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**** Chore Day
Sundays are my favorite chore day. In the bathroom, I waged chemical warfare against mildew for a solid 30 minutes, spraying and scrubbing until I felt whoozy. There's a good chance that my future offspring will suffer severe chromosomal damage because my bathroom's exhaust fan couldn't ventilate a coliseum.
I also vacuumed, which is my favorite chore ever since my father gave me a Dirt Devil for my birthday. I love the name - "Dirt Devil." There's something really motivating about imagining myself as dirt's holy enemy.
Another satisfying chore is sweeping the dead leaves off the balcony. Having been an apartment dweller for all of my adult life, I love having a bit of outdoors to tend to, even if it's just a second floor, wood-plank balcony. The thought of someday having a leaf-filled yard that requires raking makes me giddy.
I also tackled some digital chores, like cleaning up my hard drive, importing some CDs, and tagging pictures in iPhoto. I played around with the automatic photo enhancement, which, when applied to an over-exposed picture of Mount Washington from last weekend, turned out a garish but appealing alien landscape (shown below).
| Saturday September 29 2007
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**** The Natives are Restless
Nike has released the Air Native N7, a running shoe exclusively available for Native Americans
(here for USA Today).
Nike is quite proud of itself for offering this "true Native fitting, performance product" that meets the "specific fit and width requirements for the Native American foot" (here for Nike website).
The USA Today article mentions the shoe's "culturally specific look." Other than a strip of color that runs along the laces, these are the biggest, whitest, most oblong sneakers I have ever seen. In USA Today's picture, the sneaker makes the guy's head look like a peanut. That's a helluva toe box.
I'm no orthopedist, but I am a cynic. I wonder if 'regular' sneakers that suit the feet of every other race were really that inadequate for Native Americans, themselves a diverse population that span a continent. Or is Nike's market so saturated that they are shamelessly going after a market share of 1% of the population (and the non-profit health foundations that cater to it)?
But ultimately, I suspect that this is a feel-good initiative for the employees of Nike, a company that has $15 billion in revenue a year and is still scrubbing at the tarnish from the controversy in the mid-1990s over its exploitative sweatshop labor in third-world countries. What a bizarre sequence of events in White European/Native American relations. In 500 years, we've gone from wiping them out with smallpox and stealing their land to niche-marketing them sneakers.
**** Friday Night Frights
I attended exactly one football game during high school. It was the Homecoming game my Freshman year, back when I gamely "participated" in a doomed effort to sneak into a clique of sub-popular academic kids who never willingly talked to me at school events.
Maybe our team won, maybe we didn't. My only memory is the Homecoming Court. The boys wore suits and ties, and the girls all wore dowdy skirt suits. They coupled off and perched on the back of convertibles that circled the football field, carrying flowers and waving. After a lifetime of seeing Homecoming Queens and Kings in popular culture, the lackluster crowning ceremony disappointed me.
The football coach was a Russian immigrant named Coach Marinkov, loved for being the easiest and most fun history teacher in school. But I'm glad that I never had him, because he ridiculed weirdos and was a blatant misogynist. The football team's consistently dismal performance gave me deep satisfaction, because Coach Marinkov as well as every single football player was a jerk. Seriously.
The other day, I was web surfing and happened to come across a recent article about my alma mater's football program: "Methacton savoring first win since 2004" (here), about how they snapped a 25-game losing streak under the tutelage of a new coach named McNally, who taunted them over the off-season by wearing a t-shirt with the No. 25 on it.
I emailed the story to my best friend from high school, snidely noting how "the Warriors ripped McNally's oft-worn and sometimes smelly T-shirt to shreds." Apparently, the sentence struck her and me the exact same way, as she replied: "I can see it all. And it makes me feel anxious."
| Thursday September 27 2007
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**** Breakdown
I don't have time to write a real post today, because I just spent 20 minutes composing a poisoned missive to MBTA Commuter Rail Chief Bob Stoetzel (via the MBTA 'Write to the Top' feedback, here) about how the hour-long delays that have plagued the Worcester line for the past few months due to ongoing track maintenance are bringing me to the brink of a nervous breakdown. I would re-post my compliant on this site for your entertainment, but I'm not too proud of the hysterical whining ("YOU ARE RUINING MY LIFE"), goaded by tonight's commuting disaster that ended 2 hours later with Mr. Pinault picking me up in Boston. WAH.
| Wednesday September 26 2007
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**** Today's Pet Peeve: Engineers who think "anyone can write"
Obviously, engineers are literate, and usually intelligent enough to form a lucid linguistic construct. But even if their words are grammatically flawless, the resulting expanse of abstruse syntax is often the diametric opposite of what can be considered "communication." The prose of an engineer treats the reader as if they have the cognitive powers of a robot.
Through natural ability and years of practice, I have honed my ability to communicate complex concepts through clear, concise writing. That is how I get to be a technical writer.
Where do engineers get off thinking that "anyone can write?" Sure, anyone can cook too, but few have the culinary prowess to be considered a chef. I make a mean grilled cheese, but I'm not going to attempt ricotta gnocchi with tomato passatina, pecorino romano, and frizzled leek relish for $30 a plate.
If engineers want to express themselves, they can build a bridge, develop an artificial body organ, create a food additive, design a portable music player, or construct an aircraft carrier...
Engineers are experts in engineering, a discipline that a group of engineers (here) once defined as the creative application of scientific principles to design or develop structures, machines, apparatus, or manufacturing processes, or works utilizing them singly or in combination; or to construct or operate the same with full cognizance of their design; or to forecast their behavior under specific operating conditions; all as respects an intended function, economics of operation and safety to life and property.
Undeniably, an engineer crafted that explanation. My point exactly.
| Tuesday September 25 2007
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**** Reviews of Fragrance Samples from Maxim Magazine, October 2007
Fuel for Life - Diesel ("Use with Caution")
The name is not exaggerating when it implies something like the olfactory equivalent of a Power Bar. When Fuel for Life is drawn into the nose, the initial punch of cloves, musk, and amber carries the fundaments of a classic men's cologne. But then an overwhelming blast of citrus followed by an explosion of cinnamon leaves the sinuses stunned and shaken. "Use with caution" indeed, or it may fuel a nosebleed.
CKI2U - Calvin Klein ("2 new fragrances. One for him. One for her.")
The doe-eyed couple on the advertisement who are sizing up each other's comely young skin with longing looks give a clue: Both scents are immature and forgettable as a teenage hook-up. A quick burst of light lemon followed by a breath of vanilla and flowers (for her) or a pant of spice (for him). And it's over. Two scents for young adults who are still weaning themselves off of the Body Shop.
Le Male - Jean Paul Gaultier
This classic comes in an infamous bottle that is shaped like a limbless male torso. But the bottle's blush-inducing bulge may be the most manly thing about this scent, which carries notes of flowers, fruit, vanilla, and light minty spice. The nuanced complexity stirred some serious penis envy. I can totally see myself buying it... not for le male, but for moi.
**** Tales from the Woman 'hood
My new company (after a month, it feels dodgy to persist in saying "new," but it is just that) shares a Ladies's Room with what seems to be the customer service division of a financial company. This company employs a large number of young females who regularly congregate in the restroom to apply make-up, style their hair, or stare vacantly at the mirror. When in a group, they'll spew boredom, whisper gossip, gush excitement, or sometimes let loose a foul deluge of bitter complaints. Potty mouth, if you will.
The communal aspects of the lavatory prevent me from overhearing anything too juicy. There's a lot of fantasy catty retorts to unnamed adversaries. "Oh, God, when she said that? I was, like, 'get off your high horse, and remember that you are not my manager. Because if you were my manager, I'd so be gone tomorrow'" is a typical rant.
Today I was privy to an interesting exchange between two young woman who I often see brushing their glorious manes of dark hair in front of the sinks. "I learned in school, that, like, there are some tribes that send women to these special huts when they have their periods," one young woman said, "and they just do nothing but sit around for an entire week."
"Really?" said her friend. "That sounds great!"
"I know! And my professor made the hut sound bad, like it was demeaning, like it was a punishment, but I'm thinking, 'Omigod! Send me to the hut!'" The women laugh. This is the sort of conversation that could only happen in a Ladies' Room: for some a place of biological necessity, for others, a place of respite and bastion of womanhood.
**** I am Alive
The dearth of posts in the past few days may lead some readers to wonder if I'm alive. Indeed, I am. I'm alive and thriving in autumn's benevolence. Today I climbed to the summit of Mount Washington, the highest mountain peak in the Northeast. It was a piece of cake... or, rather, a piece of coal, since I sat upon the amazing Mount Washington Cog Railroad (opened in 1869, the world's first mountain-climbing cog railroad, here) as it chugged and spewed on a journey to the top that left me covered in soot rather than sweat.
For sure, I felt lazy for taking a train rather than climbing by foot, but humans were created to function best with periodic lulls in between insane bursts of activity. So I submitted to relaxing in the railroad carriage, marveling at nature and at man's ingenuity, to build something as bat-shit nuts as a cog railroad up the side of Mount Washington.
Below photos of trains on Cog Railroad by Mr. Pinault.
| Thursday September 20 2007
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**** Faces of Evil
Yesterday's New York Times had an article about a recently discovered photo album belonging to the adjutant to the commandant of the Nazi death camp Auschwitz. The album contained roughly 120 photographs, but not the typical concentration camp pictures of starvation, suffering, and inhumanity. No, these were pictures of the SS guards at play and leisure. Having a sing-a-long with an accordian. Relaxing in lounge chairs on a patio at the SS alpine-style retreat Solahutte. Playing with a dog. At shooting practice. Hunting. Lighting the camp Christmas tree. Eating blueberries.
On the train, I stared at photographs in the New York Times, fascinated (here for article "In the Shadow of Horror, SS Guardians Frolic"), then at home I viewed the entire album online at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (here). The museum's exhibition juxtaposes these pictures with those of the prisoners, but my imagination can readily conjure the horrors. And as I flipped through the album, what struck me most was how consistently happy they seem, like anyone taking respite from work that fulfills them. How contented, plump, and dapper; how banefully normal they appear. How unaware they are, that they are monsters.
| Wednesday September 19 2007
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**** I'm Too Sexy For Eighth Grade
A just-turned 13 year old girl named Maddison Gabriel was chosen as
"the face" of the inaugural Gold Coast Fashion Week in Australia (here),
prompting fabulous publicity from all sorts of outraged people, like other models ("I was 15
when I started, but 12? That's taking it to a whole new level" here) and the country's Prime Minister
("We do have to preserve some notion of innocence in our society" here).
Now, let me just say that I'm so over the demoralizing hijinks of High Fashion. If designers want to showcase their unattainable clothes on animated
skeletons, and if people continue to be fascinated, adoring, and envious of these emaciated ideals, well, whatever. Maybe we should just chalk it up to another peril of affluence and start to pay attention to the humans who aren't trying to starve themselves to death.
Still, this story disturbs me. Not because the fashion world is exploiting a willing 13-year old, but because she actually looks 13. Usually teenaged models appear to have gone through puberty, and their facial features are fully-formed so that I'm surprised that they are so young. But Maddison Gabriel looks like a prepubescent. And that's perverted.
(I haven't been this scandalized by fashion since my trip to Provincetown, where male swimsuits with heavily-padded crotches are the style du jour.)
| Tuesday September 18 2007
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**** Forky's
Ideally, one should be passionate about their career. For the record, I have never met a passionate technical writer. Nor would I want to. I mean, that sounds like the most annoying person ever.
I am passionate about hiking. Sometimes I think: How cool if I could hike for a living! And not as, like, a sherpa! Maybe people would pay me to lead them on hikes. I could read maps, exude enthusiasm, and point out obvious things in nature. "Look, it's a mushroom! That's called a, um, white mushroom."
Mr. Pinault dreams of opening a restaurant - simple yet elegant, French yet affordable, casual yet French. For several years, I championed the idea of a fondue restaurant in a cosmopolitan location. Then we discovered that urban areas are brimming with fondue establishments, and thanks to a chain called The Melting Pot (here), even upper-middle class suburbs like Natick can dine on fondue for roughly $50 per person.
But what about fondue for the masses? In lower middle-class rural and suburban areas, casual sit-down restaurants are a popular social activity, and since all foodstuffs are a slight variation on the same tasteless, greasy, deep-fried thing, a novel presentation is appreciated. It won't be classic Gruyere and Emmenthaler Swiss fondue, but given the target market, it wouldn't have to be. We're talking Velveeta fondues with bread, oil fondues with hot dogs, chocolate fondues with twinkies and marshmallows. $8/head for basic, $12/head for deluxe, and did I mention the waitresses and waiters are all (nonsensically) wearing Lederhosen?
It would make a killing, I tell you. But my passion in this venture was always based solely on the strength of being able to call the restaurant Fundue. Unfortunately, a quick Google search revealed that Fundue is trademarked by a desktop USB fondue set (here - "Looking to expand your culinary sophistication without leaving your cube?"). Wow. That's so... disgusting.
For some reason, my alternative names (Fon-fun, Forky's, The Fat Pot, Pot Belly) just don't sustain my passion. I mean, even white trash wouldn't eat at a fondue restaurant called Forky's.
**** 20-minute Train Poetry
"We Fell Together"
Hanging from a branch, unaware you exist
I wink with the green freedom of a leaf.
Then, a force that I could not resist
Flung me loose and high as the massif.
And as I fluttered above the forest, I saw you.
I saw you tossing in the brute wind.
I saw you circling without tether.
I saw you plunging to timber's din.
And when we fell, we fell together.
-Text by MSG, photo by Mr. Pinault
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**** Perfect Day for a Peak Bag
At 4340 feet, Mount Osceola is the most dominant peak in the Waterville Valley range of the White Mountains. This may sound daunting, but the trail starts halfway to the top (vertically), making for a steady raise of 2025 feet over 3.5 miles. That's a damn pleasant walk in the forest, albeit a rocky and muddy one.
Mount Osceola's summit looks out over the east, giving a spectacular view of Waterville Valley. We sat and ate sandwiches with an ever-changing crowd of hikers and dogs. "How ya doing? Exceedingly good weather!" a woman said to me. Indeed, it was sunny and crisp, with the promise of autumn underscored by a slight coloring in the foliage. Some people were bundled in jackets, wool hats, and gloves, while others basked in t-shirts and shorts. Everyone seemed comfortable.
The picture below is on the summit looking north-east; in the distance are the middling mountains of the scenic Kancamagus Highway. We ventured onto Osceola's north face so we could see the Presidential range, but the frigid wind from Canada repelled us. Not ready to freeze for a few more months...
**** Shop Til You Shop
Researchers have determined that women are innately better at shopping than men, leading to the conclusion that shopping is the modern-day gathering (here), which refers to "the primordial bargain of human hunter-gatherer societies, it is the men who do the hunting and the women who do the gathering."
While I normally adore research that explains away our behavior with evolution, I am loath to equate foraging for nuts and berries with the consumeristic frenzy that pervades our every waking moment. However, it does explain the pleasing brain buzz that I get from rummaging through a bin of clothes at Filene's Basement. (To my great dismay, the original Filene's Basement is closed for 2 years for renovation, here).
Our males, the descendants of the hunters, are typically better at navigation, but this study found that women's navigation skills were comparable if the end goal was a high-caloric food. Yes, it's true. We will work for chocolate.
| Thursday September 13 2007
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**** Age Rage
The issue is so hot, it's scorching the glue off of Post-It easel pads in meetings of highly-developed Human Resource departments across the country. Savvy, slothful, and sloppy Generation Y is entering the workplace and clashing with the staid, stolid, solid Boomers. "What we're finding is a lot of differences between the culture of the established company and this new crop of workers," says one keen-eyed, brilliant HR professional (here). Differences lead to conflict, conflict leads to violence, and the next thing you know, you got sobbing 60-year olds trying to strangle near-naked 22-year olds with their antiquated mouse cords. And there goes the HR director's annual bonus.
Manpower experts have determined key points of contention include appropriate dress, working habits, and general attitude. "Boomers respect authority; millennials question it," says the article. Wait, didn't boomers once define themselves by their youthful questioning of authority? Could this conflict simply be the normal result of old people and young people being placed in the same room? Isn't the real problem that boomers no longer have relevant knowledge and skills for today's marketplace, and hence lord their seniority over everyone's heads while fiercely guarding their ignorance in order to preserve their livelihood?
I mean, come on. Everyone knows that the boomers created flex time in order to spend more time with their children, and the millennials are merely demanding their fair share of it so that they're not stuck having to do all their Facebooking at the office while their manager is "working at home," which really means buying a vacation home on Cape Cod.
(The article scarcely mentions Generation Xers like myself, but we're the ones who are actually working.)
**** Meet The Neighbors
Our neighbors seem like such nice people. I can't understand why their wireless networks are named such vulgar things (see screenshot below).
I mean, "Selene." How disgusting. Like I want to be reminded of the Greek goddess of the moon - that pagan whore - every time I look at the wireless.
| Wednesday September 12 2007
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**** Putin's Surprise
Given the hurried pace of my new job, there is little time for leisurely web surfing breaks. To quell my raging inner newshound, I regularly scan the Google News front page here, just to make sure I'm not missing the story of the century.
Today I pinged Google News and saw the headline "Putin Picks Surprise Nominee for PM" accompanied by a picture of Vladimir Putin and GW Bush shaking hands (see screenshot below). It suggested a wholly insane scenario: Putin asked Bush to be the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation! And Bush accepted!
Well, why not? Is there anything specific in the US constitution that prohibits the US President from serving as the Russian Prime Minister?
Suddenly, everything is becoming clear. The Kennedy Assassination. Ronald Reagan and Gorbachev's chumminess. The dissolution of the USSR. The poisoning of ex-spy Alexander Litvinenko. The ill-fated invasion of Iraq and subsequent impotency of the executive branch. Karl Rove's resignation. It's all been one big conspiracy theory to throw the United States under Communist control!
(I know... get back to work, Green...)
| Tuesday September 11 2007
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**** 9/11 Forbidden Thoughts
After the September 11 attacks, the entire country grabbed a flag and waved it around in a profound display of shock and grief. But some people secretly had inappropriate reactions of selfishness, annoyance, indifference, excitement, even happiness. 5 years ago, on the first anniversary of 9/11, Salon.com published a fascinating compilation of people's "forbidden thoughts" (here).
(Doesn't "forbidden thoughts" sound so naughty? Like "Ohh, I couldn't stop thinking how sexy Guiliani looked standing in the rubble, on all those dead bodies!")
These are knee-jerk reactions to the attacks in the following hours and days. One woman was relieved to get out of work. Another hoped that enough Manhattanites had perished to snag a 212 phone number. Many felt racist or xenophobic thoughts, while others were thrilled to witness an event of historic proportions. "It was the most exciting day of my career in journalism," said one reporter. A few people revealed themselves as heartless realists, like a woman who read memorial profiles of all the deceased and thought "Yeah right. Was everyone in the WTC a super amazing person? Someone who worked there must have been an asshole."
My prevailing emotion at the time was panic for my own personal safety. (I watched way too much hysterical cable news.) Certainly millions of Americans felt terrified, but since I lived and worked in Boston, I reasoned that my fears were more justified than the Midwestern crazies who imagined fanatical Jihadists blowing up the local mall. And I never admitted this, but this fear for my life was exhilarating. Is that forbidden, or is that human?
**** Bernice Bobs Her Hair
"Bernice Bobs Her Hair" is a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, published in 1922 in his first collection Flappers and Philosophers (though I recall reading it in a Best-Of anthology during a particularly solitary summer vacation many years ago.)
The catchy title is a clue: The story is not superbly crafted, expertly worded, or sublimely meaningful. It's just deliciously entertaining and one of my favorite short stories of all time.
Fitzgerald's enduring power comes from his talent for rendering characters that transcend his Roaring Twenties milieu.
In "Bernice Bobs Her Hair," awkward Bernice and her mean-girl cousin Marjorie are timeless teenagers, instantly recognizable in their preoccupations with dancing, boys, hairstyles, and conniving vengeance.
So, if you're in the mood for some light literature, or if you want to prepare for the next resurgence of Flapper fashion, I recommend "Bernice Bobs Her Hair", which can be read online here.
**** The Gridiron's Hot...
The New England Patriots crashed the New York Jets 38-14 this afternoon at the Meadowlands. As you can imagine, my head almost exploded in jubilation at seeing preppy Chad Pennington vanquished on the field with an injured ankle. Poor, poor Chadwick.
It was the season opener for the Patriots as well as my television, which has sat dormant for the past 6 months except for some tennis matches and the occasional episode of Absolutely Fabulous ("My name is Patsy Stone, and I'm wearing thick pants.")
Oh, Television, I profess to loath you and want you smashed, but you're not that bad. It's those beastly tagalongs, those commercials that I find morally noisome. Those blaring nuggets of pop culture that appeal to our most primitive instincts: Sex, status, high-caloric energy intake, inebriation, and hilarity over things like Oreo dessert pizza mustaches.
Yes, Oreo dessert pizza mustaches, the "hook" of a Dominos Pizza commercial that initially caught my attention because one of the characters is named Meredith (here for commercial on YouTube). Which is grosser: The commercial, which features two characters (not Meredith) with mustaches of Oreo cookies... or the product itself, which is essentially chopped Oreos sealed onto a pizza crust by high fructose corn syrup? I'm glad someone found a way to restore Oreos to their demonic nutritional values since Nabisco scrubbed them of trans fats. And coming after a meal of sausage and pepperoni-packed pizza that you are encouraged to dip into sauce! I can actually hear America's blood sugar spiking underneath all the uproarious laughter over the Oreo dessert pizza mustache.
See what I mean? Commercials are so distracting. Back to the football: Tom Brady is still my foxy Lord of the Pigskin. Randy Moss is a preternatural talent. Ellis Hobbs set a NFL record with a 108-yard kickoff return for a touchdown (here) . And Coach Belichick got a new sweatshirt. The Patriots are so in the Super Bowl this year.
| Saturday September 8 2007
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**** Having a Mall
After many months of anticipation, yesterday was the grand opening of (drumroll) the Natick Collection!
The Natick Collection is a grouping of upscale stores within a large indoor building that has walkways to enable shoppers to move from one store to another. In other, less-opulent words, the Natick Collection is... a mall (here for official site; here for local press coverage).
In fact, it used to be called the Natick Mall. But the soon-to-be 12th largest indoor amassing of fabulous exquisite chain stores like Burberry, Coach, Gucci, Jimmy Choo, Juicy Couture, Tiffany, Nordstrom, and Neiman Marcus can't be called a mall, lest it be confused with a wasteland of Old Navy, Gap, and Cinnabon.
As one who watches the increasing luxurification of America with dismay, the couture clothes and high-end merchandise that are for sale down my suburban street is alarming. And as a current Natick resident fed up living with the construction eyesores and traffic snares, I can't help but to use the sneering nickname that the locals have given it: the Natick Erection.
**** Tales from the Rails
The Friday evening express is running 15 minutes late, and is stopped on a bridge hovering over Route 128, where we can watch automobiles speeding under us on wide-open highway. It is 90 degrees and the air-conditioner doesn't work. It is rush hour but the train is a single-decker. Sweaty passengers throng the aisles. A child's voice occasionally rears up in a scream. Every two minutes, the conductor comes on the loudspeaker and apologizes: "We will be moving momentarily."
A man is on his cell phone with an aggrieved loved one: "We're running late... I don't know, the train's not moving... Like I can do something about it... Ok, sure, I'll just get out and push the train to Worcester." Nobody within earshot of his nastiness can blame him. Indeed, we are sympathetic.
It's one of those homebound commutes that provokes all sorts of longings. For a glass of ice water. For a solitary patch of grass on a breezy hill under a blue sky. For a hulking SUV with all the leisurely creature comforts to make a traffic jam a desirable break. For gainful employment opportunities across the street from my home. For a book, a bed, and a beer. For the head of MBTA General Manager Daniel Grabauskas on a platter of ice cream.
People are fidgeting, bristling, sweating, sighing. 5 minutes. 10 minutes. Then, the train moves. Relief. Joy. We are moving. We are moving. The man next to me starts to whistle. Holy christ, he's whistling "I Dream of Jeannie." Damn that tune is catchy. We are moving. We are moving.
| Thursday September 6 2007
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**** Freaking Katie Couric
Katie Couric's one-year anniversary as the first female news anchor of any network weekday evening news show is approaching. Based on weak ratings and tepid reviews, the media is roundly declaring her tenure thus far a failure. Is it because she's a woman held to a double standard by a society conditioned to equate hard news with a man's voice? Or is it because she's giggly?
Couric is currently on a heavily-publicized trip in Iraq, a war-torn country that is due for a surge of Couric effervescene. Her CBS-sanctioned blog (here) oscillates between boring descriptive reporting and yellow-ribboned gushing: "All U.S. and Iraqi soldiers patrolling the streets have my renewed respect and appreciation. One-hundred-and-ten degrees with full-body armor and heavy uniforms. I don't know how they do it. But they do, and we should be grateful." (I really doubt that the troops need little convincing to wear the body armor.)
While at the Al Asad Air Base, Couric nabbed a one-on-one interview with Prez' Bush, who just happened to be in the neighborhood (here). As the NYT points out, "The Bush administration clearly hopes that CBS's in-depth coverage will lend credence to its claim of progress on the ground since Mr. Bush announced a troop increase in January" (here).
Still, Couric isn't completely playing along. She offers reports of "signs of life that seem to be normal," but adds "That's what the military wants me to see, so you have to keep that in mind as well."
Bush obviously relished being interviewed by gentle, pliable, curious Katie, up until the last moments when they discussed General Petraeus's impending progress report to Congress (here):
Couric: And if Congress isn't receptive to General Petraeus's message....
Bush: What do you mean if Congress, are you...
Couric: I don't know....
Bush: Well I don't know either.
Couric: But... What are your options?
Bush: I would hope that Congress would pay attention to what General Petraeus has to say.
Sigh.Yeah, I don't know what she's doing there. Who made her the CBS news anchor? I don't know what Bush is doing there. Who made him President? Frankly, the whole scene is a bit surreal.
| Wednesday September 5 2007
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**** Fire Hazard
One of my lower priority professional goals is to, someday, attend an uber-crazy, alcohol-fueled office party. I mean a party where everyone's trashed, stumbling around the dance floor, and turning "finger-food" into "fist-food"... and not just me.
Maybe I should become a San Francisco firefighter. The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting (here) that a drunken tailgate party ended with 30 off-duty firefighters descending upon a nearby soup kitchen run by nuns. Violence ensued. "Hoses" were exposed. A soup kitchen volunteer was closely inspected for a fire code violation in her pants.
Any firefighter will attest to the efficacy of first-class debauchery as a means of blowing off occupational stress and promoting camaraderie. Because when you're battling an inferno, you feel much better about your fellow firefighters if you've seen them drunk and terrorizing nuns.
**** Maine In Words
Maine. You know, it's the only state with only one syllable. Clean, succint, resolute, no-frills, plain Maine.
"What kind of a place is this," Mr. Pinault asked as we drove around the Carthage/Dixville/Mexico area, "where they have paintball supply stores, well-drilling stores, and deer-skin glove stores, but not one supermarket?" Indeed, in the span of road that we traveled before stumbling upon a Wal-Mart Supercenter, we passed a half-dozen residence-based beauty salons with names like "Just Teasin'," "Curl up and Dye," and "Snippers." We passed an equal number of general stores carrying identical stocks of snack foods, comprehensive assortments of jerky, coolers stacked with 30 packs of Budweiser, and jars of pickled eggs on the counter. But to buy produce, we had to go to Wal-Mart.
We camped at Mt. Blue State Park, which had a campground of 100-plus sites alongside large, clearwater Lake Webb. Some of the campers were like us, with spartan set-ups of a tent and a few accessories to faciliate cooking, lighting, and a semblance of comfort. But most campers had RVs, and all the trappings of the RV-lifestyle. Table-clothes. Gas Grills. Hammocks. Generators. Thick men watching portable televisions. Thick women fetching beer and food from a cluster of coolers.
The campsite next to us featured an RV brand called Chateau, and it was inhabited by a large extended family who were perpetually cooking some form of pork. They got in a terrific argument over the meaning of business days, as in this BB gun will be shipped within 3-5 business days. "This company ships by calendar days, not business days," a teenager kept insisting, to the infuriation of his drunk father. I sneaked peeks at the Chateau, imagining how the name was coined in a fit of White Trash cheekiness: "This here's my Chateau."
The campground outhouses were quaint until my nose revolted by physically attempting to pucker itself shut. Baring my ass to the swarm of fat flies circling around the seat didn't thrill me either. "Indoor plumbing wasn't a fad," I sneered to Mr. Pinault as we washed our hands with Volvic bottled water like total yuppies. Later, as I watched a roving band of teenagers on bicycles take turns pedaling full speed into a volleyball net, it occurred to me that Maine is what you would get if you bred Wyoming with Canada: A hokey, rugged, charming simpleton.
**** Maine In Pictures
Photographs today, words tomorrow. I'm exhausted.
Me on top of Tumbledown Mountain, Weld, Maine (by Mr. Pinault)
Mr. Pinault on Tumbledown Mountain overlooking Lake Webb, Weld, Maine
Alpine Lake on Tumbledown Mountain, Weld, Maine (by Mr. Pinault)
Snowy Egret near Saco Bay, Maine (by Mr. Pinault)
Blueberry Pie in Mexico, Maine
