One day in the life of the stay-at-home dad.

Arise. Usually to the sound of the children fighting. Make breakfast. Drink coffee.
Dress children. Spend no less than ten minutes locating shoes. Drink coffee. Notice that the boy has used the potty chair without telling me and is now in need of a quick bath, which is administered. Drink coffee.
Both children are now breakfasted, scrubbed squeaky and pink, and the girl is ready for preschool. Last minute check and out the door. Remember that I haven't packed her lunch yet. Run back inside, grab a slice of last night's pizza and a fruit cup for lunch box. Pour coffee into travel mug. Take the kid to preschool. Forget the coffee on the counter.

Drop girl off at preschool. Take boy to grocery store. Wander aimlessly for about an hour, pick up three items, none of which are what you actually wanted when you came in, check out, go home.

See coffee sitting on counter. Pour into regular mug. Reheat in microwave. Consider spiking.

Turn on TV to PBS Kids and start loading the dishwasher. Notice entirely too late that the boy is not in the living room. Find him in the bathroom coloring on the toilet lid with wife's deodorant. Also notice fresh deposit in the potty chair. Clean both. Notice ersatz MMA tattoos on boy. Find uncapped Sharpie in the living room. Decide it's not worth it at this point. Start a fresh half pot of coffee.

Realize you haven't eaten yet. Wolf down a bowl of Cheerios. Get ready to do a load of laundry, take same to laundry room, pausing to ask the boy if he'd like to "help". Notice innards have begun making noises. Start laundry, go back to kitchen, set timer so you'll know when it's time to go back to laundry room.

Innards have stopped having their meeting and have begun implementing their action plan. Leave bathroom door open so you can hear what's going on in the other room. After conclusion of business, see that boy has located his Sharpie and has given a chair a treatment similar to his arms.

It is now 10:15 in the morning.

Dishes and laundry washing, we get a break. Sip coffee, peruse the internet for the news of the day OOPS, applesauce that I didn't give him is all over the floor now. Well, that was fun while it lasted. Consider swapping coffee for beer. Clean up applesauce. Throw out paper towels, come back into living room to see boy dump your (now luke warm) coffee all over his head.

Bathe boy again. Take off self-imposed body art as best you can. Redress.

Attempt to read to boy. Be rejected because Thomas and Friends is on. Attempt to take another break, this time successfully! Fail to notice that Thomas has ended until Caillou starts. Quickly change channel before any damage can be done. Tamp down nascent temper tantrum.

Make hot dogs, peas, and mac and cheese for lunch, which the boy will reject, even though that's his favorite dish. Clean floor of evidence of said meal rejection. Contemplate straight liquor. That oughta settle him down. Remember that there are laws against such practices.

Lunch is done, time to go to the park. Watch boy try to make friends with other two year old and get shoved on the ground for his troubles. Watch him pick himself up and get shoved again. Walk over to pick him up. "Ok, that's enough." Get glared at by other child's mother who was too busy playing Doodle Jump on her phone to notice her precious bundle of joy committing felonious assault. Roll eyes. Take son to swings. Notice with amusement when said mother gets handful of pea gravel thrown in her face. Say a quick prayer for the child.

Go home, time for snacks and a story. Peel a banana, of which he will eat half. Start reading the wrong story. Be handed the correct book, the same one you've read every day for the last three weeks and read same.

Drink of water, down for a nap. Then back up. Then back down. Then back up, then back down. Repeat ad infinitum until child actually stays down.

Sit down in front of computer to attempt to catch up on the news again. Remember that you never got the wash out of the machine. Come back into living room with armload of wet clothes with the intention of hanging on drying rack and placing on the patio. Boy is sitting on the couch without any pants on.

Return boy to bed, with stern warning to stay put. Give up on coffee. Pour a glass of cold tea. Finish mac and cheese and hot dogs. Wonder why you've been putting on weight. Take two pounds of ground beef out of the freezer to defrost for supper.

Nap actually takes this time, which translates to two hours of very quiet discretionary time. Read two pages of a book your mother gave you, then fire up Netflix and watch Dr. Strange instead. Fall asleep twenty minutes in. The boy will shuffle into the living midway through the climax and demand a glass of milk.

Time to pick up the girl from preschool. Find out she had a rough day. Not listening, being rude, threw a chair at one point, possibly running numbers in the bathroom.

Get home, daughter demands a pudding cup. Refuse on the basis that children who misbehave at school don't get pudding. Weather a tantrum. Suggest a nap. Tantrum not only renews, but grows in strength. Settle down child, give her a banana.

Get children playing nicely in the living room. Turn on TV. Settle in on couch to watch Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood with the children.

Wife comes home and asks if we've really just been watching TV all day.

Go to the bathroom and take a shower. Then come back out and get ready to make sloppy joes for supper. Wife says, "Oh! Ok. I kinda wanted you make that pork roast I picked up over the weekend." Ask why she didn't mention that earlier. Be accused of trying to pick a fight, and chastised for not asking how her day was yet. As it turns out, not great, and she's sorry for being short, sloppy joes are great and can we have carrots to go with them?

Hug and make up, agree that tomorrow will be pork roast day.

Wife supervised children while supper is made.

Supper is served, mostly eaten, and dishes are deposited in the sink. Ask wife if she'd mind taking care of the dishwasher. Notice that you've been talking to yourself in the empty kitchen. Decide it's just not worth it and take care of it yourself.

Eventually it's bed time for the kids. Brush teeth, story, song, in bed. Then out of bed. Then in bed. Then out of bed. Then in bed. Then we hear them playing with their toys. Turn it over to the wife, who balks, but eventually assents. This time it takes.

Attempt to watch TV but fall asleep roughly half an hour in. Go to bed. Wife may or may not stay up a bit longer. Remember that the dying rack is still on the patio and that it's supposed to rain tonight. Decide you no longer care.

Fin.