and

Of course they are available for purchase. You can buy avocadon’t shirts here (or here) or buy avocatres shirts here. Or maybe “avoquatro” flows better than does “avocatres”.

They watch me.

In order to know how to behave and what to do, they watch me. As they are growing, I am their main example of an adult. They might not realize that they’re learning from me, but they are.

How do I speak to their mother? That is how they will speak to their wives.

How much TV do I watch? That is what they will watch.

What sports do I follow? They’ll probaby enjoy those later too.

How do I fill my free time? That’s how they’ll learn to occupy themselves.

Which is why I want you to tell me to stop if you see me playing games on my phone. I want to stop doing that, because it is a waste of time.

What good is it, really? Are my children going to brag to their friends about how well I play cards by myself? And they’re not even real cards – I’m just tapping my finger on a rectangle of glass.

When my kids are grown, which will they remember: that I played soccer in the yard with them or that I spent their childhood looking at a rectangle in my hands?

I read an article in WORLD magazine that discussed the rise of online games. While it has been great for the people at Zynga, the makers of Farmville and Words with Friends, I wonder how great it is for the general population.

The main quote from someone at Zynga stood out to me. He said how their games were perfect for filling idle time throughout the day.

The problem I have with that is that our brains need rest. Bits of downtime throughout the day are good for the brain.

People need to learn how to be quiet without being bored. To be unoccupied peacefully.

Can you be alone with only your thoughts for company?

If not, what does that say about your thoughts?

How prevalent is daydreaming anymore?

From where would the great ideas come if everyone is Drawing Something instead of Doing Something?

It seems to me that any new development or trend in society was foretold by Aldous Huxley in Brave New World. And online games are no exception.

On the surface, at first glance, you would equate Huxley’s soma to today’s illegal drugs. Which is true to some degree, but I extend that to anything that placates the masses into complacency.
Are there grumblings in the population? Release a new app for their phones! Are the people unhappy? Stream them some more movies!

People consume and consume and consume. We hear about that in the current obesity studies and health measures. But shouldn’t the same principle apply to our minds?

If all I’m doing is consuming games and apps and tweets and blogs, is my mind being exercised or stuffed?

I try to produce as much as I consume – match my caloric output with my input and limit my input. That applies to the web/internet/social media too. I’m producing things now – the key is to figure out how to produce useful things. More puns are fun, but what good does that do the world?

I need to also apply that to my spiritual life. To be still and know that He is God. To meditate on His Word. And then to produce. I am excellent at sitting in the pew and consuming. How can I balance my spiritual input with my spiritual output? I bet it starts with my four children.

In summary:
a bit of entertainment = fine,
excess entertainment = amusing yourself to death.

(If it was true for television, then it is even more true for the things that succeed the TV).

Allow me to introduce to you the 2011 SFS Baby Name List. Some of you may recall that I like to take the Social Security baby name list and reorganize it so that a name is counted only once even if it is spelled different ways. It is that time again, this time it’s the names from 2011.

For yet another year, Jacob is NOT the most popular boy’s name in the US – Aiden is. Rather, the name that is pronounced the same as Aiden is the most popular boy’s name in 2011.

Some Stats

• The top 4 names for the boys are the same as 2010 (the government got the top two names wrong).
• The top 3 names for the girls are the same as 2010 (the government got the top two names right).
• William went up in popularity, as I predicted last year.
• Same thing with Catherine/Katherine. More people spell it with a ‘K’, but the Duchess of Cambridge spells hers with a ‘C’. Both variations increased by about the same amount.
• William is the highest-ranked boy’s name that has no spelling variations.
• Girl names still have more spelling variations than boy names (319/1000 vs. 229/1000 alternates)
• The boys still have the name with the highest number of alternate spellings (Jayden/Aiden with 9 vs. Hailey/Carly with 8)
• The girls had more new variations added this year. For example: Braelyn/Braelynn, Samiya/Samiyah, and Sloan/Sloane for the girls. Also for example: Bentlee was new, as was Johan/Johann for the boys.

2011 Improved Baby Name List

Click on the link above and peruse to your heart’s content!

This week’s installment of my attempts at puns:

You will probably agree that Fum of these puns were a little weak.

My wife bought the toothpaste, and the wording on the tube itself is the same as the wording on the box. I am saddened by the lack of knowledge of English. I assume that they hire people who are writers. And I assume that there are people who review and approve what the writers wrote.

“Cleans tough to reach spaces” is ambiguous. The English language gives you tools to make wording clear – use them.

In this case, the correct thing to do is add hyphens.

Let’s look at the phrase as it is: “Cleans Tough to Reach Spaces”

When I read it, I see “Cleans Tough (in order) to Reach Spaces”. In other words, it’s a tough cleaner and it can reach spaces. Cleans is the verb, Tough is the adverb (shouldn’t it be Toughly, then?), and to Reach Spaces is the, umm, rest of the sentence.

I realize that Colgate probably wanted me to read it as “Cleans Spaces (that are) Tough to Reach”. They should have used hyphens to make themselves understood. “Tough to Reach” is a phrase that wants to be one adjective. You make multiple words into one adjective by combining them with hyphens! Yea!

Conclusion: Colgate with whitening MaxClean SmartFoam “Cleans Tough-to-Reach Spaces”

Wife: Okay, who put socks in the fridge?
The funny part was that Beta came running to claim his socks, which he apparently wanted to be cold.

Gamma: When the poison ivy is gone, what time is it?
I: Umm…4 o’clock
Gamma: 5 o’clock!
Well, at least I was close. His questioning reminded me of those annoying Netflix commercials.

Gamma: I’m washing my hair like a cat.
Wife: What?! Stop licking your hands!
Gamma: But Nanoo said that’s what cats do…
Wife: Yes, but you’re not a cat.

Then came Wrath of the Titans:


But that’s only two movies. Any good series these days has to be a trilogy, at least.

Since there’s nothing out there yet, I am going to suggest what the third installment should be.

It will be set years after the second movie – long enough so that people will have forgotten about the titans. Something will happen that will stir the echoes of the past and cause people to

Remember the Titans

What? That movie title is already taken?

Well, never mind then.

If I were given the task of naming the third titans movie, I would call it Last of the Titans. It fits the general theme and conveys the idea that this concludes the trilogy.

For example, if the Lions were to win the Super Bowl, the reporter would find Matthew Stafford and say to him, “talk about this win”.

In the past, reporters would conduct interviews with questions. The previous example would have been “What does this win mean to you?”

They mean approximately the same thing. They get approximately the same result.

After hearing yet another post-game interview, I thought about it for a few minutes. I wonder if the shift to “talk about” came because people were saying what they wanted to say regardless of the question.

Maybe reporters got tired of people ignoring the question and giving whatever spiel they had, so they stopped bothering to think up questions.

It seems to me that both sides need a refresher course on expectations: interviewers are to ask questions and interviewees are to answer the questions that are asked.

1. The NFL did a great job marketing the draft this year.
   I don’t remember caring much about the draft in prior years. In fact, most of the time I couldn’t tell you which weekend the draft was. But this year I knew.

   Maybe it was the switch to prime time. Maybe it was the breaking up of the draft over 3 days. Whatever it was, it worked. I paid attention.

   Or maybe it was the fact that the Red Wings were out of the playoffs. My sports focus did not have a particular target, so it settled on the NFL draft.

2. The Lions’ 2nd-round choice reveals careful planning.
   A lot of people are either criticizing the Detroit Lions’ 2nd-round pick of Ryan Broyles or they are simply scratching their heads at it.

   I have an explanation. Whether it is the actual reason the Lions went with him has yet to be determined.

   The Lions know one of their draft picks will get injured, so they are getting the injury out of the way.

   Think about the Lions’ draft picks over the last couple years:
   – Mikel Leshoure – missed his entire rookie season last year
   – Matthew Stafford – missed several games due to injury in his first two seasons

   With that kind of record, the Lions should assume that their draft picks will be injured at some point. Better to get the injury out of the way by drafting players who are currently injured. Maybe they’ll be ready to play at the start of the season, or maybe they’ll have to miss a few games. Either way, the Lions are ahead of the game.

3. The grades are generous.
   I read a review of the draft, and that review gave each team a letter grade on its draft performance. Most teams got As and Bs. Some got Cs, and only 2 got Ds (Seattle and Jacksonville).

   At first I thought “Wait a minute – the draft isn’t a zero-sum game. There are only so many good picks, so not every team can be above the curve.” But then I thought that every team can be above the curve, because each team has different needs.

   In the end, I suppose I agree with Coach Schwartz: “Is your draft grade a tiebreaker for the playoffs next year? When it is, let me know, and I’ll worry about what our draft grade is.”

The only problem now is waiting for football season to start.

Transcript :
TV Announcer 1: Welcome back to another edition of the Feud Network Challenge
TV Announcer 2: We’re here in Great Barton, where a massive protest has gathered.
TV Announcer 1: That’s right, there are thousands of people here, all chanting “Lance”
TV Announcer 2: Let’s interview one of the protestors.
TV Announcer 1: Sir, what’s going on here?
Protestor 1: Well, I saw the store’s sign about Lance, and I thought that it just wasn’t right what they are doing to him, keeping him locked up and all…
Protestor 2: Wait, here comes the owner of the building. Let’s see what he has to say.
Store Owner: I thank you for your support, but there is no Lance.
Protestor 3: What? We’ve been tricked!
Store Owner: If you want to help, please buy a photo session.
Protestor 4: Hey look! Someone on the other side of town wants to help Lance W. Designer!

The End