Lesbian Dad | Monthly Archive

Archive | October, 2010

Weekend bonus shot (color fairy version), 10.30.10

By Lesbian Dad on October 30, 2010 in Anima animus, Mostly a picture, Re: the lil' peanut, Weekend bonus shot

Love fairy, Berkeley, CA.

The boy’s Halloween outfit, as worn to preschool yesterday. Worth rendering in color, even if it is the weekend and I usually like to go B&W on ‘em. (Full-body preview shot here.)

He picked this fairy godmother outfit himself, when out & about with his Ma. He was reportedly entranced the moment he saw it, and insisted they get it. He had initially intended to be a poodle or perhaps a monkey, but all those plans went flying out the window when this sparkly twinkly number spoke to him from the 5-and-under aisle.

I added in the t-shirt, what with it being a chilly day yesterday. You know, for Northern California standards. It was the only clean white one we had, but I also like that it bore an additional, subliminal (and I mean really subliminal: none of his preschool chums reads Latin yet) message.

In the morning before he went to school, he said he was worried someone might say he looked silly. We asked: “Do you still want to wear the outfit?” He answered: “Yes. But I’m worried someone will say I can’t.”

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Dusk/dawn

By Lesbian Dad on October 29, 2010 in Baba familias

The gloaming, Berkeley taqueria version.

Watercolor sky, outdoor seating empty but for us, a happy, relieved quartet. I asked the girl child earlier in the day: “Where would you like to go for a celebration dinner?” Her answer, echoed by kids if not from coast to coast, then certainly up and down the great state of California: “Burritos!”

We were celebrating the end of the beginning, the personally momentous event of our renovated house passing final inspection from the grey ponytailed — but don’t let that fool you; he was all business — gent from the city. “You’ve done really nice work here,” he said to Dan, the chap who’s been the foreman on this job since, oh, somewhere’s around June, July. A man of few words (unless you hit him up for carpentry or home repair advice) and high standards for craftsmanship. Ponytailed gent from the city was right.

Since the beginning of summer we’ve been carried away on the fast-rushing river of a pretty much whole-house remodel (left way back there on the riverbank was the discretionary time I had to write much a’tall here, and as I scramble back for shore now, that’ll be one of the first logs I grab onto). The term “whole house” begs clarification, though, since we’d only been living in the attic of it for the previous five years. My beloved’s brother and his family living on the main floor. It’s all such a long story which is, as with so many long stories parsed out in a medium such as this, perhaps only tellable in bits and chunks.

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Halloween costume preview

By Lesbian Dad on October 27, 2010 in Anima animus, Re: the lil' peanut, Weekend bonus shot

I hope I’m not giving too much away about his Halloween costume this year. Least this picture doesn’t show it with the blinkey red lights emanating from under the — what’s the word for that stuff? tule? Oh, man, was he electrified (well he was!) by the discovery of that feature, by the way. “A twinkley dress! A blinkey twinkley dress!” Secretly thinking inside, I’ll bet, “Ha! No WAY the big sister could ever have had something like THIS!”

There will come a day when he takes his measure with a stick other than something he’s plucked right off her person, but that day has not yet come.

The headwear on this year’s get-up will be different than shown above, and he may not use this flashlight as his wand. Though I think I might suggest he seriously consider it. It does have the dual purpose of proper fairy godmotherly accessorizing and prudent night safety.

(A coupla years back, sister was a dragon and then a bee, whilst brother was a very smiley leopard.)

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Weekend bonus shot, 10.25.10

By Lesbian Dad on October 25, 2010 in Mostly a picture, Weekend bonus shot

Night nymph, Berkeley, CA.

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Save the Children, elect Richard Pan for CA Assembly

By Lesbian Dad on October 21, 2010 in APB, School work

I got an email yesterday from Chris Moore, President of the Stonewall Democratic Club of Greater Sacramento. Â In it, he provided an update on a tightly fought state assembly race in which the lead attorney for the Yes on Prop 8 is running. The National Organization for Marriage is in big for his campaign, and we all ought to know about it. And help support his opponent.

Here’s Chris’ piece for the California Majority Report yesterday:

National Organization for Marriage is Using Children as Political Pawns… Again.

The folks behind the divisive and hurtful Yes on Proposition 8 T.V. ads just couldn’t help themselves — The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) is once again using children as political pawns, but this time in an attempt to elect one of their own, Andrew Pugno, to the California State Assembly by smearingÂ his pro-equality challenger Dr. Richard Pan. The two are facing off in a hotly contested race for Assembly District 5 in the Sacramento region.

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Weekend bonus shot (Monday edition), 10.18.10

By Lesbian Dad on October 18, 2010 in Mostly a picture, Weekend bonus shot

Mid-morning stretch, Craneway Pavillion, Richmond, CA.

This past weekend I was not tending to others — the parental exploits that form the bulk of this blog’s subject matter — but instead tending to myself, at a nonresidential “city retreat” led by Pema ChÃ¶drÃ¶n. Â An application of ye olde “put the oxygen mask on yourself first before assisting others” truism, which truism is a reasonable shorthand for the stripes of Buddhism I’ve studied (i.e., work on opening/softening the self, the better to help open/soften others). For those unfamiliar with her, Pema ChÃ¶drÃ¶n’s an American Buddhist nun and teacher whose impact on the contemporary North American practice of Buddhism is hard to understate. At least by me who, along with countless others, has learned a very great deal from her writings and teachings.

Both she and her teachings have been aptly described as down-to-earth, practical, and disarming; she’s as compassionate about human (and animal) suffering as she is bemused by human foibles, her own included. Â To wit: throughout the weekend, during the periodic Q&A sessions, folks watching from afar would submit questions, and a few would be read by someone on site. Ani Pema (“Ani”: Tibetan honorific for a nun) would attempt to find the camera filming her and speak to it as she answered her far-away interlocutor. She turned her inability to find the camera into a kind of a running joke. Â At one point she tried and failed (yet again), at which she chuckled and said, “I feel like a complete imbecile!” Her delight was so great,Â it was as if she had just said, “I feel on top of the world!” Â That’s what it looks like to be virtually judgement free- both of self and others. We should all feel so tickled when we feel like complete (or even partial) imbeciles.

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Hang on, little tomato

By Lesbian Dad on October 14, 2010 in Mostly a picture

That’s about as much as I’ve posted here since, oh, who knows when. That much: the size of the smallest cherry tomato our boy child could find on the vine. A wee little dot of sweet. And so much is afoot in the world around us (as ever), unremarked upon.

But the end is near. I mean in a good way, as in, I think this thing munching up all discretionary (read: blog posting) time is nearing an end. For the two or three of you left out there: yay! More for you to consider and chit-chat with one another about, soon.

Meanwhile, a nice ditty for inspiration, from those fine fine Portland swingers, Pink Martini.

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Study hour

By Lesbian Dad on October 7, 2010 in Mostly a picture, Re: the bairn

Someone just got her first library card. Above, the haul, day one. I had to put some kind of cap on it, since we were walking home. Thank heavens for the double-decker stroller, is all I can say. Sixteen books we got here, ranging from Crocodiles and Alligators to Alligators and Crocodiles, plus gems on the sun, mud, sea otters, Passover, Chinese fables and fairy tales, the history of salt, birds, and my personal favorite title, Shh! We’re Writing the Constitution!

Meanwhile, little brother plots and plans.