Regret, Thy Name is Blizzard

You were so cold and inviting and cheap. An ephemeral treat to slake a nagging longing. But like an uninvited guest, you keep hanging around. Belch belch belch

Robo Toilets

Not so long ago, going to the public toilet was a relatively easy exercise, long lines (women's rooms), filth and dread notwithstanding. Sure it took a bit of maneuvering to get into the narrow stalls without making too much contact with any surface that might transfer some icky germs to our person. For most women, we'd gotten it down to a bit of science, especially if we were toting along luggage or shopping bags, or, god forbid, kids.

If anyone had consulted with women, I am sure their biggest three suggestions for improvements to public restrooms would have been: a) bigger stalls; b) copius bag shelf/coat hooks; c) foot controls.

Not so recent improvements in public toilets, save for in a few upscale places don't seem to include any of these common-sense, practical upgrades. Instead what women have gotten, likely from men designers/engineers is, automation. Yes ladies, someone out there didn't think you could do it manually!

Self flushing toilets. Taps that turn on with a wave of a hand. Self-squirting soap pumps. Towel dispensers that feed out the right sized sheet at flash of a palm. All wonderful future-now mod-cons! Yippee! Well, not so fast. Certainly all that automation would be fine if they worked as promised 100% of the time. But I am sure you've been in the bathroom at the airport watching some hapless woman waving like a lunatic at the tap, or worse yet, pressing and pushing to no avail. Perhaps that lunatic trying to brush her teeth after a gnarly flight was you?!

Call me a Luddite, but I really do not think that toilets needed this kind of futuristic mod-con upgrade. First of all, what if the power goes out? Do all these places have backup generators that are connected to the toilets.

Sure I hate to enter a stall where the previous user has left an unsightly unflushed deposit (of any number). I am guessing that the drive to automate the toilets especially, comes from a drive to make bathrooms more sanitary. Whatever the reasoning--whether it's sanitation concerns or just moving along with the technology of the times, I say, "Bah, humbug."

My experience with these automated toilets has been an exercise in frustration. Why? I don't like being flushed upon in midstream. The problem with all these toilets is that the sensors are either too sensitive or they are not sensitive enough.
I have a rather time-consuming routine when I use a public WC. These are the steps.
1. Wad up tp and wipe the seat.
2. Spread 2 strips of TP on each side of the seat. (doubled up if no #3)
3. Spread a toilet seat cover (when available) over the TP on the seat
4. Sit. Deposit.
My routine was breezy with the old fashioned manual toilets.

Now with the robo-toilet, my life is a terrifying tangled tp tango.
The trouble when the toilet flush sensors are overly sensitive, halfway through my routine, the blasted toilet flushes, splashing up droplets to the seat, sucking down my protective tp or my seat cover. That's a pain in the ass, then there's the water in the ass when, just as you sit on your little safety next about to do the business, the sensor says, "Sorry I think you've been in here a while so I better just flush." I really don't like springing up like a march hare in the middle of my deposit.

Now let's say the sensor isn't as sensitive as it should be. You've made a deposit of a more solid type and you want the toilet to flush...or even say you've only made a liquid deposit and you've stood and zipped and ready to depart. You turn and stare or even move about a bit, but still no flush. There's a line out there, backed up into the mall or the terminal or the movie theater--wherever and still no flush. You wave your hand frantically over the little dark patch with the mysterious red light. You look around for the manual override button--not always well placed--and now your face is right over the fountain of germs, ready to push when finally the thing decides to do what it ought to do! There you go again having to spring up like springbok!

It's all very disconcerting. I don't like it one bit.

Now you are out trying to wash your hand and you can't get a flow going, the water temperature is right out of Goldilocks and the three bears--too hot, too cold and not just right. There's soap dispenser but you can't tell where the spigot is so it squirts on the counter. You are now Zero for Three. At least you can get a bit of paper now! Right? Wrong! Well maybe not all wrong. I do hate the manual paper dispensers that are so tightly packed that when you pull on a sheet all you get is that damp broken off corner. So in some ways, I think the paper dispenser is the best addition, though I would argue that the dispensers that had the elbow bar, allowing women to use their elbows to crank the feed was genius. Low tech and effective--just like the toilet with the simple handle--one placed on the floor so you can use your foot to flush. That and a bigger stall is all we ever asked for!

P.s. The only thing I really like is the new DYSON air blade. Now that's a great hand drying device. No more endless brisk rubbing!

Bristol's Baby Mama Drama

I am tired of hearing about how extraordinary Sarah Palin is that she embraced her pregnant teen daughter and that she kept her child with down syndrome. Many thousands of Americans do that every day and don't get any extra credit. The beauty of CHOICE is that you should be able to make decisions that work for you and NOT have the government LEGISLATE how you make those intensely PERSONAL decisions. Neither Bristol or Sarah get extra credit for not having abortions because frankly that is what a VAST Majority of Americans do--they keep their babies. Of course the RABID ANTI-CHOICE people would want you to think that the rate of abortion is a crisis. That's just to help hype their propaganda and push their platform of government interference in private lives. It's funny how many of these same folks get riled up if the gov't wants to regulate their guns yet feel it's fine to tell a woman what to do with her body! GOD RELIGION AND SEX should be kept bedind closed doors.

Frankly what concerns me about SP's selection is the reality of WHO and WHY she was selected. I am sure McCain had little to do with it. I am sure the right wing, Christiano-fascist movement were the people who vetted her. The wall separating church and state is being dismantled. That is what should be agitating Americans, not some teenager who slept around with condoms. I wonder what the reaction would have been if instead of getting a bun in the oven Bristol picked up HIV?

Much Ado about Beijing Olympics

With the closing ceremonies over, Olympic blather is old news, especially with the DNC and RNC holding their political parties this week. But I just had a few things to say--and it's my blog so I can say it now.

1. It was clear from the outset when China was awarded these games that they were an authoritarian state with a bad human rights records with no regard for the rules of the west--except for the rule of money. Those games were awarded to China because of business interests and not as some incentive to clean up their act. And probably because they had the loot to throw pay for the party. (And what a party it was)!

Of course people should protest and advocate for a whatever it is they want to see in China, but if anyone expected these games to convert China, they were fooling themselves. Clearly their model of authoritarian capitalism works. THat "MADE IN CHINA" label is on pretty much EVERYTHING we all use/consume in the rest of the world. It doesn't seem likely that we are about to give up the stuff, so get over it.

2. It seemed to me that the US (especially its media) and much of the world were really hoping China would screw up something in the run up to the games and during they games. The opening and closing were boffo. The venues fabulous. And the deadly Smog? What smog? Hah! So much for the dire predictions of the delicate Westerners dropping down dead from too much particulate matter. Oh yes there is the matter of He Kexin the little gymnast who kicked butt. Sure she might be 14 but the Chinese government says she ain't and they control the agencies that can make her 14 or 54. So there! They ran away with the gold booty and their volunteers even learned English. That's a big nice raspberry to the west.

3. Back to He Kexin for a moment, and yes that little lip-synching girl (how could I have forgotten? The way that the Chinese government handles things is basically to say: "Whatcha gonna do? We do what we do cause we run things." And they do! That's how they roll! Gotta admit they have the balls. And again they got the money!

4. The US is a sore loser. They want to hog all the gold and glory and they don't like to share the spotlight. And that is why I had to suffer through every damn beach volleyball tournament but not get to see the three Jamaican sprinters take their places on the stand in a historic moment.

5. Olympics are a like a big expensive wedding! Lots of set up and clean up. Only the bride and groom really care! At the end of the day, people show up, eat the food, have a bit of fun and then they forget to send you an anniversary card (not that they should). The gold medal athletes are the bride and groom and everybody else is an usher a page or a waiter. You have a few nice pictures and then...Party Over!

"Trending Toward an Increase"

I recently read an article, the subject of which escapes me now, but what struck me was that silly phrase, "trending toward and increase." I know we like to turn nouns into verbs and make up words, but "trending towards an increase" is just plain stupid. Really. Trending is not a word. Sure, it's already wormed it's way into the vernacular and will probably join "ginormous" in the dictionary. It's not that I am against the growth of language, but the folly is definitely "trending toward an increase."
I think what it boils down to is people trying to sound more intelligent and scholarly than they obviously are! It would do them well to remember that the first rule of writing is to keep it clear, concise and accessible to your readers. Enough said!

Tug of Faith

Twice this week I have been to a church service. First was the baptism of a friend's daughter at a Catholic Church. Today was a memorial service for a woman who died 17 years ago.
Especially at the baptism, I found myself being caught up in the comfort of ritual. Having been raised, essentially, as Catholic, the muscle memory was strong. I was drawn by the power of faith and belief of "things unseen." The awe, wonder and beauty of our lives as humans does sometime move me to believe in something more powerful than randomness of the collision of atoms and energy that is our existence, and who can deny the sheer beauty and awesome grace of that very randomness!
I sit in the church, and listen as the priest talks to my friend and her husband of raising their child in faith. I wonder if they have their fingers crossed behind their backs, as they are as secular as anyone I know. I wonder if they are moved as I by the idea of being held in God's hands? Certainly the existence of their child, whose conception and gestation relied upon science in great part, must also reveal a certain amoung of Grace! To whom do they direct their gratitude for the blessing that is this child?
Is it easier to believe or not? I am a secular skeptic, a lapsed believer, but in moments when that memory of ritual and faith surge forward, in the quiet of prayer, I ponder the loss. Why does my heart fill so when I just enter a church? Why do the Psalms soothe me? What is it about the illogic of religion that still holds sway in some part of my heart? What is this tug of faith I feel! And why is it that I resist so?

Resetting Woojnick's Brain

It's been a bittersweet trip down memory lane these past few days since Woojnick has left us. We had a funny episode some years ago when she developed some allergies that caused her to scratch at her neck ceaselessly. Nearly weekly cortisone shots did nothing, save thin my wallet. One day I ran into this nice but wacky lady in the vitamin aisle at the supermarket. (Wacky because she and her cat were on the same supplements). She recommended a holistic vet on the westside of town. What the heck, I thought. My poor Wooj had virtually dug a hole in her neck.
The doctor seemed nice, rational and normal. He examined the cat and he took the stool sample I was required to deliver(the cat's not mine). He told me that I should get her off the "fancy feast" and go with some organic cat food. Easy. Doable. Done. Not so fast. Then came part two of the exam. He said he had a special way to test for specific allergies. I thought, "Oh no, poor Wooj is going to get stuck with needles." I cringed in painful anticipation. Well, turns out that it wasn't a needle stick that had me cringeing. He brought in his assistant to, well, "assist." She was, he explained, the surrogate. First she grabbed the cat by the scruff with her left hand and then extended her right arm out perpendicular to her body. The good Doctor then brought out a case containing several neat and impressive looking rows of small glass vials, each filled with water. It's not ordinary water, he explained with all seriousness. Each vial had been infused with the frequencies of common allergens, beef, chicken, rice, cheap cat food, etc. And so the "test" began. One by one, he passed the vials under the nose of an unaturally docile and compliant Woojnick. With each pass, the doctor pressed down on the extended arm of the assistant. Sometimes her arm would remain stiff, resistant to the pressure and other times it was fall to her side, only to spring back up. Boinggggg! You see, the assistant was chanelling the energy of the cat's reaction to each allergen through her arm. Stiff arm good. Loose arm bad!
This went on for several minutes. I watched in circus side-show amazement and awe, wondering if I'd somehow "made a left turn at Albuquerque"* and ended up in at a Ringling Bros. show. And why I wondered, was Barnum's quote that "there's a sucker born every minute" spinning in my head? The answer was not long in coming.
The last thing the good, kind Doctor did was (insert pause for dramatic effect here) RESET my cat's brain to deter future allergies. How did he do this most amazing feat you ask? With his special brain resetting instrument of course! He simply reached into his pocket protector and grabbed a (insert yet another pause for dramatic effect here)very special ballpoint pen--the kind with the clickable button at the top. He put the clicky part at the base of Woojnick's head and pressed it several times. Click, click, click, click! There you go! All done. Brain reset. No more allergies.
I didn't know what to say or do. I'd just witnessed and paid for the most ridiculous bit of quackery imagineable. Should I tell him? Instead, I smiled that nice polite kind of smile you smile when you are slowly backing away from a crazy person. I took my compliant cat and figuratively backed out of the room into my car and sped away from there like I was being chased by hound dogs of hell! What the hell!?!? just happenend I thought. Did I just pay $200 for a side-show? I had and now I was mad. The next day I did my usual boomerang. I called the vet and asked for my money back. I told him that it was cool that he'd checked on my cat and tested the stool but the arm-flapping-nose-vial-water-energy-pen-clicking-brain reset thing was beyond my realm of acceptable possibilities--even in my desperation to cure my beloved Woojnick.
I was surprised when he gave me most of the money back, but he did it with that kind of "you have not evolved enough yet to understand this scientific approach" attitude. Perhaps not, and indeed the food recommendation worked wonders for the cat and her neck stopped giving her grief. But I will tell you one thing: that brain reset did not work. Woojnick might have been docile in that office because she was terrified of Dr. Vet man, but once she was home, I knew her little brain was just as it had been before that adventure--nothing like biting the hand that feeds you new and more expensive organic cat food. Maybe the vet hadn't used the right kind pen for the job!

*can you guess the ABQ reference?