Something yesterday brought all the boys to the yard,

And I have no idea what it was, as it’s only listed under archives, and I don’t keep tabs on views for old posts to know what was garnering so much attention. I also don’t know if it was good attention, or bad. My writing can be pretty unflattering at times, though not defamatory, nor inflammatory. Could have been the egg sandwich walk through kicking off again, who knows. I’m ultimately not concerned. Some times I just see a massive spike in daily visits and views, and the rest of the time those numbers are low, low, low, low. Apple bottom Jean’s! Boots with the fur, with the fur!…

Had a productive day yesterday. Hit up the bank to pay my HST, got gas, hit the grocery store for food stuffs, went birthday gift shopping for a party this weekend, sent out some invoices, followed up on some work details, and cut the grass as well. Sent some files off to the appropriate third party, and called it a day. Today is a bit slower, but I did finally get the Christmas lights down off the house. I wanted to do that in April, but we hit a considerable cold spell, and it got windy, and I’m not a fan of being up on a ladder by myself on cold, windy, rainy days. And then I just flat out forgot about it. Was going to do it on the long weekend, but time got away from me. Done now though. Six months until I need to put them back up again. Will have to buy more eaves trough clips, as the sun & cold makes that plastic very brittle after a few months of direct unfettered exposure. Good thing they’re cheap. All boxed up and packed away safely for another year. Or part thereof.

I do need to package up some branding items and send out an invoice today. Otherwise I’m wide open heading into the weekend. This month has whizzed on by huh? Holy schnikes! June, and the last remaining days of school are upon us!

Oh, I also found a moment to watch the Guardians Christmas special. That was an amusing 45 minutes of fun. I did not realize that they had made **SPOILERS** Mantis into Peter’s half sister from Ego’s sexual exploits across the galaxy. Neato! James Gunn always has fun music in his stuff, I liked all the off colour Christmas songs. I will need to add those into the mix this coming holiday season. I get tired of the classics after a brief stint of nostalgia, from hearing them all on repeat again, and again. Over, and over. Some fresh blood in the mix will be a welcome addition I think.

While taking down the lights I also wandered the roof looking for any signs of wind damage, or excess wear & tear. I unclogged one down spout, though now I regret not actively inspecting the other two. Easy enough to do later on with my ladder, but would have been so simple while I was up there to just go look, instead of just examining the shingles. Oh well. Live and learn. That one track mind, singular focus strikes again. And no, in case you are wondering, I don’t enjoy multitasking. It find it a great way to fuck up multiple things at once. Not a fan. Make of that what you will.

On the plus side we are heading into a hot and sunny weekend with the grass already cut, and so I have extra time to enjoy myself outdoors with the kids this weekend. Happy Friday, the last one in May 2023 at that! Ciao Bella.

Bleak: Now there’s a word for you.

I love the word bleak. I like how it rolls off my tongue. How it feels in the mouth. The wretchedness it evokes. A very vivid word, bleak. I feel as though it gets used just enough about town to still feel special and evocative. There’s a newness, no, a freshness about words that don’t get thrown around willy-nilly all the time. As though it still has that “new car smell” to it. Or the cellophane still on it. I like that. Bleak. Just love it. What a word!

Not bleak.

So, here we are. Wednesday. Hump-day. Middle of the week, day. Again. Seems as though we were just here. I wonder what day is most peoples point of reference. Do you look at your week from Sunday to Saturday, or Monday to Sunday? Friday to whenever the hell you like? I don’t know. I guess it would depend on a whole host of factors. Do you work alternating shifts? Nights, weekends, evenings, or a 9 to 5? All of those could alter what day of the week you use as a reference point. Lots of people have those Sunday night blues about going back to work on Monday. So are you always refocused on your life come Sunday, or is it the awful trek to work on Monday that orients your week? Are you working for the weekend to get blotto on Friday through Sunday afternoon, just to make it to next Friday at 5pm? Lots to unpack here. I have a fairly introspective hobby, with this blog, so I constantly evaluate my week, and each day within it. Domestic Duties Monday slash bleed into Tuesday, is a common refrain here. Same with Hump-day, thinking Thursday was Friday, Thank god it’s Friday, and then the rush to go do as much of nothing as we can for the weekend. Which is a conundrum. Do too little and it feels wasted. Do too much and it feels draining as you head back into the work week, with all of the evenings responsibilities. It’s a whole thing. Finding the right balance of something fun, but not overwhelming, and a whole bunch of nothing to book end it, to make the weekend seem restful. A balancing act for certain.

Also… ugh. I hate to say this, as my kids are a handful, and we try desperately to rein them in when out and about. But exert some semblance of control over your shitty kids please. How often do we have to see and hear them all run amok at every god damn second of the evening when out at township programming. Take your unruly kids elsewhere. Take them for a walk. Go look at cool rocks outside. Show some parenting and calm them down. Get your face out of your fucking phones and be a parent for a second. Jesus christ. Look I get it. Watching 7, 8, 9 year olds fumble their way through patterns is less than appealing to most, but why make it worse with your little shit heads screaming, and shouting, and running about on the side lines making things worse. The kids can’t hear their instructors, who then need to shout, and then the meek kids check out because of the angry tone, and then other kids start to chatter, and it becomes this cascading failure. I’m not asking people to beat their children. But rein that shit in. If you know they’re hyper, go DO something with them, instead of hoping that THIS time they’ll sit still and be quiet. Act accordingly. They are your children. You should know if they can or can’t sit and watch others do stuff for an hour without needing a break, or skipping it entirely to run around in the park for that hour like a maniac. Be their fucking parent. Not their buddy. You have to make hard choices. Know their limits. Work within them. Jesus. It isn’t rocket science. I’m not asking for perfection here, god knows we aren’t able to attain it ourselves. I’m not asking for you to physically restrain your child(ren), but to *NOTICE* how out of tune they are with the surrounding environment, and act on it, within reason. You can wander the hall with your child, go look at the display cases, talk to them outside the training area, play tag with them elsewhere. Just don’t have them act like shitty kids infront of thirty others who paid to be there, and are actively trying to learn what is being taught. I’m sure your little ones would love it if others chose to run a jack hammer outside their classroom as they are trying to learn a skill they are fond of. Treat others with the respect you would like to receive yourself. Again, I’m not asking for a muzzle, or straight jacket, or wee automatons that are seen but not heard, this isn’t the 80’s. No hitting, no screaming, no anger. Just ACT. Do something about it. Remove the child if they are over stimulated, if that is something they respond positively to, so that they can calm down and come back. Not asking for them to be hidden away. But perhaps 30 seconds to run the hall or play a game might bring them back down to a calmer level. Just don’t sit there, face in your phone letting them disrupt every body else because it’s too much like hard work to parent for a bit after you sat down, or zoned out. Yeah, it’s tough, and thankless. I get it. I don’t like having to miss out because my child chose that moment to go apeshit. But you do it. Calmly. And with love and affection. Eventually they’ll figure out self regulation and can do it in a calming peaceful nurturing fashion. But you gotta be willing to lead them in that learning. It’s not a punishment. It’s a loving, and positive correction of behaviour. But man oh man, do I hate it when parents abdicate that responsibility. Grinds on my nerves.

Looks like the snow is here. Gotta be Thursday tomorrow if the snow storm is here today. 2022/2023 the years of the Thursday snowmageddon. The mid week snow shovel break that nobody asked for. Glorious. And on that note, I will bid you adieu. Ciao Bella!

What a mess… Why did you even film this…

I mean, I went into the last (read 6th) Jurassic adjacent movie with very low expectations, and somehow, somehow they managed to limbo in under an already extremely low bar. What is this film even about? (SPOILERS!) Is Jurassic World Dominion a dinosaur film? A human cloning story, an immaculate conception story, a tech bro take down, a farm & ecology allegory, a corporate greed story, an action movie, a horror film? What the hell is this mess. My god. Who looked at this script and thought “yep – sounds legit. Green light!” What did that person do next? Smoke a bowl of crack and light a dump trucks worth of cash on fire? This film is a raggedy, shambling, collection of ‘what if‘ statements that sometimes features even more new dinosaurs. The premise was originally that they could create dinosaurs from the very rare blood samples pulled from bugs trapped in amber for 65 million years. Yet every single movie has an even longer roster of dinosaurs. And no mention of how such a thing was possible. Also, why is there a heist element to this movie? Nothing makes sense. It is rather terrible.

On the other hand Top Gun Maverick was really well done. It paid homage to the original, and it has a driving through line that pulls the story and characters along together. Stop and nod at some nostalgia, but introduce new elements that “belong”, and keep the movie moving. Yes, the guest pilot recruits are mostly two dimensional caricatures that are given a fifteen second intro, and that’s as deep as it goes. That could have been done better, but it didn’t hamper the film in any meaningful way. My 2 cents would be to limit the extraneous recruits, and spent just a few more moments fleshing them out. Or show us, don’t tell us, what it is that makes them all different and unique.

Now the interior cockpit shots of the movie are great, that was a selling point I’m sure, if you were lucky enough to see this movie in an AVX, or IMAX style theater. I envy you. Also the Ice Man call backs were touching, and meaningful. Top Gun, unlike Dominion didn’t throw a bunch of mismatched shit at the wall to see what might stick, and what might play with the crowd. Poorly done that Jurassic World Dominion.