The Dodge Family Blog » Plastic http://www.dodgefam.com Random Stuff about a Random Family Tue, 07 Sep 2010 16:47:06 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 The Starry-Eyed Puppet Show, etc. http://www.dodgefam.com/archives/47-the-starry-eyed-puppet-show-etc.html http://www.dodgefam.com/archives/47-the-starry-eyed-puppet-show-etc.html#comments Wed, 25 Jun 2008 22:50:48 +0000 Mike http://www.dodgefam.com/?p=47 The kids are having a great summer, my is doing well, and Johanna doesn’t feel super-sick all day anymore (though mornings and evenings are still a little rough.) All in all things seems to be turning out pretty well. We have two semi-new couches we got from Johanna’s Amanda for free-95, and yesterday Johanna actually rearranged the front room (or is it a room, or a living room?) and it looks really nice.

Last night we went to see State Fair at the Sugar Factory Playhouse, and it was a pretty good show. Some of my old friends there haven’t seen me since I was a single, not-even-anyone-on-the-horizon sort of guy. Finding out that baby Dodge is on the way was a real shocker.

But even with all this great news, the most memorable part of the recent week was when we decided to take the kids to a free at the West Jordana library for Home Evening. It was the Starry-Eyed Puppet Show, and it was really something else. What made it so great? Well, let me tell you…

Johanna’s friend Heather told us about a free at the library, and since we didn’t have any concrete plans for the evening, we decided to go and see if it was any good. We got there quite a bit early, and had some time to wait in the kids section of the library. There is a ‘bug’ theme going on right now, and kids are able to sign up for contests and clubs to earn prizes – plastic bugs among them. Of course, for little boys, there’s not much that can top a good plastic bug.

When the finally got under way, and we were completely amazed at the quality of the show. We thought it would be some hokey little thing with a card table and a guy with some socks on his hands or something. But there was a complete 2-tiered ‘puppet-stage’ with soundtrack, silly-string-sneezing noses, giant spiders (remember the bug theme), and the kids went crazy! The show was actually funny enough that most of the adults were laughing a bit, too. And since it was at the library, of course it was educational to boot.

The show was about things that “Bug” us, and one of the first I can recall was rap – a sorry excuse for music, in my humble opinion. They had a rap about the life-cycle of a butterfly. Then they had another thing that “bugs” a lot of people – bad poetry. Some boring-to-tears worm came out and read poetry about daffodils, and all of a sudden, daffodils are flying all over the place at this worm…he never does finish the poem.

During “scene changes” a puppet comes up singing “eency weency spider” to the audience, but he isn’t supposed to be part of the show. So the master puppet tries to shoo him off, and calls on his friend spider to help. Each time the scene changes, the singing puppet reappears, and the spider shooing him away gets bigger…until the spider is HUGE and the little puppet runs away screaming! A classic joke, but well played here.

The main story was about a worker bee who noticed that all villains are popular, while nobody remembers the heroes in those books (eg. Dracula, Moby Dick, etc.) So he decides that in order to be famous, he needs to be bad. But every bad thing he does ends up saving some other bug’s life, and he gets frustrated. In the end, his conscience gets the best of him, and he is awarded for being a good worker bee.

All in all, it was a really fun little show, and Johanna thinks it might be something we could do on the side for extra income – put on puppet shows. We will have to see about that, but this much I can definitely say: the Starry-Eyed was a real hoot, and I will not second guess the programs that the library puts on for kids again. I highly recommend looking into the nearest public library to see what youth activities they have planend in the near future – and going!

]]> http://www.dodgefam.com/archives/47-the-starry-eyed-puppet-show-etc.html/feed 0 Plastic Surgery http://www.dodgefam.com/archives/17-plastic-surgery.html http://www.dodgefam.com/archives/17-plastic-surgery.html#comments Wed, 26 Mar 2008 08:43:59 +0000 Mike http://home.mikezilla.us/?p=18 Last night, Johanna and I went “under the knife” so to speak. Earlier this year I lost close to 40 lbs on a she helped me with (which I will be going on again soon :-) ). Last night, we both decided that we need to lose a little bit more. So the gloves came off, we picked up the cutlery…and our debit card is no more. The “get out of ” plan has begun.

Yes, in today’s world it might seem drastic, but it is possible to live without any form of credit card at all. I cut up my regular visa a couple of months ago, and it has been alright. But we can do more. With my new , I am waiting to see what my take home pay is after insurance is taken out. But if it is anything close to what I hope it is, our will allow us to be completely free (except the house) fairly soon. When I did the math in January, we calculated 2 years to be free. It might take a little longer than that, but in the grand scheme of things, it still isn’t bad.

What does all this have to do with you? Well, more than you would think, actually. One of the reasons people find it so hard to get out of is that they want to spend time with their friends doing fun stuff. Fun stuff usually costs money. And they don’t have any money. So they “borrow” just a little, just this once…and the cycle starts again. We don’t want to get into that habit again.

As we begin the process of eliminating (blasted student loans!), we will likely decline to participate in any activities that are not in our . As of right now, that is pretty much everything. As we get our under control, we can start to make small allowances for other activities. Please be understanding and cooperative if you have a show or a sporting event you want to go to, as we will likely not be able to attend for a while…unless admission is .

Why cut up the card, though? What will that do? Well, it helps in the discipline, keeps us on track. We will pay all of our utility bills online, and we will withdraw for groceries, household goods, and childcare expenses. We have actual envelopes that will hold all of our funds for the month, and if an envelope runs out…there is no “borrowing” from another one. We can evaluate how much is in each envelope at the end of the month, and if some categories are short and others are alright, we can shuffle the money around.

Here’s to getting free! WOOHOO!!!

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