Author: elvisgumby

I am the father of three kids. They are all adults now. As is probably the case with most parents, our parenting style and skills evolved with more kids added to the family.  We tried to be as much by the book as possible with our first child.  By the third child, we loosened up so much, she was probably raising herself.  When my kids were little, one day my son, the middle child, asked why his little sister was so wild.  I told him it was because he and his big sister were not raising her right.

I enjoy watching movies. I have passed this love of films on to my children.  I have what is probably best described as eclectic taste in movies and I think my children have this as well. My wife called me at work one day when my oldest daughter was about 4 years old.  While we were on the phone, my daughter asked to talk to me. She said, “Daddy, do you know what I want to do tonight? I want to watch The Hideous Sun Demon.”  I’m sure we watched it that night.

One day when my kids were much younger, my youngest daughter, Mary was arguing with her brother, James, in our kitchen.  I don’t remember how old she was but if she was school age, she hadn’t been in school very long. She got mad enough to tell him, “James, you’re an asshole!”  My wife was in the kitchen with them and asked Mary, “What did you say?” Mary replied, “I called him an asshole!”  My wife told her, “you aren’t supposed to say that.”  Her response was “Oh!”  Like she had never considered calling him anything else.  There has been much finger-pointing and speculation about where she heard this language.

My oldest daughter and son were upstairs playing.  They were very young.  I overheard my daughter in a loud whisper saying to her brother, “Don’t tell mom or dad.”  I was going upstairs at the time, so I asked them what they didn’t need to tell me.  I quickly saw that a cup from my daughter’s tea set had gotten broken.  I asked her if she broke the cup.  She replied “No”.  I turned to my son and asked him if he broke the cup.  I could see the wheels turning in his head. He was thinking about what to say.  It seemed like he was deciding whether to tell the truth.  His sister had said no, and she didn’t get in trouble.  If he said no, he shouldn’t get in trouble either.  When he responded to me, he confidently said “No!” His tone emphasized that he had given great consideration to the question before he answered. It expressed confidence in his answer, and I should have no doubt that it was true. It also seemed like this was the point that my son realized for the first time that he could lie and get away with it. 

Growing up, I watched the Little Rascals and Laurel and Hardy films on TV whenever I could. These movies were made at Hal Roach Studios. Watching them as much as I did, I noticed the same music being used in all the films from this studio.  Leroy Shield wrote these song and musical cues.  The library of musical cues effectively matched the range of emotions displayed in these films. I fell in love with the music as much as I did the jokes from these movies.  I was pleased when I discovered a Dutch music ensemble called The Beau Hunks that had created transcriptions of this music and recorded albums of them using vintage instruments and recording techniques.  The first discovered them around 1995 when they released a CD called The Beau Hunks Play the Little Rascals Music.  Later that year, they released On to the Show: The Beau Hunks Play More Little Rascals Music.  I picked up copies of both and listened to them regularly.  These recordings are faithful reproductions of the music on the soundtracks of the films.  There is only the occasional deviation from the original arrangement.  Most of the time, it sounded like you were listening to a cleaned-up version of the original recordings.