Author: Gerry

Categories
Cub Scouts Family

Scout Camp

Spent the day with the boy at Scout Camp yesterday. It was virtually identical to last year, allowing for the usual sorts of modifications camps make in an effort to improve the experience year-to-year. All that by way of saying, the boy and I had a lot of fun.

The boy had the better of it though, as my day consisted of “herding cats.” Actually, to be fair, the boys weren’t as bad as that. Though the extra year does make for a bit of a different challenge. They’re all less googly-eyed in the presence of adults, a bit more standoffish when they’re tired. To make it through, a little more patience and finesse is required including “letting things go” that an adult might otherwise not.

As for specifics, the boy had an interesting day. Starting at the beginning, archery, he hit the foam wrapper on the stand for the target. Twice. It wasn’t anywhere near a bullseye, but all the other kids were marveling at the feat, unintentional though it was. After that we moved on to BB’s where he had the second-highest score in the den and hit 2 bullseyes out of 8 shots. Finally, at fishing he was the only one in the den to catch a fish. It was a tiny blue gill that the boy quite literally plucked out of the water near the shore. It was so small that one of the other den leaders decided it would be more entertaining to use the fish as bait to try and catch a big fish. No such luck ultimately, but we didn’t have to worry about re-baiting his hook.

He also learned how to tie a square knot and a Bowline knot. The latter took most of the hour session to figure out. Mainly because the Scout who taught the class had to work with each kid individually and it takes quite a few iterations to finally figure it out. It took me awhile as well because it wasn’t obvious, while watching him tie the knot, that the loop the knot starts with isn’t the loop the knot ends with. Once the boy learned it he retained it, as evidenced by his demonstrating how to tie it to the Wife later.

Of all the changes to the format, the biggest is the extra hour added to the day. I was pretty sure some kind of brawl would break out between the kids just based on general fatigue levels from hoofing around the camp all day. Fortunately, nothing of the sort materialized, though it was touch-and-go during their soccer game at the end. The activity leader their didn’t exactly regale himself in leadership skills as he basically sat and watched the boys argue over various rules about the game.

Today is “Crazy Hair Day” at the camp, and the Wife spiked his hair for the occasion. He thought he looked stupid, but the Wife and I thought it looked good on him. It was too bad the Wife didn’t have any colored hair spray since he’d have made an awesome punk rocker.

I told the boy that it’s also “Hump Day”, since after today the week will be past half-way over. Even though he’s enjoying the camp, he confessed it wasn’t as much fun this year as last year. I told him it was probably just because it wasn’t all new. It certainly wasn’t for lack of friends. Not trying to toot my own horn, but I also suspect part of it is because I can’t spend the entire week with him at the camp like I did last year, though he hasn’t said anything to that effect. My only evidence is a Father’s intuition. Whatever the reason, I think part of him is looking forward to having his own time again come Friday.

Categories
Family

An Annoying Parenting Article

Here. Mainly because it’s more true than not, I suspect.

I wonder if we should start a “doomsday” clock or something. The boy is 8, so that means 5 short years until the Wife and I become embarassing, annoying and ridiculous.

Personally, if that is my fate, then I’ll aim for over achievement. Might as well give them their money’s worth. Or, perhaps I’ll shoot to be really annoying. I can do annoying. The others should follow suit.

Categories
Misc

Brave

Saturday was a miserable weather day, what with “climate change” working its magic and all. We initially wanted to head out to the local beach, but it was more overcast than not so it wasn’t really good beach weather. Additionally, Sunday was supposed to be a good beach day, so we changed course Saturday and opted for an afternoon run to the movies.

Thus, we came to see Brave.

While it was an entertaining movie, I don’t think it quite lives up to some of the other Pixar efforts like The Incredibles or Up. To me, I think it had a lot to do with the title itself. A title like “Brave” conveys the notion that the story is striving for something more than just telling the story of Merida. Whereas, with Up and The Incredibles, it sounds like you’re going to see stories and end up getting much more. I suppose it’s a matter of expectation, in one case they’re at a lower level of entertainment, for the other I’m expecting more.

While Brave is a lot of fun to watch and the story is certainly well told, it’s the “more” where it falls short. The idea is that someone doesn’t need to accept the fate they’ve been given, and they can change it if they are brave enough. As I said, in as far as this telling is done, they certainly hit the necessary plot points.

But a fairy tale is marked by it’s happy ending and most of the enduring fairy tales leverage the good versus bad tactic towards this end. Think of most any of the other Disney fairy tales: Snow White and the evil Queen, Sleeping Beauty and the evil fairy, Cinderella and her evil Stepmother and Step sisters. The happiness arises as a result of good ultimately triumphing over evil. Sometimes, it’s even the result of someone being brave enough to not except the fate that their evil antagonist has selected for them.

In Brave, the conflict arises because of differences between Merida and her Queen mother, whom is most definitely not evil. She is simply a strong willed woman who doesn’t see why the life she has been given isn’t good enough for her daughter. My guess is that story plays out all the time in real life.

And perhaps that’s where Brave loses me a bit. The story is driven by the conflict between Merida and her Mother. Without giving any details away, it boils down to Merida owning up to her mistakes and trying to undo the acts she undertook to free herself from the path her Mother has set for her. It is a fundamentally different type of fairy tale, perhaps one that is too mature for the target audience. Merida’s actions really should have had more dire consequences, a la Katniss in The Hunger Games trilogy, in order to push it into a class of it’s own.

The bottom line is that, it’s an entertaining and worthwhile story to experience with the kids but I don’t think it will measure up as a true classic.

Categories
Misc

Taxons and Factons

Hilarious.

Categories
Family

First Comics

Took the boy to the local comic store which, somewhat surprisingly for a small town, is well stocked with comics. In the process, we ran into his martial arts instructor whom, it turns out, is a comic collector wit over 10,000 comics. He prefers the 60’s and 70’s strain but doesn’t have any preference for DC or Marvel. He just enjoys his comics, even to this day.

So we wandered the store for awhile, the boy looking somewhat overwhelmed and not sure what to make of it all. I pulled down most of the familiar titles to see if he was interested, but he demurred. There are 2 challenges for picking out comics, as I see it. The first is it’s almost certain you’ll be starting in the middle of some kind of plot line meaning it’s likely you’ll need to find back issues to get up to speed. The second, which I think is more of a modern problem phenomena, is that story lines nowadays are more mature than is appropriate for the typical 8-year old, particularly with the Batman or Wolverine titles.

He finally decided something Star Wars related would do. We were able to find several titles for him to pick from. We left with a couple of them, so we’ll see if they are a medium that captures his attention.

Looking through the comics put me in mind of picking my own as well. While I’m no collector, I’ve always enjoyed comics. With my Nook, I figured it was worth a look at the B&N selection. It appears that rather than individual issues, you have to purchase graphic novel collections. That’s fine by me, since I’ll presumably get all of a particular story arc.

Why should the boy get all the fun?

Categories
Family

A Last Hurrah

“Get off me!”

The boy was upset. He was playing on his DS and the lass had come over to watch him. If you’ve ever seen a DS, then you know that it’s not exactly and iPad. Heck, it’s not even an iPhone. So in order to watch someone play, the other person has to almost become a Siamese twin. It makes for an amusing spectacle when multiple kids are around watching some Mario-warrior to their thing. Five or six kids all crowded around another, all of them squinting at a sub 3-inch diagonal screen.

The lass was in Siamese twin mode, almost sitting on her brother watching him play. It was hot today so the boy demanded was clearly being unreasonable when he asked for a little space. The lass let him know about his unreasonableness by not moving.

The Wife then chimed in by telling her to go do something.

The lass, never one to be shrugged off so easily, commented “I don’t know what else to do.” She didn’t move either.

So now it was my turn. Luckily, the lass had provided for me them means of her undoing. I said “Well, let me tell you something not to do: watch your brother playing the DS.”

That did it.

With a great harumph and display of annoyance she got up and stomped away, muttering dark murmurings about “nothing to do around here.” The Wife rolled her eyes. I shrugged. The boy played.

The lass fumed.

She left the room, no doubt figuring to punish us with her absence.

After about 30-minutes of tranquility, I got up to check a batch of refreshed starter and figured I check in on what she’d been doing. I found her in the front room. Lying on the couch. Sleeping.

A good cure for grouchiness.

Categories
Family

First Day Back

Got up around 6:30 this morning and had a big cup of Jo. That’s one thing I missed while abroad. All of the coffee was served in little cups. I guess it’s the simple things.

The boy was the first child up. Both of them slept in the basement last night. They’ve been doing that quite a bit of late because it’s cooler and more comfortable down there. The down side is they don’t really sleep. It’s a slumber party for brother and sister. The boy actually came up at one point last night to complain that his sister wouldn’t stop talking and let him sleep.

So while I enjoyed my coffee, I also pulled out one of the books we brought back and started showing him pictures of the ruins we visited in Athens. The book has renderings of what the Parthenon and so forth looked like in their hay day.

The Wife was next up, followed by the lass. So I then showed them pictures we’d taken while over there.

I was the first to unpack my bag and start the laundry process. Being a guy, my laundry was simple- two loads, colors and not-so-colors. The Wife had a little more work to do. After she’d started her loads of laundry, she went with the kids to the grocery store to pick up stuff to make a Greek salad and gyros. We weren’t quite ready to give up on the cuisine, and we figured it would be something different for the kids as well. She even bought yogurt to make tzatziki.

In the meantime, I started yard work. In the time we’d been gone, the pines had shed their needles. Again. I’m seriously considering cutting all of the pines down, I’m so sick of the incessant pine needle precipitation. So I spent a couple hours raking the needles so the wouldn’t clog up the bag on the lawn mower. When the Wife returned with the kids, she threw them outside because they’d been after each other in the grocery store. The boy, particularly, was a real bugaboo, apparently. There’s something neither of us missed.

The area around the kid’s play gym outside had filled with weeds, so we sent them out to weed. That worked out like it always does, pull 2 weeds and then complain about how hard it is, or how the other sibling isn’t doing any work. I put the rake down to help them awhile. Once the weeds had been tamed, I picked up the rake and finished that job. Then I pulled out the edger and went to work with that. All of this in preparation for the main event, mowing the lawn. That’s something I definitely didn’t miss.

I also didn’t miss the humidity. The weather in Greece had been almost unreal. It was hot, but tolerable. Here, well, we’re right in the middle of the nasty weather season. High heat and humidity. Feh.

So by the time I was done and we’d eaten dinner, I was pretty pooped. I sat on the couch and did some light reading while the kid’s played out in the pool. I could barely keep my eyes open. The food coma was setting in on top of all the exertion. So I closed my eyes for a bit…

And snapped awake when I heard the unmistakeable sound of water dripping where it shouldn’t be. I was disoriented, so I got up out of the couch and listened closely trying to focus in on where the sound was coming from. At that point, the boy had materialized by my side. Where’d he come from? He was saying something, but I was still intent on pinning down the water drip. Where was it coming from? It sounded like it was in something.

Then I heard the lass, and she was panicked. She had that half-weepy voice where she sounded on the verge of tears, but wasn’t giving in. Finally, I realized what the boy was saying. The toilet upstairs had been clogged and the dripping was the toilet over flowing. The lass was responsible for the mess- that’s why she was half-weepy. She was afraid I was going to do something crazy, like stuff her in the toilet.

When we got upstairs, I considered it for a moment, but settled for having her mop up the floor. There was a nice puddle all around the toilet. Apparently, she clogged it with TP, attempted to rectify it with the plunger and then tested by flushing. Multiple times. I finished the plunging operation and unclogged the toilet, then set her to work sopping up the water. This took more supervision on my part than I’d have thought necessary but I eventually got her to complete the job satisfactorily.

When I returned downstairs, the dripping sound had stopped. It’s always nice to know a problem has been correctly identified and resolved. My only concern at that point was whether we’d have a water stain on the ceiling. As of this moment, there is none so I’m thinking it should dry out and the ceiling will escape relatively unscathed.

From there, the evening was pretty quiet until bedtime, where the boy was upset because he couldn’t find his favored blanket. He went to bed in tears.

Everything’s back to normal.

Categories
Misc

Greek Tomatoes Are Awesome

One thing everyone in our group Greece noted early and often was how good the vegetables were. In particular, the tomatoes were awesome. Every one we had tasted like they were home grown, which is surprising considering we didn’t have a single home cooked meal. I think we had Greek salad at every meal. The brother went so far as to say he won’t eat tomatoes outside of Greece, something I find hard to believe yet surprisingly plausible.

My own theory revolved around the influences of and trade-offs due to mass production and the hydroponically grown tomatoes we have in the States. The other theories were differences in the soil, particularly all the volcanic influence in the soil over here yield tomatoey goodness.

Well, via Instapundit, here’s a possible explanation. The nickel version is we like our tomatoes pretty and that costs in the taste department. Of course, the tomatoes in Greece weren’t visually objectionable so we should be able to fix this problem post haste.

Categories
Misc

Goodbye to Greece

More on the rocks in a minute.

So our visit through Greece has drawn to a close. We started in Athens, flew to Mykonos and ended in Santorini. Along the way, we visited the Parthanon and the Temple of Zeus, went to a wedding, visited the beaches of Mykonos as well as Mykonos town, saw a sunset from a boat in Santorini and from a rooftop in Firostefani.

The food over here is amazing. I don’t know if it’s all locally grown or what, but my suspicion is it has much to to with no preservatives or other alterations. I’m now a huge fan of feta cheese, olive oil and Greek yogurt. The tomatoes alone were almost enough to make the trip worth it.

The weather here is, well, not to my liking. But I can tolerate it. I could count on 1 hand the number of clouds we’ve seen since we arrived in Athens. I’m told it will get hotter before the Summer ends here. But there is plenty of crystal clear water to cool me down. The morning swims are nice as well.

But what helped make the trip memorable were the family and friends we shared the trip with. As enjoyable as the sights were, the moments of gathering together were even more enjoyable and probably the best time we spent here. While I don’t consider myself a traveler, traveling for this was well worth the effort.

If you happen to find yourself in Greece, specifically Mykonos, there is a lighthouse at the Northwest side of the island. It is a lonely place where the wind blows strong enough to knock you over. The lighthouse looks out over the port in Mykonos Town and across to the island of Telos. Beyond the lighthouse is a path that leads down to the cliffs which lead to the sea. Along that path is a stack of rocks that we found.

I don’t know how long that stack had been there, but I added our own rock to it. I don’t know how long it will stay there. It could have been knocked down already. But I like to think it lasted that first day. And if it lasted that day, then it can probably last many more. A marker for some future traveller that someone else had passed that way.

Something to remember us by.

Categories
Misc

Santorini

My head is still bobbing from the boat ride last night. Santorini is a crescent shape that is oriented North-South. The cruise was a 5-hour affair that started on the Southeastern side of Santorini, went around the Southern tip of the crescent and sailed into the caldera. The caldera itself is underwater. We didn’t make it very far North into the caldera, probably only a quarter to a third of the way up. A shame in some ways because the view of the island from the caldera itself must be spectacular. Being an evening cruise, we started losing the wind and there is a schedule to keep so alas, it was not meant to be.

Continue reading “Santorini”
Categories
Misc

A Room with a View

We arrived in Santorini early yesterday afternoon, Greece time. We took a ferry from Mykonos to get here. The ferry was a hydrofoil so there wasn’t much to see since we were inside a cabin. Aside from the infant that screamed for the entire 3 hour ride and the fact that we were on water, it wasn’t all that different from an airplane ride.

This is the view from our hotel, which is built onto the side of the island. Literally. We have to descend a set of stairs (there is no elevator) down the hillside (cliff isn’t far off) to get first, to the hotel, and then to our room. In fact, this particular spot is a series of hotels along the side of the island. Our hotel used to be a winery. But apparently, it couldn’t cut it.

We went on a sunset cruise around the island last night. I’ll post some pictures from that later.

Categories
Family

A Small Fat Greek Wedding

That’s a pretty sweet ride for a bride on her wedding day. Is it a donkey? mule? burrow? Does it matter? Let’s just say the bride had a great ass.

A lot of fun was had by all, well into the wee hours of the morning. There was food, dancing, more food, plate breaking, a cake fight, more food and laughter. The bride and groom were blessed with a lot of good people to celebrate with them on their day.

Congratulations to the brother and now the sister-in-law. May many happy days await you.

Categories
Misc

Mykonos

We’ve been in Mykonos since yesterday. It’s, essentially, the first island of the coast of Greece and a rather popular vacation spot for both Greeks and non-Greeks alike. If the reason isn’t abundantly clear after looking at the picture above, get your eyes checked. Now.

So prior to my brother losing his bachelorhood tonight, I agreed to go for a swim with him. We started on the beach from which the above picture was taken, swam to the far beach (the one behind the boat) and swam back. Our best guess is it’s a half-mile to the far beach, so that was easily the longest swim I’ve ever taken. The brother-in-law and sister swam out to the rocky area to the left of the beach.

Aside from the exercise, it also helped settle a quibble between my Father and I. He felt the water here was saltier than normal sea water. I scoffed at the notion and said it’s just different mineral content or something. But after the swim, and several large mouthfuls of sea water as I gasped my way across, I decided he was right. It’s not an unimportant observation because without the extra buoyancy afforded, I probably wouldn’t have been able to make it across.

Lastly, because the picture can’t do it justice, swimming in the water is like swimming in a pristine aquarium. It’s cool, but absolutely clear. When under the water, it’s possible to see at least 50 feet in any direction. While swimming across, the deepest spot was, minimally, 40 feet down and except for the naturally diminished light at that depth, perfectly clear.

Categories
Misc

Athens

We spent yesterday touring the city of Athens. Mainly, that meant visiting the Acropolis but we also visited the Olympic stadium and several other more modern landmarks like Parliament and the President’s house. The tour itself consisted of a lot of Greek history and mythology (our guide was excellent and very passionate about the subject matter) which I won’t rehash here since it’s available out on the intertubes.

After the jump are a few highlight pictures of what we saw.

Continue reading “Athens”
Categories
Misc

When in Greece

So, for a few days anyway, I’m not an SAHD. Obviously, the ‘Dad’ part hasn’t changed, but I’m doing it from… GREECE! The kids have sitters for duration.

Here’s the view from our hotel window:

That’s the Acropolis, which I’ve been reliably informed is just the wall portion, not the top. On the top is the Parthenon. We’ll be visiting there today.

The food here is good, so that’s been a non-issue. They love their cheese here, that’s for sure. Souvlakas are basically shish-kabobs and something else that started with an ‘m’, that was good as well. One thing of note about out hotel room is that our room-key also serves as the master light switch. We couldn’t get any of the lights to work until we noticed a little card-reader looking thing attached to the wall near our door and gave it a try.

Time to go see some sights.

Categories
Misc

Sandusky Found Guilty

This news has been all over, he was found guilty on 45 of 48 charges. Not much I can add. I don’t know if this really helps the victims in any way, but it gets a very sick man out of the public and will prevent him from victimizing anyone else.

Categories
Family

Thunderstorm Progress

Both kids have exhibited fear of thunderstorms for the past couple of years. We are, at this very moment, experiencing our first one of the year. Both kids are weathering it well.

Earlier, the lass made mention of the fact that she wasn’t afraid of the thunderstorm. She then asked her brother if he knew why.

He replied “Bowling?”

“Yep,” she answered.

“I know,” he finished.

Apparently, for the lass, Mother Nature is bowling and the thunder is the ball rolling down the lane. The rain is her crying. I guess MN is having a bad game.

The boy told me that God is bowling and that when it thunders, he gets a strike. When it’s quiet, he doesn’t. At this point, God has had quite a few strikes.

Categories
Misc

USOC vs Knitters

The Wife knits. My Mother knits. So I was well aware of the brouhaha involving the USOC and the knitting site Ravelry yesterday. For those unaware, Ravelry is a site for knitters and other textile crafts. Members login to the community and discuss and share aspects of their craft.

Apparently, in support of the Olympics ironically, Ravelry holds a contest called the Ravelympics. Well, when the USOC caught wind of it, they sent a cease and desist letter as part of an automatic reaction to uses or variations on the word “Olympics.” Legally speaking, their actions were legit.

Common sense wise, it was the equivalent of stepping on a hornets nest. The Ravelry community is over 2 million strong and composed of not just a few people whom likely would have been watching the Olympics while exercising their craft. (I am deliberately avoiding knitting puns because all the articles Ive read so far are chock full of them.) After word of the legal notice made the rounds, as well as the tone therein, the USOC now has about 2 million pissed off knitters on their hands.

Demonstrating backbones limper than a skein of yarn, the USOC has backed off and it looks like there will be no legal action taken on their part. Though it seems to be too little, too late as far as the Ravelry community is concerned, as evidenced by a comment highlighted at the end of the linked article.

Hell hath no fury like a knitter scorned.

Categories
Family

The Boy and The Lass’ Relationship

Went grocery shopping this morning with both kids for the first time in a long while. It’s old hat for the lass, whom has accompanied me on many an occasion. For the longest time, it’s only been her. With school now out, she was joined by her brother. All in all, they managed to get along well enough that I’d be willing to repeat the exercise.

But (and you knew there had to be a “but” because why would I blog about grocery shopping?) there’s alway something. That “something” happened when we were all done. All bagged up and rung up at the register, getting ready to head out to the car for loading. The lass had pulled down the ream of useless coupons that our grocery store spits at me every time we check out.

The boy was upset about her coup. Yes, you read that right. He was upset because she had claimed all of the useless coupons. I know this for a fact because he came up to me just as we were starting to head out and said “Dad, my sister took all of the coupons and won’t give any of them to me. So she has all the coupons and I don’t have any.”

My initial, non-verbalized, reaction (you know, the immediate one that every parent has that we squelch 99.999% of the time for one reason or another) was, and I quote, “Seriously?” Followed immediately by “I can’t believe this.”

My verbal reaction to him a moment later was “You’re upset because she has a bunch of worthless coupons and you don’t? Do you know how lame that is?”

Not exactly the most, um, judicious response. But it was an honest response, which more and more I’ve decided to start offering to the both of them. Especially when it involved this level of inanity. Because, really, am I supposed to try and split-the-baby over coupons? Chinese water torture has nothing on these guys.

I highlighted this particular event because more and more it’s coming to define the relationship between the boy and the lass. Arguing over “the scraps at Longshank’s table.” Actually, if they really were scraps, I suppose I could stomach it better. Yesterday, the boy was upset because while he was getting in the pool, the lass started splashing in his general direction. The lass regularly gets upset because the boy decides to play one of his games and won’t let his sister have a turn. Because, you know, when you’re playing a 1 player game it’s really a 2 player game where you tag team it back and forth. That’s how it’s supposed to be done. Sharing and all that.

So I’ve decided that if these are the sorts of things they’ll argue over, and request that I referee, then I will communicate their pettiness by not taking them seriously. Or, by offering the most extreme penalty I can imagine on short notice. Anything to highlight the ridiculous level to which they have stooped.

If they want to make it a long Summer for me, I’ll just return the favor. In spades.

Categories
Football

College Football Playoff Coming

It would appear.

It looks like it’s a 4-team playoff of some sort, meaning it’s almost certain that only teams from big conferences will be going. Likely, Notre Dame will also get some kind of bid if they’re in the top 5 or something, though that’s just speculation on my part. No actual details have been released and the proposed first year would be the 2014 season.

This isn’t about the teams, it’s about the Benjamins:

ACC commissioner John Swofford said the commissioners have agreed on the principals of how the increased TV revenue will be distributed among the participating conferences. Industry sources have indicated a four-team playoff might be worth as much as $400 million to $500 million annually.

I still say it’s a mistake.