Pallas and I went on a daddy/daughter date to "Trapters". it was so much fun. She's growing up so fast (she recently wrote her name for the first time!) Even going there was fun- stopped at the LRT tracks, we saw two trains go by and an ambulance!  Such lucky ducks we are. Anyways when we were there we spent most of our time in the kids section ,where she was allowed to choose one item to get, but of course we had a tea party and stuff for a while first.
Later we went over to my section, ie the trade paperback comics section which is also handily right by the fantasy/scifi books. "Do you like comics dad?"
"You know I do, Pallas!"
"I was just being silly."
"I know."
Then she saw one of Charlaine Harris' books (the ones True Blood are based on) and she recognized the covers because Michelle has some and gets the others from the library. She got all excited and wanted me to buy it for her.
"But sweetie, this isn't really a book for little girls. See? It's just all words, no pictures or anything." I didn't mention all the vampire werewolf faery human sex.
"Dad! You silly!  I'm a big girl. And I can SO read! I can read I Spy books."
The book I wound up getting was neiter comic nor scifi. It was Jian Ghomeshi's 1982 which I basically read in a day. I enjoyed it- I really only bought it since as a CBC nerd I consider Jian a personal friend (anti-restraining order disclaimer: Jian is not my personal friend). And even then, 1982 and Bowie are not really subjects I had much interest in. I was 8 in 1982, so a little young to have been tuned into the zeitgeist. 1986 and I'm all in. Especially if it's all about Gowan (who Jian mentions in passing, sweet!) Like I said, though, I read it in a day so obviously I enjoyed it a lot. It's very funny and also has that awkwardness that characterized the entire 80s decade, at least for me, so I could identify even though it wasn't quite about my exact generation.
Sidenote- I also just received my copy of Stephen Tobolowsky's The Dangerous Animals Club. I haven't read it yet, but as a huge fan of his podcast, I have a pretty good idea of what's in it. You should get it. Seriously. Jian Ghomeshi should get it too. And have Tobo on Q. I'm really serious. Here's why. The Talking Heads song, Radio Head? You know the one. That the band Radiohead was named after. Yeah. That song is about Stephen Tobolowsky. I am totally not lying. I am sure that story is in the book, but if not, check out episode, uh, well I forget but just listen to them all.
Well, to bring this back to Pallas, I'll also say I introduced her today to one of my favorite movies- The Iron Giant. I got a shirt from Teefury that mashed up Iron Man and Iron Giant so of course hse wanted to know what that was all about. So we watched it together. Damn. That movie gets me every time. Poor little Pallas was just inconsolable. Actually a Dragonette dance party consoled her up pretty good, but she was crying for a long time before we thought of it. Then tonight when I was putting her to bed, she was like, "I don't want Iron Giant to come and get me."
But he won't, he's only imaginary and anyways he's a good guy.
"But but but I don't want him to step on me, I'm just little."
He's very careful not to step on people, sweetie. And anyways, he's imaginary remember?
"I don't want any mosters to come either."
"Monsters know better than to mess with me, sweetie. And imaginary!  Very imaginary."

Every great superhero needs a good Rogue's Gallery of villains and nemeses. So today at work i was brainstorming ideas from Pallas' large little world and I came up with a few. So here are Owie Badguy's bad guys.

1. Stinknut the No. Low level mob thug, probably an enforcer, utterly without mercy. Even when victims plead for their lives, his answer is always no. This is inspired by Naia whose nickname is The Peanut. Sometimes though we call her stinknut. And her favorite word is no. She even says it in varying tones of voice while sleeping. Stinknut the No, yo!

2. Terrible Two. Surely this has been done? I'm writing this out on my iPad in Evernote so I'll google it later. Super powered twins, with some sort of superpowers. You know.

3.Snot Dragon. As parents we learned that children quickly become snot dragons when they're sick. Anyways Snot Dragon would be a mystical martial artist who summons dragons who spew snot rather than fire.

4. Pallmall. Pallas was calling herself that for a while, though it evolved to Powmom or some thing later on. Anyways Pallmall would be your Joker-like psycho who just likes chaos for its own sake.

5. Trum. Your basic rampaging monster with rage issues and utterly without the ability to be reasoned with. Owie Badguy's very own hulkish analogue. Derived from tantrum, of course.

6. Night Knight. His goal in life is for the whole world to say good night. Permanently! And his favorite book is Goodnight Moon. Owie Badguy fights N.K well past the point of exhaustion,
seemingly every. single . night.

7. Gomer Pile O' Bones. We decided our Halloween skeleton hanging outside is named Gomer and my subconscious knew there was a joke in there somewhere. Finally got it to surface. An animate skeleton! Probably kind of clumsy too though I have to admit i really have no idea who Gomer Pyle is.

8. Hohoho. Pallas used to think Santa's name was Hohoho so I thought an evil santaish character with that name would be kind of cool.

9. Bastroyer. Marvel has Galactus. DC has the Anti-Monitor. But even they must bow to . . . Bastroyer! Your basic giant planet-killer. Owie Badguy would still punch him in the face though.

10. Owie Goodguy. Obviously, Owie Badguy's evil clone.

Introducing . . . Owie Badguy! Pallas told me she had a new name for a good guy.
"Yeah? What is it?"
"Owie Badguy."
"Oh, so, he's a bad guy?"
"No, he's a good guy. He makes bad guys say owie."
"Oh, I see. By punching them in the face?"
"Yeah!"
"Well that's the best superhero I ever heard of."

 She tells me his costume is supposed to be blue, with a brown mask, and pink wings. I took some artistic licence and decided to omit the wings. When you're as awesome as Owie Badguy is, being able to fly is just getting greedy.

 First ones on the block! Got some new Halloween deocrations this yeaar so as not to be too repetitive. I love the black pumpkin inflatable thing we have but this year I went with something a little different. And that life-size skeleton was too cool to pass up. Although the first one I bought turned out to be missing a foot and an arm. Luckily I discovered this when I was buckling it into my passenger seat (he has to go somewhere right?) so I took it back into the Walmart and exchanged it for a whole one. Not gonna lie- had I got it all the way home I woulda just accepted that some skeletons are incomplete and obviously this one met a violent end. Carrying it through the walmart I made all the easy jokes to passersby like, "This isn't for halloween this is my wife, thats how long we've been in here" and so forth. I am a laff riot.

Bonus pic of the girls because they're sooooo cute!

 

Yay October! This month marks the tenth anniversary of Pooing in the Woods. Been trying to think of appropriate commemorative things to do to mark the decade but so far drawing a blank. I mean, it would be easy to search the archives for favourite posts and such but that doesn't seem very interesting to me. Also been thinking about completely overhauling the blog, maybe going to Wordpress or something since my comments widget went away forever starting today. And maybe retiring the Homie Bear identity and all that, the internet has kind of outgrown usernames in recent years. Well, the actual anniversary date is the 22nd so I have a few weeks to think about it. I'd invite your comments but not allowed!

I got a phone call from Pallas today. She was excited to tell me about her adventure on the High Level Bridge Streetcar. "That streetcar was pretty brave! He was so high on the bridge. He didn't fall in the river!"

I know you want to borrow my copy of A Feast For Crows by George RR Martin, but you can't. Because it's a signed first edition. Greenwood's Bookstore brought him in waay back in 2006 or so. Michelle and I used to live quite close to Greenwood's so we spent a lot of time there on dates. Yup, for us, going to a bookstore is a great date. And an expensive one . . . though in a good way. Michelle was even known to be a little star-struck when she saw Laurie Greenwood in the store (though she hasn't actually owned it for a few years now). Anyway, it was announced or revealed that it's closing. Yet another independent bookstore casualty. Everyone thought it would be the big box stores that killed them off but I think it was the Kindle and iPad that did it in the end.
And actually, one of the last remaining used bookstores in Edmonton is also closing down, more for not having anywhere to move to in October when their lease expires forever. Belgravia Books and Treasure. This one makes me even more sad, I think. Richard always always always asks about Michelle and Pallas (though Naia, as is her wont, often gets forgotten) by name when I go in there. Not too many places like that anymore. I love used bookstores because you always find the most amazing books that you had no idea even existed.
Well, I'm not exaggerating when I say I've bought, read and loved literally hundreds of books from those two stores, so I will miss them both very much.
Cheers.

There was a local controversy here in Edmonton last spring when a teacher at Ross Shepherd High School, Lynden Dorval, was suspended for going against the Edmonton School Board's No Zero policy. He gave a zero to a student for not handing in assignments. As you can imagine, he garnered near-unanimous support in the community, where everyone was quick to point out that in the real world there isn't a no-zero policy. Last week he was fired. He landed on his feet by getting another job at a private school. But still. Public sentiment squarely in his favor.

My wife is a teacher, so we listened to the news on the radio about his termination with interest.   I made the inevitable easy comments about how silly a no-zero policy is. Her response was a little more nuanced, as someone with university training in pedagogical methods- something of which I know nothing. She said that a zero for incomplete assignments doesn't really address what's been learned or not learned but is rather an inappropriate punishment for a behavioral issue, not an academic one. I know I'm very likely misquoting both her exact words and even her intent, but that's the gist as I understood it. A mark should only be a reflection of learning, and have nothing to do with behavior. So another way to put it might be that marks are meant to measure knowledge but have no usefulness or function for judging behavior.

I didn't really have a good response at the time, though I did feel that there was an argument that could be made there somewhere. And since all I do all day is bomb up and down a haulroad in my Kress truck, I was able to come up with what I think is a reasonable pedagogical model, bearing in mind that as a Kress Truck driver in a coal mine, my expertise in this area is nil.

What if, for any course or class, we set a baseline mark of zero. We come in as fresh faced newbies innocent of any specialized knowledge, and hence we have 0%. Yeah we might know a few facts ahead of time, but let's all start on an even keel.

The teacher's job then is to impart the knowledge of the subject at hand, the curriculum, in order to bring all the students to an end mark of 100%. The ideal goal would be for everyone to learn all the necessary data and knowledge.

Assignments and tests and all that demonstrate how much of the curriculum beyond 0% a student has gained. Hey, if I'm 47% smarter (or rather, more knowledgeable) about calculus at the end of a semester than I was at the beginning, that doesn't sound so bad. If only my RRSPs grew so fast! And if I'm 80%, 90% or 100% more knowledgeable, well that's fantastic.

Not handing in work is simply a waiving of the right to demonstrate a gain of knowledge, and therefore receiving a mark of 0% is simply remaining at the baseline where one started. One could say the teacher didn't even give (or award) a zero, since they already had the zero to begin with.

Hey? Am I right? I never took any courses in logic or rhetoric back in university, so I'm still at the baseline 0% in those disciplines, but sounds alright to this coal miner!

One of these days I'll post something. Or not. I dunno. But in the meantime have a cookie- it's my birthday! (tomorrow)

Finally got some photos of that incident from July. Kind of more of the aftermath after a backhoe pulled the truck out of the sump. Actually, it pulled it out and accidentally tipped it over on its side. Pics aren't the greatest but beggars can't be choosers I guess.

Pallas got a Batman playset today at Costco and came busting through the door so we could play it together. It was pretty fun. Pallas asked if Catwoman is a good guy or a bad guy.
Well, she's sort of morally ambiguous.
I want to call her a good guy.
Well, that's the nice thing about moral ambiguity.
So the bad guys had a bad guy party and the good guys had a good guy party.
Then Joker and Robin and Scarecrow went to the library (You can joke me later, Joker, we have to go to the library now) and Hal Jordan tucked all his kids in safe and sound, even some Strawberry Shortcakes. Oh and the villains broke out of jail but got sent to the naughty mat.

Pallas: Do you know why I sent you to the naughty mat? Because you came out of jail!

Villains: Oh ok, sorry.

Pallas: I forgive you.

Animethon 19 was this weekend. I wish I knew what a great convention this was before now- one year, maybe in 1998 or so I blundered into it and it was tiny. There were maybe a dozen people in a classroom watching an anime movie, my friend and I popped in to watch for a bit and then we left, and that seemed to be the extent of it. Turns out it's grown since then. I think I heard there were something like 7000 people there over the course of the weekend- not bad at all. I went on Friday thinking I would zip into the artist alley since I knew Drake Tsui would be there, and wound up making a weekend of it. Even brought the family out on Sunday.
One of the things that I think is really cool about it is it's been held at Grant Macewan College (University now) which is one of my favorite buildings ever. Crazy towers and spiral staircases and walkways and a big clock and stuff.  Great quad-type greenspace outside which provides great backdrops for cosplay photography.
Downside- they announced at the closing ceremony that there would be no Animethon 20 unless a whole lot of people stepped up to volunteer and share some of the load. More details here.



 

 

 

There's this old railway that runs kind of parallel to sections of our haulroad. It's part of the Coal Branch. It was used mainly in the 1920s to service the coal-mining towns . Lots of interesting history there, but of course the way my brain works I just like looking down at the twisted remnants and pretend I'm in some future Mad Maxy apocalypse where we all pilot giant robots to extract the last dead black guts from the earth. . . and hey look the future is now!  But anyways.
China Miéville's new book is called Railsea and about a whole planet where there aren't oceans but rather one vast sea of railroads. The sealife is giant moles (moldywarpes) and other burrowing creatures monsterized for the purposes of awesomeness. Trains ply the rails trading amongst nations and uncovering salvage of varying vintages. The cover says it's kind of a Miévillian take on Moby Dick (Miéville covers Melville!) but really the only other books it's actually like are other Miévilles. Which is fine by me. 
This is now the second book China has written about trains, so I imagine he's a bit of a trainspotter or train nerd or whatever but it's not like you have to be one too. Trains never really impressed me much growing up but I do love giant monsters and mysterious derelicts from another age. 
Derelicts like these, you might say:

  

The House
 (for Steve)

So you're driving around in rural Alberta and it's not the Alberta you know with mountains and foothills it's just flat prairie far as the eye can see, maybe the odd hoodoo here and there and they definitely are odd. And then there's a town, no leadup, no sign, just town. Not much of a town, for sure, but still a town. The bank is in an atco trailer sharing space with the local realtor. There's a gas station. They have a surprisingly nice playground though, and you're not really sure if that's a nice thing to say about it or kind of mean since it's the only nice thing you can think of to say about it.
But of course you're not just driving around randomly- you have somewhere to be. The house is in a nice enough neighbourhood, big old trees and well-manicured lawns, the picture of smalltown Alberta, could be 1960 for all you know. Hell, there's even some sort of 1960s rocketshiplooking extendovan on the street. Is that a barbecue you can see in its window? There's always some weird thing in the driveway when you come here Steve says.
There's old cars, too, hot rods in various states of repair, and toolboxes and a stack of cartons of protein shakes in the driveway. In fact, the last time you were here a year or so ago, there was a stack of protein shakes, right there . . . that's not the same stack is it? Steve deftly avoids the elderly mother of the owner who is outside gardening but you stop and talk and she tells you the same story she told you last year about how great it is that this house was built using lumber from old government buildings that were demolished to make newer government buildings. From the outside the house is maybe a little more ornate than you would expect in Alberta, a little more fortressy-looking, but otherwise doesn't really seem like it was cobbled together from spare parts. It's only when you go inside that you see it. That you're not really in a normal house.
Your eye isn't really drawn to any particular thing at first, since there's so much to absorb. Over there is a pair of outboard engines, and here's an old red wagon, and some antique bicycles and guitars and a display case with oldtimey telephones and gaslamps and whatnot inside, but then you see to your left that this floor is actually only there to provide a catwalk so that you can look down on the basement where two whole cars are being worked on or built or something in what amounts to a Victorian style library with bookshelves two storeys high, complete with a grizzly skull next to a hippie love sign and some reader's digest books and a knight's helmet and a faux Egyptian bust. Of course, most Victorian libraries didn't have an entire wall devoted to a mural of Camelot or somesuch at sunset, looking out over the ocean. And there's the cars. Two of them.
But whatever, you're not here for that. Instead you climb the spiral staircase which has what one can only hope are structural support beams painted up to look like spruce trees. How do you like my spiral staircase the owner asks you. Yeah, it's . . . fancy you say. Yup, they're way safer than normal staircases he says. Because you know, if you fall, you won't go all the way down. You nod thoughtfully, but refrain from saying what you are thinking, which is that most normal staircases have railings and not just open spaces between the steps. And is that landing for the attic just free-floating plywood? Upstairs is why you're there, and you do what you came to do.
There's dust and there's bugs and there's the debris and detritus that you knew would be there. It doesn't matter. The owner, having displayed a certain tendency towards packratishness, is easily persuaded to keep much of the stuff. Most of the rest goes in the garbage, including piles of old expired medication. I can give you the number of the agency that disposes of expired meds the owner says. Sure you say, and when he turns around you toss it in the garbage. It's going to the dump where it won't be a danger to junkies looking to get high so who cares.
When you're done you try to make a clean getaway but the owner comes and says there's more stuff in the attic, and he leads us further up the spiral staircase. Someone lives up there, you discover. A mouldering mattress with sheets that haven't been changed in way way too long, and a plasma tv and a dr phil book on the nightstand about reclaiming your relationships. It's stifling hot and you instantly want nothing more than to leave. This guy's lived here two years now with no heat, can't talk him into moving downstairs the owner says. And he pushes aside the tarp wall and leads us past piles and piles of lumber under a roof made of that greenhouse stuff they used to use, kind of translucent plastic or whatever. How has this place not burned down you wonder. Anyways there's a bit more to do so you do it and get out of there.
And if you're still with me after all that, you might be wondering what the hell I'm talking about, what is this house. This house. It defies description. All I can say is it's the saddest place in the world.

Michelle's dad passed away on Friday and we were down in Calgary for the funeral. It was a hard time but there were some things I will definitely always remember. Pallas especially was amazing, she and Naia stayed with me in Edmonton the first night while Michelle went down to take care of some details, then we drove down on Sunday.
Naia was sick and mostly just sucked her thumb and stared forlornly. Pallas asked quite a few questions, like "What's a funeral?" "It's where we go to say good-bye to Papa Zunic forever." "But I don't wanna say good-bye forever, I want Papa Zunic to get better." "I'm sorry, sweety, that's not how it works." "But but, who's gonna be Uncle Steve and mommy's daddy now?" "No one, sweetheart."
Later she decided to sing a song, called the Going to Calgary song. It went like this: "Don't be sad, we're going to Calgary tomorrow. Don't be sad, we're going to see mommy." and repeat. I told her it was a great song, the only thing was, we were actually going to Calgary that very day, not tomorrow. "I know Dad, that's just how the song goes."
At the funeral she actually appointed herself an usher, more or less, hadning out one of those memorial cards to all the guests as they came in. She even told me to go back to what I was doing because she was busy working. Anyways, the funeral was good.

There's this brilliant guy named jouste on deviantArt who always draws the most unique and original character designs with these crazily hilarious bios. Finally a game company took notice and hired him to do some work on their new game Shellrazer, which comes out today. Giant turtles vs orcs and stuff!  Very cool.  I bought my copy so now Pallas and I will have something other than zombie-bastruction strategies to discuss at suppertime. Right now I'm working nightshifts so I haven't actually had a chance to try it out.
Here's the link. Only 99 cents!

Michelle saw some Halloween costumes at Costco yesterday and called me to see if she should buy one for Pallas, even though it's not even close to Halloween yet and who knows if she would still care about superheros by then. "Who cares?" I said, "Get her one for today!" Every day is a good day to dress up as Spider-man! Pallas agrees, because she was super excited! "I'll be the best Spider-man ever, I promise!" she told Michelle. So we spent the better part of yesterday fighting bad guys together- I may even have donned my Green Lantern costume from last years's Halloween. Cosplay day at casa homie bear!
Speaking of cosplay and the like, I just watched Comic-con Episode IV- A Fan's Hope. It's a documentary that they filmed in 2010, they year we went. So it was pretty cool, trying to find me or Michelle in the crowd shots (because then we could update our IMDB page) but I didn't see us. I did see lots of the cosplayers I met and photographed though.

So not only did I get piss-tested for that incident with the pickup truck a couple weeks ago (though described just a few posts down) but last night I got written up for it as well. But why? I wish I got to keep a copy of the form they make you read and sign. It said something like this:

On June 26th you had a pickup truck go into reverse and land in a sump, resulting in loss of a light vehicle. Any repeat occurrence will result in discipline.

 Hmm, I wonder how I can remember not to let any more trucks self-slam into reverse and drive into a sump so that I don't get disciplined? Because that seems like something I would forget.... and isn't being written up being disciplined? Anyways, there was a space for me to respond, and I did, thusly:

So, an inanimate object has a mechanical failure and I'm to blame?          That's how you spell                    B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T.

Also, no berm- bullshit. And, not even my job. Bullshit!

And in the space where I was supposed to sign, I wrote in "I'm not signing this."

Anyways, later I regretted my choice of words a bit. Technically, the Ford was not inanimate. The very fact of it being far too animate was the cause of the whole problem- it was a failure of inanimation. Well, these guys are hardly literary critics- I think they'll get the message.

I asked my union vice-president about filing a grievance, and he said he would be too happy to do so though by the time it got through, the ninety days of my disciplinary term would be up anyways. And there's really no consequences to being on the disciplinary term, so other than my disgruntled sense of injustice, not to mention my 11-year perfect record prior to this, it doesn't really mean anything. But goddamn it they just pissed me off!  Plus I want a new iPhone!

Pallas went downstairs this morning and informed Michelle, "Mommy, I've been thinking, I think I need to go to the library to buy my own Hulk books."
So of course I took her, thinking we would just grab a few of those learn-to-read books, but they didn't have any. So we grabbed Ultimate Spider-Man Volume 1, a Clone Wars Visual Encyclopedia or something, Winnie the Pooh and an animated movie called Hulk vs Thor. All her picks!
On the way home, she asked me about Hulk.
"Hulk's a good guy?"
"Yup!"
"He's not a bad guy?"
"No."
"But sometimes he gets very very angry?"
"Well, yeah."
"But he's a good guy."
"Exactly."
"He's friendly."
"Yup."
"But only when someone tries to bastroy him he fights them."
"Yeah."
"Green Hulk means go, Red Hulk means stop!"

Naia Peanut is in the 3rd percentile for weight. She is quite wee, it's true. But not unhealthily so. We are just a small people, us Homie Bears. Well, my dad's pretty big but he's the anomaly of our family, I think. A couple of years ago, I was edging up to the 200lb mark, and trying mightily to surpass it. Being 140lbs all through high school and university, hitting 200lbs was a big deal to me. Since I was a casual runner and worked out some, I figured the extra weight was all muscle, baby. Michelle tactfully informed me otherwise. So then I started running a little farther, and hitting the weights a little harder, and pretty much overnight I dropped down to my current weight which is in the 173-178 lb range, which includes, if I may be so immodest, some respectably cut muscles. Not bad for 37 years old.

I think I can mostly thank my genetic legacy and body type more than any iron discipline on my part- you should see what I eat at work. And at home...

Anyways I bring it up because I just  read The Cure for Everything! which was written by a local U of A guy, Timothy Caulfield. Pretty good book, just trying to debunk all the myths and misinformation out there about fitness and healthy living. That, and AJ Jacobs' Drop Dead Healthy have been my literary nutrition of the last few days. The messages are pretty similar and pretty simple- the only truly surefire way to lose weight and live healthily is to eat right and get lots of exercise. Easy, but hard.
I do have one question, though. Here's the thing- a guy like me, probably only supposed to eat around 2200-2400 calories a day, give or take, that may even be a little generous. For a completely sedentary person, less. I don't know if I've ever eaten that little. Doing the math a bit, I wonder how it is that I'm not way fatter? I don't run that much, and indeed, Caulfield asserts that, for all the many many benefits of exercise, weight loss just isn't one of them.
One possible answer, appropriate enough given the title of this blog: poo.
I'm not being funny or trying toilet humour, I'm serious. No one ever talks about the calories lost to poo. I guarantee you our bodies are not 100% efficient at sucking every single calorie out of the food we eat. So how much of the devastatingly bad food choices we make every single day wind up getting flushed out of us unabsorbed? Probably varies, and I'm not trying to provide another excuse for terrible eating, but it's gotta be some right? I know- I'll ask google.
Hmm, Google doesn't really know, or at least, I don't really feel like wading through all the internetz garbage such a search turned up.
Best guess: some.