Neither rain nor sleet nor snow nor retirement...

The other day, I received, among the usual junk in my mailbox, a photocopied, handwritten note from my mailman to the effect that he was throwing in the towel after 46 years with the post office.

Only recently, maybe a few weeks ago, I was standing by my mailbox when he pulled up, so he handed me my mail. I don't remember another instance of having met him or any other mailman (if indeed there has been another mailman in the 33 years of my residence here)and I would not recognize him again from this brief encounter and would not have recognized him then were it not for the fact that he was delivering my mail and driving the mail truck. Even then, I could not be sure it was the same fellow. I don't think he is a Cal Ripkin-like figure who has faithfully delivered the mail every mail day for the past 46 years and there may have been many other mailmen in my life, unbeknownst to me.

Right now, I am mulling over my response to his messsage and have sort of decided to buy a card for someone embarked on retirement and maybe leave him a bottle of wine as a token of my appreciation for his unobtrusive devotion to increasing the amount of paper garbage generated by my household, which, by the way, has led to my familiarity with the recycling team with whom I am only slightly better acquainted.

The whole scene with my mailman here in the country is in stark contrast to my experience decades ago in Manhattan. I lived in a six story apartment building with about 48 apartments and there, I was very well acquainted with my mailman. Probably because he would spend about half an hour a day in our building, sorting and placing mail in the individual mailboxes; and while a whole coterie of building residents waited for him to finish, we became his friends.

I remember the scene vividly. A little after 8:30 in the morning, a small crowd would gather in the area of the lobby which contained the mailboxes. They were located in an ill lit area behind the stairway and contained several rows of individual mailboxes with hinged doors about 4 inches wide and maybe 8 inches high. each mailbox had a unique key and was assigned to a particular apartment. Above these boxes was another single hinged door which ran along the top of the mailboxes and could be opened with a master key, which revealed, when opened, the open tops of the individual mailboxes. The mail was inserted into the individual boxes and the large door was locked by the mailman and all was secure.

The mailman, carrying a sack of mail and later using a trolley to carry it, would show up, get comfortable, fill his pipe with tobacco and get it going with a few aromatic puffs. He would then open the master door and reach in to the leftmost mailbox and pull out an electric light bulb which he screwed in to the socket above the boxes, enabling him to do his job. Then the fun would begin . Correspondents were supposed to write the apartment number as part of the address but this was not always done. He would pull a stack of letters out of his bag and taking each individual one, look at it, tap the bottom edge of the envelope against the edge of the mailboxes, either to see the address clearly if it was in a loose window envelope or maybe just as a habit, sort of like someone saying "eh" when contemplating his next words. He did need time to process where to put the mail, especially when the address did not show an apartment number. Sometimes he would hand mail to one of the waiting crowd whom he recognized. He sometimes had to struggle to get a large or bulky envelope into the narrow sheath of the mailbox (not a patch on the struggle by the subscriber to get it out)and sometimes he was baffled as to where to put the mail. He once complained, after the neighborhood had become more hispanic, "There are five Gonzales' here and they say to me 'watch!'." When I came home in the evenings there were always letters laying around near the mailboxes which apparently had been misdirected.

When he finished delivering the mail, he would unscrew the light bulb, put it in its place, slam the large door with the key in the lock which was attached to a long thong connected to his belt. We would say good bye, everyone would scramble to get the mail out of their box, and the crowd would disperse with their bills and dunning notices, until the next day.

Ah, how I love the country.

Out of the Fog

I was driving this morning on the Tappan Zee bridge in a very thick fog. As I toodled along, I thought that the drive was a good metaphor for life. I was on the long, low part, completely covered by the fog so that I couldn't see the water at all, and I couldn't see that far ahead either. So here I am, just going along with just the people around me, with no ability to see the future. Just like in life, we go on surrounded by the people around us, all heading into the future on faith. We assume that there is a road ahead of us, and we drive towards it expecting a good outcome.

Then the sun came out, and I just kept going.

Missing in Action

I know that I have not been posting lately. This is largely due to me being blocked at work from access to my blogger account, and no (real) internet at home. I am working to remedy the situation at work, but today I have the trusty laptop and access to the internet through the Court systems wifi in the courthouse. (Your tax dollars at work!). Well, they are about to call the calendar, so I have to get off now.

Until I get access or appear in Court again.

An Allegory

Many decades ago, I was invited to my brother's new suburban home for a Sunday barbecue. When my sister-in-law needed to purchase some hamburger buns or rye bread - I forget which - I volunteered to drive to the bakery and make the purchase. I was unfamiliar with the area at the time and, while willing to go into town, I didn't know where to go.

The bakery was designated by the locals as "Mrs. Frank's". To ease my way - this was before GPS - my 15 year old nephew was designated to ride shotgun and tell me exactly where to drive. He assured me he knew exactly what we were looking for. We got into my car and sped away in the direction of the center of town. As we neared the center, I asked him where to turn and he told me to just keep on going. Following his direction, I continued on past the main intersection in town heading towards the east end. I was certain we had missed the place and kept asking him if he was sure he knew where to go and he told me, "of course I do, I go this way every day," which, while slightly encouraging, didn't mean that he knew where I wanted to go. We continued in this vein for another mile or so and I was sure he had no idea. Suddenly, we approached a run down building that at one time was a private house and now boasted a sign "FRANK'S SUPERETTE."

My nephew pointed it out and told me that this was the place. Okay, I didn't know what I was to expect and he seemed so sure that I skeptically pulled to the curb, again asking him, as we got out of the car, if he was sure that this was the place. He again replied in the affirmative. I went in to find a small grocery store with a deli counter at one end. The price list showed an array of products, including pork chops and ham sandwiches among more innocuous fare. Now I knew I was in the wrong place and shamefacedly, we left the premises and returned home sans baked goods. (We didn't have cell phones then, either.)

I subsequently moved to the same area and in the ensuing years, whenever we passed Frank's Superette, we recalled the incident which had become a family joke. Over the years, Frank's closed and the building was abandoned and thereafter was razed. The property stood empty and unused for many years, the grass growing tall and finally being overcome by weeds.

This morning I chanced to pass by and to my surprise a brand new building in the style of Rite-Aid or CVS with a paved parking lot, stood on the site.

Sic transit gloria mundi.

Rounds on the House

I have a family member who likes a particular drink. Let's call her generiic family member, of GFM for short.

The drink in question shall be called Fun in the Sand, or FIS for the purposes of this post.

Now that that technical stuff is out of the way, let us proceed.

I had some pineapple juice left over from a recipe that Lovey made, so I decided to see what drink I could mak using it, since most people don't open a fridge and exclaim " WOW! pineapple juice! I am SOOO excited".

Well, I had recently taken out some bartender books, so I perused them with the help of Bug to see if there were any with pinapple juice in them. While I was doing this, I decided to try the FIS drink with it, as it calls for orange juice usually. As I sat there sipping the drink, having not found any that contain pineapplle juice that were actually do-able with my supplies at hand (What is Creme De Noyoux anyhow?) , I decided to check out the FIS recipies.

Image my surpirse when one of the books had the recipe as orange OR pineapple juice!

So this weekend we had GFM and I made the drink with pineapple juice. She deemed it passable good. I was quite pleased.

Now to figure out what to do with the leftover gravy.

I'm Sorry

You know you are having a positively awful day when you send the following text to someone.

"I'm sorry for snapping at you, it was uncalled for."

It's even worse when that person happens to be your boss.

And it really shows how bad the day is when you have to then cut and paste the message and send it to ANOTHER friend.

Backspace Delete

You learn something new every day. I recently picked up an Apple laptop which does not have a backspace button. I mentioned this to a Mac user that I know, who told me that you just get used to it, I also noticed that my Blackberry didn't have a backspace, only a delete button, and I managed to get used to that, so I guess I would just have to get used to it on the laptop as well, even though it can be a bit cumbersome.

However, quite by accident, I discovered on my Blackberry, while editing some numbers and using the alt button and delete, it becomes a backspace.

Bolstered and encouraged by this new information, I figured there HAS to be a way to get to the backspace function on a really powerful, really new laptop. So instead of bothering to research the issue, or actually reading a manual, I happened to have been in the Apple store, so I decided to ask someone, assuming they would know. Sure enough, he told me the function key and delete makes it a backspace ( which is actually kind of intuitive).

So now I am happier in my knowledge than I had been in my ignorance.

Family

Yesterday was a really good day. I spent time with my parents and all of my siblings.

'nuff said.

Pizza Party?

The other night I went out to eat with Lovey for her birthday ( somewhat belated, for all of you who might be getting nervous). We decided to go dairy, as that is her usual preference. Now I am a somewhat predictable guy with some real prejudices when it comes to certain dairy foods, facts that are well known to the members of my family. However, I decided to live dangerously and ordered the salmon.

When we got home, I was on the phone with Related, who, when I informed her that i had gone to AL Di La asked me if I had ordered the personal pizza, my usual favorite. I informed her that I had indeed ordered salmon.

Then I spoke to Stretch. I asked him to guess what I had ordered, and the answer was ….. a personal pizza.

Finally, I was talking to Soupeater, and he asked me how the dinner was, followed by " You certainly didn't order fish"

I give up.

Next time I think I will stick with the pizza

More Please

I see that our posting volume has decreased significantly over the past years ( we started the blog at the end of 2008, and pro-rated would have written 360 posts that year). 2009 was 106, 2010 was 88 and we are sitting at 68 now.

It's not like we have less to say ( just ask the family), its just that we have been busy, I guess.

However, that is not fair to all of you who faithfully follow us, hoping for a tidbit to enliven up your day.

So therefore I shall endeavor to write more in the month remaining, similar to the experiment back in August, where we managed to get out 17 posts. Hopefully we can to around 20 for December, to at least stay current with last year's output.

Then we will have something to shoot for in January, 360 posts.

Right.

Green Friday V

Once again i had the opportunity to indulge one of my favorite pastimes,shopping on Black Friday. this year's appliance that I decided to use for my quest was a deep fryer, to aid in my newest food obsession, making Kibbeh. Last year, after spending all morning looking for a waffle maker ( and you all know how THAT turned out). So as I was finally successful at Kohls, and as they were opening up at 12, I decided to go there first.

So off we went at 11:45 to wait for the midnight opening. Once again me and Bug, as well as a friend of his. We waited on line for the fifteen minutes, and then stormed the doors as they opened. I got the deep fryer,which seemed to take all the wind out of my sails. However, I went home to bed, with dreams of other fantastic deals dancing in my head.

The next morning it was off to Walmart ( of course0) for many items I don't really need, but at least the store was relatively empty, as it usually is at that time. Then it was off to the mall, and all the usual spots, Staples ( for the annual Bluetooth) , Brookstone, Bed Bath and Beyond, Radio Shack and the Apple store, where the computer i was planning to get anyhow (and the one I am writing this on) was on sale for $100 off.

After that we went to Sears to pick up my annual radar detector, and then to Home Depot to see if they had any more flashlights, since I only have about 30.

As I walked int he store, I picked up the flyer, but nothing really caught my eye. Then I saw, by the tractors, one grill. I told the boys with me, let's go look at that grill.

I had been looking for a new Weber grill all season, but then never seem to go on sale. I wanted to upgrade from my old ( about 17 years) one, which goes for $400, and the price for the next level is $500 ( but the DO last a long time). I saw that it was indeed a Weber, and it was the second level up, as well as being stainless, and having a side burner as well ( Also, all Home Depot Webers come with cast iron grates, a $30 upgrade over the regular porcelain coated ones). It was indeed on sale, reduced from $630 to $400. As i had wanted one, had lots of people to help me carry it, and was in buying mode, I picked it up and danced home (figuratively) with it.

As that was the big score of the day, and it was getting late, I curtailed the rest of the shopping to picking something up in Costco and proceeding home.

So I can catalogue everything for Lovey to return.

Public Transportation

I was in the City on Friday, down on Water Street, and I needed to go to 1st Avenue in the 20s to catch a ride home. So I decided to take a bus that would go up the east side, since the trains involve a lot of cross town action.

As I approached the bus stop, I saw ahead of me a bus in the travel lane parallel to the bus stop. ( It didn't look as if the bus had stopped there). However, this did not really compute in my brain until later. I figured I would catch the next bus. So I was waiting by the stop when a bus again pulls up to the light in the travel lane. I call out to the driver and ask why he isn't stopping and opening the doors, he shouts back ( without opening the door) that he is an express bus. So I ask him where the stop is for the express bus, and he indicates that it is further up. Mind you, this is all shouted through a closed door and window, without a doubt heard by all the people in the bus enjoying this drama.

So as the light turns green and the bus pulls away from the light, I take off, all short and fat of me, to run as many blocks as it might take to catch this bus, since the idea of an express appeals to me, as my ride would be ready to leave within a half hour. So I run the first block, and I see that the bus pulls in to the following block. I try valiantly to increase my speed, but it is a losing proposition ( see: short and fat above). However, the bus is still there when I stagger up to it, so I hop in the back, as I have no more strength to make it to the front door, and continue my stagger to the front to pay.

I then realize, to my great consternation, that this is one of the new express buses where you pay outside, similar to a subway. The idea is great, in that people just get on and off, and there is no delay for the passengers to pay the driver. However, this does not work so well for me, as I have just jumped on the bus.

So I ask the driver, oh, I have to pay outside on this one, and I jump off the bus, and look stupidly at the three machines there, in my extreme haste to (1) not have the driver leave me there, and (2) not unduly hold up the bus for all the passengers already on the bus who actually know how to use the new system.

However, as I am both out of breath and discombobulated, I just look at the machine. The driver then shouts to me to come back, I run back to the door, and he tells me push the button on the blue. That is all I hear as I charge back to the machines, since the third one is kind of blue. However, that is (probably) for credit card transactions as is it a different machine than the other two.

So now the driver has just about had it, and he shouts once again at me to come back. I zip back, and he tells me "Go to the first machine, push the button in the middle of the BLUE panel, put your metrocard in on the RIGHT, and take your receipt on the LEFT, don't worry, I'll wait for you." (He really was a nice and patient transit employee.) So reassured and properly directed, I ran again to the machine, pushed the button, slammed my card in the slot on the right, hopped a bit waiting for the receipt ( Three seconds, maybe?) and grabbed my card and the receipt, and dashed back on to the bus.


To the thunderous applause of all the passengers.


Who I then had to walk through, to get a seat in the back, nodding and bowing, thanking them and apologizing.


When I finally sat down, some kind soul, trying to be nice, told me not to worry, but managed to make it even worse by telling me that he watched and listened to the whole event for two blocks ( I assume that included the original shouting through the door) and saw me running, and really didn't think I would make it.


Next time, I think I'll drive.

8000

While we have been away celebrating the holidays and not posting, we went over the 8,000 hits mark. Maybe the way to generate hits is to actually not post anything, and just have everyone come and look. I have researched the timing from 7,000 to 8,000 to see if this theory holds up. Actually, the numbers are interesting in how they trend.

First of all, keep in mind that in August we attempted to post almost every day to see if it could be done, and if it would create more traffic. With that in mind, here are the numbers.

It took 143 days to go from 6,000 hits to 7,000. During that time , we posted 39 times, an average of one every 3.6 days.

It then took 231 days to get to 8,146 (since I haven't checked the site in a while, apparently, I am not sure when we got to 8,000). During this period we posted 48 times, including the August experiment. That comes out to one post every 4.8 days. ( I feel like MBB with all my percentages)

So the theory of posting less often would seem to bear this out. However, as we post in bursts, it isn't really fair to use this analysis, so I propose a different one.

In the 6,000 to 7,000 time period, there were ten (10) posts on waffles, that comes out to 14.3 days per waffle post. In the 7,000 to 8,000 period, I think there were two waffle posts, that comes out to 115.5 days per waffle post. So the more waffle posts, the faster we get to the next level.

I see the trend folks, BRING ON THE WAFFLES!

GILAD, WE'RE HAPPY YOU'RE SAFE, BUT........

There are celebrations among two diverse groups in the middle east today. The one in Gaza and West Bank is understandable. The arabs, enemies of Israel, are delirious over their ability to have their murderers, thieves, terrorists - criminals all - released from Israeli jails to join the continued fight against Israel. People who should have been executed will now be returned to their families scot free. Truly cause for celebration.

The celebration on the other side of the green line is mystifying to me. Yes, if I were a close relative or friend of Gilad Shalit I would be unrelievedly joyous to have my son, brother or other loved one returned from the hell of the past five years. But in the big picture, our beloved nation is bleeding and, if anything, this deal with Hamas has opened a new vein.

The lopsided numbers don't make sense. We know from experience that the arabs will see this as a sign of softness in diplomacy, a sign that we will pay any price to ransom any one of our citizens. What does Netanyahu think will become of the criminals he releases? Does he expect these formerly unemployed troublemakers to suddenly take their place in palestinian society as doctors, teachers, lawyers and community officials? We know they will continue their fight against the nation that has now amnestied them, laughing all the way to the rocket launch site. We know that those who will be exiled to other democratic nations will use their new-found freedom to concoct further mayhem in the relative anonymity afforded them by the liberal governments in whose jurisdiction they will settle. And make no mistake, they always return home, at the head of a violent following to run a country inimical to the welfare and peace of mainstream established nations.

The arabs are now convinced that all it takes to get 1000 of their criminals released from jail is to kidnap a boy barely out of his childhood and then negotiate for as long as it takes.

What Israel desperately needs is a death penalty and a revamping of the judicial mindset that has corrupted the morality of the country and its religious base.

Huh?

Sometimes, the audacity of politicians exceeds even the unbelievably low standards that I expect from them.

I heard our wimpy leader stating that he would no longer defend the Marriage Sanctity law because he believes it is unconstitutional and that it should be repealed like Don't Ask, Don't Tell. So we have a president who had publicly stated that he is no longer going to follow the law of the land because he doesn't feel like it. Forget the problems with this line of reasoning an statement for a moment ( that is for a different time and post).

What really got to me is that the announcer then went on to say that the president continued to say that all the republican candidates MUST support the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell because IT IS THE LAW OF THE LAND!!!!

I guess the best liar with the most Chutzpa really should be the president.

Oh Give Me A Home...

Last week found me looking for a company in Crawfordsville, IN. Or rather, outside of Crawfordsville, IN. Near county road 400 south which translates into a road running east west four miles south of the center of town. The street address was 4414 east which means that it was something more than four miles east of the center of town. The town isn't very big although not small for that part of the country.

I found myself at the intersection of County road 400S and Ladoga road where 400 dead ended. I knew that it must continue somewhere further east but wasn't sure where, so being at a stop sign, I stopped and took up my trusty GPS for a look.

One of the difficulties of doing any kind of manual route planning using a GPS instead of a paper map is that in order to see the whole picture, you need to zoom out to a large scale but then you can't see enough detail to be useful. Then too, each time you zoom in, the place you are looking for appears at a different location on the screen because the scale changes and becomes difficult to find.

Anyway, fooling around with the GPS for a while, I determined how I wanted to go. It struck me that I had spent about 10 minutes at the intersection and in all that time, no one beeped me from behind. In fact, I realized to my amazement that I hadn't seen a single car on either road in either direction.

Here I was, alone, surrounded by a million corn plants and as many soybean bushes their leaves firing in the mid-morning stillness. It isn't empty, it isn't quiet; you can hear the birds calling, the insects buzzing and the plants rustling in an occasional gust of air. It's the solitude, the lack of any other human being in an area encompassing the size of Manhattan.

Truly awesome!

Nobody and Me

This seems to be the season to bash the good Doctor.

I had gone to tovel some things yesterday morning. This morning, Boo asked me why I only did three items when there is a whole box of stuff to be done. I told her that I had only been given the three things, but it would have been a great time to give me more, since the place was empty, or as I put it, " it was empty, just me and my thoughts". Which prompted Lovey to state

"Wow, it was REALLY empty".

Oscar and Me

I was reading comments over at Iceberg Carwash and a look of amusement must have crossed my face.

One of my colleagues passed my office and came to an abrupt stop.

With a look of true concern, he asked me



You're smiling, is everything ok?

Short Takes

A few short observations.

I just heard that US test scores in Math and English Reading have again dipped to the lowest levels ever. We are raising a nation of morons and idiots and no one is doing anything about it.

The drop in payroll taxes instituted in 2008 to ease the growing economic crisis is scheduled to be continued if the jobs bill passes. It's great for the workers, but that is your future Social Security money which isn't being paid into the system, so if one day, you don't collect your Social Security, blame it on this. The truth is that there is no free lunch.

A European official came up with the draconian idea (that is how it is being styled) of separating commercial banking from investment banking. It's no different from Glass-Steagall which turned out was one of the best ideas for keeping the banks from risking your money. To now consider this revolutionary (it was enacted in 1935 and repealed in 1997) is ridiculous.

MICHIANA

40 years is a long time and a lot changes from then till now. A recent visit to the South Bend area illustrates the point.

What hasn't changed (at least not to my uncritical eye) is the lovely St. Joseph river which wends its way through northern Indiana and up into Michigan. In some places along the shoreline of this swift flowing river, the houses which line it as well as the docks and boathouse are almost invisible, screened by heavy forestation but in other places, one sees the typical jumble of boats, docks and house right up against the treeless shore. Driving along either shore, one glimpses short peeks of the dark water wending its way to Lake Michigan as if the water is playing hide-and-seek with the observer. For me, the river dominates the whole of western Michiana.

Cheek by jowl with the natural scenery of the river is the manmade industrial landscape of South Bend. The brick and cement multi level buildings with their mullioned windows, which lined the whole southwestern corner of the city, have slowly given way, over the years, first to other industrial uses but lately to demolition.

The Studebaker automobile company built a huge manufacturing complex here in the early part of the 20th century. A landmark of the period was a building encompassing half a million square feet which stretched along 1500 feet of Sample street, built as Studebaker's engine plant. When the company closed in the 60's the building was taken over by the South Bend Lathe company, the largest lathe manufacturer in the world. They made the best lathes. The company eventually fell on hard times and the building was abandoned. When I first visited South Bend, I was impressed by the size and length of the building and on subsequent visits, it never failed to impress me. When I visited this week the building was no longer there. In its place was partly a cultivated field and partly an excavated demolition site. If the builders could see the site now, reclaimed into the open fields they originally were, what would they think?.

A metaphor for the history of American industry.