Oh my god, you guys. My dad in his illness hasn’t been able to be as active as he prefers, so he surfs the internet a lot, and HE HAS DISCOVERED BUZZFEED. He sends me things he finds funny from Buzzfeed. It’s hilarious and amazing all at once when your dad sends you “73 Things You Think when Browsing Pinterest.”
catweazlol+30
If my father hadn’t been in a nursing home by the time Buzzfeed became a thing he would have totally printed out every article he thought was funny and showed it to me when I came to visit.
Gayer_Than_Thou+20
It is with mixed emotion that I think about how my mother did not live to fully appreciate the wonders of the modern internet. On the one hand, if she had, she would be with us (or me, at least) today. On the other hand, if she had, there would be a never-ending stream of emails and mildly inappropriate Faceplace posts.
apple_pi+10
Yes! My mom has Alzheimer’s and sometimes what I mourn for is that I never got to share fangirl culture with her. SHE WOULD HAVE SHIPPED ALL THE THINGS. *small sigh*
Ethylbenzene+5
I’ve been thinking about you and your family! I missed the Open Thread on Friday but I hope you are well!
saffiedarling+14
I offhandedly taught my dad to use bittorrent a couple of years back.
After my last visit, I was complaining that I didn’t have time to hunt through all of his music collection. So for my birthday he send me a new external hard drive with FIVE HUNDRED gigs of downloaded music.
I had no idea what I was going to unleash.
(To be fair, he already had a legendarily large and diverse physical music collection. I deal with my guilt by using the 500 gigs as a sampler box and buying the stuff I actually want, and making sure to buy him a proper CD every birthday and Christmas.)
ramina+75
Now, if you teach your toddler about Joy Division, how long should you wait before introducing them to New Order? Is there a developmental milestone that correlates with the switch?
blunderbusst+18
You can start them on anything up through Brotherhood once they’ve fully assimilated both proper Joy Division albums, but you can’t show them anything Technique or later until they’re in high school and have learned to “ironically” appreciate things like techno.
Frumiosa+45
Oy, Pixar. So true. Don’t watch the first ten minutes of “Up” with your kid unless you want them to see you reduced to a quivering, sobbing mess.
gloriana232+37
Oh my GOD. I was sitting behind a young family, and the mom started crying, and the little kid got all concerned and asked, “Why are you crying, Mommy?” And that got ME. Like a crying conga line.
My mom got teary too and I was just like, “Aww, Mom!” Looking back, I think I was glad she was just crying about a movie (even if the movie was reflecting Real Things) instead of something genuinely upsetting.
m98widow+13
A few years ago, I was at my boyfriend’s family’s place on Christmas Eve and they had Up playing on the TV in the background. I assume they had all seen it and were immune but I hadn’t and had to keep excusing myself to the bathroom to cry. And I am not a pretty crier.
coloredlights+37
My boss came into work the other day extremely indignant about the first 20 minutes of “Up,” because he’s watching the whole Pixar canon with his very precocious 3-year-old and was not prepared for the emotional onslaught. Everyone else in the office (all adults without kids) was like, “yeah, duh, where have you been.”
thebellewitch+29
“Up” is rough, but the first few minutes of Finding Nemo basically destroy me. I cannot with the “it can all be taken from you in an instant” stuff. (See Also: Land Before Time, Bambi, etc.)
Frumiosa+20
WHAT IS IT with the central trope of so many of these movies being losing one’s parents? Like in the first five minutes?? I saw An American Tail when I was 4 and I’m STILL NOT OVER IT.
solrius+14
When we went to see Inside Out, I had to bite my lip to stop myself from wailing along with a small child. (Although, to be fair, I feel I spent the whole film just on the verge of tears.)
anninyn+26
Historically, my dad has always been dismissive of my gaming. He appreciates that I love it, but wasn’t interested at all.
Until he read about a game called ‘No Man’s Sky’. And now he’s calling us regularly to ask about upgrading his PC and the specs of consoles and… and I can’t help but feel it deeply amusing.
Girl Named Jack+53
My dad never got in the way of my gaming; he just didn’t understand the limitations of video games. He would watch me play whatever RPG I was cracking out on and tell me I should pick things up. This was in the 90’s-00’s, so he was talking about the background images. No, Dad, I can’t pick up the books on the shelves, eat the food on the table, etc. etc.
Then I got Oblivion and I was so excited! By this point I was in grad school I think, but I still made him see it, just because I could finally pick everything up! Until he asked me to catch a butterfly. I was crushed.
AND THEN SKYRIM HAPPENED. Both of our lives were finally complete. the end.
anninyn+11
That is adorable dadding right there.
My dad is getting all excited about ‘procedurally generated space exploration’ and how ground breaking this game is and I don’t have the heart to say that I know exactly how groundbreaking it is and the answer is only a little bit.
He hasn’t really paid attention to the gaming industry since the first doom game, you see.
GruntledDave+2
Please tell me your username is in honor of Jack from Mass Effect!
Girl Named Jack+6
Nah, my Jack goes back way before that. All of my characters for all of my games (video or otherwise) are named Jack, and have been since JRPGs started giving us the option way back when. ๐ So Mass Effect was nice; one less step at the beginning.
m98widow+11
I am SO EXCITED for No Man’s Sky. I don’t care about the backlash – exploring planets and slowly upgrading my ship sounds like heaven to me. And I die for the color palette.
anninyn+5
It looks pretty damn cool I have to say.
BourneApprox+3
The more backlash there is, the more interesting it sound to me. It looks delightfully relaxing and full of awe of the grandeur and majesty of space!
GruntledDave+1
Why a backlash?
m98widow+6
People are worried that there won’t be enough objectives, I guess. If they are not making numbers go up and getting rewards for the numbers going up, some people just aren’t happy.
GruntledDave+5
Ugh. I mean, I get that is how many people play various games, but it seems like it isn’t the point of this particular game?
BourneApprox+9
“What? The only objective is to explore the beautiful, vast expanse of quintillions of stars and planets? BORING!”
Mrs_Peel+4
(j/o motion at universe)
mkpatter+10
I’m actually really annoyed there are shooty bits now. WHAT IF YOU DESTROY THE ECOSYSTEM, DID YOU EVER THINK OF THAT, GAME DEVS!?
Anyways I’ll probably spend most of my time trying to discover planets first so I can name them after my butt.
Mrs_Peel+3
(nods) Solid plan. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
seasleepy+2
Well, if you do that, robots will come and kill you. Naturally.
mkpatter+3
Wait which part the destroying ecosystems part or the naming things after my butt part
seasleepy+3
Robots are fine with your butt, not so fine with the ecosystem destroying!
Lady_Honoria+2
Like…. you will name them ‘Butt’? Or ‘Megano’s Butt’? Or… another secret name that your butt has??
RuncibleSpoon+4
good god am i excited for No Man’s Sky.
i watched a backlash-ish talking head review recently, complaining about the apparent lack of objectives and just…
i mean, this is going to let us be space explorers in an unknown universe!
is there really anything else to want, when that’s on the table?
plus the entire conceit, from a logistics end, is so interesting. i am going to play the hell out of this.
m98widow+3
Exactly! I just want to wander and see cool stuff, I don’t need checkpoints and missions, I’ve got enough of that going on in FFXIV.
GruntledDave+16
My daughter graduated from Reader Rabbit straight into being my sidekick in City of Heroes. We play games together, and we play different games while sitting near each other. It is amazing how easy it is to open up to your dad when you are playing games together. She’s 17 now, and I’m glad I got her started early.
PS: thanks for the hot tip on No Man’s Sky. This may be the Space Minecraft I’ve been looking for!
megotelek+3
City of Heroes! <3 That was the game that got my husband and I into MMOs! Victory and Protector servers, baby.
Now I’m sad again, because it’s gone. ๐
GruntledDave+2
There are two projects out there trying to fill the void! City of Titans and Valiance Online. I think the latter even has a playable alpha!
PS: Victory server 4lyfe!!
megotelek+1
I’m following City of Titans (I was a Kickstarter backer) but I haven’t seen any of the Valiance Online stuff…I’ll check it out!
GruntledDave+1
CoT backer here too! Hopefully we will all be in game someday!
jmstevenson76+19
My husband desperately wants our offspring to get into gaming. When she was barely strong enough to lift her ginormous head (courtesy of her mother), he had mapped out a strategy of gaming milestones that he would lead her through. I mean, she has to start with the old skool games before advancing to the new stuff, right? A kid has to learn the classics. Donkey Kong and Contra before Sonic the Hedgehog before Halo.
Heh. This weekend, the two of them spent all day Saturday playing Splatoon and having the best time together. ๐ Watching a 6 year old attempt trash talking is kind of hilarious. (G-rated, of course.)
octopoda+5
My dad loves gaming, but can only play pretty much one game now (Company of Heroes) as anything else more active makes his shoulder lock up.
BourneApprox+33
The strangest phone call I ever received from my mom: “BourneApprox, have you heard of a game named, uh, BioShock Infinite?”
My mom’s a comp lit literature professor focusing on Renaissance and classical drama, and thanks to a random NPR segment last year recently became really interested in expanding her research focus to games. So we got her a PS3 for Christmas and set her up with some games which matched her research interests, which are choice and temporality.
This all sounds really fancy, but it was still a case of trying to walk your parent through using a controller to move forward and backward. She looooved Wolf Among Us and (on PC) The Stanley Parable, though, and got most of the way through Heavy Rain. And even though they’re too difficult for her, she’s enjoyed watching me play Mass Effect, Deus Ex, and Prince of Persia. Bioshock ended up being too violent, of course. So it’s all been a weird combination of a serious research project and Peak Mom. But it’s also really neat to be able to tell my mom about my Difficult Moral Choices in, say, Wolfenstein: The New Order and have her be interested?
RuncibleSpoon+5
that is amazing. and great bonding time, i am a bit jealous.
BourneApprox+7
Not gonna lie, it’s been pretty fun! It’s particularly fun when she asks me why something is the way that it is – like, in ME2, why characters only die “for real” in some occasions but not others – and I just go “uuuuuuuuh.” Or when she finds some way of comparing game moral systems to classic tragedy. Man, I need to visit home more often.
mkpatter+8
MAKE YOUR MOM PLAY DRAGON AGGGEEEEEEE
mkpatter+5
Also your mom sounds really cool.
mkpatter+4
I just want everyone’s mom to Ride the Bull.
BourneApprox+2
How did I miss these comments yesterday?! And thanks! ๐
I showed her a little bit of Dragon Age 2 on the PS3, just to show her how the Approval-based character system works, as opposed to a Paragon/Renegade moral system. She thought it was really interesting, but unfortunately in-depth RPG systems are not her style at alllll – she likes to get to the point and the meat of the narrative, and gets impatient quickly. So Inquisition might not go over well in that particular respect, Bulliciousness aside. And she’d probably go for Cullen, Fine Young Gentleman that he is (that’s what she calls total hunks).
However, I *did* build an entire computer for my sister so she could play Inquisition, so there may yet be one more Rider of the Bull to come! (Hehe, come.)
I’m surprised to hear she’s not into RPGs as much, as I find them way more accessible than shooters, personally! (Though I have super good aim in Mass Effect now, so thank you, Mass Effect.)
You should definitely tell her about Twine games!
BourneApprox+1
I think I sent her Porpentine’s Howling Dogs at some point, but that may have been a bit…uh…diving into the deep end. Maybe I should send her the new Stephen Colbert one, hah. Other recent successes: Life is Strange.
Maybe I need to introduce her to Alistair……. That’s, uh, how I really got into RPGs.
Also, I just opened up KOTOR 2 (now on Mac and with a big steam update!) “just to see if it worked okay”, and now it’s three hours later and FUCK YOU RPGS I NEED TO GET UP FOR WORK TOMORROW.
mkpatter+2
BEEN THERE.
seasleepy+3
You should tell your dad about Space Engine! It’s like NMS but it’s in our actual universe. It’s educational.
hussified+27
$10 donuts means $10 for a half dozen at least, right? #OLDE
femmefan1946+1
New coffee shop in my neighbourhood – seventh in three blocks if you include a Starbucks- and the owner/barista sold DD &I the last $3.50 maple walnut at 2;;30pm on Friday. His wife makes them in house. Told him about the SuzyQ maple bacon donuts in Ottawa (Best EVER!) that sell out within the hour of making and he will try that when she gets back from Seattle. http://suzyq.ca/ If you are ever in Ottawa CANADA, make an expedition– also to the Byward Market for Hooker’s Beavertails. Obama likes them.
irishbreakfasttime+50
Pretty sure $10 donuts at the food truck rally = no donuts at the food truck rally, we’ll stop by the Pick’n’Save on the way home for the day-old bakery items, now THOSE are a deal.
sausagedog+11
Pick N Save day-old donuts were the BOMB, you could get like 12 for $6 or something which, split among you and 2 friends, was entirely affordable as a high schooler.
hussified+5
Now *THAT* is the Daddest thing ever.
Cannikin_MK3+30
Unpopular opinion: Pixar movies aren’t that deep, the standard dross people consume is just that shallow.
robot_dinosaur+130
Hmm, no, I think this sounds more like an asshole opinion that you’ve provided no evidence for?
Ethylbenzene+48
Unreadaethel+8
*swoon*
mattielubchansky+32
hmm. pixar is good, friend
osutein+81
True. There’s a food truck near my office that serves organic, farm-to-table dross with pork belly and kale chips and it is so much better than standard dross. People don’t know what they’re missing.
PonyAlong+17
I find your “food truck” comment incredibly funny and also cutely clever by how it references Dad Magazine.
ALL THE UP THUMBS “UP”.
osutein+39
I tried to work in a Joy Division reference, too, but the structure got tricky and I believe the beauty of a Dad Joke lies in its simplicity.
floridagal1+10
I don’t really like most Pixar movies, and yeah…I generally keep that to myself since literally the rest of the western world seems to adore them.
celery+35
That’s a valid opinion! But I think there’s a difference between “I don’t really like most Pixar movies, and I don’t know why everyone else likes them” and sneering at the common rabble for their tastes, which are far inferior to yours, a being who is blessed with the ability to see real Depth.
(Because tone of voice can fail in text, to clarify: I think the original commenter’s post came across as the latter, I don’t think yours did)
Adam8174+1
Just look at Inside Out! How did they convince people that was insightful or interesting? ๐
irishbreakfasttime+160
oh you guys, I visited my folks over the weekend and the coffee table was full of The Family Handyman, which looks like this:
It’s no Dad Magazine but its readership overlaps nearly 100%, I’m sure. I flipped through one until I got to the quiz page and my partner grabbed it to Test His Tool IQ! I don’t think you could hold up a page that says Test Your Tool IQ! in front of a Dad without him grabbing at it, keep that in mind if you ever need to set a dad trap.
GreenGrasses+20
Oh my god, my Dad is so interested in garage storage solutions. I need to buy him this immediately.
decembrian+61
I love it. “Treat yourself! Build a bar!”
Mrs_Peel+33
I read this in the voice of Tom Haverford.
sausagedog+16
oh my god my dad used to subscribe to this?? I used to read it every month… I remember the illustrated DIYs and their constant pegboard evangelizing. I think one year for Christmas I made my dad tennis-ball screw holders, as suggested in these very pages– you just cut a slit in the ball so you can squeeze it open and neatly store your fasteners. I drew the screw heads on the sides in Sharpie. (He never used them but was gracious about it.)
irishbreakfasttime+22
Awwww homemade screw holders!!!
Not sure why my dad subscribes to this, as he hasn’t been in good enough health the last couple years to do much handymanning. I guess it’s aspirational dadding, like people who buy regular ol clothes at Target but like to flip through the high-end fashion magazines anyway. (AND of course he has saved every prescription pill bottle, soaked the labels off, and stored screws in them. Because why would you just recycle such good containers?)
jennycieplak+14
OH MY GOD Dads everywhere really ARE the same! (re the prescription bottles)
irishbreakfasttime+7
aaaah of course, and I bet they are all patting themselves on the back for their brilliant storage idea <3
miprisci+5
Jesus that is a fantastic idea. Time to start saving my pill bottles…
GreenGrasses+25
Perhaps Dads can be separated into two camps – those who store their screws in old prescription bottles, and those who store them in old film canister bottles.
Mrs_Peel+13
Bonus points to the latter group if they haven’t actually taken a 35 mm. film picture in decades.
Megan+13
What about old peanut butter containers, for the hoarding Dads?
RunGracieRun+33
From when baby-food came in baby-food jars with metal lids. You (dad) nail the lid to the underside of the workbench then attach the jars, which are filled with screws and nails and little metal oddments.
Unreadaethel+8
The world has moved on to using mason jars for that.
dancingcrowdesigns+4
you are missing those who use baby food jars, from your infancy…
raqueue+13
My husband subscribes to this. My magazine racks are filled with this and magazines like Useful Storage Tips.
He’s a childless Dad-in-training.
secondursula+52
It’s a brilliant self-perpetuating problem: too many magazines cluttering up the place? Build a magazine rack! Where do I put all the tools I purchased to build a magazine rack? Build a tool rack! etc. etc. etc. Projects for days.
flammablespam+9
My dad bought me a subscription when I moves into my house! Also, it’s the best magazine ever ๐
jennycieplak+12
I feel like I need to purchase this magazine now, if only for the handy tips on cleaning up pet messes.
Mrs_Peel+25
If I ever need to set a dad trap, I’ll be sure to throw that in (along with a Coen Bros. DVD set and those little Trader Joe’s crackers that he likes so much).
RunGracieRun+4
My dad loves Trader Joe’s crackers too! Oh, the sadness when TJ’s discontinued the chinese mustard wonton chips and the spicy papadum chips.
Mrs_Peel+4
Awwww! ๐
My dad loves the little round “Multi-seed Soy Sauce” ones. Before I moved back home (and before my hometown got its own Trader Joe’s), I used to buy a million bags and drive them 260 miles for his birthdays and so on.
octopoda+17
I think my wife would love this magazine.
octopoda+22
Update: I sent her a link to their website and she does.
SarcasticFringehead+9
I think your wife and I would get on very well.
octopoda+9
The hardware store is like her favorite place to shop at. I consider myself passably handy but for her it is serious business.
Lily Rowan+21
You know what, I AM interested in setting a Dad Trap! Good tips.
formergr+42
You had me at “need to set a dad trap”. A dad trap!! I am seriously considering how I can leverage this somehow the next time my father visits me…
dancingcrowdesigns+7
Is a dad trap cor catching your own dad, or any passing dad? Because I can totally see wanting to catch a passing dad and test it out for kindness. Or experiments.
Lady_Honoria+3
Gotta cotch that dad
Girl Named Jack+10
I totally have a subscription to this magazine. My favorite is the comic at the end.
knittingBAMF+12
All they need is TINKERING!!! and it WILL be Dad Magazine.
ZevNV+21
I was just this morning thinking “Man, it’s been a while since the last Dad Magazine”.
These always give me a glimpse at my future, but this one is a glimpse at a slightly sooner future.
gloriana232+26
THE HATS!!! I’ve noticed a serious uptick in Baby Hats and Child Hats.
ljndawson+43
OMG, last Friday we had two moms and their little ones over to swim in our pool (it was super hot out), and the baby was wearing this ENORMOUS pink French Foreign Legion-like sunhat, just bobbing cluelessly around in a large doughnut in our pool like it was nothing to be THAT CUTE IN YOUR HUGE HAT.
osutein+49
New Dad Life Goal: Be a Dad Magazine Young Dads Cover Model.
Mrs_Peel+8
I was just wondering “WHERE IS THIS MONTH’S DAD MAGAZINE??” Nothing fills me with greater joy.
GruntledDave+54
The other day I had to explain to a fellow powerlifter, who is young enough to be my son, that this cool retro band he liked, Oingo Boingo, was in fact fronted by the very same Danny Elfman whose movie soundtracks he loved so much. It blew. His. Mind.
He’s not my kid, but I still felt it was a very Dad moment. Especially when I then went into mind-numbing detail about the history of the Brothers Elfman and Oingo Boingo.
californianinkansas+3
I was a member of the Oingo Boingo fan club when I was a teenager. They are still my comfort music.
Kai_Ko+11
On the parent name tip: I find my struggling to wrap my head about becoming a Mom/Mommy/Mama/Mum/Mummy/Mimzy/MAAAAAAAM. That feels like someone else’s name, someone else’s title. Anyone else go through this? Any solutions?
(While not genderqueer myself, I’ve found this list to be super helpful in thinking outside the Mom-box.)
Mrs_Peel+9
It’s not obligatory! I’ve always called everybody in my family by their first names.
jmstevenson76+10
By the time they start talking, you’re reconciled to it. Having been covered in their bodily fluids for 12 months or more. ๐
blunderbusst+27
This was so timely! Thanks!
(I’ve been struggling with coming up with a new pet name for my recently-out-as-trans Dad, who still likes being called Dad, but who I feel deserves an ADDITIONAL (not replacement) title to honor her new authentic public self. Expect me to post about this a lot here, as I have come up with nothing yet that fits.)
It doesn’t bother me as much because who cares, but “hey mamas!” definitely falls into the same cloying vein as “hey ladies!” I do whatever I can to separate out my relationship with my kids from the over-aching Mommy Cultural Drama out there in the world. Fuck whatever people are bloviating about parenthood today; toddlers don’t know or care about that shit. I’m mommy because that’s what the title of that relationship is in our language, not because my identity is automatically subsumed into some bullshit neurotic stereotype.
TL:DR: this may not be the most helpful comment of all time. But there is a lot of cursing!
Zelenka+16
There is, however, something rather lovely about being called ‘Kidsname’s Mom’ by your kid’s friend, under age twelve. Otherwise, NO.
layrl+13
All the little kids in my old neighborhood called me “Calvin’s Mom.” Calvin was my pug. ๐
dancingcrowdesigns+4
Sometimes they call you something awesome – my mother was dubbed Numyum which was a perfect mangulation of “mummy’s mummy” Sometimes they shorten your name to something they can say, sometimes you decide to insist on something, and they follow (or they mangle it, in some perfect way)
I do like some of the options for the genderqueer parents – especially Baba and Nini.
femmefan1946+2
Cuddle buddy? Oh dear.
Perdita McLeod+19
You guys. In May my entire immediate family gathered for my sister’s graduation from art school. My dad has a fancy new camera (after being largely uninterested in photographing any family moments for years and years; that was my mom’s job) and if he took less than a thousand pictures that week I will be shocked. On graduation day he probably took at least 200 shots just of my sister sitting with her classmates. At times he would sort of disappear and I would look around and find him somewhere nearby creeping on us with his camera. It was pretty adorable.
Anyway I finally saw some of the photos recently and they are SO GOOD! Yay for Dads with new hobbies!
flying_ghoti+74
I am going to be a Real Live Dad in three months and Dad Magazine has therefore taken on special meaning to me, because honestly my Dad Joke game is already pretty much on point and I’m also really good at starting DIY projects and then getting frustrated when I remember I’m terrible at DIY. I’m pretty confident that I will someday earn that highest of accolades, the #dad. But I saw this today and I realized that I have actually, seriously, not even kidding mentally rehearsed my talk to the imminent one about Joy Division, so I guess I’m already at #youngdad, and I have very mixed feelings about this. (In fairness, at the moment I pretty much mentally rehearse a talk with the imminent one about every single item I see or hear everywhere. “[Child], would you like to know more about the fascinating history of traffic cones?”)
signed, Tank
speakingofcake+9
I rehearse Explaining Things talks all the time too! And I don’t even have or want children! I think the only thing that ever does vaguely make me want them is the prospect of explaining the world – it must be quite exciting to see the world through new eyes. And my compulsion to Explain Things would make me very Dad-like, despite being a cis woman.
Good luck on your new arrival! May your Dad game be on point.
Mrs_Peel+3
I just want kids so I can force them to watch Star Trek with me.
dancingcrowdesigns+3
Avengers. The Steed and Peel kind.
Also? Totally worked!!
cleoreads+30
OMG, this really describes my brother – he sings 80s alternative lullabies and he was just pontificating to me about Inside Out the other week.
Other headlines –
The right time to introduce your child to Calvin and Hobbes.
Learning to manage boredom is an important life skill and other reasons to put off getting a cell phone for your 3rd grader.
Harry Potter 5, too dark for your 8 year old?
Hoolia+12
My nephew inhaled all the Harry Potter books when he was 6. In the later ones, he started getting a little freaked out so he had his mom go through and block out the scary parts with sticky notes with a summary written on them, like “Cedric dies” over top of the terrifyingly detailed scene. Knowing was okay; having the visuals was not.
cleoreads+10
I love this! What a great coping method.
I found a children’s book at my parents’ home that had an extra sentence written in my mother’s handwriting – because little me felt the ending was incomplete and was really upset by it (iirc, it ended with the little sister not getting a candy cane, when everyone else did, so my mom fixed it).
tragicallyludicrous+6
I went whitewater rafting today with my mom & sister and in our van was a young family where they all talked a lot about Instagram together. It was sort of weird but I guess that’s what happens with #youngdads (and moms)?
Megano!
Oh yeah, Reg's Mom is famous.
I'm surprised to hear she's not into RPGs as much, as I find them way more accessible than shooters, personally! (Though I have super good aim in Mass Effect now, so thank you, Mass Effect.)
Oh my god, you guys. My dad in his illness hasn’t been able to be as active as he prefers, so he surfs the internet a lot, and HE HAS DISCOVERED BUZZFEED. He sends me things he finds funny from Buzzfeed. It’s hilarious and amazing all at once when your dad sends you “73 Things You Think when Browsing Pinterest.”
If my father hadn’t been in a nursing home by the time Buzzfeed became a thing he would have totally printed out every article he thought was funny and showed it to me when I came to visit.
It is with mixed emotion that I think about how my mother did not live to fully appreciate the wonders of the modern internet. On the one hand, if she had, she would be with us (or me, at least) today. On the other hand, if she had, there would be a never-ending stream of emails and mildly inappropriate Faceplace posts.
Yes! My mom has Alzheimer’s and sometimes what I mourn for is that I never got to share fangirl culture with her. SHE WOULD HAVE SHIPPED ALL THE THINGS. *small sigh*
I’ve been thinking about you and your family! I missed the Open Thread on Friday but I hope you are well!
I offhandedly taught my dad to use bittorrent a couple of years back.
After my last visit, I was complaining that I didn’t have time to hunt through all of his music collection. So for my birthday he send me a new external hard drive with FIVE HUNDRED gigs of downloaded music.
I had no idea what I was going to unleash.
(To be fair, he already had a legendarily large and diverse physical music collection. I deal with my guilt by using the 500 gigs as a sampler box and buying the stuff I actually want, and making sure to buy him a proper CD every birthday and Christmas.)
Now, if you teach your toddler about Joy Division, how long should you wait before introducing them to New Order? Is there a developmental milestone that correlates with the switch?
You can start them on anything up through Brotherhood once they’ve fully assimilated both proper Joy Division albums, but you can’t show them anything Technique or later until they’re in high school and have learned to “ironically” appreciate things like techno.
Oy, Pixar. So true. Don’t watch the first ten minutes of “Up” with your kid unless you want them to see you reduced to a quivering, sobbing mess.
Oh my GOD. I was sitting behind a young family, and the mom started crying, and the little kid got all concerned and asked, “Why are you crying, Mommy?” And that got ME. Like a crying conga line.
My mom got teary too and I was just like, “Aww, Mom!” Looking back, I think I was glad she was just crying about a movie (even if the movie was reflecting Real Things) instead of something genuinely upsetting.
A few years ago, I was at my boyfriend’s family’s place on Christmas Eve and they had Up playing on the TV in the background. I assume they had all seen it and were immune but I hadn’t and had to keep excusing myself to the bathroom to cry. And I am not a pretty crier.
My boss came into work the other day extremely indignant about the first 20 minutes of “Up,” because he’s watching the whole Pixar canon with his very precocious 3-year-old and was not prepared for the emotional onslaught. Everyone else in the office (all adults without kids) was like, “yeah, duh, where have you been.”
“Up” is rough, but the first few minutes of Finding Nemo basically destroy me. I cannot with the “it can all be taken from you in an instant” stuff. (See Also: Land Before Time, Bambi, etc.)
WHAT IS IT with the central trope of so many of these movies being losing one’s parents? Like in the first five minutes?? I saw An American Tail when I was 4 and I’m STILL NOT OVER IT.
When we went to see Inside Out, I had to bite my lip to stop myself from wailing along with a small child. (Although, to be fair, I feel I spent the whole film just on the verge of tears.)
Historically, my dad has always been dismissive of my gaming. He appreciates that I love it, but wasn’t interested at all.
Until he read about a game called ‘No Man’s Sky’.
And now he’s calling us regularly to ask about upgrading his PC and the specs of consoles and… and I can’t help but feel it deeply amusing.
My dad never got in the way of my gaming; he just didn’t understand the limitations of video games. He would watch me play whatever RPG I was cracking out on and tell me I should pick things up. This was in the 90’s-00’s, so he was talking about the background images. No, Dad, I can’t pick up the books on the shelves, eat the food on the table, etc. etc.
Then I got Oblivion and I was so excited! By this point I was in grad school I think, but I still made him see it, just because I could finally pick everything up! Until he asked me to catch a butterfly. I was crushed.
AND THEN SKYRIM HAPPENED. Both of our lives were finally complete. the end.
That is adorable dadding right there.
My dad is getting all excited about ‘procedurally generated space exploration’ and how ground breaking this game is and I don’t have the heart to say that I know exactly how groundbreaking it is and the answer is only a little bit.
He hasn’t really paid attention to the gaming industry since the first doom game, you see.
Please tell me your username is in honor of Jack from Mass Effect!
Nah, my Jack goes back way before that. All of my characters for all of my games (video or otherwise) are named Jack, and have been since JRPGs started giving us the option way back when. ๐ So Mass Effect was nice; one less step at the beginning.
I am SO EXCITED for No Man’s Sky. I don’t care about the backlash – exploring planets and slowly upgrading my ship sounds like heaven to me. And I die for the color palette.
It looks pretty damn cool I have to say.
The more backlash there is, the more interesting it sound to me. It looks delightfully relaxing and full of awe of the grandeur and majesty of space!
Why a backlash?
People are worried that there won’t be enough objectives, I guess. If they are not making numbers go up and getting rewards for the numbers going up, some people just aren’t happy.
Ugh. I mean, I get that is how many people play various games, but it seems like it isn’t the point of this particular game?
“What? The only objective is to explore the beautiful, vast expanse of quintillions of stars and planets? BORING!”
(j/o motion at universe)
I’m actually really annoyed there are shooty bits now. WHAT IF YOU DESTROY THE ECOSYSTEM, DID YOU EVER THINK OF THAT, GAME DEVS!?
Anyways I’ll probably spend most of my time trying to discover planets first so I can name them after my butt.
(nods) Solid plan. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Well, if you do that, robots will come and kill you. Naturally.
Wait which part the destroying ecosystems part or the naming things after my butt part
Robots are fine with your butt, not so fine with the ecosystem destroying!
Like…. you will name them ‘Butt’? Or ‘Megano’s Butt’? Or… another secret name that your butt has??
good god am i excited for No Man’s Sky.
i watched a backlash-ish talking head review recently, complaining about the apparent lack of objectives and just…
i mean, this is going to let us be space explorers in an unknown universe!
is there really anything else to want, when that’s on the table?
plus the entire conceit, from a logistics end, is so interesting. i am going to play the hell out of this.
Exactly! I just want to wander and see cool stuff, I don’t need checkpoints and missions, I’ve got enough of that going on in FFXIV.
My daughter graduated from Reader Rabbit straight into being my sidekick in City of Heroes. We play games together, and we play different games while sitting near each other. It is amazing how easy it is to open up to your dad when you are playing games together. She’s 17 now, and I’m glad I got her started early.
PS: thanks for the hot tip on No Man’s Sky. This may be the Space Minecraft I’ve been looking for!
City of Heroes! <3 That was the game that got my husband and I into MMOs! Victory and Protector servers, baby.
Now I’m sad again, because it’s gone. ๐
There are two projects out there trying to fill the void! City of Titans and Valiance Online. I think the latter even has a playable alpha!
PS: Victory server 4lyfe!!
I’m following City of Titans (I was a Kickstarter backer) but I haven’t seen any of the Valiance Online stuff…I’ll check it out!
CoT backer here too! Hopefully we will all be in game someday!
My husband desperately wants our offspring to get into gaming. When she was barely strong enough to lift her ginormous head (courtesy of her mother), he had mapped out a strategy of gaming milestones that he would lead her through. I mean, she has to start with the old skool games before advancing to the new stuff, right? A kid has to learn the classics. Donkey Kong and Contra before Sonic the Hedgehog before Halo.
Heh. This weekend, the two of them spent all day Saturday playing Splatoon and having the best time together. ๐ Watching a 6 year old attempt trash talking is kind of hilarious. (G-rated, of course.)
My dad loves gaming, but can only play pretty much one game now (Company of Heroes) as anything else more active makes his shoulder lock up.
The strangest phone call I ever received from my mom: “BourneApprox, have you heard of a game named, uh, BioShock Infinite?”
My mom’s a comp lit literature professor focusing on Renaissance and classical drama, and thanks to a random NPR segment last year recently became really interested in expanding her research focus to games. So we got her a PS3 for Christmas and set her up with some games which matched her research interests, which are choice and temporality.
This all sounds really fancy, but it was still a case of trying to walk your parent through using a controller to move forward and backward. She looooved Wolf Among Us and (on PC) The Stanley Parable, though, and got most of the way through Heavy Rain. And even though they’re too difficult for her, she’s enjoyed watching me play Mass Effect, Deus Ex, and Prince of Persia. Bioshock ended up being too violent, of course. So it’s all been a weird combination of a serious research project and Peak Mom. But it’s also really neat to be able to tell my mom about my Difficult Moral Choices in, say, Wolfenstein: The New Order and have her be interested?
that is amazing. and great bonding time, i am a bit jealous.
Not gonna lie, it’s been pretty fun! It’s particularly fun when she asks me why something is the way that it is – like, in ME2, why characters only die “for real” in some occasions but not others – and I just go “uuuuuuuuh.” Or when she finds some way of comparing game moral systems to classic tragedy. Man, I need to visit home more often.
MAKE YOUR MOM PLAY DRAGON AGGGEEEEEEE
Also your mom sounds really cool.
I just want everyone’s mom to Ride the Bull.
How did I miss these comments yesterday?! And thanks! ๐
I showed her a little bit of Dragon Age 2 on the PS3, just to show her how the Approval-based character system works, as opposed to a Paragon/Renegade moral system. She thought it was really interesting, but unfortunately in-depth RPG systems are not her style at alllll – she likes to get to the point and the meat of the narrative, and gets impatient quickly. So Inquisition might not go over well in that particular respect, Bulliciousness aside. And she’d probably go for Cullen, Fine Young Gentleman that he is (that’s what she calls total hunks).
However, I *did* build an entire computer for my sister so she could play Inquisition, so there may yet be one more Rider of the Bull to come! (Hehe, come.)
Also, speaking of Moms and BioWare, you’ve seen this tumblr, right? http://biowareaccordingtomom.tumblr.com
Oh yeah, Reg’s Mom is famous.
I’m surprised to hear she’s not into RPGs as much, as I find them way more accessible than shooters, personally! (Though I have super good aim in Mass Effect now, so thank you, Mass Effect.)
You should definitely tell her about Twine games!
I think I sent her Porpentine’s Howling Dogs at some point, but that may have been a bit…uh…diving into the deep end. Maybe I should send her the new Stephen Colbert one, hah. Other recent successes: Life is Strange.
Maybe I need to introduce her to Alistair……. That’s, uh, how I really got into RPGs.
Also, I just opened up KOTOR 2 (now on Mac and with a big steam update!) “just to see if it worked okay”, and now it’s three hours later and FUCK YOU RPGS I NEED TO GET UP FOR WORK TOMORROW.
BEEN THERE.
You should tell your dad about Space Engine! It’s like NMS but it’s in our actual universe. It’s educational.
$10 donuts means $10 for a half dozen at least, right? #OLDE
New coffee shop in my neighbourhood – seventh in three blocks if you include a Starbucks- and the owner/barista sold DD &I the last $3.50 maple walnut at 2;;30pm on Friday. His wife makes them in house.
Told him about the SuzyQ maple bacon donuts in Ottawa (Best EVER!) that sell out within the hour of making and he will try that when she gets back from Seattle. http://suzyq.ca/
If you are ever in Ottawa CANADA, make an expedition– also to the Byward Market for Hooker’s Beavertails. Obama likes them.
Pretty sure $10 donuts at the food truck rally = no donuts at the food truck rally, we’ll stop by the Pick’n’Save on the way home for the day-old bakery items, now THOSE are a deal.
Pick N Save day-old donuts were the BOMB, you could get like 12 for $6 or something which, split among you and 2 friends, was entirely affordable as a high schooler.
Now *THAT* is the Daddest thing ever.
Unpopular opinion: Pixar movies aren’t that deep, the standard dross people consume is just that shallow.
Hmm, no, I think this sounds more like an asshole opinion that you’ve provided no evidence for?
*swoon*
hmm. pixar is good, friend
True. There’s a food truck near my office that serves organic, farm-to-table dross with pork belly and kale chips and it is so much better than standard dross. People don’t know what they’re missing.
I find your “food truck” comment incredibly funny and also cutely clever by how it references Dad Magazine.
ALL THE UP THUMBS “UP”.
I tried to work in a Joy Division reference, too, but the structure got tricky and I believe the beauty of a Dad Joke lies in its simplicity.
I don’t really like most Pixar movies, and yeah…I generally keep that to myself since literally the rest of the western world seems to adore them.
That’s a valid opinion! But I think there’s a difference between “I don’t really like most Pixar movies, and I don’t know why everyone else likes them” and sneering at the common rabble for their tastes, which are far inferior to yours, a being who is blessed with the ability to see real Depth.
(Because tone of voice can fail in text, to clarify: I think the original commenter’s post came across as the latter, I don’t think yours did)
Just look at Inside Out! How did they convince people that was insightful or interesting? ๐
oh you guys, I visited my folks over the weekend and the coffee table was full of The Family Handyman, which looks like this:
It’s no Dad Magazine but its readership overlaps nearly 100%, I’m sure. I flipped through one until I got to the quiz page and my partner grabbed it to Test His Tool IQ! I don’t think you could hold up a page that says Test Your Tool IQ! in front of a Dad without him grabbing at it, keep that in mind if you ever need to set a dad trap.
Oh my god, my Dad is so interested in garage storage solutions. I need to buy him this immediately.
I love it. “Treat yourself! Build a bar!”
I read this in the voice of Tom Haverford.
oh my god my dad used to subscribe to this?? I used to read it every month… I remember the illustrated DIYs and their constant pegboard evangelizing. I think one year for Christmas I made my dad tennis-ball screw holders, as suggested in these very pages– you just cut a slit in the ball so you can squeeze it open and neatly store your fasteners. I drew the screw heads on the sides in Sharpie. (He never used them but was gracious about it.)
Awwww homemade screw holders!!!
Not sure why my dad subscribes to this, as he hasn’t been in good enough health the last couple years to do much handymanning. I guess it’s aspirational dadding, like people who buy regular ol clothes at Target but like to flip through the high-end fashion magazines anyway. (AND of course he has saved every prescription pill bottle, soaked the labels off, and stored screws in them. Because why would you just recycle such good containers?)
OH MY GOD Dads everywhere really ARE the same! (re the prescription bottles)
aaaah of course, and I bet they are all patting themselves on the back for their brilliant storage idea <3
Jesus that is a fantastic idea. Time to start saving my pill bottles…
Perhaps Dads can be separated into two camps – those who store their screws in old prescription bottles, and those who store them in old film canister bottles.
Bonus points to the latter group if they haven’t actually taken a 35 mm. film picture in decades.
What about old peanut butter containers, for the hoarding Dads?
From when baby-food came in baby-food jars with metal lids. You (dad) nail the lid to the underside of the workbench then attach the jars, which are filled with screws and nails and little metal oddments.
The world has moved on to using mason jars for that.
you are missing those who use baby food jars, from your infancy…
My husband subscribes to this. My magazine racks are filled with this and magazines like Useful Storage Tips.
He’s a childless Dad-in-training.
It’s a brilliant self-perpetuating problem: too many magazines cluttering up the place? Build a magazine rack! Where do I put all the tools I purchased to build a magazine rack? Build a tool rack! etc. etc. etc. Projects for days.
My dad bought me a subscription when I moves into my house! Also, it’s the best magazine ever ๐
I feel like I need to purchase this magazine now, if only for the handy tips on cleaning up pet messes.
If I ever need to set a dad trap, I’ll be sure to throw that in (along with a Coen Bros. DVD set and those little Trader Joe’s crackers that he likes so much).
My dad loves Trader Joe’s crackers too! Oh, the sadness when TJ’s discontinued the chinese mustard wonton chips and the spicy papadum chips.
Awwww! ๐
My dad loves the little round “Multi-seed Soy Sauce” ones. Before I moved back home (and before my hometown got its own Trader Joe’s), I used to buy a million bags and drive them 260 miles for his birthdays and so on.
I think my wife would love this magazine.
Update: I sent her a link to their website and she does.
I think your wife and I would get on very well.
The hardware store is like her favorite place to shop at. I consider myself passably handy but for her it is serious business.
You know what, I AM interested in setting a Dad Trap! Good tips.
You had me at “need to set a dad trap”. A dad trap!! I am seriously considering how I can leverage this somehow the next time my father visits me…
Is a dad trap cor catching your own dad, or any passing dad? Because I can totally see wanting to catch a passing dad and test it out for kindness. Or experiments.
Gotta cotch that dad
I totally have a subscription to this magazine. My favorite is the comic at the end.
All they need is TINKERING!!! and it WILL be Dad Magazine.
I was just this morning thinking “Man, it’s been a while since the last Dad Magazine”.
These always give me a glimpse at my future, but this one is a glimpse at a slightly sooner future.
THE HATS!!! I’ve noticed a serious uptick in Baby Hats and Child Hats.
OMG, last Friday we had two moms and their little ones over to swim in our pool (it was super hot out), and the baby was wearing this ENORMOUS pink French Foreign Legion-like sunhat, just bobbing cluelessly around in a large doughnut in our pool like it was nothing to be THAT CUTE IN YOUR HUGE HAT.
New Dad Life Goal: Be a Dad Magazine Young Dads Cover Model.
I was just wondering “WHERE IS THIS MONTH’S DAD MAGAZINE??” Nothing fills me with greater joy.
The other day I had to explain to a fellow powerlifter, who is young enough to be my son, that this cool retro band he liked, Oingo Boingo, was in fact fronted by the very same Danny Elfman whose movie soundtracks he loved so much. It blew. His. Mind.
He’s not my kid, but I still felt it was a very Dad moment. Especially when I then went into mind-numbing detail about the history of the Brothers Elfman and Oingo Boingo.
I was a member of the Oingo Boingo fan club when I was a teenager. They are still my comfort music.
On the parent name tip: I find my struggling to wrap my head about becoming a Mom/Mommy/Mama/Mum/Mummy/Mimzy/MAAAAAAAM. That feels like someone else’s name, someone else’s title. Anyone else go through this? Any solutions?
(While not genderqueer myself, I’ve found this list to be super helpful in thinking outside the Mom-box.)
It’s not obligatory! I’ve always called everybody in my family by their first names.
By the time they start talking, you’re reconciled to it. Having been covered in their bodily fluids for 12 months or more. ๐
This was so timely! Thanks!
(I’ve been struggling with coming up with a new pet name for my recently-out-as-trans Dad, who still likes being called Dad, but who I feel deserves an ADDITIONAL (not replacement) title to honor her new authentic public self. Expect me to post about this a lot here, as I have come up with nothing yet that fits.)
Did you read Heather Havrilesky on being called Mama/Mommy etc by people not her children?
It doesn’t bother me as much because who cares, but “hey mamas!” definitely falls into the same cloying vein as “hey ladies!” I do whatever I can to separate out my relationship with my kids from the over-aching Mommy Cultural Drama out there in the world. Fuck whatever people are bloviating about parenthood today; toddlers don’t know or care about that shit. I’m mommy because that’s what the title of that relationship is in our language, not because my identity is automatically subsumed into some bullshit neurotic stereotype.
TL:DR: this may not be the most helpful comment of all time. But there is a lot of cursing!
There is, however, something rather lovely about being called ‘Kidsname’s Mom’ by your kid’s friend, under age twelve. Otherwise, NO.
All the little kids in my old neighborhood called me “Calvin’s Mom.” Calvin was my pug. ๐
Sometimes they call you something awesome – my mother was dubbed Numyum which was a perfect mangulation of “mummy’s mummy”
Sometimes they shorten your name to something they can say, sometimes you decide to insist on something, and they follow (or they mangle it, in some perfect way)
I do like some of the options for the genderqueer parents – especially Baba and Nini.
Cuddle buddy? Oh dear.
You guys. In May my entire immediate family gathered for my sister’s graduation from art school. My dad has a fancy new camera (after being largely uninterested in photographing any family moments for years and years; that was my mom’s job) and if he took less than a thousand pictures that week I will be shocked. On graduation day he probably took at least 200 shots just of my sister sitting with her classmates. At times he would sort of disappear and I would look around and find him somewhere nearby creeping on us with his camera. It was pretty adorable.
Anyway I finally saw some of the photos recently and they are SO GOOD! Yay for Dads with new hobbies!
I am going to be a Real Live Dad in three months and Dad Magazine has therefore taken on special meaning to me, because honestly my Dad Joke game is already pretty much on point and I’m also really good at starting DIY projects and then getting frustrated when I remember I’m terrible at DIY. I’m pretty confident that I will someday earn that highest of accolades, the #dad. But I saw this today and I realized that I have actually, seriously, not even kidding mentally rehearsed my talk to the imminent one about Joy Division, so I guess I’m already at #youngdad, and I have very mixed feelings about this. (In fairness, at the moment I pretty much mentally rehearse a talk with the imminent one about every single item I see or hear everywhere. “[Child], would you like to know more about the fascinating history of traffic cones?”)
signed, Tank
I rehearse Explaining Things talks all the time too! And I don’t even have or want children! I think the only thing that ever does vaguely make me want them is the prospect of explaining the world – it must be quite exciting to see the world through new eyes. And my compulsion to Explain Things would make me very Dad-like, despite being a cis woman.
Good luck on your new arrival! May your Dad game be on point.
I just want kids so I can force them to watch Star Trek with me.
Avengers. The Steed and Peel kind.
Also? Totally worked!!
OMG, this really describes my brother – he sings 80s alternative lullabies and he was just pontificating to me about Inside Out the other week.
Other headlines –
The right time to introduce your child to Calvin and Hobbes.
Learning to manage boredom is an important life skill and other reasons to put off getting a cell phone for your 3rd grader.
Harry Potter 5, too dark for your 8 year old?
My nephew inhaled all the Harry Potter books when he was 6. In the later ones, he started getting a little freaked out so he had his mom go through and block out the scary parts with sticky notes with a summary written on them, like “Cedric dies” over top of the terrifyingly detailed scene. Knowing was okay; having the visuals was not.
I love this! What a great coping method.
I found a children’s book at my parents’ home that had an extra sentence written in my mother’s handwriting – because little me felt the ending was incomplete and was really upset by it (iirc, it ended with the little sister not getting a candy cane, when everyone else did, so my mom fixed it).
I went whitewater rafting today with my mom & sister and in our van was a young family where they all talked a lot about Instagram together. It was sort of weird but I guess that’s what happens with #youngdads (and moms)?
Oh yeah, Reg's Mom is famous.
I'm surprised to hear she's not into RPGs as much, as I find them way more accessible than shooters, personally! (Though I have super good aim in Mass Effect now, so thank you, Mass Effect.)
You should definitely tell her about Twine games!
BEEN THERE.