How Do We Solve A Problem Like Maria?

And why, dear children, does that line from The Sound of Music come to mind? No, I don't refer to Martha's sister who came with us to Saturday night's performance of Schoolhouse Rock, Live! at Minot State University's Summer Theatre. But more on that in a minute. She's still in our bedtime prayers at night ("... God bless Mommy, God bless Daddy, God bless Sarah, Jeffrey, and auntie Mary."). Nor do I refer to Pastor Gerald referring to Mary and Martha among the church delegates who'd share briefly at adult forum about what happened and what's happening at our church synod -- among the delegates were ME and Martha, but I get it, the eleventh chapter of John creeps up on me too!


No, Maria today is Maria Kilbride, an applied sciences professor who the Image comic Injection (ISBN 9781632154798) opens with in an asylum. Apparently she and four other specialists, a diplomat spy, an artificial intelligence designer, a deductive reasoner, and a wizard in denial -- and that's the closest I got to making sense out of this -- found out how to bring "about the wild future and the haunted past all crashing into the present day at once" and are realizing the impact this "Injection" had on the world. Or has on the world. I'm not sure. But this being the first collected volume of Warren Ellis, Declan Shalvey, and Jordie Bellaire's work in the series, I'm sure there is a sense it makes -- it's just not exactly making sense to me right now.


Neither is the final third of my novel I want to get done. But at least I'm not drawing it too!


Schoolhouse Rock, Live! Twenty-one songs from this series that started in the early 1970s and that you might remember catching on Saturday mornings are tied together by a teacher getting up early for her first day of school and in a near-panic from being prepared out the wazoo but not having, eh, field tested anything she's prepared and sung by about two dozen kids for this second production of Season Fifty-One of Minot State University Summer Theatre. I'd forgotten how incredibly funny some of these can be while teaching you something too! Hear "Rufus Xavier Sarsaparilla". And how haunting too. Hear "Figure Eight". That, and Maria -- I mean Mary -- got an awesome family photo of Martha, Sarah, Jeffrey, and I.


Sunday's Father's Day. Kids surprised me not only with T-shirts -- Sarah's was "#1 DAD" with Darth Vader above it and Jeffrey's was "dad (n.) superhero" -- but also with a stuffed Yoda figure. We got that after visiting Dadfest south of Minot and grabbing some free food and entertainment for the kids. Hey, I know a good deal! And apparently between that and mowing the backyard Friday night I got quite a sunburn on the back of my neck too. And after lunch Sunday -- nothing too grandiose, we didn't need it -- the four of us hung out at home with the wind blowing in from outside, cleaning the bathroom; okay, Martha and Sarah did that, they let me relax a bit. It looks great though! Before I ask how do we solve a problem like anyone else, perhaps

I should start with me.


David