tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79366915948116522832024-03-12T17:35:49.274-07:00The Bitter Old QueenRandom reflections from an eccentric perspective.Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.comBlogger70125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-22864011119833827622014-03-12T07:56:00.001-07:002014-03-12T07:56:26.654-07:00Pain in the Ass<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I suppose one shouldn't use the pulpit (however obscure it may be) to lash out at someone or something in a moment of anger, but dammit, I’m mad.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was supposed to have a colonoscopy today. Actually a colonoscopy and an endoscopy at the same time. They were going to get me coming and going. The initial visit at Coral Ridge Gastroenterology Associates went well enough. The front office explained the preparations in detail, ran my insurance and found that I would have no further out-of-pocket costs, and even scheduled transportation to and from the Outpatient Center.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I enjoyed breakfast yesterday, my last meal for some 30 hours, and at 6:00 PM downed some foul tasting liquid as instructed. If you've ever had a G.I. experience, I don’t have to tell you what happened next. Suffice it to say I stayed indoors for the evening, never far from the bathroom.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At 6:00 AM this morning I repeated the process. I wondered if the eternal drainpipe would stop flowing in time for my ride at 9:30. At the original consultation I had been told that the transportation agency would call me the day before to give me an actual pickup time. Since they never called, I phoned the practice last night but it was after hours. I called again this morning, apparently before hours, and left a message.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually I got a return call. “Oh, Mr. Johnston, we’re so sorry. This never happens. I had the paperwork right here in front of me but I forgot to arrange your ride. I apologize. I’ll see if I can reach them in time.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She called back shortly thereafter and informed me that the procedure would have to be postponed until the afternoon.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“But, I’m hungry!” I whined.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She told me that I could call Sarah at the Outpatient Center and see if they had an earlier slot. Now I was thinking we were talking about arranging transportation. When Sarah told me that there was nothing available until later, I asked if I could keep my 11:30 appointment if I arranged my own transportation. Oh, no, I was informed. It was the procedure that was not scheduled, not the transportation.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So now I’m hungry and pissed off.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
About a half hour later, the Outpatient Center calls again just to inform me of my financial responsibility, a $250 copay. Snap! That was it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Cancel it,” I said. “I’m having breakfast.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Minutes later the doctor’s office calls and the woman who had screwed up in the first place is wildly apologizing, assuring me that she had cleared the insurance and that the Center should have known there was no copay.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
More apologies. But it was too late.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Excuse me,” I said. “Please stop saying you’re sorry.” (Cue Madonna) “This whole thing has been screwed up on your end and on their end.” (No pun intended.) “We’re done. I’m having breakfast now. If I ever do have a colonoscopy, it won’t be through your practice.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><b>If you go</b> (and you’d be nuts if you do): Coral Ridge Gastroenterology Associates, LLC, Dr. Manuel E. Barbaian. Pompano Beach, FL.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i>Coral Ridge Outpatient Center, 5301 North Dixie Highway, Oakland Park, FL.</i></div>
Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-56968617372409220322013-11-19T11:11:00.000-08:002013-11-19T11:11:23.811-08:00Henry Flagler<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdiUr_8e3a2idgQ4U2haS_IRLNVb8st8kWp9bqF9FKzRVNG3hPFJVwro7UKwj2YVQRBu523t6IIT9qCnbRKi6zUszju3EoI0IuZ63u93uZbw94XKRZzehaUXCoPKEnRP9XQZtPz59ozYg/s1600/flagler.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdiUr_8e3a2idgQ4U2haS_IRLNVb8st8kWp9bqF9FKzRVNG3hPFJVwro7UKwj2YVQRBu523t6IIT9qCnbRKi6zUszju3EoI0IuZ63u93uZbw94XKRZzehaUXCoPKEnRP9XQZtPz59ozYg/s200/flagler.jpg" width="137" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Henry Flagler was one of those nineteenth century
industrialists who believed he could accomplish anything he set his mind to. He
made his first fortune as the co-founder, along with John D. Rockefeller, of
Standard Oil. In fact Rockefeller once said that Flagler was the brains behind
the enterprise. Ruthless competitors, they took Standard Oil from a small
refining concern in Ohio to a virtual monopoly of the oil business. But
dominating one industry was not enough to satisfy Flagler’s ambition. He, like myself, was not a fan of cold
northern winters so he took a trip down to St. Augustine, Florida, to check out
the local scene.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He found a sleepy Spanish provincial town and immediately
saw the opportunity to make a lot of money luring other winter-weary northerners
to its agreeable climate and seaside beauty. So he built a hotel. The Ponce de Leon Hotel, named in honor of
the Spanish explorer who allegedly found the Fountain of Youth a few blocks
away, was the grandest of hotels, built
with poured concrete and brick accents in the Spanish Renaissance style. Interior elements were provided by Louis
Tiffany. It was the first hotel wired for electricity from the outset, made
possible by his buddy Thomas Edison.
Patrons of Mr. Flagler’s hotel needed deep pockets: the minimum stay was
the entire winter season, whether you stayed all four months or not.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHjMeFxYiWkoiwdV3egZxNNEnrbjY-M9G1sT1VS6Z_6qGCTRADcwI_5wRJjiOe3qIbnQZEUp1ugX-JSruZDRkohR4w47U3_OndGRUhIFPpthlah-rjB24kc7Pesf_ch-Ee4kbkfwOyTBU/s1600/flaglercollege.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHjMeFxYiWkoiwdV3egZxNNEnrbjY-M9G1sT1VS6Z_6qGCTRADcwI_5wRJjiOe3qIbnQZEUp1ugX-JSruZDRkohR4w47U3_OndGRUhIFPpthlah-rjB24kc7Pesf_ch-Ee4kbkfwOyTBU/s320/flaglercollege.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I visited the Ponce de Leon, which is now part of Flagler
College. It houses the dining hall and serves as the women's dormitory. What a contrast to the dorms I inhabited at
Carnegie-Mellon. I was not able to take
the guided tour as I am still limping and wincing from the sciatic nerve flare-up
that struck me two weeks ago. But just
sitting in the courtyard for a while and taking a look at the grand entrance
hall and rotunda was worth the effort. I
had expected a stone interior, something resembling a gothic cathedral, but
instead found it is all carved wood. Exquisite.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilnQ-ceXqxZ_UqSHrMhgm_DNTruLtd-HeTmFQvEDkTAdSXdXzuEEWt3mY6ydJcxsv615g6Y7FaIqH1MwG0C-yPPtRVMa2AO-rUtCZ60vuYHeIhWZSi4QlSpOWuLXqP5svAWKD0S5JjpoE/s1600/poncelobby.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilnQ-ceXqxZ_UqSHrMhgm_DNTruLtd-HeTmFQvEDkTAdSXdXzuEEWt3mY6ydJcxsv615g6Y7FaIqH1MwG0C-yPPtRVMa2AO-rUtCZ60vuYHeIhWZSi4QlSpOWuLXqP5svAWKD0S5JjpoE/s400/poncelobby.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Flagler needed a way to get his patrons to St. Augustine so
he bought the short line railroad from Jacksonville. He discovered that he
enjoyed running a railroad so he decided , in typical Standard Oil fashion, to
buy up all the other railroads in the region and expand southward to West Palm
Beach. But the winter of 1894-95 was so severe that only the southern tip of
Florida, where the town that is now Miami stands, escaped the freezing weather.
So Flagler set his sights there, extended the rail line, and pretty much built
Miami.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Meanwhile another industrialist, Robert Plant, was snatching
up railroads in the state. As befitting robber barons of the era, the two men
made a gentleman’s agreement: Flagler would keep to Florida’s east coast if
Plant would stay on the west. This left
Flagler with only one direction to expand – south.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4KGaqayTMHQn_DZCu2E4XiGVZQSV7jrnb6MndBPVE48KRwgC0ghJPzjfb9JrahsRg9puiDvVsfV3GXSAHSdvNv99Dg8ToDnsAJv8lbwBuWg8hZ7Z5CjhBmhxRkBxgXdNZYwLJ2I9hY5Q/s1600/overseasrail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4KGaqayTMHQn_DZCu2E4XiGVZQSV7jrnb6MndBPVE48KRwgC0ghJPzjfb9JrahsRg9puiDvVsfV3GXSAHSdvNv99Dg8ToDnsAJv8lbwBuWg8hZ7Z5CjhBmhxRkBxgXdNZYwLJ2I9hY5Q/s320/overseasrail.jpg" width="320" /></a>At the time Key West was the largest city in Florida and a
bustling port. Although engineers said it couldn’t be done, Flagler extended
his line 128 miles down the Keys, mostly on causeways and trestles. His Florida
East Coast Railroad was now the railroad that went to sea. It’s premier
passenger train was the Havana Special, an all Pullman deluxe overnight run
from New York to Key West with connections to passenger steamers bound for
Cuba.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A hurricane on Labor Day 1935 wiped out nearly one third of
the line and the railroad decided it was cost prohibitive to replace. Flagler had passed away twenty-two years
prior to the disaster but one can’t help wonder if he had been alive, would he
have rebuilt the line? Could one still have taken the Havana Special for a
vacation in the Conch Nation?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Remnants of the overseas railroad exist throughout the Keys.
Much of U.S. Highway 1 was built on the original pilings. As to the rest of
Flagler’s railroad it is alive and well today. The Florida East Coast Railroad
is the longest “short line” in the country and one of the most profitable
railroads. Long coveted by rivals CSX and Norfolk Southern, it remains fiercely
independent and a competitor worthy of Flagler’s heritage.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-36013609723913255862013-11-07T10:55:00.000-08:002013-11-07T10:56:37.616-08:00Southbound 2013<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s been a very long time since I added any articles to
this blog but I’ve decided to start writing again. Rather than the random
philosophical rants I’ve posted in the past, I’ve decided to write about travelling
full-time in an RV with my two cats.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This week I started my third annual pilgrimage south. Yes, I’ve
become a snowbird. I’ve never quite understood that term, snowbird, as applied
to folks who spend their winters somewhere warmer than their usual home base. Wouldn’t
it make more sense to call us sun birds or
sun seekers? I guess it’s like a nor’ easterly wind. It isn’t blowing towards
the northeast, it’s blowing southwest. Guess it could also be called a
snowbird wind.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYJbwN4sgRpIN2IJ3pvCfLJ47w8izJ3WvyealbU4FajbQOA18OixDrx5q2Nxs6z-IMyWElALKxymGkrT-vOIA8yScUoEAvbbFZszfi0RP24El6lstSHT_F7Y-qc7KmWsmIQLxhEaUWOXs/s1600/2012-04-11_10-10-09_808.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYJbwN4sgRpIN2IJ3pvCfLJ47w8izJ3WvyealbU4FajbQOA18OixDrx5q2Nxs6z-IMyWElALKxymGkrT-vOIA8yScUoEAvbbFZszfi0RP24El6lstSHT_F7Y-qc7KmWsmIQLxhEaUWOXs/s320/2012-04-11_10-10-09_808.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Skidaway Island State Park, Savannah GA</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve arrived in Savannah, GA. I’m staying for the second
time at the most beautiful state park I’ve ever camped in – Skidaway Island
State Park. I was lucky to find available one of the best sites in the park. It’s
a huge pull-through site, easily a quarter acre, surrounded by palmettos and live
oaks bearing Spanish moss. Very private. The cats love it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It wasn’t so great for the cats the first time we were here. In those
days, I had taught Osito to walk on a leash and I was attempting to teach
Brindie the same. Brindie, you will recall if you’re an avid reader of this
blog (which you aren’t because I don’t have any avid readers) is the stray cat
I rescued several years ago at The Woods campground in the Poconos. You’ll find
the rescue story <a href="http://thebitteroldqueen.blogspot.com/2010/11/rescue.html">here</a>. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had put a harness and leash on Brindie and thought
that we would have a nice little training session outside. Instead, she
panicked, flailed around, did back flips and in the chaos I dropped the leash.
She took off into the woods still wearing the harness with the leash dragging behind
her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV8X8R3f8SnC2YjJSYU1BZC_4AyhsqcUexIh5ykQvHyytLj-3uTvAl91B_D01kRzij9gPL7isZ6zGEFcw8GjUdCi2r9y8vdIkzGyhMqIK1YjSAwWjVexxxwWCK9SvZL_7OrYu4KM_pFmo/s1600/IMG_20110625_104131.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV8X8R3f8SnC2YjJSYU1BZC_4AyhsqcUexIh5ykQvHyytLj-3uTvAl91B_D01kRzij9gPL7isZ6zGEFcw8GjUdCi2r9y8vdIkzGyhMqIK1YjSAwWjVexxxwWCK9SvZL_7OrYu4KM_pFmo/s320/IMG_20110625_104131.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Brindie and Osito</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She eventually came back around 11:30 that night sans leash
and sans harness. The next morning I went around and told the neighbors who
had all been on alert and anxious to help. The full account of that mishap is <a href="http://thebitteroldqueen.blogspot.com/2012_04_01_archive.html">here</a>. Since that time I have become comfortable with
letting both cats out on their own if the situation seems safe. The biggest
concern is traffic, and not annoying other campers, especially the type that
might be inclined to inform the park ranger!<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So that was two years ago. Now the cats are fine, it’s me that’s a mess. Monday I felt
great. We were on the first day of the journey staying at Kiktopeke State Park
at the southern tip of the Delmarva peninsula. I took a short stroll along one
of the nature trails that afternoon and returned to the coach to enjoy dinner,
some TV and an early night.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next morning when I stood up, a pain shot through my
left leg. It was so intense that I screamed. I was barely able to walk. Somehow
I got everything stowed, broke camp and drove to my next destination – the famous
tourist trap known as South of the Border. The campground is fine for an
overnight stop and it’s not expensive. I
pushed on the following day towards my first multi-day destination, Savannah.
Fortunately the leg didn’t hurt too much while sitting in the driver’s seat and
wasn’t needed for driving.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I finally got to a medical facility yesterday. The doctor
said it was my back, not the leg which was causing the pain. He gave me a
couple of shots and called in four(!) prescriptions at a nearby Kroger. Still
limping and wincing I headed for the supermarket.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTY044my-e-LZA7smMYxqSs_Nf0n2SFMkg88hnIzGQRuq-LwIzs-rUiH2xXZVE_NJmIQYpptY-ffdvJyH39Ai0CK1EHrtMQ56tvGHiIwAUJxa4dElDmtS25rAQn2mHcB6np1yS02UySQM/s1600/cart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTY044my-e-LZA7smMYxqSs_Nf0n2SFMkg88hnIzGQRuq-LwIzs-rUiH2xXZVE_NJmIQYpptY-ffdvJyH39Ai0CK1EHrtMQ56tvGHiIwAUJxa4dElDmtS25rAQn2mHcB6np1yS02UySQM/s1600/cart.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Attack Vehicle</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I parked as close as possible to the door but resisted the
urge to pull into a handicapped space even though I certainly qualified. It
would have been just my luck to get a ticket or towed. As luck would have it,
someone had left a motorized shopping cart in the space next to me. I thought,
what the hell? The next minute I was whizzing down the aisles, terrorizing the
able-bodied. Since I had to wait 15 minutes, I went on a joy ride. What a sight
I must have been. Unshaven, wearing paint stained shorts and flip flops, and
looking like death warmed over. So what better place for a cranky, old cripple
to cruise around in? The wine racks, of course!<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s now Thursday. I feel much better. I can walk a good
fifty feet without having to sit down. Still, I had to reluctantly cancel my
tour of the Mercer-Williams house, the one made famous in John Berendt’s book <i>Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil</i>.
I’m hoping to be enough improved to try tomorrow.<o:p></o:p></div>
Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-60375328469395819322012-07-15T15:15:00.000-07:002012-07-15T15:24:44.790-07:00Say Hello to my Toad...<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">...and say farewell to my faithful truck.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Ranger Rudy has served me well for eight years. It runs
beautifully, looks great, and aside from a faint odor of cat urine seems almost
new. It has less than 50 thousand miles and best of all, it’s paid for. I
remember exactly why I bought a pick-up truck back in 2004 – I was annoyed at
the delivery charge for bringing mulch to my house each spring. So I decided
I’d haul it myself. As it turns out, not a single shovel of mulch even soiled
Rudy’s dark emerald green bed. It did haul a lot of plywood in my model
railroading days and more recently it pulled Penelope Pop-Up to various
campgrounds in the Northeast. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPc3ZCGL5WAw9dbRIQpfkNQ1kXSKgO1L02hDD8vr7LrvwOvAA5aciQnf3XYFju5LFyZj9g8Mo4gJSbvBh0_LkNptfSeqjbek_ubVxQuim0Oo6VihjXmjm51Vdu8N8zG7N5_wWaKIWV5LQ/s1600/2010-06-23+12.57.13.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPc3ZCGL5WAw9dbRIQpfkNQ1kXSKgO1L02hDD8vr7LrvwOvAA5aciQnf3XYFju5LFyZj9g8Mo4gJSbvBh0_LkNptfSeqjbek_ubVxQuim0Oo6VihjXmjm51Vdu8N8zG7N5_wWaKIWV5LQ/s320/2010-06-23+12.57.13.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span style="font-size: small;">Ranger Rudy was named after a beloved cat who kept me company for fifteen years and Penelope Pop-Up was named after another departed feline friend.</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Ranger Rudy was very good at towing. It is rated to tow 500
pounds more than my behemoth motorhome, the vehicle with the powerful V-10
engine which gets all of seven miles to the gallon. But Rudy isn’t so good at
being towed. In fact, unless you load it on a trailer it can’t be flat towed at
all. (That’s with all four wheels on the ground, the preferred method for
pulling something behind a motorhome.)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">It was inconvenient not having something smaller to drive around after setting up the motorhome in a park. I worked around it as best I could. In both Savannah and Nashville I stayed at campgrounds where the narrated tour bus comes to pick you up. In the suburbs of Atlanta, I stayed in a campground that was a short walk to the city express bus stop. In Fort Lauderdale I rented a car. But often I felt stuck in the campground. There were nearby attractions I wanted to see but not so badly that I was willing to break camp – stowing everything in a motion-safe place, bring the slides in, the jacks up, disconnecting the hoses and electrical cables, and then driving around in a 35 foot long, 12 and a half foot tall tank.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">I needed a dinghy that I could tow behind the motorhome. Some people call a dinghy a “toad” presumably because they are “towed” behind the coach. RVer’s have such a sense of humor.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">So Ranger Rudy had to go. Yesterday I traded her for a
Suzuki something-or-the-other SUV, a car that ranks on the automotive sexiness
scale in a tie for last place with the Ford Pinto. I really wanted a Jeep. Now
that’s a sexy car. It conjures up images of macho men in the outback, surfers
enroute to the beach, the studly older brother of my childhood best friend. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I weighed the pros and cons. The Jeep is fun. The Jeep is
heavy, expensive, lacking in cargo space, cold in the winter, hot in the
summer, noisy, rough, gets terrible gas milage and has a nasty tendency to roll
over. The Suzuki is practical. Both are four wheel drive vehicles that can be
flat towed. Seemed like a dead heat.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">In the end it all came down to money. Whatever I decided to
get, it would be have to be a used vehicle. Let someone else pay all the
initial depreciation. The Suzuki dealer made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. He
would take Ranger Rudy in exchange for the something-or-other and give me a check
for $500. That’s right, <i>he</i> paid <i>me</i> to take it off his hands.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I haven’t named the something-or-other yet. I haven’t even
decided if I like it. It’s kind of fun, has a ton of room inside, a sunroof,
and lots of other gadgets. Oh yes, it can be towed. It’s a silver blue color
that matches the motorhome. It isn’t
very sexy but then again, neither are toads.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaH1dPTf2iHNVPgVtvyRSDZ2EqHgbbg5uhaioESZX9ZTXWO42OW5AceYBKb_4n60qOjlC2Ulpg_VMch8ruscx0MJVEH9px_aYemK0hwGGZsgMmWWf9qNPxNCO4XjYB8gtTgj51mUtUJT8/s1600/2012-07-13_12-24-06_125.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaH1dPTf2iHNVPgVtvyRSDZ2EqHgbbg5uhaioESZX9ZTXWO42OW5AceYBKb_4n60qOjlC2Ulpg_VMch8ruscx0MJVEH9px_aYemK0hwGGZsgMmWWf9qNPxNCO4XjYB8gtTgj51mUtUJT8/s400/2012-07-13_12-24-06_125.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">The unnamed coach and the unnamed something-or-other, i.e., the toad.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-24059152107428441322012-06-15T17:06:00.000-07:002012-07-15T15:23:56.892-07:00The Tumble Bug<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">When I was a boy, amusement parks were smaller and simpler
than they are today. The rides may not have subjected you to as many G forces
but they were thrilling none the less. They were bumpier, louder, and more raw.
You could smell the grease in the gears and the ozone created by electrical
arcs in the big unshielded motors.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRBKvRZ94YPFJsQ3g8JDiVS2fh4M4Y-o7FsbdekIFPZmftMgZFWrpGKEX8qHTUPdhy9r8FeapLy31SfbFsCCxGu5MElDiJ1mq-c9wJ4sqO9Aj7MgXzU2MNBqeSZJpwqHioWx6dbVVNTXo/s1600/tbug02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="204" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRBKvRZ94YPFJsQ3g8JDiVS2fh4M4Y-o7FsbdekIFPZmftMgZFWrpGKEX8qHTUPdhy9r8FeapLy31SfbFsCCxGu5MElDiJ1mq-c9wJ4sqO9Aj7MgXzU2MNBqeSZJpwqHioWx6dbVVNTXo/s320/tbug02.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">One of my favorites, aside from the wooden
coasters, was the Tumble Bug. It was manufactured by Traver Engineering and its
successor, R. E. Chambers of Beaver Falls, PA, from 1925 until the mid-1950’s
and could be found in amusements parks across the nation, indeed, around the
world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">The name varied from park to park – Tumble Bug, Turtle Ride,
or just the Bug. It consisted of five or six cars shaped like turtles, some
versions even had metallic heads and tails. The shell was hollowed out to allow
riders to sit inside on a circular bench and there was a chrome wheel mounted
like a horizontal steering wheel in the center to hang on to. These cars rode
around an undulating circular monorail. They were held to the track by spokes
radiating from a post at the center of the ride.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">One of the unique aspects of the Tumble Bug was that it
needed a little coaxing to get rolling out of the station. The operator,
usually a teenager not much older than the riders, would start the train moving
slowly forward until it stalled on the first hill. Then he would throw the
motors into reverse to back the train through the station until it stalled on
the hill behind it. Again he would throw the motors into forward and this time
the train would almost make it over the hill, at least the first turtle would.
One more back up and we were ready to rock and roll.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">The train of turtles then went around the track, three hills
in all, raced through the station and around again. That’s it. Even so, you got
tossed around pretty good and if you didn’t hang on, you could find yourself
halfway out the opening where you get in and out of the car. They didn’t have
safety restraints or legal departments in those days. We kids used to stand in
line for 20 minutes to go around a circle for 3 minutes and we loved every
second of it. As soon as the ride ended, we would rush down the exit ramp,
turn, and get right back on line to ride again.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">There are only two operating Tumble Bugs left in the world
and they are both in western Pennsylvania – one in Kennywood Park and one in a
little park on Conneaut Lake. I made a pilgrimage to the latter to ride the
Tumble Bug.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I had been to Conneaut Lake Park once before, in my
twenties. I was working at a state psychiatric hospital in Pittsburgh at the
time and several of the social workers arranged a weekend trip for some of our
more “presentable” patients. The park was a magical place reminding me of West
View Park, north of Pittsburgh, where my school district held its annual
picnic. It was a busy, happy place with lots of excited kids and adults rushing
from ride to ride, spilling cotton candy along the way, punctuated with the
shrieks from riders on the Blue Streak coaster as it thundered overhead. There
were long lines for many of the popular rides, including the Tumble Bug.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">When I began planning the itinerary for my three-month RV
road trip, there were two places that I absolutely had to go: Key West to see
Dominique Lefort and his performing house cats and Conneaut Lake Park to ride
the Tumble Bug. I arrived on a Saturday afternoon in June and while I set up
the motor home in Camperland (which was once Fantasy Forest) I was thrilled to
hear the unmistakable rattle of the anti-rollback safety ratchets on the wooden
roller coaster across the street. I thought it was odd that I didn’t hear it
again for almost 15 minutes, but at least it was running and I would soon be
inside the park.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfM5EZG4YAsexv41EQFehJ2HE20U2v8w_Pn57DQxdriwupoOe_V20eFNocFczCTmhC-am0BphS4-clHlyft-7VlUms5K3_YJBMsPNJN5OaIEs0F8TZwhORFijH7TD-gLmoAqDwpAiaPQE/s1600/2012-06-10_14-17-22_856.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfM5EZG4YAsexv41EQFehJ2HE20U2v8w_Pn57DQxdriwupoOe_V20eFNocFczCTmhC-am0BphS4-clHlyft-7VlUms5K3_YJBMsPNJN5OaIEs0F8TZwhORFijH7TD-gLmoAqDwpAiaPQE/s320/2012-06-10_14-17-22_856.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Time has been unkind to Conneaut. The park has limped along
for the past decade, always on the verge of closing, torn apart by warring
factions on its board, and generally ignored by today’s thrill seekers who
prefer super parks like Cedar Point which is only three hours away. The parking
lot was nearly empty, the paint is peeling from the signs which proudly
proclaim “Since 1892”. There were no staff at the entrance, but the gates were
open. There is no admittance charge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwXATuYOO3Cj0fSWYNms3lrCFBSAWBbVHGEmYOyFSwrcj5b0qHR0XqwaG2OY_9fKXJKm6n3fVvcPjMxI5fGw7rQynfhOpZBMTgOdfnFJUK1C4EeWyFj3vn0kYghvfhoRuXrkrq0DzV7_c/s1600/2012-06-10_13-52-59_614.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwXATuYOO3Cj0fSWYNms3lrCFBSAWBbVHGEmYOyFSwrcj5b0qHR0XqwaG2OY_9fKXJKm6n3fVvcPjMxI5fGw7rQynfhOpZBMTgOdfnFJUK1C4EeWyFj3vn0kYghvfhoRuXrkrq0DzV7_c/s320/2012-06-10_13-52-59_614.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">As you enter the sweeping curve of the
walkway, the first ride you pass isn’t even a ride. It’s just a few crumbling
concrete footers, and a circular picket fence. Next to it is an abandoned
Tilt-a-Whirl with trees growing up through the track. The park appeared nearly
empty.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Further along were several working rides which were sitting
idle due to lack of customers. I rounded another curve and there it was – the
Tumble Bug! And it was open for business. I almost ran over to it, except my
knees don’t allow me to run anymore. I watched as it started forward and
stalled on the first hill. It rocked back and forth, as it always has, until it
had worked up enough momentum to get out of the station and on its way – all
two passengers shrieking in delight. It sounded more metallic, more strained,
than I remembered but, after all, I was witnessing an eighty-year old
mechanical device that had somehow been kept patched and cobbled together
enough to still operate. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">After buying tickets at the kiosk, I returned to ride the
beast myself. As it turned out, I was the only rider and the young man at the
controls gave me an extra-long ride, too long actually. It got boring in a
hurry. But who cares? I was on the Tumble Bug. I was the only one on the Tumble
Bug on a perfect summer day, one of the only two such rides in the <b><i>world</i></b>.
Where were the people?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbaUcOHhKIizJM3EZiGQe_sy683CkOgAftcYs-cNBOFO9JIc5aQ1etVKI8PcBePQjdUA2VijDmJKJLPsQ67hNeJvSRnY-1mnEjtne9eR6LDx2UJYuL7m5GY4Y98hF4kNFe6UqnJl8X_y4/s1600/2012-06-10_13-46-17_105.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbaUcOHhKIizJM3EZiGQe_sy683CkOgAftcYs-cNBOFO9JIc5aQ1etVKI8PcBePQjdUA2VijDmJKJLPsQ67hNeJvSRnY-1mnEjtne9eR6LDx2UJYuL7m5GY4Y98hF4kNFe6UqnJl8X_y4/s320/2012-06-10_13-46-17_105.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the park, or
what was left of it. The Pavilion had burned to the ground several years ago;
the midway was a sad glimpse of a forgotten past. The carousel, which was a
classical beauty, had one dad and his daughter riding. About the only place
that had a crowd was a loud beach bar on the lake that was overrun with bikers.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">So I decided to brave the Blue Streak. It’s an out and back
wooden coaster built in 1937 and designed by <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 115%;">Ed
Vettel, </span>who also designed the Big Dips at West View Park. I had the
naïve idea that I would shoot video with my cell phone as I hurdled along the
track. Instead I hung onto my phone desperately with one hand, while I kept my
other hand over my eyes, not because I didn’t want to see the ride, but because
I had lost my hat on the first hill and I didn’t want to lose my sunglasses as
well. That left me with no hands to hold on. It was the ride from hell. Strange
wailing moans came from somewhere, and since I was the only person on the
coaster, they must have been coming from me.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">As I left the park, I walked past the Tumble Bug one last
time. It was closed. A maintenance truck was parked in front and several
workers were huddled over the train. I asked the operator what happened. He
told me that the hydraulic brakes had sprung a leak and that the ride would be
out of commission for the rest of the day, maybe all weekend. (Maybe forever, I
thought.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">West View Park closed decades ago and was bulldozed to make
way for a shopping mall. I have a feeling Conneaut may not be around much
longer either. Why does that make me sad? Is it true that you can never really
go back?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dw6Na8mipD59jZNJHV1kHBozNQ1oybeTXAoi2reE_58T3JEK_Vmr9kKI-eh0emOhxu177cMGBcXo6xNSf5ITQ' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-38422840305113895362012-05-01T19:51:00.000-07:002012-07-15T15:26:19.345-07:00Cat Man<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I don’t have an official bucket list. That’s mostly because
my contrarian nature would never allow me to have anything that recently
exploded into popular cultural as a result of a movie designed to appeal to
mass audiences. We are refined, don’t you know? But let’s face it – we all have
a few things we would like to do before we die.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">One of my greatest wishes for many years has been to see
Dominique Lefort and his famous cats perform at sunset on Mallory Square in Key
West. Every day at sunset, crowds assemble at Mallory Square to watch various
performers such as one man bands, jugglers, unicyclists, and tight rope walkers
but mostly they come for the spectacular sunsets. If it’s a good one, it is
rewarded with a round of applause from the onlookers. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikeYH1Ffi8rl4Cc_Hit8hvEe1A2L0_lDBe1s1UPf8SpNCkd3nj3YveeQ_JgHH5o-d9DF5uH9A09LwV7qXteBLMw4a5ZzRg_MwOVoGLL0FKNjmt0zf4CJ2w7GMurUKOCdbxvEGSXpXdG-k/s1600/2012-05-01_19-52-46_59.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikeYH1Ffi8rl4Cc_Hit8hvEe1A2L0_lDBe1s1UPf8SpNCkd3nj3YveeQ_JgHH5o-d9DF5uH9A09LwV7qXteBLMw4a5ZzRg_MwOVoGLL0FKNjmt0zf4CJ2w7GMurUKOCdbxvEGSXpXdG-k/s400/2012-05-01_19-52-46_59.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Dominique has trained domestic cats, household kitty cats,
to perform circus acts just like the big cats. He has cats that walk tight
ropes, jump through hoops of fire, leap across great distances between
platforms far above the ground and generally do things that cats aren’t
supposed to do, or at least not on command and not with apparent enthusiasm. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dydnilwnjEjrVgBaG6BXeGTifIL-6IVEIewoa_rPJBATQwneE8MX4ZX4b055E4n4M45ojQHoHvI-NoLSxHu8Q' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH-KEXmCnsERNBnI87lNN2jzU9Hif21QMx2tUzE-Bc6DPuq5B_jYtXPmL5zry5hzYC2OYt22KGS29SooQu2gb5tPbJJRkdTtgCCEXXFoSQ9Prtp1NVohF67gd3hDHTmsL4dBOXPtPTA5A/s1600/2012-05-01_18-37-36_317.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH-KEXmCnsERNBnI87lNN2jzU9Hif21QMx2tUzE-Bc6DPuq5B_jYtXPmL5zry5hzYC2OYt22KGS29SooQu2gb5tPbJJRkdTtgCCEXXFoSQ9Prtp1NVohF67gd3hDHTmsL4dBOXPtPTA5A/s320/2012-05-01_18-37-36_317.jpg" width="180" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I have something of a history with Dominique. I first saw
his act in Key West some thirty years ago. I was amazed and delighted. About
ten years later, I was watching a National Geographic special about cats and
there was Dominique and his cats in a featured segment. I still remember his
response to the interviewer’s question on how he managed to train his cats to
do such daunting tricks. “With love,” he said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">When a friend of mine returned from a vacation in Key West last
winter, the first thing I asked him was whether the Cat Man still performed at
sunset. I didn’t expect he did. I wasn’t even
sure he was still alive. “Yes!” my friend told me. “He and the cats are
still there.” (It isn’t actually the same cats; they’ve been replaced over the
years with new recruits.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I knew I had to get down to Key West as soon as I could. Who
knew how much longer the show would go on? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">I arrived today with forecasts of dire weather threatening
to make the trip a disappointment. But in the late afternoon the skies cleared
and the sun came out. And so did Dominique and his amazing cats.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Scratch one item from my bucket list, I mean, the things I want to do before I go.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.catmankeywest.com/"><span style="font-size: large;">http://www.catmankeywest.com/</span></a><o:p></o:p></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-50477081768082591162012-04-16T15:26:00.000-07:002012-04-16T15:26:43.845-07:00Cat Trouble<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9AEa8E7QjuG6GfyhILgnIU3E_SmvcCaCK2UtbxuuV-uRNcwWQ0T-GYxADLRMvwpRoEDmLDoz1-8EaEYLa18ivcFfyz-4bHlYE4UbK1rFz6PZ4NcT3uW7U3wMg11tDyi8hBt_M75ueSWw/s1600/2012-04-09_16-19-41_532.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9AEa8E7QjuG6GfyhILgnIU3E_SmvcCaCK2UtbxuuV-uRNcwWQ0T-GYxADLRMvwpRoEDmLDoz1-8EaEYLa18ivcFfyz-4bHlYE4UbK1rFz6PZ4NcT3uW7U3wMg11tDyi8hBt_M75ueSWw/s200/2012-04-09_16-19-41_532.jpg" width="150" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Osito on my lap</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-size: large;">These are entries from my journal as I travel the east coast with two cats in a motor home. I am on day 14 of a three-month journey.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>Tuesday, 10 April, Skidaway State Park, GA</b><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK88pk-yl5X5InyyK3xcW-d4exqafSVAYxnek6QPdmlBtBPonYy7SUsw3Z7pxk3SR7Ndkuvy28mod58_3HTgK_nE0inO6ojX64H7rsI8O8-WklBaa0nqcD0xWoS-NFzKHdVMWQYMQPtV8/s1600/2012-04-11_10-10-09_808.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK88pk-yl5X5InyyK3xcW-d4exqafSVAYxnek6QPdmlBtBPonYy7SUsw3Z7pxk3SR7Ndkuvy28mod58_3HTgK_nE0inO6ojX64H7rsI8O8-WklBaa0nqcD0xWoS-NFzKHdVMWQYMQPtV8/s320/2012-04-11_10-10-09_808.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">This is an absolutely beautiful campground. Each site is huge and separated by stands of tall trees and bushy palmettos. My site had to be close to half an acre. Osito was out enjoying nature on his cat run but poor little Brindie was stuck inside the coach. I felt so bad that she, who I had rescued from a campground two years ago where she had free run of the place, was now confined. To add insult to injury, she sat looking out the window enviously at Osito enjoying the outdoors. I decided to try her on her harness one more time. She allowed me to “saddle her up” without objection, but when I carried her outside she began to shiver. I should have quit then, but no. I set her on the ground. She sat still at my feet for a moment then tried to walk away. As soon as she felt the tug of the leash, she went crazy. She was flailing around, literally doing back flips, snarling and growling. In the chaos I dropped the leash and she took off into the woods.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">I searched and searched to no avail. I was worried sick that the leash might snag on something and she would be trapped. Although I recalled that most of the times I tried putting her in a harness she pulled a Houdini-like escape maneuver and got free. Not only had she escaped but my cell phone flipped out of my pocket and was lost.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">I enlisted the help of my neighboring campers. One woman came over with her phone and kept calling my number but we never heard my phone ring. (It turned out it fell out of my pocket inside the coach, where I found it on the floor next to the sofa. So much for clear recall in a crisis.)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Everyone was very concerned and promised to keep a lookout for Brindie. I spent the next 12 hours searching for her. At 10 PM, I got a call from a couple in a pop-up telling me that they heard a cat cry in the woods behind their site. I thought Brindie may go to them because in the past she has always gone camping with me in a popup. I took a flashlight and searched in the woods, stopping to listen frequently, scraping up my arms and legs, but nothing. I gave up for the night.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Then at 11 PM, I got another call from the popup people wanting to know if Brindie had a white patch on her chest. There was a cat sitting at the edge of the woods looking at them. Well, Brindie does not have any white fur so I said it wasn’t her.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Thirty minutes later I heard a shy little meow outside my coach. I saw something move underneath. When I shined my flashlight there, I saw Brindie who in that light, actually did appear to have a white patch. I called her, and in a moment, she came to the door, hopped up the steps, looked at her food bowl, and demanded to be fed. There was no trace of the harness or leash. Which is fine, because I’m never trying that foolishness again.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>Sunday, 15 April. Sawmill Camping Resort, FL</b><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB-WmIDK_wNgQ3_bSDNbmk3MdF6P7X0okQ5BdmP7CZcjp1_q9TGcaMm3e8vkmtse1zb0Fpob6XpCCBMI5hbjqYp7d4BPK7tETleGw8IiuIUcwCf7wbiJVWOzENF_PKGDBXxNvTsJqbCr8/s1600/2012-04-13_11-40-40_559.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB-WmIDK_wNgQ3_bSDNbmk3MdF6P7X0okQ5BdmP7CZcjp1_q9TGcaMm3e8vkmtse1zb0Fpob6XpCCBMI5hbjqYp7d4BPK7tETleGw8IiuIUcwCf7wbiJVWOzENF_PKGDBXxNvTsJqbCr8/s320/2012-04-13_11-40-40_559.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">I took Osito for a walk on his leash this afternoon. He walked beautifully along the trail through the woods, up to the pond, and around one side of the pond. I marveled at how good he is at walking, just like a dog. Well, maybe a little slower and with a lot more stops for sniffing. As we returned by one of the campground driveways something spooked him and he went berserk -- thrashing around at the end of the leash, spitting and growling, desperately trying to get away. I tried my best to restrain him, not certain that he would find his way back to the coach if he got loose. (Why do I always make the same mistakes?) In the ensuing struggle he scratched me up pretty good and apparently bit my hand. He cowered up against a stone railing where he continued to spit at me. He was panting heavily, actually gasping for air. The harness strap under his belly had come undone but the neck strap was still holding him.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">I moved closer to him and sat down trying to talk to him in soft, comforting tones. He didn’t run away but he did hiss at me a few more times. Eventually he seemed settled enough that I could try to fasten the other harness strap and to my relief he allowed me to do so. I waited a while longer, all the time praising him in as calming a manner as I knew. When he seemed approachable, I picked him up, still gasping, but he allowed me to carry him back to the camper. As soon as we were inside, he flopped on the floor, still hyperventilating, while I washed the blood from my arms and hands and bandaged myself up.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Still feeling sick from earlier in the day, I lay down on the bed for a while. I was awakened by Osito, who had jumped up on the bed and was nuzzling my face. All was forgotten and back to normal. Forgotten by him, that is. The puncture wound on my hand was throbbing with pain and half of my hand was swollen into a big puffy mess.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">I worried that the wound was infected. Once before when I was bitten by a cat I ended up staying for 5 nights in the hospital on an intravenous antibiotic drip while the hand surgeon puzzled over my x-rays trying to determine if my hand would have to be amputated. (It wasn’t.)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">What would I do if this bite required hospitalization ? I had no transportation other than the motorhome and how would I care for Osito and Brindie while I was in hospital? I decided to monitor the situation closely and make a decision the next day.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>Monday, 16 April, Sawmill Camping Resort.</b><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Had a rough night. The pain in my hand kept waking me up even though I was popping two Ibuprofen every couple of hours. I also felt physically sick, something that may or may not have been related to the bite. There was something even more troubling. A red trace had developed from the wound site up the back of my forearm all the way to the elbow. I knew what that meant. Infection, big time.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Still, it was laundry day and I managed to do three loads while I puzzled what to do. I asked at the office for the location of the nearest medical facility and information on taxi service. The man at the counter called a clinic about 12 miles away and told them I was coming. As I walked back to the coach, Chuck, a man I just met in the laundry, asked what I had decided to do. I told him I was going to the clinic and that I was calling a taxi to come collect me.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">“Oh, don’t do that,” he said. “I’ll drive you there.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">I really didn’t want to impose on anybody but he insisted. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">“I’m retired,” he explained. “I have nothing better to do and all day to do it. Besides, we all look out for each other here.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">So with that, he drove me to the clinic, waited there for me, then drove me to the pharmacy and finally back to the campground. What a saint. I invited him to dinner the next night.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">The nurse practitioner who saw me verified that I had a serious infection and that it was a good thing I had come so soon. She gave me a tetanus shot in the arm, and a penicillin shot in the butt, and a prescription for antibiotics. She felt certain that I wouldn’t need hospitalization this time. Thank heavens for that.</span><o:p></o:p></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-71481505118015131032012-03-30T14:03:00.000-07:002012-03-30T14:03:26.226-07:00Leaving New York<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Well, the U-Haul is packed and my two cats and I are on our way. Leaving New York. It has been an enjoyable six year experiment but now it’s time to move on. For the next three months we will be travelling through the eastern states in a 35 foot motorhome. We won’t exactly be roughing it; In fact the kitchen in the motorhome is an improvement over what I had in the New York apartment. The motorhome (I haven’t come up with a good name for it yet) will be my only home. I will have no permanent address. I’m going off the grid. At least as far off the grid as one can get while still having continuous internet access and satellite television. It’s still kind of scary though, this voluntary homelessness.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL5scEzHNQBDiY5QTHV6INoIhOv-KkPXY6aEkDP_vX2k6BxFtN0-u45jlF5tNKKe3hSfrVgu-mFKQD1EWr2tLjPbFiqpym2-Bcwmc2gtvBFgPa0Az0H204FKNzeJuEpjk-exTBDuAUot8/s1600/2012-02-13_15-05-34_170.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL5scEzHNQBDiY5QTHV6INoIhOv-KkPXY6aEkDP_vX2k6BxFtN0-u45jlF5tNKKe3hSfrVgu-mFKQD1EWr2tLjPbFiqpym2-Bcwmc2gtvBFgPa0Az0H204FKNzeJuEpjk-exTBDuAUot8/s320/2012-02-13_15-05-34_170.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">During my travels I will keep a journal which I will periodically post here. Several friends have suggested, demanded actually, that I change the name of this blog. They don’t think I am a bitter old queen. They think I should change the name to something more upbeat, something more optimistic. I don’t know. I’m kind of fond of the name of this little blog and it has acquired a small but dedicated following. It’s a minor miracle that someone else hadn’t already taken the name when I first started blogging. So I’m leaning towards staying with “The Bitter Old Queen.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">In a few days I fire up the big V-10 engine and head for exotic destinations far from New York. As far as my meager savings will take me at 8 miles to the gallon of ever more expensive gasoline. If we (I’m not being royal, I count the cats as part of my family) find some oasis along the way, I might just shut off the engine and stay.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Next stop, Savannah.</span><o:p></o:p></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-43955925380452507062011-12-19T10:32:00.000-08:002011-12-19T10:32:54.438-08:00An American Christmas<span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">As we celebrate this holiday season we might well contemplate some less than joyful facts. More than 46 million Americans are living in poverty. That was the official count by the U.S. Bureau of the Census for 2010, the most recent data available. Nearly half of all Americans between the ages of 25 and 34 are below the poverty line. One out of every two! That alone accounts for why so many have been forced to live at home with their parents or with roommates years beyond the time when my generation moved into our own homes. And here’s the most disturbing figure from the Census: One of every five children under 18 in this country lives in poverty.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">What exactly does “living in poverty” mean? According to the Census, a family with two adults and two children earning less than $22,113 per year is in poverty. A single adult age 65 or older who makes more than $10,458 per year is not in poverty. Really? My rent alone is more than double that amount. Admittedly I live in New York which is notoriously expensive, but still. Can you imagine living anywhere in this country on less than 11 thousand dollars? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">There are lots of theories floating around as to why poverty is at an all-time high and continues to rise. The recession obviously plays a major role. There is simultaneously a heightened awareness, largely due to the Occupy movement, of the increasing divergence between the wealthy and everyone else. Conspiracy theories abound to explain this trend. But as everyone knows, the real culprit is the lack of jobs. Good jobs. The kinds of jobs that pay the 50, 60, 70 thousand dollars a year or more that it really takes for a family of four to prosper. Those jobs have disappeared and barring something dramatic, they are not coming back.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">Why aren’t they coming back? The answer is stamped or printed on just about every Christmas or Hanukah gift you bought this year. Made in China.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">It’s almost cliché to bewail the export of jobs overseas and perhaps a little too easy. I’m not sure I believe some of the usual excuses. For example, are the high costs of transportation really offset by lower foreign labor costs for some three dollar piece of extruded plastic crap for sale at the Dollar Store? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">American manufacturers are at a disadvantage for a variety of reasons. In this country we regulate pollution, worker safety, product safety, energy consumption, and much more. As we should. As a result, we close our plants and import products from countries which make no attempt to regulate industry and which seemingly have no regard for their people. This needs to stop.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">At the risk of irritating free trade advocates, I ask a simple question. If it is defensible to regulate American industry, is it not reasonable to expect the same standards from industries we import from? Obviously it is. We can’t do it by legislation since the offending industries are not under our jurisdiction nor has it proven effective to try to persuade foreign governments to adopt tighter standards. We can, however, control what gets imported into this country. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">It’s time to get serious about banning products which have not been manufactured under the same stringent standards that we apply within our borders. But won’t this drive up prices, further harming our beleaguered economy? To some extent it might, at least initially. But the impact can be softened by phasing controls in gradually, starting with those products that are still available from American manufacturers and adding additional products according to how quickly their production can be reintroduced in the U.S.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;">As to the impact on the economy, how bad could it be to add millions of high quality, high paying jobs at almost no additional cost to taxpayers? Would it not be a more joyful season to see “Made in the USA” on those gifts as you wrap them?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-73951584550810861902011-12-13T11:42:00.000-08:002011-12-13T11:42:40.436-08:00Florida<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I almost moved to Florida this week. Like most New Yorkers, I have a love-hate relationship with The City. I have a nice enough apartment, large by New York standards. It has a real kitchen, not a fridge/stove/sink slapped along one wall of the living room, and a nice balcony, big enough for a couple of chairs and a grill. I even have a parking space in the basement. But I’m not in Manhattan. Anything remotely resembling my apartment would rent for at least four thousand a month in Manhattan and that’s just not in my price range.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">And now it’s winter. Cold, grey, lonely, depressing winter. It’s still summer in Fort Lauderdale. That’s where I am right now, sitting by the pool at the guest house. The rents are cheap down here. I found a really nice 2-story townhouse with two bedrooms and two full baths that rents for $200 less than my one bedroom apartment in Queens. The kitchen is beautiful – all granite and stainless steel and recessed lighting. The best part about this townhouse is the large multi-level private deck which fronts on a canal. It’s a five minute walk to all the action on Wilton Drive. I could really see myself living in this townhouse. I could really see my cats spending a lazy afternoon fishing in the canal.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDNk7g24EoaDc6W9WqTknj7Rw8Pgbbm3uygo_MJqrVmhGEdxSuuzEeIpTH0mkg4slJVbceqjBfTpsfHrpKLRjTvZR-Sa0LvExSetCHH241r00OOg7_zb7_YkhRII-LdXSSDGOt_NBJ6uk/s1600/townhouse.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="218" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDNk7g24EoaDc6W9WqTknj7Rw8Pgbbm3uygo_MJqrVmhGEdxSuuzEeIpTH0mkg4slJVbceqjBfTpsfHrpKLRjTvZR-Sa0LvExSetCHH241r00OOg7_zb7_YkhRII-LdXSSDGOt_NBJ6uk/s320/townhouse.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">But picking up and moving from New York to Florida involves a lot more than real estate decisions. As I stood on the marble floor of my prospective new living room trying to decide if I should take the plunge or not, I realized that this was one of those moments when you have to confront who you are. Am I a New Yorker? What does that mean? Would I be any happier here than I am currently? What about my friends? What about the summer? It’s unbearably hot and humid in Florida in the summer. On the other hand, I’ve found myself in a rut lately. Sure New York has a lot to offer, but I rarely take advantage of it anymore. Couldn’t I just as easily sit around doing nothing in Florida? For far less money? And have a really nice home in which I enjoyed doing nothing?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The agent waited patiently for me to say something. I had to get off the fence. I had to make a decision. To my astonishment, I heard myself say that I’d take it. I felt good that I was about to start a new chapter in my life. The next few weeks would be hell of course. So many details to take care of. And moving. Who enjoys packing and moving? But I made the choice and now it was time to set things in motion.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Or so I thought. The next day the agent called to inform me that despite having signed a contract and making a substantial deposit, the owner had decided to rent to someone else. I was annoyed. I was relieved. I had come so close to saying goodbye to New York. How could I have contemplated such a silly thing?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">It’s a beautiful day in Lauderdale today. Sunny with a few puffy clouds. Warm, but a delicious breeze singing through the palm trees. I fly home tomorrow. Back to the Big Apple. It will be cold. It will be grey. It might be depressing but at least I won’t have to pack.</span><o:p></o:p></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-11453439102646638992011-11-16T09:18:00.000-08:002011-11-16T09:19:36.859-08:00A Teacher Cries<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">When I was a boy in high school, I was usually shy and quiet but sometimes, given sufficient encouragement, I could be a real brat. It happened once in my Spanish class. Our teacher, Miss Beardsley, was a stern woman of indeterminate age. She wore her hair in a tight bun which accentuated the angularity of her face. I don’t recall ever seeing her smile. She was also a very strict teacher. From the first day of class, she never uttered a word in English. She was not well liked.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">We students were an undisciplined lot, and on one particular day some of the boys began openly heckling her.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“Hey, Mrs. Beardsley,” called out tall Eric, the basketball player, “Oh, sorry, I mean <i>Miss</i> Beardsley.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Hoots and cheers followed. Several other boys joined in the game.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“Hey Miss Beardsley,” chimed in fat Tom. “How come you aren’t married?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Caught up in the frivolity of it all, and sensing a chance to score a few points with the popular kids, I blurted out, “Oh, come on, who would ever want to marry a horse face?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The class erupted into laughter but a red-faced Miss Beardsley hurried to the back of the room and through a door that led to a storeroom behind the class. She quietly closed the door. For a moment we fell into silence but soon the boys, and even some of the girls, took advantage of the lack of supervision to begin general mayhem, wadding up paper into balls and throwing it at each other and similar childish outbursts.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">After a while, I went back and carefully opened the door to the storeroom. I don’t remember why. I doubt that I had any legitimate business back there so I must have grown curious as to why our teacher had left the class and was gone for so long. Maybe I was afraid.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I saw Miss Beardsley sitting on a chair, crying. I was stunned, and terribly ashamed. I wanted to hug her and apologize but of course kids didn’t do those kinds of things with their teachers. When I returned to the classroom everyone wanted to know what she was doing. I told them she was grading papers.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Nothing more was said about the incident. The rest of the semester went on. At the end of the year I took my yearbook around to my friends and all my teachers for signatures. I don’t remember what anyone wrote; I don’t even remember most of the people. Except one.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Miss Beardsley wrote, in Spanish:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><i>“Even the smallest blade of grass casts a shadow.”</i><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Great teachers teach us lessons that have a profound impact throughout our lives. Miss Beardsley was a great teacher.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-74763209897260509652011-08-16T10:03:00.000-07:002011-08-16T13:50:25.429-07:00Hair<div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhESqVZ8fmoCOyBBO1k1aY8hTMsmuSVSKMDlKLtFuSVBPuvjVBHkHZWBUEHCs3sWQiD0sI5wK10IyoOAATTXcaujBMQ5NYu89Al_s-qZgsbPqrjtt_5_dwSckzT04O_kAzHlTpj7OtHFxo/s1600/billafro.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhESqVZ8fmoCOyBBO1k1aY8hTMsmuSVSKMDlKLtFuSVBPuvjVBHkHZWBUEHCs3sWQiD0sI5wK10IyoOAATTXcaujBMQ5NYu89Al_s-qZgsbPqrjtt_5_dwSckzT04O_kAzHlTpj7OtHFxo/s200/billafro.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Last night I stood on the oppressively warm platform at Union Square station waiting forever for the train home. It was unusually crowded for after midnight, a sure sign that there was a problem. A gaggle of twenty-somethings frolicked nearby. I was especially fascinated by two young men who were chattering away, obviously enjoying a night on the town. They laughed at each other’s jokes, often touching, and gazing into each other’s eyes. So young, carefree, and in love.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">They were cute. Cute, as in diminutive. Everyone in their group was small. No taller than 5 foot 6 or so and with amazingly narrow hips and tiny little waists. The happy male couple probably had a combined weight less than mine. I often wonder about little people. How do they fit all their internal organs in such a tiny space? Do they have a little half-size liver? Mini-kidneys? Wasp size lungs? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Being much taller, I observed that the boy with the great mop of bushy hair had a small patch on top of his head were the hair was beginning to thin. I felt sorry for him. I developed a bald spot in my early twenties. After I discovered it, I became obsessed with it. I was certain that I might otherwise have been an attractive man. I might have been popular, happy, had lots of friends, a lover, gotten married, moved to a house in the suburbs, bought a riding mower to cut the grass every Saturday, inhaled the aromatic mix of gasoline exhaust and fresh cut grass. But I’m terribly allergic to fresh cut grass and I’m bald.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I tried everything to hide that little hairless island on top of my head. I grew the rest of my hair very long. It hung down in rivulets of red curls. But there was an empty spot on top. I looked like Ben Franklin. I wore hats before it was fashionable to wear a baseball cap at all times, even while working out at the gym. Finally, in desperation, I had a hair piece made. Actually two hair pieces. Due to the constant need to maintain and reconstruct hair pieces, one of them is always in the shop. At that time, all human hair wigs were made from Asian hair – long, straight, black Asian hair. (Presumably the Asians voluntarily surrendered their hair for the greater good of humanity.) I had decided that as long as I was transforming my appearance, I may as well go all the way. I decided on an Afro, but red.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8BWnGE3ZpHSobA289J2E3RYqpQ1tZVSbEs0ZrV0b8x37kOgPk3PirRJuoBkh3elu2ZCXzDMHVsZCmG5FqwsQ1lgEEOzOJljfXwB1iBGBnJbMrmw-kGwlsoBm6tHFLTFJS0ni3JfxxHNY/s1600/toupee.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8BWnGE3ZpHSobA289J2E3RYqpQ1tZVSbEs0ZrV0b8x37kOgPk3PirRJuoBkh3elu2ZCXzDMHVsZCmG5FqwsQ1lgEEOzOJljfXwB1iBGBnJbMrmw-kGwlsoBm6tHFLTFJS0ni3JfxxHNY/s320/toupee.jpg" width="180" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Unlike a wig, a hair piece does not cover your entire head. It’s not a hat. Rather, it is custom made to exactly fit the bald area. A mesh is cut to size and technicians weave the Asian hair into the mesh. They subject it to a toxic chemical stew to curl it and color it and cut it to the proper length. Then a stylist must blend the new hair with your own hair so that it is undetectable. So once a week I returned to the salon where the stylist would first work on my real hair. Even though my hair is naturally wavy, against his better advice, I insisted on having it set into tight little curls. Then a matronly technician would emerge from a back room bearing my newly restored hairpiece on a platter. It was rather like a coronation. The stylist would apply it to my scalp with double sided tape and tease it and fuss with it and blend it with my hair for at least 15 minutes, spraying Aqua Net at frequent intervals. Finally he would hold a big mirror up behind and above my head so I could see that perfection had been achieved.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">When I left the shop I looked great. I had a full head of luxurious hair, in a great Afro bubble. It was impossible to tell it wasn’t all real. At least for the rest of the day. But I had to remove the hair piece before bed. It wasn’t a hair weave or a transplant. It was more like daily contact lens. Off at night, back on the next morning. And that is where the whole system began to break down. Without an expensive, hour-long session in my stylist’s chair, I was left to try to recreate the magic on my own. I would confuse the front from the back of the piece, stick it down in the wrong place, fail to blend it around the edges. It looked fake. I would get exasperated and start to sweat. Then the tape wouldn’t stick. I watched the clock tick towards being late for work once again. To make matters worse, the Asian hair was always trying to revert to its natural state: not curly and not red. Some mornings I was sure the front edge had curled up just enough to expose the underlying mesh but I was too frustrated and too late to care. Besides, nobody ever said anything negative. The first few days, all my colleagues told me I looked great; then they just didn’t mention it any more.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">But I wasn’t so sure. One evening at one of my neighborhood bars, I thought I heard two guys making fun of me. I walked past to hear what they were saying. One of them was singing a made-up jingle. “I used to be bald, but now I have hair.” And they both broke into a fit of giggling. I’m just being paranoid, I thought. I’m hearing things. But my confidence was shaken.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The breaking point came the night I had a date with Blake. He was a waiter but I knew him from a performance he gave at the Gay Community Center. He played acoustic guitar and sang his own original songs. I’m not usually a fan of folk music, but his voice was so clear and compelling and he sang about struggling to establish a masculine identity in a gay world. I was in love.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">When he responded to my personal ad a few months later, I’m sure he didn’t remember me from all the adoring fans in the audience that night. I made a special appointment with my stylist. I told him I had to look better than ever. He worked on me and my Asian hair for an hour. His magic worked. I looked great.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">When Blake arrived, we had cocktails and chatted, sitting close together on the sofa. He kept looking at me strangely. Oh my god, I thought in panic, he can tell. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“I remember you from the Community Center,” he told me. “I’ll never forget the nice words you said to me after the performance.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I relaxed. He wasn’t staring at my fake hair. He remembered me. All would be well.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“But I don’t remember you having all this hair. I thought you were balding on top.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Panic returned.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“No offense, but are you wearing a hair piece?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Disaster.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“I mean, it’s just that I have a thing for balding men. I know it’s weird but it turns me on.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">It took a moment for his words to take any meaning. I asked him if he was serious. Did he really like balding men. He assured me he did.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“Hang on one moment. Just stay here.” I raced into the bathroom and ripped the Asian hair from my head and tossed into the nearest place to hide it, which just happened to be the waste basket. I quickly removed the residue from the tape and flipped a comb around, took a deep breath and returned.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“Oh, much better,” Blake smiled and slipped his arm around me as I sat down next to him.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I won’t tell you about the rest of that night other than to say it went very well. I’ve never worn the hair piece since.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I thought about all this as I gazed down at the thinning spot on top of the small young man on the subway platform. I smiled. It’s nice to be older and wiser. It’s also nice to be taller. He couldn’t see the top of my head. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><br />
Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-35239459573075817842011-08-02T11:21:00.000-07:002011-08-02T11:21:47.080-07:00Road TripI'm on an extended road trip through Pennsylvania and New York with Penelope PopUp and Ranger Rudy. My two cats, Osito and Brindie, are along for the ride. Our first stop is Hillside Campground in northeast Pennsylvania. Here's what our site looks like...<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dyeZ8-DEii_gq3-4BdG29E4L_ULD34vRtwsGIGdAtmPYAPAK4dgxh046RXBRcZ8VOMvMd-EL55hh6xOt4EtEQ' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-32265283512685337662011-03-30T10:51:00.000-07:002011-03-30T10:51:33.399-07:00David Brooks on the Edge<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I admire David Brooks, the editorial columnist for the New York Times, and I often agree with his positions even though he is a “conservative” and I am a “liberal”. What I like most about him is his intellectual integrity: He gets the facts right and his positions are built upon solid logical progression. But he really blew it this week.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">In his article, “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/29/opinion/29brooks.html?src=me&ref=general">Tools for Thinking</a>”, he attempts to summarize the results of a symposium that explored scientific notions which could improve human thinking. First up is John McWhorter, a linguist at <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Columbia</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype></st1:place>, who dismisses those who lament the devolution of the English language brought about by technology. McWhorter points out that there is nothing inherit about email that prevents someone from writing in the literary style of the nineteenth century if he or she wanted to. He states that it was the lessening formality of language in the sixties that accounts for the change. That’s nonsense. Nobody is bewailing the loss of the flowery literary style of the nineteenth century, at least not in emails; what we miss is the informal (but comprehensible) style of the last decade which has given way to LOL-speak. (See my article, “<a href="http://thebitteroldqueen.blogspot.com/2010/12/loss-of-language.html">The Loss of Language</a>”.)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">He also states that the QWERTY keyboard was invented to slow typists down so that the keys of mechanical typewriters wouldn’t jam. Everything I’ve read says that the design was meant to do exactly the opposite – speed up typing by arranging the keys according to the most prevalent letter combinations in the English language. Brooks should know this and should not have passed along incorrect assertions.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">He then quotes Daniel Kahneman of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Princeton</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype></st1:place> who says, “When you focus on education you neglect the myriad of other factors that determine income.” True, but when you focus on income you neglect the myriad of other benefits of education.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">To be fair, Brooks does us a favor by introducing some of the ideas that emerged from the Edge symposium. Supervenience, the Fundamental Attribution Error, Emergent Systems, and the like are fascinating concepts, none of which I had ever heard of before. Understanding why we think the way we do is always a useful pursuit. But Brooks above all is a political commentator, and when he suggests that political polarization, rising health care costs and bad marriages can be understood if we just see them as emergent systems, I suggest that he not write his columns so close to the deadline.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-50702526598980960202011-02-04T06:54:00.000-08:002011-02-04T06:57:08.297-08:00The New Media<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqo_28p7TnIoogfkSoy5nrlfroZ-gDx9e8ZXgWxM-hmuMIRgqPOXOUHatZPOgkKT_ceEA3gD0GnD4KdM6O61SJpvzf2I_hPOvyUk_OVZvojXBFGCKTzWs2ZAIDOdrZ_7pg9vjpUvEUc3Y/s1600/enews.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqo_28p7TnIoogfkSoy5nrlfroZ-gDx9e8ZXgWxM-hmuMIRgqPOXOUHatZPOgkKT_ceEA3gD0GnD4KdM6O61SJpvzf2I_hPOvyUk_OVZvojXBFGCKTzWs2ZAIDOdrZ_7pg9vjpUvEUc3Y/s320/enews.jpg" width="292" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Quick. Where did you first learn about the demonstrations in </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Egypt</st1:place></st1:country-region></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">? While you ponder that question, let me ask you another: Is there anything particularly significant, or out of the ordinary, occurring in </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Tibet</st1:place></st1:country-region></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"> today?</span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I’m willing to bet that most people learned about the strife in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Egypt</st1:place></st1:country-region> because they heard it on the news or read about it in the paper. I’m equally sure that most of you know there is nothing particularly important happening in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Tibet</st1:place></st1:country-region> today because there isn’t anything in the news about it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">But what a minute. Aren’t we in the brave new world of electronic information distribution? I’ve been reading for several years now how the traditional media – broadcast news and printed newspapers – are relics from the past. People today get all their information from the online social networks.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">To test this theory, I just surveyed several of the social media to develop this list of the day’s major events:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Hulk Hogan has made a new rap video. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Rosie Huntington ate some falafel. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">A whole lot of people have recently checked in at Starbucks. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Overweight cats are still falling from window sills at an alarming rate. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Men are pigs. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">It’s a great day for cashmere. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Here in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state>, the MTA is intentionally screwing people by making trains late. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Everybody is discussing sexual intercourse with snow. </span></li>
</ul><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">As I review this list I can’t escape a vague feeling that I’m still missing some of the more important events of the day. I think I’ll stick with the traditional media a little while longer, gate keeping and all.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">In other news, Rupert Murdock has launched a revolutionary new venture. <i>The Daily</i> is the first exclusively electronic newspaper and will be available as an app on the Apple iPad. But, again, wait a minute. Haven’t paper and ink newspapers been searching for a way to go electronic for the past five years? Most of the major papers already have an online edition. Some are free; some require a subscription. So what’s new about Murdock’s edition?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">A newspaper on a screen is a website whether you call it a website or you call it an app. As far as I can see, there isn’t anything you can do on an iPad that you can’t do on any website except, by making it an “app”, you can limit it to a small subset of users (small in comparison to the total number of people with access to the internet). So what’s the point?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">It isn’t the technology that’s revolutionary here. It’s how the money is collected. None of the major players has yet figured out how to make a dime publishing online news. By loosening it’s prohibition against subscription services in the App Store, Apple gets to grab a whopping thirty percent off the top. Murdock presumably gets to ride the wave of popularity of the iPad and the ignorance of its users. They will think that reading a newspaper on a computer screen was not possible until their magical device hit the stores. But once the novelty wears off, are people any more likely to pay for their news than they have been in the past?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Stay tuned or tweeted, as the case may be.</span></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-70716982492729462112011-01-22T09:21:00.000-08:002011-01-22T09:21:43.721-08:00Writing<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH3xkHhTOxOr9audIblO_w3-ix6tltERQl5RRqxpyLQmBinAff117wt-_sEcvpCahBsqk_ydQS6W8mogRAQtbPsuCVZmVQcqTGiWQgJwSnv2PANte0I77fgpKnR6pp3LRLNx33Cdr6FoY/s1600/humantarget.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH3xkHhTOxOr9audIblO_w3-ix6tltERQl5RRqxpyLQmBinAff117wt-_sEcvpCahBsqk_ydQS6W8mogRAQtbPsuCVZmVQcqTGiWQgJwSnv2PANte0I77fgpKnR6pp3LRLNx33Cdr6FoY/s200/humantarget.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Writing is hard work. Many of us picture a writer as someone happily sitting at the keyboard in his studio in a <st1:place w:st="on">New England</st1:place> country home dashing off page after page of perfect prose. I suppose it is that way for a handful of acclaimed novelists, but for everyone else it is moments of inspiration connected by hours of drudgery. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Until I became a writer myself, I had no idea just how hard it is. Thousands upon thousands of hours go into writing a novel. Endless writing and rewriting. Sometimes it is necessary to discard huge volumes of completed work because it isn’t working well, or doesn’t fit into the larger picture. Sometimes a project seems so overwhelming that only the most disciplined, dedicated, or hungry writers keep slogging away at it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Writing is also very personal. Writing can not be done in a vacuum. All of the best stories you have read were based on the writer’s own life – his or her experiences, feelings, personality – as well as the people in the writer’s life. Sometimes this is obvious; sometimes it is subtle. They may be creating fictional characters but those characters are based on bits and pieces of real people.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Jennifer Bell, the author of <i>Going Down</i>, told her students that if you are not ready to offend the people you know, if you are not ready to lose some of your friends, you are not ready to write. The needs of the story have priority over how people will feel about the way you have portrayed them.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">But even more than how your friend’s play into the work, the writer’s own psyche is exposed for all to see. When we put our words out there for others to read, whether it be in a published work, or during a critique in a workshop, it is not just our writing that is set up like a giant target to be torn to shreds; it is our very souls that are on display.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">There have been times that I had to fight to keep from shaking while my work was discussed. I’m not the only writing student who has felt that. I have seen some students burst into tears – not because of anything that was said about their words, but because they had written about things that opened old wounds, things that dredged up deep emotions from their past. Now these things were layed out for all the world to witness.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I suspect that the best writers are those that can keep going, wounded and terrified, filled with doubt, to somehow finish their work. Anything less would result in a compromised story, one not worth reading.</span></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-14009463631814602382010-12-29T07:27:00.000-08:002010-12-29T07:27:04.720-08:00The Year in Review<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Last January, when I began this blog, I never intended it to be a diary. I had loftier ambitions. I wanted to write the kind of articles that, in more skillful hands (and perhaps better connected hands), you might find in The New Yorker. That might seem presumptuous but I never assumed that I was that talented; it was just a goal to work towards. The most important thing for me was to develop the discipline to meet my self imposed deadline – a new article every Wednesday. I am pleased, and surprised, that throughout this past year I have met that goal. This is the fifty-sixth entry in “The Bitter Old Queen.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I am happy that I have received many responses from readers. Some have sent emails to me. I have also received feedback on Facebook and to a lesser extent in comments posted directly into the blog. Blogger does not make it easy to enter comments so I especially appreciate those readers who have persevered and submitted their thoughts.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I got the most reaction, and most of it was negative, from “Reflections on Vallarta”, published on March 31. Many regular visitors to <st1:city w:st="on">Puerto Vallarta</st1:city>, along with expatriates who live there, took great exception to what they read as a condemnation of their version of <st1:place w:st="on">Paradise</st1:place>. The point of the article was that our perceptions of a place can not be separated from what is happening in our lives at the time. In this case I had just broken up with my partner, who I had met and lived with in Vallarta before he came to live with me in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state>. When I returned to Vallarta after the breakup I saw it more objectively, both the good and the not so pretty, rather than through the eyes of a man in love. Perhaps some of the recently arrived foreigners need to remove their rose colored glasses and see it more objectively as well. They may discover that they like it even more.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">My most read, or at least accessed, article was “Miss Columbia”, posted on June 2. It was about a contest for Latino drag queens. I was surprised that it has received ten times more page views than any other article I posted. It turns out that most of the traffic came from Google searches for the terms, not surprisingly, “Miss Columbia.” My article comes in at number ten on a list of 2,280,000 results. Just think how surprised the devotees of the Señorita Colombia (Concurso Nacional de Belleza) must have been to find themselves reading about two fat old homosexuals listening to bullfrogs in a campground in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Pennsylvania</st1:place></st1:state>.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Another article that got a lot of response, and this time overwhelmingly positive, was “The Rescue”, posted on November 3. This was the story of how I rescued two abandoned cats from a campground in the Poconos. I’m happy to say that one of them is living with me here in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state> and the other has been adopted by one of my camping buddies. They are both doing well and have turned out to be delightful pets. I have since taken training classes and been certified by the City of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:city> to participate in the Trap-Neuter-Return program. TNR is the most successful and humane way of dealing with the severe overpopulation of stray cats living on the city’s streets.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Most of my readers are in the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">United States</st1:place></st1:country-region>. I also have readers in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Canada</st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region w:st="on">Mexico</st1:country-region>, and the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">U.K.</st1:place></st1:country-region> but Google Stats reveals a few surprises. For example, I have had page hits from <st1:country-region w:st="on">Austria</st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region w:st="on">Ukraine</st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region w:st="on">Croatia</st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">India</st1:place></st1:country-region> and throughout central and south America. (I suspect many of the latter were looking for Miss Columbia.)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I think a few of the articles turned out quite well. I have listed my favorites in the sidebar to the left. If you missed them the first time around you might want to sample one or two of them now.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I took up blogging as a way of continuing my effort to improve as a writer. I have also taken several classes at the New York Writers Workshop. One thing I have learned in the workshops, as well as in writing this blog, is that my best writing occurs whenever I write from the heart. It is often painful to reveal myself personally. I have written about things that have opened old wounds and I have exposed myself in a way that leaves me embarrassed, humbled, and vulnerable at times. But, in doing so, I have occasionally written things that have resonated with readers. That is, of course, the ultimate goal of every writer.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">So I close this year by saying something that I could never have said last January. It is simple and yet it is an affirmation that I have accomplished something important to me even though, at times, it was very much in doubt. I think I can now say it: I am a writer.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Thank you for hanging with me through this process of learning and discovery. I hope you will stay with me as the journey continues in the new year.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-69728813444125963542010-12-22T07:31:00.000-08:002010-12-22T07:31:39.355-08:00Oh Christmas Tree!<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I hate Christmas. There, I said it. Bah-fucking-humbug.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">We all know that Christmas is an over-hyped gimmick to prop up the sagging retail industry and to somehow revive our economy by promoting wanton consumerism. (Although it seems more likely to help <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">China</st1:country-region></st1:place>’s economy than our own.)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">This is the time of the year when suicides and psychiatric hospital admissions spike. For many, it is not a happy time. There is an expectation that we are supposed to be happy, more happy than usual, at Christmas. When it doesn’t live up to expectations, we feel more down than ever.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB-JgLeGbuCkCbAApMLVWchZPUA1XGfD5IrDIkrUBlSLbUVwDH60aAYpmAnxLpQZK88tSUAybEsKpVg6jlUXTTcGiWFWCSwbNRi6RneHqVmd5OzZhLj8Cj66tDs5_FC3mPukMpeQnNfSA/s1600/currier_ives.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB-JgLeGbuCkCbAApMLVWchZPUA1XGfD5IrDIkrUBlSLbUVwDH60aAYpmAnxLpQZK88tSUAybEsKpVg6jlUXTTcGiWFWCSwbNRi6RneHqVmd5OzZhLj8Cj66tDs5_FC3mPukMpeQnNfSA/s1600/currier_ives.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Not everyone lives in a house that looks like the Currier and Ives illustration on the front of a Christmas card. The snow, if there is any, is more likely to be slushy and dirty. The woodland was cut down a century ago to make way for farms and orchards and more recently for planned “estate” communities. Sitting in a traffic jam in an SUV is a far cry from a one horse open sleigh.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJnyW_P6fzFs30NGwFGVWIkTekR5epGXEtzKcB-3LMpsBaddLQyW3yuSxgOSCJ7r8k-67zUS8hSocxmF-5MsZPuItLvqOQuGCZp7TLXSsENQAZonCShYOmq78cRC4wjdjw-yz5yksd6x0/s1600/redballs.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJnyW_P6fzFs30NGwFGVWIkTekR5epGXEtzKcB-3LMpsBaddLQyW3yuSxgOSCJ7r8k-67zUS8hSocxmF-5MsZPuItLvqOQuGCZp7TLXSsENQAZonCShYOmq78cRC4wjdjw-yz5yksd6x0/s200/redballs.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Christmas has never been a happy time for me. As a child, my sisters and I used to dread it. Our obsessive-compulsive dad would put up the same white artificial tree each year. He would allow us to assist in putting up red balls (all the identical shade of red) scolding us if we were not careful to graduate them from small at the top to large at the bottom. Those red balls were the only things we were allowed to put on the tree. He aimed a red spotlight on the red balls. He liked the uniformity and simplicity of it. Our obsessive-compulsive mother liked not having anything messy that might detract from her immaculately clean living room. The tree itself was disruptive enough.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">We did not have a happy family but at Christmas we were supposed to play the role of happy children. We would dutifully make wish lists for Santa Claus, carefully editing to be sure that we listed only gifts that were within Santa’s price guidelines and that were readily available at the local mall. On Christmas morning we did our best to pretend enthusiasm and curiosity about what might be under the tree, knowing full well what was there. The things we really wanted – to be loved, encouraged, made to feel we had some self worth – those things were never under the tree.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">As a young man, Christmas was even worse. Everyone would be preparing to go home to their families. They were excited. What little was left of my family had become so dysfunctional that we did not even see each other for holidays, or any other time for that matter. I spent Christmas sitting at home alone. Everything would be closed. The decorations and holiday music outside mocked me, reminding me that my life was a failure.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgph3Z_BmEhgT8LHCQssQE7O6r0rtVxSgtzqlSB9de1pJOzCIPZ5RrEL9nSq2t04GHuzzpqdu80fIA9J7buZYke4gn7LOoyaU6djKVVIT2S2r4yYOWwUn8XQAVxQPj20uUalHKuPyPgV5o/s1600/deadChristmastree.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgph3Z_BmEhgT8LHCQssQE7O6r0rtVxSgtzqlSB9de1pJOzCIPZ5RrEL9nSq2t04GHuzzpqdu80fIA9J7buZYke4gn7LOoyaU6djKVVIT2S2r4yYOWwUn8XQAVxQPj20uUalHKuPyPgV5o/s1600/deadChristmastree.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">So forgive me if I fail to wish you a merry Christmas. Let Christmas revert to the religious holiday it once was and let Christians celebrate it. I do not identify myself as a Christian and I have no more need to make a big deal over Christmas than I do over St. Francis of Assisi Day, Purim, or Ramadan.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Instead of looking to the unhappy past, let me focus on the promise of the future. I wish you all a very joyful New Year.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-49077996832062883072010-12-15T08:36:00.000-08:002010-12-15T08:36:11.791-08:00Life on the Off Ramp<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRMDHzSJkpSaLmcT-Mnd7F_70XvdDDo9DfAw0sRYkF3gp7vV3q5u1mUlmdJpa1EptwtrL5AR0O_ArOnIHqxjiPpR-M3WUbsDIEZ6pWai849WfiRGs2uvf_oXzyb8E6YcVV30fmx570oy8/s1600/exit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRMDHzSJkpSaLmcT-Mnd7F_70XvdDDo9DfAw0sRYkF3gp7vV3q5u1mUlmdJpa1EptwtrL5AR0O_ArOnIHqxjiPpR-M3WUbsDIEZ6pWai849WfiRGs2uvf_oXzyb8E6YcVV30fmx570oy8/s1600/exit.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">When I was a grad student at <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Syracuse</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype></st1:place>, I took a course in media criticism. It was taught by a visiting lecturer who flew up from <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Washington</st1:city> <st1:state w:st="on">DC</st1:state></st1:place> once a week to fill in for the full time professor who had suddenly vacated his post. I believe our instructor was a past president of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, or some similar entity which would have been suitably impressive to the hopeful future broadcasters in the class.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">One day, apropos of nothing I could discern, he drew a timeline on the marker board representing the various stages of human development. At about the twenty year point he drew a tick mark and labeled it “relationships.” Apparently we humans are supposed to begin mastering the ability to form committed, long term relationships with significant others at that age. He marked various other stages along the line culminating with self actualization – that point where you become a very successful human in all dimensions.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Then he said something which froze me in my seat. He said that you must master each skill in sequence and that if you become stuck at any point, you can not progress to the next. I was staring hard at the relationship tick mark and I knew at that moment that my life was destined to fail.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Even in my twenties, I had already fallen behind in the march along the human development line. I couldn’t recall any successful relationships to that point, not even with my own parents. They were the caretakers who ignored me most of the time except for those occasions when they chose to actively thwart any aspirations I might show.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">As a boy, the neighborhood kids would torment me. I got picked on, beaten up, and had stones thrown at me any time I ventured outside. To this day I don’t know why I elicited so much negative attention, but the fear I developed remains with me. I am afraid of the world that exists beyond my apartment door. It is a hostile place.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Yet I remained unrealistically optimistic. Ever since I first began to contemplate my own life and compare it to others, I have felt that I can overcome everything and still live the life I fantasize. There was always tomorrow. Such ungrounded optimism must be something that is hard wired into me. There is no basis for it in reality.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW1RdhSvQpoKxixUjbytVIDXovOJYodO_GMkyszuev-8u5b9DoNq6xZzHIpLwe_fOx1zi8lx0QveVq_RynNMJHabK7Y7O86zFdzCy6QbjQHNh0Vz97W7tdSsmHdhIHlaMpEy0jdLQptYk/s1600/dead-end-sign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW1RdhSvQpoKxixUjbytVIDXovOJYodO_GMkyszuev-8u5b9DoNq6xZzHIpLwe_fOx1zi8lx0QveVq_RynNMJHabK7Y7O86zFdzCy6QbjQHNh0Vz97W7tdSsmHdhIHlaMpEy0jdLQptYk/s200/dead-end-sign.jpg" width="171" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Now that I am in my sixties, I realize that the direction of my life is unlikely to change much. There is no precedent for suddenly popping back to that twenty year tick mark and hitting the play button. Aside from all the psychological baggage, there is the physical reality of aging that hinders making up for forty lost years.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Sometimes I think about the boy I once was. He was quiet and gentle, a fair skinned red head with freckles, and a sunny disposition. I want to protect him. I don’t want him to become cynical and bitter. I want to teach him the lessons I have learned through all the years and tears of my life. I want him to live his life fully and not wait for a better day to come. But I can not do anything for that boy. It is too late.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I believe that the visiting professor left something off his diagram. I think that there are alternate branches for those of us who live a compromised life. Instead of progressing in a straight line towards self-actualization, there are paths to other destinations. One of those destinations is self-acceptance. That is the point where one realizes that he will never achieve the happy and successful life he has so desperately chased for most of his life, but he can settle for the comfortable realization that he did the best he could with what he had to work with.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-18943445071119100032010-12-08T07:31:00.000-08:002010-12-16T07:31:39.263-08:00You Put de Lime in de Coconut but Not in de Beer!<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The other night I asked the bartender to put a lime in my bottle of Rolling Rock. He looked at me with incomprehension.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“You want me to put lime in a Rolling Rock?” There was suspicion in his tone.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGmBUTtzHgpIt-QlTGP3dEd68tKe0I2De_TtCV_k3GTl0jMn_ZpZnvnbbsgY7U3uMdz4C3ZWxWPoD3SBHNy2YkdRzSPoiQVj8RF-6SDVcj4Sdu0ZeZlmmY7ptn1ctPoZMsyptSpJMKsWw/s1600/limecorona.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGmBUTtzHgpIt-QlTGP3dEd68tKe0I2De_TtCV_k3GTl0jMn_ZpZnvnbbsgY7U3uMdz4C3ZWxWPoD3SBHNy2YkdRzSPoiQVj8RF-6SDVcj4Sdu0ZeZlmmY7ptn1ctPoZMsyptSpJMKsWw/s1600/limecorona.jpg" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I assured him that it was perfectly legal even though it wasn’t <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Corona</st1:place></st1:city>. He did his best the-customer-is-always-right shrug and jammed a fetid little sliver of lime into the mouth of the bottle. I didn’t really want lime in my beer; I was just messing with his head.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I don’t know why Americans think that <st1:city w:st="on">Corona</st1:city>, and only <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Corona</st1:place></st1:city>, must be served with lime. Mexicans certainly don’t. Mexicans only put lime in a beer bottle to keep insects out. They are careful not to squeeze the lime. They don’t like the taste of lime in their beer any more than they like the taste of inebriated insects swimming around in it. It doesn’t matter if they are drinking indoors either. Most Mexican buildings don’t have screens.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">When Mexicans do choose to put lime in their beer it doesn’t matter what brand of beer they are drinking. Most likely it is not <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Corona</st1:place></st1:city>. <st1:city w:st="on">Corona</st1:city> is not a popular beer in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Mexico</st1:place></st1:country-region>. It is mostly produced for export to the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">United States</st1:place></st1:country-region> and, as such, it is crafted to be tasteless. It’s amusing that Americans think they are drinking real authentic Mexican beer when they have <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Corona</st1:place></st1:city>. But then what can you expect from a county that celebrates Cinco de Mayo? In <st1:country-region w:st="on">Mexico</st1:country-region>, Cinco de Mayo is celebrated in only two small villages and wherever there are a lot of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">U.S.</st1:place></st1:country-region> tourists. Many Mexicans have never heard of it. Those who have think it’s an American holiday.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Mexicans don’t drink tequila the way Americans do either. If it’s good quality tequila they sip it slowly, like <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Cognac</st1:place></st1:city>, savoring the rich and subtle flavors. If you try a premium tequila, such as Don Julio Añejo, and you think you detect a slight taste of whiskey or bourbon, you’re right: tequila is aged in oak casks which have previously been used in the production of American whiskeys such as Jack Daniels. Lesser quality tequila is usually drunk along with sangrita, a sweet, spicy drink made from orange juice, grenadine, and hot chilies.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIiHlzU0W-wxNfUGg0co9u75yCCmECxw722zwFLBKDLppTeaEEM8cQq60iR8H3XetBxKD6p0gQSq5zOxMubxlEFxRvvUlLgxt15VYXOHUDSQhH6ShHIFoKSb4HiRVbfDCCduTlVWyu6Rs/s1600/tequilashot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIiHlzU0W-wxNfUGg0co9u75yCCmECxw722zwFLBKDLppTeaEEM8cQq60iR8H3XetBxKD6p0gQSq5zOxMubxlEFxRvvUlLgxt15VYXOHUDSQhH6ShHIFoKSb4HiRVbfDCCduTlVWyu6Rs/s1600/tequilashot.jpg" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">If you’re not in a sipping mood, the correct method for slamming a shot of tequila is as follows: Have ready fresh limes, quartered, and a bowl of salt. Pour good quality tequila (save the cheap stuff for margaritas) into shot glasses. Throw the entire contents into your mouth and allow it to sit on the tongue. Then dip a lime wedge into the salt and suck the juice into your mouth. Enjoy the exhilarating sensations.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">My ex introduced me to a charming variation of this technique for use with someone special. Proceed as above but only one of you should suck on the salted lime. Immediately thrust your tongues into each others mouths while the tequila, lime, and salt are still present. Kiss deeply. You need only do this a few times before you will be swearing your undying love to each other.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-58252884462482308492010-12-01T07:04:00.000-08:002010-12-01T07:04:09.580-08:00The Loss of Language<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Those who first encountered the keyboard as a writer saw it as a better way to write. Since they were already accustomed to composing at length, most learned to touch type so they could do so quickly and efficiently. The advent of the word processor was the next leap forward. Editing and rewriting became a joy rather than drudgery. To writers, language is a medium just as paint is to an artist. Writers enjoy bringing creativity to the correct use of grammar and vocabulary.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">On the other hand, those who first encountered the keyboard as a computer geek see it as a necessary evil to get to what they really enjoy: playing with technology. Since typing is awkward and annoying for them, they invented a shorthand so they could do less of it. From them we have things like IMHO (in my humble opinion) and ROFLMAO (rolling on the floor laughing my ass off). As you can see, they are not very original either.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Language took it’s biggest hit when text messaging became widely used in the late nineties. You could hardly blame people for taking shortcuts when they had to type on a miniature version of a touch-tone dial pad. Who wouldn’t substitute “u” for “you” when entering the latter required pressing the 9-key (WXYZ) three times, the 6-key (MNO) three times, and the 8-key (TUV) twice? Or substituting “2” (one key stroke) for the words “to” (4 key strokes) or “too” (7 key strokes)?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">But what’s the excuse for using the same abbreviations in an email when it’s composed on the full keyboard of a computer? Could it be indifference? Next time you post something on Facebook or dash off a quick reply to an email, consider this: if it isn’t worth the extra few seconds it would take to proofread it and improve it, then it probably isn’t important enough to do at all.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">As our means of communication has shifted from the slow, thoughtful discourse of the written letter to the instantaneous one-liner of the text message, the intent has also changed. We used to have longer thoughts. We used to have deeper dialogue. Now we seem to be texting the electronic version of carving our initials in a tree or drawing moustaches on subway ads. Everyone wants to jump in, say something really witty, and jump out again.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEive1vlzdHID9H_uNa9tKHVI8fUeQ87_xT-7IXx3F1ceHyD2faLq1Q7PaKQDCIlu9b5oQLGIkQ0kOhqe-QYMYl7g-A267NxtZPW97z-gVaZlMEb9k5QmO8dPJX6J4GW9LhICPKQ4Tj9ixY/s1600/lol.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEive1vlzdHID9H_uNa9tKHVI8fUeQ87_xT-7IXx3F1ceHyD2faLq1Q7PaKQDCIlu9b5oQLGIkQ0kOhqe-QYMYl7g-A267NxtZPW97z-gVaZlMEb9k5QmO8dPJX6J4GW9LhICPKQ4Tj9ixY/s200/lol.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The trouble is that being clever or witty requires expressing yourself intelligently. Having lost the ability to craft language, we resort to ending every sentence with smiley faces (in the form of punctuation marks that attempt, and often fail, to resemble facial expressions) or the acronym “lol” (which no longer means anything). The fallacy which is used to justify emoticons is that since words do not convey the facial expressions and body language of face to face conversation, nobody can tell if you’re being sarcastic or attempting a joke. Thank god nobody ever told that to Charles Dickens or Mark Twain or any of the other great satirists or humorists.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">People have bemoaned the degradation of language throughout literary history. Usually they are regarded as anal retentives who just don’t like things to change. But there are real consequences to the severe deterioration of language that is taking place today. People are losing their ability to communicate with each other. The evidence of this exists on every bulletin board and chat room on line today. Flame wars regularly break out as participants fail to understand each other. They seem as incapable of expressing themselves clearly as they are at understanding what they are reading.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">We know from psycholinguistics that language and thought are intertwined. Our language not only reflects the culture we live in, it also shapes it. That accounts for some of the differences between western and eastern civilizations. Language is the currency of our thoughts. It allows us to solve complex problems and to survive as ever greater challenges confront us.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Eighty percent of the cortex of the brain is used for speech and language functions. As our language contracts and becomes less sophisticated, we need less and less of our cortex. What happens to the unused brain cells? If we allow our language to continue to regress, we will lose the ability to create not only great works of art, literature, and philosophy, but also the very technologies that led us to this state in the first place.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPl1E284Xc9FToYIg1QhHpjOK5j8xyNIPgHU3Foyocp4lVx4g3a4DDbB67RD59zWne13_bgJNDmF5iUP26gKOV7CbkWXwAqCclM5DH7LlSXmDwB5qtW_viDNqACNXhy9-1wfk28u3uVtE/s1600/wtf.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPl1E284Xc9FToYIg1QhHpjOK5j8xyNIPgHU3Foyocp4lVx4g3a4DDbB67RD59zWne13_bgJNDmF5iUP26gKOV7CbkWXwAqCclM5DH7LlSXmDwB5qtW_viDNqACNXhy9-1wfk28u3uVtE/s1600/wtf.jpg" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Will we become the mindless consumers of technology products invented by other cultures which have more carefully nourished their language skills?</span></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-90598964547723164652010-11-24T07:33:00.000-08:002010-11-24T07:33:37.502-08:00The Outer Limits<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">New York City</span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"> is big. For the uninitiated, it consists of five boroughs: <st1:city w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:city>, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and <st1:place w:st="on">Staten Island</st1:place>. Each of those five boroughs is also one of the 62 counties that comprise <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state> state. They are named <st1:placename w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">County</st1:placetype>, <st1:placename w:st="on">Queens</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">County</st1:placetype>, <st1:placename w:st="on">Bronx</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">County</st1:placetype>, and – don’t get smug, it gets weird now – <st1:placename w:st="on">Kings</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">County</st1:placetype> (Brooklyn) and <st1:placename w:st="on">Richmond</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">County</st1:placetype> (<st1:place w:st="on">Staten Island</st1:place>).</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8OCynajGOC8qTOr3S-jCqh3XTLSHtBI1sxAxoLOcg9VwUV7A5AlthkazLBLnpxzEZTm5coqmk91YTuCA8b8_1HM-j0RlFVKHEOrgJrNvYAT_03vYgqeLIlmctVBzmlWMYRnm2Ccm2mQw/s1600/outer_borough.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8OCynajGOC8qTOr3S-jCqh3XTLSHtBI1sxAxoLOcg9VwUV7A5AlthkazLBLnpxzEZTm5coqmk91YTuCA8b8_1HM-j0RlFVKHEOrgJrNvYAT_03vYgqeLIlmctVBzmlWMYRnm2Ccm2mQw/s400/outer_borough.jpg" width="391" /></a></div><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">When most people think of <st1:state w:st="on">New York</st1:state>, they are thinking about <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:place></st1:city>. Those other four places are known as the Outer Boroughs. I’ve always found that strange. If <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">New York</st1:state></st1:place> has outer boroughs, shouldn’t it also have some inner boroughs? I asked some New Yorkers, and by that I mean Manhattanites, about that. A few told me that <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:place></st1:city> is the inner borough, but most said that there aren’t any inner boroughs. There is The City (where they are) and there are the outer boroughs. That’s it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Maybe <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">New York</st1:state></st1:place> is like one of those grid drawings that they use on the Discovery Channel to explain the Theory of Relativity. You know, the one that has a big ball rolling around on it causing it to warp like a too soft mattress. The shiny ball begins to sink into it’s own depression, spiraling downward, like water draining from the bath tub, until it disappears into a black hole. Maybe that’s what happened to the Inner Boroughs; they just disappeared into a black hole.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">City dwellers (Manhattanites) dread the thought of travelling to the Outer Boroughs. Like <st1:city w:st="on">Columbus</st1:city>’ sailors fearing that they would fall off the edge of the earth, people in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:place></st1:city> apparently fear getting sucked into the same black hole that swallowed the Inner Boroughs.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Not all of the Outer Boroughs are equally denigrated. Parts of <st1:place w:st="on">Brooklyn</st1:place> are downright trendy. The <st1:place w:st="on">Bronx</st1:place> has the distinction of sounding like the plural of something, but nobody knows what. Besides, it is the home of the Yankees, the Bronx Bombers. Queens gets less respect. During introductions in swank <st1:city w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:city> bars, I’ve had people back away from me in alarm when I mention that I live in <st1:place w:st="on">Queens</st1:place>. Staten Island is the purgatory of <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state>. Nobody admits to living there. They lie and tell people they’re from <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">New Jersey</st1:state></st1:place>.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">So next time you’re in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state>, consider something adventuresome. Take a free ferry ride to <st1:place w:st="on">Staten Island</st1:place> and get a good view of the Statue of Liberty on the way. Or if you’re feeling really wild, try crossing the dark, dangerous waters of the <st1:place w:st="on">East River</st1:place> and venture to the other Outer Boroughs. The pizza at Enzo’s in Park Slope, Brooklyn, is better than anything in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:place></st1:city>. For authentic Greek food, you must come to <st1:city w:st="on">Astoria</st1:city> in <st1:place w:st="on">Queens</st1:place> and for the best Italian head up to <st1:street w:st="on"><st1:address w:st="on">Arthur Street</st1:address></st1:street> in The Bronx. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">And don’t worry, for a mere $2.25 you can get back into The City before nightfall. Just try not to think about those lost Inner Boroughs as your train tunnels under the river.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-29203821565744509242010-11-17T10:32:00.000-08:002010-11-17T10:32:57.970-08:00Mixology<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh88pLI_9TOar8th6qnAHVeU7q8luyeUZEgOpTHNX7YJobicnJQzNc_5n7t5HqSvjslv59DHa8vPdJZDhMMvpbE3fykNB5tGyETgRrjaWrkiHCm1tXX_8qTXioOh1PqHukAuTB0WWPcrhI/s1600/bartender.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh88pLI_9TOar8th6qnAHVeU7q8luyeUZEgOpTHNX7YJobicnJQzNc_5n7t5HqSvjslv59DHa8vPdJZDhMMvpbE3fykNB5tGyETgRrjaWrkiHCm1tXX_8qTXioOh1PqHukAuTB0WWPcrhI/s1600/bartender.jpeg" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Pity the plight of bartenders. They are being replaced by mixologists (The word hasn’t found its way into my spell checker yet.) The expectations of the hard working, hard drinking, professional crowd in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:city></st1:place> have grown to keep pace with the obscene amount of their disposable income. No longer satisfied with a mere martini after work, they now sip concoctions such as the <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Buffalo</st1:place></st1:city> 66 at Il Matto made with rosemary vodka, Worcestershire sauce, and beet juice. Yours for just fourteen dollars. If you are so plebian as to order a Martini, take comfort in knowing that it will include vermouth soaked black stones from <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Mongolia</st1:place></st1:country-region>. I’m not sure if the stones are yours to keep.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFf66WUj7XwxqDA53UVnWjjdwWKPdtGWwNuEZAvWzubxfyBQ8mF8VKy6xolSBaTY-p8XvxPtWBZPYitqo6MNw9XXMWGZIK-rPLJ3U-NBTBYGSTseMJVk9kJRPx3_H2HMyOv_wMG0Srr_E/s1600/fancycocktail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFf66WUj7XwxqDA53UVnWjjdwWKPdtGWwNuEZAvWzubxfyBQ8mF8VKy6xolSBaTY-p8XvxPtWBZPYitqo6MNw9XXMWGZIK-rPLJ3U-NBTBYGSTseMJVk9kJRPx3_H2HMyOv_wMG0Srr_E/s1600/fancycocktail.jpg" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Over at the Pegu Club they “like to think in terms of each cocktail having its own unique personality,” according to their website. While they will not condescend to tell you ahead of time what these personable cocktails consist of, they do inform that “the creative process is not something we rush” and that, for their Master Mixologists, “development of each drink takes place slowly and thoughtfully.” </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Oh, give me a break! It’s just a freaking drink, not the Mona Lisa. You’re going to wait forever while they slowly and thoughtfully pour it and you’re going to get a megadose of attitude when some snooty wait person presents it and informs you that you now owe the equivalent of her next two credits in college. She will expect a commensurately large tip.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I go to bars (yes, bars, not lounges, not clubs) to socialize with friends and perhaps to meet new friends. If my main objective were to drink, I could stay home and do it far more efficiently. The bartender is not my friend; he is the guy that is between me and the bottle of beer that I want to drink. I don’t want to know his name. I don’t care if he has movie star looks and exposed pecs worthy of a centerfold. As often as not, he is going to act as if he is doing me a favor and only because the bouncer screwed up and let an old guy with a pot belly into the place. I’ll be charged seven bucks for a beer that cost the owners about forty cents. For the Herculean effort of lifting that bottle of beer out of the cooler and popping off the top, Mr. Perfection will expect a tip of at least a dollar or two.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">You would think that here in the outer boroughs we would be immune to the aggrandizement trend. You’d be wrong. The current hot spot in my corner of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Astoria</st1:place></st1:city> is a lounge (<i>not</i> a bar) named simply enough, Mix. I’m not sure if that refers to the mixed assortment of wannabe trendy metrosexuals or the fact that they don’t pour drinks, they create cocktail art. At least we now have all the pretentiousness, price inflation, and self absorbed staff of a <st1:city w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:city> lounge without the hassle of going to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Manhattan</st1:place></st1:city> to get it. Progress?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">A friend of mine told me that his dad, a bar owner, once asked him how he could turn his bar into a gay bar. On a good night he would have a dozen or so guys sipping on dollar beers and two dollar shots of whiskey while the gay bar down the street would have a line outside waiting to buy nine dollar cocktails. Maybe he should have just raised his prices and replaced his affable middle aged bartender with a shirtless bodybuilder.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIEjjM5gBsK6pNVkgorK3EvNy_oXu_YNPvSLu-NFKg8fvfQiFaXzNRgFL6Ioy-wMVwDS1Iv_zeb9VSamVZPLcb3xiOpp4yZ8vj3cSGqYnQDOcN1MGf-hmBRszKzmUwxS-080uFnsCeOgg/s1600/cocktailvend.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIEjjM5gBsK6pNVkgorK3EvNy_oXu_YNPvSLu-NFKg8fvfQiFaXzNRgFL6Ioy-wMVwDS1Iv_zeb9VSamVZPLcb3xiOpp4yZ8vj3cSGqYnQDOcN1MGf-hmBRszKzmUwxS-080uFnsCeOgg/s320/cocktailvend.jpg" width="184" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Frankly, I'd prefer this.</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">There used to be an effective strategy to counter the greed of lounge owners. You would do your drinking at home then only buy bottles of water at the bar. (Learned that trick from the ecstasy crowd, although they had far different reasons for their love of plain old water.) Unfortunately the lounge owners have caught on. A bottle of water will set you back five or six bucks. I envision the day coming soon when people who actually have to live on a budget won’t buy anything when they go out. Of course the owners will be ready for that: They will sell admission tickets outside, just like a movie theater. Ten dollar peanuts optional.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p><br />
</o:p></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-27893872183300770142010-11-10T08:08:00.000-08:002010-11-10T08:08:47.506-08:00Just Say No to Bullies<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-oythMdJ-wJZkwI5BWrcPSC4dtbMABBEq0gksvMa2tO4Sw7xO7eIgAXO-CsBi6G0Q6JS-YCet-LVQiB-eAcrFft3KyRLl_SiU9vmlTyJy84nEbeE81kzlGF889szcVIZCdL85hoawslM/s1600/bully.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-oythMdJ-wJZkwI5BWrcPSC4dtbMABBEq0gksvMa2tO4Sw7xO7eIgAXO-CsBi6G0Q6JS-YCet-LVQiB-eAcrFft3KyRLl_SiU9vmlTyJy84nEbeE81kzlGF889szcVIZCdL85hoawslM/s200/bully.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The recent spate of teen suicides has brought a swift, and mostly positive, reaction from Americans. The spontaneous creation of “it gets better” videos has shown that even in an ugly political climate, there is an enormous reserve of compassion. There has been a nearly universal condemnation of bullying in our nation’s schools.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">But it hasn’t taken long for both sides of the political battle over gay rights to co-opt this issue. At the insistence of gay rights advocacy groups, school boards in more liberal communities across the country have incorporated messages of tolerance into their curricula. These messages are specific: tolerance of families with two daddies or two mommies, acceptance of love between two boys or two girls. These messages are being pitched to students as young as those in elementary school. Needless to say, social conservatives are outraged. They see a “hidden” agenda. They believe that gay rights advocates are exploiting the bullying crisis to promote acceptance of homosexuality.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">As in all complex and deeply emotional issues, neither side is completely right. The need for a swift and vigorous response is obvious. Shaping that response is tricky. But we’ve been down this road before. Not long ago the battle lines were drawn over hate crimes legislation. In an effort to combat violence against those who are perceived to be gay, laws were passed that go beyond punishing behavior involved in a criminal act. These laws attempt to punish perpetrators for the motivation behind the act.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Isn’t it enough to have strong sanctions against violent acts without attempting to ascribe motivation? The answer is yes, <i>if</i> those laws are enforced equally for all persons without regard to classification. The problem is not a lack of legislation, the problem is a lack of enforcement. The solution is a zero tolerance policy for violence of any kind, in any situation, against any person. That policy must come from and be vigorously enforced by the people in charge – the mayors, the police department chiefs, the school board administrators, and everyone who reports to them.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">As it turns out, all of the people who can implement and enforce such a zero tolerance policy serve as elected officials or work at the discretion of elected officials. Therefore the ultimate responsibility lies with us, the people who vote for school board members and politicians. We must demand a zero tolerance policy towards violence and we must remove those who do not work forcefully to implement it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Each of us must exercise our individual responsibility to create a climate in which violence is unacceptable. Parents, in particular, must teach their children from the earliest age that bullying will never be acceptable behavior. If we work together, we can make a difference. We should fight our ideological battles in some other arena.</span></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7936691594811652283.post-40916241348095856622010-11-03T14:04:00.000-07:002010-12-16T07:43:16.494-08:00The Rescue<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Clusters of brown leaves fell like rain each time the breeze picked up. They scuttled across the bed of leaves that had fallen earlier and lay on the gravel base of the camp site. I sipped on my coffee. It had been a long drive from <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state> to the Poconos.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">“Brindle,” I called. That is the name my camping buddy had given to one of the two stray cats that had inhabited the campground all season. There was no sign of her. I began to worry that my trip would not result in a successful rescue. I didn’t want to think what would happen if I failed. The wind was cold already and it was only the beginning of November. With everyone gone, there would no longer be anyone to leave food out for her. I doubted that she would survive the winter.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The first time I saw the two abandoned cats was early in July. It had been midweek and the camp was relatively quiet. They were barely older than kittens. They sauntered over to my site and immediately tried to befriend my cat, Osito. But Osito was more fearful of them than curious. Each time I returned to the campground I would see them. They were having an idyllic life. The entire campground was theirs to roam. People left food out and there were streams and a lake for water. They frolicked and played with each other or curled up together under a tool shed for a nap. But that was summer.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I worried what would happen to them when the campground closed at the end of the season. Some people think stray cats can always survive. “They’ll hunt. They will be fine,” some of the other campers assured me. But it’s a myth that abandoned cats can survive on their own. If the mother does not teach them to hunt and eat prey, they can only eat scraps from garbage or handouts from sympathetic people. How would that happen in a remote camp devoid of humans for six months?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Last Sunday was the day the camp closed. Everyone had to vacate by six o’clock. If I were going to do anything, it had to be then. The two strays had been hanging around my camping buddy’s tent. They were even in his tent for a while. They were trying to befriend his dog. I think those two young cats really missed their mother. We decided to try to catch them.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Neither one of us had any experience rescuing animals. We had no plan and no equipment. I thought we might be able to use Osito’s carrying case as a trap. We would lure them into it with lunch meat, which we had discovered they craved. Brindle was the first to take the bait. I quickly closed the end of the carrier. We had one!</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Now all we had to do is get the other. We decided to try the same technique. First we had to transfer Brindle into another container. That’s when we lost her. Frustrated, but determined, we kept at it for hours. Several times we almost had one or the other. We could sometimes get our hands on one of them but they always got away. Too fast. Too agile. My friend finally left for home but I felt I could not abandon these guys.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">As the sky grew dimmer I began to despair. But then I saw something out of the corner of my eye. Sunshine, the second cat, had jumped into the cab of my truck. I had left the door open by accident. As stealthily as my creaky old joints allowed, I sprung over and closed the door. Got her!</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I tried for another hour to get Brindle but she wondered off. She was probably stuffed from all the ham and treats we had used. Reluctantly I called off the mission. At least one rescued cat was better than none.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Sunshine is now safely at home, in my <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state> apartment. She is still trying to befriend Osito who is still wary. Within 36 hours she has already allowed me to pet her. I think she will socialize well and be a very adoptable pet in no time. But I couldn’t bear the thought of her sister, now alone, back in the Poconos. I couldn’t give up on her. Not yet.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">After a little networking with cat rescue people, I had a trap and some advice on how to proceed. I got permission from the camp owners to return for one day only and attempt to rescue Brindle. I headed out early this morning, confident that if I could find her, I could catch her. But would she still be there? After three days without food, and without her sister, she may have wandered away.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">I first returned to the site where I had rescued Sunshine. I called and called, walking around, looking under trailers and sheds. No sign of her. So I canvassed the entire campground eventually returning to the site where Osito and I had first seen her. I called. She squeaked, then timidly approached. Her squeaking turned into a desperate wail. She was very, very hungry.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Moving quickly, I set up the trap, baiting it with tuna fish as the cat rescue people had recommended. The sent of tuna travels further than ham, they told me. She came to the trap but was afraid to enter it. She circled around, trying to get at the food, crying loudly the whole time. I held my breath and dared not move a muscle. Desperation took over. She scurried inside.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Whack! The door of the trap slammed shut. She cried out in alarm and thrashed around inside the trap while I ran over to the truck to get the blanket that I had brought to put over the trap. Another tip from the rescue people. That calmed her down. I loaded the trap and Brindle into my truck. The adrenaline rush abated and I realized that my mission was successful. I’m not usually prone to displays of joy, but I think I let out a hoot and looked up at the sky and thanked the god that I don’t even believe in.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The drive back to <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state> was the calmest, most pleasant one I have ever experienced. It was a beautiful, sunny autumn day and Brindle and Sunshine would soon be reunited in the safety of my apartment.</span><br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsVPrCoM_MlnSZDl1kffWCo-qdjeCtR0GHtNULQNBKifkUC2xWo3pIL6oGCYcBiA_eYAUL36udUVkWM54b92vVltqFvcHGCnYe0r0mKDm3RG-rNsUQXoW5F6b0056Ij_Wrh7ojBfwAfDw/s1600/Brindle_Sunshine.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsVPrCoM_MlnSZDl1kffWCo-qdjeCtR0GHtNULQNBKifkUC2xWo3pIL6oGCYcBiA_eYAUL36udUVkWM54b92vVltqFvcHGCnYe0r0mKDm3RG-rNsUQXoW5F6b0056Ij_Wrh7ojBfwAfDw/s400/Brindle_Sunshine.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Brindle and Sunshine on my bed.</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div>Bitter Old Queenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10421151565768677336noreply@blogger.com5