My mom's stuff

Spent yesterday with two of my brothers and a sister-in-law and a niece moving the remainder of my mom's things to an auctioneer's garage. My mom passed away last November and it looks like we have her home sold. None of the kids felt compelled to buy her house. She moved into the house after her divorce from my dad. It was a good house with many happy memories, but it also held many sad memories. My mother died in that house after a two-year struggle with lung cancer. I don't hold that against the house. It wasn't Radon that caused the cancer, it was my mother's choice to continue smoking even after all the data showed that smoking caused cancer. I miss my mom.

Another Moore debunker

A book is now available outlining Moore's lack of honesty and integrity. This book is certain to be on the reading lists of those that have bought "My Life" by Bill Clinton and by those salivating movie-goers waiting for a pg13 rating on "Farenheit 9/11". Oh, sorry, it is still going to be rated R, but Mikey would like those that are interested and are underage to go ahead and sneak into the theater.

Kids trying to yank dad's chain

The kids were dropped off at work this afternoon by their mother. While goofing in my office they came across a memo and they noticed that it was initialed "KK". So, kids being little greasy, diseased monkeys, decided "KK" stood for "kiss-kiss". They began teasing me that I was getting love notes at work. I stayed quiet, smiling at them, and after a couple minutes asked them to follow me. I took them to "KK" and told her what the kids said "KK" stood for. My daughter's face turned a lovely shade of red. Karen said, "So, who wants a kiss," and my son bolted. Karen is a gamer, eh? Anyway, being able to turn the tables on your children is an essential skill that in raising nice, polite children. Obviously, I don't practice that skill often enough.

J.K. Rowlings to quit writing?

According to this article, J.K. Rowlings of Harry Potter fame is finished writing. She won't complete the sixth book in the Potter series. Forget seven books as Rowling planned.

mikey moore and slate article

Michael Moore and Farenheit 9/11 brought to task here.

Fathers' Day Golf

The kids and I went golfing today. What a beautiful day. I golfed acceptably, but my 13 y.o. daughter played very well. The kids had lessons the past week for four mornings. Her swing is looking much better. My son's swing is a thing of beauty already. He needs to work on his course ettiquette. I love being able to go out and do things with the kids. Generally, it is grocery shopping or housework that we participate in together. Golf is expensive when you have to pay everybody's greens fees. So, we don't get to golf together as often as I'd like.

Clinton still allowed to pretend

As if Clinton handled foreign policy with any postive effect. Only the simpering liberal news media of the major networks would continue foisting his pissant views upon the rest of us. A whole hour of Bill on 60 Minutes. Not on my T.V.

Fathers Day

Oh, here's a great article on being a dad. I scored myself pretty well against this father's ideas of being a good father, but I have areas of improvement. Good stuff.

Fatherhood

MSN has updated an article on fatherhood, specifically, single-fatherhood.  Nothing new discussed, but it reinforces what I already know: Dads are capable and important in children's lives.  A single-dad's life has similar challenges to a single-mother's life with one rather large exception:  There is very little community understanding or support of single-dads.  I still get the odd looks in grocery lines when explaining that, "no, I'm not filling the grocery list written by the mom."  I haven't done that for nearly five years.  Will that change as more and more households are headed by men?  I guess it will, but that will be after my kids have their own families.  In the meantime, single-dads need to spread the message that we're out here and we're competent. 

What we need to do is come together and start our own support groups.

Movies I want to see

Bourne Supremacy

Harry Potter

Shreck 2

I Robot

 

Opening game

My son had his first baseball game of the season tonight.  What started out as a game that was heading to a "mercy" loss ended up a pretty good game.  We had some questionable pitching and catching the first two innings.  The other team got a lot of stolen bases and stolen runs.  Coach put in a new pitcher and the catcher improved and we came back to make it a competitive game.  We still lost.  But the boys left seeing that they would be in the hunt.  We played the last season's league winner, but then, our team was second place last year.  It's a hoot watching the kids play the game.  Oh, btw, my son struck out both times at bat, but he swung at good pitches.  We'll have to work on his hitting.

Harry Potter is Back

My daughter learned to love reading due to the Harry Potter books.  I read the first four books to the kids.  My son frequently fell asleep during the readings, but my daughter was capitvated.  When she was able, she read all four books over again.  When the fifth came out we waited outside until midnight along with several hundred other people for the release of the book.  What a hoot.  My daugher read the book first and it took her less than a week to finish. 

I still don't get the whole uproar over Harry and his pals and the "Christians" saying he's evil.  This is an interesting article regarding the theological conundrum.  No matter, we'll be going as soon as we are able even though the new Dumbledore doesn't appear to be as good Richard Harris and my daughter says Professor Lupin is completely wrong.  The power of books, of course, is that they require the reader to participate in the story, whereas the movies only require the movie goer remain awake.

Quizzlet "What kinda Woman"

School camp

Both kids are doing expanded field trips this week.  Yesterday, my daughter left for four days to an adventure camp with her classmates.  This is one of those self-confidence building camps with ropes courses, etc.  My son goes for an overnight to Mackinaw Island with his classmates today.  Should be fun.  I'm going golfing tonight!