The Absent Minded Professor

Wise Men

2006-12-15T08:09:00.000-08:00

John and I were gazing in astonishment at some of the things sold in the Frontgate catalog. On the page next to the $400 cashmere pajamas was a jewelry box the size of a piece of furniture. It included a compartment designed to hold your entire collection of watches.

"Who needs 5 different watches?" I asked.

"Wise man say: He who have one watch always know what time it is. He who have two watch never sure," John responded.

"Are you that wise man?"

"I'm one of the wise men, but not that wise man. There are seven of us."

"Seven?"

"Three of us brought gifts to the baby Jesus, three of us are ZZ Top, and then there's me."

The sun really DOES shine after a B+

2006-10-15T17:12:00.000-07:00

although it's not shining today. Fall has rolled into town. Dark clouds hover and threaten rain (but rarely deliver), the temperature has plummeted to the high sixties, and fire places across the neighborhood are roaring. What wimps! The women at the symphony last night wore fur - I saw them with my own two eyes.

It's the kind of weather that makes me want to put on a bulky sweater and thick socks, open up all the windows, crawl under a blanket and read. (Which is a good thing because I have plenty of reading to do!) It reminds me of college when Jen and I shared a small one bedroom apartment. And our late night study sessions which M would join around 9. M always brought decadent treats designed as motivation and reward for making it through the endurance study session. Most of the time, though, we'd end up eating our treats while watching Friends (it was in its heyday) and then falling asleep on our books.

Another fall, another semester of studying. The 'mere 70 pages' we were assigned in week one was no ordinary 70 pages. I had to read each case 5 times before I could figure out who actually won. The topic was jurisdiction and the cases started with Pennoyer v Neff - words said to strike fear into the heart of even veteran lawyers. I started reading Sunday night and by class had read only three of the five case, but the three I did read I meticulously briefed - which turned into its on discouraging fact in a way. The cases I had struggled over, read and re-read, repeatedly consulted the dictionary and law dictionary about our professor summed up in two sentences a piece. The following week was our first exam.

III

Here's a mere tidbit of the exam: "Joe runs a corporation headquartered in South Carolina, though he has sales people across the country. He owns a vacation cottage in California which he sometimes uses for work, but he lives in Road Island. A customer of his bought JoeCompany product in California and is now suing in that state. Does the court there have jurisdiction?"

And so begins the attempt to weed out the uncertainties and apply the case law to the various scenarios that could be created from the multitude of possible resolutions to the different uncertainties. That was a nice sentence, wasn't it? Well, that's what it was like to read these cases, minus the Latin! And if like me, you throw up your hands at some those uncertainties and make some darned assumptions so that there's a chance you can answer the question in less than 6 pages, you get a B+.

And the worst thing is, I knew I was making this mistake WHILE I was doing it. (There's a name for that isn't there?!?!)

So now, for almost a week John has had to listen to the moaning and groaning of a B+ student. It goes something like this:

Deep, guttural, painful moan bellows out of the bedroom. "KK, are you alright?!" John shouts as he makes his way down the hall. And I reply "I AM A B+ STUDENT."

"John, I can't get the TiVO to do what I want. But then again...I AM only a B+ student."

This has gone on for days, but it's lessoning now as we prepare to study NIED. For you non-lawyers out there, that stands for Negligent Infliction of Emotional Duress!

Math to Wow Your Friends - Part 3

2006-10-08T09:40:00.000-07:00

There is an island containing two types of people:

knights who always tell the truth and knaves who always lie.

You visit the island and are approached by two natives who speak to you as follows:

A says: B s a knight.

B says: A and I are of opposite type.

What are A and B?

answer coming Tuesday...

Pre-Law Chronicle

2006-10-07T09:10:00.000-07:00

About two years ago I casually mentioned to our neighbor that I'm interested in the practice of law. His eyes widened and he said 'You should take my class.'

Besides being a philosophy professor my neighbor is also a lawyer, and he teaches a class to expose undergraduates to the reality of law school. Finally this semester our schedules meshed, and I attend his class each Wednesday afternoon.

We've now met three times.

I
Here are my thoughts the morning after our first meeting:

It was FASCINATING. As I promised Jen I would, I sat on my hand for the first 15 minutes, trying to blend in. But it proved to much for me – I had so many questions! If both the federal and state courts have jurisdiction how do you decide where to try your case? Where would your odds be best?

We considered the process of filing a lawsuit and began a discussion of how jurisdiction is determined. We also spoke with a third year law student who works part time in the law school admissions office. Her stories about the clinics the school offers were amazing - students at her school get an opportunity to practice law (supervised of course) as a public defender, child advocate, prosecutor, you name it – all while gaining class credit.

But then she said that taking the LSAT isn't fun. Are you kidding me? The LSAT is one big logic test. I TEACH logic. And dare I admit? I used to work LSAT problems for fun.

For homework we were told to read four cases, roughly seventy pages in Introduction to Legal Method and Process by Berch, Berch and Spritzer, part of the American Casebook Series.

II coming soon!

New Beginning

2006-10-07T08:48:00.000-07:00

Today Annie woke me at 7am for our morning walk. We strolled past all of the usual places, old houses, tall palm trees, our favorite dogs and cats. One house we walk past every morning is an older home, humble but perfectly maintained with two huge oak trees and inviting green lawn. In its front window hangs a small cloth banner with a single gold star in the middle, denoting a family member who serves in the military.

As I approached, a car pulled up the curb and a beautiful young girl emerged holding a bouquet of flowers. She was smartly dressed in a black skirt, lavender sweater set and simple black sandals with a one inch heel. Just as she stepped from her car a young man in blue jeans and an army t-shirt ran from the house to kiss her. They whispered and then he took her hand and guided her to the house. As they walked I heard him say, "Everybody's awake and they're really excited to meet you."

Just then she glanced back with a look of apprehension that turned to determination.

I couldn't help being excited myself!

Hi Mom, How’s the porn?

2006-10-06T21:00:00.000-07:00

My eyes just about popped out of my head when I heard John say that to Billie Sue. She spends several hours a day on the internet researching her genealogy, but until a few weeks ago she didn’t even know how to send an email. Now her computer’s infected with spywear.

“John, I didn’t want to call Jasmine [the local daughter-in-law and computer resource] because I didn’t want her to have to see this. But then I thought, ‘NO! This might be the really bad stuff the FBI is arrests people for!’ So I called her.’

How great is THAT?!

2006-09-18T16:44:00.000-07:00

From the BBC:

Hundreds of Paris Hilton albums have been tampered with in the latest stunt by "guerrilla artist" Banksy.
Banksy has replaced Hilton's CD with his own remixes and given them titles such as Why am I Famous?, What Have I Done? and What Am I For?
He has also changed pictures of her on the CD sleeve to show the US socialite topless and with a dog's head.
A spokeswoman for Banksy said he had doctored 500 copies of her debut album Paris in 48 record shops across the UK.
She told the BBC News website: "He switched the CDs in store, so he took the old ones out and put his version in."
It might be that there will be some people who agree with his views on the Paris Hilton album
HMV spokesmanBut he left the original barcode so people could buy the CD without realising it had been interfered with.
Banksy is notorious for his secretive and subversive stunts such as sneaking doctored versions of classic paintings into major art galleries.
His spokeswoman said he had tampered with the CDs in branches of HMV and Virgin as well as independent record stores.
He visited cities including Bristol, Brighton, Birmingham, Newcastle, Glasgow and London, she added.
A spokesman for HMV said the chain had recovered seven CDs from two Brighton shops but was unaware that other locations were affected.
Artistic leeway
No customers had complained or returned a doctored version, he said.
"It's not the type of behaviour you'd want to see happening very often," he said.
"I guess you can give an individual such as Banksy a little bit of leeway for his own particular brand of artistic engagement.
"Often people might have a view on something but feel they can't always express it, but it's down to the likes of Banksy to say often what people think about things.
"And it might be that there will be some people who agree with his views on the Paris Hilton album."
A spokesman for Virgin Megastores said staff were searching for affected CDs but it was proving hard to find them all.
"I have to take my hat off - it's a very good stunt," he added.

Learn more about our new hero Bansky here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banksy

Biking to Work

2006-09-18T15:56:00.000-07:00

Riding my bike to work has been interesting.

I've made the acquaintance of several nice people - other cyclists and a couple of motorists.

I've nearly been hit twice - which resulted in a bit of yelling on my part.

And last week I saw my favorite TV star.

But probably the most interesting thing is what happened today. I was stopped at a red light and a fellow biker pulled up along side of me.

"I just want you to know," he said, "when I get married, I want my wife to look just like you."

What a complement! Even if it did come from a homeless man missing his two front teeth.

2006-09-17T23:55:00.000-07:00

So I told my girlfriend T about this great tile I had seen. It said:

I think I'll just skip my medicine today and surprise everyone!

Then T said that one of her favorite saying has always been:

Men are like tiles - lay them right the first time and you can walk all over them.

Got any tile jokes of your own?

I See Buckeyes

2006-09-09T06:17:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we flew to Austin to watch #2 ranked Texas take on #1 ranked Ohio State at the Daryl K. Royal Texas Memorial Football Stadium. This is the biggest football event to take place in Austin – ever – as two storied programs with the top rankings meet during the second week of the season. Planes into Austin were packed. Thirty thousand buckeyes have made their way here even though The University gave them only 4,000 seats for the game.

My plane was filled with burnt orange shirts, caps, even luggage, and as I got only the last leg of my flight, it was even filled with a little red. I made my way down the aisle, trading Hook ‘em’s at every step and found my seat – right smack dab next to the enemy.

A big burly black man about 6’5” 250lbs, who looked like he could snap a man’s neck with no more effort than popping his knuckles, stood and let me take the middle seat beside him. I grunted my apprehension/appreciation stored my burnt orange back in the overhead and sat down beside him.

“You have tickets to the game?” I ventured. Texans are never rude.

“Of course,” he sounded surprised by the question.

“I heard a bunch of Buckeyes are coming just to show support. You guys have rented out the entire Erwin Center (basketball arena) for your pep rally.”

“No kidding,” now he was really surprised.

We were quiet for a bit, and then I leaned over to quietly confess, “I’m a little nervous.”

For the first time he really looked at me, then he said in a slow soothing voice, “Ah, it’ll be alright.”

“It will?”

“Yeah,” he let the word linger there to comfort me.

For a moment we were distracted by other passengers, and I got the strange impression that he was so kind to me because he thought I just admitted that I was afraid to fly.

“No, I’m not nervous about flying. I’m nervous -”

“About the game. I know. To tell you the truth,” he whispered, “I’m nervous too. I’m just trying not to show it. Putting up a brave front.”
At that moment a longhorn sat down in front of us. He turned and asked my Buckeye, “Excited about the game?”

He was speechless.

“We’re cool,” I said.

“Yeah. We’re cool,” he echoed. And so I befriended a Buckeye.

When I John about my adventure (he was on a different flight) he was flabbergasted. “Consorting with the enemy! I thought you were a better judge of character than that!”
I just smiled. Maybe I’ll see my Buckeye at the game.

It’s no secret that Texans ain’t too fond of Californians

2006-09-05T06:16:00.000-07:00

“They dress funny, talk funny, and sure as hell eat funny. I mean, who the hell ever heard of eating raw fish?” you might hear a Texan ask.

Never mind that the same things could be said of them with their cowboy boots, starched Wranglers, belt buckles and Stetsons and their insistence that a meal isn’t a meal unless you’ve eaten a dead animal.

Though I was born and raised in Texas and still feel an undeniable, intrinsic attraction to its ways, I am unabashedly more at home in California. I blend in seamlessly with the tank-top, flip-flop wearing, sushi-eating, liberal view-espousing crowd.

So it is with a different perspective that I see and enjoy my native state when I return.

After our wedding we spent a few days at a B&B in the hill country. Our private cabin opened out to a field where we watched the deer each evening. In the morning we could hear distant cows bray and quail coo. This little B&B boasted a renowned chef who’s been featured in publications such as Gourmet Magazine. Each morning we were delighted and stunned by what he considered breakfast: three courses, every one with generous portions of devastatingly rich concoctions. That’s when it occurred to me that Texans are trying to kill Californians with butter!

“This morning we’ll start with strawberries and blueberries in heavy cream and your choice of an almond Basque tart or a raspberry lemon scone served with butter, jams and thick cream. Then for breakfast [as if that other stuff were a mere crumb] we have your choice of pancakes with hot maple syrup and our homemade pork sausage or a cheese and mushroom frittata served with mashed potatoes [with butter] and bacon.”

Each morning I plowed through the fruit, the pastry [which I’m sure contained an entire stick of butter per serving] and as much of the actual breakfast as I could manage. And each morning I had to make a mad dash back to the cabin because I was utterly sick to my stomach from the richness of the meal.

Not to worry, though. We rounded out our meals of butter and heavy cream with generous helpings barbeque and beans. When we found one barbeque join that served canned green beans I sat down and ate an entire heaping mound of them all by myself.

Needless to say, I’m glad to be back home in California - where I can finally get a cup of coffee with skim milk instead of cream.

Favorite Wedding Moment #7

2006-09-01T06:14:00.000-07:00

This isn’t exactly a favorite moment but it’s a continuation in the wedding cup size saga, so I thought I should include it.

Recap: Bought beautiful sleek wedding dress and had first fitting. Exercised like crazy to look good in sleek dress and went second fitting. The bust of the dress seemed to have ballooned – the only place, apparently, that I had lost any weight.

As fate would have it, the day before we flew to Austin I stopped by the neighborhood boutique to show the owner the amazing necklace her dad (the neighborhood jeweler) had made for me. We chitchatted and I told her about the ironic turn in events of my cup size. She grabbed a little pink box off the counter and handed me the miracle of plastic boobs. “Here, try these. They’re even grope tested!” she said.

So those were packed in the suitcase along with everything else. And as I dressed for the wedding I slipped them in my dress (where my previous larger boobs used to be) and marveled at myself in the mirror. For the first time in my life I had cleavage. I wanted to keep standing in front of the mirror groping my own amazing new boobs, but somebody was saying something about taking pictures and I had to go.

The plastic contraptions served me well all through the pre-wedding photos, the ceremony, the first dance, and the dinner. All until I took a moment to slip outside with John. When we came back inside we were whisked to the stage for toasts and then off to cut the cake and greet the guests. As we walked back toward the dance floor my hand brushed waist where I felt the unmistakable bulge of a very grope-able plastic boob.

I ran to the back of the room grabbing the photographer on my way to act as my shield. I reached inside, readjusted, restored the cleavage and asked, “Was that there while you photographed the cake and toasts?” “I don’t know. I guess we’ll find out,” she said wide-eyed.

The pictures will be available on September 25th.

Favorite Wedding Moment #6

2006-08-30T06:10:00.000-07:00

My girlfriend M rolled her 86 year-old wheel-chair bound grandpa over to see me.

“KK, I have something to say to you,” he said in his slow, deliberate Alabama way. And then, drawing out the end of each phrase he said,

I hope you have the ability
To keep your agility
To maintain your virility
Until your senility.

Then he sat back proud and just beamed with a smile stretching ear to ear.

Favorite Wedding Moment #2-5

2006-08-28T12:49:00.000-07:00

One of John’s friends after meeting Billie Sue for the first time:

“John, I got a chance to talk to your mom at the barbeque, and she went on and on telling me how different the two of you are. But the whole time I felt like I was talking to you.”

My dad in his toast:

"I want to wish you both good luck - especially John."

The very first thing my cousin's boyfriend said to me after the ceremony:

"How did the quarterbacks look at the scrimmage this morning?"

John's brother after our first dance:

"If Dad had known that you two were going to dance like that, he would have stayed alive for the wedding."
John said not to worry, King Richard had the best seat in the house.

One of John's best friends when he saw me in my wedding gown for the very first time:

"Unbelievable."
Thanks alot Bill.

Favorite Wedding Moment #1

2006-08-27T18:04:00.000-07:00

John’s three-year-old nephew had been told to ‘behave at the wedding’ so many times that whenever he saw John’s mom he’d shout, “Granny, I’ll be good at the wedding!” And he was. I’m not sure that anyone enjoyed our wedding more than he did.

He went with his mom and dad and granny to try on his tails before the big day. He shimmied on his dress pants and dress shirt and then his bow tie. “You look handsome Drake,” granny fawned. “No. Not yet,” he was adamant. He slipped on his silver vest. “Not yet,” he warned. Then he put on his black coat with tails, launched a huge smile and said, “NOW I’m handsome.”

The night of the wedding he danced almost every dance, never taking off his coat. The next day he asked, “Can we go to KK’s and John’s wedding again today?”

My goddaughter Rachel, who is also three, was equally thrilled to be in the wedding. So much so, that in the days leading up to it she referred to it as her wedding. “Mommy, when do we get to go to my wedding,” she’d ask.

At the rehearsal she was none too sure of the little boys who were traipsing around. I asked the five-year-old later, “Why were you chasing Rachel?” “Because she wouldn’t hold my hand,” he answered. But something magical must have happened because after that they were inseparable. They held hands at the rehearsal dinner and at the pool the next day – he showed off his canon ball and she showed off her goggles.

There was actually a plan of who would walk with whom down the aisle, but we were prepared to witness almost anything during the real event. As it turned out my two-year-old goddaughter walked down the aisle with her mom Jen, my five year-old cutie walked down with John’s two oldest nephews, and the two three-year-olds accompanied each other.

The aisle has two short sets of steps and at the first one Drake let go of Rachel’s hand and jumped down all three steps at once. Then he did a little dance and finally caught up with Rachel who was sprinkling petals nicely along her way. When she reached the front, she turned her basket upside down and shook it to make sure not a petal was left. Then she kicked off her shoes and sat down right next to the preacher. Meanwhile Drake said, “Now I’m going to walk down again with KK and her daddy,” and before anyone could stop him he was blasting back up the aisle. His dad’s face dropped and he silently mouthed Stop Him but to no avail. John’s friend Rob started whispering, “he’s at the 50, the 40, the 30, he may Go. All. The. Way! Oh – stopped at the 10 yard line,” where he was scooped up into his mom’s arms.

That was a tough act to follow!

I am told that it was a lovely wedding.

2006-08-26T13:25:00.000-07:00

That the ceremony was sweet and touching, that the brides maids and groomsmen cried. That the flower girls and their little boy escorts were adorable. That the reception was a blast – the food and cake and swing band divine. That is was the best wedding people had ever attended.

For me it’s all rather a blur – there was nervousness, love and wonder, excitement and dazzling dancing, a whirlwind of people, a couple bites of food, tears, a mad dash for our waiting car, more tears, relief and exhaustion.

I am thrilled and honored to be married to my John. I know that we will love and cherish each other for all the days to come. That together we will share in and support each other through whatever life may bring. I have married the best man I have ever known.

John's bathroom

2006-08-12T10:23:00.000-07:00

On Friday the contractor installed the toilet in our new bathroom. John was thrilled to see the gleaming white beacon when he got home. We marveled at it; we flushed it; we tried it out for size. (I must say it does have a very form-fitting seat.) We played with the lid and seat. (Without realizing it I had ordered a model with an automatically closing lid and seat. I think it might actually make John keep the lid down just for the shear novelty of it.) Later that evening I couldn’t find him or the day’s paper.

“Where are you? What are you doing?” I shouted.

“I’m in the bathroom. Reading.”

“You’re just sitting in there reading?”

“Yep. I paid nineteen thousand dollars for this bathroom, I sure as hell am going to get my money’s worth out of it!”

Wedding Dreams

2006-08-04T08:51:00.000-07:00

As the days till the wedding evaporate, my dreams about the wedding are becoming more frequent. Here's a taste of my mind's moonlight wanderings.

I stepped into my wedding shoes and the heels shrank - from a sexy three and half inches down to a mere half inch. With no time to spare I grabbed my laptop and headed straight to Stuart Weitzman. But my wireless card wasn't working and Tim Allen was too busy playing balderdash with his friends to help me. Don't even ask why I was at the tool man's house. I struggled in vain until I woke. Lucky for me my shoes are still a stunning 3 1/2 inches tall.

For the love of God, PUT ON A SHIRT

2006-07-24T16:53:00.000-07:00

I can stand the heat.

I can even stand the humidity.

But what I absolutely cannot stand is one more sight of a droopy, bulging, hairy, neon white naked chest.

I know the heat can make some people do crazy things like walk around outside with no shirt on. So if you're one of those people, please let me help you.

YOU ARE SCARING THE CHILDREN!
PUT ON A SHIRT!

Of course, if you look like this, none of the above comments apply.

For Your Understanding

2006-07-22T09:25:00.000-07:00

I will never have children.

I have suffered three periods of major depression, each time more severe than the last. My most recent experience changed me in a fundamental way. I no longer expect happiness to outweigh misery. I no longer see life without knowing that the heaviness of depression awaits me. I fully expect it to return, and one day to take me with it. I am born of this earth and I will struggle to survive, but I would never wish ‘life’ upon another.

I Have Become My Father

2006-07-17T01:46:00.000-07:00

If it were up to me, I never would have done it. But John insisted.

And so this week the miracle of air conditioning appeared in our home. It is a truly glorious, blessed thing that simply cannot be appreciated by those who have never gone without.

We set it to 68 and stood mesmerized in front of the vent as our hair and clothes were blown by a massive rush of cold air. I went around the house drawing curtains, shutting off vents and closing the doors to empty rooms, turning off lights, and tightly securing doors and windows. I refused to let even the tiniest wayward lick heat into our dreamy comfort.

“Shut that door, you’re letting the cold air out!” I yelled to John.

With fear in his eyes I heard him say, “I’ve created a monster.”

Pre-Marriage Test #245: Remodel Your Bathroom

2006-07-17T01:41:00.000-07:00

Make sure that:
It’s the only bathroom in your house with a shower
and
You do it exactly one month before your large out-of-state wedding.

Our front bathroom no longer exists. In its place are a few beams, a view of the roof above them and the earth below. Among other things this means that John and I are now sharing one bathroom with its quaint little 1929-built cast iron bathtub. John’s first strategy to avoid the bathtub was to be out of town for the entire renovation. When that failed he planned to limit his baths to once a week. Luckily, that one failed too.

On Saturday morning I heard the water running and some splashing and a few loud thumps, so I gingerly tiptoed down the hall and peeked into the bathroom. John sat there, his knees crumpled up to his chest, wedged into the little tub, with a grimace on his face.

He said he felt like a cowboy in an old Western sitting in a metal tub, being forced to bathe by the womenfolk.

“Is there anything I can get you?” I offered.

“Ma’am, water is for horses. What I need is whisky!”

Could Somebody Please Explain This to Me?

2006-07-14T06:23:00.000-07:00

These two plants have been living together and thriving together since Christmas. They're the same variety, were planted at the same time in the same sunny location, get watered the same amount, mulched the same amount, loved the same amount. Then last week the one on the left shriveled into a despondent, crunchy, brown mess and died. The one on the right continues to thrive.

God Bless Google Talk

2006-07-13T15:13:00.000-07:00

Jen and I live thousands of miles apart, but we visit each other's living rooms every afternoon.

KK: Great Dooce today!

Jen: Yes, I know.

KK: I just read the Tech Weekly article – I can’t believe she gets paid to blog!

Jen: Nice right.

KK: I want to go watch TV right now but I can't find the remote control - panic!

Jen: THIS is why you need a kid

KK: You mean - to make the kid find it right? Not to make me watch less TV?

Jen: Neither. To change the channel for you.

…

Jen: Is it a problem that I just asked my neighbor for a beer to marinate a steak in, and instead of using it for the marinade, I used vinegar and drank the beer

KK: I love you Jen.

The Prenup

2006-07-12T13:10:00.000-07:00

Back when John and I were first getting to know each other his brother got married. Somehow the topic of prenuptial agreements came up and we started talking about whether either of us were the kind of person who would want a pre-nup before we married. All very hypothetical. John said absolutely! His brother has one and so will he. I said absolutely not. I didn’t want to marry someone if we believed we needed a contingency plan.

Time went by, and then John and I began dating, fell in love, moved in together. Now here we are five years later planning a massive, insane, fabulous wedding.

A couple of months ago I was joking with my good friend Steve that John seemed to have forgotten all about the pre-nup - to which Steve quickly replied that he’d be sure to remind him!

Yesterday out of the blue John said, “We still need to do our pre-nup.”

I decided to play it cool. “Would you like me to write it in purple glitter pen? Like I did back when you were my boss and seduced me and I wrote that I wouldn’t sue you for sexual harassment?”

“Yeah, like that.”

Dancing is making love to music…

2006-07-11T14:00:00.000-07:00

Or so says Frank Sinatra.

John couldn’t find a better way to show me how much he loves me.

“Sometimes I feel like my feet aren’t connected to the rest of my body,” he tells me. “You mean I have to move my arms AND my feet and the same time?” he asks.

Two to three times a week, for the past four weeks John and I have been taking private ballroom dancing lessons. This was our deal. John wanted a big wedding; I wanted to elope. So I agreed on a huge bash, and he agreed to a swing band and dancing lessons.

Why men are so averse to learning to dance is beyond me. Don’t they know that women love a man who can dance? Don’t they know that dancing is making love to music?

John threw himself whole-heartedly into the lessons. He signed us up for the maximum number we could possibly attend before our wedding. He bought a book on ballroom dancing that he reads at breakfast and before bed. He brings his video camera and tripod to each of our lessons so that he can capture what we’re learning.

I know this doesn’t come easily to him. And I’m simply amazed at his patience and perseverance. I certainly know how much he loves me.

A Poet

2006-07-10T12:55:00.000-07:00

This weekend our fabulous neighbors threw us a wedding shower. We had a delightful time sitting on the patio overlooking the canyon sharing food and fun and presents with all of our neighborhood friends.

We especially enjoyed getting to know two former neighbors: Rose and Wayne. Rose is a study in serenity; calm and poised with a most endearing smile. Her husband Wayne is a rough and tumble sort, an ‘old fart from Texas’ as he calls himself. Throughout the afternoon he regaled us with stories of growing up on a farm in the middle of nowhere. And at one point, with his voice low and crackly he recited this poem.

The Devil in Texas

The devil, we're told, in hell was chained,
And a thousand years he there remained,
And he never complained, nor did he groan,
But determined to start a hell of his own
Where he could torment the souls of men
Without being chained to a prison pen.

So he asked the Lord if He had on hand
Anything left when He made the land.
The Lord said, "Yes, I had plenty on hand,
But I left it down on the Rio Grande.
The fact is old boy, the stuff is so poor,
I don't think you could use it in hell any more."

But the devil went down to look at the truck,
And said if it came as a gift, he was stuck;
For after examining it careful and well
He concluded the place was too dry for hell.
So in order to get it off His hands
God promised the devil to water the lands.

For he had some water, or rather some dregs,
A regular cathartic that smelt like bad eggs.
Hence the deal was closed and the deed was given,
And the Lord went back to His place in Heaven.
and the devil said, "I have all that is needed
To make a good hell," and thus he succeeded.

He began to put thorns on all the trees,
And he mixed the sand with millions of fleas,
He scattered tarantulas along all the roads,
Put thorns on the cacti and horns on the toads;
He lengthened the horns of the Texas steers
And put an addition on jack rabbits' ears.

He put little devils in the broncho steed
And poisoned the feet of the centipede.
The rattlesnake bites you, the scorpion stings,
The mosquito delights you by buzzing his wings.
The sand burrs prevail, so do the ants,
And those that sit down need half soles on their pants.

The devil then said that throughout the land
He'd manage to keep up the devil's own brand,
And all would be mavericks unless they bore
The marks of scratches and bites by the score.
The heat in the summer is a hundred and ten,
Too hot for the devil and too hot for men.

The wild boar roams through the black chaparral,
It's a hell of a place he has for a hell;
The red pepper grows by the bank of the brook,
The Mexicans use it in all that they cook.
Just dine with a Mexican and then you will shout,
"I've a hell on the inside as well as without."

I've Lost Weight!

2006-07-05T22:04:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the running, the biking, the interminable dog walking, and the DDRing, I've lost weight in one place - my boobs.

The roll around my middle hasn't budged a bit, but now my wedding dress is too big in the bust.

I just can't win.

Kate Moss? Who’s Kate Moss?

2006-07-03T15:54:00.000-07:00

My friend Jen wrote this fabulous piece on her blog. But I had to admit that I didn’t know who Kate Moss is. “You need to get your nose out of Scientific American and read People Magazine for a change,” she said.

“Can I help it if my favorite magazines are The Economist, Wired, and Texas Monthly?”

“Hey, I’ve seen a Cosmo at your place.”

“That was John’s. Whenever I hear riotous laughter coming from the bathroom, I know he’s in there reading Cosmo. The only downside are the sex tip articles. He’ll come out saying, ‘They're right on about #4, #22, and #80! In fact, I'll circle some for you, if you like.’”

Blogging at It’s Best

2006-07-02T13:03:00.000-07:00

A girl left her Sidekick in a taxi, and when the thief refused to give it back, she started this website. It’s a hilarious journey through the ramblings of moronic crooks. The internet community pitched in, identified the bad guys and ultimately got them arrested.

If you think that sounds good, then you’ve got to read this . Guy bought a computer on eBay. The computer didn’t work, but it contained a fully functionally and fully loaded hard drive. So the customer started a blog filled with all the personal, confidential, and highly embarrassing tidbits of the computer con artist.

Enjoy,

KK

Finally

2006-06-27T13:10:00.000-07:00

Finally I slept through the night – until the purring furnace jumped under the covers at 5am and started nuzzling my chin with his nose.

Finally I was able to sit and read without distraction – it helped that Texas Monthly arrived yesterday.

Finally I was able to relax in peace, instead of pacing the floor each evening.

Why?

Because I rode my bike. I attached a wicker basket to my handle bars, peddled down the street to the bike shop where I bought a lock, and then I started exploring. I rode all over the neighborhood. Twice. Then I rode to the store for milk, to a fancy pet store for the kids, and to a sushi shop a few miles away. It felt wonderful.

I still can’t run as far as our 60 year old president of the United States, but I’m getting there. And I’m having lots of fun while I’m at it. Tomorrow I think I’ll bicycle to the beach.

Confessions of a Pulp Fiction Reader

2006-06-19T19:40:00.000-07:00

John brought one home from his last flight; said the guy in the next seat gave it to him. I found a couple more at the store and surreptitiously placed them in my basket. I can no longer deny it – I’m a Carl Hiaassen fan. His books are perfect for summer vacation – raucous, light-hearted adventures filled with mystery, good, evil, sometimes love and always hilarity.

Besides reading, I’m spending my days preparing for class, watching movies with my buddy Frank, and focusing on the homestretch of wedding season. Eight weeks to go. Quarter Pounders with cheese are but a distant memory; pass the salad please. Jogging, DDR, dancing, whatever it takes – I shall look smashing in that straight, sleek wedding dress that shows every single curve. (What was I thinking?!)

Despite all of this effort, I have friends that tempt me with the most amazing treats. This one was so good, I asked for the recipe. So, for all y’all out there who aren’t trying to squeeze into some insanely gorgeous white dress, eat some for me.

Chocolate Walnut Pralines

½ cup butter (one stick)

½ cup light brown sugar, firmly packed

1 pkg semi sweet baking chocolate (8 squares), coarsely chopped

1 cup walnuts, chopped

35 saltine crackers

Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Play crackers in a single layer on a foil-lined baking pan.

Heat butter and sugar in saucepan on medium-high heat until butter is melted and mixture is well blended. Bring to a boil; boil 3 minutes without stirring. Pour over crackers.

Bake 7 minutes. Immediately sprinkle with copped chocolate; let stand 5 minutes. Spread melted chocolate evenly over ingredients in pan; sprinkle with walnuts.

Cool. Break into pieces.

Best Conversation Overheard in Texas

2006-06-13T14:03:00.000-07:00

I was at The University of Texas Co-op bookstore this weekend, and two men were in line at the register. The cashier nonchalantly said to the first one, “I think we could have a good year this year, if no more dumbasses get themselves thrown in jail.”
“Yeah, what a dumbass," agreed the first customer.
Then the second in line, “If that dumbass could have stayed out of trouble for just two more years he’d have himself a nice NFL contract.”
Pause.
And then all three in unison, “Dumbass!”

Poor Texas Longhorn football fans and poor Romance Taylor.

The Bride’s Maids Dress

2006-06-10T18:32:00.000-07:00

Jen: We think we have found the perfect dress. But is it okay with you if it’s strapless?

KK: Of course. Why are you even asking?

Jen has the physique of a goddess – she’s absolutely stunning.

Jen: My new tattoo will show.

KK: What tattoo is that?

Jen: The one that almost made my husband divorce me.

KK: Ah, sounds interesting.

Jen: It’s the names of my two little girls and my husband and it’s on the back of my shoulder.

KK: Well now you have to wear the strapless dress.

I can just hear Billie Sue now…

Did you know that your friend has a TATTOO?!

Yeah. And see that black man over there? That’s her husband!

Jen: She might faint.

KK: No, she’ll be too excited by the scandal to miss any of it.

Welcome to Texas

2006-06-09T19:20:00.000-07:00

I landed in the Great State on Thursday. Today my mom and I toured the wedding site, visited the caterer, the florist, and the photographer. Nordstrom’s and the baker are planned for tomorrow.

Going anywhere in Austin means a lot of driving.

My mom is a nervous driver. The kind who speeds up just to put on her brakes. And then brakes several times at one stop because she’s not sure she braked hard enough the first time. If her passengers don’t have whiplash, then she hasn’t done her job properly. The kind who won’t switch lanes until there’s not another car anywhere in the vicinity of where she wants to be. In a busy town like Austin, that causes quite a bit of stress, cussing, starting, and of course more breaking.

At one point, I eagerly volunteered to take over the driving responsibility, explaining that my carsickness was on the verge of causing a very big mess in the front seat.

And that’s when I remembered that mom is a nervous driver even when she isn’t driving. On our way home we were heading down Slaughter Lane to eventually go south on interstate 35. She was very helpful about providing directions.

“KK, you need to get in the right hand lane before we reach the highway. “ (One mile from the highway.)

“You need to get in the right hand lane before we reach the highway.“ (10 blocks from the highway.)

“You need to get in the right hand lane before we reach the highway.” (3 blocks from the highway.)

“Take a right, right here, right here.” (At the highway.)

I’m glad she said something, I had no idea what that big sign with the markings I35-S and the arrow to the right meant. I might have accidentally rolled my eyes, because then she said,

“Okay smart-ass. And don’t you dare go writing this in your blog.”

The Semester is Over!

2006-06-07T15:16:00.000-07:00

We could all use a little rest.

Burnt Orange Lunatic Fringe

2006-06-06T14:30:00.000-07:00

John unpacked from his recent trip to Texas. We have a routine for things like this – I sit and wait and he brings me surprises one by one. The first surprise was a heavy plastic bag filled with chunks of concrete.

“Parts of the Daryl K. Royal Texas Memorial Football Stadium,” he says with wonder.

The second surprise was another bag of chunks of concrete stadium.

“I packed these in two separate suitcases in case the airline lost one.”

Then he went on to unveil a dozen new Longhorn t-shirts, a dvd set of the entire 2005 football season and separate dvd of the national championship game (which we promptly watched again.)

Part way through he tells me the story of sharing the stadium artifacts with his brother.

“What’s that? Pieces of the Berlin Wall?” his brother asked.

“No. Pieces of the Daryl K. Royal Texas Memorial Stadium.”

“Even better!”

Living Up to My Name

2006-06-04T10:49:00.000-07:00

The moniker HAD to go.

Saturday

I got to school early - 9:30 - and whiled away time at my desk. I was eager to get the test started but why show up an hour early? At thirty minutes till test time, I just couldn't stand it - I went to the classroom. Everyone was waiting. Wow - I can't believe they got there so early. People started telling me that there was no test today, that the dean showed up and cancelled it.

The exam didn't start at 11. I wasn't 30 minutes early, I was 30 minutes late.

Sunday

I woke from my recurring nightmare - the one where I forget to go to class. I don't just forget once, apparently I've been forgetting all semester. So I make my way through this maze of stairways with cobwebs and stray kitties and try to find the classroom. All the while I'm trying to figure out when I last saw them, how long its been since I last went to this class, how I'm going to tell Charlie the department chair, what I'm going to tell the dean.

Today, A.M.P. could stand for the Abashed and Morose Professor

The Invitations

2006-06-02T08:39:00.000-07:00

I think they’re gorgeous. But then again, I designed them.

John says they look like funeral notices.

Our colors are black, white and pewter, so doesn’t it make sense that our invitations are too?

Billie Sue called as soon as hers arrived.

Billie Sue: You’re future brother-in-law doesn’t like them. But Jennifer says that they’re fitting. And … I think they’re just fine. They are one hundred percent okay.

John: Why doesn’t Glenn like them?

Billie Sue: Because of the black. I think he was hoping they’d be burnt orange.

John: With a Hook ’Em Horns on them?!

Billie Sue: Yeah.

Billie Sue: Hey KK, if John doesn’t pick out his tuxedo in time, the guys can just wear University of Texas shirts.

KK: No.

John: Oh come on.

KK: No. No burnt orange invitations, no UT shirts, and definitely no –

John: You still don’t want cheerleaders at the reception?

KK: NO!

John and Billie Sue howl in laughter.

What am I getting myself into?

No one thought John would marry

2006-06-01T17:59:00.000-07:00

Not his brother, not his mother and certainly not any of his friends.

In fact back when I lived with Billie Sue she said, “KK, you need to dump him. John’s never going to marry you.”

But I had faith.

For a couple more years I waited patiently. Then one new year’s eve he wrapped me in his arms, looked into my eyes and told me how much he loves me. So I said, “Want to marry me?”

My question took both of by surprise, because even though I’d been thinking such thoughts, I’d never before let them cross my lips.

He accepted and now we’re engaged. I love being engaged - so much excitement, so much to look forward to. But the relatives, I learned, aren’t as keen on the engagement as I am. They actually want the marriage that it presages.

My plan of an infinite engagement or a quick wedding in Vegas were quashed and we started planning a large, formal wedding. Planning rolled along smoothly and quietly for a while. Too quietly, in fact. We reserved a site, hired a caterer, florist, musicians, and photographer, bought dresses, shoes and tuxedos, found a preacher, created a guest list, and ordered invitations. I was efficiently steering us toward a beautiful day.

And then Billie Sue went to a baby shower for a friend of ours in Texas. This friend is the sister of John’s best friend. Naturally our wedding came up in conversation. “We haven’t heard anything about the wedding, so we figured it’s off,” said the best friend to John’s mom.

Imagine the cataclysm this caused in Billie Sue’s heart. Next to the birth of her grandson, this is the biggest event in her life. She’s been shopping for a dress since the moment she heard we’re engaged.

Billie Sue called John’s brother, who was no help. “Mom, I told you I wouldn’t believe they’re getting married until I see it with my very own eyes.”

Then she called us. John was out of the country and I was working in the garden, neither of us were near our cell phone.

With her tender heart beating she phoned my dad, “Jim, did you hear that the wedding’s off?” And he just about had a stroke.

One day last week we were working on the list of people to invite to our wedding…

2006-05-31T16:09:00.000-07:00

KK: John, your mother said she only wanted to invite 50 people, but each week she sends me more names. She currently wants to invite 130 people.

John: Let me see that list. He grabs it from my hands.

John: I don’t even know who some of these people are!

So, we call Billie Sue.

John: Mom, who are Mr. and Mrs. MacMerter?

Billie Sue: They lived next door to us in Marshall when you were born.

John: We moved away from Marshall when I was one year old. Have I ever seen them since?

Billie Sue: Your brother used to play with their kids when he was little.

John: Mom, have I ever seen them since I was a year old?

Billie Sue: No.

KK: They’re OFF the list!

Memorial Day Weekend 2006

2006-05-29T19:13:00.000-07:00

Annie and Sunshine enjoy Memorial Day together. And Piper enjoys herself.

Resting

The Stare-Down

Back to Resting

Meanwhile

The Perfect Shoe

2006-05-27T10:30:00.000-07:00

In one hour today I bought a new dishwasher and the perfect pair of shoes. It occurred to me after purchasing the shoes that they weren't that far in price from many of the dishwashers I'd seen. So I asked myself the obvious question: If I could only afford one which would I buy? That was an easy one!

Uncle Alfonz died today

2006-05-26T08:12:00.000-07:00

He was my mom’s favorite uncle. They used to chase each other through the house with wooden spoons battling imaginary sword fights. Inevitably someone would end up on top of the table, someone beneath and they would fight it out, wooden handles flying through the air.

Tante Max tells the story best. Each night for weeks, air raid sirens had been going off forcing the neighborhood into bomb shelters. But this night, word came to evacuate. People piled onto the train, clinging to whatever they could from their former, orderly lives. During the trip they were repeatedly forced to flee from the train into nearby ravines whenever bombers passed overhead. By morning they had made it safely into the countryside.

After their night of terror they knocked on a farmer’s door. The burly, gruff man agreed to give them shelter in exchange for their work on the farm, and he set them to work immediately.

For two years my family lived in a one room shed at the back of the farmer’s property, while World War II raged throughout Europe. They sewed their clothes out of flour sacks, they ate only vegetables and bread. When the war finally ended and they were able to get the luxury of butter, Grandma sat down and ate an entire stick slice by slice.

The war had destroyed their previous lives, their homes, their business. But slowly they recreated themselves in a different part of Germany. My mom’s mom fell in love with an American soldier and became an American citizen along with her daughter.

My mom flies to Germany tomorrow to say farewell to her favorite uncle.

Procrastination

2006-05-25T07:41:00.000-07:00

I’m good at it, darned good, but John takes the cake.

Last week we finished John’s expense reports for 2005. His reimbursement won’t be enough to pay for the wedding, but it will be enough to build us a fine new bathroom.

My first Expense Report Experience with John came just a year or so into our relationship. The company where we were working instituted a new policy – that expenses had be submitted within 90 days of incurring. This threw John into a tizzy, a whirl of tender stresses. He flew to his home in the Bay Area and collected a box full of receipts.

Keeping the receipts is not John’s difficulty, because John keeps just about everything. In his three bedroom house in San Jose one entire room and half of the garage was devoted to boxes of uncertain treasures. When we moved in together I made a brave effort to sort through those treasures – the shock and appall from my discoveries is too monumental to describe here. Let’s just say that some of the highlights include

1) A letter to the newspaper editor of his hometown that he wrote in 12^th grade in which he threatened to sue the school district if they changed the method for calculating GPA’s prior to his graduation. He was slated to be valedictorian, after all.

2) The profile of his ideal mate, which he completed for a dating service while he lived in Chicago – being a non-smoker was his main requirement. Such high standards! I feel so special.

3) A hideous ceramic bowl/vase object painted in pink and greens and yellows with hula dancers in grass skirts. I think he pilfered it from a bar in a fancy hotel during one of his sales conferences. I vaguely remember a story about one his sales reps sneaking it out in a baby stroller. I am such a proud girlfriend.

The point is, in that box he brought home, John had every single receipt he had collected in his five years on the job with this company. All we had to do was sort through them, order them by date, match them with the correct business trip, tape them to blank pieces of paper and document each one in an excel spreadsheet. It took us four weeks of evenings and weekends, plus the help of two secretaries who were assigned to the project.

When the head of business services realized the magnitude of the expense reports soon to cross her desk, she had the company begin allocating money with which to reimburse John.

In the end, they paid him over a $100,000. “Hey, it’s better than I would have done if I’d invested that money in the market!” was John’s sole rationalization. And he may be right.

I have a feeling this post will earn me some hate mail, especially from that character who calls himself Johntex.

Sudan, Tattoos and a Furry Helmet

2006-05-24T18:19:00.000-07:00

One of the things I love about my college is the plethora of interesting people I come into contact with.

This morning I was talking with a student of mine who is from Sudan. I discovered that he speaks four languages and that his father has three wives. As we were walking across campus we overheard a group of girls chatting, he pointed towards them and said, ‘Those girls are from Somalia.’

It was a pretty glum day today, bad news kept crossing my desk. So I decided the heck with it, I broke free of my office and left to soak up some sun before my evening class. I followed the path to my car and ended up walking behind a young fellow with a colorful tattoo that covered his entire right calf. “I’ve never seen a hibiscus flower on a tattoo before.” “Really?” he asked incredulous. “I’ve got them all over.” “That’s nice,” was all I could think to say.

A motorcycle was parked behind my car, and strapped to its handlebars was a helmet. The rider had outfitted it with a furry striped tail and two floppy ears.

People are amazing.

Check out the cool wedding photographer we hired: www.sarahborkhamilton.com

Dooce

2006-05-22T23:03:00.000-07:00

Jen is one of the most fabulous women I know, and I’m proud to say, one of my very best friends. Last week I told her about a new blog I’d discovered called http://www.dooce.com/ . I think my exact words were, ‘Go there RIGHT NOW and start reading!’ So of course she did.

The next day she told me she’s about to get fired because she can’t tear herself away from the internet. We both agreed that Heather B. Armstrong, the author of Dooce, should be our own personal friend.

KK: Jen, are you teaching summer school?

Jen: Hell no.

KK: Good, then you’ll have time to blog. I think you owe it to yourself [read us] to explore your fascination with Picaso and how it could ruin your marriage.

Jen: I don’t think I’m strong enough. I mean, I couldn’t handle getting hate-mail like Dooce does.

KK: Oh please, I DREAM of getting hate-mail. That would mean that more than six people read what I write and even cared enough to comment. Why can’t I get hate-mail?

Jen: I think you have to be more controversial.

So here goes:

This House of Love is Built for Five

Not too long after John and I moved in together, we started calling our little apartment the House of Love. It was because of the way we made each other feel, each having so much faith in and support for the other. We made a home together where we were safe from whatever craziness life brought, where we would always find love, support, warmth and happiness.

One day a couple of years ago while I was visiting my friend Jen in Texas, we spotted a stray kitten scampering through the yard. We chased it down, which was no easy task even though it had a broken leg, brought it inside and fed it milk and tuna. That night Jen provisioned me with a make-shift litter box, food dishes and more tuna and dropped me off at the motel where my mom and I were staying. I called John the next day and said, ‘I’ve got a kitten in my purse,’ and without missing a beat he asked, ‘Is she cute?’ Piper was three weeks old then, now she’s a glorious, graceful big cat.

Next came Annie. She was a little gray mass hiding under my neighbor’s car after being attacked by a coyote. We took Annie to the vet, who operated on her, and brought home a shy and weary little creature. That same night Annie started following me wherever I went. John faithfully cleaned Annie’s wounds three times a day, while I petted her head and tried not to look at the blood. Nowadays Annie still follows me around the house and I follow her when she takes me for brisk three mile walks.

Then came Sunny, and you know all about him. The vet’s report is in: he shall live to poop another day. It turns out that he has a rather bad case of a rather ordinary parasite. We increased the dosage of the medicine he’s already on, and we’re hoping to have this resolved in a week.

None of these kiddoes was expected, and each one has brought an unimaginable amount of joy. Each time I think my heart can’t getting any bigger, that I couldn’t love any more, it does, and I do. I love these creatures, and their odd proclivities, dearly, and I feel very, very lucky to have them. I know this probably sounds silly to those of you with real, human babies. But this is as close as it gets for me. I’m not all that interested in being a mom to the human variety.

I do, though, relish my role as fairy god mother to two gorgeous little girls. I like to play with them, spoil them, buy them presents, and then be able to hand them back to mom when they start to cry. Just the other day I bought my two-year-old a new book. It’s of the small, three by five variety, with chew-proof cardboard pages. It’s called Baby, Mix Me a Drink, and each page contains a full color illustration of how to make the perfect mixed drink for each family member – martini for Mommy, pina-colada for Daddy, hot toddy for Granny, and so on. So you see, my gifts are both educational and practical. Soon, my little munchkin will be adorable AND handy behind the bar. I hope she’s practicing, because I’m coming to visit in June!

KK: How was that? Was that better?

Tuesdays and Thursdays aren’t bad either

2006-05-19T10:51:00.000-07:00

Usually they’re good. Very, very good. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I don’t teach until 3:30pm, which leaves my mornings free to do whatever I can dream up. Okay, I don’t often get more creative than crawling back into bed with my coffee and a good book once John leaves for work. But that IS one of my favorite things.

This Thursday included another one of my favorite things, going to see my marvelous hair dresser Keri. There are a few things you should know about my visits to Keri. The first is that I often put a note on the inside of the front door to remind me of any extra errands I need to run each day. So, the day before seeing Keri, there’s usually a note up there that reads HAIR in big block letters. This is also my little way of ensuring that I receive the appropriate complements when John gets home.

One week I flew out the door without taking the note with me, partly to make John aware of my new found radiance. That particular evening John came home and we began the normal evening rituals – making dinner, discussing our days, playing with Annie and Piper. I waited patiently for my complements to begin. Finally out of desperation I pointed to the note on the door. “You forgot to get your hair cut!” John shouted.

That’s another one I’m not letting him forget.

Believe it or not, it was a hair stylist that signified a serious progression in our relationship. John also gets his hair done by Keri. He likes all of the perks that come with a trip to an Aveda salon, like the shoulder, neck and scalp massage, the scented oil aromatherapy, the great hair products and the ability of an Aveda stylist like Keri to make him look, as he says, ‘edgy’. One day about four years ago John picked me up from the airport at the end of a week long business trip to Argentina. I was exhausted, but tan, happy, and carrying a couple of well chosen souvenirs, including a very sexy pair of shoes. (In my opinion, Argentinean women have perfected the art of sex appeal, and my male co-workers seemed to agree.)

John had an appointment that morning at an Aveda salon along the coast, and I decided to ride along with the hope that they would be able to work me in. I could tell that John was a little uneasy with my idea. “It’s just that I don’t like to share my hair stylist with someone I’m dating.” Now I was confused. “If we broke up, we couldn’t both keep going to the same stylist. And I don’t want to lose her.” I must have giggled. “I think it’s a reasonable precaution,” he continued. And so this simple outing had turned into a make-or-break moment for our relationship.

In the end John made the noble, brave decision, and we’ve been using the same hair dresser ever since. Clearly he made the right choice. Soon, Keri will be working her magic to make us both look perfect for our wedding day.

This week, John noticed my hair. We’re in high romance mode, soaking up the sweetness until John leaves again on Sunday.

Poop update: I collected a sample, and the vet sent it to a lab for analysis. We should know something later today.

A Black Fly in My Chardonnay

2006-05-18T09:26:00.000-07:00

I wish I were joking. After two sips, it landed, wings waterlogged, helpless, drowning in my delicious indulgence. So I was forced to switch to a different mood enhancer. By then the coffee was ready. I enjoyed a slow cup, a bowl of cereal, and a couple stories in the morning paper.

The day before my soon-to-be mother in law had none-too-delicately reminded me that whatever parasite Sunny has is probably communicable to Annie and Piper. THEY COULD ALL DIE, she told me. Oh God. So far, Annie’s eaten at least one of the kitten’s poops, Sunny’s used Piper’s litter box, they’ve all played and licked each other. Did I mention that Sunny got behind John’s beloved entertainment system (most people would consider a 52inch TV large, John considers that merely computer-monitor-size, just to help you put this ‘system’ of his in perspective) and pooped on all of his cables? I discovered that when I noticed Annie and Piper uncharacteristically routing around back there. Anyway, chance for infection was high and I had to take immediate, drastic action!

Fortified, I grabbed Annie and we made for the local pet store, making a brief detour to a new grocery store where I stocked up with 18 jars of baby food, which at our current rate was enough for three days.

At the pet store I decided I’d had enough shit-cleaning and refused to tackle the disgusting task of decontaminating Piper’s litter box. She’d simply get a new one. (Yes I know I am contributing to our city’s overflowing landfill!) I picked out a Buddha Dome for Piper and a more straightforward fully enclosed container for Sunny. (He wasted no time in spreading his poop on the inside walls as soon as I put it in his room.) I grabbed a play toy for Sunny, paw wipes and some pig ears for Annie, crammed all of this into the passenger side of my two-seater, put Annie on my lap and headed home.

Back at home my Gift-From-God (aka Olga, the housekeeper) was cleaning our shower. No matter, I didn’t have time anyway. I dished out the new litter boxes, toys and treats, washed my face, brushed my teeth, pulled on a tank top, a pair of hiking pants, my flip flops, and most importantly a hat. (I couldn’t remember the last time I’d shampooed. God, if having a human baby is anywhere near as tiring as having a kitten baby, you can count me out!) I spread on copious amounts of deodorant, some perfume, and drove to class.

On Mondays and Wednesdays I must deal with my inherited hooligans. I’m happy to report that I have scared them into submission! They actually complemented me on my camouflage costume and cheerily soaked up three hours of algebra and geometry.

Once class was over, I still had to prepare my lecture notes for the evening’s calculus class and meet with students during office hours. Is it a bad sign that, as an education professional, I sometimes pray that no students show up? My prayer rarely seems to work, but it did this day. I must have made the homework too easy.

As soon as I finished my lesson, I rushed home, petted each of the three kids and was about to drive back to school when I saw John’s taxi arrive. I can’t tell you how glad I am that he’s home.

I’ll skip the rest and just say that calculus flew by, John’s smitten with the new kitten, and I’m in heaven now that John’s home.

Ah Wednesdays, one of my favorite days of the week

2006-05-17T08:42:00.000-07:00

Or so I was about to write. When I woke this morning I discovered that Sunny’s condition had worsened over night. He now has very little chance of making it to the litter box in time, even though he and it are never more than 9 feet apart.

I cleaned up the droplets that followed wherever he went, fed him yet another bottle of baby food. By now I’ve depleted my grocer’s supply of strained meat Gerber jars and have to find a new store to pillage this morning.

I made coffee, I opened the drapes, I stepped outside and got the paper. And then I thought about Churchill. You know, he started each day with a Scotch (though he did somehow make it last till noon.) I selected a perfect Riedel glass and poured in (a modest amount) a 1997 Stag’s Leap Chardonnay. Perfect.

Now Wednesday may once again be one of my favorite days of the week.

Ah Mondays, one of my favorite days of the week

2006-05-16T07:41:00.000-07:00

Mondays are the day that I meet my buddy Frank for a matinee at our local movie theatre. Frank is a self-described physics geek, movie buff and misanthrope. Only the first two are true though, he’s one of the nicest people I know. Often our stroll to main street necessitates a stop at the pub before the movie, where we order a gin and tonic for Frank and a Guinness for me. Sometimes the movie necessitates another stop at the pub before the walk home. This week we were running a bit late so we compromised and sipped canned Guinness taken from the fridge on the way out the door.

It was an odd flick, slap-stick, made funnier by the aforementioned Guinness. Adam & Steve, a love story between two gay men, who were star-crossed lovers in the 80’s and rediscovered each other in the present day. Posey Parker played an prickly-yet-adorable side-kick; it’s probably worth seeing just for her. I left feeling inspired by love and giddy from the last two dance numbers. If only life were like musicals, where we could break into choreographed singing routines and mend our troubles with a tune.

Once home for the evening, I made myself a salad and hosted online office hours for my calculus students. Then I was off to bed to read The Last Lion, a biography of Winston Churchill, and before I knew it I was singing and dancing in my sleep, dreaming about Tuesday.

One Sunny Week

2006-05-15T07:57:00.000-07:00

It’s been one week since Sunny came to live with us. During this time my feelings have ranged from desperation, awe, disgust, delight, and finally love. John gets home in four days to discover Sunny first hand. But it’s already too late, Sunny is here to stay.

Last Sunday he slept and hid and then peed and pooped on a stack of John’s old t-shirts. (John doesn’t know about this yet, and I’m not so sure he needs to.) I shut my eyes to the problem and instead took a drive up the coast to a fu-fu pet shop where I paid far too much for some quite adorable non-necessities. I rationalized it with the thought that I’m a middle-aged woman with no kids in sight (nor desired) who ought to at least be able to spoil her cat! When I returned he was still exhausted, scared and rather bewildered by his new circumstances. But my purchase of a carpeted triangle wedge cubby hole with multiple-sized windows, attached fake mice and a coating of catnip was a real winner. His time in my study was over, though. His pooping indiscretion had earned him a stay in the all tile boy’s bathroom. (It also lacks t-shirts.)

On Monday Sunny was well rested and ready to play. I built him a huge playpen out of heavy cardboard so that he could be in the living room with us without the fear of being attacked by Piper or eaten by Annie. That amused and contained him for about a day.

On Tuesday he broke free. This meant he could only be in the living room under strict supervision. Annie had to be on her leash and Piper watched at all times. Plus he still hadn’t mastered the litter box, so I required him to make frequent trips to the boy’s bathroom to become reacquainted with it. In all of my years of stray cat adoption, I have never known a cat not to immediately adapt to the litter box. Every one of my cats (and I’m afraid that’s no small number) has instinctively known to use it and had no more than a single accident. Whoever had Sunny before me must have paper trained him, because when I gave him a piece of tissue paper to play with it, he immediately peed on it!

Tuesday was also Sunny’s first visit to the vet where he received a near perfect bill of health, a vaccine, and an antibiotic to help with his outrageously pernicious, unimaginably vile smelling and un-litter-box-contained diarrhea. The vet also suggested I feed him only strained turkey baby food until he recovered, which smells almost as bad as the diarrhea!

None of this slowed him down though. Sunny was absolutely delighted by life and the wealth of play toys he discovered in his new home, like a scrap of paper that had fallen to the floor, my laptop cable, the leaves on the houseplant and Piper’s tail. He performed acrobatic maneuvers that amazed the rest of us, literaly somersaulting through the air, hoisting himself up on the couch, dangling from the cushions on the dinning room chairs, and loping down the hall like a kangaroo. Annie and Piper each thought themselves in hell. Annie because she had discovered the perfect chew toy but wasn’t allowed to eat it, and Piper because she couldn’t seem to escape this cheery, playful, indefatigable little beast.

And so went Wednesday and Thursday. During this time Piper’s hissing became less frequent, and though Annie still licked her lips when she saw Sunny, she occasionally had moments of calm in his presence. On one of these days I discovered that Sunny and Piper could in fact tolerate each other without my refereeing. (I ‘discovered’ this when I accidentally closed Piper in the same room with Sunny while I went off to school.) That was a huge step forward. However, Sunny still couldn’t sleep through the night, and the rest of us were becoming exhausted.

On one of these days (perhaps induced by sleep deprivation) I declared Sunny litter box trained and did not confine him to the bathroom that night. Annie and I went off to bed, shut the door to our room, and slept straight through to morning. I woke to discover my down comforter, which seems to reside on a living room couch, covered in diarrhea. Dear God, surely I am made for more than picking up poop! I already had to clean Piper’s litter box, Sunny’s litter box and litter box surroundings (I think sometimes he hangs his butt out over the edge), and pick up after Annie when we go for a walk. And now this! I recovered from my melt down, cleaned up and returned Sunny to the bathroom to pay for my parenting mistakes.

Friday was another day. By then Annie was rather used to traversing the house attached to my hip, and Piper had stopped hissing. Annie no longer acted as if she would die if she didn’t get to eat Sunny, but like she might simply stroke-out instead. Meanwhile Sunny got promoted to larger digs, back to my study, and John’s bathroom got a thorough cleaning so that it would be ready for his return.

On Saturday I came to the conclusion that all of our lives would be much less stressful if instead of having the four of us simultaneously occupy the living room, I rotated who was allowed in at any given time. Being the epitome of queenly behavior, Piper was always welcome, as was I. Annie and Sunny got to take turns.

By Sunday I was even better at this rotation scheduling and was able to enjoy more discoveries about Sunny. I watched him and Piper play chase and hide-and-seek. Piper and I used to play those games! I learned just how much Sunny likes his belly rubbed, his face nuzzled and his paws played with. I got to rub Annie’s tummy again, too, because she wasn’t always sitting in wait for Sunny. The vet warned me to keep a close eye on Annie until Sunny is bigger than a rat and can defend himself against Ann's inescable terrier genetics. And I will.

I also have more time for myself. Today I finished writing my last final exam for the semester, selected new textbooks for the fall, and had enough energy to lengthen my run to two miles. And those t-shirts? They are once again clean and fresh smelling, and I’m almost half way through turning them into a t-shirt quilt for John. Now that should be enough to make him forgive Sunny, don’t you think?

Sunshine

2006-05-08T21:37:00.000-07:00

There is a picture of me as a child, about four years old, sitting on our avocado-colored linoleum kitchen floor, surrounded by kittens, with a huge smile on my face. The perceptive among you may see an animal lover. Apparently you should also see a sucker for stray cats and dogs.

Saturday morning began with a predawn trip to the airport to send John off to Spain. When I got home I rummaged through the garage for some odds and ends and began setting up for the neighborhood garage sale. The day went well: I brought in over a hundred dollars and managed to only spend five at my neighbor’s. (I couldn’t believe she was selling a hand-thrown gorgeously glazed vase for only $2!)

Just as I was packing up for the day, marking “Free” on a few remaining items, my neighbor appeared holding a mewing, shaking, skinny black kitten. “One of our customers found this wandering in the street. KK, this one has your name written all over it.” This is the same woman who saved my life two weeks ago. I growled.

I refused. I resisted. I swore. I begged and pleaded. And now there’s a black cat sleeping in John’s bathroom.

The neighborhood kids named him Sunshine, and I call him Sunny for short. He’s got Annie, Piper and myself all spellbound. He gallops across the wooden floors; he spins, lunges, and practically flies when he’s attacking a string or a ball with a bell in it. And then he curls up in my arms, purrs so loud you can hear him across the room, and falls asleep with his feet sticking up in the air.

Of course John has no idea there’s a cat sleeping in his bathroom. I wonder what he’ll think when he reads this.

Running for (not from) a Wedding

2006-05-05T18:29:00.000-07:00

It’s time to get in shape. To stop fooling around. To burn off this belly and slim down that rear end. (In a massive Freudian slip John called them “chubby cheeks” when he swears what he meant to say was chilly cheeks. He’s still suffering for that one.) The reason for all this? I’m getting married in three months and I have bought myself a stunning, slinky wedding dress. The kind that doesn’t look good with bulging bellies and butt beneath it.

My first step was to lay in all the right equipment. I went to the running store and bought two new pair of shoes. It’s best to rotate them you know, a different pair every day. During my running hiatus my old pair were co-opted for gardening. Then I bought a couple of pretty running outfits and a variety of new socks. I am on the way to a new me, I felt. But first, I needed a stop at McDonalds for a quarter-pounder combo meal, supersized. And of course, after that I needed a nap.

Later this afternoon I put on all my new gear. I had forgotten how good new clothes make a girl feel. I’ve been so busy buying things like a maid, wedding invitations, a new bathroom and termite tenting that I forgot all about the power of clothes shopping to lift one’s spirits. Anyway, I got decked out in over a hundred dollars worth of sparkly, scientifically engineered fabrics and went for a run. A whole mile and a half.

But I’ve got to start somewhere. BTW I found a simple little internet site that lets you chart your progress and keep you motivated. http://www.presidentschallenge.org/index.aspx Remember the President’s Physical Fitness Program that we participated in at grade school? Well, it’s still around. And now they have a website for grown-ups.

It may be a long road getting back into shape, but it’s worth it. I feel wonderful when I run. And it (like the internet) can be addictive.

More Disjointed Ramblings, Forgive Me

2006-05-04T10:54:00.000-07:00

Hector Berlioz arrived today, or rather his six CD compilation of orchestral words did. Hector himself hasn’t been with us for the last 100 years or so. When I opened the box and started leafing through the notes I was struck, not by any profound understanding of his music, but by his hair. How can you not love a guy who looks like this? (Perhaps he was the Lyle Lovett of the nineteenth century.)

Hector has kept me company this morning as I made my way through some sequence and series problems in calculus II. For some strange reason I find working math problems consoling. If she were still here, this would be the day that my septuagenarian French neighbor and I would go walking. We would discuss the events of the week, national, global, neighborhood and personal. I would tell her that

- If everyone we’re inviting comes to the wedding, we’ll have 300 guests. While I fret about the cost, John just smiles and says, “These are the things in life worth spending money on.”

- I’ve designed the invitations, picked out a wedding ring, hired the bands, caterer, florist, and baker, and bought my dress. All that’s missing are the photographer and tuxes - in other words, John’s responsibilities.

- John will be out of town for the entire month of May.

- The dishwasher is broken and needs to be replaced, and if John thinks I’m waiting until he gets back in town to buy a new one, he’s got another thing coming.

- The most brilliant looking orioles have started visiting my bird feeders.

- Annie had another seizure this morning, poor dear.

- Olga, the housekeeper, is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Although, after our wedding, I should probably start saying that John is. (We marvel at the way she folds our t-shirts in to perfectly flat, uniform squares. It’s a mystery how she does it.)

- I succumbed to my mother’s pressure to register at Williams-Sonoma. I find it almost impossible to register for our wedding since we’re both in our 30’s and have been living together for years. But I indulged my wish list with some Riedel crystal. (My girlfriend AMQ and I bought some last year and I love treating myself to glass of wine in it when I get home at night.)

- Yesterday I thought I’d need a glass of wine to get through my calculus class. I kept saying, ‘There’s no crying in mathematics.’ Although, I’m not really sure why, I seem to remember plenty of crying in my mathematical studies.

- I discovered a website called zillow.com that overlays the price of properties on top of satellite images. Try it to see how much your house is worth (and that of your neighbors!)

- We’ve finally hired a contractor to redo our bathroom and scheduled the termite tenting. I like him, AND he knows how to use email!

- I tried to watch the film at our neighborhood’s independent movie theater this week, but I found it too sad and left after 10 minutes.

- The college had a book sale yesterday and I picked up five books for five dollars. Most are about Java programming, but I did manage to get Wuthering Heights and a novel by Nadine Cordimer that takes place in South Africa. (Giselle, my neighbor, would recognize this author, even though I don’t.)

- Texas Monthly is one of my favorite magazines, and I make a point of reading all of the articles written by Skip Hollandsworth. This month he’s written about a charming, modern-day cattle rustler. The pictures in this article alone are worth the price of the issue, especially that of the Texas cattle ranger. He stands strong, imposing and mean looking next to a broken fence, wearing his starched blue jeans, star-studded belt, crisp white shirt and blue neckerchief, white Stetson, silver badge and a gun on his hip. Did you know that the state of Texas had a separate law enforcement agency, begun in 1877, to arrest a cattle thieves? Me either. Sometimes it’s hard to believe this is the same state that’s home to NASA, Neiman Marcos, South by Southwest and the tallest state capital in the country. Even though I’m from there, sometimes I hardly recognize it.

- I’m trying to pick out the symphonies we'll attend in the 2006-2007 season, but it’s been tricky to manage it with John’s directive, “It can’t interfere with football season.” I call him part of the burnt orange lunatic fringe.

- The new KPBS catalog came yesterday and I’ve circled all the must-see programs for the month of May.

- A&E is still running Nero Wolf mysteries on Saturday nights and I try to record every one. God bless Rex Stout, whom I discovered in college. I just love him. Isn’t Archie grand? And the orchids! The weather is so amazing here in SoCal that my neighbor grows them in her front yard. (Sickening, I know.)

- Some people find it strange that I keep a globe in my bathroom. My mother for one. But I can’t count the number of times I’ve been reading a history book in the tub and needed to look something up.

- This weekend I must plant the oregano, basil and Gerber daisies I’ve raised, AND get ready for our neighborhood garage sale.

- I seem to have recovered from my internet addiction. So my days are more balanced now, but I can’t say they’re as much fun!

- Best of all, my friends AMQ and Steve are in town!

In between my ramblings Giselle would comment on what’s she’s read in the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times this morning. She’s a voracious reader. Then she’d tell me about yoga and any treats she may have bought at Trader Joes and Whole Foods. We’d talk about her children and grandchildren. We’d talk about gardening, books, movies and music.

I think I’ll go write her a letter.

Skeletons in the Family Closet

2006-04-27T08:23:00.000-07:00

D taught me how to twirl. We made up a routine to “It’s an itsy-bitsy-teeny-weeny yellow polka-dot bikini.” B sewed me my very own Raggedy Ann doll. C put my hair up in the latest styles. I was the youngest of the four grandchildren, all of us girls. By the time I was five my cousins were in high school. On a few special occasions I got to spend afternoons at their house, and at Christmas they’d give me enchanting presents; I was thrilled by the fact that these beautiful, mysterious, exotic teenagers selected something just for me. Perfectly focused images hang suspended in my mind. I remember staring awe-struck at their endless drawer of barrettes, at the maze of bottles in their shower and at their long, golden, and womanly bodies as they sunbathed. One Christmas they bought me a life size crib for my favorite doll. It was beautiful, pink and had rollers on it. My baby and that crib went everywhere with me, from room to room, so that dolly was never out of sight. As a child I was aware that my family didn’t spend a lot of time with my aunt and uncle and cousins but I never questioned it.

When I was eleven or twelve my parents finally explained it to me. Uncle G had helped himself to funds from the family run business. Dad agreed never to tell Grandpa about this embezzlement if Uncle G would agree to give up his share of the business.

And so it is that my Aunt claims we robbed her children of their inheritance. I wish I could tell you that our family run business turned into an icon like Hilton Hotels or Ford Motor Company. Instead it was simply a struggling mom-and-pop that was slowly put out of business by superstores like Wal-Mart.

This past year we buried my grandmother. Grandpa passed on two years before. And once again we were all together. Huddling around the gravesite we quickly became reacquainted. My magnificent teenage cousins are now middle-aged with children in college. Uncle G is almost a splitting image of Grandpa. And Aunt J has the exact same bouffant hairdo as before but now it’s grayish white instead of black. We reminisced a little, especially about the drawer full of love letters we found in grandma’s dresser, which she refused to let us read. I’d like to read them now, but they seem to have been lost.

As we left the funeral that day I realized that a chapter in my life had closed. That was the last time all of us will ever be together.

Two days ago my mom called to say that my Aunt and Uncle are contesting the will. I guess that chapter isn’t quite closed yet.

Math to Wow Your Friends - Part II

2006-04-24T21:14:00.000-07:00

There is a building not too far from campus that looks like this

and at closer inspection like this

which raises an almost infinite number of questions.

In addition to all of the questions you have about the artist and the owner of the building and the painted guard and the little brown squirrel, you’re probably also wondering what pi and Pythagorean’s theorem have in common (besides the fact that you were made to memorize both in school.)

You may remember from Math to Wow Your Friends - Part I that most types of numbers can be written as a fraction or ratio and hence are called rational numbers.

The number pi, however, is irrational. It is a never ending, never repeating decimal that cannot be written as a fraction. Other numbers, such as the square roots of primes, are also irrational.

The first Greek mathematicians were happily devising geometry without any notion of irrational numbers until they tried to apply Pythagorean’s theorem to a very special triangle.

Pythagorean’s theorem tells us how to calculate the hypotenuse of a right triangle given the lengths of its two legs.

Let's use it to find the hypotenuse of this triangle

So, in other words

This is exactly what the Greek mathematicians did. Then they tried to write the square root of two as a fraction. And that is where they got stuck.

They could not find a way to write the square root of two as a fraction, so they were compelled to prove that it couldn’t be done.

Here is a simple, elegant proof that the square root of two is irrational:

First, we’ll assume that it CAN be written as a fraction, and see if this assumption leads to a contraction. If it does, we will have proven our point.

Assuming that the square root of two can be written as a fraction, we can write

where a and b are whole numbers (and b isn’t zero, since it’s impossible to divide by zero.)

We can re-write this as

and by squaring both sides we can write
Now comes a bit of logic. Think about perfect squares like 4 and 9 and 16 and 25 and 36 and so on and the number of prime factors each one has. Here are several perfect squares broken down into their prime factors.

4 = 2 * 2

9 = 3 * 3

16 = 2 * 2 * 2* 2

25 = 5 * 5

36 = 2 * 3 * 2 * 3

and so on

Do you notice that each perfect square has an EVEN number of prime factors? Try some more on your own if you’re not convinced.

Back to our equation

b-squared must have an even number of prime factors and a-squared must have an even number of prime factors.

But the 2 on the left of the equal sign means that the left side of the equation has an ODD number of prime factors while the right side of the equation has an EVEN number of prime factors.

If two numbers are equal they will have the exact same prime factorization. Since the left side of the equation and the right side of the equation don’t even have the same NUMBER of prime factors the two sides of the equation cannot be equal.

This is a contraction. And that means we have proven that the square root of two cannot be written as a fraction and is therefore irrational.

Oh, and by the way, the squirrel says:

“I love you Mary!”

2006-04-19T08:58:00.000-07:00

Evolution is a bulldozer disguised as a stationary bike.

--Tom Robbins

Spring Cleaning of the Mind

2006-04-18T09:45:00.000-07:00

Don’t worry! Not another word, or even letter, about the insidious horror that is housework will these fingers type!

The taxes have all been paid, the IRAs contributed to, and the sun did come up today after all. Now that that weight and worry has left my mind it’s time to clear out the rest of the cobwebs and start exercising that lazy financial muscle.

Yesterday I gathered up all of my savings – a 401k here, a 403b there, IRAs all over the place, a money market, a savings account and even a $100 savings bond I was given in grade school. My financial advisor calls me a closet saver. I started each of these accounts with some fantastic savings intentions only to have my efforts dwindle over time. On my recent quest to corral these misplaced nuggets I discovered that some accounts had been managed aggressively, some very conservatively, and others not at all. Some laid languishing like an old car up on blocks in an overgrown southern yard. (Catch the Tom Robbins influence?) Now the light is shining on these formerly hidden treasures, and they’re all being coaxed into respectable growth. Thank goodness.

How else are John and I going to be able to afford that super deluxe RV we plan to drive across the country during our retirement?

Think I'm kidding? I guess you’ll just have to keep reading my blog to find out. Hey, what do you think we’ll have instead of blogs by the time we retire?

Easter 2006

2006-04-17T15:27:00.000-07:00

Ah Easter, a time of renewal and rebirth; yellow chicks and white fluffy rabbits; daffodils, tulips and lilies; pastels galore; and even a little chocolate.

My Easter included three days of antibiotic by IV, taxes (refunds are an urban legend, right?), eating left-hand-made lasagna, and lying on the couch reading while keeping my chew-toy-of-a-hand elevated.

On our one foray out that didn’t involve the doctor’s office, we discovered a wee little bookstore tucked into the folds of a shopping corner. And in one dusty little cubby-hole it had novels for sale for ninety-three cents. I bought an Alice McDermott, which I realized later I had already read, and John picked out Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas by Tom Robbins. That was the perfect Easter weekend read. And by the way, The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri is excellent.

I wouldn’t say I’m a BAD driver

2006-04-13T16:42:00.000-07:00

I’ve never caused an accident, and I’ve never received more than a parking ticket or occasional speeding ticket. But I’ve had plenty of adventures behind the wheel of a car.

One of my earliest driving memories is sneaking into my parents bedroom where they were both asleep, silently opening the cabinet where they kept the keys, tiptoeing back to my room, lifting the screen off my bedroom window and climbing out into the night. It was about midnight, I had never driven before (if you don’t count sitting on my mom’s lap as a child and steering us down an old country road), and I was wearing nothing but a blue teddy and a blue jean jacket. I slid into the station wagon, turned the ignition and as quietly as possible made my way down the driveway. I didn’t know where the lights were, so I made the first few miles driving twenty miles an hour guided by nothing but the moonlight. By the time I made it out of the neighborhood and onto the big farm to market road, I’d found them. Ten minutes later and I was outside my boyfriend’s house. I can say that all ended safely and well; two hours later I was back in bed as if nothing had ever happened. The next day, though, my Mom with a wry smile on her face said something about needing to better secure our windows.

My very first car was a 1968 Dodge Dart given to me by my great aunt. When I got the car in 1989 it had 38,000 miles on it. My great aunt drove it to the store and back and church on Sundays, literally. She kept meticulous records of each time it was serviced and every drop of gas that was added. In fact, when I got it, it still had the original factory plastic wrap on the seatbelts in the back seat. Most important to my parents, however, was that it was big and safe. Its lack of power steering and power breaks strengthened my arms and legs and it provided plenty of protection. One evening I was waiting to take a left turn, against traffic, on a busy rural highway, into the school parking lot. I was rear-ended by a car traveling 40 mph. That car was crumpled straight up into the driver’s seat; my rear bumper had a small v-shaped dent. The Dart car served me well. But the insurance company decided not to pay to repair it, and I moved into the realm of more modern machinery.

One weekend during college my girlfriend and I decided to take a road trip out of town. She drove and sang and talked and looked for music, all at the same time, and almost missed our exit. When I pointed this out she veered for the turn, just yards from the highway railing, at 60 mph on the elevated exit lane. Her little Nissan Sentra swerved straight toward the left hand railing, and then once she corrected it headed straight toward the right side railing. Time slowed to a crawl as I watched this scene play out before me. We alternately headed straight toward the left then the right railing, all the while several stories above the highway. I felt my heart stop. When my girlfriend finally got the car under control, we continued on, neither of us talking, until she said, “Wow, I handled that really well. Maybe I should go into trauma medicine.” A few hours later I got my voice (and heartbeat back.) Today my girlfriend is an excellent doctor.

When I moved to California, I promptly took my signing bonus down to the BMW dealership and bought myself the fastest, sleekest Z3 on the lot. It’s a silver convertible with black leather seats with seat warmers (once you try them you can’t go back), extra wide tires and an awesome sound system. This was to compensate myself, I reasoned, for the insanely long hours I worked at my new job. The best part of driving this car was when I left the office late at night. To get home I had to make my way around a three-lane highway onramp that circled 270 degrees. Imagine taking that curve at night, with the top down, the stereo blasting, and the road wide open for miles ahead. Each night I’d take it a little bit faster, the cool air whipping my face and hair, shouting out the lyrics to my favorite song. I never got tired of that road.

Ah, the memories.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For those of you concerned about my cat inflicted wounds, my index finger is out of commission and hurts like HE**. Call me, I could use the sympathy.

Karma's a Bitch

2006-04-12T18:14:00.000-07:00

Various friends and relatives have made it abundantly clear that they regard my new housekeeper indulgence with a mixture of jealousy and outright contempt. I’ve gotten used to the shunned phone calls, the unreturned emails, and the shouts of “I hate you” on the other end of the receiver. But today the cosmic pay-back for my loose lips (and fingers) occurred in earnest.

The morning started as usual – coffee and breakfast outside in the courtyard, a glance at the morning paper and a doze in the shade. Later I let the kids enjoy a romp in the (mostly) enclosed courtyard while I slipped inside for a quick peek at the internet. Five minutes later I discovered Piper sitting just two feet outside the courtyard near the breach in the fence that runs along the top of the wall. Then on my way through the house to reach her new perch I heard Mini, her nemesis, attack. It was an awful sounding flurry of cat hisses, growls and screeches accompanied by flying fur. It was so loud my neighbor came outside to inquire. She chased off mean, grey Mini and I went to collect Piper. However, Piper, traumatized by this attack on her coddled and comfortable in-door-only existence, was traumatized, and she regarded me as another attacker. While hoisting her out of danger and back into the safety of our yard, she gnawed my finger to the bone. But she was safe, and that was all that mattered.

Until I saw the copious streams of bright red blood flowing down my hand and onto the path at my feet. My vision got blurry, I started seeing black and I just barely made it over to my neighbor’s house before fainting. My stoic (and extremely medically handy) neighbor picked me up off of the sidewalk, cleaned, soothed and bandaged my wounds and got me back to the house where Piper was sitting serenely on the bed as if nothing had ever happened.

Now I sit here one tetanus shot and antibiotic’s course later typing this with one hand while my other hand rests elevated and swollen behind a mass of white gauze.

I had no idea that hiring a housekeeper could be so dangerous. I will try to be more careful about any future indulgences. (Or at least more secretive.)

The Video of Our Times

2006-04-11T22:11:00.000-07:00

Tonight I was lying on the couch reading The Economist (as an AMP is wont to do on a raucous spring break night) when a slight, almost hidden little article caught my attention.

First, watch this, something I am forever grateful to Mel for turning me onto.

Now, read this, from The Economist

HUANG YIXIN and Wei Wei, two students at the Guangzhou College of Fine Arts, were hanging around their dormitory last summer and decided—as one does—to turn on their webcam, put on their Houston-Rockets jerseys and lip-synch a few of their favourite songs by the Backstreet Boys. They uploaded the clips to Google Video, a free website full of such stuff. Their grimaces are over the top, self-consciously ludicrous. And they became famous almost instantly.

Astonishingly famous. Almost every Chinese internet user under a certain age has seen the “Back Dormitory Boys”, [and now, so have you! what would you do without Mel and me?] as they are now called. Web forums discuss their private lives. National radio and television shows have hosted them. Even their roommate, just visible in the background playing computer games, gets celebrity treatment.

Last month, a media company in Beijing called Taihe Rye hired Messrs Huang and Wei to continue their lip-synching, for cash. Song Ke, the boss, says that he has already placed his clients in a television commercial to be filmed next month for Pepsi Cola, one of China's largest advertisers. The plan, says Zhao Qian, another manager at Taihe, is to put the Back Dormitory Boys together with their idol, Yao Ming, a Chinese basketball prodigy who plays centre for the Houston Rockets. Messrs Huang and Wei will thus join the company of such global celebrities as David Beckham, Ronaldinho Gaucho and Janet Jackson as a public face of Pepsi in China.

To some of China's professors and cadres, all this is further confirmation, if any were needed, that the country has taken a worrisome turn. They had barely recovered from Sister Lotus, a young lady who published provocative photos of herself online in order to find love only to find fame instead, at least until the government censored her. Then came that other grassroots celebrity (also a Taihe client), Li Yuchun, a boyish-looking girl who became champion on “Super Girls”, a television show that lets viewers vote for their favourite star, who also unleashed potentially worrying amounts of enthusiasm for voting. And now the Back Dormitory Boys. The phenomenon indicates a modern social illness, says Pan Zhibiao, who is vice-president of the Guangdong Provincial Society of Aesthetics, and thus, of course, an expert in such matters.

You Go Boys!

Oh let me count the ways that I am in heaven

2006-04-11T14:40:00.000-07:00

I am presently sitting outside (reclining actually on my oh-so-soft and comfortable chaise lounge) on the patio of my courtyard in beautiful sunny SoCal. Not a cloud in the sky, a mere 73 degrees, Annie at my feet and Piper smelling the new blooms on our tropical plants. All while typing on my laptop and sipping a delicious beverage. This is after a refreshing hour of driving around in the convertible singing "This is the best day of my life," my own personal ditty.

Why is that? you ask. Because while I am luxuriating, basking in this wonderful life, someone else is cleaning my house. I do believe the house has never been cleaner. The hardwood floors gleam, as do my windows, and the sinks, bathtub and bathroom floors. Not a spot of dust, nor even a stray hair. (Which is saying a lot living with Annie and Piper.) The wood furniture is infused with orange scented oil, and the beds are plump and inviting with sheets smelling of springtime.

Life is good. Very good indeed.

Two Delicious Recipes Even an AMP Can Make

2006-04-09T06:39:00.000-07:00

For years I've looked for a scrumptious muffin recipe. Now I've found two. Both are from a terrific website called Epicurious, which hosts a collection of Gourmet Magazine and Bon Appetit recipes that have been rated and reviewed by hundreds of cooks. These two recipes are so good, I just had to include them here - with my own notes and suggestions of course. Enjoy!

Coconut and Macadamia Nut Banana Muffins
Notes:
This recipe will make about 2 dozen muffins. I halved it using 2 eggs and 2 bananas, and it turned out great.
If your macadamia nuts come salted make sure you use unsalted butter and omit the salt.

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon double-acting baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
3 large eggs
1 tablespoon freshly grated lemon zest
1 1/3 cups mashed ripe banana (about 3 large)
3 tablespoons sour cream
3/4 cup chopped macadamia nuts
1 cup sweetened flaked coconut, toasted lightly and cooled

Into a bowl sift together the flour, the baking powder, the baking soda, and the salt. In a large bowl with an electric mixer cream the butter with the sugars until the mixture is light and fluffy and beat in the vanilla, the eggs, 1 at at time, the zest, the banana, and the sour cream. Add the flour mixture, beat the batter until it is just combined, and stir in the macadamia nuts and the coconut. Divide the batter into well-buttered and floured muffin tins and bake in the middle of a preheated 350°F. oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. Remove from the pans and let them cool, right sides up, on a rack.

Mix-It-In Muffins
Notes:
This is a delicious basic muffin recipe that you can turn into any style you desire. For example you can mix in
- 1 chopped banana and 3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
- 1 cup toasted almonds, 3/4 cup dried cranberries, and 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
- 1 cup chopped drained canned pineapple and 1 cup sweetened flaked coconut
- 1 cup chopped dried apricots and 1 tablespoon poppy seeds
- or anything you can thing of

The dough is rather dry, but don't be fooled. The muffins turn out moist and delicious.

If your family can't eat all the muffins the morning they're made, consider halving the recipes because their taste and texture the second day is no where near as delicious as the first.

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter
1 cup sour cream
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 400°F. and butter twelve 1/3-cup muffin cups.
Into a bowl sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Melt butter and in a small bowl whisk together with sour cream, egg, and vanilla. Stir butter mixture (and additional ingredients; see note, above) into flour mixture until just combined. Divide batter among muffin cups and bake in middle of oven until golden and a tester comes out clean, about 20 minutes.

Makes 12 muffins.

Enjoy. If you try these, let me know what you think!

Life is Good

2006-04-08T20:18:00.000-07:00

I feel healthy and rejuvenated
The sun is shining, the flowers are blooming and the birds are chirping
Annie is at my side
And best of all John is home from a week abroad

I also feel fine because I

Hired a maid. You must pause here to reflect on how outrageously, gloriously happy that makes me. Only another woman with the same German-inherited and inescapable fastidiousness and cleaning compunction would understand.

Signed up for yoga classes. My septuagenarian French neighbor says those aren't a luxury but rather a requirement. She's been going every Monday morning years. I will try to catch up.

Saw Marvin Hamlisch in Concert. He's absolutely one of my favorites. And as if that weren't enough, our symphony's director announced that he will be our new principal pops conductor!

Bought a stunningly, breath-takingly beautiful wedding gown. It also, unfortunately, took away a lot of my pocketbook.

There you have it. Four things to make you happy when you’re feeling down.

The truth is I had a bit of buyer’s remorse after plunking down the hefty sum for that wedding dress and couldn’t help feeling a little disconsolate.

I think I may have to go clothes shopping to cheer myself up, she says with wink!

What’s an anemic to do on a rainy day but sit on her couch and read, between naps, that is?

2006-04-04T18:26:00.000-07:00

Today’s treasure is Interpreter of Maladies, a collection of short stories by Jhumpa Lahiri. This is Jhumpa’s first major work and all the more astonishing for it. (I will be buying her second book from Amazon as soon as I'm finished here.) The stories involve people in India and America across generations in different stages of life and love. They include a mix of servants, co-workers, arranged marriages, adulterers, precocious children, struggling immigrants and other lonely souls. I think I smell a curry cooking as I read! Each chronicle is captivating, thought-provoking and entirely different from the previous ones. In each I’ve gathered insight into unique and interesting people, become sympathetic to their causes and curious about their lives after the stories end. In other words, I HIGHLY recommend it.

Tired of reading about reading? New, non-literary posts coming soon. I promise!

Four-legged Kids, Anemia and a Southern California Weekend

2006-04-02T19:01:00.000-07:00

I found out that my exhaustion was, in fact, not internet related but rather due to the iron deficiency known as anemia. (I guess those late night meals of grilled cheese sandwiches and fries just weren’t doing the trick after all.) So, apart from a trip to Einstein Bagels, this bod has been firmly planted on the living room couch for three solid days. Friday and Saturday were mostly spent sleeping, but Sunday I was awake enough to savor 4, yes FOUR, episodes of Veronica Mars and enjoy several lovely all-beef meals prepared by John. What would I do without him? Here’s a picture of me and the kids and the ronunculus John bought for us.

Okay, it’s a picture of my elbow and the kids, but trust me, after three days on the couch you wouldn’t want to see me anyway.

Rainy Day Reading Recommendations

2006-03-31T00:37:00.000-08:00

During our recent rainy days I’ve had ample opportunity to catch up on my reading, and I though I’d share a few of my discoveries with you.

My favorite books are the ones that transport me to new places or different times or introduce me to new people and experiences. That's what each of these four books do.

Fiction

Intuition by Allegra Goodman

In her latest book, Allegra explores the dynamics of a group of hungry post-docs, careful, plodding researchers, complacent technicians, and fame-starved scientists all working together in a biology research laboratory in the shadow (literally) of Harvard. The plot evolved rapidly and kept me in suspense, but I think the book’s main strength is its rich and intricately developed characters. Though I had no particular interest in reading about laboratory life when I began the book, by the time I finished it I felt as though I’d been immersed in today’s scientific research culture and as though I understand people who previously seemed foreign and impenetrable. Now that is the sign of a good writer, one who makes you enjoy reading about something you’re not even interested in.

Tip: Keep your dictionary handy for this one! Allegra is a vocabulary goddess.

Memories of My Melancholy Whores by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

In the opening pages the narrator, a ninety year old man explains that he will present the story of his life through the memories of his relationships women, or the lack thereof. It’s an enjoyable book, each page revealing a new facet of the story and punctuated by Gabo’s colorful language and descriptions. His fanciful words and unique turns of phrase are a delight to encounter, but in the end I feel let down by this narrator who doesn’t provide the richness I expect from Garcia Marquez. By the end of the book I’ve certainly learned something about the story teller, his long life, and his struggle for love, but I haven’t been transported to his land or time or actually met any of the people that he so vaguely introduces. And the story on its own, without the abundance of this context, is interesting but not compelling.

By contrast Garcia Marquez’s first installment of a three part memoir Living to Tell the Tale is hauntingly real. Though I read it over a year ago I still reflect in wonder at many of his adventures. My memory of them is as bright and clear as if I were actually there, and Gabo seems a person I have actually met. My advice: read the memoir not the novel.

The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar

This is a thought provoking book centered around the stories of love and loss of two very different families in present day Bombay. Two grandmothers separated by education, income and caste, one the other’s servant, and yet friends, struggle to make their way through life, each with her own shame and her own burdens. This book explores the complexities of relationships between servant and mistress, husband and wife, children and parents, wife and in-laws in modern Indian culture. Though parts of the story strain credibility and though the writing tends toward prosaic, the subject and the questions it inspires are intrinsically intriguing. Thrity’s book gives us a fascinating glimpse inside India and a colorful tapestry on which to view the human condition.

Non-Fiction

Synthetic Worlds: The Business and Culture of Online Games by Edward Castronova

Excellent book. Review coming soon!

Dear Readers - please tell me some of your favorites. I desperately need a new book to read!

Thank God for Bob

2006-03-30T00:34:00.000-08:00

When I walked by the kiosk on our campus quad and saw that it was stacked with books that had Dick Cheney’s face and the words ‘Son of Satan’ on them, I knew I was in for a treat. I just didn't know how delicious it would be.

Bob is one of my calculus students and a person who makes me roar out loud laughing. Some might think him a strange fellow with his dry, self-deprecating humor, his imposing height, his somewhat stand-offish demeanor, not to mention his Lyle Lovett inspired hair. I know I did, but that was before I had the pleasure of getting to know him.

Bob saw the pamphlets lying on my desk. The students who ran the kiosk had tried to get me to donate to their Hate-All-Republicans-Love-Only-Lyndon-LaRouche cause. I told them I’d think about it if they gave me some of their reading material. And I could see Bob eyeing them.

“You ever heard of this guy?” I ask.

“Yeah, he’s been running for president every year since about the time Nixon was elected.”

“Humm. I must have missed him,” I said.

“Is he out of jail?”

“What?”

“Yeah, he seems to spend a lot of time in jail. Gosh, I thought this was your politics.”

“No, I just picked them up for laughs,” I admitted.

“I’m a closet Republican myself. Being in California I have to be careful how loudly I say that.”

“The fact that you read the Wall Street Journal every day kinda tipped me off,” I told him.

“Really? I’ve been trying to cut back on news. My mom says I become depressing to talk to the more news I watch.”

“I know exactly what you mean, it’s so easy to get sucked in to cable news shows."

“Oh, I’m not addicted to cable news. It’s C-SPAN. I used to watch the Senate for hours on end. But now I'm forbidden."

“Don’t you hate it when your mom takes away your C-SPAN?” I teased.

This conversation, this Bob, is just too good to be true. I never know what he's going to say. But whatever it is he says it with an impassive face, drooping eyes and a somewhat nasal intonation, which somehow makes it even funnier. I stuck the LaRouche magazines in a big envelop so no one would see him with the scandalous material. “We’ll compare notes at class,” I told him.

A couple of hours later I caught up with Bob outside our classroom. “I felt like I had to read these by flashlight under my bedcovers so no one would see me. You’ve got to read the stuff on Lagrange.”

“The mathematician?” I asked, incredulous.

“Yeah and the Fundamental Theorem of Algebra. You’ve got to read about how it can be used to explain something or other about existential societal influences.”

Once I recovered from this gem I asked him about the sections that compare Republicans to Hitler.

“Oh, I always like those. It’s usually the sign of good and logical intellectual argument.”

We talked and laughed for several more minutes.

Tonight when I got home I asked John if he’d ever heard of Lyndon LaRouche.

“Yeah. He’s the perennial candidate for president from the Libertarian party. I like him. He’s the only presidential candidate I’ve ever sat in a room and had a conversation with.”

You Deserve It Too

2006-03-29T16:32:00.000-08:00

Reader: So, AMP you say you deserve it. You say you’ve earned this fabulous southern California lifestyle with the great weather, the beaches, and the ocean. Not to mention the fabulous fiancé and the cush job. Tell us, what exactly did you do to deserve it?

AMP:
I worked 18 hour days for 2 years straight
I took calls from Japan at midnight and from Europe at 5am
I spent over half my nights alone in strange hotel rooms
I flew to England, Germany, France and back all within one week
Over and over again
I lost so much weight I dropped below 100 pounds
I aquired raccoon-like dark circles around my eyes
I lost my mind and then got it back again
I met interesting, amazing people whom I was too exhausted to appreciate
I developed a most discriminating taste in sushi
I accumulated an obscene amount of frequent flyer miles
And I made a hell of a lot of money
But most of all,
I gave up my sanity, my health and 2 years of my life for something that really didn’t matter

Readers, I hope you find something that makes your heart soar and your mind thrive. I hope that you find happiness in your life. That you set your priorities right. That you might learn from my mistakes, because you deserve it too.

One Gardening Adventure at a Time

2006-03-28T09:48:00.000-08:00

During our recent rainy days while I was tucked snuggly under a blanket reading a book, my garden was springing to life. Our front yard turned green under my watchful eyes, but the back yard did so in secrecy. To my surprise and horror, my vegetable garden and flower garden from last year have re-seeded. Lettuce is growing not only in the garden and but also in the path. Tomato plants are making their way up in both the vegetable garden and the flower garden, and weeds are lush and green throughout. Pink and white cosmos have shot up in the cracks in the sidewalk and my oriental poppy plants are now the size of bushes. Daisies, bachelor buttons, sages, sunflowers, California poppies and more form a soothing expanse of yellows, oranges, pinks, and blues. It’s a beautiful southern California gardening cacophony. Our problem here is not how to make something grow, but how to make what you actually want grow. But these gardening adventures would have to wait, our weekend was designated to the front yard.

Our goal is to transform the yard from an English cottage type to an open and relaxing courtyard that will complement our Spanish style home. We’ve already cleared the space and leveled the ground, planted a privacy hedge and some palm trees - you should see the way I handle a pick-axe, installed a huge three-tier fountain, and bought a half ton of flagstones for a meandering path. This weekend we created that path. We set each of the stones, we pulled the weeds caused by the rain, and we mulched.

Mulching was indeed a new gardening adventure. The city recycling center lets you take away all of the dark brown, finely decomposed treasure you can carry. We watched spellbound as a bulldozer filled John’s truck bed to the brim with the stuff. Then we shuddered at the realization that what took the bulldozer mere minutes load would take us with our shovels and buckets hours to unload. John helped pass the time with his rendition of such gardening classics as “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the comin’ of the mulch…” and “Swing low, sweet shovel o' mulch, coming for to carry you home…” Eventually, we conquered the challenge.

The result of all this hard work is both aesthetically pleasing and acutely painful. The front yard looks good, but John and I are in dire pain. Yesterday I could barely lift my arm to write on the chalk board, and John said he had trouble raising his diet coke can to his mouth.

Luckily, the forecast for this weekend calls for rain.

Grandpa

2006-03-25T09:07:00.000-08:00

My grandpa and I were born just seven days and 69 years apart, so maybe that’s what gave us our special connection. For one reason or another grandpa and I were inseparable; I thought he was the most amazing person who ever lived.

As a child I spent most school day afternoons in my grandparent’s large, dusty house filled with old papers, funny smells and potential treasures everywhere. I loved staring at the photos of them when they were younger and wondering what their lives were like back then. How did they ever manage to get so old?

My grandpa and I would work in his garden picking vegetables, planting seed, staking the green bean stalks, and collecting grub worms in an old coffee can – one of my favorite jobs. Grandma and I would bake chocolate chip cookies (I still use her recipe) and play dress up with her flamboyant jewelry and hats. Sometimes grandpa and I would teach ourselves to play a song – me on the organ and him on the violin. We must have made an awful racket, but grandma never said a thing.

As I grew older he and I were still very close. When I went away to college we exchanged letters, which are now safe in a shoe box under my bed. But a rift in the family, too complex and sordid to explain, kept us apart for several years.

By the time I was in graduate school I visited him again, this time at his apartment in an ‘independent living’ center. I remembered the previous time I’d seen him and how I’d hugged him goodbye saying, “You are my favorite grandfather.” He hugged me back, “You are my favorite granddaughter.” And then, “You are my only granddaughter. Right?” I didn’t want to correct him, though he actually had three more who each had children of their own.

My parents had warned me that he’d aged significantly since that last visit, so it was with some trepidation that I opened the door to his apartment. I found him sitting in his bedroom in his old, worn, brown recliner peering out the window. There wasn’t much to look at, just a parking lot and a few trees in the distance.

It was wonderful to see him again, to hold his hand and see his smile. We chatted for some time, and then he asked me, “Do you see that dog in the tree?”

I was stunned, afraid of what this might mean. But I leaned over and looked out the window. “No, I don’t see a dog up in a tree.”

“It’s right there,” he said pointing, surprised and disappointed that I couldn’t see it too.

“You see, it’s a momma dog with her babies. Look, now the father has come home and the mom’s asking him where’s he been, why’s he so late. Don’t you see ‘em?”

I looked again. My heart was sinking. In the years since our last visit my grandfather must have started to lose his mind.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I still don’t see it.”

“That’s too bad. It’s a terrible thing not to have a good imagination.”

I was so mad at him and happy at the same time, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Grandpa was older, but he was still my grandpa, just like I remembered him.

Cleaning Shoes

2006-03-24T16:18:00.000-08:00

Ah… Friday. The luxury of no school. I celebrated by sleeping in. An internet addiction can take it’s toll you know, and I needed sleep. Annie tried to wake me with a pounce and a lick, but I rebuffed her like an old pro. At 10am the doorbell rang; it was the termite man. I greeted him in my pink pajamas, with messy hair and make-up smudged eyes. John had warned me that they’d want to poke around the outside of the house. No problem, I thought, I’ll hardly know they’re there. But he was wrong - they wanted to come inside the house. Uh, okay, I said, and let them pass. Then the flurry began.

Quick, grab all the dishes, I told myself, and pile them into the sink. Race past them and scoop up the dirty clothes from the floor. At that moment, with my arms overflowing with clothes I nearly said, “We’re not really slobs.” But then I realized how ridiculous that would sound with books scattered across the living room floor, mail piled on the kitchen counter and a mound of socks waiting to be folded on the dining room table. Take that image and add a layer of cat hair and the remnants of a tissue that went through the dryer floating over the floor. Now you’ve almost got the picture. There’s also the overflowing trash can and recycle bin, the partially sorted laundry on the kitchen floor and the bucket full of vegetable scraps and used coffee grinds outside the kitchen door that hasn’t magically made it’s way to the compost. It felt hopeless, but my embarrassment compelled me to try to clean.

By the time they left, an hour later, I’d managed to get the house into some semblance of decency. It was tidy, but not yet clean. It still needed a good vacuuming, mopping, and dusting. But instead, I crawled back in bed for a well earned nap.

Why not get a maid, you ask.

My mind does a funny thing when it comes to disposable income, it automatically calculates the shoe exchange rate. It goes like this: I could pay $70 dollars a week for a maid, or buy a nice pair of shoes each week (or a fabulous pair every other week.) For now I just can’t bear to throw away that shoe purchasing power, when there’s always loud music and wine to help me get through a couple of hours of cleaning. And my feet have been amply rewarded. You name the outfit, and I've got the perfect pair of shoes to match.

Cat Math

2006-03-23T00:43:00.000-08:00

Piper can be a very active cat - when she’s not sleeping, that is. She likes to explore every conceivable nook and cranny. She'll hide in the bathtup or behind the bedroom door and then surprise me with a big leap when she thinks I don't see her. She also likes to hang out in paper grocery bags and sneak sips of other peoples’ drinks when they’re not looking. She’s a huge fan of twist ties, chasing them mercilessly across the hardwood floors, and push-pins, which she can remove from any bulletin board no matter how inconveniently located. Most of all, she’s enthralled by gravity. Her favorite game is to climb a high shelf and then one by one knock all of its items onto the ground.

However most of her time, an exorbitant amount of time, is spent sleeping on her little red beanbag cube. When I get home at night I find her in the exact same place and position she was in when I left her eight hours earlier. I don’t think she moves the entire time I’m gone, which leads me to the topic for today: cat hair.

See her beautiful fur coat? It sheds! Copiously. Here’s what that fashionable red cube looks like when Piper does finally get up for the day.

I’ve done a little measuring and calculating, and here’s what I’ve discovered:

The amount of hair that Piper leaves behind in one day could be made into a ribbon 1 mm wide that would reach from my shoulder to my finger tip. In a year that ribbon would be longer than 3 and half football fields. And in the course of her lifetime, the amount of fur Piper sheds would form a ribbon over a mile long.

I don’t even want to know how many hours of cleaning that translates to.

My Dog, the Word Snob

2006-03-20T19:59:00.000-08:00

I’m not sure what Annie does during the day when I’m at school. But I have a suspicion that it involves lying on our bed, which isn’t allowed. And I think she taunts the cat occasionally as well. Other than that, I haven’t a clue. Does she read the paper? Does she surf the web? Does she get Word-of-the-Day emails from Dictionary.com?

Here are just a few of the things I’ve heard her say lately.

Annie to me: Mom, I’m tired of the crapulous hangers-on that I find sprawled throughout the house on the mornings after your Karaoke and Martini parties.

Annie to Piper (the cat): Mom’s thoughts seem to wander peripatetically, probably from one blog idea to another, as we perambulate through the neighborhood together each morning.

Annie to me: Mom, I think John bought you this manse because his fortitude crumbles when it meets his uxorious nature.
(To be clear, our house is a mere 3BR-2B affair, but to Piper and Annie it IS a manse compared to our old studio apartment.)

Annie to herself: I think my parents like to fancy themselves dilettantes, what with their new season tickets to the symphony and all. I wonder if they miss me when they’re there, surrounded by the city’s social elite who no doubt consider my parents mere parvenu and hardly worthy of attention. I bet these are the same kind of people who only want purebreds. Let me at their ankles!

What will that dog say next?

My St. Patrick's Day

2006-03-17T18:30:00.000-08:00

My day started as usual: up by dawn, sipping coffee and checking email, watching the neighborhood matriarchs march by. From the spry youngster in her sixties to the more mature matron in her nineties, these ladies are perfectly coiffed, not a hair or an eyelash out of place.

An email message from Charlie caught my eye. You may remember my trickster department chairman, the one with his own dry cleaners. Apparently I included an unmentionable in the last load of clothing I gave him. I sank with embarrassment as I read. How exactly does one respond to that sort of message from your boss? Luckily I was able to avoid him all day.

After school I stopped by the neighborhood pub for a glass of Guinness with the usual crowd. Barbara Anne rolled up in her motorized scooter and wobbled inside with her cane. She ordered a whisky with ice and polished it off. After her second the sweet bartender wrapped her up in her coat and sent her rolling away. A few minutes later the bartender of a another pub called to ask if we might have Barbara Anne’s coat. It’s a mystery what she does on that scooter. We just hope she doesn’t drive drunk.

By the time I got home the postman had come, and I discovered a letter from Billie Sue. Here’s what I found inside:

Crisp green cash
St. Patty’s Day stickers
And a little green note that read

When Irish Eyes are smiling very big and the piper plays a jig, here’s a little green to eat some pig
signed Mom.

So that’s what we did: ate a yummy (not-so-Irish) meal.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you and yours!

The Great Hail Storm of Aught-Six

2006-03-16T07:13:00.000-08:00

I wore my pink shoes on Friday, but to no avail.

Until…Saturday morning at 2am. Rain crashed against our bedroom windows, thunder crackled, lightening streaked the sky. And Annie raced under our covers. By 4am we had faded back to sleep. But at 7 we awoke to a new sound hammering our windows. Hail. Pea size pieces of hail had formed a thick white layer in our courtyard. I felt as though I were heaven.

Annie, by contrast, thought she had wound up in hell. Which reminds me of another family member…

Hurricane season in Houston is a time of magnificent thunderstorms, flash floods, downed trees and power lines and unfortunately sometimes much worse. For me these storms are cathartic; they bring a sense of freshness and renewal. It’s as though the world stops for a time, giving us a chance to reflect on our priorities.

During one storm I remember lying in bed, hearing the rain batter my window and the tree branches rustle against the house, closing my eyes and imagining the cool clean water splashing my face. Suddenly I was jolted alert by, “KK! Get in the bathroom!”

Billie Sue doesn’t exactly share my love of a good thunderstorm. To her any amount precipitation, no matter how small, is cause for alarm. When this storm was first predicted Billie Sue started laying in supplies. By the time she called me into the bathroom we had over 350 cans of food and 50 bottles of juice piled across the kitchen counters, in the pantry, above the refrigerator, inside the china cabinet, and anywhere else she could squeeze them. She even bought new metal shelves just for the provisions. Not all of this food was bought for this particular weather crisis; when I perused the cans I saw that many expired years ago.

“Come on, KK. Helen’s already in there.”

“What about King Richard?” I asked.

“Hah! He’s still asleep and said not to bother him,” she utters with exasperation. “If the cancer doesn’t kill him, this storm might! Come on, let’s go.”

And so the three of us spent the next four hours together in a six foot by 3 foot bathroom, while the unflappable King Richard was snuggled warm and peaceful in his bed.

During our southern California hail storm, we did our own form of provisioning. John and I made the futon into a bed in front of our huge living room window so that we wouldn’t miss a drop. We brought out the down comforters and flannel sheets. We surrounded ourselves with books and warm coffee, and we silently prayed for it to last all day.

I think Annie wished she were in the bathroom with Billie Sue.

Beer Anyone?

2006-03-14T13:29:00.000-08:00

It’s 12:30pm and I’m about to head in to work. I crave the taste of a beer. But there’s no time. Should I worry about this desire? Let’s see, I’ve had three – no four – beers in the space of four days. Though I can’t remember the last time I had one before then. Surely four beers does not an alcoholic make.

My mom used to worry about this too. “I’ve had one martini a night for five nights in a row. Does this mean I’m addicted?” she’d fret. “Your grandfather was an alcoholic, you know? We have to be careful. They say it runs in the family.”

“Mom, grandpa was your step-father. You couldn’t have gotten it from him,” I remind her.

“Oh. Right,” she says.

She doesn’t remember her real father. He was French, and his trucking company was seized by the Nazis during World War II. The last time he was seen alive was behind the fence of a concentration camp. I don’t think either of us ever asked grandma about his proclivity for a cocktail or two.

My mom’s step-father, my grandfather, was indeed an alcoholic. He had his very own tap installed in his make-shift bar on the back porch. I remember him wheeling in kegs on a dolly, bought just for that purpose. I remember the way he smelled, always a mixture of booze and after-shave, and when I catch that same smell on other men, it still brings back loving memories. Eventually my grandfather existed in a perpetual state of drunkenness, and when my grandmother became very ill, he took out his service revolver and shot himself. That was some time ago, while I was in college; I couldn’t sleep for weeks without all the lights on.

I saw a man outside the neighborhood bottle shop debating whether to enter. At first he stood with his back against the building chewing his nails, staring hard at the ground. Then he paced the sidewalk and made his way right up to the door. His hand almost reached the handle, and then he turned back around. He did this again and again. Eventually he walked inside. I wonder what has happened to him.

I know that both my mother and I are healthy and well, but I feel deeply for others who suffer from this disease. It hurts so many people around them. For a truly excellent book about one family’s struggle with their daughter’s alcohol addiction, please read George McGovern’s Terry.

And Who Should I See This Morning?

2006-03-14T08:12:00.000-08:00

My friend the western blue jay.

When we first moved into this house, and I started my garden from scratch, one bright, handsome blue jay would always appear. Each day as I weeded and hoed, put down new seed and watered, he’d be there just a few feet away.

Did I know him, I wondered. Was he really a bird? Why did he follow me so?

My grandpa and I used to be avid bird watchers and gardeners and all around merry-makers. So I started to wonder… could this be him? Checking up on me; showing his constancy, love and support?

I decided to believe that it was.
A little spiritual magic never hurt anyone, now did it?

Help Me Forget

2006-03-13T22:40:00.000-08:00

My heart doesn’t flitter any fly anymore. It used to skip and summersault and spin across the day. Now it just sits here, heavy, in my chest.

School is still in session; students keep crowding the campus; the highway is bustling with traffic; the sun still rises each morning; and every day more weeds grow in my garden. I go on about my day, while my chest aches, and my eyes burn, and I’m afraid my voice will give way and let out a deep, mournful cry.

I try to read my book, but I can’t concentrate. I wear obnoxiously happy clothes – pink and black striped tights today – but they don't even make me smile. I play my favorite CD again and again and then some more, but I find no solace in it. I’m too tired to phone my friend Jen.

The pub might help me forget, I think, so I stop by after class. Mr. Jack bought me a beer, and I sipped it slowly with lime. I listened to the stories – how to get rid of bee hives; how not to install insulation; what it was like to be an aerospace engineer during World War II. I didn’t tell my own – no one wants to hear about cancer and hospitals and pneumonia and little girls left behind. Music played on the jukebox while we ate our pretzels and smiled at the sweet bartender.

I head for the door, say goodbye to my new friends and go home to walk the dog. Maybe a few math problems will help me forget.

When in Doubt Wear Pink

2006-03-10T15:41:00.000-08:00

I’ve had a hard week. The skies turned gray and stayed that way; I found out that a young coworker has cancer; a good friend moved across the county; and my best friend left me for a boy.

I closed the drapes, I stayed inside and when I had no choice but to venture out, I wore pink.

Pink looks good at work,

in the classroom,

and even when the day is over.

Any Given Monday

2006-03-07T07:43:00.000-08:00

1. The Meeting
First, I spent a productive hour in a meeting with other faculty members. Then, the meeting devolved into a gripe session about the governor’s recent visit to our campus. Many faculty members feel that our president and chancellor should have sought their approval before allowing Schwarzenegger on school grounds. You should be proud – only two outbursts passed these not-yet-tenured lips.

My view may be a bit simplistic, but I figure one photo-op isn't a bad price to pay for support of massive funding increases for schools like ours. The inconvenience was minimal, and I doubt anyone inferred from his presence that our college is a bastion of political support for the governor. Anyone who watched the last state election - with Schwarzenegger’s initiatives on the ballot - knows what extensive efforts the unions took to defeat his propositions. Lest I dimish all chance for tenure, I will stop there.

2. The Office Hours
There’s nothing like working with students to lift your spirits and refocus your mind. Last night I held online office hours for my Calculus II class.

Here’s how it works: I sit on the couch in my (pink) pajamas with cookies and milk at hand and my laptop ready. At 9pm we all logon to the same website and dial into the same conference line. At this website we can draw on the electronic whiteboard – equations, graphs, doodles – and chat in the textbox. We take turns discussing difficult problems and deriving their solutions. This tool has been an invaluable for helping those students who work fulltime and can’t visit me on campus during the day. Here we are in action with an excerpt of erudite student chat:

Bob starts to write what he got for the second derivative. “This is the one that makes me swear.”

“They all make you swear,” says Rita.

The banter continues. I’m not sure how they manage it, but my students can solve math problems on the computer screen, chat through the text window and talk on the phone line all at once.

Bob was temporarily disconnected.

“Sorry, I just got kicked off.”

“For swearing.” Rita doesn’t miss a beat.

3. The Midterm

I could procrastinate no longer. I promised the midterms back on Tuesday. This is for a math class of elementary education majors. We delve into the how’s and why’s of math concepts that most people take for granted, and we explore techniques for introducing these topics to children. So, an exam in this class isn’t of the typical equation – solution variety. Instead the exams contain questions about how to explain topics or how to correct a student’s misconception. On this particular test I included a question about division by zero. “How do you explain the difference between 5 divided by 0 and 0 divided by 5?” I asked.

Oh Lord help me not to swear in front of the class or quit my job. Seventy-five percent of my students got this wrong; they didn’t understand the meaning of either. And yes, we spent copious amounts of time on this concept in class. Dear Lord, I promise not to let these people be elementary school teachers until they know that it's impossible divide a number by zero.

4. The Other Half

Meanwhile, John and Piper spent the evening holding down the beanbag and playing EA Sports (It's In The Game!) NCAA football. That evening, Texas beat Texas Tech 66 - 0.

I wonder what Tuesday will bring…

Tips & Advice from an Internet Addict

2006-03-06T16:43:00.000-08:00

Tips
I’ve discovered some remarkable websites during my tour, and I want to share some of the best with you.

One of my all-time favorites is Epicurious. We all have to cook, right? Especially those of you with family members who aren’t quite old enough to dial for pizza. Epicurious is more than just an online collection of recipes (principally from Bon Appetite and Gourmet magazines). It also contains reader/chef reviews and a place for you to store your favorites and even your own creations. Try it. You’ll like it.

DearReader is another favorite. At this site you can read excerpts of books, exchange emails or chat with authors, and submit your reviews and comments for a chance to win prizes. In just two short weeks I've already won a set of Penguin classics. But be forewarned: this site is addictive!

Wikipedia is an online, fully editable encyclopedia made by people like you and me. It has truly restored some of my faith in humanity. How is the quality controlled, you ask? By people zooming around the website wearing little red capes with the word geek on the back. These administrators look for vandalism and misinformation and work to settle disputes among contributors. Just last week the English version of the encyclopedia topped one million articles. Check it out, you can be sure your students already are.

This whole blogging business is pretty fun isn’t it? If you’d like to start one of your own, I recommend Blogger. It free and fast and easy to get started. Plus its run by our favorite Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, the guys at Google. It even has helpful articles like “How Not to Get Fired for Blogging” and “How to Make Sure Your Mom Never Reads Your Blog.”

Hey, and while you’re at, go ahead and check out Frappr. It’s a mapping tool people can use to keep up with their worldly friends. The best way to learn about it is by experiencing it. Come see the Absent Minded Professor’s Frappr Group.

Maybe you’re ready to start your own website but don’t know where to begin. You need Webmonkey. This site includes everything you need to create and run your website. Not only does it have easy to follow instructions for beginners (like an invaluable HTML cheat-sheet), but it also has a regular flow of articles on the latest web tools, including this excellent one, described below.

If you haven’t already discovered Flickr, it's a site people use to post and share photos. Several creative and industrious people have written some pretty cool applications that access these photos. It's impossible to pick a favorite, but one really fun one is this screen saver that displays a digital clock where each number is a photo from Flickr. I love it!

Too much information about technology and the internet? I’ve got the perfect antidote. His name is Tony Long, aka The Luddite, and he's a columnist for Wired Magazine. It’s an absolute joy to read his rantings about car alarms, cell phones ringers, microwave oven timers and more. You’ll always get a chuckle from his articles and perhaps even a new word or too.

To energize that vocabulary of yours try Dictionary.com’s Word of the Day feature. You can have them email it to you, along with its meaning, pronunciation and several clever sentences using the word, OR you can set it to display on your computer’s homepage. It really works. Just the other day Annie told me that her kibble with gravy is a poor simulacrum of her toothsome doggie treats. Oh, and if you’re looking for a cool yet unobtrusive homepage, try the easily customizable one offered by google.

Finally, you are definitely not getting enough out of the internet if you are not reading these GREAT blogs. Crazy Aunt Purl is written by a hilarious, recently divorced, displaced southern knitter with four cats. WaiterRant is a chronicle of nightly adventures in the New York city restaurant world published by an extremely gifted writer. El Guapo in DC is a Guatemalan with a riotous sense of humor living in our nation's capital. This is my new favorite. Please don't miss it!

Advice
Always pair housework with wine (or beer or hard liquor.) It makes the time go by so much faster, and it works wonders at adjusting your standards of cleanliness.

Please share your favorite sites - leave a comment.

No School on Fridays

2006-03-03T21:22:00.000-08:00

So what will I do this Friday? After our lovely early morning stroll with our septuagenarian French neighbor, Annie and I debated and then decided that we should lie on the couch, watch movies, make cookies, and make chicken enchiladas for dinner. (Piper said she didn’t care what heck we did as long as it didn’t infringe on her fourteen hour nap.)

Two hours later Annie and I decided we needed a little more girlish fun, so we went shopping! Doggie style. We picked out several very delicious looking treats, one chew toy (see picture below), gravy for the kibble, and some kitty grass for the cat. My idea, not Annie’s.

Not only did Annie shop for goodies today, she also peed right in the middle of the store. Annie can pee with the best of them; she even lifts her leg and everything. If dogs pee on things to establish territory or ownership, as some people say, then we own some pretty nice property and apparently part of PetSmart,

When I told John about our new acquisition, he retorted, "PetSmart's share price is down today, must be the cleaning supply expenses."

If this is all getting a bit too mushy (or stinky) for you, don’t worry. I have some math to make you feel better. [See the post below]

Who was the mathematician who said “When I feel down, I do math to feel better. When I’m happy, I do math to stay happy….”

Math to Wow Your Friends - Part I

2006-03-03T21:15:00.000-08:00

Is it possible to write the number like 0.232323... as a fraction?
We call numbers like this repeating, non-terminating decimals, and the answer is Yes!

Here’s how:
Give the number a name, like n.

Since the number repeats every two digits, multiply it by 100.

Now, subtract n from both sides.

Then solve for n by dividing both sides by 99

Voila!
It turns out that most types of numbers can be written as fractions. These types of numbers are called rational numbers. Numbers that cannot be written as fractions, like the square root of 2, are called irrational numbers.

John said I needed a witty ending like, Whenever someone calls you irrational, say "No I'm not. I can be written as a fraction!"
Are you happy now John?!

Part II - coming soon

Absent Mindedness Strikes Again!

2006-03-03T07:11:00.000-08:00

My day started at 6:05am with a speedy and imperative trip to the 24-hour grocery store. I hate going to the grocery store. But since we were to the point of having our cereal with chocolate soy milk, drinking our coffee black, and not even being able to make pb&j’s, I bit the bullet and grocery shopped. One hundred forty-five dollars and twenty-two minutes later I was back at home making coffee and opening the curtains to the day.

It was while I was sitting on the couch watching the early morning walkers pass by that I realized I had left my notebook in my calculus classroom last night. On Wednesdays and Thursday s I have evening classes that don’t end until 10pm. Needless to say by the time those classes end I am ready to hit the road. I drive home thinking about how happy Annie will be to see me and dreaming that John will have dinner ready for me. Annie never disappoints.

Usually the four of us watch something on the Tivo and then head off to bed. And that’s exactly what we did last night.

So, it wasn’t until this morning that I realized my dreadful mistake. That notebook contained not only my course notes but also official school documents with the students’ ID numbers on them.

Let’s see. So far this week I have:

1. Left above mentioned super-important calculus notebook in the classroom & now can't find it
2. Failed to check my paper mailbox for 2 weeks in a row and missed a big administrative deadline
3. Forgotten to grade a homework assignment that I had promised to my students by Tuesday, so they could have it to study for their big test today - oops!
4. Discovered that my pink converse tennis shoes don't actually go with every outfit - despite my previous assertion that pink is the new black.

[But in my defense, I had a life altering week. I discovered that through a long lost girl friend and 2 other degrees of separation, I am connected to the producer of my favorite TV show Veronica Mars! You can’t beat that.]

At 7:00am I called Charlie, our trusty department chair. He usually gets in early, so I thought he might be able to search the classroom for me. He said he’d do it.

So I waited. And waited.

I waited so long I completed an entire calculus assignment, no doubt with plenty of mistakes, given how worried I was.

And finally…I emailed.

------------------------------------------

From: KK
Sent: Thursday, March 2, 2006 10:02 AM
To: Charlie
Subject: did you find it?

[message body blank]

------------------------------------------

From: Charlie
To: KK
Sent: 3/2/06 10:10 AM
Subject: RE: did you find it?

Well...... I can't say for sure...... I may have, and then again, I may not have.... :-(

You're just going to have to give me more clothes for you to find out.... *

Pretty evil, huh??? ;-)

*[Charlie also runs a dry cleaning business]

--------------------------------------------

From: KK
Sent: Thursday, March 2, 2006 10:11 AM
To: Charlie
Subject: RE: did you find it?

Grrrrrr....

--------------------------------------------

From: Charlie
To: KK
Sent: 3/2/06 10:24 AM
Subject: RE: did you find it?

so, how did you forget your notebook???

--------------------------------------------------

From: KK
Sent: Thursday, March 2, 2006 10:26 AM
To: Charlie
Subject: RE: did you find it?

You are truly cruel.

I'll remember this.

You know I'm an uptight type A personality - you're KILLING ME!
:-)

------------------------------------------

From: Charlie
To: KK
Sent: 3/2/06 10:31 AM
Subject: RE: did you find it?

Of course I know the type of personality you are.... shit.... my wife is way worse. Do you know that EVERY FREAKIN' day she calls about 2to 3 times when I'm down at the store just to find out how the business side of the store is doing...... she freakin drives me NUTS!!! I'll also have you know that prior to when we started this business, when I would work hours on end here on campus, she would call literally EVERY DAY at about 5 to 5:30 to ask the same freakin question!!! which was.... "so, what time are you coming home." Now, this wasn't necessarily because she was anxious to see me, but more because, she had had it with the kids (which by the way, we only had at most three, at that time) and just wanted me to take over.

Well, I guess the only thing that I can say to you as I would normally say to her is........."why do you ask questions that you don't want the answer to???" :-)

--------------------------------------

From: KK
Sent: Thursday, March 2, 2006 10:36 AM
To: Charlie
Subject: RE: did you find it?

If you want sympathy, you've come to the wrong place.

Ok, look. I forgot the notebook because I'm an absent minded professor.

HOWEVER, though absent minded, I am still capable of forming a tag-team with your dear sweet wife - so that we may call you SIX TIMES A DAY.

Don't put it past me!

Your dear sweet assistant professor,

-----------------------------------------

From: Charlie
To: KK
Sent: 3/2/0610:43 AM
Subject: RE: did you find it?

So, the real question is how important is the true answer for you??? Hm.... can I smell extortion.... And I think that I'm just going to have to turn off my cell phone from now on, huh?
-----------------------------------

Radio silence as time ticks by.

-----------------------------------

From: Charlie
To: KK
Sent: 3/2/06 2006 11:15 AM
Subject: RE: did you find it?

Hey... where are you??? I've been waiting for your reply..... ;-(

--------------------------------------

From: KK
Sent: Thursday, March 2, 2006 11:34AM
To: Charlie
Subject: RE: did you find it?

I needed a quick nap. Remember, YOU assigned me night classes?

Now I have to walk the dog and get ready for my eventual departure from the house. :(

I must say, you are a formidable email antagonist. I would have been able to break a lesser emailer by now.
K

---------------------------------------

From: KK
Sent: Thursday, March 2, 2006 1:24 PM [I’m at school]
To: Charlie
Subject: RE: did you find it?

YESSSS!!!! Try to imagine the clenched fist of victory that accompanies this.

thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you

Thanks for putting it on my desk.

Oh, and when I write this up for my blog do you want me to call you Aldo or Charlie?

-------------------------------------------

And so this one ends happily.

But then they usually do. You know why?

Because I have a job where I can get away with wearing pink converse tennis shoes, and I can step right outside my office door and see the ocean.

Don’t hate me because I live in socal – I earned it. (But that’s another story.)

Some of My Favorite Student Emails

2006-03-02T21:57:00.000-08:00

dr.k hi I know is kind of late to ask you this but i dont understand this problem at all I am stuck on this i have looked at the example over and over i still cant figure it out can you help me and if i dont get a chance to finish my homework can i make it up and get some credit for it the reason i didnt start on this earlier is beacause i have had to work alot of overtime and i have had to help my boys out with their work at school and one of my boys is doing special projects at school i have had to take him here and there thank you.

Ah, she finally found the period key!

Dr. K,

I have just one question. Well, so far I have only one question. This is probably the first of many questions.

I do not believe you said whether we need to memorize the table of integrals for our test. Because I don’t recall you spent very much time on this.

It would be helpful if you respond by today.

Thank you,

YYYYYYYY

Let’s see. The CRC lists 728 equations in its table of integrals. I think I’ll tell him yes.
IS HE OUT OF HIS MIND?! This is like asking if he should memorize statistical tables or logarithmic tables - okay, sorry, I can't think of any non-math examples.

Dr. K,
My name LTJG XXXXXX. I am the Education Services Officer on USS ZZZZZ. I am requesting an extension for 4 assignments and 1 exam from today, Thurs 02 MAR 06, until midnight Sunday 05 Mar 06 for your student, YYYYY. We are currently at sea and scheduled to come back into port for two days on Saturday. There have been some issues with the IT side of the house, no ability to download directly from the internet, because we are in the middle of the pacific and have no hardwire connection to shore. Because of this, there is no way for Mr. YYYYY to download the required programs and complete his assignments on time. Please consider giving him an extension under the circumstances. Feel free to contact me if you have any more questions. Thanks.

Very Respectfully,
LTJG XXXXXXX
USS ZZZZZ
Education Services Officer

I don't have a smart-ass comment for this. I just thought it was great getting a letter from an officer out at sea.

Dr. K,

I recently found out that I was dropped for non-payment of my courses this semester, which I found odd because I thought the matter was already taken care of. The Records Department informed me that if I wanted to stay in your course (which I do), I would have to have you sign the Late Add Petition. However, I do not know how do this since this course is through the internet. Do you have office hours or are you ever on campus? Please let me know.

Also, I know that I am behind in the work but I have taken this class before (both on campus and online) so the beginning chapters should be just a refresher to me. I hope that you will still consider adding me to your class.

I apologize for all the trouble and hope to hear from you soon.

Sincerely,

XXXXXXXX
ID# 1234567

I have never heard of this student before in my life, but s/he must really like this class if s/he’s taking it for the third time. How does one make this kind of mistake?

Rain Day

2006-03-01T10:43:00.000-08:00

It rains so rarely in southern California that when it does, I consider it a holiday. And on a Rain Day Holiday, there is no grading, no test writing and no lesson planning. In fact there’s very little of anything except cuddling up under a big blanket in front of a window with a book.

Here’s how we spent our Rain Day 2006.

It’s my lucky day!

2006-02-28T08:11:00.000-08:00

I knew today was a lucky day. I just knew it! Maybe it was because it rained last night or because the blue birds came to my feeder or because my first two California poppies bloomed this morning. Whatever the reason, I began preparing for my special day. Today I decided to accessorize my typical morning attire – pink pajamas - with a turquoise necklace. And instead of cereal, I fixed myself French toast with maple syrup. And then I waited…

At 7:44 it happened. My bug doctor appeared.

Kelly and I were best friends in elementary school. In addition to being fashion designers (for our dolls), magazine publishers (for the 4th grade), underwater ballerinas and Mexican hat dancers, we were bug doctors! This meant rescuing, diagnosing and treating our many bug patients. Often treatment involved removing a leg or two and occasionally other forms of surgery. We spent weekends and vacations together involved in all sorts of adventure until eventually boys became more interesting to us than bugs.

By high school we ran in different circles. She was a brilliant student and an excellent writer. I could never fathom what those English poets were trying to tell me, but I was enthralled by math and astronomy and physics.

After high school I heard that Kelly went to UT and was in a sorority there; the same one her mother had been in, in fact. I went off to a different school and continued exploring my wild side.

And just like that 10 years went by.

So this morning I was sitting on the couch, sipping coffee and replying to students’ emails, when opened one from a Kelly A.

I woke up in the middle of the night the other night thinking about you for some
reason—

Ah, another wacko email.

And just as I was about to delete it – it came to me. This was my 4th grade best friend.

I knew it was my lucky day!

HAAAYYY DR. K!

2006-02-25T12:34:00.000-08:00

shouts Mark, a musician in the Air Force, as I enter the classroom. And so begins my Thursday night pre-algebra class. Pre-algebra includes topics that most people learn in junior high, but at our college it draws fifteen hundred students each semester. Nobody takes this class for fun; they take it to move beyond their current life situation.

Miranda is a fifty-year-old mother of four who is tired of doing manual labor for a living. She wills herself to stay awake for our three hour night class.

Jeff hasn’t taken a class in twenty-three years, but he’s tackling this now because he wants a pay raise at his job as a machinist. The next step up for him requires an associates degree.

Maria wants to go into nursing. She sits by herself on the right side of the classroom, works diligently and isn’t afraid to shout out ‘Stop!’ when she can’t follow one of my steps on the board. She also keeps the time for us – letting me know when break should be and how much longer until class is over.

Ronelle, a strikingly sincere man, never finished high school. He spent his youth in all of the wrong places – and has the tattoos to show for it – but now he’s turning his life around.

Hadji is one of my many students from Somalia. He’s clearly had a good education, but he struggles to remember all of the intricacies of factoring, order of operations and how to work with negative numbers.

Cuizon is from the Philippines, where he claims to have taken Calculus. He’s forever trying to solve more complicated problems than the ones we do in class, but he still sometimes confuses equations with expressions.

Tozi just joined our class last week and I haven’t learned much about her except that she has a beautiful accent and completes her work without difficulty, sometimes even helping Jeff with his.

When I get to the front of the classroom I shout back:
“What’s 2 raised to the zero power?”
“One!” they respond.
“What’s 20 divided by 0?”
“Undefined!”
“What’s the area of a rectangle?”
“Length times width!”
…and so we go for several minutes. I’m actually astonished at their memories.

Last week we learned about negative numbers and order of operations. This week we introduced polynomials. You know the kind: two x-squared plus six x minus three, for example. “Let me solve it! Let me find the value of x!” Cuizon shouts from the third row. "We can’t solve it," I explain, "it’s not equal to anything; it's just an expression."

“Well, what IS x?” Ronelle wants to know. "Think of x as a place holder," I tell him. "For example, you know that you will earn $10 for every hour that you work. Your formula for how much money you make is $10 times x, where x is how many hours you work. The formula works for any number of hours that you plug into x."

Ronelle was skeptical about this explanation, but he conceded that it made sense. “By the end of the semester will you please tell us how to figure out what x is?”

As the evening progressed we solved more problems and learned new techniques for working with polynomials. At one point Maria crossed the room to give Ronelle a note card to help him remember sign changes when multiplying negative numbers. Then later when I wrote problems on the board, the students clamored to be selected to solve one in front of the class. And whenever someone would make a mistake Mark would give them a friendly correction-yell, "Remember buddy, a negative times a negative is a positive!"

Prealgebra is not a class most professors sign up for, but it's one the new guy inevitably has to teach.

I've discovered that with its incurably persevering, charming and eclectic students it's one of my absolute favorites.

Just wait till we learn fractions!

*all names have been changed

Suspended

2006-02-24T20:35:00.000-08:00

The great Coffee House Tour of 2006 is temporarily suspended.

John comes home tonight from three weeks abroad. For my last evening of anonymous pleasure, I ate el authentico Tex-Mex. It’s hard to find good Mexican food – read lots of meat and cheese – in the alfalfa sprout capital, but we actually did it! This treasure is just 2 doors down from the VMars coffee house. Who knows, maybe someday it will make it into the show.

When I emailed John about my internet addiction and nascent blog he was thrilled – and then mortified. “You can’t say anything to hurt my presidential bid!”

Well, I think John can do that all on his own. (But that's another story.)

When IS this run for the White House anyway? This is the same line he used to lure me five years ago, and my oval office carpet designs, china patterns, and wardrobe dreams continue to linger. A girl can only wait so long for her presidential power fulfillment. (Imagine the pedicures!)

At least John and I are finally getting married. For years I feared I would be the first First Mistress.

So, for the remainder of my last lonely night I will sip my latte, read my book and then Annie and I will head for the airport!

A Few of My Favorite Things

2006-02-24T17:37:00.000-08:00

(in no particular order)

T-shirt sheets
The sound of rainstorms on a tin roof
Finding a perfect sand-dollar
A good pinot noir
Taking early morning walks with my septuagenarian French neighbor
The smell of rain
Annie and Piper asleep in my lap
Laughing out loud
Being wrapped in John’s arms
Avocados
The smell of fresh cut grass
Finding books from Amazon on my front porch
Star jasmine
Feeling the cool grass under my bare feet
Little flowers reaching toward the sun from a crack in the side walk
Western blue jays at my feeder
Skipping and dancing along the sidewalk while listening to old blue eyes on my ipod and walking the dog
South African biltong
Red shoes

Little Orphan Annie

2006-02-23T08:36:00.000-08:00

I made it three miles and was finally in the cool down phase. I like to run late at night when no one can see me. As I rounded the corner to our house, I saw a flurry of activity – grey forms dancing across the street. And then I heard the yelp. I ran towards the activity just in time to see a small grey bundle scamper under the neighbor’s car. I’m used to seeing coyotes around the neighborhood.

They come up from the canyon in the late night and early morning – searching for dinner in the form of cats and small dogs. Perhaps that’s what I heard, I wasn't sure. I tried to coax the animal out from under the car, but to no avail. So I went inside, showered, and turned in.

Two days later my neighbor was trying to leave the house but couldn’t get a scroungey little dog out from beneath her car. My other neighbor – the doggie expert – came to the rescue; She discovered a grey, hopeless little figure, with big sad eyes, bleeding from her side. This was Annie.

Two surgeries, several baths, and lots of TLC later she's the gorgeous girl in the picture below.

President's Day 2006

2006-02-21T22:42:00.000-08:00

This is how Annie and I spent President's Day.

Weevil's Uncle (a continuation from last night)

2006-02-19T10:06:00.000-08:00

Weevil’s uncle turned out to be a former professional soccer player from Peru. Now he’s in his last semester at SDSU completing his civil engineering degree. He also salsas and would like to take me dancing with him.

I took the longest route home possible.

Which is it, you ask. Do I want to meet people or not. Perhaps I’m just an extrovert in cyberspace.

When I finally got home, Annie was thrilled to see me and served up half an hour of ‘Please rub my belly. Please rub my belly.’ Followed by ‘Let me lick your face.’

And that was Saturday night.

I think I'm addicted to the internet

2006-02-18T20:57:00.000-08:00

It all started around the time K.A. got in touch with me. She googled me, she said. She discovered where I went to school, what I do for a living, where I live. It got me wondering what else is out there.

It was after I read the latest Charles Krauthammer article. Where I found his links to blogs. I started clicking on all the ones with names that caught my attention: Stacked, Waiter Rant, Crazy Aunt Purl,… Once I was at eBlogger I hit Random Blog and just started reading.

And in a weird way it made me feel less lonely. Online I found people who made me laugh, who are smart and interesting, who share some of my own thoughts and feelings. How many such people might I find in an hour, in two hours…

It could take my whole life to meet just a handful of people like that in person in San Diego. Isn’t it ironic that by becoming more insular – glued to my laptop, sitting on my couch – I might actually be becoming more connected.

So I shared this thought with my best girlfriend J. She struggles with the same problem, though perhaps worse – being stuck in mommy-ville inside a cookie-cutter suburb of Houston. She, however, has made friends with one of her fellow bloggers.

So I started one. I started my very first blog.

At least leave the house, she said. You can still be glued to your laptop, but try doing it from inside a coffee house for a change. And what do you know? My first night out I met another professor who teaches at the same college I do.

Now I’m on night two of the great coffee house tour of 2006.

This is the one they show on Veronica Mars. Where Keith met up with Veronica’s counselor. And it’s a completely different crowd from last night’s trendy, urban spot.

There’s the:
· odd gay couple - skinny white guy and large Chinese man, each with a laptop, comparing computer code it looks like
· middle aged man and woman - talking cheek to cheek
· middle-aged Hispanic studying a big book - and definitely looking out of place (Maybe it's because I just watched a VMars episode, but he looks like he could be Weevil's uncle)
· cute young college girl, with requisite laptop, and older (~40ish) man
· pensive high schooler (sitting next to me) working on a homework assignment
· high school basketball player
Maybe everybody just looks young to me - now that I'm getting (slightly) older
· lonely 30-something writing in her journal - NOT ME
· I'm the cute "I can't believe she's 30-something" curled up on the couch with her new blouse on. (The one she treated herself to at Nyla's yesterday.)

And that's all I can see from my cozy corner.

So, I’m ready. Where are all the people who are supposed to read MY blog? HERE I AM. I’M READY FOR YOU.

Some Background

2006-02-18T15:43:00.000-08:00

I live in southern California with my dog Annie, cat Piper, and fiancé John. I’m a college professor – love my job and the socal lifestyle. But it hasn’t always been so.

I’m originally from Texas (as is John) and I used to have a terrible, horrible job in industry, which never-the-less earned me plenty of money. (Like Opinionista says, “It’s pretty fascinating, when you think about it, how we’ve built a society based on making yourself deliberately miserable in order to achieve success and supposed happiness?”) So, one day I just quit.

Around that same time John’s dad had been diagnosed with cancer and was on his own personal mission to fight it in every possible way. While John and I were visiting his family in a small suburb of Houston, we did what most people do for fun on a Thursday night – we went to a school board meeting. John’s brother is a board member, so we got kick out of heckling him from the back. (Should they or should they not allow Coca-Cola vending machines….)

At the end of the meeting I jostled my way through the crowd over to the high school principal and asked her for a job. Two days later I was teaching math at the local high school. (Which, by the way, is located on an old farm road next to a cow pasture.)

John and I thought this was a good opportunity for me to do something I’ve always wanted and, at the same time, be able to help his mom and dad. So while John returned to our apartment in socal, I settled in to his old room at home with his parents.

Living with John’s parents for eight months was its own special kind of adventure. The stories below capture just a couple of the many unforgettable moments I enjoyed with them.

The Video

2006-02-17T20:38:00.000-08:00

King Richard comes rushing into my room. “Oh Karon! We have a serious problem!”

With shirt off, white cotton briefs poking out the tops of his blue jeans, and the end of a catheter dangling just below his collarbone, he frantically heads toward where I’m sitting. “Something terrible has happened,” he continues, panic spreading across his face. I can hear Billie Sue and Helen talking excitedly in the background.

“You’ve got to help us,” he implores.

“Okay.” I will stay calm and assess the situation, I tell myself. I know I can remember how to get to the nearest hospital. “Where are you hurt?”

“I’m not hurt. It’s much worse than that.”

I look up at him, confused. Is it Helen or Billie, I wonder?

“We can’t find the video from the hospital that shows how to clean the catheter.”

“That’s it?!” I ask incredulously. “That’s all that’s wrong?”

“Oh, it’s terrible! We returned the movie to the video store, but it’s still here, and there’s just the box of the hospital tape. How will we clean the catheter?! That tape cost $15!” The words flew from him in a frenzy.

“So, let me get this straight. The cancer tape accidentally got returned inside the movie box and the movie tape is still here?”

“Yes. It’s terrible. What are we going to do?”

Now, THIS, I could definitely handle.

In 10 minutes I was back from the video store with the movie returned and the treasured tape in hand. We watched the tape, cleaned the catheter and all went off to bed relieved. Until King Richard called me.

“Karon, did they charge us a late fee?”

I Think the Chemo Fried Your Brain!

2006-02-17T20:36:00.000-08:00

Billie Sue announced that we were having Burger Tex for dinner tonight, and I was sent out the door to pick it up. Usually these burgers are a Friday night treat, but we got lucky early this week. By 5 o’clock we were all sitting around the kitchen table sipping coke from our Styrofoam cups and eating burgers and fries straight out of the Styrofoam containers.

I relayed the news I heard about the school hiring an experienced math teacher for calculus next year. It relieved my sense of obligation to stay in Houston next year instead of joining John out in California.

King Richard turned to me with his jaw dropped open – displaying a gooey, white lump of mashed up burger bun – and a look of pained confusion on his face.

“She’s going back to California when the school year’s over,” Billie Sue explained as if to a slow child. “You don’t think she’s going to stay here without sweet little John do you?” I had accidentally called John that in one of my conversations with her and she showed no signs of forgetting it.
.
“Yes, as much as I love it here, I want to be with John.”

KR pointed vigorously to the table. Sometimes the food and the ‘talker’ are just too much to handle so he resorts to pantomimes to help bridge the gaps in his communication.

“Do you think John should live here, too? We could be like All in the Family,” I teased, and KR nodded contently.

“John has already worked harder than most people do in a lifetime. He needs to quit work immediately.” The philosophy of life through the lens of cancer has been interesting to discover from King Richard. But Billie Sue displayed no interest in the philosophical.

“Are you out of your MIND? And live on WHAT?”

“People focus too much attention on making money. You really don’t need all of that,” he continued.

Her body jerked back away from his as she glared at him, “I think the chemo fried your brain!”

Just then the phone rang and abruptly ended our discussion.

After Billie Sue had left us for the quiet of the den I showed KR what I had scribbled on my napkin - I think Chemo fried your brain. He looked at it disapprovingly. But I told him the quote was just too precious, that I had to write it down. “I mean, when are you ever going to hear a quote like that again?” I asked.

“Tomorrow,” he grinned. And after a pause, “I hope.”