Wednesday night is usually one of not-well-organized chaos. After picking up Michael, I come home to a house overflowing with teenagers, as my own girls are with us for dinner. They’ve usually got a huge stream of updates for me. This night was no exception. Just before dinner, my 14-year-old daughter L came running up [...]

…of a teenage girl on Saturday 11:30 AM: Awaken. Check for text messages. Send a couple. Shuffle down stairs. Enter kitchen, pour bowl of cereal, add milk. Send a text message or thirty. Send more text messages. Take bowl to table with one hand. Ignore father’s admonishment about being careful. Text. Text. Text message. Texting… [...]

Okay, kids, here’s a scenario: you walk into the bathroom, and just after you shut the door you notice there’s no toilet paper. The dispenser has an empty cardboard tube, and the spare rolls are all gone. What will you do? What Will You Do? True, you could use the facial tissue that’s in the [...]

Didja know? Your 6 ounce bottle of “Ragdoll” perfume will actually last you more than three days if you use the handy spray feature built in, instead of uncapping and upending the entire container to douse your head and shoulders. Using a light touch with this clever spray method, you’ll exude a subtle, delightfully elusive [...]

Sister S: “What are you making?” Michael’s Mom: “Corn muffins.” Sister S: “Ewww!” Me: “Why ‘ewww’?” Sister S: “It sounds gross.” Me: “Have you had cornbread?” Sister S: “Yes.” Me: “Well, it’s the same thing, just in muffin form.” Sister S: “Ewwww.” Me: “What makes it ewww? It’s the same darn thing!” Sister S: “Because [...]

For all those daughters in their teen years out there: Did you know? If you use a little less eye liner, you can actually get more than one use out of your eye liner pencil! Amazing! Saves the planet! Keeps you from looking like a raccoon or a villain from the 1960′s-era Batman show! People [...]

One Saturday in recent history, sister B asked if she could have a friend over for dinner. A boy-type friend. “Yes, but you’ll stay down stairs,” I admonished her. “What if I keep the door open to my room?” “No. You stay down stairs.” “All right…” she said, reluctantly. And they did, staying down stairs [...]

On certain weekday evenings and every other weekend, there descends upon our house a plague of near Biblical proportion: a voracious hunger that cannot be sated, but merely pacified for a time. I’m speaking of my two teenage daughters. For the majority of their lives, they reside with their mom in a small house in [...]

Today we proclaim a monumental honor for Being Michael’s Daddy! On Teens Today is a modern-day perspective on teens by teens, moderated by Vanessa Van Petten, whose mission is providing a venue where teen writers can “tell parents what they wish their own parents knew (and didn’t know).” We’ve been voted as one of the [...]

One of Michael’s dear sisters is a study in energy conservation, both mental and physical. Having recently attained the status of teenager-hood (by no effort of her own, other than merely riding upon the earth for thirteen trips around the sun) she is now ascending to a seasoned ripeness of sloth. Now, I’ll give you: [...]