Shortly after I posted Thursday I called my wife to check on my daughter. She was home sick that day, after having developed a cough the seemed to be growing worse each day. So, she was heading to the doctor, and I called home to check. No answer, so I called her cell. She was still at the doctor, waiting for a nurse to reappear and give my daughter a shot. The reason? She had pneumonia.

Four days later, after the shot and antibiotics, she seems to be doing fine. The doctor said that they’d seen a lot of it recently. My daughter’s friend was just in the hospital with it a month or so ago. Fortunately, the medicine, fluids and rest seemed to have done the trick. She returned to school today, which the doctor said she’s be able to do, and so hopefully she’ll remain well.

Unfortunately, this has limited some Halloween related activities for us. We were planning to visit “Boo at the Zoo” here at the Little Rock zoo last Wedensday night, but she’d come home from school running fever. “Boo” lasts through Halloween, and we may still try to make it tomorrow night, if possible, since it’s a bit warmer here this week. But last Wednesday was members night (we are members and wanted to go on that night), and it gets more crowded the closer you get to Halloween. It will probably depend on how my daughter does over the next two days.

More movies… I watched a couple of movies this week that I’d never seen. Being the season of Halloween, there have been plenty of “horror” films on cable. I caught the original Saw last week and figured I’d see what it was all about. I’m not much into “horror” movies, mainly because they usually suck - just a bunch of gratuitous violence and little else. I kind of enjoyed Saw because there was a little more to it than that, although it’s still not exactly my kind of entertainment. I later came across Saw II, which, unfortunately, I would have to rate well below the original film. It was more along the lines of a Friday the 13th where a bunch of people are killed over the course of the movie. Just not that interesting, and basically a waste of time. You knew, too, after having seen the first one, that there’d be a twist at the end and it was pretty predictable. So, I think I’ve watched my last Saw film.

Over the weekend I also finished Al Franken’s Lies And The Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair And Balanced Look At The Right. It’s a few years old now, but I “mooched” a copy and thought I’d check it out. I’ve always thought Franken was pretty funny, and this book was no exception. My wife began to find my laughing out loud annoying at times. There was a lot of interesting info in the book, and while I’m not willing to take everything Franken said as gospel, I suspect much of it is on target. Seems unlikely you’d write a book about so-called liars without making sure your facts aren’t pretty solid. Of course, he has a (left-leaning) perspective unlike those he criticizes, so no doubt there are those on the right who would see some of his facts and interpretations in a different light. I even felt some could be viewed as saying more or less than they did as Franken presented them. Still, the book was a lot of fun, and the story of him taking his “son” on a visit to Bob Jones University (as if he was searching for a college) was hilarious. You can read that online here.

I found this morning (via Mark Elrod and Political Cartel) that athiest Hemant Mehta spoke at my alma mater, Harding University, last night. I read Mehta’s book, I Sold My Soul On eBay, just a couple of months ago and enjoyed it. His is an interesting story. I’m glad he was invited and would like to have been there to hear him myself. However, I found it interesting that an athiest was allowed to speak at HU, where folks like Mike Cope would be denied.