This past school year, as our daughter conducted her ongoing first-grade-inspired seminars, I was most distressed by her lecture on The Food Pyramid. I liked it better when we only had to keep track of The Four Basic Food Groups: Pasta, Cheese, Meat, and Potato Chips. These are the staples around which my Cuisine is based... well, I don't generally cook with potato chips, but I do have seven different kinds of cheese in my fridge right now.
Of course, my daughter isn't the only one who relishes illuminating my ignorance. Maybe 18 months ago, I bought something at Best Buy (I should never be allowed in Best Buy unsupervised. Even though I'm far from an impulse buyer, nearly every trip in there plants a seed for a future purchase). They had a deal: join Reward Zone and get a short-term subscription to a magazine. Since I already get most English-language publications, I decided I'd give Entertainment Weekly a try.
Don't get me wrong, I'm no stranger to the Free Introductory Offer. I figured I'd let it go a couple months, then cancel; unfortunately, I didn't fully account for my voracious thirst for printed material. At this point, in addition to the daily newspaper, I have no fewer than six weekly subscriptions... including, of course, EW. I say "weekly", but somehow several of them tend to print a lot of "double issues" and then take a week off.
EW provides coverage of all forms of entertainment media -- TV, movies, music, books, even video games -- and while I enjoy keeping up-to-date on all those topics, I sometimes feel their primary purpose is to reinforce something I've known for a lot of years: I ain't hip.
The articles and especially the reviews usually tout the band that's stretching its genre, the movie that is an intricately crafted work of art, the novel that is unflinching in its portrayal of blah blah blah... even the TV shows are most often the ones more noted for Critical Acclaim than for, you know, viewers.
It seems like human nature, or maybe just the nature of criticism (or a bid for job security), but it's frustrating that seemingly the only Worthwhile Art is obscure and challenging and difficult -- almost as if something that's actually enjoyable is somehow less worthy.
As for myself, I find that in almost all matters of taste, and not just the literal one, that I have a deep-seated appreciation for cheese.
I've read and enjoyed Shakespeare and I'm familiar with at least the most obvious literary classics, but I'd probably say my favorite author is Robert B. Parker. At least statistically: he's written 68 books and I know I've read well over 50 of them. Is he a master literary stylist, constantly breaking new ground? 68 books in 36 years -- you do the math.
Wikipedia helpfully links my favorite musical artists to the Star-based Music Critics, so I'm painfully aware that they range from tolerated (Billy Joel) to widely panned (Styx) to downright laughingstocks (Barry Manilow)... but if the iPod dials up "Until the Night", or "Come Sail Away", or "Can't Smile Without You" and no one's around, I'll be singing along at the top of my lungs (my daughter caught me singing AND doing air guitar to "Rockin' the Paradise" the other day, which was... awkward). Incidentally, "Can't Smile" is the single best karaoke song in recorded history -- sure, "everybody hates Barry", but I've never failed to get an ovation with that one.
While I don't see much more than a half-dozen movies a year, even in the DVD/PPV age, I like movies that make me laugh.. although I'm not opposed to a drama, or even a tearjerker if it doesn't totally insult my intelligence. I guess you'd say I'm more "Stripes", or "Rocky", or "The Incredibles" than "Leaving Las Vegas" or "Trainspotting". I'd rather watch "Sixteen Candles" once than a whole pile of auteurs producing finely-observed Works of Art about despair and depravity.
In television, I think the critics look for "raw" and "gritty", or maybe "quirky/offbeat". Now I believe I rank pretty high up on the Quirkymeter, but if you've read anything I've written about my favorite shows, you'll note they are for the most part pretty general-appeal. Exceptions that prove the rule: the critics and I agree wholeheartedly on Hill Street Blues and Sports Night.
I've gone to two art galleries dedicated to a single artist, both of those for Norman Rockwell -- also the only artist featured on the walls of my home. He ranks roughly as high on the coolness scale (not to be confused with the Quirkymeter) as myself, but -- not meaning to flatter myself -- I think of his art in the same kind of terms as my blog: take a moment that's familiar and see it in a slightly different way, or perhaps take another moment that's personal and try to find the universal in it.
And of course, coming full circle to the literal cheese theme, I've made no secret of my preference for simple foods cooked well: steak, BBQ ribs, fried chicken, lasagna, pizza. And although I'll always watch Top Chef and Next Food Network Star with interest, I'll never understand or appreciate the culinary approach that produces a slice of this and a dollop of that, and something smeared around the edge of the plate. Suffice it to say that if there's anything on the menu you can't pronounce or define (or tablecloths on the table, for that matter), you won't run into me there.
I suppose that in some respects this makes me appear Ignorant and Proud of It. Don't want none of that Art 'round here! But if there's a grand moral to the story, it might be that I don't want my dining, or any entertainment, to be like taking vitamins. I'd rather have a big ol' tasty hunk of cheese.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Monday, August 10, 2009
Just Forward My Mail to 1981
If it were up to me, we wouldn't need much more than one TV channel. But after a period of time (that is, a span of time about as large as the average punctuation mark) my wife can't take any more baseball -- and this is only on once a week. So we end up over at HGTV a fair amount of the time. Often, they are talking about real estate values... and of course, when you turn off the TV and pick up the newspaper, the big story is the economy and people just trying to make ends meet. Well, I've found a place to live where the cost of living is a lot lower...
The past.
Last fall, of course, I visited Homecoming at my alma mater; this spring and summer, under the influence of a group of my Facebook friends, I've been thinking and talking quite a bit about my days at Gaslight Village -- which culminated in my most recent post here. Then to complete the trifecta: this past weekend, I had the opportunity to attend my 30th high school reunion.
Now, even though I've proved I have a rose-colored rearview mirror, I remember plenty about high school that would not lead one to want to revisit it. So why is it that every time there's a reunion, I'm there when the doors open? I'm 4-for-4: 10, 20, 25, and 30.
Well, for one thing there's always the chance I'll get to see someone I've really missed. OK, that actually doesn't happen -- in reality, it seems I spend a lot of each reunion talking to all the people who never talked to me on the first go-round -- but still I live in hope.
That's one of the reasons I find reunions pretty interesting -- if only in the sociological sense. And it has gotten better over the years; I think at least at the 10-year reunion we were all a little preoccupied with how the others saw us, trying to impress each other with all we'd accomplished (which for me was a little dicey since I had only a part-time job, no kids, and was living in a one-bedroom apartment). Now we've all more or less come to terms with who we are and what we've done -- and even if we're not, we're far enough away from high school that none of these people are really our primary peer group any more. Or is that just me?
As for the actual event, it was enjoyable enough. We ate a lot; I did connect with 1 or 2 people I'd lost touch with; and I did get to do not one but two karaoke numbers. Surely any day with karaoke is not a total loss. And I was at least able to collect a few oddities to take home with me (and, you know, post on the World Wide Web).
The past.
Last fall, of course, I visited Homecoming at my alma mater; this spring and summer, under the influence of a group of my Facebook friends, I've been thinking and talking quite a bit about my days at Gaslight Village -- which culminated in my most recent post here. Then to complete the trifecta: this past weekend, I had the opportunity to attend my 30th high school reunion.
Now, even though I've proved I have a rose-colored rearview mirror, I remember plenty about high school that would not lead one to want to revisit it. So why is it that every time there's a reunion, I'm there when the doors open? I'm 4-for-4: 10, 20, 25, and 30.
Well, for one thing there's always the chance I'll get to see someone I've really missed. OK, that actually doesn't happen -- in reality, it seems I spend a lot of each reunion talking to all the people who never talked to me on the first go-round -- but still I live in hope.
That's one of the reasons I find reunions pretty interesting -- if only in the sociological sense. And it has gotten better over the years; I think at least at the 10-year reunion we were all a little preoccupied with how the others saw us, trying to impress each other with all we'd accomplished (which for me was a little dicey since I had only a part-time job, no kids, and was living in a one-bedroom apartment). Now we've all more or less come to terms with who we are and what we've done -- and even if we're not, we're far enough away from high school that none of these people are really our primary peer group any more. Or is that just me?
As for the actual event, it was enjoyable enough. We ate a lot; I did connect with 1 or 2 people I'd lost touch with; and I did get to do not one but two karaoke numbers. Surely any day with karaoke is not a total loss. And I was at least able to collect a few oddities to take home with me (and, you know, post on the World Wide Web).
- - One of my classmates asked me if I was “still really smart”. I suppose if I were really all that bright, I would have had a brilliant riposte to that, so maybe the question answers itself. Even I (not at all desperate for an infusion of self-esteem) would be hard pressed to answer that one, “Why, yes – yes, I am.” Instead, I opted for, “Actually, I’m much dumber than I was then; back then I knew everything,” which I thought struck the right reunion-oriented note of light-heartedness, crossed with wisdom born of the passage of years, seasoned with just a sprinkle of good-natured self-mockery. I do wonder in hindsight whether someone who would even ask such a question is capable of perceiving that level of nuance, of course…
- - Given that the ticket price included all-you-can-drink beer, it was perhaps inevitable that someone’s thirst would outstrip his capacity for self-restraint. The crowd as a whole was very well-mannered, but at least one guy had over-refreshed himself: in the midst of my karaoke number he decided to come up, wrap his arm around me and start to sing along. I’ve already noted my wife’s flair for persuasion; she came forward and very clearly pantomimed that she was supposed to be the one I was singing to, which distracted him enough that some others were able to peel him off. Given the effect that karaoke usually has on me, it’s perhaps predictable that my main concern was whether my performance would be spoiled.
- - Heading out to the parking lot at one point, I ran into one of my classmates who asked whether I was headed out to “smoke a bowl.” Pretty sure he was just ribbing me there… but there were those in attendance who confused a high school reunion with a re-creation – on a later trip to the parking lot, I did discover there was a group out there in the dark somewhere having a non-tobacco-related group smoke.
In similar fashion, I’m just as much of a stick-in-the-mud as I ever was, so we left pretty early. Later that evening, as I was absorbed in my usual never-ending rehash, my wife in the fashion of wives everywhere asked the question that cut to the heart of all the underlying issues: what is it that makes me so enraptured (I’m not sure if she used the word “obsessed”, but it was more or less implied) with all these journeys back into the past?
There might be a hundred answers or there might be no good answer at all. High school reunions for me can serve as a chance to do it all again – an opportunity to relive it and get it right this time, a chance to connect with people that I always felt somehow separated from. Not above or below, but rather just apart. But at this juncture so many years later, I have the feeling that we’re more alike than different.
I think my interest in all things Gaslight Village is probably partly an effort to recapture a simpler but also more exciting time. I could name a half-dozen incidents from those days that I recorded in my journal with a joking “Dear Diary” because they seemed So Very Momentous to me. Probably because it’s the first time for many different experiences, or perhaps just because when you're young, there’s not such a thicket of real life to lose them in. Either way, it's pretty awesome to recapture even a little of that excitement.
I’m not sure why the college homecoming trip was so important. I think it started as nostalgia for a wonderful period in my life, but eventually became a realization that it wasn’t really as wonderful as I like to remember… but that there's nothing wrong with that. I felt like I came out further ahead by working that out than just reliving misty watercolor memories.
And Facebook, which honestly is just another side of the same coin… while I have Facebook friends that I also see in person, it’s also a way for me to integrate all the parts of my life: the slightly odd kid from high school; the rushing-to-be/afraid-to-be grownup from the Gaslight Village days; the young married guy trying to figure out how to be a grownup; and yes, even the middle-aged guy with a wife & 2 kids, a good job and a lot of gray in his hair (but less actual hair).
I’m not always crazy about all the me’s I run into as I observe myself in all my time-travels. Still, just as I’m richer for all the experiences I’ve had and the people I’ve shared them with, I believe I get a benefit from keeping in close touch with all my prior selves… and perhaps even learning something about my present self into the bargain.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
BOFOH Bits
Amid all the reams and wads and stacks of information (and "information") available on the World Wide Web, there's relatively little written about a topic near and dear to my heart: Gaslight Village. I suppose that's only natural; nobody really remembers Pete Best (forget about Stu Sutcliffe), no one writes scholarly biographies of Shemp Howard, and good luck finding someone who's heard of the DuMont Network.
All of these, of course, were in some way overshadowed or even made obsolete by contemporaries (unless you're one of the four people in the world who believe Shemp > Curly, to which I can only say this: no). It was Gaslight's fate to be the ugly corporate stepsister in the empire of Charles R. Wood -- now fondly remembered as a philanthropist, but for us the man who employed most of the teens in the Tri-County area and screamed at a significant percentage of those -- to the legendary Storytown, soon to be known as The Great Escape and eventually to become a part of the Six Flags universe.
The conceit -- the shtik -- the premise of Gaslight Village was a "Gay Nineties" theme. I think I'm safe in saying the concept predated the use of "gay" to mean something else entirely... but in either case it's kind of a hard theme to carry through in an amusement park. There is something vaguely old-fashioned (maybe even musty) about T-shirt shops and skee ball and bumper cars, but maybe more '50s than '90s.
I landed at Gaslight in the summer of 1978 more or less by accident: our high school did The Music Man for our spring musical, and 2 of the guys in the show's quartet decided that was a great path to a summer job (that didn't involve too much work), but the other 2 guys weren't interested, so I was invited to join.
The revised quartet was hired, and a couple or 3 times a day we'd put on red vests and straw hats and belt out "Lida Rose" and "You Gotta Have Heart" and... a bunch of other barbershoppy stuff. However, if you do the math, that's only about a half-hour a day, and Charles R. Wood wasn't about to pay 4 teenagers a day's wage to sit around for all but a half-hour a day.
So Jeff & Steve ran rides, and Kevin & I became grounds boys. I was always assiduous about my duties; there were several spots scattered throughout the park that were polished almost to a gleam. It's possible that, in an effort to be polite, I might have made conversation with young ladies that might have been located in the vicinity of those locations.
As dedicated as I was to keeping my corner of Lake George popcorn- and cigarette-butt-free, my ambition was always to make it to the Opera House, the park's "dinner theater" (okay, snack bar theater). The theater featured 7 shows a day -- the old-fashioned mellerdrama, with a clean-cut hero rescuing the innocent heroine from the dastardly villain, 4 times a day; and a full-fledged ice show, performed on an ice rink about the size of your dining room table, 3 times a day. Seriously, I have about half that much ice in my drink right now. Anyway, suffice it to say there was always a very clean spot in the Opera House doorway.
In the course of time -- lots of time; I worked at Gaslight for 6 summers, so that's more than one calendar year -- I was to weasel my way into the Opera House, bit by bit. Towards the end of my second summer when everyone quit, I joined the cast of the mellerdrama. The show, which narrowly missed a Tony Award nomination for Best Amusement Park Parody/Ripoff of a Recently-Popular Movie, was entitled "Star Squabbles"; I played the character role of Kindly Old Okee Dokee. A character role, if you're not theater-savvy, means you don't get any funny lines and you don't get to do anything in particular; you're there mostly to give the hero somebody to talk to. Occasionally you get to do Exposition, meaning you say something like, "Look, Fluke (the hero's name was Fluke Skycrawler), we're on a spaceship!" so the audience can figure out what the scenery's supposed to be depicting.
The acting... um, performing?... no, stage gig only lasted about 2 weeks, but I got to wear stage makeup and a wig made of the finest yak hair (and from the smell of it, the yak was using it on my day off), and get paid, and not sweep any grounds, so I felt myself Quite the Big Cheese Indeed.
Overall, during those three long summers of custodial servitude, I had the opportunity to fill a lot of other roles that even today lend my resume a madcap air that would otherwise be lacking:
All of these, of course, were in some way overshadowed or even made obsolete by contemporaries (unless you're one of the four people in the world who believe Shemp > Curly, to which I can only say this: no). It was Gaslight's fate to be the ugly corporate stepsister in the empire of Charles R. Wood -- now fondly remembered as a philanthropist, but for us the man who employed most of the teens in the Tri-County area and screamed at a significant percentage of those -- to the legendary Storytown, soon to be known as The Great Escape and eventually to become a part of the Six Flags universe.
The conceit -- the shtik -- the premise of Gaslight Village was a "Gay Nineties" theme. I think I'm safe in saying the concept predated the use of "gay" to mean something else entirely... but in either case it's kind of a hard theme to carry through in an amusement park. There is something vaguely old-fashioned (maybe even musty) about T-shirt shops and skee ball and bumper cars, but maybe more '50s than '90s.
I landed at Gaslight in the summer of 1978 more or less by accident: our high school did The Music Man for our spring musical, and 2 of the guys in the show's quartet decided that was a great path to a summer job (that didn't involve too much work), but the other 2 guys weren't interested, so I was invited to join.
The revised quartet was hired, and a couple or 3 times a day we'd put on red vests and straw hats and belt out "Lida Rose" and "You Gotta Have Heart" and... a bunch of other barbershoppy stuff. However, if you do the math, that's only about a half-hour a day, and Charles R. Wood wasn't about to pay 4 teenagers a day's wage to sit around for all but a half-hour a day.
So Jeff & Steve ran rides, and Kevin & I became grounds boys. I was always assiduous about my duties; there were several spots scattered throughout the park that were polished almost to a gleam. It's possible that, in an effort to be polite, I might have made conversation with young ladies that might have been located in the vicinity of those locations.
As dedicated as I was to keeping my corner of Lake George popcorn- and cigarette-butt-free, my ambition was always to make it to the Opera House, the park's "dinner theater" (okay, snack bar theater). The theater featured 7 shows a day -- the old-fashioned mellerdrama, with a clean-cut hero rescuing the innocent heroine from the dastardly villain, 4 times a day; and a full-fledged ice show, performed on an ice rink about the size of your dining room table, 3 times a day. Seriously, I have about half that much ice in my drink right now. Anyway, suffice it to say there was always a very clean spot in the Opera House doorway.
In the course of time -- lots of time; I worked at Gaslight for 6 summers, so that's more than one calendar year -- I was to weasel my way into the Opera House, bit by bit. Towards the end of my second summer when everyone quit, I joined the cast of the mellerdrama. The show, which narrowly missed a Tony Award nomination for Best Amusement Park Parody/Ripoff of a Recently-Popular Movie, was entitled "Star Squabbles"; I played the character role of Kindly Old Okee Dokee. A character role, if you're not theater-savvy, means you don't get any funny lines and you don't get to do anything in particular; you're there mostly to give the hero somebody to talk to. Occasionally you get to do Exposition, meaning you say something like, "Look, Fluke (the hero's name was Fluke Skycrawler), we're on a spaceship!" so the audience can figure out what the scenery's supposed to be depicting.
The acting... um, performing?... no, stage gig only lasted about 2 weeks, but I got to wear stage makeup and a wig made of the finest yak hair (and from the smell of it, the yak was using it on my day off), and get paid, and not sweep any grounds, so I felt myself Quite the Big Cheese Indeed.
Overall, during those three long summers of custodial servitude, I had the opportunity to fill a lot of other roles that even today lend my resume a madcap air that would otherwise be lacking:
- - opening cages, backstage, for the tiger show
- - onstage announcer for the performing bear act
- - actor in the Keystone Kops pie fight
But I may be proudest of my lighting work for the ice show -- which started while I was still working grounds; eventually, the show's impresario/skating magician, Ron Urban, came to trust me sufficiently that he handed me the show's running order and asked me to devise my own light cues. Not to mention that I ended up dating the girl who ran the other spotlight, for over a year!
But it wasn't till my fourth year at Gaslight that I reached the apex: Singing waiter in the Opera House (incidentally, we always called it the Big Old-Fashioned Opera House, or BOFOH -- hence BOFOH Bits). I've been asked this a lot: you don't sing while you're waiting on tables, but from the bandstand between customers. I featured those well-known Gay Nineties standards, "I Get a Kick Out of You" and "All the Things You Are". We were, as I said, basically a snack bar -- pizza, pretzels, soda, and beer -- so the combination of an average check under $10 and my own uniquely winning personality meant that I sometimes made as much as double figures in tips.
This is when it gets tricky to write. I did have a great time in my three Opera House years; we became in a lot of ways a family, or at least a team, in a fashion that just didn't happen in the rest of the park. In fact, I was really prompted to write this by recently reconnecting with a bunch of my old OH pals via Facebook (hi guys! love ya...).
I also know that I'm unusually susceptible to the Good Old Days virus that makes (almost) 30 years ago look like a lot more fun than today, and perhaps than it did then. Plus I have to be unusually careful about accuracy with a group of fellow survivors auditing me.
And... I'm afraid I'm not wholly up to the challenge of capturing what it really felt like: to be on the doorstep of adulthood, taking my first real steps toward independence, trying to figure out -- painfully at times -- who I really was, experiencing the exhilaration and devastation of my first truly adult romantic relationship.
I do remember a lot of snapshots, flashes really, like in the old prison movies when the spotlight sweeps across the darkened prison yard:
... a lot of laughter, feeling like we were banding together against a mob of surly and cheap tourists
... going out dancing with the gang after work, and on top of "having a great time", feeling that swell of "hey, I'm a grown-up"
... timing my trip past the side of the ice cube so I could do my "special cheer" just as our star skater, Kim, was finishing her routine
... sitting on the bench outside the kitchen door crying because someone had said something like "Hey, why do you have to be so sarcastic all the time?" -- and thinking Big Thoughts about "Who am I really?"
... feeling jealous when new people came to the Opera House and acted like they belonged there, when it felt a little like they were horning in on My Thing.
... driving away from the last time we were all together, in September of 1983, knowing in my heart (and the pit of my stomach) that something important in my life had just come to an end, something I'd never get back -- and getting stopped by the cops on the way home for running a red light because I was in such a daze.
I realized suddenly while writing this (although to be honest it's taken me almost 2 months to write) that I'm actually glad Gaslight's closed. Like I said, I'm jealous: the place was special to me in a variety of ways, some obvious and some not so much, and somehow to have it go on without me doesn't seem right. I know that's a Mark-centric view of the world... but hey, it's my blog.
So to CD and O'B and Kim and Jeff and Leslie... and to Amy... and Steve, Ron, Bernie, Chucko, Warren Boden, Anne Bishop, and Bob Carroll (but not to Fred Dufel) -- thanks so much for being part of my life. I promise not to blame you for any of the less-desirable aspects of who I've become, and I leave you with this thought:
- Just remember that sunshine always follows the rain,
- So wrap your troubles in dreams, and dream your troubles away.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Upholding More Than One Tradition
For some reason when I think of doing a travel piece, my mind always goes straight to Kerouac. This despite the fact that I've never read On The Road (but if you're a Frequent Reader you know that my titles, in particular, trend toward the pretentiously literary). It's also true that there is a long and honorable tradition of the Comic Travel Piece; I myself have read such essays ranging from Twain, to Benchley, Perelman, and all the way up to P. J. O'Rourke (but perhaps my favorite example of Travel Literature is Jackson Browne's "Running on Empty"). I have it on good authority, however, that none of those worthy creations mention children's museums, zoos, or amusement parks. Of course, they're most likely more entertaining too.
I decided to forgo the obscure road-related puns in this title; I refer rather to the fact that each summer we go on a family vacation, and each summer I write about it. I'm not offering any warranty that this will be in the same league as any of the guys mentioned above.
Vacation doesn't inspire coherence, so instead of a linear narrative, consider this a series of snapshots. Maybe I should have titled it "Postcards from the Edge".
I decided to forgo the obscure road-related puns in this title; I refer rather to the fact that each summer we go on a family vacation, and each summer I write about it. I'm not offering any warranty that this will be in the same league as any of the guys mentioned above.
Vacation doesn't inspire coherence, so instead of a linear narrative, consider this a series of snapshots. Maybe I should have titled it "Postcards from the Edge".
- $ For any trip, I marshal the full resources of the 21st century: Internet research, including directions from destination websites; full turn-by-turn directions, calibrated to 0.1 mile, from Google maps; and, starting this year, GPS as well. Despite all that, I still had several moments of (if not outright lostness) at least uncertainty. North Carolina in particular has a disturbing habit of combining & then re-dividing their numbered routes. So I asked my dad; he told me that in the late 40s he made three round trips from New York to California. They did have basic roadmaps, but no "interstate highways", and no way to really know what was up ahead; they drove until they found a "tourist cabin" where they could stay the night.
- $ We passed some of those developments bulit practically in the interstate breakdown lane. It's too bad nobody still bakes pies & leaves them on the windowsill to cool, because if they did, you could snag yourself a good snack from the right-hand lane. They had that sign that says, "If you lived here, you'd be home now"... but I couldn't help thinking it should really read, "If you lived here, you'd be wondering what on earth possesed you to spend all that dough on a place where cars are always going through your front yard at 70 mph."
- $ With regard to E-Z-Pass: what took me so long? Some of these highways now have Express E-Z-Pass -- you don't slow down or even drive through the cattle chute; just keep on rolling, they'll get your money. What's more, you can even pick up an e-z-pass transmitter at the grocery store!
- $ Parents traveling with relatively young children do well to deploy several weapons, including extra snacks, electronic games, and a portable DVD player... however, the two most important words to keep in mind: suite hotel. For me, it would be difficult to survive a vacation where lights-out was at 8 every night -- so the separate bedroom is indispensable. Caution: for some chains, "suite" means "has an armchair and a mini-fridge", so don't be fooled by cheap imitations.
- $ Best thing about crossing old Mr. Mason & Mr. Dixon's stripe: Chick-Fil-A. It turns out that there are some in the northeast; the nearest one to us is only 150 miles away. But they're easier to find in the South -- in fact, when I finally got a chance to enjoy my visit, it was here. I don't understand why I can't get a chicken sandwich that good without paying my way into an amusement park.
- $ Twice in a row while visiting Baltimore, my wife pulled off one of those deals only she can, to get things people don't want to give us. We went for the stadium tour at Camden Yards: first she got the parking guy to let us park (in the "wrong" lot) for free, even; then when the tour was sold out after only the other three of us got in, she met the tour guide and talked him into letting her come along after all. I don't know whether it's "feminine wiles", or "selling ice to Eskimos", or The Power to Cloud Men's Minds... but I'm sure glad she's on our side.
- $ Later on in Baltimore, I was going to put my credit card in the parking meter when a guy slipped in ahead of me, stuck in a card, and pulled out a $2 ticket. He said, "I'll give you this $2 ticket for $1 cash." I had about 4 seconds to think about it, so I said, "OK, sure." As I walked away, I decided it must have been some kind of scam -- stolen credit card? -- but I'm still not sure exactly what happened there. In any case, I was able to park all day long in a major American city for $4!
- $ It's good that my literary ambitions are basically drained away by this blog (and, of course, all my Facebook masterpieces), or I would be tempted to write the definitive guide to Children's Museums of the Northeast. This trip brings me to 5, lifetime, I believe -- plus at least 5 other museums with varying degrees of family-friendliness. There is a Children's Museums association, but I'm starting to suspect that the certification process is mostly a formality...
- $ The sequel would be a compendium of hotel pools -- as soon as my fingers un-prune enough that I can hold a pen.
- $ One of the charms of the road trip (or indeed, of getting out of bed each day) is the chance to see something you've never seen before. Quite often it turns out to be something you never imagined wanting to see, but that's another story. For this trip, my nominee for Eighth Wonder of the World was: a restroom hand dryer that actually dries your hands. It's called the Xlerator and after seeing it in action, I can only conclude that it's powered by the same engine as the Boeing 737. The only downside is that every time I use it, it sets my watch back about an hour.
Ten days, 1800 miles, 6 states, 4 hotels, 4 visits to the beach, about a dozen visits to souvenir/gift shops, and all the fast-food cheeseburgers you can eat. Actually a few more than you can eat. In any case, it sure is good to be home. I think I'm going to stick to the roads that are too small to have numbers for awhile.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Papa Song
I suppose it's possible my sense of humor has changed over the years -- although this is never not funny:
but I recall a song that, when I was in college, always had me & my roommate in stitches. It was called "Papa Song", by Phil Keaggy, and what made it funny was the voiceover at the beginning of one of his small children saying "Papa!"
Yeah, I know, I just read that over & it didn't make much sense to me either. The kid did kind of sound like he was weaned on helium, and we always giggled -- in fact, many nights we'd just play that few seconds of the song before we went to bed. I suppose "you had to be there, and also then, and maybe even me" doesn't quite cut it in print.
In any case, as a companion piece to my Mother's Day post (there's still time to send the link to your mom as a special post-Mother's-Day remembrance, if you haven't already!), I'm thinking about dads as the big day arrives. You know, the day where everyone makes a big deal out of dads and there are gifts and dinner out and... well, maybe not. I'm not sure Father's Day is quite as much of a big deal; sometimes it seems a bit like an afterthought to me. I already wrote about this a few years back in my trademark snarky/whimsical style, but since it's summertime I'm in reruns.
I was out shopping for the card for dad this week (observing my own card rules & regulations as laid out in the Mother's Day post), and I noticed a curious theme. Mother's Day cards, of course, are all about "Mom, we love you so much and you're so wonderful and you bring joy to our lives".... all very valid & commendable sentiments.
Many of the Father's Day cards, on the other hand, seemed to cluster around this idea: "Dad, even though you find it hard to say how you feel, we know you really love us." In fact, the ones from sons read more like this -- "Dad, even though we never talk about our feelings, I hope you know I love you."
I've always led the charge against this kind of male stereotype -- and I'm well aware that "Hallmark" comes from the Latin, meaning "cliche" ... but I'm a little hesitant to start painting the picket signs just yet. I'm also aware that cliches get to be cliches from a basis in fact, and maybe I've just seen this scenario actually happen too often in real life to automatically dismiss it as slander.
All I can do is work against it in my own house. I make no claims to parental excellence; I just try to control what I can control (which, believe me, does not always include any of the other residents here): I try to make sure I know my kids better than anyone else in the world, and I let them know every day, a bunch of times a day, exactly how I feel about them.
And, you know, probably 73% of the time or more, that's a good thing.
but I recall a song that, when I was in college, always had me & my roommate in stitches. It was called "Papa Song", by Phil Keaggy, and what made it funny was the voiceover at the beginning of one of his small children saying "Papa!"
Yeah, I know, I just read that over & it didn't make much sense to me either. The kid did kind of sound like he was weaned on helium, and we always giggled -- in fact, many nights we'd just play that few seconds of the song before we went to bed. I suppose "you had to be there, and also then, and maybe even me" doesn't quite cut it in print.
In any case, as a companion piece to my Mother's Day post (there's still time to send the link to your mom as a special post-Mother's-Day remembrance, if you haven't already!), I'm thinking about dads as the big day arrives. You know, the day where everyone makes a big deal out of dads and there are gifts and dinner out and... well, maybe not. I'm not sure Father's Day is quite as much of a big deal; sometimes it seems a bit like an afterthought to me. I already wrote about this a few years back in my trademark snarky/whimsical style, but since it's summertime I'm in reruns.
I was out shopping for the card for dad this week (observing my own card rules & regulations as laid out in the Mother's Day post), and I noticed a curious theme. Mother's Day cards, of course, are all about "Mom, we love you so much and you're so wonderful and you bring joy to our lives".... all very valid & commendable sentiments.
Many of the Father's Day cards, on the other hand, seemed to cluster around this idea: "Dad, even though you find it hard to say how you feel, we know you really love us." In fact, the ones from sons read more like this -- "Dad, even though we never talk about our feelings, I hope you know I love you."
I've always led the charge against this kind of male stereotype -- and I'm well aware that "Hallmark" comes from the Latin, meaning "cliche" ... but I'm a little hesitant to start painting the picket signs just yet. I'm also aware that cliches get to be cliches from a basis in fact, and maybe I've just seen this scenario actually happen too often in real life to automatically dismiss it as slander.
All I can do is work against it in my own house. I make no claims to parental excellence; I just try to control what I can control (which, believe me, does not always include any of the other residents here): I try to make sure I know my kids better than anyone else in the world, and I let them know every day, a bunch of times a day, exactly how I feel about them.
And, you know, probably 73% of the time or more, that's a good thing.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Public Enemy (Grade) 1
I have probably mentioned that my daughter has possibly more than the standard allotment of personality. As my son is fond of saying (when he’s not shrieking her name at jet-takeoff decibels), “Dad, she’s a rascal, dad.” He has in some ways keen powers of observation, but you don’t have to watch her for long to figure out – if not how her mind works, exactly, definitely toward what end.
The first weekend after she started kindergarten, we received a phone call from her teacher. When she identified herself, my heart sank and I immediately imagined all sorts of issues my girl had gotten into in her three-day educational career. But the teacher immediately put my mind at ease: “She’s already become quite a leader. Some of the other kids are timid about trying new things, but when they see that she’s willing to try anything, it puts them at ease.” So I was relieved and only a bit surprised to find she was using her superpowers for good, rather than for evil.
Since then, the teacher reports have been generally quite glowing… although there have been the occasional incidents of Interpersonal Clash (I may have mentioned as well that she is a junior member of the International Society of Frequently Wrong, But Never In Doubt). In any case, we always experience that delightful jolt of uncertainty when it’s the teacher on the phone – as was the case last week.
This time it was not a plaudit, but instead the news that she had been overheard using… colorful language. It would be impolite of me to specify the color, but suffice it to say it was not a word from her spelling list, not to mention one she hadn’t encountered at home.
And yes, I know that’s what they all say, but although all of us in the house are capable of expressing ourselves with force and clarity, I can say with some assurance that she didn’t hear it here, or at the church.
The teacher hastened to add that she had had a visit with the principal and that she seemed visibly and almost violently remorseful. This is as good a time as any to mention that, especially as former teachers, my wife & I make a practice of backing the teacher to the hilt; we told her that we appreciated her dealing with this swiftly and firmly (this is not a girl, if I have not already made this clear, who does well with a long leash).
When she got home, I waited to see if she’d betray any hint of her ordeal, but when her lips (for once) seemed sealed, I confronted her directly with the Stern, Solemn Talk. I told her that these were not words that she learned or heard or would be permitted to use at home, and that we expected her to behave in a respectful and correct way at all times. I impressed on her the embarrassment attached to going to the principal and having the teacher call home; I know she’s sensitive to being embarrassed. She told me that she was just “repeating” the words – which apparently doesn’t count as “saying” the words – and that she wouldn’t do it again.
When mom arrived, we went through the drill once more – this time with a trifle more, um… emphasis. And this time she revealed something I didn’t know: not only had she employed the word I’d already heard (a relatively junior officer in the Colorful Language Army), but had in fact let loose with the Head Honcho, the dreaded F-bomb. In fact, to prove it, she set one off right then & there in the living room.
My wife was looking at my face when our 6-year-old girl launched it, and she said the color completely drained from me. I have to admit, that was a milestone experience for me, and not in the best possible sense.
Well, washing her mouth out with Clorox seemed inadvisable, so we had to settle for a just-short-of-unhinged lecture and withdrawal of Electronic Privileges (Game Boy, videos, CD player) for one week. And as we all know, there are few more stringent sentences in the modern world than to be unplugged.
I’d like to think that for a normal kid, that would’ve been the end of the story. But in the midst of this, she also slipped in, “By the way, dad, you need to send in money for my cafeteria account.” I knew I’d just sent in money recently, and she’d brought her lunch every day since, so I couldn’t imagine what had happened. I quizzed her: “You’re just getting milk every day – right?” “Yeah, dad, just milk!” When I looked at the check register, I realized I’d sent in $10 one week prior. All I could figure is that maybe the check didn’t make it all the way to be deposited somehow, so I grabbed the phone book to look up the bank’s 800-number so I could find out whether it had cleared.
That’s when she said, “Um, dad, I think I need to tell you the truth about something.” She had been buying a lunch every day, in addition to bringing a lunch with her. I asked her why; was it to be cool or like the other kids? “No, I just like it.”
So in addition to her Electronic Grounding, she also was lunch-grounded the same day: her account was closed, and she was told all she could buy for the rest of the school year was white milk.
Seeing how much she’s testing our parental ingenuity at age 6, it seems to me like I ought to go on amazon.com or eBay or some such place and find out what it takes to pick up an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet. Ought to come in handy right about 2nd grade.
The first weekend after she started kindergarten, we received a phone call from her teacher. When she identified herself, my heart sank and I immediately imagined all sorts of issues my girl had gotten into in her three-day educational career. But the teacher immediately put my mind at ease: “She’s already become quite a leader. Some of the other kids are timid about trying new things, but when they see that she’s willing to try anything, it puts them at ease.” So I was relieved and only a bit surprised to find she was using her superpowers for good, rather than for evil.
Since then, the teacher reports have been generally quite glowing… although there have been the occasional incidents of Interpersonal Clash (I may have mentioned as well that she is a junior member of the International Society of Frequently Wrong, But Never In Doubt). In any case, we always experience that delightful jolt of uncertainty when it’s the teacher on the phone – as was the case last week.
This time it was not a plaudit, but instead the news that she had been overheard using… colorful language. It would be impolite of me to specify the color, but suffice it to say it was not a word from her spelling list, not to mention one she hadn’t encountered at home.
And yes, I know that’s what they all say, but although all of us in the house are capable of expressing ourselves with force and clarity, I can say with some assurance that she didn’t hear it here, or at the church.
The teacher hastened to add that she had had a visit with the principal and that she seemed visibly and almost violently remorseful. This is as good a time as any to mention that, especially as former teachers, my wife & I make a practice of backing the teacher to the hilt; we told her that we appreciated her dealing with this swiftly and firmly (this is not a girl, if I have not already made this clear, who does well with a long leash).
When she got home, I waited to see if she’d betray any hint of her ordeal, but when her lips (for once) seemed sealed, I confronted her directly with the Stern, Solemn Talk. I told her that these were not words that she learned or heard or would be permitted to use at home, and that we expected her to behave in a respectful and correct way at all times. I impressed on her the embarrassment attached to going to the principal and having the teacher call home; I know she’s sensitive to being embarrassed. She told me that she was just “repeating” the words – which apparently doesn’t count as “saying” the words – and that she wouldn’t do it again.
When mom arrived, we went through the drill once more – this time with a trifle more, um… emphasis. And this time she revealed something I didn’t know: not only had she employed the word I’d already heard (a relatively junior officer in the Colorful Language Army), but had in fact let loose with the Head Honcho, the dreaded F-bomb. In fact, to prove it, she set one off right then & there in the living room.
My wife was looking at my face when our 6-year-old girl launched it, and she said the color completely drained from me. I have to admit, that was a milestone experience for me, and not in the best possible sense.
Well, washing her mouth out with Clorox seemed inadvisable, so we had to settle for a just-short-of-unhinged lecture and withdrawal of Electronic Privileges (Game Boy, videos, CD player) for one week. And as we all know, there are few more stringent sentences in the modern world than to be unplugged.
I’d like to think that for a normal kid, that would’ve been the end of the story. But in the midst of this, she also slipped in, “By the way, dad, you need to send in money for my cafeteria account.” I knew I’d just sent in money recently, and she’d brought her lunch every day since, so I couldn’t imagine what had happened. I quizzed her: “You’re just getting milk every day – right?” “Yeah, dad, just milk!” When I looked at the check register, I realized I’d sent in $10 one week prior. All I could figure is that maybe the check didn’t make it all the way to be deposited somehow, so I grabbed the phone book to look up the bank’s 800-number so I could find out whether it had cleared.
That’s when she said, “Um, dad, I think I need to tell you the truth about something.” She had been buying a lunch every day, in addition to bringing a lunch with her. I asked her why; was it to be cool or like the other kids? “No, I just like it.”
So in addition to her Electronic Grounding, she also was lunch-grounded the same day: her account was closed, and she was told all she could buy for the rest of the school year was white milk.
Seeing how much she’s testing our parental ingenuity at age 6, it seems to me like I ought to go on amazon.com or eBay or some such place and find out what it takes to pick up an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet. Ought to come in handy right about 2nd grade.
Monday, May 11, 2009
M Is for...
In American culture, there are all sorts of traditions around Mother's Day. For those of us in geographical proximity to mom, brunch seems quite common, and the local restaurants oblige with high-priced spreads (I saw one place that advertised Mother's Day Brunch and Drink Specials, just in case your family tradition includes getting Mom hammered). Hallmark, of course, is founded upon this kind of occasion -- and it's important to go for the real thing. If you send Mom an American Greetings card, all you're doing is saving yourself the ink for writing inside, "Hi Mom, I threw this in the cart while I was at the grocery store!" And if you use one of the "funny" American Greetings, you weren't at the grocery store, you were at the dollar store (Don't even get me started on those 99-cent cards... which send the clear message: "You haven't changed my old bedroom into an office yet, have you, mom??").
When in doubt, go for Hallmark: the ones that are about as big as a manila envelope, with a flower on the front and that translucent "cover page" on the front. If it has a paper insert inside the card with the words printed on it, so much the better.
Anyway, those of us in the church will recognize another Mother's Day tradition: the mom-centered anthem (this was not quite what I had in mind, but apparently it was for Google). They are usually, let's say, not quite as musically exemplary as the anthems for the week before and the week after. This year's selection here was probably a cut above the average: Honor Thy Father andThy Mother, from a composer I generally enjoy.
It got me thinking about what that phrase -- well, it's not just a "phrase", I guess -- really means. Obviously first it means exactly what the casual reader would suppose: be respectful to your parents. Treat them with honor, and even assume that they know what they're talking about (this is one I'd especially like to impress on my daughter; her default response when I say anything factual to her is "No!" This is age 6, so I'm not really looking forward to 14 or so). Twain said it a long time ago... or maybe not.
But especially for those of us who have gotten past the Teenage Retort stage, I think there's a wider view: honoring your parents also means bringing honor to the name they passed on to you, making sure that the way you live your life and the decisions you make reflect well on them -- even if they're not really getting the credit/blame any more.
And even if you can't fit it into a manila envelope.
When in doubt, go for Hallmark: the ones that are about as big as a manila envelope, with a flower on the front and that translucent "cover page" on the front. If it has a paper insert inside the card with the words printed on it, so much the better.
Anyway, those of us in the church will recognize another Mother's Day tradition: the mom-centered anthem (this was not quite what I had in mind, but apparently it was for Google). They are usually, let's say, not quite as musically exemplary as the anthems for the week before and the week after. This year's selection here was probably a cut above the average: Honor Thy Father andThy Mother, from a composer I generally enjoy.
It got me thinking about what that phrase -- well, it's not just a "phrase", I guess -- really means. Obviously first it means exactly what the casual reader would suppose: be respectful to your parents. Treat them with honor, and even assume that they know what they're talking about (this is one I'd especially like to impress on my daughter; her default response when I say anything factual to her is "No!" This is age 6, so I'm not really looking forward to 14 or so). Twain said it a long time ago... or maybe not.
But especially for those of us who have gotten past the Teenage Retort stage, I think there's a wider view: honoring your parents also means bringing honor to the name they passed on to you, making sure that the way you live your life and the decisions you make reflect well on them -- even if they're not really getting the credit/blame any more.
And even if you can't fit it into a manila envelope.
Saturday, May 02, 2009
Face the Virtual Nation
Some time back, I mentioned to my niece -- as I have to virtually every living creature I encounter -- that I was writing a blog (this was way back when I was actually, you know, posting something once in awhile). She said, "Oh, on your MySpace page?"
I had to admit that I didn't have a MySpace page; I didn't add that I felt I was being pretty hip just to have a blog. Now, I'm not going to beat into the ground the extent of my non-hipitude; I've been over that ground before and it may fall pretty well into the dog-bites-man category anyway. But I've always been at least a wee bit (sometimes less wee) behind the times, even on techie-related stuff. I'm certainly not a rusher-into-things by nature.
I had actually been thinking a bit about Twitter recently. You can't turn on the TV or pick up a magazine without encountering a Twitter reference -- even the sports mags are talking about who's Tweeting (and sometimes when). And it did kind of appeal to me because there are times I have something brief I'd like to say; it doesn't seem quite like a whole blog post, but it would be nice to put it out somewhere (usually it's a joke or maybe something that strikes me weird on TV or in the newspaper).
Still, I was kind of waiting it out; I wasn't sure if I could keep two Webby things going and I was a little worried about that little touch of OCD I have: would I be Tweeting every hour on the hour?
As I pondered, I got a comment right here on this blog from a friend I hadn't heard from in 25 years. I wanted to contact her back and catch up, so I googled her & discovered she had a Facebook page. Well, since Facebook has more or less been supplanted by Twitter in the public consciousness (I'm sure that Entertainment Weekly would call it "5 Minutes Ago"), that really makes it right up my alley.
So I got myself a Facebook page and started hunting down people from my life both past and present. One of the really difficult aspects of Facebook, especially when you're a newcomer, is that you have to ask people to add you as a friend, and then wait to see if they do. I made sure to add a little personal message, in some cases almost a "hey, I'm not really stalking you" kind of vibe. Nevertheless, sometimes you don't hear back so you have to ask yourself: did they decide to Ignore me, or are they just not very active users?
Then after I connected with a few people from college, I started to hear from their friends -- often people I'd recognize, but not necessarily close friends even back in the day. Then I was on the responding side and had to decide: do I accept people I don't have a close connection with? It was a lot like going to a reunion and trying to decide where to sit.
On the other hand, at the reunion, if I sit down I'm obligated to make small talk... in the online reunion, we've essentially all agreed that we'll eavesdrop on each other but we don't necessarily need to speak directly to each other. So sure, if you want to listen to me on those terms, come on aboard! And I quickly realized as well that I could potentially pick up a few new readers for the blog.
The bad news: I'm every bit as compulsive about checking my page as I feared I was going to be. Several times a day, most days, I check to see if anyone's posted something of interest, or has commented on one of my Major Pronouncements. It's a little like hanging around the ballfield waiting to be picked; at least I can't see anyone else's home page and discover they've hidden my posts.
I suspect I've probably repurposed a few of my formerly blog-dedicated brain cells (although not to tremendous benefit so far -- I'm not sure I've really advanced the cause of online literature with my contributions to date). But you know I'll keep trying to find the groove; first of all, I'm a sucker for connecting with my past, and the majority of my Friends so far come from my prior experiences. But mostly it's another chance, just like this is, to talk and hope that someone out there is actually listening.
I had to admit that I didn't have a MySpace page; I didn't add that I felt I was being pretty hip just to have a blog. Now, I'm not going to beat into the ground the extent of my non-hipitude; I've been over that ground before and it may fall pretty well into the dog-bites-man category anyway. But I've always been at least a wee bit (sometimes less wee) behind the times, even on techie-related stuff. I'm certainly not a rusher-into-things by nature.
I had actually been thinking a bit about Twitter recently. You can't turn on the TV or pick up a magazine without encountering a Twitter reference -- even the sports mags are talking about who's Tweeting (and sometimes when). And it did kind of appeal to me because there are times I have something brief I'd like to say; it doesn't seem quite like a whole blog post, but it would be nice to put it out somewhere (usually it's a joke or maybe something that strikes me weird on TV or in the newspaper).
Still, I was kind of waiting it out; I wasn't sure if I could keep two Webby things going and I was a little worried about that little touch of OCD I have: would I be Tweeting every hour on the hour?
As I pondered, I got a comment right here on this blog from a friend I hadn't heard from in 25 years. I wanted to contact her back and catch up, so I googled her & discovered she had a Facebook page. Well, since Facebook has more or less been supplanted by Twitter in the public consciousness (I'm sure that Entertainment Weekly would call it "5 Minutes Ago"), that really makes it right up my alley.
So I got myself a Facebook page and started hunting down people from my life both past and present. One of the really difficult aspects of Facebook, especially when you're a newcomer, is that you have to ask people to add you as a friend, and then wait to see if they do. I made sure to add a little personal message, in some cases almost a "hey, I'm not really stalking you" kind of vibe. Nevertheless, sometimes you don't hear back so you have to ask yourself: did they decide to Ignore me, or are they just not very active users?
Then after I connected with a few people from college, I started to hear from their friends -- often people I'd recognize, but not necessarily close friends even back in the day. Then I was on the responding side and had to decide: do I accept people I don't have a close connection with? It was a lot like going to a reunion and trying to decide where to sit.
On the other hand, at the reunion, if I sit down I'm obligated to make small talk... in the online reunion, we've essentially all agreed that we'll eavesdrop on each other but we don't necessarily need to speak directly to each other. So sure, if you want to listen to me on those terms, come on aboard! And I quickly realized as well that I could potentially pick up a few new readers for the blog.
The bad news: I'm every bit as compulsive about checking my page as I feared I was going to be. Several times a day, most days, I check to see if anyone's posted something of interest, or has commented on one of my Major Pronouncements. It's a little like hanging around the ballfield waiting to be picked; at least I can't see anyone else's home page and discover they've hidden my posts.
I suspect I've probably repurposed a few of my formerly blog-dedicated brain cells (although not to tremendous benefit so far -- I'm not sure I've really advanced the cause of online literature with my contributions to date). But you know I'll keep trying to find the groove; first of all, I'm a sucker for connecting with my past, and the majority of my Friends so far come from my prior experiences. But mostly it's another chance, just like this is, to talk and hope that someone out there is actually listening.
Friday, April 24, 2009
The Landlord
A veteran baseball executive was asked some years ago (on live TV, no less) why there were so few black managers and executives in the major leagues. He answered that blacks lack the "necessities" for management; despite fervent testimonials from his friends of all races, and a sneaking suspicion that he had probably meant "prerequisites" (i.e., experience), he was essentially out of a job before he finished the sentence.
I am pretty sure that I lack the necessities, in this case probably related to a second X chromosome, to explain the wreath on our front door. Let me hasten to clarify: it's not a Christmas wreath. That, actually, I could explain with ease -- it's not entirely unheard-of that a Christmas decoration might be left a tad out of season by our Outdoor Decor Management staff.
I can't honestly say the wreath is particularly spring-y either, although clearly my genetically-impaired opinon can't be fully credited. To me, it's... well, it's a circle made up of twisted-up plastic stuff. You might not want to use that description when you visit your local wreath retailer in search of a duplicate.
I tolerate it because first of all, you have to pick your battles (and could there be any more inspiring marital advice than that?); but mostly because what little time I spend on the front steps is generally facing away from the door. It's not like it's hanging over my desk or anything.
At least one local resident has expressed unqualified approval, however. One morning as I stepped out to grab the newspaper, I found a handful of dead grass and leaves half-nestled in the middle; other times, opening the door has precipitated a flurry of wings and avian grumbling, as a little feathered construction worker is interrupted mid-task.
Every morning we've been checking for building progress, and throwing away whatever we find there in the hopes that the prospective tenant would give up and try one of the trees nearby. Regrettably, the epithet "birdbrain" does have a basis in fact, as it appears he can't take a hint. And he even got some small measure of revenge one day as I came abruptly up the steps and scared him off -- he nearly parted my hair as he went.
A couple of days ago when I checked for twigs, I found instead a signed lease: there was a perfectly symmetrical and complete nest tucked in there. And while I could try to disrupt construction progress, I didn't have the heart to demolish a completed dwelling. Before we knew it... there were eggs in the nest.
So if you're planning to come see us over the next several weeks, you'll have to either come through the garage... or wait till summer.
I am pretty sure that I lack the necessities, in this case probably related to a second X chromosome, to explain the wreath on our front door. Let me hasten to clarify: it's not a Christmas wreath. That, actually, I could explain with ease -- it's not entirely unheard-of that a Christmas decoration might be left a tad out of season by our Outdoor Decor Management staff.
I can't honestly say the wreath is particularly spring-y either, although clearly my genetically-impaired opinon can't be fully credited. To me, it's... well, it's a circle made up of twisted-up plastic stuff. You might not want to use that description when you visit your local wreath retailer in search of a duplicate.
I tolerate it because first of all, you have to pick your battles (and could there be any more inspiring marital advice than that?); but mostly because what little time I spend on the front steps is generally facing away from the door. It's not like it's hanging over my desk or anything.
At least one local resident has expressed unqualified approval, however. One morning as I stepped out to grab the newspaper, I found a handful of dead grass and leaves half-nestled in the middle; other times, opening the door has precipitated a flurry of wings and avian grumbling, as a little feathered construction worker is interrupted mid-task.
Every morning we've been checking for building progress, and throwing away whatever we find there in the hopes that the prospective tenant would give up and try one of the trees nearby. Regrettably, the epithet "birdbrain" does have a basis in fact, as it appears he can't take a hint. And he even got some small measure of revenge one day as I came abruptly up the steps and scared him off -- he nearly parted my hair as he went.
A couple of days ago when I checked for twigs, I found instead a signed lease: there was a perfectly symmetrical and complete nest tucked in there. And while I could try to disrupt construction progress, I didn't have the heart to demolish a completed dwelling. Before we knew it... there were eggs in the nest.
So if you're planning to come see us over the next several weeks, you'll have to either come through the garage... or wait till summer.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Going Through a Much Rougher Spell
I read a quote not long ago that really stuck with me. I'm sure I'd heard it before, but this time I guess it just hit me right. It's from Faulkner -- and you have to admit, that's a lot classier than quoting, I don't know, "Stripes" or something.
The quote is, "The past isn't dead. It isn't even past." I find that to be particularly true for the parts of our past (or my past) that didn't play out the way we wished the first time around. While I have little enough imagination that I occasionally repeat myself... I find that I have already made a couple of previous references to something that happened to me a mere 36 years ago. So at least that part of my past certainly isn't past, but I'm really hoping that another 36 years will do it.
I'm going to just close my eyes and plunge into this. When I was in 6th grade, I represented my elementary school in the city-wide spelling bee. At that time I viewed myself as a budding genius, always in heated competition with Bridget Witbeck to determine which of us was the smartest in the class (of course it's completely possible someone else entirely was actually the smartest, but we were clearly the two most successful students). And while I must admit I have learned the limits of my not necessarily gargantuan intellect, one thing at which I have always been really excellent is spelling. Couple a fanaticism for reading with a just slightly obsessive-compulsive personality and what you end up with is a decent speller.
While I was nervous about performing, I was fairly confident that I would do well, and I started strong enough... I guess. While I must've won the school-wide contest to get there, and must've gotten something right once I did, I can remember absolutely none of that. I do, however, recall with Technicolor clarity the immensity of my eventual failure.
I've been willing over the life of this blog to humiliate myself a bit here and there in the pursuit of a laugh or a lesson, but all I'm willing to say is that it was a word I knew well but for some reason it didn't sound right to me. Somehow I couldn't make sense out of it and... well, if the contest had been for coming the farthest from the correct spelling, I would've had a decent shot. I'm just hoping that I will understand and/or come to terms with it before I die (the good news is, it's only been 36 years so far).
When I heard that our local library was co-sponsoring a spelling bee for adults, my heart leapt. I thought it sounded fun, I believed I had a shot at winning -- and I sensed an opportunity to undo one of my life's disappointments. I steeled myself ahead of time against the possibility of losing, but I promised myself I would not lose on a word I knew.
Arriving at the library at the specified time, I figured I might be in the wrong place: there were maybe a dozen people in an auditorium that seats 140. I quickly identified my principal rival, a tall, gray-haired woman who looked like one of those people who's always carrying around a big thick book in a sensible tote bag. I was soon to find that in our entire "metropolitan" area, there were only eight souls brave/geeky enough to show up for a spelling bee.
They lined us up in the front row, and I ended up quite by accident in the "coveted" lead-off position. Each of us stood in turn, got a word, had to repeat it and then spell it. The first round was clean, but two bombed the second round and three crashed & burned the second time around -- so there were three of us left. The first three rounds, with my words in bold and the misspelled words in italics:
cumulative, acoustics, precipice, blasphemous, sophisticated, tuberculosis, vaudeville, stenographer, affiliated, decadence, grimace, furlough, clientele, overwrought, conglomerate, silhouette, harangue, scuttlebutt, vociferous, symbiosis, bailiwick, toxicologist.
I was frankly a little surprised that the words weren't harder -- although I was thrilled to note that I knew how to spell all of them.
I kicked off the fourth round with facilitate; I noted that the middle of the word was a little tricky with alternating vowels/consonants, so I carefully negotiated it and made ready to sit down... only to hear, "I'm sorry, that's incorrect." The moderator said, "it's f-a-c"; I looked at him in complete shock and said, "That's what I said!" He replied, "No, you said f-e-c". I looked around and people were nodding -- yup, you said "f-e-c".
I was completely dumbfounded. As I said later, I would have testified in court that I said f-a-c. All I can think is that I was concentrating so hard on the middle of the word that I wasn't paying attention to what I said at the beginning and just misspoke.
The competition went on: facilitate (F-A-C-I-L-I-T-A-T-E), derelict, ikebana (both remaining contestants got this one wrong), fledgling, epidermis. The winner: the tall, gray-haired woman. I was appalled to note that I actually knew how to spell every single word in the entire contest, and still finished third.
I think, however, I might have cheerfully finished last (well, OK, maybe not last) -- if I had only met my single, solitary stated objective for the day. But of course, in making that my focus, I probably made it inevitable that I would lose focus on the words themselves.
What I can say for nearly certain is that in about 11 1/2 months -- or only 37 years from the original precipitating event -- I will be back in the same auditorium to try it again. In fact, I may just plant my sleeping bag in the hallway now.
The quote is, "The past isn't dead. It isn't even past." I find that to be particularly true for the parts of our past (or my past) that didn't play out the way we wished the first time around. While I have little enough imagination that I occasionally repeat myself... I find that I have already made a couple of previous references to something that happened to me a mere 36 years ago. So at least that part of my past certainly isn't past, but I'm really hoping that another 36 years will do it.
I'm going to just close my eyes and plunge into this. When I was in 6th grade, I represented my elementary school in the city-wide spelling bee. At that time I viewed myself as a budding genius, always in heated competition with Bridget Witbeck to determine which of us was the smartest in the class (of course it's completely possible someone else entirely was actually the smartest, but we were clearly the two most successful students). And while I must admit I have learned the limits of my not necessarily gargantuan intellect, one thing at which I have always been really excellent is spelling. Couple a fanaticism for reading with a just slightly obsessive-compulsive personality and what you end up with is a decent speller.
While I was nervous about performing, I was fairly confident that I would do well, and I started strong enough... I guess. While I must've won the school-wide contest to get there, and must've gotten something right once I did, I can remember absolutely none of that. I do, however, recall with Technicolor clarity the immensity of my eventual failure.
I've been willing over the life of this blog to humiliate myself a bit here and there in the pursuit of a laugh or a lesson, but all I'm willing to say is that it was a word I knew well but for some reason it didn't sound right to me. Somehow I couldn't make sense out of it and... well, if the contest had been for coming the farthest from the correct spelling, I would've had a decent shot. I'm just hoping that I will understand and/or come to terms with it before I die (the good news is, it's only been 36 years so far).
When I heard that our local library was co-sponsoring a spelling bee for adults, my heart leapt. I thought it sounded fun, I believed I had a shot at winning -- and I sensed an opportunity to undo one of my life's disappointments. I steeled myself ahead of time against the possibility of losing, but I promised myself I would not lose on a word I knew.
Arriving at the library at the specified time, I figured I might be in the wrong place: there were maybe a dozen people in an auditorium that seats 140. I quickly identified my principal rival, a tall, gray-haired woman who looked like one of those people who's always carrying around a big thick book in a sensible tote bag. I was soon to find that in our entire "metropolitan" area, there were only eight souls brave/geeky enough to show up for a spelling bee.
They lined us up in the front row, and I ended up quite by accident in the "coveted" lead-off position. Each of us stood in turn, got a word, had to repeat it and then spell it. The first round was clean, but two bombed the second round and three crashed & burned the second time around -- so there were three of us left. The first three rounds, with my words in bold and the misspelled words in italics:
cumulative, acoustics, precipice, blasphemous, sophisticated, tuberculosis, vaudeville, stenographer, affiliated, decadence, grimace, furlough, clientele, overwrought, conglomerate, silhouette, harangue, scuttlebutt, vociferous, symbiosis, bailiwick, toxicologist.
I was frankly a little surprised that the words weren't harder -- although I was thrilled to note that I knew how to spell all of them.
I kicked off the fourth round with facilitate; I noted that the middle of the word was a little tricky with alternating vowels/consonants, so I carefully negotiated it and made ready to sit down... only to hear, "I'm sorry, that's incorrect." The moderator said, "it's f-a-c"; I looked at him in complete shock and said, "That's what I said!" He replied, "No, you said f-e-c". I looked around and people were nodding -- yup, you said "f-e-c".
I was completely dumbfounded. As I said later, I would have testified in court that I said f-a-c. All I can think is that I was concentrating so hard on the middle of the word that I wasn't paying attention to what I said at the beginning and just misspoke.
The competition went on: facilitate (F-A-C-I-L-I-T-A-T-E), derelict, ikebana (both remaining contestants got this one wrong), fledgling, epidermis. The winner: the tall, gray-haired woman. I was appalled to note that I actually knew how to spell every single word in the entire contest, and still finished third.
I think, however, I might have cheerfully finished last (well, OK, maybe not last) -- if I had only met my single, solitary stated objective for the day. But of course, in making that my focus, I probably made it inevitable that I would lose focus on the words themselves.
What I can say for nearly certain is that in about 11 1/2 months -- or only 37 years from the original precipitating event -- I will be back in the same auditorium to try it again. In fact, I may just plant my sleeping bag in the hallway now.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Under the Spell
Just this past weekend, I was faced with an agonizing choice: take my son to see a high school musical (no, not the High School Musical), or spend the afternoon cleaning the basement.
I'm not sure how long the Jeopardy theme lasts, not that I'm planning to pay royalties to Merv Griffin's estate... but let's just say the decision didn't take that long.
Start with the fact that I am myself the veteran of a number of stage musicals -- anyone who knows me even casually would probably guess that. Add the twist that the show was being presented by my alma mater. Plus, the wife is not so much a fan of the melodic arts (and besides, she was On Duty for the school project we've been trying really hard to pretend was not coming around again via child #2), so if one of us was taking the boy, it figured to be me. In addition, I kind of "collect" classic musicals, and this was one I'd never seen... and for the clincher, it was Godspell.
When you put all of that together, what you end up with is yet another of those perfect storm situations -- or as I often say, if nothing else, I'll get a blog out of it.
I'm probably fortunate that they've redesigned my high school to the extent that the interior is pretty much unrecognizable; there's only so much sensory input I can process at once, and nostalgia all by itself tends to blow my circuit breakers. Still, the auditorium hadn't changed much, so I got an instant zing walking down the aisle.
Before the show, we got an orientation from the director, pointing out that the basic book (script) is meant to be supplemented with more current cultural references (it was written almost 40 years ago, after all). And indeed there were enough extra "bits" that it threatened to veer into Monty Python territory at times, but it mostly all worked as part of the atmosphere.
You can see that, as usual, I was dealing with the Curse of the Blogger -- the affliction wherein I can't really just experience anything for itself. I'm always a little bit outside myself... asking, "Am I enjoying this? Is this really good? What's it like for the people involved?"
I should note, this didn't come about as a result of the blog; if anything, it's the cause. I like to think, at least, that it helps me develop more of a unified 'storyline' to the topics I write about, and maybe even dig out the essence or most important/interesting aspects of an event. However, it can also be kind of a pain in the keister to never quite be all the way in the moment.
I could almost feel the different parts of my brain firing simultaneously as we reached the show's climax. I had been wondering throughout: what's it like for a bunch of "random" high schoolers to be in a show based on the words of Jesus? Did any of the words get through? Were any of them more curious about discipleship than before they started?
At the same time I was also mindful of the experience of putting on a show, keeping an audience's attention, getting applause -- the rush of entertaining; but also the sort of foreboding that comes during the last show, as the intense experience you've been sharing for so many weeks is about to come to an end.
The emotional high point of the show is when Jesus is crucified -- symbolically, not violently, but it's still a wrenching moment. And much of the cast was crying or near tears. I wondered... are they just really good actors? Maybe some of them are painfully aware that in 10 minutes the show will be over forever. Or... could it be that one or more of the kids up there is being overwhelmed by the truth of the gospel?
Hard to say from my vantage point. But it's kind of ironic that keeping myself "outside" the show really worked to draw me in, to really feel what the cast members must've been feeling -- both the performance experience and the true majesty of the story. And as the triumphant conclusion unfolded to the strains of "Long Live God", and then the cast returned laughing and crying at once for the encore, I paused for a moment (choking back my own tears) to pray for the hearts of a group of kids, that they would always contain all the words they had spoken and sung.
I'm not sure how long the Jeopardy theme lasts, not that I'm planning to pay royalties to Merv Griffin's estate... but let's just say the decision didn't take that long.
Start with the fact that I am myself the veteran of a number of stage musicals -- anyone who knows me even casually would probably guess that. Add the twist that the show was being presented by my alma mater. Plus, the wife is not so much a fan of the melodic arts (and besides, she was On Duty for the school project we've been trying really hard to pretend was not coming around again via child #2), so if one of us was taking the boy, it figured to be me. In addition, I kind of "collect" classic musicals, and this was one I'd never seen... and for the clincher, it was Godspell.
When you put all of that together, what you end up with is yet another of those perfect storm situations -- or as I often say, if nothing else, I'll get a blog out of it.
I'm probably fortunate that they've redesigned my high school to the extent that the interior is pretty much unrecognizable; there's only so much sensory input I can process at once, and nostalgia all by itself tends to blow my circuit breakers. Still, the auditorium hadn't changed much, so I got an instant zing walking down the aisle.
Before the show, we got an orientation from the director, pointing out that the basic book (script) is meant to be supplemented with more current cultural references (it was written almost 40 years ago, after all). And indeed there were enough extra "bits" that it threatened to veer into Monty Python territory at times, but it mostly all worked as part of the atmosphere.
You can see that, as usual, I was dealing with the Curse of the Blogger -- the affliction wherein I can't really just experience anything for itself. I'm always a little bit outside myself... asking, "Am I enjoying this? Is this really good? What's it like for the people involved?"
I should note, this didn't come about as a result of the blog; if anything, it's the cause. I like to think, at least, that it helps me develop more of a unified 'storyline' to the topics I write about, and maybe even dig out the essence or most important/interesting aspects of an event. However, it can also be kind of a pain in the keister to never quite be all the way in the moment.
I could almost feel the different parts of my brain firing simultaneously as we reached the show's climax. I had been wondering throughout: what's it like for a bunch of "random" high schoolers to be in a show based on the words of Jesus? Did any of the words get through? Were any of them more curious about discipleship than before they started?
At the same time I was also mindful of the experience of putting on a show, keeping an audience's attention, getting applause -- the rush of entertaining; but also the sort of foreboding that comes during the last show, as the intense experience you've been sharing for so many weeks is about to come to an end.
The emotional high point of the show is when Jesus is crucified -- symbolically, not violently, but it's still a wrenching moment. And much of the cast was crying or near tears. I wondered... are they just really good actors? Maybe some of them are painfully aware that in 10 minutes the show will be over forever. Or... could it be that one or more of the kids up there is being overwhelmed by the truth of the gospel?
Hard to say from my vantage point. But it's kind of ironic that keeping myself "outside" the show really worked to draw me in, to really feel what the cast members must've been feeling -- both the performance experience and the true majesty of the story. And as the triumphant conclusion unfolded to the strains of "Long Live God", and then the cast returned laughing and crying at once for the encore, I paused for a moment (choking back my own tears) to pray for the hearts of a group of kids, that they would always contain all the words they had spoken and sung.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Tell Me What I Want to Hear
There's something about political season that always brings out the curmudgeon in me. Last fall I made a sardonic comment, if you can imagine me doing so, about how the political season would be resuming in mid-January. I thought at the time that I was only indulging my penchant for amusing, yet harmless, hyperbole... but then our U.S. Senator got kicked upstairs. So we went through weeks of search, only to have our Congressperson promoted in turn.
Now we're engulfed in news stories and ads leading up to the special election in a couple of weeks. And of course, the new reality of political advertising is that it's all about burying the other guy. So we've been treated to the heartwarming spectacle of the young guy saying the old guy is just another political hack (and a liar), and the old guy saying the young businessman is too inexperienced and greedy (and a liar).
Let's see, what's missing from this picture? Nowhere along the way have we heard anything much about what we can expect each guy to do; the theme is, whatever you do, don't vote for the other guy. Strangely enough, the American electorate seems to be heeding the warnings. I think it's true that negative advertising works: when faced with the constant barrage of don't-vote-for-the-other-guy, voters have seemingly resolved not to vote at all.
I'm not kidding myself that much has changed throughout the nation's history. From what tidbits I know, political campaigns have been brutally personal since day one. But I still believe that a candidate who stood up and was truthful with the public, who talked about what can realistically be done, who shared real ideas, could get elected.
I don't want to hear that everything can be fixed in a couple weeks, because I know it can't. And I don't want to hear that the other guy's an idiot or a criminal, because (at least for the most part!) it's not true. I want a candidate to say: my opponent is a good person with the best interests of the country at heart; still, I believe s/he is mistaken about "X", and here's my better idea. At this point it's highly possible that I may vote for whichever guy comes out first with a positive message about himself.
In a way it reminds me of my favorite business philosophy. Another frequent news feature over recent months concerns businesses that have cut corners or even made up stuff in an effort to make more money. Of course, I've been part of the corporate world for more than 11 years now, and while the cynical view of corporate America is very popular, I have to say that I've never seen it. I work for one of the acknowledged top countries on the integrity scale; one of the proudest days of my career was a meeting with an executive several years back (before my little company got swallowed by the gigantic one, actually).
The exec stood in the front of the room and said, "We want to make a lot of money, and we need to continue to grow our income. The best way for us to do that is to produce the best product we can, and give our customers excellent service."
I suppose I'm starting to sound like next I'll be summoning the woodland creatures to help clean the house, but doesn't it seem like it ought to be possible to succeed in business, or politics, just by being yourself really really well, and doing it with integrity?
Now if you'll excuse me I have to run -- if I hurry, I can still catch that turnip truck I just fell off.
Now we're engulfed in news stories and ads leading up to the special election in a couple of weeks. And of course, the new reality of political advertising is that it's all about burying the other guy. So we've been treated to the heartwarming spectacle of the young guy saying the old guy is just another political hack (and a liar), and the old guy saying the young businessman is too inexperienced and greedy (and a liar).
Let's see, what's missing from this picture? Nowhere along the way have we heard anything much about what we can expect each guy to do; the theme is, whatever you do, don't vote for the other guy. Strangely enough, the American electorate seems to be heeding the warnings. I think it's true that negative advertising works: when faced with the constant barrage of don't-vote-for-the-other-guy, voters have seemingly resolved not to vote at all.
I'm not kidding myself that much has changed throughout the nation's history. From what tidbits I know, political campaigns have been brutally personal since day one. But I still believe that a candidate who stood up and was truthful with the public, who talked about what can realistically be done, who shared real ideas, could get elected.
I don't want to hear that everything can be fixed in a couple weeks, because I know it can't. And I don't want to hear that the other guy's an idiot or a criminal, because (at least for the most part!) it's not true. I want a candidate to say: my opponent is a good person with the best interests of the country at heart; still, I believe s/he is mistaken about "X", and here's my better idea. At this point it's highly possible that I may vote for whichever guy comes out first with a positive message about himself.
In a way it reminds me of my favorite business philosophy. Another frequent news feature over recent months concerns businesses that have cut corners or even made up stuff in an effort to make more money. Of course, I've been part of the corporate world for more than 11 years now, and while the cynical view of corporate America is very popular, I have to say that I've never seen it. I work for one of the acknowledged top countries on the integrity scale; one of the proudest days of my career was a meeting with an executive several years back (before my little company got swallowed by the gigantic one, actually).
The exec stood in the front of the room and said, "We want to make a lot of money, and we need to continue to grow our income. The best way for us to do that is to produce the best product we can, and give our customers excellent service."
I suppose I'm starting to sound like next I'll be summoning the woodland creatures to help clean the house, but doesn't it seem like it ought to be possible to succeed in business, or politics, just by being yourself really really well, and doing it with integrity?
Now if you'll excuse me I have to run -- if I hurry, I can still catch that turnip truck I just fell off.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Nothing But the Tooth
One of the many stark and sobering realities of parenthood is that you never know when you're going to be ambushed by a question you can't, or don't want to, answer. Even when you dodge a bullet, you can be pretty sure the next chamber's loaded.
There must have been a logical trigger, but it sure seemed random to me when my daughter asked me the other day, "When you're the president, can you smoke?" I should probably note that, in our zeal to inoculate the young'ns against sundry vices, we seem to have created a state of affairs where they recoil in horror when they see a smoker -- or someone with a "needle tattoo" (not to be confused with the rub-on kind).
I told her that the president, or any adult, is free to do more or less what he wishes... which brought the unexpected follow-up, "Well, it's a good thing at least Barack Obama doesn't smoke."
Of course, 21st-century campaigns in the 21st-century media leave few vestiges of privacy, so I was aware that although he's been trying to quit, the Most Powerful Man in the Free World has been known to sneak an occasional butt. So I said, "Well, actually he does smoke a little, sometimes..."
OK, in hindsight I probably should've let that one "lie", so to speak; I know it had some kind of consequence because within hours my wife was asking me, "Why did you tell her the president smokes?"
Fundamentally, I believe in telling kids the truth. Age-appropriate truth, yes, but truth. But it sure is hard when you consider how many built-in lies we're already stuck with. We briefly considered trying to get around Santa, since it's a really high priority for us to emphasize Jesus as the Reason for the Season... but it turned out that sealing them in Tupperware for the last 2 months of each year was impractical and interfered with homework. Then there's the Easter Bunny -- a fondly-remembered staple of my wife's childhood -- and of course the Tooth Fairy.
On top of the strain of maintaining a series of fictions year-round, it can get pretty darned expensive. I am sure that we buy more presents when accounting for Santa than we would otherwise. And they both have a mouthful of teeth.
My son made the tooth fairy thing relatively easy on us. After a couple of rounds of a dollar under the pillow, he said, "Dad, can the tooth fairy bring me stickers instead of money?" In fact, he didn't even figure out that he wasn't getting new stickers. Since he caught me off-guard without an opportunity to contact the tooth fairy, I slipped him some stickers out of the existing stock in the Sticker Box... OK, I'm not proud of that one. My daughter, however, is (as always) a different story, a tougher nut to crack.
She is gleeful each time a tooth starts to wobble, and she will worry it continually till it's out. This last tooth was only a little bit loose when she came home from school with a tale of having been knocked down and getting the tooth knocked out; there's a chance that some or all of that is actually true. And that -- don't hate me for saying this -- is where the story really begins.
But it really gets sticky about 4:30 the following morning, when I am awakened by my daughter's piteous wailing in the hallway: we have forgotten to put the tooth under her pillow, and All Is Lost tooth-fairy-wise. Apparently she completes her rounds in the Northeast US before 4:30am EST.
No, no, baby, of course we'll take care of it... I'll go get the tooth right now and I'm sure we can still catch her. So I stumble downstairs in the dark, leaving the lights off so as not to overpower myself with the glare -- and while I'm there, I snatch a bill out of my wallet. Then I return upstairs to put the tooth under the pillow (did you know that the school now supplies a tiny plastic 'treasure chest' to store the tooth in? wonder what the annual budget for that looks like), and I slip the bill to my even less-conscious wife to plant under the pillow, so I can rejoin my regularly-scheduled coma, already in progress.
In the morning -- or as I like to call it, about 39 winks later -- I notice that she is surprisingly closed-mouthed about the tooth fairy's visit. For one thing, finding a penny on the ground is for her a major occasion for gloating to her brother, and for another, "closed-mouthed" is not her natural state by any stretch of the imagination. Something is nagging at the corners of my brain (and yes, my brain is a perfect equilateral cube), so I check my wallet.
I am a math major by training and a computer programmer by profession, so while I'm not exactly a 'neat' person I am in many respects orderly. The bills in my wallet are always faced identically and arranged from smallest to largest... and the smallest remaining bill is a $20.
I share my growing sense of dread with The Mom, so a little later she asks, "Hey, did the tooth fairy come? What did she bring you?" At first reluctant, as well as practiced in the arts of dissembling, she eventually comes clean: "Yeah, um, I got $20." My wife was able to convince her she owed us $10 from an earlier toy purchase -- but since she did owe us $10, I don't feel like I got anything "back", exactly.
So I'm thinking that from now on, the tooth fairy may be bringing an itemized invoice that shows her account status against an advance for the next 19 teeth (although she doesn't even have 19 to go, so I guess the rate's going up in any case). Knowing my daughter, it won't be long, since she will probably contrive to be "knocked down" weekly now that it's proven to be such a lucrative scam.
There must have been a logical trigger, but it sure seemed random to me when my daughter asked me the other day, "When you're the president, can you smoke?" I should probably note that, in our zeal to inoculate the young'ns against sundry vices, we seem to have created a state of affairs where they recoil in horror when they see a smoker -- or someone with a "needle tattoo" (not to be confused with the rub-on kind).
I told her that the president, or any adult, is free to do more or less what he wishes... which brought the unexpected follow-up, "Well, it's a good thing at least Barack Obama doesn't smoke."
Of course, 21st-century campaigns in the 21st-century media leave few vestiges of privacy, so I was aware that although he's been trying to quit, the Most Powerful Man in the Free World has been known to sneak an occasional butt. So I said, "Well, actually he does smoke a little, sometimes..."
OK, in hindsight I probably should've let that one "lie", so to speak; I know it had some kind of consequence because within hours my wife was asking me, "Why did you tell her the president smokes?"
Fundamentally, I believe in telling kids the truth. Age-appropriate truth, yes, but truth. But it sure is hard when you consider how many built-in lies we're already stuck with. We briefly considered trying to get around Santa, since it's a really high priority for us to emphasize Jesus as the Reason for the Season... but it turned out that sealing them in Tupperware for the last 2 months of each year was impractical and interfered with homework. Then there's the Easter Bunny -- a fondly-remembered staple of my wife's childhood -- and of course the Tooth Fairy.
On top of the strain of maintaining a series of fictions year-round, it can get pretty darned expensive. I am sure that we buy more presents when accounting for Santa than we would otherwise. And they both have a mouthful of teeth.
My son made the tooth fairy thing relatively easy on us. After a couple of rounds of a dollar under the pillow, he said, "Dad, can the tooth fairy bring me stickers instead of money?" In fact, he didn't even figure out that he wasn't getting new stickers. Since he caught me off-guard without an opportunity to contact the tooth fairy, I slipped him some stickers out of the existing stock in the Sticker Box... OK, I'm not proud of that one. My daughter, however, is (as always) a different story, a tougher nut to crack.
She is gleeful each time a tooth starts to wobble, and she will worry it continually till it's out. This last tooth was only a little bit loose when she came home from school with a tale of having been knocked down and getting the tooth knocked out; there's a chance that some or all of that is actually true. And that -- don't hate me for saying this -- is where the story really begins.
But it really gets sticky about 4:30 the following morning, when I am awakened by my daughter's piteous wailing in the hallway: we have forgotten to put the tooth under her pillow, and All Is Lost tooth-fairy-wise. Apparently she completes her rounds in the Northeast US before 4:30am EST.
No, no, baby, of course we'll take care of it... I'll go get the tooth right now and I'm sure we can still catch her. So I stumble downstairs in the dark, leaving the lights off so as not to overpower myself with the glare -- and while I'm there, I snatch a bill out of my wallet. Then I return upstairs to put the tooth under the pillow (did you know that the school now supplies a tiny plastic 'treasure chest' to store the tooth in? wonder what the annual budget for that looks like), and I slip the bill to my even less-conscious wife to plant under the pillow, so I can rejoin my regularly-scheduled coma, already in progress.
In the morning -- or as I like to call it, about 39 winks later -- I notice that she is surprisingly closed-mouthed about the tooth fairy's visit. For one thing, finding a penny on the ground is for her a major occasion for gloating to her brother, and for another, "closed-mouthed" is not her natural state by any stretch of the imagination. Something is nagging at the corners of my brain (and yes, my brain is a perfect equilateral cube), so I check my wallet.
I am a math major by training and a computer programmer by profession, so while I'm not exactly a 'neat' person I am in many respects orderly. The bills in my wallet are always faced identically and arranged from smallest to largest... and the smallest remaining bill is a $20.
I share my growing sense of dread with The Mom, so a little later she asks, "Hey, did the tooth fairy come? What did she bring you?" At first reluctant, as well as practiced in the arts of dissembling, she eventually comes clean: "Yeah, um, I got $20." My wife was able to convince her she owed us $10 from an earlier toy purchase -- but since she did owe us $10, I don't feel like I got anything "back", exactly.
So I'm thinking that from now on, the tooth fairy may be bringing an itemized invoice that shows her account status against an advance for the next 19 teeth (although she doesn't even have 19 to go, so I guess the rate's going up in any case). Knowing my daughter, it won't be long, since she will probably contrive to be "knocked down" weekly now that it's proven to be such a lucrative scam.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Picture Window on the World
There was a time when I used to make a schedule for weekly TV viewing. Don’t get me wrong; while I enjoy TV, I don’t really plan my life around it. If we have places to go and things to do, we go and do. But there are always certain shows I look forward to more than others.
Now it seems like the more channels we get, the less there is to watch. I know that’s not profound or original (Springsteen, among others, said it back in 1992), but don’t forget why it’s a cliché to begin with – because it’s largely true. At this point, in the average week, there are approximately six shows we make an effort to watch: Heroes, Lost, Top Chef (or Project Runway, whichever’s current), Grey’s Anatomy, ER, and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.
Several of those are more “mine” than “ours”, although she at least tolerates them; and some seem more like remote-control muscle memory than a conscious choice (ER in particular has kind of turned into the classic movie zombie that keeps walking around, never realizing it died some time ago).
I was going to claim that the CR ratings were all I needed to pull the trigger -- but since I rarely get anyone reading this who doesn't already know me well, I don't think I'd get away with that little white lie. Of course I dithered around, went from store to store, couldn't even decide on the size... but then in the end, I just went for the one they'd designated their Best Buy (although, of course, as soon as I bought it, they came out with ANOTHER set of ratings in which my set was still "recommended" but no longer Best).
Now it seems like the more channels we get, the less there is to watch. I know that’s not profound or original (Springsteen, among others, said it back in 1992), but don’t forget why it’s a cliché to begin with – because it’s largely true. At this point, in the average week, there are approximately six shows we make an effort to watch: Heroes, Lost, Top Chef (or Project Runway, whichever’s current), Grey’s Anatomy, ER, and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.
Several of those are more “mine” than “ours”, although she at least tolerates them; and some seem more like remote-control muscle memory than a conscious choice (ER in particular has kind of turned into the classic movie zombie that keeps walking around, never realizing it died some time ago).
The last one, however, is definitely my wife's. I enjoy it OK, or at the minimum it only bothers me when Ty's screaming (there are 16,400 results for "ty pennington scream" on Google), but she gets a "fix" from it: a little burst of heartwarm. Still, it's always pretty interesting at the end when they show the results, especially for an inveterate HGTV watcher. What's always amazed me in those tours was all the flat-panel TVs scattered throughout the house... just always seemed so high-tech and extravagant to me. Then our non-flat TV died.
Actually, it died quite a while back and we've been making do with another old (and smaller) set. Strangely enough, however, as I (we) get older, that smaller set wasn't getting any easier to see, so at length I faced the fact that we were going to have to begin the search.
Our last major TV search was about 11 years ago, and in that instance I really dug deep: we had friends who were getting a new TV, and he was Doing Research, so I waited for him to give me his results and I bought that TV. And it did last about 10 years...
This time around what turned the corner for me was the Annual Magazine Subscription Scam, out of which we decided to get Consumer Reports. And almost instantly they came out with their most current TV ratings. I got a bit of a shock when I realized that a flat-panel TV is no longer something out of one of those HGTV shows where somebody spends a million on their house -- it's almost the only kind of TV there is any more. I felt a little like I went to buy a new car and all they had at the dealer was hovercrafts.
I was going to claim that the CR ratings were all I needed to pull the trigger -- but since I rarely get anyone reading this who doesn't already know me well, I don't think I'd get away with that little white lie. Of course I dithered around, went from store to store, couldn't even decide on the size... but then in the end, I just went for the one they'd designated their Best Buy (although, of course, as soon as I bought it, they came out with ANOTHER set of ratings in which my set was still "recommended" but no longer Best).
So now in my den -- maybe 10'x12' -- I have a 40-inch flat panel LCD TV. And yes, it's a trifle overwhelming at 7 or 8 feet away... but believe me, I am getting used to it. I can tell you that this week when I watched Lost, I gasped for a reason that had nothing to do with the mysteries of time travel, or Ben's pure creepy evilness, or even Jack's beard. But the sight of the
Mysterious Island (OK, Hawaii) in wide-screen, hi-def, big as life, was quite literally breathtaking.
Mysterious Island (OK, Hawaii) in wide-screen, hi-def, big as life, was quite literally breathtaking.
So at least for 6 hours a week (well, 5 actually -- Bravo doesn't broadcast in HD yet, at least on our cable) we'll get to watch our favorites in rather vivid fashion. The rest of the time... I may just leave the set on anyway. A picture like this could make Knight Rider and According to Jim worth watching.
On second thought, I'm really regretting the demise of the test pattern.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
TFD: On the 17th Day of Christmas
I made a lot of noise last time about how Christmas was over... but truthfully, there are still little vestiges of the season left around. I can't really say a lot of it is conscious, of course; the Christmas tree is still lying on its side in the side yard because I dragged it out just before we left for our Christmas-break vacation stay at camp. There are miscellaneous decorations here & there that just didn't get put away. The wrapping paper is still piled up in the corner of my office (although I did finally fold up the worktable a couple days ago. Some time soon I will take the folded table out of the office, too).
And despite all my protestations to the contrary, all the Christmas music is still loaded up in my iPod, as well as iTunes. Before Christmas, I was doing a constant shuffle of all the holiday songs; now, at least, I've returned to the full list shuffle. As a result, the Christmas music acts like a little punctuation -- I could say that it's the nutmeg in the eggnog, but that's a holiday-only metaphor. In any case, instead of the whole dish, it's just the spice, which in its way makes me "hear" it a little more.
I tried through the season (the "real" season) to rate my songs using the iPod's 1-5 star system, and it may be that I decide that the 4- and 5-star songs are worth keeping year-round. That will probably almost automatically include most or all of Steven Curtis Chapman's two Christmas albums.
It seems like every time I mention Christmas music, I come back to SCC. One of his songs hit me in a special way this year, to such an extent that I convinced myself that it gave me a fresh insight. I've had some time to think about it, and I guess it falls a little short of, you know, C.S. Lewis-level inspiration -- but I'll share it anyway.
The song that brought Christmas home to me this time was "Our God Is with Us":
And despite all my protestations to the contrary, all the Christmas music is still loaded up in my iPod, as well as iTunes. Before Christmas, I was doing a constant shuffle of all the holiday songs; now, at least, I've returned to the full list shuffle. As a result, the Christmas music acts like a little punctuation -- I could say that it's the nutmeg in the eggnog, but that's a holiday-only metaphor. In any case, instead of the whole dish, it's just the spice, which in its way makes me "hear" it a little more.
I tried through the season (the "real" season) to rate my songs using the iPod's 1-5 star system, and it may be that I decide that the 4- and 5-star songs are worth keeping year-round. That will probably almost automatically include most or all of Steven Curtis Chapman's two Christmas albums.
It seems like every time I mention Christmas music, I come back to SCC. One of his songs hit me in a special way this year, to such an extent that I convinced myself that it gave me a fresh insight. I've had some time to think about it, and I guess it falls a little short of, you know, C.S. Lewis-level inspiration -- but I'll share it anyway.
The song that brought Christmas home to me this time was "Our God Is with Us":
Our God is with us
Emmanuel
He's come to save us
Emmanuel
And we will never face life alone
Now that God has made himself known
As father and friend, with us through the end
Emmanuel
(You can hear the song, and in fact the whole album, if you go here and click 'play' next to The Music of Christmas)
It's always been one of my all-time favorites, but one day it hit me at a new angle: he's come to save us. And instead of the conventional sense of the word -- those who believe in him don't have to go to hell -- I took it quite literally. I imagined myself in a lot of trouble, maybe even being held captive, when suddenly the SWAT team arrives to rescue me. OK, I guess in this case it's more like the SWADDLE team, but the image of Jesus coming because it was the only way to bail me personally out of danger made Christmas a little more, I don't know, urgent -- not just another Silent Night.
Don't get me wrong, I love the Silent Night. I love Joseph standing nearby trying to keep his head from exploding with everything that's happened to him. I love the shepherds saying, "Wait -- you're telling us the most important news ever?" I love Mary watching it all wide-eyed, "treasuring all these things up in her heart" (there's a blog I'd pay to read). And I saw one of my favorite Biblical phrases on a Sunday school bulletin board this week: it was a Birth Announcement for Jesus, and on the line for "When:" it said, "In the fullness of time". I wish I could say that's why this post is so "late" -- I'm just trying to achieve the fullness of time for it.
But alongside all that we have the image of Jesus arriving at just the right time -- albeit not in the most powerful or glamorous fashion -- to save us from a crisis... and that, much more than shepherds or wise men or donkeys, is a piece of Christmas I can take with me all year long.
Friday, December 26, 2008
Is It December Already?
At long last I might be able to say that all is more-or-less calm and/or somewhat bright (the children are even nestled all snug in their beds); it seems that the Christmas Marathon has passed the finish line. I find to my astonishment that I haven't posted during the entire month of December, but it's really just a byproduct of my seasonal strategy -- I even decided to postpone my much-loved Christmas letter till sometime around the New Year.
I'm not telling anyone anything they don't already know; I'm pretty sure that if you need a sketch of my December to-do list, you need only consult your own. But as busy as it got, I really made an effort this time not to try to jam 10 pounds of Christmas into a 5-pound Santa sack, so this had to wait... even though I ended up missing my own Third Blogiversary (traditional gift for the Third Blogiversary is apparently "forgetting to post").
One reason December is always hectic for me is that I'm incapable of being Christmasy before its time. My wife did almost all the shopping by November; much of the wrapping was done in (very) early December (The wrapping is also complicated by the fact that -- having done zero of the general shopping -- I'm obligated to pitch in. But her philosophy is: cover each object with paper as quickly as possible. On the other hand, I'm about hospital corners, and creative packaging to disguise the gift, and getting the maximum number of packages out of the minimum square footage of wrapping paper. In keeping with one of my core tenets: The Wrapping is Part of the Gift).
I can't even think about planning to start making a list of things I might later buy until Thanksgiving has passed and it's time to crank up the Christmas music. I have semi-famously written about this topic before, of course -- still one of my favorites, though I have to admit that the Waitresses selection was at least partially an intentional effort to be provocative, somewhat hip, and an out-of-the-box thinker. That was before I demonstrated to everyone's satisfaction that the quickest way to locate me was to look inside the box.
Seriously, drop everything and watch this version of the Waitresses piece...You'll thank me.
The holiday music experience, like everything else in my frighteningly circumscribed existence, was revolutionized this year by my iPod. In fact, I maxed it out several weeks ago, at almost 2000 songs, transferring the over 200 Christmas songs in my CD/cassette/LP collection. And I've been carrying it around with me every chance I get.
In my original post on Christmas music, I concentrated on the traditional (secular) "seasonal favorites" you might encounter, or be assaulted by, in any mall... although admittedly it would have to be a pretty New-Wave mall to be playing the Waitresses. I sometimes have somewhat mixed feelings about Christmas music that does have spiritual significance, however.
Almost every Christian artist has a Christmas album, of course; not to record one would be a little like a baseball player deciding to take a sabbatical while his team played in the World Series. I've collected albums from many of my favorite artists, but it leads to a bit of a conundrum.
Nobody really needs 9 different versions of Silent Night -- as I find from my iTunes that I have (actually, that's from an alphabetical sort; I'm pretty sure I have at least 2 more in there somewhere as part of medleys). Even the artists themselves know this and often end up putting a new spin on an old classic... with not always predictable results. Audio Adrenaline does a version of Little Drummer Boy that is, ah, not for the faint of heart. Rebecca St.James did an entire Christmas album in a rather alternative style, and it's not bad but I often get the feeling when listening that I'm just not quite hip enough to get it. Albeit that might be said about me for anything on the far side of Perry Como.
So I find when looking at an album that I shy away from it somewhat if it's just the Same Old Titles. But on the other hand, it surely doesn't need to be reiterated that I am traditional right down to my argyle socks (not kidding, it's a great wardrobe day when I find a way to work argyle socks into the ensemble) -- so I get kind of scared about an album with mostly unfamiliar titles (i.e. new original Christmas songs) as well. I can't say I'm entirely paralyzed, since I do have over 200 Christmas songs... but as with every other decision in my life, I'm given much pause before triggering the buy.
I am one of the most ardent living fans of Steven Curtis Chapman, so I was able to overcome my reluctance and purchase both of his Christmas albums -- and I find the first one, The Music of Christmas, to be the absolutely flawless combination of classics, reworked classics, and originals. It's probably the only holiday album I own that makes me wish I weren't so completely inflexible that I can only listen to it for one month a year. Technically, as a Christian Jesus' birth and all related topics are relevant to me all year long, but I'm pretty sure a Christmas album in May or June would be a shock to my psychological foundations from which I wouldn't soon recover.
Other songs that are hard to wait for till late November: the first 2 cuts of this album, one of which is Al Green's funky "First Noel"; and a couple of real obscurities, My Christmas by Brett Williams & In Reach, and "Tonight" by Benjamin (The only place I could find this to have you listen to it -- other than, you know, having you all over to the house -- was at Rhapsody, which can be a bit annoying to negotiate but does have the advantage of allowing you to hear not just the whole song but the whole album, which also includes "My Christmas").
Sadly, I sense the statute of limitations expiring on how long I can continue shuffling Christmas... I think I can stretch it through Epiphany without enduring a prolonged and painful personality transplant (or implant, as the case may be).
Postscript: the pieces I've written at past holiday times tend to be my favorites, so I invite you to think of them as holiday specials; you've watched Charlie Brown more than once, haven't you? If you don't mind repeats, these are my absolute favorite pieces...
I'm not telling anyone anything they don't already know; I'm pretty sure that if you need a sketch of my December to-do list, you need only consult your own. But as busy as it got, I really made an effort this time not to try to jam 10 pounds of Christmas into a 5-pound Santa sack, so this had to wait... even though I ended up missing my own Third Blogiversary (traditional gift for the Third Blogiversary is apparently "forgetting to post").
One reason December is always hectic for me is that I'm incapable of being Christmasy before its time. My wife did almost all the shopping by November; much of the wrapping was done in (very) early December (The wrapping is also complicated by the fact that -- having done zero of the general shopping -- I'm obligated to pitch in. But her philosophy is: cover each object with paper as quickly as possible. On the other hand, I'm about hospital corners, and creative packaging to disguise the gift, and getting the maximum number of packages out of the minimum square footage of wrapping paper. In keeping with one of my core tenets: The Wrapping is Part of the Gift).
I can't even think about planning to start making a list of things I might later buy until Thanksgiving has passed and it's time to crank up the Christmas music. I have semi-famously written about this topic before, of course -- still one of my favorites, though I have to admit that the Waitresses selection was at least partially an intentional effort to be provocative, somewhat hip, and an out-of-the-box thinker. That was before I demonstrated to everyone's satisfaction that the quickest way to locate me was to look inside the box.
Seriously, drop everything and watch this version of the Waitresses piece...You'll thank me.
The holiday music experience, like everything else in my frighteningly circumscribed existence, was revolutionized this year by my iPod. In fact, I maxed it out several weeks ago, at almost 2000 songs, transferring the over 200 Christmas songs in my CD/cassette/LP collection. And I've been carrying it around with me every chance I get.
In my original post on Christmas music, I concentrated on the traditional (secular) "seasonal favorites" you might encounter, or be assaulted by, in any mall... although admittedly it would have to be a pretty New-Wave mall to be playing the Waitresses. I sometimes have somewhat mixed feelings about Christmas music that does have spiritual significance, however.
Almost every Christian artist has a Christmas album, of course; not to record one would be a little like a baseball player deciding to take a sabbatical while his team played in the World Series. I've collected albums from many of my favorite artists, but it leads to a bit of a conundrum.
Nobody really needs 9 different versions of Silent Night -- as I find from my iTunes that I have (actually, that's from an alphabetical sort; I'm pretty sure I have at least 2 more in there somewhere as part of medleys). Even the artists themselves know this and often end up putting a new spin on an old classic... with not always predictable results. Audio Adrenaline does a version of Little Drummer Boy that is, ah, not for the faint of heart. Rebecca St.James did an entire Christmas album in a rather alternative style, and it's not bad but I often get the feeling when listening that I'm just not quite hip enough to get it. Albeit that might be said about me for anything on the far side of Perry Como.
So I find when looking at an album that I shy away from it somewhat if it's just the Same Old Titles. But on the other hand, it surely doesn't need to be reiterated that I am traditional right down to my argyle socks (not kidding, it's a great wardrobe day when I find a way to work argyle socks into the ensemble) -- so I get kind of scared about an album with mostly unfamiliar titles (i.e. new original Christmas songs) as well. I can't say I'm entirely paralyzed, since I do have over 200 Christmas songs... but as with every other decision in my life, I'm given much pause before triggering the buy.
I am one of the most ardent living fans of Steven Curtis Chapman, so I was able to overcome my reluctance and purchase both of his Christmas albums -- and I find the first one, The Music of Christmas, to be the absolutely flawless combination of classics, reworked classics, and originals. It's probably the only holiday album I own that makes me wish I weren't so completely inflexible that I can only listen to it for one month a year. Technically, as a Christian Jesus' birth and all related topics are relevant to me all year long, but I'm pretty sure a Christmas album in May or June would be a shock to my psychological foundations from which I wouldn't soon recover.
Other songs that are hard to wait for till late November: the first 2 cuts of this album, one of which is Al Green's funky "First Noel"; and a couple of real obscurities, My Christmas by Brett Williams & In Reach, and "Tonight" by Benjamin (The only place I could find this to have you listen to it -- other than, you know, having you all over to the house -- was at Rhapsody, which can be a bit annoying to negotiate but does have the advantage of allowing you to hear not just the whole song but the whole album, which also includes "My Christmas").
Sadly, I sense the statute of limitations expiring on how long I can continue shuffling Christmas... I think I can stretch it through Epiphany without enduring a prolonged and painful personality transplant (or implant, as the case may be).
Postscript: the pieces I've written at past holiday times tend to be my favorites, so I invite you to think of them as holiday specials; you've watched Charlie Brown more than once, haven't you? If you don't mind repeats, these are my absolute favorite pieces...
Sunday, November 30, 2008
House of Mouse
As a parent, I spend many, many hours weekly immersed in the antics of animated characters. I've been quite upfront in this space about my lack of regard for Mickey, so I won't rehash that opinion here.
I will concede that he ranks higher than he once did, since I got forcibly exposed to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, which is at least cheerful and attempts to engage the kids -- and features some of the catchiest music.
It's also worthwhile to note that Mickey's and Minnie's houses -- note carefully, houses; no hint of impropriety in this relationship -- were among the highlights for the kids during our Disney Visit, and they were genuinely pretty thrilled to meet the Great Mouse in, um, person. Mickey made a big deal out of my daughter wearing a Mickey t-shirt... however, both kids were a mite puzzled by one thing: on TV, Mickey is chatty to the point you'd like to stuff a sock in his snout (?) on occasion, but in person he resorted to pantomime and could not be induced to squeak out a single word. Disney should have pamphlets available with advice on how best to handle those types of questions.
Seemingly of a different species altogether is the rodent half of the Tom & Jerry comedy duo. I have to say that I've always harbored a real prejudice against these two as a result of childhood exposure to a lot of Hanna-Barbera dreck such as Magilla Gorilla, Quick Draw McGraw, and Huckleberry Hound (aka the Not Funny Crew), and it's only in the past year I've really studied them closely, albeit involuntarily, every night on Boomerang from 7:30-8:00 pm ET.
I'm compelled to admit that even after repeated (and repeated, and RE-repeated) viewing of Boomerang's Tom & Jerry repertoire, rare is the evening that I don't admit at least once (sotto voce), "OK, that's funny." I do sometimes wonder why Tom sings at times, but seemingly can't speak; Spike the dog, and Nibbles the other little mouse, and that little Yakky-Doodle fellow rarely shut up, but T&J remain resolutely silent.
Of course, hardly anything in the cartoon world makes any less "internal" sense than almost any episode of Heroes (or for that matter, the fact that "According to Jim" is still on), so I suppose it's pointless to quibble.
Animated hijinx aside, I haven't found our last few trips to camp all that amusing. Since our camp is only sporadically occupied, and not exactly hermetically sealed, we've been aware that we're at risk for four-footed visitors. It hasn't been that uncommon to find upon arrival a scattering of very tiny droppings; once we found that a jar of peanut butter had had its top gnawed. Mostly, however, I've been successfully pretending that we're doing a kind of woodlands timeshare where they leave long before we arrive.
A couple of visits back, just after lights-out, we heard dishes being bumped around, so I stepped out into the kitchen to find a frightened mouse scurrying back and forth in confusion. No, wait -- that was me. Anyway, as we both scurried, he dove off the counter behind the stove and disappeared. All I could do, really, was to plug the gap with a big mug and go to bed -- but before we left the next day, I set out 2 traps loaded with (what else?) peanut butter.
The next time we returned, my wife went ahead earlier, and when I arrived with the kids, she said, "Remember the, um, things on the counter? Well, they were, uh, you know... but I took care of them." And having claimed two victims enabled me to return to my deluded state.
That night after lights-out, we did hear the pitter-patter of little feet (and I knew it wasn't my daughter, because she just lies in bed and yells, "DADDY!!"), which we eventually concluded was inside the wall and hence not fixable in any case.
This last time when we went back, I moved some throw-pillows on the bed... and found an acorn. I'm not sure whether the mice are getting bolder, or whether they're inviting the squirrels to party with them, or what. I am a bit concerned, though, that the next time we're going to find red shorts and a pair of white, 4-fingered gloves in the laundry basket, though.
I will concede that he ranks higher than he once did, since I got forcibly exposed to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, which is at least cheerful and attempts to engage the kids -- and features some of the catchiest music.
It's also worthwhile to note that Mickey's and Minnie's houses -- note carefully, houses; no hint of impropriety in this relationship -- were among the highlights for the kids during our Disney Visit, and they were genuinely pretty thrilled to meet the Great Mouse in, um, person. Mickey made a big deal out of my daughter wearing a Mickey t-shirt... however, both kids were a mite puzzled by one thing: on TV, Mickey is chatty to the point you'd like to stuff a sock in his snout (?) on occasion, but in person he resorted to pantomime and could not be induced to squeak out a single word. Disney should have pamphlets available with advice on how best to handle those types of questions.
Seemingly of a different species altogether is the rodent half of the Tom & Jerry comedy duo. I have to say that I've always harbored a real prejudice against these two as a result of childhood exposure to a lot of Hanna-Barbera dreck such as Magilla Gorilla, Quick Draw McGraw, and Huckleberry Hound (aka the Not Funny Crew), and it's only in the past year I've really studied them closely, albeit involuntarily, every night on Boomerang from 7:30-8:00 pm ET.
I'm compelled to admit that even after repeated (and repeated, and RE-repeated) viewing of Boomerang's Tom & Jerry repertoire, rare is the evening that I don't admit at least once (sotto voce), "OK, that's funny." I do sometimes wonder why Tom sings at times, but seemingly can't speak; Spike the dog, and Nibbles the other little mouse, and that little Yakky-Doodle fellow rarely shut up, but T&J remain resolutely silent.
Of course, hardly anything in the cartoon world makes any less "internal" sense than almost any episode of Heroes (or for that matter, the fact that "According to Jim" is still on), so I suppose it's pointless to quibble.
Animated hijinx aside, I haven't found our last few trips to camp all that amusing. Since our camp is only sporadically occupied, and not exactly hermetically sealed, we've been aware that we're at risk for four-footed visitors. It hasn't been that uncommon to find upon arrival a scattering of very tiny droppings; once we found that a jar of peanut butter had had its top gnawed. Mostly, however, I've been successfully pretending that we're doing a kind of woodlands timeshare where they leave long before we arrive.
A couple of visits back, just after lights-out, we heard dishes being bumped around, so I stepped out into the kitchen to find a frightened mouse scurrying back and forth in confusion. No, wait -- that was me. Anyway, as we both scurried, he dove off the counter behind the stove and disappeared. All I could do, really, was to plug the gap with a big mug and go to bed -- but before we left the next day, I set out 2 traps loaded with (what else?) peanut butter.
The next time we returned, my wife went ahead earlier, and when I arrived with the kids, she said, "Remember the, um, things on the counter? Well, they were, uh, you know... but I took care of them." And having claimed two victims enabled me to return to my deluded state.
That night after lights-out, we did hear the pitter-patter of little feet (and I knew it wasn't my daughter, because she just lies in bed and yells, "DADDY!!"), which we eventually concluded was inside the wall and hence not fixable in any case.
This last time when we went back, I moved some throw-pillows on the bed... and found an acorn. I'm not sure whether the mice are getting bolder, or whether they're inviting the squirrels to party with them, or what. I am a bit concerned, though, that the next time we're going to find red shorts and a pair of white, 4-fingered gloves in the laundry basket, though.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Bloglet #1: Chickening Out
It has also occurred to me, to resume my previous thought, that not every post has to be War and Peace... in the old days when I was very concerned about my stats, I tried to make every post 'legitimate'. I think I may experiment a bit with smaller posts, although the real issue for me is the time it takes me, not the number of words I put out. So here goes...
This evening, my daughter & I had a little "date"-- her brother was at their grandmother's, and mom was out for the evening, so we decided to have a little adventure. We took advantage of one of the great inventions of recent years: the fast-food location with two franchises. I suppose it's mostly that the food business has consolidated lately, but I sure wish they'd had this when I was a kid. In our area we have an A&W/KFC, a Taco Bell/Long John Silver's, and a KFC/Taco Bell, so plenty of fat & calories available in many varieties.
We chose the latter tonight; Taco Bell has a 99-cent taco that qualifies as a feast for her at a price it's not hard for me to love. And I am all about the fried chicken... ok, I know it's not really fried, it's Pressure-Cooked. With zero-trans-fat oil. So really, it's almost health food. You probably know that they don't use "fried" in their name any more -- it's just plain KFC -- but I really enjoy the way they get the subliminal benefit from the Implied Fried while at the same time sort of disavowing it.
When you go out for fast food, it's probably better not to think about the nutritional angle, and frankly I probably wouldn't have except in visiting the KFC website to see whether they really play up the pressure-cooking angle (I couldn't find a mention), I discovered a nifty nutrition calculator.
Here's the scoop on my relatively modest meal (2 pc thigh & drumstick, extra crispy; mac & cheese, a biscuit and a Pepsi):
This evening, my daughter & I had a little "date"-- her brother was at their grandmother's, and mom was out for the evening, so we decided to have a little adventure. We took advantage of one of the great inventions of recent years: the fast-food location with two franchises. I suppose it's mostly that the food business has consolidated lately, but I sure wish they'd had this when I was a kid. In our area we have an A&W/KFC, a Taco Bell/Long John Silver's, and a KFC/Taco Bell, so plenty of fat & calories available in many varieties.
We chose the latter tonight; Taco Bell has a 99-cent taco that qualifies as a feast for her at a price it's not hard for me to love. And I am all about the fried chicken... ok, I know it's not really fried, it's Pressure-Cooked. With zero-trans-fat oil. So really, it's almost health food. You probably know that they don't use "fried" in their name any more -- it's just plain KFC -- but I really enjoy the way they get the subliminal benefit from the Implied Fried while at the same time sort of disavowing it.
When you go out for fast food, it's probably better not to think about the nutritional angle, and frankly I probably wouldn't have except in visiting the KFC website to see whether they really play up the pressure-cooking angle (I couldn't find a mention), I discovered a nifty nutrition calculator.
Here's the scoop on my relatively modest meal (2 pc thigh & drumstick, extra crispy; mac & cheese, a biscuit and a Pepsi):
- 1110 calories
- 87% of the recommended daily value for fat
- 51% for cholesterol
- 113% for sodium
- 5% for dietary fiber (that's almost all the biscuit, of which I only ate about half)
I should probably pause here to request that if I die before I finish this post, please tell my family I loved them...
After eating and before my arteries hardened all the way, I took my daughter to the rest room. Rather than turning her loose in what I'm sure was an absolutely pristine ladies' room, I took her into the men's room. As I opened the door, I was confronted face-to-face with the "men's products" vending machine. I got her settled into what she needed to do and sort of sidled over to the machine to begin to prepare the spiel for the inevitable... she always notices everything and wants to know why and how and who and where.
Here's what KFC thinks every man needs: (1) a small pack of Tylenol (2) a pack of temporary tattoos (although the label was actually spelled 'tatoos') and (3) a pack of glow sticks. By the way, the glow sticks had a disclaimer: should not be taken internally. In case you were feeling really literal about trying to get that 'inner glow'.
And of course, since I was prepared with an answer to "Daddy, what's that?" (although I would have been absolutely stumped by the inevitable follow-up, "Why do they have glow sticks in the bathroom?"), she didn't even notice.
I'm pretty sure the conversations are going to get worse anyway...
Monday, November 10, 2008
Time Keeps On Tickin' Tickin' Tickin'
My wife loves to make lists. There's almost always a legal pad lying about somewhere, covered from top to bottom with all the things she wants to get done in the next day/week/lifetime. Quite often there's a second column with my name at the top with a separate list. Sometimes it's actually the first column.
I don't tend to write anything down, but I do make mental lists as well. Of course, one problem with a mental list is that it's pretty painful to try to cross something off. For me, in any case, a lot of the list is taken up with standing items anyway... stuff I always have pending and that never gets crossed off. Things that hang over my head like the anvil over Wile E. Coyote's.
Many's the evening when, after finishing off my daily tasks -- and that's a whole different list, by the way, and sometimes it's pretty late before they're complete -- I sit down on the couch and think to myself: how should I pass the rest of my evening? Should I read, or watch TV, or simply spend time with my wife? I could surf the net, or rip some of the music I have recorded on my hard drive to my iPod. There's always e-mail to catch up on...
As I run through the options, I always bump into at least one item on the master list: the blog. I can tell you that it's a very rare day when I don't stop and ask myself, "How long has it been since I posted?" I do feel an obligation to post often enough that anyone checking in semi-regularly won't have to wait too long to find something new. I'm well aware that if someone tries a couple times and comes up empty, they're probably not coming back. And I'm not so swamped with visitors that I can spare any.
Here's the rub: it won't be worth bothering if I just write something to fill up a date. As I've said before, I've only had like about a half-dozen original ideas in my whole life -- so considering I've got what, 130+ posts, I may be in danger of repeating myself.
On the other hand, I don't want to shut the thing down. I do still have things I want to say, at intervals, and I've put too much effort into this -- too much of myself -- to just walk away.
So this is what I want to do. I want to keep the blog going, and I want to post when I have something to say. But I want to declare independence from the notion that I need to post on schedule 'X'. Frankly I feel it pulling me toward writing crappy stuff. And I certainly don't need any extra push in that direction.
I hope you will keep coming back to visit when the spirit moves you, but I hope you will give me the grace to be somewhat erratic in my schedule. I do have some ideas for some things I want to write, which I believe will be better if I take the time to write them as they sort of ripen in my head rather than because oh no it's been 3 weeks and if I don't post something now no one will ever come read me again.
After all, I do have well over 100 posts and I would bet good money that no one but me has ever read all of them... so browse the back issues while you're waiting to be served! Kind of like the doctor's office.
I don't tend to write anything down, but I do make mental lists as well. Of course, one problem with a mental list is that it's pretty painful to try to cross something off. For me, in any case, a lot of the list is taken up with standing items anyway... stuff I always have pending and that never gets crossed off. Things that hang over my head like the anvil over Wile E. Coyote's.
Many's the evening when, after finishing off my daily tasks -- and that's a whole different list, by the way, and sometimes it's pretty late before they're complete -- I sit down on the couch and think to myself: how should I pass the rest of my evening? Should I read, or watch TV, or simply spend time with my wife? I could surf the net, or rip some of the music I have recorded on my hard drive to my iPod. There's always e-mail to catch up on...
As I run through the options, I always bump into at least one item on the master list: the blog. I can tell you that it's a very rare day when I don't stop and ask myself, "How long has it been since I posted?" I do feel an obligation to post often enough that anyone checking in semi-regularly won't have to wait too long to find something new. I'm well aware that if someone tries a couple times and comes up empty, they're probably not coming back. And I'm not so swamped with visitors that I can spare any.
Here's the rub: it won't be worth bothering if I just write something to fill up a date. As I've said before, I've only had like about a half-dozen original ideas in my whole life -- so considering I've got what, 130+ posts, I may be in danger of repeating myself.
On the other hand, I don't want to shut the thing down. I do still have things I want to say, at intervals, and I've put too much effort into this -- too much of myself -- to just walk away.
So this is what I want to do. I want to keep the blog going, and I want to post when I have something to say. But I want to declare independence from the notion that I need to post on schedule 'X'. Frankly I feel it pulling me toward writing crappy stuff. And I certainly don't need any extra push in that direction.
I hope you will keep coming back to visit when the spirit moves you, but I hope you will give me the grace to be somewhat erratic in my schedule. I do have some ideas for some things I want to write, which I believe will be better if I take the time to write them as they sort of ripen in my head rather than because oh no it's been 3 weeks and if I don't post something now no one will ever come read me again.
After all, I do have well over 100 posts and I would bet good money that no one but me has ever read all of them... so browse the back issues while you're waiting to be served! Kind of like the doctor's office.
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