Category: Life

Okay, I’m starting to get my head back above water. 

Paula and I got back from Germany last Tuesday,  and Thursday our friend Max flew in from Colorado.  We went from ten days of touring Germany with my parents to five days of touring Ireland (well, Paula and Max did most of the touring… I dug through e-mail :)).

And now more fun news, our friend Christopher is going to come stay with us next week!  We’re both stoked to have yet another visitor from the states.  We really enjoy living in Ireland but do miss our friends tremendously.

Every once in a while, when I’m rinsing a spoon, I manage to put it in the flow of the tap just right and spray myself.  What a pain.

What if, however, someone clever stuck a spoon on the back of a toothbrush?  Well, you’d get the Brush & Rinse, of course.

As we age, men slowly gain an understanding of what and what not to wear but some never get it.  As someone who’s figured out some of the dos and don’ts in life I thought I’d pass on some info which is self-evident to most… but not obvious to all.

Wearing things on your belt does not make you look like Batman

Trust me here, there are very few situations where you can safely wear something on your belt and not look like a dork.  Things you shouldn’t hook to your belt include compact cameras, leather man pocket tools, pagers and cell phones.  I know, wearing a cell phone on your belt makes you kind of feel like you have a holster… but honestly, it doesn’t make you look like Han Solo.  

Speaking of cell phones, here’s another one:

Unless you’re talking on the phone, take off your Bluetooth headset

If your cell phone holster makes you feel like a cowboy then your Bluetooth headset must make you feel downright special forces.  Sorry, it doesn’t look like a military-issue comm set and people aren’t giving you extra looks because you’re so ultra-manly cool.  Here’s a quick tip: if you’re eating dinner in a restaurant, enjoying a meal with your date… take off the ear-tumor.  First, you shouldn’t answer a call during a romantic meal out.  Second, you’re not so important that you should answer a call during a romantic meal out.  But it probably doesn’t matter… if you’re wearing an ear piece during meals you won’t be eating with company long… she’s already planning on breaking up with you Sgt. Rock.

And while you’re taking off that silly earpiece…

Not even movie stars look cool wearing sunglasses inside

I suppose there’s one exception, Jack Nicholson… but that’s all I’ll give you.  Everyone else who wears sunglasses inside is just kidding themselves.  This goes double if the sun isn’t even up.  Stevie Wonder, you’re on notice, you poseur.

Coming soon

In my next men’s fashion advice column please look for additional gems such as:

• If you’re over 40, make sure your shirt has sleeves
  and
• Only .1% of the population can get away with wearing bike shorts (even fewer, a Speedo)

But wait… there’s more

My new teen fashion blog will debut shortly.  Here’s a teaser:

• Leave your PJs at home, why advertise you’re lazy and your parents have no control over you?
  and
• No, your “Spoiled Princess” T-shirt isn’t cute, but until the FDA legislates warning labels for brats, keep wearing it.

It’s July 14th… hard to believe we’ve been in Ireland for a year already.  My official first day at work was the 17th (a Monday) but Paula and I arrived the Friday before to start getting settled in. 

Time has gone by very quickly and we’re still having a blast.  Here’s to another great year (and to getting our friends from California to come visit ;)).

This is the type of really, really important stuff I spend time thinking about… 

As I was hanging our new shower curtain I wondered… who decided there should be 12 holes in the curtain?  Someone, at some point, decided to make a shower curtain with 12 holes… who were they?  Why did they pick the number 12?  Why did everyone else say “12? That’s genius! I’ll put 12 in mine too.”  Our shower curtain from Pottery Barn has 12 holes, the liner we bought from Target has 12 holes and the set of curtain rings we bought in Ireland came in a pack of 12.

I don’t know why I do it, but often when I hear a sound I feel compelled to mimic it.  More often than not I mimic it badly.  Perhaps if I did it well Paula would find it less annoying… but I don’t do it well.

Here’s what life is usually like:

Getting into an elevator:

Elevator: “Ding!”
Reeves: “Ding!”
Paula: “Stop it”

Paula walking around wearing flip-flops:

Flip-flops: “Snap, snap, snap..”
Reeves: “Snap, snap, snap..”
Paula: “Stop it”

When a bass-happy import car drives by:

Car: “Ooots, oots, oots…”
Reeves: “Ooots, oots, oots…”
Paula: “Stop it”

And just yesterday, pouring wine:

Wine bottle: “Glug, glug, glug…”
Paula: “Glug, glug, glug…”
Reeves: “That’s my job”
Paula: “It’s been thirteen years… something is bound to rub off”

I’m so proud of her. 

The Irish government has generously acknowledged that we all work too hard and have declared today, March 1st, to be “Work Life Balance Day”.  In order to help us out they have… thank the maker… created a web site!  I feel much better now.

The Work Life Balance web site has lots of information, but the most helpful thing on the site by far is their 142 page report which includes qualitative results for employers and employees.  Having a very short attention span, I jumped straight to the Policy Measures/Interventions on the employee section.  I examined the 10 bullet points find the holy grail of… uh… doing stuff to not work too hard while keeping up the respect of coworkers and continuing to earn promotions…  and took away these two things from the list that I’ll need to address:

1. “Change in the culture of organizations, i.e. male attitudes […]”
   
   Given we have no women on our team as of yet, I’m going to work with my coworkers to rotate the responsibility of having a female attitude.  With our team of 9 I think a good balance would be two or three people each week taking on the role, bringing in the much needed female qualities our team lacks (empathy, fashion sense and a general distaste for fart jokes).  They won’t, however, need to wear a skirt… that would be silly.
   
2. “Remove the mythology behind work-life balance arrangements.”

   This is going to be a tougher one to implement.  To date we’ve been able to keep people slaving away at their computers with the threat of a Minotaur which roams the halls until 7pm.  Granted, it also means I can no longer go home early every Thursday using the excuse “Sorry, I need to pick my Unicorn up for school, my wife is at her mermaid husbandry class.”

Speaking of husbandry… women in Ireland get 26 weeks of maternity leave.  Their husbands? 1-3 days.  Uh, oh… I feel some male attitude coming back.