Posts Tagged ‘holidays’
Songs About Bad Dads (Daddy Issues)
As a former contributor to The A.V. Club I vaguely wish I had contributed to this list of Songs About Bad Dads. Just in time for Father’s Day, of course. Then again, I haven’t heard of most of the tunes on here, so maybe I wouldn’t have been the best writer to tackle this assignment, despite my penchant for all things Daddy Issues.
This isn’t a song, but nobody has more daddy issues than Scott Summers, aka Cyclops.
There are the obligatory indie-rock bands (The Mountain Goats have two entries) but also some surprises, including, I shit you not, Shaquille O’Neal, who apparently recorded a song Biological Didn’t Bother, which I have to admit is a pretty good title. (By the way, because Amazon truly has everything, if you decide you really love Shaq’s song and want to sing/rap it yourself, you can get a karaoke version. Yes. Seriously. For reals.)
Make your way through the full list (it’s not that long) and you will be rewarded with a tune titled Daddy Wasn’t There from Austin Powers in Goldmember, performed by the fake band Ming Tea. It is, as the A.V. Club writers point out, rather catchy, kinda funny, and just a teeny bit sad to those of us with daddy issues of our own. Here’s the video (Bonus: you get to look at Susanna Hoffs.)
The Austin Powers’ movies are, in their way, filled with daddy issues, particularly Scott and his father Dr. Evil.
Click the link below to check out the full list of Bad Dad Songs from The A.V. Club. Here’s a tip: be a great dad and no one will write one of these about you. And happy father’s day!
Bad dads: 19 songs about shitty fathers · Inventory · The A.V. Club.
Related articles (Note: These are offsite links; DaddyTips takes no responsibility for outside content.)
New Essential James Taylor CD – Great Thanksgivukkah Gift
This new James Taylor double CD set is a great Chanukah / Thanksgivukkah gift. Or a gift for one of those other holidays. Christmas, I think they call it? It doesn’t get much attention from the media but I think it’s still sort of a big deal to a few people. You know. Like hockey.
Full disclosure: DaddyTips received a review copy of the new double CD, The Essential James Taylor. That said, receiving the press release announcing the new collection caused us to go on a bit of a JT shopping spree. Seriously. We took a picture. Look.
What can we say? We like James Taylor.
As for the item in question, it happens to be a great collection of JT’s music.
Even if you already own copies of “Never Die Young”, et al, you could do worse than to pop in this well-selected collection of great songs. As for gift giving, get “The Essential James Taylor” is a perfect fit for anyone on your list. (We’re assuming your list consists of people who like great music.)
Some reviewers on Amazon take issue with the “Essential” title, saying that they would have preferred one song over another. This is one of those dopey arguments that occurs with any collection from any musical artist. I happen to have a soft spot for “New Moon Shine“. Was I bothered by the fact that “Essential” doesn’t include the song The Frozen Man
Lord have mercy, of course not. (See what I did there? If not, Frozen happens to be a tune that I particularly love; I have fond memories of seeing JT do it live when he was on tour after “New Moon Shine” came out.
But once you start down that road, the one marked “Why Didn’t They Put (Fill In Song Title Here) On This 2 CD Set?”, you’ve kind of gone off the rails.
Bottom line: After listening to both discs, all I can say is that there isn’t a single bad track. How often can you say that about any collection of music?
Mimobot USB Flash Drives On Sale (DaddyDeals)
DaddyDeal for you — big sale on MIMOBOT® flash drives, including Batman (DKR, as in Dark Knight Returns, or maybe Dark Knight Rises — if it matters to you, look before you buy, which you should be doing anyway).
Look at that cute scowl. And his enormous cranium. Doesn’t it scream “buy me”?
Holiday gift giving season is coming up fast. Chanukah is on Thanksgiving. Seriously. If Chanukah is your holiday, you don’t have as much time to shop as you did last year; you might want to start shopping now.
Flash drives actually make good gifts for kids. Why? Lots of reasons.
– Older kids can use them for school.
– Younger kids can use them to move files from a computer to the flash drive and back.
– Younger siblings can stop being jealous of their older sibling’s flash drive.
All good reasons. And these particular flash drives are cute as well as useful.
Batman is listed as “almost gone”, which isn’t a big surprise considering the price is under 20 bucks as of this writing. (Pricing depends on memory size. And which character you buy. And other stuff. We just provide the link; details are at Mimobot.com.) If you don’t want Batman, Mimobot’s site has lots of other options, including Babo, Big Toe, Brickle, Emily the Strange (which we think looks a lot like Batwoman), Galacula, Galaxor2, Ice-Bat, and even Kilowog! Kilowog is “almost gone” as well. Why? Because Kilowog is AWESOME. (For those who don’t know, Kilowog is also a DC character, part of the Green Lantern Corps.)
Sale ends 10/31/13, aka Halloween. Scary! (Not actually that scary.) Hit the link below to get your favorite Mimobot on sale before it goes bye bye.
On Sale! – Save Big on Mimobot USB Flash Drives | Mimoco.
Kid-Friendly Android Apps On Sale (DaddyDeals)
Quick holiday DaddyDeal for Android — the Google Play Store has a bunch of apps on sale, many of them kid-friendly.
For example, Kids ABC Letters and Kids ABC Phonics and only $1.99 each.
Even cheaper is The Amazing Spider-Man, on sale for just 99 cents.
The game is a space hog, and no, we don’t mean it features Peter Porker, The Spectacular Spider-Ham. We mean it needs 2GB of memory. But it’s Spider-Man and usually costs $7 instead of 99 cents. So there’s that.
Also worth mentioning is the ever-popular Where’s My Water? That too is only 99 cents.
Full list of sales at TalkAndroid. Link below. These prices are correct as of this moment but may be for a limited time only so they may go up when you go to buy them. Happy holidays!
Roundup of Google Play app and game deals for the Holidays | TalkAndroid.com.
Ethan Hauser’s Reflections On Holiday Family Time
This was my favorite line:
There are, I imagine, legions of people for whom the holidays are bliss. Gracious sons and daughters, proud grandparents, unwounded mothers and aunts and cousins. Selfishly and bitterly, and no doubt wrongly, I believe there are two elements common to such people: there are Christmas trees in their homes, and no one in their families is a practicing psychotherapist.
via The Total Agony of Family Time – NYTimes.com.
Should True Christians Ditch The Tree?
First of all, Merry Christmas.
I say that as someone who does not, in fact, celebrate Christmas, at least not religiously. I have never been to Midnight Mass. I did, however, believe in Santa Claus until I was six years old, despite being Jewish.
Which brings me to this well-written opinion piece in the Green Bay Press Gazette: First Amendment column: Separate sacred, secular to end Christmas wars. Read the whole thing, it’s worth it.
Part of the essay points out that the “War on Christmas” is a load of crap. Here’s a key sentence for those who prefer to peruse:
So, why would faithful Christians insist on labeling the annual national blowout “Christmas”? Calling it “holiday” (though it’s clearly no “holy day”) doesn’t take Christ out of Christmas — it could help give Christ back to Christians.
See, shopping and trees have nothing to do with religion. They don’t. Really. Santa Claus isn’t in the Bible. “As Jon Stewart quipped, the bearded guy they’re defending is the wrong bearded guy.”
I enjoy Christmas — the parts that have nothing to do Christ. No offense meant, I respect all religions (I really do — ask me sometime). I happen not to be a Church-goer, so it’s not my thing. But Christmas trees? Sure. Christmas music? Love it. And I’m fine with anyone who wants to go to Church and also have a tree. But when someone starts with the “War on Christmas” garbage, it makes me nuts. How many businesses are closed on Hanukkah by government mandate? How many? Hm? Oh. That’s right. NONE. And how many Hanukkah specials are there on TV? Um… can’t think of any. So let’s be clear — there is no War on Christmas. At all.
There’s nothing wrong with believing in Jesus. There’s also nothing wrong with NOT believing in Jesus. (Ouch! Lightning bolt! Stop that!) There is something wrong with pretending that shopping is a religious experience. So let’s keep the peace on Earth, good will towards men, heck, keep Santa Claus. Just don’t try to tell me that Jolly Old Saint Nick is one of the Apostles. Because he’s not.
To sum up: Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and read Charles C. Haynes essay.
First Amendment column: Separate sacred, secular to end Christmas wars [Green Bay Press Gazette]
