Then I got to Week 3.

Mind you, the creator of the site (who did not come up with the program - he's simply re-printing it based on something he found on the intarwebs years ago which has since disappeared) has admitted that he himself was totally unable to make the numbers of Week 3 and had to repeat it this time around.

Yeah.

The problem is, if you started with lower-middle ability, the numbers just aren't possible. Today's goal was 25/17/17/15/25+, which totals out to 99 pushups. With only 60 second breaks. Dude: 60ish just kicked my ass FOUR DAYS AGO. How am I magically supposed to do 99?!

So I hit the near-comical 25/17/8, and then had to take a several minute rest. Then I got 13, waited another 3 minutes or so, and got 7. At that point I had to really concentrate on not barfing. So: instead of 99 I totalled 70. Which is, for those keeping score at home, NOT EVEN CLOSE.

I've been building to this conclusion but now it's official: I call shenanigans on the whole 100 Pushups program. Clearly it is a good way to increase the number of pushups you can do, fairly quickly. I'm still glad I'm doing it.

But the claim that *anyone* can do 100 pushups within six weeks is completely bogus. It's snake oil.

Maybe - MAYBE - if you started already able to do 50+. But for noodle-armed 23-pushup dumplings like myself? The chances that I will bang out 100 pushups without a break three and a half weeks from now are approximately - wait, carry the two, minus four - nil.

But hey. I just did 70 pushups. My triceps think they're on someone else entirely.

The [Park Slope] Declaration of Co-Dependence.

Nothing less than a sweeping set of rules that will allow all residents of Park Slope, Brooklyn, to get along without anybody being an unconscionable douchebag about it. Stop everything you're doing and go read it.

A sample:

Article I: Sidewalk Behavior

I.a.1 - Parents with strollers shall not occupy more than 66% of the width of a given sidewalk's walking area, except for periods of less than ten seconds when passing jutting storefront artifacts such as elongated entranceways, outdoor eating areas, or subway stations.

I.a.2 - As mothers, especially new mothers, are often hormonal masses of cluelessness, fathers will be responsible for a family's compliance with article I.a.1. Childless Individuals are urged to take special note of these characteristics of a mother's mindstate, and to factor this understanding into their reactions to violations of Article 1.a.1; a mother's failure to make room for you on the sidewalk does not derive from her arrogance, though it may easily be mistaken for such; said failure is merely motivated by obliviousness due to lack of sleep, individual freedom, and the chemical demand of continual and exclusive focus on her children.

I.a.3 - In cases where Article I.a.1. is violated, Childless Individuals are requested to keep a sense of propriety and a sense of humor regarding the violation. It is recommended that a victim of this violation simply blurt "careful!," "'scuse me!," or even "Article 1!" - but should attempt to refrain from getting bent outta fuckin shape: There is no reason to shoot the mother a psychotic Billy Corgan look, act like a self-important fuckin douche bag, or invoke hatred and negativity as if someone just flew a 747 into your office building. At the end of the day, is getting where you're going 30 seconds earlier really worth all that? Don't worry - I guarantee you'll still get home in time to watch the new episode of The Cunt - and if you don't you should have Tivo'ed it; either way it will be on In-Demand in a couple of days at most.

If this Declaration can be read and honored by every resident of our neighborhood maybe finally the international press can pick some other damn neighborhood to love/hate on.

If you've been wondering how it came to be that "believ-datshit" entered my vocabulary, I'll let you know the culprit: Blognigger.

One commenter summed it up: "Park Slope's own The Onion, but funnier and more racist!" Social satirist of the first degree, BN (who has also secured the url TheBlogThatMustNotBeNamed.com in case you're shy about using his given) exploded onto the snark scene a couple weeks back when Gawker picked up his typically scathing take on The Real World Brooklyn.

But what really gets me is his dead-on critique and celebration and desecration of Park Slope. The quote that hooked me for life: "my rage disorder barely allowed me to survive the closing of Red Hot Sczechuan last month, which was like the fucking closing of CHINESE FOOD ITESELF."

Which, if you live south of 9th, is OMFG SO TOTALLY TRUE.

Then came "The Nanny Diarrhees," a note perfect evisceration of Park Slope Parenthood (which he also defends against all haters in the brilliant "Nobody Calls My Mom a Slut But Me").

On a self described mission to "just keep getting more and more honest with each other until either we rid the world of communism or somebody passes out," BN has outdone himself today, ripping the veil off of the behavior of men towards hot women.

Especially on the F train, during the morning commute.

And, having spent 9:04am through 9:27am inclusive this morning trying desperately not to stare directly at the exposed boobs of the very short, very attractive young lady who was PRACTICALLY STANDING ON MY TOES FOR THE WHOLE RIDE, I'm feeling his pain when he says:

What do you think, Park Slopers? "What a bunch of sexist, misogynist bullshit." Is that it? NO; Bullshit YOU! Then why did God and Jesus and Darwin give me these fucking chemicals in my head then, Park Slopers, that cause me to sweat and ache to obtain the succulent fruit of the female form???

Do you have any fucking idea what it's like in this prison - having to walk around all day in Manhattan looking at shit like this (esp Union Square / Chelsea Market / Soho) - and having to not only keep from throwing these women down wells and reading them the Lotion/Basket Riot Act of 1992, but also having to PRETEND to be tasteful and indifferent regarding their sick, sick bounty?

Preach, Brother Ni--

Yeah, I'm not there yet.

I also failed the Blognigger Transcendence of Political Correctness Test this weekend at a barbecue: I was asking a buddy if he had discovered Blognigger yet. He - like you do - laughed and said "no what's that?" I was explaining, and the hostess walked by. "What is this?" she asked.

Problem was, in the meantime an attractive young black lady, who I had met only minutes earlier, had wandered over and was standing on the other side of me. I would have to repeat the blog's name in her presence and earshot.

Dozens of years of liberal inculcation washed over me in an instant, and I am ashamed to say that I pretended I didn't hear the question.

Sigh. Help me, Blognigger, you're my only hope.

Ladies and gentlemen, the singing voice of Charlie Tolan.

(Sorry it's sideways - Procrastiwife forgets that you can't auto-rotate the video on her cameral...)

I don't know - do you think Max is excited about our trip in August?

#2:

A few moments ago we declared that it was time for Max to get into the bath. He announced that he was not going to take a bath, but was instead going right to bed. Lisa said "No way, buddy, have you seen your legs?" His legs are smurf-blue with chalk from kneeling on his chalkwork (above).

He looks down, laughs, and says happily "God damnit. Look how stupid I am."

[UPDATE/DISCLAIMER: To put this in context, he's currently fascinated by "bad words" which he knows he's not supposed to say and so, naturally, tries to use all the time. Some are mild curse words, but some are just mean or teasing words that we've cracked down on in the past. Current favorites are God Damnit, Jesus Christ, Hate and Stupid. Hopefully in that context the above story reads as cute quirky rather than heart-rendingly depressing...]

#3:

This is out of date, but I never remembered to blog it at the time. About a month ago, Max was making me recite all the pets I've ever owned (a near-daily ritual for a couple weeks). I came to the sad story of our dog Dick (so named as a pair with his sister Jane - though the "Dick & Jane" reference was lost on the rednecks who goggled at me in disbelief when I was ten years old and had to tell them my dog was named "Dick").

Dick, you see, was epileptic, and eventually died of it after he had too many seizures - about a dozen in one day. It fried his brain. He was walking into walls and turning little circles.

"He had seizures?!" asked Max, with a good deal of wonder.

"That's right," I said.

"Like TED KENNEDY?!"

I'm ON THAT.

I did the "initial test" tonight, and discovered that I could do 23 and a half pushups before my arms stopped moving. I used to be able to do 25-30, so that's not a terrible dropoff. I'll start the program (a series of reps with varied intervals) tomorrow, and keep tabs here so that I can be shamed if, come August, I can not tear off a century at will.

I'm going to be SO BUFF.

That is all.

MAJOR UPDATE:

Oh, it's on. Mr. Peanuthead has signed on for the 100 pushups challenge, with a little wager to make it more interesting. In eight weeks (allowing two weeks of slide) we'll be in Tahoe for a wedding - at which point we'll go head to head to see who can do 100 pushups... FASTEST. There's $50 riding on it.

Of course, Mr. Peanuthead is, at 7 years my junior and 12 pushups fitter in the initial test, well ahead of me. Even so, fitty bucks is fitty bucks. So mid-August will find me WAY MORE BUFF than him.

UPDATE (ongoing):

Week 1/Day 1 - complete. 10 pushups, then 10 pushups, then 8, then 6, then as many as you can do (at least 7), with 60 seconds in between each.

The set of 8 started to get shaky. On the fifth of six I, um, may not have gotten all the way down. And on the sixth of the "at least 7" I definitely dipped my ankles to help sort of throw myself back up. But I got 7 - and then my arms dropped me on my face on the floor. They quit like somebody threw a switch.

It felt like somebody snuck up on me during that last set and replaced my biceps with baked potatoes. But I got through it - 41 pushups total. SO BUFF.

Week 1/Day 2 - complete(ish). 12/12/10/10/10+, 90 seconds between. On the fourth set my form went to poo on the last two, and on the fifth set I definitely started to lead with my butt on numbers 8, 9 and 10. Still, I got from nose-to-the-carpet up into the air, so I'm counting it. Sorta. 54 total pushups (49 if you leave out the bad form ones).

Woke up yesterday with knitting needles in my pecs. Seriously. Sore. Better today, just in time to get all wrecked up again.

Week 1/Day 3 - complete(ish). 15/13/10/10/15+, 2 minutes between. Kept the form more or less together through first four sets, then bonked after 9 on the last which was supposed to be 15+. So I totalled out 6 short of where I was supposed to be.

Still, 57 pushups total. Considering that 41 kicked my ass just five days ago, that's not bad.

Week 2/Day 1 (6/27) 12/12/9/7/10+, 1 minute between. Felt *way* stronger on the first set, just as cashed by the end. Did 11 in the last set, for a total of 51. Made the number required, but 6 fewer than two days ago. Hmm.

Week 2/Day 2 (6/29) 16/13/11/11/15+, 90 secs. between. I've started to suspect this program isn't all it's cracked up to be, as the number I was supposed to do today was totally impossible, and I'm only on Week 2. Rather than fall short on total, I stopped when I totally bonked but then when back to complete the set after a short rest.

So my actual set went 16/13/11/10/7/4/5. 66 total. I know in future weeks you're encouraged to repeat weeks if you can't hit your numbers, but that's looking totally inevitable and I'm left wondering who, if anybody, can actually go from 23 pushups to 100 in 6 weeks. Even the author of the site admits that, the first time he did it, he had to repeat a week.

In other news, ProcrastiWife has joined the challenge! She knocked out 9 pushups (not girl style, either) in her test, putting her in the second column. Way to go!

Week 2/Day 3 (7/2) 15/15/12/12/15+, 2 mins between. Actual was pretty close - 15/15/12/12/13/2 - w00t! Didn't feel wobbly until the last couple of the third set, and the last several of the fourth set. After second set, Lisa (who had already done hers) said "you make that look so easy." After the fourth, she said "yeah you're not making that look easy anymore..." Total: 69.

She banged out 7/7/5/4/5+ as 7/7/5/4/3, which is damn good.

Up next: I "re-test" to see how many I can do in one go.

Week Two - Re-Test - On the malodorous floor of the Rt. 9 Budget Inn, Warrensburg, NY, I banged out... 32 pushups in a row. Which is nine more than I did two weeks ago. And still 3 shy of where Mr. Peanuthead started, which makes me a little nervous about my part of this wager. Lisa is projecting "exponential" improvement in the coming weeks, which was probably just to make me feel better.

In the meantime, she cranked out 9/8/6/5/7, which is pretty damn impressive.

From the introduction, entitled "What is DreadWhimsy, pray tell?":

DreadWhimsy is the deadpan comedy of the absurdly foreboding. It's the street clown caught in a terrorist attack screaming "Jesus Christ! Somebody DO something!" It's walking in on your cat chopping vegetables with a sharp knife in your kitchen in the middle of the night. It's the unwholesome stare from a red-headed child in a passing station wagon. It's whatever fills you with apprehension while involuntarily making you laugh.

It shouldn't be funny. But it is funny. And you're wrong for laughing. But I forgive you. But not really.

Enjoy.

Boy, is this a good political ad.

While we're genuflecting to the Obamessiah, I just got this from the papa of Charlie's BFF, Nate Dawg:

There are many things people do not know about BARACK OBAMA. It is every American's duty to read this message and pass it along to all of their friends and loved ones.

Barack Obama's skin is the color of AMERICAN SOIL.

Barack Obama wears a FLAG PIN at all times. Even in the shower.

Barack Obama says the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE every time he sees an American flag. He also ends every sentence by saying, 'WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL.' Click here for video of Obama quietly mouthing the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE in his sleep.

A tape exists of Michelle Obama saying the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE at a conference on PATRIOTISM.

Every weekend, Barack and Michelle take their daughters HUNTING.

Barack Obama is a PATRIOTIC AMERICAN. He has one HAND over his HEART at all times. He occasionally switches when one arm gets tired, which is almost never because he is STRONG.

Barack Obama has the DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE tattooed on his stomach. It's upside-down, so he can read it while doing sit-ups.

There's only one artist on Barack Obama's iPod: FRANCIS SCOTT KEY.

Barack Obama is a DEVOUT CHRISTIAN. His favorite book is the BIBLE, which he has memorized. His name means HE WHO LOVES JESUS in the ancient language of Aramaic. He is PROUD that Jesus was an American.

Barack Obama goes to church every morning. He goes to church every afternoon. He goes to church every evening. He is IN CHURCH RIGHT NOW.

Barack Obama's new airplane includes a conference room, a kitchen, and a MEGACHURCH.

Barack Obama buys AMERICAN STUFF. He owns a FORD, a BASEBALL TEAM, and a COMPUTER HE BUILT HIMSELF FROM AMERICAN PARTS. He travels mostly by FORKLIFT.

Barack Obama says that Americans cling to GUNS and RELIGION because they are AWESOME.

Heh heh.

538 collects all state level polls and weights them against their own past accuracy and against some voodoo historical derivation, to assemble a proprietary "average" electoral probability for each candidate in each state.

Based on the speeches last Tuesday by the respective candidates (the John McCain Rictus-Against-Lime-Green travesty versus the Obamessiah treatment), I'm going to assume that John McCain is already doing as well as he's going to do. He has, for years, been ensconced in the lizard brain of collective America as "a decent, steady, independent guy" and no profane flipouts at his colleagues or 95% party line voting record are going to change that.

On the flip side, as we get to know him better in the unforgiving glare of a national presidential campaign, I doubt we're going to like him better.

Obama is less well known nationally and, in general, cuts a far better figure and makes a far better impression. So I'm assuming that, as this grinds on, more people are going to shift from McCain to Obama than the other direction.

So I did a prospective electoral map based on the assumption that Obama's numbers against McCain will improve 5% across the board between now and November. Meaning he would win any state where McCain currently enjoys a lead less than 5%. If that bore out, here's what the electoral map would look like:

Oh. Oh so pretty.

Then again, if the tide really and truly turns in O's direction and garnered him a country-wide 10% bounce (I think this is more farfetched though I won't rule it out), it would look like this:

Go Blue.

And then the popular, charming football coach gets up at a school assembly and says something hilarious and scathing about poetry, and how pointless it is, and how sissified you'd have to be to like it.

It would go something like: "When I played in high school we didn't even wear pads, and I got two concussions and broke my ribs. But it could have been worse. I could have been in poetry class." But, you know, funnier and more scathing.

In any event, it's well said, and everybody laughs.

And just like that, the knife has been put into the poetry class. It is now impossible to take it seriously, at least in public. And every time you hear a new poem, you think about that football coach making fun of it, and you take it less seriously. A couple bookish types try to point out that poetry is actually kind of nice, and they're hooted down.

Okay. So for the purposes of this discussion, that football coach is Ronald Reagan, and the quip in question is "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are 'I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.'"

Back at Allegory High: the years pass. Sophomore year, there's a new teacher for the poetry class, who's pretty cool and some kids say they once saw him smoking pot, and he tries to deal with everybody thinking poetry is dumb by teaching "the collected works of Eminem," doing translations of poems into plain English, whatever.

And some people dig it. It doesn't challenge the basic premise that poetry is lame. It just points out that some of it is less lame than others, and that anyway it can still be kind of enjoyable in spite of being lame.

Let's not even talk about Junior year. Assistant Coach Jockstrap teaches poetry that year. It's a bad year for poetry.

Then, Senior Year at Allegory High, there's a new poetry teacher. He's young. He's black. He's cool. He's laid back and intense at the same time.

And here's the thing: this motherfather just LOVES poetry. Loves how it uses the language, loves how it demands an active interaction from the reader, loves the way it can express stuff with a specificity that prose can never touch.

And everybody is sitting in his class, and they get all stirred up listening to him - let's call him Mr. O - listening to Mr. O talk about poetry and what it can do.

And Mr. O is so damn cool that all the boys want his approval and all the girls have crushes on him and everybody's talking about poetry class while they're in the lunchroom.

And by jiminy, Allegory High has itself a little poetry renaissance.

So.

If Mr. Leatherhead the football coach stands for Ronald Reagan, then "poetry" stands for the idea that the government can and should actually help people.

The Reagan era caused a shift. Suddenly, believing in the government's ability to help meant you were a rube and a ninny. It took the New Deal/Ask Not paradigm of civic governance and left it bleeding in some busboy's lap.

Bill Clinton is the first President that I cast a vote for, and the first politician that I took personally. But in hindsight, looking at the difference between Clintonian politics and Obamian politics, I see that for all the good he did and even more he tried to do, he didn't shift that paradigm back.

He didn't even try. He made a point of doing exactly what was possible and nothing more. And, in some critical cases, he sold out the principles of a liberal/progressive society entirely (Don't Ask/Don't Tell, welfare "reform," the Defense of Marriage Act, etc.).

"You'll never get these kids to like poetry," say the Clintons (allegorically). "Just give 'em what they want and maybe slip a little poetry in around the edges. If you think you can change their minds, you're a damn fool."

Maybe they were right, at the time.

Barack Obama wants to restore the idea that the purpose of government is not to get out of the way, but to do good. To help. That's the big-C "CHANGE" he wants everybody to believe in. From the Obama website:

Amid the partisanship and bickering of today's public debate, he still believes in the ability to unite people around a politics of purpose - a politics that puts solving the challenges of everyday Americans ahead of partisan calculation and political gain. (emphasis mine)

Mr. O of Allegory High got the kids back into poetry both by what he said and who he was. In Barack Obama, with his incredible reserves of personal charisma, there's a match between the message and the messenger.

Paradigms don't shift easy. Obama's got a big hill to climb, but he's the first guy I've seen who looks like he actually has a chance to climb it.

Ronald Reagan wasn't a demigod, he wasn't the Messiah, he was just the right guy with the right thing to say at the right time. He was the delivery vector for a thought virus, and we're fighting the cognitive infection to this day.

Obama wants to be the cure.

In deference to (a) those who would rather not see an anti-Hillary screed while they wait patiently for an update; (b) the fact that I've cooled off about Hillary's RFK gaffe (not that I think it was a reasonable comment, just that I've relaxed about it); and (c) the need for future unity in the Democratic party, I've moved said anti-Hillary screed below the fold.

Anyway, she's been totally outdone by Liz Trotta at Fox:

But that's what she meant.

I've resisted the anger against Hillary that has engulfed the progressive left, but I'm done.

Sheesh.

UPDATE:

Two further points:

Point the First. What I think this comment reveals about Hillary is: she is staying in this because it's a long time until the convention and, you know, anything can happen. Obama could have a love child come forward. Michelle could have a lesbian lover come forward. A bank somewhere could find a cancelled check from Tony Rezko to Barack Obama for one meeellion dollars with a Memo line that reads "in exchange for doing everything I ask you for." Obama could end a speech with "Allahu Akbar" instead of "God Bless America." It's a couple months - anything could happen.

Including, Obama could get shot.

I really do believe that is something she believes, and is part of why she's in this race. Not that she *wants* him to get shot, but she *does* want the other stuff to happen, and hey, you never know.

Point the Second. Thank you, Hillary.

Why?

As of this afternoon, I was pondering the question of a running mate for Obama. It's clear that choosing Hillary was, by most metrics, a bad choice. She counteracts his message of change. She undercuts his pure and consistent opposition to the war, and to escalation with Iran. She's a hugely divisive figure who, despite her popularity in Appalachia, probably brings as many negatives as she does positives.

BUT: he had to take her anyway. Period. The end. As of 3pm today, there was no way for Obama to pick any other running mate without bucking the narrative that everyone is, consciously or not, rooting for. It was simply what had to happen.

Guess what: it's not anymore.

Fingers crossed.

[Update: Karl Rove said the same on Fox. I can't believe I'm happy to agree with Karl Rove.]

From the time Charlie was born, other than noting that he looked just like I did as a baby (this has since been confirmed with family photo albums, and the resemblance is sometimes spooky), we also noticed that his left eye never opened as far as the right. We asked the doctor about it at his in-hospital visit, and he suggested it was probably swelling from the birth.

A week later it was still noticeable, so we asked another of the pediatricians in our practice. She suggested a tear duct was blocked and that we should massage it regularly.

Another week later, after we had dutifully jabbed our fingertips into the corner of the poor tyke's eye every couple of hours, his left eye was still at half mast. Moreover, it wasn't developing the crease that was allowing the right eye to retract. We asked the pediatrician again and, with the long suffering sigh of one accustomed to dealing with over-concerned parents, she huffed that we should go ahead and see a specialist if it would make us feel better, but it was really just a tear duct issue.

Well, no. Nana reminded us that her sister, Charlie's Great Aunt Phyllis, was born with ptosis in both eyelids which had been corrected with surgery. With much Googling and Wikipedia-ing we had come to suspect that was what Charlie had, as well.

The ophthalmologist took one look and said "ah, yes. Congenital ptosis." For those not familiar (as I wasn't), ptosis (pronounced "toe-sis") is a problem with the muscles of the eyelid. In his left eye, Charlie doesn't have proper muscles but instead fibrous tissue. Luckily, the eyelid clears the pupil at least most of the time, so he's getting visual input and his sight can develop normally. He'll have a procedure (what the ophtho called "a fun little surgery") when he's about two, to insert a silicon rod that will more firmly knit the fibrous tissue to his eyebrow muscle, allowing him to use his eyebrow to fully raise the eyelid.

So expect my son to affect a permanently surprised expression, starting in eighteen to twenty-four months.

I have to say, after obsessing about the "winky eye" during the period where we weren't sure what it was, I've now become quite fond of it. Charlie wouldn't look quite so much like Charlie without it.

And Forest Whitaker and Thom Yorke (fellow ptosics) now loom large in our family mythology...

Of course it turned out later we needn't have wondered for so long - Charlie's Uncle Bob and Aunt Judy (pediatrician/pediatric nurse, respectively) confirmed that they had identified the ptosis in the very first picture they saw of him. That's what we get for not requesting an in-family consult.

[UPDATED to correct the timeline and properly attribute Nana as the first one to correctly identify the droop as ptosis.]

In the meantime, go here and look at 84 pictures of my kids. Click the "i" in the middle of the slideshow for my captions, which are awfully clever. Or charming. Or something. At least you'll know who you're looking at.

Some highlights: