At a Loss
While most of the Sooner fans I’ve talked to are disappointed by the loss to Colorado over the weekend, I can’t say that I care too much at this point, as my family had a much bigger loss Saturday: Bosco. …
The Seven Deadly Sins of Kid Culture
This guy has a pretty interesting article on what he considers “the worst of children’s entertainment.” With the exception of his take on Clifford, I think he’s pretty spot on.
Oddly enough, I’ve been thinking along the same lines as this author with regard to Clifford and shame — minus Clifford, which we love, by the way. 🙂 I’ve been kicking around the idea that we’ve given shame a bad rap — that we’ve become so concerned with self-esteem that we’ve given up on a very powerful form of negative reinforcement (a method of teaching that is probably the origins of shame’s current predicament). I don’t think we need to be wielding shame like a hammer or putting giant scarlet letters around people’s necks, but it seems that sometimes we rush too quickly past any sense of shock and horror when confronted with some sort of grievous failing, whether in others or ourselves. I would think that if we let shame, even if just a little bit, settle on us (and especially on ourselves, as we should all “tend our own gardens” first), that repeats of the action in question would be much less likely. I think. I still haven’t made my mind up on that. In the vague and never fulfilled final words of a Matt Drudge story, “Developing…”
Update: Here is an interesting piece on this very topic. (hat tip: Brian)
Turtles All the Way Down
Jonah Goldberg, a National Review author, recently noted on The Corner the anniversary of the passing of his Father. I was pretty moved by the aching he expressed in his post even two years after his father’s death, and moved even more by the touching, funny tribute to his father shortly after his death. I really appreciated Jonah’s connection of humor and wisdom, and how he highlighted that with stories about his dad, who sound like a really, really neat man — the kind of man I would have liked to have known.
The stories of the walks with his dad and the seemingly random pearls of wisdom he would share challenges me to make sure that I have those moments with my boys. What really struck me, though, was the phrase at the end:
“He was turtles all the way down.”
I love the image that stirs. I hope someday (a long, long time from now, hopefully) my children can write about me the way Jonah wrote his dad.
Why won’t you sleep?
For the most part, I can’t really complain about how Noah sleeps. He usually falls asleep easily, and sleeps through just about anything, it seems. Given how much Andrew fought sleep at the same age, I should be extremely grateful for any sort of improvement, and I am. However, Noah has had a rough night or two over the past few days, so I have had to get up a couple of times a night to go pat or rock him to get him to go sleep: Stumble in the room; Start the classical CD playing again; Re-insert the pacifier (which I hate using, btw, but what do you do?); Starting patting or rocking. This morning at around 2:00 or 4:00 (you lose track eventually), as I was losing feeling in my arm from patting, listening to the CD and praying he’d drift off, I got to thinking, “Noah, the sooner you learn that you’re supposed to fall asleep when classical music plays, the happier we’ll both be.” 😉
Andrew doesn’t miss a thing
Angela just told me this story:
I just started a Mr. Rogers for Andrew and he asked me, “Is he gonna visit Mike and Jeannie?”
I said, “Who are Mike and Jeannie?”
He said, “They are on K-lub and someone says don’t miss Mike and Jeannie tomorrow morning.”
What a cool boy, eh? 😛
What a child can teach you
This past Christmas, “Santa” brought everyone some candy, and that candy, in the hands of a three year old, taught me a lot.
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My New Do
For about seven years now, Angela has been cutting my hair. We figured we could save a lot of money if we were to just buy a hair cutting kit once, versus paying $10-$15 month. Recently, we started wondering if we could save some time in how we cut my hair. Traditionally, she would clipper the back and the sides, then use scissors and a comb on the top, but that takes a lot of time and is a bit more difficult. What we started wondering is if we could just use clippers, albeit with a longer guard, on the top, replacing the need for scissors.
Well, since we have no major picture/family events any time soon, we decided last night that it was time to try it. We started of with a 7/8″ guard on top, but that seemed too long, so we dropped it down to 1/2″ and let her go to work, which she thought was hilariously awesome. The end result? …
A Child is Born
No, not that child, but my second son, Noah William, was born on 11/21 at 12:15am. He and Mother are doing well, and we’re all enjoying some time at home as we adjust to a new life in house. Andrew is quite excited about his little brother, and rightly so, for he truly is a gift from the Lord…
The US Navy Says Goodbye to the Tomcat
Recently, Angela, Andrew and I took a “mini-vacation” to Tulsa — just a quick trip to get away before Noah is born. In Tulsa, we visited the Tulsa Air and Space Museum. Those that know me know my fascination with military aircraft. At one point, late in my adolescent years, I pondered (if ever so briefly) the possibly of joining the military for the purpose of flying one of those great war machines, but my imperfect vision killed that dream before it had a chance to talk hold.
At any rate, yesterday on a fairly popular geek new site, I saw this article, which reminded me of our visit to that museum in Tulsa. Sitting in the middle of the museum floor was a real F-14 Tomcat. Much to Angela’s amusement, I walked all around that aircraft (easily one of my favorites of the modern US military), peeking in the air intakes, investigating the landing gears, staring into the back of the engines. I got to run my hand down the plane, and even walk under it for a real close up inspection. The real highlight came when Andrew and I climbed the ladder to look into the cockpit. The museum volunteer told me something I though I’d never hear: I could sit in the cockpit if I wanted to. gasp! First, I let Andrew sit in the pilot’s seat. He played with the stick and pushed buttons, generally having the great time that any three year old boy would have when presented with lots of new buttons. I then lifted him from the pilot’s seat, and sat him in the back in the RIO’s seat, at which point I slid into the pilot’s seat. Extremely cool. All the gauges and buttons, knobs, switches and lights. For me, easily the best part of the trip in terms of sites visited.
What really struck me as odd, though (although it shouldn’t if I had stopped to think), was how gritty the interior was. With my only real exposure to the Tomcat “in action” being movies like Top Gun, I had always pictured this jet, and every other, I guess, as being pristine, shiny metal cylinders of military dominance. While they were certainly militarily dominant, they’re anything but pristine. The console looked a bit grimy (though it had been cleaned for the museum), and the fabric that covered the sides of the cockpit was old and torn, dangling in place as if tired from a long and hard commission, which I’m sure it had.
The movies also made it look quite spacious in the cockpit, with room to turn around and talk to the RIO. Nothing could be further from the truth. To sit in the pilot’s seat (and I’m sure the RIO seat was the same — I didn’t get a chance to sit in that one), you really have to wedge yourself in. And, sure, you can turn and talk to your RIO just like Maverick did to Goose, but my guess is that you’re really going to have to crank to get turned around.
So it was a very surreal and eye-opening experience for me. We even have pictures taken from the floor of me in the front and Andrew in the back. Very cool. While the experience did shatter some odd misconceptions I had about the physical state of the aircraft, the act of getting to touch it made my fascination with the plane grow that much deeper. And it is with a bit of nostalgic regret that I read that the Navy has offficially decommissioned such a great jet, but it has had a long and successful career, and those replacing it, like the F-18, F-22 and the Joint Strike Fighter, are at least as cool, and probably much more powerful, so my boyish fascination with flying war machines can live on in child-like wonder! 🙂