Spring Break...and whatnot

Loved this movie as a teen.

This week is Spring Break for everyone.  Well, not for me.  I still have discussions to post, a research paper to plan, and plenty of academic reading to do.  But my kids are all home.  And I mean ALL of them.  My daughter is here for the week from Vegas.  That provided some tension at first, since her now ex-boyfriend, Isaac is still living with us.  But, it seems to have sorted itself out, and all is right in the world.  They may not be dating anymore, but they are obviously good friends.  And at their ages, that's really how it should be right now.

The only downside of this week is that my wife has to bear the brunt of the stress involved with a crowded apartment by herself, for the the most part; I still have a 9to5-er to go to during the day.  But, she will get her break in the evenings, when she has to go to work, and I get to stay home.  Oddly, the biggest problem we run into, it seems, is figuring out how to feed this army of finicky eaters.  But, my wife generally has a good handle on that, so it's not too bad, all things considered.

I spent the day lazing around the house yesterday.  I didn't actually go outside for anything all day.  I should have spent the time reading.  Either for school or pleasure (or even... *GASP* ...writing!!).  But my brain just wasn't having it.  Besides there were bad guys to shoot in CoD: Black Ops II.  The funny thing is that both Isaac and I play that game the same way.  A lot of profanity, cries of cheating, and even more profanity and creative insults.  We had my wife and daughter in stitches yesterday.

I did manage some reading, though.  I finished the third story arch in the Punisher MAX series, entitled "Mother Russia."  Very brutal, tense, and foul-mouthed, and it included a guest appearance by Nick Fury (and not the Sam Jackson version).  I loved the relationship between Nick and Frank, and I hope that continues on occasion in the future.

Also watched a movie I had been eying for a while; Abduction with Taylor Lautner.  I should state that I actually like him.  I think he's a good actor, and has a pretty good screen presence (he plays one of three characters I like from the Twilight movies...Jacob, Charlie and Felix).  This movie was pretty good, and the only reason I can imagine it didn't do well was because of Twilight.  Lautner is going to have to work hard to get past that.  This was a decent start, though.  It had good action, pretty believable characters, and the acting was spot on.  The cast even surprised me a little, as I didn't expect such big names to be in supporting roles.  It was worth a rental for sure (though we saw it on NetFlix).

I don't think we have anything planned for this week.  Tomorrow my in-laws are coming down to have lunch with us and visit with Faith.  Other than that, it's just hanging out at home for the kids.  But, they're all Xbox-babies, so it shouldn't be too bad.  There will probably be some major cleaning and organizing this week, as well.  The Spring Cleaning bug has already hit my wife (despite the snow we were having yesterday), and frankly, our place needs it.  With that many people living in such a small space, it's hard to keep up with it all.  So, we will need to buckle down and get into it this week.

On a final note, I should be getting my copy of Writing Fantasy Heroes: Powerful Advice from the Pros today.  Very much looking forward to digging into this.  I will post a full review somewhere down the line, for sure.