"You're doing what?"

I'm the kind of person who has one close best friend (other than my wife) and many other good friends. I tend not to go out a lot preferring the company of my wife and/or daughter and the sanctity of home. I don't really go out with "the guys" as I tend to find many of them rather boorish. I'm not a jock head (I watch only football), I thought "Shoot Em Up" was an awful movie, I like my wife, I like my daughter, I don't drink, and I have good taste in women. Sadly, this takes care of a good percentage of men out there of who I can relate to or with.

My wife has a few close girlfriends with families of their own. Every time we get together the guys head to the basement bar, turn on some sport program, and sit around and talk sports and how things used to be before wives and kids. The women are in the livingroom talking about cooking, school, movies and TV, and the occasional bum husband. Me? I'm with the kids in the bedroom or outside. I'm not kidding. Or I'm with the women. Hey, I'm not stupid.

My wife has several close friends. Every week she's usually off somewhere helping, visiting, shopping with, or dining with a girlfriend of hers. She's a great friend. Very willing to help her friends with anything. Caring. Thoughtful. Her friends like her a lot. But, she makes the effort. I don't. I admit to being a little lazy in that regard. I'm too comfortable at home with the family and my sister in law and her family who live 8 houses away.

Anyway, I come home from work yesterday and engage my family in the usual manner. At one point I ask "what's going on tonight?" Jackie, my wife answers, "nothing much. Just cleaning a little." And then I say something she hasn't heard in quite some time.

"I'm going out."

There were two thuds as not only did my wife faint, but my daughter as well. Which tells you just how shocking this statement was.

"Your doing what?" "I'm going out . . . to visit with my geek blogger buddies at Papa's." She knows about the blogging thing but doesn't quite fully understand it. After explaining it a bit more she says "that's great. Have fun."

My daughter, who is 8 and way more in tune with the online means of the world wanted to come along. She sits with me reading Dan's live blog during American Idol. I chat with my daughter from work when she comes home from school (hope my boss doesn't see this). So, again, she's pretty savvy. I tell her she can't go. It's a bar, it's smokey, it's a school night, blah blah blah. Had I known some couple was bringing their infant in to that environment and I might have thought different. For shame!

To keep a long story from getting completely out of hand, I went to Drinking Right at Papa's last night. First time. Fred has been giving all kinds of crap about never showing up even though I live about 8 blocks away. Geez. Anyway, it was great. Nothing new to most reading this but many of the blogs I read were represented. It was a good time. Even Dan Deibert showed up after his live blog of AI. It was very nice meeting the people behind the blogs. We solved some world problems, poked some fun at other bloggers, laughed at the left, cried about the right, and tried to see what Fred was writing all night.

So, in complete contrary to character, I went out and made some new friends. Thanks fellow bloggers. You'll be seeing more of me from now on.