Educate me please… since when is ____ offensive?

I consider myself to be fairly well educated.  I’m a minority myself (asian).  I am not a racist.  I am very open minded.  I am also pragmatic. I am for diversity, but not at the expense of success. I believe racism is not a myth, but is overblown and perpetuated by many of the organizations who would do away with it.  I would like to think I am sensitive enough to know when something is offensive and when it is not.  I believe - “to each, his own.”  I also believe that political correctness has gone WAY TOO FAR in most cases.

So, educate me please… since when is the word “monkey” offensive?

I first heard about it in a local news report — some high school kids got in trouble for using the word in a chant at a sports game.  I’ve NEVER heard that the word “monkey” is somehow offensive, but apparently it’s long been considered an offensive word.  I checked with some friends and my wife, but none of them heard of it either.  Just because someone at some point in history called an african american a “monkey” does not automatically make the word an offensive one.  I was once called “skinny” (long ago)… yet that word has not become offensive.

While I’m on the subject… Since when is “plantation” an offensive word??

Sully Plantation - a historical site near my home - has recently changed it’s name to Sully Historical Site.  Sorry, that’s just lame.  Eventually, we’ll be calling it something like… “Historical location #43234″  just so we don’t offend anyone who’s great, great, great grandparents were slaves or may have lived on a plantation — and we’ll strike the word “site” because it might offend the blind.  Sheesh!

I guess if it makes people happy, we’ll go along with it all - but you know what… I’m still going to teach my kids what a monkey says —that’s  “oooh, oooh, ahhh, ahhh” for those who were wondering.  I don’t care what the news reporters say!

Gout sucks - again!

Had gout in my foot in Feb.  It decided to make a reappearance about 2 weeks ago.  I even ended up in the hospital ER in the early morning on the 8th, and was unable to put any weight on it.  They gave me X-rays and some pain relief, but essentially took my word at the fact that it was probably gout.  I’ve been a tender-foot ever since.  I’m no longer taking any pain killers - they didn’t seem to help too much anyways, they make you so sleepy… but I am still not in any shape to run or walk 100%.  But hey, no pain when I put weight on my foot — that’s a very good thing!

I went to see my family doctor a couple days after getting out of the ER… I was unable to see my preferred doctor, so I saw another doctor in the practice.  She was not helpful.  She did give me a prescription for more pain-killers (again, not so effective, but sleepy)… but the worst was when I was asking her questions, trying to get advice - and her advice could be summed up by this simple sentence:  “Just do some reading on www.webmd.com“.  Heck, why not just tell me to Google for some info about gout?!?  That’ll be $150 please…  Sheesh…  Next time, I’m going to insist on my normal doctor.

Abracadabra!

Thomas played a magic trick last night. He was waving Lauren’s princess wand and said, “Abracadabra Boom! Make Mommy disappear!” It just so happens that I was working downstairs in the office, so I wasn’t physically upstairs with the kids. Thomas figured that his magic trick must’ve worked since mommy wasn’t there.

Then Thomas tried to make mommy reappear again… except his magic didn’t work this time! Mommy did not reappear! Where did she go!?! Thomas, in a panic, started crying for mommy. Po-Po and Lauren were with Thomas. Po-Po said, “Thomas, STOP crying! You made mommy disappear, now just do your magic and bring mommy back!” “I can’t! LoLo - YOU DO IT! Bring mommy back!!!!” Thomas cried as he tried to shove the magic princess wand back into Lauren’s hands.

I still don’t know why he wanted to make mommy disappear, but I know he wouldn’t do it again! “It’s too hard, mommy!”

Are you feeling better?

I thought this was really cute, so I had to capture it.

Thomas was sick last week so I kept him home one day. Lauren came home from school and was so excited to see Thomas.

“Hi Tommy, are you feeling better?!”

“Yeah…..”

“Alright! High 5!!”

Mommy - I have a secret to tell you…

Out of the blue one day, Thomas ran up to me and said, “Mommy, I have a secret to tell you.” He then put his little skinny arms around my neck and whispered into my ear and said, “I love you, Mommy.” (awwwhhhhhhh…. doesn’t that just melt your heart?! For all the parents out there, you all know what I mean!) I gave him a big mamabear hug and whispered into his ear, “I love you too honey!”

Meanwhile, Lauren was standing next to us witnessing all this kissing and hugging between Thomas and I, she jumped in and said, “Mommy, I have a secret to tell you too!” Thinking that she’ll say something similar, I asked, “What? What’s your secret?”

“Mommy, you are SMARTER than you think.” (This was before Lauren turned 3.)

I’m not the only geek in the house…

Apparently I’m not the only geek/gadget-guy in the house… My 3 yr old has figured out how to fly the mini-remote-control helicopter I got for my birthday.  No, I did not show him how to do it.  He learned by simply watching me.   Kids are amazing.

Song about Kids and Bedtime

This guy has it spot on!

Everyone loves a rainbow…

We were coming out of the restaurant we ate at last night and what to we see??  A rainbow!  As Lauren said, “Oooh, it’s SO shiny!”  Who doesn’t love a rainbow?!?

Wow… Florida is Flat!

I don’t live in the Rocky Mountains. On the east coast, we have the Blue Ridge and Appalachian mountains, but by western standards you could hardly call them mountains. Still, at least our horizon has a profile…

I just came back from a biz trip to Orlando FL… Wow! Florida is Flat!!

This is a Treo 650 photo (pitiful) from my hotel room balcony - the Orlando Marriott World Center and Resort

Wand-diculous!

No, it’s not a new Harry Potter spell learned at Hogwarts, but it is something I saw related to Harry Potter.  Now I like Harry Potter… I don’t love it like some people do.  Also, while I may be a pack-rat to some extent, I’m not a true “collector” of anything in particular.  But…

Yesterday, I was having dinner with my boss in Orlando FL - where were having a Linux seminar this morning. We went to Downtown Disney and ate at Bongo’s - a cuban place there.  Good food, BTW.  After dinner we walked around a bit and went into a store which had a lot of collectible items — mostly autographed movie poster, a baseball bat signed by Lou Gherig (I think), a neat photo of the Capitol Building in Washington DC which has been signed by the last 12 US Presidents over a 30+ year span, and much more.  One of the things in the store was an original Harry Potter wand prop that was used in the actual filming of the movie.  It was mounted in a nice frame with a large picture of Harry in a spell-casting pose.

How much would you be willing to pay for that collectible wand??  (It looked to be made of plastic, by the way)…  Okay, if you were Harry Potter’s biggest fan, how much would you be willing to pay then?

What number did you come up with?  $1000, $5000??  maybe much less?

Well, you can take that movie prop home for a mere $35,000!  What a bargain!  Honestly, I can’t recall if it was $29,995 or $39,995… but does it really matter??