Interesting that a liberal station would be so cynical.  It was suggested on NPR this morning that a possible impetus for California going ahead with the gay marriage initiative might be the state’s rocky financial situation, and the desire for an estimated 6 million dollars to pour into the economy from the hands of the happy couples. 

A lady whose company makes wedding cake toppers for interracial, gay, and other non-traditional couples commented how a few years ago Macy’s rejected her application to be included in their catalogue of services.  At the time, they touted their “more traditional customer base.” Now they’ve taken out a full-page ad in the LA Times welcoming wedding registries from same-sex couples.  A full-page ad…at a cost of, like, a million bucks.  Gimme gimme.

Don’t we wish we could say it was the grass-roots efforts of a hard-working but vocal minority?  Gay people have been a huge part of the California economy since there was a California economy.  Of course they should be granted the same benefits as straight people.  It’s pretty shitty to think that the only reason they’re getting them in California this week is for Kindergarten Copland to make a buck.

PS:  The title of this blog recalls a quotation in a movie.  What’s the movie, what’s the actual line, who said it, and why?  Be the first with the correct answer and I will send you a copy of the movie.  Tell me something about the movie that’s NOT found in a five-minute internet search and I’ll really be impressed.

Drove to Wisconsin on Saturday.  Not on purpose.  I mean, we intended to take a road trip, just didn’t intend to miss the turnoff for Galena.  That’s in Illinois near the Iowa (and, obviously, Wisconsin) border.  Galena is also near the Illinois Highpoint (a-HA, you say…) and it’s a lovely little river town.  If you’re familiar with Manitou Springs, in Colorado, you’ll recognize Galena.  A single street or two crammed with interesting shops and restaurants, pricey bed & breakfast inns in historic homes, weekend destination for moneyed visitors from nearby bigger cities. 

So yeah, that’s a road trip.  If you’ve ever driven across Iowa or Illinois, you know it’s a pretty mild terrain.  (Read that:  flat.)  And except for the tornado and the tire blowing out, it was pretty uneventful. 

I ended up being grateful we crossed the border into Wisconsin, because I noticed the county name as we passed the state line and could thus identify ourselves as being in the tornado warning area.  I am so thankful to the radio announcer for telling us that the tornado’s route in relation to the highways (parallel to ours, but veering away) instead of just counties and towns, none of which was familiar to us. We experienced torrents of rain and some persuasive winds, saw a lot of tree branches down, but that was it.  By the time we got to the high point northeast of Galena, the sun was out and the day was (muggy – and buggy – but) beautiful. 

Gratitude # 2 – the owners opened their gate from the road to the base of the hill, saving us the 2+ mile amble up the sloping gravel road.  Since we’d lost an hour or more headed up the wrong road and driving through the storm and since more bad weather was coming, I was thrilled by the short cut.  This also meant that Norway could make the rest of the route on his own.  Norway scrambled up that hill like a little mountain goat, with Ollie urging him on.  They romped and fooled around on top and admired the beautiful view of the river valley and farms spread out below. 

Because the IL highpoint is on private property and the route goes right through the owners’ yard, they limit access to visitors to 4 weekends a year.  I’m already scheduled to work the other 3 open weekends, so on Friday I decided, what the hey.  What’s another 800 miles on ol’ Shelby?  (Shelby being the mini-van’s name.  Naming your dependable mini-van after the hot rod Mustang you really want seems kind of like naming your baby after your high school sweetheart and first true love.  Feels like a betrayal of some kind.  Sorry, Shelby.)

Not more than an hour after descending the (ahem, sharp, uneven) gravel road… (This is foreshadowing here)… we blew the front driver’s side tire.  My second thought (after “OH SHIT”) was holy crap thank god it’s not raining.  It blew on a flat spot of a hilly section of highway, plenty of daylight left, plenty of visibility for other drivers, and plenty of passers-by.  I called information for tire service out of Dubuque, IA, the next town, but only got one service station’s voice mail.  I put the phone away and started to change the tire.  I was mainly concerned about getting the lug nuts off.  Those pneumatic guns that Sears uses to tighten the lug nuts get those damn things on so tight.  Last time I had a flat tire, it took a big-armed guy with a sledgehammer to loosen the fuckers, no joke. 

This time, all it took was a couple of benevolent cyclists.  I had no sooner jacked up the van when they rolled in and asked if I needed help.  I did!  Girl power be damned, I couldn’t figure out how to get the damn spare detached.  The three of us got it all done in a manner of minutes.  Thank you, Eastern Iowans Pat and Don!  May your road home be all downhill and damn, you guys look extremely good bending over a tire in those little shorts.

Gratitude #4 (or is it 400?)

I stopped several times on the way home to check the tire.  I was very glad to have a full-sized spare and not a donut, but I’d never used the thing and stayed nervous the whole way home.  Ever drive 6 hours watching for the air pressure light to come on?  I was so damn tense by the time we got home at 01:30, I couldn’t sleep.  Which was all well and good, because I was up reading and watching the lightning that seemed to be right on top of us.  I was no sooner thinking, “Gee, this looks like the movie Twister right before the sucker rips through the drive-in movie screen…” when the sirens went off.  Tornado touchdown in the west part of town and a funnel reported in my part of town.  I woke up the household and dragged the sleepyheads downstairs until the all-clear was announced.  No power outage, no damage to my neighborhood, and no kids had any memory of being snatched rudely from their beds and dumped on top of Stan (whose bedroom is downstairs).  Bunny fell asleep sitting up in a chair before I went back down to retrieve them. 

Of course I wasn’t downstairs; I was on the front porch watching the action.  I like storms almost as much as road trips.  And this was a doozy – ka-BOOM!  An early report said the roof was ripped off a Wal-Mart, and I couldn’t help thinking that that was somehow funny in a trailer park kinda way. 

This highpoint was a repeat for Ollie and me (Stan has this one, too) but Norway didn’t have it marked off of his list yet.  So Stan, Ollie, and I are holding at 16 while Norway now has 14.  He only needs NE and AR to catch up to us, both of which I hope to get this summer.  Then we all move forward toward the big 5-0.  Wow. 

So what did YOU do on Saturday?

Kansas City is a special place for Frank and me.  It was one of our first real getaway spots, close enough for a one-nighter but far enough away to really be alone.  Norway was created here, at least metaphysically.  (The math doesn't quite hold up, but let's not quibble.)  We love to eat in the Plaza and walk around to our favorite shops.  Frank loves Jack Henry and the Kenneth Cole shop, he tolerates Anthropologie and Restoration Hardware for me.  We have visited dozens of bars and restaurants, but I know he always wants to eat dinner at Houston's.  It's now been four years since our first kiss when the whole world opened up wide. . . we celebrated with a bottle of champagne that turned out to be faintly pink...Domaine Chandon Etoile, it was.  It's only a few wines that Frank and I enjoy equally, and this was one of them.  Enough of a fruit cast for him and just barely dry enough for me.  Lovely.  We ate pork chops and steak, easily the best we'd had of either in a long, long while, and split most of a piece of key lime pie over coffee. 

Frank's at a meeting now while I tool around KC.  I'll tell him I came north to Briarcliff for some reason other than that I took the wrong exit on the way back to the Plaza after dropping him off.  I won't tell him he told me the wrong exit either.  Briarcliff is north on 169 and is it evah snazzah!  Fancy subdivision with this little coffee shop.  Ahem, 7 bucks for my cappuccino and croissant, yow.  Most of the little fancy shops open at 10, I'm told.  I'm looking forward to a little nosing around.  Perhaps after a little work on the old novel, eh?  1000 words, then I reward myself with something interesting.  I've never heard of any of these shops... I can tell plenty by the kind of cars the employees are driving.  Must be some kind of covenant; all cars are either pearl, white, or black, and either BMW, Lexus, or Caddy.  I stick out like a sore thumb in the bronze-colored Buick crossover.  It's new, but it's so totally the wrong color, darling.

I'll pick up Frank and noon and bring him back here for a light Mediterranean lunch at Trezo Mare.  You can tell by the name it'll be good.  And if not, well, it's Kansas City.  Our magical place.

I did it I did it.  I went to the gym.  I finished a 60-minute SET class (strength, endurance, training) and I can’t wait to do it again. 

My face was the reddest in the class.  I am the fattest in the class, not counting the pregnant woman.  Her tummy might stick out more, but my ass is bigger.  I forgot my water bottle but remembered my tuff towel.  I accidentally took the instructor’s spot because I didn’t know I had to set up my own.  (I also didn’t know “starts at 0915” meant “set up and gossip at 0900, start kicking butt at 0915.”  My butt kicking started at 0921.)

I was in the back, in a corner, by a mirror.  I watched my form doing lunges with and without weights.  I concentrated on my form and not lunge depth or amount of weight.  When everything started to shake, I switched to hand weights, then just to the weight bar with no weights on it.  My form is good. 

The instructor was supportive but (thank you, Lord!) not perky.  She had ballet training; several moves were familiar to my body.  Other than plié, I’ve forgotten their names.  I can’t believe I’ve forgotten their names.  I used to hear them in my sleep, yelled in my former dance teacher’s voice:  Pas de chat!  Changement!  Pas de chat!  Changement!  In French, that rhymes.  We did millions of those.

And go, Donna Summer!  Did you know she is the only artist to have a #1 hit on Billboard's club charts in every decade from the 70's to present?  I can't think of too many artists at all who've been singing that long and are still creating new music. although Willie Nelson comes to mind.  When was Bruce Springsteen's first hit... was it 70's or not til 80's?  Who else?  

Down here where the heat’s so fine

I’ll drink to your health and you’ll drink to mine

As we try

To make the money

We scored out in Vegas

Hold out for awhile

...

It’s goin’ on like this

For three years I guess

And we’re drunk all the time

And our lives are a mess

And the debtless love that we swore to protect with our bodies

Is stumbling across its bleak ending

But none of the rage in our eyes

Seems to finish it off where it lies

I got sugar

In the fuel lines

Both of us do

The fights and the lies that we both love to tell

Fail to send our love to its reward down in hell

I got pudding

For a backbone

And so do you

La la la

Hey hey

I only gave you my favorite lines in this song.  So you might miss some of the point.  You could go listen to it yourself, but I have no idea the name of this song, and I have no idea what album it's on.  The MG's have, like, 64 albums and 8 zillion songs, and most of song titles aren't the first line of the song.  EXCEPT, one I found while searching for this one (I did try for you) that just told me that the song I thought started out "The Best-Ever Death Metal Band Out of Denver" isn't.  Isn't Denver, I mean.  It's Denton.  Which is funnier.  Denton, TX is not a thriving metropolis, and it's not the place you'd expect to find any bands that don't play something you can two-step to. 

This is a direct quote from a message board discussing whether or not the band My Chemical Romance influenced a 13 year-old girl’s decision to commit suicide.  (Didn’t we cover this with Ozzy and Judas a few decades back?)  I did not change a letter.

Any body who claims that a band is able to make someone commet suicide is niave and igronant.

All fun-poking aside, of course the comment is right.

Now I have to cite Mike Royko.  I’ve talked about him before.  This acerbic columnist was one of my favorites in the 80’s, for his sharp wit and sarcasm.  What teenager doesn’t love a smartass?  And he was a bitingly intelligent smartass, at that.  Bart Simpson grows up, moves to Chicago, and smokes a lot.  (And, by the way, wins a Pulitzer.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Royko

One of Royko’s most memorable columns, to me, was his public response to a person who’d written to him threatening suicide.  His message?  Well go ahead and do it.  His point?  People who kill themselves are sick (or ill, if you prefer).  Something is wrong with them and they need help.  If they really want to do it, nothing will stop them.  People who threaten suicide by sending a note to a public figure?  That’s a different condition altogether.

He expressed sympathy for the former, but not for the latter.  I’ve been thinking about his statements in that column for 20 years, and I heard similar thinking repeated from the shrink I saw after my own incident.  I can’t call it a suicide attempt.  I didn’t want to die, but I hated my life, hated living, and saw no way on earth things would get better.  I spent 4 weeks in in-patient treatment and several more months in out-patient, visiting with this psychiatrist who helped me completely turn my life around.  Choices were her big thing.  You choose to be unhappy.  No one makes you mad, you give them that power over you when you react. 

Heady stuff for a teenager:  you have ultimate power.

This was a valuable lesson that I have never forgotten.  It includes an almost revulsion against the phrase “I wish…”  Don’t wish, do.  If you wanted to, you would.  If you don’t do it, it means you don’t want to.  Now there’s no bad or good in there, it just is what is.  You wish you could lose weight?  Something else is more important.  You wish you had a better job/had a cleaner house/spent more time with your kids?  You wish you could marry me? 

Something else is more important.  People do what they want to do.  Frank and I have had this conversation and boy did he listen.

I’d like my own kids to understand this without the razor and the mental hospital.  Maybe I could start by sharing Royko articles with Stan.

It matters not how strait the gate

how charged with punishments the scroll

I am the master of my fate

I am the captain of my soul

-from "Invictus," by William Earnest Henley

The kids are almost out of school.  In spite of repeated bulletins from yours truly, they will be shocked and dismayed to discover that "summer" does not equal "Wii."

Random thought while eating at my desk:  Why can't I get as compulsive about exercise as I am about eating and drinking?

Ollie's soccer game Tuesday was the most exciting I've ever seen.  The kids are finally dribbling instead of just booting it; they're aiming within the goal instead of just at it; they're keeping the ball away from the center of the field; and most of them are not scared to get up in the mix of kicking legs and cleated feet and get! a toe! on that ball!  The teams were very nicely matched this time.  Our team won (not that we keep score, ahem), but the boys worked hard for it.  Have you heard the phrase "they had to play the whole game?"  Okay well I just made that up, but anyway.  They had to play the whole game.  I just loved it.

Ollie, while not the best soccer player, is a phenomenal athlete.  He is lean and sleek and runs like the wind.  He is only 7, but when he runs, he holds his upper body up still and straight -- he looks like an Olympian. It makes me want to sign him up for every sport that exists.  I can't wait to see what this kid will do. 

"Essentiallly, eating high-calorie foods becomes a coping strategy to deal with daily life events for an individual in a difficult social situation," Dr. Wilson said.

That would be a no-duh statement in Seventeen magazine, but that’s not where I found it.  It’s in today’s New York Times, and it’s a story about monkeys.  As the teaser says, “New research suggests that eating fatty snacks may be a coping strategy for low-status primates.  You can read the article here.  

Only difference is, after hitting the snacks, apes seem to feel better.  Women, as we know, just feel guilty, and enter a cycle of feel bad, eat to feel better, feel bad.

In a completely unrelated update, my department floats along rudderless at risk of disbandment while I am no longer losing weight, but instead have started gaining again with no regard for the 20-year HS reunion in less than 30 days.  Talk about being reminded of one’s status, fucking high school, jesus.

Now where’d I hide that bag of Dove dark chocolates?

PS:  I stayed up late finishing this book - it is outstanding.  Whether you like baseball or not, but especially if you do, give it a read.  One thing I love about Frank Deford is his humanity - his sensitivity to the heart and soul of a person, but it is a sports book, okay?  So you're not getting any Alice Walker here.  But this is a writer who lives and breathes manly sporty things 24/7, yet will never forget the unbelievable heartache of losing his young daughter to CF.  If you really want to see his heart (and cry your head off), read his first book Alex, the Life of a Child.

PPS:  Stayed up reading it with my 3rd glass of wine.  Fuck that no alcohol shit.  We lower-status monkeys got to have some fun, woot!

We made it through “no TV week.”  We made it through “no restaurant week.”  But starting today I’m going to try “no alcohol week.”  I will never break through this weight loss plateau if I can’t say no to my nightly glass/s of wine.  And though I rarely drink more than 2 of anything, it worries me, sometimes, the feeling that I MUST have it.  In fact, I start looking forward to it about noon, and it’s almost the first thing I do when I get home.  1-kiss children, 2-drop bags, 3-pee, 4-pour wine.  You could set your clock by it. 

I am making only one exception: drinking with Frank.  If we have an occasion to grab a quick glass of wine together, I will do that.  But that’s it.

First test will be dinner tonight.  I told Bunny, the sitter, that we’d have a “Bunny Appreciation Dinner” and go out to eat at the place wherever she likes.  I would normally have a drink or two and use the eating out as an excuse to overeat or eat a big fat steak or heavy pasta.  I will resist!

I am still not exercising regularly.  I mowed the lawn, which counts, but that was two days ago and was hardly a workout with my new fabulous mower.  I. Love. This. Mower.  You have to understand, I didn’t mow but a few times a summer for the past few years because I could never get the fucker started.  It was bad enough with a gimpy right shoulder, but once the left wrist went wonky, I had no chance.  The “old” gas mower was finicky and very heavy, tough to push up the steep hill in front, and a bitch to get from the front yard to the back, and an unreasonable amount of wrangling to get the stupid bag off and emptied and back on.  (My grass is too thatchy to leave on the ground.  Plus, only mowing once a month, uh, there was always kind of a lot….) God that bitch was hard to start.  There were several times I just shoved it back in the garage after an hour of priming, pulling, cursing, waiting, pulling, pulling, flooding, cursing, kicking, crying, and giving up.  Toro, just so you know.  Once it got going, a powerful motor, a great mower, but it just wasn’t working out. 

My new mower is a Black & Decker ELECTRIC, less than 50 pounds, one click to start, one hand to push, easy lift-off bagger whose opening – get this – is narrower than a yard bag, so you can just take off the bagger, put the end of a yard bag over it, and flip.  So fucking easy.  I briefly considered the cordless mower (now that’s just crazy convenient!) but it was twice as much money, weighed 25 pounds more, and had just a fraction of the power.  Plus, Consumer Reports said don’t even bother. 

I’m hauling my new toy out to the cabin tonight to do my good deed for the place.  I so totally can’t wait for it to be cabin season again.  Give me sun!  Give me beach!  Give me water! 

We have some pretty big goals this year.  July riding RAGBRAI and September climbing Mt. Humphreys, not to mention this crazy idea I have of buying a bigger house next year.  Is it wrong to hope the housing crisis goes on a bit longer?  Yes, it is.  But there are some seriously fire-sale opportunities out there, in neighborhoods I couldn’t think of approaching in ordinary times.  I haven’t really “looked” at a single house, just driven around a few neighborhoods observing sizes and locations and yards and for sale sign after for sale sign.  Another 10 years and I bet prices are even lower, as boomers downsize homes and move into condos or retirement communities.  But I’m not waiting 10 years to move… it’s just something to keep in mind… buy a house with the understanding that it may be 20 years to really appreciate.  Route66 Finance 101 for the duhhhhh.

RAGBRAI.  www.ragbrai.com

Forget about clip-ins and mileage-counters.  First I got to figure out how to fill the stupid tire on my bike.  Couldn’t we just keep the old-fashioned screw off top and the valve that the pump just screws onto?  I tried multiple configurations of the valve and pump attachments and still couldn’t get air from hose A into tire B.  Stupid elitist athletes and their goddamned conspiracies to keep new adopters out.  Last spring I claimed the tire had a tear and had the bike shop replace the tube.  That man at the cycle shop actually lectured me about wasting money having him replace it when I could probably patch it myself.  Here I am standing there with a baby on one hip, pulling Ollie off the new bike displays, while simultaneously telling Stan how much he can or can’t spend on a bike bell.  Do I look like I have time to patch a tire?  I don’t know how to fricking patch a tire, you bastard.  Didn’t people used to say “it’s as easy as riding a bike?”  It ain’t easy no mo.

MT HUMPHREYS.  http://www.summitpost.org/mountain/rock/150241/humphreys-peak.html

12,633’.  All you need to be a Highpointer is the ability to walk.  Sure, there are big tall mountains that require technical skill, but they’ll still be there when we’re ready for them.  For Humphreys, I’ve heard, we just need endurance.  One foot in front of the other and a pretty good elevation gain.  But slow and steady up a well-packed and defined dirt trail… easy trail path to the summit, too, which is such a blessing after climbing so long (SD is a bitch once you finally get near the top...knee-high stone steps might as well be 10’ high after 3 hours of walking uphill.  Humphreys, my cohort says, is a little tougher than TX and SD, but not as tough as NM, CA, ID.  Okay then, that’s the kind of comparison that computes.  We failed TX but conquered SD, Norway in the backpack, Ollie’s endless blessed whining, Stan’s shin splints and all.  And I’d do TX again now, in a heartbeat.  In fact, we might consider getting to it before Humphreys, just for some training, if I could find a good 3-4 days free before the summer gets too hot.  TX’s Mt. Guadeloupe is east of El Paso on the NM border, due south of Carlsbad, NM.  You do not want to be on that hill in July.  You’ve probably seen pictures of El Capitan?  Mt. Guadeloupe is her sister mountain, right next to her, not as handsome but j-j-just a wee bit taller.  Highpointing is a totally awesome family project.  We tackle the lowboys while the kids are young and start in on bigger challenges as we gain experience.  I think we have about 15, but I started getting mixed up as we’ve tried to get Norway caught up.

We all summitted
MN, WI, MI, SD, ND, IA, KS, MO, TN, MS, AL, SC, NC

Stan, Ollie, & I (but not Norway) have summitted
IL, AR, NE, GA

So I guess that’s 17 for the big kids and 13 for Norway.  Gee!