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Tuesday, September 09, 2003

SpaceCamp

My kids are watching SpaceCamp. (note: from reading my diary you'd conclude that my children watch videos non stop since they seem to always be watching one while I type. Really, though, it's not like that -- it's just that the only times I can sit and relax and write up an entry are when they're settled quietly, and one way to do that is with a video). Until they borrowed this movie from my grandmother a few months ago (they have since returned it and re-borrowed it, by the way, must clarify lest you think I let them keep borrowed movies for years ;-), I hadn't seen it since I think 1986, on New Year's Eve. I must confess that I was totally convinced that "Daedalus" as portrayed in the movie was a real actual space station. When we watched it as a family, I told T that a boy in junior high had done a History Day project about Daedalus, but that he'd spelled the name wrong. T very diplomatically said that he was 99.9% sure, having been a space buff since grade school (which was longer ago than my grade school, let's just say that), that Daedalus was invented solely for that movie. I was not as diplomatic; I insisted, I'm afraid, that it had to be a real thing since Richard had done his project about it. Whoops. I did a lot of research online, and finally found out for sure on an astronomy newsgroup that T was right and I was wrong. I do not remember what the stakes were of our silly little bet on that topic, but I was utterly demoralized and felt like a buffoon. Not as much of a buffoon as Richard, though. He got a lot more than the spelling of the name wrong. What I have to wonder is where the heck he did any research for that project. Granted, it was eighth grade, but we had to have at least some sources.


Not, by the way, that I can claim much superiority in the area of History Day projects. I was in seventh grade that year, and my school friend and I decided to work together on a project. She would do the art, and she was really into drawing with perspective at the time, and wanted to do some kind of interior of a cathedral or something for the background art for our project. The only problem was that the topic of the project had to have something to do with "frontiers". So how to incorporate a cathedral with that? Simple, you title your display "Frontiers In Christianity." ACK. We did a good job -- we wrote a lot about the changes in religious culture from Biblical times to the present, and typed up blurbs of text and put them on little scrolls which we glued to the background. And of course the cathedral interior looked just great. :) But what a stupid idiotic name for a project. I'm surprised we didn't overhear the judges laughing about it. Maybe they were still in shock from "Deadelos."



C's doctor appointment went fine, by the way. The doctor says that the pigment loss on the side of her neck isn't anything to worry about, and that it's really common (which went along with the research I'd done online). She was more puzzled by the discoloration above her mouth, and finally concluded that it looked most like a bruise of some kind, like she was sucking a glass down over her mouth, but if it's still there next week I'm to bring her back in. C loves going to the doctor. She's been asking me at least once an hour to check the white spot on her neck, in a very serious little 3-year-old voice. She likes taking medicine too, little booger. She gets that from her dad, who used to try to drink Triaminic recreationally when he was a little boy. I, on the other hand, will generally suffer with a headache for hours before I finally give in to T's cajoling and take two aspirin. I tell him it's my anti-addictive personality -- unlike some people, I don't need to seek chemical solutions to my problems, physical or otherwise. ;-)



I was just getting a good laugh reading California's voter guide for the special election in October. Here's a quote from Larry Flynt's blurb: "California is the most progressive state in the union and I'm sure its citizens would welcome having a smut peddler who cares as their Governor." That's really funny, except that it's also true. This election is making South Florida look like a think tank in comparison. Dave Barry had a really great column about this a few weeks ago.

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