in bed drifting but awake and listening to the footsteps approach until they are on top of me
babo: What time is it?
fallie: BOg!*
babo: What time did you get up?
fallie: BOO!**
babo: Is your sister up?
fallie: No!
babo: Ok, give us a few more minutes, we will be downstairs soon.
(fallie with antlers via brerfly)
*8:09
**8:00
reblogged from brerfly
gratuitous picture of a disembodied mumblelarm
field trip
I took the skull girls to the ice cream factory yesterday so they can have a good mental picture of where I spend most of my time now. We did all the standard stuff. They sat in my desk chair, drew on the glass walls of my office with dry erase markers, and I arranged for a few portraits via the motion sensitive security cameras. Then they raided the snack cabinet for cheezy puffed corn snacks and candy covered chocolate snacks, and I taught them how to mix a cocanade* from the communal soda fountain.
Once they were appropriately snacked up and jacked up, Finn played Up on the game console machine while Fallie watched and laughed. In general, we made a bunch of noise and mocked the accounting nerds who were actually working on budgets or taxes or some other deadline driven general accounting nerdery.
I was going to make them skull girls identity badges, but the junior identity badge officer must have changed his password from the one I shoulder harvested, and I couldn’t log into the machine. The girls had very few questions, but I am sure that they will have plenty of comments over the coming week. Despite the fact that I was in the office on a Saturday, it was a pretty fun morning.
*cocanade is two-thirds cola product and one-third high fructose lemonade product. It should probably be called crackanade because of its brief effective window and its tooth-grinding moreish qualities, or maybe methanade because it is produced in a slightly creepy communal kitchen, but cocanade is a more natural portmanteau.
southern snowstorm
Archival photograph from the biggest snow day we have had in Atlanta (even better than this one). It was not good sledding snow, but it was perfect for rolling huge snow man torsos and crunchy exploding snowballs. The dirty dirty is supposed to get wicked cold next week, so maybe we will get to do it again.
(left to right: floyd, orangina, mumblelard, fallie, finn)
whatever you do
Two of my lovely girls being lovely together.
fallie knows what ralphie really says when he spills the lugnuts and it’s not fudge
finishing touches
…and then a bath, a small dinner, a christmas eve present, some wrestling, a christmas movie and popcorn, girl children bedtime, stocking assembly, adult bedtime, ;) , sleep, and it is the big day. happy solstice feast day observed eve! -mumblelard
finn and fall
Their names do not have a really clear etymology or a good anecdote with a satisfying hook. The discomfort that this lack of explanation causes some people is one of many things I didn’t anticipate. The names are the explanation and any elaboration is doomed, but …
They are not common names, but they are not bizarre. Even people who consider them strange at first can’t help but see that they are right and natural. They can be read and pronounced by almost anyone.
The shape was the most important thing and the hardest to explain. They fit certain twitchy rules or preferences for the composition of words in terms of spelling, shape and sound that I have wired into me.When I learned to read, letters fought battles in my head. Some won and some lost and words were the diagrams of these conflicts. “Finn” and “Fall” are battles that haven’t happened yet. The forces have been rallied, but it isn’t clear what happens next.
They are short and monosyllabic and punchy but they still have room for a double consonant. Double consonants tickle me for some reason.
The letter F is soft but strong to me. It bends in the wind.
They have associations with feminine names like Ann or Holly, but they still have an androgynous edge to them. A tiny bit of freedom from expectations.
My grandmother is Finnish. She never called herself a finn, but it did help. Twain did not really have anything to do with coming up with Finn’s name but it was probably supporting evidence once we did. One of Fallie’s other names was Auli which might have something to do with us often saying Fallie not Fall, but I don’t know. Likewise, Fallie’s name did not come from her autumn birth but it probably helped after we came up with it.
I have associative stories in my head that give the names the feeling of exhortations of warriors to me but I could not explain the stories clearly. They are pictures and pictures of words but not made of words. It has something to do with Finn to fin to end to end times and Fall to fall from grace to cast out to the beginning of life outside of a paradise to the life we all live now and them carrying the strength or power to start and end human history or one cycle of it so addressing any that challenge them will only require the effort of their smallest finger, if that. Everytime I read this paragraph it gets further from the truth. I don’t know.
That is the best I can do explaining it. I am not trying to sound vague, but the truth about this is vague. I wish I had a good quick story because people get the impression that I am being evasive when I just shrug my shoulders in answer to this question, but really a shrug is the best I can do.
gratuitous picture of mumblelard and fallie on the day after thanksgiving
Fallie tops the tree on the odd years, but as soon as one of them is as tall as me, I get a turn again.
long fallie couch fort
fallie (self portrait)
Fallie has been arranging a workshop for herself in the basement with crafting, reading, and relaxing areas. She took this self portrait after I let her use the camera to photograph her work.
my lovely girls
They have been making fun of us for taking so long to finish one book. Floyd is trying to prove that it is a difficult book to read quickly, but they are not convinced.
i will be a tree that you come home to
We had a rough morning yesterday.
gratuitous picture of a couch nap
river haint
Last night we went on a night hike down by the river. It was part of an owl presentation at the Chattahoochee National Recreation Area near us (thank you Jimmy!) It was a fun night.
