bear

1 Comment Posted on movie reviews, parenting, Uncategorized

The Journey Home DVD Review

These days, I leave it up to my nearly 5 year-old son which DVDs to review here on Family Friendly Daddy Blog. Last week when I showed him a picture of the DVD cover for The Journey Home and asked him, “Jack, should we review this movie about a boy who helps a baby polar bear?

The Journey Home DVD Review

With zero hesitation, he responded with an excited yes, as if to insinuate, “Well, why wouldn’t we, Daddy?”

After all, my son is obsessed with learning about animals. Some of his favorite shows on Netflix are Dinosaur Train and Octonauts; both of which provide him with an array of trivia for him to quiz me about after he watches each episode.

Simply put, my son was fascinated by and fixated on The Journey Home the entire time.

It was pretty amazing even for me to see a little polar bear interact with the main character, a teenage boy, with such personality. The bear was like a little puppy.

I particularly enjoyed all the helicopter shots of the arctic.

After we finished the movie, my son asked me, “Daddy, do we get to keep it?” I suppose that implies he’s planning on watching The Journey Home again in the new future.

Now that my son is getting older, we’re able to start watching more family movies, as opposed to just kids’ movies.

Therefore, I do want to point out this movie is rated PG; not G. As the rating label on the box implies, there are a couple four letter words; as well as some disturbing images, like a dead polar bear after it was killed by hunters, as well as the frozen remains of a man who apparently died in the snow and ice.

As for my nearly 5 year-old son, he was too excited about the baby polar bear to notice the elements that make the movie PG rated.

Now, for some exciting news…

Just as our family gets to keep this movie like my son asked about, so did one lucky reader of Family Friendly Daddy Blog as well…

Congrats to Matt Wright, who was the first person to go the Facebook wall of Family Friendly Daddy Blog and ask this question:

Did I just win The Journey Home?

Thanks for reading!

RLJ ENTERTAINMENT PRESENTS

THE JOURNEY HOME

Available on DVD and Digital Video Sept. 22, 2015

THE JOURNEY HOME DVD


Genre:                        Family/Drama/Adventure
Rating:                        PG

Language:                  English
Format:                       Color
Year:                           2014
SRP:                           $27.97
Length:                       98 minutes
UPC:                           0014381002898
Cat#:                           POL00289DVD
Aspect Ratio:              2.35:1
Audio Format:             Dolby Digital 5.1
 
 

The Journey Home DVD Review

1 Comment Posted on Health, Nostalgia, People, Spirituality, Storytelling, Uncategorized

dad from day one: He Who Dies Happy in Old Age, Still Dies

Thirty weeks.


 

Ironically, while waiting for my first child to be born I am accompanied by thoughts of the finality of my own life.  Having a baby is such a huge milestone, such a life-changing event, that my mind skips decades ahead to when my kid will graduate high school, to when I will be a grandparent, and ultimately, to my inevitable passing into eternity.  In my mind, all those big events are strung together like bubbly Christmas lights from 1988.

My wife and I have this agreement that concerning our own inevitable deaths, we will die healthy but of “natural causes” in our sleep, both at age 92, holding hands.  And I would assume that most happily married people would wish for the same thing- to be able to raise their children with their spouse, to grow old with their family, and to pass this life in our right minds – not lonely and suffering in a nursing home.  I don’t consider a sudden brain aneurism, a car accident, or being mauled by a bear while hiking through the woods.  No, you see, I have carefully planned out my own “natural causes” death in a romantic and perfect way.

And that’s the only way I can think about the end of my life- with optimism.  Assuming I will live a long, happy life, giving all I can to my family.   It’s the only way I can think, because even now, two months before Baby Jack is scheduled to arrive, I am responsible for another life.  I have to be here to take care of him.  And my wife.

I truly am incapable of trying to fathom how so many people in the world don’t have a solid understanding (or at least some kind of basic perspective) of what happens after this life, and that they don’t think about it on a daily basis like I do.  How the afterlife is completely something to be considered, how beyond heaven and hell issues, this dream of life is the prequel to eternity.  And now, already, a new soul has been created, and I had something to do with that.  I have changed the course of eternity.

This baby is not just a body; he’s got a soul.  A soul that will need guidance for this life and the eternal one.  And I have to be here for that.  Even if these thoughts may seem dark and depressing to some, I refuse to ignore the reality that life and death are intertwined.  As much as I “try not to take life too seriously” like all those stupid bumper stickers and annoying e-mail forwards tell me, I still take life seriously enough to think about this stuff.

All pictures with the “JHP” logo were taken by Joe Hendricks Photography:

Blog- www.photojoeblog.com

Website- www.joehendricks.com

1 Comment Posted on Storytelling, Uncategorized

Pickles Make for Good Reading Material- Episode 5

If the only way you could eat any meat was by actually killing the animal yourself, would you still be a carnivore?

I am aware that I am a hypocrite. Because if I could only eat the meat of animals that I killed myself, I would dang near be a vegetarian. Fish don’t really make sounds or look at me, so I could kill them. And eggs. Plus they don’t have to suffer such a violent death as noise-making, blood-spilling cattle, chickens, turkeys, and pigs.

The thought of eating the veins, muscles, and fat of what was recently a living being is so weird. But still for every lunch and most dinners, I eat a meal consisting of cut-up chunks of animal flesh. And aside from the act of slaughtering an animal, there’s the cleaning and processing of the carcass.

The only animals I have a desire to kill are the ones that want to kill me. And so far no grizzly bears, killer wolves, rabid foxes, spitting cobras, or hoof-punching deer have tried to attack me. Just mosquitoes. And they deserve to die because they’re trying to steal my blood. And blood is life. They are trying to kill me; therefore they deserve to die.

When it comes down to it, I’m a vegetarian at heart. Just not in action. The main reason I’m not a practicing vegetarian is because I don’t see how that would be a practical lifestyle.

 

We plan so much of our lives around eating. When people get together for more than a few hours, a meal is often involved. What if I went to dinner at someone’s house and they grilled out hamburgers for me and there was no salad available? What would I eat, just a bun with ketchup and onions and pickles?

Often vegetarians eat portabella mushrooms instead of meat. Maybe I could do that with pickles. Put a slab of pickles in between two buns. I can see it now, taking the nation by storm: Pickle Burgers, because…

 

“If you don’t hear that crunch, then it ain’t worth the munch!’

Pickles Make for Good Reading Material Table of Contents:

Episode 1 http://wp.me/pxqBU-1X
Episode 2 http://wp.me/pxqBU-20
Episode 3 http://wp.me/pxqBU-26
Episode 4 http://wp.me/pxqBU-4o
Episode 5 http://wp.me/pxqBU-ef