I Have Called Upon Your Goodwill and Patience Frequently In the Past, But Never Moreso Than Now, When I Have a New Toy

I woke up on my birthday last week and was gifted with a digital video camera, already loaded with this message:

Don’t worry. Groom knows he is the whitest boy on the planet when it comes to carrying a tune and/or dancing. Since he excels at all else, it is only fair that he be fallible. Note, however, how well he plays up his deficiency, hammering out and sustaining even the sharpest note. That, in itself, is a talent (kind of like how Rush Limbaugh pretends, through sheer bravado, that he has a brain).

Later that day, Niblet began establishing his relationship with the camera and asked to film me:

There’s a strange light from the window behind in this clip, but let’s pretend it’s the angel what lives inside me, coming out for a wink. And aren’t we all wondering, based on this rendition, what kind of “Happy Birthday, Mr. President” I could coo out for Obama, thus tapping into the subtext of our years-long torrid affair? (not that such a thing would ever happen because His Nibs is much too smart and genuine to ever take for granted the peach that is Michelle, and if he did, I would have to gauge out my eyes with a flagpole, what with every last belief having been rattled).

Shortly thereafter, PacoTacoHaco/Niblet wanted to try out the song himself, standing next to one of his creature creations, a guy named “Eye-o”:

Even better, in the intervening days, Niblet has taken over the camera and started staging stop-motion Lego films:

Sure, he’s six, so he has little patience for the multiple incremental movements a longer film would require, but it’s still a really cool start to his future career, when he will join the Wallace & Gromit production team. Until then, he’ll live in our basement and have seriously pasty skin.

During the years of pasty skin and basement dwelling, I’ll take him a platter of pancakes every night–to keep his cinematic energies from flagging–and once a year, on his birthday, I’ll put a candle in the stack of pancakes and sing him that damn song.

Rolling his eyes, he’ll mentally storyboard a stop-action video in which his mother is decapitated by a light saber.

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13 responses to “I Have Called Upon Your Goodwill and Patience Frequently In the Past, But Never Moreso Than Now, When I Have a New Toy”

  1. furiousBall Avatar
    furiousBall

    I’m pretty sure that booming sound I heard coming from Los Angeles was Martin Scorsese crapping himself.

  2. Chantal Avatar
    Chantal

    Love it, now I have to get one of them fancy cameras. Last year we went to the Ontario Science Centre and my hubby had to be forcibly removed from the exhibit where he got to make stop motion films. He and my boy would be entranced for hours!

  3. kmkat Avatar
    kmkat

    Send that little boy to Portland to join Laika Productions, the bunch that did Coraline. He will have a long and happy and productive life.

  4. lime Avatar
    lime

    well that was such a treat to finally see all of you in real live motion and sound. “honey, we done gone to the talkies and hoo-ey was that a sight to see!”

    do thank your lovely family for giving this gift so we can enjoy in a whole new way the joy that is the clan of jocelyn and groomeo.

  5. Jazz Avatar
    Jazz

    He does indeed have a stupendous career ahead of him…

  6. Bob Avatar
    Bob

    I miss Wallace & Grommit. It's been a long time since A Close Shave. I still think that Shorn (which is what I heard) would've been a better name than Shawn (what it really was) for the lamb that invaded their home and started them on the adventure. But – since I heard Shorn instead of what they said – Shawn – maybe they counted on the mis-hearing of the name to be part of the joke, and only those who don't always grasp Peter Sallis' accent to get the double-joke.

    (I just remembered that Curse of the WereRabbit came after A Close Shave. It's still been a long time, only not quite so long as I had thought, so – Nick Parks should stop making TV episodes Creature Comforts and make a new film – but I now see that he DID make a new Wallace & Grommit, but it was only released in the UK & Australia – the bastards, don't they know that not all Americans are idiots who don't get British euphemisms and cultural references, get over it and release it here and OK, now I'm done.)

  7. Green Girl in Wisconsin Avatar
    Green Girl in Wisconsin

    That is awesome! Your entire family has major skills! I look forward to your son's future career (as a serious Wallace & Grommit fan).

  8. chelle Avatar
    chelle

    hahaha

    The stop motion film was awesome!

    You all have skills!

  9. citizen of the world Avatar
    citizen of the world

    That’s great. I’ve decided that I have a limited pateince for long video clips, and these fall well under my 2-minute patience limit. Therefore, I watched all of them!

  10. heartinsanfrancisco Avatar
    heartinsanfrancisco

    First of all, Paco looks exactly like his father while Girl is you all over again. However did you do that?

    Can you send me tickets to the premiere? I have a great dress that will look smashing on the red carpet.

    So exciting to see and hear you in real living color. These are treasures which you can enjoy in your old age, and embarrass your children when they grow up.

  11. Voyager Avatar
    Voyager

    You most definitely have a future Oscar winning director there. You can retire now. Lucky you.
    V.

  12. flutter Avatar
    flutter

    how ever is it that this brilliance has previously been hidden from the world?

  13. Kylie w Warszawie Avatar
    Kylie w Warszawie

    That’s some pretty amazing talent for a 6 year old! My daughter took an elective class last year in stop motion and we still have about a hundred films on the computer that I sometimes watch.

    But you know, she’s 14 and hers, while longer, were of the same quality as Niblet’s.

    Kid’s got talent, I tell ya!

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