Category: Family

All things family related go here (so pretty much everything).

On the First Day of Christmas My Family Gave to Me….

A bunch of games!  Actually everyone got one game.  You see in our house instead of getting all of our presents on Christmas day we get one present a day for the twelve days of Christmas.  Mom and Dad handle the gift giving for most of the days of Christmas, but the groups of the children have taken it upon themselves to give the gifts for one day each (that way the parents still get to be surprised). Anne and Nathaniel like to do the first day of Christmas (they are historically impatient), so yesterday they gave us our gifts.

From left to right (and youngest to oldest), Veronica got Mousetrap (one of my old favorites).  Robert got a Lord of the Rings card game and Christopher got the same game so that four people can play together (in a large family you want very few two player games).  Anne broke the theme a little, Nathaniel gave her a kit for crocheting Marvel superheros.  Anne gave Nathaniel a display case for his bug collection (now he can stop keeping it in a shoe box in our bathroom).  This gift was also a little off theme, but Jonathan got us back on track with a monster based dice/card/board game, King of Tokyo.  I got a very cool superhero card game Sentinels of the Multiverse. Nicholas got the classic game Battleship.  Mom broke theme again, she got eight wash clothes hand knitted by Anne (now you know why Anne got a crochet  kit, she’s very crafty with string and yarn).  Mom also got  a cardboard house to match her cardboard Christmas village.

Finally Dad got Five Crowns a five suit card game.

Pretty cool, huh? I love it when a good theme comes together!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! I know I did not put up many posts about Christmas, and I would have, but we were really busy, and besides we did not even start decorating till yesterday. Maybe I will write a post about the decorations or our gifts later, but right now we haven’t even opened our gifts yet. Till then I hope you all have a wonderful time at your parties or at home. Merry Christmas!

I Came Here to see a Man Beat on Gorrilas

Not whatever that was.

The other night we watched the new Tarzan movie.  This was a sad mistake.  Not only was the movie quite anti-Catholic (which is truly annoying in this era of so called inclusion. Apparently we are to be accepting of anything today, except for religion), but also the movie was a total travesty in it’s portrayal of Tarzan.

I greatly enjoyed the original Tarzan books by Edgar Burrows, and I could have lived with the serious dubbing down of the ape mans superhuman powers (I mean what kind of Tarzan can’t beat Akut?), but the total alteration of his character is unforgivable.  Tarzan was not the sad Englishman who reviled his former way of life and reluctantly embraced his past as he was portrayed in the movie.  Rather, he was a proud, but noble man who took great joy in life.  He was a man of honor, even as a wild man.

He loved his home and his wild ways and did the much greater feat of giving up what was most dear to him to please his wife.  Indeed he would not even have worn more than a loin clothe, but to please Jane.  Not that Tarzan ever enjoyed killing other men, rather he always knew it was unnatural and avoided it as much as possible.

Tarzan was also not a naturalist as he is always portrayed in modern media.  He liked animals, but he understood he was above them and had no problem killing them, even killing them for sport.  The animals followed him if not because they liked him, because they knew he was far more powerful than them.  The Tarzan in the book was greatly different than the one portrayed in the movie and this is greatly disappointing.

Also why was Nicholas Rokoff not his villain?

Suffice it to say, I was not impressed.

Nativity Scene

This is one of my favorite Christmas decorations.

Looks pretty keen huh? We got this nativity scene a couple of years ago when a man came to our parish to raise money to help people in the Holy Lands. He gave a really great speech and besides a few other things we got this nativity set. It is made of olive wood and looks really nifty. In fact Mom likes it so much, we leave it up all year.

Peppermint and sweater vests

So have you ever sat back and wondered what do sweater vests and peppermints have in common? Probably not but I have and so I will now tell you all about there similarities. This is a post I’ve been meaning to write for a while. First, similarity is you generally only see peppermints and sweater vests around Christmastime. Second, both peppermints and sweater vests are generally colorful. Most importantly, both peppermints and sweater vests make me happier. I am easily 15% happier when wearing a sweater vest or when eating peppermint. If I combine the two and eat a peppermint and wear a sweater vest I will be at least 30% happier.

The Tale of Two Birthdays

Back when I was very young (very, very young) the doctors gave my Mother the due date for her next child.  Though Mom had already had two children who completely missed their due dates (one was late, the next early), Mom felt that this was the day her next son would be born.

Sure enough I arrived right on time.  I was born several years ago on December 19th, but that’s not the cool part.  The cool part is that my father was born even more years ago on December 19th.

That’s right I was born on my due date on my father’s birthday.

I’ve been punctual ever since.

 

Extra! Extra! Read all About it!

Longbow presents The Fabulous Wenning Sisters with the debut of the hit song “Poly Platypus’

Believe it or not there’s actually a very interesting story behind this song.  The Polytechnic Platypus was originally an idea by my good friend Ben “Banjo” Grewal.  He conceived of the giant, purple, bipedal platypus as a mascot idea for Florida Polytechnic, the university we were both attending.  I asked Ben if I could feature the platypus in a H.A.T.S. comic, he agreed and thus a parody was born.

The song is a parody of “Johnny Angel” as performed by Shelley Fabares on the Donna Reed show.  It was performed in Ohio by my cousins Laura, Julie, and Sarah (also known as The Fabulous Wenning Sisters). The video also feature the superb acting talents of my Aunt Ann Garmann, her son Grant and my Mother.  Clips from the original show were used in the video to tie the two together.

I hope you enjoyed the song please comment on the YouTube video and let my cousins know what you thought!

 

I Know I had Them Yesterday

Today Nicholas and Jonathan got up before me because Jonathan needed to attend a math test and he needed Nicholas to take him.  When I got up I showered and got dressed, but when I went to put my shoes on I couldn’t find them.  Ten minutes later they were still lost.  You guessed it, Jonathan was wearing them.  So I put on his shoes.

I ascertained later that Jonathan had put my shoes on by mistake, but I wouldn’t have blamed him if you had stolen them intentionally, his shoes are painful!  So yes, I can last a day in my brother’s shoes.  They’re just too tight.