yesterday's danish

Inauguration!

2009-01-19T20:50:00.001-05:00

Adam took this on our street today.

STOP TALKING

2009-01-11T11:03:00.001-05:00

There are all types of misbehavior in a classroom, and a myriad of ways to handle it. When something occurs, I tend to first think about the effect on the class. If it is making anyone feel unsafe, then I deal with it quickly and seriously.

If it is not, then I think of the student’s motivation to cause the behavior: boredom, their being upset about something else, not wanting to do work, wanting to prove their coolness, or in order to antagonize or test me. A fairly rare type (at least by this point, halfway through the year), and the type I pounce on most viciously, are those students acting to antagonize. Most of the rest can be effectively dealt with by concern, positive feedback, or a honed “teacher stare”- an amazingly powerful weapon.

However, that doesn’t work all the time, especially with Alexis*, a student in my first period class. Alexis is a classic case of not wanting to do the work. He speaks and writes Spanish better than English and he is a very social kid. He would much rather converse with his peers than read books or write essays, and he has a hard time controlling himself. Alexis and I get along well, and I know that his continued talking is not meant to upset me, but he will often receive the “teacher stare” multiple times in one class because as soon as I look away from him, he starts again.

This type of misbehavior is hard to respond to effectively. Taking a drastic measure, like sending him out of the classroom, won’t help matters because during silent reading time he would much rather not be in the classroom. Positive reinforcement when he is on task is useful, but it doesn’t seem to override Alexis’s temptation to talk.

Two days before Christmas vacation (also known as one of the two most useless days of the school year) I got truly frustrated with Alexis. I spent twice as long as normal just getting the students seated, with their materials out, and their books open. The class wanted nothing to do with silence. Finally, FINALLY, I got them quieted down and reading.

I turned to my desk to mark the attendance. I heard Alexis talking to the student next to him. I turned and gave him the stare. He stopped. I turned back around. After a minute or so, he started again. I stared. “Sorry, Miss” he said and put his nose back into his book. I went over to help another student and I heard him again.

Part of me wanted to yell and scream, but the situation didn’t warrant that. Then I remembered something random Adam had given me about a year before. Adam has an interest in design and he had stumbled across these cards, which are very plain white business cards that say STOP TALKING in small serious letters in the middle of the card. He got me a pack of them. They are intimidating cards. I walked over to my wallet where I keep one, took it out, and silently handed it to Alexis.

The effect was astounding. He looked confused and then gave a chagrined half-smile and bobbed his head down a little. He looked up at me sheepishly and said, “Can I go read in the back?” I nodded. He gathered his stuff and started walking from the front of the room to an isolated desk in the back of the room, the card in one hand. As he walked down the aisle, other students reached out to see what I had handed him. He paused for a second and then shook his head gravely and kept walking quietly, down an aisle of outstretched hands.

He read silently for the entire rest of the time. At the end of class, he walked back up to me and handed me back the card. We didn’t discuss it at all.

I can only assume Alexis thought he had stumbled on to some whole new aspect of discipline, that he had violated something large and beyond his knowledge of the system in which we operate… that there was and is a whole further level of things.

If only that was true!

Mermaid

2008-12-16T21:58:00.007-05:00

In class the other day one of my students decided to dance around a bit before getting down to work. As he finally sat down he fell and landed spectacularly on the floor. The class laughed and once I saw he was okay I pretty much ignored it and tried to move along to the next activity.

It seemed a ploy for attention, an idea that wasn't disproved when Jonathan* remained on the floor. I ignored his being on the floor for a while, and then I went over to him and asked him what was going on. He didn't reply so I asked him to write about why he was upset (this works about ninety percent of the time when the student won't respond verbally). He wrote that he was upset because Edwin* (the boy next to him) had pulled his chair out and caused him to fall. I wrote back that I hadn't realized that the chair was pulled out from under him, and it was dangerous and I would speak to Edwin after class. Jonathan continued to frown but acquiesced to my request that he get up off the floor.

I walked away and assumed he had gotten to work until I walked by again and saw that he was busy drawing a telling image- a boy riding a dolphin above the waves. The waves were labeled "piranha tank" and a boy in the water was labeled "Edwin." I smiled and let him keep at it.

Class ended and I went over to where Jonathan and Edwin were sitting. I turned to Edwin and said, "Edwin, you cannot pull chairs out from under people. It is dangerous, someone could get hurt, and it is not respectful. It's not funny when it can really hurt" or something along those typical teacherish lines. Edwin nodded and left.

Class had ended but Jonathan continued sitting and drawing. I came back to Jonathan a couple minutes later and beheld the new, improved version of his piranha tank vision; the tank and Edwin had been erased, and I had entered the picture as a mermaid! It is an ever so accurate depiction of the class, despite the slight misspelling of my name:

*names were changed

Dear President-Elect

2008-11-11T10:23:00.001-05:00

Dear President-Elect Obama,

Today I mailed a packet of 65 sixth grade students’ letters, letters filled with introductions, advice and questions for you, the President that will hopefully carry these young students from childhood into adulthood. My students live in the South Bronx, in one of the poorest congressional districts in the country. The majority of them receive free lunch. The letters they have written you are filled with hope for the change you seek to bring to our country. I try to teach my students that their voices are worth being heard. Please read and consider their statements. I think their dreams reflect what many of us across the country want to see. In a selection of their own words:

“My wish came true you became president.” “I am happy because you are the first black man to be a President. And I am sorry because of what happen to your grandmother.” “You are the president that gets to change this world and make it a safer and better place for all of us to live in.” “I hope that you will do a great job fixing all of former President Bush’s mistakes.” “I wanted to work for you but I am only 11.” “I am writing to you to give you my opinion. I have great ideas.”

“I hope that over the next four years you will change the war. I hope the war will end soon. I think that because people are dying for no reason when maybe you just need to sit them down and tell Iraq that we don’t want to fight anymore.”

“Another thing I think you should do is make taxes lower because people spend too much money and barely have any leftover. I think it would help millions of people. Also it would give people a little more money in their pockets and more money to spend on food. Especially when you have a family you need as much money as possible so you can feed everyone’s mouth. I know this because I have a family with one sister, one brother, and a mom and a dad just like you I know you have children and a wife. That’s why I know you understand.”

“You should make a college for poor people so that they can learn.”

“Are you going to put a basketball court in the white house when you move there?”

“You made history from what Mr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, he said “We Shall Overcome” and that’s what you did on Tuesday, you overcame Obama.” “I believe in you and look up to you because you make me think that maybe when I get older I might be able to become the first female president of the United States.” “I know you have a tough road ahead of you, but you can do it because you know what I believe in you.” “Lastly I know you will be the best president ever.”

Sincerely,
Ms. Edmonds and various Sixth Graders

“P.S. I hope you like being the president!”
“P.S. You are the man!”

Donors Choose Me, Please!

2008-11-07T10:24:00.007-05:00

I did a cool project with my students last year in which they wrote creation myths and then illustrated the myth in a little book. We invited their parents and read and celebrated their work. It was a proud occasion and I'm looking to recreate it this year, but I need some funding (I know, not the best economy to be asking for that)- but anyway, here is the link for the full proposal on Donor's Choose:
http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/proposal.html?id=224650

Maverick

2008-11-05T10:30:00.000-05:00

On election day, my dad, who is a member of the East Hampton Town Democrats, went to his local polling place to hold up an Obama sign with the other Town Democrats. Now, tradition in East Hampton dictates that Democrats hold up signs on one side of the street, Republicans on the other. My dad decided to stand on the Republican side. Some folks were miffed, so the chair of the Town GOP walked over and told my dad he needed to stand on the Democrat side. In characteristic fashion, my dad refused, explaining that he was a "Republican for Obama." Later, the GOP leader learned that my dad is in fact a big ole Dem. So he goes back to my dad and says "You're on the Democratic committee. Why did you say you were a Republican?" My dad's response: "Because I'm a Maverick." (written by my sister)

Letter to the Editor

2008-03-11T20:14:00.003-04:00

My Letter to the Editor on this NY Times article, Next Question: Can Students Be Paid to Excel?

To the Editor:

Re “Next Question: Can Students Be Paid to Excel?” (front page, March 5), about a program to reward teachers and students for test performance at P.S. 188 on the Lower East Side of Manhattan:

I was a student teacher at P.S. 188 and am familiar with the school’s focus on state tests. I was shocked that educated professionals would support an initiative to pay students for test scores.

As a middle-school English teacher who constantly strives to help students realize that reading and writing are a larger part of life than a short state test, I detest the concept of rewarding their performance with money. Poor students who do basic academic work because it results in cash are merely being coached to perform, and the people really benefiting are school professionals and politicians.

This initiative sends the message that learning for learning’s sake is obsolete. Paying students for test scores reduces the teaching of English to a transaction, one in which a teacher sells students methods of fooling test graders.

This is not an education.

Julie Edmonds
New York, March 5, 2008

I'm Not Running for President

2008-02-28T22:19:00.001-05:00

In college my housemates and I spent a disproportionate amount of time personifying objects, which is part of why I find this ad, about the wind and for wind turbines, awesome.

Miracle Berries

2008-02-18T20:44:00.011-05:00

I cannot eat sour foods. I pucker uncontrollably, turn red, cry, and my throat closes up. It is truly horrible. Unfortunately, my sour receptors are also very keen- oranges, for example, are a bit too sour for me to really enjoy. Limes, Granny Smith apples, kumquat and grapefruit- out of the question.

For Valentine's day, Adam came up with a gift to address this issue. A magical gift by the name of "miracle berries" or "miracle fruit."

Miracle berries are just that; berries from West Africa that, for about 20-40 minutes after you eat them, make sour foods taste sweet. It is hard to imagine or believe, but it is true, and amazing! The proof I offer you, besides personal testimony, is in the form of pictures. The one at the top is a before (horrific face caused by lime) and the ones on the left are befores, on the rights afters (kumquat-induced):

I love the last lines of poems.

2008-02-16T14:59:00.001-05:00

Navigating in the Dark
by Erik Campbell

Papua, Indonesia

In this mining town in Papua the electricity
Has a habit of giving up at night, and this

Is a miracle of modern stasis, a secular Shabbat,
Reminding us of what is expendable, of how so few

Of us ever truly experience the dark. We are amazed,
My wife and I, with the heavy darkness

Of the no moon jungle, insect sounds lacerating
All illusions of silent places. "It's so absolute,"

My wife says, and I like to think she means
More than the darkness; the naked places

Of ourselves we dress in sunlight, lamps,
And recorded music like antithetical

Blanche DeBois's fearing a different sort
Of scrutiny. "We could pretend it's 1940,"

I say, "put a Jack Benny tape on the short wave
And drink coffee, light candles." She suggests

A walk outside instead, where there are dozens
Of others already out on paths bounded by jungle,

Stepping small and laughing loudly through various
Uncertainties; flashlights as eyes, ears like animals'.

Soon we are trying only to remember not to disappear
Altogether; everything is so absolutely, so darkly possible.

Happy St. Valentine's Day!

2008-02-16T14:54:00.003-05:00

Vote

2006-11-07T08:38:00.000-05:00

"Bad officials are elected by good citizens who do not vote."
Nathan, George Jean American editor and drama critic (1882-1958)

from Toothpaste for Dinner-

All Hallow Dreaming

2006-10-19T12:52:00.000-04:00

I had the worst dream last night. It wasn't a nightmare, but I am going to argue it was worse than a nightmare, because there was no sense of relief when I awoke. I dreamt I needed to get an oil change, and then I woke up and realized I did, in fact, need to get an oil change. Practical dreaming! Horrid!

Neglect

2006-10-11T18:06:00.000-04:00

Awesome- Interview with Sharyn-the-playwright, righting all our wrongs!

3Graces presents a GraceNotes workshop production of NEGLECT in repertory with NICKEL AND DIMED.
NEGLECT is written by Sharyn Rothstein, winner of this year's Samuel French Original Short Play Festival, and is directed by Catherine Ward. Based on the 1995 Chicago heat wave that claimed the lives of over seven hundred elderly residents, mostly African-Americans who lived in social isolation, NEGLECT is the story of an elderly woman, Rose, and her young neighbor, Joseph, who come together on the first day of the heat wave to escape the unbearable heat and their own feelings of loneliness. A story of social responsibility, NEGLECT is an often funny, deeply moving play about what holds us together and what keeps us apart.
Directed by Catherine Ward
Dramaturgy by J. Holtham
with Geany Masai* and William Jackson Harper*featuring Ange Berneau*
GraceNotes is 3Graces' forum for studio theater and experimental works, including solo shows, one-acts, and works-in-progress. Co-artistic directors Elizabeth Bunnell and Annie McGovern call it an "artistic playground," where company members, guest artists and audiences share in the delight of developing and performing new works.
NEGLECT will run October 10 - 25 at the Bank Street Theater, located at 155 Bank Street.
Performances: Tuesday, Wednesday, Sunday at 7pm.
Tickets for NEGLECT are $15 and are on sale through Ticket Central at http://3graces.pmailus.com/pmailweb/ct?d=CHLeqwCHAAEAAAgXAADM2w or 212-279-4200.
For more information, visit http://3graces.pmailus.com/pmailweb/ct?d=CHLeqwCIAAEAAABpAADM2w.

* Appearing courtesy of Actors Equity Association

Too Hot to Handle

2006-10-03T12:42:00.000-04:00

This is the kind of thing that freaks me out about becoming a teacher:

"...Ms. McGee, 51, a popular art teacher with 28 years in the classroom, is out of a job after leading her fifth-grade classes last April through the Dallas Museum of Art. One of her students saw nude art in the museum, and after the child’s parent complained, the teacher was suspended." (from New York Times).
An art teacher getting suspended because there happens to be some nude art at the museum? The child whose parent complained is going to grow up with some unfortunate complexes about nudity. The statue at left is one of four of the "offending" sculptures. Of course, now that this case has made the news the pictures of these nude sculptures are being shown on the news (with the anatomy blacked out- thank God), so even the schoolchildren that didn't go on the field trip can get offended. Considering the lives American children lead nowadays, with their internet access, video games with scantily clad women spurting blood, and the music videos shown on tv, getting upset about some classic art may be the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.
(Sculpture pictured- Shade, Auguste Rodin)

haha

2006-10-02T17:14:00.000-04:00

Failed t-shirt idea from Toothpaste for Dinner:

Hot day, Summer in the city

2006-08-03T21:20:00.000-04:00

I went to a coffeeshop the other day. As I was waiting impatiently for some iced coffee concoction, I listened to the sort of nervous-looking middle-aged guy in front of me request his order, a frozen coffee drink. The woman behind the counter nodded and turned to make it, then asked, "do you want whipped cream?"
The man, all awkwardness, quickly replied, "Not for the coffee-" paused for a while, then added, "or anything really."

Domesticated Apes

2006-07-26T10:14:00.000-04:00

A wacky quote from the New York Times article, "Nice Rats, Nasty Rats: Maybe It's All in the Genes";

His strategy is to cross the tame rats with the ferocious rats and then score the progeny for how much of each trait they inherit. He hopes to identify 200 sites along the genome at which the tame and ferocious rats differ. If one or more of the sites correlate with tameness or fierceness in the progeny, they will probably lie near important genes that underlie one of the two traits.

The genes, if Mr. Albert finds them, would be of great interest because they are presumably the same in all species of domesticated mammal. That may even include humans. Richard Wrangham, a primatologist at Harvard, has proposed that people are a domesticated form of ape, the domestication having been self-administered as human societies penalized or ostracized individuals who were too aggressive.

Case Work

2006-07-24T22:33:00.000-04:00

I encourage you to check out this article on New York Times online. The article, entitled "The Case of Marie and Her Sons," was the lead in the Sunday magazine this past weekend. I happened upon it today online and it "gave me the heebie-jeebies" as my mom put it, as it was exactly the job I was doing the year before last, child protective casework, in the nearest office to where I was doing it, and the case worker they focus on started around the same time I did. I wrote about it before here. It's a job I quit, but still think about frequently, wondering how my clients are doing- how their stories played out, if they're okay. The work forever changed my perspective on how lives are lived in America, and how people are affected by their family. It's a job I'm incredibly glad I don't have anymore, for my emotional well-being, but part of me wants to go back and do it over again, perfectly. Which, as the article shows, is not possible.

School Project Time

2006-07-12T13:26:00.000-04:00

Anyone feeling magnanimous can head over to this site and follow the directions...
Thanks!
(if you're not feeling magnanimous, I understand. It is Wednesday, after all)

Epalpebrates!

2006-07-04T00:29:00.000-04:00

Where Words Go To Die

2006-07-03T22:18:00.000-04:00

I guess I was in a morbid (morose, gloomy, melancholic, sinister, macabre, gruesome) mood today, as I have spent significant time pondering death- the demise of words, that is--

You too can delve into this otherworld of words (The Phrontistery), and ponder what has become of:

alabandical
adj
1656 -1775
barbarous; stupefied from drink
His behaviour after the party was positively alabandical.

And

foppotee
n
1663 -1663
simpleton
What a pitiful foppotee he was, always oblivious to our jeers!

Did we outgrow them? Grad school is going to lead me to need the word “alabandical” (RIP 1775) and “foppotee” (RIP 1663). Why would these gems fade out and others like “inebriated” and “moron” remain? Perhaps answers to all our philosophical queries can be found in these lost words… especially words like epalpebrate and stiricide:

(I include this one because I liked the sentence):
cacatory
adj
1684 -1753
accompanied by loose bowels
For the diners, the effects of the chicken cacciatore, alas, were cacatory.

epalpebrate
adj
1884 -1884
lacking eyebrows
If you don't stop plucking, soon you'll be epalpabrate!

jobler
n
1662 -1662
one who does small jobs
We've found a great jobler who takes care of our repairs quickly and cheaply.

murklins
adv
1568 -1674
in the dark
She stumbled murklins about the house until she found the light switch.

pigritude
n
1623 -1656
slothfulness
Despite the college student's pigritude, he continued to maintain a 'B' average.

stiricide
n
1656 -1656
falling of icicles from a house
The untended tenement was very dangerous in winter due to stiricide.

uglyography
n
1804 -1834
bad handwriting; poor spelling
Your uglyography conceals the cogency and brilliance of your ideas.

Subaru Time

2006-06-27T10:03:00.000-04:00

(picture from Natalie Dee)

As it turns out, Subarus are the official car of the Hudson Valley, so my car and I are fitting right in from the getgo with this return to country living. Ways I am not fitting in includes expecting something, ANYTHING, to be open past eight o'clock at night.

Strange aspects include the bleating pygmy goat that has suddenly appeared in my backyard ("Not in my backyard!" I cried, when it chewed on my bicycle), and the fact that all I have to do with myself is sit around reading on the porch.

2006-06-18T22:35:00.000-04:00

Stephen Colbert Interview on the 10 Commandments

I know more commandments than this dude, and that is certainly not saying much.

2006-06-11T23:06:00.000-04:00

David Hasselhoff - Hooked on a Feeling

The pop bubblegum favorite... performed by David Hasselhoff for some German video.

Poignant Blues in India

2006-06-07T20:06:00.000-04:00

1. According to wikipedia, the Ramayana is an epic which tells the story of a prince whose wife is abducted by a demon. The story "contains the teachings of the ancient Hindu sages and presents them through allegory in narrative and the interspersion of philosophic and devotional."

2. In other wikipedia info, Annette Hanshaw was a flapper and a blues singer of the 1920s.

3. Lastly, Nina Paley is an animation filmmaker living in New York.

The amazing thing is that combining these three things has created something wonderful. Nina Paley is in the process of creating a 72 minute animation film of the Ramayana from Sita's perspective. It's called Sitayana, or Sita Sings the Blues. Paley is using Annette Hanshaw's stunning blues songs as the background for each beautifully crafted scene. It's like a graphic novel come to life, with a great soundtrack. You can and should watch completed parts of it here: http://www.ninapaley.com/Sitayana/

Nina Paley came to combine these two disparate cultural icons through personal upset, as she was dumped by her husband over email after their marriage fell apart in India. She identified with Sita from the Ramayana and listened to Annette Hanshaw to overcome this, and it lead to this art.

An' the livin' is easy...

2006-05-31T09:48:00.000-04:00

"Summer afternoon- summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language." -Henry James

Winter barges in with a snowstorm, then leaves for a bit, then returns and overstays its welcome. Spring wavers in and out with nice days and rainy days and the refusal to make the world green soon enough. But summer- summer just glides in, right on time for Memorial Day barbeques.

I've been spending my time honoring its arrival, with walks, fruits, beers, canoeing, and just hanging out. It's an intense combination of activities, specifically designed to maximize appreciation for the heat and greenness of the outside world.

As much as I love New York, I am also soaking in being in the country. My friend's mom told me she was surprised I was living in the city, and as I went to respond, I realized I was too. We were talking outside after just having walked up from the lake, and the air smelled fresh, and for a second I wondered what the hell I was thinking dwelling amidst all those buildings. But, as she and I concluded, everything is a trade-off. So now I trade for six months in the country... we shall see.

Diplodocus

2006-05-25T16:40:00.000-04:00

I told Adam who told Paul who emailed it to Overheard in New York, so here you go... dinosaur disbelief is now famous.

Death of a Goldfish

2006-05-24T10:47:00.000-04:00

Dust in the Wind

Crinkle has left one bowl for another.

As his life is flushed away, let us reflect fondly on his brief sojourn in a bepebbled orb in the living room. Crinkle was hardly able to use his three seconds of memory in his short, sweet life. But he swam well & died bravely. Not long for this earthly world, we can only thank him for making our days a little more golden... if only for a moment, then the moment's gone.

In lieu of donations, Adam has placed a note in Crinkle's bowl that states: Gone Fishin?

All mimsy were the borogroves...

2006-05-19T16:09:00.000-04:00

To go along with yesterday's bird theme, I happened to look at this, a work in progress by David Troupes called The Renaming of the Birds. I liked it yesterday, but since looking at it my appreciation has only grown to the point that I keep reflecting on it & I think I will start calling pigeons "brave ladyfriends" and bluejays "noisy blue jerks."

Have you ever thought about what you would name things if you were assigned naming responsibilities? That's a weighty task. I think names are hugely powerful. I don't believe a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet- if roses were called grackles, they would not enjoy the popularity they have today. Peonies would have surpassed them a long time ago. I also think politicians usually win based on who has the better name. Seriously.

Sincerely,
Hortense D. Terwilliger

True Life Story

2006-05-18T15:31:00.000-04:00

A couple of weeks ago Steph, Julie, and Julie's parents met an elderly woman while waiting to cross the street in New York City. This lady, well-dressed and leaning on a cane, turned to this amenable crowd to say, "Is there something on my back?"
Unfortunately for this individual, some fresh bird droppings had come to adorn her black jacket.
"Eww, yes... but it's not too much," replied Julie's mom.
"Yes," said Steph, in a cheery voice. "It looks like a bird had its way with you!"
The walking signal clicked on, and the old lady got a strange look on her face as she replied. "That's one way of putting it."

Fuck Betsy Ross

2006-05-17T16:40:00.000-04:00

This NY Times article, about a trip around the world in 90 days, brought to mind Nellie Bly, a reporter who took a trip around the world in 72 days in the year of 1889. Nellie Bly is the kind of female historical figure we should have learned about but didn't, because history books were too busy going on about Betsy Ross (how many times can you go over the fact that she sewed the flag (unless it was Frances somebody or another- BIG controversy!)? who cares?). Anyway, Nellie Bly is a different story... I learned on wikipedia (not in those Betsy-Ross-loving history textbooks) that she got her journalism career started at 18 (in the 1880s, when there were few women in that type of work, and when she had to use a pen name, as a woman's name in the newspaper wasn't socially acceptable) when she wrote a response to a sexist editorial which proclaimed girls were only good for getting married and raising children. Her response, which she signed "Lonely Orphan Girl" was published in the newspaper. She met with the newspaper editor as a result, and told him she wanted to write articles about ordinary people, and got the job.

As a result of those pieces, advertising was pulled from the newspaper and they then tried to reassign her to fluffier things- she refused, and went to Mexico and wrote about politics and the like there for 6 months, until she was thrown out of that country. She eventually ended up in New York, and wrote a piece on going undercover in a lunatic asylum that caused a grand jury investigation and provoked an additional million dollars funding. The piece was called "Ten Days in a Mad House," published in 1888. You can read it here (complete with an advertisement for Madame Mora's corsets), it's really intriguing and also horrifying. Here's an excerpt:

I always made a point of telling the doctors I was sane, and asking to be released, but the more I endeavored to assure them of my sanity, the more they doubted it. 'What are you doctors here for?' I asked one, whose name I cannot recall. 'To take care of the patients and test their sanity,' he replied. 'Very well,' I said. 'There are sixteen doctors on this island, and, excepting two, I have never seen them pay any attention to the patients. How can a doctor judge a woman's sanity by merely bidding her good morning and refusing to hear her pleas for release? Even the sick ones know it is useless to say anything, for the answer will be that it is their imagination.' 'Try every test on me,' I have urged others, 'and tell me am I sane or insane? Try my pulse, my heart, my eyes; ask me to stretch out my arm, to work my fingers, as Dr. Field did at Bellevue, and then tell me if I am sane.' They would not heed me, for they thought I raved. The insane asylum on Blackwell's Island is a human rat-trap. It is easy to get in, but once there it is impossible to get out.

Ah horsefeathers!

2006-05-16T16:23:00.000-04:00

I'm not trying to just beat my gums here when I tell you that life is feeling copacetic as I'm about to get a wiggle on out of this joint... that's right- I'm giving work the bum rush. Come Friday I'll be donning my glad rags and slurping some giggle water. Time to get spifflicated and live like an egg before I return to school and this tomato turns into a pill; a regular Mrs. Grundy.

Slang of the 1920's

Applesauce- an expletive same as horsefeathers, As in "Ah applesauce!"
Balled Up - confused, messed up
Bank's Closed - no kissing or making out - i.e. - "Sorry, Mac, the bank's closed."
Bearcat - a hot-blooded or fiery girl
Beat one's gums - idle chatter
Bee's Knees - An extraordinary person, thing, idea; the ultimate
Beeswax - business, i.e. None of your beeswax."
Berries - That which is attractive or pleasing; similar to bee's knees, As in "It's the berries."
Bird - general term for a man or woman, sometimes meaning "odd," i.e. "What a funny old bird."
Bum's rush - ejection by force from an establishment
Carry a Torch - To have a crush on someone
Cash - a kiss
Cat's Meow - Something splendid or stylish; similar to bee's knees; The best or greatest, wonderful.
Cat's Pajamas - Same as cat's meow
Check - kiss me later
Copacetic - Wonderful, fine, all right
Dapper - a Flapper's dad
Darb - An excellent person or thing (as in "the Darb" - a person with money who can be relied on to pay the check)
Don't know from nothing - don't have any information
Don't take any wooden nickels - Don't do anything stupid
Drugstore Cowboy - a guy that hangs around on a street corner trying to pick up girls
Dumb Dora - a stupid female
Egg - a person who lives the big life
Fire extinguisher - a chaperone
Flat Tire - A dull witted, insipid, disappointing date. Same as pill, pickle, drag, rag, oilcan
Get a wiggle on - get a move on, get going
Giggle Water - An intoxicating beverage; alcohol
Glad rags - "going out on the town" clothes
Goofy - in love
Hair of the Dog - a shot of alcohol
Handcuff - an engagement ring
Hard Boiled - a tough, strong guy
Horsefeathers - an expletive ; same usage as applesauce
Hotsy - Totsy - Pleasing
Jack - money
Jake - OK, as in , "Everything is Jake."
Jalopy - Old car
Jane - any female
Java - coffee
Juice Joint - a speakeasy
Mrs. Grundy - A priggish or extremely tight-laced person
"Now you're on the trolley!" - Now you've got it, now you're right!
Orchid - an expensive item
Ossified - a drunk person
Palooka (1) a below-average or average boxer (2) a social outsider, from the comic strip character Joe Palooka
Piker - (1) a cheapskate (2) a coward
Pill - (1) a teacher (2) an unlikable person
Rag-a-muffin - a dirty or disheveled individual
Real McCoy - The genuine article
Ritzy - Elegant (from the hotel)
Rubes - money or dollars
Sap - a fool
Sheba - A woman with sex appeal (from the move Queen of Sheba) or (e.g. Clara Bow)
Sheik - A man with sex appeal (from the Valentino movies)
Spifflicated - Drunk. The same as canned, corked, tanked, primed, scrooched, jazzed, zozzled, plastered, owled, embalmed, lit, potted, ossified or fried to the hat
Spiffy - An elegant appearance
Stuck On - Having a crush on
Swanky - Ritzy
Tomato - a female
Wet Blanket - a solemn person, a killjoy

Leave it at, Leaving the Wild

2006-05-11T15:26:00.000-04:00

I've been mulling over this New York Times article, Leaving the Wild, and Rather Liking It, all day. It's an amazing thing to reflect on:

SAN JOSÉ DEL GUAVIARE, Colombia — Since time immemorial the Nukak-Makú have lived a Stone Age life, roaming across hundreds of miles of isolated and pristine Amazon jungle, killing monkeys with blowguns and scouring the forest floor for berries.
But recently, and rather mysteriously, a group of nearly 80 wandered out of the wilderness, half-naked, a gaggle of children and pet monkeys in tow, and declared themselves ready to join the modern world.
....
The Nukak have no concept of money, of property, of the role of government, or even of the existence of a country called Colombia. They ask whether the planes that fly overhead are moving on some sort of invisible road.
They have no government identification cards, making them nonentities to Colombia's bureaucracy. ...
Are they sad? "No!" cried a Nukak named Pia-pe, to howls of laughter. In fact, the Nukak said they could not be happier. Used to long marches in search of food, they are amazed that strangers would bring them sustenance — free.
What do they like most? "Pots, pants, shoes, caps," said Mau-ro, a young man who went to a shelter to speak to two visitors. Ma-be added, "Rice, sugar, oil, flour." Others said they loved skillets. Also high on the list were eggs and onions, matches and soap and certain other of life's necessities.
"I like the women very much," Pia-pe said, to raucous laughs.

I cannot even begin to imagine what it would be like to enter a civilization as wacky as our own in 2006. Reading about the fact that these newcomers love skillets makes me want to drop everything and move to that town in Colombia to meet them and ask- what is so great about skillets?

However, the Nakuk-Maku peoples sudden decision to leave their previous lives and lifestyle behind is strange. After all, it couldn't be more different- their old lifestyle involved living deep in the forest with virtually no possessions, moving every few days. The New York Times states it is unclear why they decided to leave, and mentions the possibility of the drug war pushing them out. However, a quick look on the Internet about the issue brought up many articles that portray the Nakuk as refugees. For example, an article on Survival International called Nomads killed, and others flee as fighting rages, serves as a negation of the optimistic tone of the Times article concerning the Nakuk's situation. The United Nations website has this to say:

...In a related development, the UN issued the latest in a series of warnings today that Colombia’s indigenous communities are threatened with extinction because of the country’s four decades of civil conflict and the violence associated with the cocaine drug trade.
The Nukak Maku’s population has declined by almost 60 per cent in the last 20 years and today they number less than 500 members, of whom more than half have been forcibly displaced from their homes, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said.
The Nukak, who live in small nomadic groups of six to 30 and speak only their own language, have fallen victim to malaria and flu since their first contact with outsiders in 1988, and now their lands have been occupied by coca growers and parties to the conflict.

So now I am left feeling depressed, for the threatened Nakuk population, and regarding the Times' oversimplified, overly upbeat, reporting on the Nakuk, which is, incidentally, the most emailed article of today.

How Opal Mehta Fell From Grace

2006-05-09T17:59:00.000-04:00

I read "How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life," just because I can't believe a Harvard student was stupid enough to plagiarize from numerous currently popular sources to create this bestseller, that has now been pulled off the shelves for that very reason. The author, Kaavya Viswanathan, now a sophomore at Harvard, stole entire paragraphs- changing only the name of the characters or small details- from Megan McCaffrey's coming of age series. Unfortunately for this student, it was the Harvard newspaper that broke this story, and it was picked up everywhere else. Anyway the similarities to a few different written works have been extensively discussed, but I haven't heard much of anything about the fact that she stole scenes and plot points from Tina Fey's movie, Mean Girls. In the book, just like the movie, a clueless but pretty girl enters the upper echelon of high school society, by joining into a false friendship with 3 mean (2 blondes, 1 other) but ever so popular girls with their own set of grooming rules- you can only wear your hair down, etc (the girls are called the Haute Bitchez, in the plagiarized version, the Plastics in Mean Girls). The scene in which one of the mean girls complements a wannabe on an item of clothing, then disses it when it she walks away, is in both the movie and the book, as is the clueless girl wearing a tight dress at her own party. Also, the idea that the clueless girl messes up things with her true crush by becoming popular is a major part of the plot in both, and the link between one of the other popular girls and that crush. So anyway, it's quite obvious that the author stole from the movie, and she even mentions the movie itself and Lindsey Lohan in her book. So why isn't this such an issue as are all the instances of taking the scenes from books? Are movies not respected as creative property in the same way as novels, or are they not subject to the same copyright laws?

Let them eat cake

2006-05-08T15:55:00.000-04:00

It's always nice when people acknowledge your birthday, but it was a little odd to get an email from myself. If you go on futureme.org, you can write an email to be delivered to yourself sometime in the future. So, apparently, on June 10th of last year, I was sitting around with nothing to do, and wished myself a happy birthday for this year (I also told myself to buy something "on me"- what a dork). But anyway, even though it is tough to know what pronouns to use in addressing yourself, it is a cool idea. Users can also choose to make their emails public, so you can read how other people talk to themselves- it's a real mix, from those that berate, encourage, chide, belittle, or express sympathy to themselves. A lot of people tell themselves they hope they're not dead- which is counterintuitive if you ask me. Anyway, after reading a few public ones, this one was the best I stumbled across:

hey you! YOU BETTER BE A SWEET ASS NINJA BY NOW! AND BE TRAVELLING THE WORLD!!!

(written Fri Dec 23, 2005, to be delivered Sun Dec 31, 2006)
http://www.futureme.org/public.php?id=169228

It's A Wonderful Pope

2006-05-07T17:20:00.000-04:00

Has anyone else noticed a striking resemblance between the Pope and Clarence Oddbody (the hapless angel from It's a Wonderful Life (click on the link to see a 30 second version of the movie, with bunnies))? I realized this when the Pope was featured (first one below) as one of those odd pictures that some news places collect into a slideshow.
And, if I'm not mistaken, the Pope rings bells. Hmmm.....

The Pope

Clarence (on left)

The Pope

Clarence

WWFSMD?

2006-05-05T15:26:00.000-04:00

I have to link to this page, Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, because it is hilarious, involves pirates, and because I find the design of the Flying Spaghetti Monster monstrously appealing, aesthetically. The Monster is just beautiful, and will definitely be making an appearance on October 31, 2006 in the guise of Me. Anyway, see excerpts below of the letter written by Bobby Henderson, concerned citizen, although you should read the whole thing on the webpage. This sentence "We feel strongly that the overwhelming scientific evidence pointing towards evolutionary processes is nothing but a coincidence, put in place by Him" reminds me of my previous discussion on those who don't believe in dinosaurs.

I am writing you with much concern after having read of your hearing to decide whether the alternative theory of Intelligent Design should be taught along with the theory of Evolution. I think we can all agree that it is important for students to hear multiple viewpoints so they can choose for themselves the theory that makes the most sense to them. I am concerned, however, that students will only hear one theory of Intelligent Design.

Let us remember that there are multiple theories of Intelligent Design. I and many others around the world are of the strong belief that the universe was created by a Flying Spaghetti Monster. It was He who created all that we see and all that we feel.

I’m sure you now realize how important it is that your students are taught this alternate theory. It is absolutely imperative that they realize that observable evidence is at the discretion of a Flying Spaghetti Monster. Furthermore, it is disrespectful to teach our beliefs without wearing His chosen outfit, which of course is full pirate regalia. I cannot stress the importance of this enough, and unfortunately cannot describe in detail why this must be done as I fear this letter is already becoming too long. The concise explanation is that He becomes angry if we don’t.

You may be interested to know that global warming, earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural disasters are a direct effect of the shrinking numbers of Pirates since the 1800s.

Stiff Neck Girl

2006-05-04T14:38:00.000-04:00

I woke up this morning with a terrible crick in my neck, and it persists. I have to avoid turning my head to the right. It goes a bit, hurts, then refuses to go any further. What a wimp! I tell my neck. You can do it! I say. Unfortunately my inspired peptalks are failing and I end up jerking my head in a Frankenstein-esque manner. The pills I took are also failing, and have left me sleepy beyond compare and wishing I could pull a George Costanza and curl up under my desk and nap. But instead, I ignore the painful stapeling (stapling?) "work" piling in my cubicle and write here.

I also googled my condition, which 9 times out of 10 is a bad idea, due to the fact that something scary comes up with everything. With the internet and a little imagination, a bruise can become thrombocytopenia. With this type of thinking I found I could have a subarachnoid hemorrhage, (which sounds like an underworld spider bleeding disease) or I could have slept on my neck wrong. Or, it could be a stapeling (stapling?) induced injury, which neglected to come up in my googling, but is pretty likely.

Back to life, back to reality...

2006-05-02T15:09:00.000-04:00

Flying back into JFK airport after a lovely vacation in Vieques, Puerto Rico, I was pleased to realize I had missed not only my cat, roommate, and the plethora of New York food options, but also Manhattan itself. This first dawned on me as I watched from the sky as the sun set over the panorama of buildings, but it really hit home when I directed the cab driver to my apartment by saying, "drop me off towards the end- on the right side of the
street- you can just pull up right in front of those police officers arresting my neighbor. Thanks!"

Of course, New York City is also a bit of a shock after spending the week being roused by roosters, on a rural island similar in size, and in nothing else, to Manhattan. Vieques doesn't have one stop light, and, as of 2000, had 69.5 persons/km2, whereas Manhattan has 25,800 persons/km2. However, for a small, sparsely populated place, Vieques has a tumultous and interesting history, and an incredible amount of beauty (unfortunately, I can't even begin to describe the awesome-ness of the bioluminescent bay- you just have to go & see it for yourself).

Picture below is of a person making a snow-angel in water lit by dinoflagellates in the bioluminescent bay.

Vieques appears to be perched vicariously at the edge of more transformation- from a sleepy, affordable beach destination to a more crowded resort area. As of now there is plenty of tourism, with a range of hotels and restaurants to accomodate. However, a big W resort goes up in 2007, and ten years from now, the landscape may be unrecognizeable. After all, it's a cheap and easy flight away from New York, and it is just gorgeous. The reason resorts haven't taken over yet is because the Navy occupied Vieques until 2003. They used Vieques as a testing ground for bombs and the like, until the people of Vieques were able to protest enough to get them out. Their occupation left a large expanse of the island (about 2/3) unpopulated, and in general, slowed the tourism process back 40 or 50 years I'd say. So now plenty of land is available, which many Americans are buying up as I write, for time-shares, summer homes, retirement homes, and the like. Vieques natives are once again objecting. However, although the people of Vieques managed to get the Navy out, the American landbuyers may prove to be more difficult to overcome. When I was visiting there was a lot of anti-American-buyer graffiti in Vieques, asking Americans to take their money home, or simply stating "foreigners go home." This may intimidate some, but I think in the end, the place is just too pretty for its own good, and the land will go.

My hope is just that, as it develops, the pressure to change in an ecologically sound way also increases, and Vieques becomes a destination known for preserving a rural, environmentally-friendly character. With its wild horses, loud roosters, and large ex-Navy unpopulated areas, it distinguishes itself for its nature and its beaches-sans-high rises. As it grows in popularity that should continue to be a focus of its tourism, as it is of its beauty.

Speaking of change:
This is an article from the New York Times from March 2003 (when the Navy still occupied Vieques), and here is one from April 2006.

Dinosaurs? Or "Missionary Lizards"?

2006-04-21T15:36:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, coming out of Starbucks, I heard a woman turn to her friend and say, "Well, I don't believe in dinosaurs." This odd statement has been resounding in my head ever since, so I decided to google "belief in dinosaurs" today. I found it to be a much more controversial subject than I ever imagined. Apparently some people consider dinosaurs to be a "dinosaur myth" that is perpetuated by the "dinosaur industry." To quote my source here, Dinosaurs: Science or Science Fiction, "This article will discuss the possibility that there may have been an ongoing effort since the earliest dinosaur "discoveries" to plant, mix and match bones of various animals, such as crocodiles, alligators, iguanas, giraffes, elephants, cattle, kangaroos, ostriches, emus, dolphins, whales, rhinoceroses, etc. to construct and create a new man-made concept prehistoric animal called 'dinosaurs'." From what I gather from this site, the fact that paleontologists and scientists are the ones to generally find dinosaur bones should be taken as evidence that it's a hoax- because these are people with a vested interest in dinosaurs. Now there is a fine example of "evidence" that makes the opposite of sense. Paleontologists are the ones finding them, because they are the ones looking for them. Was it only manufacturers of plastic dinosaurs finding dinosaur "evidence" then I might get in this whole conspiracy theory bandwagon. But no- it's educated, interested individuals doing a job in a specific location using excavation tools and technology. So anyway, at the end of all this very logical information the website forwards a hypothesis on the motivation behind the elaborate dinosaur myth:

The pro-evolutionary bias is evident with this organization promoting dinosaur discoveries.

As mentioned earlier, motivations for the possible invention of the dinosaur include trying to prove evolution, trying to disprove or cast doubt on the Bible and the existence of God, trying to disprove the young-earth theory, and trying to disprove creationism. Of course, the devil's ultimate goal is to cast doubt on the deity of Jesus Christ and prevent people's eternal salvation.

The name of Devils Canyon Science and Learning Center may possibly provide good insight to the real source of the dinosaur concept.

Now I also found that there appears to be plenty of people that think dinosaurs existed, but not millions of years ago- instead, they existed at the same time as humans- Adam and Eve, specifically. For this concept, much pictorial evidence is offered.

Now, if you think I'm creating some elaborate disbelief hoax, you can read further in a book called The Great Dinosaur Mystery: Solved! which can help you to, "learn how to effectively use dinosaurs as “Missionary Lizards.”"
Anyway, if dinosaurs were some wild hoax, they would be a fucking awesome hoax, because how cool are dinosaurs?!

Romantic Acceptance

2006-04-20T16:10:00.000-04:00

Picture from the New York Times.

Mentally handicapped individuals face a truly difficult barrier in effecting change regarding their status or circumstances: relatively few are capable of advocating for themselves, or understanding what changes
should be made and how to make them. This voicelessness has contributed to allowing mentally handicapped people to be treated despicably in the past, when they were packed into institutions, abused, and viewed as sub-human. Horrific stories abound from this treatment- for example at one typical school of the 1960s in Massachusetts, "Conditions... were appalling for those with Down syndrome, cerebral palsy and other true physical or mental conditions. Given little treatment or training, they were often straitjacketed or tied to chairs and left soaked in urine and feces."

Workers were not equipped to deal with their mentally handicapped clients, and a sad marriage of cruelty and power, rather than empathy and understanding, dictated the way in which these institutions were run. This same phenomenon was famously distilled in a simple classroom exercise of separating out the blue-eyed from the brown-eyed kids to demonstrate racial prejudice:

That spring morning 37 years ago, the blue-eyed children were set apart from the children with brown or green eyes. Elliott pulled out green construction paper armbands and asked each of the blue-eyed kids to wear one. “The browneyed people are the better people in this room,” Elliott began. “They are cleaner and they are smarter.”

She knew that the children weren’t going to buy her pitch unless she came up with a reason, and the more scientific to these Space Age children of the 1960s, the better. “Eye color, hair color and skin color are caused by a chemical,” Elliott went on, writing MELANIN on the blackboard. Melanin, she said, is what causes intelligence. The more melanin, the darker the person’s eyes—and the smarter the person. “Brown-eyed people have more of that chemical in their eyes, so brown-eyed people are better than those with blue eyes,” Elliott said. “Blue-eyed people sit around and do nothing. You give them something nice and they just wreck it.” She could feel a chasm forming between the two groups of students.

I think there are some similarities between this experiment and establishing an IQ cut off point and treating all the people below as completely inferior. It is dissimiliar, in that this classification is not arbitrary, but there is a likeness concerning the notions of power. Establishing this IQ point demarcates those below as those without power, just as the blueeyed children were, and just as the guards were in the Stanford Prison Experiment.

As changes in the way mentally handicapped people are treated shows, their abilities lie on a spectrum and not solely on the other side of an IQ boundary (or precipice, as it was once considered). This type of more inclusive thinking has quickly and radically changed the perspective on mentally handicapped people, and the circumstances provided for them to live their lives. Now developmentally disabled people are provided with assistance in order to live with as much independence as possible, often earning money, making their own choices, indulging in their own interests and hobbies, and attending social events with their friends. Group home residents have individualized action plans specifically designed to foster their independence and socialization, curtailed to their personality, abilities, and interests. Disability rights activists worked hard to get society to this point, and as an article printed in the Times today shows, they are now working on taking it to another step.

This article, Learning to Savor a Full Life, Love Life Included, concerns allowing mentally handicapped individuals to pursue physical romantic relationships. Educating mentally handicapped people about romantic partners, allowing them to exercise their right to have a partner, and valuing their ability to form romantic attachment, takes their rights to a logical yet impressive level of acceptance.

A generation ago, young adults like Ms. Graham and Mr. Ruvolo were generally confined to institutions, with no expectation of a normal life. All that changed in 1975, when a court order closed the notorious Willowbrook State School on Staten Island and moved its residents, and others like them across the country, into community settings to live as fully as their limitations allowed.

That could include attending neighborhood schools and holding salaried jobs. Now many men and women in their 20's and 30's, encouraged from childhood to be independent, expect the same when it comes to expressing their romantic and sexual needs.

...Far safer, Dr. Levy said, is allowing such needs to be met in the group home, after a consent evaluation by a psychologist. That evaluation tests knowledge of birth control and disease prevention, the need to limit sexual activity to private locations, the difference between legal and illegal sexual acts and how to avoid exploitive situations.

Oh the places you'll go

2006-04-18T11:26:00.000-04:00

The map above is from a website called World66 that lets you check off countries you've visited and then it makes a pretty map and tells you what percentage you've been to. Pretty cool. The website in general takes the whole readers-edit-it-wikipedia-idea to the travel guide genre.

Happy Easter Aftermath

2006-04-17T11:11:00.000-04:00

Eggs in Three Baskets

2006-04-12T12:47:00.000-04:00

Holidays like Easter leave someone without a religion a little at a loss. It still matters, it is still an exceptional day, but it's difficult to say how much or why. Like most holidays, it usually boils down to a seasonally expected combination of food dishes and family gathering. With Easter, I think of lots of chocolate, something good baked by my mom, and some limp ham, rolls, and mashed potatoes we used to eat at my Granny's place. Which was then followed by lots of chocolate: Irish tradition dictated more desserts than people at the table. The excitement of these desserts, and the loveliness of a basket of goodies, consistently overwhelmed my curiousity of the particularities of a day devoted to celebrating a large bunny with a preference for pastel eggs. To be honest, I still don't get the logic, and I am still more interested in whatever my mom baked.

Then in college I got the chance to celebrate Passover with friends. Celebrating Passover is a wonderful experience, I think in general, but also from the perspective of an atheist. Passover has a script! Unlike Easter, which surely takes some understanding derived from countless Sundays spent in pews, Passover has a great narrative, tells you what to say and when and explains each part. It even tells you when to drink, and tells you to drink often enough, that you end up drunk by the end. With that drunkenness also comes a strange satisfaction that I don't experience with Christian holidays; a feeling of having fully completed a celebration; of having reached a destination, with fellow revelers, to the end of the story.

Attempting both celebrations whenever possible may seem like enough for one atheist, until I stumbled upon a third way to honor the season today. Apparently, Norwegians celebrate Easter by gorging themselves on... crime stories. According to this article:

Sales of crime books jump around 500 percent in the week leading up to Easter, estimates bookshop chain Tanum, while television and radio programmers schedule back-to-back thrillers over the Easter break, which in Norway lasts 5-1/2 days.

...Nobody knows when the Norwegian tradition of crime telling at Easter began, but their warrior ancestors -- the Vikings -- were renowned for raiding trips to the British Isles.

On their return the Vikings would settle down with flasks of mead, an alcoholic drink made from honey, and recount tales of murder and pillage to their women and children.

So, admittedly, this is a bit creepy. But still a celebration I can easily participate in- so excuse me while I go get a crime novel, some chocolate, some matzah, and some cheap red wine- it's holiday time.

Elevator Mindset

2006-04-11T14:29:00.000-04:00

I pushed my way into a packed elevator following lunch today. The fellow anonymous businesspeople and I all scrambled to push our specific floor buttons and step into an egalitarian personal space arrangement. The machine rose and conveyed us silently upwards. Everyone was demure and mindful of moving out of the way appropriately for those disembarking.
When it was my turn, as I crossed the threshold, I opened my mouth to yell: "SEE YA!!!! WOULDN'T WANT TO BE YA!!!!!!!" But instead I smiled and told the receptionist it was nice outside as the doors clicked shut behind me.

The Bidding has Opened

2006-04-10T11:28:00.000-04:00

Sharyn is in this playwrighting group called Youngblood that came up with the wacky but brilliant idea to allow people to bid on the opportunity to get their life turned into a play. Click on ebay link below to bid for YOUR 15 minutes (plus) of fame (as promised by Andy Warhol):

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=6620300570

From the New York Times
On Your Life Story Onstage

All those people who have always thought their lives more scintillating than that of the average Joe or Jane can now bid on the chance to have it recreated onstage. A collective of emerging playwrights known as Youngblood and working under the aegis of the Ensemble Studio Theater will happily do the writing. Starting today, bidding begins on eBay for "True Life Story of [Your Name Here]," a play yet to be written. The winning bidder will meet with a Youngblood team, have their story adapted to the stage and be exposed in front of audiences at the Brick Theater in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, as part of the $ellout Festival, beginning June 2. This will not be a play about a procrastinator, though: the auction ends in 10 days.
STEVEN McELROY

Madlibs- The State of the Union is dim!

2006-04-07T13:49:00.000-04:00

Jen unknowingly contributes:

STATE OF THE UNION

KARYN:
Furry evening, distinguished baby mamas, ripe senators, members of the Supreme pimp (aka steve), my fellow muffins. I am cantankerous to announce that the state of our union is hot!

JEN:

Burnt evening, distinguished leaves, crisp senators, members of the Supreme banana, my fellow chairs. I am light to announce that the state of our union is bright!

STEPH:

Gloomy evening, distinguished peanut butter sandwiches, colorful senators, members of the Supreme sailboat, my fellow monkeys. I am sparkly to announce that the state of our union is red!

JULIE:

Sanguine evening, distinguished snots, oversized senators, members of the Supreme astronaut, my fellow crocodiles. I am hairy to announce that the state of our union is dim!

AMANDA:

(So) scandalous evening, distinguished balloons, red senators, members of the Supreme pocket, my fellow zebras. I am soft to announce that the state of our union is noble!

How to Criticize Advice

2006-04-06T10:20:00.000-04:00

Today I stumbled upon Wiki how to lists- a rapidly growing database of how to advice. Some are interesting (How to Buy Your Own Private Island- cue Adam clicking so fast he almost sprains his wrist), some odd ones (How to Make a Rice Sock) and many geared toward teens. Regarding those, I think that it's amazing how many times people will give the advice to just "be yourself." For example, Step 1 of "How to Be the Type of Nerd That Girls Love" is to be yourself. It is Step 7 in how to be Miss Popular.

I hate to say it, but to "be yourself" is not necessarily good advice. The truth is, some people should probably not be themselves. Some people are assholes and would be better off as someone else entirely. Other people
are quite nice and should mostly be themselves, but to mask a couple traits, should master some features of someone else. There, that's my advice.

Now, to help Amanda out, here are some tips from Wiki ehow on How to Get Gothic in 1 Month:

1. Get a journal.
2. You don't immediately have to start wearing black. Nor does it have
to be all black, or at all times. Dark purple, blue or grey are
acceptable alternatives to plain black.
7. Read Robert Browning, Lord Byron, and other Romantic poets.
Dostoevsky will also aid in establishing a suitable life outlook.
9. Being Goth isn't about being cool, it's about being one with yourself
and LOOKING cool.
10. Dye your hair black. Or purple, or red, or blue. If you're a little
worried about the parents, just put in streaks.
12. Listen to your personal music device [ipod/walkman etc.] with the
volume up all the way.
16. Get a pet and be oddly attached to it. eg a mouse or rat that you
take everywhere. Other suitable animals are black or grey cats, frogs
and bats if you get one. Madagascar hissing cockroaches are great too;
be sure to show your little buddy to teachers. Dogs are seldom Goth,
although greyhounds have some potential, being so skinny and all.

Orchids!

2006-04-04T15:57:00.000-04:00

Pictures taken by Ali, Bird and I at the New York Botanical Gardens Orchid Show- incredible!

Friday Office Haiku

2006-03-31T15:49:00.000-05:00

my coworker ate
a twinkie- the most drama
encountered today

No, but seriously guys...

2006-03-30T12:38:00.000-05:00

Sad but true! From the Natalie Dee website. Check it out.

Pointless Barking

2006-03-29T15:34:00.000-05:00

It may be pretentious, or something, but I will admit it anyway: I love New Yorker cartoons. However, it has been going on for about a year, maybe longer, that on the backpage of the New Yorker magazine there is a cartoon caption contest, where they give you the picture and you're supposed to provide the witticism. You can check it out here. I'm not sure why I'm providing the link for this contest, because what I want to say is, I'm sick of it. It's just never that funny and I become sad, each week, to find that I can't come up with anything good for the caption. But then again, most of the time, nobody does.

However, all this was redeemed when I came across this McSweeney's List:

Future Winners of the New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest.
BY ROY FUTTERMAN -

"You are doing something unusual, Harold!"
"I certainly am in a bar with other businessmen."
"This desert island is a bummer."
"I love being wealthy in the Hamptons."
"I'm saying a cliché in a different context, Pam."
"Boy, I sure do like intercourse."
"I'm thinking something incongruous to what I'm doing."
"Wanda, we are doing some nutty things in this picture!"

Starting from the womb

2006-03-27T16:09:00.000-05:00

Some days, like today, because I am not getting any damn email, I gad through the "next blog" link on the upper righthand corner of the page to see what I can stumble across. The most surprising thing from this meandering through blogspot has been the excessive amount of baby blogs. Many parents are choosing to blog from a child's inception. Here's one example, that starts in the womb, but really there has to be a ton based on how many I've seen without looking for them. I came across one blog that was supposedly written by the baby... unfortunately, that was so saccharine that if I tried to link to it, it would melt.

This is- I guess- cute in a way, but basically it is a strange trend. I mean, parents can keep far-flung friends and relatives in the loop, and broadcast their love for the child. But from the kid's perspective- I would imagine it would be fun to see baby pictures of yourself and all that, and it's nice to know your parents care a lot about your infantile self, but this particular blogging phenomenon brings it to a weird microlevel that mentions every little stage of development. What happens when your parents have set up a blog for you from day one and then you get to middle school and your crush googles you? It's kind of awkward that they could read about your first burp, hear a podcast of you mispronouncing a word, and see pictures from your first bath.

One post I read on Red Herring, by a blogging parent, had this to say on it:

My efforts to archive my children's lives stand in stark contrast to the scant documentation of my own past. My entire childhood is preserved in just under 200 pictures, a few letters, and a couple of yearbooks: it all fits in a single box. In contrast, I can take 200 pictures of my daughter at a birthday party. At my current rate, each of my children is in danger of having me take 50,000 pictures of them by the time they turn 18. It used to be that only presidents and Nobel laureates had such thoroughly documented lives. Thanks to digital technology, the archive – once a symbol of political power, fame, or wealth – is being democratized.

Is this a good thing? Is the idea that someday the child will take over this blog? Who would want that much of their self on the internet? I mean part of the fun of the internet is the idea that you can reinvent yourself ("on the internet, no one knows you are a dog")-- but that is not an easy thing to do if you have existed on the web before you were cognizant of existence itself.

Anyway, as it turns out, pets can have their own blogs too.

Money, Squash, and Paperclips

2006-03-24T13:18:00.000-05:00

I got a terrible feeling this morning: that I was going to look back on this period in my life, in my 60s or something, and kick myself for not getting rich. Perhaps this does not seem a legitimate reason to berate myself- I'm over having missed the dot.com boom. But what is occuring now is the wacky idea boom- the gimmick concept- where if you can come up with an idea that enough people will be motivated to email around or bring up over the water cooler, you are golden.

My prime example is this guy, who started out with a red paperclip and a determination to barter his way up to getting a house. Seriously. To quote him, "My name is Kyle MacDonald and I am making a series of up-trades for bigger or better things up to my goal of a house. I started with one red paperclip on July 12th, 2005." He's currently got a recording contract to trade for something.

But there is also the more modest internet use... the people that find a way and a community online to indulge their personal obsession in a (hopefully) money-making way. Many cartoonists, for example. And also sincere seedsmen. If anyone is in the market for some hard-to-find seeds, why not buy from a man that is not afraid to showcase his love for squash:

"Jeremiath C. Gettle is a young entrepreneur who has a passion for preserving unique and colorful ethnic seed varieties before they totally disappear... Born in September 1980, Jeremiath says that he has been interested in gardening from as early as he can remember. At the age of 4 years, Jeremiath was planting his own garden of scallop squash and yellow pear tomatoes. At age 7, while other children were opening lemonade stands, Jeremiath was producing "play" seed catalogs."

http://gettle.org/

What to bring?

2006-03-22T14:40:00.000-05:00

For my last class tonight instead of having a regular class, and meeting in our regular classroom, we are having a party. The party will be at another student's apartment (shockingly, I did not volunteer mine, as it could fit approximately 3 people at a time, and one of those people would be standing in the shower). I am overly excited about this party, not necessarily because I think it will be a really fun time, but more because I don't know What it will be like. I realized that I like- in a sort of love/hate relationship way- going into strange social situations. Seeing everyone in my class, which to begin with is an odd mix of people of varied ages and professions, at a random place, with alcoholic drinks available, promises to be pretty damn awkward. Yes.

Now, as part of this shindig, we are supposed to bring something, some food or drink item. This whole bringing something thing has a tendency to (in the same vein as overexcitement) overly stress me out. I think too much on it, I build it up in my head. I feel this weird responsibility to arrive with baked goods even when a bottle of wine would suffice.

For example, for my work Christmas lunch this year I decided to make Rice Krispie treats. Rice Krispie treats are perhaps the ultimate in low key desserts, yet tasty, and would be pretty much ideal in fulfilling my obligation. So the night before the Christmas luncheon I started out efficiently producing typical rectangular Rice Krispie treats, but then, as often happens, I could not leave well enough alone. I thought to myself- well, it is a Christmas party, maybe I should make some snowballs. Then, after a couple of those were satisfactorily executed, I said- well, if I stacked these, I could make snowmen. Then, as long as I am making snowmen, I might as well make a few Christmas trees. Then maybe I'll put sprinkles on all of it... and I'm left with this smorgasboard plate of weird-looking treats dripping with sprinkles. So I'm going to try my hardest to just pick up some wine. We'll see.

Dangerous Work

2006-03-21T15:51:00.000-05:00

I was pleased to see this article from the New York Times, Killing in Texas Spotlights Attacks on Social Workers; it's about time that gets some attention. When I worked as a child protective social worker
threats and fear were considered part and parcel to the job. Seasoned workers had a repertoire of stories concerning the clients who threatened to kill them/clients who tried to fight them/the situations they walked into
that they should have been walking out of, and more. I heard more than my share of these stories, because it was most fun to share them with green young white new workers- for which I was the poster child.

One story involved a worker that used the two year old child he was holding as a shield from the child's father who tried to attack him. Another tough, large female worker told me a story about running into her client in the
grocery store. In her words, the client got all up in her face, wanting to fight, so the investigator ripped off her own badge and returned the challenge. The client backed off- you would to if you were faced with that particular investigator.

A study released last week by the National Association of Social Workers found that 55 percent of 5,000 licensed social workers surveyed said they faced safety issues on the job. Sixty-eight percent of them said their employers had not adequately addressed their concerns. A survey in 2002 of 800 workers found 19 percent had been victims of violence and 63 percent had been threatened.

There was often mutterings about whether we could get "hazardous duty" benefits (like the police have- getting to retire after 20 years) as we were regularly expected to go places and enter situations, alone, that cops did with guns and partners. When I requested to bring another worker along I often got ridiculed by my supervisor, and I also felt like a jerk, dragging a coworker with cases of their own with me to the apartment of a drug-addicted client in the projects who was likely to slam the door in our faces. I had a coworker that resorted to bringing her husband along on some frightening home visits.

The times when workers arranged to do visits in conjunction with the police also proved aggravating. The police often showed up a couple hours after the worker was expecting them, and their role was never clear. About a month after I started the job, I went out with another worker on a domestic violence case. The worker and I were helping a woman move out of her abusive husband's house. I went along to speak Spanish with the woman. The worker and I thought it would be a situation in which we picked up a few bags of her and her baby's stuff and moved on. However, the client had another idea. She took this opportunity to basically strip the house of everything- from the sheets on the bed to the pans in the kitchen cabinet. This took a long time, and was not enjoyable, both because it was 90 degrees outside and she lived on the third floor, and because the abusive husband and 3 or 4 of his male relatives glared at us, the entire time, as we trooped up and down the stairs. On this occasion, a policeman was present- sort of. The policeman sat outside in his car and watched us also, for about an hour, and then he came in and said his shift was over and he was taking off, but the abusive guy that was sitting on the porch, staring us down, would not be a problem. Thanks a lot, we said.

Often, child protective social workers are expected to enter into situations that are comically dangerous; for example, I was supposed to give a ride to court to the client I was bringing into court to testify against in order to remove her children. The client decided not to come to court, thankfully- the possibility of that drive going well would have been a hell of a lot less likely than it ending in violence.

So my question is, why are police awarded for the dangerous nature of their work (and I respect that- they do not have an easy job) and social workers historically not acknowledged? One possibility is that social workers are mainly women, and women often do not receive the pay or benefits men are likely to, nor would the work they are doing be recognized in the same way as perilous. Another possibility is that people do not want to acknowledge the depth and severity of societal problems that require social workers, and in what a dangerous state society is actually in due to those problems.

Plans

2006-03-17T15:08:00.000-05:00

From website Toothpaste for Dinner.

Long Vermont Roads

2006-03-16T13:03:00.000-05:00

The other day Adam asked me what was the best meal I had ever eaten?
This was an awesome question because it forced me to reflect on many purely positive experiences; to try to determine when delicious food and good company combined to a near-perfect state of a blissful "best meal."

What came to mind was dinner at the Owl in Vermont last summer: chili, fresh mozzarella, tomato, and basil salad, chicken and corn on the cob grilled on the fire, beer, smores, wine.

I don't know if I have ever tasted- or will ever again taste- anything as good as that corn on the cob.

The cool thing about this homemade meal is everyone was at work on some part of it, and when we sat down together to eat it, the collective pride regarding the spread about equaled the copious amount of food.
And it was fresh, and it was summer, and why the hell is it back to being cold outside?!

Odd-toed Ungulate

2006-03-15T13:51:00.000-05:00

Like most red-blooded Americans, I am finding myself thinking about rhinos today.

Top Three Facts:
1. Rhinoceros horns, unlike those of other horned mammals, consist of keratin, densely compacted hair
2. A group of rhinoceros is called a "crash"
3. The horn of the Rhino is not attached to the skull

"The Rhinoceros" (1515), by Dürer. In 1515 the German artist Albrecht Dürer made a woodcut of a rhinoceros, an ominous-looking creature with a sharply pointed horn on its snout. It wore a duded-up suit of armor from which emerged four scaly legs with cloven feet. Dürer had never seen the real thing; neither had most other Europeans. But his widely distributed image, conjured up from descriptions of an actual beast given to King Manuel I of Portugal by the governor of his Indian territories, was accepted in Europe for more than 200 years. It even inspired part of the design for a bronze door at the cathedral of Pisa in 1602. (The real rhinoceros, dispatched as a gift to Pope Leo X, could not serve as a reality check because it went down with the ship transporting it to Italy.)

I think it is pretty amazing Durer came up with the woodcut above without ever having laid eyes on a rhinoceros. Well, at least I think it is impressive. Come to think of it, I've never laid eyes on a rhino either. For all I know the existence of rhinoceros could be an elaborate hoax, a crazy conservation money scheme.

I do think there should be more in the way of elaborate hoaxes.

But anyway, in my thinking about rhinos, I did find that "rhinomania" was enjoyed in Europe in the eighteenth century due to an early marketing campaign. There is a book about it titled CLARA'S GRAND TOUR: Travels with a Rhinoceros in Eighteenth-Century Europe by Glynis Ridley. Apparently, according to one review, "fashionable people started to accessorize their hair, clothes and carriages a la rhinoceros, using
feathers and ribbons to simulate Clara's body parts." Book summary:

For nearly 20 years in the mid-1700s, a 3-ton Indian rhino named Clara
traveled Europe--from Rotterdam to Breslau, Naples, Marseilles, and many
places in between. Making this an even more amazing achievement is that
it happened before railways and modern roads existed. Clara, orphaned
when she was only months old, was hand raised by a Dutch merchant in
Assam, India. When she was 3 years old, a Dutch sea captain brought her
to Europe. There, she became a sensation. In one of the first marketing
campaigns of all time, her owner promoted Clara's appearances to
peasants and royalty alike. Both came to see her. There were Clara
product tie-ins galore: poems, songs, fashions, portraits, etchings, and
bronze figurines. Her image adorned everything from tin coins to fine
porcelain, and a fortune for the Dutch captain.

Smells like Spring!!!!!!!

2006-03-10T12:22:00.000-05:00

Today
by Billy Collins

If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze

that it made you want to throw
open all the windows in the house

and unlatch the door to the canary's cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,

a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies

seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking

a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,

releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage

so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting

into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day.

Neon Bunny/Blue Cat: You Decide

2006-03-10T10:57:00.000-05:00

‘Alba’ is a transgenic albino rabbit: She contains a jellyfish gene that makes her glow green when illuminated with the correct light. Alba was created by French scientists who injected green fluorescent protein (GFP) of a Pacific Northwest jellyfish into the fertilized egg of an albino rabbit.

What is art? is perhaps a question that has been asked enough times to seem pretty trite. I think a better question for our day and age is what is the line between art and science? As science gets wackier and more impressive, various robotic things and genetic twists and outer space images are more stunning, innovative, and thought-provoking than a lot of "art."
The ability to manipulate technology has rapidly become more important to visual artists, musicians, photographers, filmmakers than a lot of the classic tools involved with these trades. Artists on the cutting edge are pairing up with scientists and making other's scientific know-how and work into their own art.
This brings me to the rabbit above. The living rabbit, named Alba, was a piece by Eduardo Kac called Transgenic bunny. Wikipedia has this to say on it:

Kac considers himself a "transgenic artist," using biotechnology and genetics to create provocative works that concommitantly revel in scientific techniques and critique them. In what is probably his most famous work, GFP Bunny, Kac collaborated with a French laboratory to procure a green-fluorescent rabbit; a rabbit implanted with a GFP (Green Flourescent Protein) gene from a type of jellyfish. Under certain blue light, the rabbit fluoresces green. Kac's wife and daughter helped name the rabbit, Alba. After a brief stint as an installation work, wherein Kac and Alba would live in a pseudo-domicile in a gallery, Alba was to return home to Evanston to live with Kac's family. At the last minute, before the scheduled release of Alba to Kac, the lab retracted their agreement.

Alba ostensibly died prematurely in the lab, of unknown causes. The death raised some interesting questions, including that of Alba's age (in relation to the premature nature of the death), causing some to question whether Kac was actively involved in the creation of the GFP Bunny, or whether he merely "purchased" a specimen already planned and/or living at the lab. GFP plants, fish, and mammals have, in fact, been long-term residents of science laboratories. The GFP gene is typically used as a type of marker, that, when attached to a separate genetic modification or gene, illustrates where that symbiotic gene manifests in the organism. Notably, since Alba's conception, GFP zebrafish have hit the commercial market under the trademarked name, GloFish(tm).

Kac, in response to the lab's retraction of Alba's liberty, flies a flag outside of his home, sporting a silhouette of a green rabbit. Apparently, this is the transgenic artist's version of keeping the porch light burning, so to speak.

My junior year of high school my friend Jaime and I were bored one day after school and we dyed a blue streak- like a skunk's- down the back of my aged cat, Mousey. She did not like it too much, but we thought it was pretty funny... lucky for Mousey, though, she did not have to live out her days in a lab after this experiment. If she had though, you can bet I would still be flying her flag high!

Fido Luggage

2006-03-03T15:28:00.000-05:00

This may be the coolest thing I have ever seen:
Fido Luggage.
A robot piece of luggage that you don't have to worry about dragging around, because it follows you.
Whoa.

Fido Luggage appears, at first glance, to be remarkable only because of its colorful exterior and blob-like shape. But then you might notice it has a tail. And that it moves on its own, heels beside its owner, and changes direction on command. The owner wears a wristband, which holds an on-off switch for activating Fido, and a receiver for programming voice recognition. And in ways that only a robot can be superior to a dog, even when Fido gets old, you can still retrain it to respond to new commands.

Now this is what I like to see from technology!

I watched The Jetsons. I felt they had a lot to offer the future. Yet I have been feeling since maturity struck that there is something lacking in this world- I'm speaking of the void left by slowly developing robotics. Where are the helicopter cars? Why don't I have a robot? Where's the new ease of life technology has brought on? Well this luggage assuages all those concerns in one fell swoop.

Also, that link to the Jetsons found me reading episode's synopsis from the 60s on. Please note I have nothing at all to do at work. Anyway, there were a few that I thought might help us navigate a world that includes more robots:

Mother's Day for Rosie
Rosie wants to meet her mother, who is later discovered to be an obsolete model of a robot maid named Norma. Rosie found out how much she missed her mother when she read one of Elroy's poems that he wrote for Mother's Day at the Little Dipper School. Unfortunately, being a robot, she short-circuits from the tears she cried after reading Elroy's Mother's Day poem. George Jetson who realizes this, tries to bring the scrapped robot, only instead to come back with the original blueprints; but, even only the blueprints satisfy Rosie in the end.
Robot's Revenge
George makes a massage robot very angry. The robot gets fired after George filed the complaint. This calls for revenge, which can be very nasty if the whole world is run by computers and compatible robots.
Wedding Bells for Rosie
Rosie falls in love with the robot of the genitor. To get a "green card" for that robot they need to get married. But can robots get married?

New York Notes

2006-03-03T15:26:00.000-05:00

Things I like:
1. deli flowers on the street
2. the lack of ordinary
3. hummus availability
4. the vague Frankenstein-like look in the eyes of commuters
5. overhearing conversations

Things I dislike:
1. overpriced drinks
2. lack of stars
3. crowdedness of every damn starbucks
4. the vague Frankenstein-like look in the eyes of commuters

New York Notes
by Harvey Shapiro

1.
Caught on a side street
in heavy traffic, I said
to the cabbie, I should
have walked. He replied,
I should have been a doctor.

2.
When can I get on the 11:33
I ask the guy in the information booth
at the Atlantic Avenue Station.
When they open the doors, he says.
I am home among my people.

Also Avoid Strainers

2006-03-01T12:55:00.000-05:00

According to this enlightening article, I, as a Taurus, am supposed to avoid the following things this month:

Taurus (April 20 - May 20)
You might have a hard time getting up in the morning or making a quick decision, Taurus, but once you get going, nobody can stop your forward motion. You love what you love, and there's no arguing with you about it.

What to avoid: Ugly objects; fake environments; quick showers; scratchy clothing; flirty partners; forced change; windowless offices; fast-food jobs; nagging mothers.

Your survival pack: A flush wallet; a chia pet; a chamois scarf; well-fluffed pillows; a faithful lover; a drive in the country; aromatherapy bubble bath; your favorite collection.

However, like all great literature, this piece leaves me with questions as well as answers: How am I to avoid fast-food jobs? And what is a chia pet doing in my survival pack?

El Barrio or Spa Ha?

2006-02-27T14:44:00.000-05:00

"Gentrification refers to the process whereby a low rent neighborhood is transformed into a high rent neighborhood through redevelopment, usually in conjunction with changing demographics and an influx of wealthier residents" (Wikipedia).

The blog of an acquaintance, Bagel in Harlem, was mentioned in a New York Times article this past weekend. The article, "Feeling Settled? Must be time to move," uses her blog, which is about "A Jewish girl from Indiana navigates the maze of New York City real estate and finds herself residing in East Harlem. Her stories reflect upon the notion of ‘home’ and the quest behind finding the right one. This site is dedicated to the search for a Bagel in Harlem," as a springing off point to discuss serial movers- people that frequently change New York City apartments and neighborhoods. Partly because the majority of people have moved in the last year or two, and more or less fit that description, I didn't find the article too intriguing. I was disappointed to see that was the direction the NY Times decided to take regarding "Bagel in Harlem."

To me, Bagel in Harlem is fascinating as a discussion from the perspective of a gentrifier in the serially gentrified neighborhood of East Harlem. A quick look at the history referenced on the website East Harlem Tourism shows an ever-changing ethnic New York City area. Another history account can be found on the Hope Community, Inc. website. From what I can tell, East Harlem started off as the farmland area of New York, provence of the Native Americans. Eventually German and Irish immigrants took over the area, then Italians and Eastern Europeans, to the point that "in the early 1900s East Harlem was home to the largest number of Italians in the country." With World War I and II came settlers of Puerto Rican and African American descent. Throughout the 1900s and especially in the 60s, there were many political struggles waged to determine who would control which aspects (educational, etc) of East Harlem and activists representing the different cultural groups residing in East Harlem became involved in the community. Currently, the neighborhood continues to change as Mexican, Dominican, and South American residents enter the area, as well as artists and musicians, and former Manhattan-ites lured by the real estate deals offered in "Spa Ha."

Newcomers- mostly white yuppies and hipsters, or whatever you want to call them, are just the latest in this chain of influxes, but follow a historical precedent of completely changing the community. The website East-Harlem.com, maintained by Jose B. Rivera, an East Harlem resident and community activist, has plenty to say on this new trend, as he rants about the new name Soho-like name for Spanish Harlem- "Spa Ha"- and "New Residents":

"Spa Ha"
People are moving up here like crazy. Sometimes these newcomers look at us as if saying 'What are you doing here?" Most of the time they just rush on by. But how long will it be before I am the sore thumb, sticking
out and not belonging in my own community because it's very character has changed? It's good to have fresh faces in the community, but this is getting scarry. Am I about to be squeezed out by their ability to pay
higher rents?

"New Residents"
Remember, you are displacing us. If you care at all about us, don't come and together we can show the greedy landlord and real estate interest how not to destroy a community, a lesson they need to learn.

Yet, as reading Bagel in Harlem notes, what looks to be ego and ignorance of the local community can just be fear. In the honest post, "Tough Times," the author describes walking by a bunch of men late at night:

I tell him to stay out of trouble as I walk past him and his posse. It feels good to throw my shoulders back and walk purposefully; to feel tough in a way that extends beyond any mental or physical strength I’ve known. Perhaps it’s part of a reinvention of self that comes with the territory that I find myself living in. Or maybe the badass in me has always been lurking - looking for a place like 125th street to come out. As I make my way home, I pull the belt of my wool coat tighter around my waist, and tug at my ponytail holder to let my hair down.

You Forgot Poland!

2006-02-23T15:26:00.000-05:00

We've been living under Bush's reign for so long, and I am so fiercely aligned with the blue state liberals, I don't feel there is much gained in discussing his idiocy further. However, I can't help but comment briefly on this latest tidbit.

First of all, remember how America needs to break its addiction to oil?

The excerpt from Bush's State of the Union address:

Keeping America competitive requires affordable energy. And here we have a serious problem: America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world. The best way to break this addiction is through technology. Since 2001, we have spent nearly $10 billion to develop cleaner, cheaper, and more reliable alternative energy sources -- and we are on the threshold of incredible advances.

So tonight, I announce the Advanced Energy Initiative -- a 22-percent increase in clean-energy research -- at the Department of Energy, to push for breakthroughs in two vital areas. To change how we power our homes and offices, we will invest more in zero-emission coal-fired plants, revolutionary solar and wind technologies, and clean, safe nuclear energy. (Applause.)

I would applaud that speech excerpt also. Less oil, damn good idea. However, an illustration of how little Bush's administration actually means those sweet-sounding things he reads to the camera becomes apparent when you come across the article "Bush Admits to 'Mixed Signals' Regarding Laboratory on Renewable Energy" from the New York Times.

Basically, this article states that right after Bush talked up looking into different energy sources, his administration cut the budget for it, which resulted in the firing of a bunch of researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. They fired the people that, to quote the president's goal, "develop cleaner, cheaper, and more reliable alternative energy sources." The administration didn't even have the courtesy to wait a few months before letting them go. Bush just said one thing and fired another.

Nobody may have bothered to note this discrepancy until, as a public relations stint, Bush decided to go to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to promote his Advanced Energy Initiative. I guess that was the point when the administration realized they had to hire the staff back-- so Bush would have someone to talk to about this great new energy plan that obviously- in reality- means nothing to the administration.
But my favorite is what Bush had to say about this whole thing. His explanation on the budget cut and subsequent firings:

"The issue of course is whether or not good intentions are met with actual dollars spent. Part of the issue we face, unfortunately, is that there are sometimes decisions made as a result of the appropriations process, where money may not end up where it is supposed to have gone."

And an excerpt from his speech to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory employees:

"My message to those who work here is, we want you to know how important your work is," Mr. Bush said. "We appreciate what you're doing. And we expect you to keep doing it. And we want to help you keep doing it."

Of course, the 32 researchers that were fired as a result of the budget cuts were just being rehired and not even back to work yet (paperwork confusion) by the time Bush gave the speech. I hate to tell you, Mr. President, but those words would have sounded a lot better if you had 32 more employees to "encourage" at the lab.

Winter of Our Discontent

2006-02-22T11:19:00.000-05:00

First Panel:
Calvin: I wonder why people are never content with what they have.
Second Panel:
Hobbes: Are you kidding? Your fingernails are a joke, you've got no fangs, you can't see at night, your pink hides are ridiculous, your reflexes are nil, and you don't even have tails! Of course people aren't content!
Third Panel:
Calvin: Forget I said anything.
Hobbes: Now if tigers weren't content. That would be something to wonder about.

Wikipedia link on Calvin and Hobbes- some good long reading.

Also off wikipedia- Horrendous Space Kablooie entry in full:

The Horrendous Space Kablooie is an alternate term for the Big Bang, coined by Bill Watterson in his comic strip Calvin and Hobbes.

In one strip, Calvin says to Hobbes, "I've been reading about the beginning of the universe. They call it 'The Big Bang.' Isn't it weird how scientists can imagine all the matter of the universe exploding out of a dot smaller than the head of a pin, but they can't come up with a more evocative name for it than 'the Big Bang'? That's the whole problem with science. You've got a bunch of empiricists trying to describe things of unimaginable wonder."

Hobbes asks, "What would you call the creation of the universe?"

Calvin replies, "The Horrendous Space Kablooie!"

This term enjoyed a brief popularity in the scientific community and was widely used in informal communications (often abbreviated to "the HSK").

Flirting with danger ooh oooh

2006-02-21T15:19:00.000-05:00

The last post has got me (and many other news outlets, as the lawyer story continues to get picked up) thinking about email blunders. There has been some fantastic stories of the havoc that electronic communication can wreak. Email me if you have one.

Unfortunately, I have been a part of one or two examples.

A particularly traumatizing email incident occurred my sophomore year of college. It was finals week, and I was, to say the least, stressed the fuck out. It was late in the (dark & stormy) night and I was glued to the computer chair with the faulty beginnings of a final paper, that was due the next day, taunting me on the screen. I was at that point in finals week when you are just plain desperate, and you do- to the utmost- the tasks you normally avoid (cleaning your room, doing laundry, reading your high school yearbook, flossing and brushing your teeth for a solid five minutes...). Needless to say, I was checking my email approximately every two and a half minutes.

As I indulged in distraction, desiring only the small oasis from stress a good email can provide, I found another sort in my inbox; an email from my Spanish professor. My professor chose that moment to email the class a long list of what would be on the final exam, which was slated for the next week. She also chose to put everything there was on the final exam (as far as I could tell), and made the list in CAPITAL LETTERS. It was an intimidating list no matter how you looked at it, but with the capital letters, the list appeared to rage at me and to belittle my every effort in the Spanish language. I couldn't take it and I absolutely had to comment on its awfulness by forwarding it to my friend that was in the class and stating that capital letters were mean and the professor was annoying. I have to admit using a perhaps excessive amount of exclamation points after both these statements. Anyway, the email whisked away into cyberspace and I got back to my dismal paper.

It was a long night of writing, but I finished the damn thing, handed it in, and went about my day. It was late afternoon by the time I returned to my room and checked my email again.

I can still clearly recall the frozen moment of fear that jolted me as I spied an email from my Spanish professor awaiting me in my inbox, an email titled: Re: Re: FINAL EXAM. I dialed my friend's number as I opened the email, hoping against hope it was an elaborate joke. However, upon reading it, I realized it was no joke, that I had in fact emailed directly back to my professor and unleashed my final exam frustration on that unsuspecting woman. She said, in full lowercase, she "didn't know capital letters were mean." I left my friend a message, of myself screaming. And screaming. At least I knew I got the right phone number.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

...Even telling this story has got me thinking about the ease of creating new verbs the internet has wrought. The internet is so new it requires a whole new set of language. Crazy. I mean, television changed everything and it can't begin to claim all those new verbs!
To google. To friendster. To blog. To tag.
The longer we live with The Internet the more it becomes the stuff of science fiction.

Another thing I've been considering lately is the professional consequences of having an online self. For example, a friend of mine got a writing job recently, and her new employer told her that there were many qualified candidates, but he googled them all and she had the most impressive results. This, though positive, also brought chills down my spine. It is a smart thing for an employer to do. But eventually, a new version of padding the resume will be creating a false online self for employers to stumble upon. Then how will you separate the successful doppelgangers from the actual online selves, if those can be called actual?

Furthermore, if you are relatively young and living in the fully blogged area of New York City, there's a good chance at this moment, and an ever increasing likelihood, that your prospective employer would, if they looked hard enough, stumble upon a tale of some drunken exploit or revealing photo or hookup story or -something- regarding their candidate- which would negate all the trouble you took with that fancypants suit, obsequious attitude, and smooth hairdo.

I guess the moral of the story is that this is some dangerous territory being created. Beware!

You can e-mail this to whomever you want.

2006-02-16T11:48:00.000-05:00

-----Original Message-----
From: Dianna Abdala [mailto: dabdala@msn.com]
Sent: Friday, February 03, 2006 9:23 PM
To: wak@kormanlaw.com
Subject: Thank you

Dear Attorney Korman,

At this time, I am writing to inform you that I will not be accepting your offer.

After careful consideration, I have come to the conclusion that the pay you are offering would neither fulfill me nor support the lifestyle I am living in light of the work I would be doing for you. I have decided instead to work for myself, and reap 100% of the benefits that I sew.

Thank you for the interviews.

Dianna L. Abdala, Esq.

----- Original Message -----

From: William A. Korman
To: 'Dianna Abdala'
Sent: Monday, February 06, 2006 12:15 PM
Subject: RE: Thank you

Dianna -

Given that you had two interviews, were offered and accepted the job
(indeed, you had a definite start date), I am surprised that you chose
an e-mail and a 9:30 PM voicemail message to convey this information to
me. It smacks of immaturity and is quite unprofessional. Indeed, I did
rely upon your acceptance by ordering stationary and business cards with
your name, reformatting a computer and setting up both internal and
external e-mails for you here at the office. While I do not quarrel
with your reasoning, I am extremely disappointed in the way this played
out. I sincerely wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors.

- Will Korman

-----Original Message-----
From: Dianna Abdala [mailto: dabdala@msn.com]
Sent: Monday, February 06, 2006 4:01 PM
To: William A. Korman
Subject: Re: Thank you

A real lawyer would have put the contract into writing and not exercised
any such reliance until he did so.

Again, thank you.

----- Original Message -----

From: William A. Korman
To: 'Dianna Abdala'
Sent: Monday, February 06, 2006 4:18 PM
Subject: RE: Thank you

Thank you for the refresher course on contracts. This is not a bar exam
question. You need to realize that this is a very small legal community,
especially the criminal defense bar. Do you really want to start
pissing off more experienced lawyers at this early stage of your career?

-----Original Message-----
From: Dianna Abdala [mailto: dabdala@msn.com]
Sent: Monday, February 06, 2006 4:29 PM
To: William A. Korman
Subject: Re: Thank you

bla bla bla

-----Original Message-----
From: William A. Korman [mailto: wak@kormanlaw.com]
Sent: Friday, February 10, 2006 7:59 AM
To: 'David Breen'
Subject: FW: Thank you

Did I already forward this to you?

-----Original Message-----
From: David Breen [mailto: dbreen@bu.edu]
Sent: Friday, February 10, 2006 9:47 AM
To: 'William A. Korman'
Subject: RE: Thank you

OH MY GOD!

Where to begin?

First of all, how unprofessional.and secondly, it is "reap what you
'sow,'" now "sew".if she is going to use a clich?, couldn't she at least
spell it right? And WTF is with her "blab la bla"? Does she not read
your e-mail about it being a small community?! So, finally, can I
forward this along to some folks? I am sure they would love to see how
the up-and-coming lawyers are comporting themselves! (Clearly she did
not go to BU!!!) J

-----Original Message-----
From: William A. Korman [mailto: wak@kormanlaw.com]
Sent: Friday, February 10, 2006 9:55 AM
To: 'David Breen'
Subject: RE: Thank you

You can e-mail this to whomever you want.

I received this email exchange in a forward yesterday. It was first forwarded February 10th, and on February 15th, when it got to me, I could track the path of forwards to put myself at 38th remove. That is astounding. 38 people forwarded the email exchange on, most to multiple people, the majority on the same day it began to be emailed. If I, someone at a remove from the law world, received this in 5 days (which included a weekend in which it was only forwarded on twice), and the email was headed in a myraid of other directions, through law firms, law schools- the entire legal community I'm sure,- hey I sent it to someone at UCONN law school- it is insane to speculate how many will come to know the sad tale of the spoiled Dianna Abdala.
How do I know she is spoiled? This whole thing was on the front page of the Boston Globe today. Check it out.

An excerpt from the Globe article:

"Abdala, who described herself as a ''trust fund baby," was admitted to
the Massachusetts bar last year and said that since then she has ''just
been taking it easy" because ''I worked hard in school." She decided to
respond to Korman's job posting because ''I wanted to establish somewhat
of a career for myself," she said. ''No one wants to be living off daddy."
Abdala's father, George S. Abdala, is a Springfield lawyer."

Also, for the record, I think "a real lawyer" as Dianna Abdala so eloquently puts it in her email, would sue over this whole proliferation of forwards. What has she got to lose at this point?

The Gates Nostalgia

2006-02-15T15:34:00.000-05:00

From an interview with Christo & Jeanne-Claude on The Gates:

"Question: The Gates, like all of your work, is temporary and public. Why do you choose to create temporary public art?
Answer: The temporary quality of the projects is an aesthetic decision. Our works are temporary in order to endow the works of art with a feeling of urgency to be seen, and the love and tenderness brought by the fact that they will not last. Those feelings are usually reserved for other temporary things such as childhood and our own life. These are valued because we know that they will not last. We want to offer this feeling of love and tenderness to our works, as an added value (dimension) and as an additional aesthetic quality."

Yesteryear, before I knew I would count myself among the residents of this metropolis, I came in to see The Gates in Central Park the day it opened. I met up with a group of friends from college, and we walked, for hours, starting at Bethesda Fountain and winding our way through the saffron-bannered crowded paths of the park. It was beautiful. The amazing thing then, and still now when I think of it, was the sheer mass of people experiencing this public art. With the banners flapping over our heads, it felt like a parade. Whether people liked it or not- and there was plenty of both reactions- it was something people felt a need to see, to consider, and to feel for themselves. To me this attitude defines a part of New York City; people here feel a personal right and an ownership to cultural events that is unique. The Gates could have been about creating this compulsion, or appreciating it. Or it could have been about rediscovering, in a dreary month, the most anachronistic and beautiful part of the city, Central Park- or it could be a celebration of artist's obsession- or it could be an aesthetically pleasing array of color in a beautiful setting. Whatever it may have been, I am finding myself missing it a year later, so it was certainly something.

Chiaroscuro Ski

2006-02-12T22:12:00.000-05:00

This past week has been so crazy-busy that I feel like I crashed headlong into a wall of pillows now that I've got nothing to do. Arriving in Connecticut with a snowstorm in tow is a pretty effective change of pace. Most nights last week were spent literally dashing downtown to uptown and vice versa and now I am finding myself just plodding up and down the stairs, mulling over which hot beverage best suits the hour (coffee, tea, cocoa, tea), and trying to lure the dog onto my lap.

Earlier this evening my Dad and I went skiing, after the sun went down, on the airline trail. The moon had lit the sky to a suffused orange point, and it reflected off the snow enough to silhouette his figure and exposed parts of tree branches; the only other things out there as far as I could tell. I don't imagine there is any better way to clear your head than glide through a cold still trail layered with silence and whiteness.

The picture above is from this website, which has years of beautiful pictures from the Hebron section of the Airline Trail.

it's... Candlemas!

2006-02-02T12:59:00.000-05:00

I had both tea & coffee this morning and now my brain is working overtime, in a strange way. I'm at my desk trying to focus on a monotonous task and I am getting irrepressible urges, approximately every 2 minutes, to google something new. Groundhog day (fuck you Phil, you rodent! you're wrong!) Metropolitan opera! Fred's got slacks! the Monkees! the Irish governmental system! Swedish fish!
This is not producing neat stacks of properly stapled papers in a timely manner.
Also, i am wearing a new pair of sneakers (half-price, yay!), and they are all awesome and cushy and new-feeling, like what i imagine moon boots to be like. (Hyper brain says: google moon boots! do it now!) The sneakers are making me want to skip around the office, and break out into a brisk trot in the hallway.

So I've been giving some thought lately to Secret Food. I moonlight (not entirely accurate, but sounds good) as a receptionist, sitting at the front desk while the other person goes to the bathroom or eats lunch. So the last two times I've noticed, and this is with two different people, each individual had a candybar stashed under the lip of the desk. One, a butterfinger, the other, a Cadbury's fruit and nut bar. Myself, I like to keep a York peppermint patty around. And my sister was telling me about interrupting a guy eating mini rainbow sprinkled Krispy Kreme donuts in his office. So all of this brings me to the hypothesis that people have secret foods, often times, candybars. I mean, candybars are obviously sold in New York- they are plentiful- but you never actually see people eating them.
My friend and I realized this one fateful day not long after I had moved to the Big Apple. We decided to eat some lunch, head over to the Strand bookstore, and then go to this candy store I had heard great things about, called Economy Candy. Unfortunately, as I said, I had just moved to New York, and therefore had no concept whatsoever of the Lower East Side (now I have a concept, but not yet real directional knowledge). But anyway we ended up wandering for hours trying to find this place, walking from the East River to the Hudson River and back in pursuit of candy. I can think of few times I have felt so determined in my life than I was to get to this place. I can empathsize more with crack addicts now, and their desperation. So, the long and short of it is, Economy Candy was closed by the rather late hour we reached it, and we were weak with hunger and physically sore from the exertion of attempting to locate it. So, desperate times call for desperate measures, and we ended up buying Snickers bars at a drug store, and tearing into them on the street. We then noticed we were getting some weird looks, which are not the easiest things to get in New York. There we were, unabashedly and simultaneously practically gulping down chocolate, right out in the open!
It's secret food! Keep that in the privacy of your own home, or at least, hidden in your desk!

more espionage; mystery photo

2006-01-31T15:52:00.000-05:00

Mermen, Monsters, or Cephalopods?

2006-01-26T14:42:00.000-05:00

I think I liked the world better when no one could prove they had seen a live giant squid.

Calculated Gloom

2006-01-23T14:36:00.000-05:00

Getting out of bed this morning produced sound effects not unlike velcro, I wanted so much to stay in it. After getting up and glancing out the window, I actually did crawl back in, effectively choosing sleep over breakfast this wet Monday. Yep, so bad it's a cliche of bad- a wet Monday; rainy but cold. New York umbrellas (a whole different species of umbrella) were out this morning and people were not afraid to knock each other around with them.

As you can tell, I was feeling low, but I made it to work and figured I was just tired until I stepped into the elevator. The fancypants elevator at my workplace has a little screen which flashes various (random) headlines, usually pertaining to the odd celebrity tidbit, but today it had another announcement: today is the Gloomiest Day of 2006, as determined by "scientists" based on a calculation having to do with weather, debt, days after Christmas, and some other factors. Who exactly are these scientists that woke up this morning and said "yes! This is it!" Those are the people I'm going to worry about the rest of today.

So this may seem far-fetched but apparently this news does NOT only exist in my elevator: there is an article on a website called Scotsman.com titled "It's 23 January... have a bad day." Long excerpt from said article below:

But, wait for it, the worst is yet to come, and it falls today: not a blizzard, a financial crash or even a rogue asteroid, but the dire convergence of all our seasonal woes, the most depressing day of 2006, as identified by psychologist Dr Cliff Arnall of Cardiff University's Centre for Lifelong Learning, an expert in seasonal disorders and a man who likes his formulae.

Last year Arnall created a formula enabling those rash enough to do so to calculate their life expectancy (involving factors such as genetic inheritance, optimism, nutrition, and relationships). We don't know what percentage of the population decided not to bother getting up this morning as a result, but expect a rash of absenteeism today, as another formula he has made up identifies it as the most miserable day of the year (last year he similarly predicted 24 January as Day of Gloom).

Taking into account factors such as foul weather, Christmas debts, the lingering effects of seasonal overindulgence, failed New Year's resolutions and generally reduced motivation, Arnall's worst day "formula" is ([W + (D-d)] x TQ) ÷ (M x NA). (W: weather, D: debt, d: money due in January pay, T: time elapsed since Christmas, Q: time since failed New Year's resolutions to quit smoking, drinking etc, M: general motivational levels, NA: the need to take action.)

...and they called him Meal

2006-01-19T11:14:00.000-05:00

Hamster and Snake Forge Unlikely Friendship

TOKYO (Jan. 19) - Gohan and Aochan make strange bedfellows: one's a 3.5-inch dwarf hamster; the other is a four-foot rat snake. Zookeepers at Tokyo's Mutsugoro Okoku zoo presented the hamster - whose name means "meal" in Japanese - to Aochan as a tasty morsel in October, after the snake refused to eat frozen mice. But instead of indulging, Aochan decided to make friends with the furry rodent, according to keeper Kazuya Yamamoto. The pair have shared a cage since.
"I've never seen anything like it. Gohan sometimes even climbs onto Aochan to take a nap on his back," Yamamoto said. Aochan, a 2-year-old male Japanese rat snake, eventually developed an appetite for frozen rodents but has so far shown no signs of gobbling up Gohan - despite her name.
"We named her Gohan as a joke," Yamamoto chuckled. "But I don't think there's any danger. Aochan seems to enjoy Gohan's company very much." The Tokyo zoo also keeps a range of mostly livestock animals, and promotes "cross-breed interaction," according to Yamamoto. But Gohan and Aochan's case was "was a complete accident," Yamamoto said.

Why I'm Not Cut Out For This Job

2006-01-18T15:15:00.000-05:00

I just had a just-barely-resistable urge to go over to my coworker's cubicle- where he sits silently, patiently hardworking- and start shaking him and yelling, in his face, "aren't you excited about numbering these pages? Aren't you?!!!" This is sick. Even writing it makes the muscles in my arms clench longingly to go & do it.

Child Abuse, Removal

2006-01-17T09:47:00.000-05:00

So for the past week the story of Nixzmary Brown, a seven year old child, and her death and abuse (see today's New York Times article) at the hands of her stepfather has been all over the papers in New York; on the cover of each one this past week. It is a tragic story, a story made more terrible the more you read about it. It has people up in arms over the child protective services, and even the mayor spoke out against the state system for failing to protect this child. Some of this attention may result in positive change, but there is also a likely result of encouraging social workers to pull children from their homes prematurely. Which is also a hard concept. On one hand, if it may prevent death and abuse like in the case of Nixzmary Brown, how can one not take a child from a home? On the other, abuse is not always easy to prove, not always cut and dry, and to take children from homes which may not, in the end, be considered abusive, can be far more traumatic than allowing them to live at home, with ongoing services.

It should be recognized that taking a child away from their home is perhaps the most incredibly violent well-intentioned act that exists. Imagine you are five years old, sitting around watching T.V. with your mom, and some person walks into your home, tells you to pack a suitcase and grab your favorite teddy bear, and leave for an undetermined amount of time. You are five and have no idea when you will see your mom again, and no one will give you any answers for the million questions you are too confused or afraid to ask. A social worker can rip a child away from every single thing they know and have ever known: their parents, grandparents, siblings, friends, neighbors, pets, possessions, culture, daily routines, school. Then, when the child is taken out of the home, there is no magic place to bring them. Foster homes may be hard to come by, may be temporary, may be terrifying and strange. A lot of times children that have been removed bounce around, to eventually land back where they started.

Child protective services (ACS, as they are called in New York) did fail Nixzmary Brown; child protective services in an inherently flawed system. Having worked in a similar child protective state system, reading the various details of the case provokes odd realizations of understanding, resignation, fear, disgust, and anger. I have been the worker that could not get access to a home in which there was abuse going on. Firing a few people involved and hiring a few more is not, unfortunately, the solution.

I take birthdays seriously.

2006-01-12T14:03:00.000-05:00

I wake up with a strange feeling on friend's birthdays, especially when they live elsewhere. On their birthday, absent friends get on my mind like that thing you walked from the bedroom to the kitchen to get and then promptly forgot. Sometimes it takes me most of the day to figure out where that feeling is coming from, but usually the birthday person's countenance will come floating to my brain and I will think of the date and say, aha, the feeling has an origin. I am starting to think of this feeling as the Observation of the Missing Celebration; a day that should be and yet is not a celebration in your life. Like the experience of being in another country on the 4th of July. You're walking around missing things you generally don't need or want- missing fireworks, hot dogs, beer, Lays potato chips- with a vengeance.
So, happy 25th birthday to Myla, who is somewhere in Utah(?)!

A Birthday Poem
by Ted Kooser

Just past dawn, the sun stands
with its heavy red head
in a black stanchion of trees,
waiting for someone to come
with his bucket
for the foamy white light,
and then a long day in the pasture.
I too spend my days grazing,
feasting on every green moment
till darkness calls,
and with the others
I walk away into the night,
swinging the little tin bell
of my name.

...also, speaking of birth, how wild is this?

From Ireland On-Line:

After a decade parents discover babies switched at birth
10/01/2006 - 13:13:29

Two babies born on the same day in the same hospital in Thailand were accidentally switched at birth, but nobody knew about it for a decade.

The parents of the children, now 10 years old, learned last month they had been raising children that biologically were not theirs, doctors said today.

Doctors at the hospital in the southern Thai province of Trang where the children were born said it was still a mystery how the mix-up occurred, but noted that the pair shared certain traits.

“They were (born) in the same room, had the same weight, and were delivered at the same time,” said Sinchai Rongdet, the current director of Yantakhao Hospital where both babies were delivered. “The only difference is their gender.”

Doctors typically tell a mother her baby’s sex as soon as the child is born and tag the baby’s wrist with his or her particulars.

The children – Orawan Chanthong, the girl, and, Cherawut Bunyu, the boy – grew up in neighbouring villages and went to the same school.

Neighbours constantly told the parents that their children bore close resemblance to the other child’s family.

To end nagging curiosity, the parents and children went for DNA tests, Sinchai said.

“DNA tests confirmed that the children were switched,” he said, adding that the families have not yet decided how to handle the news.

A senior Health Ministry official, Prat Bunyawongwirot, said the ministry was investigating the incident and assigning psychologists to speak with both children.

Havana Bourgeois

2006-01-10T15:59:00.000-05:00

I saw the play Havana Bourgeois this past Sunday; it was the first night it played, so it was a little rough around the edges (the play started and immediately someone sprinted out of the room to turn out the audience lights) but very well done all the same, with some amazing actors. The play concerns someone embarking on their career, on the verge of achieving "the American Dream," when the Cuban revolution gains power & eventually upsets the country and notion of the Dream itself. The play was made more interesting when Sharyn and I talked to the director afterward and found out the play is the playwright's father's actual story.

Also, if you are in the mood to contemplate some philosophical conundrums on the order of angels on a pinhead, check out this wikipedia entry on the omnipotence paradox (Could an omnipotent being create a stone so heavy that even that being could not lift it?). The highlight of the wikipedia entry being the Simpsons' reference: On the TV Show "The Simpsons", while Homer is using medicinal marijuana, he asks the question, "Can Jesus microwave a microwaveable burrito so hot, that even he himself could not eat it?"
Now THAT provokes some thought. It also bring to mind a classic Deep Thought by Jack Handey:
"If God dwells inside us, like some people say, I sure hope he likes enchiladas, because that's what He's getting!"
Also, apparently the Simpsons and Philosophy are so entertwined they teach a course about it at Berkeley.

"If not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled." -P.G. Wodehouse

2006-01-06T14:03:00.000-05:00

This poor woman in the other room keeps sneezing, and she has one of those unfortunate loud sneezes that sounds like screams. So every time she sneezes the woman sitting closest to her reacts with a surprised noise. From this room it sounds like a fight.

I just spent a pleasant lunch hour reading P.G. Wodehouse. He writes with all this great 1920s English Oxford chap slang. Dialogue from the book I'm reading, Very Good, Jeeves:

"I found a difficulty in boosting along the chit-chat. He was not a responsive cove.
'Nice day,' I said.
'Quite.'
'But they say the crops need rain.'
He had buried himself in his paper once more, and seemed peeved this time on being lugged to the surface.
'What?'
'The crops.'
'The crops?'
'Crops.'
'What crops?'
'Oh, just crops.'
He laid down his paper.
'You appear to be desirous of giving me some information about crops. What is it?'
'I hear they need rain.'
'Indeed?'"

Wanderlust

2006-01-05T11:00:00.000-05:00

It was this time two years ago I was preparing to leave for my journeys in South America, and this time 2 years before that I had just arrived in Oaxaca, Mexico, and, as much as I like my life in New York, it is painful to break that streak. There's nothing in the world like walking out of the airport in January into weather that was previously inconceivable, carrying all the belongings you will have for the next few months, ready to see what it is you want to do now.

One time when traveling in Europe my friend Roxy and I got on a train going to Geneva, Switzerland by mistake. We got onto the train and sat down, pulled out our snack (croissants- we were coming from France) made ourselves comfortable, and barely managed to get off right before it pulled away. We were amused and relieved when we finally got on the right train, going to Genova, Italy, but the strangest moment was when we
realized it would have been no catastrophe had we gone to Switzerland instead. A little more pricey, maybe, but we'd heard they had pretty mountains and tasty chocolate, so we would have managed. The possibilities that rule you and your life while traveling are just infinitely more probable. I think some of the best times Myla and I had traveling in South America was when we were not where we expected to be; but then again, we often forgot to expect ourselves to be anywhere.

Also, I searched the term wanderlust and found the work of this incredible photographer, Howie Garber. You must look at his wilderness photos.

Hogmanay

2006-01-03T11:32:00.000-05:00

Hope you had an enjoyable Hogmanay (Hogmanay \hog-muh-NAY; HOG-muh-nay\, noun: The name, in Scotland, for New Year's Eve, on which children go about singing and asking for gifts; also, a gift, cake, or treat given on New Year's Eve.)

I greeted the New Year on a lower east side rooftop with good company and bad champagne. It was swell.

"New studies suggest that cute images stimulate the same pleasure centers of the brain aroused by sex, a good meal or psychoactive drugs like cocaine, which could explain why everybody in the panda house wore a big grin."

As you can see, I have been ruminating on cuteness this morning, inspired by this New York Times article. I especially liked the line above, as I happen to know a couple people beyond obsessed with the baby panda at the National Zoo. They are not, apparently, the only ones with this interest: "And though the zoo's adult pandas have long been among Washington's top tourist attractions, the public debut of the baby in December has unleashed an almost bestial frenzy here. Some 13,000 timed tickets to see the cub were snapped up within two hours of being released, and almost immediately began trading on eBay for up to $200 a pair."

Anyway the article talks about the Darwinian tie to cuteness- the fact that our concept of "cuteness" is based on babies' physical characteristics, the characteristics of which are based on babies' helplessness and need for protection- and therefore our strong reaction to cuteness makes sense. For propagating the human race and all. It gets more interesting as researchers look at how much we find cute because of this ("The human cuteness detector is set at such a low bar, researchers said, that it sweeps in and deems cute practically anything remotely resembling a human baby or a part thereof, and so ends up including the young of virtually every mammalian species, fuzzy-headed birds like Japanese cranes, woolly bear caterpillars, a bobbing balloon, a big round rock stacked on a smaller rock, a colon, a hyphen and a close parenthesis typed in succession."), and how different cultures respond more to cuteness than others. Cuteness is a cultural taste- i.e.- let's add some cuteness to this product and it will sell like wildfire in Japan. That's some weird shit. -) -) -)

Also, this article corresponds to a heavy theme running through the New York Times recently- they just can't get enough Darwin. I guess this is liberals fighting intelligent design- bringing evolution to every section of the Times. I bet people with really impressive opposable thumbs are going to be on the Sunday Styles page next week. And Arts and Entertainment will have some article on how the cowboys in Brokeback Mountain represent the pinnacle of evolution somehow.

2006-01-01T13:39:00.000-05:00

Lifted from The Onion:

Hopes For 2006

December 28, 2005 | Issue 41•52

What are your biggest hopes for 2006?

Nick Del Mar Waiter

"A pair of novelty 2006 spectacles. At first, anyway."

Jim Sclavanous Package Delivery Man

"I just want to stay on that bull for eight seconds. Eight goddamn seconds. Is that too much to ask?"

Nicholas Knox Chemist

"Settle down, man. We're not even sure if Congress is going to approve funding for 2006 yet."

Miriam Bateman Tax Preparer

"I hope they come out with a third, better Hilton sister."

William Linna Career Counselor

"I just want to spend quality time watching my baby grow up. Of course, I guess I'd have to impregnate some sort of woman first.

Kate Alexander Produce Manager

"Next year? But...but I only just finished this one! When may I finally rest?"

Aquarium Workplace

2005-12-29T13:29:00.000-05:00

Despite sleeping well and relatively long, I am quite tired today. Makes no sense. I had the kind of sleep that when the alarm clock went off, I said "what the hell could that infernal beeping be?! I guess I have to get up and turn that OFF!" which, I will admit, happens frequently enough that the alarm clock is placed on the other side of my room, so I actually do get up, hence the alarm clock is fufilling its intended purpose, and getting me out of bed. I consider my sleeping self a different creature than my awake one, and resort to trickery to replace one with the other. Anyway this tiredness, and the rain outside (I wonder if the window-washers are pissed?), has somehow lent a rather aquatic feel to the workplace. I feel like a jellyfish just sort of bobbing along, and my boss keeps swimming through the room and glancing at everyone with fisheyes. She is inexplicably reminiscent of a trout.

Chronic of Narnia

2005-12-29T11:04:00.000-05:00

This is hilarious. The New York Times even wrote about it...

In "Lazy Sunday," a music video that had its debut on the Dec. 17 broadcast of "SNL," two cast members, Chris Parnell and Andy Samberg, adopt the brash personas of head-bopping, hand-waving rappers. But as they make their way around Manhattan's West Village, they rhyme with conviction about subjects that are anything but hard-core: they boast about eating cupcakes from the Magnolia Bakery, searching for travel directions on MapQuest and achieving their ultimate goal of attending a matinee of the fantasy movie "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe."

...Mr. Schaffer and Mr. Taccone were also contacted by friends who heard the rap played on radio stations and in bars. And Mr. Samberg found himself in the delicate position of having to explain to his mother that the song's chorus is a play on words involving the name "Chronicles of Narnia" and the word chronic, a slang term for marijuana. "She's like, 'So is it actually about weed?' " Mr. Samberg said. "It makes you think it's going to be about weed, but then it's actually just about 'Narnia.' She's like, 'Oh, I think I get it.' "

Window Washing Day

2005-12-28T15:00:00.000-05:00

My cubicle is located next to the window and today, on the other side of this window, are two dudes in a box that appears to be hanging from the sky, wiping at the other side of the glass. It is ridiculous that I am in such close proximity to two people in such a different place! Whereas I have to take an elevator down over 30 flights to go out, they are out there, with this wild possibility of falling that they are constantly reminded of as they swing slightly in the air. I wish I could join them today. It's nice outside.

Also, this window washing pleasantly reminds me of this Haruki Murakami story that was published in the New Yorker a month or two ago; great story. It is what started me reading him somewhat obsessively. He's pretty popular right now, as you can tell by his being in the New Yorker, after all, and on the front tables in the Strand bookstore, but he apparently hasn't historically been too popular in his native Japan. The interview excerpt below touches on this.

This is another good story by him... It starts off with this:

"Nineteen-seventy-one was the Year of Spaghetti.

In 1971, I cooked spaghetti to live, and lived to cook spaghetti. Steam rising from the pot was my pride and joy, tomato sauce bubbling up in the saucepan my one great hope in life."

Excerpts from a Salon Interview from 1997 (by Laura Miller) with Murakami:
The heroes in Haruki Murakami's dazzling, addictive and rather strange novels ("A Wild Sheep Chase," "Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World") don't fit the stereotype of conformist, work-obsessed Japanese men at all. They're dreamy, brainy introverts, drunk on culture (high and pop), with a tendency to get mixed up with mysterious women and outlandish conspiracies.

Do they have a problem with what you write?

I love pop culture -- the Rolling Stones, the Doors, David Lynch, things like that. That's why I said I don't like elitism. I like horror films, Stephen King, Raymond Chandler, detective stories. I don't want to write those things. What I want to do is use those structures, not the content. I like to put my content in that structure. That's my way, my style. So both of those kinds of writers don't like me. Entertainment writers don't like me, and serious literature people don't like me. I'm kind of in-between, doing a new kind of thing. That's why I couldn't find my position in Japan for many years. But I'm feeling that things are changing drastically. I'm gaining more territory. I have had my very loyal readers in these 15 years or so. They're buying my books, and they're on my side. The writers and critics are not on my side.

I'm feeling responsibility as a Japanese writer more and more as I gain territory. That's what's happening to me right now and that's why I came back to Japan two years ago. Last year I wrote a book about the sarin gas attack on the subway train in Tokyo in March 1995. I interviewed 63 victims who were on the train that day. I did it because I wanted to interview ordinary Japanese people. It was a weekday, a Monday morning -- 8:30 or something like that. They were commuting to the center of Tokyo. It was packed, as you know, rush hour, and you can't move, you're like this [hunches shoulders together]. But they are very hard-working people, ordinary people, ordinary Japanese, and they were attacked with poison gas for no reason at all. It was ridiculous. I just wanted to know what happened to them. Who are those people? So I interviewed them one by one. It took one year, but I was impressed to find who those people are.

So, I myself hate those company people -- salarymen, businesspeople. But after those interviews, I had some compassion for them. Honestly, I don't know why they are working so hard. Some of them got up at 5:30 in the morning to commute to the center of Tokyo. It takes more than two hours by train, all of it packed like this [hunches]. You can't even read a book. But they are doing that for 30 or 40 years. That's incredible to me. They come home at 10 p.m. and their kids are sleeping. The only day they see their children is Sunday. It's horrible. But they don't complain. So I asked them why not and they said it's no use. It's what all the people are doing, so there's no reason to complain.

You say that imagination is very important in your works. Sometimes your novels are very realistic, and then sometimes they get very ... metaphysical.

I write weird stories. I don't know why I like weirdness so much. Myself, I'm a very realistic person. I don't trust anything New Age -- or reincarnation, dreams, Tarot, horoscopes. I don't trust anything like that at all. I wake up at 6 in the morning and go to bed at 10, jogging every day and swimming, eating healthy food. I'm very realistic. But when I write, I write weird. That's very strange. When I'm getting more and more serious, I'm getting more and more weird. When I want to write about the reality of society and the world, it gets weird. Many people ask me why, and I can't answer that. But I recognized when I was interviewing those 63 ordinary people -- they were very straightforward, very simple, very ordinary, but their stories were sometimes very weird. That was interesting. -H. Murakami.

Entry Uno

2005-12-27T17:53:00.000-05:00

I was thinking about reading some other blogs first entries to see how people start these things off, but beginnings have no option but to be a bit awkward and arbitrary, so I decided not to mess with that and just type away. Actually, I am a big fan of awkwardness.

So, I'm sneaking into the blog-world pre 2006 (oh futuristic sounding year!), when, who knows, maybe it will Really explode. This internet thing has yet to take off, right?

I am blogging in direct correlation to the lack of employ in my employment. Or perhaps more in homage to my own ennui. My job involves sitting in an overwhelmingly beige cubicle. Therefore, a blog appears to be a good way to amuse myself, keep from obsessing about my coworkers and my email, and get through a rather formless work week.

I discussed blogging with a couple friends and they told me to start one with the stunning endorsement of "I would read it," with this sort of fuzzy look in their eyes. I'm not sure how that stands as a recommendation, considering these are people that go so far as to hang out with me, but I will let it stand in case they follow through.