Today, for the first time in my life, I visited the dermatologist and when the doctor-- Dr. Penelope Cohen, a little lady who wore a doctor's gown and red high-heeled shoes-- asked me why I had scheduled an appointment, I told her "my wife told me to" and she said, "that's what most men your age who come here say" and then she prescribed me some cream for a spot on my face that is sun-damaged so it doesn't turn into cancer-- so I'm glad I went.
Hot Peppers, Homer Simpson, and Some Annoying News
My wife's garden has been producing an abundance of hot peppers and we needed to do something with them before they decayed in the crisper, so I cut them, deseeded them, and roasted them on the grill-- it was too hot to do them in the kitchen (honestly, it was too hot to do them on the grill-- it was 95 degrees yesterday) but I did not wear gloves when I cut the peppers and my hands got covered in capsaicin and they burned and burned, though I washed them . . . and I took a bike ride to the pool and swam a few laps but that didn't help either-- in fact, they burned even more-- and it turns out that Homer Simpson was right, as "alcohol . . . the cause of and solution to all of life's problems" would have remedied the pain (and, in not so great news, I also read about a recent study that found that people who drink more than five alcoholic drinks a week have shorter telomeres and thus are aging faster than those that drink less . . . dammit, so much for the "pickling yourself" theory).
Outer Banks Fishing Trip XXIX
Here are a few things I remember from OBFT XXIX:
1) manatee sighting;
2) Bruce gave a heartfelt speech and then we took turns scattering some of Johnny's mortal remains into the bosom of the Atlantic Ocean . . . and luckily the wind was blowing the right direction so there were no Lebowski moments;
3) sea turtle nest next to the dune, so we were chastised for being "in the direct line" between the turtle eggs and the ocean-- I could hear David Attenborough's voice describing the difficult journey the baby turtles make from under the sand and into the ocean, trying to avoid the drunken middle age men, the beer cans, and the flying cornhole bags . . . unfortunately, the eggs did not hatch while we were there, but we did get to watch the volunteers rake the sand and build a little walled runway for the turtles;
4) Ethan told an excellent joke about a party that was going to have some "drinking, dancing, fighting and fucking" . . . I can't wait to tell it;
5) Paci spoke in a German accent for thirty-five minutes straight;
6) Gormley spoke in tongues on Wednesday night at Whitney's new place . . . and Billy made the mistake of staying up late with him;
7) Whitney was in the middle of a move-- so while we enjoyed the pool in Norfolk, he was running around trying to figure out task rabbit chores, prices of furniture, and other real estate minutia;
8) Whitney's canopy withstood the wind, mine did not . . . and then I forgot it;
9) Whitney and I played a live version of our tribute song "Where's Johnny?"
10) plenty of stinging jellyfish in the water (mainly in the mornings) so Marston offered to drink a lot of beer so he could pee on anyone who was stung . . . maybe next year he'll get his chance;
11) Charlie Carter cooked an amazing meal of tuna and beef tenderloin and Fernandez brought down a bunch of high quality sliced smoked meats-- chorizo and salami and such-- and some really good bread and cheese . . a whole charcuterie!
12) we filled the bar at Tortuga's on Friday, including the panhandle-- and we were NOT shushed;
13) much cornhole was played on the beach-- I had good runs with Old, Marston, and Smokin' Joe;
14) Mac thought I might like a band called Ice 9 Kills-- perhaps because the lead singer holds various weapons (including a chainsaw) while singing, but I informed him they were a little heavy for my taste now, and that I was listening to a lot of Steely Dan;
15) Mac and Whit played a drunken game of drunk driver;
16) Whitney engineered a compelling song connection/trivia night on the deck on Saturday;
17) Z was played on Friday;
18) we got salad with our pizza Saturday night;
19) I believe a good time was had by all . . . thanks again Whitney (and everyone involved) for organizing, traveling, and making this happen-- we've been doing this for more our half our lives now!
Two Recs
Two good things:
1) Jordan Peele's new movie Nope . . . it's Moby Dick, Jaws, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind all rolled up into one story . . . with horses too!
2) Spice 24-- a dry pot stir fry place in the H-Mart plaza . . . my wife and I both loved it and I think the kids will too, it's an authentic version of Honeygrow: you get to choose what goes in your stir fry from numerous options (from baby octopus to black mushrooms to bean sprouts) and everything we got was delicious . . . although I don't recommend biking there, which is what we did-- it was really hot and hilly (although the straight shot home on 27 wasn't so bad).
Rain!
I'm not sure I'd like living in a place where it rains all the time-- Pittsburgh or Rochester or Seattle-- but we've had quite a dry stretch in central New Jersey and it gets depressing-- all the plants are brittle, the ground is dusty, and I feel like I'm always about to sneeze . . . so it was nice to have a damp, dark, rainy day (and we could finally take the dog for a long walk) and I hope we get a couple more of these before the end of summer.
Mean Streets and Not-So-Mean Streets
I couldn't find my car keys this morning but we solved the mystery-- Ian left them in the car door last night . . . and the van was parked on the street-- a street where cars are occasionally broken into-- so it was something of a miracle that the car was trashed, stolen, taken for a joy ride, or something worse . . . but we don't live on streets as mean as those I detail in the new episode of We Defy Augury: Ghettoside vs. Murderbot . . . check it out, it's my best one yet.
Back from the Beach
A fun but slightly fraught family beach vacation-- Alex never made it down, he kept testing positive for COVID and he didn't want to risk passing it to my father or the two pregnant cousins-- but the rest of us had a good time (despite the frigid water temperatures) playing pickle ball, basketball, tennis, cornhole, and spikeball . . . Greg and I defended our cornhole title (despite the presence of his wife) and that will be it for us-- you get one year to defend your title in the random draw cousins event, so next year we will both be back in the pool . . . because of the cold water, I did a lot of reading on the trip-- I finished Jonathan Franzen's new novel Crossroads, The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order: America and the World in the Free Market Era by Gary Gerstle, and Last Orgy of the Divine Hermit by Mark Leyner (and I started Tracy Flick Can't Win by Tom Perrotta . . . in other news, my brother got engaged to his longtime girlfriend Amy (and all things being equal, my dad-- while toasting them-- also mentioned the cornhole champions) so we're adding another wedding to the mix (a bunch of the cousins are getting married and there are two babies on the way, so next year's trip will have a different tenor) and while it's good to be home and see Alex and Lola again, there's nothing like the ocean breeze at the Jersey Shore and it's going to be really fucking hot all week inland (but at least I'm headed down to OBFT in a few days).
No Swimmin'
Interesting beach week so far: Alex tested positive for COVID the night before we left-- luckily, he hasn't been around much, he's been working and hanging out with friends so none of us contracted it-- we all tested negative-- but he's home alone, hanging out with his buddy Aidan-- who also has COVID-- and hoping to test negative soon and get down to the beach; he hasn't missed much as far as the ocean, it was frigid yesterday -- 56 degrees Fahrenheit . . . to whom do I complain?-- and today there's a red flag up because of rip currents; Ian and I played some tennis yesterday, but we were beset by green-head flies and high heat and humidity; today we had an excellent three-on-three basketball game . . . Ian, who is really just learning to play again, is now the big man! until his brother shows up . . . tomorrow we're going to try to play some pickleball and hopefully the ocean will stop being so cold and angry.
The Tattoos They are A-Changin'
Long ago, I wanted to get a tattoo on my back of the great undersea battle: sperm whale vs. giant squid, but They Might Be Giants released "Apollo 18" and I didn't want to be second fiddle to an album cover . . . yesterday I realized (while my wife shaved my back) that if I get a tattoo on my back now, it would have to be some kind of dark-haired mammal, like a bear or a moose or a musk ox, so my back hair would not ruin the aesthetic.
Sherlock Holmes in Space
If you're looking for a locked-room-type whodunnit set in the far future, in the vast reaches of space, on a space station, with a robot detective, then check out Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells . . . especially the parentheticals when Murderbot gets annoyed by humans (and their habits of touching everything and throwing balls where they are not supposed to throw balls).
It's Still Hot, But We're Out In It
I played tennis this morning with my buddy Cob and-- because of the extreme heat-- we were the only people on the courts playing singles . . . it may have been ill-advised, but we took plenty of breaks and we survived; Ian worked eight hours at the tennis camp; Alex worked eight hours life-guarding; and Catherine went to her garden and did maintenance there; I also grilled a bunch of hot peppers (on our outdoor gas grill) so we could freeze them: the combination of the heat, the sun, and the grill added up a an inferno on our back porch . . . so we're soldiering on in this weather but without the respite of A/C I would lose all my energy, my mind, and my ability to complete any tasks . . . I'm not sure how people are surviving who don't have it.
It's Hot
Stacey gave me a ride home in her jeep from our college writing workshop today (we got so much work done! I actually did some work in the summertime!) and riding in the jeep with the top down is generally a treat: the sun on my head, the breeze blowing through my (lack of) hair . . . but it was so hot today that it felt like we were driving in a pizza oven.
Sleep Comes and Goes
Everyone knows when you have a newborn in the house, you're going to be sleep deprived; soon enough they sleep through night and things are restful again . . . but what they don't tell you is that when they turn eighteen, you go through the same thing all over again-- but this time around, you're old and amazed at all the energy a human can have at 2:30 AM in the morning.
Dave Finishes Two Things
I just finished making Episode 5 of We Defy Augury: "The Foundling by Ann Leary: Eugenics on the Beach?" and I just finished reading Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America by Jill Leovy, which will definitely inspire another episode-- this is a book that turns policing and violent crime on its head-- it's about a particular murder of a policeman's son in South Central LA; the causes and misperceptions of gang violence; the kind of policing necessary to combat the high murder rates among black males; and the reasons murder rates in certain areas stay persistently high . . . tragic but highly recommended.
As Usual . . .
One of the recurring themes of this blog is that I think I am sore from doing some oddball exercise (this time: deadlifts) but then it turns out I have a virus-- this time it's a weird stomach bug that I got from my wife: no diarrhea, thank God, but bloating and burping and generally feeling a little run down and sick and glassy-eyed . . . hopefully it will be gone tomorrow (and it's definitely not a kidney stone, which I wondered about last night when I couldn't sleep because my stomach hurt).
Post Deadlift Blues
Ian and I had some fun doing trap bar deadlifts yesterday at the gym-- the trap bar makes deadlifts much easier to execute . . . which might not be such a good thing, now my entire body is sore.
Post Beach Blues
The day after a beach day is always a bit depressing-- it's so hot and dry in central Jersey right now- and while I did bike to the pool and swim a few laps, it's not the same as a foggy chilly breeze off the ocean . . . unfortunately, beach real estate is through-the-roof, perhaps because of this work-from-home thing that has freed rich people from living in urban centers . . . boo to that.
Bloodhound at the Beach?
Lovely (and fairly typical) beach day in Asbury Park with Stacey, Cunningham, Chantal and my wife-- but one odd moment when we were walking through the convention center: a policeman with a retired bloodhound ordered Stacey and I to get "cheek to cheek" with the dog for a picture; we obeyed, of course, he was wearing a uniform and the dog was too cute . . . and so we have this priceless pic to show for it.
A Beach Read . . . About Eugenics?
The Foundling, by Ann Leary, is billed as a summer beach read and it meets those specifications: while there's no sun or sand in the novel-- it's quite gothic-- it's definitely a vacation for your brain, especially the second half, which has a very compelling escape plot, reminiscent of Shawshank Redemption; the book is an easy read, on the one hand, especially for historical fiction (the setting in a woman's asylum in Pennsylvania in 1927, the Nettleton State Village for Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age) but on the other hand, the book brings up some difficult questions about eugenics, morality, who should be institutionalized, corruption, power authority, religion, woman's rights, and racism . . . but only in the first half of the novel-- then it just gets beachier and beachier.
Oddly Liberating
This morning my son Alex took the book bag with my phone in it and Ian took the car with my wallet in it so I had no phone or money so I took a nap.
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