but she's got all of Alayna's old crap lying around the house, and all she wants to do with anything anyway is shove it in her mouth and drool all over it.

Did I mention she's sitting upright now? Pretty sure I did. Anyway, she's sitting up now. Falls down a lot, and she's hit her head so much I'm pretty sure I can safely rule out medical or law school in this girl's future, but she is sitting up. Huzzah.


Alayna's main gift from us, that Fisher Price iXL thing I was talking to you about before (think iPad for toddlers), was a pretty big hit. It's a complex, little piece of hardware, but she seems to already have the jist (gist?) of it. She's been raised around cell phones, iPods, and the like, so she's probably more proficient than most when it comes to handheld electronics.

...I don't know if that's really, really cool or really, really lame.

Yulin',

- Brian

Attack of the Christmas Beast

Well gang, it's coming down to go-time. The Christmas season is upon us, and - if you're a department store or the Dollar General by our house - it has been since, oh, late August or so.


We here at the Houghs always try and hold back the Christmas Beast as long as we can, lest we get sick of Santas and Christmas Trees and all things Yule well ahead of December 25th. This year was no exception, but - and I take full responsibility for this - we caved a little early this year. Usually, we put up our tree the day after Thanksgiving (the day commonly referred to as 'African American Friday'), but this year we threw it up a week early.

'Cause we're suckers.

While I will take the majority of the blame for this early pounce on 'the season fo' pleasin',' I think Home Depot and my school should incur some, small degree of accountability. My school gives us a full week of vacation for Thanksgiving. That's right, a full week. This means that as the holiday fervor begins to rise to a boil, Yours Truly is sitting around a non-decorated house, feeling the Christmas Beast breathe down his neck. The last two years, I've put up the interior house decorations the week leading up to Thanksgiving, with the tree itself going up the following day. As was to be the plan this year, too.

Home Depot had other plans.

Now, since we've been married, Kris and I have had to get by with a 6 ft, artificial Christmas tree that we picked up at Family Dollar. We have to string the lights on ourselves, and every year it just looks like pure hell. Seriously.

Remember Charlie Brown's sad, little Christmas tree? Remember that.

Yup.

Anyway, every year I declare I'm going to acquire a new, pre-lit Christmas tree, and every year it doesn't happen. Either they're too expensive or else we can't find anything worth getting (as was the case last year). This year, though, we found an early Black Friday special at Home Depot - a multi-colored, 7 1/2 ft., full-sized, Aspen spruce. Lots of tips, lots of lights, and retailing for $200... but we got it for $120.

Seeing how we had this awesome tree sitting in a box in our living room, we said 'what the hell' and threw the damn thing up early. 'Tis the season. The Cannonball loved the whole process of putting up the tree, and we had our parents oh hand via Skype, so it was a good time. Of course, we had to set up the tree so that all the hard-to-break, crappy, cheap ornaments were towards the bottom of the tree, and in the kids' reach, while the over-priced, Hallmark ornaments were higher up and safe from inquisitive fingers

Now, while decorating and Yule-spreading is frowned on before Thanksgiving, gift-getting and holiday shoppitude is most certainly not. No, the Houghs start buying Christmas gifts in late October/early November... because we're really, really smart.

Who the hell waits until December to start buying gifts for people? Seriously?! Why face those throngs of morons and crowds of 'crap, I gotta find this!' shoppers in malls and department stores, when one can easily just sit at home and purchase gifts online via Amazon or Target or eBay or what-have-you?

This year, we started picking out things for our daughters via Amazon, and began whittling away at those gifts in October. As of now, we're 100% done with Christmas shopping for the girls. Completely. If there's anything left to pick up, it'll be an impulse buy Kris picks up on African American Friday (because, being completely insane, she's still insisting on going out and braving the hordes at 4am).

Alayna was, by far, the easier of the two kids to shop for. Abby's more or less getting the money we'd otherwise be spending on buying her more toys deposited directly into her savings account. She has all of Alayna's mountain of old toys to play with, and there's really nothing she needs from us.

The Cannonball, however, is getting to an age where the toys we buy for her need to be more complex and challenging. Since Kris and I are both teachers, we really push reading, writing, and drawing with her, so I put some research into the highest quality toys available on the market that could assist her in further developing her reading and writing skills (phonetics, grammar, composition, etc.).

What we decided to buy her this year for her main gift was the Fisher Price iXL Learning System. Think of it as an iPad for toddlers. You can download various software programs onto it, you can upload your own mp3 audio files, your own pictures, and custom design the interface to fit your kid's personality. It's an e-reader, a hand-held gaming system, and mp3 player, and a picture-viewer all-in-one. You can draw, practice writing, listen to jams, view pictures, play games, and read books using a stylus and touch-screen.

If it sounds like I'm trying to sell this thing, it's because I seriously think this is the coolest kid's toy I've ever seen. If you're interested in learning more, check it out yourself. I'd highly recommend it for your own kids if they're gentle with electronics (Alayna's uses Kris' iPod Touch all the time and is knows how to handle and use it).

In closing, we're going home to Michigan this year for Christmas, and are once again making the 1300-mile trek via Tactical Family Transport Vehicle (i.e. 'mini-van'). We'll keep you posted as we develop our plans regarding this most perilous of ventures.

Stay tuned.

- Brian