Red Nose

Kids At The Museum

What's a perfect place for a school field trip? Why, the museum, of course!

The coral reef aquarium attracted big crowds -- Nemo and Dorie are crowd pleasers, but the other fish (especially the giant clam) were also popular.

Actually, you don't have to be in school to like the coral reef. This little guy and his dad were fascinated.

The giant crystal ball is pretty interesting, too.

But really, you can't beat the T. Rex!

Bread and Other Stuff

It's that time of year again! My stats are going up steadily as people search for pumpkin pie recipes for the upcoming feasts. I continue to believe that mine is the best pumpkin pie in the whole entire world.

I am taking tomorrow off. I checked my leave balance the other day and was very pleasantly surprised to find that I have a healthy dose of vacation days. I thought, "Well hell -- take a day off!"

Actually, I'll use most of the day to do some stuff I've been putting off, most notably calling the county and starting the process to get Mom approved for Medicaid. Ugh. It will be a tedious task.

So I'm coming up from the subway this morning, and I buttonhook around to the right to grab a City Paper, and what do I see atop one of the many many newsstands clustered around the subway entrance?

I hope whoever got the Pet Lovers Companion doesn't want a sandwich later.

Fun On The Metro

Normally my ride into work on our fair city's rapid transit system is uneventful. I get on at the end of the line, sit down, read the freebie version of the Post, do the crossword puzzle, play a little Collapse on my phone. The train fills up as we go along, gets crowded through downtown, then empties out as we head back uptown.

Today? A little different.

It was the same old ride up until Judiciary Square (or maybe it was Union Station? I forget. I was zoned.), when the train operator announced that we would be stopped for a bit -- someone on the train was ill and needed to be taken off the train.

Okay, that's a good idea.

After a couple minutes we were on our way. At Gallery Place, the operator announced that we would delayed a little while because of a maintenance issue.

Okay, also a good idea.

Again we were on our way, heading into the tunnel.

Suddenly, BANG! BUMP! I mean, bang like a gunshot! People jumped and a few gasped and squealed. I looked out into the tunnel and saw smoke, then smelled an acrid, burning smell. I will admit that my heart raced a tad. The train slowed, then continued.

BANG! BANG! More smoke! Burning smell! More squeals; my heart reached cardio workout level. (Given Joe's recent experience, I'm surprised I wasn't more panicky.) A couple people wanted off the train and expressed that wish.

The train stopped. The operator said, "Attention passengers (oh, don't worry, Ms. Train Operator, you have it!) we are going to inch our way to Metro Center and find out what's going on. Please do not panic."

Okay, I guess that's a good idea, seeing as how we're stuck in the tunnel. On the other hand, perhaps that maintenance issue should have gotten a little more attention back there at Gallery Place.

We rolled slowly into Metro Center, where the train was placed out of service. Everyone got off and milled around for awhile. I called work to let my boss know the deal, then thought about my alternatives. Switch lines and then try for a bus? Cab?

Well, it all worked out. Metro started single-tracking so all I had to do was cross over to opposite platform and wait for the next train going in my direction. I wasn't even very late for work. I must admit, though, that I prefer the uneventful ride.

Good Stuff

Wow, October already!

It's been a busy few days, what with visiting Mom, deadlines at work, and emotional stuff, but it hasn't been all bad by any means.

My Caps have started their season off with a bang, winning the opener against the Bruins very decisively (4-1) and winning the home opener against the Maple Leafs slightly less decisively (6-4). This makes me very happy. Before the home opener, our newest banner was dropped from the rafters:

 

As is our wont (and because we wanted to be sure to snag a Mike Green bobblehead), Joe and I arrived downtown extra early. To pass the time, we wandered over to the Museum of American Art. I was quite taken with a wall-sized multimedia sculpture called "Electronic Superhighway" by Nam June Paik. It's a map of the USA in neon, with DVD players inserted in each "state" playing video specific to that state -- for example, Kansas is playing The Wizard of Oz.

 

This photo really doesn't do it justice. What was really cool was that right where DC would be was a camera, which meant that whoever walked by it was shown on the small video screen right beside it. So of course I had to try to capture that -- you can sort of see me in my Caps jersey here.

Today we went to the Redskins game, courtesy of my sister, where we cheered our team to victory -- a sloppy, sloppy victory, but a victory nonetheless. Let me tell you, my sis and her family do tailgating right.

The game was a roller coaster (kind of like my life at the moment), but we managed to overcome a 10-point deficit and hold on for a win.

So it was a good weekend, overall. The art inspires me, the Caps make me happy, and the Skins give me hope.

I'll take it.

Exploring the Sant Ocean Hall

I mentioned in the last post that Joe took me on a private tour of the Sant Ocean Hall, where he's a volunteer docent. It's magnificent! I loved the living coral reef, with Nemo and Dory swimming  around the brilliant coral. Psychedelic!

I even loved the male giant squid, hanging head down in his case. His is a face -- if you can call it a face -- that only his mother could love. He's pretty big, almost 20 feet long all told.

He's not nearly as big as the female giant squid, though. She's laid out horizontally. From the tip of her head to the end of the longest tentacle, she's about 25 feet long now. The liquid that's preserving her caused her to shrink from her original length of 35 feet. You go!

My favorite, though, is the life size model of Phoenix, a right whale currently living in the North Atlantic ocean. The model is precise -- right down to the scars Phoenix has from dragging a fishing net that got caught in her baleen. She's 45 feet long and hangs from the ceiling of the hall. She's so big I had to take three pictures of her and stitch them together.

So next time you come to DC, get in touch. I can hook you up with a great guide who'll be happy to take you on a personal tour.

But he's coming home with me.

Roller Coaster

The emotional roller coaster continues to operate at high speed.

Wednesday was bad. I met with the social worker at the nursing home and signed the DNR orders for Mom. Did you know that there are two main types of Do Not Resusitate orders? The first, DNR-A, specifies maximum effort to prevent cardiac arrest, but no CPR should arrest occur. The second, DNR-B, specifies minimal effort to prevent cardiac arrest, and no CPR should arrest occur.

I chose B. I also specified comfort care, no antibiotics, no intravenous nutrition, no respiratory intervention. I felt like a one-woman death panel.

Thursday was awful, although it actually started Wednesday night when we found out, quite by chance, that our checking account was overdrawn by $2400. Yes, twenty-four hundred dollars. It turns out that a check I had deposited several days ago bounced! So on Thursday I had to deal with that, and I couldn't deal with until after a 90-minute meeting first thing in the morning.

I was, to put it mildly, a little stressed. It evidently showed, because at least four people asked me if I was all right. The last person to ask if I was all right was in the meeting, just as it was getting started. When she asked, I said, "No!" and promptly starting tearing up, so I left the conference room and found my way to a relatively private nook and pulled myself together. I went back in and made it through the rest of the meeting, then called the business that had written the rubber check.

They were shocked -- shocked! -- to find that the check had bounced and promised to take care of it right away. I started feeling a little bit better.

And then my older sister called to tell me that it looked like Mom was fading fast. So I grabbed everything, called Joe, and beat feet out to the nursing home. When we got there Mom was actually awake. She even talked, although it was more like repeating what we said. She ate a few bites of soup. Mostly, though, she slept.

I took Friday off -- I really didn't want to chance a repeat of the Thursday tear-fest. We got out to the nursing home shortly after lunch. Amazingly, Mom seemed more with it. She talked more (though it wasn't really conversation). She smiled. She called me a dumbass and said I didn't know my ass from a hole in the ground. (Gee, thanks Ma!) She had quite a few visitors. She ate a whole bowl of soup and drank some milk.

The bank account situation got resolved too, so that was a huge load off my mind.

In the evening a bunch of us went over to the assisted living home and moved out more of Mom's furniture. Joe and I took the sofa. We ate a late dinner, all together, and talked a lot. It always feels so much better when we all talk. We get each other; we can say what we're really feeling and it's okay. Somehow we always manage to laugh.

Saturday Joe and I went to the Capitals Convention and had a ball. I put all my worries on hold and just had fun. I got some great autographs, went to a couple of interesting panels, and ran into some old pals. In the middle of this, my older sister called to report that Mom was really much better! She had been out of bed, in the wheelchair, talking coherently, and ate some lunch in the dining room. A miracle!

Today we went to the Caps game, a preseason tussle with the Rangers. The game was great -- the Caps won 4-3. Then Joe took me on my own private tour of the new Sant Ocean Hall at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. (He's working in the hall as a docent.) Then we checked out the dinosaurs and the gems and minerals (Hello, Hope Diamond!).

Tired but happy, we got on the subway. Halfway home, my younger sister called. Mom may have been great yesterday, but today she took a real turn for the worse. She spiked a fever, she was terribly lethargic, and she didn't eat or drink. Off we went to the nursing home. She was sleeping, but it was a deep, deep sleep. We couldn't wake her. After standing around for awhile, we all agreed to head home.

So we have fun. We keep life going. And we wait.

Dumbassery

I've heard it said that God looks out for drunks and idiots. Perhaps because those folks cannot look out for themselves, God keeps an extra close eye on them, sending an extra guardian angel or two to make sure no one gets hurt.

Well, this morning I definitely fell into the idiot category.

First off, I slept poorly. I went to bed relatively early, after falling asleep during the premiere of Community. This happened because I really wanted to see that show, so therefore I fell asleep about one minute in. It's my own damn fault; I stretched out on the sofa and that, my friends, is the kiss of death to consciousness.

Anyway, I woke again about 2:45 am. Wide awake. And yet, not awake enough to realize that Joe had already gotten up and moved to the guest room. So I stumbled into the guest room, thinking that a different pillow might help me fall back to sleep. I grabbed the pillow and almost pulled Joe out of the bed. After apologizing, I stumbled back into my bedroom, turned off the alarm, grabbed the original pillow, decamped to the sofa, and turned on TCM.

I must say, Hollywood pulled out all the stops to support the troops during World War II. I present as evidence: Hollywood Canteen, a strange mixture of fictional romance mixed with Hollywood Stars and musical numbers.

I drifted off during another Rah Rah World War II picture starring Kay Kyser and his Kollege of Musical Knowledge. This movie features an actor name Ish Kabibble. Really. Ish Kabibble.

I woke up 45 minutes later than normal. I jumped (sort of) off the couch, put up the coffee, and dragged my ass into the shower. I got to work almost an hour late.

Since I had to deposit a check, I decided to just go to the bank right then and there, so I wouldn't get wrapped up in work and forget, which I am wont to do. Even though I was already late, I went anyway, because hey, in for a penny, in for a pound, whatever that means.

Now, at Bank of America you no longer have to put deposits in envelopes. You just insert the check into the deposit slot and an unseen force yanks it into the magical scanning ATM, where it reads your check and displays it on the screen.

Alas, the magical scanner did not recognize my check as a check, so it spit it back out to me. I grumbled and tried again. Again with the ptui! Frazzled, I grabbed the check and marched into the bank (imagine actually going into a bank!), filled out a counter slip, and handed the check and deposit slip to the teller.

"Now just swipe your ATM card and enter your PIN," she said.

I reached into my wallet and...

No ATM card. The light dawned -- in my frazzledness, I neglected to cancel the transaction and retrieve my ATM card.

"SHIT!" I exclaimed (I am a delicate ladylike flower), "I left my ATM card in the ATM!" I ran out to get it, but the ATM screen was just the bland, welcoming screen. No ATM card in sight.

I ran back into the bank, weeping and gnashing my teeth (well, more gnashing than weeping), and the wonderful guardian angel teller said, "Hang on, let me see if we have a key."

They did!! She asked me wait, went to the back of the ATM, unlocked it, and rescued my ATM card. She made sure I was me, then handed it to me with only a slight admonishment.

"You're lucky," she said. I wholehearted agreed, thanked her profusely, thought about kissing her feet (but rejected the idea), and left.

The minute I got to work I logged into online banking and made sure no one had helped themselves to our meager bank balance while I was blithely filling out the deposit slip. Nope -- all was as it should be.

Thank you, God. I promise to work on not being a dumbass.

Our Version Of A Spa Getaway, Western Maryland Edition

I always know I'm getting close to a weekend full of laughter and peacefulness (yes, peacefulness) when I spot the Sideling Hill cut in the distance, just before rolling through Hancock, Maryland.

Joe and I headed out to the Cumberland area last Saturday to celebrate his brother's birthday. We went up late Saturday afternoon because, hey, it's a three-hour drive and we are pretty much past the point of doing that twice in one day. Luckily, Joe's sister offered up her guest room to us for the night so off we went, in the mist and drizzle, to the mountains. The clouds parted just as we approached the cut.

Joe's sister and her husband live on a ridgetop surrounded by woods. I think they must infuse the air with relaxation gas, because all my muscles start easing out of their knots as soon as we turn off I-68 and onto the twisty, back country roads in Flintstone. You wouldn't think that was possible, especially when you round a sharp turn and come face to face with a big old cow standing on the side of the road, just hangin' out chewin' some roadside grass, but it is.

We finally turned off the pavement just before sunset, headed deep into the woods and up the hill.

The nice tree man was there to make us feel welcome.

 

The koi among the lily pads in the pool swam up to have a snack.

 

A bee sipped from the gorgeous fall flowers.

On Sunday afternoon we had a party for Joe's brother with great food, and of course, cake!

After visiting, laughing, and eating, it was time to head home, east through the cut, back to reality. Oh well, we can always go back!

Ten Things About Jury Duty

Tuesday I reported to the Montgomery County Judicial Center to fulfill my civic responsibility as a juror. Here are ten things about that experience.

1. It rained that morning, so traffic was fucked. Of course, I had to be across the county by 8:30 am. I made it, but not by much.

2. The "Welcome to Jury Duty" orientation and video was good. Among other things, I learned that "voir dire" means "to see and to hear". (I already knew it, but what the hey. I'm sure there were folks who did not.)

3. The juror's lounge had free Wi-Fi. However, it was really slow and Twitter was blocked. Damn!

4. I got called to a courtroom shortly before noon. The courtroom was kind of small, but round, with comfy chairs. 

5. The judge's first name was Durke. His last name was not Diggler. He explained everything to us again ("voir dire" means "to see and to hear"), told us that this was a criminal case, and introduced the people in the room. The defendant was accused of stealing three cars late last year. He reminded us, several times, that in our legal system an accused person is considered innocent until proven guilty, and it is up to the prosecution to prove its case. The defense does not have to do anything.

6. Voir dire (meaning "to see and to hear") took a long time. The judge asked the group (about 40 of us) a number of yes-or-no questions. If we could answer "yes", we had to stand, state our juror number, and tell why we answered yes. The judge would then ask a couple of follow up questions, one of which was always "Will this affect your ability to be fair and impartial and judge this case based on the evidence?"

7. I answered "Yes" to two questions. One was whether I or any member of my immediate family had a connection to law enforcement. (Hi SonnyeBoy!) The other was whether I or any member of my immediate had been a defendant, witness, or victim in a criminal proceeding.

8. Most of the folks who stood in answer to the second question said stuff like, "I've had my house burgled" or "My wallet was stolen." But if anyone did not feel comfortable explaining their "Yes" answer in front of the other prospective jurors, he or she could approach the bench and explain privately. A lot of folks did -- I suspected they were telling the judge that they'd been popped for DUI or something similar. I thought about doing that when I answered that second question, but then I decided that I was not ashamed of my answer and that people need to be aware that these things happen. So when the judge asked me what had happened, I said, "In 1972, I was gang raped." A couple people gasped. The judge was cool though. He allowed as how that was a serious crime; did I feel that it would affect...? I said, "No, I think I can be fair and impartial."

9. Then the first 12 prospective jurors were called up to sit in the jury box (which wasn't actually a box, just two rows of comfy chairs). Each of us had to stand, and the defense and prosecution got to decide to swear us as jurors or excuse us from service. The defense attorney didn't hesitate with me -- "Excused!" he said.

10. It was the easiest $15 bucks I'll ever make.

It's Not Fall Until September 22

It was actually cool this morning when I left for work, almost jacket cool but not quite. I wore a turtleneck -- a thin one, to be sure, but a long-sleeved turtleneck nonetheless.

But I refuse to believe that it is fall, because it isn't. It isn't fall until the Autumnal Equinox; that is, September 22, 2009; 5:18 P.M. EDT. At that time, you can stand on the equator and the center of the sun will be directly overhead, if that's your idea of a good time. What's more, day and night will be equally long; 12 hours of daytime and 12 hours of nighttime.

After that, the night takes over, little by little, until the winter solstice in December, when I will hide under a blanket and whimper.

That might give you the impression that I hate Fall. Not so! I do hate the short days and the long, long nights, but I'm okay with the season itself. The air is cool and dry and feels clean instead of being a big hot mess of damp; the sky is blue as Redd Foxx's comedy act.

And, of course, there's hockey. The first home preseason game is September 21 against the Buffalo Sabres. Sounds like a great way to end the summer!