The Accompanying Video

For this post

Walking Jack

Brilliantly Awkward

Living with a lanky seven year old can be like living with Kramer from Seinfeld. Not only is she skittering into a room and tripping over her growing limbs constantly, she often has these ideas for businesses she'll start when she grows up.

"I'm going to start a business that shops for the groceries for you and then brings them to your house, I'll call it 'Food Getters.'"

Turn It Off

How much energy does it take to run an escalator? They can't be used by people with strollers of wheelchairs, so I think they're limited to to people who can use stairs but just don't want to. Maybe we should burn less fossil fuels and a more fat to get to the second floor?

Papua New Guinea man sees an escalator for the first time.

Tits and a Dead Terrorist!

Facebook won't let people post photos of breastfeeding mothers but yesterday I was inundated with pictures of a dead terrorist. I read comments about drawing and quartering a human, letting people spit on a grave, parading a decapitated head around the country for all to see. If these thoughts are less offensive than milky breasts to the public then we have lost our way.

Thank You, Fresh Meat

I'm skating in the third bout in three weeks tomorrow. This on the tail end of something derby related every night this week. I was starting to suffer overload and then today I went and helped at try outs and there is nothing like seeing derby through a new skater's eyes. It's like watching a kid ride the Ferris wheel the first time, sheer terrified excitement followed by giants smiles and a willingness to go around again. Thank you for making it new again ladies.

Definition

Courage: to let your seven year old romp around in the waves even after they crash over her head and get salt water up her nose.

Definition

Courage: to nurse a tired teething baby

Little Things

-Stickers

-Instant coffee and strudel

-Cool dry breezes

-Tropical bird noises

-Sleepy children with dirty feet

-Old photos

-Threadbare t-shirts

-Polka

Wimpiest Cops in the World Part IV

In which 'Officer Davis' on a middle school playground in Mesquite Texas pepper sprays a baby squirrel in front of the kids.

Police Officer Complaints: ... 972-216-6236

Sexual Assault Prevention Tips Guaranteed to Work

Stolen straight from the I Blame the Patriarchy post Toronto Activists Take Back the Slut in wich she attributes it to an email. Because it's worth the repost and I encourage you to pass it on.

Sexual Assault Prevention Tips Guaranteed to Work

1. Don’t put drugs in women’s drinks.

2. When you see a woman walking by herself, leave her alone.

3. If you pull over to help a woman whose car has broken down, remember not to rape her.

4. If you are in a lift and a woman gets in, don’t rape her.

5. When you encounter a woman who is asleep, the safest course of action is to not rape her.

6. Never creep into a woman’s home through an unlocked door or window, or spring out at her from between parked cars, or rape her.

7. When you lurk in bushes and doorways with criminal intentions, always wear bright clothing, wave a flashlight, or play “Boys Who Rape (Should All Be Destroyed)” by the Raveonettes on a boombox really loud, so women in the vicinity will know where to aim their flamethrowers.

8. USE THE BUDDY SYSTEM! If it is inconvenient for you to stop yourself from raping women, ask a trusted friend to accompany you when lurking in shadows.

9. Carry a rape whistle. If you find that you are about to rape a woman, you can hand the whistle to your buddy, so s/he can blow it to call for help.

10. Give your buddy a revolver, so that when indifferent passers-by either ignore the rape whistle, or gather round to enjoy the spectacle, s/he can pistol-whip you.

11. Don’t forget: Honesty is the best policy. When asking a woman out on a date, don’t pretend that you are interested in her as a person; tell her straight up that you expect to be raping her later. If you don’t communicate your intentions, the woman may take it as a sign that you do not plan to rape her.

In other words, the best way to prevent rape is to not rape anybody.

Mexican Pointy Boots, The Movie!

Wimpiest Cops in the World Part III

Just go ahead and add Lakewood Police Officers in Colorado to the wimpiest cops in the world list for pepper spraying an eight year old Glennon Heights Elementary School second grader, twice.

Housewife Confession

I am frugal. I like a store sale. Give me 50% off this rack because you need to make room for new things, but please keep your coupons to yourself. It's all I can do to remember a shopping list and my recyclable grocery bags. Coupons must be clipped, sorted, brought and then the item must be hunted within the specified dates, there are rules and regulations and governing bodies to coupons. Besides all of that, in theory coupons really piss me off. I think if it's possible for a company to charge less for milk or diapers then they just should. It's the same way I can't stand when companies offer to give starving orphans, crippled puppies and cancer patients a dollar if I spend the time to wash my yogurt lids before depositing them into a hand addressed envelope and mailing them to El Paso. The company should skip the hoop jumping and give the money to the needy already, or perhaps cancer doesn't get cured this year for the want of one more dollar because I refused to be held hostage in the crazy lid scheme. It's a lot of guilt I don't need during and afternoon yogurt snack.

Bibliophilia

I stood at Goodwill among the stacks of used books scanning each spine for something interesting when I happened upon a pink book stuck spine inward. I grabbed and turned it about before putting it back in the stacks and finding a little brown wrapped text book next to it.

The old brown wrapper is oily and smooth from being used and covers a beautiful red text book called "Mathematical Tables - From Handbook of Chemistry and Physics Seventh Edition" compiled by Charles D. Hodgman, M.S., Associate Professor of Physics at Case School of Applied Science from Chemical Rubber Publishing Co. 2310 Superior Ave. N.E., Cleveland, Ohio. 1941

It's a relic befitting of a shelf with a slide rule and a Kodak Duaflex IV twin lens camera also perched on it. It's a book I'll not take the time to read, understand or use, but a book I instantly fell in love with. On the inside cover Eugene Anthony Tiernan, who later co-authored "New Technology in Oilseed Proteins," carefully wrote the log shortcuts he wanted to easily access while he was in Iowa State College's Chem E. Class. It was a time when instead of buying a cell phone case, one bought a brown book cover to wrap a book in and had phone number like "2183-J" that an operator had to connect you to.

On the inside of the buttery little book are pages and pages filled with patterns of numbers in tables carefully typeset in something like a Bookman font. The pages are thin, smooth and abundant. The whole book lightweight and satisfyingly convenient in size. It made utterly no sense for me to buy it other than I wanted it. I paid $1.50 and with the original selling price at 55¢, if my math is right, I figured it to be a terrific investment already appreciating by almost 300%.

Hyper Kid

As parents I think we really need to stick together and build each other up. There's plenty of judgement and blame for parents to go around, but I can no longer stay silent watching folks put their six and seven year old kids in strollers at the zoo. I don't think it's wrong to make a little person walk at the zoo until they complain their legs hurt, that's when it's time to get lunch or go home. And I promise, after walking outdoors all day, they will go straight to sleep that evening.

TINY DRAWINGS BLOG!

Learning to Eat

I keep giving Jack pieces of banana and sometimes peas even a few corners of toast. The only thing he's managed to feed himself is two scraps of black construction paper and a kernel of dry dog food.

Irish Need Not Apply

How many people do you know that will proudly recite how many quarters, eighths and one sixteenths French, German, Irish, Cherokee, Jamaican, and Italian they are when asked? How many will proudly share with you a family recipe from the old country when asked? Or agree the Statue of Liberty is a powerful symbol of America? Are they the same people who would vote for the politicians in this video? Or chant USA in the face of a child who's skin is brown?

This Saturday

I'll be skating here this Saturday.

http://www.thehotrodhoedown.com/