A Bionicle Tale

My 8-year-old son Ian is destined for a career in writing. Behold his latest work. My only input was on some capitalization. Everything else is his, including drop-capital and word emphasis. I might add that this is a work in progress, and he's greedy for any spare lap-top time to work on it.

For the uninitiated, Bionicles are fantasy creatures from the Lego Universe, complete with online games, comics, books and an extensive back-story to drive sales.

uparu activated his laser drill. A red laser shot from the weapon,  and he slammed the drill into the bumpy rock face in front of him. Two drops of sweat the size of small pebbles fell off a spike on his mask and hit the cavern floor with a splash.The drill turned around and around at terrific speed. Oh, why Jaller, why do you have to make us miss literally hours of sleep, Nuparu thought, all  because of some shrimpy little Matoran’s coaxing, he added to his thoughts. Jaller had been coaxed by a group of native Matoran that had reported freaky invaders trying to convince the Voya Nui Matoran that they were  “Toa”. So far they were successful; but when it came to Garan and his team, Balta, Velika, Dalu, Piruk , and Kazi it  went over the edge of a cliff; not long after the canisters washed up on the beach the team suspected that the “Toa”-a voice interrupted his thoughts: “hey what are ya doing?-hey ow!” “Those pebbles sting!” Nuparu’s drill was sending a barrage of pebbles flying everywhere. He turned and looked to see Hewki standing a few feet away with his hands on his hips. The drill-bearing Toa of earth looked Hewki straight in the eye and said coldly: “says the Toa who controls stone-which means also pebbles.” “wow!” said Hewki, embarrassed. “I can’t believe I never thought of that” “well”, said Nuparu, “would you mind sneaking me a hand here”? “not at all!” said Hewki, “you know I like the rocks, and this place is a cavern” “plus, if these new guys the ol’fire ball sent us after are meaner than we think, there will be two of us” “good point” said Nuparu, even as his laser drill made a huge chunk of rock the same black shade of his armor topple out of the boulder and smash on the floor. Hewki lifted his laser axe up over his shoulder, activated the laser, and brought down with a smash. Chunks of rock flew everywhere. A smallish hole had been formed in the rock from the brute force of the impact, the laser buzzing on and from the axe, and the fact that Nuparu had been working on it before. “Here’s where I take over” said Hewki. . . .

Expedition Pictures, and my website

When I was in High School, my family lived for a year in Cambridge England. As part of that experience, I attended a British boys' school (it's co-ed now), which sent a small expedition to the Arctic island of Spitzbergen. My parents offered me the opportunity, and I took it.

Recently I scanned the photos from that trip and uploaded them to Picasa. Then I made a web page to show them off.

Here's the link.

Please don't expect to find much on the rest of the site; there are tidbits, but not much. I don't do this professionally, and I'm busy with a lot of other things. But at least the expedition photos are all commented and in good order. I hope you enjoy them.

I hope that one day, I'm able to provide my own children with the same kind of incredible opportunities that my parents gave me.

BTW this post is cross listed at my other blog.

Man v. Raccoon

We had our second visit in two weeks from a raccoon last night (click here to see me in action after the first one). At 3:55 A.M. Hannah and I were jolted awake by a horrific squawking and loud commotion from the hen house. Without thinking, I grabbed my glasses and sprinted to the back yard in my boxers, grabbing a broomstick on the way. Floodlights revealed feathers flying everywhere and a grey and black raccoon dancing with my hens. Hannah was yelling at it from the window as I hurdled through the fence, broomstick first. I halted my progress briefly as I remembered a recent discussion on a urban poultry list about how a guy got bitten and scratched up pretty badly by a 'coon, but then I plunged ahead anyway and took a good whack at it. As it scaled the fence to get out, I hurled the stick at it.

Then it was all jitters and pounding heart as I corralled the thoroughly freaked-out hens back into their coop and checked them over for wounds. No problems this time, but the feather carnage was impressive. I think hens must shed their feathers to distract a predator, and I also think that they have learned to get my attention pretty effectively. Their collective commotion has gotten better over time (this is the fourth or fifth time I've been out for a midnight rescue.) I think I finally fell back asleep for a little while around 5:30.

I thought I had locked them up, but apparantly I forgot. The routine is so repetitive that sometimes it's easy to forget. Once again, I renew my resolve to always make sure they're locked up at night...

Behavior Academy

Today, for the second time in our house, we tried a behavior academy. We got some professional advice on how to increase the compliance of our children, and today we used it with dramatic results.

Yesterday, my dear wife reported trouble with the kids getting through their morning list, and there was general trouble all day long with obedience, right up through bedtime. Today, therefore, we had an academy. The goal was to do morning and night-time lists with no reminders and a good attitude. Lizey pretty much sailed through hers, and she managed to think it was actually kind of fun, but Ian was a different story.

At first he just couldn't believe he was actually required to get into pajamas, put clothes into the hamper, brush teeth, clean up eight things, and report back. There was moaning and wailing, death threats, angry stares, the whole nine yard. I gave him a 5/10 on obedience for the number of reminders I had to give, and 1/10 on attitude. At least he did not actually throw any punches or get physical with me. There was more disbelief and wounded shock when I told him then to start on his morning list, which includes putting away breakfast dishes (yes there were some out), brushing teeth (again), getting dressed, and doing a morning chore. Obedience level was about the same because I had to give a lot of reminders, and attitude improved to 2/10, with an important difference. He started to ask whether he was going to have to do it again, and that was the clincher. Hannah and I explained to him that until we had what we wanted for both obedience and attitude, he was going to have to keep going. Well, the second time through the night-time list was much better, an 8/10 and 5/10 for obedience and attitude. Then he finally got it all figured out, and turned himself around. The last repetition of the morning list scored a 9/10 and 8/10. And then he was free to go back to the computer game that I pulled him from to do the academy.

The great thing about this method, was that it allowed Hannah and me to keep our cool and not get personal. There was a tremendous turnaround in Ian's outlook. He was actually happy at the end of it, and while he did not enjoy the process, I think he feels a lot better afterward.

We finished off the session by explaining that if they enjoyed doing the academy, all they have to do is talk back, disobey, or get distracted in the middle of doing something we asked them to earn another one.

Future academies may include perfecting such tasks as getting dressed and putting away pajamas or the reverse, doing chores, getting into the car, coming in from the car and remembering to bring everything in with them.

Has anybody else tried anything like this? Post a response and share!