Welcome to Super Dad's
Web Site

Welcome!!

Some of Super Dad's Favorite Activities
         I enjoy being a home school dad and husband, day hiking and camping,  teaching, laser research, and fiddling on my computer.  I also am a fan(atic) of my hometown NBAPortlandTrail Blazers.  I'm not sure who my favorite player is right now, but you've got to love Rasheed!.    I play a little Magic: The Gathering (visit my MTG page!), but I find the cost of putting together killer decks as too expensive for my blood.  Some day I'd like to play more chess like I did in high school.  Of course, I really like going on vacation!  I like staying at state and national parks (such as Oregon parks), taking a ferry to the San Juan Islands, seeing museums along the Oregon Trail and more!  When sabbatical time comes up, I hope to spend a year in Australia!

Some of Super Dad's Interests
       My sons and I really enjoy the Star Wars trilogy and had a great time seeing Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace.  I also really enjoy Daniel Quinn's book Ishmael.  It seems like we share a lot of the same ideas, but he put it all together in a way I couldn't.  Daniel Quinn has also written The Story of B, My Ishmael (the sequel to Ishmael), and his autobiography Providence.  He recently released Beyond Civilization.  He has also written extensively in answering people's questions about the books at the Ishmael Website, which includes his List of Suggested Readings.  While DQ's books may put you on a journey to improve society, I'm also very interested in improving myself.  One of the ways is to simply eat better.  I am moving to a diet with more raw food and someday I may be on  The Hallelujah Diet or a variant of the Caveman Diet.  I realize that being a sedentary worker puts me at risk, and recently I purchased a house 1.0 miles from work.  The daily walk to work with the accompanying lunch-at-home visit gives he about four miles a day.  Eventually I'd like to do daily Ki exercises as recommended in Ki in daily life by Koichi Tohei.  A good website on this subject is Body, Mind, and Modem. While I like durable goods as much as the next man, I realize that getting more stuff doesn't help me get more of what I really want.  Thus, simplicity is an important part of my philosophy.  I really enjoy the book Simple is Powerful by Michael J. Roads.  Being raised in the big city, I have been a convert to rural living (of interest is the Country Life and Simplicity Village homepage).

Some of Super Dad's Values and their Consequences
        The world is a sacred place.  In 60 years or so, I'll be dead and gone. In a short 100 years from now, everyone that knows me at all will be gone as well.  Some time in there my name will be uttered by mankind for the last time.  On the surface it sounds depressing, but on the other hand, I'd better have my fun while I can.  So, here's to Carpe Diem (which sounds better than "Go for Regret Minimization").  By the way, an insurance company thinks I'll live to be 91.  Check out how long you're going to live, and get some advice from some centarians on how to prolong your life.   As the scientists at the Linus Pauling Institute will tell you, nutrition plays a key role in longevity (especially raw fruits and vegetables).  Check out their info center and their prescription for health.
 

Quotes to Ponder
  If you had a billion dollars in the bank, would you go on doing the work you do to make a living? Really, honestly, truly? I'm sure about ten percent of the people reading this book would say yes--for example, Steven Spielberg and Bill Gates (who already has his billion but still seems to love his work). I too am among that lucky ten percent. If I had a billion in the bank, I'd go right on writing.
-From "Beyond Civilization" by Daniel Quinn

 "We practice a unique form of agriculture that I've called Totalitarian Agriculture, which is based on the idea that, since the world itself belongs to us, all the food in it belongs to us as well. In other words, we can (2) take any food formerly available to other species and lock it up for our exclusive use, (2) destroy any species that competes with us for our food, and (3) clear any piece of land of food formerly available to other species and use that land to grow food for our exclusive use.

Totalitarian Agriculture began to be practiced among us at a time when the world wasn't thought of as having any limits. It was assumed (even if it was never explicitly so stated) that the world was of infinite extent, and if this were the case, there would be no problem. In fact, however, the world is a place of distinctly finite limits. There is only so much food-bearing land (land that will sustain life) and only so much food-bearing water. We can't increase either of these commodities (though we can reduce them and ARE reducing them), and we can't increase the amount of sunlight that falls on our planet, from which ultimately all life (and therefore all food) derives."
-Daniel Quinn

   I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here.  It came to me when I tried to classify your species.  I've  realized that you are not actually mammals.

   Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment.  But you humans do not.  You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area.

    There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern.  Do you know what it is?  A virus.

   Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet.  You are a plague.  And we are... the cure.
-From "The Matrix" (Am I living this way, what can I do not live this way?)
 
 

Vocabulary Answer:  WWWebster defines "in loco parentis" as "regulation or supervision by an administrative body (such as at a public school) acting in the place of a parent." - otherwise known as a bad idea.

Random Fact:The National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) said: 25% of all high school seniors Did NOT have Basic Reading Skills in 1996 (see p. 15, fig. 4)

Random Fact:  17% of the high school graduating class of 1997 graduated with a drinking problem. (Source: Oregon Coalition to Reduce Underage Drinking).

Random Fact: The third leading cause of death in the U. S. in 1998 was medical mistakes.

Misc. Links

Home Education
       Yahoo Listing: Home Schooling
  Crosswalk
  homeschooling.miningco.com
  School is Dead page
  National Assessment of Educational Progress by the NCES
       A Homeshooling Listserv

 Shareware
  DOS Shareware
  Kids Domain