My daughter was having a particularly good day. She had seen Ava DuVernay’s Oscar-nominated documentary 13th (2016), about the loophole in the 13th Amendment (1865) banning slavery.
“Did you know,” she asked me, “that there weren’t cross burnings by the Ku Klux Klan until the movie Birth Of A Nation (1915) came out?” Why, no, I didn’t” – and if I did, I had forgotten that detail. It’s true.
“I told you something you didn’t know!” She LOVES doing that. And she realizes that for it to have an impact, it has to be something I care about.
While she knows a LOT about K-pop music, and can name songs and artists ad nauseum, she knows nothing (yet) about Hendrix or the Pretenders. I play the “yeah, but” card. “Name a song by XO”, and I can’t. “Name a song by Twice.” “Yes or Yes.” (I read Dustbury.) “Name a song by Talking Heads,” I say, and she can’t. Which is a bit my failure, I suppose, but whatever.
Then she shows me her geometry homework and shows me how to draw equilateral triangles with just a line segment and a compass. I was good at math in high school, but I never learned this trick. “I taught you TWO things today!”
She somehow got the number up to five, with other geometric magic. It’s not that she’s actually TAUGHT me these things, but she did show me them, which is good enough for her.
Her mother and I are not beyond bribing her to get her AP World History done on time, as opposed to staying up all Sunday night. In February, I told her she could see a BTS concert movie, one of those Fathom events, if she finished her homework by 6 pm Sunday EASTERN Time. (Her lawyerly definitions required the time zone inclusion.)
I never bothered reviewing Love Yourself in Seoul here because it would be like reviewing Beatlemania, including from my daughter. Closeup shots of the band, great dancing and decent singing, solo segments for each of them.
The photo was posted seven years ago by the little boy’s father, and is probably a year or more older than that.
You have always been the walking encyclopedia in our family, so it id great that your bright child looks fir ways to try and stump tou. Nit an easy task! Hope she has a wonderful birthday! š„°
Love your blog. Love the Lydster too.
Just watched a BTS video (Idol “I love myself”). The boys can certainly dance and perform and mug for the cameras, but that’s sure some really expensive looking production. Also, these boys are… how can I put this… unabashedly girly. Like the one boy coquettishly posing with a spread fan like a geisha. That The Lydster and a whole lot of other ladies her age are big fans of them informs us old people an awful lot about how they see the world. I’d guess that smart boys her age are studying these videos to find out what attracts the females and also gets them in good with their peers.