From the mouths of babes

So Gloria thinks that I should post more photos of my new home. I would but it's a total mess so instead I'll give you this.

Teaching today (yes, people honestly trust me with impressionable minds) one of my students asked about my tastes in movies. Poor fool didn't know what door he was opening. He had made his dad watch "Donnie Darko." The student asked if I had ssen it; I said at least twice. (Of course I mostly teach math so this is definitely tangential.) I have not seen the director's cut so we had to discuss that. He then stated that his dad made him watch an older film that was a parody of 50s horror. It took me two guesses to determine that the film in question was "Rocky Horror." Why do I suddenly feel so old? I explained to him that "Rocky Horror" is best seen in a theater at midnight with a full cast and props. I knew that I loved his dad. When I met with his dad in a conference recently, he (the dad) paused to tell me that his political views were pretty far left, like Marx. Pretty heartening to hear that a lawyer feels, or at least supposedly feels, for the people.

Of course what really disturbed me is that dad made reference to 50s horror (such a statement on the Cold War) without actually showing the poor kid any of the movies from the era. I asked, "Of course you have seen 'The Incredible Shrinking Man?'" The answer was, "No." The answer was the same to all the films I named. Why do parents insist on examples without giving the full history?

I guess I don't understand because I am not a parent. I just spend more time with kids than most of their parents do. What do I know?