Let Us Reflect Upon How Menacing These Big Dumb Cups Are

My high school students, my wife, and-- according to this SNL Skit-- a large portion of the female populace (i.e. pretty ladies who drive massive cars; women between the ages of 12 and 70; women who visit Target on the daily; women who are "physically, or at least spiritually, blond") possess Big Dumb Cups—and any time I see these things in the wild (unless they are in a car cupholder) I complain about their size, their top-heaviness, the danger of them tipping over, and their general absurdity . . . they are menacing; the other day, my wife's Big Dumb Cup was on the counter by the sink, and it tipped and FELL into a sink full of fragile dishes and glasses—those are real photos, not a reenactment! --and while we were lucky that the Big Dumb Cup didn't land directly on a pint glass and shatter it, it could have; it certainly could have . . . and I don't know what to do about this trend, as my wife and my students LOVE their Big Dumb Cups more than I've ever loved a cup— so there's no separating these people from their Big Dumb Cups, but if you know someone who owns one of these things, you should at least make them suffer through the SNL skit (which isn't very good, honestly, but it might make these people reflect on just how big and how dumb these cups really are).

Dave Has Three Different Thoughts in Less Than a Second

I've been going to the gym often to ride the bike and use the elliptical machine because I just got a cortisone shot in my knee, and I'm trying to do low-impact exercise—yesterday, when I started pedaling, I looked over to my right and had three thoughts in quick succession:

1) there's a leak in the ceiling!

then I noticed the guy on the elliptical, striding above this puddle: he was a skinny youngish guy, wearing a ski hat and a long-sleeved shirt . . . and this was his SWEAT . . . and I felt kind of lame, as I was pedaling rather slowly, while I contemplated the Midi crossword—so my second thought was:

2) I really need to work out harder . . .

but then I came to my senses, and my brain issued a final judgment on this situation:

3) this guy needs to take it outside . . . this is disgusting.

It's Never Ugly in Princeton (Even When the Air Quality is Awful)

Yesterday, we took the train from what has to be one of the filthiest, smelliest, most dilapidated train stations in New Jersey: New Brunswick . . . the passages between tracks are often closed, the station houses a number of drug-addled street folk, and there's the ever-present smell of urine and feces; the dark warren of grubby shops is rather pathetic, there's a gross Dunkin' and a little flower and plant store (which our friend owns and runs; she finally had to call the cops because there's so much drug dealing and drug use right in front of her shop) and the railing all the way up the stairs to the southbound track is rusted, jagged, and coming out of the concrete—and New Brunswick Station is even more of an eyesore now that the multi-billion dollar HELIX (Health and Life Science Exchange) complex is nearly finished, as it's located directly across the street—but if you take a 17 minute train ride south, to Princeton Junction and then ride the two-car "Dinky" train for five minutes (2.7 miles) into Princeton proper—as we did yesterday—then it's like you've left New Jersey and gone to to a different country . . . the train station is beautiful and immaculate; you walk up a set of modernist stairs and past an enormous outdoor sculpture installation featuring 12 massive bronze animal heads that represent the signs of the Chinese zodiac-- and then we stopped at one of the best small plate and fancy drink places in the universe:The Dinky Bar and Kitchen-- which is in the old train restored station . . . we had espresso martinis and bao buns-- and then we wandered through the Gothic stone buildings on campus (some of which are hundreds of years old) and we then wandered over to the Princeton University Art Museum-- which is a Manhattan quality museum plopped down right in the middle of campus, and totally free-- and we saw the recent new exhibit, the mesmerizing and layered abstract canvases of Willem de Kooning-- plus loads of other stuff (which only represents five percent of the museum's holdings) and then I got some expensive sorbet at The Bent Spoon while my wife went to the consignment shop and then we met a bunch of friends at Triumph Brewery to listen to jazz and drink great beer in what might be the nicest bar in New Jersey (it took seven years to renovate the old post Office in Palmer Square into this space) and then we were lucky enough to catch a ride home-- Cat and I are the only people that regularly take the train to Princeton, I'm not sure why-- but everyone else drove-- and the next thing we knew, we were in South Brunswick, the North Brunswick, the New Brunswick, then Highland Park . . . and all that Laura Ashley preppy style was long gone and we were back in the Jerzee we all love and know.

It Is STILL Ugly Out There!

Despite the sunshine, the air quality in Central Jersey is WORSE than yesterday—due to the Canadian wildfires . . . fucking Canadians, smoking their cigarettes, lighting their fireworks and leaving campfires unattended . . . there's also plenty of dry vegetation due to global warming, so lightning strikes are also culpable, but it's more fun to blame actual Canadians rather than static electricity—but my wife and children did not believe my air quality report—my wife played pickleball this morning, outside (with a stye in her eye, probably caused by all the smog and smoke) and my son was going to play basketball outdoors, until I persuaded him not to . . . but hopefully tomorrow's rain clears the air (and we just cleared our gutters, so we are prepared) and I have never been rooting so hard for a rainy day.

It's Ugly Out There!

While I know I should be appreciative of the fact that I am alive and healthy and the little things are the big things and good friends and family and meat on the table and all that bullshit, I'd instead like to take a moment and point out some of the ugliness I ran into today:

1) while driving my dog to the vet so they could collect a clean urine sample, I saw the world's dirtiest unicorn, hanging from the back of a trailer—it was so ugly I snapped a photo of it;

2) the photo of the world's dirtiest unicorn looks even filthier and grittier because the air in New Jersey today is quite ugly and smoggyy (due to Canadian wildfires)

3) while I was at the vet, waiting to pay for Lola's urine analysis, I heard some ugly, mournful wailing behind a door, which I surmised was a woman who just put her dog down . . . brutal to hear this, haunting—and made me remember this awful day;

4) and finally, an ugly ray of hope: I purchased something that looks ugly and has an ugly moniker, but despite the ugliness, achieves its purpose: the poetically named "Bike Trailer Hitch for Wagon Camping Rolling Cart Collapsible Wagon with 360° Swivel Joint & Shock Absorber, Quick-Release Clamps for Folding Wagons, Pet Carts & Garden Trailers" was an impulse Amazon purchase, a contraption I hoped would make hauling our beach wagon the five blocks to the beach quick and easy, and I hooked the thing up to my bike and our wagon today, and it works! 

Tacos Todo Los Días . . . Fifteen Years Later and Still Delicious

We had Mexican fare for Alex's graduation party, and there was TONS of extra food, so I've eaten various tacos-- al pastor, barbacoa, ground turkey, blackened chicken-- with the leftover rice and beans for every meal since then; so a few tacos on Saturday and then six tacos a day since then-- 24 tacos or so?-- but, alas, it's finally over . . . Alex finally finished the last bit of turkey taco meat for lunch today, so I'm finally going to eat something different-- and it's hard to believe it's been fifteen years since my infamous Taco Count! . . . I feel like the internet has fueled much grosser kinds of eating since then, mukbang videos and competitive eating contests and ASMR chewing . . . 200 tacos in one year seems like something from more innocent times.

Reading, Icing, Rinsing, Repeating . . .

I am still laid up and moving slowly today-- waiting for the cortisone shot to work its anti-inflammatory magic on my left knee-- I went for some x-rays this morning to make sure it isn't anything more than arthritis (and the x-rays were quite taxing, I had to lie on a cold metal bed and twist my leg this way and that way-- then the machine got finicky and they had to take a few shots over again, then I had to sit-up, holding the digital sensor board behind my knee, and freeze in that pose) and I've recently finished two novels, quite opposte in tone: The Keeper by Tana French, the third in the Ardnakelty trilogy, is dark and claustrophobic and insular, a Chicago cop retires to what seems to be an idyllic pastoral Irish village but then he learns that the town and its inhabitants have been entangled with the land and each other for centuries and you shouldd not mess with the locals . . . and by the third book, Cal Hooper has nearly become a local and he really gets involved in the town, a mysterious suicide, a woman, a once feral child, and the baroque relationships, hiearchies, and gossip mill that fuel much animosity and loyalty-- it's the usual Tana French, masterful, brooding, smart, and evocative . . . and then for something completely different, I read Volume 1 of The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion by Beth Brower, which can only be described as witty, delightful, and faux-Victorian-- it's mildly historical fiction (with lots of Shakespeare references) from the point-of-view of Emma Lion, once an upper-middle-class Victorian woman, but now thrown into difficult financial straits by her annoying fop of a cousin Archibald, who has spent much of her inheritance before she could manage it . . . it seems Emma will have to navigate all sorts of social and fiscal quandaries in her london milieu, but she'll do it with verve and aplomb and plenty of witty repartee and banter-- I'll certainly read a few more of these to take my mind off my knee.

Dave's Not a Doctor . . . and He Could Never Play One on TV

I survived my visit to the sports doctor (Dr. Navia) and my prediction was half correct: after some poking, probing, and prodding, she decided to give me a cortisone shot but said there was NOT enough fluid to warrant draining the knee (hooray!) and I'm getting some x-rays tomorrow and going for a follow-up in September, to see if I need the hyaluronic acid shots—but for now, I need to ice and rest, and hopefully the cortisone will do the trick (and I could never play a doctor on TV because I couldn't even look at the tray with the needles on it, let alone the actual needle going into my knee—this is why I don't watch The Pitt . . and I was already stressed out by the time Dr. Nadia got to me because I was reading the end of the excellent new Tana French novel, The Keeper—book three in the Ardnakelty trilogy—and some bad, rather visceral medical shit was going down . . . next time I go to the doctor, I'll be sure to read something lighter while I wait).

To the Left, To the Left . . . Stupid Shuffle

The good news: my right knee, after a series of hyaluronic acid shots, is feeling excellent—less popping, no pain, and better flexibility . . . but now arthritis has flared up in my left knee, which was my good knee (but is now my bad knee), and I'm headed to Dr. Navia tomorrow to see what's up . . . I'm guessing it will need to be drained, and she'll give me a cortisone shot—I've never gotten one in my left knee, and the first time I got a cortisone shot in my right knee, it didn't hurt for a year—but one of the main things to remember when you're reading this blog is that I AM NOT A DOCTOR . . . I'm constantly telling my wife, my students, and my children this fact . . . I am quick to give medical advice, and I certainly know how to Google various symptoms and ailments, but this is (probably) not a credible alternative to a medical degree, and so I will report back tomorrow and judge the accuracy of my diagnosis.

No More Tuition Payments!

I was helping my wife with so much party prep—for Alex's graduation party—that I forgot to write a sentence . . . the party was a great success; we had an obscene amount of food; the weather held up; for the first time in a long time, ping-pong was played int he driveway; my British friend Ashley nearly had an aneurysm during the England/Norway World Cup match (and I kept my rooting for Norway to a minimum so as not to upset him . . . but I was hoping that my ten dollar bet on Norway to win it all would pay out . . . no such luck) and the kids helped with the set-up and clean-up, so our house is back to normal now, sort of (we have a lot of leftover Mexican food, and we have to return a bunch of chairs and tables to friends).

Alas Poor Yorick, Alas Poor Ophelia, Alas . . . Alexander the Great is Stopping a Bunghole?

 

I truly and sincerely believed I was going to complete my podcast series about Hamlet with this episode, but this play, which has a mind of its own, was not having it—there's just so much to cover in scene 5.1—and so, like the play itself, my podcast will not end; it is stuck in a loop of indecision and deliberation and contemplation . . . but next episode, I promise, things will be resolved (and it's going to be tragic . . . but also I will also be quite relieved when everyone dies).

Two Things I'll Never Do Again (Because I Like Jazzier Numbers)

Last night I saw Joe Jackson at the State Theater (my wife and a few friends are fans) and this morning I finished John Steinbeck's sprawling novel East of Eden, and while I am glad to have done both these things, I'm not revisiting either—the classic Joe Jackson songs ("Is She Really Going Out With Him?" and "Sunday Papers" and "Steppin' Out") have too many words for my taste; I'm not a huge fan of dense singer-songwriter lyricism, nor am I a fan of easy-listening punk rock—I prefer obtuse abstractions sprinkled in amongst music with syncopated timbre (e.g. The Breeders' song "Cannonball" . . . I'll be your whatever you want/The bong in this reggae song) and I have the same complaint about Steinbeck's East of Eden . . . it's a compelling (but ultimately and very consistently) tragic multi-generational saga that is just so fucking long that, while I am glad I read it, I am also very glad that I am finished—it's a bit heavy-handed with Biblical imagery and symbolism . . . but I did enjoy Joe Jackson's newer, jazzier numbers—the songs where he let his incredible band (a fantastic drummer and a fantastic percussionist!) step out and really play and he interspersed some of his trademark lyrics here and there, and I also like John Steinbeck's looser, jazzier books: Cannery Row, which is more a sequence of entertaining and fragmented vignettes and anecdotes of the colorful characters that work at the labs and processing plants and sardine factories in Monterey, California—or Travels with Charley, a non-fiction travelogue wherein Steinbeck drives ten thousand miles with his pet poodle in a modified GMC pick-up camper (named Rocinante) and so the moral here is sometimes it's nice when artists leave things out and let the theme emerge (or not) instead of beating you over the head with it for 640 pages.

Doing Things Right is Exhausting . . .

 

I installed three strands of string lights in my backyard today—my old string lights frayed and fell apart, most likely because I didn't install them properly: I haphazardly draped them and twisted them and nailed them and screwed them and stapled them to whatever surface was available—but this time I bought the highly rated, heavy-duty Feit LED string lights from Costco (quite affordable if you buy three 48-foot strands) and I installed them by the book, with C-cup hook screws—which was tedious and tiring (and my right forearm was a bit sore at pickleball, from all the screwing) but I think these lights will last longer than the last batch (and, once I got done, I went batshit crazy and ordered three more strands, and I'm going to install a guide wire across the back of my yard, from tree to tree, and light up a long stretch high in the leafy canopy . . . why? because the internet told me to . . . and this should be good for late night cornhole).

MTV Cribs: Gecko Edition

My son Ian just upgraded his lizard tank, and it looks great—honestly, I'm amazed that the little guy is still alive . . . Bossk is at least nine years old, and he seems to be in good health (although, full disclosure, I am not a herpetologist, so how the fuck would I know?) and with proper care, Google says that a crested gecko can live fifteen to twenty years—so plenty of time for him to enjoy his new digs.

Minor Epiphanies . . . Major Stupidity?

A few minor thoughts that sprang into my head of late . . . half-baked, mishappen, and of no significance whatsoever:

1) I was in the gym locker room, struggling through the hardest part of my workout—changing from my workout clothes into a bathing suit and organizing all the gear—the goggles and earplugs and suit and towel and sandals, taking off my socks (always a struggle) and figuring out where to put everything while I changed, and then I realized a simple solution to one of the things . . . instead of placing my open lock down amidst all the other junk, where I tend to lose it, I could just hang it on the hasp of another locker—one that I wasn't using, and then pull it off and snap it shut on my locker once I was done changing . . . it's a game changer! and it only took thirty-five years for me to figure out this method;

2) lately I've noticed a lot of fat people (of all ages) riding electric bikes in Donaldson Park . . . and while part of me is thinking "maybe you should pedal a bit," there's another part of me that realizes these things are a game changer for people who couldn't (or wouldn't) have the power and stamina to propel themselves on a traditional bike, so (pun intended) more power to them;

3) this morning at 4:39 AM, when the dog's coughing fit awoke me, I realized that I had never thought about exactly how the TV Guide worked . . . the guide knew, IN ADVANCE, all the shows that would be on for the coming week—for all the various localities in the United States . . . I always took this for granted, but apparently the country was divided up into 100 regions, and these regions had to constantly communicate with TV Guide . . . by phone, fax, and mail—to make those schedules accurate . . . it kind of miraculous, and I really never thought about it . . . and this minor epiphany is going to lead to some major thoughts about the modern world . . . I grew up in a time when a little magazine knew in advance all there was to watch—for the most part—but now, no one knows what's out there because there are billions of hours of content and no guidebook, no way to navigate it all, aside from opaque algorithms and people you trust . . . anyway, feel free to take any of these ideas and run with them, I'm going to play pickleball (I had a minor epiphany about my backhand grip at the kitchen the other day-- knuckles first, knuckles first).

The Bubble Man

I love the comedy stylings of Roy Wood Jr.-- Black History Museum Tour Guide and Leonardo DiCaprio is an Underrated White Ally are great bits . . . and his new album "Lonely Flowers" is a special one; it's a little more universal and profound than your typical comedy album; it's about human connection and friendship, and in the final bit—"The Bubble Man"—it's about love . . . check it out, it's fantastic: I couldn't find a video of the entire story so this is just audio— and it might get a little dusty by the end.

Eat at Joe's

There's nothing better than playing some indoor pickleball (and crushing all opponents) and then, when you get home-- hangry and tired, before you assemble some kind of primitive lunch, the kind of shitty lunch you make while shoving other random food in your mouth while making it, your wife calls you and says she bought a sandwich to split from a highly recommended place up the road in South Boundbrook called Joe's Meat Market . . . so I sat on the couch (and ate an ice pop) and waited patiently until she got home and it was worth the wait: it was the best breaded chicken cutlet, mozzarella, roasted red pepper sub I've ever had, and I can't wait to try their other food.

The Heat Was Hot, The Power Was Not

Last night, I was enjoying our A/C, watching the Argentina vs. Cabo Verde World Cup battle, when—suddenly—the sky turned black, and the winds kicked up, and we heard a loud crash on our front porch—like a car hit our house—and this was the result of the wind lifting a very heavy, very solid metal chair, bashing it against our aluminum siding, and then yanking the chair down the front porch steps . . . soon after that, our block lost power—there were trees down all over town, and one had pulled down a wire on Second Ave, up the block from our house—and a transformer on the North Side (Walter Ave) exploded . . . I watched the end of the game on someone's phone at my neighbor's house while firetrucks and police blocked off streets and assessed the damage; the scary thing was that without A/C our house got hot fast, even though it was raining and the sun was down, but the humidity works fast—and it made me realize just how attached and dependent we are to the power grid (and this morning I started Googling the most temperate places in the U.S.—places where you need the least heating and cooling . . . unfortunately, many of them are in California, and I'm not moving that far away, but it seems the Blue Ridge Mountains are a closer alternative) but PSE&G was on the ball last night, and we had consistent power by 11 PM—so we didn't lose any food in our refrigerator, and we were able to get a good night's sleep.

DSW? I Thought We Were Going to Lunch!

My wife and I found ourselves in Woodbridge today-- we were driving Ian's girlfriend home-- and so we decided to grab some lunch out of our normal vicinity: first we tried the highly rated Siwa Thai, but when we walked in, we noticed their AC wasn't working so after sitting for ten seconds, we did an about face and then headed to Blue Habanero in nearby Perth Amboy-- also highly rated AND recommended by Ian's girlfriend-- and while the food was great and the portions were huge, they also barely had any AC (but by this time we were hungry and simply sweated it out) and during lunch my wife sprung this idea upon me: let's go up the road a bit to DSW . . . I need sneakers and I was like, "I wish you told me this because I also need running shoes but I'm not wearing socks," and she was like, "I don't have socks either, we could buy some" and I really did not want to take this detour to the Designer Shoe Warehouse-- it was so fucking hot out and I hate putting socks on when my feet are sweating, and it would that much worse to put them on in public, in a DSW-- but then I remembered that we had boxed up quite a bit of our lunch and I was like: "we can't leave the food in the car, it's 102 degrees" and that was enough justification NOT to go to DSW.

It's Very Hot and Dry, So-- in the Name of Liberty-- Let's Shoot Off Some Very Loud Incendiary Devices

It's really fucking hot out, like actually hotter than the kind of heat that I normally complain about, but our neighbors are still having their annual July 4th BBQ-- on July 2nd, to coincide with the town fireworks, and our town is still shooting off their annual July 4th Fireworks (on July 2nd?) so at some point I'm going to brave this heat and drink a beer and play some cornhole-- and though it is an inferno outside, it's fairly pleasant in our house-- probably due to the awesome ceiling fan that I REINSTALLED today (with the help of my lovely wife) so that the connection plate is now perfectly flush with the ceiling, eliminating the slight wobble which I noticed yesterday (and remedied with two folded up piece of paper-- practical but not particularly classy) and I also tightened the fail-safe wire loop so that even if the screws fail, the fan housing will not crash down on anyone's head (unless you're like six foot five, sorry Whit).

Big Day, Already (Dave Finishes a Book, Installs a Ceiling Fan, and Prepares to Be a Soccer Fan)

 

I woke up early this morning and finished a massive tome (900-plus pages) I've been reading for two years: Reaganland: America's Right Turn (1976-1980) . . . this is the final installment in historian Rick Perlstein's series on the rise of the American conservative movement and while the books are exhaustive (and exhausting) they do remind you that there's nothing new under the sun— the playbook was the same: savvy conservative politicians harnessed anxieties about women and race and sexuality and crime and the lack of Christianity and family values in America . . . and the same tropes: scandals such as Hunter Biden and Billy Carter; optimism (make America great again!) instead of tightening your belt (and wearing a sweater) and absurdities—Carter's killer rabbit!-- and pretty much everything Reagan said about pollution (trees cause more pollution than automobiles?) and nuclear weapons (nuclear proliferation is none of our business? all the waste in a year from a nuclear power plant can be stored under a desk?) but despite Reagan's lack of policy and factual knowledge, Carter was no match for "the Teflon President," who could really deliver a speech and galvanize the corporate elites, the Southern whites, the evangelical Christians, and generally disaffected voters who were sick of inflation, high gas prices, the hostage crisis, and how the counterculture movement was bleeding into the suburbs . . . and not only did I finish that epic history, but I also finished the third Thursday Murder Club  Mystery (The Bullet That Missed) and I successfully installed a ceiling fan—alone! -- which is a crazy procedure; for a decent amount of time the fan housing and blades were hanging from a thin metal cable while I connected all the electrical wires and the remote receiver . . . but, unlike my plumbing debacle, the fan and the light now work like a charm (and neither leaks water) and really, my day has just started . . . now I'm off to play pickleball, then I'm going to acupuncture, and then we're headed out to watch the USA play Bosnia AND Herzegovina—it seems ridiculous that they have to play two countries at the same time.

Not That Strong a Swimmer

I just did some laps in the pool at the YMCA, and while I wouldn't call myself a strong swimmer, I'm certainly a smooth swimmer—but I certainly don't push myself to the limit; meanwhile, the dude in the lane next to me was the worst swimmer I have ever seen swimming laps in the big pool: he moved through the water like a broken blender, generating an incredible succession of splashes and froth . . . frankly, I don't know how he kept his body above water, his legs were dangling, dragging, and fairly useless (he was definitely not swimming downhill) and his arms flailed with violence and consistentency that would have worn a lesser man out . . . so while his swimming was slow, intolerable, and annoying, he WAS getting an incredible workout trying not to drown.

First True Day of Summer (for Dave)

Today was the first real day of summer for me—a weekday when everyone else is working, and I have no obligations, so I can do shit during off-peak hours: I woke up when I wanted to wake up (5:50 AM) and worked on my podcast, then I turned off the electricity breaker and started to install our new ceiling fan, but when I opened the package, I realized that my wife ordered the wrong fan (plastic blades, not wood . . . super cheesy) and so I went to Wal-Mart and returned aforementioned ceiling fan  at 10:00 AM . . . no line at customer service; I was in and out and playing pickleball at Ace by 10:15 AM—and over the past two days I've really established myself with the good younger players that play in the middle of the day (do they work?) which isn't easy for an old man, but now they know that looks can be deceiving—and then I watched Brazil defeat Japan (and took a nap at halftime) and after that I went to the Liquor Cave, before rush hour . . . when that two-mile drive becomes impossible to navigate (although it's probably easier now that school is out) and on my way home I asked Google why you can't serve beer over ice and it's because the ice melts rapidly and the coarse surface makes the beer release all it's carbonation, so it gets watered down and goes flat-- so then I had an idea for a plastic frozen stick that goes into beer to chill it but luckily these things already exist, so I don't have to invent them and market them (has anyone used one?) and now I'm going to unload the dishwasher and then try to relax a little, as it's been a hectic day.

Jaws + Parks and Rec = A+ TV Show

Widow's Bay, a show that perfectly balances horror and comedy, follows the struggles of Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) as he tries to draw more tourists to an isolated New England island, which has Martha's Vineyard-type potential (fuck Cape Cod) if only the place wasn't horribly and historically cursed—and this was originally a spec script by Katy Dippold for Parks and Rec, but she developed it into this fantastic series (but you can still feel the Parks and Rec influence) which made my wife and I both laugh hysterically and jump out of our seats—ten rope fire safety ladders out of ten.

More My Speed

Although my plumbing skills are abysmal-- as is fitting and proper for an English teacher—I am capable of measuring, drilling, and screwing (even if I don't measure all that much, it's the motion of the driver, not the size of the screw . . . being an English teacher also makes me capable of recognizing and utilizing crass wordplay and innuendo) and so though I couldn't install the pipework and fixtures properly in our new sink and vanity, I WAS able to affix the towel rack (and I am glad they gave me two tiny Allen head tightening screws; I didn't understand why at first, but my wife said it was probably in case you lost one and then on my first attempt, the screw slipped out of my hand and slid down the drain—lost forever—so for my second attempt, I inserted the screw BEFORE I entered the bathroom with the ring and then tightened it with the tiny Allen wrench . . . even when it's easier, it's never easy).

Zman Knows Me Too Well (Fuck You Zman)

My buddy Whitney (a.k.a. Les Coole) and his co-host Penny Baker do a fantastic radio show on Tuesday nights on WODU, and last Tuesday they let the fans take over the playlist (with Penny Baker's approval, of course) and so I submitted a mini-theme-: three songs that share a mystery common denominator . . . my original three songs were "Love the One You're With" by Stephen Stills, "Where It's At" by Beck, and "Shake It Up" by The Cars-- but Whitney and Penny substituted Violent Femmes "Kiss Off" for "Love the One You're With"-- which was probably too classic rock for the show . . . anyway, fucking Zman guessed my mini-them ONE song in—so annoying—but he said he just "thought like an English teacher" and moments into "Where It's At" he guessed "songs that end in prepositions," which was correct- even though technically in the song "Kiss Off," off operates as an adverbial particle that modifies how you should kiss and it's the same grammatical situation with "Shake It Up" . . . but "Where It's At" and "Love the One You're With" truly end with prepositions functioning as prepositions- so the moral here is that the next time I submit a mini-theme, I'm NOT going to think like an English teacher, I'm going to think like a patent lawyer.

The Alarm is Off

Another school year in the books: we loaded the kids on the bus, I cleaned up my room, we chatted in the English office, I ran over to the vo-tech to pick up my son Ian's OSHA card, my friend and fellow English teacher Stacey did a fantastic and very teacherly graduation speech (41 minutes in) while I played some pickleball—because the unfortunate thing about being a graduation speaker is that you have to attend graduation—then I went to lunch with my wife (Tacoria) and took a nap . . . and while we do have a meeting tomorrow and grade sign-out (and a pool party) I don't have to set my alarm until next September.

I Do Need to Cut Down on My Pizza Intake . . .

The women in the English Department like to do things communally, especially get coffee from WaWa and pay too much for food delivery . . . and while I'll sometimes take part in these cooperative ventures-- especially coffee runs: I don't mind getting coffee for one or two people (although I prefer Rachel to Stacey, as Stacey's coffee order is always very complicated) but I'm more every-man-for-himself when it comes to getting food and I REFUSE to ever take part in overpriced food delivery . . . so today when I had to run an errand, I stopped by Pasquale's and got a slice of grandma pepperoni and a slice of mushroom pizza and then, when I went into the English office to relax and eat my food, I got bullied into sharing a sliver of each slice with Cunningham and Denise (because I had the audacity to go and buy food all by myself . . . the gall).

Pain: It Hurts

I went to the dermatologist today, and she used a liquid nitrogen spray to freeze off some actinic keratosis on my nose and the top of my head-- this was moderately painful-- but slightly less painful than earlier in the day, when Kyle, a powerful, left-handed, lanky youngster, clobbered me in the side of the face with a pickleball.

Crunchy

 

My wife makes her own granola (and now I'm spoiled: it's much more delicious than store-bought).

Happy Father's Day! Half Day?

Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there . . . but honestly, considering how easy it is to become a dad-- I won't get into the details of THAT-- but there's no pushing a ten-pound baby out of your womb, no breastfeeding, no perimenopause, no pelvic floor weakness, no postpartum depression, no hemorrhoids, no cesarean section, and no bowel issues-- so maybe dads shouldn't get an entire day, maybe just a half-day?

Deatz Analyzes the Beats!

If you're looking for some music recs, my buddy Deatz has started a zine-like blog called Deatz Beats, where he posts playlists and oddball, musically adjacent anecdotes-- he's into a wide variety of music, but there's a lot of punk, electronic, experimental, and alternative stuff (and music for when you're full of rage).

The Method

At my age and fitness level, the rules of the game seem to be: no impact sports (pickleball, basketball, soccer, tennis) two days in a row-- and try not to play pickleball for much more than two hours-- and then right after playing an impact sport, go swimming at the YMCA in the colder, full-length competition pool-- just a few laps and some stretching and then a hot shower . . . and then you can actually walk into New Brunswick for the USA vs. Australia World Cup game and not look like a limping geezer.

Addendum: the method did NOT work today; I got a hamstring cramp at Destination Dogs while watching the game . . . not incapacitating, but maybe I shouldn't always swim after impact sports.

Not So Crazy, After All These Years . . .

Teenagers don't know who Paul Simon is.

This is Thriller Time

It's nearly summer, and so I'm taking a break from Robert Caro's twelve-hundred-page bio of Robert Moses, The Power Broker, and consuming some thrillers . . . I recently finished The Dry, by Jane Harper, a grim, tautly written, well-paced murder mystery in a rural Australian town full of Bogans (Aussie rednecks) and regret, and now I'm reading the second Thursday Murder Club book, The Man Who Died Twice, and then I've got Anthony Horowitz's sixth Hawthorne installment, "A Deadly Episode," waiting for me on hold at the library . . . so I'm turning pages, happy and intrigued, and learning absolutely nothing.

Jersey's Finest

Today was the best possible weather-- sunny and dry and 78 degrees-- and I know other parts of the country experience this regularly (fuck you, San Diego) but for Jersey, it was a slice of heaven . . . I biked over to Buccleuch Park for some pickleball, biked home to a lovely ravioli dinner, and because it was so dry, despite all the exercise, my shoes and feet didn't reek.

One More Day (of classes) to Go!

 

The last days of school with seniors are taxing and silly-- there's nothing at stake, most of them are exempt from the final exam, and they should really just be released from the grind-- but that's not how it goes, so instead, to kill some time on the last A-day, I showed them Father Guido Sarducci's "Five Minute University" -- a bit about starting a college that teaches you what the average college graduate remembers five years after college-- so economics is reduced to "supply and demand"-- and then I had them present something they would remember from elementary school, middle school, and high school five years or fifteen years or fifty years from now . . . and I told them a few stories (how to avoid getting "poled" on the Linwood playground-- "poling" someone consisted of a couple of large bullies grabbing a little kid, each bully grabbing and arm and a leg, then lifting the small child so he was horizontal to the ground, spread-eagled, and consequently ramming him, testicles first, into the basketball pole . . . the way I avoided this fate was to make friends with a giant kid with a mustache who hit puberty in fourth grade and stay near him at all times . . . until, of course, the next year, when I hit puberty and could start bullying younger frailer folk and continue the cycle) and then my students presented various memories and lessons-- some cute: the parachute games in elementary gym class and some more embarrassing, but it was a fairly fun way to pass the time before I had to sign yearbooks, which is always a chore.

One More Act to Go!

 

It nearly killed me (and Shakespeare is to blame . . . too many things happen in this section of the play), but I have finally finished my Pig on the Wall episode analyzing Act IV of Hamlet . . . so if you love Shakespeare and you've got two hours to kill, check it out.

Crisis Averted! Miraculous!

I was midway through Jane Harper's fantastic (and very grim) Australian thriller The Dry when I realized the Libby Kindle loan had expired and so I put my Kindle on airplane mode so that I wouldn't lose the book, but that didn't work-- it disappeared from my Kindle and I still need to solve the mystery . . . did the drought drive Luke Hadler mad, leading him off his entire family (except the baby) or is there another culprit . . . luckily, Highland Park library had a copy of the novel in the library . . . when the fuck does that happen? so I just biked over there, unperturbed by the heat because I was on a mission, and not only was the novel on the shelf, exactly where it was supposed to be, but I also borrowed the second Thursday Murder Club mystery-- which I thought was on hold but was actually sitting on the shelf, so now I've got a couple of actual bona fide library books to read (and thus I'll have to wear my progressive glasses) but still, this is rather unprecedented and definitely a minor miracle.

It Was a Good Day

I took my last personal day today, and it's been a pretty good day, pretty pretty good . . . I walked the dog-- no barkin', no smog-- and then worked on my podcast, ate some leftover pizza for breakfast, went to Ace and played several hours of indoor pickleball-- where I'm trouble-- and then drove straight from pickleball to the pool and swam a few laps, came home and took a two-hour nap, roused myself and went out to Shanghai Dumpling for Ian's birthday-- he turns twenty-one tomorrow-- and now I'm settling in to watch the USA vs. Paraguay World Cup game, and I've got the brew and the chronic, and I didn't have to use my AK-- I don't even own an AK-- so I gotta say, it was a good day.

OG!OG!OG! Hustling From the Inbound Pass!

I went out and had a couple of beers for the first half of the Knicks game last night-- 3 dollar Miller Lights at our local bar!-- then I walked home, morose and pessimistic, at halftime and fell asleep-- the Knicks were down 29 points, so I didn't think they had a chance in hell, and I was exhausted from watching all this late-night basketball-- luckily, my son woke me up when he got home from New Brunswick, and I watched the final minutes with him, his girlfriend, and his buddy Gary-- and when the Knicks completed the largest comeback in NBA playoff history, sealing the game with OG Anunoby's tip-in off a long Brunson three-point attempt, we all screamed so loudly we woke up my wife (and scared the dog) but the real issue here is this: what are we going to call this monumental, life-changing basket? . . . The Perfect Putback? The Hand of OG? The Timely Tip? . . . or just "The Tip" . . . scratch that one, that doesn't sound right . . . but it needs to be called something, I'm sure the internet will figure it out.

Getting in Shape for the Battle of Zela

Today, after a soupy day at school, I went to the YMCA pool to swim laps, and I would like to say "I came, I swam, I conquered," but I haven't swum all that much lately, so it was more like "I came, I swam, I did not drown."

Focus This

Our principal sat my friend and colleague Stacey down at the prom and asked her if I was returning to teach next year or if I was perhaps secretly retiring-- and Stacey assured him that I WAS returning for another year of fun and chaos-- but the reason he was asking is that I somehow missed and did not respond to FIVE emails asking me to sign my letter of intent and contract . . . this was very embarrassing, as I have been on the ol' email several times in the past month (I'm not a diligent emailer, but I do check it occasionally) and there's proof in my inbox and sent messages that I've read emails and responded to emails recently, but I somehow missed these-- despite the double red exclamation points and all caps-- and I first blamed the FOCUSED and OTHER tabs but I think the real reason is I pinned too many important messages to the top and I wasn't really seeing many new emails . . . whatever the reason, it certainly wasn't my fault-- but I had to drive over to the Board of Ed building on my off period and sign my letter because the high school secretary had sent them all back over there and so I met another very nice secretary with an Irish accent and she said that I "wasn't the only one" but my colleagues insist she said this just tto make me feel better.

Dave . . . Not Only Does He LOOK Like an Old Man . . .

I heard an excellent Built to Spill song a couple of weeks ago on my buddy Whitney's radio show, and since then, I've been playing the band's catalog nonstop on Spotify-- and so I got very excited today when I was walking down the English hallway, and I heard "The Plan" emanating from my friend Denise's classroom-- I was like: Holy shit! Built to Spill! What are the odds! I wonder why she's playing this song? and so I popped in and started rambling on about how excited I was to hear a song from the 1999 album "Keep It Like a Secret," an album I just started listening to in its entirety, an album full of sprawling, catchy, slightly experimental guitar-driven prog rock-- reminiscent of "The Soft Bulletin" by The Flaming Lips-- and then, in the midst of my musical monologue, I realized that "The Plan" was not emanating from her classroom; it was emanating from MY phone, which was in my pocket, and my soliloquy and my consciousness just sort of fizzled out, and Denise said, "You're acting like a crazy person," and I agreed with her, pulled out my phone, shut off the music, and rambled on, singing my song, round the world . . . you get the picture.

Sunday, Day of Running Around?

No rest for the wicked today (or the good, as my wife got a lot of shit done as well) but I went to bed early last night; awoke early; finished Act 4, scene 6, of my Hamlet podcast-- one more scene to go and then Act IV is done, hooray-- then reffed a game in Metuchen; met my wife for lunch at the Metuchen Corner Deli; reffed another game in Metuchen-- which was delayed because of thunder so our third ref took off early to Monroe, where our last game was located, and we finished the second game with just the two of us (and it got a little out of hand; one team was particularly obnoxious) and then Carlo and I drove from Metuchen to Monroe, where our third game had already started, and we took our AR positions, finished that, split the cash, and then I stopped at my mom's place in Monroe and jumped in the pool, and then I drove home and walked the dog and then loaded up my wife's car with the rest of the disassembled bed and dumped that in the park dumpster, and then I finally headed home to shower and eat-- Mexican lasagna-- and I don't even want to get into all the stuff my wife got done today, but maybe we should become Puritans and actually rest on Sunday.

Sometimes, You SHOULDN'T Try . . .

The end of my plumbing saga is both disheartening and instructive-- I called my buddy the plumber on Friday afternoon, and he had just gotten to the bar, so he made an emergency visit because I told him it wouldn't take long-- I just needed him to hook up this sink properly so it didn't leak and I had done the bulk of the work, but then when he took a look at it, he was like, "This is a mess, we've got to take this off the wall . . . how did you hook this to the wall?" and he undid my pathetic and sloppy wire job and then they disassembled the entire sink-- which was a pain in the ass-- and when I told him, "I had the instructions so I figured I'd give it a try" he said, "I wish you hadn't-- we'd be done by now if you didn't try" and then they did everything differently than the instructions-- because they're professionals-- and assembled the whol thing outside the bathroom, the siliconed the sink to the wall-- nobody told me I could do that-- and then they ran some hot water to expand the gaskets (one of which I put in backwards-- it happens, they said) and then they tightened things a bit more and then I gave them 200 bucks-- which probably would have been 100 bucks if I did nothing at all-- and we called it a day—but now I know with plumbing, I'm not even going to try . . . because even though I am an English teacher and I can read instructions in English, the instructions are bullshit and you need a plumber to do plumbing.

Movies, Making a Comeback?

Today was a weird half-day at school-- it's prom night, but the powers-that-be also thought it would be a great day for the After the Fire presentation-- a documentary and Q&A given by survivors from the Seton Hall dorm room fire-- and while the presentation was moving, prom day might not be the right vibe for it . . . the seniors were pre-occupied and anxious and frantic about prom houses and nails and hair and all that and so cramming them all in the auditorium for two hours didn't work all that well-- and I was outside the auditorium doing bathroom duty for two hours and then I had a random class, so I brought my cornhole board and we played, but the most fun I had was discussing the awesome low-budget indie horror phenomenon Obsession with all the students that saw it-- this felt like the old days, when students actually went to the movies and got obsessed with certain films-- and Obsession is a great one to talk about-- it has a Gremlins meets Fatal Attraction feel and there's plenty to unpack: whose fault is it; why doesn't Bear know the "Aladdin rules" about wishes; why does she cook the cat? is Nikki the cat? is this indicative of Millennials and how they express their feelings?. . . I talked about every scary and funny moment with both the students and my own kids and their friends-- it's really excellent that young people are going back to the movies--and not just movies about folks people already know, like Iron Man-- my wife and I saw Obsession in a crowded college movie theater, and people were laughing and gasping and screaming-- so catch this one in the theater; it's very good, scary, gory, disturbing fun.

How Did I Miss This Stuff?

I'm not sure how Dave Martsch's indie project/band "Built to Spill" flew under my radar for so many years-- but I am enjoying their music now (and it's always nice to discover some music from the past you now like but totally missed in the moment, probably because we had to buy CDs back then so if you didn't own it or your friend didn't own it, and it wasn't on the radio, then you didn't hear it) especially the album "Keep It Like a Secret"-- sounds like Flaming Lips meets Modest Mouse with a touch of Jane's Addiction and Pavement.

I Give Up

I went to Home Depot, bought some threaded tape and gaskets, hooked everything up, twisted a bunch of knobs, tightened some shit, and then gave it a try, and it leaked-- so I'm giving up and calling a professional . . . but at least I tried.

Plumbing Sucks

I did some work on the sink today, but I'm stuck on step five (of sixteen?) because I need to go to Home Depot and buy some rubber gaskets and some thread seal tape (and I probably need to undo some of the shit I've done . . . because plumbing sucks).

Dave Keeps His Mouth Shut and Reaps the Rewards

Over the past few days, I've been killing it with the lies and half-truths-- essentially refraining from saying my actual opinion: on Saturday night, my wife realized she lost her engagement ring and I immediately thought this was because she never zips up her purse-- I'm always zipping it for her . . . she leaves it unzipped ALL THE TIME, and shit is always falling out of it and hanging out of it—but I refrained from saying this and I remained totally positive and optimistic that she would find it-- even though I figured it fell out of where she put it (her sunglass case?) at some random moment and was lost forever-- because she leaves her purse unzipped-- and then, miracle, she found it under her desk at school today and all was well and I did not get in trouble for blaming the loss on her poor zipping habits or being pessimistic; then today, I made a RADICAL move to amend her poor sandwich roll selection-- she bought some smallish, rather stale rolls when she went grocery shopping Sunday but instead of complaining this morning, I made my sandwich on this lousy stale roll and remained stoic and silent, knowing that complaining about these rolls would NOT be a good idea for the health of my marriage-- because grocery shopping sucks-- and then third period— - just before lunch-- when I walked into the English office, there was a loaf of sourdough bread and butter on the table and I took a slice and slathered it with butter and ate it and it was delicious and then I was struck by a bolt of lightning, the lightbulb went off-- and I was alone in the office-- so I hacked two slices of bread off this loaf (consuming most of it) and TRANSFERRED my sandwich from the shitty stale roll to this amazing flavorful chewy sourdough bread, and when people returned to the office, there was a complaint or two that I had sorely depleted the sourdough, but it was worth it because my sandwich was much improved (and I did not provoke my wife's wrath by complaining about her roll selection) and so this just goes to show that sometimes Dave should keep his mouth shut and he will be rewarded by fortune's good favors.

Sunday: Day of Ref

I reffed five matches this weekend (well, actually I got paid to ref five matches, but one match was a forfeit . . . ) and I now consider myself a real referee, as yesterday's U-14 Boys match gave me a wealth of experience-- one guy didn't show up, so I was the center, and I only had one AR, and the game was a little wild-- I had to take control of things, as the scrappy Plainfield team had some giant children on it and while there's a penalty for being big, there IS a penalty for clearing a player out without playing the ball-- but it's a fine line and when one kid is five foot-nine and 180 pounds and the other player is four foot-eleven and eighty-three pounds, strange things happen-- anyway, I had to give out my first yellow card (for a two-handed push from behind) and I also had to call my first penalty kick (and the goalie came off the line so we had to do it a second time . . . neither shot resulted in a goal) and then there was some kind of altercation after the game-- one team was accusing the other of cursing at them in the handshake line and then stealing their game ball-- but then today's games were much more calm (and the U-14 girls game was downright civilized) but now I've got to get to work on this stupid sink-- I've got to attach the vanity to the wall and put down some silicone and drop the sink onto it-- BOO! 

Sunday, Day of Sink?

Though the sink calleth, this seems more like a Sunday afternoon job.

Thus Endeth an Absurd Week

It's finally Friday of an oddball week-- we had Monday off for Memorial Day; I went to school Tuesday, but there weren't many students or teachers present, so it was something of a wash-- then we had Wednesday off for Eid al-Adha; Thursday was fairly normal and then today was supposed to be "senior skip day" but some influential student (Regina George?) put the kibosh on today and recheduled it-- but not everyone got the message and so I had five out of twenty present in my senior class, and then I actually taught some Creative Writing, for half the class, and then we went out and saw the open pit ceramic firing for the second half of the period and now I'm languishing at study hall bathroom duty, a duty that I'm very very bad at-- the kids always escape because I'm generally distracted grading papers, chatting with other students, or writing this stupid blog.

Job Well Done?

This morning, I thanked my wife for cleaning out the fridge-- I get nervous and overwhelmed when there's too much stuff inside it, and I can't see what's what-- but she said, "I didn't clean out the fridge . . . both boys are home and they eat everything."

No Running Water, But Looking Good

I had to do some light demolition and use some heavy profanity, but I figured out how to remove a vanity and sink with a broken faucet from our half bathroom today-- this stuff is always harder to execute than how the nice man does it on YouTube-- the vanity was attached to the tile wall, and it was REALLY hard to access the screws, so I had to pry the sink off the wood cabinet, and it was attached with very stubborn silicone . . . now all I have to do is attach the NEW vanity to the wall-- but of course shit doesn't line up with the old holes and the stud—and then I have to attach all the various tubes and knobs and pipes and S-traps and drain apparatus to the new faucet (which hasn't arrived yet) but still, things are looking pretty good. 

The Ten Year "Affair"

The Ten Year Affair by Eron Somers is not for everyone-- as with many books that I like, the Goodreads reviews are split-- which I find a better indicator of something interesting than if the vast majority of people like the book . . . and this book was well-reviewed by actual literary reviewers, so fuck gate-keepers and all that, but sometimes they know what they're talking about . . . anyway, the novel is about a millenial couple who move to a suburban town in the Hudson Valley and have various millenial child-rearing problems and social interactions, and the narrator-- Cora-- is in a mainly sexless marriage witha depressed but very nice husband, begins to imagine an affair and splits her life into two timelines, very Sliding Doors, until it gets messier . . . the tone reminds me a bit of Halle Butler . . . but not quite as futile-- anyway, give it a shot, you'll know if you like it by page two.

Full House . . .

We spent this wet Memorial Day Weekend moving my son Alex out of his New Brunswick apartment and cleaning the place up-- and I made the requisite drive today with a box spring and mattress roped to the top of the car, and now our basement, study, and storage area is full of his crap-- but it's nice to have him home for a while (although he's doing job interviews so maybe not for long) and the dog is very very happy to have the whole family under one roof.

Knicks! Knicks?

Alec, Catherine, and I went to the River Road Tavern last night for cheap beer, fairly cheap Blanton's, and great cheesesteaks . . . and to watch the Knicks (because there's no dedicated sports bar in New Brunswick right now-- annoying) and the crowd in this joint was comically diverse-- all the ethnicities of central Jersey in one small dive bar-- mainly there to watch the Knicks dominate once again . . . this is an absurd run, ten wins in a row and a +225 point differential over that stretch-- but my son tells me that the teams from the West are very, very good, and if the Knicks make the finals, things won't be as easy.

Schizophrenic Saturday, So Far

A raw, rainy Memorial Day Weekend Saturday, which has had a bipolar quality-- I had so much fun playing pickleball this morning with my brother, Ann, and Craig-- we started at 7:30 AM at Ace in North Brunswick (they open at 6 AM?!) and played together for two hours, and then Marc and I whipped all comers ont he challenge courts until I realized I had to get out of there and help my son move out of his apartment in New Brunswick-- that was NOT so much fun and more about carrying overpacked bags of clothes and books (children don't know how to repsonsibly pack things) and tearing apart and tossing old furniture, but we got done a decent amount (although the job is not done, I will have to go back Sunday and Monday-- yuck) and now I am very sore-- I am too old to do two physical things in one day) but eagerly awaiting tonight's Knicks game.

Maybe Because I Came of Age in the 1980s?

I am getting into Roxy Music's older stuff-- and while I'm definitely enjoying it, sometimes it's a bit too over-dramatic and campy for me-- I get why For Your Pleasure (1973) is regarded as the ultimate glam-rock-avant-garde album . . . but maybe my taste is basic: because I still think Avalon (1982) is their best.

The Dank

Three cheers for the drizzle, the damp, and the clouds-- I know I won't be singing in the rain three days from now, but after that wicked heat wave, I am truly enjoying the dank.

Blissful Beach Day

My son and his girlfriend took the train to Long Branch yesterday to beat the heat, but they didn't know that over a thousand kids from Newark were doing the same for "Senior Skip Day"-- so they got a first-hand view of some teenage chaos, both on the train and on the beach.

Dave Changes His Tune About a Tune

I have often criticized the inane, vague, occasionally cryptic, occasionally matter-of-fact lyrics of the song "A Horse with No Name" but I'm old enough to admit when I'm wrong, and I now realize I was dead wrong (and beating a dead horse) when I knocked these lyrics-- and there is great irony in this-- because if the narrator is accurate about the heat being hot, then his brain, like mine at this very moment, is addled by the high temperature, and when he describes the desert as being comprised of "plants and birds and rocks and things" he's not being obtuse on purpose-- he can't think of a better word than "things" because his consciousness is baked by the sun (and the song is only two chords because the music is stunted from the heat and parched ground) and so the structure and lyrics to this song are not imprecise and ill-defined; they are fuzzy and nebulous due to weather . . . this song is an extended pathetic fallacy and quite perfect.

The Heat is Hot

The heat is hot, and my brain is addled, and I wish I lived within walking distance of the ocean (the stupid Raritan River does nothing to cool things off).

Another Ordeal at Eagle's Landing

Today, I refereed three games in Monroe with Bill-- a grouchy old codger who is still running centers at age 80!-- and while there were a few moments of conflict . . . some disputes about player passes, some toxic masculinity amongst the three dudes coaching the Brick team, and a guy coaching his team on the spectating side of the field-- who Bill excoriated and relocated-- but still, this was a walk in the park compared to my second game yesterday, out at Eagle's Landing in North Brunswick (the location of my first game as a ref and also the setting my first fan fistfight . . . perhaps this field is cursed for me) when, with thirty seconds left in the half of a U-13 game, the goalie, a girl, and a player in the box had a small collision-- which looked like nothing-- until the offensive player, who was lying prone, started shrieking-- and when I jogged over and saw the injury, for a moment my brain couldn't process it and then I nearly puked-- a compound fracture between the knee and the ankle-- so the kid's leg looked like it was turned askew and had an extra bend in it-- yikes-- we called 911 and it took fifteen long minutes for the ambulance and the police to arrive-- they drove out on the grass field while we milled around-- and both coaches agreed to abandon the match-- not that we could even restart because there was no moving this child-- he was a trooper after the initial yelling and shrieking, which occurred when he turned and saw the injury-- but he did NOT want the EMTs touching his leg or moving him, so then a second ambulance came and I think that's the one that administers pain meds and such, and the poor kid was on the away team so he lived all the way down in Manchester, over an hour away-- but I assume they were goign to take him to a local hospital-- though our work was done once the game was abandoned, I hung out for a while at the site, because the two home coaches were brothers who graduated from East Brunswick High School, where I work, so we chatted about the state of high school to kill time while watching the medical crew do their work . . . and I'll tell you: I could not get that image out of my head yesterday and ast night, when I went to sleep-- I don't think I've seen anything like that since I was a little kid.

Saturday Stuff

I just refereed a soccer match on a very large turf field, and the center ref-- Carlo-- is seventy-five years old! . . . I hate the phrase "seventy-five years young" but in this case, it might actually apply . . . and then I took the cash I made from the game and pretty much fed it into my car and then I returned home for a break between games, and my son Ian, who I woke up this morning because I couldn't find any water bottles-- after searching and searching in the cabinets and the dishwasher-- my son Ian showed me that the two bottles I was looking for were sitting right in plain view on the counter-- pretty embarrassing-- but meanwhile, he's dealing with some sort of situation where he threw his blanket into his cactus, and now his hands and his blanket are covered in cactus quills, so we're all idiots (but I hope I can ref for another twenty years).

A Surreal and Mind Boggling Afternoon

My son graduated from Rutgers today —now we have an aerospace engineer in the family —and the last time I attended a Rutgers graduation was in 1995 . . . when my wife graduated.

There Are Rules Here

In the last weeks of school, my wife randomly selects a king/queen for the day in her fifth-grade class-- so every kid gets a turn to be a classroom monarch and as such, they are entitled to certain privileges . . . they get to sit in the teacher chair, they choose a prize from the prize box, they get to be first in line AND they get to make five rules for the day-- and these are the (quite impressive) rules that her first queen created:

1. Everyone had to adopt a food-based nickname (Tasty Taco, Ms. Sushi, Dr. Brownie, etcetera)

2. If you had to throw something out in the garbage, you had to moonwalk to get there;

3. If you left the room, when you re-entered, you received a "silent celebration"

4. If you had to sharpen your pencil, you had to proceed to the sharpener in slow motion . . . I really enjoyed this rule as it is reminiscent of "the lead game"

5. At the end of the day, there would be a paper airplane competition . . .

and my assessment: these are rules to live by, and I will be instituting them in my class (and from this time forward, please refer to me as Mole Poblano).

Dave Remembers What He Forgot

At some point after the summer, I totally forgot about my Big Weird Musical Project-- but no worries, now I have returned collecting and cataloging all my favorite albums (and other notable albums that come up in my research) in a Google Sheet, ostensibly to eventually print this spreadsheet out so I have a handy reference guide that I can peruse, the way we used to peruse shelves of CDs or albums, or racks of tapes . . . I'm up to 487 albums so perhaps when I hit 500 I'll print out a copy (and put it up on Gheorghe) but until then, if you've got any oddball albums you've been listening to that I might like, send them my way; lately, I've been grooving to "Last Nite" by Larry Carlton and "Street Dreams" by Lyle Mays (and everything by Roy Ayers).

End of an Era

Friday afternoon, my wife and I hustled over to Clydz in New Brunswick-- the grungy hipster basement martini bar with the excellent happy hour-- for perhaps the last time . . . or the last time in this location; this was the bar we went to after we got engaged (back in 1998) and a place where we have enjoyed many, many martinis and many good times-- I think it's being demolished in a week and then sometime this fall, Clydz will be resurrected in a much more modern venue up the street in the Helix-- but it won't be the same.

Eight Arms and Nine Brains

Ray Nayler's sci-fi novel The Mountain in the Sea is not an easy read, but contains plenty of (sea) food for thought-- the novel takes place in the near-ish future around the Con Dao archipelago in the South China Sea, where octopi have evolved the capability to use tools and a symbolic language-- and while there are some thriller and sci-fi tropes (there's an android, an AI powered fishing vessel, and plenty of international intrigue) the bulk of the narrative is philosophical, concentrating on trying to understand the perspective of a different, decentralized consciousness (Nagel's famous essay "What is it Like to Be a Bat?" is referenced) and really the book is like the film Arrival . .  except that the aliens aren't from space, they are from a foreign watery place right here on earth, but the communication problem is just as intractable.

Happy Mother's Day!

Eleven years ago, the kids and I made a Mother's Day video called "A Day Without Mom" and then my wife and the kids made a derivative but even more ambitious video entitled "A Day Without Dad"-- so for this Mother's Day, the boys and I recreated the original video . . . it's not quite as cute, now that my children are taller than me (and we did have some filming difficulties, but we weathered the mishap-- the show must go on!-- and reshot the necessary footage).

I Hate Driving and I Hate Drivers

Today, on our drive to Avenel for a funeral service, it seemed like many of the people on the road operating motor vehicles had never done so before-- perhaps they were youngsters who had stolen these cars and were joyriding? . . . and, of course,  I couldn't tell if these were underage drivers running stop signs, making illegal turns, changing lanes without warning, stopping in strange places, and tailgating because theses days, it seems everyone in New Jersey has tinted windows-- which also makes it very difficult to ride a bike, because you can never make eye-contact with the driver to see if they know you exist and are not going to run you over when you cross the road.

Dave Fully Commits

For the first time in months, I really hustled up and down the court at 6:30 AM basketball-- and my hamstring felt fine-- and not only did I really commit to running and getting back on D, but also (in true Nick fashion) I committed many fouls-- if they counted, I wouldn't have lasted past the first game.

I Am an Idiot

For Mother's Day, the boys and I are remaking a YouTube video that we filmed a decade ago called "A Day Without Mom"-- it's a hypothetical imagining of how rough our lives would be if Catherine weren't there . . . and while I still have to edit together the new clips, I'm lucky that there are new clips to edit-- when we had one more scene to film, the boys asked me to check the audio, and I realized I had not taken any video of the boys; I had pressed the photo button, not the record button-- so all I had were a few still pictures of each scene-- but the boys gamely redid every scene (once again) and hopefully the finished product will be a nostalgic and cute walk down memory lane for my wife.

What is Your Ween "Walk Out" Music

This was the question posed to me by my buddy Whitney while I was trying to cook dinner-- he's choosing "I'll Be Your Johnny on the Spot" while I would go with "Take Me Away" or "Awesome Sound"—but of course, there's no right answer here; it just depends on how you feel like walking out.

A Student Has a Good Idea!

These days, I feel like new and creative ideas rarely surface in class, but today a senior offered something worth thinking about: the British Monarchy is analogous to Fisher's runaway model of sexual selection-- essentially, an ornamental trait like the peacock's tail goes through two stages, one where the tail indicates health and vigor and then a coevolutionary spiral where the trait detaches from practicality and becomes unhinged from natural selection—and the monarchy fits this-- the monarchy was once the most effective way to rule and protect the country (Queen Elizabeth leading the British against the Spanish Armada) and the British saw this ruler as appointed by God-- and there was certainly an element of survival of the fittest among these monarchs, with much plotting and murder and intrigue, but slowly the monarchy detached from practicality and became more for show—an expensive and pompous and ornamental display that survives because of preference and popularity, not for any practical reason-- the peacock's tail of Britain, while the Prime Minister and Parliament are the actual genetic code of the country.

Certified Mail Part Two: A Satisfying and Ironic Resolution to a Genuine Cliff (Clavin) Hanger

I went to the post office and picked up the mysterious certified letter sent to me by the State of New Jersey, and it turns out I have NOT inherited millions from a long-lost dead relative-- in fact, it's the reverse: this letter is to inform me that my "spouse/civil union partner/domestic partner has selected the Maximum retirement allowance . . . under this choice, the monthly retirement allowance is payable for the lifetime of the member only"—which means that "in the event of death" of my wife, I will not receive any pension payments . . . we've both chosen to go this route with our pensions so that we can live it up while we are both among the living (and it is also now in my best interest to keep my wife alive: protect her from wild beasts and villains and falling steel girders and encourage her to eat healthy and stay off the meth) and so, of course, this letter is the exact opposite of a long-lost uncle giving me an inheritance . . . instead, it is a message informing me that someone very close to me will be giving me nothing.

Reffing Inside Plato's Cave

I am finally home and drinking a cold beer after a taxing weekend: I reffed six games-- three on Saturday and three today-- and I worked three games as the center ref and two games as AR where the home team was running a serious offside trap, so I got some good experience calling various infractions, from the center and from the side-- and while I'm really starting to get the hang of things-- checking players in, keeping order during substitutions, calling fouls and restarts, and the various organizational duties of the ref, but I still haven't given out a yellow or red card yet and I haven't called a penalty kick-- but I'm ready to do so-- and this weekend, i worked with some veteran refs, including Rocco, an older Italian gentleman who condemns Venmo and only operates with cash and our one-armed assignor, who told a youngster who was nervous about his performance "the best ability is AVAILability"-- which is a fucking great old man statement; anyway, I've noticed that the difference between being a ref and being a coach is that when you're coaching, you are looking for reasons the ref should call a foul, but when you are reffing, you are looking for reasons to NOT call a foul: advantage, there was no contact, the player tripped over his own feet, the player's hands were against his body, little kids are just generally spastic, the ball is stuck in a pack of seven children and there's going to be random bumping without malevolence, a player tripped over the ball, etcetera . . . and there's definitely no way to get it all correct-- reffing is an exercise in futility, an exercise in unreliable narration-- but you have to be confident with your calls-- you can't reveal to the crowd and the players and the coaches that your perspective is limited, that you are at the mercy of your angle and your eyes and your old legs, you can't reveal that we are all residing in Plato's metaphorical cave, only perceiving the shadows of reality, not the actual truth, and your calls are just one subjective view among many, from one particular view of the field, your calls are not biased by rooting for one team or another, your calls are biased because you are a human, living within the flow of time, unable to stop it, run it back, rewind it, slow it time, look at it frame by frame-- this isn't TV-- and there's something very excellent and fun about this, you make a call and sometimes you nail it, and sometimes you wonder, and sometimes you get it wrong (and sometimes your AR corrects you) but you are outside, in the sun, watching sports and listening to passionate fans and players-- so, as a retirement job, it sure beats tutoring kids for the SAT or helping them write a college essay (plus, I got a shitload of exercise-- my feet hurt . . . also, if you bring any of this up during a game, I'll give you a yellow card for dissent).

Certified Mail Part One: A Cliff (Clavin) Hanger

I received a postal notice yesterday that the postal service unsuccessfully attempted to deliver a piece of certified mail from the State of New Jersey . . . but I went to the post office today, and they don't have the letter—it's still out there somewhere, but they said I could come pick it up Monday: very mysterious . . . either I've inherited loads of money or I'm being subpoenaed for tax evasion . . . or perhaps something in between-- my pipes are lead-free? -- who knows-- I'll fill you in on Monday.

Knicks!

I am still basking in the glow of last night's epic Knicks victory over the Hawks-- the Knicks were up 51 points at halftime-- a margin large enough for us to watch an episode of West Wing before returning to the game--. I should tell you that West Wing is a very good show that we missed and still feels quite relevant (although also totally dated because it's a bunch of smart, talented, dedicated, clever, wonky folks running the White House) and this enormous early lead also assuaged my anxiety about missing game seven because I am scheduled to referee a soccer match on Saturday evening (also a fantastic Sixers win to stretch the Boston/Philadelphia series to seven games . . . things are looking up for the Knicks!)

Kids: Moving Fast, Taking Chances (A Very Special Sentisode)

Today, during passing time, I got knocked out of the way by a fast-moving student-- or I should say I got ushered aside by his white cane, because this student, who was moving faster than me through the hallway congestion, was blind.

Martha Wells Kills It With Murderbot

Network Effect, the fifth book in Martha Wells "Murderbot Diaries" series, is longer and more complicated than her earlier novellas-- it's definitely "hard" sci-fi, replete with malignant code, memory wipes, killware, infectious alien remnants, future legalese, hostage protocols, wormholes, surveillance drones, futuristic space-opera content, and many other specific and developed sci-fi tropes-- but none of that matters all that much . . . at it's heart it's another story of Murderbot, the rogue and existentially curious Security Unit cyborg, learning how to "network" and have relationships in a world not governed by its governor module-- and the relationhip between Murderbot and the AI that runs a deep-space research and survey ship-- nicknamed ART (Asshole Research Transport) by Murderbot, is especially poignant . . . and often awkward and humorous-- brilliant voice, brilliant sci-fi, brilliant Martha Wells.