A Spooky end to LoveWeek! Blah!

It has been a perfectly pleasant Halloween. Max has had a fantastic time going door to door, and is still having fun handing out candy. The final costume decision was puppy dog. For those out there who were wagering on the outcome and picked ‘puppy dog’, congratulations!

It’s been really nice to see a steady stream of kids to our door. The last 2 years have been kind of pitiful, with only a handful of kids each year. Whatever the reason, the kids have returned and it’s ben fun giving them candy.

On to the daunting challenges segment of our program. Tomorrow NaNoWriMo starts, and I’m going to do this thing. To make it harder, I will be blogging the fruits of my hurried writing on a separate blog (it’s the link on the right  hand side over yonder, if you’re so inclined). How will I manage to write and average of 1700 words every day, and edit the mess before unleashing it on the public, and continue doing this blog, and keep an eye on Max during the day, and get to the gym to combat my growing midsection, and do any paying work that comes along?Wish I wasn’t so soft and whiny when it came to sleep deprivation. Oh well, pitter patter, let’s get at ‘er.

 

 

LoveWeek Still? I love a bargain!

Max and I went Halloween shopping today. To be accurate, this is the 3rd or 4th Halloween shopping event that either involves or focuses on him so far. This is his fault because he looks so adorable in every costume he puts on. Ape? Cute. Dog? Cute. Pooh Bear? Don’t even get me started.

This time I planned to get something, anything, for myself. As usual, I started to seize up with the paralysis of choice. If you ask me ‘what do I want to be?’ I look at you with a fearful and confused look in my eye. What do I want to be? What truly represents me? Why do I over think every decision in my life? Can’t I just pick something and relax?

Well, I found the catalyst that pushed me past the critical decision-making threshold-cheapness! Specifically, a 50% off all Halloween items at Zellers. I won’t pay 15 bucks for a cheap vampire cape, but evidently 7.50 is a perfectly reasonable sum.

A big part of the appeal is the large variety of nonsense I could buy for very little money. Instead of having to carefully pick one costume idea and spend my meager funds on that, I could pick shoddy accoutrements from a bunch of disguise ideas.  I bought the cape, a pair of glow in the dark handcuffs, deluxe makeup kit with vampire fangs and glow in the dark fake nails, a wig and gloves and hat for the wife, a devil mask, and another set of kid-friendly makeup, all for 35 bucks. I hope no one at the store thought I was implying anything about my dear wife when I was asking Max  “should we get a broom and witch’s hat for mommy?”.

Now I can finally realize my secret dream of being a vampire millionaire detective (wasn’t that a show on Fox?). There’s probably a moral to this story, but heck if I know what it is right now. But I do know that relaxing and going with the holiday spirit made the whole thing a lot more fun. I may have reclaimed yet another holiday/special event from my anxious childhood. Score!

LoveWeek continues! Hooray for The Wiggles!

(A note to people without children in their lives: The Wiggles are a musical act who entertain children, not a strange erotic dance for adults)

We went to the Wiggles concert last night, and I am once again overwhelmed with the sheer effort and dedication shown by these gentlemen. when they set out to entertain kids, they put their backs into it. Literally.

This year’s theme was “The Wiggly Circus”, with acrobatics, a ringmaster, new circus-themed songs, all alongside the regular antics of a Wiggles show. Keep in mind that 3 of the 4 Wiggles are over 40.The oldest of the bunch  (Jeff, 57) was up in the air and doing hand stands, and to misquote an old episode of the Simpsons, “let’s see your grandfather do that!”.

From the start of the show until the end they put everything they have into giving a great show for the kids. It’s not for the money, since they’re sitting on giant piles of cash already. It’s not for the fame. They could film one movie a year and have the same rabid fan base, without touring the world every 2 years and playing 2 shows a day in every major nad not so major city.  When you watch them perform, you can see that they believe that what they’re doing is important, and should be done well. Entertaining and teaching the kids is serious work, but they remember that it’s fun work too.

I noticed that they made sure to pick up every rose and picture brought by the audience for Dorothy the Dinosaur, and they read every sign that was held up for them. No matter how much time they had to spend wading through the audience, they reached everyone. Their entire show was designed to focus on the kids out in front of the stage and make them all feel special.

There were several instances where there was a little slip-up or mistake on stage, and each time the Wiggles would acknowledge it and laugh it off. Think about how important a lesson this is for kids. If you’ve ever tried to calm down a hysterical child who is wretchedly disappointed that they made a mistake, you know that learning to cope with your own mistakes is a big deal. I’ve bellyached about my own fear of failure before, so use that as an example of how far into adulthood this can reach.

I am an unabashed fan of the Wiggles. They present an image of everything I want to be as a dad and as a male role model: patient, confident, caring, and committed.