DadCentric

DadCentric's 2011 Last Minute Gift Guide For Dads

Let's cut to the chase: 'twas the night before The Night Before Christmas, and you totally borked on getting the dad(s) in your life a present. Not to worry: we got your back. Here's a few last minute gift ideas for you from us.

Jason: I love getting books for Christmas; getting someone a great book is about as thoughtful as you can get, IMHO. Here's a few suggestions.

• Susan Russo's The Encyclopedia of Sandwiches and Recipes Every Man Should Know. Susan Russo is a great food writer (check out her blog here), and these two books compliment each other well. Perfect for the foodie dad, or the wanna-be foodie dad, both are chock full of great recipes and helpful suggestions.

• Neal Pollack's Jewball. Our old friend Neal Pollack boldly decided to self-publish this novel; yes, we're helping a brotha out by promoting his book, but I'd do so regardless, because this tale of Jewish basketball players in the years leading up to World War II is a blast. 

• Brian K. Vaughan and Tony Harris' Ex Machina. This celebrated comic book series is available in trade paperback; I downloaded issue #1 for free over at Comixology and was hooked. The story of an average guy who becomes super-powered (in this case, given the ability to communicate with control any type of machinery with his mind) has been done before, but Vaughn puts a whole new twist on the genre when his protagonist becomes the mayor of New York.

TwoBusy: The single best thing I read this year: Alden Bell's The Reapers Are The Angels, a stunningly beautiful zombie novel. Yes, you read that correctly: beautiful. Think of it as Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets World War Z, filtered through the voice of Flannery O'Connor. The imagery, the lyricism, the characters... plus, y'know, zombies. I read several remarkable novels this year - including John Hart's The Last Childand Emma Donoghue's Room, which were both outstanding - but The Reapers completely blew my socks off. Absolutely worth seeking out. 

The single best thing I heard this year: the self-titled debut by Winged Victory for The Sullen, in a narrow win over the veryveryvery different The Big Roar by The Joy Formidable. Winged Victory is the kind of thing I simply don't have the musical vocabulary to adequately describe: it's a series of neo-classical collaborations between composer Dustin O'Halloran and Stars of the Lids' Adam Wiltzie that manage to be so wordlessly powerful and deeply emotional that it's almost impossible to listen to the album without feeling like the world around you has slowed and changed into the saddest, most haunting film you've ever seen. A truly gorgeous piece of work.

The Holmes: Does Dad love beer? Does he have a bit of the DIY spirit about him? Perhaps he'd like to try his hand at brewing up his own beer. Get him stared with The Complete Joy of Homebrewing. Or maybe Dad likes shiny things that go zoom through the air. RC helicopters are crazy-cheap these days. Or does Dad get bored sitting in a cube all day? Bring a little excitement to his workday with some weapons of siege warfare.

Kevin: Combine Dad's love of Star Wars and cocktails with the Han Solo in Carbonite Silicon Ice Tray. It's perfect for sucking back icy whiskeys while watching the 47th re-re-remastering of The Saga and bitching about how George Lucas has yet again played you for a sucker.

New Avengers Trailer

The Avengers movie doesn't come out until 2012, but much like the political process the hype is starting early. Unlike the political process, this looks promising:

Are you geeked?

Fun fact: When I was covering the D23 Expo (think Comic-Con, but all Disney) the majority of the cast joined a few thousand fans (myself included) for their very first look at the film (about 4 minutes of action, none of which, as far as I can tell, is included here). Then Robert Downey, Jr. yelled something into the microphone, and like Kanye before him, he was out. Still, I was in the room with the Avengers, people. Be jealous.

Has It Really Taken This Long For Someone To Do A Dr. Seuss - H.P. Lovecraft Mashup?

In his house in R'lyeh, Dead Yertle waits dreaming.

For the entire 11 page story - go here. (Thanks to Cole Gamble.)

The Best Halloween-Themed Family Photoshoot Ever

Is Ivan Owen the Greatest Dad Ever? Possibly. The owner of Chain Crafts, an Etsy store specializing in interesting jewelry and armor, got an interesting request from his wife: she wanted to do a Post-Zombie Apocalypse Family Photoshoot. The Owens contacted Bakan Photography, and the results? Awesome. Here's a peek; you can see more at Bakan Photography's blog. (And yes, I'm kicking myself for not thinking of this.)

(Source.)

That Kid With The Tiger

“Oh! That reminds me of this Calvin and Hobbes where...!”

That, my friends, is a sentence opener that my mother got very used to/very tired of hearing out of me when I was a kid. Calvin was my dude, right? Even though he was a few years behind me in school, everything he did was awesome. His adventures with his buddy Hobbes were humor at its finest. My mom and I got into debates about the realness of Hobbes.

“He’s only real in Calvin’s imagination, sweetie.”

“No! He’s real! He’s really really real! Calvin’s just the only one who can see him!”

I kind of think we were both right.

My eldest noticed my old Calvin and Hobbes books sitting on a bookshelf a while back, right there next to the likes of Pekar, Gaiman, Clowes, Moore. He brought them to me, asked me to read them to him, his interest piqued by nothing more than pictures that struck him as funny. He’s a year behind Calvin - funny how that works - so some of the humor’s over his head, but plenty of it’s not. But the best part?  I think the little dude’s learned a pretty valuable life lesson. Check this out:

The last time I took this kid to the doctor and he had to get a shot, he screamed “I DON’T LIKE YOU! I DON’T LIKE YOU!” at the nurse, his voice filled with all the vitriol that a five-year-old can muster. And yet, the comic above has him rolling on the floor, laughing uncontrollably, banging his fist on the carpet. “Again!” he demands. “Read it again!” 

Could it be, then, that maybe this kid is learning how to laugh at himself? Let's hope so, for the good of all involved. It’s one of the best things a person can ever learn as far as I'm concerned, one of those handy tricks that makes life flow a bit more smoothly, like a personal lubricant for everyday existence. 

Of course, there are some lessons I’d rather my kids not learn from the boy and his tiger.

It's The 9/11 Cartoon Show! You Know - For Kids!

Quick show of hands - who thinks teaching (not sure if that's the right word) the kids about the horrors of 9/11 via a cheaply made propraganda cartoon is a good idea? Well, you're in luck: former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee's new venture, a company called Learn Our History, has just the thing for you:

 

I was half expecting the Ambiguously Gay Duo to show up and punch Bin Laden. Anyway, Huck himself makes an appearance on the company's website, explaining that because schools today are distorting facts and not Red White and Blue washing events and the causes behind them, your kids should learn the truth from his 9/11 cartoon, which doesn't bother with nonsense like "root causes" and "blowback", instead focusing on the important stuff, like God loves America because we love God.

Before you go labelling me as the guy who wants Howard Zinn's version of history in the classroom, consider this: the answer to having "left-biased" (if that's the phrase we're using) curriculum in schools is not dumbing it down with reactionary crap. (A reminder: Christopher Columbus did not, in fact, discover America.) The way to avoid raising a generation of morons: encouraging kids and teachers to take a neutral look at the people and events that shape our history - to teach facts, and not wrap them in mythological trappings.  

Rather than buy this, I think I'll hold off until my kids are old enough to read Lawrence Wright's The Leaning Tower. Unless Mr. Wright can be persuaded to write a graphic novel. On second thought, maybe that's not such a good idea.

(Thanks to Marinka for the heads-up.)

The Last Airbender: Legend Of Korra Trailer Arrives, And It Looks AWESOME

Put any and all all thoughts of M. Night Shyamalan's ghastly adaptation of the excellent and popular Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon series out of your mind. The TV show was terrific: exciting, funny, beautifully drawn and well-written - in a world where quality action-oriented 'toons for older kids are scarce (or worse, merely infomercials for the toys they're based upon), it remains one of the best. The folks at Nickolodeon are bringing the world of The Last Airbender back: Legend of Korra starts this fall, and if the trailer's any indication, we may have another classic on our hands. The kid's gonna geek out when he sees this: I sure as hell did.

 

Questions, Questions

"I used to listen to this song back in college. It's one of my favorites."

"Ohhh. When were you in college?"

"Let's see - I started back in 1987, so that was...wow. 24 years ago."

The silence of deep thinking. Then:

"Dad?"

"Yeah, bud?"

"Were there computers back then?"

"Yes."

"Was there TV?"

"Yes."

"Did you have Wii?"

"No."

"Were there cars?"

"Yes."

"Did they have Transformers?"

"Yes. Just the toys and the cartoon, though."

"Harry Potter?"

"No."

"Green Lantern?"

"Yes, but comic book only. Same with Iron Man, and Captain America...well, there was a Captain America movie, but it was pretty bad."

"Was there pizza?"

"Yes. There was always pizza."

"Were there phones?"

"Yes. That's how we got the pizza."

"Were there iPhones?"

"No."

"So...no Angry Birds?"

"Nope."

"Wow."

We drove past Target, Starbucks, Barnes and Noble. A treadmill of gentrification. Back then there was just hills and orange trees and the occasional house. It was as much of The Country as one would get in SoCal.

"Dad?"

"Yes?" 

More thinking.

"What if going to the bathroom was an actual sport?"

 

Hump Day Humor

Remember when the clever people at Volkswagen (Farfegnugen!) did that thing with the kid and the Star Wars and we were all, "Whoa!" and you were like, "I know!"? Remember? That was awesome.

Not to be outdone, the clever people at Disney/Marvel have made the EXACT SAME commercial, but with hair. Okay, it's not exactly the same, there's a twist.

Is it just me or did the dad kind of have that coming? Added bonus, can anyone ever think of Thor without hearing this in their head (or computer as the case may be)?

If that's not in the movie I'm demanding a refund.

How To Fold A Fitted Sheet

Fitted sheets are evil and if the alternative wasn't worse, I'd say that they should be rounded up and burned, every last one of them, because several studies have indicated that trying to fold a fitted sheet is the leading cause of death for fathers between the age of 19 and 65. I don't give a shit who you are. You may be the most well-rounded Modern Father on the planet - the Justin Timberlake of Committed Dads! - but you can't fold a fitted sheet. Yeah, you think you can, but you can't. Not like this lady. She's a linen-folding mutant (The Sheetress! Lady Threadcount!) who could teach a class at the Xavier Academy. Witness a miracle. This is like Doug Henning making a life-sized origami Harley-Davidson Fat Boy. Only better.

 

(via www.kottke.org)