Shannon Larratt is Zentastic

Written with a USB keyboard due to spill damage :(

After school Nefarious and I had an evening of errands — starting with a big pile of mail at the post office, where she brought in her latest book and read it on the steps while I did all my packages. Then we headed up to Canadian Tire to get her a new pair of skates because she’s outgrown last year’s pair. We managed to find a cute set of pink and white hockey skates to replace her now too-small figure skates (and grabbed a small sled also)… A slight delay though at the exercise equipment though, as she insisted on trying out every single piece of gear they had. She can’t remember it, but we had an eliptical machine in Mexico and even back then (she was two) she loved to ride it with me.

Before going into the store we stuffed ourselves with a couple hot dogs from the vender outside the store… It sounds silly perhaps, but I really love going for a street dog after school in a “father-daughter moment” sort of way.

I parked next to a stock Cherokee — the identical truck to mine, minus the modifications. When you see my truck on its own, it’s not particularly overwhelming if you’re used to my old 44″ truck, but when you see it next to what it used to be, it’s quite engorged!

I have to admit that I’m surprised that there aren’t more customized vehicles on the road… People think nothing of spending thousands of dollars on haircuts and clothing and makeup, but very few choose to modify their vehicle with custom paint or mechanical work, even though most people feel that their vehicle is an expression of themselves.

We also stopped and got more videogames… An AC/DC song pack for me, and a Dora video game for the Wii for Nefarious, which she’s completely glued to as I write this. It’s easier than some of her other games, but still, I’m impressed at her ability to grok this stuff… Like I said yesterday, when I was a kid, games were incredibly simple in comparison. That said, when her reading is a little better, I’m going to get her started on Zork and games of that ilk, because I think they’re good for the creative brain.

She and all her classmates are all into Captain Underpants right now, so that series of books has been our bedtime reading. The key to reading to a five year old? Funny voices. Which I enjoy doing.

Other than that, earlier today Boing Boing posted about a video of an awesome chainsaw-assault rifle combo, the perfect zombie killing tool (more). I was a little disturbed at the initial “anti-redneck bigotry” on Boing Boing… I suppose everyone has their prejudices, and I probably hate the classist yuppy wanna-be artist wanna-be computer nerds that gravitate to Boing Boing (a blog that I greatly enjoy along with Dark Roasted Blend, Deputy Dog, and other casual reading), but those sorts of comments really show that shallow thinking is definitely not reserved for any demographic. For whatever strange reason, in this age of political correctness, it’s still perfectly fine to make fun of (a) East Indians, and (b) rednecks/hill billys/rural folk…