Kathe heard a coyote yipping and howling last night. Sounded like it was about five blocks away, she said. Okay, Corvallis is only about 50,000 people, and I saw one just a couple of miles outside of town, but still a wonderfully spooky (and trickstery) thing. Sorry I missed it. //The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Be careful of wishing for a visit from a trickster."\\

Shoot-'Em-Ups

I have finally noticed that I read comics in two modes: one for Persepolis and Vogelein, and another for Birds of Prey and 52. The latter serve for me the function Ace Double Novels did for my father (what he referred to as "shoot-'em-ups"). I think other people establish these categories early in life, often discarding one or the other entirely. Not sure what that means, either the division or the timing, but it's something I have noticed. //The Magic Eight-Ball says, "A rolling stone gathers momentum."\\

The Ink Fairy

Okay, that's just weird.*

Spots of inky black liquid are appearing at seemingly random places around the house. So far there is (no pun intended) no pattern we can make out.

I'm tempted to walk through the house saying, "When I said I was hoping for ink, I meant publicity for The Christmas Mutiny!"

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Don't look at me, my ink is all staying inside."\\

* I think I'll make this a new tag.

It's Up There

I stood on the porch and looked up at the evening sky. There was just one brilliant light, high and bright. I thought it was too high to be Venus, and therefore presumed it was Jupiter. Which was cool, because someone I know is particularly fond of Jupiter.

But I looked it up, and it was indeed Venus.

But that's okay, because one way or another, it was Brightly Shining.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Shine on."\\

God Damn It All

http://pandagon.net/index.php/site/comments/a-young-black-man-being-late

Emmett Till was an awfully cute kid, too . . . .

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Inch by inch, row by row."\\

Goodlife

During his campaign, Gardner promised average voters would inspire his actions. One ad said, “I will always put Colorado families before the Washington special interests.” But in Key Largo, Gardner appeared to offer special interests lots of face time. He was seen on camera talking to an attendee who said he works for a bank. In another shot, he’s seen going charter fishing as part of the fundraising package—they head out on a group of boats including one named “Good Life.”

Re the S.S. Good Life, two references come to mind.
One is the obvious, the short story "It's a Good Life", that was made into a Twilight Zone episode (and a Simpsons Halloween special, also).
The other is even more pointed, that in Fred Saberhagen's Berzerker stories, when a human chose to serve the killer robots in their crusade against organic life, s/he was called a "Goodlife". I have long felt that this word, like "robot" and "flash mob", should make the transition from science fiction jargon to common language.
The Repub party, long under the influence of people who have turned Goodlife, has now fallen completely under their sway.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Live long and prosper."\\

So, I Hear There's This Doonesbury Strip . . . .

Some newspapers don't want to run it.

http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/assets/pdf/BK186474313.PDF

Others are only putting it up on their web sites -- that way, kids won't see it, I suppose.

http://www.gocomics.com/doonesbury/2012/03/12

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Some people have no sense of humor."\\

Christopher Robin and Pooh Come to an Enchanted Place

Tonight I read the last chapter of The House at Pooh Corner to a little boy, and we talked about it a little.

I remember my mother reading to me from that book (especially the Woozle sighting), but I definitely don't remember her reading me the ending.

Possibly she thought it would be too confusing for me. Or possibly she was simply interrupted by her fast-changing life, back when she was a college student and the mother of three preschoolers (good grief!). Or perhaps, knowing what a fickle child I was, I one day said, "Winnie the Pooh! Yuck! I'm not a baby!"

I read Winnie the Pooh to my own kids, but we never got around to The House at Pooh Corner. Not sure why that happened, either.

But I by-Christopher-Robin did read that last chapter to one little boy, anyway.

For whatever that's worth.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Leave them there."\\

The Christmas Mutiny, Now Available

My novel, The Christmas Mutiny, is now available for download at Amazon.

I hope people read it, and like it.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "They will, John. It's good."\\

Where Does It Hurt?

On my right side, near the lowest ribs, when I take a deep breath.

My left shoulder aches some days.

My right knee hurts occasionally, when weight-bearing.

My right shin hurts some days, with or without weight-bearing.

Both wrists ache occasionally. It doesn't feel the same as the hand pain that led me to have to wear hand braces at night and eventually to having surgery on one hand.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Watch and see how it changes."\\

Another Minor Loss

Awhile back at some web site or other, Kathe and I saw people discussing the moral blind spots of previous generations, and speculating on what our descendants might be appalled at our tolerating.

I'd like to nominate our persistence in pretending that dental and optical care somehow aren't health care, and shouldn't be covered on the same plan, or even at all.

Just the other day, Kathe told me that I couldn't have any more dental problems until she'd had some deferred maintenance taken care of on her own teeth. Alas, I woke up at 5:30 this morning with a toothache that hadn't gotten the memo.

A root canal and crown would have cost a thousand dollars we didn't have, so I got to have an extraction for $80. We didn't have the $80 either, but we might get it sometime relatively soon.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "At least it's over."\\

Another Small Sacrifice

Without my beard I look less jolly and ingratiating.

But more respectable. And younger.

I really dislike shaving every day. And I don't care much for having stubble.

Oh, well. Maybe this will help me get a new job. Something's got to do it.

Oh, wait, no it doesn't. Maybe I just won't get another job, ever.

Still, if I quit trying, I definitely won't.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "It does make you look younger, though."\\

Camelot 1:16:48 -- Look Familiar?

In 1967, even George Lucas didn't know who C-3PO and Princess Amidala were -- so what gives?



And how on Earth did it take until 2012 for someone (me) to notice?

Oh, also: We made it to Aumsville today.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Sometimes a coincidence means something really profound. Other times, it's just this thing that happened."\\

Bit Wet

We awoke to a drip from the ceiling. The pan that was supposed to catch the drip had overflowed due to very heavy rainfall.

We went out so Kathe could serve some papers and were first amused by swollen creeks, then annoyed by water crowding the lanes, then alarmed by overflow running right over the roadway, and finally blocked by flooding that cut off one route and then another.

We never did make it to Aumsville.

Oh, and in a non-rain-related matter, our daughter Mestowet called from Georgia. It was good to hear from her. I also noticed something that I hadn't before: whenever I hear from one of our kids, I think of how grateful I am to Kathe for making it possible for me to know them. That's true of each of my kids, as much as if she had borne them: I wouldn't have known any of them if it weren't for her. Thank you, Kathe.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "I'm glad you made it back safely."\\

Lights Out

This site is observing the Internet Blackout.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "-------"\\

New Web Site Coming Soon

Soon, if all goes well, the link above these words will be live, and my web site, designed by Kathe's son Jake, will be up and running, offering my stories for sale.

Jake asked me to write summaries of some of my stories for the site:

The Christmas Mutiny, a Young Adult novel of alternative history, about 50,000 words.
Several young people are present at the famous Christmas Truce of 1914, in which for a brief moment enemies lay down their arms and enjoyed a moment of peace. History says that after the truce, they went back to killing one another for another three years -- but perhaps there are other worlds than ours...?

"Rattler Lil", a Western fantasy, about 4,000 words
An adolescent boy finds a surrogate mother, as do many other strays in a frontier town. Miss Lillian Clay seems to be a good person to have around, especially where children and rattlesnakes are concerned. And there may be more to "Mama Lil" than the neighbors suspect.

"The Right Man", a story of alternative history, about 2,000 words.
It's the fall of 1932. The Great Depression is at its worst. An army of unemployed men are occupying the Mall in Washington. How will President Hoover remove them? He needs to find the right man for this job.

"Frankie", an incident at a 1930s candy store, about 1,500 words.
Is Frankie really that Frankie? What race is pulp magazine her Dusty Ayres? Why doesn't Frankie listen to The Romance of Helen Trent? None of these questions will be answered.

"Secret Identity", a writer's thoughts at work, about 1,000 words.
What makes a man a hero? Can we always tell? Do we need to?

"Gandhi Versus Hitler", a story of alternative history, about 1,000 words
Everybody knows Gandhi could never have stopped Hitler. Everybody knows that....

"The Salmon Cage", a science fiction story, about 5,000 words.
An old man ties his boat to a salmon maturing cage while it drifts across the Pacific from Macao to Canada. A silent boy stows away. Much against the old man's wishes, they gradually bond during a very difficult crossing.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Good. Now go make some money with it."\\

List of Defunct Automakers

Could be useful for writing historical or alternate-world fiction.

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

And while I'm at it, here are links to fictional car companies:

http://dictionary.sensagent.com/list+of+fictional+companies/en-en/#Automotive
http://www.coloradostangs.com/auto-news/24985-auto-autoline-after-hours-holding-first-annual-automotive-fantasy-draft-%5Bw-video%5D.html
http://nerowolfe.org/htm/tidbits/tidbits.htm#heron

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Have you driven a Heron lately?"\\

The Year Ends

Was it a good year for you?

Yeah, me neither.

No job, acute emotional depression, dubious prospects for the new year.

My father died, my grandmother died, and other things were difficult also.

The first post in this blog was titled, "It's Easy to Get Discouraged". It still is.

I am taking antidepressants, and they help some, but not enough, really. I wish I could go back into therapy, but we really can't afford it, and my former therapist has moved away. I am looking for a support group for the long-term unemployed, but there doesn't seem to be one. Maybe I should start one.

On the other hand, we did get the water out of the oil tank so the heater runs again. And we got the mud out of the kitchen sink drain so water runs through it again. I finished my first novel, and possibly it will bring in some money. That'd be good.

And the new year...will be a new year. Anything could happen.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says: "Put one foot in front of the other. Repeat."\\

Corvallis From Above

Here and there around Corvallis, there are aerial photos and aerial views of the city:

At the OSU Registrar, a painting dated 1932.
In the lobby of the Park Plaza Apartments at 124 NW 7th Street, a painting from the 1960s.
Upstairs at the Corvallis-Benton County Public Library, a photo from 1999.
At the city water department, a photo from the 2010s.
At the historical museum in the old Philomath College building, a painting of a speculation of "Corvallis in 2057" which was, fortunately, quite inaccurate in most details.

//The Magic-Eight-Ball says, "Perspective helps."\\

Peace On Earth

I have just read Nate Powell's Any Empire, and I like it rather a lot.

It tells, in a non-linear fashion, about how children's "missions", the play which they approach in absolute earnest, shapes their choices in adult life.

I am especially reviewing it here because one of Powell's young protagonists is deeply impressed by the classic cartoon "Peace on Earth", which deeply impressed me, and remains one of my own holiday favorites.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "People say war exists because of 'the nature of the beast', and they are right, but the beast in question is not Homo sapiens but Leviathan."\\

No American Blackout!

In honor of American Censorship Day, I am turning my blog black.
Sorry if it hurts your eyes.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says: "I'm a good deal more conservative than John, and even I think Federal online censorship is a bad idea, much less giving corporations veto power."\\

Boy, Does My Back Hurt

It started hurting on Friday afternoon, and it hasn't stopped yet.

At times it has been really, really bad. Naproxen helped. So did Cyclobenzaprine. A shot of Toradol at Immediate Care helped a whole lot. Also an electric heating pad and frequent hot soaks in the tub.

Kathe is taking good care of me.

Mostly, though, I'm just waiting for it to get better.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Don't despair. It will get better."\\

Occupy Corvallis

I told people attending tonight's meeting in Corvallis's Central Park that by the time they got home they'd be able to view http://groups.yahoo.com/group/OccupyCorvallis and http://OccupyCorvallis.blogspot.com, and here they are.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Don't forget the already-existing FaceBook page."\\

Questions From Sierra

My niece Sierra sent me an e-mail:

Could you please answer some questions for my family history project? here are 5 questions.


1.What was your life like when you were young?
My parents were college students, living in rented accommodations until I was six years old. I didn’t really understand what all of that meant, other than that Daddy went to “the school” every day to collect “day-da” for his “diss-ree-tation”, and that this was very important work.
Spending my childhood in an academic setting, I learned a great deal, and developed a large vocabulary from an early age. I absorbed concepts like cultural parallax and the need to test an hypothesis. I also absorbed an intellectual snobbery that I didn’t notice for the longest time, making it all that harder to discard.

2.What were people afraid of when you were young?
People talked a lot about pollution and about social changes that seemed to threaten civilization, but above all about the threat of nuclear war. Although my parents tried to divert me from thinking about it, I lived under the threat of destruction until I was twenty-nine years old. I went to school suspecting I would not live to grow up. I joined the Navy because I thought it might be safer than being drafted into the Army when Ronald Reagan inevitably went too far. I got married and had a child still under that shadow, because life did have to go on. It was not until Kathe and I saw the Berlin Wall being demolished that we really believed it was over.

3. What is a story from your childhood?
One day, Dad had been working on an old radio, the kind that was the size of a cabinet and stood on the floor, with a huge green light like an eye at the center of the dial. He talked about how much fun he and his siblings had, listening to old radio shows. He turned it on, joking that since it was an old radio, perhaps it would bring in an old radio show…and it did.
We listened, rapt, to an episode of Chandu the Magician. When it ended, the announcer came on and told us we were listening to the Old Time Radio Hour on KEX 1190 AM. We wound up listening to KEX every night, and recorded episodes on cassette tapes. But I will never forget the eerie experience of hearing those voices and sound effects coming through the radio just as Dad had predicted.

4. What is the bravest thing you’ve ever done?
Bicycling home from work after a night shift, I came upon a group of men standing over a fallen jogger. None of them seemed to know what to do. She had a pulse but wasn’t breathing, so I dove in and started giving her mouth to mouth. I gave her breaths until I couldn’t find a pulse, and then started CPR. To spare the others from the risk of infection, I gave her all of the breaths while they took turns giving chest compressions.
One of the men peeled back her eyelid and said, “There’s no pupillary response. I don’t think we need to bother.” I heard the voice of Sergeant Preston of the Yukon shouting, “We will continue until we are relieved!” – and it was me. That’s literally how it felt at the time.
An ambulance came and took over. I went home and went to bed. I heard later that the woman had died, but I knew we had done our part.
They always tell you at CPR classes that the person in charge at an emergency was whoever spoke up first, but I never thought that would be me.

5.What is one thing you’re proud of?
I am very proud of whatever role I have played in how my children have turned out. Some of them were half-grown when I got them, and none of them were related to me genetically, but I did what I could for them. They had many difficulties to overcome, and some of their problems could not be solved, but all four of them have faced and are facing life on their own terms with tremendous courage and persistence.


//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Teach the children well."\\

OMTA Meeting

Kathe and I just got back from the Eugene edition of the annual meeting of the Oregon Massage Therapy Association. The theme of the meeting was keeping your business afloat during the current difficult times.

I noticed that in addition to the meeting being divided into Eugene and Portland editions, almost everything else at the meeting was oriented to either Portland or Eugene. No big surprise, since those are the largest centers of massage activity, but as Kathe put it, there was a distinct lacuna, and we were in it.

So now I am thinking about setting up a mid-Valley chapter covering the Philomath-Corvallis-Albany-Lebanon area, extending maybe as far as Salem and Sweet Home. I will be contacting local LMTs to see what they think of the idea.

I Suspect This Is Not Going to Feel Good Either

Carpal Tunnel Release surgery in the morning.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Adulthood. What fun."\\

They Broke It

I used to be a free-market anarchist, but that was back when the free market hadn't been broken.

Now? The rotters have broken it as thoroughly as they broke the Code of Honor.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "This is why we can't have nice things."\\

Now, This Does Not Feel Good

I have had chest spasms and pains on rare occasions for years, but every test and exam indicated that my heart was in fairly good shape given my overall physical condition, but after today, I am wondering.

Chest pains, a vague sick feeling, no energy -- it does not feel very good at all. I took one of Kathe's nitroglycerine tablets and it seemed to help a little. A few hours later I took another.

I do not feel good right now, no I do not.

Dying right now would really stink.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "It usually does."\\

A Couple of Bits of Family News

Kathe sent out this message to the family:

"First, John's grandmother Zoe is definitely on her deathbed, although it seems to be in no hurry to bear her away. We see her at least once a week, and the last time we were there, she slept most of the time. She was awake for five or ten minutes and completely lucid, so we had some conversation. She was completely herself, although Pat and Dorothy say she has been delusional sometimes.

"Second, we have been telling people that we know where Tes is, and that he must be at least mostly okay. But the last letter we sent him, with a money order enclosed*, came back yesterday. We sent it in June to the rehab place where he was staying, and I guess they held it until they were sure he wasn't coming back for it, so now we don't know.

"We're still okay, still discovering new horizons of household economies, but I think winter is going to be a challenge.

"*We send money orders because he can cash them more easily than personal checks."

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Tesfaye can be more easily located than Zoe."\\

Zoe Cook: No Longer Improving

She isn't planning to return to her apartment anytime soon.

But she is surrounded by family and taking a positive attitude. We'll see what comes next.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "There is never anything to do but see what comes next."\\

GoodBlogs

I am trying something new, called GoodBlogs.
http://www.goodblogs.com/bloggers/6565
I don't know whether this "get votes and be paid money" thing really works, but I am willing to give it a try.
Also, it's been years since I wrote reviews of the things I read, but I find I still enjoy it.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Try it and see."\\

Zoe Cook Continues to Improve

See?

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Seeing is believing."\\

Buy My Massage Book

If you haven't been to my new massage blog, go take a look:

http://johnmburtlmt.blogspot.com/2011/07/buy-my-book.html

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Nice book you have there."\\

The Salmon Cage

I have just published a story of mine on Amazon.com for the first time:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Salmon-Cage-ebook/dp/B005BCP7L4/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1310151380&sr=8-2

I am hopeful for the story. I think it's a good one. Of course, that is no guarantee that anyone will be interested in it, or even know that it exists.

But, as I say, I am hopeful.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Your only choices are to live in hope, or to live without hope."\\

Yes, Riverbend

http://www.peacehealth.org/shmc

patient tracking 370551

Mom and Pat are at her side.

She has had corrective surgery and is reported to be comfortable at the moment.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Hold on."\\

Grandma's In The Hospital*

*Probably Riverbend, but I'll let people know when I know for certain.

She fell and broke her hip last night.

Mom (Dorothy) is rushing to her side.

I'll let you know more when I know more.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Keep calm and carry on."\\

Kill Your Darlings

Peni R. Griffin recently posted a deleted scene from her latest story on her blog. That sounded like a good way of assuaging the pain of doing so, so I will now try it myself:

A two-lane paved road, the Niemandslandbahn, connected a row of towns from the Alps to the North Sea. Some had already existed, like Armentieres, while others grew out of the temporary shelters built in No-Man's Land, and had names like Pax Romana, Réconciliation and "Wir Sagen So". Thousand of French Citroens, British Wolesleys and German Autopopuli drove along it every day, except on December 25th, when all traffic ceased for 24 hours, and much of its length was used for festivals and parades.

Heh, that does feel better.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Learn from the experience of others."\\

Out With The Old, In With The Stored

Big events taking place around here -- big by our standards, anyway.

* We got rid of the two worst mattresses in our bed and replaced them with a mattress and box spring from the majestic bed, formerly belonging to my parents and given to me about 30 years ago, in which I slept for oh, a couple of years in the 1980s. The bed, stored in our shed for a number of years and eventually borrowed back by my parents, has now been rescued from my mother's Corvallis mobile home and stored in our storage locker. So, still not actually sleeping in the bed, but it is my hope to have it assembled in some room of the house eventually.

And meanwhile, the bed we're actually sleeping in is more comfortable. And taller.

* We finally pulled some of the old stuff out of the garage and placed it where it will do some good. The hardwood chunks left behind by Corky the woodcarver who used to have his workshop in our shed have gone to a woodcarver in Albany, and the organic gardening magazines have been claimed by someone else. Thank you, Freecycle groups!

* We are finally cleaning out "the boys' room" (where several young boys and teenagers have lived for most of the time Kathe has owned the house) and are turning it back into a habitable bedroom.

Not a lot of progress, but some.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "A little and a little and a little...."\\

My father left very few things undone. One that comes to mind is that he never published or wrote (so far as I know) a science fiction novel like the ones he so liked to read.

One story that he mentioned he would enjoy writing is one in which the Central powers were victorious in the First World War.

I'm not writing that story either, but I am right now engaged in a project inspired by the Christmas Truce of December, 1914, and it does involve an alternate history and a different outcome for the war that his own father fought in. And I do think of my father and his father often as I write.

I feel another affinity for my father as I work: I am doing it in no small part because I have a family to support.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Filius est pars patris, for better or worse, like it or not."\\

Goodbye to the Stink Factory

One of my first memories of the Greater Corvallis Co-Prosperity Sphere was of the incredible wet-dog stench of the papermill we always called "the Stink Factory".

Today we drove past it and saw that the walls are being removed. We could see daylight through it.

Kathe wrote to the family: They are taking it apart! I can't remember before it was there, and soon it will be gone! Of course, it hasn't operated since a year ago last Christmas. Is that right? Or was it two years? Great time to close Millersburg's main business. Oh, about that Christmas break . . . take all the time you want . . .

Apparently the world needs a lot less kraft paper, now that so many of us bring our own bags to the grocery store.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "I'm glad I'm not a paper-dependent fortune cookie."\\

Walden and Mary Got Married

Wow.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Amazing."\\

'Bye, Bellfountain

Kathe and I went to Bellfountain one last time today, to retrieve a few more items and for one last walk-through.

That's it. We have given up the keys and will have no more reason to go out there.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "To everything there is a season."\\

Plan For Armageddon, But....

My father once told me a story about a congregation which had been thrown into great anxiety by their pastor's lurid sermons about the imminence of Armageddon, until someone passed the word that the pastor, although doubtless quite sincere in his belief that the end could come at any moment, had been seen in his yard, planting fruit trees.

I thought of that the other day, while collecting more of Dad's things from the barn, walking past the small grove that lay between the house and the creek.

He planted those trees. I have eaten fruit from them. Now he is dead, and his ashes are nourishing their roots. The trees and the house and the land are all going to be sold soon. The people who eat the fruit from those trees are unlikely to know the name or the life of the man who planted the trees. But the trees are still there, and will be for years to come.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Be prepared for the end to come at any moment -- but plant fruit trees."\\

A Flag

Out driving around with Kathe today, I saw a flag I'd never seen before (the one with trees). I was interested enough that we went around and stopped at the house. The woman there said her husband had bought it, and she thought it was the flag of the province of Prince Edward Island, or maybe the personal banner of King Richard the Lionhearted.

I have no idea what either of those things might mean to her husband, but it was an interesting experience.

Oh, and for the record, it is PEI. Richard's banner is the one with three lions.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "A flag can mean many things."\\

My Father's Funeral Is Today

He died not long after my last post. Services will be held at the First United Methodist Church in Monroe, which he and my mother attended for some years. Afterward, my brothers and I will scatter his ashes at the land at Bellfountain where he and Mom lived for the last 20 years (but which Mom has just sold).

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Keep it together."\\

What a Good Boy

I'm not getting up at 4:00 to go help with my father anymore. Instead, I'm getting up at 3:45 to ride with Kathe on her paper route.
Among other things, I'm trying to learn the route so I can cover for her if need be.
I am learning things about how I learn things. I notice that I still fail to integrate verbal or written instruction with practice -- even when I have both read and done the task before. A significant difficulty if I want to go back to nursing school.
I also noticed something else that might be even more useful: I got quite upset over a series of mistakes, and noticed that I wasn't successfully calming myself. Quite the contrary, I was reinforcing it. Was I enjoying the rush of emotion?
I don't think that was quite it. I think it was that I was saying to myself, "I made a mistake. That's bad. But I am a good boy. I have to be. I am quite upset over that mistake, so clearly I know how bad it is. I had better make myself even more upset, so I can be sure I was upset enough, or else I won't be good enough."
Got to stop thinking that way. Ummm, make that, I've got to stop responding that way.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Or perhaps, 'I have to start responding differently'."

George Sherwin Burt, 1930-2011

My brother David has written this obituary for our father:
George Sherwin Burt
July 4, 1930 — March 6, 2011
George Sherwin Burt died peacefully at home in Corvallis, Oregon in the presence of his family on March 6, 2011. Despite health problems during his final years, he remained spirited and engaged with life until the end. His family and friends benefited from his presence and will miss him greatly.
George was born in San Francisco to John and Velma Burt. After graduating from high school George served in the Air Force during the Korean War, where he instructed South Korean servicemen in radio operations. George’s experiences in Korea were the beginning of a life-long love of teaching and helping others. After being honorably discharged from the Air Force, George earned a Master’s in Psychology from San Jose State University, and eventually his PhD from Arizona State University.
In 1959, George married Dorothy Cook, who remained at his side through many adventures and until the end of his life. George and Dorothy moved to Corvallis, where they would raise their three sons in 1966, when George began his 24 year employment with Oregon State University as a professor of psychology. A very engaging teacher, he involved himself in the well being of those who studied with him. He read voraciously and always viewed the world with wonder. The love of science that he encouraged in his students was more than academic and spilled over into all aspects of his life. At the same time, he never let his dedication to intellectual pursuits supersede his concern for what was going on in the world. He conveyed this profound enjoyment of life to those around him, including the many friends he made in Africa and South America.
When George retired from OSU in 1990, he and Dorothy began a new adventure when they enrolled in the Peace Corps, where they would complete two tours instructing local people in agriculture in Tunisia, 1990-1992 and in Paraguay in 1994-1996.
Upon the couple’s return from the Peace Corps, George continued to work for social, political and environmental causes in many roles and took the welfare of all those he met to heart—especially the rural poor of Benton County. He continued to assist with community food banks and other charitable endeavors until his health rendered him unable to do so.
Until the end, George possessed a love of science, the world, and other human beings that filled himself and those around him with joy and the drive to do good works.
He is survived by his wife of 51 years, Dorothy Cook Burt; his sons John, David, and Thomas; his grandchildren Walden, Mestowet, Ashnakech, Tesfaye, Sierra, Darius, Cuba, Linda, and Andrea; and his Sister Anne Hiler.
A service will be held at the Monroe United Methodist Church at 11 A.M. on Saturday, April 2, 2011
George asked that you give of yourself to some cause that is important to him or to you. He wouldn’t want to dictate to your conscience. If you have to give money instead, make it a gift to something important---by the way, there was nothing more important to George than children. They are our future.

Thank you for writing this, David, and thank you for being with Dad when he passed.

//The Magic Eight Ball says, "Everything changes and ends."\\

The Mysterious Island

Kathe and I have been watching a lot of videos from the library lately. We saw a Ray Harryhausen film awhile back, and she mentioned that she hadn't seen most of them, so I reserved all of them that the library had.

The most recent one was The Mysterious Island, and that reminded me of just how many film versions of it there have been, and how many extraneous elements each of them have had: giant crabs, a feral child, cultures of aquatic humanoids, Caribbean pirates of the 1600s in the western Pacific of the 1860s, a rival in his own submarine, an oddball tie-in with a totally different Verne novel and so on.

I suppose it's the result of the book's being a sequel to 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, one of the most famous books of all time (even in English, where it has suffered from some very poor translations), but isn't anywhere like as colorful or bombastic.

Still, invaders from Mercury...?

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "The book remains unharmed, on the shelf over there."\\

Who Said That?

I don't recall who said it -- not one of those famously thoughtful or witty persons, but someone famous -- and for that matter, I can't recall exactly what it was he said, but it was something like,
If I had my way, I would start life as a little boy, following which I would be a young girl, after which I would be a young man, then a mature lady, and end my life as an old gentleman.
Something along those lines, anyway.
The other day something reminded me of that thought, and I turned it over in my mind and saw the sense in it. But my next thought was that this is rather like the way we do live today:
Pretty much everyone, regardless of gender or race or social class, has a childhood that includes riding bicycles and playing soccer and collecting cards.
Pretty much everyone spends their adolescence deeply concerned about clothing and grooming and social events.
Pretty much everyone leaves school as an adventurer: going to college or starting a business or joining the Army or doing something else reckless and glorious.
Pretty much everyone tries to arrive at "a certain age" with some measure of gravitas and respectability and if at all possible, some degree of financial security.
And pretty much everyone would like to end their lives with a few good stories to tell.
It's not a perfect model, but I do think we live closer to that now than we ever have.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Find the good in being who you are, and welcome whom you are becoming."\\

Second Breakfast

Greatly though I have always admired the lifestyle of the Hobbits of the Shire, I have never gone so far as to indulge in the practice of "second breakfast" until just now.

I get up at 0400 (I used to get up along with Kathe at 0345, but that tended to interfere with her getting ready for her paper route), eat a half-sandwich and drink coffee, and cross town to my parents' new place. I assist my father as best I am able (the last few days, I have just been giving him a bed bath and putting socks on him, because he hasn't been up for getting out of bed), and go home to get in bed with Kathe (who is usually home by then) at about 0630. We get up about 0830 or so and have (second) breakfast together -- usually for me, another half-sandwich.

Small as they are, that does still mean adding another meal to the day. My weight is probably going up. I haven't been checking lately. Too much else to worry about.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Too much to do is not an excuse for neglecting your health."

George S. Burt

Dad recovered from his bladder infection enough to leave the hospital for the nursing home, and then recovered enough to go home.

He was home two days and then when I arrived to help my mother get him up, found him on the floor. We could not between us get him into his wheelchair, so we finally called 911.

All we thought Dad needed was fore three or four burly EMTs to hoist him into his chair, but as they checked him out, they found more problems and took him to a hospital (one which was closer than his last one, but not as nice).

They had been in the process of moving from their hobby farm into town, but this latest crisis and Dad's further deterioration inspired them to move up the schedule.

It should be easier for Mom to take care of him in town, and emergency response will be faster. It will be easier for me, since instead of a half-hour drive to help get him up in the morning, it will be just a ten-minute bicycle ride. I am looking forward to having an excuse for a bicycle commute -- nothing puts me in a better mood for work.

Still, two hospitals and two homes within the span of a week is a lot for a failing old man to deal with. And Dad is going downhill all the time. There is less of him each day.

Part of the reason Mom finally bought a place in town was that Dad no longer recognized the view out the window as his own land, bought with his own earnings. The property, and the cash value of it (as real estate and as standing timber) had been a source of satisfaction to him, but if he didn't even know what it was, there was not much point in staying there.

Last week, I helped him out of bed and steadied his walker on the way to take a shower. Today, I gave him a bed bath and helped him transfer to a recliner, and in the evening back into bed. Soon, I expect, he won't get out of bed at all.

I'd been warned that it would be a very difficult experience for me, the first time my father didn't recognize me. That hasn't happened yet (though he has been a bit hazy on how he is related to me), but the other day something arguably worse happened: he asked me where he was and what the date was. When I told him, he smiled and said, "So I am George Burt!"

Well, at least he was pleased by the knowledge. And well he should be.

You could do a lot worse than to be George Sherwin Burt, and have lived his life these past eighty years.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Do what you can."\\

The Ronald Reagan Centennial

Let us never forget the many ways in which Ronald Reagan changed the world forever.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Never forget."\\

Dad Goes Home

Not yet moved into the new house in Corvallis, but at least back to the old place at Bellfountain.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "A little and a little and a little...."\\

Soaking

Dear Kathe:

I love you.

I love you so much that over the last 27 years, it has soaked into every fiber and fluid in my body.

When I realized that being too emotionally dependent upon you was not good for either of us (my therapist once told me it seemed as though we had become potbound, our roots painfully intertwined), I thought that learning to stand on my own would mean that I would not love you quite so intensely and passionately. It was quite a surprise to find that actually I was able to love you far more.

Friction and frustration and defensiveness built up over years of difficult times have made both of us shy of saying what we are both thinking. This note is a small step towards reminding us both of a simple fact of life:

John loves Kathe.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Yes."\\

Now It's Dad's Turn...

...to be hospitalized*, with a new multi-species bladder infection and aspiration pneumonia.

He's at Riverbend, the same Springfield hospital where his mother-in-law stayed.

All of which means it is my turn in the barrel tonight.

Not that other people don't have it harder. Mom, for instance. Still, this gets old after awhile.

Not that other people aren't older.

Sometimes I feel nostalgic about working night shifts, and having been one of Night's Own Children is a cherished part of my identity, and to be sure if I am offered a night job I would take it so fast I'd be there the night before, but I don't think I want to actively court a night job.**

//The Magic Eight Ball says, "Stand watch through the night. Somebody's got to do it."\\

*Funny, I thought I had written at least something about Grandma's heart attack last week. Maybe later I will go back and make a post about it.

** Which means either that I am getting old, or that I no longer need to abuse myself in order to feel worthy of love and respect. Or both, I guess.

Happy Holidays*

*Whichever and however many you care to observe, and anyone who wants to be exclusive and hog all of December for themselves can go do it elsewhere.

We didn't buy a tree this year, but while we were looking for a convenient way to display our incoming cards (the mirror where we usually tape them up has been removed while we restore the living room wall -- note the nice fresh drywall in the background), we saw the ladder leaning against the wall and decided to set it up. And having once done that, it seemed like a good idea to drape a string of lights over it.

So there you have it. Our Yule Ladder for 2010.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "For goodness' sake, do please ring in the new."\\

A Narrow Escape?

A few minutes ago I was up in the lookout tower on top of the house (which these days is located in the former boys' bedroom at the top of the stairs*), working on a story I'm writing**. I had carried the laptop up there in its bag, mainly because it was still in it after I'd gotten home,*** but I picked up the computer as I usually do, tucking it under my arm and wadding up the extension cord, then picked up the carrying case and my coffee cup, and then picked up my glasses case and held it between two fingers....

And then I suddenly saw how precarious and unstable the whole arrangement was, and felt a chill at the possibility of falling on the stairs.

So I put the computer and its cord into the bag, and my glasses case into my pocket, and descended the stairs in a much more sensible and grown-up fashion.

In how many alternate timelines am I lying dead or crippled at the bottom of the stairs for Kathe to find me when she gets out of the bathtub? Possibly quite a few but hey, that's their problem, as is the loss of the laptop in the timelines where I dropped it.


//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "The one thing nobody ever gets to know is what would have happened."\\

* Kathe's grandson Dick may be moving in soon. We would both enjoy the extra company, as well as the rent money.

** I'll let you know how that works out later.

*** I spent the morning sitting up with my father while my mother attends to the closing of the house and their moving to a mobile home in Corvallis.

One, Anyway

Driving out to my parents' place this morning, the fog was very thick until I got up onto the elevation of Reese Creek Road, when it suddenly became clear. I grumbled about how I could have used to have clear driving on 99W, until I noticed how very frosty it was up there, also.

Some of these microclimates are pretty damned micro, I must say.

Also, I must say the Valley sure is flat, that the entire stretch from Corvallis to Monroe is in the same band of weather.

And one more thing about the weather this morning: as I got out of the car, I saw just one brilliant meteor. We'd have seen many more, if the sky had been clearer lately. But it almost never is, in the Valley in December.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "One can be enough, if you let it be."\\

The Last Christmas

My father's health is not improving, and my mother is not large enough or strong enough (or young enough) to take care of him without more help, especially not in a house that is not really suited to an aging couple in frail health.

So, they are moving to a more-accessible mobile home in Corvallis, to be nearer to their doctors and to emergency services.

They will be moving early in the new year, which means, among other things, that this will be The Last Christmas (cue portentous music) in the house at Bellfountain.

David and Tom and their families will be gathering at the house, and will help with some of the moving (and will take away some quantity of family heirlooms, as will Kathe and I).

It probably won't be too difficult or too tearful, but I reckon it's going to be interesting.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "You can cue portentous music all you want, but it still is going to be The Last Christmas."\\

We Didn't Watch Videos Tonight

I suppose we are getting just a bit set in our ways: it really is news when we don't watch either an episode of a TV series or half of a feature film.

Tonight, we were planning to go to a potluck at the Oddfellows Hall, but as it turned out, we went first to a vigil at the mosque, to show the community's support for the congregation as they recovered from a terrorist fire attack.

So, that's what we did this evening, instead of watching Ratatouille.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Ratatouille still has a few days left before it has to go back to the Library."\\

Sphygmomanometer

I like sphygmomanometers. I like to look at them. I like to use them*. I like to say "sphygmomanometer".

*[I am gradually getting more confident in my desire to go back to nursing school again, in spite of multiple failures in the past.]

The other day, I was watching some kids playing with a toy medical kit, noticing that among other things, it included a plastic bracelet in the form of an adhesive bandage. Also noticing that they still put it all in a "little black bag", a feature almost as anachronistic as the way that toy gas pumps still go "ding-ding" as they pump imaginary gasoline.

I was intrigued by one little boy using a toy sphygmomanometer on another boy, squeezing the little bulb and pretending to read the dial: "Eighty, ninety, ten, eleven, twelve." Interesting combination of the correct and the almost-correct -- notice that he did keep the tens column straight.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Mind your blood pressure."\\

New Perceptions

Kathe:

Since I started therapy, I have been overcoming sensory inhibitions right and left: food tastes better -- and I pay more attention to its nutritional value as opposed to any emotional comfort it might give. I told you about the ground under my feet feeling more substantial. I don't know if that has led to any improvement in my posture, but I feel more balanced anyway.

But tonight while soaking I was overwhelmed by a rarer and more precious kind of improved perception: I suddenly had a powerful feeling of how much you really do value me, how much I mean to you.

I would have been unable to recognize such a feeling before, or if I started to get an outline of it, I would have recoiled from it with fear or horror or shame, feeling both unworthy and unfairly burdened.

The thing I craved like an addict was also something I couldn't bring myself to look at directly.

Oh, well, doesn't have to make sense.

But thank you for your love, admiration and desire.


-- Love, John

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Value all that you see, and see all that you value."\\

Sometimes Parking Is Difficult

[NOTE: Illustrations will be added to this post when Blogger quits acting weird.]

When there isn't a parking space available on "our" block (10th Street, between Jefferson and Adams, preferably on the east side, preferably at the north end near the house), we have to park the cars elsewhere in the neighborhood. Parking got more difficult when the medium-density apartments across the street were replaced by the high-density construction which we call the Great Wall, and more recently when a nearby area was made into a parking district, and our block was not included.

The other day, I wound up parked on 9th, between Jefferson and Adams, in between a carnation-pink Smart car with a license plate that read FLUFFF, and a vehicle with plates issued by the Grand Portage Band of the Chippewa nation.

Almost 30 years ago, while hitchhiking across the country, I got a ride through Chippewa country in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I had an interesting conversation with a Chippewa, and had the pleasure of joining him in urinating into Lake Superior, at what he told me was Whitefish Bay, a location I instantly identified as the safe harbor that the Edmund Fitzgerald did not reach. He told me that people on the lakes appreciated that song very much, and took it as recognition for all the many ships which had been lost on the Inland Sea.

But I did not know that the Chippewa issued their own license plates, much less did I think that one day I would see one in my own Corvallis neighborhood.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "And what associations do you have with a pink car named FLUFFF?"\\

Halloween 2010

We went to the Boo Belly Bash at the Old World Center and saw a number of very accomplished dancers in inventive, eccentric outfits.

I especially liked the idea behind Tibella's mad scientist outfit (complete with lab coat and chemist's goggles), but have some advice for her, should she want to wear it again in future:
* A rubber apron to take off and toss to the audience
* Thick black rubber gloves (also to toss). The apron and the gloves really go with the goggles.
* Some sciencey devices to dangle from the jangling dancer's belt: a micrometer, a glass and steel syringe, a light meter, an Erlenmeyer flask, things like that.
* Maybe something smokey inside the coat, or in a pocket...?

We only got one group of three (adult) trick or treaters tonight, which was disappointing. But they went away with butterscotch candies and copies of Mad magazine, so I trust the spirits of the ancestors were satisfied.

We had a really nifty jack o'lantern designed by a friend (we'll post a picture when we get it uploaded). Pity he couldn't come by tonight, but that's life.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Remember the dead."\\

Did I Mention I Was In "The Boy Friend" In High School?

Probably not. Geez, I hope not -- I have never thought of myself as the kind of person who refers very often to my high school years. Bad enough how often I start a comment with, "When I was in the Navy".

But the other day, Debbie Ellingsworth posted a photo from The Boy Friend on her Facebook page, and tagged it as having me in it (playing Lord Brockhurst, the dirty old man). So, I thought I'd mention it.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "At least you outgrew being a dirty old man before you became one."\\

The Overton Wall

There's been a lot of talk lately about the Overton Window, the range of generally acceptable opinions and positions, the positions which will allow people, even if they disagree with your position, to at least take you seriously.

To say, "Welfare eligibility should be further restricted" is within the Overton Window. To say, "Welfare recipients should be given six months to find jobs or go to concentration camps" is outside it.

One of the great concerns people have is that the Overton Window keeps moving, and it moves according to the statements and actions of a relatively small number of people. When President Richard nixon announced that he would go to China to meet with Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, the Window moved to meet him. When it was revealed that Justice department lawyer John Yoo had written a secret memo providing a rationale for torture, the window moved.

But what happens to a pundit, candidate, blogger or water-cooler sachem, who misses the Overton Window?

Obviously, s/he hits the Overton Wall [my own coinage -- I Googled to make sure].

I hereby predict that Sharron Angle, Christine O'Donnell and most of their TEA Party classmates in the 2010 election are aimed squarely to the right of the Overton Window, some of them by as much as 45 degrees, and they are going to hit the Overton Wall good and hard.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Normally, I'd wanr you against making bold predictions, but in this case, I'll just suggest that a wise man would make some popcorn."\\

Changing Habits

I have problems concerning material possessions. These manifest in various ways.

Over decades, I accumulated a large quantity of comic books. I always insisted that I was a reader, not a "collector", and that I kept the comics only so that I could read them again later.

And I did, sometimes in immense quantities. I still have fond memories of the months it took me to run through a complete (including reprints) set of the Legion of Super-Heroes.

But I kept the collection together for many years in a way that made it clear that I felt as though giving up any part of it would diminish me.

Then one day I realized that I simply didn't feel that way anymore. In fact, the existence of comics shops made me feel more comfortable about passing comics along to others who would appreciate them. It felt less like giving up a part of myself and more like releasing something back into the wild.

For years I carried money, checkbook, checks to be deposited and bills to be paid in a nice big zippered bank bag. I carried it around in my backpack for quite a long time, long enough that the bank that issued it no longer exists. Now, it's wearing out, and I need to replace it with...something.

Meanwhile, my back has been aging along with the rest of me, and I am being dragged toward carrying my stuff through other means than one big bag that I carry everywhere. So rather than look for another bank bag, I was shopping for a fanny pack like unto Kathe's, a good solid one that won't wear out in a single season.

As it happens, my mother had one she didn't use anymore, one she bought in Tunisia, made of leather. Couldn't ask for better, and I like the label [orange on black, with a little propellor plane and the brand name "XY", so I guess it's made for boys :{) ].

I still feel kind of bad about getting rid of the worn-out bag, though, but I discovered that I would feel better about it if I could keep a picture of it. Weird, I know, but I'm not too proud to use a crutch when I need one.

I couldn't find a picture of a purple bank bag online, though, nor of the Oregon State Bank logo. So I recolored a blue bag and recreated the logo from a sort-of-similar font by tweaking the letters, and here it is.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Use what works for you."\\

[I will add the photo of the bank bag as soon as Blogger gets over its spell of not having an "insert picture" button.]

Pastor Jones

Text of a message Kathe and I sent out this morning:

Pastor Jones is back in the news today (first he says he will, and then he won't), and we have decided to donate $20 to the local mosque for the express purpose of providing a copy of the Quran to someone who wants or needs it. We'll inform our local newspapers, also, in the hope that other non-Muslims will follow our example. Maybe we can out-weigh the "pastor's" destruction, for a net increase in the number of Qurans.

We are pretty damned short of money, but we will find $20 in our budget for this purpose, and we hope to persuade some of our friends to do the same.

Considering that "Pastor" Jones' church-and-used-furniture business only has about fifty members, our "action" may be bigger than his.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Comparisons are odious."\\

Things I saw This Morning

While on my way over to look after Uncle Wesley this morning, I saw a couple of things that made me smile.

One was a woman picking up plums from the northernmost tree, the one with the especially juicy plums. I invited her to use the plum picker standing on our porch.

As I do invite everyone to do -- we don't have the energy to use our plums for anything this year, so please do come get them. Likewise the apples, and the filberts if the squirrels had left any.

The other was a group of...was it cats? No, as I got closer I saw it was five half-grown raccoons, crossing Monroe near 14th, and scurrying under the porch of a frat house.

How nice to see thriving urban wildlife -- and how nice that they aren't thriving under our porch.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Never pass up an opportunity to smile."\\

A Core Sampling

Samaritan Health Services (or as we like to call it, The Very Big Medical Corporation of the Mid-Willamette Valley) is building a new physical therapy facility just north of the intersection of Kings Boulevard and Walnut Boulevard. They graded the soil, poured concrete for the walkways, and drilled holes in said concrete for the planting of handrail support posts, and that's where Kathe and I come in.

The drilling resulted in many small cylinders of concrete being drilled out and tossed aside, and the other day we stopped by and collected a couple of dozen of them.

We're not sure what we are going to do with them: Lay them down corduroy fashion in a walkway? Set them upright like teensy pillars? Bury them until only their circular tops show, and use them as pleasingly symmetrical accents to the irregular slabs we lay down on our walkways?

But we'll think of something, as Arthur C. Clarke said of David Bowman.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "To think is not enough -- one must act."\\

The Fien Experiment

I had this idea yesterday afternoon, just about the time Anne and Wes would have been having their automobile accident, I guess. I do hope that Anne will be in a position to take part.

I am going to try to recount off the top of my head what I know about my paternal grandfather, also named John Merritt Burt, and ask people who knew him (or who heard stories about him as they grew up) to expand and correct my recollections. I will also later on check available records, but as i said, part of this exercise is to see what I can come up with out of my own unassisted memory.

Have you ever tired to draw a map from memory? That is the sort of experiment I am trying here.

Merritt Burt and his brother Walden Burt were born in the 1880s, named after the two Methodist bishops in their parents' diocese. As a young man, Merritt decided he didn't like having a last name for a first name, and took to calling himself John Merritt Burt.

He joined the Navy in 1906 and left in 1912 with the rank of Boatswain's Mate 3rd Class. While in the Navy he learned to tie knots very well, and in later years was known to show off by tying knots with his toes. He also learned how to whistle the national anthems of all the world's naval powers, since when his ship was in port in Hong Kong he had to stand on deck at dusk while every ship in port lowered its flag in turn, its band playing, a process which could take as long as two hours depending on how many ships were in port.

He acquired a collection of handsome old-fashioned sailor's tattoos, of which there is alas no photographic record.

He was once put on bread and water for two days as punishment for punching out his immediate superior.

In 1917, he joined the Army and went to France as an infantry Lieutenant. He came back with various souvenirs, including his issued Enfield rifle and a plundered German Mauser rifle which remained in the family until they were stolen by a burglar in the 1970s.

After the war, he became a Treasury agent, and was kept busy during Prohibition busting up stills in the legendary fashion. He took a significant amount of copper home with him, and made it into various useful household objects such as the decorative work on a set of fireplace bellows which my parents used for many years. He never did make anything of the long-nosed copper alembic which became a favorite toy of my childhood. He also acquired, possibly also confiscated from a criminal, a long blackjack which he kept aeound the house, though the only use I know he ever made of it was in using its handle to give especially severe spankings .

Other highlights of his career as a "revenoor" included standing guard over the Golden Gate Bridge just after Pearl Harbor and finding a human brain washed up on a San Francisco beach (it proved to have been carelessly discarded after the shipboard autopsy of a sailor who had died of meningitis). He might have lost his job on account of a prank he and three male friends played, driving slowly around the San Francisco Mint as though casing the joint. They circled the building three times before a police car pulled them over and they were told to knock it off.

He worked in copper and in iron, and in wood. Once, while cutting a piece of wood with a table saw, he cut off half of his index finger. The stump of that finger was a memorable feature of his appearance when I was a small child, as was his clouded eye and his emphysemic wheeze.

He smoked for many years, rolling his own cigarettes with tobacco from a small cloth bag. He suffered from emphysema for some years, but it was lung cancer, presumably also from smoking, which finally killed him.

He married relatively late in life, and often regretted not being younger and more vigorous while his children were growing up. He fathered four children, two girls and two boys, one of whom was my father, George S. Burt. He often had a bad temper with his children, and frightened them with harsh criticism and physical punishments such as making them run home within the beams of his car headlights when they stayed out after dark. His favorite pejorative for his son George was "impertinent whelp", but you knew you were really in for it if he said, "I hope you're proud of yourself". His habit of flying into a towering rage with his children was, alas, passed on to his son and to his grandson -- I had to work very hard at unlearning it.

The children had a lively family culture, which manifested itself in various ways, including the invention of an imaginary language and culture. The kids gave themselves "Grorian" names, and may have given them to their parents also, but I do not know John Burt's Grorian name, if he had one. They also at some point gave themselves (or one another) "monster" names like "Thing" and "Creature". They named their father "Fiend With a Fearsome Face", usually shortened to "Fien", and they were still calling him that well after they were grown, and even after he had died.

Towards the end of a long day, he was fond of imitating a favorite expression of a neighbor, "Ahm tarred. Ahm tarred and ahm hongrey." His son did the same, and I have been known to say it myself. I have often wondered what other figures of speech and other habits I have acquired from him without knowing it.

He worked for the Treasury Department until he had accumulated just enough seniority, between his Treasury job and his military service, to qualify for a pension, and then retired. His wife was younger than himself, but she died of cancer more than a decade before he did.

After leaving San Francisco, he moved to rural Watsonville, and that is where he lived when I knew him, on a small acreage near what was proclaimed on its side to be "the world's biggest haybarn". I don't know if the land was an actual working farm, although that is how I thought of it as a child. The only thing I know for certain that he raised was bees.

He was a frail old man with a breathless laugh that was both comical and frightening to me as a child. I associated him with Boris Karloff, I think mainly on account of his squarish face, and perhaps also an air of mingled kindliness and menace.

He died when I was nine years old, but I hadn't seen him for some time by then. He was very sick, and I think my parents didn't want to expose me to his frailty, or perhaps to strain his health with my obstreperousness.

His last words were in response to a ringing telephone: "Uh-oh, that's Waldy." he was right: it was a call to let him know his brother had died.

Okay, that is as much as I can come up with right now. I will try to write more later, and I would appreciate any additions and corrections you folks might provide.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Don't delay."\\

Dolls on the Walls

Someone I know on Facebook posted a photo of assembled figures from her desk, including a Japanese figure called "Unicorn Girl", with an odd dark-blue thing on her forehead that looked more like a pin stuck there.

This inspired me to make this comment:

On our bedroom wall, we have Rosie the Riveter, Sigmund Freud, Harry Mudd (the lovable crook from OS Star Trek), J. Jonah Jameson (with desk-pounding action!), some guy called Fuzz, a knockoff of Batman called Battle Man, Halloween Witch Barbie, a Sailor Moon knockoff called Meteor Girl, a Barbie knockoff in overalls that we pretend is another Rosie, Tarzan, a Martian Plant Man, a Basilisk, Sally (from The Nightmare before Christmas) and Mandarin Medieval Spawn (which we bought because of its incredibly elaborate costume).

We also have a tiny Superman; even tinier figures of Isis, Thoth, Anubis, Bastet and some royal sarcophaguses (in an "Egypt Toob" from Safari Ltd.), still tinier figures of three Apollo astronauts (and possibly some figures so tiny they escape the naked eye, but those are probably just dust).

We'd love to have a Princess Unicorn, because of a very tasteless inside joke that I won't mention here, except to say that it involves a comedian's misunderstanding of the name UNICEF....

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Since you couldn't play billiards with me, I suppose I am a sort of action figure myself."\\

Going Back To School

I have been trying, in one way or another, most of my adult life to do this job, failing at this job, or recovering from failed attempts to do this job.

The reasons to stop trying to do this are obvious. But I continue to think that this is where I belong, so I won't quit.

And I am not the 21-year-old who couldn't be a Hospital Corpsman, or the 36-year-old who couldn't look after the residents of an assisted-living facility. Or the 45-year-old who couldn't get through nursing school. I am 49, not quite 50, and I am just going to find out whether I can be an acute-care CNA at Good Samaritan.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Be here now."\\

Wish Me Luck, Wish Me Well

Starting my progress toward becoming a CNA2, aka Acute Care Aide, making an early-morning commute to Lebanon and a late-afternoon return to Corvallis.

Persons not resident in the Valley, please note that this means I'm driving into the Sun both ways. "And uphill all the way...."

This morning, I stopped at the light going over the freeway overpass and looked over at another driver, and suddenly wondered what I looked like, hunched over and squinting in my dark glasses, with my moustache waxed. Rather dramatic and/or comical, I should think.

//The Magic Eight Ball says, "Here's the World War One flying ace on dawn patrol...."\\

A Small Rescue

Today I went to my parents' place, where I never know what I am going to do. Whatever they need, basically.

Today that included helping my father take a shower and get dressed, wash out his bladder through his suprapubic catheter, make him his breakfast and give him his pills.

It also included helping my mother put up plastic reflecting film on the east-facing windows to see whether it would keep the heat out while still allowing Dad to survey his domain (and the clouds above it).

And going south toward Eugene but stopping just short of actually entering the city (which sure did feel funny), to make a pickup at Jerry's. Next time, we'll be putting up handrails to make it easier for Dad to practice walking without his walker.

Last of all, I gave direction (not very well, I think) to a dump truck driver as he delivered a load of gravel to replace what washed away in last winter's flooding. Going ahead of the truck as it backed down the hill, I saw a patch of daisies right in the middle of the bridge.

I'd been looking at wildflowers by the roadside all morning, thinking about picking a few to put on the Sputnik's dashboard, and here were flowers which in moments would be buried under a load of gravel. I picked three and tucked them into my hat, and laid them on the dashboard later.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "A rescue is a rescue."\\

Flowers in the Car

Some chapter in some Kurt Vonnegut novel is titled something like "When Cars Had Cut Glass Flower Vases".

When the so-called New Beetle (which like all true Bug lovers I despise almost as much as I do the post-1967 Super Beetle) came out, one of the few things I liked about it was that it had a bud vase.

The other day, Kathe spotted some interesting flowers growing by the roadside and wanted to take it home to show to me. She picked a sprig and laid it on the dashboard. She did show it to me, and the flowers sat on the dashboard for several days more, gradually drying out into a rather pretty image. The car smelled nicer, too.

Does anybody else do this? Or are we just being weird again?

//The Magic Eight-ball says, "Don't worry so much about what other people do."\\

The Salmon Cage

My latest story, The Salmon Cage, has now been printed and mailed.

I hope my stomach will forgive me for doing this soon.

Hold me in the Light, folks.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Ars gratia artis."\\

Walking Around With Jim

Two years ago Jim, Kathe's ex, moved to Corvallis. I've been making friends with him lately: playing Xiangqi, studying Mars and taking an interest in other interests of his.

The other day, I absentmindedly drove over to visit Jim (although my habit has been to bike over), and Jim suggested that we drive to a park that was further than the ones within walking distance of his home, and walk around there.

Just before we were to leave, I finally remembered to check the oil in the car when the engine was cool. I found to my alarm that there was no oil appearing on the dipstick at all.

Now, I don't know a lot about cars, but I know enough to be aware that no oil on the dipstick didn't mean there was no oil in the crankcase at all, so I wasn't too alarmed, but I did know that I needed to get the oil restored right away. So Jim and I wound up driving to the Jiffy Lube at Ninth and Circle for our outing.

It turned out quite well, actually. Jim and I walked over to the far side of Highway 99W, to where it ran parallel with a bike path and with railroad tracks, and where a narrow strip of trees and grass bounded the western edge of the KMart's parking lot.

we walked along that strip of greenery, noting how effective it actually was at shielding the parking lot from the noise of the highway. We went along that strip, noticing things like store furnishings stowed in remote parking spaces, and a beaten path which had been "paved" with planks and sheets of plywood (and even a tabletop) which ran from the back corner of the parking lot to the railroad tracks and across to the highway. Jim and I were wondering who had created it and for what sort of traffic, and then two bicyclists politely called out and passed us. I watched them go over the path, portage over the tracks and then continue across the highway and into the parking strip behind the Plaza Nine shopping center.

Jim and I looked through the overgrown back fence of the KMart, which separated it from the front parking lot of the Home Depot, then turned around and returned to the oil change place (and yes, the Sputnik did run better after a change of oil and steering fluid, and looked better after a car wash), still contemplating the significance of the thin veneer of uncivilization that had made for such an enjoyable, if unplanned, expedition.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Enjoy what you get."\\

Juneteenth

Not a holiday that has been widely observed around here in previous years, but it sure was tonight.

Fireworks were more or less continuous for a good fifteen minutes, finishing with four really impressive BOOMs which could only have been improved if they'd been used to launch garbage cans.

Good. It is our second Independence Day, and deserves proper recognition.

//The Magic Eight Ball says, "Yee-ha."\\

A Moderately Disappointing Evening

But hey, not a total disaster, and it's good to vary your routine.

We went to Cloud 9 to see a performance by Allure, a group which advertised "modern belly dance", starting at 10:00 PM. We're not normally out at that hour, but we took a nap and went down there at 10:00.

At nearly 11:00, one dancer came out and performed, then vanished. When it got to be 11:40 and no second dancer was in sight, we left.

Oh, well. The apricot-habanero chicken wings were interesting, anyway.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Seek not, find not."\\

Now They Match

One of the less enjoyable aspects of my recent short stint as a Census worker was getting rear-ended and having to get the repairs done, collect from the other driver, filing paperwork since it was job-related, &c.

Fortunately, it wasn't hard to find a replacement bumper for the Sputnik, and we didn't much care that the gold bumper didn't match the dark-blue car.

Apparently we did care a little, since we bought a can of gold paint, and I masked off the new bumper and sprayed it down.

It came out fairly well, if I do say so myself.

Only problem is, it's obscurely embarrassing how it looks like a Subaru Outback. Not sure why we should care one way or the other, but there it is.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Put not your trust in appearances."\\

Coversation After Visiting the Farmers' Market

...and before looking at Sadly, No!

"Did you feed the cat?"
"No! I suppose she told you so?"
"Yes, but I wasn't sure whether to believe it."

[And then later, while looking]

"So, I fed her. I gave her some wet, since even if she got some yesterday, she deserved some compensation for having to wait. Also, her water dish was dry, so I gave her some. But weren't you keeping a jug of water in the shed for watering her? I didn't find that."
"Yes, but lately I've been keeping it in the back hall."
"Oh, I saw that, yes."

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Value the small things."\\

So Many Ways

There are so many ways for a human brain to go wrong. It's actually kind of remarkable that most of us are more or less fully functional.

My father has suffered a stroke which impairs his memory. Not sure if it's authentic anterograde amnesia, but something close. Also, he tends to lose track of where in his lifetime he is, constantly worrying about high school or graduate school issues, or about finishing his doctoral dissertation.

Constantly worrying -- he seems to have a positive need to worry about something.

One of my children is schizophrenic. He hears voices. He doesn't obey them, but some of the things he does to silence them get him into trouble.

I'm suffering from symptoms of stress, myself. So is my wife. Funniest thing. But I am trying to assess it as just one more psychological issue to address, rather than wallow in it.

Just got to hang in there, keep on trucking, never give up.

I don't see any other option available, anyway.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Life Goes On."\\

Someone At The Door

Kathe and I saw someone on our porch the other day. We were pleased, because although the "front porch book sale" has never been a hot performer, it's been extrememly inactive lately.

The person turned out to have lived in Corvallis years ago, to have passed our house often though she'd never met the people who lived there. This is fairly common, actually -- in fact, when Kathe's daughter Becca first invited me over, one of the first things I said was, "Oh, you live here!"

In fact, this person had once spent a rainy homeless night dozing under our cedar tree where it overhung the sidewalk.

She'd gotten into town the night before and been obliged to walk the streets all night.

Naturally, we offered to let her sleep here.

It's good to have someone else in the house, even for a little while. This place is obviously made for more than just two people.


//The Magic Eight-Ball Says, "When opportunity knocks, invite it in."\\

Somewhat Like Old Times

We met someone the other day. She had arrived in town the night before and had no place to stay, so we invited her to sleep in the upstairs room where various kids had lived over the years (although we most often call it "the boys' room").

It felt good to offer space in the house to someone. It's a big house, and clearly its proper nature is to be home to more than just two people.

Blue Shirt

I bought some new shirts so that I would look more respectable while working for the Census.

I especially like the bright blue one.

A brilliant sky blue, like Superman's. And I always need a little Superman in me, and especially just now.

Having an excuse to buy that shirt is worth the hassle I have gone through to get a Census job, and lose it, and wind up with a different one.

The money is nice, too.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Enjoy what you find, even if it isn't what you sought."\\

I Liked Doing Census Work

It was interesting, challenging, an opportunity to try new things.

I knew it wouldn't last very long, but I have just learned that in my case, it is already time to end it.

Oh, well.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Forward."\\

Dances With Wolves

I took a break from running my Census crew (and I was really, really worn out) to finally* watch Dances With Wolves with Kathe.

Did me a world of good, I'll tell you.

Yes, after a day that really wore me down, I felt a lot better after watching a powerful, beautiful, uplifting film. And eating good food. And rubbing Kathe's feet.

Shortly, when Kathe gets out of the tub, I will go have a soak and go to bed.

Bet that will do me some good, too.

* Yes, "finally", as in, "I never did it before".

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Love yourself; get outside yourself and take action. Focus on the solution; be at peace."\\

D-591

That's the form you fill out when you are involved in an automobile accident while on Census Bureau business -- like when I was rear-ended on Highway 99E in Albany yesterday, on my way to Salem for training as a fingerprinter.

I don't blame the other driver -- the car in front of me made a sudden stop, so I made a sudden slow-down, and so did she, only not quite enough.

The Sputnik's plastic rear bumper was shattered, but there was no other damage to the car or to me, so the bumper served its function admirably.

A couple of phone calls, and it appears that a bumper off a junked Escort can be obtained and attached for under $300 (touch wood), so not too bad.

There was a time when I would have suffered pretty severe traumatic reactions to a traffic accident, even a minor one, and worse yet I would have loudly denied any such thing. As it was, I did have some strange emotional responses, but I noticed them and calmed them. I really do like my post-psychotherapy self.

Today, I spent a total of ten hours helping batch-process enumerator trainees. That was pretty stressful, too, but I survived that, too.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "You are going on a trip -- oh, wait, you already did...."\\

Census Work -- It's a Living

I'm training this week to be a Crew Leader for the 2010 Census, visiting and interviewing the people who haven't returned their questionnaires.

"May you live in interesting times...."

I have never had anything like a managerial job (unless you count teaching a middle school history course). This is something totally new to me.

I kind of wish I hadn't read that blog post, though, about the guy threatening to greet census workers with a shotgun. I feel worse about the prospect of sending enumerators out to interview people like that than I would about going myself.

Oh, well. If I totally hate being a manager, or totally stink at it, it will only be for a few weeks. And if it turns out I like it, that will be something worth knowing.

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Seek, and ye shall find."\\

Drywall and Firewall

We're putting up drywall on the living room ceiling, getting sore arms, also getting the occasional faceful of plaster grit/dust/soot from the fire of 1948, gradually getting some ceiling covered.

As I write these words, we're taking a break with a mocha and an apple fritter, feeling perfectly entitled to do so (and it takes some doing to really feel entitled to an apple fritter, what with the grease and the sugar frosting), and I'm struggling with an infestation of "Vitsa Antimalware 2010".

It seems especially unfair to have to deal with a fake Vista program, considering I'm not even running Windows Vista....

Anyway, does anybody know what to do when a viral nasty walks right in past your Norton 360 like it was asleep on the job?

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Try to put computer viruses in perspective."\\