After I affirm (with a positive grunt) that water freezes at 36 degrees, Griffin twists his head and asks, matter-of-factly,
“Daddy, are you for real listening?”
Busted.
Category Archives: Griffin
Griffin Music
Music can be tough with our kids. Some children’s music is hard to listen to as an adult. And Griffin and Maggie both like to repeat songs endlessly, bludgeoning even great songs to death. They are also mercurial, wanting to switch songs, bands, and genres repeatedly, and always wanting to control it. My answer to this has been Pandora.
At first the kids were disappointed when I put it on, because they couldn’t make requests. For those that don’t use Pandora, it basically generates playlists based on some musical seeds that you create, but you can’t request individual songs. As you listen you can fine tune the station. I created a station for Griffin, called simply “Griffin Music,” seeded it with some songs that he liked, and then showed him how to use the “Thumbs Up” and “Thumbs Down” feature to mark songs that he liked or didn’t like. After he got used to this, he loved it. (Of course Sarah and I could also go in and “Thumbs Down” songs that drove us nuts.)
While glancing over the station details recently, I was shocked to see how many tracks Griffin (and Maggie, to some degree) had marked. We launched the “Griffin Music” station in 2011. Since then we’ve added nine seed tracks. Griffin has thumbed-up 228 tracks and thumbed-down 21. Read on if you’d like to actually see those lists, a snapshot of Griffin’s musical taste over the past few years. These lists are current as of November 17, 2015, and are sorted in reverse chronological order.
Continue reading Griffin Music
Not Quite as Bad
Donald Trump came up tonight during an eclectic dinner conversation, mostly between Sarah and me, but including various spawn-sponsored tangents. I don’t remember what we were saying precisely, but it wasn’t flattering. This piqued Griffin’s interest, of course, so he started asking questions about this Trump character. Both Sarah and I backpedaled off our most colorful aspersions — “ok, maybe he’s not a total idiot,” “he just likes to say ridiculous things,” “we just don’t agree with him about anything” — which only made Griffin more interested. (We usually keep the trash talk out of earshot.)
Suddenly, a look of understanding crosses Griffin’s face, and he says, “Ohhhh! He’s that guy… um, that really bad guy.”
“Which guy?”
“That bad guy. The one we learned about.”
“Where did we learn about him?”
“At the u-boat exhibit in Chicago.”
“Oh … wait … Hitler?”
“Yeah! Hitler!”
<between gasps of appalled laughter> “No, honey, Trump is not as bad as Hitler.”
All Hallows’ Couture
A conversation yesterday:
Griffin: I know what I want to be for Halloween!
A skeleton!
Sarah: Oh, I think that will be a fun costume to make!
Maggie: I know what I want to be for Halloween!
Elsa!
Or, I could be superman,
but I think I’ll be Elsa.
Sleepy Kiddo
Overheard tonight after putting the kids to bed:
Griffin: <whispering, excited> Maggie, do you want to go to sleep right now?
Maggie: Yes. Because I am SO tired.
Griffin: Oh. Ok.
State Fair 2015
Our annual pilgrimage to the Minnesota State Fair. This year we were all a bit crankier than usual, but that didn’t stop us from staying for nearly 12 hours (and 17,000 steps, according to my trusty fitbit).
Fair food included (basically covering all of our meals today):
- hot waffle ice cream sandwiches (just as good as last year!)
- chicken in waffle cones (another favorite from last year)
- mini-donuts
- strawberry rhubarb milkshake from the dairy barn
- hot dogs and pronto pups (verifying that regular corn dogs beat pronto pups)
- samosas from the midtown global market
- gyros from holy land
- cotton candy
Favorite discovery this year was the play area outside the Eco Experience. Sand + water + building supplies = infinite fun.
We thought we’d kick things off with hot waffle ice cream sandwiches.
Divine.
Seriously.
Puppet show. Kinda weird this time, but the kids enjoyed it.
Ram
Lamb
Rabbits
Piglets
Griffin loves this ride.
Last year he was nervous.
This year he had no qualms.
Maggie on her wheels.
Maggie riding a whale (or something).
Carousel
Carousel
Pilot
Examining the map
Pronto pup
Eco superheroes!
A quieter moment in the agriculture building.
My favorite seed art of the year.
And a close second.
In the skyride
Happy skyrider
As a postscript, in the interest of keeping things real, I should mention that shortly after putting this post together, Griffin puked all over his bed. Besides being gross, it was a good reminder that fair food, though fun, isn’t really what a growing body wants.
(But man, those waffle sandwiches were awesome.)
Spring Lake Adventures
A glorious escape to the yellow cabin with our good friends, Jess, Kevin, Murray, and Olive.
Griffin drew this to welcome Murray.
Squeezed in a bit of D&D too!
Cousins!
Raven and Max, and their parents, came for a glorious visit during the last week of July. Many adventures were had, some of which are documented below. Click on any photo for a larger version (and a slide-show interface, if you’d like to flip through all of them).
Sequence
Minnehaha creek
The Science Museum
Black Sheep Pizza
Canal Park on Lake Superior
The dock at the Yellow Cabin
Tyler & Mieka
Continuing an awesome summer of seeing distant friends and family, we enjoyed a perfect Twin Cities weekend with Tyler and Mieka. I’ve known Tyler since college, and we became close while working together in the Oberlin computing center. Then we were housemates in Oakland for a few years and neighbors thereafter. (Plus probably a thousand hours of D&D and video games.) Suffice it to say that he has been a rock in my life for the past twenty years and I miss having him nearby. Marrying Mieka, of course, added some outrageously good icing to the cake, and not just because we got to hang out with them at an Italian villa for their wedding. We were thrilled that they could make it to our neck of the woods this summer because they’re preparing for a major move from the Bay Area to Zurich in the coming weeks. Our house marks their eighth temporary home for the month of July.
In two short days we covered a lot of territory without feeling frenetic. Highlights included a Korean rice bowl feast cooked up by Sarah, a walk to Highland Fest with the kids, strolling across the Mississippi on the Stone Arch Bridge, an evening at the Guthrie to see a spectacular performance of The Music Man, a lovely Sunday brunch at The Buttered Tin, and a visit to Minnehaha Falls before heading to the airport. (And despite some hearty meals, I think we can claim a healthy weekend, earning more than 25,000 fitbit steps each on Saturday alone!)
We’re already trying to figure out how we make it out to Zurich in the next few years…
Photos of some of our activities below. Click for larger versions.
A Maggie and Mieka duet
“Let it go!”
Mastering the climbing wall at Highland Fest
Victorious descent
Mieka and Tyler catching some shade at Highland Fest
At the Guthrie for The Music Man
View from the Guthrie’s Endless Bridge
Tyler and Andrew, discussing geeky esoterica
Perfect Minneapolis evening
Panorama focusing on the Stone Arch bridge
Griffin perched on a rock by Minnehaha creek
Maggie enjoying the creek
“I’m swimming!”
Nothing better on a hot day
Grudgingly returning to shore
Serendipitous encounter with Scott who agreed to take the kids for a ride
Learning the controls
Tally ho
Thumbs up all around
Home Sweet Home
After 32 days on the road, clocking 93:02 driving hours, and passing through 16 states plus the District of Columbia, we’re back home. House is in great shape, and the garden, barely planted before we left, is verdant. Sarah’s first activity upon arrival was to yank out all the weeds.
We’ll catch up on some backlogged posts about the final chapters of the trip in the next few days. We’re all looking forward to sleeping in our own beds tonight!
Road Trip 2015 Vital Statistics
Starting Mileage: 118,454
Ending Mileage: 122,828
Trip Mileage: 4374