Letters from the small hand to the large world....

A weighty matter...

2012-02-03T17:00:00.001-06:00

I wouldn’t say I’ve struggled with my weight all through my 20’s and 30’s. I’ve never been the yo-yo dieting sort. I’ve seen what extreme dieting can do to a person… watching someone you care about struggle with an eating disorder… well, it makes you not want to count calories. And it was a pretty traumatic funeral to go to. I just let myself get really overweight… and tried not to worry about it. There was no struggle.

Then right after 9-11… I realized I was creeping up into the "holy crap" territory of being overweight. America was attacked… and because the world seemed to be ending… an extra helping of mac and cheese really didn’t seem to matter much. I ate myself right up to the top of the Lane Bryant size chart… and then had a moment of “whoa” when I was starting to have a hard time finding pants that fit. So…

In 2002… I started Weight Watchers. I lost around 80 pounds total over the course of a year… bringing my two-hundred and mumble-mumble pound body down to a pretty manageable 170-ish. Maybe not the ideal for my weight/height… but I was happy and comfortable at that weight. Had more energy. Life became pretty good…I could shop for clothes wherever I wanted…wear heels without killing my knees…all I had to do was join the cult of counting points. Because that’s what Weight Watchers takes… a near religious commitment to accounting for every bit of food you put into your mouth. (Back then… the plan was “Winning Points” and you’d bank extra points for things you wanted to splurge on later in the week. Today’s plan is different. YMMV.) It worked. And because I’d lost enough weight for exercise to become downright enjoyable… hiking, bicycling….walking the dog… I kept the weight off until my brain started going south in 2007.

Between 2007 and 2008… 30lbs crept back on. Depression is a meanie… and I get the depression where I want to eat… not where I’m too depressed to eat. When it started getting worse… I switched to Effexor… and man… I could have eaten sugar right out of the bag with a tablespoon. 30lbs became 40… and kept going up. I started getting cravings to binge on carbs that I’d never had before. (Not to mention all of the other god-awful side effects I had on Effexor.) But the depression was lifted… and that seemed worth the expanding waistline. I mean… I could always lose weight… but repairing my remaining friendships and marriage… and family relationships damaged by several years on the “I hate life” roller-coaster… seemed worth an expanded waistline and new pants. And considering the mortality rate for depression is about as dangerous as obesity… I again tried to just ignore my weight and get on with life the best I could.

And now… with depression being pretty well managed by a VERY low dose of a more mundane antidepressant… and the careful management of my thyroid problems… I’m left in size 20 pants… wondering how I’m going to get back down to that weight I was happy in…. without rejoining the cult of Weight Watchers. It worked… but I hated being a food accountant. MY LIFE REVOLVED AROUND FOOD. What I could eat … where I could eat it… how much. What I was going to eat next. I talked… about food. Dieting. And other people… well-meaning people… would complement me on how good I looked. And what would we talk about? Food. I do about a zillion other things besides eat… from having a smart and beautiful dog… to crochet… quilling… sewing… reading… listening to and playing music. Etc. But my life was about FOOD on Weight Watchers… and the “Quest for Eating More for Less.”

That’s the problem with dieting… you put the thing you shouldn’t be thinking about… front and center in your life. Problem number two… unless you’re ALWAYS on a diet… dieting doesn’t work. We have a zillion years of evolution telling us to hold on tooth and nail to every calorie we take in. Add my thyroid problem already making it very difficult to lose weight… and I’m never going to model for Victoria’s Secret. Maybe Victoria’s middle-aged older sister Eunice’s Secret. But after I’d lost the weight… I did manage to keep it off for quite a while without much effort. Being thinner made activity easier. Feeling better makes you want food that… well… makes you feel better. Not “comfort food” but stuff like vegetables. I was lucky that walking and exercise had become a bigger part of my routine… because I know the first thing to go out the window was counting points…

So I’ve been reading up on other diet ideas while avoiding the fad diets. The Beck Diet Solution is more of a behavioral solution. I’ve tried it… and since it’s based on a therapy model… it seems like something that would work better if a therapist or coach facilitated it. It works… but only for people who are also big fans of therapy. I also read all of Dr. Walther Willett’s books… the “Eat More, Weigh Less” philosophy and really do believe in what he says about whole foods… and eating to live… and food that is good for you tends to be low calorie… so we should eat more of it.

But again… hard to follow what’s basically a dietician’s guidelines when I’m working to 7pm and come home hungry enough to eat my dog. What the hell… don’t people who eat healthy have LIVES? Sometimes… you just have to grab a burger because it’s the only food around for miles… and the alternative to eating is getting a hunger migraine. (Skip a few meals… and yeah… they’re fun.)

So… as a counterpoint…I’ve been reading Linda Bacon’s “Health at Every Size” and have to say that a lot of what she says is intriguing… but some of it smacks of the Fat Acceptance Movement. I am never going to accept that weighing nearly 300lbs at 5’ 7” is healthy. Weighing more than that… is not a glandular problem. It’s a distinct lack of physical activity plus some sort of compulsive overeating that really should be addressed medically. People who are overweight should not be discriminated against. But neither should they expect to go to their doctor and not have their weight discussed… OR expect the “average sized” world to cater to their size. I mean… from amusement park rides to airline seating… there is ONE SIZE FITS MOST. And if you weigh 450+ lbs… accepting that there are going to be a few things you won’t be able to do comfortably at that weight is going to be a lot like a blind person having to accept that they’ll never get a driver’s license… or a little person realizing that they’re not going to make the physical requirements for the military. Your dreams of skydiving… are probably DOA.

And there are a lot of things that cause people to be really, really heavy…besides just overeating and a sedentary lifestyle…hormones, economics, mental health, genetics, education….and gender. Anyone who looks at someone who is obese and thinks that they just LOVE cookies and sit on the couch and eat them all day… well…I’d rather be fat than stupid. Because that kind of thinking is stupid.

I’ll use myself as an example. I guess I’m what I’ll call “functionally obese.” My BMI is right around 40. Bu blood pressure and blood sugar are all normal. My cholesterol is normal. I can still exercise without significant problems. But I sit on my ass almost all day… and try as I might… I can’t seem to break out of it. Put me on vacation… and I’ll walk every day. Go hiking. Bicycle. But after a day of work the last thing I really want to do is run on a treadmill. I’d rather swallow live scorpions than go to an aerobics class. I’ll try to walk at lunch… and eat healthy… but I have hormonal swings… get food cravings… and I’ve always been an evening eater. I’m hungry at night. Not before bedtime… but I like large dinners. And after an hour commute home… I don’t want to spend a lot of time cooking. I come home HUNGRY. My husband does most of the cooking… and most of the time for dinner I’ll out eat him because by the time I get home I’m starving. Physically, mentally… sometimes emotionally. And the physical hunger is the easiest to feed. I’ll start scarfing down anything that isn’t nailed to the table. Then I’ll eat dinner. Then if I’m not comatose, I’ll start poking around for other things to eat to fill in the cracks around dinner. Candy. *munch* Cookies. *munch* Dove Bars *munch* Is it eating disorder bad? No. Is it a really terrible habit? Yes.

A few months ago… I watched the documentary “Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead.” It’s basically about juice fasting… and the body’s need for micro-nutrients… and how we don’t get them in the standard Western diet. Something about this documentary is sticking with me… something besides watching the guy in the movie go from looking like fat middle-aged Australian dude to a rather svelte copy that Peter Walsh guy who comes in and helps you clean out your garage. He cleaned off 30 lbs.… but also developed a love of running and other kinds of exercise along the way that I don’t know that I’d ever get into.

I like to walk my dog. I like to bicycle OUTDOORS… and not on a stationary bike. I also enjoy swimming and reading. Reading is about the only reason I don’t weigh a zillion pounds… because I’ll download a good book to my Kindle and then will forget I’m on the elliptical machine in the wellness center where I work…until my knees start to smolder or someone taps me on the shoulder and tells me it’s time to go home. It doesn’t work the same way with TV… for some reason… watching TV turns my body off… whereas I can read and do almost any physical activity… you know… besides riding a bicycle and driving a car. If I can hold a book steady… I can read and exercise… and forget I’m exercising.

Anyway… the other part of the juice fast documentary that got me was just how… well… healthy the people looked afterward. Not model skinny… or like they’d just been on months of Jenny Craig… but… healthy. And by drinking juice. I LIKE juice… so the idea has been sticking in the back of my mind that maybe I need to go on a juice diet.

And then I smell my coffee… and that Idea goes straight into the trashbin.

Yes Virginia… there is a double-standard clause.

2012-01-31T18:00:00.006-06:00

A few weeks back I went in for a vaginal ultrasound. I know… complete TMI… sorry… but I promise I have a point. I showed up for my appointment… hoped I’d remembered to shave BOTH legs… and after waiting for 45 minutes because the radiology lab had needed the ultrasound room for an emergency… I put on the stunning cloth gown and let a perfect stranger squirt warm gel up my hoo-ha and probe me with a camera shaped like a ding-a-ling for ten minutes.

It was… well… lemme tell ya. I DON’T have a medical fetish. And my tech was a woman… pretty… mid-20’s… blonde… wearing pink scrubs dotted with teddy bears. Being rather heterosexual… I’m NOT attracted to women in lab coats… no matter how nice they are. Nor do I have a thing for pink and teddy bears. So the whole experience was rather… um… awkward. At times… slightly uncomfortable… because there is nothing “exciting” about getting probed down there when it’s not in a sexual contest. (At least for me. YMMV.) But yet it’s not the same speculum, swab, scrape, and “OHMYGODDON’TPUSHTHERETHAT’SMYGONADNOTAFRICKENSTRESSBALL” that is your standard pap smear and well-woman exam.

A vaginal ultrasound… well… it’s bizarre to say the least… especially when you’re getting it for some other reason than to see your little tadpole. I imagine the excitement over seeing one’s soon to be spawn overrides the weirdness of being masturbated by a stranger with a camera.

(FYI. I have a benign cyst on one ovary that was screwing around with my cycle. No worries folks.)

And with that in the back of my head… I heard this while listening to NPR this morning…

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/30/mandatory-ultrasound-bill-virginia-anti-abortion_n_1242627.html

If you don’t wanna click… here’s a short quote that just about sums it all up…

To protest a bill that would require women to undergo an ultrasound before having an abortion, Virginia State Sen. Janet Howell (D-Fairfax) on Monday attached an amendment that would require men to have a rectal exam and a cardiac stress test before obtaining a prescription for erectile dysfunction medication.

"We need some gender equity here," she told HuffPost. "The Virginia senate is about to pass a bill that will require a woman to have totally unnecessary medical procedure at their cost and inconvenience. If we're going to do that to women, why not do that to men?"

OK. I’ve been hearing about the debate going on in Virginia and Texas over the “Show me the fetus” laws… but I had no idea that a) It was going to be at the woman’s expense as part of the abortion procedure. b) They wanted a VAGINAL ultrasound.

Without getting any more graphic… let me explain this to men...

Imagine going to your doctor for a “wand check” and having to maintain a stiffy for 10 minutes while someone "examined" it with a “sleeve” that subtly mimics its intended non-excretory usage… INCLUDING the liberal application of warm lubricant… but is being done by some big hairy guy named Bruce wearing a lab coat who is telling you to hold still and relax. (Unless you’re gay or bi and into bears… then see the description of my radiology tech above.) And the price of this awkwardness... around $600.00.

How excited would you be about it… REGARDLESS of why you were getting the examination?

It’s legislative punishment. Pure and simple. But it’s not punishment for an actual transgression. Because getting pregnant and not wanting to keep your baby… OR to go through the physical trauma and health risk of pregnancy and childbirth for the sole reason of providing your offspring to someone else to raise… IS NOT A CRIME. I have a right to make decisions for things that happen within my body. And as a woman… I also have a right to be able to boink another consenting adult without signing up for 18 years of childcare.

Men lie about their vasectomies. Condoms break. Diaphragms move. Cervical caps slip. IUDs fail. Pills get forgotten. Or God forbid you read the Republican Guide to Sex Education and now believe one of the many myths like… “You can’t get pregnant the first time you have sex” or “If you douche after sex you won’t get pregnant.” Or you’re too poor for birth control… or you're functionally illiterate and can’t use a calendar. (Not downing on folks who can't read... or read ENGLISH.)

On a more sinister note…rape happens… and so does incest. Women can get manipulated into a sexual encounter for money… a place to stay… food on the table… or a sense of security. There can be drugs and addiction involved. The moral question of having sex doesn’t matter. Where sex and intimacy is concerned… the ability to make a good decisions isn’t always there… and sometimes there’s only the ability to make the “least horrible decision” available to you. And sometimes that decision is having sex even when you don't really want to.

There are a thousand reasons why sex leads to pregnancy… and they don’t mean the woman is using abortion as a form of birth control.

So… rectal exam and cardiogram before getting your happy pills? Why stop there? Why not require that the man also be straight, married, and have a wife who is still fertile? Because EVERYONE KNOWS that the only reason to have sex is to procreate. So why would you want an erection if it wasn’t for the specific purpose of having sex to have children? (Cue Monty Python’s “Every Sperm is Sacred.”)

SOPA, cockroaches... and crystal meth.

2012-01-20T12:50:00.001-06:00

Well… I think by now we’ve all heard it. An elderly woman who loses her home and car because her grandson is cooking meth in the basement… and asset seizure law doesn’t really give a crap who owns the meth lab… but takes it away from granny so that it is no longer available to be used for criminal acts. It’s sad really… this sort of situation. But it really does behoove someone to know what is going on in their own home… no? It’s not a “chemistry set” and nobody needs that many boxes of Sudafed.

So… SOPA. Provisions of the law will work similarly to asset seizure in a drug raid. But in effect… it would be like seizing someone’s house and property if the cockroaches living in their house were cooking meth between the walls.

When you have what could be considered… an infestation… living in your house. You can do due diligence in calling the Orkin Man… and making sure you’re not leaving food out for the little buggers… but it is nearly impossible to have a home and know what every little creepy crawly inside is doing at any given moment.

And not only is this now an absurd analogy… it’s what SOPA is basically expecting Internet companies to do. Peer into the minds of the little cockroaches that are file sharing illegally produced copies of the Twilight movies… or the latest album by Slipknot… (really a self-punishing act… no…??) or they’ll huff and puff and blow their entire business back into the early 1990’s.

It’s chilling… the idea. I mean… I’m all for corporate responsibility. A CEO should take full responsibility for any crimes committed by their employees on their watch. But this is holding the CEO accountable for crimes committed by their CUSTOMERS. Like suing the gun manufacturer because someone committed murder with a handgun. Might serve them right in some instances... but...

Makes no sense. If I choke someone with a bunch of bananas... you going to go after that Chiquita lady with all the fruit on her head for it?

Anyway… the business model for companies who benefit from intellectual property is outdated. Rather than buck up and change their business model… they’re trying to push our government into protecting it. Not that this has ever happened (ahem) before in the United States as we started to bleed manufacturing jobs… and the family farm slowly turned into a hobby for fans of Jeff Foxworthy. Nope… we’ve never tried to dig in our heels and try to keep progress from happening by kicking and screaming and refusing to let the good old days pass…

*laugh*

I’ll tell you… I really… really dislike online piracy. Oh… I’ve done my share of downloading. But try to find a legal copy of Helena Bøksole’s last album in the United States… and you’d hit a torrent site too. I am NOT flying to freaking Oslo for it. If it’s out of print, hard to find… or I’m looking for something innocuous like a subtitle file… yeah… I download. I’m sure I’ve downloaded something that is copyright protected. Especially when I’m too lazy to hook up my USB turntable to listen to something… so I grab the mp3 off the internet…but I don’t make it A HABIT. I don’t download things because I’m too cheap to buy a legit copy. I'm just too cheap to buy an 8-Trak Player. (Yes... I do still have a few.)

And that’s the thing in a nutshell. If people had been buying legit copies of things all the while… THIS WOULDN’T BE HAPPENING. And why aren’t they? Sure… I like free stuff just like the next person. One of the reasons I buy CDs still is because I like the liner notes. Or in some cases… the sound quality of the CD is just so much better than I could do if I bought a copy on MP3 and then burned it off to listen to in my car. I buy CDs… when I don’t have to… because I like the product… and can afford it.

So entertainment industry… if you want people to buy legit copies of movies and music and whatnot… do what any other business does. Lower costs... increase value… maximize sales. Cut out the middle men… distribution… etc. Break yourself up into small, profitable chunks. Rethink your business strategy. MOVE OFFSHORE. Worked for most other industries no? Software companies? Again… lower costs… increase value… maximize sales. You want to keep me from buying a pirated copy of your operating system? Provide me KICK ASS customer support when I buy a legit copy. Give me VALUE… and I’ll shell out $300. The thing is… I’m NOT going to shell out $300 when the only reason you’re putting out a new version… is because someone in your marketing department decided Windows 7 sounds better than Windows XP. Or Windoze whatever is buggier than a hot July and if you don't put out an updated copy... you'll implode. Stop selling me cosmetic updates… give me REAL value… something so new that you deserve another $300 of my hard earned money… and I won’t even consider borrowing a copy off my neighbor.

Pharmaceuticals? That’s a different story. It’s a case where R&D needs to balance profit and demand… and there is a maze of legislation that makes the situation so sticky… it’s covered in flies. I don’t have an easy answer. If I didn’t take prescription medication daily. I’d die. Lucky for me my drugs cost pennies a pill. But if you were deciding on rent or food vs. going without your drugs… yeah. Well… it’s a lot different from pirating an operating system.

Health care… in America… is broken. If money was provided by the government for R&D into new drug treatments… I think whatever is developed should end up having a shorter patent duration than when the research is fully funded by a for-profit company. And in the same token… more money for drug research then needs to be provided by the government. Will this happen? It’s about as likely as my finding the cure for cancer in my lunchbox. But it’s what needs to happen. Something NEEDS to happen… because it’s a quality of life thing.

Kindling for my Fire...

2012-01-12T17:30:00.003-06:00

Since August, I have gone from being a died-in-the-pulp paper book reader to having four e-readers in the house. (OK. One is my husband’s…but I did order it for him so he’d keep his mitts off mine.) I have now found the one gadget that I couldn’t live without. I like my iPhone. It’s a decent phone… and it seamlessly integrates with my Outlook at work and calendar at home taking the place of the Palm I used to have… what’s not to like? No manual syncing… and occasionally I play a few fun games on it. But I’m not a heavy phone user… and not a real big fan of texting either. (It takes too long because I refuse to devolve the English language into a series of lol brb Ihtgpdgm “I hope the grammar police don’t get me” shorthand phrases.)

But my Kindle… has saved me from being too cheap to buy books. Not MONEY cheap… but space cheap. I stopped buying fun books to read when we ran out of bookshelf space. For a long time… I just didn’t read unless it was something trashy I knew I wouldn’t keep after I read it. (That I could buy used… or really cheap at Borders.) I read out of the library… or I borrowed books from other people. Anything to keep from adding to my net total of books.

But I love books… so the next thing I did was join paperbackswap.com… and start getting rid of books I knew wouldn’t be re-read… or that I could probably find in the library from now until doomsday. (Copy of the Iliad… Shakespeare’s Plays…etc.) Then I got rid of any hardcovers I could spare. Then I let go of a few books that I “liked” but didn’t love. And any books I owned specifically for work… I actually brought to work.

But in August I bought the wi-fi Kindle because the price finally seemed reasonable. I am a pretty heavy Amazon user… was an early adopter of Amazon Prime… and now use Amazon’s subscription service to purchase a majority of the household dry-goods in bulk. I like Amazon’s customer service. I like their MP3 downloads better than iTunes. (Stuff on Amazon occasionally goes on sale like a normal CD would.) So I figured… why not? I’ll give this Kindle thing a try….

I was reading the Jim Butcher “Dresden Files” books… and had managed to Paperback Swap the first few… but I really liked them… and kind of wanted to hang on to them and not re-swap them. So…I bought the next book in the series for the Kindle. And then the next… and then was kind of hooked on the whole idea of WANTING to read something… and then being able to in about three minutes.

Really… that’s what it takes from turning your Kindle on… navigating through the Kindle store… making the purchase… to completed download. I timed it.

So… after that… I decided any fiction I was interested in would have to be bought for the Kindle. It started with fiction… then I bought ONE cookbook for the Kindle… then a new Thesaurus… then all of a sudden I was a full-blown Kindle user. And when they announced the Fire… I put it on pre-order. The only thing that disappointed me with the wi-fi Kindle… was that I couldn’t see some books in color. Not necessary for most reading… but it was the one thing that was keeping me from buying a lot of travel books and cookbooks for the Kindle. Plus I kind of wanted a tablet computer anyway. And having something small and portable to watch movies on that was a little bigger than my iPhone seemed like a good idea. So… I figured… $200… what’s not to like?

All around… it’s a nice device. But it’s not perfect at anything it does. I don’t like reading on it for prolonged periods of time…e-ink is a thousand times easier to read. But I DO really like it for anything with color photos…cookbooks… to “how-to” books… travel books…etc. And it’s great for the odd Android game I like to play…light web-surfing…and as a kitchen computer. (I love youtube cooking shows. Being able to prop up a tablet in the kitchen to watch them is pretty handy when trying to follow a recipe.) What I don’t like is Amazon Prime movies.

The movie selection is OK… but maybe I don’t like it because I’m a long-time Netflix user. The Amazon Prime Movie interface just sucks. I don’t like not being able to have some sort of queue or playlist feature. If there IS one… I haven’t found it. So it’s pretty much useless because I can’t surf around on my computer for a list of stuff I’m interested in… I have to browse through their entire catalog of Prime movies to find something I’m interested in watching. I do like the rental feature though… because my corner video store was just killed by the two Redbox machines nearby… and I’m kind of sad to see it go. The local video rental store was such an icon of 1980’s and 1990’s movie watching culture… I refuse to support Redbox. So now… I’ll rent from Amazon.

So the Kindle Fire…It’s not so much an e-reader as it is an “Amazon Content Delivery Device… now with Internet!”

And then I was watching Woot… and came across the Kindle DX (wide format) for $200. Damn. Bigger e-ink screen… for $200. And my workplace has gone 5S crazy… and I need to get rid of at least a half-shelf of reference books. For $200… I could download PDFs of all of my manuals and literature into one device. A couple of clicks later… and now I own a Kindle DX… and yeah… the bigger screen rocks. And you really can look at a regular sized page of text without going blind. The handy rotate feature makes it even easier than my Kindle Wi-fi. I loaded all of my manuals and literature onto it… and got rid of four binders worth of paper. The only thing I kept paper copies of were my color publications… and wide format publications.

And with three Kindles I can’t part with… of course I bought my husband one.
What I don’t like about the Kindle… any of the Kindles… is the file organization. On the e-ink Kindle… it’s clunky. If I have 300 documents I want to load into a collection called “Reference Material” I copy it onto my Kindle using the USB feature… and then I have to go onto my Kindle… and individually add each and every document into that collection. Ugh. Cludgy. Obviously not geared towards managing complicated directory structures… and organizing documents. It’s a DISPLAY device… and it does that wonderfully.

It makes me wonder what the next step for hand-held devices is. Five years ago… my Palm Tungsten was my indispensable device. Now it’s kind of… “Palm what?” And with the iPad becoming so popular… I wonder if it will kill e-ink devices. (Which for dedicated readers… is just SO MUCH easier to read than a backlit screen. Please, please, please keep making something akin to e-ink…tech gods… are you listening?)

The only thing I’m not too upset about that everyone else seems to be is pricing. I don’t mind paying near “full-price” for an e-book. The current pricing structure is antiquated. It’s based on the distributor/consignment model that bookstores use. People think that since it costs so much less to “produce” an e-book vs. a paper book… it must automatically be 80% cheaper. But books are priced so everyone who “handles” them gets their fair shake. Your average paperback book… what is it… 40-cents in paper… maybe 60 cents in ink and binding materials plus labor? The largest cost is in shipping and warehouse space. And since some printed paper books will always be needed… the profit from high-volume sales books will ALWAYS have to cover for art books… coffee table books… small releases… and other books that can’t be formatted easily for print on demand. (Photos that bleed off the edge… NOT easy to do on a POD press. There’s still a ton of trimming that needs to be done...etc.) If we priced books based on the cost of production without any thought to distribution… I think the variety and number of publications would go down… not up. Books aren’t paper and ink. They’re not JUST shelf space. They’re the blood, sweat and tears of the author. They’re ideas and emotions and knowledge passed from one person to another. They’re history and laughter… reference and religion. And do you really want all of that cheapened?

In the Purple

2012-01-02T17:30:00.003-06:00

I know I should accompany this with a photo… but I’m going to be a meanie and make this text only until I can figure out some way of taking a photo of the back of my head without growing another set of arms.

For my 40th birthday… I decided to be bold with my hair color… and get red highlights. My stylist over a Black Hearts Hair House… Kat… has suggested red highlights a couple of times… but I’ve always been a little iffy about the idea. I go through life with a perpetual flush anyway… I don’t need anything else to make me look red and blotchy. But I figured I was turning 40… and might as well do something I’ve never done before.

It was… well… interesting. Every time I looked into the mirror my reaction was rather like…”Whoa fuck… my hair is red!” My second reaction would usually be to play with it until the large highlighted chunks were hidden. After two weeks… I knew I was done with red… and then it started to fade out. Bad…from red… to orange… probably on its way towards looking like someone peed on my head.

So… seven weeks later and I was back in Kat’s chair. And she asked if I’d like to do something funky with vegetable dies rather than another hair-frying application of permanent highlights. (I usually go several haircuts between highlights.)
In a fit of whimsy… I decided on purple. Yeah… actual purple. No… I didn’t also have plans to pierce my lips and work in a record store. I had myself convinced that it wouldn’t be too bold and unusual… or couldn’t be more unusual than the mauve… or the really bright red… so I let her paint on the “Pimpin Purple” over my faded highlights and have at it.

I have to say… I like it quite a bit. It’s less shocking than the red…and the red I had was actually a “comes in nature” color of red. It’s less noticeable too.
Anyway… why is my haircolor blogworthy?

A long… long time ago I remember a Saturday Night Live skit with Eddie Murphy in it… where he got himself made up in “whiteface” to see what he was missing.

http://www.snotr.com/video/422/Eddie_Murphy_goes_undercover

And it’s a lot what having purple hair is like. Strangers smile at you. People come up to you and tell you how much they like your hair. Kids point at my head and scream… “Mommy! I wan’t purple hair!” When I say I had it done in a salon… pens and paper must be found so I can scribble down the phone number for people. It’s like I’ve gone from being a fat, middle-aged woman who isn’t pretty… but isn’t ugly… to some sort of daring hair vixen.

I’m not exaggerating… I’ve had no fewer than 20 compliments on my hair in less than a week.

When you’re not one of the “beautiful people” you don’t learn how to take compliments. I tend to “p’shaw” folks when they tell me I look nice. I also have a mirror… look at myself every day… and have never seen anything special. I don’t take my appearance that seriously… don’t wear make up… don’t primp that much… so when something as easy as changing my hair color makes me feel pretty…
It’s a good feeling.

But alas… purple hair is not very office friendly. I’ve had a few strange looks from management… and after this fades and grows out I think I’ll be back to plain old naturally occurring colors. Because being noticed by strangers is fine… being noticed by someone with the power to fire me because they don’t like my hair… not so fine. For the next few weeks… I will enjoy being pretty… vibrant… different… and then go back to the obscurity of highlighted brown.

After Twilight...

2011-12-26T17:30:00.000-06:00

I have a deep love of young adult fiction. Some of the books I loved the most were Ursula K. LeGuin’s “Earthsea Trilogy” and Susan Cooper’s “The Dark is Rising Sequence.” Later on… I enjoyed some of the “teen trash” that was floating around in the 1980’s. And as popular stuff comes out… Harry Potter… Percy Jackson…I check them out of the library so I can figure out what all the buzz is about. What I’d be reading if I magically turned into a teenager. Some of the stuff out there has been fluffy. I read several of P.C. Cast’s “House of the Night” books… and found the plot uninteresting… but the storytelling to be at least engaging. I’ve read the books that the Vampire 90210 television series “The Vampire Diaries” was based on… and thought they were semi-enjoyable romance novels with a suspense twist. So… I figured I’d join “Team Herd” and finally buckle down and read Stephanie Meyer’s “Twilight” series.

I understand the age group the books were supposed to be written for…really I do. But that said…I am scratching my head as to why people… teen readers and adults… think these are the best romance books since Jane Austen wrote about Lizzie and Darcy.

I don’t just read YA fiction…I also read romance novels. Regency mostly…but I enjoy a well-spun romantic tale just like the next girl. I do not think they’re “fluffy” reading. (I do admit that most of them have “disposable” plots. But so do most genre novels. Mystery…horror…etc.) But they usually have an overarching theme of the nature of love…the difficulty of relationships…and the joy of finding the “right” person. (Anything that is about…boinking…boinking…boinking…reaches into erotica. Which I won’t knock…I like erotica…but there’s nothing romantic about an anonymous hook-up. I equate erotica with “sports novels.” The joy of kicking the winning goal…the joy of…well…you know. Ahem.)

So… it was with horror and dismay that I finished “Breaking Dawn.” I would have thrown the book across the room except for the fact I’d checked it out of the library on my Kindle… and I don’t think the Amazon warranty covers damage due to disgust. So… here’s my review of the “Twilight”… and what goes for the books… at least from the first two movies… goes for the movies. Except I actually used to really like Muse before they became the Twilight OST band.

What bothers me most about the Twilight series? Bella…is vapid. Passive. Her most pronounced feature is some sort of congenital inner ear problem that makes her clumsy. Through the course of the books…we learn NADA about her personality…because she doesn’t have one. She likes…Edward…her Dad…Edward…Jacob…her truck…Edward…and anything fast and dangerous that will help her hallucinate Edward when Edward isn’t around. Reading? Crochet? Television? My life when I was a teenager…was full of…well…things. Girl Scouts. Reading. Hanging out with friends. Teenaged drama… and occasional tragedy of a non-supernatural sort. But in Forks…Bella…loves Edward…attends school…and cooks for her dad. She has no aspirations for the future…interest in politics…she doesn’t volunteer, have a social conscience… or even stop to do her nails. Nada. She doesn’t want to save the wales…listen to music…or smoke pot… though if it made her hallucinate Edward she’d be Dime Bag Bella. Her other features? Apparently her BO is vampire crack…and her skull is really, really thick.

Edward…is every parent’s nightmare. Hot. Rich. Obsessed. Drives a fast expensive car. And is about 80 years older than their daughter. It makes Anna Nicole Smith’s relationship with J. Howard Marshall understandable…you know? (And the fact that Bella has less personality than Anna Nicole…is pretty sad.) He’s also…disturbingly controlling. Like the uber-Lassie…every time it looks like Bella might fall down the well…Edward is there…stalking her. Or having his family stalk her. Because the big, bad vampires might kill her. Because she’s human and frangible and might stub her toe and die. When he’s not stalking her…he’s kidnapping her. Or causing her to run away from home to save him from committing suicide. Edward at least has a bit of a personality. He likes… family. Music. Cars. Blood sports. Bella’s BO. He’s well-traveled…educated…and an ex serial killer. But since he’s gone the vampire equivalent of vegan…the fact that he’s a killer is somehow a-ok….because it’s completely balanced by believing in chastity until marriage. The fact that being with Bella…will cause her to lose her family and give up her friends…die…and give up her chances of growing old and contributing to society…did I mention die? They give him angst…but Bella’s BO overrides his 80 odd years of moral existence.

UGH.

And final random thoughts:

Plot arc? New girl meets handsome topaz-eyed loner dude. After initial conflict…they fall for each other. They break up. She pines. She starts stringing along another guy who will never live up to “danger loner dude.” She gets back together with loner dude…they overcome danger. And then it turns into a weird Jerry Springer episode. Girl gets knocked up…nearly killed by the alien in her stomach…and of course…no difficult birth goes unpunished…and the poor hapless woman ends up learning some sort of mental jujitsu to fend off the vampire DCFS. Loose plot ends are tied up when second-best “nice guy” stops lusting after a married woman and becomes an insta-pedophile. Oh…and they meet Dracula and his twin brother Vlad. Tidy. Creepy.

There are also at least four places in the plot where any red-blooded American father with knowledge of firearms would have simply shot Edward in the head…or sent Bella off to boarding school. Charlie…not winning any father of the year awards. And…despite several hundred years of medical and scientific experience. ..the fact Carlisle couldn’t come up with the vampire equivalent of full-body concealer…just boggles the mind. Kat Von D put out a line of concealer that can cover up her tattoos… there’s got to be some sort of roll on for the sparkles by now.

And that’s the main feeling I came away with… Creepy. Bella let herself get sucked into her partner’s life. Let him isolate her and pull her into their cult. And I don’t mean Mormons… but the cult of being a woman with a controlling husband. I thought Edward bruising her up so badly on their “wedding night” was about the only logical conclusion to their relationship. Along with how forgiving she was of him. Because all of his actions before their marriage screamed “controlling abuser stalker dude.” The fact he did so unconsciously…and was forgiven so quickly…was just…well…creepy.

Meyer also desperately needed this little thing called an “editor.” What was up with the intro of Breaking Dawn? Did she become too successful to “need” editing?

To Meyer’s readers… I hope you can quickly move on to something else. If you still need your vampire fix… I’ve heard the Sookie Stackhouse books are very entertaining. I haven’t read them… because I was burned once by Laurell K. Hamilton and I want the series to actually END before I start reading them to make sure they don't devolve into masturbatory fantasies for bored housewives. I HAVE read quite a few of MaryJanice Davidson’s “Undead” series… and find them to be adequate beach reading. A vampires meets chick-lit sort of read. Enjoyable… but unmemorable. I’ve also read most of Sherrilyn Kenyon’s “Dark Hunter” series… thanks to paperbackswap.com… and if you enjoy paranormal romance… they’re also decent reading. Usually every other book is pretty tight… and the one between is a toss-off. I think “Seize the Night” was my favorite… and that’s just because of those four years of Latin I took back in High School. Any of these… even the vamperotica novels of Laurell K. Hamilton have stronger female characters than poor Bella.

In short... Twilight sucked.

Dances with Names

2011-12-19T17:30:00.000-06:00

I’m on my continuing my odyssey into researching Smart Grid topics for work. I’ve had to stop and develop a Smart Grid acronym glossary. It’s really sad when there are so many hard to understand terms floating around… that you have to list them out in order to read a simple three page document. DMS, OMS, FLISR… I really am wondering if a set of preschooler’s magnetic letters might be a good purchase. I can’t keep them straight. I’m reading a white paper now… which is by a competitor so it shall remain nameless… that uses nine different acronyms in the same paragraph. I literally read it… and spent the next five minutes flipping backwards through the document to find out where they were all spelled out. If you’re going to go that acronym-crazy… spell them out every few pages so losers like me don’t forget what you’re talking about when your Outage Management System (OMS) is linked to your Network Topology Processor (NTP) which is tied into your Geographic Information System (GIS) all receiving commands from your DMS via SCADA.

Makes “deely-bobber” and “thing-a-ma-gig” sound positively descriptive…

Anyway… creating a glossary of unusual terms when creating a technical document is always a good idea. And it’s usually a step I fudge. And since I’m trying to get back into the “Do what I say because that’s what I do” philosophy of technical writing… I’ll divulge a few technical glossary tips.

When writing up an instruction manual, the first thing I usually do is look at what the engineer named the “wingle-ma-doodle” on the print. Sometimes there are three “L Brackets” or “Spacer Washers” and I need to differentiate between them somehow. Sometimes I’m starting my draft before the design is finished… and I get to name the wingle-ma-doodle. That can be dangerous, because my inclination is to name everything “George” so I can love it, and hug it… and have it be my best friend. Aren’t you my best friend George? (If you didn’t watch “Marvin the Martian” cartoons… disregard the above.)

But since my second inclination is to give things a name that is descriptive, I’m usually OK. First I start by taking a snapshot of the product… or ask the designer to send me an exploded view of the drawing. And… I label all of the parts. This usually gets tacked up on my cubicle wall somewhere for the duration of the project… so whenever I’m writing and can’t remember whether it’s a Belleville or a lockwasher… I have that information right in front of me. If fasteners need a certain torque… I jot it down next to the fastener callout on my diagram. If things need lubricant or some other kind of surface prep… I’ll try to jot that out too. Usually it’s something like wire brushing… or grease removal. Grease can have a part number… or can be something considered industry standard. Like aluminum conductor prep compound… I’ll call out what we suggest… and then ask the engineer if the customer is OK using their favorite aluminum prep if the stuff we use is unavailable. I’ll try to make any notes on places where an instructional tag or label might be needed. This is my “master sheet” and usually ends up crinkled and coffee-stained at the end of a project.

How often to I actually have the luxury to do this? Well… a lot less often then I like to admit. Sometimes I’m scrambling so hard… I don’t know what I’m called… much less the product I’m documenting. I don’t have time… or the engineer changes the part and now naming it the shunt latch won’t work because it neither shunts… nor latches… and I have to pull a new name out of my rectum and hope that the gods of “find and replace” are with me. Often… they aren’t. Changing the name of a part is a sure-fire way of inserting errors into documentation. Not for the faint of heart…

But this white paper writing about high level stuff is more difficult. It’s a lot of acronyms for names made up by people who don’t have any idea how to functionally name something… or who don’t know how to be brief. (Because SCADA… or Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition is not intuitive… unless you’re sex life is really, really dull…ya know? For one… the “Supervisory” is kind of ambiguous as to what it means… usually it means monitored by a computer. Or monitored by a computer and including an interface for human interaction. Usually it collects data and allows some sort of pre-programmed external set of control parameters tell it what to do. So if you have one of these nifty digital thermostats that receive signals from an indoor/outdoor weather station… before it makes the decision on whether or not to kick on your furnace…or turn on your humidifier…then there’s some SCADA going on somewhere…between the weather station…thermostat…furnace…and whatever dingle-dongle you use inside your house to monitor the temperature of your living room.

Anyway… now that I’m trying to figure out how a GIS connects with a DMS… I’ve found it helpful to make myself a table of acronyms, what they stand for, and a brief description. I have to keep stopping and adding things… and eventually it will need to be alphabetized… but for now it’s a start. A real professional indexer could tell you an easier way… but sometimes a simple list works. It’s kept me in groceries for the last 25 years…

NANOWRIMO failure...again.

2011-12-16T17:30:00.000-06:00

I made a valiant attempt at NANOWRIMO for the third year in a row.

I always lose it in the third week.

The main reason... that will ALWAYS BE the main reason is work. As a technical writer, I am not writing for eight straight hours a day, but I usually am doing a lot of writing sort of thinking all day. At the end of the day all I really want to do is hug the dog and watch crappy television and avoid having to use language period.

I reread a little of what I wrote last night. Ugh. I really am a terrible fiction writer. I feel the urge to put down every thought and action that my character has or does… like I was documenting a process. Maybe I should be pre-post-modern and try to meld the world of the novel with the instruction manual?
Now there’s an idea…

I am born. Wait… that’s been done before. How about…

Procedure for Human Birth
Procedure Time: Nine months after conception.
Procedure Environment: Clean sterile environment.
Tools Required: Basic medical supplies as would be supplied in a hospital or home birth setting.
Technical Skill: Moderate to Skilled

Step 1
After dilation to approximately…..

Yeah….well, maybe not.

But in all honesty… that’s not too far off from what my fiction reads like. My characters breathe in… raise their arms… walk across the room. I have no idea how to write as a fiction writer and not like an observant bystander. I think it’s po-mo or bust for me…

I hate to admit it… but my secondary concentration in the “Program for Writers” wasn’t fiction…it was poetry. I’ve always been better at it than fiction. Short stories are the hardest things to write… you almost have to have the entire story in your head before you start. But poetry can be narrative, or jump from image to image. It can be a list, a letter, a song; it can rhyme or use language so jarring that it’s difficult to read. It can have shape...or be one line.

I won’t regale you with any of my poetry. Especially anything I did as a teenager… which was usually all about being worried that someone would drop the bomb… and that I’d never finish college. But as much as I enjoyed the classes as I was taking them… I also realized at the time… like I do now… how useless they were.

Oh sure… art for art’s sake. But when your mother cleans toilets for a living and you’re rationing your student loan money in order to eat regular meals… ART FOR ART’S SAKE is a really fucking stupid idea. College for me was a business transaction. I really wish I could say it was more… that I wanted to be a Renaissance woman or some such drivel… but what I really wanted was a four year degree… ANY four year degree… so I wouldn’t have to scrub toilets for a living too. (Which I did in college… to help pay for my tuition. So I know what that’s like.)

As a result, I actually feel like I didn’t get as much out of the whole experience as some people who actually went to school because they like school… or because they’re good at it did. I was never a straight A student. I don’t consider myself that bright. I have a knack for writing things down as I think them… thought to hand… and it’s not even that knacky of a knack. (Not fishing for compliments… but there’s a grammatical or spelling error in here somewhere. Wait for it…)

I keep thinking I want to do something different with my life… but then I look at the education I have… and what I’d like to do… and realize that I might need more education… and there’s my pause. Every time grad school has seemed like a good idea, I remember being in college… and think to myself how damn glad I am not to be in college anymore. It was HARD. Homework… trying to cram stuff into my brain on a timetable that was too short for my limited ability to absorb new information. Ugh. I’m a terrible student. Even now, I’m taking Norwegian Classes one night a week and can’t get my homework done on time… and I’m not even getting graded!

But people tell me that they think I’m smart… and full of answers. I’ve never felt smart. Ever. Because I think real smart people don’t have to expend any effort to learn what they’re studying… or to do what they’re doing. I’ve been struggling for weeks to write a white paper for work… sweating, swearing… even went on a crying jag in my car when I got really frustrated. I procrastinated for an entire week… and now I have one crappy page written. And it’s crappy… but at least it’s down on paper. Because my first rule of writing is:

1) Give yourself permission to write utter crap. Shit. Verbal dungheaps. Bad grammar. Sentence fragments. Don’t spellcheck. Don’t look up word meanings or punctuation rules. Just get a draft.

Because if you agonize about what you’re writing… and whether or not it’s perfect… you’ll never get it on paper. Or the screen. It’s like being so afraid of getting in an accident that you never get behind the wheel of a car to practice. Sure, you’ll never get in an accident…but you'll never learn to drive either.

That's my main rule. I have more rules… and I really should post them in my cubicle but I'd hate to let on to the rest of my coworkers that I need a reminder list on how to do my job. So, I’ll share them with you here… this is what a college degree and 15 years of professional writing has taught me:

2) Set aside time to write, without disturbances… and with coffee.
3) Write in your OWN WORDS and do not try to be Kafka… or sound like a technical paper. You can always fancy stuff up later.
4) Know your audience. In technical writing… I also ask:

o Do they need background info on your subject?
o Do they need any of your language defined?
o Is English their first language?

5) Avoid jargon…buzzwords…marketingese…and synergistic keystone strategies for leveraging concise dynamic and impactful mindshare opportunities to interface with your metrics and methodologies and facilitate extensible infrastructures of innovative communications…and avoid clichés unless you’re trying to be cute. Yeah, everyone knows the early bird gets the worm… and that the early mouse doesn’t get the cheese… but there’s a simpler way to say it without using a cliché... and it's going to sound better.
6) No stressing about spelling, grammar and formatting…yet. See rule #1.
7) No writer is an island. Someone else needs to see your work before it goes live… no matter how good you think you are. Even here on my blog… I rely on my other personality to proofread.

I also have a few tricks I use. I’ll begin at the end… speak into a tape recorder in my car… write part of a blog post as a warm up… pick up my work and move to another area. Work at home. But they’re just gimmicks. Really it comes down to rule numero uno... and a lot of revision.

So… that’s it. Writing wisdom from a professional writer who can’t complete a crappy novel in a month of NANOWRIMO…. Who really, really needs to take her own advice once in a blue moon.

Fender bender

2011-12-12T17:30:00.001-06:00

I was in a minor car accident on Friday. I can say minor, because besides being shook up… and some minor aches and pains… I’m OK. Besides a little pooch in my bumper… my car is OK.
It was slick out on Friday… our first sticking snowfall of the season… and I was leaving work early to get in for an early morning meeting. The radio said there was an accident on 290 just as I was approaching Washington… so I decided to skip the expressway and take Washington in to Cicero… and Cicero north.

Traffic is always weird on Washington. I hate to say it’s a little ghetto… but it’s a little ghetto, though the community organization along Washington does try its best. I pulled up behind someone who was double-parked in front of an apartment building, and waited for the traffic behind me to pass before I pulled out. Only it didn’t pass… the guy behind me slid into two parked cars before slamming into the back of mine with enough force that the bags probably would have deployed if the street wasn’t so slick that my car slid forward about two feet from the impact.

I was rattled. I was also momentarily blind as my glasses had flown off my head… and landed with my hat in the back seat. The contents of my car had been tossed around like popcorn. I’m still missing a few things out of my purse that I’m sure I’ll find in the seats eventually. The guy who hit me had come to rest with his driver’s side door against my bumper, and the passenger side door against one of the cars he’d hit. Pretty pinned in. I got out, looked at my bumper… and took snapshots of his license plate with my phone before I pulled my car up and gave him enough room to get out. He started begging me not to call the cops… suspended license… no insurance… I kind of figured from the sled he was driving that it was the case… and I wasn’t in a neighborhood where starting an argument would be a good idea… so since there was no real damage… I made him call my cellphone so I had his number… and left for work.

I got to work, and checked in with the nurse. She checked my blood pressure… kind of said…”Oh, we’re going to have you lie down…” and about 40 minutes and two ice packs later I went back to work. Or non-work. I kind of spent the day in a bit of a haze… I suppose early morning adrenaline rush will do that to you. I stretched a bit at lunch… and tried my best to workout after work even though I was sore and just wanted to go home.

What I didn’t expect… was the anxiety that driving home caused. Every time I stopped… it was like I expected someone to slam into the back of my car. I kept replaying the morning over and over. Saturday, when my husband and I drove out to Bensenville… I was kind of sick in the car the entire way. (The warehouse where my storage container smelled like fish, which didn’t help…) This morning on my way to work… was just 100% pure anxiety. And I don’t just like driving… I usually find it relaxing. Sometimes relaxing enough that I start pulling into the parking lot here at work and don’t quite remember the drive… it’s like I was in some sort of Zen meditative state. But this morning… I had to stop and put on an audio book in order to calm down. Same anxiety as last Friday… just waiting for someone to hit me.

And it makes me feel… well… weak. Because though I’ve been tapped before… I never really considered the distinct possibility before that with as much as I drive… the likelihood that I’m going to be in a serious accident someday is pretty high. One of my co-workers from my old building was in a four-car pileup a few weeks back. Whiplash and a near-totaled car just in time for the holidays.

Winter is coming... be careful out there.

Why Occupy?

2011-12-06T17:16:00.000-06:00

I feel like a failed liberal sometimes. Or maybe it’s just turning 40… and the natural exuberance of youth finally petering out as I crest the hill of middle age.

I don’t like the Occupy movement.

First of all… semantics. Occupation has overtones of when a larger, more powerful government or people… subjugates, exploits, colonizes or marginalizes another people. Most of the Age of Exploration was people from one country amazingly “discovering” another people... and new real estate... and then taking it because they could.

Poor choice of words people….

And I have direct personal reasons…for one… they tend to like to occupy downtown Chicago which I have to drive through twice daily to get to and from work. And I’ve heard stories from friends and other coworkers who go to downtown meetings about getting shouted at… spat on… and harassed because they happen to be in business attire and walking into an office building. Does the Occupy Movement not realize that 99% of the folks who work in finance… are ALSO the 99%? And can't they tell the difference between a custom and off the rack suit? What… are the people who work in finance supposed to throw away their CPA license and become hairdressers?

My Mother worked downtown for years… and my Great Aunt Helen. Both at Continental Bank, which enjoyed its own financial scandal back in the early 1980’s after it snapped up a bunch of bad oil and gas investments from Penn Square. She was a computer operator… back when computers looked like storage furniture from Ikea. Which meant she spent most of her time mounting and dismounting data reels and pulling reports off of the printers. Not what I’d call a career... but it was a decent job.

Until I was about 10, she worked the night shift and I saw her as this sleeping lump in the bed most of the time. And then the bank started to collapse… and Mom’s hours got kind of crazy for a while until she was doing more “part-time” maid work for Phone-A-Maid than she was working at the bank. Then she started doing full-time maid work because it paid better than WORKING AT A BANK.

I digress…

The thing is… corporations are some of the largest employers of the 99%. YOU know or are related to someone who works in the financial sector. I work for a corporation… though not a publicly held one. If people started protesting outside my workplace…I’d have to say…”Hey…what gives? It’s a pretty decent place to work. Good benefits. Good wages. So it’s a little quirky at times… what company isn’t?”

And I imagine most people who work for BoA and Chase and La Salle feel the same way. And the liberal (mostly white…and college-aged… i.e. people who have probably never held down a job before) youth of America is beating wash pail drums outside of their office window and shouting slogans like…”This is what a police state looks like.” Meanwhile… the greedy Mr. Potter that they really should be shouting at probably lives in another state…probably somewhere with less traffic. This isn’t freaking Bedford Falls… it’s Chicago. If you were rich beyond belief… would you live here… or somewhere else where the sandy beaches didn’t freeze solid every December? Hmmmm?

In the meantime… I’m stuck in traffic while the police try to clear protesters off of Michigan Avenue… anxiously looking at my gas gauge hoping I have enough to get me home. Gas that I’m paying for. And we ALL pay taxes for the overtime required for the police… and trash removal folks who have to clean up after the police state we all apparently live in. You wanna see a police state? Visit North Korea. Go to western Africa. Send me a postcard from Somalia.

We are SO FUCKING LUCKY to be living in this police state… there are people in other countries who… after walking two days into town for food, water and medical supplies… will look at those silly Americans on the town’s only working television set… fat with warm coats and the best REI camping equipment money can buy… and here’s what they think…

"What are they so upset about? I can’t leave my house because I may get raped. Three of my children have died. Two of my teenage sons have been taken and forced into the army. I have AIDS… and who will take care of my kids when I’m gone?"

This might be the message to send to corporate America… but what kind of message does it send to everyone else? To the REAL 99%. It’s like we’re fucking shouting “I want my MTV!”

Unbelievable.

And these campouts… are not the bucolic Woodstock love and flowers places that we think they are. I was freaking scared out of my mind sitting in my Toyota while protesters flooded around me. I had momentary visions of the LA riots and having my car flipped over. And Chicago is TAME compared to the Oakland folks… where the Occupy movement has become a breeding ground for crime… and a “fuck the police” mentality that doesn’t take into account that the police thanklessly do one of the crappiest jobs on the planet. Imagine if you were the cashier at Wal-Mart… and every customer who came by heckled you for even lower prices… or spat at you because your job supported child labor in China… or you had to tackle them to get them to pay for their stuff? And then when it was closing time… they WOULDN’T LEAVE. And then they decided to move into the home and garden section like Natalie Portman in “Where the Heart Is.” How does that police officer feel when they tell you to move along… tell you to get back on the sidewalk…try to let traffic pass… and you flip them off… call them a pig… and then get angry with them when in order to do their jobs… they have to muscle you around. Because protesting is perfectly legal… and the police know that. Squatting on someone else’s property… is NOT. Even public property. And if it is… sweet!! I’m plunking a mobile home down in Warren Park and cutting my commute down to a five minute walk. And I expect the taxpayers to pay for my water and sewage hookup…

I'm not against protesting... not by a long shot. Every Thursday morning I see the same group of people... protesting the Iraq war... standing at the overpass on Austin and 290. Every week... a visible reminder that we're still at war. That American Soldiers are overseas when they should be here... with their families. Peaceful. Non-disruptive. And very poignant. At first... I thought they were annoying. Then silly. Now... YEARS later... I have a LOT of respect for them. I spend my morning swearing in traffic. These retired hippies spend theirs reminding me of the real cost of war.

In contrast... at first I was thumbs up for the Occupy Movement... until its underbelly started to show. OK... you have everyone's attention. Now what? You don't want to pick representatives to negotiate because you're a "true democracy" and negotiation means consensus...blah, blah... Have you EVER tried to get anything done when all decisions are made by a committee before? What are you smoking?

There are people all over the world who have no choice but to live in tent cities. You're not proving anything by doing it too. Even if yours has free daycare (scary...stranger daycare) and a yoga tent.

So… since it’s not good to critique something without proposing an alternate solution… here goes:

Back in the day… and that day is the 1980’s… “health food stores” sold dusty boxes of dehydrated hummus… and all sorts of weirdness coated with carob. A few bags of unusual grain… maybe a case or two of frozen food… and three to four aisles of supplements. Occasionally… they carried this strange thing called “organic produce” which was still pretty much in its embryonic stage in development. Did organic mean grown without spraying? Added cow poop? Something I needed to wash extra well before eating? Now… I can shop at Whole Foods… for organic, vegan, sustainable, shade grown…fair trade everything. An idea… has become an industry. And a pretty well managed one. And it did it because someone got tired of carob rice cakes and protein powder that smelled like the inside of a gym locker… and decided to take organic… corporate. Now we have “locally grown” movements… slow food… eating in season. More people give a crap about where their food comes from NOW then they have since we all pretty much grew it ourselves. The health food nuts… have an industry built around their wants and needs for handmade soap and tofu. They wanted better choices… and voila!

And I think that’s what finance needs… we need to demand something DIFFERENT from our financial institutions. We wanted easy home loans and home equity loans... and look where that got us? Right now all we want is free checking and low ATM fees. So… the OM had “move your money to a small bank day.” And every large bank in America that had free checking and e-deposit consumer accounts was probably saying…”THANK YOU JESUS” because now the customers who are annoying them for very little profit have gone off to bother the folks at the small local bank where you have to pay forty cents per check. Buh-by now… and don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out…

*chuckle*

The thing about the housing bubble…at least that I noticed when my Corus Bank account mysteriously changed to MB Financial… is that a lot of those small local banks failed… sometimes in more spectacular ways than the larger banks who were considered “too big to fail.” And I’m going to go back to” It’s a Wonderful Life” and Bedford Falls... because my first lesson about finance was watching the movie one Christmas...remember the run on the Building and Loan scene? Where is my money? Is it in my neighbor’s home and business when I deposit it into my savings account? Is it paving the road outside of my house?

Yeah…right. It’s bundled into some sort of interest asset portfolio… when it’s making any interest at all. Probably invested in Mutual Funds… or some such financial gibberdy-flibbit that I couldn’t pronounce much less understand. If you want to bank with the Bailey Building and Loan… you need to join a Credit Union. (I belong to one...FYI.) You'll get higher interest rates on your savings… AND your money will be helping to buy another member of the CU a new car, house … or send their kid to Lincoln Tech. Because they give out pretty sensible loans, at reasonable interest rates… and do a pretty good job of scoping out what you want to DO with the money… and make sure it has nothing to do with Las Vegas. No easy money or 10k limit credit card.

The other thing that bothers me is… a lot of the 1% worked pretty fucking hard to get that money. Bill Gates could have been a complete grease spot on the road to riches… you know? Bigger risks… bigger rewards… and if you look at some of the “ultra-rich” … they’re not. I’m in better financial shape than Donald Trump where debt to income ratio is concerned. AND I’ll never have to worry about Hair Club for Men. Even where I work...I’ve met our company president… actually had breakfast with him once. (I won breakfast in a company contest...I don't have THAT fancy of a job where I eat breakfast with our CEO on a daily basis.) And for one… he’s REALLY smart. Really smart. And a very interesting person to listen to. For two… I know he’s probably the hardest working person in the company. Sure… he flies planes as a hobby… and that’s the sort of hobby you have to have more than “disposable income” to do. But he also... I think... really believes that our company is here FIRST to make great stuff for our customers... SECOND to provide great jobs for it's employees... and THIRD... to give back to the shareholders and community. And I’d like to say he’s unique and that I live in la-la never-never land...but with the exception of one job I’ve had… the company presidents have never been amoral asshats. (The ONE would be the philandering president of my first job out of college… who will remain nameless.)

I’d like to see the Occupy Movement start supporting an alternative financial system… or SPECIFIC REFORM to our current system. Social equity…ok…HOW? What do you want the other half of the 1%... who got their money manipulating the system… to do? You think they care? What would you like our government to do to them… or for us? Tax them all the way to a new home-office in the Caribbean? Slime will always ooze. And yeah... for every decent CEO there's someone who has dollar signs tattooed to the inside of their eyelids. But Bill Gates and my company’s CEO… they deserve every penny they make as far as I’m concerned. A lot of the Chicago-based companies...seem pretty decent. It's hard enough to want to get people to move their business to Chicago... and here we are beating drums while they're trying to work.

There has to be a way to build a Whole Foods out of the carob snack shack here somewhere… but Occupy isn’t doing much more than making noise… trash… and will possibly someday incite a riot.

Politics of Putting By

2011-11-28T17:55:00.001-06:00

My husband and I have recently gotten into canning our own food. It started last year at the end of the summer… when we had two gallons of leftover green tomatoes from the garden at the end of the year. I figured we could make a batch of green tomato pickles… and that would be that. So $18 for a granny ware water bath canner… and another $12 for a box of Ball jars later… and we canned pickles.

Delicious pickles. Really they’re the perfect thing for a ham sandwich.

Then for Christmas… I thought I’d be cute and I bought the hubby a sauerkraut fermentation pot. It’s got a water seal lip… and you pretty much put cabbage and salt and water in… and pull kraut out in three weeks.
Delicious sauerkraut. Really… once you’ve made homemade the store bought stuff just tastes vile. And that’s when we started developing a collection of Mason jars. We’d give away some kraut… buy more jars. Got to be where people were trading us empty jars for kraut.

And then after the holidays… my Mom moved over to the Mayslake Senior Living Apartments… and she gave Tim her pressure canner. I think I remember my mom using the pressure canner exactly once when I was growing up… so it was still in its box with all the packing.

So here we were… with all the supplies to really “put food by” but we live in a condo. It’s not like I can farm my living room? And then we started experimenting. First with mint jelly. Our mint plant at the community garden went crazy… and I had GOBS of mint. So we made mint jelly. It was good… I refused to put the green food coloring in that the recipe called for… and it made the jelly a lovely golden color.

Then the farmer’s market rolled around… and we bought a couple of half bushels of slightly bruised tomatoes. We canned tomato-basil sauce. (One of the acid recipes from the Ball Book where you add lemon juice to make sure it’s acid enough for water bath canning.) Again… really delicious… and besides the outlay for jars… pretty cheap.

Then we decided to take a day one weekend in October and go apple picking. And we found a place that had U-pick vegetables. So we brought home a bushel of tomatoes… and a bushel of mixed carrots… several pie pumpkins, squashes… and a bunch of eggplant.

And then the canning began in earnest. Pepper rings, smoky chili BBQ sauce, pumpkin-pineapple compote, more tomato sauce. Jalapeno jelly, and we roasted some of the eggplant for freezing… and froze some of the pumpkin… and some roasted chilis. And applesauce. We’d scored a bushel of “applesauce apples” when we went apple picking… and I don’t know how many quarts of applesauce we put up… but it was a freakload of applesauce. At least three canners full. Two batches plain, one batch spiced.

So here Thanksgiving rolls around… and I start thinking to myself… “Self. Now is the only season when pineapple, sweet potatoes… and cranberries are at a reasonable price. I love pineapple. I’m pretty fond of sweet potatoes… and rather UN-fond of commercially canned sweet potatoes because they’re usually swimming in weird brown syrup. And I love cranberry sauce.

So one trip to Aldis…and I come home with five bags of sweet potatoes… five pineapples… and six bags of cranberries.

I started looking around on the Internet for more canning ideas… and that’s where I started coming across this phenomena called “prepping.” It seems like a philosophy somewhere between the Mormon mandate to put food by in case God decides to raid your pantry… and preparing for the zombie apocalypse. Hoard food, guns, water… personal supplies… and if the virus that could destroy humanity hits the fan… or the commies finally attack…you have the ability to fend off your hungry neighbors with a shotgun.

At first glance… there’s something that seems very sane about emergency preparedness. I could probably eat for several months out of the contents of my pantry. Mind you… it wouldn’t be a stunning variety in meals… rice and beans… rice and chili… pasta and sauce… pasta and beans….

But I could do it. And not because I believe in zombies… but because I believe in THRIFT. Pick up an extra when something goes on sale. Buy in bulk. And now our home craze of canning sale produce so we can enjoy it all year long. Sure…I’m going to end up with flats of sweet potatoes under my bed… but what the hell? They were cheap!

But… I think about all of those fearful people out there… hoarding food and water and ammo in a back closet so they can protect their family in case of economic collapse… and then I listen to the pleas of our local food pantries who have had to stop giving out bags because they’ve run out of food… and think to myself… WTF. Take care of my family… sure. But what about everyone else?

I realize no food pantry in their right mind would accept home canned goods. I don’t feel weird about stocking up on canned pineapple… because Jeez… you stand in the kitchen for several hours minding a boiling canner and that pineapple is not only cheap… it’s the literal “fruit” of my labor. I put the filled cans back in the case… slip them downstairs onto a basement shelf… and know I’ve done something to save my planet by processing my own food… in season. (Even if it was supermarket food.) But the idea of stocking up on six months of living supplies in case I miss the rapture?

It’s like planning for the scenario where the government breaks down… and Mel Gibson is leading us in a wild-haired chase across the new American wasteland for guns, food, and fuel… until Tina Turner ushers us into the Thunderdome. If that ever happens… if our society ever breaks down to the point where I need to carry a gun to keep from getting raped in the street… or Tina ever does turn away from soul to soldier…

Pinto beans would be the last think I‘d be thinking about.

Prolonging a life that would become ever more nasty and brutish in the hopes that somehow… order would prevail after the collapse of my civilization? Whaaa? I mean... my heart bleeds for the people of Somalia... I have serious respect for their plight... because I wouldn't last 50 seconds over there.

Growing up...in the event of a nuclear holocaust…I actually felt pretty good about living in Chicago. We have Great Lakes Naval Base. We’d be front and center if the Ruskies decided to bomb us into oblivion. A flash of light… and then my retinas would vaporize before the fact I was about to die would even register in my brain. I’d never have to see the aftermath. I spent most of my childhood living in the cold war era… with that thought as a COMFORT. Comfort. If the worst happened… I wouldn’t survive to watch my hair fall off... and my friends and family mutate.

So as I watch these prepper videos… trying to learn a better way to chop sweet potatoes for canning… listening to the underlying message of ”Those godless ACLU loving crazies are going to try to take away my guns, freedom, fresh water… and canned pumpkin… and when our financial system collapses after the Socialists take over...” inwardly I cringe a little. Has the zombie apocalypse already started… and it’s happening on youtube? Sustainable I care about… we've lost touch with our food. Most of us... myself included... have lost touch with our waistlines. Anything I can do to make eating more REAL and less FAST is a good thing.

But survivable? Am I worried that the end is near... and someday Swiss Miss Cocoa mix will be a commodity item? Not so much.

http://www.chicagosfoodbank.org/

Samuel Insull...the most famous Chicagoan you've never heard of...

2011-11-18T17:23:00.000-06:00

I'm trying to work up a White Paper on the Smart Grid... and am in that stage of writing where I'm desparately trying to educate myself on the subject and feeling like a big, stupid, dopey, graduate of a sub-standard liberal arts program.

Oh...wait...

But I've become enthralled with Samuel Insull. Here's the skinny...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Insull

Now I'm going to assume that you've just clicked off my blog and read that entire wikipedia article. M'kay?

Wow. Talk about rags to riches to rags! This is the man who created the modern electric grid. Who created the BUSINESS of selling electricity. And want a quote:

"For my own part, I cannot see how we can expect to obtain from the communites in which we operate, or from the state having control over those communities, certain privlages so far as a monopoly is concerned, and at the same time contend against regulation."

Right there...black and white... the FATHER of the modern power grid pretty much spells out that electrical infrastructure... with declining costs for production, high capital expenses, and intensive scrutiny by government and politicians... would NEED regulation.

And what did we do over the last 20 years? Deregulated the electrical system. Made it "for profit." Like anything that's for profit... the basic business premise is to sell as much as possible to as many people as possible at the highest price you possibly can.

Exactly opposite most of the goals of the Smart Grid. Limiting GHG emissions... creating supply stability... promoting efficiency... it's counterintuitive. We shot ourselves in our collective feet on that one...didn't we?

Quilling

2010-01-07T17:30:00.000-06:00

For some reason, I really want a button maker. It’s not a wild hair idea…I think I’ve wanted a button maker since I was six years old. All I got was a bunch of those crappy snap together buttons.

I want a Button Biz maker. They’re like $300 dollars. Yikes!

I think my current idea…is mood buttons. A few people make them…but I’m thinking more like mood announcement buttons. Depressed, Anxious for no particular reason, PMS, Sick, Tired…excessively perky. Need my dog. Need more coffee.

If only I could draw…or at least doodle. Maybe I can recruit a drawer. And there’s always the wonder of slogan buttons. I had one for a little bit that said “Medicated for your protection.” Came in handy.

Maybe the amount of quilling I’ve been doing lately has got me into a crafty mood. But I think it’s more of the need to be doing something I like…rather than feeling like poople all the time.

(Poople. I just made that up. It’s a combination of “poop” and “people.” Poople. But…I’m trying to avoid the whole getting an idea and then immediately plunking down cash thing. Though…my last couple of cash plunks seemed to do well…the Fujitsu scanner…is DREAMY. And I love my netbook.)

Anyway…quilling is an art of patience. Last night…while watching three episodes of Law and Order and I managed to make two poinsettias and started a rather complicated snowflake. I need to get into Mom’s Christmas decorations so I can dig out the ornaments that Aunt Darlene made…and see if they’re something I can copy. She had the mad quilling skillz.

And…though it’s a little more popular than it was in the 90’s…it’s still not wildly popular. I have to mail order supplies. Thank Jeebus for

I bought a few extra quilling boards and tools for our “Women’s Craft Event” here at work. It was really just a bunch of crazy women with wine and glue guns. Fun. I wasn’t expecting to actually have my own table or anything like that…and I had four women who were pretty interested in learning.

It was nice…the feeling of imparting something I know to someone else. Gave me one of those warm and fuzzy feelings inside.

I couldn’t count the number of times someone said, “But my snowflake doesn’t look as nice as YOUR snowflake does.” Well…no. For one, I learned how to quill when I was eight. That’s 30 years ago. What do you expect? I wasn’t that great the first time I got behind the wheel of a car either.

It’s not hard to master…but it’s tricky to get consistency when you’re first starting a project. If you need six teardrops for a flower…make eight and pick the best six. THAT’S why my stuff look as nice as it does. If I make a subpar circle…I toss it. But when I have one hour to impart the basics of an art that women used to learn in finishing school…and snowflakes STILL look passable…well, not a bad accomplishment.

But…I still have the urge to do something…and do it well. And in the crafty department…quilling is what I’m good at. Buttons? Not a skill or a craft…but maybe more of a need to express myself.

So…I’m filling out the paperwork to teach quilling at the Park District. We’ll see how that goes.

www.helpholly.com

2010-01-06T12:51:00.000-06:00

Hello. I'm doing something I usually don't do. Asking for some help.

But not for me.

If I've done you a good turn in the past...and you've always wanted to repay me...or something schmaltzy like that...I ask you to take a look at my friend Holly's web donation site.

www.helpholly.com

I've known Holly the entire length of her illness...and it's 100% real. Unexplained growth of odd legions on in the area between her lung and the "lining" of the lung...that cause her sharp pain. Imagine going for the last six years with the constant feeling of a near-broken rib.

Yeah. I don't really want to imagine it either.

She's managed to stump the folks at the Mayo Clinic...and after losing her job...is getting ready to lose her health insurance because she took a "part-time" job not realizing the State of Illinois would recalculate her benefits.

The nerve block injections are similar to the ones they've done on my back...meaning they cost around $1500 each. On a part-time salary...she can barely afford food, rent...and her COBRA premium. Plus...she has fibromylagia...gets migraines...and one of the medications she was put on for her fibro caused a weight regain that I can completely sympathize with after my couple of years on Effexor. And let me tell you...it's always fun being a chubby girl with health problems. Cause I get the "fatty" looks every time I go to the doctor too. *sigh* Like losing weight will MAGICALLY make my not need antidepressants...and will make my spine shiny and new.

I digress.

She has some help from her family...but there's only so much money a cash-strapped Iowa family can send to a daughter with a severe illness.

So...if you could...either donate...or pass along her story by linking to her website in your blog...etc. Or...I know she could use some help with her website. Or with job leads if you're in the Chicago area and looking to hire an Office Manager.

If any of my friends from outside the USA want to know what it's like to NOT have socialized medicine...her story is a good place to start.

Sense and Sewability

2009-10-29T13:33:00.002-05:00

My fetish for Jane Austen and all things Regency…along with a great sale at Handcock Fabrics on patterns has caused me to pick up a dozen or so historical costume patterns. For a buck each, how could I go wrong?

I realize there are probably more historically accurate patterns out there…but considering I still haven’t finished sewing the Raksu I started nearly three years ago…from a lack of ability in sewing in whatever odd foldy-fold pin-pin seaming style favored by bald Japanese monks…I figured I’d do better with a commercial pattern.

(BTW…I’m sure Buddha would have been ALL FOR sewing machines if they were around when HE was around. *sigh* Can’t I just slap a mantra on my Kenmore Machine and have at it?)

Anyway…I figure I can spend the winter picking at costumes. There’s an English Country Dance group in Evanston that gives regular dances…and a group in Champaign-Urbana…and Tim and I have always wanted to learn some sort of dancing. We made a lame attempt at Ballroom Dance years ago…and sort of managed the Fox Trot. And we dropped by for a Caeli Dance lesson at the Irish American Heritage Center…and that’s when we realized we probably needed to start with something a little more basic. Unfortunately the Wiggleworms class at the Old Town School is only for pre-schoolers.

So…on a recent re-watching of Pride and Prejudice…I thought to myself…”Self. That doesn’t look too complicated.” And after poking around on “Ye Olden Interweb” found out that most of the dancing in the movie…would have probably been “called” like a square dance. But since historical accuracy was not the purpose of the movie…looking at Colin Firth in tight-fitting pants WAS…I learned something new. A few more googles…and there you have it. Lists of all the Country Dances…and Jane Austen balls in the area.

Next thing I new…I was sitting next to a toothless old black woman at the Handcock chatting away about bias tape. (Fascinating woman…she looked rather like a bag lady…had gnarled hands…but she sewed choir robes for local school groups and churches…and did a lot of volunteer sewing for children’s theater. She’d worked as a seamstress/tailor since she was a teenager. I wanted to take her home with me…she was that much fun to talk to. She decided that after all these years…she wanted to learn how to make her own shoes…and a conversation about house slippers started. Kwik Sew has a pattern…I digress…)

I’ve always done well with Renaissance sewing. I mean…the first thing wearable I ever managed to sew was the oddly shaped vest I made in Junior High sewing class. (Yes…I’m old enough to have had sewing in school. As did EVERYONE in the seventh and eighth grade in Oak Park, IL. Boo-yah!) The most complicated thing in Renaissance clothing is the women’s bodice…or the men’s doublet…which are both basically vests…so…a few patterns later and I saved myself a bundle on costuming…and now never get called up for the “audience participation” segment at faire.

I think the most complicated thing will be sewing clothing for Tim. I do NOT know how to tailor. But…I doubt he has to look “perfect.” I figure the more complicated things…like a frock coat…I can probably get help with from my Mother…who used to sew all of her own clothing…and still occasionally remembers how. And I’ve usually found that more complicated piecing is easier done by hand. And if I use a natural fabric…I can always use starch and my trusty iron to make up for any pooching or wrinkling around seams.

My current issue with the patterns I bought is the arms. I have abnormally fat arms for my size. And…Empire dresses tend to “pouf” at the top of the shoulder and are more of a cap sleeve sort of thing. On a fat armed woman…this sort of sleeve makes arms look like large cuts of ham. So…I’ve been poking around to see what styles of sleeve will suit a large-armed woman. *sigh* There isn’t much. I think I may just elongate the arms…or possibly hide a gusset in the armpit to give me more room.

I should be able to do a majority of my projects out of my current fabric stash. I know I have a bunch of thin wool I bought eons ago for a cloak that I never made…which is probably enough for a frock for Tim and a Spencer for me. And I have a bunch of green corduroy left over from doublet making.

Handcock has brocade on sale. That will help. I need it for a waistcoat for Tim. They also have muslin and velveteen on sale. I need muslin for my chemise…Tim’s shirt…an Ascot. I may make a Pelisse of velveteen for myself. They also have wool suiting on sale. So if I find a color I like better than the drab grey I own…I won’t go broke.

It’s rather like they’re having a “Regency Costume Fabric” sale as far as I’m concerned. If heavy cotton twill was on sale…I’d be all set.

A few of the commercial underthings patterns in the “Sense and Sensibility” line have managed to go out of print…so I did a search on them…and managed to pick them up for just a little over retail. I’d bought a rather historically ambiguous corset pattern…but knew that Simplicity had licensed a pattern for Regency Short-Stays from “Sense and Sensibility” when the last Austen movie craze was going on. I bought it in small and large…on the odd chance that I either get smaller…or maybe I convince a few other people to costume with me. Or just become a terrorist and make costumes for people I want to drag dancing with me.

Waiting with baited toes...

2009-10-20T17:00:00.000-05:00

The best thing about my job is the crap people ask me that has nothing to do with my job.

Question of the Day: What’s the origin of the phrase, “Waiting with baited breath?”

Well Researched Answer: Well...it’s actually spelled “bated” and is a phonetically shortened form of the word “abated.” So the literal meaning of the phrase is “waiting with shortened breath.” (Billy Boy clipped it for increased iambic pentameter value in The Merchant of Venice. Silly poet...clips are for kids.)

So what does this actually have to do with my job? Nothing...I’m just the answer gal for this sort of thing. Because I'm the department's writer...naturally I know all sorts of obscure points of grammar and the etymology of every word in the English language. (Ah...no...not really.) Luckily I have a handy copy of the QPB Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins…so I can amaze my co-workers and win big $$ playing NTN Trivia.

Two weeks ago I corrected a co-worker’s spelling of “tow the line” for about the zillionth time. It should be “toe the line” and is a reference to boxing...not sailing. (Boxers getting up off of the mat after being knocked down would have to put their foot at a pre-marked line on the floor of the ring before the next round could start...so someone who gets up from a beating over and over is “toeing the line” for their manager.)

So...I wonder...can you toe the line while waiting with bated breath?

I can haz accent...

2009-10-19T17:00:00.001-05:00

Whenever I talk to Tim's family...I realize I have an accent. I had no idea what a "spicket" was for the longest time. Water in Chicago comes out of faucets. A spigot is an "oldy timey" name for a faucet that is not hooked up to a pressurized water supply. And here...we pronounce the 'g'. If you pump water out of a well...it comes out of a spigot. Ain't that quaint?

Supposedly native Chicagoans speak Inland Northern American English.

I realize I say "grage" (long-a) instead of "gah-rage" for garage. I slip a "g" into the word bedroom...making it bedge-room. And I misuse the poor word "with" with great abandon. Because only Midwesterners say..."You wanna go with?" and imply "me." And to my knowledge...only Chicagoans say "What's with you?" to mean "Have you suddenly lost your bleeping mind?"

But I don't talk like a reject from the mafia.

To a native Chicagoan...the "Da Bears" accent made famous by Mike Ditka is the Bridgeport or "South Side" Chicago accent. It's associated with the old Irish and Italian-American neighborhoods down by old Comiskey Park. Even WE THINK IT'S FUNNY.

When I was still in College...my linguistics teacher told me that I spoke SCWE. "Standard Chicago White English." He was on the seventh year of his study on Chicago neighborhood dialects...and had just published a paper on "Chicago Standard Mexican English."

I stopped him before my brain started to foam.

Contract...

2009-10-16T17:00:00.005-05:00

I have quite a few bi, lesbian and gay friends....who are disappointed by the anti-gay crap that flies around the political scene in the name of preserving marriage...or the family...or whatever.

It's a bunch of bull. Marriage. Legally...it's a contract and should be blind to gender. If two unrelated people want to legally enter into a contract providing for mutual financial support and responsibility...legally they should be able to do so. Period.

Preserving "marriage" is semantics. Does marriage mean the holy union between a man and a woman...or does it mean a contractual state of cooperative cohabitation and responsibility for the others welfare...where you become responsible for the others debts and can share in their assets?

Can it mean the first in a secular state? No...not really.

This is one of those fuzzy cases where our legal system allows the encroachment of religion in a way that is not only damaging...but inconsistent. I can go online...be ordained by the Church of Universal Life...or the Church of the Holy Hand Grenade...and perform wedding ceremonies. Why...does paying $40 make me capable of ascertaining the fitness of two people to enter into a legal and binding contract? Is there not a flaw here? When I got married...my ID was checked when I applied for the license with my husband...but my gender wasn't. Nobody asked to check "underneath the hood." Obviously it was important...but not THAT important.

And there are biological conditions that put gender into question. If you're born with both sets of gonads...and by some miracle allowed to keep them both until the age of majority...can you pick your gender? Are you both? Does a team of doctors need to evaluate and decide for you? Do you lose your right to marry because you have a chromosomal problem and can't decide what gender to be?

And transgendered people...now I know that the same folks who want to see marriage "preserved" probably also think that transgendered people shouldn't be allowed to exist...much less marry....but do they lose their rights? I mean...sex change operations usually aren't performed until extensive psychological evaluation and therapy happens. It's not something you can just "have done" like a nose job. People change their gender in response to identity issues that can in most cases...cause severe mental illness if NOT addressed. Do they lose their right to Marry because of what modern psychology considers a mental illness/identity crisis?

If marriage is a state designed to keep us from sin...and allow for procreation...do sterile people lose their rights? People who don't want to or shouldn't have children because of a medical condition?

Either marriage applies equally to any two people with the mental capacity to enter into a contract...or we should just abolish it all together. No marriage penalty...and no benefit. You want your life partner to share your assets...be entitled to your retirement...or have legal guardianship of your biological children...you get a lawyer to draw up a bunch of expensive paperwork assigning those rights and responsibilities. Man...it would create jobs for a literal army of paralegals...think of what it would do for the economy!

*sigh*

The world isn't overflowing with love. Love in all of its forms is beautiful...and should be cherished when it happens.

Fuzzycaid...

2009-10-15T17:00:00.003-05:00

I'm not sure what a government run health care plan would consist of...but I do want to see the uninsured...insured. Here in Illinois...there's a requirement for all college students to have health insurance. If they don't...it's provided by a University Clinic for a sliding-scale fee.

That's what I sort of imagine is going to happen eventually.

But I'd rather do what I'd consider to be a few HIGH-impact things before trying to figure out how to provide health insurance to areas of the country that have no "public health" infrastructure.

Like...

-Vouchers for smoking cessation and smoking cessation related products for low-income families. Poor and a smoker? Being a smoker just makes you poorer...and sets you up for other health issues that you can't afford any more than you can afford a carton of cigarettes. Provide some sort of voucher for _proven_ smoking cessation programs and/or things like the patch or zyban.

-Substance Abuse. Treatment centers and rehab...considering the waiting lists for getting into these programs...and the fact that many, many people need to be in two or three times before they can sucessfully complete them...you'd think it would be a prime area of "health care" that we'd want to support before trying to compete directly with the folks at Cigna. With the added bonus of reduced drug use and alcoholism reducing crime. (Especially if crimes related to addiction are decriminalized and the person "sentenced" to rehab instead of jail.) Sure...somebody might make the choice to put something in their body...but very few people do it with the vision that someday they'll be giving out blowjobs so they can earn money to support their crack habit. We need to help these people more than what we're doing now.

-Universal Children's Healthcare. Why worry about adults when we can catch them young before they have a chance to become diabetic? Kids already HAVE TO go to school...tying children's health to the school nurse that SHOULD be in every school in the nation seems like a no brainer. Schools already monitor hearing, sight...and vaccinations...why not provide money to help the schools provide basic healthcare to students? Maybe because education funding isn't a priority in the US? *sigh* Programs that work with schools to provide children's nutrition are some of the best ideas I've ever seen. (Like the backpack programs that send low-income kids home with nutritious food to eat.) Of course...we might have to stop funding schools with property taxes and/or the Lotto to do this.

-Wellness Voucher. I got a $40 voucher from the government because they were changing TV broadcasting. Every seller of the set-top converter boxes was required to accept it. Why not a healthy voucher? Rebate or subsidize the annual wellness checkup for non-insured Americans. Give me a coupon or a voucher or a card so I can see the doctor once a year and get whatever routine tests are suggested for my "age group" and update my vaccinations...get a pap smear...smoosh boobs...tickle prostates...or whatever. Make all of the costs of this annual checkup covered by my coupon. I hear the number of Americans who haven't seen a doctor in 2+ years...and it makes me wanna scream. Maybe fewer people will die of cancer...stroke...heart disease...if they actually GO to the doctor and get it diagnosed early before they start having symptoms and feel sick.

Plus...a LOT of common medical concerns can be treated on one visit a year. Illnesses like high-cholesterol requiring nutritional counseling. Prescriptions for birth control. Allergies. Athsma. Nutritional deficiencies. High blood pressure. Treating certain viruses. Migraines. Cold sores. Etc. Not that it's ideal...but it's better than treating NOTHING on NO visits a year.

You could even put in a reduced cost for treatment of any conditions and/or illnesses diagnosed during this checkup. Or at least some guidance as to where to go for low-cost treatment.

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

Where would the funding come from? Employers who don't offer health insurance. Walmart could pay some sort of 'employee tax' to the government that would help pay for these rudimentary services...or bite the bullet and just provide insurance to employees in order to avoid it. Since payroll taxes are already reported to the government...it's not going to bloat anything to collect another employee based tax from an employer. The self-employed would be required to pay it for themselves.

I'm not an economist...but I do know that plenty of people who work at a company that doesn't offer health insurance ARE insured by a spouse and/or family member who works somewhere that does. So the intake of this tax will probably cover more of the output of the program than one would think. And most business that "balk" will end up showcasing the fact that they don't provide healthcare...which seems like a bad PR move. Better to just pay the $50 - $75 per employee per quarter...or whatever.

That's my $0.02.

Mount Olive...with a side of lutefisk...

2009-10-14T16:03:00.000-05:00

I've been doing some research into the family cemetery. I've been doing it because there's no Wikipedia article on it...and as one of Chicago's older cemeteries...that seems a little odd to me. You can find MILES of information on Mount Olivet Cemetery...it's kind of a who's who of the Chicago dead. But not much about Mount Olive...

But I found a juicy tidbit. One of the cemetery founders was apparently famous bank embezzler, Paul O. Stensland. He was the former president of Milwaukee Avenue Bank...and almost got away with $1,500,000.00. Impressive for 1906! I mean...holy crap. Makes the Enron folks seem like amateurs.

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9F03E4D61F3EE733A25755C2A96F9C946797D6CF

I found several sources citing that he tried to cover up some of the funds by laundering them as his "salary" as president of the Cemetery Association that bought the land that became Mount Olive.

Unlike a lot of Chicago cemeteries...there isn't anyone particularly famous in Mount Olive. (I think that's because Norskies don't typically BECOME famous...preferring to eat herring and drink beer in peace.) Halvol Michelson...one of the largest Great Lakes shipbuilders of the last century...is buried there in a family plot. Olympic gold medalist in swimming, Sybil Bauer. Earl Herold Juul...pitcher for the Brooklyn Tip-Tops in the 1914 season...in the defunct "Federal League." And Niels Juul (no relation) former U.S. Congressman...and U.S. Collector of Customs for Port of Chicago.

Haven't figured out if Mr. Stensland is buried there. One would think that he would have managed to buy a plot in a cemetery he managed...but then again...all of his assets and property were seized...so...

I guess I'll have to stop by and see.

I need to go take photos of the gate...and the viking fountain. And maybe the chapel...even though it's been shuttered for the last 20 years. When I'm finished, I should be able to post a pretty comprehensive article for Wikipedia. Even though I'll probably be the only person interested in it.

But besides my Great Aunt Helen...who is in Mount Emblem (because it's a Masonic cemetery...and my Uncle Bill and Aunt Helen were big into lodge) all of the rest of the Ericksons are there. My Grandpa Arthur and Grandma Mickey. My Great Grandparents Andrew and Martha. Great Aunts Anne and Alice. Great Uncle Edwin. My Uncle Melvin. None of them historical figures. Most of them people I never met. But family nonetheless.

Time to make the donuts...

2008-11-21T15:33:00.002-06:00

So...right now I've been attacked by the PMS monster. My leg hurts...my back hurts...I feel bloated...and I'm glad my desk chair has adjustible arm rests because my ASS FEELS LIKE IT'S EXPANDING AS I TYPE.

*sigh*

So...despite my best wants to the contrary...I ate a gigantenormous number of mini-donuts last night. If you're from Chicago...Butternut mini "gems" as they used to be called are a classic. In their yellow happy paper bag full of powdery or chocolately goodness. Thing is...whenever the mini donut craving hits I want powdered AND chocolate covered and it's all I can do to not sit down and eat both bags.

Well...lucky for me I have a dog.

I left my bag of powdered mini-donuts momentarily unattended...and the next thing I know Rerun is running around the living room with a donut bag on his head bumping into things like a deranged pinball.

My yell of..."AAAAAAAHHHH....my donuts!" brought Tim out of the dining room to fish the bag off of Rerun's head and give him a good..."No...no...baddoggie!"

Rerun slunk around on the floor...as is his usual response...and then submissively rolled over to show his belly.

He had powdered sugar all around his nose. Are there doggie coke addicts?

Anyway...I just couldn't be mad at him. He saved me from 1300 calories of mini donuts...and made me smile.

Oh I hate to get up in the Mooorning!

2008-10-10T18:00:00.002-05:00

Why can't I get to work on time?

I'm sure my boss would love to know the answer to that question too. Hell...I'd like to know the answer to that question.

This morning...I woke up with the dog laying on my back. I don't usually sleep face down...but I must have rolled over and eventually Rerun must have thought..."Hey...Mom is warm...I think I'll sleep on her."

But I didn't wake up for it. Sometimes I don't wake up for my alarm. Sometimes I sit in bed in a semi-conscious state for almost an hour because my brain was aroused at a time when the wonders of Effexor made it incredibly flush with serotonin. I sit in my half-coma as Tim hands me my coffee and glasses.

So I wait. Wait for whatever magic is in the coffee to kick in. Wait for that time when I can think in a coherent sentence. Sometimes I read a magazine...and after I feel I can actually FOLLOW along with what I'm reading...I start moving for the day. Sometimes I load or unload the dishwasher...those are GOOD days when I can actually attempt a physical task.

Where did the morning sleepy paranoia come from? It came from the sleety morning when there was an accident on 290 so I decided to take Ridgeland/Nagle to work. I was somewhere around Fullerton when a car hydroplaned in front of me...and in my half-asleep state I overcompensated....popped the curb...splashed latte ALL OVER MY FUCKING CAR...and "woke up" with my car on the sidewalk. Right next to a bus shelter.

Three feet...and I would have swerved into a bus shelter full of people.

And ever since then driving to work in the morning has been an anxious...nerve wracking and disappointing experience. Disappointing because I want to be on time...but panic and nervousness that only comes from having that near-near-death-experience happen just gets in the way. The doctor has me waking up at 6am. I have this list of crap I'm supposed to do that I never get done but try. Sometimes I forget to shower. Sometimes I lose my keys or socks or whatever. And some days...the dog sleeps on me and I'm just too warm and calm and comfortable to get out of bed and face the day.

Patchwork

2008-07-22T08:29:00.002-05:00

This morning...I woke up a burrito. You know...when you wrap the blankets around you and roll to the left...roll to the right...twist and shout...and then the dog can lick you on the face as much as he wants to because your arms are unceremoniously clamped to your side...

One of those mornings...

But some of it is my new quilt. My birthday quilt that my Mommy made for me and finished six months 'better late than never' late.

It's great. My quilt. Because my Mommy made it...and it's purple...and it's the perfect weight for a summer blanket...

Mom has been wanting to quilt forever. But work has pretty much prevented her from putting her time into it. She seems to have just about enough focus to do one sort of "project" thing at a time...and work was taking up all of her energy. So now...quilts. She made me a weird sort of lap quilt covered in sailboats and fish...and now my purple quilt. And later this month...she's taking a class in T-shirt quilts...and called me with the long list of all the Snoopy T-shirts of mine that she's had saved....since I was like in the eighth grade.

Scary...what your Mommy will save of yours....

But I wonder what she must have thought every time she moved the 40 or so T-shirts she'd been saving for that rainy day where I magically wanted them again. Wanted something that she'd done for me. It has to suck...being a parent. For so many years you're the center of another human being's world...and then...you're like yesterday's newspaper.

To box or not to box...

2008-07-15T10:30:00.002-05:00

My mother’s life insurance policy came up for renewal…or review…or whatever. It’s a 14k policy. If she cashes it in now…she’ll get 7k. She doesn’t want to leave me with funeral expenses. I ask…if I can’t bury my own mother…who am I going to bury? Just pre-pay for whatever you really want…and I’ll arrange with church for everything else.

So…that brought about the whole discussion of what she wanted. Cremated…put on her brother Melvin’s grave…no embalming. And no viewing…just a memorial service.

Sounds good to me.

I have this whole horror at the idea of rotting underground. And an equally strong horror of embalming. My Grandmother was buried whole…but not embalmed…in an “eco” coffin and liner. So she’ll return to the earth. Which is what we’re supposed to do. But sometimes I find myself morbidly wondering what she must look like now. Liquid? Solid? Mushy? I’ve seen photos of corpses before…and…well…

I’m all for cremation.

I was surprised how fine and white my dog Linus’s cremains were. I wanted to see them at least once before they went into his little photo holder urn/box thing. It was a surprisingly heavy squarish plastic packet of grey powder. My fuzzy dog…in a little box. I have to say…I can’t remember crying harder than when Tim returned from Iowa with the little plastic box that they give you. Last time I’d held my dog…he was warm and soft and alive. Then…box.

So…that left me wondering what I wanted? First…donate whatever can be donated. Eyeballs…liver…hair…really…if I go to God bald and missing my heart and kidneys…I’m all down with that. Then…no embalming fluid. C’mon…it’s just GROSS for one…and the idea that someone can dig me up in 100 years and poke around at me. Just…well…no. It’s my body…and I don’t want to be someone’s stinky science project a century from now.

Then…memorial service. Preferably some sort of picnic thing where everyone can drink and enjoy themselves. Like what I did for Linus. Say something. Shake my urn for good luck. Donate to charity in lieu of flowers. Have a few hot dogs. Most of all…I don’t want anyone to spend a whole lot of money on a funeral home. It will NOT be what I wanted. Ever. Not that I don’t like funeral homes…or think less of people who have the “traditional American funeral” but…well…if you’re going to do that….lay me out on the couch with my favorite afghan and come on by the house and have an “old-fashioned American funeral.”

Then…I might as well hang out with Mom and Grandma Mickey. There will be a space on Grandma Mickey’s grave for an urn. Just put a few teaspoons of my dogs in with me…and put a tiny marker for anyone who feels the need to visit…name…dates…and that’s really it. Cause in 50 years…who will visit? My non-existent Grandchildren? Nobody will visit. And in some ways…it’s sad that after I’m gone…there’s nobody to visit Mom…or Grandma…or Melvin…or Andrew and Martha…my Great Grandparents.

OCD...you can't catch me...

2008-06-22T14:41:00.002-05:00

A while back I went down to Rush to participate in a study of the genetics of depression. It was an interesting experience...made moreso because my interviewer had gone to college down at Northeast Missouri State at the same time I did...and knew a bunch of the same people.

It was an interview...a blood test...and a questionaire. All in all about three hours of my life...hopefully to make a difference in someone else's.

My Grandmother...she had a lot of stuff going on. Depression, schizophrenia...probably actually suffered from Bipolar 1...but when we put her in the nursing home...at the forefront was OCD.

My grandmother was a compulsive hoarder.

I know I've told friends about the whole process of putting my grandmother into the hospital. Cleaning her apartment was a cross between an archeological dig and a superfund environmental remediation. Among other things...many, many other things...she hoarded her garbage. Food garbage. There were at least four years of take out containers from the local corner diner stacked up in her kitchen...and because she lived in a vintage Chicago multi-union apartment building that meant.

Cockroaches. Big time. Not one here and one there...it was Stephen King's Creepshow in proportion. The floor was sticky and crunchy and covered in a brown sort of "dirt" that was actually the rotted casings of what was probably six to eight years of dead cockroaches. In some places...over an inch thick.

The smell...well...anyone who has ever lived in the city knows what roach smell smells like. It's kind of a weird stale musty smell...produced by a combination of roach poop, roach oil and roach vomit.

Mmmmmm....

And if you do know...imagine it amplified to the same level as dead skunk at the side of the road. The smell burned in my nostrils...and the only thing that made it go away was rubbing Vicks on my upper lip. A trick I learned from some sort of crime detective mystery novel...used to mask the smell of rotting flesh. And I pulled my socks up over my jeans...rubber banded them to my legs...and added tape for good measure. Kept my hair under a shower cap. Really...it was so nasty that it was just me and Mom and Tim working on it because I couldn't possibly ask a friend or another family member to help with that. It was the kind of horror you would never invite someone else into knowingly.

The day before we went in to start cleaning...Mom and I went over with a couple of industrial strength roach foggers. That was the creepiest...because there was this sort of crinkle noise in the room from all of the moving insect life. Like leaves or papers moving in a mild wind. We plunked two bombs on the kitchen counter...and hauled ass.

And the next day...we came to clean and sort. At first...my mother wanted to look through every bag of garbage...but the green maggot filled trays in the first couple of bags changed her mind...so everything in the kitchen that was already bagged as garbage went out as-is. At least my Grandmother was nice enough to bag her garbage...

It took over three weeks...for a 700 square foot apartment.

So if anyone wants to know why clutter and junk and dust and dirt bothers me so much. Why seeing one cockroach in my house will send me into a nervous frenzy of cleaning...that's why. Because I didn't need a study and an interview to tell me that SOMETHING runs in the family besides thick calves and broad shoulders.

The compulsive hoarding cases you see on television now that Oprah has gotten interested in the subject...and it's on TLC's "Clean Sweep" and such...and that old ladies with 70 dogs make the news headlines...it seems commonplace.

God I hope not...

I had a funny thing happen at the beginning of the month. I keep tossing around the idea of becomming a professional home organizer...along with the idea of becoming a dog groomer...or robbing a bank and moving to my own island in the Carribean...anyway...

I bought a copy of Peter Walsh's book..."It's All Too Much" on the suggestion of a friend...and was a little disappointed that there were sections in there for organizing your kids...but not your pets. And my dog has a ton of crap.

So I jotted down a few ideas...found Peter Walsh's website...and sent them off thinking..."Hmmm...i'll get added to some sort of automated mailing list..."

Nope. I got a phone call. "Hi...this is Peter Walsh..." on my voicemail...in his cute Australian accent and everything. He wanted to use my e-mail for his June newsletter...and I was like..."Hell yeah!..."

So...later on in the day...he called back. While I was at my desk. We commiserated for a few seconds on both being employed in anal retentive type A personality jobs...and I mentioned that plenty of my friends thought I should become a home organizer...

He said something to the effect: "...that it LOOKS cool until you spend two weeks wading through someone's floor to ceiling full-o-crap-garage...."

Yeah...I know what that looks...smells like...and no thank you. Because for every five people who have every Prescious Moments figurine in the world taking up every square inch of their home...there's someone like my Grandmother...who is genuinely mentally ill...who can't let go of foam take-out containers because without them...she'll lose her sense of self.

Bark...

2008-06-20T10:15:00.001-05:00

My dog barks when I'm not home. He barks when we leave. It's separation anxiety pure and simple.

Thing is...every time I leave I feel like barking too. I mean...I go out the door to work and 99.9% of me is screaming..."GO BACK AND PET THE DOG!"

This wouldn't be so bad except I've been getting the Nellie report every morning. Monday: Your dog is barking...could you do somethine? Tuesday: Still barking...how about shutting your windows? Wednesday: Still barking...I can hear him through your window fan. Thursday: Still barking...ever thought of one of those anti-bark collars?

Friday...I kind of feel like recording 30 minutes of my dog barking...and hanging one of my stereo speakers out the window. I think tonight is gonna be PUNK ROCK MUSIC NIGHT! I'm gonna pull out all of my Black Flag and The Misfits and she can listen to "I Ain't No Goddamn Son of a Bitch" turned up all the way to eleven.

I know all of the techniques for teaching my dog not to bark. Thing is...I'd just rather be home than teach him not to bark when I'm away...

So...today I'll shop online for smarter dog toys...and tomorrow I'll talk to the dog trainers at animalsense.com where I take classes about ways to stop the barking. But the real way is for me to JUST IGNORE IT. No yelling...because then whenever he barks he'll get to hear Mommy yell at him which sounds like..."Blah, Booiiah...Rerun!!" to him.

It's stress....anxiety. I mean I took two months off of work to get my head back together and work on getting my own tired ass outof bed to work on time and I have some retired woman who want's to sleep in complaining about my barking dog.

GET A JOB. BUY EARPLUGS. Better yet...why don't I just drop him off at your place every morning and you can entertain him for the day?

Really...sometimes...I really like Nellie. Because I appreciate busybodyness. Sometimes...I want to bury her head first in the front courtyard.

But really...I feel that way about everyone from time to time.