Reflection of highway overpass, Two Rivers, WI.
photo by A. Graf
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Sunday, December 18, 2005
Panic Attack
I had a small panic attack in bed Thursday night, surely brought on by the recent stresses of five children in the house, including two teenage girls, not to mention the fact that I thought I was about to die. I have been trying not to take any Zanax to get to sleep and I often succeed in dropping off all by myself, tired as I am these days. I am taking Celebrex daily for my hip/back problem, which has not yet been officially diagnosed. The Celebrex works, though, and I’m glad for it. Merck is once again in the news as a man died from a heart attack after a month on Vioxx and the proceedings of his widow’s lawsuit are splashed across the papers and heard on radio and tv reports almost daily. Some think that Celebrex and Bextra are similarly dangerous to the heart, though this seems to be disputed by the medical profession. My own doctor, Dr. Spiekerman, said I shouldn’t worry about being on it, especially for the short time I would be taking it – originally three weeks. I’m back on it, though, as three weeks apparently wasn’t enough time to heal whatever is causing my mystery pain. That’s a whole story in itself. I’ll save the details of the bad hip for another time.
So, Thursday night I am lying in bed, no Zanax in my system, trying to fall asleep. Success seems imminent as I am so very tired and have almost dozed off. Suddenly there is a sharp pain in my lower left leg. It is a very localized pain in the middle of the front of my leg, a bit off to the outside of that long bone that runs down to the foot. It doesn’t feel like a nerve and it doesn’t feel like a muscle acting up. It’s just a razor sharp pain of medium intensity that lasts only a few seconds. I give a jolt and am now wide-awake again. Dean feels me jerk and shifts in bed next to me. I calm down, wonder what the heck that was and try to recapture my sleep. 20 or 30 seconds later – there it is again. And again. Every 20 or 30 seconds I get this little jab in my leg. Now I remember the Celebrex and all those late night lawyer ads recommending anyone who has taken Vioxx, Celebrex or Bextra to call this 800 number and get into a class action lawsuit to defend their health rights and receive the compensation possibly due them. Geez. This doesn’t help my emotional state at all. I imagine a blood clot, just about to let go of whatever it’s holding onto, poised to jump into the stream of my circulation on its way to my heart or lungs. Which would come first, the heart or the lungs? Which one kills a person – a clot in the heart or the lungs? I thought it was the lungs. I remember one episode of that old crime show, Reasonable Doubts, with Marlee Matlin and Mark Harmon, when one of their co-workers had surgery and was recuperating in a hospital bed when suddenly she couldn’t breathe and she coded and everyone rushed in to try and figure out what was wrong and to try and save her from what turned out to be a simple little old blood clot that had broken away from her surgery site and landed in her lungs like an unwanted relative on your doorstep during Christmas festivities. I remember the look on her face, the incomprehensible terror and the gasping for breath, the rush of orderlies, the whir of emergency machinery, and then the denouement as each doctor and nurse slowly backed away from her lifeless body. She was acting, of course, but it was convincing and I cried. She wasn’t like a bit part on that show either. I was amazed they had allowed her to die like that. Maybe she had a better offer from some other show. Maybe she was pregnant in real life and wanted to stay home to raise her family. I don’t know. They cancelled the entire show some time after that and I never heard anything more. That is beside the point.
I am still lying in bed, having these evenly spaced out stabs of leg pain and imaging my own death from a Celebrex-induced heart attack or a tiny, little blood clot, knowing that my husband will sleep through the entire episode and I won’t even get to say goodbye to my children. The dog will probably be the only one aware of my demise before I’m cold under the sheets.
These thoughts aren’t helping. I get up and use the bathroom and play a few rounds of pocket Yahtzee, hoping the pain will slow down, lessen or disappear. Walking to and from the john doesn’t help, but returning to bed I notice that perhaps it is easing a bit. I make a concerted, oxymoronic effort to relax and finally do fall asleep, still Zanax free. In the morning the pain remains, off and on, though milder than the night before. It fades away by mid-morning, after the kids are on the bus and I am now home alone for the first time all week.
So, Thursday night I am lying in bed, no Zanax in my system, trying to fall asleep. Success seems imminent as I am so very tired and have almost dozed off. Suddenly there is a sharp pain in my lower left leg. It is a very localized pain in the middle of the front of my leg, a bit off to the outside of that long bone that runs down to the foot. It doesn’t feel like a nerve and it doesn’t feel like a muscle acting up. It’s just a razor sharp pain of medium intensity that lasts only a few seconds. I give a jolt and am now wide-awake again. Dean feels me jerk and shifts in bed next to me. I calm down, wonder what the heck that was and try to recapture my sleep. 20 or 30 seconds later – there it is again. And again. Every 20 or 30 seconds I get this little jab in my leg. Now I remember the Celebrex and all those late night lawyer ads recommending anyone who has taken Vioxx, Celebrex or Bextra to call this 800 number and get into a class action lawsuit to defend their health rights and receive the compensation possibly due them. Geez. This doesn’t help my emotional state at all. I imagine a blood clot, just about to let go of whatever it’s holding onto, poised to jump into the stream of my circulation on its way to my heart or lungs. Which would come first, the heart or the lungs? Which one kills a person – a clot in the heart or the lungs? I thought it was the lungs. I remember one episode of that old crime show, Reasonable Doubts, with Marlee Matlin and Mark Harmon, when one of their co-workers had surgery and was recuperating in a hospital bed when suddenly she couldn’t breathe and she coded and everyone rushed in to try and figure out what was wrong and to try and save her from what turned out to be a simple little old blood clot that had broken away from her surgery site and landed in her lungs like an unwanted relative on your doorstep during Christmas festivities. I remember the look on her face, the incomprehensible terror and the gasping for breath, the rush of orderlies, the whir of emergency machinery, and then the denouement as each doctor and nurse slowly backed away from her lifeless body. She was acting, of course, but it was convincing and I cried. She wasn’t like a bit part on that show either. I was amazed they had allowed her to die like that. Maybe she had a better offer from some other show. Maybe she was pregnant in real life and wanted to stay home to raise her family. I don’t know. They cancelled the entire show some time after that and I never heard anything more. That is beside the point.
I am still lying in bed, having these evenly spaced out stabs of leg pain and imaging my own death from a Celebrex-induced heart attack or a tiny, little blood clot, knowing that my husband will sleep through the entire episode and I won’t even get to say goodbye to my children. The dog will probably be the only one aware of my demise before I’m cold under the sheets.
These thoughts aren’t helping. I get up and use the bathroom and play a few rounds of pocket Yahtzee, hoping the pain will slow down, lessen or disappear. Walking to and from the john doesn’t help, but returning to bed I notice that perhaps it is easing a bit. I make a concerted, oxymoronic effort to relax and finally do fall asleep, still Zanax free. In the morning the pain remains, off and on, though milder than the night before. It fades away by mid-morning, after the kids are on the bus and I am now home alone for the first time all week.
Saturday, December 10, 2005
Scutigeraphobia
I have never screamed in church, except for that one Sunday years ago when I was about nine. We had arrived late and were forced to take a seat in the very last row of the sanctuary, under the overhang of the choir loft. We sat, stood, sang, sat and stood with dull regularity until the quiet moment of prayer directly before the start of the sermon. I remember standing there, eyes closed and head bowed, when I felt something funny on the bare back of my right forearm. I opened my eyes and twisted my arm around to have a look; something you should never, ever do if you have the least suspicion that something might be crawling on you, which, indeed, it was. I gave a little scream – okay, maybe more of a swallowed yelp – and brushed frantically at the little centipede that had climbed up my arm from who knows where. A few heads turned to watch me do a mini tarantella in my pew. Embarrassed, I brought my electrified nerves in check and managed to stop thrashing. The prayer ended and we all sat down, though I frantically investigated in every direction before reluctantly seating myself as far to the left of my original spot as space would allow.
Thirty years later, I was sitting in a small circle during our adult education hour at church. Suddenly I saw a dark shape, like a pocket-sized Pekingese, whip out from under one of the chairs. My husband, sitting next to me, quickly and instinctively slapped out his left foot. I audibly sucked in air and sat bolt upright. Linda, whose chair was next to mine, noticed my reaction and heard me whisper, “Was that a centipede?” She reached out, put her hand on my shoulder in comfort and answered, “Yes, but he got it.” I lifted my feet up and rested them on the side of my husband’s chair for about twenty minutes afterwards, like the stereotypical housewife after glimpsing a mouse. Mice do not frighten me.
I glanced nervously at the floor before reaching down into my backpack to get my rubber stress ball. I kneaded it purposefully and concentrated on deep breathing. I had had a cup of coffee before church, which did nothing to attenuate the rush of anxiety I could feel coursing through my veins. For quite a while afterwards I could sense a vibration in my entire body, so high-pitched and nearly audible. If a dog had wandered into the room at this point, he would surely have begun to howl in pain at the sound of my nerves reaching a frequency that only his ears could hear.
I will not try to reconcile my spiritual history with the demonic sensibilities that this little beast can conjure in my soul, but I do find it peculiar that I have had more than one highly disturbing centipede encounter while in church. After all, who made the centipede? But I digress.
I can remember individual centipedes encountered over the years: the one that came around a corner as I sat on the floor of Merrill Hall waiting for my journalism class to start 20 years ago, the enormous one on a stack of books in our spare bedroom when we lived in our first apartment, the one in our bathroom last year, and the one that fell off the wall before my very eyes this past Easter Sunday morning. The knowledge that something with that many legs can still fall off of a wall did not do anything good for my already overdeveloped fear of centipedes.
I know my fear is not rational. I love most other bugs and am fascinated by them. Last year we had a pet katydid. This year we raised a praying mantis from a tiny half-inch long hatchling to a fully formed adult. I held them. I photographed them. I played with them and even named them. But centipedes? I have what must be a biological, pathological fear of these speedy, multi-ped monsters that goes beyond my own understanding.
After all, the common house centipede is a helpful, honest predator and certainly not looking to disturb me, personally, except maybe to hide under my clothing were I to lie on the basement floor, at night, in the dark. Centipedes enjoy damp, dim, and cramped places and will hunt down and kill small spiders and insects, including silverfish and cockroaches, that are also found in our homes. Centipedes, often lazily lumped in with spiders or bugs, are true arthropods and neither insects nor spiders. A house centipede, Scutigera coleoptrata, will have one pair of legs per body segment, translating to between 30 and 100 legs, depending on the species. The last pair of legs is much longer than the others and is used to lasso and hold prey while the hunter’s venom takes effect. They do not commonly bite humans, unless provoked, but they can and some quite painfully. The larger the bug, the worse the bite. The dead, slightly crumpled carcass that I found in an abandoned bucket in our basement last week had only the minimally requisite 30 legs. My relief is almost palpable.
House centipedes lay 50 to 100 or more eggs in the late spring or early summer and the young hatch with four pairs of legs. They go through several larval stages marked by an increasing number of pairs of legs until reaching maturity after five or more molts. They can live up to six years. I feel ill. Is there no safe harbor, not even church? A centipede went through the wash machine recently and I found it dead on our comforter in the evening after making our bed. It wasn’t squished, like they usually are when I make them die, so I gingerly picked it up with a tissue and held the creepy body and examined it. It had an almost likeable little face, which surprised me, seeing as how a live one can terrify me more than anything else I know of native to southeastern Wisconsin.
A 26-year old man living near Bangkok recently earned admittance into the Guinness Book of World Records after spending 28 days eating and sleeping with 1,000 centipedes inside a 12 square meter glass room. An Internet photo showed him with a ridiculously enormous centipede crawling over his chin and up onto his lips. I counted at least 40 legs on this five-inch long fright before I had to navigate away from the web page, clear my computer cache, turn off the machine entirely and take a little walk around the block with my six-year old son to remove the image from my brain. If I ever were found to have information some international enemy wanted, all they would have to do is put me in that room. I’d talk. I’d tell them whatever they wanted to know – my age, my weight, my checking account information, my social security number, highly classified American anti-terrorist machinations – just don’t bring on the centipedes.
I want to know where this fear comes from, and why some folks have it and others don’t. Nine out of ten people I ask about centipedes are completely grossed out or afraid of them. I happily married one of the few, the proud, the non-Scutigeraphobic. I call upon his anomalistic indifference to do the dirty act of killing whenever necessary, whenever he is available. If I am home alone and I spy one of these accursed apparitions on wall or floor, my terror alone gives it a better chance of survival. Poor little guys. They can’t know how frightened I am of them. They can’t know how my stomach runs for cover behind my uvula at the sight of them. Why, they’re almost heroes, considering all the good work they do around my house. My first instinct remains murderous, but entomologist Eric Grissell gives this advice instead: "In my house, I never kill these creatures, but when I see them I do what any right-thinking person would do – faint. When I wake up, they are gone."
Quote source: Grissell, Eric. Insects and Gardens. 26.
Thirty years later, I was sitting in a small circle during our adult education hour at church. Suddenly I saw a dark shape, like a pocket-sized Pekingese, whip out from under one of the chairs. My husband, sitting next to me, quickly and instinctively slapped out his left foot. I audibly sucked in air and sat bolt upright. Linda, whose chair was next to mine, noticed my reaction and heard me whisper, “Was that a centipede?” She reached out, put her hand on my shoulder in comfort and answered, “Yes, but he got it.” I lifted my feet up and rested them on the side of my husband’s chair for about twenty minutes afterwards, like the stereotypical housewife after glimpsing a mouse. Mice do not frighten me.
I glanced nervously at the floor before reaching down into my backpack to get my rubber stress ball. I kneaded it purposefully and concentrated on deep breathing. I had had a cup of coffee before church, which did nothing to attenuate the rush of anxiety I could feel coursing through my veins. For quite a while afterwards I could sense a vibration in my entire body, so high-pitched and nearly audible. If a dog had wandered into the room at this point, he would surely have begun to howl in pain at the sound of my nerves reaching a frequency that only his ears could hear.
I will not try to reconcile my spiritual history with the demonic sensibilities that this little beast can conjure in my soul, but I do find it peculiar that I have had more than one highly disturbing centipede encounter while in church. After all, who made the centipede? But I digress.
I can remember individual centipedes encountered over the years: the one that came around a corner as I sat on the floor of Merrill Hall waiting for my journalism class to start 20 years ago, the enormous one on a stack of books in our spare bedroom when we lived in our first apartment, the one in our bathroom last year, and the one that fell off the wall before my very eyes this past Easter Sunday morning. The knowledge that something with that many legs can still fall off of a wall did not do anything good for my already overdeveloped fear of centipedes.
I know my fear is not rational. I love most other bugs and am fascinated by them. Last year we had a pet katydid. This year we raised a praying mantis from a tiny half-inch long hatchling to a fully formed adult. I held them. I photographed them. I played with them and even named them. But centipedes? I have what must be a biological, pathological fear of these speedy, multi-ped monsters that goes beyond my own understanding.
After all, the common house centipede is a helpful, honest predator and certainly not looking to disturb me, personally, except maybe to hide under my clothing were I to lie on the basement floor, at night, in the dark. Centipedes enjoy damp, dim, and cramped places and will hunt down and kill small spiders and insects, including silverfish and cockroaches, that are also found in our homes. Centipedes, often lazily lumped in with spiders or bugs, are true arthropods and neither insects nor spiders. A house centipede, Scutigera coleoptrata, will have one pair of legs per body segment, translating to between 30 and 100 legs, depending on the species. The last pair of legs is much longer than the others and is used to lasso and hold prey while the hunter’s venom takes effect. They do not commonly bite humans, unless provoked, but they can and some quite painfully. The larger the bug, the worse the bite. The dead, slightly crumpled carcass that I found in an abandoned bucket in our basement last week had only the minimally requisite 30 legs. My relief is almost palpable.
House centipedes lay 50 to 100 or more eggs in the late spring or early summer and the young hatch with four pairs of legs. They go through several larval stages marked by an increasing number of pairs of legs until reaching maturity after five or more molts. They can live up to six years. I feel ill. Is there no safe harbor, not even church? A centipede went through the wash machine recently and I found it dead on our comforter in the evening after making our bed. It wasn’t squished, like they usually are when I make them die, so I gingerly picked it up with a tissue and held the creepy body and examined it. It had an almost likeable little face, which surprised me, seeing as how a live one can terrify me more than anything else I know of native to southeastern Wisconsin.
A 26-year old man living near Bangkok recently earned admittance into the Guinness Book of World Records after spending 28 days eating and sleeping with 1,000 centipedes inside a 12 square meter glass room. An Internet photo showed him with a ridiculously enormous centipede crawling over his chin and up onto his lips. I counted at least 40 legs on this five-inch long fright before I had to navigate away from the web page, clear my computer cache, turn off the machine entirely and take a little walk around the block with my six-year old son to remove the image from my brain. If I ever were found to have information some international enemy wanted, all they would have to do is put me in that room. I’d talk. I’d tell them whatever they wanted to know – my age, my weight, my checking account information, my social security number, highly classified American anti-terrorist machinations – just don’t bring on the centipedes.
I want to know where this fear comes from, and why some folks have it and others don’t. Nine out of ten people I ask about centipedes are completely grossed out or afraid of them. I happily married one of the few, the proud, the non-Scutigeraphobic. I call upon his anomalistic indifference to do the dirty act of killing whenever necessary, whenever he is available. If I am home alone and I spy one of these accursed apparitions on wall or floor, my terror alone gives it a better chance of survival. Poor little guys. They can’t know how frightened I am of them. They can’t know how my stomach runs for cover behind my uvula at the sight of them. Why, they’re almost heroes, considering all the good work they do around my house. My first instinct remains murderous, but entomologist Eric Grissell gives this advice instead: "In my house, I never kill these creatures, but when I see them I do what any right-thinking person would do – faint. When I wake up, they are gone."
Quote source: Grissell, Eric. Insects and Gardens. 26.
Sunday, November 27, 2005
Thursday, November 24, 2005
Survival
Today is Thanksgiving and as we were all home together, I decided to get out my Kid Surveys. I created this simple survey for my children years ago when the oldest was still young, just to track changes in their opinions and ideas as the years pass. When they were smaller, I used to give the surveys a couple times a year, but it has been over a year now since the last one. I ask things like, "What is your favorite color, song, movie, food?" "Who is your best friend and why?" "How would you describe God?" "If you were stranded alone on an island and could only have five things, what would they be?" "What do you want to do or be when you grow up?"
One question is, "What are you the most proud of?" Sam answered: "That I have survived this far in such company."
When I asked him the desert island question, he gave these five things he'd like to have with him: 1. A large ship 2. Enough fuel to get to the mainland 3. Six months rations of food and water 4. A map to the mainland 5. A guy who knows how to sail the ship.
They are definitely growing up.
We have a lot to be thankful for. I hope you see this in your own lives as well. Happy Thanksgiving!
One question is, "What are you the most proud of?" Sam answered: "That I have survived this far in such company."
When I asked him the desert island question, he gave these five things he'd like to have with him: 1. A large ship 2. Enough fuel to get to the mainland 3. Six months rations of food and water 4. A map to the mainland 5. A guy who knows how to sail the ship.
They are definitely growing up.
We have a lot to be thankful for. I hope you see this in your own lives as well. Happy Thanksgiving!
Thursday, November 10, 2005
Tread Carefully
I am struggling with how to put today's thoughts into words. As I walked home from the auto repair shop this afternoon, I chanted to myself: "Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight."
What have I learned?
Trusting, leaning on and acknowledging God aren't always easy, but they are much more effective than chanting.
What have I learned?
Trusting, leaning on and acknowledging God aren't always easy, but they are much more effective than chanting.
Monday, October 31, 2005
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Listening to our Money
According to a recent spate of lengthy forwarded e-mails, our money may be speaking to us in ways we never imagined. After folding and refolding my daughter's $20 bill this morning, I came up with a new message:
"America is being taken for all it's worth."
Also - "God is important. So is rust. Take more photos."
Stay tuned for more rusty, God-inspired photographs. Hang onto your wallets. This blog is a free service.
"America is being taken for all it's worth."
Also - "God is important. So is rust. Take more photos."
Stay tuned for more rusty, God-inspired photographs. Hang onto your wallets. This blog is a free service.
Sunday, October 16, 2005
Saturday, October 15, 2005
Friday, October 14, 2005
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
Synecdochically Speaking, the Dictionary Walks
My two daughters spent some time with Grandpa yesterday. When they got home the older one got me aside in the hallway and said that Grandpa had forgotten the younger sibling's name. She was concerned. Grandpa's mother faded into Alzheimer's for a decade and a half before she died, so my own stomach did a few flip flops as I listened. I asked her if he had been teasing, but she didn't think so. She thought he had really forgotten and was trying to cover it up by pretending to tease.
I called my Dad this morning and asked him how it went with the girls yesterday, careful not to use Sarah's name, waiting to see if he'd remember it on his own. Finally, I told him outright what Laura had told me the night before.
He just laughed and said, "I'm not that far gone yet!" He had been about five steps ahead of her, teasing her all along. Well, that being cleared up, I started to tell him about the new word I had just learned: synecdoche. This is one of those words that I come across every so often - I have no memory of ever even seeing it in print. When I punched it into MerriamWebster.com's dictionary and heard it pronounced, it was totally foreign. Like the true living dictionary that he is, Dad whipped out the definition off the top of his head. (You'll have to look it up yourself!)
Gee whiz! I should have known better than to doubt that man's ginormous mental database.
I called my Dad this morning and asked him how it went with the girls yesterday, careful not to use Sarah's name, waiting to see if he'd remember it on his own. Finally, I told him outright what Laura had told me the night before.
He just laughed and said, "I'm not that far gone yet!" He had been about five steps ahead of her, teasing her all along. Well, that being cleared up, I started to tell him about the new word I had just learned: synecdoche. This is one of those words that I come across every so often - I have no memory of ever even seeing it in print. When I punched it into MerriamWebster.com's dictionary and heard it pronounced, it was totally foreign. Like the true living dictionary that he is, Dad whipped out the definition off the top of his head. (You'll have to look it up yourself!)
Gee whiz! I should have known better than to doubt that man's ginormous mental database.
Monday, October 10, 2005
Post Post Post
My husband keeps telling me to post, post, post. I just haven't got the time or the energy these days. I am taking this writing class and all my literary efforts are being forced out in that direction. Someone at the gym today mentioned the Pakistan earthquake and I didn't know what they were referring to. I was so sad to hear about the suffering, then sad that I had missed two days of grieving and praying for those poor Pakistanis. They already had it hard and here I am in one of the most developed nations in the world with way too much news coverage and I hadn't even heard of it!
Actually, I can tell you where I was over the past two days. I found this absolutely wonderful website called whatsthatbug.com. You can identify bugs by looking at the myriads of categories with photos and descriptions. Or, you can send in your own photo, like I just did (my dad's photo) and find out which specific dragonfly you have, for instance. It was a red saddlebags, a relatively rare species, that perched on my parents' sidewalk last week - Tramea onusta. Wow. I spent a good bit of time looking at all the photos of various creepy crawlies, and loved it. Even the centipede section.
I should have been an entymologist. Either that or a neurosurgeon. Something that involves lots of little details. The neurosurgeon probably makes scads more money, but the bug person gets to work outdoors.
Actually, I can tell you where I was over the past two days. I found this absolutely wonderful website called whatsthatbug.com. You can identify bugs by looking at the myriads of categories with photos and descriptions. Or, you can send in your own photo, like I just did (my dad's photo) and find out which specific dragonfly you have, for instance. It was a red saddlebags, a relatively rare species, that perched on my parents' sidewalk last week - Tramea onusta. Wow. I spent a good bit of time looking at all the photos of various creepy crawlies, and loved it. Even the centipede section.
I should have been an entymologist. Either that or a neurosurgeon. Something that involves lots of little details. The neurosurgeon probably makes scads more money, but the bug person gets to work outdoors.
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Saturday, September 24, 2005
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Goodbye and Thanks for All the Crickets!
I went outside to clean Trygve's enclosure this morning, removing the fake twigs and leaves and dumping a dozen or so cricket carcasses into the garden. It was such a lovely day, this last day of summer, and I felt it was time to let my mantid go. I carried him (or her, I really don't know) over to a climbing pile of morning glories at the edge of the patio and he walked off onto the leaves. I got my camera, of course, and took a number of parting shots, but eventually got busy mowing the lawn and tidying the garden. I checked back every so often and had to laugh at how far his head would swing around in this wide new world as I approached. Our schnauzer walked past and that triangular head swung around and down. My neighbor came out and over went the head again. What a lovely bug! After finishing the lawn and trimming the edges, I walked back towards the house and past the morning glories, but this last time I failed to find him.
Happy hunting, you odd, lovable bug. I wish you long life and lots to eat!
Happy hunting, you odd, lovable bug. I wish you long life and lots to eat!
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
Sunday, September 04, 2005
Friday, September 02, 2005
Clean the Raindrops
It began to rain on a Saturday afternoon
and my oldest son was bored.
I told him to go and clean his closet,
an idea that he dismissed at the end of a long litany of
Things He Would Rather Do.
My younger son overheard this discourse
and suggested I ask the older son to clean the raindrops instead.
This was such a lovely suggestion I knew it had to become a poem,
something along the lines of polishing stars, dusting rosebuds
or waxing the moon.
Cleaning a closet or cleaning a raindrop:
one and the same to a child.
Both of them completely unnecessary.
Both of them utterly impossible.
and my oldest son was bored.
I told him to go and clean his closet,
an idea that he dismissed at the end of a long litany of
Things He Would Rather Do.
My younger son overheard this discourse
and suggested I ask the older son to clean the raindrops instead.
This was such a lovely suggestion I knew it had to become a poem,
something along the lines of polishing stars, dusting rosebuds
or waxing the moon.
Cleaning a closet or cleaning a raindrop:
one and the same to a child.
Both of them completely unnecessary.
Both of them utterly impossible.
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Ironic Fire Safety
Late one afternoon my children gather around the TV for Arthur on PBS. The topic on the show for discussion during the intermission between segments is Fire Safety. Kids gather around real firemen and ask questions and give answers.
Q - "What if your door is closed and you feel from the inside that it is hot?"
A – "Don’t open it! Go out a window if you can; shout for help!"
A little girl asks the fireman, "What if there's a fire at the fire station?"
My own daughter answers – "You call it irony."
Q - "What if your door is closed and you feel from the inside that it is hot?"
A – "Don’t open it! Go out a window if you can; shout for help!"
A little girl asks the fireman, "What if there's a fire at the fire station?"
My own daughter answers – "You call it irony."
Sam's Neo-Idioms
My son Sam, exasperated by his younger sister's pesky behavior, tells her to shut up.
I scold him for saying shut up.
Sam replied, "But she's getting on my last nerve!"
I scold him for saying shut up.
Sam replied, "But she's getting on my last nerve!"
Random Chance of Greatness?
"We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually produce a masterpiece. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true."
- Eyler Coates
- Eyler Coates
Sunday, August 28, 2005
Comments Comment
Just wanted to let you know that this blog now allows anonymous comments. That means basically anyone can comment now, even if you're not a registered user. I'm figuring these things out as I go along. Maybe I'll hear from you now?
Friday, August 26, 2005
Six Degrees of Separation or It's a Small World
I was trying to explain the theory of Six Degrees of Separation to a young friend the other day and she greeted the information with skepticism. I blame that on youth as everything seems so big the younger you are. Even the kitchen you grew up in seems huge until you visit it again as an adult. Everything shrinks as we grow older, except maybe taxes and waistlines. But I digress. There is a story in all of this.
When I was a child my parents took me on vacations to Door County during the summers. One night we visited the studio of "The Glassblower," as Tom Yelvington called himself. He would open his studio after dark and put on glassblowing demonstrations, lighting up the night with long strings and balls of molten glass. I remember this performance and the amazing process by which he would take a hunk of nothing and turn it into a beautiful vase or bowl. By the time I was a teenager he had shut down his studio and my parents and I never heard what happened to him.
During my last week in the firm I was assigned to a new desk right next to a secretary who had just been hired. She introduced herself as Mary Yelvington. In my mind I immediately saw molten glass spinning in the dark of night. She has red hair just like her brother, Tom. She tells me he has retired and is living right here in Milwaukee. The counters in my mother's kitchen just became a little lower than I remembered them.
When I was a child my parents took me on vacations to Door County during the summers. One night we visited the studio of "The Glassblower," as Tom Yelvington called himself. He would open his studio after dark and put on glassblowing demonstrations, lighting up the night with long strings and balls of molten glass. I remember this performance and the amazing process by which he would take a hunk of nothing and turn it into a beautiful vase or bowl. By the time I was a teenager he had shut down his studio and my parents and I never heard what happened to him.
During my last week in the firm I was assigned to a new desk right next to a secretary who had just been hired. She introduced herself as Mary Yelvington. In my mind I immediately saw molten glass spinning in the dark of night. She has red hair just like her brother, Tom. She tells me he has retired and is living right here in Milwaukee. The counters in my mother's kitchen just became a little lower than I remembered them.
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Daydreaming Causes Serious Illness
Scientists and doctors are now exploring a possible link between daydreaming and Alzheimer's development later in life. Geez, where does that put me after working all summer in this huge law firm? Will I be able to litigate for damages caused by extreme workplace banality leading to flights of mental fantasy and in turn increased liklihood of debilitating disease? I better snag one of these hard working lawyers now before I forget.
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Use an Electric Mower
"It would save you, on average, 73% in lawn-chore costs and is better for the environment. The average gasoline mower tested by the Environmental Protection Agency emits in one hour the same amount of hydrocarbons that a 1992 Ford Explorer emits over 23,600 miles." (emphasis mine)
- from an article on Green Living in today's Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel by Natalie Ermann Russell (USA Weekend section)
Madison Gas and Electric in Madison, WI says, "Mowing your lawn for one hour with a conventional gas lawn mower can cause more air pollution than driving from Madison to Chicago and back in a new car. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, gas mowers cause 5% of the nation's air pollution. Trade in your old gas mower for a new corded or rechargeable cordless electric lawn mower. You'll save time and money—and help the environment."
Responsibly mow or let it grow!
- from an article on Green Living in today's Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel by Natalie Ermann Russell (USA Weekend section)
Madison Gas and Electric in Madison, WI says, "Mowing your lawn for one hour with a conventional gas lawn mower can cause more air pollution than driving from Madison to Chicago and back in a new car. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, gas mowers cause 5% of the nation's air pollution. Trade in your old gas mower for a new corded or rechargeable cordless electric lawn mower. You'll save time and money—and help the environment."
Responsibly mow or let it grow!
Saturday, August 20, 2005
Friday, August 19, 2005
Sorry, But Comments Just Got Harder
Thanks to some spam-rat who left a huge advert in one of my "comment" areas, I am now using a supposedly safer system, which just means that you regular folks and friends will now have to work slightly harder to leave a comment. All it will do is ask you to type in the funny word you see on your screen before posting. This is supposed to stop spammers from dumping auto-crap into your comments, as the above-mentioned jerk recently did. I apologize for this and hope it won't deter your sincere comments.
Pine Tree Gallery
Typing this entry I can look down and see the lovely bracelet I bought at the Pine Tree Gallery in Ironwood, Michigan this past week. I simply had to plug the place and recommend that anyone travelling in the vicinity stop in and visit them on Hwy 2. They always have solid art on exhibit and for sale and they are very nice besides. They gave us great information on the Porcupine Mountains Wildnerness Area which served us very well on our vacation. We (okay, I bought all the stuff) bought some jewelry and a ceramic bowl on our two visits. Go guys - I love your gallery!
Northwoods Vacation
We just returned from a week in Wisconsin's north woods, near Lake Superior, and when I get things going there will be many photos to post. We had enjoyed beautiful weather up until the very last day, the homecoming day. Then it rained off and on all day long and we took forever to get home, finally arriving at our back door at 10:20 pm. We apparently were driving just behind some tornados, but were thankfully and blissfully ignorant of this fact until after they had done their damage south of us. With the sky overcast and gloomy I finally enjoyed some even lighting and took a good number of photos on the ride home. I can still hear the groans from the back of the van each time I turned around and headed back to some scene to be photographed.
I was burning along at 74 mph a few miles south of Hurley on Hwy 51 when a State Patrol car coming towards me turned on its lights and did a quick U-turn. Rats. He was very nice about it, at least, and I got some really pretty photos by the side of the road while he sat in his squad and wrote out my enormous ticket. I have only had one speeding ticket in my life up until now. That occurred back in Minnesota in the early '90s on a back road coming home from South Dakota. The officer at that time gave me a $40 ticket and then chided me on what a nice pair of shoes that $40 would have purchased, tch, tch. I wanted to punch his lights out.
My husband just came upstairs to tell me that our van was broken into last night. Passenger side window is smashed and the radio was ripped out of the dash. The only reason we left the van outside last night was because we have a friend's Land Rover parked in our garage. We were going to take the Land Rover on our trip, for fun (it's loaded), but after driving it home from the friend's house, realizing how little storage space there actually is in there after putting half a dozen people in, and then filling the tank with the requisite super premium gasoline for $50, we decided to take our roomier, slightly more economical though less exotic minivan. So, the Land Rover sits unharmed in our garage with $50 in its tank and our van is on the parking slab, bruised and battered.
Welcome back to the city.
I was burning along at 74 mph a few miles south of Hurley on Hwy 51 when a State Patrol car coming towards me turned on its lights and did a quick U-turn. Rats. He was very nice about it, at least, and I got some really pretty photos by the side of the road while he sat in his squad and wrote out my enormous ticket. I have only had one speeding ticket in my life up until now. That occurred back in Minnesota in the early '90s on a back road coming home from South Dakota. The officer at that time gave me a $40 ticket and then chided me on what a nice pair of shoes that $40 would have purchased, tch, tch. I wanted to punch his lights out.
My husband just came upstairs to tell me that our van was broken into last night. Passenger side window is smashed and the radio was ripped out of the dash. The only reason we left the van outside last night was because we have a friend's Land Rover parked in our garage. We were going to take the Land Rover on our trip, for fun (it's loaded), but after driving it home from the friend's house, realizing how little storage space there actually is in there after putting half a dozen people in, and then filling the tank with the requisite super premium gasoline for $50, we decided to take our roomier, slightly more economical though less exotic minivan. So, the Land Rover sits unharmed in our garage with $50 in its tank and our van is on the parking slab, bruised and battered.
Welcome back to the city.
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Trygve Update
We came home late tonight and for the first time I caught Trygve molting. He was nearly out of his old skin, hanging from the top of his enclosure by about a centimeter of his long narrow abdomen still stuck in the old shell. He had two sets of curled up, turquoise wings, much larger than the last version. He eventually wiggled completely free and the old skin dropped to the floor where a cricket quickly ran over to investigate. I reached in and removed this fragile carcass and studied it, amazed at the thin membrane that had covered even eyes, wings and antennae.
The new Trygve has turquoise wings and forelegs, each molt in general producing slightly more color. His abdomen was plump and his wings short and curled, but he began to sort of pump the extra fluids from his body out to his limbs and wings just like butterflies do when they emerge from their cocoons. My new macro lens just arrived this afternoon so I put it to the test (see above), but will surely have to take more photos in the daylight after I hunt down my tripod.
The new Trygve has turquoise wings and forelegs, each molt in general producing slightly more color. His abdomen was plump and his wings short and curled, but he began to sort of pump the extra fluids from his body out to his limbs and wings just like butterflies do when they emerge from their cocoons. My new macro lens just arrived this afternoon so I put it to the test (see above), but will surely have to take more photos in the daylight after I hunt down my tripod.
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Depression and Writing
[The] link between writing and depression may stem in part from the fact that depressed people tend to be strongly introspective, a trait that may foster writing. Depression, when it does not incapacitate a person, may actually make him or her see the world more accurately than normal people do. (Of course, an accurately pessimistic view of things can also be paralyzing.)
- from The Midnight Disease by Alice W. Flaherty, p. 32
- from The Midnight Disease by Alice W. Flaherty, p. 32
Sunday, August 07, 2005
When Want Goes Awry
Just because you want something very, very badly does not mean you can have it. Even if you' ve wanted it ever since you can remember wanting anything. It is better to pour the effort into living without and be so easily rewarded thus that the wanting melts away and becomes the thing forgotten.
Friday, August 05, 2005
Highest gas prices of my life
Yesterday we gassed up the van at $2.499 a gallon (why don't we just say $2.50?) . Late last night we had to make a grocery run (damn full-time job) and upon returning to the car, hubby couldn't find his keys. He had been driving so he must have had them when he got out of the car. I started to dig through my purse for my lately unused set (damn full-time job), but before I could find them we reached the van and it was running. Found the keys in the ignition.
We had just purchased $145 worth of groceries, so you can imagine it wasn't just a quick run-in, get-out trip. How ironic that we chose the day when we had just paid the highest price for gasoline in our lives to let the van run for a good 45 minutes, empty and still, in a dark parking lot.
(My sincere apologies to hubby. I could have easily done the same, and I hold no grudge. You are a very good man. Thank you for working hard so that we can afford to pay $2.50/gallon to run our environmentally degrading vehicle.)
We had just purchased $145 worth of groceries, so you can imagine it wasn't just a quick run-in, get-out trip. How ironic that we chose the day when we had just paid the highest price for gasoline in our lives to let the van run for a good 45 minutes, empty and still, in a dark parking lot.
(My sincere apologies to hubby. I could have easily done the same, and I hold no grudge. You are a very good man. Thank you for working hard so that we can afford to pay $2.50/gallon to run our environmentally degrading vehicle.)
Thursday, July 28, 2005
Saturday, July 23, 2005
Back from the Northern Peninsula
We just returned from a family reunion up north and it was great. We spent way too much money and ate way too much good food, but seeing family again was worth it. My daughter and I rode our bikes up, leaving two days earlier than the rest of the family in the van. We rode about 155 miles to the town of Sturgeon Bay, WI where we finally found the local Wal-Mart and called my husband up at the hotel to come and get us. This is the second time my daughter and I have done this ride, though the first time we took six days to do it and wound our way further up the peninsula. Because of my summer job we had to cram the ride into three days, but it worked. The last day was spent almost entirely on the Ahnapee State Bike Trail and it was lovely. On over 30 miles of trail we met only one other cyclist. Hopefully more folks use these trails on weekends because that was a little disturbing, not seeing this wonderful state asset being taken advantage of, but in a selfish way it was so peaceful for us to have it to ourselves. Two photos are above and more will probably follow.
Friday, July 15, 2005
Making a Pass or Passing By?
In the hallway at work today I overheard a casual conversation between a lawyer and his assistant in which he said that he would be in her "nape of the neck" this weekend. Do their respective spouses know this?
Monday, July 11, 2005
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