Splinter, Triangle, Pix, Batteries

Just a quiet Sunday night for me -- trucked the boys to Exene's, where they were, as always, reluctant to be. I watched "Splinter" -- an indie horror/monster movie. A nice effort, I have to say, and a nasty monster. Not a perfect story, but it managed to hold onto its tension nicely, despite this. I liked the quiet implications of the monster, without it being made implicit. I think that was a nice move on the part of the filmmakers, and the movie overall was a good effort, although very indie, so small-scale, although well-shot, so you didn't feel it so much. I also watched "Triangle" the day before, which was a UK horror (?) thriller (?) that was perhaps a more intriguing/disturbing movie with a curious plot twist in it that was rife with possibilities. I won't go into it, as it would spoil the movie, but it went into a very odd place, and kept getting more tangled, which compelled me to watch it to get a sense of where it was going. The writer(s) surely had fun with it.

Speaking of having fun, I've mentioned how much I am enjoying my new camera, right? I bought a couple of quads of rechargeable AA batteries, so I can always have the sucker ready to go. The thing uses four AA's at a time, so I went with the rechargeable batteries to keep the batteries out of landfills!

"Herr Schiller! Sie haben eine Möwe auf den Kopf!!"

HMD

Happy Mother's Day to all the good mothers out there, doing their thing. I know our patriarchal culture devalues the hard work you do, but as a hard-working single dad, I get it, I understand. Stay strong!

I bought a new dining room table and chairs for the boys and me. Looks sharp! I also bought a new vase for my clementine sapling, giving it room to grow further.

Peaceful

The other day, I was walking about, had the boys where they needed to be, and it was a lovely, sunny-yet-cloudy day, big puffs of towering clouds breezing through, sun shining, trees budding, and I felt the most wonderful sensation of peace. I had my camera with me, snapped shots as they came to me, and just felt at ease. Weirdly, it's like, post-Exene, at 41 years of age, my true life in Chicago is beginning (despite having lived here since I was 23). There was just this strong sense of rightness and "alrightness" about it. I'm alive, I'm free, I'm healthy. Life is good. I'm more prone to brooding than fretting, anyway, but I was just surprised and pleased by the sense of peace I felt. Things are going to keep getting better for me. I think I was sorely tested the past few years -- a lot came my way at the same time -- and I not only survived all of it, I think I actually emerged better than I was going into it.

I know these shots are, perhaps, kind of foreboding, but they were from that day when I felt such peace, so I'm posting them. The beauty of the sky really did hang brightly over the darkness on the ground, and the contrast heightened the beauty of both.

Trees

I planted some lemon tree seeds with my boys this morning, so my clementine sapling will have some company. B2 insisted on planting a cherry pip, too, although I doubt I can get that to grow. I have a green thumb, but we'll see how it goes. The lemon trees should grow fine. The boys were fascinated by the process, which is cute. I love when kids get all absorbed in stuff like that. And if the seeds sprout, so much the better.

Horoscopic

The ONION's horoscopes always crack me up. Several of these had me laughing out loud...

Aries Sleep will elude you as you wrestle all night with existential questions of mortality and meaning as well as a couple of random wrestlers.

Taurus You'll start to think the people who want you to choose between hugs and drugs have set up a false dichotomy after discovering you can actually have both at once.

Gemini Remember, only you can give yourself permission to be happy, although the people in charge of giving you permission to use the bathroom may have something to say about that.

Cancer You had no idea the love life of the nuthatch was so vigorous, so obsessive, and so likely to result in the death of people like yourself who just like to watch birds do it.

Leo You hate the phrase "We're through the looking glass here, people," but you'll have to use it anyway this week when you and a bunch of people go through a looking glass.

Virgo The stars hate to be the ones to tell you, but the problem with you is certainly not that you love too much.

Libra People will say you've hit a new low even for you, which is depressing, as they clearly haven't been paying attention to a thing you've done.

Scorpio You'll score a bunch of great stereo equipment and furniture from your neighbors, who happen to die when you go into their house and stab them and take all their things.

Sagittarius You'll finally give in to a persistent coworker's desire to, as he puts it, "spread you wide open, throw your feet up on the mantel, and really go to town," but to your great dismay there seems to be sex involved.

Capricorn You knew that moving to the suburbs would expose you to a whole new kind of culture shock, but you had no idea there were people who didn't get drunk to mow the lawn.

Aquarius Romance will bloom in your sign this week, coating everything with a thin layer of pollen and making a mess before germinating into the overripe and rotten fruit of routine.

Pisces There will be no major changes in your life this week, which given the fires and barracudas, is pretty terrible news.

Rearrangement

I rearranged the boys' room today, with the "help" of B2 (to his credit, he did help to the extent his youthful attention span allowed). B2 was thrilled to see me moving their bunk beds and dressers around. For me, the main reason was to clean the various nooks and crannies of their room, a classic, old-school Spring Cleaning kind of operation. But also, I just like to move things around. I figured the way I have it set up, it'll make it work better as the summer months kick in. The boys' room is already the most comfortable room -- warm in winter, cool in summer -- but this'll make it even better.

Speaking of arranging things, this blog amuses me:

ThingsOrganizedNeatly.

B2 amuses me -- he's such a natural lil' athlete. He's quick, strong, nimble, fiercely competitive. He's a true natural, one of those kids that I can just tell will be able to speedily pick up anything he wants to do, and make it look easy. And he's precocious and charismatic, a natural performer. He's going to be total trouble when he's in school. I can already tell. But the smart ones always are.

B1 is sweet, very honorable, protective of his little brother. It was cute -- walking back from school with the boys, a little girl saw B1 and turned around, said "Hi" to him. I asked him who that was, and he told me, and I said "Is she from your class?" and he said "Last year." One of his fangirls! It was cute that she made a point to turn around and say hi to him. He was pretty casual about it.

PBF

I loved Nicholas Gurewitch's "The Perry Bible Fellowship." Such a demented sense of humor. I'm bummed that he's semi-retired, because his work was so good...

Rad...ish

I saw this in a window I passed on the street, and had to capture it...

Bloody Great!

I saw this truck today, loved it! I can just imagine a Bela Lugosi-type voiceover for it -- "Ve have a stake in your floors! It would be a grave mistake not to go vith us!"

Arthurian Mythos

My boys enjoy "Arthur" on PBS, and it's a cute show, I'll admit. I actually enjoy it, too. One thing kind of merits a bit of deconstruction, though: namely, Arthur's best friend, Buster, and his family situation. Buster's folks are divorced, one of those little "real life" details they have in the show. They don't make a big deal about it. Buster's got a mediocre brain, at best. But what makes me curious is how Bo Baxter and "Bitzi Lynn" got together to begin with. First, their character sketches...

Bitzi Lynn Baxter: Buster's mom,who is divorced. She is the editor-in-chief of the Elwood City Times. She's overprotective of Buster and a frantic character, but has settled down a bit in later seasons. (In the early Arthur books, she had blonde hair, although the later books and TV show depicted her with auburn hair.)

Bo Baxter: Buster's father, who is divorced. He is a pilot. Buster flies with him around the United States in the spin-off Postcards from Buster series. In Postcards from Buster, he is shown with short brown hair and glasses. However, during his few appearances in earlier seasons of Arthur, his face is noticeably hidden from view, for instance behind a newspaper. His physical appearance has changed several times, and early appearances was partially concealed by various methods, such as Buster on his shoulders or Bo meeting him appearing as Santa Claus.

Now, Bo's a charter pilot -- he tends to fly small gigs for high-profile clients, so I understand this literal jet-setter's motivations, how he might be gallivanting around the globe, leaving kids in every airport. But what's the story with Bitzi Lynn? How'd she manage to win over Bo Baxter to begin with? I mean, look at her...

Bitzi Lynn Baxter, MILF??

I don't know what to make of that. Maybe Bitzi Lynn was quite the bad bunny in her youth? What's the back story, there? She tends to be quite the nervous nellie on the show, so it's hard to see just how she'd have much appeal, there, much in the way of game. Unless Bitzi Lynn is a real hellcat in the sack once she gets behind closed doors? I mean, Bo married her, at least for a time. We're not sure how long they were married, only that they were, and that they had a kid -- or was Buster an "oops" kinda baby? Was Bitzi trying to be the air traffic controller to Bo's high-flying pilot? Was she trying to ground him?

And with a name like Bitzi, it makes me think that maybe she was a groupie or something -- maybe she and Bo crossed paths when he was piloting a rock band around or something. I mean, Bitzi's kinda cute in a librarian/schoolmarm kinda way, but with that frenetic personality of hers, what's her big secret? How was she able to rope Bo in (even if only temporarily)? And what's more, who broke things off? Was it Bitzi or (in my opinion, more likely) Bo? I'd like to have seen pictures of Bitzi in her youth, to get a better understanding of how she got herself in that situation with Bo. Sadly, there's only a tiny picture of Bo available, so I had to blow it up...

Bo Baxter, with a kind of shit-eating grin going on.

I have this image of Arthur and Buster as teenagers, biking beneath a bridge and seeing "Call Bitzi Lynn! Night or Day!" spraypainted on one of the bridge supports, and Arthur asking "Buster, is that referring to your MOM?"

Way to Gohio!

Ohio had not one, but two of the "20 Cities You Don't Want to Live In...Yet" -- Cleveland and Dayton (5th and 10th, respectively). Way to go! Alas, Youngstown didn't make the cut. I guess there's bottom of the barrel, and there's gazing into the abyss, where cities are concerned. Still, it's kind of a downer that Flint and Detroit are on that list, but Youngstown isn't. It's worse off than Flint, Michigan? Yikes.

May Flowers!

I love how the color turned out on this one...

Mild

Had a great day with the boys, and great weather, too, which made it nicer. We played catch in the park, and the boys ran around, up and down hills, from tree to tree. B2 lost his first tooth yesterday, and, of course, the Tooth Fairy left him a coin under his pillow, which thrilled him. He was asking about the Tooth Fairy, and I said she was like a pixie, only shyer and nicer. He was so excited to find that coin, he climbed his bunk to wake his big brother to show him. A dollar coin, naturally, since that's "gold." Haha!

I took the boys grocery shopping today, as well as a trip to Target to get'em a few new pairs of jeans and some shirts. I had bought'em school clothes in the fall, but they're growing so quickly, I needed to get'em a couple of backup pairs.

The boys are getting so brotherly, it cracks me up -- they're inclined to tussle, wrestling their way across the apartment. It amuses me, since B2 is still much smaller than B1, but is feistier and fiercer than his big brother, who puts up with it until he reaches a point of no return, then goes after him. Cracks me up, watching them go -- it's like the cartoon equivalent, the dust cloud with arms and legs everywhere!