Monday, January 24, 2011

Two things

Over winter break I finally had time to build the second of three cheap book shelves I bought months and months ago. It was tall and white and I put it in our boys' room, the last one was black and didn't match the room's color scheme. The boys have been happy to have their books, comics and trading cards back in their room rather than in the attic where they aren't really allowed to go into.
My kindergartner said he wanted to paint the book shelf. Knowing full well that I was not going to let him do this I asked what color he wanted to paint it, he said, "Clear!"
I let him know that you can't make non-clear items clear with paint.

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We got back late from a family birthday party last night and missed the first few minutes of the Jets game. My boys wanted to watch the game but I sent them to bed during half-time and told them that if the Jets come back you can watch the DVR of the game, if not they save themselves the grief of watching their team lose.

During the third quarter I got up a few times to go to the kitchen to make food and get drinks. I was pretty much sedentary for the fourth quarter. After they lost I felt a bit bummed and thought, "I am not going to watch the Steelers celebrate," and turned the channel, then to my surprise my 8 year-old popped up from under a TV tray standing the far side of the couch that I was sitting on and yells, "I hate the Steelers!" I asked how long have you been there? "Uh," okay how many Jets touchdowns did you see? "Two." So he snuck down the stairs when I went to the kitchen and hid for at least a half an hour about six feet away from me.


......... kitchen
-
--
---
---- ......... TV
^ stairs
couch-> [_me_______] him

If we were not both so bummed about the outcome of the game he would have gotten in trouble for sneaking out of bed and staying up late.

Jan. 24th, excerpt from "Laughter," by Deng Ming-Dao

"... We are too often in a rush for our children to grow up. It is far better for them to fully live each year of their lives. Let them learn what is appropriate to their time, let them play. And when their childhood is spent at adolescence, help them in a gentle transition. Then their laughter will continue to resonate with cheer and hope for us all."

Sunday, January 02, 2011

Holiday Issues

Our hamster died at one year and 11 months, just shy of the normal hamster life span, which was good considering she had cancer since being one month old. She had been slowing down for a month and two weeks ago it did not look like she was going to make it through Xmas. She bounced back the past week to the point we thought that she had gotten better, but it was just that last burst of energy that we often get right before giving birth or dying.

With the giant snow storms that hit our area I had lots of snow to shovel, then the next day I built my kids an igloo with entailed a bunch more shoveling, then since I did not want to go snowboarding I agreed to my wife's B plan of tubing, the next day we spent the whole day shopping so tons of walking and carrying big boxes, this all lead to my back going out at a restaurant. We got home to see our hamster dead which lead to the kids climbing all over us because they were upset, which lead to them sleeping in our bed, neither or which was good for my back.

We also went out to lunch with my parents who we have not seen in more than six months due to a some major family issues, though everything went fine the lead up did add stress to the week.

So like many breaks this one ends with me accomplishing less than half of things I thought I would at its onset.

Me, Petty, No?

I had two conversations over new year's eve where separate friends debated little factoids I brought up as being incorrect. Now neither one is of any ground shaking importance, one is about the history of the town we all live in, the other about a soccer tactic used in a recent match. As a residue of growing up rather shy I usually don't make statements that I am not sure of outside of speaking with my immediate family, therefore I am usually sure of my statements.

So I politely let my doubters know that I stood by my statements and that I could back them up with documentation, which still didn't convince them. So big deal right, well my issue is not with them it is with my desire to send them web links to prove that I was not speaking out of my ass. As I write this I realize my problem is that I hate when people go on about shit they know nothing about, or stand strong on points where they can easily be proved wrong, so for someone to think that about me places me in a zone of discomfort. This has to do with me not allowing myself the freedom to be wrong. I understand that I am frequently wrong across many subjects, but I apparently can not deal with others thinking I am wrong when I am not.

So my desire to email friends links proving that I was not talking out of my ass is petty, no?