B. Hudson

I love my kids.  Technically I only have one kid, but I claim the other two even if they will always be “step” kids.  I love them.

If you know me or have read from me before you know the wild/crazy times that my house seems to continually spin in.  Life has not really changed over the last several months since I blogged about my kids.

My Oldest (daughter) is 11 (12 in December).  She is in 5th grade, and has tested to be in the 70th percentile of 5th graders in the state of Indiana.  She’s a bonehead.  I don’t TRULY know how to address her most of the time.  Her report card:  all D’s except for a C+.  I hear you in the back.. “wait.. what about this 70th percentile crap, brent!”  I don’t know.  I just don’t.  The girl is bright beyond bright, but its far more fun to goof around with friends than to actually do WORK.  Although, to her credit she DOES work, but she blazes through it at lightspeed and typically does relatively poor.  I don’t expect straight A’s on my kids.  I think that’s unfair.  I like have expectations that go under what I’m really capable of, its like a cushion but its one I extend to my kids as well.  What I do expect is mostly B’s.. Some A’s and if you had a rough time in a subject a C is okay.  Sound terrible?  Doesn’t to me..  My daughter shows me her report card of all D’s and 1 C+, and says.. “I got a C in Math!  Why are you upset?”  I blacked out after that and woke to find out I had been red faced wild eyed angry.. here on known as “crazed maniac mode, or CMM”.  So that was over.  Girl is done with her grade review.. now for my boy

Preface on the boy.  He reads at a 6-7th grade level.  He tests into the 85+percentile in Indiana schools.  He.. Has decided he’s boycotting 4th grade.  Not in like a socio-political outcry..  He just doesn’t “feel” like doing work.  What does he do in class?  Color.. and when the crayons/pencils are taken away for this..he makes paper airplanes or stares at the corner.  Needless to say he’s sporting mostly failing grades.  Unlike the girl, he shows NO caring that he’s failing.  None.  Its like he is testing whether or not he will actually have to do it over.  I know what your saying “Brent, get on that boy.. get him!  No 9 year old should be allowed to run rampant in such a way”.  If I could find you, I’d punch you.  I have done everything conceivable on the legal side to get him to do his work.  Nothing.. Grounded?  He’s like permanently grounded.  He doesn’t go anywhere, or do anything.  And he seems genuinely shocked he’s in trouble over this.  He does all the little things teenagers do to get into trouble with their attitude and he does all the things 4 year olds do to get into trouble.  So this guy like, BREEDS trouble for himself.  Spank?  done it. Yell?  done it.  Positive Reinforcement?  done it.  Mix all of the above?  done it.  I sincerely think the boy is brilliant.  Not smart, brilliant.  Like Good Will Hunting brilliant.  I don’t understand him not wanting to get the good things in life by acting accordingly.  He acknowledges that he messed up on whatever our talk is about that day (grades/attitude..) and apologizes, but is he really sorry?  I just don’t know anymore.  I love this boy so much.  For so long I thought it was cause his “real” dad wasn’t having anything to do with him or his sister.  This isn’t the case anymore.  He’s still not as active as I think he should be, but its become a weekly thing almost for them to see him.  So thats probably not it, although you can’t really track that and as kids they don’t know where their feelings lay for things like that.

Then my 4 year old.  This poor guy gets the short end of the stick.  I have to spend so much time kicking the other two around (figuratively) that I haven’t got him reading or writing anything yet.  I feel like I’ve screwed him over big time.  I’m really soft with him now, its like I don’t want to punish him at all.  I want to soak up every second I can with him.  I feel like I’ve cheated him, and he has no other dad.  Nobody takes him every week and ports him into a more fun existence.  He’s stuck with me. I want him to be as good/better than the other guys, of course.. I just don’t know what to do.  I could SWEAR I was doing right with the other 2 all this time.  Now I just don’t know.  I feel like, like maybe I messed them up.

My dad told me, “..there’s no instruction manual for parenting.  You’ll mess up.  You will.  The key is to do the best you can.”  My biggest concern here lately is.. What if my best isn’t good enough?

Well I was sitting around minding my own business in a inocuous conversation with a friend..  When I got hit

“Are you religious?”

The question had some undertones to a followup conversation I’ll mention after this..

I hate this question.  Sounds like it could be contagious doesn’t it?  Are you religious?  Do you have smallpox?.. I don’t know of a way for 2 people to convey this to each other without possibly offending (sheesh) atheists or agnostics.  Nuff said?.. okay on we go..

So to answer the question.. I think I’m really religious.  I have some die hard beliefs fostered by reading the Bible (or um.. hearing it.. since I have a 2nd graders reading ability) that can cut big gashes in people.  Like homosexuals.  While I know, and I am friends with them, they understand that my belief structure leaves little room for doubt on where they will spend eternity. Two things to understand here…

1. I am not a theologian
2. I don’t.. what is it catholics say.. I don’t “practice” my faith as I should.. yeah.. thats it

Just saying if you’re gay, the bible mentions 2 cities with homosexuality.  God blew’em up.  I don’t know if there’s a remark on if it was the homosexuality or if it was parking tickets or that they were UK fans.. but regardless.  To ME, if that town had been marked biblically by “the red shoe wearing” I would avoid red shoes on premise alone.   This is quite simply the end of my debate on it.  I think its hazey.. but the only time its mentioned really, the towns got blown up.  Period.

I am pretty strict in my views, which if you are a christian makes you “narrow minded”.  I hate this also.  Like if you were describing to a blind person what a sunrise looked like, and they told you.. To THEM how it looks..  While I respect your viewpoint that the sunrise is green with yellow/pink polka-dots on it.. I have to tell you you are WRONG.  This however would not make me narrow minded.. but accurate.

Its really, REALLY unpopular to be a christian these days.  Anyone notice how we are portrayed?  In comedy routines we’re almost always uneducated.. In video media we are always seen as backwards and foolish, or we are judgemental and crazed.  No middle ground.  Firstly, just like some atheists, communists, and agnostics are some of those things, those are not defining features of christianity.  Some people are, but didn’t your mothers ever tell you not to pick on “special” folks?  And if their being rude/mean.. whatever, why bother with them at all?

People blame the election of Bush(part deux) on christians.  IF ONLY!  Christians lack the central motivation ability of the abortion lobby.. We can’t even have a SINGLE denomination, much less have a SINGLE candidate.  What is really shocking, and I was told this just recently, is that churches.. (wait for it) can’t say  “we think xyz candidate should be elected”.. Why?  I mean IBM can support a candidate.. Microsoft can support a candidate.. But if my church does it we’re in deep poo-poo?  Thats messed up and you know it.  Separation of church and state you say?  They ARE separated.. My church makes no rules in government, and my government regulates what my church can do (candidate selection).. I think we need that last tie separated.  Honestly I don’t see the problem with religous rule.  Most religions are hardlined and have no gray area for nonsense.  This would mean it would be very easy to know how to get our help.. don’t be a jerk.  Very easy for us to blow you up.. act like a jerk, and threaten folks.  I’m a big fan of Israel and their government policies.   They are tough.. their “shoot first and ask questions later” motto is great.  I mean just look, they are in a part of the world where everyone hates them and wants to blow them up.  Yet they remain and nobody has the sac to invade them..  Thats a good setup.

Anyway.. ranting off topic.  If you’re reading and don’t know.. I am religious.  I have faith.  I’m not anyone to use as a “poster child” for a faith.. I think I do better than the average fella, but I’m not getting close to where I need to be.  If you are also religious pray for me.. If you aren’t.. go play some warcraft.. if you come to medivh server tho.. I’ll totally pwn you!

and just in case its not clear, I support no candidate of a system that is inherently broken.  All candidates are liars, and will prove themselves such in due time.  Vote for someone?  The presidential elections are just a hair off of being american idol.. Nobody cares who the best person is (best singer on idol hasn’t won since season 1), they want who they think is the most fun (like Billy Clinton.. what a total doofus, he did okay on some things but totally boned us on the rest).  If you vote.. I say vote for the old guy.. McCain.  Why?  I don’t trust Obama.. he chants change too much.. almost like a homeless guy.. and Hilary.. Oh please you can’t SERIOUSLY think she’d do ANYTHING good.  Did you see the chick her hubby went for instead of her?  I mean YIKES.  What does that say about her as a person?? to me… a lot.  She PLANTED questions to make her look better… not 1x.. but several times, jeez.  The other folks don’t matter.. McCain is stomping the Repub’s.. and cheaters-wife/homeless chanter are splitting the rest up relatively evenly.

I am basically withdrawn from a government who is no longer “of/for/by the people”.

Election time is always the best time to point out how professional liars (politicians) get elected by people without the sense to really look into the situation.

Firstly:  I believe all politicians with very FEW exceptions are slightly higher on the evolutionary scale than pond scum.  Not withstanding, I love how campaigns are NOT run with facts, but instead run with “tag lines”.

“I’ll stop the war!”  (not how, or what the impact will be.. it’ll just stop, period.  And we’ll all just skip and sing together)

“I’ve got experience!”  Um, as no one running for president has ever BEEN president, I highly doubt senatorial positions have 1/1,000,000 of the power/prestige/pressure of a presidency.  Do I know?  nope.  To me though, it is a singular position, that you cannot have experience to qualify you for unless you are, or have been president before.

The old “they=bad, me=good”..  All politicians use this.  Even the “Look I don’t do mudslinging like him” is an example of this.  Basically they prey on the fact that most people DO believe everything they read/watch/hear.  Even if they don’t believe it 100%,  it will resonate with them.  Then what do they use to define “the bad guy” in a political forum?  Simple judgements.. Do they “look” honest.. I don’t like the “look” of him.  Not realizing that NO candidate on the campaign trail handles their own appearance, they are TOLD what to wear, they wear makeup (except hillary.. yikes), and usually read SCRIPTED speeches that they didn’t write about beliefs they will quickly abandon if it suits them once in office.

I’m getting heated just thinking about how politicians and the political machine of our country totally ridicules the public as a whole.  If you ask any of the people from any political show (except fox news for some reason) Bush won against kerry because he was a christian.  The truth is that Kerry was a tool, a moron.  He came off poorly because he LOOKED like he had no idea what he was talking about.  Did he?  I don’t know/care now, but thats how he “looked” to me at that point.

The American public are puppets of the media, who are in turn puppets of the wealthy, who.. guess what… push the wealthy candidates.  If a candidate was truly of/for/by the people, he/she/it would know what its like to tell their kids “christmas is going to be tight this year think of 1 thing you want and we’ll see if we can get it”.  Even if they know hard times it isn’t fresh.  You have to be wealthy to run for an office of any sort anymore.  I’m waiting for Bill Gates to run for a position, he could have windows pop-ups with his face and “Gates-08″.. He couldn’t be worse than our current game we’re being forced to play.

Stay tuned for the finger pointing I do to the candidates and what obvious methods of manipulation they use to try to get an uneducated vote out of you…

Well the much heralded “gathering of the 4″ was just as completely awesome as I thought it would be.  Here is a short brother update:

• Drew

• still skinny as a rail
• still sick (ongoing condition)

• still weird (like me)
• now with super long girly hair!!

• still with his woman (she’s good for him)
• Lives with said woman (as he requires a chaperon)
• Holds down a decent job still
• Making better grades than me in school (cause he pays the teachers off, I’m sure of it)

• Now with a wife!

• she’s cool but afraid of cats (I don’t know why, don’t ask but its a serious fear not like.. “ooo I don’t like kitty” its more like “OH SWEET MOTHER OF GOD IS THAT A CAT” followed by crying and maybe her bowel release due to shock of kitty)
• They are in one of the carolinas (honestly I forgot North or South)

• Probably pissing off loads of people by making perfect grades on ridiculous hard  tests

That is the rundown pretty much that covers all the brothers except me, more on me to come as I’ve had excitement of late..

Well I apparently took about 2 months off judging from the last post date on the site.  If you are a regular reader or family, I’m sorry.. Been busy.  I am going to spit out a list of wild and exciting things that I will go more into later:

1. Thanksgiving was awesome, not just awesome..THE awesome, period
2. Leaving my job at UofL..
3. Starting my NEW job

1. problems this will cause
2. problems this will solve

That’s the short list, be on the lookout for more info on each of these subjects!

Well at this point we are just the 3 brothers anticipating the arrival of the 4th, and his new bride.  I’m really excited.  That honestly is putting it pretty lightly.

My crazy flute playing brother arrived with long hair, so I obliged to use colorful nomenclature such as “Sally” when I refer to him.  Why?  Well thats just our way in the Hudson family.  Other than that he seems pretty normal… I had actually been a little frightened to see what he looked like as my father calls him scary skinny, and honestly the guy has never had any “extra” weight, so loosing what weight he had is a travesty for humanity.
My other brother, the one I refer to as “the convict”, is actually settling in rather nicely to his life with his woman.  I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again, women are the reason for society.  Guy would totally live in a shack with a 50″ plasma TV and never want for anything else.  Women require us to venture out of the normals that we would normally confine ourselves to.  Anyway, his lady has apparently the right combination of being ridiculously nice, while being firm enough with my brother (c’mon we all have some inner knucklehead in us..) to keep him on the straight and narrow.  He’s crazy smart, and ready to take the world on.  I think with his recent grade report from his school (deans list, FTW) he is actually starting to believe that he IS as smart as I always told him he was.  I’m thrilled to see him leave his older habits in the past and push forward into being the kind of remarkable that we all knew (but as guys, could never say) he could be.  I wonder if its that he grew up enough to do this, or if his lady is just the catalyst for this change.  Either way its awesome.

Unfortunately, he’ll probably graduate college before me and with this “deans list” crap, I’ll be the brother with the lowest GPA.  Such is life, I suppose.  I really couldn’t ask for a better bunch for my brothers, and I’m honored to be family with them.  With any luck when they all go out and make millions they’ll toss a few grand my way for just believing in them.. well its a thought. 

I’ll be back on in a day or so to fill in where the Dr comes in!!

Writers are on strike.. The world seems all tore up and both sides are really just as guilty.

Writers want more money (notice, not SOME money.. not a FAIR amount.. but MORE) for the crap movies and TV that they are churning out.  They feel entitled as they WROTE the thing, and if hey its a hit.. maybe they should get more money out of it.  Oh and maybe its online, so they should get some money out of that (in fact they get SOME now, just not much).

Companies, of course want the total opposite.  Writers get less, actors get less, company gets more.  Which is basically why business models are failing left and right in our society.  No one wants to change how things are done.

Anyway, to the 3rd party outside of the whole “we write, and we want money”, and “screw you writers, you get plenty!”.. I can tell you this.  Movies make a bucketload of money, I think writers/actors should receive probably 40% total.  Split that in half for the individual shares, put about 20-30% with the company propper.  Then put 10% on support staff (*see below), and 20% in critical areas (*see below).

**Almost all shows/movies have an area that gets a lot of work.. Scifi goes nuts on all of them (costume/makeup/set design/etc..) and other genre’s typically hit one specifically.  I honestly think directing is the most bogus position on a movie at this point.. I’ve seen movies (renditions) by 2 different directors and typically the difference isn’t the “style” of the movie so much as it is the different actors chosen to do it.. (casting probably).

*In summary if you use a lot of makeup give those guys a bigger cut, if you use CGI, give my peeps (the geeks) a bigger chunk

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I got this comment from Digg.com regarding.. well it was regarding more “Bush sucks.. we’re all screwed”.   As a rule you become an instant butthead if you say Clinton didn’t cure cancer/aids, and find ways to make lions live in happiness with sheep..  However, I’ve chanted this for a long time.  Why on earth is a lucky streak make everyone love one president and hate the other.

The dotcom bubble was such an incredible explosion to the economy that its just ridiculously unfair to say “Bush is when things turned bad..”.  Look things did turn bad, but I don’t know if you notice Bush isn’t hiring people.. So he has little to do with you loosing your job to someone who will do it for less.  Hate the company for moving to India or Mexico or some other dirt hole.. well do you wear all prada?  Oh so you buy some cheap stuff cause you see no reason a tie should cost $500?  Well basically thats what the company is doing.  Pay me $400 a day, or a guy in India $150.  Reality would show that this comparison is way off.  More like pay the Indian $10.00.  Why on earth would they stay?  The dotcom fiasco was just that, a fiasco.  It ruined many things for many people, but it was a short term burst of money into the economy that everyone felt.  This alone does not immunize Clinton to scrutiny.  People LIKED him, which is about all you can say for the guy.  Personally, I thought he was a bonehead, less so than Bush.. but still.  His wife is a nutbag who will probably be president and still people will say “who voted for that nutbag?”..
I’m not a big fan of Bush.. but I’m not a fan of politics.  There are 2 parties, protecting the rich.  Democrats try to do finger pointing “Republicans are for rich.. nya nya..”, Republicans are so rich and aloof they don’t bother pointing fingers..  The end result is every single congressman/politician makes more money than the average American.  Why is this fair?  They are supposedly for/of/by the people.. Does no one understand the OF part?  Sure its possible to have an idea of how poor people live, but serioiusly… Bush has no clue.. Neither did Clinton.  Nor does ANY of those muckety mucks in Washington.  Its depressing for me as an American to know that the people as a whole are ignorant of real issues and buy into petty name calling and false fact reporting.  Women don’t want Republicans cause OOOO they might do away with abortion..  Which seems to ALWAYS be a big issue, and to be honest.. I don’t believe in abortion.  There is too much inequity in it.  It isn’t a womans body, its a part of a woman and a man in a woman’s body.  But I’ve ran off track again..  Abort, I don’t care.  Do it 3 times a day and show videos during spaghetti-o lunches for all I care.  I want someone LIKE Bush who just doesn’t care what popularity he’s at… He just DOES what needs doing.  Righ tnow that includes, leaving Iraq.. Fixing the many issues on the homefront that trump whether someplace in Africa is having 3yr old kids as barbecue condiments.. Its terrible, sure.  I don’t WANT it to happen.  However I’d much prefer our homefront issues regarding our economy were straightened out.  Forget the economy.. how bout just sit with the middle class who are falling into the lower class.. and see WHAT can be done to bring them back out.  They didn’t STOP working.  They didn’t START blowing money left and right.  They are just drowning in increasing local issues as well as childcare, and on and on and on..

War is not the ONLY answer, but sometimes it IS the answer you can have at the moment.  It is a sad state that we live in boys and girls.  With any luck things will change, but as long as we elect completely oblivious politicians instead of people of/for/by the people we can kiss that hope goodbye.  Sad part is, who would believe a guy who ran his campaign on those kinds of principles??

A woman in a hot air balloon realized she was lost. She lowered her altitude and spotted a man in a boat below. She shouted to him, “Excuse me, can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don’t know where I am.”

The man consulted his portable GPS and replied, “You’re in a hot air balloon, approximately 30 feet above a ground elevation of 2346 feet above sea level. You are at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100 degrees, 4909 minutes west longitude.

She rolled her eyes and said, “You must be a Republican.”

“I am,” replied the man. “How did you know?”

“Well,” answered the balloonist, “everything you told me is technically correct, but I have no idea what to do with your information, and I’m still lost. Frankly, you’ve not been much help to me.”

The man smiled and responded, “You must be a Democrat.”

“I am,” replied the balloonist. “How did you know?”

“Well,” said the man, “you don’t know where you are or where you’re going. You’ve risen to where you are, due to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise that you have no idea how to keep, and you expect me to solve your problem. You’re in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but, somehow, now it’s my fault.”

Firstly.. Read this  BLOG

Then understand the plight of the REAL Dad.  I am overly hands on with my son.  To the point of almost being a control freak.  I’ve said it on here before, and I repeat it.  I wanted to be a Dad since I was 10 years old.  THIS was what life was about for me.  I WANTED to hold him in my arms.  I WANTED him with me every moment.  My wife has talked to me about breaking ME of having him sleep with us (don’t freak out, he comes back there.. I just don’t deny him).

The modern consensus is that Fathers as a whole have not evolved.  Have not changed from the oddly inaccurate depiction of Ward Cleaver, where we are in our room reading/smoking while Mom does everything.  It’d be nice if life was this easy, but I didn’t have a kid so that I could let someone take care of him.  Everyday I pick him up from daycare and I tell him the same thing “I missed you ALL day!”.  Its a ritual and a truth at the same time.  He will run past his mother most times to actually get to ME.  He is in all definitions a “daddy’s boy”.

The fact that some people would intentionally write me off as a caregiver would put me to the point of being.. well, myself.  I’ve also stated that I’m NOT a nice person.  I push as hard as I can to be as nice as I am as is.  Even with all that effort, I am no where NEAR what anyone would consider “nice”.  Were someone to look at my wife and respond in kind as these individuals do, I would without hesitation ask them what kind of a shiffless loser they are married to that wouldn’t be involved in the life he helped create.  I would devolve to name calling at a speed that would rival lightspeed.

No apologies.  I was spoken down to for a LONG time among my coworkers for just being a “man”.  As if having testicles somehow precluded me from knowing how to raise a kid, or knowing how to take care of my little one(s).  I battled this furiously as this is what I was about.  This is WHY I have done all that I have done in life.  I work to provide for my family, I go to school to get more money to provide better for my family (in quiet hopes I’ll get more time with them in doing so).

I take pride in very few things in life.  My main is my family.  I have a GREAT family, extended and immediate.  I also won’t be spoken to like a 2nd class citizen just because I can’t give birth to a kid.