library class?

"We thought that since we have home-schoolers, we'd just try to show them how to use the library, because [the students] don't get that if they're not in school," Berry said.

This from an article here, which I found at Home Education and Other Stuff, a great read if you homeschool.
The article was really long and wordy, and honestly, I've read enough today to have not bothered with the entire article. Plus, having gotten to the quote above, I just had to hop over here and write/rant this.
I've got half a mind to give it the old, "Oh no she didn't!" rant, but that gets us nowhere. So instead I'd like to just say that, as homeschoolers, we are generally familiar with the library. Many of us spend much of one day a week at the library. Sometimes we even call it library day, so quaint. We know how to search online for books, how to use the hold/reserve option and even a little something about Dewey and some sort of decimals.
Add to the fact that we homeschool, or home educate as some prefer. By nature we see things to teach our kids. We find interesting tidbits to share, as if the whole world were a knowledge buffet. Wouldn't we then teach our kids about the library? When do kids in schools visit the library? Do they have library class?
We like the library and have fun there. We're there so much the staff recognizes us. Sometimes we run into other homeschooling families we know. Sometimes we see people we don't know, but we can tell they homeschool.
I'm not saying the program in the article is a bad thing, but I love those misguided sentiments that seem to think homeschoolers need help at the library. Honestly, the library is pretty self explanatory, even if you were to just wander in off the street having never been inside one before.
I'm done near ranting, because if I dwell on that quote . . .
Oh no she didn't . . .

iron chef america

I don't really like the American version of Iron Chef. I do however adore the original Japanese show. I have an especially soft spot in my heart for Morimoto, my all time favorite Iron Chef.
I really wish that the episode that I am now kind of watching were just a ploy to get Rick Bayless across kitchen stadium to stick a knife in Bobby Flay's ribs.
I just don't like Bobby Flay. I never have. Back when he was grillin and chillin, I always waited for the other guy to just whip his ass one day. I don't even remember the other guy's name, and I'm not googling it right at the moment either. Chances are though that if there were such a thing as justice he'd have the contract with Food Network and not that butt nugget Flay.
I would like to see Flay and Jamie Oliver fight. That's one of those moments that would just truly be golden. Of those two, which is the biggest geek? I can't really say the things I most want to about these guys as I'd like to keep this whole thing at least PG-13ish. I'll say honestly that I could take them, probably not at once as I just don't trust either of them in a fight. But seriously . . .
I'm not sure about Bayless. When I've seen him on some cooking show . . .hmmm, have I ever?
I kind of feel sorry for Alton Brown when I watch this. It seems as if he sold himself to get the good show, and then some evil corporate overlord came up with the idea to make Iron Chef suck, looked through the pile of contracts for souls and picked poor old Alton.
Anyway, chalk the rant up to disgruntled jealousy. I'm sure that's what it is. Okay, it's mostly that Bobby Flay sucks, but there's also the disgruntled jealousy.

almost soccer season

Sitting under my left hand and the left side of the keyboard are the forms to register Big Brother and myself for the spring soccer season.
I've been coaching his various teams since his second season making this roughly our third year. We have two eight week seasons, spring and fall, so it's been about six seasons. As well as coaching, I have played on an adult team a few times in the last three years. I totally missed playing this past fall as the season snuck up on me while I waited for the phone call. Apparently a bunch of my teammates played a summer season and needed a break, so our team didn't quite form in the fall. Nice of the bunch of butts to bother calling.
I played some high school soccer when my tiny private/christian school grew too small to field a football team. I did play one season of football meaning I practiced hard all season and played roughly 20 seconds of the very last game. We did in fact suck. The last of the guys big enough to play graduated that year, so we switched to soccer for the next school year. Again, we sucked.
I also played basketball, but that has yet to come up really, though Big Brother may want to play more sports as he is now seven years old.
Momma and I, being the good punks that we claim, have been sort of anti-sport. I didn't have great memories of my sporting days, though none of the horrid jock stories some kids have. She just never cared much for sports.
I also claim my Atlanta based childhood as driving me to anti-sport type attitudes. That's a whole other rant for a whole other day though.
Add all this to the baseball strike a few years ago and Michael Jordan ruining basketball and the fact that I never really like football to begin with.
Even so, I always remember remembering soccer fondly. Now that it's become a part of our lives, I've grown to really love the beautiful game.
I need to pretend to exercise a little, try to be in shape for next season. I'm not a bad player all things considered, and even without being in shape, I can build up some small amount of stamina over the course of the season. I'm not in horrible shape, no extra weight or major health issues. I could stand to stop smoking of course, but I play with guys that will light up at half time regardless of whether or not we have subs that day.
I'm getting more and more excited. Even just proofreading through this thing is working a little magic. I need to scoop the yard of the dog placed landmines. It's pretty dangerous out there in the winter as I'm a lazy s.o.b. But once I get that little scent of soccer on the horizon, it's time to get scooping. You'd think the other scents inherent to the current dog based issue would be enough of a force, but it doesn't really work the kind of odorous magic one would expect. Also, see "lazy s.o.b." above.
Now, I wonder if John Holt wrote any books about coaching youth soccer . . .

is myspace evil, or is it those damn kids?

Some homeschool moms have discovered Myspace and got freaked out by it. Some of the kids they found talked dirty, discussed drinking and drug use at parties, have "friends" with booty pictures. Some of them found personal information that could lead a pervert straight to their innocent daughters.
Is Myspace evil? Myspace is nothing more than any number of websites that were designed for the intended purpose of adult socialization. One could argue that it's no different, basically, than Blogger or even HomeschoolBlogger. The main difference is the open nature of Myspace in that it doesn't specifically cater to any single demographic or group and is newer, fancier, full of music and pictures and yes, booty.
I will admit that the shot of panties, booty and a little bit of a plaid skirt is a nice diversion. These pictures are racey, but the site does work to keep actual nudity out. A lot of the booty shots can take one directly to a link to a site off of Myspace where one can see even more. I've also found that the wrong word in a Google search can bring some unintended viewing.
Due to the open nature of Myspace, one is always a click or two away from a picture of booty. One is never more than a click away from something personally questionable at any time the computer is online.
Is there evil at Myspace? Well, I'd personally say that any evil is in the horrible pages you people's kids are putting up. The evil is in all those annoying glitter letters and the Fallout Boy song that starts playing when I click the link. And if you want, you can set your child's Myspace profile to members only, and no one not on their friends list can get in.
Myspace has groups of all sorts, people of all sorts, pictures of all sorts. After joining, members are invited to customize their profile page, to seek out "friends," join groups (basically boards, kinda like at Yahoo) upload pictures, blog. Everyone typically has an avatar, many people opting to use an actual picture of themselves or a family picture. These images are sort of your face at Myspace and can be just about any image you choose to upload to the site.
Friends, in Myspace terms, is a really loose term. On my page you might learn that, in addition to my wife, my friends include the Reverend Horton Heat, Rosie Flores, Fatlip, The Debonaires, and even more bands that I don't really know. As well you will find friends that I've known for years, some close by and some hundreds of miles away. It's a neat way to find people with similar interests, to listen to music and read some really varied blogs. You can use a variety of searches to find actual friends who may also be on Myspace.
I have no good segue to my next issue. I'm astounded at parents "learning" shocking things about their kids. If your children are on Myspace, are friends with booty picture people, like to attend parties with drinking and drugs, how are you not already aware of this? How has your family gotten to a point where you are hiding things from each other? Do you ever look past the booty pictures at the child and figure out the initial motivation? Do your kids just like being sneaky and hiding things?
I sincerely hope that I and my wife and our children can always be open and honest with each other. I hope we can always be close enough to share our interests and our hopes and our fears and our problems.
If you want, visit Myspace and see for yourself. Go to my profile if you want to. You can see the homeschooling groups there while your visiting. It's free! Why not?

how's them limits comin?

How many days straight has Big Brother not even bothered getting clothes on? and would he bathe if I didn't make a point of it? Maybe I should take him grocery shopping in his pajamas, or to the library.
How much candy can a child eat at 2.5 years old? Can he eat his weight in candy in one day?
How many random snack/meals can I come up with to feed them? This one, while having no answer, has been fun to ask. In and amongst the candy feeding frenzy we have managed to get some amount of noncandy food into two little bellies.
Tomorrow is Momma's late night. She doesn't go into work until 5:00, so I'm forcing the rest of us, and her if she wants, out of the house to do something. I don't do outdoors and cold, so maybe we can squeeze in the library visit we seem to keep missing.
random ramblings . . .off . . .now!

transition part B

I'm not new to homeschooling or the concept of unschooling. I have delved into unschooling more lately and have been finding a lot of truth in the philosophy.
In the wide world, homeschoolers are often seen as sort of outside the mainstream. Within homeschooling circles, we unschoolers are often the outsiders. The rest of the world has plenty of opinions about unschooling when they first hear about it. The entire concept runs counter to what society believes about childhood and education.
Unschooling is really simple. Trust your kids to learn. Parent them without controlling them. Offer them everything you reasonably can, also known as the real world. Children are born learning and will always learn assuming some outside agent doesn't step in and try to teach.
As I transition, I find that I just cannot agree with so much that I see. I feel like an outsider in more ways than just as an unschooler.
I see this most evident in my internet usage patterns lately. A lot of boards I used to visit just don't quite appeal to me anymore. So many parents that I used to feel camraderie with I no longer feel comfortable discussing things with if the discussion is at all about children. I can't give them answers they want to hear when the discussions lean toward kids or parenting issues. The answers I do have can bring out some pretty intense debate, disagreement even anger in other parents.
I don't claim to have all the answers, but even just a different opinion is sometimes enough to skew an entire topic. Very often, the unschooling point is that different opinion.
This is the side of the transition that I expect to have the most fun with. We've never been like the other families, and now we are even less like other families, or are we just like less families? I don't know if I care honestly. I do care about my kids, and they and my wife are the people I care most about. So they are the people that whose opinions I'm going to concern myself with.
And each day I will be a better parent. Each day my kids will see the options they have. We will grow and learn and love while relaxing and playing. We'll watch movies and eat candy if we want to.

transition part one

Very middle? Still just beginning? Near the end?
I am in the middle of a personal transition from being a controlling father always on the verge of shouting, or worse, to bcome a father that doesn't do those things.
I'm blaming it in part on "those unschooling women" as I put it to my wife. She sees what I'm trying to do, and we are still both coming to terms with it. We need to discuss it and come together on it, but we have time.
I wrote about limits recently, and part of the philosophy behind unschooling is removing limits. TV is not inherently evil and doesn't breed zombie children. Candy isn't a drug and will not make junkies out of children. These are not the only limits parents tend to place on kids, but these are the two that seem the hardest to get passed for people new to unschooling.
As part of our/my transition, we have had total candy days lately. We stopped saying NO to The Boy when he asked for candy. We offered other options and prepared other options. He was able to eat what he wanted. Big Brother has had the same removal of limits and has enjoyed some candy. His big thing has been Pokemon on the Gameboy for days (weeks?) and stopped today to watch a movie.
Basically, I've decided that rules won't make us happy. They are basically an invented reason to fight your kids. We have decided instead to follow a couple of basic principals. We respect each other and we don't tear up the house. Those cover basically anything that we are truly concerned about without having a whole list of unreasonable demands on the boys and what they do with their time.
The hard part is what Sandra Dodd refers to as voices. We all have those voices of parent and grandparents telling us what we should do, how we should parent. Sometimes those voices are actually physical, maybe over the phone, maybe just memories. Those voices might also just be other homeschooling parents telling us about their "right" way. Wherever those voices come from, they often tell us things that are incorrect, unhelpful, or worse, damaging to our relationship with our kids and family.
The hard part is stopping what you did do, how you were, in order to do a better job. I see the importance of what I'm doing, but that doesn't make it easier. I've never been one to listen to those voices, but some of them have slipped through and seemed to make sense. In addition, some of the tools my parents used were tools I didn't want to use. I did use some of them that I didn't take the time to consider.
So I'm basically at a point where I'm reassembling my tool box. I have to rethink so many actions and reactions and decide each time how I really want to behave. Nothing can be allowed to just come out or just happen. Nothing just happens as a parent, though we often don't take the time to think about what we do.
I'm no longer a reactionary parent, and each time I think through something, I find that I and my boys are happier for it. I can't help but wonder about the transition. Will I ever be through it? or should I just stop looking at it as such? I'm guessing that what I'm doing now is just the opening bell of what's to come. Instead of finishing the transition, the transition will just open up into the rest of our lives.

the limited homeschool

Some people homeschool as a limiting agent. I read a comment to a blog earlier today in which a mother proudly stated the things to which her children have no exposure. Admittedly, many of this type of homeschooler is choosing to home educate due to religious belief. And in a sense, I can completely understand this motivation. I often see our family's motivation in a similar but different sense.
There are aspects of a public school education that I do want to limit our exposure to. I say "our" because the children aren't the only losers in the public schools. I can rant about the family dynamic being ruined by gschools some other time.
I want to limit my kids' sexualization to a naturally ocurring part of human life. I don't want the disaster-waiting-to-happen that I see as natural in the setting of public schools whereby children are exposed to sex in a most unhealthy and bizarre situation.
I want to limit my kids association with drugs. My own stance on drugs is actually very liberal. I can rant about the war on drugs on a whim, but I don't want to drop my kids into one of our nation's largest arenas for drug sales.
I want to limit the exposure to my family of the entire school system. When I pass schools, I have pictures of buzzing lights, stress and tiredness, and the fact that everything outside the window is so much better than sitting at this damn desk. I see boring or mean or stupid teachers outnumbering the good ones, the nice and intelligent teachers, the ones you hear about but don't always meet.
I want to limit my kids exposure to the attitudes bred in the public schools. I want to give them broad open avenues full of choices and experiences. I want to offer them all music, not limited to what their "friends" at school tell them is cool. I want them to see art and spend time with it, gazing at it as much as they want. I want to give them warm sunlit corners and long books. I want to give them Fats Waller and Hank Williams in the same day The Clash and Mozart.
Homeschooling shouldn't be about limits. Schools are places of limits and raising hands and walking in line. We limit our actions based on mutual respect both as parents, kids and homeschoolers. Beyond those limits, we have a whole borderless world. We can stay at home and play video games or we can go do something. And in the end, my limits aren't really very limiting. If anything they allow for even greater variety in our options which is the point.

about what I said . . .

Yeah, I reread what I wrote about Jamie Oliver and his cookbook, and had some thoughts. First, considering the term "faggoty haired," I don't want people to think that I don't like gay people. I think that gay people are basically just like straight people. I could be wrong, but essentially, booty is booty, chocolate/vanilla and different strokes. So why say "faggoty?" Because there just isn't a better way to describe that hair.
Second, I have to say that Momma actually likes Jamie Oliver. I assure her that it's okay. She's also flipped through his cookbook, which brings us to number three.
I still haven't checked out the recipes. I imagine it's a bunch of upscale restaurant crap that I won't actually cook at home. That being said, it is a cookbook, and I will end up checking it out. I will readily admit to anything I end up cooking and will be fair.
To be fair, the guy needs a comb. Seriously! But I can't fault him having a cool job.

bush-9/11

Apparently, everything Bush has done, including treating the American public like idiots and stomping on civil rights is working. The arguement? We haven't been attacked since 9/11, so the warmongers must be doing something right.
Right?
Well, I'm sure that makes sense, in Bizarro World. But here in America, we used to demand just a bit more. We used to be a country that was based on freedom, on the rights of each man, woman and child.
I've been sneaking out at night to peak in our neighbors' houses. I don't tell them about it, but I carry a small step ladder with me, just in case, and I peak in their windows. I'm sure they are all out to get me because someone, several months back, tossed a chunk of concrete garden border into our yard, breaking part of a small street lamp type light fixture.
After I peak in their windows, I snoop through their trash. If I can, I rifle through their mail before they take it from the mail box.
It must me working, because I haven't had anything thrown at my house or into my yard.

They that can give up essential liberty for a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. -Benjamin Franklin

This is my new favorite quote. My wife first introduced me to this quote which has been a favorite of hers for a while.
We are not a nation of babies that need our screams and needs coddled. We are a nation of free men and women. We are a nation founded on principals of equality and freedom and the desire to find our own happiness.
Children need protection, though sometimes they don't understand. Men and women must stand up, protect themselves and take the rights they deserve.
The Bush family and their cronies did not invent freedom nor did they give it to us. They can take it away, but only because we are letting them. We really have to blame ourselves when we let the current administration steal from us our liberty in the name of safety, and we can only blame ourselves when what they called safety turns out to be something much more sinister than just the greed for money and power that they display through their lies.
We didn't cause 9/11 and it isn't America's fault that some Muslim assholes misread their scriptures. We can blame Muslim countries for idling about while the terrorists besmirch their name, but we can't blame Islam for the failings and evil of some of that religion's adherents. Bush has not saved us from another 9/11, nor is he making us safer.
And as a post script, let me add that I don't really spy on my neighbors. I am a little nosy and peak out the window as they drive by, but I don't really snoop about and spy on them. Our self-important president does just that though. He snoops around, peaking at our stuff, sniffs our butts and taps our phones. He has lied, does lie and will lie.
Clinton lied about sex and got impeached. Bush lies about everything and has gotten several thousand Americans and Iraqis killed. How many innocent lives equal the cost of the pretend safety he offers?

good ol' Thomas

Imagine my surprise. Me, being the punk rocker that I am, never set out to enjoy half the things that appeal to me as a parent. There are those things you know about before kids come along, even if in passing, and I was somewhat aware that there was such a thing as Thomas the Tank Engine.
Big Brother had an extended passing fancy with trains, probably starting when he was between two and three, like The Boy. The wooden track was purchased for him in the pre-Boy years, though Thomas had not entered the equation at this point. Trains in general were a delight for Big Brother, and one that took a back seat to other interests as he got older. I won't say that he lost interest in trains, he just got older, and his world got bigger.
Credit The Boy with discovering Thomas. I'm not quite sure how it happened. We came to posess two Thomas videos which may have been the start. Thomas is now a phenomenon in our house. Big Brother is almost as crazy about it as The Boy, but he is also into it differently.
Big Brother is slowly memorizing Thomas. We got a set of the original Rev. Awdry Thomas books for The Boy for Christmas, and we've been checking out and wearing out videos from the library. The Boy watches the videos and Big Brother ends up watching as well. Then Big Brother reads the books. Of the episodes we've seen of which we now have the original story in the book, he can tell you the subtle differences.
So I hear Thomas in the background, and sometimes I sit to watch with the boys. I've really grown to love the Thomas stories. How can you not love Ringo Starr and George Carlin reading about cheeky tank engines?
I love the story of the Thomas stories. A parent makes up stories for their child based on something the child loves. The characters take on a life of their own. Somehow these stories are written and published. Because they are good stories, they become somewhat classics. I rank Rev. Awdry with A. A. Milne. Sadly, due to the proliferation of Thomas, I fear that the original stories get somewhat lost, much like the original Winnie the Pooh stories. I dare not go into that rant just now.
I forget now where I was going with this. The Boy, as per usual, is sleeping with Bill and Ben, having added Percy for tonight. It's always Bill and Ben in the left hand, and sometimes someone else in the right. On a tangent, homeschooling edition, Bill, Ben and Percy are all 0-4-0 saddle tank engines. Big Brother has taken a different Thomas toy to bed, but I forget the name of this one. He is the tractor that loosens the big boulder that wreaks havoc on the island.

some gifts that stood out

This is not to demean the gifts given, the givers or anyone else. I love my family and appreciate the thoughts behind the gifts. I can't pretend that I always buy the best gifts, though I'd like to think I am good at getting people stuff.
So why do these gifts stand out? They all have their own interesting facets, but these three were especially notable for the reasons listed.
Lets start with the coffee. When I say I am a coffee snob, this is not intended to indicate that I like small cans of flavored coffee from the WalMart "gifts for people you haven't taken the time to know" section. Having said that, I will flavor my own coffee if I want to, but I still appreciate that, knowing I like coffee, someone got me something they thought I'd like. However, the only reason I didn't send it home with Grandma is because I hadn't written this humorous blog yet. After reading, you may decide that I still haven't written a humorous blog.
The only corporate name on the coffee is Zavida. The ingredients are listed as "100% Arabic coffee, natural and artificial flavors. No sugar added. Does not contain any nut products."
So far all of that sounds good. It's Arabica as opposed to the lesser quality Robusto. There are neither sugar nor nut products. So allergy issues are placated. Of course, if there are no nut products, then how did they flavor the hazlenut vanilla and the amaretto almond?
Now for the next gift. Momma and I are both cooks, but I'm the cookbook junky. I do use my cookbooks, or at least I use two or three of the nearly fifty. The newest one is good old Jamie Oliver. I've never really liked that guy. He does bring a little gayness out of me, making me want to be his wife so long as my own wife doesn't find out. The cook book has maybe one recipe for every seventeen pictures of JO's faggoty haired ass. Comb your hair you dink! They have combs in the UK?
Anyway, the food pics are really beautiful, as you would expect. This is one cookbook that I may not use much, and I kind of feel for whoever bought it for us. I appreciate the thoughts, but it won't be nearly as useful as the giver hoped.
Last gift to wonder about:
City Kidz die cast free wheel racer. What does that mean? Basically dollar store knockoffs of Hot Wheels. I'm not so brand concious that I care, and they belong to the boys, so as long as they like them, I don't care. That isn't at all the point.
The cars were produced in China and imported by a Canadian company. Most of Canada is English speaking, so the messages on the cars aren't their fault. I have to wonder though how the Chinese company making/painting these cars came up with the slogans to print on them. They look like typical Nascar style race cars. Then when you look closely you start to wonder. So here I will list the things printed on these cars.
On the yellow car:
Extra! Extra!
53 Spain
Two Way Power
Ka Boom
Tunnel
Good Boy
New Recovery

On the black car:
Outdoor
Pall Grace (this is the name of the driver I'm guessing)
Wheaton College
Correction Unit
High Class
Corper Team
Fun!

On the red car:
Bang
First Aid
Cusyom Built
Histortroom
Condos that

Any misspellings or unclear words are copied directly from the cars. I honestly don't know what to think. I do wonder if the American version of toys for import to China have equally odd phrasings that leave Chinese parents scratching their heads as they hand the toy of to their child. From reading through them, several words seem as if a Chinese person heard the English words and used them. Maybe these are words that came up most often in some sort of Google search and got a bit tangled in translation.
Those are the stand outs. There are always some odd gifts. It is Christmas after all. The odd nature of the gifts in no way compromises the love I feel for my family and my inlaws. I appreciate them for more than their gift buying savvy, so please understand that these are not complaints.

right behind me, or buncha savages in this town

or Men Alone II: the KY Connection
Clerks is on Comedy Central. I should be playing some music, and we have lots of new stuff that we got each other for Christmas. But I can't help it.
I really do love this movie. Sadly, Kevin Smith's other movies don't quite seem to measure up to Clerks in my opinion. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of the man's films, but Clerks has this special something. It's one of those random movies that just hits so many different points.
I didn't really plan to blog about the fact that I can hear this movie and see it in my mind. Is that bad?
Having said all that, I'll soon end up running through the Kevin Smith library, those of his movie which I own.

Random thougt:
What is it in people that drives them to hold opinions with no actual knowledge of the subject of their opinion? It's easy to jump to conclusions based on hearsay. It's easy to let a small amount of "knowledge" guide your opinions. I think too often, the leaders in society just give the party line. That line changes based on the postition of the particular leader, teacher, preacher, family. As a homeschooler, I'm loathe to use the perfect example because, as most homeschoolers, I'm sick to death of the "S" word. But the socialization arguement really is a prime example of what I'm saying. People will argue about socialization, will listen to the truth in well reasoned arguements from people who are actually homeschooling, and they will still deny that socialization happens outside of gschools.
That isn't the point though. The point is that people will argue wrongly, full of faith in what they say. You will disprove their arguement with reason, with direct quotes from real studies, duplicated results, and they will offer the sermon or lesson against what they believe is wrong. You can go online to their local library and put the book on hold for them, and they often still won't admit the truth.
Okay, rant off.

Effin-A blogs!!! by crikey!
I can waste more time jumping from link to link, starting with a couple of blogs that I actually care to read regularly. Then there's that random (currently it's a cold) reason that the day is especially lazy. I can read more blogs and still clean the kitchen and feed the boys. I manage to holler at them just enough most of the time. I get a decent little bit of television/video game time. But if I got paid dollars per blog read, I could . . . pay off a debt maybe?

currently reading

With the cold weather, I don't spend as much time sitting outside. And when all my lazing is done inside, I tend toward the computer as opposed to a book. Nothing beats sitting in the shade on a hot day with good book and a St. Terese pale ale from Highland Brewing.
So, while I stand outside and shiver and smoke, I'm reading Rob Roy by Sir Walter Scott. He's one of those writers I'd never gotten around to reading. I have to think I was aware of his having written, though having searched the library, I realized I'm very ignorant about his work.
Big Brother and I recently read Kidnapped as his bedtime book. Searching around the internet for information about time and setting of that book I came across references to Scott.
This is a "why I love homeschooling" moment really. Sitting here with the boys, letting them learn, I have been reading some great books, finding resources based on current interests and learning. We don't always learn together, and it's good that we follow our own interests. But very often, our different interests tangle together in interesting ways.
At this moment, Big Brother is reading to TheBoy. They just read The Bike Lesson and are now reading some random book.
Big Brother recently reread The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. We read through the Narnia books together a while back. I first enjoyed my own escape into Narnia as a child and was happy to share these books with my own boys. We have yet to see the movie, and it's likely it will not happen in the theater. The Boy isn't willing to sit through anything that doesn't regularly feature trains. I'm fine with that and used to waiting for the rental.
I think I'll restructure my own day enough so that we just watch movies from now until decent weather. I often think about a movie, but I also think that we should do something productive. At this point I usually turn back to the computer to see if any of the blogs or websites have updates because it's been an hour since I last checked on Home Education and Other Stuff or Punk Parents.

one week more

That whole "having kids speeds up time" thing, that just messes with me sometimes. Just one more week till Christmas. The boys and I have been such complete shutins lately that it seems to have crept especially quickly this year.
I have now wrapped three presents and ordered one more for Momma earlier. It's one of those gifts that will have her name on it, but we'll all enjoy it. Then there's the loot for the boys.
I haven't thought once about cooking for any of the three days that our particular holiday is dragged out to. We'll have a lovely Christmas Eve and Day, two weeks of rest before we drive south for a couple of days for the last family Christmas one week into the new year. I try to make pralines once a year, but those don't fly in Atlanta due to nut allergies, and no one here wants to take as much as I end up making. I may try to halve the recipe, but that might not work at all. I need to make more candy and learn all the intricacies.
Momma keeps mentioning new tattoos for Christmas, and I'm quite certain she knows exactly what she wants. I have too many loose ideas floating around my head, unfinished bits of tattoo ideas that I can't quite settle on.
I've been getting sucked into homeschool blogs lately. I never realized just how many people are posting the same kind of crap as me. I didn't think of doing this without having found a few of course and thinking . . .obviously not a lot . . .maybe I can do this. The problem is that it's like walking into, and here I'm stumped. I can sit here and jump from one link to another, all the while using as my excuse, I'll just bookmark the good ones and come back later. Certainly I can scan through and learn if it's something I want to read again. I can end up with ten tabs open at the top of my page, which I will wade through, Xing out of most. In the end, I while away the day in an attempt to find some blogs that I'll actually find interesting, jumping up periodically to holler at someone or fix a snack. The only reading that isn't the computer happens standing outside the back door smoking and shivering or taking care of a certain type of business best not mentioned.
So goes the past week I suppose. I haven't even written anything here because I keep reading blogs! I suppose that's how they get you.

slowing down

I don't know that slowing down is the right word for it. I've been moving pretty slowly since the end of monetarily fulfilling work for me. I think I remember a spell of laziness that I considered to be a bit of relaxing.
At some point in time, I could no longer honestly suggest that I was really being anything other than lazy. The house was getting messier and even dirtier in some areas. I've caught Momma one too many times cleaning things that I should have done. She works hard enough, so my lazy ass really needs to scrub the damn toilet.
The slowing down of which I speak is more what unschoolers might call deschooling. Mostly, I'm relaxing my attitude toward a lot of things having to do with the boys. I'm rethinking the concept of rules, making my expectations of them make sense. I've long known I need to work on the yelling and being angry dad.
I've always felt that I needed to expect a certain level of everything from the boys. I've demanded a lot of them that I never needed to. I've forced levels of behavior that are often ridiculous. Now I'm trying to undo some of that. It's a hard moment realizing that you don't meet the expectations that you have for your kids.
Just these early tentative steps have been paying off. Momma has noticed that I'm nicer these days. I think I could have listened to her a few years ago and saved us all some trouble. She has been a little short with the boys, but I think a lot of it was my negativity being so much that it trickled down. Had I been more relaxed from the beginning, she would also have been. She has tried to show me before how I was being a butt, but I was certain I was right and probably argued my point better.
That's parenting. I certainly didn't ruin the boys. They're everything you could want in kids really. And we can all be just a little happier and loving toward each other. I'll do my part by expecting more of myself than I do of them. I'll model how I should be rather than telling them how I think they should be.

ham and cheese scones

From Food Network, this was actually Emerill's recipe for bacon and cheese scones. I used country style ham instead of the bacon and didn't include the green onions as I didn't want that flavor in my scones.
His recipe called for six ounces of cheese, but after I'd grated about four ounces, it seemed like almost too much. I'll have to make these again with the whole six ounces.
They turned out really good. Seriously, ham, cheese and a scone? Did you wonder if it was going to be good? Silly ass!
I have to wonder if it has to do with geographic location, but every time I make a baked quick bread, I find that I need slightly more liquid than whatever recipe I'm using. I think Alton Brown's biscuit recipe may be the one that came out right. However, everything from my mother's biscuit recipe to James Beard's biscuits always need more liquid in the end. I'll generally measure out whatever the recipe calls for and proceed with the mixing. I can never get everything moist/sticky/incorporated without adding more liquid. The liquid of course is generally milk or buttermilk, and I never need more than a tablespoon or two extra. But it seems that, without fail, all baked quick breads require this same tiny bit extra.
Batter bread, muffins or pancakes for instance, always seem fine, even though muffins are baked. So instead of baked throughout this, I should possibly have worded it differently. Am I going to change it now? Hell no! That would take . . .like work? . . .or something?
yeah . . .

ramen sans packet

Late night hunger and nothing quick, see chips, cookies, any random snack at all; so what DO we have?
Two packs of ramen noodles, somewhere between 2 and 3 cups of chicken stock, some venison, portabella mushrooms, green onions. I sliced everything very thin, all the better to mix in the noodles.
Go ahead and boil the noodles if you want. They only take 3 minutes so you could wait. Stir fry/sautee the mushrooms, onions and deer meat. Toss in a little garlic and ginger, also sliced thin. Toss in some soy sauce and fish sauce, basically deglazing the pan, adding a little sesame oil even because it's really lovely stuff. Add your noodles and some chicken stock. Consider the whole 3 minutes to cook thing, I could happily have thrown the noodles in at this point and cooked them rather than precooking them. It also would have even saved the energy and water I suppose.
I wasn't quite happy with it. I added some more soy sauce and a little oyster sauce in a great what the hell moment, both of which came together, Wonder Twins style, to finish the job. It was delightful.
The deer was left over from Thanksgiving. The rest of the things are pretty much pantry items, depending on what the menu for the week looks like. The boys are lucky come lunch time tomorrow when they get the leftovers.
We still have a small amount of the venison and plenty of turkey. Tomorrow may be turkey salad sandwiches, followed by whatever the Joy suggest for leftover turkey. Tomorrow is turkey clearance day. All leftover turkey must go.

musical post

Lately, I and the boys have listened to mostly country. We whole heartedly avoid the pop stations that claim to play country. We have very close to us, downtown on Gay Street, one of the coolest radio stations I know of and you can visit and even listen at www.wdvx.com. So we listen also to some bluegrass and old folk music. As it is now Christmas season, we've also pulled out all the cd's of Christmas music, one of my favorites being Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker. We listen to a little bit of classical music, lots of the aforementioned country (think old/outlaw country) lots of punk and ska, and generally whatever we like.
Giving the kids that kind of variety is very important to me. We love different forms of expression, books, art, whatever we like basically.
Earlier today, sitting here at the brain magnet brand computer, The boy approached wanting to be on my lap, and of course he wanted me to find train pictures. I hadn't yet put any music on when he asked specifically for Johnny Cash. I was so happy. I know that it's a tiny bit selfish wanting the boys to like what I like. I do want them to develop their own taste in things, but I feel that providing them with variety is the best way to do that. Of course, that variety tends to consist of what Momma and I want to hear. Of course, they are welcome to find other stuff, which again, will tend to be what Momma and I like as that is what they are going to have access to.
I asked Big brother a few days ago what he wanted to listen to. He asked for Stevie Wonder. Sadly we don't own more than one Stevie Wonder album though we had checked out a greatest hits album from the library. We all enjoyed it (I'm going with DUH here) and I was happy that Big brother had remembered it fondly. We of course checked it back out on our very next library day.
A short time ago, as the Johnny Cash ended, I asked the boys what they wanted to hear next. I offered them Christmas music listing what we own, the Elf movie soundtrack, Stevie Wonder (the one of his albums we actually own, again, sadly), the Nutcracker, Squirrel Nut Zippers and a couple of compilations, Christmas Swing being one. Big brother asked for Stevie Wonder.
Now I'm old enough and punk enough to be a little cynical, cold, sarcastic etc. But Someday at Christmas holds a certain power, along with every other song Stevie Wonder has ever done. So of course I was delighted to play his request.
I also love that my boys are just as happy with Willie Nelson as Stevie Wonder as the Clash as Ozomatli. I have my fear of course of the teen rebellion days that I don't doubt are somewhere in the future. I also know that homeschool families tend to be a little closer, and we are not giving the boys much to rebel against. There are too many paths open to them for them to have to grow that rebellious nature. Then I have to wonder, is that drive to separate from the parents a natural phenomenon, or is it an outgrowth of those damn schools? By giving them such good music, will they one day rebel in favor of whatever replaces Britney Spears on the crap radio charts?
How's that for rambling?

pumpkin bread part 2

The aforementioned pumpkin bread spent nearly two hours in the oven. The recipe called for it to cook for an hour and fifteen minutes. I checked it at an hour and ten minutes. It wasn't even close, though the top was doming and browning beautifully. I continued to check it every ten minutes or so until the tester finally came out clean.
I pulled the bread and set it on the counter to cool and turned the oven off. I gave it a few minutes then ran a knife around the inside of the pan. I pulled the sides of the bread from the pan, turned it over and eased the bread out.
It left a nice size part of itself on the bottom of the pan, and through the hole I looked into the bread and decided it needed to cook a bit more. So I turned the oven back one and replaced the bread.
I let it cook as long as I could justify. I finally decided it was either done or it could go to hell, because it was coming out of the oven regardless. I allowed it a few more minutes to cool before the old invert/remove. After a few more minutes cooling sans pan, I cut into it.
The top is very very crusty, in a very good way. It's difficult to cut through neatly but oh so crispy! However, rather than a nice crumb it's just entirely too moist. I'm guessing the pumpkin itself was too moist, and perhaps that's why it took so long to cook and has such a gummyish consistency. It does have a great flavor, and may dry a little as it cools. I might also should have left it in the pan a bit longer.
Oh well, there's always next time.
For what it's worth, the recipe is Alton Brown's from the Food Network website.