weapons of massdistraction

The little man and I are ill. Again. Last schoolyear we picked up all kinds of crud from his classmates, but at some point we seemed to build up an immunity. His summer school program, however, has thrown some new kids into the mix. Different kids = new and complex germ factories. The lad and I have dealt with this latest cold differently. He fell asleep around 6ish last night and didn’t get up until 7ish this morning. While I foolishly tried to medicate this cold into submission with some generic sudafed. I was awake and jittery all night long. So this morning, when I read a quote by some cat named Leopold Kronecker, it looked like this:

“God made the integers, all else is the work of man.”

But my tired brain parsed it out as this:

“God made the teenagers, all else is the work of man.”

Uh, yeah. I fear I’m losing my mind. And I’ve still got nearly a decade before the little man becomes a teenager. Just think of all the colds to come.

Good things have always come out of Seattle, but this time it’s personal. First it was the bequeathment of fine footwear by Receptionista, to me. More recently an awesome mix CD arrived in the mail from the stellar Starbody. I popped it in several times over the weekend but I finally listened to it from start to finish in one sitting, while making our Sunday evening meal…and it ended just as the food was ready to be served (clocking in at 78 minutes of music, and prep time). That was the relaxing bit. The chaotic portion of the stickyhot and humid weekend commenced with Friday night’s They Might Be Giants show, battling Basilica Block Party traffic to get to the venue. Somehow we arrived just moments before the first band got going. TMBG’s opening acts have always been quite the grab bag. You never know what you’re going to get (in this case, the tickets listed the openers TBA). So when the first act took to the stage I couldn’t get past the strangeness of it…of seeing one of Buffy’s Big Bads, ok, maybe little Bads, doing something so out of character. It was Adam Busch, the actor who played Warren. I knew he was in some band, but couldn’t remember what they were called. Apparently it’s Common Rotation. At times amusing, at times annoying, their set passed by quickly…probably because I was so discombobulated. They were followed up by the indescribable Corn Mo. This is closest to doing the experience justice:

“If you take a little bit of Tiny Tim, Weird Al, Nikki Sixx, Night Ranger, and a heaping tablespoon of Jonathan Richman, you will come up with a shake full of Corn Mo. He played with a crash cymbal and an accordian, that’s it. A towering vision of long hair, mutton chops, and 80’s metal attitude. It was a sight to behold, and his voice was as powerful as a Meat Loaf epic ballad.”

Yeah. And naturally TMBG were wonderful, as usual (I’ve still got Robot Parade stuck in my head). So much so that I had to see them again. I took the little man to Orchestra Hall the next morning for the free family-friendly performance. Little did I know that other families had shown up before 8am to stake out their spots for the 11am show. We showed up around 10:50am, pushed our way through the crowd, and lucked into a spot next to friends. Sadly the little man didn’t seem very enthused, save for two highlights. 1) a shower of confetti and 2) John Linnell singing Mop! Mop! Mop!. The next day’s visit to the Children’s Museum, with our most excellent neighbors, was much more to his liking.

Some randomness for this fine Friday morning.
In the spirit of the fifty pound rice bags, the husband has continued his supersizing efforts. I came home yesterday to find a five pound tub of peanut butter in our fridge (the hippie co-op kind has to be refrigerated, in case you’re wondering).
The little man obtained a large sheet of bubble wrap, the kind with the very small blisters. He’s been laying it down on the landing and jumping on it from a few steps up. The resulting sounds are not unlike the bursting of firecrackers.
When we were at the park last night two tween girls approached me…to tell me they liked my hair. I’m meeting with more tween and teen approval now than I did when I was of that age. Guess at 31 I’m finally “cool”. Or something.
This article, via Cheek, explains so much (about love being blind):
“It seems that once we get close to a person, the brain decides the need to assess their character and personality is reduced.”
And here I was thinking I’d just been hypnotized…the year I dated the little man’s bio-dad.
It’s great to see this burgeoning awareness of the Iron Sheik (the current incarnation, not the pro-wrestling villain). Mizna was lucky enough to host a performance of his in Minneapolis last Fall. Alas, I was without a little man sitter that night.
There’s been something of a Misfits revival going on in our household of late, and I can’t get Glenn’s crooning of “I want your skulls, I need your skulls” out of my head. Now that’s an earworm if ever there was one.
I was about to take a fabulous photo last night, of some kids running up to an ice cream truck, against a cotton candy sunset, when my camera batteries died. Curses.

After reading this article (prompted by my perusal of 42short)…I think it’s time to mention…I have also had physical contact with Sean Lennon. It was on my mind just last week, after a brief bout of steamy hot weather. But it was even hotter then. The year was 1999. The venue…First Avenue. I was there to see Luscious Jackson, with Cibo Matto opening. At the time Sean was seeing Yuka Honda, of the latter (the celebrity lothario has since been connected with Bijou Philips, Aimee Osbourne, Courtney Wagner, Casey Johnson, Leelee Sobieski, and now Elizabeth Jagger). I was dating…no one. But I was seven or eight months pregnant, with the little man kicking away at my innards. The music was good, but the evening was miserable. The sweathouse was packed with drunken fools, with a few of them asking to touch my belly (eww, no). Others gave me unsolicited advice, telling me I should have stayed home because of the second hand smoke, caused by the cigarettes they themselves clutched. All I wanted to do was sit down, or at least settle in to watch the bands. Finally I managed to secure a halfway decent spot on the balcony. If I angled my head just so I could sort of see the stage. Until some guy rudely shouldered his way in front of me (hello, you do NOT stand in front of short girls at shows, especially crabby pregnant ones), pushing me back and completely obscuring my already limited line of sight. After fuming for a minute or two I was about to tell him to piss off, when he turned around. I looked up into Sean’s face (so like his father’s) and was too surprised to say anything at all.

What is wrong with people? Shivving someone over a parking spot so isn’t Minnesota Nice. And, hello, it was just a parking spot. At the mall, for chrissakes. An argument over something so trivial shouldn’t turn into a life and death situation. I guess some folks need to get their priorities straight.