Augustus Randomus

Mr. July

Fun fact time.

As you know, a common Latin root for the number '7' is sept.  For 8, it's oct.  9 is nov.  Essentially that's where the months September, October and November got their names - they were the 7th, 8th and 9th months of the Roman calendar.  The first six months of the year were named after Roman gods (Janus, Juno, Mars, etc.) - so when Julius Caesar (one of my favorite historical figures, actually) was declared a living god by the people of Rome, they honored him with his own month - July.  And it only made since to keep all the gods together, that's why July's the 7th month of the year.

Years later, when Caesar's grand-nephew Octavian became Rome's first emperor, he renamed himself Augustus. . . and decided that he, too, needed a month named after himself.

Guess which one.

So yeah. . . there's your history lesson for the day.  Another month named after a Roman emperor, another collection of leftover, un-released randoms from America's favourite family.

Enjoy.

I was extremely excited upon finding this for the Cannonball.  There's a lot of vocab and nouns in there she can't read, but the fundamentals she can handle.  Now if only I can get her to watch something in the trilogy besides Temple of Doom.

Why not.

My school truly appreciates me (I'd kinda rather have a gift card.)

What follows is a series of ridiculous family selfies taken on our kitchen floor on a Tuesday night following dinner.  'Cause that's how this family rolls. . .

Winding down with the evening's story time. . .

Rockin' out at another splash pad - this time with the Voigts in downtown Winter Garden.

The following photos courtesy of the Cannonball. . .

Alayna's bizarro selfie.

Living with a bunch of chicks is awesome.

- Brian

Why I Don't Bowl

Respect Hough Toes, America.

I'm good at a lot of stuff.  Not to brag or anything, but I've got a unique skill set that, I feel, puts me a few steps ahead of the herd, so to speak.

For example. . .

I can pick up small objects and open doors with my toes.
I can say the alphabet backwards flawlessly faster than most people can say the alphabet the regular way.
I can have someone murdered without consequence so long as they're willing to fly over to Ghana and meet me in the roadside village of Sankpala, no questions asked.

Wanna know what I can't do?  Bowl.

At King's Bowling in Orlando

Waiting for shoes.

I suck at bowling, and I don't say I suck at a lot of things.  My deficiency in bowling ranks up there with my inability to spell and/or ice skate.  Can't do it.  And never has there been more proof of this than when Kris and I took the girls out to King's Bowling Lanes.

Behold:

This bowling joint was actually pretty cool.  Reasonably priced, with a full bar and restaurant.  We ended up scoring free pop for the evening when our waitress forgot to charge us for it and said 'screw it, it's on the house.'  Too bad the same couldn't be said for my beer orders. . .

Victory dance.

The party bowling next to us hogged the metal ramp-thingy kids use for their bowling balls, which sucked at first. . . but considering they were using it for a severely crippled dude in a wheelchair, we let it slide.  The girls were still able to 'throw' the balls down the lanes anyway, and the bumpers ensured they knock down more pins than Yours Truly.

Taking a smack to the balls after hitting my one and only strike of the game.

Tension builds over the course of twenty minutes as Alayna's ball slowly creeps towards the pins.  A couple times we had to have employees come over and recover bowling balls, which would occasionally stop before hitting the pins.

Abby puts her whole body into preparing to throw the ball. . .

. . . then she just drops the shit on the lane.

After the party next to us left, we were able to snag the metal ramp-thing.  It didn't help much.

Read 'em and weep.  I suck at bowling.

- Brian

First Daze of School

Welcome back to Hell, readers.

It's time to go back to SCHOOL.

The kids are obviously waaaay more excited about this than I am - I'm not fond of working, and sitting around on my ass all summer was kind of 'cool.'  Anyway, here's some 'Back to School' pics for ya:

Alayna's new 1st grade teacher, Mrs. Hall (the teacher she was hoping to get, fortunately), gave all of her students a secret package at the school's 'Meet the Teacher' night that wasn't supposed to be opened until the night before school started.  So, accordingly, we opened it up before she went to bed last night and found a little baggy of confetti and this cute/inspirational poem about the upcoming school year.  It more or less instructed the kids to put confetti underneath their pillow so they'd have pleasant dreams about the following day and the rest of the school year.  So far so good, right?

Well, Alayna didn't have 'pleasant dreams.'  Not by a long shot.  Instead, she was waking up every hour or so throughout the night, scared to death from school-related nightmares brought on by God knows what. . .

(We blame the confetti.)

Fortunately, Abby - who asked to have some of Alayna's confetti - didn't experience any nightmares herself.  It was rough enough waking up every hour to deal with one scared-shitless child last night. . .

Abby - geared up and ready to roll into VPK at Sunchild Academy.

Alayna posing with her new school crap for First Grade.

More voguing.

Posed out in front of the new-and-improved John Young Elementary (fortunately now free of portables.)

Alayna has a real classroom this year instead of a portable, and the tech these teachers at her school get to use is ridiculous - years beyond what I'm using at my ghetto school (Mrs. Hall's SMART Board is bigger than my car.)

Abby moves her apple from 'Home' to 'Class.'  She's got three teachers this year, and hopefully they're ready to tango with  the Queen of Stubborn.

- Brian