Words of the Week

I started reading "Tom Sawyer" to the boys. They're not too interested in the story, but Tom definitely reminds me of the soon-to-be third-grader.

"Although my book is intended mainly for the entertainment of boys and girls, I hope it will not be shunned by men and women on that account, for part of my plan has been to try to pleasantly remind adults of what they once were themselves, and of how they felt and thought and talked, and what queer enterprises they sometimes engaged in."
- Mark Twain, in the preface to "Tom Sawyer"

Words of the Week

I've been reading the Chronicles of Narnia to the boys. (Mrs. Wahoo has been doing the heavy lifting, though). Can you tell?

Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God do you learn.
- C.S. Lewis

Words of the Week

Words to live by from one of the greatest presidents.

Whatever you are, be a good one.
- Abraham Lincoln

Words of the Week

Emma Lazarus was born 161 years ago on July 22, 1849. She wrote the poem - words often forgotten today - inscribed on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Words of the Week

Bo knows priorities. It's scary that he sounds like a voice of reason.

"My No. 1 goal is to keep my train on the track, and not worry about anybody else's. That's the way I've always lived my life. (But) if you're stupid enough to go out and do some stupid (stuff), then be a man and suffer the consequences. I have no sympathy for you."
- Bo Jackson, in an article in USA Today

Words of the Week

Grumpy is good for you. I knew there was a reason I like Eeyore.

"Whereas positive mood seems to promote creativity, flexibility, co-operation and reliance on mental shortcuts, negative moods trigger more attentive, careful thinking, paying greater attention to the external world."
- Joe Forgas, Australian psychology expert

Words of the Week

I'm obsessed with the World Cup now, and I also am obsessed by how people respond to their mistakes. Hey, we all make 'em.

“At a younger point in my life, it would have affected me more. You turn around and pick the ball up out of the back of the net and say, ‘right, that’s happened, let’s move on.’ You don’t really kick yourself for the next 50 years.”
- England goalkeeper Robert Green, who allowed a soft goal in a 1-1 tie against the United States

Words of the Week

I'm finding this to be true. It least I'm finding out that I have the capacity for infinite stupidity.

"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe."

— Albert Einstein (from goodreads.com)

Words of the Week

Remembering heroic actions, whatever the government may say.

"I asked the general, 'How can you say that there were doubts and yet you give us a Navy Cross citation that says that Sergeant Peralta did the exact same thing the Marines say he did?'" I told him, 'Every single Medal of Honor from now on is going to be tainted because of what's been done to Peralta.' The Marines are never going to give up. We're never going to give up fighting for Peralta's medal."

- George Sabga, "What Happened to Valor?", New York Times Magazine

Words of the Week

Stay true forever.

Don’t worry about losing your accent, a Southern Man tells better jokes.

- Drive-By Truckers, "Outfit"

Words of the Week

Remembering a baseball legend, Ernie Harwell.

“Baseball is Tradition in flannel knickerbockers. And Chagrin in being picked off base. It is Dignity in the blue serge of an umpire running the game by rule of thumb. It is Humor, holding its sides when an errant puppy eludes two groundskeepers and the fastest outfielder. And Pathos, dragging itself off the field after being knocked from the box.”- Ernie Harwell, "The Game for All America"

Words of the Week

Above all others, the one rule I want my kids to know. 

"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I loved you, that you also love one another."

- John 13:34

Words of the Week

Don't worry, be happy.

"The truth is, there's no better time to be happy than right now. If not now, when?"

- Richard Carlson, "Don't Sweat the Small Stuff"

Words of the Week

Wisdom from a wise, wise man.

Why aren't we flying? Because getting there is half the fun. You know that. 

- Clark Griswold, "Vacation"

Words of the Week

A reminder to myself of what really matters.

"His favorite game for a long, long time will be playing with you. Be available. Even when you're tired. Even when the presentation went south. Be available."

- Harry H. Harrison Jr., "Father to Son: Life Lessons on Raising a Boy"

Words of the Week

The darling mispronunciations of childhood! -- dear me, there's no music that can touch it; and how one grieves when it wastes away and dissolves into correctness, knowing it will never visit his bereaved ear again.

- Mark Twain, "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court"

Words of the Week

A reminder of why we watch the Olympics, of what the Games are supposed to mean.

It happened again Sunday. There the athletes were, smaller and more real suddenly, snapping pictures like tourists, waving to cameras -- "Hi, Mom!" -- milling aimlessly, mashed together in the most accomplished mosh pit in history. Canadians, Americans, Russians, Finns: all the stiffness, posing, pre-competition jitters was gone, dissolved in a moment of pure fun. There's nothing else like it in sports.

- S.L. Price on SI.com

Words of the Week

We watched a feature on the 30th anniversary of the Miracle on Ice with the kids yesterday. I still get chills whenever I hear this call.

"Do you believe in miracles? Yes!"

- Al Michaels, calling the end of Team USA's victory over the USSR in 1980

Words of the Week

Abraham Lincoln raised four sons and somehow managed to keep his sense of humor.*

"I have three walnuts and each wants two."

- Abraham Lincoln (from Carl Sandburg's biography)

*Unfortunately, Lincoln's personal life also was filled with tragedy. Only one of his sons reached adulthood.

Words of the Week

Old Wahoo just started reading Michael Lewis' "Home Game," a collection of essays on fatherhood. Lewis also wrote the book "Moneyball" and the book upon which the Academy Award-nominated film "The Blind Side" is based.

"... I realized that all around me fathers were pretending to do one thing, and feel one way, when in fact they were doing and feeling all sorts of things, and then engaging afterward in what amounted to an extended coverup."

- Michael Lewis, "Home Game"