Yeah, I’m a parent. One of the best compliments I’ve ever received came from my Number One Road Dog Vince (Keith Pridemore, to any of you who’ve read Oogie Boogie Central ), who told me, “Man, I don’t like kids in general, but I really dig hanging out with yours.” What makes that better is that I’ve heard the same thing from a lot of people. I never had a parenting strategy beyond the standard “I’ll never do THAT to my kids” we all vow during the heights of teenage angst. With my sons, the influence I wielded ended early thanks to the divorce and visitation. You can only exert so much control on alternate weekends. Still, both boys have turned out relatively well, and if I close my eyes while they’re talking, I can hear myself in their words, attitude and inflection. I’ll leave it for posterity to determine whether my influence has been positive or not. Lex is a different story. After a lengthy gap in my day-to-day parenting experience, I was ...
