How do you top a train?

Fathers' Day is coming up, and I need to think of something good.

For Mothers' Day the guys took me for a ride through the Michigan countryside on the Little River Railroad, a real old-time train powered by a restored steam engine. We're talking a smaller version of Hogwarts Express here, with all the attendant hissing, chugging, billowing steam ... literally all the bells and whistles.

Even better, we nabbed the up-high window seats in the caboose, the ones you have to climb to get into. And, because Elder Son knows the engineer, we got a personal tour of the engine itself. The weather was perfect, we went to dinner after, and was just a great day all around.

So. Now it's my turn. And I'm out of keen ideas.

I guess I started this with Hubby's birthday. Hubby loves to play with this little remote control helicopter we gave him for Christmas. Elder Son is a pilot, and he knew somebody with a real helicopter, so we all chipped in to give his dad a chance to fly it -- with the real pilot in control for the tricky parts, of course. He loved that, and reciprocated with the train ride.

He does need a new grill, but that seems so prosaic now. Any thoughts?

Coming soon to a theater near you

Throngs of moviegoers set sail last weekend in search of Cap'n Jack Sparrow. Alas, we were not among them. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End looks like a lot of fun, and we were all set to go at one point.

So, you might ask, what happened? Well, Son the Younger flat refused to go to the theater because, and I quote, "I never enjoy it. There's always somebody talking, or kicking my seat, or yelling at the screen, and I just hate that. I'd rather wait for the video." Mind you, this is a kid who wants to go to film school.

When people like Son the Younger announce they're done with the theater experience, the industry is in some deep trouble. And theaters are finally taking notice.

Regal Theaters is now providing regular customers with a "snitch" device to alert management to the presence of evildoers in the audience.

Sounds like a good idea, but there's no word yet on what management will do, exactly, in response to the alarm. Rowdies and bag rustlers in the audience are annoying, but they're small potatoes compared to incursions of enforcers bent on hauling out the perpetrators. And do the snitches get a security detail to defend them against being pelted with popcorn and JuJu Bees?

Of course, if you came for drama you could consider the ruckus to be a bonus. I know at least one young snitch who'd gladly risk it.

Holy crap

Found this recently on BoingBoing. I can only hope it's a joke: Christian Domestic Discipline Store.

It seems God wants men to "discipline" their nasty, naughty wives. By spanking them. While they're wearing disturbingly juvenile, crotchless pantaloons. (I'm assuming the wives are the ones wearing the pantaloons but, given the rating this gets on the Kink-o-Meter, that may not be a given.)

According to the site's book on the subject, "It is best if the wife submits willingly, rather than being forced to obey her husband." However, there are chapters for how to handle things if she gets all uppity: Common Alternative Punishments ... Common Implements ... Spanking for Punishment ... Uncooperative Wife ... Bruising/Marks.

I'd like to add a few chapters of my own to that little gem: Surviving a Blow to the Groin ... Appeasing Wives Who Know Kung Fu ... Hiring a Divorce Attorney ... Removing a Wad of Pantaloons from Your Ass ...

Kinda gives new meaning to the term Jesus Freaks, don't you think?

Memorial Day

Flags for the Fallen

* U.S and Coalition Casualties in Iraq

* Heroes of War


(clickable photo)

Fat cat blues

Behold Gatsby, AKA "His Plumpness".

The vet suggested, rather pointedly, that Gat Cat needs to shed a few pounds. And we're not talking pounds of hair.

This boy's feed bowl has always been kept perpetually full, which was (obviously) a mistake on our part. So now he gets a reasonable scoop of diet food in the morning and another in the evening, and that's it. It must seem like a cruel and incomprehensible twist of fate to a kitty who do love his kibble.

All in all, he's adjusted pretty well and is slimming down slowly. But he really, really wants that bowl filled on time. He launches a full-throated beg fest as soon as I start working in the kitchen. Having two kids and a husband, I'm pretty much immune to that. However, when he stands up on his hind legs and sinks his claws into my behind, that does get my attention. I can only hope the others don't pick up on that trick.

No point here. Just sharing.

It's a drum day

I don't want to work.
I don't want to play.
I just want to bang on this drum all day.

An old song. Stuck in my brain. Stuck in my soul. I gotta leave for work now, if I can make one foot go ahead of the other long enough to reach my cubicle.

I gotta find a way to get health insurance and a 401k for drum-banging.

Double trouble?

The morning talk shows are abuzz today with stories about a 60-year-old woman giving birth to twins. There is much wrinkling of the brow, interspersed with concerned clucking. I have to admit, my first thoughts were not positive.

At these moments, the Little Voice in My Head always pipes up: "What is your problem?" it said. "She's not much older than you are, and you'd love to have another baby." (The Voice is a troublemaker, through and through.)

Well, Voice ... she's old. So am I, in case you haven't noticed. When those babies are ten, she'll be 70. She may develop health problems. She may never live to see them graduate from high school.

Voice: Younger mothers get sick too. Some of them die and leave youngsters behind. It's rough, but the kids manage. Do we say those kids should never have been born?

OK, Voice, but those kids are going to be teased all through school about their geriatric mom.

Voice: You mean like the kids who get teased because their mom is too fat, too short, too tall, too ugly, too poor, or wears funny clothes? All kids get teased over something. They'll cope.

Well, then, what about her own ability to cope? It takes a lot of energy to chase kids, you know. Not to mention the constant chauffer duty and scheduling. It's exhausting.

Voice: I hate to break this to you, but thousands of seniors are out there right now parenting their own grandkids. This is just not the big freakin' deal you're making it out to be.

Well, Voice, maybe you're right. Maybe I'm the one with the problem, not her. At any rate, I wish them all luck -- and joy in the journey.

In-a-gadda-da-vida, baby

Flower Child, circa 2007

Younger Son's American History class recreated the sixties this week, complete with an outdoor "Woodstock" -- minus the sex and drugs, of course. (Which is sort of like groovus interuptus, but what're ya gonna do. At least they kept the rock 'n roll.) The Son had been looking forward to it for months, and even let his hair grow long.

Having been there for the real sixties, I have actually been of some use to him in the project, and I must say it's been a lot of fun. I got to introduce him to Jimmy Hendrix and Janis Joplin, and to tell him what it was like when the Beatles first played on the Ed Sullivan Show. After explaining acid rain and nuclear testing, I even got to play Joan Baez's "What Have They Done to the Rain" without getting the eye-roll thing.

I told him what the draft was like ... how we all sat in front of the TV, watching the numbers drawn by lottery, to see if my brother would have to go to Vietnam. I told him how the girls in my school could not take classes like drafting or engineering, and how I was told point-blank by counselors that even though I was a straight-A student and could do the work, I would never be hired in any field of science because women were not allowed.

POW bracelets, peace signs, Age of Aquarius, Hair, Black Panthers, back to nature, bell bottoms, earth shoes, flower power ... a total bonding experience. We even made protest signs together.

The event was not, however, without its drawbacks.

The Son needed a tie-dyed shirt, and I had managed to survive the era without learning how to produce such a thing. No problem ... off we went to Hobby Lobby. There we found blank T-shirts on sale for $2.99 (score!) and a kit that promised to do the job for $10.99 (ouch).

Being an artistic sort, The Son wanted a three-color spiral design. Again, no problem. The kit had Instructions for that: "Decide where the swirl will be. Pinch fabric at this point. Twist fabric around into a flat spiral. Bind with three rubber bands, creating six wedge shapes. Apply dye on wedges using as many colors as desired." Uhhh. What??

So there I am in my latex gloves, hunched over the bench on my back deck with an array of dye bottles, my kitchen dish pan, paper towels, plastic bags, and a wadded-up cheap shirt, thinking Where the hell is an overalls-clad hippie when you really need one?

Plan B: The Internet. God bless Google: There's a video for that.

Back to the deck, where I discover that I need to add water to the bottles of fine dust that is, apparently, the dye. Nowhere in the instructions does it say how much water to add, just "for lighter colors, use more water". Arrrgh. The video said amateurs don't use enough dye, so I need enough to soak this sucker. But I don't want to end up with pastels, because I know Son ain't going out in pink and baby blue. I fill them three quarters full and hope for the best.

Five minutes later, the shirt is soaked and wrapped in plastic, the timer is set for four hours, and the dye dust has migrated to every surface within a ten-foot radius of ground zero. Hosing ensues. Thank God I didn't try this in the house.

After clipping the bands off, hosing down the shirt and washing it a couple of times, we have the real deal: a bona fide, butt ugly, tie dyed T-shirt a la 1967. Son is pleased. Mom is declared Groovy.

This week totally rocked.

Baubles, bangles and beads

In browsing around on the Web, I happened on an MSNBC video in the "Making a Difference" series that simply blew me away. It's about an outstanding oganization called Beadforlife.


In a village in Uganda, we see women in extreme poverty, raising children alone due to the depradations of war and HIV; we see women who eke out a living breaking rocks for a dollar a day. And yet, in their down time, they create these incredible beads out of anything paper they can get their hands on.

The founders of the nonprofit, Ginny Jordan, Torkin Wakefield, and Devin Hibbard, brought the beads back to the USA and showed them to friends, who were equally touched and amazed. The group now hosts bead parties and an online store, pays the beaders fair trade prices, and donates the profits to community improvement projects in Uganda.

One look at the smiles on all those faces, and you'll be sold. Check it out and buy yourself a necklace or two. You'll feel beautiful.

Sweet, sweet Sunday

A real two-day weekend is such a luxury. I get only one or two a month, so it's a huge treat. When Sunday is all you have, it's devoted to bill paying, errand running, paperwork, cleaning, laundry, and so on. But if there's going to be a Saturday as well, then man oh man, it's like Christmas.

The trick is balancing everything: the obligatory chores, of course, plus staying up late, sleeping in, the movie you've been dying to see, the next chapters in that book you started two weeks ago, the new recipe that takes hours to do, blogging ... the list always exceeds the extra hours. But what a joy it is to have all that time. It's sad that we've become so busy.

When I was a kid, the whole family worked hard all day, had supper together, then had the whole evening to read, watch TV, or just hang out. The adults would sit with the kids, helping with homework, if we had any. Board games were big, along with backyard badminton, baseball or croquet; we'd play a block-wide game of hide and seek when it got dark.

On Sunday, there was church and a whole day of puttering around afterward. We'd sit out on the wide front porch in the big wicker swing, or on the springy metal chairs. There would be stories and jokes to tell, beans to snap, peas to shell, corn to shuck over last week's newspapers. Neighbors strolling by would come up the walk and sit a while, sharing news and gossip over a glass of iced tea. The biggest decisions of the day were whether to have pie or cake for desert, and whether to nap on the sofa or in the hammock under the maple tree.

Our generation traded away all of that for lives of striving and aspiration. We have more money now than we did then. I suppose we have more accomplishments to point to. Our toys are more complex, we travel farther afield than our parents ever dreamed of going, and our possibilities are bigger. But I'm not sure, really, that it was such a good deal.

Sag free or die

Apparently, Louisiana law enforcement doesn't have enough to do.

The House Justice Committe there wants to make it illegal to wear your pants too low. They want to fine you and sentence you to community service for it. Jeeez Louise.

Do we really want government involved in fashion choices? Is the threat posed by saggy pants great enough to warrant legislation?

Every law reduces our freedom in some way, and we should not enact them lightly. "That government is best which governs least."

American dilemma

It's hard to be a liberal these days.

Crack open my flower child heart and you'd see that corny old 70's commercial, people of all nations holding hands and singing. "I'd like to teach the world to sing, in perfect harmony. I'd like to buy the world a Coke, and keep it company."

The problem is, some of the lovely folk in that circle are now wearing bomb belts and want the rest of us dead.

It is horrifying that my government is detaining and torturing people at Guantanamo and, worse, in secret facilities around the world, denying them any semblance of due process. But ... do I really want those people released, to go about their business unimpeded? I can't honestly say that I do.

Any true American should be willing to put his own body between his neighbor and a lynch mob. But ... should we be expected to silently and passively board a plane with neighbors who are muttering curses against America and behaving in ways consistent with membership in the potential-bomber club? I don't think so.

In today's news, we find that the six imams who were removed from a United Airways flight last year are now trying to sue the passengers who reported them as suspicious. From the imams' point of view, they were being discriminated against because of their religion. This is probably true. We would not have responded in the same way to the same behavior from another religious group. But then, we don't generally find, say, Buddhists chanting Death to America every night on TV.

Should the imams have been removed, given what the passengers saw? Yes. Should they have been reboarded when found to be harmless? Yes. Should they have the right to sue, if their civil rights were violated? Absolutely. Should they win the suit against the passengers? Hell no.

The threat to our freedoms and civil liberties is very real. But so is the threat to our lives. As I said, it's hard to be a liberal these days.

It came just the same

A couple of weeks ago, these buds were encased in ice and snow. It seemed they were goners for sure, and yet here they are. Most of the spring flowers actually made it through, though I have no idea how they survived.

I wish there were some way to share the scent. More than once, I've nearly snuffled petals into my sinuses, drinking it in.

Life is full of surprises. Some of them are good. We cynics will just have to deal with it.

Song of the stones

Check this out: 'Da Vinci' church reveals secret code - CNN.

Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" pays homage to Rosslyn Chapel, an intricate and enigmatic Scottish church packed solid with centuries-old puzzles. Now, it seems, at least one of its mysteries is solved.

Code breaker and composer Thomas Mitchell, along with his composer son Stuart, have deciphered an archway sporting 13 angelic musicians and 213 geometric symbols. Turns out, the symbols are musical notes; specifically, they are Chladni patterns, the shapes that result when a sand-covered plate is vibrated by various tones. He and his son have recreated the corresponding medieval melody, dubbed The Roslynn Motet, and it will be performed in the chapel for the first time on May 18.

Mitchell has a website that explains all, including a snippet of the music and an awesome video of the sound patterns forming on the vibrating plate, matched with corresponding carvings.

Is this cool or what?