A Drone Miracle

My son Alex was determined to fix his broken quadcopter drone, so he ordered a tiny two dollar motor from China, waited a month for it to arrive, then unscrewed a million tiny screws to get the drone body apart, replaced the broken motor-- with some help from his father-- and finally, had a complete meltdown when he attempted to get it airborne and found out that in order for it to fly, two of the drone propellers have to spin clockwise and two of them have to spin counterclockwise-- but, because of the way he hooked up the wires, he had three motors spinning clockwise . . . which pushed one side of the drone back into the ground, but-- I'll give him credit-- he opened the thing up again and switched the wires (which I thought might work) and it reversed the direction of the propeller and the drone lifted off for a moment, and then the battery died and then the wire connected to the battery ripped out and we tried to unsuccessfully fix that and then I told him to go outside and play with a ball because I couldn't take anymore . . . but then mom found the spare battery ( a minor miracle) and Alex charged it and hooked it up and -- miraculously-- it worked . . . and he got two days of enjoyment out of it before he crashed it and broke another motor, and now he has decided to give up on drones (a miracle in itself).

Podcast of Dave! And Stacey! And Cunningham!

For a full description, head over to Gheorghe: The Blog, or-- if you're brave-- just dive in and listen; but Stacey, Young Cunningham and I have recorded a podcast: it's called The Test and the theme is epistemology . . . and we've got background music and questions and debate and a theme song and an audio montage (which is probably far too long and self-indulgent) and you can play at home, but you can't study; we are planning on having guests in the future, so if you want to be on the show, tell us.

Dave Prevents a Race Riot With an Allusion to Mean Girls

I was showing The Manchurian Candidate  to my senior Composition class and I promised them a scene where Frank Sinatra does karate, and at some point midway through the film a group of girls yelled at me: "Where is Frank Sinatra? You said Frank Sinatra was going to do karate!" and I pointed to Frank Sinatra, who happened to be on screen, and I said "he's right there and you already saw him do karate" and one of the girls said, "Frank Sinatra is white? I thought he was black," and the rest of the girls on that side of the room concurred-- Frank Sinatra was most certainly a black guy-- and when I told them that was not correct, they expressed sincere disbelief that Frank Sinatra was an Italian American-- including an African-American girl-- and then an Asian girl yelled "Just because he has a soulful voice doesn't mean he's got to be black!" and then, just before the race riot, I nipped the whole thing in the bud with the perfect line, a line that only an extremely experienced high school teacher could come up with in a situation like this . . . I said, "Oh my God, you can't just ask why Frank Sinatra is white" in my best Gretchen Wieners voice, and everyone laughed and lauded me for a job well done (nothing is more important for a high school teacher than to have comprehensive knowledge of Mean Girls).

Bonus Sentence: The Lorax Needs to Write This Article

Here is the Star Ledger article about the car chase that started on our street; apparently a local dude was caught with drugs that he was intending to distribute and took off in a hurry-- and though the chase ended when he crashed into a police car, the article explains that no one was injured . . . which I suppose is technically true, but I think the writer should mention that there was some flora that suffered injury-- my beautiful tree that I planted and tended for its entire life . . . who will speak for the trees?

Three Bands: Three Long Songs (with occasional breaks for profanity)

The Stone Pony Summer Stage is a great place to see a concert: there's a beach breeze, it's not too loud, the shows begin early (doors opened at 5:30 . . . right in my wheelhouse), the beer is fairly cheap (5 dollars for a domestic, 6 for the fancy stuff) and there's plenty of space to move around; a bunch of us saw Gogol Bordello, Flogging Molly and Mariachi El Bronx Friday night and it was a lot of fun (despite several mosh pit injuries-- Alec pulled his bicep and Rob suffered a stomped toe) although I will say it sounded like we heard a total of three very long songs: one hipster mariachi song, one extremely long Irish punk song, and one fairly long gypsy rock'n'roll song; in other words, the bands sounded great, but you couldn't tell one song from the next (also, Mariachi El Bronx are not from the Bronx, nor are there any Mexicans in the band, yet they dress like a mariachi band and do a lot of punk versions of traditional mariachi songs . . . and then curse a lot in English in between the songs).

Blood, Knife, Tooth, Sink . . .

Imagine seeing this vivid tableau soon after your son lost a tooth; you walk into the bathroom, and there's blood spattered on the white porcelain around the drain, and your son's pocket knife rests on the sink ledge . . . and you've been watching a lot of Parks and Rec with the boys and they love Ron Swanson-- who would be just the kind of guy to use a pocket knife to remove a loose tooth . . . but it turned out to be a false alarm, two unrelated incidents . . . Alex was cleaning his pocket-knife, which was covered with dirt, when his loose tooth fell out.

Can Duct Tape Really Fix Anything?

Yesterday afternoon, a bit after six PM, Ian and Catherine heard a loud bang on our front lawn-- they were in the kitchen-- and so they ran outside and saw the tail end of a wild car chase . . . a white car drove over the No Parking sign in front of our neighbor's house (causing the loud bang) and then raced across our lawn, clipping one of our trees; this caused the car's bumper and side mirror to come off (and he also knocked a huge chunk of bark off my tree . . .  more on that later) and then the car turned back onto the road and continued south on Valentine, pursued by five police cars (marked and unmarked) and though I was in the room closest to the incident, I missed the entire thing (I was in my music studio, wearing headphones, editing a podcast) and finally, from what we heard, the car plowed into a police road block on Benner, injuring the officer that was in the car . . . I can't find an article yet, but I will link to one when I do; Cat was freaked out because they were out on the front lawn five minutes before, unloading from a day at the pool, and I was freaked out because my beautiful tree, that I planted when Ian was born, suffered a severe injury, but the web tells me that if you duct-tape the bark back to the tree, the tree has a much better chance of surviving, so though it looks weird, I did it and I hope it works.

We Can't Spare a Square

The final message of Michael Tennesen's book The Next Species: The Future of Evolution in the Aftermath of Man is that humans are probably going to go the way of the crocodylomorphs (crocodile-jawed creatures that existed 230 million years ago, just before the age of the dinosaurs, and "spread across the lands, evolving into different forms, from slender, long-legged, wolf-like animals to huge, fearsome animals that were the apex predators of the food web") due to various causes (overpopulation, starvation, disease, loss of native species, exhausted soil, global warming, rising oceans, ocean acidification, etcetera) and it will probably be-- in a geological sense-- sooner, rather than later . . . this is where the analogies come into play, because, despite our intelligence, humans have great difficulty realizing what a young species we are and just how ubiquitous extinction is; Tennesen uses Stephen Jay Gould's explanation: "if our planet's beginning is the end of your nose and its present is your outstretched fingertip, then a single swipe of a nail file wipes out all of human history" and I recently hear Louise Leakey describe it like this: if the history of life on earth is a 400 sheet roll of toilet paper, then the dinosaurs take up fourteen sheets and modern humans have been around only for the last millimeter of the roll . . . so we haven't existed long enough to wipe our own ass.

Don't Mention This Hypothesis to My Wife (or do it when I'm not around)

I'm not going to say this out loud, because summer vacation has just started-- which is awesome-- but the house does get disastrously messy because we are living in it a lot more, but still-- just entertain this for a moment-- isn't it possible that it might be more efficient to put dishes in the dishwasher once there is a whole pile of dirty stuff, instead of putting them in one at a time, right when you're finished using them?

There's a Fine Line Between Pedant and Douche-Bag

For the past few years, I've been correcting certain people over the grammatically correct usage of lie/lay . . . not all people, just my wife and kids (because they kept telling our dog to lay down and I couldn't stand it) and my fellow English teachers (because I think they should know better) and the occasional neighborhood kid (because if you're hanging out in my kitchen, eating my snacks, enjoying my air-conditioning, then I've got the right to correct your grammar) but I think I may need to give up the ghost because:

1) it's extremely annoying, and I'm already that guy enough . . . I don't need to add to it;

2) the battle may be lost . . . Roman Mars, the eloquent host of the phenomenal design podcast 99% Invisible, botched lie and lay twice in the first two minutes of the new episode-- "Freud's Couch"-- which, of course, features lots of lying down on furniture and laying out the structure of one's subconscious . . . but here's something even more interesting: though Mars makes the typical mistake with the verb (54 seconds into the podcast and then a few seconds later) and describes how Sigmund Freud would have his patient Fanny Moser "lay" down on his couch and then he explains that when "she was laying there" he would have her talk about what was running through her mind, but in the paragraphs summarizing and describing this particular episode, the error is corrected: "when Moser came to Freud, he would have her lie down on the couch, just like he did with his other patients," which means some neurotic copy editor heard the error and fixed it in print . . . and maybe that's how it will be from here on in, it's something to correct in writing, but something to let slide during conversation . . . on a related note, I'm not sure which is correct-- "just like he did with his other patients" or "just as he did with his other patients" . . . I don't know and I'm not going to worry about it.

There's a Fine Line Between Stupid and Clever

When my wife watches Christiano Ronaldo play, she always makes a comment about what a beautiful man he is, and I think that's fine; on the other hand, I've felt a little awkward about opining on the attractiveness of players in the Women's World Cup (not that it's stopped me . . . especially when Sweden's Elin Rubensson was racing after the ball) and so I'm wondering how many comments are acceptable before it becomes gauche and sexist . . . I think the rules are slightly different than women's tennis, where it's literally impossible not to constantly comment on the attractiveness of the players, who often look like supermodels and are dressed in adorable outfits-- the ladies competing in the World Cup are much tougher, more daring, and less concerned about how they come off to the crowd than tennis players, and so in honor of their fierce play, I am going to hold myself to one (1) comment per half about attractiveness, and the rest of my commentary will be about tactics and soccer.

My Wife and Kids Outdo Me . . .

The boys and I were quite proud of our short film A Day Without Mom, which we presented to Catherine on Mother's Day . . . but that's nothing compared to the movie Cat and the boys made for me on Father's Day: A Day Without Dad has more clips, more transitions, better editing, more costume and set changes, and all sorts of other professional touches (but I will say that the filming of A Day Without Mom went smoothly and I never wanted to kill the children, but it sounds like Catherine's experience was slightly different-- Francis Ford Coppola trying to direct a couple of lunatic monkeys? -- because I talked to her on the phone just after she completed the project and she was close to cracking up).

Not Quite a Dream (But Just as Stupid)

Fans of Sentence of Dave know exactly how I feel about dreams (they are stupid and I don't want to hear about them, even if I was in them) but this sentence takes place in the gray area between sleep and consciousness, so even though it is dreamlike, I'm going to forge ahead: Friday night, after a fairly epic afternoon of food and beverage consumption, I started to watch an episode of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, but I fell asleep and when I awoke, I saw Red (Kate Mulgrew) on the screen and I thought to myself: she must be doing a cameo on Kimmy Schmidt and then I saw a number of other characters from Orange is the New Black on the screen, doing some kind of extemporaneous drama exercise and I thought to myself: they must have all the people from Orange is the New Black on Kimmy Schmidt . . . that's weird . . . and where is Kimmy Schmidt? and then I asked my wife if she was watching Orange is the New Black . . . which, of course, she was.

How to Be Interested in Politics . . .

I've been listening to Dan Carlin's political podcast Common Sense and while each show is a detailed and logical look at a specific issue (or issues), one of the themes is that the typical topics that Democrats and Republicans debate aren't very interesting . . . you either have to investigate the opinions of the outliers-- people on the far right and far left fringes-- or take a look on the things that the parties agree upon (such as trade agreements and the power of money and lobbying in our political system) if you want to find anything revealing; this is useful for me, because any time I start to follow politics and read about politics, I get so frustrated with the insincerity and the obfuscation and the avoidance of real issues, that I go back to reading/ watching anything else, which is sad (but probably how the politicians want it, better for folks to be opining on the machinations of the people in Westeros, rather than actually paying attention to what is going on in America).

Meta-Dinosaurs Fight Ghosts of Dinosaur Past

For the most part Jurassic World operates as billed: plenty of dinosaurs, plenty of cheese, and plenty of eye-candy (i.e. Bryce Dallas Howard) but there is something more to chew on at the core of this saccharine Tootsie Pop of a film; the dino-based island theme park Jurassic World needs a new attraction to "reinvigorate" the patrons of the park, and-- in an aesthetic meta-parallel-- the Jurassic Park franchise needs reinvigoration as well-- and, once again, the audience needs to learn the same lesson . . . that you shouldn't tamper with mother-nature-- so enter Indominus Rex, a genetically modified dinosaur that would enjoy this Radiolab podcast; the result is a movie about movies . . . we demand more and more entertainment from the summer blockbuster, but nothing can satisfy us . . . although, the climax of Jurassic World comes pretty close: the boys and I watched the movie in Imax 3-D and the final scene which pits Indominus Rex against a T. Rex (with a few extra twists which I won't spoil) makes a larger comment about the art of the action-sequel franchise, which is an ultimately an exercise in reductio ad absurdum which can only end in parody (and not only is there a meta-theme buried at the core of this movie, but the actors actually stumble upon the old Jurassic Park when they are lost in the wilds of Jurassic World . . . and as far as the cheese goes, there was a wonderful meta-moment when Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard were looking at a number of dead dinosaurs that Indominus Rex had killed but not eaten, and I whispered to my son Alex, "he didn't eat them . . . he's hunting for sport" and then a beat later Chris Pratt turned to Bryce Dallas Howard and said the exact same words, with the exact same intonation, and my son looked at me and said "Whoa!" and I had to explain to him that movie dialogue in this sort of story was very predictable . . . also, don't sit behind me and my boys if you go to the movies-- Alex and I both have a penchant for running commentary and Alex has a hard time whispering).

Rare Combination: Helium Balloons and Anger

I turned from getting some cash at the Wells Fargo ATM and saw something wonderful stomp down the avenue: a woman in a denim skirt with an intense scowl on her face, dragging five helium filled Mylar balloons behind her.

Greasetruck Likes Food!

After a series of barely tolerable songs about obtuse topics (time travel, the Olympic theme for snowboarders, psychedelia in the desert, free will vs. determinism, and novel writing) Greasetruck tackles a subject that should be a hit: food . . . the new song is called "I Like Food" and I am pretty sure it is the best song in the history of rock, and it features a bonus rap (with some mad rhymes penned by Whitney).

Hooray for Learning! Boo for Humans! Hooray! Boo!

I am reading two books right now, and it's like riding a mental rollercoaster; one is called How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where and Why It Happens by Benedict Carey; it's a breezy, fun and scientific approach to all the counterintuitive things science has learned about memory, and it is full of handy facts about when to review for tests, the importance of testing on recall, how long after learning something you should review the material, and the percentage of time you should spend reading and the percentage of time you should spend recalling if you want to memorize lyrics or a poem; the other book is called The Next Species: The Future of Evolution in the Aftermath of Man by Michael Tennesen, and while the tone of this book is also breezy and it's full of fun facts (some jungle frogs sit on their eggs like chickens!) it is mainly about how humans have done irreversible damage to the planet and we are really in for it in the near future: our soil is almost tapped out, we can't sustain the growing population, there won't be enough protein for the burgeoning middle class, we are in the midst of a great extinction, and the diminishing biodiversity is having all kinds of awful effects on the planet, with less biodiversity, diseases have an easier time spreading, new microorganisms are resistant to nearly every antimicrobial drug we have (and we aren't rapidly developing more) and the oceans are overfished, acidified, and low on oxygen (which is bad for fish but good for the giant Humboldt squid, which can survive in low oxygen zones, and also good for sperm whales-- which like to eat the squid-- and other breath holders such as elephant seals, and while this part of the apocalypse sounds awesome: an ocean full of giant squid and fish, it's still a major loss in biodiversity . . . and while I like calamari, I'm not sure I want to eat giant squid steaks every time I want some protein).

Mea Culpa?

Martin Seligman, who wrote Learned Optimism, asserts that it is mentally healthier to sublimate rather than ruminate-- if you suffer a setback, blame an outside force instead of yourself . . . this is how you avoid depression; I may have taken this to the extreme on Sunday, when I stubbed my toe on the short flight of stairs leading from the study into the kitchen (stubbed it hard, hard enough that I crumpled into a ball) and immediately blamed my wife for the injury, claiming that it was her fault because she "talked to me while I was climbing the stairs" and -- in my throes of pain-- I told her she shouldn't engage me in conversation until I was in front of her and stationary or that it could result in injury . . . I recognize the absurdity of this logic now, but it did make my toe and my ego feel better during the incident-- instead of being a comically injured spaz, I was an indignantly wronged victim.

Governor Christie, Try Cracking One of Those Old-Fashioned Books Of Which You Speak

Governor Christie makes some interesting claims in this video, including the opinion that teachers are "getting paid a full time salary for a part time job" and then he demands that, for the sake of the children, teachers work longer hours-- despite the fact that we are getting paid less every year (because of increased health care "donations" and increased pension payments . . . even though Christie refuses to pay what the state owes to the pension fund) and while he also believes that we should get rid of all those antiquated school books and instead give every kid an Ipad, he should try reading Elizabeth Green's book Building a Better Teacher so he can appreciate the productivity of American teachers, who spend far more time in the classroom and teach far more students than the countries that are tops in education (notably Finland and Japan) and while one of my recent goals is to follow politics more closely-- to start, I'm listening to Dan Carlin's podcast Common Sense-- but perhaps this is a bad idea if I'm going to be an effective teacher, as it's hard to teach when your blood is boiling.