Gutting an aging interior

Today’s story about the underbelly of the United Nations headquarters (here) made me feel about as ancient as the building itself (and I am! I am! –give or take a year). The NY Times article describes a building that was meant to last 30 years without an overhaul and it is now going on 51+. What are you likely to find if you poke your nose behind the vast, awe-inspiring conference rooms? Consider this from the Times:

East River water is pumped into the building as a coolant, and Mr. Raymond (a foreman who has worked at the UN for 25 years) said workers had collected eels, blue claw crabs and bluefish from the basement filters to take home to cook. …

[P]eriodic surveys have found the building, with its asbestos, lead paint and outmoded plumbing and electrical systems, to be alarmingly behind the times. …


In the rooms directly above the high voltage chamber, computers have been known to go into visual convulsions, and Vivian van de Perre, a management officer, said, "We sometimes joke with each other that the only women we'll allow to sit there are the ones who've already had their children."

[photo to the right, btw, depicts the UN "knotted gun" monument]

There is, finally, a plan (subject to a loan approval from the US) to renovate the “patched-together, aging interior of the landmark Modernist marble and glass tower.” This pleases me no end. 50+ structures should occasionally be updated, polished and improved. It sends a message of hope to 50+ year old structures. An overhaul is possible: past sins of omission and commission erased, insides overhauled, a fresh and unblemished outlook on life achieved. [Hey, are we still talking about the building? Maybe yes, maybe no.]

Questions, comments

This day brought a flurry of (e)mail activity, some of which is worth noting.

First, I was amused with an email from a friend and reader from southern climes. She writes (clearly out-of-her-mind-jealous): “(Your blog) made me miss spring as it is perpetually spring or summer here; we never get the joy of a glorious spring day in the garden and mine will undoubtedly be a mess by the time I return (north) at the end of May.” Yeah!!! I am plenty sympathetic, even though in February SHE was out picking shells on a beach while I was scraping ice off of the sidewalk.

Then, my most distant reader and friend from Asia writes: “I think that once you get over the Big 5 things are supposed to be getting easier, slower and more peaceful.” He is referring to my turning 51 sometime very soon. Peaceful? Slower?? Easier??? He must be kidding. Richer maybe. Nothing more, nothing less.

So is it Slovakia or Slovenia?

There will be readers who will think this is a question worthy of a third grader. Yes, there will be one or two such readers. The rest of the world is confused. Separate countries? Do we know which is which?











An article in the IHT (here) reports the following:

Last December at a news conference in Rome, Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, introduced Anton Rop, the prime minister of Slovenia, which is directly above Italy's northeastern border. "I'm very happy to be here today with the prime minister of Slovakia," Rop recalled him saying, adding politely in a recent interview, "It was very strange..."

In 1999, when the then Texas governor, George W. Bush, was on the presidential campaign trail he puzzled a Slovak reporter by saying that "the only thing I know about Slovakia is what I learned firsthand from your foreign minister, who came to Texas. I had a great meeting with him. It's an exciting country."

In fact, Bush had not met the foreign minister of Slovakia, but the then prime minister of Slovenia, Janez Drnovsek.

The stories of wrong national anthems being played at state events and wrongly delivered mail are legion.
….
Erwan Fouéré, the head of the European Commission's delegation to Slovenia, recalls getting a memo recently intended for the commission's office in Slovakia. A Slovene ambassador in a European capital, who asked not to be identified. says his staff meets someone from the local Slovak embassy at least once a month to exchange wrongly-addressed mail.

Why the mix up? If one remembers that there once was a Czechoslovakia, then it’s easy, isn’t it? The word gets broken down into the two countries that were born of it. Slovenia thus is simply the “other one.” [The flags, of course, are also confusing. Note Slovakia is on the left here, and 'the other one" is on the right.]

The real challenge, I think, is to distinguish between something that is Slavic rather than being a Slovak or Slovene. For instance, being Polish makes one Slavic. So does being Belorussian, Bulgarian, Czech, Serbo-Croatian, Slovene, Russian, and Ukrainian. Thus, if you are from Slovenia, you are Slavic, but not a Slovak.

And as we’re brandishing national identities here, I may as well ask – if I am Polish (I have not formally relinquished my Polish citizenship, though I have become an American a decade or two back), does that mean, in addition to being Polish and Slavic and American, that I will be as of May 1st, also EU-nian? Does that make me a walking multinational treaty of sorts?

Correction: no droppings

In a previous post I claimed to have my grass fertilized with turkey droppings. Apparently this year my Green Earth guys have gone vegetarian. Their letter tells me that they have just sprinkled my grass with organic corn gluten meal. Like me, I am sure you’ll want more information on this yummy new product. Green Earth tells me to take my curiosity to their website at www.gluten.iastate.edu . My own report is that the bunnies appear pleased with the change to corn. I’m watching a monster rabbit outside at this very moment –he can hardly move, he is that obese. (Maybe it’s a pregnant ‘she’? Oh joy, I am supporting an extended rabbit family with a steady diet of tender flower buds and corn meal.)

Expect to see more pickled cantaloupe

Today’s WashPost (here) describes the migration of Amish families from Pennsylvania to Wisconsin. In an effort to escape the urban sprawl of the eastern states, families are opting to buy land in the pastoral farming communities of Wisconsin. According to the article, Wisconsin now ranks fourth in Amish population (with about 12,000), after Ohio, Pennsylvania and Indiana.

Most Wisconsinites welcome the new ‘immigrants.’ The Amish grow crops and make products that are well received on the Wisconsin markets: the article mentions good sales of goat cheese, rhubarb pie, furniture, leather harnesses, and a new one for Midwesterners – pickled cantaloupe ("people here hadn't heard of pickled cantaloupe, so we tried selling it and they really like it," commented a woman from an Amish household).

Is the migration always a complete success? Not everyone is pleased with the Amish swell here. Town meetings have helped build tolerance among those who have reacted less than graciously to the presence of the Amish. One Wisconsinite commented bluntly that “the Amish ‘are the worst thing that have ever happened to this area.’ [The long-time Wisconsin resident] owns a farm-implements store that has been in his family for three generations. Because the Amish do not buy mechanized farm equipment, he said, his business is struggling.” Others complain that the horse-drawn buggies are unsafe and that horse droppings ruin the country roads. Indeed, one Elroy resident got so angry when a buggy caused his car to go into a ditch that he went on a violent rampage against a local Amish family.

Overall though, the Amish appear to like the move to the north. The title of the news story is “For the Amish, the Grass is Greener in Wisconsin.” True, the article was written in April when it appears a lot greener to many of us. Against the chill of a Wisconsin January night (the Amish typically do not use electricity), these newcomers may have been longing for their more southern spaces.

[photo: Green Co., WI]

Sociological perspectives

A reader wrote to tell me he had recently received a complementary book in the mail (he is a sociologist and the book appears to fit into that discipline’s boundaries). The book is titled “If You Tame Me” and from what I can tell, it has something to do with developing a conceptual and theoretical framework for looking at “human-animal intersubjectivity,” whatever that means (who said sociology is obvious?). If you are concerned that this perhaps hasn't the worth of a more conventional text, do note that it has been favorably reviewed by Jeffrey Masson, author of "When Elephants Weep: The Emotional Lives of Animals and The Nine Emotional Lives of Cats: A Journey into the Feline Heart."

But there's more: in the envelope, along with the book, a baggie was included with a little promo card announcing the release of the book. Along with it, there were 3 animal chewies and a little green mouse with pink ears. I want to know what's behind this. The publisher writes that “’If You Tame Me’ makes a persuasive case for the existence of a sense of self in companion animals and calls upon us to reconsider our rights and obligations regarding the non-human creatures in our lives.”

Are we to chew the toys ourselves, perhaps to demonstrate ‘the animal within’ (meaning our shared traits with other species)? Or should we take on the task of bringing a greater number of animals into our fold? I presume the little toy mouse is for a cat? Aren’t we, therefore, sacrificing one animal-kind (the mouse) for another (the evil predator cat)?

The other (literally) mystifying thing is the author’s previous publication. It appears to have no relation to this most recent topic. Or does it? She is only an assistant professor of sociology but she already has an earlier book in print. That previous one has the title of “Codependent Forevermore: The Invention of Self in a Twelve Step Group.” It is at times like this that I have a lingering regret that I am no longer part of the sociological enterprise. The things I could be reading right now! Instead, I am stuck with deciphering the contextual antecedents to the legal best interest standard in custody determination. Bummer.

Disconnect

Sometimes there is a total disconnect between what you want to accomplish in a day, or in an email, or in a post (your intent) and what ultimately appears to happen (your inept end-product). Perhaps on those days it’s best to make your way to that part of Owen Woods where charred fallen logs are still smoking after a burning of deadwood. Then, on returning, you can play an endless number of Chopin’s Nocturnes (try Nocturne No.2 or No.1 for a real Polish-style melancholy spin into the land of moroseness). And then? I’m still working on the “then.”

Spring Update

Last night I pulled weeds, all 847 of them, until it was so dark that I couldn’t tell a weed from an honest plant.

The perennial beds are so full of promise at this stage! I can’t see the planting mistakes yet, everything looks fresh, dense, alive.

I especially like my clumps of Aquilegia out front and my pink Gaura plants in the back. Each comes with a delicate stem, but it is misleading: the blooms will be sturdy and strong and subtly beautiful. And when the Aquilegia fades in late spring, the evening primrose will take over – that magical flower that has spread to form a mat of yellow faces. All are well established by now, just biding the time until the weather decides to settle down into a more stable pattern of warm days and nights.

A letter from my mother

I’ve blogged about my mom on numerous occasions, particularly around the time of the primaries. Though she is 80 years old, I don’t think most would regard her as feeble or soft-spoken.

With each letter she sends newspaper clippings and these reflect her unique Berkeley-style take on the political scene. I haven’t read all the clippings yet. Each time the size of the envelope grows—she’s now using yellow manila to pack it all in. But I did read the letter.

One has to know this about my mother: she has a not insignificant interest in home decorating. Though she lives in one tiny room in a very modest retirement home in Berkeley, there was a period in her life when she moved in and out of diplomatic circles (my father worked for the UN, actually at the time that Bush Sr. was the US Ambassador) and she studied carefully that which she herself could never have: the glamorous life of privilege (the UN itself was an odd assortment of wealth and modest means, depending on which country you came from).

This time she writes:

“Incidentally, did you see the picture in last week’s Newsweek of Bush with the Saudi prince inside the Crawford ranch?? What an ugly, ugly house with those ugly dining room chairs, ugly tall windows, ugly bookshelves and ugly sofa chairs. Ugly, ugly, ugly.”

You heard it here. Listen, the woman knows classic high-end décor, so I’m taking her comment seriously. The operative word here is ‘ugly.’

Perhaps I am over-sensitive…

In the NYT Sunday Travel Section there is an article about Warsaw (here). I was expecting it, really, what with May 1st being just days away (Poland, along with 9 other countries, will be joining the EU then).

I know the author of the article is the NYT Bureau Chief in nearby Prague and so he is knowledgeable about Central European matters. Still, there were many points in the piece that I felt were skewed and misleading.

The opening paragraph is just fine. I read:

"Poland is the new player in the New Europe, the biggest by far of the 10 countries set to join the European Union in May. Its lure is not the grand or the quaint; it was leveled with systematic cruelty by the Nazis in World War II, and you can still find houses where holes from bullets and shells have not been repaired. No country suffered more in the last century. Rather, Poland, and particularly Warsaw, is a place where you can almost see history being overcome."

But then, we come to observations that are a touch more troubling. Briefly, the article raises the following points:

* It concludes that Poles are skeptical about joining the EU, not foreseeing any immediate benefits for themselves.
[response: although Poles will acknowledge that an immediate economic miracle is not in the cards, virtually every single Pole I have raised this with has said that they are hopeful because of the emergence of a European community, with Poland in its midst.]

* There’s the following sentence to worry about as well. The Times writes: “Luckily for visitors, that moment comes in spring, when Poland shakes off its long winter and the flowers of its big downtown parks eliminate all shades of drear.”
[question: Drear? What drear? Does the author imply Warsaw is dreary at times when it isn’t covered over with flowers? I'm not liking this guy...]

* Then, there is also the Chopin bit. From the Times: “When the weather finally warms, Poles pay weekly tribute to Chopin - revered like no other Pole, with the possible exception of Pope John Paul II - in free Sunday concerts at Lazienki Park off Aleje Ujazdowskie. Poland is rarely overrun by tourists, so the concerts attract a fair share of ordinary folk”
[comment: Poland is rarely overrun by tourists? Well, okay, though maybe the Prague Bureau chief hasn’t been in Warsaw during its hot days of summer when tourists are EVERYWHERE, especially in Warsaw and Krakow. And what’s this last line about ‘ordinary folk?’ Who is the referent here? Ordinary, plain, colorless, fade-in-the-crowd type people? And am I an ordinary folk?]

* Comment on the Polish cuisine: I have never eaten wild-boar knuckles in my life. I do NOT consider it a well-known or beloved traditional Polish dish.

* On the subject of milkbars, the Times writes: “For a quick and cheap meal, it is worth a visit to one of Warsaw's vanishing Communist traditions, the milk bar. Among Poles, milk bars are regarded with nostalgia, disgust or both. They are places where students and workers could fill up on breakfast with a glass of milk, pancakes, pirogi and soups inexpensively, often in gloomy surroundings.”
[comment: how many things are wrong with that paragraph? Are milk bars a Communist tradition? Are they regarded with disgust, ever? They are the former fast food emporia of sorts. Most Poles did like them quite a bit and I don’t remember anyone ever referring to them as gloomy. They may not have had the pizazz of an American food court, but they were nonetheless highly popular.]

It’s late. I’m sure I’ll see the good sides to this article come morning. For now the exuberance is lost on me. I read a description of a city that is dreary, with uninteresting food and ordinary folk lappin’ it up, in gloomy surroundings. Makes you want to pack your bags and go to Prague.

Birches

If you were a birch tree today (IF YOU WERE A BIRCH TREE???), you might want someone to write and revel in your good looks. I am providing that service. A grove of young birches could never look more fetching than in the late morning light of an April day. Not surprisingly, in this summer-like weather, the birches I saw today were absolutely stunning.

Dinner

Last night two very wonderful people came to dinner. As is my custom, I identify no one outside the blogger community by name here and so they shall remain anonymous. Call them A & Z if you want.

In my mind, they were the perfect guests. I couldn’t quite put my finger on any one reason and so I floated a list in my head of what was especially congenial about the evening. I came up with the following:

1. They brought flowers. The custom of flower-giving is something that hasn’t quite caught on here. I don’t know why. Flowers are a lasting (at least for several days) source of pleasure. They move the evening beyond the meal itself. They are uplifting. They are cheerful, colorful, they speak of spring and summer days, and you can never have too many in the house.

2. They accepted a second helping graciously. We are talking about thin, food-conscious people here who probably would eat half the amount were they home. But they were thoughtful of my preparations and they extended themselves in this way for my benefit.

3. They noticed my salt shaker. I love my salt shaker – it is a work of art. Most people never pay much attention to it because it holds the substance of evil – salt – an anathema to the dieting public. (I’m not thinking of those with medical necessity on their side; I am thinking of the common joe or jane out there.) But salt, in small doses, is a flavor enhancer. Eliminate canned, processed foods and you will eliminate the need to monitor the salt you sprinkle on your main dish or put into the cake (to enhance the intensity of chocolate, you need salt). But even when a diner picks up the offending container, the vessel itself goes unnoticed. A shame.

4. They tried everything that was offered. Cooking these days for others is a minefield of tastes, diets, statements, inclinations. People are off the deep end with their preferences. It makes me think back to winter months in Poland some thirty years back when one was SO GRATEFUL for any food variety at all. I did not understand the concept of food preferences until I moved here.

5. They politely asked for the site of this blog. I need say no more.

Revenge

Depending on whom you ask, cyclists around town are either a supreme menace, or are menaced by the world of cars. Cross, say, University Avenue on a green pedestrian light, and inevitably you will be grazed by the manic rider who is determined to weave around every obstacle in sight, including you, at breakneck speed. Conversely, ride a bike on one of the streets where there aren’t bike lanes and you will understand what it means to have a brush with death as cars mistakenly calculate that they CAN pass you while sharing the same lane.

Perhaps we have reached a time where bikers, walkers and motorists simply cannot coexist. It’s a tense world out there: gentility is gone, the pressure to get where you need to be mounts, and there you are, glaring at the obstacle that is impeding your progress and making life difficult.

I am assuming that was the mood of the moment in England, where a cyclist had experienced one too many road incidents where he was done in by a motorist. This time a car had passed him in total oblivion to the road issues they both faced: puddles, in the very real British definition of puddles: big oceans of water on the road. The cyclist got drenched as the car whizzed by.

Fury took hold and planted the ugly seed of revenge. Over the next ten days, the cyclist slashed the tires of some 2000 cars.

The NYTimes notes today that he got a hefty jail term for his act of violence. Deservedly so. Still, one can sympathize just a bit. Cars are merciless to cyclists. But then, cyclists are merciless to pedestrians. I have to admit that when a cyclist darts in front of me when I cross a street, I have been known to ‘tap’ his (it’s almost always a guy) tail end with my bag, just as a reminder that my pedestrian rights have been egregiously violated. A form of revenge, I suppose. At least I leave the tires alone at the bike racks.

[to interject a note of lightness into the tense story, I have included a Guinness Book of Records photo of a man cycling backwards while playing the violin]

Spring Update

(it’s not all about plants you know)

If you were to look outside right now, directly into the morning sun, you would see the rays working their way through branches glittering with the wetness of last night’s rain. It is such a beautiful sight that it deserves a post of its own.

[photo credit: scottwork.com]

My grandfather was a better person than I am

As a young kid, I used to sit outdoors next to my grandfather quite often. He and I shared a love of sun, plants, fresh air, spring. A favorite activity for me (these were not very stress-filled days) was to sit by his side, chin in cupped hands, and watch bugs walk across his stomach or his arms, on the way to their next destination. I’d always ask – “don’t you want to chase them off?” and he’d answer “what for? They like this path.”

Today was a perfect day for me to take my notes outside (I’m trying to imagine what I am going to say during guest lectures I have to give later this month). Sitting in my yard, thinking of my plants, of the sun, of the fresh air and of spring makes me drift back to my grandfather. He and I shared a birthday, except his was in a different century. He would have been 118 this week.

Out of deference to him, I tried the ‘let bugs move across my stomach and arms’ thing. It was like the oldest form of torture. One pernicious wasp-like creature actually appeared to raise its fangs, poised for an attack. I flicked it off. Sorry, dziadku*, I tried.

*[Polish, directive tense (in the Polish language, nouns get conjugated as well), for grandfather]

Wisconsin images

To no one’s surprise, I’m sure, a Wisconsin patrolman took the first prize in the annual doughnut-eating contest for police officers (story here).

The World Cop Donut Eating Championship attracted some 40 contestants from the US and Canada.

I thought that the winning result was unspectacular. The prediction had been 7 or 8 doughnuts in 3 minutes. Our Wisconsin man ran away with first prize at 10 doughnuts. That seems entirely doable to me. Unless they were powdered sugar, with no accompanying beverage to push things down faster. That would be a challenge.

Politics, politics and more politics: patriotism is all about how you speak

It was disheartening to read the New Yorker story (here) on Kerry and his use of the French language when among French diplomats or journalists. The Washington Bureau Chief for France 2 has remarked that in recent months Kerry has refused to banter on record with the French press corps in their native language. It appears that Kerry’s relatives in France, his attendance at a Swiss boarding school, and his comfort level with foreign journalists in general have earned him such labels as “Monsieur Kerry” and “Jean Cheri” and “Jean Francois Kerry.” Capitalizing on the whiff of negative air directed at the Democratic campaign, the Secretary of Commerce, Donald Evans (perhaps looking after his own le job), told reporters that Kerry even looks French. Mais non!

The French press have had a tough go of it in Washington this year, the article tells us, what with snide references to freedom fries and the Axis of Weasel hanging in the air. But Kerry’s abrupt departure from his previous open-door policy toward foreign journalists has the press corps ‘perplexed.’ The following comment is cited in the New Yorker: “For us (this from the French journalists), to speak any other language and have an open view of the world, for a President, should be a plus.” It appears that this view is not shared by the rest of this nation.

Patriotism has come to have an interesting, singularly American meaning: it appears to require a repudiation of anything not born and bred on American soil. And it requires speaking like an American.

The concept of ‘patriotism’ makes another appearance in the New Yorker: in a letter to the magazine, a reader writes in response to a review of Woody Guthrie’s biography which had suggested that the songwriter was less than patriotic. The reader states: “[M]ore troubling…especially in today’s political climate, is the implication that one becomes patriotic by supporting one’s government. Wasn’t Guthrie being patriotic when he stood up for poor people during the Depression or when he fought for the labor movement? Was he being unpatriotic when he wrote “Pastures of Plenty” and “This Land is Your Land?”"

I suppose if Guthrie had also worn a French beret and occasionally thrown around a bonjour, he wouldn’t have stood a chance. Can you blame him for affecting an American drawl?

How to irritate a government official

Say you’ve just written a mystery-thriller novel. All characters appear to be fictionalized versions of people out there. You’ve inserted the standard language about everyone not really being anyone and about the coincidental likenesses that may have emerged (which is, of course, foolish because your imagination most likely made use of traits scalped straight from your black book of familiar persons), and you are hoping for big sales. Your book even has political undercurrents: it is about a person who seeks revenge after being driven by the government to a state of complete desperation. This main protagonist winds up shooting the Chancellor (I forgot to mention, the book takes place in Germany).

Wouldn’t it be maddening if you were that author and the real Chancellor (Gerhard Schröder) brought a successful injunction to put a stop to the sale of the book, because on the cover there is an illustration that sort of kind of but not really looks like him? The NYTimes writes about this (here), noting that the judge sided with the Chancellor (oh what a surprise) and banned publication until the picture is removed from the cover. Is someone over-sensitive, or could one really make the credible argument that such a likeness (if it is a likeness) might incite someone to acts of great violence?

A word of thanks to the greats

There are four weblogs out there that keep me going each day. There are others, too, but these four are what I start the weblog day with and I am never disappointed. They could not be more different from each other and it is this perhaps that gives me such joy in reading – the diversity of perspectives and the singular personalities that come through (I do happen to know all four authors reasonably well and that is definitely an asset).

I’ve picked one completely non-representative post from each to cite to here. The authors may squirm at my selections, but hey, it is my choice!

I’ll start, alphabetically, with Ann’s. Ann doesn’t always accompany her text with photos, but on the rare occasion that we do get pictures, there’ll often be a gem of a caption. Consider the post here – and be sure to scroll down to the "trees squirming." Look around at her other posts to get a taste of her commentary on art, politics and the American Idol.

Jeremy, yes, well, then there’s Jeremy. In truth, his was the first blog I ever read and so if there is any culprit out there responsible for the blogathon that was born this year, I suppose he must bear the blame. Just today he posted a paragraph about a concert he attended. Read about it here. It is poignantly hilarious. Scroll down further (note photo depicting his sentiments about teaching this semester) and you’ll become a JFW addict.

Mary came onto the blog scene later than the others. Though legally inclined, she brings to her blog her past life as a journalist. Consider her post today on cranberries (here). It makes me so very proud that her blog grew out of our discussions on blogging early in the semester. (You mean I had a wee tiny role in this? Wow!)

Tonya can be irreverent in her blog. I can’t resist linking to her post from today (here) because it shows off her pride in having 'Communist friends' – and perhaps only she would appreciate the joy I get from being singled out as a friend in this way!

Again, there are so many other bloggers who can make my day on any particular morning. But these four – they are always part of my wake-up. This, then, is a quick (and late! oh my is it late!) note of thanks. Your efforts are SO appreciated.

Are you STILL in school?

That is the question I wanted to ask a student who came by to talk about his work plans for the summer. My memory may be off a bit, but I swear that he was first in a class of mine some five or six years back. His visit reminded me of the cartoon below -- a relic from days when it seemed like I would NEVER be done with the proceess of collecting degrees (or not collecting them, as the case may be, unless they have now officially designated an 'ABD' as a recognized academic degree). And isn't there a law that says you have to be out of law school within six years (in Wisconsin) OR ELSE??

Early run in with the law

I was taking a morning sprint through Owen Woods when I came across a police officer and a squad car. Being rather in a fine mood and not wanting to face a dose of blood and gore on this gorgeous day, I went up to him and asked, in my most level (rather than excitement seeking) voice: “Is everything alright, officer?” I mean, I sounded like a role in a movie. I swear he blushed. Or maybe he was just flushed. He said: “I couldn’t help it! I just had to get out of that squad car and take a stroll on this fine day! The weather got to me! So, let’s just say I inspected the trails. They’re safe, you can go right ahead.”

I don’t blame him. I myself should have been preparing notes for lectures that I have to give at the end of the month. Instead, I was counting chikadees in Owen Woods (I don’t know anything about birds; they looked like they should have been chikadees). This day is THAT beautiful.

A momentary retreat into politics: on the error-proof GWB

Watching the GWB press conference today, I noted (as I hope the rest of America noted) that his greatest source of difficulty was with the four differently worded but basically same questions having to do with his mistakes of the past. It was fascinating to watch how uncomfortable he was, to the point of stumbling and ultimately flubbing the direct appeal to give just ONE EXAMPLE of a mistake, a misstep, an error of judgment. He couldn’t do it: he visibly squirmed and in the last go-around, admitted to one thing: that he wasn’t adept at thinking of mistakes extemporaneously.

[BTW, I think the reporter from NPR, the guy with the very last query – QUESTION: But I guess I just wonder if you feel that you have failed in any way. You don't have many of these press conferences where you engage in this kind of exchange. Have you failed in any way to really make the case to the American public?—can just assume that his goose is cooked in the White House; GWB had taken the gamble, feeling perhaps that it’s a do or die situation, and pointed to NPR for that last Q. Mistake. NPR will have lived up to the GOP image of it as a commie-liberal waste-pile –it hammered in the point that GWB regards himself as error-proof. I’m sure even at this moment GWB is scribbling memos that will lead to further cuts in federal funding for All Things Considered.]

And how do you respond to the question of “What were your mistakes, your errors, your moments of poor judgment?” knowing that Democrats are sitting at the edge of their collective chair, pencils poised, tomorrow’s TV ads waiting to be written?

Bush’s speech writers failed him. Any person applying for a job would know that the interviewer may ask for a list of weaknesses, or reflections on things you wish you had done differently. You learn to enumerate faults and errors in ways that make you look strong. To say “shucks, I really can’t imagine what they could be” is an invitation for someone to say “oh yeah? Let me help you come up with a list for future reference.”

Is it really the end of the semester?

(Where inconsequentiality and lightness return to the blog)
Today marked the beginning of the end: I gave out course evaluations in my big Family Law class SO NOW I DON’T HAVE TO BE A GOOD TEACHER ANYMORE (and of course proceeded to have immediately after one of my best classes ever – can we redo the forms?)!

Just a few minutes ago, a student came in to talk about her paper and she told me how thrilled she was that the academic year is nearly over. She was animated and excited about her future work, but completely deflated when she spoke of the next few weeks.

I don’t think there’s a person teaching who doesn’t relish the end of a semester to a degree. But I have to say that to me, there are ulterior sad elements as well. By now, I have a decent sense of the students – I know their style of speaking in class, the slant of their comments, their quirky traits. But unlike in grad school where you see the same faces for many years, in law school you only get to work with them once, at most twice and then they’re gone. And the class dynamic, that irresistible and energizing force of the collectivity – that ends with the end of the semester.

So, at the risk of sounding extremely odd and off-kilter, I do have to admit that part of me is sorry to have just a few more class meetings left –especially now that the evaluations are done and I am free to be AWFUL.

"When you digest your lunch is that you?"

This question is posed by Dr. Crick, who, at 87, is still attempting to determine what creates conscious awareness.
Is there a dividing line that separates mind (consciousness) from matter (the millions of neurons operating in the brain and the nervous system)? The NYT states: “While some philosophers claim that consciousness is a phenomenon outside the purview of material science, Dr. Crick dismisses such arguments with the imperious confidence that is part of his legend.”

If you are as fascinated by the debate over the validity of a neurobiological approach to understanding consciousness, you’ll have read, no doubt, today’s NYT Science article on this subject (here). If you’re not, well YOU SHOULD BE! Today, the weblog is seeking to educate and expand the horizons of the fellowship of blog readers. From Slovakia (below) to the brain: let it not be said that I write about fat cats (below) and Siberian irises (below) alone! [Have I suddenly strayed from my pledge to maintain an incredible lightness of blogging? Nothing could be further from the truth; the post titles alone should reassure the worried reader who does NOT wish to be educated, but simply wants to kill time in between more valuable pursuits, such as reading other, more worthy blogs.]

Dr. Crick is ruthlessly opposed to the idea of a consciousness that “lives” outside the body. In the Times article we read: “In a 1979 editorial in Scientific American, he argued that the time had come for science to take on the previously forbidden subject of consciousness. In his 1994 book "The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for the Soul," he went further. "You," he wrote, "your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules."”

Does Dr. Crick’s view diverge from mainstream science? The Times states: “While many scientists assume that consciousness is a global property of the brain — "a gestalt phenomenon" — Dr. Koch and Dr. Crick say they believe that only a few neurons are responsible at any given moment. Of the 50 billion or so neurons in the brain, Dr. Crick says that perhaps only tens of thousands, or even a few thousand, give rise to the feeling of conscious awareness. "We believe it is essentially a local phenomenon," he said. That position is certainly contentious. "The idea that there is a special population of neurons that mediate awareness is a minority view," Dr. Kanwisher noted.”

Moreover, Dr. Crick’s work raises questions about when exactly we can speak sensibly of consciousness: “[H]e asks, "How do we know that a newborn baby is conscious?" Perhaps consciousness is something that doesn't begin at birth, he said, but gradually emerges.” Dr. Crick insists that in the next several hundred years the idea of an independent soul will have been discarded with the science of the Dark Ages.

Be proud that you've read this far! This blog will stand out one day as being at the vanguard of modern science -- it will be admired for putting forth revolutionary ideas in the same way that bloggers 500 years ago, had they the time and means to do so, may have been tempted to link to the Copernicus website (we all know that he was Polish, right?), to share with other bloggers all that we now take for granted.

Spring Update

So long as we are on that side of the Atlantic (see post below about Slovakia), I thought I’d sneak in a post about the Siberian Iris – a favorite plant that is coming up in a robust way both in the front and back yards. I’ve not met a person who doesn’t think this flower is a “ten” on the scale of loveliness. My most recent additions (from last year) have the added bonus of rather unique, variegated yellow and green leaves. But the attention is all on the blooms. A sample of what’s coming appears herein.

In my continuing efforts to raise awareness about life in Central Europe:

The IHT reports (here) that Slovakia is about to become the Detroit of Europe. Just this year, the ancient walled town of Trnava has succeeded in attracting the large auto manufacturer Peugeot Citroën to build a plant there (to the great consternation of the 123 people whose homes have to be demolished for the project).

One could say that Slovakia is the poorer cousin of Central Europe and so a plant of this size means welcome economic growth to the region. Tell that to the people who have lived there all their lives and now must relocate. The article suggests that the displaced farmers, some too old to ever reap the benefits of having Peugeot there, are ‘distraught.’

Slovakia has been extremely successful in attracting car manufacturers to its borders. The IHT reports:

Scrappy, hard-working, and relentless in its drive to attract foreign investment, Slovakia has lured two giant car makers, Peugeot Citroën and Kia Motors of South Korea, in the last two years. It beat out Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary for the projects, despite their larger populations, better-developed economies, and expertise in manufacturing cars.

Volkswagen already has a major factory in the capital, Bratislava. When all three plants are running in late 2006, Slovakia, with 5.4 million people, will produce 850,000 cars a year - the most of any Central European nation and the most per capita in the world.

Trnava itself doesn’t look like Detroit (see my quirky photo comparison), though I wouldn’t be surprised if a visit in a few years would make one gawk in amazement (and what makes me think that the changes wont all be for the better).

The Monday after Easter

Comment from friend who got sprinkled by me with water today: “I’m sure glad I knew you in the years prior to your renewed interest in your ethnic heritage. Things were a lot dryer then.”*

*Today is Smigus Dyngus in Poland – the day when it is legitimate, even expected, to douse others with great amounts of water. Smigus Dyngus is also responsible for more google leads to my blog than all other google leads put together. For reasons unbeknownst to me, the world out there has a peculiar fascination with Smigus Dyngus. It’s just water, for pete’s sake: you dump water on others, what’s so curious about that??

Fat cat living

I’m trying to understand the importance of the message forwarded to me by a friend and reader (I mention ‘friend’ because this brings forth the presumption of helpfulness, attempted in this most indirect fashion). The story (here) is about an extremely obese German cat who was put in a shelter for protection. His owner had been feeding him about ten times the amount of food he needed and as a result the cat just blimped out.

I have several theories here:
1. My friend wants to demonstrate that cats have the same problems as we humans do and so I should have greater respect for these feline monsters whose sole purpose in life seems to be the killing of birds in people’s back yards;

2. My friend is worried that I am not good to my own animal (Ollie the dog who is wonderful, beyond reprimand, he would never ever go after a bird) and is hinting that shelters are there to protect pets from people like me, who refuse to basically spend five hours each day tickling the dog tummy and making sweet cooing sounds (which she thinks is standard owner-to-pet behavior, I’m sure);

3. She is indicating that Germany has problems with obesity and it’ll just be days before the epidemic spreads to neighboring countries, like for instance Poland and so I should warn all friends and neighbors there;

4. The most likely explanation: my pal is so cat-obsessed that she would find this story possibly the most important and interesting story to grace the papers today. Notice that I, by blogging about it, am totally humoring her. That’s what friends are for.

Will the joys of technology never end?

I just wanted to go on record as saying that writing anything by hand is no longer an option: I will never pick up the pen again.

Today, for the first time, I lugged my laptop to a faculty presentation. I wanted to type in a file right away (rather than transcribing it from notes later) because FOR ONCE, the presenter was actually talking about something relevant to my work (a rare event) and so I wanted to store the information for later use.

It was brilliantly awesome to have my little baby laptop right there next to me. I was tired and so there was a danger of me drifting off when the analysis got a bit tedious, but with my baby there, GONE were those squiggly illegible letters that I am capable of producing as sleep takes over and the pen falters. It was all beautiful text, neatly organized, saved, filed, stored.

I am throwing away all pens and pads. From now on, it’s me and my little machine.

Obsessed with religion?

There is a very interesting article in the WashPost today (here) describing the Atheist Convention that took place in San Diego this Saturday. There is a definite voyeuristic tone to it, as if the writer is checking to see if these people are really Normal. With great relief then, I read the following:

The godless do not look so different from anyone else. Normal with a capital N. You couldn't pick them out of a police lineup in the hunt for a secular humanist. … [T]he leader of the American Atheists today is Ellen Johnson of Parsippany, N.J., who wears tailored suits and matching pumps. She is blond and trim and as put together as an astronaut's wife at an Apollo launch. … Really, this gathering looks like decaffeinated Unitarians. Or like a real estate investment seminar in Indiana. Slightly more men than women. Older than younger. A few aging hippie ponytails. A T-shirt that reads: "Who Would Jesus Bomb?"

The association brings together people who support any number of small and large objectives:

[O]ne of the longtime members … runs an atheist-centric summer camp for kids called Camp Quest (motto: "It's Beyond Belief!") … In the lobby are tables selling books on papal corruption and greeting cards that wish recipients a Happy Solstice. … There are bumper stickers that read "Praying Is Begging." Several attendees show a visiting reporter how they scratch out the words "In God We Trust" from dollar bills. One fellow says he defaces $300 a month.

But grouping atheists together appears to be a challenge:

Organized nonbelief is a bit of an oxymoron, or, as Ellen Johnson likes to put it, getting atheists to cooperate collectively is "like herding cats." … Kenneth Bronstein, president of New York City Atheists, recalls attending his first meeting of the Gotham group. "It was sad," he says. "Ten guys in a room, all arguing with each other." A typical rally would draw a dozen people.

One long term goal for the group is the support of politicians who openly and continuously advocate for the separation of church and state. Thus it seems natural that there should be an action committee established toward that end. The reporter offers the following comment:

We wonder how many candidates are ready to have among their endorsements the overtly godless. … [T]he atheists here understand that most of those people are not aligned, specifically, with the atheist movement. It retains a stigma. It is revealing, the atheists admit, that they have adopted the language of the gay rights movement. "I've only been out of the closet for a year," says Seattle's Bob Seidensticker of his atheism. Like many here, he told family members for years that he was a doubter, an agnostic, that he was "questioning." But he recalls that at one family gathering, he was listening to a relative talk about how Noah's ark had dinosaurs; he finally flipped and declared himself. It was liberating, but tough.

Most members of the association were one-time believers. Their knowledge of the Bible can be impressive. Again, from the article:

[One member] is wearing a "Proud to Be an Atheist" T-shirt. He once was a young Bible quoter par excellence on the Southern Baptist circuit of youthful savants. … But one day, he says, he began to compile these "contradictions" in the Bible. He was just a kid. "I made a list of 200 and stopped," he says. His relatives told him, "You read too much." He says, "Can you imagine?"

Gaither spends hours a week in chat rooms debating the Scriptures. That is another thing about the atheists at this convention. They can be snide. They can bash. Frank Zindler, director of the American Atheist Press, does a whole hour on the podium lecturing on "the parasitic class" of priests and ministers engaged in what he called "the ignorance industry," saying, "These guys can spew out more disinformation and nonsense in 30 minutes than I can refute in 30 years."

Yes, these atheists are absolutely obsessed with religion. The weekend was like antimatter Bible camp.

Why have an annual meeting on Easter week-end? It appears not to be a ‘Statement’ of any sort. Practical concerns set the dates: hotel rates are cheaper during this stay-at-home holiday period.

What’s New for 2003 (tax-wise)?

- the label wouldn’t peel off, and when I stuck it onto the 1040, the paper curled around it in a most unattractive fashion;

- I do not think I could purchase a new TV on the money GWB saved me;

- It took me 16 minutes less to do the forms for 2003, quite likely because I copied all those zeros off of last year’s form without giving them much thought, to save time;

- Because the week-end is so far in advance of April 15th, I completed the forms a full 4 days ahead of schedule, a life-time record of sorts, I’m sure.

Wisconsin forms will have to wait. My mind is spinning after this excessive conscientiousness.

Greetings

To family and friends in Warsaw and Krakow, none of whom got a card from me as I never remember that Easter calls for greetings of this nature, thank you so much for your messages and let me just say:

Wesołych świąt wielkanocnych, smacznego jajka i mokrego dyngusa

Out of kindness to those who think I am making it all up and it is all gibberish, let me inform you that the above is a traditional Polish Easter greeting, translated to mean: (May you have) merry Easter holidays, a delicious egg and a wet Dyngus.*

*On the meaning of Smigus Dyngus, see post of April 1.

Separation of church and gym

An annoying moment happens when you look outside, see that it is close to 32 degrees cold, with an occasional snowflake for emphasis, decide that a walk would be less than inspiring, and so you slip on your gym shorts, pick up a book that you just have to finish by Thursday, and go to the gym. Yes, THAT gym the one for which you have paid great sums of money, only to consistently under-use now that the weather is good, the same gym that promises round-the-clock 24-hour protection against the encroachment of superfluous blubber. So you drive up and you see that the lot is empty, but you drive up anyway in the hope that the patrons are all there, they just WALKED over, hence the empty lot. But no, lo and behold, there is a sign, and the sign says “closed for Easter.”

Now I don’t want to deprive folks of their rightful share of Easter merriment. But for many of us the day allows for plenty of hours for which the gym is a very real and attractive possibility. To say nothing of those for whom the day just doesn’t have the same degree of zesty commitment to the home as, say, Thanksgiving. And so I am filing a protest: places of public gathering should think about keeping to regular business hours today. Besides, NOTHING IN MY CONTRACT SAID ANYTHING ABOUT EASTER! I want my annual membership refunded for 1/366 of its value!

I did take a walk in the end, but it was with hands deeply buried in the winter jacket pockets. And the shorts had to be replaced. So how fun is that on an April morning??

Sociology News (Okay, I start the day on a more serious note. It'll be 'down the light path' henceforth.)

It’s hard for me to pass up any article featuring a prominent sociologist and so, not surprisingly, a VERY LONG interview with Ann Swidler in the WashPost (here) caught my attention this morning. Swidler, a professor at Berkeley, writes on families. Her latest book, written three years ago (“Talk of Love”), takes on the topics of love, marriage and commitment. Is there an overarching theme? The author of the interview says that Swidler’s stance on marriage or family life isn’t easy to pigeon-hole, though you could certainly conclude that Swidler takes the position that “the family in America is in a flux—both imperiled and deeply resilient.”

Having once been a grad student in sociology with an emphasis on comparative families, and now finding myself teaching family law, all this would, of course, be good reading for me. But there are also other memorable little tidbits in the article, having less to do with family studies and more with the art of academic discourse. For instance, the author recognizes an interesting and bifurcated world out there. About Swidler’s research on marriage and the family he writes:

Swidler works quietly, methodically and out of the popular limelight, which makes her an interesting voice -- refreshingly nuanced and unpredictable -- when asked about the wrenching cultural issues of the day. She is a chin-stroker, when it comes to thinking about American family life, rather than an ideologue with a fast-on-the-draw sound bite for every occasion -- which only underscores the huge gulf between sociologists who simply study American life, and sociologists who throw themselves into the partisan fracas.

Of course, it’s easier to abandon sound bites when you are having multiple pages of a prominent paper devoted to your “nuanced voice.” Nonetheless, it is true that these days lecturing or writing about families forces you to make decisions on how you are going to position yourself before an audience (a non-positioning is of course a positioning of sorts) in the current debates that are taking place. Swidler does not use her academic arena to advocate. Is this good? It’s one way to gain respect as a scholar. It’s not the only way, but it is one way.

And they said it was going to snow

Never underestimate the potential for good weather in April. Today, though not brilliant and certainly not warm, had enough of a spring feel that I decided that a camouflaged Spring Update may be in order. How can I not acknowledge willow catkins that are ready to flower? Or the budding birches? Or the presence of bluebirds? Just a brief post, no great words needed. Taking a walk brings out all the very best of this crackerjack month.

The politics of salmon

In a post below I wrote of my determination to step away for the moment from political blogging. I am staying with this decision (and indeed, the response seems to have been one of relief, since several readers indicated that this is a good thing).

However, may I just retreat into a fishery politic for a second to say that everywhere I turn, I am now reading about the horrors of farming salmon and it MAKES ME SO MAD because here we are again, making our foods “cheaper” (translates: more profitable and produced on a larger scale) in the short run and quite deadly in the long run. I truly think that it’s gotten to the point where one just should not buy farmed fish unless the grocery store can tell you exactly what the farming practices have been at the place where the fish was raised (Seafood Watch tracks the safety issues, but most grocers don’t give you this information even if you ask, forcing one to shop in places like Whole Foods because there at least you don’t have to battle the store at every turn if you want to know about these things, and indeed, they can provide assurance that minimal standards of sustainable fish farming have been adhered to).


A good synopsis of the debate over “wild” versus “farmed” can be found in this month’s Wine Enthusiast (of all things). The recommendation couldn’t be clearer – unless a restaurant or a store can tell you about how the fish was raised and whether sustainable farming practices were followed, if it's farmed rather than wild, don't order it. Farmed salmon, raised in the “modern way” (SO MAD!) has up to 40 times more PCBs than wild salmon, to say nothing of having hormone levels that probably sprout facial hair on the poor fish and an antibiotic overdose, just to counter the filth in farm holding pens (analogy of chicken coops comes to mind). The FDA (which regulates farmed fish; the EPA sets only wild fish standards) refuses ('is lax') to update its standards for fish safety in spite of the surfacing reports about the dangers posed by eating conventionally farmed fish. REALLY MADDENING!

[cartoon credit: wildsalmon.org]

Update on calves and cottonwoods

My reader from Montana clarified things a bit for me. Two days ago I posted a picture of calves, thinking this would be a good depiction of what life in Montana would be like now (she had written about caring for young calves and planting cottonwoods this week).

Not accurate, writes my pal. In her words:

"I like your pictures - only you need to change the calf picture. This morning it's snowing [we've had several inches in the last hour] and the calf that was just born is wet [from both the snow and life in the uterus] and slimey. I left it so its mother would lick it off but soon will check to see if it needs a warmer place to be."

Okay, maybe I should focus on spring updates closer to home. I seem to know nothing about young calves and weather conditions in April in Montana.

As for cottonwoods – my reader explains:

"Cottonwoods are large, deciduous trees that are native to this area - they are related to poplars. They are also the tree you see in Utah's canyon country along dry riverbeds."

I am all for accuracy in the blog! I’m not sure what you see here is a Montana cottonwood, but at least it’ll strike the image of a futon store* from our minds.

[*Cottonwood is, I believe, the name of the local futon merchant]

What my mother told me

Today’s Cap Times (Madison’s local paper) invites readers (here) to submit sayings and wisdoms that their mothers have passed on to them. The idea is that on Mother’s Day we will have a paper filled with important words implanted by mothers to their daughters. Yes, to daughters. For some odd reason the paper invites only daughters to participate in this enterprise.

The newspaper offers clues as to the type of sayings that might be appropriate:

"If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

"Don't imagine you can change a man, unless he is in diapers."

Or, what has to be a first for the Cap Times:

"Keep your dress down and your panties up."

I thought about this project some and deliberated whether my mother (who now lives in Berkeley) would enjoy seeing this public display of her infamous words of wisdom. I decided not. But forget the Cap Times, what is the blog for if not to relive those years where virtually all conversations ended with the following pronouncement on her part:

“Life is not a bowl of cherries.”

Deep? Well, yes, if you think about it. There are anti-Pollyanna overtones to the message, to be sure, but a friend with whom I shared this recently said that it also speaks profoundly to certain cultural differences between Poles and Americans. He speculated that perhaps cherries had inherent value to a Pole (after all, in the past I’d described cherry vodka, the popularity of sour cherries, even my sister’s week-end-long-nothing-but-cherries fast). Surely depriving a Pole of cherries would be a harsh punishment. Life, then, according to the saying, could never measure up to that dish of all dishes: plain old unadulterated cherries.

He has a point. But perhaps there is a silver lining? I have contemplated upon occasion how good it is that life is not a bowl of cherries. I don’t think that is what my mother intended, but certainly the words have had this other effect. Sometimes I even hope that it’s all about blueberries or raspberries. Others may wish for cherries, but for me, there are those other fruits to consider. And in the end, as I have been know to say so often lately, you take what you can get, right?

P.S. My mother’s other important missive was that “you have to sacrifice for the children.” That doesn’t quite have the punch of the first, but it’s worth noting nonetheless. Though perhaps it isn’t so much a directive as a statement about where she sees herself on the sacrifice continuum?

To days gone by...

The New Yorker this week reports on the phone company’s sudden and unexplained cancellation of New York’s longtime informational numbers –including the longstanding weather information source at 976-1212. I remember that number as well as I remember the birth date of Jacquie Graupner’s mother (Jacquie was my grade school girl-friend – see post somewhere below). But as of March 24th, the weather person behind that number is gone. Gone, too, is “at the tone, the time will be one twenty five, and thirty seconds, beeeeep!” which had lasted for many many decades at 976-1616.

There appears to have been no citizen’s revolt, no great protest or outcry. The author of the article speculates that people are inundated these days with informational sources. Weather forecasts appear everywhere from newspapers to elevators and computers. All true, but in fact, when you wake up in the morning and you wonder how many sweaters you’ll need to survive the April-in-Wisconsin kind of morning, it shouldn’t be that you have to turn on your computer to find out. Turning on the computer leads immediately to ten other computer-related activities (I should check my email; I should check the headlines; I should check a few blog updates…) and then you’re just lost. Calling an anonymous voice to get the weather was like a gift to yourself – you could avoid the world encroaching on your space that much longer. You could not pick up the paper, turn on a radio or TV or computer, you could just BE.

As a side note, the reporter for the New Yorker attempted to find out why Verizon had decided to scrap the info numbers. The article states: “A call to Verizon didn’t reveal much, either. The company spokesman seemed to be preoccupied with a recent catastrophe involving a technician who had mistakenly routed two hours of 911 calls to a bank in Brooklyn.” Next time I am down on myself for some inept act that I will have committed (so many come to mind, even as I write…--you, email recipient of the wrong message as of fifteen minutes ago, know exactly what I am talking about!), I will remind myself that at least I did not do that: at least I did not cause people to reach a bank when they desperately needed a doctor or a police officer.

Where have all the politics gone?

I have noticed recently that I have absolutely no inclination to blog about things of a political nature. Stories that caused me to contemplate a post today ranged from an article about cat remains found in an ancient burial site (NYT here) to a piece about a woman who decided to use her down-time at the airport to give free advice (IHT here). (Both are great stories, btw!) I had no interest in blogging about anything more serious than that. [I know, I know, my devoted-to-cats reader will immediately respond that an article on the origins of cat-as-pet scores a ten on the seriousness scale, but for the rest, I would regard it as a curiosity rather than a shattering event; and it certainly lacks any political overtones.]

It could be that I am bucking the trend. Every day I come across a new weblog with posts about politics. Some of these commentaries are interesting, thoughtful, original, but most, to me, are not. Many appear arrogant (no cites, I don’t want blogger-enemies), anything but reasoned, in fact –quite off-putting.

On the other hand, abandoning politics here seems entirely wrong too, since the very title of this blog suggests a contemplation of matters that are of concern to those living here and in more distant places (eg Poland – and I have a handful of loyalists who continue to check the blog there!). If ‘politics’ stands for the art of government, then surely an internationally-inclined blog should at least make references to things of a political nature.

Call it a crisis of blog identity. I am giving more ‘serious’ thought to the ‘lightness’ factor that has seeped into virtually every post. Perhaps it is a sign of the times: I look for frivolity because the daily news stories that I wake up to have almost none of it, or at least it is overshadowed by the doom and gloom of a never-ending political drama that is both threatening and unnerving.

Comments and suggestions are welcome. If none are forthcoming, then I will organize a focus group very soon and I will gauge public sentiment from this select audience. The scientific method for selecting members of the focus group? I’ll use the legal standard of ‘arbitrary and capricious.’

A week-end of 1040 fun

It’s not holiday time. It’s tax time! Last year I asked one of the professors who teaches Tax here, which computer program he uses to file his returns. He said “the simple one called ‘pencil and eraser.’” Me too.

But I’m still a week away and the temptation each day is to push this odious chore to another moment.
Today, for instance, I could not possibly work on taxes. I am distracted by the following email received from a reader:

Greetings from Montana.
Although my head is full of keeping calves alive and planting cottonwoods right now, I will be back in Madison next week.

What is more interesting than gathering the requisite papers for tax work? The above. I wish I were keeping calves alive and planting cottonwoods this week-end (btw, what are cottonwoods*? Futons?).

*name of store in High Point Plaza

It’s Easter week-end, isn’t it?

My family never did anything about Easter as I was growing up. There was no reason to make a holiday of it: in Poland, Easter was a supremely religious celebration (my family was not Catholic). I don’t remember there being bunnies or chicks or Easter bonnets – just crowds pouring out of church, and then, in the late post-dinner afternoon, crowds in parks, as families went for the weekly ‘promenade.’

But the painting of Easter eggs for Easter transcended the holiday itself. We learned early on how to get the egg out of the shell and preserve the shell itself. And we learned to love the designs that we repeatedly saw reproduced on eggs sold in craft shops.

I'm including a few photos here, perhaps to remind myself of their loveliness.

It’s final: a pyramid over a crate

I didn’t read this week’s NYT science article (here) until today. I once fancied myself as being mathematically-inclined (it seems, in retrospect, that I have fancied myself inclined in very many ways over the years…hmmmm..) and so I read the article with greater care than I normally would read a piece from under the “science” rubric.

It appears that one of the oldest problems of math has been conclusively solved (as demonstrated by the acceptance of the proof by a leading mathematics journal). No, don’t stop reading! You may want to know, even if you have no interest in math. The problem is all about the most efficient ways to pack oranges (originally stated as a problem of stacking cannonballs): the pyramid holds more than the crate. Why? The Times gives this simple layperson’s explanation: “(the pyramid) allows each layer of oranges to sit lower, in the hollows of the layer below, and take up less space than if the oranges sat directly on top of each other.”

The article explains how the computer-assisted proof initially raised eyebrows (checking issues arose). It is a fascinating story of how mathematics can no longer rely on the human brain to solve its remaining puzzles (but neither can it simply feed the problems to the computer, for understandable reasons). But I am still stuck on this very basic truth: pyramid over crate. So easy, so logical, but I would have never guessed.

Confession of a weary gardener

It’s not all fun and games out there in the mud. Nor is it all smiles in the blogger community in reaction to my Spring Updates. Two comments from yesterday are especially telling:

Reader number one wrote the following:

“I'm glad to see that you are not blogging about Spring and gardening today. Though I enjoy the pictures of the flowers, you were making me feel guilty because I have no interest whatsoever in doing yard work or getting my hands dirty.”

Conclusion number one: Spring Updates inspire guilt rather than pleasure.

Reader number two commented:

”Call me old fashioned, but I like to see grass as the dominant plant-life of a lawn. It seems that if you sprinkle turkey droppings and only turkey droppings to sustain it, you’re likely to have weeds, weeds and more weeds. In fact I distinctly remember seeing weeds last year in your front yard.”

I remember an exchange that I had with someone about lawns a few years back. When I recounted to this person that I had just spent a morning picking out the particularly noxious spreading weeds, she had said “in my yard, if it’s green it stays.”

Conclusion number two: people feel strongly about lawn care (or lack thereof).

I am all for balance, so I promise, Spring Updates will appear at intervals so great that you wont even remember when you last saw one. As for weeds – I will continue to dig by hand. For those used to greener pastures – I’m sorry, but I can’t even stand to take walks through the neighborhood when the Chemlawn truck has passed through and left its dirty trail. The stench takes all the pleasure out of walking. In my mind, this is one of the most avoidable chemical addictions that suburbanites continue to support. I can understand smoking better than I can understand spraying your yard repeatedly so that it will look like Astroturf.