Thursday, December 29, 2005
Snail Mail
Every couple of months I get an envelope in the mail originating from New York City. It's always the same. It's one of the long rectangular envelopes with my name and address written in ballpoint pen. I'm sure that the envelopes I send back East have a same kind of consistency. Since 1990, I have had the joy of having a snail mail correspondence with a friend of mine that I met on the famous "Love Boat" (ok people, once and for all, there is NO BOAT involved). Somehow early on, we began writing to each other by letter (typed not handwritten) and we've both committed to it. OK, a shout out to a certain cousin and his wife in San Diego who are readers of this blog! You know who you are! Anyway, I have kept every single letter she has written me over the past 15 years. I think she has done the same with mine. We could probably reconstruct the majority of our lives over the past decade and a half from these missives. I usually wait a month or so before I write back because letters are never just dashed off. These are usually four to five pages (single spaced with 12 font) descriptions of what is going on in our lives. Yes, on occasion we do have to contact each other on the phone, or an email, but 90% of our communication has been the good old fashioned letter. So Jennifer C. hats off to you for your willingness to hold up your end of the bargain. I'm willing to do this as long as you are. And knowing the stubborn tradition loving types we are this could last another 40 or so years!!
Tuesday, December 27, 2005
A person who has affected my life
Many of you ask about my mobility and my health post-accident and most of the time I reply that everything is pretty much hunky-dory. I can't point my toes, which makes running impossible and I find standing in my barefeet very uncomfortable so I simply avoid it by always wearing something on my feet. No big deal. There is one huge pain in my life and that comes to travelling by air.
Remember this guy?
Yeah, the shoe bomber from 2001. This man, has probably more than any person, affected my life. Four years since his little "stunt" travelling through America's airports requires us to take off our shoes and put them through the x-ray machine. Simple for most, but a huge undertaking for me. I now have a couple options.
The first, and one that I have to undertake if I don't plan ahead, has me approach the TSA person and hold out my x-rays. I then ask to be able to walk through the machine with my shoes and then I will sit down, take off my shoes and then have them x-rayed separately. Because of this request, I am immediately flagged and put into the high-security line. This requrires my to be wanded by one of the TSA people. If the alert level is orange or above, the sensitivity of the wand is so great that my barefeet set off the the wand, which causes further inquisition. But after showing them my x-ray and being cleared, then most TSA people are interested in the story of my feet and well, being the cheerful and giving person I am, off into the story I go. If I am lucky, this whole encounter takes less than 10 minutes.
My second option, one that I discovered works like a charm is to pack a pair of flip-flops in my carry-on. Flip-flops are not required to be removed and so I can zip through without any issues. But, the sight of my changing into flip-flops in a cold city like Seattle in December does cause people to raise and eye-brow or two.
So, hats off to you, Richard Reid, the shoebomber. Thanks for causing such a hassle in my life.
Yeah, the shoe bomber from 2001. This man, has probably more than any person, affected my life. Four years since his little "stunt" travelling through America's airports requires us to take off our shoes and put them through the x-ray machine. Simple for most, but a huge undertaking for me. I now have a couple options.
The first, and one that I have to undertake if I don't plan ahead, has me approach the TSA person and hold out my x-rays. I then ask to be able to walk through the machine with my shoes and then I will sit down, take off my shoes and then have them x-rayed separately. Because of this request, I am immediately flagged and put into the high-security line. This requrires my to be wanded by one of the TSA people. If the alert level is orange or above, the sensitivity of the wand is so great that my barefeet set off the the wand, which causes further inquisition. But after showing them my x-ray and being cleared, then most TSA people are interested in the story of my feet and well, being the cheerful and giving person I am, off into the story I go. If I am lucky, this whole encounter takes less than 10 minutes.
My second option, one that I discovered works like a charm is to pack a pair of flip-flops in my carry-on. Flip-flops are not required to be removed and so I can zip through without any issues. But, the sight of my changing into flip-flops in a cold city like Seattle in December does cause people to raise and eye-brow or two.
So, hats off to you, Richard Reid, the shoebomber. Thanks for causing such a hassle in my life.
Monday, December 19, 2005
Miss Manners Weighs In
The Christmas card saga will never end even though I try and put it behind me. What gives? Here's what Miss Manners' column advised as proper Christmas card ettiquette in the San Francisco Chronicle on Monday December 19th, 2005:
"........However, signing one's name to printed inanities, or mass-producing a composition about one's petty triumphs over the year, is not keeping in touch. Keeping in touch means writing one's sentiments with one's very own hand. This may be a full letter, or on the words "Merry Christmas" added to a picture card, but one must write it oneself.......Miss Manners will only add the requirement that they nevertheless write out a message, however brief, between the poesy and the signature."
There you have it. What we all should be laughing at is the irony that I, perhaps the person who worries least about ettiquette, had his instincts validated by the court of highest authority, the one and only Miss Manners. BOO-YAH!!!
"........However, signing one's name to printed inanities, or mass-producing a composition about one's petty triumphs over the year, is not keeping in touch. Keeping in touch means writing one's sentiments with one's very own hand. This may be a full letter, or on the words "Merry Christmas" added to a picture card, but one must write it oneself.......Miss Manners will only add the requirement that they nevertheless write out a message, however brief, between the poesy and the signature."
There you have it. What we all should be laughing at is the irony that I, perhaps the person who worries least about ettiquette, had his instincts validated by the court of highest authority, the one and only Miss Manners. BOO-YAH!!!
Friday, December 16, 2005
How's this for a distribution?
So, I lied, there has to be one more posting about Christmas/Holiday cards. This one relates to the fact that I finished up my cards today (those of you receiving them will think I am a total geek, just you wait). As I was about to haul them to the blue box up the street, I got it into my brain ask where all these cards are going. So being the zip code guy that I am I counted out the following distribution:
These are the number of cards being sent to zip codes starting with
0 13 (Puerto Rico, New England and New Jersey)
1 9 (New York, Pennsylvania and Delaware)
2 3 (DC, Maryland, Virginia and the Carolinas)
3 1 (The Southeast)
4 3 (Kentucky, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana)
5 1 (The Upper Midwest, the Dakotas and Montana)
6 4 (Illinois, Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska)
7 0 (Louisiana, Arkansas, Texas and Oklahoma)
8 4 (The Rocky Mountain States, Arizona and Nevada)
9 36 (California, Oregon, Washington, Hawaii and Alaska)
Intl 4 (Netherlands, Austria, South Korea, Canada)
The breakdown of 9's is as follows
Southern California (91, 92, 93) 5
Northern California (94, 95, 96) 19
Hawaii (96) 0
Oregon (97) 0
Washington (98, 99) 12
Alaska (99) 0
Doing this made me happy!
These are the number of cards being sent to zip codes starting with
0 13 (Puerto Rico, New England and New Jersey)
1 9 (New York, Pennsylvania and Delaware)
2 3 (DC, Maryland, Virginia and the Carolinas)
3 1 (The Southeast)
4 3 (Kentucky, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana)
5 1 (The Upper Midwest, the Dakotas and Montana)
6 4 (Illinois, Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska)
7 0 (Louisiana, Arkansas, Texas and Oklahoma)
8 4 (The Rocky Mountain States, Arizona and Nevada)
9 36 (California, Oregon, Washington, Hawaii and Alaska)
Intl 4 (Netherlands, Austria, South Korea, Canada)
The breakdown of 9's is as follows
Southern California (91, 92, 93) 5
Northern California (94, 95, 96) 19
Hawaii (96) 0
Oregon (97) 0
Washington (98, 99) 12
Alaska (99) 0
Doing this made me happy!
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Closure on the holiday card saga
A couple hours after Tuesday mornings feelings dump, S told me that she had crossed me off her Christmas card list and that she was incredibly incensed at the original posting, but that she wasn't going to bring it up to me until after the New Year. The course of the discussion took us all over the map, but the essence could be boiled down to 1) what exactly is the role of the holiday card and 2) how different life is between those who have children (especially newborns and toddlers) from there single friends.
The first issue is easier to address. To S, the card is simply wishes the receiver of the card well, the hope that things are well in their lives and to let the receiver know that the person is in the senders thoughts. To me, I've always expected more than that. It is my belief that because these people are an important person in the story of our lives that it's unfortunate that we can only see each other rarely and have this once a year communication. This communication to me deserves more than a cursory "throw something in the mail". I have friendships with different people from different points in my life so the type of communication I have with them is different and I try and reflect that in what I send, even if it is a couple sentences long, I feel I have given the relationship some respect. Simply stuffing the card in to the envelope to me feels like, as my colleague CD so eloquently put it, "relationship on resecitation (sp)".
This lead to the more critical discussion and that is that it is a luxury for those who have young children at home to take time to sit down and type out an email or write a letter or even make a phone call. Ok, point taken. Yes, when I come home, it's a place where I am not being pulled in 55 directions at once. So S told me that it is the job of the single person to change their strategies and instead of just relying on the other person to initiate contact, that I as the single person needed to reach out and often times more than once or twice. When it is me that is always calling or emailing it doesn't mean that the other person doesn't want to communicate, it is often they can't. Here comes the key issue and that is I always feel like it's a burden upon my friend with kid when I want to call. How many times have I called and gotten the friend/parent while they are trying to do three things at once, and I get about 50% of their attention. So, that makes me feel really good, or they say that they'll have to call back. That actaully makes me feel worse because I feel as though I'm another thing on their list of things to do.
This conversation had me in tears in the office and I don't even know why. Was it the friendship on rescicitaion realization? Was it that I was being insensitive into the demands of parenthood? Was it S's making these statements and me feeling like an insensitive prick? A combination of these or all? So, I'm still confused and baffled by lots of things here, but I know that I can try and make sure to make the effort to reach out to those friends of mind who have young kids and to be understanding about the constraints on their time and energies. As for the cards, well I can simply do what I think is right and model the behavior myself. As off today, I'm over this whole saga now. I'm putting it to bed.
The first issue is easier to address. To S, the card is simply wishes the receiver of the card well, the hope that things are well in their lives and to let the receiver know that the person is in the senders thoughts. To me, I've always expected more than that. It is my belief that because these people are an important person in the story of our lives that it's unfortunate that we can only see each other rarely and have this once a year communication. This communication to me deserves more than a cursory "throw something in the mail". I have friendships with different people from different points in my life so the type of communication I have with them is different and I try and reflect that in what I send, even if it is a couple sentences long, I feel I have given the relationship some respect. Simply stuffing the card in to the envelope to me feels like, as my colleague CD so eloquently put it, "relationship on resecitation (sp)".
This lead to the more critical discussion and that is that it is a luxury for those who have young children at home to take time to sit down and type out an email or write a letter or even make a phone call. Ok, point taken. Yes, when I come home, it's a place where I am not being pulled in 55 directions at once. So S told me that it is the job of the single person to change their strategies and instead of just relying on the other person to initiate contact, that I as the single person needed to reach out and often times more than once or twice. When it is me that is always calling or emailing it doesn't mean that the other person doesn't want to communicate, it is often they can't. Here comes the key issue and that is I always feel like it's a burden upon my friend with kid when I want to call. How many times have I called and gotten the friend/parent while they are trying to do three things at once, and I get about 50% of their attention. So, that makes me feel really good, or they say that they'll have to call back. That actaully makes me feel worse because I feel as though I'm another thing on their list of things to do.
This conversation had me in tears in the office and I don't even know why. Was it the friendship on rescicitaion realization? Was it that I was being insensitive into the demands of parenthood? Was it S's making these statements and me feeling like an insensitive prick? A combination of these or all? So, I'm still confused and baffled by lots of things here, but I know that I can try and make sure to make the effort to reach out to those friends of mind who have young kids and to be understanding about the constraints on their time and energies. As for the cards, well I can simply do what I think is right and model the behavior myself. As off today, I'm over this whole saga now. I'm putting it to bed.
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Hmmm, there must be something underneath
Well, last weeks "pet peeve" posting has caused quite a stir. I dashed that piece off in a quick ten minutes, but I guess it is pretty clear that there was emotion behind it. But I didn't really believe it at first. The first comment was an email from Mom stating that she thought I must be angry at the fact that being a gay man, I wasn't going to ever have children and something must stem from that lingering bitterness. My initial reaction was, because it came from Mom, that she was way off base. By the end of this post, it will turn out that she was kind of in the ballpark, perhaps she made contact but her proverbial baseball curved off into the stands. Scott had also made a comment, actually, his lack of comment was the real comment, but I blew it off. However, when a friend of mine emailed me directly to tell me her reaction to it, I knew that something had really struck these people in my life that something was out of whack with me.
So, as I always do, I sat down and stared at the wall and sorted through what I believed to be my feelings about the "photocard as christmas card" anger. In retrospect, the storm began to brew last week when a colleague of mine (not in my department) and his wife are due to have a baby any day now. There is some uproar about the "not so progressive" policy around paternity leave. A letter was going around and I was asked by another faculty member to sign it. Granted, I believe that the rules should be changed to reflect the values of the institution, but I decided that I didn't want to be associated with an issue that clearly wasn't ever going to benefit me. I know that sounds horrifically selfish, but it is one of a couple benefits that I, as a single (gay isn't even an issue) non-parent faculty member will NEVER use. It's money that I can't even try and get because I'm single and don't have children.
Around the same time, I was asked to donate money towards a baby gift. Standard procedure. We also found out that another faculty member's wife was pregnant and I saw more cash leaving my wallet. Then we had our scheduled faculty meeting (which could be distilled into a memo of announcements) morph into a "words of wisdom" for oncoming parenthood and cake celebration. This joyous occasion as one of my colleagues who has been trying for a couple years to get pregnant had to sit and watch and wonder. It was feeling like all baby, all the time.
So that's part I. The second part of my "scrooge-ness" can be distilled as an equivalent to the time when a first child gets all pissy because all of a sudden its parents are splitting their energies between the firstborn and the newborn. I'm the firstborn in this situation. I have all these wonderful friends in my life and we all met and had these amazing experiences together when we were younger. First, life taking us across the country and world scatter us all over. So I've lost part of them first to geography. One by one, my formerly single friends found partners and began to do "couples things", a world that I can be included in but never truly feel welcome. At least, their spouses and partners are adults and always persons of intellect and quality so even though I lose part of them to their partners, I gain another friend. It's a wash. But the loss in this case is that I can't experience the world in a way that they do. I'm not privy to married/partner life and all the other couples and their orbits. And don't even ask me to try and comprehend and empathize with the issues and emotions around being a part of a pair.
Then comes the ultimate loss. The arrival of the child/children. If you thought I was at a loss to understand on an emotional level the issues of coupledom, well you can imagine how difficult it is to translate an theoretical idea of what some emotion/fear should be into really understanding and anticipating how to communicate and relate to those who do/are experiencing parenthood. Add to that the irrationality of those parenthood feelings/fears and I feel like I'm on eggshells.
I've "lost" a person who was at one time a friend of substance in my life. This person would warrant mention in my autobiography. This person would certainly be part of some hilarious story in which the joke would be on me. This person would come across in a positive light and would be amazed at how I could think of them in such high esteem. However, the course of life has removed them from my life. There is little about our lives anymore that are similar. And I don't think that our lives being different is all that bad, in fact, it's something that should be celebrated that each and every one of us has pursued a career or passion that was true for each and every one of us and is living a life of genuine happiness and contentment.
So, it hurts when the only thing that remains as a representation of our friendship arrives in the form that I complained about. And it's not the picture of the child, really. It's that it would have taken the sender a minute, maybe a maximum of three minutes to jot something down about them the person who is raising that cute kid in the picture staring at me. So really, I feel like (and I know this is completely childish and immature) I would rather not even get a card. Even though the sender is celebrating the development of their child and the picture is a snapshot of the incredibly hard work, loss of sleep due to worry and all the diaper changes, it's not something I can understand at the core level. At its most crass level, the baby/child/children 1, Ernie 0. And there isn't even a chance at a rematch/do over.
To end this post in a constructive way, I ask that those of you who send the picture cards of your children, please just take a minute to tell me about YOU. What are you doing in your life? What are the things, other than your child, that motivate you to get up each day? These are the things that brought us together as friends in the first place. These are the things that are going to keep us single people around. As for my issues with those benefits, most glaringly the missed opportunity at tuition remission at a private K-12 school, well, I'm just going to have to think creatively to see that benefit come to fruition. The inequities are as stark as me not having any benefit to another teacher who sent all four of her kids here for 13 years at 75% off. Umm, you do the math on that one.
I hope that I've explained the basis for my anger. I apologize for my bluntness. I don't apologize for the fact that I made light of what is a touchy issue for many of us who don't have children. Please remember what our lives our like because you were there once. We'll do our best to try and be sensitive to your feelings, joys and issues. However, for us it's in many ways an intellectual exercise and we might not always get it right. Thanks for making it this far. Good friends are willing to read to this point. Thanks, friend.
So, as I always do, I sat down and stared at the wall and sorted through what I believed to be my feelings about the "photocard as christmas card" anger. In retrospect, the storm began to brew last week when a colleague of mine (not in my department) and his wife are due to have a baby any day now. There is some uproar about the "not so progressive" policy around paternity leave. A letter was going around and I was asked by another faculty member to sign it. Granted, I believe that the rules should be changed to reflect the values of the institution, but I decided that I didn't want to be associated with an issue that clearly wasn't ever going to benefit me. I know that sounds horrifically selfish, but it is one of a couple benefits that I, as a single (gay isn't even an issue) non-parent faculty member will NEVER use. It's money that I can't even try and get because I'm single and don't have children.
Around the same time, I was asked to donate money towards a baby gift. Standard procedure. We also found out that another faculty member's wife was pregnant and I saw more cash leaving my wallet. Then we had our scheduled faculty meeting (which could be distilled into a memo of announcements) morph into a "words of wisdom" for oncoming parenthood and cake celebration. This joyous occasion as one of my colleagues who has been trying for a couple years to get pregnant had to sit and watch and wonder. It was feeling like all baby, all the time.
So that's part I. The second part of my "scrooge-ness" can be distilled as an equivalent to the time when a first child gets all pissy because all of a sudden its parents are splitting their energies between the firstborn and the newborn. I'm the firstborn in this situation. I have all these wonderful friends in my life and we all met and had these amazing experiences together when we were younger. First, life taking us across the country and world scatter us all over. So I've lost part of them first to geography. One by one, my formerly single friends found partners and began to do "couples things", a world that I can be included in but never truly feel welcome. At least, their spouses and partners are adults and always persons of intellect and quality so even though I lose part of them to their partners, I gain another friend. It's a wash. But the loss in this case is that I can't experience the world in a way that they do. I'm not privy to married/partner life and all the other couples and their orbits. And don't even ask me to try and comprehend and empathize with the issues and emotions around being a part of a pair.
Then comes the ultimate loss. The arrival of the child/children. If you thought I was at a loss to understand on an emotional level the issues of coupledom, well you can imagine how difficult it is to translate an theoretical idea of what some emotion/fear should be into really understanding and anticipating how to communicate and relate to those who do/are experiencing parenthood. Add to that the irrationality of those parenthood feelings/fears and I feel like I'm on eggshells.
I've "lost" a person who was at one time a friend of substance in my life. This person would warrant mention in my autobiography. This person would certainly be part of some hilarious story in which the joke would be on me. This person would come across in a positive light and would be amazed at how I could think of them in such high esteem. However, the course of life has removed them from my life. There is little about our lives anymore that are similar. And I don't think that our lives being different is all that bad, in fact, it's something that should be celebrated that each and every one of us has pursued a career or passion that was true for each and every one of us and is living a life of genuine happiness and contentment.
So, it hurts when the only thing that remains as a representation of our friendship arrives in the form that I complained about. And it's not the picture of the child, really. It's that it would have taken the sender a minute, maybe a maximum of three minutes to jot something down about them the person who is raising that cute kid in the picture staring at me. So really, I feel like (and I know this is completely childish and immature) I would rather not even get a card. Even though the sender is celebrating the development of their child and the picture is a snapshot of the incredibly hard work, loss of sleep due to worry and all the diaper changes, it's not something I can understand at the core level. At its most crass level, the baby/child/children 1, Ernie 0. And there isn't even a chance at a rematch/do over.
To end this post in a constructive way, I ask that those of you who send the picture cards of your children, please just take a minute to tell me about YOU. What are you doing in your life? What are the things, other than your child, that motivate you to get up each day? These are the things that brought us together as friends in the first place. These are the things that are going to keep us single people around. As for my issues with those benefits, most glaringly the missed opportunity at tuition remission at a private K-12 school, well, I'm just going to have to think creatively to see that benefit come to fruition. The inequities are as stark as me not having any benefit to another teacher who sent all four of her kids here for 13 years at 75% off. Umm, you do the math on that one.
I hope that I've explained the basis for my anger. I apologize for my bluntness. I don't apologize for the fact that I made light of what is a touchy issue for many of us who don't have children. Please remember what our lives our like because you were there once. We'll do our best to try and be sensitive to your feelings, joys and issues. However, for us it's in many ways an intellectual exercise and we might not always get it right. Thanks for making it this far. Good friends are willing to read to this point. Thanks, friend.
Friday, December 09, 2005
Pet Peeve
As many of you know, I have had (am having) issues with all of my heterosexual friends getting married and having children. I am not jealous in any way. Hello? I spend my days with 14 and 15 year old high school freshman. I get my fill of immature behavior. I have often threatened to write a book whose working title is something like:
"The Single (or Gay) Persons Guide When Their Friends Get Married and Have Children"
Topics would include:
1) How to not be a third wheel.
2) What not to say when you visit them in the hospital the day their first child is born.
3) How to avoid getting caught on the phone with your friend and having them put their soon to be talking (yeah, RIGHT!) child on the phone to "talk" to you.
4) Never attend a one year old child's birthday party. It's full of other married couples who have done nothing but spend every waking moment worrying about their precious baby. Write the check to the kid and stay the hell away.
5) Insist on being called by your name, never be called Uncle/Aunt So-and-So. You are a person, not a human gift giving/baby sitting machine.
There are many more tips that I can mention but you are probably wondering what the impetus for this posting was. It's Christmas time and that means that Christmas cards are flowing into my home at a rate of one or two per day.
Why do all my friends who have kids simply think that sticking in a photocard of their "adorable" child/children (and no picture of any adult in sight) with no personal greeting, suffices for a holiday card. I've learned absolutely NOTHING about what you did they did this year. All I can do is pull out the picture card from last year and see that Johnny/Judy can now hold a spoon and plaster food all over themselves. Come on people, put in a little more effort and care than that. Your actions (or non-actions as the case may be) are giving all you parents a bad name with your single/gay friends. Your lives are not to be lived only for your child. You, too, were independent, interesting and dynamic people at one point at an earlier point in your lives!
Topics would include:
2) What not to say when you visit them in the hospital the day their first child is born.
3) How to avoid getting caught on the phone with your friend and having them put their soon to be talking (yeah, RIGHT!) child on the phone to "talk" to you.
4) Never attend a one year old child's birthday party. It's full of other married couples who have done nothing but spend every waking moment worrying about their precious baby. Write the check to the kid and stay the hell away.
5) Insist on being called by your name, never be called Uncle/Aunt So-and-So. You are a person, not a human gift giving/baby sitting machine.
There are many more tips that I can mention but you are probably wondering what the impetus for this posting was. It's Christmas time and that means that Christmas cards are flowing into my home at a rate of one or two per day.
Why do all my friends who have kids simply think that sticking in a photocard of their "adorable" child/children (and no picture of any adult in sight) with no personal greeting, suffices for a holiday card. I've learned absolutely NOTHING about what you did they did this year. All I can do is pull out the picture card from last year and see that Johnny/Judy can now hold a spoon and plaster food all over themselves. Come on people, put in a little more effort and care than that. Your actions (or non-actions as the case may be) are giving all you parents a bad name with your single/gay friends. Your lives are not to be lived only for your child. You, too, were independent, interesting and dynamic people at one point at an earlier point in your lives!
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Someone's Birthday...
This past Sunday a group of 15 of us were picked up in two limos at the Diamond Heights Parking Lot for a day wine tasting in Napa. Armed with bagels, fruit and a fully stocked bar, the two limos were whisked up to the Napa Valley. First stop, Cakebread Winery. S. had arranged for our group to take an extended tour of the winery, the conclusion of which was an extensive wine tasting.
Our tour started with a walk through the grapevines. Being someone who is only now learning about wines (S has taught me now the ability to determine between families or reds and whites) I actually learned a great deal and put some of the words that I have learned in context. As you can see it was a fabulous day weatherwise.
The Cabernet Sauvignon vines have this unkept look because during the summer when the grapes are growing the leaves of the arching overhanging vines shade the fruit and traps heat underneath allowing the grapes to produce sugars for a longer time during the day.
This isn't a cucumber or zucchini, but actually will be a loofah someday when it is dried. The garden is on the Cakebread grounds and when cooking classes are held, the foods are taken directly from this plot.
The tanks at Cakebread Winery
Next stop, Peju Winery. This winery does not sell its wine commercially, only over the Internet, here in Napa or one can find it in top restaurants.
Peju's signature tower
We had our tasting in Peju's main tasting room which was the top floor of the tower.
Tasting at Peju
Here's a partial list of the wines we tasted at Peju.
I had tasted the wines at both Cakebread and Peju (come on I had to taste a wine that costs $125.....I mean the pragmatist in me was going "What the hell is so special about a wine to have it cost $125?") However, the little wine I had was making me loopy and so S cut me off. Peju was fantastic and we were off again. This time to the Merryvale Winery.
Merryvale
At the point in the day, I was enjoying the fresh air outside and dozing off due to my Asian gene deficiency.
The day ended with a stop at Domaine Carneros known for it's famous Tattinger label. Again, I took a pass on the tour and tasting.
The Napa Group in front of the Tattinger House.
The day ended with us riding the limo across the Golden Gate Bridge at sunset. Happy Birthday S.
NOTE: I just spent two hours going through all the blog postings eliminating last names. I've replaced them with the first initial of the last name. On about five separate occasions this year, I have gotten some word of a person mentioned being googled and having my blog posting with their name show up. So, in the interest of people's privacy, I've taken surnames off of here. If you find one that I missed, please let me know. Thanks.
Our tour started with a walk through the grapevines. Being someone who is only now learning about wines (S has taught me now the ability to determine between families or reds and whites) I actually learned a great deal and put some of the words that I have learned in context. As you can see it was a fabulous day weatherwise.
Next stop, Peju Winery. This winery does not sell its wine commercially, only over the Internet, here in Napa or one can find it in top restaurants.
We had our tasting in Peju's main tasting room which was the top floor of the tower.
I had tasted the wines at both Cakebread and Peju (come on I had to taste a wine that costs $125.....I mean the pragmatist in me was going "What the hell is so special about a wine to have it cost $125?") However, the little wine I had was making me loopy and so S cut me off. Peju was fantastic and we were off again. This time to the Merryvale Winery.
At the point in the day, I was enjoying the fresh air outside and dozing off due to my Asian gene deficiency.
The day ended with a stop at Domaine Carneros known for it's famous Tattinger label. Again, I took a pass on the tour and tasting.
The day ended with us riding the limo across the Golden Gate Bridge at sunset. Happy Birthday S.
NOTE: I just spent two hours going through all the blog postings eliminating last names. I've replaced them with the first initial of the last name. On about five separate occasions this year, I have gotten some word of a person mentioned being googled and having my blog posting with their name show up. So, in the interest of people's privacy, I've taken surnames off of here. If you find one that I missed, please let me know. Thanks.
Friday, December 02, 2005
So this is where aging Olympic rhythmic gymnasts end up....
Yesterday, for Scott and mine's eight month anniversary, we attended Cirque de Soleil's newest show, Corteo. The tent is set up in the parking lot of SBC (nee: Pacific Bell) Park just south of the Bay Bridge. Since picture taking is not allowed under the big tent, I am providing pictures that I lifted right off the web. Just like my experience attending the opening of Wicked, where I had no idea what to expect and ended up having a wonderful time, the same happened last night.
The show was a circus, but so much more. My favorite acts were the actually near the beginning:
The women would grab onto a part of the chandelier and twirl the strings of "pearls" or actual metal itself, all while swinging up and down and back and forth as the chandeliers were raised and lowered.
My favorite, however, was the "bouncing beds". I think the picture speaks for itself.
The night was cold and blustery, but under the big tent, the air was electric and pumped full of warm air.
As we left Corteo and were driving home, Scott and I both noted that Corteo would only travel to seven cities throughout the United States. It underscored for both of us that one of the attractions of living in San Francisco is that it is a world-class city. It draws to its stages shows like Wicked and Corteo so we can experience them right in our own proverbial backyards.
Sunday, November 27, 2005
A decision to not consume
A couple weeks ago, Scott and I went to Best Buy to check out something he was thinking of buying (BOSE speakers if I recall). I was wandering around, overwhelmed by the amount and variety of technology from which I could choose, when I saw it. It being a TIVO machine, which after a rebate (offer expires Sunday 11/27) would only set me back $50. Granted, this doesn't include the TIVO subscription cost, but the machine would be a mere $50.
My mind was going at warp speed trying to figure out how I would be able to have a working TIVO in my house since it requires a phone line and I am one of those people who ditched my landline to go mobile only. To solve this issue, I would need to purchase a $75 wireless card to plug into the back of the TIVO machine so it could communicate with my wireless router. But the best idea was to have Mom buy it for me for my Christmas present.
One of my mother's biggest complaints about both my father and I is that we have no sense of delayed gratification. If we want something, we just buy it. This then precludes my mother from buying that desired item as a gift for either of us. Not this time, however. I called and left a message for my Mom. I called my sister as well for secondary confirmation of my message.
When my Mom called back, not to my surprise, she had no idea what a TIVO was. There was no way I was going to be able to explain to her the difference between a TIVO and a VCR, therefore I told her to go down to Best Buy and talk to one of the salespeople. She did and this past Friday, she called and told me that I should just go ahead and purchase the TIVO down here since it didn't make sense for her to buy it in Seattle and then have me haul it back down to San Francisco. Score!!!
But as the weekend wore on and the rebate deadline approached, I took a hard look at my desire to have a TIVO. In reality, I know all of the cool features and the convenience of watching television without commercials. But I have pretty much eliminated television from my life. The genesis of my desire to have a TIVO was that I had missed setting the VCR to tape Gilmore Girls for three straight weeks. Yes, I have officially outed myself in the public domain as being a devotee of the WB's Gilmore Girls.
All I really needed was the ability to write a note to myself in my planner to set the VCR, not a machine to take care of all that for me. So that's how it is here at the end of November 2005. I remain sans TIVO.
My mind was going at warp speed trying to figure out how I would be able to have a working TIVO in my house since it requires a phone line and I am one of those people who ditched my landline to go mobile only. To solve this issue, I would need to purchase a $75 wireless card to plug into the back of the TIVO machine so it could communicate with my wireless router. But the best idea was to have Mom buy it for me for my Christmas present.
One of my mother's biggest complaints about both my father and I is that we have no sense of delayed gratification. If we want something, we just buy it. This then precludes my mother from buying that desired item as a gift for either of us. Not this time, however. I called and left a message for my Mom. I called my sister as well for secondary confirmation of my message.
When my Mom called back, not to my surprise, she had no idea what a TIVO was. There was no way I was going to be able to explain to her the difference between a TIVO and a VCR, therefore I told her to go down to Best Buy and talk to one of the salespeople. She did and this past Friday, she called and told me that I should just go ahead and purchase the TIVO down here since it didn't make sense for her to buy it in Seattle and then have me haul it back down to San Francisco. Score!!!
But as the weekend wore on and the rebate deadline approached, I took a hard look at my desire to have a TIVO. In reality, I know all of the cool features and the convenience of watching television without commercials. But I have pretty much eliminated television from my life. The genesis of my desire to have a TIVO was that I had missed setting the VCR to tape Gilmore Girls for three straight weeks. Yes, I have officially outed myself in the public domain as being a devotee of the WB's Gilmore Girls.
All I really needed was the ability to write a note to myself in my planner to set the VCR, not a machine to take care of all that for me. So that's how it is here at the end of November 2005. I remain sans TIVO.
Saturday, November 26, 2005
A day of thanks -- Yet Wah style, and an agreement to disagree
A Happy Thanksgiving shout out to all those reading, especially my family on 121st Street. I'll be seeing you all in a couple of weeks for sure. Remember I'll be on Alaska #573. I mean how can I not be excited when I find out that my sister agrees with my grandfather that my grandmother's new haircut is reminiscent of the same style fashioned by none other than the Japanese Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi.
My grandmother and Koizumi, separated at birth?
My hope is that her hair doesn't grow out too fast and the resemblance diminishes. So, my Thanksgiving was both lazy and kinetic all rolled into one. I slept in late, took a nap, took another nap after transferring from my place to Scott's. Then I was aroused to Scott informing me that we were scheduled to have drinks with friends. Somehow, in the course of all this planning, I missed this key piece of information. After a turbo shower, I was ready and off we were to meet his friends at the Wah for pre-dinner drinks. After a half hour, we then scooted over to his friend Lori's place in the Richmond (a mere hop skip and jump from the new De Young Museum in Golden Gate Park) for dinner. We were in and out in less than two hours, it truly felt like a dine and dash. Out to door we were and back over to the Wah for dessert. The owners of the Wah, opened up their kitchen for one of their regulars and Scott's friend, Anita, to cook part of dinner. It was an interesting feeling to walk back into the kitchen of the Chinese restaurant and see a turkey and all the side dishes sitting next to woks, tongs, steamers and other utensils with a turkey sitting on the counter.
In many ways, the group of people sitting there in the half lighted bar of a Chinese Restaurant in San Francisco was truly the essence of Thanksgiving. All of us from all parts of the country and world being thankful for having each other. Being that I am a new addition (as a Scott hanger on), I listened to the stories and laughed as I could at all the inside jokes, but soon I'll be just as part of the group as everyone else. It takes time and I know that. Hey, if I win the football pool this Sunday, it will happen instantaeously.
The day after the big day was spent lazing the day away again. That night, Scott and I had a "flopsie" evening. No plans, just doing our thing together and individually. What did come up was our diverging opinions about two of the Food Networks biggest stars, Emeril LeGasse and Rachael Ray. Here are pictures and a summary of our feelings towards each.
Scott is enamored whereas I find him totally fake and grating
Scott hears her giggle and equates it with fingernails on a chalkboard, whereas I find her cute as a button and totally a joy to watch. E.V.O.O. baby!!
That's Thanksgiving in a nutshell!!
My hope is that her hair doesn't grow out too fast and the resemblance diminishes. So, my Thanksgiving was both lazy and kinetic all rolled into one. I slept in late, took a nap, took another nap after transferring from my place to Scott's. Then I was aroused to Scott informing me that we were scheduled to have drinks with friends. Somehow, in the course of all this planning, I missed this key piece of information. After a turbo shower, I was ready and off we were to meet his friends at the Wah for pre-dinner drinks. After a half hour, we then scooted over to his friend Lori's place in the Richmond (a mere hop skip and jump from the new De Young Museum in Golden Gate Park) for dinner. We were in and out in less than two hours, it truly felt like a dine and dash. Out to door we were and back over to the Wah for dessert. The owners of the Wah, opened up their kitchen for one of their regulars and Scott's friend, Anita, to cook part of dinner. It was an interesting feeling to walk back into the kitchen of the Chinese restaurant and see a turkey and all the side dishes sitting next to woks, tongs, steamers and other utensils with a turkey sitting on the counter.
In many ways, the group of people sitting there in the half lighted bar of a Chinese Restaurant in San Francisco was truly the essence of Thanksgiving. All of us from all parts of the country and world being thankful for having each other. Being that I am a new addition (as a Scott hanger on), I listened to the stories and laughed as I could at all the inside jokes, but soon I'll be just as part of the group as everyone else. It takes time and I know that. Hey, if I win the football pool this Sunday, it will happen instantaeously.
The day after the big day was spent lazing the day away again. That night, Scott and I had a "flopsie" evening. No plans, just doing our thing together and individually. What did come up was our diverging opinions about two of the Food Networks biggest stars, Emeril LeGasse and Rachael Ray. Here are pictures and a summary of our feelings towards each.
That's Thanksgiving in a nutshell!!
Sunday, November 20, 2005
It's nice to be nominated....
A friend of Scott's from "the Wah" runs a football pool based each week on the game played by the San Francisco 49ers. Alas, how to describe it both in brief and detail. There is a grid of 100 hundred squares (10 X 10). Each week along the horizontal, the numbers 0 through 9 are randomly assigned and represent the last digit of the total points scored that week by the 49ers. Along the vertical, the numbers 0 through 10 are randomly assigned and represent the visiting teams final point total.
50 out of the 100 squares are purchased ($10 a game for a total of $160) and the balance are left blank. If the last digits of the 49ers and visiting team correspond to a blank square, the $500 winnings from that week are rolled over to the following game. There have been 10 games so far this year and someone hit the square on the second game. However, since that time, there have been seven consecutive games in which the digits landed on a blank square. This made the pot $4,000 for this weeks game against my hometown Seattle Seahawks.
Scott and I went to the game, my annual trek to Candlestick (I refuse to call it by its now official name) to watch the 7-2 NFC Division leading Seattle Seahawks try and extend their five game winning streak against the 2-7 San Francisco 49ers. The starting quarterback this week was Ken Dorsey but you heard it here first, but I predict that by the end of the 2006-07 season, Cody Pickett will be the regular starting quarterback and not the millions earning first in the draft pick, Alex Smith. You heard it here first: Cody Pickett.
This week, Scott had 9 for San Francisco and 4 for Seattle. The game unfolded this way,
Seattle 3 San Francisco 0
Seattle 3 San Francisco 3
Seattle 10 San Francisco 3
Seattle 10 San Francisco 6
Seattle 17 San Francisco 6
Seattle 17 San Francisco 9
Seattle 17 San Francisco 12
Seattle 24 San Francisco 12
At this point, with about nine minutes left in the third quarter, a touchdown and extra point would put Scott in the catbirds seat. However, one must know that this is the same 49ers team that had NOT scored a touchdown in three games.
Alas, the Seahawks scored a field goal and the score was
Seattle 27 San Francisco 12
However, the first play of the 4th quarter brought the 49ers scored a touchdown.
Seattle 27 San Francisco 19
We were on. Instead of the 49ers needing to score a touchdown, it was now the Seahawks that needed to make it into the endzone, a much better proposition than before. The clock ticked down, at first this was desired as to run out the clock, but it then became the enemy.
In the end, the 49ers scored a last minute touchdown to make the game 27-25 but missed the two point conversion and Seattle left town with a win.
Addendum: At halftime, a great moment occurred as Steve Young was presented with his Hall of Fame ring. The speech that he gave was heartfelt and moving, even to one who has never been a fan of the 49ers. You could tell that he wasn't using hollow words to thank all those who were a part of his success in football. One strange thing of note, however, was every 49ers inducted into the Hall of Fame was present except for Joe Montana.
50 out of the 100 squares are purchased ($10 a game for a total of $160) and the balance are left blank. If the last digits of the 49ers and visiting team correspond to a blank square, the $500 winnings from that week are rolled over to the following game. There have been 10 games so far this year and someone hit the square on the second game. However, since that time, there have been seven consecutive games in which the digits landed on a blank square. This made the pot $4,000 for this weeks game against my hometown Seattle Seahawks.
Scott and I went to the game, my annual trek to Candlestick (I refuse to call it by its now official name) to watch the 7-2 NFC Division leading Seattle Seahawks try and extend their five game winning streak against the 2-7 San Francisco 49ers. The starting quarterback this week was Ken Dorsey but you heard it here first, but I predict that by the end of the 2006-07 season, Cody Pickett will be the regular starting quarterback and not the millions earning first in the draft pick, Alex Smith. You heard it here first: Cody Pickett.
This week, Scott had 9 for San Francisco and 4 for Seattle. The game unfolded this way,
At this point, with about nine minutes left in the third quarter, a touchdown and extra point would put Scott in the catbirds seat. However, one must know that this is the same 49ers team that had NOT scored a touchdown in three games.
Alas, the Seahawks scored a field goal and the score was
However, the first play of the 4th quarter brought the 49ers scored a touchdown.
We were on. Instead of the 49ers needing to score a touchdown, it was now the Seahawks that needed to make it into the endzone, a much better proposition than before. The clock ticked down, at first this was desired as to run out the clock, but it then became the enemy.
In the end, the 49ers scored a last minute touchdown to make the game 27-25 but missed the two point conversion and Seattle left town with a win.
Addendum: At halftime, a great moment occurred as Steve Young was presented with his Hall of Fame ring. The speech that he gave was heartfelt and moving, even to one who has never been a fan of the 49ers. You could tell that he wasn't using hollow words to thank all those who were a part of his success in football. One strange thing of note, however, was every 49ers inducted into the Hall of Fame was present except for Joe Montana.
Someone Like Scoop
By Froma Harop of The Providence Journal
Taken from The Seattle Times (November 20th, 2005)
"The Democrats need a candidate like a Democrat they used to have. He was Henry "Scoop" Jackson, a hawk abroad, a liberal at home. From 1941 until his death, in 1983, Jackson represented Washington state in Congress. He spent his last 30 years in the Senate. Until Democrats find someone with his kind of credibility on national security, they are not going to win the White House.
Jackson was the last Truman Democrat. As such, he believed that America should help working people but had to win the Cold War. Jackson's worldview was forged in the lesson of Munich: that appeasing Nazi Germany led to World War II and the death camps. Jackson understood that totalitarians view weakness with contempt — and offering them one-sided concessions just made them more dangerous.
People forget that from World War II through the Kennedy years, Democrats led the way on national defense. Republicans were held back by their isolationist wing and a resistance to government spending.
As chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Jackson roasted President Eisenhower for putting budget caps on defense spending. He blamed that policy for "the missile gap" then favoring the Soviets. "The richest country in the world," Jackson declared in 1960 while campaigning for John F. Kennedy, "can afford whatever it needs for defense."
Jackson was the father of neoconservatism, a legacy that troubles some Democrats today. Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and Paul Wolfowitz all worked for or with him. These Jackson alumni planned and promoted the Iraq war.
But what would Jackson have thought about Iraq? That the war's architects learned about the world at Jackson's knee might suggest approval from the great beyond.
"Jackson would have been very pleased by the performance of his disciples," asserts Robert G. Kaufman, author of "Henry M. Jackson: A Life in Politics."
"Jackson identified the root cause of the Cold War as a messianic ideology and totalitarianism," says Kaufman, professor of public policy at Pepperdine University. He would have seen similar root causes in 9/11.
Other readings of Jackson do not draw such slam-dunk conclusions. Jackson's support of a strong defense did not necessarily translate into an appetite for marching into war — especially in the Middle East. In 1982, Jackson slammed President Reagan's decision to send peacekeepers into Lebanon, and for reasons that might resonate today. Citing the volatile mix of Christians, Shiites, Sunnis and Druze, he insisted that Lebanon was no place for American troops in a police role.
"The danger of Americans being killed, the danger of divisiveness that would accrue from those developments ... are all too real," Jackson said on "Face the Nation." "A superpower should not play that kind of role in a cauldron of trouble, because sooner or later we are going to get hurt."
So Jackson very well might have opposed going into Iraq. But here is the point for Democrats: Jackson could have taken that position, and no one would have questioned his determination to defend America.
John Kerry did not inspire similar confidence. Voters didn't need him to declare the war a brilliant concept. By the 2004 election, unease over the wisdom and execution of the war was already growing. What voters wanted, and didn't get, was a more general sign of resolve to confront the terrorist threat. Had pro-choice women who were worried about terrorism — the so-called security moms — not abandoned Kerry, he would have won.
Jackson was often mocked as "the senator from Boeing." And without a doubt, he helped send a lot of defense dollars to his home state. But he famously opposed the sale of AWACS radar planes to Saudi Arabia, which would have been a very big deal for Boeing. Jackson feared the aircraft would pose a threat to Israel's security.
He was also seen as being overly beholden to Israel. And it was true that Jackson cared deeply about the Jewish state's survival. But again, American interests remained paramount. He showed little patience for Menachem Begin's biblical claims to the West Bank. And when Israel invaded Lebanon without first consulting with the United States, Jackson read it the riot act. "This can't continue and still have public support for the state of Israel," he declared.
In recounting Scoop Jackson's enthusiasm for a robust defense, we mustn't overlook that he was as much a liberal as he was a hawk. Jackson supported proposals for national health care, starting with President Truman's. He was a staunch friend of labor and an unswerving supporter of civil rights.
Jackson was a square. A son of Norwegian immigrants, he believed in the blue-collar ethic of hard work and obeying the law. His personal life was spotless.
Right-wingers hated Jackson. In 1952, the red-baiting Sen. Joseph McCarthy campaigned against him. Even as Jackson offered strong support for Ronald Reagan's defense buildup, the conservative Richard Viguerie targeted him for defeat. "He has got a lot to answer for," Viguerie said in 1982, "you know, like his 100-percent AFL-CIO voting record."
By the time Jackson ran for president, in 1972 and 1976, Cold War liberals had gone out of fashion. The trauma of Vietnam had soured the party on a militarily assertive America, and Jackson could not get his party's nomination.
In the post-9/11 world, Scoop Jackson seems fresh again. And Democratic candidates would do well to speak his language on national security. Their job is to pair a liberal agenda with an uncompromising toughness toward external threats. Scoop Jackson proved it can be done."
Taken from The Seattle Times (November 20th, 2005)
"The Democrats need a candidate like a Democrat they used to have. He was Henry "Scoop" Jackson, a hawk abroad, a liberal at home. From 1941 until his death, in 1983, Jackson represented Washington state in Congress. He spent his last 30 years in the Senate. Until Democrats find someone with his kind of credibility on national security, they are not going to win the White House.
Jackson was the last Truman Democrat. As such, he believed that America should help working people but had to win the Cold War. Jackson's worldview was forged in the lesson of Munich: that appeasing Nazi Germany led to World War II and the death camps. Jackson understood that totalitarians view weakness with contempt — and offering them one-sided concessions just made them more dangerous.
People forget that from World War II through the Kennedy years, Democrats led the way on national defense. Republicans were held back by their isolationist wing and a resistance to government spending.
As chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Jackson roasted President Eisenhower for putting budget caps on defense spending. He blamed that policy for "the missile gap" then favoring the Soviets. "The richest country in the world," Jackson declared in 1960 while campaigning for John F. Kennedy, "can afford whatever it needs for defense."
Jackson was the father of neoconservatism, a legacy that troubles some Democrats today. Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and Paul Wolfowitz all worked for or with him. These Jackson alumni planned and promoted the Iraq war.
But what would Jackson have thought about Iraq? That the war's architects learned about the world at Jackson's knee might suggest approval from the great beyond.
"Jackson would have been very pleased by the performance of his disciples," asserts Robert G. Kaufman, author of "Henry M. Jackson: A Life in Politics."
"Jackson identified the root cause of the Cold War as a messianic ideology and totalitarianism," says Kaufman, professor of public policy at Pepperdine University. He would have seen similar root causes in 9/11.
Other readings of Jackson do not draw such slam-dunk conclusions. Jackson's support of a strong defense did not necessarily translate into an appetite for marching into war — especially in the Middle East. In 1982, Jackson slammed President Reagan's decision to send peacekeepers into Lebanon, and for reasons that might resonate today. Citing the volatile mix of Christians, Shiites, Sunnis and Druze, he insisted that Lebanon was no place for American troops in a police role.
"The danger of Americans being killed, the danger of divisiveness that would accrue from those developments ... are all too real," Jackson said on "Face the Nation." "A superpower should not play that kind of role in a cauldron of trouble, because sooner or later we are going to get hurt."
So Jackson very well might have opposed going into Iraq. But here is the point for Democrats: Jackson could have taken that position, and no one would have questioned his determination to defend America.
John Kerry did not inspire similar confidence. Voters didn't need him to declare the war a brilliant concept. By the 2004 election, unease over the wisdom and execution of the war was already growing. What voters wanted, and didn't get, was a more general sign of resolve to confront the terrorist threat. Had pro-choice women who were worried about terrorism — the so-called security moms — not abandoned Kerry, he would have won.
Jackson was often mocked as "the senator from Boeing." And without a doubt, he helped send a lot of defense dollars to his home state. But he famously opposed the sale of AWACS radar planes to Saudi Arabia, which would have been a very big deal for Boeing. Jackson feared the aircraft would pose a threat to Israel's security.
He was also seen as being overly beholden to Israel. And it was true that Jackson cared deeply about the Jewish state's survival. But again, American interests remained paramount. He showed little patience for Menachem Begin's biblical claims to the West Bank. And when Israel invaded Lebanon without first consulting with the United States, Jackson read it the riot act. "This can't continue and still have public support for the state of Israel," he declared.
In recounting Scoop Jackson's enthusiasm for a robust defense, we mustn't overlook that he was as much a liberal as he was a hawk. Jackson supported proposals for national health care, starting with President Truman's. He was a staunch friend of labor and an unswerving supporter of civil rights.
Jackson was a square. A son of Norwegian immigrants, he believed in the blue-collar ethic of hard work and obeying the law. His personal life was spotless.
Right-wingers hated Jackson. In 1952, the red-baiting Sen. Joseph McCarthy campaigned against him. Even as Jackson offered strong support for Ronald Reagan's defense buildup, the conservative Richard Viguerie targeted him for defeat. "He has got a lot to answer for," Viguerie said in 1982, "you know, like his 100-percent AFL-CIO voting record."
By the time Jackson ran for president, in 1972 and 1976, Cold War liberals had gone out of fashion. The trauma of Vietnam had soured the party on a militarily assertive America, and Jackson could not get his party's nomination.
In the post-9/11 world, Scoop Jackson seems fresh again. And Democratic candidates would do well to speak his language on national security. Their job is to pair a liberal agenda with an uncompromising toughness toward external threats. Scoop Jackson proved it can be done."
Friday, November 18, 2005
Henry
I've got the scoop on cousin Henry. Let's just say he still is all about the Dallas Cowboys. The core of the boy hasn't changed.
Cousin Henry
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
If you want to know why I am pissed off....
This post originally written on the afternoon of Wednesday November 9th, 2005, but posted on the evening of Thursday November 10th, 2005. I needed to cool off.
It's because those of us who play by the rules, plan ahead and adjust to things as information becomes available, GET SCREWED. This is essentially what I stated emphatically to an administrator today at 2:35PM and then promptly walked out of the Math Dept. office, to my car and drove home. I brought no work home.
"To promote responsibility...." this is one of the five tenets of the school mission. I try and live my life in a way that is an example of living responsibily. That means, I am always prepared for class, I plan ahead and give my students the time they need to learn the material. I believe that were my students polled they would agree that in my class, they know what the expectations are, know that I give them all the warnings they need and that I hide nothing. Tests and quizzes are always returned at the next class period because I honor their efforts of taking the exam on the day its scheduled so they should know their results as soon as possible.
As usual, I need to set the stage by giving some background information. Six weeks ago, or so, there was a Friday evening dance. Some students were drinking and in the aftermath, one student was riding on another student's car and fell off subsequently requiring hospitalization for what turned out to be a minor head injury. This all happened in the school parking lot. As a consequence, all dances for the entire year were cancelled. Included under the perview of all dances, the Prom.
At about the same time, I planned my curriculum and determined that I would give a test on Monday 11/14/05. The benefit for me of giving a test on Monday is that it is the only day in which my three sections of Geometry are in sync. On Mondays, my three sections meet 1st, 4th and 6th periods. The rest of the week they are a day off because two sections don't meet Tuesday and the third skips on Friday. Every other day of the week, the third section is at least two lessons ahead because their last class of the week is Thursday first period which is before the the third meeting of the week for either of the other two sections. By giving a test on Monday, I can minimize the worry of having students talking to each other about it, which even though they sign a pledge that they won't, they do. I am also not willing to write two versions of a test.
As I am a person who plans ahead, I posted my Geometry test on the schools online calender. I was the first test on the calender for 9th graders and therefore I couldn't be bumped as the rule is there can only be two tests per day for students.
A couple of weeks ago, the administration and class deans decided that the students should be given an opportunity to discuss the dance ban and make their own suggestions as what they could do or pledge to do in order to have them reinstated. It was emailed to all faculty that a discussion would be held during the assembly period on Friday 11/11/05 (in advising groups). Needing to capture the "spirit" of that discussion, the students, again in advising groups, would then meet again and sign a document on Monday 11/14/05. This second meeting would cancel 1st period class.
Woops. My 1st period section would have their test time eliminated. So, being the responsible teacher I am, I rearranged things on the calender and moved the test for all sections back to Friday 11/11/05, allowing my 3rd section that doesn't meet on Friday to take it last period on Friday if they didn't want to take it Thursday morning 1st period. It would mean that I would not benefit from my schedule of not having Friday classes after lunch and stay until the end of school. No problem, I should stay to the end of school anyway.
This rearrangement of my teaching comes in addition to the fact that 1/3 of my Statistics class was not in class on Tuesday 11/8/05 because of a Bay Area Ecology Field trip to Point Reyes as well as not having 1/3 to 1/2 of my students on Wednesday afternoon 11/9/05 due to the fact that all students taking French were gone watching a French film at the French foreign consolate. I also might be missing students Friday 2nd period because the Jazz students need to set up for a preview of their performance held at a prominent Jazz club in a few weeks time. Lastly, some of my Thursday first period students will be in class after travelling two hours, both ways, to play, or watch, a playoff soccer game at 7PM Wednesday evening.
So earlier this week, in another email to all faculty, it was announced that the 1st period class on Monday would be reinstated. With this news, I told my students that their test was on Monday 11/14/05 as first planned. To fill this extra day I created another lesson plan. Today, I found out that in fact on Monday 11/15/05 we would run what is affectionately known as a "squeeze schedule." All classes would be shortened by 5 minutes in order for an extended advisory period to be included so the student could sign the document pledging whatever they needed to pledge in order to have their dances reinstated.
This threw me for a loop and I was pissed, but I managed to keep a lid on things for the most part. I did go in and make my point abundantly clear to the administration that I felt that I was trying to hit a moving target in trying to pin down what the exact schedule was. In addition, I pointed out the unintended consequences of decisions being made and then being changed. For example, I have 8th graders who come up from the Middle School for one of my Honors Geometry classes. When a squeeze schedule is run for the Upper School, my 8th graders either miss class or show up half way through.
Then at lunch today, I was informed by another colleague that one of my Geometry students informed her that my test had changed and therefore I was the third test for most 9th graders. Since I hadn't changed my test back to Monday on the online test calender, I was third in line and therefore out in the cold. At this point, I lost it. I erupted. It was the end of the line to the point that my dear friend Shahana told me to cool it because I was making a scene. Well if making a scene lets people know how I feel that I'll take the consequences and reprimands. If I had ignored the second change in schedule I would still be first in line to give my test on Monday 11/14/05. Now, I'm having to rearrange my teaching schedule for the third time.
What is at the core of my anger? It's that I feel that we are rewarding those who don't play by the rules. Just because a couple students used poor judgement and broke the rules, we are rewarding them with the opportunity to try and get their dances back. In reality, is a school responsible for providing its students a social life? If students want dances, their parents can organize them and hold them off school grounds.
At the end of the day, an administrator came to see if I was alright and asked if there was anything he could do. He said that he'd be willing to take the heat, essentially saying that I could administer the test on Monday. But that would be bending the rules again, and those who would be affected would be the students. The students shouldn't have to suffer because of the decisions of adults. So I said that it wasn't necessary for him to change the rules. I wanted to take the high road and play by the rules.
The next day.........
So, I did a bit of creative juggling. I had the two sections that skip class on Tuesday to come on Tuesday to take the test and then have their free on Wednesday instead. I will introduce material for the next chapter on Monday instead of giving the test. I do have to report that my class that was supposed to start at 10:35AM this morning after school meeting didn't start until 10:42AM. More fuel for my fire.
It's because those of us who play by the rules, plan ahead and adjust to things as information becomes available, GET SCREWED. This is essentially what I stated emphatically to an administrator today at 2:35PM and then promptly walked out of the Math Dept. office, to my car and drove home. I brought no work home.
"To promote responsibility...." this is one of the five tenets of the school mission. I try and live my life in a way that is an example of living responsibily. That means, I am always prepared for class, I plan ahead and give my students the time they need to learn the material. I believe that were my students polled they would agree that in my class, they know what the expectations are, know that I give them all the warnings they need and that I hide nothing. Tests and quizzes are always returned at the next class period because I honor their efforts of taking the exam on the day its scheduled so they should know their results as soon as possible.
As usual, I need to set the stage by giving some background information. Six weeks ago, or so, there was a Friday evening dance. Some students were drinking and in the aftermath, one student was riding on another student's car and fell off subsequently requiring hospitalization for what turned out to be a minor head injury. This all happened in the school parking lot. As a consequence, all dances for the entire year were cancelled. Included under the perview of all dances, the Prom.
At about the same time, I planned my curriculum and determined that I would give a test on Monday 11/14/05. The benefit for me of giving a test on Monday is that it is the only day in which my three sections of Geometry are in sync. On Mondays, my three sections meet 1st, 4th and 6th periods. The rest of the week they are a day off because two sections don't meet Tuesday and the third skips on Friday. Every other day of the week, the third section is at least two lessons ahead because their last class of the week is Thursday first period which is before the the third meeting of the week for either of the other two sections. By giving a test on Monday, I can minimize the worry of having students talking to each other about it, which even though they sign a pledge that they won't, they do. I am also not willing to write two versions of a test.
As I am a person who plans ahead, I posted my Geometry test on the schools online calender. I was the first test on the calender for 9th graders and therefore I couldn't be bumped as the rule is there can only be two tests per day for students.
A couple of weeks ago, the administration and class deans decided that the students should be given an opportunity to discuss the dance ban and make their own suggestions as what they could do or pledge to do in order to have them reinstated. It was emailed to all faculty that a discussion would be held during the assembly period on Friday 11/11/05 (in advising groups). Needing to capture the "spirit" of that discussion, the students, again in advising groups, would then meet again and sign a document on Monday 11/14/05. This second meeting would cancel 1st period class.
Woops. My 1st period section would have their test time eliminated. So, being the responsible teacher I am, I rearranged things on the calender and moved the test for all sections back to Friday 11/11/05, allowing my 3rd section that doesn't meet on Friday to take it last period on Friday if they didn't want to take it Thursday morning 1st period. It would mean that I would not benefit from my schedule of not having Friday classes after lunch and stay until the end of school. No problem, I should stay to the end of school anyway.
This rearrangement of my teaching comes in addition to the fact that 1/3 of my Statistics class was not in class on Tuesday 11/8/05 because of a Bay Area Ecology Field trip to Point Reyes as well as not having 1/3 to 1/2 of my students on Wednesday afternoon 11/9/05 due to the fact that all students taking French were gone watching a French film at the French foreign consolate. I also might be missing students Friday 2nd period because the Jazz students need to set up for a preview of their performance held at a prominent Jazz club in a few weeks time. Lastly, some of my Thursday first period students will be in class after travelling two hours, both ways, to play, or watch, a playoff soccer game at 7PM Wednesday evening.
So earlier this week, in another email to all faculty, it was announced that the 1st period class on Monday would be reinstated. With this news, I told my students that their test was on Monday 11/14/05 as first planned. To fill this extra day I created another lesson plan. Today, I found out that in fact on Monday 11/15/05 we would run what is affectionately known as a "squeeze schedule." All classes would be shortened by 5 minutes in order for an extended advisory period to be included so the student could sign the document pledging whatever they needed to pledge in order to have their dances reinstated.
This threw me for a loop and I was pissed, but I managed to keep a lid on things for the most part. I did go in and make my point abundantly clear to the administration that I felt that I was trying to hit a moving target in trying to pin down what the exact schedule was. In addition, I pointed out the unintended consequences of decisions being made and then being changed. For example, I have 8th graders who come up from the Middle School for one of my Honors Geometry classes. When a squeeze schedule is run for the Upper School, my 8th graders either miss class or show up half way through.
Then at lunch today, I was informed by another colleague that one of my Geometry students informed her that my test had changed and therefore I was the third test for most 9th graders. Since I hadn't changed my test back to Monday on the online test calender, I was third in line and therefore out in the cold. At this point, I lost it. I erupted. It was the end of the line to the point that my dear friend Shahana told me to cool it because I was making a scene. Well if making a scene lets people know how I feel that I'll take the consequences and reprimands. If I had ignored the second change in schedule I would still be first in line to give my test on Monday 11/14/05. Now, I'm having to rearrange my teaching schedule for the third time.
What is at the core of my anger? It's that I feel that we are rewarding those who don't play by the rules. Just because a couple students used poor judgement and broke the rules, we are rewarding them with the opportunity to try and get their dances back. In reality, is a school responsible for providing its students a social life? If students want dances, their parents can organize them and hold them off school grounds.
At the end of the day, an administrator came to see if I was alright and asked if there was anything he could do. He said that he'd be willing to take the heat, essentially saying that I could administer the test on Monday. But that would be bending the rules again, and those who would be affected would be the students. The students shouldn't have to suffer because of the decisions of adults. So I said that it wasn't necessary for him to change the rules. I wanted to take the high road and play by the rules.
The next day.........
So, I did a bit of creative juggling. I had the two sections that skip class on Tuesday to come on Tuesday to take the test and then have their free on Wednesday instead. I will introduce material for the next chapter on Monday instead of giving the test. I do have to report that my class that was supposed to start at 10:35AM this morning after school meeting didn't start until 10:42AM. More fuel for my fire.
Where my people are.....
Yesterday was election day (more specifically, special election day) here in California. On the ballot were initiatives ranging from parental notification of abortion to the creation of programs to help get medical drugs to those who are uninsured or unable to afford them. There were four initiatives that our Governor (we all know who he is) was pushing hard. These were things that he said he could deliver on during his election during the recall of former Governor Gray Davis back in 2003.
Prop. 74 - Teacher Tenure to increase from 2 years to 5 years probation
Prop. 75 - Requiring unions to get permission to spend dues for political purposes
Prop. 76 - State spending caps and changes to educational funding formulas
Prop. 77 - Redistricting of political boundaries moved to committee of retired judges
In looking at how I voted on these to the maps (Prop. 74 , Prop. 75, Prop. 76, Prop. 77) of the results, by county, as found on the California Secretary of State's website, I found that I am not exactly in line with the Bay Area, which resoundingly voted NO on each of these four. I should be living in...........Bakersfield (Kern County) or Fresno (Fresno County). It's becoming more and more the case that I am becoming a Republican in my old age.
Prop. 74 - Teacher Tenure to increase from 2 years to 5 years probation
Prop. 75 - Requiring unions to get permission to spend dues for political purposes
Prop. 76 - State spending caps and changes to educational funding formulas
Prop. 77 - Redistricting of political boundaries moved to committee of retired judges
In looking at how I voted on these to the maps (Prop. 74 , Prop. 75, Prop. 76, Prop. 77) of the results, by county, as found on the California Secretary of State's website, I found that I am not exactly in line with the Bay Area, which resoundingly voted NO on each of these four. I should be living in...........Bakersfield (Kern County) or Fresno (Fresno County). It's becoming more and more the case that I am becoming a Republican in my old age.
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
"The Plan"
One of the great things about the teaching profession is that you are presented with new challenges every year, whether you want them or not. This year, I have been asked to teach the 9th Grade Algebra Seminar. For most 9th graders, their Geometry class meets four out of the five days each week. The Seminar, graded pass/fail, meets the fifth day of the week for those students who have been identified as having had a weak performance in 8th Grade Algebra I. As you might have predicted, these students are NOT happy about being there.
I went into the course having little idea what exactly these students needed or wanted. Well, what they want is to have me cancel class every Tuesday, but as the saying goes, "you can't always get what you want." What I have identified over the course of this first quarter of the year is that these students, when they can concentrate on Math itself, are not as bad as they or other teachers make them out to be. Their issues are structural. These are the students who always are asking for a pencil, need batteries for their calculators and/or take notes on scraps of paper which end up in the detritus of the hazardous waste sites called their backpacks. They are just as intelligent, ok, within the margin of error, as their more successful classmates who aren't in the seminar.
So, I've implemented "the Plan." I must give credit to my colleague Chris D. for creating this idea as he was the one who taught this seminar last year. Students are required to have a pencil, notebook, calculator, any required handouts and be facing the front not talking to their classmates at the time class begins. The threat is that if they do not meet this "regularly", I will call their mothers.
I have seen a marked increase in their ability to have their items ready for class. It has been so effective that in any of my 9th grade classes, the mere threat of being put on "the Plan" has struck fear into their hearts. If I hear someone ask someone else for a calculator, I'll threaten the offender with "the Plan" if they actually use their peers calculator. More often than not they will forgo use of the calculator. But you bet it's there the next day!
Do YOU need to go on "the Plan?"
I went into the course having little idea what exactly these students needed or wanted. Well, what they want is to have me cancel class every Tuesday, but as the saying goes, "you can't always get what you want." What I have identified over the course of this first quarter of the year is that these students, when they can concentrate on Math itself, are not as bad as they or other teachers make them out to be. Their issues are structural. These are the students who always are asking for a pencil, need batteries for their calculators and/or take notes on scraps of paper which end up in the detritus of the hazardous waste sites called their backpacks. They are just as intelligent, ok, within the margin of error, as their more successful classmates who aren't in the seminar.
So, I've implemented "the Plan." I must give credit to my colleague Chris D. for creating this idea as he was the one who taught this seminar last year. Students are required to have a pencil, notebook, calculator, any required handouts and be facing the front not talking to their classmates at the time class begins. The threat is that if they do not meet this "regularly", I will call their mothers.
I have seen a marked increase in their ability to have their items ready for class. It has been so effective that in any of my 9th grade classes, the mere threat of being put on "the Plan" has struck fear into their hearts. If I hear someone ask someone else for a calculator, I'll threaten the offender with "the Plan" if they actually use their peers calculator. More often than not they will forgo use of the calculator. But you bet it's there the next day!
Do YOU need to go on "the Plan?"
Sunday, November 06, 2005
.195% Probability
Last evening, we were invited to attend our friends Hans & Teresa’s “bag” party. I had participated in this a couple years ago in a smaller incarnation and have to admit that it was fun. My other half, being the Meyers Briggs STJ wanted to know what to expect and how the evening would play out. Being the STJ myself, I knew it was hard for him to hear, “you just have to trust me.” He’s a good sport, and even though he wasn’t 100% healthy, he and I got on BART and headed over to the 510, which in Scott’s mind is a foreign country.
The instructions from the hosts were to bring a bag in which five items were placed. Two of the items were to be “good” items, two were to be “bad items” and one was to be neutral. In my bag were, from what I deemed to be good to bad, a $25 gift certificate to a French Bakery, an Alfani polo style shirt, a mug with a beautiful painting on it (of course I knew nothing of the artist), a palm sized soft soccer ball and a jar of homemade leftover pickling juice. The two good gifts were gifts from students that I was “regifting” and the mug was my take from the last "bag" party that I had held on to for precisely this night.
What is this “bag” party? Well it’s based on this toy that most of our generation knows from childhood called a Cootie. It has a body, head, two antennae, two eyes, one tongue and six legs. Think Mr. Potatohead in bug form. Each of the six items is assigned a number, in this case 1=body, 2=head, 3=antennae, 4=eyes, 5=tongue and 6=legs. Now, you’re thinking how can this be given a context within a game. We sat down in groups of four, and in the layout of the apartment, table 1 was in the kitchen, tables 2 and 3 were in the dining room and 4 through 7 were in the living room.
In your table of four, the player directly across from you is your partner for that round. The object is to build (in our case draw) as many COOTIES as you could in a given timeframe. The kicker is that the COOTIES could only be created in a certain order. To do anything, the body had to be built, or a 1 rolled. At that point, you could start building legs (6) or the head (2). Only when the head was created could the antennae, eyes and tongue be created. Inevitably, most every game came down to the rolling of 6’s to create those legs, which finished off a COOTIE. Once a team finished it’s first COOTIE, it embarked on building a second or third within the given round.
At the end of the round, the pair that had the most COOTIES, or parts of, was the winner. The winning person in each pair then got to choose an item from within the bag of the player on their left. To replace that item, the winner got to give any item from within their bag to that player from whose bag they just received. The winning pair then moved up to the next table closer to table 1. You see table 1 had special powers. Every round ended when a pair at table 1 finished ONE COOTIE. The four people at table 1 could start playing anytime because only when they finished, did the round finish for the other 8 groups. As I learned later, the four people in the kitchen (location of table 1) took their time getting started by going to the bathroom, grabbing another drink, socializing or whatever. The world was their oyster. One indignity, however, was that the losing pair of table 1, was in the subsequent round, assigned (banished as Scott would later call it) to play at table 7.
At the start of a new round, you found yourself either staying at the same table with the your partner of the previous round or moving up with your winning partner of the previous round. The rule was that you could not play with the same partner for two consecutive rounds. This, by the way, sounds like it could be a great icebreaker kind of game.
There were 10 rounds played in the course of the evening. Scott and I both started at table 3. Scott promptly won and moved up to table 1, where he stayed for four consecutive rounds. Alas, he lost in round 9 and ended up at the of the 10th round, his COOTIE ego bruised, at table 7. I lost 9 consecutive rounds of COOTIE. It happened over and over where a pair who had won at table 4 would come up, the pair would take their seats at table 3 and I would tell the person across from that they had unfortunately picked the wrong partner. Inevitably our pair would lose, even in the face of sure victory. My partner would then play the next round with a new partner and they would win and move up. Did I mention that I lost 9 consecutive times? Only in the 10th round did I finally win. But since no 11th round was played, I never, ever, moved from my seat.
Mathematically, since we are going to assume the rolling of die is a random phenomenon, the probability of my losing (or winning) a round is 50%, or .5. My probability of losing 9 times in 9 tries can be calculated as (.5)^9 (.5 multiplied by itself 9 times) which come out to 1/512 = .00195 = .195%. People, that’s essentially two-tenths of one-percent. In the face of continued defeat, I’m finding silver lining in the fact that something so rare could have happened to me.
However, one must wonder at what I ended with in my bag given that I gave away the “good” items in my bag early on. After the fifth round, the winners were pretty disappointed when they looked through my bag. I left with a colorful toy sunflower (which was the best of the five), a can of cat food (salt in the wounds since not only do I not have a cat but that it was expired), condoms, the pickling juice and an old CD case in which there was a half-used bottle of "Oder-eaters". I consider myself luck as after the last round I was able to unload an old used laptop battery. The battery would have been the ultimate insult as it is technically hazardous waste and would have required a special trip to dispose of it in an environmental safe manner.
The night was a classic example of something so simple being so fun.
The instructions from the hosts were to bring a bag in which five items were placed. Two of the items were to be “good” items, two were to be “bad items” and one was to be neutral. In my bag were, from what I deemed to be good to bad, a $25 gift certificate to a French Bakery, an Alfani polo style shirt, a mug with a beautiful painting on it (of course I knew nothing of the artist), a palm sized soft soccer ball and a jar of homemade leftover pickling juice. The two good gifts were gifts from students that I was “regifting” and the mug was my take from the last "bag" party that I had held on to for precisely this night.
What is this “bag” party? Well it’s based on this toy that most of our generation knows from childhood called a Cootie. It has a body, head, two antennae, two eyes, one tongue and six legs. Think Mr. Potatohead in bug form. Each of the six items is assigned a number, in this case 1=body, 2=head, 3=antennae, 4=eyes, 5=tongue and 6=legs. Now, you’re thinking how can this be given a context within a game. We sat down in groups of four, and in the layout of the apartment, table 1 was in the kitchen, tables 2 and 3 were in the dining room and 4 through 7 were in the living room.
In your table of four, the player directly across from you is your partner for that round. The object is to build (in our case draw) as many COOTIES as you could in a given timeframe. The kicker is that the COOTIES could only be created in a certain order. To do anything, the body had to be built, or a 1 rolled. At that point, you could start building legs (6) or the head (2). Only when the head was created could the antennae, eyes and tongue be created. Inevitably, most every game came down to the rolling of 6’s to create those legs, which finished off a COOTIE. Once a team finished it’s first COOTIE, it embarked on building a second or third within the given round.
At the end of the round, the pair that had the most COOTIES, or parts of, was the winner. The winning person in each pair then got to choose an item from within the bag of the player on their left. To replace that item, the winner got to give any item from within their bag to that player from whose bag they just received. The winning pair then moved up to the next table closer to table 1. You see table 1 had special powers. Every round ended when a pair at table 1 finished ONE COOTIE. The four people at table 1 could start playing anytime because only when they finished, did the round finish for the other 8 groups. As I learned later, the four people in the kitchen (location of table 1) took their time getting started by going to the bathroom, grabbing another drink, socializing or whatever. The world was their oyster. One indignity, however, was that the losing pair of table 1, was in the subsequent round, assigned (banished as Scott would later call it) to play at table 7.
At the start of a new round, you found yourself either staying at the same table with the your partner of the previous round or moving up with your winning partner of the previous round. The rule was that you could not play with the same partner for two consecutive rounds. This, by the way, sounds like it could be a great icebreaker kind of game.
There were 10 rounds played in the course of the evening. Scott and I both started at table 3. Scott promptly won and moved up to table 1, where he stayed for four consecutive rounds. Alas, he lost in round 9 and ended up at the of the 10th round, his COOTIE ego bruised, at table 7. I lost 9 consecutive rounds of COOTIE. It happened over and over where a pair who had won at table 4 would come up, the pair would take their seats at table 3 and I would tell the person across from that they had unfortunately picked the wrong partner. Inevitably our pair would lose, even in the face of sure victory. My partner would then play the next round with a new partner and they would win and move up. Did I mention that I lost 9 consecutive times? Only in the 10th round did I finally win. But since no 11th round was played, I never, ever, moved from my seat.
Mathematically, since we are going to assume the rolling of die is a random phenomenon, the probability of my losing (or winning) a round is 50%, or .5. My probability of losing 9 times in 9 tries can be calculated as (.5)^9 (.5 multiplied by itself 9 times) which come out to 1/512 = .00195 = .195%. People, that’s essentially two-tenths of one-percent. In the face of continued defeat, I’m finding silver lining in the fact that something so rare could have happened to me.
However, one must wonder at what I ended with in my bag given that I gave away the “good” items in my bag early on. After the fifth round, the winners were pretty disappointed when they looked through my bag. I left with a colorful toy sunflower (which was the best of the five), a can of cat food (salt in the wounds since not only do I not have a cat but that it was expired), condoms, the pickling juice and an old CD case in which there was a half-used bottle of "Oder-eaters". I consider myself luck as after the last round I was able to unload an old used laptop battery. The battery would have been the ultimate insult as it is technically hazardous waste and would have required a special trip to dispose of it in an environmental safe manner.
The night was a classic example of something so simple being so fun.
Thursday, November 03, 2005
Answer: Nine Days
Question: How many days did it take for The Head-Royce School to come back and ask me to serve on the Admissions Committee?
I knew it was going to happen. As was previously mentioned, because I had agreed to take on organizing the Fair, I was relieved of all other extra duties, such as coaching, chaperoning dances or committee work. NINE DAYS. They didn't even make it into double digits!!!
So, I agreed to do it but on my terms. One of the more onerous parts of the committee is the requirement to come in on two Saturdays in the winter and interview applicants. It's half my weekend shot. This is in addition to file reading and attending the big meeting in March. I said I would do the file reading and attend the meeting but that i would ask not to have to do Saturday interviews. I got confirmation today that this arrangement works for all parties.
Side Note: Faculty who come in on those Saturdays and are not committee "members" and are considered "volunteers". If I did elect to do either or both Saturday interviews, I too would be considered "volunteer." Did I mention that "volunteers" are paid $30 an hour for about 5 hours of work? CH-CHING!!
I knew it was going to happen. As was previously mentioned, because I had agreed to take on organizing the Fair, I was relieved of all other extra duties, such as coaching, chaperoning dances or committee work. NINE DAYS. They didn't even make it into double digits!!!
So, I agreed to do it but on my terms. One of the more onerous parts of the committee is the requirement to come in on two Saturdays in the winter and interview applicants. It's half my weekend shot. This is in addition to file reading and attending the big meeting in March. I said I would do the file reading and attend the meeting but that i would ask not to have to do Saturday interviews. I got confirmation today that this arrangement works for all parties.
Side Note: Faculty who come in on those Saturdays and are not committee "members" and are considered "volunteers". If I did elect to do either or both Saturday interviews, I too would be considered "volunteer." Did I mention that "volunteers" are paid $30 an hour for about 5 hours of work? CH-CHING!!
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
Rookie Mistake
Halloween on Cortland Avenue is a zoo if you announce that you are open for business. It's old hat to me, but since Scott has always lived in an apartment complex and now on a out of the way cul-de-sac, he has never had the joy of giving kids the treats they so crave. So this past Monday night, he was so excited to greet his first kids. He opened the door, the kids yelled trick-or-treat and he promptly stuck the bowl right out in front of them. One kid took one Tootsie Roll. The other girl stuck her hand in and took a large handful. In my estimation, she probably got just under 50% of the bowl. Upon closing the door, Scott was incredulous at the audacity of the little girl. But he did say that she was a bit taken aback by the opportunity she had been given and after a paralyzing moment, she did what she needed to do. Next time, Scott says he'll pick up candy from the bowl and drop them into the Halloween kids' bag. Good idea!
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