My Young Padawans

I've noticed that so far my blogs have only associated my children with sleep deprivation. While it is true that the recent birth of our second child has made coherent thought a rare commodity it is only a temporary condition. Already things are on the improve. We are getting 4 or 5 hours of sleep in a row some nights.

It is a little odd to be going to bed around 9pm or earlier. It reminds me of my childhood, when I'd be bundled off to bed just as TV looked like it was getting interesting. I still remember being allowed to stay up for the occasional movie, The Guns of Navarone, The Dam Busters, or The Desert Rats. My father likes classic war movies to this day. I think there were meant to be part of my education. Not sure what lesson I was meant to get from them though. War is hell ... and entertaining too?

Now-a-days I can set the VCR to record the shows we are too tired to stay up for. Although most nights we can't find anything we want to bother saving.

One of the great things about having kids is that I can watch cartoons without guilt again. I never fully gave up cartoons when I 'grew up'. Just when it seemed I was turning into a responsible adult some crazed new toon show would drag me back down to idiot child status. Ren & Stimpy, I am Weasel, The Teen Titans. And there was always Anime to add to the mix, even if that was usually not childish.

Thanks to my eldest child I have been introduced to Spongebob, Fairly Odd Parents, Jimmy Neutron, Billy & Mandy, and a host of lesser toons. Her current fave is the Clone Wars cartoons, even though she has never seen a Star Wars movie. She just loves Yoda.

Like most 'old fans' of Star Wars I was very disappointed with the prequels. They seemed ... dull ... and stupid. Not that the original movies didn't have their silly moments, but somehow I found those endearing. The prequels just fell flat for me. I've never even seen the third prequel, although I have played it on Lego Star Wars on the Wii.

It's the Wii that is responsible for my daughters obsession with Star Wars. One of her proudest achievements was the day she could defeat the Darth Maul level without needing my help. She bounced all over the house after her success. For her the Star Wars universe is entirely different than for me. She will get to see all the movies with young eyes, rather than the overly cynically eyes I viewed the prequels with.

Greedo fired first! Jar Jar is the most annoying character in movies! The 'racial' stereotyping of characters in Phantom Menace is beyond insulting! The pod race is a bad rip-off of Ben Hur!

Okay, I got that out of my system. But maybe, just maybe, thanks to my children, I'll come to enjoy the entirety of the Star Wars lexicon. Not with my own eyes, but through theirs.