finally: mr nice guy's stance on burping

i really didn't mean to go so long between posts, but the Amazing Napless Farting Chickenbaby has been keeping me busy -- busy praying for her to sleep, busy rocking her, busy taking her on walks, busy performing do-it-yourself vasectomies on my boys with rusty tweezers and a zippo.

for the moment she slumbers. and for the moment i wear my ipod so in the event she ceases to slumber, it's her problem and not mine.

on friday the nice guy family went to a reunion for our supremely excellent birthing class. not all the moms showed up and besides me there was only one other dad (aww yeah, mr nice guy knows where to go to get the good lady-to-nice-guy-ratio going). it was great to see our fantastically superlative instructor there and it was a little trippy to see all the moms in their non-preggo bodies. but the true bizarreness was to see everyone's babies: all these little critters actually attended every single birthing class that i did, they just attended them inside their mothers. gives me the jeeblies just thinking out it.

anyway, the baby-on-baby action was cute. the moms shared their birth stories, the dads took pictures for everybody and that was that. our wee child chose the reunion OF ALL TIMES to take a fucking nap. so we don't have pictures of her adorably holding hands with little baby dexter, or sneaking off to make out with baby jules in the supply closet, or gossiping with baby natalie about how baby antonio has the dreamiest bedroom eyes and how baby ruby turned out to be such a dumb baby slut.

but the best part of the day had nothing to do with babies. it had to do with the nice guys' least favorite classmate who was always attempting to corner the instructor to ask insipid questions in a transparent attempt to curry favor. tch, teacher's pet. on friday we heard her ask this question, sotto voce, verbatim (i could not make this up if i tried): "so, what's your stance on burping?"

now, i only wish she had asked this question to mr nice guy. our birthing instructor didn't really have a well articulated stance on this divisive topic, something to the effect of "um, burp the baby after she eats." (i made the grievous error of giving her the link to this website, so i can only hope that in her unsurpassed judgment she has not deigned to visit it because i hate knowing that my former birth-mentor par excellence might disapprove of how stratospherically lame this all is.) mr nice guy, on the other hand, has been developing his stance on burping since he was about five years old. he has very strong feelings on burping. in fact, he has written a whole burping manifesto, a burping dissertation, and holds a phd in belchology. he has very strong feelings on burping.

i will not bore you now with my well-documented research into the role of the burp in ancient warfare. my controversial defense of the supragastric belch has ruined friendships and cost me jobs. nor will i go on ad nauseum (pun intended) on how pivotal the belch was to the development of western culture, primarily through charting its portayal at key moments in the evolution of the novel as an artform. ok one example: in heaping praise upon the "strange and wonderful" people of the island of raunch ruach, pantagruel points out "they neither exonerate, dung, piss, nor spit in that island; but, to make amends, they belch, fizzle, funk, and give tail-shots in abundance." sounds like my kind of island! also, and i know this is a play and not a novel so spare me your pedantic emails, it was no mistake that in "twelfth night" shakespeare felt compelled to name a minor hero -- he who drunkenly thwarts the dastardly malvolio -- sir toby belch.

ah, see what i've done? i've been babbling on about my favorite topic again. i am sorry, dear reader. but the next time someone asks you for your stance on burping, do not shrug it off as merely something you do to your baby after feeding. no. give your stance!

but don't do it for mr nice guy. don't even do it for baby nice guy, who has so far evinced a strong devotion to, and aptitude for, the art of burping.

do it for: this guy.