Storytelling

Leave a comment Posted on August 11, 2015August 11, 2015 car reviews, Storytelling, Uncategorized

Green Meanie’s 2016 Scion iM and iA Press Preview

Though I’m sure you’ve heard of me by now, I am indeed world renowned Internet celebrity and spokesman, Green Meanie. You may know me as the main villain in the super hero series on YouTube, Jack-Man.

Due to the wild success of that program, I also was approached by Nick Shell, the man behind Family Friendly Daddy Blog and Shell House Productions, about doing my very own show, The Green Meanie Show; which you’ll see in a minute.

Today, I am serving as a guest blogger here on Family Friendly Daddy Blog, as I recently made my way to Grand Rapids, Michigan; for the official press preview of the 2016 Scion iM and 2016 Scion iA.

Scion even put me up in a nice place called the JW Marriott Grand Rapids, where they easily catered to my vegan lifestyle.

So why do I make a good spokesman for Scion? Well, first, I’m a Millennial; born in 1981. I’m of the main demographic that Scion is targeting.

Second, I like to be the first to capture (and share) exclusive information on cars before anyone else; then be the first to put it on the Internet, in a creative format people aren’t used to.

So I made two videos from the footage I took from my trip; both are episodes of The Green Meanie Show.

After all, YouTube is the #2 search engine in the world. People will have to come to me if they want to see fun pictures and fun videos of new cars. I will be that gatekeeper for so many who wouldn’t normally check out a car blog.

I know that most readers of parenting blogs like this one are mainly read by women; while it seems most car blogs are very technically written- often with a male audience in mind.

My genius plan is to be able share information in a format that an audience besides just men will care to check out.

Besides, let’s face it: With a smile and laugh like mine, who wouldn’t want to watch The Green Meanie Show?

There’s your third reason right there; in case you’re still counting.

So now that you know my agenda, I hope you enjoy my videos of the Scion iM and iA; neither of which are even on the market yet.

You’ll see what a wonderful time I had in Grand Rapids, Michigan; along with my new friend and driving buddy, Dave Nicolanti of 2 Wired 2 Tired.

Green Meanie’s 2016 Scion iM and iA Press Preview

In the one below, you’ll see my interview with Andy Lee and David Lee, who are both experts on these new Scions.

And in this one here, you’ll get to see an overview of my trip.

Next up on my agenda is to check out the 2015 Camry while Jack-Man visits his family out in Sacramento, California. It’ll be loads of fun!

Stay Green,

Green Meanie

1 Comment Posted on July 30, 2015 Nostalgia, parenting, Storytelling, toy reviews, Uncategorized

Dear Jack: You’re Not Growing Up Way Too Fast

4 years, 8 months.

Dear Jack,

I’ve never felt that you are growing up too quickly. I think you’re growing up at exactly the right speed.

The metronome in my head works just fine as it measures at what rate you should graduate across the sliding scale of baby to boy.

Maybe a good reason I feel this way is that I’ve written at least one blog post and/or letter to or about you since before you were born. That’s more than 5 years now!

There are now hundreds of stories and pictures of your life story that I have preserved in time. (And they all can be retrieved by clicking on the Blog Archives tab on the left side of the screen.)

So maybe I am the exception to the rule of feeling my kid is growing up too fast. I never find myself missing any younger version of you. I have warm nostalgic thoughts about those days, but I don’t miss them.

Because I so appreciate who you are now.

You’re perfect. You’re exactly everything I could possibly hope for in a son.

You are a beautiful, intelligent, and creative young boy.

It is a gift each day that I get to see who you are becoming.

Maybe I’m being too pragmatic here, but if I really wanted to relive the “baby days”, I should focus getting you a brother or sister…

That seems like the best way to relive that time period, but at the same time be able to appreciate the nearly 5 year-old boy you are.

But no, you’re not growing up too quickly for me.

You’re my genius son who just entered his Lego creations into the upcoming county fair. But you’re also down-to-Earth enough that you fully appreciated the “pooping moose” key chain I brought back from Grand Rapids this week as a souvenir.

Love,

Daddy

2 Comments Posted on July 26, 2015July 26, 2015 parenting, Storytelling, Uncategorized

This is Not a Facebook Pregnancy Announcement, Just a Social Commentary about Them…

I want to be extremely clear. I am definitely, absolutely not (!) hinting at all that we are having another baby.

Just to be clear, there is not another baby on the way. I promise.

At least not one that I am aware of…

But I do admit, that having been in our new house for 6 months (as of next week) and having been debt-free for over 2 years now (other than our mortgage), life in the new house has created an environment in which having another baby can now be… considered.

It’s now a conversation that takes place. There’s now logic behind the reasoning, in my mind.

It wasn’t a conversation before. It wasn’t practical, then. But now that our son is nearly 5 years-old, the thought of expanding our family, in a 4 bedroom house as compared to our 2 bedroom townhouse, sounds less intimidating. At this point, unless we had twins, we wouldn’t have 2 babies or 2 really young children at the same time.

Instead, we would have a Kindergartner and a newborn.

That thought doesn’t terrify me.

I’m sure I could expand more on the why, but for now, I simply want to usher in the subject by acknowledging the culture behind announcing a pregnancy over Facebook.

These days, even if you’re just simply a casual Facebook user, there is still a social expectation that you’re supposed to do some kind of clever “Facebook pregnancy announcement” for everyone.

I created the meme above to demonstrate what I mean.

So now that that sort of thing is the norm, I feel like it’s part of the process of considering having another child.

You have to decide the boy and the girl name.

You have to decide how you want to prepare the baby’s room.

And you have to decide how to make a Facebook announcement, which is sure to get at least 75% of your Facebook friends to “like”.

I should close by once again making it clear I have no official announcement to make here.

The future holds possibilities because of where we are at in life now; whereas before, we weren’t ready.

If there is any kind of announcement at all, that would be it.

Well, actually, publicly realizing I am open to having another child is a pretty big deal- to me, at least.

1 Comment Posted on July 25, 2015July 25, 2015 parenting, Storytelling, vegan

Dear Jack: You Saved a Cricket, I Saved a Possum

4 years, 8 months.

Dear Jack,

Yesterday morning as I was driving you to school, you shared your thoughts with me:

“Daddy, if everybody was vegan and vegetarian, then the animals wouldn’t have to die.”

With a statement like that, an outsider might assume I brainwash you daily with those sorts of thoughts.

But that’s not how I believe in parenting you. I sincerely want you to come to your own conclusions, based on daily observations, regarding the reasons why our family doesn’t eat meat.

I don’t feed you information like this- I only explain it after you think to ask these questions on your own first.

Your epiphany was all your own crafting.

After all, you are truly an animal lover; or at least a stuffed animal lover. Between stuffed animals and Legos, you really don’t play with much else. Those are the things you spend your money on.

My response to your “animals don’t have to die” comment was this:

“Most people still believe that in order to get enough protein, they have to eat meat. But you and I are obvious proof that’s not the case. We’ve lived without meat for years. And we’re both very healthy; as our family doctor has recently confirmed. And that’s why I made that Green Meanie video about it last week.”

I carried our deep discussion with me to work. As I took my first 10 minute walk of the day during a break around 9:00 AM, in which I walked to the end of the cul-de-sac of where I work, I discovered a young possum in a cage trap.

By noon, it was still there, in the horrible summer heat. So I walked into that building and informed the lady at the front desk. She called the building manager, who freed the possum by the time I left work.

Apparently, foxes and possums have been getting into the dumpster behind that building.

But I’m no specist- I don’t care what kind of animal it is: a domesticated dog, a wild dog, or even a lowly scavenger possum…

I don’t want to see any animal suffer. So I made sure the possum was freed.

When I came home from work, I was excited to share my “I saved a possum!” story with you.

You then shared your own story with me:

“Daddy! I saved a black cricket today. I saw it crawling on the floor in my class at school, so I picked it up and took it outside! And then after my nap, I got to feed our class pet frog two crickets!”

Yes, there is some certain irony in saving one cricket from being stepped on, yet feeding two other crickets to a frog; all in the same day.

Ultimately, you and I share a love to protecting animals.

But really, you rub off on me more than I do you, I think.

Love,

Daddy

Leave a comment Posted on May 28, 2015June 10, 2015 Jack-Man, parenting, Storytelling

Dear Jack: Webisode 6 of Jack-Man, “The Juggler Strikes Back” (Featuring Best Fiends)

4 years, 6 months.

Dear Jack,

You and I made 4 new webisodes of our exciting new superhero webseries, Jack-Man, over Memorial Day weekend.

The most recent is Webisode 6, entitled “The Juggler Strikes Back”.

In this storyline, we see your arch nemesis Green Meanie (played by me) and his henchman The Juggler (played by your Uncle Andrew) scheme a plan to defeat you by taking away your new favorite game, Best Fiends; which is free to download…

#LoveBestFiends

This post has been sponsored by Acorn.

In this smartphone game, you get to help the Best Fiends grow up and level-up fast to unlock new powers and take down the slug army.

By playing Best Fiends, players can even help Edward end Malaria. Seriously Digital Entertainment is serious about doing good in the world. They have teamed up with Malaria No More to help players give a child a life-saving test and Malaria treatment by playing this game. That’s an awesome way to help others! (When prompted just enter your email address and $1 will be given to Malaria No More.)

Of course, in our new webisode, Jack-Man and his superhero cousin Super Calla (played by your real life cousin Calla) think of a clever way to get Best Fiends back.

Your Uncle Andrew had downloaded Best Fiends for free on his smart phone at the beginning of the weekend. By the end, he had gotten to Level 30; he stayed up playing Best Friends as I edited the newest Jack-Man episodes.

As seen in Webisode 6 of Jack-Man, “The Juggler’s Strikes Back”, you really enjoyed counting the items and characters on Best Fiends, and liked defeating the evil slugs.

This post has been sponsored by Acorn.

This is apparently a pretty popular game right now… which I didn’t realize…

Yet it is still continuing to grow in popularity.

We are seeing the same thing happen with our Jack-Man webseries, but I knew it couldn’t hurt to feature Best Fiends as a plot device in a Jack-Man episode, since people who search for Best Fiends footage on YouTube might find this episode of Jack-Man.

Best Fiends is now forever part of the Jack-Man series!

And to make it even easier for people to find our new show, I’ve created a playlist on Youtube so that anyone can watch all episodes together at once, in chronological order:

We had a lot of fun this weekend making new webisodes of Jack-Man and playing Best Fiends!

Love,

Daddy

This post has been sponsored by Acorn.

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Just to be clear, there is not another baby on the way. I promise.

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