Baltimore Diary

If East and West Germany Can Reunite, There's Hope for the Virginias

Elvira: I'm glad to see you're back. You're glad to see my front.

—Movie Macabre, 1981-1993
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GF and I got back from our trip on Sunday night. We had a very relaxing time, although it took us way longer than we thought to get down there because of the rain on Wednesday night. The route, incidentally, takes you through Frederick, MD, then south into Virginia. Then into West Virginia. And then back into Virginia. The hell?

The cabin we'd rented was in New Market, VA or, more accurately, two and a half miles up the mountain from New Market. I don't think I've ever seen a road sign indicating via symbols that the pavement was about to end. I therefore share it with you:

The cabin was very small and had two sources of heat: Electric heaters mounted in the walls, or the fireplace. GF, of course, wanted to use the fireplace as much as possible. This was basically okay with me but the wood was a bit damp despite being on the porch. So for the first hour or so that night I got a pretty good roaring smolder going on.

I got better at the fire thing as the weekend wore on, not that we always needed it. The weather was great the entire rest of the weekend. We stayed in on Thanksgiving Day and watched the Macy's parade in the morning. This place, incidentally, had no cable; we were watching on regular antenna-based TV. Four channels and none of them coming in especially sharp. We went into town and found a place to eat our holiday meal; a café/emporium called Wayne's 2 Worlds. Everything homemade and delicious, served up with some friendly chatter from the staff. We got back and watched the Bucs get their asses kicked. Then, it was into the hot tub under the stars.

Friday we went back into town and poked around the antique shops and a flea market down the road. Lunch took place in the Southern Kitchen, which had a real diner/lunch counter-y feel to it.  You can't really tell by this picture, but that's some serious neon in that sign.

We drove down to Luray and back, just taking in the scenery. After dinner back at the cabin, we took another dive into the tub.

On Saturday we spent the better part of the day just hanging out, reading our respective books and, of course, jumping into the bubbles again. We went out once to get decongestants because all the wood smoke was starting to get to us. 

By Sunday morning, however, all the nasal spray and Benadryl wasn't really helping; I was in the middle of a full-blown cold, which may have settled into my chest. I'm still fighting it off. But at least it held off until we were about to leave, so there can't be too much complaining about it. For the trip home we took our time, avoiding the interstate highway as long as we could and poking through a few more shops along the way.

We still managed to get home before 5:00 and get to bed at a decent hour. It was a great way to disconnect and completely decompress.

The Secret's Out

Duckman: Comedy should provoke! It should blast through prejudices, challenge preconceptions! Comedy should always leave you different than when it found you. Sure, humor can hurt, even alienate, but the risk is better than the alternative: a steady diet of innocuous, child-proof, flavorless mush! Demand to be challenged, to be offended, to be treated like thinking, reasoning adults. And raise your children to be the same. Don't let a comedian, a network, a Congressional committee, or an evil genius take away your freedom to laugh at whatever you want.

—Duckman, 1994-1997

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I have to say this: ever since certain people have found this site, my daily hit count has nearly doubled. I have to wonder if they're just scouring it for references to themselves, or what. According to these people, "You got [sic] a lot of nerve and surely no class", so perhaps they're looking for more examples of this. To what end, I'm not sure. Maybe they're vetting me to work on Martin O'Malley's transition team, but somehow I doubt it.

At any rate, for those of you who are just tuning in to see me use less-than-flattering terms for people, keep reading. I may come up with something for you yet. Perhaps a tribute to Gary Glitter, I don't know.

The Thanksgiving Biannual

Woody Boyd: Yeah, this is my first Thanksgiving away from home. I mean, unless you count last year.

—Cheers, "Thanksgiving Orphans", 1986

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GF and I don't have the girls this year, so we're going away for Thanksgiving. We get to do this every other year. The first time (in 2002) we went to see the Macy's Parade, the last time (2004) it was Plymouth, Massachusetts. This year we're going to New Market, Virginia.

Those first two were very cool and very Thanksgiving-y. Especially wandering around Plymouth, where you got to see people dressed in period costumes and hear them say archaic things like "Ye". So this is pretty much of a departure for us. We're renting a cabin and there's a whole lot of Not Much in the immediate area, although we'll be fairly close to the Luray Caverns area. We've already seen that, but who knows: maybe we'll find something else fun to do. At this point we have practically no plans, which is fine by me. I need more time like that. In the meantime, I hope that there's plenty of wood available for the fireplace.

GF doesn't want me to take any work along, which is OK, but I may bring the laptop so we can watch movies on it. When you're a New Yorker, what's Thanksgiving without King Kong? (Son of Kong and Mighty Joe Young give you the Big Ape Hat Trick, but those two are optional.) If I'd planned ahead a little better, I'd have March of the Wooden Soldiers on-hand as well; that's another Thanksgiving staple from my TV Childhood. It all depended on whether you watched Channel 9 or Channel 11 that day.

GF's annual Thanksgiving movie tradition is Miracle on 34th Street, but she couldn't tell me why. So what's yours?

WYPO'ed

One of the things I believe is that if you've got a job where you have to represent the face of your employer, you need to do it well. It doesn't matter to me if you're Bill Gates or a greeter at Wal-Mart. There's no such thing as a crappy job in that respect. If that's your job, just do it well or do something else; something that doesn't represent the company. You know?

So yesterday morning at about 8:45, I'm heading east on the 28th Street Bridge. It's busy but it's moving along. I'm in that left lane that's about to turn into the middle lane because of the ramp coming up from I-83, and I'm minding my own business, just heading to work and listening to NPR. Shortly after that merge, a car from the new left lane does one of those Pop On the Signal After the Maneuver Has Started routines and cuts me off. With the signal still on, he taps the brakes just long enough to force me to hit mine, then dodges over to the right lane. Then he gives me the "yeah, I did that" look and makes the right-on-red down Sisson Street.

As it happened, because of him hitting the brakes in front of me, I got a good look at his license plate. It read "WYPR".

Son of a bitch.

I'm sitting here listening to HIS station, and he treats me like this? Lemme tell you something, bub. I pay your salary. Not only do I pay it through the taxes that go into your federal subsidies, I pay it a SECOND time because I'm one of the people who's foolish enough to send you money each year. Who knows, maybe the city gives them money so I'm paying him a third time.

All I'm saying is, if you're going to represent yourself as one of the public faces of a radio station, you should maybe treat the people around you a little more politely. You never know who you're cutting off. They could wind up cutting you off in the end, if you get my drift.

And I know it didn't mean much in the grand scheme of things, but I changed stations immediately. Asshat.  

Thanks for Nothing

Gracie Allen: Well, you see one Christmas my father caught a wild turkey and he fed him corn and chestnuts. But then we didn't have the heart to kill him so we let him get away.
George Burns: Oh, I see.
Gracie: But the turkey liked the food so well that he came back each year. And that way we always had—
George: A turkey for Christmas dinner?
Gracie: Yes.

—The Burns & Allen Show, 1950-1958

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Every month, the folks who have my job title meet in some central location. It used to be that the meetings would start around noon and go until 3:00, maybe 3:30. This year, The Powers That Be decided that the meetings would be all-day affairs.

This isn't too terrible a thing, as they usually give us a lot of material to present. However, it does get to be a bit much as the day wears on, especially since TPTB feel that they have to define what's going to be discussed for the better part of the day. What then happens is, they'll put items on the agenda that are identical to staff development sessions we've already held a short time ago. This can really try people's patience, as you can imagine. Plus, it actually winds up cutting into what we need to share with them.

Because the days are so long, I've tried a few tactics to cut the tedium. One time, instead of a rehash of stuff we'd done already, I had everyone working on a quiz involving famous novels. This month, I've organized a potluck Thanksgiving luncheon.

The boss and I would provide the turkeys and everyone else would bring something. The boss, of course, asked me to purchase and cook his turkey and he'd reimburse me. I didn't have a problem with this; I figured I'd do one in the oven and one in my Ronco Showtime rotisserie.

All was going well until I noticed that the kitchen looked a little smoky. I went in there and it turned out that the turkey in the rotisserie had shifted and was no longer spinning. Consequently I had a turkey that was burned on one side and nearly raw on the other. And here it is, 9:30 pm. What could I do? I went to Giant, hoping I could thaw a bird with some efficiency.

I was in luck: it turned out that Giant was putting some of the turkeys in the regular meat bins so they weren't completely frozen solid. I found one that seemed to be more or less defrosted, took it home but the one in the oven wasn't done yet. Well, no way was I using the rotisserie again; besides, the new turkey was too big for the rotisserie. It wasn't until midnight that I got the second bird into the oven. I figure it'll be there until about 5:30-ish.

And here I sit, at a quarter after three in the morning. I'm going to nap and let the bird do its thing, but tomorrow is NOT going to be a pretty day for me, what with the all-day meeting followed by a class at Notre Dame. Fortunately it's the last class of the semester.

Censored? Not So Much

Sergeant Joe Friday: Now you listen to me, you gutter-mouth punk. I've dealt with you before, and every time I did, it took me a month to wash off the filth. I'll tell you what you did to that four-year old girl out in Westlake Park: you staked out a bench like you've always done. You bought a sack of penny candy; you waited until the right little girl came along... You got her in your car. She started to cry; you hit her across the mouth twice. You cut her lip with your ring. Knocked out three of her teeth. And then you know what you did to her... Now, I didn't say that, Rockwell, you did. That's exactly what you told those officers who arrested you. They advised you of your constitutional rights before you opened your mouth. Now you're trying to tell us you didn't understand. Well, you're a liar... Like every hoodlum since Cain up through Capone, you've learned to hide behind some quirk in the law. And mister, you are a two-bit hoodlum. You've fallen twice for A.D.W. Burglary, three times. Twice for forcible rape; I tagged you for those. And now you've graduated: you've moved to the sewer. You're a child molester.

—Dragnet 1966, 1969

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No, those dates aren't a typo. Dragnet 1966 was a made-for-TV movie that didn't air until 1969. Anyway.

For the first time today I deleted a comment that wasn't spam. It was a response to a post I'd made back in June. Now, I'm all about free speech and that, but this isn't that kind of forum. Unlike a lot of other people who write blogs, I pay for my space. That's a choice I made so that I would take this seriously. If I don't post, I'm the one pissing away the money. If I do, then I'm getting my money's worth. So as the publisher of this particular blight on the Internet landscape, I get to say what appears and what doesn't. And a reply that just extends a stupid argument? Well, that doesn't.

I'm being deliberately obtuse here with the not naming names and stuff because I think that to give any kind of reply gives the person involved some credence that just isn't deserved.  Let's just say that I'm not necessarily at the front of any lines for political appointments, which is OK with me.

edited to add: coincidentally, someone else was responding to the same post while I wrote this one. I didn't delete that one and took the time to respond, partly because he and I have, so far, more or less enjoyed a decent "agree to disagree" relationship.

Are You Tone Deaf?

An online test that tests your musical ability. It's basically a quick way to determine whether you have good pitch perception.

I got a 72.2% on the first go-round, which isn't bad considering that I had the dogs play-fighting in the room for part of the test. It's also not bad considering that I don't play an instrument.

Good speakers or a headset are recommended, and you'll need Flash Player 8 or 9.

How did you do?

Another Search That Led To This Site

What the hell is the matter with some people, anyway?

Poll Position

Dick: So, how many times do I get to vote?
Registrar: One time.
Dick: And it doesn't matter that I'm brilliant?
Registrar: No.
Dick: Have you noticed how tall I am?
Registrar: We all get one vote.
Dick: You mean your opinion counts equally with mine?
Registrar: You got it.
Dick: You're awfully smug for a man who works at a folding table.

—Third Rock From the Sun, "Dick the Vote", 11/27/96

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I went and did my civic duty this morning, not that I got a sticker for it.

Our polling place is Morrell Park Elementary/Middle School. They do the Election-Day stuff in the cafeteria, perhaps because the geography involving the gym is a little weird. What happens is that they close off the main entrance to the school and you have to walk up a walkway midway down the building to go directly to the cafeteria area.

Now, since the rule for electioneering is that you can't do it 100 feet from the door to the polling area, and the door is set back from the main part of the building, you're beset by people along the school's entire sidewalk area. And, of course, the O'Malley contingent was all over the place, including 10th District Councilman Ed Reisinger and his greasy, short-fingered lapdog Wayne Sherman. Man oh man, being associated with Wayne is reason enough not to vote for someone, but I'm an issues voter, not a party voter. You can't always choose who sides with you, you know?

We hear from good authority that Ed has been attending neighborhood community meetings all over the district for the last several months. He's been pretty invisible in Morrell Park since about April, though. I'm sure that it's only a coincidence that his disappearance happened shortly before his brother-in-law started his harassment campaign against the Morrell Park Community Association. A more cynical mind would suggest that he's trying to distract the Association from getting anything done, since they won't play "yes-man" to him. Politics in this town is definitely all about "what have you done for me lately" and in 2006, Ed Reisinger hasn't done anything noteworthy in this neighborhood. I can think of a couple of things that he'll take credit for, though.

[Insert Very Bad Language Here]

Brad Taylor: All I wanted to do was be with my friends. A lot of people I like are going to be down there.

Tim Taylor: Christmas is not about being with people you like...It's about being with family.

—Home Improvement

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Despite having a forum such as this to express myself, I'm really rather a withdrawn person.

Yeah, they don't believe that at work, either, because I have to speak in front of groups all the time. But if you've been reading this long enough, you know that I've said several times something to the effect of "nobody really knows everything about me", which is true.

This is all part of the reason I didn't go to the Blogger Happy Hour last week. I had a class which kept me away until almost nine o'clock. Given another 15-30 minutes to get to the place and we're talking almost nine-thirty for an event that started around six. Given that I would have known nobody in the place and I'm not the kind of guy to wander around asking "Where are the bloggers?" Yeah, that trip was doomed. There's more to it than that but you get the idea.

But this isn't about the Happy Hour, which I do regret missing even though there were mental hurdles to clear. This is really about Christmas.

I've been going down to my family in Florida every Christmas for the last several years. The basic structure is the same. I (and sometimes Daughter, depending on the calendar) drive down; there's Christmas Eve at my mom's place (or my grandmother's, when she had a house of her own); Christmas Day dinner with my brother's stepdaughter and her husband (whatever you'd call that relationship), somewhere in there my brother and I would hit a sporting event (Bucs or Lightning, whatever); lots of pepperoni and cheese would be consumed. (Inside joke, that last.) In recent years, GF would fly down with the Wee One to join us shortly after Christmas Day, having spent the Eve and the Day with her own family.

So since last year, GF has been working on me to have us spend one Christmas together, all four of us, here in Baltimore. We'd do the Christmas Eve thing, do the Christmas Day thing, do whatever in the week following. I was pretty resistant because I like getting the hell out of Dodge that week. But I figured one time wouldn't kill me, so I agreed. Plus, after this year there's only one more holiday season that Daughter will be old enough to push around and after that she'll be on her own, visitation-wise. I don't have a lot of illusions about her spending the holidays with me after 2008.

So I felt a little bit better when I learned that it was GF's turn to do Christmas Eve dinner. This may sound a little odd, but that meant that her family would have to come to our house for dinner and whatever bonhomie was going to take place. I'd get at least some illusion of control over the situation; I'd spend all day cooking and playing host and staying busy enough that I wouldn't have to actually, you know, interact with anybody. (No kidding; one time I was helping out at a party for my brother and when my mother asked me why I wasn't outside talking to people, I told her "because people suck.")

I, being a reasonably good host for big-deal meals like this, actually started planning the meal a few days ago. Got a soup course down and had the pasta course narrowed to two choices, and what's the traditional main course, honey? GF's worry was that her brother and his wife had recently (over the summer) had their second child and that they might not come, or would somehow steer events to happen somewhere up by them, whether at their house or at GF's parents' place. We're talking Monkton, here, up by where Snay does a lot of his deliveries. From here that's a bit of a hike. I told her that if it was her turn, then it was her turn and that she should just present everything as a done deal. I've got plans for dinner, etc.

I spent the better part of the day inside, reading the newspaper, catching the Ravens game, that sort of thing. I had a dinner that I was going to start at 4:00 and all would be well with the world. Then I discovered that I was out of dog food. I go through twice as much of the stuff as I used to, you know. So I boogied out to Sam's Club in Catonsville to get the dog food and some big honkin' cans of crushed tomatoes so I can make gallons (literally) of spaghetti sauce. I'm going to need it for the pasta course. I get home an hour later and I swear I'm not in the house one full minute when GF tells me that she spoke to her sister-in-law and that Christmas Eve will be at their house.

Fuck fuck fuck fuckity fuck. So now I'm not only stuck here for the holiday, I have to drag my ass up to the middle of nowhere to just sit there and behave like I'm interested in whatever banality is passing around my head. The conversations are a little inbred; they're all about what's happening to whom right in the area so I couldn't contribute if I wanted to. And as bad as it will be for me, Daughter will have it just a little worse.

Christmas is going to suck even more than usual this year.