Go Go Speed Poster!

Ah! Too many things! Must post quickly!

-NaNoWriMo is going well. Word count is a little behind but the chapter by chapter approach is going great. My primary success metric is posting a chapter every second day on the other blog, and so far, so good.

-you can only ask a two-year old to handle so much stuff in a week, so don’t be surprised when they go into an atomic meltdown by week-end. And since he was really tired, we got a nostalgic reminder of his old night terrors. But he slept in today and was back to his wonderful self, so no harm done.

-I am growing a moustache to raise awareness of prostate cancer, as well as just to grow a moustache. I don’t know if I’ve ever really grown one before, having been a goatee dude, with an occasional beard occurence. It’s going well, except I drifted off while shaving in the shower and accidentally shortened one side, forcing me to match the other side too. It’s not a hitler ‘stache, but it’s uncomfortably close to the Stan Laurel. I will disguise it with general stubble for the next few days until I can return it to its intended shape.

-Does it seem wrong to anybody else that the kiwis we buy at the grocery story come from Italy? I have no grasp of geography or botany, but aren’t kiwis a tropical fruit? Italy’s not tropical. Kiwis are frequently one of the fruits in a ‘tropical blend’ juice or a ‘tropical’ fruit salad.

Could be good, probably won’t be.

Ah, sleep. One of the behaviors that some parents fool themselves into thinking they have any say in the matter. It took a very long time for me to realize the little dude sleeps when he sleeps and we just have to ride it out.

You can make small adjustments, create a good sleep environment, and try to hold to a schedule, but don’t get bummed out when things go sideways. Today is an example of sideways sleeping. Max spent the day with his mom while I worked on my NaNoWriMo project (which is going great, thanks for asking. check it out yourself by clicking the link over on the right). She’s currently out at a social function/ volunteer event, and I was in charge of post-dinner entertainment and bedtime. Well, bedtime was pretty easy. Easy because he passed out in my arms an hour and  a half before bedtime was supposed to start. That’s the consequence of a long fun day with no nap,I guess. So now I’m hoping we get a lucky break and he sleeps until his regular time of 6AM, but I have a bad feeling that he’ll be up and ready to start his day in the dark, dark night. It could be a long day for mom and me.

At first, I felt guilty that he fell asleep so early on my watch. But honestly, what was I going to do? I could have engaged in a long and unpleasant keep awake campaign, but do I really want to make my sleepy dude miserable for the sake of routine? And I’ve had limited success keeping him awake anyway, so getting worked up over it was pretty pointless. So let’s roll the dice and see what we end up with tomorrow.

 

Blogging after 11PM? Who let me stay up this late?

I’m trying to get a lot done this month, maybe too much, and it’s already getting precarious. Tonight a concert deftly slipped in and took the time that was going to be alloted to writing and exercising.  Was it worth it? Definitely. Gord Downie and the Country of Miracles put on a dynamic and fun show. But still, the piper must be paid and so here I am. Officially, I  could just forget blogging tonight, but it’s on my big big list  of too many things  to do so I’m going to churn out something.

The focal point of the show tonight was Julie Doiron, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist. For some people, she’s just the chick in Gord’s band, and that band is nothing but a side project of The Tragically Hip. Others may know of her own solo work, and the real music nerds (hello!) hold her in a place of reverence for her part in Canada’s first prominent alternative band, Eric’s Trip. So it was very strange that near the end of the show, she  looked  out into the audience and waved excitedly at a  friend of mine.

To be more accurate, she was waving at the sister of one of my high school friends. We’ve never hung out, but I get along with her and I really admire her artistic pursuits. In addition to singing in the band Bruce Peninsula, she also writes and produces theatre works, short stories, and collaborates with other artists. But regardless of the body of work she’s creating as an adult, she’s still a little sister in my mind. So it’s weird when a professional musician gets excited to see her.

On other fronts, the multimedia part of the show was great. The theme of the show was impermanence and the volatility of art, that as soon as the sound is created it disappears. And in between songs, Gord used an overhead projector, cutouts, and paint to create pieces of art to accompany the next batch of songs. From nothing to a stunning tableau in 30 seconds, and probably different each and every night.