Comma Dot Comma

An interesting post on Earth Day over on KarenJoy’s blog got me started on a long commment that I decided to convert into a post after it reached its second parenthetical aside.

Her post reminded me of some of my early experiences when we moved here from the liberal east coast. One thing about the culture of Arizona that struck me was how fiercely people resisted any label that smacked of, oh, how shall we call it– non-conservatism. On several occasions I heard people say, “I’m no _________ (fill in the blank with your favorite term, liberal, environmentalist, feminist), but…” and then share a deeply held belief or lifestyle choice that, to my mind, fit quite comfortably in that category.

Does this happen because people associate those labels with the most extreme ideas within those categories (For example, the tiny number of feminists who believe we’d be better off without any men at all)?. Abstract terms like these are catch-alls that hold a wide variety of ideas about a certain theme, and people who do identify with these labels often do not even agree with each other (Consider the label “Christian,” which I gladly accept, even though I share it with a few people who march around with signs that say “God Hates You”– an idea I do not agree with, to say the least). Is there guilt by association? Let’s take the term “environmentalist”. Some, if not many, environmentalists are motivated in their efforts at conservation by philosophies which are not Christian and in fact may be antithetical to Christianity. Should I eschew association with such a label due to the differing motivations among my fellow label-ees? I admit it’s not really a fair question since I had an answer before I even wrote it.

I’d describe an environmentalist as anyone who seriously considers, and tries to minimize, the environmental costs and consequences of their use of resources. If someone asked me if I were an environmentalist, I’d probably say yes. But in terms of actual choices about food, purchases, and use of water and energy, I suspect that my friend KarenJoy, who does not want to be called by this label, is actually more of an environmentalist than me.

I think it would be a fun experiment to take some of these assumption-and-association-prone terms and get a bunch of one-sentence definitions from people. Do you think it’s been done already?

Liberal
Conservative
Enviromentalist
Feminist
Politician
Emergent Christian
Fundamentalist Christian
Evangelical Christian
Humanist
Activist
Evolutionist
Creationist
Spiritual
Religious
Intellectual

I’ve got a few days off from my regular job and I am spending them…. working. I’ve got two online creative writing courses that I will begin teaching (thanks for the edit Karen) come Monday, and there’s always more to do to get online courses ready than one imagines in one’s little mind when one chooses to watch movies instead of working on curriculum for multiple weekends in a row. Both courses are getting into ship-shape order now, and I’m feeling that start-of-the-course excitement. We are gonna have some fun! It has just occured to me that, since they are online, anyone could sign up, not just my fellow Phoenicians. Eight weeks, with one assignment due per week. The first course is Beginning Creative Writing, where we will work on memoir, poetry, and short stories. The second course is Beginning Poetry, where we will do five different poems (nature, persona, list, strange, rhymed) plus some revisions. I know it’s late notice, and I must confess total ignorance about the availability of space, but hey, if you’re interested, check it out. http://www.asu.edu/pipercwcenter/workshops/index.html

There is this depressing thing at my work called a body fat meter. It measures what percent of your body weight is fat, water, and other tissue by measuring the electrical resistance in your bare feet. It prints out a receipt helpfully listing the percentages and total pounds in each category. The machine is not super-accurate but in a way, it is kind of fun to have a receipt listing my percent body fat, right where sales tax would be listed on a grocery receipt. I get on this machine every six weeks or so, and no matter how much my weight changes (ok, it doesn’t change MUCH), it always declares that my percentage is one point above the desireable range. That’s the depressing part.

Since my golly-I-need-new-pants high point in mid-December, I have begun erratically exercising more and erratically enforcing a one-food indulgence-per-day rule for myself. I occasionally endure the cheerful encouragement of the free fitness trainer at my work; he is excellent at knowing when I am plotting to quit my weight lifting reps too early. If I seem especially stubborn on this point, he will ever-so-kindly swap my weights for the next size down and make me keep going. He is unaffected by my black stare of doom, which communicates the message, “I am old enough to be your mother, youngster, so don’t even think of bossing me around again.” I would have had to begin childbearing when I was 10 yrs old for that to be true, but you are allowed to mentally exaggerate when you are resisting others’ attempts to help you get healthy. (It’s a human right,look it up on the UN website).

Unrelentingly Cheery Fitness Trainer and I have fortunately eliminated the need to buy me new pants (I wonder how he would be as a personal shopper? As far as I know his wardrobe consists entirely of sweats and basketball shorts). But that darn “desirable range” percentage point! Why must it elude me?

In this issue, you get to hear the authors read their poems aloud, if you wish! Topics include Marco Polo, psychological tests, unicycles, IV nutrition, and many other fine, rhymed items. Check it out at www.unsplendid.com.

This week we had a friend from upstate New York staying with us. The other night I reported that we had a winter storm moving in and he started to laugh– “What does ‘winter storm’ mean in Phoenix?” he asked. “Oh, a few hours of rain,” I said. He left before the storm hit. When it came were watching a Fellini movie — La Strada– and wandering outside every few minutes to check the progress of the lunar eclipse, which was made decidedly unglamorous by the cloud cover. We could see the uncovered edge of the moon but none of the weird colors of eclipses past. As the clouds thickened, the sky got brighter and turned yellow. It looked like about 6 am instead of 10 pm. I don’t know if all the lightning was diffusing through the clouds or what. The thunder shook the entire house, including the light bulbs in their sockets. Fellini just couldn’t measure up. His movies are just too circusy for real life.

Is it too late to talk about superbowl commercials? I know a blog is supposed to be at least somewhat timely, but what the hey. I liked the clydesdale one, the one about the oboe player that got picked second draft to the rangers, and the giant mouse. And I had a special place in my heart for the animatronic badgers. And yet, it all made me wistful for some of the commercials of superbowls past. Given the years I have put in, in various organizations, as an office minion/professional, I have an especially soft soft spot for Terry Tate, Office Linebacker. I think the year it aired was Dr. G’s and my first superbowl with our new church in DC. There was a chili cookoff, and everybody was hanging out at the pastor’s house. The other day I pulled up the commercial on the internet and started laughing all over again. Then Dr. G pointed out that the whole thing is, unfortunately, a giant black man terrorizing white people. Okay, so he’s right. Well, Terry terrorizes one wimpy black guy. Does that mean I ought not to embed it here? But it’s so funny.

How To Influence Without Authority
Central Solar Power
How to Get More Hits on a Website
How to Make Pozole
How to Design and Develop a Hybrid Course
Nanotechnology
Microprocessors
Community Colleges
Programmable Logic Controllers
How to Buy a House
The Military-Industrial Complex
How to Frame a Video Shot
How to Host a Poetry Reading
How to Get 75 Kids to Be Quiet
How to Storyboard
How Superbowl Commercials Get Made
How to Install a Garbage Disposal
Machining
Fake Grass
Pool Care
What an Iron-Deficient Tree Looks Like
When to Plant Tomatoes
How to Select Poetry Submissions
Facebook
How the Chicago World Fair Got Built
Xeriscaping
How to Stretch out My Neck

It’s been awhile, hasn’t it? Yikesy Daisies. Ok, brief rundown.

Christmas
My poor mom had an emergency root canal on Christmas Eve, but other than that the gang had fun in California, each of us patiently waiting for a turn at the Wii my sister brought with her. Yay guitar hero! The nephews lived up to the expected cuteness, with the youngest one (20 mos) demonstrating the lastest in dance moves. Step 1: Plant your feet as far apart as you can without falling over. Step 2: Stick your behind out as far as it will go, and keep it there. Wearing giant elmo slippers can help with balance. Step 3: When the music starts, lean from right to left like a skiier, shrugging your shoulders. Step 4: Once you get a good rhythm going, add hand motions to taste. Rockin!

2008
Do I have a resolution this year? No, not really. I would like to plant a tiny raised-bed kitchen garden, with a tomato, basil, cilantro, and jalepeno in it. I haven’t lived anywhere with even an outdoor porch since 2001, so this spring will be the first opportunity to try my hand at gardening as a grownup.

Doing a little recreating
I was laid low with a 10-day illness starting right after Christmas. Made matching coocoons in the bedroom and on the livingroom couch, and divided time between them. Read seven books and watched nine movies (latest discovery if you are the sort that likes the BBC miniseries Pride and Prejudice: North and South, also a BBC miniseries, set in industrial England in the mid 1800’s. Boy, the love interests in that one are going to have a loud marriage!). I’ve had quite a sickly year, the worst since I worked at the homeless shelter back in 1999. And that counts two years in a 3rd world country. This fact is making it more difficult for me to like Phoenix.

Food-related comment
Pozole is a yummy soup. You boil pork meat for about an hour with garlic, onion, and cumin. Then you skim off the fat, chop up the pork,and throw it back in the broth with some hominy, additional onion, crushed tomatoes, ancho chili paste, boullion, and chili powder. Let it cook another hour. Float fresh cabbage, avocado, radish, and lime on top to serve.

Okay, the singer of O Holy Night has revealed himself. It is a Nashville music producer and arranger, who recorded the song on a dare at the end of a long recording session in the 90’s. So, while he is not a singer per se, he knows music and deliberately tried to recreate the many errors he hears beginning singers make. At first he was non-plussed that it got out; now he sees it as a fulfillment of his calling to lift people’s spirits with his musical talent. More info available from fred mckinnon, the blogger and radio personality who broke the story. Includes audio interview with the singer.

UPDATE: Well, someone has added an alternate possible source in the comments section. So, I feel I must clarify that there is still room for doubt. The person on Fred’s site a) does not have any corroborating witnesses (such as the sound engineer who recorded it) b) has only circumstantial evidence and c) doesn’t offer the ultimate proof that I was hoping for: singing at least PART of the song during the interview. However, his speaking voice, the story of the song’s recording, the timing, his musical background, and his speculation on how the song got out all offer a good enough case that I’m quite happy to go with it. Like so many things in life, you pick the best option with the evidence you have, and revise later if necessary. That’s my story and I’m stickin to it!

It was a business lunch. We were discussing marketing and branding, and it turned out I had a lot of opinions. My fork was stuck conveniently in a pool of black beans, ready for me to take a bite once I finished talking. “We have to keep focused on students,” I said, gesturing to emphasize “students.” I gestured right onto the handle of my fork, which flung sticky, glistening black beans high into the air above the table. They showered down in singles and clumps onto my hair, face, and shoulders. “So that settles it!” I said after a moment of stunned silence.