Akiko Runs Afoul of the Mafia (not a bird joke, though it should have been)

Sigh. So, there was supposed to be pictures and a video to go along with this, as usual, but I did something stupid. The video I mention later, about Gabe playing with his new training potty while pantsless, was still on the camera, so I thought I'd move it over. Turns out, I had moved it last night, so I clicked the delete button, figuring it would just delete the movie, but instead of being selected on the movie I had just tried to copy over, Windows Explorer decided that what I really wanted to select was the entire folder on the camera's memory card. So I deleted all of it. And I don't think Gabe would tolerate doing it all again.

Oh well. On the plus side, there really wasn't much to take pictures of for this entry (though I did have one of Karl up on the LED "jungle light" that Libby bought, which is where his nightmare inducing home used to be, and that would have been fun to point out with a picture to illustrate), and the video was a disappointment. I gave Gabe one instruction, to make his kitchenette in his room "explode." To inspire him, I filled the oven with toys and stacked a mess of books on top of it, figuring he would make short work of it all. Instead, he spent a minute carefully pulling down three books and reading them. Double sigh. Of course, within five minutes of when I'd stopped filming, the entire area around the kitchenette was destroyed with a stack of books ankle deep on the floor.

Anyway, here's the entry for today, minus the pictures. Just imagine something mildly pertinent is happening somewhere in our house with the relevant stuffed animals in play. Triple sigh.


No word back yet from Colm Meaney. And, since my last post, there haven’t been any searches for his name that brought people to my site. So, either that means Mr. Meaney wasn’t impressed enough with me to research his name and visit again or he’s bookmarked me so he can check up regularly. If the second one is the case, and he didn’t leave any comments or try to contact me otherwise, I have to assume that he doesn’t want to be my friend. That makes me sad. Everyone should want to be my friend.

In other news, Libby bought Gabe a potty training toilet yesterday. To me, it seems WAY too early to start trying to potty train. While he does seem to know what he’s doing when we put him in the bathtub and the first thing he does, before he sits down, is pee on all of his bath toys, I’m thinking he just doesn’t have the wherewithal to consciously go to the toilet when he needs to pee. Nonetheless, before taking him to his bath last night, Libby broke out the toilet and stripped him down to just his shirt to see if he’d be interested in trying it. This, I thought, was a terrible idea, especially since she did it in the dining room (and we’ve already had at least one incident, that I can remember, when Libby got him naked for a bath and, associating bath-naked with peeing in the tub, he immediately proceeded to pee all over the accordion gate we have between the dining room and my office). But he just played with the toilet instead of doing anything. I did manage to get some video of it, though. It’s posted on our youtube account if anyone is interested. I won’t post it here because it’s pretty long and contains baby frontal nudity, which I’d rather not get into trouble for.

Akiko Runs Afoul of the Mafia

So, back to Akiko’s story.

After faking her own death in a most Godzilla-y way, Akiko decided to start on her quest for revenge on her father by taking a trip to America. “Why,” you might ask, “did she go to America when she knew exactly where to find her father—on his Cossack dirt farm in Russia?” To which I would reply, “Good question.”

By a process of needing to end up where I had several of my other characters already established, Akiko landed in Chicago and immediately started to look for the means to exact her revenge. And what better place to start a revenge quest than with the Italian Mafia? They are, after all, experts on the subject if you believe the things you see on television and in the movies.

She immediately started sending out “feelers” to put her in touch with one of the local mob bosses. The best way to get their attention, she decided, was to start blowing up Italian restaurants, since it’s a well known fact that all Mafioso sit in corner booths eating huge plates of pasta—at least until some thug busts in the door with a tommy gun and hoses them all down. But she didn’t want to actually hurt anyone in the process, so she took to blowing up buildings late at night after making sure the place was empty.

Before too long, she blew up The Spicy Meatball, a favorite haunt of Maria “The Eye” Calzonne. Maria had heard about the bombing of some of the other Italian restaurants in the neighborhood, most notably I’ma Mario’s (and that does it for the two things I can hear said in a stereotypically Italian accent in my head), and she feared it was the act of a rival faction/family/gang/brotherhood/whatever, so she immediately sought out the person responsible.

It didn’t take her long to find Akiko, who was leaving cryptic business cards at the scene of every be-arsonned eating establishment. Maria set up a meeting with Akiko at a local park.

Not surprisingly, Akiko’s plan backfired. Instead of wanting to meet with her to discuss future business dealings, as Akiko had hoped, Maria set up an ambush at the park with the intention of eliminating this new threat.

Meanwhile, Akiko’s Aunt, fearing what Akiko might do, had sent her new husband “Tarnations” to America in search of their niece. Not having the foggiest clue where to even begin, Stanley did what anybody in an 80s serial drama would do, he found a private investigator. After carefully examining a phone book, he chose the P.I. with the best ad—Dag Masters, P.I., whose ad included the rousing endorsement of one Karl Weathers who claimed Dag “Put the ‘P.I.’ in ‘Helping people with their problems, no matter how ridiculous.” Stanley called him right away.

After hearing Stanley’s story, Dag decided to call in his sometimes partner, Karl Weathers, to help him with the case. The pair set up a meeting in, of all fortuitous places, the exact same park that Akiko was supposed to meet Maria in that very night. Wackiness ensues . . . .