Soup

The Dora-themed pasta floated in the broth, surrounded (very sparsely, I might add) by vegetables. Into his mouth went monkey heads, backpacks, and Swiper the Fox clones. Finally, there was only one piece left - a rather ragged looking section torn from a star.

"What's that?" he asked.

"Pasta!" I replied as he fished it out with a spoon.

"That's a M though!"

I grabbed the spoon before it reached his mouth and forced Lara to come and look at the bowl - otherwise, maybe she wouldn't have believed me. The pasta was indeed an M, and my child is a freaking genius.

Weekly Wheneversday #24

... good thing it's not Daily Wednesdays...

Weekly Link:
These Volkswagen Ads show film fanatics talking about how Ghostbusters is really a story about the obesity crisis in America, Mary Poppins is just the Exorcist with songs, and Star Wars is really just a remake of the Wizard of Oz.

Weekly Video:
Wooden mirrors...




Weekly Writer's Block:





Weekly Wager:
At what point after entering the pedestrian walkway entrance at Place d'Orléans mall will Kiernan's legs mysteriously give out on him?
The odds:
Right inside the door: 2:1
Halfway down the hall: 3:2
End of the hall, as soon as the mall threshold is crossed: 5:3
None of the above: 1:10

Weekly Wednesday #23

... Now for the first time in Friday-o-vision!

Weekly Revelation:
Yesterday at about 2:30pm a coworker mentioned an event happening "tomorrow"... I thought to myself "Wasn't that on Friday and not tomorrow?" and then discovered it was Thursday yesterday, and not Wednesday. Then I was too busy getting groceries to post anything last night. I'm not sure what happened this week, but I hope I had fun on my missing day.

Weekly Link:
Enhancing a digital video using higher resolution still photographs -- These students will make a lot of money. The before/after video is amazing.

Weekly Word:
Fruck. Only half of the times the R is silent. As in "Daddy, a fruck! And a 'nother fruck!" Of course, in the mall there's a "fireTRuck" and a "towTRuck"... but as I walk by a group of nuns it's always "'NOTHERFRUCK DADDY!!!"

Weekly Addictive Game:
Reset Generation. It's nice to find an original game, then crappy when you finish the 1 player story mode, then awesome when you can sign up for free and play live against other players for maximum replayability. If you have an account and play, add cynic_lite to your friends list!

Weekly Philosophical Discussion:
More on frucks: Driving down a road devoid of trucks, I hear from the back seat "A fruck daddy! And a 'nother fruck! Oh! 'Nother fruck!"
"Where are the trucks, I don't see any trucks." I ask.
A brief pause to consider, then "Maybe frucks oer'dere daddy!"

I shouldn't blog about customers, but...

This weekend, the brick-and-mortar version of my wife's online store opened in the mall. Woohoo!

Now, I happened to be in the store yesterday, and I fell into the habit of eavesdropping on passers-by. The cries of "Ohhhh!" and "Awwww!" as they see the giant posters in the window of the cute kids, then come in.

Along walks a pregnant lady, her young son, and his grandmother. Can you say target market?

"Oh, look, a new store!" says sweet, lovable grandma as she slows down her pace.

Pregnant lady barely pauses, glances in, and snaps "It's cheap quality clothes." and walks on.

Excuse me? What? Trust me, I am well experienced with the hormonal rage that can build up inside a pregnant lady, or maybe you just wanted to leave the mall, but screw you.

Come in, look at the product, listen to my wife's factoids about how this line is made in the lululemon factory in BC and how all our products are made by Canadian companies. Touch the organic pyjamas and the fleece-lined change pads. Then I dare you to tell me the product is crap.

Hopefully grandma will come back and shop, then mom will be all "Oh, wow, where did you get this awesome stuff?"

Weekly Wednesday #22

Weekly Image:

Weekly Link:
The Impossible Task of Cutting Plastic Out of Your Life

Weekly Video:
I found this so sketch by Olde English hilarious. I've watched it four times so far, and I'll probably watch it again when I preview this blog post. Or maybe I'll take a break from blogging and watch it again now.

Weekly Workplace:
Another password change, so I've been there for six months!

Weekly Wondering:
Did the anonymous commenter from last Wednesday break down and watch the Weekly Video?

Random things I notice on Treehouse TV

- Before getting his own show, the Diego appearing on Dora seems to have been voiced by a post-pubescent teenager, and Baby Jaguar didn't talk. I guess when they decided to spin him off they were all "Wait, how old is he? And who's going to be his Boots-like-sidekick?"

- The costume designers of Hi-5 go to great lengths to add patches or random swatches of cloth in order to prevent cleavage from appearing on a kids show. It doesn't always work for Kimmee.

- There's a new show called Noukie and Friends. Noukie is a 3D-rendered Winnie the Pooh clone, and her friend Paco the Donkey looks like Eeyore. There is no match in A.A. Milne's world to their friend Lola the cow, so maybe that's how they avoid copyright issues.

- Fifi and the Flower Tots hovers barely above Max & Ruby and Miss Spider in its level of annoyingness.

- The songs on Yo Gabba Gabba all sound the same to me. It's all beeps and whistles for those young people! And now I have Party in my Tummy going through my head. I love how the Super Martian Robot Girl segments are designed by Evan Dorkin, who used to draw one of my favourite comic characters, Milk and Cheese.

- Another thing about Noukie and Friends -- I know how they stretch a 3D "skin" over a 3D "skeleton" to make characters look more realistic, but is there nothing that could be done by the animators to prevent the fact that when she walks, Noukie the bear has a nigh-constant case of camel toe? Did I mention the characters don't wear clothes? I can't find an image online to show you that isn't conveniently cropped at waist-level.

Lesbians were not covered in the hygiene manual...

So I pulled into a parking spot at the mall and began stuffing things I didn't want stolen under the passenger seat.

From the back seat I Kiernan exclaimed, "What's that o'erdere?"

"I dunno," I said as I adjusted the laptop bag to show passers-by that it contained not a computer, but merely Tupperware from lunch. "What is it?"

"Kissing!"

I glanced up to see the car parked two spaces away, where two teenage girls were making out hardcore in the front seat. "Ah. Lesbians." I said aloud before my brain stopped my vocal cords.

Now, Kiernan is at the age where he'll mimic just about anything. We had him running back and forth between the kitchen and the living room the other week saying "Nice bum, mommy!" "Nice bum, daddy!", and a friend of ours who was visiting on the weekend accidentally had him going "Tastes like ess!" for a few minutes at lunch.

I casually unloaded the child from his car seat as I heard the girls exiting their car behind me, their sapphic tongue wrestling apparently done for the moment.

As we walked all the way into the mall behind the two girls, is it bad that I was thinking if Kiernan would only yell "LESbee'ing!" it would make an even better blog post?

...or maybe since he loves loud farewells I should have whispered to him to say "bi"...