In Maricopa County, Arizona, the Sheriff makes prisoners wear pink underwear and eat green bologna sandwiches. He also organized a posse to round up illegal immigrants. He has a cleaver interpretation of a law that, in his mind, allows for arresting illegal immigrants for smuggling themselves. Isn’t that like arresting runaways for kidnapping themselves?

I heard about a couple that was married in a cemetery. It sounded interesting but it also sounded like a bad idea. But, it turned out, I had misheard. The couple was buried in a cemetery. A better idea, but not that interesting.

I have a love/hate relationship with the world (not the Earth).
I love Flowers and I love fruit trees because they produce a lot of flowers. I love the flowers more than the fruit, which I also love.
I hate war. I think it is wrong. It is: barbaric, old fashioned, not necessary, unproductive, expensive (money and lives – lots of young lives), uncivilized, not pretty, hell, and bad for the environment.

Old Lady

Imagine, ten or twelve years after the civil war. I do not know what was happening in El Salvador in 1878 other than this woman's birth. It was year 1 of the Gilded Age here in the USA. The American Cereal Co. introduced Quaker Oats as the first mass-marketed breakfast food. This panorama of San Francisco was taken by E. Muybridge in 1878. Cruz Hernandez was 88 when I was born.

I ordered a dark chocolate frappe at Alterra on Lincoln Memorial drive on my way to Chicago. I pronounced it “frapp,” and the clerk corrected me saying, “Frapp-ay.” I am not sure why, but I decided to tell him that it is really pronounced, “Frapp.” This is what I said: “In the Northeast it is pronounced Frapp.” I wanted to tell him that the northeast is where frappes were invented but before I could he said, “Frapp-ay.” Part of me thought that perhaps there is a difference in the pronunciation because, in New England, frappe is a regional term for milk shake and the frappe I was buying was a blended ice coffee drink. But that part of me was very quiet, I almost didn’t even notice it. I just thought it more important to argue about pronunciation with some poor guy working in a cafe. In case you aren’t convinced of my pettiness yet, I checked the pronunciation on dictionary.com when I got home:
frappe (frap) (there is suposed to be a 'u' shaped symbol above the 'a' but I can't find one).
n. Rhode Island & Southeastern Massachusetts

See milk shake. See Regional Note at milk shake

I was right. Unfortunately, so was he. And he was even more right, because my pronunciation really only refers to a milk shake.

The Year of the Beard

Archive

I took these pictures the day before my 30th birthday. I was driving through the Sacramento Valley with Toby (Placer High, class of ’84). The man in the photo gave us a talk about cockfighting and how it is illegal so he does not fight his (I think I detected a wink when he said it). Then he talked about how there are humane ways to fight chickens. He said someone has come up with little chicken boxing gloves with electronic sensors for keeping score.

White-throated Sparrow

For those of you keeping track, the White-throated sparrows (this one is named Robert McDonald) are back in Milwaukee. I did not hear any last week. When I left the house this morning I could hear them singing from every direction. In Canada, birdwatchers describe the song "Oh Sweet Canada, Canada, Canada" while American birdwatchers describe it as "Old Sam Peabody, Peabody, Peabody," or "Oh Sweet Jonathan, Jonathan, Jonathan."

Book Review

"How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life," is okay at best. But, to be fair, I did not like “Sloppy Firsts,” or, the decidedly worse, “Second Helpings.” The titles of the latter two volumes implied a titillating narrative that they simply did not deliver.

Happy Birthday Mom

Today is my mother’s birthday. She doesn’t read blogs. She never liked them, even as a kid. She didn’t even read Roosevelt’s Fireside Blog.

I wonder if people will start naming their sons Judas now that he’s a good guy.
"Judas! Let go of your sister's ponytail!"
"Judas! Time for dinner!"
"Now Judas, no one likes a tattle tail."
Just trying it on for size.

Coffee

I’ve lived in Milwaukee for, what? 10 years? 15 years? 8 months?, and the coffee still sucks. I find that in order to make the coffee in Milwaukee palatable I have to put twice as much sugar in it. If my teeth rot I will blame Wisconsin.
What do you think of the idea of a tattoo of Wisconsin? Maybe under the map it will say, “Wisconsin, where the winters are bitter and so is the coffee.”

Do you know what the worst thing a public radio station can do?
Play music.

New Car

Ever since Luke bought a BMW, we have noticed a lot more idiots on the road.

Money Saving Plan

In anticipation of higher gas prices, I decided to buy my gas now. I bought 250 gallons. That should get me through the summer. I’ll feel pretty good knowing I only spent $2.89.9 instead of $3.15.9 or what ever the summer price ends up being.

Not MySpace anymore

I quit MySpace. I admit to feeling bad for the people who asked me to be their friend - both of them, but the feeling of deleting my account was so much better than the feeling of opening a MySpace account.
When I logged on to MySpace today I promised MySelf that if my browser, Firefox, froze while attempting to log in, I would keep logging in until I succeeded so I could cancel my account. Firefox froze, twice.
While I write this there is a story on the radio about how MySpace is a haven for child molesters. Whew. I got out just in time.
Also, I tried to create a link to MySpace but when I opened MySpace my browsers froze and I lost this post and had to re-write it.

Whooping Cranes

Luke emailed this story about Whooping Cranes in Chicago, which reminded me that on my way home from work a Golden-crowned kinglet fluttered in front of me like a butterfly and then landed a couple feet from me on the sidewalk.
P.S. None of the bird photos are by me unless they are really bad.

Beggerman

When someone approaches and says, “Excuse me, can I ask you something?” And then says, loudly, “I am not a Bum, or a derelict, or a panhandler,” you know that the next thing they are going to do is ask for money, which, by definition, makes the person at least one of the above. Yesterday a man of about 60 approached me at the Lake Forest Oasis on my way to my car. He had a pretty long story about the car braking down and him having money for the towing and his buddy – who waved at me from the driver’s seat of the car – having had the money for the repair. Now they needed money for gas. It seemed only right that I should pay my share so I gave him money but I did consider asking for a receipt because, as a charitable contribution, it is deductible.

If you are a panhandler find me. I cannot say no. I do not like giving money away, but I usually do it to get away from the situation as fast as possible.