The Man With the Yellow Hat is a Very Peculiar Man
My oldest son loves him some Curious George. The books, the show (on PBS) and even the toys, but he wouldn’t buy one of those toys because it’s not a superhero or a Planet Hero, but if those didn’t exist he probably would buy some Curious George toys.
He and I read Curious George books probably twice a week thanks to the library. Curious George Goes to a Restaurant. Curious George Plays Baseball. Curious George Flies a Kite. Curious George is Bored. Things like that. You know the drill.
And no one in this country or world would know about Curious George if it wasn’t for his ubiquitous friend, the Man With the Yellow Hat (MYWH for those in the know). He has no name, no history, he just exists as the Man With the Yellow Hat. We do know a few things about him though. He is an explorer, as we know from the first Curious George book. He also appears to be wealthy, having an apartment in “the city” and a house in “the country” and because if this he is a man of leisure. There are no real world locations in Curious George, but one can assume that given the history of his creators, the husband and wife team of H.A. and Margret Rey, who fled Nazi Germany to eventually live in New York City, that New York is “the city”, but I’m completely and totally getting off topic.
The Man With the Yellow Hat is ALWAYS wearing yellow. He never wears blue. He never wears red. He never wears black. Only yellow. And it can only be yellow or else part of his persona and psyche is gone, like a war veteran who lost a limb that can still feel it itching when he gets back to “the world”. This weird character trait would make it difficult for a normal person to shop for clothes, but he does live in “the city”, so he probably gets his clothes tailor-made at some haberdasher, being a wealthy gentlemen and all.
And for the love of all that is holy, don’t lose his hat. Few things are worse than this scenario. As he said in one of the episodes of the Curious George show, which I watch with my oldest, “Without my hat, I’m just not…me.” No kidding, Man With the Yellow Hat. Then you’re just “The Man”. A generic plot point in a children’s book. He. Is. Nothing.
The Man With the Yellow Hat also seems strange just for the fact that he’s a strapping young guy in a city full of available ogling females who lives with a monkey. Not that there’s anything wrong with that! And he’s always leaving George by himself, saying things like, “Now I’ve got to conveniently go over here. Don’t get into trouble!” What does this moron think is going to happen, George is going to just sit there? Everybody in the books calls the monkey CURIOUS George. There is no “Mild-Mannered George” or “Dullard George”.
But all in all the Man With the Yellow Hat seems to live a pretty cool life. He’s an explorer, he drives a convertible, he flies a plane, he has a pet monkey. My oldest would kill for that life.
Who Are All These People on Facebook and Why do They Want to be My Friend?
Kim kept bugging me. “You should join Facebook. Everybody’s getting on Facebook. You’ll find people on Facebook that you haven’t talked to in years. You should join Facebook.”
Facebook is a social networking site, meaning that people that you talk to already on a regular basis can now have another way of talking to you on a regular basis. You can chat, email, do little applications (I have book reviews for books I’ve read/am reading on there) and other stuff. It’s pretty easy to connect with people but not so easy to always find people you’re looking for. Say you have a friend named “Bill Smith”. Good luck finding the correct Bill Smith, especially if he didn’t include a picture of himself in his profile.
And people who are friends with other people that you’re already friends with will then try to add you as their friend (yes, it sounds complicated). Someone will want to add you to their “friend list” and then they’ll email you asking your permission. You can ignore, deny or approve their request. If you approve it you get added to their friend list, and then you two are “friends” in the virtual sense.
It only gets weird when someone that you don’t know suddenly emails you asking to be friends. I got a request the other day from someone that I literally had no idea who they were. Some girl. Supposedly we went to high school together. Did I recognize her? Nope.
So what do you do then? Be a jerk and not add her? Deny her? Or just ignore her? Or do you say, “Okay, let’s take the plunge and see where this goes.” I more often than not ignore these people. I don’t think of myself as a jerk; I just don’t want to be friends with everyone. I’m pretty selective. If I like you and I have some idea of who you are, then sure, I’ll add you, but if you’re like this girl that I’ve never met before, forget it sister, ain’t gonna happen no matter what tangential link we share. It’s like someone walks up to you on the street or in a bus and just starts talking to you. “Hey, you look familiar.” Can’t place them to save your life. Then they say, “Let’s be friends.”
I like to know who my friends are and those who aren’t my friends. What’s so wrong with that? So if I don’t know you and you want to be my friend on Facebook, think twice.
This Freaking RSS Feed Stuff…
Everyone,
I’ve decided to leave the protective arms of Feedburner behind for RSS and email feeds. They broken my feeds (for both this site and tellyouwhatithink.com) over and over and wouldn’t couldn’t let me send out the last post that I’d put on tellyouwhatithink.com letting everyone know that I was moving the blog to glennvance.com for some stupid reason. Enough is enough! I’m hosting the feeds from now on myself. I’ve always prided myself on self reliance. Who needs a Google-run company to do it for you when you can do it yourself?
I’m going to do away with the email feed for awhile. I can’t get the plugin that runs it to work. Sorry.
So, if you’re reading this, and you subscribed at some time to my website’s feed, please point your eyes to the new feed in the upper right of the grey bar at the top of the screen. Thank you.
A Very Big Week
Man, I haven’t written on here in about a month I think. A lot has happened since I last wrote any posts. What has happened? I lost my job. Got let go.
And looking for work hasn’t been terrible. I’ve had quite a few nibbles on the resume, had an interview, working the emails and the phone. Something will happen soon, I can feel it. Then I won’t be Mr. Mom anymore.
But that’s not what this post is all about. It’s going to be a very big week around here. In no particular order -
- Noah starts kindergarten. Monday August 25th, 2008. Today. Ms. Owen is his teacher. Is daddy nervous? Oh lord yes. He will be a Seahawk, as the picture to the right shows. That’s the school mascot.
- Peyton starts mother’s day out. Is daddy nervous about this? Nah, not as much. It’s mother’s day out, not kindergarten. Minor league stuff.
- I am finally starting the long march to the Master’s degree this week out at UTA. Colonial America to 1763 will be the first class. I couldn’t be more excited and nervous at the same time. It’s going to completely rock.
So that’s life right now. I miss writing here. Gotta finish up that Operation Downfall series. How will it end? Who knows.My bet? The Americans win. I’ve got a shiny penny riding on the outcome, believe me.