Approved for all audiences

I know I try to keep this blog family friendly, but I didn't realize it was this tame.

What is your blog rated?

Go have fun...or else!

As PLANET3RRY points out, Nolan's note to his mom sounds very familiar...

From 6/21/90


From 6/22/90

What could have been...

Back in September I was one of the many people singing the praises of “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip,” declaring it an instant hit for NBC.

Well we all know how well that turned out. The final episode of the troubled series airs tonight.

Hercules over at Ain’t It Cool News wrote an excellent article outlining everything that was great about the show and everything that went wrong. Unfortunately, there was plenty of both and little in between. If you enjoyed the show at any point, then I suggest you check it out.

“Studio 60” is a classic example of “what could’ve been.” If you never saw the show, then I still suggest you find a copy of the brilliant pilot episode to watch.

The summer blahs

We’re just over a week into summer vacation and so far Kris has managed to keep the kids pretty busy. They’re taking swim lessons this week, visited a farmers’ market today and have had a few other outings here and there.

However, there is always some down time, like this afternoon. With Thomas in his room for his afternoon quiet time and nothing else planned, Kris insisted that Nolan go outside to play.

But he didn’t want to. He probably wanted to A) bury his nose in a book, B) play video games or C) mope around and complain that there was nothing to do despite the fact his mom had given several good ideas.

Sometimes Kris has been known to pretty much force the kids to go out and play for their own good, and that’s what she did today. She brought Nolan outside with her.

But then he announced he needed something and disappeared back into the house. A short time later he returned and said, “Mom, there’s note on the stairs,” -- as if to say “Wow, where did that come from?”

Kris went to see this note, and this is what it said:

Dear Mom, I do not like going outside. Love, Nolan

Needless to say, we thought that was pretty funny. The note is now hanging on the bulletin board and will probably wind up in a scrapbook.

As for Nolan…he still had to play outside.

My ears are burning

Is anyone else sick of Price Chopper's "House of Barbecue" jingle by now?

Life in Springfield

Here's a post I'm blatantly ripping off from college classmate and fellow blogger Mike Sussman. He pointed out the website for The Simpons Movie is up. It has an option to create your Simpons character, and he posted a picture he made of what his family might look like.

So I've never been one to avoid ripping off a good idea. Here is the closest I could get to me as a resident of Springfield.

I photoshopped the Simpsonized me into a picture of my office. I also had to add the glasses myself, since they didn't give you an option to have your character wearing glasses.

Hopefully I wasn't too generous with my body type. Your choices include kid-sized (Bart, Milhouse), average (Lenny, Carl), buff (Ranier Wolfcastle) and portly (Homer, Krusty). I think there is a little more of me than the average setting. But I haven't quite consumed enough Krispy Kremes to get to Homer-level portliness.

Back to the great outdoors

Our first camping trip of the summer is behind us. We spent the night last night at Cherry Plain State Park.

What was great about this trip was that we went with most of the other families from our Cub Scout den. There were four families there. Counting siblings, there were 10 kids altogether. Everyone had someone else the same age to play with. As a result, they all had a blast.

It was a little too chilly to swim, but there were plenty of other things to do. It was 24 hours of fishing, hiking, skipping rocks, playing ball and just plain running around.

Last night after the kids went to sleep the moms and dads stayed up late chit chatting around the campfire. Wow! Socializing with other adults without kids around! How often does that happen?

It was a quick trip – just one night. But everyone had a great time, and the little campground we discovered is a hidden gem. We all agreed that this might have to become an annual event.

Picking up on 'Potter' clues

I need to start brushing up on my Harry Potter knowledge as we get closer to the release of "The Deahtly Hallows."

One of the best places for all things Potter is The Harry Potter Lexicon. This great online reference guide indexes evrey person, place and thing mentioned in the books -- no matter how seemingly trivial.

I bring this up because an article on Ain't It Cool News about the upcoming "Order of the Phoenix" movie included this juicy tidbit...

In the original draft of the screenplay for ORDER OF THE PHOENIX, they had decided to remove a character from the story. Rowling read over the screenplay and said “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” that they were free to do whatever they liked, of course, but “if you make a 7th movie you’ll have tied your hands.”

No mention of which character J.K. Rowling was talking about. The filmakers are keeping that a secret.

The first one I thought of was Hagrid's half-brother Grawp. But who knows? Maybe Harry's old babysitter, Mrs. Figg? Feel free to post your own theories...

'The man with the hat is back'

This photo will be everywhere before long.

Shooting has begun on Indy IV, which rumor has it will be called "Indiana Jones and the City of Gods."

This photo of Harrison Ford was snapped by Steven Spielberg himself on June 21 and posted on IndianaJones.com.

The new Indiana Jones movie is set in the 1950s and stars Shia LaBeouf, Cate Blanchett, John Hurt, Ray Winstone and Jim Broadbent. It's set for release on May 22, 2008.

Summer kick off

Kris and the kids celebrated the end of school and kicked off summer the other day with a trip to Hoffman's Playland with the Brownells.

As Kris mentioned before, Thomas' pre-school class and the first grade at Nolan's school put on some end of the year concerts in the last couple of weeks.

Nolan's class also recently went on a field trip to the State Museum.

In addition all of that, we had Father's Day last weekend (which was very nice). The next day there was a Father's Day picnic at Nolan's school that included a kickball game for all of the dad's and kids.

Prior to Father's Day, on Saturday, I took the kids and a friend of Thomas' to see "Shrek the Third" (I was disappointed -- it's easily the weakest of the three movies -- but the kids liked it).

And of course, as I mentioned before, we had our last few baseball games.

Anyway, here are some photos of the Hoffman's Playland trip.

'Put me in, coach'

It's been far too long since the last time I posted anything. Sorry, one and all.

We've had a lot going one with various end of the school year activities. Both boys are done with school for the year and the baseball season is over.

Hopefully, I can get back into the swing of things with regular updates on our lives and other meaningless meanderings. I'll get the ball rolling with some highlights from Nolan's baseball season...

'One day to see them all...'

Wow. If I had no life, then it would be fun to spend the day geeking out June 30 at the Palace Theatre in Albany. They're going to be showing all three "Lord of the Rings" movies back-to-back-to-back. It starts at noon and should be over around 10:30 p.m.!

They have some great movies at the Palace. That's where I went to see "Raiders of the Lost Ark" again last year. This week they're showing one of Kris' favorites, "Ghandi." In the past month or so they've shown "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "The Godfather."

The final stretch

Today is Thomas' last day of Kiddie Car. He had his End of the Year Show a couple weeks ago; well, at least the rest of his class did. They work on different songs and motions to them throughout the year and give a concert for the parents at the end. What I feared happened: Thomas came walking down the aisle for the show and as soon as he saw us, sat right down and that was the end of it! I did get him to go up for a little while but it was really hard for him. Oh well--he'll have another chance next year. It's just so funny. He usually loves being the center of attention but when it comes down to it, he's a softie when all eyes are on him. I'll have to remember this story when he's a lawyer some day. Anyway, they are having their end of the year party today and then he is going home with his best friend Leo to play. So he's pretty psyched.

Nolan is a happy kid today too. Today is his Young Author Day. In a few minutes we will be going to the school to watch his class sing and then read books they've created over the year. Nolan reads constantly now so he's really excited about today. He's been into this series called The Magic Treehouse and he's on the 14th book now. Nolan is done school next Wednesday. He has 3 more baseball games, 2 more school parties and a field trip to the museum before that.

It's been so crazy around here that I crashed a little on Sunday. I fell asleep on the couch and Chris said he was watching me sleep. My eyes were screwed shut and my face was all scrunched up as I slept. I'm even stressed in my sleep! But it's all so good. It's exciting watching them grow up.

Everyone's favorite treat

The doughnut fairy paid another visit to our house yesterday. Yes, our supplier hooked us up with another fix of sweet, delicious Krispy Kreme doughnuts.

What better way to celebrate completing a 25-mile bike ride than by downing a couple of Krispy Kremes?

As you can see, we had some friends over to help us share in the doughnutty goodness.

Tour de Cure 2007

The Tour de Cure went well yesterday. I wasn’t quite prepared to do the 50-mile ride this year. So I did the 25-mile route, which was still enough to leave me a little sore afterward.

The route starts at Stillwater High School and goes north on Route 4. Eventually it crosses over the Hudson River into Washington County and comes back down south before crossing back over into Stillwater. The 50-mile route is basically the same – it just goes farther north.

I really love riding through that neck of the woods. There are stretches where you have a great view of the river and little else – no homes, no docks, no roads except the one you’re rising on. It makes it very easy close your eyes and imagine the history that unfolded in the region (you’re riding very near the Saratoga Battlefield).

I suppose the only downside to the day was the effect the ride through the country had on my allergies. I was a mess for the rest of the day. But it was worth it. It really was a great ride.

And it was for a great cause. I raised $225 for the American Diabetes Association. Thank you to all of you who contributed. If you’d like to contribute, it’s not too late. Just click here.

Surfin' Safari

Ok all you Mac users. Make the case why I should download Safari.

The Mac folks made their browser available for Windows users today.

Right now I'm using IE 7 at work and Firefox at home. Although I still have to use IE when I do work from home -- and then it's IE 6, since I can't get IE 7 to install on my computer.

Anyway, I'm very pleased with Firefox. But I know the Macheads love their Safari. So is it worth my time to check it out? Is it all that different from Firefox?

If Yoda had a blog...

If Yoda did have a blog, what would he call it? Blogobah?

RSS in Plain English

According to The Common Craft Show, there are two types of Internet users: those that use RSS and those that don't.

I've mentioned before that I'm border-line adicted to Google Reader.

If you're not using an RSS reader to read the web, why not? There's a reason why RSS stands for "really simple syndication" The Common Craft Show put together this little video that explains the whole concept...

Margaritaville

The never-ending quest for free stuff continues...

I'm on the mailing list for Garcia's Mexican Restaurant in Colonie. According to the e-mail I got this morning, starting today and for the remainder of the summer, any time the official temperature at the Albany Airport hits 90 degrees or higher, stop into Garcia's for a free Margarita. The e-mail says you just need to tell them that you're "part of the club."

Cheers!

I cannot tell a lie

Retired Gen. George Washington Criticizes Bush's Handling Of Iraq War

I just like the picture of George Washington talking to Tim Russert on "Meet the Press." There is also one of him being interviewed by Wolf Blitzer on CNN.

@#$%ing hillarious!

This is one of the funnier beer commercials I've seen in a while...

'I Am Iron Man,' Part 2

I'm a few weeks late in posting this. Odds are, if you're geek enough to care, then you've already seen this photo of what Iron Man will ultimately look like in his upcoming movie.

But since I earlier posted the first image of his old, clunky gray armor, I figured I should keep up and pass this along. It's been sitting on my desktop for three weeks.

Plugging into 'Unplugged'

I know I just blogged the other day that the MTV Movie Awards are the only thing I watch on that channel (I'm not exactly in their key demographic anymore).

But that may change this summer. MTV's "Unplugged" franchise is returning. Apparently, someone reminded the people at MTV that the "M" stands for music.

The show will return on June 22 with Bon Jovi. Also on tap for this summer is
The Police, which should be awesome to see.

"Unplugged" was an MTV staple in my college days, with great performances from the likes of Eric Clapton, Paul McCartney, Paul Simon, Elton John, 10,000 Maniacs, R.E.M. and of course Tony Bennett.

This time the show will also be shown other Viacom properties like VH1 and CMT.