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June 30, 2006

Smaug's Hoarde

Okay, so several people commented that the picture of 14 monkeys constituted a collection. Maybe for most people that would ... but not for me. In general, I collect toys. Also, books. Within those two large collections, there are subsets. For example, I collect the pre-1990 Fisher Price Little People. The last time I attempted to catalog and count just the peoples, I had well over 400 of the little guys. I would guess right now that I'm in the 500-600 range just in the people. I think I now have every Fisher Price Little People base piece as well. That means the brown house, the yellow and blue house, the McDonald's, the Nifty Station Wagon, the castle, the Sesame Street buildings ... and the list is way longer. Most of those sets, I have all the little pieces for. A lot of this stuff I got at garage sales and thrift stores, but some of it I bought off eBay and Fisher Price swap meets. In fact, one year I got to go to Toy Fest in East Aurora, New York ... home of Fisher Price.

And, because I enjoy working with my hands and re-creating nifty things, I even did this to an old beat-up Fisher Price Little People village building:

(Click to go to the post about this building set)

This takes up an entire 12' bookcase ... and spills over a bit. My plan is to eventually have a nice little outbuilding where I can set up a Fisher Price Little People museum. The intent is to set up a town kind of along the lines of a model railroad set-up. I already have sections of this town kind of set up in my head ... and a plan for making the cars and such move around the town ... it'll be awesome if I can ever find the money and space to do it.

So to me, THAT'S a collection.

Then there's the Fisher Price Adventure People. I've got all but one set, there, I think. That's about a decade's worth of a toy line. Then there's Star Wars ... divided into Original Star Wars toys ... and New Star Wars toys. Then there's a smattering of Batman stuff ... mostly playsets so that in one of the rooms of my toy museum I can build this awesome freaking batcave that I have planned out in my head. And, of course, to populate that, I have nearly every figure from the Batman: The Animated Series lines.

As a subset of the Batman figures, I think I have just about every single modern Robin action figure that's been made. Even the really stupid re-paint versions. Hey, I'm a sucker for the little sidekick. In fact, there's a shot of the 8 Robin figures I have in my office here.

Then, there's a sub-set of action figures I collect as well ... kids. The girl from one of the Jurassic Park movies, the kid from Lost in Space, the Captain Planet kids, Space Academy, etc.

Umm, yeah ... I collect stuff. :)

Some people think I'm nuts or a "hoarder" for having all these toys. Eh, I prefer to think of it as fun. I enjoy getting new pieces, getting them fit into the collection, setting up dioramas ... and I really, really, really look forward to the day that I can actually set up my little toy museum.

But the monkeys a collection? Eh, not so much. At least, not for me.

But, something occurs to me now ... several people have commented on the toy posts I've made in the past. Would anyone be interested in my starting a toy category and perhaps posting one of my toys and its story once a week or something? Drop me a comment and let me know what you think.

Posted by Red Monkey at 4:28 AM | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble

June 27, 2006

More Monkeys

Okay ... this should be the last time I bring up photos of the monkeys ... but after showing off pictures of my office, several people asked about the red monkeys and if I collect monkeys. The deal is that I do not actually, actively collect monkeys, but when I see one I like ... well ... this results:

The funky "convict" monkey in orange is actually one of the little dog's most favouritest toys (hence, no eyes). Stitch is here as an honourary monkey ... cuz he may be an alien, but we all know he's a crazy li'l monkey at heart. In the back are "the" 3 red monkeys. (Story of the red monkey here.) The littlest one is usually atop my monitor at work - I brought him home especially to take this monkey picture. The other large monkey is Davin Michael ... from the Build-A-Bear Workshop.

So that's the monkeys.

Oh yes, others have asked about the red monkey icon on the page. That's a vector graphic I drew in Adobe Illustrator which is based on the Fisher Price Little People monkey which came with the circus sets. There is no "real" red monkey which looks like that ... I simply blended my Ty Beanie Baby red monkey with the drawing of the Fisher Price monkey.

Oh ... and then I put it on a t-shirt at GoodStorm.

Next post: something of substance. :)

Posted by Red Monkey at 2:20 PM | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble

June 26, 2006

New Shop

While I've had a CafePress store for a while now (see the Shop link above), I've been hunting for a new source for t-shirts for a variety of reasons. I found GoodStorm. Seems like a better deal in many ways, but they only sell t-shirts. So ... now I have two shops. And, the premier shirt for the GoodStorm shop is:

I also have a new Red Monkey - in Jeans shirt over there as well. GoodStorm is apparently a new-ish company and still working out their offerings, but I like the fact that I can choose the quality of shirt (I picked heavy-weight for everything it was available for). Also, they have some better colour shirts than just the plain white at CafePress. I do wish there there some baseball Ts (those raglan sleeve things) and some other products, but this is a nice start. I especially like the pebble colour shirts.

I've got several more designs in mind and I'm sure I'll be putting up more there over the next several weeks.

Let me know if you order something from there and how the quality of the print is. I know I'll be ordering some of my own stuff (cuz I'm a geek that way) and testing out the quality of the products.

Posted by Red Monkey at 7:00 AM | Blog | Stumble

June 25, 2006

Vampire Bear Redux

So, I attempted to put my Xander bear up on CafePress, but the design was promptly pulled down as copyright infringement on Care Bears. I heartily disagree, but CafePress can pull any design for any reason at any time. Fine.

So ... here's Angel bear ... not as cutsie, but a cool shirt anyway. :)

Posted by Red Monkey at 12:23 AM | Blog | Stumble

June 24, 2006

In the Ghetto

For regular watchers of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, you know where I got today's title and subject matter. (Meanwhile, check out the Player Haters video from The Daily Show link ... it'll get your blood a-boiling.)

Video games, apparently, are something the U.S. Congress does not comprehend. I suppose this must be much like once books were commonly available. All them old folks simply don't get this new-fangled dissemination of ideas, concepts and freedom of thought. Especially not when those li'l whippersnappers get hold a them idears.

Nothing, and I mean NOTHING, riles me faster than "adults" dodging responsibility. I will attempt to curb my language in this post, but I make no promises. There may very well be strong language which reflects my intensely strong feelings on this issue.

I don't care if we're talking about Dungeons & Dragons, the swimming hole at the quarry, the Hardy Boys books, My Little Pony, cartoons, video games or the freaking rocks in the "empty" field. Kids find stuff to get into that we wish they didn't do. The fact of the matter is, they are tiresomely independent and creative in finding ways to amuse themselves that we attempt to keep from them.

Now, the catch-22 is that we can watch almost their every move if we are willing to give up a two parent career/jobs ... providing you're not a single parent already. Of course, giving up two incomes probably means you can't give your children all the opportunities you'd like to give them. For some families, that might be food and clothing. For others it might be a junker to re-build together. Your mileage, of course, may vary. There will still be times that we can't be with our kids, but we can at least hover over them most of the time. (Providing they don't sneak out of this smothering closeness at night. Of course, I suppose you could put an alarm system on the kid's room and get around that, too.) But you can utterly stifle them and watch them most of the time.

Or, you can raise them as best you can, talk with them, instill your values in them, and then do the hardest thing in the world for any good parent: trust them enough to let them make their own choices (within certain parameters, of course).

Then again, the third option is to ignore the crap outa them and let everyone else raise them haphazardly, as they see fit. Sadly, this seems to be the preferred method for far too many American families.

But what got me on this topic to begin with? Let's listen to a minute long MP3 clip from "Player Haters" on The Daily Show.
The U.S. House of Representatives apparently feels the need to discuss video games and their violent tendencies more than say, violence in Iraq. Because they can do something about video game violence. In this clip, they are discussing, of course, Grand Theft Auto.
(PC IE users, you may need to download and play from your favourite MP3 application, FireFox users should be able to hear this play in browser.)
Player Haters Clip (Opens in new window so you can read this post and listen at the same time :) .)

"It's safe to say that a wealthy kid from suburbs can play Grand Theft Auto or similar games without turning to a life of crime. But a poor kid who lives in a neighborhood where people really do steal cars or deal drugs or shoot cops, might not be so fortunate."

REALLY? OMFG, HE SAID THIS ALOUD AND ON THE RECORD?????

Let's dissect this, shall we?

A wealthy kid ... a poor kid ... the poor kid "might not be so fortunate." Gee, ya think? And only people in poor neighborhoods steal cars, deal drugs and shoot cops? C'mon here! Could this dude spurt more stereotypes?

"There's almost certainly a child somewhere in America who's going to be hurt by this game. Maybe his dad's in jail or his big brother's already down on the corner dealing drugs."

All right, now wait a minute here. I mean, Jon Stewart nails one of the issues by pointing out that the "Columbine boys" were NOT poor little inner city "chilluns." But there's so much more here. Where's the personal responsibility of the parents? Oh wait, I forgot. We're assuming all these "unfortunates" have a dad already in jail, mom is presumably working or waiting in the welfare line and big brother is selling drugs on the street corner. (Double meaning to the last is intentional.) Second, boy, dad and brother. Wait a minute. Mr. Joseph Pitts ("Mmmm, unfortunate name.") from Pennsylvania seems to think that the females are not going to be affected by the game ... or that it might be Mom in jail instead of Dad.

Leaving the issue of male/female aside - this was, after all, just a 3 sentence clip - I just gotta say WTF. I mean what the bloody freaking hell?

Now look, I don't want my 5 year old playing Grand Theft Auto. Let's just be clear about that. Nor do I think I really want my 10 year old playing it. At least from what I've heard about it. But let's do a little freaking proactive parenting here, huh? Video games tend to run about $50 while they're brand new. What ten year old has $50 that they can just run over to Target and spend at will? We start getting much older than that, and I suppose by 13 it might be possible. (We're gonna get to the "but what about their friends' homes" whine in just a minute.)

13 year old wants to play a video game. It's marked M for mature. Okay. Kid really wants to play it and "everyone" in his class already owns it. Go down to the local gaming and video store and rent the damn thing. Don't tell Junior, just do it. After he goes to bed at night, play the game. Are you gonna get all the easter eggs? No, not really, but you will have a good idea if you really want your kid playing the damn game or not. Okay, let's say I've got a 13 year old who is utterly car mad and impulsive. Umm, I'm thinking NO to Grand Theft Auto. Pretty emphatically. She argues that she's not gonna "do anything," she just wants to play the game and I'm mean to her.

Tough. Okay, kid, prove to me that you are mature enough to play the game. Let's set some goals and ground rules surrounding the impulsivity issues. If Impulse-child can meet those goals in six months, I'll re-consider.

Now the deal is, this only works if 1) you know your kid and talk to the kid 2) the kid knows that "re-consider" means re-consider and it doesn't mean an automatic hell no. It can't be a delaying tactic just to shut the kid up. 3) it means you have to be willing to do some research and stay involved.

Is any of this easy? Yes and no. It's time consuming, and at the end of the day, many of us are simply too tired and too caught up in our own lives to invest enough into creative parenting. But the fact of the matter is this: kids are far more appreciative of being treated like thinking beings than they are of having the latest stuff. Sure, most of them want both. :) But those kids who are treated like thinking beings will grow to understand why they can't always have the stuff. And they'll learn to cope with that and enjoy their relationship with their parent(s).

The fact of the matter is, Dungeons and Dragons is not evil. Video games are not evil. Rocks in the field are not evil.

Children who are so isolated from right and wrong that a rock war in the field sounds like a stunning idea, never mind that three kids had to have stitches ... that's something to be concerned about.

Suburban ... white suburban boys who are angry at the world and in anger management therapy and yet still have access to guns and terrorize a "nice suburban" school ... that's something to be terrified about.

Is it the parents' fault when their kids do terrible things? That's a very knotty question that depends on the total situation and another post another time. Please understand I am NOT knee-jerk reacting and saying that bad behaviour of children is automatically the fault of the parent for not paying attention.

But when we're talking about things like video games, we have choices. More choices than many of us seem to think.

For example, a good friend of mine at work is very religious. Not in the in-your-face, hey, I'm RELIGIOUS kind of way. He's very quiet about it ... very much tries to live a simple and devout life. Doesn't feel the need to convert everyone around him. We were talking about the Lego Star Wars video game one day. His kids just adored the game and had great fun with it. After all, when you swing the light saber at something, it just breaks into its little Lego blocks. No blood, no gore. Didn't really seem like a violent game. If I remember correctly, the littlest boy is something of a pistol at five or so. What "Jonathan" noticed was that the kids got very wound up after playing the game. He told the kids he was going to take it away for a week after they'd had a particularly rambunctious day. Over the course of that week, they're behaviours calmed down. Once they had the video game again, they went back to Nutsville.

They don't get even that E for Everyone game anymore because with six kids in the house, they simply wound each other up too much. Does that mean the Lego Star Wars video game is bad for all kids? Not at all. In Jonathan's situation it was. Perhaps if the littlest of the kids had been a bit older, they'd have been mature enough to reign in their excitement. Perhaps not. It really depends on the kids and their personalities.

What I'm saying here in this long post which has now taken me two days to write is this:
You have to be willing to observe your kids. You have to be willing to say no. You have to be willing to do the research. You have to be willing to find the time to do all of this.

We don't get it right every time. We can't. We're only human.

But we can't blame a game, or a book or a CD for our children's behaviours. It's so very much more complicated than that.

And back to Mr. Joseph Pitts for a moment. It's absolutely reprehensible to assume that the rich suburban kids will have no problems with the more "dangerous" games like Grand Theft Auto while the poor inner-city youth will automatically succumb to the situation at hand. Absolutely reprehensible. And, to my mind, the fact that this @sshole planned out this statement just makes it all the more reprehensible. He's looking for a scapegoat that will garner him votes. He's looking to soothe busy parents' minds by telling them it's definitely not their fault, they can blame these modern times and gizmos. I find that irresponsible and ridiculous.

Argh. I forgot to get back to the "but what about their friends' houses" whine. Another time, another time.

Posted by Red Monkey at 6:16 AM | Never Underestimate the Power of Human Stupidity | Stumble

June 22, 2006

Good Luck! :)

I've talked about some of my struggles here for a while, but it's time to switch gears just a tad. My little sister (yeah the one who used to be afraid of ants) decided to leave Texas with her husband and they were going to try their hands as musicians in one of the big cities. It's going as slowly as most people warned them it would, but they're doing okay. My sister has a HUGE job interview this afternoon with an absolutely incredible charter school in a traditionally depressed urban area.

Everyone, please, send out good thoughts to them. Right now, they're both in between gigs and teaching jobs are pretty hard to come by despite their really outstanding qualifications. Things are getting a little desperate for them and I just thought I'd try to send them some extra goodwill.

Here's to my little sis scoring a beautiful job in the inner city.

Posted by Red Monkey at 10:55 AM | Struggles | Stumble

June 21, 2006

Suffering From Delusions of Adequacy

Ahhhhhhhhh, the smell of parody in the morning ... is there anything better?

Ever since I was warped by Rocky and Bullwinkle, I've loved sarcasm, parody, dry humour and general smart-ass-ness. The concept of taking something familiar and re-thinking it ... generally in a really warped way ... was just utter brilliance to me. Naturally, when I discovered Monty Python, I thought I'd found the height of comedy (well, for some of the skits anyway).

Sure, it takes talent to create something new, whether it's a novel, a painting or a song. But it takes another kind of brilliant creativity to come up with really good parody.

When I was in high school, we had a poetry test every Friday, followed by a discussion of the previous week's poetry readings. I hated it with a passion. It just about ruined Fridays for me during senior year. I've never been one much for poetry and have been known to say on more than one occasion: "Poetry is like a bodily function. You don't mean for it to come out, it just does." (Sure, you can quote me ... just trackback or otherwise attribute it to me :) )

So, despite being in Honours English, my teacher wasn't overly impressed with me as I ran through the poetry and the tests as absolutely quickly as I possibly could in order to minimize the pain. And then, after two weeks of hurrying through the test quickly so I could then write a parody of the poem we were supposed to be analyzing and showing them to my friends, I finally said, "screw it," and started turning those parodies in along with my exam.

The teacher was frustrated and yet, still amused. What was funny to me, though, was that she seemed to assume that I couldn't analyze the poetry because I wrote parodies. I'm not sure why the two things were mutually exclusive, but there it was. When I did make a "brilliant" analysis of one poem (her word, not mine), she began discussing it in class after handing back the exams. It was hysterical to watch her flounder with the author of this "brilliant" analysis. First, she was sure that Kyungah, our valedictorian, was the author.

"Well, this person thought that 'Mr. Z' must be a reference to the fact that black people during this time period were considered last and lowest."

I almost laughed outloud. Let's see ... black ... poem about oppression ... this seemed like a no-brainer to me. Evidently this was not obvious to the rest of the class (I wish I remembered the name of the poem so I could look it up). The teacher quickly ran through the top brains of the class, but no one claimed the interpretation. As the teacher got more frustrated trying to remember, I finally said that this had been my idea. She looked pole-axed. Despite having a class FULL of smart-asses, she'd tagged me as a harmless, lazy and not-really-bright student. She'd pegged me as a B honours student with no new ideas. I didn't really care what she thought, actually, but I did find it interesting how she viewed parody and intelligence. After one particularly brilliant parody (my word this time), she told me after class that she'd started showing the parodies to some of her college professor friends who thought I was really talented. But, she hastened to add, I was not -- say it with me now, folks -- "living up to your full potential."

Because, of course, parody is essentially a waste. At least in the eyes of people like that instructor.

I'm not sure why parody and intelligence are not more closely linked to more people, but I was the kid with the parodies, not the kid with the brains. Ah well.

My life is brilliant, your life's a joke, you're just pathetic, you're always broke

While attempting to catch up on blog reading yesterday, I discovered Capn Platy's Depressing Link-o-Rama which included a reference to Weird Al's new free MP3 download. It's a parody of James Blunt's "You're Beautiful" ... a song that I love even though it really doesn't make much sense. Weird Al has done one of his most stellar jobs since "that Anakin guy" version of "American Pie."

You're suffering from delusions of adequacy

Check out Weird Al. You'll love the song. It's brilliant.

Posted by Red Monkey at 5:09 AM | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble

June 19, 2006

The Airsoft Update

I still cannot get Darth Vader to fall over.

I am sad. I am depressed. I can shoot the two Pez dispensers from across the room and topple Grievous and the Death Star (sometimes with a single shot, if I get the angles just right). I can kill the little Storm Trooper, no problem. But no matter how many times I drill Airsoft BBs at Darth Vader, he stands resolute. I would say he's an immovable object, except that with each BB that strikes him, he moves further and further back, retreating beneath my onslaught.

But he never falls.

Yeah, umm, I had four hours of sleep last night.

I had intended to write something today about Juneteenth ... but with four hours of sleep, my brain cannot seem to rise above the obsession with shooting Darth Vader in just the right spot to knock him over. Maybe it was the fact that I read Betrayal last night when I couldn't sleep. (A Star Wars book ... really good if you like the concept of Star Wars. Good enough that I'm going to have to find some of the others by this same author.)

and then ... then ... THEN ...

I've been freaking tagged. :(

I normally do not do them because they are evil spawn of satan. But ... just to prove why I should not be tagged, I'll do this one.

five things in my fridge
milk (2%)
diet Vanilla Pepsi
sliced cheese
jalepenos
Goldschlager

five things in my closet
not me!
skateboard helmet
cowboy hat
stage sword
neon green sleeping bag

five things in my purse
my WHAT????

five things in my car
gas
transmission fluid
oil
brake fluid
air

five people to tag:
the sun
the moon
the stars
the trees
the internet at large

:)

Posted by Red Monkey at 9:46 AM | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble

June 17, 2006

Silent Reverie

If you've read much of this blog before, you know that I frequently claim to have been an odd child. Maybe I should make that one of the categories here, as it seems like an almost ritualistic start to many of my posts.

At any rate, I was an odd little kid. At seven, I was positive that I had the whole world figured out. The point of life was quite obviously to be an adult. This was the mecca of achievements. After all, grown-ups were always telling us to act more mature. And, the definition of a grown-up was to be objective, impartial and to have no emotional extremes whatsoever. Getting angry or hurt or mad or too sad, all of that was childish. And even at seven, I strove to be as adult and grown-up as I possibly could.

To go along with this concept, I assumed that as my friends and I aged, we would become more "adult," more objective, more impartial, less given to petty fights over nothing at all.

As I grew older and realized that most chronological adults are anything but objective and impartial and who are still quite emotional and sometimes petty, I grew terribly confused. Why couldn't all the adults see that my vision of how life should be was the right one? They obviously weren't trying enough.

Like I said, I was an odd child.

Okay, seemingly big jump here, but I'll tie it all together in a minute, hang on.

I've been online in one capacity and frequency or another since the kid across the street got a modem for his Commodore 64. He'd labouriously log into his BBS and we'd type to some other kid. The modem transmitted one slow letter at a time. And oh, but God forbid you make a typo ... then you would watch the cursor back up, eating one letter at a time until the other dude got to the mistake and then labouriously re-typed the real word. And trust me, on the C-64, you had to whale on those keys with your fingers to get each letter to take. There was none of this soft-touch keyboard action. You might as well have been on an old Royal typewriter and you'd better have some damn strong fingers if you wanted to touch-type instead of hunt and peck.

Now I am both a very visual person and a very words-oriented person. The two traits together have helped me learn to read people's words, body language and mannerisms fairly well. (Okay, so being the child of an alcoholic honed that skill more than anything else could have, but you get the point.) And what I noticed about the early BBS was that it was far easier to get into a misunderstanding there than in person. In fact, the limited typing skills, the speed of the modems, and the programming of the systems pretty much generated disagreements like Orville Reddenbacher generated popcorn.

When I got back online in 1993 and joined MUDdog, the landscape of being online had changed drastically. While there's still the "lag kills" issue to be faced, the 'net was far more of a "real-time" community than it had been. But the miscommunications and fights seemed to be just as bad, if not worse, than before. And because I both love figuring things out and because I'm a writer, I tried to do what I do best: sit back and observe and then draw conclusions. (And then share them ... gee, aren't you lucky?)

The fact of the matter is that on the computer screen, everything is flat as hell. It's a one-dimensional, flat as a pancake, exercise in frustrating interpretation. The fact of the matter is that most of us are completely used to relying on another person's vocal tone or body language to give hints as to whether someone is laughing at us or with us. As a writing teacher, I saw this over and over and over again. Our little black marks on the page are one of the best ways we have to communicate our ideas to a wide audience ... and they are also simply the dead skeleton left behind by the ideas we convey as we speak. They're better than nothing, but they're not the whole Stegasorous.

And what really sucks about this is that so many of us feel that "plain speech" will "clear the air" and is the best way to avoid being misunderstood and to still be true to our own selves and our own feelings.

Unfortunately, this simply is not true most of the time. Plain speech, more often than not, leads to people taking offense. And we can say all we want, "I didn't mean it that way" or "I should be able to say what I mean" ... but the deal is ... language, any language, every language, does not have fixed meaning.

An example: I hate the word lesbian. It drives me up the frigging wall. Yet, most people who are trying conscientiously to use the "right" word for a gay female will use lesbian. To me, it sounds like a frigging disease. See, when I was in high school, and a newscaster was forced to talk about "one of those people," they'd say lesbian in this hideous tone of voice that just dripped distaste. One particular news story discussed the "crazed lesbian who broke into Sharon Gless' home." (This was while Cagney and Lacy was airing.) For me, I internalized all that venom directed when the newscasters said that word and so it's never been a word I particularly liked. Dyke, on the other hand, was a word I'd never heard before I came out in college. So while a great many gay women find the term offensive, it's always been one that I preferred.

Actually, I just thought anyone who wasn't heterosexual oughta go by "gay" since I have never really seen the need to separate out every little faction of the community ... but that's just me. :)

All of that is to say while the basic definitions of lesbian, dyke and gay woman all seem to describe the same concept, well, they really don't mean the same things.

One more seeming sidetrip and I'll wrap this post all together.

I read a LOT of Robert Heinlein novels as a kid. And I can remember reading in several of his books about the concept of manners and politeness. In several different books he talks about the brashness of youth and how many young people seem to think that being polite really just throws sand into the gears of life. If we would all just say what we mean, then things would move more quickly and efficiently.

I was confused. Being just a kid, I pretty much agreed that the ritual politeness of adults was a little crazy. But it bugged me to be categorized as "just a kid" in this way, so I thought about it a lot. And I eventually came to realize something.

"Political Correctness" is not bullshit. No, we didn't use the term back then. And I'm not talking about Orwellian double-speak, taking things too far political correctness. I'm talking about attempting to consider the other person's view and culture before opening our mouths ... or letting our fingers do the talking for us.

You see, when we say something that's on our mind with absolutely no internal editor on it at all, chances are we're going to use a few words that have highly charged meanings. Then, if we want to continue productive conversation with that person, we're going to have to back up and explain what we really mean, or soothe hurt feelings, or dig our heels in, call the other person overly sensitive and walk away from it all.

If we think a little more before we speak ... if we search for the right words when writing ... if we take the time to explain the context (even tho that takes longer), then we often have a better communication with a wider number of people and fewer hurt feelings or lost conversations. Which way is more efficient? Taking an extra ten words to explain part of the back-story or reason or taking an extra few seconds to choose a term carefully ... or "speaking plainly."

Particularly in online communications, our words serve as the grease which keeps the gears moving smoothly. Sure, it's messy work getting the right grease on the gears. Sure, it's kind of a pain to try to do that. And sure, sometimes you use the wrong stuff and the whole damn thing grinds to a halt anyway. The point is not whether the right word is lesbian or dyke or Sneetch without a green star on thars. The point is that we are not really objective, emotionless automatons who instantly grok the meaning and intent.

Sure, this can all go too far, to the point where we're making up words that are hopefully not offensive to anyone. Sure we can be so afraid to offend someone that we no longer speak up or talk about the things that need to be talked about. To me, that is PC bullshit. Fear of speaking is the bullshit. But there's a second side to that coin as well. It's just as bullshit to decide that words have but one meaning and no one should be offended by the words and jokes we tell. There are shades of grey here because we are not emotionless automatons.

Striking that balance between trying to think of the other person ... and still saying what you need to say ... that's being an adult. It's not politeness and ritual just for the sake of ritual and wasting time. I get what Heinlein was trying to say about manners now.

And I wish it was easier to convey our meanings and intents in our online communities. Because I've been online for a long time. I've been part of a LOT of different online communities, and I love them. There is something particularly delightful about meeting people from around the globe and learning about different ways of life, different cultures, different ways of thinking and being and living. But that also means there are lots and lots and lots of different ways to offend and be offended. To hurt and be hurt.

And while we aren't the "perfect," objective, impartial "adults" I'd conceived of back at the tender age of 7, we can at least try to listen to the other person. We can try to understand them. We can try to choose a less loaded word in hopes of carrying on the conversation longer. But ultimately, shit will happen because we don't all think exactly perfectly alike. We're not objective and impartial most of the time. And most of us are hard-wired to include at least some pettiness.

I just wish ....

I've been trying to finish that sentence for ten minutes now. There are so many things I tried to cover in this post. So many things I want to convery. But it's late, I'm really tired, and I don't know if any of this even makes sense anymore. I guess I'm just saying "why can't we all just get along?" Idealistic. Overly Pollyanna-ish. I know ... I know. But no matter how many times I see misunderstandings ... no matter how times I hear them ... I'm a writer. And I'm always trying to figure out how to bridge the rifts that words make ... with more words.

Well ... it's been well over an hour since I started attempting to unearth this particular dinosaur and uncover his bones, dust them off and examine them. Perhaps I should leave further interpretation for another day and other commenters.

Anyhow, I'll close with a bit of the song from which I took this title ... Sarah McLachlan's "Angel" :
so tired of the straight line
and everywhere you turn
there's vultures and thieves at your back
and the storm keeps on twisting
you keep on building the lie
that you make up for all that you lack

Posted by Red Monkey at 1:30 AM | Never Underestimate the Power of Human Stupidity | Stumble

June 16, 2006

GOOOOOOOD Morning

People tend to call me a party pooper because I do NOT like fireworks in the neighborhood. They call me a worrywort. They call me old fogey (even when I was 19 and told my friends to go do that crap somewhere else ... away from my car and home).

Well, the other half went out to the truck at 4:30 in the morning ... time to leave for work ... walked to the curb, where it was parked under a streetlight, and discovered that someone had pointed a bottle rocket straight at the windshield "to see what would happen." This is what would happen:

Click either image for a larger look.

You can see in the top picture that there are actually two points of impact. One, centered, has white residue not just from the lines of the cracked glass, but from the cement or powder or whatever that's in the bottom of the bottle rocket. Just to the left of that is another white smear of that same reside. And the heat cracked the windshield far beyond just the impact. And of course, the people who did it, picked up most of the bottle rocket "debris." The paper, the little stick thing and the cement plug are all gone.

At least there was no damage to the body of the truck. And at least they didn't set the gas tank alight. Still, this did not make for a good day yesterday for either of us.

I suppose we're both grateful that this didn't happen while driving and that what happened to the neighbor's car a year ago didn't happen to us. Cuz the neighbors were awakened by the police around 4 one morning ... because as they were driving past, young neighbor lad's car was "parked" in the yard.

Yeah, someone had come up the street fast and nailed his parked car hard enough to move it at least a good car length onto the yard. And then they abandoned their car (with all their paperwork and personals still in it) and took off on foot. Completely totaled neighbor-lad's car.

Still and all ... it's not a nice way to wake up in the morning.

Posted by Red Monkey at 9:54 AM | Never Underestimate the Power of Human Stupidity | Stumble

June 15, 2006

World Cup Feets and Hands

So, back in the day, late 70s, I lived in the most perfect city in the United States: Austin, Texas. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know many of you Americans will claim New York or Chicago or even the sprawl of the OC and LA. But nothing beats the beauty of the Texas hill country and the bustling combination of big city and country that surrounded Austin in the 70s and 80s.

Well, back in the day in Austin, the big kids and the little kids did NOT play together in the schoolyard. But David Tapia, despite having the same birthday as me, was a bit bigger than most of the little kids, so he often got away with hanging out and watching the big kids play.

He brought home the most fascinating game we'd ever heard of. Feets and Hands. We all admitted it was probably Feet and Hands ... but that didn't sound as cool to us.

David hurriedly organized the neighborhood kids in his backyard. Nancy and I were one team. David and John and Debbie and my little sister were the other team (I think ... we might have gotten one of the little kids). The object, he said was to score goals. Well duh. We picked out two planks on the fence on one side of the yard ... and two planks on the other fence on the other side of the yard. Okay, we had our goals duly marked.

"Now," David said, all important at teaching us lesser mortals a sport, "you try to kick the ball into the goal."
Easy we said.
"But," he added, "you can only use your feet. Except, you can yell out HANDS at any point in the game and then you can only use your hands to handle the ball. And if you use the wrong body part, then the other team gets the ball."
Cool, we said.

We must have played our version of "football" or "soccer" for weeks like that. The Tapias dad snickered at us on a regular basis when we'd scream out HANDS and begin flinging the ball around, only to have someone else holler FEETS. The playing field was generally utter chaos. Particularly once David observed an older kid perform a head shot and tried to tell us that we now could also yell HEADS. That particular call was pretty much only used once by each of us until we discovered that it hurt to do that with a fully inflated ball ... and it hurt differently to do it with a mostly inflated basketball.

When I moved to Arlington a couple of years later, the biggest game at recess was something I'd never heard of: soccer. I was so very confused to discover that "hands" was a penalty call, not a way to handle the ball. And after our convoluted rules, I just couldn't see the magic in the simple way my new school friends played this "soccer."

Watching the Germans play yesterday, I do see the interest now. It's certainly more interesting to me than baseball or American football ... though arena football is a far better sport than NFL football. It's complex, it's difficult and it's kinda fun to watch someone in total control of his skills, simply run a hair too fast and almost lose the ball, his balance and everything all at once. Seems to me it's more of a sport than a lot of the commercialized junk I see most of the time. After all, it's grass, some dudes and a ball. There's no high tech bat to make the ball go farther. There's no "Eh, he slam dunked the ball, so we'll ignore the travelling." There's no, I'm 8' tall and 500 lbs, so no one's going to knock me over. It's skills based. It's a HUGE field, so there's not generally a great rapidity in scoring.

In a lot of ways, it reminds me of skateboarding ... simple equipment ... people pushing each other to excel. In skateboarding, you get a bunch of skaters together and they try to outdo one another with their skills. Sure, there's no goals to score, but there's a very solid emphasis on fitness and skill. I just don't see that same emphasis on skills and love of fitness in many American sports anymore. I suppose that's why I find the NBA and even college basketball boring anymore.

Or maybe I've just become an old fogey who just doesn't get it. Wait, an old fogey whose favourite sports are skateboarding and snowboarding? Well, I guess it could happen.

Meanwhile, I'm looking forward to the Ecuador v. Costa Rica game today ... too bad I won't be able to watch it at all since it takes place during my work day. (And I can't bring myself to tape a sports event unless it's skateboarding/ snowboarding.)

Wonder if I can teach any of the neighborhood kids Feets and Hands?

Posted by Red Monkey at 4:12 AM | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

June 13, 2006

Note to Self

Note to self:
Never buy a trackball with an easily removeable ball ever ever ever again.

I think I spend more time with the ball removed and spinning it on the funky mousepad than I do actually using it. Sure, it gives me greater control than my Gateway mouse. Sure, it's more ergonomic. But boy, is it a great toy to roll around the desk. And spin without letting it leave the mousepad (and thus make loads of noise). Or to occasionally bounce when no one else is in the office.

I wonder if I could replace it with a superball ... you know those really big superballs in the vending machines for a dollar. Hrm. I think I have one of those at home ... I'll have to bring that in and test this new theory out.

Yeah, so I'm thinking maybe I need to go back to the doctor and see about some ADHD meds again ... *sigh*.

Posted by Red Monkey at 1:24 PM | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble

Get Off My Lawn

I posted last week that I'd had a great post idea on Thursday and then promptly forgotten it. Well, after hanging out in the shoutbox at Blogmad (again) the other day, Capn Platy reminded me what it was.

Back in 2001, I lived in the 'hood. I was just a few blocks south of Notre Dame, but it was SO the 'hood. Little known tidbit (unless you know a lot about gangs or about South Bend, Chicago and Detroit): South Bend, Indiana, is considered a halfway point between Chicago and Detroit by the Crips and the Bloods. And probably other gangs and I don't really wanna know more about it. Suffice it to say, there's a lot of gang activity around here. And, in 2001, we had a crack house across the street from us and a whorehouse back behind us. In fact, early that summer, I was standing outside talking to my elderly next-door-neighbor when we heard a commotion. A lady started running down the alleyway, barefoot, barely clothed ... and a somewhat more fully dressed man was half-heartedly chasing her. Before I could spring into action (forgetting momentarily that I'm not a superhero and that my other half would kick my behind if she knew what I was planning), my neighbor put a hand on my arm and said, "That's one of those whores from the house behind you."

I blinked rapidly. The man saw us watching, and resignedly walked back and let the woman go.

With my spidey-senses no longer tingling, I relaxed and looked at my neighbor in shock. "Whorehouse?" Who says 83 year old women are not observant? I'd totally missed it. I mean, I was really tired of people parking in the alleyway behind our house, but I completely missed the fact that it was only men ... lots of different men ... and that they were all visiting the same house. Where there were lots of women apparently living. Oh. Yeah. Huh.

The crack house across the street was more obvious, even to me. Something about the red light in the porch on some evenings and the green light on other evenings. And then there were the green light conversations that went something like this:
"Man, you gotta go into the alleyway ... can't sell out here on the street."

That particular crackhouse did not last long. It was, of course, replaced by another one later.

So all of this is to set up just exactly what kind of neighborhood I lived in at that time. A bit rough. So when I say the neighborhood children were not scared of much, you have some idea what I mean. One of the women who lived in the house behind us, regularly had her children climb our fence to cut through our yard. I don't know why. If you went down just one more house, you were at the corner and didn't need to cut through anyone's yard. And our fence was not easy to climb, either. It was decorative wire ... too sturdy to bend easily ... not sturdy enough to climb like chain link. Too high for an adult to step over. After a few weeks of this, the fence was finally beginning to droop and I eventually had to take it down.

Unfortunately, after that, the neighborhood kids thought playing around our dinky, crappy little shed was fun. It made me nervous because our landlord had moved that rickety thing from who knows where and just kind of plopped it on the property. It was seriously falling apart. I'd already gone out a few times and tried to shore up falling supports and replaced a few slabs of walls, but I always thought a good wind would knock that sucker right over.

So the kids are playing tag around this rickety thing and I can just see it: the freaking shed falls on one of them and the whole neighborhood comes after us.

Now, I'd yelled at the kids to "GET OFF MY LAWN" so to speak, a few times before. To very little avail.

But in the spring of 2001, I was undergoing the ESHAP chemo protocol in preparation for a bone marrow transplant. And I'd lost most of my hair. And shaved my head because I really am not very vain, but watching your hair fall out in chunks is just NOT a fun process.

On a whim, I opened the backdoor, removed my now ever-present ballcap and screamed in my deepest, most authoritative, "scary" voice:
"YOU KIDS GET AWAY FROM THAT SHED RIGHT NOW!"

Hehehehehe. They paled. They freaked.

I took a step out onto the tiny cement back porch.
"I DON'T EVER WANNA CATCH YOU BACK HERE AGAIN, YOU HEAR ME?"

And I took a second step out to the yard.

They flew.

Was the only time the neighborhood kids ever listened to me. Even if I did feel a bit like Mr. Wilson from Dennis the Menace.

Apparently bald white women screaming out their back porch is utterly terrifying to the fear-less children of the local gangs. Who knew?

Posted by Red Monkey at 5:10 AM | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble

June 11, 2006

Alligators and Gorillas

So, there's a whole silly reason that I call this blog Red Monkey, but of course, one of the reasons I wanted the red monkey, was because I do adore monkeys and gorillas both. So tonight, as I was watching Growing Up Gorilla on the Discovery Channel, I remembered my trip to the Brookfield Zoo and the pictures I got of a new gorilla mommy.

The best part of the show was watching four little guys playing together. The one male of the group, second to youngest of them all, decided he was a silverback already. Posturing and pulling all the others to the ground, even the one several, several months older and much bigger. Once he'd decided he'd dominated them, he went to the electric fence that separated them from the toddler gorilla-kids, he kept trying to get through the fence to prove himself king of the big kids too!

Ahh, gotta love the politics of the playground. I can remember when I wished there was an electric fence to keep the bullies away from the younger kids, too. In fact, there are times on the internet when I still wish the same thing, what with people not conversing in comments left on other blogs, but instead just spitting insults and venom. And no, I'm not talking about here ... somehow, at least up to this point, I've managed to avoid any trolls or venemous spitting comments, but I've witnessed it on the blogs of many other people. I never do understand it ... it always makes me think of junior high.

In fact, back, waaaaay back when I was in junior high and the abacus had only recently been tossed in favour of some funky hand held device that weighed about 6 pounds and could add, subtract, multiply AND divide!!! (all on one single 9 volt per every 100 calculations) ... anyhow, back in the day, the rage was Lacoste Izod shirts. These were the little three-button shirts with a collar. Sometimes called a polo. Sometimes called a golf shirt. Well, there were Izods back then and then there were just plain shirts. The Izod had the little alligator and was thus considered cool. The reason why is lost in the mysteries of time and the brains of the then pre-adolescents. Everyone wanted that stupid alligator on their shirt.

I just thought those shirts in general were the height of cool. Obviously, they were dress-up shirts because they had a COLLAR. And, still, they were t-shirts. Casual and dress-up all in one package!!! I loved them.

I really didn't care if they were plain, had the alligator or the Sears Le Tigre tiger on them. Whatever.

However, most of my classmates were terribly rabid about the Izod alligator. Oh, you weren't made fun of for wearing a plain 3-button. But you certainly weren't "in" if you did that.

Of course, as soon as I hit seventh grade and junior high, my mother decides this is the perfect time to pick up sewing. And she proceeded to infinitely increase my cool factor by making most of my clothes. It's not that she was bad at sewing, but her taste in materials left much to be desired. At any rate, in my perpetual attempt to make fun of my classmates for being slaves to stupid things, I found a nifty -- and quite large -- alligator applique whilst whiling away the interminable hours at the fabric store. Mom was looking for the cheapest cloth and the best cloth: a search continually doomed to failure, so she usually chose cheap. (I'm surprised we didn't have shirts made out of that funky white crap that I can't remember the name of ... edging? no ... whatever.)

I bounded over to my mother with this freaking three inch alligator and announced that I wanted THAT on one of my shirts. My mother looked at me sadly. Obviously I was a challenged child in terms of spatial relations and she said tenderly, "Honey, no one is ever going to think that's an Izod alligator."

I rolled my eyes in the fashion of teens and pre-teens everywhere. "I KNOW, Mom, that's the POINT."

She reluctantly purchased my joke alligator and dutifully sewed it on one of the shirts.

All I heard that day at school was "That's not a real Izod you know."

To which my reply was a big grin and a delighted, "I know ... that's the point."

There were a LOT of confused kids in my school the first few times I wore the shirt.

But, the saddest thing to me was that while I got a lot of confusion over that shirt, I never did get teased. On the other hand, "Donna" wasn't so lucky. She couldn't afford an Izod. Her mom got her the next best thing, at least in Mom-Think. Donna got a Le Tigre shirt instead. She spent an evening getting the tiger off that shirt and then, skipped athletics one morning and took an alligator off some unsuspecting girl's Izod. She tried to glue it onto her shirt.

Watching the gorilla kids on the tv show tonight reminded me very much of that scene in the girl's locker room in the 80s. A pack of girls, converging on Donna. Yelling at her. Screaming, "That's not an Izod, you faker!" And other, less nice, things. Donna, frightened, insisting that it was. Truly, it was an Izod. She tried to divert attention to me, reminding the girls I had a HUGE alligator. They were tearing at Donna's shirt now, trying to get to the tag on the inside back. Donna was squriming, terrified, trying to get away.

All she'd wanted was to fit in.

All I'd wanted was to let the other kids know you didn't have to fit in.

I got ignored.

Donna got her shirt literally ripped off. And the tag held up triumphantly. Le Tigre.

The coach had to find her a shirt from the lost and found. Luckily, there were some just back from the laundry.

In the show tonight, the slightly bigger toddler gorillas were picking on the littlest one. Something that wouldn't really happen in the wild, according to the researchers, because the older adolescents and the adults wouldn't stand for it. But in this habitat, they get groups of babies, not the adults. So the humans sometimes have to just let the "kids" sort it out for themselves ... sometimes they have to step in.

What is it in us, that makes us go after the weak or those we perceive to be weak? Is it a throw back to some more survivalist instincts in which only the strongest survived and if you killed off the weak, it was more food and survival for you?

I hear some folks, adults, talk about this phenomenon with disgust for the weak. I've heard others talk about with hurt and confusion. Others with a determination to fix it all.

For me, it was in junior high that I realized that this behaviour the adults called "junior high" was prevalent everywhere. I saw adults being just that petty as to be asinine over what brand of clothes someone wore. What neighborhood they "chose" to live in.

And all I could think ... all I can think ... is our need to not be alone really that strong? That this is one of the largest worries in so many people's lives in the western world? (I presume it's the world over, but I don't know other cultures well enough to presume to speak for them.)

Schoolyard bullies. Proving strength like the young gorillas. Proving they're cool like Cordelia in the early seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Proving we're still essentially animals despite our insistence that we're civilised.

Wow. This post took some turns I didn't expect.

Posted by Red Monkey at 7:51 PM | Never Underestimate the Power of Human Stupidity | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble

June 10, 2006

Odd Week

It's been an odd kind of week for me. I had a great idea for a post to use on Thursday, but by the time I had some time to sit down and write it, I'd completely forgotten what it was. I mean completely. No clue even the topic, much less the specifics. Knew I should have jotted down a note or two while I was thinking about it. I thought that on Friday, I would write about being interviewed by the local paper, but after the two hour interview was over with Thursday night (nothing so interesting as blogging, of course), I really didn't want to write anything about it until after the article itself comes out ... and that may be weeks, of course.

Instead, I give you another bit of vector drawings from The Incredibles. This comes from the credit roll at the end of the movie ... to the left of the Incredicar, you'll see iconic line drawings of the family ... this is from the same clip during the credits of the movie. And, apparently Brad Bird also had those icons made into a shirt, as he's wearing a black T with those icons in white during one of the interviews on the DVD.

Anyhow, here's the link ... enjoy!

Posted by Red Monkey at 9:53 AM | Sketches | Stumble

June 7, 2006

Xander

We've been Buffy-festing for the past few days. Just chilling out, ignoring broadcast TV and watching DVDs of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In some episode of Season Two, one of the characters made reference to a dark teddy bear, probably Willow talking about the ever-broody Angel.

An idea was born. Hope you enjoy ... the Vampire Bear.

I call him Xander.

(Cuz Angel annoys me, too.)

Posted by Red Monkey at 8:52 AM | Sketches | Stumble

June 6, 2006

The Gas Station

I'm going to tell another set of stories on my poor bug-phobic sister and then I'll leave her alone for a while. But I should probably also say that she's not nearly this much of a wuss anymore.

Picture it, Texas, during the energy crisis (no, not this one) ... two youngsters on their way to the promised land: DisneyWorld. What? Oh ... I've been watching old episodes of Golden Girls in the afternoons while I vegetate after getting home. Apparently Sophia is contagious. At any rate, we were preparing to head across the country from Texas to Florida so we could go to Disney World. My sister was all of 3 and a half and I was just 7 and a half. I was beside myself despite knowing that it would be a two day trip in a very packed Delta 88.

Grandpa drove and we reached New Orleans and drove through the French Quarter briefly on our way. My sister and I fought over who was sitting next to grandma in the backseat ... this was a complicated debate because it meant having to sit in the middle of the long bench seat and be squashed by a sibling on one side and grandma on the other side.

And, of course, these were the days before iPods or Walkmen, before GameBoy ... Advance, DS or plain-ole plain-ole. We had a set of car bingo "cards," one of those magnetic face dudes (that I eventually tore apart to see just how soft those magnetic filings really were ... cuz they looked soft), and some books.

Somewhere between Disney World and home, we made a pit stop at a gas station. It had a nice restroom, white tile - pretty palatial for the time. Naturally, as the kids, my sister and I made a beeline for the stalls. Just as I'm ahhhh, relieving the pent up tension of the trip, my sister begins screaming.

Three year old. Room covered in ceramic tile. Great set of lungs. Ummm, OW. Mom and Grandma finally get out of her what's wrong: spider.

Now, in the stall next to my sister, I am trying to finish up frantically before this huge nest of tarantulas comes and eats me alive. Because that MUST be what's happening to my sister given the amount of terror in her voice.

I am hurriedly trying to escape my stall before these hideous creatures come over to my side and I'm also positive at this point that my poor little sister is obviously dying given the horrendous screams coming out of that gas station, reverberating restroom. However, in my panic, I'm twisting the little knob to get out of the stall too far. This particular design let you turn the knob half way to open the door. I am frantically turning it all the way one way ... can't get out ... and all the way the other direction ... can't get out. Finally, I keep pressure on the door as I turn the knob and it pops open. I flee to the safety of my grandmother's arms. Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty ....

"Go crawl under the stall door and let your sister out of there," my mother tells me.

WHAT?

Sure the kid is still screaming and therefore still alive, but come on ... it's been like eleventy minutes of solid screams in there ... surely she has been bitten so many times that she's going to die. And now Mom wants ME to go in there?

At this point I turn into a babbling fool.

My sister has barely stopped screaming to breathe. I am now under the impression that she can scream while drawing breath in as well as while exhaling. I'm also certain that is only a matter of minutes before she inhales spiders and stops making that infernal racket.

Mind you, I'm sad that my sister is obviously dying of spider bites ... but not so much so that I want to risk joining her in death by crawling into that spider's nest of a stall where she's been mutilated by foot long spiders.

Mom insists that I crawl under the door and rescue my sister because I'm smaller and I'll fit. I'm terrified. Petrified. This is when Grandma begins telling Mom that she should let my poor little sister out. Mom insists that she won't fit under the stall ... baloney, she's at least as scared as I am at that point. Plus, it's kinda undignified.

During the argument between Mom and Grandma, I discover the groove in the lock to the stall. I calmly insert my fingernail, frantically look at the floor for the swarm of angry spiders ... and begin slowly twisting the lock open. Finally I have it.

My sister has absolutely no mark on her. She's still screaming.

There is no swarm of tarantulas. There are no tarantualas. In fact, I don't even see the spider at first.

I go in, lead her out by the hand.

The first moment I can remember of older sibling disgust.

Daddy longlegs.

There is a single daddy longlegs in the corner of the stall.

Poor thing was probably terrified by all the commotion.

As we finally finish our tasks, wash up and leave the restroom, there's practically a crowd of people carefully not-looking at us as we exit. My sister is still kind of hitching and snuffling, but I'm rolling my eyes and completely unconcerned anymore. My mother, on the other hand, is utterly mortified. The Public Service Announcement commercials advertising the Child Abuse Hotline have just recently been introduced around the country and my mother is certain that everyone at the gas station has lined up at the pay phones to call the cops on her for so obviously beating her child half to death and back.

I didn't know it then, but that was my introduction to my sister's bug phobia and a good preview of what we'd be dealing with at Disney World in the days ahead. (Apparently the Mad Tea Cup ride was the perfect ride and even the It's a Small World "roller coaster" was too much for her. Well, she was just three.)

A daddy longlegs ... sheesh.

Posted by Red Monkey at 4:44 AM | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

June 3, 2006

9rules

Holy cow, Maynard.

The 9rules Network, according to their website, highlights "the very best web content in the world, and package it in a nice bow for you to unwrap. Our members discuss a wide range of topics from interface design and technology, to business, humor, and many others."

What I've always liked about this site is that they're not a traffic exchange where you surf for credits. Instead, they bring a bunch of independent blogs together, build a community and also feature bits about the blogs on their front page or their Communities and Featured sections.

But to be perfectly honest, what completely sold me on the site was their original 9 rules for living:

1. Love what you do.
2. Never stop learning.
3. Form works with function.
4. Simple is beautiful.
5. Work hard, play hard.
6. You get what you pay for.
7. When you talk, we listen.
8. Must constantly improve.
9. Respect your inspiration.

So, now I await the Member Agreement so that I can officially become a member of an outstanding network of blogs.

To Greenr, Joe and all the others from BlogMad who made it (I haven't gotten through the whole list of nominees yet), a very heartfelt: CONGRATULATIONS.
Also, a special congratulations to Mike Rohde of rohdesign ... I discovered Mike's blog while searching for some reference material to practice my own sketching techniques and fell in love with Mike's SketchToons. So I'm doubly excited to see that he has also made the preliminary 9rules list.

Posted by Red Monkey at 11:58 AM | Blog | Stumble

June 2, 2006

Terror and the Bagthorpes

So, I have this great love of a young adult series called the Bagthorpes. I mean, these are some of the best kids' books I've ever read. Hysterically funny. Back in October, I posted about them, listing the one that I thought I was missing (only to discover I'm missing Bagthorpes Battered as well as the Bagthorpe Triangle). I thought I'd run a fast eBay check for them, and had to look up the names of the ones I was missing. What I see on my blog is this (click through for the larger picture):

This does just boggle the imagination, doesn't it? I don't think the word terrorist appears in that post at all. Nor Iraq, nor weapons of mass destruction, nor anything else that might lead to Adsense thinking terrorism ads might be a valuable link here.

As near as I can figure out ... the main kid in these stories is Jack. Everyone in the U.S., it seems, is obsessed with Jack Bauer. Jack Bauer fights terrorism. Hence, anti-terrorism ads on my blog.

Jack Bagthorpe is NOTHING like Jack Bauer. For one thing, Young Master Bagthorpe is from the U.K. Another, he's 11. Another, he's ordinary. That's why the first book is called Ordinary Jack. He can't get around the house in 10 minutes, let alone get around LA in ten minutes.

Posted by Red Monkey at 10:05 AM | Blog | Stumble

June 1, 2006

Airsoft Update

In the spirit of continuing the airsoft experiments, my supervisor yesterday was intensely curious. After all, the graphic designer had now been shot, I'd shot myself ... he wanted to know ... just how bad it hurt. So the graphic designer, upon invitation, shot him in the calf.

He opens his mouth to say, "That doesn't really -- OW!" He looked somewhat shocked. "Doesn't hurt at first, but after!"

Now the only person in the room who hasn't been shot directly, insists that enough experimentation has been done and he feels no burning desire to find out for himself how it truly feels. Ricochet shots and our example is apparently enough for him.

So, the experimentation has moved on. We've discovered that, sadly, airsoft does not penetrate Play-Doh effigies. It will knock over the Star Wars Galactic Heroes StormTrooper, but not Darth Vader. Apparently the force is still strong with that one.

It also leaves small dents in the wall behind the targets.

Particularly if you use a battery operated rapid fire pistol, you can tear a business card to shreds. Or, you can simply catch it just right and knock it to the floor.

You cannot do more than a tiny dent in a coke can, which is sad.

You can "take out" the Star Wars Death Star Pez dispenser, however. Even better is when you angle it just right so that you take out both Grievous AND the Death Star all with one shot.

Of course, after all of this, you then have to rummage through the room looking for little green plastic BBs which have mysteriously, in the manner of toys everywhere, multiplied far beyond the original number.

Several people have asked now where in the world I could possibly work that would allow me to not only have toys all over my cube, but not throw a screaming fit about firing off an airsoft pistol in the office. Well, I'm part of an online company's creative department. You know, advertising and such. So between being one of the "creatives" and being a part of the geeky web coders, the toys are actually kinda normal. The airsoft is a bit more unusual, but just about everyone comes down here to use it now.

One day, I am determined, Darth Vader shall fall to a sparkling green BB shot. One day.

Posted by Red Monkey at 9:57 AM | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Stumble