In my last post I talked about how hard it is to get kids motivated to do work, and how the new generations coming up seem woefully unprepared for the rigors of, first, higher learning, and second, life.

And I promised in the next post I would talk about ways of dealing with that with your kids and so forth. But can I post-pone that post until the next one, con permiso, my bloggies?

Because I have some late-breaking news. We interrupt the regularly scheduled blogcast to bring you an urgent bulletin:

Mac got a tat.

Now, the other day a blogger for Canadian Family magazine aired her opinion that no one should try to be "hip" or "cool" past the age of 35, especially I suppose parents.

You may agree or not, my bloggies. I heartily disagree, I think that's just when you need to be hip and cool THE MOST, but to each his/her own.

But this wasn't about that. It's not really a "cool" type of tattoo at all: not primitive, or Polynesian, or Japanese, or realistic, or whatever.

It's just a flaming heart with the names of my wife and three kids written around it in the ultra-curlicued, super-serific type of font tattoo artists seem to favour.

It's more almost a sailor type tattoo. The flaming heart is a reference to the fiercely passionate birthday and Xmas cards my second-oldest, JJ, used to write, in which he would tell us, his parents (and on at least one occasion his grandparents): "I love you so much my heart is on fire."

I sprung it as a surprise on Ms. Daddy. She was surprised.

"I can't believe you actually did that," she kept saying, as if I'd just confessed to an heinous crime.

"Don't worry, Mom, it'll wash off," my youngest said.

But it won't. It's my way of proclaiming I love them so much "my heart is on fire."

And OK, yeah, maybe I'm trying to get my "bad boy" mojo back, a bit. Is that so bad, my bloggies? Just because someone is a Dad and over 35 he can't be a "bad boy"?

Maybe you think, along with my mother, that it's "stupid." Fair enough, and I can certainly see a case for holding that POV.

But to be honest, we "bad boys" don't really care what other people think. And one guy has already said it makes the bespectacled Mac look "tough." Another that the tattoo itself was "sick," which is, I believe, the highest rating a tattoo can get.

In any case, it doesn't matter what I or anyone else thinks. It's there. And ain't never gonna wash off.