According to this NYT article, the group Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood recently discovered what every parent of a public-school child has known for years: a lot of the stuff that Scholastic is selling in the flyers that they send home with kids is not books. Based on this shocking finding, CCFC has started a ‘Put the Book Back in Book Club‘ campaign.
What gets me is this (from the NYT article):

Susan Linn, director of the campaign, said she had received complaints from parents who were concerned that their children were being sold toys, games, makeup and other items under the guise of a literary book club that is promoted in classrooms.

For parents like this, I have one piece of advice: if you don’t want your kids buying junk, don’t let them. Do you really need to complain to an anti-consumer watchdog group about it?
When Samuel brings the Scholastic flyers home, he inevitably asks to buy a toy, not a book. No duh, he’s a kid. I know this might come as a shock to some, but I actually tell him what he can buy: sometimes I let him get a toy; sometimes I tell him he can choose a book, but most of the time, I just tell him ‘no.’
Side note: I always just assumed that schools send these flyers home because the school benefits financially in some way from the sales it generates. If that’s true, it’s no obvious on the Scholastic web site (not surprising). Is my assumption correct? If so, can any teachers or school administrators explain the arrangement?

I’ve been a Flickr user for several years. Some time back, Flickr started offering detailed stats on your photo stream. My most viewed photo–which has almost double the views as my second-most viewed photo–is Neck tumor dog.
I thought that was curious, so I drilled down into the stats. Images.google.com is, by far, the top referrer for this photo. No surprise there. What did surprise me is the search terms that led people to my photo. Below is a screen shot of the search terms. Click on the image for a larger version.
I think it’s safe to conclude that not a single person who viewed my photo via Google image search found what he or she was looking for.

News headline: Job searches fastest-growing Internet category

I’m home today nursing a bad cold. Here’s what I’ve learned: our dogs’ dinner time is about 5:00 p.m. Tippie starts pacing nervously at around 2:00 p.m.
I knew already that Tippie gets nervous before dinner time, but on other days when I’m home, there’s enough going on that I didn’t notice that it starts this early. Today, it’s pretty much just me on the couch with the dogs.
Considering Tippie’s advanced age and decrepitude, I guess I should be glad to see that she still has enough life in her to pace all afternoon.

It seems like half my office is out with that uniquely central Texas winter affliction: cedar fever. As I was walking along Bull Creek this afternoon, I caught on the bastards about to burst into a cloud of eye-burning pollen.

While I was uploading the photo and writing this post, my nose started itching something fierce–though I only have a very mild allergic reaction to cedar pollen, if any.

The 13-year-old boy in me is amused.

[click on image for larger version]

This is my kind of woman.
(via Consumerist)

I saw the sign below on my way to work. Should I bring my shotgun or basketball?

(Sorry for the poor quality of the photo; I had to shoot through a rainy windshield as I drove past. Click on the image to see a larger version.)

This article about the Halloween candy hierarchy got me thinking about my candy preferences as I rummage through my son’s Halloween candy and through the leftover candy that coworkers have brought to the office.
This year, my son Samuel went trick-or-treating with a school friend in a nearby subdivision. The friend’s parents must have better stamina than my wife and I, as Samuel netted much more candy this year than in previous years. I’d estimate he got 8-10 pounds–so much, in fact, that he let my wife take about a third of it to campus for her college students. I didn’t witness his sorting, so I’m not sure which types of candy he deemed undesirable enough to give away to her students.
In my very subjective opinion, Samuel received a smaller percentage of chocolate this year than in years past. What does this mean? I can think of three possible explanations: 1.) it’s a sign of the overall poor state of the economy, 2.) the average income of the neighborhood in which he trick-or-treated this year is slightly lower than in our subdivision, or 3.) my observation is total bullshit.
In any case, what this big candy haul means for me: I can steal quite a bit of Samuel’s candy before my theft becomes apparent. My first choice in Halloween candy is chocolate, especially Trix, Kit Kat and Snickers. But since there is a relatively small number of these chocolate treats, I have to be careful not to eat them all, lest my theft be detected early on. Typically, I eat these chocolates in the kitchen, often with Samuel watching TV in the next room, and then I hide the wrappers down in the trash can.
My second choice of candy is Smarties and SweeTarts. I like to crunch things (peanuts, ice, etc.), so I typically take these out when I’m downstairs alone after the kids have gone to bed. I eat them slowly on the couch while I use my computer or watch television. The absence of these candies is not so obvious, so I depleted Samuel’s supply of these crunchy treats yesterday.
Things go downhill for me pretty quickly after Smarties. Last night, I found myself eating some Starburst candy, and I suddenly realized it just wasn’t worth it. This morning, I moved Samuel’s bags of candy from the kitchen counter to the pantry, so I wouldn’t start eating less desirable candy just because it was under my nose.
You know, it’s kind of scary to realize how much thought I’ve put into all this.

This is our 18-pound Maine coon cat Norman, displaying himself with no shame. Click on the photo to see him in his full glory.

Let’s see you beat that, Lopsided cat!