Riding in the Car with My Wife and Two Kids

Kate is four and Karsten is one.  When my family drives somewhere, even just 10 minutes away, Kelley and I can’t speak a word to each other unless we yell.  

Karsten whines, cries, or starts saying CONTINUALLY, “ahh unh, ahh unh, ahh unh, ahh unh (brief pause) unh ahh, unh ahh, unh ahh, unh ahh.”  

Kate eventually gets tired of it, so she tries to drown Karsten out by LOUDLY singing OVER and OVER,

“There WAS a FARMER,

HAD a DOG

and BINGO was his NAME-O,

E-I-N-G-O, E-I-N-G-O . . .”

Kelley interrupts to say, “Kate, it’s B-i-n-g-o.  Buh Buh Buh –B!”

So Kate STARTS OVER and may or may not spell Bingo with a B the next of 10 times she sings the song.  We’ve told her plenty of times that it’s B-i-n-g-o, but I think she spells it wrong just to be annoying. 

Meanwhile, Kelley and I are still trying to talk so our volume has risen to about 9, and that’s when it SUDDENLY hits me that my HEAD is about to explode!  It doesn’t slowly build, IT HITS ME ALL AT ONCE.  You’d THINK I’d see it coming. 

I went 34 years without a wife and wondered if I’d EVER have children, so I should probably just smile when this stuff happens.  But smiling isn’t my first impulse!