Au-Reservoir October 22
Philosophy, Part 2 October 21
Light the Night October 20
Nipply October 18
Wow October 15
Bricks October 14
Soccer Time October 13
Nexters and Ishers October 12
De Helaasheid Der Dingen October 8
Flu Shots October 6
Monday Night Football October 5
Jon LaJoie October 1
Nosediving September 30
Book September 29
Movies September 28
Saturday Event September 25
Miscellany September 24
Nobody Believes Me September 23
What I Learned Today September 22
Gravity September 21
An Unexplored Island September 20
Hospital Food Bingo September 17
Jupiter September 16
TED September 15
Backing Up September 14
Three Things September 13
The Wedding September 10
Jury Duty September 9
Wedding Singers September 8
Gym and Wine September 3
73-Year-Old Dad September 2
Auto-Tune The News September 1
At The Grocery Store August 31
Youch Take Two August 27
Youch August 26 Reading August 25
School August 24
A Weekend Away August 20
A Travel Question August 19
A Philosophical Question August 18
Song Time August 13
A Movie August 12
Cool August 10
Fabrice August 8
Bob's Art August 6
My Feet August 5
Heavy Metal August 4
Two Items August 3
Back Home August 2 Dogs July 24
Book July 23
A Video July 21
Birthday and Movies July 20
No Ode July 16
That's Economy, Sister July 15
Two Things July 14
Many Unrelated Things July 13
Ellis Island July 10
Pullen Park July 9
New Restaurant July 7
Several Things, Including Movies July 6
Parades July 3
The Last Film In My Stack July 2
Bourne Number 1 July 1
Very Important News Items June 30
Some Things June 29
The True End of an Odyssey June 25
The End of an Odyssey June 24
Product Endorsement June 23
Happy Solstice Weekend June 22
Dinner Plans June 17
Starry, Starry Belgian June 16
Hotlink Heaven June 15
Lebowski June 11
Foot Health June 10
Rhapsodizing June 9
Film Boy Speaks Again June 8
The Girls June 4
80s Video June 3
Another Movie June 2
Weekend Review June 1
Aventine May 28
Recap May 27
A Baby May 26
Mushy Mushy May 20
A Video May 19
Recital May 18
A Snake Question May 17
CraigsList May 14
Stupid Criminals May 13
Traffic Philosophy May 12
A Post For D.C. People May 11
Weekend Review May 10
Today's Visit to the Dentist May 7
Fear The Fear May 6
Houses For Sale May 5
Two Important Items May 4 There is an archive going back to 2005, but who reads archives?
And server space is limited.
This blog is no more. If you're really interested in the new location, send me an e-mail:
VanKlotenADDAHYPHENHERE122andhereinsertthe@symbol--yahoo d NOSPAM o NOSPAM t com.
Water Park October 23
This weekend we're staying one night at Great
Wolf Lodge, not only because there's no better way to celebrate flu season
than to spend many hours in an indoor, moist, warm water park with hundreds of
people from a wide geographical stretch, but because it's buckets of fun.
I'm off for early kid pick-up at school because of
Emma's karate class, after that we're going straight to Light the
Night. It's 3
o'clock; I hereby shut down my computer for the day.
Two months ago I posted John Mackey's health care essay
because I was surprised people were so upset. I shrugged. Here's a video
of Anita Dunn mentioning Mao. It seems that YouTube user digitalPimple is
displeased. Again, I shrug. While Mackey is a private citizen, Dunn is a public servant, and unless a public
servant does something unlawful or untoward, I'll continue shrugging.
Thursday evening we'll be attending Durham's Light
the Night event. 5:30 outside Tyler's. If you come too, it'll be even more
fun. Here are more
details.
Neither Ken nor Barbie have nipples. This troubles me.
People live in the tunnels under Las Vegas. Source.
I'm on a hunt for bricks for the bunny barn floor. If you
have any lying around, or know someone who does, I'm all ears. And hands. (For
picking them up.)
In this soccer video
clip, the goalie makes a big mistake and then repeats it a minute later.
Remarkable.
And for more fun: own goals here,
and here.
There are "this"ers and "next"ers, as in
"this Saturday" or "next Sunday." Next could mean the very
next one coming up soon, or it could mean two Sundays from right now, i.e., not
technically "next" in line. Best to ask each time. There's a DJ on
WNCU who says "Coming up this coming Friday..." I wish he wouldn't do
that.
There are also "ish"ers, as in "Shall we say
5ish?" I'm not one.
Last year my friend Michael
in Antwerp sent me De Helaasheid Der Dingen (literally "The
Unfortunateness of Things." Helaas = alas), a very good novel about severe
family dysfunction, among other things. The movie
was introduced at Cannes, complete with a publicity
stunt. This
feeble trailer may be hinting at the English-subtitle version.
Durham County is flu-misting 5th graders for free at
elementary schools. According to the Duke Web site, flu vaccines are in as of
today; I just used their online portal to request an appointment for Jane.
It's Brett Favre vs the Packers tonight. They are seriously
going to try to tear him a new asshole, I just know it. I can't wait. I'm heading to the tube
now.
I hadn't checked in with Jon LaJoie for many months. I just
watched "I
Kill People" for the first time. (Audio language and offensiveness
alert.)
Even Counter Culture is laying off employees.
There are so many good books out there I have yet to read,
but sometimes I can't resist tucking into a good rerun. Soon I'll re-read Cheese, a short novel that sparkles with understated humor and a
main character who somehow manages to be both pathetic and deserving of
sympathy.
During the past week I saw parts of two movies. I
watched the last 30 minutes of U.S. Marshals and then the first 30 minutes (a
late-night channel played it twice). It was The Fugitive all over again, with
Tommy Lee Jones and everything. I also watched the last hour or so of The
Rock.
Nicolas Cage is silly, but I like Sean Connery.
And last night the girls watched the Mike Myers version of The
Cat in the Hat (oh my, that's a low IMDB rating). I think they liked it, even if it was a bit creepy.
WXDU
Record Fair, Saturday from 11 to 5 in the Duke Coffeehouse building.
Here's
an excellent explanation of urine in the body.
As I type this I'm listening to Boney
M. on Rhapsody.
I found a site
describing Disney secrets. I'd always heard about the underground tunnels.
Here's an excerpt about garbage:
The sanitation crew works 24 hours per day picking up the garbage and dumping it into the AVAC systems throughout the park. Garbage is literally sucked to a central location for processing.
The AVAC system moves garbage through pipes at 60 miles per hour using compressed air. The system operates at intervals of about every 20 minutes. Depending on where you are when it happens, it sounds as if a tornado is quickly approaching, then passes you by. The system moves the garbage from all points around the park to a central location where it processed and recycling takes place.
And as I type this sentence, I've just turned off Boney M.
They were getting on my nerves.
You'll remember I'm a sucker for cat videos. This
one is good.
It rained heavily earlier. It's raining now.
Not all the clocks in Pulp Fiction are set to 4:20. Source.
"Testify" and "testicle" are not likely
related. Source.
Sexsomania
saves time.
Vince Guaraldi does a mean, 16-minute version of "You
Can't Always Get What You Want."
Liz Story's Night
Sky Essays is relaxing.
My partner during today's mundane tasks was this question:
how does gravity work? I remembered all that grade-school business about masses
attracting each other, but that doesn't explain gravity. What a weird thing it
is. What makes it work? Is it really force, or is it an absence of force, or is
it gnomes? At the end of the day, I'm more confused than I was at the
beginning. A day of thinking provided no clarity. I rather like being confused.
I'd never heard of North
Sentinel Island before paging through an issue of Mental
Floss this evening. The blurb I read emphasized the denizens' habit of
showering passersby with arrows. Even the Indian government won't go near it.
Sounds like an intriguing adventure-tourism opportunity.
A man copes with his hospital stay by having readers
guess what the food is. Here's
his blog.
It's awfully nice of Jupiter to be out there, much bigger
than we are, catching nasty asteroids that might have come our way. Seems there was
a big one this
summer.
FriendBetsy shared another TED
talk.
File backup. Digital photo backup. Aaaaaargh! If your
computer and/or digital photo storage device crashed right now, would you be
ready? I wouldn't.
Jessica and Braxus are married! It's official. We sang and did
well, I think. Afterwards there were copious piles of merriment, food, and
beverages. People should have weddings more often.
In downtown Leesburg, VA, a very short walk from my childhood
house, some nice people converted the old shoe repair shop into a coffee
joint. More on the story here.
It's good.
And in Durham news, Avid Video on Broad Street is moving
around the corner to Perry Street. Their usual pre-pay deal of 20 movies for
$50 is on special this week (before they move next weekend) : 25 movies for $50.
We'll be out of town for 2 days for niece Jessica's wedding. A
wedding! I love weddings. I mean that.
Someone mentioned Alain de Botton the other day at jvg, so I
found this short
lecture online. I wish it were slower and more exhaustive, but I like it.
I'll start sniffing around for his books.
I just phoned the Juror Hotline, and I'm off the hook for
jury duty tomorrow. Yeehaw.
My niece is getting married this Saturday in Maryland.
Kimberly and I are going to sing the Beatles' "In My Life." I shall
now try to learn it.
Jane is ready to try gymnastics again, so we've signed her up
for a 12:15 Saturday class at the Little
Gym. As luck would have it, this is
right during wine tasting time next
door. Looks like it'll be a standing gig for
some time.
I'm not a Twitter person, but this
is very funny. (Language alert, text only.)
It's a good thing there are only a handful of Auto-tune
the News videos, or I'd overdose.
As Kimberly and I approached the Harris Teeter checkout, we
saw the cashier and a customer hunched over the scanning surface. The customer
was carefully scrutinizing a big grid of pennies from the cashier's drawer.
Turns out she's a regular, forever in search of new Lincoln pennies, and always
requires her cashier-victim to empty the drawer so she can swap regular pennies
for new Lincolns. I wondered if the cashier would keep his "professional
cool," and he did while she was there, but as she left he rolled his eyes,
puffed out a big breath, and told us she was "completely insane." He
then vented to Kimberly about another customer who fears "radiation from the
scanner." This customer demands that the cashier manually key in every UPC
number for every grocery itemno scanning allowed.
Aw, man, with only two minutes to go in our soccer game last
night, I injured my left heel (the plantar-fasciitis-problem one) and had to
hobble off the field. I got an appointment with my regular doc
at the clinic
today, had an X-ray, and he'll e-mail me a link to the radiologist's analysis
when it's ready. I'm using crutches some of the time, and hobbling on the ball
of my foot some of the time.
While working in the yard today I was stung by a caterpillar
that looks a lot like this
one. It left a small grid of stingy bumps all over my elbow. Nasty little
frotter.
My friend Nancy
reads at the Regulator tonight at 7. I'm
going.
First day of school tomorrow for the girls!
Tomorrow morning I'm hitting the road. And then the air. I'm
going on a trip! On a real aeroplane! I'll be at a conference
center south of Atlanta with 50 other Unitarians, learning how to teach sex
education to 8th graders. Doesn't that sound like fun? I'll be back Sunday.
Our family of four would love to fly to Belgium during
Spring break of 2010 and spend a week there, but hoowee, the ticket prices are
high. So far, the lowest price I've seen is $829 per person (travel days,
tentatively, are March 31 and April 8; changing April 1 to March 31 led to a
per-ticket savings of about $30). Any international ticket-buying advice out
there?
Whole Foods Guy John Mackey wrote this
thing. Some people aren't pleased with it, but so what? Must the CEO of a
store-chain have views completely aligned with yours before you'll shop there?
If you look deeply enough, won't you run out of places to shop?
I shall now introduce two songs that will stick into your
brain. Mwa ha ha, etc. 1) "Reunited,"
by Peaches & Herb. 2) "Shake
Your Groove Thing," also by Peaches & Herb.
If those aren't good enough, I offer "Love
Will Keep Us Together," "Muskrat
Love," and "Do
That To Me One More Time." I love that Vegas-show-like clapping the
audience does when the performer sings the first line of the song. Cheese!
Okay, have some more. "Do
Ya Think I'm Sexy?" "Beth."
(Anyone else read Dave Eggers' AHWOSG?
The wedding scene with the song "Beth?" It was good.) Okay, enough
fooling around: "Flick
of the Switch," "Bedlam
in Belgium," Eat
the Rich, "Dreams
I'll Never See," "Too
Young to Fall in Love," "Rime
of the Ancient Mariner."
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Last weekend Kimberly and I went to a real movie theater and
saw a movie. It was called (500)
Days of Summer. Meh. It was sort of cute and fun and lite. Not
completely engaging, and the dummy narrator gave away the ending in the first
few minutes. It had that
guy from the 3rd Rock TV show; he's sort of a homely version of Keanu
Reeves. The co-star
I'd never heard of or seen before.
We spent a hot night at home last night because the air
conditioning system went on the fritz some time mid evening. Hoowee! I think the
sleeping-time temperature hovered around 82. It wasn't too bad, but not what
we're used to.
And of course today we were looking forward to a high of 100
degrees in Durham, with a heat index of 107. And as they always have in the
past, Lee Air Conditioners
saved the day. (One time a few years ago, I'd sent them an early-morning e-mail before
business hours, and someone phoned me just before 8 to let me know I was in the
queue.) Today I phoned my request at 8 am when they opened, and a nice man named
Matt came at 10:30 and had it fixed by 11. Apparently something called the
"capacitor" had broken. At the moment, the house is cool.
Everyone will be very excited to learn that Fab
Morvan, previously of Milli
Vanilli, is busy these days doing solo
work.
Left (the offending) foot was only slightly sore this
morning. I'll count it as a triumph. For now.
I've mentioned FriendBob before, an excellent man and member
of my soccer group. He's been busy
bulking up his body
of work. I especially like Marsh
at High Tide.
Many months ago, determined to heal my plantar
fasciitis, I bought custom
orthotic inserts on eBay. I've been wearing them for walking, hiking (like the
aforementioned mountain adventure), and running. Tonight I put them through
their soccer test. They're excellent. I feel only a very dull pain that had been
much worse before I started using the orthotics. The final test comes tomorrow
morning when I get out of bed and start walking across the bedroom floor.
Fingers are crossed.
Although I watched it several times when it came out, it's
hard to find people who've even heard of the movie Heavy
Metal. I only just learned at imdb that John
Candy and Eugene
Levy had parts.
FriendGen and I did some kid-swapping today so we could get a
few things done. During my afternoon errands while Emma and Jane were with her,
I ducked into the Durham Joe
Van Gogh. The walls are now bright green. I'm not sure how I feel about
this. They're very, very green.
Never give up hope when you see a lost
pet sign.
We were away in the mountains, meters
from Nantahala Lake, for a whole week. No Internet and no cell phone signal.
Can you imagine? I can. We had a swell time. We signed the girls up for rapids
rafting (class 2+) without fully explaining just what we were getting into,
and they had a blast. Jane only just made the seven-age-minimum by two weeks.
I'm going to start looking for some class 3 rapids closer to home (if possible;
I have no idea).
We were three families in all.
Four of us (grown-ups) decided one day that we would go for a nice long hike and
that it would be fun, fun, fun. Alas, we proudly hiked
many miles down the wrong side of a huge fucking mountain and had to knock on
the door of a very nice mountain lady at the bottom to ask could we kindly use
her phone to call for a ride. Still the hike was semi-enjoyable. After
descending from the Wayah
Bald observation tower, we crossed paths with the Appalachian Trailwhich
had on it some very neat-looking and authentic-smelling A.T. hikers who were on
their 10th day. They were so cute with all their gear and their cute whistles
around their necks and their adorable passing around of ibuprofen and their
smell. Did I mention their smell? They smelled. Hoowee did they ever. It's
possible that our wrong turn resulted from the speed with which we fled the
stench of their PigPen
cloud. Bastards.
A few times we made it into town
for provisions and
a visit to the local coffee
shop. The coffee shop's nickname is the Beans & Novel. Get it? Beans
& Novel. The espresso there was excellent. And they had very good wine. The
next time you're in Andrews, go there. It's tasty.
My drink of choice during this vacation was Busch beer, which
is cold as a mountain stream and smooth as its name.
On the way up we ate lunch in Asheville; on the way back we
lunched in Black Mountain. Good coffee there, too, at the Dripolator.
No more pooches allowed at the farmers' market.
I'm 50 pages into Ardent
Spirits. Nice. Very nice. He's a good writer, this Price
fellow.
This video exaggerates,
but only a bit.
Jane has turned 7. Happy Birthday Jane! Halfway to fourteen. Wow.
And Emma's 10, more than halfway out of the house.
Over the weekend I watched two movies. The first was Brόno,
which I thought was very good, hilarious, heartbreaking, sad, outrageous,
irreverent, but still not as good as Borat. I'd heard conjecture that this sort
of acting is going to become more difficult for Cohen because of his success,
and in fact one of the scenes in Brόno
had to be cut short because someone recognized him. The second movie (I still
don't know the difference between a film and a movie, or a preview and a
trailer) was Bread
& Tulips--excellent! Light but interesting, set in Venice. Two
thumbs pointing into the air above me. And me smiling.
No more Ode for me. The articles aren't nearly exhaustive
enough, and now the magazine has started advertising
cigarettes.
Jim
has created yet another masterpiece.
The Lowe's truck rental today went smoothly, without a hitch. Ha!
Without a hitch. And as I jammed into the ground in the rabbit yard with
the post-hole digger, the bunnies were agitated and demanded to know just what I
thought I was doing.
And now I shall drink
beer.
Recent movies. Away We
Go. Meh. A handful of funny scenes (Allison
Janney steals the show),
but overall I give it a thumbs sideways. The
Sea. Very good. Thumbs up. Depth,
interest, dysfunctional family dynamics, lovely Icelandic cinematography,
dramatic questions, and good acting.
Saturday night we had dinner with friends who pulled out
random sheet-music for everyone to sight-sing on the spot at the table. My kind
of crowd.
These same friends have a guinea pig named Little Bevo.
Apparently this has something to do with the University of Texas.
Almost everywhere I go, my Canson
notebook is with me. Notes, thoughts, interesting receipts, pictures the
girls draw me, medical blood test results, my dad's cremation certificate,
fiction-writing ideas, business cards, photographs, a filled-up Joe
Van Gogh drink card, general inspiration, sketches, frustrations,
thought-provoking quotes or reading passages that cross my path, they're all in
my notebook. I'm a handful of pages from the end of the current notebook, so
it's time to buy another Canson. It's always an exciting tradition. Very
exciting. Seriously. I love it.
I never saw Sicko,
but this
makes me want to rent it.
What I first thought was a disadvantage of not having a
van has turned out to be a fabulous blessing. I can't transport even an
8-foot-long 2x4 in either of the cars we have. To buy everything for this rabbit
barn I want to build, I have to plan meticulously. And it turns out that with the
monthly savings in gas between a Scion XB and a Honda Odyssey, I could rent the
Lowe's $20/hour truck 10 more times per month than I'd actually need it. This is
good. Yesterday I finalized my list of materials, and tomorrow I'll finish my
shopping. The hourly charge for the truck doesn't start until I have the truck
fully loaded at Lowe's. Booyah.
For years I'd read how great the short stories of Chekhov
are. I checked out a
collection at the library a week ago. I'll be returning it tomorrow. Yawn.
In a couple of weeks we're heading to the mountains, renting
a house near Lake Nantahala. If anyone has been in that area and has tips and
ideas, lay 'em on me.
I'm also keen to learn tricks for cleaning the dirt out of
green onions.
The detail available at the Ellis Island Web site is
vast.
I've been poking around with names from our family tree, though I haven't found
any clear hits yet.
In this week between camps, the girls and I trekked to Pullen
Park in Raleigh. We'd never been. The excursion officially qualified as a hoot:
a carousel (one of these old, old things with a loud Wurlitzer organ), a train
ride, and paddle boats. While snacking on huge dill pickles, we watched a heron
catch and swallow a fish--whole, right down the gullet.
Sa-heh-haaaay. A restaurant with a bunch of vegan food.
Must get over there some time.
Saturday night we watched ballpark
fireworks from the lawn of the DPAC.
They were, y'know, fireworks. Ho hum.
We've been renting DVDs like mad. Over the weekend the girls
watched Chitty
Chitty Bang Bang (6.5 stars at imdb? Blasphemy) and Mousehunt.
Both were hits.
Meanwhile I watched The
Bourne Supremacy and The
Bourne Ultimatum. Much fun, those Bourne movies. I like having the DVD,
because I can fast-forward all the boring car-chase scenes. Will there be a
fourth Bourne movie? The Bourne Legacy? The Bourne Conspiracy? Bourne on the 4th
of July? I'm a-twitter. (Just kidding; I don't even have a Twitter account.)
I also watched A Good
Year because I'd read the book a few
years ago. And even though those Peter Mayle things are just fun, quick reads
that aren't written terribly well, the book was better than the movie. Just last
night at dinner someone asked, "Can anyone think of a movie that was better
than the book?" Anyone?
A fourth of July kid
parade. And another
one. What to do.
Run, Lola, Run is fast and furious. A good movie to rennt, I
mean rent. Hee hee. It's a quick 81 minutes. The format, pacing, and sequence
aren't normal, but saying more would give things away.
The
Bourne Identity was good fun. All that moving around and shooting and
fighting and suspense and tension and whatnot. I'll look for the next one at the
video store.
Starbucks has taken
out hydrogenated oils.
World's
ugliest dog. Surely they could have found someone uglier.
After all these years, I'm still steamed that Mongolia and
China haven't worked out their rail
gauge difference.
Sa-heh-hay, they give grants for this
kind of work?
Ew, four-foot-long worms, among other
things.
Do you get
along with your neighbors?
Plan your movie-related
trip today!
I always knew someone would find out the source
of the conflict between Israel and Palestine.
Good news from the Durham planning department: I don't have
to submit a structural design and I don't need a permit to build a 10' x 10' x
8'-high rabbit shelter in the back yard. We're up to two rabbits at the moment
(the most recent addition is a petulant thing I named Hazel; it seems like a good
female bad-ass name).
We saw Up
over the weekend. Very nice.
Kimberly's in Vienna for a week with the Durham
Choral Society. Every night at dinner the girls and I raise our glasses high
and bellow, "To Mommy!" before clinking and then sipping. We miss her
already. However, her absence does mean I get to watch weird movies at night
after the kids are in bed.
First up is Sex
and Lucia. I'm 40 minutes into it. Is it uncool to make comments before
it's over? I hope so. Something interesting had better start happening soon, or
I'm stopping.
In the queue also are the first Bourne
movie and Run,
Lola, Run.
I wanted to write more yesterday about the impending van
sale, but I didn't want to jinx it. It's done! Everything went smoothly. I
posted the Odyssey on CraigsList Monday, a nice couple test-drove it on Tuesday, an
inspection was done at their expense on Wednesday, and today we sealed the
deal. We signed over the title, filled out a bill of sale, and did a wire
transfer since we both bank with USAA. A most swell experience all around.
I've done a lot of CraigsListing over the years, and I've
learned a few things. Apparently the very first person to respond to any listing is usually
the most flaky, rudest, or severely lacking in social skills of the whole group. I'm amazed at this
pattern. Instead of jumping at the first e-mail, I've learned to let a few
responses collect before assembling them not in order-received order, but in
who-appeals-to-me-personally order. I admit it comes down to that. This van deal
was finalized mainly because we--buyer and seller--liked each other. Hoorah for
personal relationships and social dymanics.
Tomorrow we're selling our mini-van. It's the end of an era.
Moment of silence. Sniff.
Trader Joe's sells tasty cinnamon
crumpets. We love them. Warm. With butter.
This weekend I drove up to Leesburg to help my brother and
sister clean out all the clothes from Dad's closets, dressers, and boxes. There
were a bunch. I was going to find a local place to donate it all, but Dad had so
many shirts with logos and decals on them, I decided to schlep it all back to
Durham and give it to a thrift store here. The strategy is to spare my stepmom
the possibility of spotting, say, Murray the Leesburg wino standing on the
street corner sporting an Exeter Lacrosse sweatshirt. If I end up seeing them
around Durham, that'll be fine, and actually kind of neat. Since Thrift World at Lakewood has been my own source for great shirts for many years, I
delivered the whole collection there this morning.
In other news, we're dog-sitting Bessel the Walker hound, who
in addition to having a doggie IQ of something like 6, seems to daily defecate 7 or 8 times the volume of food she takes in. I
don't know how she does it; it's alarming. She's a soft-serve shit-spewing
marvel. She hobbles around the backyard in an awkward walking squat, with me
behind her holding a shovel and trying to keep up with her perpetually gushing
backside.
The girls are enjoying their second week of Camp
Riverlea. Swimming, archery, canoeing, drama, tennis, art, you get the idea.
Our morning bugspray and sunscreen fumigation is magnificent.
During my drive I listened to two audio-books. Fear
& Loathing in Las Vegas (silly, aimless, no plot), The Gingerbread
Girl (goofy and too straightforward), and The
7 Spiritual Laws for Parents (I only made it through about 6 minutes; no
resonance for me). Unfortunately I was in a rush and had grabbed recordings whose
run-time best matched the number of hours I'd be on the road (ten). Hopefully
next time I'll plan ahead and get good stuff.
Googling Thrift World led me to this
amazing post at Endangered Durham about Lakewood. Like the author, I
remember eating at Satisfaction, playing pool at TJ Hoops, and going to the
theater there. His philosophizing about the American dream toward the end of the
essay is exquisite.
Oh good, another excuse not to cook. Thursday at Weaver
Street Market the Maudlin Brothers are playing from 6 to 8.
Parents! We must show all our kids this
story.
Kimberly and I have been married for 15 years! Saturday night
we celebrated: dinner at Azure,
dessert and port at Cypress,
and a movie
(Kimberly hadn't seen it) at the Varsity.
Here's to 15 more. And 15 more again. And so on.
You'll have noticed it's my second time seeing The
Hangover. It held up well. Stu's
song has been in my head all day. And Zach Galafianakis's prepared speech on
the roof was funnier this time.
On Saturday as I dropped off Jane for a birthday party at the
bowling
alley, I craved a white
Russian. I didn't think this right after watching the movie, but I'd see The
Big Lebowski again. I've been mulling over some of the scenes and
dialogue bits. At the moment I'm tickled that Philip
Seymour Hoffman's character started calling Lebowski "Dude." John Turturro's Jesus
character (strong language alert) was particularly uproarious, and like
Thomas Haden Church reacting to Paul
Giamatti's "fucking Merlot" line
in Sideways, Jesus's antics
increased five-fold in hilarity
because of other characters' reactions ("8-year-olds,
Dude."). Now I want to go bowling. And drink white Russians.
While the girls and a couple of friends were in the next room
watching Snow
Buddies, I watched The Big Lebowski on my laptop. I'd never seen
it. I laughed, sort of, out loud a few times. This Lebowski
character, though, I wanted him to have a little more oomph. I'm sure the lack
of oomph was part of the point, but it isn't my kind of point. John
Goodman--he's funny.
I've been out of soccer commission for many months now
because of plantar fasciitis
in my left foot. For years I'd used a pair
of orthotic inserts from time to time for walking, and those helped a bit,
though the arch was too high. Now I'm trying custom
orthotics I found on eBay (after poking around and finding I'd have paid
much more for custom orthotics anywhere else). These ones are great. My left
heel hasn't hurt since wearing them. Next week I'll try a long walk
to give them a real test.
We (I think I can speak for Kimberly) love our Rhapsody
subscription! When I signed up last October, I remember thinking, "Eh, I'll
try it for a year and see if I like it." I imagined I'd use it every so
often and hope to end up feeling like the subscription was worth it. And here I
am using it every day. It's ideal for a dude like me, who owns not a single CD (omg,
that totally rhymes). I do, however, own an old 33 piece of vinyl by Burl Ives called "The
Lollipop Tree." Why do I still have that? I don't know. It'll be gone
soon.
What a silly thing The
Hangover was. I liked it! You'll know instantly from this
trailer whether or not it's your kind of movie. All the actors did a nice
job, but Zach
Galifianakis and Ed
Helms stole the show. If you like Helms in "The
Office" (whoa, that's one of the highest IMDB ratings I've seen),
you'll like this too.
3.75 days of school left. Today was 1st-grade field day.
Monday will be 4th-grade field day. Also sometime next week Jane's class has a
pizza party (Monday, I think. I should check), and the 4th grade has some sort
of cookout. Homework stopped a couple of weeks ago. Emma was mentioning the other
day how excited she always feels when it's time to go supply shopping for
back-to-school in August. That's our Emma. I'm pretty sure she's looking forward to summer,
too.
Oh, yes, and Emma wanted me to tell everyone that yesterday
in karate class, she earned her gold belt. Yes!!
I never saw the original version of "Head Over Heels" by
Tears For Fears, so when the "literal
version" crossed through my inbox today, I couldn't believe the video
footage was authentic. It's perfectly goofy even without the altered lyrics.
I just finished watching Ocean's
12. Not as good as the first one,
but even with some of the sloppiness (the break-dancing guy among the moving
lasers, George and Brad dressed like that sports team coming out of the
Amsterdam hotel
where none of the other team members thought that was odd), it wasn't too bad.
And I liked the extended cameo by Eddie Izzard.
June? Really? Okay, if I have to.
Kimberly has been out of town on bidness since Friday
morning. I'm pretty sure she's somewhere in Florida. Saturday--what a time. Emma
and Jane were invited to a birthday party, and because kids and grown-ups were
having so much fun, we stayed four hours without realizing it. We played
badminton. With shuttlecocks! That's an excellent word.
Saturday night I dropped the girls off for a sleepover at a
friend's house and then scooted over to the Chelsea to watch a thing called Valentino. I wrote a brief review over at
the
Rag.
Jane stayed home from school today with a 102 fever. Here's
hoping for a good, long night's sleep tonight.
I finally got to visit my friend Chris at his work place
earlier this week. He's a carpenter at Aventine Inc. in Carrboro (no Web site;
can you believe it?). Fancy, high-end stuff: cabinets and whatnot. On his lunch
break, Chris practices riding one of his three unicycles. I tried for 1.75
seconds before coming to my senses.
Okay, okay. Here we are. We spent the weekend in Colonial
Williamsburg and Great Wolf
Lodge. The only Disney place I've been to is Epcot,
but the wolf lodge place felt like Disney Lite. It was fun and watery and the fermented
beverages flowed; for a fee. I could have wandered around Williamsburg
for another day or two, easily.
Yesterday Emma and I woke up at 5 am to take a school field
trip to Kure Beach and the
Aquarium at Fort Fisher. 3 hours on the bus each way.
We arrived back in Durham at 6.
Tomorrow I'll be at Duke Gardens chaperoning a
field trip with Jane's 1st grade class.
I keep seeing snippets of all these Bourne movies (we caught
a bit on the hotel TV), but I've never watched one from beginning to end. They
seem good. Thoughts or comments?
No time for a "here's what I've been doing for the past
few days" post. For now, an exciting announcement; my niece Jessica just had a baby
girl! Woo hoo! Baby Isobel was born this afternoon, 8 pounds 11 ounces, she's
doing well, her mama's doing well, etc. My sister (who's four years my senior)
is now a grandmother. Dayum. We've always been a fertile bunch.
My mind is mush. I've been spending hours and hours as an
end-of-grade test proctor at the
school. I'll be back there again tomorrow
morning. Mush.
There are several reasons I like the video that crossed my desk
today, courtesy of Gary. It's short, it has an animal, it's kid-safe, and it has
a great title: Cat
Solves Printer Problem. My stomach hurts from laughing.
Jane had a dance show at Barriskill this evening. She had
fun, but she's decided to move on. She says dance is too hard.
A 2 1/2-foot copperhead has taken up residence under the lid
of our sewer pump shaft. Does anyone have recommendations for relocating a
snake? I could easily snatch it and toss it into a lidded trash can if I had one
of those grabby-things-on-a-pole. I'm less worried about the snake than about a
nest of babies.
I generally like selling things on CraigsList, but some
people need to work on their manners. I just got an e-mail from a woman (I'll
call her "Debra," since that's the name she used) who opened her
message with "This is the second time I have emailed you." Well,
"Debra" (with your strange e-mail address that starts with lihfmzvxmfi),
this is the first time I have heard from you. Maybe my courtesy filter deleted
your "first message." Just kidding--there's no courtesy filter. I
really only got one message from her. Anyway, maybe she just had a bad day or
something and I should stop expecting people to be nice.
I love these kinds of stories! A short list from today's
reading:
Liquor
thief fills out raffle ticket.
Falsetto
thieves.
Man
sleeps with gun.
Teen
breaks into cop car.
Diva
thief.
Roll
the credits.
I'll
be back.
Behold! I have noticed a pattern. If the driver in front of
me isn't paying attention (driving waaaay too slowly, idling at a traffic signal
when the light is green, etc.), that driver will invariably be a) talking on the
phone, b) wearing a hat, or c) driving a Buick. I'm completely serious here. If
I ever see any exceptions to this, I'll post details right away.
My friend Mario performs in a play he wrote called "Fat
Gay Jew" (what a title!) at Washington's Charter
Theatre. Articles here,
here,
and here.
This weekend we had a visit from my sister, stepmom, and
nephew, who made the drive Friday from northern Virginia. We played. We drank.
We ate. We did all the fabulous things people do when fun family come to town. A
Friday night highlight was dinner outside at Nantucket
Grill in Sutton Station.
Saturday night's storm knocked the top off one of our
sycamores, toppling with it a woodpecker nest in a hollow. A neighbor saw the
fledgling on the ground the next day; it had disappeared moments latera good
sign, I hope.
As I channel surfed one night, I tripped over an awful thing
called Kill
Bill. I hadn't heard of it. The 6 minutes I watched were frighteningly
silly.
Happy Mother's Day, all you muthas!
Did anyone else see Saturday Night Live with Justin
Timberlake? The Target skit was my favorite. And I think I have yet to see a
skit where Kenan
Thompson isn't hilarious.
My computer stayed off the entire day Saturday.
There is no toy store at the mall.
Scandalous.
While yesterday was my birthday (yippee, 41; friends
descended and ate cake), a remarkable number of people I know share this honor.
Happy One Day Late Birthday to Valerie down the street, Josh in Raleigh, and my
cousin Chris Cremers outside Turnhout, Belgium.
The girls are cavity-free, and if I haven't said it before,
Scott Donner is the best dentist and all-around guy and interior and exterior
designer ever. And there's always interesting music playing while he works. I
wish he had a Web page with pictures of his groovy office. His wife owns Dolly's
in Brightleaf, so that'll give you an idea.
Back when I was in elementary and middle school, three things
(that I can think of now) were made clear to us: the killer bees were going
to arrive from South America through Mexico and threaten us, the Soviets were going to
bomb us, and we were all going to get trichinosis if we even looked at
undercooked pork. Reminds me of that whole Y2K business from a few years back.
Honestly.
For anyone who wants to move in and help make Manford Drive
even groovier than it already is (as if that's possible. I know, right?), there
are three places for sale: here, here,
and here.
Today is my brother's birthday. Happy Birthday, Philippe! Old
Man! He's 37.
Two of my friends have been very artistically busy recently. Nancy
had a book
published. Elise sold a
painting.