By Daddy Clay January 15th, 2013

Want to make a dad mad? Texting and driving will do the trick. Especially if you are in the vicinity of said dad when he’s hauling the rugrats to school in the minivan. I can think of no other observable behavior (with the possible exception of the lap dog with its head out the driver’s window) that drives me more nuts.

We’ve all heard the stats. We know that texting drivers are 23 times more likely to be involved in an accident. 100,000 crashes a year involving texting. Yet these people think that they are just too skilled behind the wheel for it to happen to them. Idiots.

And too often it’s other people that pay the price. Innocent people. Kids.

Which is one reason I’m so impressed that ATT is doing the right thing with their It Can Wait campaign. Not only have they created a cool website at itcanwait.com (take the pledge while you’re there) and some cool videos like the one linked below, but they’ve also given us some amazing loot to give away.

All you have to drop a comment here or on our Facebook page about idiotic texting behavior that you have seen or you can send out a tweet with the hashtag #ItCanWaitDad and you will be entered to win the It Can Wait giftpack that includes a Samsung Galaxy SIII phone, an ICW branded case, a t-shirt, thumbbands, stickers, and a SkinIt Coupon good for one free large device SkinIt.

Did I mention the Samsung Galaxy SIII? That phone is amazing. They sent me one to try out, and I’m incredibly impressed (full review soon).

So let’s get out there and start “text shaming” and see if we can do some good. Take the pledge while you’re at it.

ATT sent us a gift pack as a thank you for promoting the campaign so we can honestly tell you how awesome it is. Get registered.

Texting and Driving Crash – It Can Wait

Posted in Health, Safety, Travel

By Daddy Clay January 8th, 2013

the new guy

Like a Pavlovian dinner bell, the sound that signaled dinner preparation was underway was loud enough to draw our kids away from their desks and into the kitchen to see what mom and dad were up to — a kind of bass thump and tinny clang. The sound that the lid of our old step-can made banging against the wall.

It’s funny what you can get accustomed to. I think I just assumed that the noise was something inevitable, the floppy plastic lid flying back to smack the wall. When the sound became too loud, I’d scoot the can a bit more away from the wall, but it would just slide back into noisy proximity over time. “That’s just what they do,” I told myself.
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Tags: bags, can, design, garbage, home, House, kitchen, review, simplehuman, stainless, stepcan, trash, upscale
Posted in Diaper Pails, Eating, Health

By Daddy Clay December 20th, 2012

Do athletes make the best dads? The stars appearing in the Journey to Comfort spots from Dove Men + Care provide appealing portraits of fatherhood, obviously comfortable in their own skin. While not many dads are sports stars, or were in a small town track team kind of way, lots of them are former athletes. And for most of these dads, sports had a formative influence on them. Which leads me to pose the question: does having a history as an athlete make a man a better father?
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Tags: athletes, college, dad, dads, deadbeat, domestic, family, fathers, highschool, jocks, kids, responsible, Sports, violence
Posted in Health, Sports

By Daddy Clay December 14th, 2012

Do other dads have a love/hate relationship with buying electronics? I crave gadgets, love them all equally — phones, laptops, tablets, game systems. What guy doesn’t enjoy unboxing the latest digital gewgaw? At those moments I’m the poster boy for childish glee.

Am I the only one that compulsively hits the refresh button on the delivery service web page? Out for delivery! I almost squee.

And unlike cars, I get little satisfaction from nursing utility out of well maintained, older hardware. I want the new stuff.
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Tags: camera, device, digital, electronics, family, gadgets, kids, phone, phones, Photography, production, prosumer, upgrade, video, wife
Posted in Marriage, Money, Photography, Tech, Toys