Archive
Search every published Our Old Dad post by words, section, or year.
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- Ode to Assholes
Sometimes an asshole does you a favor by making you leave. I only had to cross a couple of ball fields to find somewhere better.
- Why Aren't You Complaining?
I've been called a complainer for most of my life. But I've also fixed a lot of problems. Why aren't more people complaining about what doesn't work?
- The Napkin
A fictionalized story from the early '80s, when a fraternity road trip became an exercise in terrible decisions, bad explanations, and trying not to laugh.
- Whose Garden Is It, Anyway?
I built a tropical garden, gave two Rottweilers the perimeter, and spent months trying to keep them out of the beds I'd put there.
- Straight Greats No. 6: Pink Floyd Had Four Perfect Albums in a Row
Pink Floyd made four perfect albums in a row from The Dark Side of the Moon through The Wall. Of those four monsters, Animals is still the one I pick.
- I Hate Everything but I Need the Money
Forty years after cheering for overtime at Andersen Consulting, I’m staring at the same old bargain: I hate what success seems to require, but I still need the money.
- Don’t Shoot Me. These Handcuffs Keep Falling Off.
Toy manufacturers spent nearly a century making handcuffs safe for children. The NBI apparently went one step further.
- The Five Years Before I Was Born
A five-year musical constraint turned into 150 songs, a classroom math idea, and proof that old music was never one genre.
- Straight Greats No. 5: The Rolling Stones Had Six — and the Weird One Counts
The Rolling Stones made six straight great albums from Their Satanic Majesties Request through Goats Head Soup: five Certified, one On the Edge, and the weird one counts.
- How the Straight Greats Scorecard Works
The rules behind Straight Greats: what counts as a skip, how the three badges work, where a streak begins and ends, and why the argument belongs at track level.
- Straight Greats No. 4: The Cult — Three Great Reincarnations Before They Fucked It Up
The Cult made three nearly perfect albums by becoming a different band each time—then Kurt slept through their peak from the front row.
- Straight Greats No. 3: R.E.M. and the Years I Was Lost
Three R.E.M. albums arrived at three moments when I was lost. Two clear the line clean; one survives a single strange, irritating detour.
- Straight Greats No. 2: Aerosmith Had Six
Aerosmith's first six albums all clear the line. The last two only felt like letdowns because the first four had made the band an eleven-year-old's main connection to rock and roll.
- One Senior, One Child, and a Two-Year-Old
At sixty-one, taking a four-year-old and a two-year-old to the pool gives strangers a small social problem to solve.
- Straight Greats No. 1: Radiohead
Radiohead opens Straight Greats with The Bends, OK Computer, and Kid A: three consecutive albums, three different versions of the band, and three Certified skulls.
- We Weren't Going to Tell Her So Soon
Raven recognized me in an old classroom photo. Then she pointed at the twelve-year-old Korean boy beside me and asked if that was her.
- Did I Shit Myself?
A suspicious smell follows an old dad and two kids into the library, where a diaper investigation, two staring babies, and one attractive mother prove almost nothing.
- There Was No Ned
One drunk flight from Boston, one invented stranger named Ned, and a prank that kept working long after it should have fallen apart.
- Not Everyone Should Teach
You can't coach a kid past your own ceiling. Grad school showed me the uncomfortable part: the profession will defend people who can't clear its own basic tests.
- A Message for Louis
Thirty years ago, Louis showed me that you can draw an absolute line without needing hatred to hold it in place.
- Joe Walsh: 34 Songs and a Familiar Kind of Crazy
A Joe Walsh playlist brought back a strange stretch of Chicago radio, Caribou Ranch, and a catalog whose writing gets better the closer I listen.
- My Friends Had Oregano
In 1983, I flew to Hawaii with a fake Kentucky license, handed a hundred dollars to two strangers, and somehow ended the week with the stash. My friends had oregano.
- The ’83 Hawaii Playlist
Forty-five songs from a 1983 senior-class trip to Honolulu. They still do not sound like 1983 to me. They sound like Hawaii.
- Not Satisfied
My wife remembers fish-head soup. My family history is full of people who looked at the life prepared for them and refused to call it enough.
- Supporting Characters
Most people do not get remembered the way the story says they should. A reflection on invisible help, supporting roles, and the hard peace of never knowing which part was yours.
- Closer to Nomadland Than I Want to Admit
Watching Nomadland again exposed the fear beneath our slow-travel plan: not the van or the road, but being stranded when luck runs out.
- Google Almost Killed Us
A wildfire closure, a phone route toward Black Bear Pass, and a family pickup learning that possible and reasonable are not the same thing.
- The Pace Rule: We Are Not Dragging Two Kids Through the World
Slow travel only works if the pace protects the family: long bases, limited move days, local rhythms, and enough slack for kids to stay steady.
- None of Those Roads
A couch, a little blue bus, two laughing kids, and the old-dad math of regret: every smarter road would have missed the moment in front of me.
- The Weather Filter: Why Most Great Destinations Fail Before We Even Pack
A slow-travel weather filter for choosing places where daily life works instead of fighting heat, cold, rain, smoke, and the wrong road setup.
- The Constraint System That Will Pick Our Next Places
A slow-travel plan only works if the places survive real constraints: weather, housing, safety, pacing, internet, visas, money, and kids.
- Slow Travel: The Mission
An old dad, a seven-year runway, two young kids, and the plan to build a slow-travel life instead of rushing through the world.
- Everything Is Not Yet Lost
A quote found on a messy desk becomes a way to interrupt the grievance reflex and return to the person in front of me.
- What if I don't?
A podcast let the doubt back in, and the fear finally turned over: leaving wasn't the gamble. Staying was.
- Sure You Will
A 1989 sidewalk promise, a friend calling bullshit, and the useful trap of saying the thing out loud before I'm ready to back it up.
- The Purple Scooter Walk
Xander is two. The plan was a few minutes of scooter practice in front of the house. He had a different plan, and it ended a mile away at the park.
- 1985: The Wrong Algorithm
A 1985 playlist becomes a Purdue time capsule about analog college life, wrong lessons learned well, and the scattered music of a young man getting good at a game he did not respect.
- Little Tommy
A pre-internet photo cleanout turns into a fake kid named Little Tommy, a pile of mailed junk pictures, and a small experiment in how hard people work to make nothing mean something.
- The Zam Coup
A baby-name negotiation, one accidental assist from Alexa, and the quiet family coup that produced two Zams.
- The Math Isn't Good
I got the miracle. They get the math. That is not an even trade.
- 1993: The Year Everything Was Right in Front of Me
The songs from my musical home year — and the year I had everything right in front of me and didn't reach for it.
- Within a Listen
Thirty-six years is an ocean. Then a record starts and the distance folds down to the length of a listen.
- A Room From 1983
The five years I spent at Purdue still take up more room in my head than decades that came after. A small dorm room, a TA who blew my tiny mind, and a memory I am no longer sure I can trust.
- The Funk That Forgot About Me
Teachers know this funk, even when they pretend they don’t. A field guide to twenty years of end-of-winter-break dread, the avoidance hobbies that came with it, and the year I learned more about Desi Arnaz than any reasonable person should.
- I Got Another Round
Two pictures, sixteen years apart. Same guy, different game. The setup for what we are about to try.
- I'm Almost 5, Dad
Raven turned four and went straight to work on five. A walk to the park, an ant hill, and a four-year-old running a goldfish play I didn't see coming.
- 1977: The Year That Wouldn't Pick a Lane
My favorite songs that make 1977 sound like 1977 to me, thrown together the way I still like to hear them: on random play, like FM radio is still in charge.
- Dad, Do You Love Me Enough to Protect Me?
The sales pitch will not look like tyranny. It will look like parental love with a subscription plan.
- Running Away, Running True
Regret wants to edit the past selectively. But if I pulled too many threads out of my life, I might also lose the part that matters most.
- The Wrong Ruler
Ross Perot had enough money to stop forever. The fact that he kept going forced me to notice what kind of life I thought money was supposed to buy.
- Hey, Dudes! Advice From an Old Dad, No. 1: Don’t Be a Dick
The first rule is not elegant or fancy, but it covers a surprising amount of ground: don’t be a dick.
- Hey, Dudes! Advice for life from an old dad, No. 2
A nearly-ninety-year-old neighbor shoveling my sidewalk one December morning, an insult disguised as a compliment, and the kind of person I keep wanting to become.
- Reasons to Reconsider the 80s
I have spent a lot of years being annoyed by 80s music. This playlist is my reminder that the decade was not all shoulder pads, gated drums, and songs built for shopping malls.
- Earline's Mom
A child’s memory, a train fantasy, and the realization that I’m a lot closer to the old woman’s chair than to being young on Pearl Street.
- Bad Company: 40 Songs Worth Burning Through
A Bad Company playlist brought back eighth-grade graduation money, a record-store splurge, and a band that still hits harder than I remember.
- Journey: 40 Songs and a Time Machine
A Journey playlist turned into a map of memory, bad timing, school dances, and the Steve Perry years.