Miz Susan and I make a thing out of Sunday mornings. Drink some coffee, eat a little breakfast, choke down our handfuls of prescription and over-the-counter drugs, check out the Sunday paper. And sometimes the Thursday, Friday and Saturday papers if the pace of the week has gotten a little too frenzied for us.
There's not much joy for me in the Sunday paper between late-October and early-March. I've fallen away from following football and hockey and never was much for basketball in the first place so the sports section doesn't hold much allure. Think about it, a quick check of high school boys' swimming results (to remind me of just how bad I was, even 40 years ago) and three sentences on Joe Crede's free agent deal with the Rockies don't chew up more than three or four minutes. The Sunday obits page has gotten gigantic but that doesn't take long either. Once I've confirmed that I'm not featured among the recently departed, there isn't much left but to scan the news sections to confirm what terrible shape the world, country, state and neighborhood are in with an occasional rowser from Michelle Bachmann. After that, it gets down to arm-wrestling with Susan over the advertising sections.
We use the grocery ads to plan out our dinner menus for the week. I'm partial to the Cub ads but Susan, even if she won't always admit it but usually does, hates the place. She'll come up with almost any excuse as to why I shouldn't go there. Like, "Oh, it's OK hon. I was gonna stop at the coop, Trader Joe's, Kowalski's, Widmer's and Baker's Square after school tomorrow anyway." Right. She even thinks that Target qualifies as a full-fledged grocery store and yesterday somehow sweet-talked me into going there instead of Cub. I think that it was the turkey breast that Target was advertising at 79¢ a pound (half of Cub's price) that she used as Exhibit A. Made sense to me.
Our trip to Target last weekend was a disaster. I had this horrid grim feeling almost the whole time I was there. It was as if I knew that a bunch of the other shoppers were serial killers and that they were all feeling the itch again. Nobody actually threatened to kill either of us but I repeatedly got cut off and run into and forced to do long detours to bypass aisles that looked more like cart storage areas than retail spaces, all of this so many times that I started to get the creepy paranoid feeling. To top it off, somebody made off with our cart full of 45 minutes worth of middle-American consumerism and Miz Susan's favorite winter gloves which had probably originally been bought at Target. We were so thrown off by that disaster that we couldn't reconstruct what we needed (yeah, our list was in the stolen cart, too) and ended up forgetting half the stuff we'd come to buy.
Shrugging off that recent defeat, I headed for Target with my list in hand and my mouth watering at the thought of 79¢ a pound turkey breast in the crockpot. I'd also been given an auxiliary to-do list, most of which centered around service issues for the Chevy Tahoe at Holiday. Which was mostly a ploy to get the car washed. Who in their right mind washes a car when it's 8º outside? But, what the hell, there are certain standards we need to make a pretence at maintaining and I love being inside the car when it's getting washed. I was deprived of so many things as a child.
Target pretty much overwhelms me whenever I go with a long list of must-haves. I've been reduced to tears of frustration and shame while looking fruitlessly for square cotton pads for makeup removal. This time I got most of what I needed without having to double back over the entire store more than four or five times. It was the two-pack of re-usable lunch totes that nearly did me in this trip. I asked like five different redshirts where they were and I actually got what turned out to be helpful advice but it took me about four passes through the bargain section back by the seasonals before I found the damn things. And when I got them home, I got chewed out for not buying them in patterns rather than in basic black and purple. Sigh.
Oh yeah, the turkey breast. They hadn't gotten their shipment in, something about their distributor being out. Distributor, schmischtributor. They own the distributor, for God's sake. I was told that the shipment was on a truck due for arrival later that night. Check back tomorrow. Which I did today from work. Still no turkey breast at 79¢ a pound. Sigh again. Walgreen's didn't have the special Anniversary Edition of Uno back in stock either, another of the hopeless grails that I've been assigned by this sadistic woman I live with.
You can probably guess where this is headed. After Miz Susan told me in no uncertain terms not to, I stopped tonight at Cub out in Brooklyn Park for their turkey breast. It was more expensive than Target's alleged turkey breast but at least it was in stock. And I wasn't about to miss out on hot turkey sandwiches out of the crockpot on Wednesday night.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Sunday, January 9, 2011
season's greetings!!!
Another sure sign of the change of seasons besides the Linwood Monroe charity auction is the arrival of Christmas and other holiday greetings cards. We had a great collection this year and I enjoyed almost all of them. We're fortunate to live in a house that's hosted a number of homeowners over a relatively short timespan so we get not only the cards addressed to us but those intended for people several notches down the title opinion from us. Part of me wants to return the cards from people we don't know and tell them that their erstwhile friends have become even more erst. But Miz Susan won't let me and maybe that's for the best.
One of the departed who still gets cards here (as well as investment advice) is apparently alive and well to the point of having run for a Ramsey County office this past election season. A few of his lawn signs popped up in the front yards of some of the neighbors so he must have been an OK guy. I didn't vote for him. We tend to stick to straight party line voting and this guy didn't show up on my sample ballot. Our candidate actually won which seems like a rarity some years. That was enough to bind the wounds of not getting to live in the local version of the George-Washington-slept-here house.
A couple of years ago, we opened a card addressed to some long-gone tenant and discovered a Christmas letter which caught Miz Susan's fancy. It was a Christmas ABC letter and the damn thing ate at her for a couple of years before she finally gave up on trying to shame me into concocting one. She cranked one out during the uneventful hours of her jury duty stint. She did a considerably better than average job, better than I ever could have. She's a sucker for kids' illustrated ABC books so maybe there was some creative longing that finally found an outlet. Except for filling in the letter "F" which she'd forgotten (and what was that about?), I could only come up with a few minor tweaks and edits to make it production ready. We sent it out tucked in some 30 year old holiday cards that I'd probably bought home from the Hamline Bookstore in about 1988. No one's complained yet and we haven't had the postal inspectors at our door telling us to quit wasting the mail carriers' time with junk like that so I'm going to call it a success. If any of you missed out on this thing just let us know and we'll get one headed your way.
I don't usually feel sorry for our mail carrier. He sometimes gets the mail delivered to us before dark and he liked our cat Miles but other than that we're not all that crazy about him. We had a great carrier when we moved in but he didn't last the year before the geniuses downtown pulled him off his long-time route and turned our block over to a cast of characters which can only be described as a mixed bag. The nearest to regular guy hates to take advantage of the opportunity available to him for wholesome outdoor exercise and will tromp across our front and through Miz Susan's gardens shamelessly. About the only good thing to come from all the snow this winter is that it's piled so high next to our walk that he can't trailblaze his own shortcut and is forced to take the long way around to the next door neigbors.
About the most bizarre card we got this year was the one that showed up (after Santa's big day) from Linda and Laird Hanson of Hamline royalty fame. This card always sends Miz Susan into a seethe for a couple of hours and even I'm perplexed as to how I've stayed on that mailing list. I hate to think it, but maybe Linda doesn't realize that I still get the card or even remember who I am (or was). This year's version was particularly smarmy with L and L surrounded by a group of purported Hamline students who might have come straight from the Multicultural Modeling Agency. Mainly, I wonder why it was late in arriving. Probably the stress of the all-by-her-lonesome keeping Hamline propped up in the face of all the nay-sayers prevented her from getting to her cards as soon as she'd have liked. Hey, it's nice to still be counted among the inner circle. And it fills the void of not getting a card from the President out at North hennepin.
One of the departed who still gets cards here (as well as investment advice) is apparently alive and well to the point of having run for a Ramsey County office this past election season. A few of his lawn signs popped up in the front yards of some of the neighbors so he must have been an OK guy. I didn't vote for him. We tend to stick to straight party line voting and this guy didn't show up on my sample ballot. Our candidate actually won which seems like a rarity some years. That was enough to bind the wounds of not getting to live in the local version of the George-Washington-slept-here house.
A couple of years ago, we opened a card addressed to some long-gone tenant and discovered a Christmas letter which caught Miz Susan's fancy. It was a Christmas ABC letter and the damn thing ate at her for a couple of years before she finally gave up on trying to shame me into concocting one. She cranked one out during the uneventful hours of her jury duty stint. She did a considerably better than average job, better than I ever could have. She's a sucker for kids' illustrated ABC books so maybe there was some creative longing that finally found an outlet. Except for filling in the letter "F" which she'd forgotten (and what was that about?), I could only come up with a few minor tweaks and edits to make it production ready. We sent it out tucked in some 30 year old holiday cards that I'd probably bought home from the Hamline Bookstore in about 1988. No one's complained yet and we haven't had the postal inspectors at our door telling us to quit wasting the mail carriers' time with junk like that so I'm going to call it a success. If any of you missed out on this thing just let us know and we'll get one headed your way.
I don't usually feel sorry for our mail carrier. He sometimes gets the mail delivered to us before dark and he liked our cat Miles but other than that we're not all that crazy about him. We had a great carrier when we moved in but he didn't last the year before the geniuses downtown pulled him off his long-time route and turned our block over to a cast of characters which can only be described as a mixed bag. The nearest to regular guy hates to take advantage of the opportunity available to him for wholesome outdoor exercise and will tromp across our front and through Miz Susan's gardens shamelessly. About the only good thing to come from all the snow this winter is that it's piled so high next to our walk that he can't trailblaze his own shortcut and is forced to take the long way around to the next door neigbors.
About the most bizarre card we got this year was the one that showed up (after Santa's big day) from Linda and Laird Hanson of Hamline royalty fame. This card always sends Miz Susan into a seethe for a couple of hours and even I'm perplexed as to how I've stayed on that mailing list. I hate to think it, but maybe Linda doesn't realize that I still get the card or even remember who I am (or was). This year's version was particularly smarmy with L and L surrounded by a group of purported Hamline students who might have come straight from the Multicultural Modeling Agency. Mainly, I wonder why it was late in arriving. Probably the stress of the all-by-her-lonesome keeping Hamline propped up in the face of all the nay-sayers prevented her from getting to her cards as soon as she'd have liked. Hey, it's nice to still be counted among the inner circle. And it fills the void of not getting a card from the President out at North hennepin.
Friday, December 24, 2010
pallid, chill and drear
It can't be breaking news for anyone living around here that winter has arrived. Officially on the 21st but effectively way back before Thanksgiving when we got hit with the first of a yet-to-be-interrupted string of major winter weather events. I can't keep track of them any more nor of the peculiarities of each storm. We're into a state of perpetual snow emergency. I wonder if Opening Day at Target Field will even be fully accessible or if Mpls will still be enforcing its quaint and totally incomprehensible winter parking regulations.
A sure sign of the approach of winter around the Young household is the annual Linwood Monroe Silent Auction Benefit. If you don't have it on your social calendar into the middle of the next decade...well then, just too bad for you. It's the brainchild of an unknown con artist who must have had a fleeting association with the Linwood PTA and has since been serving time in a federal penitentiary for some stock derivative arbitrage conviction. This thing is that insidious.
It works like this. The Linwood Monroe PTA sends its activists out into the St. Paul marketplace to beg for donations from local merchants. Parents and teachers and whomever else gets sucked in will donate goods and services. The individual grade levels work on collecting items for theme baskets. This effort always nets a high-quality haul of stuff to get auctioned or raffled off and pulls in a decent chunk of change for various school beautification projects. Probably not as much as might get raised out in Edina or North Oaks. But still a serious chunk of change for a humble St. Paul operation. Serious enough, anyway, to hire an off-duty St. Paul cop to keep the cash box safe and sound. And all in the name of keeping the kids from having to be out on the streets while hawking frozen pizzas and holiday wrapping paper.
Lately, the staff has been asked to contribute to a "Wall of Wine" by chipping in a bottle of hooch. Yeah, this is for a K-8 school; don't ask me how this gets justified. It's put me and Miz Susan in the interesting position of donating goods and then bidding on them to buy them back. I got hooked last year when one of the teachers sent her husband out for a bottle of wine and he came home with a bottle of premium tequila. I couldn't very well let someone else take that home, could I? We barely touched last year's bottle but that didn't stop me from bidding on this year's lot. Anyone up for a marguerita party?
Susan and I try to stick together to coordinate our bidding activity and keep an eye on the budget. That usually lasts for eight or ten minutes. After that, I just count on hooking up with her at the end of the evening. She tends to go for the highbrow stuff, jewelry and fabrics and artwork. I'm more inclined to the booze and chocolate. So far, I haven't given in to the urge to get into a bidding war over the 10-lb Pearson's Nut Roll but that's about the limit to my restraint. Anything else goes.
At the end of the night, I wander around and collect all of the stuff we've won and the bid sheets that get tallied up at auction central. This year, Susan's and my diverse bidding patterns drew more than the usual notice from the PTA bosses when it came time to ante up. Some catty comment came up about about her bidding on the month's membership to a health club and me bidding on the three homemade cheesecakes. And I thought the school was supposed to be all about celebrating our diversity.
All in all, a nice milestone to pass and a warning that the Christmas insanity wasn't far behind. As a precursor to winter though, the Silent Auction ran late this year. I had to claw my way home from B'lyn Park in the middle of the the December 3 snowstorm in order to get to the darn thing. A normal 35-40 minute trip got stretched out to nearly two hours. It's a good thing that we both enjoy the event so much because this year's version must have missed the news flash that winter had already arrived.
Happy holidays to all. And to all a good night!
A sure sign of the approach of winter around the Young household is the annual Linwood Monroe Silent Auction Benefit. If you don't have it on your social calendar into the middle of the next decade...well then, just too bad for you. It's the brainchild of an unknown con artist who must have had a fleeting association with the Linwood PTA and has since been serving time in a federal penitentiary for some stock derivative arbitrage conviction. This thing is that insidious.
It works like this. The Linwood Monroe PTA sends its activists out into the St. Paul marketplace to beg for donations from local merchants. Parents and teachers and whomever else gets sucked in will donate goods and services. The individual grade levels work on collecting items for theme baskets. This effort always nets a high-quality haul of stuff to get auctioned or raffled off and pulls in a decent chunk of change for various school beautification projects. Probably not as much as might get raised out in Edina or North Oaks. But still a serious chunk of change for a humble St. Paul operation. Serious enough, anyway, to hire an off-duty St. Paul cop to keep the cash box safe and sound. And all in the name of keeping the kids from having to be out on the streets while hawking frozen pizzas and holiday wrapping paper.
Lately, the staff has been asked to contribute to a "Wall of Wine" by chipping in a bottle of hooch. Yeah, this is for a K-8 school; don't ask me how this gets justified. It's put me and Miz Susan in the interesting position of donating goods and then bidding on them to buy them back. I got hooked last year when one of the teachers sent her husband out for a bottle of wine and he came home with a bottle of premium tequila. I couldn't very well let someone else take that home, could I? We barely touched last year's bottle but that didn't stop me from bidding on this year's lot. Anyone up for a marguerita party?
Susan and I try to stick together to coordinate our bidding activity and keep an eye on the budget. That usually lasts for eight or ten minutes. After that, I just count on hooking up with her at the end of the evening. She tends to go for the highbrow stuff, jewelry and fabrics and artwork. I'm more inclined to the booze and chocolate. So far, I haven't given in to the urge to get into a bidding war over the 10-lb Pearson's Nut Roll but that's about the limit to my restraint. Anything else goes.
At the end of the night, I wander around and collect all of the stuff we've won and the bid sheets that get tallied up at auction central. This year, Susan's and my diverse bidding patterns drew more than the usual notice from the PTA bosses when it came time to ante up. Some catty comment came up about about her bidding on the month's membership to a health club and me bidding on the three homemade cheesecakes. And I thought the school was supposed to be all about celebrating our diversity.
All in all, a nice milestone to pass and a warning that the Christmas insanity wasn't far behind. As a precursor to winter though, the Silent Auction ran late this year. I had to claw my way home from B'lyn Park in the middle of the the December 3 snowstorm in order to get to the darn thing. A normal 35-40 minute trip got stretched out to nearly two hours. It's a good thing that we both enjoy the event so much because this year's version must have missed the news flash that winter had already arrived.
Happy holidays to all. And to all a good night!
Saturday, November 13, 2010
mixed messages: a recurring theme
A week and a half or so ago, Miz Susan made the mistake of leaving me home alone for a night. She was off to some party where husbands were frowned upon and she, always the gracious guest, was quick to tell me that I couldn't come and that I'd better stay out of the leftover Halloween candy.
This is usually cause for minor celebration; even the Halloween candy part semed a small price to pay. I'm always looking forward to the half a dozen or so nights a year that I'm left unguarded at home. I plan out unhealthy eating excursions for months in advance. Local pizza and rib joints' owners may still be scratching their heads over spikes in same-store sales over the last year's numbers but they're never likely to figure out that these were solely because a certain someone was away from home and not serving up another meatless meal.
I thought hard this time about the appeal of an extra 3-5 thousand calories and damn hard about all the various ways I could make that happen. But it turned out to be a no-go. I think that all the possibilities froze me into indecision.
This is what comes from living in a vibrant metropolitan area with a lively restaurant scene. There are so many spots within 7-10 minutes which serve food that's both totally delicious and totally bad for me; it's godawful painful to narrow things down. I've even been getting daring lately and have started thinking about...gasp!...Lake Street. Yeah, I know; dangerous for an innocent St. Paul kid like me but, my god, the food. The food, I tell you! So anyway---Thai, Italian, burgers, ribs, Friday night fish fries and more. It's tough to pull the trigger when there are so many targets of opportunity.
OK, so I wimped out on the illicit food thing. Call me what you want but I decided I couldn't let a night alone go completely to waste. I decided to get really demented and I walked up to Cheapo/Applause or whatever they call themselves these days. I hit both the CD store on the far side of Snelling and the record store back across the street. And if I didn't actually buy anything other than a lottery ticket at SA (a loser, it turns out), that doesn't make me anything less of a rebel and a man's man. Does it?
Just as I was browsing the Nancy Wilson LP's, looking for a record that I'll never actually see even after multiple reincarnations, Miz Susan called. Where am I, what am I doing, how soon am I going to be home and you do know that it had better be damn soon, right? Yes ma'am, I'm on the way.
I wrapped up my business at the record store (does grabbing a free City Pages on the way out count as business?) and headed home. The front storm door was hooked on the inside. I already had a feeling where this was headed but I played dutiful and went around to the back where I found that door burglar- (and husband-) proofed as well, keys be damned. Back to the front porch where I wondered just how many blankets were in whichever car I had a key to. I called on my cell phone and, in my very meekest voice, asked: please, could I be allowed into the house? Please?
I saw this as a classic case of mixed messages. I'd been told to get my worthless, dead ass home, stat. But, when I got there, the doors were all locked. In her defense, Susan seemed genuinely happy to see me, said it was all reflex action that had led her to lock me out of the house. Maybe she wouldn't have been quite so happy if she'd known then what I know now about that lottery ticket.
Election night left me feeling pretty much the same way. Minnesota has got to be the mixed messages heavyweight champ of the Republic when it comes to voting to ensure zero-sum government. This, after all, is the state that sent Paul Wellstone and Rod Grams to the U.S. Senate. At the same time. Minnesota seems to have loved Tim Pawlenty (yeah, I don't get it either) despite stacking the Legislature solidly against him. Now, to even up that score, we find ourselves with a Legislature in the hands of the Republicans for the first time since Alexander Ramsey's second term but with Mark Dayton as our presumptive guv-elect. Mixed messages on a heavyweight championship scale.
It's been a struggle to watch the GOPers strut and preen and spout their "The people have spoken." blather, ad nauseum. Hell, the people spoke two years ago. And these sanctimonious cockroaches did nothing but sit on their hands and state publicly that they weren't going to do anything to acknowledge the voices that had been raised. And, further, that they were, by God, going to do everything they could to obstruct and sabotage any and all efforts to respond to those voices.
It's going to be a tough two years of watching Mitch McConnell drool his morning Cream of Wheat down his tie and listening to Minnesota GOP mouthpiece Tony Sutton drone his endless recount conspiracy theory schtick between bites of jelly donut. The entertainment value of that kind of stuff has a pretty limited shelf-life.
Maybe I'll see if Tony and some of the other Repub wonks want to go restaurant-hopping with me the next time Miz Susan goes out and forgets to hire the kids across the street to track my movements. I'll even offer to pick up the tab. That has all the makings of a helluva mixed message.
This is usually cause for minor celebration; even the Halloween candy part semed a small price to pay. I'm always looking forward to the half a dozen or so nights a year that I'm left unguarded at home. I plan out unhealthy eating excursions for months in advance. Local pizza and rib joints' owners may still be scratching their heads over spikes in same-store sales over the last year's numbers but they're never likely to figure out that these were solely because a certain someone was away from home and not serving up another meatless meal.
I thought hard this time about the appeal of an extra 3-5 thousand calories and damn hard about all the various ways I could make that happen. But it turned out to be a no-go. I think that all the possibilities froze me into indecision.
This is what comes from living in a vibrant metropolitan area with a lively restaurant scene. There are so many spots within 7-10 minutes which serve food that's both totally delicious and totally bad for me; it's godawful painful to narrow things down. I've even been getting daring lately and have started thinking about...gasp!...Lake Street. Yeah, I know; dangerous for an innocent St. Paul kid like me but, my god, the food. The food, I tell you! So anyway---Thai, Italian, burgers, ribs, Friday night fish fries and more. It's tough to pull the trigger when there are so many targets of opportunity.
OK, so I wimped out on the illicit food thing. Call me what you want but I decided I couldn't let a night alone go completely to waste. I decided to get really demented and I walked up to Cheapo/Applause or whatever they call themselves these days. I hit both the CD store on the far side of Snelling and the record store back across the street. And if I didn't actually buy anything other than a lottery ticket at SA (a loser, it turns out), that doesn't make me anything less of a rebel and a man's man. Does it?
Just as I was browsing the Nancy Wilson LP's, looking for a record that I'll never actually see even after multiple reincarnations, Miz Susan called. Where am I, what am I doing, how soon am I going to be home and you do know that it had better be damn soon, right? Yes ma'am, I'm on the way.
I wrapped up my business at the record store (does grabbing a free City Pages on the way out count as business?) and headed home. The front storm door was hooked on the inside. I already had a feeling where this was headed but I played dutiful and went around to the back where I found that door burglar- (and husband-) proofed as well, keys be damned. Back to the front porch where I wondered just how many blankets were in whichever car I had a key to. I called on my cell phone and, in my very meekest voice, asked: please, could I be allowed into the house? Please?
I saw this as a classic case of mixed messages. I'd been told to get my worthless, dead ass home, stat. But, when I got there, the doors were all locked. In her defense, Susan seemed genuinely happy to see me, said it was all reflex action that had led her to lock me out of the house. Maybe she wouldn't have been quite so happy if she'd known then what I know now about that lottery ticket.
Election night left me feeling pretty much the same way. Minnesota has got to be the mixed messages heavyweight champ of the Republic when it comes to voting to ensure zero-sum government. This, after all, is the state that sent Paul Wellstone and Rod Grams to the U.S. Senate. At the same time. Minnesota seems to have loved Tim Pawlenty (yeah, I don't get it either) despite stacking the Legislature solidly against him. Now, to even up that score, we find ourselves with a Legislature in the hands of the Republicans for the first time since Alexander Ramsey's second term but with Mark Dayton as our presumptive guv-elect. Mixed messages on a heavyweight championship scale.
It's been a struggle to watch the GOPers strut and preen and spout their "The people have spoken." blather, ad nauseum. Hell, the people spoke two years ago. And these sanctimonious cockroaches did nothing but sit on their hands and state publicly that they weren't going to do anything to acknowledge the voices that had been raised. And, further, that they were, by God, going to do everything they could to obstruct and sabotage any and all efforts to respond to those voices.
It's going to be a tough two years of watching Mitch McConnell drool his morning Cream of Wheat down his tie and listening to Minnesota GOP mouthpiece Tony Sutton drone his endless recount conspiracy theory schtick between bites of jelly donut. The entertainment value of that kind of stuff has a pretty limited shelf-life.
Maybe I'll see if Tony and some of the other Repub wonks want to go restaurant-hopping with me the next time Miz Susan goes out and forgets to hire the kids across the street to track my movements. I'll even offer to pick up the tab. That has all the makings of a helluva mixed message.
Friday, February 26, 2010
some observations and modest proposals for the iooc...
02/26/10
Both Miz Susan and I were disappointed when the U.S. women's hockey team didn't grab the gold last night. Heck of a game though, eh? If the USAers didn't claim the top step of the podium they at least caught Susan's attention to the point that she watched the entire game from the time that she got home. We missed the early scoring--her, because she works for a living and me, because I was boiling eggs in the kitchen for another of Susan's nummy salads (translation: meatless meals) for dinner. I shouldn't be kicking since all I had to do was stand around in the kitchen waiting for the water to boil while she had to brave the Mississippi Market to get salad greens and more half+half.
Despite the loss, Susan's willingness to watch the game last night might just mark the opening up of whole new worlds of possibilities for us. I doubt that, in her entire life, apart from her niece Marcy's youth league games, Susan has watched enough minutes to patch together a full hockey game. You'll hear the hockey announcers talk about a star defenseman racking up 40+ minutes of ice time in a big game but that's about where Susan stands for her viewing career. In her defense, I sense that ice hockey was not a way of life down in Lamberton, MN. I'm not saying that there wasn't talent for the game out west on Hwy 14 but it would appear that whatever talent there was got scooped up early and hustled of to the top Junior A leagues. It's tough to run a grade-A high school hockey program when your best kids keep getting sent north to Montreal and Toronto.
Susan was very disappointed that our ladies (didn't you want to strangle Mike Milbury every time he used that word last night? I'd forgotten how much I despised him when he played for the Bruins.) fell short but I tend to the philosophical in these things. As the puckheads are want to say, "You've got to put the biscuit in the basket if you wanna win." Do puckheads really say that? Anyway, our skaters didn't really come close to lighting the lamp except for maybe once off of a scramble in the second period and the Canuckers played plenty well enough to make it stand up. Hats off to the Canadiennes. I'm happy to join in on Oh, Canada! most any time.
But we do need to remember the real purpose of the Olympics and who invented them. The Americans and NBC-TV, right? C'mon, everyone knows that. And when I say "Americans", I'm not willing to get all inclusive to bunch Canada and Mexico in with us. Both of those countries have made plenty of contributions to the world at large but, by god, the Olympics are ours. And with an eye to avoiding future disappointments to households all over this great land and to maintain the potential for ad revenue growth for NBC, I have a few suggestions (the "modest proposals" mentioned in the title above) on how to improve the game of Olympic hockey.
What we really need to understand is that we can't have the U.S. teams in ice hockey losing to anybody. The rest of the world can have all the curling and team Nordic combined skiing medals that they can bear to drape around their necks but the integrity of U.S. viewership needs to be protected at nearly all costs. So, with that in mind, I'm going to throw out these few simple suggestions. Get back to me and tell me what you think.
I'm perfectly willing to let the first period of any future hockey game get played on an even keel. But if Team USA (and this is for women's and men's teams alike) is losing after the first period then the second period will need to be with the other team playing without skates. Broomball shoes would be OK but no skates. And if we're still down after two, then the other guys will have to pull their goalie. For the whole period. Oh, we'll let them have a sixth player but he or she would be restricted to staying inside the center face-off circle. Oh yeah, and that sixth player wouldn't get a stick. These few simple rules modifications should be enough to give our U.S. team a fighting chance to win in most games.
I came up with these ideas last night after Team USA's loss but I'd been thinking hard about ways to improve the Olympics even before that. How about, for example, running the downhill skiing events at night? The cameras could be equipped with infra-red lenses to pick up the body heat from the skiers as they go bouncing past. Or maybe doing the ice dancing competitions on the bobsled run? I'm even working on ideas to successfully combine the ski aerials, snowboard-cross and the biathlon. This could make for some major league fantastic reality TV. And the ratings. Just imagine the ratings!!
Both Miz Susan and I were disappointed when the U.S. women's hockey team didn't grab the gold last night. Heck of a game though, eh? If the USAers didn't claim the top step of the podium they at least caught Susan's attention to the point that she watched the entire game from the time that she got home. We missed the early scoring--her, because she works for a living and me, because I was boiling eggs in the kitchen for another of Susan's nummy salads (translation: meatless meals) for dinner. I shouldn't be kicking since all I had to do was stand around in the kitchen waiting for the water to boil while she had to brave the Mississippi Market to get salad greens and more half+half.
Despite the loss, Susan's willingness to watch the game last night might just mark the opening up of whole new worlds of possibilities for us. I doubt that, in her entire life, apart from her niece Marcy's youth league games, Susan has watched enough minutes to patch together a full hockey game. You'll hear the hockey announcers talk about a star defenseman racking up 40+ minutes of ice time in a big game but that's about where Susan stands for her viewing career. In her defense, I sense that ice hockey was not a way of life down in Lamberton, MN. I'm not saying that there wasn't talent for the game out west on Hwy 14 but it would appear that whatever talent there was got scooped up early and hustled of to the top Junior A leagues. It's tough to run a grade-A high school hockey program when your best kids keep getting sent north to Montreal and Toronto.
Susan was very disappointed that our ladies (didn't you want to strangle Mike Milbury every time he used that word last night? I'd forgotten how much I despised him when he played for the Bruins.) fell short but I tend to the philosophical in these things. As the puckheads are want to say, "You've got to put the biscuit in the basket if you wanna win." Do puckheads really say that? Anyway, our skaters didn't really come close to lighting the lamp except for maybe once off of a scramble in the second period and the Canuckers played plenty well enough to make it stand up. Hats off to the Canadiennes. I'm happy to join in on Oh, Canada! most any time.
But we do need to remember the real purpose of the Olympics and who invented them. The Americans and NBC-TV, right? C'mon, everyone knows that. And when I say "Americans", I'm not willing to get all inclusive to bunch Canada and Mexico in with us. Both of those countries have made plenty of contributions to the world at large but, by god, the Olympics are ours. And with an eye to avoiding future disappointments to households all over this great land and to maintain the potential for ad revenue growth for NBC, I have a few suggestions (the "modest proposals" mentioned in the title above) on how to improve the game of Olympic hockey.
What we really need to understand is that we can't have the U.S. teams in ice hockey losing to anybody. The rest of the world can have all the curling and team Nordic combined skiing medals that they can bear to drape around their necks but the integrity of U.S. viewership needs to be protected at nearly all costs. So, with that in mind, I'm going to throw out these few simple suggestions. Get back to me and tell me what you think.
I'm perfectly willing to let the first period of any future hockey game get played on an even keel. But if Team USA (and this is for women's and men's teams alike) is losing after the first period then the second period will need to be with the other team playing without skates. Broomball shoes would be OK but no skates. And if we're still down after two, then the other guys will have to pull their goalie. For the whole period. Oh, we'll let them have a sixth player but he or she would be restricted to staying inside the center face-off circle. Oh yeah, and that sixth player wouldn't get a stick. These few simple rules modifications should be enough to give our U.S. team a fighting chance to win in most games.
I came up with these ideas last night after Team USA's loss but I'd been thinking hard about ways to improve the Olympics even before that. How about, for example, running the downhill skiing events at night? The cameras could be equipped with infra-red lenses to pick up the body heat from the skiers as they go bouncing past. Or maybe doing the ice dancing competitions on the bobsled run? I'm even working on ideas to successfully combine the ski aerials, snowboard-cross and the biathlon. This could make for some major league fantastic reality TV. And the ratings. Just imagine the ratings!!
Thursday, February 25, 2010
back from the doctor's office
02/25/10
That was actually this past Monday. Miz Susan took a day off of work despite her concerns that some less-than-handpicked sub might undo all of the progress her 4th graders had made since last September. She's more worried about me undoing all of the progress I've made since Christmas Day and she wouldn't let me go by myself. Something about ice and crutches and about how stupid I am. Something along those lines. Hard to argue with her given the evidence she's collected.
It's a good thing that she came with me. I'd never have thought to bake cupcakes to take to the staff at the Specialty Clinic. And if I had thought of it, those cupcakes sure as hell would not have made it out of the car and up to the third floor. You'd be surprised at how many cupcakes you can eat in an 18 minute car ride. Not as many as White Castles but still quite a few. City driving allows for better productivity in the speed eating department since you can usually catch a few stoplights along the way to line things up for maximum efficiency.
They made like they were happy to see us down at 435 Phalen. I suppose they were since we've kept them fully employed since last July. No worries about layoffs in the local medical workforce when I'm in town. And they all brightened up even more when Susan handed over the cupcakes. I tried to keep up a brave front as the last of my birthday booty disappeared into the staff break room. Almost the last anyway; there are still a few pieces of Jill and MaryAnn's pecan pie left and I ain't giving those up to anyone.
The doc poked and prodded and made me hop around the exam room on one leg for a few minutes. He told us that he was pleased at seeing better progress than he would have expected. I doubt that he had any concept as to just how easy I've been taking it for the last six weeks. My knee and all of its assorted muscles and tendons and whatnot have really had no opportunity to do anything but make progress. He told us to come back and see him in four weeks and to keep on doing whatever it was that I had been doing.
That wasn't all though. He called in for the delivery of my old friend, the CPM (Continuous Passive Movement) machine. That arrived Tuesday afternoon and I've already logged a few sessions in its healing clutches. In fact, I'm headed back that way soon. I'm glad to have the thing back as it's a concrete reminder that I might be able to walk again someday and also because I haven't done nearly the amount of reading I did last fall. Maybe I'll get through a couple of books that I was looking forward to.
The CPM even got delivered by the same guy as last time. He was also happy to see me. Here's a guy who spends his workdays on the freeways with a minivan full of medical equipment making deliveries and doing set-ups. He said his route map on Tuesday was Plymouth to Cottage Grove to Regions and me in the Midway to Coon Rapids and then home to Chisago City. But no matter how crazy his days must sometimes feel, he's gladdened by the fact that he's not me. He, at least, gets to get out of the house once in a while.
I am starting to feel that there might be light at the end of the tunnel. Miz Susan and I went off to see Kate perform in Hopkins High's adaptation of Talking With last night. The highlight of the evening was Kate (live snake and all--ask her, not me) and the rest of the cast but I also shone in my supporting role as driver; my first driving since being rendered hors de combat in the Great Christmas Snow Shovel War of 2009. Miz Susan graciously accepted my offer that I drive to Minnetonka and I made the most of it, weaving in and out of traffic like a regular suburbanite on the way home from happy hour. I'm on the way back.
I realized that I maybe should have grabbed the wheel for the return leg when Susan announced that she was suffering from night blindness just as she started down the long twisting entrance ramp onto Hwy 169. We did make it home safely despite the best efforts of some for-real suburbanite doing his for-real happy hour induced weave on 94 just past the 280 exit. I thought that it was touching that he wanted to share the lane with us at 55 mph but Susan took a dimmer view of his advances. She asked me what in the hell he was doing. As if I knew. I don't have the faintest idea what I'm doing most of the time let alone some idiot who would easily have blown a .15 on any passing cop's drunk-o-meter.
I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to driving every day again.
That was actually this past Monday. Miz Susan took a day off of work despite her concerns that some less-than-handpicked sub might undo all of the progress her 4th graders had made since last September. She's more worried about me undoing all of the progress I've made since Christmas Day and she wouldn't let me go by myself. Something about ice and crutches and about how stupid I am. Something along those lines. Hard to argue with her given the evidence she's collected.
It's a good thing that she came with me. I'd never have thought to bake cupcakes to take to the staff at the Specialty Clinic. And if I had thought of it, those cupcakes sure as hell would not have made it out of the car and up to the third floor. You'd be surprised at how many cupcakes you can eat in an 18 minute car ride. Not as many as White Castles but still quite a few. City driving allows for better productivity in the speed eating department since you can usually catch a few stoplights along the way to line things up for maximum efficiency.
They made like they were happy to see us down at 435 Phalen. I suppose they were since we've kept them fully employed since last July. No worries about layoffs in the local medical workforce when I'm in town. And they all brightened up even more when Susan handed over the cupcakes. I tried to keep up a brave front as the last of my birthday booty disappeared into the staff break room. Almost the last anyway; there are still a few pieces of Jill and MaryAnn's pecan pie left and I ain't giving those up to anyone.
The doc poked and prodded and made me hop around the exam room on one leg for a few minutes. He told us that he was pleased at seeing better progress than he would have expected. I doubt that he had any concept as to just how easy I've been taking it for the last six weeks. My knee and all of its assorted muscles and tendons and whatnot have really had no opportunity to do anything but make progress. He told us to come back and see him in four weeks and to keep on doing whatever it was that I had been doing.
That wasn't all though. He called in for the delivery of my old friend, the CPM (Continuous Passive Movement) machine. That arrived Tuesday afternoon and I've already logged a few sessions in its healing clutches. In fact, I'm headed back that way soon. I'm glad to have the thing back as it's a concrete reminder that I might be able to walk again someday and also because I haven't done nearly the amount of reading I did last fall. Maybe I'll get through a couple of books that I was looking forward to.
The CPM even got delivered by the same guy as last time. He was also happy to see me. Here's a guy who spends his workdays on the freeways with a minivan full of medical equipment making deliveries and doing set-ups. He said his route map on Tuesday was Plymouth to Cottage Grove to Regions and me in the Midway to Coon Rapids and then home to Chisago City. But no matter how crazy his days must sometimes feel, he's gladdened by the fact that he's not me. He, at least, gets to get out of the house once in a while.
I am starting to feel that there might be light at the end of the tunnel. Miz Susan and I went off to see Kate perform in Hopkins High's adaptation of Talking With last night. The highlight of the evening was Kate (live snake and all--ask her, not me) and the rest of the cast but I also shone in my supporting role as driver; my first driving since being rendered hors de combat in the Great Christmas Snow Shovel War of 2009. Miz Susan graciously accepted my offer that I drive to Minnetonka and I made the most of it, weaving in and out of traffic like a regular suburbanite on the way home from happy hour. I'm on the way back.
I realized that I maybe should have grabbed the wheel for the return leg when Susan announced that she was suffering from night blindness just as she started down the long twisting entrance ramp onto Hwy 169. We did make it home safely despite the best efforts of some for-real suburbanite doing his for-real happy hour induced weave on 94 just past the 280 exit. I thought that it was touching that he wanted to share the lane with us at 55 mph but Susan took a dimmer view of his advances. She asked me what in the hell he was doing. As if I knew. I don't have the faintest idea what I'm doing most of the time let alone some idiot who would easily have blown a .15 on any passing cop's drunk-o-meter.
I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to driving every day again.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Valentine's Day with me as target practice for cupid and his little bow and arrows
Valentine's Day is upon us. I thought it would never get here. The last three months of the NFL season definitely slow down the passage of time to a crawl and are an unhappy reminder of just how long it is between late-October and late-February. I suppose that winter and its short days, long (and generally uneventful) nights, low sun angle (is that redundant?), and all of its many varieties of noxious weather conditions also play their parts in making the clock and calendar seem like they're standing still. But we're past all of that now. The days are getting longer and, if the nights are still pretty uneventful, there is a glimmer of hope on the horizon marked by Valentine's Day and my birthday, a mere week later. Twins pitchers and catchers report on February 21, my special day. Coincidence? Maybe. But I like to think that we all deserve a break and a sense of hope that, soon, we'll have major league baseball to ease us through the still otherwise unevevtful evenings.
But we do need to get past this Valentine's Day thing first. I've never been the biggest fan in the world of Valentine's Day and have tended to see it as a contrived event to benefit the manufacturers of schmaltzy red and pink tinted cards and the retail outlets that sell the damn things. I'm all for getting tons of chocolate dumped in my lap but mostly what I've gotten instead are those rock-hard, heart-shaped little instant tooth decay pellets with the stupid messages on them. Seriously---Q-T-π? Those things are even more deadly than the sugar-coated marshmallow lumps that get sold during the Easter season. But I'll admit that there are a few silver linings in the Valentine's clouds and those have to do with...surprise!!...food and drink.
And I'm not just talking chocolate. I'm talking pizza from Carbone's on Randolph. Heart-shaped, no less. And unlike the little heart-shaped sugar jaw breakers, this stuff--though it might still kill you--will at least make the trip to the hereafter worthwhile.
We first discovered the concept of heart-shapizza a feww years back at Carbone's on Randolph, my old stomping grounds from way back in high school and even before that. I would have been far too cool to have submitted to such an emotions-on-the-sleeve thing back when I was 17. Moot point though; I'm almost positive that this beauty wasn't on the menu back in the day. No, I'd somehow convinced Miz Susan that what we really needed for Valentine's Day dinner was pizza from Carbone's. Imagine my shock when she actually agreed. Then imagine my pathetic little man-brain spinning feverishly when I ordered and they asked if I wanted it in the shape of the day. Who was I to say anything but, "Hell yes, I want it it heart-shaped!"? Particularly since I'd undoubtedly done my usual half-assed job of paying due respect to the holiday and was probably coming home with, at best, a more than half-wilted bunch of daisies from the floral department at Cub. Long story short, we loved it (hard not to love a Carbone's pizza) and we've been stuck on it ever since. A tradition had been born.
I mentioned drink as well. Miz Susan got hooked on the bubbly a couple of New Year's Eves ago down at the University Club. One of the waiters who was probably looking to pad our bill gave her a free sip of the stuff and she fell right into his trap. Before I knew it we had a whole bottle to kill and now she's always taking a detour past the champagne rack whenever we go to the liquor store. Sadly, the weather and the trials of the week conspired to keep her from that one last stop on Friday afternoon and we were left without any Schramsberg Blanc de Blanc. We've given up on any ideas of ever tasting Dom Perignon, let alone buying a bottle. I talked her into beer instead and she was more than happy to help polish off the last of the Schell's Octoberfest after I pointed out that if she really needed to drink imported she could start putting a dent in the Amstel Lights that had gotten shoved to the back of the fridge.
So Valentine's Day dinner was a relatively low-key operation despite Miz Susan having to venture out to pick up the pizza, Carbone's one major failing being that they don't deliver. Never have, doubt they ever will. But it's not like I didn't have to pay a steep price for the beer and pizza. I wonder if Miz Susan would have even allowed me this much if I hadn't played the part of Valentines Lackey for her fourth grade class.
For whatever reason, political correctness has not yet done away with the exchange of Valentines in at least a few of our public schools. The kids probably still like it and I know that Miz Susan always brings home a wad of the things every February. For her students, she (meaning me) has sometimes copped her cards off of the internet but this year she decided to throw some of our hard earned dollars at Target in exchange for a box of 32 of the cutest, glossiest, heartiest little monkey Valentines you can imagine. Complete with matching rub on tattoos. She even ponied up for a couple of bags of M&M minis to go with each card. About five minutes into the process of separating and addressing and folding and taping and M&Ming she told me that this really wasn't a very efficient use of her time. She was right, of course. She's making good money and I don't even qualify for unemployment so I offered to take over for her. I separated the perforated sheets of the little monkeys and turned them over to her for addresses and her initials. Then she threw them back at me for the rest of the minimum wage work. I tucked the matching tattoos into their little slots and taped packages of M&M minis and folded and sealed them all up with the little red heart stickers that came with the pack. An hour later, with my hands throbbing from the picky-ass work and Miz Susan smirking and basking in the glow of having Tom Sawyered another chunk of her work-related tedium off on me, I wrapped things up. After a last count to make sure that no 4Y student was going to be scarred for life due to a missing Valentine monkey card which had slipped under the bed, I poured the things back into the Target bag. To rub my nose in my low-life status even further, Miz Susan grabbed the bag with the untaped M&M's and took that away from me too. She threw me one measly little package for my troubles but that was all. I figured that I could bide my time, that maybe there'd be a few leftovers after the mayhem on Friday that would come back home. I should have known better. Those most likely got handed over to the Desk Fairy for future positive reinforcement purposes because I sure as hell never saw them again.
Can't hardly wait for Valentine's to roll around again next year.
But we do need to get past this Valentine's Day thing first. I've never been the biggest fan in the world of Valentine's Day and have tended to see it as a contrived event to benefit the manufacturers of schmaltzy red and pink tinted cards and the retail outlets that sell the damn things. I'm all for getting tons of chocolate dumped in my lap but mostly what I've gotten instead are those rock-hard, heart-shaped little instant tooth decay pellets with the stupid messages on them. Seriously---Q-T-π? Those things are even more deadly than the sugar-coated marshmallow lumps that get sold during the Easter season. But I'll admit that there are a few silver linings in the Valentine's clouds and those have to do with...surprise!!...food and drink.
And I'm not just talking chocolate. I'm talking pizza from Carbone's on Randolph. Heart-shaped, no less. And unlike the little heart-shaped sugar jaw breakers, this stuff--though it might still kill you--will at least make the trip to the hereafter worthwhile.
We first discovered the concept of heart-shapizza a feww years back at Carbone's on Randolph, my old stomping grounds from way back in high school and even before that. I would have been far too cool to have submitted to such an emotions-on-the-sleeve thing back when I was 17. Moot point though; I'm almost positive that this beauty wasn't on the menu back in the day. No, I'd somehow convinced Miz Susan that what we really needed for Valentine's Day dinner was pizza from Carbone's. Imagine my shock when she actually agreed. Then imagine my pathetic little man-brain spinning feverishly when I ordered and they asked if I wanted it in the shape of the day. Who was I to say anything but, "Hell yes, I want it it heart-shaped!"? Particularly since I'd undoubtedly done my usual half-assed job of paying due respect to the holiday and was probably coming home with, at best, a more than half-wilted bunch of daisies from the floral department at Cub. Long story short, we loved it (hard not to love a Carbone's pizza) and we've been stuck on it ever since. A tradition had been born.
I mentioned drink as well. Miz Susan got hooked on the bubbly a couple of New Year's Eves ago down at the University Club. One of the waiters who was probably looking to pad our bill gave her a free sip of the stuff and she fell right into his trap. Before I knew it we had a whole bottle to kill and now she's always taking a detour past the champagne rack whenever we go to the liquor store. Sadly, the weather and the trials of the week conspired to keep her from that one last stop on Friday afternoon and we were left without any Schramsberg Blanc de Blanc. We've given up on any ideas of ever tasting Dom Perignon, let alone buying a bottle. I talked her into beer instead and she was more than happy to help polish off the last of the Schell's Octoberfest after I pointed out that if she really needed to drink imported she could start putting a dent in the Amstel Lights that had gotten shoved to the back of the fridge.
So Valentine's Day dinner was a relatively low-key operation despite Miz Susan having to venture out to pick up the pizza, Carbone's one major failing being that they don't deliver. Never have, doubt they ever will. But it's not like I didn't have to pay a steep price for the beer and pizza. I wonder if Miz Susan would have even allowed me this much if I hadn't played the part of Valentines Lackey for her fourth grade class.
For whatever reason, political correctness has not yet done away with the exchange of Valentines in at least a few of our public schools. The kids probably still like it and I know that Miz Susan always brings home a wad of the things every February. For her students, she (meaning me) has sometimes copped her cards off of the internet but this year she decided to throw some of our hard earned dollars at Target in exchange for a box of 32 of the cutest, glossiest, heartiest little monkey Valentines you can imagine. Complete with matching rub on tattoos. She even ponied up for a couple of bags of M&M minis to go with each card. About five minutes into the process of separating and addressing and folding and taping and M&Ming she told me that this really wasn't a very efficient use of her time. She was right, of course. She's making good money and I don't even qualify for unemployment so I offered to take over for her. I separated the perforated sheets of the little monkeys and turned them over to her for addresses and her initials. Then she threw them back at me for the rest of the minimum wage work. I tucked the matching tattoos into their little slots and taped packages of M&M minis and folded and sealed them all up with the little red heart stickers that came with the pack. An hour later, with my hands throbbing from the picky-ass work and Miz Susan smirking and basking in the glow of having Tom Sawyered another chunk of her work-related tedium off on me, I wrapped things up. After a last count to make sure that no 4Y student was going to be scarred for life due to a missing Valentine monkey card which had slipped under the bed, I poured the things back into the Target bag. To rub my nose in my low-life status even further, Miz Susan grabbed the bag with the untaped M&M's and took that away from me too. She threw me one measly little package for my troubles but that was all. I figured that I could bide my time, that maybe there'd be a few leftovers after the mayhem on Friday that would come back home. I should have known better. Those most likely got handed over to the Desk Fairy for future positive reinforcement purposes because I sure as hell never saw them again.
Can't hardly wait for Valentine's to roll around again next year.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)