20Nov / 2009

Of two minds

Scared the daylights out of Gamma this morning. She likes to hide around the wardrobe in the entry way and jump out when I walk past, and today she got a taste of her own medicine. The interesting aspect of her reaction was that instead of a huge shock followed by a tapering-off to sort of, whew, heh, got me, her fright reaction kept getting worse, as if her adrenal gland had gotten stuck in the ‘on’ position and was pumping more and more adrenalin into her system. She was a little surprised at the start, and after a couple seconds was totally terrified.

Part of me felt really bad to have frightened her so badly, and part of me didn’t.

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02Sep / 2009

5 More Things Not to Let the Kids Bring into the Car

Recalling my goal of landing some free-lance writing work I have decided to get in a little practice doing some more serious (or at least more commercial) writing here and learning from your comments. Pam mentioned this article in a recent tweet. Apparently some guy wrote it and Wired bought it. I found the article humorous yet incomplete. Only five things? I could think of at least five more. Then it occurred to me, in view of the above-mentioned, that I could always write my list and post it here.

So here it is: Five More Things Not to Let the Kids Bring into the Car

snspecial1 1. A Saturday Night Special

Not the band, and not the gun.

Especially not the gun. A Saturday night special is dangerous only at close range. Inaccurate at any distance greater than five feet, it is useless in a road rage situation, and eventually the kids will get the drop on you and you’ll end up driving to the mall everytime you get in the car. Or wherever it is kids like to drive to nowadays.

bape1 2. A Barbary ape

YOU DO NOT WANT A BARBARA APE IN YOUR CAR UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES! NOT EVEN ONE!

THEY ARE NOT CUTE AND THEY ARE NOT FUNNY!

BARBARY APES ARE THE ASSWIPES OF THE ANIMAL KINGDOM!! DON’T LET ANY INTO YOUR CAR, NOT EVEN ONE!

amatter1 3. Antimatter

Everyone wants to get their kids interested in science, and to support this interest wherever they can. Antimatter, however, has no place in traffic.

According to the current Wikipedia article on antimatter, “… mixing matter and antimatter would lead to the annihilation of both in the same way that mixing antiparticles and particles does, thus giving rise to high-energy photons (gamma rays) or other particle–antiparticle pairs.”

Few things are more distracting when driving than high-energy photons.

wnest1 4. A nest of wasps

We all know how distracting (and dangerous!) a single wasp can be. Well, imagine having an entire nest of wasps in your car!

Barbary apes are nothing next to a nest of wasps.

If you had a nest of wasps in your car, you’d be wishing for a Barbary ape instead.

Or a Saturday night special.

Or even antimatter, depending on the amount.

wshatner1 5. William Shatner

William Shatner’s rendition of the Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” is epic, I just heard it on the radio. I was going to include a link here, but just do a search, I don’t know what is legal anymore and what isn’t.

Likewise, his readings of Sarah Palin’s beat poetry were also genius.

At first. But, you know. We get it, Mr. Shatner.

Can you imagine trying to drive while he’s reading Sarah Palin’s Facebook status updates or something?

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16Jul / 2009

Ljubljana etc etc

My trip to Ljubljana last weekend was a lot less confusing than my previous trip five years ago because they have the Euro now. Otherwise I noticed few changes. They still like rollerblades there. The women are still charming and beautiful, the men are still long-legged and tall with smallish heads (i.e. exactly wrong place for me to buy clothes), all are well-dressed. I don’t know if all of Slovenia is like this or only the capital city, but they’re good dressers. The Viennese looked, upon my return, like cheap slobs.

Present company excepted, of course.

A couple days ago I wore my new suit. It differs from my old suits in several aspects. One, it is new and they are old. Two, it is not black. Three, it fits. I… sometimes you just reach the point where you say, you know, fuck it and buy clothes that fit and not that are the size you want to be to motivate you to get to that size. Boy, it was comfortable not feeling like a bumble bee squeezed into a wasp outfit.

Looking back on your life, it is like badly-made Swiss cheese, I was thinking just now, out strolling around the neighborhood. Mostly solid cheese, with a few giant holes in it so when you slice it to make a sandwich, you’re all, WTF is with this big hole?

And the ham is looking through, and the structural integrity of the sandwich is compromised, and a thick layer of mayonnaise and mustard is trapped in the hole, unless you fill it with a slice of pickle or tomato.

Also: my tortoise escaped. We’re going to hang posters around the neighborhood. We’re more concerned and upset than I had expected. The fact that it escaped was not exactly surprising – it’s been trying to tunnel out for the past five years – but it’s still a shock to see that it has gone over the wall.

Also: the kids are in the United States now. Hi, kids. Hope all is well.

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Metamorphosism

Tag Archives: kids

Of two minds

Ljubljana etc etc