I swear to jeebus, it’s a good thing so many geeks still live with
their parents, and the rest of them made brazillians in the dot com
boom, because these game systems are getting stupid expensive.
parked under the sunsphere
The kids are on Spring Break this week. Anne and Ryan are up in HellaNorCal, checking out colleges, and Nolan and I are hanging out with the dogs until they get back.
It’s been a really fun week so far: lots of Magic: The Gathering, Brawl tournaments, The Los Angeles Dodgers of Los Angeles on TV, and walks with the dogs around the neighborhood when it isn’t raining.
I’ve also introduced him to Lost, and I have the feeling that he’ll run through Season One on DVD in five days, just like I did. Hopefully, he won’t become as hopelessly just-jam-it-into-my-veins addicted to the show as I am (I’m only up to Episode 4 of Season Two, so if you’re going to comment, please don’t post any spoilers, okay? I reserve a special type of wrath for that sort of thing) but I managed to hook him on Battlestar Galactica this way, and I apologize for nothing. Nothing!!1one!
Sorry. I got a little carried away there.
So.
I’ve always felt that, as a parent, my job (and greatest hope) is to help my kids grow into the kind of adult that I’d be proud of, and I’d like to spend time with, even if we weren’t family: honest, honorable, generous, compassionate, and responsible. Sometimes, as part of the whole Pod People experience, I feel like those efforts are failing. Add the bonus of the really great and neverending loyalty conflict game (that I refuse to play, but have to deal with, anyway,) and it’s easy to wonder if any of the work will ever pay off. It’s been easy to lose hope.
But over the last couple of months, I’ve come to believe that the Pods were actually Chrysalises, because it feels like both Ryan and Nolan have emerged as young adults whose company I really enjoy (and I believe the feeling is mutual.) The moments of irrationality are still there, and I’m sure that I am still so lame from time to time, but I have lots and lots of hope.
If you’re a parent dealing with a Pod Person, don’t give up. One day, you may wake to discover that your Pod Person has vanished as quickly as it arrived, leaving behind an honest, honorable, generous, compassionate, and responsible young adult.
Technorati Tags: parenting
some cinderella kid
I ended up watching a few minutes of VH1 Classic before I fell asleep last night, and, uh, i kind of watched this crazy old video of Kenny Loggins.
It was totally rad, with the whites blowing out and the occasional old VHS noise, and the slightly greenish skin tones. He was playing an outdoor concert which was just filled with girls in tube tops and guys with horrible Kenny Loggins-esque beards, and the whole thing looked pretty stinky and coked-out. If that wasn’t enough evidence that it was the early 80s, he was playing I’m Alright, from Caddyshack, which is one of my guilty pleasure tunes (I didn’t realize until last night that it contains the lyric "No, no, cannonball it right away.")
So far, we’re okay, but you may want to prepare to throw up in your mouth a little bit: he was wearing white ankle-high boots, a huge, puffy red jumpsuit with a novelty-sized belt around his waist, the obligatory rock-n-roll mullet, and seriously rocking out with his bad self while strumming an acoustic guitar.
Maybe I’m uptight, maybe I just don’t understand the rock like I think I do, but when he ran around the stage during a guitar solo (which he wasn’t playing; he had his 12-string a-strummin’) and jumped up on a raised platform so he could kick an amp off the stage, I didn’t think, "Oh man, that guy is a hardcore rockstar!" as much as I thought, "Uh, what the hell was that all about?"
I changed the channel when the Top Gun song started. There was no way I could endure shots of L. Ron Cruise after that.
the mystery hotel
Shane posted this picture of a mystery hotel in his blog over the weekend, and I suggested to him that it would be cool to have writers post short stories that it inspires.
I’ll be honest: I’m terrified right now, before I hit publish and send this out into the wild. I’m not the best in the world at brevity, and whenever I attempt fiction, I feel incredibly self conscious.
I also made the mistake of reading Otis’ story after I wrote mine, and I feel (like I often do when I read Otis’ writing) like a kid who belongs at the card table, pretending to sit down in the dining room with the adults.
So now that I’ve managed to lower your expectations to UPN-like standards, please enjoy. . .
Room 302
by Wil
Farnsworth frowned as he shuffled the photos. He dropped them on his desk and looked over the top of his reading glasses.
"I can’t use any of these, son. I can hardly see the men, and there’s too much whitespace in here." He picked up one photo and pointed at the tin ceiling. Martin recalled how brightly it had reflected the flash, and how the younger man had flinched in the light.
"Mr. Farnsworth –"
"Look, you’re a good kid, and even if your photos aren’t always front page material, you rarely let me down."
"Thank you, sir."
"I know that you have a baby on the way, but I can’t pay you for photos that I can’t use." He leaned back in his chair and folded his hands across his chest. "Hotels don’t stay in one family and celebrate their hundredth anniversary every day, though, so it’s news that I need to run. So why don’t you go back to the hotel, get a closer shot of the Ellisons, and I’ll pay you double for it." Farnsworth smiled, and put the photos into an envelope.
"I’ll see what I can do, sir. Thank you." Martin took the envelope and traded the quiet of Farnsworth’s office for the chaos of the newsroom.
Martin needed the money, and it was important to keep a man like Richard Farnsworth happy. Evelyn was due in two months, and these freelance newspaper jobs were all he had.
But he wasn’t going back into the Ellison, today or ever. There was something very, very wrong there, and Martin felt it in his soul when he walked up the stairs into the second floor lobby. Those men were terrified, and Martin wanted to get out of there before he found out why.
He took the number five bus home, and left the envelope on the seat when he got off. The sooner he could get way from it, the sooner he could begin the long process of wiping that feeling from his memory. He hugged his wife tightly when he walked into their apartment and felt his unborn son stir between them.
Back at the Ellison Hotel, the tenant in 302 woke and rang the front desk. Father and son looked at each other.
It was time to eat.
alive in the weeds
Nolan just called me from school to tell me that he got an 88 on a history test that he was really nervous about even passing.
He was walking down the hallway from one class to the next, and I could hear the sound of his peers swarming around him, in that dull almost-roar that fills high schools between classes before the campus drops back into near silence for 48 minutes.
I told him how proud of him I was, and how happy I was that he took the time to call me and tell me about it.
"I called mom, too," he said, "but now I have to go into class so I gotta go."
"Okay," I said. "I’m really proud of you, Nolan. Have a great weekend at your dad’s. I love you."
"I love you too, Wil." He said. "Bye."
I love it that my 14 year-old told cared enough to call me and share good news about his grades, and told me that he loves me, even though he was surrounded by his peers.