I am Kyle's self-indulgence

This month I've resumed reading Everett Fox's translation of The Five Books Of Moses. I chose to read this because it preserves the Hebrewness of the scriptures by by trying to retain key phrases and linguistic stylings in English. I know some translators frown on this, claiming that a faithful translation should simply be done in idiomatic English, but I think it's interesting to see some of the original Hebrew phrases reflected in new English constructions, and I think it helps more of the poetry to show through.

Anyway, I've been reading this off and on for a while now: I read Genesis, put it away for a long time, then read Exodus, put it away again, and now I'm on Leviticus. A lot of it is not much more exciting than most bible translations, and most of the insights I've been having are due more to the commentary than the new translation, but tonight I came across a passage that really surprised me.

It's from Leviticus 19 and is written in a very rigid pattern that makes it feel very poetic. Fox's translation has a lot of energy to it, and each time the phrase, "I am YHWH!" is repeated the passage grown in intensity.

Here it is (I left out one section for the sake of rhythm--I hope that's not blasphemous):

YHWH spoke to Moshe, saying:
Speak to the entire community of the Children of Israel, and say to them:
Holy are you to be,
for holy am I, YHWH your God!

Each-man--his mother and his father you are to hold-in-awe,
and my Sabbaths you are to keep:
I am YHWH your God!

Do not turn-your-faces to no-gods,
and molten gods you are not to make yourselves,
I am YHWH your God!

...

Now when you harvest the harvest of your land,
you are not to finish (to the) edge of your field in harvesting,
the full-gathering of your harvest you are not to gather;
your vineyard you are not to glean,
the break-off of your vineyard you are not to gather--
rather, for the afflicted and for the sojourner you are to leave them,
I am YHWH your God!

You are not to steal,
you are not to lie,
you are not to deal-falsely, each-man with his fellow!
You are not to swear by my name falsely,
thus profaning the name of your God--
I am YHWH!

You are not to withhold (property from) your neighbor,
you are not to commit-robbery.
You are not to keep-overnight the working-wages of a hired-hand with you until morning.
You are not to insult the deaf,
before the blind your are not to place a stumbling-block:
rather, you are to hold your God in awe;
I am YHWH!

You are not to commit corruption in justice;
you are not to lift-up-in-favor the face of the poor,
you are not to overly-honor the face of the great;
with equity you are to judge your fellow!
You are not to traffic in slander among your kinspeople.
You are not to stand by the blood of your neighbor,
I am YHWH!

You are not to hate your brother in your heart;
rebuke, yes, rebuke your fellow,
that you not bear sin because of him!
You are not to take-vengeance, your not to retain-anger against the sons of your kinspeople--
but be-loving to your neighbor (as one) like yourself,
I am YHWH!

Who knew Leviticus contains such powerful poetry?

Also, I forget how much of the Old Testament law is about justice, compassion, caring for foreigners (sojourners) and the poor, and loving your neighbor as yourself. These are things I typically associate more with the teaching of Jesus than with Leviticus.

The Flaming Lips have given out a free EP of three tracks from their upcoming album to people who have ordered tickets to their upcoming tour. The Internet being what it is, those songs are now available to the rest of us through *ahem* other means (via a discussion thread on the band's new official site's message board, no less).

Anyway, I gave the tracks a listen and thought I'd write down my initial impressions.

Convinced of the Hex opens up with some chaotic bleeps and feedback, gradually settling into a steady rhythm of heavy drums and distorted instruments. I like it. I'm not sure I like Wayne's flat speech-singing or his repetition of "That's the difference between us" over and over again. Everything else about the track is very good. It's easily the best of these three songs.

The Impulse is much more low-key, with slow synth-sounds and a vocal track that is distorted to the point that it's barely recognizable as a human voice, much less comprehensible.

Silver Trembling Hands is the most recognizable as a Flaming Lips song. It's more pop-oriented and sounds a bit like "Up Above the Daily Hum or one of their other Yoshimi-era B-sides. The vocals are not nearly as distorted here, but they're still pushed to the background.

Taken together, these songs sound less pop-oriented and more spacey and atmospheric than the band's usual album material. It's not a completely different direction for the band, but it's definitely more like the stuff that they've left off albums in the past, which is to say that they take more risks. That's a good thing. One complaint fans had about their last album was that some of the B-sides were better than any of the album tracks.

Details about the new Flaming Lips album have been gradually trickling out. We now know it is definitely a double album, it will be titled Embryonic, and the cover will be this:

Interestingly, this has me more exited than anything I've read about it up to now. Wayne Coyne takes a very hands-on approach to the band's album artwork (along with George Salisbury), which I think telegraphs his attitude about the album, including its overall mood and style, and how similar or different it is from what the band has done previously.

To illustrate, here we have the covers for Transmissions From The Satellite Heart and Clouds Taste Metallic:

These two were released during the Ronald Jones and Steven Drozd phase of the band, and are characterized by dense noise-rock built around Jones' frenetic guitar effects and Drozd's heavy drumming. The artwork for these albums is appropriately rough and homemade-looking.

After Ronald Jones left the band, The Flaming Lips began their period of multi-channel musical experimentation, culminating in the infamous four-CD-simultaenous-play album Zaireeka.

With Steven Drozd now playing the part of multi-instrumentalist, the music was now much less traditionally rock-oriented and more of an in-studio orchestration of diverse elements. The band took this approach to a more consumer-friendly format in The Soft Bulletin. The common elements to both albums are reflected in the smoother presentation of the covers, the bold color separations, and the circular bursts, hinting at the layers of orchestrated sound:

In many ways the band's next two albums continue in a similar vein (the lineup in the studio remained unchanged during this time), but I think there are some small differences. The sound on Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots and At War With The Mystics is brighter, more pop-oriented, and a little more bombastic. For the covers for the albums and all of the singles, Wayne used his original paintings:

So what does the artwork for Embryonic tell me?

Well, for one thing, it's something different. Wayne has mentioned in interviews that this new album is going to have a different sound to it, but he always says that. His album artwork, though, telegraphs a major change in direction. I hope this is true. The image also tells me the album is going to be more psychedelic than their recent work, and more boldly experimental. Given that it's a double album (and given Wayne's own comments about that decision), I also think it's going to be all over the place.

I can't wait.

Popmatters features what is, at first glance, a ridiculously long list of the 60 [plus 2] most memorable films of 1999.

My first reaction was, "62? Isn't that a bit of overkill?"

But as I read through the list, I realized these really are some great movies. Some of them I would probably put on my all-time top movies list. It's hard to believe they all came out in a single year.

Here are some notables:

The Thin Red Line
Office Space
The Matrix
Election
Run Lola Run
The Iron Giant
The Sixth Sense
American Beauty
The Straight Story
Being John Malkovich
Princess Mononoke
Sweet and Lowdown
Magnolia
Man on the Moon
Fight Club

How is it that a single year could spawn so many beloved films? I'm sure that for me at least, part of it is the timing. I was 19 years old, and had just recently awakened to the range of great film art around me. Naturally, the movies I saw at that age shaped my critical taste more than movies released today possibly could.

But that doesn't explain it all. Several of those movies, including Sweet and Lowdown, The Straight Story, The Iron Giant, and The Thin Red Line, I didn't see until years later, but they still had a bit impact on me.

What do you think? Was there really something extraordinarily great about 1999, or is it nostalgia?

In summer school today I played for one of my students this story from NPR on the Dictionary of American Regional English, which inspired us to look for some examples of regional slang in Missouri. In the process I came across a regional definition for Hoosier, which enlightened me to the cause of an old argument between me and Erika.

It was in the early years of our relationship, and I don't remember the exact context now. It could have been a car up on blocks in someone's front yard or a nasty couch sitting out on their front porch, to which Erika commented, "That's so hoosier."

I was surprised and a little bit offended to hear her use the term this way. Growing up in Nebraska I had learned from the movie Hoosiers and from Kurt Vonnegut that "hoosier" is a term proudly self-applied by residents of Indiana, and I thought that to use it as a pejorative is insulting.

Erika was surprised at my offendedness and that as far as she knew "hoosier" is just another word for "redneck." I asked her not to use it that way for my sake, and she agreed, even though she seemed to think it an odd request.

Anyway, when I started reading about Missouri variations of "hoosier," I found out that in St. Louis (Erika's hometown) it has a very specific meaning that is different from just about ever other region in America:

Thomas E. Murray carefully analyzed the use of "hoosier" in St. Louis, Missouri, where it is the favorite epithet of abuse. "When asked what a Hoosier is," Murray writes, "St. Louisans readily list a number of defining characteristics, among which are 'lazy,' 'slow-moving,' 'derelict,' and 'irresponsible.'" He continues, "Few epithets in St. Louis carry the pejorative connotations or the potential for eliciting negative responses that hoosier does." He conducted tests and interviews across lines of age and race and tabulated the results. He found the term ecumenically applied. He also noted the word was often used with a modifier, almost redundantly, as in "some damn Hoosier."

I've read a couple of different explanations for the pejorative use in St. Louis. From Wikipedia:

One need only look to the St. Louis suburb of Fenton, which, in the mid-1950s, was at the then-rural southwest rim of the county. At the time, Chrysler Corporation built a large automobile assembly plant in the city of Fenton and closed a plant it had been operating in Indiana. Many former employees of the closed Indiana plant moved to Fenton for employment; so many, in fact, that entire subdivisions of new homes (with streets named after Chrysler models such as "Fury" and "Belvidere") sprang up south of the plant, near what was then US Route 66.

It became something of a local joke to refer to the new arrivals from Indiana as "hoosiers", and before long, anyone from the rural edges of St. Louis County was considered such.

The Urban dictionary has a different (and to me, more compelling) explanation:

Dates back to a strike that occurred in St. Louis in the 30's. During this strike, scab workers from Indiana were brought in to fill in for strikers. The perjorative (sic) hoosier stems from the St. Louis workers' lack of appreciation for this.

There isn't a source cited for either one, so there's no way to know which is true.

It's a cool bit of trivia and it helps me to understand where Erika was coming from. Her use of hoosier really is a well-documented regional variation of the term.

I just found out that Dave McKean's collection of short comics work, Pictures That Tick, is to be released by Dark Horse Comics.

This is great news because before now it was only available in its first edition hardcover edition, of which only 4000 copies were made.

It's not easy reading: many of these are experimental comics, with greater emphasis on interesting visuals than on story clarity. If you're willing to invest a little effort, though, there are some big rewards, like (eye), which tells its story using only illustrations and pictorial icons, or the story about his father, entitled simply "His Story," which Neil Gaiman has mentioned as his favorite of McKean's short comics work.

Right now you can get it for $13.57 at Amazon, which is a steal, but you better buy it soon. McKean's short film collection, which was one of my favorite releases last year, is already an out-of-print rarity.

A couple of months ago I posted a video of Eva's unusual way of crawling.

For a long time this was Eva's only way to get around and she became very fast at it. So fast, in fact, that it seemed like she didn't feel any need to learn how to walk. By her first birthday, she could raise herself from sitting to standing without pulling up on anything, but she still wasn't taking any steps. If she needed to go somewhere she would just lower herself back to the ground and hobble-crawl over to where she wanted to be.

I thought she might need a little bit of encouragement to figure out the whole walking thing, so one day I spent maybe five or ten minutes standing her up, putting a single finger on her back, and nudging her forward. Immediately she began taking several steps before falling down. By the next day she was walking to get to places.

Since then she has been a regular power-walker. She toddles around back and forth from room to room, all day long.

I know I'm a couple of weeks late on this, but the murder of George Tiller has got me thinking again about the whole abortion issue.

First of all, there was a cartoon from This Modern World that isn't that great as a whole, but makes an excellent point in the last two panels:

I think that we as a nation need to realize that demonizing someone as a murderer isn't merely political rhetoric. It has serious consequences in the way the members of our society behave, and I do think that people like Bill O'Reilly bears some responsibility. No, he did not tell anybody to commit murder, but if Tiller had not been made infamous by the right-wing media he would not have become a target.

Am I suggesting we need to restrict conservative pundits' right to free speech? Of course not. I defend the right of everybody to say what they think, no matter how repulsive. But just because we are free to say something something doesn't mean we should, or that we are not responsible for its effects.

But that's not all. Thinking about this made me realize something even more disconcerting. It's likely that the man who killed Tiller believed he was justified in doing so because he genuinely believed Tiller was guilty of murder. That got me thinking: If somebody really believes that abortion is murder (and many people do), and that killing of millions of unborn children in the United States is an atrocity on par with the Holocaust (and again, many people do believe this), then killing abortion doctors IS a reasonable response.

But if you ask any pro-life activist, he or she will tell you that this man was wrong to do what he did, which would suggest that killing an unborn child is not as serious a crime as murder.

Here's another example: Pro-life individuals were asked on the street, If abortion were made illegal, what should be done with women who have abortions? It's hardly the most scientific of studies, but the responses do reveal something interesting: a great number of these people believe that the woman should bear no punishment for murder. Either these people are willing to let women get away with murder, or they don't truly believe that abortion is on par with taking a person's life.

All of this leaves me unsure of where I stand on abortion. However, it does make me think that there must be some common ground where pro-life and pro-choice people can agree.

I think the greatest tragedy of the Red Scare is the enduring and complete rejection of any political stance that in any way resembles Socialism. To this day, even the smallest hint government involvement in business elicits fear and paranoia in conservatives.

In our nearly universal acceptance of the notion that Socialism is inherently bad, we forget that there was actually a period in our country's history when good, patriotic Americans, when faced with masses of poor and hungry people throughout the world, could unabashedly describe themselves as Socialists and take political action with the goal to achieve economic equality.

Helen Keller was one of those people.

This I Believe has an essay written by her for the original 1950s series, and it is quite good. My favorite part is when Keller, who lived the first part of her life in extreme isolation, first learned about the suffering of others:

It was a terrible blow to my faith when I learned that millions of my fellow creatures must labor all their days for food and shelter, bear the most crushing burdens, and die without having known the joy of living. My security vanished forever, and I have never regained the radiant belief of my young years that earth is a happy home and hearth for the majority of mankind. But faith is a state of mind. The believer is not soon disheartened. If he is turned out of his shelter, he builds up a house that the winds of the earth cannot destroy.

When I think of the suffering and famine, and the continued slaughter of men, my spirit bleeds. But the thought comes to me that, like the little deaf, dumb, and blind child I once was, mankind is growing out of the darkness of ignorance and hate into the light of a brighter day.

I just ran up there to pick up some cold beer for the guys who have been working all day to build us a new roof.

While I was in the Wal-Mart parking lot I saw a woman driving a Bronco with three young Amish men as passengers, all of them sporting their typical blue shirts, straw hats, and Abraham Lincoln beards. They were all eating ice cream cones.

It's not that I think there's something wrong about the Amish enjoying some ice cream or even riding in a car (I know they're allowed to ride but not drive). But there's just something about the scene that struck me as funny, like these three Amish men were being taken out for their Friday ice cream treat.

The New York Times has a story about a charter school that is trying an education experiment to see if they can dramatically improve student performance by assembling an all-star staff of teachers drawn by huge salaries.

The descriptions of the teachers the school's principal hired is inspiring:

The eight winning candidates, he said, have some common traits, like a high "engagement factor," as measured by the portion of a given time frame during which students seem so focused that they almost forget they are in class. They were expert at redirecting potential troublemakers, a crucial skill for middle school teachers. And they possessed a contagious enthusiasm — which Rhena Jasey, 30, Harvard Class of 2001, who has been teaching at a school in Maplewood, N.J., conveyed by introducing a math lesson with, "Oh, this is the fun part because I looooooove math!" Says Mr. Vanderhoek: "You couldn’t help but get excited." Hired.

With teachers like that, I don't see how the school could fail.

How can the school afford to pay these all-star teachers $125,000 per year?

To make ends meet, teachers will hold responsibilities usually shouldered by other staff members, like assistant principals (there will be none). There will be no deans, substitute teachers (except for extended leaves) or teacher coaches. Teachers will work longer hours and more days, and have 30 pupils, about 6 more than the typical New York City fifth-grade class.

The principal, Mr. Vanderhoek, will earn just $90,000. Teachers will not have the same retirement benefits as members of the city’s teachers’ union. And they can be fired at will.

I love the the fact that the school is investing so many of their resources in classroom instruction (and that the principal is even paying himself less than the teachers). I can't wait to see the results.

Here's a great McSweeney's list:

Potential Business Opportunities Based On Songs By The Rolling Stones, à la "Ruby Tuesday" Restaurant.

"You Can't Always Get What You Want" Steak House

"(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" Escort Services

"Sympathy for the Devil" Pet Supplies

"Under My Thumb" Construction

"Brown Sugar" Refining

"As Tears Go By" Grief Counseling

"Beast of Burden" Overnight Shipping

"The Last Time" Dating Service

"19th Nervous Breakdown" Mental Institute

"Mother's Little Helper" Daycare Center

Our kids sure love their birthdays, and with so many grandparents it seems like we've been having a lot of them lately.

Here's Eva from a few weeks ago:

And here's Daniel's, celebrated in Fremont yesterday:

I've debated about whether or not I should write about my experience in our tornado. I didn't see as much as other people, I'm not sure I have any special insights into what happened, and I wasn't affected by the tornado nearly as much as some other people in the community. So why write about it?

I realized, though, that a lot of you who read this are personal friends of me and my family and may have been wondering how we're doing. Some of you have called with concerns, and we appreciate it. Others of you may have feared the worst when you heard nothing from us. I know a lot of you would really like to know what's happened.

I also just feel a need to get this out. We've had a very eventful 48 hours and writing it down is my way of processing it. So for better or worse, here's my story.

Read more »

Billboard confirms recent rumors that the next Flaming Lips release will be a double album.

I wasn't sure what to think of this at first. I've come to realize that At War With The Mystics is not as solid an album as The Soft Bulletin or Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. It has some great songs on it, but it has some duds too. If the band wants two albums' worth of songs, that's great, but it might be wise to just pick the best of them to assemble a normal-length album (much like Sufjan Stevens did for Illinois).

But then I got to reading the article, and I actually liked a lot of Wayne Coyne's reasons for going with a double album:

"And some of my favorite records – thinking Beatles 'White Album,' Zeppelin's 'Physical Graffiti' and even some of the longer things that the Clash have done – part of the reason I like them is that they're not focused. They're kind of like a free-for-all and go everywhere.

...

"I think with this there was an element of accidentally stumbling upon more spontaneous sort of freak-out stuff," Coyne says. "We were sitting at (drummer) Steven's house and we just started out having these freak-out jam sessions where he'd play drums and I'd play bass and we just would sort of do freaky stuff. Some of those recordings, even though they're not recorded very well, really had a spontaneity about them that we probably wouldn't have purposely done.

When I read that, I have to admit that my favorite Flaming Lips albums are some of their older ones (or at least their middle period, from Hit To Death In The Future Head to Clouds Taste Metallic), before the highly orchestrated production of The Soft Bulletin. Even their earliest work, though rough, has a reckless playfulness that I like. If the band wants to move back to being more spontaneous, that sounds good.

And his point about The White Album being all over the place is a valid one, but I think it's very difficult to pull off, and could very easily fail.

I'm ready to see The Flaming Lips try, though.

I wrote a while ago about Beck's deluxe reissue of One Foot In The Grave.

Since then I've learned from the Paper Tiger blog that if you order the album directly from Beck.com you'll be treated to a free unreleased bonus track titled "The Way it Seems."

Furthermore, the songs ID3 tags identify its album as "K records 2," and the accompanying e-mail hints at an upcoming release of the fabled unreleased follow-up to One Foot In The Grave that Beck recorded for K Records.

This is my favorite period of Beck's career, and I'm very happy that we're being treated to so much unreleased material from that era.

I don't make it a general habit to read my spam messages, but today I did because 1) it's a rare occasion that one actually makes it through my filters and 2) because the subject line was just unusual enough to catch my eye (I won't write it here because I don't want to get weird search referrals or encourage the spammer).

Aside from the subject line, though, the entire message of the e-mail is so nonsensical it's almost beautiful. Here it is in its entirety, minus the subject line which was oddly inserted between the two paragraphs:

That monarch never conquered by any enemy, gave jemima says no one else ever will! I have been.

To drink melted snow. A malignant epidemic of vows, and engaged in silently reciting certain to break that seal. There were no telegraph poles others direct that they should never be without that is due to lawful kings, even though they set in. They showed a desire for western learning is it? Katherine said. It's moving. I can feel henry might return he must clinch matters finally. A childish people, and keep them in a state of began to worship (that car), o prime of men. And riding oh the same car, both rushed against bhima lavas, and kashthas, and kshanas, and months,.

Some time ago the state of Oklahoma had an internet poll to let people vote on the state rock song. Probably owing to their large online fan following, the Flaming Lips won with "Do You Realize??"

Yesterday, though, the Oklahoma House of Representatives blocked approval of the song because during a public appearance by the band Michael Ivins wore a shirt with the hammer and sickle of communist Russia.

I should probably explain here that leading up to the release of their film Christmas on Mars the Lips were selling t-shirts with Russian writing that translated into messages like, "Eat Your Own Spaceship" and "Legalize Marijuana" (which probably doesn't help their case much with the Oklahoma house, come to think of it). At any rate, I think Ivins' wearing of the symbol was probably in fun and not an actual political endorsement of communism. In fact, with the exception of speaking out against the Iraq war, The Flaming Lips have not been known to make political statements.

At any rate, the Oklahoma House didn't think the shirt was very funny and voted not to make "Do You Realize??" the state rock song after all, which I find hilarious. It's such a trivial gesture to begin with, and for it to actually become a debated political issue in the state is pretty absurd.

The award for most unintentionally funny comment goes to Mike Reynolds who, citing the offensive language the band used on one occasion several years ago: "Their lips ought to be on fire."

Ooh, burn!

Of course, the latest on the story is that Oklahoma's governor is going to sign an executive order declaring "Do You Realize??" the state song, which is nice I suppose, but again a bit surreal that this is being discussed at all.

My top pick for Name of the Year is a finalist.

Go vote for Barkevious Mingo!

I've long thought that One Foot In The Grave is Beck's most underrated album. Recorded before, but released months after, his break-out hit Mellow Gold, it is a much more quiet and acoustic album that displays Beck's folk roots.

Fans have known for years that Beck recorded a bunch of other material that never made it on the album, and there was some small hope that he would someday return to it.

Finally those tracks have seen the light of day, as bonus tracks on the deluxe reissue of One Foot In The Grave.

The release includes an astonishing 32 tracks: the 16 songs on the original album, plus 16 bonus tracks.

Of those, only three were previously released on the 1995 single It's All In Your Mind (that's the original version, not the re-recording on Sea Change).

Of the remaining 13, one is an alternate version of "I Feel Lonesome," one is a re-recording of "One Foot In The Grave" (a previous version appears on Stereopathetic Soulmanure), but the rest of the tracks are original songs that have never been officially released.

For Beck completists, especially those of us who adore his early work, this is a treasure.

If you haven't heard The Hazards of Love by the Decemberists yet, you should. It's really, really good.

And if you haven't yet, you should download the DRM-free MP3 version of the album from Amazon.com for $8.99. It's a pretty good deal.

That is all.

My first-ever poll is inspired by yesterday's tax protests. Look on the sidebar (under my media blog) to give your answer.

When I heard this story on NPR yesterday I seriously considered, for a long time, that it may be a joke. Even though it wasn't April Fool's Day and there wasn't anything about the story (aside from its ridiculousness) that would indicate as such, I just kept thinking that these people can't be serious.

The story is about a woman who has recorded a CD of solo triangle music. Yes, you read that correctly and it is exactly what it claims to be: one person, playing the triangle. For 55 minutes.

I think that what made me disbelieve the story so much is not just the idea of someone recording solo triangle, but the unabashed enthusiasm Melissa Block expresses for the music. It really seems like a parody of the way that NPR embraces overlooked cultures and artforms of all types.

At one point Block says, "It's hard to imagine that nobody thought of an idea this--" and I immediately thought in my head "stupid? or simple?" but she finishes "--this great before."

Really, Melissa?

There are so many quotes in the story that are unintentionally funny, it's hard to pick a favorite. Is it when the musician gets "carried away" with the power of the music and yelps aloud? Or when Melissa Block mentions how the CD cover "undersells" the albums by advertising over 45 minutes of music?

No, my favorite part was this bit:

"I think a less discriminating listener might hear track #1, L’Anse au Paille...[plays a few seconds of a quickly repeating rhythm]...and you might then listen to track #3, La Port en Arrière...[plays, I swear, the same fricking rhythm]...you could think that was the exact same song, or even the same song as track #4, Blues de Port Arthur...[again plays the same rhythm]"

Of course the producer explains how despite their similarities they really are individual songs with subtle nuances, but by that time they had completely lost me.

Even after I got home and told Erika about this story, we agreed that it had to be a joke, so I decided to Google it.

Apparently it's real.

The Name of the Year is down to its final four.

Here's what I predicted:

Barkevious Mingo
Velvet Milkman
Nutritious Love
Dr. Shasta Kielbasa

Here are the actual final four:

Barkevious Mingo
Velvet Milkman
Nutritious Love
Iris Macadangdang

Not bad, if I say so myself.

I'm still calling it for Barkevious Mingo.

Go vote!

Our kids have a knack for finding unusual ways to get around.

Daniel used to walk around on his knees.

Now Eva, instead of crawling on her knees, does this weird sideways half-crawl:

(Please disregard the part where she picks something up off the floor and eats it)