the Philly phoenix

Super Bowl

2010-02-07T13:31:00.002-06:00

Have finished digging out and am settling in to watch the Super Bowl with my mom's signature Super Bowl Sandwiches:

Take hamburger buns (though substituting sandwich thins takes 100 calories off each one) and split them in half.

Place the buns on a cookie sheet and place any combination of the following on them:
-onion
-tomato
-ham (though i substitute turkey and it's just as good, again, saving calories too)

Top each one with cheese, bake for 15 minutes at 350

Go Saints!!!

Suspicious Minds

2010-01-27T08:55:00.002-06:00

Today is "Teacher Idol," and i volunteered to do an act in front of the entire school and three students acting as Simon, Paula, and Randy. Singing "Suspicious Minds" because i already have the words memorized.

i figure it doesn't matter if the students KNOW the song because
A) this is the perfect opportunity for them to be introduced to the genius that was Elvis Presley
and
B) as long as i am up there making an idiot of myself they will be so busy crying with laughter they won't even know what i'm singing anyway.

Don't think i have a stress fracture, as my leg has been feeling better today after two "off days," but it's so frustrating not to be able to run!! i guess i will just keep hitting the elliptical for the rest of the week and try getting back on the roads after that. Hopefully the pain doesn't come back. Who knew you could get so addicted to this sport so quickly!?

Ups and Downs

2010-01-25T08:05:00.003-06:00

On Saturday nights, i get frustrated with my job. Yet another man complains about the amount of time i have to give him, and i start to wonder if i am sabotaging my social life and chance of future happiness for nothing. i wonder if i should just get a lab job and cut my losses.

Then Monday morning comes, and a bubbly 13-year-old who normally wouldn't care about anything she didn't read in TeenCosmo comes running up to me holding a stag beetle and begging me to stay after school and help her dissect it, and it all feels worth it.

Have been feeling a dull pain in my right calf for about a week and a half now. Maybe i shouldn't have run on it last Friday, but i kept thinking i would get stronger and it would go away. Hoping it's something in the muscle and not the bone, but i am hitting the elliptical instead of the roads this week and trying to get a doctor's appointment.

If it IS a stress fracture, and i have to stay off of it for six weeks, i will be devastated. Does anyone have any good ideas for exercise in a boot? :(

First 5K

2010-01-17T21:34:00.005-06:00

Well, my first 5K is done! i felt so awesome after i was done! Finished 55 seconds ahead of my goal time, and improved my pace per mile by 1.3 minutes. i've already registered for the February event, so it'll be interesting to track my progress on an identical course after another month of training.

Here's a picture of me with the pickle (he ran with us... please do not ask me why... it is inexplicable).

And me with my running partner, Jenn...

Neglect

2009-12-31T11:42:00.003-06:00

Wow, since discovering Facebook i have so been neglecting this blog!

Workouts have been going exceptionally well. my pace is still around 17 minutes/mile, but that includes warmup walking. The two miles that i jog straight probably run around 16:15/mile. i've been pretty impressed with myself and i feel awesome. Not to mention that i will probably have those 10 Philly pounds gone in another week and be working on the next 40.

i went on the best first date (ever?... no, but close) since arriving in the city last night. We sat and talked for four hours, but i completely botched the kiss at the end. Hopefully that won't land me in the 'Friend Zone' and i can give it another go next time.

Almost initially perfect, this guy not only passes my initial check marks, but also understands my doppler effect bumper sticker. Mom asked, "yeah, but what is he allergic to?" Animals. All of them. But, he did seem optimistic about trying to live with them someday. Enough for me for now, anyway.

Worry not, Sao, my days of giving up pets for men are long gone.

Christmas was a blast. i managed to get my family exactly what they wanted, no (as far as i know) utter failures. Liz loved the scarf i got her, and that was my biggest gamble. Got my brother started on Beck, and my mom loved the Kindle we all pitched in to buy her. Finally found dad the shirt he loved that says "Beer is Good" as well.

Sao did NOT appreciate Stella Rue (Dave and Liz's big dog), and spent the entire break up in the guest bedroom after a very energetic first meeting. She is ecstatic to be home.

i am off tonight to spend New Year's Eve with some new friends and am so excited! Last year's ringing in at Wichita Midcontinent Airport, alone and heartbroken, went so fundamentally against my midnight tradition. But like my family said, it did portend a year of travel and change. i hope this year will portend a year of good friends.

Happy New Year to all of you!!

Some Lofty Goals

2009-12-12T13:04:00.003-06:00

On Kate Moon: thanks for satisfying my curiosity, guys! How do i not know her? i just found it doing a YouTube search for Clemson, or Clemson Band, or something like that. The comments were similar to those guys you knew, Ali... something like "so this is what it feels like to fall in love..." And i was so hoping it was Andee or Becky. Oh, well.

And now for some truth and consequences.

Since starting school i haven't been so good with the exercise. The schedule we keep here has been kicking my butt, and i've been getting home at 7 or 8 every night, and in bed by 9, and not wanting to spend my few precious hours of alone time sweating it out in the gym.

But i backslid on a lot of my progress too, gaining back about 10 pounds of the 40 i had lost. And that made me sad, which made me feel less like working out.

i have held off on making this post until i was sure my drive and motivation were back, and after two weeks without missing a workout, and five of those ten pounds back under my shoe rubber, i think i can. i am back to the 17-minute mile (i know that's not very impressive, but it does include up to 10 minutes of non-stop jogging at 4 mph, which i have been unable to do since moving to Kansas over two years ago)

Some rather lofty goals have been swirling around in my head for the last two weeks and i have hesitated to make them public, as that makes them real. But i think i am ready. Any of you runners who want to do any of these with me, i'd be more than happy to make a trip down to DC or even further, particularly for the last one, in order to have people with me when i do it.

1.) By summer of 2010, run a 5K race.
2.) By the end of 2010, run a 10K race.
3.) By the summer of 2011, run a half marathon.
4.) Drive around with one of those oval "13.1" stickers on my car.

i know what you're thinking... where's the marathon, Elle? Yes, yes, i know. It just seems so out there that i can't imagine it yet. And if i can't imagine it, i can't set a realistic goal. Perhaps i will add it once i've made it to the 10K mark.

Ok, own up...

2009-12-10T14:03:00.002-06:00

Who WAS this????

Does anyone know?

Those uniforms are from our day, and i certainly remember all of you doing this dance at one time or another... but who got caught spankin' the imaginary partner on ESPN?

Pennsyltucky

2009-12-06T19:34:00.010-06:00

In politics, the talking heads say that Pennsylvania is always a swing state because it consists of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with Alabama in between.

my brother’s name for this aspect of our state is “Pennsyltucky.”

There are more rural parts of the state than urban, of course. Much of it is covered with trees and rumpled by high (by Eastern standards) mountains. Bill Bryson describes Pennsylvania as the place “where hiking boots go to die.”

But let us not, ever, mistake this rural for the ‘Rural’ that exists in Kansas, Oklahoma, or New Mexico.

i like to take minor roads whenever possible.

In Kansas, this meant heading out of Wichita for ten minutes to find yourself a straight, flat ribbon through miles of farmland. Every now and then you’d come to a town which usually consisted of not much more than an abandoned rail car, a few homes, and a grain elevator.

Here, it takes a lot longer to feel “out on the road.” Most US and PA routes wind through the city, then the suburbs, then the outskirts long enough to make you feel that if you see one more stoplight you’re going to ram somebody out of road rage. And even once it does open up, it’s not a matter of whether you’ll get stuck behind a coal truck, an 18-wheeler, or a camper… it’s only a matter of which one of those you get stuck behind. You kind of have to accept this, and just settle for looking out to the sides of your car rather than ahead.

i miss the openness of Kansas.

But i will say that those little towns that the PA routes go through are much more charming. They all tend to have a square with a traffic rotary directing the two routes that pass through the town around the circle. In the center there’s usually a flagpole flying the US flag, the PA flag, and here in the eastern half of the state, they add the “Don’t Tread on Me” flag. In the process of circling, you are bound to be delighted by some little shop or café that you see there and park so you can go in. You are also very likely to find specialty shops that you’d never imagine could survive, but they somehow do. In Paradise, PA, there was a doll shop. In Gettysburg an Irish heritage shop. A cat lovers’ store in Towanda.

As delightful as i have found this, i do miss ghost town hunting. Bluff City will be swirling around in my mind as a venue for a horror novel for years, maybe forever (or until i write it?). Unless i go west again, this part of my life is essentially over. Little towns haven’t died out here.

i wonder what the difference is?

Here are some images of Pennsyltucky:

P.s. - First snow this weekend...! It is beautiful!!! i wish i had had my camera in Pittsburgh. i had gone out there to surprise my mom for her birthday, and didn't bring it because i assumed i'd only be there for 24 hours. Snow had other ideas. The drive home today through the mountains was spectacular.

P.p.s. - No butterflies. Another first (ok, second) date bust since arriving in Philly. Prospect of getting more cats looking very likely.

Waiting for Relief

2009-11-12T22:37:00.002-06:00

i won't be able to post much for another week or so.... comment writing time is coming up.

Last Saturday i went out with 10-Digit Man. i was so excited when he gave me his phone number. And excited as i drove to the place we were to meet. We had a great time. We laughed, he teased me about keeping one eye on the football game (Clemson takes out Florida State, yeah baby!), and parted well. When i got home i realized... i didn't have that little fluttery post-first-date feeling. Am i just too old and practical for that now? This guy is out-of-my-league good looking, funny, smart, powerful... why are there no butterflies? And am i still supposed to have them? Or is this just what i should expect from dating in my thirties?

He also admitted to me that his biggest concern about me was me not having enough time for him. Argh, guys, get over it... i'm a teacher, i work my ass off, ok? He said he'd have to revise his time expectations for me. i said i appreciated that. He asked when we could go out again, i said... five days, when i'm done writing comments. i'm sure that went over well. Will there be butterflies next Wednesday??

Until then, i am focused on my comments. One section tomorrow and tomorrow night. Two sections on Saturday. One on Sunday.

In other news, i watched the Steelers play Monday Night this week, and was floored. i haven't been paying much attention to the NFC, but during halftime i was informed that the Stains (i mean Saints) are undefeated. Whhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?!!? How bitter am i going to be if the Steelers play the Saints in the Super Bowl and i can't talk trash with Jeff? i believe my students would tell me the proper expression is... "O-M-G."

(i am assuming the Steelers will go the Big One again, of course.... Of course!)

Lastly, last Sunday was the most glorious day i have seen in ages. At least since moving here. i went for a long walk down to Germantown Avenue (the main drag through this neighborhood) and did some Christmas shopping as i walked. i found the coolest little ice mold.... Easter Island statues!

Great Day

2009-11-03T06:54:00.004-06:00

So, since i complained so vehemently last time i wrote, i felt i needed to acknowlege that i have had an excellent 24 hours... any one of these things would have been great on their own, but all three happening at once? Psssshhht.....

1 glowing report from my first class observation by my department head
17 lab reports turned in out of 18, all graded, entered, and annotated
10 digits of a really cute guy's phone number

i was so excited that i slept in my sexy pajamas last night! You know how big a day it takes to lose the flannel, ladies!

Hawk Mountain

2009-10-31T23:33:00.009-05:00

Tonight i was sitting out on my porch, reading my book and minding my own business, and a guy walks up to me, sits down, and starts talking to me. Nice guy, but he actually used the phrases "you've really got it going on" and "once you go black, you'll never go back." i didn't think people actually said those things. Much too young for me (22), and, is it snobbish to say that i like my pick-up lines a little more linguistically creative?

Anyway, last weekend i took a trip up to Hawk Mountain to hike. This place was astounding, particularly this week as we are at peak foliage. Another thing i missed while living in Kansas, where there are so few trees that what most people use to mark autumn is the occasional corn maze. (Not that i don't enjoy a good corn maze from time to time.)

Hawk Mountain is known as (and named for) a great place to watch hawks migrate in the fall and then again in the spring. It was a beautiful clear day, but i only managed to spot two red-tailed hawks... among the most common species. But the hike was relatively challenging, particularly on the northern half of the trail.

You can sort of see in the photo above, right in the center of the valley, a feature called "the river of rocks." It's an "upside down river," with large boulders in a trail down the side of the mountain and through the valley. Water runs beneath them.

The northern terminus of the Hawk Mountain trail is at a large boulder field unassociated with this rock river. But clamoring over them was nonetheless harrowing, as the dropoff on either side was precipitous. The trail from there was a link to the Appalachian Trail about 2.5 miles away. i'd have hiked out to it, but it was already getting toward dusk, and i didn't want to risk it.

Most of the trail looked like this...

And most of the drive back to the Pike looked this this...

These hikes are such great reliefs, as i am finding work very stressful. The school at which i'm working now is high-powered, prestigious, and demanding for both students and faculty, and i am finding the pace of life here a big change from Wichita. There i had a number of other responsibilities, like the after school program, chess team, and the accreditation committee. Here i can't imagine doing any of those things on top of my teaching load. (Well, except chess, which begins next week.) The first year at a new school is always the most stressful, and next year will be better. i am still managing to eat right, but am not exercising as regularly as i was last year. It's really frustrating, but if i want to keep my job, i have to keep up.

i find myself longing for three-day weekends and holidays. Lord knows what i'll do in January and February when there are none. And i haven't even had to write my first set of comments yet! That'll be just before Thanksgiving.

i feel like i'm always a few hours away from cracking. i'm just venting... i know i'll make it through, but man am i tired. i've got to stop doing this... maybe i'll just stay in Philly.

Well.... or maybe just one more move... five years or so? Head on up to Maine or Vermont....?

Gettysburg

2009-10-11T17:13:00.020-05:00

Last Monday was the perfect day for adventuring. Most everyone else was at work or honoring the Day of Atonement. It was also a splendidly crisp and clear early autumn day.

i waited for rush hour to be over (read: i slept until 9 because why not it’s a three day weekend and i’m not setting an alarm on a day i don’t need to!) and then got on the road, three times. (Just one of those days where i kept forgetting things.)

Once on Route 30 West, i popped in my Gettysburg Road Mix CD and started jamming out as i drove. Round about Lancaster, this song called “Your Rocky Spine” comes on. It’s a quality song, very mellow and aching. (i actually think that having a CD player in my car has allowed me more time to listen to music and in turn has improved my taste… i have wished several times over the last few weeks that Jeff and i were friends so i could make him a CD proving this fact. Oh well, he’d probably still say my taste sucked.) And i’m dangling my arm out the window and breathing in the rushing air as i do.

This song is lulling me into a contemplative state and i think… damn, i’d forgotten that autumn in Pennsylvania has these distinctive smells. You can smell sweet gum, earth, corn, hay, and [i swear] the coming snow. These smells are rushing over me and in my head i’m naming them, naming them as i whisper the lyrics of this gingerly possessive song, remembering each one… blueberries, bonfires, fertilizer, apples, hickory nuts, Ramen noodles…

Ramen noodles?

Where did that thought come from?

i’m jerked from my thoughts and my song, and i look off to the south and sure enough, there’s a Nissin plant out there on the rolling hills east of Lancaster, PA, home of the amish and the Dutch home cookin’.

Anyway, i drove through York and on to Gettysburg for my first look at the battlefield since I was 10 years old.

i went through the museum but didn’t have the patience to sit through the multimedia presentation. i was anxious to see the battlefield that my mother swears is haunted.

The driving tour is self-guided and spans a much broader area than i imagined. The battle ranged from north to east to south of the town of Gettysburg, but thankfully left the town pretty much unscathed.

The first place i stopped was meant to be the last, but it wasn’t until i had seen everything else that i really understood why. It was the Gettysburg National Cemetery. There are many people who have been buried here SINCE the Civil War, so it is not exclusively for those who died in this battle, or even this war. But most of the unknown soldiers and many of the identified Union soldiers are, in fact, interred here. And of course, it is breathtaking in a morbid way…

i think this one stands out as one of my best photos

This was also (and i didn’t know this) the site of the Gettysburg Address, the occasion of which was to dedicate this cemetery. More specifically, the memorial in the center was where he stood.

From there i headed into the town toward the northern front. In so doing i was absolutely charmed by the city [town] itself. So delightful… it’s sad how many people miss it in their battlefield crawl.

the square... "downtown" Gettysburg, and typical of small town Pennsylvania

From there i drove along Cemetery Ridge, the high ground held by the Confederates through most of the battle… and the monuments along that part of the drive are for the southern states, though their monuments are smaller because not a lot of southern states have cared to put money into remembering Civil War battles they lost… (though who really lost is a ridiculous question if you count men instead of ground… 28,000 confederates and 23,000 Union…)

canons on Cemetery Ridge

Virginia Monument

The Virginia Monument stands at the site of Pickett’s Charge, a cavalry move that pretty well ended it for the Rebels that day (and arguably… the War?) Sitting atop it is General Lee (my kin!) and engaved on the bottom is “Virginia to her sons at Gettysburg.”

The observation tower is eight flights up and offers a great view of the southern Gettysburg sites. In this one you can see Little Round Top and the Rose farm just below it.

Once i got to Little Round Top, a name i had heard many times, i learned that it was a stronghold for the Union sharpshooters, and that Confederate sharpshooters did comparatively poorly from their position down in the Valley, specifically Devil’s Den, a rocky outcrop visible on the far left of this photo. The Valley itself, now called the Valley of Death, is where a lot of those 50,000 soldiers fell, in particular the Wheatfield just beyond the far right of this photo.

As an aside… Devil’s Den is the only thing i remember from my first visit here. Climbing on the rocks was fun… both times.

The last stop on my trip was the Pennsylvania Memorial… the grandest of all the states’ memorials here on the battlefield, and dear to my heart for obvious reasons. It was getting late by the time i got here, around 5pm or so, and the light was a little tricky to get right. Also, though it was a slow day as far as people went, i was by no means the only on here, so i had to be patient to get a shot without anyone in it. i shot it from many different angles, but can’t decide on my favorite, so, here’s a decent one…

Around the base are the names of every soldier from Pennsylvania who fought here. A few…

A [pretty sad] anniversary

2009-10-05T09:55:00.004-05:00

Another postponement of the Gettysburg pics to note that i am approaching an anniversary which deserves to be marked.

But is it sad that i celebrate an anniversary with.....

....my cat? Sao and i will celebrate one year together on October 20th. She has done this snuggle-into-mommy's-neck thing since that first day, and this is the first picture i've ever managed to have taken of it. (Because usually nobody's around when she does it! Thanks, dad!)

Does that make me even more cat-lady-ish than i already am?

On that note....
(disclaimer: yes, i know this is not literally true... i have had some great boyfriends in the past, and probably will in the future... but it certainly feels this way sometimes, and it's funny!)

(post)ponement

2009-10-03T10:56:00.003-05:00

Get it?

Anyway, i know i am scheduled to post on my Monday adventure to Gettysburg, and i will, soon. i also know that i owe a lot of your blogs visits. i have been scarce since i started school again. my deepest apologies.

But i have to postpone once more to record the events of last night.
They may seem perfectly uneventful to most.
They probably are.
But it was the most fun i've had since arriving in Philadelphia, and i want to be able to come back to this and read it someday!

So... i'm running around my lab on Friday after school, trying to wrap things up and get out of there at a reasonable hour (read: 5pm) when two 5th graders poke their heads into my room and ask if they can sit in there and do an interview they had been assigned to do for their Civ class.

Jen, the educational technologist, follows them in and says says hello (we work across the hall from one another, she always seemed nice enough), and they proceed to interview her while i finish off emails, sort through my stack of grading, and pack up my bags.

The interview was really cute, and at one point, they asked Jen to recite some lines of her favorite poem, but she couldn't remember them! Luckily, i was on hand and could finish it for her.

After the kids left, she spontaneously asked me if i wanted to go have sushi with her and two other young, single, female teachers.

i have just developed a love of sushi over the last four months or so. i was staying with my Philly cousins while i apartment hunted, and they took me out to this sushi bar. Well, i didn't want to be rude, so i ate some and it was like a whole new culinary world has opened up.

But since arriving in Philly, i haven't had the chance, so i said yes!, even though it had the potential to be quite awkward.

When i arrived at Bluefin, Jen, Meadow, and Stephanie were already there. i knew Meadow because we are both new to this school and have gone to the New Faculty Meetings together. But i literally sat down, introduced myself, and shook hands with Stephanie at the beginning of the meal.

It didn't take long for us to realize that we have a lot in common. It must have been funny to hear us tiptoeing around issues we weren't sure were going to offend each other, timidly saying it anyway, and then realizing we all have very similar views on religion, politics, relationships and all the other potentially offensive topics.

We decided that we're kind of like the Sex in the City girls. Jen and Stephanie think that Meadow and i are hysterical and we think they are. We decided we all belonged on a TV show not called "Sex in the City" but rather "Not Getting Any In Philadelphia."

We discussed terms of being kicked out of the group when you get some, and how long of a dry spell it would take to earn your way back in, and then dubbed ourselves (for reasons which will remain private) the Sigma Sigma Sigma sorority.

We made plans to attend the bridesmaid's ball, and to rope three more people to dress up as the 7 deadly sins for a halloween party (which we also have to plan, and throw).

Of course the implied confidentiality of the circle grew as we talked, and i won't write about anything else we may or may not have discussed.

i will say that we were the first people at the very popular restaurant that night, and while not the last to leave, very close. As we got up 5 hours after sitting down, we each added another $10 into the tip, figuring they could have had three tables there in the interim, and the sushi chefs got up and clapped.

They clapped as we left and said, "hey, you set the record!"

i don't usually make friends at work.

You all know i have some personal stuff that i don't like to share with people i work with, and so i usually tend to find friends through other outlets.

But this was great. Sometimes nights like this happen, and then plans fade away, and people forget to come back together. And i can't say that won't happen, but i can say that if it doesn't happen, and i really have found three girlfriends of the quality i think i have, that i will want to remember last night for a long time.

Chaddsford Winery

2009-09-30T16:27:00.004-05:00

i propose that school goes all year round, except we get three day weekends every week.

The three-day weekend is perfect because it allows me to do everything i want to do with my weekends, all at once.

Saturday was spent with friends.

Sunday was a pajama day.

Monday was an adventure.

Saturday i went to a harvest festival at Chaddsford Winery with a group of new friends. This place is south of the city and part of a complex of vineyards I didn’t know about until that day. It’s a quaint little place that was decorated to its greatest extent for this event, i believe.

We were there for most of the afternoon and evening, going back for bottles of wine or bricks of cheese as was necessary. There was also a live band, and they played a great mix of rock and folk, but were unfortunately a little loud.

We also got to tour the facility, and boy did it smell good!

All you had to do was buy a glass and then you could go through and taste anything. As a group we had the spiced apple wine and the pinot noir, and i took home a bottle of Riesling which i have yet to have occasion to use.

i picked up a packet that lists and maps all the wineries in Pennsylvania, which was surprisingly thick. i suspect i’ll be using that in time!

Big Pocono

2009-09-06T16:09:00.014-05:00

So, i did call that guy back, and he is very sweet. But i felt nothing. And here's a quote from the afternoon lunch we had today... "If it's easy, it's not that hard."

People always say that love finds you when you're not looking? Well, bad dates can also find you when you're not looking (or in this case, when you're checking out at the grocery store). Did i mention the 25 year old who's still living with his mother? i am officially 0-for-2 in Philadelphia.

At least i have a cooler date tomorrow. A friend-date. Is there a word for that? i met this girl who's an engineer but has never seen Big Bang Theory, one of my favorite shows and very geeky. So she's coming over tomorrow for a mini-marathon. The second season comes out on September 15, so if she digs it i can see us doing it again. Either way, she's pretty cool and has great close friend potential.

On to the Pocono hike...

So, the pictures of the views didn't come out so well. Turns out, Camelback Mountain is on the outskirts of the Poconos, and while it's quite high, the surrounding terrain is less impressive. But it was so nice to get out on the trail again. Kansas didn't offer much, and of course i was pretty slack about finding the trails it did offer. So it's been over two years, i think, since i set bootrubber to mountain, and it was long overdue.

view from the top

Indian trail... the path was quite rocky, but being the coordinated person that i am, i had no trouble with balance...

An inunnguaq i built along the trail... it's an Inuit structure meant to communicate that "someone has been here before you." Something about that has always made me smile. my mother gave me a glass inunnguaq when i left for Kansas.

For this i have no explanation. i kept taking pictures of fungus. There were SO many different kinds!!!! These little guys were my favorites.

A little more traditional...

At one point along the trail, i found this rock, which was just begging to be sat upon with a notebook and pen. What did i write? Oh, that's between me and the mountain.

The Indian Trail on Camelback loops around the side of the mountain and offers this view at it's southernmost extent. The drop off is... precipitous, let's just say. However, given my astounding surefootedness, i was unconcerned.

After completing Indian Trail, i headed out along South Trail where i was promised two more vistas. In truth, there was only one, but it was my favorite of the day... i love the lake in the lower right. It was a hot day, and i would have given my right boot to dive in.

College friends will remember this. my mom was robbed as a parent with my birthday always falling in the first week of school. It was never celebrated properly when i was home because of this, and once i started college, she would always have to drop me off 600 miles away a week before my big day. But at Clemson, the dining halls had this program where you could order a cake and a pizza and have it delivered to your child in the dorm on their birthday. my mother did this religiously during the three years i lived on campus. Since then she has had to find more and more creative ways of getting a cake to me on my birthday, but she always manages.

This year was more difficult than others, because i had just moved to Philly and didn't know anyone. Or so she thought. Turns out, Shelley's uncle and his finacee live here, and she enlisted them to take me out to dinner. We arranged to meet on my way back from the Poconos, and lo and behold, they had a cake. my mom is good.

i was a little worried that the meal would be awkward, since i had only met John once, and never met his wife-to-be, but it was quite pleasant. They brought me a small gift... a stuffed duck holding a sign that says "birthday girl," and it was tied with a ribbon.

When i got home, i tried to put the ribbon on Sao with a little bow. i thought it would be a pretty thing she could wear around for the occasion. She ate it instead. (And thew it up later, of course.)

Sweat and Salad

2009-08-24T19:37:00.004-05:00

i haven't posted anything on the weight loss front in a while, mostly because there's been nothing to post. When i went to New York for that seminar, i had no time to exercise, and i sort of fell off the wagon. Packing and moving served as excuses for the next several weeks, and when i arrived here, well, i packed my social calender so that i could make new friends and that served as an excuse!

So last week when i went to my gym to transfer my membership from Wichita to here, i knew they would weigh me, and i prepared myself for the worst. i was sure i wouldn't have gained all 40 back, but i thought 10 at best, 20 at worst.

Then i got on the scale, and... nothing! i maintained. So even though my timeline is off (i had hoped to be below my post-Emily weight by my birthday), at least i didn't lose any ground.

So, now i'm back to a routine of sweat and salad. The walking/jogging i was doing in Kansas has been put on hold for now. There's an active rapist running around Fairmount Park here in Philly and the news says you can walk there, but best not to do it alone, and especially not alone with an iPod in your ears. [pointing to myself] So instead of walking 3 miles once a week, i use the elliptical machine in my apartment's clubhouse for 35 minutes 3x/week. i figure that's a fair trade, if not a better one.

i also have a date, if i can bring myself to call the guy back. It's scary to think about going out on a date for the first time in almost a year. i don't even know how to make a connection on a date anymore... not without 3" of ice and Tennyson, or rope and thumbtacks, or swords and moonlight (you college buddies remember when i stabbed Duncan in the hand and had to take him to to the hospital for our first date?.... heh... i don't think that'll work a second time).

But for now, i'm enjoying the fruits of summertime! i spent the last two days poolside, and will drive up north to hike Big Pocono sometime later this week. Those pictures should rock, so stay tuned!

Center City and South Philly Market

2009-08-14T17:26:00.013-05:00

Today i went on the train down to Center City. i had a couple of things i wanted to see so that i could "get the tourist out." i don't want to be lugging my camera downtown every time i go there like i'm some hillbilly come to see the big city. i hit the tourist spots so that next time i can go down there like, 'i'm a metropolitan gal... do this all the time...' you know... even though i don't.

i also wanted to identify some places for future reference, like the Hard Rock, and the South Philly Italian market, and the train stations so that i can get back to them without needing a map.

It's just about a 5 minute walk from my door to the nearest SEPTA station with a direct train to the three downtown stops (Market East, Suburban, and 30th Street Stations). i got off at Market East, and headed west a few blocks to check out City Hall. That's Ben Franklin on the top, and many years ago, it was a city ordinance that nothing could be built higher than Ben....

...so much for that city ordinance. It was tossed so that the financial district could go up. Really, it was unrealistic to expect it to remain, once skyscrapers became more feasable.

From there i walked along Market Street back toward the train station and then on down the line to the Constitution Complex. Here, between 5th and 6th Streets, is the Philly Mint (no photos allowed in the Mint), the Constitution Center, Independence Visitors Center, the Liberty Bell, Constitution Hall and Independence Hall.

First, the Liberty Bell... had to do it. So Philly.

Now here is a building that has been tragically overlooked. my feeling is that it has become so because of its proximity to Independence Hall, which is impressive, and i will address it independently (get it?). But this is Constitution Hall, where the first congress met, where George Washington was inaugurated, and where three states were admitted to the Union. But who remembers this place!?

This is, of course, Independence Hall, where the Declaration and the Constitution were both debated and signed. Here is where the geniuses who engineered our society did so. That's pretty cool, but i still don't think it deserves all the credit!

Then i was off to find the South Philly Italian market. So i headed down 6th and through a little square between 6th and 7th where i stumbled upon this. It is officially the Tomb of the Unknown Revolutionary War Soldier, but apparently there's no grave to find. People, men, soldiers, are just... under the ground... all over the square... i loved this marker. "Freedom is a light for which many men have died in darkness." Wow.

When i made it to the Italian Market, i was dumbfounded. This place is SO classic... look at it, that's all i can say. i bought some bread and basalmic vinegar to make my favorite dippin' oil, and then had a slice of pizza that put all other pizza to shame. (i know, if there were any New Yorkers around, they'd pulverize me for saying that, but hey, it was that good.)

i felt like a real dork taking a photo of this and not going in to patronize the place, but i just couldn't NOT.

Then this, i don't know if you can see in the thumbnail, but if you click the pic and enlarge it, get a load of the last line!

Finally, i walked back up 9th street to Walnut and then across to 15th, were i returned to City Hall and found Love Park before boarding Suburban Station and returning home. Seriously, guys, how many times have you see this sculpture reproduced? And how many of you knew it was in Philly?

Vestiges of a New Life

2009-08-02T17:53:00.013-05:00

i am slowly sloughing off the vestiges of my old life. Before i get into it, here is the Mary Tyler Moore photo. my mother bought me this big wooden E because we used to watch the Mary Tyler Moore show, and a big wooden M hung in her apartment. It was the first thing she moved in and the last thing she moved out. So, i do the same with my E.

As i suspected, the apartment is humongous. It leaves me with a lot of space that is just... space. Which is nice. Here's the living room.

And as i suspected, Sao LOVES the windowsills! my Wichita apartment had one window, and the sill was big enough for her to stand on, but not to turn around on, or sit on, or lounge on. This apartment has three windows, and all have cat-sized sills.

i actually have a dining room. A room that is for dining. It has a door and everything. It's not a nook. It's a room. i even had to buy a floor lamp to light it. i went with the four-footed one, so that it would be harder for Sao to knock over. So far, so good.

my bedroom. The door on the right goes out to a hallway (with a walk-in coat closet, no less!) and the powder room. The door on the left goes to my dressing area (a dressing area, for god's sake!) and the master bath and walk-in clothes closet.

Here's the view from the dressing area. Big white wooden E and all.

The apartment was expected. Here's my news. Believe it or not (i know, it's a stretch), the truck qualified as a clunker under the government CARS program. It was falling apart, guys. The passenger door wouldn't close unless it was locked from the outside first. It was leaking gas whenever i filled up. It was making knocking sounds over every bump in the road (and in Pennsylvania, that's every 1.2 meters or so). When it rained, it was leaking over the passenger seat. It was rusting, under the frame and into the frame. The gas cap took several minutes to pry off.

Don't get me wrong, i loved that truck. Loved it. Duke. i'll miss you, buddy.

But meet The Black Sparrow...

He's a 2009 Toyota Yaris. Three doors. (Yeah, that took me a minute too... they consider the back trunk a door.) Tiny. Sleek. Fuel efficient. i got $4500 for the truck, which was worth about $50. But to do that, Steve and i had to jump through about 24 hoops made out of beurocratic red tape. Steve is my Toyota dealer. We spent so much time together, we made it to first-name basis. Everything was set on Thursday, but i had to wait for the car to arrive from Jersey. So when the program was suspended on Thursday night, we freaked out. It all turned out alright, but i had a very sleepless night and a very stressful Friday.

i didn't realize how much stress the truck was giving me until i thought about not worrying about it anymore.

This is my first new car. Oh, i've had cars before. But never new. And i have never bought one before. my dad bought the Escort i drove in college, and gave it to me after i split a year's worth of payments with him or so. my dad also found and bought the truck (used) because my credit was so bad at the time. And while i payed for it, and maintained it, it didn't feel like mine, even when we transfered the title to my name.

The Black Sparrow is mine. i don't even think i'll mind making the payments on it. i just love driving it around. It has a CD player. Guys, i've never had a car with a CD player before!

And the back bumper? A blank canvas for new bumper stickers.... mwahahahahahaha.....

It has power nothing. No sun roof, like i've always wanted. No little beepy panic button. But i don't care. He's all mine, and he smells like a new car.

i've been fixing up the apartment, car shopping, and meeting new people in the last few weeks. But i think i will venture into the city on the train this week sometime, and hopefully bring you some Philly photos.

Saying Goodbye

2009-07-21T19:03:00.005-05:00

As i have become a part of Emily’s life, even as peripheral a one as i maintain, Shelly has taught me lots of tricks about being a parent. Many of them i don’t remember, but some i do: Never be above bribing your children into good behavior. Sometimes lowering your voice is just as effective as raising your voice. Taking something away that a kid really wants can be made easier if you just ask them to say goodbye to it.

So many of the goodbyes i made on Sunday seemed like the shallow, one-sided goodbyes of a child to a beloved toy. They were goodbyes to people and places that, for the most part, can never return my regret at parting, for one reason or another.

This is the last photograph i will ever take of Kansas…

it is the Flint Hills, one of my favorite places. Riding the highway along the rolling ridges is like treading the crests of frozen green ocean waves. i will miss this. i will think fondly of the first time i beheld it, and the soaring feeling of freedom that came along with it. i said goodbye to Kansas. i can’t say that i will never return. i would like to, but that is a naive notion (as is, i suppose, the declaration that i will never photograph it again) and you can never say never. If nothing else, it was and will always be a place people have to drive through to get elsewhere. If i ever do that, i will think of when i knew it as so much more.

i crossed the border just south of Kansas City. And when i put Kansas in my rearview mirror, i left a lot of one-sided goodbyes there too.

First and foremost, Jeff, my reason for being here in the first place, and whom i still think about every day, much in the same way that i think of Emily every day. They are two people i loved with my whole heart, but for very different reasons, i did not belong in their lives. i will walk on, as i always do. But i fear his resentment of me will be a shadow that always walks a few steps behind. There were so many moments in these last weeks when i deeply wished we could have shared goodbyes. i don’t know if it would have given me the closure i am seeking, but for all we shared, it would have been nice to begin and end this adventure on his doorstep.

The Midwest. We tangled, she won. A beautiful and unforgiving place. i thought i would come out here and change the world. If i opened a few minds, or even one, i move on believing that is the best i could do.

Wichita. The perfect city. On my visit to Philadelphia, the first thing i did was get lost! Once done, i stopped relying on Google maps and returned my faith to my navigational genius. i was good after that. But it has been a much easier task out where the grids are aligned to the compass. Or where there are grids at all! Wichita is a city with everything you could ever want to do: the symphony, Indian food, good airport, baseball… all surrounded by stark openness. Where you can go from skyscraper to wheat field in ten minutes flat. Where there’s never traffic, but there’s enough people for anyone to find friends.

My school. It has so much potential, all of it wrapped up in the kids and the faculty. i wish great things for it as it attempts to better guide that potential, as it tries to determine who it is, where it fits in, and what it wants to accomplish. The mire is thick, but it can be done. Make me proud guys – no, make yourselves proud.

Last but not least, my friends, who are scattering literally to the ends of the nation. Many began while i was away last month. Ben barely knew me at the start of last year, and i don’t know if he realizes how instrumental he nonetheless was in keeping my head above water through both heartbreak and crisis. Amanda, who i thought was just a silly blond party girl, and who showed me the great depth and understanding i look for in my closest friends, all while drinking a beer and watching football. Sarah, who has introduced me to some very cool shows, and who commiserated with me in a crucial moment. Will, the most complicated fratboy i’ve ever known.

When i was a child, i loved the pool. So much so that my mother had difficulty getting me to leave at the end of the day. She recalls hoisting me under one arm while i kicked and cried, screeching at the top of my lungs, “goodbye swimming pool; my mama won’t let me be with you anymore!”

And so now, aged 30, and quieter, but no less heartbroken, i say, “goodbye Kansas. We can’t be together anymore. You brought me more joy than sorrow, but we’re just not right for one another. Be proud like the pioneer spirit. Be strong and true and achingly free. But maybe a little more open minded, if you can manage that.”

Council Grove, Kansas

2009-07-18T01:01:00.009-05:00

my friend Susan has been trying to get me up to her lake house in Council Grove for two years. i finally made it in my last week in Kansas. Once we got up there, she gave me the grand tour of Historic Council Grove. It was a stop on the Santa Fe wagon trail. I saw the stump of an elm tree under which Custer once camped and a cave where a the hermit priest Father Francisco once lived for five months. (These are all on the Historic Driving Tour.) There were a couple of notable stops, though...

The Last Chance Store, the last place to buy supplies on the trail between here and Santa Fe:

The wagon ruts where the pioneers forded the Neosho River:

We went to Hays House, the oldest continually operating restaurant west of the Mississippi, for supper after a wicked storm chased us off the river:

Morris County, Kansas, has some of the most obliging insects i've ever photographed:

The lake was marvelous. We arrived in the late afternoon, and i promptly fell asleep reading on the porch. At sunset i took a series of photos over the water, and then the next day we swam for hours before heading back to Wichita:

i'm here until early Sunday morning, when the movers come to pick up my stuff and i head up to Illinois to stay a couple nights with my mother and visit Mark Twain's hometown of Hannibal, Missouri. Sao's in hog's heaven. With all the boxes stacked all over the apartment, it's like i've filled the place with cat furniture for her to climb around on. If i was worried about Sao being upset by all the packing, i shouldn't have been:

Pics from Dad's Wedding

2009-07-14T13:43:00.008-05:00

Making vows

Husband and Wife

my brother, Dave, and his fiancee, Liz

The view of the Allegheny River at the reception

my uncles, Buzz and Pooh round out "the heathen table"

the new sibs: stepbrother Richie and wife Gabe; brother Dave and soon-to-be sister-in-law Liz

Cleaning out the Computer

2009-07-07T11:11:00.011-05:00

Came into school today to get the boxes i packed before i left, drop off some literature i got at the Institute, and get my files from my computer. In so doing, i found some cute random things i had forgotten about.

me and my best Kansas bud, Ben at homecoming last fall... he painted my face "Bach Rox My Sox" and i painted his "Newton is my Homeboy."

This is unbelievable to me...

A science cartoon that i was trying to make into a card for Jeff at one point, but i still just think it's too sweet...

And a bunch of these from Graph Jam, but i picked this one because of Sao, who, by the way, took completely over my mother's home. Including the computer chair, which is the most coveted seat in the house.

Kansas Weather (last one)

2009-07-04T23:01:00.006-05:00

Just some SLCs (scary-looking clouds... that's an official term, no, seriously) from a thunderstorm that rolled through a few days before i left.

And the resulting hail...

i am back in Wichita for about a week an a half. In that time i have to check in at school and give back my key, meet with my boss, and grab the boxes out of my room. Tomorrow i have to make a run South to go to the Wyldwood Cellars Winery (i have several orders to fill for my family as well as a list for myself!) and the Ponca City Hastings to sell a few things so that i don't have to move them. After that it's packing, ordering wedding photos (my dad's, not mine!), canceling my utilities, getting a new phone number, and shipping out. Somewhere in there i will post photos from my dad's wedding and any last-ditch Kansas sites i can fit in.

Moving is SO MUCH FUN!

Apartment

2009-06-19T20:05:00.004-05:00

The apartment hunt is done, and i found a near-perfect place for a great deal. (i'm pretty proud of myself.)

Pros:

About a mile and a half to school, so on days that i walk i'll get three miles in!
A block from the R8 train that goes right into Center City (and from there to NYC, Washington DC, or the Phila airport)
Larger than any apartment i've ever had before - 875 sq feet with 1.5 bathrooms and a tremendous walk-in closet, dressing area, and den
Huge kitchen that is its own seperate room -- not the galley style i've always had
GREAT fitness center with three elliptical machines and four treadmills so that i can start injecting workouts into those other three days a week that i presently don't utilize
Newly remodeled stuff that still SMELLS like new carpet and cabinets
Because i'm an educator i get a discount package on rent and security deposit
4 blocks from the trendy Germantown Avenue shops
And the best part... the windowsills are wide and low so Sao can sit on them and watch the world go by

Cons:

Air conditioning is not central, it's wall units
Heat is gas (and therefore $$)
No balcony
It's on the ground floor of the first apartment building i've ever been in with elevators!

Can't wait to show you guys this place!
i'll be moving in officially in late July, and will have about a month until school starts where i can hopefully do some traveling. Maybe see some of those babies i've never met!

Will update better with photos when i return to Wichita in a couple weeks.

Yeah, baby!!!

2009-06-12T23:46:00.002-05:00

First city ever to win the Super Bowl and the Stanley cup in the same year.
First hockey team to win the Stanley on the road in 32 years.
Youngest captain ever to win the Stanley.
First Pens cup since 1992.
i LOVE this town!

Learning to Spell It

2009-06-11T11:53:00.003-05:00

Seriously, i have GOT to learn how to spell Philadelphia. It keeps coming out Philaldelphia or Phliadelphia or Phialdelphia. This reminds me of the fifth grade, when i hated my first name so much i wanted to go by my middle name, but couldn't spell it. So my teacher came to me one day and pulled me aside. She said, "honey, if you can't spell it, you're going to have to go back to using Ellen."

i feel like any minute now, some Philly cop is going to come knock on my door and say, "ma'am, I'm sorry, but if you can't spell it, you're going to have to go back to Kansas."

i found out last week, i have cousins on the Main Line in Ph-- Ph--- Philly. So i can stay with them and don't have to shell out for three nights in a motel 6 while i look at apartments next week. It's my father's mother's brother's son, so he is my first cousin once removed. And get this: he has two children (my second cousins), one of which goes to the school i'll be teaching at next year! She's a senior, and i won't teach her, but that's pretty nifty, isn't it?

On a side note, have you ever watched a cat fall asleep sitting up? It's too cute.

Remembering to Ask

2009-06-04T10:31:00.004-05:00

First off: don't be alarmed, i was speaking of my father's wedding, not mine... which is not planned nor even conceptualized. Dad got married without a hitch (pun intended... heh). At the reception i was kind enough to ask Donna when they were leaving for Virginia on their honeymoon, and she said, "Is that where we're going?!" Aaarrrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Once that was over last week, i just have four weeks to wait around until the Klingenstein Institute begins! i'm filling it with the reading i have to do for the program, working out, and making phone calls for apartments. i am very excited over a few of them, and will be going out on the 17th to scope them out. i have to remember to ask a whole litany of questions that i almost never remember to cover (central air? cat friendly? dishwasher? garbage disposal?) so i may well get out to some of these places and find them baking in the June sun with no a/c.

All the ones i'm looking seriously at are within walking distance to the commuter trains. So i'll be able to go into center city without taking the truck. Nice, eh?

Speaking of questions i need to remember to ask... the questions that i must start remembering to ask guys when we first start going out is growing, and soon i won't remember them all. This list doesn't come out of my purse like an interrogation sheet, but i do try to work them into conversation fairly early on. Say, first four weeks. If their responses are not what i'm looking for, it just saves everybody a lot of time. It's not meant to be mean, or put guys on the spot.

Also, responses do not preclude friendship. See, i don't hold differing opinions against people. The truth is, though, i'm just not going to be long-term compatible with people who don't agree with me on a few things. Up until yesterday, they have included the following:

1. Have you ever been cruel to an animal?
2. Do you live on your own?
and
3. How do you feel about birth parents?

i have been carrying on a flirtation with a guy i met in the last two weeks... he's local to the Philadelphia area but happened to be around Pittsburgh for a bit. We started emailing every day. It was a great exchange of ideas and dreams. i was getting very excited to get to Philly and spend some time with him.

i decided it was about time to tackle some of the big questions. So i asked him about religion. And the very next response was the big I. Intelligent Design. We went back and forth for a bit, but eventually i had to say, look, we're not going to be anything but friends.

He got offended.

Seriously, i'm sorry. i'm a biologist. i just don't see myself falling for someone who thinks my life's work is a load of bull. Best friends who banter and argue intelligently over the topic? Sure, any day. Grab me a beer and hit me with your best shot, buddy. But a lover? Mmm, no. When i get excited over a new discovery i want to be able to share it with the person i'm with. When i am crafting my lesson on big bang i want to be able to bounce ideas, not hide it away.

So....
4. Do you accept evolution as a scientific theory in the vein of gravity and quantum mechanics?

Pffft......

(Sorry, no pictures, and none for a while yet... my camera is full of photos from my dad's wedding, a hike i took last week, and a bad body-shot i tried to take in the mirror... but i'm staying with my mom and out of respect to her i won't upload the pics from dad's wedding on her computer. You understand..........)

i will be back to Wichita in four weeks to pack and move, and may well get the photos done then.

Need a new Name

2009-05-19T14:32:00.003-05:00

Given that Rachel Alexander just won the Preakness (which made me oddly proud of my gender... hm....), i was thinking Philadelphia Filly. But i'm almost 30. Not really a filly anymore.

Help me out, guys... i'm swamped in moving arrangements, wedding arrangements, and a two week intensive institute in New Jersey. i need a new blog name.

Nothing about cheese steak, please.

Ugh.

Or Rocky.

"Walk on, walk on, walk on..."

2009-05-11T10:10:00.004-05:00

This morning i accepted the job in Philadelphia.

i am happy and terrified. And this is a good thing. Were i not scared, this would not be moving on. But now i am certain that it is. i have often wondered, as i mull over decisions, if it is possible to make a mistake and miss your path forever.

i am inclined to think that your path is indeterminate, and that its end is not destiny. But what do i know?

When i hung up the phone, i sat down on the floor, listened to the Weepies on the stereo, and cried. i will be leaving much behind here, though in a way i feel it has already left me behind, and i am simply closing the door and letting it all go. Sometimes that is the hardest thing to do.

i will save a place in my heart for Kansas... for the wide openness of it all, and the energy carried across the plains by its summer storms. i will miss how easy it has been to travel from here, and lament the Death Valley trip that will take me a long time to make now. This summer has gone from hectic to whirlwind, and when it is all over i get to start a new job in a new city!

i will miss people. From my best-Kansas friend Ben to Frat Boy Will, to New Guy and New New Guy (who is a great kisser, by the way, but not monogamous - what IS it with that?!) and my colleagues at school who have supported me through some really difficult days.

Five more pounds gone. Forty total. A new life. A new city. Here's to Philly!

Philadelphia

2009-05-05T10:18:00.003-05:00

Short post because i'm busy catching up and so confused and torn...

i was offered the job in Philadelphia. No idea about salary yet, and with the increased cost of living, that might decide it. Assuming it doesn't, though... here's my dilemma...

i have a strong sense that i don't belong here. But i don't want that to beat me. i almost feel like i'd be going back to Pennsylvania with my proverbial tail betwixt my lower limbs. i'm afraid i'd always look back on Kansas as the place that won. i think if it were in Seattle or Albequerque it would feel like moving on. But going back to PA seems like copping out.

i'm many unpleasant things (insensitive, elitist, judgemental) but i don't think anyone could accuse me of being a coward. And i don't want to be one now.

On the other hand, maybe there's something to be said for knowing where you don't belong.

i also think i may want to hold out for an upper school biology position.

And it could still be a grand adventure. i could get an apartment in downtown Philadelphia. i've never lived in the middle of a big city before - where you could go out for Chinese at 2am or ride a subway from your place to your best friend's place. i would be going back, almost exactly thirty years later, to the city where i was born, though i left it when i was only two years old.

And i'd be closer to all my family... just about equidistant from my brother and parents, but far enough away to have my space.

Geez, guys, i don't know.

Territory

2009-04-30T07:44:00.006-05:00

Heading to Philadelphia tomorrow morning at dawn's butt crack.

Went on the yearly field trip to Topeka this week which included much of the same sites as last time except for Lecompton, the territorial capitol of Kansas and the site of the start of the civil war. (Yes, i defended Fort Sumter for y'all, but these people are convinced.... they do have a point, that Bleeding Kansas was the first bloodshed over the issue of slavery, but if you ask me they're really splitting hairs.)

Still, it was cool, and i have a new history-crush (sort of like a man-crush, but on somebody who's dead): Jim Lane, an abolitionist and hell of a speaker. If you're so inclined, i highly recommend getting a copy of some of his speeches!

Anyway, since most of y'all back east don't live in states that have territorial histories, i thought you might get a kick out of this...

In other news, i have a date. Remember married guy? So, my friend called me Saturday wondering why i hadn't made it to the gathering on Friday night, and we got to talking. i asked him if the cute New-New-Guy (i need to get better code names for these people!) with the goatee and the killer smile was there and he said no, that he had RSVPd but didn't show. So i said, aw, that's ok, he's married anyway. my friend says uh, no, he's divorced... and i started verbally kicking myself and finally told him to send New-New-Guy a personal invitation from me to the next event. Yesterday... i got an email from my friend.... New New Guy is excited to see me and will definitely be attending on May 9.... heehee!!

When i met him last time, though, i felt bold and daring. i flirted like it was my last flirt. Now with so much time to anticipate it, i'll be all nerves and fidgets. i'll probably trip on my own toes and make stupid science jokes. How could i have NOT caught the 'ex' part when he was talking about his wife?!?

Off to Phila... the city of my birth...

Early Before/After Photos

2009-04-22T15:33:00.007-05:00

Ok, so i had my camera out last night because i was packing it for school today (ever since i bought this SLR i've been drafted into taking all the class photos for the 8th grade slideshow). And Sao struck a pose.....

....so since i had the camera out i decided to snap a few pictures of myself and see what i could come up with. i know it's not a body shot, but i was pretty impressed with myself anyway. So, here they are, a little early (i'm at almost 35 pounds lost now... five pounds more than last time i posted about it). i always love seeing these things of other people so i hope you enjoy as well.......

Here i am at Thanksgiving, my highest weight ever in my life (i can't believe i'm making this picture public!!)....

And here i am as of Tuesday night, right about where i was when i moved to Kansas....

Stay tuned for the "lowest i've been since 2004" shot this summer and, hopefully, around my birthday, my "i know i'll never be a skinny minnie but i'm happy, healthy, and comfortable at this weight" shots!!

The 17-minute Mile

2009-04-21T08:18:00.003-05:00

On Saturday i got up lazily at nine and ate breakfast with my cat on my face, as usual. When it was time for my walk, i decided to do things a little differently.

Perhaps because making my route longer has proven annoying (too few sidewalks, and i hate causing traffic jams as much as i hate walking plastered up against the brick walls that enclose ostentatious housing developments), or perhaps because you all and your incessant running have inspired me, i decided to push myself on pace and keep my safe, sidewalked, 3-mile route. It usually takes me 54 minutes, which means i walk a shameful 18-minute mile.

i decided i could push myself to 51 minutes (17-minute mile) to begin with and then work it back from there. i had to jog in several places, including the last several hundred meters when i should have been cooling down, but i did it. And i felt tired, and hurt. All good things.

Saturday, after dodging a tornado (only in Kansas could your social life be interrupted by a tornado), i went out with a new group of friends... ones i've known about since shortly after arriving here and have just now managed to hook up with... and i felt fine. Loose. Good.

But Sunday morning i was sore! Yesterday my muscles felt fine but the Nebraska-sized blisters on my heels were so bad i had to skip the gym for the first time in months. This is not good... an excercise routine that keeps me from excercising?!?? Help, running friends... i need advice! New shoes? (That rarely helps with blisters, right?) Mole skin? i had a dancer friend tell me to rub deoderant on the blister-prone spots before going on my walks... What do you think?

Good reasons to keep doing this timing thing:

i really pushed myself and got a better workout
i can set goals for myself to work toward, like getting back to my 15-minute average from before i moved to Kansas, and maybe eventually the 10-minute national average
It's a way to gauge how fit i am becoming

Good reasons to stop doing this timing thing:

i became absolutely obsessed with time!, and thought of nothing else... normally when i walk i put my headphones on and spend an hour having elaborate fantasies (which could be fodder for science fiction bestsellers, by the way) or sorting through my life... i've lost that as i mentally subdivide my walk and make sure i am on pace
These blisters are killer!!
i will have to be on par or better every time i walk; knowing me, i will not tolerate any backslides and will push myself even when i probably shouldn't

So, those of you who have advice, please help me out.

Sedgwick County Zoo

2009-04-14T16:04:00.011-05:00

This post might also be termed 'dating sucks.' i shouldn't, of course, call it dating, as New Guy and i decided to be just friends after the Adoption Insult Fiasco (hereafter, "the incident"). i have to be careful about comparing new guys to Jeff. But in this instance i have to say that Jeff really did set a high bar. He accepted and embraced not only my love of Emily but also Emily herself.

Argue all you want for New Guy - he didn't know, he was just trying to be funny, the incident was a sincere mistake - a relationship is just not going to happen there. Which is for the best anyway: he was wanting more than i was, and that's just not fair to him.

So, we made plans to go to the zoo. Two friends who both love animals, and a nice walk. i had never been to the Sedgwick County Zoo before, and was excited to see it. But when i arrived at his place to meet up with him, he had laundry for me to do. Oh, and trash to take out. What?!?? i know that i'm bent toward more... traditional... relationships. But we're not in one, and this guy spent several weeks trying to convince me that i was wrong about that. So... why the chores, Mister?

i let it go and focused on enjoying the day. But between sung choruses of "zoo, zoo, zoo, I love the zoo," were random bits of advice on playing a good game of Zoo Tycoon®. (This from a guy who's been trying to convince me for months that the fact that he's two years younger isn't worth worrying about.)

In the evening we met up with a group of mutual friends for supper. And this supremely hot guy with a goatee and a killer smile walks in, sits down, and we have the best conversation about Bob Marley/Jimi Hendrix. He's a music geek, but not an Elvis fan. (Strike one, but i'm thinking he's hot enough to get one pass.) Two hours in, the crowd's thinning out... i'm starting to imagine an enchanted evening where we sit here until two in the morning just talking and losing track of time... then we wander into the parking lot and it's cold so he gives me his coat... then it ends with this tentative kiss that promises secret nights of ecstacy... and he drops the W bomb. No, he didn't vote for George Bush. "My wife and I love to camp...." i have a feeling that that's going to start happening to me more and more often as i enter my thirties.

Ugh. i repeat. Pointedly... dating sucks.

Anyway, here are the best pics from the zoo.

Two bar-headed geese sleeping together

Ruddy Shelduck

Demoiselle crane

Red river hogs fighting

P.s. - i'll make a deal with you... i'll promise to post before and after pictures at the 50-pound mark, if you guys stop asking every time i drop five. :) Seriously, though, especially with a big old SLR, it's difficult to take a good self-portrait, and i feel like a dork asking people to take them of me. So, i'll take one at 50 and another at my goal, if that sounds ok with you. i already have my "before" picked out... the photo that inspired the change!

P.p.s - Your support has meant a lot to me and kept me from more than a few pieces of birthday cake over the last few months. Thanks heaps, guys!

Drive-by Update

2009-04-06T08:34:00.005-05:00

my brother's getting married!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i'm getting one of the coolest sister-in-laws ever... AND a dog-niece!

i was accepted to the very prestigious Klingenstein Institute for their summer program run by Columbia Teachers College and will be in Princeton, NJ for two weeks in June.

i've lost another 5 pounds (slowing down, but i kind of figured it would... still going in the right direction, though)! Total: 30 since December 5th.

i have an interview in Philadelphia in May. Idaho didn't work out.

1237

2009-03-31T07:48:00.004-05:00

i have this weird-ism about myself and the number 1237. i developed it in high school when i went to my first (and only!) traditional high school "party." i use the quotations because i was way too much of a goody-goody to actually drink or anything else that went on there that night.

i think the house number might have been 1237....? Or it ended at 12:37....? i don't actually remember now. But i got it in my head that night that that number was portentous. Since then i have seen it everywhere. If i wake up in the middle of the night? It is garaunteed to be 12:37am. If i randomly glance at a clock in the afternoon... 12:37. It's the filing code on my Netflix movie, or the expiration time on a McDonald's cherry pie. Maybe it's no more common than any other number and i have just convinced myself for the last fifteen years that it's everywhere. Or maybe, just maybe... it'll be the day i die (1/2/37) or the address of my first home. Or the price of my next car! Or the time of my first [second] child's birth.

Who knows. i'm probably nuts.

It showed up again on Friday night. We dismissed early from school on Friday due to the blizzard (if any of you have been watching the Weather Channel lately) and i gleefully went home to a long weekend stuck inside with the excuse of not going anywhere. i would play with the cat, watch Red Dwarf, and eat Lean Cuisines (no cooking!). But on Friday night at exactly 12:37, as i was snuggling up in bed with a book and the pelting sleet drumming against the window, i heard a little beep in the hallway. It sounded like the smoke alarm, so i went to peek my head out the door and found a waterfall in the ceiling of my apartment building. It wasn't leaking into my unit, so i called the emergency maintenence and went back to bed. A little after 3, i woke up to the alarm blaring continually. i guess water had gotten into it or something. So i called again, and stayed awake. Who could sleep? Sao climbed up onto my shoulder as she always does the instant i sit on the couch, and we listened to the sleet and watched NBC, the only channel i could get on my new television.

By 8am, the alarm seemed to be slowing down in both tempo and pitch, and finally it went off. Ah, blissful silence. So i wandered back to bed and snuggled back in. Sao jumped up and joined me. We were two peas in a pod. Ten minutes later, the cable guy calls. Sleet has turned to snow and we now have 5 inches on the ground with blizzard conditions and new snowfall of about 2 inches/hour. i can't get the apartment maintenence men to come fix a celing that's leaking in no fewer than five places, including a light fixture. But the cable guy? He's there two hours early and raring to hook me up!

Now, i have never paid for cable in my life. But when my old TV broke and i had to buy a flatscreen, i could no longer get my broadcast channels via rabbit ears. So i broke down and asked for the most basic package, channels 2-22 which essentially covers the broadcast channels plus the Weather Channel (nice to have in Kansas, though i am discovering that the local guys do a much better job in a tornado situation) a few local public access channels, and two CSPANs! Seriously? Of all the cable channels i would have chosen, CSPAN would not have been one of them. Let alone two of them. CNN, sure. Discovery! Animal Planet. Nick at Night. Anything. Just not CSPAN. But i get two of them!

So the cable guy comes and goes, and i check out CBS, which i've never gotten here. Yes! It comes in. i can watch Big Bang without having to get a tape from our secretary. Now i can go back to bed in peace. It's 11am and great afternoon sleeping weather. So i crawled back into bed. i kid you not, folks... i kid you not... the moment i pulled the covers up to my face and got that happy little smile of a sleep deprived person about to succumb to the land of Nod... the alarm started going again.

And so went my weekend.

Sao, napping professional, hardly noticed...

Louisiana Part 3: Food and the Return

2009-03-21T15:16:00.007-05:00

Louisianans eat some strange stuff...

So i figured i had better join in. On the way back through Alexandria, we stopped at this charming little restaurant called Tunk's Cypress Inn...

Tunk's sits right on the Kincaid Reservoir. The view is spectacular, and the atmosphere is wonderful. But their fame comes from the menu. They serve alligator here. So, when in Rome...

It was very good... tail meat, from what i'm told. They cut off the tails and then feed the rest of the body back to the other gators. Mmm.... Actually, i have came to find out that a lot of restaurants in Louisiana serve alligator. But these guys will give you a bumper sticker to brag about it!

We went back home through Shreveport and Dallas on 20, and then up 35 through Oklahoma. i was excited to see the Arbuckle Mountains, of which i had heard so much hype. So when we got there and saw a scenic overlook turnout, i took it. Here's the view:

Those are Arbuckle Mountain Cows, my friends... very rare species. ;) See those peaks in the background?!

We also went by Norman, and it was too late and mom was too tired to stop at the mega-Hastings (a books and movies store that i love but no longer get to much). We went by Blackwell, and mom was too tired to stop for the Chinese restauraunt (that i love but no longer get to at all). And we went by Wyldwood Cellars (a winery that i love... are you getting the pattern?) but they were closed for the day.

So i've decided that on the first Saturday of April i will make a tour of Lost Oklahoma Pleasures.

i sent mom home on the train today. It's always sad when she leaves. Sao is glad to have her bed back, though.

Louisiana Part 2: Louisiana Proper

2009-03-21T14:15:00.017-05:00

The next morning we got up and drove the remaining 20 miles or so into Louisiana. i was so excited to get this last continental state!! As soon as we stopped, in a little town called Natchitoches (pronounced Nak-a-tush) i leaped from the car and set foot in my 48th state. Even that far north, there were swamps in every direction. Most of the roads are causeways!

From there we got off the highway onto Louisiana Route 1, which essentially follows the Red River southeast toward Alexandria. Most of the route looked like the way a horror movie would start (very reminiscent of the Bluff City trip). my mom was looking for the Bayou Folk Museum, which is located in Cloutierville (pronounced Cloot-cherville), a town worthy of Dueling Banjos...

...but we couldn't find the stately home of the author. Turns out, that was because it burned down five months ago, and when we finally figured out what this was, we were so disappointed. What a terrible loss to this community, and the state's history in general....

On to Colfax. Site of the Colfax "Riot," better known as the Colfax Massacre. my mom and brother were both trying to read the same book over Christmas. Turns out it was about this incident in Colfax, Louisiana. So we had to see it on our way to St. Francisville, which is right on the Mississippi River, and where we spent the largest amount of time.

Louisiana is beautiful. Absolutely stunning. i say that with two caveats:
1. i was there in March, not August.
2. i did not spend much time off the beaten path, in towns like Cloutierville.

There are swamps with knobby cyprus trees all over the place. Birds and flowers and huge old oak trees with lots of Spanish moss.

St. Francisville has a church at the center of town with a beautifully kept cemetary...

... and several lavish plantation homes around.

The Myrtles

Rosedown

Before we left St. Francisville to head back up North, we stopped into a little store called Grandmother's Buttons where they make jewelry out of antique buttons, and a local vinyard and winery where we both got bottles of Muscavine Wine... both of which are now gone.

Louisiana Part 1: Texas

2009-03-21T13:36:00.009-05:00

i have now completed the Lower 48! Only Alaska and Hawaii left... though i am thinking those might be a ways off. (But who knows!?)

my mom came in on the train for our yearly spring break visit. i offered to drive up to Kansas City to pick her up so that she could check her luggage, but that left us in the truck until 1am on Sunday morning. We crashed hard. She had been traveling for twenty four hours, and i had been at the state chess tournament all day before the six hour drive.

[Chess season is now over. Our team took 8th place in the state of Kansas. Not too shabby.]

On Sunday we bummed around Wichita packing and playing with the cat, and watching my favorite show on DVD: Big Bang Theory. On Monday morning we went and picked up our rental car for the trip.

We made it as far as Marshall, Texas the first day and stayed in a Motel 6. (i have not sung the praises of Motel 6 since my Summer Solo Southwest Safari... let me say again, they are always cheap, always clean, and always dependable. i love Motel 6.)

my mother had never been in Texas, so this brought her State Count to 43. my brother is still lagging behind everyone else at 40. my dad got all 50 years ago.

But Texas was not our goal, so we pretty much blew through it. Here is what i remember about the Lone Star State: they love catfish. They have night and day speed limits.

Thinking about Emily

2009-03-12T07:36:00.010-05:00

Last Friday, March 6th, was Emily's 6th birthday. Can you believe it? Six years.... Anyway, i come home on Friday, late, of course, as i am with the after school kids until 6pm and then at the gym until 7, and there's a note on the door from a local florist shop. And i think, who would send me flowers on Emily's birthday? Nobody has done anything like that since maybe her first birthday. The note said they had been left at the apartment office, and i realized that i was going to have to leave the chess tournament on Saturday to go get them or, given my schedule and the office hours, i was never going to get them. (Going to the bank, post office, or rental office when you work M-F 7am-6pm is really difficult.) So i get to the chess tournament and after the first round starts i tell the other coaches that i have to go pick up these flowers or they'll die between now and two weeks from now when the next time i'm avaiable to get them will be. The parents all twitter over me... "oh, are they from your ex boyfriend??" And i say no, i seriously doubt that, and try to slip out in the bustle of pairings.

When i got to the office, i found these...

They were from Chris and Shelly. It's so sweet of them to think of me on this day. And they truly are the most thoughtful people in the world. Shelly even remembered how i prefer plants to cut flowers, and they are still growing and blooming on my kitchen table today. (Although Sao likes to eat the leafy green part, and i have to keep spraying her with water to keep her discouraged.)

When i got back to the chess tournament, i hadn't even thought about the parents and their enthusiastic curiosity. i went into our team room and was immediately asked, "Well??" And then i'm thinking... oh, crud, what do i say? It's not like i can just tell all these people our story... it's not really professional, some of them don't even like me...

So i said they were from the new guy and tried to drop it.

i didn't make him up. There is, kind of, was, sort of, a new guy. i've been taking it pretty slow for several reasons, not the least of which is that it was just happening that way. Romance should be organic, and i am dealing with a major overanalyzer here. Not to mention on my end that i have only just marked five months of singlehood.

We have a standing Tuesday date, and have been seeing each other in a friendship/dating hybrid status for a couple months. So i felt like it was about time to sit down and tell him Chris, Shelly, Emily, my, and my family's story. i wanted to do it soon enough that if it was a deal breaker, i wouldn't feel like i had led him on, but after enough time that i felt comfortable crying in front of him because, let's face it, when i tell this story, even to this day, i bawl. Hell, i'm crying now as i type. But more importantly, we were getting to know each other, and it's impossible to really know me without knowing this part of my life. It shaped so much of who i am, even today. Not a day goes by that i don't think about her. And i'm sure it's a little puzzling to people who don't know, when something in some random conversation will set me off and i look momentarily depressed.

Anyway, so i was to meet him at his place on Tuesday and we walked over to a restaurant nearby. We ate and i was excited when we didn't linger afterward, as i wanted to get back to his apartment and sit down and have this conversation. But as we rounded the corner in front of his door, he says we're going shopping. Normally, this kind of spontaneous, casual task would be a blast. But i understood now that with this i wouldn't have enough time for my plan. So i shrugged it off and figured, well, next time. Later, we were standing in front of his fridge putting groceries away and there's a picture of one of his friends' kid, about seven, and i choked up, and felt like i didn't hide it well. So i told him that next time we saw each other i had a story i needed to tell him, and that we needed to leave enough time to tell it, and that i was going to cry. No more sidetracks, no more lost opportunities.

He was so curious that yesterday he sent me one of the most stinging emails i've ever recieved. Not only was i disappointed at the lack of patience, but it was terribly insulting. Paraphrasing, it went something like this: "I have some theories about your "secret." Did you kill someone in Vegas just to watch him die? [It was Reno, by the way, Ass....] Are you a kleptomaniac? Did you have kids but give them up for adoption?"

i wanted to charge over there and tell him what an ass i thought he was, but i would have missed my workout. So i just replied. Now, i realize that he was attempting to be funny. And i know that some people just don't get it. In fact, i realize that anyone who has never had to walk away from their child just doesn't get it. It's not a pain that you can really put words to. The only thing that i can imagine being worse is losing a child in death.

And i even realize that it can be a deal-breaker for some. It's heartbreaking to hear the way people talk about birthmothers. Most often they don't even realize they're being insulting. But i recognize and respect his or anyone's right to think whatever they want about adoption. He keeps trying to reassure me that whatever it was in my past that i wanted to tell him wouldn't change how he feels about me now. But his attitude toward it has nonetheless made me terribly angry, and i think it may be best to just let it all go.

This will always and forever remain the most excruciatingly difficult thing i've ever done. But when i think of Emily, getting off the bus with her mom there to hold her hand and walk her home every day... When i think of her all excited when the garage door opens a few hours later and she realizes that daddy is home... When i think of her sick, and know that her parents never hesitate out of financial concern to take her to the doctor... or taking care of her sister, so tenderly... i know it was also the best thing i've ever done.

Let this be a lesson to any future prospective boyfriends.

Tough Decision

2009-02-27T08:31:00.003-06:00

my mom sent me an email a few days ago... the Upper School chemistry teacher is leaving Ellis.

Now, i wasn't planning on going back to Pittsburgh this year. And i do want to move to an Upper School position, but i had been thinking biology, not chemistry. i kind of figured i had one more grand, solo adventure in me before i headed home to be with family and friends five or ten years later. i took a chance on Kansas for love. i want to take a chance on me now. Go somewhere thrilling and far away.

But when i think about all those nights last year that i went home or to Perry just sobbing, missing Ellis so much, and the girls who had me looking forward to every day, it becomes more compelling. Faculty positions don't open up there very often. Most people are smart enough to know how lucky they are. And i've been teaching chemistry and physics for the last two years. Granted, not at the AP level, but i always love a challenge, and though i know it would be a lot of work, i also think i could do it.

But i had my eyes on someplace new, different, and mountainous. Santa Fe, Seattle, Idaho... the whisper of the unknown is almost irresistible to me. The vision of me in my truck, with some new "moving tapes" and another twenty five pounds lighter, bounding across the rockies to a new life.... i ache for it.

Help? Advice?

Realization, New Plans, Kansas Winter

2009-02-21T19:07:00.010-06:00

i recently added Beth to my list of blogs and something that had struck me mildly before has really hit home as i stumbled on photos of her and Elaina, and of Robin and baby Erin.

A lot of my friends, and i mean a LOT of my friends have girls. Seriously, have y’all looked around? You all have daughters. Alli has Mac now, but other than him, it’s a bunch of girls! Andrea has two, Lauren, Rhett, and Beth each have one. i had one. Isn’t Jenny’s baby a girl? Didn’t Cheryl and G even announce that their baby will be a girl? i can’t possibly be the first to make this observation… can i?

i will post a set of before and after photos in a couple of months, when the difference is more dramatic. Another five pounds gone since i last posted!

There may be some new plans on the horizon. i can’t say anything publicly, but i’ll give you a peek under my cards: Idaho.

And since i promised you pictures, but Kansas isn’t the most photogenic state in winter, here are the best photographs i could muster of the Kansas winter…

Last weekend i went up to Topeka with a friend, to a party thrown by some of his friends. Some mutual buddies were there. We stayed at the party way too late, and by 3am were staring the drive back to Wichita down like two condemned people. So instead we went about halfway and stayed in this beautiful old farmhouse with our other buddies. Since i didn’t see it in the dark, i had no idea where i was. When we woke up we found ourselves in a ghost town! Burdick, Kansas. How do you like that? Here’s Burdick…

Blatant Bragging

2009-02-04T07:33:00.008-06:00

i've had a lot more time in the last four months. For the first few weeks i spent it on nothing special: watching more Netflix (until they put me on the "badgirl list" for getting too many movies too fast), calling my mom and friends so often it annoyed the crap out of them, and reading the Twilight books (a true guilty pleasure).

i maintained the same bad habits i had developed while focusing all my attention on my man. i ate fast food because it was easy and, you know, fast. i stayed up too late at night. i spent my weekends on my butt on the couch or on my butt in my truck. i even took some of those habits to new levels. i think at one point i ate and entire 8x8 cake in one day. i stepped on the scale in November and found i had gained 5 pounds since the breakup. Five pounds in just four weeks!

And i realized i was going about this all wrong. i had all this time on my hands now... i could use it... on myself! So that's what i started doing. i went back to my favorite organic store, Green Acres Market, and have shopped there almost exclusively since. i started spending the time in the evenings to cook good, healthy meals that don't sit in your stomach like a rock, ala Burger King or Tyson chicken fingers.

i started going back to the gym regularly. Three times a week, at least. And on weekends? Pfft... i thought i would never fill that time and they would always approach me with a daunting cloud. i thought i was doomed to forever lay on the couch and glance hopefully at my cell phone. So i started walking. At first it was just Saturday, just three miles, around two city blocks, and back. Now i've added another mile and a half and, whenever the weather cooperates, Sunday too.

What do you know, i stepped on the scale this morning and not only have i lost that extra five pounds, but another fifteen on top of that!

It's not just the weight loss, i think, that is making me feel physically better. i have made some other resolutions, like getting enough sleep, having more bubble baths, and even little things like taking the time to paint my nails. In two months i have made myself into a healthier person, and i was just euphoric this morning when i woke up and found the results. Not that there haven't been results - i felt a rib for the first time in a year last week. i can vauguely make out a wasitline now (thanks to the oblique machine). i can lift more, walk up more stairs, and my feet don't hurt at the end of the day. But it's nice to see it numerically too.

So, sorry, i had to brag a bit. i know it's unseemly, but i'm too excited and i don't want to call up my family because i want to surprise them when i see them next.

In other news, i got my new camera! For a little over a year, i've been telling everyone who buys me presents to chuck the actual gifts and just put whatever they would have spent on a Wal-Mart card. This month i just threw in the last $50 and bought a Nikon D40. This is pretty cheesy, but i took some photos of my new camera with my old camera:

i am still figuring out all the controls, and i need to buy another lens before my Summer Adventure. But i already love it and can't wait to get out and take some landscapes. Now all i need to do is move to Maine so that i actually have some landscape to photograph!

For the moment, settle for one of Sao, fearless attack cat.

Here we go, Steelers!!

2009-02-02T09:46:00.007-06:00

Not only was that one of the best games ever, with two of the most amazing touchdowns ever, but the night belonged to my boys. Let's hear it for the Pittsburgh STEELERS!

my day was pretty predictable. i had a chess tournament Saturday so i took the opportunity to sleep until 9:30 on Sunday. i watched a really good movie called Hard Candy, and hung with Sao. She was really getting into the hype:

After that i went for my Weekend Walk (such a routine for the past three months that it deserves capital letters) and then a drive and stopped off at the grocery store. i had to stock up on chocolate chip cookies, because i promised my students i would bake "Steeler Cookies" (chocolate chip with gold colored sprinkles) if they won. i hoped as i stood in line that i was not jinxing them.

From there i went over to watch the game with six other football fans. i was the only one rooting for the Steelers... but that ended up being ok anyway, since we, you know, won and all. my friend Amanda lives in the most beautiful apartment... i want so much to move to her complex this summer, if i'm still in Kansas.

When i got home, i immediately whipped out cookie batter and started in on the seven batches (168) that i ended up finishing right before midnight. Sao was so glad that Pittsburgh won, she decided to jump into my Steelers shopping bag and hunker down:

From the moment the game ended until the moment i went to bed and shut it off, my phone was lighting up every fifteen minutes. "How great was that touchdown by Santonio? Can you believe he was in?!" "100-yard touchdown run, and by a defensive lineman!" "Did you see them hooking Harrison up to the O2 after that one?"

"What a great day for Pittsburgh."

Today, Pittsburgh schools (including Ellis, i'm sure) are on a two-hour delay due to celebrations. How great is that? i love my city. i love my boys. Way to go, Steelers.

Oh, and hey, if you guys want some Chicken Poop so badly... send me your address by email, i'll mail you a tube!

Chicken Poop

2009-01-27T08:02:00.004-06:00

Another Kansas-ism for the books. This one seems off-putting when you first hear about it. i know it did to me. But as it becomes more familiar, it also becomes more endearing.

Back story: there's something about the Midwestern winter that does not agree with my lips. i've lived in cold climates for a good portion of my life and have never had the problems i have here. Every winter, like clockwork, January rolls around and my lips start cracking and peeling. Maybe it's not that it's so much colder in Kansas but so much drier. i don't know, but it drives me batty, and it hurts like crazy!

So i went on a mission to heal my poor lips. i tried Chapstick, i tried Blistex. i even tried straight up petroleum jelly as per a suggestion from a friend and found that not only ineffective but largely unpleasant as well.

Along came Chicken Poop.

Yes, that's right. Chicken Poop. The whole label reads like this...

100% pure
free range
Chicken Poop
lip junk
put put it on your lips
contains no poop
a product of Kansas
ilovechickenpoop.com

Now, Chicken Poop doesn't actually work any better than Chapstick, and yet i put it on daily. All it really does is make the little skin flakes on my lips wetter. But hey, i can't help it. i'm a Kansan, and this is what we use. Everybody uses it. i don't exaggerate. EVERYBODY.

You can get it anywhere. Wal-Mart, Sears, grocery stores, gas stations, and of course, Walgreens...

It's quirky.

All Hail the Hairy Beast

2009-01-22T08:11:00.004-06:00

Scott is an utter genius! Thank you, thank you! The song is Vaughn Williams, English Folk Song Suite, Movement I: Seventeen Come Sunday. The second and third movements are good too, but this is by far the best. Almost worth embedding in my blog... hm.... ;)

i used to have this on a CD. What the heck happened to it? Ah, i probably lost it in a move somewhere (the perpetual excuse of military families and transients).

On a more poetic note, now that my desperation is momentarily slaked...

This song has recalled a simpler time in my life when love was thrilling but uncomplicated by adult responsibilities, when i didn't spend January impatiently waiting for my W2s, when i let school happen to me as opposed to having to think through and plan every day in excruciating detail. It was a time when the best hour of the day came at the end: band. When i sat in the first clarinet chair and was generally considered to be "the best" at what i did. When the greatest joy in the world was to sit behind a stand of music, like this Folk Song Suite, and take part in the sound that unfolded from that room. It was magic. i remember the feeling - like flying. It actually felt like flying in a formation with everyone else in the room. That's why i loved band, and music. That's why i went on and performed at Clemson and that's why i was a member of the fraternity with you guys. i don't think i've ever felt that free, before or since. Here's to music.

Help, Band Folk!!

2009-01-21T10:14:00.009-06:00

Ok, i have had an excellent few days, what with the STEELERS going to the Super Bowl and Obama being inaugurated.

But now i am going crazy and i need some serious help. During the presentation of former presidents, the Marine Band played a song that i know and love. But i can't find the name of it anywhere! It's driving me mad and i feel that i have to have this song.

We played it in one of the bands i was in... don't know if it was Clemson or high school, but if it was Clemson i figured some of you might recognize it.

It occurs in this video, about 4:30 seconds in and lasts about a minute. Help?!?!?!

P.s. - i've looked at a lot of blogs about the inauguration in my quest to find the name of this song, and i just have to thank all of my blogging friends for not embedding music into your sites. What a pain in the---

This Summer's Adventure

2009-01-13T16:34:00.009-06:00

So, i've started thinking about where to go this summer. i've applied for a program at Columbia University in NYC, but won't know if i got in until March sometime. Still, it's only three weeks in June so i'll have plenty of time for another little 10-day solo jaunt after it is over in late July and early August.

I was thinking Las Vagas, Death Valley, Ash Meadows, and hiking in Utah. i will have my new camera by then and will take an exorbitant number of photos. i will probably rent a car again because the truck grows increasingly less reliable every day and if i'm going to be driving alone around the Nevada desert, i'm going to want a car i don't have to worry about.

Here's the tentative route...

View Larger Map

This will also take me, interestingly (or not, if you're not curious about this kind of thing) through Colorado City/Hildale which is that famous FLDS town. Fear not, i will bring you further curious tales from the American West!!

Neptune and the Nereids

2009-01-08T07:52:00.005-06:00

i've not wanted to write about her until after our trial period was over, so now that the shelter has finalized our paperwork and we are all settled... meet my cat.

i went and got her about two months ago i guess; i've lost track. For the first week we just got to know each other, and then i finally gave her a name: Sao (SAY-oh). Sao is the 11th moon of Neptune, a prograde irregular. And of course, she had to have a geeky name. As with most of the moons of Neptune, it was named for one of the Nereids: water nymphs in Greek mythology. Sao was the rescuer; legend has her leading lost ships to port.

This Halloween, i cut up cotton batting, pinned it to my shirt, and used the new spray bottle i had bought to keep her from clawing the couch and went as "partly cloudy with a chance of showers." i got to spinkle people with water all day, it was fantatic. Sao loved the batting, and has since shredded all that was left.

She's extraordinarily affectionate, and stalks around all evening waiting for me or anyone who's visiting to sit down on the couch, at which point she promptly jumps up, snuggles into my neck, and starts purring. It's so sweet. Of course, i am allergic to her. I had a couple of rough days when she first came home and then again when i got back from my trip to Pittsburgh, but it does fade.

i don't think i'll be serving bread at my home anytime soon...

The Joyous Noise of Family

2009-01-02T17:09:00.009-06:00

i haven't written anything in a while because i have been home in Pittsburgh, enjoying what might be the last Christmas holiday as i have known them, despite divorce and several moves, since my birth. Next year my father will be married and my brother will be working both days sandwiching the holiday. And though everything will be different next year, i know two things. One, thirty family Christmases is probably more than most people get. And two, no matter how we spend next year's holiday season, it will still be filled, however briefly or disjointedly, with the joyous noise of family.

This year i spent more days at home than i otherwise would have, simply due to the cheapness of plane fare. Only one day after i arrived, my brother joined me at my mother's house and we put up the tree, watched some West Wing together, and commiserated about not having an election to follow anymore. Each day we would get up, eat English muffins, go our separate ways to work out, and come back together at the end of the day for supper. my brother brought Stella Rue, his dog, and one of my favorite animals on the planet. Here's Stella:

i spoiled her to death with homemade milk bones and hour-long walks around Aspinwall. She entertained me with her tricks and her quietly enthusiastic company. She makes me want a dog in the worst way. But i know i don't have time to devote to one. Hmmph.

Dad and Dave and i went out for dinner a few times over the break as well. And since i've never posted a picture of either one of them, here are my dad and brother:

And of course we all had an evening with Chris, Shelly, Emily, and Elizabeth. i brought Emily a Creepy Crawler Bug Maker (sort of like an Easy Bake Oven, only it makes squishy spiders and worms instead of baked goods) for Christmas. i got Elizabeth a singing purse because Shelly said she liked to take things out of her real bag and hopefully this will be a distraction! They got us all copies of the yearly "Emily and Elizabeth" calender, and Shelly sighed over how predictable it was and thought maybe she should do something else for next year. To that we all replied, simultaneously, "NO!!!"

We also played a new game over there called Blokus, and i have to highly recommend it. It's a nifty game.

On Wednesday afternoon it started snowing, and hard. my mom was worried about the weather so i told her to just take me to the airport then so she sould get home while it was still light. This left me with about five hours to kill at the Pittsburgh airport. After wiling away that time, i got on a plane and flew to Minneapolis, my connection. (Minneapolis, at night, by the way, is a thing to see. It sparkles. It literally sparkles in the middle of the cold dark prairie around it.)

When i arrived, i realized that it was not only the same airport into which i had flown on my way to see Jeff for the first time since college, but also at the same gate. i was sitting at gate A6 at the Minneapolis airport, waiting to board what might have been the same flight number to Wichita, almost exactly two years later to the day. i could see the print on the window where i had leaned up and rested my forehead trying to decide whether to get on the plane and fly into the ice storm that awaited me in Kansas. i could see the wear in the carpet beside the moving walkway where i had paced back and forth on the phone, his warm and encouraging voice in my ear. i could see myself, two years younger and a little more optimistic, in the bathroom mirror, fixing my hair and making sure my makeup was... just right.

And i missed him. Big time. In the months since our breakup (i don't think mentioning it here violates my policy to not discuss it on the internet), whatever time i spent thinking about him i have only spent angry over the last correspondence we had. But that night i just had an empty suck in my chest, and for a few frightening moments i couldn't catch my breath. It was good, to not be angry for a change, to remember the spark that used to ignite whenever i thought of him, and the magic that we seemed to create around us when we were together and well. But it was also deeply sorrowful, and after a while i wanted to get out of that airport so badly i could have hijacked the nearest Cessna and piloted it myself.

When i finally got back to Wichita, i was, as predicted, waiting at Baggage Claim Carousel 1 (there are only two at Mid-Continent) as the clock struck midnight on 2009.

The midnight arrival had also been a convenience of plane fare, but i have regretted it and regretted it even more in the moment. How i greet a new year has always been very important to me. Some years i have sat at home sipping Cold Duck with my mom. Some years i have been with my best friend, Beth. Other years i have been out on the town with a big crowd, or curled up under a blanket on a couch with someone i love. i have no specific ritual, but it always has to have meaning. my mother says that i should think of it as a portend for a year of travel and excitement. i hope that's the case.

Happy New Year, everyone... now back to the grind!

Accident

2008-12-14T13:11:00.004-06:00

Let me preface this as Shelley did... everybody is ok.

Shelley and Emily were in a car accident. Their van skidded on some black ice on an overpass and flipped over. The two of them were trapped in the car until fire and police could come and get them out. Both went to the hospital and both are fine. i've been on and off the phone with Shelley all afternoon, and two things have reoccurred to me.

One. i can't believe how damn lucky i am that i went to the one lawyer in the one Westmoreland county town that had Chris and Shelley's profile. i can't believe how damn lucky i am that i found the best (sorry, friends) parents on the face of this messed up planet for Emily. i can't believe how compassionate and loving and giving they are that they would go through an ordeal like this and then think to call me and tell me that everything is ok.

Before they left in the ambulance, a police officer spoke to Shelley and told her that the car seat Emily was in saved her. He said whatever brand that was to go out and buy another one just like it. It reminded me of the story that the lawyer told me the day after we left the hospital. i had gone into her office to see the counselor that prior to the birth i had sworn i would not need. And she told me that when Chris and Shelley left the hospital they had a car seat with a leveler on it. We laughed. She said how could i possibly be worried when these people had a leveler on their car seat??

Two. Shelley said she knew God was watching over them. Now, of course, i don't know about all that. But i did put down the phone and thank God... if he is there... if he does watch... for that. For watching over Emily and her mom.

Twilight

2008-12-02T08:10:00.004-06:00

So, for months now i’ve been hearing about nothing from my groups of exceptionally talented female students except Edward Cullen. Probably my most gifted student this year, who nonetheless never speaks, took me completely by surprise by running up to me and starting to babble when she saw me carrying a copy of the last book, Breaking Dawn, from the lunchroom. i disappointed her when i told her that i had just found the book left by a student on one of the tables. She went back to not speaking.

Last month i picked up Twilight in the library and started reading. i got through about 20 pages and put it back down. It sounded like it was written by a 13 year old girl. (As it turns out, it was written by a whiny, melodramatic Mormon woman, but i digress…) But just before Thanksgiving, i got into a discussion with another girl about the quintessential young woman’s novel. She says it’s Twilight. i say it’s Gone with the Wind. So we agreed to a book trade: i promised to read all four vampire books and she promised to read the gargantuan Civil War saga.

So as i waited on airplanes and in airplanes and in airport lounges this past weekend, i started reading this book. i admit, i am engrossed. It’s not classic literature, to be sure, but a quick and satisfying story, albeit a little repetitive at times. The only problem is that i dislike the main female character, Bella. i find her ungrateful, bratty, ordinary, and simpering. Oh, Edward, you’re so beautiful, I can’t live without you, make me a vampire…?!? Ech.

But of course, i am more than a little smitten with Edward. i may have swooned once or twice over this fictional, gentle predator.

i am now reading the beginning of the second book, and am once again mildly annoyed with her. Edward leaves her in the woods, saying goodbye forever, and what does she do? Stumbles around for a few minutes or hours and then lies down on the moss, and stays there until half the town forms a search party to bring her home. Now, i can absolutely sympathize with the feeling. That’s of course what you want to do when your heart is broken. i still feel like doing it now, months later. But you just can’t do it.

There have been a couple of quotes from these books that i felt a particular attachment to, encouragement from, synergy with…

“When life offers you a dream so far beyond any of your expectations, it’s not reasonable to grieve when it comes to an end.”

“Time passes. Even when it seems impossible. Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does. Even for me.”

my pain may be nothing like that of an immortal creature who must live forever with vivid memories of his only love, or even the human narrator of these romantic fantasies, but i certainly identify with these lines.

An acquaintance from a group of friends here has seemed to take an interest in me, and my new single status. The attention is always flattering, but i do think he overestimates my readiness to move on. i still feel in my heart like Bella, curled up on the ground in the forest, waiting for the time to pass, knowing that it will, but unwilling to move until it does.

Burn After Reading

2008-11-21T07:50:00.004-06:00

Quick post to tell everyone to see this movie at some point. Careful! Not for children...

i went with a friend to our local dollar movie theater (really $2.50 movie theater) last night to see this movie, which was probably out long ago and will soon be rentable. Ben suggested it to me and i was uncertain until he said it was the Coen Brothers. It was absolutely hysterical. Brad Pitt is undeniably the best part of the film, but Clooney's role is fantastic as well as Frances McDormand. It really rivals Fargo in terms of successful dark comedy and if you liked that one, you'll like this one too.

Probably my last entry before i leave for Thanksgiving, so i hope everyone has a lovely one. i will be getting to see my brother and parents, Emily and her family, and Beth. It's too bad its such a short break, but it'll still be good to see them, especially now. i can't wait to sit down at Beth's kitchen table with coffee and just cut up for a few hours.

At any rate, Happy Thanksgiving, everyone... i want to see pictures of kids with Christmas trees soon!!

How Much Easier Would My Life Have Been...

2008-11-16T16:39:00.001-06:00

This weekend has been pretty slow. i was sick with something most of last week and even took Friday off school. i'll never know what it was, since my doctor wouldn't see me. But actually, that's exactly the kind of doc that i want. i'm not big on taking antibiotics for any drip and fever that comes down the chute. That's how we ended up with super-bacteria, thank you very much. But i was compelled to call her after two nights of being unable to sleep from a cough that wouldn't respond to syrups. The nurse asked me what was wrong with me, and so of course i said, 'oh, there's so many ways to answer that question.' After waiting fruitlessly for a laugh, i went on and told her i had a cough. She was unimpressed and wouldn't give me an appointment. Bravo.

Anyway, i was feeling better on Saturday when i got a call from Emily. Get this, guys... she's a Girl Scout! Yep, my baby girl, who for me will ever in part be the sleeping angel of an infant i placed in her mother's arms, is now a shameless cookie pusher.

i've always told my students that the first girl to bring me a cookie form will totally clean up, but i guess i can stop saying that now. i've found myself a new dealer.

Later i went to a pizza party for one of my friends' final adoption hearing. Yes, their two lovely children, a 4 year old boy and a 6 year old girl, are now legally theirs. i couldn't help but remember Emily's own final hearing. Of course she was just 6 months old on that day. But that was the first time i had seen her since the hospital. And that was the first day that Chris and Shelly let us into their lives and the first day after she was born that i didn't wake up worrying about her. And, really, the last.

Today we went to see the Upper School play, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. i had no idea how racy it was!! Much less so than the Mesozoic Era, in my opinion, though i'll hear much more about the inappropriateness of the latter.

Remembering Andrea's Old Friend

2008-11-10T09:44:00.003-06:00

This weekend was our first chess tournament of the season, so i did that all day Saturday. Had no plans to do anything else but grade lab reports when... i got a call from my new friends. They said they were hitting Old Town (a groovy little area of Wichita where all the youngin's hang out on weekends to drink themselves silly).

We ate first at a Mexican restaurant called Playa Azul (translation: Blue Beach... who knows why?) and then went to Mort's bar across the street. After sitting around there for a few hours we decided to hit another place, presumably an Irish bar called Finns. It is difficult to describe how out of place a bunch of teachers, even in our twenties, were at this place. It was not so much Irish as Wichita, Kansas's attempt at an inner city dive. So i decide my last drink of the night needs to be an Alabama Slammer. Andrea put this idea back into my head last month and i thought, hey, what the heck...

So i'm sitting there with five other nerds, sippin' on my old friend and watching all the urban youths grind on each other on the dance floor while we sit around and talk politics and philosophy at a volume that will make all of us hoarse the next day. What comes on the speakers next, but Sir Mixalot. So we all get up and dance... drinks in hand, and i'm having myself a total 90s revival in my own mind.

i also took the oppertunity this week, since my mom was feeling bad for me about some unpleasantness in the romance department, to break the news about my latest tattoo. So since my mom knows now, i guess i can show y'all too.

i did this last month... or even back in September. i love it to death. The tattoo artist (and most everyone who has seen it) says, "hey, cool, a satellite dish..." And i have to say... "um, no, helLO, its a radio telescope....??"

It was based on this photograph from my trip to the VLA during my Southwest Safari:

And here's how the tat turned out...

It's on my left thigh, a little lower than i think maybe it should be, but high enough to be covered for school and low enough to be seen in shorts without having to flash leg! No, it's not the whole periodic table nor the neodymium square i was pondering early this year. BUT when i thought of it i knew immediately i wanted it. Good sign. It both expresses my inner (maybe not so inner?) nerd and commemorates my trip through the desert. So i'm pleased.

my mother of course says... "do you know how bad that's going to look when you're 80?!" And my response, as ever, is... "do you really think when i'm 80 my tattoo will be the worst-looking part of my body??"

Just One Vote Each

2008-11-05T07:55:00.009-06:00

i had a small group over last night and a constant stream of text messages with my brother and mother. i watched from the first closings in Indiana and Kentucky until the victory speech and the official call on Florida.

When ABC called Ohio, we all knew. my phone lit up with a one-word text message: BOOM. my friends and i looked around at each other with wide eyes, then jumped up and cheered.

This morning, tired and feeling like i am still dreaming, i find myself in tears. my brother has been touched by this for weeks, somehow better grasping the enormity of this moment. But for me it took waking up this morning and finding that nothing changed overnight, watching the images from last night on the morning news, and listening to the chatter of of my "intellectual elitist" colleagues.

This morning i feel so proud of my country. Over the last eight years i had begun to wonder who we were, and what we believe in. Preemptive war, disdain of the educated and education, and the lack of compassion in our government.

i like Barack Obama and i think he will make a fine president. But i am most proud today of Americans, and their willingness to reach forward into a new generation and to embrace a new (dare i use the word) hope. As i told my students yesterday, both candidates are exceptional men. Both were worthy of respect and honor. Both have accomplished feats of which i am simply not capable. And perhaps i would have felt this way no matter what today. But as i said in the primaries when trying to explain why i would not vote for Hillary Clinton... there's just something about this man. He is an inspiring orator, to be sure. He is an historic figure as the first black president but he also comes from white [Kansas!] roots as well and may be one of the few people who can bridge the gap between races and unite us all. But none of those things are what reached me and my vote. It is his wisdom. Barack Obama is a scholar, a listener, and a deliberate thinker. A wise man... a wise person.

And i can't help but think about what this means to civil rights in America. Just fifty years ago, in parts of this country, this man would not have been able to drink from the same fountain as me. i think of all the older black people in America who remember being afraid to drive across the state of Indiana, and today Indiana casts its electoral college votes for a black man. i find myself hoping that there is an afterlife, so that all those men who were beaten to death, lynched, or executed by a racist state can see how far we have come. Have we overcome? No, there's still so much to solve, and so much to heal, and so many walls still to break down. But America stood up last night and took a stride.

John McCain gave a very classy, very gracious acceptance speech, and i wish we could go back to those days when the runner-up became VP. i was not as impressed with the crowd, but... hey, if there was no dissent, it just wouldn't be America.

Go USA.

Murphy's Law

2008-11-04T18:01:00.002-06:00

It does not vary: whenever i have somewhere to be (like people coming over for an election night watch party), one student will be late being picked up from after school....

gRrrrr......

Centering

2008-11-03T08:24:00.014-06:00

It's a day and a half until polls close. my brother and i have been talking back and forth and analyzing everything to death. i am absolutely useless as a teacher today. Tomorrow will be worse. If we are up late on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning waiting for a call on who our next president is, i will be pretty useless Wednesday too. i am not going to bed until i know who will be inaugurated in January.

i have been feeling this way for days, essentially counting days and hours until tomorrow. i even numbered the days on my wall calender from about a month ago. So this weekend i decided i needed a little bit of centering. i have not had the luxury for a few months now, not since my Southwest trip, to think. Just think. And feel. And wonder. So, to center myself for this election, i headed to Lebanon, Kansas.

Lebanon is a little over 200 miles from Wichita, due north and then a little west. With gas prices around here back under $2, and a fresh paycheck in the bank, i decided to make the trip. Lebanon is the perfect place to center yourself for an election because it is literally the center of the continental US.

i woke up around 8 and had a few errands to take care of, like paying rent and finishing the mix tape i made for the road (yes, my truck still has a tape deck). These things started slowing me down and i didn't get out the door until around 10. But once on the road i was quickly at home. It was a gorgeous weekend. Highs in the low 70s and whispy cloudy skies. On my way out of the city i listened to all my backlogged Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me... episodes, but once i cleared Salina and left the highway, i switched to the tunes. my first stop was the little known Rock City outside of Minneapolis, KS.

Kansas used to be the bottom of a large inland sea. In fact there are many places in Kansas where you can go to find marine fossils. This strikes people as odd sometimes, but it is quite demonstrable. These sandstone concretions are left over from that time period. They are tremendous formations!! It's difficult to illustrate this without anyone to pose in front to the rocks. (i should go ahead and say now that i was the only one at three of my five destinations on Saturday.) To correct for this, i took a photograph with my truck in the background:

Rock city is a lot smaller than i thought it would be, but is rather impressive, though perhaps only to us science types. Here's another one i thought was cool due to its near spherical shape:

Next i was off to the Center. i went through the charming little towns of Concordia and Belleville, then turned west on US 36 and some very lonely country with more cattle than people. Half an hour brought me to KS 181 where i turned north and found the town of Lebanon.

It seems that Kansas towns, like pets, come to resemble the places after which they are named. Where Minneapolis, KS, seemed to take on the manicured prosperity of Minnesota, Lebanon looked like a war-torn town falling on even harder times. Most of the homes were pretty shoddy, but there were an awful lot of trucks and what seemed like a decent city center. To be fair, i never did follow the sign pointing out Lebanon's "business district."

A little north of the town is KS 191, a road built with only the purpose of carrying people to the geographic center. i was the only one here too. Unimaginable.

Right at the spot is a stone monument. i was there. At the center of continental America. Three days before the most historic election of my lifetime. i sat and i tried to feel the extent of our country on all sides of me. i thought of all the diversity of people going about their lives, working, playing with their children, having sex, reading on their porches, facing death, being born... i thought about all the people i know all over this country, from California to Oklahoma to South Carolina to Pennsylvania. i thought about how many of our lives have interwined, abided, slipped away, or just missed. It was quiet, with a gentle breeze and nothing moving but the cattle on a far hillside. i did not see another human being.

A little ways from the monument is a small chapel that holds about six people or so. It's called the Center Chapel. And behind that is an old motel. i guess people used to come and stay here. It looks like it's been closed since the early 80s or so, though. Perhaps due to the movement of the actual center of the US to Belle Foursche, SD when Alaska and Hawaii were admitted to the Union in '59.

Here is what you see looking back along KS 191 (which, for some reason, Google Maps calls US 191) toward the town of Lebanon.

And that's Kansas for you. The center of it all and yet absolutely nothing at all. Or at least, nothing if you want something. If nothing is what you're looking for, Kansas has it all. This kind of openness is what i will miss about Kansas when i leave it in a couple of years.

The other thing i will miss is stumbling upon oddities. i left Lebanon and headed south on KS 181, then took US 24 back east. i planned to cross my northbound path and go on to Manhattan, KS to shop at a particular book store that i love. But on US 24 i found myself driving through downtown Cawker City.

i went all the way through the town but something was nagging at me. i knew i had heard of Cawker City. i had read about it somewhere and there was something i was missing. So i turned around and picked my way back through the town, looking for something that i somehow knew i didn't want to miss. And sure enough, i had read about Cawker city in a book on Kansas Superlatives. It is home to the world's larges ball of sisal twine. How glad i am that i did not miss this!!

And man, i really wanted to stay here at the Ball of Twine Inn, but alas, there was no vacancy, so i pressed on.

i did make it to Manhattan, which is just a beautiful area of Kansas, and bought the new Family Guy and the first season of Big Bang. The drive home was fantastic. Sunset on the red flint hills is just gorgeous. And i didn't think i was going to, but 11 hours after setting out, i managed to make it back to Wichita in time to meet some friends for a haunted house. After that? The Blair Witch Project at one of their homes. Finally, i have found not just another human being who likes that movie but 5!!

i think i found my center. Again.

Politics and Booze

2008-10-27T07:47:00.011-05:00

No, i am not going to use my blog to try and convince you to vote for my guy. It wouldn't work anyway, and i'd rather keep my friends. But, i did have an interesting weekend of politics, friends, and essentially free beer.

No, i'm not talking about the party i wanted to have the night of the Vice Presidential debate where all present would have to drink every time Sarah Palin winked...

i'm talking about Barack-toberfest! Yes, you heard correctly, the Sedgwick County Democrats hosted a blowout bash and they called it... Barack-toberfest. It was held on South Commerce Street here in Wichita, apparently a trendy little neighborhood where progressive artists hang out and where the liberals of Kansas sneak around to their underground parties. When i pulled up i saw my friend walking down the street, and was immediately relieved because i thought i was in the wrong place. i asked him if this wasn't a little ghetto, and he said yes, and wasn't it great?! Apparently he is very familiar with this area... being a music teacher and a bit of an art snob. So i met up with him and the two of his friends he brought along. We went in and paid the $5 cover (that's where the essential part of the free beer comment comes in) and saw this...

This is how liberals in Kansas party, my friends... oh, yes. We were there half an hour late, which was apparently not late enough to be fashionable. So we hung out for a while, got first dibs on the keg, and just chatted it up, looked at the buttons and shirts for sale, and waited on the band. The building started to fill up and by the time the music started, it was as hoppin' as it was going to get. They fed us hot dogs and little cupcakes with the O symbol in the icing. Later we heard from the big shots at the Sedgwick County Democratic Party, and some local politicians stumping for themselves. i have to tell you, my district democratic candidate for the Kansas State Senate has a great butt.

Some other folks from school met up with us after the band and before the stand-up comedian and we decided to head out and catch the last showing of that new movie, W. It was definitely Netflixable (new verb) but not necessarily even mantinee worthy. On our way out after midnight, we ran into more people that my artsy-fartsy friend knew, and we hung out a bit outside the theater and critiqued the movie. So there we were... 1:00 on a Friday night (yeah, yeah, Saturday morning), a bunch of young people in our prime, a city full of lights and bars and dives waiting for us. Where did we go next?

Home. To bed. Heck, most of us were teachers. We were all yawning and had to shake our heads at ourselves for the silliness of it all.

i would be lying if i said i didn't go to this as a way of trying to keep myself busy. But in the end it became a pretty nice way to keep myself busy. And i made some new buds and had a few Buds, so i guess it worked well enough.

The next day i went out with a group of other friends, formerly mutual to Jeff and i. That was much harder, as everything kept reminding me of him, and i nearly cried at the restaurant and then excused myself to the bathroom later at my friends house and actually did cry. At some point during the evening, though, i found myself sitting in the living room engrossed in a good conversation 'gone bad' and laughing hysterically. i realized it was the first time in two weeks that i had done that, and it felt really good.

i got tired earlier that night, probably due to all the crying or trying not to cry. So i left around 11 with the express purpose of heading home and going to bed. But as i rode through the city with an old tape on, i found myself driving in circles around my block, and then out on the highways, and then out to neighboring towns. The cool October air was circulating through the cab of the truck and i felt somewhere between tears and hope. i couldn't just go home and go to bed, not feeling like that. So i drove and sang loudly to the music. At the same time i was thinking...

i told my mom about everything last week in an email. She sent back, "what did I tell you about moving for a man?" And i had to defend myself, so i said, "mom, it was an adventure... and i don't regret it... you have to take chances, you know... maybe they don't always work out, maybe they never do... but it's the chances you don't take that you regret... it's those moments when you look back and think, geez, i wonder what might have come of that..." Her response to me made me well up and smile. She said she admired my sense of adventure, and that so few people, of either gender, would have had the guts to do what i did... she said that despite everything that happened in our family, i had managed to develop a strong sense of self.

i thought about that exchange as i drove through and around the city. Thought about the past and about the future. i thought about myself on the last night of my life and tried to project how i would feel about this past two years at that point. i thought about risks and oppertunities, love and loyalty, failure and success.

i can't say that i came up with much in the way of wisdom. i kept thinking about that old cliche: "to love and win is the best thing; to love and lose, the next best." i drank in the cold air and reminded myself that living truly is the most thrilling adventure. Experience is everything. You take nothing material with you when you die and go... wherever it is you believe you're going to go. The only thing you can do is hope that as you close your eyes and look into the last abyss that you have truly known what is was to be alive. To feel, deep and thick, every moment and to embrace and know as many passions as you can manage in the time you are given.

It's nice to say, but in reality you can't live every day like it was your last. You have to plan for the future and try to anticipate tomorrows. But if i think of life like baseball, i know i don't want to trot across homebase easy and confident but rather come sliding in, dirty and bleeding in a cloud of dust, and shouting, "wow, what a ride!"

An ending, a beginning...

2008-10-19T17:15:00.005-05:00

Jeff and i broke up last week.

Right before comments. Again. And of course i am here blogging and trying to find ways to work through the disappointment and sorrow and not doing my work.

It's almost certainly for the best but that's a difficult thing to admit when you're letting go. People are just so different, and even though you always have to make adjustments when fitting your life in with someone else's, there comes a point when you realize you're doing too much adjusting and it's not comfortable for anyone.

i won't talk about why it happened as i am certain he would consider that too personal for a blog. But i will say that i will miss him tremendously and wish him nothing but happiness and love.

He was the only person i ever thought about marrying, the only person for whom i would drag my frigid butt halfway across the country and back in an ice storm for one kiss. Likewise, i don't think i have ever had anyone love me as thoroughly as he did. And he taught me so much about love, sacrifice, family... and limits. He told me this past spring that i could post this and i just never got around to it, so here he is, my big dorky librarian, and my last words on the subject... at least as far as the internet goes.

Every ending is a beginning, except for the very last ending of course, and so even as i grieve i am beginning to wonder about the future, what it will bring and where i will go. Admittedly, i am now free to consider just about any option i could dream up. i don't think i can find a teaching job in Alaska and i don't think i am willing to give up teaching just yet. Plus the flights home would be wicked expensive. But perhaps Maine. i've always loved Maine. i remember driving through the interior of the state and winding my way among the very northern Appalachian foothills, from little town to little town... and the faint mineral smell of the lakes... the depths of the woods were remarkable...

i am also thinking about a cat. Might as well go ahead and become Cat Lady. But isn't that one of the cutest little faces you've ever seen? C'mon, admit it.... i sent an email but haven't gotten a response yet. i think if i don't hear by Tuesday i will call. Sombody is going to snatch her right up!

Danger, Will Robinson!

2008-10-08T18:26:00.008-05:00

Ok, so I’ve been very careful on this blog. Given that it is read by so many of my old friends and I want to keep up with them (rather than royally piss them off) I have been censoring myself on certain topics like religion, politics, and global warming. But I had an experience this week with a student of mine that has really gotten me thinking.

So, I beg you a favor… if you are a creationist and don’t like being challenged on that or hearing evaluation of your theories, please, skip this post and know that I love you and that we must agree to disagree.

The story begins with one of my favorite students this year. Yes, teachers have favorite students. No, we don’t admit it to them.

This kid took all my electives last year (astronomy, cosmology, conservation biology). He is signed up for KJAS (Kansas Junior Academy of Science) this year which only 5 other students have… two of them 6th graders who can’t even compete. Last year he had some serious issues on which I will not elaborate, but has grown up so much since then and matured past them. It’s been wonderful to watch. All his teachers are proud of him but none more than I because he is such a talented science student.

A few weeks ago the kids wrote their first lab reports, and an awful lot of them used the phrase “the hypothesis was proven correct” during their data analyses. The day I gave them back, I decided I needed to nip that in the bud. See, you can’t prove anything in science. You can disprove something, but you can never prove it. You can only support a hypothesis with evidence. Given overwhelming evidence, the hypothesis becomes theory. Given more overwhelming evidence (and a mathematical equation doesn’t hurt), the theory becomes a law. But the beauty of science is that we are all open to being proven wrong. Any law, no matter how deeply rooted in the scientific community, can be overthrown with one repeatable, elegant, expertly executed experiment. One verifiable measurement of light bending around a massive star toppled the Newtonian concept of gravity. It would take only one mammalian skull lodged in demonstrably Precambrian rock and the whole theory of evolution would topple down. General relativity, evolution, thermodynamics, the electron cloud model… all these theories are supported by massive amounts of evidence. But it would only take one.

Anyway… I was ranting on and on to my students in this manner and after class this kid came up to me and shocked my socks off. He said, “Miss K, evolution is just religion.” I blinked for a few minutes trying to remember if, of all the criticisms of evolution I had heard from non-scientists over the years, I had ever heard it called religion. Most creationists, I thought, would be highly offended by this invasion of their personal space. But he was insistent. I told him that I would not argue with him about the correctness of evolution and creationism, but that I had to firmly disagree with the assertion that evolutionary biology is religion and not science. If for no other reason than the fact that I studied it as a scientist for seven years!

He would not relent. He asked me to watch a video he had on the age of the earth by a dude named Kent Hovind. I told him I would be glad to watch the video in order to take in his perspective but that he would need to read a book of mine in return. (Later, Kent Hovind informed me that this act of asking my student to read would send me to hell… but what the heck, I was headed there anyway.) I then e-mailed his parents to inform them of the exchange. The response I got back was nothing like what I thought, and I wish I could clone these parents and give them to all my other students. What they said boiled down to: my son is old enough to read anything he chooses and to make up his own mind about what he thinks about it. Would you mind reading a book of mine as well?

Dr. Kent Hovind

I said sure. So I have this book and this video on creation science. The book will have to wait until I’m done reading about the 2012 Mayan apocalypse. But nonetheless, I will read it. I did, however, start watching the video. It’s 2.5 hours long and I am about 1.5 hours in. It has taken me about 4 hours to watch the first 90 minutes as I pause every few moments to make notes. I now have 7 pages of objections. For instance, he claims that the star Sirius was red during the time of Jesus and is now a white dwarf. Well, that’s not entirely true, no. Sirius is actually a star system composed of, yes, a white dwarf, but also a white main sequence star. It is this latter star and its proximity to Earth that makes Sirius so bright, not the dwarf.

There are scores of examples… the use of the moon’s escape from earth as a timeline and the expert use of the inverse square law to calculate the gravitational force of the moon on the tides but the complete disregard of the same law to calculate the gravitational pull of the earth on the moon slowing its escape. It really goes on and on… for 7 pages. So far.

The point that really stood out to me was the one that my student kept repeating over and over again: evolution is just religion. Dr. Hovind made this point about 30 minutes into the program. He says that cosmological science and the theory of evolution are religion because even though there is evidence for the Big Bang, and for the timing of the Big Bang, nobody can say where all the matter came from.

This latter point, I concede. Science can answer some amazing questions these days. It can tell us that we are one of trillions of galaxies in the Universe. It can tell us what the temperature of the Universe was at only 10^-30 seconds! It can tell us that all that we see and all that we are was once in an area so tiny that it had no dimension whatsoever, and that that singularity burst into being around 13.7 billion years ago. But it can’t tell you why. As a scientist I can’t even tell you what triggered this event. And that’s where this all breaks down. The moment of the beginning.

Dr. Hovind says that because science cannot explain the moment of the beginning then it can’t explain anything. And that I find both logically unsound and incredibly ignorant.

There’s a lot that science can’t explain.

A lot.

A lot.

There are plenty more questions than there are answers. But that doesn’t mean that none of our answers are correct. For instance, no scientist can tell you what causes gravity. Is it an exchange of particles between objects? Is it intrinsic to all mass? Who knows! But that doesn’t mean that we throw out the theory of gravity altogether.

I have no problem with creationists. If you look intelligently at both ideas but you sincerely decide to believe in the literal translation of the bible instead… then that is your choice and I respect it. But you must, as I must, recognize that the literal translation of the bible and the understanding of modern science are in opposition.

But I dislike a man with a Ph.D. in Christian Eduction telling me what science is and is not. Study science. Learn science. Do science. Then, when you can critically evaluate data and analyze statistics and develop sound experimental design… then you can discuss what is and is not science. But of course, most everyone who does study science for 10 or more years becomes convinced of it.

Why, why is it so offensive to understand the bible as an analogy to a people who would not at the time have understood the genetics, biology, and chemistry of evolution? Why is it so hard to imagine that god gave the creation story in the way that best suited the time in which it was given? Why is it offensive to imagine that maybe now god is speaking to us through the intellect that he gave us? Why is it so frightening to so many people to think that god created the Universe, the Earth, and life itself through the mechanisms we are now uncovering??

I always say I don’t believe in god. But as I said to Jeff last night, I guess if you really whittled me down I would probably be better classified as an agnostic. Because while I don’t think there is a god, I cannot say for sure. I do not discount the possibility but nor do I believe it to be true just because it might be. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t thousands of faithful scientists out there. There are, and I have known plenty. In fact, as a member of the scientific community, I would say that I am probably in the minority even as an agnostic, let alone an atheist.

While you should never practice them in tandem, science and religion can coexist. As Einstein said, “the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it can be comprehended.” If you believe in god, you believe that he endowed us with intelligence. Why then would he be offended by its use?

Oh, and by the way, Dr. Kent Hovind is currently serving 10 years in federal prison.

The Riverwind Casino

2008-10-06T08:00:00.008-05:00

Kansas and Oklahoma, but mostly the latter, were and still are the final resting places for many Native American tribes. Their presence is touted for tourism purposes, but if i'm being blunt, there are not a lot of tribes who live in places that everyday rich white people would want to go and tour.

There's so much more commentary to be made on that score, but this is supposed to be a post about a very funny man, and if i go down that road it will absolutely set the wrong tone! Many tribes have done fairly (but not very) well by building and maintaining casinos on their land. One such is the Riverwind Casino just south of Norman, Oklahoma. Norman is a suburb of Oklahoma City and the home of the University of Oklahoma. So there's an awful lot of traffic in the area and the casino gets some big names. Two weeks ago, Jeff went to see Charlie Pride play. As he was getting ready to go, he asked me to look up the casino and write directions for him. In so doing, i came across and annoucement for the following week's performance: Frank Caliendo.

i immediately knew that i wanted to go see him, so i jumped up screeching, and told Jeff we WERE going to this show the following weekend. He didn't instantly know who i was talking about, so i explained... you know, they guy who does Bush? Gobble, gobble? Ohhh, yes, he says, I think I know who you're talking about. So i called and they only two seats they had next to each other were in the VIP section. i snagged them and began waiting until Friday.

For those of you who haven't heard of Frank Caliendo, here's a clip for you.

Over the course of the show, he did George W., Charles Barkley, Bill Clinton, Kermit the Frog, Dr. Phil, Jim Rome (my personal favorite), John Madden, Seinfeld, Al Pacino, and Robin Williams. i am certain that i'm missing some. On Jim Rome, i was maybe one of 35 people in the audience laughing, since not everybody knows who he is i guess, but in Frank's own words, "i was totally wetting myself." The guy was outstanding. So damn funny. And at the end i got a picture with him! Here he's doing "the Bush face."

The Palin Effect

2008-09-25T10:22:00.007-05:00

This is a blog mostly for my friends to keep up with me and my new life in the midwest. And since my friends are all of different political bends, i don't spend nearly as much time blogging about politics as i do thinking and talking about politics.

Occasionally, for the sake of humor, i make exceptions. i am teaching an elective on politics this year. It's been very eye-opening to me what a blank slate politics can become in just a few years. The kids i am teaching today will be voting in the next election, yet none of them knew about the electoral college SNAFU of the 2000 election. Know why? They were 8 when it happened. Yeah. We're getting old, my good buddies.

i do my absolute best not to indoctrinate all my students into the bleeding-heart liberals that i want them all to be. (Actually, if i do say so myself, i do a fine job of being unbiased when in front of the classroom.) We watched two class periods worth of coverage from both National Convetions, have analyzed dozens of campaign ads from both camps. And so, it was with great pleasure (and a little bit of censorship on the MILF bit) that i showed my classes this video:

i was also surprised to hear about an anti-Palin rally in Anchorage, Alaska. my understanding was that she was hugely popular in that state. But i guess this particular demonstration brought out 1,400 people! While i did not discuss this rally with my class, and nor did i show any of the hand-made signs, i did also find some of these amusing...

Back to talking Kansas

2008-09-08T10:19:00.004-05:00

So, here's a truly Kansas experience.

Shortly after i moved here i started seeing these trucks all over the place. Kansas and Oklahoma are rife with them. Well, ok, they're not rife, especially in the city of Wichita. But if you drove around outside of the cities for more than a week, i guarantee you would see one of these license plates.

Beef.

No. BEEF.

Just Beef! What?? Who's beef? Why should i care? Are you just stating a preference over chicken?

These plates are always on trucks. Without fail.

Big trucks. Usually with some kind of brush guard on the front and tires a little too big for the wheel wells.

Jeff will post a comment that they actually say more than BEEF. Something like the Oklahoma Beef Processor's Union or something. But that's not really the message they're sending. Because you don't see the rest of what the plate says. You just see BEEF.

And i think that's freaking hilarious.

Farmington, NM to Wichita, KS (Days 9 & 10)

2008-08-13T13:45:00.015-05:00

Northern New Mexico is an interesting mix of dirty desert towns and cute little alpine towns. Farmington is the former. But just east of the town is a number of Anasazi ruins, the most accessible of which is the Salmon Ruins. There's a huge complex of rooms here, the outline and footprint of a large building that housed hundreds of people.

Steaming east toward Taos, NM, i started climbing into the Rockies, the southern extent of which almost reach Santa Fe. i crossed the continental divide twice, once going west and again coming east.

But i was completely unprepared for the day i was about to have. i just kept going up, up, up into the mountains. The land became exceptionally green, the air cool, and the trees just barely budding to an early spring.

As i rounded some curves near the crest of the mountains, i started seeing white patches. At first i thought it must be sand. It wasn't. It was snow. i later found that my elevation here had been slightly higher than 10,000 feet.

This was the most beautiful view i encountered the whole trip. The rocks of the Brazos Cliffs are over 1.7 billion (1,700 million) years old. It was spectacular. i could have stayed here all day. i could have cut down a tree, built a hut, and stayed here forever.

Alas, i eventually had to descend. As i did, i drove through Carson National Forest. There were a lot of beautiful scenes here, sprawling, lush fields nestled between peaks. Lots of cows. i imagined they were pretty happy cows. i would be a cow here...

i pointed the car toward Raton, and my last night in a motel. i followed US 64 through the town of Cimarron, "where the mountains meet the plains." And on my way north to Raton was disappointed to find that i had to merge onto Interstate 25 for 4.1 miles before catching the rest of 64 on the other side. After nine days and not a single mile on the interstate, i was crushed.

i stayed that night in a Motel 6. Let me just take a moment to sing the praises of this chain... it's dependably clean, cheap, and accessible. It feels safe, the water is hot and the A/C works. As much as it is possible to love a motel chain, i love Motel 6.

Day ten was really just supposed to be a travel day, and i got up and continued east on US 64 with that intention. There was one stop along the way, but i didn't figure it to take very long. In the town of Capulin, New Mexico, i took this photo, because i thought it was so representative of the desolation of this part of the country...

The stop was Capulin Volcano National Monument. There was a trail along the rim of the volcano and i wanted to hike it. It was a short one, only about a mile and a half, and as it followed the volcano's rim, i assumed it would be an easy one. Boy, was i pleasantly surprised!! Capulin kicked by hiking boots. It was fantastic. Here is the photo from near the top of the trail, looking into the crater. If you click the photo, you can see the parking lot on the far side of the rim.

In Clayton, New Mexico, i turned onto US 56 and managed to drive right past the last attraction i wanted to hit: the common point of New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma. Unfortunately, there was a massive amount of construction at the border and i couldn't easily turn around to go find it. Oh well.

I followed 56 through Boise City, Oklahoma, which, like Guymon on the way in is just another forgotten panhandle town. And this one didn't even support the now famous (in my mind) Oklahoma Panhandle State University. i did drive back through Greensburg, Kansas, and managed to take one unobtrusive picture. So here it is... Greensburg, Kansas, one year after the EF-5 tornado turned it into rubble...

So that was it... it's taken me most of the summer to complete the review of the Great Southwest Safari. Not much else has happened this summer that i care to blog about at present. i did go home to Pittsburgh for a month, and visited Emily and her little sister and parents. That's worth talking about, i guess, but i'm pretty much spent at the moment.

School starts in a few days and though i love vacation, i am ready to have something to occupy my mind.

i will post again before my Labor Day Mini-Adventure, but probably not much.

Could it be....?

Louisiana and the completion of the Lower 48? Who knows!!

Flagstaff, AZ to Farmington, NM (Days 7 & 8)

2008-08-06T14:28:00.018-05:00

The next morning i left Flagstaff and drove north on US 180. The drive to the Grand Canyon was only about an hour and a half. Very shortly after i left the city, i drove by Humphrey's Peak, a mountain i was destined to be running across on the horizon all day. It is the highest point in Arizona at 12,633 ft.

i approached the Grand from the south. As i meandered through nondescript scrubland, i started looking around for it. i've been to a number of National Parks: Yosemite, Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Mammoth Cave, Acadia... the list goes on and on. All of them looked like Parks. Most of them you could see coming from miles away. Crossing the Wyoming prairies you can see the Tetons from so far away that you spend about an hour and a half thinking, "i must be almost there!"

The Grand Canyon is stealthy. It sneaks up on you. i drove up to the first lookout parking lot still wondering if i was in the right place. As i walked up to the railing, the Canyon spilled out in front of me. It was as if the Earth was opening it's mouth in a great big yawn. Thirty yards from this, you wouldn't know it was there...

...yet it is quite possibly one of the most spectacular sights on the planet. It is unbelievably large. Even standing before it, i could not fathom it's size. It is visible from space. i am the first member of my family to reach it.

The trails down to the bottom of the Canyon are two-day affairs and, despite hard work i am still not physically fit enough to attempt it in June. The hike i really wanted to do, the Hermit's Rest Trail, was unfortunately closed during my visit. But the Rim Trail is very well maintained and not much traveled if you're willing to walk a few miles from the visitor's centers. Getting a little solitude in the Park is important. This place presents you with a lot to ponder.

In this last Canyon picture, you can see the mighty Colorado River flowing through...

i spent the entire day at the Grand. It really deserves more than that, but alas, a day was all i had. So i turned back East for the first time, on Arizona Route 64. As i made my way to Tuba City for the night, i entered the Navajo Lands. That evening everyone i encountered was Navajo. Gas station attendants, motel clerks, and even Taco Bell cashiers. There were tons of roadside stands selling pottery, jewelry, and rugs.

Tuba City was an oddity. There were three motels in town, a Quality Inn and two mom 'n' pop places. One of the independent motels was $64 (twice what i was accustomed to paying) and had no A/C. The other was $74. Given that the Quality Inn came in only $10 higher, i decided to stay there. It was the only night i spent in a chain hotel.

i thought i would be really bitter about shelling out so much for a room. But let me just say... it was worth ALL 84 dollars. The sheets were clean, the A/C was powerful, the pillows and the comforter were feather. The shower was hot and the TV wasn't green. i took a shower that night so i could fully appreciate the experience clean. They also gave me a coupon for a free breakfast at the diner next door and free espresso at this cute little coffee shop. i left Tuba City feeling very spoiled.

i headed southeast on Arizona 264, and crossed the Hopi Lands, also called the Painted Desert.

The Hopi Indians are known throughout the area as keeping the closest to their traditions. Most of the Natives there still live in traditional homes and are proficient in traditional arts, mostly pottery and weaving. After leaving the reservation i traveled north on US 191 to the town of Chinle, gateway to Canyon de Chelley (pronounced Shay).

This was probably the highlight of the whole trip. This is one of the most spectacular places i have ever seen. The Grand may be bigger, the Pine Creek may be greener, but this one took my breath away.

For those of you who believe in a very involved God... can you just see hands sculpting these rocks? To me they look like they were shaped on a potter's wheel. Ironic, since the Natives who inhabit it are renowned for pottery.

Sprinkled along the North Wall, there are more cliff dwellings and ruins. The Navajo people do not allow outsiders to enter the Canyon without a guide. There are still many Native people inside the Canyon, living and farming the land.

After i left Canyon de Chelley, i drive north and east to the trading post of Teec Nos Pos and then detoured a few miles north to see the Four Corners. This is the only place in the United States where four states meet. Simultaneously, i stood in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah.

After that i said goodbye to Arizona and crossed back into New Mexico. The color of the rock seemed immediately to change from red back to brown. And this very spectacular rock called Ship Rock loomed out of the desert. The Navajo say that on a hot summer day, viewed at sunset from the South, it looks like a ship sailing on a sea of desert. This view is from the west, unfortunately, but i still think it's pretty remarkable.

From Show Low, AZ to Flagstaff, AZ (Days 5 & 6)

2008-08-05T13:22:00.013-05:00

i woke up in Show Low and headed West again on AZ route 260. This country road followed the Mogollon Rim along the border of Fort Apache IR and Apache Sitgreaves NF until it crosses the rim and starts downhill into the Tonto NF. It was here, crossing the rim, that i snapped this photo, looking down into Tonto.

Shortly after crossing the rim, i saw a pull-off for a trailhead, and made a snap decision to park and do some hiking in this spectacular area. i found myself on the Highline Trail, a beautifully maintained, 51-mile walk from Christopher Creek to Pine. i walked about 4 miles of it and then got a very odd feeling. As it was a spur of the moment hike and i had brought only water and not my whole pack, i didn't have my knife and was feeling very vulnerable. Mountain lions have quite a healthy population in Arizona and New Mexico. So i decided to turn back. i had a lot of driving left to do anyway. But what i did see was stunning. Here is the trail heading up the mountain.

Between the mountain towns of Payson, AZ and Pine, AZ, there is a unique geological structure called the Tonto Natural Bridge. Before being allowed to pay your $3 and enter the park, the rangers will give you a cross-examination regarding your gear! "Do you have at least 2 liters of water?" "Do you have sturdy hiking boots?" "Be prepared to be out of the park by 7pm or we will be sending a rescue crew."

The hiking in the park was strenuous, but not impossible. On the other hand, it does get VERY hot in Arizona, and there were a lot of out-of-state tourists there. Given the level of caution, though, i would be willing to bet there was a major accident of some kind. You can hike both over and under the natural bridge. And running through it is a little trickling stream, probably responsible, over thousands of millenia, for carving the thing.

After the natural bridge, i headed toward Sedona, but took some sage advice from a local and stayed the night in Clarkdale, instead. It was much cheaper, and i had a great night in the smallest room of the trip. Once i was settled in my room, i headed back out to see Jerome, AZ. The residents call it "the largest ghost town in America." There are plenty of abandoned buildings in Jerome, many from the 19th century. But it is not a ghost town. It's become another artist community, but getting there is really the fun part! To reach Jerome on US 89A, you have to navigate your car up a series of switchbacks, and the whole town sits on a 30-degree slope!

The next morning i drove the remaining 15 or so miles to Sedona. Sedona is an artist town with lots of shopping and new age wisdom. For instance, the locals believe there are four or five "vortexes" around town. These are places of power, supposedly humming with energy. But amid all the tarot readers and crystal medicine, there's a lot of history too. For instance, this cliff dwelling from 7000 years ago...

One of the vortexes is at Cathedral Rock. i hiked in, anxious to feel the "energy," and sat patiently at the base of the rocks for a good half hour. Nothing. Maybe i'm just not "tuned in."

As i hiked back, though i was rewarded. It was hot, and so i climbed down to the stream and sat on the cool rocks in the shade. i drank some of my water and watched the rapids to my right. After a few minutes, a family of common mergansers started darting up the river, fighting against the rapids. Mom, dad, and about seven baby mergansers swam right in front of me. The chicks were all fighting for a spot on mom's back, pushing each other off and slipping off in their clumsiness. Dad gave me the best shot, but i was absolutely kicking myself for not having a telephoto lens here...

i headed back into the town of Sedona proper, and then up one of the high hills surrounding the town to get a picture of the whole thing.

The last sight on my list as the afternoon wore on was the Chapel of the Holy Cross. Built right into the red rocks, it is a spectacular structure. i didn't go in, but walked around outside and took tons of photographs. Isn't the sky just ridiculously blue here?

i left Sedona on 89A going north. The road winds through the base of Oak Creek Canyon, and the going was VERY slow. Another set of switchbacks led me up the mountain and out of the canyon. With that i followed to Flagstaff where i stayed night 6.

From Roswell, NM to Show Low, AZ (days 3 & 4)

2008-06-30T16:06:00.015-05:00

i left Roswell and traveled on US 380 through the beautiful Hondo Valley....

...which divides Lincoln National Forest into its northern and southern portions. This, by the way, is where Smokey Bear is from. (The natives say they have no idea where his middle name, "the" came from... and they ought to know.) He was a real black bear who was orphaned in a huge fire in the Lincoln National Forest. The town of Capitan, on this road, hosts the national museum of Smokey Bear.

As i left the Lincoln National Forest, i found Carrizo Mountain, and found it stunning.

Oddly enough, i hunted only one ghost town on the Safari. White Oaks, New Mexico. Here is a photo from above the old schoolhouse. Everything was off limits, as some eccentrics have moved back into the town since its desertion, but it is mostly lifeless. Too bad, because it's such a beautiful setting.

There was another long stretch of US 380 between White Oaks and Socorro, which tracked along the northern border of the infamous White Sands Missile Range. It is completely off limits to the public, and the Trinity Site is inaccessible except during two weekends of the year. Luckily for us science teachers, those two weekends are in April and October.

As i neared Socorro, where i slept night 3, i crossed the Rio Grande. Here it is as it flows off to the south to form the Mexican/American border.

Day 4 began as i excitedly left Socorro and headed west on US 60. i passed through Magdalena and then turned south on a barely paved road toward the NRAO VLA. On the way, i saw my first of many pronghorn antelope. All totaled, i saw over 50 of them, often grazing right by the side of the road. And i never saw a single dead one. i guess they too, are smarter than whitetail deer.

The NRAO (National Radio Astronomy Observatory) runs the VLA (Very Large Array) outside of Socorro because there are very few people around, the Plains of Augustin are extremely flat, and it is surrounded by mountains on all sides to block radio interference from towns and cities. i don't think i can begin to aptly describe the vastness of this high, chilly desert. It was astounding. i also managed to spend hours... many, many hours... exploring this site and photographing the radio telescopes.

There are 27 radio telescopes at the VLA, each over 40 feet high. They are also - and i didn't know this before going - all mobile. Yes, these babies can be picked up and moved. Not quickly, mind you, but effectively. There are 9 telescopes on each arm of a Y shape. When they are all close together, they encompass and area only 1/2 mile wide. Fully extended, each arm of the Y is 13 miles long, and the whole array would not fit within the Washington, DC beltway.

i dragged myself away from the VLA to continue west on US 60 and in so doing crossed the border to Arizona. When i put my feet down for the first time in Arizona soil, my state count reached 47.

This is Escundilla Mountain, the third highest peak in Arizona and home to it's last grizzly bear:

Shortly after entering Arizona i crossed into the Fort Apache Indian Reservation. i cannot begin to describe to you the beauty of this land. It truly must be sacred.

i stopped at around 4pm to hike the Mogollon (pronounced Muggy-own) Rum Trail. The trail was only about 3 miles, but the Rim itself stretches across a large portion of eastern Arizona. It divides the Reservation from the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest.

i stopped in Show Low, Arizona on night 4, a small town that, legendarily, was named for the card game in which it was won. It is also outpost of private land in a sea of National Forests. This section of Arizona is mostly public land, mostly Forest Service land. Within an hour's drive from the town is Apache-Sitgreaves NF, Tonto NF, Coconino NF, and Prescott NF.

i managed to haggle my way into a $60/night motel room for $40 flat. i honestly wasn't trying to bargain with the guy, i just didn't want to pay $60! So i told him thank you but i was going to check out some other motels in town. He wouldn't let me go. It was a very nice room, probably the second nicest of the trip, but made nicer for the extra $20 i saved.

i was really looking forward to staying in these little motels where you walk in and meet the owner, pull right up to your room, and still use regular keys. i managed to do this every night except one. But that's a post for another day.

From Wichita, KS to Roswell, NM (Days 1 & 2)

2008-06-29T16:25:00.003-05:00

Well, so begins the chronicle of my Southwest Safari. On Monday i slept later than i thought i would be able to, and had some errands to run so i did not leave Wichita until after 11am. But Safari or none, i am on vacation, so i didn't mind so much. This, by the way, was my ride....

How much does THAT rock? At the Hertz, they were all out of the compact cars i wanted, so they gave me the 'Stang for the same price. The gas mileage was a little lower than i was hoping for, but c'mon... who wouldn't want to tool around New Mexico and Arizona for ten days in that hot little thing? So i set off west on US 54, and followed it through Greensburg, Kansas (the once and future town) almost exactly a year after the tornado leveled it, as well as Pratt, Meade, and Liberal. From there i crossed the Oklahoma border and had to ride through the panhandle before getting my first new state, Texas, officially number 45. i only went through the corner of Texas's panhandle, but passed through a number of small towns. This was the only photograph i took of Texas:

i entered New Mexico near a small town called Nara Visa, barely a wide spot in the road, and continued south to Tucumcari.

i stopped in Tucumcari and stayed my first night in what would turn out to be my favorite motel of the 9 i slept in. It was called, simply enough, the Tucumcari Inn. It had a queen bed, air conditioning, a clean shower, and only cost me $25.16. The next day i was headed to Roswell, and, determined not to use an interstate, i drove some very questionable state routes that took me past a number of places like this...

...and directly through several cattle runs. Seriously. i turned west on NM 252 in a "town" called McAllister, only to see a large herd of cattle on the road ahead of me. i drove carefully up to the back of the pack and asked one of the cowboys if there was another way around. He was very pleasant and just told me to drive right through 'em and they'd know to get out of my way. i guess cows are smarter than whitetail deer.

Once i got to Fort Sumner, i took another state route south to Roswell. Talk about lonely road.... i might have seen two other cars in 80 miles.

Roswell is a very cute, very modern town. It has CD stores, Wal-Marts, Applebees, and a lovely, historic downtown. Think of Anderson, South Carolina, only in the desert. Very close to the center of town is the Roswell UFO Museum and Research Center. They have a lot of great exhibits (presenting both sides of the story)...

...as well as art, a theater rolling documentaries, and a gift shop.

Just down the street you can catch a bite at this quirky restaurant...

A Week of Storms

2008-05-27T13:52:00.008-05:00

This past week has been very weather-busy. Almost every night since i finished school last week has been peppered with continuous weather coverage on my favorite local station, KAKE. (Yes, they named themselves after a baked good.) On one night, the coverage lasted for 8 hours straight! The meteoroligists were on from 6pm to 2am, no commercial breaks, no regular prime-time television, nothing... just watching tornadoes march across the state.

Here in Wichita, we did not get any tornadoes, but we got several severe thunderstorms with large hail and damaging winds. (This phrase, "large hail and damaging winds" is a common one around here, and for the longest time i said it wrong, with "large winds and damaging hail." But that's true enough as well.)

Unfortunately most of the storms happened after 10pm, and there was not enough light to film them or even take flash photography. Yesterday we got a little one with some hail...

It was mostly just quarter-sized, but yes, those suckers hurt when you walk outside in them!!

And then later that evening at around 9pm there was a nice lightning show off to my North, as one of the storms passed over Park City or Bell Aire Kansas...

On Thursday i will be off to take my dad to Denton, Nebraska to the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter. A couple of his friends are being ordained in the Latin Rite there this weekend. After i drop him off on the 1st, i will spend one more night in Wichita, and then i am off on my Great American Safari!!

Telling the story of my trip through Arizona and New Mexico might take several posts over several days, but i will get it up here with pictures eventually. i look forward to having more time to read about everyone once i return! This has been a hectic time of year.

Topeka

2008-05-07T08:19:00.015-05:00

Back in March, i went on a field trip with the 8th graders to Topeka, Kansas. As it was a history trip, most of what i did was crowd control and taking photos. i can't say why it has taken me this long to write about it, except that this is a very busy time of year. Until i had a computer issue this morning, and went to back up all my files from March on in case of a failure, and stumbled upon this pictures, i had completely forgotten about it.

i was impressed with the capitol, if not the city of Topeka itself. There is a lot of history here! Many people may not realize that Kansas became a state just months prior to the opening shots of the Civil War. Kansas "Jayhawkers" were Union sympathizers, and in the years leading up to statehood, fought bitterly to make Kansas a free Territory. Nearly 2/3 of military-aged men enlisted and fought in the War, though most of the action occurred in Missouri and elsewhere.

Kansas continued to be an exceptionally progressive state on civil rights. The first stop that we made was the Brown vs. Board National Historic Site. It was one of the black schools in Topeka from which the plaintiffs came. (There were several, around 12 i think, though most people only think of Brown.) The school is still situated in a very poor area of town, though the building itself has been renovated several times in preparation to house the museum inside.

From there we went on to the capitol building. i regret that i don't remember all the details i was told about when it was built, what all the murals mean, and so on. i do remember that the capitol's north and south wings (east and west?) were built first, and later as more money came into the fledgling state, the other two wings were added and the center built to connect them.

There are murals all over the capitol walls: the arrival of Coronado, the movement of cattle on the Chisholm Trail. This one is of the famous abolitionist John Brown, of Harper's Ferry fame. Little known fact: he led the famous Pottawatomie Massacre and several other actions against pro-slavery settlers during "Bleeding Kansas."

The dome was very impressive, and photogenic, especially from the inside.

Here is another view. The painting in the bottom center of the photograph was a personal favorite. The three women represent science, peace, and art (in that order). i like to think of art and science as the two surrounding peace.

The Kansas Senate chambers are dark and difficult to photograph. The pillars are plated copper and 24 carat gold is inlaid in the ceiling and walls.

At the end of the tour, we had a choice to make: sit back and wait or climb to the top of the dome. i am proud to say that i am the only faculty member who made it to the top! Flight after flight of inside stairs led us up to this terrifying staircase in the center of the dome. The last spiral leads to a narrow walkway at the top of the builing.

Unfortunately, this was the view from the top.... hm..... it was also exceptionally cold and windy, but that's Kansas for you. And this is Topeka for you. It's not the most attractive city on the planet, just an industrial working town that happens to be host to the state business of Kansas. i was told that the view is better on a beautiful spring day. Aren't they all? was my response.

At least i got some bragging rights with the other teachers...

The last stop was the Kansas history museum. i was tired by this time and didn't take too many pictures, but at least i finally learned that these things...

...(which are all over Kansas) are not for electricity. They actually pump water from the ground using wind energy. Kansans have been using them since pioneer days. In some little towns in Kansas, it looks like they have been using the same ones since pioneer days. But that's a post for another day.

Searching

2008-04-28T08:07:00.006-05:00

Last weekend, Jeff presented me with a map of Noble County, Oklahoma, and all the "named places" there. He said that, aside from the county seat and a few towns that still have purposes (Northern Oklahoma College, for instance), most of them are now ghost towns. So we drove around the back roads of the county searching for them. We did find Marland, which definitely rose to the occasion of Freeport, if not Bluff City, but i didn't take any pictures. Marland, Oklahoma is squarely in the Ponca Nation, and most of the people who live there are Ponca Indians.

The map was a little vague, and despite my navigational genius, it had a fatal flaw (namely, it said that OK 156 continued east until it ended and gave way to back roads beyond US 177, but unfortunately OK 156 makes a northerly turn in Marland that was not indicated by the hand-drawn map) so we ended up wandering through the back roads of Kay County, and found no more ghost towns. However, i did have a wonderful time looking out over the prairies in springtime. They are strikingly green, greener than i have ever seen the trees in Pennsylvania or the spartina grass on the coast of South Carolina. Photographs do not do it justice, but here are a few.

Springtime is delicious on the Great Plains. Winter is long and harsh, and the land becomes stark and uninteresting. The winds whip across the fields and can cut into you even through multiple layers of clothes. When spring finally comes, it is spectacular. But there's no such thing as free lunch, and here the beauty of a new season comes with a number of dangers. Most familiar to the rest of the country is the tornadoes. (No photos yet... i'm working on it.) The other may be familiar to you bar-hoppers (or former bar-hoppers): prairie fires. In the Flint Hills of Kansas, this is the time of year people will travel there, supposedly from nation-wide, to see the controlled burns. They will find a hilltop and perch there as the sun goes down, to watch the lights across the sea of grassland. But you don't have to travel far to find them. i have seen several in my back-road jaunts. Here is one that was small enough to drive up to and photograph safely.

When my mother came to visit Kansas, she could see the charm here but not why i am so enchanted by it. my father understood immediately. i don't know that i can describe it. But it's just... different. And that's what i was really looking for. i will not stay here forever, but i will always remember the arc of the Kansas sky, and the wide open feeling of freedom. i remain a mountain girl, and a forest lover. But i can understand now why prairie natives feel claustrophobic in the shadow of high peaks, and why they have been caught saying things like, "I don't like the Rockies. They block my view of the stars."

Six Word Philosophy

2008-04-14T08:17:00.009-05:00

i feel so special, i got my first blog tag. Thanks Andrea!

i'm supposed to give my six-word philosophy on life and then tag other people to do the same. So, here it is...

Fear is temporary; regret is forever.

The way i see it, you can spend your life being afraid, or you can spend your life sucking all the joy you can out of it. Either way, it will fade away, and in the end, all you have are the experiences you have made for yourself and the wisdom you have passed on. i don't want to lie on my death bed and realize that i never lived. Fear can be a paralyzing thing, but there is no such thing as courage without it.

In most any game, you will lose more often than you win. And in that spirit, i have lost a fair share. i cried so many tears over the loss of my daughter, more so than i can imagine anyone knows but for parents who have buried children. i have wandered far from loved ones whom i miss with a sucking ache. i have faced punishment and persecution for my beliefs.

But over those same years, i have also placed my hands in the rich blackness of North Dakota soil, slept under the stars as the Atlantic ocean lapped against the rocky coast of Maine, and stood on the precipice of a cliff in the middle of the Kansas prairie. i have known the love of a good man, and passed many quiet mornings in his arms. And i have earned the respect and admiration of people who inspire me.

To live richly, passionately, and deliberately, no matter the cost, no matter the risk. That is what i carry in my heart every day.

Now... as for the people i 'tag'? Here you go... though i'm not sure how many of you are paying attention...

Jeff
Stephanie
Nate
Caroline (even though someone already tagged her... but she hasn't done it yet, so... maybe another one will help?)

Springtime and the Livin' is Easy

2008-04-02T15:16:00.006-05:00

i have little to write about today, but it has been a beautiful day! i've gotten to spend most of it outside as well with my students conducting a heart rate lab on the track. Kansas springs are not as early as South Carolina springs, and not nearly as reliable as Pennsylvania springs. i remember at Clemson, spring would arrive by March 1 every year, faithfully. In Pennsylvania, it doesn't arrive until May, but once it does, it is there to stay! In Kansas, winter and spring take turns for a month or so. At that's where we are now. Nonetheless, the signs are getting more visible:

Some developments in life that i have neglected mentioning here are:
-i have been relieved of physics duty!! After next year, i will be teaching Earth Science again, and i cannot wait.
-i have located KJAS (Kansas Junior Academy of Science) and have scheduled myself to be a judge in May so that i can get a sense of how things work around there. i will be teaching experimental design as an elective next year to kids who want to participate.
-i have discovered a love of team teaching. Two colleagues of mine are teaching an elective right now on flight, and it rockets my socks off! i love getting to talk to them every day while we work.

So yesterday, i'm out with my advanced class and they are taking great data for their labs. It was windy. And when i say it's windy, it's like a South Carolinian saying it's hot. Take my word for it. Kansas is serious about wind.

So it was windy, and i was complaining. One of the girls said, "Miss K, do you know why Kansas is so windy?" And i said, "Yes, but i get the feeling that this is a joke and the geographical position of the state is not the punchline." She ignores my snarky remark and gives me the punchline, "Because Nebraska blows and Oklahoma sucks."

Fabulous. Fabulous.

Winning Souls to Barack Obama

2008-03-24T09:14:00.005-05:00

This week has been eventful, both personally and politically!

On the personal side, my mother drove to Kansas to spend the first half of her spring break with me on the entirety of mine. We didn't see anything that i hadn't seen before, except for the Spice store which delighted me to no end. But i did get to take her to Wyldewood Cellars, purveyors of "Fine Kansas Wine," where we bought wine made from sand plums (endemic to Oklahoma and Kansas), elderberries, and blackberries. Then i took her to Lindsborg, the Swedish town i wrote about last year, and around the city of Wichita. She, as i, was impressed by the clean, gridded, friendly city i now call home.

Politically, it was a big week for my man Obama. Michigan and Florida will not revote. Good for us, since Obama did not campaign in either state. Also, Fox News decided to release video of Obama's former pastor (former because the Reverend retired several months ago) making some impassioned sermons regarding the complicity of the United States in the way extremist groups have come to view us.

i have been a supporter of Barack Obama for almost a year. Last summer, my brother mentioned him to me and i started doing my research. my brother is the most brilliant person i have ever known, and as he is my big brother, i may have a bit of a hero complex with him. But, he did have the highest SAT and LSAT scores i've ever seen, he does have a degree in history, and he is nearly through law school with strong emphasis on civil rights and constitutional law. Certainly, there are less educated or qualified people to guide me through the political jungle. So when he tells me about a candidate, or an issue, i listen. And i listened about Barack Obama, and liked what i found so much so that i became a bit of a campaigner myself.

Jeff came up for the weekend, so two of my favorite people in the world were here with me yesterday, and after they dragged me to an Episcopalian Easter service and i sat impatiently through a sermon about how dying tomorrow would be wholly acceptable (speak for yourself, lady!), we came to my school to look up the weather for my mom's drive home today. Since we were here and had been discussing the Reverend Wright issue the night before, we decided to listen to the entirety of Barack Obama's speech on race and religion in America.

By the end, my staunchly feminist, gung-ho Hillary mother and my I-guess-I'll-have-to-write-in-Micky-Mouse disenchanted boyfriend who keeps whining about Obama's lack of experience to hide more deeply seeded fears were chocked up and ready to think, if not vote.

It's a long speech, over 35 minutes, but well worth watching. As i tell my students: you don't have to agree with me, but you do have to have all the information before you decide.

Boeing

2008-03-11T10:08:00.004-05:00

As anyone who spends more than an afternoon in Wichita can tell you, the aeronautics industry is the fuel of this town. All prosperity comes from and through Hawker-Beecher, Cessna, and Boeing. All three are headquartered and/or have major plants here giving Wichita the nickname "the Air Capitol" of the world.

It's true enough. Famous people come here all the time shopping for their private jets like you would go to a super automall to shop for your next car. my boss even met Harrison Ford that way.

So the decision of the US Air Force to ask for bids to replace their half-century old refueling tankers was a big story here. Boeing put in a bid, as did Northrop, a consortium of companies including the Franco-German EADS (European Aeronautic Defence & Space Company). Wichitans (that's what we call ourselves... no, seriously) were assuming that Boeing would get the contract, as the old refueling planes, the KC-135, are Boeing planes, and Boeing is an American company. So they're a shoe-in, right?

WRONG.

Northrop put in a better bid. Wichita was disappointed, but what can you do? Well, according to Boeing and all the uber-conservative talk show hosts, you take the Air Force to Pentagon Court (otherwise known as, dispute the contract -- on what grounds i don't know -- before the Government Accountability Office).

Now i ask you... how exactly do these people not see their hypocrisy? You cannot run around the world bulldozing capitalism onto everyone else and then whine when capitalism doesn't work out for you. So some Europeans will get our money and our jobs. They freaking competed for them. Not only did they compete for them, they outcompeted the Americans. Isn't that "what America stands for"??

You want to force companies, or government agencies, or private individuals to do what the government thinks is best for everyone? Fine, go for it. In fact, you'll have my vote. It's called socialism. Welcome to the enlightened, gentlemen. But who exactly are these pigheaded conservative idiots who think they can tax the hell out of the poor of America while they run around with five boats and a few BMWs, and then complain about the results of free markets?

Please, please... give me five minutes alone with Rush Limbaugh. Five. That's all i need.

#!@*

Freeport and Bluff City, Kansas

2008-03-03T12:59:00.014-06:00

Now that the weather is growing more agreeable (and i say "more" agreeable only in the sense that we are moving from snow and ice season to the much warmer tornado season before we move into the dog days of 100+ heat), i am off once more to hunt ghost towns. This past weekend was Freeport, Kansas.

On the way to Freeport, we passed through a number of charming little Kansas towns including Goddard (home of the Roaring Lions) and Viola, where i stopped for gas and one of those popular church marquee photos:

We also passed through Conway Springs and Argonia, Kansas. In Argonia, i took Kansas route 210 south from the town. Shortly (and i mean shortly) thereafter, Kansas route 210 ended and i was following a paved but marginal road south looking for 30th street NE. Once on 30th, we encountered a sign that said "Pavement Ends" and sure enough, it did. After that the truck was plowing through a mix of red clay and manure. Even marginal Kansas roads are usually well marked, but for one reason or another these were not, so i started guessing for the next turn, which was supposed to be at NE 100th. Much to Jeff's continued amazement, i chose one and we found ourselves coasting into Freeport, Kansas. my reputation as "navigational genius" is quite secured.

Freeport's claim to fame is that it is the smallest incorporated town in the US with a bank. So, i took a picture of the bank. The grain elevator (which you can see reflected in the window) is also operational. So is the post office, though only for about 3 hours a day. It's really too bad we didn't go there when the bank was open. We looked in through the windows, and it looks like a scene from the 1940s. There's an old hat and coat rack right next to the door, wooden bars around the one teller with a sign overhead reading "chasier" and a tin ceiling.

The best thing about this bank was the facilities, which you have to see to believe:

As Jeff put it: when you go to make your deposit at the bank, you can make another deposit out back. No door on this restroom. i guess with a population of 8, you don't worry so much about people wandering by.

i did meet a denizen of Freeport. A middle-aged guy in his truck was pulling out of the grain elevator as i took photos of the "downtown" strip. He was quite nice and answered a lot of my questions about Freeport, pointing out a number of points of interest. He had been born there, and lived there all his life. Seen it deteriorate over the years to what it has become, but he didn't seem bitter about that or annoyed by me poking around at the ruins as i might be had i been in his shoes. Others were aware of our presence, but the only indication they gave was turning on their porch lights as they looked out dirty windows at us. This downtown area contains the post office (other side), bank, and what used to be a grocery store and a repair garage.

Before leaving me to finish poking around, this Freeport man suggested if i was interested in dingy old towns i might want to check out Bluff City, which was just a few miles south. He gave me good directions which i easily followed. Bluff City, i have since learned, has a population of about 80, but it was much, much creepier than Freeport. i did not have the cojones to get out of the truck in Bluff City, so much like the movie "Wrong Turn" it was.

Bluff city sits about 11 miles north of the Oklahoma border and 5 miles south of Kansas route 44 in Bluff county. There is a small network of roads, a working post office, and a high school turned senior center. The rest is mostly residences... if you can call them that.

i didn't dare to take pictures of the worst of them. Most had a number of 1970s or 1980s vehicles out front, many of those with busted wheels or rust on the window glass (i don't even know how that happens). They almost all had broken wooden swing sets in one state of disrepair or another. Many homes looked unlivable with fallen in porches and roofs, cracked windows or hanging doors. Others just looked squalid with sofas in the yard next to old farm equipment, and in one case an enclosure of fighting goats. Of this i did not dare to take a photograph. For many of these, i snapped them on the fly. For the ones on the right side of the road, i implored Jeff to do so for me.

one of the more picturesque homes in Bluff City

Bluff City's City Council Building

Bluff City High School

i left this town with many senses. One, i felt extremely lucky. i don't live like this, and i never have. i wish there was something i could do so that nobody ever did have to live like this. Then that thought makes me feel extraordinarily arrogant. Who knows how these people want to live, or if they're happy here, or if they pity me picking through city traffic at rush hour?

My other sense was that of extreme creeped-outedness. This place literally looked like something out of a horror film. Some nubile young actress should have been driving through here with a bottle of Fiji water, an out-of-order cell phone and an overheating engine.

Looking forward to the next one...

P.s. - Found out later that i missed the first tornado of the season by about an hour. :( We left Bluff city around 3:45, and travelled south of Milan, Kansas at around 4pm. At 5 that evening, the first Kansas tornado of 2008 touched down outside of that town. Had we done things a bit differently, i'd have been in a perfect position to photograph it. Bummer.

Epidemic and my Mommy

2008-02-22T14:01:00.005-06:00

First let me say... it is SO cool catching up with all of you from KB! What a great way to keep up with people who wouldn't necessarily get around to e-mailing me all about their lives. Rhett, glad to have you on board, and i'm really enjoying seeing all the pictures of your beautiful baby!

If i sound euphoric it's because my temperature is back under 100 and i'm only caughing every four or five minutes now, and it feels good. i came down with the flu last Friday night, and spent an entire three-day weekend in a self-imposed quarantine. Don't get me wrong, i have a serious respect for this virus. But like a worthy adversary, there's no need to help it out. The flu is a very good virus. Maybe it doesn't make headlines like the very sexy smallpox, or write its own horror novels like ebola, or fuel the pompous righteousness of the religious fundamentalists in America like AIDS, but it is truly the emcee of human viruses. It has been known since the early part of the 20th century, but has probably been with our species for centuries, if not millenia. It doesn't kill, and that's why it's so good at it's job: you live to spread it around. Well, i tried my best not to. i holed up in my apartment and watched a whole lot of political analysis interspersed with Family Guy DVDs. Take that, Influenza....

Of course now i'm back to school even with a little cough. But i don't seem to be endangering anybody, since everybody already had my flu. Looks like the joke's on me. What an epidemic this has become! Some Kansas City schools closed due to the high absenteeism. Wicked.

This week we did, among other things, an iodine clock reaction. This is one of the highlights of my year. The reaction is simple enough, and only involves mixing two clear solutions to cause a color change, but the cool thing about it is that the color change happens all at once, and of course, i don't warn my students about this. So i'm there, stirring away, and all of a sudden, 600-ml of stuff that looks otherwise like water blinks black. i love all the "ooo"s and "aaah"s that go with it. The point is to illustrate the affect of temperature, concentration, and catalysts on reaction speed, but the showboat aspect is enjoyable as well. Since i had students falling asleep during the sodium and water pyrotechnics in the week before winter break, i wasn't sure what to expect, but they seem to be coming around a little bit, and this demo went much better.

i will be seeing my mother soon, and i'm looking forward to that. Over the last three weeks (sorry, i couldn't think of a better segue) i have had the unpleasant experience of having to spend time with a set of parents who do not like me much at all. i'd like to think it's because of a misunderstanding, or a difference in personality, but i don't think it is. i think they simply value different qualities in a young woman than my family and i do. And it made me think hard about how grateful i am for my mother, and the things she has taught me. i am proud of the kind of woman i am, despite the fact that it may not fit the gentle, simpering ideal to which some still cling.

My mother taught me that a woman's dignity is in her strength, her confidence, and her intelligence. She taught me never to play stupid to get a man, never to pretend something is when it clearly is not, and to stand up for what i feel is true in the face of any adversity. She taught me that independence is my only security and encouraged me to take pride in helping myself. She gave me the perspective to pity the damsel in distress but to have the courage to show emotion when it is appropriate. She showed me that being tough didn't mean being masculine, and that real power has nothing to do with the reach of your arm or the size of your muscles.

So, i know it's not Mother's Day, or her birthday, or any other special day, but... thanks Mom. i dig you. And for all the other strong, proud, intelligent, fearless, independent women out there... i dig you too.

Tonight.... salsa dancing?? Jeff won't be here until tomorrow because i have another chess tournament and he has a Saturday morning meeting. So the Spanish teacher invited me to go out with her group of friends and learn salsa. It will remind me of my dear late friend Gary, who taught me how to do the mambo on top of a hill in Washington county. A topic for another day.

Exploring Not Kansas

2008-02-03T10:01:00.001-06:00

These are the states i've been in. That's 44, so you don't have to do any counting. And DC. For years i've been on a quest to get all 50. Because my dad was military and we did so much moving around, my dad, brother, and i ended up on this mission to visit all 50 states. my mother thinks it's ridiculous. But then, she thinks anything my father does is ridiculous. (Much of it is.) My father visited New Mexico in 2004 and completed all 50. i pulled ahead of my brother in the same year with a trip through Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. i rented a car and drove up there on my own. Only had three days because i had a summer job that year, but what a blast. One of the best times of my life. i could have died in Acadia National Park it was so beautiful. Mid-August, tried wading in the ocean, realized why all the other people doing it had Canadian accents. Brr.

Recently i set some goals for myself. The lower 48 by the time i'm 30, and all 50 by the time i'm 40. Alaska and Hawaii will be difficult on a teacher's salary. i'm still holding out hope for a summer job in Alaska someday. After that, i will work on the Canadian provinces (i only have 2 of 13 at the moment), and then i guess the Mexican states (of which i only have 1, out of.... some number).

There is one thing about being a teacher that makes this easier -- summer vacation. That means i have two months to go and do whatever i want, every year, if i can do it cheaply enough. Which i figure means that i rent a compact car, pack a cooler so i can eat apples for lunches and other cheap things, and stay in roach motels when i have to and camping grounds when i can.

Recently i have begun thinking about this summer's adventure: Arizona and New Mexico. Just by coincidence, i will also have to drive through a corner of Texas to get there. And though i will "count" it as a state, i will have to go back and experience it. Driving through and putting your foot in counts the state, but doesn't make up for not knowing the place.

So far i only have two things on my list to visit (well, three, if you count the Fuddruckers in Albuquerque): the Grand Canyon and the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Also, i want to drive a solid section of US 666 (now renamed 491 -- pansies) and Route 66.

Here are my guidelines for traveling (which i call experiencing):

Log as few interstate miles as possible.
Never pass up an opportunity to eat at a local greasy spoon.
Cooky little places the billboards tell you to go are a crap shoot. Try them anyway.
Meet locals.
Take pictures. Of everything. You never know what will make a cool shot when you pull it off your camera a few weeks later.
Have a vague plan of what you want to see. But itineraries are for pussies.
Maps, on the other hand, are essential. Get the big gazetteers with the back roads if you can find them.

i did ask an old hiking buddy of mine to find me a good 6-hour hike, something off the beaten path, moderately strenuous, and with great views. So as soon as that comes through i'll have three. But that's pretty pathetic. i need to get some guide books and start researching. Suggestions would be welcome.

the Wellspring

2008-01-29T15:51:00.000-06:00

Yesterday morning, i came into work and spoke to a few colleagues, who were anxious to inform me, knowing my enthusiasm for a Barack Obama presidency, that he was coming to Kansas. El Dorado, just half an hour from Wichita, was hosting Obama the very next day at 12:30. i expressed my disappointment at not being able to go, having already planned some personal days for family things, and went back down to my classroom to prepare for the day. A few minutes later, my principal walks in and says, "get a sub for tomorrow." From that point on i was a twitter of anticipation for the big day. i stayed late into the night to get two days worth of work done in one, and then left school into the balmy spring-like evening to go rest up for the trip.

This morning i awoke to classic Kansas weather. Cold, ferocious wind, and snow. i headed out to the campus well in advance of the publicized 11:45 door-opening. i arrived at 8:45, and was already 100-deep into the line. So i staked my spot and bundled into the huddle. People poured in as the hours went on, and it became quite clear that my decision to arrive early was a sound one. i got to know a lot of people in the crowd. With 3 hours to wait in the frigid temperatures and blowing snow, we did a lot of talking, mostly, i think, to keep ourselves warm. i met Republicans, Libertarians, Independents, Democrats, black people, white people, Asian people, poor people, rich people, young, old, fat, thin, brilliant, and clueless. There we all stood together, looking to be inspired.

Thankfully, as hypothermia had so nearly set in, they opened the doors a bit early. It was a really good thing they did so, because it then took another hour and a half to get everyone seated and to find an overflow venue for all those who didn't fit into the tremendous gymnasium. i expected to see propaganda everywhere -- Obama signs and waving cardboard banners and streamers. There was none of that. Oh, they passed out bumper stickers (and yes, i got one, and yes, it will go on my truck) but the rest was very simple. As soon as he started speaking, i knew why. He doesn't need all that. He commands so much attention with his words, he doesn't need you to look at waving banners. i have heard so many times that hearing Barack in person is so much better than seeing it on television, or, even worse, YouTube. i didn't think there could be a whole lot to that... after all, he had won me over with those debates and interviews and televised speeches. How much better could it be? The man is transfixing. He speaks with so much passion and ardor. You get the sense that he really believes in all this audacious hope.

He discussed a tax plan that would stop cutting rates for the richest in America and large corporations, especially those who outsource jobs. He explained that economic growth should be a "wellspring, not a trickle-down."

Passionate about the energy crises, he acknowledges the need for investing in solar, wind, and biofuels, rather than funneling $1 billion per day away to foreign nations. And on that note, that the $9 billion we spend each month in Iraq will be redirected to improving domestic infrastructure and curbing the Debt.

When he spoke about universal health care and eliminating the preexisting conditions clauses, he attacked the "empathy deficit" in America. What a great perception on his part. The empathy deficit. The fact that we all go around thinking that we are an island. That if someone is different from us in one way, they must be different from us in all ways. And we can't or we refuse to see each other as our responsibility.

Barack Obama does not agree with me on everything. For one very important issue, abortion, we are opposed. But though we are different in some ways, we are more similar than not. And yes, i was inspired.

For all of you who continue to say that he is not experienced enough to be president, recall Ted Kennedy's words when he endorsed Barack: "It is not the length of time you have in Washington, but the reach of your vision." Listen to his speeches. Read his books. Be open to a politician with a vision, for a change. Then, when you are reached, as i am certain you will be, caucus for him. Or if you are not a Democrat, vote for him in the general election.

At the end of Obama's speech, he introduced Kathleen Sebelius, the governor of Kansas and at one time thought to be Hillary's first choice for a running mate. my friends in the stands looked at each other as she strode out and we all muttered, "will she?!"

After telling us the stories of her two sons and how they had come to support Obama (one for his politics and one for his ability to get a hottie like Michelle to marry him), and why she felt he was inspiring to so many, and so many different, people, she did. Most of her remarks were lost in a roar of applause and whistles, but clearly before the din drowned out her voice we heard, "my enthusiastic endorsement of Barack Obama." She later said that she believed we were in the presence of the next great American president.

God (or whomever) willing.

For me, i go home and grade more papers. Life goes on, as someone told me this weekend. No matter who becomes president. But i will remember the day i saw Barack Obama, and will continue in my own quiet way to keep informing people how to caucus, and to keep hoping. Audacious as it may be.

Manhattan

2008-01-18T08:15:00.000-06:00

No, i've not been to New York lately. Chances are i will never go there again. Nothing against your city, or anything, y'all. i'm just not big on the hustle and bustle.

i have been unusually busy since i returned from Pittsburgh, but have not wholly identified why. Ever have that problem? In November i had time to get my grading done, post in my blog, take photographs.... but in the last few weeks have found myself behind on everything that's important, making everything a dire priority. And other than my New Year's resolution to make time for the gym 3 days a week, i can't find my time sink.

So last night, around 7pm, still sitting in my classroom doing research for a lecture i am giving... today... i discovered something curious about my family's history. my class has just finished up the periodic table, and though their book does not address it, i decided we would also cover the mechanisms of radioactivity. Of course, 14-year-old boys have only one question about the strong nuclear force: how does it make an atomic bomb work?

The history teacher in 8th grade only covers the Civil War and Reconstruction, so i find myself needing to give a lecture on the Manhattan project, of which i knew virtually nothing except that it happened in New Mexico and produced one of the wonders of nuclear physics. Turns out, the National Laboratory at Los Alamos was just the main campus of the Project. There were also two other major sites: Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Hanford, Washington.

Oak Ridge was chosen by the US Army in 1942. The site is located in those beautiful folded foothills of the southern Appalachians. And it was populated with rural people who would probably have frightened me with their one-toothed grins had i been around to meet them. They were farmers, mostly. Many of them had owned the land since colonial days, but when the Army decided that this was the spot for enriching Uranium, they gave them about two weeks' notice to vacate. i don't know whether the Army gave those people somewhere to go, or paid them for their land, or just told them to make like a drummer. The town growing up around the three nuclear plants was soon the 5th largest in the state. During the mid-40s, Oak Ridge used 1/6th of the nation's electricity - more than New York City, but the governor of Tennessee never knew it was there.

the Hanford site

The other other site was in Hanford, Washington. And while the verdant Appalachians were pumping out Uranium-235, the eastern Washington desert was pumping out Plutonium. The Hanford site sat directly on the Columbia River, using the water to insulate the cooling towers. At this point in my research, i made a connection. my mother was born in eastern Washington, and my grandfather was a nuclear engineer. So i called my mother and asked her. Sure enough, that's where granddad worked. Now, he wasn't there during the Manhattan Project, but he was there during the 50s, when the first H-bomb (a much nastier version of the atomic bomb which uses a fission device to trigger a fusion device) was tested. He's been dead since i was about two years old... one of the greatest regrets of my life. He and i were supposedly a lot alike. Both of us scientists and curious adventurers who love life and lived it hard.

As it's probably still classified to this day, i will never know what he actually did there. He may have been working on designing new rotors for the base vehicles. Or he may have been designing the most powerful weapon then known.

Heartless Airlines

2007-12-21T08:28:00.001-06:00

i know that blogging about this won't help on this tiny little space which only friends read, but it needs to be said, and damnit, i'm gonna say it.

Jeff and i booked plane tickets months ago to spend Christmas with my family in Pittsburgh. Our flights go through Cleveland, Ohio, which is only about an hour and a half from Pittsburgh. Things developed and changed, and as it turned out, Chris, Shelley, Emily, and Elizabeth, only have the 23rd open to spend with us. That's the day Jeff and i arrive.

Because of a 3 hour layover in the Cleveland airport, it actually ends up being faster for us to stop there, have my dad pick us up, and drive to Pittsburgh. So we decided we would do that, and that way we'd all be together on the 23rd for supper.

This week i decided to call Continental Airlines to make sure that it would be alright to have our baggage taken off at Cleveland, and i got rebuffed. They won't even let us stop in Cleveland. Called again, rebuffed harder. Asked Jeff to call and give them the library director voice. HE was denied and they threatened to cancel our whole itinerary if we caused any more problems. Had my dad call to give them the lawyer voice. No bones. Looks like i will not get to see Emily this Christmas, nor will Jeff get to meet her at all. My whole family will be together with them... and trust me, i don't begrudge them that... but i will be absent. And i am heartbroken.

The airline will not allow us to NOT fly from Cleveland to Pittsburgh. If we try it, they will cancel our flight and we will have no way home. Well, that's not entirely true. They will let us not fly from Cleveland to Pittsburgh... for $425 each -- more than the ticket cost in the first place. i spent every last dime i had to spare just to get home, and couldn't fathom $425 if i tried.

Over the course of this ordeal i told them... i'm just trying to get home to my family for Christmas, and if i can't get off in Cleveland, i will miss them entirely. No sympathy, no compassion. Just, "sorry, ma'am, it doesn't work that way."

Do me a favor, please. If you ever have the choice between Continental and another airline that won't cost you more than a few bucks, please, choose the other airline. They will probably never notice the difference, but who cares?

The pathetic joke becomes... what if i don't use the overhead compartment? How much is that gonna cost me?

Being Mrs. Claus

2007-12-19T08:30:00.000-06:00

i got an e-mail a few days ago from Emily's parents with a photograph of Emily and Elizabeth with Santa and Mrs. Claus. i almost posted it but don't think that Em's parents are big on having her picture on the internet. Take my word for it: they're adorable. Anyway, the photograph got me to thinking about Lady Claus.

Girl has it made!! Here's my list of reasons why it's good to be Santa's wife:

1. Elf slaves.
2. It's not only acceptable to have a few extra pounds, it's expected of you.
3. No noisy neighbors.
4. Global warming actually works for you.
5. You get your husband to yourself for 364 days a year.

Then again....
Why it would suck to be Mrs. Claus:
1. Feigning sleep to get out of sex is not an option.
2. Reindeer smell.
3. Spending an eternity trapped at age 65.
4. You can't even look at another man without getting called a 'ho.'
5. You get your husband to yourself 364 days a year.

my next tattoo

2007-12-06T08:19:00.001-06:00

i don't know who this dude is or where he lives, but i want to do this......

How wicked is that?! It's even coded: the pink squares are metals. The blue are metalloids, and the green are nonmetals. The only thing left to decide is where it will go. The other option is just the square of my favorite element....

This would look good (using the term relatively, of course) on the upper arm or maybe a right thigh... hmmmmm................ thinking, thinking....

Chess Jocks

2007-12-03T18:03:00.000-06:00

i spent Saturday at a scholastic chess tournament. It was great... chess everywhere. Nothing but a gym full of nerds playing the most strategic game ever invented by man, stretching their minds and sharpening their intellects.

my students took 2nd place in this massive meeting of the minds, after two tie breakers which separated them from the winners. i came home with a massive trophy and a slew of medaled chess 'masters.' We were triumphant.

Today the chess club met to go over their games and to play bughouse, a new chess variant that they taught me briefly in the Skittles room. Incidentally, they also introduced me to the idea of plunder chess, though it requires special equipment and i have yet to play it. After club met, played, and left, i had a meeting with the elementary chess coach and our respective principals.

At this informal meeting i learned, to my dismay and near disbelief, that two of my players had gotten into a fist fight in the hallways while waiting for new pairings to be posted. Chess players! Fist fighting! i guess sometimes the stress of having to assert yourself as a man in this adolescent jungle just becomes too much. The constant thrust and parry of rooks and pawns must have overwhelmed the boys who took to each other with rampant masculine drive to assert dominance over one another.

On the up side, the football coach is now a little scared of me... all i have to do is look at him and say, "be careful, man, i'm tough, i play chess."

Firsts

2007-11-26T14:58:00.000-06:00

Since becoming an adult (or at least reaching the age of adulthood), i have been expected to make contributions to my familys' Thanksgiving meals. Normally, i bake the pies. i'm good at fruit pies like apple, cherry, and peach... not pumkin or rhubarb. Even though they might count technically as fruits under varying definitions of the term, they, in my opinion, do not belong in pastries. [Coincidentally, there are places fruits just do not belong either... for instance, salads. No strawberries in spinach salads, no grapes in chicken salad. Just no. But that's another blog entry.]

But this past Thanksgiving was the first one that was wholly mine. Well, not wholly... Jeff and his brother both contributed to the meal. But the turkey was on me, as well as the cooking. i was nervous because no matter what i do it always seems wrong to his family. And i could just imagine the fallout of giving both boys a case of Salmonella from undercooked turkey.

It all turned out alright, and i had another fantastic time with Jeff and his brother. They are absolutely hysterical together. i laughed until i cried more times than i could count. And then later in bed, i just cried. i missed my family. Terribly. i never thought it would be that bad, but it hit me and hard.

We returned to Wichita for Black Friday, and i broke another expectation of myself. i swore i would never go near a mall on the day after Thanksgiving. But Jeff made me an offer i couldn't refuse: spend an hour and change at the mall and get treated to the new Steven King movie at the cineplex. When we stepped outside to go the mall, it was snowing. my first Kansas snowfall. Just flurries, but they picked up as the evening went on, and by the time we hit the theater, the flakes were big enough for tongue-catching. Still, the ground was so warm and the flakes were so intermittent that there was no accumulation expected.

On Saturday morning we woke up to put lights on the tree, and low and behold... three centimeters of fresh, driven snow all over everything.

First Thanksgiving dinner... first Kansas snowfall. Another weekend of firsts.