They grow up so fast. A precocious youngster, Driscoll is already showing signs of being the playa, or, dare I say, lothario, that his father was.
Exhibit A: Moves. These are essential. When approaching a hottie at the bar, you’re never gonna get the time of day right away, even if you bring her a Red Bull and Goldschlager THAT YOU PAID FOR. Why? Who knows. Women. But that’s when you’ve got to bust a move and BLOW HER MIND.
Exhibit B: Relentlessness. Sticktoitiveness. No means Hells-to-the-Yeah. Positive attitude! She wants you! They all do!
This time of year, lots of American kids are probably getting into a sport that has heretofore been much more popular in Spanish-speaking countries than in our own. So the fact that Driscoll is doing so is not a surprise. The surprise is that it’s bullfighting.
But make no mistake, his passion is as fiery as that of any Madrileño. Here he explains the process:
And here he demonstrates (albeit with a pretty lame (castrated?) bull, who just woke up):
And, okay, yeah, he’s got some World Cup fever as well…
“Time is of the essence.” Does that mean anything to you? Here at SD we’re confounded by it, it just doesn’t really say anything. Which may explain why this post about the Christmas holidays comes 1/12th of the way to the next Christmas.
Now, if all you know about us is what you read on this blog, you probably think that we share a house with my parents, and sister, and sister’s family. We don’t, but to continue that facade we packed up the family and flew down to Houston for the holidays, making December something like the 5th consecutive month in which we saw them. Despite the fact that they live 1/2 of the country away. Kinda creepy, really. We do have other friends.
Visiting Houston in winter is fun, because the weather there tends to be spring-y, while the weather here is often at its nadir. Plus, spending the holidays without family kinda feels weird and empty to me, though I’ll likely have to get used to it as holiday travel grows more complicated in the coming years. But that’s a worry for another year. On to Houston!
Want a taste of what the big day was like at the Strong household? Does it get any more fun than this? You get a good look at some of our presents as well. Kirsten made the broomstick ponies that Driscoll is modeling, and we had the “pie!” t-shirts screen printed in honor of Linney Pie. Oh, and our new camera definitely does something weird to my voice. There’s no way I sound like that big of a dork in real life.
The newspapers say the economy is in a freefall, shedding jobs like so much jetsam. Well, here at SDWHQ, you’d never know it. If you look at our annual report, employment here has spiked in the last fiscal year. Salaries and benefits have kept up with inflation, and readership has seen a dramatic increase. Yes, the Strealey Dealie is riding high, zigging while the market zags.
Well, as a result, SDWHQ is moving! This all started innocently enough. We weren’t on the market for a new place, but had been thinking that maybe in another year or so we’d start looking around. Yet, there I was out for a run in the dreamy Laurelhurst neighborhood, and noticed a sign in the yard of a handsome house. Intrigued, I looked it up online and found that, jeez, it looked pretty nice, and was fairly reasonably priced. So I gathered up SD staff and suggested we go have a look. This was met with a shrug. Once we took a look around, however, well, we kinda had to have it. I think Kirsten cried. Oh, we did our due diligence and went and saw the handful of comparable houses on the market, but in our minds they didn’t really compare. A week and a half later we had an offer accepted. Easily the most expensive run I’ve ever taken.
Here are the pics from the MLS listing. It’ll undoubtedly be uglier when you see it, since the sellers (a couple of artsy types in town working on Coraline) had nicer stuff than we do. But no matter what ratty crap we put in there, it’ll still have tons of natural light. Hooray!
I’d be remiss if I didn’t share our little maestro, helping himself to the sellers’ piano during the inspection. I don’t know how to tell him it’s not staying.
They say every man must face his own personal demons, the skeletons in his closet. I find this unpleasant, as my skeletons are most likely osteoporific (patent pending) and in need of marrow transplants, or at least milk. And who am I to “out” my skeletons? They can stay in the closet if they so desire. I have decided instead to face the closeted skeletons of my friend John Robertson. See, John and I were in SPIRAL together in 7th grade (SPIRAL, incidentally, stands for SPring branch IRAL). This was a program supposedly for talented and creative kids, though I have here provided evidence that they should revisit their vetting process. Most of the smart kids with any awareness of social strata dropped out of the program, but John and I had bigger ideas than simply salvaging any claim to coolness. See, in this class were the heartthrobs of SBJH, the Alford twins, and we saw overwhelming humor as our tickets to their hearts.
With this in mind, we undertook “The Alamo”. We showed ourselves to be not only hilarious, but cultured, delicately juxtaposing Rocky III with Tears for Fears, the Terminator with Hunter. This was to be our Opus, the first step towards a lavish Hollywood lifestyle with the Alfords. Well, curiously, we got a B on the project, and never got a date with the twins (or much of anyone else). But at least we got this video out of the deal.
I should probably mention here that I don’t actually appear in the video. My voice does, and the camera work and editing were all yours truly, but John was our on-screen presence. So, for those of you with 10 minutes to throw away, enjoy…
Hello readers! After that 3-post explosion, it was time for a much-needed vacation here at SDWHQ. Blogging, as you know, is hard work.
Today we’re going to take a look at the little guy during mealtime. He is not what you might call a world champion eater. He wouldn’t even make all-district. And when he does eat, he eats weird. Avocado on a Cheerio? I’m pretty creative with my cereal concoctions, but that was a step beyond anything I’ve tried. Fortunately, he tends to enjoy himself.
The early days (as a cannibal)
Trying out spoons
Would you like some of the avocado on my face?
Christmas is kinda freaky
Who needs to eat, it's party time!
The video below shows just how much fun meals can be, if you have the right attitude, and the right amount of food on your chin. Careful! Any imbalance in your attitude or chin food volume can keep you from reaching ultimate bliss, demonstrated here by the little fella.
