Daddy's Birthday

Monday is The Man's birthday. Yesterday I took the kids out to try and find him an attractive, displayable chess set for his gift. We looked long and hard and came up with nothing. We tried Macy's, Dillard's, Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, HomeGoods, ToysRUs, TJ Maxx, and Pier 1 Imports. Nothing. ToysRUs did have a Transformers Chess Set and I actually considered it for a second due to desperation.

We were required to be at my mom's house at 7 and after three hours of dragging three hungry kids in and out of assorted stores I was ready to give up anyhow. So we left. At 10 pm we finally came home. As soon as we opened the door Goober yells in his loudest voice

"Daddy! We couldn't find a ch.."
"GOOBER!"
He tries again.
"THERE WERE NO CHE.."
"GOOBER, NO! Don't tell Daddy what we were looking for. It's supposed to be a surprise!"
"Oh yeah."

Munchkin and Bug giggle and head off to brush their teeth. Munchkin informs me that she would like a blanket for her bed.

"OK, honey, get one out of the chest."

"You just SAID what we were getting DADDY!"

The Man laughs. The gig is up. There goes that surprise.

After the kids went to bed we actually played a couple of games of chess. I've played maybe five times in my life, all against The Man, and never won. The last time we played was in 2005 while on the Disney cruise. I had since forgotten many rules on how pieces moved and The Man actually felt a little bad when he slaughtered me the first time. He lost the guilt the second time and went gung ho on the attack.

I think I should practice.