Friday, November 26, 2010

Five Links for Friday

I am still carrying around my Thanksgiving food-baby, or at least it feels that way when I try to wear anything but elastic waist pants, so I can't say I have much to offer the world of the internet tonight. But here are a few links, in case you're up late, digging into the leftover pie and wondering if there's anything good on TV (there's not, there never is: give up now).

Katie Roiphe has a wonderful piece from the Financial Times about everyone's favorite topic: helicopter parenting. She doesn't call it by that name, but if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck ... Anyway, a very good read. Pour a drink, neglect the children, and read away. HT: Instapundit, where all my good ideas come from.

Adam Savage from Mythbusters took a flight to Seattle recently with 12" razor blades nestled undiscovered in his carry on. Whoops. I guess the TSA is so busy taking the shirts off 6 year old boys, they've forgotten how to operate that x-ray thingy they run our bags through. Good thing we're all safe, though ...

The boys' school is an unofficial Guinness Book of World Records holder for the largest game of tag ever held. 937 screaming children (and adults) played this past Monday to highlight the problem of childhood obesity. The game was organized by two girls in One's class, and as such the honor of "taggers" went to all of One's class. I think it's safe to say that a good time was had by all.

Now that Thanksgiving is over, we're thinking Christmas around here. Hopefully the big hits this year with the boys will be new swords, a Rokenbok building set, and some sort of reading chairs for their rooms. We're having a terrible time over the the last item; we love these iChairs from Pottery Barn Teen, but the price is more than unpalatable. We may have to (gasp!) leave the house and shop in actual stores to find something suitable.

Back to Thanksgiving for a moment, John Stossel was on TV tonight explaining how the first Thanksgiving owes its existence to the idea of private property rights. Not what they taught you in elementary school, is it? His piece is written up here; it's an interesting read.

And that's all I got. Have a wonderful long weekend - mine is likely to be spent unplugged, unless I motivate myself to post a picture or two. Enjoy, y'all.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I've managed to stay away from late evening food for a while, but there is no getting around - nothing good on tv. Nada.

I only perused the parenting piece (yawn). Nature vs. nurture again. (For my essay on the topic see my middle column). (smile)

The swords are very cool. Does your family ever attend the Renaissance Festival in Plantersville? We've attended annually for 7 years now. Love it!

Barbara