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.
Shortly after we arrived at Graceland, I saw a lady talking to three Elvis Tribute Artists. She caught my eye because of the picture of Elvis on the back of her dress ran from the shoulders down to the bottom of the otherwise black, floor length dress. While getting my picture with her I found out that she was from Shreveport, Louisiana. She said this was her 19th straight Candlelight Vigil because she started coming in 2000. A quick check of her math says that this was actually her 20th trip but I didn’t argue. She that during one of the trips, she traveled in a black limousine with an ETA (Elvis Tribute Artist). She said they had two blowouts on the interstate. Her husband, who was taking our picture, said “And you know a limo only has ONE spare.” As the lady continued telling her story, I noticed a slight lisp that I couldn’t help noticing when she said, “We were stranded on the side of the road until some sweet soul in an SUV stopped and saved us.” Go back and read that last line out loud with a lisp.
In the last month, Popeyes Chicken has introduced a new chicken sandwich. The sandwich is so similar to a Chick-fil-A sandwich that Chick-fil-A started a small feud on Twitter. That Twitter war got enough attention that people are flocking to Popeyes for these sandwiches in numbers large enough to create lines around their stores similar to what Chick-fil-A sees every day. Popeyes is also selling out of their sandwiches. I decided to visit my favorite Popeyes to try the new sandwich to see how it compares to Chick-fil-A. I also wanted to experience the cultural phenomenon of being at a store riding a wave of success.
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.
This story starts on Thursday, July 11 and there are several things that you need to know going in. Here is a list:
During one of the meals on my 2006 trip to China, I talked about music to some of the guys that we were visiting. They found out that I write and sing songs. I found out that some of our hosts were into karaoke. They thought that I would enjoy going to a karaoke bar. Why not? I didn’t know anyone that could say they had sung in a karaoke bar in China.
In previous posts, I have talked about my weekend in Hong Kong in 2006. In addition to shopping for a Fake Rolex, I spent this weekend being attacked by monkeys and a handicapped boy. While we were still looking for a fake Rolex vendor, we were standing at an intersection next to the street market. The vendors had their booths set-up in the street, so it was no problem for us and everyone else to be standing in the street.