Pooped.

Two Miles

Squirrels

I think the squirrels in my backyard are completely unstoppable.

Last Summer, I bought a new bird feeder, specifically to foil the squirrels whose persistence destroyed the one it replaced. That new feeder has since been broken (I need to order a replacement part), and for now, the squirrels occupy it with impunity. I've tried a chili powder additive as a deterrent, but they didn't even break a sweat.

I have nothing against the squirrels (despite what you may have read in past) — I appreciate their persistence, and I can't help but admire their intelligence. I'd just prefer they didn't monopolize my bird feeders.

Many, many years ago, when we lived in Jersey City, we were in an apartment that was down the street from a large park. We got in the habit of feeding the squirrels there, because they were so friendly. (I miss doing that.) At first, they'd come up to the bench we were sitting on. In time, they began to come up on the bench we were sitting on. We brought mixed nuts — almonds, hazelnuts, brazil nuts, and walnuts — and I've no doubt that made us especially popular.

When I was working, I used to have a photo on the bulletin board in my office (I wonder what I did with it?) of a squirrel perched on my knee.

One morning, while waiting for a bus at the edge of the park, I noticed a squirrel that seemed to be taking an unusual interest in me. I remember it scampering around at my feet, expectantly, as if it were waiting for me to feed it. When I walked back into the park to try to encourage it out of harm's way, it just followed me back out again. At one point, it gave up on me and decided to explore my shoulder bag, which was on the bench. (Nothing of interest there.) I tried talking to it, but that probably only made matters worse. I wouldn't have thought it possible, but I think it actually recognized me.

I had to leave it, disappointed (do squirrels even have a concept of disappointment?) when the bus arrived. But from that day, I don't think I ever left home without a few hazelnuts in the front pocket of my shoulder bag.

Flying A

I wonder how long ago it was that gas was 36 9/10 cents a gallon?

Shuffling On

I got a new iPod Nano as a gift for Father's Day. It's silver, shiny and new, with no trace of the wear that had accumulated on the older iPod Nano I've been using for the past three or four years, or however long it was. (And it has twice the storage capacity, which is always welcome.) I'm even beginning to embrace the "shuffle" function (on those rare occasions when I'm listening to music), which I'd always ignored. It's just so much fun to activate it by shaking the iPod ― how could I resist?

But what to do with the old Nano? It still works (more or less), it's just a a bit beat-up, and it's difficult to navigate with half the display gone. As a music player, though, it probably still has a great deal of life left in it — think of it as an iPod Shuffle with a display. (Sort of).

Anybody want it? Click the link on the right to email me. (You won't even have to pay for postage.) I'll be happy to send it anywhere I know it's going to be put to better use than sitting in a mug on a bookshelf in my office.

My Cat Jack

my cat Jack
purs alot
meows loudley
brown and tan
very loud runing
that is all

A poem my son wrote in school. (There was another that also ended with "that is all.")

Notes From The Field

It's the end of the school year — tomorrow, in fact — and papers and worksheets accumulated from the past several months are being sent home...

I don't like brusle sproots (brussel sprouts). I think I knew that. Who does?

I like my teacher.

I don't like homework. I suppose that's obvious, but I think it really depends on when you ask. Most times, when we do homework together in the afternoon, he doesn't seem all that bothered. In fact, he's often anxious to get to it.

I wish that I could spell every word. I've been trying to get him to embrace the concept of making mistakes as an opportunity to learn. How well that works depends on his mood on any given day.

I don't like the dark. You know, I don't think he's ever mentioned this to me...

Every day in the spring it is sunny. Sometimes it is rainy. I love when its sunny.

Anticipation

The side yard is just a few short weeks away from erupting in wild raspberries. This year, I've promised to make ice cream (which we never did get around to last year).

Card

The important thing about my Dad is that he loves me.

He brings me to playgrounds and he helps me fix my toys. He also pickes me up from school.

But the important thing about my Dad is that he loves me.

From the homemade Father's Day card I received from my six-year-old yesterday.

This Father's Day

My parents divorced when I was very, very young. Much too young to take notice. (There's an interesting story there, but let's save that for another time.) In the years since, as I've watched children deal with divorce, I've come to understand just how fortunate I was.

I never felt different than anyone else, never felt as though my situation was the least bit unusual. Never knew that anything was missing.

I've known friends — too many — for whom Father's Day is especially difficult each year, even painful, for reasons of abuse or abandonment (or both). For me, the day often comes and goes without much notice, mostly because I'm not paying attention. (This irritates my father no end.) It has become practically unavoidable for me, though, now that I've become a parent — though I'd still just as soon let it quietly pass. I never feel entirely comfortable as the center of attention.

And yet...

Tomorrow, my six-year-old will give me the beautiful picture he painted of me tinkering with his robot costume, a picture that only he could have painted. (I couldn't help but see it when I was unpacking his backpack from school.) I can't wait. I have a closer relationship with my son than I remember having with either of my parents. I wonder if he'll be better at remembering Father's Day than I am?

Half A Nano

My beloved iPod Nano is not quite itself these days. Oh, it still works as well as ever — but the bottom half of the small screen is no longer viewable, only the soft blur of a handful of pixels. That's made selecting podcasts a good deal more difficult, which becomes particularly irritating over the course of a long drive.

I'd sort of hoped this Nano would last for, well — forever. I wanted this to be the thing I had used for as long as I could remember, that I had carried with me for as long as I could remember. I'm already on my third iPhone, and it hasn't even been two years! I'm looking forward to the novelty of having a gadget that just keeps going. Forever.

A Postcard From The Road To Nowhere

New and Novel

That was easy. I was expecting I might have to wait for hours (which is what happened last time, with a line that was nowhere near as long), but I don't think it took more than twenty minutes.

I'm surprised none of the reviews I've seen have mentioned the distinctive "figure eight" motion you need to make with your phone to calibrate the built-in compass. (Now, whenever I see someone doing that, I'll immediately know the reason.)

In Line

I'm standing in line, waiting to purchase my new iPhone. (AT&T relaxed it's eligibility requirements, so I no longer need wait for August.) This is actually my second Apple store visit of the morning — I discovered, only after I had arrived, that the store I usually go to is being remodeled, and won't be open for another two weeks.

I'm just about at the front of the line. More soon...

We Missed The Bus

"Have a good day at work." I said to my son, absentmindedly, as I dropped him off at school this morning.

Degrassi

I've been watching old new Degrassi this weekend ― by which I mean older episodes of Degrassi: The Next Generation, not the various Degrassi series that preceeded it by almost ten years (which would, I suppose, be "old old Degrassi"). New episodes seem to come in fits and starts, but they'll be starting up again next month.

I keep watching, but I'll admit, it's mostly out of habit ― I don't think the series has ever really recovered from it's outstanding young ensemble cast (and their characters) growing up and, inevitably, graduating from High School, and moving on. They've all had a likeable, natural quality that could carry anything from the lightest of high school intrigue to more serious, more substantive drama.

Few of the new characters that have been brought in to take their places ― and that step should have been taken much sooner than it was, instead of following several of the established characters into college life ― seem to have those same compelling qualities, as either characters or actors. And the stories have become increasingly far-fetched (and often established characters seem out-of-character), as new writers struggle to find paths that hadn't already been followed over the course of the past seven years.

That's a pity too, because when Degrassi is at it's best, it's been terrific. Don't underestimate this series just because it's set in High School — there's good reason the series has won so many Gemini Awards through the years. (That's the Canadian television equivalent of the Emmy Awards.) But it's difficult and disappointing to watch Degrassi sort of wobble along as a shadow of its' former self.

Baby Tooth

My son has just lost his first baby tooth. And when I say "just lost," I mean not five minutes ago — he's very excited!

More Baby Groundhog

The baby groundhogs — one of them, anyway — seem to be getting along just fine.

What do you do with a Chipmunk?

When we saw it yesterday afternoon, wobbling among the tall grass in the backyard, I thought it might just be a bit young, and not yet entirely steady on it's feet. But when I saw the chipmunk again today, it seemed a good deal less lively, which has caused me to worry. (It even let me get close enough to take a series of photos, which probably isn't a sign of good health for a chipmunk.)

A local wildlife rehabilitator we spoke to suspected internal injuries, perhaps even poison, and suggested we gently place it in a box with some food, and wait a few hours.

Later, when the chipmunk seemed a good deal more active, she suggested we ought to bring it to her, so she could, in turn, have it examined by a vet. She thought it might be young (which might explain why it was reasonably comfortable with being gently handled), perhaps even orphaned, and probably underfed (which might explain the unsteadiness). There's the possibility of illness, of course, but we remain hopeful.

We've promised to bring it home and release it in the backyard once it's healthy enough to get around on it's own. I hope that will be soon.

Curiosity

The Mars Science Laboratory rover, scheduled for launch in 2011, will be named "Curiosity." That name, selected from among thousands of entries, was submitted by a twelve-year-old girl from Kansas. And it's just about perfect!

Upgrade

A new iPhone was introduced today. I'm not usually — that is to say, I'm not always eager for the-next-big-thing, not unless there's some real, tangible benefit to be had. In this case, there is: among other improvements, there's a better camera, with better control over focus, white balance and whatnot. This, of course, appeals to me greatly, for obvious reasons. You know, I've never understood the complaints about the iPhone's built-in camera — it's a cel phone camera, fergoshsakes, so expectations ought be limited, and anyway, I've been pleased with what I've been able to accomplish with it. (Mine seems to have this persistent sort of pinkish hue in the center, under certain conditions — you might be able to see it in the last picture in the series of this set, in the raised letters — but perhaps that's just a quality of this particular iPhone.)

There are other improvements, as well — a faster processor, better battery life, and an oil-resistant coating (my iPhone screen is inevitably covered with fingerprints moment after I clean it, so I'm curious as to how well that will work).

Then there's the question of "upgrade pricing." Many existing AT&T customers (of which I am one) are irritated that they are not able to purchase a new iPhone at the same low (subsidized) cost as a new customer, based on whatever metric AT&T is using to decide who is and isn't eligible. I bought my iPhone 3G only last August, and I had thought that this would rule me out for the rest of the year, at least — but it appears I'll qualify for the upgrade pricing in early August. (My wife, however, will have to wait for January of next year, which will undoubtedly be a source of discontent.) I don't understand why or how, but I'm too afraid of ruining my good fortune to ask.

(Check back in about two months, and we'll see if it all worked out.)

Found Object

I'm very happy to have a chance to go to school to study office work.
I know it will be hard for me, but I will get through the difficulty and on my job I can get health ...

I went to my Boss office to tell him that I'm go to school on June 2. I show him worried about telling him the program I was going to study. I was wondering ... after school I'm going to be late for school. he told me the pay is good and it's time with him if I'm later for 15 minutes, also He

I found this not too long ago, handwritten on the back of a piece of paper that had been used for something else, blowing in the wind near my parked car. (The ellipsis are the parts I couldn't make out.) I wonder if I may have seen the woman who wrote it this afternoon.

Old Friend

Just yesterday I heard from an old friend I'd lost touch with. (He had only my outdated e-mail address, and the contact form on my web site is woefully inoperative at the moment, but he was able to find me through Google.) He mentioned at first he had been trying to find me through Facebook (without success), but in the process came across several mutual friends who haven't been heard from in ages. I can't help but be a bit curious to know what's become of people I was close to, so long ago.

But I've never had the least bit of interest in Facebook, or MySpace, or any of that. If you knew me well, I suppose that might come as a surprise — I'm just as likely to have good friends at a distance as close by. But the "social networking" phenomenon has never had any appeal to me — in fact, I've stubbornly resisted it. (And if you knew me well, that would come as no surprise at all.) It's always struck me as little more than an exercise in filling an address book with the names of different people you know, or used to know, like a birdwatcher that accumulates a list of the different birds they've spotted. It all seems so shallow, so impersonal.

I want more from my friendships than that. I want depth and intimacy. I want laughter, even tears. I want truth. I want to listen to people, to hear their voices as they tell their stories (even if those voices are only heard in what they write). Anything less hardly seems worthwhile.

Pest

The view from my office window today, mid-morning.

Now That's Package Design!

Girls

It was bound to happen, sooner or later. A small group of girls had been taunting my son at school, in that way that girls will do, which upset him terribly. I tried my best to explain to him that this is something that happens to everyone, and the best you can do is try not let it bother you — but when you're six years old, and emotions are still close to the surface, perhaps there isn't much value in that advice.

I think the ice cream cones we shared later that afternoon made him feel much better, though.

Waterloo Bridge

I've been watching the 1931 version of Waterloo Bridge, part of TCM's Forbidden Hollywood Collection, and a title I must have somehow missed. It's shamelessly melodramatic, of course, but Mae Clark has a natural quality that few actors in that era seemed to possess. (If you've ever seen a movie from the 1930s, you'll know what I mean.) There was an uncomfortable sense of familiarity about the story, though the less said about that, the better.

MGM bought this film outright (from Universal) when, not quite ten years after the original release, they wanted to film the story again — it had been kept it mostly hidden away from view in the years since. Unlike the version made by MGM, though (with Vivien Leigh and Robert Taylor), this film leaves no question of how the heroine makes her living.

Also on this disc was Red-Headed Woman, from 1932. This was as close as MGM would every come to the sort of overt sexuality demonstrated by the heroines of the Warner Bros. films of that era — in fact, the plot is more or less the same as Babyface (which would be released the following year), with Jean Harlow seducing and marrying her way into high society. But here, without the sordid and unpleasant themes of Babyface, the story is a good deal more fun and playful — and Harlow had a great gift for comedy.