Let's play a game

Here are a bunch of pictures. After looking at them all, complete the following phrase:

America: Land of the Free, Home of the _______________.










Yes, all of these pictures were taken in the U. S. of A.

Come on lurkers.....you know you want to play!

Happy Black Friday

Now that the Thanksgiving victual gorging is over, we can celebrate the beginning of another form of over-consuming.

Apparently I need to engage in this to prepare for the upcoming holiday:

Or this:






Don't get me wrong. I like to shop. I like to get gifts. I like to give gifts. I just get scared and sad when I think about people literally getting trampled for the sake of stuff.

So after I dug out of the avalanche of sale ads in the yesterday's newspaper, I found a few things on-line to help me stay focused and try to simplify:




this book or this book

and this book




And as usual, Mothering Magazine has this article
that speaks to kids and consumerism.

Have a good Friday.

Model Citizen

The holiday catalog deluge has begun. In the mail yesterday we got one for toys, one that I like better than others because of it's offering of toys that require more child imagination and less noise and blinking lights. Brennan grabbed it up right away and began going through the pages with LOTS of excitement......"I want that. I want THAT! Can I have that? I want that." I listened and mumbled indulgent responses for a while and then became more and more uncomfortable. When he said "We can go to the store and get that right now" I'd had enough. I said, "Sweetheart, these are toys that you could get for Christmas. We don't go to the store every day to get toys." He said, without blinking an eye and in all seriousness, "Yes we do."

Yikes.

Priviledged

Here's what I saw on my run today:

• a big pile of what looked like dryer lint
• a can of Cheez Whiz (I didn't stop to see if it was empty or not)
• a wadded, mud-encrusted blue and white dish towel
• a flattened PB&J sandwich with one bite out of the corner. Granted, it was made with that flavor-less, texture-less white bread.....I probably would have thrown it away too (or composted it)
• one blue tube sock covered with grass
• numerous piles of dog poo and fast food bags
• lots and Lots and LOTS of the typical trash (cigarette butts, beer bottles, plastic wrapping, the ubiquitous Wal-Mart shopping bag, etc.)
  

Only in a wealthy nation can people afford to throw away this kind of stuff. Maybe it's time to bring back this commercial

The Media Machine strikes again!

Evey night before Brennan gets in bed, George and I have to make sure that he has all of his "stuff." The "stuff" getting the honor of going to bed with Brennan changes from day-to-day, but there is always a core group of items that are essential. Below is the line-up from last night:

Any guesses on which movie is currently influencing this child? Maybe the shot below will give a few more hints.....


While Brennan was brushing his teeth he moved his inner circle of favorites right next to him. There's big Lightming Aqueen, little Lightming Aqueen, and Chic Hicks, who Brennan calls "Cachigga." This doesn't surprise me that much because most little kids have their favorite things that they drag everywhere with them -- Brennan just has a large sack full.

What really gets me is that this kid, who LOVES to be naked, if allowed would go anywhere and everywhere naked, and has refused pjs since he could throw a tantrum when we tried to put them on him, now wants to wear pjs to bed AND clothes during the day.....as long as it's a Lightming Aqueen shirt. We finally broke down and bought two sets of Cars pjs so that we could wash his Cars shirt at night.

Way to go, Pixar!

You'd think with our giant Cerebrums we'd learn faster

"And Man created the
plastic bag
and the tin
and aluminum can
and the cellophane wrapper
and the paper plate
and the disposable bottle,
and this was good
because Man could then take his
automobile
and buy his food all in one place
and he could save that which was good to eat in the
refrigerator
and throw away that which had no further use.
And pretty soon the earth was covered with
plastic bags
and aluminum cans
and paper plates and
disposable bottles,
and there was nowhere left
to sit down
or to walk.
And Man shook his head
and cried,
'Look at all this God-awful litter.'"

--Art Buchwald, 1970

Heard on NPR this morning......

It's a sad, sad country we live in when too-lazy people can sit in front of their computer and hunt. Don't believe me? Check out this commentary by Frank Deford.