It's the middle of spring break for the public schools.
Holy Wednesday. As this break doesn't coincide with my work's spring break, we like many school parents are seeking childcare barters and playdates (I didn't use that word) to break up the break.
So we arranged for Nate to spend the night
at his friend R's house.
Sleepovers are still a rarity for our second
grade boy. R's household is a typical Pittsburgh family
household, in some ways: TV always on, much electronic
entertainment, and cigarette smoke in the air. We're OK
with Nate, but thought Solange to be too young for such
a carousing night.
Naturally, Solange required compensatory
fun, so her friend Z was invited here for a sleepover.
Z is five years old and the youngest of three sisters.
Tonight would represent her first ever night away from
her sisters. Earlier today, her mom confirmed that Z wanted to go through with it, and delivered her to our house at 5:30p.
Shortly after, we all got in the car (girls in the back,
Nate got to sit in the front seat because my car is too
old for a passenger airbag), and dropped off Nate at R's,
then swung over to Adrian's to pick up a great pizza that
L hates. (L is my wife and she works on Wednesday nights).
The girls ate pizza, carrot sticks and root beer while watching
Alladin this in accordance with a list for the evening. I was upstairs writing emails or something aside from the paper I have due at the end of the month. Blogging now is more non-writing of the paper, of course.
Licia got home. The girls went to bed. I went to bed. Solange then comes into our room. "What are you doing here, Miss?" "Z is scared. She wants to go home." So we call Z's parents, and I take her home. Now it's midnight, and the day is done.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Friday, March 5, 2010
The House Mouse
Today was a day of mourning in the household. Mousie is dead.
Most of the three years in our home on Roup Ave in Pittsburgh have been shared with mice. Not many--maybe two at any one time. We have yet to set a commercial mousetrap, though we accidentally caught a few who scrambled up into a waste basket and couldn't scramble out. Then they get driven to a park two miles away and released with tiny rucksacks of food and a couple dollars.
OK, it was the mouse-survival-kit equivalent-- a slice of bread with cheese.
Anyway, we spotted a mouse last November, but couldn't catch it in the waste basket. Erica, babysitting one night, succeeded with the kids, luring it into a cereal box. Then L. (mom, and my wife) got home from work and declared that it must be released--in the house! With winter approaching, she noted, its chance of survival on the outside was slim. We all agreed, and the mouse stayed.
Note: Mice can be destructive, even self-destructive in a human habitat. They like to gnaw through things including electric wires. They twice chewed through a plastic water hose under our sink. They poop a lot. But it's small poop and not too stinky, and our co-habitation has mostly been a harmonious one. Zoe, our cat, is no danger at all.
We did not see the mouse again through the holidays and into the chill of January or the record-snowy days of February. Then, about a week ago, "he" reappeared. Or "she," though Miss ("Miss" is our 5 year-old daughter, Solange) named it Jaspert. To me he was Mousie, and since this is my blog...
Mousie was now remarkably social. He did not cling to the perimeters of the room, but ventured into the middle--under the table, between our feet, freely running the kitchen-dining-living room circuit in search of morsels. We don't know how he spent those three Missing Months, but the transformation of Mousie was profound (is there est for rodents?).
His boldness enamored him to us, especially L., who began preparing him cheese balls and crackers. This was followed by dried fruit, for fear of irregularity. Finally, a nice well-rounded meal of fruit, veggie-dog bits, bread and water was served on a cocktail napkin. He was growing visibly plump and as far as we could tell, very happy.
Note: when a paragraph ends as the last one did, something dreadful must follow, as surely as adagio follows allegro in a Baroque concerto. How I wish this blog entry were an exception, but it is not.
Mousie was living amongst giants, thousand-fold times his weight and stature. Yet he mingled with us as an equal, crawling over our house-slippers and pant-legs. We joked that he may eventually join us in bed--while half-wondering if his new-found pet status might lead to just that. By this morning we were altering our behavior for his sake, trying to avoid stepping on him by ever-looking downward. Learning from an incident yesterday, when I kicked him a yard across the floor, I had just begun the "shuffle"--walking without lifting my feet...
But late this morning, at approximately 11:30AM, I reverted to my normal gait while moving from pantry to kitchen, and I crushed Mousie underfoot. I immediately knew what the horrible sensation meant, and I cried out. L. and I, who had been talking about him just a minute before, saw that he was still alive but gravely injured--I will spare the details--and sprung into action toward a mercy killing. I already had a plan for this, and went the basement. L. was already there, in a panicked but activated state, helping me locate the needed instruments, two boards. But by the time I returned upstairs, the animal was motionless: he had died no more than a minute after the trauma began.
I cleaned Mousie while L. lined a large matchbox with tissues. We placed him in the cardboard coffin and decided to inform the kids after their school day was done and Nate (older brother of Miss) was finished with piano lesson. Instead, L. told Nate before the lesson. He was upset, but remained focused during the lesson. After his tutor left, Nate burst into tears and cried all the way home.
The four of us buried Mousie (Jaspert) in the back yard. L. prepared the elegy, and delivered it a quavering voice:
Most of the three years in our home on Roup Ave in Pittsburgh have been shared with mice. Not many--maybe two at any one time. We have yet to set a commercial mousetrap, though we accidentally caught a few who scrambled up into a waste basket and couldn't scramble out. Then they get driven to a park two miles away and released with tiny rucksacks of food and a couple dollars.
OK, it was the mouse-survival-kit equivalent-- a slice of bread with cheese.
Anyway, we spotted a mouse last November, but couldn't catch it in the waste basket. Erica, babysitting one night, succeeded with the kids, luring it into a cereal box. Then L. (mom, and my wife) got home from work and declared that it must be released--in the house! With winter approaching, she noted, its chance of survival on the outside was slim. We all agreed, and the mouse stayed.
Note: Mice can be destructive, even self-destructive in a human habitat. They like to gnaw through things including electric wires. They twice chewed through a plastic water hose under our sink. They poop a lot. But it's small poop and not too stinky, and our co-habitation has mostly been a harmonious one. Zoe, our cat, is no danger at all.
We did not see the mouse again through the holidays and into the chill of January or the record-snowy days of February. Then, about a week ago, "he" reappeared. Or "she," though Miss ("Miss" is our 5 year-old daughter, Solange) named it Jaspert. To me he was Mousie, and since this is my blog...
Mousie was now remarkably social. He did not cling to the perimeters of the room, but ventured into the middle--under the table, between our feet, freely running the kitchen-dining-living room circuit in search of morsels. We don't know how he spent those three Missing Months, but the transformation of Mousie was profound (is there est for rodents?).
His boldness enamored him to us, especially L., who began preparing him cheese balls and crackers. This was followed by dried fruit, for fear of irregularity. Finally, a nice well-rounded meal of fruit, veggie-dog bits, bread and water was served on a cocktail napkin. He was growing visibly plump and as far as we could tell, very happy.
Note: when a paragraph ends as the last one did, something dreadful must follow, as surely as adagio follows allegro in a Baroque concerto. How I wish this blog entry were an exception, but it is not.
Mousie was living amongst giants, thousand-fold times his weight and stature. Yet he mingled with us as an equal, crawling over our house-slippers and pant-legs. We joked that he may eventually join us in bed--while half-wondering if his new-found pet status might lead to just that. By this morning we were altering our behavior for his sake, trying to avoid stepping on him by ever-looking downward. Learning from an incident yesterday, when I kicked him a yard across the floor, I had just begun the "shuffle"--walking without lifting my feet...
But late this morning, at approximately 11:30AM, I reverted to my normal gait while moving from pantry to kitchen, and I crushed Mousie underfoot. I immediately knew what the horrible sensation meant, and I cried out. L. and I, who had been talking about him just a minute before, saw that he was still alive but gravely injured--I will spare the details--and sprung into action toward a mercy killing. I already had a plan for this, and went the basement. L. was already there, in a panicked but activated state, helping me locate the needed instruments, two boards. But by the time I returned upstairs, the animal was motionless: he had died no more than a minute after the trauma began.
I cleaned Mousie while L. lined a large matchbox with tissues. We placed him in the cardboard coffin and decided to inform the kids after their school day was done and Nate (older brother of Miss) was finished with piano lesson. Instead, L. told Nate before the lesson. He was upset, but remained focused during the lesson. After his tutor left, Nate burst into tears and cried all the way home.
The four of us buried Mousie (Jaspert) in the back yard. L. prepared the elegy, and delivered it a quavering voice:
Today was a bad day
Our mouse, Jaspert, passed away.
You liked to scamper, hop & run
With you around we had such fun.
You never lived in a cage
You lived to be a ripe old age.
You will always be our mouse, wild & free
In our hearts you will always be.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
PEOPLE of the DECADE
In the Worlds of Culture, Religion, and Science
POPULAR CULTURE
Entertainer of the Decade. Dominated by child-centric cinema, repurposed music, and the oxymoronic reality television, the decade in pop culture was characterized by style in search of substance, drama in search of meaning, talk in search of real dialogue.
No, wait—there was no searching going on. So the natural choice for Entertainer of the Decade is the person who embodies everything about the decade, meaning nothing at all: Ryan Seacrest. Don’t know who Ryan Seacrest is? No one truly knows who, or what he is. He is a “personality.” He is everywhere and nowhere, and has no physical body.
Athlete of the Decade. He’s a baseball player. And check out these average yearly numbers for the ten seasons this decade:
RELIGION
Christian of the Decade (tie). This is based, of course, on which public figure most embodies the principles of Jesus. I choose a man who devoted most of adult life to prizing the least among us: the late, Judeo-atheist Studs Terkel. True, his was a life of words, while countless unnamed people acted Christ-like in deed. But at some point, Studs’ work became deeds themselves—the act of listening, the act of sharing the words of common people. He published five such books in this decade, all acts of love.
Shared with:
Osama bin Laden, for best carrying on the more ruthless traditions of Christianity, and for his uncanny resemblance to Jesus.
Muslim of the Decade. Islam means devotion to God in accordance with the teachings of the holy Koran. Therein we will find some recurring themes, like equality and restraint. A few quick quotes:
“An Arab has no superiority over a non-Arab nor a non-Arab has any superiority over an Arab; also a white has no superiority over black nor a black has any superiority over white except by piety and good action."
“You may fight in the cause of God against those who attack you, but do not aggress.”
“You may kill those who wage war against you, and you may evict them whence they evicted you.”
After giving the first-ever Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech advocating war, under the same conditions described above, Barack Obama sweeps in late to grab another honor, Muslim of the Decade.
SCIENCE
Environmentalist of the Decade. Being an environmentalist has nothing to do with beliefs or personal commitments to saving the earth. Supporting green causes no more makes you an environmentalist than joining PETA makes you a vegan. So this award goes a person you have seen often, a most public of public figures: the homeless man in your city. He doesn’t drive. He uses minimal gas & electricity. He recycles. He drinks domestic beverages. Us homed people better give a hell of a lot of money to Greenpeace if we want to make up the difference in carbon footprints between us and him.
Technologist of the Decade. I type these words on an antiquated system. It’s a computer, of course, but the interface of keyboard, mouse and screen already seem dated in the presence of a video game system called the Wii. The Wii is not just a translator of bodily motion into data, like a computer or other game console; rather, it integrates the body with the machine. Games have made the big leap forward. Sex and porn will follow, and then finally all communication and expression will occur with electronic devices completing the social circuitry of movements and vibrations of the body. This award could go to Ken'ichiro Ashida, a principal designer of the Wii. But I’m giving it to the Russian inventor Leon Theremin, whose musical instrument of the same last name is the technological godfather of the Wii. Death silenced Leon in 1997, but his lovely sounds reverberated through the decade.
What’s missing here? A sense of fairness led me to search for a Jew of the Decade, but I was stumped, and welcome nominations. The absence of women among the winners led me to try to shoehorn one in, but the best I could do was Hillary Clinton as Loser of the Decade. Again, I welcome suggestions.
Or just wait till 2020 rolls around. Have a great decade!
POPULAR CULTURE
Entertainer of the Decade. Dominated by child-centric cinema, repurposed music, and the oxymoronic reality television, the decade in pop culture was characterized by style in search of substance, drama in search of meaning, talk in search of real dialogue.
No, wait—there was no searching going on. So the natural choice for Entertainer of the Decade is the person who embodies everything about the decade, meaning nothing at all: Ryan Seacrest. Don’t know who Ryan Seacrest is? No one truly knows who, or what he is. He is a “personality.” He is everywhere and nowhere, and has no physical body.
Athlete of the Decade. He’s a baseball player. And check out these average yearly numbers for the ten seasons this decade:
28 HR, 68 RBI, .268 Batting Average
If you’re not impressed, consider the circumstances. He was part of a generation of stars who emerged in baseball in the late 1980’s that included names like Clemens, Bonds, and Sosa. He was considered the best in baseball in the 1990’s, but his stature diminished in the past decade, eclipsed by those names. Age and injuries slowed him, and while the others used steroids to artificially counteract those forces, he chose to deal with them naturally (as far as we can tell). In a hypercompetitive sport obsessed with statistical records, Ken Griffey Jr. accepted being good, not great, in the last half of his career. And that’s what made him great.RELIGION
Christian of the Decade (tie). This is based, of course, on which public figure most embodies the principles of Jesus. I choose a man who devoted most of adult life to prizing the least among us: the late, Judeo-atheist Studs Terkel. True, his was a life of words, while countless unnamed people acted Christ-like in deed. But at some point, Studs’ work became deeds themselves—the act of listening, the act of sharing the words of common people. He published five such books in this decade, all acts of love.
Shared with:
Osama bin Laden, for best carrying on the more ruthless traditions of Christianity, and for his uncanny resemblance to Jesus.
Muslim of the Decade. Islam means devotion to God in accordance with the teachings of the holy Koran. Therein we will find some recurring themes, like equality and restraint. A few quick quotes:
“An Arab has no superiority over a non-Arab nor a non-Arab has any superiority over an Arab; also a white has no superiority over black nor a black has any superiority over white except by piety and good action."
“You may fight in the cause of God against those who attack you, but do not aggress.”
“You may kill those who wage war against you, and you may evict them whence they evicted you.”
After giving the first-ever Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech advocating war, under the same conditions described above, Barack Obama sweeps in late to grab another honor, Muslim of the Decade.
SCIENCE
Environmentalist of the Decade. Being an environmentalist has nothing to do with beliefs or personal commitments to saving the earth. Supporting green causes no more makes you an environmentalist than joining PETA makes you a vegan. So this award goes a person you have seen often, a most public of public figures: the homeless man in your city. He doesn’t drive. He uses minimal gas & electricity. He recycles. He drinks domestic beverages. Us homed people better give a hell of a lot of money to Greenpeace if we want to make up the difference in carbon footprints between us and him.
Technologist of the Decade. I type these words on an antiquated system. It’s a computer, of course, but the interface of keyboard, mouse and screen already seem dated in the presence of a video game system called the Wii. The Wii is not just a translator of bodily motion into data, like a computer or other game console; rather, it integrates the body with the machine. Games have made the big leap forward. Sex and porn will follow, and then finally all communication and expression will occur with electronic devices completing the social circuitry of movements and vibrations of the body. This award could go to Ken'ichiro Ashida, a principal designer of the Wii. But I’m giving it to the Russian inventor Leon Theremin, whose musical instrument of the same last name is the technological godfather of the Wii. Death silenced Leon in 1997, but his lovely sounds reverberated through the decade.
What’s missing here? A sense of fairness led me to search for a Jew of the Decade, but I was stumped, and welcome nominations. The absence of women among the winners led me to try to shoehorn one in, but the best I could do was Hillary Clinton as Loser of the Decade. Again, I welcome suggestions.
Or just wait till 2020 rolls around. Have a great decade!
LIVING in PITTSBURGH: Christmas Tree Lot, Bloomfield
Each December in Pittsburgh we would buy a Christmas tree on a street corner in the neighborhood of Bloomfield. This time the guy didn’t have much of a selection, but he sent me to his boss’ lot, deep in another part of Bloomfield. I travel that evening down the main avenue, Liberty Ave., and look for ‘Xmas Trees’ signs to get there. There was one such sign on Liberty, and then you’re on your own, traveling down a narrow residential street till it ends at a ‘T’. To the left is darkness; to the right, a full block away, were a few lights. I headed that way, and on the edge of a steep valley was a fenced lot and abandoned garage that served as the Christmas tree store.
I picked out what-I-thought-was-a-gorgeous tree, at the very reasonable price of $25, and brought it home. Licia (Licia is my wife) hated it—the spaces between the branches, which I see as inviting depths to adorn with decorations, she saw as ugly gaping holes. Had her parents not been driving 1,000 miles from Kansas to spend the holiday with us, then maybe I would have been more stubborn, but I agreed to try to exchange the tree.
I stopped by the lot the next evening, without the tree, and asked The Guy about trading the tree. He said sure. So the following night, Licia, the kids and I strapped the tree back atop the station wagon, and headed down to the lot. The Guy was helping another couple at the time, but when they went off browsing for a tree, I greeted him, reminding him of our deal, and asked where I should unload the tree. Then it got weird.
“I’m with a customer. Come back later,” he said.
“But we just want to exchange the tree.”
“No, no, look, you want your money back? Here’s your money back.”
“No, we want a tree. In fact we’ll pay you extra for a bigger tree.”
“You want a tree? Go to Home Depot. They sell trees. What was it, twenty dollars? Here’s twenty dollars.”
I think I stopped arguing with him at that point, and took the money that we didn’t want. We figured that he didn’t want the other customer seeing him exchange a tree, as they would think it’s policy. Perhaps he thought other families were as contentious as ours.
We did end up going to Home Depot, the national mega-store, and spending our money there instead of at the Little Tree Store That Wouldn’t.
I picked out what-I-thought-was-a-gorgeous tree, at the very reasonable price of $25, and brought it home. Licia (Licia is my wife) hated it—the spaces between the branches, which I see as inviting depths to adorn with decorations, she saw as ugly gaping holes. Had her parents not been driving 1,000 miles from Kansas to spend the holiday with us, then maybe I would have been more stubborn, but I agreed to try to exchange the tree.
I stopped by the lot the next evening, without the tree, and asked The Guy about trading the tree. He said sure. So the following night, Licia, the kids and I strapped the tree back atop the station wagon, and headed down to the lot. The Guy was helping another couple at the time, but when they went off browsing for a tree, I greeted him, reminding him of our deal, and asked where I should unload the tree. Then it got weird.
“I’m with a customer. Come back later,” he said.
“But we just want to exchange the tree.”
“No, no, look, you want your money back? Here’s your money back.”
“No, we want a tree. In fact we’ll pay you extra for a bigger tree.”
“You want a tree? Go to Home Depot. They sell trees. What was it, twenty dollars? Here’s twenty dollars.”
I think I stopped arguing with him at that point, and took the money that we didn’t want. We figured that he didn’t want the other customer seeing him exchange a tree, as they would think it’s policy. Perhaps he thought other families were as contentious as ours.
We did end up going to Home Depot, the national mega-store, and spending our money there instead of at the Little Tree Store That Wouldn’t.
LIVING in PITTSBURGH: Giant Eagle, Lawrenceville
On Tuesday, having left a party in the ever-up-and-coming neighborhood of Lawrenceville, Will stopped at the Giant Eagle (aka Giant Beagle, aka Giant Ego) store there. This particular store is noteworthy for the vast, pocked blacktop parking lot preceding the building as well as its clientele and staff, many of whom rotate between those two groups and all of whom hail from “Old Lawrenceville”—not the self-proclaimed “urban pioneers” or artistic colonists, but those who grew up in the Ninth or even the Tenth Ward.
When Will finds himself in Lawrenceville, he often stops in at this store to buy some Stauffer’s brand Ginger Snap cookies. They’re the only store-bought cookies necessary, Will believes. On this evening he brought three bags of the cookies—priced at the same $1.99 that they were three years before, when the Household was located in Lawrenceville—to the checkout counter. The young female caucasian cashier scanned one bag three times—but only after she had already scanned the other two. Will isn’t sure about that, but thinks that is what happened. The young lady almost instantly detected her error, and after a short pause, went about to rescind the overcharge by pressing a key on the register and scanning the item again. And again, and again, and again. This resulted in a total of $3.98, which she verbalized to Will.
Will is neither the most honest, nor the most dishonest of people. When he is undercharged in everyday commerce, he often detects it, thinks “It’s my lucky day!” and walks away with the extra cash. A countervailing impulse, however, sometimes wins the day, and he will at those times coolly but proudly point out the error. Simple decency and a vague belief in karma is behind that impulse. This evening was one of the honest ones for Will, and he informed the cashier that he should be charged more.
The cashier paused, her static eyes betraying a calculating mind. Then without a word she grabbed one of the bags and scanned its bar code again. Struck with resentment that I pointed out the error, she completed the transaction wordlessly, and moves on to the next customer.
When Will finds himself in Lawrenceville, he often stops in at this store to buy some Stauffer’s brand Ginger Snap cookies. They’re the only store-bought cookies necessary, Will believes. On this evening he brought three bags of the cookies—priced at the same $1.99 that they were three years before, when the Household was located in Lawrenceville—to the checkout counter. The young female caucasian cashier scanned one bag three times—but only after she had already scanned the other two. Will isn’t sure about that, but thinks that is what happened. The young lady almost instantly detected her error, and after a short pause, went about to rescind the overcharge by pressing a key on the register and scanning the item again. And again, and again, and again. This resulted in a total of $3.98, which she verbalized to Will.
Will is neither the most honest, nor the most dishonest of people. When he is undercharged in everyday commerce, he often detects it, thinks “It’s my lucky day!” and walks away with the extra cash. A countervailing impulse, however, sometimes wins the day, and he will at those times coolly but proudly point out the error. Simple decency and a vague belief in karma is behind that impulse. This evening was one of the honest ones for Will, and he informed the cashier that he should be charged more.
The cashier paused, her static eyes betraying a calculating mind. Then without a word she grabbed one of the bags and scanned its bar code again. Struck with resentment that I pointed out the error, she completed the transaction wordlessly, and moves on to the next customer.
LIVING in PITTSBURGH: Shur Save, Bloomfield
(by L, my wife) I need corndogs. I thought I would zip in and out of Shur Save in Bloomfield. But, no, the corndogs are nowhere to be found. Neither are any employees, so I find myself standing in line at the deli counter, waiting to ask the only employee in sight, the face-tattooed deli worker. The customer ahead of me orders a slab of unsliced ham. Deli worker hands it to him and remarks, “Makin’ a salad, are ya?”
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