Oscar Night Open Thread. Update!

I should start off first by admitting that this open thread is not even my idea.

In fact I did not even realize that the Academy Awards were even happening this weekend.

But then I got that call from the daughter.

"So Dad are you ready for the big night?"

"Uh...big night?"

"Don't tell me you don't know what is happening this Sunday?"

"Of course I do it's..uh..you know...an anniversary or something."

"DAD! It's the Academy Awards! You know how important those are to us."

Us?

"Sure honey I was only teasing. Totally going to watch it, and I will even host an open thread on IM.

So here we are.

Just between you and me I have only seen two of the nine films nominated for Best Picture. (For those wondering the films were "Arrival" and "Hell or High Water.")

They were both great and either one could win in my opinion, but beyond that I simply have not been paying much attention.

But I am now, and boy am I stoked! This is going to be a great night!

(That sounds convincing, right?)

Here is a list to get you started.

And remember even if you are watching by yourself, in a dimly lit apartment, just you and your six cats, you are really never alone on Oscar night. The whole world is watching.

In fact in year's past even the new president was an avid viewer.

What ever happened to the good old days of The Academy Awards. This show is an insult to the past, just plain bad!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 23, 2015

The Oscars are a sad joke, very much like our President. So many things are wrong!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 23, 2015

So I imagine that Trump will be watching right along with the rest of us, which is great since I think his name is going to be mentioned quite a few times.

(Boy if he thought the White House Correspondents' Dinner was the lion's den, wait until he gets a load of tonight.)

You can also follow me on Twitter tonight, where I might have a few clever things to say. Though to be completely honest I plan to drink a little so as the night wears on they may only seem clever to me.

Update: For those who missed it here is Jimmy Kimmel's hilarious opening monologue.

After all these years I am still not tired of the Kimmel/Damon feud.

Update 2: Well Trump will be all over this tomorrow.

Good job CNN. That is all the ammunition the Right needs.

Will and Grace cast reunites for the 2016 election.

Okay that was literally just for my daughter.

I mean I really liked it and all but if I had decided not to post it I would never have heard the end of it from that kid who keeps eating all of the olives in the house.

My daughter freaking LOVES Will and Grace.

From my daughter's Facebook page.

Yep, I done good.

Are you ready? Say it with me, "President Hillary Clinton."

This from CNN:

So many girls for so long were told -- overtly and subtly -- what they could and could not be. Housewives? Yes. Teachers? Sure. President? Unlikely. 

They were told to not express their opinions too strongly -- it's not polite. To not challenge a man -- it's not ladylike. 

For those girls -- many of them now mothers with daughters of their own -- what happened Tuesday night was more than a political triumph. 

Regardless of party persuasion, Hillary Clinton's victory is the definition of historic: She became the first female presidential nominee of a major political party. 

Her chances of becoming president -- the first woman head of state in America's 238-year history -- are now much closer to reality.

I predict her chances of winning the Presidency are right around 100% personally.

I think once Hills unleashes her surrogates, which will include the likes of Bill Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, and of course President Obama, they will chew Donald Trump and spit him out.

And once it really sets in for the largest voting block in the country, the women, that this election will be just as historic for them as the 2008 election was for African Americans, I imagine they will flock to their polling places to take their place in history.

And Hillary understands that as well.

Take a look at this recently released advertisement:

I'm just a guy but I certainly feel a surge of pride that my daughter will soon realize that NO door is closed to her, and that she can now be literally anything that she wants in life.

You know on the day that my daughter was born I promised to work hard to make a better world for her.

Well here it is, though to honest I cannot take much credit. But by gosh I did what I could.

Bernie Sanders insults the intelligence of the American voters.

Courtesy of Salon:  

The Bernie Sanders campaign has injected a lot of welcome aspects of lefty thought into the national discourse this election cycle: An emphasis on income inequality, a discussion on how to rebuild the declining middle class, a reminder that almost none of the bankers who destroyed our economy paid for their crimes. 

Unfortunately, Sanders is also injecting one of the most wrong-headed and frankly embarrassing aspects of lefty thought into our discourse: The tendency to dismiss people who disagree with you as dupes who have been misled by a shadowy cabal of evil masterminds who brainwash the masses in order to perpetuate economic injustice. 

This is the premise of Sanders’ “political revolution” argument: That the only reason voters hadn’t backed a socialist in the past is they never really had a chance to. But once they heard the good news about democratic socialism, they will throw off their shackles, embrace the truth, and usher in our socialist paradise. 

That sort of rhetoric is harmless enough when it’s a pitch to win over voters. But now Sanders is losing the nomination. Rather than accepting the possibility that the voters heard his pitch and disagreed with him, however, Sanders has started to dismiss his loss as inauthentic, the product of shadowy forces misleading the easily duped voters rather an an authentic rejection, by the voters, of his ideas.

It has been pointed out here and in other places that Sanders seems perfectly happy with the primary system so long as he wins, especially the caucus system which most of us despise,  but whenever he comes up short he IMMEDIATELY claims that the process is rigged or broken.

At first it was easy to laugh off, but now that it has taken root, and there are people essentially calling every primary that Bernie lost illegitimate, and calling for a massive overhaul of the entire, it is really no longer a laughing matter.

Remember this is the same system that selected Jimmy Carter in the 1970's, Bill Clinton in the 1990's, and Barack Obama in 2008.

And of course back then their opponent's supporters also thought the system was rigged, and cried foul. THAT is also essentially part of the process.

If you think WE have it bad just imagine how the Republicans must feel having just selected the orange tinted short fingered vulgarian as their candidate. If ever a primary process needed overhauling, that would seem to be the party to take that leap first.

Over on the Huffington Post they have offered a helpful guideline on how elections work for the more fact resistant  of the Bernie supporters.

Speaking of Bernie supporters I finally had a long conversation with my daughter last night.

I initially called to ask her if she thought the attacks being launched against Hillary by Trump, which dredge up Bill Clinton's past indiscretions and blame her for being an enabler, would work with young millennial females.

She said absolutely not, and that her friends find him more repulsive every time he opens his mouth.

I thought so, but it never hurts to check.

So after that we discussed the state of the Democratic primary and she expressed disappointment over how it played out and that she still feels that Bernie would have been the best choice.

However she is facing facts and has every intention of voting for Hillary in the general.

She also shared that after the New York primary the number of pro-Sanders Facebook posts on her timeline dropped dramatically, and since that time have only been intermittent.

She said that a lot of her friends, who were inspired by the simple message put forth by Sanders, were now pretty disgusted with the back and forth between Hillary and Trump.

She also said that right now a lot of them are feeling drained by the process and many simply want to ignore the whole thing until it is over.

So I said I understood that and reminded her of how all of the Obama supporters felt after he was elected and immediately ran into a Republican wall of resistance which made it almost impossible for him to push through his agenda.

I then reminded her that if you are really unhappy with the way things are going then giving up is not an option, and went on to bore her with stories of the civil rights movement, the anti-war movement, and the current progress of the LGBT movement. And that if she and her fellow millennials want to change the party platform, and the political process, they need to stay engaged and not take their ball and go home. 

The call ended after I started singing "We Shall Overcome." Off key of course.

What can I say, I was caught up in the moment.

Former speechwriter for President Obama explains why it may be more important to elect Hillary Clinton on 2016, than it was to elect his boss in 2008.

Yeah I know, I'm the dragonlady.

This Daily Beast article was written by Jon Favreau, longtime Obama speechwriter, who describes with some embarrassment how his initial perceptions of Hillary Clinton proved to be totally wrong: 

This same story has repeated itself throughout Clinton’s career: those who initially view her as distrustful and divisive from afar find her genuine and cooperative in person. It was the case with voters in New York, Republicans in the Senate, Obama people in the White House, and heads of state all over the world. There’s a reason being America’s chief diplomat was the specific job Obama asked Hillary to do—she has the perfect personality for it. 

Your eyes are rolling. You don’t often see or read about this side of Hillary. You don’t doubt her fierce brilliance when she’s debating policy with Bernie Sanders. You don’t doubt her stamina or tenacity when she’s sitting through hour eleven of the Benghazi Kangaroo Court. But when it comes to nearly everything else, Clinton can seem a little too cautious and forced—like she’s trying too hard or not at all, preferring to retreat behind the safety of boilerplate rhetoric and cheesy soundbites. It’s a tendency that can’t just be blamed on her opponents or the media, though I wonder how many of us would be so brave and open in our public personas after being subjected to 25 years of unrelenting and downright nasty criticism of what we say, what we do, and how we look.

Favreau closes the article in this way:  

Hillary Clinton isn’t perfect. She isn’t flashy or entertaining. She isn’t cool or hip, so please stop forcing the poor woman to learn the Dab on Ellen. As someone who’s been in politics for a few decades, she’s made plenty of mistakes, and will probably make many more. 

But Hillary is also more than just a policy wonk who can’t wait to start shuffling through white papers in the Oval Office. She cares. She tries. She perseveres. And now she has a chance to tell the story she’s always wanted about America: the story about a country that found the courage to turn away from our darkest impulses; that chose to embrace our growing diversity as a strength, not a weakness; that pushed the boundaries of opportunity outward and upward, until there are no more barriers, and no more ceilings. 

At stake in this election is control of a Tea Party-run Congress, at least one Supreme Court vacancy that could tip the balance for a generation, and the very real chance that a highly unstable demagogue could become the 45th president of the United States. So while I may not have imagined myself saying this a few years ago, I certainly believe it now: It’s far more important to elect Hillary Clinton in 2016 than it was to elect Barack Obama in 2008.

I found this article to be particularly interesting because just last night I had a similar discussion with my daughter, who as you know is a Sanders supporter, about the importance of electing Hillary Clinton.

My daughter flew up here for my birthday and we have been having a blast together, eating out and going to the movies, but last night we watched a rather interesting debate on "Real Time with Bill Maher" which inspired our own discussion on politics.

My daughter it is sad to say has some of the same issues with trust concerning Hillary Clinton that are often voiced by those who only know of her by way of the constant attacks lobbed by the Right Wing.

Her basic take on Hillary is that she is bought and paid for, and that she is controlled by special interest groups who will significantly influence her policies in the White House.

In response I explained to her that being paid to give speeches in no way made the speaker beholden to those paying to hear that speech, beyond the delivery of said speech.

We also talked about political revolutions and I listed the number of past politicians who had once been heralded as change agents who fell by the wayside such as George McGovern, John Anderson, Ross Perot, Ron Paul, Howard Dean, and of course, Ralph Nader.

I explained that all of these folks had tremendous support, ESPECIALLY from younger Americans, but that in the end they failed to get the support they needed to "fundamentally change politics."

My daughter did admit that my points about voter turnout and political connections within the Democratic party were valid, but of course in the end she wants to vote her conscience, and who can blame her for that?

So of course she still plans to caucus for Bernie, and that is fine with me.

But in the end, once Hillary is the candidate, she has no problem marking her name on the ballot.

And to me that is all anybody can ask.

On the Origin of Species voted most influential academic book in history. Oh this is not going to go over well.

Courtesy of the Guardian:

Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species has been voted the most influential academic book ever written, hailed as “the supreme demonstration of why academic books matter” and “a book which has changed the way we think about everything”. 

After a list of the top 20 academic books was pulled together by expert academic booksellers, librarians and publishers to mark the inaugural Academic Book Week, the public was asked to vote on what they believed to be the most influential. With titles in the running including A Vindication of the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft, George Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, and Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations, Darwin’s explanation of his theory of evolution was the public’s overwhelming favourite, with 26% of the vote, said organisers. 

Professor Andrew Prescott of the University of Glasgow called Darwin’s 1859 study “the supreme demonstration of why academic books matter”. “Darwin used meticulous observation of the world around us, combined with protracted and profound reflection, to create a book which has changed the way we think about everything – not only the natural world, but religion, history and society,” he said. “Every researcher, no matter whether they are writing books, creating digital products or producing artworks, aspires to produce something as significant in the history of thought as Origin of Species.”

Yeah religious conservatives are going to lose their shit over this. 

I can personally attest to the influence of this book in my life, and even in my daughter's life.

They say that the best way to create an Atheist is to have them read the Bible. However it is not the only book with that kind of power.

Quite a few years back when my daughter was attending that uber fundamentalist church in Georgia, and coming home with these crazy ideas about evolution, rather than argue about it everyday with her I challenged her to read this book instead.

To her credit she did exactly that, and it did indeed change her mind completely.

Now she is not only a strong supporter of Evolution, and of science in general, but she is an even more ardent Atheist than her old man.

So yes, this book is powerful indeed.

Perhaps THAT is why the Religious Right fears it so.

The Tesla Model S autopilot. The future is here. Well almost here. Update!

Courtesy of Jalopnik: 

The Tesla Model S isn’t the first truly autonomous car on the road and available for sale to the public. We’re not there yet, just as a society. But it is the first car with what Tesla’s calling its “Autopilot” system. And if this is the future not of driving, but of sitting in traffic, then please sign me up. 

Autopilot, if it isn’t a full autonomous system, is simple enough in execution. It won’t drive you to your ultimate destination, it won’t make navigational turns without your input, and it doesn’t know what the traffic light or the sign in front of you says. So think of it less like an autonomous system, and rather more like the ultimate execution of cruise control. It uses a forward-looking radar, a front-facing camera, 12 ultrasonic sensors, and GPS to make sure everything stays on the road, and it seems to work well enough using those. 

But even if it’s just the holy grail of cruise control, its execution is almost perfect.

The self driving car debate in my house is still ongoing and quite passionate.

Interestingly enough my daughter and I are not on the sides of the issue you might imagine.

I am all for self driving cars as I think they will be great for the elderly and awesome for long distance drives.

My daughter on the other hand does not like the idea of machines taking over yet another human responsibility and making us even more reliant on machines.

I see her point, and even agree with it to some degree, but then I think of the gee whiz factor and suddenly I'm like a kid in a toy store.

Besides let's face it, this WILL be the future someday whether we like it or not.

Update: In other car news Toyota has plans to virtually do away with all gas powered vehicles by 2050.

God I love the smell of progress in the morning.

John Oliver on Whole Foods.

Click image to play video

Okay I have a confession to make.

The entire point of this post is for my daughter's benefit alone.

She fucking LOVES Whole Foods, and any other store that advertises it sells non-GMO organically grown products.

My daughter reads food labels like lonely middle aged men read the back of porn DVDs.

"Nope too much fat in this one."

"Nope too many unnatural additives in that one."

She quite literally drives me crazy by judging the foods I eat, which in my defense are pretty healthy, by some unnatural standard that I could only achieve if I lived off of berries and bark in the woods near my house.

And even then she would probably be upset if she was not convinced that I had humanely harvested the tree bark without causing any pain to the tree.

And finally a 4th of July message from someone who actually understands the importance of the occasion, President Obama.

Now THAT is an inspiring 4th of July message.

In fact considering the last week, this might be the best 4th of July that President Obama can remember.

However the President refuses to call this last week, his "best week ever." That label goes to another week from his past:  

President Barack Obama said Tuesday that last week – when he won historic victories on trade, health care and gay rights – was “gratifying,” but he stopped short of calling it his “best week ever,” as some pundits have. 

“In terms of my best week … now my best week I will tell you was marrying Michelle, that was a really good week. Malia and Sasha being born – excellent weeks,” Obama said during a joint news conference with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff.

Now that is a smart man.

Well for this American that last week was pretty damn special, but I also have to agree that it cannot hold a candle to the day that I held my newborn baby girl for the first time.

And I want to thank this President for helping me to keep a promise I made that day to help make the world a better, safer, and more tolerant place for my daughter to live.

The new look for White House.gov yesterday.

Source

The White House website was by no means the only ones to adopt the rainbow motif either.

I have to tell you folks, we are going to be hard pressed to have another week quite as good as this last week.

My daughter and I had some amazing conversations about Supreme Court decisions, and I felt as if my promises to her when she was born of making the world a better place for her are starting to come true.

(Yes I realize I did not make these changes directly, but I would like to think that I helped some. Maybe just a little?)

Forget Nostradamus, the real prognosticator was Nikola Tesla.

Nikola Tesla 1926:  

"When wireless is perfectly applied the whole earth will be converted into a huge brain, which in fact it is, all things being particles of a real and rhythmic whole. We shall be able to communicate with one another instantly, irrespective of distance. Not only this, but through television and telephony we shall see and hear one another as perfectly as though we were face to face, despite intervening distances of thousands of miles; and the instruments through which we shall be able to do his will be amazingly simple compared with our present telephone. A man will be able to carry one in his vest pocket." 

Almost ninety years ago this man predicted the future we are living today, including cell phones and the internet.

Tesla is one of my daughter's all time heroes, along with his contemporary counterpart Elon Musk.

What can I say? I raised her right. 

Death toll in Nepal rises to almost 2,000.

Courtesy of The Guardian:  

The death toll from the devastating earthquake in Nepal climbed above 1,900 on Sunday and was continuing to rise as officials struggled to gauge the full scale of the disaster and the world rushed to provide desperately needed aid. 

Dozens of aftershocks jolted Nepal on Saturday and Sunday as people sheltered where they could. Nepalese authorities continually revised the number of dead upwards a day after the Himalayan country was shaken by a magnitude 7.8 quake that wrecked houses, flattened centuries-old temples and triggered avalanches on Mount Everest. 

More than 5,000 people had been injured, with the number of dead and injured expected to rise in the coming days. Nepalese police officials said more than 700 people died in Kathmandu alone. 

An avalanche triggered by the quake struck a section of Everest’s base camp, killing at least 17 people and injuring 61 others, local reports said. Further up the mountain, about 100 climbers were safe but facing difficulty getting down as the route back to safety was damaged, with the situation of more people on other other routes on the mountain still unknown and rescue efforts under way.

So much devastation!

My daughter arrived back home last night after being on the road with a traveling stage show for almost a month, and she sort of shamed me by asking how I could be so focused on the President's WHCD speech and not this tragedy.

She had a point.

I guess part of the reason I had not written about it is that I found it a little overwhelming and didn't know what I could do to help here on this blog.

The US is responding by sending a disaster response team and a million dollars in aid, but I imagine that amount will go up as we learn more about the devastation and loss of life.

I would suggest to those that want to help that they could start by making a donation to the Red Cross, because you know they will be in the thick of things.

If any of you have more information, or more legitimate places to donate, please let us know.

After all we are really one community sharing this planet, and what hurts one of us, hurts all of us.

US soldiers raped and sexually assaulted dozens of Colombian children between 2003 and 2007, filmed the attacks to distribute as pornography, and face no charges due to treaty granting immunity.

Colombian children

Courtesy of WSWS:  

US soldiers and military contractors were responsible for the rape and sexual abuse of scores of Colombian children, but faced no legal repercussions because of a treaty between Washington and Bogota granting them full immunity. 

A fresh revelation of these appalling crimes came as a byproduct of ongoing peace talks between the Colombian government and the FARC (Armed Revolutionary Forces of Colombia) guerrilla movement taking place in Havana, Cuba. 

Last month, a Historical Commission on the Armed Conflict and its Victims in Colombia, formed jointly by the Colombian government and the FARC, presented an 800-page report documenting the causes and consequences of the decades of civil war that have claimed millions of victims in terms of dead, wounded, abused and displaced. The commission was composed of leading Colombian academics and intellectuals acceptable to both parties. 

A section prepared by Renan Vega Cantor, a professor of history at the National Pedagogical University of Bogota, dealt with the role played by the US military. The Pentagon has sent advisers and contractors to the country as part of Plan Colombia, which has included $6 billion in mostly military aid directed at combatting both drug trafficking and the anti-government guerrilla movements. 

The report cites 54 cases of rape and sexual abuse of minors, some as young as 12. “In one of the best known cases, in Melgar and in Giradot [both are to the southwest of the capital of Bogota, with a major Colombian air base that housed US “advisers” located in Melgar], 53 minors were abused sexually by mercenaries, who also filmed it and sold the tapes as pornography,” the report states. The young girls were subsequently threatened with death, and they and their families had to leave the area.

This post is the result of a late night message from my daughter demanding that I write something about this and let people know what we have done. 

She was of course quite horrified and wanted to know how we could not only allow this to happen, but also protect those who committed these atrocities.

My response is of course to refer to the Ted Cruz post from earlier today.

After all how can Americans be held accountable when they are clearly agents of the "American civil religion" whose every action is divinely inspired?

This is the result when you see the military, and military contractors, through rose colored glasses and believe that their every action overseas "protects us over here."

How dare we even think of prosecuting them for helping to keep us free by spreading American exceptionalism to every corner of the planet?

For those who want to learn more about this you can read here, here, and here as well.

I have found my final resting place. I'm gonna be a tree.

Courtesy of The Collective Intelligence:  

Italian designers Anna Citelli and Raoul Bretzel recently introduced a new burial technique with the potential to change the world. They call it the Capsula Mundi project, and it's a shockingly simple concept. 

Rather than burying dead bodies in wooden boxes in the ground, bodies are placed in a biodegradable sack like the ones below. 

The sack is then buried in the ground, with a tree planted above. 

The premise is that as the tree grows, it will use the nutrients produced by the human body as it decomposes. 

The designers wish for cemeteries to eventually look more like forests.

Man do I like this idea!

I have never been a fan of funerals, but having a ceremony to plant a tree, now THAT sounds like a celebratory event.

My daughter and I recently discussed this idea and she is all for it. She says she would be much more likely to come and water me if I was a tree, rather than sit and grieve for me if all she could see was a headstone.

And the idea of providing oxygen to the earth after my passing makes me pretty happy as well.

This also falls in line with what Neil deGrasse Tyson has said he would like for his remains to be used for after he breaths his last.

My daughter wanted to share this.

Recently my daughter has become very politically aware, and holy crap!

If you think I get opinionated and strident sometimes trust me when I tell you my kid can verbally work you over and leave you shaking in the fetal position in about five minutes flat.

She now has her own chair in my office where she sits to debate me.

Have to admit, it's kind of fun.

Quote of the morning.

Courtesy of Elizabeth Warren: 

"If Scott Walker sees 100,000 teachers & firefighters as his enemies, maybe it's time we take a closer look at his friends.”

Excellent, excellent observation.

By the way Warren is hands down my daughter's favorite politician, and she wants her to run with Hillary so bad she can hardly stand it.

Dealing with my Academy Award hangover.

Was not always impressed with NPH last night. But this took guts.

Okay so I watched the Oscars last night with my daughter, which is kind of like watching a Nazi parade with Hitler.

Every time my attention drifted away or I missed a joke she exclaimed "Dad! I thought you were going to watch this with me!"

I was, I was watching it with her.

However where she was on the edge of her seat over each category (Really? Sound mixing?), I was only really interested in the BIG moments such as Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Movie, and most steeply plunging neckline.

Of course unlike her father my daughter made it her mission to watch EVERY single one of the nominated movies. I think she missed like three or four, but she certainly saw all of the biggies.

So when the movies were announced in each category my daughter went through the same process. "Oh that one was so good it should win. But wait I loved that one too. Oh no this one is really the one that should take home the Oscar. Oh they all deserve to win, I can't decide."

And then when the winner was announced my daughter would leap from her chair and yell "Yes! This is the one I wanted to win!"

This happened every time, for every category, no I am not exaggerating.

So for those of you who did not spend your evening listening to bad jokes, fumbled pronunciations, and awkward award presentations, here is a list of the winners.

The top winners were "The Grand Budapest Hotel" and "Birdman" each with four Oscars. (Birdman also won for Best Picture.)

Eddie Redmayne won Best Actor for "The Theory of Everything," and Julianne Moore won Best Actress for "Still Alice." (This was the only win that was punctuated with the sound of cans ricocheting off of a Wasilla refrigerator.)

As it turned out "American Sniper" only brought home one Oscar for Sound Editing which you know will result in all kinds of Right Wing conspiracy theories.

Now I don't want you to think that I did not find some enjoyable moments, because I really did.

For instance there was Common accepting the award for best original song for the movie "Selma." His speech was quite powerful and incredibly eloquent.

The same could be said for Patricia Arquette's acceptance speech for her Best Supporting Actress role in "Boyhood:" 

"To every woman who gave birth to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else's equal rights," she said. "It's our time to have wage equality once and for all and equal rights for women in the United States of America."

That was so good it made Meryl Streep react like this:

Definitely got the Meryl Streep and J-Lo seal of approval.

However just speaking for myself the best, and most unexpected moment, came when this happened.

Okay seriously, who knew Lady Gaga could sing like THAT?

And when Julie Andrews came out afterward I thought my daughter was going to collapse with joy.

So all in all it was a really fun evening, and I really enjoyed spending it with my insanely crazy about movies daughter.

And you know the best part? Well the best part is that they announced the Best Picture early enough so that I was able to quickly turn the channel afterward and watch everything but the first few minutes of "The Walking Dead." (You should have heard my daughter scream when I did that.)

So does your family treat Academy Awards night like a holiday? Well apparently mine does.

You know as a parent you always hope that your children will share some of your interests.

If you are a mechanic you probably hope your son enjoys working on cars.

If you are a a voracious reader you hope your child inherits your love of books.

And clearly if you are a deeply religious person you hope your children embrace your faith.

In my case what I wanted to share with my daughter was a love of movies.

I took her to her first movie in a theater when she was about three years old.

It was Walt Disney's Peter Pan. A movie that I had loved as child and hoped she would as well.

Instead when she finished the few treats I bought for her at the concession stand, she stood up and said "go home now" and started walking out of the theater.

Nothing I could say or do would convince her to stay.

However that was the LAST movie she ever left early.

She became my constant companion during Saturday afternoon matinees and we watched hundreds of movies together. It became our thing.

As many of you know she now often works on movie or television productions, and if not that is working behind the scenes during performances in theaters all across the country.

In other words my daughter's love of theater and movies makes mine look tiny and somewhat adorable by comparison.

However even I did not realize to what extent the importance of movies played in my daughter's life until she walked into my office the other day and announced that we were watching the Oscars together today.

As it turns out my daughter considers today to be more sacred than any religious holiday, birthday, or anniversary imaginable. She in fact clears her schedule of work commitments just so she can watch the entire thing every year, including the pre-show, from start to finish.

In times past she usually engaged in this ritual with friends, but currently most of them are either busy or out of town. And that leaves me.

I, of course, felt honored that she wanted to spend what is clearly a special day with her father. But that was when I thought there was some kind of choice.

There isn't.

I attempted to argue that today is my day to watch the Walking Dead, which is my favorite show right now, but she said I could DVR it. Which of course I can, I guess.

I also attempted to argue that I really don't enjoy all of the glad handing, oohing and aahing over dresses, and over long speeches that take place during the Oscar ceremony, but then she gave me a look like I had just run over her dog, so I kinda let that go.

Then my daughter reminded me that she is about to accept a big job that will take her out of state for several months at a time, and that she might even have to relocate to another part of the country, and  then I knew I was toast.

So anyhow tonight I will be watching the entire Academy Award broadcast, from start to finish, including the pre-show. Whoopee.

In my defense I really just wanted somebody to go to the movies with me.

Who knew?

Sent to my phone late last night by my daughter.

Lately my daughter and I have been spending quite a lot of time together, whihc has been great since when she leaves for a job I sometimes don't communicate with her for weeks at a time.

Anyhow lately we have been discussing movies (Our favorite topic), technology, the Occulus Rift, politics, and, most recently, atheism.

As some of you may remember I took great pains to keep pains to keep my views on religion to myself while my daughter was growing up, and her mother did just the opposite and inflicted fundamentalist Christianity on her while living in Georgia.

Anyhow fairly recently my daughter has decided, almost completely on her own, that religion sucks balls.

And as a newly outed Atheist my daughter is demonstrating a kind of pugnacious approach toward religion that has caused her to start arguments with family members, friends, and even people at work.

I am currently attempting to be supportive while also letting her know that challenging people's belief systems in some arenas can have negative effects on her relationships and employment opportunities.

Ultimately I think she will be fine as she is well liked by her peers and an absolute beast at her job.

I have to admit though, I could not be prouder of her. And what a great time to be nonreligious.

I really think this new enlightenment is going to be something spectacular.