Week-end Activities

My friend Sylvia is staying with us this week-end. We met when we were about 6 years old, attended the same church, elementary and secondary schools, camp and college (Manchester). Also she has relatives, the DeWalls, who are from Forreston, where I used to live. So nice to have a friend who shares your own history! Despite the time zone difference, she was up early to go out for coffee with me. I made a lame attempt at showing her the campus of Ohio State University, but everything was so torn up and there were so many new buildings (and it had been awhile since I was on the Oval), I don't think I did it justice. Taking the "short cut" to get home, we ended up in traffic thick and deep at what appeared to be a high school track and field event being held on campus and a graduation ceremony.

Also she was game to go to the art festival, an annual June event here in Columbus. I started to wilt after about two hours in the almost 90 degree heat. This event draws artists from all over the country. Sylvia is a musician so we stopped at a booth where the artist made small wooden stringed instruments played with a bow and he provided a demonstration. To my untrained ear they sounded a bit like a harpsicord. Another booth had hand made harps with beautiful inlaid celtic designs, but it also provided lovely CDs by the co-artist.

We visited the booth of Stephen Sebastian a North Carolina artist whose work we had purchased about 16 years ago, although his technique and style had changed so much I wasn't sure it was the same guy and was about to move on. He hollared out, yes it's me and said you have to keep changing to stay fresh. After 15 minutes in the shade and a lemonade, we were making the last lap back to the car and we stopped at the booth of Gary Curtis. We were so charmed by his watercolors of light reflecting on simple objects of glass, ceramic, metal, and fabric, that we purchased a print of one titled, "Communion." We recognized his work immediately because he has appeared in American Artist and Artist's Magazine.

There are three things you shouldn't bring to art festivals: 1) babies, who are miserable in the heat and frying their delicate skin in the sun; 2) dogs of any breed no matter how well behaved--I've yet to meet a dog who appreciated art shows and crowds; 3) your credit card. Just kidding about that last one.

After a brief nap, we went out for dinner at The Rusty Bucket, then headed to Sylvia's Columbus relatives who were celebrating the graduation of a daughter from Dublin Scioto High School. Tomorrow we'll attend church at both the Mill Run and Lytham Road campuses of UALC and see two more art shows.

1098 Friday Feast 50

Appetizer
What comes to mind when you hear the word bizarre?
The most recent scandal in Ohio comes to mind; it is about state employees' pension money being invested in coins and some of it has come up missing. Investing in coins? A pension fund? Story was developed by Toledo Blade.

Soup
Using just a few words, describe your childhood.
I couldn't wait to grow up and be on my own. I was independent, sassy, opinionated, and resented authority figures; I was studious, had lots of friends, but could play alone, loved horses and dogs; I always envied the girls with the stylish clothes, and disliked cliques but was in one. That's about 50 words. Is that "few?"

Salad
Name one thing you do each day that you feel improves your appearance.
I eat nutritious, fresh foods, take vitamins, stay out of the sun, and don't smoke. That's more than one, but good habits come in a package.

Main Course
On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how would you rate your self-confidence?
Depends on the task. Playing a trombone would be a 1; riding a horse a 1; but achieving my plans for retirement would be a 9. Obviously, I didn't include playing in a band or trail riding in that.

Dessert
Where did you last find a bargain?
I bought a handsome book on cowboy art for $2 at the library sale on Tuesday. Good quality paper and color, no damage, and it still has its book jacket.

Friday Feast site here.

1097 Who's the real Dummy?

Not us, says Walter Mossberg. He answers questions about technology in his column "Mossberg's Mailbox" in the Wall Street Journal. He assures his readers (in print, didn't see this at his web site):

"You are not a dummy no matter what those computer books claim. The real dummies are the people who, though technically expert, couldn't design hardware and software that's usable by normal consumers if their lives depended upon it."

Visit his website for help with your computer.

1096 Raising Awareness--Darfur

Save Darfur is a coalition of 129 organizations including Amnesty International and National Council of churches which tries to educate the public through ads, speeches, rallies, banners, yard signs, etc. Those two organizations alone would keep me from contributing, as awful as I think that tragedy is.

Raising awareness is NOT action, it is not research, it is not a cure and it definitely isn't a political solution. And yet, how many times have you been asked to contribute money to a disease race, walk or a cause only to find that the money goes to perpetuate the organization which advertizes the problem? I know where this particular ad campaign is going, because I've watched it progress on the op-ed pages. At first the Darfur civil war was reported as a massacre by the light skinned Arab Moslem Janjaweed militia murdering, raping and slaughtering the black African Moslem Darfurians. Then later it was reported that the U.N. peacekeepers and observers were standing by doing nothing in Darfur. Then this week I noticed that Nicholas D. Kristoff said the United States was not acting against the atrocities in Sudan (never mind the public outrage on the left that we acted against the atrocities in Iraq--now we're supposed to spread to Africa).

Kristoff is moving quickly toward blaming George Bush personally, because Bush mentioned Sudan on January 10, but things have gotten worse. Bush has provided food and shelter for 2.2 million homeless Sudanese, but he has not intervened and stopped the slaughter with American troops. Watch. This is going to end up being George Bush's failure--not the U. N.'s, not the Moslem racists', and not greater Africa's. Kristoff wrote, "above all they need the international community to shame Sudan for killing and raping people on the basis of their tribe."

When was the last time international moral outrage stopped the rape of women during wartime? Kristoff started his article with the words of some nobody, an isolationist, who had written, and then he put those words into the mouth of George Bush. What? Who and which party have been the isolationists a la 1930s?

1095 The conundrum of time and gadgetry

An article in today's WSJ on the ever increasing complexity of gadgets and their accompanying inflation of costs in time and money for the user set me to thinking. What gadgets or inventions or improvements in technology have actually made my life easier, safer, simpler or faster since I married in 1960 (the year I declared myself an adult)? The author, Cameron Stracher, points out that there is no escape from life's hassles. If you speed it up one place, it just backs up and slows down somewhere else.

Here's my list of changes and improvements in the last 45 years that have actually saved time, wear and tear on my body, and improved the quality of my life. The corresponding list of said "improvements" that really haven't changed a thing in terms of quality or time saved is longer than the YES list, and grows every day.

In the YES column, the winners are:

Automatic garage door opener
Microwave kitchen appliance
Cordless phone
Central air conditioning
Warning lights in cars
automatic windshield washers and defrosters
automatic door locks in autos
Improved and longer wearing tires (safety, cost, etc.)
55 mph speed limit on interstates
portable, handheld hair dryers
velcro
permanent press and blended fabrics for clothing
TV remote with 2 buttons
card board file boxes with lids
one-use cameras
automatic defrost in refrigerators
flip top lids on cat food
advances in heart health--surgery and meds
improved picture tubes in TV (our newest set is about 15 years old)

In the NO column, the losers are
(OK, not exactly losers, but they haven't changed my life or health or given me more time to do other things)
computers
cell phones
VCR/DVD players
dishwasher
answering macines and voice mail
home security systems
automated grocery check-out
barcodes on merchandise and library books
TV remotes with 25 buttons
automated answering services in doctors' offices
"paperless office"
Digital camera
ATM
I-pod, mp3--any music conveyance beyond the cassette tape player
Any shopping gimmick invented after green stamps--coupons, sweepstakes, loyalty cards
Hanging screens in churches for reading text and hymns
Amplified sound in public spaces
ice makers
cable TV

Automobile improvements surprisingly topped my list, something I rarely think about. But between 1955 and 1965 I probably changed 5 or 6 flat tires. In recent years, I've had a few flats, but usually a slow leak with some warning, and have never been stranded on a highway thanks to improved tires and warning lights.

Your mileage may vary, but ask yourself how many time-saving devices really live up to their promises, or do you just spend more time reading manuals and replacing the hair you've pulled out?

1094 Wolfowitz on board at the World Bank

Jane Galt says, "The appalling poverty of Sri Lanka or Mozambique is not some bizarre aberration that can be tracked to a cause we can cure. We are the aberration; Sri Lanka and Mozambique are the normal state of human history. Trying to figure out how to reproduce those abnormal results in a couple hundred more countries is very, very hard. Fascinating, and unbelievably important. But tricky. If Paul Wolfowitz thought he was controversial before, wait until he tries to finance his first dam." Full article. And don't forget to read the comments.

Wolfowitz bio.

1093 Naked torsos, large

There are lots of words to cover a large lady, and Lane Bryant is one (or two). Owned by Charming Shoppes, a family of brands that specialize in "plus-size" clothing, Lane Bryant's headquarters are in Columbus. Lane Bryant was founded in 1904 by a young immigrant seamstress who must have had some foresight, because women are much heavier today than 100 years ago. Years ago, clothing for young, overweight girls was called "chubby," and for women I think it was "half" sizes. A 12 1/2 was for a plump, short size 12. Sizes for women used to be "juniors" and "misses" and now are usually just plain vanilla sizes (zero through 18) plus women's sizes, which are for large women, like 2X and so forth. Lane Bryant's sizes range from 14-28.

So today I'm looking at "AIA Columbus" (a section of The Daily Reporter) and I noticed a photograph of the new 135,000 sq.ft. Corporate Headquarters of Lane Bryant, decorated with large plus size naked mannequin torsos at the entrance of each office cubicle. These mannequins don't have particularly large bellies, as you might expect of a size 18, but they do have rather pendulous breasts. I think they represent the male fantasy of what a naked "plus size" lady should look like (no face, lots of chest), because they don't resemble any I've seen in the locker rooms and beaches of America. Sure, mannequins represent an ideal, and I occasionally see a naked anorexic mannequin in a store window (although you don't see many anymore), but I think seeing them in the hall at work would be a bit off-putting. Particularly for the female executives.

1092 How much for the school library?

I like organ music--wrote about the restoration of our church organ at my other, other blog. However, this story sounds like a less than useful way to spend FEMA funds:

"Over the years, Reseda [CA] Elementary's 900-pipe instrument has suffered through three earthquakes that damaged its internal workings — including the 1933 Long Beach temblor, which demolished the second floor of the original school building.

There was a repair job — financed by donations — in the years after the 1971 Sylmar earthquake. After the 1994 Northridge quake, organ technicians spent nearly two years restoring bent and mangled pipes. That $160,000 repair bill was covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency." LA Times story here

The organ in the elementary school has been hidden behind a wall for years, and even now is only partially working. I think it is nice that these grade schoolers have a very expensive organ, but do they have a library?

Another organ restored with FEMA funds, but it sounds like the earthquake was just a timely event that allowed for restoration of a non-functioning organ.

1091 A slow newsweek?

Professional sports addiction and nicotine addictions are your own fault. Nobody forces you to do either as a pass time. I have no use for either, but recent stories about the San Francisco 49ers training film and the use of images attractive to women to sell cigarettes are just beyond belief. Primarily, both stories demonstrate the anti-business bias in our society.

Disclosure: I don’t smoke and I won’t own stock in any tobacco death-pushing company, nor will I watch a football game where grown men in pretty exercise outfits chase their balls and hug each other.

A locker room training film insults whom? The delicate psyches of 300 lb. football players hired to smash and injure the other guy? The film was never intended for the public. It was suppose to help them with the media--and God knows, they need that. Have you ever sat through one of those strategy interviews? "And uh, then, uh, weir gonna run, uh dah ba down dah feel and . . uh."

In the film an Asian guy mocks an. . .Asian‘s struggle with English using the double entendres we‘ve all heard a hundred times. Two women kiss after a phony wedding ceremony and it’s called Lesbian soft porn? Give me a break--it was San Francisco. What about the famous Britney Spears and Madonna kiss? And that was on TV. Glenn Beck says, if they’d just spun it as an anti-Bush clip on gay marriage, they would have been applauded.

The film was made with reverse psychology--how NOT to behave in diversity sensitive areas. I'm a prude, and I found it far less offensive than the Pepsico CFO middle finger speech, and she was insulting the entire United States, for no other reason than to be just “one of the blue state guys.” I think anything football is pretty silly--the games all look like reruns to me and are good only for napping as far as I’m concerned, but locker room jokes don’t affect me in my living room. Who put this stuff on the Internet? Was it stolen? What was his motive?

And the big cigarette expose. Long, tapered cigarettes were intended to attract more women to smoking. Well, duh! Isn’t that what marketing does--sell a product? Feminist scholars have been writing this stuff about advertising for 25 years. Why is it now just making it to the evening news? What about all the ladies’ girlfriends who told them when they were 15 that it was a good way to lose weight? Are teen-agers really reading ads in women’s magazines and reading billboards or are they gossiping with their girlfriends?

It must have been a very slow news day, or newsweek.

1090 The Democrats Plan to Take Back America

Los Angeles Mayor-elect Antonio Villaroigoso was quoted in today's paper as speaking to liberals and asking them to develop a more strategic or practical plan in their quest to "reclaim" America. I've noticed that conservative talk-show hosts like Michael Medved, Rush Limbaugh, and Hugh Hewitt actually encourage liberals to call in and speak to something, anything, specific. I'm wondering if it is cruel to bait them, or if the call screener just selects the most vocally vague and vacuous to put on the air. Surely there must be coherent Democrats out there who can speak to a specific plan that isn't just more of the same old same old. I used to be a Democrat and we didn't all cross over!

Medved asked this very question two days ago of a liberal caller: what specifically would you want your party to do to win back the White House and Congress. All the caller could do was babble something about "don't ask don't tell" (a Clinton plan, not Bush) and gay marriage. Medved kindly (or not) gave him enough rope to hang himself, and then reined him in and restated the question asking for specifics. This time he got something about "we are Christians too" (Medved is Jewish), so I'm not sure where he was going. Medved stated his question, slowly and carefully a third time, and still the caller couldn't develop a coherent thought.

Limbaugh uses this technique occasionally on his Friday call-ins. He gives liberals more time to answer or ask, and unless he determines they have been put up to the call, he just lets them embarrass themselves. It's a little like watching a drunk at a party trying to find a rest room, and then deciding it's just too much trouble.

If you glance to the left (no pun) at my links you'll see my link to News Talk 870 which is easy to listen to on your computer. We have very limited radio talk options here in Columbus, and it is nice to hear someone different occasionally, even if I do have to listen to the California weather and local politics reports. The Internet has really opened up the vast possibilities of radio, including radio blogging.

1089 Children and Self-Esteem

There was a USAToday Forum article by Christina Hoff Sommers today, titled "Children can handle failure." She and two other authors have a new book titled, "One Nation Under Therapy; How the Helping Culture is Eroding Self-Reliance."

She is interviewed at American Enterprise Online:

"Our schools of education promote the idea that high self-esteem is essential to academic achievement. But the concept is too poorly understood to be an appropriate classroom objective. High-school dropouts, burglars, car thieves, shoplifters, even murderers, are just as likely to have high self-esteem as the winners of the Congressional Medal of Honor or Rhodes Scholars.

In May 2003, four prominent academic psychologists published the first comprehensive review of the supposed benefits of self-esteem. They concluded that there was no significant connection between feelings of self worth and achievement, success in personal relationships, or healthy lifestyles.

The self-esteem movement has turned many classrooms into therapy centers rather than places of learning. Learning history, for instance, especially American history, has been radically transformed by the requirement that schools provide students with textbooks that enhance their self image. California subjects prospective textbooks to a social content review with the goal of determining whether the books "promote individual development and self-esteem." California is the largest textbook market in the country, so publishers selling their books in other states still tailor them to California's specifications. What happens is that students are sedated by what one critic called "textbook happy talk," and shortchanged academically."

The self-esteem mantra was going strong even when my children were little--even the Christian authors like Dobson got on the band wagon. So today's parents have not only their own upbringing to deal with, but apparently it is getting piled deeper and higher by the experts.

1088 Freedom to enjoy nature

Do you think today's children have the same freedom to play outdoors (riding bikes, hiking, playing in creeks, digging in dirt, etc.) that you had?

I suppose the answer would depend on your age and where you grew up. I grew up in two small, rural towns in northern Illinois where I was free to ride my bike anywhere, even to the next village, crawl through fences to pet the horses and cattle, poke at wasp nests, capture tadpoles in streams, wander over to neighbors and play with the new kittens under the porch, and walk my paper route. Our towns also had organized recreation for summers that included outdoor sports and swimming. No transportation from Mom required--just walk down the street. There was work too--but nothing awful--pushing a mower, pulling weeds from the garden, and later as a teen-ager, working in the fields detasseling corn. Now that I look back I can see a lot of benefits to the time I spent outdoors, wandering free and making up my own games.

I heard an interesting interview on NPR Monday driving home from the lake with Richard Louv discussing his new book (May 2005) "Last child in the woods; saving our children from nature-deficit disorder." He said that children who have outdoor recess regardless of the weather have fewer colds and viruses than those kept indoors. There are adult studies on stress reduction and nature, but not on children. The author believes that exposure to the outdoors decreases ADHD, and that as recess has been shortened or eliminated, the problem has increased.

An art teacher called the program and said she sees a positive difference in the hyperactive children when they've been outside (her school had a regulated wetlands next to the school grounds where the children were allowed to go). Interacting with nature and spending time outdoors could be a lot cheaper than medicating and counseling children, if Mr. Louv is correct.

1087 Jordanian Queen Reads to Children

Jordan's Queen Rania read to children at CentroNia, a bilingual and multicultural learning center in Washington D.C. I haven't seen reports of U.S. librarians or movie stars demanding that she solve the cultural and religious problems in the Middle East or the AIDS crisis in Africa. In her own country her critics are unhappy that she wears pants, high heels, and drives her own car, nothing that would raise an eyebrow here.

1086 Where is Marion Ross when we need her?

She was the ultimate 1950s mother in the parody of the 50s that played for 11 years in the 1970s and 1980s--Happy Days. She was cute, perky, kind, funny, loving Mrs. C., and she wore dresses and looked smashing.

So what is the image of the suburban TV housewife/mother today? We've got Desperate Housewives, hotty plastic imitations of that noble profession of yesteryear, and this summer we'll get Weeds with a suburban Mom who sells marijuana to support her family. Paris Hilton's mom will get a reality show. The Growing up Gotti's got just your average working mom. Then there is the Meet Mister Mom show where the mothers disappear all together. Maybe that is just as well--they should all get outta town.

1085 Blake's story

Glory Be tells a wonderful story about a young man whose friends give him a prom night to remember and the rest of us renewed hope in young people.

1084 Laura the wonder wonk

Can a mild mannered former librarian save the world? Of course, if she'd just stop talking about books and literacy and get down to being a female Jesse Jackson (unelected do-gooder) and run around the world telling people of other cultures how to run things.

The latest hoot was Christine Lahti opining on AIDS in Africa and how the First Lady really needed to be addressing this (at Huffington blog). I think she is a great actress, but when the Hollywood types try foreign policy they can get pretty silly.

And Annie Applebaum of WaPo says Mrs. Bush "failed to put the issue of women's rights in the middle of the democracy debate going on in the Muslem world." She thinks Mrs. Bush should change the entire structure of Moslem culture--the Shariah religious laws, the religious courts, the power of the local clerics and how the Quran is interpreted. Tall order, but she'll whip into a ladies room and put on her Wonder Woman costume and change thousand years of tradition.

Over at LISNews someone was calling her a hypocrite for NOT speaking out on a topic other than literacy and reading. Go figure. Librarians 223:1 liberal, which is worse than Hollywood but with better shoes and faster computers.

1083 No Grandma Left Behind

The Plain Dealer reported yesterday that Medicaid In Ohio will be reined in by tying money to quality of care. The better the care, the more money a nursing home gets. And this saves money because. . .?

I tried Googling this story for another source, but kept finding plans to save Medicaid and improve health dated 2000, 2002, etc.

The joys of librarianship--Green Tuna News

Life on Hold suggested I check out Green Tuna, a librarian blog, so I did and found it quite amusing. Here's a typical job description:

"Let me tell you how it is. Library work is part detective, part computer hacker, part Name-That-Tune expert (Music side), part Antiques Roadshow appraiser, (Art side), part HazMat employee (the removal of a plastic bag containing beer and underpants hidden in the folio stacks comes to mind) and part social worker, to name just a few.

But more often than not, the job is a blast. Be nice (treats help), and the librarian will go the extra mile for you. Case in point: A few weeks back a doctoral student came in looking for organ music he was requested to play at a wedding reception. Not the regulars. Not Bach, Mendelssohn or Wagner. Not Pachelbel or Purcell.

He needed Circus Music.

Specifically, he needed "you know -- that circus song they always play." And he sang it for me. And of course, I knew exactly what he was talking about, but had no idea what it was called.

I asked Google. I asked Amazon. But it's hard to know what to ask for when all you can do is doot-doot-doot the tune.

But because the question was so awesome (Circus music for weddings. Love IT!) and I didn't know the answer, I was determined not to give up. So, I did what any answer-obsessed, wedding music hating, computer-savvy music library type person would do. I consulted the ultimate reference source.

I emailed a clown.

As I am writing this email, trying to explain a musical tune in words..."

For the answer, and more fun, see Green Tuna News

Don't laugh

More bad news on the medical front.

"More than half of patients with asthma can have an attack triggered by laughter, New York researchers reported here at the 2005 American Thoracic Society International Conference.

Fifty-eight percent of patients reported that laughter was a trigger for an asthma attack, making it a common trigger, said Stuart Garay, MD, clinical professor of medicine, New York University Medical Center in New York. "This occurs more commonly than most physicians appreciate." " Seen at Medscape.com.

1080 Friday Feast, a day late

Here are the questions posted at the May 27 Friday Feast, and my answers.

Appetizer What job would you definitely not want to have?

If the job required math or measuring, I would be miserable and in tears most of the time. So that would be engineer, architect, carpenter, seamstress, landscape designer, etc.

Soup Oprah calls and wants you to appear on her show. What would that day's show be about?

Defintely about why using coupons and loyalty plans and other gimmicks cost the consumer money and time. This would really get her audience excited because Americans like to think there is a free lunch out there waiting for them.

Salad Name 3 vegetables that you eat on a regular basis.

Raw carrots definitely--usually for breakfast, but I enjoy them in a dessert like carrot cake too, shredded in a green salad, or mixed with pineapple and raisins in its own salad. I like broccoli in soups and salads. Squash of all kinds in casseroles, or grilled in a little butter with cinnamon, or in a pie. Yum.

Main Course If you were commissioned to rename your hometown, what would you call it?

Although I've lived in Columbus, Ohio, for almost 40 years, I still call Mount Morris, Illinois my hometown. It's not a bad name--there are towns named this in a number of states, but it is a bit boring. And the "mount" is the high place on the prairie. I've traveled back more times than I'd want to count, so I'd name it "Destination, Illinois."

Dessert If you had a personal assistant, what kind of tasks would you have her do?

I'd have her put freshly washed and ironed sheets on my bed everyday; I'd have her clean out the auto interior and see that my van goes through the carwash once a week; I'd have her keep me up to date on all the techie things I don't know about and of course, she'd have to know the best prices and downloads; she'd be paid handsomely to make all the phone calls and wait for service people to come to the house; she'd be a good seamstress and let the seams out on my slacks and skirts; she would drive if the trip meant going outside our suburb; she'd nag me to do my walks and then go with me and set the pace.

Thank you Friday Feast for these good questions.