‘Twas a busy, yet thorougly entertaining weekend…

After jetting home (in a rolling, plodding sort of way on I-95) on Friday afternoon, Colleen and I slipped out for a couple of hours by ourselves to grab dinner and catch a movie – kabobs at a great local joint and a screening of Babies at the local art house cinema.

Quick review? Good stuff; it chronicles the first year of four different kids from different parts of the world. There are lots of great anthropological insights to be had, though they’re all inferred (thankfully, the filmmakers didn’t feel the need to impose some sage voice-over on it); simply showing the ways that families and childrearing work around the world, but also demonstrating that despite all these cultural differences, we’re all an awful lot alike: put a baby near a cat, for example, and the kid’s going to tackle and otherwise torment it, no matter what continent it’s on (thankfully, cats are mostly patient creatures).

I expect, however, that a lot of people will watch it more for the squee factor of watching eighty minutes of babies doing cute baby things.

Much of the rest of the week was occupied by a family camping trip with the cub scout unit at the Newport News Park, a huge chunk of public park land a little ways west of home down I-64. Even though the wind had the lake shut down, dashing our canoeing plans (and caused some disconcerting creaking from the trees above my tent), we had a nice time sitting around the campfire, making sugar napalm toasting marshmallows, and trying to spot animals (saw a bunch of dear, raptors, toads, and a quick little lizard).

And lesson learned: Want to keep a pack of pre-teens occupied and engaged for the better part of an evening? Hand ’em a case of MREs for dinner. For the record, the beef stew isn’t completely terrible, but stay away from the “strawberry banana dairy shake”; way too sweet.

Upon returning home Sunday, I had a decently productive afternoon, taking care of a whole pile of chores, making a good (but probably a little too spicy) Thai peanut chicken dish, getting a nice long bike ride in (after applying the lessons learned from this book toward getting the drivetrain and gearing dialed in properly), and finally watching the replacement copy of The Hurt Locker from Netflix – good movie, worthy of the accolades it received.

My head’s honestly somewhere else, so I’m going to leave the commentary to a minimum.

Hopefully the camping trip this weekend will make some things clearer.

1. “Knife going in” – Tegan and Sara
2. “A Little Bit Lonesome” – Kasey Chambers
3. “Androgynous” – The Replacements
4. “Jonas & Ezekial” – Indigo Girls
5. “Brick By Brick (live)” – Katy Perry
6. “Money For Nothing” – Dire Straits
7. “Life and How To Live It” – R.E.M.
8. “Crocodile Smile” – Innocent Nixon
9. “Windowsill” – Arcade Fire
10. “The Letter” – The Clarks

Carrie Vaughn wins an internet from me for her post calling attention to how women are so reluctant, due to social pressures or the patriarchy or whatever other influences, to simply accept compliments or declare their inherent worth or ability without qualifying it, and how this is really a very harmful thing.

As a father of daughters, this is exactly the kind of thing we ought to be calling attention to.

The general trending topic she points to specifically addresses women, who really do feel a lot more pressure to qualify their worth when they receive a compliment than men do; it’s just the unfortunate way the world works (although there are a lot of great people out there doing their part to change that in large and small ways every day).

Also, without diminishing in any way the experience of the women this movement is describing, I can say that I think this message does, at least for some of us, does apply across gender lines. Somewhere in my formative years, I, the burly white man of privilege, absorbed the same lesson – that acknoweldging one’s own abilities, embracing one’s awesomeness, as it’s described, is unseemly and frowned upon. I’ve struggled with this for years; I can’t accept a compliment without cancelling it out by pointing out a flaw I also posess; it’s a reflex, and it’s a damned tough one to overcome.

To illustrate this point; I’m going to quote a piece from the lj piece I linked to above; they’re the words of the author, but it could honestly be pulled out of my head any given day of the week; showing exactly how often we do this to ourselves:

I am Karen Healey and I am awesome. Today I helped out friends who needed help with moving even though I left before a lot of my friends and I feel bad about being so lazy. I came home and made a cake with a fantastic rum-chocolate ganache but the cake itself was pretty dry and I should have paid more attention to the recipe, I’m an idiot. I then sat on the couch and read a book instead of doing all the work I have lined up. I am very proud of my reading skills. They are excellent, and so am I when I am not lazy, dumb, prejudiced, boring, offensive, and scatty.

That’s just one paragraph…as much as I’m a fan of self-deprecating humor, I like the way the marked up version reads better.

So, to reiterate – we (especially women who are under serious social pressure not to) should take opportunities to embrace our awesomeness, to celebrate our worth and our talent and our efforts, without qualification. It’s good for us, and we really ought to be good to ourselves more often.

Usually, when I’m present at a ball game, those in attendance are treated to a pitcher’s duel; many strike-outs, the occasional pop fly, three up, three down, rinse, repeat.

Last Night at Nationals Park was, thankfully, a little different than the norm.

Last season, I went to six games, and was present for one home run, and for that, I had my back turned. Last night, I saw four, three from the Nats, including a big one from Adam Dunn into an upper deck (too bad it wasn’t mine), as well as an amazing diving catch from Roger Bernadina:

And miracle of miracles, the Nats even won, beating the Atlanta Braves 6-3.

All in all, a great game, and an excellent evening out.

Happy Star Wars Day

I really wish I could write as well as Slacktivist.

Only this year, you’re covered if the man with the tan shar-pei is hearing-impaired:

Happy First of May, everybody!

I really don’t have much comment – the little stuff I usually put here has been creeping into the blog proper this week. It’s been a week.

My biggest complaint is that the Hurt Locker Blu-Ray netflix sent apparently doesn’t play in my PS3; not sure if it’s a mastering issue or that little sticker thing they put on the hub unbalancing it; could be firmware or BD Live connection thing…

Ah, the pleasures of a developing format. I do know, however, it’s annoying: I was looking forward to watching that this weekend. Maybe I’ll try a few things before I send it back.

1. “Paradise City” – Guns N’ Roses
2. “Our American Cousin” – Molly Lewis
3. “Never Say Never” – Earth To Bob
4. “One of the Boys” – Katy Perry
5. “Still Feeling Blue” – Kasey Chambers
6. “Big Jack” – AC/DC
7. “Lay It Down Clown” – The Replacements
8. “Calling All Angels (live)” – The Wailin’ Jennys
9. “Come on Up to the House” – Sarah Jarosz
10. “Born Too Late” – The Clarks

Oh, and don’t forget like I almost did – Tomorrow is Free Comic Book Day!

One of the more interesting things swirling in the wake of the Iron Man 2 pre-release hype is the resurgence of rumors regarding the Del Toro/Gaiman Doctor Strange film collaboration. Also, while I haven’t been able to source it anywhere besides some AICN commenters, there are rumblings about this being a full-on Defenders film, with the aim of pulling the more mystical/paranormal elements of Marvel comics into the film universe.

For the record, all they have to do is tell me where the screening is, and I’ll be there. I have a serious soft-spot for Marvel third-stringers who peaked in the 70s; I’d love to see Strange and some version of the Defenders on screen. I’m sure it won’t be as delightfully weird as the 70s comics, but with Del Toro at the helm, one never knows.

I doubt we’ll see The Elf with A Gun, but you can’t do a Stephen Strange movie without showing us this place:

I’d really love these rumors to be true…

__________________

I had another nice bike ride yesterday afternoon; turns out I’m in better shape than I thought, but I still have a long way to go. The gearing on all our bikes could probably use a tune-up. I’m hoping to find a decent bike shop within spitting distance, not that I won’t be out hunting for a book covering basic maintenance in the next week or so.

Arizona is really too pretty a place to be this wrong.

Between the immigration law, Sherriff Joe, closing state parks, and the whole MLK day thing way back when, I kind of feel bad, because I really liked Flagstaff and points north.

Really, nobody in this country should hear “papers please” from anyone, unless it’s delivered in a cheezy german accent in an old movie.