Apparently, unbeknownest to me, there is a violent battle pitching apace concerning the serial comman in this country. I, for one, and for no real reason, am a serial comma guy. I'm real America. Let's just turn this debate over to Vampire Weekend - per Andrew Sullivan (you can follow a good bit of the debate at his site).
A discussion at work today devolved into whether or not Patrick Swayze was an A-list star. First all, and before we get too far down the hole, an important disclosure: I’m a big Swayze fan. My position on the A-list nomenclature is that someone would have to be on the shortlist of about 15 actors or actresses who are constantly banking big-time money for big-time movies over at least a five- or ten-year period. Swayze is a difficult bill of goods because just about everyone will bring up Ghost and Dirty Dancing, huge hits but both really surprises in the money department. By being successful in both movies I always felt that Swayze punched well above his class. I consider him the very peak of the B-list movie celebrity who endeared a lot of movie goers with those two rolls and for just a moment stood at the door of the A-list room He might even be considered the B-list king. Then again, at the very end of the discussion we suddenly remembered Point Break and for at least a moment reconsidered his place in the pecking order: alas, it didn’t change. Along with his successes you have to really consider what comes to mind when you really dig deep and think of Swayze’s career: Roadhouse, Outsiders, Red Dawn. And with those great movies, the case is closed.
I was going to serenade you with the events surrounding what is now know as the “Landlord & Dishwasher Service Call” episode but I don’t have the heart. I think you can probably figure out whether or not it was a result in the end.
My former F/A-18 pilot and co-worker was just stumped by the plane-on-a-conveyor belt-taking-off puzzle.
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Over the last few months I’ve been trying to chase down some logic books – logician books, the science, not logic puzzles. Of course, I don’t mind a good logic puzzle. My luck had been middling with a few smaller paperbacks that I enjoyed but the mother lode escaped me; my Moby Dick, if you will. The problem is that I believe the world to be littered with vast textbooks on the subject that are undoubtedly dry and miserable (don’t even start on your thought that all logic is already dry and miserable). What I wanted was a guide to walk me through the process all the while being exciting and readable. This logic problem folds in nicely with my previous post on history in that we aren’t actually taught these things in school…either back in the 70s and 80s, or now. I went to some high quality public schools and aside from about two weeks of proofs and theorems in Geometry – and I hated that block of instruction – none of the real theory is offered through primary or secondary school. They also never really explain that “begs the question” is a logical fallacy and not something spouted by talking heads to mean a completely different idea. Well, I’ve found my white whale and it’s a two volume primer written by Paul Teller. Teller, who I believe teaches (or taught) at UC-Davis, has converted his course material to books that were originally published by Pearson Education. At some point they ceased printing and returned all rights to Mr. Teller and he’s been awesome enough to allow us to access it for free. I’ve already printed the first volume and am slowly working my way, two steps forward-one step back, through the meat of it all. I’m sure L. can’t wait until a few years hence when I gracefully bequest hot her a copy of A Modern Logic Primer. If you’d like to add it to your wish list then you might just find a copy under the tree at Christmas; I can already see that smile on your face.
I’ve drafted up a short Omaha primer for WonderTwin 2’s impending jaunt to my homeland. Bearing in mind that the city has ‘changed’ and grown since my youth – and my three-year tour in the early, mid -90s, the fact of the matter is the Omaha never really changes. There will still be drivers heading east on I-80 who can’t figure out which lane will take them downtown and which will shoot them off to Council Bluffs (they only changed the layout about 20 years ago). You’ll still be able to find a steakhouse that’ll serve you a hunk of meat with a side of manicotti. And the basketball hoop in my old driveway is still there – it may survive any disaster ever laid upon the world. If you look real close, and squint just so, you can see the ghost of my youth working on my turnaround jump shots and free throws on a cool summer’s eve in 1978.
I’ll let you go.
A bit more on the graphing calculator before I go.
I suddenly drew upon a revelatory process. Stick with me.
Bassinet >>>> Baby >>>> Garage sale / eBay / Craigslist
TI-83 >>>> ___________ >>>> ___________
See if you can fill in the blanks.
The more I thought about it the more I realized that a poor college graduate with a TI-83 in the boxes he's moving from his frat house might just want to get some cash. How would they do that? What could they sell?
Trust me when I say that you can type TI-83 into Craiglist anywhere in America and not be disappointed. I'm pretty sure that nothing has changed in the graphing world in the last ten years.
The Eleven took yesterday off (and today…this didn’t work out) so that her can’s position could go through a pocket revision. I’ll put that into better terms: They were going to open up her shoulder area yesterday morning and reposition the ICD. This merry journey began on Tuesday at her first follow-up when she told them that it felt like that it might be slipping position a bit. She wanted to know if it might keep moving and cause troubles for both her and the device. This discussion got translated, a bit erroneously into “let’s pop you open on Thursday morning and fix that thing.” No one was looking forward to another trip into the twilight, re-positioning of the device, and a fresh start on her physical recovery. This may be the only time where ‘fresh start’ doesn’t indicate a good thing.
We checked into the hospital in the morning, got the paperwork in order, and were called back to the surgery prep area. The multiple questions, from multiple questioners, were answered. We spoke with the pre-op nurse, another nurse (the op nurse?), the Anesthesiologist, and had the IV started. Ready to go. Then the doctor comes in and the discussion starts to ramble through confusion: Is the move aesthetic? Is the device okay where it is? Is it bothering her? Marker is put on both her shoulders (one saying “no” on the good shoulder) to indicate where to move the thing. A bit more of a discussion and then the doctor leaves. (Pause.) New doctor enters. Come to find out he’s a more senior member of the practice and the head of cardiology at the hospital. He’s clearly been called over because there’s confusion on whether or not to proceed. He’s quite good; comforting and focused. He pretty quickly sorts out the concerns and isn’t much interested in proceeding. I think the term was, exactly, “I see no medical reason to do this.” Right. He heads out to gather up one more opinion. (At this break in the action, the OR nurse comes by and says, “Okay, are we ready to go?” To which we both sort of reply, “I think we’re holding off for a second.”) CardioHeadMan returns with practice founder who jiggles can (ICD, not his) and declares tomfoolery. Nurse comes back, removes IV, and we exit stage right. (Curtain.)
No new recovery period needed, no reentry required, recovery time will be a few months for the original, and no worries about infection nor whatnot. Happiness all around.
L. has taken to asking X. for temporary authority to direct G. in various ‘activities’. Authority has been denied.
L. told me last night that she needs a graphing calculator for Algebra. “Sure,” I say, “they probably run $30 or $40 so we’ll just grab one at the store.” Funny that. Apparently most types of calculators have come down to a cost of about nothing; not graphers. $130. Yikes. I think I’ll use it when she’s done so I at least get my money’s worth. I don’t think Euclid had a graphing calculator. I think he did his work in stone.
Am I confusing historical epochs?
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If you’ve been around me on long drives or at holiday gatherings then you’ve heard at least part of this theory. It comes out when I have people trapped and they can’t comfortably escape from either a moving car or a room full of others, just as crazy, folks. For some reason it came up today while L. and I were driving to the Metro and may have followed on from some talk of Euclid and geometry and doing proofs in stone. What? They had paper in the days of Euclid? That will be much funnier in a bit.
I have this crazy position that American History, as taught in both our high schools and colleges (remember the classes American History to 1865 and American History after 1865 as core courses?), essentially goes like this:
Columbus
Pilgrams
Eli Whitney
The Civil War
Watergate
That’s it. Nothing more. If you try to draw a rudimentary timeline of what happened and how things tie together, based on what we actually teach, you’d find that a lot of Americans would nearly conflate Columbus as tour guide for the Mayflower. Seriously. If he wasn’t Julie the Cruise Director on the same voyage as the Pilgrims than it all happened within a few years of each other. How about if we look at it this way: Columbus = 1492, the Mayflower = 1620. Alright, students, give me a quick run down of what happened, here or worldwide, in that 128-year gapping hole of American learning. I’ll wait.
1513 – Ponce de Leon lands on the coast of Florida
1565 – St. Augustine Florida becomes the first European colony in North America
1607 – Jamestown, first English settlement in America, is established
(Whoa! Where are the Pilgrams?)
1619 – First representative assembly meets in Jamestown. First African slaves arrive.
1620 – Mayflower arrives
Worldwide?
1492 – The Moors conquered in Spain by Ferdinand’s troops
1497 – Vasco da Gama sails around Africa
1503 – Da Vinci paints the Mona Lisa
1509 – Michelangelo paints Sistine Chapel. Henry VIII ascends to English throne
1513 – Balboa sails the Pacific. Machiavelli writes The Prince
1519 – The Reformation starts in Switzerland. Mexico is conquered by Spain. Magellan sets out
1520 – Luther excommunicated
1527 – Rome attacked by troops of the Holy Roman Empire. End of the Italian Renaiassance
1535 – Reformation begins in England. Henry VIII makes himself head of Church of England after being excommunicated by the Pope
…and on and on.
Context.
The problem we have in history is too many dates and mindless trivia. I don’t care if you can give me the year the Mona Lisa was painted but you should have a ballpark figure based on other events. I don’t care if you know the exact dates of the American Civil War but you should say something like the mid-19th century. What we should also be able to do is recognize what’s happening around the world that affects, or affected, what happened here. I think that Henry VIII thing might be important.
And yes, I used Wikipedia.com….sue me. But, I’m a product of the system, I love history, I’ve read quite a bit (not so much American), and it’s all quite shallow even to me. When you don’t have any stuffing to prop open a space it simply collapses upon itself.
In the end, you wonder why Eli Whitney didn’t just bring a cotton gin over on the Mayflower with Columbus.
Dismissed.
Okay, back in the saddle.
The house has settled down and we’re simply back with the ‘normal’ load: the Eleven, one boy and one girl. And two cats. X is back to near normal aside from the slower recovery required for her left shoulder. That’ll probably be another couple of weeks before she can lift, rotate, and carry on as normal. I’m very pleased to have my normal chick back. Thanks to everyone out there for driving around, helping out, and sending wishes and cards. We’re lucky the knucklehead is still with us after two years of that dodgy ticker.
The four adults headed into D.C. on Friday night to see a live performance of Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K for the hepcats) though they work under the title of Cinematic Titanic these days – copyright issues, I guess. The seats at Lisner aren’t the best for long sitting (a little over two hours) but the show was quite good; almost like sitting on a big couch back in 1994. I sort of considered us dorks for being so excited to see the crew live…I was wrong. I think we’re normal. Any MST3K get together is going to have a large pods ‘Trekkie’-like idolatry about the wandering about the place. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
For those who’ve been to the Hilltop you already have a visual for the next bit, for those that haven’t, here’s some background. The ‘Top is a fully wood-floored, single-level home. There’s a rug in our room, one rug in G’s, and one in the den (or “library” as east coast elitists might call it.) Other than those, the place is free-and-clear of material matter on the floors. We’ve had two vacuums (one tank that died and now an upright that does floors) since moving here about 2 ½ years ago but neither has tripped my trigger. How to most efficiently clean wood floors? I know that the fans are screaming ‘Swiffer’ at their monitors and I’d nearly give credit for that idea; but, I need you to think bigger, think better. Think one of those industrial janitorial shaggy brooms that the crazy janitor used to clean your high school classrooms and hallways. That’s right, I’m fully loaded now and the total coat was $23 at a commercial cleaning place (Daycon) right next to G.’s gong fu hut. I was waiting to pick him up a few Saturday’s ago and was eyeing the Daycon shop, as usual, wanting to head in for some commercial products; I love that sort of stuff. As I was envying (?) the place and the men that use it, I thoughtof my house, I thought of my cleaning, I thought of my sweeping. It hit me like a…well, like a sweeping thing. I wandered in and started a chat with the manager – you know, explaining my needs in the most manly way possible – and walked out with the long-handled pusher, the rack, and a blue-sky colored (washable) cover. Sweet. After a few weeks of simply sliding most things in the house to one side of the room, sweeping, sliding, and sweeping, I can report that this is the best device, ever. Don’t tell me you don’t remember trying out Janitor Watson’s shaggy push moppy/broomy thing back when you were in school. And, just as you remember it, that thing is just as maneuverable, gets all the edges, and doesn’t leave anything behind. I can’t decide if the inventor is my hero or if I’m my hero. It’s a fine line.
If you have a retractable cable keychain with about 100 keys on it that you can send me I promise I’ll wear it while working the sweeper.
Well, well. All the girls have been re-herded to the house. L. arrived on Tuesday evening and is safely ensconced back in her room and at the New School.
X. also came home from the hospital on Tuesday afternoon – about 24 hours after her surgery. Truckloads of stuff rolled through my head while she was in the hospital: love, fear, anger. When they called me into the recovery area, after they were done cutting and tugging at her, I cried to finally see her again. She was frail, groggy, and googly-eyed as she came out of her twilight. She recognized me right away and asked me if they were done. Had it happened? I told her it was over and she was safe once again. She closed her eyes and slept for ten more minutes. Too many things to process when thinking about it all. For that, it’s said much better by her sister here and here.
She’s home. She’s still very sore but she’s recovering. Another few weeks and she’ll be (bionically) as good as new.
Days are back.
