Memo to some parents on my block this 4th of July...

I realize that it's July 4th and that boys like to shoot off fireworks. I, myself, blew up my fair share of them when I was a kid continuing through my teenage years. Hell, I even blew off over 80 dollars worth last night when me, my father-in-law and a relative pitched in, so I'm not against it.

What bothers me is that today, as I was driving down the street to get home, I encountered four of your kids standing in the middle of the road and lighting off fireworks. Never mind that the middle of the street was so littered with firecrackers and assorted fireworks that you could barely see the road. What did bother me was that instead of looking to see if a care was coming, your boys proceeded to light off a cone firework.

I figured that once they saw me in the road that they'd move aside or at the very least, one of you would yell at them to get the hell out of the way! They finally saw me and walked rather slowly to the middle of the road. That's right, they barely moved and I was forced to swerve around them.

If this was me and my Dad was watching, he would have yelled at me good. So my advice is simple: Tell them to get the frak out of the way if a car is coming! It's not that hard....

My 40th Birthday party playlist songs 61-70

61. Save It For Later by The English Beat


62. Heat of the Moment by Asia


63. Destination Unknown by Missing Persons


64. Run Run Away by Slade


65. One Thing Leads to Another by The Fixx


66. Peace Sells by Megadeth


67. Space Truckin' by Deep Purple


68. Pressure by Billy Joel


69. Here Comes Your Man by The Pixies


70. Since You're Gone by The Cars

My 40th Birthday party playlist songs 51-60

51. Legal Tender by the B-52s


52. You've Got Another Thing Coming by Judas Priest


53. Hyperactive! by Thomas Dolby


54. Dirty Deeds Done Dirty Cheap by AC/DC


55. Two Tribes by Frankie Goes to Hollywood


56. The New Style by The Beastie Boys


57. Keep Feeling Fascination by The Human League


58. Genius of Love by Tom Tom Club


59. Let's Go Crazy by Prince


60. Ashes to Ashes by David Bowie

My 40th Birthday party playlist songs 41-50

41. My Philosophy by Boogie Down Productions


42. Games People Play by Alan Parsons Project


43. Love Missile F-11 by Sigue Sigue Sputnik


44. Close to the Edit by Art of Noise


45. Finest Worksong by REM


46. Homosapien by Pete Shelley


47. Up the Creek by Cheap Trick


48. Super Cool Wagon by Sons of Freedom


49. Can't Hardly Wait by The Replacements


50. Freedom of Choice by Devo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVGINIsLnqU

My 40th Birthday party playlist songs 31-40

31. Fall on Me by REM


32. Rock the Casbah by The Clash


33. Pop Muzik by M


34. Life in a Northern Town by The Dream Academy


35. My Ever Changing Moods by The Style Council


36. Behind the Wall of Sleep by The Smithereens


37. Shock the Monkey by Peter Gabriel


38. Nothing Bad Ever Happens by Oingo Boingo


39. Abracadabra by Steve Miller


40. Rock Box by Run DMC

My 40th Birthday playlist songs 21-30

21. It's My Life by Talk Talk

22. Big Beat by Billy Squier

23. Boom Boom by Trio

24. Don't Bring Me Down by Electric Light Orchestra

25. Bicycle Race by Queen

26. All That I Wanted by Belfegore

27. In My Dreams by Dokken

28. Owner of a Lonely Heart by Yes

29. Crybaby by Utopia

30. Good Times by INXS

40th Birthday Party playlist songs 11-20

11. Words by Missing Persons



12. House of Fun by Madness



13. New Song by Howard Jones



14. Goody Two Shoes by Adam Ant



15. Pump Up the Volume by MARRS



16. Turning Japanese by The Vapors



17. Renegade by Styx



18. Is There Something I Should Know by Duran Duran



19. Turn to Stone by Electric Light Orchestra



20. I'll Be You by The Replacements

40th Birthday Party playlist songs 1-10

At my party, I created a playlist with songs picked by Bill and I that were a few of our favorite songs growing up. The playlist was shuffled. Here's the order that they played.

1. Saved by Zero by The Fixx



2. Ah! Leah! by Donnie Iris



3. Dead Man's Party by Oingo Boingo



4. Atomic Boms by Kix



5. Put the Message in the Box by World Party



6. Der Komimisar by After the Fire



7. Bring on the Dancing Horses by Echo and the Bunnymen



8. Big Time by Peter Gabriel



9. Say What You Will by Fastway

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpUCznIaFlw

10. In a Big Country by Big Country

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vhebiuuLqU

Watched Paranormal Activity 2 or as I like to call it...

Parasnoremore Activity 2.

Laura and I saw the first one in the theater. For me, it was okay. For Laura, she was freaked out by it. Admittedly, it was a little creepy sometimes, but I think that was more the effect of seeing it in a theater full of people. Laura grabbed at me several times when something would go bang, so she was interested in seeing the sequel.

We rented it and watched it this afternoon.

If you haven't seen either Paranormal Activities, the story goes like this. Both movies are presented as if they are found footage of real events, but actually actors portray the real people. The first movie centered around Katie and Micah (pronounced Mee-cah), who were being disturbed by some sort of ghost in their house. Micah is, of course, skeptical, but he buys a video camera and sets it up in the bedroom to film themselves sleeping. You see time lapsed videos of some weird stuff going on, like Katie getting up and standing by the bed for over two hours.

Spoiler Alert....

The first movie ends with Micah getting killed by a possessed Katie. In the second film, the action takes place a little bit before the first movie's events. Katie's sister, Kristi, who has a one-year-old boy, along with a husband and a step daughter, is being bothered by some strange events in her house.

It's a pretty expensive house with a pool so when someone breaks in and trashes the house, but only takes Kristi's necklace that her sister gave her, the Dad does what any rational person does, he has a whole house DVR surveillance system installed. Logic would tell you that a normal person would probably get a surveillance system that is only tripped by movement, but these babies film 24 hours a day!

So things start to get a little weird, but my God does it take a long time to get there! You see multiple shots every night of the front yard, the pool area, the living room and the upstairs baby room.

Every night goes like this:

(Cue quiet noises of the house and outside)

The front yard camera (nothing happens)

The back yard camera (nothing happens)

The kitchen camera (nothing happens)

The living room camera (nothing happens)

The baby's room camera (nothing happens at first)

Then something weird will happen like the baby stands up and looks at something that isn't there, or a door will open, or the dog will bark at something that isn't there.

After a while of this, I almost fell asleep with all the soothing sounds of night.

The movie has a "script", but you could tell a lot of the dialogue was improvised. I mean, some of the Dad's dialogue is awful. He's told about some weird stuff going on, but he doesn't believe it. He always says things like "That's the last I want to hear on the subject!"

Their live-in nanny, a Hispanic old lady who can understand English, but doesn't speak it for reason, senses some bad spirits in the house, so she starts praying and making signs. The Dad is not down with her burning some strong incense to keep spirits out of the house, so he fires her.

All the while, weird stuff is going on and I'm practically yelling at the screen, "Why in the hell did you install that whole house DVD if you're not going to use it!?"

Finally, the teenage daughter shows her Dad some of the footage of weird stuff happening, but even after that, the family checks the DVR sporadically. If this was my house and weird things were afoot, I would be checking that puppy every freaking day!

At one point, the daughter shows her Dad some of the weird stuff. She asks him, "Now do you believe me?" Even after this, they still miss a lot of the weird stuff. The plot takes a rather odd turn when one of the members of the house gets possessed and there is something about a deal with the devil that would mean that the first born son would be taken. Even after these details, no one things to call in some paranormal investigators.

All in all, it was an okay movie with about 2 whole minutes of some freaky stuff. I don't think that's worth the 90 minutes of improvised dialogue.

Playing Video Games With Dad Builds Better Daughters

Here's an article about how girls that played video games, especial with their Dads, were better behaved, felt more connected to their families, felt less aggressive, and demonstrated decreased levels of internalizing, which can lead to depression. Granted, the study was for girls ages 11 to 16 and Julia's been playing for two years now, but it's time well spent!

Playing Video Games With Dad Builds Better Daughters