Anatomy of an Attempted Murder - Gangland Duck Edition

The Scene - A photo perfect day, with the sun out and a nice cool ambience.  Ducks are being fed by a perfectly great looking family, with a handsome, geeky photographer taking random photos of his kids, and his assorted body parts.

The Crime - The photographer notices something amiss.  Three ducks are grouped together, quacking sinisterly at the water.  They move together in a choreographed pack, as if they were contained in their motions.  The photographer looks harder.  He sees something in the water, something moving.

It's another duck.  

As the duck below struggles to get his ducky head above water, the aggressive attacker, henceforth referred to Evil Duck, is persistent in his actions.  He positions his entire body on top of the other duck, keeping the victim, henceforth referred to as Duck Soup, submerged.  Evil Duck has a hold of Duck Soup's neck, holding it far under the water, depriving Duck Soup of precious oxygen.  Duck Soup manages to get a couple gulps of air once in a while, but Evil Duck is fatter, stronger, and has more hate in his evil little duck heart.  

"You're an example," Evil Duck quacks to Duck Soup.

"So the other Ducks know that that's what happens when mother****ers don't pay up."

"Bbbuulrbbb!  I'll have it in a week!  I swear!" gasps Duck Soup.

The other ducks cackle with delight.  They love it when they squeal.   They get some pathetic and whiny.

The photographer and his wife realize their moral duty and break up the fact with random arm-waving and spurts of "Wah!" and "Burgh!".  It's awkward, but it worked.  The three ducks break up their formation, and Duck Soup flies for his wet life.

"Next time, Duck!" Evil Duck yelled, shaking his clenched wing.  "Your ass is mine!"

Duck Soup looks back at the Beautiful Family and winks a thank you.  His gratitude will be everlasting.

For one day out of the year, it's actually good to be poor.

I checked the account balance in the bank, and we got paid. That's right, when you have 3 kids, and a combined income of $33,000 and a small business on the side, you get a nice little refund. It's mind boggling the money we're getting back. Alas, we're also neck deep in debt, so we won't get to see very much of the money. Virtually all of it will go back into loans and whatnot.

But good news as well! Once one of the loans is paid off, we will free up almost 200 bucks every month. Doesn't seem like much, but it's still all good.

Instant money is definitely cool.
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Cute kid story of the day - I was going to take a bit out of a french baguette today, one that I bought a few days ago, and it was rock hard. So I gave it to the kids to play, which they did, thumped it on the wall. Then I took a nibble out of it, which they thought was a grand idea. So Alex thumped the wall with the bread, and then took a bite out of it. I have photos, but they're still on the camera. So's the video.

People eating oversized foods is funny.

Having a laptop at work means that I can blog offline about more inane, useless information.

It's nice though, not having to just watch TV soaps in the breakroom like everyone else, as good as soaps are.

Sometimes I'm worried about not liking my children when they get older. Sounds mean and premeditated, but it's not meant to come across that way. It's just that like with Franklin, our fat gray tabby - he was cute and interesting at one point, but now he's just a cat that gets on my nerves. I suppose it's all in the context. Cats aren't children. But I worry because children do inevitably grow up, and they could either get along with you really well, or they could grow up to have a completely polar personality than my own. Doesn't mean I won't love my children anymore, but what if you don't like them?

Yeah, it's a little taboo, I'm aware of that, but there are adults out there who are estranged with their parents. People who can't stand their parents. I think the best thing for me to do is to hope that we bring up the children correctly and they learn to be the kind of people who like their parents.

But right now, rest assured that I will give my children all the love I could possibly muster, and then give them some more on top of that. In a way, it's ironic that I'm so touchy feely because my father was pretty hands off. As was my mom. It wasn't that they didn't love me, it was just embedded in the culture that intimacy between parents and children were mostly verbal and emotional. Physical displays of affection were only for extended leave of absences or the bigger things.

Like my mom was saying, if only the Eastern and Western sensibilities got together, children would be more well-rounded. The Eastern sensibilities of child bringing with the strictness and discipline could use a little softening, and the Western "Buddy" sensibilities could use a little more rules.

Lunch is now over. Time for work.

Back in the game

As Neonvirus mentioned, I am on a little bit of a blogging spree, simple reason being that the computer's more accessible to me now. Even though I have tons more to do with editing weddings and whatnot, the laptop has given me a little more mobility, so I don't have to sit at the desk and feel obligated to write something. Right now, I'm just sitting in bed, doing a little bit of blogging before bedtime. It's really nice to have a laptop.

The thing I do worry about the kids is their sugar intake. We don't outright buy sweets for them, but they do get juice, fruit snacks, and treats a little more often than I feel comfortable with. The biggest concern I have, really, is that when they don't eat their meals and instead want fruits, or treats. Honestly, if they ate their meals, or made attempts to do so, I wouldn't really care as much. But as of late, they are fifty fifty on their meals. They either eat it or they're just not interested. I get a little wacky because I start insisting to the kids that if they don't eat, that they don't get any juice, fruit, or anything sweet for the rest of the night. That doesn't always work because one of the three grown-ups in this house will probably cave and either make them something junky, or give them fruits.

I'm not perfect, of course. I like to give them ice-cream and treats because it makes them happy. It makes me feel like a hero. But fact of the matter is that my mother, my father, and my grandmother has diabetes. And I'm probably in line for getting it as well, and I'm probably five times worse than my mother was when she didn't have diabetes. Damn genetic disposition. I'm not even afraid of the kids getting obese off sweets, I just cringe at the idea of having to monitor diabetes in children. And I would really, really hate to have to give someone the needle. I hate needles myself, and I couldn't fanthom having to do that to my children.

Hey, I'll never be a crack addict.

I've started to write at work, scene by scene of my Feature Movie. Right now I've rewritten two scenes that I originally penned in a notebook, and I feel like the characters all sound alike, the dialogue is slightly stilted, but hey, it's words on a page. That's one step closer to getting the movie going. Today I tried to rough cut some wedding footage that's due at the end of the month, and Final Cut Pro just sucked the life out of my old batteries. I mean, 10 minutes and the iBook had to put itself to sleep to conserve energy. So I'll be bringing my power adapter tomorrow, got the okay to plug it into work from the Store Director, who probably thinks I'm just being geeky, bringing in my laptop to work.

That said, Good Night, and Good Luck.

Lust has a new Name. It is Nikon D50

I suppose being a geek that I am, instead of requesting threesomes with strangers or an open marriage, my bargaining with my wife consists of, "Can I buy this?" A Mac Mini and a used iBook later, my latest obsession is the Nikon D50. It is an entry level digital SLR, with the kind of photographic control that I lust over. I love my Minolta Z1, but mostly in well-lit rooms or beautiful sunny days. The rest of the time I would take some photos, and then hope they look as good as they did on the LCD when I put them up on the computer. I would say that a lost a lot of good photos like that.

Yesterday my wife and I had a little break, and we went over to Staples to look for a wireless router for my iBook. Lo and behold, they had a Nikon D50 on display, with the battery charged and the lens on. We had swung by Best Buy before, but I had a salesboy (he was like 12) hovering over me, telling me things I didn't understand.

Salesboy: "The Nikon has a CMOS sensor blah blah blah."
Me: Can I take naked pictures of myself in the dark?
Salesboy: Um. Yeah. The on-camera flash will accomodate most situations.
Me: What about inside me?

Anyway, I got to meddle around with the camera a little more, and that's the next big thing for me. I don't have any birthdays or anything coming up that might warrant me getting something cool, even though my 30th birthday is in September, but that would require patience. So I made a deal with my wife, that I would come up with half of the price of the camera by selling my crap, and the other half will be from our money. From my wedding money, or income tax refund, whatever.

So the next phase is trying to figure out what I can sell to reach my goal of $260. Already, I have my dead iMac which will go for, I dunno, 30 bucks. I'm planning to archive all my original CDs and bundle them to sell. Maybe some of my old movies, my Maxim magazines, my film camera, my 1.3 megapixel camera, and whatever else I can find that is of some value to sell. And hopeful reach that goal. Do I need the camera? Well, maybe. It's a great camera, lots of control, brilliant colors. Awesome photos. Do I want that camera?

You betcha ass.

Anyone want a soundtrack bundle? Includes Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Desperado, Shine, West Side Story, Cool World, Pulp Fiction, Reservior Dogs, and When Harry Met Sally.