Little boy becomes superhero for a day

This story is just amazing.  It still seems like one of those things that happens in after-school specials or in one of those Hallmark channel movies.

Miles Scott, who at age five has already been fighting cancer for three years, lives in California and like many kids his age he loves superheroes.  He especially loves Batman and would apparently wear the costume quite a bit.  So the Make-A-Wish Foundation decided to turn Miles’ dream into reality by transforming San Francisco into Gotham City for a day.

But the most amazing part to me is how many people, many of them random strangers, became involved.  Literally thousands of people.

One of Batman’s creators drew the little boy a comic featuring villain Bane retreating from Miles as Batkid.  The mayor, the chief of police, the TV news, the San Francisco Chronicle, even President Obama, all got involved.  And thousands of strangers (many of them carrying Batkid signs and such) showed up to cheer him on as he “rescued” people from villains that included the Riddler and the Joker.

The links I included have a lot of good photos and video.  Watch, read, and try not to tear up.  I dare you.

-Geoff

Thanksgiving: A Guide

In the United States Thanksgiving is a holiday that is supposed to be about celebrating bounty.  The bounty of friends, family, togetherness, and food.  It’s about the end of summer and fall, the harvest, and making one last big get together before the coming winter.  (There are others who celebrate/mourn it differently, that’s not what this post is about.)  It is about giving thanks for what we have before we might lose it to the cold, the dark, and the winter.

While Thanksgiving might be about conspicuous consumption of the food variety, some people choose to celebrate it in other ways.  Some give back at churches, food pantries, and soup kitchens to those without a bounty to celebrate.  Some get together and play football, roast marshmallows around a bonfire, or prepare for Christmas.  Lots of people watch the parade or the dog show after eating too much.  While there may be a lot of conspicuous consumption going on, Thanksgiving is patently not about the shopping variety.  If you’re shopping on Thanksgiving, you’re doing it wrong.

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Happy Birthday Shakay

Happy Birthday to the best man at our wedding, Geoff’s best friend, and the guy who has stuck by him through everything.  We are lucky to have you in our lives, and we appreciate it more than you know.  You are a member of our chosen family, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.  May this year be better than all that have come before it.

~Kelly & Geoff

Happy Anniversary

Today is our 2nd wedding anniversary.  Over the past week or so we’ve received cards, emails, voice mails, texts, and calls from family and friends wishing us a happy anniversary.

I suspect that some portion of this has to do with the fact that 1) Geoff was recently hospitalized and 2) our wedding is on Veteran’s Day weekend.  Be that as it may, I’ll take it.

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Winter is coming, indeed

One of my favorite things about New England is the seasons.  I love the seasons here, and how we actually have four distinct ones. The ground is now covered with leaves and the trees are mostly bare.  We woke up this morning to snow coming down, although not very hard.  More like heavy flurries, if that makes sense.  It wasn’t really sticking either except for a few elevated surfaces.  But it was still kind of cool to see.  Just a sneak preview of the winter that is coming.  At least for us it won’t last for years, like the poor folk in Westeros.    The temperature today is not supposed to get much above freezing.  Now, at 1 PM, it is still only 33 degrees Fahrenheit.  It’s the sort of day to make you glad to be indoors, enjoying a good cup of coffee.

It is also the second anniversary of our wedding, and my brother Greg’s birthday as well.  So happy anniversary, Kelly my love, and happy birthday big brother!

-Geoff

History coming to the big screen next year

Nathaniel Philbrick is one of my favorite historians.  I especially love his superb maritime history books.  And it turns out that one of his books is being made into a movie.  Heart of the Sea is based on his book In the Heart of the Sea, in which Philbrick recounts the story of the Essex, a whaleship that was rammed and sunk by a sperm whale in 1820, far out in the Pacific Ocean.  Its crew was stranded in small boats for several months until they were rescued and in the meantime they had been forced to commit cannibalism.  The disaster served as inspiration for Herman Melville, who used it and his own experience on a whaler to help him create the novel Moby Dick.

The film, directed by Ron Howard, is set to be released sometime in 2014.   And there are at least three actors from Game of Thrones that are also in this film: Joseph Mawle (Benjen Stark); Donald Sumpter (Maester Luwin); and Jamie Sives (Jory Cassel).  Good Northmen all, and all dead, sadly.*  So that frees them up to be in this film.  I am looking forward to it.

-Geoff

*Technically, Benjen Stark is missing, but let’s just say that it isn’t looking good for him to be alive at this point.

Terrible news from the Philippines

Now that Typhoon Haiyan has passed over the Philippines and headed west towards Vietnam, the people there have had a chance to begin initial assessments of the damage done, and it doesn’t look good.  One observer has described the scene as “apocalyptic”.  Some areas are so devastated that there is no communication from them at all.   Accurate assessments of casualties at this point are impossible, but it looks as if the loss of life will easily be in the hundreds, if not the thousands.

If you have any ability to help at all, here’s some groups that are assisting with relief efforts: the Philippine Red Cross; the World Food Program; Shelter Box; and Americares.

-Geoff

Possibly the strongest typhoon ever recorded

Wow.  Glad we don’t have a storm like this anywhere near us.

Super Typhoon Haiyan is definitely the strongest storm of 2013, and it may just be one of the strongest ones ever recorded, with sustained winds of 195 miles per hour and gusts of up to 230 mph.  Imagine that.  Good God, an EF5 tornado has winds of 200 plus miles an hour.  And this is a tropical cyclone, causing damage over a much wider area.   They probably won’t even know for a while just everything that it has done.  The size and power of it are just mind-boggling.  Hopefully the loss of life in the Philippines and other places in its path will be minimal.  They seem to have been quite prepared, at least.

I will settle for some cooler weather and rain here, thank you very much.

-Geoff

We have come a long way indeed

Wow.

The new cover of Sports Illustrated talks about this amazing World Series win and features Big Papi and the three Boston police officers from some of the most iconic photos on the day of the Boston Marathon bombing.  Those same three officers had been on a previous cover shortly after the bombing.

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A quick note on history and food in ASOIAF

As I mentioned before, I have been doing a lot of experimenting with medieval recipes in recent years.  And this includes trying many of the delicious-sounding foods from George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire.  Thanks to the diligent work of Chelsea and Sariann, we ASOIAF fans have a fantastic resource to explore our foodie sides.  Everything I have made from their website and their book has been delicious, so seriously, try making some of their recipes.

Recently, I noticed something about George’s books that I had not noticed before: an utter lack of potatoes, Irish or sweet.  Now, at first glance this would seem to make sense, because they are both “New World” foods that would have been unknown to medieval Europe, which is the historical basis of much of Martin’s writing.  Potatoes would not be introduced to Europe until the 16th century, when the Spanish brought them over.  So no potatoes in Westeros, right?  Makes sense, right?

Yes, it would… except that there are plenty of examples of other New World foods that are present in Westeros.   So why include them but not potatoes?

Continue reading “A quick note on history and food in ASOIAF”