Pictures from last week

I already told you about my Photoshop instructor Brady Poirier.  Here he is in the first picture.  Doesn't he look like Howie Mandel to you? ???





Next to that is a class photo taken by fellow student Zelena Cartagena last week.  I am second from the left.




Finally, here's the tallest Christmas tree I have ever seen.  It's at Nokia Plaza in downtown Los Angeles.  It was taken after the Los Angeles Clippers' 97-85 win over the Sacramento Kings on Friday night, which I attended in person.

"Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!" - Clement C. Moore

Want to see the new family photo?

Today, as promised, I completed the "official" family photograph.  It shows all 13 of them outside what would be their beautiful country home, and the picture and captions say it all.  (If only I could remove that unsightly glow from Bryson!  That's what you get when you grab a picture from television.)

UPDATE 3/9/2013: By changing the source of the arms placed on the Photoshop work from "Moonshiner" Tim Smith to Bailey Miller of Greenwood, SC, their arms now look more realistic and the revisions make the photo better!  Hope you really enjoy it now! 

Upcoming: a themed reality game show

As those who have been reading this know, reality competitions - who someone pejoratively called "game operas," a title I have picked up on - is a favorite thing of mine to follow.  For the last three years, I have posted summaries of such programs to the506 (registration required to view), and I have found feedback and support from some other users who are also fans.  I even made up one, Sing for the World, in a previous post.

Now, I want to get to the next level, with posts following an entire season of a "game opera."  The "press release" announcing the show is below. - D.H.

On January 1, 2013, Barefoot Media Network will debut BMN Superfan, its first reality competition series.   This season will feature 13 of the greatest fans of the Barefoot family, as featured on Buddy Wayne: Coming Home and other network shows, in various weekly contests for the most unique grand prize ever awarded - access to the Barefoot family for one week!

The winner will live exactly as they do, from making homemade food and clothing to attending church services and even participating in entertainment and events.

In addition, the winner will get $50,000 cash and a 2013 Chevrolet SS Supersport, and the show will donate $10,000 to each of five different charities.

Host: Shandi Finnessey (Miss USA 2004)
Judges:

• *Brandon McLamb (Buddy Wayne Barefoot's publicist)
• Matt Rogers (finalist on American Idol season 3, host of various TV shows)
• Various guest judges

Contestants:

• Barbie (Kelly Kelly) Blank, 26, Jacksonville, FL - WWE "diva," former world women's champion
• Brendon Bump, 23, Lawrence, KS - Seminary student, son of Methodist preacher
• *Mikel De Vries, 27, Los Angeles - Male model, aspiring actor, originally from Cape Town, South Africa
• Anna (Lil' Bit) Granthum, 31, Marbury, AL - Owns Mountain Creek Mud Bog, which was featured in 2011 TV special Mud Lovin' Rednecks
• *Lindsay Hall, 34, Fort Sill, OK - Army medic, would like to become a midwife
• *Josh LoMonico, 36, Pittsburgh, PA - Fitness instructor, volunteer firefighter
• Ivey McClelland, 50, Albuquerque, NM - Part-time jazz musician
• Frankie Meadows, 40, Charleston, SC - Auto mechanic, fan of NASCAR and minor-league hockey
• Dustin Plunkett, 35, Bellflower, CA - Special Olympics athlete renowned for his athletic accomplishments and community service
• Jeff Porter, 46, Alpharetta, GA - Athletic trainer, Atlanta Braves baseball team
• Brittany Ramos, 33, Boca Raton, FL - Extreme couponer, stay-at-home mom, former teacher
• *Jake Stubblebine, 32, New York City - Graduate student, hobby farmer, nephew of Reuters photographer
• *Megan Turnipseed, 20, Brandon, MS - College student, cheerleader (Millsaps College)

*Characters made up by me

BMN Superfan will premiere with a special two-hour episode at 9 p.m. ET.  Thereafter, it will appear every Tuesday at 10 p.m.

Author's thoughts about Newtown

As much as I would love to keep this site free of any mention of current events, the creator of this fiction does not live in a vacuum.  Characters are based on, and have similarities to, real people and events.  So it is that I point out the connections between the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT, on Friday and the world I chose to make:

• Some of the 20 children who were killed were roughly the same age as Belinda (9 years old) and Bryson (7).
• Brenda has an emotional disability, as reportedly did the killer at Sandy Hook, Adam Lanza (and unfortunately too many other accused mass gun murderers through the years).  In addition, before Brenda made it into eternity, she loved to collect obituaries and tried to send personal messages to the survivors' families.  (I got that trait from one of my Facebook friends, Deb Holmes.)
• The Bowlings, who recently became friends with Buddy Wayne Barefoot, consist of 26 family members - the same number as the number of victims in Newtown.

Here's what I wrote about it for an online forum the day it occurred:
It's funny (as in ironic funny not ha-ha funny) that I was right here this morning when Moo made the first post about this event here.  I then left for ABC Adult School.  The class was just getting started (9:50 a.m. Pacific time) at almost the exact moment that police gave the death toll.  Needless to say, I struggled emotionally through the rest of the day at school.

It was during a long break from classes that I felt I needed to be at a place with a TV set.  There, I saw President Obama's emotional comments and the start of the briefing with Dannel Malloy, Connecticut's governor.

I'm with the president.  Enough is enough.  But what to do?  Thoughts and prayers are obviously great, but it's time to move beyond that.

Somehow, some way, the power of the NRA must be broken.  It is its policies that have helped to keep the gun count - and the death rates by gun - much higher in the U.S. that in any other industrialized nation.

But again, how?  Do we have a March on Washington?  An Occupy movement?  Buy ad time during the Super Bowl?  Any better ideas?

For now, and as always, (three emoticons of crying)

Fortunately, many charities have come through to help those affected, and here's a list.

Having a Barefoot Christmas (part 2)

As promised, here are more of the family's holiday traditions.

Here, even gift-giving is different.  Whereas you may attribute your presents to Santa Claus, we credit what we get to Mary Elizabeth McBiddlewhiskers, a/k/a "Biddy," the same angel that delivered us to our ideal home.  Every year, she conducts the "Biddy drop," in which an item we want for whatever reason just comes down from the sky.  It could be something we miss from our old lives or a brand-new item that we're inspired to get.  The items we want are written down, sent in the mail, and then we see if she responds on Christmas Eve.

On the day after Christmas, we commemorate Boxing Day.  It's a popular holiday in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other countries of the British Commonwealth, but is rarely celebrated in the U.S. and certainly not as a legal holiday.  The holiday began as a way to help the poor and servants through the distribution of "Christmas boxes" filled with money and gifts.  Our idea to celebrate it came from Belinda, who got it from her teacher Shirley Mae Crabtree, who in turn read about it in one of Magdalena Babblejack's books.  On Dec. 26, Belinda and Bryson get extra gifts (in place of the poor) and we also name one "worker of the year" to get the servant's gift.  This year, Harvey is honored for especially hard work.

Finally, even though we have chosen to unhook ourselves from modern life most of the time, we do have some concessions to the fast-paced and highly evolved times in which some of us grew up.  Throughout December, we watch classic movies and TV shows on hand-cranked devices.  Our favorite films are It's A Wonderful Life and A Christmas Story, while our top TV shows are A Charlie Brown Christmas and The Year Without a Santa Claus.  In fact, we love ...Life, the 1946 classic film, so much that we have organized a live stage show based on selected scenes.  I play George Bailey, Ralph is Bill Bailey, Bobby plays Edmund Potter, Popeye is Clarence the guardian angel, Hambone is George Bailey's wife, and of course Belinda and Bryson are the Bailey kids.  We perform it twice, the day after Thanksgiving (the retail "Black Friday") and again on Christmas Eve.

Some more things about Idealia

Last September, I reintroduced my world of Idealia by naming the families who live there.  But as I looked through some other posts to add details to Barefoot family life, I realized that there were a few more things I failed to mention about it.  So here are those details:

Weather and climate
It's pretty much the same as the American South - relatively mild in the winter, pretty hot and muggy in the summer, pleasant in the spring and fall.  Some families (e.g. Spears, Bowling) live in Appalachian microclimates which allow for more seasonal variation, including snow in the wintertime.  There are still plenty of thunderstorms, but damaging hurricanes and tornadoes are a thing of the past.:)

Business and trade
An informal system of trading and giveaways replaces the organized business climate we are so used to.  There are no big corporations, really wealthy people, or unemployment.  People with things they want to share with other families simply move around from place to place to try to drum up interest in their items.  It is true: word of mouth is the best way to advertise.  However, "snail mail" is OK too.

The "booger"
Idealia - as well as the rest of the larger New Confederacy - has adopted the "booger," a mythical creature with the head of a panther and the body of a coyote - as its national symbol.  One of the most popular oral legends in Idealia recounts the story of the Boogers football team, which traveled to the World Gridiron Championship to try to bring the title back home.  (Much like the very successful Southeastern Conference in real life!)

Use of old Confederate symbols
Since it's part of the New CSA, the controversial cross of St. George flag - first used in battle during the American Civil War but not by the actual Confederate government - has become the new national flag.  (The association as a racist symbol dates back to its use by South Carolina governor Fritz Hollings in 1960 as he defied Brown v. Board of Education and would not integrate the state's schools.)  Also, "Dixie," originally written by a minstrel artist based in New York City, is now the "national anthem."  Some surprising groups  have adapted the symbols - blacks and mountain people (the latter opposed the Confederacy so much that many of those who lived in Virginia broke off from the state and created West Virginia).

Having a Barefoot Christmas (part 1)

Merry Christmas!  Our decorations have been completed and we are ready to celebrate another holiday.

Within our family celebrations, we are trying to keep a balance between the religious and secular parts of the holiday.  On one hand, Jesus Christ is indeed the "reason for the season," as this is after all about celebrating the occasion of his birth and his unlikely origins in the stable in Bethlehem.   On the other hand, there are gifts to give, songs to sing, and fun to be had.

Here's some of what we do:

• We set up a Nativity scene, based on the exact setting of Jesus' birth.  The children have one of their own made of dolls.  In addition, the Jesus and Christmas stories are told in plays at Mrs. Crabtree's schoolhouse which Belinda and Bryson attend.
• We set aside one night a year for a caroling pageant that harks back to the Victorian era in England, where much of what we associate with Christmas celebrations began.  The Barefoot Boys will be joined by Jennifer and Brandy to carol with the McLambs, and in turn the McLambs visit us, specifically Shayla, Shawnelle, Rebecca and Rachel.  (For some reason, only the ladies of that house have the good singing chops.)
• The families also come together on Christmas Day, where about 50 people (all current residents of both families and some distant relatives of both) attend a massive church service.  Ralph Barefoot and Jerald McLamb are co-pastors, with us hosting in even-numbered years and them in odd-numbered years.  Christmas is one of only three times all year that the families participate in common activities; the others are at Easter and the annual summer block party.
• In mid-December, we have a parade of little boats on the pond of our property.  The idea came from a similar parade I once saw in Myrtle Beach, SC - ironically at Barefoot Landing.  (The name of the mixed-use development comes from the carefree attitude of beachgoers, not our own family name.)

Next week, I will have more Christmas traditions and events in our family, including how we get our gifts, a live stage show you may not be thinking of, as well as what we eat for the holiday dinner and what we do the day after "Xmas."  (Hint: We won't be going to the stores.)

(What you see at right is a picture from the boat parade in Huntington Harbour, CA, about 10 miles from my house.  No, I haven't been there. - D.H.)