As a kid, I always was amazed that Christmas was only one day. It seemed like there was so much to do, so much fun to have, such great stuff to explore, that it really should have been three or four days long. Thanksgiving, in contrast, is a four day long event in my family.

This year, Thanksgiving started in the traditional way, on Thursday, at my aunt’s house. This was the gathering of my mother’s near-by family and we did much of the typical stuff–spent time with family, ate great food (contributed by everyone), and marveled at the first snow of the year, and played with army men. When we got home, we relaxed with a bit of TV (Mythbusters, of course).

Friday was spent doing various things with relatively little stress. First up, we got to see one of Emily’s friends playing ice hockey. I, of course, used this as a photographic opportunity. Emily’s friend was playing defense the whole time, so I didn’t get any good shots of him on the puck.This one, however is about the best I could do a) shooting through plexiglass, b) with crappy stadium lighting.

After we got home from the hockey game, we ate lunch, then the kids continued a recent fascination of theirs: knocking army men off of blocks using Playmobil canons!

They’ve spent hours together playing like this over the last couple of days, and it has to be one of the most heart-warming experiences a parent can have: kids playing together incredibly well.

We also cleaned up the house a bit in preparation for the only Thanksgiving meal that we’re hosting this year. After the house was pretty well prepared, we diverted into jamming to the tunes of DJ Rick spinning the MP3s on the whole-house stereo. Special request from Nathan: Black Sabbath Crazy Train; from Emily: Guns ‘N Roses Welcome to the Jungle. Some day we’ll probably be astonished we let them listen to this kind of music, but for now it was great fun to have watched them jamming to a mix of classic rock and modern pop.

Finally, we departed for an OSU Women’s Volleyball game. OSU played Michigan, and swept them 3-0. All three games were tight and very exciting.

We spent much of Saturday in relaxed preparation for my father and his wife to come over for dinner. We even pulled out Anne’s Grandmother’s china for the first time in our kids’ memories.

We were pretty laid back about getting the pork roast in the oven. My dad and his wife were to arrive at 4PM and we figured the roast would be done between 4:30 and 5PM. Unfortunately, it turned out to be closer to 5:30PM, and my dad’s wife had to leave to go work on the suicide hotline. Its incredibly meaningful work, I just wish we’d known that earlier than “Dinner’s on the table!”–”Oh, I’ve gotta go.” But quite honestly, that was the WHOLE DRAMA for the entire 4 day weekend. At least I remembered to get a shot of the kids with grandpa before he left.

Anne and I got up late on Sunday, and prepared our dish for our final Thanksgiving meal. We were tasked with making salad. Not content with dumping a salad out of a bag, Anne glazed some pecans to go with the spinach, red leaf, red onion, feta, and dried cranberries.

I enjoy salads, but I don’t normally rave about them. This one was fabulous, yummy, and perfect.

We descended upon Anne’s dad’s house to feast upon roast beast with a bunch of her step-siblings and their assorted “others”. Again, this event was relatively low-key, especially for us. I think Anne’s step-mother spent way too much time cleaning the grout (as she is wont to do) and every other nook-and-cranny-that-no-one-will-notice. But she would probably do that in preparation for a camp-out.

The evening, and our Thanksgiving weekend in general, ended in a rubber band fight–all the kids against uncle Lance.

So, back to my original point: Thanksgiving is better than Christmas precisely because there is none of that gift-giving stress. And for religious significance (and I ain’t religious), Jesus really wanted his disciples and followers to break bread and have meals together. I’m pretty sure he didn’t say anything about stocking suffers, gift exchanges, or putting yourself in debt to prove how generous you are. Thanksgiving has become the holiday that Christmas should be.

Would you want to coach again with an assistant? :):):):):) I may need one more….are you in? PLEASE

She followed this up with a phone call and another plea to the three most likely dads on the team:

The 3 of you have had lots of experience with YMCA Soccer!  I have total faith in you to help out with the 7-9 team that needs a coach!   I have placed [your kids] on the same team so you 3 could help each other with covering games and practices.

My “lots of experience” consists of watching my kids’ games for a couple of years, and assistant coaching my son’s team this past spring. I’ve never played soccer. I was a bit skeptical that I was a good choice for the job, but I didn’t want there to  be three co-coaches. Without a clear leader, I was afraid that would lead to confusing practices, and potential conflicts of leadership style (or lack thereof). So I replied “I’ll take the lead role.” And with those 5 words began my first ever experience as a coach of a sports team.

Fortunately, the YMCA sports program is low competition. That means I was coaching for participation and could spend time working on basic skills rather than trying to figure out how to win games. I checked out a couple of books from the library, and read through the material provided by the YMCA, and formulated a plan for my first practice. I used much the same plan for every practice:

• warm up and stretching
• low stress ball handling practice (dribbling with various goals)
• speed and physical mobility (short sprints, stops, turns)
• medium stress ball handling (one-to-one team work, one-vs-one handling, “knock-out”)
• scrimmage, forcing everyone to play every position

When I coached the games, I had a clip board with a grid of the kids names on rows, and four columns to write their positions for each quarter. I had witnessed as a parent other parents questioning coaches as to how much their kids played, and whether or not they got their fair share of time. So I wanted to be sure I was as fair as possible, and in the first couple of games, I tried to rotate the kids through a variety of positions so that they could all get a feel for them. In the later games, I tried as much as possible to honor the kids’ requests for their position of choice.

I was really fortunate in the kids that were on my team. Of the 11 kids, I had one fantastic player, 8 reasonably strong players, and only 2 “Space Cadets”–the term one of my friends uses for the kids who just don’t seem to get it. I was typically able to keep the Space Cadets separated, and paired with a stronger player to help compensate.

My assistant coaches were decent guys and were generally helpful during practices and games. One of them, Kent, had a habit of constantly yelling instructions at the kids during the game. “Get on that ball. Go! Go! Go! We’re going that way guys! Get down there. Go! Go! Go! Pass it to the center! Pass it to the center! Get up the field!” all in the space of about 10 seconds. It was incredibly tiresome, and drowned me out on a number of occasions. Rather than tell him to tone it down, I just let it go, and instructed the kids as much as possible during play stoppage.

Kent also had a habit of getting onto the field by a step or two. Normally I didn’t worry much about it especially when play was not close to us. But one time he was about three steps into the field, and play had come pretty close to us. I was afraid the referee was going to reprimand him so I said to Kent “You may want to step off the field.” His response? “You should read the rules. We’re allowed to have one coach on the field.” I corrected him: “I have read the rules, and that applies to the younger groups, not this age group.” He stepped off the field. The next game when he found himself accidentally on the field, he quickly stepped off.

In the end, it was a positive experience. The kids were a lot of fun, and the parents were generally communicative when their kids weren’t going to be at a game or practice. At the end-of-season “banquet” a number of them thanked me for my efforts. I’m glad did it.

Oh, and by the way, our record (“We don’t keep track at the Y”) was 6-0.

First, dinner and homework, with the flash behind the umbrella, camera right.

Second, Nathan holding the new flash, triggering in optical slave mode-the built-in flash fired, causing the flash he was holding to fire.

Next is a still life with flash behind the umbrella, camera left, medium height.

By the way, I’ve intentionally not cropped any of the back ground material out of the still life shots so that I can see the effects shutter (none) and aperture (smaller = darker background) have.

Now the still life without the umbrella.

Next I put the light up high, around 7 feet, no umbrella, and pulled the zoom out all the way (85mm)

And for comparison, flash at wide angle (28mm).

Finally, just to see what it would look like, flash high but toward the back left.

It was trigger with the built-in flash, manually set to 1/32 power.

I didn’t make anything particularly great. These are just some experiments with the off camera flash angles to help me understand the impact.

So I looked forward to visiting the India Festival, but didn’t really know what to expect. As we pulled into the parking lot and didn’t see another Caucasian, I knew we were in the right place.

We stepped inside and were immediately hit with the smell of curry and garlic. We wandered the aisles looking at the vendors’ wares.

The vendors could largely be lumped into four broad categories: food, clothing, Indian DVDs & CDs, and mystics/spiritualists. One of the clothing vendors was tickled by Emily’s curiosity in the saris and helped her try one on.

The aisles were frequently packed such that it was difficult to move through without being bumped. It felt a lot like a bazaar, at least to my limited experience.

However, we spent the majority of our time sampling the food. We tried dishes from four different restaurants (Udipi Cafe, Bayleaf India Bistro, Taste of India, and a vendor from Virginia), most of which I don’t even know the name of. The food from Bayleaf and Taste of India was excellent. One of the dishes we got from Udipi would have been better had it been fresh and hot.

I especially appreciated Bayleaf’s $3 sampler plates. They were reasonably sized and perfect for sharing a variety of interesting dishes.

The best part was that the kids tried everything! And then came back for more.

Years ago, Anne and I ran into some acquaintances at a local Japanese restaurant and we were jealous that their daughter was with them. At that time in our lives, our kids were picky eaters at home with grandma, and we didn’t realize just how soon that would change. Today our kids ate a lot of dishes that were entirely foreign (in nationality) but not so foreign to their experience.

We sat in on a few performances in the auditorium. One was a really adorable childrens’ song expressing unity although we have different names and faces. When the final girl, face painted orange, white, and green sang “I am Bindia and I come from India”, the crowd roared.

As we went home, Anne and I agreed that it was fun and interesting, but perhaps not worth the $6 per person it would have cost us if it were not for the free tickets. The India Festival was geared toward the Indian population of our city, as a celebration of their culture by them, not so much as outreach or education of the non-Indian residents. So although it was interesting, I don’t think it was worth $29 (tickets plus parking) to us to have a bunch of Indian restaurants in one location.

For those not familiar with Cub Scouts, boys are members of Packs which are then broken into Dens by grade level. The pack we joined has had 20 or fewer scouts the whole time we’ve been there. Nathan’s den for the last two years has averaged 4-5 boys.

Toward the end of last year, it became clear that I was the most likely parent or leader to take the reigns for the pack as the Cubmaster. The other parents were either clearly personally uncomfortable with the idea of leading the pack, or in one case completely over committed with other Scouting activities.

So early last spring I told Dan, the previous Cubmaster, that I was willing to take the role, if he would help me transition into it during the end of the school/program year. He agreed, but honestly wasn’t organized enough to do much transitioning. He didn’t think far enough in advance to say to himself, “Hmm, I’ll bet Rick would like to learn how to do this. I’ll call him.” No, Dan flies by the seat of his pants 90% of the time, and as a result, I got little in the way of preparation for my role.

At our final pack meeting of the school year last June, Dan announced to the pack that he was stepping down (his son had left the pack in March to join a Boy Scout troop), and that I would take over as Cubmaster. I was tickled by the warm applause. Anne later told me that someone leaned in to her after Dan’s announcement and said “Oh good!”

I procrastinated most of the summer, choosing to fill it with vacations galore and other cool stuff. As the school year approached, I tried to touch base with Dan to go over final transition tasks. He told me he wanted to continue to help out as the assistant Cubmaster for a few more months. Was he crazy? Very likely, yes. Did I appreciate the help? Hell Yes!

When I was at a training class to learn how to recruit at elementary schools, a leader from a pack that meets 0.5 miles from us asked me if I would be recruiting at a school that was moving into the neighborhood. Well crap, I thought to myself. My kids go to that school! Why didn’t I think of that? After comparing sizes of packs (mine around 15, his at 50+) he agreed that I could recruit at the school, and he would leave it alone.

A few days later, I spoke to the principle, reminding her that I had kids there, and asked about various recruiting possibilities: talking to kids during the day, sending fliers home with the kids, and putting a yard sign in front of the school. To my astonishment, she said yes to all of them.

The principle suggested that I talk to the kids during the lunch hours rather than in classrooms since I would be less likely to miss a class due to their crazy schedules. At three different lunch periods, I waited until all the kids were seated and eating, then a teacher introduced me to the quieted cafeteria. I told the kids who I was and why I was there. When I told them about upcoming events like “shooting BB guns” I had them hooked. It was hard to get to “camping at the Crew Stadium” and “Halloween camping” without quieting the excited talking. When I was done with my spiel at one lunch, a woman teacher said “I’ve got just one question. Why can’t girls join!?!” to which many of the girls in the room loudly agreed “Yeah!”.

The flier that went home had an informational meeting listed for the next Wednesday. In previous years we’d gotten maybe 5 new scouts. I figured materials and information packs for 15 would leave me with extra for stragglers who would show up later. I arranged about 20 chairs in a circle, and had to add to it twice as people kept streaming in. I handed out all 15 information packs and had 4 or 5 parents who were left with only a promise that I would e-mail it to them (which I did, of course). I got 16 new scout applications that night, officially doubling the size of the pack. At the end of the night, after dealing with the money and paperwork, Dan looked at me with a broad smile and said “Well done, sir.”

That was a week ago. This week, the phone calls and e-mails continued to stream in from interested parents. “I’m sorry we missed last week. My son is really interested” several exclaimed. “Is it too late to join?” I reassured them it was not too late. We’d love to have them. As my spreadsheet of scouts passed 35, 36, 37, I got nervous about what little planning I’d done so far, and how little I’d involved the other parent leaders.  We met on Sunday to plan for the coming Wednesday (today), and a few weeks out. There was nervous excitement about the new size of the pack–the kind of giddiness that comes from anticipating something new yet familiar.

Today we had everyone together in the same room for the first time–new and returning scouts. The returning scouts had been off in their own den meetings the previous week while Dan and I wooed new parents. Many of the returning parents were a bit stunned to see the crowd of new faces jammed into our smallish meeting room. We had 39 boys show up tonight. And some familiar faces were absent. We might be 42-44 strong before next week. Even if we lose some down to 35, that is still a very comfortably sized Pack. I don’t feel like we’re just barely clinging to the cliff-edge of existence.

To give you an idea just how badly I’d underestimated the size and enthusiasm of the new pack (it really does feel like a New pack), I created a sign-up sheet for the bb-gun activity with 12 lines on it. The form is overflowing with 21 families committed, totaling 42 participants (non-scout siblings are allowed).

In the previous years, especially the Tiger and Wolf years, I struggled with my role as den leader. I really didn’t feel like I was organized enough, was enthusiastic enough, or that I had enough help from parents. I lacked confidence in my ability to lead the dens. Today, with the help of 5 other parent/leaders, we had a great meeting to kick off a fun year.  I’m actually looking forward to it.

The best part? We were there for about six hours, and between the four of us, we took about 400 pictures (over 700MB!). I’m looking forward to making a couple of mosaics of subjects that we all shot.

OK, actually, that isn’t the best part. The best part is that we had a great time, and the kids were fabulous. And it started in the parking lot on the way to the front gate. There were two overweight women walking in front of us with their kids in tow. Both women had seriously over-tight pants (“Do these pants make me look desperate?”) with dunlop’s disease, and in quick succession, both bent over to tend to their kids, revealing ample crack. I quickly suggested that we move to the other side of the walk-way. After we were out of ear-shot, my son exclaimed “Oh My God, I saw her butt” in the most disgusted tone he could muster. I laughed, and explained that was why we moved. We spent much of the rest of the day marveling at the supreme wonderfulness of our kids.

• New Books on CD
• New DVDs
• New Kids DVDs
• New Rock CDs
• New Teen Graphic Novels

The possibilities are just about endless.

The library’s explanation is good for reasonably narrow searches, but here’s one point that they don’t make: on the advanced search page, you can change the format to, for example, DVD, and then search with no other qualifier. The result page has lots of category selections on the right to help you narrow down to a favorite genre or time period. Or, in the example below, I’ve left it wide open. Then click the RSS feeds button in the upper right of the results section to get your custom-built RSS feed. Very nice.

Today was our third Pinewood Derby. In the previous two derbies, we’d done well. I say “we” because it is intended as a parent-son activity. It is intended that the parents will help the scout with some of the more difficult bits of designing, shaping, and finishing their car. So, although we try to call it the scouts car, it is really the product of the parent’s and scout’s work.

As such, I felt a reasonable amount of pride that Nathan’s our car has made it to the finals the last two years. I figured I’d come across a reasonably successful formula of preparation techniques to produce a good car, and that over the years I’d perfect those techniques to help Nathan win some time. We spent a fair bit of time working on his our car.

Today was the test of those techniques. In the “standard” race, in which only the scouts participate, our car came in second-to-last in the final point standing. I think the only races that our car wasn’t 4th (of 4) was when another car jumped the track. More often than not, it wasn’t even close. Nathan was visibly upset but maintained his composure very well.

After the scouts’ race was finished, I looked at his car and made some adjustments that I thought would help. For example, the spray-paint finish seemed to be a bit tacky, so I put some tape on the body to protect the wheels from rubbing on the paint. I also adjusted the axels a bit and added some more lubrication. I also added a car of my own to the race: a completely unfinished pinewood derby kit. Its a block of wood with four wheels. It was called “Blockhead”. I really wanted to see just how much difference all the work made on a car.

Unfortunately, the blockhead car beat the car we’d spent ours designing and finishing. Out of 14 racers, the blockhead car came in 10th. Our “highly tuned” car came in 13th. Clearly something was wrong with the car. I still can’t tell what.

So, in one respect, we utterly failed to make a decent pinewood derby car.

But in the part that matters, it was a total Win. I was very proud of the way Nathan behaved. He was disappointed, but he didn’t throw a temper tantrum. He didn’t cry; he didn’t stomp out of the race; he didn’t blame me or himself. He was puzzled at the results (as I am) but he didn’t beat himself up about it. He was a great kid that demonstrated wonderfully one of the other lessons of the pinewood derby: not everyone is a winner. He managed one of the best smiles I’ve ever seen after two defeats.

“Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.” –Ben Franklin

I can’t believe I’ve missed it all this time. The best part? I’m going to “church” tomorrow night to have more beer! And I’ll be happy about it! Boom! There’s the proof. Beer! There must be beer volcanoes in Heaven!

Incidentally, the Weizenbock pictured above is amazing. It is the 2007 Best In Show for the Chicago Regionals in the American Homebrew Contest.

Last year, Nathan’s friend Dante won the regatta with a new (to our pack) boat design. His father had helped him turn the standard sailboat shape into a catamaran. Dante won easily last year because the catamaran solved all the weaknesses of the standard design: it was more stable, it tracked straighter, and it wasn’t top heavy.

I liked the design so much, this year I went searching for plans, and found one I liked. It wasn’t hard to build. Nathan did a majority of the cutting and sanding. I glued the pieces together, and he put on all the paint. The only deviation from the design is that I had to use the mast. Our pack didn’t like that Dante’s sail was attached directly to the boat, and so they made a rule that the sail cannot be attached directly to the hull of the boat. So we cut the mast in half, and made it double masted for more stability.

This year, Nathan won every heat, and beat Dante (with a new catamaran) in the finals. Fortunately they were both absolutely ecstatic to finish 1-2.