Newness Colony

You can't spell nudist colony without a healthy colon.

We explore today the very nature of exploring. I was reminded the other day that new is great. In virtually every aspect of life, newness is appealing, exciting, and stimulating. I think everyone knows this. In every industry I can think of newness is the key to success. Certainly in the computer industry, newer, bigger, better, faster is better. But even in software, using a new application is great. Using a old application that has been revised and upgraded to have new features is great.

New wife? I think it is possible that affairs start as a result of our pursuit of newness. Have you ever met somebody you think is great, funny, entertaining, and witty - then you meet her husband. He treats her like crap because to him, she is old, used-up, and pruny. Her jokes are re-hashed, hackneyed junk she tries out on anybody who hasn't heard them yet. Her stories? Just as worn. But the new girl? Fresh and alive and charming and delightful with fun stories and a charismatic way of telling them.

Car companies know this all too well. Used cars are new to somebody. And new cars have that smell that feeds the need for newness. My car isn't new. But there is something missing - ah, yes, the Duramax with the Allison transmission. I will pull this trigger soon because I want a new truck. New sometimes pulls a trailer better too.

I have seen people fix up things and make them new again. I tried this with Debi. One hip down, one to go. I did this with my house. One hip down and one to go. Ba dum, ch! I’ll be here all night. Try the veal. It is like living in a new house that is really familiar. I can't describe it but I somehow really LOVE it because it is new. Remodels are a good way to make something old, new again. I have seen people jack their cars up, put new tires on, and put on a fuzzy steering wheel cover to bend the newness curve up again.

Then there's old that is so old it becomes new again. Classic cars are always a sight on the road. We look at them and remember the good old days when things were made better. Back then when you got in an accident in your steel-on-steel Chevy you just hosed off the dashboard and kept on driving it. It is only after you pass the classic Rambler that you realize that it is 115 degrees outside and he had his windows down because he had no air conditioning. Oh, and push button transmission and crappy shocks. And the whole thing could catch fire at any moment. Thank goodness I don’t like old cars.

Sometimes, just to keep things new, I avoid asking my wife for sex - just to change things up a bit. Keeps the relationship alive...

Good Dreams and Brad Dreams

OK, I admit it. Lately the blog has kinda been a train wreck. OK, more like a train with its wheels locked so sparks shooting from the track as it smashes into a busload of retarded children headed for summer camp with their special guest star Lionel Richie singing ‘Hello’ and leading them in the chorus. (thx Adam) Sorry. There have been few posts and the ones that made it really blow. I think it is a mood thing and a time thing. Enough excuses.

Today’s topic: dreams. I am worried. Most of the time my dreams are benign and confusing with highlights of sexual content. I can cope with them. But sometimes I dream things that cannot possibly have originated in my brain. I mean, I know my brain. I live in it. It often generates the most random and unexpected things. I call that creativity. I like that aspect of my brain. But when I am faced with the realization that the dreams I have expose thoughts that are actually lurking in my mind…I entertain the thought of just accepting the psychosis and beginning the shock treatment.

And why is it that I am not free in my dreams. In the midst of the most disjointed, dysfunctional, delusional extravaganza, I am strangely aware of my boundaries. That doesn’t mean that I don’t go to the mall naked. It means that when I go to the mall naked I am always shamefully hiding behind a garbage can (and fashioning a suit of armor out of it) instead jogging round from store to store asking them if they want to participate in the ‘Name the Pee-Pee’ contest. Instead, I am wondering why it took me until I was in the mall upstairs outside the Mrs. Fields to REALIZE THAT I WAS NAKED! It must be the dough. Or the smell. And let’s just say that she wasn’t the only one handing out free samples…

I would never cheat on my wife. That said, I can’t even cheat in my dreams. I often find myself in compromising situations only to be thwarted by my morals and ethics. I don’t advocate explaining these dreams in great detail to the Mrs. because even if your explanation includes the disclaimer that your love for her and devotion to her transcended the subconscious so as to restrict your catatonic bone dancing you will still be sentenced to sofa-sleep. (Davenport dalliance dreams are delicious)

Why is nudity such a part of dreams? I see naked people. Usually I don’t know them. Often I am naked. Nearly always, my wife is naked. I will probably study this phenomenon a little more closely to see what the expert wacknoids who think they know but are really guessing have to say about it. My own pre-researched conclusion that I jump to is that the forbidden nature of nudity is socialized into us to the extent that it is only in dreams that we can dip our toe into these illicit waters.

Now, a dream. Last night I had a strangely disjointed dream about my friend Brad. Brad owns a successful advertising company but in my dream he was a plastic surgeon living and practicing out of his house in Hawaii. My dream picks up the story when I go in to visit him for an indescribable procedure. I can describe WHAT he did but not WHY he did it. I was lying on a table and he came up to my left arm and sank his scalpel deep into the shoulder and cut a line from it to the inside of my elbow right alongside my bicep. I remember feeling nothing. Not painful, no cutting. I do remember thinking that as he cut I was growing more delirious as if he had some sort of elixir on his knife that caused an anesthetic response (both local and general). As he cut, he complained about how hard it was to cut through a piece of fat near the shoulder/bicep division. He had to cut that a few times to get a deep as he somehow needed to cut. He left the room and my wife came in, naked, and slipped under the covers of the bed diagonal from me. He came back in and went to her bed, pulled down the covers, and used his scalpel on her hip, I believe, perhaps to revise her scar. But he must have forgotten the anesthetic because his first cut made her SCREAM so loudly that it woke me up.

This dream was not particularly troubling but I always have to ask myself...Why in Hawaii? Why Brad? Why wasn't the bed next to mine? I know why not my bed. She wouldn't want to disturb the large gash in my arm...

Serenity

Am I told what to think?

What a funny notion but on the other hand, it happens. I was talking to a person I used to work with who stayed in the hell hole that was NDCHealth after I left. In a passing conversation sometime after I left I asked him if he liked working there. He said, "It's a great place to work. At least that is what I am told..."

How telling. Can't you hear the corporate rah, rah in that? Instead of actually making it a great place to work, they just tell people how much better it is. The problem is that employees who have been there and seen both worlds think the new working environment sucks. And they are right - except they are continuously told how much better things are now.

I wonder how often this happens in life. How often do we bother to gather empirical data versus being fed information via the media spoonful. How often have I used facts and data from unverified, plastic-haired commentator source versus my own research. I'm afraid I do this often. I don't have time, for example, to disect the federal register report on HIPAA legislation so I rely on shortcuts to bring me to a level of understanding that allows me to emphatically rant about regulations and requirements with minimal knowledge. Now that's convenience. This is not to say that I don't have my crap-detector finely tuned on every piece of information I receive, its just that if it sounds good and matches my core beliefs, it's readily added to the arsenal.

I was talking to a friend the other day and at the risk of sounding cryptic, we were talking about a subject that is controversial. I realized that I didn't have a stand on this issue. Now, in my many years of life that doesn't mean that I haven't ever thought about it but if I had to state my stance on the subject, I would have to defer until I had thought enough about it to make a statement. Either that or catch a documentary on Discovery that swayed my thinking and filled my arguement quiver with undocumented, unverifyable, unsubstantiated weapons.

I concluded at the end of our discussion that I wasn't affected by the topic and therefore didn't have a strong opinion - meaning that I would be able to argue either side effectively. This was a mistake. His take was that I should see the world as he sees it. There should be no middle ground and there certainly should be no such thing as a flexible opinion.

As I gather more information and change my mind as a result, I'm smarter, right? As I more deeply contemplate a topic and gather my own information, I should be better informed to make a decision, re-align my thinking, and fight to the death to make sure everyone sees it my way -- at least until I change my mind again...

Thin Line

First, some lyrics:

It’s a thin line between love and hate
It’s a thin line between love and hate
It’s five o’clock in the morning
And you’re just getting in
You knock on the front door
And a voice sweet and low says
Who is it? She opens up the door and lets you in
Never once asks where have you been
She says are you hungry?
Did you eat yet?
Let me hang up your coat
Pass me your hat
All the time she’s smiling
Never once raises her voice
Its five o’clock in the morning
You don’t give it a second thought
Its a thin line between love and hate
(repeat)
The sweetest woman in the world
Could be the meanest woman in the world
If you make her that way
You keep hurting her
She'll keep being quiet
She might be holding something inside
That’ll really, really hurt you one day
I see her in the hospital
Bandaged from foot to head
In a state of shock
Just that much from being dead
You couldn’t believe the girl
Would do something like this, ha
You didn’t think the girl had the nerve
But here you are
I guess action speaks louder than words
Its a thin line between love and hate
(repeat)

We were talking about a couple, let’s call them R and E, who really don’t deserve the two beautiful children they have because they are so busy being angry and hateful and vengeful with each other that they can’t see past their differences to be civil – even for their kids.

Poor little T is only 9 years old and feeling the brunt of it. A new chapter was written this weekend involving a late visitation, a power-hungry, hypocritical mom, a butthole dad, and a couple of kids that basically got squashed in the middle of the drama.

At one point in the story, I turned to the storyteller and commented that A) I don’t know whose side I am on because I dislike both of them for different reasons, and B) it’s a thin line between love and hate. Only too recently have I been exposed to many folks who “don’t love each other anymore” and who are trying to move on in their rather advanced years. It seems to me there are fundamental prideful problems with each of them. How can they attempt to find love again? How can they try to sever deep ties with home and family and kids and lives without wrecking all? What makes them think their single offering is so desirable that others will want them?

So, I have decided to open a butthole-gone-single aging-meat-market (BGSAMM) dating service. I will list their real qualities –
1) Strong determination to walk away from responsibility
2) New-found desire to improve self and look good
3) Ability to forget past (accomplishments but not faults)

and their imagined qualities –
1) Thinks they are better off
2) Have more to offer to their pursued new relationship now that they are free

I think most of the BGSAMM participants think the opposite of love is hate. They could not be more wrong. The opposite of love is indifference. The opposite of love is ‘I do not care.’

It is the inability to think objectively and rationally that I don’t get. Why not fall in love with the person you were in love with before? Is that so hard? If you hate them now, you aren’t far away from loving them. Cut yourself a big slice of that humble pie you avoid so fervently and fold up the selfishness you hold so dear into a small wad and stick it under the table of reconciliation. If you look under there you find that many others in your situation have already done that. Gross, isn’t it?

Plus, you know what they look like naked so there won't be a 'third-nipple surprise.'

A Fish Story

I searched my blog and found that I haven’t used the word puke nearly enough. So, I have another puke story – this one from sophomore year at Westwood High. Don’t worry, this one does not involve cows, it involves fish. I also can’t tell this story without you seeing it coming down Broadway so I apologize in advance if your anticipation exceeds the payoff. I am reminded of this story because I just ran into a friend of mine at a restaurant and had a lovely chat with him. He has a cute daughter who is graduating this year – also a plus as I have a son.

Jim, whose real name is Jim, is 2 years older than I am – making him a lofty senior when I was a lowly sophomore. Steve, the other principal in this story, was also a senior. They were contemporaries of Dennis. Jim had a knack, a gift, or a talent which I did not discuss with his children while they were in the restaurant. He could puke on command. I’m not sure how this superpower helped him but somehow we were jealous of this ability when we were in high school. He assured us that when he really puked – that is when he was sick and retching – it was nasty, painful, uncomfortable, etc. much like the experiences we all can tell and re-tell before being shut down by the wimpy weak-stomached (WWS) in our midst. However, in daily life, he could reproduce a meal with great ease and no discomfort.

One day at Mc Don Al Ds, Micky dees, you get it, right, I am hiding this from the corporate name protection police, he actually ate a Begg Meck, regurgitated it back into the styro-container that used to house these burgers before we all turned green, and tried to return it. He claimed it was ‘undercooked.’ Gross, I know. But it gets better (or worse if you are a WWS). Jim often reproduced meals, which became boring after three to four years.

Senior year, there was a school-wide dance held in the gym for charity. There were several raffle-type activities yielding funds to be given to a worthy charity, I’m sure. One of the evening’s activities was goldfish swallowing. You can see it coming, can’t you? You could spend $1 on a goldfish that you would then have to swallow – all in the name of charity.

Not to be outdone, Jim and Steve teamed up in the name of charity as well. They cornered the DJ (from a local radio station who happened to be working our dance) and told him that between the two of them they would swallow the same goldfish. Pause. Really? How? Jim would eat the goldfish, blanch it back up, and Steve would eat it again. The DJ stopped the music and announced the offer these guys had made and began the bidding. I wish I could remember how high the bidding got – somewhere around $200 or so I think. Once the bidding stopped, a hush fell over the crowd as Jim ate a goldfish (and drank a little of the water from the fish tank for effect). A minute later, up came the fish back into a cup filled with other stomach contents. The DJ verified that indeed there was a little fish in the mixture so Steve grabbed the cup, hesitated slightly, and then drank it. Without peer pressure I don’t think he could have kept that concoction down. But he did. And we were all amazed at the combination of guts and stupidity. How does anyone survive high school?

Crabby Maui

I couldn’t resist another travel blog. This one involves in-flight turbulence. Picture yourself in the cockpit of a 4-seat Cessna with a beautiful view of the Pacific Ocean and Kahului, the airport you just left on the isthmus of Maui, Hawaii. This was me a few years ago. What a great trip. What a fabulous sight. I was the third passenger, the first two being Kioki, our instructor/pilot and Jeff Ward, my business partner who was copilot/in-training pilot trying to get a few more flight hours. Where better than in Hawaii to enjoy a little flight instruction?

After taking off, we flew toward the West Maui Mountains and on over to the sea cliffs on Molokai and Lanai before heading back to Maui. The flight was smooth and fun, not the least bit scary and there was really no concern for the wind or the weather. The pilots handled the ride differently: Kioki was calm and Jeff was, um, hyper-alert. As we made our way back around to Maui we could see Lahaina and then we circled around the West Maui Mountains toward the isthmus on the south side. Kioki, a VERY seasoned flyer, casually mentioned that we would be breaking free of the protection of the mountains and that the trade winds through the isthmus were significant. We noticed a definite line in the water ahead where the calm sea gave way to the waves churned up by the wind. On cue, Kioki said, “…we always feel the wind right about here when we come around this … [something indecipherable because of the sudden blender-like shuddering of the increasingly tiny gnat-plane we were wrapped in]”. I think he meant mountain. Wow, you think turbulence is bad in a big plane? This was eventful because A) I have never been shaken so violently in a tiny craft before and B) Kioki found our girl-like screams amusing.

Upon approach, Kioki told Jeff that the crosswind was about 30-40 knots with gusts. According to Kioki this is normal wind for the isthmus between two GIANT mountains with the trade winds, etc. According to Jeff, this was a reason to avoid takeoff – let alone attempting to land. In Arizona, these conditions cause private plane owners to divert. Kioki told Jeff to throttle back all the way to idle. Really, it looked like the propeller stopped spinning. We stayed in the air as a result of two forces: the wind and the audible prayers uttered from the back seat.

This landing reminded me of a short flight I took to Salt Lake City. I learned some new aviation terms during this flight – and not the ones used by other passengers who were puking in bags around me. We actually ran out of barf bags on that flight. Seriously, I didn’t think commercial planes could be bounced around the sky like this one was. When we got closer to landing, the wind, clouds, and, well, tornados were a little disconcerting. I was informed after we landed that they closed the airport. Our flight was evidently the experience that tipped the should-we-close-this-sucker-down scale. Upon approach, the plane’s nose pointed toward the mountains. We were flying at about a 45 degree angle relative to the runway. They call this ‘crabbing’ perhaps because crabs fly sideways. Crabbing allows the pilot to fly against crosswinds. I think I crabbed my pants.

as Big as Texas

Have you ever felt turbulence while on the ground that was so bad it made you want to toss your bagels? Almost as violent as when you were in the air? I have. Here’s the story:

When I was traveling extensively for the red menace, I had occasion to visit Dallas, Texas. I was headed for San Antonio but for some reason we were diverted to Dallas. I don’t remember if I was connecting through Dallas or if we landed there temporarily. All this was because of the weather there so we were delayed for some time waiting. The airline, in a heart-felt gesture, decided I deserved a $20 voucher for my delay and troubles to be used in the airport. So, I went to the closest airport kiosk and asked for a bagel and a juice. The total was $7. The girl behind the counter decided that she would let me in on a little secret. “You see”, she said, “you can’t get change for this. You might as well order $20 worth of food.” So, I did. I just got $13 worth of bagels. It filled a brown paper bag.

We were finally allowed to board the plane and I was relegated to the rear of the plane. We taxied to the runway and then the captain came on and told us that there was another nasty cell coming through so we would have to wait. Again. Here’s where the turbulence came in. I could see out my window that the sky was darkening and actually quite ominous. No big deal. Let’s wait for the storm. Wow! As the heart of the storm beat upon us that plane rocked, tipped, and yawed like a Mormon newlywed bed. Holy smokes, many of my fellow passengers were less than amused. An hour and a half later, the storm left. The pilot came on and informed us of the proverbial good news/bad news scenario. The good news was that we had been cleared to be able to take off. The storm was over. The bad news was that there were 27 other planes that had priority over our departure. We were queued up. They expected about a 90 minute delay before takeoff.

It was at this point that a rather ample hungry-looking black woman near me began to complain about her hunger. Asking her to wait for the storm was OK, but could we please cut in front of some of these other planes and get out of here so she could eat!? So, Samaritan that I am, I piped up with an offer of a poppy seed bagel. She declined sheepishly. I think she realized that she was the only one complaining. I then said, to everyone in my section, that the airline had been gracious enough to give me money for these bagels and that I couldn’t possibly eat them all. That did it. Oh, yes. She accepted my offer of a bagel, as did many others seated around me. I nearly emptied the bag. Can you believe it, after everyone had a bagel, she had the gall to ask, “…do you have cream cheese?” I had to laugh. The nerve. Me with free bagels but no cream cheese.

After distributing the bagels, eating them, suffering with no beverage (no, I didn’t ration my juice) and apparently suffering worse with no cream cheese, we took off. It seemed to me that they saw a crack in the sky, a break between storms, and went for it. The liftoff was spectacular. I expected to hear, “…and the Airbus A320 has cleared the tower for the first-ever multi-racial, multi-bagel, experimental land-speed record-setting flight…” We were freely batted about the sky headed for San Antonio – or so I thought. Remember that storm that we waited for? Well, apparently, it had made it most of the way to San Antonio by the time we waited for the 27 planes in front of us. So, we would have to ‘fly around’ for a while waiting for the same storm to leave the San Antonio area. So we did.

Then came the pilot with some more good news/bad news. The good news is that the storm was leaving the San Antonio area but the bad news was that FAA rules stated that our fuel levels had reached a point where we had to refuel wherever we were. This, happily, was in Abilene, Texas. Abilene, it seems, had never had a plane this big actually land in this airport so they had no facilities to allow us to disembark. A truck, with a long hose, came driving up to the plane and we waited while Otis squeezed the handle and the jet fuel trickled into our plane. I half expected Gomer and Goober to run out, wash the windshield, and run the pilot’s credit card out the window.

Who knew it would take me 7 hours to fly over Texas. Sure, all the Texans did, right.

Teach Me to Lead

I now accept leadership as a legitimate art form. I don’t know how I felt earlier in my life. I probably accepted leadership for what it was and engaged in the lame, pedestrian leadership myself that I see so often in others now. Back then I didn’t understand the real reason for leaders. I think I thought leadership was more the enforcer/cop keeping vigil on naturally occurring events. I thought things would get done just fine without leaders keeping tabs on everything. I assumed that leaders were nothing more than watchdogs ensuring that there were no violations. I never accepted the notion that because the team lost too many games the coach should be fired. He never played. He didn’t lose. He didn’t drop any passes or jump off sides. I get it now.

I was wrong about leadership. Unfortunately, I was often in leadership positions so there are plenty of witnesses to my pathetic leadership skills.

Why? Did I have such crappy leaders and bosses early on that I didn’t grasp the true nature of great leadership? Or did I have such excellent leaders that their supremacy was seamless and undetectable? Many years ago when I learned that leaders can make or break something. I have seen inept leadership first-hand and heard of it second-hand and talked about it extensively third-hand.

On the other hand, because I have been both a good leader and an extremely poor one, I cannot in good conscience be critical of any leader. But I am anyway. Management styles differ vastly and effectiveness is often in the eye of the beholder – or the next manager up the poop chain. I tend, now, to manage as I like to be managed. I don’t really have any insight into great management. I guess that is why there are so many books on the subject – none of which agree with each other. I try to give direction and allow the ‘managed’ to control their own destiny. Sometimes I get into trouble because those who are managed need more direction. I don’t. I don’t like much direction. I invent. When I am given direction, it is often limiting, which is against what I should be about in my opinion.

I now stand in admiration of great leaders. I watch the tricks, tactics, and methods of leaders I see hoping to steal from them and incorporate some of their characteristics in my own leadership responsibilities.

A side note: my dad often brought home stray dogs to his house. His father would take them out the back door and behind the shed and 'teach them how to lead' which meant kill them. My dad never liked animals until much later in his life.

Teaming

Teams. It seems teams are a part of every facet of life. I have been on teams, coached teams, and been kicked off teams. The common thing about teams is that association with a team teaches a life lesson that is useful in many circumstances.

When I was young, I was on football teams, baseball teams, basketball teams, softball teams, track teams, etc. Although the term Track Team seems a little strange since track is an individual event. But now that I think about it, Tennis Teams, Swim Teams and other individual-like sports have a different definition of a team.

So, there are the kinds of teams that promote a sense of belonging to a larger organization, like the track team or, I suppose, being schizophrenic. These honor the individual effort but don’t rely on teamwork per se to accomplish their objective. Sure, one track team beats another by virtue of points accumulated, but let’s not split hairs. Teams like a football team or basketball team count on each other to be able to conquer opponents, douse each other with champagne and blame each other for extraneous misconduct. No team, no event, no rape.

Being old now, I coach teams more than I participate on teams. Sports teams, that is. I am on management teams and the like but they are usually called task forces, panels, or juries. I derive great joy from coaching my children on teams but I try to involve them on different teams for the experience. Caitie’s teams have been fun to coach and I have learned how to manipulate them so they gain a sense of teamwork and a subsequent desire to assist each other and do better because they feel they are a part of an entity they care about. I used to be suspect of leadership but have a whole new take on that topic – for another blog.

In college I was forced to assemble teams for group projects. This was particularly difficult because I was always the team captain and always did the bulk of the work. As my education progressed, I figured out that I was going to be put into teams in each of my upper-division classes. I was also fortunate to find another guy who was a leader and who worked/shouldered his share of the project load. He and I coordinated our schedules to have the same classes. We would purposefully sit on opposite sides of the room and ‘recruit’ team members. When it came time to assemble teams, the teacher would invariably leave the formulation of the teams up to the students. This was perfect for us. We knew we would be on the same team but would strike up casual interviews with the others in the class to see if there were others whom we deemed worthy to be on our team.

Our dialogues went something like this: “Oh, I hate teams. I always get stuck doing all the work…” (hoping for a ‘me too’) or “Do you know if this class is hard? My GPA needs a boost…” (hoping for a ‘none of these classes are hard’) or “If we pull an all-nighter, do you object to wearing see-thru pajamas?” (hoping for ‘that’s all I have and I don’t wear underware’) – the last one was for female candidates only.

We ended up assembling great teams that accomplished strong results because we recruited well. Was that cheating?

Extreme Optimism

OK, so I admit it, I'm an extreme optimist. I have been optimistic since I was a little tyke rolling down the driveway in Phoenix on my new bike that I didn't know how to ride yet and skinning my knees on the asphalt driveway. Oh, no, here comes a bifurcation – two blogs in one. Why was it OK for our parents to A) provide no visible means of protection for the little kamikaze bike riders, B) provide no medical assistance and little pharmaceutical assistance to our wounds, and C) HAVE AN ASPHALT DRIVEWAY WITH LOOSE GRAVEL TO CRASH ON AND IMBED INTO OUR WOUNDS IN THE FIRST PLACE? We had no knee pads, helmets, wrist guards, or other protective gear to help us bounce off the earth. And yet we survived. Strange, isn't it? It is perhaps this upbringing that contributed to my optimism. There, I knew it would be come back together.

I am afflicted by extreme optimism in so many ways. There are times when my optimism keeps me in the dark. There are times when my optimism gets me through tough times. But most of the time, optimism seems to be the way to most properly live my life. My wife says I am not realistic because I am optimistic. This seems misleading. The continuum is pessimism to optimism – not realism to optimism. I think optimism is a closer cousin to reality than pessimism because of three very important factors: optimists rule, pessimists suck and reality is conjured. No, really, the three things that I count on are 1) the goodness of people and their constant desire to continue to do the right thing regardless of their shortcomings, 2) events occur predictably for the most part, and 3) pessimists suck.

1) Carried to extremes, a pessimistic person would never drive on the freeway. Other drivers on the freeway may stop, or swerve, or try to cause trouble for the pessimistic driver who would constantly be on guard, stressed out, and pull over into the middle lane and creep along at 54 mph. I think this happens to old folks as they try with ever-increasing desperation to preserve their lives – either that or they don't trust their degenerated reflexes enough to avoid the driver who stops, swerves, or tries to cause trouble. Optimistic people travel the same freeway believing that all the other drivers will for the most part try not to crash into them, try to maintain the correct speed, and generally avoid trouble (or eye contact for that matter). Extreme optimists not only believe this but also look into every car thinking they for sure they will know someone and that person will want to have sex with them.

2) (The following example excludes many construction trades or the production of any software product) If I try to estimate the duration of a trip, the length of time to complete a project, or the time necessary to accomplish the tasks on my to-do list, I have to employ some sense of reason and logic and mix in some real time experience to prognosticate. Pessimistic folks plan extra time for a flat tire, a bomb scare in the store supplying materials to complete a project, or the inevitable multiplication of tasks on that to-do list. Pessimists will often remark that if they approach life in this negative frame of mind then they are never disappointed. That's too bad, because the majority of the time they aren't happy either. They constantly wait for the 'other shoe to drop' rather than enjoying the first shoe. And the saddest part is they wish everyone around them would join in their misery. Extreme optimists wish they had more on the to-do list to show just how much they can do – whether they can do it or not. The ability to achieve is irrelevant.

3) I am optimistic that I can change a pessimists mind. I can’t, but that doesn’t stop me from believing that I can. This is why pessimists suck. If they won’t bend to my constant, relentless optimism, then ‘rain on them.’

The other day, my brother-in-law Chris and I were in the basement cleaning and moving items up stairs when I began complaining about the fact that the giant hand-me-down TV would eventually have to make the trip down the stairs and try to turn the corner into the room. No room, no flexibility, and very heavy. So, in our discussion, Chris said, "…why don't you wrap the stairs around and open them up. You know the last 3 stairs don't have to have a banister…" He drew me a picture on the wall and I hastily agreed. He ran upstairs, grabbed his Skill saw and cut the end off the existing banister. Strangely enough, this began at 6:oopm and by midnight he and I (ok, mostly he) had the old stairs opened up and the new addition to wrap the stairs completed. At one point, during all the sweating and cutting, my sister pointed out, "…the problem is they are both optimists." She was right. We had no problem with this project. The timeline fit (Debi was coming home in 4 days) and the painter, carpet guy, and others had to be scheduled also. No problem. The thing is we did it. I did find out during the course of this that Chris is an extreme optimist like me. I explained my debilitating extreme optimism by telling them that each morning while in the shower, I wait for and wonder why my wife hasn't joined me. For 20 years I have had this thought EACH DAY with no reason to entertain such a thought! Chris confided that he has the same thoughts. His affliction is particularly acute since he gets up at 4:30am each day and still looks for these events to occur.

One more: Betsy and Trent visited one fine spring day and we decided to take the trailer out for a weekend campout. The place I selected was one that is great – except for two unanticipated drawbacks. One, mosquitoes. Two, getting down the ravine into the riverbed consisted of driving on roads not suitable for, um, trailers. So, I dragged the trailer to the edge and my extreme optimism kicked in. I was sure that I could make it down. Well, we did make it down, but we dragged the bottom of the trailer so badly that it tore off the plumbing (so no pooping) and bent up the bumper so badly that we couldn't get the back door open (so no quadding). I admit, in this instance, my extreme optimism cost me money. I could not, however, shut it off. I am currently looking for a 12 step program that helps me cope with over-happiness.

Grin Grimace Stoop Hunch

Grin Grimace Stoop Hunch
I’ve been noticing lately a strange set of human behaviors that are not usually called to consciousness. However, everyone knows about these. There are two sets of idiosyncratic behaviors that are not so idiosyncratic. Common idiosyncrasies. Who’s the oxy and who’s the moron now, huh?
The first one is the half-grin. This is used in social behavior when two individuals meet who really don’t know each other. There could be some familiarity between them, or they could be in a social situation that commonly demands a smile – and reciprocal smile between the two parties. However, the smile, being a little too familiar, does not quite fit. So, and you can try this at home, the half-smile is employed. This is done by using some, but not all of the smiling muscles in your face. Employ mostly the muscles immediately adjacent your mouth without using the higher cheek “…turn it upside down and smile that frown away” muscles. Want extra style points? Purse the lips a bit too, in a knowing fashion – poised and ready to say hello to the stranger should they break the half-grin barrier.
It seems that committing the whole face to a real smile is somewhat too personal or not worth the effort but not smiling at all shows gives off a stoic chill akin to the look I get from my wife after a good fart joke. So, instead of just looking ahead, or looking away (preferred, but not an option if you have been spotted looking directly at somebody as if you were going to have to pick them out of a line-up later) you just glance, give them the halfer, and move on. Not an issue. I am amazed how often I see this. I get it most at fast food restaurants – except In-N-Out where full-face smiles are handed out like Clinton pardons.
The second is the hunch. This is the act of walking in front of something, somebody, or a group of somebodys and stooping over slightly in Cro-Magnon form to avoid being seen, blocking view, or disrupting an event.
I see this one in several places. Church – when somebody comes in late (even in the back, strangely enough) they will walk in hunched over slightly. Movies – see the guy that got here late? So does everyone else even though he is walking as if his spine has suddenly given way. Conversations – when two people are talking in a hallway and somebody has to pass between them, there is usually a hunker involved. This move is usually accompanied by a streamline body turn so as to avoid getting too close to the conversators. This makes no sense to me but somehow it excuses them even if they don’t say it. The fact that their body posture demonstrates an inferior position allows the hallway conversation to continue uninterrupted.
Poop. See?

Retrieval System

I now admit that there are retrievable memories stored in my head that, but for the sake of some trigger, will never be released. I went to a fireside meeting last night and the following chain of events triggered a memory from 1970 (when Eva Von Zeppelin, heiress of the airship designer, sues in an attempt to stop 'Led Zeppelin' from using the family name). Ok, here it goes...

Last week, Doug Waldie told me he was going to a fireside featuring renowned author and historian Richard Bushman (Gouverneur Morris Professor of History emeritus at Columbia University) - ((Gouverneur Morris was the guy who wrote the friggin constitution)) so naturally I asked if I could crash the party. The party, you see, was actually being held in Scottsdale/Phoenix where Doug's brother-in-law is the Stake President. Let's now rewind back about umpteen years from when I was 2 years old to 12 years old (6th grade) and living in the vicinity of 56th Street and Osborn. I went to Ingleside Elementary School (which is now Ingleside Middle School) which at the time was a K-8 school. When I was in 4th or 5th grade there was a new coach who started his teaching career/coaching career at Ingleside and was our new, crew-cut coach with an attitude.

Flash forward to the events following the amazing fireside with Dr. Bushman (Harvard BS, Harvard MS, Harvard PhD). After 'amen' we all stood and I saw a very familair older, crew-cut gentleman walking toward the refreshments. I said 'Bevel...' to which he reacted but didn't pursue as he continued walking toward the back. I followed him and eventually stopped him in the gym and asked him if he was Coach Bevel. He indicated that he was and I introduced myself. I said nothing about his hair. He remembered me, or at least pretended to, and I related the following story to him - thus proving that I used my head for more than just holding my ears apart as my father often said was its only purpose: "I remember when Coach Bevel first started at Ingleside and he was our new coach. We did and exercise called 'Six Inches' where the victim lies down on his back and raises his heels off the ground six inches. Then he waits. Not more than six inches. Not less than six inches. No bent knees. No feet apart. In fact, if he violates the prescribed leg position, Coach Bevel would throw the football he was holding at the victim - trying to hit him in the stomach - which by now contained a burning muscle straining against the ever-increasing weight of his legs. I was a victim once - I guess my feet weren't in the correct position and I heard Coach Bevel holler and then **BLAMM-O** a football hit right next to my head. You see, those who can't do, teach. And those who can't play quarterback coach in elementary school.

Fortunately, he laughed at my story. I told this story to his wife as he was listening and he actually began laughing when I started the story with "...we used to do this exercise called 'Six Inches'." I don't know why, but I have very fond memories of Coach Bevel. I also told him that when I was playing football for Westwood High School he was coaching at Scottsdale High School. I greeted him at the end of the game and he claims he sort-of remembered that brief meeting as well. He asked me who my contemporaries would have been that stayed around to play sports in later years. I named a few of my friends from Ingleside and he said he had actually received an email from one of them a week prior. Pretty cool.

After this encounter, I went back to the refreshment table and Debi was there - Coach Bevel came over and met her too. After he left, I saw another familiar face which was confirmed by Doug as John Driggs (former Chairman of Western Savings) so I went over and spoke with him. He was Wil's good friend and we spoke for a few minutes. I love it when I meet someone my dad knew because they invariably charished their friendship with Wil.

I'm amazed at the retrieval system we have. I can't imagine the memories stored there. I have taken to trying to remember these and start writing them down when I get a chance.

What a lovely evening.

Boy or Girl

Boy or Girl? This is the first question usually asked about a person. In the olden days (I always wanted to say that) there were no ultrascans and high-tech imaging devices to expose your pre-birth winkie so the does-the-apple-have-a-stem question was usually answered at birth. It has been a goal for most of my life to never have that question asked of me again. I'm sure when I was luggage my mom had to dress me in something blue so folks would not make the mistake of calling me a girl, thus incurring offended mother wrath. Still, I was born in the 60's so the 70's were during my formative years and all role-model boys around me had longer hair. Girl hair.

I bring this up because today my wife (who is a verified girl) and I were dining at Chevy's and she noticed a woman/man/thing sitting at a table near us. Debi pointed out that 'Pat' was wearing a white shirt, slacks and a necktie but had pierced earrings. Short, sticky-uppy gray hair, glasses, a bit corpulent (thus concealing boobs or man boobs) and had a high voice. I have 'Pat' tipping the female scale but Debi wasn't too sure. This got me to thinking: is it desirable to be misjudged as a girl?

Well, that depends on who you are and where you are. Our painter has a son named Page. May be Paige. May be Peij. Who knows. When I was introduced to Page, our painter went out of his way to say, "...this is my SON Page." Good thing, too. I saw a pretty, petite, young 12-year-old with shoulder-length, curly, strawberry-blonde hair and delicate features who looked up at me and said, "Hi." I thought, OK, first of all, cut that kid's hair off, get him to go outside and scream a lot to rough up his voice, and maybe even get a marker and fill in a little mustache to butch him up a little. Wow, what a sad situation for this kid. And there is no way he doesn't get butchered at school. Unless he goes to an all-girls Catholic school.

Which brings me to my next point...I remember wanting to dress and act as a girl to see if I would be detected in certain unmentionable social situations. The problem was I was 6'2" and 195 lbs. I don't think I could have pulled it off (so to speak) which accomplished my earlier-stated goal. I remember talking to a girl who wanted to try the same sort of reversal so we discussed binding her breasts (I volunteered, it was the least I could do...) and trying to talk lower and meatier but she just couldn't pull it off. I've decided that nearly none can. When I see a trannie I often identify them as having switched before it becomes aparent. I am not sure, however, if I am right all of the time.

There are several movies that do a poor job of passing the girl off as a boy that I have seen lately. It takes a great deal of suspended reality to get me even close to believing these movies. In each of these movies there is the obligatory 'let-me-see-your-junk' skinny dipping scene where she can't toss the laundry with the chums for fear of flashing the fronts. I guess that is what makes great cinema - I just never buy it. Perhaps this is because I was thwarted as a lad with my huge, um, muscles and bulging, um, pecks. No guys I know like their prom dates to sport stubble.

Oh well, the chick in the restaurant remains a mystery - not her gender, but why she would look that way in the first place...

No Experience Necessary

“I'm impressed by your 'yada yada' “ (where yada yada refers to the attributes of our conduct, intellect, and vision). That is what we heard one day while interviewing technicians. This kid was a college student. His graduation was eminent. A computer science degree. And he must have been coached to say something along those lines. It seemed genuine but somehow scripted. Here's the problem with it as I pointed out to my partner after this candidate left. “Hey, lookie here, we impressed a college student. Whoopie!

My problem isn't that he had the ego to come in to our offices and profess his superiority (thus nearly elevating us to his status by being 'impressed'). My issue with his attitude is that he clearly does not place value in the most important element of knowledge: experience. Perhaps he isn't experienced enough. I felt like saying, “...excuse me drooling college pimple who couldn't code his way out of a paper bag...kiss my umpteen-years-of-sitting-in-front-of-a-computer-with-glassy-eyed ass. You don't even know what you don't know yet. You'll not be able to handle technical questions, computer questions, customer questions, boss questions, colleague questions, wife questions, and mother questions with the degree of elegance I have for some time. It will take you years to master the art of time-filling and clock-burning. I will take you longer – if ever – to refine the art of butt-kissing-without-seeming-like-it-is-butt-kissing.” I know, them's fightin' words. Don't worry, I'm a CodeWarrior.

Experience shows most, I think, when troubleshooting or problem solving. Book smarts don't reach the far corners of a boot failure. I was over fixing a friend's computer. He has been a plumber for 30 years. I sat down, diagnosed his trouble, made the proper corrections and adjustments, and his computer was fixed and singing again. He commented that he had invited several people over to fix his computer who had all failed. One, in fact, was a newly trained and certified technology company technician and installer. I hope that was ambiguous enough.

Nothing against the fine and reportedly thorough training program he had just completed, he just lacked the experience of having been there. I asked my friend if it would be better to entrust the most complex plumbing problems to someone who had just graduated from a trade school in plumbing or himself. He didn't hesitate because there are things he knows about plumbing that he can't teach. (Water flows downhill and never lick your fingers...among others) Thoughts, feelings, impressions, and twinges all result from experience (or old age, I've discovered – especially the twinges).

I get that there are entry-level jobs that post no requirements to be hired. No experience necessary jobs, however, don't exist. You have to have made a sandwich, or at least seen a sandwich made to make one.

I heard a statement the other day that said, in effect, "...if you are a different person today than you were a year ago it is most probably a result of something you read or someone you met." To this I would add Jeff's wise and crappy advice, "...it could also be a result of something you did (to gain experience) or a disease you got."

I've seen people change for change sake. No external forces, no real reason, just something that made them change. Drastically. I think it would be hard for me to change drastically. I make little changes in my life but I am tightly integrated with my current life. Deviation would create ripples beyond reasonable control. There are those who hate ripples. That's been my experience.

I Know Stupid Stuff

There is a virtual traveling trophy (one day we will have a real one when this gets serious) in our office called the KOOK Award. Yes, to the biggest kook. Kook stands for Keeper Of Obscure Knowledge. Every once in a while somebody in the office snaps off a definition of a practice, object, or idea to which everyone else immediately responds, "...BS." The validity of said obscure fact is then validated on the Internet and the person keeping such knowledge is then awarded the KOOK award. This trophy is a badge of both honor and wonder. I will give some examples.

There is a practice known as threading. It is a form of facial hair removal where two pieces of thread are twisted together around a group of hairs on a face and then BITTEN off. This one came out in a conversation in the office and I was actually frightened that this kind of knowledge could be attained, let alone retained.

The funny thing is that there is a great deal of knowledge in my head that I take for granted that is sometimes surprising to my co-workers. I think everyone should know that the Kashmir is a region in India, once the capital, and also a song by Led Zeplin and not to be confused with cashmere the wool or lead whose chemical symbol is Pb. (I learned the chemical symbol in 8th grade chemistry and the way I remembered it is we used to say that Lead Zeplin played a concert at Pacific Beach. Strange remembering strange facts but even stranger knowing how and when you learned them.) Everyone should know that neon is inert. So is Krypton. Used to make Kryptonite...I think.

Keeping obscure knowledge is not a problem for my wife. She used to be the smartest girl I know. Then, is seeped away. I don't know why. I still think she is the smartest KOOK because often she knows that Ben Afleck is no longer dating Jennifer and now dates Paris or Angelina. I can also call her whenever somebody asks a question about a movie such as, "...you know that movie with Cuba Gooding, Jr. and Al Pachino?" to which she replies, "...you mean 'Men of Honor' with Cuba Gooding, Jr. and Robert Deniro?" We're not worthy. Her friends call her 'Google' because she knows so much.

I'm glad she's not in my office or the KOOK Trophy would constantly reside in her office. Virtually.

Managing Thickness

I have learned throughout this process of remodeling the house that life is ALL about managing thickness. When you buy a new pair of socks, the thickness of them determines to some degree if they are comfortable and if your shoes fit. However, never has the thickness debate been more evident than when building something. I had some sense of this before I began so I didn't worry too much about it as we went. Adding to a room meant just kicking a wall out, adding some studs and drywall and painting over it. Not so. The concrete guy was 3/4" off on one side. This has caused me more grief and cost me about $6,600.

Doors swing to hit floors and other doors if thickness is not managed. Will there be tile or granite? Different thickness in the finished product means different materials used to arrive at the finished product. What's on the floor? Carpet? Tile? What's under the floor? Concrete? Wood? What will you put out there once it is done? Flagstone? All these questions help the designer determine thickness.

We had 'whoops' in our walls. That’s what our painter called them. Our drywallers, of all subs, have been the worst and cost us the most in repair/redone work. So much for saving a buck. Of all the subs, I think the drywallers were one of the most important and I didn’t realize that until now – amid paying to get their mistakes fixed. They did a poor job of managing thickness.

Through this process my hair is thinning. I guess I will have to manage the thickness of that , too. I remember an old Fernando sketch done by Billy Crystal where he had Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert on his show and they were discussing Muriel Hemmingway’s boob job. This is back in the day when breast augmentation was rare. Fernando asked G and R how much difference the surgery made to which Roger replied with a hand gesture demonstrating thumb and index finger about 1.5 inches apart. This is not where I got the original idea to employ hand gestures demonstrating various breast statuses but it should have been the genesis.

Another thickness which I have believed for 20 or more years comes from the Jethro Tull album “Thick as a Brick” which Richard informed me while we were young referred to unit size. There is a line in one of Tull’s songs that says, “…I’m tight against the seam,” which, of course, infers a state of arousal – the seam being the seam of ones pants. That song, of course, was from “Songs From the Wood.” I think the thickness in this instance is more centered on my thick skull for believing this. See for yourself. The song is called “Velvet Green” and is about grass and trees and cows. Silly me.

OK, items to blog:
Cruise
Remodel

We went on a cruise to the exotic land of Catalina, San Diego, and Ensanada, Mexico. We spent Christmas Day at sea. The weather was perfect and we had a great time.

We have not much remodeling left. Just the cabinets, the flooring, the electrical and plumbing, and the countertops. Not bad.

The end.

Just kidding. Not much in the blogging mood right now. I will do a brain-dump later. However...

On the cruise we met a rather interesting gentleman named Yefim. We became friends on our short trip and I got him to tell us a little about himself. He is 77 and a Russian Jew. His English was rough so I couldn’t get as much out of him as I would have liked. I first learned that he was a ship-building engineer and later learned that he was in the military during the Cold War. Yefim said that in 1965 he was in a Russian submarine looking through the periscope at San Francisco. And ‘America’ didn’t see him. He now lives in San Francisco.
His family has an interesting tale to tell as well. His father is one of 11 children – nine of whom were killed by Nazis. His father and his uncle were the only survivors of their family.

Yefim was there with his grandson Martin. Martin slipped between English and Russian freely. They were a delight. I will post some video soon showing them and us and such as that.

ttfn

Concrete Evidence

I have decided that there is nothing easy about concrete. I come by this knowledge honestly - through good, hard experience. I meant to say that.

Some years ago I replaced the gates in my driveway with wider ones. Not that I needed them, I could have parked my stuff behind narrow ones with a bunch more practice and some pretty nasty scratches on said trailers. But, in the immortal words of Joe M., I would rather widen the opening than...oh, never mind. So, I had a guy replace my gates and remove a couple of columns of block to accommodate the new gates. The result was a strip of concrete under the gate that consisted of broke-out block. It looked like Tom's teeth every time Jerry hit him in the face with a giant frying pan. Most impressive was the way Jerry could levitate high in the air and still have the leverage to swing that massive cast-iron skillet in order to reshape Tom's face -- and his teeth, by the way. (didn't think it would come back, did you...)

Anyway, I went to Home Depot, which I now own as a result of the remodel, to get some concrete patch material. I got a large bucket and followed the directions. I even got a trowel. Is that how you spell it? So, I mixed the concrete and applied it all along the broken-teeth jaggy-ness. Then, I went back to smash it into the cracks of the broke blocks to smooth out the driveway.

When I went to hit the first, um, I'll call it a clod of concrete, I expected to be able to manipulate it like drizzling chocolate in the voids of the three-scoop mountain Debi loves so much. Not to be confused with the two mountains Jeff loves so much. Instead of the soft, smooth, creamy substance I expected, I hit solid rock. I think it hit me back. The bag said it would dry hard and fast but this was ridiculous. I threw the clods away. I threw the bucket away. I even threw the trowel away. I have such animosity that I didn't even look up how to spell it. I ended up having the slab company patch this gap and it looks great.

I may have mentioned that during the remodel (mind you I didn’t say ‘…before the remodel began when it could have been properly planned’) we decided to add a veggie sink in the kitchen. To do this, we had to saw-cut the newly poured slab to accommodate the wires and pipes necessary to tie the plumbing to the island. The saw-cutter came out and cut the concrete. I busted it out. There is strangely nothing straight-forward about this. It looks cracked, it can move, but I cannot remove the piece I am working on.

I found it gratifying to use the sledge hammer on the concrete right up until I got to the deeper foundation concrete. My sledge hammer literally bounced off this stuff. So, I found it hard to work with. Next, I went to Home Depot, which I own, and rented a jack hammer. This 30-lb light-duty device helped me chip out some of the more delicate areas around existing pipes and corners. It, however, failed to penetrate the foundation sufficiently. So, I went to Home Depot, which I own, and rented The Whacker. This device actually comes with its own moving dolly. I was able to jackhammer my way to success using The Whacker. I’m sure the digital nerve damage and hearing loss were worth it.

Now I'm scared of concrete.

Merry Christmas 2006

Much like Saddahama Huseinne, we have been living our last several months of freedom in a cave or basement. I don't know if we will be found and removed from this hole, but it seems unlikely. The contractors will grind the floor tomorrow morning at 7. Joy to the World.

So, Merry Christmas to everyone. We, the Crandalls, have many things to be thankful for or complain about depending who you are. The drywallers were in today to do some touch-up sanding of some rough spots and Debi was following them around making sure all was OK. I should preface this by saying that I am the inept contractor of our remodel. I try to run a safe jobsite and periodically I am caught off-guard because I could not forsee problems that could easily been avoided by someone who does this more or less professionally. I, on the otherhand, regularly endanger others who view our progress. One of the issues I might have under-addressed in the safety void that is our house is the 3" pipe that used to be the down-draft in our old island. This pipe will end up being under the new island and has not been filled in. Nor has it been marked or ground down or temporarily bridged or secured in the least. Until now, everyone has successfully navigated the kitchen without incident. Until now.

So, Debi is wandering around with the English-is-my-second-language-and-I-should-get-around-to-studying-it-someday drywaller chick and she is examining the computer desk area in the kitchen. She then spun around as la chick wanted to show her something across the room. She mistakenly looked at the thing, not down at her feet and her left foot went into the pipe. Not the picture of agility, Debi bent forward and back like one of those crappy toy figures they give out at Sonic with the suction cup on the bottom. She sprang back upright but not until she had sufficiently injured her shin bone and twisted her ankle.

She is resting comfortably now in our bed with soreness in her shin, ankle, and surprisingly, her left hip doesn't work anymore.

Eyes like Marty Feldman

My eyes are beginning to struggle. I have always had great eyesight. According to my kid's ophthalmologist, I am one of the few lucky ones. My dad, oh, I have to write about him someday, always had bad eyesight and glasses. My mom had good eyes and has concealed the fact that here eyes are bad now. Her mother was nearly blind. Throughout her life, my maternal grandmother had varying degrees of eye trouble, cornea transplants, collapsed pupils, and generally poor eye health. I think this is where my mother got her intensity about eyesight. I remember driving down the road one day when I was young and commenting that I thought I looked good in glasses. I may have mentioned that I wanted to damage my eyesight in order to deem it necessary to have these glasses to make me look good.

My comments must have been credible enough because my mom reacted in a violent way. Her tirade contained many reasons why I would not want to do such a thing. She was spitting fire and hollering as she demanded that I swear on a stack of shoes that I would never do anything so stupid. Of course I wouldn't. Although it was a known fact even then that people with glasses were smarter than people who were unbespecticled. There I was -- Mr. Dunderboy Nakedface.

I remember how much my friends were jealous of my eyesight. When we would drive somewhere (especially to the South Twin where it was dark) I could see the street signs far sooner than my friends. They thought I was blessed with a super power to be able to see like I could. I would deem that superpower-lite as my vision at the time was 20/15.

I was told that my eyesight would vanish when I turned 40. I remember reading a book aloud that night and when the clock struck 12 I still had the ability to read and see. I beat the odds, donchaknow. Now, at 45, I recognize the symptoms of gradual blindness. I didn't know doing that would cause such a belated effect. Checking my palms now. I now read everything just fine except when I get tired. I find that focusing when I am really tired has become interesting. I have tested this to see if there are times when I have more or less difficulty and the only thing I can tell is that when American Idol comes on I am instantly blinded. It must be Realitvigmatism.

Here's the weird part: I got some +1.25's for the tired reading times. If I get tired, I bust them out like a proud grandpappy dragging a fart through a crowded mall. I use them for a second and then I realize that I don't like them so I take them off and I can see better with them off. I can't explain that. I didn't think corrective lenses actually corrected anything. But they seem to correct my ability to see as Mr. Nakedface. So much for me donning glasses to look smarter. I can't wait for the day when I get to wear a neck-strapped pair of +2.00's around my neck everywhere I go. That will look cool. Sorry mom.

Vomitorium

I haven't posted for two weeks - since the ugly bug got the house. I guess I should record our experience so if we ever look back on this we will remember the days following Thanksgiving 2006. It was Thursday, and by Friday midnight 5 out of 6 of us were blowing. It hit each of us at about the same time. There was literaly one moment when Max was driving the porcelain bus, Caitie was hanging over the sink, Olivia had a bowl in the bathtub, and I came around the corner headed to the bathroom. Debi, the only survivor of this ordeal, began to laugh and directed me up stairs to find a functional toilet because there was absolutely nowhere else to puke. It would have been funny if it weren't so gross.

New Pictures 11-30

http://picasaweb.google.com/jeffbyte

Lookie here - notice the Harry-Potter-forehead-like lightning ceiling.

Idea Germ:

I have recently become fascinated with the specialized language used in each profession or situation. Handsome Dan is a great example. Another is Crime Central. I was watching CSI with Abby and they used 'crime central' to mean a specific situation. Now, the word crime and the word central don't trip me up individually. But collectively, they mean something different. I am not talking about difficult or unintelligible language such as is used by doctors and lawyers. That's the biggest bunch of habius corpus. I am talking about word groups that have been assigned meaning to help out a profession communicate in our otherwise weak language.

Some examples in my profession. Spaghetti Code. Technical Refresh. Boolean Drill. Kludge. One of these if 'jargon'. Can you guess which one? But the others are easily identifiable as possessing the characteristics of that which fascinates me. I have started paying attention to people who say, "...we call that X." The 'we call it' identifier in any conversation signifies the approaching word group that has been reassigned meaning. These are fascinating to me – at least the ones that are foreign to me. The ones I know and use...not so much.

Bovine Pate

I don't know whose idea it was. We were the Westwood Warriors. They were the Mountain View Toros. It was high school. I worked at a butcher shop every morning boxing meat that had been slaughtered, cut, and frozen from the previous day's carnage.

I think a bunch of us were talking about mascot pranks and our desire to participate. Mountain View was getting a little too big for its britches so we decided we would try to do our part to bring them down a notch or two. Since they were and are the Toros, we needed something to do with cows or bulls. I pointed out to the group that I had access to any cow part they wanted. We originally spoke of a cow hoof – a part I had used earlier in the year in a skit I did for a talentless show. “Anything tastes great when it sits on a Ritz.” That didn't seem like enough.

So I told everyone what a cow head looked like once it had been skinned. With the red meat and connective tissue that made up the muscles in the face, they were always a splendid site.
Our plan was to take the meaty cow head and place it somewhere that would bring out the secret passions of the Toros. We thought it best if sports were involved since A) mascots are most closely associated with sports, and 2) emotions ran quite high during these sporting events. We chose basketball. The most difficult obstacle was how to smuggle a cow head into a basketball court, hold it until the right time, and then somehow deliver the present with the dignity it deserved.

We chose the night and I secured the head. It was beautiful. Our method of bovine execution at the butcher shop was firing squad – er, um I mean a single bullet between the eyes. This victim was no exception and as a bonus he had horns. As an added, added bonus, we found a blue feather which fit perfectly in the cranial hole and completed the picture. After all, we were The Warriors! We were now ready to pull off the caper. My mind is fuzzy on who brought the head in the gym and stored it nonchalantly next to their seat. Then we waited.

During a time out and with both teams still on the court but gathered at their respective benches, a group of us crowded around the head and escorted it out to center court. Nobody could see what it was nor what we were doing. We set it down, took it out of the plastic, inserted the feather, and faced it toward the Mountain View side of the gym. Then we walked away.

I wish we had a picture of this. Meaty, glassy stare with horns and a feather as if massacred by a Warrior. There is one picture and a small write-up in our yearbook which I will post sometime but you can't really get a good feel for the splendor in black and white. The head sat there and a stunned silence fell over their crowd. Then they began screaming and wondering what they should do about this. Finally, a group of boys came out of their stands and gathered up the head. They brought it to our side of the gym and deposited it on our sideline. Laurel (and those of you who know him know just how scary this is) leaped from our stands and grabbed the head in one hand and sprinted across the court – winding up to throw it into their crowd. That is when the adults tackled him. He was respectful enough to cooperate once he was apprehended.

He was removed from the game. We were all banned from any further games and we completed several hours of campus beautification as punishment for our crime. It was worth it. I have seen some of our principals later in life and asked them about this prank. Each remembers it with fondness and only punished us to show that they could not approve – though they admitted that they did.

Plaster and Alginate

When Kansas and Styx were fighting it out for best band using an organ, I was in high school. OK, there are many stories from that time but two come to mind immediately: the cow head story (later) and the plaster parts story (now).

My friend Jeff M's father was an orthodontist. This profession requires making plaster casts of people's teeth in order to construct Marquis de Sade-level appliances to force said teeth into perfectly pleasing position. To do this, a rubbery, gooey substance called alginate is applied to the teeth. This solidifies so that plaster can be poured in to create a positive of the model. Why the dissertation on straightening supplies? Because given a few dozen boxes of alginate, access to the orthodontic offices and the cover of night -- not to mention the hormone-deranged thinking of two 16-year-old boys, there were a few ideas that spawned to help us kill a little time in our latter-formative years.

I'm talking, of course, about plaster body parts. Our first idea was to create plaster casts of our hands. We used box after box of alginate creating many different finger/hand configurations. We poured the plaster into the alginate. After it hardened we tore away the milk carton-like box the alginate came in, pealed away the alginate, and revealed the perfectly white, perfectly formed plaster replica of our hands. We made several hands the first night we did this.

Not knowing what to do with them once they were created, we threw them down the street toward a dumpster at the end of a cul-de-sac. This alone paints a strange picture as we were not too careful to actually hit the garbage can, but rather let the plaster digits shatter into pieces in the road. Oh to know the thoughts of the adult who found those.

We then got the great idea to bring dates to the alginate parties. We did this under the guise that we wanted to create a fist-shaped gear shift for our cars. We drove stick shift cars in those days (said with a certain swagger and mist for the good ol' days). All day long we would grasp girl's fists and determine if the were worthy of being cast -- literally. I did get one I liked. Small, fitting, and I even painted it blue to match my VW. I drilled out the wrist and epoxied it onto the shifter. It worked for many moons.

In time, boredom set in. Who didn't see this coming? Jeff and I decided we needed to do a face. This, however, presented a problem. The fists and feet (did I mention we did feet?) could fit in the alginate boxes so we would make a whole box of alginate right in the box, shove hands and feet in, and wait. Face: no structure. Our only alternative to using alginate was to use plaster to make the negative and then fill it with plaster to make the positive, and then crack away the negative. This in not uncommon but it was our first try.

Jeff was the victim. To breathe, we found some surgical tubing and stuffed them up each nostril. For lubrication, we used Vasoline on his face. Then, we applied a generous thickness of plaster to his face, and waited. It hardened. When it was time to take it off of his face, we gently turned him over to allow gravity to assist and with minimal effort it separated from his face – except for his eyelashes. We gently tugged on the now hardened negative of his face and it wouldn't budge.

At one point, the entire weight of the plaster mask was hanging from his eyelids. Panic. After several minutes of teasing and coaxing, he finally RIPPED the mask from his face, taking approximately three fourths of his eyelashes with it. I think he experienced pain.
We took the eyelash-plucking mask and poured a boatload of plaster in it. We waited, then chipped off the mask. The resulting positive, much like a death mask, looked remarkable like Jeff with two strange anomalies: the nostrils were enlarged as a result of the surgical tubing and, you guessed it, it had eyelashes. Spooky.

“What body part is next?” we asked with hormonal eagerness. Of course, a butt. Jeff was again the victim. We piled a large mountain of dirty lab towels in the middle of the floor of the lab. Jeff dropped trou and 'peeked' on the towel mountain. I had the dignified job of applying the large amount of plaster. Then we waited – not much of an awkward conversation there, and then Jeff slowly arose and tried to remove the shell from his butt. With minimal effort it separated from his butt – except his butthole hair. Really not a pretty picture here, but the psychosis continues.

At one point it was hanging from this hair. He got brave and RIPPED it out and then we commenced pouring the positive. We chipped away the shell to reveal the butt and guess what. It had hair. Jeff was grossed out enough that he decided to burn the hair out. So, he got a lighter and burned the hair out. This had the desired effect of removing the hair but had the undesirable effect of turning the crack brown/black. Stark white butt, browneye.

We decided this was a bad deal so we took it to my house where I had some sandpaper. We were sanding the butt in the family room when my mom caught us. I think she hasn't really recovered from that one. I kind of wonder what happened to that thing. Jeff still has the face. With eyelashes.

NO, we never tried a wee-nah.

Daddy Daughter

A couple of weeks ago, trauma hit our area hard. I am hoping they don't come in threes as the saying goes. I received a phone call from Doug informing me that he was called to help with a search and rescue behind Dennis' old house. He explained that two little kids had fallen into the canal and needed to be rescued.

The next call was much worse.

Doug called back and told me that two kids had indeed fallen into the canal, that one was alive, and the other was dead. The little two-year-old girl was Isabella, a girl we all knew from a family we all knew. She and Jesus, her best friend, had slipped out the back gate which was left open by the pool construction crew who left for the dump but forgot to close the gate. Minutes later, the 19-year-old boy, Michael, went looking for the kids. When he couldn't locate them immediately, he called for his dad, John, who had been ill and was very weak. Despite this, John and Michael went into the backyard to look for the kids. When he saw the gate open, he ‘knew we were in trouble.’ They went out the gate and immediately noticed the dirt slide marks down the bank of the canal leading to the water. Michael jumped in there but was unable to find the kids.

On instinct, and judging from the current flow, Michael climbed out and he and John began running ‘downstream’. About a quarter of a mile from their home, the canal runs under McDowell Road. On the other side is a water-flow regulation gate. Michael ran across McDowell and jumped in the water just in front of the gate. He quickly found Jesus who was clinging to a pole with his head beneath the water. How he knew at two years old to hold on to a pole is beyond me. Michael grabbed the boy and hastily handed him up to John. John took the boy over to the sidewalk – Jesus was coughing and gasping.

Michael returned to the search – frantically looking for his little sister. If Jesus was here, she would be too. Soon John heard a scream from the water – and Michael held Isabella’s lifeless body up for him to pull from the canal. John told me later that he knew she was gone. By this time, 911 had been called and helicopters were on the scene to take the children to the hospital. John said he was relieved to let the professionals continue to administer CPR – taking over where he left off.

When I arrived at their home, the other children were all home and news reports described two kids in critical condition. Two television stations had parked their vans in the cul-de-sac and periodically would come to the door and ask if there was an update on the children’s conditions. The home has a large front door that is mostly glass. We covered the door with a sheet so the media could not shoot through the door and capture the hugging and crying going on in the entry.

I have never in my 45 years upon this earth seen grief and sadness on a person’s face like I saw when John walked in the door from the hospital. His wife, Jacqueline had similar sorrow on her face. They wanted nothing more than to hug their children. Then, officially, they took their children into the master bedroom and informed them that their little sister had passed away. We all waited for ‘the meeting none of ever wanted to be invited to’ to finish.

By the time I arrived to their home there had already been a lot of food prepared and delivered. The family, of course, was not terribly interested in eating it. Probably the most interesting/touching gesture from a neighbor was luminaries. Their walkway was lined with small, white lunch bags filled with sand and a candle in the bottom – a fitting tribute or gesture that really said nothing more than ‘we care’.

I was asked to help assemble a DVD with music depicting pictures of this little girl. I also was asked to help with the funeral program. I was honored to be able to help. As the week progressed, I prepared to leave town to take my daughters on the ‘Daddy-Daughter Campout’. As I had not received all the information on time, I ended up constructing the program and delivering it to Kinko’s for printing over the weekend. I was unable to deliver it so while I was gone, Debi chased around to different establishments to get this thing printed. She saved my life. Without her, I would not have been able to go to the campout – which was fun.

The Sunday after the campout was the viewing for this little girl. They held the viewing in their home and opened the front door to HUNDREDS and HUNDREDS of well-wishing friends, family, and neighbors. The DVD was playing just inside the front door while the body lies in state in the family room. The courageous parents stood by and greeted the throng. One particularly poignant comment offered was, ‘…it’s not right that they make caskets that small. It should be illegal.’

The most surreal part of the Sunday night event was that Jesus was running around, in and out of the crowd, obilvious of his friend in the box.

The Clothing Chair

This morning, I went to the corner of Gilbert and Broadway and asked of three young men would get into my car and come to my home and help me clean up some of the debris left by the several trades who recently concluded their construction activities on my house. They agreed and climbed into my car. I listened to the radio on the way home.

When I arrived at home, I went to the back yard and began describing, in my best international sign language invented by the same guys who invented talking louder to foreigners so they can understand better. I described – digitally -- my desires for the garbage, wires, concrete, insulation, dust, dirt, rocks, wood, cultured marble, paper, pipe, nails, plastic, drywall, and other materials to be removed from the house and place gently and lovingly in my 40-yard, $330 per dump dumpster. They agreed and the sweeping and shoveling began. As they started picking up the smaller things, I began removing the larger things such as shower doors, lights, planks and marble splash. There was a wall that had a sheet of cultured marble that had not been removed yet, so after I took the large stuff, I busted that thing off the wall.

Three hours, three carnitas burritos from Filibertos, three large cokes, and some cash later I had a remarkably clean workspace ready for inspection.

Meanwhile, Debi was cleaning up for Jeannie. This is always a delightful event culminating with every piece of dirty laundry piled knee-deep in the laundry room. I did not know, however, that you could use a stack of dirty laundry as a chair. I went to visit her in the laundry and she was sitting on a stack of laundry while folding, sorting, and searching other laundry. I wondered, silently, where she sat when she completed all the laundry in front of her and had no material to work with except that upon which she sat. I didn’t ask.

Yale Trip

I refer you to http://picasaweb.google.com/jeffbyte again only this time to look at the Yale pictures. We had a blast. The game, however, didn't turn out so well. As Wil would say, they played too long. Yale was up the whole time but Princeton came back in the 4th with a few minutes left to beat Yale 34-31. Bret had a concussion and did not play. He should play next week in the Harvard-Yale contest.

I won't bore you with all the details of the trip but there were a couple of great things.
The mascot for Yale is the bulldog. They are the Yale Bulldogs. A real live bulldog roams the field during the game. His name? Handsome Dan. Could that be better? I almost feel dumb that I didn't know this before.

The halftime show was nothing short of a travesty - terrible music, bad announcing, filthy innuendo punctuated by two violins -- in the marching BAND???? It's gone awry in New Haven on that front.

OK, so boring. I just got a look at the last couple of posts. Sorry for that. I think I need to reboot my brain and then I will be able to come back online with a little more interesting content.

Busy Ness

I was talking to Mike W the other day, whom I love-no not that way-fag. Our conversation turned to business and I listened as he talked as if right through me, strumming my pain with his fingers, saying my life with his words. Killing me softly with his tale, killing me softly... I realized that the hell that is big business is not unique to rogue companies who buy small companies and exploit them. After thinking about my experience with the Red Menace that I used to work for I formulated the following rant: In business management school they teach students how to manage business. There are two very important parts of that discipline that are sadly overlooked in many cases and it shows. The two aspects are customers and employees. Oh, I could go on all day about how employees are treated in a large business but it seems almost trite. Everyone knows that nobody treats employees well, no business cares about individuals, and employees are 'hot-swappable'. This is for another rant another day.

My beef has to do with the inability of management levels to address real customer needs. I can tell you from personal experience that the higher you climb in a company, the less you talk about customers, the less you care about customers, and the less you do for customers. This seems absurd but it is all too true. I will give you an example ripped from the pages of a business management textbook.

There is a concept known as ‘JND’ which stands for Just Noticeable Difference. This concept allows a company, for example, to maintain the price of a product but reduce its size slightly. So, the 12 oz. can you used to get is now a 10.5 oz. can costing the same. This allows profits to rise because less is produced but sold for the same price. The JND threshold is such that if customers don’t notice the difference, they will continue to consume at the same rate. Revenue forecasts and production rates do not need to fluctuate which holds revenue stead while reducing costs.

I ask you, is this evidence of a customer-centric organization? I answer before you--no. A customer-centric company would not do this to their customers. Their goal would be to reduce costs, maintain product levels, and ultimately deliver more to customers, determine what customers want, and make it easier for them to get it.

As I became more involved with the management of the business I became less involved in running the business the way I would run it. I catered to the stockholders and spent most of my time justifying each move I made to them and to upper management. The problem with this is two-fold. First, you NEVER talk about customers, and second, you tend to be cautious in your approach to your job because you don’t want to have to try to help the c-level managers understand what really needs to be done. Heaven help the guy at Kodak who thought digital cameras were a passing fad…

What you end up with is a bunch of butt-covering, mediocre lemmings that have had the creativity squashed out of them. I can’t tell you how many times I heard comments like, “…if you choose Microsoft, you keep your job.” Tragic.

Wow...Sorry

It's been too long. How have you been? I've missed you. First things first. Here is the latest on the house:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jeffbyte

Electrical should be done today or tomorrow. Then inspection. Then low-voltage. Then insulation. Then drywall. Then stucco. Then doors. Then paint. Then cabinets. Then shelves and closets. Then countertops. Then tile and carpet and finished. Then Christmas.

Office Software by Google

Google docs and spreadsheets is kinda cool if you need a browser-based word processor or spreadsheet. I can't think why I would buy Office for my kids when these are free...go figure.

Ame 2

Rain. That is what I said. I tell you, we wait for it to rain here in the AZ with grand anticipation. The problem is the while 6" per year thing. So, I have the roofer scheduled for Oct 16. That's 9 days to you and me. Nine. We can't wait for our little storm for a measly 9 days? No, we have to get a gully-washer today and soak the indoors of the new Crandall home. And let me tell you, that really soaks. The back side filled with water (sounds like the start of an enema story) but it would not drain out, so it drained into the basement...a little at a time. Just enough to drip in 4-5 places and cause extreme constraination. I tried with all my might to suck out the fluid with a rather large machine I purchased at Home Depot but the damage was already done. Debi used the ever popular 'closing the barn door after the cows are already out' speech on me. That one never gets old. The kicker is that the forecast including the extended forecast shows no more rain until the roof is on. Famous last words.

You see, the issue is that the roofing had to be pealed back in order to tie the framing into the existing house. That said, I thought the

So, basement living isn't all it's cracked up to be. More butt jokes. Sorry. I think our biggest problem is no kitchen.

We put the *fun* in funeral

I went to a funeral today. Dick Campbell, the guy I spoke of a few days ago. It was nice. I wish everyone knew him. He was one great guy. Parkinsons disease robbed us of a great man. Two things that were funny and I must record them:

Teri, Dick's daughter, had a *friend* over and Dick came wandering out into the kitchen in his underware. Teri, embarassed, told her dad to get something on to meet her friend. He returned a moment later, still in his underware but wearing a cowboy hat. He asked, "Is this better?"

Steve, his brother, got up and said, "Dick's favorite color was brown. I didn't have a brown suit to wear, so I went out and got this blue tie that has a little brown in it. It cost me $50 bucks. I guess I can return it when we're done..." He went on to say that maybe it would become his favorite tie. I really enjoyed the funeral. Too bad but great for him...

I burned down the fence and other lies

OK, busted. I lied to my parents when I was young. I did it to make sure I didn't get in trouble. It worked. I, however, had to come clean and appologize to them later. That was bad. I should not have done it and I think it is being done to me to some degree. I can tell when the lies come out, and I think my folks could too.

The first lie I remember was when I was playing with matches with Lisa, my next door neighbor in Phoenix. When we were done playing with the matches, we simply took all the cardboard and match covers and papers we burned and threw them into the alley. The alley ran behind the Beck's house. For those who don't know what an alley is for, the garbage cans were kept back there and the truck would come through the alley once a week and collect it. This thoroughfare was not paved and was full of weeds. You can see it coming down 5th Avenue, can't you? To top things off and complete the picture, the city would periodically drive through the alleys spraying the weeds to try to control them along the fences of the neighbors -- the wooden fences, that is. I think I have set the stage completely now. Allegedly, when the half-burnt materials were gently discarded into the alley, they must have set alite the weeds which in turn torched the fence. I didn't know this until the firetruck arrived. I didn't even make the connection until Lisa asked me later if it could have been our materials and carelessness that caused this scene. I assured her that I had no clue and began to feel the guilt.

By the time my mom asked me if I had done this, I said, 'No.' I guess I could have left it at that, but being the helpful/lying soul that I am/was I hinted that maybe Danny Blaine may have done it. That was safe, you see, because he was a little older than I was, he was known for his mischevious ways, and my family never spoke to their family. I don't even know if my parents knew where the Blaine family lived. Still, a fitting scapegote was he. I gave no inference that I had witnessed the arson but rather planted the idea seed deeply enough in my folks' heads that they began to reason that Danny fit the crime. I think I fessed up to this one when I was about 30 years old. Accidentally.

The second lie involved a movie I shouldn't have seen in a place I shouldn't have been seeing a girl I didn't want to see while there doing something she shouldn't have been doing. Sorry, this one may need a diagram. Cheerleader movie, South Twin Drive-In, Amy L., Coors. When I went home I told my mom I ran into Amy at the movie...and she was drinking. Mom and Dad were both surprised because there aren't many theaters they could think of that would allow drinking. Oops. I thought of the only one I could think of -- The Valley Art. Sometime I could go just on the Valley Art. But, the Valley Art in Tempe was quite a ways north of where I actually was -- the South Twin. Drinking IS allowed in any drive-in thearer. The problem was if I told my folks which theater I went to they would have been able to figure out the kind of movie I attended. To be fair, I think the Cheerleader movies then would be rated PG-13 now. Oh well. This one my mom will have to read in my blog before I come clean on it...watch for comments.

Two blogs and a packet of gravel

OK, The Devils are worse than I thought. I really don't know what else to say. No amount of explaining can excuse this performance...I hope I am reading this in a year and we have a new coach.

Move on

Jeff Mason quit Seminary. Stunning news that he just gave me permission to share. Weird. I think he is really happy with his decision but at the same time he feels a great loyalty and did not arrive at the decision lightly.

In other news, Dick Campbell is not long for this world. He has suffered over 14 years with Parkinson's Disease and recently underwent brain surgery to help relieve some of his symptoms with disasterous results. We wish him and his family all the best.

The Devils play tomorrow. Oregon. I predict another loss at the hands of a great Pac-10 team. I have never understood why it is that a coach gets fired when the players are the ones who do or do not win. Until now. Our coach, Dirk, is not qualified to lead a Pac-10 team in my opinion. Why do I think that? First, his teams don't ever seem ready to play. Second, they jump offsides, and commit other mental errors that point directly to coaching. Third, I have never seen a Dirk-lead team come out of the locker room the second half and change one thing about their execution of the game. They don't come out more fired up, they don't change their schemes, they don't play with more despiration, they don't play more motivated. Fourth, I can't understand why our defensive secondary won't turn around and look up for the ball. Yes, this is the secondary coach, but if I'm the head coach, I have seen some good players do it right and I watch my players do it wrong and I kick some collective buttocks.

I put all these things on an aweful coach.

Marbyte

Happy Birthday, Marlo!

Puppy Love

Not only will I refer the time period by music, but the titles will also be song titles. This will signify to you that I am writing about the past so you can skip these posts. They may bore you, you see.

Just when Janice and Jimmy bought it, I found my first love. I actually had a girlfriend all through Ingleside grade school. Ingleside was K-8 at the time and there were literally 8th graders running around on the same playgrounds where we played. We were not allowed on certain parts of the campus (if you can call a grade school a campus) and if we were caught there, our teacher would read to us out of a Kindergarden book -- See Spot Run kinda stuff to make us feel like babies and emotionally batter us into avoiding the playground of the younger kids.

First, the girl who liked me...third grade. I met this new girl who was nice and she told somebody who told me that she liked me. I decided to like her because she only had one hand. I don't know if I felt badly for her or she was really a nice girl, but I decided to like her. Her name was Dianna Schmidt. She didn't seem the least bit selfconscious of it. She showed it to me and I marvled at the complete lack of hand that she had on her arm. I don't remember the reason she didn't have a hand. I don't remember asking and I don't remember her telling me. Somehow, though, it was OK. Maybe it was kinda exotic to me. I don't know. I do remember her using her non-hand to restrain herself when she had to pee. I would get her laughing and she would laugh and pound to keep herself from peeing. Why do I remember that? I would love to get ahold of her again to see what she is doing.

Next, the girl I liked. Karen Sullivan. I liked Karen because she had the same birthday as me. Of course, she was cool, very cute, and she liked me too. Those very strong attributes and her cute freckles sealed the deal for me. I think she was my girlfriend until I moved away in 6th grade. I remember years later after moving to Mesa I called her on a dare from my friend. I was no better off with women then than I was in third grade so like an idiot I let my friend do the talking. BIG MISTAKE. I still feel badly about this because she probably still thinks I moved away and got really weird. So maybe I did.

I remember having crushes on the older women at Ingleside. I liked Debbie Drain because she ran for office - 8th grade president or something. I remember her name because it was somewhat unusual. It seems she would be about 5 years older than me. In elementary school, that was nearly as old as my mother.

There was one other lady who meant a great deal to me in grade school. Mrs. Snyder or Mrs. Keith, I think, was her name. When I was 8 my brother died of liver cancer. My older brother is Dennis, my younger brother is Marlo. My other younger brother is Richard. Richie as we called him. He was only a few months old when he died. I remember it very well, though I don't remember him. He was just a little baby, you see, like any other. I do remember that my mother had his crib set up in her bedroom. I remember climbing up on Richie's crib bars and looking at him. One day I was sick - a cold or something - and I climbed up to see my brother. I remember my mom scolding me for breathing on him and possibly making him sick. A few weeks later, my brother died. I remember having two distince feelings: 1) if he could die, so could I and 2) because I breathed on him, I caused his death. I guess I was kind of disturbed after that. Enter Mrs. Keith. She ate lunch with me in the cafeteria everyday and made me feel like it was OK. I don't really think I have deep psychological difficulties as a result of this but I do think I carry sympathy to a little bit of an extreme.

Telling Stories

I wish I were as interesting as my friend Darren. I wish I had a phrase that captured my audience like Darren does. All Darren had to say was, "Well, before I went to rehab..." and he had us. The story that followed that phrase had all the thrill, sting, and linger of an episode of Cops, Jerry Springer, and Miami Vice in one.

In an attempt to assemble some sort of journal, I will, from time to time, relate a memory of childhood. I must come up with a phrase signifying my transition from contemporary events to past, age-improved experiences. Maybe I should say, "...before I went to Japan," or "...when I was still a virgin," or "...before my dad died." I don't think any of those conjure the curiosity and breathless anticipation that 'before I went to rehab' does, but at least it sets a timeline. Maybe just a date or a season will suffice. What if I cite the concurrent music. "So, when Saturday Night Fever filled the airwaves..." or "When Burning Down the House by Talking Heads was popular..."

So, the other day, in 1969, when Janice and Jimmy died, I was 8.