I took a personal day yesterday, because the boys had several special things to do that day. I got the boys breakfast, made their lunches, took B1 to a class picture photo shoot, dropped him off to class, then walked B2 down to the grocery store, got groceries. I then took him to his gymnastics final (which was very cute -- he was delighted to have me in the audience, kept waving and saying "Daddy! Hi, Daddy!" and telling his friends in the class "That's my Daddy. His name is [says my name, very emphatically].") Calling it "gymnastics" is probably a stretch at his age -- it's just things like somersaults and skipping, etc. Then I dropped him off at preschool, then had a few minutes to myself for some lunch. I then biked up to B1's school, because they were having a special school spirit parade parents get to walk in, and I took pix of that and walked with B1, until I had to leave and bike back down to B2's preschool and pick him up. Then I took B2 back to the apartment, stowed my bike, and he and I hung out a bit, I gave him a snack, and he and I trekked back to B1's school to pick him up. I use the stroller for the treks to B1's school, just because it's a long way to go for B2's little 4-year-old legs, and he conked out in the stroller. Then we walked down to a salon and I got B1's hair cut, a nice short cut for the summer. Then we went to the grocery store for some ice cream sandwiches and popsicles -- by request of the boys, since is was super-humid and summery, and then home (at last), where I cooked pizza for dinner (Exene brought pizza home), and THEN off to B2's preschool performance show, and then had the boys play in the park a bit to (literally) run off steam. Then home, finally. Whew.
I made like seven trips to B1's school -- I think I logged a little over six miles of foot traffic yesterday! My thighs are a little sore. I was particularly pleased with the bike bit, since I was sweating how I'd get to go with B1 on his parade, and yet cover the distance to get B2, when the bike solution came to me.
My boys are such daddy's boys. It's so apparent. At the evening performance, B2 kept waving to me, saying "Daddy! Hi, Daddy! That's my daddy!" And then he'd remember that Exene was there for that, and would tack on a "Hi, Mommy." and wave to her, and then "Hi, [B1]!" for his brother.
B2 amused me -- like the consummate performer he is, he actually gets a bit of performance anxiety before a gig. For example, before going to his gymnastics, he's like "Daddy! How do I do a somersault? I don't know how!" (he actually does know) I showed him a couple, walked him through'em, and before going to the evening performance, he said "How do you sing? I don't know how to sing!" But he totally does, he sings all the time. So, I made up a song and sang it to him, explaining how to sing with the lyrics. He's very much of a sing-a-long type, so that helped. It did amuse me, however, him getting the lil' jitters or something.
Today I'm taking B1 to his soccer match, with B2 coming along for the ride. I think Exene has a race she's running today, or the usual "Mom In Absentia" kind of stuff she pulls. For somebody who insists on shared/joint custody, I just don't see how she's going to be able to handle it -- like all the stuff I did yesterday, she'd have whined and complained about having to do that, and wouldn't have tacked on grocery-shopping or the hair cut in the mix. Guaranteed.
B2 complimented his brother about something (oh, that reminds me -- it was cute -- B2 saw one of his classmate's shirts at preschool and said "I LIKE that shirt, [Classmate]" -- I loved that he noticed that. He's my lil' fashionista! Anyway, B2 complimented his brother, and B1 was like "Yeah." and Exene said "When someone says something nice to you, or does something nice for you, you should thank them for it." And B1 just watched the show he was watching, didn't react. I said "Wow, he's just like you or your dad. It's been passed down. From him, to you, to [B1]." And Exene said "More like from my grandma, to my dad, to me, to [B1]." And I thought "Ah, four generations of taciturn Teutonic ingratitude." Her grandma was a complete hardass. Seriously. A hard, hard woman. I'm sure Exene picked a lot of that up, honestly. This was a grandma who Exene told me would use an ice cream scoop to pick up dogshit, and then later, Exene saw her using the same scoop to serve her grandchildren ice cream. I'm sure she cleaned it (she was a nurse, after all), but still, Exene commented that she'd not eat the ice cream, and didn't tell her siblings about it until after they ate their ice cream. Now, the visceral reaction to that is "What kind of grandma would DO that to her grandchildren?" and, having met the woman a few times over the years, I can say, without hesitation, that she is exactly the type of grandma who would do that. A hard, hard woman. And Exene most definitely has that, although even she'd not pull Scoopgate on kids, let alone grandkids.
Thankfully, B1's Teutonic lineage is strongly offset by my Celtic ebullience. It sweetens the Sudeten sourness!
Saturday, June 5, 2010
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Y-Town in the news
NPR's "All Things Considered" had a piece on Youngstown tonight.
Also, there's this...
http://www.inc.com/magazine/20100501/semper-youngstown.html
Also, there's this...
http://www.inc.com/magazine/20100501/semper-youngstown.html
Recipe: Rum Cake
I made coconut rum cake last night. Yummers!
Rum Cake
Preheat oven to 325 F
1 yellow or white cake mix
1 container of vanilla pudding
4 eggs
.5 cup cold milk
.5 cup rum
1 cup pecans or walnuts, chopped
Mix cake ingredients (except for the nuts -- pour the nuts into the bottom of either a bundt cake pan or a tube pan). Pour the batter into the pan, over the nuts. Cook for ~1 hour (Obviously a bit less if your oven runs hot). Remove when done and let the cake cool a bit.
For the glaze:
1 stick of butter
.25 cup water
1 cup of sugar
.5 cup rum (or up to 1 cup , to taste)
In a saucepan, melt the butter. When that's melted, add the water and the sugar, and boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat, stir in the rum. Then you pour the glaze on the cake as it sits in the pan.
Once it soaks up the glaze, then carefully remove the cake, and voila!
Rum Cake
Preheat oven to 325 F
1 yellow or white cake mix
1 container of vanilla pudding
4 eggs
.5 cup cold milk
.5 cup rum
1 cup pecans or walnuts, chopped
Mix cake ingredients (except for the nuts -- pour the nuts into the bottom of either a bundt cake pan or a tube pan). Pour the batter into the pan, over the nuts. Cook for ~1 hour (Obviously a bit less if your oven runs hot). Remove when done and let the cake cool a bit.
For the glaze:
1 stick of butter
.25 cup water
1 cup of sugar
.5 cup rum (or up to 1 cup , to taste)
In a saucepan, melt the butter. When that's melted, add the water and the sugar, and boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat, stir in the rum. Then you pour the glaze on the cake as it sits in the pan.
Once it soaks up the glaze, then carefully remove the cake, and voila!
Heh
I just wrote perhaps my most sarcastic comment on SALON, ever. It's the first comment in the article "My Baby Is Too Boring To Blog About." I'd link to it, but SALON seems to be bogging, or my computer's bogging. Not sure which. Anyway, it had to be said!
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Wow
I'm listening to NPR's "Fresh Air" at the moment, and Samantha Bee (from "The Daily Show") is being interviewed, and listening to her, what she was saying, I thought "I bet she's a Scorpio." I could just tell. And you know what? She is. October 25, 1969. I just looked her up. Now I can even spot Scorpios without seeing them! I didn't even have to see a picture of her. I knew.
Oh, and a thing I always notice about Scorpios: they routinely cross their arms like that.
Serial Killers, American Style
Isn't it weird that most serial killers are American? Like if you look at serial killing around the world, the vast majority of them occur in the US. There are serial killers everywhere, but they are most common in this country, with the UK having the next-largest number. What is it about American and British life that lends itself to serial killing? What socio-cultural conditions exist that make this so? I have no answer; I'm just wondering. Are Americans just that much more violent than their peers in other countries? Are we more isolated and anomic? I would chalk it up to size of country and/or media, but we have far more serial killers than, say, Russia. What is it about American (and British -- since we have to remember that our cultural roots are British) culture that fosters this? Is it sexual repression? Cultures of violence? As countries adopt an American or British socio-economic model, does serial killing grow there? Is it perhaps tied to our mass media?
I scrolled down the lists of killers by country, and it appears that more Westernized/Americanized a country was, the more serial killers it had. Many Americans like to suck their own dicks about our cultural hegemony, how great and wonderful Western Civilization(tm) is (and how uniquely exceptional and virtuous American culture is), and yet, it has this shadow creeping in its wake, in the form of the serial killer, as well.
I scrolled down the lists of killers by country, and it appears that more Westernized/Americanized a country was, the more serial killers it had. Many Americans like to suck their own dicks about our cultural hegemony, how great and wonderful Western Civilization(tm) is (and how uniquely exceptional and virtuous American culture is), and yet, it has this shadow creeping in its wake, in the form of the serial killer, as well.
Gnash gnash
This makes me gnash my teeth and stomp my hooves. Of course, the guy's pedigree (Iowa Workshop AND Harvard) no doubt helps, it still is killing me. Especially the reference about publishers scooping up paranormal tales -- which publishers?! AAAAUGH!
*GNASH*
*GNASH*
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Gored?
I don't wish'em any ill will, really (except Tipper's record labeling thing was really annoying). Al would've been impeached if 9/11 had happened on his watch -- seriously, if Monicagate was impeachable for Bill Clinton, then 9/11 would've had the Republicans howling for Gore's blood, if it had happened to him (yes, quite the opposite stance of their whole "Let's put politics aside" charades in the wake of 9/11). He was probably better served as a presidential also-ran (or a "Hey, I actually won, but the fucking opposition actually stole the motherfucking election") than actually being a president.
The pictures at left amuse me -- photobooth pix are fun! I regret not having done nearly enough of'em! Something I'll have to remedy in the future!
Farming the Sun and Wind
As I watch that blight in the Gulf grow and grow and grow, this symbol of death and insanity and the lack of a coherent energy policy in our country (sorry, 'Baggers, but "Drill Baby Drill" doesn't count as a coherent energy policy), I find my mind drifts toward our country's farm subsidy program (quote Wikipedia)...
$20 billion a year. What if, instead of subsidizing farmers not to grow various crops, or to grow others, what if that farm subsidy money was used to encourage the creation of wind and solar farms? We always hear about the decline of family farms and what-not, and the reality of American energy independence is something that's been in dire need of being addressed for the past 40 years, so, I'm thinking of a reform to the farm subsidy program to have them develop actual alternative energy sources (wind and solar -- FUCK ethanol. Let me repeat that: FUCK ethanol).
Benefits: 1) help move American energy policy into the 21st century; 2) help with climate change; 3) help our country attain energy independence; 4) help the farms produce something of value (instead of being paid either to NOT grow things and/or to grow unnecessary things); 5) decentralize our country's energy grid, giving more power (literally and figuratively) to the local level (and making our energy infrastructure resistant to terrorist attacks); 6) contribute to rapid investment in and advancement of alternative energy in this country.
Try as I might, I just can't see anything wrong with this, EXCEPT that it steps on the toes of the fossil fuel industry, AND it would decentralize our energy grid.
The disaster in the Gulf qualifies as actual eco-terrorism, although it won't be seen as such, but the damage it'll do is worse than what happened on 9/11, hate to say it. More people will be impacted, more lives ruined, on and on and on. It's a clarion call (or should be) that our country absolutely must develop a proper alternative energy infrastructure. I've heard estimates that it's a $1 trillion market just waiting to be tapped -- and yet, it's always kept off the table. The technology is here, the need is here, the national will for change is even there. Win, win, win.
Must be why it's not being done.
The United States currently pays around $20 billion per year to farmers in direct subsidies as "farm income stabilization"[10][11][12] via U.S. farm bills. These bills date back to the economic turmoil of the Great Depression with 1922 Grain Futures Act, the 1929 Agricultural Marketing Act and the 1933 Agricultural Adjustment Act creating a tradition of government support.
The beneficiaries of the subsidies have changed as agriculture in the United States has changed. In the 1930s, about 25% of the country's population resided on the nation's 6,000,000 small farms. By 1997, 157,000 large farms accounted for 72% of farm sales, with only 2% of the U.S. population residing on farms. In 2006, the top 3 states receiving subsidies were Texas (10.4%), Iowa (9.0%), and Illinois (7.6%). The Total USDA Subsidies from farms in Iowa totaled $1,212,000,000 in 2006.[13] From 2003 to 2005 the top 1% of beneficiaries received 17% of subsidy payments.[13] In Texas, 72% of farms do not receive government subsidies. Of the close to $1.4 Billion in subsidy payments to farms in Texas, roughly 18% of the farms receive a portion of the payments.[14]
"Direct payment subsidies are provided without regard to the economic need of the recipients or the financial condition of the farm economy. Established in 1996, direct payments were originally meant to wean farmers off traditional subsidies that are triggered during periods of low prices for corn, wheat, soybeans, cotton, rice, and other crops." [15]
Top states for direct payments were Iowa ($501 million), Illinois ($454 million), and Texas ($397 million). Direct payments of subsidies are limited to $40,000 per person or $80,000 per couple.[16]
The subsidy programs give farmers extra money for their crops and guarantee a price floor. For instance in the 2002 Farm Bill, for every bushel of wheat sold farmers were paid an extra 52 cents and guaranteed a price of 3.86 from 2002–03 and 3.92 from 2004–2007.[17] That is, if the price of wheat in 2002 was 3.80 farmers would get an extra 58 cents per bushel (52 cents plus the $0.06 price difference).
Corn is the top crop for subsidy payments. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 mandates that billions of gallons of ethanol be blended into vehicle fuel each year, guaranteeing demand, but US corn ethanol subsidies are between $5.5 billion and $7.3 billion per year. Producers also benefit from a federal subsidy of 51 cents per gallon, additional state subsidies and, federal crop subsidies that can bring the total to 85 cents per gallon or more.[18] (US corn-ethanol producers are also shielded from competition from cheaper Brazilian sugarcane-ethanol by a 54-cent-per-gallon tariff[19][20])
$20 billion a year. What if, instead of subsidizing farmers not to grow various crops, or to grow others, what if that farm subsidy money was used to encourage the creation of wind and solar farms? We always hear about the decline of family farms and what-not, and the reality of American energy independence is something that's been in dire need of being addressed for the past 40 years, so, I'm thinking of a reform to the farm subsidy program to have them develop actual alternative energy sources (wind and solar -- FUCK ethanol. Let me repeat that: FUCK ethanol).
Benefits: 1) help move American energy policy into the 21st century; 2) help with climate change; 3) help our country attain energy independence; 4) help the farms produce something of value (instead of being paid either to NOT grow things and/or to grow unnecessary things); 5) decentralize our country's energy grid, giving more power (literally and figuratively) to the local level (and making our energy infrastructure resistant to terrorist attacks); 6) contribute to rapid investment in and advancement of alternative energy in this country.
Try as I might, I just can't see anything wrong with this, EXCEPT that it steps on the toes of the fossil fuel industry, AND it would decentralize our energy grid.
The disaster in the Gulf qualifies as actual eco-terrorism, although it won't be seen as such, but the damage it'll do is worse than what happened on 9/11, hate to say it. More people will be impacted, more lives ruined, on and on and on. It's a clarion call (or should be) that our country absolutely must develop a proper alternative energy infrastructure. I've heard estimates that it's a $1 trillion market just waiting to be tapped -- and yet, it's always kept off the table. The technology is here, the need is here, the national will for change is even there. Win, win, win.
Must be why it's not being done.
Sleepy
I'm sleepy. Woke up too early. *yawn*
Up too late watching the hockey game. I dreamed about being at a bar, thirsty, and everything I drank didn't help. I had trouble ordering -- my brain was unable to articulate "PBR" so I muttered "Newcastle" in my dream, and even that didn't help.
So I woke up around 4ish and then got some water. It was very foggy outside. I didn't take any pictures of it.
B1 has two more soccer games left and then he's done. Maybe two more weeks of school, and he's done with that, too.
I took the boys to the zoo yesterday. They had a great time there, and it wasn't too crowded, as it had stormed most of the day, and so the usual Memorial Day crowds were comparatively slight, which made it more fun for the boys, in terms of getting to see the exhibits without dealing with lots of foot traffic, etc.
Up too late watching the hockey game. I dreamed about being at a bar, thirsty, and everything I drank didn't help. I had trouble ordering -- my brain was unable to articulate "PBR" so I muttered "Newcastle" in my dream, and even that didn't help.
So I woke up around 4ish and then got some water. It was very foggy outside. I didn't take any pictures of it.
B1 has two more soccer games left and then he's done. Maybe two more weeks of school, and he's done with that, too.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Passive Voice
This phrasing bugs me...
Because, clearly, the man was behind the wheel of this vehicle, and was, therefore, ostensibly in control of it. It's the usual "you're allowed to run people over if you're too old to be driving" thing that always happens.
Headline rewrite: Ohio vet strikes paradegoers when he loses control of his vehicle
First paragraph rewrite: Police in Ohio say a World War II veteran in a car lost control of his vehicle, went off the road, and struck five people lined up for a Memorial Day parade.
The original, by keeping it passive voice, it eliminates agency. And people might say "Oh, give the poor 84-year-old a break." And I'd say: 1) He shouldn't be driving anywhere at 84 years of age, least of all at a parade; and 2) five people got injured by this -- what about them?
The double standard with oldsters behind the wheel is dangerous to them, and to the people around them. Camouflaging it with passive voice doesn't do anybody any favors. Passive voice is used all the time in the news to spin things this way or that.
Ohio vet's car strikes people lined up for parade
By Associated Press
Police in Ohio say a car driven by a World War II veteran went off the road and struck five people lined up for a Memorial Day parade.
Authorities say 84-year-old Everett Cole's vehicle rolled over and hit a tree in front of a house in West Chester, about 15 miles north of Cincinnati.
Cole was conscious and talked with emergency personnel as they extracted him from the car. There was no immediate word on the extent of any injuries to him or others.
Because, clearly, the man was behind the wheel of this vehicle, and was, therefore, ostensibly in control of it. It's the usual "you're allowed to run people over if you're too old to be driving" thing that always happens.
Headline rewrite: Ohio vet strikes paradegoers when he loses control of his vehicle
First paragraph rewrite: Police in Ohio say a World War II veteran in a car lost control of his vehicle, went off the road, and struck five people lined up for a Memorial Day parade.
The original, by keeping it passive voice, it eliminates agency. And people might say "Oh, give the poor 84-year-old a break." And I'd say: 1) He shouldn't be driving anywhere at 84 years of age, least of all at a parade; and 2) five people got injured by this -- what about them?
The double standard with oldsters behind the wheel is dangerous to them, and to the people around them. Camouflaging it with passive voice doesn't do anybody any favors. Passive voice is used all the time in the news to spin things this way or that.
Rainy
Doesn't it always rain on Memorial Day? It sure seems to. We have storms here today.
Nothing fancy going on; just working on the screenplay, minding the boys, gonna watch the Blackhawks game tonight, gear up for the workweek.
The boys amuse me -- they conceived of "Daddy Club" -- basically getting to do stuff with me. If one of them does something that bothers the other one, they say "Now you're gonna have to be in Mommy Club." Which prompts Exene to say "Hey, what's wrong with that?" They know. Daddy Club is much more fun, at least to my boys.
I guess I won't stay on; it's thundery today.
Nothing fancy going on; just working on the screenplay, minding the boys, gonna watch the Blackhawks game tonight, gear up for the workweek.
The boys amuse me -- they conceived of "Daddy Club" -- basically getting to do stuff with me. If one of them does something that bothers the other one, they say "Now you're gonna have to be in Mommy Club." Which prompts Exene to say "Hey, what's wrong with that?" They know. Daddy Club is much more fun, at least to my boys.
I guess I won't stay on; it's thundery today.
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