Pope Francis is Elected

 White smoke over the Vatican! A new Pope has been selected (but the name has not been released)

Cardinal Bergoglio of Argentina has been named Pope

Bergoglio, a 76 yr old Jesuit, will apparently take the name of Pope Francis, becoming the first Pontiff to take that name.

First impression? A calm, friendly man more reminiscent of a parish priest than a Pontiff. I like him

ABC News has done a respectful job of reporting on the new Papacy, but boo to their translator for having trouble with the Lord's Prayer lol

Hitchcock

 We watched "Hitchcock" tonight, a 2012 Anthony Hopkins/Helen Mirren biopic about the making of "Psycho". It was fun and informative, and I'm glad we watched it. Grade: B+

A strange and potentially violent encounter

 A guy came to the door with a slip of paper claiming to think this was a property for rent from a "Mr. Reynolds". When Lisa answered and told him he was mistaken he went next door, then returned and asked her for directions, then wanted to know if she lived alone and if she was married. She tried closing the door and he screamed at her to show him "her titties" and tried to stop the door. I was half asleep two rooms away when I heard this. I yelled and headed for the door and he booked it and drove off by the time I got down the front stairs. F'ing NASCAR getaway. Middle of the f-ing day. WTF?????? Black male, early thirties, 5'11, 220#, black knit cap and scraggly beard

WTH

 A guy came to the door with a slip of paper claiming to think this was a property for rent from a "Mr. Reynolds". When Lisa answered and told him he was mistaken he went next door, then returned and asked her for directions, then wanted to know if she lived alone and if she was married. She tried closing the door and he screamed at her to show him "her titties" and tried to stop the door. I was half asleep two rooms away when I heard this. I yelled and headed for the door and he booked it and drove off by the time I got down the front stairs. F'ing NASCAR getaway. Middle of the fucking day. WTF?????? Black male, early thirties, 5'11, 220#, black knit cap and scraggly beard.

Junie at Bounce Realm

 

The family walks home from school and Junie is almost hit by as car

Today a treat: Lisa joined me in walking the kids home from school today, which the kids loved. The walk went smooth until until a block from home when Junie inexplicably darted into the road and came within three feet of being hit by a car. Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln reports the play went well.

Truman's Memoirs

 I'm more than a 100 pages into the first volume of Harry Truman's memoirs, and so far I'm not impressed. To date, he seems woefully miscast in the Oval Office, full of blind hero worship of FDR and insistent on the status quo at a time when the situation in the field was changing by the hour. The worst thing, IMO, is that even at the time of the writing (1955) he seems perfectly content with first being briefed about the atom bomb thirteen days (!) after assuming the Presidency. I also have difficulty liking a guy who calls the Foiles Bergere "disgusting". It's early, and there's much of history and memoir to digest, but my whatever the outcome on the job he did I have a feeling I wouldn't have liked him very much in everyday life.

edit from 2022: I actually remember liking the two volume memoir, even if I thought his politics were bunky. It must have picked up the pace a bit after this post LOL

Oz the Great and Powerful

Team Slap, along with most of Entourage and co., went and saw "Oz the Great and Powerful" today. Beautiful visuals (bringing out several "cools!" from LK and PD) and an engaging story. Yes, there were some anachronisms in the film,, at time Franco seems painfully aware that he's an "Actor" with a capital A, and as plots go it isn't up there with a Charles Kaufman script - but so what? It's about witches and munchkins and a man finding himself and it does all of that well. I grade it a happy A.

The Wizard of Oz

The lil' ones are watching Wizard of Oz for the first time, and after some annoyance at the sepia scenes they were spellbound by the cyclone. Then, when Dorothy opened the front door and saw Oz for the first time, Junie broke out into a huge, heartfelt grin and said: "Cooooool". Well done Victor Fleming, well done sir.

Not that there's anything wrong with that

On a recent snow day we braved the snow and took the kids out to eat. Afterwards I stopped at a nearby bookstore to browse. To keep the kids happy during that time I gave them each a buck to spend at the Dollar store with Lisa.

Fifteen minutes later I collected the family. To my chagrin Smiley had spent his dollar on an elaborate Chinese folding fan decked out in black laquer and gold accents. Not only did he buy it, he was zealously protective of it, cradling it in the car on the way home.

" What the -," I asked Lisa.

"I know," she said,"I kept trying to talk him out of it but he wouldn't even consider something else. Just let it go, it's only a fan."

Yeah, a very girly fan. But she was right,  it didn't matter, and we went on with our day. Later Smiley came up to me in the kitchen beaming with pride.

"Dad,wanna see what I got?" he asked.

"Sure," I said with a measure of reluctance.

He took out the fan, opened it, and promptly whipped it at one of his sisters.

"I bought a boomerang!" he said.

I burst out laughing.

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to my gorgeous brown eyed other man....lol...Happy 8th birthday buddy/p diddy/lil man!!! I should apologize now to your future wife, cause no ones gonna be good enough for my boy, lol!!! - Lisa

Happy Birthday Smiley!!

Happy Birthday to my gorgeous brown eyed other man....lol...Happy 8th birthday buddy/p diddy/lil man!!! I should apologize now to your future wife, cause no ones gonna be good enough for my boy, lol!!! - Mom

Junie

 

 

So far in 2013: 12 books, 56 movies. Waaaayyy behind the curve here. Damn those work/family/homeowner obligations!

1290AM, formerly an African-American all-talk radio format, is now a Rat Pack era station. It's now #3 on my AM presets in the van.

 WITI is reporting the 14 month old Town of Walworth boy attacked by pit bulls has now died. RIP

Selecting the Pope: Uncovering the Mysteries of Papal Elections by Greg Tobin

Given current events, I just finished reading "Selecting the Pope: Uncovering the Mysteries of Papal Elections" by Greg Tobin. I found the portions of the book related to the actual selection process fascinating, but too much of the book is taken up by a shorthand history of the papacy and Tobin's own {liberal Catholic} opinions on where the Church is headed.

Hugo Chavez

Hugo Chavez is dead at 58. The news is 58 years too late for the good of the Western Hemisphere, but I'll take it anyway.

 

Pasta shells stuffed with ricotta, italian sausage and spinach for dinner tonight. Yum - best of all the kids might reject them, leaving more for me. In the meantime, while we were stuffing them I ate some of the mixture, only to be mildly annoyed when Lisa told me she'd added a raw egg to the mix for cohesion. 

"You let me eat raw egg?" I whined. 

"Pulease, you eat cookie dough all the time," she said.  

"That's different," I said, "God blesses cookie dough and keeps it safe. Known fact, Lisa. KNOWN FACT"

“ . . . and to my delight two Rex Stouts which I don’t think I’ve read . . . . He writes so urbanely that after a diet of ordinary thriller writers he cuts the palate with a nice astringency, a neat pungency.”

-- from The Richard Burton Diaries

My Friend Fred Bryan

 

 30 years ago today, February 28, 1983, the final episode of M*A*S*H aired.

YaYa and Junie