Please nobody tell James Cameron

The waitress handed Precious Nephew a 3-D puzzle toy. We put together the puzzle and Precious gazed at it, perplexed. "Where are the glasses?" he asked. "How can it be 3-D if there are no glasses?" Uh... crap.

I am not ideologically opposed to 3-D movies. In general, I am in favor of the March of Progress and all that. My sister recently found a 1950 shelter magazine that breathlessly suggested housekeepers could enjoy unexpected benefits from modern, office machines like... staplers. I have a stapler – and a 3-hole punch, tape dispenser and copy machine – in every room of my house in which I am likely to encounter paper. Though in a few years, the use of paper could mark me as old fashioned all by itself.

I like synced sound and color movies, too. My problem with 3-D movies is selfish. I am one of the 2-12% of the population who just doesn't see them in anything resembling 3-D. This makes me the annoying wet blanket on movie night. And for that, I hold Mr. Cameron personally responsible.

Of course, my insistence on good 'ole 2-D makes me a pleasantly cheap date. Though as an adult who buys my own tickets, that's not such a great argument.

Sun to snow in less than two hours

I had family in town all last week. We journeyed to see the desert in bloom at the Antelope Valley Poppy Preserve – an amazing show after a particularly wet winter.





Afterward, we mobbed the lone ice cream truck on a sweltering strip of highway and looked up at the snow-covered San Gabriels in the distance. We decided to be THERE instead. Soon after, we were – with snow crunching underfoot and everything. Ain't Los Angeles grand?





We started the day a mere two miles from the Pacific Ocean, to boot.

Coming home, I experienced a ginormous Bass Pro Shop in Ontario, California. I read a post-apocalyptic script once that specified a Bass Pro Shop as the location for a scene. At the time, I found the specificity annoying. I don't need to know exact brands of product or retail locations from the scripts I read. Marketing departments do, but their needs shift and change – why limit available opportunities?

Now that I have seen the crazy over-the-top hugeness of the store in Ontario, I get it. A scene of post-apocalyptic travelers camped out in a camping goods store the size of a forest – and designed to look like a forest – is pretty freaking funny.

The flip book movie of your life

I've been playing with the new features in iPhoto '09. (Instead of polishing the latest draft of something else, I know.)

When you drag the cursor across one of the images on the Face cork board, it flips through the tagged photos in date order. If you've taken a lot of pictures, this flip sequence makes a little movie of your life.

It's particularly fun with kids. I just watched a flip book movie of Precious Nephew changing from tiny baby to gawky five-year old. Cool. For me, anyway.

In years to come, the parents of kids who grew up with digital photos will be able to massively embarrass their kids not with a few snaps, but with a flip book record of their precious darling's baby face gettin' older and older and older -- complete with bad haircuts and facial hair and wrinkles and everything. Hee-hee.

Nepotism

One last Precious Nephew post... 'cause it's a good one.

Precious Nephew loves the appalling plastic Gormiti figurines -- but the Italian toys have disappointingly little accompanying narrative video. Yesterday, Precious Nephew interrupted my sister and me to describe the convoluted plot to a Gormiti movie. I assumed this was a real movie, like the Transformers and Bionicle movies he spends hours describing. But no. My sister informed me that there is no movie containing the plot elements he was describing. Intrigued, I asked Precious Nephew if he was writing the movie and he said, "Yes. I am the author." I asked him if he wanted to be a screenwriter -- a person who writes movies -- when he grows up. And he said, "Yes. I will be a screenwriter. I will write all the movies."

He's four now. Considering he's already asked how to make Youtube videos, in a few short years, this kid might be writing all the movies. I'm looking at some kick-ass nepotism from Generation Underpants. Bring on the (literal) baby writers!

From the mouths of not-so-little babes

I visited Disneyland yesterday with Precious Nephew. He is four and Space Mountain was the only ride he requested by name -- which says something about the marvelous ubiquity of Disney marketing. How does a four-year old who lives in Virginia know about Space Mountain in Anaheim??

We thought the roller coaster might be a bit much for him -- he's tall and made the height requirement, but was clearly the youngest kid in line. But Precious Nephew insisted: Space Mountain or bust. We briefly tried to convince him that the rocket ship kiddie ride in front of Space Mountain was Space Mountain. He laughed at our foolishness, "That's not a mountain."

In the end, we needn't have worried. Precious Nephew clutched his mommy the whole way, but I screamed more than he did. I think next year we may need to up the thrills and visit Six Flags. Yikes.

Anyhow... here's a bit of marketing insight for anyone questioning the wisdom of Disney's Marvel purchase. As we left the park, Precious Nephew caught sight of the Lilo & Stitch image on a plastic ray gun. He turned to us and declared, "I used to love Disney Features... when I was little. Not any more."

Quick -- somebody buy that kid a comic book franchise!