10 Most Offensive Board Games and Many Other Things

• Good list of the ten most offensive board games from io9.
• The best science fiction and fantasy of 2013. - a lot of things I haven't read, although MaddAdam is in my library pile on the counter and Ancillary Justice is in my iPad.
• 5 films the Dallas Observer thought were worth streaming on Netflix.  I saw 237 and enjoyed it.  I'll have to stream the rest when I'm done with my latest Bollywood film while cycling (Matru Ki Bijlee Ka Mandola)
• Learn to Play 16 Easy Guitar Riffs from Music Radar - I have got to learn to play Supermassive Black Hole.  I'll be set if any exotic dancers want to suddenly dance in  my space.
• A very stately and organized flash mob by the USAF at the National Air and Space Museum courtesy of Larry (the father in law Larry, not the other one).  Not exactly flash mobby when it involves violins, cellos, and everyone in dress uniform.  But still neat.
• Ten Things You Didn't Know About Voodoo from Listverse - primarily for Eryn who's very interested in Voodoo, although she's still not allowed to watch Coven.
• The Scientific Seven Minute Workout - it's become my laptop wallpaper.  I intend to make it part of my new year's resolutions.
• How To Motivate Yourself at Any Time - I do almost all of these.  I'm naturally a fairly non-motivated person.  But I tend to just do things because I know there's a domino effect to getting more done and, in the end, I'll expend less energy by not worrying about something more than once.

Guitar and Banjo

Eryn and I have been bicycling to her guitar lessons now that it's warm enough out.

And this is for my father.  It's his banjo.  I got it somewhat in tune (although those strings go out of tune fast, so I hope it's not the posts).  This is what you can learn in five minutes with Banjos For Dummies. A little bit of not so competent two and three finger pinching and some basic strumming.

Guitar Mash Up

Eryn told her teacher she wanted to play Fun's Some Nights in guitar lessons.


He listened to about 20 seconds and then played Simon and Garfunkel's Cecilia for her.  If your timing is good when you play them both simultaneously, it's a bit hard to tell which one has the foreground.

Who Says

Yesterday, after getting back from St. Peter, we rushed through the burrito line at Chipotle and hurried to The Garage in Burnsville by 7:00 p.m. for Eryn's guitar gig.  When we got there, the parking lot was empty.  We didn't have the details with us so, after testing the door, we drove back home to see what was wrong, assuming we had the wrong location or wrong day.  Instead, we had the wrong time.  I'd told my wife we needed to be back before 7:00 so we could go, but it was practice on Friday at 7:00, the actual performance was at 3:00 p.m.  I felt awful.  If possible, worse so than missing her birthday because I was in a coma.  She looked so sad. It's about the only event I haven't entered into my phone calendar since...I don't know since when. I entered everything into my calendar. And you might think entering 7:00 p.m. into my calendar wouldn't have fixed anything, but it would have forced me to read a bit more carefully.

We went out for ice cream at Ring Mountain to distract her, and it worked a bit, although she was still disappointed. She did sit down and belted out the tune she's been practicing for the last month, "Who Says" by Selena Gomez. I said I wanted to put it online so her cousins could see her play.  Eryn says she wants some voice lessons, but she's doing a great job actually belting out the song and getting some voice behind it, and she gets better as she warms up and relaxes. She's not shirking and mumbling. And it was a performance for guitar, and she's doing great there. I really enjoy watching her fingers as she plays. I'm not very good with a guitar, and I'm jealous of her strumming and how fast she can flip between chords.

I told her that at least she has an easy song to practice for her next performance.

Eryn's Guitar, Ming's Poster

A very nice picture of Eryn playing guitar while wearing her new Christmas dress. In the background, you can see my cool artcrank poster from pedlar that Ming bought and framed for me for my birthday. It's not on the wall yet, but will be soon.

The Other Univeral

Between the days at Islands of Adventure, we went to Universal Studios.  The area with Shrek, Jaws, Terminator 2, the Simpsons, and the sorts of rides I remember from being a kid at Universal in California.  I think Eryn was originally dubious about why we'd want to spend time there when we could be going back to Harry Potter, but she ended up having a great time.  Particularly on the interactive rides like the "make a movie" ride with Christopher Walken (nice orange sneakers!) where they film members of the audience and make them part of action-adventure movie/train ride.  Or the MIB ride where you shoot at aliens with a laser gun.  She's all about laser tag.  My favorite was the Simpons' ride, where you don't really go anywhere, but the roller coaster car you're in shakes and rattles as the walls move around it, and giant screens make you feel like you're on a hell of a roller coaster ride that includes being chewed on by a giant Maggie.

Pooteewheet and Eryn not too long after the Jaws ride.


I got in trouble for spray painting on a wall.


Who's a dingus?  Eryn's a dingus!!!


After a day of rides, we went to Hard Rock for dinner.  Not my usual choice of faire, but Eryn wanted wings, and I was pretty sure that was the closest place with good wings.  This picture is for Kyle.  It's Alanis Morissette's harmonica, next to a picture of her playing a guitar.  And it says she used it for a hand in my pocket, but if you're playing harmonica, then your hands can't be in your pockets.  It's all very ironic.


Eryn wanted a picture next to Pete Townshend's guitar.  Or what was left of his '73 Gibson Les Paul.  I quote the Hard Rock Orlando description that it is, "a testament to the raw energy and aggression of The Who's brilliant guitarist and songwriter, Pete Townshend.  A landmark instrument, it was immortalized in the famous print ad for the film The Kids Are Alright.  The ad featured Mr. Townshend (at the Newcastle Odeon) with the guitar over his head moments before it was reduced to it's current condition.  The caption read, "This Guitar Has Seconds To Live."

That said, this isn't that guitar.  The waitress led us astray.  But it is pieces of a Stratocaster Townshend smashed in 2002 during a concert in which he played The Kids Are Alright.  Tomato/tomato.


The usual Universal Globe picture you have to take when you visit.  The stuffed animal is "Patch."  Eryn won it playing head to head whackamole against Pooteewheet.  No one else would play and they guy felt bad for her because she'd been there for ten minutes without a challenger.

Apparently, I'm a Teenage Girl

Because a guy on YouTube who showed me the chords for Almost Lover by A Fine Frenzy noted that it's a song liked by teenage or almost-teenage girls. Damn it.

This is actually a pretty good rendition. I like her chords better than the Am D G C chording, which is probably more accurate, and it's easy to see her strumming technique.

Skype Concerto in E Minor #1

This is what passes for amusement at our house now that we use Skype. Eryn on guitar. Grandma on harmonica.

Doesn't Look Good

I rode my bike in two days this week, pulling the Burley behind me so I could take Eryn home from day care. With all the laxatives she's been on lately, she had an accident or two at work (streaks - she's embarrassed about it, and tries to joke it off), and so I was sent home with two bags, each containing a pair of underwear.

Well, I got to work this morning, and was just about to walk away from the Burley, when I noticed I'd missed one of the pairs of dirty panties in a bag. And then I realized it wasn't just a bag, it was a latex glove, because they'd run out of bags. I had a pair of dirty kid panties in a see-through latex glove in the bottom of my Burley, laying there in all sorts of road gravel kicked off the bike tire. I don't think it's possible to look more like some sort of serial killer. I'm pretty sure I'd have asked the guards to check me out if I had locked my bike up next to me.

I pushed them back up under the Burley seat where they could only be found with an appropriate search warrant.

I get to practice Pretty Woman and Smoke on the Water this week on the guitar. Not the whole songs, just riffs. But it's cool to play something fun.