The Gershwin brothers wrote that summertime was "when the livin' is easy." Maybe so, but, nothing is easy when you are 85 years old. At least summertime in western Colorado is definitely when the fruit and other food stuffs are ripe and luscious. Now the wild asparagus is just a memory, and in spite of the early rain, mushrooms don't seem to be cooperating by hatching. But the peaches, pears, cherries, melons, and ... Olathe Sweet Corn... are all available and delicious. I don't try to freeze it anymore, since the process of cutting it off the cob is rather messy, but we do eat it as often as we can and enjoy it while it is available.
I'm not sure when Olathe Sweet Corn came to market, but I have seen it distributed in stores in a lot of other places besides around here. I've watched in wonder when they send those automatic pickers into the fields with people working on the platforms and ta-da! In only a little while a whole field has been picked, packed on ice, and is on its way to markets near and far. For us locals, there are plenty of entrepreneurs who pick corn by hand, throw it into the back of their pickup trucks, cover the crop with ice and blankets, and bring it alongside the highways and do a thriving business selling it. We are told that Olathe Sweet is so good because the Colorado nights are cool. The nights have sure been cool this year.
One of the drawbacks for do-it-yourself consumers has always been that you can't buy the seeds for Olathe Sweet and grow the corn independently if you are a gardener. The owners of the patent do not release seeds to anyone except commercial growers. I've tried to find seeds but have always been told that they aren't available. Not that I blame the people who developed the crop or the farmers who grow it. But there are some changes on the horizon. Competition! Capitalism! I love it!
Last Sunday's Denver Post ran a story about a new type of sweet corn, supposedly superior (sweeter and earlier) than Olathe Sweet, that was developed in Montrose, CO. The name of the corn is Mirai (pronounced Me-Rye). The Post article reported that in Japan the corn is sold as a dessert. It is such tender eating you don't need teeth! At this time, limited production goes to selected restaurants but seeds are available from Park, Jung, and Harris. I've ordered seeds and can't wait to try to grow some. This location, near Olathe and Montrose, should be just right.
My mother-in-law used to plant her sweet corn, wait until it came up, and then planted Kentucky Wonder green beans right beside the corn stalk, using it as a stake for the beans. Saves looking about for a fence, because we 85 year olds don't like to squat to pick beans, either. (To squat is easy, to get back up again, divine.) I like green beans with beans in them, and the green beans you get in the grocery store now just don't fill that need. Sufferin' succotash, all I have to do is last long enough to garden another year...
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
What's in a name?
I have to disagree with Mr. Shakespeare. Parting has no part of sweet sorrow. There is nothing sweet about parting, if the people with whom you part are those you love.
Then there was the time I had to have blood drawn and as I was in the physician's office at the time, he delegated that job to his staff. Let it be known that everyone in that office was professional, trained, and able. But also consider that I am a lousy blood drawee, with veins that collapse whenever they even sense a needle a mile away. Both the Licensed Practical Nurse and the Registered Nurse poked and poked, but the result was a dry hole, both arms, not that they didn't diligently try. Too diligently. They wouldn't admit failure. Now that is an admirable quality in the case of courage, paying taxes, or going to the dentist for a root canal, but not if you are the drawee who started out squeamish in the first place. So I was sent to the hospital. As I was waiting to see who would come into that tiny room loaded with vials and mission statements, all of which I noted, read, and disbelieved, there entered this cute little hippy-type girl who 
bounced in and said "Hi! My name is Kizzy, and I'm here to draw your blood!" She seemed actually happy about the assignment. My thoughts were, "OH, S***! Now I have to deal with this little snippy kid and I am too young to die myself, I am one year away from Social Security". But the chair they put you in has an arm that keeps you in there, and as I said, it was a tiny room, she was between the door and me, and I was trapped. So I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth and tried to relax while she put the tourniquet on, and three seconds later, Kizzy said, "All Done!" and sure enough she had a syringe full of that dark red stuff and the ordeal was over and I hadn't felt a thing. From that time to this day, my motto is, Phlebotomists Rule, even if their name was Kizzy.
bounced in and said "Hi! My name is Kizzy, and I'm here to draw your blood!" She seemed actually happy about the assignment. My thoughts were, "OH, S***! Now I have to deal with this little snippy kid and I am too young to die myself, I am one year away from Social Security". But the chair they put you in has an arm that keeps you in there, and as I said, it was a tiny room, she was between the door and me, and I was trapped. So I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth and tried to relax while she put the tourniquet on, and three seconds later, Kizzy said, "All Done!" and sure enough she had a syringe full of that dark red stuff and the ordeal was over and I hadn't felt a thing. From that time to this day, my motto is, Phlebotomists Rule, even if their name was Kizzy. On the other hand, you can't argue with Gertrude Stein when she said, "A rose is a rose is a rose" now, can you?
There are times when politicians put "spin" on what was actually said, to explain what was actually meant, when the person actually meant what was actually said but it's too embarrassing to contemplate...
There are times when another, nicer, more socially acceptable word is used to dilute actions or feelings we'd prefer to not acknowledge, a euphemism, such as "cowardice" for "gutless". Most of the words our Saxon ancestors left us have been relegated into something prettier. It loses a little (sometimes a whole lot) in the translation, however.
And there are word phrases that lead you down a primrose path into thinking you have something valuable and you don't really, like "limited warranty".
The word "recovery" has been kicked around a lot lately. So far, the means of how we will deal with the consequences of the debt involved have not been disclosed. I haven't heard "raised taxes" or "inflation" to pay back the debt with cheaper dollars (too bad, Mr. China), yet, but I suspect we will before the next election.
I understand from TV this morning that "health care reform" has been changed to "health insurance reform" hoping to take the wind out of the sails of the protesters. I think we should be changing the name of "town hall meetings" to "hornet's nests". Why are living wills which have been around for over 20 years being called "death panels" when they can prevent a person's being comotose and tied up to feeding tubes as long as they draw breath artifically? Just get a copy of one and read it and decide for yourself. Have you lost the ability to read and think?
So, what's in a name? It depends. Get a dictionary if you have to. Don't take anything for granted.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Home Sweet Home
If I had the time or the inclination, I would work a cross-stitch sampler and hang it on the wall of my cabin, my little grey home in the West. Built on the side of a draw, it clings for dear life to the four steps down to where the land eases off, and is poised towards the creek which runs year-round and circles the building about four feet away (and another three feet down). That extra space gives peace of mind during spring run-off. Once it came up to within six inches of the building, which gave "cliffhanger" a new meaning to us overnight, but then it subsided and the relief was palpable.
The noise of the water racing 2,500 feet down from the mountain, past the cabin, got attention and brought forth words like "roaring" and "thunder," not to mention "catastrophe," "did you leave the car running?" and "is that our dog on the other side of the creek?" But it all turned out alright.
When we bought it, there were no bedrooms, just a four foot dressing space opening into the bathroom. It had (still has) of all things, a pink tub, sink, and toilet, quite a surprise to find in the mountain west. Eventually the cabin got added on to, several times, and perched as it was on the incline, we used to joke that there were no plumb walls or square corners, and that I should answer the telephone "House of Shims."
The first summer we spent there we had five children, and since our double bed was squeezed into that four foot dressing space, during the night it was not unusual to have kids gingerly stepping between us, and on us, in order to get to the john. It was togetherness with a vengeance. They all slept in the living room. The boys were encouraged to find a bush, outside, but the girls insisted on using the indoor plumbing. We adapted. It was no big deal.
Now there are two bedrooms, a media room (small but oh so beautiful looking out over the waterfall), two baths, a utility room, and a spa room. All added one stick at a time whenever we had enough money scraped together to buy the 2x4s and nails. The setting was, is, a grove of aspen trees, but the first year I purchased 50 evergreen pines and spruces six inches tall from the Forest Service (at 50 cents apiece), and they have now reached maturity at 40 to 50 feet. The aspens are dying out, but provide firewood for the taking which includes a tremendous amount of effort. Wild lupine, penstemmon, fireweed and violets grew wild along the paths, and they live happily (well, no complaints) alongside of the introduced vincas, tulips, and daffodils that we planted.
The creek is about the same as it was 35 years ago -- no larger, no smaller. It bursts forth at the top of the mountain as a rivulet that collects spring outflows as it goes along, gathered together in a man-made slough. It then heydays down the 2,500 feet past the cabin and eventually ends up as irrigation water in orchards and alfalfa fields in the flatlands, then on to the Gunnison and Colorado River. Does any of it end up in Mexico? Doubtful. But it has done its job adding life, fruit, and oh yes, native trout to the environment in between.
I love to trout fish in the creek, because if you put your bait into the creek, and you wait a few minutes with no action, move on, there are no receptors in that particular location. I don't own a real fishing pole. I have an old cut off broken pole with a few of the eyes left to thread the line through, and I let myself have about 20 feet of it because I don't have a reel, either. When I get a bite, I furiously pull on the end of the line that is tied off by the broken handle, and flip the trout onto the bank and run over and cover him gently with my foot lest he flop back into the water. That is, I used to run over. Now I don't execute this part of the process as quickly. Come to think of it, I haven't caught any fish lately, either.
However, nothing tastes better than a trout, freshly caught, gutted, salted and peppered and floured, fried up in a bit of oil for breakfast. "We're living off the land!" I used to say enthusiastically. We also had chokecherry jelly for our toast -- it is an acquired taste which means it is good if strawberry is not available. But then, a gin martini is an acquired taste also, and I don't see anyone faulting it for that.
There was a time in Colorado when the Game and Fish Department let citzens over 65 have life-time fishing and small game licenses for the ridiculous sum of less than $5. It is a prized possession -- both Dick and I have one -- because once a year, in the fall, when the land-locked salmon run upstream from Blue Mesa to where they were implanted in the Roaring Judy, milked salmon are given away to Colorado fishing license holders. We went two years ago, and intend to repeat it this fall.
It runs like clockwork. You form a line at the fish hatchery, and it pokes along for about two or three miles until you come to the enclosures where the milked salmon are let back into the creek. Then there is a young man (just getting started, I'll wager, and literally getting his feet wet in the system) that is down in a pool. He dips his net into the water and brings it up wriggling and thrashing -- it is so full of fish he can't lift it over his head, and on the bank there is another strong young man who takes the net and dumps it out onto a slough where workers sort fish five into a sack, and bring it down to your car and put them into your ice chst. So we got ten fish (five to a license that year) -- Big Ones -- and brought them home and cleaned, fileted, and smoked them. It took almost an entire day for a couple of pounds of dry fish, but they were FREE! We were living off the land.
It is one of the few things that stay in place. They used to give away slabs cut off of the evergreen trees at the sawmill. We built a barn out of them. There may still be a few cattle drives that go past the cabin on the way up to the National Forest; I would clean the streets of manure after they had passed for my compost pile, but you can't put a value on the thrill of watching them go by and hoping they didn't stray off into the garden to make the deposit first hand. The cattleman's dogs saw to that.
The mountain is still full of wild strawberries that bloom prolifically, but I hardly ever see any strawberries to pick. Once I did, and the kids and I spent two happy hours filling a cup -- they are so small, about as big as your little fingernail, but the taste, the taste -- is nectar. Dividing up one cup of heaven amongst one adult and three or four kids doesn't take long, but the memory outlasts social security, arthritis, homework duties, a root canal, or other losses too numerous and insignificant to mention.
One advantage that still exists is stalking the wild mushrooms. I think it was the year 1985 that there was a 100 year mushroom "bloom" on the Mesa. There was hardly a space where mushrooms didn't grow abundantly. Lately there have been a spate of the poisonous ones, the gorgeo
us red ones with white fly killer specks on top, but if you know not to try them, let them be and admire their beauty, is my motto. The ones you want to find are the boletus, the French call them Ceps, look them up in your handy mushroom book. They don't have gills, they have pores, but not every mushroom with pores is edible, so go the first time with someone who is knowledgeable. Sometimes the forest service has classes. In every locality there are mushroom experts to identify your treasures. Find out who they are and use them. Some people are allergic to fungus; it is best to try just a little if you are eating them the first time. Stay AWAY from any fungus with white gills, just to be sure they are not Death Angels. They can kill you. You don't want to die whilst living off the land.
I've never seen a poisonous snake at 10,000 feet, but Sidewinders are present down at the lower altitudes. Just so you know. They live off the land, too.
Like every location, there are good things and not so good things. The best thing about Colorado that is not spoken of often is the air. You forget how good the air smells after you have been gone for a while. Take a deep breath. Sleep with the windows open. If you are comfortable at sea level, take a little while to get used to the altitude. Carbon monoxide in the mountains is just as deadly as carbon monoxide on the coast. Find yourself a little place on the Western Slope, away from the Madding Crowd, use less electricity, plant something, build a fire in the fireplace to take the chill off at night, see how many stars there are that you can see in the sky, and watch yourself grow.
To grow makes living exquisite, and ends this piece on a positive note...
The noise of the water racing 2,500 feet down from the mountain, past the cabin, got attention and brought forth words like "roaring" and "thunder," not to mention "catastrophe," "did you leave the car running?" and "is that our dog on the other side of the creek?" But it all turned out alright.When we bought it, there were no bedrooms, just a four foot dressing space opening into the bathroom. It had (still has) of all things, a pink tub, sink, and toilet, quite a surprise to find in the mountain west. Eventually the cabin got added on to, several times, and perched as it was on the incline, we used to joke that there were no plumb walls or square corners, and that I should answer the telephone "House of Shims."
The first summer we spent there we had five children, and since our double bed was squeezed into that four foot dressing space, during the night it was not unusual to have kids gingerly stepping between us, and on us, in order to get to the john. It was togetherness with a vengeance. They all slept in the living room. The boys were encouraged to find a bush, outside, but the girls insisted on using the indoor plumbing. We adapted. It was no big deal.
Now there are two bedrooms, a media room (small but oh so beautiful looking out over the waterfall), two baths, a utility room, and a spa room. All added one stick at a time whenever we had enough money scraped together to buy the 2x4s and nails. The setting was, is, a grove of aspen trees, but the first year I purchased 50 evergreen pines and spruces six inches tall from the Forest Service (at 50 cents apiece), and they have now reached maturity at 40 to 50 feet. The aspens are dying out, but provide firewood for the taking which includes a tremendous amount of effort. Wild lupine, penstemmon, fireweed and violets grew wild along the paths, and they live happily (well, no complaints) alongside of the introduced vincas, tulips, and daffodils that we planted.
The creek is about the same as it was 35 years ago -- no larger, no smaller. It bursts forth at the top of the mountain as a rivulet that collects spring outflows as it goes along, gathered together in a man-made slough. It then heydays down the 2,500 feet past the cabin and eventually ends up as irrigation water in orchards and alfalfa fields in the flatlands, then on to the Gunnison and Colorado River. Does any of it end up in Mexico? Doubtful. But it has done its job adding life, fruit, and oh yes, native trout to the environment in between.
I love to trout fish in the creek, because if you put your bait into the creek, and you wait a few minutes with no action, move on, there are no receptors in that particular location. I don't own a real fishing pole. I have an old cut off broken pole with a few of the eyes left to thread the line through, and I let myself have about 20 feet of it because I don't have a reel, either. When I get a bite, I furiously pull on the end of the line that is tied off by the broken handle, and flip the trout onto the bank and run over and cover him gently with my foot lest he flop back into the water. That is, I used to run over. Now I don't execute this part of the process as quickly. Come to think of it, I haven't caught any fish lately, either.
However, nothing tastes better than a trout, freshly caught, gutted, salted and peppered and floured, fried up in a bit of oil for breakfast. "We're living off the land!" I used to say enthusiastically. We also had chokecherry jelly for our toast -- it is an acquired taste which means it is good if strawberry is not available. But then, a gin martini is an acquired taste also, and I don't see anyone faulting it for that.
There was a time in Colorado when the Game and Fish Department let citzens over 65 have life-time fishing and small game licenses for the ridiculous sum of less than $5. It is a prized possession -- both Dick and I have one -- because once a year, in the fall, when the land-locked salmon run upstream from Blue Mesa to where they were implanted in the Roaring Judy, milked salmon are given away to Colorado fishing license holders. We went two years ago, and intend to repeat it this fall.
It runs like clockwork. You form a line at the fish hatchery, and it pokes along for about two or three miles until you come to the enclosures where the milked salmon are let back into the creek. Then there is a young man (just getting started, I'll wager, and literally getting his feet wet in the system) that is down in a pool. He dips his net into the water and brings it up wriggling and thrashing -- it is so full of fish he can't lift it over his head, and on the bank there is another strong young man who takes the net and dumps it out onto a slough where workers sort fish five into a sack, and bring it down to your car and put them into your ice chst. So we got ten fish (five to a license that year) -- Big Ones -- and brought them home and cleaned, fileted, and smoked them. It took almost an entire day for a couple of pounds of dry fish, but they were FREE! We were living off the land.
It is one of the few things that stay in place. They used to give away slabs cut off of the evergreen trees at the sawmill. We built a barn out of them. There may still be a few cattle drives that go past the cabin on the way up to the National Forest; I would clean the streets of manure after they had passed for my compost pile, but you can't put a value on the thrill of watching them go by and hoping they didn't stray off into the garden to make the deposit first hand. The cattleman's dogs saw to that.
The mountain is still full of wild strawberries that bloom prolifically, but I hardly ever see any strawberries to pick. Once I did, and the kids and I spent two happy hours filling a cup -- they are so small, about as big as your little fingernail, but the taste, the taste -- is nectar. Dividing up one cup of heaven amongst one adult and three or four kids doesn't take long, but the memory outlasts social security, arthritis, homework duties, a root canal, or other losses too numerous and insignificant to mention.
One advantage that still exists is stalking the wild mushrooms. I think it was the year 1985 that there was a 100 year mushroom "bloom" on the Mesa. There was hardly a space where mushrooms didn't grow abundantly. Lately there have been a spate of the poisonous ones, the gorgeo
us red ones with white fly killer specks on top, but if you know not to try them, let them be and admire their beauty, is my motto. The ones you want to find are the boletus, the French call them Ceps, look them up in your handy mushroom book. They don't have gills, they have pores, but not every mushroom with pores is edible, so go the first time with someone who is knowledgeable. Sometimes the forest service has classes. In every locality there are mushroom experts to identify your treasures. Find out who they are and use them. Some people are allergic to fungus; it is best to try just a little if you are eating them the first time. Stay AWAY from any fungus with white gills, just to be sure they are not Death Angels. They can kill you. You don't want to die whilst living off the land.I've never seen a poisonous snake at 10,000 feet, but Sidewinders are present down at the lower altitudes. Just so you know. They live off the land, too.
Like every location, there are good things and not so good things. The best thing about Colorado that is not spoken of often is the air. You forget how good the air smells after you have been gone for a while. Take a deep breath. Sleep with the windows open. If you are comfortable at sea level, take a little while to get used to the altitude. Carbon monoxide in the mountains is just as deadly as carbon monoxide on the coast. Find yourself a little place on the Western Slope, away from the Madding Crowd, use less electricity, plant something, build a fire in the fireplace to take the chill off at night, see how many stars there are that you can see in the sky, and watch yourself grow.
To grow makes living exquisite, and ends this piece on a positive note...
You made me what I am today (I hope you're satisfied)
fdsaf (space) jkl;j (space) (Remember?)
I have a lot of assistance. Not in the kitchen, where it is immediately apparent as soon as you walk in the house, but in this writing mode. I have a triumvir, kind of, except that all three of them are rolled up into one...
The first part of this three part helper, is my agent/financial advisor, who has an MBA from Fordham University. I have promised my agent 50% of the gross proceeds from sales of these articles (snicker, snicker, how much is 50% of 17 cents, the amount earned so far from Helium.com, payable when it reaches $25 in the year 2300 AD?) I guess the answer to that is $12.50 if we live that long, but please don 't think, "Do the Math" because math has nothing to do with it. Math is algebra, geometry, and calculus, and how many of your friends can do calculus, much less arrive at the square root of anything? We should say, do the Arithmetic. I know they all say Do the Math -- just check at Walmart. They used to have signs hanging from the ceiling saying just that -- it is because they can't spell arithmetic. I can help:
A Rat In The House May Eat The Ice Cream
There. My Editor will be pleased that I made a difference in both Grammar and ciphering.
Speaking of which, the second part of the triumvir is my Editor, who has a Master's degree in English. Not very often does a typo, or a misplaced modifier escape the eagle eye of the Editor. I am going to double the Editor's salary. For budget purposes, how much would two times zero be? Do the arithmetic.
Perhaps the part of triumvir most important in this genre is the technical advisor, the techie, the one who puts all of this together, who understands the workings of outer space, the internet, the spiders, the googles, the digitals. Now listen, I have read Brave New World and I don't want to have any part of it. Sometimes, you can cut the exasperation of the technical advisor (who thinks I can do this as well as understand that) with a knife, but I think I have by reason of the application of heavy amounts of ennui outlasted this attitude. After all, I wasn't a part of the 300 at Thermopylae, or with Colonel Travis at the Alamo, but I understand being stubborn and not getting the message.
There are other kinds of outlets besides those in strip malls. To get yours, you must first live a long time, have educated children, and run with the ball when you are not throwing it to your dog.
CQ, CQ, CQ....or, Is Anybody Out There?
Dah didah dit... Dah dah didah
Such was the forerunner of chat rooms back in Amateur Radio days. You had to have a transmitter (with a transformer so heavy you had to grunt to lift it) and a receiver. You had to know Morse code with an efficiency of at least five words per minute. It was a lot more difficult than entering chat rooms today, though I never heard of sexual predators operating under these circmstances. I guess five words per minute was a little slow for those fast talkers.When I was growing up during the thirties, my cousins and their friends all had these "ham" rigs, and in time I married a fighter pilot who entered his military career as a radio operator in the Signal Corps. Later on, as a Cub Scout Den Mother, I taught Morse Code to my den of six cub scouts for their merit badges, and one of them later entered the U.S. Navy and became a Signalman. I never mastered the flags or tried to, but I guess he did. Pinky, if you are still out there, I hope you are alive and well.
Part of our electronic experiment was to make crystal radios. Each Cub Scout had to bring an empty toilet paper roll, and we furnished the wire, the crystal feeler, and the headsets (we were in the radio business at the time). The toilet paper roll became the core we used to wrap the copper wire around, and the little "feeler" served as a tuning device placed gingerly along the coil until a signal was identified.
When the boys pulled an AM signal out of the empty air, you should have seen the looks on their faces. I suppose it can still be done, but the irony of using a toilet paper roll in order to "make" a radio was a novelty. No one was more surprised than I, but my husband, who masterminded the whole affair, just smiled. His Air Force uniform still hung in the closet, and we were trying to wring a business from out of nothing, but he had the time to share his knowledge and training with others -- some who became his competitors, and he did it with no reservations.
Amateur radio operators were active in those days as one of the first lines of civil defense when disaster (tornadoes, floods, and the like) struck. If you can imagine a world without cell phones, or the internet; still, we lived. Every now and then you can spot an automobile equipped with amateur radio by the antennas they carry, or by their license plate. The plates will be their call letters, like W5EJT, and their houses will look a bit like Cheyenne Mountain. The lower the radio band, the taller the antenna. That's where you may go when the electricity is out (they mostly have their own power supplies) and perhaps you want to know how your old parents are doing in Minneapolis. And he will call on his transmitter, CQ, CQ, CQ, Minnesota, is anybody out there? Come back.
I think he will still get an answer. I hope so. The American Radio Relay League (ARRL) is still alive and well. Google it!
When the boys pulled an AM signal out of the empty air, you should have seen the looks on their faces. I suppose it can still be done, but the irony of using a toilet paper roll in order to "make" a radio was a novelty. No one was more surprised than I, but my husband, who masterminded the whole affair, just smiled. His Air Force uniform still hung in the closet, and we were trying to wring a business from out of nothing, but he had the time to share his knowledge and training with others -- some who became his competitors, and he did it with no reservations.
Amateur radio operators were active in those days as one of the first lines of civil defense when disaster (tornadoes, floods, and the like) struck. If you can imagine a world without cell phones, or the internet; still, we lived. Every now and then you can spot an automobile equipped with amateur radio by the antennas they carry, or by their license plate. The plates will be their call letters, like W5EJT, and their houses will look a bit like Cheyenne Mountain. The lower the radio band, the taller the antenna. That's where you may go when the electricity is out (they mostly have their own power supplies) and perhaps you want to know how your old parents are doing in Minneapolis. And he will call on his transmitter, CQ, CQ, CQ, Minnesota, is anybody out there? Come back.
I think he will still get an answer. I hope so. The American Radio Relay League (ARRL) is still alive and well. Google it!
Friday, July 3, 2009
Social commentaries
The opinions expressed are personal.
Life With Luigi: Luigi was an Italian immigrant and his life was intertwined with Pasquale, who had assisted in providing passage for him to this country. Pasquale was an entrepreneur interested primarily in enriching himself, and was always scheming about how to take Luigi to the cleaners. He would approach Luigi with "Luigi, my friend," and everyone knew that Luigi was in for it. The story always came to a conclusion with Luigi escaping Pasquale's clutches by some miracle, or by Pasquale getting what was coming to him. It made you feel good for the villain to be outsmarted by the simple folks with a little help from karma. We need a lot more of that today.
They are not even widely accepted.
Remember the old time radio programs?
Life With Luigi: Luigi was an Italian immigrant and his life was intertwined with Pasquale, who had assisted in providing passage for him to this country. Pasquale was an entrepreneur interested primarily in enriching himself, and was always scheming about how to take Luigi to the cleaners. He would approach Luigi with "Luigi, my friend," and everyone knew that Luigi was in for it. The story always came to a conclusion with Luigi escaping Pasquale's clutches by some miracle, or by Pasquale getting what was coming to him. It made you feel good for the villain to be outsmarted by the simple folks with a little help from karma. We need a lot more of that today.Bob and Ray: They always signed off their program with "Write if you get work, or hang by your thumbs." Hmm. Not much of a choice there, but it aired during and after the Depression, when options (good or bad) were pretty scarce, and all options seemed reasonable.
Ring! Ring! Ring! "Hello, Duffy's Tavern, where the elite meet to eat, Archie the manager speaking, Duffy ain't here." Duffy was never there, but a parade of neighborhood characters were, including but not limited to Digger O'Dell, the friendly undertaker...
Then there was Yukon King, the dog, who had to console himself that without Sergeant Preston, the show wouldn't have been so successful. Dogs are like that. They do the work, and others get the credit. Not fair, but "dese are de conditions which prevail(ed)" (Jimmy Durante).
Amos and Andy: This show was considered racist, but I could never understand why. I guess a simple peasant girl can't be expected to understand everything. Stephen Fetchet played a laid back Black and made a good living at it in the early movies, but the part was scrapped as a poor character example. As if someone like William Warfield could be mistaken for a lazy, needed-to-be-prodded person of color. He was acting, not running for Congress. Yet today, vampires, monsters, scoundrels, floozies, and bankers are considered heroes. The bad guys were identifiable in Amos and Andy's day, while it seems bad guys are those in a position of trust today. No doubt this is progress.
Speaking of racist, when the Daughters of the American Revolution prohibited Marian Anderson from singing in Independence Hall, I promptly resigned my membership and told them why. I never did receive a response back from them, and I never did reinstate my membership.
Let's talk about women's styles. I've noticed that everyday housewives are aping the TV and movie stars. In the boob department, little is left to the imagination. No longer are we restricted to cleavage confrontation, we are seeing the east and west side of two slim hangy-downs. Both of them. All of them as a matter of fact. No man's land to the north has been available for a long time, but I never expected the image to widen that far. The only modesty still available is reserved for nipples, those end providers of preferred sustenance for new children, I suppose spared from public view because of their practical purpose(s). I applaud such visual reticence on the part of designers. How long do you think it will last?
I don't mind lusty, under the proper circumstances (candles, dinner, soft music). But in the grocery store? Please. Go home. Get some clothes on. Spare me. I am aware of how you are built and I don't need to see it displayed or even deployed next to the artichokes. (I am not talking about actually nursing a baby, get off your high horse.) But one can't help but wonder and be in awe of a sudden turn to starboard and having things fly into space, knocking down nearby pedestrians, and leaving the occupant-owner to scramble to retrieve 'em. Now that might be fun to watch.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Twitter: To utter successive chirping noises
Let me tell you about Wilferd the Wren, who every year builds his nest on the corner of my mountain cabin. The nest itself is cozy inside a semi-hollow log, with a floor on the bottom and a sloping roof made from a wooden slab. There are so many sticks in it, they protrude out of the hole that is his front door. Wilferd keeps a vigil outside the nest, really a twittering expert, shaking his feathers and jumping up and down on the aspen tree that grows about six feet from his place. Sometimes, I see him flitting from treetop to treetop and singing the most joyous melodic songs. He strings the themes together as though he had been tutored by Simon and Garfunkle. I kind of wait for the guitar accompaniment but so far, nada. It is a capella.
Once, I was resting on the picnic bench right under his nest and I noticed that he was unusually agitated. He chirped an urgent, strident call. I wondered if he had swallowed a worm the wrong way, but then he dove down towards the ground, barely missing me. I thought he was suggesting that I Move, but as I followed his dive I saw that there was a tiny green snake about five inches long that was scurrying just ahead of Wilferd towards the woodpile. Wilferd was defending his nest. He knew that Colorado is a Make My Day state.
As he regained his post in the tree, I got up and decided to rest inside the house to allay any fears that he might have about my own intentions. (I read later in a wildlife book that those green snakes are an endangered species in Colorado, and I know why. Too many of them have been in the wrong place -- close to a wren's nest -- and the wrong time -- when they are brooding -- to survive.)
There are other twitterers outside of my cabin. The mocking bird, Pasquale (I call him that because he is a tenor, and I can just see him in his clown's suit, pulling aside the curtain, and belting out, tears streaming down his cheeks, to the enthralled audience, that Laugh, Clown, Laugh song from Pagliacci.) (This was before television, kids, you may have to ask somebody to explain it to you.) Pasquale the mockingbird is looking for a mate. He hangs out in the tallest trees, on the tallest branch, or on the 50-foot-in-the-air light post. He tells the world his hopes, his dreams, his aspirations. He must be a young bird because he is not very big, and he sang all spring last year but never in the moonlight, which means that he never found a mate, and that is why his songs are so heartrending. (They stop singing when they find a partner, just like us humans.) Pasquale, we know the feeling. We hope you don't die of old age before you get lucky. Next year you'll be bigger. You'll have a better repertory. We are all rooting for you.
Frank and Jesse were a little different. When we first moved to Colorado, I wondered what kind of birds those fancy black and white ones were with the long tail feathers. I thought they might be called cop car birds, but I was informed that they were "Oklahoma pheasants," or magpies. The kid from the ranch next door told me that they were not really welcomed in the bird world: they stole babies from other birds' nests and used the housing for themselves, for example. I had to have a pair. I paid him a dollar to steal two fledglings for me, and he delivered them the next day. (I am sure he told his momma that the crazy lady from Texas wanted them.) Now I had two bandit birds and I didn't know what to feed them. I scrambled an egg and poked it into their beaks, making twittering noises myself, and sure enough, they ate it. We got along pretty well together, me digging worms from the garden and they making themselves at home in my living room for about two weeks until they got to the point that better thinking convinced me to turn them out, and I did. For a while, they would both come to the bedroom window and squawk at me, and I would squawk back at them. But after a while, they went on their scandalous ways and never came back like the teenagers they were.
Now, when I see a magpie flying over, I call out, "Is that you, Frank? Jesse?" But they keep on flying. After all, it was 35 years ago. It was a fun experience, once done, never repeated.
This year, I thought it would be cool, a great adjunct to the back yard, to start feeding the finches. Last year, I saw a few of them around the regular bird feeder, and I thought, Oh boy! Let's attract more of the darling little creatures.
The finch feeder I was able to obtain at the local hardware store is a sock about nine inches long made of small mesh. The food, thistle seeds, is poured into the sock and voila! it is armed and ready. I suspended it from the apricot tree, and sure enough, it wasn't long before several female finches appeared, and then some redheaded males, and one bird with a gold head. Bingo!
Sometimes, there are three to five little birds hanging upside down and sideways on that sock, working away, chowing down. Just some casual twittering: "Cheap. Cheap. Cheap-cheap." (A commentary on the sock? Everyone's a critic.) They are mostly friendly to each other, sharing the bounty selflessly, although yesterday I saw one female chase off a male. Mostly, the eaters just move over to make room for newcomers. Such grace. Such atmosphere. Such harmony, not often seen in nature.
Molly chases them off sometimes, but they come back, secure in the knowledge that dogs can't fly. I guess it is worth the $30 a month to have such a sideshow directly outside the kitchen window.
Once, I was resting on the picnic bench right under his nest and I noticed that he was unusually agitated. He chirped an urgent, strident call. I wondered if he had swallowed a worm the wrong way, but then he dove down towards the ground, barely missing me. I thought he was suggesting that I Move, but as I followed his dive I saw that there was a tiny green snake about five inches long that was scurrying just ahead of Wilferd towards the woodpile. Wilferd was defending his nest. He knew that Colorado is a Make My Day state.
As he regained his post in the tree, I got up and decided to rest inside the house to allay any fears that he might have about my own intentions. (I read later in a wildlife book that those green snakes are an endangered species in Colorado, and I know why. Too many of them have been in the wrong place -- close to a wren's nest -- and the wrong time -- when they are brooding -- to survive.)
There are other twitterers outside of my cabin. The mocking bird, Pasquale (I call him that because he is a tenor, and I can just see him in his clown's suit, pulling aside the curtain, and belting out, tears streaming down his cheeks, to the enthralled audience, that Laugh, Clown, Laugh song from Pagliacci.) (This was before television, kids, you may have to ask somebody to explain it to you.) Pasquale the mockingbird is looking for a mate. He hangs out in the tallest trees, on the tallest branch, or on the 50-foot-in-the-air light post. He tells the world his hopes, his dreams, his aspirations. He must be a young bird because he is not very big, and he sang all spring last year but never in the moonlight, which means that he never found a mate, and that is why his songs are so heartrending. (They stop singing when they find a partner, just like us humans.) Pasquale, we know the feeling. We hope you don't die of old age before you get lucky. Next year you'll be bigger. You'll have a better repertory. We are all rooting for you.
Frank and Jesse were a little different. When we first moved to Colorado, I wondered what kind of birds those fancy black and white ones were with the long tail feathers. I thought they might be called cop car birds, but I was informed that they were "Oklahoma pheasants," or magpies. The kid from the ranch next door told me that they were not really welcomed in the bird world: they stole babies from other birds' nests and used the housing for themselves, for example. I had to have a pair. I paid him a dollar to steal two fledglings for me, and he delivered them the next day. (I am sure he told his momma that the crazy lady from Texas wanted them.) Now I had two bandit birds and I didn't know what to feed them. I scrambled an egg and poked it into their beaks, making twittering noises myself, and sure enough, they ate it. We got along pretty well together, me digging worms from the garden and they making themselves at home in my living room for about two weeks until they got to the point that better thinking convinced me to turn them out, and I did. For a while, they would both come to the bedroom window and squawk at me, and I would squawk back at them. But after a while, they went on their scandalous ways and never came back like the teenagers they were.
Now, when I see a magpie flying over, I call out, "Is that you, Frank? Jesse?" But they keep on flying. After all, it was 35 years ago. It was a fun experience, once done, never repeated.
This year, I thought it would be cool, a great adjunct to the back yard, to start feeding the finches. Last year, I saw a few of them around the regular bird feeder, and I thought, Oh boy! Let's attract more of the darling little creatures.
The finch feeder I was able to obtain at the local hardware store is a sock about nine inches long made of small mesh. The food, thistle seeds, is poured into the sock and voila! it is armed and ready. I suspended it from the apricot tree, and sure enough, it wasn't long before several female finches appeared, and then some redheaded males, and one bird with a gold head. Bingo!
Sometimes, there are three to five little birds hanging upside down and sideways on that sock, working away, chowing down. Just some casual twittering: "Cheap. Cheap. Cheap-cheap." (A commentary on the sock? Everyone's a critic.) They are mostly friendly to each other, sharing the bounty selflessly, although yesterday I saw one female chase off a male. Mostly, the eaters just move over to make room for newcomers. Such grace. Such atmosphere. Such harmony, not often seen in nature.
Molly chases them off sometimes, but they come back, secure in the knowledge that dogs can't fly. I guess it is worth the $30 a month to have such a sideshow directly outside the kitchen window.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
More about Molly
You (probably) already know I have a wild, sedate, smart as a whip, persuasive border collie/Australian Cattle Dog (if you didn't know that, please see my previous posts). To be more exact, she has me. The Cattle Dog part of her (mongrel, Smithfield, dingo, Bull Terrier, dingo, Dalmation, dingo, and Highland Rough Collie) results in all sorts of behaviors. You name it, she does it.
Wild Molly: Sometimes, she just can’t stand it any longer. Out of the blue, she will begin to run in the house. She has adjusted, mostly, to living with two old people and having a very tiny back yard to hang out in. But sometimes she begins to run without warning–from one point to another, like she is following a program. She touches base with an object, a chair, a bit of dust on the floor (well there are lots of bits of dust on the floor), one of her toys, something, and then turns on a dime and rushes over to another target chosen at random, and returns joyously, as though she is accomplishing a task and being repaid for it. Occasionally the run will happen on the stairs, and she chooses a particular step in the string of steps and noses it, (You’re IT!) And returns to the landing, reverses herself, back to the chosen step, and returns, and I mean FAST. She stops just before exhaustion takes over, but she seems very satisfied. I encourage her. I yell out, Run, Molly, RUN! And she does. We can’t do this if my husband is present, but we manage to accomplish this exercise quite frequently.
Sedate Molly. She sits and looks at me. And Looks at me. She is trying to fathom what makes me tick, what I am up to next. She is ready for anything, but she would like a clue as to what it would be.
Smart as a whip Molly. She knows many commands: “Go find the ball!” “Eat your food.” “Want a drink?” “Do you want to go for a ride?” “Molly’s place!” “Molly Up!” “Stop that!” Then, “Go find Mr. Treat!” prompts her to find her Kong and drop it at my feet in the kitchen, where she waits patiently as I stuff it with doggy goodies, return it to her, and she runs into the living room, lies down on the Persian Rug, and begins to harass the Kong until it divulges the contents. I hope that whoever invented the Kong is making a fortune, $9 for a little plastic thingy, but it sure does give her pleasure, and me peace for about 10 minutes.
Molly the persuader. When she wants something, like "Play ball?" she will begin to whine while she drops the toy at my feet. If nothing happens, she will come up to me and sit. Next she will put both paws on the chair I am in. Next, both paws, one at a time, go on my shoulders. Then gently, oh so gently, she will lower her 65 pound, lithe, muscular torso down on my fat, fragile body so she is in a position to lick my face. The crowning gesture is, she will lay her majestic head upon my once lusty bosum. I swear that if she could smile or smirk, that would be displayed. We call this the bear hug. It’s better than chocolate.
Now, if she whines in front of the door, it is poop time. That gets immediate response.
When we are in Arizona, I use PetSmart for vets. They seem to be mostly young, female, probably recently graduated from school. They are very enthusiastic about Molly, just as she is enthusiastic about them. They comment about her shiny coat, her lack of restraint, her otherwise Attitude. They ask, “What do you feed her?” Expecting to hear, I suppose, one of the high dollar dog foods. I tell them, “Purina.” They seem surprised. They tell me, she should be trained to be an agility dog. Now, agility dog trainers in Phoenix make about the same amount of money as a licensed plumber, so that option has so far been denied her. Here in rural Colorado, her vet pulls calves, doctors horses, wears cowboy clothes, and is kind of laconic, John Wayne style. So she has the best of both worlds.
I’ve taken her up to the cabin in the woods twice. She is really excited about a new place, new smells, a different environment. I’ve got to find a sheep ranch that is fenced, has trainer dogs, with herders who have lots of patience. Then maybe, just maybe, Molly won’t have to herd invisible sheep inside the house.
Wild Molly: Sometimes, she just can’t stand it any longer. Out of the blue, she will begin to run in the house. She has adjusted, mostly, to living with two old people and having a very tiny back yard to hang out in. But sometimes she begins to run without warning–from one point to another, like she is following a program. She touches base with an object, a chair, a bit of dust on the floor (well there are lots of bits of dust on the floor), one of her toys, something, and then turns on a dime and rushes over to another target chosen at random, and returns joyously, as though she is accomplishing a task and being repaid for it. Occasionally the run will happen on the stairs, and she chooses a particular step in the string of steps and noses it, (You’re IT!) And returns to the landing, reverses herself, back to the chosen step, and returns, and I mean FAST. She stops just before exhaustion takes over, but she seems very satisfied. I encourage her. I yell out, Run, Molly, RUN! And she does. We can’t do this if my husband is present, but we manage to accomplish this exercise quite frequently.
Sedate Molly. She sits and looks at me. And Looks at me. She is trying to fathom what makes me tick, what I am up to next. She is ready for anything, but she would like a clue as to what it would be.
Smart as a whip Molly. She knows many commands: “Go find the ball!” “Eat your food.” “Want a drink?” “Do you want to go for a ride?” “Molly’s place!” “Molly Up!” “Stop that!” Then, “Go find Mr. Treat!” prompts her to find her Kong and drop it at my feet in the kitchen, where she waits patiently as I stuff it with doggy goodies, return it to her, and she runs into the living room, lies down on the Persian Rug, and begins to harass the Kong until it divulges the contents. I hope that whoever invented the Kong is making a fortune, $9 for a little plastic thingy, but it sure does give her pleasure, and me peace for about 10 minutes.
Molly the persuader. When she wants something, like "Play ball?" she will begin to whine while she drops the toy at my feet. If nothing happens, she will come up to me and sit. Next she will put both paws on the chair I am in. Next, both paws, one at a time, go on my shoulders. Then gently, oh so gently, she will lower her 65 pound, lithe, muscular torso down on my fat, fragile body so she is in a position to lick my face. The crowning gesture is, she will lay her majestic head upon my once lusty bosum. I swear that if she could smile or smirk, that would be displayed. We call this the bear hug. It’s better than chocolate.
Now, if she whines in front of the door, it is poop time. That gets immediate response.
When we are in Arizona, I use PetSmart for vets. They seem to be mostly young, female, probably recently graduated from school. They are very enthusiastic about Molly, just as she is enthusiastic about them. They comment about her shiny coat, her lack of restraint, her otherwise Attitude. They ask, “What do you feed her?” Expecting to hear, I suppose, one of the high dollar dog foods. I tell them, “Purina.” They seem surprised. They tell me, she should be trained to be an agility dog. Now, agility dog trainers in Phoenix make about the same amount of money as a licensed plumber, so that option has so far been denied her. Here in rural Colorado, her vet pulls calves, doctors horses, wears cowboy clothes, and is kind of laconic, John Wayne style. So she has the best of both worlds.
I’ve taken her up to the cabin in the woods twice. She is really excited about a new place, new smells, a different environment. I’ve got to find a sheep ranch that is fenced, has trainer dogs, with herders who have lots of patience. Then maybe, just maybe, Molly won’t have to herd invisible sheep inside the house.
Wildlife
Lately there has been a spate of publicity about a cultural social phenomenon. A new term has been coined, "cougars," and it refers to older women dating younger men. On May 28th, 2009 (just before shutting down its printing and delivery to our front door), The Denver Post headlined this story, "On the Prowl" at the same time that they identified the custom as acceptable and without a negative tone. Is that straddling the fence or what?
I suppose that if you can call older men who pursue younger women as "wolves" that the masterminds who coin new definitions for English words felt that a similar form of wildlife should be found for their female counterparts, and the word "cougar" jumped to mind. If we were to consider the natural world, no "wolf" in his right mind would tackle a "cougar," even on a dare, but there is no one to speak up for our real wildlife but me.
Let's face it, society has changed. The days of barefoot and pregnant are mostly over. Women are better educated, and are left single either because of divorce or death of a spouse. They are already working and earning good money, their children are grown, and yet they hanker for companionship. Are they to choose men their own age (if there are any around who are not burdened by baggage they have accumulated over time), or will they choose to be with younger men (more virile) who are not interested in a long term commitment? -- not that the woman herself has that for an agenda either.
My take on the problem is, let it be. It is not worth titillating over. It is a personal and private choice and relationships are, and should be, personal and private. What the dickens does a difference in age have to do with any of it, since it is not to be long term anyway? Sure, someone is bound to be hurt, in spite of the participants' denials. But we don't learn from success, we learn from failure, and that applies to social life as well as business or education or sports, or the practice of medicine. Thomas Edison was chided because he had tried about 1,000 different metals for his light bulb filament. Mr. Edison replied, well, we know 1,000 metals that don't work.
We may get this relationship thing down in time. But I doubt it. One adage does come to mind though, ladies. You play, you pay.
I suppose that if you can call older men who pursue younger women as "wolves" that the masterminds who coin new definitions for English words felt that a similar form of wildlife should be found for their female counterparts, and the word "cougar" jumped to mind. If we were to consider the natural world, no "wolf" in his right mind would tackle a "cougar," even on a dare, but there is no one to speak up for our real wildlife but me.
Let's face it, society has changed. The days of barefoot and pregnant are mostly over. Women are better educated, and are left single either because of divorce or death of a spouse. They are already working and earning good money, their children are grown, and yet they hanker for companionship. Are they to choose men their own age (if there are any around who are not burdened by baggage they have accumulated over time), or will they choose to be with younger men (more virile) who are not interested in a long term commitment? -- not that the woman herself has that for an agenda either.
My take on the problem is, let it be. It is not worth titillating over. It is a personal and private choice and relationships are, and should be, personal and private. What the dickens does a difference in age have to do with any of it, since it is not to be long term anyway? Sure, someone is bound to be hurt, in spite of the participants' denials. But we don't learn from success, we learn from failure, and that applies to social life as well as business or education or sports, or the practice of medicine. Thomas Edison was chided because he had tried about 1,000 different metals for his light bulb filament. Mr. Edison replied, well, we know 1,000 metals that don't work.
We may get this relationship thing down in time. But I doubt it. One adage does come to mind though, ladies. You play, you pay.
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Rules is Rules
Note from the editor: Hi, Mom! You're terrific! Love, M.
My editor and I had a warm friendly conversation last week about the use of the personal pronoun "us" instead of "we" in the Nomad piece, below. Properly speaking, "we" was the pronoun of choice, like in "we, the people" and "we band of brothers," etc.
My stand was, a simple peasant voman would be thinking in the vernacular subjective sense "us" rather than the patrician collective "we," and it looks like I won this one.
I understand that you can't argue with the rule book unless you wish to take up arms, be subversive, and put it all on the line for an idea (after you have raised a lot of money or received a grant). But you should choose your battles and maybe it isn't worth it for a personal pronoun, unless it is My or Mine.
So I guess this piece entitled Rules is Rules may open the door to communicating about the verb "to be" and plurals. (I wouldn't dare -- editor.) Isn't English exciting? And we haven't even addressed that comedic opportunity scenario, misplaced modifiers, my favorites. I love this job.
My editor and I had a warm friendly conversation last week about the use of the personal pronoun "us" instead of "we" in the Nomad piece, below. Properly speaking, "we" was the pronoun of choice, like in "we, the people" and "we band of brothers," etc.
My stand was, a simple peasant voman would be thinking in the vernacular subjective sense "us" rather than the patrician collective "we," and it looks like I won this one.
I understand that you can't argue with the rule book unless you wish to take up arms, be subversive, and put it all on the line for an idea (after you have raised a lot of money or received a grant). But you should choose your battles and maybe it isn't worth it for a personal pronoun, unless it is My or Mine.
So I guess this piece entitled Rules is Rules may open the door to communicating about the verb "to be" and plurals. (I wouldn't dare -- editor.) Isn't English exciting? And we haven't even addressed that comedic opportunity scenario, misplaced modifiers, my favorites. I love this job.
Friday, May 29, 2009
Euell Gibbons, Luther Burbank, and me
Weeds.
I read once that weeds are doing God's work, keeping the earth green. That's fine with me, but I just wish I could rid them from this little patch of a yard where I live in the summer.
It used to be the wild lettuce, and now it's the dandelions that have staked a claim to my yard, and although I am informed that both are edible, neither appeals to me. Being diabetic, I prefer sweet things, not bitter ones.
The pre-emergent killer stuff works, but then you lose the delightful johnny jump-ups and other volunteer surprises that pop up by themselves. There is just no substitute for getting down on your knees and pulling the unwanted plants up. It's life. You've got to "weed" out the interlopers, the bad guys, and encourage the nicer things... or go live in a high rise apartment and forget about digging in the dirt. There are always options. There are not always options that you like.
Philosophy aside, we are lucky to live in an area where you can actually stalk the wild asparagus. Old timers around here tell us that the asparagus that grows abundantly along the bar ditches in the county are escapees from pioneer gardens. All I know is that the taste of these volunteers is much more flavorful than the cultivated asparagus that you buy in the market. I sometimes surprise overnight guests with creamed asparagus with cheese on toast for breakfast, and they soldier on after the initial shock of eating something green so early in the morning. When we first moved to Colorado, the kids and I would come in from an asparagus foray with about a bushel of asparagus at a time, which we would eat, and/or freeze against "hard times" (summer, fall, and winter) to come. I didn't have a pressure canner then so freezing was the only way to preserve it, but we certainly had our fill while the season lasted, and it was for free.
There are a plethora of tomatoes to choose from when you plant a garden, or even a container. So many kinds, and so tempting, it is difficult not to try for some of each. But I have found that on balance, the very best tomato is the Brandywine, the old heritage stock. It grows luxuriously, with potato-like leaves, and they are large fruits with a wonderful taste. I had so many one year that I had to can most of them (we couldn't eat them all). I felt like I was butchering them to cut them small enough to get into the canning jar. I hope I have the same problem again this year.
I've been asked for gardening advice, and the only thing I can suggest is, Plant stuff that is expensive in the stores.
Besides tomatoes (my goodness, $4 a pound?), try beets, artichokes (fun to grow but you need a large space), peppers, cucumbers, string beans, and whatever your favorites are. A green thumb is usually spelled W-A-T-E-R with F-E-R-T-I-L-I-Z-E-R. Meanwhile, before tomato season, try this simple exercise to enhance the store-bought tomatoes so they won't taste like art gum erasers:
Slice the tomato onto a plate.
Sprinkle lightly with salt, sugar, lemon juice, and olive oil.
Let marinate for a few minutes.
Almost as good as home grown.
(The juice that is generated is good, too.)
Saturday, May 23, 2009
The Nesters
Remember the cowboy movies wherein the ranchers grab up all the public land and think that since they got there first, the land was theirs... until the Nesters arrived and staked out a claim to some of it? And put up fences to keep the cows out, otherwise messing up the landscape and causing a range war?
You may be glad to know that this lifestyle still exists in my backyard, that magnificent spread of about 36 feet by 24 feet, pretty small for a range war. But then, the participants are pretty small, too.
When we moved from the mountain cabin into the house in the village, this was the best place available for the dime, and it had some advantages. The elevation was lower and tomatoes grow better here than at 7,500 feet above sea level. So we set to work and the first thing you knew, we had five fruit trees, a garden spot, a postage stamp of grass, wild asparagus, a solar fountain, 42 (count them) tomato plants, and a bird house in that tiny space. Naturally, we then had to add bird feeders, a swing set, raspberries, a rhubarb plant, an artichoke plant, and a table with an umbrella. Plus a sprinkler system.
I had hoped for a glamorous renter for the birdhouse -- say an oriole, or a bluebird. Instead, our Nester turned out to be Mr. English Sparrow. In nature, a nest isn't needed unless you intent to start a family, and to start a family you need one each of opposite sexes -- this is not going to turn into a political/social essay, relax -- and to attract a female, Mr. E. Sparrow does what other bird dudes do: he sings his mating song. It is nothing like the symphonic arias of his cousin the mockingbird, or like the rhapsodic melodies floating down from the trees of the house wren.
It goes like this: Chirp. Chirp-chirp. Chirpchirpchirp. Chirp.
You may be glad to know that this lifestyle still exists in my backyard, that magnificent spread of about 36 feet by 24 feet, pretty small for a range war. But then, the participants are pretty small, too.
When we moved from the mountain cabin into the house in the village, this was the best place available for the dime, and it had some advantages. The elevation was lower and tomatoes grow better here than at 7,500 feet above sea level. So we set to work and the first thing you knew, we had five fruit trees, a garden spot, a postage stamp of grass, wild asparagus, a solar fountain, 42 (count them) tomato plants, and a bird house in that tiny space. Naturally, we then had to add bird feeders, a swing set, raspberries, a rhubarb plant, an artichoke plant, and a table with an umbrella. Plus a sprinkler system.
I had hoped for a glamorous renter for the birdhouse -- say an oriole, or a bluebird. Instead, our Nester turned out to be Mr. English Sparrow. In nature, a nest isn't needed unless you intent to start a family, and to start a family you need one each of opposite sexes -- this is not going to turn into a political/social essay, relax -- and to attract a female, Mr. E. Sparrow does what other bird dudes do: he sings his mating song. It is nothing like the symphonic arias of his cousin the mockingbird, or like the rhapsodic melodies floating down from the trees of the house wren.
It goes like this: Chirp. Chirp-chirp. Chirpchirpchirp. Chirp.
All the same note. No inflections. No harmony. No crescendos. But it does the job, because sooner or later a few female sparrows arrive, and he shows off the nest he has discovered, and finally one of them likes it well enough, and they start moving in their furnishings (dry grass mostly). The insemination of the female does not occur within the privacy of the birdhouse, well maybe it does, but if it does, it is in addition to the flirtatious behavior they exhibit on the fence. My land! Such abandon!
Eventually they do get down to filling up their house with selected straw -- some pieces so large it takes two swipes at the entry to get it through. Both of them work at this until is passes muster. Several weeks go by with Mr. Sparrow bringing in worms and I guess taking his turn at incubating the eggs until one day, out pops Mrs. S. and she is followed by five or six little S's and they all fly away to continue the line.
Now enter the ranchers, in this case, wasps. It was a bad year for wasps; that is, they were everywhere. Eventually, they moved into the birdhouse and the sparrows stayed away. Finally, we sprayed the birdhouse to be rid of the wasps -- who wants to watch a wasp? -- but the sparrows didn't come back; I suppose due to the smell of Raid. So we took the birdhouse down, washed it in soap and hot water, and put it back up again. This year, we were disappointed to see wasps going back into the birdhouse again. Phooey! But who else was in the picture?
This little sparrow (I think he was wearing a cape with a big yellow S on his teeshirt) appeared, took out after the wasp, and chased him away. He actually went into the birdhouse (his, now) and came out with wasp cocoons in his beak and spit them out! Several other soldier wasps appeared, and he gave them the boot, too. He had taken charge. The underdog ruled. A sparrow with Spunk. Now we listen to:
Chirp. Chirp-chirp. Chirpchirpchirp. Chirp!
It is music to our ears.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Us Nomads
Definition: “a member of people... wandering from place to place usually seasonally and with a well defined territory in order to secure a food supply.” Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary.
National Geographic documents real nomads every now and then. It looks so glamorous. The man of the house rides up on this Mongolian pony, hair in a pigtail, face bronzed from the sun (a direct descendant of Ghengis Khan), dressed to the nines in rawhide and fur. He swaggers into the yurt, and tells the little woman, Honey, tomorrow we pull up stakes and head south because the horses are having trouble finding grass. Honey looks around–her priceless Persian rugs hug the walls, the cookstove heats the tea for supper, goat meat sizzles on the spit, she knows she is pregnant but she hasn’t told him yet. She will have to leave all of this, strike the tent, roll up everything else, search anew for herbs to flavor the meat and buffalo chips for the fire, secure the stores of foodstuff packed away for a rainy day, find all of the dogs and coop them up, make sure the children are dressed appropriately, and be ready by daybreak to trudge at least 10 miles uphill where the grass still grows, all the while having dinner ready and keeping track of the kids and keeping in place the smile, smile, smile..
I never thought of myself as a nomad, a transient person, but excepting for the search for a food supply, it fits me pretty well. As a matter of fact, it fits a lot of folks pretty well, although I will wager that they don’t think of themselves that way, either. Ask us, and we will tell you “We’re following the sun; we are tired of shoveling snow; we don’t want to fall down on the ice in the driveway; we don’t like winter,” and other excuses. They call us snowbirds. I’ve been doing it for eleven years and it is beginning to wear on me. I took my snow boots out of the Colorado closet last week, and they looked downright comfortable compared to my sandals. When I complain to friends about the difficulty of pulling up stakes every six months and beginning anew, they take this holy attitude that they have no trouble at all with the transition, what’s the matter with you?
I’ll tell you how some of them cope.
Example number one: They don’t even pack their car. They hang their clothes on a rail in the backseat of the car and Away They Go. Pretty simple, eh? Yeah. And they have everything they need in duplicate. That's solution number one.
Solution number two: They fly back and forth and have a car in both places. But they are beginning to rail at that flight surcharge of $25 for the second suitcase and they pack some stuff and other friends take it in their car to the destination they share. Lucky they have a laptop. It’s a carry-on.
Solution number three: They too fly back and forth, but the lady of that house digs up her geraniums and mails them to herself back home the day before her flight leaves (really!). You’ve got to admire that.
In my case, there are lots of things I just don’t need two of. So our van looks like part of a gypsy caravan when fully loaded to the Plimsoll line. It was bad enough before we got a dog, because Molly’s crate takes up a space 42" Long and 36" High and 36" Wide and that is a considerable amount of cubic inches that I used to be able to utilize. For my plants. For the sewing machine. (Who wants two sewing machines? Suppose someone’s seams get ripped? Suppose you want to make something? It’ll have to wait six months because the sewing machine is at the other place.) For the new printer. For the golf clubs. For the ice chest. For the foot bath. For the tool box. For the Simpson meter. For my seeds. For the bathroom stuff. For the favorite CDs. (Who can live 6 months without listening to your favorite artists? Jimmy Durante. John Gary. Any Italian tenor singing Tosca. For Gilbert, for Sullivan. The list is endless. Thank goodness they don’t take a lot of space.) For the garage sale end table that will just fit under the window where we are going? We are old. We take a bunch of medicine. I can’t cut down on the Christmas trees; I already have one of them in both locations, just in case. Et cetera.
We’ve been home for two weeks now and we are still eating food I brought along from my Arizona pantry. So here’s the thing. I can’t just not nomad any longer because it has become a health issue for my husband. He thinks he can’t live in a cold climate again. What is the use of marrying a Scandinavian if he doesn’t like snow anymore? (No, that’s not an option, and I’m keeping the dog, too.)
So: 1. No more overstocked shelves even if groceries are a lot cheaper in Arizona than here.
2. Adjust to being frugal. Do without some of that stuff. Where to start? I need all of that clutter.
3. I have 5 3/4ths months to think of something but I already know what the answer is. I’ll do it all over again in October. Well, everything but the smile, smile, smile...
National Geographic documents real nomads every now and then. It looks so glamorous. The man of the house rides up on this Mongolian pony, hair in a pigtail, face bronzed from the sun (a direct descendant of Ghengis Khan), dressed to the nines in rawhide and fur. He swaggers into the yurt, and tells the little woman, Honey, tomorrow we pull up stakes and head south because the horses are having trouble finding grass. Honey looks around–her priceless Persian rugs hug the walls, the cookstove heats the tea for supper, goat meat sizzles on the spit, she knows she is pregnant but she hasn’t told him yet. She will have to leave all of this, strike the tent, roll up everything else, search anew for herbs to flavor the meat and buffalo chips for the fire, secure the stores of foodstuff packed away for a rainy day, find all of the dogs and coop them up, make sure the children are dressed appropriately, and be ready by daybreak to trudge at least 10 miles uphill where the grass still grows, all the while having dinner ready and keeping track of the kids and keeping in place the smile, smile, smile..
I never thought of myself as a nomad, a transient person, but excepting for the search for a food supply, it fits me pretty well. As a matter of fact, it fits a lot of folks pretty well, although I will wager that they don’t think of themselves that way, either. Ask us, and we will tell you “We’re following the sun; we are tired of shoveling snow; we don’t want to fall down on the ice in the driveway; we don’t like winter,” and other excuses. They call us snowbirds. I’ve been doing it for eleven years and it is beginning to wear on me. I took my snow boots out of the Colorado closet last week, and they looked downright comfortable compared to my sandals. When I complain to friends about the difficulty of pulling up stakes every six months and beginning anew, they take this holy attitude that they have no trouble at all with the transition, what’s the matter with you?
I’ll tell you how some of them cope.
Example number one: They don’t even pack their car. They hang their clothes on a rail in the backseat of the car and Away They Go. Pretty simple, eh? Yeah. And they have everything they need in duplicate. That's solution number one.
Solution number two: They fly back and forth and have a car in both places. But they are beginning to rail at that flight surcharge of $25 for the second suitcase and they pack some stuff and other friends take it in their car to the destination they share. Lucky they have a laptop. It’s a carry-on.
Solution number three: They too fly back and forth, but the lady of that house digs up her geraniums and mails them to herself back home the day before her flight leaves (really!). You’ve got to admire that.
In my case, there are lots of things I just don’t need two of. So our van looks like part of a gypsy caravan when fully loaded to the Plimsoll line. It was bad enough before we got a dog, because Molly’s crate takes up a space 42" Long and 36" High and 36" Wide and that is a considerable amount of cubic inches that I used to be able to utilize. For my plants. For the sewing machine. (Who wants two sewing machines? Suppose someone’s seams get ripped? Suppose you want to make something? It’ll have to wait six months because the sewing machine is at the other place.) For the new printer. For the golf clubs. For the ice chest. For the foot bath. For the tool box. For the Simpson meter. For my seeds. For the bathroom stuff. For the favorite CDs. (Who can live 6 months without listening to your favorite artists? Jimmy Durante. John Gary. Any Italian tenor singing Tosca. For Gilbert, for Sullivan. The list is endless. Thank goodness they don’t take a lot of space.) For the garage sale end table that will just fit under the window where we are going? We are old. We take a bunch of medicine. I can’t cut down on the Christmas trees; I already have one of them in both locations, just in case. Et cetera.
We’ve been home for two weeks now and we are still eating food I brought along from my Arizona pantry. So here’s the thing. I can’t just not nomad any longer because it has become a health issue for my husband. He thinks he can’t live in a cold climate again. What is the use of marrying a Scandinavian if he doesn’t like snow anymore? (No, that’s not an option, and I’m keeping the dog, too.)
So: 1. No more overstocked shelves even if groceries are a lot cheaper in Arizona than here.
2. Adjust to being frugal. Do without some of that stuff. Where to start? I need all of that clutter.
3. I have 5 3/4ths months to think of something but I already know what the answer is. I’ll do it all over again in October. Well, everything but the smile, smile, smile...
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Behavior Modification: People and Dogs (101)
Here is the way it began:
Molly finishes eating her dinner, and goes to her water dish. It is empty. She looks at me. I get up, fill the dish, set it down in front of her. She drinks her fill. Nonverbal communication, check.
Molly goes to the back door, touches the knob with her nose, looks at me. I get it. I get up, open the door, she goes out. Mission accomplished.
She brings me her ball. I am concentrating on the crossword puzzle. She sits quietly patient. She whines. I don't hear her. She barks one time, shrill enough to get my attention. Hey! Pick it up! Let's have some action here! I can't wait all day! Finally, I throw the ball, beginning the game that lasts for a while until she tires. She is a very strong dog and doesn't tire easily. When she does, she sets the ball down where it is within her reach and takes a nap. The day has begun.
Once, when I had my left elbow on the table, she stuck the ball up into my armpit. Imagine looking up from your puzzle and finding a ball stuffed under your arm and you weren't even aware that the game had started. Wake up!
We wake up at 3 a.m. I get up and go to the bathroom. Molly opens one eye. If I return directly, she doesn't move. If I take two steps towards the kitchen for a drink, she is at my side by the third step. Her radar is working. She never misses.
Although many toys have been provided for her, she keeps the amount down to about three. The others are either buried, eaten, lost, or otherwise indisposed. Shake the peanut jar, and she will drop what she is doing and stand at the ready. I tell her "Go long." And, she backs up for the high fly. I tell her, "Left field," and before I get it out of my mouth, there she is, to the left. Then she makes a beeline for right field because she knows the next peanut hit will be there, and she gets ready for "Line Drive!" wherein the missile goes straight towards her snout and she snaps it up and gives me a look that says, Is that all you got?
For some reason, she refuses to fetch her leash, even if I ask her, "Do you want to go for a ride?" Yes, she wants to go for a ride, and yes, she will stand still to attach the leash, but she will be damned if she will fetch it; get it yourself, is her attitude.
"Molly, do you want to watch the rabbits?" makes her run to the picture window and look outside. There are lots of rabbits, who if close, evoke the border collie Crouch and Stare. The rabbits somehow realize they are in the target sights and they hold really still, even though Molly is behind a glass window -- they seem to know or feel the eyes upon them. Seeing the coyotes makes her very nervous. She goes a bit haywire and doesn't calm down until a period of time passes. She wants no part of them, thank goodness.
But today was a little scary. She had been outside for a couple of hours while I worked on the income tax return. Needing a break, I went out on the patio where she greeted me. It is getting a little warm here in Arizona, and I looked at her and I wondered whether she would like to play in her washtub. I just thought that thought without glancing at the tub. She was looking at me and she immediately ran to the washtub, then to the end of the hose, and then looked back at me. I thought, Now she is reading my mind. This is peculiar, like Alice in Wonderland. What next?
Surely, the dog can't be anticipating my thoughts...can she? How could this be possible? She usually doesn't play in her washtub until late afternoon... this was before lunch, so there was no precedent as to time of day... Maybe it's like when horses learn to count.
I don't know... but I sure am impressed.
Molly finishes eating her dinner, and goes to her water dish. It is empty. She looks at me. I get up, fill the dish, set it down in front of her. She drinks her fill. Nonverbal communication, check.
Molly goes to the back door, touches the knob with her nose, looks at me. I get it. I get up, open the door, she goes out. Mission accomplished.
She brings me her ball. I am concentrating on the crossword puzzle. She sits quietly patient. She whines. I don't hear her. She barks one time, shrill enough to get my attention. Hey! Pick it up! Let's have some action here! I can't wait all day! Finally, I throw the ball, beginning the game that lasts for a while until she tires. She is a very strong dog and doesn't tire easily. When she does, she sets the ball down where it is within her reach and takes a nap. The day has begun.
Once, when I had my left elbow on the table, she stuck the ball up into my armpit. Imagine looking up from your puzzle and finding a ball stuffed under your arm and you weren't even aware that the game had started. Wake up!
We wake up at 3 a.m. I get up and go to the bathroom. Molly opens one eye. If I return directly, she doesn't move. If I take two steps towards the kitchen for a drink, she is at my side by the third step. Her radar is working. She never misses.
Although many toys have been provided for her, she keeps the amount down to about three. The others are either buried, eaten, lost, or otherwise indisposed. Shake the peanut jar, and she will drop what she is doing and stand at the ready. I tell her "Go long." And, she backs up for the high fly. I tell her, "Left field," and before I get it out of my mouth, there she is, to the left. Then she makes a beeline for right field because she knows the next peanut hit will be there, and she gets ready for "Line Drive!" wherein the missile goes straight towards her snout and she snaps it up and gives me a look that says, Is that all you got?
For some reason, she refuses to fetch her leash, even if I ask her, "Do you want to go for a ride?" Yes, she wants to go for a ride, and yes, she will stand still to attach the leash, but she will be damned if she will fetch it; get it yourself, is her attitude.
"Molly, do you want to watch the rabbits?" makes her run to the picture window and look outside. There are lots of rabbits, who if close, evoke the border collie Crouch and Stare. The rabbits somehow realize they are in the target sights and they hold really still, even though Molly is behind a glass window -- they seem to know or feel the eyes upon them. Seeing the coyotes makes her very nervous. She goes a bit haywire and doesn't calm down until a period of time passes. She wants no part of them, thank goodness.
But today was a little scary. She had been outside for a couple of hours while I worked on the income tax return. Needing a break, I went out on the patio where she greeted me. It is getting a little warm here in Arizona, and I looked at her and I wondered whether she would like to play in her washtub. I just thought that thought without glancing at the tub. She was looking at me and she immediately ran to the washtub, then to the end of the hose, and then looked back at me. I thought, Now she is reading my mind. This is peculiar, like Alice in Wonderland. What next?
Surely, the dog can't be anticipating my thoughts...can she? How could this be possible? She usually doesn't play in her washtub until late afternoon... this was before lunch, so there was no precedent as to time of day... Maybe it's like when horses learn to count.
I don't know... but I sure am impressed.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Aloha, Matilda
I think my 1995 IBM clone computer is failing in health. It doesn't want to turn off, and it will not turn off -- repeat, will not turn off -- unless you give it a breathing space of about five minutes to grasp the concept. Then it doesn't want to turn ON, until it has extolled the Powers That Be to gird up its loins, get the AC flowing, check its parameters (or whatever it does), and stand at the ready. Or almost ready. Ready in a minute or so. Ready pretty soon. What's the hurry?
Waiting for Matilda to respond is kind of like the fairy tale Rapunzel. You can emote, "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, Let down your golden hair," and wait for her to come alive for you... until you wonder whether Rapunzel has eloped with the pizza delivery man. When the hair does fall down it doesn't seem as bushy as before. Is Rapunzel out cavorting at the marketplace and not paying any attention to business? Does anyone besides me wonder what is going on inside of the box? (Remember HAL? Be careful...)
Give the old girl credit, though, once she survives all the processes, she does a credible job, only occasionally acting stubborn or losing the place, and only attributable to her perhaps 50% of the time, the other 50% my fault; after all, I am no spring chicken either. Maybe we just suit each other. Heaven forbid that some young person should sit down and try to coerce anything out of Matilda the Rapunzel, she who waltzes to her own tune. If it became a matter of Wills, my money is on the machine, not the kid. After all, Matilda has survived neglect, power surges, eight years of Republicans, moving back and forth following the sun, and the rebuff of being replaced twice. It's a wonder she even responds at all.
In any event, it will be like saying goodbye to an old friend to abandon it. How can you young people blindly pitch your present devices for the siren calls of the newest techie marvels? Why I don't even like to trade in my 20 year old used car without a teary look back at the lot, where it sits disconsolately getting its tires kicked, wretchedly waiting to see if its new owner will keep the oil filled. Sob! That's the car that got me to the hospital on time, beating out the stork, the car that took me on the vacation where I fell in love with the mountains, the car the kids used to learn to drive... I understand why so many old cars (in the South, where I grew up) wind up in the back yards becoming space ships for the young 'uns or coops for the chickens, rusting away in peace, like in a nursing home. Do you think that rusting hurts steel more than pride? and how did a car get into this eulogy for Matilda, anyway?
Make way for progress. Youall write if you get work.
Waiting for Matilda to respond is kind of like the fairy tale Rapunzel. You can emote, "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, Let down your golden hair," and wait for her to come alive for you... until you wonder whether Rapunzel has eloped with the pizza delivery man. When the hair does fall down it doesn't seem as bushy as before. Is Rapunzel out cavorting at the marketplace and not paying any attention to business? Does anyone besides me wonder what is going on inside of the box? (Remember HAL? Be careful...)
Give the old girl credit, though, once she survives all the processes, she does a credible job, only occasionally acting stubborn or losing the place, and only attributable to her perhaps 50% of the time, the other 50% my fault; after all, I am no spring chicken either. Maybe we just suit each other. Heaven forbid that some young person should sit down and try to coerce anything out of Matilda the Rapunzel, she who waltzes to her own tune. If it became a matter of Wills, my money is on the machine, not the kid. After all, Matilda has survived neglect, power surges, eight years of Republicans, moving back and forth following the sun, and the rebuff of being replaced twice. It's a wonder she even responds at all.
In any event, it will be like saying goodbye to an old friend to abandon it. How can you young people blindly pitch your present devices for the siren calls of the newest techie marvels? Why I don't even like to trade in my 20 year old used car without a teary look back at the lot, where it sits disconsolately getting its tires kicked, wretchedly waiting to see if its new owner will keep the oil filled. Sob! That's the car that got me to the hospital on time, beating out the stork, the car that took me on the vacation where I fell in love with the mountains, the car the kids used to learn to drive... I understand why so many old cars (in the South, where I grew up) wind up in the back yards becoming space ships for the young 'uns or coops for the chickens, rusting away in peace, like in a nursing home. Do you think that rusting hurts steel more than pride? and how did a car get into this eulogy for Matilda, anyway?
Make way for progress. Youall write if you get work.
San Jose is West of Here...
And it is too far to walk unless you are into that sort of thing, which I am not, just like I am not into E-mail. So to respond to those tons of E-mails inquiring about the book, The Last Laugh, (both of you), I am forced to admit that The Last Laugh was a fantasy, too.
There were a couple of realities in the midst of the fantasies. Molly the dog is real as she appears in the homeless scene. And believe it or not, the handsome Prince was real in the out-of-this-world fantasy. Although handsome Princes can cause heartbreaks, I hope that most of you will someday meet up with one. For a while, life will be different than you ever thought it could be. For a while, you will walk on air. For a while, you will feel that quickening of heartbeat when you think about the two of you. It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all -- just as soon as you recover from the pain of rejection.
However, speaking about retribution, which we hope does not come after rejection, I do know how to cure the feeling of emptiness, and it is a four letter word. Now, before you stop reading because of your high standards (you are still reading this, aren't you?) let me rush to state that four letter words have been given a bum rap. Of course, there are vulgarities amongst them, just like some of our bankers, lawyers, and politicians are crooks. Perhaps the percentage (some) is understated.
However again, just think of all of the good four letter words we use every day without a hint of bad: like love, kiss, cash, kind, fair, shop! Play, life, pink, joke, Visa, tree, good, hope, cure, ease, fern, lace, warm, lake, snow, bean, idea (there's one for you, a four letter word with three syllables) -- but the finest of these is, WORK.
Work is a holy privilege. Are you mourning the loss of anything dear? A person, a job, a keepsake, a romance, a reputation? Work is the answer. Not all work entails performing something for someone else for pay. Work includes studying, thinking, sharing, cleaning, helping, practicing, planting, learning, and forgetting yourself and taking arms against a sea of troubles (thanks, Mr. Shakespeare). Work hard enough, and there won't be any room in your life for regrets or revenge, and you just may hit on something that will make the rest of your life just what you want it to be. Good luck!
There were a couple of realities in the midst of the fantasies. Molly the dog is real as she appears in the homeless scene. And believe it or not, the handsome Prince was real in the out-of-this-world fantasy. Although handsome Princes can cause heartbreaks, I hope that most of you will someday meet up with one. For a while, life will be different than you ever thought it could be. For a while, you will walk on air. For a while, you will feel that quickening of heartbeat when you think about the two of you. It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all -- just as soon as you recover from the pain of rejection.
However, speaking about retribution, which we hope does not come after rejection, I do know how to cure the feeling of emptiness, and it is a four letter word. Now, before you stop reading because of your high standards (you are still reading this, aren't you?) let me rush to state that four letter words have been given a bum rap. Of course, there are vulgarities amongst them, just like some of our bankers, lawyers, and politicians are crooks. Perhaps the percentage (some) is understated.
However again, just think of all of the good four letter words we use every day without a hint of bad: like love, kiss, cash, kind, fair, shop! Play, life, pink, joke, Visa, tree, good, hope, cure, ease, fern, lace, warm, lake, snow, bean, idea (there's one for you, a four letter word with three syllables) -- but the finest of these is, WORK.
Work is a holy privilege. Are you mourning the loss of anything dear? A person, a job, a keepsake, a romance, a reputation? Work is the answer. Not all work entails performing something for someone else for pay. Work includes studying, thinking, sharing, cleaning, helping, practicing, planting, learning, and forgetting yourself and taking arms against a sea of troubles (thanks, Mr. Shakespeare). Work hard enough, and there won't be any room in your life for regrets or revenge, and you just may hit on something that will make the rest of your life just what you want it to be. Good luck!
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Do you know the way to San Jose?
Sure, I have fantasies. As a matter of fact, I have two favorites, both of which revolve around where I might live at the time. Here you go.
The first one I call my down-to-earth exercise, in which I imagine myself as a homeless person. For a long time, my sleeping arrangements were a tarpaulin and a blanket, but somehow lately I've accumulated a refrigerator box. Don’t ask me how I came to have a refrigerator box; it was just there, and I was busily moving into it, dragging my tarpaulin and blanket, trying to adjust the tarp in order to keep out the cold wind and freezing rain. It’s amazing how many different ways that tarp can be arranged: underneath, on top of, strung from a tree, folded into an envelope and held in place with clothespins. All ways that are designed with a specific purpose—protection against the elements.
I also have, thank goodness, a down comforter, because I usually enjoy this feeling of snugness against all odds. Somehow, I am bathed in comfort inside my abode. Molly, the dog, appears to help, and usually gets in the way.
There aren’t any other homeless people around to try to confiscate my warm box; it is mine without a struggle. But if bad guys WERE to appear, I am sure Molly would bark fiercely and scare them off, then turn around three times and plop down beside me to help keep me warm. From that moment, I relax and sleep.
I use the first person when I write about this skit—I, Me. After all, a simple peasant girl doesn’t care if people know about how she thinks or feels.
My other fantasy? The magical out-of-this-world one? Well. There is this place, halfway up the mountain that can only be reached by a devious path, or several devious paths, and the entry to that wondrous place is behind a waterfall. Then, there is a short dark tunnel (with a light at the end of it -- of course you silly goose) and it opens up into a large cavern with a skylight in the ceiling to admit the sunshine and starlight and moonbeams, whichever. In the center of the great room is a hearth with a fire surrounded by large stones. The entire room is carved from an old gold mine—quartz and gold and silver veins circle about, plus beautiful gemstones gleam in the sides, reflecting the light from above and from the fire glow below. The normal cave temperature of 55°F is modified to 72° because of circulating thermal waters beneath the surface, creating a slight waft of breeze throughout the structure. There is a pool located towards the rear of the cave where a relaxing bath of mineral water eases the strain of walking upright.
I must interject here that this place must be described in the third person, by she who abides there. Because the she-person is beautiful, lithe, intelligent, caring, close to perfection; this story would really be science fiction if it were an aspiration, not an inspiration. What does this ultimate lady do for a living? Well, she is like a physician, healing people with natural remedies. She is like a judge, meting out advice to those who ask for her opinion. She is an accomplished dancer, almost flying, defying gravity, in her movements, with ne’er a hint of clumsiness. She can sing the birds out of the trees. She thinks wondrous thoughts. God, what a woman she is! Twenty-five years old. Hardly ever aging. Brilliant red hair, naturally curly. 38-25-36.
My alter ego is not so strong that I could even remotely be this person…denial, denial.
Her sleeping arrangements? There is an alcove up a flight of five stairs, entered from the main room, just large enough for a Tempurpedic bed. How did that big bed get there, halfway up a mountain by a devious path, through a narrow dark tunnel? (Didn’t I mention in the beginning that this was a magical fantasy? By definition, fantasies need have no resemblance to reality.) (But I think, the bed came from the same place as the refrigerator box.)
There is another opening onto a terrace that looks out toward the sea. An enormous city is far, far, away. A forest lies between the mountain and the city and all types of tame animals live there in peace and harmony. On the terrace are many containers with lush plants, melons, beans, squash, herbs and fragrant flowers. Grape vines and cherry and peach trees drape from the overhang above. I think She is a vegetarian, although She does enjoy a smoked fish occasionally, along with a loaf of fresh baked bread from her ovens and a glass of red wine from her vineyard, and cheeses aged and stored back in the cave at the proper temperature, made from the essences of her herds of goats and cows that graze contentedly in the meadows below.
Have you been waiting for the handsome prince? Here he comes. Irish. Riding a jet black steed named Homer, housed in a stable at the base of the mountain filled with shiny straw and fed with the finest alfalfa hay, cared for by a young lad who brushes him down and massages him with DMSO to take away any slight annoyance he might have. The prince rides in, tosses the reins to the stable keeper, rushes up the mountain, enters into the great room, and takes the woman into his arms. Ecstasy. Strangely enough, Molly the dog never appears in this venue. Would it be because the relationship between the man and the woman is complete?
I’m not going to tell you any more of the fantasy. You have an imagination, carry on yourself. But, there are three possible endings to the story:
Ending Number One: They live happily ever after and have lots of children who go out into the world and end up as the Dr. Sweitzers, the Ghandis, the Mother Teresas, the Winston Churchills, plus many famous, successful Jewish comedians and political satirists.
Ending Number Two: The handsome Prince (whose name was Stupid) got tired of all of the perfection and decided to stay in the city and sample the joys of what he found there. He exited so fast that Homer (his steed, pay attention) left skid marks. But Homer didn’t take to being tied up outside the barber shop so often, and ran away to return to the stable with the shiny straw bed plus the abundance of care. He earned his keep plowing the wheat fields and basking in the feeling of being worthwhile without having to put up with being spurred on by the handsome prince. The She-person did finally recover from the shock of Paradise Lost and lived on for a long time, eventually becoming a writer.
Ending Number Three: The She-person gets even.
Ending Number One: They live happily ever after and have lots of children who go out into the world and end up as the Dr. Sweitzers, the Ghandis, the Mother Teresas, the Winston Churchills, plus many famous, successful Jewish comedians and political satirists.
Ending Number Two: The handsome Prince (whose name was Stupid) got tired of all of the perfection and decided to stay in the city and sample the joys of what he found there. He exited so fast that Homer (his steed, pay attention) left skid marks. But Homer didn’t take to being tied up outside the barber shop so often, and ran away to return to the stable with the shiny straw bed plus the abundance of care. He earned his keep plowing the wheat fields and basking in the feeling of being worthwhile without having to put up with being spurred on by the handsome prince. The She-person did finally recover from the shock of Paradise Lost and lived on for a long time, eventually becoming a writer.
Ending Number Three: The She-person gets even.
I can’t tell you any more because the story called The Last Laugh about how she evens the score has been sold to a famous textbook publisher and will sell for $19.95 in paperback in the year 2012 around Christmas time. Many who have been dumped, both males and females, have already placed their advance orders. (E-mail me; I might let you in.)
"What’s that you say, Dr. Leibermann? My hour is up? Yes, Sol, I will see you again next week, same time. Sibling rivalry? OK. Say hello to Aunt Rebecca for me…”
"What’s that you say, Dr. Leibermann? My hour is up? Yes, Sol, I will see you again next week, same time. Sibling rivalry? OK. Say hello to Aunt Rebecca for me…”
Friday, March 27, 2009
Got Gout?
If Henry VIII’s physicians had access to cortisone, probably two of his wives could have escaped the chopping block. Poor Henry must have been miserable with his overweight body and dealing with the misery of the swollen arthritic feverish travesty of what used to be a dependable foot, capable of carrying a person around, kicking the gong around, kicking up heels, sloshing through autumn leaves, tippy-toeing around, dancing the light fantastic, you get the point. Or even going from bed to chair. As for me, I’d rather give birth than have gout.
Gout: what is it, anyway? What a miserable name for a miserable affliction. Here's the definition, according to WebMD: Gout is a kind of arthritis. It can cause an attack of sudden burning pain, stiffness, and swelling in a joint, usually a big toe. These attacks can happen over and over unless gout is treated. Over time, they can harm your joints, tendons, and other tissues. Gout is most common in men.
May be, but I can tell you it happens with women, too. Did you know that if you have gout that it endows your foot with the ability to detect a cat treading across the floor two houses away?
Gout has a radar that can detect anything that moves, or even thinks about encroaching, into its space. The slightest threat of a waft of breeze within a mile and a half will send it into defensive mode. Don’t even think about coming any closer! shrieks the gout-afflicted appendage.
There is one saving grace to this malady. If they give you cortisone for gout, it will also relieve the pain in your back, your shoulders, your hands, everything else that suffers from arthritis. Too bad the relief is so fleeting; be thankful that it appears for even a little while.
A cold water soak helps. They say it is caused by too much uric acid in the system. The common understanding is that translates into too much of the good life, high eating, excess drinking, over-indulgence. If that is so, then what is a simple peasant woman like me doing in this picture? I suspect that I wasn’t caught doing something else I needed to be corrected for, so I was thrown this challenge just to test my character, my patience, and my pursuit of happiness.
Gout: what is it, anyway? What a miserable name for a miserable affliction. Here's the definition, according to WebMD: Gout is a kind of arthritis. It can cause an attack of sudden burning pain, stiffness, and swelling in a joint, usually a big toe. These attacks can happen over and over unless gout is treated. Over time, they can harm your joints, tendons, and other tissues. Gout is most common in men.
May be, but I can tell you it happens with women, too. Did you know that if you have gout that it endows your foot with the ability to detect a cat treading across the floor two houses away?
Gout has a radar that can detect anything that moves, or even thinks about encroaching, into its space. The slightest threat of a waft of breeze within a mile and a half will send it into defensive mode. Don’t even think about coming any closer! shrieks the gout-afflicted appendage.
There is one saving grace to this malady. If they give you cortisone for gout, it will also relieve the pain in your back, your shoulders, your hands, everything else that suffers from arthritis. Too bad the relief is so fleeting; be thankful that it appears for even a little while.
A cold water soak helps. They say it is caused by too much uric acid in the system. The common understanding is that translates into too much of the good life, high eating, excess drinking, over-indulgence. If that is so, then what is a simple peasant woman like me doing in this picture? I suspect that I wasn’t caught doing something else I needed to be corrected for, so I was thrown this challenge just to test my character, my patience, and my pursuit of happiness.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow
Last year was memorable. It was a year when climate change and the President of the United States appeared to have teamed up to provide regular everyday citizens with more than they ever bargained for. It was a year when Christians, Jews and Arabs were basically trying to eliminate each other from this worldly existence in spite of the fact that each religion calls for love and peace.
Today (well, recently) the stock market has fallen to inexplicable lows. Seems like the majority of the lenders (crooks) in this country went against prudent rules and caused the death of our real estate. The house you and I have lived in before creative financing set in lost at least 1/3rd of its value, through no fault of our own. The auto industry, a giant in its time, has failed because of stupidity. I am not a historian, but to me it seems like the decline and fall of governments and civilizations (the Romans, the Maya, the Egyptians, the Turks, the Persians, the British, the French, the Nazis, the Bolshevics,) have all been caused for one reason—the rot at the top. The good news is, that leaves most of us out of the causing and opens the door to solutions.
I wish I knew what that solution is!
Perhaps if we could have managed these problems, we wouldn’t have botched it up so profoundly. It is comforting that while life continues to become more complex on a global basis, it is still possible in our personal and professional lives to center on our values and goals, assess our strengths and weaknesses, and not allow the problems thrust upon us to swallow us up.
All of us can’t have 40 acres and a mule, an ax, and a rifle. We must start over with what we do have. Hopefully, in the bag of tricks that you have, (besides a partner who cares for you, and children who are healthy) you have a strong back and a will to win. Hard and difficult times bring forth tough and versatile people. The American Dream was not thought out during times of plenty or justice. “Summer soldiers and sunshine patriots” existed during the 1700’s, but that didn’t stop Americans who put it all on the line for independence by sacrificing and winning the chance for themselves and us, their descendants, to be able to work out of a mess, and in a bloodless manner (for us, not for them).
Sometimes, there is no way around a problem except through it. By now, all of us should have a healthy sense of skepticism. We are not fish, ready to bite on any bait or promises from politicians. All of the technology gained in the last 25 years is not for nothing. We need to use it in a positive manner. We need to ask our children to become either entrepreneurs, or if they are still at home, to be of benefit to the family in other ways. Empty nest? Give support and encouragement to your “independent” children. (Get even with them—move into their house). Bad as times may become, we don’t live in shanties next to the garbage dump. Our problems with obesity might actually be solved if a few meals are skipped.
Think of it as the Game of Life, or Monopoly, which it is.
There is no Get Out of Jail Free card. But the opportunity and possibility to Pass Go, and Collect $200, still exists and will soon come around for us again.
Today (well, recently) the stock market has fallen to inexplicable lows. Seems like the majority of the lenders (crooks) in this country went against prudent rules and caused the death of our real estate. The house you and I have lived in before creative financing set in lost at least 1/3rd of its value, through no fault of our own. The auto industry, a giant in its time, has failed because of stupidity. I am not a historian, but to me it seems like the decline and fall of governments and civilizations (the Romans, the Maya, the Egyptians, the Turks, the Persians, the British, the French, the Nazis, the Bolshevics,) have all been caused for one reason—the rot at the top. The good news is, that leaves most of us out of the causing and opens the door to solutions.
I wish I knew what that solution is!
Perhaps if we could have managed these problems, we wouldn’t have botched it up so profoundly. It is comforting that while life continues to become more complex on a global basis, it is still possible in our personal and professional lives to center on our values and goals, assess our strengths and weaknesses, and not allow the problems thrust upon us to swallow us up.
All of us can’t have 40 acres and a mule, an ax, and a rifle. We must start over with what we do have. Hopefully, in the bag of tricks that you have, (besides a partner who cares for you, and children who are healthy) you have a strong back and a will to win. Hard and difficult times bring forth tough and versatile people. The American Dream was not thought out during times of plenty or justice. “Summer soldiers and sunshine patriots” existed during the 1700’s, but that didn’t stop Americans who put it all on the line for independence by sacrificing and winning the chance for themselves and us, their descendants, to be able to work out of a mess, and in a bloodless manner (for us, not for them).
Sometimes, there is no way around a problem except through it. By now, all of us should have a healthy sense of skepticism. We are not fish, ready to bite on any bait or promises from politicians. All of the technology gained in the last 25 years is not for nothing. We need to use it in a positive manner. We need to ask our children to become either entrepreneurs, or if they are still at home, to be of benefit to the family in other ways. Empty nest? Give support and encouragement to your “independent” children. (Get even with them—move into their house). Bad as times may become, we don’t live in shanties next to the garbage dump. Our problems with obesity might actually be solved if a few meals are skipped.
Think of it as the Game of Life, or Monopoly, which it is.
There is no Get Out of Jail Free card. But the opportunity and possibility to Pass Go, and Collect $200, still exists and will soon come around for us again.
Monday, March 23, 2009
The Domicile
Thanks to the warm heart of the newest member of our extended family, I was recently treated to visiting the Phoenix Botanical Garden. One of the displays was a path created in the beautiful setting of Papago Park—a part of the desert surrounded by reddish hills covered in cave-like openings—a surreal landscape. The theme of the trail was how the Indians lived here several hundred years ago. They invented the ramada—a shelter made with the barest minimal resources—sticks on top of supports to provide shade, but not much in the way of keeping off the rain—but then, rain in the desert? Not a problem of everyday life for them. I don’t know what they did when it rained…but getting wet was a sure thing.
Their houses were not much more than a bare covering, either. They bent down poles like an overturned bowl and thatched the cracks between them with grasses and shrubs, anything they could lay their hands on. There was one opening in the south? East? But the structure sure didn’t keep out flies or mosquitoes or wind or rain or rattlesnakes or unfriendly visitors (the neighboring tribe).
One wonderful idea they had was to keep the kitchen out of the main dwelling place, thereby forgoing the chore of cleaning up after a meal so you could go to sleep in a neat environment. Their kitchen was under a ramada just a hop skip and a jump away from the living room—the bowl domicile with the southern exposure. The floor was dirt, which I must presume turned into mud when it did rain.
Now, it gets chilly in the desert even in the summer at night. Imagine how uncomfortable it must have been for them in the winter “living area” when it rained and the wind blew, and they had a sick baby and were hungry and fighting all intruders who would have liked to take away from them even what little existed. Yet, they survived long enough to pass the torch of life along to their descendants and managed to get through the stone age times and live to build casinos and make do with what they had, just like their grandparents.
At least the plains Indians covered their teepees with animal skins to make the “houses” wind and rain repellent, and to keep them warm. And the house was mobile—just use the supports as portage material and roll up the skins, let the women carry them, and be on your way. The Arizona Indians had to start all over again if the game ran out or the neighbors got on their nerves, or whatever reason they had for pulling up stakes. Maybe they stayed because they had no place else to go, unlike those of us who live here in the winter by choice—an amusing thought. Progress, it is wonderful.
The shaman made house calls—what else, there was no hospital. It was important for him or her to have good bedside manners, as big trouble could occur if it was decided that he didn’t know what he was doing. Imagine what it was like, being born naked in a hostile culture—the desert is full of thorns and poison—and to really live off the land without a wheel or a steel ax or a written language. They may not have lived a long time, but I bet it seemed like a long time.
Never deprecate indoor plumbing.
Their houses were not much more than a bare covering, either. They bent down poles like an overturned bowl and thatched the cracks between them with grasses and shrubs, anything they could lay their hands on. There was one opening in the south? East? But the structure sure didn’t keep out flies or mosquitoes or wind or rain or rattlesnakes or unfriendly visitors (the neighboring tribe).
One wonderful idea they had was to keep the kitchen out of the main dwelling place, thereby forgoing the chore of cleaning up after a meal so you could go to sleep in a neat environment. Their kitchen was under a ramada just a hop skip and a jump away from the living room—the bowl domicile with the southern exposure. The floor was dirt, which I must presume turned into mud when it did rain.
Now, it gets chilly in the desert even in the summer at night. Imagine how uncomfortable it must have been for them in the winter “living area” when it rained and the wind blew, and they had a sick baby and were hungry and fighting all intruders who would have liked to take away from them even what little existed. Yet, they survived long enough to pass the torch of life along to their descendants and managed to get through the stone age times and live to build casinos and make do with what they had, just like their grandparents.
At least the plains Indians covered their teepees with animal skins to make the “houses” wind and rain repellent, and to keep them warm. And the house was mobile—just use the supports as portage material and roll up the skins, let the women carry them, and be on your way. The Arizona Indians had to start all over again if the game ran out or the neighbors got on their nerves, or whatever reason they had for pulling up stakes. Maybe they stayed because they had no place else to go, unlike those of us who live here in the winter by choice—an amusing thought. Progress, it is wonderful.
The shaman made house calls—what else, there was no hospital. It was important for him or her to have good bedside manners, as big trouble could occur if it was decided that he didn’t know what he was doing. Imagine what it was like, being born naked in a hostile culture—the desert is full of thorns and poison—and to really live off the land without a wheel or a steel ax or a written language. They may not have lived a long time, but I bet it seemed like a long time.
Never deprecate indoor plumbing.
Friday, February 20, 2009
And the Alternative Is...
All Ye Who Don't Shop Often:
Bringing you up to speed, at Walmart they have taken down the signs that said "Do the Math," when they really meant, add and subtract (that's Doing the Arithmetic). Anyway, whatever euphemism you wish to use, I was there recently because they sell Purina dogfood in the 18 pound package $1 cheaper than they do at Safeway. (Now the signs read SAVE, or did last weekend, which they can rest their cases on. But there is more to Walmart than just SAVE.)
Where else can you buy blue jeans, ladies' underwear, dogfood, craft supplies, carrots and celery for tomorrow's soup (not soup du jour, but soup de manana if you will) all well as fill your prescriptions, get a hotdog, get lost, and have experiences you never planned ahead for???
There may be quality control opportunities in a few central Florida Garden Centers, but they could easily be alleviated if only a few mongooses were let loose overnight for patrol purposes (see "Man Sues After Bitten By Snake at Walmart", AP newswire).
The last time I was in Walmart in Arizona, I was gandering about and kind of looking for my lost or misplaced husband, who gets lost every time we go into a big store, despite the fact that he can drive from here to downtown New York City without ever consulting a road map because he knows, he just senses, which way is north without looking to see which side of the trees the moss grows upon. It is an inborn talent, which I do appreciate (trying to overlook the time spent looking for him and concentrating instead on his good qualities.)
ANYWAYS, I looked down the main aisle about 50 feet (just a short distance inside of that really big building) and there was this slender man with a little black mustache and slicked back wavy hair. Beside him was his silhouette that looked as if someone had taken a sharp pair of scissors and cut out the outline of a person. (Strange, but there were no insides to this person; this gentleman and his void of three dimensions that moved along next to him were headed my way.) Three things occurred to me:
- Now I knew I really needed new glasses.
- I've got to stop watching those paranormal TV programs.
- Take Cover!
So I ducked behind a display, and hidden behind my shopping cart loaded with 18# of Purina's best, I waited. They finally came into view, and bless gracious, that void was a beautiful black lady dressed in a very stylish black outfit. From a distance I couldn't tell where the lady stopped and the outfit began. She smiled at me. All was right with the world again.
Another thing. I was passing by one of those $4 per DVD kiosks, and my arm just reached out on its own and snagged a Matthew Broderick "The Producers" classic. I don't know how that happened, but what a bargain! $4 for a Broadway show! I placed it in the cart. Things were now really rolling -- $ave, dogfood, pretty lady, entertainment tonight ... what next? Where IS my husband?
I passed a couple speaking a foreign language, and lots of teenagers in those long crotch shorts that you can't help but wonder how they run with them on??? And once I caught a glimpse of an old lady pushing a shopping cart with an unusual expression on her face... and I wondered about her ... until I realized I had encountered a mirror in the ladies' department ... I don't look into mirrors anymore. It took a while to recognize me, but the dogfood in the cart did it.
My husband did finally turn up, and we paid the bill and began to exit the building, and then it hit me. You know how sometimes a riddle, a joke, an old saying, a pun, or a paraphrase will jump uninvited into your mind? I recalled a poem we had to memorize back in the 6th grade:
"Let me live in a house by the side of the road, where the race of men go by..."
But what came to me was:
"Give me a house close to Walmart, where the race of men go buy..."
and I thought of all the criticism that Walmart generates (because of jealousy I suppose) when I know they hire employees who aren't trained for Microsoft duty (or who have been laid off from Microsoft) but they have a J O B, and I thought of the rest of the poem which also seemed appropriate:
"So why should I sit in the mourner's seat, or hurl the cynics' ban?
Let me shop at the store called Walmart, and be a friend to man..."
P.S. Dear Wally: The bill's in the mail...
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Aw, Shucks...
Once I worked for a progressive company that headquartered in Minnesota, that mother of the giant Mississippi, the land of the 40° F. below zero, Scandinavians, Betty Crocker, the twin cities, and 3M. They would regularly send around experts to advise us in the management of the business and I really looked forward to the visit, in order to show off the facility.
There was the time that one of them and I were considering a solution to a problem/opportunity/crisis and the options we had seemed marginal, improbable, and unlikely to result in anything favorable, even. She uttered a word. “Uf dah,” with a heavy sigh.
The word sounded like she had been struck in the solar plexis with a hard line drive baseball. It kind of explained itself. I asked her what kind of language Uf dah was. She said it was Swedish. I asked her what did it mean? She replied, “I don’t know.”
Well, I thought, didn’t I just recently marry a gentleman who was proud of his Swedish ancestry? Didn’t his name (mine now) end with -son just like the Oles, the Swans, the Johns, the Hendricks, the Anders, the Eriks, the Peters, the Alberts and all of those other migrants from das Fatherland? I determined to get to the bottom of it as soon as I got home. Of course, I forgot all about it until 3 am, when I shook him awake. As I was still a bride, this action did not bring down the house as you might expect, but he mumbled, "What?" And I said to him, proudly, “I learned a Swedish word today!” “What word is that?” He asked. I brought it out: “Uf dah!”
“That’s not Swedish, that’s Norwegian,” he said, and promptly went back to sleep.
I shook him awake again. “What does it mean?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he replied, and went back to sleep again, this time with finality.
I don’t like to admit defeat easily, so the next day I called 1-411 and got the telephone number for the Norwegian Consulate in Denver, and a nice lady answered the call. I explained that I was calling for a definition of a Norwegian word, and she asked what word is that? And I said, “Uf dah.”
She answered, “I don’t know.”
But then she explained that it is an expression of exasperation, like if you were taking out your garbage and the bag broke and it spilled all over your living room floor, you would exclaim, “Uf dah.” She added, that if the garbage spilled all over your priceless Persian rug, you would say “Fe dah!” At the time I didn’t think to ask if Fe dah was similar to other F words in the English language, but I just let the garbage lay there on the Persian rug and quit while I was ahead. So I thanked her and adopted the word into my own personal vocabulary, right along with Oi Vey because it conveys the same idea. It turns out I use it frequently when no other word expresses your disappointment and dismay, like when you open your tax notice and find your house has been reevaluated upwards when you can’t sell it for half that appraisal, or you learn that you make too much money to stand in line for the free Department of Agriculture commodity giveaways for Seniors, or you do spill the garbage on your living room rug.
My advice is, take the garbage out through the back door and take everything else in stride with an Uf dah. Uf dah is Norway’s gift to us, no charge, help yourself, it's free.
There was the time that one of them and I were considering a solution to a problem/opportunity/crisis and the options we had seemed marginal, improbable, and unlikely to result in anything favorable, even. She uttered a word. “Uf dah,” with a heavy sigh.
The word sounded like she had been struck in the solar plexis with a hard line drive baseball. It kind of explained itself. I asked her what kind of language Uf dah was. She said it was Swedish. I asked her what did it mean? She replied, “I don’t know.”
Well, I thought, didn’t I just recently marry a gentleman who was proud of his Swedish ancestry? Didn’t his name (mine now) end with -son just like the Oles, the Swans, the Johns, the Hendricks, the Anders, the Eriks, the Peters, the Alberts and all of those other migrants from das Fatherland? I determined to get to the bottom of it as soon as I got home. Of course, I forgot all about it until 3 am, when I shook him awake. As I was still a bride, this action did not bring down the house as you might expect, but he mumbled, "What?" And I said to him, proudly, “I learned a Swedish word today!” “What word is that?” He asked. I brought it out: “Uf dah!”
“That’s not Swedish, that’s Norwegian,” he said, and promptly went back to sleep.
I shook him awake again. “What does it mean?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he replied, and went back to sleep again, this time with finality.
I don’t like to admit defeat easily, so the next day I called 1-411 and got the telephone number for the Norwegian Consulate in Denver, and a nice lady answered the call. I explained that I was calling for a definition of a Norwegian word, and she asked what word is that? And I said, “Uf dah.”
She answered, “I don’t know.”
But then she explained that it is an expression of exasperation, like if you were taking out your garbage and the bag broke and it spilled all over your living room floor, you would exclaim, “Uf dah.” She added, that if the garbage spilled all over your priceless Persian rug, you would say “Fe dah!” At the time I didn’t think to ask if Fe dah was similar to other F words in the English language, but I just let the garbage lay there on the Persian rug and quit while I was ahead. So I thanked her and adopted the word into my own personal vocabulary, right along with Oi Vey because it conveys the same idea. It turns out I use it frequently when no other word expresses your disappointment and dismay, like when you open your tax notice and find your house has been reevaluated upwards when you can’t sell it for half that appraisal, or you learn that you make too much money to stand in line for the free Department of Agriculture commodity giveaways for Seniors, or you do spill the garbage on your living room rug.
My advice is, take the garbage out through the back door and take everything else in stride with an Uf dah. Uf dah is Norway’s gift to us, no charge, help yourself, it's free.
Make Way!
What follows may be considered indelicate in some quarters, almost like some of the Ole-Lena jokes, such as:
When Ole and Lena got married, they drove to Minneapolis for their honeymoon. En route, Ole put his hand on Lena’s knee and she blushed and said, “Ole, we are married now, you can go farther than that.” So he drove to Duluth.
There is a saying I’m sure you’ve heard, “Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas,” but have you ever considered how the dogs may feel about the situation? My dog Molly follows me everywhere about the house, and if I happen to take a nap during the day, she hops up on the bed also, plopping her muscular 60 pound, 104°F. body snugly up against mine. I don’t attempt to stop this because it is as good as having a sturdy, furry hot pad that relieves the pain of the arthritis that goes all the way down the spine and is present even in the body’s prone position.
Here comes the indelicate part, so don’t read any farther, like going to Duluth. (I was in Duluth once and what I remember about it was there was a lot of water on one side of the road, called Lake Superior, and a hill on the other side, and it might be a lot like being between a rock and a hard place, but enough about Duluth…)
…our digestive system being what it is, fermentation by definition causes some gas, and gas, well, it rises, or escapes through the line of least resistance, or it is expelled, like those burning oil field flares. You know what is coming…it is usually accompanied by the noise of explosion or release, which may vary from a quiet sneaky sound, hardly discernable, identified in some quarters as breaking wind, or an explosion equivalent to detonation of a formidable amount of TNT, enough to cause considerable damage to the Hoover Dam.
Getting back to how dogs feel about lying down with masters:
“Lie down with masters, get outta there when the bombardment starts…there are no atheists in foxholes…don’t stick around for whatever Act II has in store.”
So, here’s the picture: I’m napping, dreaming of looking like Penelope Cruz.
Molly is napping, dreaming of chasing rabbits.
The indelicate episode happens, produced by the human condition. Immediately, not a nanosecond later, Molly jumps straight up in the air, coming down on all fours, five feet from the bed, wondering what happened? Hackles raised, all instincts en guard, looking around to see what is gaining on her, and ready to man the barricades as it were.
I can’t help but laugh. Who cares that any resemblance to Penelope Cruz breaks down to we are both the same gender and that is where it stops? Who cares that you just lost a bundle on the sale of some real estate? Who cares that your chances of seeing the winter solstice in the year 2012 is an improbable dream?
Your dog still has perfect reflexes, at least for the moment. And if you read this far, you may as well have made that trip to Duluth…
When Ole and Lena got married, they drove to Minneapolis for their honeymoon. En route, Ole put his hand on Lena’s knee and she blushed and said, “Ole, we are married now, you can go farther than that.” So he drove to Duluth.
There is a saying I’m sure you’ve heard, “Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas,” but have you ever considered how the dogs may feel about the situation? My dog Molly follows me everywhere about the house, and if I happen to take a nap during the day, she hops up on the bed also, plopping her muscular 60 pound, 104°F. body snugly up against mine. I don’t attempt to stop this because it is as good as having a sturdy, furry hot pad that relieves the pain of the arthritis that goes all the way down the spine and is present even in the body’s prone position.
Here comes the indelicate part, so don’t read any farther, like going to Duluth. (I was in Duluth once and what I remember about it was there was a lot of water on one side of the road, called Lake Superior, and a hill on the other side, and it might be a lot like being between a rock and a hard place, but enough about Duluth…)
…our digestive system being what it is, fermentation by definition causes some gas, and gas, well, it rises, or escapes through the line of least resistance, or it is expelled, like those burning oil field flares. You know what is coming…it is usually accompanied by the noise of explosion or release, which may vary from a quiet sneaky sound, hardly discernable, identified in some quarters as breaking wind, or an explosion equivalent to detonation of a formidable amount of TNT, enough to cause considerable damage to the Hoover Dam.
Getting back to how dogs feel about lying down with masters:
“Lie down with masters, get outta there when the bombardment starts…there are no atheists in foxholes…don’t stick around for whatever Act II has in store.”
So, here’s the picture: I’m napping, dreaming of looking like Penelope Cruz.
Molly is napping, dreaming of chasing rabbits.
The indelicate episode happens, produced by the human condition. Immediately, not a nanosecond later, Molly jumps straight up in the air, coming down on all fours, five feet from the bed, wondering what happened? Hackles raised, all instincts en guard, looking around to see what is gaining on her, and ready to man the barricades as it were.
I can’t help but laugh. Who cares that any resemblance to Penelope Cruz breaks down to we are both the same gender and that is where it stops? Who cares that you just lost a bundle on the sale of some real estate? Who cares that your chances of seeing the winter solstice in the year 2012 is an improbable dream?
Your dog still has perfect reflexes, at least for the moment. And if you read this far, you may as well have made that trip to Duluth…
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Molly the Collie
When I decided there was a void in my life that could only be filled by having another dog, those dear to me had the disheartening thought, "She's getting senile." Maybe so, but it was an experience I hadn't had for 15 years, and I didn't want to leave this life without having the experience again. Never mind that the dog would probably outlive me.
I wanted a Standard Poodle, but my husband had enjoyed a Border Collie mix before and if I wanted a dog, that was the kind of dog I would get if I were smart. He started reading the puppy ads in the newspaper. Once, he said, "Look, border collie, blue heeler mix pups, $20" and I stopped him cold and told him we definitely did not want blue heeler in the mix because they are bred to nip at heels even if the heels were attached to people, not cows. "Oh," he said, and he continued to read the ads.
Then he found an ad that said, "Border Collie mix puppies, FREE to good homes." We made the telephone call. Yes, they had one female left. We got the address and presented ourselves to the puppy owner. He placed this seven pound, six week old, black and white ball of fur in my arms. She was making those little puppy grunts; she was adorable.
"What breed is the mix?" my husband asked. From far away, as if from a troubled speaker system, I heard: "She is part blue heeler."
I looked into the pup's eyes. She looked into mine. I didn't acknowledge hearing anything but the normal ringing in my ears. I had my puppy and I was oblivious to anything else. "Thank the man, and let's go home," I said, and Dick slipped him a ten spot for dog food, and we left with our new dog.
So we took Molly the Collie home and right away we had our hands full. She had been part of a 13 puppy litter and their mother had abandoned them when they were only 5 weeks old. Poor thing! I knew the feeling. Molly had already been weaned and was eating moistened puppy food, but she had not been taught the things mother dogs teach ...such as No Mouthing. She had never disciplined the puppies with her teeth on the back of their heads like the Dog Whisperer does. (You could try that ad infinitum on Molly; it didn't even get her attention.)
She was just one stubborn pup, so I bought a book on Blue Heelers to see if there was any wisdom that I could latch on to that would help. What I did learn was that Blue Heelers were bred for the outback situation in Australia. The Smithfield Collies that the cattlemen brought over from England couldn't take the conditions encountered down under. So they bred them to the wild dog, the dingo. In order to instill more order, they then bred those pups to Bull Terriers and then back to the dingos again.
This resulted in more nipping at the cattle's heels as well as the horses, so the breeders reasoned they should impart some Dalmation blood. Then back again to the dingoes, then the final round to the Highland Blue Rough Collie. Whew. So we have a multi-breed dog here, fit for the United Nations.
One bit of wisdom the book implanted was that you couldn't civilize an adult dingo, but that puppies would respond nicely. Since our dog was only 1/4th Blue Heeler, I felt we had a fighting chance.
Of course, she was bred to be a working dog, a dog with a JOB, and we are in our 80s and have a very small back yard. She fought the leash and so the walking exercise would not work for her. She plainly had been mis-placed. I was bombarded with family members saying, Put her up for adoption. And for a while, both Dick and I had bites on our arms -- well, not bites, exactly, but with thin skin and her sharp puppy teeth, just grabbing us made us bleed. It was a low time.
Slowly, though, as she aged, the nipping at the heels stopped (I told you so!) At 16 months, the mouthing has (almost) stopped. She hasn't knocked me over for 6 months. She finally has been house broken. Now I can ask her, "Outside, pee pee?" and if she needs to go, she trots to the door, proceeds outside, and squats and pees and is back inside the house again in about two minutes flat. She knows 35 words and phrases and her mental aptitude is about equivalent to that of a three year old child (I am told by those who know about such things.) I am working on stringing three ideas together, such as Go Find -- Mr. Treat -- and Bring Him to Me. She almost has the hang of that one.
She can differentiate between her toys. Go Find Mr. Bone makes her snap around, smell the air, and locate Mr. Bone. Not Squeaky, not Ball, not Mr. Lion, but Mr. Bone. She understands that even if an object is hidden, it is still there.
She is a handsome dog, but hard to identify as to breed (duh?) Her back looks as though a black pelt has been thrown over her white body. She has the long legs and white spotted face with the black ears of a Dalmation, framed by the fluffy white ruff of the Collie. The black fur on her back is rather stiff, shiny, and oily, and curly on the rump. The tip of her tail curls over her back, Collie style, and is white. She has three cowlicks, one on the middle of her chest and one on each front leg. She has a Playboy bunny emblazoned on the top of her head.
But what is unusual ... as if all of the above is not enough ... is that she seems to have a lot of the instincts of the wild dog of the outback. Sometimes she looks at me as if she is trying to deliberately understand what I am saying, and she does know those 35 words, with the appropriate hand signals to accompany them. The first time she heard thunder she ran right over to me, looked me straight in the eyes and seemed to be asking a question: Should I be afraid? I told her no, it is just a loud noise; she returned to her doggy day, but not after she looked out of the window for reassurance.
I am sorry I don't have a sheep ranch. She is sorry, too. But she likes the food and I hope she is making allowances for her family. We have certainly made a lot of allowances for her -- but like Marley of current dog fame, there isn't another dog like her in the world for me.
(For more about Molly, read "Molly's Lament" and "How Dog Evolved, Part II".)
I wanted a Standard Poodle, but my husband had enjoyed a Border Collie mix before and if I wanted a dog, that was the kind of dog I would get if I were smart. He started reading the puppy ads in the newspaper. Once, he said, "Look, border collie, blue heeler mix pups, $20" and I stopped him cold and told him we definitely did not want blue heeler in the mix because they are bred to nip at heels even if the heels were attached to people, not cows. "Oh," he said, and he continued to read the ads.
Then he found an ad that said, "Border Collie mix puppies, FREE to good homes." We made the telephone call. Yes, they had one female left. We got the address and presented ourselves to the puppy owner. He placed this seven pound, six week old, black and white ball of fur in my arms. She was making those little puppy grunts; she was adorable.
"What breed is the mix?" my husband asked. From far away, as if from a troubled speaker system, I heard: "She is part blue heeler."
I looked into the pup's eyes. She looked into mine. I didn't acknowledge hearing anything but the normal ringing in my ears. I had my puppy and I was oblivious to anything else. "Thank the man, and let's go home," I said, and Dick slipped him a ten spot for dog food, and we left with our new dog.
So we took Molly the Collie home and right away we had our hands full. She had been part of a 13 puppy litter and their mother had abandoned them when they were only 5 weeks old. Poor thing! I knew the feeling. Molly had already been weaned and was eating moistened puppy food, but she had not been taught the things mother dogs teach ...such as No Mouthing. She had never disciplined the puppies with her teeth on the back of their heads like the Dog Whisperer does. (You could try that ad infinitum on Molly; it didn't even get her attention.)
She was just one stubborn pup, so I bought a book on Blue Heelers to see if there was any wisdom that I could latch on to that would help. What I did learn was that Blue Heelers were bred for the outback situation in Australia. The Smithfield Collies that the cattlemen brought over from England couldn't take the conditions encountered down under. So they bred them to the wild dog, the dingo. In order to instill more order, they then bred those pups to Bull Terriers and then back to the dingos again.
This resulted in more nipping at the cattle's heels as well as the horses, so the breeders reasoned they should impart some Dalmation blood. Then back again to the dingoes, then the final round to the Highland Blue Rough Collie. Whew. So we have a multi-breed dog here, fit for the United Nations.
One bit of wisdom the book implanted was that you couldn't civilize an adult dingo, but that puppies would respond nicely. Since our dog was only 1/4th Blue Heeler, I felt we had a fighting chance.
Of course, she was bred to be a working dog, a dog with a JOB, and we are in our 80s and have a very small back yard. She fought the leash and so the walking exercise would not work for her. She plainly had been mis-placed. I was bombarded with family members saying, Put her up for adoption. And for a while, both Dick and I had bites on our arms -- well, not bites, exactly, but with thin skin and her sharp puppy teeth, just grabbing us made us bleed. It was a low time.
Slowly, though, as she aged, the nipping at the heels stopped (I told you so!) At 16 months, the mouthing has (almost) stopped. She hasn't knocked me over for 6 months. She finally has been house broken. Now I can ask her, "Outside, pee pee?" and if she needs to go, she trots to the door, proceeds outside, and squats and pees and is back inside the house again in about two minutes flat. She knows 35 words and phrases and her mental aptitude is about equivalent to that of a three year old child (I am told by those who know about such things.) I am working on stringing three ideas together, such as Go Find -- Mr. Treat -- and Bring Him to Me. She almost has the hang of that one.
She can differentiate between her toys. Go Find Mr. Bone makes her snap around, smell the air, and locate Mr. Bone. Not Squeaky, not Ball, not Mr. Lion, but Mr. Bone. She understands that even if an object is hidden, it is still there.
She is a handsome dog, but hard to identify as to breed (duh?) Her back looks as though a black pelt has been thrown over her white body. She has the long legs and white spotted face with the black ears of a Dalmation, framed by the fluffy white ruff of the Collie. The black fur on her back is rather stiff, shiny, and oily, and curly on the rump. The tip of her tail curls over her back, Collie style, and is white. She has three cowlicks, one on the middle of her chest and one on each front leg. She has a Playboy bunny emblazoned on the top of her head.
But what is unusual ... as if all of the above is not enough ... is that she seems to have a lot of the instincts of the wild dog of the outback. Sometimes she looks at me as if she is trying to deliberately understand what I am saying, and she does know those 35 words, with the appropriate hand signals to accompany them. The first time she heard thunder she ran right over to me, looked me straight in the eyes and seemed to be asking a question: Should I be afraid? I told her no, it is just a loud noise; she returned to her doggy day, but not after she looked out of the window for reassurance.
I am sorry I don't have a sheep ranch. She is sorry, too. But she likes the food and I hope she is making allowances for her family. We have certainly made a lot of allowances for her -- but like Marley of current dog fame, there isn't another dog like her in the world for me.
(For more about Molly, read "Molly's Lament" and "How Dog Evolved, Part II".)
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