Monthly Archives: May 2018

Thanks for checking this space! Between wife’s birthday and our anniversary and the series finale of The Americans and my ongoing book deadlines, this entry got away from me. More next week! – Daniel

On Sunday, I had a moment of revelation. To set this up, know ye that Monterey has a major recreational space called Dennis the Menace Playground. Check it out online! It’s as awesome as it looks. When wife and kids and I sojourn to Monterey, we gravitate to this playground, because Dar’s brother loves it. Dar, meh. He can take it or leave it. He prefers water. Lots of flowing water. The family had some free time in Monterey on […]

This week is the first week that one of my kids fell in love with Sylvester and Tweety cartoons. I was never a huge fan of that cat and bird; previously, we had been sticking to Bugs Bunny. But now that Dar’s brother loves Sylvester and Tweety as much as Bugs, I suppose I can be proud that I have passed on the fandom of (generalized) classic Warner Bros. cartoons to the next generation. That, or maybe, since Dar’s brother […]

“I’m Not Black, I’m Kanye”, about Kanye West “lending his imprimatur…to the racist rhetoric of the conservative movement,” is yet another tour-de-force essay by America’s premier public intellectual. I deeply appreciate how Ta-Nehisi Coates offers so much more than he really needs to, how he opens windows and doors that shine profound light on seemingly ancillary subjects. In this case, those subjects include the pre-internet era of having to see something to believe it and Coates’ current, oddly alienating stardom that […]

Dar’s aide at school is required to write in a journal so that we have a sense of his daily activities, what he’s doing, how close he’s coming to meeting the requirements of his IEP. We truly worry about the hitting, but the school doesn’t. Here’s May so far, as of today:   5/1 8:10 Morning snack 8:35 Bathroom Break 8:45 Reading 9:00 Identifying letters and numbers 9:15 Sitting on carpet with peers 9:40 Recess on play around bouncing ball […]

“There’s something about that class.” The teachers, aides, and parents have all confided this to me, during moments when the kids can’t hear us. The first time I heard it, I got confused. I asked, “You mean there’s something about that teacher’s classroom?” “No,” the sympathetic adult said. “There’s something about second grade.” “Oh, you mean when kids get to this age, they act up?” “No,” the still-sympathetic adult replied. “There’s something about that group of second-graders, in all three […]