Nature is amazing. Perfection.
Physics is Super Cool
Reply
Tag Archives: Dude
Say It Ain’t So: Kidzania
Are we really building “amusement parks” where we are willing to pay for kids to be exposed to mass marketing/consumerism and work in a mini-world as mini-adults?!
It seems like we are. Kidzania hasn’t arrived in the US yet, but it has locations around the world, and could be in your neighborhood soon.
Here’s Wikipedia’s definition:
Every KidZania is themed as a child-sized replica of a real city, including buildings, shops and theaters, as well as vehicles and pedestrians moving along its streets. In this city, children aged 2 through 14, work in branded activities from bottling Coca-Cola, working in a Crest-sponsored dentist office, and working at a McDonalds restaurant. The children earn KidZos currency while performing the tasks, and the money is kept in the KidZania bank for children to spend at the gift shop and on non-free KidZania activities. The blending of marketing has led The Morning News to dub KidZania as “advertainment”, stating “there is little that’s pretend, and the play revolves around following instructions from the adult Zupervisors.”
Sounds like a blast, right? Pay money to be exposed to marketing and work in menial jobs getting bossed around by Zupervisors for low wages that accumulate in fake banks (that probably lose your money on bad investments) so you can pay for more consumerism. Holy shit?! What’s wrong with us?
Really, I’m going to pay you to allow my kids to wash car windows and pump gas, all while you flash your company logos in our faces?
Adults don’t want to act like adults. Why would we make menial labor and purchasing junk seem like it’s fun for our children? How about some imagination, art, music, reading, physical activity, and god-forbid some non-big-business related fun? A beach perhaps?…and it’s free.
I can feel the brainwashing seeping into our domes…and it’s scary that we’re letting it happen.
Princess, Little Dude, please don’t ask; Kidzania is off limits.
Perhaps “Say It Ain’t So” needs to be a new regular installment for the Dude….an area where I wax poetically about the ways of the world. Eh, maybe not.
Razor + Jeans = Awesome
This works. I’ve been using the same razor for a month. For reals.
The Dude would not steer you in the wrong direction.
Only one way to find out…give it a whirl.
Happy Easter
Little Dude Easter Bunny
Happy Easter from the Dudes. Little Dude makes one heck of an Easter Bunny.
We had some gorgeous weather and made our first trip to the beach for the spring season. The good news is Little Dude is not afraid of the water. The bad news is Little Dude is not afraid of the water.
In case you’re wondering where the Easter Bunny comes from, Newser has you covered…those crazy pagans.
Maiden Voyage
The Easter Bunny made an early delivery – thanks Nina ;). The Boy was in need of some sort of swinging apparatus, and the giant bunny carrying colored eggs came through big time.
Here’s a quick video of the Maiden Voyage. Little Dude clearly digs it…but not enough to stop eating.
Hard to Say Goodbye
Winter Beard - Final
After four and a half months, it was time to part ways. We made it through a lot together, but it had to end at some point.
When we flipped the seasonal script to Spring a couple weeks ago, the winter beard came off. It’s tough to destroy a creation I worked on for so long, but it’s kind of liberating. That thing was a beast.
It was the biggest beard I’ve had, and it was pretty sweet, but the Dude is ready for some spring. I’m ready for warm days, veggies growing in the garden, and surf with something lighter than a lead suit.
Luckily Mrs. Dude surprised me with a great photo session to memorialize Winter Beard 2011. Don’t worry my Dad has a beard…awesome!
But before we sign off, take it away Boyz II Men…
Week 37: On the Move
Little Dude is officially on the move. He’s actually been on the move for a little over a week. I’ve been trying to get this post out since last weekend, but life happened. No good excuse, just a series of bad ones.
Kids. That will be my general excuse for the foreseeable future.
Here we are a week and a half late. L.D. is crawling, and luckily, this video is actually the very first time he put together a serious crawl…as you can tell from Mrs. Dude’s excitement. I happened to grab the camera at the right time.
Little Dude is loving his new found freedom. Just like figuring out how to sit-up, it’s a whole new world for him. He can follow his interests wherever they take him.
After a week of crawling experience, it’s safe to say he’s got the hang of his new skill. He’s pretty much sprint-crawling now…sprawling? And the things he’s interested in…generally the most dangerous non-baby items in view.
Be careful what you wish for. I guess it’s a cliche for a reason. It’s a awesome to see each new skill, but as his freedom increases our responsibility increase as well. And I think this relationship stays the same until roles reverse and he starts changing my diapers.
What if the World was Made of Pudding?
Life is full of deep questions.
We go through our days acting like we have it all figured out. Simply tune into 24-hour news station to hear experts being experty…O’reilly anyone?
But that’s just an extreme example. We all do it. Everyday, all day. That’s how we get through life. Fake it until we make it.
Parenting is nothing but faking it until we make it. Bachelor Dude was not much different from Daddy Dude. Sure, we lived a somewhat different daily existence, but down deep, we’re the same dude. But one day I woke up and I was a Dad, and the the parental faking began. My parents did it before me, and their’s before them. That’s how we exist. We experience, and we learn from our experiences.
However, the rub is that down deep, we really don’t know…about anything. We can act like we are the best parents in the world, but we’re just making it up as we go. We’re ok given our conditions, but no one has the answers. In the same way that no corporation is the perfect corporation, no government is the perfect government, no country the perfect country. We need to be careful of the “experts” we put our faith in.
We let our experty faking abilities cloud the reality that regardless of how much we have advanced as a civilization (mind you many civilizations have advanced quite well before us), we are still very far from understanding the most essential mysteries of life. We are easily consumed by our daily activities, but if we take the time to ponder the biggest of the big pictures, it is easy to see we are clueless.
Which isn’t a bad thing. In fact, it’s a great thing. Acknowledging the unknown creates so much opportunity. It allows us to drop our minor worries (that often seem major) and focus our attention on priorities. Cheesy, yes…but life, love, family, happiness, community. All of the really fun, warm words that bring us closer to each other.
Where is my rabbit hole of ramblings leading us?
Mrs. Dude and I battle over bugs. Mrs. Dude is very anti-bug in the house….especially spiders. Not that I’m pro-bug in the house, but the Dude generally abides. I’m not overly concerned about a spider.
Mrs. Dude used to squeal an ax-murder scream and expect the Dude to ride in on his white horse to save her every time a bug was encountered. Then reality set in. I don’t kill bugs. I catch them and put them outside. And most of the time I don’t catch them well, so they generally escape.
I’m not worried about it. I’m not bothering the bug; I don’t expect them to bother me. This philosophy doesn’t sit well with Mrs. Dude.
Reluctantly, she has accepted me for who I am. She now kills her own bugs…and leaves them for me to clean up.
But the deep questions still linger in my mind. While I am now just the janitor that scoops up the kill, I’m still involved in the process. It makes me wonder where we draw these arbitrary lines.
If I’m confused, my kids must be as well. Should I just fake it until I make it? Ignore my ignorance of the answers to life’s deeper questions?
So, the ramblings lead us here, to this video. I came across this video today, and I was going to share it with Mrs. Dude so she’ll know what I’m singing to her every time she requests that I clean up a dead bug, but then I figured a quick blog post would be in order. Now 45 minutes and 10 paragraphs later I’m finally getting to the video.
Seriously, what if the world was made of pudding?
King of Naps
King of Naps
Here’s a link to a recent article about how taking naps promotes our ability to learn. This is the most recent study in a long list of studies that say that naps are the bees knees. Yeah, that cool.
Naps are amazing. For real, amazing. But naps aren’t as easy as one may think. There are many types of naps, and every nap is unique based on the conditions and the nap time goals. This is not the proper time for me to share all of my napping knowledge (sweet alliteration), but it’s safe to say that quality napping requires committed practice.
I’ve been refining my napping skills for years. And I think it’s time for me to take my napping to the next level. I’ve done my research (i.e. a one minute Google search), and it dawned on me that the napping community lacks a meaningless figurehead with absolutely no power and a pointless title. And I think I’m just the person to fill this made-up-by-me incredibly unimportant position.
I do hereby declare to the world (i.e. the internet) that the Dude is from here forth the self-proclaimed King of Naps!
Howard Stern did it for media. I think the Dude can do it for naps.
Not only is the Dude an ordained Dudeist Priest, and a dishwasher loading wizard, but now, also the King of Naps. I’m adding some serious credentials (i.e. letters) to the end of my name: The Dude, O.D.P., D.L.W., & K.o.N.
Enough typing…I need a nap. Sleep on my napping subjects.
PS – Don’t worry. That’s an old photo. The beard is still intact. Beard update in the near future.
Wave Skiing?
This dude is insane! In a good way.
First time I’ve seen this. A new sport in the making?
Here’s the description from YouTube:
“Chuck Patterson is a former pro Freeskier, a professional Waterman, and one of the most fearless humans we’ve ever met. After a brief experiment with skiing on waves several years ago, Chuck’s passion for the idea was re-lit after watching Mike Douglas and Cody Townsend ski the waves of Maui in 2009. In January 2011, Chuck followed the biggest swell of the year to Maui, to see if he could successfully ski Pe’ahi or ‘Jaws’ — one of the most powerful waves on earth.”