In her infinite wisdom, Maggie has chosen to re-write the song Row, row, row your boat.

Here it is:

Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
Life is but a dream

Row, row, your boat
Gently down the …

POLAR BEAR!

I think I find her version more entertaining than the traditional one.

Some twenty-one-ish months ago, I started a little project called the Maggie-A-Day. And dutifully, almost every day, I post a photo of Maggie. Like this one:

And generally, I’m proud of myself for it.

There are too many days when I have to dip into my archive of photos, and more than a few days where the photos aren’t particularly great, but it’s actually a very hard thing to do. I’m doing it. It’s fantastic.

And then I found Jason Lee’s blog, Kristin and Kayla, which is his own project, which is similar, but much, much better.

And me? I’m back to thinking that I have a long, long way to go.

Recently on the Big Bad Blog, we wrote about the guilt we feel when a project hits a snag. We are all about the projects, here at the Big Bad Blog, given that the Blog itself is a project. We do not like to fail at them.

The other side of the project coin is the inspiration side.

When it comes to photography, there is no end of inspiration available on the Internet — fantastic photographers sharing their work, professional photographers and their portfolios, legions of Tumblrs sharing the best of what they find, and horrible photographers who seem to nevertheless make a living as professionals in the field.

They provide new ideas and concepts to explore. A level to which to aspire, and the impression that I am doing something right.

But it is rare to find something which translates directly to my own photography project — The Maggie-A-Day. Hobbies are taking a back seat to the baby these days, and the best way around that is to combine the hobby and the baby. Additionally, I love taking photos of my daughter, and the feedback from friends and family who seem to enjoy the new direction my hobby has taken.

So Maggie, each and every day.

But, like any daily project is probably bound to do, Maggie-A-Day has stalled of late. There are too many days when the camera doesn’t come out. Procrastination or exhaustion eliminate the small window of time I have each day. A more specific inspiration — inspiration for the project — is more important, and harder to find.

Which is why it was nice to see this article (and its follow-up) on Photography Served, by Jack Radcliffe.

It is hard to tell whether he approached photographing his daughter as a project, or simply took many photos of her over the years — he himself indicates that the significance of the photos were discovered retrospectively. But watching his daughter grow up and transform, through the photographs he presents of her, is remarkable.

So we would like to thank Mr. Radcliffe for reminding us why it is important to fight the exhaustion and make use of those few moments each day which are available for the project.

The recent attempted assassination of Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona has caused many attempts at blame from all corners of the media and political spectrum. Here at the Big Bad Blog, we decided to avoid the political minefield of attempting to blame one person’s irrational actions on people we do not like — this post at BoingBoing (and its 9/11 precursor) best describes what we have heard in the media over the past few weeks.

This article, which we read today, is more of the same. It argues along the lines of “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” … and then goes on to analyze why Americans do more killing. Unsurprisingly, it then focuses in on American childhood and the popularity of gun-related toys and entertainment.

In this it is interesting to us, in that it strikes a chord with your intrepid blogger. A central tenet of the argument, as presented, is that early immersion in the world of play guns (for American children) leads to an adult culture of gun violence.

Growing up in Canada, your blogger was not allowed to own toy guns. But this parental directive did not extend to other children, or prevent me from playing with their toys. It also, apparently, did not extend to lego. Bombarded with the same media, playing with the same toys (toy guns, elastic-band guns, air rifles, water guns), yet Canada has notably less gun violence than the US. In fact, we grow up to sing/appreciate songs such as this one.

American culture, it must be noted, is its greatest export.

And, for the record, we think that Giffords probably wouldn’t be shot if there were rules preventing the sale of guns to crazy people.

Photo is from Make My Mood. Origin unknown.
Webcomic is Something of that Ilk by Ty Devries.