I: And So They Are Off
Today it begins. Stephanie and Crystalyn take the ferry from Haines to Juneau, staying tonight at the Juneau Airport Travelodge; Jessica flies from Craig to Ketchikan, spending the night with her grandmother.
II: Mid-morning Call
Wherein we see the wisdom of starting Jessica on an early morning Saturday flight taking only half an hour to get her to Michigan by Monday noon. Just got the call. Craig is fogged in. No flights out of there today or tomorrow or possibly Monday. However, she does have time to make the ferry today and connect with the rest of her flights. Her grandmother can as easily pick her up at the ferry terminal as at the airport.
Travel in Alaska seldom goes according to plan.
III: Meeting at the Ferry Terminal
And so, this evening I drove out the road to the Ferry Terminal and met Stephanie and Crystalyn when they arrived from Haines on the Malespina. When I was walking in to the terminal, I saw these two huge dogs! Just amazing. Almost as tall as my favorite Irish Wolfhound, Abe, but much bulkier. "What are they?" I asked. "Mastiffs," replied a man who seemed to know. Well, I can believe that! They certainly looked like all the things I'd ever read about Mastiffs. And then I walked two feet further, and saw the dog they were with. She looked just like them, except that she made them look like toy mastiffs! An animal this big looks naked without a saddle! (And as I was leaving the very small woman who owns the dogs came up. She says they are a St. Bernard, Great Dane mix. And the big one is named, are you ready for it? Tiny.)
And on to the gangplank and there they are, coming off the ship. Since Stephanie is the chaperone, the three of us had dinner together and discussed some few business items that needed to be dealt with ("please make sure everyone turns in their boarding passes so our director can get reimbursed by the grantor" type of thing) and, since I just hired her to be the Adult Leader for Teens In Action, Haines, a few weeks ago and we had only met on the phone, getting to know each other. Only a few years after I was a hippie in San Francisco, she lived on a commune in Vermont. When I was a Montessori teacher, she was a special ed teacher for the deaf. When I moved to Fairbanks, she moved to Haines.
Crystalyn is a delightful young woman; yesterday was her 16th birthday. Haines is a town of 1,850 people. Crystalyn knows all 80 of the students in her high school. The traffic in Juneau (6 p.m. Saturday night, coming in from the ferry dock, in a community of 32,000) was a little overwhelming for her.
This is going to be so interesting for everyone involved. All of the other teens at the camp are from Michigan, all will be getting in cars Monday morning and driving to camp. And here comes our group. Three of them traveling for two and a half days! Taking ferries and and planes, changing planes in Seattle and Cleveland. Heck, most of the campers aren't even packed yet, and one of mine has had to change from a float plane to a ferry because the island she lives on is fogged in and another has tried deep fried mushrooms and gone swimming in a hotel pool.
Saturday, July 08, 2006
Friday, July 07, 2006
Anticipation Friday
Last week I explained the importance of Alternate Thursday to me. That's the day I get my Full Circle Farm box. Today is Anticipation Friday. It is the day I get an e-mail from FCF telling me what will be in next week's box. I can then go online and trade out three items from a list of substitutes, which includes items I can double up on, and order supplementary items at an additional price per item. Oh, the decisions! Sometimes they are easy. I mostly trade out kale, as it is a bit strong for me. And any time they have Meyer lemons, gotta have lots of those! (Like a true California girl, I eat them out of hand with a little salt.) But, sometimes! There is something I would like to double up on, but nothing I want to do without! What to do, what to do. Sometimes I can order more of the item I want at the extra cost. Sometimes they don't offer it and I can't.
And once I have made my decision, then I look at the list of what I am getting (and it is: broccoli, sweet onions, basil, zucchini, carrots, bell peppers, Romaine lettuce, nectarines, pluots, limes, Bing cherries!) and start planning. I'll add chicken stock, garlic, a cinnamon stick, and hot salsa to make a pot of zucchini lime soup! (A lovely hot weather soup.) Add potatoes from my last box to broccoli and sweet onions from the new, that's several dinners with steamed veggies. Basil, onions, and tomatoes! Add rice wine vinegar and oil and it's Karla's tomatoes, of course. Fills me with delight as I taste the treats in my mind.
Ah, such a lot of enjoyment from every little bite. Anticipation. Reception. Preparation. And finally, sit down and eat that good grub.
And once I have made my decision, then I look at the list of what I am getting (and it is: broccoli, sweet onions, basil, zucchini, carrots, bell peppers, Romaine lettuce, nectarines, pluots, limes, Bing cherries!) and start planning. I'll add chicken stock, garlic, a cinnamon stick, and hot salsa to make a pot of zucchini lime soup! (A lovely hot weather soup.) Add potatoes from my last box to broccoli and sweet onions from the new, that's several dinners with steamed veggies. Basil, onions, and tomatoes! Add rice wine vinegar and oil and it's Karla's tomatoes, of course. Fills me with delight as I taste the treats in my mind.
Ah, such a lot of enjoyment from every little bite. Anticipation. Reception. Preparation. And finally, sit down and eat that good grub.
Jonas Salk is My Hero
J read my Friendship post and wanted to know what polio season was. Oh, the things we neglect to tell our children! It used to be dangerous to do certain things during certain time(s) of the year, because you were more likely to get polio. It was probably summer, because I remember pools being closed when there was an outbreak. And, of course, you didn't have surgery during polio season unless you had no choice. Probably Colleen got tonsillitis in the summer most of the time, which makes sense because when we had ours out, I missed school.
I remember watching Johnny Carson one night when J was a baby and his guest was Jonas Salk. Johnny told Salk how that morning at breakfast his son had asked who his guest was and then wanted to know who Jonas Salk was and then what polio was. Johnny and Salk and I all sat there and cried! And, I'm crying now. Because of what Salk did, there are children who don't know what polio is!
I decided to google polio season and this is what I found.
I remember watching Johnny Carson one night when J was a baby and his guest was Jonas Salk. Johnny told Salk how that morning at breakfast his son had asked who his guest was and then wanted to know who Jonas Salk was and then what polio was. Johnny and Salk and I all sat there and cried! And, I'm crying now. Because of what Salk did, there are children who don't know what polio is!
I decided to google polio season and this is what I found.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Random Thoughts
As I was walking to work today, I had the following exchange with a retired gentleman who lives about two blocks from me.
Me, pointing to some small, orange flowers with purple centers in the yard we were standing beside, "Do you know what kind of flower that is?"
Him, "Well, my wife never objects when I get it with the weed whacker, so it must be a wild flower."
On Refdesk.com, in the Daily Diversions section, is "A Game A Day". It is for folks from 9 to 99 and has two levels of difficulty. There are games to play each week day for the month. A number of kinds of word games: opposites and rhymes and crossword and things like this month's "Triple A" which has words like Alaska, that have 3 As in them. I discovered this when I was having a bad stretch of sleep problems last year. Between restless legs keeping me twitching and blocked sinuses making it impossible to breathe, I spent a good deal of time out of bed in the middle of the night. I didn't want to read, because if I get into a book, I can sometimes read until dawn. Better to play computer games, and then at the end of each game I could see if I was breathing and if my legs had calmed down. My favorites in "A Game A Day" are Inquiring Cartographer, which is a child's level geography puzzle, and Gemini, a game of clicking on pairs of tiles to find matches. Both are topical – Gemini might do umbrellas in April or jack-o-lanterns in October or like this month, fresh fruit. Inquiring Cartographer is often a map about countries currently in the news, or like now, the original 13 colonies. Now, if these games are for folks between 9 and 99, obviously they aren't very difficult. This was perfect when I was killing time before I could go back to bed, because I never got as involved with it as I would in a standard computer game. It doesn't take any great brains to do them. And yet, how satisfying I find them. Oh, I still can identify all 13 colonies! Hey, I remember where I saw the red and blue kite! I have noticed, sadly enough, that I am fastest at Gemini (it has a countdown clock) the first time I do it. After that, I keep remembering where I've seen that one last time and it slows me down. So, Gemini is good only about every fourth day.
Every Wednesday our paper, like most papers in the US, concentrates on food. One of the things the Juneau Empire has is a column by the owner of the local health food store, Rainbow Foods. This week he wrote about fresh figs. Yum. And since my office is just across the street from his store, of course I went over yesterday at noon and picked up a basket of black figs. And it reminded me of when my kids were in junior high and we lived in Campbell, California. I had a huge and generous fig tree right outside my bedroom window. The birds loved it. Because my brother, Forrest, once climbed a cherry tree and ate sprayed fruit and went into convulsions, I don't believe in spraying fruit in backyards. Besides, there were more than enough figs for the birds and the ants and us. Every morning, the birds would congregate and sing and feast. And our cat of the time, Evenrude (pronounced Eve en rude, and named for the outboard mosquito in The Rescuers because her purr sounded just like him) would lay on the window ledge and watch them and do bird calls. A bird would sing, "cheaper, cheaper, cheaper" and Evenrude would chortle, "meowder, meowder, meowder," and a bird would sing, "chip, chi, chi, chi, chip," and Evenrude would chortle, "meow, meo, meo, meo, meow". I have no idea why she did it, but it was a pleasant sound to wake to in the early morning.
Me, pointing to some small, orange flowers with purple centers in the yard we were standing beside, "Do you know what kind of flower that is?"
Him, "Well, my wife never objects when I get it with the weed whacker, so it must be a wild flower."
On Refdesk.com, in the Daily Diversions section, is "A Game A Day". It is for folks from 9 to 99 and has two levels of difficulty. There are games to play each week day for the month. A number of kinds of word games: opposites and rhymes and crossword and things like this month's "Triple A" which has words like Alaska, that have 3 As in them. I discovered this when I was having a bad stretch of sleep problems last year. Between restless legs keeping me twitching and blocked sinuses making it impossible to breathe, I spent a good deal of time out of bed in the middle of the night. I didn't want to read, because if I get into a book, I can sometimes read until dawn. Better to play computer games, and then at the end of each game I could see if I was breathing and if my legs had calmed down. My favorites in "A Game A Day" are Inquiring Cartographer, which is a child's level geography puzzle, and Gemini, a game of clicking on pairs of tiles to find matches. Both are topical – Gemini might do umbrellas in April or jack-o-lanterns in October or like this month, fresh fruit. Inquiring Cartographer is often a map about countries currently in the news, or like now, the original 13 colonies. Now, if these games are for folks between 9 and 99, obviously they aren't very difficult. This was perfect when I was killing time before I could go back to bed, because I never got as involved with it as I would in a standard computer game. It doesn't take any great brains to do them. And yet, how satisfying I find them. Oh, I still can identify all 13 colonies! Hey, I remember where I saw the red and blue kite! I have noticed, sadly enough, that I am fastest at Gemini (it has a countdown clock) the first time I do it. After that, I keep remembering where I've seen that one last time and it slows me down. So, Gemini is good only about every fourth day.
Every Wednesday our paper, like most papers in the US, concentrates on food. One of the things the Juneau Empire has is a column by the owner of the local health food store, Rainbow Foods. This week he wrote about fresh figs. Yum. And since my office is just across the street from his store, of course I went over yesterday at noon and picked up a basket of black figs. And it reminded me of when my kids were in junior high and we lived in Campbell, California. I had a huge and generous fig tree right outside my bedroom window. The birds loved it. Because my brother, Forrest, once climbed a cherry tree and ate sprayed fruit and went into convulsions, I don't believe in spraying fruit in backyards. Besides, there were more than enough figs for the birds and the ants and us. Every morning, the birds would congregate and sing and feast. And our cat of the time, Evenrude (pronounced Eve en rude, and named for the outboard mosquito in The Rescuers because her purr sounded just like him) would lay on the window ledge and watch them and do bird calls. A bird would sing, "cheaper, cheaper, cheaper" and Evenrude would chortle, "meowder, meowder, meowder," and a bird would sing, "chip, chi, chi, chi, chip," and Evenrude would chortle, "meow, meo, meo, meo, meow". I have no idea why she did it, but it was a pleasant sound to wake to in the early morning.
Friendship
When I was a sophomore attending Hillsdale High in San Mateo, California, I spent a lot of time in the public library. And this odd thing was happening. In those days, when you checked out a book, the librarian stamped the date it was due on a small page attached to the inside cover of the book. So, by looking at that you could see how often the book was checked out and when that had last happened. And what I noticed was that I was checking out a lot of books that hadn't been checked out in years, and then a lot from the very same shelves, and often by the very same authors, that had very recently been checked out for the first time in a number of years. I mentioned it to the librarian who told me that there was another girl my age who was checking out the same books and noticing the same things. I went back and looked in the books I had previously taken, and sure enough, very often there was another reader within a couple of weeks. One day I was in the stacks and the librarian came up to me and said, "Come with me, your friend is here." And that’s how I met Kate.
Sometime that year my sister, Colleen, got tonsillitis. Actually, Colleen often got tonsillitis but they had never been able to take them out before because she usually got it during polio season. This time she got it when it wasn't polio season and the doctor and my parents decided that it would be a good idea to get all three of us taken care of at the same time. And so it happened that Colleen, who was four, and Forrest, who was nine, and I, who was 14, got rounded up and operated on. And while I was in the hospital after my tonsillectomy, Kate came to visit me. She brought this unbelievably funny black rabbit that she had made out of a pair of her father's socks. One arm was sewn inside out and the cotton was poking out the arm pit on the other side, so it looked like the rabbit had left off shaving her pits in the middle. I laughed and laughed. Then, Kate told me that just as she had been finishing it up, she heard her father asking her mother, "Where are my good black socks?" and that was so supremely funny that I laughed until my throat bled and the hospital wouldn't let Kate come to visit me again because she cheered me too far up! And I had that silly rabbit for about forty years and would have it to this day if it hadn't been lost in a move.
Kate and I used to spend the night with each other as often as we were allowed. Once when she was visiting me, my entire family was asleep and we were sitting up in bed reading. One of us was reading James Thurber's "File & Forget". She (I?) began reading it aloud, but it was so funny, that she (I?) laughed too hard to read and the tears began to run and her (my?) glasses fogged up. So, the book went back and forth between us, each reading as long as she could and then surrendering the book to the other, who had barely recovered from her last attempt. Somewhere in there my mother came in about three times to hush us up because, "you are going to wake up your father!" And the funny thing about that is that, although I didn't realize it until recently when I was telling this story, she really meant that we were keeping her awake. And the way that I know that is that my step-father didn't sleep with his hearing aids in.
Sometime that year my sister, Colleen, got tonsillitis. Actually, Colleen often got tonsillitis but they had never been able to take them out before because she usually got it during polio season. This time she got it when it wasn't polio season and the doctor and my parents decided that it would be a good idea to get all three of us taken care of at the same time. And so it happened that Colleen, who was four, and Forrest, who was nine, and I, who was 14, got rounded up and operated on. And while I was in the hospital after my tonsillectomy, Kate came to visit me. She brought this unbelievably funny black rabbit that she had made out of a pair of her father's socks. One arm was sewn inside out and the cotton was poking out the arm pit on the other side, so it looked like the rabbit had left off shaving her pits in the middle. I laughed and laughed. Then, Kate told me that just as she had been finishing it up, she heard her father asking her mother, "Where are my good black socks?" and that was so supremely funny that I laughed until my throat bled and the hospital wouldn't let Kate come to visit me again because she cheered me too far up! And I had that silly rabbit for about forty years and would have it to this day if it hadn't been lost in a move.
Kate and I used to spend the night with each other as often as we were allowed. Once when she was visiting me, my entire family was asleep and we were sitting up in bed reading. One of us was reading James Thurber's "File & Forget". She (I?) began reading it aloud, but it was so funny, that she (I?) laughed too hard to read and the tears began to run and her (my?) glasses fogged up. So, the book went back and forth between us, each reading as long as she could and then surrendering the book to the other, who had barely recovered from her last attempt. Somewhere in there my mother came in about three times to hush us up because, "you are going to wake up your father!" And the funny thing about that is that, although I didn't realize it until recently when I was telling this story, she really meant that we were keeping her awake. And the way that I know that is that my step-father didn't sleep with his hearing aids in.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
I'm Getting Dizzy & My Eyes Are Crossed
I'm sending one adult and three teens to Michigan this weekend for MADD Powercamp. Since it is a ropes course, and I do cane rather than ropes, I'm not going. I am, however, in charge of reservations and making sure that everything goes well. Which would be ok if they weren't departing from three different towns. And if they were all starting out on the same day. Or if Travelocity's response to my initial request wasn't, basically, "You can't get there from here" (the single most consistent response to anyone trying to travel around or out of Alaska by any means of transportation whatsoever).
So, I spent three whole days, including working through lunch, just lining up the reservations. In order to get to Flint in time for camp on the 10th, three start on the 8th. Two come to Juneau on the ferry. One goes to Ketchikan on a float plane that has been known to be fogged in. The fourth starts on the 9th. Then the three who have flown out of Juneau have to meet the one who flew to Ketchikan in Seattle. At this point, Travelocity can figure out how to get them to Michigan. Coming back is just as complex, with one stopping in Seattle to visit family for three weeks and one stopping in Ketchikan for a day to have a tooth pulled.
So, three days to figure out the schedule, let my brain rest over the weekend so I could look at it with clear eyes before I made the reservations. Last week, I spent two days working out charts and tables in order to send them a letter telling them their individual confirmation numbers, flight plans, seat assignments, etc. Had the agency secretary read it for clarity.
Came in this morning and spent two hours figuring out meals -- how many of each, considering that the teen from Craig will be having dinner with her grandmother on the 8th, the teen from Juneau will be fed breakfast by her mother on the 9th. All that sort of thing. Worked out a table. Took it to the same secretary, who is also a bookkeeper, to see if her numbers agreed with mine. They did. I presented this to the director to get an advance for the chaperone to take to buy these meals. And he said, "Have her put it on her card if she can and we'll reimburse her when she gets back."
And now all I have to do is compose a letter for the parents of each of the girls to sign giving permission for them to travel (and outlining that girl's itinerary) and to seek medical attention if it is needed.
I really appreciate travel agents about now.
So, I spent three whole days, including working through lunch, just lining up the reservations. In order to get to Flint in time for camp on the 10th, three start on the 8th. Two come to Juneau on the ferry. One goes to Ketchikan on a float plane that has been known to be fogged in. The fourth starts on the 9th. Then the three who have flown out of Juneau have to meet the one who flew to Ketchikan in Seattle. At this point, Travelocity can figure out how to get them to Michigan. Coming back is just as complex, with one stopping in Seattle to visit family for three weeks and one stopping in Ketchikan for a day to have a tooth pulled.
So, three days to figure out the schedule, let my brain rest over the weekend so I could look at it with clear eyes before I made the reservations. Last week, I spent two days working out charts and tables in order to send them a letter telling them their individual confirmation numbers, flight plans, seat assignments, etc. Had the agency secretary read it for clarity.
Came in this morning and spent two hours figuring out meals -- how many of each, considering that the teen from Craig will be having dinner with her grandmother on the 8th, the teen from Juneau will be fed breakfast by her mother on the 9th. All that sort of thing. Worked out a table. Took it to the same secretary, who is also a bookkeeper, to see if her numbers agreed with mine. They did. I presented this to the director to get an advance for the chaperone to take to buy these meals. And he said, "Have her put it on her card if she can and we'll reimburse her when she gets back."
And now all I have to do is compose a letter for the parents of each of the girls to sign giving permission for them to travel (and outlining that girl's itinerary) and to seek medical attention if it is needed.
I really appreciate travel agents about now.
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
And the Rockets Red Glare
It's July 4th, and here in Juneau, we have already had our fireworks. The thing is, it doesn't get dark enough to see fireworks this time of year until midnight. In most of the state, it doesn't get dark enough at all, so Southeast Alaska is the only part that has Fourth of July fireworks. The rest of the state has to be content with New Year's Eve.
Unless July 4th falls on a Saturday or Sunday, people have to get up and go to work on the 5th, so we have our fireworks at midnight, between the 3rd and 4th. They're set off from a barge in the middle of the Gastineau Channel, between Juneau and Douglas Island. And, as I mentioned, I live on a hillside overlooking Gastineau Channel. I can see the fireworks from my patio. Well, it's not so much a patio as the roof of my living room, but I just open the door from my upstairs and walk out onto it and there we are.
Because of all the mountains which surround the barge, we get echoing booms. First we get the original boom. Then it echoes off Mount Roberts (which is the one I live on the skirts of) and then across to Mount Jumbo on Douglas Island and then off Mount Juneau, and then the echoes echo. We get a lot of bang for our buck. Last night we had about four of them that shook the roof beneath our feet. This is one night you can open my front door without warning the bears you are coming, because the bears have headed for the hills and won't be back for a few hours at least!
The tradition is that I cook spare ribs for my son Richard and his wife Kathy and we have a late dinner on the 3rd and watch the fireworks together and then they walk the eight blocks home and we all go to sleep. And, the Hooligans hear the echoing booms and hide until the next day. But, first, we lock them on the front porch while I get the ribs ready and again while we eat dinner. Poor Hooligans. The Fourth of July isn't their holiday so much.
But it is mine. First I get some time with Richard (Kathy is a librarian and she works until 9 most days), then Kathy gets here and I get some time just with her while he does any tweaking my computer needs, then dinner is ready and I get the both of them. And, of course, the next day I get very quiet cats. And today there will be a parade downtown, followed by another (featuring most of the same floats) on Douglas Island (just across the bridge) and sand castle contest and community barbecue and all the other delights of small town USA.
Unless July 4th falls on a Saturday or Sunday, people have to get up and go to work on the 5th, so we have our fireworks at midnight, between the 3rd and 4th. They're set off from a barge in the middle of the Gastineau Channel, between Juneau and Douglas Island. And, as I mentioned, I live on a hillside overlooking Gastineau Channel. I can see the fireworks from my patio. Well, it's not so much a patio as the roof of my living room, but I just open the door from my upstairs and walk out onto it and there we are.
Because of all the mountains which surround the barge, we get echoing booms. First we get the original boom. Then it echoes off Mount Roberts (which is the one I live on the skirts of) and then across to Mount Jumbo on Douglas Island and then off Mount Juneau, and then the echoes echo. We get a lot of bang for our buck. Last night we had about four of them that shook the roof beneath our feet. This is one night you can open my front door without warning the bears you are coming, because the bears have headed for the hills and won't be back for a few hours at least!
The tradition is that I cook spare ribs for my son Richard and his wife Kathy and we have a late dinner on the 3rd and watch the fireworks together and then they walk the eight blocks home and we all go to sleep. And, the Hooligans hear the echoing booms and hide until the next day. But, first, we lock them on the front porch while I get the ribs ready and again while we eat dinner. Poor Hooligans. The Fourth of July isn't their holiday so much.
But it is mine. First I get some time with Richard (Kathy is a librarian and she works until 9 most days), then Kathy gets here and I get some time just with her while he does any tweaking my computer needs, then dinner is ready and I get the both of them. And, of course, the next day I get very quiet cats. And today there will be a parade downtown, followed by another (featuring most of the same floats) on Douglas Island (just across the bridge) and sand castle contest and community barbecue and all the other delights of small town USA.
Monday, July 03, 2006
The Twilight's Last Gleaming
I was visiting Pureland Mountain and Robert was talking about the total loss of fiscal control by our government and how it is leading to a global meltdown and I started to comment and then realized that unless my comment was going to be bigger than his post, I probably needed to post it here. I had been thinking about the Fourth, about needing to say something about the wonderful country that we were given and that we seem to be allowing to slip out of our hands, and this just fit so well.
I expected to spend my granny years making the world better for Maya. When I was raising my kids, I was broke and inexperienced and lacking in time, contacts, political savy, and other resources. Keeping them fed and in braces, teaching them to love each other and be decent human beings, assuring them that they were loved and lovable -- that stretched my abilities. But now -- now, although I am still broke and nowhere near as politically savy as I suddenly need to be, I do have more disposable time and even a measured amount of disposable income, I have some degree of wisdom, I am as well connected as I am ever apt to be. I should be able to work to advance freedoms for Maya's generation. Instead, I am trying to stem the incoming tide. The literal tide as the glaciers melt. The tide of red ink as this administration throws our children's incomes into the bottomless maw of an unjustified war. The tide of tyranny as Congress allows the executive to ignore the Bill of Rights one after the other and totally subvert the Constitution.
I expected to spend my granny years making the world better for Maya. When I was raising my kids, I was broke and inexperienced and lacking in time, contacts, political savy, and other resources. Keeping them fed and in braces, teaching them to love each other and be decent human beings, assuring them that they were loved and lovable -- that stretched my abilities. But now -- now, although I am still broke and nowhere near as politically savy as I suddenly need to be, I do have more disposable time and even a measured amount of disposable income, I have some degree of wisdom, I am as well connected as I am ever apt to be. I should be able to work to advance freedoms for Maya's generation. Instead, I am trying to stem the incoming tide. The literal tide as the glaciers melt. The tide of red ink as this administration throws our children's incomes into the bottomless maw of an unjustified war. The tide of tyranny as Congress allows the executive to ignore the Bill of Rights one after the other and totally subvert the Constitution.
Control
I am the content moderator for an on-line support group of women who, having recognized that we are not among the 2% for whom diets work (take it off and don't return it with interest), have given up diets and decided to get on with our lives and put all of that energy we were wasting on non-productive yet painful self-absorption into other things.
Today we have been talking about control. One of our dear members is having horrible diet thoughts and she knows it is because with a diet she could control at least her food and her husband is dying and she needs to control something. And there is nothing in the world that I can say to make it better. And cyber hugs don't cut it in a situation like this. Hell, real hugs don't cut it in a situation like this, but at least they help.
People are not meant to bear these burdens alone. And I wonder if my friend in cyberspace has anyone in her life like the members of the Saturday Morning Breakfast Club? How I hope that she does. How I hope that you do.
Today we have been talking about control. One of our dear members is having horrible diet thoughts and she knows it is because with a diet she could control at least her food and her husband is dying and she needs to control something. And there is nothing in the world that I can say to make it better. And cyber hugs don't cut it in a situation like this. Hell, real hugs don't cut it in a situation like this, but at least they help.
People are not meant to bear these burdens alone. And I wonder if my friend in cyberspace has anyone in her life like the members of the Saturday Morning Breakfast Club? How I hope that she does. How I hope that you do.
Happy Anniversary
Today is Julie and Ted's 13th anniversary. Thirteen years ago we gathered in Ted's mother Susheela's back yard and the pundit (a real one, not somebody who talks on tv) performed the ceremony and our families were joined. Thirteen years ago I gained a wonderful son-in-law and became part of his family as he became part of mine. I have no idea how I became so lucky. Well, I know that Julie had a lot to do with it, as she is the one who fell in love and married him. And Susheela had a lot to do with it, as she brought him into this world and raised him. And Pops and Dan-Dan had a lot to do with it, as they were his fathers and showed him how to be a man. And the basic, intrinsic goodness of Ted himself had a lot to do with it.
I spent 10 of the 13 years that Ted has been my son-in-law working with women who were working to get their kids back out of foster care and that can give you a real strange perspective on men. So many of my clients were abused. Not only by their husbands. By their fathers and brothers and uncles and the guy across the street. And so many of those men not only abused my clients, but also their children. I long ago lost count of the number of women who had to choose between the men they somehow still loved and the children those men had injured.
Sometimes at the end of the day I would wonder what was wrong with the Y chromosome. And then I would look at the picture on my "Parent and Child" wall of Ted and Maya coloring together and the one of Ted and Maya both throwing their heads back and laughing with identical light in their eyes. And I would be soothed, because I would know that my girls were safe.
Sunday, July 02, 2006
And More Turtles
And so, I decided to research this, googled "Are you a turtle?" and here is what I found:
Such riddles have long been the hallmark of the Turtles, an international society of clean-minded people. All Turtles are assumed to own donkeys, so when a Turtle is asked "Are you a Turtle?" he or she is required to respond "You bet your ass I am!" or else buy drinks for everyone within earshot. A perhaps-apocryphal story claims that Mission Control once asked one of the astronauts "Are you a Turtle?" during a space mission that was being broadcast live across the world....
Saturday, July 01, 2006
The Saturday Morning Breakfast Club
For well over a decade now I have been having breakfast every Saturday morning with a group of friends I call The Saturday Morning Breakfast Club. Originally there were two of them, Harold and Pete, who I think ate breakfast together every morning. In those days I worked with at-risk parents who either had their children in foster care or were in danger of the state stepping in. I worked one-on-one helping them to improve their parenting skills, and on Saturdays I gave a parenting class. Since I was the only one in my agency working on Saturdays, I would get into the office at 7:00, put in an hour on files from the previous day's home visits, and then treat myself to breakfast at BaCar's (pronounced Baker's) when they opened at 8. I would usually get there a few minutes before they opened, and Harold and Pete would also be waiting. We would nod. We would smile. One morning we chatted until the doors opened. Soon, we were exchanging comments between tables. Before long, they invited me to join them and I never left. After a few years, Pete came in one morning with a woman (Jann) and then we invited a woman who had always been at another table when we were there (Christina) who happened to be Jann's boss, and a couple of months later Jann's mother (Barbara) moved to Juneau. Then Pete and Jann got married and eventually they stopped coming (Jann likes to sleep in on Saturdays), but Christina and Harold and Barbara and I continue to meet every Saturday morning.
For a good number of years, I walked there and back -- BaCar's wasn't far from my apartment or my office and although in those days I rented a car for home visits two days a week, I turned it in Friday afternoon. Then I injured my foot and Harold started picking me up and dropping me off at my office. Somewhere in there, I changed jobs and was no longer renting a car and so couldn't pick up groceries when I had it and at just that time, I was on a walker with sciatica for seven months and Harold started taking me to A & P after breakfast and the Care-A-Van would pick me up after my shopping. Then Harold's step-dad began to go downhill and Harold moved in with him and wasn't sure that he could come every week and so Christina started picking me up. Now Christina picks me up on Saturdays and drops me at A & P (which is downtown and near the restaurant and my apartment) after, except for about once every two months when Harold takes me to Fred Meyer (which is out in the Valley and close to where Harold now lives) and I do a huge shopping for non-perishables (48 cans of cat food, 12 bottles of Hot and Spicy V-8 among many other things) (A & P is horribly expensive and I buy an absolute minimum there) and Harold takes me home and carries this great weight of stuff up my stairs for me and empties this huge bag of cat litter into a container that Pippin can't get into and spread about and whatever else I need. And on the way home, we stop at the dry cleaner and I exchange dirty clothes for clean ones. And today we stopped at Christina's to see how the work she is doing on her new deck and garden is coming along and at the cherry stand.
And so, when I read something like this, I truly appreciate these staunch and loving friends. I am amazed at how lucky I am. Not only because of Harold and Christina. I really have a good number of friends who are prevented from helping me only by my not asking them. I still have Kate after all these years, who took care of me in California last summer for a week after I had surgery even though it meant packing my wound and she is squeamish. And Robert, a dear friend from my second high school, and his wife Fran who drove for six hours to visit me while I was recovering at my mother's. And Jane, another dear friend from my second high school, who drove to Sacramento in the horrible heat to see me.
And one day I will tell you about my family and the blessing that they are, but they deserve a post of their own, just as The Saturday Morning Breakfast Club does.
For a good number of years, I walked there and back -- BaCar's wasn't far from my apartment or my office and although in those days I rented a car for home visits two days a week, I turned it in Friday afternoon. Then I injured my foot and Harold started picking me up and dropping me off at my office. Somewhere in there, I changed jobs and was no longer renting a car and so couldn't pick up groceries when I had it and at just that time, I was on a walker with sciatica for seven months and Harold started taking me to A & P after breakfast and the Care-A-Van would pick me up after my shopping. Then Harold's step-dad began to go downhill and Harold moved in with him and wasn't sure that he could come every week and so Christina started picking me up. Now Christina picks me up on Saturdays and drops me at A & P (which is downtown and near the restaurant and my apartment) after, except for about once every two months when Harold takes me to Fred Meyer (which is out in the Valley and close to where Harold now lives) and I do a huge shopping for non-perishables (48 cans of cat food, 12 bottles of Hot and Spicy V-8 among many other things) (A & P is horribly expensive and I buy an absolute minimum there) and Harold takes me home and carries this great weight of stuff up my stairs for me and empties this huge bag of cat litter into a container that Pippin can't get into and spread about and whatever else I need. And on the way home, we stop at the dry cleaner and I exchange dirty clothes for clean ones. And today we stopped at Christina's to see how the work she is doing on her new deck and garden is coming along and at the cherry stand.
And so, when I read something like this, I truly appreciate these staunch and loving friends. I am amazed at how lucky I am. Not only because of Harold and Christina. I really have a good number of friends who are prevented from helping me only by my not asking them. I still have Kate after all these years, who took care of me in California last summer for a week after I had surgery even though it meant packing my wound and she is squeamish. And Robert, a dear friend from my second high school, and his wife Fran who drove for six hours to visit me while I was recovering at my mother's. And Jane, another dear friend from my second high school, who drove to Sacramento in the horrible heat to see me.
And one day I will tell you about my family and the blessing that they are, but they deserve a post of their own, just as The Saturday Morning Breakfast Club does.
Squirrel, Squirrel, Squirrel
Not that I forgot to say "Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" you understand. Just follow-up on Rabbit etc. and a couple of other things mentioned earlier.
1. Several of you have commented on the Rabbit post and I am amazed. I had no idea so many people knew about the turtle exchange! Over the almost half century since Kate and her Scout troop did this, I must have told a good 50 people about it and except for the owner of the Turtle Club outside of Fairbanks, this is the first time I have ever run into anyone who knew about it or who didn't think me odd for remembering! Kate doesn't even remember it! (Well, of course Linda and Bobby and Fern didn't think me odd for remembering, but they expect me to know everything.) And now I discover there is even a web site devoted to it. here
2. I was saying that the A & P produce section needs to be A & A: not just that section, apparently! Last week I bought some new garbage bags there and this morning I opened the box and used one to change the cat box. Dumped the dirty litter into the bag, closed up the bag, lifted the bag and my thumb went right through it and there I was with dirty cat litter in my shoes!
3. Pippin is the smarter one. Yes. Bought a couple of pounds of Bing cherries today from a fruit stand (the man flew the cherries up in a small plane and was selling them in a parking lot. A couple of years ago it was peaches. Very good.) and had them in a bowl in the kitchen. I was sitting reading and I heard this plunk, plunk, plunk noise. Looked around. Merry was curled up with his face buried in his paws, sound asleep. Got up, went into the kitchen. There was Pippin with a couple of cherries hanging from his teeth by the stems, and about 20 or so on the floor. I once read a naturalist who said that the smarter the animal the more messes they make and I knew immediately he meant Pippin. Pippin, as I like to say, is a raven with fur!
1. Several of you have commented on the Rabbit post and I am amazed. I had no idea so many people knew about the turtle exchange! Over the almost half century since Kate and her Scout troop did this, I must have told a good 50 people about it and except for the owner of the Turtle Club outside of Fairbanks, this is the first time I have ever run into anyone who knew about it or who didn't think me odd for remembering! Kate doesn't even remember it! (Well, of course Linda and Bobby and Fern didn't think me odd for remembering, but they expect me to know everything.) And now I discover there is even a web site devoted to it. here
2. I was saying that the A & P produce section needs to be A & A: not just that section, apparently! Last week I bought some new garbage bags there and this morning I opened the box and used one to change the cat box. Dumped the dirty litter into the bag, closed up the bag, lifted the bag and my thumb went right through it and there I was with dirty cat litter in my shoes!
3. Pippin is the smarter one. Yes. Bought a couple of pounds of Bing cherries today from a fruit stand (the man flew the cherries up in a small plane and was selling them in a parking lot. A couple of years ago it was peaches. Very good.) and had them in a bowl in the kitchen. I was sitting reading and I heard this plunk, plunk, plunk noise. Looked around. Merry was curled up with his face buried in his paws, sound asleep. Got up, went into the kitchen. There was Pippin with a couple of cherries hanging from his teeth by the stems, and about 20 or so on the floor. I once read a naturalist who said that the smarter the animal the more messes they make and I knew immediately he meant Pippin. Pippin, as I like to say, is a raven with fur!
Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit
In 1957, in San Mateo, California, my best friend from my first high school, Kate, belonged to a Scout troop that had an unusual custom for greeting each new month. As soon as you got up on the first, you were supposed to jump up and down three times, saying "Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit". If you missed the first, you could satisfy the fates by greeting the second with "squirrel, squirrel, squirrel". I no longer remember what the saving phrase was for the third, but your last chance came on the fourth, with "turtle, turtle, turtle". For some reason, although there was no exchange on the first three days, on the fourth there was added a greeting from one Scout to another. And so, on the fourth of each month, Kate and I would be walking down the hall and she would spot another girl from her troop and it would happen.
"Are you a turtle?"
"You bet your sweet ass I am!"
Fast forward to Fairbanks, Alaska, 2000. I was visiting my friend Linda, who I went to junior high with in El Paso, Texas in 1954 (we moved around a lot when I was a kid) and her husband and her mother. Now, the thing is that Linda and Bobby and Fern have this idea that I know everything, and no matter how I try to dissuade them of this, they save lists of things to ask me when I'm coming. That year we had already gone through a good number of pages of obscure stuff, all of which I knew, including recognizing a photo that had been puzzling people there abouts. "Oh," I said casually as I glanced at it, "that's the old Sutro's Baths in San Francisco." (Which, as it happens, I had visited with Kate.) So, we check the web, and sure enough!
One evening we went out to eat at the Turtle Club. We sat down and the place mats had AYAT? YBYSAIA on them.
"What," asked Linda, "do you think that means?"
"Are you a turtle? You bet your sweet ass I am!"
And Linda said, in a most satisfied tone, "I knew she'd know!"
"Are you a turtle?"
"You bet your sweet ass I am!"
Fast forward to Fairbanks, Alaska, 2000. I was visiting my friend Linda, who I went to junior high with in El Paso, Texas in 1954 (we moved around a lot when I was a kid) and her husband and her mother. Now, the thing is that Linda and Bobby and Fern have this idea that I know everything, and no matter how I try to dissuade them of this, they save lists of things to ask me when I'm coming. That year we had already gone through a good number of pages of obscure stuff, all of which I knew, including recognizing a photo that had been puzzling people there abouts. "Oh," I said casually as I glanced at it, "that's the old Sutro's Baths in San Francisco." (Which, as it happens, I had visited with Kate.) So, we check the web, and sure enough!
One evening we went out to eat at the Turtle Club. We sat down and the place mats had AYAT? YBYSAIA on them.
"What," asked Linda, "do you think that means?"
"Are you a turtle? You bet your sweet ass I am!"
And Linda said, in a most satisfied tone, "I knew she'd know!"
Friday, June 30, 2006
It Boils, My Blood Just Boils
I did warn you. I did say that I'm opinionated. Even then, I managed to be calm for the first two days of my blog. I suppose I could have managed longer, if only I didn't read. So, here are three things I have read in the last hour (Lordy, Lordy, all at once! All at once!) that have brought out the real me.
The first is here . So, now we have a vaccine for cervical cancer, and the religious right doesn't approve of it because the cause of cervical cancer is an STD. And I quote:****
And the second is here, where we discover that the same religious right are angry at Warren Buffett and Bill Gates for making charitable contributions to Planned Parenthood. And, again, I quote:*** ***
And finally, on a related (in that it's about a woman's health) but separate (in that it isn't to do with sex) note. A story about a woman with a 32 pound cyst being given diet pills. Because, we all know that fat is the issue and the only issue! This reminds me of when my friend Robert (like me 64 years old and therefore, no longer adolescent thin like when we were in high school, but who, unlike me, has never been overweight a day in his life) went to the doctor because he had dropped 30 pounds without changing his eating or exercise habits and he was worried. When he got on the scale, the nurse congratulated him for the loss! So did the doctor. Here is a man without a weight problem who suddenly and without discernable cause drops 30 pounds and they congratulate him! Finally, he insisted so vehemently that they test him to find out what was wrong, and what do you know! Diabetes! We are so fatphobic in this country that a very serious condition would have been missed if the patient hadn't had better sense than the doctor. Are we nuts?
The first is here . So, now we have a vaccine for cervical cancer, and the religious right doesn't approve of it because the cause of cervical cancer is an STD. And I quote:
"I would be opposed to making it mandatory. They need to give people the choice to do it or not, not force it on us,"
Prestwich said. "I don't live my life in such a way that I am concerned about STDs. And I don't worry about it for my daughters."How can anyone believe that her daughters are immune to STDs? Never heard of rape? Never heard of straying husbands? This -- oh, Gawd, there is no word for what this woman is -- this Maxine Prestwich person would rather take the chance that her daughters could die of cervical cancer than have them immunized for an STD. Because, we know, that if they are immunized, they might just not be afraid of sex and they might just have some. Apparently, anything to protect the virginity of young girls and women. It's ok to lie to them about condoms, to not give them information about birth control and sexuality, to risk their exposure to cervical cancer!
And the second is here, where we discover that the same religious right are angry at Warren Buffett and Bill Gates for making charitable contributions to Planned Parenthood. And, again, I quote:
Warren Buffett's new philanthropic alliance with fellow billionaire Bill Gates won widespread praise this week, but anti-abortion activists did not join in, instead assailing the two donors for their longtime support of Planned Parenthood and international birth-control programs.
"The merger of Gates and Buffett may spell doom for the families of the developing world," said the Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, a Roman Catholic priest who is president of Human Life International.
Referring to Josef Mengele, the infamous Nazi death camp doctor, Euteneuer said Buffett "will be known as the Dr. Mengele of philanthropy unless he repents."Yes, God forbid that women in third world countries be given reproductive freedom! Just because being able to control the number and spacing of pregnancies is the single most important thing in empowering women, it must be opposed. Pro-life they call themselves. More like enforced birth if you ask me. What next? Take away the vote? Return to chastity belts? In my never humble opinion, on this one, if you don't got a uterus, you don't got anything to say!
And finally, on a related (in that it's about a woman's health) but separate (in that it isn't to do with sex) note. A story about a woman with a 32 pound cyst being given diet pills. Because, we all know that fat is the issue and the only issue! This reminds me of when my friend Robert (like me 64 years old and therefore, no longer adolescent thin like when we were in high school, but who, unlike me, has never been overweight a day in his life) went to the doctor because he had dropped 30 pounds without changing his eating or exercise habits and he was worried. When he got on the scale, the nurse congratulated him for the loss! So did the doctor. Here is a man without a weight problem who suddenly and without discernable cause drops 30 pounds and they congratulate him! Finally, he insisted so vehemently that they test him to find out what was wrong, and what do you know! Diabetes! We are so fatphobic in this country that a very serious condition would have been missed if the patient hadn't had better sense than the doctor. Are we nuts?
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Why Not Do It In Public?
So, I say in my masthead: Sometimes I fall on my face. Why not do it in public? And what do you know, my good friend Kate e-mails me that, in the masthead, I have misspelled accumulate!
Borderland
I live on the border between wilderness and town,
Forest spreads above me, fenced yards going down.
Sweet rocket and conifers climbing up the hill,
My gardening neighbor bends plant life to his will.
Marmot, bear, and porcupine wander hillside free,
Raven, owl, and heron, each choosing her own tree.
And just across the street, behind the well trimmed hedges,
Birds in cages, dogs on leashes, cats on window ledges.
And I live on the border and choose which side to see.
It suits me to my very depth; both sides are part of me.
Forest spreads above me, fenced yards going down.
Sweet rocket and conifers climbing up the hill,
My gardening neighbor bends plant life to his will.
Marmot, bear, and porcupine wander hillside free,
Raven, owl, and heron, each choosing her own tree.
And just across the street, behind the well trimmed hedges,
Birds in cages, dogs on leashes, cats on window ledges.
And I live on the border and choose which side to see.
It suits me to my very depth; both sides are part of me.
Alternate Thursdays
Today is my alternate Thursday! Oh, heaven. See, I take from a CSA (community supported agriculture) farm called Full Circle Farm. They are in Seattle, and I am in Juneau and the way it works is they fly organic produce from their farm there to their warehouse here to be boxed and picked up on Thursdays. You can take a large box or a small one, weekly or an alternate weeks. Since I live alone, I take a small box on alternate weeks.
Produce is a problem in Alaska. If you garden (and, living on the side of a mountain, I have no space for a garden) you are set for veggies, and if you gather you can get berries, but otherwise! Oh, otherwise! Last week, having eaten all of the fruit from my FCF box (I always eat the fruit faster than the veggies), I picked up a pound of Bing cherries ($7, horror of horrors says the woman who used to live near an orchard and buy 21 pounds of doubles and spurs [look funny, taste great!] for $7) and a tiny watermelon ($7) at the local grocery store. Hell, I'll name it. At the A & P (stands for Alaskan and Proud and the produce department should be the A & A [Alaskan and Ashamed]). Got them home. The cherries were lovely to look at. Tasted like sawdust! And the watermelon! My grandfather used to grow (among other things) watermelon. Every year he saved the seeds from the best and planted them the next year. By the time I was born, Grandpa Herndon was growing melons to die for. Well, let me tell you, if he knew about this poor excuse for cattle fodder he would spin right out of his grave! No satisfying crack when I cut into it. And then, one bite! One bite! No taste and slick. Soft. I threw that sucker away! $14 worth of fruit (well, not really $14 worth of fruit. I paid $14 for the fruit, but as far as worth -- had they paid me to haul it away I could retire), and not one edible bite.
So you can see why I love Full Circle Farm! The produce is wonderful. Full of flavor. (Well, once I did get a spoiled strawberry.) But, it is heaven. And this week I am getting: orange honeydew, grapefruit, peaches, nectarines, pluotes, limes, carrots, snap peas, Roma tomatoes, green onions, Romaine lettuce, Cremini mushrooms, and mint. I feast! I absolutely feast! Fruit! Salad! Carrots to nibble! And it is tonight!
Today is my alternate Thursday!
Produce is a problem in Alaska. If you garden (and, living on the side of a mountain, I have no space for a garden) you are set for veggies, and if you gather you can get berries, but otherwise! Oh, otherwise! Last week, having eaten all of the fruit from my FCF box (I always eat the fruit faster than the veggies), I picked up a pound of Bing cherries ($7, horror of horrors says the woman who used to live near an orchard and buy 21 pounds of doubles and spurs [look funny, taste great!] for $7) and a tiny watermelon ($7) at the local grocery store. Hell, I'll name it. At the A & P (stands for Alaskan and Proud and the produce department should be the A & A [Alaskan and Ashamed]). Got them home. The cherries were lovely to look at. Tasted like sawdust! And the watermelon! My grandfather used to grow (among other things) watermelon. Every year he saved the seeds from the best and planted them the next year. By the time I was born, Grandpa Herndon was growing melons to die for. Well, let me tell you, if he knew about this poor excuse for cattle fodder he would spin right out of his grave! No satisfying crack when I cut into it. And then, one bite! One bite! No taste and slick. Soft. I threw that sucker away! $14 worth of fruit (well, not really $14 worth of fruit. I paid $14 for the fruit, but as far as worth -- had they paid me to haul it away I could retire), and not one edible bite.
So you can see why I love Full Circle Farm! The produce is wonderful. Full of flavor. (Well, once I did get a spoiled strawberry.) But, it is heaven. And this week I am getting: orange honeydew, grapefruit, peaches, nectarines, pluotes, limes, carrots, snap peas, Roma tomatoes, green onions, Romaine lettuce, Cremini mushrooms, and mint. I feast! I absolutely feast! Fruit! Salad! Carrots to nibble! And it is tonight!
Today is my alternate Thursday!
Would you believe?
So, I was reading this and had to share my thoughts on it with you. In a lifetime of being fat and reading about it, thinking about it, living with it, etc. I have heard a number of theories about why more people are fatter these days, starting with take out and modern conveniences causing us to eat too much and exercise too little and going to one study that claimed it was a virus. (Just what fat people need, an already fatphobic society deciding that you can catch it from just being around us! I can see it now, not only will they charge us more for plane seats [thank you, Southwestern] but they'll refuse to get on the elevator with us. Ooh, fat cooties!) And, some of the conclusions drawn by this study I've heard before: sleep deprivation and medication come readily to mind. However, my favorites here are 9. Darwinian natural selection and 10. Associative breeding.
Nine is saying that fat people live longer than thin people (and I read a study last year that said that and I have some very long lived fat ancestors) which causes me to wonder -- if we live longer, why is obesity a health problem again? Aren't all of those people who tell us that we need to lose weight concerned about our health? Don't they "just want you to live long enough to see your grandchildren"?
Ten says that fat people are having sex with other fat people, resulting in more chubby children. Think about that one for a moment. First off, don't we tell kids that if they are fat no one will be attracted to them? (Heaven knows it's what they told me!) And now, it seems, that we are so attractive that we are outbreeding the thin folks. Of course, fat people having sex with fat people would tend to result in fat children. But, and here is the kicker, aren't thin people having sex with other thin people? Doesn't that result in thin kids? How, exactly, does this work?
It puzzles me. But, one thing I gotta say, if we live longer and have more and more productive sex, score one for my team.
Nine is saying that fat people live longer than thin people (and I read a study last year that said that and I have some very long lived fat ancestors) which causes me to wonder -- if we live longer, why is obesity a health problem again? Aren't all of those people who tell us that we need to lose weight concerned about our health? Don't they "just want you to live long enough to see your grandchildren"?
Ten says that fat people are having sex with other fat people, resulting in more chubby children. Think about that one for a moment. First off, don't we tell kids that if they are fat no one will be attracted to them? (Heaven knows it's what they told me!) And now, it seems, that we are so attractive that we are outbreeding the thin folks. Of course, fat people having sex with fat people would tend to result in fat children. But, and here is the kicker, aren't thin people having sex with other thin people? Doesn't that result in thin kids? How, exactly, does this work?
It puzzles me. But, one thing I gotta say, if we live longer and have more and more productive sex, score one for my team.
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
How I Came To Blogging
So, last week I posted a comment on a blog I enjoy a lot (Pureland Mountain) and Tabor asked who I was and why I didn't have a blogsite. I got to thinking about that. Why didn't I? My daughter does. My son-in-law does. Several friends do. I'll bet I know people with blogs and I don't even know they have blogs. It certainly looked like a fun thing to do.
Besides, do you know what it means when I say I live with two cats? It means that I don't have a captive audience (who understands English) to tell all my adventures and thoughts and the minutiae of my life to. I have friends, but surely once in a while one of them would like to talk! It can't always be all about me. And yet, I have so much to share! I like hearing what is happening with them, but I am left feeling that no one really knows everything that is happening with me. And it is so interesting, surely they should! Surely they don't want to be left out!
And the thing you have to know about me is that I was once the ultimate oney-oney (only child). I was the oldest child of two oldest children. I was the first child, grandchild, great-grandchild, niece in the family. They hung on my every word. They thought I farted attar of roses! I recited nursery rhymes and counted and they thought me brilliant! It only lasted for five years, but it gave me an appetite for it. I love being the center of attention. I can get up in front of crowds and talk about anything and never get flustered. And I never took up acting because my own words are so worthy that it seemed a waste to recite someone else's.
And since I was born on the birthday of Shakespeare and Shirley Temple, the stars may have made me this way (says the skeptic who doesn't believe in astrology but who did say she contradicts herself).
Besides, do you know what it means when I say I live with two cats? It means that I don't have a captive audience (who understands English) to tell all my adventures and thoughts and the minutiae of my life to. I have friends, but surely once in a while one of them would like to talk! It can't always be all about me. And yet, I have so much to share! I like hearing what is happening with them, but I am left feeling that no one really knows everything that is happening with me. And it is so interesting, surely they should! Surely they don't want to be left out!
And the thing you have to know about me is that I was once the ultimate oney-oney (only child). I was the oldest child of two oldest children. I was the first child, grandchild, great-grandchild, niece in the family. They hung on my every word. They thought I farted attar of roses! I recited nursery rhymes and counted and they thought me brilliant! It only lasted for five years, but it gave me an appetite for it. I love being the center of attention. I can get up in front of crowds and talk about anything and never get flustered. And I never took up acting because my own words are so worthy that it seemed a waste to recite someone else's.
And since I was born on the birthday of Shakespeare and Shirley Temple, the stars may have made me this way (says the skeptic who doesn't believe in astrology but who did say she contradicts herself).
Introducing Me
I have one grandchild (Maya, could you guess?), who I am justifiably proud of. Two children, both coming up on middle age, ditto pride.
I live with two cats, Merry and Pippin (litter mates), who are sometimes called Granny's Boys and sometimes The Hooligan Cats. Both are loving and funny, Merry is bigger and Pippin is smarter.
I come from a long line of strong women. My tenth great-grandmother was one of the first three arrested for witchcraft in Salem. My great-grandmother refused to promise to obey when she got married in the 1890s. One of my other great-grandmothers was raised by her widowed grandmother and her great-grandmother, who was born during the Revolution and died after the Civil War.
I live on the side of a mountain overlooking the Gastineau Channel, can watch bald eagles circling below my window, and sometimes knock on my own front door and yell before I open it from the inside because bears have been known to use my stairs.
I stopped being a hippy before the word was in the common vocabulary and am as opinionated as they come.
I live with two cats, Merry and Pippin (litter mates), who are sometimes called Granny's Boys and sometimes The Hooligan Cats. Both are loving and funny, Merry is bigger and Pippin is smarter.
I come from a long line of strong women. My tenth great-grandmother was one of the first three arrested for witchcraft in Salem. My great-grandmother refused to promise to obey when she got married in the 1890s. One of my other great-grandmothers was raised by her widowed grandmother and her great-grandmother, who was born during the Revolution and died after the Civil War.
I live on the side of a mountain overlooking the Gastineau Channel, can watch bald eagles circling below my window, and sometimes knock on my own front door and yell before I open it from the inside because bears have been known to use my stairs.
I stopped being a hippy before the word was in the common vocabulary and am as opinionated as they come.
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