Some gutless coward stole my neighbor's "McCain" sign. They left my "Obama" sign alone, which I guess I am supposed to feel grateful for, or even appreciative of.
What a steaming load of nonsense.
One of my favorite political stories concerns a nameless British parliamentarian who took it upon himself to be the welcoming committee for all the new MPs from his party. At one point during the tour of the House of Commons that he would give the newcomers, he would invariably stop and point across to where the other party's MPs sat. "Those people over there are your opponents," he would say. "Your enemies are on your own side."
It disturbs me that there are morons running loose in the streets who think that stealing signs is the proper way to conduct themselves in an election season. The whole point of the affair is to hear what each side has to say, decide what is most in line with your own views, and support that side. I know that American elections haven't come close to that ideal for, oh, ever - but I can still dream.
It makes me want to go out and get my neighbor a new sign, even if it means walking into the local Republican party headquarters to do so. I may have to wash my hands after doing so, but my conscience will be clean.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Why Can't Us?
The Phillies have won the World Series.
Think about that for a moment. The Phillies have won the Series. This is not something that happens every year. They have won a grand total of two of them now since they came into the National League in 1883. The first one took 97 years, during which a few notable events happened:
The Spanish American War. WWI. WWII. The Korean War. The Vietnam War.
The inventions of the automobile, the airplane, the radio, the television, the record player, and the atomic bomb.
The discoveries of antibiotics, neutrons, and Pluto.
So it was an eventful time. In the 28 years since 1980, the world has been similarly exciting, but not for the Phillies. This year, though, it was different. This year they managed to win it all.
I watched them win it this time, just as I watched them win it last time. They won the same way, with their best reliever throwing strike three for the final out. Tabitha and Lauren did not have school the next day due to, well, something that the school board decided was important enough to close the schools (it still isn't clear to me what), so we let them stay up and bask in it. Tabitha is old enough to follow it a bit, and she's been asking me for updates after every game since most of the games have ended well past any reasonable definition of her bedtime or, in one case, mine (though I admit I did see the end of that one anyway). Lauren just absorbs it all.
But there we were, in the living room, celebrating. I did not expect the Phillies to do it, did not really think they would. It's really sweet to be wrong sometimes.
"Why can't us?" indeed.
Think about that for a moment. The Phillies have won the Series. This is not something that happens every year. They have won a grand total of two of them now since they came into the National League in 1883. The first one took 97 years, during which a few notable events happened:
The Spanish American War. WWI. WWII. The Korean War. The Vietnam War.
The inventions of the automobile, the airplane, the radio, the television, the record player, and the atomic bomb.
The discoveries of antibiotics, neutrons, and Pluto.
So it was an eventful time. In the 28 years since 1980, the world has been similarly exciting, but not for the Phillies. This year, though, it was different. This year they managed to win it all.
I watched them win it this time, just as I watched them win it last time. They won the same way, with their best reliever throwing strike three for the final out. Tabitha and Lauren did not have school the next day due to, well, something that the school board decided was important enough to close the schools (it still isn't clear to me what), so we let them stay up and bask in it. Tabitha is old enough to follow it a bit, and she's been asking me for updates after every game since most of the games have ended well past any reasonable definition of her bedtime or, in one case, mine (though I admit I did see the end of that one anyway). Lauren just absorbs it all.
But there we were, in the living room, celebrating. I did not expect the Phillies to do it, did not really think they would. It's really sweet to be wrong sometimes.
"Why can't us?" indeed.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Liquid Life - Just Add Water
Only the Phillies could manage to be ten outs from a World Series championship, lose the lead and then have the game postponed due to the same drenching rains that had apparently been okay to play in for several innings before that.
I have been dutifully wearing my Phillies hat to show my support of late. The Phillies are my favorite baseball team, after all, even if baseball is no longer my favorite sport. It used to be, way back when. I followed the Phils though losing years, more losing years and the occasional winning year because it was a great game and they were my team. I watched the entire '93 Series while living in a town whose TV reception was so bad that I generally couldn't see the ball through the video snow on the screen and had to rely on watching the players react. I assumed they could see the ball, and certainly the Blue Jays could, alas.
But then they went on strike the following year. For a while I was just too annoyed at baseball to care, and I refused to watch even when the strike was over. But that didn't last - they did what they did, and so be it. But I never went back to baseball.
Life is liquid. If you remove baseball from it, don't expect to see a baseball-sized hole there later on, waiting to be filled up. Other things rush in and take that space, and baseball - or whatever it is that was removed from your world - has to figure out a way to slip in edgewise. It rarely does, at least not to where it used to be. I didn't watch television for almost nine years at one point in my life. It wasn't a moral decision - it wasn't anything to do with television really. I just got too busy with other things, and television simply fell out of my world. And when I did have time, after those nine years, there was no tv-sized hole in my life for it to fit back into. I watch it now and again these days - there are some good things on - but it fills in the edges now, not the middle.
So now baseball runs behind football, hockey, and at times even soccer. Usually I've got on my Eagles hat if I'm wearing a hat. Nobody in Wisconsin knows who the Flyers are, but sometimes I wear that one instead. My usual mug for tea is from the Sons of Ben, who supported the drive to get a Major League Soccer team in Philadelphia - I got it for the logo, which has a skull with Ben Franklin glasses and hair, and a Liberty Bell crack in it. It's cool, even if nobody knows what it signifies even in Philadelphia. But the Phillies are doing well - they're still only nine outs and one run away from winning, and even though I continue not to expect anything good to happen (when the Rays got a baserunner in the 9th inning of Game 4 I was sure it would lead to disaster even when Kim reminded me that the Phillies were leading at that point by a score of 10-2), the odds of my being pleasantly surprised are going up. So I'll watch and cheer, and if they manage to screw up and not lose, I'll be happy.
I have been dutifully wearing my Phillies hat to show my support of late. The Phillies are my favorite baseball team, after all, even if baseball is no longer my favorite sport. It used to be, way back when. I followed the Phils though losing years, more losing years and the occasional winning year because it was a great game and they were my team. I watched the entire '93 Series while living in a town whose TV reception was so bad that I generally couldn't see the ball through the video snow on the screen and had to rely on watching the players react. I assumed they could see the ball, and certainly the Blue Jays could, alas.
But then they went on strike the following year. For a while I was just too annoyed at baseball to care, and I refused to watch even when the strike was over. But that didn't last - they did what they did, and so be it. But I never went back to baseball.
Life is liquid. If you remove baseball from it, don't expect to see a baseball-sized hole there later on, waiting to be filled up. Other things rush in and take that space, and baseball - or whatever it is that was removed from your world - has to figure out a way to slip in edgewise. It rarely does, at least not to where it used to be. I didn't watch television for almost nine years at one point in my life. It wasn't a moral decision - it wasn't anything to do with television really. I just got too busy with other things, and television simply fell out of my world. And when I did have time, after those nine years, there was no tv-sized hole in my life for it to fit back into. I watch it now and again these days - there are some good things on - but it fills in the edges now, not the middle.
So now baseball runs behind football, hockey, and at times even soccer. Usually I've got on my Eagles hat if I'm wearing a hat. Nobody in Wisconsin knows who the Flyers are, but sometimes I wear that one instead. My usual mug for tea is from the Sons of Ben, who supported the drive to get a Major League Soccer team in Philadelphia - I got it for the logo, which has a skull with Ben Franklin glasses and hair, and a Liberty Bell crack in it. It's cool, even if nobody knows what it signifies even in Philadelphia. But the Phillies are doing well - they're still only nine outs and one run away from winning, and even though I continue not to expect anything good to happen (when the Rays got a baserunner in the 9th inning of Game 4 I was sure it would lead to disaster even when Kim reminded me that the Phillies were leading at that point by a score of 10-2), the odds of my being pleasantly surprised are going up. So I'll watch and cheer, and if they manage to screw up and not lose, I'll be happy.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Ow. Ow ow ow ow ow ow. And ow again.
On Friday night, I wore my high heels out on the town.
Now, I've always felt that high heels were rather ridiculous, even on women. On a crowd of men, most of them still wearing their normal clothing, they look even worse. Though, to be fair, there were a few men in the crowd who got a little more into the spirit of the thing and came in drag. It was not an improvement.
But it was for a good cause. We gathered at our starting point, milling around and taking pictures and hamming it up for the news cameras. Then there were a couple of short talks, most of which were completely inaudible, but the one speaker who made himself heard was the chief of the local police department, who thanked us for raising all of this money for the YWCA's domestic violence prevention programs and brought home the seriousness of the event by describing the latest such call that the police had had to respond to. It was only hours before he spoke.
But there is only so serious one can be in a crowd of men wearing high heels, and so - our spirits rising along with our calves - we headed off into town to "walk a mile in her shoes."
Great googly moogly, people, whoever thought these shoes were a good idea? They have no padding. They leave you canted at obscure angles. They sink into the ground, into cracks in the sidewalk, and even the asphalt. And, as at least one person found out, they break. Easily.
But we soldiered on, waving our signs and grimacing. Tabitha and Lauren marched along with me (though most of the time they stuck close to the little dog in the gold satin booties), and Kim led the parade for a while as one of the designated route-runners. The motorists we passed all honked approvingly, perhaps because if they didn't they would be run down by squadrons of well-heeled Harley dudes in leather and pumps. Harleys carry a lot of cultural weight in our little town.
We made it a mile, and then I took the girls home to a sitter and returned to the party, where - as promised - there were hors d'oeuvres and wine in quantity. We raised a whole pile of money, and had a good time doing it too. Some people might have had just a little too good of a time - I refer specifically to the gentleman in the plexiglass shoes with the six-inch heels that lit up whenever he took a step, and the phalanx of men in sparkly red shoes that the Wicked Witch of the West would just kill for - but that just couldn't be helped, now, could it.
But if you think I'm going to make a habit of this, you can jolly well think again. If I ever do decide to be a transvestite, I'll stick with flats. Those heels hurt.
Now, I've always felt that high heels were rather ridiculous, even on women. On a crowd of men, most of them still wearing their normal clothing, they look even worse. Though, to be fair, there were a few men in the crowd who got a little more into the spirit of the thing and came in drag. It was not an improvement.
But it was for a good cause. We gathered at our starting point, milling around and taking pictures and hamming it up for the news cameras. Then there were a couple of short talks, most of which were completely inaudible, but the one speaker who made himself heard was the chief of the local police department, who thanked us for raising all of this money for the YWCA's domestic violence prevention programs and brought home the seriousness of the event by describing the latest such call that the police had had to respond to. It was only hours before he spoke.
But there is only so serious one can be in a crowd of men wearing high heels, and so - our spirits rising along with our calves - we headed off into town to "walk a mile in her shoes."
Great googly moogly, people, whoever thought these shoes were a good idea? They have no padding. They leave you canted at obscure angles. They sink into the ground, into cracks in the sidewalk, and even the asphalt. And, as at least one person found out, they break. Easily.
But we soldiered on, waving our signs and grimacing. Tabitha and Lauren marched along with me (though most of the time they stuck close to the little dog in the gold satin booties), and Kim led the parade for a while as one of the designated route-runners. The motorists we passed all honked approvingly, perhaps because if they didn't they would be run down by squadrons of well-heeled Harley dudes in leather and pumps. Harleys carry a lot of cultural weight in our little town.
We made it a mile, and then I took the girls home to a sitter and returned to the party, where - as promised - there were hors d'oeuvres and wine in quantity. We raised a whole pile of money, and had a good time doing it too. Some people might have had just a little too good of a time - I refer specifically to the gentleman in the plexiglass shoes with the six-inch heels that lit up whenever he took a step, and the phalanx of men in sparkly red shoes that the Wicked Witch of the West would just kill for - but that just couldn't be helped, now, could it.
But if you think I'm going to make a habit of this, you can jolly well think again. If I ever do decide to be a transvestite, I'll stick with flats. Those heels hurt.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
The Story of Our Summer, Part II: San Francisco
Having obtained free airline tickets by driving to Philadelphia for Christmas, we decided to head to San Francisco over the Memorial Day weekend. Our thinking was that this weekend would give us some extra time to visit with Kim's brother Geoff, his partner Dave, and their friend Denise. This was a sound line of reasoning, as far as it went, but it neglected a couple of things.
One was that that the girls were both by now in the domain of the public school calendar, which had decreed that one day off for Memorial Day was plenty, thank you very much. In the end, Kim negotiated with their teachers and worked out a deal whereby the girls would each write blogs of their trip for their classmates to read. In this way we made our trip Educationally Sound.
The other thing was that I was finishing up my one-year stint teaching history at Far Away University, a 90-mile commute each way, and that my final exams would be given two days before the trip. In a hellacious 48 hours, I drove 180 miles, gave and graded 110 exams, calculated rather more final grades than that (not every student felt that the final was worth their time), and posted the grades on teh interweebs for them to look at in wonder and awe. Or awwwww. Either one. Then Kim and I packed until midnight, slept for 4 hours, and headed off for a Crack O' Dawn flight which would get us to San Francisco in time to have the day to explore.
For those of you who have not flown in the last seven years, all I can say is that the magic is gone. You show up two hours early. You herd yourself through the security checkpoint, suppressing the urge to baa like the sheep you are, looking appropriately solemn and turning over yet another Swiss Army knife for the personal collection of the US Attorney General because otherwise the terrorists win. You put your shoes back on. You find your gate - it's easy to spot: it's the one roughly halfway to your final destination. You head over and keep a sharp eye on the counter staff, who all seem to view the boarding process as a sort of shell game designed to keep people alert. You wedge yourself onto the plane, carrying enough food and supplies to support a covert incursion into a small third-world country (though if you should meet resistance you will die, since you are armed only with small clear plastic baggies full of toiletries and the memories of your latest Swiss Army knife). You know, people used to dress up to fly.
But fly we did, and without casualties. Once you're in the air, it's still pretty cool.
Geoff picked us up at the airport in his spiffy copper PT Cruiser and drove us back to Denise's apartment, where we would be staying. It's a great place, with a huge garden in the back (well, huge for being in the middle of the Mission District) to run around in. We set our stuff down and headed out to do Tourist Stuff - because we were Tourists, dagnabbit, and we might as well enjoy ourselves.
Geoff and Kim relax in Denise's garden
Geoff took us around the corner to a Pakistani restaurant (note: there is no such thing as a Pakistani restaurant in Wisconsin, mostly because the Pakistanis stubbornly refuse to put cheese on everything and we have standards here in the Dairy State. This is why we have to travel to get stuff like that). In a highly impressive show of bravery, Tabitha - whose normal idea of adventurous eating is to finish the ends of her hot dogs as well as the middle - actually ate and liked the Potato Nan. Lauren liked her food too, but she's a bit more willing to try things so we weren't quite as surprised. Afterward, we went up to a nice neighborhood park and let the girls run around for a bit. There was some sort of school field trip going on at the time, so the place was just overrun with kids, and it was windy enough to make you fear that they would all blow into the bay. But a good time was had, and nobody took any unplanned swimming trips.
Tabitha and her Potato Nan
Since we were already in the Mission District, it made sense for us to go to Mission Dolores, just a short walk away. The Mission is old and beautiful in the way that weathered stone and brick buildings can be. Kim and I had been there before, but this was the first time for the girls. It's a quiet place, nicely preserved and sort of centering just to stand around in. It's a peaceful spot in the middle of a fairly busy city. The garden in the back was the highlight for the girls, though, as they got to play in the yurt in the middle of it and run around the path. We have about as many yurts in Wisconsin as Pakistani restaurants, more's the pity - someone should look into this. Maybe if we used them to store cheese.
The girls at Mission Dolores
The next day was Dave's birthday, so we went downtown to his favorite Italian restaurant and ate a lunch such as lunches were created to eat. As a veteran of Italian cooking, I have to say that I was impressed. San Francisco is a lot like New Orleans, in that you really can't find a bad meal there.
Happy Birthday Uncle Dave!
Somewhere on the walk over, Dave acquired a nickname - he is now Uncle Wall-E, mostly due to a spot-on imitation of the Pixar character that the girls just loved. Hey - it keeps him from being confused with me. Because we look so much alike, you know.
After that we felt the need to walk, so we hiked pretty much all over town (in between trolley rides). We visited a carousel, went to an arts and music festival (those things just crop up like mushrooms out there) and ended up at some sort of art museum that we didn't go into because there was just so much Art outside to see.
Tabitha has a meeting of the minds with Art
The next day we decided to go on a picnic at Angel Island, out in the bay. The long ferry ride out to the island passes right by Alcatraz, which was fascinating to see up close. The island itself was full of all sorts of scenery and, like most of the area, steep hills that we climbed about upon. We had a nice lunch, most of which we had picked up the day before at the store where Geoff bakes. Uncle Geoff took the girls out to the beach area to quest for, well, whatever it is one quests for on the beaches out there.
Lauren and Tabitha with some of the native flora of Angel Island
On the way back we stopped at Fisherman's Wharf (because we're Tourists, that's why - see above) and spent a pleasant hour trying not to be overwhelmed by the smell of the sea lions. Sea lions are not the cute animals that they appear to be in cartoons. No, they are fat, bewhiskered and smell like a mixture of old fish and sourmash. Normally you have to go to a Civil War re-enactor camp to get this experience but we got it in San Francisco without having to wear a lot of itchy wool or eat hard tack. So bonus points for us, I say. There was also a bungee-machine there for Tabitha and Lauren to bounce around in, so the day was complete.
On our way home that night we took the cable car, because you have to take the cable car if you are a Tourist in San Francisco - there's a law about that. You wait in a line that is almost as long as the airport security line, though it is surrounded with coffee shops that you can duck into for sustenance and you get to keep your shoes on. Your turn comes and you pile in, and the cable winches you up what San Franciscans will tell you with an utterly straight face is a hill. It is not a hill. Hills do not require rappelling gear for public transportation. Hills do not require you to have oxygen at the top. Hills do not have falcons nesting halfway up. San Francisco is a triumph of geometry over geography - there is no way a city should have been built on those hills, and even if you concede the city there is still no way anyone should have slapped a grid-system of streets on top of those cliffs. But there it is. We rode all the way up and all the way down, and it was wonderful.
All they need is Rice-a-roni!
That night while Uncle Wall-E and I went out on the town in search of used books Geoff and Kim taught Lauren how to play Uno. She nearly beat them. Next year we're taking her to Vegas.
On our final day in San Francisco, we got out of San Francisco and headed up to Muir Woods. On the one hand, the redwoods there are really impressive - tall, wide, stately, and surrounded by lesser trees as a queen is surrounded by all of the king's mistresses - and trying just as hard to choke them, too. On the other hand, they're trees, and after a while they start to blend together in your mind. The fox pelts and animal skulls that the ranger had out on display were cool, though. No matter what you learn in Disney movies, the forest is full of things that will eat your sorry butt - if not before you're dead, then certainly after. THAT never gets old.
Lauren in the depths of the trees with Uncle Wall-E
After we left the forest, we went to the beach.
Why is it that so many things in the San Francisco area involve precipices and high winds? It's not enough that towers and bridges make you feel that you are only moments away from free-fall - you also get this feeling with trolleys, light-houses, and - yes - beaches. It's astonishing how much of the San Francisco area is just one wide-opening fence away from reading about it in the papers.
We went to the beach in two stages. First, we drove to the nearest handy precipice (never more than 15 minutes by car from any point). We got out to inspect the abandoned WWII military gun emplacement overlooking the coast, and from there we wandered down the almost-Japanese-style walkway that followed the ridgeline and led to the overlook (irony being a specialty of ours). This was a wildly Romantic spot, full of sound and fury, wind and gravity. And fog. Lots of fog. But pretty, in a way. Then we got back into the car and drove down to the actual sandy beach, where we had a picnic lunch and the girls got to dip their tootsies in the Pacific Ocean. That they were willing - nay, eager - to do this was somewhat surprising, considering the stiff breeze and 60-degree temperatures, but they loved it.
The path overlooking the beach
One ocean down, one to go
Hanging on for dear life at the lighthouse.
And then we left.
One of the odder side-effects of this trip is that now the girls just adore Bill Cosby's "Driving in San Francisco" routine, which is one of the ones that I memorized as a child from the one album of my parents' that survived my childhood. Uncle Keith gave it to me as a CD a few years ago, so now we listen in the car.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
It Beats "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" ...
We've recently begun to teach Tabitha and Lauren to sing the ABC's to the tune of Pink Floyd's "The Wall." Try it sometime - it works.
Hey! Teacher! Teach those ABC's!
Corrupting their minds, one cover song at a time.
Of course, at some point they will demonstrate this newfound knowledge to their peers, and then we will be known as Those Parents. For most of their peers' parents, this will probably not be a good thing - but for some, it will be a recommendation. Those parents we will try to hang out with.
This is called social networking.
Hey! Teacher! Teach those ABC's!
Corrupting their minds, one cover song at a time.
Of course, at some point they will demonstrate this newfound knowledge to their peers, and then we will be known as Those Parents. For most of their peers' parents, this will probably not be a good thing - but for some, it will be a recommendation. Those parents we will try to hang out with.
This is called social networking.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
I Can See Clearly Now
We have two new windows in our dining room now. They're white vinyl, with spiffy locks and hinges that let you clean both sides without going outside. They've even got argon gas between the two panes of glass, though for all I can tell they could have banana fumes. There are twelve more just like them sitting in our garage, and two more sort of like them and yet two more not really all that much like them at all - eventually they will all have to go in.
Our neighbor Adam, a professional carpenter, is the Lead Person on this project, which makes sense since he is the one with the tools and the clues as to how this is done. I'm just there to be commanded. This is about right, as I have a defective Mr. Goodwrench gene and can cause projects to run off the rails merely by acknowledging their existence. My main contribution to most household projects is simply to stay out of the way long enough to allow Kim to finish them, and take the girls with me though sometimes they get to help out if there aren't too many Lethally Pointy Bits. I also lift heavy objects and occasionally reach for tall things. I'm a regular Bob Vilas, let me tell you. Kim loves these projects, which is a good thing since otherwise we would be living in a ruin. A shabby ruin, with outdated rocks. So we're a good team that way - Kim has ideas and energy, and I provide unskilled labor and occasionally height. Let me tell you, our rocks are stylin'.
It is a very good thing that Adam is involved here. Our windows are not standard windows. They don't have the depth that has apparently been standard since the Civil War, for one thing, and they've got all sorts of odd molding and flanges that regular windows don't have and which have to be removed without causing the rest of the house to collapse or float off to points unknown. It is therefore good to have someone with skills and tools on this project. I'm fresh out of those, and Kim is too busy earning a living for me to simply take the girls out of harm's way and expect the project to be done. Even with professional help, though, those two windows took up most of the day.
The windows are a lot brighter than the old ones. I'm not sure whether this is due to the white vinyl instead of the dark wood of the old ones, the lack of muntins (or is that mullions? Who can tell?) in the panes now, or the simple fact that the old ones were so difficult to clean that we seldom bothered. Those hinges will go a long way, let me tell you.
Two down, sixteen to go.
Our neighbor Adam, a professional carpenter, is the Lead Person on this project, which makes sense since he is the one with the tools and the clues as to how this is done. I'm just there to be commanded. This is about right, as I have a defective Mr. Goodwrench gene and can cause projects to run off the rails merely by acknowledging their existence. My main contribution to most household projects is simply to stay out of the way long enough to allow Kim to finish them, and take the girls with me though sometimes they get to help out if there aren't too many Lethally Pointy Bits. I also lift heavy objects and occasionally reach for tall things. I'm a regular Bob Vilas, let me tell you. Kim loves these projects, which is a good thing since otherwise we would be living in a ruin. A shabby ruin, with outdated rocks. So we're a good team that way - Kim has ideas and energy, and I provide unskilled labor and occasionally height. Let me tell you, our rocks are stylin'.
It is a very good thing that Adam is involved here. Our windows are not standard windows. They don't have the depth that has apparently been standard since the Civil War, for one thing, and they've got all sorts of odd molding and flanges that regular windows don't have and which have to be removed without causing the rest of the house to collapse or float off to points unknown. It is therefore good to have someone with skills and tools on this project. I'm fresh out of those, and Kim is too busy earning a living for me to simply take the girls out of harm's way and expect the project to be done. Even with professional help, though, those two windows took up most of the day.
The windows are a lot brighter than the old ones. I'm not sure whether this is due to the white vinyl instead of the dark wood of the old ones, the lack of muntins (or is that mullions? Who can tell?) in the panes now, or the simple fact that the old ones were so difficult to clean that we seldom bothered. Those hinges will go a long way, let me tell you.
Two down, sixteen to go.
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