It’s Never Too Late (unless you’re dead)

Much has been made of Colin Firth’s performance in “The King’s Speech” and I have no doubt it is deserved. I’ve been a fan of his ever since my good friend, Mimi, turned me onto ‘Pride and Prejudice’ back in the 90s. A few months ago when I was first hearing about the movie, I went in search of some information and stumbled onto an article about the writer of the screenplay, David Seidler. I just fell in love with Mr. Seidler and had intended to watch the Academy Awards, which I haven’t done in years, in hopes of seeing him. Since I was traveling that evening, it was not possible. But thankfully, he won, his speech was loaded to YouTube, and I was not disappointed:

Of course his story of George VI’s struggles and his own struggles with stammering have inspired many who have had their own speech issues, and I really appreciate Judiang sharing how it’s affected her. But Mr. Seidler is also an inspiration to anyone seeking to do something later in life when others may have written them off. I have to write him a fan letter!

Dear Mr. Seidler,

Thank you for that wonderful speech at the Oscars. It was just right. Thank you for being so humble and witty and real. What a powerful combination. If I were single, you would be a temptation despite our age difference. :D But mostly, thank you for not giving up on your dream.

Sincerely,
A newly devoted fan

For further edification:

Confessions of David Seidler, a 73-year-old Oscars virgin

Screenwriter David Seidler: ‘Being a stutterer puts a cloud over childhood’”

“Proud of his Dad’s work (but tried to talk his father out of writing TKS)”

March 5, 2011
Categories: Tangents . Tags: , , , , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 10 Comments

Twitter Encounters — Part 2

March 5, 2011

Yesterday, I was talking about Twitter having a positive effect on me. I did acknowledge one pitfall, and other than that, it’s been very positive and productive. But it’s imperative to reiterate Twitter is what you make it which means it matters who you are when you get there. And who are you? What are you about? Chances are good Twitter will reveal who you are whether you want it to or not. I’m not talking about your name or title. I’m talking about how you think and why. If someone talks long enough on Twitter, and it doesn’t take very much talking, they will reveal where they’re coming from. Even the alter egos cannot completely squelch their real selves.

Blue Ostrich

Two things dictate Twitter’s keen ability to reveal someone. First, being on Twitter means a person wants to be heard. There is no other reason to be there (that’s true of any online presence, i.e., blogs, forums, etc. or almost any conversation whether online or not). Let me say that again. There is no other reason to be on Twitter than a desire to be heard, and more accurately, a desire to be known and to know, and I don’t mean everything about someone but at least some aspect. Before anyone starts objecting, please realize I’m not saying this is a bad thing. It’s hardwired into us to desire being known, and it’s not so much in the sense of celebrity that we want to be known but being in communion with others, which can only happen in relationships — online or otherwise. Why do you think social media is so popular? It’s appealing to the basic instincts of everyone.

Second, the stacatto nature of Twitter makes it conducive to generating someone’s unvarnished thoughts. Someone said yesterday that Twitter invites the knee jerk. Yes, in many respects it does even if someone only retweets another’s thought. But doesn’t a knee jerk, i.e., a visceral reaction, usually reveal a lot about a person? It’s my experience that it does. In fact, it can oftentimes say a lot more about someone than seemingly thoughtful answers they may craft. Isn’t that why job interviewers throw job candidates curve balls? Aren’t they looking for the person’s involuntary reaction in order to take an accounting of them beyond the image they’ve created? As a long time interviewer of potential employees (mostly white collar but some blue), I can tell you yes, that’s what they’re looking for, and sometimes an honest response of, “I don’t know” or “I need to think more about that to answer” is completely acceptable. Depends on the question and of course, on the interviewer, but this interviewer thinks it’s often a great response. This is also acceptable on Twitter and can lead to some interesting discussion, and frankly, I’m suspicious of people who seem to have the answers to every question. No one’s that good, but that discussion is for another post.

I have much more to say about Twitter, but I suspect this post will go on so long that it will have trouble loading. So I’m saving most of it for later. But I do want to say that I find it infinitely fascinating that Richard Armitage has not been on Twitter, and I mean on Twitter as himself since he may very well be on Twitter. If my gut is still functioning properly (although it had a glitch awhile back LOL!), I suspect he is there anonymously. The man for all of his supposed reticence is a talker. I know there are those of you who will have a violent disagreement with me about this, but you’re mostly reacting to my choice of the word “talker.” That’s not an aspersion on him at all. When I say that I’m not saying he’s indiscreet. Certainly, he doesn’t talk about some of the things that some would like him to, but those who have any brains are not going to tell everything they know or even come close to doing so. First, it’s boring and second, it’s like dropping your pants and bending over. Wait. That’s a bad analogy. LOL!!! Uh, let me try that again but without analogy. Who wants all of their personal business known? No one I know of unless they’re dense and/or temporarily rendered dense by being desperate, e.g., Charlie Sheen. More about Charlie later. Maybe. That post is quite a piece of work. Not sure the public is ready for it.

edit: I found this article interesting. I’m not sure I entirely agree with it, but I agree with the dynamic. Perhaps I don’t fully agree because if someone analyzed my RAFrenzy account on Twitter, they would find I follow both “liberal” and “conservative” accounts, and I can assure you I’m not a moderate. :D

March 5, 2011
Categories: Tangents . Tags: , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 27 Comments

Twitter, the Pithy Maker

March 4, 2011

It’s amazing what Richard Armitage has prompted me to do. Well, he and some others.

I’ve been neglecting my blog lately but not really. Been doing something that will just make this blog better (picture me with a type of grin that even I’m not crude earthy enough to describe here). Of course I’ve been hanging out on Twitter, which harvested all sorts of guilt from me when I first started. But I think I’m almost over that; however, not quite or this post probably wouldn’t exist (yes, I have a sentence with but and however). What’s great is that I can rationalize anything if I want — can’t we all?

Seriously, the limitation of 140 characters on Twitter is helping me cut out the fat, and with someone like me who too often feels compelled to explain every cussed move I’m making, this is a good thing. You don’t want to read all of that, and I don’t either, and on Twitter, you can’t. Well, you can with Twitlonger and some other services. I just feel like I’ve failed when I have to go to Twitlonger, and really I feel my eyes start to shutter when I begin to read explanations that go on and on and well, aren’t funny and surely aren’t uh, pithy. But the best part of this pithy machine, aka Twitter, is that I now have a great explanation for SO (whose middle name is Pith) as to why I like to spend time there. Thankfully, he has noticed it in my writing, and now I can say, “See, see, this is a good thing.”

Recently though I will admit I’ve been like all the other dreaded onlookers on Twitter who are observing the destruction of Charlie Sheen. The guy set a Guiness Record for the quickest amassing of one million plus followers, and I know his secret. It’s not that he’s a famous wreck; there have been other famous wrecks on Twitter who didn’t get his kind of attention. It’s that on his way to hell, he’s pithy, and that naturally makes for a sensation on Twitter. Very sad but true. Not being funny here. More about Charlie later in another tangent. Yes, I get on a roll with these things, and it’s hard to stop. Anyone who has enough opinions for at least four people cannot help but get on tangents, and really, I would explode if I didn’t, so it’s a good thing. :D Need to slap myself for explaining that, but hey, I’m trying to fill out this paragraph so it’s more than a few sentences. If I wrote better, then I could write only three sentences, and you would be so wowed you wouldn’t care that it’s a short paragraph. See why I need to cut out the fat?

Where was I?

Yeah, Twitter is great for making me think about what I’m actually communicating, and I’ve had to take some risks in running something out there even if it wasn’t quite clear to the recipient. But I have a caution on that, which most thinking people will already know, but hey, I’m a thinking person, and I got carried away on Twitter, and you can too. So take note. I’m going to blame the cold medicine for my mistake, but really, if I’m honest, I had a shabby moment. So here’s the caution: if you’re going to be pithy and say something really sarcastic (key word is really), do it with someone who already knows you and gets your humor. I made the mistake of doing it with someone who didn’t know squat about me, and I got blocked. Yes, I was blocked by someone. I didn’t know it until a couple of weeks later, but man, it stung, and the worst part of it is that the person probably thought I was serious. Sadly, when you’re blocked, you can’t contact the person. I even thought about contacting them through another id to apologize, but that smacks too much of stalking. So I didn’t. I’m now chalking this up as a pitfall of getting up to speed on Twitter. See how easy it is to rationalize?

And now that Twitter almost has me at fighting weight on the pith, I may run a few laps to get ready for the big leagues on Tumblr.

Dropping some of the mask:

I can hear the wheels turning in the heads of some of you who are probably around my age. You have this notion that Twitter lowers your ability to be articulate because it just appears to be a lot of gibberish. I’m sure it can facilitate some gibberish. Ohmygosh, can it facilitate gibberish! But I don’t believe it does arbitrarily. It’s just a tool and up to each of us how we may use it. I’m choosing to experiment with it, and no, it’s not all as RAFrenzy. And you may ask why am I really messing about on Twitter? To make this the greatest blog since napkins were created? Or to simply deal with idle time? Maybe to be cute? LOL! I do think it will help this blog, but honestly, I have very little idle time and lost all hope of being cute years ago. Not being funny again. I have almost no idle time in my life, and I don’t want any. What I’m doing is learning the language of the future. Scratch that. It’s not the language of the future; it’s already here. It is the language my kids understand, and I want to understand it as well. Oh, I make them speak my language too, but it’s only fair that I learn how their generation communicates. That is enough to compel me to get in the flow of this.

edit: I guess WordPress hiccuped on me. This above is now my final post, but what posted before was not. Arrgh! That kind of stuff drives me nuts.

March 4, 2011
Categories: SO, Tangents . Tags: , , , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 21 Comments

Tangent — Micro Expressions and Beyond

Sorry to inflict my geek moment on you, but I can’t help myself, and if you’re into screencapping Richard Armitage, this might be of interest.

Last spring I was reading about an HD cinematic camera which could shoot frame rates at 100 times the usual. So what does all of this mean and why should you care? There are things that can now be seen which before could only be consistently captured with scopes (decidedly less detail than a camera) or speculated with mathematics, and usually that is so abstract for most as to be inconceivable and therefore blown off. But enter the Phantom Flex, and thankfully, as of a few weeks ago, there is now some fantastic video to show exactly how precise this camera can be.

I realize some may not be that impressed with this, but that’s because you have probably not watched much slow motion video. Most of it is a lot more blurry than this video above, so the detail in this is amazing. For any of you who have made screencaps, you know how frustrating it can be to fight the blur. Can you imagine the screen capture ability with this kind of video?! Mind boggling. It captures such detail that it’s like seeing the forbidden. Should be interesting to see what is unearthed from coming films.

And Richard Armitage just thought we had him under a magnifying glass. LOL!

If you haven’t already done it, watch that video in full screen mode.

And if you’re not a geek, I’ll throw in a picture to make reading this worth your time.

The guy who started it all:

Screencap courtesy of RichardArmitageNet.Com

February 21, 2011
Categories: Geek, North and South, Tangents . Tags: , , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 15 Comments

I Ate a Twinkie Today

There is actually something that can distract me from Richard Armitage watching. Yes, I know that’s a shameful thing to admit, but there it is. Son (aka the son of SO) has me running all over the country to help him check out potential schools. I have never worked so hard nor been so tired except maybe when I gave birth to said Son. I refresh myself with the thought that he will have several years of schooling possibly paid by someone other than dear old Mom and Dad. Oh, that sounds like a cop out? You have obviously never had to deal with a kid who is maniacal about participating in an activity. Yes, that’s what I thought — no clue about what a huge drain it is on time and other resources, which means I have paid in advance for this “privilege” of someone else paying for Son’s schooling. LOL! The years of driving to his events are enough to scare most sane people.

And now come the recruiters. What a learning curve this has been, and son is getting a marvelous education in card playing. He, who was taught to let his yes mean yes and his no mean no, was innocent about recruiters. I’m happy to say he is a quick study and has learned very fast which cards to play and which to hold. On his own he now has the two schools of his choice up to paying for almost everything. I’m observing in amusement as he might actually get them to pay for all of it. No matter what happens, he’s parlaying this into much more than I ever dreamed of during the years I was watching him work out before and after school, often say no to his friends when they wanted to hang out, eat his precision diet with carb loading on certain days of the week, drink untold amounts of water, monitor the competition, spend what seemed like man years studying the best ways to improve his abilities, and certainly, perform his sport. Ahh! this last is quite a thing to behold, but his ability at the non-answer is fast eclipsing it. In celebration of his new found negotiating skills and our diet not needing to be quite so strict around here in future, I renewed an acquaintance with highly processed, sugary foods.

Since this isn’t a tangent piece (although it borders on one), the inevitable tie in:

Perhaps Richard Armitage was right when he said some of his fans are motherly. Although I don’t feel in the least motherly towards him (the thought is icky), I must admit I have at times thought of his mother and wondered if she has felt about her son as I’m feeling about mine right now. What was it like for her to watch her child immerse himself so completely in something he loved? Was there a niggling thought he may actually want to pursue a career with such a potentially fickle fate? Was she scared about her son making deals only to perhaps find himself hurt and the dream dying? Or did she focus on his wonderful discipline and tenacity to pursue something so difficult for most others to attain? Did she some days get a pang of fear and want to talk him out of it and on other days seek to move heaven and earth to see that he got a chance? I did read somewhere she took a job so he could attend Pattison’s College in Coventry. I also wonder how many performances she saw or perhaps even helped with before her son was ever on anyone’s radar. Did she ever think it would come to this? And when it did, how did she celebrate?

I hope you indulged in more than a Twinkie, Mrs. Armitage.

A picture of Richard in his early twenties and on the verge of entering the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts (LAMDA).

For those just stumbling on this site, yes, the guy in my banner picture is the same.

Photo courtesy of RichardArmitageNet.Com

February 19, 2011
Categories: Tangents . Tags: , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 62 Comments

Tangent — Say It Ain’t So, Pete

[Note: No, there will be nothing about Richard Armitage in this piece, but sometimes I just can’t help but talk about other things]

AOL (America Online) is that company which almost everyone in America has used as an ISP (Internet Service Provider) — thanks to those CDs that were littered across America’s mailboxes and practically pressed on us when we went to Wal-Mart or Target or even the grocery store. If it weren’t for AOL, America would not have become accustomed so quickly to the joys of surfing the web. But as other ISPs, who did not sink their hooks into our systems quite so much, came into existence and had the means to provide high speed services such as DSL or Cable at a cheaper price, AOL went on the wane.

However, they should never be counted out. They have managed to stay afloat, and now they are once again on an acquisition frenzy. I’m fascinated with what they’re doing. Unless they know something the rest of us don’t, I’m thinking they’re nuts. And now Mashable.com might be one of their pickings? Tomorrow Mashable is announcing something major, and I’m wondering if they will make this list. And if you don’t know about Mashable, well, then I haven’t done a very good job of public service while you’ve been reading this blog. :D

To know about Mashable, you have to know about Pete Cashmore, its founder and CEO. Other than being one of the hottest geeks around,

Pete has built an information empire majoring on the power of social media, and all beginning when he was 19 and blogging from his bedroom in Scotland. If Pete says something or Mashable says something, it often sends a wave through the media community. If AOL gets hold of that? Oh man, I don’t know what I think at this point. My gut is screaming, “No, no, no and no!” But maybe I’m wrong. I’m always willing to be wrong. It’s just that AOL is so pedestrian, and I have a hard time thinking they’re going to go places that Pete has taken the rest of us. I don’t see it.

But hey, if Pete does sell, I don’t blame him. He is young enough at 25 to do many more things. I just hate to see the establishment get hold of Mashable. Bummer.

February 7, 2011
Categories: Geek, Rumors, Tangents . Tags: , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 8 Comments

Tangent — The New Year’s Thang

January 3, 2011

[Note: For those new to this blog, my tangents usually have little or nothing to do with Richard Armitage. For the fans: I do like to post pictures of RA as often as I can, so maybe there will be one at the end. And for all of you: be sure to read the post script at the very end if your stamina holds out.]

I have this quirk in my nature which always wants to buck the system when I have even the slightest sense the system is all about form and not really about any meaningful function. The first time this obstinance manifested was in the first grade. One Friday the teacher asked me to go to the blackboard to write something so I could learn along with the others, and I said, “I don’t have to go to the blackboard.” She arched a brow and looked over her glasses at me, and said, “What do you mean?” I replied, “It’s Friday, and my mother says I don’t have to go to the blackboard on Fridays.” I was quickly reprimanded and taken to the hallway where she grabbed my chin and with her other hand, dug her fingernail into the top of my head while she told me how much trouble I was in. The following week she requested a conference with my parents (I still hate that word conference), and I got my backside blistered by dad when he got home from that meeting. I also got a lecture about how it was wrong to co-opt the idea from our Catholic neighbors who didn’t eat meat on Fridays. All I knew is there was no need for me to go to the board. I already knew what the teacher was talking about.

None of this is to say that I’m generally obstinate. I just don’t like doing things expected of me which don’t appear to have any benefit, to anyone. Yeah, it sounds arrogant and selfish, but how many of us hate doing things that are a waste but we do them anyway? C’mon, I know some of you do things like this, but you do them only because someone, somewhere expects it. And you hate it. We’ve all done it. But as I get older, I find I’m going back to my six year old self. I don’t want to squander time on things that really don’t count no matter how good they might make me look. So where am I going with this? Well, I felt a little bit of a pull to do the requisite New Year’s write-up/recap thang on the blog, and I was not excited about that at all. So I didn’t do one. I’m simply enjoying the wonderful pieces done by others.

But you’re not getting off the hook before I wax on about my objection to New Year’s resolutions, and yes, I know I’m not the first one to say this nor will I be the last. But people like me need to keep saying it until a few of you get it. New Year’s resolutions for most of us are a waste of time. I mean who keeps those things — if you even remember them after a couple of months? I don’t think I’ve ever known anyone who kept a New Year’s resolution. No, that’s not true. I have known one person who did, and she talked about it incessantly, which was the result of being shocked that she kept it. But most and probably darn near all people don’t keep them. Or maybe I just run with a slothful crowd.

Obviously, I think my crowd is in the majority, which compels me to talk to you about something that is so unnecessary and usually just leads to guilt. Yep, it’s a setup for failure. I don’t know about any of you, but I don’t need any help with feeling like a failure, and several years ago I resolved to stop making resolutions because of that feeling. There are so many deadlines to meet in life, and I don’t need to create another one for myself especially when it only facilitates self-flagellation. Of course there is that minority who keeps resolutions, and if you are one of those people, and it makes you feel good, I’m sincerely happy for you. My lazy self will continue to refrain.

Yet I completely understand the need to make New Year’s resolutions, the need to wipe the slate clean and start over, the need to have another chance at making something right or attaining something we long for. That need is so great among us, that when a year comes to an end and a new ones starts, and we’re quite naturally taking stock of our lives, it seems fitting to cobble together something that sounds important for us to do, something that sounds like a great destiny. But I submit to you that you don’t have to start on January 1, and that may be the worst date to do it for some of us. So make up your own day for starting over, and hey, it really can be every morning. Frankly, if I didn’t start over at least once a week and sometimes daily, I would never want to talk to anyone or leave my house, and I’ve been there before. Not fun. So it’s Monday after the holiday, and the day didn’t get started all that well. I may need to start the year over on the 4th.

End of sermonette.

A picture of Richard Armitage as sort of promised. (Scroll beyond it for Post Script).

Yeah, I know you understand what I’m sayin’, Rich.

Screencap courtesy of my stash.

Post script: My mother just reminded me the first time my obstinate nature clashed with a teacher was actually in kindergarten. The class was learning to print their names. My name ends in an ‘A’, and I’ve always hated the look of a lower case ‘a’, and when it was on the end of my name, it didn’t look finished. So when I printed my name, I ended it with a small sized capital ‘A’, and I still print it that way today. (Yes, I know it’s harder to write.). When the teacher came by to check my work, she said, “No, honey, you must write it like this — ‘a’.” I just nodded and kept writing it with a capital ‘A’. The teacher got so flustered she screamed at me and ripped my paper into several pieces. Then she gave me another paper, but I still proceeded to write with an ‘A’ on the end of my name. She finally called my mother, who met with her that afternoon. The teacher told her I was developmentally delayed (or whatever pc language teachers used back then to say a kid was slow mentally). Mother was devastated and went home in tears. When my dad came home from work, he quizzed her about her upset, and she told him what the teacher had said and how she wasn’t sure what to think. To which good ol’ dad said, “Oh, that’s horseshit. The kid can write in cursive for cryin’ out loud.”

January 3, 2011
Categories: Tangents . Tags: , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 8 Comments

Merry Christmas

…to all of you from this flawed follower of Christ who’s sitting here thankful that the Lord decided to walk among us and still does today.

I also want to say thanks for reading my stuff. I’ll be back with snark sometime next week.

December 25, 2010
Categories: Tangents . Tags: . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 6 Comments

Tangent — A New Scrooge

December 22, 2010

I love giving gifts, but I hate giving things out of obligation. Is there anyone who likes that? Oh, you do?! Masochist.

Christmas for some has become about obligation. How can it not be with the continual bemoaning from so many about how much Christmas buying is killing them? And it’s not chiefly the result of a bad economy; that kind of plaint has been around for years. It’s just more pronounced with the current financial squeeze. But these days when it’s earnestly said to me, I sometimes reply, “Don’t do it.” I never say this with a flippant tone, and it still gets me looks as if I’m teasing or have two heads. But the looks never bother me. I understand what drives them. A significant number of people really do hinge their identities on what they do for Christmas (been there, done that, got a t-shirt), so they will almost kill themselves trying to maintain whoever it is they think they are or should be, and to suggest otherwise is laughable or freaky to them. Their behavior is specifically wrapped up in being a good person, friend, child, mate or parent, and the last one is the real killer. I mean who wants to let down the kids? People who let down their kids are scum. Right?

May I suggest that generally kids’ expectations have been corrupted, and it’s time to take back their inclinations or at least make a serious adjustment to them? And what a great year to do it when resources are so low for so many. May be the perfect time to make a change. I mean who’s driving what the kids want? And is it reasonable? At first it can be fun buying for them — they’re so little and cute and really don’t want that much and are happy with almost anything. But unless a family is living in a hole in the ground or lives in a developing country with no access to any media, chances are good that as the kids get older their appetites are growing by continually being whet with all the “needs” that barrage them almost every waking hour, and parents are under tremendous stress to meet those “needs.” Well, I stopped meeting them, and surprisingly my kids do not see me as scum.

I’m not going to act as if this was an easy thing. It wasn’t, and I give SO complete credit for having the backbone to say, “Enough is enough.” This started a couple of years before we decided to move out of the city, but hey, media still gets to the country. We simply did not buy as much that Christmas, and what a relief it was. The key was letting go of this idea that creating magic for our kids on Christmas morning with “good” gifts was supposed to keep them from great emotional damage as an adult. LOL! Sorry I couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of that. But back to how I became a Scrooge. Oh, there were some tears from the kids when we cut back, and I think my oldest actually said we ruined her life (she said the same thing when we got rid of the tv for five years). Such is the wisdom of a child, and sadly too many of us listen to that as if it really is wisdom, but it’s not wisdom and never will be.

And each year I watch some friends painfully go into hock over Christmas, and when they explain why (as they almost invariably do if for no other reason than to convince themselves), it’s not uncommon for the reason to be about their child really really wanting something, and they just don’t have the heart to deny them even if it creates stress enough to bring on health issues. Often their rationalization for taking the burden of debt is something like, “My parents never got me ______________ at Christmas,” and you can almost hear the longing in their minds concluding, “My life would have been so much better and my relationships more fulfilling if I’d had one of those like everyone else.” Marketers have done a superb job when someone feels like that. That’s the gift that keeps on giving to their hip pockets.

But the marketers don’t care about anyone’s relationships. They only want to sell you something. Oh, you already know all of this? Well, it seems many of us often forget it and succumb to the number their trying to do on our heads — tying our worth as a parent, as a human being, to what we can provide for Christmas and worse implying that our relationships with our kids will suck if we don’t buy certain things for them. The real horror is that the message is given to the kids to in turn give to us.

The only way to get loose is to first be aware that “good” Christmas presents will never help anyone’s psyche and second stop succumbing to the idea that it does. That means buying the things you want to buy and can reasonably buy (obviously this is different for everyone) and being happy with it — reveling in the joy of giving, the heart of it. Most important being happy to be with family and friends and not making Christmas about that few minutes on Christmas morning when the kids dive into all the stuff. It’s amazing how kids pick up on our attitudes. Maybe not immediately, but they do eventually. Parents are still the most influential people in a child’s life no matter what “they” tell you. Don’t listen to that internal voice that’s being fed mostly by marketers that you must buy more and more in order for your child to be well adjusted. It’s a lie. And you have more power than you realize. It may not seem like it immediately, but it’s true.

Now for the most important part, and no part of me is being snarky. You take the stuff away and something usually needs to replace it, and maybe for some of you this isn’t an issue. At our house it was about time, therefore SO and I have made an effort to spend more time with our kids and to really listen to what’s going on with them. Christmas is just another time to focus on them a little more because we have set more time aside to do it and to hopefully make memories with our interactions rather than some expensive electronic gadgets. In the past I was so busy making money and making a mark that frankly, it was easier to give material things, and I salved my conscience with the idea that I was able to give “good” gifts. But my time is the real gift they need, and that’s the kind of obligation I need to joyfully meet.

My kids might not have felt that way about it when I first began to give it, but they see it now. One of my “little” SOs is faraway right now and can’t make it home for Christmas (feeling choked as I write this), but unbeknown to her, I’m going to surprise her on Christmas day, and I can hardly wait. That means I will be around here less in the next couple of weeks. Oh, I have a couple of posts loaded up, but I will not be hovering over my laptop when they let fly. So think of me in coming days hanging out with my kid and roaming the streets with her and laughing about God knows what, and I know she will not expect me to come bearing gifts, but I will, and what a wonderful feeling to give with absolutely no obligation. That is surely a joy, but the greater joy is knowing I can hang out with her and she will want me to.

And I know there will come a moment as there always does when I look at the great person she has become and is becoming and realize that it could have been a little different. We could have stayed on that same path with her and her siblings that left no part of the living room floor bare of gifts on Christmas morning and had us facilitating an ever growing gluttony for things, and ultimately building a bondage to things which would have made them dull people.

Edit: It’s 2012, and I’m going back to NYC at Christmastime. I now have two “little” SOs there. I can hardly wait.

December 22, 2010
Categories: SO, Tangents . Tags: , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 18 Comments

Tangent — A Little Love

One of these days I may start writing a music blog. That’s my first love and will be the one that sees me out of this life. I can never close my mind to any kind of music and never get tired of listening to everything that comes down the pike. Yes, even rap music. Some of it is really good. The little SOs who are not slouches when it comes to knowledge of music (loving everything from Bach to Nat King Cole to Gershwin to Lou Reed to Muse) are always laughing at my music choices and then putting them on their iPods. :D

Lately I’ve been preparing another post about Lucas North, and the process of it has me listening to someone who became one of my favorites several years ago. He is a precious little jewel to me and apparently only to a few other people as he’s vastly underrated by the general public and unfairly swabbed with a song that was run in the ground awhile back. That debacle would ruin a lesser musician, but he’s too talented for that to keep him down. Oh, I’ll get to who it is, but I had to say that first. Whoever this guy really is, he’s a thinker, and he’s just damn fine at playing too.

The album this song below is from should go down as one of the all-time greats, but that will probably be dictated by his next few albums. Whatever his place in music history, I look forward to whatever he’s got. Before you look at this video, just know it’s a slideshow of someone’s wedding in Russia (?). Interesting song choice, but then perhaps the Russians are a bit pensive about everything even including a wedding event? Maybe Cresmix will weigh in and help us understand. Not that I expect her to speak for all Russians, but it does seem they are very emotional and sometimes heavy hearted even about something that should be joyous.

And I would embed something else, but this was the only thing I could find, and I really wanted you to hear this song if you’ve never heard it. I figured almost everyone had heard this song, but I’m finding out that’s not true — at least here in America, and that’s even with the album making it to Number 7 on the charts in the U.S.

December 6, 2010
Categories: Musicilove, Spooks, Tangents . Tags: , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 5 Comments

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