NCN at the Party Palace

Let's get it started in here


Pimp Daddy and the Daiquiri King (also known as "my savior")


New red boots won in the raffle


And Cleopatra (otherwise known as Robin) won a cashmere robe!


Candy canes for Mardi Gras!


An earnest discussion. Or maybe MJ's music was too loud.
Mary 2, Michelle, Jordan (whose fabulous spats didn't make it into any of the photos), Dick, and Sharon


The kids had a great time with Frank's samurai helmet. This is Niall.


And this is Erich.


One of our most surreal moments: the teenagers and Diana headed for the men's room.


Michelle is blue. I missed getting a photo when she was still wearing her pink hair.


"Let me outta this crazy place!"
Fergus


Our tamest group photo

NCN trip to the piercing parlor

Sunday before the big game, we headed over to Painless Steel to get some piercings. Unfortunately, only MJ had her ID with her, so everybody else...


just watched


while Harper (instead of Daddy!) held her hand.


She made faces


but she didn't make a sound, not even when she did this


while I got flustered and Harper got just a little green.


And then it was done.


"That wasn't too bad," said Frankie Fingers, the piercing artist. "It would have been worse if you'd been drinking last night." Indeed.

NCN Sunday

"Let's go!"


Gamers


Fergus and one of his weekend heroes, Ducky
with Hayden, Michelle, and Effie


Football Cliché Bingo


Oh, yeah, and football. How about that fourth quarter, huh?


Dallas and Effie, cracking each other up


Wise women
Madelyn, Gillian, Diana

NCN Monday

A subdued breakfast at IHOP.
(Yes, this is our version of subdued.)


And just like that, they were gone.

A Friday message to NCN'ers

We were supposed to see it beforehand, of course, but it's still beautiful.

Also check out her amazing and delicious TT!

http://sayitagainsammie.blogspot.com/

Kaizen

"Kaizen" is Japanese for continuous improvement. It's a workplace term typically.

But there's a lot of Kaizen in the unschooling community. We see it in action with our kids, who are always reaching up and out, and we see it in action with unschooling parents, who are always striving to improve their parenting and their connections to their kids.

Kaizen moments abounded at Non-Con North, but my favorite was the Sunday night group-chat in our livingroom. Our "panel" was made up of five parents and three teens, with some younger kids playing within earshot nearby. The teens were consulted as the experts they are, and a wealth of ideas was shared by all.

This is one of the reasons we love getting together with unschoolers SO MUCH. The joy of talking things over with people who understand our parenting goals is immeasurable.

Yes, We Can

I have so much to say about Non-Con North, it'll probably take me days to finish writing my post. In the meantime, here's this:

Friday fill-in

1. Once I was not much of a joiner, and then I went to LIFE is Good.

2. Popsicles and staying home from work are the only good things about being sick.

3. Today at work I was mysteriously absent.

4. What's all that happy unschooler noise all about? Non-Con North, of course!

5. If I make a mistake I feel like crap for an excessively long time.

6. When I woke up this morning, I thought — simultaneously — "Oh, I can't wait for everyone to get here" and "Ohmigosh, I hope nobody arrives before five."

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to spending a second evening laughing and talking myself hoarse with some of the best people in the world, tomorrow my plans include a fabulous Mardi Gras celebration at the Party Palace, and Sunday, I want to hang with my peeps!

Thursday 13

Thirteen Cool People Who Will Be At My House Today

(not including my three favorite people)

(in no particular order)

(okay, there's a pattern of sorts, but no preference order)

1. Effie
2. Fergus
3. Qacei
4. Conor
5. Logan
6. Hunter
7. Kyla
8. Gillian
9. Craig
10. Mary
11. Jon
12. Michelle
13. Jordan (maybe) or Randi (maybe)

and a bonus 14: our special guest, Harper!!

Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow

WE'RE SO EXCITED!!!!

And tomorrow's arrivals are only the beginning of the fun!!!!

Europe on a shoestring

Frank and I booked our flights to Italy last night, by way of Asheville and New York City (the latter just for a layover). We are pretty excited. We're (perpetually) anxious to see Chiara, of course, but it was especially thrilling because we found flights for $400!!

More advice to travelers: Build your own trip. When Expedia built it for us, the price tag was thousands more. For what they wanted for four trips from Asheville to Milan, we got Seattle to Charlotte, a rental car in Charlotte, Charlotte to JFK, an airport hotel in NYC, and JFK to Milan. With money left over.

We haven't booked our return trip yet, because we need to do a little more research. But we discovered one exciting tidbit: Flying home from Dublin instead of Milan is about $1300 less, per ticket. It seems like we are **required** to go to Ireland on this trip.

Oh, darn.

Snow!

But not enough to cancel work.

Oh, well. It's still pretty.

400 and counting

I passed the 400-blog-posts mark the other day. Woohoo!

A little announcement

I feel a little odd about this, but I also felt a little odd not saying anything, so here goes...

I have been invited to be one of the speakers at the Live and Learn Conference in Asheville next fall. I am very excited about this and very nervous. I hope my own personal unschooling support group will be there to "seed" my audience with friendly faces. :-)

Kelly says the 2008 Web site will be live soon with all the details.

Taking the debate out of global warming

Have a look. If you find flaws in his argument, I want to hear about them, too.



(Thanks, Schuyler.)

NCN latest

Thursday
- Is anybody arriving this day besides Harper and the Mayers?

Friday
- When you get into town, come on over to our house! No need to call first. If you need directions, send me e-mail. (My e-mail address is at the bottom of this blog.)
- Dinner: We decided to do a sandwich/salad bar at our house rather than going out. This will make the fun easy to find.

Saturday
- Daytime will possibly find us wandering the town in packs. (Trader Joe's, anyone? Or the nice little wine shop in downtown Everett?) Send e-mail if you need cell phone numbers to assist you in locating the group.
- At the party: In case you (Craig) had any doubt, there WILL be jambalaya. And King Cake. And costumes. And an eclectic playlist by MJ.
- Have you heard about the Found Items Raffle? Check out the details and bring something(s) fun!

Sunday
- Football Cliché Bingo is ON. There will be prizes!
- Cheapskate Gambling is also on - a betting pool you can join without breaking the bank (and also without needing a financial advisor to help with your winnings).

¡MUY IMPORTANTE!
I continue to delude myself that I know who is showing up for this extravaganza. If you haven't yet informed me of your plans to attend, please send e-mail! Thanks!

What's in a name

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet & current car) Cognac Odyssey - the lead singer for the aforementioned punkers, Hinduism in Mongolia, she is into poetry and welding

2.YOUR GANGSTA NAME: (fave ice cream flavor, favorite cookie) Rocky Road Macaroon - more fluff than tuff

3. YOUR “FLY Guy/Girl” NAME: (first initial of first name-first three letters of your last name) R-Mai - I'm not sure I even know what a fly girl is, but R-Mai is very fly

4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal) Blue Panther - a slinky blonde with an affinity for earrings, champagne, and being underestimated by men

5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born) Ann Ellensburg - the secret daughter of the matriarch of the richest family in town, she is pregnant with her half-brother's child and doesn't even know it

6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first) Mairo - a waiflike resistance fighter who will one day save Luke Skywalker's life, then throw him over for Lando

7. SUPERHERO NAME: ("The" + 2nd favorite color, favorite drink) The Green Margarita - a Latina hottie with kaleidoscope eyes (she doesn't do much)

8. NASCAR NAME: (the first names of your grandfathers) William Donovan - heir to a shipping empire, Will would rather drive than sit in board meetings, and, really, who can blame him?

9. STRIPPER NAME: (the name of your favorite scent/perfume/cologne, favorite candy) Opium Swedish Fish - nice bod and a decent dancer, but she doesn't get many tips with that moniker

10.WITNESS PROTECTION NAME:(mother’s & father’s middle names ) Valerie Joseph - a mild-mannered school teacher who own day discovers she can throw knives with great... oh, wait, that's been done

11. TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME: (Your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter) Dyer Denver - a toothy brunette with her eye on the prize (any prize)

12. SPY NAME/BOND GIRL: (your favorite season/holiday, flower) Summer Sweet Pea - umm, let's not go there - Bond doesn't deserve this chick

13. CARTOON NAME: (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now + “ie” or “y”) Strawberry Bray - a chipper little-red-donkey sidekick

14. HIPPY NAME: (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree) Cookie Willow - peace love free, baby

15. YOUR ROCKSTAR TOUR NAME: ("The" + your fave hobby/craft + your fave weather element + “Tour”) The Blogging Sunshine Tour - yep, that's what it's all about

Friday fill-in

1. Family time, especially in the sunshine, and especially on the road, makes me happy. (The memory that leapt to mind when I wrote this: hiking with the girls up to the blessedly cool pools on the Romero Canyon Trail out of Catalina State Park in Arizona.)

2. I would like a housekeeper like Alice, please.


3. Monkey Bread tastes SO good!
Note to my readers who speak the Queen's English (or a different variation thereof)—the "biscuits" are dinner rolls, not cookies.

4. Friday is my favorite day of the week because the whole weekend is stretched out in front of me, full of possibilities.

5. My perseverance is my best feature.

6. We could learn so much from closing every school in the world.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm REALLY looking forward to getting ready for Non-Con North, tomorrow my plans include getting ready for Non-Con North, and Sunday, I want to get ready for Non-Con North! (Get the picture?)


Have a great weekend, everybody!

Thursday 13

This is my 13th TT. I would have liked to do something special like Mary did for her 13th, but I am theme-less today. So here is... A Random Thirteen 1. Why live music is better: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhhLeqjjf20 2. This is the cat I would have if I weren't allergic: I fell in love with Abbies when I met a little charmer named Tiger. He loved me nearly as much as I loved him and sat on my shoulder to cuddle and sniff my ear. I sneezed and wheezed for an hour afterward, but it was worth it! 3. As you might have been able to discern from my TT of two weeks ago, I love movies with ensemble casts best of all. "Two minutes, Turkish!" 4. I find it tragic that the subjunctive is fading from our language, especially when expressing a wish or a hypothesis. However, I once heard (a possible grammar-geek urban myth) about a killer's use of the subjunctive in a note left at the crime scene helping to convict him, since so few people use it these days. 5. Speaking of urban myths, did you know that "Ring Around the Rosie" is probably not about the Black Death? 6. MJ took this: 7. The oldest romance novel I've read (if you don't count Austen, Brontë, et al.) is The Ivy Tree by Mary Stewart, originally published in 1961. It's a damned good book. 8. This is terribly unoriginal—I'm certainly not the first to claim her—but this is my secret girlfriend: Why? She's stunning, of course, she works for the welfare of children, and she did some of her own stunts in Lara Croft. That bungee ballet scene? Beautiful! I'm just glad they skipped the silly falsies in the sequel. 9. Oh my gawd, I just realized I left The Rock off of my list of favorite action movies. For shame! Great quote: "Well, gosh, kind of a lot's happened since then." 10. These are the 935 lies that drove us to war in Iraq — The Center for Public Integrity 11. After Juno, I have had to reconsider my opinion that Jennifer Garner is a horrible actor. She still sucked in Rose Hill, though. Of course, that movie was a pretty terrible adaptation of a pretty charming book, so her suckiness was...appropriate? 12. We have been watching this family transform their house. So nice to have somebody else doing the work for a change! 13. This is the prettiest TT I've ever seen.

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Lying to kids

Mrs. G has a typically entertaining blog post up about the lies she has told her children. Now, I love Mrs. G, don't get me wrong, and I enjoyed the post in (I think) the spirit that she intended it. But I am finding the 90-some comments pretty distressing. Some of them are just compliments to Mrs. G, but dozens are from moms confessing (often gleefully) to their own lies.

Only one person has responded the way I wanted to respond (but didn't feel clever enough to do without offending Mrs. G or her readers). Since this is my blog, I can offend anybody I want.

Why don't these people see the harm they are doing? They are not only not accepting their children as they are, but they are using lies that will eventually be uncovered to disguise their lack of acceptance!

The lies that made me saddest were the ones that were used to steal from a child something that gave him or her comfort. Terrible.

Here's the comment I liked:

I remember feeding my kids some stories so that my own life would be a little more convenient.

Kinda wish I could go back and undo that kind of stuff now.

Trust is precious. My 14yo won't eat with a particular type of fork from the silverware drawer, because he saw me use it to scrape cat food into the cat's dish. He does not believe me when I tell him it's been washed, sterilized, disinfected.

He doesn't believe me about a lot of little things like that, even when they are true.

Really, I'd rather have the trust than the convenience. Too late.

(emphasis mine)

Brava, Laura. Thanks for putting it into words.

Tip for travelers

If your family is like my family, the places you stay while on vacation tend to supply their rooms with plastic cups. Like free wireless Internet, it turns out that is actually one of the perks they offer over their fancy-schmancy counterparts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3OWE2Lx0dk&NR=1

Juno

Go see this movie.

Enough said.

But wait - I also have to say, "Ohmigod, where did Ellen Page come from?" She is amazing. She's beautiful. She's astonishingly talented. And she'll be 20 in a month, despite my having just proclaimed to Frank that she couldn't be more than Juno's 16.

Happy Birthday, Ellen! Thanks for our present!

Hot off the presses

The long-awaited second album of our favorite Hindu punkers was released today!


Here's the meme:

You design the cover of your band's album using these links:

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Randomom
The first article title on the page is the name of your band.

2. http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four words of the very last quote is the title of your album.

3. http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/
The third picture, no matter what it is, is your album cover.

You then take the pic, add your band name and the album title to it, and then post your pic to your blog.

Maybe I was an unschooler from the beginning

I've always been aware that my transition from "homeschooler" to "unschooler" was very brief, but I thought there was a transition. Now I'm not so sure. While cleaning out my office, I came across this note that I wrote when I was researching homeschooling:

I'm interested in homeschooling because I want to give my girls a life less ordinary. I want them to use their time on activities that interest them. I want their individuality to be nurtured and encouraged instead of smashed and buried. I want them to be safe from the social pressures and negative experiences that cause so many girls to suffer a crisis of self-esteem and self-image as they enter adolescence. I want them to get a first-class education, but I am beginning to admit that may not (need to) include college. I want to spend time with my kids; accompany them on their journey into adulthood; celebrate instead of fear their adolescence; support them starting now in their interests, dreams, and endeavors instead of waiting to see what they choose as adults. I want them to be experienced in pursuing their own dreams by the time they need to make adult decisions.

I see our days flowing pretty loosely. I would like some tidiness and some measurable progress each day, but meandering until we discover a goal is okay with me.

I guess all that's really changed are my own definitions of "first-class education" and "measurable progress."

Friday fill-in

1. The last compliment I got was from piscesgrrrl; she said she's adding me to her favorite blogs.

2. I'm reading the book my very best friend recommended to me a year ago.

3. I woke up today and thought, "One more day..."

4. Why does the time til Non-Con North pass so slowly?

5. The last thing I ate was a bite of oatmeal.

6. January... the month before Non-Con North.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to FREEDOM, tomorrow my plans include Real Life, and Sunday, I want to revel!

Thursday 13

Thirteen Reasons I Would Have Preferred to Stay in Bed this Morning 1. It's (still) cloudy. 2. It's (still) cold. 3. I got cozy new sheets for Christmas. 4. The book I'm listening to while I commute is a little boring. 5. I have to commute. 6. It would be better for the environment. 7. I'd rather be sleeping. 8. My left knee is sore. 9. My kids aren't home. 10. It's not like the world would have ended if I had slept in. 11. I am capable of coming up with a good excuse to give my boss. 12. My new officemate is a dork. 13. At some point, it would have been too late to go to work, and then I could have gotten up to do something fun.

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A drum roll please

MJ is done with driver's ed!!!

She had her final drive tonight and passed! Yay! She is very relieved, as she was finding class pretty boring.

Now she has about 9 months to practice for her real test...

She had a fab time in Corvallis, of course, and wasn't ready to come home. I think all the teens are really glad they'll be together again in less than three weeks.

Tonight is STUN movie night, so as I type this there are seven kids, aged 10 to 17, piled in our basement watching Mel Brooks movies. "Blazing Saddles" is first on the agenda, probably Mel's most educational film of all.

The girls have started their dogsitting job, so we might not be seeing much of them for the next couple of weeks. I hope they'll take turns coming home so I can get my kid fix.

A special shoutout to Randi and Kauleen: ((((good vibes))))

Control

"Sooner or later we will come to the edge of all that we can
control and find life, waiting there for us."
— Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D.


I have had this quote featured in the sidebar for a few days, and I think I'll leave it up a bit longer. It's from Dr. Remen's book My Grandfather's Blessings, which I discovered several years ago while on a personal odyssey (as it turned out) visiting a friend in New Mexico. It had quite an impact on me.

I come from a long line of detail-oriented women who (attempt to) leave very little to chance. When my kids were small, my need for control — and it approached obsessive-compulsive levels in those sleep-deprived days — caused a lot of pain in this house.

It's hard for me to look back at that time objectively. Frank and I have always encouraged exploration and individuality to some degree, and we did a lot that can be classified as attachment parenting (nursing on demand, letting the girls self-wean, holding them whenever they wanted, cosleeping in one big family bed). I look at photographs and home movies from the girls' childhood, and they were undoubtedly happy kids who knew they were loved and cared for.

But I remember times that don't show up in those images, times when I screamed and they cried, when I lost my temper and did regrettable things ranging from throwing things at walls to tearing up the girls' new coloring books to spanking them. And I remember 2-year-old Chloe hiding under the diningroom table one afternoon while MJ and I engaged in our latest battle of wills.

I knew that couldn't continue. And since I had gone so far to the punitive side, I knew more of the same or a harsher version of the same was not the answer. I discovered Positive Discipline by Jane Nelsen and began to relinquish control in small ways, letting the girls choose between the red shirt or the blue shirt, and letting them experience a few natural consequences instead of trying to prevent every negative thing. I began, for the first time, to put myself in my kids' shoes and see what the world looked like from down there.

My motives in this were still rooted in control to a certain extent. Punitive discipline wasn't producing the behavior I wanted, but maybe positive discipline would. I'm being a bit overly harsh with myself there, because of course it broke my heart and filled me with guilt when I hurt my kids, and I genuinely wanted better for all of us. But a zebra doesn't shed her stripes quite that quickly, and I know that when I offered the red shirt or the blue shirt, what I really wanted was a kid who was wearing a shirt.

But it was a start. I had gained awareness of my own intense need for control and begun to explore the reasons for it. And I discovered that letting go of some control didn't kill me or anyone else. In fact, life improved by leaps and bounds, and, gradually, when I offered the red shirt or the blue shirt, it was because I wanted my child to have choices.

I also discovered that my kids did not have unreasonable wishes and needs. When I stepped into their shoes, I found that the things they wanted were good, healthy, and easy to provide. Imagine that!

So I let go a little more. And every time I did, I was richly rewarded (positive reinforcement), and the process fed itself.

I think my current enthusiasm for acceptance is the latest step in this journey, so I'll close with a quote from Dr. Remen about that.

"The greatest blessing we offer others may be the belief we have in their struggle for freedom, the courage to support and accompany them as they determine for themselves the strength that will become their refuge and the foundation of their lives."

What unschooling looked like this weekend

This weekend, I can't speak with much authority about how my kids spent their time or what they learned. I decided to do my monthly "day in the life" post anyway, because the increasing independence of a couple of teen unschoolers is part of what it's all about.

MJ is away from home, visiting Zenmomma and family and Harper in Corvallis, Oregon. She made her own travel plans, purchased her tickets online, did her own laundry, got her luggage packed, and kept her parents and Zenmomma informed so she'd have rides to and from the Greyhound stations. She's spent the weekend hanging out with an unknown number of other teens. She did this. She's probably also gotten to eat at Sunnyside Up at least once, something that causes her mother a measure of envy. Beyond that, I know not.

Chloe has spent the weekend in a series of self-directed activities. She does this often, having long periods where she is busy doing her own thing and we see her only intermittently. The specific activities I know are:

* She got out all the Harry Potter books and made a list of the more significant character deaths, then discussed this list with us in some detail.
* She created a Harry Potter guild on Neopets and then put together a detailed and interesting guild Web site on Freewebs. (I'll share the URL if I remember to get permission.)
* She made homemade thank-you notes for her Christmas gifts from out-of-town relatives. (I don't know if she finished this task, and now she's away, too, so if you are one of these generous people and never receive a thank-you note, you'll at least know that her heart was in the right place.)
* She spent a long session playing with the rats.
* She tolerated her parents' football frenzy (and then comforted us afterward).
* She and I read "Son of the Morning" by Linda Howard aloud together, skimming from good part to good part, and discussed what it might be like to find ourselves cut off from our routines, support base, money, lifestyle, etc. This book is part historical mystery, so we also discussed the Knights Templar, Friday the 13th, and what languages an educated person might have known in the 14th century.
* She got herself ready and packed so she could start the three-week dogsitting job that she and MJ have taken on. (She agreed to take the first shift so MJ could go to Oregon.)

Beyond those, I know not.

When Chiara came to live with us, she created a new e-mail account, which she still has (but rarely checks) to this day. It includes the phrase "il grande volo di Chiara," or "the grand flight of Chiara." I always loved that, and if you know Chiara, you know how perfect it is for her. But that is what unschooling is all about: watching our kids take flight. And that is what unschooling looked like this weekend.

Friday fill-in

1. My favorite new experience of 2007 was LIFE is Good.

2. I'm most tempted by playing hooky.

3. Today I want world peace and to accomplish good things at work so I'll feel free of it all weekend.

4. The last thing I took a picture of was Christmas morning chaos probably.

5. You and I have memories like steel traps. Sometimes.

6. The most recent movie I’ve seen that I really enjoyed was The 13th Warrior (yes, I'm obsessing a little).

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to watching a new episode of Psych, tomorrow my plans include wearing a lot of neon green as I loudly encourage the Seahawks to smack the Pack (regardless of the fact that they can't hear me through the television), and Sunday, I want to hang out with Chloe!

Far, far away

A coworker just showed me this. Pretty, isn't it?
(click the picture for the amazing details)

Eaters of the Dead

Perhaps inspired by my Movie Project and today's Thursday 13, I picked up Michael Crichton's Eaters of the Dead on CD. I've been listening to it during my commutes and have made a couple of discoveries. (Mild spoilers follow.)

* The first part of the story is based on the real Ibn Fadlan's journal about his experiences with and of "the Norsemen."

* The footnotes about the translation of the journal and about the social context behind some of Ibn Fadlan's comments, which I found mildly distracting at first, are now some of my favorite parts. They are rich with details and tie in nicely with the reading Chloe has been doing lately about the Norse gods (said research having been inspired by an anime series called "Mythical Detective Loki Ragnorak").

* Some of the best dialog in the film The 13th Warrior is not from the book and should probably be credited to screenwriters William Wisher and Warren Lewis (although Crichton did have some involvement in the film).

* Some of the best moments in the film come from the book, such as the way the warriors snore while awake before the first attack and the scene where Ibn's cheerful friend, Herger, convinces the king's son that they are not to be trifled with.

I arrived at work and had to turn off the CD this morning just as the glow worm was attacking. This has not done a great deal for my concentration today.

BWO

Have you all noticed the little "Blogging Without Obligation" logo way down at the bottom of the sidebar at right? This is a wonderful little philosophical statement distributed by Down the Tartx Rabbit Hole. It has made all the difference in the world to my blogging.

From that site, here are my favorite reasons for writing about only what I feel like writing about, only when I feel like writing.

Because I shouldn't have to look at my blog like it's a treadmill

Because it's okay to just say what I have to say

Because sometimes less is more
(although "less" can rarely be used to describe my pontifications)

Because I will naturally keep my blog around longer if it isn't a chore
Blogging without obligation means I do a bit less family reporting and a bit more self-entertainment. It means my posts are more about me than my readers. And it means you will probably never see the words "blog neglect" on my blog again, because, well, there is no such thing! Blogging is now a Free Enterprise.

Thursday 13

My Thirteen Favorite Movies (in no particular order) 1. Die Hard This movie was an original that has yet to be equaled. It was good enough to convert me from Bruce Willis hater (Moonlighting? gag me) to Bruce Willis fan. Humor, explosions, gorgeous bad guys, a head villain we could respect, Alexander Godunov stalking across a rooftop, and the Ode to Joy. What more could we want? Great quote: "...we'll be sitting on a beach, earning twenty percent." Exception: Some of the abysmal lines they gave Deputy Chief of Police Dwayne T. Robinson. There was no need to make him such a caricature. 2. Raiders of the Lost Ark There hadn't been an action movie like that in decades. Maybe there had never been an action movie like that. Indiana Jones might have been battered and cynical, but we loved him from the first scene. Great quotes: "It's not the years; it's the miles." "Indyyyyyyyyyy, the torch is going out!" Exception: They took too long to make the fourth one! 3. Blast from the Past I think I've seen this one about a hundred times. The dialog is crisp and fun, Adam is admirable and sweet, and the supporting actors are to die for. Sissy Spacek and Christopher Walken stole every scene they were in. Great quote: "There used to be something called a liquor store... Write that down." Exception: Some of the romantic scenes between Adam and Eve bog down a bit. 4. Clueless Pure fun, with one of the most romantic movie kisses ever. I think Jane Austen would have loved this one. Great quote: "I totally paused." Exception: She was probably supposed to be, but Brittany Murphy is overly annoying from time to time. 5. The 13th Warrior An intelligent, fascinating, expertly crafted action movie that I can watch over and over. Great quotes: "The thirteenth warrior is you." "Hurry to meet death before your place is taken." "The dog can jump." "No, boy, this is no day to be close to land." (We can relate.) "I cannot lift this." "Grow stronger!" "It's cavalry!" "I rather prefer a dragon." Exception: Harper, our weapons expert, says many of the props are anachronistic. I never noticed personally. 6. Gross Pointe Blank Take one neurotic hitman, the attractive DJ he can't forget, and a host of entertaining side characters, throw them together at a high school reunion, and watch the fun ensue. Great quotes: "This is me breathing." "Workers of the world, unite!" Exception: The awkward scene where Joan Cusack turns tough on the telephone. 7. Shakespeare in Love If I were stranded somewhere with only one movie to watch, this is the one I would want it to be. It's a delight and includes the best (partial) performance of "Romeo and Juliet" I've ever seen. Great quote: "It will be all right." "How will it?" "I don't know. It's a mystery." Exception: None. 8. The Usual Suspects Who is Keyser Soze? I'll never tell. Great quote: "Well, I believe in God, and the only thing that scares me is Keyser Soze." Exception: The changes between time and place are confusing to the first-time viewer. 9. Gladiator Russell Crowe seemed shocked when his name was called for the Oscar for Best Actor of 2000. We certainly weren't. His Maximus is deep and strong and I'd follow him anywhere. Great quote: "My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions, loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next." Exception: Dodgy editing in places, with costumes revealing that the scenes were not in the designed order. 10. A Fish Called Wanda Clever, intelligent, sexy, and side-splittingly funny. Great quotes: "It's K-k-k-ken, c-c-coming to k-k-kill me." "Wake up, limey fish!" "Avoid the green ones. They're not ripe yet." "I have dresses with higher IQs." 11. The Sixth Sense The big test: I knew the big secrets when I saw this movie the first time and loved it anyway. Great quote: "Grandma says hi." Exception: The deleted scenes should have been left in. 12. Snatch Guy Ritchie's masterpiece of overlapping stories, wacky characters, Desert Eagles .50, and assorted English accents. The milk-carton sequence alone makes this movie worth watching. Great quote: "Yeah, I like dags." Exception: Just a few very minor imperfections, nothing worth mentioning really. 13. L.A. Confidential A cast of exceptional actors turns this police drama into one of the greatest movies I've ever seen. Shotgun Ed. Great quotes: "Something has to be done, but nothing too original, because hey, this is Hollywood." "Some men get the world. Others get ex-hookers and a trip to Arizona." Exception: Ed and Bud don't call for backup at the Victory Motel. Honorable Mentions Love Actually The wedding. The comeback. The crush. Colin (the character). Colin (the Firth). Two hours of bliss (plus some really wonderful deleted scenes on the DVD). Let's get our asses kicked by love! Great quote: "I am Colin, God of Sex. I'm just on the wrong continent." Exception: Mr. Bean. Pride and Prejudice Beautifully condensed into the Good Parts Version, with stunning cinematography and a dreamy Mr. Darcy. Great quote: "I have the utmost respect for your nerves. They've been my constant companion these twenty years." Exception: Jena Malone's overblown portrayal of Lydia. The Long Kiss Goodnight Samantha's transformation into Charly is fascinating. And it blowed up real good. Great quote: "There may be many reasons not to kill you, but among them is not that you'll be missed by NASA." Exception: They missed the obvious line at the very end and it bugs me every time. She throws a knife to kill a noisy cricket and doesn't say, "Chefs do that." Mumford This is my guaranteed feel-good movie. Great quote: "You know what this feels like? When I was in high school, the thing I wanted most when I was stuck in class, the thing that I was desperately in pursuit of, was a hall pass. That's all I ever wanted. I loved moving freely around the school while everybody else was trapped in there. That's how I feel right now. Like I have some giant, all day hall pass." Exception: Martin Short. Except he probably does what he's supposed to do. Star Wars The quintessential space fairy tale, with special effects that are still damned good thirty years later. Great quote: "There's no mystical energy field that controls my destiny." Exception: None. Even the flaws are treasured friends. Get the Thursday Thirteen code here! View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

Brrrrrrrrr...ight!

Our furnace chose yesterday for its annual "hey, my pilot light could use cleaning" poop-out. I called the gas company this morning and was first scolded for not using the magic words ("we have no heat") and then informed that they could come and help us no earlier than Thursday.

So then I called some repair places. I got quotes for $85, $89, and $470. The gas company would be free, so we contemplated waiting for them. Then Frank decided to try it himself, something he's done once before under the supervision of former gasman Tom.

Success! The house is warm again and all is cozy and bright.

The Movie Project

I decided to do my favorite movies for this week's Thursday 13. This led to quite a little project in categorizing and prioritizing movies, and to the discovery that my favorite movie list is quite long. On Thursday, I will announce my top 13, but here are the top contenders in each category.

Keep in mind...
* I could only count movies I've seen, and the movies that live in our home (and thus could remind me of their existence) had a much better shot of making one of the lists.
* Once I included a movie in a list, it was disqualified from other lists.
* While some of these are Great Movies, most are simply my personal favorites, the movies I enjoy watching again and again. No pretentions here.

If you think I missed something, put it in the comments and I'll consider it for my top 13 on Thursday.

Ensemble Cast
Apollo 13
The Big Chill (added 2/21)
The Breakfast Club
L.A. Confidential
O Brother Where Art Thou
Pulp Fiction
Snatch
Sneakers
The Usual Suspects

Music and Dance
Blues Brothers
Chicago
Coal Miner's Daughter
Sister Act
Top Hat
Young Frankenstein

Paranormal
Ghostbusters
Interview with the Vampire
Resurrection
The Sixth Sense

Fantasy
Field of Dreams
Just Visiting
Ladyhawke
The Mummy
Willow

Sci-Fi
The Abyss
Back to the Future
Galaxy Quest
The Matrix
Men in Black
Star Trek 4
Star Wars
Stargate
Terminator

Horror
Aliens
Blood Simple
Jaws
Pitch Black
Tremors

Epic/Tour de Force
Braveheart
Dances with Wolves
Forrest Gump
The Godfather
The Ten Commandments

Drama
Falling Down
A Few Good Men
Good Will Hunting
Ordinary People
Regarding Henry
The Shawshank Redemption
The Silence of the Lambs

Classic
Arsenic and Old Lace
Ball of Fire
Casablanca
It's a Wonderful Life
The Quiet Man
Roman Holiday
The Scarlet Pimpernel (Leslie Howard)

Sports
Bull Durham
A League of Their Own
Major Leage
Mr. Baseball
The Replacements

Western
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Maverick
Silverado
Stagecoach
Unforgiven

Foreign
Amelie
Das Boot
La Femme Nikita
Sanjuro
Tampopo

Action
Die Hard
The Fugitive
Gladiator
Gross Pointe Blank
Lethal Weapon
The Long Kiss Goodnight
Mission: Impossible
Speed

Action Adventure
The 13th Warrior
Captain Ron
The Count of Monte Cristo (Jim Caveziel)
Pirates of the Caribbean
The Princess Bride
Raiders of the Lost Ark

Comedy
Okay, this category was really hard. In order to include more of my faves, I broke it down into three arbitrary subcategories.

Gutbusters
Animal House
Big Trouble in Little China
A Fish Called Wanda
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
The Ref
Ruthless People

Light Comedies
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
The Birdcage
Encino Man
Happy Texas
Liar Liar
Trading Places

Comedies with Heart
Accepted
As Good as it Gets
Blast from the Past
Bulworth
Clueless
Dave
EdTV
Mumford
My Favorite Year
My Cousin Vinny
Secondhand Lions
Sixteen Candles
To Wong Foo...

Family
Beauty and the Beast
Homeward Bound
Hook
Monsters, Inc.
Mulan
ET
Hocus Pocus

Romance
Always
Heart and Souls
Love Actually
Moonstruck
Pretty Woman
Pride and Prejudice
Romancing the Stone
Sense and Sensibility
Shakespeare in Love
While You Were Sleeping

NCN details

Check out the new Non-Con North details!

Cardiovascular workout

Did you see that Seahawks game?! It's been over for two hours, but Frank and I haven't recovered yet. As loyal Seahawks fans are all too aware, when things start to go bad for the Hawks, they go really bad.

So imagine our shock when their latest "tanked game" turned into an impressive victory!

Seahawks 35
Redskins 14

Marcus Trufant is our hero of the day. His perfectly timed interception for a touchdown turned the game back around and kept us in the hunt. (video)

Now if the Jags can beat Pittsburg, our joy will be complete. (No, we will never forget.)

And for next weekend: Look out, Green Bay!

Could it be?

From Barack Obama's victory speech in Iowa:

Hope is the bedrock of this nation. The belief that our destiny will not be written for us, but by us, by all those men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is, who have the courage to remake the world as it should be.

That is what we started here in Iowa and that is the message we can now carry to New Hampshire and beyond—the same message we had when we were up and when we were down; the one that can save this country, brick by brick, block by block, callused hand by callused hand: that together, ordinary people can do extraordinary things.

Watch the whole speech

Friday fill-in

1. This year, I'd like to see regime change in America.

2. Traveling and blogging is what I daydream about most.

3. My secret boyfriend is a beautiful black man.
....................

4. I would like to have more tropical swims in my life.

5. I love to have lots of unschoolers around the house.

6. Seeing a happy kid always makes me smile.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to sushi at the Cherry Blossom, tomorrow my plans include cheering the Seahawks into the next round of the playoffs, and Sunday, I want to do something fun to get ready for Non-Con North!

Thursday 13

A quickie!

Thirteen Beaches Worth Visiting

1. Topsail Hill Preserve, Destin, FL – protected, quiet, sugar sand
2. 7-Mile Beach, Grand Cayman – Life's a beach and then you dive!
3. Dog Beach, San Diego – many happy, free doggies
4. Salt Creek, Olympic Peninsula, Washington – tide pools, eagles, and a tide-stranded island
5. Honeyman State Park, Oregon – sand dunes, a lagoon, and yurts
6. Lake Powell hideaways, Arizona and Utah – pick an inlet, any inlet
7. Lowestoft, Great Britain – gaze east, young woman – and bring your coat!
8. Benures Bay, Norman Island, British Virgin Islands – paradise with an octopus
9. The Baths, Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands – paradise with grottos
10. Trunk Bay, St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands – paradise with stray cats and a sign-posted snorkeling trail
11. Kauai, Hawaii – pick a beach, any beach
12. Redwood National and State Parks, California – it's not just about the trees
13. Alki Beach, Seattle, Washington – sand, sun (in August), and some of the best views ever

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!
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NCN Hotel

News for those interested in Non-Con North, our early February gathering of unschoolers:

I have arranged a discounted rate of $85/night at the Best Western Cascadia Inn on Pacific Ave. in Everett. It is about a mile and a half from our place, is adjacent to a Chinese restaurant and a Denny's, and offers a not-just-muffins continental breakfast each morning.

When you make your reservation, tell them you're with Non-Con North in Veronica Maier's party.

Reservation lines:
Hotel direct: 1-425-258-4141
Toll free: 1-800-822-5876

Click here to see more info about Non-Con North