Other Bloggers Agree

It was nice to see this post from a lady blogger on a friend's facebook wall.  It's very much in keeping with the spirit of Competent Parent.

http://shaunaniequist.com/dads-arent-dumb/

Media Review Doubleheader: If This is 40, Bring on 50

Armed with a free RedBox rental coupon from the grocery store courtesy of Kellogg's (wha huh?), we sought out a movie the other weekend.  Having read the quite enjoyable 2012 comedy issue of Vanity Fair - edited by Judd Apatow and heavy on his sensibility - and having enjoyed Paul Rudd just about every time we've seen him, we chose Apatow's This is 40.

It may be that they shortened the title from This is a Version of 40 That is so Bleak and Depressing we Can't Remember Why we Made a Movie About It or Where we Left our Souls.  Or they should have.  The trailer features the laugh-y parts, but in reality, this sort-of-sequel to Knocked Up portrays depressing people completely incapable of being honest with themselves or others.  The first twenty five minutes were so bleak that we paused it and asked each other if we should go on.  There would indeed be something to laugh at every five minutes or so.  We told each other that if the characters could make real changes deep inside themselves that the movie would be a good redemption story.  Spoiler alert: it doesn't happen.  They blame everything and everyone else for their problems.  They're horrendous parents.  At the end, my competent wife asked "Do you think Judd Apatow really hates his life?"  Casting his wife as a horrible person married to a horrible person makes this a very viable question.

On the other hand, we've bored everyone we could raving about an obscure drama/comedy that lived a too-short two seasons and is now on DVD.  Men of a Certain Age, an original hour-long show from TNT (yup, that TNT) stars Ray Romano, Scott Bakula and my long-term man crush Andre Braugher.  I know!  Ray Romano!  Whodathunkit?  They portray three guys nearing 50 who went to college together and are still friends.  One's going through a separation, one's married, one is single and, um, busy romantically.  One has little kids, one has teenagers and one has no kids.  One has big daddy issues, one battles an addiction and one has to confront the knife edge of following creative dreams versus having enough to live on.  The show portrays real male friendship featuring real give-and-take and accountability.  They call each other on their sugar honey iced tea.  It's dramatic but also deeply funny.  We got attached to the characters and plot very quickly.

If you think you know Romano from Everybody Loves Raymond, Andre Braugher from Homicide or Scott Bakula from Quantum Leap, think again.  Spend 26 hours with these episodes and you'll see whole different sides of all three actors.  Despite all of the good TV out there, there's still not enough real, moving drama on television.  Do yourself a solid and check out these two seasons.

  

The Onion gets it

This Onion article drips with the Competent Parent ethos.   



Tip of the quill to Wooter for pointing it out.

Be a father to your child...in a smallish chair

After the foolishness of bass ackwards day a few weeks ago, I welcomed the arrival of the semantically challenging Take a Father to School Day in the Pittsburgh Public Schools. I call it semantically challenging because in the three or four years I've been aware of this 13-year tradition, it's been called "Take your Father to School Day" and "Take a Significant Male Figure to School Day". That latter one trips off the tongue. The problem, of course, is that in a big urban district, there will definitely be children who don't have an involved father to take to school. This year's official title was "Take a Father/Significant Male to School Day". One of my son's teachers took to calling us "male role models" to cover the grandfathers, uncles, pastors and coaches who filled the role for the day.

So, it's a tricky subject. The good news is that the number of men showing up at my kid's school grows every year. I last went when I was a first grade dad, joining about 75 significant males. This year, 150-200 men attended, which rocks pretty hard in a school of about 380. We had a very hard time fitting everyone on the front steps for the group photo. After some words from the principal and a dad and a video featuring Mike Tomlin (a Pittsburgh Public Schools parent) in the auditorium, we enjoyed some donuts and departed for our respective classrooms.

I appreciate the fact that my son's school doesn't turn TAFTSD into a carnival; some parents were talking about the field day that goes on at their school on this day. I prefer the chance to actually witness classroom activity, even though I know having a bunch of large men sitting in small chairs amidst the students changes the dynamic massively. In my son's class, there were 9-10 dads to about 20 kids for the morning hours that I was there. I've known some of his classmates since he was in kindergarten, so it's easy to watch out for kids who did not have a "dad" with them and have them join our little group. We played some of the math games they play at stations. Frankly, I dominated at the "24" station. James and Eddy didn't stand a chance, although Charlie ended up tying me in the end. In art class, there wasn't much for the dads to do, although I did see a dad totally do the project for his daughter who couldn't quite get it.

Next year, I'll be one of those dad splitting time between two students in the same school. In addition to the crop of classmates who know me as "Charlie's dad", I'll get to become "Teddy's dad" to a bunch of kids with even smaller chairs.

Editor's note: the post title and video are an homage to my brother, who called me excitedly last week after meeting Ed OG for his work at the Kroc Center in Boston. As he reminded me, the song features transcendent lyrics like "after a skeeze, there's responsibilities".