So last Friday I picked up my daughter from school. As we were leaving the grounds  she turned to meet my face, rolled her eyes and said “Oh here we go”, pointing to a boy approaching us. He stammered as he said, “Bye and have a great weekend. Oh, is this your dad? Hi. Ummm, errr, well I can see where you get your good looks from.”

I smiled politely as she said her cordial good-bye to him, but my smile turned into a chuckle as we approached the car. My daughter asked me, “So, you got it too, then?” I relied with, “Got what?”

“The gay vibe.”

“Oh yeah,” I laughed.

Rule number one, boys. If you want to impress a girl, don’t compliment her father’s looks. Reserve that for her mum. As far as I can tell, women only like their boyfriends to be slightly gay once they’re in their twenties.

Today Paul got on a bus in Santa Monica and headed towards Hollywood.

Unfortunately, he got off at the wrong stop and felt rather lost and bored and tired.

Fortunately, he found a shopping centre that had a bathroom and a place to sit and relax.

Unfortunately, the centre also had an Apple store, and temptation overcame him.

Fortunately, he remembered that a trip to Montreal would be sacrificed if he went all consumer-bang-bang here in LA, and he did NOT buy an iPad.

Unfortunately, he saw an iPod Nano, and thought of his daughter. And consumer-bang-bang turned into faux-parent-moral-consumer-bang-bang.

Last night my four year old turns to me at the dinner table and says “Look, I’ve almost finished my dinner. I’m going to be big and strong like you.” My nine year old retorts with “Yep, only ten thousand macaroni and cheese meals to go”.

Bless ‘em.