My fifth grader is having to learn US geography — in particular, to look at a blank map and write in the correct name for each of the states. I think that’s great. I love maps and geography. But that’s a lot of states. I’ve been sharing with him a number of ways I’ve somehow remembered where states are located, and I’m curious to hear what others have to say.

California is easy. I grew up in the state, and he’s already learned it simply because I’d always point to it so much. But look at the shape. See how it’s kind of like a C? So it’s C for California.

Texas is another “letter” state for me. It kind of makes a T shape. Next to it, Louisiana looks like an L.

Then there are states that look like objects. Oklahoma, I always remembered it as being the state that looks kind of like a frying pan. Kentucky always looks like a chicken drumstick to me, appropriate when there’s Kentucky Fried Chicken out there. So that was another one easy to remember.

As I mentioned in a similar post on this topic from 2005, I learned from Laurie Keller’s great book, The Scrambled States of America, that Michigan has a glove shape.

I really got put to the test in helping him with his own real test, however. For some states, it was simply running him through those on the map. Damn, New England has a lot of states! I suggested that Alabama kind of looks like an A. That since he knew at a glance where Florida was, and it began with an F, the state above was the next letter — G — for Georgia.

Getting him to recognize either North or South Dakota or either North or South Carolina also meant he pretty much could get the other. The same was true for Virginia versus West Virginia.

So far, he’s gotten 100% on his two tests (he’s learning by region), so the repetition seems to be working. Still, I wish there were more tips or tricks or funny ways to look at a blank state on a map and know what it is.

I did find some interesting US geography online tools here, and there are some other tips here on how to remember state names and capitals. But those are more ways to remember lists, rather than locations on a map. Heck, it’s just easier to remember the Fifty Nifty United States song (written by Ray Charles, no less!). For those who don’t know it, here you go:

Anyway, if you live in a particular state where you’re taugh a particular way on how to memorize it, I’d sure love to know. Last time I tried this, I learned from a reader that aside from looking like a glove, folks in Michigan also remember their geography by thinking “The High Five State.” That’s cool.

Next, how to memorize the Gettysburg Address. Can you guess which homework lessons fall to me around the house?

Ten years ago today, my life changed forever. I became a father. A decade has passed, and it seems like yesterday and forever, simultaneously.

I’d thought about being a father before I became one, but I didn’t fully comprehend how much it changes you once it happens.

For one, you’re ready to die for them. Seriously. You know how in movies there’s that parent who covers up his kids when the bullets are flying? Before I had kids, I’d see that type of thing and wonder if I could ever do that. Now, I haven’t a doubt. They come first. You sacrifice for them. You lose your independence. You have a small child that fully relies upon you, from being provided for to seeking a role model.

In particular, I’ve probably felt the role of provider more heavily than any other. Since we decided to have children, I’ve worked and my wife has cared for the kids — and make no mistake, that is indeed a full-time incredibly difficult job.

We’ve been fortunate, in this way. They’ve blossomed having one parent around all the time. But as the sole breadwinner, so to speak, I’ve always felt a tick-tick-tick of whether I’m saving enough. Are they covered for college? Are they covered for a roof over their heads? Can I provide for all the assorted things that children seem to require?

And so I would dive into work, to play that provider role. Of course, it’s also because I have loved my work, and it’s easy to think (or at least for me, so I have thought in the past), that your children will still be there after a deadline you’ve needed to hit has passed. That they’ll wait the “five minutes” that’s my constant refrain about when I’ll finish with something, then end up taking an hour or two instead. My oldest son about a year ago showed how much he’s grown by calling me out on it. “You always say you’re just coming, and you never are.”

Of course, after having done all this work, I’d be exhausted both physically and mentally. I’d spent so much time trying to be provider dad that the roughhouse dad the kids really wanted was nowhere to be found. And therein lies another problem — even at the best of times, I’m not much of a roughhouser.

The boys love it, just love it if I smash into them, “steamroller” by rolling across them, pick them up — you name it. They’re boys. They want to be tossed around. But that’s just not really me, and I find myself feeling guilty when I don’t do more of it. I feel even guiltier when I see other fathers who DO do it and clearly love being that way. What’s wrong with me?

There’s a scene from Jersey Girl that also makes me feel like I’m a bad dad. It’s where Will Smith (playing himself) is talking to Ben Affleck (not playing himself) about being a father. He’s talking about how his kids just want him to play in the dirt with them, rather than be off working all the time. And I see that with my own kids, and I feel bad for not making more dirt time.

I realized only last year that to be a better dad, I ironically had to be less of one. My children are part of my life, but they can’t consume it entirely (however I let that happen, such as working too much).

In talking with my wife about this, she’d had some similar feelings. While I’d been lost as provider dad, she’d felt consumed as caretaker mum, shuttling the boys around to activities, making sure they’re ready for school, watching over the homework and slowly losing her identity as a person.

In trying to be good parents — what we we’ve thought good parents should be — we’d given up too much of our independent identities. We’d been parents first and adults on second, when we’d had time to be adults at all.

As I’ve talked to some other parents, I’ve seen similar nods of agreement — especially when I joke about trying not to let the kids suck the life out of us. Last fall, my wife came across a Wall Street Journal article on the same topic — that to do the best for your kids, you might do best not to center your life around them.

Things have been changing. As we’ve become more aware of how much we were getting lost in our children, we’ve worked to stand apart from being just parents. It has meant giving the kids more independence (which is also easier as they’ve gotten older). It has meant a lot more of making time for ourselves. And ironically while I feel bad for even thinking about being apart from my kids, for not wanting to spend all my time with them, I also think that it’s an important part of being a better dad when I am with them.

With the move back to California and this greater awareness of needing more time overall, my work habits have dramatically changed. I’m around a lot more. With school being close, not requiring a drive, I can bicycle with them most mornings. And while I might not still be a roughhousing dad, I’ve come to accept there are other things I do enjoy that they also like: building sand castles, shooting tin cans with BB rifles or even just bicycling up to get some tacos. In the end, as I’ve always known, they don’t really want things. They just want my time. So I try to make sure they’re getting that time, but I’m also working to make sure I feel like more than just a dad.

And to my oldest son, who doesn’t read this blog but will someday, don’t interpret your father’s struggles with being a better dad as regret for having become one. I love you and your brother dearly; you bring joy into my life. The loss of independence comes with the gain of interdependence. We are forever bound together. And on this your 10th birthday, know that you’ve always made me so proud and happy.

Flipping through the LA Times last weekend, Meghan Daum had an opinion piece talking about President Obama as a new role model for Black fathers. That brought me up short, because in the past few weeks, I’ve just been thinking about him as a role model for any father, including myself.

Daum wrote:

It’s worth asking why we’re so punch-drunk in love with Obama’s role as a father. Is it simply because he’s charismatic and his girls are photogenic? Or does it have to do with something many Americans — of all races — are perhaps aware of intuitively but don’t want to admit or say out loud: that Obama is a black man in a culture that’s starving for images of responsible black fatherhood?

Speaking for myself, I honestly hadn’t considered that people might be looking up to him as an image of “responsible black fatherhood.” I’ve just been looking at him as someone who appears to be an incredible father, period.

Fatherhood is tough enough whatever your race, I’d say. Here’s a guy who was busy running for the highest office in the US, yet who also seemed to be making time for his kids, such as trick-or-treating on Halloween. I’m a busy enough person, and I never feel like I make enough time for my kids. Watching Obama, as a father, was inspiring.

I was gripped watching him and Michelle Obama talk on TV about parenting — I loved hearing that to get their girls to behave, they just talked them to death about being disappointed. You know, I gave that a try recently when my kids got out of hand recently. It worked!

Obama’s giving up cigarettes. I know I should as well. I’ve been trying to stay in shape. Did you see those pictures of Obama shirtless? I wasn’t thinking hunky — I was just thinking wow, envy — I should redouble my efforts at the gym!

I can sympathize with Daum’s argument that we shouldn’t be looking to Obama to be a role model on top of all his other burdens:

Obama is already burdened with a load of superhuman qualities we’ve imposed on him. Not least among these is the idea that he might be capable of signing executive orders with one hand and checking his kids’ homework with the other. Worse, given our culture’s persistent anxieties about race, that “world’s greatest dad” figurine sitting metaphorically on his desk is perhaps more about quelling a nation’s fears about black masculinity than it is about a family ideal

And goodness knows, I’m sure he has plenty of “bad dad” moments just like the rest of us. But I’ll take my inspiration where I can get it. And I’ll kind of hope that I’m not alone, that America isn’t full of people thinking “A good Black dad,” as Daum suggests — rather, it’s kind of nice to see what appears to be a good dad, regardless of race, dealing with a young family in the White House.

Sidenote: They still haven’t gotten that dog yet, have they? See, that’s why the girls were so well behaved during the inauguration. Well, that’s what I’d have done with my boys. Want that dog? You behave during this cold long day, and we’ll get it after that

Another Christmas, and another one where I won’t be phoning my father. I used to for his birthday, Thanksgiving and Christmas — just to try and keep the whole family thing going to some degree. But I gave that up about 10 years ago.

My father wasn’t a very nice man. Well, he was nice to those who knew him — plenty of friends, people enjoyed his company. They just didn’t have to live with him. An alcoholic, he’d go through these rages every three or four months, taking his anger at the world (I assume he was angry at the world) out on his family. Yelling, hitting and lots of breaking of things. He drove his car into a house once. A two-story clubhouse my mother had built for me got reduced to one-story courtesy of a sledgehammer.

He shot up our house twice. The first time, I heard the shots from outside, knowing my mother was in there arguing with him. I assumed they were both dead and recall having a strange calmness about the entire thing. Of course, the shooting made for cool souvenirs to show your friends — here are the holes where the bullets passed through my wall, still unpatched. This dent in my window frame? A bullet bounced off that.

I’m fortunate not to have inherited his alcohol problem. The tendency to break things, I struggled with that for years. When the main male role model in your life routinely destroys things when angry, I guess it kind of rubs off as acceptable behavior. In the past, if I was really upset, I’d break things too. Windows. Foot through a door. Broken staircase banister. Eventually, thankfully, my wife said enough. Stop doing that. So I bought some books on anger management, and maybe I got a few tips from them. Mainly, I just focused on not doing the bad behavior and got past it.

Despite only being a kid, I had a pretty long-term view of the situation. I knew I’d be leaving home at some point, so I just carried on trying to stay out of the way as best I could whenever he was gripped by his anger. Sometimes you couldn’t. Out one night with some friends at an arcade, he showed up there looking for my step-sister. Not finding her, I instead became the target. I never knew when he might show up and for years, one of my biggest fears was that out of the blue, he’d arrive at some public event.

In college, away from him, we’d mainly have contact any time my car broke down. He’d come out to fix it. He was an amazing mechanic, and perhaps I should have paid attention more on all those long cold nights, holding a flashlight for him. I picked up some things, but drop an entire new engine into a car? Forget it — that would be like magic to me.

Once I had a new car, we had less contact — it not breaking down at all. Still, I’d call — even when I moved an entire continent away, I’d make the effort. We didn’t say anything particularly much, but family, you know — there’s that obligation you can feel to make an effort despite all the many negative things.

That came to a stop after my oldest son was born. I called for that, too — left a message and never got a call back. And when his first birthday came around, no call then, either. Not that my son could speak then. But I decided it was one thing to be a bad father in so many ways to me; it was quite another to be a bad grandfather. I guess that’s where I drew the line with feeling the family obligation and realizing I had no need to make that effort. To this day, my boys have no idea he exists. Oddly, they’ve never even asked about “Daddy’s dad.” I’m sure they will at some point; I’ll probably say he wasn’t a very nice man, so I don’t really talk to him.

He’s still out there. My sister continues to talk to him. I confess, there is a small part of me that would like to say proudly these are my boys, these are your grandkids. A very small, very tiny part. It’s not something I think about often; my life has continued without him as a part of it just fine. I’m sure there are some who would say everyone needs to resolve family issues. For many, I’m sure that’s true. But the “they’re family” thing in his case doesn’t work with me and hasn’t for years.

Note: I’ve closed comments for this entry. Appreciate the first ones that came in, but the post wasn’t really looking for sympathy (seriously, I totally am not looking for that nor do I need it). I like to write, and sometimes you want to try writing about personal things as part of the writing, that’s all.

I’ve read plenty of articles by now that cover how much people might be exposing themselves to identity theft through social networking and social sharing sites. But I’ve had a different worry over the past year or so. Is all my twittering, Flickr posting, Facebooking and so on putting my kids in danger?

Think about it. I’m not just exposing myself online as I share things with my now 2,000 followers on Twitter or my 1,500 “friends” on Facebook or anyone who sees a photo I leave public on Flickr. I’m giving away details of my life to strangers that could let a crazy person make themselves seem familiar to one of my kids.

Chills. I got chills after writing the sentence above. And I’ve thought about it for some time, pondering whether I should even do a post about it, for fear that just talking about the potential danger might make it more real. But I think it’s an important issue that few are really considering and one without an easy answer. Below, some of what I’ve been thinking about and doing to reduce the danger.

I don’t want to throw up the shutters and withdraw from social activity on the web. I enjoy twittering, and it’s fun to have photos up on Flickr so that I can make them show in places like on my blog. Tim Bray recently likened Twitter to being like a corner coffee shop, and I like walking into the shop, talking with some of my friends and even some people I don’t know well there, because I make new friends that way.

It’s also hard for me to withdraw socially when much of what I do revolves being on both virtual and physical stages. In particular as a marketer, social sites are places I want to be, making connections and networking virtually as I would do in life.

In fact, I just came back from our SMX Sydney show, where I did plenty of real-life networking that involved talking about my personal life with people and hearing about their personal lives. When did I arrive? When am I leaving? And your family is back where? You’re going to do what next week? Completely innocent questions that are asked and answered without a second thought — but do the same thing online, and they become a record of your current and future movements that might be used in ways you don’t expect.

To date, I don’t think I’ve ever named my kids on this blog. I’ll refer to them as my “oldest” or “youngest” but not use their actual names. That was a conscious decision. I didn’t want their names out there, for fear of aforementioned crazy people, scary strangers, whatever. Similarly, I didn’t put their pictures into my Flickr photostream until a few months ago, so that someone might know I have kids but not have any idea what they look like. They’d be on Flickr, but they pictures were restricted to friends and family.

One problem with my great master plan is that it didn’t take into account friends. I’ve had friends who know my children and both talk about them by name and post pictures online. If you were really looking, you’d figure it out. Aside from friends, occasionally my kids would be with me at a conference, so would meet someone there who might then mention the encounter online.

I don’t fault my friends or those I’ve met for any of this. It’s not like I wrapped the kids up in big “do not blog” bubble wrap clothing. No one did any of this with intent to cause harm, nor would I even say they were thoughtless in it. Rather, I think we’ve been fortunate that to date, online has remained a largely happy, safe place to share and talk about things.

Instead of hiding my kids, I think the solution is that I’ll have to educate them more. “Stranger Danger” means I know need to explain that Daddy shares some things online, and if anyone comes along that seems to know a lot about what you’ve done, where we’ve gone and so on, that doesn’t mean they are your friend or that you should trust them. I’m really pondering the best way to explain all this, so that I don’t freak them out yet keep them safe.

To give you some perspective, they’ve never even really had the basic stranger danger talk from me yet. That’s because they’ve grown up in a small English village, where no one plays in the street as I did as a Southern California kid. They’ve been driven to school not out of laziness but because it’s way too far to walk and generally have never been out of sight of either me or my wife. But our move back to suburban Southern California’s going to mix them with many more people, plus as they’re getting to that age where I might let them walk places on their own. Chills, again, even thinking about that. Maybe I’ll keep them under escort until 16

Clearly, they need the talk. And clearly to me, that needs to include how people could make it seem like they know us, when they don’t. Scary stuff, and part of me wonders how much I created the problem inadvertently or if rather, it’s inevitable for anyone who spends much time online these days.

I’ve also pondered pulling back on some of the personal stuff I share online. This is hard for reasons I’ve mentioned already plus as a writer, not being able to talk about my family prevents me from doing more of the personal writing that I want to explore more. What’s the balance?

As I said, I don’t plan to pull the shutters down. But I have been already and probably will be more careful about what I do share, along with doing the proper education of my kids.

Ironically, when I moderated our Teens & Search panel at SMX West, the teens on the panel expressed that kids needed more education that what they share on social sites could be used against them. Certainly there have been plenty of articles on this topic, too. But parents and adults need that education too. What you share isn’t just exposing you. It’s exposing others (and see Vanessa’s excellent post on this from last year).

I think about that a lot beyond my kids. I generally don’t post pictures of people who I don’t think have been in a public view. And if I write or twitter about someone, I ask myself carefully if they’re going to mind, if they’re already talking about such things themselves.

After 12 years of living in the UK, I’m going home — back to Southern California, back to Newport Beach. This will be a fairly personal post about the decision my family has made, but my blog was supposed to be for more than writing about gadgets and computers and donuts. Good writing is often deeply personal, and I don’t do nearly enough of that type of writing.

Back in December 1996, I came to Britain with my wife so that we could start a new chapter in our lives, that of raising a family. I didn’t want to leave home. I simply love California. I love Orange County and in particular, I love Newport Beach. I take nothing away from the many other beautiful and wonderful places in the world. It’s just that this is where I grew up. It screams “home” to ever fiber of my being. I literally feel the difference in the air, smoggy as it may be, that I breathe when I get back.

Nevertheless, I agreed to come back. I knew Britain and had spent much time here. Indeed, that’s how I met my wife, who is British. And she wanted to be home for this part of our lives. I figured it would be OK. There was no way to be both places, and I knew she’d be more comfortable near her family as we started having our own. We’d get back to California and perhaps eventually return there.

We did start going back. With my travel schedule, I returned often for work. As a family, we’d get back usually once per year. I often tell a story about the first trip back with my son who had just turned two or so. I took him outside, and he looked up at the trees with a puzzled look. I looked up and realized he was confused at the trees — they were palm trees, and he’d never seen them before. Or maybe it was just gas, but it makes for a nice story.

As the years ticked by, people would often ask me how I liked being in the UK. “It’s OK,” would be my standard answer, and I’d cover the general things about missing the weather at home, the general expense of things in the UK but how we lived in a nice village and universal health care couldn’t be beat. “Will you ever go home,” was a common follow-up question. Sure, I’d reply — when my kids were 18, daddy was going back, and anyone who wanted to join him could.

Over the past year, it became increasingly harder for me to say the “It’s OK” thing. I was traveling back much more, and I was finding I missed home even more. I couldn’t help myself — my responses more and more came out as “I hate it.” To all my UK friends, it’s not that I hate Britain. It’s that I’ve hated being away from my home, the place I’ve felt most comfortable.

Despite really not liking it, I felt I had little choice. The kids, you know. You can’t disrupt the kids. Or the entire family, to make such a move. Just. Can’t. Be. Done.

Or so I thought. Talking is a good thing, and my wife realized how much happier I’d be at home. Many of the things I love — and love to do with the family — are at our doorstep in California. Sure, Big Bear isn’t the greatest place to ski or snowboard, but it makes for a fun day. My youngest who’s into skateboarding — as I’ve been getting into — doesn’t need to be driven an hour away only to find the park is so wet that you can’t use it.

Being back in California also means a lot of good things in terms of work. So much of what I do is helped by personal meetings, but I get little time for these being 6,000 miles away from the heart of the search industry. For all these years, I’ve also worked a schedule where I know my day will stretch late into the UK night, because that when the California day is just getting going. And any trip back, that’s always meant at least three days away from home — one out, one back plus whatever work days in between. Since I got out so rarely, I’d often try to bundle a lot in a trip, which means I could be away for two weeks at a time.

Now I can hardly believe the change that’s about to come. Later this year, if I want to get an update with Google or Microsoft, I can jump on a plane and spend a day to do it, no jet lag, no planning multiple meetings around an already exhausting conference that might be happening.

It’s scary in some ways, mainly because of not knowing how our two boys will react. Talking to them this weekend, the first reaction was of not wanting to go. I’d felt they’d be OK, because each year I semi-joke with them about going back, and after our last trip, they actually seemed kind of eager.

Tonight, my oldest came in very upset, worried about the many things we’d be leaving behind. But my wife and I talked with him more, and he seems OK now. The thought that I’ll switch my Mini here for a Mini convertible there certainly brightened him up.

The treehouse I built, of course, can’t come with us. Believe me, if I could deconstruct it and transport it over, I would. But in the end, it’s only a thing. Things can always be replaced, or you go on without them. Life is more than worrying about things.

We know that kids are resilient, and we think the boys will be OK, and we’ll surround them with love as we embark upon this new journey. And daddy will start taking them to school in the morning, rollerblading alongside them as they bicycle their way, until they’re old enough to tell daddy to go away

The plan is to be back by August. It’s going to be a busy and changeful next few months as we move to that, and I’ll be blogging about how we go through it. But California here I come, right back where I started from. Open up those Golden Gates!

My boys were playing baseball today. Just up and decided to play all by
themselves, which is a pretty big thrill for an American dad living in England.
OK, I’m a sports idiot, as
I’ve written before. But I like baseball, going to the odd game on occasion, or
pretending I know how to actually throw one to the boys now and then. I don’t,
by the way. But I’m better than they are.

I’ve long wanted to take them to a real game, with the National Anthem, the
seventh inning stretch, the food and the entire atmosphere. Some Brits just
can’t figure all that out, why we go to a game but don’t really seem to watch
it. I try to explain that at least for me, and those I know, it’s the
atmosphere. It’s just being out, with the game almost an excuse.

For once, we’re all back in the US during baseball season. I just realized
this. Like wow! I can take the boys to a game. Do they want to go to one? Do
they! So I’ve just booked tickets, to the Orioles versus Kansas City. My team’s
is Orange County’s Los Angeles Angles Of Anaheim, of course (sigh, will Orange
County ever have a team that just uses the county’s name?). But I’ll go with the
Orioles — plus, who wouldn’t want to go to a game at Camden Yards?

Barely booked is more like it. OK my stateside readers, I’m sure you deal
with Ticketmaster all the time. It’s an IAC company, and last year around this
time, I had the pleasure of interviewing IAC chief Barry Diller. If I were doing
it again, I’d skip all the questions about his plans for search and Ask.com. I’d
dive in on how he’s going to make Ticketmaster less sucky.

Jumping to buy a ticket from the
Orioles
schedule, you get this option to search for "Best Available" ticket.
Perfect. They’ve never been to a game, so let’s splurge.

Best available turns out to be way out in a club box behind right field. OK,
I resign myself to they getting some atmosphere but no up close action. But then
I’m curious. I try again, this type specifically choosing the field box option.
Voila! Tickets for just behind first base are suddenly available.

Glad I checked. Now it’s fast action time, because every page has this timer
counting down. I’ve got two minutes to act, including reviewing my charges.
Apparently, just charging me a large amount per ticket isn’t enough. Each ticket
also has a $5 "Convenience Charge." What’s the convenience? That I was able to
book it online?

No, that’s not it. If it was, I wouldn’t be paying the $2 per ticket email
delivery charge. Two dollars per ticket, to email me the tickets? Are you
insane? I should be getting a discount!

Now we’re $28 into fees on top of the tickets. But kick it up to $31.50,
because there’s a $3.50 processing fee. For what? The convenience charges and
email delivery charges weren’t enough?

Sigh. Well, let’s just pay for them. That means making an account. Buying
anything from a US web site from outside the US is always fun. Ticketmaster
doesn’t disappoint. First, I make it through the CAPTCHA codes after four
attempts. The codes are not only hard for machines to read — humans have
trouble as well.

Next I have to choose a delivery option. I went for the email option. I did
this so quickly that I didn’t notice this was grouped as a "US Customers"
choice, as opposed to a "Canadian" option. Of course, there’s was nothing on the
next screen to make me think this was an issue. That’s because the next screen
makes you create a Ticketmaster account, where you list your country as
residence from options such as the US, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Mexico or
Other.

I went with Other. That brought me to the billing screen which simply would
not let me change from being in the US. Nor would it handle my non-US address.
Instead, it kept telling me to pick a delivery option for my country — which,
as I then realized, wasn’t available.

As usual, I feel back on the cheat I have but other Americans abroad don’t. I
used my US PO Box, and the card was processed. Sometimes that works, and
sometimes I have to fall way, way back to using a card with a real residential
address of a family member in the US.

Still, we’re going to the game!

My arms are aching. The kids are out of school for spring break, and my wife
got a new trampoline for them to play on. I got dragged out of the office just
now to help her secure those "last few springs" to hitch the trampoline to its
frame.

More like 20 of them, and each one harder to pull. There’s a special tool to
use, a glorified hook, but I couldn’t get the oomph needed for the last seven or
so. You put the tool around a metal tab on the trampoline fabric, then pull with
all your worth to stretch that tab back to where you have the spring in your
other hand. Theory goes, you just pop the hook on the spring over the tab and
you’re bouncing. But these last ones — even with all three of us tugging on the
trampoline, we couldn’t close the gap.

We thought about perhaps losing up more of the other springs to get more
give, and I pondered if I had any type of winching tool forgotten in the garage.
Perhaps some chain and one of the car jacks….

Finally, I got on the trampoline itself and tried using the tool to pull the
spring toward the trampoline hook. Voila! Turns out pulling a spring with all
your might works a far sight easier than trying to pull the not-so-yielding
fabric of a trampoline.

When I opened my hotel room door Wednesday morning, the front page of USA Today sitting outside of it made me smile. It featured a big picture of the Peanuts characters in A Charlie Brown Christmas, one of my holiday favorites. But what’s this about being a baby boomer tradition!

The classic that almost wasn’t is the USA Today article, a great surprise explaining how the television special came about and how the producer didn’t think it was going to work. Of course, it’s a classic now. It aired Wednesday night on TV here in the US.

I’ve already watched it with my kids back in the UK. It’s not shown there on TV, but I make up for it by us all watching it on DVD. Despite it being 40 years old, it still stands up for them. They love Charlie Brown, especially love Snoopy, though why the football he kicks is oval rather than round confuses them!

My jaw dropped when I got into the part of the article where a television professor called the Christmas special a “baby boomer” tradition. I’m not a baby boomer. I’m Generation X. I and my generation were the ones watching this show when we were children. And yes, it’s very much a tradition for me to watch, just like I do with my own kids.

But my mother? She is a baby boomer, and I know it never occurs to her to watch the show. She didn’t grow up watching it entranced. I did, as did others of my generation. I’d argue this isn’t a baby boomer tradition but rather a Gen X one.

The USA Today story also mentions some other Christmas favorites, such as Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer. I remember reading on Chris Pirillo’s blog recently that he didn’t feel that classic held up for him. It still does for me, as it does for the kids, as well.

In fact, we not only watch it each year, we also listen to the soundtrack when decorating the tree and during the Christmas period as well. I got a big smile the other day when my six year old, listening to it while making cookies, told me he loved “One Foot In Front Of The Other” and wanted me to play it again

Like these classics as a tradition yourself but missed them when they came on TV or want to watch them again. I highly recommend these DVD box sets:

• Peanuts Holiday Collection (): This covers “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” plus you get “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving” and “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown,” all of which I drag out before each holiday for the kids.
• The Original Television Christmas Classics): This gives you “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town,” “Frosty the Snowman,” “Frosty Returns” and “The Little Drummer Boy.” I also have Easter Bunny’s Coming to Town, which is the same Rankin/Bass stop motion animation and another classic I drag out to the eager kids for the holiday. I saw that there was a sequel made to Rudolph recently, but my friend Michelle told me it was awful, so I skipped getting it.

And if you like the these classics, you’ll love listening to these soundtracks, which have all the great songs from the classics above:

• A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Original Sound Track Recording Of The CBS Television Special
• Rudolph Frosty & Friends Favorite Xmas Songs

One of tonight’s bedtime books was You Wouldn’t Want to Be an American Pioneer! This was another great find I came across on a trip back home recently. It’s both well illustrated and chock full of information on what it was like to cross the country back in the 1800s.

The kids especially like the part where the books tells them that if they drink river water with a funny taste, that’s probably just the buffalo pee! It’s also interesting to read about having to make decisions on whether to have oxen pull your wagon (picky eaters, slower walkers but can pull more weight and taste better if you eat them) versus mules (will eat anything, walk fast but not nice to eat, if you get to that point).