DISTRACTOR BEAM

Gift from Creepyville

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One of my kid's gifts this year appears to have been imported directly from Creepyville. (That's somewhere in the Uncanny Valley.)

My kid pretends to be 20

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My son is in kindergarten; he's not quite six. He still holds my hand almost everywhere we go, he's still too scared of loud music and the dark to see a movie at a theatre, and he still thinks bikes are locked up so the garbage men don't take them away by mistake. 

The following is as close as I can get to an exact transcript of our conversation while walking home from the subway station yesterday. I spent most of the time trying not to laugh.

Kid: Daddy, I want to pretend we're grown ups.

Me: Okay. How old do you want to be?

Kid: Sixteen. 

Me: Sixteen isn't a grown-up yet. You have to pick a number over eighteen.

Kid: Um, twenty.

Me: You're twenty? Ok. 

A beat. We act as if we're just running into each other.

Me: Hey! Nice to see ya!

Kid: Hi.

He shakes my hand, which is absurdly formal. We start walking down the street – holding hands, of course.

Me: So how've ya been?

Kid: Good. How have you been, Mike?

Me: Great, thanks. Hey, since we're both grown-ups, we should do something together.

Kid: Sure, Mike. We can do some grown-up things.

Me: What do you want to do?

Kid: We could see the Toxic Avenger.

Me: The musical? Sssure, we could see that. Do you want to have dinner together first?

Kid: Yeah! We could eat at a restaurant in Niagara Falls! 

Me: Sounds great. What do you think you'll have? Since you're a grown-up, you could have a beer if you want.

Kid: Yeah, I think I'll have a beer.

We stop talking for a few minutes as we wait for a gap to cross the street. Once we get to the other side:

Kid:  Actually, I think I'll have a red wine.

Me: Okay. Should I drive there or do you want to?

Kid: I'll drive. I'm a fast driver, but safe, too.

Me: What kind of car do you have?

Kid: (shrugs) A stretch limo.

Me: But if there's just me and you in a limo, that seems like a lot of wasted space.

Kid: We could pick up some people to ride with us.

Me: Like who?

Kid: Like some teenagers.

Me: If Mommy asks, we never had this conversation, okay?

Kid: Okay.

 

My kid reads LOLcats #2

I couldn't help myself. Here's another bunch of cats narrated by my kid.

TOYMAGEDDON

This weekend I noticed that a neighbour's flower garden is populated with dozens of toys arranged in action-packed poses, like a diorama in the best museum ever. 

If there's a story here, it's about how the dino-toys took over the world. (And put E.T. in jail.)

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My kid reads LOLcats

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Me and the kid made a few of these a while back. My Facebook pals like 'em. Maybe you will, too.

All in a day's work

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Between takes on the set of the short film, "Mud." I got to be the clean one. Score!

Lightning

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I shot some video of a recent thunderstorm. Check out what lightning looks like in slo-mo.

Wm. Shakespeare's Five and Twenty Random Things Abovt Me

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The meme is older than anyone guessed! Here's something I just dug up at the library. 

1 Sometimes I Feele so trapp’d by iambic pentameter... Does that make me a Freake?

2 I haue been Knowne to cry at Bear-baiting. 

3 I am not uery ticklish. I am Not. So prithee, do not euen try. Waste. Of. Time.

4 I cannot keep Lice, and know not why. 

5 Sometimes I thinke plays are all Talke, Talke Talke, and wish for a cart-chase scene. I tried one in The Merry Wives, but it looked like Shitte, so I cut it. The men playing the horses were so Pissed at me.

6 I once threw vp on a man's head, from a high Windowe. I was so fvcking Sicke that Daye.

7 I hate to wear a Ruff, for I haue such a pleasing Necke.

8 As a player, I am painful-slow to learn my part. Once whilst playing Edward I, I used the prompter so ouermuch that a groundling yell’d ~Stop interrupting, Will!And it was my Dadde. (Kydding!)

9 Sometimes when I am Stvck for a rhyme, I new-mint a Worde because I jvst want to get the Damned script ovt the fvcking doore.

10 I play the Flute yet poorly, but I can make any crumhorn beg for Mercy.

11 When I am happy I call Anne my Kicky-wicky. When I am cross I call her “Olde Fun Killer Hag-Ass.”

12 I keepe my Stashe hidden in our seconde best bedde. Shhh. Don’t tell the Fyve-Oh.

13 The people that loue my Wordes the best are always the most disappointed vpon meeting me. Is thisse List ouer yet?

14 On the topic of dating, my daughter Susanna loues to remind me: ~Jvliet was only thirteen! And I remind her that i) she was Italian, an impulsive race ii), she was actually played by a middle-aged Eunuch named Ned, and iii) she died. That always shvts her right vp.

15 I deteste it when the Low-Comedians improuise the scenes I writ them… becavse they always make them so mvch fvnnier.

16 I haue, on occasion, thovght abovt hiring a Boy to fixe my Latin.

17 When I was sixe, my Goode-Friend Charles brovght to Schoole a wood-cut of his mother, qvite naked. After that we called him Charles Nudie-Mummy, whiche did make him Crye.

18 I take my eggs ouer-medium. If I get them O’er-Easily, I tell my Porter, ~You may thinke this is what I ordered, but it’s snot. I thinke that one is a real Slap-A-Th’Knee.

19 I work ovt my calues thrice weekly, usvally three pyramid sets of Calf-Rises whilst holding a flagon of Meade. I knowe I should stretch afterwards, but it Bores me so I do it not.

20 As a boy in my Bed, I would shriek i’the night that Witches wovld come to eat me. My Mother (bless her) wovld smooth my Hair and whispr ~ Be not afear’d, the Witches onlie eat the Jews.

21 Whitsuntide has become so commercial.

22 Nobody euer forgets where they were the moment they heard that Thomas Kyd died. I was shopping for codpieces in West Cheape. I came ovt of the Change-room and the proprietress was i’tears. I said ~What is it, now?  and she replied  ~Kyd is dead. There was a melancholy qviet, and then she said ~And that Piece is a mite too small on ye.

23 Euery time we do the Taming of the Shrew, some pvnter wants his Money backe, because we don’t actually show a shrew getting tamed. 

24 I do not vnderstand all the Fvss over Currants. Sure, they are both sweet and Small, but must they bee added to EUERY FVCKING MEAL these days? Yestermonth, found I currants in a Tarte of Spinnedge. I meane come on, People. Seriovsly. 

25 When I am feeling Melancholic, I console myselfe with the Knowledge that, aboue all else, I will be remembered for my Musick.  

[Originally posted to Facebook on Feb. 5, 2009.]


Wm. Shakespeare's Five and Twenty Random Things Abovt Me by Mike McPhaden is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Canada License.

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