Author: Roger

I'm a librarian. I hear music, even when it's not being played. I used to work at a comic book store, and it still informs my life. I won once on JEOPARDY! - ditto.

I am painting

I am painting the attic. The daughter helped me with the primer coat, but still–
I am painting the attic because, after we got half of the attic insulated – in JANUARY – the Wife said we had to paint that half of the attic.
I am painting the attic, even though she didn’t mention painting it BEFORE we got the attic insulated.
I am painting the attic, since she thought it was “obvious” that we would have to paint it after the insulation.
I am painting the attic, even though the only time painting is “obvious” to me is when paint is peeling or obviously faded.
I am painting the attic, even though I think it’s “just the attic”.
I am painting the attic because all of the items in the one half of the attic are now jammed in the other half of the attic, making everything in the attic inaccessible.
I am painting the attic because I want to play my LPs.
I am painting the attic because I want to access my summer clothes.
I am painting the attic because it’s the only way to get to about half of my books.
I am painting the attic because there are things on the second floor, including the Christmas decorations, that really need to go up to the attic.
I am painting the attic despite the fact that I hate painting – the feel of paint, the smell of paint. Don’t tell me that modern paint has “no smell”.
I am painting the attic despite the fact that I can’t see the difference between the current light gray walls, the white primer and the yellow paint, so I keep painting over the same areas. Maybe I’m just colorblind.
I am painting the attic now, even though it would have been better to paint the attic in the winter, when it’s not as warm.
I am painting the attic, even though it takes time away from writing a decent blog post.
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Go look at these quite spectacular pictures of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano.
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May Day, May Day! Free Comic Book Day, the Kentucky Derby and May Day all converge on May 1.
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Do pacifiers lead to drug addiction and masturbation?

ROG

ROG

TV Fandom Meme

Please, Spock, do me a favor… and don’t say it’s `fascinating’

From Mr. Frog.

Pick five of your favorite shows, in no particular order, before you read the below questions, then answer them!

1. M*A*S*H
2. The Mary Tyler Moore Show
3. The Dick van Dyke Show
4. Homicide: Life on the Street
5. The Twilight Zone

Continue reading “TV Fandom Meme”

O is for Olympics


You thought that when the closing ceremonies took place in Vancouver, BC at the end of February, the high-caliber athletes had almost all left town. But there would be, in March, a parallel “Olympics”, he Paralympics, coming to the Canadian city. This involves a number of athletes who compete at the highest levels despite their physical disabilities.

The Paralympics started in 1960 (summer) and 1976 (winter), and has its own governing board, separate from the IOC. Yet, since the Summer Games in Seoul, South Korea in 1988, the location of these games have paralleled the locations of the Summer and Winter Olympics. At least for the next Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, the Olympics and the Paralympics share a common organizing committee. I called the U.S. folks in the Paralympic movement to clarify the relationship between the two groups, but the public relations person was not available.

The summer and winter games include the following sports, governed by the IPC: Alpine Skiing, Athletics, Biathlon, Cross-Country Skiing, Ice Sledge Hockey, Powerlifting, Shooting, Swimming, Wheelchair Dance Sport, plus several sports regulated by international federations, and a handful of others under the jurisdiction of International Organization of Sport for the Disabled.

The Paralympics are not to be confused with the Special Olympics, founded by the late Eunice Kennedy Shriver. “For people with intellectual disabilities, Special Olympics is often the only place where they have an opportunity to participate in their communities and develop belief in themselves.”

Not incidentally, this year is the premiere of the Youth Olympic Games;you can find more here.

Of course, there are the Olympics, which ran for about 1000 years, then was canceled for over a millennium, with a few furtive attempts to restart during that time. I’m not going to talk about the modern Games, which started in 1896, except for three things:
1) if I ever get to Switzerland, I MUST go to the Olympic museum
2) a really cool feature on the olympic.org site is feature that can retrieve all the Olympic results from 1896 through 2008; Vancouver is not yet represented.
3)Juan Antonio Samaranch, former IOC head, recently died. Got to say that he really modernized the financing of the games, though there were some issues over the Salt Lake City Games. And, except for American Avery Brundidge, he was the only IOC head I could name.


Sumi, the Paralympics mascot

ABC Wednesday
ROG

ROG

The Lydster, Part 73: The Health Report


A bunch of pictures from last fall. The reason I don’t use a digital camera is the very real likelihood that I would lose it. I took these on a one-use camera, then lost it, then recently found it.


In any case, Lydia is 4’2″ (50 inches) and 70 pounds. She’s over the 97th percentile for her height and her weight. She’s very active. Not only does she take ballet once a week, but she dances in front of the TV to the music of her favorite TV shows. Usually it’s quite graceful, though the thing she was doing to one particular song from the Backyardigans looked more like thrash dancing.

She loves to run. In a 50-yard race, she will beat me because she has great acceleration; eventually, I can catch her, but it is by using maximum effort. She’ll race me up the stairs and always beat me, but to be fair to me, she usually has the inside track.

She has various and sundry allergies, some seasonal, others year-round. She takes Zyrtec practically daily, plus her fluoride and vitamin, and other medicines seasonally, as needed. She was tested again, and she’s still allergic to peanuts; she’s never been allergic to tree nuts, but we have to avoid them too, since they tend to be processed in the same location.

She lost her eighth (or is it her ninth?) baby tooth this week, and has one adult tooth (top center). I must say that the Tooth Fairy is WAY more generous with her than she was with me.

As I’ve noted she’s doing well in school. Initially she fretted that she wasn’t ready – the source of the glum look (above) is that this was the first day of school back in September – but now she loves it.

I generally help her with her homework. Recently, he had to add coins, two quarters, and she guessed 51 cents. I explained that if 5 plus 5 equal a number ending in zero, than any two numbers each with the last digit of 5 added together would end with zero. She hugged me and said, “Thank you for showing me that, Daddy!” She REALLY loves to learn. The curse of being the child of a teacher and a librarian, I suppose.

EDIT: Found picture.

ROG

ROG
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