Tonight I had dinner downtown at Checkers with Mark and Josh and Beth. The plan was supposed to be us wandering around the Parthenon. It was actually dark by the time we got out there. So we hung around Checkers watching prom attendents usher themselves into Amerigos next door. While we were waiting to get our food, we noticed some homeless guy anxiously waiting around the walk up queue. (Keep in mind this is Checkers Fast food – no dine in – 2 drive thrus and a walk thru.) The homeless guy seemed out of place. I wasn’t sure if he was in line or what. Anyways what it turned out to be was probably a youth minister/pastor/worker/chaperone buying the homeless guy a meal. The minister apparently was from next door Taco Bell where a youth group had stopped. So I guess he was doing his Christian duty – something we all should try to do more often. Yet we have become pretty jaded and frustrated at homeless people these days.
Afterwards we drove around the Parthenon for our night tour. The scaffolding is down for the most part.
Next was the Great Escape – a used CD store near Vandy. Not very many parking spaces. I didn’t find any CDs that I couldn’t live without. We browsed around but nobody got anything. Really, sometimes you can find a rare jewell among the undesired CDs. But you really have to dig sometimes.
Back to Josh and Beth’s house for Nintendo 64. Super Smash Brothers. I was never any good at that. Mainly played Kirby because it was a stupid character and I needed a good laugh.
Did I mention Beth is really pregnant? Due in April. Probably will burst while I’m in El Salvador. I pointed out to Josh that this will be the first grandchild on both sides. So this grandchild will set the standard. Get to pick the names of the grandparents….whether its granny or grandma or memaw or whatever. So being the first grandchild has its privledges. I’m not sure if this will be Golden Child for the Hornes. Who knows?
Josh is still tramatized (as I am also) from our forced viewing of a birthing video in our sophomore biology class in high school. Josh remarked that he remembered how “that woman was in pain.” I’d tend to agree. The video itself was pretty nasty. And it must have made an impression if we still remember it….from 12 years ago.
Somehow the whole concept of birthing and drugs has changed since I was brought into the world. In the 1970s gynecologists doped up an entire generation of babies to deaden the pain of the birth process. “Put the lady to sleep” was the cry from the birthing room. Who knows how much better “we” would have turned out? Maybe we wouldn’t have been Generation X. World peace could have been achived. But doctors decided to deaden the pain thereby giving us all brain damage.
Now its all natural childbirth. Deaden the pain with an epidural, but keep the lady awake through the whole proceedure. Believe me, I would definitely want to be put to sleep instead of squeezing that thing out. But being a guy, I’m thankful I never have to go through childbirth. Women may indeed have a high tolerance for pain.