Frenzied Daddy

Miss B, playing Kingdom Hearts with Miss K watching on.

Miss K: “What’s his name?”
Miss B: “Bambi”
Miss K: “Why?”
Me: “Because his mother wanted him to have gender confusion issues.”
Miss K: “Why?”
Ms B: *glares at me daring me to come up with something the three year old will understand*

I was reading about Ian McKellen playing King Lear (one of my favorites of Shakespeare’s plays), and found myself flabbergasted. No, it wasn’t about him ( Sir McKellen ) dropping his trousers during the storm in Act 4. No, it wasn’t about the fan letter he got from the seven year old. No, it wasn’t reading that he only was offered Gandalf after Sean Connery, Peter O’Toole and Anthony Hopkins turned it down. No, it wasn’t that he “enjoys being a star” because he’s very shy and hates going into rooms with a bunch of strangers, so his stardom is a blessing because everyone knows who he is ( thus there are no more rooms with many strangers ).

What surprised me was that he’s gay. It’s funny; my moms are gay, I’ve got gay friends, I’ve been around gays and lesbians for as long as I remember — they’re part of my landscape like rivers, plants and republicans. So it’s kind of surprising to me to be … so surprised … about Sir Ian.

Not only is he gay, but he also was one of the founding members of Stonewall, named after the Stonewall Riots. And he regrets the years he spent lying to his parents and friends about himself. Reading some of the other interviews with him, he said that staying in the closet is itself a homophobic act and demonstrates self-hatred (I’m paraphrasing). But he likes himself, and so he’s out.

Generally, spiders don’t bug me. Sure, black, bulbous bodies with spindly legs that have sharply bent joints … they get squished. I don’t mind the little brown garden spiders though. Yeah, I practice racial profiling and prejudice against spiders. Sue me.

I’m not going out like this poor guy: German Man. Note to Chris: do not click. Note to others: the story is not believable for many reasons.

When I was younger, even when Ms B and I first got married (well, ok, up until about six years ago) I had a terrible phobia about flying bugs… I would run and jump around like a monkey if I thought a bee was in my hair. I was more in danger of scaring the poor thing than anything else. Miss B has been following in my footsteps, which has caused me to consciously “worry less” when there’s flying insects nearby. She claims she likes some common bugs but other ones disturb her. And flying ones, well, just give up.

I’m on call this week which means I go to bed early and I’m up early. This morning I came down to find a note on the basement door that read “there is a moth inside. please remove.” in Miss B’s best handwriting.

I took my local Fred Meyer’s manager to task. They put up these “neato” family friendly signs over the cashier lanes where they took out the Cosmo magazines. I don’t care about the cosmo mags; the ten year old and the three year old don’t hardly notice them. But right at eye level for both those kids is a series of big red packages that say candy! Family friendly my big red butt.

Apparently, I’m not the only parent who thinks this way. Shopping with kids can be hell! At least I don’t have to worry too much about my kids being sneaky though. This woman’s selling an entire box of Pokemon cards that somehow “fell” into her cart!