Adoption Week: Supergirl

In honor of National Adoption Month, we’re featuring a few stories about adoptions and adoptive families. 

Don't get sidetracked by that superhero outfit so much that y'all forget that Supergirl was adopted.  That's right--this Kryptonian tough girl was adopted by the Danvers family to raise her safely and teach her the ways of us Earthlings. And it's a good thing too.  Her adopted sister Alex saves her butt all. the. time.

 

How to Commemorate

• Put your hands on your hips as much as you can.
• Bring someone hot coffee, maybe your boss.
• Traditional food: potstickers.

Learn more at Adopt US Kids or Child Welfare Information Gateway.

Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited    

Supergirl (tv)

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Adoption Week: Modern Family

In honor of National Adoption Month, we’re featuring a few stories about adoptions and adoptive families. 

Hey. Henry here. I’m the granddad in this motley group of book jockeys. I’m the one who’s pretty old-school.  I like Clive Cussler and Tom Clancy and Horatio Hornblower and stories about soldiers and all that.  You know, tough stuff. Not saying I'm a tough guy or anything, though I am a former Marine so... yeah, maybe I'm tough.

Until it comes to my granddaughter. My daughter (ok, my daughter and her husband) adopted Grace 3 years back, and I admit I didn't quite get it when they made the decision.  Blood means a lot to guys like me who fought for their country, but when I first saw Grace's little hand in my daughter's, something in this old turkey melted.  So I relate a lot to Jay on Modern Family, being the grandad to a beautiful kid.  Jay doesn't always catch on right away, but he usually comes around in the end.  There are kids out there right now who need love and a home, and I'm damn proud that my daughter stepped up to welcome one in and make her family.

How to Commemorate

• Dress up in costumes.
• Go ice skating.
• Go trapezing.
• Plan a Halloween funhouse.
• Take a family portrait?  (I don't know.  How do you guys come up with stuff for this every time?)

 Learn more at Adopt US Kids or Child Welfare Information Gateway.

Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited    

Modern Family

Amazon         Barnes & Noble        Public Libraries

Adoption Week: Meet the Robinsons (2007)

In honor of National Adoption Month, we’re featuring a few stories about adoptions and adoptive families.  In Disney’s Meet the Robinsons, Lewis is a twelve-year-old inventor who lives in an orphanage.  When another boy shows up at his science fair saying that he has a time machine, Lewis sees an opportunity to fulfill his dream of finding his mother and learning why she abandoned him at the orphanage.  All that sounds pretty serious, but then they go to the future, encounter a dinosaur, and lots of other mayhem.  This is a fun movie with a solid inclusive theme about how families come in all shapes and sizes.

 

How to Commemorate:

• Wear a bowler hat.
• Go to a science fair.
• Decide where you’d go with a time machine. (Okay, when.)
• Support an adoption center.

Learn more at Adopt US Kids or Child Welfare Information Gateway.

Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited    

Meet the Robinsons

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TBT to that time nothing happened. Or everything happened all at once. (April 22)

There are points in time that cannot be changed no matter how we try to avoid them. Once such fixed point was the death of The Doctor at Lake Silencio on April 22, 2011, (S6E13) but by choosing not to end his life, River Song caused a temporal paradox. When asked, later, to explain what happened, The Doctor said this:
"Nothing happened. And then it kept happening. Or, if you prefer, everything happened at once, and it won't ever stop. Time is dying. It's going to be 5:02 in the afternoon for all eternity. A needle stuck on a record."
How to Commemorate

• Dress in space clothes.
• Visit a lake and have a picnic (preferably, don't let someone die).
• Wear a cowboy hat.
• Use anachronisms. (Light a candle to see your laptop keyboard. Navigate to a historical marker by using GPS. Make a phone call from your smartphone.)

Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited    

Doctor Who. (Series 6)

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*This content was previously published on April 22nd.

Fictional President Flashback

Since today is a special occasion (with Americans voting for the future of our nation and perhaps the free world), we decided to have our own special occasion. We asked some of our Today in Fiction contributors to name their favorite presidents--fictional presidents, of course. In no particular order, here they are.

Love Actually.  Because if Billy Bob Thornton can be president, so can I! ~Nate
Independence Day.  Key to getting re-elected: get in a fighter jet and take down huge-ass alien spaceships.  Win!  ~Zayna
Air Force One.  Well, actually I'd vote for Harrison Ford IRL so...  ~Amy
Deep Impact.  If Morgan Freeman delivered the State of the Union, I would listen to the entire thing.  ~Ethan
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.  You didn't say American president, did you?  No?  Then I choose the President of the Galaxy, Zaphod Beeblebrox.  ~Nina
Dave.  Come on.  We'd all vote for Dave.  ~Ashley


And we just want to give a sidelong reference to that epic of film The Adventures of Pluto Nash, which mentions a bill of currency called "the Hillary". 

V attacks Parliament on Guy Fawkes Day (Nov 5)

V is an anarchist freedom fighter in dystopian London who tries to incite a revolution by performing various acts against the government.  V for Vendetta was originally a graphic novel that was made into a successful movie in 2006.  The V/Guy Fawkes mask has become a sort of symbol against tyranny.

Also, there’s this great dialogue where V says:

Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation, stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin vanguarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition. The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous.

How to Commemorate

• Shave your head (or, okay, wear a bald cap).
• Use as many v-words as possible.
• Decide which ideas are most important to you--because ideas are bulletproof. 

 

Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited    

V for Vendetta (2006)

Amazon         Barnes & Noble        Public Libraries

Works Cited    

V for Vendetta (graphic novel)

Amazon         Barnes & Noble        Public Libraries