[url=http://www.aintitcool.com/node/32321]25 Years Ago: The Best Genre Year Ever – Part V! PORKY’S, FAST TIMES, And LAST AMERICAN VIRGIN![/url]

Check it out…more great memories of good (and not so good) movies.

I for one, saw [b]The Last American Virgin[/b] and these other three films when I was way too young to understand and a few years before the idea of teen lust and love would ever even occur to me. But, I watched this on DVD last year and I was also surprised (like the reviewer on AICN) at how honest and rather unexpected the ending was. It seemed sort of out of place given the first hour and a half of goofiness but it was certainly realistic.

The babies have moved on from eating squash, to sweet potatoes to squash and now onto peas. Robyn and I were quite keen to see how they would react to the different foods that we introduced, but it’s funny because they really have not shown much reaction to each new taste! I guess we were just expecting some kind of funny face or reaction, but they were quite calm.

[img]http://www.oninohana.com/gallery2/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=1013&g2_serialNumber=3[/img]

Some more video….

Sometimes life seems to follow a theme of sorts. A conversation that Robyn and I had a few nights ago along with raising two kids and then listening to a couple of recent Podcasts and watching episode 2 of [url=http://www.sho.com/site/thisamericanlife/]This American Life on Showtime[/url] got me thinking and asking myself how much of what we do and feel is “hard-wired” and just how much is learned or comes about through life’s little twists and turns?

One of the features on [url=http://www.sho.com/site/thisamericanlife/]This American Life[/url] was about a 12 year old boy who claims that he doesn’t believe in love. When asked if he loves his parents, he responded that he liked them and thinks they are nice people, but he doesn’t “love” them. Although he is growing up in a loving household with intelligent, caring parents and siblings, he believes that love really doesn’t exist and that all the rest of us are experiencing some kind of delusion. Of course, the average person’s response to this kid would be “you just haven’t experienced enough in your young lifetime to understand love”. But what if he’s right and he’s seeing through this delusion by which the rest of us are blinded?

While laying in bed the other night, Robyn and I were talking about the kids (as we do pretty much each night before falling asleep) and how we love them so much that it hurts. It [i]literally hurts[/i]. The thought of anything happening to them or of them being in any pain is simply unbearable. I mentioned that I thought this is a consequence of any loving relationship. Along with the good feelings that love brings us, it has a sort of “dark side” I guess. I’ve read that the feelings that we call “love” and attachment are considered by some scientists to be a biological function that keeps the family unit together long enough to ensure the survival of the young. I guess over the millenia, we humans have added a little bit to this with our sentimental feelings and whacky marriage customs. Maybe that 12 year old was right?

Earlier in the week, I saw this article on the [url=http://www.cnn.com]CNN[/url] headlines: [url=http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/04/04/neurotheology/index.html]Are humans hard-wired for faith?[/url] In addition, [url=http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=13]Fresh Air[/url] featured interviews with [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dawkins]Richard Dawkins[/url] and [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Collins]Francis Collins[/url] who presented their extremely polar views on God, religion and science. I pretty much consider myself to be [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism]Agnostic[/url] in my “beliefs” – do I even have any beliefs then?

[url=http://www.aintitcool.com/node/32131]25 Years Ago: Capone Remembers POLTERGEIST![/url]

Some updates on recent posts….

Much to our relief (I’m knocking on the wooden table as I type this!), the babies are generally sleeping quietly through the night in their cribs. Gabriel tends to wake up and cry until we come in to soothe him at least a few times a night between bedtime and midnight. But, from midnight to 6am he seems to sleep pretty soundly – or at least not loudly enough for us to wake up.

I went to the doctor last week about my wrist. Happily, after assessing the movement and my pain levels, he pronounced my case a mild one and indicated that he would not recommned a cortisone shot this time around. He gave me a wrist brace that comes up over my thumb to immobilize the wrist and thumb while I sleep and suggested that I take ibuprofen for the inflamation. So far, this seems to be helping because I haven’t had the levels of pain that I did a few weeks back.

I finished [b]From a Buick 8[/b] by Stephen King. I had taken some time off from reading the Gunslinger series, and I somehow ended up reading another King book as a distraction. This book was an interesting variation on his usual theme that focused more on the characters than on the events in which the characters find themselves. I think this may have something to do with this being his first book completed after [url=http://www.cnn.com/books/news/9906/20/stephen.king.accident.02/]his brush with death[/url] several years ago. He seems to be saying that the search for answers about the unexpected turns that our lives so often take is generally futile. There are no firm answers and no Hollywood endings where everything is neatly wrapped up.

[url=http://www.gotoquiz.com/what_american_accent_do_you_have]Test yours![/url]

I got an email with this information the other day and I thought it was interesting. I can’t vouch for everything here, but I did check a few of the facts and it turns out the ones I looked up were true!

[b]New Jersey Facts[/b]

[list]
[*]New Jersey is a peninsula.
[*]Highlands, New Jersey has the highest elevation along the entire eastern seaboard, from Maine to Florida .
[*]New Jersey is the only state where all of its counties are classified as metropolitan areas.
[*]New Jersey has more race horses than Kentucky .
[*]New Jersey has more Cubans in Union City (1 sq mi.) than Havana , Cuba .
[*]New Jersey has the densest system of highways and railroads in the US .
[*]New Jersey has the highest cost of living.
[*]New Jersey has the highest cost of auto insurance.
[*]New Jersey has the highest property taxes in the nation.
[*]New Jersey has the most diners in the world and is sometimes referred to as the “Diner Capital of the World.”
[*]New Jersey is home to the original Mystery Pork Parts Club (no, not Spam): Taylor Ham or Pork Roll.
[*]Home to the less mysterious but the best Italian hot dogs and Italian sausage w/peppers and onions.
[*]North Jersey has the most shopping malls in one area in the world, with seven major shopping malls in a 25 square mile radius.
[*]New Jersey is home to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island .
[*]The Passaic River was the site of the first submarine ride by inventor John P. Holland .
[*]New Jersey has 50+ resort cities & towns; some of the nation’s most famous: Asbury Park, Wildwood, Atlantic City, Seaside Heights, Long Branch, Cape May.
[*]New Jersey has the most stringent testing along our coastline for water quality control than any other seaboard state in the entire country.
[*]New Jersey is a leading technology & industrial state and is the largest chemical producing state in the nation when you include pharmaceuticals.
[*]Jersey tomatoes are known the world over as being the best you can buy.
[*]New Jersey is the world leader in blueberry and cranberry production (and here you thought Massachusetts ?)
[*]Here’s to New Jersey – the toast of the country! In 1642, the first brewery in America , opened in Hoboken .
[*]New Jersey rocks! The famous Les Paul invented the first solid body electric guitar in Mahwah, in 1940.
[*]New Jersey is a major seaport state with the largest seaport in the US , located in Elizabeth . Nearly 80 percent of what our nation imports comes through Elizabeth Seaport first.
[*]New Jersey is home to one of the nation’s busiest airports (in Newark ), Liberty International.
[*]George Washington slept here. Several important Revolutionary War battles were fought on New Jersey soil, led by General George Washington.
[*]The light bulb, phonograph (record player), and motion picture projector, were invented by Thomas Edison in his Menlo Park , NJ , laboratory.
[*]We also boast the first town ever lit by incandescent bulbs.
[*]The first seaplane was built in Keyport , NJ .
[*]The first airmail (to Chicago ) was started from Keyport , NJ .
[*]The first phonograph records were made in Camden , NJ
[*]New Jersey was home to the Miss America Pageant held in Atlantic City.
[*]The game Monopoly, played all over the world, named the streets on its playing board after the actual streets in Atlantic City.
[*]And, Atlantic City has the longest boardwalk in the world, not to mention salt water taffy.
[*]New Jersey has the largest petroleum containment area outside of the Middle East countries.
[*]The first Indian reservation was in New Jersey , in the Watchung Mountains.
[*]New Jersey has the tallest water-tower in the world in Union , NJ. [i]actually, NJ is home to the tallest water SPHERE in the world[/i]
[*]New Jersey had the first medical center, in Jersey City
[*]The Pulaski SkyWay, from Jersey City to Newark , was the first skyway highway.
[*]NJ built the first tunnel under a river, the Hudson ( Holland Tunnel).
[*]The first baseball game was played in Hoboken , NJ , which is also the birthplace of Frank Sinatra.
[*]The first intercollegiate football game was played in New Brunswick in 1889 ( Rutgers College played Princeton ).
[*]The first drive-in movie theater was opened in Camden , NJ
[*]New Jersey is home to both of “NEW YORK’S” pro football teams!
[*]The first radio station and broadcast was in Paterson , NJ .
[*]The first FM radio broadcast was made from Alpine, NJ, by Maj. Thomas Armstrong.
[*]All New Jersey natives: Sal Martorano, Jack Nicholson, Bruce Springsteen, Bon Jovi, Jason Alexander, Queen Latifah, Susan Sarandon, Connie Francis, Shaq, Judy Blume, Aaron Burr, Joan Robertson, Ken Kross, Dionne Warwick, Sarah Vaughn, Budd Abbott, Lou Costello, Alan Ginsberg, Norman Mailer, Marilynn McCoo, Flip Wilson, Alexander Hamilton, Whitney Houston, Eddie Money, Linda McElroy, Eileen Donnelly, Grover Cleveland, Woodrow Wilson, Walt Whitman, Jerry Lewis, Tom Cruise, Joyce Kilmer, Bruce Willis, Caesar Romero, Lauryn Hill, Ice-T, Nick Adams, Nathan Lane, Sandra Dee, Danny DeVito, Richard Conti, Joe Pesci, Joe Piscopo, Joe DePasquale, Robert Blake, John Forsythe, Meryl Streep, Loretta Swit, Norman Lloyd, Paul Simon, Jerry Herman, Gorden McCrae, Kevin Spacey, John Travolta, Phyllis Newman, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Eva Marie Saint, Elisabeth Shue, Zebulon Pike, James Fennimore Cooper, Admiral Wm.Halsey,Jr., Dave Thomas (Wendy’s), William Carlos Williams, Ray Liotta, Robert Wuhl, Bob Reyers, Paul Robeson, Ernie Kovacs, Joseph Macchia, Kelly Ripa, and, of course, Francis Albert Sinatra and “Uncle Floyd” Vivino.
[*]The Great Falls in Paterson , on the Passaic River , is the 2nd highest waterfall on the East Coast of the US .
[/list]

I am sitting at the dining room table tapping this out on the keyboard of our laptop while Robyn makes the bottles for tomorrow and the baby monitor relays the soothing sounds of ocean waves coming from the sound machine in the babies’ room. Yes, that’s right, the babies’ room. Tonight is the first night that we put Chloe and Gabriel down in their cribs in their room instead of in their bouncy seats on the floor of our bedroom.

So far, about an hour and a half in, there has been some crying and fussiness, but it’s generally been quiet. We’ve been in to check on them about 5 times each and each time, they’ve been fine and look very cute sleeping in their little [url=http://www.amazon.com/HALO-SleepSack-Wearable-Fleece-Blanket/dp/B00009MOO2]sleepsacks[/url].