Have a Very Beary Day (Chapter 2: Bidaber or Bust)

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It took me a while to figure out how to get the kid strapped into his carseat, but I finally got it done. I looked at him there in the back babbling away and started to wonder whether this carseat and seatbelt was enough protection - not for him but for me. I remember reading something in the news about a woman who duct-taped her kids to a chair because she couldn’t control them. That didn’t seem like such a bad idea now. I mean what was to stop him from wiggling out and then covering up my eyes on the highway or wigging out and smacking me in the head with his spiderman lunchbox. I searched the car for some kind of restraining device but my ex –girlfriend must have taken the chains and handcuffs I had in the back of the trunk. How could she, those had sentimental value? Once again I was left in a compromising position. I turned back to the one person I had less faith in then all of humanity combined and pleaded with him.

“Wyatt, I’m asking you to stay in your seat until we get to Build-A-Bear. Can you do that for your Uncle Onionhead?”

“Of course, Uncle Onionhead. I’m not a baby anymore, I’m a BIG BOY.”

He sounded sincere, and even though he’s batted .000 with his trust percentage since I’ve known him, I had to believe in him. What choice did I have?

“That’s right, you’re a big boy, mature beyond your years. Now you just stay in your kiddie seat and we'll be at Build-A-Bear in no time and you can stuff your own make-believe friend and buy him costumes to wear at tea parties and whatever other delusional fantasies your infantile mind may have.”

“COOL!”

I peeled out of the parking lot and no sooner was I thinking about how easy that just was, did I look back in the rearview mirror and see him tugging at his seat belt trying to squirm out.

“Hey, Hey, Hey! What do you think your doing?”

“I’m a big boy. I wanna drive!”

“Oh you wanna drive, do you? I got a better idea, why don’t we just tape fifty pounds of bloody ribeyes to our arms and legs and go swimming in the shark-infested Australian waters?”

“We can do that later Uncle Onionhead.”

There was no reasoning with this kid, he was set in his ways. Lucky for me my cell phone rang and the clamor took his attention away from his plans to drive us into a twenty car pile-up . Unlucky for me he had stretched just far enough to grab it off my console and decided he would answer it.

“He-wo. ..Huh…..what? ….your doggie what? Hahaha!”

“Who is it?” I yelled back at him.

“OOO…OOO…it’s some dude asking if he can speak to his dog. Hahahaha! Doggies don’t talk, they go WOOF!”

We got to a stoplight and I snatched the phone out of his meddling hands. It was my slacker friend Shawn.

“What up Dawg” (I call all my friends dawg).

"Onionhead, what are you doing man? Who the fuck was that?”

“Dude that was my nephew. I picked him up from school and we’re going to Build-A-Bear for his birthday so he can make himself a little friend.”

“Build-A-Bear? Are you kidding me? You’re gonna turn him into a sissy. Go get him a football.”

“Listen John Wayne, he’s six years old. Besides, he got a football for Christmas and all he does with it is throw it at my niece when she opens the door of his Easy Bake Oven before his cupcakes are done.”

“Oh, well shit man, that’s cool. Tell Julia Childs I said happy birthday. So, do you want to kill a case and watch the Presidential debate tonight?"

“I dunno man. It depends on what time we get done. I’ll holla back. Peace.”

No sooner did I hang up the phone then my nephew was choking himself with his seatbelt drooling like Pavlov’s dog trying to take it off my hands. I had unveiled my new cellphone with built-in camera at his birthday party the night before. My family, who are about as technologically advanced as the Flintsones, were mighty impressed with my fancy new phone. When I was taking pictures during the party my mom inquired why I had my calculator raised up in the air.

“Onionhead, can you not see your calculator? Where’s your glasses? Do you not have glasses? When’s the last time you had a check-up. You know you’re straining your eyeballs right now. Oh My! You're going to go cross-eyed.”

“Mom, I’ve been wearing contacts for 15 years, and you know this. This is a cellphone with a built-in camera. I’m taking pictures right now. See, right now I’m taking a picture of you”, I said as I took a picture of my mom with her mouth hung open in terrifying amazement. It didn’t startle me that my mom didn’t know that cellphones had cameras built-in nowadays, but I was a little worried that my mom didn’t find it the slightest bit odd that I was talking into what she thought was a calculator just minutes ago.

My nephew was likewise fascinated by my fancy new phone and played with it more than all of his new birthday toys combined. And it actually survived his wrath of destruction which is more than I can say for the Rock’em Sock’em Robots I bought last Christmas, a gift which was down for the count in less than an hour after a certain red robot suffered a mild dislocation of the neckular region. With the family snapping pictures like the paparazzi it made him feel important to also have some of that power. And I didn’t care because when he was busy with that phone he was leaving Onionhead alone, which gave me plenty of free time to do some hands-on investigation of the snacks my sister had stocked up in their cupboard for the nuclear winter. Wait a minute. That’s It. The phone. The damn phone!

“Hey pal, here you go.” And I handed him the phone. “How about you do a photo shoot from the backseat of the car commemorating our trip to Build-A-Bear. Now I want these picture to turn out good so I need you to concentrate. That means none of this babbling about whatever it is you babble about all the time, OK? Do we have a deal?”

“O Boy O Boy O Boy O Boy! You betcha Uncle Onionhead. I ‘m going to take the best pictures ever.”

“OK but I don’t want to know you’re even back there. The best photographers take their pictures incognito.”

“COOL, In-cod-needo.”

I looked back in the rearview and there he was already meticulously lining up his shots with the camera upside-down. Sweet. I wouldn’t hear another word from Ansel Adams in the backseat until we got to the mall. Sometimes I impress myself. It’s no wonder I am such an underachiever with all the potential I got. Those who have little potential can only underachieve but so much. I, on the other hand, have enormous potential and therefore consistently underachieve at a monumental level. For a moment I thought I laid a warm fuzzy egg right there in my car seat, but it was just gas, so I cracked the window, cranked up The Replacements, and for a moment, enjoyed the calm before the storm.

When we arrived at the mall I pulled into the upper level of the parking deck, and with a little help from the god of all that is slack, found a spot right outside Build-a-Bear. I turned to the backseat where my nephew was busy reconfiguring all the settings on my phone. I didn’t care though because we were finally here, and we had all of our limbs, and our bodies weren’t charred beyond recognition. It was a successful trip.

“Hey sporto, were here! Are you ready for some Build-A-Bear?”

“Bidaberbidaberbidabebidaber-yeyeyeyeyeyeyeyayayayayayaay bidaberbidaberbidaber.”

“Yo, Mariah Carey, enough with the dolphin noises already.” I unbuckled him from his car seat, and he was shaking like a prison bed on Conjugal Visit Day, not that I would know anything about that of course. He climbed out of the car and we started walking toward the entrance. I felt that this was a good time for a heartwarming "uncle to nephew" coming of age solliloqy, so I went with it.

“You know Wyatt, you have matured so much in such a short amount of time. It seems like just yesterday you were in diapers, pooping and peeing all over yourself like a stinky flea market kitty. But you know what, you ARE a big boy now, and I’m so proud of you. I can only imagine the greatness that lies before you…you…OK, where the hell are you?”

I looked back and there he was, about 15 feet away, with his head hung down staring at his feet. Ok, I know my little impromptu speech was cheesy, but it wasn’t that bad.

“Hey Captain, what are you doing? Build-A-Bear is in there, and we’re out here.”

“I pooped in my pants.”

“You what?”

“I pooped in my pants.”

That’s what I thought he said. HaHa! That kid is always playing with his Uncle Onionhead. Like I don’t know the game. My nephew and I, we tell poopy jokes, that’s what we do. It’s our repertoire, our forte, our modus operandi. Oh sure, sometimes we tell fart jokes, and pee pee jokes, but it’s the poop jokes that leave the crowds in a frenzy, wanting more. I figured I would chime in.

“Oh yeah, well I did a poopy in Principal Pissypant’s fish tank. And they said, ‘Sorry Charley, we don’t eat corn, we’re fish, and we ain’t from Iowa.” HAHAHAHA!”

He wasn’t laughing, and that bothered me, because it was really funny. Ummm OK, maybe you had to be there.

“I’m serious Uncle Onionhead. Come see.”

I was starting to get a little worried. “”I pooped” and “come see” are two phrases you should never hear back to back. NEVER. I didn’t appreciate his little trick, so I walked over to him.

“Whateva Wyatt, you are so lying right now. Now let’s go, or there won’t be any Build-A-Bear today.”

“No, I’m seeeeerrrious. Its in my pants” I knelt down at eye level and turned him around and I didn’t see anything abnormal on the back of his jeans, nothing that would have raised the brown flag at least.

“You know what, I think your trying to make a fool out of your Uncle Onionhead. I don’t see nuthin.”

No the poopy is in my pants. Pull down my pants.”

“PULL DOWN YOUR PANTS! PULL DOWN YOUR PANTS??”, and right then, about fifteen feet away I saw Soccer Mom of the Year with her two kids, frozen in time and staring in horror at what must have looked very unsettling from her angle. As I started standing back up she began inching away, like someone trying not to startle a sleeping bear. I felt the need to explain.

“O hey, haha! Didn’t see ya there. He made a poopy in his pants and I don’t believe him, so now he wants me to check and…hey where are you going…hey it’s not what it looks like!!!! OH JEEZ, HE’S MY FRICKIN NEPHEW!”

Obviously in her mind she had already seen enough to get an all-points Amber Alert out on me. She had turned around and couldn’t drag those kids behind her fast enough to keep up with the high-steppin she was doing toward the mall entrance. I turned back around and my nephew was still standing there dejected staring at the ground. I was trying to think what the hell to do now. I mean I can’t drag the kid into Build-A-Bear now, he’s got a dump in his pants, allegedly. My concentration was broken by a shrill sound and as I looked in that direction I saw a scooter with sirens blaring, closing in on us. It was the mall cops, and they had themselves a live one, and a chance to make the 6 o’clock news. Could this day get any worse?

MALL COPS, MALL COPS, WHATCHA YOU GONNA DO, WHATCHA GONNA DO WHEN THE KID GOES POO?

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Hey kids! be sure to check back for chapter III in a few days! Peace! BOH