Boy Camp 2014

Boy Camp, a mescla of high and low. The girls are camping in the Pennsylvania wilderness, getting their feminist on, while we sleep late and watch a lot of television. We look like we smell of beer, but there is no beer.

Last night, culture. It was opening night for the Cleveland Shakespeare Festival production of Romeo & Juliet, set this night in the Coventry Peace Park. Highlight of the evening were the rising of a half-dozen police vehicles which sped east along Euclid Heights Blvd. just as the deadly fight began Tybalt, Mercutio and Romeo.

“Mercutio, one of the ballsiest males in Shakespeare, is played for some elusive purpose, by a woman.”
- Jim Damico, The Free Times (1994)

 As intense as that was, it was hard to keep a straight face when, just as the Prince decreed, “Bear hence this body,” an ambulance flew down the street behind him.

(Side note: Calimoxo is an excellent drink to put into a travel coffee mug.)

After we went home and watched Red vs. Blue and MST3K: Gamera.

"Kenny!!!"

Saturday morning I made chicken & waffles, and then to School of Rock, where the boy kept time rather successfully, in spite of an injury to his right hand at a ball game last Tuesday. I wrote.

We took a visit to the garden center, and then he introduced me to Critical Hit Games across the street. Some day I am just going to drop him off there and let the geeks teach him how to play Dungeons & Dragons while the wife and I have drinks at Melt.

Just kidding. We don't like to go to Melt.

Spreading hardwood mulch was thwarted by a delightful summer downpour, but that’s cool, that’s why we have Minecraft videos.

"This is crap."

 Saturday evening things got a little crazy, as we made our annual pilgrimage to go bowlin’ in Solon. The boy was joined by two of his high octane companions, fortunately I had Dr. D. as company and got to engage in the first big-people conversation in 24 hours.

The good doctor inquired about my writing, after I had claimed to have drafted one page that morning. He asked, “When that happens, do you think, Euerka! I have written a page! Or is it more like, Ugh. Only one page.” What a great question!

In that morning’s case the latter, but this morning, as the boy played video games with a friend who had slept over, I wrote another page and thought, Eureka!

Photo: Brent Durken

Our final journey before the women returned was to attend Emily & Benjamin's wedding in St. Theodosius in Tremont. Such an iconic building, but I had never been inside. It's beautiful! The boy was very patient, though I regretted my ignorance that Orthodox services are spent largely standing. If I had known this, I would have chosen an aisle seat so the boy could see the proceedings, but he was very mature and patient.

As most in attendance were not Orthodox, the priest was explaining the service as we went. The boy, who remained attentive, whispered to me, "It's like he's giving us a tour of his process."  That's my son.

Boy Camp 2012

For three years running, the wife and girl have journeyed to the Land Project Feminist Girls' Camp in western PA to get their empowerment in. Two years ago, when the boy was only five, he was less than pleased with the idea that his sister got special mom-alone time. What was going to happen for an entire weekend without Mom in the house?

I swiftly replied, "Boy Camp."  What is Boy Camp, he asked. I said I was pretty sure it involved bowling.  He was no longer disappointed.

Really, Lassester? Really?

The first year was pretty simple, father-son bowling, burgers and beer (for Dad.) Last year we also walked up the movie theater to watch Cars 2, which is without question the worst thing Pixar has ever produced.

Last month at a bowling birthday party I was sharing the joys of Boy Camp with a fellow father and an invitation was extended to Dr. Dean and Mr. Boy to join us. This was a good move, as my boy has become more interested in racking up tickets-for-crap from the arcade than tossing the ball which he is now finally strong and tall enough to sling properly. Mr. Boy provided a third-way, which was to introduce the extremely welcome art of hip-hop dancing into the mix. As everyone knows, Party Rock Anthem was written for seven year-olds, and they each had the chance to get their groove on.

Can I also mention that during our second game, a had a turkey -- and then a double? Oh, I guess I did.

Boy Camp also means super-late bedtime. He was knocked-out cold by 10.30.

The next morning it was sleeping-in, pancakes and a long-awaited haircut. The boy asked for a buzzcut over three years ago, but his last was last fall he's become quite the moptop since. I have not forgotten how much I enjoy cutting his hair.

Cleveland, 1845

The summer baseball season came to a conclusion with 44-14 blowout (which cannot be independently confirmed) after which we drove to the Lantern Theater at Canal Corners Farm and Market to see Singin' On The Ohio by Eric Schmiedl.  The Lantern is a former dairy barn adjacent to the former Ohio & Erie Canal, and the show is an historical-fiction about an adventurous young woman (Andrea Belser) and a flinty Irish canal boat captain (Mr. Schmiedl) making their way down the canal to Portsmouth. It's fun to watch the eternally cheerful Eric S. play someone aloof and grumpy!

East Bank Images

Yesterday was also my very last chance to catch Henry VIII, this time at the Shaker Colonnade. The boy had already seen the show twice, so I promised him ice cream after if he remained a good audience member. There was some dude in the crowd who was recording the song on his iPhone. If anyone knows who that was, I'd really like to see it -- the song was the most powerful I'd heard it last night. I think having them so close to the audience really helped.

The Maple Bacon will slap your grandmother.

We rounded out the evening -- another late evening -- at Sweetie Fry. If I were a cupcake I would write an entire post on how this one corner ice cream store puts Cleveland on par with any major city in America!!!  (In spite of, you know, everything else.) The boy got Key Lime Pie, I got New York Cheesecake with blueberry compote, and we shared the chicken tender fries ... which I assumed would be chicken tender-seasoned fries or something, but no, it was a basket a fresh fries with three fried chicken strips on top. No complaints!

The boy observed, "This is the kind of food you eat when you are up past your bedtime."

Just evil.

The day before, as promised, we got a copy of Epic Mickey from Redbox. The boy tried it out during various downtimes yesterday, but gave up on it and went back to Pokemon. I uttered those fateful words, "Let me give it a try ..."

Thing is, I don't play video games anymore. They bore the hell out of me. Five minutes, tops, I'm done. Repetition, repetition, repetition, ugh. Since we got the wii my only interaction with it has been to watch Poirot on Netflix.

Before I had realized it, and with the boy's encouragement, I had plunged headlong into this game, completed three levels, two and a half hours had passed, I was sick to my stomach and had a splitting headache, which took the rest of the day to abate.

But seriously, once I had emerged from the world of Epic Mickey, I could not articulate a thought, I could not speak in a complete sentence, for at least a half-hour. I just made lunch, brainlessly, and ate it with my son saying, "huh?" and "what?" and "I'm sorry, would you repeat that?" over and over again.

Suck it down.

This hasn't happened to me since I spent every day of 1999 doing absolutely nothing but playing Duke Nukem. It is my personal belief that the emergence of ADHD in the 1980s, which afflicts a disproportionate number middle-class, white boys, in often the misdiagnosis of symptoms brought about by video games. Or maybe that's just with this middle-class, white boy.

The rest of the day was spent reading epic battles from The Dangerous Book for Boys, watching small children catch very large fish on YouTube, hacking low-hinging limbs from the tree by the sidewalk, and engaging in the manly art of hair dye.

Then the ladies returned, and we were very happy to see them.

"Let's Go Bowling!"

"Every size, age, kind, breed and class from all walks of life."
Except ... well, you know ...
Last year my wife took the girl to what they call Girl Camp, a weekend of feminist mysticism and indoctrination. Seriously, though I think they sit around a campfire and sing and cry and talk about boys. So the boy and I declared our home Boy Camp which meant we slept in, farted a lot and went BOWLING.

This weekend ... BOY CAMP YEAR 2: This time, it's Star Wars.

Bowling Proprietors Association of America presents:
Let's Go Bowling


Growing up in Bay Village, my parents would take me with them on League Night, when I was too old for them to seem to justify paying for a babysitter, but too young to leave at home on my own, like when I was eight or nine years-old. Besides, I knew there would be pizza at Dominic's afterwards.

Bay Lanes in those days was full of smoke, smelled of beer, and the "kids' room" was a plexiglass cage with broken toys and a black and white TV with very poor reception. Those under 18 were not allowed in the "lounge" which was a slightly more respectable plexiglass cage in the swinging 1970s style. I would often slip in quickly to snab one of the cardboard coasters or bev naps with dirty cartoons on them.

DID YOU KNOW ..?

Nixon did not build the first bowling alley in the White House. He did have a new alley constructed (paid for by donors, not taxpayers) under the North Portico in 1969. However, bowling lanes were originally installed in the West Wing in 1947 as a birthday present for President Truman ... who did not like bowling. The staff, however, formed a league. Makes you wonder which bowl-happy member of the staff thought that might be a good present.

These lanes were torn out in 1955 to create a mimeograph room.

Sources:
The White House Museum
Secret Bay Village

We're going bowlin' ... so don't leave 'er in Solon.

Ladies and gentlemen ... Charlie Mosbrook.
We are having a big Cleveland weekend.

Tonight it's Noblefest, the annual PTA fundraiser/carnival held at my daughter's elementary school. It was cancelled last week due to (what else?) rain, and Hell or highwater, literally, it will be taking place this evening. Come join us!

Tomorrow at noon begins the Hessler Street Fair. Time to buy a big, fat pea pod sandwich and a lemonade, get the boy a new tie-dye, straightarm the Communists and listen to the hippie-dippie stylings of Charlie Mosbrook

Charlie goes on at 2 PM people, be there.

If we have been left behind at 6 pm, then the Great Lakes Theater Festival Stratford-Upon-Avon High School Prom is my next stop ... I am playing Vice Principal Shakespeare and the girl will be attending as one of my sprites. Just spent the morning fixing up Gray's Armory in anticipation of the event.

I need to post about the Armory some time soon, it's fascinating.

Sunday, the boy celebrates his sixth birthday in Full Cleveland style, having a big old bowling party at Freeway Lanes in Solon.