Here’s another of the unexpected joys of having a child in a private school (and I’m not even talking about the wallet-emptying, money sucking void the tuition turned out to be): Every other year, the private school in which Zippy the Monkey Boy is enrolled has the same spring break as do other private [...]]]> by Richard

Here’s another of the unexpected joys of having a child in a private school (and I’m not even talking about the wallet-emptying, money sucking void the tuition turned out to be): Every other year, the private school in which Zippy the Monkey Boy is enrolled has the same spring break as do other private schools and, on the alternating years, it has the spring break that public schools have.

George of the Jungle and Speed Racer are in public schools. Which means that Zippy has spring break starting on Friday, while George of the Jungle and Speed Racer don’t have their spring break until April. Because we’re nice, wonderful people (and because I don’t want a bored, cranky Zippy the Monkey Boy underfoot for nine days) we decided to give the little dude a little spring break of his own.

Road trip!

Zippy the Monkey Boy and I are going down to Atlanta for about five days to give him some time away from video games and sleeping so late he gets up when his brothers come home from school. Believe me, that gets really annoying. He gets up, yawns and ambles down to make fun of his school-bound brothers. Sure, it will be reversed when George of the Jungle and Speed Racer have their spring break, but, for now, it’s all about annoying them.

So we decided to get him out of town for a while. Zippy the Monkey Boy being Zippy the Monkey Boy, we thought we’d spend time hanging upside down, falling from great heights and gawking at other animals. Yeah, we’re planning on hitting Six Flags over Georgia, the Georgia Aquarium, the zoo down there and anything else interesting that I can think of.

What he doesn’t know is that I’m also going to be making a little time to drop in on Georgia Tech, to give him an idea of what an urban university looks like. Consider it a preview of the college death march we’re going to be taking together come summer. We’ve already started talking about it and he’s told me he wants to visit schools in Florida, Louisiana, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.

Yeah, right.

Anyway, we’re planning on having a little fun and adventure this time around.

So, when you hear a distant scream, like a little girl about to be covered in daddy long legs, waft in on the wind from somewhere far away, think of me as I whip around the Six Flags park, praying for death and wondering what’s taking so long.

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For some reason, my youngest little dude, Speed Racer, has become heavily into James Bond. He’s never seen one of the movies, nor has he read any of the original books. But he says he loves the character and wants more. So I gave it to him.

Big mistake.

I ordered Live and Let Die, starring [...]]]> by Richard

For some reason, my youngest little dude, Speed Racer, has become heavily into James Bond. He’s never seen one of the movies, nor has he read any of the original books. But he says he loves the character and wants more. So I gave it to him.

Big mistake.

I ordered Live and Let Die, starring the Roger Moore version of Bond, from Netflix and sat down with Speed Racer, Zippy the Monkey Boy and my wife, known to me as She Who Must Be Nigh Perfect, and watched a James Bond movie that I remember absolutely loving when I was little.

At about 30 minutes into the movie, I remembered that I also used to love eating dog biscuits when I was a little dude. (long story and not something I need to go into here. Especially because it’s pretty embarrassing.)

This movie was terrible. Released in 1973, Bond, as is his wont, tried to tie into the zeitgeist of the late hippie time and early libertine 1970s with success ranging from horribly inappropriate to just plain awful. And it was quite possibly one of the most racist movies I’ve seen in a long, long time.

I won’t comment on the clothing as movies tend to reflect what’s going on in the fashion world around them and, let’s face it, the early 1970s were no fashion nirvana and that’s only looking at the ties they wear. I mean, those things were so wide Lindsey Vonn could have skied on them. (Hey, look! A topical reference! Well, only a couple of weeks out of date so not all that bad.)

No, the problem I had with the movie were the appalling stereotypes filling out the ranks of the secondary characters. First off, there’s the so-dumb-it’s-a-wonder-he-remembers-to-breathe Southern sheriff with a cornpone accent so thick you can barely make out the words between dribbles of tobacco spit.

Then there’s Solitaire, played by Jane Seymour in her first major role. A typically ineffective woman who sticks around so James has someone to rescue and to look at him admiringly. Rosie, played by Gloria Hendry, is supposed to be a secret agent and a double agent, but comes off as a horribly clichéd scardey woman, who can’t help but get freaked out by a dead snake and a hat with a chicken feather on it. Good thing James Bond is there to comfort her.

Finally, there’s the movie’s portrayal of blacks. It’s so appallingly horrible I was cringing most of the way through the movie. On the small Caribbean island, blacks are hootin’ and hollerin’ voodoo followers, all wide eyes and open mouths (I could swear I saw Amos and Andy in there somewhere) and just plain dialogue. In America, black people are depicted as the worst kind of stereotyped pimps, with feathered hats and huge, decked out cars that a real person wouldn’t have been caught dead in. I really felt sorry for the actors who thought they were getting a big break by playing in a James Bond movie.

Seriously, do not rent this movie. If I could give negative numbers I would. As is, I’m giving it 1 dude out of five, if only because I could actually follow the razor-thin plot, not that I wanted to. It also gave me a good incentive to take a nice long shower after, although it didn’t make me feel clean.

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I love browsing quote sites. Or, when I was back in the dead-tree book phase, browsing through books collecting quotes from lots of different people. Well, today, I ran across a great one.

“Setting a good example for children takes all the fun out of middle age.”

This is by a dude named William Feather, who [...]]]> by Richard

I love browsing quote sites. Or, when I was back in the dead-tree book phase, browsing through books collecting quotes from lots of different people. Well, today, I ran across a great one.

“Setting a good example for children takes all the fun out of middle age.”

This is by a dude named William Feather, who was a publisher and author out of Ohio starting late in the 19th century. And, really, he’s right, you know.

I mean, I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve wanted to get out an egg and hurl it at something, or wanted to take out the old sawed-off baseball bat I used to keep under my car seat and just go to town on something, or take off my clothes and run starkers through the airport (yes, I do have anger and clothing issues. Why do you ask?), but I can’t because then I’d see three little dudes doing the exact same thing and that wouldn’t be good.

Especially the running naked through the airport. There are only a few of us who can pull that sort of thing off with panache and style. I’d hate for them to find out they’re not in the tiny minority.

But sometimes. . . Just sometimes. . . When I’m in a place where there are no witnesses and will be no consequences. . . Well, let’s just say it would be setting a bad example and leave it at that.

But, oh, it is fun. So very, very fun.

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