Things I've learned since last Thursday

1. Brackett Park in Minneapolis may have become our new favorite park in the Metro. With a super-cool modern playground, a fenced in wading pool, clean bathrooms, a fair amount of shade, and even a skatepark Brackett is hard to beat. Follow the link and read about the rocket.

2. The most direct route to Forestville/Mystery Cave State Park from St. Paul according to the DNR map online is not the best route. Turns out many "County Roads" are, in fact, gravel roads... and those gravel roads lead to a bridge closed to automobiles about 1 mile from our destination.

3. Digging for fossils can be a very fun activity provided you avoid the Wild Parsnip and you don't fall down the cliff of loose limestone. Amazingly we avoided both and found one good fossil. Some other little girl found a nice sized cephalopod fossil. I was jealous. Q was more interested in getting back to the campsite to "make fire".

4. Bringing a pack of 6 Cheddar Brats for the two of us left me with a comfortable margin of error that the slight pitch of the cooking grate took full advantage of.

5. Avoiding horse poop on the shared hiking trails turned a 3 mile hike into a 5 mile hike.

6. Q is not a big fan of bats.

7. Watching hundreds of fireflies just outside the tent window with a three year old is awesome.

Pumping music for K8

The Bird and The Bee

This Week....

we spent a lot of time in the giraffe tent,



suddenly got brave at the park,



and picked up these camo Keen's on clearance at REI for Q.



Now I'm packing up for Q and I to go to Forestville/Mystery Cave State Park for Q's first camping trip. "On to a'venture."

Feed Me!

I think we could go for a hiatus on buying clothes for the boys for a while but this shirt I found at babesta.com is really bad ass. Orange, lion, and graffiti font, the trifecta of cool in this house.

Hero of The Week: Feliciano Dos Santos

Let’s wash our hands
Let’s wash our hands
For the children to stay healthy
For the uncles to stay healthy
For the mothers to stay healthy
We build latrines

That's a rough translation from one of the songs by Feliciano Dos Santos and his band Massukos. Having grown up in the remote Niassa region of Mozambique, Santos is all too familiar with the horrific toll poor sanitation can have.

One of the biggest pop stars in Mozambique, Santos is now using his icon status to fight the diseases that plague so much of Africa. Many of those diseases are ones that we often think of as being eradicated. Santos himself walks with a limp from his battle with polio.

Click here to watch a great profile on Santos and his work from PBS's Frontline/World.

Like little phoenixes from the ashes

How in the world did these two handsome devils emerge from my genetic output? The only theory I have is that K8 passed on 100% dominant traits while I am a mass of purely recessive. Lucky for them.

Buying Locally in A Global Marketplace

When looking for events for the the whole family on the weekends, I've found that the best way to get K8 on board is to find something that bears possibility of her getting unique handmade earings. That was the case for the Stone Arch Arts Festival and is the case with Art in The Market at Midtown Global Market this Saturday.

Art in The Market has been happening once a month since March up through August 9th so we're jumping in at the tail end. The event showcases 10 local artists and their paintings, photographs, jewelry, etc that were all selected by a panel of judges.

If you've never been to the Midtown Global Market you should check it out this Saturday... or any other day if supporting the local art scene isn't your thing. If for nothing else go there sometime for lunch for the exotic array of food all under one roof.

just some videos worth watching...

every morning to set you in the right mind before you leave the house.


Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.


(HD) A More Perfect Union from Andrew Sloat on Vimeo.


Too much candy from Capucha on Vimeo.

1234 Monsters walkin' 'cross the floor.

In a full circle musical moment for Q, one of his favorite songs gets reworked for bumpin' on da Street.

Keepin' Cool

On these crazy hot days there are few things better than a frozen treat molded into something fun. Like rockets (via swissmiss)


or Lego people (via Geekdad).

Hero of The Week: Rick Smolan

A photographer with an amazing and touching story to tell.

The Invisible Man

Crazy Old Lady At The Grocery Store: "I'm concerned about this baby being left unattended."

DK: "I think me standing right here next to him disqualifies him from being unattended."

COLATGS: "No. Where is his mother?"

Kids, there are times in life when lying is not only forgivable but necessary. Sometimes it's to save the feelings of those you love, an attempt to keep you out of a Turkish Prison, or in this case an attempt to make some old lady feel bad for saying something really fucking stupid and offensive.

DK: "She died about a month ago... But thanks for your concern."

Super Tuesday

The new Beck Album Modern Guilt hit the stores (and the internet) yesterday. I decided this was as good as any reason to introduce Q to The Electric Fetus and the joy of new release Tuesdays.

I didn't realize how much I missed the record store environment. The chorus of click click click click being played by browsers flipping through the CDs. The excitement of discovering something new or forgotten. The crazy mix of people. Even the smell. God damn! I missed it all.

Fucking itunes! The easy whore that she is has led me, and so many others, astray. Led me away from the brick and mortar ones I love. Now they are dying. The fact that I can't take the boys to Let It Be Records depresses the hell out of me.

I remember cutting class in high school most every Tuesday just to drive over to the local independent record store. We would spend hours there expanding our collections of Nirvana and Pearl Jam bootlegs and drooling over the Bob Dylan and Led Zeppelin boxed sets. It was on those Tuesdays that I discovered Ben Folds Five and was blown away when I first heard Beck's Odelay album.

I even got a job at a record store when I first moved to Minneapolis, albeit a now defunct chain store. I don't think I realized it then, but working there was a blast. All the free CDs, free concerts, VIP passes, free beer, partying like a rock star with rock stars, getting hit on by movie stars... ok, that only happened once and I had to turn her down since I was already dating K8.

Anyway, I really have to start making regular trips to the record stores with the boys.

As for the the Beck CD:

DK: "What do you think of the new Beck CD?"

Q: "No, no, I don't like it."

DK: "Really? I do. Why don't you like it?"

Q: "I like the dancey stuff better."

Here you go Q

Weird Science

The Science Museum of Minnesota, every Monday, has a poorly publicized event cleverly dubbed "Pre-school Playdates". Even less publicized is that if you're a Children's Museum member you can get into their playdate for free. The free admission doesn't get you into the special exhibits like the current Star Wars geekfest. But since Q has yet to see any of the Star Wars movies, I figured all that stuff might end up taking away from his experience of seeing the films for the first time anyway. The little extra playdate activities are certainly not anything special and most of the exhibits are a bit over the head of your average pre-schooler. But as long as it's free, then getting in to see the dinosaurs and to play with light 10,000 different ways is worth the occasional visit.

Update: Preschool Playdates has been moved to Tuesday.

Happy belated 4th of July

Another Independence Day celebrated/survived at the lake without need of major medical intervention... though K8 and I damn near sunk the Hobie-Cat.

This one's for you Grandma Sally!

Hilton Head

All Paris Hilton Blowjob jokes aside, our family trip to Hilton Head for K8's firm's "Family Weekend" was a lot of fun. Not being golfers we would have never gone there on our own and will most likely not return. All the stuff the Marriott had set up for all of the children was amazing and Q had a blast. We stayed a few extra days to go to Charleston to visit some friends and to tour Savannah before flying home.

Highlights of the trip:
Q peeing on K8's leg on the beach.
Q peeing on the plants right in front of the beach towel booth.
Q peeing into the packed kiddie pool.
Q not peeing in his pants!
Pizza at Mellow Mushroom.
Two (tipsy) nighttime walks on the beach, just K8 and I.
County Road 17.
Wandering beautiful Charleston with our friends Bill, Ana, Will, and Izzy.
Shopping in ShopSCAD and Cherub in Savannah.
Eating two of the best damn cupcakes I've ever had.
The 70% of the time in the air that Ozzi wasn't screaming as though a confederate flag was being branded into his side.

Boys Who Like Boys

Most day's I'll say that having two boys is ideal for our little family. I love having two boys and am relieved that I will never have to worry about a teenage daughter or have to put up with a ton of princess shit. I know I, of all people, shouldn't be giving in to socially prescribed gender roles, but Hannah Montana is lurking around every corner to deprogram all attempts to raise an anti-princess. Having two boys also provides me with an almost endless supply of Beastie Boys costumes for the three of us for many a Halloween.
That all being said, every once in a while I do miss the little girl we will not have. I'm bummed that we'll never get to use the name we picked out for a girl (Harper). I'm even more disappointed when I think of all the great songs that I would have sung to her. Not that I can sing.

Gone Baby Gone. The Goat is Gone!

If it wasn't bad enough that I had to take the boys to the mall this morning, somewhere between The Apple Store and Urban Outfitters, Goat, one of Ozzi's favorite wrestling partners, abandoned stroller never to be seen again.

With the tragic irony of this and my previous post fresh in mind I frantically searched everywhere praying I would find him. No luck. I annoyed the hell out of a few MOA employees. No luck there either.

But, all is not lost. Pacifier reassured K8 that Goat is still replaceable. During the search I also meet a super cool family from Iceland, Norway, or one of the other Nordic nations. Their orange Phil & Ted's was much cleaner than ours and they weren't in a panicked frenzy.

And just in case you were wondering who makes the cutest and cuddliest little goat this side of the alps: blabla kids. A fantastic globally responsible company that you can be happy to give your money to.

Hero(es) of The Week: The volunteers that found Keith Kennedy

Kennedy, an autistic man with some health problems, had been missing for a week. Just before the search would have been called off for the day, a group, including a few St. Paul Firefighters, decided to "go back in" one last time to search an area that had already been searched at least three times since the searching began. Kennedy was found in rough condition but alive Sunday.

Here's to all those willing to "go back in" one more time.

While I'm on the subject of cool new cars...

I really wish the people at great companies like Tesla Motors and Fisker Automotive would strike up deals with great toy companies like Plan Toys and Automoblox. A Tesla Roadster is too impractical to ever be parked in our garage, but a Tesla Roadster wooden toy car... We'd gladly make room in the playroom for at least a few.

BTW, we finally got the Automoblox C9R Sportscar. Without a doubt, Automoblox make the best toy cars you can buy.