Kirk blAug

Yesterday morning while at the park with the boys, Jupiter suggested that we play superheroes. Since he was wearing a Batman shirt, Jupiter wanted to be Batman. In keeping with the theme of the moment, Tsunami decided to be Robin. Jupiter then asked which hero I would choose to be. I told him that I wanted to be Alfred. "We are playing super heroes, dad!" Jupiter replied. I argued, "Alfred is essential to the hero that is Batman. In fact without Alfred, I do not think there could even be a Batman as you know and love." To be honest, I had never actually thought of Alfred in this way until the moment I made the argument. But I think it holds true. How many times has Alfred been there for Batman in ways that were essential to his task? I think plenty. Without Alfred, I do not think that millionaire, Bruce Wayne, could keep his identity a secret. Alfred has covered for him often. There have even been instances where Alfred has put on the bat suit in order make

Jupiter is currently building the Ecto 1 thanks to Grandma Ernie and Grandpa Pat. I am really loving these LEGO Ideas sets. I applaud LEGO for bringing community involvement to their retail products. I am sure it is no easy task as there must be licensing hoops to jump through as well as making sure the products meet a certain degree of structural integrity. The Back to the Future set was equally fun to build. One thing that I really like is that, aside from unique paint on some of the pieces, these all seem to be built from preexisting pieces. There are seemingly no new molds created because, for example, a certain Star Wars vessel has some particular need. Maybe one day we can submit one of our own creations to LEGO Ideas to be voted on as a potential product, but for now we have been more than satisfied with what the community has come up with. Now if only we had some of that Hi-C Ecto Cooler that I loved drinking in the late 80s, we could really get the nostalgia flowi

I, along with my partner, went to an estate sale yesterday. I had never been to one before. There was a lot of cool stuff. The most interesting thing about it to me was not that I had an opportunity to buy someone’s old stuff though. I found myself thinking about who that person was and what I could learn of their life from the stuff I saw. It was the last day of the sale, so I did not have as much to go on as I otherwise might have. There was still a lot there to see though. The old gal who passed away seemed like she might have been widowed, but if so it was not very recently. She certainly traveled the world quite a bit. There were artifacts from China, Germany, Iowa, and throughout Europe. There were a slew of nifty handbags, fancy hats, fur coats, and delicate jewelry. This woman had a certain prideful way of presenting herself. Perhaps deservedly so. I found myself wondering what it might be that she carried from place to place in the big trunk that we found in the baseme

This morning while running I came upon a tree where a couple of squirrels were apparently having a tiff over some sort of property. I imagine that the one whose hindquarters was stuck in the air left his stash of acorns to go for his own morning run. Upon return from his run, there was a stranger claiming his gatherings. That is when the fight broke out. The adversary, an innocent ticket taker at the local scamper-in theatre who just happened on the stash, thought he might help himself to an acorn or two. After all, here was a pile of acorns with no one around to claim them. It was certainly a pile that was intentionally placed by another squirrel, but where was that squirrel now? For all he knew the squirrel that left these could be dead. If that is the case, unfortunate though it may be, it would be a shame for all these acorns to go to waste. Besides, it is not as if the theatre pays its ticket takers anything that could be considered a living wage. His family could use the go

For about four months I have been without a device that manufacturers market and consumers know as a phone. I sold my iPhone 4S after getting a Nexus 7 (2013) with a cellular modem in it. I had long realized that since telephony works over the Internet through various VoIP services, I was grossly overpaying my cellular provider for voice services. Especially considering my lack of frequent usage of that feature. I had wanted to stop doing this. However, I believe that the cellular providers had also realized that VoIP threatens part of their business and so they had been reluctant to sell data without voice for a long time. I was interested in the iPod Touch or an Android equivalent with a cellular modem, but that device never came to market. That is, until cellular ready tablets started to hit the market. The only problem there was that the device was too big for me to feel comfortable using as a phone. Eventually tablets got smaller and phones got bigger. The Nexus 7 and the iPad

Just a quick one.

Occasionally while on a long drive I listen to podcasts. The other day while driving between St. Louis and Kansas City one of the podcasts I listened to was Penn's Sunday School .   +Penn Jillette  hosts the show with  +Michael Goudeau  and +Matt Donnelly  as co-hosts. Penn's Sunday School speaks on a variety of matters from the mundane to the absurd, but one topic Penn mentioned on episode 116 really made me think. I was thinking about it again today on this morning's run. "No one gets to choose their funeral" is the idea that Penn put forth on his show. This isn't the first time I had considered this. It was just the time it really settled in.  I have sometimes expressed ideas about how I would want my funeral. From an early age, saving my family from the funeral industry's exploitation concerned me. "You don't have to bother with a funeral and casket or any of that racket." I said to my family. "Just put my remains in a ba