Personal

Kids say (or e-mail) the funniest things

Penny has a niece that has started writing her e-mail. Her niece is seven or eight years old and is very precocious. She is kind of quiet but once she gets to know you, she is a real hoot and says the funniest things. Her latest e-mail went something like this:

I e-mail you. You e-mail me. It all works together.

Oh, so THAT’s how it works! Maybe you just have to know her, but this just cracks me up.

Matt Mullenweg in Generation Kill?

I’ve been watching an HBO mini-series called Generation Kill. It’s a grim and gritty look at Marine forces that were involved in the second Iraq war. It is extremely well written and the actors seem to be authentic. But did anyone else realize that one Matt Mullenweg (the mastermind behind WordPress) is apparently moonlighting as Lt. Nate Fick? Inquiring minds want to know …

(It is actually Stark Sands that plays Lt. Nate Fick, but c’mon, you can see the resemblance, right?)

Father grounds daughter, court overrules

Straight out of the “too weird to be true” files, it appears a female justice from the Quebec Superior Court has ruled that father really doesn’t know best.

The father banned his 12-year-old daughter from going online after she posted pictures of herself on a dating site. Then after fighting with her stepmother, the father told her she couldn’t go on a school trip. The girl took the matter to court and — be afraid — seems to have won her case.

Madam Justice Suzanne Tessier of the Quebec Superior Court ruled on Friday that the father couldn’t discipline his daughter by barring her from the school trip.
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Lucie Fortin, the lawyer representing the 12-year-old, said the judge found that depriving the girl of the school trip was an excessive punishment.

She said the girl has already been forbidden to use the Internet and her father also punished her by canceling her participation in an extracurricular event.

Please, please don’t let this foolishness come to the States.

What a great father’s day!!!

Went on a 13-mile bike ride with my son, went to Academy and bought a badminton set and a Frisbee®, then played outside for nearly four more hours! Not to mention the fact that I got breakfast in bed (Eggos, milk and coffee!) and running shorts to boot! I am exhausted but it has been such a good day. I even took some of Kate’s brownies and cookies back to my dad.

Two down, three to go …

Slowly but surely, we’re knocking ‘em down. Kate graduated high school this afternoon and the ceremony was super. The student speakers were excellent and polished, and the main speaker, Kirk Meyers, gave a great charge to the kids. In spite of this being the largest homeschool graduation in the history of the Pulaski County home school organization (67 students graduated) the whole event went smoothly and didn’t seem to last forever. In fact, it really flew by!

Congratulations, Kate. You have certainly earned it! I am so proud of you, kiddo.

Celldweller - Switchback Remixes (Best of the best)

If you are fan of industrial rock, especially instrumental music, you probably like Celldweller (even if you didn’t know it.) Celldweller is actually made up of one guy, Klayton, who plays guitar, keyboard, percussion, handles vocals and programming of the studio tracks. You have probably heard his music already since a lot of it is used uncredited in movies and commercials. I’ve read that every song on his debut album has been licensed at least once for a movie, video game or another form of media.

Another really cool thing he has done is release his raw material and let other musicians remix it into brand new songs in his Take it and Break it contests.
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A busy and grateful year

This is probably going to be a pretty rambling post, but it has been a long time and I am out of practice. I figured that if I don’t take at least a part of my Christmas vacation to update my blog, I might as well shut it down. So, what has been going on lately? For me, it has certainly been a busy year.
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Cheap gas!

I don’t know how it happened but I suspect someone may have goofed. Typically when I fill my car with gas, I try to do it at the Kroger gas station where we get a 10 cent discount because we buy so many groceries. When I went to gas up my car yesterday I got a stunner of a deal. The sign outside said the price for unleaded should have been $2.71 (which should have been $2.61 with the discount.) I inserted my card and started pumping. I looked down and couldn’t believe my eyes: I was paying $2.17 a gallon!!! I thought this can’t possibly be right, but after filling up, I drove past the other pumps and they all had the price fixed at $2.27. I don’t bet it is still that cheap, but what a deal. I had to snap a picture just to prove it.