To Be Read, and Reread, Upon my Untimely Demise

The Hard Cap: Part I

2012-02-10T12:48:00.003-05:00

a few weekends back i headed to sunny san diego, california for a psychology conference and to visit an old friend who i was counselors with at a Jewish sleep-away camp in southern California.

there are many many funny aspects to our relationship, but how we met is probably my favorite. As i have mentioned previously, in high school i was very active in my jewish youth group. like, vice president active. and so, like many of my peers, i went on a summer trip to israel after my junior year in high school. On said trip i did my best to get in touch with both my jewish roots and my make-out roots. Like so many teen-tours before and since, the adolescent sexual tension on these trips often boiled over into super intense frenching sessions. yah, i said frenching. i'm not saying that things didn't go further, but while the tongue-swapping was rampant, i didn't get the sense that too many people were getting too R rated. Least i never got to hear about it.

One particularly sexy weekend off, left me adventuring around Jerusalem with two girls from another group. One was the younger sibling of my older brother's best friend from when he was on the same trip. Her name was(n't) Gina. The other was a friend of hers from Arizona (not) named Lisa. You have to remember that 16 year old me was not the "relationship expert" you see before you today. The 16-year old me was desperately trying to grasp the logistics of the situation unfolding before him.

I hooked up Gina. Which is to say we made out a bunch. Potentially even while rolling around. I remember being a small-town Massachusetts kid totally infatuated with this whole "very California" vibe going on. And while I certainly also wanted to make out with Lisa, I was content to put my eggs in Gina's basket, so to speak.

Soon after exiting make-out central, it was bedtime, and because it was the "free weekend" the staff was off as well, so Lisa, Gina, and I push a couple beds together and hunkered down for the night. I wish i could tell you i said something awesome. Sometime like, "be sure to cuddle up, so no one falls off the bed." I wish i could say that i pulled the double yawn arm around move. I wish i could say i rode the tricycle. The truth is, i didn't have it in me. I had just made out with Gina, and in my "good-guy" brain, trying to sneak a 3-way right after gettin some seemed like a huge no-go. Looking back, it should have been a no brainer. I didn't make out with Lisa, or even Gina, that night. But i thought about it. Oh, i thought about it.

I thought about it so much that i had to go run back to my own room in the morning to change before breakfast.

Like in so many high school romance stories, Gina was totally using me. I can't say for certain what her intentions were in the moment, but after a few attempts to meet up post that weekend, it was clear that the feelings left with the sunrise. I remember being sad and a little hurt, but not decimated. Shortly after that weekend she met and began dating Aaron. Both of them would be with us at camp the following summer.

I was convinced that going to California to be a counselor was a good idea by a good friend of mine who, through no coincidence, also worked at the camp. We'll call her Miriam. Cause that's her name. Considering I had no ties to camps in the east at that point, and there were a whole bunch of people in California I wanted to see again (and its california!!!). A few weeks before camp begins I get a call from Miriam. The co-counselor list is out, and she's calling to tell me who mine is.

"So, you're co-counselor is Eric. He's a year or two older and from what i know he's a really good guy."

Not very descriptive. Also, she said the entire update with a tone. the tone i call "the implied but" tone. (Not to be confused with other butt tones.) "What's the but?" i asked.

Miriam: "Well, last summer when you hooked up with Gina . . .

Me: " ... yes..."

Miriam: "Well, she was kind of dating Eric at the time. "

Me: "So, you're telling me that my co-counselors ex-girlfriend cheated on him (unbeknownst to me), with me."

Miriam: "Correct."

Me: "Peachy"

There was one additional variable. and one can't be measured in terms of how much influence it had on how events played out. If you remember, Gina moved on to another man that summer, and he, Aaron, also decided to come across the country (we ended up going to college together) for Cali camp. One big happy family. Gina, Eric, and myself all worked with the same age group. A lot of group contact. Aaron, was spared, and i believe was given a slightly younger age group.

I first night that Eric and i spent in that tent i remember clearly. It was still staff training as Eric lay on the bottom bunk, me staring at the ceiling from the bunk above. Silence. More silence.

I don't do well with silence. i'm a communicator. A talker. Always have been. And so, what else could i do but begin with, "so, . . . Gina huh. . ?"

"yah," he replied, letting out what i would learn to be his signature exasperated-sigh-giggle, "Gina."

We were pretty much best buds after that. He was the bad cop to my good cop. the voice of reason and responsibility to my nighttime storytelling and adventure walks. And it turned out that us becoming such good friends was pretty much the worst thing Gina could have asked/hoped for. I wouldn't say we were outwardly mean to her. But the underlying tension . . . her betrayal of Eric, he discarding of me . . . were palpable during our area meetings. And Eric and i totally promoted it, unflinchingly. We essentially were given the opportunity to make Gina sleep in the bed she made, and we made sure that she did. All summer. For the most part we left Aaron out of it. I don't think he knew she had a boyfriend at the time either. And he seemed like a really nice guy.

It was a fun summer.

So, travelling back to Cali to visit him and his 3 kids this January was an accutely different experience.

to be continued . . . .

She Told Me So

2012-02-06T22:47:00.000-05:00

My fiance came home early from work today. She left a note saying she'd be home at 5:45, but it's 3:45 when i notice the dogs disappear to the sound of the creaking front door.

And she's caught me. In the act.

Of cleaning.

I had just finished emptying the dishwasher and was making my way through the weekend leftover dishes. Busted.

She began the crock-pot full of yumminess for tomorrow nights dinner as i as settled on the couch to continue my lesson planning. And. I had to remark.

Me: You KNOW . . . SOME people come home early from work to find their lovers in much more compromising positions.

Her: (Laughing) Blog about it.

So i did.

How I Went Deaf But Not Really

2012-01-25T00:43:00.000-05:00

the other day i woke up and i couldn't hear out of my left ear. and it wasn't one of those "i feel like there might be something in my ear" problems. it was one of those "im in a hearing aid commercial" hello Hello HELLO!!! kind of total blockages. Thankfully i was unafraid.

I was unafraid because i remembered a story my father told me years ago about the time that he woke up and though he had gone deaf. The best part of this story is not that he mistook an ear blockage as a permanent loss of hearing. its not even that my dad is a doctor. The best part of the story, for me, was that when he woke up, he couldn't hear anything partially because his "good" ear was still on his pillow.

At least thats how i remember it. and now that i've written it down on the internet, it essentially becomes truth. niffy really.

I digress. The moral of the story was supposed to be that i learned from my father, as fathers have passed knowledge down to their sons for hundreds of years, that if you ever wake up and think you might have gone deaf, you probably have a ton of wax in your ear.

I hydrogen peroxided the problem. cotton swab. cotton swab. cotton swab. pen cap?

eventually the pain in the ass of being partially deaf got the better of me and i went into the health center to get it taken care of.

"taken care of" i learned means a spray bottle of warm water with an attachment that shoots the stream to the back of your ear, flushing its contents into the awaiting receptacle.

it was gross. what can i say. oh, what i can say is that after i got my ear douched and somewhat violated, i could hear again. magical. if only my back pain had had such an easy fix.

After my cleaning the doctor came in and gave it a quick look. He said it did look red an irritated. He was obviously contemplating whether or not i might have an infection.

And i sat there in the pregnant silence. I am a man un-prone to keeping my mouth shut, so it was quite a feat that i kept mum.

kept mum on what you say?

Well . . . the irritation could have been caused by my temporary meltdown when i shoved that toothpick up my ear to try and scrape the wax out.

He said i should monitor. the situation.

Will do.

How Facebook has changed the chose your own adventure story

2012-01-17T19:19:00.001-05:00

I am constantly surprised by the twists and turns in the lives of those whose paths have crossed mine. I have lived on four continents now, and multiple locations in the US. This is not a matter of bragging, but rather that i have crossed paths with a huge number of people along the way. And if i were growing up 25 years ago, i would probably have a few pen pals and i could see what happened to my high school girlfriends during reunions (this actually wouldn't be the case for me, since most of my high school girlfriends didn't go to my high school (god bless youth group)). But now we have Facebook, Google+, MySpace, Friendster. And because of the complexity and thoroughness of online social media, i get to be a voyeur to the end of all of these people's journeys (not creepy at all right?). While I may have exited their life, that no longer means that our connection terminates as well.

I'm not one for questioning my decisions.   Ok, that's completely untrue. I question my decisions almost non-stop. UNTIL i make them. And then, it's done. over. i deliberated. probably stressed. waited past a few deadlines. more deliberation. but then -- at some point you have to give yourself credit for making a thoughtful decision. and i do. and thank goodness.

The internet can be torture for those of us who aren't like this. Those of us who worry we may have erred. Was she the one that got away? Did i end my friendship with him too abruptly? There can be endless questions that could be asked. With Facebook, we can now make a somewhat information-based conjecture regarding how our decisions played out. "oh, i'm much better looking than her new boy." "Look at them living it up on their honeymoon . . . that shoulda been me." You add a dash of toomuchtimeonyourhands, and you could get a pretty depressing situation up in their right quick.

This isn't an argument regarding social media being evil. it's more to the tune of me assuring you that the sex ed classes of the future will focus increasingly on privacy and moderation. Privacy in terms of anything you put up on the internet is accessible to the whole wired world. Privacy in terms of "if you let someone take a picture of you, that image can instantly be uploaded to the whole wired world." And moderation in terms of hours spent staring at screens. Moderation in terms of how much access we make available to our friends and the public at large. And these are not just lessons that we need to teach our children. They are just as applicable to ourselves. To myself. This friggin blog probably makes available more information than one would deem appropriate for some job searches. But i made these decisions intentionally, and likewise, i have left out chunks of my life that are either too private or inappropriate. The trick is, no matter what you do or do not disclose, to do so intentionally.

Many of our politicians continue to reinforce how easily the power of the internet can be weaponized (penis photos, ab flexing, page texting).

But alas, thankfully, the internet's power can also be used to spread joy, laughter, genius.

And so, to honor this, i present to you the conversation i had with my father, who is on vacation, via text. the background you need to know is that the Sadie Sea is a boat that passes our house twice a day, and i moon them, and they honk. Subsequently i met them. Laughter was had. And now, when they see people at the house, they always give a toot as they pass on by. Ok, here we go.

Dad: Sadie Sea just tooted us.... Miss u...

Me: Did you moon!!!!

Dad: No. Mom would have killed me! I tebowed...

Me: Nice!!!!

Me: Think about planking.

Dad: ??

Me: Look it up. Image search.

* * email received * *

<< attachment>>

Priceless.

Videochat Killed the Speakerphone Call

2012-01-05T22:57:00.002-05:00

I haven't been in the writing mood lately. Thankfully this happened and got me off my ass.

A few weeks ago was Hannukah. My family has embraced this modern age and we have taken to Skype video chatting so that we can more intimately light candles together while physically apart. Video chat is a significant improvement in many respects to our past ritual of singing the prayers over the phone. Besides the obvious advantage of being able to see my parents and their menorah, i ALSO now get to hear them.

Because cell phones work on the whole "one person talks while one person listens, then switch" principle, they are not designed to both transmit and receive sound simultaneously. Therefore, when we would sing to each other over speakerphone, inevitably, the speakers would eject fragments of my parents voice, dotted like morse code. I can only imagine that my parents also received dots and dashes of my voice, though they never mentioned it. In any case, video chat seems to be here to stay.

After the candles were lit, mol, grover, and i settled in for a chat with my parents. My mother loves grover. loves him. This is not to say that my father doesn't, but my mom grew up with pets and i believe still harbors a secret desire to have a fuzzy companion of her own. My dad has no problem in the slightest with that scenario, as long as he is deceased. And so, my mom loves grover a lot.

She loves him so much, that inevitably at some point in the conversation she will announce, "Ok, let me see my grandpuppy! Where is my grandpuppy at!?" And, because i love her loving our dog, we lower the screen and show her grover, groggy and affable as always, curled up on the couch.

"Where is he?" my mom says.

She wants some eye contact. Some face time. Since grover really doesn't care how you arrange him, i pull him onto my lap and facing the camera.

Then . . . i see . . . a flash.

I realize that my mother is taking pictures of her computer screen in order to have more images of the dog. Multiple photos. Not only is she photographing the picture of the dog on her computer screen (i may literally blow her mind when i show her how easy taking a screenshot is), she then proceeds to show me the picture she took of grover on her computer screen to me by putting the screen of her digital camera up to her computer. Now try to keep up with this: I was being asked to evaluate the image of my dog on my lap on my mom's computer taken by a digital camera and then relayed back to me. Pretty friggin meta.

I was laughing entirely to hard to comment on the photo itself. i'm pretty sure the actual dog on my lap appeared more crisp and "lifelike," but i loved the enthusiasm.

I can only imagine whats going to happen when she meets the new puppy . . .

(to be continued!!!!!!!!!!!! cliffhanger!!!!!)

will matt and mol be getting a new puppy? is this just a ploy to get people re-engaged with the blog? is this couple going to keep getting new puppies each year until they show up on Hoarders: Animal Edition? The answers to there questions and more in the next installment!

it's about having an inner light, and i got me some

2011-12-21T00:35:00.003-05:00

tonight was the first night of hannukah. and, sadly, my 2011 streak continued with bad news tracking holiday celebration like a sniper on a rooftop on a clear day.

but tonight was a little different. because this holiday is about a miracle of light, and i got me some of that.

*flashback

on a trip to the virgin islands as a young kid, my brother (2 years older) and i, befriended another boy around our age at the communal pool at the resort. We were "holiday friends" and the whole experience really centered around having people to horse around with more than the fostering of what might become a decade long pen-pal correspondence (remember pen pals!). It was mostly normal kid stuff. Until . . . and I don't remember the details, but that kid had a younger sister, who was just young enough to not yet be old enough to be "fun." i don't remember teasing her. I wasn't that kind of kid. Could we all have been leaving her out, totally. Hell, you know what, we might have teased her. I can't even try to defend the 11 year old me (approx. age). Anyway, i definitely don't remember there being an acute incident of her getting upset.

What i do remember was the kid's father coming into the pool area (my childhood brain recorded his arrival as: "from out of nowhere") and starting to scream at my brother and me. His face was red and he was really digging into us about how ashamed we should be of ourselves and bad kid this yadda yadda yadda. he didn't scream at his son. This. was. shocking.

We were not the kind of kids who got screamed at much. we were, well, dorks. But more than that, our parents very rarely brought the hammer down. I mean, i think they punished accordingly--no real harm, no real foul. So this guy screaming at us out of nowhere was jolting. And here's what i remember. I remember my brother saying back, "Your not our father!" and us running back to our room.

Back in the room we told our parents what happened. They were, in a word, furious. "NO ONE screams at you but us!" i recall my father saying, totally supportive and without seeing the irony (i didn't yet know what irony was, so that was just good parenting.) And that lesson stuck. It's akin to "no one puts baby in the corner," except with your soul.

There will always be doubters, and worriers, and haters, but don't you dare fuck with my ner tamid. You need permission to criticize one's character, and that right is one that must be earned.

So this hannukah. this celebration of the light that endured. I protect my own light. and frankly, im growing it. So as i watch those candles multiplying night by night, i remember that the light in my soul has been around for years. and its been multiplying and multiplying. it burns with a vigor that that will not be extinguished. Not by anyone.

there are days which seem dark and strung together. its during those stretches when one's light is tested. This hannukah, my light will endure.

Back in the Saddle

2011-12-20T00:30:00.004-05:00

Sometimes, as a writer, you are cursed with an uneventful period; where you don't feel like anything is worthy of getting down on paper (or virtual paper). Im not sure this is a "thing" or just something that happens to me, but either way, i am not in such a phase.

I have somehow found myself in the opposite situation. Too much life in my life. Too much real in my life. And its just beyond the scope of what i use this blog for; its not therapy. its more performance. Granted, its a personal performance of my life. But i push on. By the numbers.

1. This headline is seriously NOT OK (it is so serious a violation that i am using caps, bold, italics, and underline!)

Are you f'n kidding me. ARE YOU KIDDING ME! I rarely hope for someone to be fired around "the holidays," but holy shit i hope someone was sent packing at msnbc for this garbage pun from dumb-dumb city.

2. I know that the TV business is an unpredictable one. Tons of pilot episodes are made, and only a select few even make a debut. Of those that make it on air, they then have to survive the court of public opinion. Well, at least in theory. I mean, the show Community is god damn genius and its still apparently up for cancellation, so who knows what drives this approval process. All this being said, I have never been more confident of a shows imminent demise, pre-airing, than the new show "Rob!" Why will this show be cancelled quickly? I need me some bullet points.

Rob Schneider is the Rob they are referring to.
The actual title of the show actually has an upside down exclamation mark in front of Robs name, because he's joining a Spanish speaking family. Yes, i can't even type the name of this show without going into "symbols" in my fonts. And that's not something i do for Rob Schneider's comedy.
When i type Rob! into google, zero of the entries on the first page reference this show.
When i type "Rob! tv show" into google, the 6 and 7th entry talk about this show (7 is imdb). None of these hits are the show's page.
this is imdb's description of the shows storyline, "Centers on solitary guy, Rob, who marries into a huge Mexican-American family"
none of the promo's for the show are funy. if you can't cut together 20 seconds of funny to draw people in. you're in big trouble long-term.

In the interest of "fair and balanced," they do have Cheech cast as the family's father. I'm worried it's too little too late. Not even Cheech could smoke enough to make this show a winner.

3. I really have started to enjoy Christmas personally. I was thinking recently that the "worst part" of Christmas for me is that mol's parents have cats which i'm allergic to. That's a huuuuuuuge improvement of attitude. and its all mol and her family's doing. They really make it fun and loving and warm. And i am looking forward to it.

4. That said, the older i get, the crazier this country's reaction to Christmas is to me. I mean, fundamentally speaking, if you put all the effects of, um . . . Jesus's birth, and all it extends to: shopping, lights, radio broadcasts, tv specials, travel, tree cutting, school cancellation, cooking. The US goes more gaga for "the holiday's" than they do for the woman named Gaga. And i'm not saying that Hannukah is any better. It's basically the same premise, just less popular locally.

Is it possible that just making a few weeks where the country on holiday (hell, maybe it focuses on the importance of family and friends and community) could be a really good thing. I mean, nothing to fight over. Everyone can agree on it's importance. Now thats my holiday feeling. We hide our love for each other in religious get-togethers, and we shouldn't need the excuse.

5. Lastly, and on a completely different note, something for you football fans. Tonight's monday night football match-up between the 49ers and the Steelers was completely dominated by the 49er's punter. (no, i don't learn punters names. OH, he's lucky, he was just on the screen, his names "Lee." I'm assuming it's his last name, but i don't really care. Again, he's a punter.) This guy is launching 60 yard kicks that bounce straight up on the 5 yard line. Over and over and over again. The average starting field position for the Steeler's was the 15 yard line. Worst since 2005. Even when he only got a 50 yarder to the 35 yard line, the returner ran backwards 10 yard and they got a penalty putting them at the 12. I can't remember ever saying this, but give that man the game ball. He's the #1 reason the Steeler's didn't get in the end-zone tonight (the pass rush was reason #2).

Grover's Roar

2011-11-28T16:29:00.001-05:00

I am forcing myself to write something uplifting. Cause i want to. Cause its hard.

And so, as the centerpiece of what i am thankful for this past year, we turn this blog, once again, into its alter-ego: Matt's Dog Blog of Grover doing incredible cute mundane things. (that's a LOT of commas, mol the reading specialist won't be pleased with me) And theyre even cuter . . . cause he's a dog!!!!

Today we will focus on his roar. Can Grover bark? Yes. He can. Does Grover bark? No. He's doesn't.

Since we got him a year ago, grover has barked at about a dozen different instances. No real pattern. Sometimes its because we are outside and he is inside and he wants us to hear him. Sometimes, if you are getting him riled up playing, while he's anticipating, he'll bark once. No bigs. My dad heard him bark for the first time over the past weekend. One bark. No bigs. Dad was offended. Then laughed at himself.

But this doesn't mean that our dog is a silent dog (ok, he is a mostly silent dog). But when he doesn't talk, he makes the most hilarious guttural, "dying-giraffe" sounding, soft "o" sound. He's all ooOOOooOoOoOOoOoo like an old man trying to grapple with getting a book off a high shelf. It's hilarious. the milkweed crackle of my dog saying hello is worthy of it's own post. it's that funny sounding. But i don't have an audio file . . . . so thankfully, there's more.

When he does talk, when he does make his gravelly o face (don't over think that), he can't do it without a post-talk sneeze. Yup. He talks, then sneezes. oooOOooOooOO. Achoo. Repeat repeat repeat.

And what makes it so funny to me is that he's voice is all pleading and pathetic (on purpose), but then the sneeze makes it so ridiculous that you can't help but laugh. Thus producing, for him, the opposite of the intended reaction. It's like when a Canadian tries to say "I'm sour-ee" or a tough guy drinking out of a flexi-straw. Don't make no sense together.

So if you hear a geriatric howl followed by a sneeze . . . don't worry! That big headed, black-and-white cow colored hugging and licking machine isn't an assisted living code red . . .

It's just my dog.

Is thanksgiving. Is not thanksgiving.

2011-11-27T14:12:00.001-05:00

I have had the discussion many times before. It's a philosophical one. it goes like this.

Premise: Without bad, we would not truly be able to know good. Without darkness, we can't appreciatelight. Without sadness there is notrue knowledge of happiness.

That's the premise. It can be expanded or contracted (to one dichotomy), but the essence ofthe argument generally is the same.

I should say upfront, that i've always thought that thisidea was, at least mostly, crap. I just think that if you were constantly happy, youmay mellow into a contentment, but i somehow doubt that you need some good olfashion pain to really feel good. It somehow equates luck with necessity. As in, someone lucky enough to escape hardship mustget unlucky in order to appreciate how lucky he/she's been.

But again, like many things in philosophy, these argumentsonly exist in the vacuum of theory. In the non-existent plane where unexistable scenarios exist.

Because bad, darkness, and sadness are, on the existentplane where existable scernarios exist, unavoidable. And all three came to my house this thanksgiving.

If one can only know thankfulness in the face of great loss,then this year's thanksgiving was perhaps the most authentic ever. On Wednesday, while leaving thehospital where he works as the head of psychiatrics, my Uncle Bill was hittingby a car in the parking lot. Asthe news trickled up the phone lines from the big apple to western mass, wewere told that his head hit the ground post-collision (the car was driven by ahospital employee who was not going very fast), and that he was insurgery. The prognosis wasunclear, but somehow simultaneously bleak.

A few hours later the news came that his brain stem has beensevered and he was, brain activity wise, gone. And like that my uncle went from thanksgiving host togone from our lives in a matter of hours. Like someone took an eraser to my family and simply eliminated one ofus. So sudden. So unfair.

The new york laws for organ donation, i have learned thisthanksgiving, are almost totally crazy. While i realize that every one of them probably has a very sane reason(most likely stemming from totally crazy situations), in this situation, inorder to use all of his extremely healthy organs, they had to wait for hisbody, the mechanical side (automatic processes like slight breathing can stillcontinue without brain function) to completely give out.

Functionally, for my family, this meant that we spent thisthanksgiving waiting for the life to leave our uncle's body, so that in hislast moments, he could save or improve countless other people's lives. This process of waiting, as i imploreyou not to imagine, is incredibly difficult on those who love Bill,particularly my aunt. My aunt, whohas worked so hard to create the life shewanted with the man she loves so much. my heart crumbles at the thought of her. the thought that, were i in herposition, my heart would be left a pile of dust. This issadness. This is the dark.

The memorial on Sunday was delayed til next weekend. With all of the organ donation, thehospital wasn't sure he'd be gone in time for his own memorial. That sentence typifies the surrealismof the past four days for me.

My mother went to new york to be with her sister, myaunt. This is her 2nd thanksgivingin a row in a hospital. Exactly ayear ago, we were standing by my grandmother's hospital bed holding a vigil(she is doing well!). The rest ofmy family went to my parents house in western mass as planned. We sat together. Took walks. Chatted.

We sat in the darkness, in the bad, in our sadness. But together. We put what was left of our inner fires, we took all of ourtiny internal flickers, and we put them together in order to light a wayforward. And i think its fair tosay that we were thankful for that. For the comfort of the familiar that comes when surrounded byfamily. And we did the best wecould. Feeling angry and lost andthankful and sad and shocked all at once.

It should be noted that my mother is such an expert atthanksgiving at this point that even in her absence she had pre-prepared theentire meal for the rest of us. She even made my favorite dessert for me. I wish we could have shared it. And i miss Bill. And i'm hurting for my aunt.

and all this crap. this sad dark bad crap. just doesn't feel like it's gonna make me understand happiness in anydeeper, more fundamental earth-shattering way. Though, if knowing its opposite is the key to unlocking thatgoodness . . .

. . . i'venever been more ready to be wrong.

Learning to Spell P. h. D.

2011-11-20T16:26:00.001-05:00

It's the final countdown.

i don't usually talk about work on the blog. for many many reasons. but at the moment, it's impossible to ignore. I am defending my PhD on December 16th. That's soon.

And so my life now revolves around finishing this paper. Analyzing this data. Sprinting to the finish.

And, much like writing an invite list to a wedding, the only way to really get through it is to put blinders on and do what's right for you. Except in this case (the dissertation), it envelopes so much of my time that i really have no choice but to ignore all of my other worldly responsibilities. And of course, the irony abounds considering that my dissertation revolves around the division of labor in marriage, and mol (ugh. i dont like mol. my only love just makes me think of that 70's (80's? 60's?) song and . . . i'll get back to that later.) is ending up doing most of the labor with me laboring RE: domestic labor.

You get it.

I also DO plan on finishing the blogs about my "birthday" this year. But the next section is long. and i just don't have the time.

So, in summation. I need a hall pass from you, my blog readers, until december 16th (well, 17th, i'll be up real late on the 16th). I will try to get some stuff up on here. But if it doesn't feel like the quality and quantity you are used to . . . gimme a month.

How Going to Wesleyan Ruined My Life

2011-11-09T16:37:00.003-05:00

Or more accurately, how being a dance major at wesleyan ruined my life.

i loved college. loved it. i experienced as much as i could, and even managed to go in a biology major, and leave with a degree in dance and psychology. So how could such a positive experience lead to such ruinous ends. I'll tell you.

As a dance major, there are certain degree requirements you must fulfill. One of these requirements involves the constant participation in multiple different dance practice classes each semester. Plus, as majors, you both lead rehearsals for dances you are choreographing, as well as attende rehearsals for dances you are a dancer for. This is all the minimum, with additional opportunities for dancing being available through various campus dance groups.

I'm not trying to paint a "those poor dancers" scenario, but rather emphasize the amount of time that was spent in the various dance studios. Dancing. On any given day, i would have anywhere from one to four different dancing sessions. That's a lot of movement . . . and touching.

Now i know its very easy to take this to an extremely sexual place. And, as a major, i assure you i have either heard or created all versions of the sexualization of dance. And, as a matter of fact, one of my most loved and respected dance mentors, a 60+ year old devout Christian, in a modern dance class declared, "dance IS sex!" And, as always, she was right. But, in this instance, i not talking about the sexual aspect of the human contact, but rather the tactile and emotional aspect.

When you are dancing, and rolling around, and massaging, and hugging, and throwing, and jumping and lifting each other, you (i?) get an almost womb-like comfort from all that human contact. You want community? Try contact improv. You haven't felt community til its inadvertently flung you ten feet into the air, and then let you slide down its back to the floor once again. While you may spend the learning process flailing about like a jelly-fish in a killer-whales mouth, the comfort you can gain from the human energy transfer can be incredible cathartic. And so every day of college, i spent a good portion of my time in the metaphorical womb of my loving dance community.

And then there was the student body itself. Back in the day, my day, Wesleyan was not hipster, but rather hippie. And i never shook any of my friends' hands. ever. we hugged. we hugged when me met for lunch. we hugged when we got home. we hugged when we met to go out. we hugged when we drank. and sometimes we more than hugged.

But, taken as a whole, the amount of physical contact i received on a daily basis in college was truly staggering. and that became my baseline for human contact. my intimacy meridian. that, in turn, has caused me to suffer greatly.

Out of college i moved directly to new york city, downtown brooklyn to be more exact. That was July, 2001. New York is the photographic negative of wesleyan. Where i used to be unable to avoid human contact and constant companionship, now, i had to call, confirm and schedule opportunities to see familiar faces. And, while it may seem paradoxical, anyone whose lived in nyc can attest that for some reason, being smushed against the cold sweating flesh of a wide array of strangers during rush hour in the subway has the exact opposite affect of all other skin to skin contact. It is the very definition of isolation. You are dying inside alone, sandwiched between human barricades. Suffice it to say, nyc and i were not a match. And while i did manage to leave the city on what i would consider my own terms, i'm not moving back there any time . . . anytime.

Then i moved to the mountains of Japan. Very much a no touching country. Extremely no touching. Hugging a native Japanese person (and these are my good friends i'm talking about) is like trying to coral a giant sea eel. They squiggle and, with their arms outstretch in semi-circles in the correct pre-hug pose, they subsequently assault you to fury of tiny gentle pat-down attacks. The contrast of squiggle and jabbing additionally makes them extremely difficult to get a good hold of. And if you are thinking that this just makes me sound super creepy -- all grabbing them and stuff, i would argue that what is actually happening is more akin to the hug equivalent of the "dead-fish" handshake. Fun fact, true to their country's strict separation between public and private, Japan does have a paradoxically high rate of unprotected sex among their youth, but i have no personal experience to speak from in this area.

Fast-forward past my time in boston (where there was a good deal of hugging surrounding a certain 2004 baseball victory) to my present life in Amherst. This is a pretty touchy-feely town. I hug a good deal of my friends. Not all, but the majority. During any given day, i am practically certain to simply run into people i know and socialize with, all whilst going about my daily routine. And i love it. love it love it love it. But what i'm realizing . . . more and more . . . is that wesleyan ruined my life.

Cause i'm still south of my intimacy meridian. Even in this almost ideal bastion of community, i still want more hugs. I feel like the goddamn cookie monster of intimacy, where i want to (metaphorically!!!!) shove that human touch down my non-existent gaping felt (pun) mouth-hole -- pieces of the love crumbling to the floor below. Like i said, this whole wesleyan dance major thing has turned me into a monster.

Bullet Point (to the brain) Tuesday

2011-11-08T17:13:00.000-05:00

In my first step toward becoming an answer (question) on Jeopardy (hopefully in a post-Trebek age. Tangential Fun Fact: If you google "Alex Trebek is a douche," this blog is the #3 search result returned. Not too shabby.), a fellow blogger wrote an entry about a study i conducted and published. You can find his article about my article here. Is there anything more narcissistic than re-post on your blog another blog post about yourself . . . all while being a graduate student? i think this might be some kind of record.

I rarely get so moved to anger as i have by the recent unearthing of some truly horrific evil events happening at Penn St. Football Dept. Yes, granted, Sandusky is by far the most abhorrent. He was raping children. Not only that, but he started a foster program for disadvantaged kids . . . and then raped them. He also has a number of adopted children. Five boys. It is all really ugly stuff. And the furor that has gone up surrounding all of those in the know, including coach Joe Paterno, is warranted. These are children that were victims. They deserved more responsible and effective action. If you hear that a child is being raped in your facility, whether or not that coach is in the process of retiring is not a good enough reason for only telling your university supervisor and not calling the police. it if was your son being raped, i bet you would have called the cops. Where have our priorities run away to?

Sports radio is, by and large, crap. And i actually don't mean that negatively. It is the sports equivalent of US Weekly. You aren't really going to learn much, but its fun to be temporarily immersed in the conversation. Well, this whole Penn St. scandal brought Heath Evans to the radio microphone this particular afternoon. and while i know Evans as a fullback for the patriots, i didn't expect what came next. He started speaking about how one day, when he came home to his nice house, with nice cars, and 2 beautiful daughters, he found his wife, trying to take her life because of the emotional scars caused by sexual abuse. Evans eloquently ran down the numbers. 1 in 4 girls is sexually abused/assaulted, 1 in 6 boys. He described the situation as the epidemic it is. He spoke about the rising number of girls, 16 and under, who are now on anti-depressants -- a sign, he contends, that we are medicating the problem instead of dealing with it head on.

And Heath Evans is going to confront this thing head on. he started www.heathevans.org and he is personally involved in getting free, skilled mental health services to those who need it. He is helping to create online couselling classes that are age appropriate and can be used anonymously, for those victims too scared to share their story. He also create imavictim.com as a place for victims to anonymously (or un-) share their story of abuse. Unburden themselves of the weight of being the only one who knows. And to dispel the myths that victims of abuse are alone, that they are the only one's dealing with pain like this, and that they feel they are to blame for what was done to them. I am rarely impressed by the men (and occasional women) of sports radio. Heath Evans, you are the exception. and you were exceptional. i honestly believe you educated the listening audience.

Lastly. Yesterday in class, the professor asked the students what they thought of my lecture the past Friday. There were mostly murmurs, but one girl responded. "Beautiful." That was, and remains, a pretty creepy response. Which, caused me to look at my co-graduate assistant Amanda and say, "what happened to the good ol days, when only the female ta's got sexually harassed."

Here's to a happier Wednesday.

More or Less Teaching

2011-11-05T12:37:00.003-04:00

*A brief entry unrelated to the snow and ice and tree and power-line-maggedon. Part II will be along. But lets take a break for a second to talk about yesterday.*

Yesterday i gave my first large lecture. I mean, i have been teaching in various capacities for years, but never to 400+ students. This time it was 400+ students (of a social psychology class).

And am i crazy to think that this is kinda a big deal. I mean, on some level, my first "snap-shot" of social psychology was in a similar lecture environment back in undergraduate. The professor of that class, who was a mentor then--and still is today, had a good deal of influence in my decision to pursue this field as a psychologist. He brought it to life. He explained how these ideas he was teaching about formed the underpinnings of why people say and do the things they say and do. And he was right.

And now. here i am. Being that guy. Boom.

I'm not used to teaching that many people. I am used to 10-50 students. You get a feel for their mood. their personalities. I work the room. effective teaching for me usually leans toward overly-intelligent comedy. But 450 people, they are a group. They have a group personality. and it takes awhile to gauge. and the class in only 50 min. So it was a little daunting.

I started off a bit shaky. i forgot to show a video (i remembered and showed it at the end of class). I was pacing a bit fast and semi-stumbled through the first two slides. And then slowly. Gradually. I eased into it. Found my narrative voice. Found the story. And we settled in.

Interestingly, one of the subjects we touched on in this class was the media/public portrayal of homosexuals, and how that affects our behavior, including stereotyping and prejudice. I thought back about a year when i was visiting a relative in college. While we were hanging in his frat, we got to talking about some topic, let's say sports, and he remarked, "oh, they're so gay."

"Excuse me?" i said. "oh, not gay gay, not like that, just like, you know dumb, stupid. It's just slang."
"it's bad slang" "its slang i don't want to hear coming out of your mouth" "ill slang you right in the face if you say that slang again." Some version of all of these statements were said. But the truth was, we were both right. He was right that using gay as synonymous with stupid is a ubiquitous part of college culture. And I was right in that using gay in that way is both offensive and detrimental.

this is what i was thinking about when we began covering the topic in class yesterday. And then i remembered something, holy shit. im the teacher. im responsible for teaching them ABOUT this. And so i did.

I'm not sure how many points i actually drove home in yesterday's class. But i do know that they were silent during this particular message. All of these students who are starting to grasp these hidden prejudices and implicit attitudes. And then i tell them that using the term gay to mean stupid or lame is the exact kind of hidden behavior that reinforces these prejudicial attitudes. And then, even though they may have thought it or heard this said in the past, when its said in the context of all other similar examples of racial and sexist prejudices that are no longer considered acceptable at all . . . they get it. They at least get it enough to, for that moment, consider their own behavior. Consider what it means when they have said it in the past.

And that, for a teacher, is the best case scenario.

I feel compelled to add that when rereading this post, it sound like i was much like the inspirational teacher in Stand and Deliver, or at least of that ilk. I was not. I will not pretend that this was a life changing lecture. Except for me. I was my first, and that's memorable. But it was also my first, in that there was a lot of room for improvement. lots. Like next time im going to staple my notes so they don't end up scattered and unorderable within the first 15 minutes of the lecture. I'm also going to make an effort to breathe more. Cause oxygens my friend.

All im arguing for is a moment of teaching. A moment of trying to be the change you want to see in the world. A moment of putting my money where my gay mouth is.

The Dirge of Halloween 33 -- Part 1

2011-11-02T16:45:00.001-04:00

"Halloween is cancelled!!!! Halloween is cancelled!!!!!!!"

That's all i heard as i flipped from radio station to radio station in my car. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Saturday Night: With my friend driving in from CT, through the beginning of the craziest snowstorm i have ever seen in my life, mol and i got reservations at our most favoritest eatery in the world, Chez Albert. They are friends. They are community. They are also the site of our future wedding rehersal dinner. Because we are still last minute doers, when it comes to things like "making reservations," we are sometimes out of luck. In this case, we got a 9:15 reservation. The late shift. We piled in the car, mol at the wheel, and drove through the now driving snow (homonym double usage!!!).

As we pulled into the back parking lot at Chez, we saw the kitchen, nay, the entire restaurant power flick on and off. This smelled of adventure. We parked the car and went in.

Inside the mood was more panicked than usual. While the Frenchman (capital F!) is, by nature, amazingly loosey-goosey, you could feel the kinetic energy of the pace being picked up. We sat. They told us what we already knew; they've been losing power. They were waiting for us before they shut it down. They love us and the feeling is mutual. Touched. I was touched. So, we ordered immediately. All courses.

And they came and they were delicious. Which is obvious, considering the source. What is more note-worthy was the now fully raging storm outside. We lost power temporarily too many times to count. The small tree outside by the sidewalk was now coated in freezing wet snow and blowing in the breeze, resembling a Chinese dragon slinkily dancing in a parade. And as we were paying the check, the first crazy piece of news came. A tree branch had fallen on the cars. And, "you're ok, as long as you don't drive a Subaru." Mol drives a subaru. Amazingly, while there was a huge branch on the hood and windshield of the car, there was no real damage. And that began the craziest f-n drive home i've ever experienced.

*brief tangent. did i mention that the card machine was down and we didn't even pay. yah. that happened. thats community. I mean, they DO know where we live if we never come back. then again, never coming back would be punishment enough. end tangent*

We pull through town, to a frozen snow-scape. If it hadn't yet, it now becomes apparent that what is happening is some for reals shiznet. and it is not messing around. Trees are down everywhere. Tree's are coming down everywhere. A main road now has a canopy of trees leaning across the top, creating what feels like a driving version of Russian roulette. Will they snap now, will they snap later.

We are lucky to have many many different ways to get to our house. Because of the mayhem, we decided to go home by the main roads.

Main road #1: main road number was has live power lines down and active. The scene is dire enough that it quickly attracts a cop and his flashing lights. We turn down a side road to turn around in their cul de sac. Halfway around we are met with a full tree across the road. Mol, aka. the driver aka our savior, pulls the half circle in reverse, and we are on our way. Well, almost. A guy and his car blocked our backtracking turn, as he struggles in reverse. This went on long enough that my friend and i went out to help this guy stop being an idiot. "I'm stuck," he said. "No you're not" we replied, "you just need to go forward." With that, he went forward. We did tell him about the tree in the cul de sac. I can only hope he did not die there, trying to back around that O.

Back on the road, we tried going past our house and doubling back on our street. Up ahead there was a massive combo of tree/power line disaster, now block the major thruway. (Would later come to find out the road we would have turned on from there was also SUPER un-passable).

Turned around again. Back toward town . Again the trees hanging overhead, threatening to snap. New route home. This time we took the road we usually take home. It's a bit of a sideroad though, and we were playing it smart. Miraculously . . . . let me say that again . . . miraculously . . . that street was passable. Street were no longer "clear." that was no longer a designation. This particular street had a huge amount of trees down, but none of them completely blocked the road. miraculous.

We turned onto our road. Probably 1/4 of a mile to go. No chance. Trees down. Plural. big trees. No chance.

We go up past our house to the last remaining inroad to our home. This is blocked, but only by movable branches. We move them. We then turn onto our street. We are one house away, and we have to weave left, right, left to squeeze through 3 downed trees. and then we are home.

We park, get out of the car and hear "creeeeeeeeeaaakkBOOM." A tree falls behind us, completely sealing us off the roadway.

I. am. not. kidding. This happened. It was as indiana jones as it seems. and we were scared. As we walked to the house, the sounds were of trees creaking and falling. It was so constant and consistent that you could just sit there and listen to the neighborhood crumbling. Surreal.

Suffice it to say, the power at our house was out. Thankfully, we had a huge bag of tea-lights, and it was already pretty late at night. We spent some fun time in candle-light, bundled up, and went to bed.

Not a bachelorette, but not yet a wifey

2011-10-29T16:58:00.000-04:00

Today is the one-year anniversary of my engagement to mmf. So, i have been using the term mmf for exactly a year. Which means its time for something new. Something that expresses less surprise (at having a fiancé) and more excitement (at the upcoming metamorphosis into a wifeypants). Hmmmm.

Some brainstormed thoughts:

FOTF - fiancé of the future. This one was vetoed because its sounds too permanent.

ffTff - fiance for the foreseeable future. This is a front-runner. Only being held back by the connotation that sometime in the future, i will somehow find (build?) a stronger better faster stronger fiancé, whom i will switch her out for. Like she has an expiration date. Which she doesn't.

smmf - still my motherfucking fiancé. I think this one's veto is obvious.

mmf part II - see above.

mff - my focaccia fiancé - just cause it sounds so fun.

fiw - fiance in waiting -- both too british and the process leading up to the wedding is anything but a passive process.

twp - the wedding planner -- reallllllllly sends the wrong message.

mol - my only love - yah. lets go with this one for the time being. i like.

Anyway. I was trying to figure out what an appropriate gift is for a proposeiversary. I mean, there is no script for this one. No rubric of material. And trust me when i tell you that a second diamond is out.

So, considering she's from "the Kingdom" in Vermont, I decided to get her a foot of snow. You know, to make it feel like home down here in balmy Massachusetts. And wouldn't you know it . . . it came right on time. A white halloween, and not just in the bathrooms at college halloween parties either. we are talking october inches of snow, falling merrily from the sky.

Either the worlds gone mad, or i am.

2011-10-26T00:27:00.000-04:00

Today i got a parking warning. What is a parking warning, you ask? It looks just like a university issued parking ticket (same little yellow sleeve and everything), only on the piece of receipt paper, instead of a fee, it read, "this is a warning."

"A warning for what," I though to myself as i stood beside my car, located in the parking lot for which i have a pass. It was for "failure to display parking pass." The best part, the part which made me actually laugh out loud, was that at the bottom of the warning the attendant had typed in my parking pass info (which i can only imagine they read off the pass).

Now i don't know whats going on. I drive straight to the parking services office. I show them the warning. "It only a warning," the woman there says. "yes, i reply, but a warning against doing what." She admits that that is a very good question. I appreciate her honesty. A minute later the tall be speckled parking manager comes around the corner. He comes around the corner like a man who usually is coming around the corner to give the final word on some bad news like, "we towed your car" or "we lost the keys to the car-boot".

to me he just, "let's take a look at it." And a few moments later we are both staring at my pass, at the warning, and at the matching numbers. Now he is shaking his head. That makes me feel better than anything. "You're good," he says. And he says it with a tone that says, "i have no friggin clue why this yahoo decided to write you a ticket."

I suspect that the attendant probably didn't see the pass at first, started writing the ticket, saw the pass, and turned the ticket into a warning. In the panic of having an extra slip of meaningless paper, he/she sleeved it in yellow and put it on my car anyway. Wash, rinse, repeat.
__________________________

I think i came up with a way to make millions off of this blog, and all id have to do is stop writing about the things i want to write about. And since that isn't happening, i'm giving the idea away for a small slice of any profits made off of its use. copy-written.

In this lucrative blog, what i spend my posts doing, is making funny and social relevant commentary on the random ads that appear in and around my posts. Ok, maybe i just make fun of them in a witty way. Ooooooor, maybe i show how their corporate greed is a building block of the failure of the modern american dream. Ok, probably mostly jokes.

Anyways. Because i am so hilarious and insightful, other advertisers will fight for the future ad space around my oh so magnetic words, and soon there will be massive bidding wars just to advertise near me so that i might skewer their products in a visible way that will boost sales.

Is this the definition of selling out?

$$$ for Nuthin but your PhD's for Fee

2011-10-24T12:49:00.000-04:00

Those of who take notice of blog changes. all four of you. may have noticed that ads have begun popping up in and around my blogspace. i did that.

I figure, can't hurt. I have made $1.75 so far. and if i get enough to take mmf out for dinner, thats what ill do. Interestingly, i believe that in the agreement for running the ads i am not allowed to A) click on the ads myself (i truly have better things to do) and B) I don't think im supposed to encourage my readers to click on the ads (which i wasn't thinking of doing in the first place). This second rule is a bit strange to me as i also have the option of editing which ads are shown, to better fit my audience.

Which means i'm essentially being asked to figure out exactly what you guys/gals would like/want/need, but then not to encourage you to get it. it all seems very backward. Which means it will probably work.
_________________

In other relevant news. Being in my building in graduate school is becoming a metaphor. How so? Well, they've begun construction on the area all the way around our building. Which means that the parking lot is gone, as well as the grassy hill where you could watch the sunset (the one beautiful thing that this building has is a great view of sunset). Now its a dust bowl. And the building vibrates. And there's beeping. This is the "new view" from my office window (which doesn't open).


home sweet home

As grad school has excavated my will to continue this "educational" process, the machines outside are reflecting this process before my very eyes. Living a metaphor.
________________

Speaking of things that are totally wrong. I saw this scene unfold at the coffee shop over the weekend.

I'm at the counter, talking to my barista friends, when i hear a girl/woman speaking in noticeably loud Chinese (not sure which dialect). I turn my head and see the girl sitting at "the island" talking super loud and i figure her friend (obscured by the pillar in front of me) across from her must be running over the "close talker" episode of Seinfeld in her/his mind (if Seinfeld made it to China).

Then i turn and realize, there IS no one across from her. This girl is rattling off a conversation, volume turned up to 11, while voice-chatting over her computer. it was too good not to try and capture. So, with the help of some friends, i got some surreptitious video.

Some notes on the video: 1. it's back lit. sorry bout that. no control over the sun yet.
2. The volume doesn't really come through. You can hear her, but you can't hear how, relative to the other sounds in the shop, she was like a verbal firework going off in the center of town. I think this has more to do with the microphone on my iPhone, more than me exaggerating the actual volume. Enjoy:

_____________________

And. To close. Some words of wisdom:

A dirty dog, is a happy dog.

The Sneak Strikes Again

2011-10-20T17:35:00.002-04:00

Bullet Point Thursday!!!!

This is how i imagine the meeting going at the advertising center of Wendy's headquarters:

Ok everyone. I want something fresh, hip, new. We need a slogan that says "come to wendy's." Something that will speak to the young people.

Executive: how about "Where's the beef?" Exec Head: you mean our old slogan from the bygone era?
Executive: yup. how about that again. but you know. again. the old people will remember it fondly, and the majority of people will have never heard it before. Exec Head: "BRILLIANT"

Me: not brilliant Wendy's. I'm not THAT old and i remember where's the beef. What i can't for the life of me remember is why i give a flying squirrel. Oh, that's right, it makes no sense anymore. (did it ever?). I don't think this is going to be the moment where Wendy's surpasses McD's or even Bugger King (sic) and a purveyor of cheap questionable meat. And they aren't in subway's league.

As long as i'm bagging on advertising . . . . have you seen the new Sims game? You know, the game where you pretend to be someone else as you interact with a fake real world? Well the new Sims asks, "Are you a cat or a dog person." but they mean it literally. In the new sim it looks as if you can play as an animal OR a human (and potentially a human with a animal head--i haven't entirely listened to the commercial). But i did catch the advert beckon you to, "chase some tail." Does that mean they've animated pets having sex? sadly, i am pretty sure i know the answer to my own question here, but it begs the secondary question: is there any wonder that the world has so many problems when some of our best computer minds are animated animal porn instead of, well, anything but that.

Also, are they really marketing these games directly at the stereotype of lonely shut its with only their pets as company? I mean, i have a pretty uncomfortably close relationship with my pup, and even i find no draw toward playing with animated pictures of pets being controlled by other people who may or may not want to get it on with me doggy-style. again, literally.

I have grown to enjoy (GROWN to, mind you) Chelsey Handler's Chelsey Lately tv show. I have a soft spot for ladies with sass who don't give a rat's ass. That said, the strength/format/most guest comedians on that show are simply not funny enough to allow for a "guest host" to suffice during Chelsey's absence. That is all i have to say on this.

There is an old William Carlos Williams poem (one of my favorites ever) that reads:

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast.

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold.

Here is the version i wrote and dedicated to the sneakiest sneak in the sneak-o-verse, mmf:

I have eaten
some of the candy
that you hid
in the kitchen drawer

and which
I know you hid
purposefully
under that cloth napkin.

I forgive you.
the kit-kats were delicious
and the tootsie-pop
so sweet.

It took me 2 weeks to find that goddamn candy!

Moments: It's NOT just how you ask for breath fresheners

2011-10-12T15:44:00.000-04:00

I just had a moment.

thank god i just had a moment. i needed a moment.

it's funny. these days great moments often get measured by the sell-ablity of the subsequent screen play. Disney moments. Those are the super big bucks moments. Because all of the 'lovable losers who come back and win' story lines have been played out, now we mine reality for our success stories. And perhaps I'm being cynical here, a criticism that i rarely get. perhaps shining a spotlight on the wonders that happen to real world underdogs is what we need more of. real world glory.

but a part of me can't help but think that this is real world glory in the same way that the Little League World Series is now a month long event on ESPN. Yes, these kids are playing their hearts out. And yes, there is something beautifully raw about the way they care and play the game. But do i need to be watching it? Some 32-year-old guy watching a the worst day of this 13-year-old's life play out in front of a newly minted national audience? You have to admit, even the biggest skeptic would have to say that there is something, let's say, exploitative, going on. And i feel like that is the mildest way of saying my feelings on this. The most mild.

And that's how i feel about the Disnifying of real life triumph. Why can't the recognition of the moment be glorious in and of itself. We look for our moments from the television and miss the one's that happen in our day-to-day.

today, at the back end of a long day, i had a moment. And i'm recognizing it right now.

5 years ago i taught a first year student-success course (this is not completely un-related to the piece that i authored that was recently published on this issue). I had 3 sections of 20 (or so) first years -- and my task was to help acclimate them to the college lifestyle, and give them the tools (note-taking, studying, etc.) to reach success at the college level. But, as i've grown to understand much more, i was also there to put a friendly face on "college" and give these kids an outlet for connecting with someone affiliated with the university. Often students end up in large survey courses their first year, and can go long periods of time without having actual face-to-face contact with a professor. As you might predict, this is not good for their general college well being.

In the smallest of these three sections, the one with 12 students, was Chris. Chris was a light-skinned black kid with a puffy winter jacket and a Yankee's cap -- flat brim -- pulled down over his forehead. He was quiet and reserved and thoughtful. But also spectacularly disengaged.

It's fair to say i liked him immediately. Which is to say i was a little harder on Chris than i was on most of the other classmates. First, the Yankees cap had to be addressed. His eyes engaged immediately. He wasn't just wearing the cap for show -- he was a fan. While sports fandom often gets a bad rap, it provides an opportunity for two people to connect instantly. If i throw a red sox barb your way (5 years ago we were smack dap in the middle of our glory years), you are required to reply. What kinda yankees fan wouldn't? And so he did, and then i did, and then he did, and then i made sure he didn't half-ass any of his homework assignments all semester. It's called teaching.

Did he always enjoy this process and extra attention? definitely not. His outfit said it all. A bundle of puffed out clothes between him and the world. In his shell. Quiet and succinct responses. And so when i made him phrase his answer in a complete sentence . . . and then complete that thought . . . and then tell me why he thought that might be . . .

He suffered.

But he did great in my class.

The tough part about this type of class for me, is that when it is over, i am left with their comments on teacher evaluation forms, and then back to my grad school life. They are left with my teachings, and very little reason to ever see me again.

Six months later i got an email from Chris, asking if i would write him a recommendation for a summer job. He explained in the email that at the end of his first year, i was the only instructor that he felt knew him at all. Like no one else could pick him out of a line-up. And i did it gladly. And life went on.

Today i ran into Chris on campus. He was wearing a yellow v-neck t-shirt and no hat. He had lost a significant amount of weight, and his posture was chin and head held high. No slouch. When he recognized me, as i approached him, he greeted me loudly and cheerfully. Sunny t-shirt, sunnier disposition. he told me he was a super-senior, he had added a second major, and that he was in the midsts of applying to grad schools. for what? social work.

boom goes the dynamite.

This kid made it. He succeeded in the system. he found his voice and his direction and it made me sincerely overjoyed. it was a moment. and while i certainly don't pretend that his success was the sole result of my tutelage, i do contend that i was a part of it -- and that I contributed to his success. And that is what teaching, for the best teachers, is all about. While you can never be solely responsible for a student's success or failure, you can take their resulting success or failure personally, to whatever degree you contributed. That's how teachers take pride in their work, and how they push themselves to do better.

Today, for me, a got to see a W for education. It broke a long string of recents losses.

Which is why i needed the moment i got.

Un-Friend Request

2011-10-02T21:57:00.000-04:00

*Disclaimer* This may be a blog first. i'm not going to use someone's real name in this post. usually i do. but I suspect that some people who i went to high school with may read this blog, and I'm just not sure i want to deal with the possible repercussions of using this person's real name. I guess I'm just admitting to myself that i don't need or want more drama in my life. but i still want to say whats on my mind. *end disclaimer*

The city (small city) i grew up in was not a particularly fun environment back then. And whilst most of the time in high school i was just cool enough to stay off people's radar, there were some kids who just seemed to really zone in on me. Mark Johnson was quite possibly the worst. At least in high school. While the soccer team has its own brand of fear tactics and prejudice language, Mark Johnson somehow managed to make his anti-me anti-jewish kid agenda extremely clear to me without ever even being on a sports team with me. He literally chucked pennies at me. i mean, who fucking does that. They do stupid shit like that on after-school specials -- not in actual high schools. He did. He knew all the slurs. It's amazing that such a dumb-fuck of a kid had such a wide vocabulary of religious (and requisite homosexual) slurs. I hated Mark Johnson. I hated him in the way that the 15-year-old inside me still hates him.

I remember one English class where the teacher stepped out into the hall for some reason, and immediately he stood up and shouted slurs and made fun of what a lame jewish gaytard i was in front of the entire class. There never seemed to be any repercussions for his behavior, and the injustice of that stuck with me. I should mention that by high school i was no longer defenseless. Well, no longer defenseless in the sense that while i still had no actual defense against Mark and his bullying, i had figured out that the issue was one of his anger and poor parenting, not some innate defect of mine.

In my experience, while that may take away the sting of the assaults, it rarely kept them from leaving a mark (bully pun!).

Now the question you may be asking yourself is why i'm dragging this sob story out. Well, on friday -- the Jewish New Year and high holiday of Rosh Hashana, Mark Johnson sent me a friend request on Facebook. (i do wonder if the irony of this act was completely lost on him)

The whole world has literally come full circle. Or at least the definition of "friend." Friend somehow morphed from the people you care about the most, to some of the people i care about the absolutely least in the world.

A few weeks back my dad told me that an old middle/high school acquaintance of mine had been caught embezzling money from his uncles business. I have zero connection to this person anymore, but on some base level i felt bad for him. I mean, i knew the 13-year-old version of this guy--and that kid was no embezzler. He was just a little fat drama geek trying to survive high school like the rest of us. If someone told me that Mark Johnson was thrown in jail for whathaveyou (let's say, for shits and giggles, a hate crime) . . . I wouldn't care. Not even a little. And that's crazy to me, because it's not the type of person i am. Or at least not my conceptualization of myself. I think of myself as over-empathetic, crying at videos of the Japanese tsunami or Andy Rooney's last broadcast on 60 Minutes.

I think its that my 15-year-old self still cries for retribution. Mark Johnson is as much a symbol of the abuse i took in high school as he was a source of it. And that abuse is an integral part of the lens through which i see a world full of beautiful underdogs who simply need a healthy watering of love and acceptance. And he is a symbol of the judgement and criticism and self-hatred and shame that form the gauntlet we call by the startlingly benign name of adolescence. So to my emotional self, any downfall that befittingly comes to Mark seems like a move in the right direction, even though my rational self knows that a bunch of horse crap.

Either way, i did not accept his friend request.

If a Picture is 1000 words, this post is over 21,000 words long.

2011-09-28T20:34:00.000-04:00

For a change of pace, and because i recently was notified (by my phone) that i have an excessive amount of photos on my phone (just above 2,500). I figured i should share some of them. and give some of them captions. maybe funny ones. we'll see what happens. Some of these first one's won't even be of my dog. Here we go:

Halloween kitten.

Turns out this kitten was not super excited with her new pit-bull roommate.

she lets her hair down

my beautiful mmf. Stunning.

bird on a hot aluminum side mirror

I'm not sure what you guys consider notable in your days, but 2 birds on a car side-view really revs my engine (car pun!)

i'm almost positive this is art

This is a picture, and i'm not making this up, of eggplant roadkill. Fresh eggplant roadkill. I feel like this picture is the punchline to a joke that begins, "you might live in the country if."

however, I think someone was sending a message. I think some small time farmer got mixed up with the wrong people . . . spaced out a few of his loan repayments . . . and his bookie is just making sure he doesn't pay late again. it's sad that an innocent eggplant had to die because of it. (i actually hate eggplant myself, so my heart is cold to such appeals.

pure motherf*cking heaven.

Yes, that is chicken and waffles and bacon. i'll pause to let you wipe your mouth.

thats not a chupah . . . THIS is a chupah!!!

love

also love

This wack-a-doo is our marriage officiant. I think we made the right choice. I mean, he's a stickler for time . . . so thats a positive. And who couldn't use a quick lube job from time to time.

*new topic. it is both dangerous and hilarious to have a board with rearrangeable letters on it near a bunch of drunken wedding guests. As Ryan & Laura, who got married on the 3rd floor of the Woman's club found out.

mid-wedding

end of wedding

I do recommend the latin congo company. they tore the roof off that biatch.

And now its time for pictures with dogs in them:

My friend Liza has this thing with my dog where they take amazing and powerful photos together seemingly by accident. The first one in this next series may be on my top 5 all time pics i've taken:

This past weekend Grover had a play day-te (and date that lasts all day?) with our friend's lovely old english bulldog Sadie. Sadie was a little stand-offish at first (hard to get anyone?), but the two 2-year-olds ended up having a blast together--as the video at the end proves. Enjoy!

new friends!!!

look how awesome we are together. syncro-sitting

don't. ever. leave me.

is he still looking at me?

He's crawling over here, isn't he?

crawling right into your heart!!

KISSES!!!!!!!

tired friends

"Let's do this again soon!"

*the sugar on top*

What a Difference a Half a Decade Makes

2011-09-27T16:02:00.001-04:00

I remember back to my first year in graduate school. It's the one year of grad school that i can kind of say i enjoyed. I have this vivid memory of walking down our 6th floor hallway, whistling. Literally whistling. I can't remember what song, and let's face it, once you get to a "whistling" level of contentment, the tune matters very little. My eyes were cooked egg white back then -- no red. And this memory of a care-free me, forging forward on my career path is striking in its juxtaposition to the now.

My right eye is red now. The lid above is puffy and it recedes when the stress level recedes, which is rarely -- usually during vacations. yesterday i woke up, poured myself a cup of coffee, and sat down to do some morning work at home. I then threw up in the toilet. I am ashamed to say that my first thought, post-hurl, was not, "crap, I'm sick!" but rather "crap, now i'm going to have to buy coffee on the way to work." yes, thats sick.

At work i felt worse and got permission to skip the class i TA in order to reserve energy for the night meeting for the same class, and then running a 2-hour TA session for said class until 8pm. After the review session i limped home, got to watch some new tv with the mmf and then it was bedtime.

The overall impression this day left was a big ol skid-mark. the underpants kind. A skid because mostly the day was a blur of nausea and information exchange; and a mark because the whole thing stunk like shit.

And that was a pretty normal day for me. I have no real complaints about the day. i was not treated unfairly in any way. it was a day.

But i didn't whistle. Not even close. I can safely say that the idea of whistling didn't even cross my mind. i have, at a minimum, been changed by this graduate school experience. And that change, unfortunately, has taken the whistle out of my work.

These are the Creepers in your Neighborhood

2011-09-25T12:48:00.000-04:00

If you were to go looking for me, at any given time when the sun is out--there are a few places you would look right away. My house, the psychology building, and the coffee shop. This post happened at the coffee shop. My coffee shop. Amherst Coffee. (hi kylie). Now i don't own Amherst Coffee. It's not even a position i aspire to. But, i do know every person that works there (or has worked there in the past 4 years) and a good 80% of the people who frequent this amazing coffee mecca. It is my home base. My social strike zone. My tangible metaphor for community.

So it was not at all unusual to find me at the seats outside the front window, sipping an Americano, eating a muffin, and sitting with friends and puppies (grover's friend sadie and my friend becky were in for a visit--more on this later), chatting in the sun. Mmf was inside talking with some friends, and i was outside with becky and two friends from our local bar.
________

There are, of course, downsides to community as well. There are weirdos in your neighborhood, and ours is no exception. Today weirdo is "the Creeper"

the creeper looks like a skinnier (but not skinny) strung out version of Ben Franklin. glasses and all. his long white hair is wisp, straight, and gray -- but it mostly is reminiscent (to me) of the hair that grows from burn victims heads. Spotty. He covers it with a floppy round brimmed fisherman's hat which really adds that pedophile feel which he probably isn't purposely going for. What's amazing, is that none of this is why we call him the creeper.

This guys particular feature of creepiness includes: slowly sidestepping his way into other peoples private conversations and then, once physically close enough, using the close proximity as an excuse to just begin inserting himself into the conversation.

It's rude, uncomfortable, and, because the shit that comes out of his mouth is not benign (foreshadowing), its super duper annoying. His creeping means that if you are having a conversation with friends, and you see this guy, you have to essentially move or shun him actively. Good stuff.
__________

So here we are, the four of us, sitting outside the coffee shop, with Grover (my pup) and Sadie (becky's adorable old english bulldog), when the creeper shuffles up.

Creeper (to me): "What was your dog's name again?"

(we both live here and therefore he's seen my pup before)

Me (friendly): "oh, this is grover."

Creeper: "he's ugly."

*all of us are in a somewhat stunned silence*

Me: "excuse me?"

Creeper: "he's ugly . . . ugly . . . disgusting actually . . . . he looks like you."

and he walks away.

This actually happened. Verbatim. My friends who were sitting with me looked over at me and all said, "if you told me the story of this happening, i wouldn't believe you. Or at least i wouldn't believe you that it happened JUST like it happened. I would think you were exaggerating."

i am not exaggerating folks. Stranger comes up, insults the cutest puppy in the world, then me (more understandable), then walks off.

And crazier still, this guy looks like the after photo of the super-villian who gained his evil powers after a horrible chemical plant accident. The guy looks like he's got some kind of venereal disease all over his skin. (i get mean when people f with my puppy)

But with every hilariously inappropriate insult from a stranger, there is a silver (hopefully padded) lining. The creeper will creep near me no more. I was so shocked by his out-of-nowhere insult, that i didn't have time to retort (he also went away). I can assure you i will have no problem telling this guy to "go away because no one is talking to you" in the future, when he stalks up alongside us.

I did mention to him, on my way to my car, that the day that puppies seem ugly, might be a good day to take a long look in the mirror.

While i doubt he took my advice on the matter, if he did, i hope he found himself one strong-ass mirror.

I Ordered a Double Burrrrgerrrrrrr

2011-09-18T13:13:00.001-04:00

Another Chicago tale.

Same friend that i was staying with. And this story took place at his house, so i must give you some particulars about his place.

For those of you who live in chicago, he lives in Lincoln Square. Because I'm an idiot, i constantly told people that i was staying in "lincoln park" (because of the band). But, i was constantly immediately corrected by nearby friends, as i learned that lincoln park is ALSO a place in chicago which is very much NOT lincoln square.

And his place is super nice. 2 bedrooms and a huge sitting room. My favorite part is that it has a long hallway that runs through the middle of the place. And, since my friend is a bit of a "Monica" aka. likes it neat -- the place is both well decorated and immaculately clean. Which makes the place feel nicer still. Additionally, they have a small back yard and garage, but now I'm just bragging.

But. There is a but. In true chicago, living in the city, style -- my friends primo place is directly next door to a Burger King . . . . with drive thru. And while this, as kids, would probably have been fertile ground for all sorts of shenanigans and pranks -- as a man in his 30's, being able to spit and hit the BK has less appeal. Important to the story, the drive thru ordering microphone and menu sign is directly outside my friend's kitchen window. The scene is set.

Here i am, sitting in the kitchen. Eating a sandwich. When i hear shouting coming from across the parking lot, in the direction of the BK order box. Now, mind you, when i got to this conversation, there was already shouting, so i missed the lead up. But, given what i heard, i think i can Sherlock it all together for you.

When i opened the window i saw a man idling in a CRV SUV, with a kid in the back. He is screaming at the woman on the other end of the microphone ordering mechanism. From her reaction to his tone, I'm guessing the speaker on that baby doesn't have a volume nob. (put that one in the suggestion box).

He is screaming, "NO NO NO NO NO. there is a discrepancy!!! It says something here and then its different there. THERE IS A DISCREPANCY!"

this goes on for, no exaggeration. 5 minutes. Enough that i have now called my friend to the window and even have thought to wake his wife up from her nap to watch the ongoing coverage of BK parking lot crazy. (we didn't, but we should of). We are also (maybe just me) DYING to know what the discrepancy is that he is talking about. it seems massive -- his tone makes me think the discrepancy might just be the difference between him making rent this week or not.

Then, he breaks this one off . . .

"Fuck it, ok fuck it! I don't care about the .50 cents anymore . . ."

Let's pause it right there. 50 cents!!! That whole friggin canipshit was over more money than it took to keep your 17 mile-per gallon road monster idling all that time. That's makes you an idiot sir. and it also means that, while berating another human being is never truly an ok thing to do (but come on, when we are getting f'd over, we all make exceptions), in this case -- there really was no warranting it, as it was an obscenely small amount of money. It also means that its the type of price misprinting discrepancy that the poor woman taking your order at the Burger King drive thru window in the middle of Chicago certainly has no control over. Short version, it means this guys an ass.

Back to his rant . . . cause it gets awesome.

"Fuck it, ok fuck it! I don't care about the .50 cents anymore . . . just add a Double Whopper meal, an onion rings, and a kids cone." (i LOVE that at the end of this order always comes "and a kids cone." reminding us that all this assery is happening in front of a child."

BK Woman: "So you just want the Double Whopper meal, onion rings and a kids cone?"

This is where his brain pops. i swear. it pops. he is now shouting at his full volume WHILE striking the top of the front console of his car while getting brick red in the face (remember that we are watching all of this from my friends kitchen window--and sorry for the oncoming caps lock). "NO NO NO NO NO. ARE YOU AN IDIOT!?!?!" NO NO NO NO NO"

He is interrupted in his rant by the BK woman asking him to "please not scream at her." He replies, half screaming, that it is hard not to when she is being so difficult. Totally lack of realization at the irony of his statement.

He continues at a slightly SLIGHTLY softer scream. "I STILL want the 7 Double Whoppers, (insert a shit ton of food here), and THEN i want the the Double Whopper meal, onion rings and a kids cone?"

this really puts that 50 cents into additionally crazy perspective considering the massive haul of "fast" (not anymore!) food he is ordering. 7 Double Whoppers? To feed his army of goats? (they'll eat anything!) And then who was like "no no no i don't WANT a double whopper, i want a DOUBLE WHOPPER MEAL!"

All of these questions are racing through my mind as the woman finally tells him to drive up to the window, which is blocked by cars amazingly still waiting for their food. Amazing considering we've been watching this atrocity for a solid 15 minutes, and i can't imagine how the other orders weren't finishing. Less surprising is the loooooooong line of car behind the SUV from hell, who are no doubt debating whether or not they should just drive through to another drive thru.

As he pulls forward, he looks right and I'm pretty sure he saw the two of us gaping out the window (we were laughing and shouting at him pretty loudly by that point). I swear he waved. Maybe just with one finger, but I'm pretty sure he waved. He still had to wait anther 10-15 minutes for his order. We imagined one of two scenarios taking place inside his vehicle.

Scenario 1: with the threat removed, and his kid in the backseat, he reverts back into his mild mannered self and feels shame and embarrassment. But, i have to admit, this seems less likely considering the behavior we have just witnessed.

Scernario 2: Stewing. Sitting there, anger brimming like a smokey pot stirred by wart-covered witches. In this scenario i wonder if he starts to ponder all the obscenely grotesque crap they are currently putting his food through.

"Front of the pants or back of the pants" the cook is asking the just screamed at order taker. "Oh definitely back of the pants," she is replying. And thats not even getting to the "special sauce and condiments." You really shouldn't screw with people who both don't give a shit and are making your food. It's a delicate balance . . . and your shouting just tipped it in the direction of 'boogers' over 'burgers'. Sorry. i meant Double Booger Meal.

Bon Appetite assface. and a kid's cone.

Some Like It Wet

2011-09-13T16:39:00.000-04:00

A few weekends ago i went to chicago for a wedding. Before going to said wedding on the sunday, i spent thursday thru saturday with my friend (from the early summer chicago wedding) relaxing and eating various blocks of chicago style meat cubes. No one does chunks of various meats like chicago. One of my favorite such meat logs is a burrito from "Garcias" (?), where i can get a cheeseless, marinated-beef stuffed, guacamole-smothered, tasty-ass burrito--that should, practically speaking, be eaten for two meals. Obviously, that was not the case here. Mouthface destruction.

i also went to "Chubby Wieners." A joint (pun) that specializes in chicago style meats. The Chicago-style dog (which i respect and enjoy but is not my favorite preparation) is one popular selection. Another is the "Italian beef." Italian beef not only specifies the meat--but also the bun and condiments and the sauce. It's a thing. And its a tasty friggin thing.

Sauce is especially native to chicago. (i learned a lot about sauce this trip.) While one would think that sauce is a fairly viscous, ketchup-like consistency--its actually mostly watery. But its warm and pretty much meat-juice and spices. Yum.

Well, i like to try things with the local flavor, so when the guy behind the counter asked us if we wanted our beef "wet" . . . (first i giggled internally) and my friend immediately said "yes"-- so i also said "yes."

Big mistake.

Here's what "wet" is. Wet means they dip the entire bun in that sauce, til its soaked, then apply meat and veggies. We took ours to go. And while my friend lived right around the corner, by the time i went to eat my sandwich, it resembled meat encased in a meaty bread pudding. But then it crumbled like a wet graham cracker (i dip!). All in all, i think chicago gets a big fail on this one. i do not like biting through a sand castle of soggy bun to get to my deliciousness. I have consulted with friends from the area, and they say that if you house your sandwich right on the spot after getting it wet, its awesome. Not sure i'm gonna give this one a second chance.

Still ate the whole god damn thing, of course. Let's not get crazy.

oh yah. there was also chicken and waffles. did i not mention the chicken and waffles? they tasted as good as they looked.

So Doggone Smart

2011-09-08T13:07:00.002-04:00

This is not a dog blog. which means, of course, this post is about dogs.

Recently i was having a conversation with a labradoodle owner. And, not surprisingly, she said what i've heard many other dog owners say to me about their dogs. It is always something like, "oh, my ______ is just sooo smart. We thing its the labrador in her, but poodles are smart dogs as well." Now i love the labradoodles--they are just plain cute and as a kid of allergies, its extremely hard to hate on hypoallergenic dogs--even designer ones. But i just don't know why a 'smart dog' is a thing.

So i laugh. Cause I think its the most ridiculous thing ever.

It's not that i don't understand what they're telling me. I do. I get what a 'smart dog' is. They do tricks. Maybe they even fetch your slippers if you wear slippers and if its a really smart dog. I still don't care. Because unless you are wheelchair bound or blind or otherwise impeded from retrieving your own slippers/shoes, all that is is a nifty way to move less. It is a remote control for your shoes.

(*sidenote: service dogs who do all of these seemingly mundane tasks for their owners are, indeed, very smart and unbelievably amazing. you should assume from here on out that service dogs are outside the realm of even poking fun at. cause they obviously rule. in fact, i want to be a service dog when i grow up. all this said, as i continue, i think you'll see that service animals fit into my sense of what makes a dog good, anyways. end sidenote*)

So your very smart dog knows what it's bed is and which toy is "bunny." So smart. Is he going to college? Is she putting that intelligence to work getting scholarships? Are your pooches on the job market? No. Of course not. Because, other than staying away from the road and remembering to eat, pee, and poop, dogs have very little need for intelligence. In fact, i have it on some authority that a number of, what in the human world we would call "mentally challenged" dogs, live happy healthy amazing dog-lives with their families. They run into walls and their family laughs and loves and life goes on.

Because, for us humans, a dog's real job is to love us unconditionally. To be a companion. To show us the loyalty that fellow humans often falter at. So if you tell me that your labradoodle is unendingly loyal to you. Well now, that's tell me something.

I think an example of what im getting at may help illuminate my point. let's take grover. Grover, in general, sleeps in our bedroom at night. He has a bed comprised of two comforters (one is so fluffy we call it "the marshmellow") laid on top of each other. Behind the comforters are two big file cabinets (the metal cabinets actually form the back boundary for the bed. In front of his bed, is our bed.

To understand this story, you need to know that on school nights, mmf goes to bed a few hours before me. She wakes up much earlier, so this makes sense. Therefore, grover and i cruise into the bedroom in the low light of the hall lamp, and settle in. On this night, as i am "tucking" grover into bed, my elbow hits the metal file cabinet drawer which makes a fairly loud noise (especially loud considering the hour and otherwise silent room). Grover was solidly terrified and shot like a bullet up on the bed (where mmf was sleeping) and turned.

This is important. This is relevant. Was he scared? Hell's yah! But, in his fear of danger (the sky is falling!!!), he didn't bolt downstairs, he didn't go hide in his crate, he jumped in front of mmf and faced the threat. I'm not saying that House of Pain was going to do anything (watch Swingers for the reference). I mean, grover is not a fighter. But he is loyal. Deeply. And he's wired to be at our side when shit goes down. And that, i would argue, is more important than smarts or being able to jump through a tire.

Is grover a 'smart dog'? Well . . . you tell me.

and yes, he did just pin his back paw down with his front paw to stabilize it for his face.

Mattiti vs. the Vacation Varmints

2011-08-30T11:59:00.003-04:00

So this is one of those posts people. One of the one's i warn you about ahead of time. It's gross. It is also a true story of something that happened to me a few days ago. So if you are the type of person who stops following blogs because of reading hilarious tails of truly disgusting things happening to other people. Skip this one. It's not for you. (mom and dad, you already know this one, so you might as well keep going.)

We got home from a whirlwind vacation about a week ago. And, as one does, we began taking stock of the state of our house upon return. Well, after i took stock of my four things i sat down to watch some baseball. Mmf kept taking stock. As she moves to the kitchen i hunker down on the couch, reveling in the feeling of home. And then i hear her scream.

Now its not some horror movie shriek or anything, but mmf definitely full volume screams momentarily. This is bad for two reasons.

1. Women from Vermont don't scream at a whole bunch of things. Mmf grew up pretty much in the middle of the woods and sees most animals as neighbors more than potential threats or something to scream at. its all, "Hello Mr. Bear, are you enjoying your midday stroll. Nice seeing you. Say hi to the cubs for me." So if she's screaming, its *not* good.

2. The last scream-able situation had happened recently. While staying with mmf's family out on the north shore of boston, a bat got into the house. Actually, it got into mmf's parents room. The first night. We discussed said adventure at breakfast. I believe my input went something like, "If i see that goddamn bat i'm gonna scream like a little girl." Looking back, i realize that if you were watching a movie of my life--viewing this situation from your tv at home--this would be the moment everyone on the couch would groan with obvious foreshadowing. But at the time, it seemed like the only thing to say.

Of course, the next night, as i was bringing Grover in from a walk around 12:30 in the morning, batman resurfaced in the main room. And that bat was friggin big. Not the size of a car or anything crazy, but, with wings spread, probably the size of my forearm. Grover (our pup for those of you who are new here) decided to sit all pretty-like and hope that the bat might be a new friend to play with. He sat and followed the bat with his head as if he were watching a bizarre tennis match. I was not as calm. I may have blacked out. but i did NOT scream. take that me! there was, however, a fair bit of panicking on my part. Grover, on the other hand, realized that the bat was not going to play with him and went onto the couch to sleep (his bed was upstairs, however). He wouldn't come, and after a trying day, i just had no more energy to be alone, afraid and wrestling with a dog while trying to prevent a bat from getting upstairs to where we were sleeping (turns out he did get back into the parents room . . . oops). Anyways, long story medium length, i woke up mmf and she threw a towel over her head, marched directly out to grover, pulled him off the couch and upstairs. She is my knight in shining armor.

All this should accentuate how bad hearing her scream felt. Beacaue, a la the bat--whatever it was that was causing her to scream, it was my turn . . .

Mmf: "There's a dead baby mouse in the tinfoil/saran wrap/sandwich bag drawer."
Me: "But there isn't even food in there."
Mmf: "i don't think i can do this one."
Me: "ok, i need to mentally prepare for this." (to myself, chanting) "i'm about to see a rat baby [technically a mouse, but give me a break], im about to see a rat baby. i'm about to see a rat baby."

I am two step to toward the kitchen when i hear it. She gasps. Full gasp. Movie gasp. Horror gasp. My baby is gasping. This. Is. NOT. Good. I can't even comprehend what it is making her gasp, but i already know i should have toughed it out with the bat.

Me: "What is it hon"
Mmf: "A nest. In the sandwich box."

She says this while turned away from the drawer itself. It's gross enough that she hasn't stopped to look at the details. I did. Here's what i saw:

1 mostly unused roll of tinfoil.
1 mostly used roll of saranwrap.
1 open box of sandwich bags with many bags still inside.
1 dead hairy mouse fetus, whole and on the drawer bottom
1 dead hairy mouse fetus, bled out across the drawer bottom
432 (ish?) dead hairy mouse baby fetuses, nested in said sandwich box--all snug as a bug in . . . well, as a mouse baby in a sandwich box nest.

I'm going to be honest with you folks. You can't un-see that. And i still see it sometimes. The rest of that day i saw friggin ghost dead mouse babies everywhere. Every dust ball, every semi-hidden remote control--i was a very jumpy chap.

Our first thought was to just pull out the drawer and dump it whole hog (whole dead mouse nest) into a garbage bag. Turns out, the drawers in our kitchen are the one thing that doesn't come apart (unlike our dishwasher). Had to go at it by hand. Well, gloved hand and paper towels. The one that had bled out was the grossest. The brown lining (there is no sliver lining to this story) here was that i could dump the nest without having to pull all those individual suckers out. All in all the experience left me running and gagging for the toilet. Just dry heaves. That's composure.

While i was gloved i decided to wipe the whole drawer down a bit. It is now 2 weeks later, and while we have bought new saran wrap, tinfoil, and sandwich bags, they are all still out on the counter.

Cause i still can't open that drawer.

Letters From Japan: Part Next

2011-08-25T01:02:00.001-04:00

Hey y'all. (I have a southern accent when i'm embarrassed). I'm been very busy . Busy busy busy. So here are a few excerpts from writings in 2003 when i was away in japan teaching english to elementary and middle school kids. hope you enjoy.

Recent adventures.

Ok--Im starting withthe most frivolous because Im so psyched about it. Up here in japan--where I am--its ski country. There arethose that ski and those that don’t live here. And last week I bought not one but 2 pairs of skis. Ok--so one was only 40 bucks and used(for rock skis til the snow gets good) but the other pair----mmmmmmmm-- LOVETHEM. Im so happy that I finallygot off my somewhat nerotic ass and made a purchase. This recent acquisition has led me to fits of almostcomatose-like starring at the clouds begging them to deliver their white nectarupon me. Along with this purchaseI also acquire . . .. . . BEDDING. im officially out of the sleeping bag and into the sheets and acomforter. Only took me a month and a half --gomatt go.

But now sad news--atthe time of my first email I believe you were introduced to mycar---Carrdvark. The Honda civicshuttle that looked like an aardvark and made pokeman like sounds. Well--One month in and an inspectionlater and I receive this CLASSIC email from the mechanic (and the guy I boughtit from): “Please no more driving the car. the casewill be a serious accident in the future. The steering, braking and suspension system are important.” awesome email --simple awesome--socaardvark is dead and im tooling around in a loaner Toyota tercel which im notnaming because I will hopefully soon have a new car. And then ill tell you allabout it. Cars--cyclical--like a circle --they go around.

*break*

ok--where to begin. Ahh yes--school lunch --the best place of all. Now first off school lunch is the mostrandomly priced thing ever. Todayit was 233 yen (about 2 dollars) .usually its thereabouts but NEVER NEVER a round number. 256, 301, 273--I just don’t get it. Today for lunch I had Chinese dumplingswith kim chi and testicle soup. Oops. Did I say testiclesoup--I mean THREE testicle soup. I would love to give you all the witty punch line where I tell you whatthe testi sized balls in my soup were . . (editors note: since then I have surmised these were quail eggs). . Buteven in front of a captive 4th grade audience there wasn’t no way that shit wasgoing into my mouth. Im all forinternational understanding, but I had to take a firm george bush like stand onthat one (theres my political commentary for this email).

*break*

Tomorrow is theEnglish speech contest. Students from every middle school around here sendrepresentatives to give speechs (7 and 8th graders read the ones from a book--9thgraders write their own) and I, yes, me, gets to be the luckyjudge---whoooooopie. That meansover the past month each individual school has tried to find ways to make mejudge their individual school speeches -pick my favorite kid et al., give themselves a leg up -- this contest has more corruption thanthe mob. Its nutty and funny andsad and im in the direct center of it. Wish me luck.

A bit about theeducation down hear. The kids bowbefore every class--I like that bit--and after that its a crap shoot. Generally I think the biggest variableis the homeroom teacher--ESPECIALLY in elementary school. Ive had classes where the kid wereSOOOOOO excited to learn English and participated and were genki (energetic)and generally speaking, their teacher is also interested in English. Ive also had classes that were totallyasleep.--usually their teacher can be found correcting papers in the back ofthe room not giving a shit. And worst of all the teachers who exert noauthority over there kids--those kids run rampant and punch (especially in theprivate areas) and do the "kancho" (this is totally true) where they put their hands together likethere was a pretend gun and try to jam their fingers up your butt. I have learned to grow eyes in the backof my head--they always told us that school was a prison--they didn't know howright they were. I had one suchclass like this on Monday--ive never wanted to start swinging away at kids morein my life--these 2nd graders hit me continuously for 40 mins and their 50 someyear old teacher just sat there ineffectually trying to get a little quietwhich never came--they totally didn't respect her and took it out on me. I only escaped after class by enlistingsome 6th graders to round up the 2nd graders that wouldn't stop pummeling meand throw them out of the room--they saved me (and they didn't seem to mindthrowing the little kids around either). I felt like a mob boss--I liked it . ps --after that class I seriously weighed the merits ofsmoking cigarettes. Which many ofthe teachers do by the way--in front of the students even. And apparently Gunma is better thanmost places.

*break*

Many have also askedfor an update on the toilet situation. Well--ive got the whole squatting thing DOWN--sadly--but the newchallenge is wiping. In thatposition its almost impossible to wipe front to back, and since only one male Iknow wipes back to front, im still left figuring it out. It also puzzles me what woman do--maybewhen my Japanese gets better I can ask people these questions--im sure they’lllove it almost as much as you guys enjoy hearing about it.

Jack Hanna Day Part II

2011-08-06T19:20:00.000-04:00

This was an epic snorkel.

Maho Bay is always good for tworeasons. The beach is adjacent theparking and the snorkeling is always decent. There is also a healthy amount of sea-grass around, so youalways have a chance of a turtle sighting. Well folks, the good grass must be growing right now becauseit was turtle-mania out there. Oneturtle two turtle three turtle NINE! They were practically rolling in packs. 3 big fat faced green turtles, the cows of the Caribbean,with there soulfully big eyes staring back at you. Some smaller guys, stuffing their faces trying to beefup. And interspersed with theturtles . . . rays. I saw a familyof 3, all the size of the top of a coffee-table, cruising the grass strip. You know, just putting in anappearance.

The real gems, as always, weremuch harder to spot. Octopi. You may recall that finding an octopus,in my family, is the equivalent of the pubescent warrior being sent out on theplains alone, only to return with the head of a lion in his hands. Ok, maybe not quite that dramatic . . .but its big. These screwballanimals can be pretty much any color or shape, and they spend most of theirtime making hiding places. Thishiding actually becomes their undoing (to being spotted by me at least),because there are certain characteristics (empty shells near the entrance to ahole/cave/indention) that draw me to investigate certain crevices morethoroughly (why do I think this line is going to be quoted back to me in thecomments?) And, low and behold, Ifound not one, but two verified octopi. The first of which had what I would consider a deluxehidey-hole, complete with a huge conch playing body-guard just to the side of asizable cave on the ocean floor (sizable for an octopus mind you). It’s like I killed a whole FAMILY oflions. Wait, that doesn’t feelright. Um . . . it was awesomefacesandwich, lets leave it at that.

The conch (and more specificallytheir shells) were one of the coolest parts of the snorkel. Usually you see one or two of theseshells (sometimes with conch inside, sometimes not) along the sea-bed. But today, they were everywhere. And they were all inhabited. And it seemed that some conch somewhere gave the retreatsign, cause these conch were absolutely trucking it alone the sand. Now, since a conch is essentially ahuge snail in a shell, you must wonder what “trucking it” looks like. Here ya go. To move, the conch sticks itself out of the bottom of theshell similar to the gondolas in italy. But, because of their clunky shape and lack of real steering, it justkind of pops them up haphazardly like a popcorn kernel popping or, even moreaccurately, like a person imitating a whale breaching. So, a bunch of conch trucking lookslike a seabed of gorgeous shells popping like its hot in a semi-consistentdirection. Pretty surreal andbeautiful.

It was, by almost any standard, agreat snorkel. As we toweled offand moved to avoid the asshats’ cigarette smoke coming from next to us, oursmiles were hard to contain. If wehadn’t seen any more animals for the rest of the day, it would have still beenamazing. As it turns out, thisright here was the perfect amount of animals. But there were more.

We saw some deer on the drivehome. No biggie. I mean, kind of a biggie as deer arenative to the island and have no real predators here, but it was a small andcute little deer and while it didn’t move to avoid my car, it didn’t run at iteither.

Understandably, when we got homewe were exhausted. Mmf went to napin the bedroom and I took my book out to the hammock. My hammock. The mattock. It is, bar none, my favorite place in the entire world. Not today though.

I fell asleep in the hammock perusual. I had pretty much done thaton purpose. Because it was headingtoward dust, I also lay a towel over me, with only my next and head exposed. When I awoke, it felt like carpenterants had just set up shop inside my body. My back was on fire. Freaking fire. And my neck scratched horribly. I ran to mmf in the bedroom.

“I got bit. I’m pretty sure I gotbit bad.” Initially shegiggled. I’m funny, itsunderstandable. But when I turnedto show her my back, the laughing stopped and the gasping started. It looked like about 15 differentrelief maps of Hawaii had been built across my entire back. Apparently, bugs can bite through hammock. Noted. They also had takenthe easy way and chomped at my jaw and neck. I was a fire ant. I just wanted to take a bath in cortisone cream. I settled for a burning hotshower. Which helped. A little. I think Iblacked out after that.

I'm too Sexy for My Shell

2011-08-05T23:37:00.005-04:00

So, i was going to paste a few pictures into my last post, and then i thought, wait, you know how i was talking to them about the crazy photo shoot mmf had with the crab(s). Well folks here it is. With a few sunset photos thrown in for mama. Mama loves a good sunset.

the artist and her muse

rocky weather. i kill internet.

"Let me in!"

very Dawson's Creek

life turned upside down

Add caption

you just keep me holding on!

manicure

great pic!


how much i care (the crab IS on the ledge)

i think im a spider

mama was a rollin stone

frog. look close.

Jack Hanna Day Part 1

2011-08-05T09:54:00.004-04:00

There is only a small subset of things in life that one cancontrol. The rest, im afraid, isbeyond us. And while I’m surethere is someone on this island for which internet not coming through the wiresis a fixable problem, for me, it is something completely out of control. Not coincidentally, it is alsoextremely related to my lack of ability to post new entries while downhere. That said, if you arereading this, I found a hotspot (pictures will be added to this point as theinternet allows.

Two days ago was, for us, that one day of vacation that youhope for when you arrive. It was aJack Hanna day, filled with animals from start to finish. It began, as all days down heredo, with coffee on the perch of our house, overlooking the ocean. While I was staring dreamily out at thewaves (scanning hopelessly for the passing whales which never seem to breach),I realized mmf was attending to something much more local. Somehow, and I really have no idea how,a big ass crab had clawed its way to our perch, and was now hanging by a clawand two feet from the edge, a 6 foot drop below.

Mmf and I had very different reactions to this news. I went the practical route. I’m all A) he wont die if he falls, hehas a shell (I still believe this to be true) and B) all I need to do is goboil some water and we have crab cakes for breakfast. I could tim gunn it and make it work. A little aioli. Some eggs. Boom . . .breakfast.

Mmf is from Vermont. Like, wayyyyyyy up there. I’m not positive but I suspect that along with teaching the children upthere that skis are actually their modified legs, they all commune with theiranimal friends and may even learn to speak to the wildlife. Mmf thought the big blue crap (who Inamed “Cake”) was just the cutest little budgeybudgeybudgey (say all thesewords together in baby talk and you’ll get a close approximation to how shesounded). Long story short, I wasnot going get to cook this critter, and he might even be replacing me in thebed.

So she picks it up. I would not have done that. Not cause its dangerous, mind you, but because that’s just the craziestthing in the world to do and I am I huge wimp. She did wear kitchen gloves as protection, but still, shewas having a gay ol time letting the guy run along the stone pathway after sheremoved him from his precarious ledge. When lifted, it became clear that underneath the crabstorso was a bundle of black stuff. The crab was taking pieces of said stuff and popping them in his/hermouth. I say his/her here and nowbecause the black soil like stuff was either some sort of food he was hiding,or eggs she was now protecting through ingestion. It was at this point that I lost interest in said crab andwent back to reading. Mmf, crabsavior that she is, re-donned the gloves and hiked that Marco Polo of a crabexplorer doing the cliff and replaced him into the relative wild. She comes back from her adventure witha smile that says to me “I may not bevegan but I’m a WAY better person than you.” Thankfully, I knew that already.

About an hour later, mmf inside, I remain at my perch like aBritish solider in front of the palace. I look at the clam sea below and spot an eagle ray gliding just beyondthe rock/shore line. I scream tommf. Loudly. I’ve seen turtles from the perch abunch of times, but this is both my first ray sighting, and the body shape andwing span of the ray is unique and I know it to be an eagle ray, which is rarein and of itself. They can movethough. Mmf finally comes to theledge about 2 minutes later. Shehas very obviously been summoned mid-shower. I am remorseless and even a bit pissy about her slowresponse to my shrieking. The rayhas swum too far down the shore to still make out. She’s seems semi-pissed at me, so I drop it.

On our drive out to the day’s snorkel, we jam to the tunesof the island. There are a limitednumber of English radio stations on the island. Even fewer play songs you have ever heard of. One of our favorites is a classic rockstation that plays “Steve Miller Band” fair. We like. Thisstation is 104.9, The Mongoose. It’s called the mongoose because thoselittle elongated furry cute ass rodents live well on this island. While there are no snakes on thisisland (which is nice), the Riki-tiki-tavis of the island seem to make due withthe multitude of other lizard inhabitants (and im sure insects and fruit andwhatnot). I digress. Anyways, as we are driving, the radiostation takes a mini-break for station identification. I swear that at the same time that thedude says “the mongoooooooooose,” a mongoose flies out from the forest alongthe road and runs full bore in front of our car. Awesome.

If you believe in signs, which I usually do not, seeing allof these animals pre-snorkel is a good one. Animals beget more animals is thetheory there. And if you are oneof those people, then I’m glad you weren’t with us, because in this particularstory you would be right, and then I would have to deal with a whole car ridehome of “be open to the signs” this and “Celestine Prophecy” that. And you might get left roadside. I digress once again.

We met up with one of mmf’s closest childhood friends fromVT who happens to manage one of the most well-known and awesome bars on theisland. We don our masks andfins and get out there. Beforeentering, however, we see a baby nurse shark, cruising the shallows. We also watch the tourists reaction tothis, which is to all converge around the poor little guy in a circle. I think, “make a shark feel cornered. That’s perfect, just like they tell you.” Had I known the stupidity they were about to share with thebeach, I might have even said something then. Thankfully, the shark had the wherewithal to get thehell out of there. Unfortunately,I didn’t get to see him again. Iblame the morons.

We are in the water, masks on,fins being adjusted, when mmf looks over to the bloated tourists onceagain. (I should clarify thatwhile tourists can be annoying, Ihave no real grudge against the population as a whole. And I realize that I fall in that weirdBrittney-esc middle ground myself, “not a tourist, not yet a local.” But these tourist were fuck-wits, so allowme to vent on them without generalizing to all people getting away from itall.)

To fully describe what was takingplace, and my reaction, I need to tell you of a different snorkel spot on theisland. A place called WaterlemonKay. While I will spare you a fulldescription of the spot, it takes about a mile hike to get out to the kayitself, but 9 times out of 10 it is the best snorkel you’ll have on theisland. Because of the extraeffort necessary, less people end up finding there way to this gem, and itscoral and aquatic inhabitants (a big nurse shark, a huge turtle, squid, etc.)has remained more undisturbed than some of the other, more popular,beaches. One particularlybeautiful oddity of this spot is that, during the right seasons, it is absolutelycovered with deep sea starfish. They are these big jumbo starfish that vary in color and, especiallywhen viewed in the 100’s, are breathtaking. My brother, in particular, feels deeply connected to thesestarfish. Deeply. He may or may not have declared himselfthe starfish king. And while thismay seem crazy on the outside, for our family it is completely par for thecourse. We all love octopi(finding them in particular), I search for whales, mom loves collecting shells(like in an almost scary way), and dad’s a turtle man. All of this is to say, I’m glad that mybrother wasn’t here to witness what these fuck-wit tourists did next.

I look over and the large breastmother (of a family that we would later find smoking together at the watersedge—a sight that would make me mentally imagine I had a flame thrower andcould seer the skin right off their bubbly bodies) has two starfish inher hands!!! You don’ttouch the wildlife. You idioticself-centered crap columns. You don’t touch the wildlife! Then, with her family’s high schoolegging on and cameras at the ready, the orca floats onto her back like an otterthat ate a manatee, and places one starfish on each of her flour-sack breasts. I am livid. Mmf is livid. Our island friend is livid. You’re not the little mermaid whorehat. You know how I know. Because what you are doing is so stupidthat not even a cartoon woman would use cartoon live animals to cover herbreasts. She used shells. I want to assure her that she DOESresemble a certain octopus-bodied character from the same film. I am about to say something to thefamily about their blatant disregard for anything other than themselves whenmmf’s friend says that she often has to physically bite her tongue. I think, “its not my tongue I want to bite.” But I’m on vacation, so I turn and head out to enjoy thesea responsibly (I regret not saying anything now).

To be continued… was it a good snorkel? (amazing) could there be MORE animals (many more). Tune in next time for the excitingconclusion of these are the animals inyour neighborhood!!

I Saw the Sign

2011-07-31T13:21:00.002-04:00

When you reach a moment in time, no bells and whistles flare. Unless you are at a baseball game, no fireworks go off, no crowd goes wild. What i'm try to get across here is that we really have to make sure we recognize when something important or special is happening in order to fully appreciate it. More than once it has only been in retrospect that it dawned on me that something unique had just occurred.

I'm pretty sure one such event happened a few weeks ago while mmf and i were enjoying a post work snack on the couch.

Mmf had come home from the elementary school where she was finishing her training. because she is both all sorts of amazing and an elite educating machine, obviously the school tried to find a way to keep her at their fine establishment. Unfortunately, the public school system isn't exactly flush with wiggle room when it comes to hiring and firing, and the best they could find was a para position in the kindergarten (another ironic word that i can't spell--aren't we growing kids there?).

I should mention that mmf has a degree in both elementary ed AND reading specialization, and that she has already worked in the school system here as a para in the nursery school before she went back to school for the later degree.

This job offer was not something to be taken lightly, however, in that it was both a job and brought with it benefits, in a time when schools aren't on a hiring binge.

Mmf came home with this scenario. Take this job they were offering, or hold out for a reading specialist job--or something closer to her ideal (she works more with 3rd-5th graders). here is where the moment came. She asked me what i thought--always a precarious moment in relationships. And i didn't wait to hear her thoughts first (to not be influenced). And i said something along the lines of this:

You have, ostensibly, already done the job they are offering you. You did it and you didn't love it. the kids were too young and you, being a para, didn't have any real control. And then you got more training -- training i watched you take seriously and devote yourself to. I can't see taking this job, secure as it might be, as a step forward. At best, its a lateral step. But you are better than that. You are worth more. You are more than capable of being a reading specialist and, more than that, you are no longer anyone's para. You being a para at this point would only give the school an overqualified (aka disgruntled) teacher for a discount price. And you ain't no discount item. You fancy, huh!

And, because mmf is a thoughtful amazing (evil genius) person, she heard what i said. In truth, she was leaning toward taking the offer. And i get that. Job searches suck ass and its nice to be wanted. But she thought about it more, and decided she WAS worth more (is there anything greater than hearing your favorite person recognize their greatness, in even this small way). She declined the offer. Another moment.

The happy post-script here is that this decision kicked off what turned out to be the easiest and most successful job search i have ever witnessed. A reading specialist position a few towns over was advertised. She applied. She interviewed. And because the world recognizes the same brilliance in mmf as i do, they smartly scooped her up almost immediately. She got the job. Doing exactly what she just trained to do.

But that is not the moment (not that we didn't celebrate it like a moment). For me, this was one of the most critical points in time when i really felt like a partner. I felt i had to potentially upset mmf for her own sake. I put our money where my mouth is. It's all well and good to tell the person you love how great they are . . . but its another thing advising her to turn down a salary and security for the sake of both her potential and her potentially greater happiness.

I'm really glad i did. She IS that good. It's nice, at a time in life when there are no more clear right and wrong answers to life's questions; feeling like you really did help make the correct decision for the person you love.

2 Points of Clarification for All My ReReaders

2011-07-30T11:24:00.001-04:00

Two points I feel I need to clarify, as mini versions ofconversations related to these points seem to happen more and more.

Point #1. Pleasedon’t be embarrassed by, shy about, or otherwise insecure about talking to meabout reading my blog.

Now I recognize that this particular post pertains mostly tothose of you (of you heroes with your beautiful pictures under the Followers moniker) who both read thisblog and know me in some form in real life. I don’t want those of you who haven’t been able to come sayhi yet (and that how I see you peeps) to feel as if you are less than or not asimportant. The truth is you aremuch MORE important in that developing a readership can only grow so far ifeveryone reading has your same last name.

So hear me out nonetheless. Reading my blog is not “stalking me.” Stalking me is hiding under my porch snappedhi res photos of me through our window. If this is what you are doing, it is mostly your own problem and I wishyou would have just said something so I could have worked out or given you mygood side or whatev.

Reading my blog is the antithesis of this. I am honored to have anyone read myranting. And you don’t need tohesitate to put a follow on me either. It doesn’t matter if we went to high school together (Jamie) or went tocollege together (Selena) or if you just see me from time to time on the island(Eric) . . . it’s a high compliment, to me, when people spend any amount oftheir precious time reading my scratches. So don’t apologize. You don’t have to. This public blog is not my diary. You didn’t reach between the sheets of my childhood bed to pull out thedrawn-on padlocked writing tablet (before tablet meant a computer) which servedas my diary/the-girls-i-like repository--along with a few select porno mags(before they invented the internet for porn).

You clicked on a link I published. We are more than all good. No shame factor here. And that no shame factor beings us to Point #2.

Point #2: Please don’t be embarrassed by, shy about, orotherwise insecure about about NOT reading my blog.

Now I’m not encouraging this. And I realize that in some sense, writing “don’t worry aboutnot reading the blog,” on the blog, is a fools errand. But I had to give both sides of thestory. Especially because thisparticular worry makes more sense. I mean, I DO want everyone to read me. But im a huge narcissist. Admittedly. Ifyou did whatever I wanted my friendswould probably end up yoked to a sled like those ubiquitous reindeer. OnBrian and Harvey, on Janis and Kristen . . .

You get the idea. But I simply can’t even pretend to muster up offense at someone notdedicating themselves to my writing. I mean, even the thought is, like, obviously bizarro riDONKulous. But take a deep breath. I too have experienced the business oflife. Hell, I hardly have time toread the few blogs I manage to peruse. Often times the decision is one of reading others blogs or writing myown, and as I’ve already made clear, im a narcissist.

The moral of these stories . . . Whether you read or not, I willnot be offended. But please . . . eitherway . . . support my crushing self-absorption by increasing the self love meter,found under the “Follow” button to the right.

I am as needy as I am conceited.

ps. do you like "rereaders" as a name for peeps who dig this blog? i think i do. i think i like it a lot.

Getting Here Part II

2011-07-28T11:01:00.001-04:00

I rarely get super pissed. I don’t “see red” very often.

But, after going through security and getting to our gate, Ihad an interaction that pretty much put me into emotional hibernation for therest of the day.

Like any normal human, after getting to our gate, I went tothe customer assistance desk to try and check out if there were, in fact, anyother options to get us to our destination without taking a tour of east coastairports. This seems eminently reasonableto me. It not that I didn’t think USAirways woman #1 was trying to screw us, or wasn’t good at her job, or any ofthat. I just figured that she wasdoing reroute after reroute that morning and perhaps the constancy of panicstricken stink-faced customers (I can only assume that my “I woke up at 5am”face is approximately a stink face to others) may have prevented her fromexploring all options.

I find the service desk and there are two people already inline. The first is a woman who iscurrently talking to the slightly over middle aged man behind the counter. He seems to be helping her. This is heartening. He’s helping her so good, actually,that she’s up there for what seems like 20 minutes. Hey, at least progress is being made. I sit on the floor in line. The person in front of me is a 15 or16-year-old boy who seems mostly disoriented. After the woman finally clears, he gets to the front andessentially asks directions to his gate. I can’t believe that he waited this long to ask that. Not my problem. I get to the front and I, mostlycalmly, explain my situation to him. He looks me straight in the eye and just says, “nope, nothing I can do.”

BUT YOU DID EVEN FUCKING LOOK AT YOUR COMPUTER!!! He didn’teven pay me a flinch of attention. I ask him if he realizes how insulting it seems to not even attempt tocheck my options. His reply is,essentially, “This is not my firstday. I know the flights (FROM ALL CARIERS!!?!?!).”

This is unacceptable to me. It’s not the lack of optionsthat pisses me off. Its that i’veobviously been screwed, and he simply doesn’t give a shit. He doesn’t even give a shit enough tospend a second of his work time on exploring the problem. He is, I suspect, secretly enjoyingsticking it to me.

I wish I could continue with how I used my wit and cuttingsarcasm to inflict verbal repercussions back toward this man. But, on days where im up at 5am, Isacrifice these tools for the good of consciousness. I also have never been great at expressing fiery anger. I seldom scream (in anger [I scream formy softball team ad nausea]). And so, that switch inside me which has two settings, “fuck some shitup” and “chill that shit down”flicked downward, and I sucked it up and in to hibernation mode.

To be all FOX news here, that is fair and balanced, I mustadd that as all of this is going down with the puss encrusted ass hat servicerep, another US Airways employee, Shannon, was being unbelievably accommodatingto mmf near our gate. Turns outthat when she actually looked into our situation on her computer, she saw thatthe flight after ours to Charlotte was actually now leaving ahead of us, andthe 30min difference between the two flights arrivals would be extremelyimportant in us making our connecting flight to Miami. This is additionally crucial in thatthe one place I really didn’t want to spend that night was Charlotte, becauseits one of the few places I really don’t know anyone—and therefore we wouldhave to bunk up at a motel etc etc. Shannon (we <3 you Shannon) looked out for us and we were the firstpeople to be switched to the earlier flight. She friggin saved the day is what she did. And she saved US Airways from a nastynasty letter. From this point on,mmf was our point person the rest of the day.

Because I want to cruise to happier and more interestingtopics, I am going to bullet point the rest of the disaster of this day.

-Twice when we arrived at our gate, mmf and I had to dealwith passengers who decided that they realllllllllly needed to cut a few lineswhile exiting. I actually had ayoung lady who was sitting at the window cut across me and another passenger(middle and aisle) to stand in the aisle as soon as the seat belt chime went“ding.” Wrong day missy. “Really?” I ask her. “Ihave to make my connection,” she replies. “Thank goodnessyou’re the only one with that problem,” I respond. (good morning wit and sarcasm,apparently you were waiting for me in Charlotte). Because on this day people are evil, this doesn’t stop herfrom plowing to the aisle. Shewaits there, for an extended period of time as my smile grows and grows. A poor woman travelling with 2 smallkids (martyr) is getting assistance from a friendly passenger—struggling tojuggle her children and luggage. Iget the satisfaction of watching this girls face crinkle as she realizes shesgoing nowhere fast.

- The second cutter is a middle aged guy who thinks he’sgonna pull a fly by on mmf. Because I’m on the window for this one, I decide to start singing(pretty loudly) a song dedicated to the “yellow-shirted guy” which essentiallylays out how inconsiderate and asinine it would be to try take advantage of anelderly couple needing a few extra seconds to get out of their row and pushahead of them and us. He doesn’tlook directly at me. But he heardme. Mmf throws a body block andtakes pains to assist the older couple with their overhead luggage. There are times when mmf being an evilgenius is just plain sexy, and boxing out that dude was one of those times.

- On the flight to Miami, across the aisle, we have essentiallya couple out of the Miami version of jersey shore. They are douchetastic. More importantly, the guy has this itsy bitsy habit whereby he, veryloudly, lifts the phlegm up from his throat and then nose-wrangles it back downwith a snort. Every 15seconds. Thank goodness for noisecancelling headphones.

- Our final flight showed a movie. The movie was JaneEyre. I could play this offlike “duh, everyone whose anyone read that book in high school,” but the truthis I read little to nothing in high school (in 10^th grade I did abook report on Yakov Smirnoff’s Coming toAmerica. You can googlehim). I probably figured Jane Eyrewas the sequel of The Scarlett Letter,and Pearl scared me so badly the first time, I couldn’t take another dose. Mmf has read the book. But it was so long ago that she hasforgotten the ending—and she decided to watch the flick.

As we are descending, the loudspeaker cuts in over the film andmmf tells me that they’ve just spoke over the most crucial scene. Turns out she shouldn’t have worriedabout it since there is still 15 or so minutes left to go as the screens goblank and we taxi to the gate. Oopsie. Did we show a 1 hrand 45 minute film on a 1 hr and 30 min flight. I mean, the final scenes are usually the least important one’sanyway. Long story medium, if you rememberhow that book ends, you should email mmf.

You Can't Get There From Here

2011-07-27T16:25:00.003-04:00

I cant pretend like I didn’t kinda abandon you, people whoare kind enough to read my rantings on a somewhat regular basis. I mean, writing that last entry (badplace much?) and then cutting out for my longest blogcation with no warning wasa little dick. And Iapologize. Life happens, and inthis case I needed to divest from the blog for a week or two in order to getwhere I am now . . . which is paradise. My first vacation with mmf in over a year. Aaaaaaaaand, lucky for you all, before flying down to theisland, we first took an excursion to Chicago Il/Fort Wayne IN, for a friend’swedding. And that, my friends, iswhere blog entries are born. Lotsof em.

This is the story of our 18 hr. trip from Chicago to StJohn.

There are some days that just are born to be no good. I have found that across the board,days that begin with my alarm going off (correctly) at 5am immediately throwthemselves toward this category. I’m not saying that everytime I have woken that early has been a horrific nightmare. I once woke that early to hike Mt.Masada to see the sun rise. Thatwas beautiful. I also woke up at asimilar time to watch the sun rise over the grand canyon. Also beautiful.

I’m seeing a pattern. Perhaps my original statement should go like this: Any day I am woken at 5 am not to watch a sunset is very likely ano good very bad day. And I willsay that usually one of these days (such as the one I am writing this very longintroduction to) is juxtaposed by the day following, which more than not isspent in whatever wondrous local I deemed worth suffering the indecency of theprevious morning for. But somehow,in the moment of eyes at half mass, stumbling like a drunken zombie looking forclean underwear, fog filled confusion, I just don’t have that perspective. I am not a morning person (unless youconsider 11am morning, in which case im pretty ok).

On with the show. Mmf and I wake in my college roommates bed on the south side ofChicago. Said ol roomy is in hisown little slice of post-doc hell, and conveniently his gf lives a mere 2blocks from his office. So in mymind, at 6am, when he finishes his daily torture, he kinda lets gravity andexhaustion and his gf’s beauty, tractor-beam his body down the steps of hisbuilding and into her bed. Said gfis insane and wondrous enough to volunteer to pick us up at 5:30am and lug ourasses to Ohare. She either thingsim insane funny or really loves my old roommate. The good money is on the later.

Four zombies drive a bad ass Chevy Caprice (it looks like afuturistic cannon) on the swerving death trap which is the airport road. I check my phone for emails on the way,mostly out of reflex. Groupon Groupon Orbitz Orbitz. UH-OH. BothOrbitz emails explain our flight is delayed . . . and then furtherdelayed. The later email has usdelayed well past our connecting flight, in Charlotte, to the islands. An email that essentially says“you could have woken up 2 hours later, been more well rested, and still not made your flight today sucka!” Least that is how I read it.

I slide my credit card into the self-check in machine andthe computer spits back a “you have been rebooked on a later flight. See below for details.” Below, there are no details. Literally blank. Assistanceplease? Us Airways man #1tells me that we have been rebooked for our same flights the following day,(Unacceptable) and that we should go wait in the line to the left for furtherassistance. Wait #1. When we get to the front of said lineUS Airways woman #1 tells us that the best she can do (and she seems togenuinely be looking to help us—foreshadowing people) is to send us on ouroriginal flight to Charlotte, then connect us to a flight to Miami, and thenconnect us to a AA flight to the island. She realizes how sub-optimal this is, but tries to ease the burden ofreality by letting us know we are probably one of the few people getting to ourdestination the same day. Notreally a huge consolation at that moment. She did give us exit row seats on the Char à Miami flight however, thoughnot in the same row.

I had to ask. What is causing this mayhem? What vile beast of destruction isreeking havoc on our travel plans. I should have known better. I really should have. Knowledge is not always power. Sometimes knowledge just pisses you the hell off. Thereare sandstorms in Phoenix, she says. I think to myself, “I don’t give a shit about phoenix (though I do have my papers on mejust in case). I’m not headed to Phoenix, not headed evenin the cardinal direction of Phoenix and overall phoenix can pretty much suckmy balls. (this is not to saythat I am happy that they are covered in sand of course).

Why the hell should weather in phoenix be an acceptablereason for ruining my travel day with no compensation? Of course she explains that our planeis coming from phoenix and a delay out, means a delay in, means my daysucks. This continues topiss me off (on the inside—this woman was just doing her job and obviously hasno policy control). Hell, doesANYONE have policy control on the airlines. I mean, what if I tried this in my occupation. Sorry doctor so and so, I was going topresent my dissertation today, but my cousin in Chicago has the flu, so it’s ano go. I’m pretty sure thatwouldn’t fly (travel pun!!!!). Sorry surgery patient, I was going to perform this procedure on you butthe hospital in Albuquerque is experiencing a power outage, so were going tocancel. It just seems likebullshit that the excuse that you aren’t compensated for your travel troublesif there is nasty weather pretty much anywhere in the country, seems superlame.

Things actually got worse after we went throughsecurity . . . but that is to be continued. (I promise there will be many blogscoming now that I have control of my time once again. Stay tuned and bring a friend.)

They've Come to Take Me Away, HA HA, They've Come to Take Me Away

2011-07-19T00:44:00.002-04:00

Thereare times, mostly after midnight, when i cast my mental fishing line out intothe everything, and i catch nothing but the back end of feeling infinitelysmall. There is me, in the shadow of my planet in the shadow of my galaxyin the shadow of being so small as to not yet have the capabilities to knowwhat lies beyond. My life span inrelation to the human existence, in relation to life on earth in relation tothe creation of the universe. . . As you might have guessed, this is the thought process that inventedanti-anxiety medication.

Butthe facts are the facts and that’s why they are scary. And I think about this more and more inthe mornings. When I begin anew. I have been thinking, “this is one ofthe days of your life. Have atit.”

Thisis easier said then done. Especially in graduate school. But it makes me even happier to see my friends. I am appreciative of the privilege of,as Sesame Street always encouraged me to do, knowing the people in myneighborhood. I get to greet the peopleon the street, because they’re the people that I do see each day.

Holyshit. I just realized that I’vebeen brainwashed by Sesame Street. The Children’s Education Workshop has control of my mind. Ohmy god . . . how do I remember that their even IS a childrens educationworkshop!!! ” My reality is crumbling, I don’teven know where my cell phone is half the time, but I remember the in’s andout’s of the rules of Snuffleupagus ’s reality like they were the rules tobaseball. I’m tailspinning. The “yupyup yup” of the alien squid puppets is humming outside my window. I see them bobbing just outside thekitchen window.

OH NO THEY ARE INSIDE THE HOUSE!!!! They just friggin phased through thewall or something. Like there weremagical creatures or teleporters. Either way im done for.

Remember to read and reread this blogwhen im gone.

Their hovering is insanely creepy. Im scared. But it all makes sense now. All that education . . . I mean . . . a DANCE major . . .and we named the dog Grover for god’s sake. I should have seen this coming. PBS is evil ya’ll. Raw methodical evil.

And now this. Their minions. Cometo finish me off.

Their googley eyes will haunt last my lastbreaths.

Abandonment issues & the 4th of July

2011-07-07T12:29:00.000-04:00

This is not a dead blog. This past week has been chocked full of life and has therefore left little remaining time for it's blog retell. selfish life, taking all my attention. But, lull no more, lets just throw it around the horn to get back into the feel for things.

Mmf abandoned me to go the great white north in alaska. she had 2 weddings in anchorage, one friday and one saturday. completely unrelated from each other. I like this is the kinda strange stuff that happens only when you are an uber nice person like mmf. On a related note: Beware the Anchoragoneans. I'm pretty sure they are up to something.

While my lady was off ice climbing with the yetis, i went to my parents place to help celebrate a milestone bday for my mother. Begin tangent: I can honestly say im not sure if my mom would care if i said which birthday exactly. My gut says she wouldnt, but i have learned in such situations to exercise caution. There are physical alarms that literally go buzzing and chiming and ringing inside me when i'm approaching a situation that may cause my mom upset. I have been both pre-programmed and well trained. So, all i'll say is, happy 40th mom. you look great. End Tangent

One of the centerpiece events of the birthday celebration was dinner at the restaurant on the top of Mt. Greylock-- the tallest mountain in massachusetts--with a full palette of family. MOST notably, my grams, Rita, who you might remember from her inspirational blog comment last year, post surviving a near death ordeal which lasted months. Well ladies and gentlemen, shes back. Full strength. They are making her carry a cane, and i have seen video of her "walking her cane." Not walking with the cane, but rather, taking the cane for a walk, a la a puppy. She is back to her stubborn hilarious self. Heartwarming stuff.

top of Greylock

Two points on Rita. One, she is a sculptress. She makes clay figures conducting various activities, and also glazes them beautifully. They are organic and really capture something distinctly human in her representation of the human figure. Well, she made grover. Yup. For our upcoming wedding, she is making figures for us. and she started with our puppy. It was made from a picture and turned out spot on (PUN!). She got the ears right, the spots, his energy. I cried when i saw it. It's that beautiful.

"hi, im amazing"

damn right i have a clay dog toy!

facsimile

the real mccoy

Second story. We are sitting there at dinner. Me next to Rita. And she leans over and says, "Matt, i've been watching this new show, . . . have you seen 'Ice loves Coco'" I nearly fell to the floor in laughter. of all the tv programs i thought my grams would happen to flip to, the rapper Ice-T's reality show with his surgically enhanced barbarella wife Coco T (right!!!!), was NOT what i thought she'd be into. I was wrong. "It's silly," she says. Admittedly i have only seen clips of this show, but the clips did include Coco's sister asking Coco to be her dulah or birth coach or something. And Coco is relaying this story to her gay manservant?, who is alternatingly texting, not paying attention to Coco, and fully encouraging her to help birth this child. Pretty life changing stuff.

Now part of what makes this funny for me is the ironic trajectory of Ice-T's career, going from U.S. Army, to the rap group Body Count featuring the iconic song Cop Killer to playing a police detective on Law & Order, to having a reality tv show. My friend andrew says that this is a reflection of hip hop cultures inability to enact effective change. I think its about how growing to need the spotlight desperately knows no bounds -- and a guy whose been famous since the late 80's wants to stay in the spotlight. I mean, i saw Ice-T on a reality show called "I get that a lot." Where celebrities go work retail jobs and when people tell them they look like, well, themselves, they say "I get that a lot" and proceed to try and convince people they are wrong. Now, Ice-T was pretty hilarious running game out the Foot-Locker, but at the same time, is there any show ever that is more self-indulgent. Oh hi, it's just lil ol me, Mc Movie Star, working this plebeian job like you 'normal people'. Is anyone going to recognize that i am, like, so out of place here. Oh you did recognize me? Oh, well then lets play a game where i pretend that i'm NOT me! Won't that be fun for us. You wanting to meet me and me being here and at the same time pretending not to be me for tv. I think you get my point.

Dog related lightning round.

Brother got to meet Grover. Since Grover is my first pet, he is also my brothers first pet by proxy. Considering the affect the grove-ster has had on me, i was pretty sure he would similarly affect my bro. You be the judge.


Smitten

Grover got to meet kitty. Grover was excited to play. The kitty . . .

less so

And that, in a nutshell, was my week away.

hope you enjoyed your mini-holiday.

"I heart Independence Day"

Sorry. but you won't be.

2011-06-27T01:26:00.000-04:00

'Brady Bunch' mom got crabs in affair with NY mayor : Politician sent Florence Henderson flowers to apologize

(i had to link to that article) that said. I could have gone my entire human life--no matter how long or short that may end up being--without ever knowing that information. And now you know it too. like i said at the outset, Sorry.

This is not news. this is something that happened. its unfortunate, scummy, too much information, and does not deserve a headline. we have too much news. we have our too much information. constantly. we are bombarded. i am bombarded. i am bombarding. i post this blog on facebook, twitter, and sometimes on my gmail status update. i am not an innocent. i currently have a movie on in the background, my iphone at my side, and the baseball box score running in the background. my screens have multiple screens. baby screens people. im a little scared of this. and the less im scared of this i am, the more i think maybe thats what the screens want me to think. stay tuned (ack. robot takeover pun!)

another thing that i find strange. we are still finding new species of animals on our planet. and yes, most of them ARE a long way down in the ocean, and getting down there is difficult. but. in my defense. we've been to the moon. so come on. don't give me that. and its not only ocean creatures (and wowwie are they ever creatures), an expedition to some place in south asia recently came back with photos of some crazy new tree frogs and a few other new species. i mean, i am a fan of conservation. a big fan. and a part of me is incredibly happy that there are still uncharted places on our planet. but at the same time. isn't it kinda nutso that we haven't been everywhere on the earth's surface. i mean, we loooooooooove taking over new places. almost as much as we love spreading diseases. this jungle must be some pretty dank friggin crack to be still unexplored. otherwise we'd have tree houses and bungalows with glass floors and facial peels and swimming with south asia's version of dolphins (maybe dolphins?) and we'd get to watch the former natives dance a watered down version of their previously happy culture's ritual hunting preparation dance. this is all conjecture, of course. but it probably rings some bells at the same time.

back to the ocean. lets get down there. i was promised way back during SeaQuest (oh yah i did) that we would have dolphins full on communicating with us. Lets have a friggin space race to talking with dolphins (seriously though; monkeys, chimps, and the like have had their chance to be the people's champion. i make an exception for orangutans, however. we had a talk, and we're cool.). If douglas adams had faith in them, then i do too. They are probably all down in the ocean, swimming around, babbling about how easy it would be to cure cancer for us if only they had a way to tell us. Somehow hitting the square block and jumping through the hoops haven't exactly transmitted to subtleties of how to correctly apply beta-blockers. You get the point.

it turns out i am almost militantly pro-dolphin. go figure. and now that i've learned something about myself, i'm stopping.

happy birthday brother.

Greatest Comment Ever: Could anyone tell me how to do?

2011-06-24T12:24:00.000-04:00

I'm not feeling great today.

I don't expect you to care about this per say, but my original enthusiasm for the forthcoming post has been slightly muffled by my incessant wheezing and rock-a-bily headache. i will try to do it justice nonetheless.

Not all comments on the blog are created equal. All are encouraged and make my heart sing, of course, but some just rise above. There was the cardiac haiku, for instance. And there are John's blog length comments which i know i have to set time aside to read ;).

But recently, i got what i think might be the very best one yet. I comes from an anonymous follower and was left on my "I just can't quit you newsweek" blog post. (Note: i received my latest free issue yesterday!). It is pretty self explanatory:

I want to cancel my subscription, but is very hard, please could anyone tell me how to do? My resident is spoted in south America. -anon

Um. Awesome.

Is it awesome enough to make a list of all the things that are awesome about it. Yes, i think it is.

1. Someone in south America (my kind of capitalization btw) read my blog.
(I can only hope that we are talking about South America and not some semi-literate Alabamian.)
2. Someone in south America was routed to my blog by search how to cancel their Newsweek subscription.
3. I love the term "spotted" in south America. It makes me want to pop over to google maps and look for their house. Oh, there is Cesar working on his roof!!! And i spotted his dog by the front door as well!
4. Even someone who obviously is still in the process of learning English seems to know that Newsweek has fallen to shit and wants to cancel their subscription. What a Catch-22. Knows too much English to appreciate Newsweek, and not enough English to figure out how to cancel their subscription.

And lest anyone say that i am all talk and no walk. Here, my anonymous reader, is the support page for newsweek. In the top left, there is a menu for "espanol." That might also help: http://www.newsweeklatinamerica.com/support/

Good Luck Cesar! I hope to spot you later.

The Second Little Piggy

2011-06-21T12:54:00.000-04:00

Outside of our little house on our little side street, kitty corner from our little community cemetery (if a cemetery can look quaint, this one does), we have a very large tree. For this post, lets call the tree Wanda, because A) it’s fun to give plants names. B) Wanda is a particularly fun name C) I was going to call this post “A Tree Called Wanda” before deciding that it was too much of a stretch, but still I grew (pun) attached to the name. You will too.

So Wanda is a significantly large tree that provides shade to both our car space on the left (while also providing a perch for the birds to lay down a nice base coat of bird shit on my windshield) and our front porch behind. On the opposite side of Wanda there is an old fashioned Lincoln-log style wooden fence made by two horizontal beams (about 8 feet long) and stubbier vertical beams about every 6 or 7 feet. On the opposite side of the fence, is our road.

hello Wanda

Wanda’s diameter is like an average sized coffee table and it branches into a number of telephone pole sized mini-trunk branches. (with all of this size and shape talk, I’m scared im gonna give Wanda body issues). I promise that I tell you all of this for a reason.

About a week ago, while mmf and I were eating dinner and watching some television on the couch, we heard what sounded like 1.5 seconds of a noise I would describe as “crackling” and then a sound I would describe as “bad news.” The sound was accompanied by a physical vibration. There was an impact accompaniment. With the blinds closed, mmf and my first reaction was to look at each other. Like I said, the sound after the crackle, the “snap” or “pop” if you will, was definitely not a sign that our night was about to get better and more relaxing.

We run to the front door, we are on the porch.

First reaction? My car is safe!

Second reaction? Holy shit, the tree branch/mini-trunk just broke off, crashing through the wood fence like butter and completely stopping traffic from being able to pass in either direction. It was essentially a big branchy leafy telephone pole stretching from 4 feet onto our rental property to 4 feet into the ditch on the opposite side of the road. Not good.

We called the police. It’s one of those times when you just dial 911 and don’t even think of trying to figure out what the “local number” for the police is.

Third Reaction: How the hell did that branch not hit any power lines? Pure dumb luck folks. There is no other reason. There are plenty of lines to choose from, this tree missed them all. Thank goodness.

All and all, as huge potentially house or car crushing tree branch falls go, this was a pretty good one. Just one little problem of a blocked road in the darkness.

Minutes later, all the king’s horses and all the king’s men had come and lit up our avenue with blue and white flashers. Cones were put up and chain saws sawed. The speed with which the whole process took place made me wish these were the same people working on paving our roads. They were efficient and as quiet as one can be under the circumstances. An hour later the flashers were gone and the road was silent once more.

Grover examines the damage. That's his favorite pee spot that got destroyed.

It all seemed to happen so fast. Boom. A branch falls in the night. Boom. You worry your car is crushed. Boom. Crisis averted. Light Camera Action. And scene. It all might have seemed like it had been a dream had . . . well . . .

Had the road crew not only removed the part of the branch that was physically laying across the road. The moment a millimeter of that branch was on grass (our grass), they stopped cutting. Which means that we still have a huge length of tree branch lying across our demolished wooden fence. Our yard kind of has the look of country bumpkins who drunkenly decided to build a cross in their from yard, got the wood, then passed out and forgot about it.

"hey man, its not on the road"

You know, classy.

Human Roadkill

2011-06-16T12:59:00.000-04:00

Today I had to pretend to ignore a discarded band-aid cotton ball combo that was lying on the changing room bench in the locker room. I would say that there is a 94% chance it was from a blood draw at the health center, because it was a shimmery reflective kaleidoscope of a band-aid, the kind that a grown up would only wear if someone else put it on them. I have had such band-aids put on me. At the health center. That’s the other way I know. And so, here I am, sitting on an already pretty gross bench between a used blood clotter and someone’s dirty bathing suit hanging outside their locker. And I wonder. Is this really worth it? Do I care about swimming that much?

I do. I really do. Even when I hate swimming, I love it. I hate it as one hates laying the foundation of one’s own success.

________________________

Another disturbing trend I’ve been noticing is that people have begun attempting suicide by running or walking into my moving car. Now animals having been doing this for years, but it seems that we humans needed smart phones to get us moving toward vehicular self-manslaughter (lady-slaughter?).

Example one, I am making a left turn off a busy road onto a side road, and I am stopped, waiting, with my turn signal on. I see a woman, surfing her phone, starting to walk across the side road in the cross walk. I wait until she has a good head start across the street and then I begin my turn. As I get closer, she full stops in the middle of the street!!!! to typiddy type type on her phone. In the middle of the street! My dog knows better than that. I swerved left (the side street didn’t have oncoming traffic so I could swerve where oncoming traffic would have been coming from). As I passed, I certainly took the time to project out the window, “really, RIGHT in the middle of the street?” Suicide. It’s the only explanation. She was trying to make it look like an accident.

Today, I watched 4 people waiting patiently at a crosswalk for a walk signal. Unfortunately, instead of the “Walk” sign popping up next, the other green light came on, giving my lane of cars the left hand turn green light. But those pedestrians had been waiting at least 20 full seconds, and they decided that “damn, it feels like its our turn to walk.” So they did. They walked straight toward the lit red words saying "DON'T WALK" Perhaps that thought that sign was only referring to the little people. They walked right to where we, the oncoming cars, desired to drive. In this case, since we couldn’t just bowl them over (well, I couldn’t because the car in front of me wouldn’t go), I decided to sing a nice loud audible song out my window to the walkers that went approximately like this, “look at that beautiful ‘don’t walk’ sign, all red and asking you to not walk. Boy do I wish you could read it, because that way you would know not to walk . . . “

I should make it clear that those were not the exact words to the song that I sung, both because I can’t remember now, and because it went on for some time. The general feeling and tone, however, remain the same. Which is to say that they both heard me, and looked, and one even gave me a semi-dirty/confused look. I felt fine about it.

We aren’t done. I’ve had to swerve around at least 2 other downward facing dingbats who think they can simultaneously pass that last level of angry birds while navigating through town. It’s as if the invention of the smart phone has deprogrammed the “moving cars > pedestrians” equation out of our own internal hard-drives. Which can mean only one thing . . .

Road kill ain’t just for squirrels anymore.

YOU are the weakest wedding link . . . GOODBYE

2011-06-11T21:32:00.000-04:00

The time has come. We are now less than a year out from Weddinganza 2012, and one of the next steps in the process is compiling the guest list. And before i can start to make this list, i really needed to get down how much i am going to loathe this process. loathe. compiling the wedding guest list is, by far, the part of wedding planning i am looking forward to the least.

It's downright unamerican. ok, maybe that's taking it a bit far. But, honestly, making a finite list of one's friends is the antithesis of how i actually approach friendship. Let me spell it out.

Friendship is not a zero-sum equation. I really love people (sometimes even undergrads!). I enjoy forming connections, trying to understand where other people are coming from, and feeling a connection to a larger community. If i were to meet someone new, and befriend them (or be befriended), this doesn't lesson the amount of friendship i have left for my already established friends. This "you can't be friends with me if you are already friends with them" attitude that we are introduced to in middle school is pervasive and influential and often can abuse our relationships well into adulthood. And its a farce.

Except when it comes to a wedding guest list. In that case there are literally only so many spots at the table. And so, factually speaking, invitations are a zero-sum equation. One person coming means another person can't. Barf.

We've only just started.

Also, back in my high school and college days, who my "best friend" was used to be very important to me. But, as the world grew around me and i found my place in it, i realized that having a best friend meant that you had tons of not best friends. This idea seemed so limiting to me, but i liked having a best friend. So i expanded the definition. Now i have a bunch of best friends. Best friend from growing up. Best friend from Boston, Japan, Israel. Best friend from the coffee shop. Best friend from vacation. Best friend best friend best friend. Let me tell you folks, you can do much worse than having a logjam at the position of best friend. And why this works, . . . why having all these people holding the same esteemed place in my life doesn't create conflict, is because friendship is not hierarchical.

Just as having one friendship doesn't lessen another friendship, there really is nothing to gain from ranking your friends on any merit scale. Sure, people all contribute different amounts of time and energy to friendship. And there are times when people who care about you simply don't have the resources (financial or emotional) to help you. But to me, none of these traits are central in awarding the best label. The best comes from a level of commitment. A commitment that says "i am for you, and to the best of my particular abilities, i would like to foster that commitment."

And then, shazam, you're a bestie.

But not in the wedding invite world. In the wedding invite world there are first lists and second lists and maybes and significant others and on and on and on. it makes me nauseous. i pretty much either love you or i don't, very little distinctions there between "love love" and "little love." I mean, how can such distinctions ever serve me well in any other life domain. cept fucking wedding invitations.

And i don't want to tell anyone they can't come. because i want all of my friends to come. i mean right? duhsville. And while i know that we are all adults on the outside and that people understand that i can't invite 500 people to our wedding (if i want have someone to wed!). But i also know that we are all middle schoolers on the inside and that there is a part of us that feels that tinge of rejection and feels un-special to whomever didn't invite us to their wedding, no matter how much we try to intellectualize it. and i, most of anything in the world, wouldn't and don't want my friends to be made to feel un-special to me. cause holy shitballs batmans, that's my thesis. making my friends feel special is what i'm all about. My friends are everything to me. Feeling connected to my friends is how i stay connected to life, the universe, and everything.

so how am i supposed to make a list? how am i supposed to find a cut off point? how do i say, "no?"

So far, the only solution i've come up with is to call the "No" list: "People Invited to Crash Our Wedding."

now that sounds like me.

Point. Counter Point.

2011-06-08T14:29:00.000-04:00

(editors note: for those who appreciate perpetuating temporal continuity in blog entries, i wrote the "Point" last night and the "Counter Point" today. thus making the timing of the news referenced consistent with the space time continuum.

Point.

I see an ironic twist slowly happening.

Twenty years ago we had the weather girl. See was good looking, and preferably ~~very smart~~ good looking. And she was fetishized, and underhandedly mocked, and 'less than.'

Today the weather is tossed to the quirky meteorologist. He or she has thick glasses, a strange voice and/or a not ready for t.v. stage act that is incorporated into their broadcast. And they are mocked for their misplaced self-importance and for being weirdos and for being less than.

But their day is coming. Soon, the weather will be the news. Hell, the news is the weather today! Mmf and i briefly turned to the news and it proceeds . . . cut

to Arizona/New Mexico. fires traveling through the desert eating the dry landscape like it was gasoline. The smoke plume from the fire is making the air unbreathable and evacuations are ongoing . . . cut

to flooding of both the mississippi (still fun to write, even in tragedy) and missouri rivers. they showed a damn opening and the town with sandbags braced for impact below. a town in iowa may soon be underwater . . . cut

to record high temperatures across most of the middle and southeast of the country. Easily hitting 100 degrees many places. The wave is headed east tomorrow. "Can't wait!," says Sarcastic Sam.

there were more cuts. I think two more. I can't remember exactly. I do remember that it was enough cuts that mmf asked, "is this for real?" This comes after driving through springfield, MA twice this weekend, passed the mangled trees lining the river. scary stuff folks.

we need to quickly get past the conversation about if global warning is a real thing, and we need to begin solving the problem of how we will be dealing with it's repercussions while we try to reverse the damage we've done. because they are not "coming," future tense, they are here, present tense.

I've said it before, and i'll say it again, i look around me and all i see is the beginning of the premise of almost every disaster-porn movie we've ever made. Cept for maybe The Core. That shit is just silly. We should be more worried about this. Weather people, prepare to be serious people very soon.

Counter Point:

This past weekend i had the exhilarating pleasure of officiating my friends wedding. I married em. I married em good.

And part of my pleasure in marrying them, besides them being a wonderful example of love to be celebrated, was the task of writing a little wedding talk for them. On this blog i have the constant luxury of writing about whatever the hell i feel like. I can talk about my poop or killing osama. i would say thats a pretty open landscape. But writing a wedding speech is a much more directed assignment, and i enjoyed delving into both what is meaningful to me, and them, about marriage.

additionally, the whole experience of officiating was nerve-wracking. In a good way. I rarely get nervous, and when i do, it's usually because im doing something really worthwhile. This was no exception, i road that adrenaline well into the dance party.

And dance i did. As a former dance major i can, to put it simple, can tear it up. People throughout my adulthood have giggled at the prospect of my dance background, until they see me dance. Then i get props. Which is good and all, but for whatever reason, dance has never been about showing off for me. As i told a friend recently, "dance is practically the only thing i do in life that i don't want attention for." Perhaps because i learned it as an art, perhaps because i matured dancing alone on the dance floor of a kibbutz bar in Israel. I'm not sure. But, even though getting watched while i dance (socially, not in performance, obviously) makes me a little uncomfortable, it pales in comparison to the elation of dancing it out good every once in awhile. and mmf and i cut up a mofo rug.

also, we had a great ass time. their friends are hilarious and this story happened. to prove it, i provide pictures. i have a loose consent to post them, and therefore im going for it.

The brides best friend and homosexual extraordinaire, we'll call him Rupert (hahaa. Yah, we're calling him Rupert). Rupert is super excited and at least a little very intoxicated. As mmf and i exit our hotel room into the hallway, Rupert pops out from his room, 2 rooms down on the same side, wearing nothing but bikini briefs, his yarmulke from the wedding, and a huge smile. This is made all the funnier considering he is a red-headed non-jew who happily proclaims "i'm a goy!" when given the opportunity.

"HEY GUYS!!!!!!!!" *huge smiling wave*

click . . . click . . . bang

Me: "The door to your room just closed behind you huh?"

Rupert: "Uh huh"

Me: "You don't have a key to your room, do you?"

Rupert: "Nope."

Me: "Amazing."

What transpired next mmf and i followed about 4 paces behind. We were bent at the waist, laughing our faces off and bracing ourselves up with the walls, as we watched as Rupert marched his little bikini clad bottom up to the front desk to get a new key.

Nice yamulka, right!

Now it gets funnier. he goes to the front desk, in his underwear, and the woman at reception is on the phone and puts up her finger to him for him to wait until she is finished!?!?! I can't friggin imagine what phone call is more pressing than a hotel guest, scantily clad, in your lobby. But below you see proof of it happening. You can see the receptionist in the background yapping it up. Obviously, you can also see that Rupert is taking the blatant disrespect pretty well.

"just happy to be here"

When the woman finished her conversation, Rupert went over to get a new key (she didn't hassle him much for identification,which could have gotten amazingly hilarious). And there i got the money shot:

"i'm supposed to meet someone from the JDate?"

I should give Rupert his full credit. After retrieving a key to his room, he continued on with us to the after-party in his skivvies. Much respect.

Final tangent as a conclusion to the counter-point. As we proceeded out from the wedding, i was the last one to exit. As i was exiting, i had this moment of realization that everyone was just kinda staring at my back, since it was the only thing left happening. So i leapt, and i clicked my heals, and it looked like this.

photo credit Steve L. Romero at SLRphotographer

These are the moments we remember forever.

The Road Less Able to be Travelled

2011-05-30T17:04:00.000-04:00

Dear Amherst Roads and Recreation Department,

First off, i don't know if this is your department's actual name. It sounded good, with the word "roads" in it, and i went with it. If you are actually the Amherst Town Hall or even the somewhat popularized Park and Recreation Department, i apologize. Public Works? These town politic things have always confused me, no offense meant.

Second. I know what you're thinking. "this is the guy who is complaining?!? the guy who has gotten like 428 parking tickets." Yup, its me. and in my defense, i paid all those friggin parking tickets, even the bullshit ones that resulted from your constantly malfunctioning meters. I paid those tickets despite the vigilance and number of parking meter attendants you rotate which i feel may boarder on exploiting your own community. I paid. And, considering that you've gladly accepted those $4,280 in fees, i think my voice should be of particular importance, though i am firmly aware that it is not.

Here's the thing. As you know, with the winter being as brutal as it was, followed by wet wet wet wet wetness, the roads have gotten bad. They got real bad. Especially those roads that are not exactly considered main roads, but are still integral semi-shortcuts either to the university or to, say, my house. Potholes that look like they are designed to swallow other potholes. Potholes that have popped so many of my tires that i keep a spare spare (not a typo) in my trunk for when, not if, the next one pops. Potholes so large that if Falcor were to come flying out, it wouldn't be that surprising.

And you know its true. That's why you guys in Roads and Services slllooooowwwwwwwllllyyy began to patch and then repair some of the worst roads. Thankfully, you smartly desided to repave the roadways and intersection near my house. roads that had gotten so bad that the drunk drivers were the only ones who would go straight across the swiss cheese grater of a road, while us sober folks were left veering wildly from the left lane to the right, trying to save our cars an extra season without a cracked muffler. I'm not exaggerating. I spent a good amount of time in the left lane on the way home. I think an oncoming car probably would have hurt my car less than staying in my lane.

And so you paved. And sure, you took your time, tearing the blacktop off the gravel below it for a few days (the gravel was MUCH easier to drive on). And then, like hot fudge coating atop a sundae, you poured that smooth hot black tar evenly across the injured surface -- from the STOP sign to the undamaged portion of the street. You even were conscientious enough to build a curb to protect the houses from erratic drivers. And for all this, i say, "thank you. thank you so very much."

But now, unfortunately, we must get to the complaint portion of our program. And here it is. You poured that black money-shot of a infrastructure reconstruction about a month and a half ago. And yet, the seams where the previously intact roads meets the, significantly lower in profile, newly paved roads -- remain (insert where the rubber meets the road joke here). These seams aren't really a problem if you are driving the direction where you drop from the higher road to the lower, but going the other way, those plateaus essentially become long straight-line potholes, similar to those "Don't Reverse" spikey one-way teeth grates that you see at the entrance to parking lots. And if you don't slow down from the listed 35 mph to 15 or so, you essentially ruin your car in the very same way that you would have had the potholes just been left in the first place.

So my question is, "what's the fucking deal people!!!!" There are 3 such seams on my drive home. I generally remember 2 of them. If the point is to get people to slow down, just put in a friggin speed bump. a bump, not the lazy-persons version of a jagged right angle. Mmf thinks that you may have run out of money. If this is the case, i have to think that the blacktop that was used to create the curbs may have better served the community if they were instead allocated to connecting the roads.

I tend to believe that the tardiness in completing this job revolves around the idea that, if left as is, the repeated weight of cars repeatedly slamming into and over the seam will eventually even it out. If this is the case, than i must send you all the most genuinely and vigorous, "fuck you so much." And, I only say it that way because it is truly how i feel.

And so, as we transition into June, i will attempt to be the change i see in the world. How's this. From now on, take the money that you get from all of my friggin parking tickets and finish fixing the god damn roads people. Roads are not like bike tires, where a patch makes it good as new. a not completely repaired road is still a damaged and dangerous road.

Here's another possible solution. I will start resolving my parking tickets in the same way that you resolve the town potholes. You send me the ticket. I pay about 75% ($7.50) of that ticket. I then break into city hall and rob it of $7.50. I then wait until you get super duper angry . . . . and then wait some more.

I swear though, the check's in the mail.

14 Years Bad Luck

2011-05-27T20:43:00.000-04:00

today was a weird day.

not a bad day, certainly. but not a particularly great day either (though the bruins are still playing, so we'll see).

And example:

About a month ago i mentioned to mmf that my car's right side mirror was shaking when i got up to speed. About a week ago, she noticed it was super loose, and pulled it off. Not the whole side mirror mind you, just the thin slice of mirror that is glued onto the side-mirror console. And so everything looks normal, except there is no reflection.

Today on the way to work, i stop at a stop sign and hear a crash like someone had broken a bottle on the pavement off in the distance. "Someone else's problem," i thought to myself. I pulled out onto the main road and i am proud to say it was not too long til i glanced at my left side mirror and discovered that it too, and jumped ship.

That is weird. right? So now i can only look behind me with my inside rear view (here's hoping they used better glue on that one) or the ol' head turn.

Is this the product of 5 year super glue or something. I mean, whats going on. I didn't even know those rear-view mirrors had real mirrors on them until a week ago. Now they are para-trouping off my car like the view outside Gadhafi's compound (oops, are we supposed to wait until after . . . my bad.)

Anyway. That's the kinda weird its been. Least it's not boring.

I Just Cant Quit You Newsweek

2011-05-24T00:57:00.000-04:00

about a week ago i wrote about how cancelling my subscription to Newsweek was the best thing i have ever done, in that i both cancelled before it fell to crap and that they continue to send me Newsweek at 100% off the cover price.

I thought i was done with it. but then, on friday i get this picture text from mmf.

(im available if you need a Photoshop tutorial)

That's correct. Another issue of there magazine concurrent with a letter recognizing how long it has been since i last paid for their magazine. Now you know the letter is from Newsweek because its addressed to "Maltitiyahu". It's their little pet name for me.

i absolutely love the text. its almost a poem onto itself:

it's late.
But not too late.
for the "comeback of the year"!

i can almost hear Shatner reading it.

i assume that in this case the comeback refers to my return to paying for their magazine. I think i'm a better candidate for best sportsmanship.

Amidst all this poking fun at Newsweek, i looked at the past few issues and saw a strange similarity between their May 16 and May 23 issues. See if you can pick it out:

you don't even want to know "why the flashlight"

is Newsweek trying to assassinate Cindy McCain? Maria Shriver? Todd Palin!?!

is Newsweek the blindfold pulling the wool over our eyes?

is Newsweek implying that wives are domestic terrorists?

Was Seal Team 6 comprised of politico wives? (can i even write "Seal Team 6" now that Disney owns it?)

is Newsweek pointing out how the republican's wives hairdos resemble Osama's mustache?

i hope these stories start trending.
i could do this all night.

One quick thing

2011-05-17T14:36:00.000-04:00

that is all.

Adventures in Wedding Planning: Part One

2011-05-16T12:51:00.000-04:00

So, by nature of the nickname ('my m'f'n fiance'), mmf and i have begun planning for our nuptials. But, said nuptuals are still over a year away, so we are still trying to enjoy the process and toss around any wedding ideas that may pop into our heads. Which is a perfect transition into todays blog topic which is:

"Worst Wedding Idea Possible Suggested by members of the Wedding Couple." Somehow, i am fairly certain that in the coming year, the award will be expanded to include a "by a non-Wedding Couple member" and perhaps a "by Total Strangers" category. We can only wait and hope.

But lets not get ahead of ourselves. Yesterday, both mmf and myself got on the board of "worst ideas ever." Mmf even bested herself in just the first day of play.

MMF's Worst idea #1. I suggested (half-jokingly) that we have the tables be signified by various power animals. (this is not the bad part assholes--spirit animals are awesome. period.). Mmf then threw out the additional suggestion that guests could then just choose which table they wanted to sit at (presumably by power animal?). this is a bad idea for a host of reasons. here are the 2 most obvious to me.

1. This is essentially open seating for the wedding. Um . . . trust me, if this were a good idea, nobody would spend hours stressing over seating charts. Ever.

2. On my own wedding day i would be stuck at the "Chickadee" table all alone, or maybe with an ornithologist who went with the only bird available. Not cool.

This was her brunch suggestion. At dinner, she let this one rip:

MMF's Worst idea #2 (and current champion): In a discussion over where we should go to maximize relaxation and pampering for our honeymoon, mmf suggests . . . and i am not making this up . . . TIJUANA! I have been to tijuana. You have a much better shot of getting a great deal on some (perhaps only slightly used) Pampers than you do of actually getting pampered. You have a better chance getting involved with a huge drug deal than you do of getting a huge deal on a hotel. You have a better chance of sipping giardiasis than you do of sipping juice poolside.

I think you get the idea.

My Worst idea #1: On a car ride home recently, Nine Inch Nail's song Closer came on the radio. (Note To Parents: Nine Inch Nails is a band name.) This is a great song. A really great song. It's one of the few songs that i voluntarily tell people my *cough cough* college a capella group *cough cough* sang. Suuuuuuuuure you could argue that some of the lyrics are explicit. I would argue that almost all of them are. "I want to fuck you like an animal. I want to feel you from the inside. I want to feel closer to goddddd" goes the refrain. Sure, its not "good christian music," but the genius of the song is in its delivery. The way they say the words combined with the driving instrumentals, conveys such a primal, human, sexual drive. It is very "get-able."

Annnnyways. Here comes the fun part. I thought it would be hilarious and wonderful to have that be our wedding entrance song . . .

eh . . .

eh . . .

eh . . .

Yah. Mmf didn't think so either. And instead of laughing agreement, i received that "Matt, that idea is not as funny as you think and i can't even risk a courtesy laugh because of my fear that you might run with it." You know the look. The "that was your worst wedding idea yet" look.

Message received.

Barren Forever

2011-05-13T15:17:00.000-04:00

The best part about cancelling my subscription to Newsweek is continuing to get Newsweek. Uninterrupted in fact. Even after the "if you don't respond to this you will have interrupted service" letter. The next day, boom, a Newsweek with the Olsen twins on the cover (touche Newsweek).

In other news. I am beginning to annoy myself with the amount of love i have for this dog of mine. I mean, i am that guy (as opposed to becoming that guy). And here is what i take from this: I'm pretty sure that i can't have kids.

Hear me out. At this point, i'm at least pretty sure that nobody wants to see more pics/vids/more pics that i continue to show my friends . . . ad nausea. This fact hasn't stopped, or even slowed, me from continuing to whip out my phone and brandish pic after pic of puppy excellence.

From what i can tell, kids are like 10x as cute as pups. or at least narcissisticly, they look like their parents, so they seem 10x cuter. Same end result . . . picpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpicpic. And i'm not sure i can do that to all of my loved ones. I'm not sure i can, with the foresight i have now, subject all of you good people to the level of annoyance that is me with a kid (do you think i should mention any of this to my mmf?). I owe the world to save them from myself.

Now, i leave open the possibility that one day i will awake with the primal urge to create a smaller version of myself (ahhhh . . . i mean . . . of
mmf). And if that feeling emerges with a concurrent and similar feeling in my partner, i will have no qualms about trying to put a little parasitic copy of myself to incubate inside my loved one.

But until that point, if that point exists, i will try to hold steady at my current level of annoyingness. Cause there is no way i'll ever be able to stop from showing you shit like this:

Anatomy of a Whirlyball

2011-05-11T13:15:00.000-04:00

While the title may seem dirty, i assure you that whirlyball is fun for the entire non-pregnant family.

This weekend i journeyed to chicago for a friend's bachelor party. whirlyball was the main course on the menu of fun.

What is whirlyball you ask. i am SO glad you asked. Whirlyball combines . . . jai alai, basketball, lacrosse, and mf'n bumper-cars. yup. you heard me right. bumper-cars.

the sport takes place on a hockey rink sized floor with a basketball hoop backboard on either side. The backboards have no basket or netting on them, and instead have a dodge-ball sized hole in the middle of them. you pass and then fling (using those middle school plastic jai alai scoops) a whiffle-ball through the hole to hit a sensor which registers a score. Scoring, i found, to be one of the least fun aspects to shoot (pun) for. Because, you shouldn't forget, you're in bumper cars!!!! And the speed is just fast enough to really be able to put a lick'n on your friends. Especially if they dont see you coming. And so, in teams of 5 or so, you try to get the ball into the hole. No using your hands -- ever.

Oh, ps, there are no steering wheels on the cars. Instead, there is a single crank which loosely guides your car through space (you actually do learn how to control it with some accuracy). To reverse, rotate the crank one time fast, and you go backwards. Crank it again to go forward. this may sound annoying, but it become part of the fun, and allows for one handed steering.

So, you are asking yourself, how could this seemingly perfect sport get even more amazingface?

Another great question. Well, directly next to said Whirlyball rink is a WhirlyBAR!!!! Whirlyball is where you can go to drink and drive. Hell, being a drunk driver can actually make you BETTER at Whirlyball, where collisions and heckling are encouraged (note: i do not condone drinking in driving outside of licensed Whirlyball facilities). I would love to tell you how i got super drunk and ran into everyone, but the truth is i was way too busy playing Whirlyball to have time to stop and drink. I had one beer. I'm telling you, this game is that fun. But, my sobriety did not cut down on the amount of running into other people i did. not at all. I feel i was a bit of a defensive force (aka. i couldn't shoot for shit). I was the Dennis Rodman of Whirlyball (minus Carmen and Madonna). Lock-down defense combined with some pure aggression and crowd pleasing drive-by's and donuts.

this is me during a combo donut / drive-by. cant you *FEEL* the aggression?

By the end, i feel i got good enough to see how this could develop into a more organized team sport. You could see how spreading the court and having people stay back on defense made you a more effective team. I mean, we didn't do any of that . . . but i saw how it could have developed.

Instead i spent my time trying to pick up speed and then use that speed to ram someone looking the other way. Kaboom! If you hit someone hard enough, this white foamy/feathery stuff came flying out of the bumpers, making it look like you knocked the head off their Rock-Em Sock-Em robot. And if s/he was on your team . . . ? it happens. if the hit is good enough, all is forgiven. Guilt free aggression. We all need it.

I, naively, thought that all this fun would come with no consequences at all. Two days later, however, the top of my quads are stones of immobility from being all squished up and counteracting the impact of the cars smashing me. I hobbled through the airport like a mannequin with my puppet-master gliding above me, gingerly tapping my feet against the linoleum as progressed past the terminal gates.

Upon my return to Massachusetts, spouting stories of this epic new sports craze, i simultaneously lamented its distance away from me, geographically (it is obviously already in my heart). And then . . . with one quick search on the google . . . i find: "Welcome to Whirlyball East Coast"!

Did you get the chills too? and better yet . . . its in CT, only an hour from where i live. So it guess the only question to ask now is . . . . Who's in?

Tick-tok and They Don't Stop Biting

2011-05-03T16:10:00.000-04:00

I feel like i must have been an indoors kid. before the dog.

let me start by saying that i didn't know that my heart would sing when i saw my dog's head hanging out my car window.

i didn't know that when i come home after leaving grover in the crate for a few hours, instead of being resentful of my short lived abandonment, he would just want to press his wiggly little body up against mine for as long as possible in celebration of our reunion.

but i also didn't really know about ticks.

I mean, i knew what a tick was of course. I knew they existed. I knew they carried lyme disease (sure fire "you may be Jewish if . . ." you know the disease everything is linked to). And i guess i kinda knew there was a tick season, though, if pressed i probably would just guess it was the summer (its the spring folks [maybe summer too . . . gulp?]).

With a dog . . . ticks are prevalent. And i guess that for people who . . . ah . . . do outside things in warm weather, they are always around. But this is the first time, for me, that they are a solid part of my reality.

Last night, right before going to bed, i found two ticks, back to back, on my dog grover. not cool ticks. super not cool. As i grabbed the first one, sandwiched between a small piece of paper-towel, i found myself with the apple sauce jar full of hydrogen peroxide that we use for tick execution/burial at sea (*osama reference!*) in one hand, and the paper-towel in the other. And i'm trying to scrap the tick off the towel into the jar. but those friggin ticks are built to grip. I hope we use tick-leg technology in our car-tire technology. cause im sitting there for like 30 seconds trying to scrap this impenetrably shelled sesame-seed-sized piece of turd off this fucking piece of paper towel. And then, in a moment of 1am clarity, i just tossed the little piece of towel, tick and all, into the peroxide bath. smart mattiti. cant believe it took that long to make it to that mental outcome.

Suffice it to say, i used the same technique when i discovered tick #2. Buh-bye

And then, as i turned to go back to the couch, i looked down and saw the hugest fucking bug i've seen in awhile (i have seen bigger in Japan). It looked like that huge lava-shooting horned bug from Starship Troopers.


but just a tad bit smaller

But i think it also may have had wings. it was solid like one of those fat ol' bumble bees, but twice as big. It was big enough that i didn't feel a magazine would be a definite one shot kill. I ended up using a car battery sized box of "greenies" doggie treats on the queen bee. (sorry insect lovers) but it died so dead.

and right afterward. i was shaken. i was lying in bed, with phantom tick itches, worried that the insect giant was just the probe of some larger bug master race that was propagating in our vent system. I had flashes of an insect version of Arachnophobia happening in my very own home.

Sorry mmf. i know you had to get up early to teach. but i really needed that bug . . . i mean hug.

"I'mmmmm Mellllllttttttinnnngggggg"

2011-05-02T12:35:00.002-04:00

It's hard to write a post right now without discussing this whole "we killed Osama" thing going on. And yet, i don't really feel like going too too deeply into it. so ill say a few things and move on in my next post.

1. I'm glad he's done with. I felt much more relieved and maybe even a version of happy to hear the news of his apprehension/assassination. As i was living in NYC for 9-11, i saw the hurt and horror up close, and whether i like it or not, Osama is the figurehead of that attack and his killing represented our ability to hold a non-country terrorist accountable for their actions.

2. I was surprised by the whole "dancing in the streets" aspect of his killing. As good as i felt about this "being over" (those are huge quotes), i just can't get to dancing over death. i'm for closure, i'm for accountability, i have just seen and felt nauseous over too many broadcasts of Arab nations dancing in the streets over attacks (9-11, israel, etc) and killings to see it as an option. Celebrating killing is like fighting for peace and fucking for virginity . . . in the end it just doesn't seem to turn out for the best.

3. I saw a headline, "Rumsfeld: Intelligence may have come from Gitmo" (i will NOT link to this video). Here's my reaction to that. Fuck you Rumsfeld. Fuck you so fucking hard you fucking fuck. You can not try to rationalize your torture of prisoners by going on tv and saying it may have helped the administration after yours do what you couldn't. Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. You aren't allowed to try and re-write history anymore. You're out. Your 15 minutes are over and you made your country worse. There is no excuse for torture. Torture without due process is exactly what we are fighting against you tired bag of shit. perhaps we need to water-board you until you can admit this to your own country who you feel so comfortable lying to.

Why You Shouldn't Mess with a Social Psychologist

2011-04-28T17:23:00.000-04:00

We study what people do and why they do them.

Sometimes, however, the "why" is not as important as the what.

For example. A woman at a Milwaukee baseball game listed her actual cell number on a sign asking the Brewer's amazing (and Jewish!!!) left fielder to marry her. Predictable to everyone but this woman, a whole crap-load of people called the number. She shut her phone off. Hilariously, the player, Ryan Braun, heard about this whole ordeal and called the number only to find it going to voicemail. Upon hearing this, the woman turned her phone back on . . . commencing a whole crap-load more phone calls.

The moral of this little story is that when given a phone number in a public forum, people call it. The show How I Met Your Mother employed this knowledge when they had Barney (aka neil patrick harris) stand up in an add at the Superbowl with "his phone number" listed on it. Commence a crap-load of phone calls. This same premise also works when phone numbers are said in movies, which is why they came up with the 555 prefix for fake numbers (e.g. 413-555-6767).

Considering the amount of subtle marketing going on in TV shows now (Jeopardy has sponsored categories -- Top Chef is essentially Top Product placement -- Even sitcoms have pretty gratuitous product placement [come ON 30 rock, you're better than that.]), i have to think that this whole 555 business is a missed opportunity.

People hate cold calls. Oh how people hate them. People hate them enough to go online and enter their phone number on a "do not call list" (how easily could that be used as a way to get people's numbers btw?). I think some people leave themselves off "do not call" lists because they enjoy the release of telling people who cold call them off when they call during dinner (i'm looking at you dad). But, generally speaking, i've never heard anyone say, "this guy called from Comcast last night to ask me if i wanted to expand my existing coverage, and we had the. best. time. ever!" Doesn't happen. So, if people don't like being called . . . and yet . . . when given any public phone number they will call it themselves . . .

You see what i'm getting at here. If you make those 555 numbers into marketing firm numbers, when people call them, thinking they are being all subversive and cool, they end up talking to a person on the other end who answers, "thank you for choosing to take our brief 5 minute phone survey about product X." Or, better yet, "thank you for volunteering to answer these few polling questions about your voting preferences." Pew (polling service) and Gallup should be all over this shit. You could even insert different phone numbers in the tv shows in different viewing regions, so as to categorize the responses geographically. This is gold people. It's like i'm giving away free money.

i think, in a parallel multiverse there is a different version of me who has no inner need to do good and has made a crap-load (see how i'm tying the language together--that's called good writing :) of money off of these horrible life-worsening yet eminently profitable ideas. I bet that version of me wears a lot of fitted suits and enjoys the feel of a tie around his neck. Fuck that me. I hate that guy.

Chubby Bunny of Love

2011-04-24T13:30:00.000-04:00

Easter is a confusing holiday. It seems all filled of mixed metaphors with its resurrection slash eggs slash renewal slash rabbits slash jellybeans. I have to say, from a jew's perspective, this holiday just comes off . . . sloppy.

My earliest experience with Easter, however, was very positive. In elementary school on Easter, random lunch trays were marked with tape on the bottom. and a bunch of them said "egg" which meant that you got a plastic egg filled with jellybeans (um . . . this was in the 80s . . . so i guess it was pre-childhood obesity). I went about my business in the lunch line. Got my fluff samich, per usual, and hunkered down at the long white fold-down tables that you only see in school cafeterias and food kitchens. Munching away, the announcement about the tray prizes was made and immediately 100 kids flipped their trays upside down. i can only imagine that a good amount of food took to the air, but, being as i was about 8 years old, details like you're making a mess didn't come close to registering in my candy driven mind.

On the underside of my tray i found a piece of tape, but i did not see the word 'egg'. I knew it wasn't "egg" because i knew what that word looked like. 3 letters long. only 2 letters involved. These are the type of words that elementary schoolers thrive at. we are short uncomplicated word learning monsters. And that word on my tray had 6 letters. and it was not "eggegg" either.

I think i brought the tray up to a teacher. And the teachers eyes lit up. It turned out that one tray each lunch period . . . one lucky tray . . . said basket on it. And that lucky kid got a huge wicker basket full of marshmallow bunnies and chocolate eggs. I remember it being a shit-ton of candy. The school must have been glad it went to a kid as scrawny as me (80% bone). Giving that much candy to a chubby kid would not have looked good for anyone.

That said, one of the five jewish kids in a almost completely christian school getting the big Easter day surprise was not an irony lost on my peers. Let's just say i was advised to put the basket in my cubby and enjoy it at home. And, the fact that an ADHD kid (animal) like me agreed with this recommendation tells me that this probably would have been a great inroad to teaching elementary schoolers about the Holocaust. (too far?)
____________________

In any event, later in life Easter once again became memorable as the first morning I ever woke up with mmf next to me. While still keeping it very PG, mmf and i had an epic date which included dinner at an insanely loud restaurant (her choice), candle-pin bowling (my choice), then drinking 28oz of beer from huge Styrofoam cups while watching the end of the sox game (mutual choice), then T-ing back toward my place to go to another bar and meet my then roommate who attempted to embarrass me unsuccessfully. and then. after a bit of encouragement. back to our apartment. We remember the date, of course, because the next morning everyone in the house + sig. others went out to a big Easter brunch together.

Resurrection indeed.

Sleeping Bubonically

2011-04-23T14:30:00.001-04:00

I've been sick. ill. and not beastie boys ill. more gizmo wet after midnight ill.

Personally, i try my best to take an "airplane travel" approach to illness. Which is to say, i try to sleep my way through it. Because when you're asleep, it's magical.

For instance. I can get on a plane in hartford, take a 'relaxation aid' in the form of a mild anti-anxiety med, and after the most pleasant of naps, i magically arrive in California. i have no idea how this happened because i was asleep. My best guess is that a couple of my guardian angels swooped down and fairy'ed me there (super pun).

When the snot monster comes, i try the same approach. Sleep it off. Sleep through it. Sleep hard. This is a particularly helpful strategy for me because my illnesses are usually the result of totally overworking my body and mind until they meltdown. In this current case, my tentative grip on health was additionally foiled by mmf getting the plague (the 10 day version of the 3 day cold im dealing with). Because she loves me and learned at an early age the importance of sharing, she gave me a weakened version of her black death.

During the past 48 hours of illness, i slept through 28 hours of it. My body just couldn't seem to stay awake. And who am i not to go with the flow. Suffice it to say, these were very happy days for our puppy grover. Essentially this meant he had free access to sleeping on the bed for almost a week (mmf's illness plus mine). He loves this. And as i am writing this i'm beginning to worry that maybe my puppy (much like his mother) is an evil genius. Secretly infecting his parents with non-lethal totally debilitating diseases so as to lay them up and thereby giving him access to the almighty human-person bed.


bliss squared

It all makes sense now. I feel like the tv detective right before the end of the show where my mind's eye is watching all the puzzle pieces fall into place.

oh no . . . i'm at the coffee shop typing this . . . i've left mmf alone at home with the pup. what if this is the moment he's been waiting for . . . to put into motion the final phase of his plan . . . .

*running home to see if ill they'll ever be a space for me on the human-person bed ever again*

don't count on it.

Beautiful Bubble-Gum Babies, Ready to Party

2011-04-13T00:47:00.000-04:00

Undergrads are unavoidable.

And i don't mean the one's i work with. The one's i work with are smart and driven and funny and great. I'm talking more about the undergrads i interact with in dining commons, around the building, etc. I don't know these students, we are but two ships ion the college sea at night.

But i smell them. And, i know you think i'm going to talk about BO and grossness and whatever. But no.

It's the ladies this time. For whatever reason it dawned on me today. The women at this school smell like bubble gum. And not just "bubble gum" scent, but also smells that i associate with bubble gum flavors. Peach Punch, Green Apple-berry. Shit like that. And i don't get it. Maybe this is one of those "im getting old" things, but i don't don't see the allure of smelling like Hubba-Bubba. I can't see myself being like, "this chicks only kinda fly. hairs all messed up, but she's funny. i'm torn . . . but she smells like Grape Ape Jungle Chew, so i'm gonna go for it."

Maybe the thinking is that the guy (let me get hetero-normative here for a minute) will smell the bubble gum and it will remind them of baseball. Thinking of baseball will make them want to "play ball" (so many sex/baseball metaphors to choose from).

The only time i ever remember a girl smelling like sugar coated fruit is from my limited exposure to strippers. You can understand how smelling like strawberries and cream can be an asset in the stripping business. I mean, you want your customers to want to devour you (right?). But, for the college population at large, is this what our culture has trickled down too. Are Bubble-Yum scents for girls the next leggings with Ughs (i'm assuming that's how those are spelled).

I thought one of the reasons girls went to college was to avoid becoming a stripper?

(*editors note: i hold no strong moral or ethical qualms with stripping other than i don't think i would enjoy doing it myself and that it probably propagates bad societal gender politics. but nothings perfect.

Let My People Grow

2011-04-12T01:09:00.000-04:00

Ok. So first. TITLE PUN! Not only will this entry relate to plants but Passover is just around the corner. I'm proud of this one. You can tell.

So second. I belong to a non-exclusive club. That club includes anyone who starts any blog/conversation/aside with a version of this statement, "if it is technically alive, doesn't have a mouth, and is in my house -- it will be dead in a matter of months. Months is generous. Months is adult-Matt with plants. college-Matt could desiccate a flower faster than a magnifying glass on ant.

The only plants that have ever survived my wrath, or really that have any chance at all, are cacti and bamboo. Let me be clear. I have killed both cacti and bamboo. But they have also survived the longest. Currently i have a set of three sprigs (wtf's a sprig) of bamboo up against the window. This would be all well and good and zen and whatnot, if not for the fact that these 3 sprigs are the survivors of two separate batches of bamboo. the smaller batch, probably 6 sprigs, i took for my own, and killed. Just to give you an idea of how hard it is to kill bamboo. All bamboo need is to be in some level of water. The other batch of bamboo was in a pho-indian ceramic elephant. There was a ton of it. 40 sprigs. When my batch was dead, every single sprig that had been left, mostly neglected, on top of the fridge were alive. By the time I got around to swapping out the dead sprigs i was *ahem* nurturing, there were only 4 survivors. These 3 sprigs we currently have are the ones that survived the move to the new house. It's like Darwin's evolution, but much much faster.

I've also killed cacti. I've killed plants designed to survive to worst possible environments. The sahara aint got shit on me. The lone cacti survivors are two "Christmas" cacti. Named because they are supposed to bloom in December. One of mine blooms around Thanksgiving. The other just bloomed. I think he was thrown off by our move. I hear changing home environments can be very stressful on your plants.

No i didn't. That's stupid. I hope you didn't believe that not even for a moment. That said, if you did believe it, let me know so i can start up some plant therapy/massage studios:

I mean, cause, don't you want your plants to feel like they're a part of the family too.

I mean, cause, don't you love your plants enough to give them the best.

I mean, cause, 90% of planned parenthood goes to abortions.

They're all lies, but only one was said on the floor of Congress.

Thankfully, i'm attracted to nurturers. And i'm lucky to live in an area where the moniker "Farmer" is synonymous with Mrs. or Mr. or Dr. etc etc etc. It must feel nice to have a moniker that you identify so strongly with. One of my earth nurturing Farmer friends recently started his own CSA from scratch with help from a federal grant. he started a farm. a farm! I seriously can't even figure out how to affix my coat-rack on the wall without creating an avalanche of plaster, and he is pulling food from the earth like a midwife 9-months after 9-11. He got shares out the first season. He even is kind enough to bring us some of his fresh veggies when he visits. Usually i am very picky about food that looks too earthy. All covered in soil and whatnot. But I trust Farmer Steve. Partially because of the moniker. Partially because even though i eat my vegetables begrudgingly . . . his always taste so good.

Except the asparagus. Asparagus makes me gag.

New Slang

2011-04-07T18:06:00.000-04:00

Time for a mini-risk. Today is a new poetry day. and by that i mean not only is it time for a poem of mine, but its one i've written recently. or rather, it is the one i have written recently. i do hope you like it.

Losing My Tears

i used to cry all the time.

Back when every question was a path yet to be discovered

and all of my effects had definable causes.

Don't get me wrong,

i still ball.

But not all the time.

Nowadays the tears have to make it through my knowledge, my ability, my perspective, my "better judgment".

My adulthood.

And once it manages past all the superficial reasoning i set out for keeping it together,

i can cry like a withering stem.

Because it's always the child inside us doin' the cryin'.

Always.

And that's a good thing.

Because that kid has no excuses to give for the mistreatment, the anger, the unfairness, the helplessness.

of adulthood.

and while i love my inner child for the laughter,

i need him for the tears.

Multiple Choice

2011-04-04T23:45:00.000-04:00

Guess which of these things happened to me today.

A) Testing to see how clogged my nostril was, i blew a short burst of air threw to check the territory. In response, a quarter size glob of gummy clear snot bee-bee gunned out of my nose and onto the shoulder of my shirt.

B) Relaxing on the couch with my puppy, i reached to gather him in, when i felt a medium length burst of "soft air" flow gently by across my palm. puppy fart.

C) While absentmindedly walking from the post-swim shower to my locker, i happened to stem into what i can only term as a ball of multiple people's human hair.

D) A & B

E) B & C

F) All of the above

are you sure you're ready to know.

positive?

it's D! but aren't you glad you got to picture that hairball!!!

sorry. i had a bad day.

Barely Legal

2011-04-01T00:47:00.000-04:00

Last week i went out to dinner with a 30 yr old male friend (aka. total bromance) and, after I ordered a beer, the waitress asked me for ID.

I thought two things simultaneously.

1. I'm old enough to take that as a huge compliment.

and at the same time . . .

2. I'm old enough to take that as a huge compliment.

it seems like only yesterday that Ferris was reminding my to stop and smell the roses.

The Other Drunk Woman I Met on Vacation

2011-03-31T12:21:00.000-04:00

It's time. You've waited long enough in anticipation. Here comes the payoff.

I should mention, by means of comparison that, while the 1st girl i met was most certainly drunk off her rocker, the woman (she was significantly older than the last girl) that i am about to speak of, i only hope was really drunk. I assume she was. But, unlike drunkasaurus rex from Woody's, this woman's eyes weren't rolling around her head like a Muppets and she seemed capable of forming words without adding extra h's and "shhh" sounds to everything. Drunk, but not drunkasaurus rex. Maybe a drunk-a-raptor. Or some smaller form of meat eater (dirty pun!).

here goes.

On the island, there is a little mini casino. well, not a casino per say, but rather a mirror encrusted bar with electronic slots, blackjack, and roulette. Apparently the law works in such a way that as long as there are no dealers or actual cards, aka. everything is electronic, you can do pretty much whatever. This system works for everyone. People bet real money and get real money in return. And in the end, that's what's most important in this situation.

I, not being immune to the gambling impulse, but being saddened by slot machines as a whole, decided to play some electronic blackjack. In terms of my personal run at the "tables," it went like this-- i was up, then i lost a little, i was way up, then i lost a bunch. In the end i made about 20 bucks. And i had fun. good deal.

But this story involves what happened while i was gambling. Me and two other older men, were sitting at the far blackjack machine which is shaped like a half circle, us along the curved edge, with our backs facing the back row of slot machines along the back wall.

there was a lively and fun mood at the table, with the guy to my right betting big and winning big. Hundreds. All while simultaneously verbally abusing his wife who was kinda roaming around the place drunkinly getting involved in this or that. I filed it all under "not my problem" and moved on. The man to my left was older still, maybe 70, southern, and into college basketball. The two men traded harmless insults regarding each others college sports conference and we we're well on our way.

As we were on a roll, we hear a woman's voice behind us. "How do I get there."

There are moments in life, when you just find clarity. Without turning around, i swear to you all, i knew exactly what was happening and how it was going to play out. I'm not sure why. I'm not saying i have powers or im psychic (psychotic?) or anything. Just that, in this particular situation, the moments that were about to occur fell smoothly into place in my mind ahead of time.

I turned. "That's a mirror," i said.

"Excuse me?" she replied. The tone was a mixture of confusion, potentially feeling insulted, and then back to confusion.

Me again. "Where are you trying to get?"

Her: "There." She points toward the back wall, toward the row of slots that line that wall, with the wall itself being a large mirror, giving the effect that the room is twice as large as it actually it. Remember, i said, the effect.

Seeing her, standing there, pointing at a mirror (which DID reflect her btw), desperately trying to find her way into the "back of the casino" to get to the slots that look almost identical to the ones shes at, only backward -- did not move me.

"That," i repeated, this time giving her supposed destination a cursory glance, "is a mirror."

Her reaction this time was almost identical, except this time it was just a look, no words. And it ended with the recognition that she was trying to find a way into a friggin mirror.

I turned back to the table.

The funniest part, however, is that as i turned back, the two men at my sides finally turned their attention (and chairs) toward the woman i was having this 'conversation' with. They had been half-listening without actually investing any energy to help. But my reply had peeked their curiosity.

And i swear you could watch their faces slowly comprehending what had just transpired. Looking at her, looking at the back wall mirror, back to her, then to me, then back to her. And then -- booming laughter. From both of them. the best part was watching these guys piece together the hilariousness that had just transpired on a simultaneous delay, and then just loosing it as they made their way to the punchline.

If only Alice had been there. Perhaps she could have led the drunk lady raptor through the looking glass . . . . and far far away from reproduction.

A Letter from Japan

2011-03-21T22:47:00.003-04:00

I really thought that today was the day when i would tell you all about the 2nd horribly dumb woman i met on vacation. Alas, it is really funny, and it will be coming directly. But not today.

Today, I'm gonna have to talk about Japan. In a way i've been in denial. Not real denial, mind you, but the type of denial you get into when a country you love is amidst a situation that is, at least potentially, worse than one can imagine.

As some of you know, i spent a little over a year teaching elementary and middle school English in Japan. Specifically in Gunma-ken prefecture, which spans northwest from Tokyo (and therefore southwest from the most significant impact of the quake and wave. I was part of the JET (Japanese Exchange and Teaching) program which contracts thousands of foreigners each year to go to Japan to help the country learn native English. It is an impressive program. Lately, it has been in the news because one of the 24 year old teachers from the program was the first American officially killed by this disaster. Keep in mind, however, that something like 15,000 are missing. I'll say that again 15,000 are missing.

There was a 60 min. segment on the earthquake/tsunami in Japan yesterday. The two most powerful excerpts. The reporter was speaking with another JET teacher from Miyagi -- the prefecture which was hit most directly. He told the story of rushing the elementary students to the gym to escape the earthquake, then getting conflicting info as to whether or not they should run back to the school when the tsunami alert went off.

There wasn't enough time. They all huddled in the gym as the water rushed in . . . violently. The teacher described the water levels rising up to the basketball hoop as people were forced out of the building by the rushing water. Elementary students were trapped by the water, and he recalled throwing/pushing as many students as possible over the upper balcony railing. He said about 100 survived in that gym, on that upper balcony, in the dark, water all around, for 6 terrifying hours.

During the segment, they went back to that gym. the reporter showed how about 85 bodies were laid wrapped on the gym floor. "the truth about the situation," he said, "is that there are not enough living, to take care of the dead."

This is where i tell you the extent of my fear. My fear is that any of these mornings, we will wake up and half of Japan will be gone. With 4 nuclear reactors overheating in close proximity, the meltdown of one could be catastrophic, especially if the destruction of one reactor dominoes into the overheating of the others. Which brings me to the second powerful excerpt from the 60 min piece. They spoke with a woman who is high up the American nuclear braintrust, and was already in Japan on related issues when this all started. She emphasized how grave the situation was. The reporter asked her how bad it could be, if the reactors chain reacted. Her face visibly changed. She couldn't say it. Essentially, you knew she could answer this question, but it seemed the reality of the answer was too scary and horrid to speak of out loud. She equivocated. Something along the lines of "beyond horrible and unimaginable." But her face said that she had imagined it. Her face said it all.

My fear is not only for the radiation. Yes, at the moment, that is the most virulent strain of potentially still tragic news. But there was also the earthquake. The tsunami. The earthquake shook the entire region -- hard. The tidal wave destroyed miles and miles of villages, rice fields, and lives. In a country that, no matter how far out in the country you were, always impressed me with its orderliness. Things are organized. Trains run on time. And now, the pictures all come back katrina-like.

It makes me immensely sad. What's striking, is that in all the pictures, the videos, you don't see people. Like frozen death washing in to find it's victims. Thousands died. And from the looks of the terrain, the true death toll won't be known for a good long while.

But even this isn't the extent of the problem. As far as Gunma-ken, where i lived, radiation is already showing up in the crops. Not only the rice crops of Miyagi, but the spinach of Gunma. And part of the sustainability of Japan comes from their ability to manufacture so much of their own food, so after the radiation, after the earthquake destruction, after the tsunami damage, and after the homelessness and power outages-- right around the time people are hoping things are back to normal -- Japan will have to deal with the stigma and fear surrounding their own food supply. Already vegetables marked as coming from certain regions of the country are being left in the bins.

This is a disaster. A still unfolding disaster. There have been MANY MANY MANY aftershocks above 5 on the Richter scale. They continue to scare the people and keep them on perpetual edge. And what i want to get across here is the enormity. Not only of the destruction, but the destruction in comparison to the size of the country itself. One of my good Japanese friends, Ayako Ono, who lives in a suburb of Tokyo recently sent out an email to her international friends describing both her experience and the mood in the city. Remember that Tokyo wasn't close (relatively) to the earthquake epicenter when reading her accounts. It was scary just to read, let alone imagine my friend living through. In terms of the grammar, i have edited the English some, but not much (my friend's English is superb). If you are a stickler for grammar, try writing in Japanese, and then chill out:

Dear Friends all over the world
Hello from Japan where we are under an emergency situation as you know!
I am sorry to send this at once to everybody. But I think it is easier to tell all of you what my situation is and how I have been.
Thank you very much again for your warm messages and worrying about me and Japan!
The earthquake on 3/11 was the biggest one in Japanese modern history.
And sadly over 8000 people died until today. And still 15,000 people missing.
I was at the office on 16th floor that time. (in Tokyo) It was the worst scary experience I have ever had! The earthquake was very long, I guess more than 3mins!
It was totally unusual.
And very difficult to run down the emergency steps to get out! Because there was so much shaking! I had to hold the railing bar to run down!!
And the wall came off because ofthe earthquake's power while I was running down. So scary. I thought the buiding will crash!

(editors note: this is completely fucking terrifying to me)
While we were out side of building, it was still shaking too much! It is very rare to feel earthquake usually when you are outside.
But it was very strong and shaking over and over.
Fortunatelly nobody got hurt or no fire from my office building.
And I could go home next day because Trains stop.

And you watched what Tsunami did to us...
I still feel sick now when I watch the images on TV. And still feel shaking sometimes even if it doesnts shake now.
This feeling happens many people now here... because of stress.
But I am fine somehow. Thank you.
And my family, and friends are fine. Some friends are under the inconvenient situation though. i.e. no gas, no water, no electricity...
But from these incidents, to be alive is very thankful. I felt " I need to survive!!" when the earthquake came.
Well, as seen on TV, our Atomic plants are still under emergency situtaion.
So we have to save electricity. Maybe I trust too much my country's technology. Who said Atomic power is clean and safe before I was born!? Because over 1 week later, this crisis is still not solved, although it sounds going better. But 4 main plants are in danger. And now we have to feel scared of radioactivity. It is leaking little by little.
Foods from near plants, can we eat it in the future? Not sure. :(
Especially Miyagi prefecture, which had the big Tsunami shock, is famous about rice field...
We are in very negative situation, but some "miracles" happen also. So not only bad things.
Limited blackout around Tokyo region, it started last week.
It is a bit inconvenient.
But we can save power more and we notice how much we use electricity too much usually!!! I know brightness is important for our life though.
But my home area, I don't know why, the blackout didn't come. And everything goes on as usual, thanks.
If you go to supermarket, you cannot buy some "daily stuff" now. And Gasoline for cars, you can get only a few litters because of the shortage.
But don't need to use it around here. You can walk or use bicycle!
I am a bit afraid of radioactivity in the air... but hopefully it won't cause bad things for us immidiately.
I guess some foreingn countries evacuating is... the right thing. But it is for the worst case.
And I guess we are not still in the worst case. Of course you don't know when it turns "the worst".
Anyway, air is fresh, feeling Spring. Getting warmer and wamer. (Northern Japan, it is still too cold though)

I really don't want to go out in much in the radioactive spreading air.
But I have to live here. And I cannot run away.
So I HOPE no more big earthquakes will come. Small earthquakes are still coming every day, even around Tokyo, from the North!
And we will be able to recover somehow. But... I think it will take for a looooooooong time. Nobody knows when.
Because some towns were swept away. And never have i seen such a mess! How can we tidy up...
Anyway, our government is not good as usual. And our economy will be back to bad again.
But Japanese, we try to be stronger.
And maybe many of you know, we have a spirit to support each other when someone is in hard times.
And when you are in hard times, we have to support each other naturally.
We can get through somehow!
So I cannot invite you here for a while, but I would love all of you to show again how my country is good place as your place. :) (editors note: it really is!!!! the food is BETTER than here!) So I really appreciate your warm message and being friends!
I feel so happy when I received many messages from you all over the world.
So please keep your eyes on my contry. And I am very fine because I have a space in my heart to take care of footie (*soccer) news as usual! Don't worry too much until you hear another big earthquake hit Tokyo directly.
Media likes to make "too much drama". (What do u think, friends works for the media! :P )
Again, Thank you very much and hope you are fine!
Speak to you soon!
With love,
Ayako
P.S. Shaking twice while I am writing this!!! Ugh (yes--they had two earthquakes while she wrote this letter!)

I will conclude by emphasizing that this is the terrifying story of a person nowhere near the brunt of the destruction, and still the narrative reminds me of 9-11 (the terror of the building potentially falling--obviously not terrorism). I cannot watch these imagines of such a beautiful country that i love being swept away and destroyed without crying. Ayako is right about the spirit of the Japanese people, however. They will band together and get through this. Why don't we band together with them and then we will speak of connected spirit of the human people.

To Be Read, and Reread, Upon my Untimely Demise

The Hard Cap: Part I

She Told Me So

How I Went Deaf But Not Really

How Facebook has changed the chose your own adventure story

Videochat Killed the Speakerphone Call

it's about having an inner light, and i got me some

Back in the Saddle

Grover's Roar

Is thanksgiving. Is not thanksgiving.

Learning to Spell P. h. D.

How Going to Wesleyan Ruined My Life

Bullet Point (to the brain) Tuesday

More or Less Teaching

The Dirge of Halloween 33 -- Part 1

Not a bachelorette, but not yet a wifey

Either the worlds gone mad, or i am.

$$$ for Nuthin but your PhD's for Fee

The Sneak Strikes Again

Moments: It's NOT just how you ask for breath fresheners

Un-Friend Request

If a Picture is 1000 words, this post is over 21,000 words long.

What a Difference a Half a Decade Makes

These are the Creepers in your Neighborhood

I Ordered a Double Burrrrgerrrrrrr

Some Like It Wet

So Doggone Smart

Mattiti vs. the Vacation Varmints

Letters From Japan: Part Next

More White People Problems

Jack Hanna Day Part II

I'm too Sexy for My Shell

Jack Hanna Day Part 1

I Saw the Sign

2 Points of Clarification for All My ReReaders

Getting Here Part II

You Can't Get There From Here

They've Come to Take Me Away, HA HA, They've Come to Take Me Away

Abandonment issues & the 4th of July

Sorry. but you won't be.

'Brady Bunch' mom got crabs in affair with NY mayor : Politician sent Florence Henderson flowers to apologize

Greatest Comment Ever: Could anyone tell me how to do?

The Second Little Piggy

Human Roadkill

YOU are the weakest wedding link . . . GOODBYE

Point. Counter Point.

The Road Less Able to be Travelled

14 Years Bad Luck

I Just Cant Quit You Newsweek

One quick thing

Adventures in Wedding Planning: Part One

Barren Forever

Anatomy of a Whirlyball

Tick-tok and They Don't Stop Biting

"I'mmmmm Mellllllttttttinnnngggggg"

Why You Shouldn't Mess with a Social Psychologist

Chubby Bunny of Love

Sleeping Bubonically

Beautiful Bubble-Gum Babies, Ready to Party

Let My People Grow

New Slang

Multiple Choice

Barely Legal

The Other Drunk Woman I Met on Vacation

A Letter from Japan