Also, there’s always the Internet. We are still very enamored with Red Fish. It seems like there’s always something we haven’t found before! Lately we’ve been clicking on the rocketship a lot and playing with the planets. Fun times.
Some of the math games on Red Fish remind me a little bit of Math Blaster, which was well after my time, but I loved having it in the classroom when I taught.
My love for educational computer games may seem incongruous with my anti-video game stance, but I never said I wasn’t complex. Blame my parents for sending me to the Math-Science Center for summer camp instead of something more outdoorsy. Nothing spelled fun in 1978 more than a dozen kids standing around a Frigidaire-sized computer, taking turns typing “BANG” in the all-text version of Oregon Trail. Can you stand the thrill? We hardly could.
During my teaching career, I always made sure my classroom computer library was stocked with Math Blaster, Word Munchers, Oregon Trail, a stack of Carmen Sandiego games and anything else I could talk the administration into buying. One of my all-time favorite finds was The Dark Eye, a super-creepy video game based on multiple Edgar Allan Poe stories. It was narrated by William Burroughs! Thomas Dolby did the music! There was Claymation involved! Be still my dark little nerdy heart!
I remember one of my middle-school students getting all overwrought because he came to the "Cask of Amontillado" part of the game and had to brick the pleading Fortunato up in the wall before he could progress. “I promise I’ll come back and bust you out, man,” he said with tears in his eyes, clicking on one brick after the other with a heavy hand. I don’t think The Boy will be ready for The Dark Eye for a long time, but when he is, it’s here and waiting. For now, Red Fish is just his speed.
The Boy had an absolutely marvelous time. He hit it off famously with another little boy, and they played together for three solid hours. They worked their way from one end of the playground to the other, climbing things, rocking on other things, sliding down still more things and digging in the sand. All the while, they chatted up a storm about the things little boys talk about when they are in their own little boy world, away from the grown-ups. At one point we got close enough to hear, and they were discussing whether Optimus Prime had laser weapons or plasma weapons. It was a lively debate.
Tad and I actually fared better than usual at this particular playgroup. On the Tad side of things, the presence of another dad made him feel less like the literal odd man out, so that was nice. On my end of things, my usual fishing-for-conversation nervousness was helped along by the fact that one of the topics that came up was Humboldt Fog. It just so happens that I recently read an absolutely marvelous cheese memoir, Cheesemonger — A Life on the Wedge by Gordon Edgar. Also, my friend (and fellow Open High alum) Dany Schutte is Ellwood Thompson’s resident curd nerd, so fortunately I know a little sumpin’ sumpin’ about cheese.
Between the fun everyone was having and the comparatively mild weather yesterday, what we thought was going to be a brief foray kept us out well past lunchtime. By the time we made it home, we were all dragging just a little. Actually, The Boy was dragging a lot. As I went through the motions of fixing his late lunch, he spread himself flat on the living-room floor like a bearskin rug and stared into space.
“Are you OK, Buddy?” I called in as I sliced the tomatoes for his sandwich.
“Yeah,” he replied, but just barely. Then he added, “I think I used up all of the imagination I had for this day, though.”
“It’s OK,” I assured him. “I don’t think you’ll be required to imagine anything else until tomorrow.”
“Good,” he said, without moving. I had nothing but empathy for him. I know that feeling all too well.
These days, I’ve changed up the recipe a little bit. We’re rocking the whole-grain bread in our house, and while we do still use real mayonnaise, I can’t handle a big glass of milk like I used to, so it’s usually just ice water or tea on the side. And — don’t tell Friddell — I have been known to occasionally add a little cheese, or, if I am feeling particularly cosmopolitan, a slice of avocado.
But my liberties are nothing compared with The Boy’s. Following firmly in my footsteps when it comes to the tomato love, he’s been polishing off platefuls of thick slices and bowls of cherry tomatoes ever since he could eat solid food. “Juicy red to-MAH-toes,” he calls them (a tribute to Bing Bunny*), and they’re one of his favorite snacks. And the only thing he likes more than a nekkid to-MAH-to is a to-MAH-to sandwich. Made his way.
Some days, “his way” is a plain sliced tomato stuffed into a folded-over slice of bread. Hold the mayo because he is definitely not a fan. Sometimes he likes mustard on his sandwich, but not catsup, because that would be redundant. And last night, he wolfed down not one, but two, folded-over hummus, jalapeño-mustard and tomato sandwiches that actually made me shudder to assemble, but he was adamant, and hey, I’m not the one who has to eat it, so whatever!
I hope we have a good long tomato season this year, for me, The Boy and Guy Friddell. In fact, I’m going to make a tomato sandwich right now. Hold the jalapeños.
* Note: If you would like to read the story from which The Boy picked up "juicy red to-MAH-toes," proceed to the Bing Bunny website and click on the book entitled "Yuk" on Bing's bookshelf. Ted Dewan, the author, reads it himself, and you get to see all the pictures, too! Super-cute but unfortunately there's no direct link. Worth the clicks, I promise.
But even I have to draw the line somewhere.
So anyway, when Tad said it to me in person, that set me right off! Because I was talking! About important things! That Tad needed to hear! “You can’t say ‘tl;dr!’” I screeched indignantly. “You can only write it! It doesn’t even make sense! If anything, you would have to say ‘tl;dl!’ For ‘too long; didn’t listen!’” Netspeak! Ur doin it rong! Of course he LOLed. ROFLed even. Because he obviously got to me. That’s the thing about using the snarky Internet comebacks in person. You actually get to see how annoyed your target is. Which is kind of awesome. Unless it’s you.
Case in point — last night, The Boy asked if he could have some chocolate-covered peanuts. And being that it was awfully close to bedtime and he had already had one sweet treat that evening, I did not grant his wish, telling him simply no, no candy tonight, sorry. At which point he stomped his foot indignantly, threw both hands in the air and said “N Double 2 E S! Why can’t I have candy?”
I guess he told me, huh? SMH.
Each story is just a few pages long, perfect for bedtime reading. It’s suggested that you guide your child through a short, relaxing meditation before you read the story, so that the message of the parable will transmit better and, also, one hopes, so that the message that it is bedtime when the story is over will stick, too. We have not yet tried these as bedtime stories, just as afternoon storytime stories, but I am saving the rest for bedtimes, and I will let you know how they go. After Birthday Week 2010, some relaxing bedtime meditations might be just what the mama ordered.
