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One of the great things about having kids, and having your parents still in the house in which you grew up, is that you get to relive the experiences you had growing up. Preferably they would be only the good experiences, the ones you want to relive.

This past Saturday, my brother had his kids and my kids down by my parents’ pond. He found a garter snake and pointed it out to the children. It was about a foot and a half long, maybe two feet.

I have many memories of chasing and catching garter snakes during springs and summers. I thought I would try to relive my glory days of snake catching. Those days must have been 20-25 years ago. So my brother and I chased it through the grass. The snake must not have had anywhere to go, because he didn’t hide very well and didn’t go very far. I grabbed for him a few times, but my skills were a little rusty. I missed those few times, always hitting just where the tail had just been.

I decided that I needed to aim closer to his head, leading a little bit so that I wouldn’t miss again. But I also wanted both hands free so that I could quickly grab his head once I caught his body. That’s the easiest way to avoid being bitten. I was carrying the infant in one arm, so I handed him over to my brother so that I could have both arms free to catch the snake. Surprisingly, I caught the snake on the next attempt.

It is a lot easier chasing snakes without having to worry about dropping a 2-month-old child.

I held the snake just behind his head. Sure enough, he started twisting his head around, with his mouth open and fangs bared. He tried that only twice and then realized it was futile. But he also was writhing his body. You want to hold the flailing body away from you, at arm’s length, because the snake will usually start emptying his digestive system. And you don’t want that to get all over you.

We took the snake over to the other children, and they were interested for a little bit. They touched it, but no one wanted to hold it. Then it was dinner time, so I let the snake go back in the grass. I assume there’s no license required for catch-and-release for snakes.

“Now suppose one of you fathers is asked by his son for a fish; he will not give him a snake instead of a fish, will he?”
– Luke 11:11

One of my favorite magazines is WORLD magazine. They have a mailbag department where they print letters to the editor and they also print one picture in that section. The picture always has someone reading a WORLD magazine, and they usually show people in far-away lands.

I decided to take a picture of someone reading a WORLD magazine, but it was in my own front yard, not in some distant country. So I don’t know if it will even be in the running. In case it doesn’t get printed, here it is.

As you can see, I am going for the humor angle, rather than the normal location angle.

This is several months old, but there’s an emulator that turns your Pocket PC into a Commodore 64. This is only for PocketPC / Windows Mobile devices (PDAs and smartphones). Which means it might be hard to plug in the old joysticks I still have in my basement.

I have nothing but fond memories of the good old C64. Okay, I do still have the C64s themselves. Ahh, the good old days. Back when you had to choose between screen resolution and color depth. But there was still plenty that could be done with the limitations.

But the old computers don’t need to be relegated to the past. You can even play play Guitar Hero on one, well, almost.

So if you know anyone with an iPaq or other Pocket PC, tell them to get the Pocket Commode 64.

“The memory of the righteous is blessed, But the name of the wicked will rot.”
– Proverbs 10:7

We watched Space Chimps last weekend. We got it from the library, as we have found it easiest to rent/borrow movies from the library than from any other movie places. I hadn’t heard of Space Chimps before, but my wife said that Dove liked it. It was rated G, so I figured it should be okay for the 3- and 5-year-old to watch.

It was almost okay for the kids to watch. There was not much objectionable in the movie, unless your children object to giant carnivorous flowers and vines that try to eat the protagonists. And there’s some bully behavior, which you definitely don’t want your kids to learn. But, of course, everything works out fine by the end of the movie.

But until the kids were sure that everything was going to be okay, the dangerous parts of the movie had the kids moving from their own chairs to my lap, then from my lap to the couch behind me (next to mom). The many-toothed, large-mouthed plants were just the start. It was the long-fanged cave monster, chasing the heroes through the cave, that most affected the kids. But if you stop a movie at the scary part, I think that’s worse than continuing to watch it. If you stop it when they (or you) are scared, you are left with only your imagination. The damage has been done, assuming that it is only a scary part of an otherwise decent movie, and the best way to mitigate the damage is to finish the story.

Of course they make it through the cave okay, and of course the friendly aliens who were dipped into freezing liquid by the bully alien are just covered in a frozen shell instead of being frozen solid. I would not introduce the youngsters to liquid nitrogen after watching Space Chimps, as they may have the mistaken impression that if they get frozen by it they could just break out of it with no ill effects.

At the end of the movie, the kids were laughing and were able to tell me their favorite parts. Their favorite parts of any movie are always the slapstick parts. In this case, it was a chimp falling down on a treadmill.

Jeff Daniels voices the bully Zartog and does a fine job. I had seen his name in the credits and was trying to figure out which character he was, but I could not. Patrick Warburton, on the other hand, is much easier to tell. Maybe his voice is too distinctive, or maybe he gets typecast into these roles. If you know what Patrick Warburton sounds like (especially in other animated films – I’m thinking Bee Movie) then you’ll have no problem figuring out which character is his.

There were enough jokes and stuff aimed at the parents of the kids watching the movie. So it is entertaining for all. I did laugh out loud at a couple of parts, or at least chuckle heartily. Here was my favorite bit (might not be exactly right, but the general idea is there):

Two chimps, Ham and Titan, are in a spaceship heading back to Earth.
Ham, protesting: “But I’m not an astronaut.”
Titan: “Are you wearing aluminum clothes?”
H: “Yes.”
T: “Are you in outer space?”
H: “Yes.”
T: “Are you David Bowie?”
H; “No.”
T: “Then you’re an astronaut!”

“But you said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God, And I will sit on the mount of assembly In the recesses of the north.'”
– Isaiah 14:13

Christmas is a happy time.  One of our night-time rituals is reading books at bedtime.  I’ll tell the kids to pick one or two books each for me to read to them.  The other night, what “book” am I brought?  The most recent Lego catalog.  So we read each page, skipping the detailed descriptions but hitting all the names of sets and minifigures.  I am sure the kids dreamt well that night.

Then today we got a new Lego catalog in the mail. There is a new series in the Lego world: Power Miners. This series has the premise that geological disturbances are being caused by some new form of mineral, and the Power Miners must thwart this threat! It seems to have taken a while, but the concept of Tiberium has crept into places other than Command and Conquer. There is even a harvester set. Rogue crystals are headed to a toy near you.

Having played Guitar Hero, I find I listen to songs differently.   Now when I hear a song on the radio, I will listen for the lead guitar part and will try to picture how well the song would fit into the game and how fun or difficult it would be to play.  Some songs, like Don’t Fear the Reaper, have a good guitar part in the middle but might be rather boring for the rest of the song.  I know they probably don’t need any song suggestions, but it’s fun to think of some.

Another song I thought would be good was Hotel California, but I checked and someone else already thought it was a good idea and put it into Guitar Hero World Tour.  They need more Zeppelin too.  I’m thinking that the guitar solo in Heartbreaker would be the highlight of the game.  And some Johnny B. Goode wouldn’t hurt either.  Ooh… Clapton’s Layla (the fast one, not the slow, unplugged one) would be fun too.  And Sultans of Swing.

Okay, for the last two suggestions I cheated and peeked at Guitar World’s list of top guitar solos of all time.  On a lighter note (pun intended), I also recommend Hocus Pocus by Focus and Frankenstein by the Edgar Winter Group.

Some radio stations are all-Christmas format, so I usually don’t find a lead guitar part in those.  Although… Christmas Eve in Sarajevo could be a good candidate for Guitar Hero Holiday Edition.

And not to be left out of a trend, the Christian bookstores are selling Guitar Praise.  That way, you can enjoy wholesome fun with the entire family, playing Christian/praise/worship songs on the guitar.

“Give thanks to the LORD with the lyre; Sing praises to Him with a harp of ten strings.”
– Psalm 33:2

The new James Bond movie Quantum of Solace is set to open later this week.  The last one, Casino Royale, was good, but it had two problems.  The first was that it was a Sony Picture movie displaying Sony shots of Sony products.  Some parts seemed more like Sony ads than a real movie, such as when he is viewing the Sony security camera footage on Sony TVs using Sony players, or when he is sailing on his Sony boat and he looks at his Sony laptop.

Okay, maybe it wasn’t a Sony boat.  But if Sony had made boats, I’m sure they would have been featured prominently.  The other problem is a smaller one, but one from which Tomorrow Never Dies suffered badly: explaining too much to the audience.  In that one, the actors explained what they were doing as they did things.  Very annoying.  At least Casino Royale had a secondary actor “narrating” to help out the audience.  Something like whispering “He has the 5 and 7.  He needs the 6 to win.” to someone else while Bond is playing poker.  But enough with the trivial complaints.

According to one interview I read, Barbara Broccoli, the producer of the Bond movies, has said that Quantum is the name of the Sinister Organization that Bond is fighting.  Quantum is really QUANTUM, an acronym in the tradition of SPECTRE, but QUANTUM is so secret that not even she knows what it means.  So, to help her out, I have some suggestions of what it could mean.

What does Quantum stand for?  Try …

• Quit Using Acronym Names To seem Ultra-Mysterious
• Quest to Undertake Another National Target by a Universal Mob
• Quintessential Underworldly Archenemy, Needed To Upset MI6
• Quarrelsome Underground Association of Nuclear Threats and Undermining Morale
• Quiet, Unassuming Agent Negotiates The Ultimate Movie
• Quipping, Urbane Agent Neutralizes The Underling’s Moves

The last two apply more to Bond than to QUANTUM, but I liked them so I included them.  If you have any more suggestions, please add them in a comment.  Thanks.

“For nothing is hidden, except to be revealed; nor has anything been secret, but that it would come to light.”
– Mark 4:22