Walgreen Story

On the way into the pharmacy the other day I overheard a snippet of conversation between (actor #1) the gentleman with the red bucket, collecting for I know not what charity and (actor #2) the somewhat loud talking lady on crutches. As I passed them I observed the lady was missing one leg just below the knee; the conversation went like this:

"My son gets out of prison next week."

"Parole or release."

"Oh definitely parole to a halfway house in Oakland."

"How many years he do?"

"They gave him twenty but let him out in twelve, he should never have done a day."

"What for?"

"He got the man who did this to me." She pointed at her missing leg.

When I came out of the store, the lady was gone but as I passed the man he spoke to me:

"You heard the story bout her son."

"I did."

"Ain't true."

I stopped, knowing this would be worth the time.

"I knew her back when see lost that leg from too many infections."

"Needles?"

"Yup, and she ain't got no son either. Leastwise not one that gettin' out of prison; her only child died from the same crap that took her leg."

"Sad story."

"Well nobody makes you put that poison in your body."

"No I guess not."

I dropped five bucks in his red bucket for the story and headed to my car with my physician prescribed narcotics in the clean, white pharmacy bag with the tax receipt attached.

--

Art: Decision Time by americanpsycho

IKEA Adventures

I had my first IKEA experience last week. Normally that would not be worth a blog post but when does anything normal make it to the blog? This is after all an adventure in observing the nearly normal, usually half-a-bubble-off happenings. Now I are not a shopper, like many males I do not have the shopping gene. Recently, however, I have observed that there are shoppers and there are closet shoppers. There are people, my friends among them, who do not have shopper in their DNA but they do have consumer hard-wired somewhere. I think its the nature/nurture thing or maybe just advertising propaganda.

Not me. I really find commercial outings distasteful, plus I have really been divesting for the past decade. But I needed a bed, with my bad back and the newly remodeled apartment, I just had to bite the Discover card and buy a bed. After some online research and a bewildering array of sales that seem to go on 24/7 and 365, I decided to try the land of unfinished Scandinavian excess. So I went to the local IKEA in Emeryville with the intention of buying a bed and only a bed. 

I put on my best anthropologist demeanor, prepared to observe the purchasing rituals of the americanus consumerosis, but I should have been better prepared. Like all wide-eyed field researchers I went into the wild unprepared with even the simplest of equipment. First of all, who would have thought that I needed a map . . .

I had no warning. My colleagues who are not shoppers have, as I, never been to the land of IKEA. Those who have had an IKEA experience thought nothing of allowing a virgin ikeadite to venture out alone. I think they were probably getting back at me for the time I told them it was OK to get the ground beetle ceviche in Honduras. Also probably why no one told me to "try the meatballs" while I was waiting in one of the many lines I encountered at IKEA.

Now less you think I was swallowed by the whale of housewares, I will tell you that I left the land of blue and yellow with only a purchase receipt for a bed, a mattress and a delivery invoice for the following day. Had that been it, as they say, you would not be reading this blog post. But no. After locating the bedroom corner of the IKEA wilderness and ferreting out the order form and golf pencil ritual; not to mention the local knowledge that the "bed" display room is different than the "mattress" room. Confident that I had followed the unwritten rules and traditions, I made my selection and communicated with a less than eager staffer in something I call Ikean English value added dialect. There was some walkie-talkie communication with someone in the warehouse which contained idiomatic expressions I could not decipher and hence the later to be revealed cultural clash.

No I ordered slacks and a table cloth.

The next day my mattress was delivered but not my slated platform base, instead I got two king box spring units, not my order. I called the IKEA hotline, got a real person with no accent, she understood the problem, quickly got me a return order reference number but we jointly decided I had better go back to the store and get the correct item code on the slated platform base. So I returned for part two of my IKEA adventure, found my way to the bed section, not the mattress room and discovered the secret hidden slated bed base code (Sultan Laxeby 001.259.72). I then proceeded to the customer service desk as instructed, only to find there is no customer service desk. Three blue&yellow consultations later, having visited the Information Kiosk, the Information Desk and finally the Return Room, I found a helpful person, who had to leave the Return Room to consult with the delivery manager who advised her to advise me that since I already had a apparently precious return order reference number . . . they would call me to arrange for a pick-up and delivery of my desired product.

This is where my IKEA adventure stands today, no call yet, mattress on the floor, slated platform bed base lingering in some cold, sterile warehouse awaiting the third act appropriately titled: Some Assembly Required.

UPDATE (3/29): Five days now and another long phone conversation initiated by me, I now await the alleged return call to schedule the exchange and new delivery.

UPDATE (3/30): Call came this morning. Delivery tomorrow, wonder if this time we got it right.

UPDATE (3/31): Nope, still haven't got all the parts I thought I had ordered.

UPDATE (4/1): Made a third trip to IKEA, vowed never to return and now need to get a friend to visit and help me put all the pieces together.

Recycled Political Observations

Someone said to me the other day: "Doesn't it frighten you that a major political party in the United States has been taken over my extremists."


I'm not proud of my answer, I think it was really low-hanging fruit but I couldn't resist. I, of course answered: "Which party?"


As expected he didn't think it was a particularly funny line and gave me an exasperated sigh coupled with a downturned slow shake of his head.


"No really, which party." OK, I was just rubbing it in at this point. Later and away from my much too seriously middle of the road lefty friend, I remembered that I had blogged about this back somewhere in the past. Today I recycle that post, in the hope that no one ever again attempts to draw me into a serious discussion about the merits of the two party system in this country.

                                                     

Paranoia strikes deep

Into your life it will creep

It starts when you're always afraid

-Buffalo Springfield

For What It's Worth is the song by Messrs. Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Richie Furay, Jim Messina and perhaps Dewey Martin and/or Bruce Palmer depending on the version you listen to and who was caught up in the last drug bust.

Just a small digression, when Buffalo Springfield broke up after about two years of revolving bass players and the aforementioned drug busts---Stephen Still hooked up with Graham Nash of the Hollies and David Crosby from the Byrds and formed a little band, they took in Neil Young and played some music. Jim Messina and Richie Furay joined forces and formed Poco. Jim Messina eventually teamed up with Kenny Loggins.

Meanwhile back at the topic of this here post: Paranoia Strikes Deep. That was the tagline for a Nov. 9 (2009) opinion piece in the NYTimes. The paranoia being discussed is that the Republican Party has or will be taken over by an extremist right wing. Whether this has or hasn't happened yet depends on just how left or right you already are and in particular (here comes the point) how paranoid you are about such a possibility. The article can be summarized with it's last two lines:

"The point is that the takeover of the Republican Party by the irrational right is no laughing matter. Something unprecedented is happening here--and it's very bad for America."

In case you missed it, the lyrics from Buffalo Springfield are:

"Something's happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear. There's a man with a gun over there, telling me I got to beware."

The cultural distortion is that you can't tell if the guy with the gun is an extreme conservative, a paranoid libertarian or a fearful liberal who has decided to defend his turf. That it ain't exactly clear is why paranoia strikes deep but it starts when you're always afraid.

Tune Stuck in My Head

From the moment I could talk

I was ordered to listen.
-Cat Stevens

For three days those lyrics were stuck in my head. They come from an old Cat Stevens song called Father and Son. I checked the lyrics, they have nothing to do with why I the tune kept going round and round in my brain. No, I hadn't heard the song on an old oldies station. Sure I knew the song, I liked Cat Stevens back before he found his own fundamental way to the divine.

And I wasn't hearing the whole song, at times not even the music, just those eleven words. Was I silenced as a child - absolutely not. I, we were all encouraged to be vocal. I also learned early to watch, listen and observe before I acted or spoke.

I had two older brothers and growing up I got to observe them getting into all sorts of trouble. My oft learned lesson was - well don't do that or at least don't do it that way. I was always a good student of staying out of trouble. Which brings me to today's story, which has nothing to do with those lyrics.

I suppose I was about nine or ten; it was a Sunday afternoon, I came downstairs heading for the bathroom. I know it was a Sunday afternoon because my father was home. He was never home during the week, he was always at the pharmacy, which was only half a mile away but he was never actually home, except on Sunday afternoons. He was sitting in his chair with the Sunday Detroit Times unfurled in his hands.

As I passed the kitchen, my mother came out and said something to me; I have no idea what she said but I am reminded of a cartoon character who opens her mouth and some off key trombone notes come out - you know just noize. It probably began: "Timothy, why didn't you do this" or "Have you done that." It was mean, she was being a nag and I didn't deserve it. I don't know if my parents were having a little tiff or if she was just looking for a target to bitch at. But I was in the line of fire.

Problem was, without thinking I said: "Don't you snap at me! I got all A's on my report card."

Now, nothing wrong with that response but the way I said it - it came out way too sassy. We did not use that tone with adults. Talking back to adults was a mortal sin in our house. I wanted to swallow the words as soon as they came out. My content was fine. My delivery, however, had just turned this into a potential shit storm for me and all I had been doing was just walking by.

There was a long moment of silence, a long moment. Then my father brought the two sides of his paper together, turned the edge of the next page and open it up again and kept on reading without saying a word. My mother stared at him, turned with the loudest silence I had ever heard and headed back into the kitchen.

As it turned out I had invoked the magic words - good grades and not just good grades - perfect grades. All three of us knew my mother was just bitching to bitch, but she had picked the wrong target and my father was not going to take the bait and deflect her foul mood onto me. I was just passing through on the way to the bathroom.

So maybe there is a little something there from the Cat Stevens' song. The lyrics tell a story of a father giving advice to his son; advice the son is not going to take. Well I heard my father's unspoken advice that day; I heard it and I remembered it.

If you're doing your job and getting it right, don't take shit from anyone that isn't yours to begin with. I didn't and I don't. Thanks Dad.

A Higher Education

I pose a simple question: What percentage of the population of the United States hold a college degree? The answer will appear below the cyber-fold. I must admit I was surprised by the number. I assume that lots of folks who hold a degree estimate too high, I did a quick unscientific survey of a small group of individuals and found that those who do not have a degree give a slightly lower number but still aim a bit too high.

So you have a clue, your guess is probably too high, so knock off 5% maybe 10% if you have a masters or a doctorate, we know those advanced degrees really schew your perception of reality.

So what was your guess? The answer is that as of 2009, twenty-seven and one-half percent of the adult population holds a college degree.

Here is a very cool interactive map from the Chronicle of Higher Education that shows where these over educated people live. It's a county by county breakdown and here is the really cool part, you can track back from 2009 to 1940. You thought the college numbers were higher today, only 4.6% of the country were college educated in 1940. When I got my B.A. in 1969 the overall number had just reached 10%.

The map also has breakouts by gender, ethnicity and income. Before you leave the map, be sure to set it for 2009 and click the Asian button.

The Girl Who Played with the Dragon's Nest

Have you read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo? If yes, then have you read the sequel - The Girl Who Played with Fire? and, of course, having read two you must have gotten to the final book - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest. All three remain in the top 30 on Amazon nearly three years after Dragon Tattoo (english version) was released. 


So I have a question - why? 


The writing is not brilliant nor is the mystery unique. A New Yorker article attempted to answer the question: Why Do People Love Stieg Larsson novels? An interesting article that poses even more question than I have and informs us that Larsson may have planned a series of 10 novels with these characters but he died having completely only these three.


I think the answer has to come from the lead female character - Lisbeth Salander. With a Nazi monster for a father, victim of all sorts of abuse; childhood and contemporary, tough, smart, silent and a feminist of a very unique pedigree. The attraction to the books must be a strong affinity to the girl with the dragon tattoo.


For me the books were interesting beach reads, though I consumed them during this northern california winter. The setting in Sweden meant readers are exposed to a different corrupt government than Russia, China, U.S. or Vatican City; that was refreshing. You never get a really good dose of neo-Nazism at work in American novels.


But after the change of setting, the novels are not particularly well written politico-mysteries. No, it has to be the girl in the titles. Don't get me wrong, the stories are good, at times very good; but the delivery is weak. The New Yorker article summarizes all the controversy about who may have helped with the editing of Larsson's original drafts. There is much agreement that he had more than substantive editing revisions to get the books to their current condition.


But even with a gang of editors the books really are nothing unique. Not a single orc to be found, nor actual dragon to be slain or ridden.


Can someone explain this to me?

Literature on the Road

One perk of my semi-nomadic wanderings is that I get to sample the daily lifestyles of the friends and family I visit, including their choice in literature and periodicals. Right now, here in Lake Shastina, California the magazine selection includes two of my favorites: National Geographic and Discover. And while I will go home with a box of older editions, I thought I would share with you the January/February lead story in Discover - The Year in Science: 100 Top Stories of 2010.

To pick my favorite story I had to skip a couple of NASA tales, which I am very fond of, particularly those with photographs from the Hubble. There were also several fossil finds, which made us several tens of millions of years older and set the dinosaurs back nine digits in human years. There were solar planes and green cities; avian optical illusions and rocks in Death Valley that move.

But being the anthropocentric fool that I am, I had to go with a finding from neuroscience about another capacity of the human brain. We know we can measure the neural response in the human brain to nearly any stimuli. So a test was done to first notice the neural activity via fMRI when someone told a vivid memory from their life. Next a group of volunteers were scanned as they listened to a tape of that same memory. 

Two results were discovered. First, the more closely a listener paid attention to the story the more their own brain activity mirrored that of the original story teller. Attention was measured by a follow-up questionnaire. Even more interesting was the discovery that among the most attentive listeners, "key brain regions lit up before the words even came out." Listeners were able to anticipate the coming direction of the story just as the original speaker would foretell their own tale. The short conclusion:

"The more you anticipate someone, the more you're able to enter their space."

For those interested this article is #78 in the top 100, titled: Good Listeners Get Inside Your Head.

Secret Supper

I was torn between the Quentin Tarrantino Last Supper and the Big Lebowski version or even one from the Simpsons. But I went with Battle Star Galactica because that caught more of the flavour of last night. On a side note, if you would like to view over 50 Last Supper spoofs, a little click will do ya.

But today's post is not about the art but about the dinner last night. A good friend, of many names, has launched a new aspect of her culinary bricolage with the inaugural event in her Secret Supper. Once a month a select group of Bay Area elite email eaters/invitees receive directions to a Secret Supper. Menus are attached (for last night's delectables, see below) and payment is via PayPal. Last night was launched in a warehouse space in Oakland and by most mouthful utterances was a big hit. I particularly liked the asparagus soup and the warehouse cat, who braved the both dogs to locate a couple of cat people and receive generous pets and scritches.

My apologizes to any local readers but it may be several months before I can sneak you onto the limited invite list, but I am always looking for a monthly food date. Here is the essence and the edibles from this month's venture.

Secret Kitchen is an underground dining club which changes both the prix fixe menu and location monthly. Members will enjoy gourmet dinners in a relaxed setting, with great entertainment and thoughtful conversations with interesting people. Diners are asked to bring the beverage of their choice, and wear comfy clothes as you'll never know just where you'll be sitting til you get there!  Here is our homage (menu) to Spring: App:Braised Pork Belly in Citrus-Maple Reduction Soup: Roasted Asparagus with Lemon Chive Creme Entree: Salmon Papillote with Smoked Chilies Baby Potatoes in Green Garlic Butter Dessert: Spiced Fruit Phyllos with Wine Sauce and Marscapone

. . . and my favorite Last Supper spoof.

Which Came First the Media or the Sheep?

For quite some time now I have held the opinion that the dumbing down of the news media in the United States has been solely the responsibility of the news media itself. We all know it is easier and cheaper to run a quick gossip piece that it is to fully research a segment on nuclear energy, the humanitarian crisis in Darfur or fraud in the Department of Justice. The media moguls argue that they are only covering what the public wants to see, hear and read. My answer has been: Bullshit! I for one do not believe who Tiger Woods might be screwing is on the moral equivalent of two wars, global economic meltdown or the fate of the Hubble telescope.

Last evening, however, I tuned into the Charlie Rose Show and found him leading with an interview of a senior reporter from Golf Digest. Seems Tiger made a fully scripted statement that said blah, blah, blah. Charlie Rose lead with some bullshit PR piece by an athlete who was unfaithful to his marriage. There actually is more hard news on The Daily Show than on PBS.

Let me be clear on this item. Tiger Woods is the best professional golfer in the world. I enjoy the accomplishments of athletes like Woods, Michael Jordan, Pele, Gretsky... I like that every so often someone really is heads and shoulders above everyone else. It proves, if nothing else, that socialism is wrong. But who any of these people sleep with is not news. Repeat, not news.

I am not a news junkie, at least not what passes for news on television or in the the olde print media. I get my news from the net, where I can filter it. Yet, even with rigorous tweaking of what comes to me as news, I still know who this worthless piece of flotsam is:

Did I search once too often for "romantic european capitals" or "tackily themed las vegas casinos"? No, the news media machine decided that this creature was worthy of covering, something she apparently is unable to do on her own.

So, I asked myself: Am I wrong? What does the "public" really want to see covered in the "news"? Since I get my news from the web, I thought I should consult the internet and in particular Google for my information.

As of this moment, these are the top ten Googled items on the web:

1. who's afraid of virginia wolf

2. facebook problems

3. alexander haig

4. jazimine cashmere is pregnant by what rapper

5. facebook not working

6. dragon wars

7. miss peregrym

8. facebook outage

9. crossroads tickets*

10. tiger woods

*if you are in Illinois in late June, this is worth checking out

And these are the top ten trending topics:

1. tiger woods

2. glenn beck cpac

3. woods

4. tiger

5. olympic hockey

6. facebook

7. stick it movie

8. haig

9. wii

10. tiger woods effect**

**That last one got me, so I followed the link and found among other things that during the 13 minute Tiger Woods apology speech, the New York stock exchange actually slowed as traders paused to watch.

I shall now alter my opinion on the survivability of the human race.

Marriage

[Content Disclosure: 12.4% Social Commentary; 87% Societal Stupidity]

On the eve of the state Supreme Court hearing in San Francisco on Proposition 8, which prohibits same-sex marriage, advocates on both sides describe the issue in similar high-stakes rhetoric.

“On a broader scale, beyond the scope of the definition of marriage, this is about whether the social fabric will be torn by decimating the concept of the consent of the governed."

“I truly believe that the future of equality and the promise of justice for all hangs in the balance as the court considers Proposition 8."
Hard to tell sometimes who is fer and who is agin.
My position is obvious, I hope. I oppose anyone telling anyone else how to live their life; as long as that living does not materially affect aforementioned anyone's wallet, nose or jacuzzi. In other words, why do you care what those two folks down the street do with their life?
I thank my friend, Wil Wheaton for the graphic demonstration of what any sane person knows is the only rational position. This, of course, gives me pause when "liberal" California can vote completely opposite said rationality.