Things no one told you when you became a parent. Reason 60579

After a night in which he fell asleep at 10, woke up and 2AM and did not go back to sleep until about 4:30.

No one told me having a child would be the harbinger of my own death.

A friend just suggested this poem to me. Sounds about right by the title alone.

My son, my executioner

I take you in my arms
Quiet and small and just astir
and whom my body warms

Sweet death, small son,
our instrument of immortality,
your cries and hunger document
our bodily decay.

We twenty two and twenty five,
who seemed to live forever,
observe enduring life in you
and start to die together.

-Donald Hall

Things I learned while the server was being moved

Ohio is full of creatures. This state has it's weirdness, its gateways to Hell, Air Force base hangars that house aliens and whatnot, Mothman and more. Today I learned about the Loveland Frogman, who may or may not be a lizard.

This got me to thinking about my time at CML, and the day two guys came in for library cards and to use our computers for their research. While I was processing their new accounts, they started talking to me about Bigfoot, and how they were seeking its existence in Adams County. I'm sure I wrote a Live Journal post about this, but can't find it. I wrote a lot of posts about the goings on and day to day weirdness and folly at the Hilltop branch. A couple of dudes looking up Bigfoot was not an atypical event. For that place, it was quite scholarly.

Today I found out about a film called Not Your Typical Bigfoot Movie, and seriously believe these were the two guys I gave cards to. You can watch it on YouTube, and I did. Here's the link. These two are from the most unkind part of Ohio, Portsmouth, and we see their life struggles. By the end of the hour long documentary, you may not have a clearer conclusion about Bigfoot. However, for all the craziness in this world, you learn these two guys are harmless, and believe in their convictions with pure faith and clarity.

More on Shakespeare and Autism

This segment aired on the local PBS show Broad and High this week. It's about the Shakespeare and Autism Project that Kelly Hunter wrote about in her book.

You can see my son on the lower left, in the audience



I wrote about the performance of this show in this post back in July 2014.

2015 begins

Happy New Year.



Obvious goals: read more, write more.

The movies I saw in 2014

I did average more than one film a week this year. It's hard to concentrate on a movie when my son is in the house and does not dig Lubitsch the way I do. Hope to see more in the cinemas next year, but I appreciate Netflix.

1) That's Entertainment
2) Inside Llewyn Davis
3) Arsenic and Old Lace
4) Blackfish
5) Reds & Blues
6) Negros With Guns
7) Drinking Buddies
8) Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure.
9) Heroic Trio
10) A Hard Days Night
11) The Rape of Europa
12) The Lego Movie
13) Gigot
14) From Russia With Love
15) Ghostbusters
16) Gamera Vs. Guiron (MST3K)
17) 20 Feet From Stardom
18) Destroy All Monsters
19) Goldfinger
20) Godzilla Vs. Mothra
21) The Grand Budapest Hotel
22) The Fifth Element
23) Captain America: The Winter Soldier
24) Dave Clark 5: Above and Beyond
25) The Matrix
26) Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster.
27) Beware of Mr. Baker
28) Godzilla (2014)
29) Muscle Shoals
30) Pele and Garrincha - Gods of Brazil
31) Much Ado About Nothing (2013)
32) The Angels Share
33) The Aristocrats
34) High Anxiety
35) Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
36) Werewolf (MST3K)
37) Girl Shy
38) Alpha Papa
39) Sharknado 2: the Second One
40) Boyhood
41) Bettie Page Reveals All
42) Guardians of the Galaxy
43) Axe Giant: the Wrath of Paul Bunyan
44) To Be Or Not To Be (1942)
45) Hot Saturday (1932)
46) A Dog’s Life (1918)
47) Upside Down: The Creation Records Story
48) Blue is the Warmest Color
49) God Help the Girl
50) The Divorcee
51) God Help the Girl (with Wife)
52) Red Dust
53) The African Queen
54) Twentieth Century
55) Gone Girl
56) A Night at the Opera.
57) Birdman
58) Snowpiercer
59) The Last Gladiators
60) Filth
61) Pulp: a Film about Life, Death, and Supermarkets
62) A Long Way Down
63) Love and Death
64) Comfort and Joy
65) Shop Around the Corner
66) Big Eyes
67) Pearl Jam 20

Books 2014

The embarrassingly low number of books I've read in the past year. I got nothing. No excuses.

1) Pat Conroy. The Death of Santini. 339 p.
2) Carol Conroy. The Beauty Wars 124 p.
3) Jay Stringer. Lost City. 301 p. ***
4) Emma Donoghue. Frog Music. 405 p. ***
5) Bill Campana. Said Beauty to the Blues. 137 p. ***
6) Scott Martelle. The Admiral and the Ambassador. 310 p. ****
7) Stephen King. Mr. Mercedes. 437 p.
8) Greg Baxter. The Apartment. 193 p. ***
9) Denise Mina - The Red Road. 297 p.
10) Amanda Petrusich - Do Not Sell at Any Price. 260 p. ****
11) Haruki Marakami - Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage. 386 P. ****
12) Peter Matthiessen - In Paradise. 256 p. ***
13) Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz - Dr. Mutter’s Marvels. 372 p. ***
14) Ken Sharp. Starting Over: the Making of John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s Double Fantasy. 262 p. ***
15) Randall Maggs. Night Work: the Sawchuk Poems. 189 p. ****
16) Michel Faber. The Book of Strange, New Things. 500 p. ****
17) Scott Saul. Becoming Richard Pryor. 586 p. ***

2014 in pictures

Put this slideshow together on my Macbook Pro, the acquisition of which was a highlight of the year. The soundtrack is Who Killed the Moonlight by Nicole Atkins, my favorite song of the last 12 months.

Enjoy.