A Slow Start to the World Cup . . .

Yesterday, I took a half-day and so did my friend, colleague, and fellow soccer coach Terry-- our plan was to find a raucous bar, settle in, and watch the USA vs. Wales World Cup game . . . the first two places we went-- Barca and Tavern on George-- were closed because it was Monday . . . and while I get the whole restaurants-are-closed-on-Monday thing, we're talking about the World Cup-- most countries shut down (except for bars and restaurants) when the national team is playing a cup game-- so we ate lunch at George Street Ale House and talked soccer with a salesman and watched the Netherlands beat Senegal in the waning minutes and then we went over to the Golden Rail to watch the USA game-- there was a bit of a crowd there and the new owner, an enthusiastic Asian guy, was excited about the game-- but the only reason he opened the bar was because he saw that there was an article in the local paper (and the local internet paper, if there is a such a thing) that said that the Golden Rail was a great place to watch soccer-- because the previous owner was British-- so he figured he'd better open; then for the second half, we went to Highland Park and tried Pino's because they said they would have the big projection screen going for the game-- and they did-- but there was also a group of old dudes in a circle in the front of the bar playing folk music (one at a time, taking turns . . . yikes) and there was only one other USA fan in the place, my buddy John, so we watched together and suffered through Zimmerman's unfortunate foul of Gareth Bale and the resulting PK that drew the game-- hopefully there will be more fanfare and festivities on Friday.

Southern Change Gonna Come at Last?

 

The past couple weeks I have immersed myself in the South, with a capital "S": my wife and I traveled to Charleston; I read a bunch of Battle Cry of Freedom-- the epic James M. McPherson Civil War history-- and I whipped through two S.A. Cosby crime novels that are set in rural Virginia . . . Blacktop Wasteland and Razorblade Tears . . . the result of all this Southern immersion is a new episode of We Defy Augury called "Southbound with S.A. Cosby" . . . there are cameo appearances from Zman and my son Alex (but they are pretty deep into the show-- you've got to have patience in the South . . . check it out and I hope you enjoy it.

Kids These Days . . .

We've had bathroom issues at East Brunswick High School-- vaping, vandalism, hooking up, etcetera-- so kids have to digitally sign into monitored bathrooms and only two students can enter at a time . . . it's a real pain-in-the-ass, pun intended, and in any given period (and we have block scheduling, so our periods are 82 minutes long, so kids are going to have to go to the bathroom) most of the bathrooms around the school are closed and locked, so the kids have to seek out an open bathroom and often wait in line to go-- some kids take advantage of this, they know they can wander the halls of the school with impunity, basically cutting class, but when they see teachers or SSO officers, they just tell them they are looking for an open bathroom; I saw a couple of these "hallway wanderers" pass each other last week, and after they slapped hands, one delinquent said something that might have passed between two septuagenarians: "bro, you're the only guy who get more steps in this building than me."

American Tailgating vs. The Americans

There's nothing like a good-old-fashioned-football tailgate-- but that doesn't mean I like everything about a good-old-fashioned-football tailgate; Rutgers played Penn State today and we have a number of kids from Highland Park that attend both schools (including my son Alex, far right in the photo) so it was fun to see the high school gang back together and the parents brought loads of good food and drink, but it was bitter cold and it was windy-- notice the flags-- and wind ruins everything . . . tennis, biking, golf, tailgating (everything except kite-flying) so while I enjoyed the cold-- especially from a food hygiene point-of-view, I had no problem eating leftovers from this tailgate hours later, because everything was kept at refrigeration temperatures-- I was happy to catch a ride home and watch the game inside my warm, windless house . . . and then when the game broke bad, I was happy to watch an episode of The Americans with my wife . . . and choosing a show about Russian spies over football probably means I'm some kind of pinko communist.

 

Stuff I Watched, Stuff I'm Watching

If you're looking for a different take on the horror genre, check out His House-- it's the story of a refugee couple from wartorn Sudan who seeks asylum in England and ends up in a not-so-typical-haunted-housing situation . . . these folks have some real skeletons in the closet and some real ghosts in their past; if you're looking for more traditional horror, check out Midnight Mass, a Netflix miniseries directed by Mike Flanagan-- the characters are well-drawn and Saracen from Friday Night lights has a superb role in this haunted island community; if you're looking to be stressed and depressed, watch The Americans . . . we've almost made it to the end of season four, and while the portrayal of two Soviet deep-cover spies who are "married" and have a family in Washington D.C. is compelling, gripping and candid, the show gets dark and then it gets darker . . . we can't stop watching, but it's brutal.

Voodoo Health Shit

I pride myself on being a logical person, versed in numeracy, literacy, and many topics-- but one thing I don't fuck around with is medical information . . . I don't read about medical stuff, I don't investigate it, I don't wonder at it, I don't think about it-- when I was a kid, I skipped that page in Discover about medical mysteries (was it called Vital Signs?) and while I know this is ridiculous, I just think it's bad juju to wonder about how your body works . . . if you read about heart attacks, you might have one; if you watch a medical show where someone has an aneurysm, your body might follow suit; if you research too much about your kidneys, they might stop working, and I did not read one page of Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer (even though I heard it was an excellent book) and then yesterday, we were discussing strokes (because my friend's dad had a stroke) and I got a terrible headache-- and I never get headaches-- and it was like a spike had been nailed into my head above my right eye and I could barely teach and I had to cancel my dermatology appointment . . . but apparently lots of people get headaches-- some far worse than the one I experienced-- and I wasn't having a stroke and it went away when I had some acetaminophen and coffee, but I still don't want to know how this stuff works (my friend Rachel told me she has lots of little white scars on her brain from migraine headaches!)

Dave Learns Two Things (That He Already Knew . . . Sort Of)

This morning I learned that I really like Billy Cobham-- I like his drumming and his original stuff and his work with Miles Davis and his work with the Mahavishnu Orchestra . . . I just didn't know the name "Billy Cobham"-- I "liked" a bunch of his songs on Spotify without ever knowing the percussionist behind the music . . . the other thing I learned TWICE this week (and I'm sure I knew this previously) is that if you don't rake the leaves in your backyard, you are going to step in dogshit . . . because fallen leaves are often the color of dogshit and fallen leaves obscure dogshit.

Go Ahead and Glue Yourself to The Scream

I really loved the new Sam Harris podcast "Science and Civilization"; Harris chats with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson about numeracy and the difficulties humans have with numerical logic . . . the section about global warming was especially enlightening-- and, as usual, I am adding my own thoughts and tangents into a summary of what was discussed; Tyson points out that people have trouble understanding the dire consequences of one-degree change in average temperature because they don't think in Gaussian (Bell) curves-- we think about one degree warmer in our house or on an average day, but the fluctuation has much greater significance at the edges of the curve-- that's where the action is at (the storms, droughts, wildfires, dust storms, erosion, heat strokes, and death) and even if most people DID understand the ramifications at the long tail of a one-degree change, the mathematics of our political cycle precludes our political system from addressing the problem because we elect people in four-year cycles-- so the time horizon is too short to run on a long term concept like climate change . . . politicians run on inflation, cultural wedge issues, gas prices, immigration . . . things that are happening NOW . . . and Sam Harris is concerned that young people are th eonly people that care about these issues, but the way young people are protesting is kind of deranged-- especially the folks gluing themselves to "priceless" works of art; Tyson explains that young people are the only ones who care about these kind fo long term problems, plus they are the people with time and energy to protest-- I agree, and quite honestly, these "pricesless" works of art are only priceless in a market economy with extreme wealth inequality-- we have plenty of digital pictures of the art and it's only paint on canvas, so who gives a fuck? . . . maybe some rich art patrons but for the rest off us, the planet, the ecosystem we live in, the current state of the oceans and rivers, clean air and water, endangered species . . . all these things are far more priceless than art; a species took millions of years to create-- so I say, go ahead and glue yourselves to famous paintings if it gets some attention to the cause of climate change-- you've got to break a few eggs to bake a cake . . . but then you've got to explain the statistics to people as well-- so good luck.

A Bit 'mo Charleston

Some last thoughts about Charleston--

-- our tiny VRBO rental on Line Street (in the young and trendy Upper King Street neighborhood) was not for the faint of heart (or the elderly) because the bed was a floating loft at the top of a skinny spiral staircase . . . when you got out of bed, your only option was to get ONTO the staircase . . . 

--Brown's Court Bakery was a block away from our place-- some of the best baked goods I've ever eaten: the pepperoni/jalapeno danish, raspberry danish, bacon and cheddar scone, and the lavender sugar donut are all worth trying;

--Brown Dog Deli in downtown Charleston is a cheap, delicious joint to grab sandwiches and a beer;

-- the Two Sisters walking tour was excellent . . . we had Mary Helen (as the two sisters split the group) and she gave us an entertaining history of the city-- it's a weird place, after the Civil War and the earthquake of 1886, Charleston was somewhat in ruins . . . and because it wasn't wealthy, the city never rebuilt all it's historic homes and buildings-- and then some motivated Southern Ladies started preserving things until the money came into town and now the place is astounding, the homes are all remodeled historically by rich part-timers, there are lush gardens and window boxes and narrow cobblestone streets and brick alleys and iconic porches and patios-- it's like a beautiful version of New Orleans (without the urine and the vomit) and I'm not sure if we've ever put in more miles walking in a city--

--despite the windy weather, everyone told us you have to go to a rooftop bar when you're in Charleston so we went to the Pour Taproom, atop the Hyatt . . . an interesting concept: they have 80 computerized taps and you serve yourself beer and pay by the ounce . . . great views from up there, you can really see the layout of the city;

-- our last meal we went to Leon's again-- great affordable Southern food and local beers and a really great vibe;

--the Led Zeppelin poster in our VRBO rental was of the same nature as all those Nirvana t-shirts that the youngsters are wearing . . . I doubt very much the rental barons of StayDuvet are huge Zep fans but the band logo has become an aesthetic signifier of something young and fun;

--Charleston is a lot fo fun but I've heard it's swampy and mosquito-ridden in the summer and if we stayed there another week, Catherine and I would both be obese . . . it's a great place to visit and it's being rapidly gentrified as we speak . . . it's a Southern version of what happened in Asbury Park-- a prim location stunted by poverty and left in ruins until the money came to gentrify, and now both towns are adult playgrounds, great for a fun weekend, but maybe not somewhere to live full time.

More Charleston

We have really covered a lot of ground over the past two days, according to my Fitbit we've walked over fifty thousand steps, and we've managed to avoid getting soaked; Wednesday night w took a very very long stroll north to Edmund's Oast brewery-- but we thought we we headed to the restaurant but Google maps sent us to the brewery and while the beer was delicious, they didn't have an extensive menu so we ordered some boiled peanuts, which I loved at Cat hated-- very very messy food-- and then walked all the way back to Leon's-- an oyster and fried chicken place in a refurbished garage . . . the food was amazing; the nest day we walked down to the water, through the colorfully painted home in the French Quarter, which has a New Orleans feel, and took the tour of the Old Exchange and Dungeon, a venerable and extremely solid old building with symmetric brick foundational arches, a hidden cache of revolutionary gunpowder and an impressive history as a slave market, a battery, a port building, and a historical society, the building was on the river but now there is four hundred feet of reclaimed land; we got soaked on our walk home, but the vociferous and loquacious black lady working the register at the convenience store told us it was all God's plan and the rain removed the bacteria; we went back to our tiny house, watched a show called Magic For Humans which is oddly addictive and we only discovered it because we are on Sissy's Netflix account, so all kinds of weird suggestions, and then we walked back downtown for a rich Southern dinner at Magnolia's and then back uptown to see a band at the Commodore, a weird dive bar with music-- quite the crowd in there, it seemed everyone actually knew how to dance, like really dance, but the band canceled and some white guy started energetically rapping, doing hip hop covers, so we watched a bit of that and then went home (it also should be noted that I yanked my belt off a closet door, it was under my jeans, and the buckle whipped over the door and clocked me in the head, giving me a nice knot on my noggin).

Charleston day one

After a slightly stressful departure, as our son Ian-- who was locking up the house and heading to my brother's place with the dog while Catherine and I celebrate thirty years since our first date with a trip to Charleston-- dropped and broke his phone while listening to music in the shower and then totally lost his phone either at school or in the house so we had no Sim card and so we had to make like Avon Barksdale in The Wire and buy a burner phone, which was way harder to set up than we thought, but we did it and so we could communicate with our air brained son who ended up getting everything done he had to get done, enabling us to leave very very early, fly to Charleston, tour Magnolia Plantation, see some slave quarters, learn about rice farming, stalk some gators, take scenic pictures of Spanish moss and ancient live oaks, pet a pig, and walk a lot of miles through reclaimed swamp and beautiful wild gardens along the Ashley River, and then we ubered to town and gave our Uber driver some advice on his other job, where he cleans pools and got to drive a really nice pool truck until the new supervisor took it from him and gave him the shitty truck, a real kick to the balls, and it still wasn't check in at our tiny house near King Street so we grabbed a beer and a catfish sandwich and some fried green tomatoes at the Rarebit and then, finally, got into our little cottage with spiral stairs and a loft bedroom; soon enough we'll head back out to check out the night life and then hunker down for the rain.

Destroying the World (Creatively)

My newest episode of We Defy Augury is an epic adventure into apocalypses of all kinds; "Apocalypse New" is inspired by Walter M. Miller's classic post-apocalyptic religious sci-fi classic A Canticle for Leibowitz, but there's lots of cameos: Ziggy Stardust, Tyler Durden, Karen Thompson Walker, Rick Grimes, Sookie Stackhouse, Bill Compton . . . and even Kramer, to help with some poetry; I highly recommend the first novella in Canticle-- the Catholic Church, like a cockroach, is still hanging on six hundred years after a nuclear flame deluge-- and the monastery in honor of St. Leibowitz is trying to preserve some arcane and archaic knowledge from that old, destroyed world . . . then the book keeps going and going and going . . . you might want to listen to my podcast rather than reading the rest.

What About the Dogs? The Dogs!

Nothing is more fucked up than having to tell your dog she can't have dinner at her usual time because of a massive government conspiracy to control our clocks . . . I really thought there was some legislation to end all this springing forward and falling back bullshit, but apparently we're still doing it-- with no concern for the dogs! the poor dogs!-- and so now I've got a grouchy Pavlovian salivating dog, who can't understand why 5 PM is now 4 PM (mainly because I can't understand why 5 PM is now 4 PM . . . so there will be barely any time to get outside in the sun after school . . . why do we do this?)

Lantern Flies: The Hits Keep on Coming

Ian and I took a chainsaw to the low branches on the autumn blaze maple in our yard; I held the ladder and Ian used his long arms to reach and sever a half dozen or so limbs that were hanging over the bamboo and the Leyland cypress, in the the hopes that now the lantern flies will be more exposed on the main trunk-- the easier for trapping and killing . . . meanwhile, I taped the two maples in our front yard and while many lantern flies got stuck on the tape bands, there's still been an endless supply climbing the trunk, which I diligently massacre every time I go outside . . . so at the base of each tree there's a mass grave of splattered lantern flies-- which you'd think would serve as a warning to these stupid beasts, but they keep on coming-- but the questions is: where the fuck are they coming from? . . . or to be grammatically correct: from fuck all where do they be coming?

Conspiracy Theories in America

This episode of Plain English about conspiracy theories is both compelling and entertaining . . . I especially like the definition of a conspiracy theory-- brought to you by the guys from "Stuff They Don't Want You To Know"--

1) an event with an unsatisfactory explanation

2) lack of transparency

3) element of control-- either something controlling events or controlling information

4) a participatory aspect

and there's lots of other "fun" stuff about JFK, Lee Harvey Oswald, aliens, UFOs, and the government secrecy orders and patents.

But Don't Confuse Samuel Jackson and Laurence Fishburne

A student walked into my first period class this morning sleepily murmured, "Good morning Mr. Soder" and I turned my head and said, "YOU RACIST! You think every old white bald goateed English teacher looks the same?" and he stammered a bit and apologized for calling me the wrong name and then I told him I was just kidding-- that I could totally see how he mixed up me and Mr. Soder . . . because old white bald guys with goatees do look the same (especially to sleepy teenagers).

Got to Be the Shoes

You don't choose your family, but you don't really choose your friends either-- friendships tend to form in a fairly arbitrary pattern based on your activities, location, upbringing, family, race, religion, and a host of other factors . . . in fact, when you think hard about it (which you shouldn't) you might not choose anything (aside from the kind of shoes you wear).

(Ooh) That Smell

I lent my car to my seventeen year old son Sunday night, so he could drive some friends to get Halloween costumes-- but instead they got pho and I think someone spilled some (or they were very sweaty and were rubbing their stinky feet all over my van's upholstery) because Monday morning, there was a heinous odor emanating from the interior of the car, like vomit and chlorine and footstink all mixed together-- I've been driving with the windows open since then and the smell is finally dissipating but then today at the dentist I was punished with an even worse odor/flavor-- the cement that they used to affix my bridge made me gag over and over and over . . . I'm glad I didn't puke on the hygienist because she was very nice (not that I would punish a rude hygienist by puking on her) but I hope that the rest of my week is odor free.

 

Whole Lotta Barking Going On

 No matter how clearly I explain it, my dog does not understand Halloween.

Reality Returns

The Giants and the Jets performed more realistically today, thus proving we do not live in a simulation.

I Feel Like Pip in Daytona

This morning I went to the gym and I did some rowing and some upper-body lifting; then, on the way home, I stopped at the pickleball courts and there were people there so I figured I play a bit and then head over to the girl's soccer game-- but after I played a few games, I walked to my van and I couldn't find my keys anywhere-- so I assumed that I locked them inside the van; I called my wife, told her I needed her to come over and unlock the van, and then went back to playing pickleball . . . and it took my wife a while to get to me because she didn't have a van key and Ian did and he had slept over a friend's house and she had to track him down-- so by the time she got to me, I had played a lot more pickleball and when I was finished, my back started to hurt-- my lower back-- which never happens to me and then my wife arrived and I opened the van and my keys were NOT inside the van . . . so we searched the premises-- the courts and the path and the parking lot and the grass, and this nice Indian dude foudn them for me-- huge-- but by this time my back was really starting to hurt, and by the time I got home it was in full spasm-- I took a nap, but it didn't loosen up-- so no sports for me tomorrow (and I also doubt I'll climb the ladder with the electric chainsaw and cut down those limbs infested with lantern flies . . . I think I need to be in prime condition to do that stupid job).

Really?

If I'm in such good shape-- which I am . . . I still play soccer, badminton, basketball, tennis, and pickleball; I lift weights, I run, I swim, and I snowboard-- then why did I strain a quad muscle karate-kicking a lanternfly on my maple tree?

End of Era

Highland Park lost a 1-0 heartbreaker and was eliminated from the state tournament tonight, but I'm so proud of my son Ian-- he had a rough high school soccer career, after being an exceptional youth player . . . this was the first high school season that he didn't get injured and he fought his way into a starting position and scored some big goals and had a few exceptional assists; tonight he had to start at left back (because our left back had a doctor's appointment) and then when the left back arrived he went up and played right wing and then when our center back got hurt he played center back, and then when our center forward cramped he switched to center forward, then went back to center back and then ended the game at left wing . . . Highland Park dominated possession but we couldn't punch through the back line-- we had a number of great shots, and at one point, Ian actually headed a ball into the goal-- but it was was called back because apparently the ball glanced off the football crossbar, not the soccer crossbar -- and we had one frantic rush at the end of the game, which resulted in a corner, and with the clock winding down, Ian got to take a shot off a carom just outside the eighteen-- right footed, unfortunately, as he's a lefty-- and it floated high and just over the crossbar and then time ran out . . . but he had a great season and this team was a blast to watch and at least his career ended with a classic soccer match, an ugly 1-0 loss, where the only goal was an incomprehensible mess in the back and the goalie got out of position and Point Pleasant poked it in-- that's soccer and there's a part of me that's happy never to watch a match with one of my kids playing again-- it's too damn stressful-- and so now it's time to start practicing for tennis season.

F&%$ing Shuttlecock!

My wife claims I am "too dramatic" and "curse too much about silly things" and if there was a video record of today's early morning badminton session, she would have been correct.

Time and Tranquility

Brett McKay had Laura Vanderkam on his Art of Manliness podcast and she had some good advice about achieving tranquility with time management . . . some of these things I do and some I could improve upon:

1. have a set bedtime . . . I crush at this-- I try to stay awake until 9 PM each, but I often struggle to get past 8:45 PM;

2. move around during the workday . . . I'm lucky enough to have a job that isn't sedentary, but I also work in a walk-- perhaps even a backwards walk-- or a run or some push-ups or something during my free time in the school day;

3. have one small and one big adventure each week . . . this generally happens but not always-- I'm going to be more mindful of breaking the routine-- and my wife loves adventures (although not right now, the new COVID omicron booster absolutely crushed her);

4. three times a week makes something a habit-- not seven times a week-- so I won't get down on myself if I don't practice my guitar or work on my podcast every single day;

5. reverse the order of easier and more difficult "leisure" tasks-- this is one I'm really going to try to implement-- I'm going to read first or practice my guitar first, THEN play online chess or do the Quordle of the NYT Spelling Bee . . . because more often than not, if you do the easier, more mindless thing first, you'll never get to the task that needs more brainpower;

6. batch small tasks instead of procrastinating and spreading them out-- do a bunch in a row and then stop;

7. plan your week on Friday . . . that way when Monday rolls around you'll be ready to do the hard work and you won't have to plan ahead-- I do a good job of this with my lesson plans and such, but I could also do this for weekends and planning big and little adventures.

Work . . . Boo

We had an in-service teacher education day today, and while it was quite productive, I imagine this is what having an actual job is like: meetings, normal hours, lots of discussions with smart adults, some collaboration and turn-keying and such . . . definitely mind-numbing and soul-crushing-- I'll be glad to be back to the chaos of teenagers tomorrow.

Horse Shit

A new episode of my podcast We Defy Augury is up and streaming . . . the episode is called "All the (not so) Pretty Horses" and it focuses on a brilliant book by Jaimy Gordon, Lord of Misrule, which is about a down-and-out horse track in West Virginia in the early 1970s; the book captures the language, the characters, the consciousness, the cons and the gritty feel of a run-down horse track . . . the podcast also features cameos from Michael Scott and Mike the glue factory guy.

Go Rutgers! From a Comfortable Distance . . .

I now believe the preferred method of going to a Rutgers football game is to bike over; attend a tailgate; eat, drink, etcetera; and then bike home after the tailgate-- without entering the game-- this was much more relaxing than our last adventure.

Hazy Friday

Although I love Mr. Pi' sushi, I am starting to have my doubts about the tap beer-- for the second time, after having two Sierra Nevada Hazy Little Things, I was rewarded the next day with a headache and some stomach issues . . . and, of course, as my punishment for drinking beer on a weeknight, I had to cover PE class today-- with the new block schedule, 82 minutes of high school kids playing "badminton" is a recipe for a headache.

Fuck Lantern Flies!

The maple tree in my backyard seems to be generating a never-ending supply of lantern flies-- every afternoon, I go out and squish dozens of them with a long-handled broom and the next day there they are again; apparently-- according to my dog-park buddy Bill-- they crawl up from the ground and go up the tree to try and lay eggs, which turn into scaly egg masses, and the lantern flies bore a hole into the tree under the egg mass, so the sap of the tree can feed the eggs and young lantern flies-- which will eventually damage the tree (plus the sugary lantern fly excretions, which land on the plants below the infested tree, attract aphids and black moldy gunk) and nothing seems to eat these critters (aside from praying mantises, and there aren't enough praying mantises to eliminate the never-ending supply of lantern flies) so if I can't figure out some way to quell these creatures, I'm going to have to cut this tree down and replace it with an evergreen (even though it's the primary shade tree in our backyard-- fuck these things!)

Joy

 A new season of Derry Girls is out on Netflix!

Fuck Capitol One!

Capitol One double charged us a week ago-- my wife paid $3823 two days early so she could sort out our budget and then Capitol One automatically took another $3823 two days later-- their auto-pay extracted that amount again, even though our balance was zero-- so that our bill was now negative three thousand and some dollars-- and when we called to rectify this, their customer service was atrocious-- NOBODY could do anything . . . apparently they can take your money but they can't give it back-- and the fucking customer service people just read and read from their script and no one could bump you up to anyone with actual power . . . we were finally promised that after an "investigation" they would return the money they stole from us-- at first they said they would return it in the form of a check, but we were like: "you fucking took the money digitally so you can return it digitally" so the rep said he would do that ASAP-- but he was a liar-- and then a week went by and we received nothing so I called again this Saturday-- and now we were in worse shape because our credit card statement no longer reflected that we were three thousand in the negative . . . but we didn't have the money-- and I must point out that we were lucky enough to have enough money to pay our Rutgers bill, as this double-charge was enough money to cripple some families financially-- and the lady couldn't even see that there was some weird payment correction pending and she also had no supervisor working she could refer us to-- so after much yelling she finally figured out that Capitol One had sent us a letter-- a letter!-- informing us that they would soon be sending us a check-- a fucking check, though they stole our money digitally-- and this is obviously because some percentage of people never get the check and never follow up, so Capitol One makes even more money by bilking people . . . so it's going to take a couple weeks (I hope) to get our money back that they stole by double billing us, though they extracted it digitally, so as soon as we get the money we'll be cancelling our account and I implore everyone to cancel their Capitol One accounts and forward this story and tell your friends and family to FUCK CAPITOL ONE because they are crooks with atrocious customer service.

Feeling Old

I covered for the special education teacher in an environmental science class today and when I walked in I assumed the skinny, masked child behind the desk was a student-- but he turned out to be the teacher, a rather diffident brand-new hire who looked no older than my younger son . . . and then one of my other students said, "I was telling my mom how you needed to use a phone cord as a belt because your pants were falling down and my mom's friend said that you taught her-- her name is Julia and her daughter is a freshman"-- so that's what's coming down the pike, children of the kids I taught in my early years . . . yikes.

Beers, Bars, and Stumps

This weekend was much mellower than last weekend, but Cat and I did manage to go out after the senior night game on Friday-- and though we were very tired, the scene at the bar at Mr. Pi's sushi place woke us up-- first we were chatted up by a very energetic lesbian couple-- Stacey and Nerissa-- and we found out that they were older than they looked (50 and 46 no kids will do that . . . and for Nerissa, black doesn't crack) and Nerissa played basketball at St. Peters back in the day and knew folks that my brother played with at North Brunswick-- Wayne Cruz and Daryl Banks and such-- and then it was more small world game, Nerissa runs the after school program at the school where my wife works, so they will run into each other again-- and there was also a book club happening and there were some younger soccer moms that we knew, and the Deatz family wandered in-- they were eating dinner on the restaurant side, and then Sleepy Dan ambled in to complete the bar scene . . . and the bartender was a trip-- she's planning all sorts of jazz and karoake and footabll specials-- and we talked to one of the chefs, a Japanese guy who was very hungover for the previous night's sake tasting; Saturday I actually went grocery shopping and succeeded in getting everything on the list and then we went to Flounder Brewing and the Bellemara distillery next door-- really the best beer and drinks around (but a little pricey) and Sunday morning Cat and I played pickleball and then I watched the Giants while she worked on curriculum for some program (and Ian worked, yardwork and he gave a tennis lesson) and we got sandwiches from Sapore Deli in Middlesex after pickleball-- this place is HIGHLY recommended-- I got a broccoli rabe, hot pepper and chicken cutlet sandwich, ridiculous amount of food for 13 bucks-- it's two meals-- and then I successfully killed and bagged a stump from a dead tree (see the trophy photo above).

Beginning of the End, Sort Of

Last night was "senior night" for the HP Boys Soccer Team-- Catherine, my mother and I went out on the field with Ian-- who gave my mother a bouquet of flowers-- while my dad looked on from the fence on his scooter (it would have been difficult for him to navigate the turf on that thing) and then Highland Park cruised to a 5-0 victory over Timothy Christian in the first round of the county tournament; little Michael Volpert was the hero, scoring all five goals; Ian gave him a nice header assist for the first goal and Ian started at left-back instead of wing so that all the seniors could start the game-- it was fun watching him play there (the same position Alex played last year) and while there are still a few regular season games left, another county game to play, and the state tournament, this is the beginning of the end of watching high school soccer with a kid on the field (although the stands were packed last night, with plenty of HP fans whose kids have graduated, so I'll probably be watching games in the future, but it won't be the same of course).

Gender Stuff

We read Jia Tolentino's "Athleisure, barre, and kale: The Tyranny of the Ideal Woman" in College Writing class-- and the descriptions of barre class, while mildly erotic, are also depicted as training that helps "you adapt to arbitrary, prolonged agony," similar to the hyper-accelerated modernly optimized feminine lifestyle-- which led to a class discussion about why most women-- even if they played sports in school-- don't participate in pick-up basketball and soccer and other joyful sporting activities and instead subject themselves to yoga-pilates on a reformer (as my friend Cunningham does) and perhaps it is because-- as evidenced in the contrast between Tolentino and our other text, "The Naked Citadel," that men haze each other while women haze themselves.

There Are Two Sides to Every Conflict About a Rubber Doorstopper

Earlier in the week, my friend and colleague Terry was sitting morosely in the English Office (as he is wont to do, we don't call him Eeyore for nothing) and he said to me:

"Liz just called me a dick, in front of our homeroom!"

I asked him why this happened and he said: 

"We've got this stupid rubber doorstopper and I couldn't get it to work because you have to fold it over or something and after she showed me how to do it, I said 'I still don't like it,' just joking around and she blew up at me!"

I said that was odd and maybe she was upset about something else-- she was teaching an extra class and had a lot of different preps and maybe she was just in a bad mood-- and then for the sake of Denise, who was also in the office and hates all men, I said: 

"You know, not everyone is as calm and rational as us in these kind of situations" 

and then I went on my merry way

the next day, Liz said to me, "I don't want you taking Terry's side before you hear the entire story" and so I gave her a recap of what Terry said happened and then-- because she has a dramatic bent-- Liz acted out what happened-- or what she thinks happened-- and it was a bit more compelling than Terry's story . . . apparently Terry is the extra teacher in the homeroom and he doesn't contribute much to running the show-- and Liz claims he was hunched over the doorstopper, fooling with it and muttering and complaining for like five minutes-- and she showed him how it worked but he continued to complain so she told him to "fuck off" . . . and she did admit she got pretty pissed-- which can certainly happen to Liz, who generally exudes school spirit and positivity, but when she's confronted with enough masculine fatalism she can lose it-- longtime fans of this sentence may remember when Liz kicked me out of the department because I did not want to "dress like a holiday" . . . and now, coincidentally, I share homeroom with Haim, the guy who prevented me from redeeming myself in that debacle . . . anyway, something happened between Terry and Liz in homeroom and the catalyst was a rubber doorstopper . . . the rest is shrouded in a profane mystery.

The Orchard . . . You Know, Behind the Tennis Courts

Today the sophomores and juniors had to take the PSAT (interminable and the script that admin made for us was riddled with typos and errors-- it was actually difficult to read-- you had to correct spelling, verb tense, and actual wrong wordage on the fly) so we had a half day, and to escape traffic quickly I brought my bike-- right when the test ended, I ran out of the building and jumped onto it and rode over to the used book sale at the mall and bought some books . . . when I returned I saw one of my friends from the History Department walking to his car and stopped my bike and entered into a very strange conversation:

"Hey what's going on?"

"I just rode over to the used book sale at the mall, got some good cheap books . . . now I'm headed over to the orchard to bike the trails"

"The orchard? I don't live around here . . ."

"The orchard . . . behind the tennis courts? where the track team runs?"

"Cranbury Road is behind the tennis courts"

"Not exactly . . . you go over a bridge, there's a large piece of land, that used to be an orchard-- with trails-- it's high school property"

"I've never been back there"

"Behind the tennis courts? There's a bridge over a little stream?"

"I don't know man"

"How long have you worked here! Twenty years?"

"Twenty years"

"Well . . . there's an orchard-- I used to walk across it to the old Blockbuster if I needed a movie for class"

"Alright, sounds cool, maybe I'll eat my lunch back there"

"Watch out for ticks"

and then I went biking in the orchard, a place I often run, walk, and bike . . . wondering how he made it twenty years without hearing about the orchard, a large chunk of multi-use land on our high school campus . . . weird . . . I wonder what stuff I don't know about our high school.

Gross Stuff Part II

In the comments yesterday, Zman wondered if cleaning out the wood under my deck would eliminate cave crickets-- and my answer is yes, I think it will help-- they like to live under rotting wood; this afternoon I also cleaned out the bike shed, and found dozens of cave crickets in there, under a piece of spare plywood-- so I took the doors off the bike shed, cleared out the spare pieces of wood, smashed a bunch of crickets with a shovel, sprayed some insecticidal soap, and put down some bug killing powder-- both in the shed and under the deck-- so we'll see how that works, but I'm still annoyed by some out of reach lantern flies in my maple tree-- maybe I'll try to get to them today, I think I can hit them from the deck with either long distance wasp spray or some Neem oil from our pump sprayer . . . I'm kind of ready for the first frost, which should decimate all these pests.

Gross Stuff, Indigenous, Exotic, and Otherwise

I cleaned out all the wood under our deck today-- there were pieces of old fencing and rotting chunks of timber from past projects and all kinds of other crap that was under there before we put lattice up-- including a deflated basketball full of water and one hard seltzer can that must have been tossed in there by one of the kid-- and this stuff was a haven for cave crickets so hopefully this will cut the population down; I also killed bunches of lantern flies on our maple trees-- gross-- and then we watched The Dark Crystal:Age of Resistance, which is an awesome show and highly recommended, but also quite gory and gross.

Too Many Things

I usually don't do too many events in a short span of time because I start to lose my mind, but this weekend was an exception:

--Thursday night I chaperoned the East Brunswick Homecoming Dance . . . 1200 kids! fascinating anthropological experience to see so many children dressed up, many dancing, others trying simply to walk without falling in high heels;

--Friday I went to a Highland Park soccer game (until half-time) and then Dom's tailgate and then a Rutgers football game;

--Saturday I went to the gym, then bought a tree, then attended the Highland Park soccer game, then planted the tree, then biked over to the Boyd Park Food Truck Festival (and had a jerk chicken sandwich) then attended a party at Sleepy Dan's house;

--Sunday I played pick-up soccer, then watched the Giants beat Green Bay, then went over to the Rutgers women's soccer game, picked up Alex at his dorm, and then went to my parents for dinner . . . so six sporting events and five social events . . . and now I have to work all week?

Sports Potpourri

Catherine and I inhaled a lot of sports in the past two days-- with a mixed bag of results-- yesterday we stopped at the HP soccer game, just in time, to see Ian score a wild back-heel flick volley goal off a long shot . . . and this was an easy 6-0 win so we left at half-time to go to the Rutgers/Nebraska game-- we parked at the edge of town and decided to walk over (we had subs and drinks and we were meeting our friend Dom at the Greek Church lot to tailgate) but someone told us the entrance to the park was flooded, so we hightailed it through the train trestle tunnel (which has no walking path) and then walked on the muddy rutted path parallel to River Road-- and Catherine wiped out in the mud and banged up her knee (before even consuming any alcohol!) and then we realized that the walk along River Road to the church lot was not only miserable and muddy but also really long (3 miles?) and we were walking next to all the game day traffic-- but we made it to the tailgate, cleaned up Catherine's knee, had some food and drinks (Cat made our drinks in ziplock bags, so we could dispose of everything once we were done drinking!) and then walked back to the stadium and met my buddy Haim and his wife (who gave us the tickets) and watched an absolutely awful football game-- a million penalties and TV timeouts, just slow as fuck-- but Rutgers was in it so we stayed until the end, only to see them throw an interception on their last drive, down by one point-- blech-- and then because we stayed so late, the traffic was insane, so we walked back to the car . . . after a nearly four hour game (and I was only wearing a t-shirt because it was so hot walking over, but then it got really cold-- I've been to two Rutgers games this season and that might be it for me, football is fun to watch on TV, when you can do other stuff, but it's pretty drawn out in person (although it was fun to talk to all the Nebraska folk at the game . . . I only know one thing about Nebraska-- that the Ashfall Fossil Beds are one of the greatest paleontological sites in the world, just astounding-- so I brought them up and the guy sitting next to us said he lived an hour south of them, so I had something to chat about-- then this morning I went over to see HP play Timothy Christian and this was a wild and exciting game, which HP finally won 4-3 . . . and Ian scored a great goal, he received a through ball, took a couple dribbles, and then finished nice and early-- before the defense converged on him, and shot a rocket past the big keeper from the eighteen-- he should have scored a couple other but the keeper made a great fingertip save on one headed to the upper corner and he was about to finish a follow and got clobbered (no foul) so Ian is having quite a season-- he scored the game winner the other day against Wardlaw-Hartridge-- and most importantly, he's playing a lot of minutes and his speed and defensive hustle look really good, and-- knock on wood, because he's only 130 pounds-- he hasn't gotten hurt.

 

Huberman: Nice Guy, Smart Guy, But He Ruins Everything!

Andrew Huberman has a doctorate in neuroscience and is a professor at Stanford, and his podcast, Huberman Lab, is comprehensive, exhaustively researched, intelligent, and enlightening . . . but the last two episodes I listened to have been pretty brutal-- in a very nice, non-judgmental way;

1) the main takeaway in the two hour long episode "What Alcohol Does To Your Body, Brain & Health" is that more than FIVE servings of alcohol a week is really bad for your brain, mood, sleep, liver, longevity and telomeres . . . there's so much more in there but that's what I remember-- and for a guy who enjoys beer, it's a tough constraint to follow;

2) the big takeaways from "The Effects of Cannabis (Marijuana) on the Brain & Body" are:

-- people under the age of twenty-five should NOT use cannabis because of well documented decrease and thinning in gray matter-- that's the good stuff stuff in your brain, especially in the prefrontal cortex -- and an increase in future incidence of schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder, psychosis, depression, and anxiety;

--pregnant women should never use cannabis;

--while there are some pros for people over 25 who use cannabis-- reduced anxiety, pain relief, increased focus and creativity-- if you use cannabis more than twice a week, then you lose these benefits, build a tolerance, reverse the anxiety reduction, screw up some receptors in your brain, and increase likelihood of mental illness down the line;

--smoking cannabis, or any drug, has a whole host of other negative health benefits that aren't even associated with the drug . . . and the same goes for vaping;

so while cannabis might be "better" than drinking alcohol, Huberman doesn't think this makes a particular good case for chronic use of the drug-- because that comes with its own costs.

Playing the Tomorrow Game

 

I recently finished Sudhir Venkatesh's new book The Tomorrow Game: Rival Teenagers, Their Race for a Gun, and a Community United to Save Them-- and, like his other stuff, this is required reading; you may know Venkatesh from the first Freakonomics book-- he details the crack cocaine economy in South Chicago from a close and personal perspective (and he turns this sociological adventure into an entire book . . . Gang Leader for a Day) and his new book is equal to the detailed, anecdotal, and economic reporting of his first-- but this is a tighter story and perhaps more relatable to anyone who has or works with teenage children-- it's a typical high school story of bullying, honor, friendship, and money-- but with the added shadow that is always looming South Chicago: gangs, drugs, and guns . . . and all the revelations about these elements of the inner city will surprise you; my latest episode of We Defy Augury is devoted to thoughts about this book . . . and Cobra Kai . . . check it out (and give it a good rating an Apple music if you have time, that makes a big difference . . . thanks!)  

Smoking Puppets?

My family has enjoyed the first few episodes of The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance-- the sets are intricate and awe-inspiring, the plot is epic, and while the characters are a little difficult to differentiate, the show is pretty intense-- considering it is enacted by puppets-- but I was surprised the the Netflix warning at the start: "fear, gore, smoking"-- I could see the fear and the gore, although it's fairly cartoony fear and gore, but it's certainly no Madmen.

I'm a Subconscious IT Guy

Apparently, when I bang on my Lenovo ThinkPad to make the screen return from random blackout to whatever I was previously working on, I am doing "percussive maintenance"-- which is an actual tech strategy to solve certain malfunctions (but don't try it on toddlers . . . but perhaps try it on robot toddlers).

Who's Who? Who Knows?

One of these people is yours truly and the other is my brother-- but I'll leave it to you to decide who is who.

 

Like the Fog, Dementia Rolls In

Last night, we were at a potluck dinner at our neighbor's house and I asked my wife the location of my cousin Tommy's 60th birthday party-- an event we were attending today-- and she said, "Catherine Lombardi" and I was like, "OH MY GOD! That's awesome!" because Catherine Lombardi is in New Brunswick, two minutes from our house (and I thought we would be driving all the way out to South Brunswick) and my wife said, "You knew that-- I told you weeks ago" and I said, "I most definitely didn't know that! I would have reacted the same way-- I would have been so excited that we didn't have to drive!" and she said: "That's exactly how you reacted the last time I told you."

Yelling Rarely Fixes Electrical Issues

After yelling at the universe for the thousandth time that the living room lamp that I use for reading was unplugged-- because my son uses the outlet to charge his phone/computer and only one of the outlets works, I actually solved the problem-- for 11 dollars!-- and ordered a power strip that also has three USB ports.

High School Sports: Treasure That Shit

Highland Park soccer took a beating today against Middlesex-- they're always brutal on their grass field-- and though Ian played great, he wasn't capable of the heroics of Wednesday's game . . . but I was impressed that his team played hard until the end, even though they were down 5-0-- and I was also impressed that Ian didn't get caught giving the finger to some very obnoxious high school aged Middlesex fans . . . and I will remind Ian that win or lose, there's nothing like playing high school sports: they're just serious enough to be super-competitive, there are ageless and endless rivalries (like HP and Middlesex) and you get to switch to a different sport when the season ends . . . I played soccer in high school and it was wild and physical and competitive, but I also played golf in the spring-- with my best friends-- and we loved it . . . as the photo above indicates (I'm the one three from the left, wearing a Members Only jacket, sporting a mullet).

 

Ian Plays Soccer Like a Hurricane

My son Ian, who is a senior in high school, has had a rough couple years of high school soccer-- he was an excellent player when he was young, but then he didn't grow . . . and then he grew too fast-- so he's endured a broken elbow, stretched and tender Achilles tendons, and an elbow to the orbital that gave him a concussion-- he didn't really play any soccer all summer , he just played tennis and basketball, but he's been getting his touch back during this season and yesterday he had his best varsity game ever-- and coach rewarded him with the "man of match" award-- a free sub-- he dominated both outside mid-positions; won a ball and beat a couple got the game winning assist; set up two other perfect assists that players outright missed, hit the post on two shots-- one of which was an incredible left-footed bending ball from outside the 18 on the right flank-- pursued all over the field and won balls, trapped every long ball perfectly, hit a number of quick one-touch give-and-goes and generally hustled, played smart, and won a lot fo balls . . . and he managed to make it uninjured until three minutes left in the game, when he went to shoot and got crushed by two players, one sliding in, the other next to, causing him to flip over (he's 5 foot 11 and only 130 pounds) and land on his back, knocking the wind out of him . . . but he was fine today and hopefully he'll perform just as well tomorrow.

Dave Grohl and Langston Hughes, Together at Last?

You're not going to read Dave Grohl's memoir for the writing quality: The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music is kind of cheesy . . . and you're not going to read it for the inside scoop on Kurt Cobain-- he doesn't get into the drugs and depression and Courtney Love stuff very much-- but you might like his attitude about music, which borders on religious fervor-- and the anecdotes-- which feature loads of musicians that I love (notably Iggy Pop, Tom Petty, Lemmy and Pantera) and if you're up for a real adventure, you could listen to the new episode of We Defy Augury, "Dave Grohl and Langston Hughes Rock the House," which features the Grohl book, Langston Hughes, and a bunch of other connected audio cameos. 

What Are the Odds?

I've spend an inordinate amount of my life on grassy fields-- playing soccer, coaching soccer, playing golf, hiking, walking the dog, etcetera-- but I've never spotted a four-leaf clover.

Out with My Wife (Three Outings!)

 

Today we had off for Rosh Hashanah so my wife and I headed out to Sandy Hook to explore the old army base (Fort Hancock) at the tip of the peninsula-- and while much of the place is in ruins, the old bunkers and the theater and the barracks and officer's housing-- there are a few houses that have been restored and can now be rented out for a scenic but quiet (and kind of spooky) beach vacation; we trekked out onto the North Beach and got a nice view of NYC and also nearly stepped on one of the iconic Jersey shore syringes that wash over from the Big Apple . . . on the way home, we stopped in Keyport for lunch at Old Glory, a church converted into a gastropub-- the food was good (although we sat down at a table in the nearly empty restaurant and then these two old ladies, REALLY old ladies, sat down right behind us, even though they had the whole place to themselves, and the one old lady started crowding my chair, so we moved tables . . . one lady ordered a soda and a shot and she slowly poured the shot into the soda and drank it) and I must say that Keyport was pretty weird, a corner of New Jersey I've never experienced until today-- it's an old almost-beach town that's almost gentrifying-- in the first stages, but it's mainly full of antique and junk stores, the way Asbury was in the 90s, before it became a full-on tourist hot-spot . . . next time we'll have to stop in Keansburg, which apparently has a similar vibe.

Out with the Deatz

I was at the Annual Grant Avenue Block Party yesterday when Deatz made me an offer I couldn't refuse: a free ticket to the Rutgers/Iowa game . . . we walked over straight from the block party, watched Rutgers hang in athletically (but not strategically-- and they made some horrific game-changing turnovers) and then got a ride home from his daughter, who goes to Rutgers and was at the game . . . quite a scene over there, and even though Rutgers got beat, it looked like a Big 10 football game.

Out with the Ladies

Successful happy hour at B2 Bistro, a newish place on Farrington Lake near my old stomping grounds-- used to be Sir John's, a place we would occasionally terrorize when we in high school-- we'd run in and steal the bowl of mints or a bag of steak fries and then book it back to my friend Rob's house . . . I was the only guy attending (Terry had to coach) but I was able to handle all the attention from the beautiful ladies of EBHS with my trademark charm and style.

Got the Podcast Done Just in Time

First of all, I managed to finish another episode of my podcast We Defy Augury . . . this one is about Steven Johnson's new book and it's called "Revising Our Notion About Pirates" and I got it done just in time-- because I'm going to sound like I have marbles in my mouth for a day or two-- this afternoon, I underwent two hours of clanking and poking and pulling and drilling, and casting and impressing-- and now my old bridge is gone, as is all the decay under my old bridge-- and my dentist, Dr. David, is "cautiously optimistic" that I won't have to endure a root canal before they can put in my permanent bridge (and there's going to be a bit of gold on my permanent bridge! not quite a grill, but it's something) and right now I'm sipping some Olmeca Altos tequila, waiting for the lidocaine to wear off, which it most certainly will-- and then, apparently, my mouth is going to hurt some (I should also point out that the hygienist was pretty weird and nerdy in a fun way, we were talking about how long a day it had been and she started postulating about the possibilities of time dilation . . . and I couldn't really chime in much because I was biting down on some weird goopy stuff in order to make a mold for my temporary bridge).

Special Guest

Alex came home from college and ate dinner with us tonight-- which was very exciting-- but the reason was not so exciting: he needed to buy a new laptop (but it was still fun-- we cooked a steak, got the lowdown on his classes and all the parties, and then Cat drove him back over to Livingston so he could attend some physics study group).

Tuesday = Johnny Lawrence

Ian scored his first varsity goal yesterday-- so he's one step closer to his goal of scoring in varsity soccer, varsity basketball-- which is a stretch because he hasn't played organized basketball since 8th grade-- and winning some matches as first singles in varsity tennis (which, barring injury, will be business as usual) meanwhile I worked my ass off today, teaching three of the four 82 minute periods (including singing a song, doing a music theory demo on my guitar in public speaking, and brainstorming a lot of demo topics with kids) and I covered a class during my only off period-- and then we had a department meeting-- so while I'd like to continue reading about the Civil War, I think the best my brain will be able to muster is watching the new season of Cobra Kai.

Very Very Early Action

I was upstairs reading some Civil War history and I heard some yelling downstairs so I went to check it out and apparently Ian was getting started on his Rutgers application-- which is totally separate from the Common App-- and he was clicking through shit like a lunatic, which is how both my children navigate web-pages-- fast and furious, with very little comprehension-- and he somehow submitted his application before filling out any of the stuff, and there are no take-backs with college applications-- so we're going to have to send a bunch of emails to rectify this (and the first reply was basically "sorry, no take-backs") and I don't think high school boys are qualified to apply to college.

Phrases phrases phrases

My wife has a habit of slightly altering idioms so that they retain the meaning but contain a synonym or two in place of the typical words in the saying; for example, "drip in the bucket" instead of "drop in the bucket" . . . today, she described her shopping trip as a "crazy goose hunt" instead of a "wild goose chase"-- I quite like that one-- and last week, she called me to vent after undergoing a time-consuming, fruitless customer-service call and ensuing message from the furniture store that was very hard to understand-- she described this poorly recorded voicemail as "marbled" and I said, "you mean 'garbled'?" and she said, "marbled, totally unclear . . . and if you're going to correct my vocabulary I'm going to hang up!" so I wisely stopped pursuing the matter, but today-- after we laughed about her invention of crazy duck hunt, she told me what she meant was that the guy on the message "sounded like he had marbles in his mouth."

Pirates? Not the Disney Version

Great non-fiction writers can make any topic interesting and Steven Johnson is one of the great ones, he's done it over and over with various topics-- innovations and ideas, cholera, the history of air, organized complexity, decision-making, video games and TV, etcetera-- and in his new book, he astounded me by taking a topic that I always thought was kind played out and juvenile: pirates-- but Johnson's take on pirates is different . . . he puts  them in global context, but I should warn you, Enemy of All Mankind: A True Story of Piracy, Power, and History's First Global Manhunt is not a book that focuses on swashbuckling and sword-fighting-- although that stuff comes up-- instead it portrays pirates (specifically Henry Every) as a bundle of contradictions: democratic rapists; multi-cultural xenophobes; contract abiding torturers; free-spirited slave traders . . . it's a lot to take in, but Johnson does it in a fast breezy style and the history of the Mughal Dynasty and the East India Company goes down fairly easy.

Thus Endeth the Streak

 It was such a good week for Ian (until the mooning incident).

Could Be an Educational Experiment

I had an Indian curry and a shitload of lentils for lunch and I'm drinking coffee and now I'm wolfing down rice and beans for dinner, then heading over to Back to School Night . . . the parents could be in for a treat!

Epic Week But No Complaints

A long week . . . five days of teaching six classes and four preps, plus Back to School Night (and no more videos, we're doing it in person) but it's been a good week: Rutgers football won, Giants football "won" . . . but just barely, Ian went up 190 points on the SAT, Ian played really well in the tragic soccer loss against Middlesex . . . another ridiculous call-- this time a phantom PK and the Middlesex kid, who had been diving all game, kicked the ball while he was on the ground and HE got the call in his favor and then our goalie got knocked out of the way and another goal was scored and then another Middlesex kid took a dive and out player got his second yellow, so I'm glad I'm not coaching but Ian scraped the rust off from a summer of only tennis and actually looked fit and aggressive and his touch was excellent, and we had a delicious flank steak for dinner-- and you never know with flank steak, sometimes it can be tough, and I've got another episode of We Defy Augury out . . . we'll see if I can keep it up after this long week (and Garage Sale Day on Saturday . . . if I get the next episode out, I'm a podcasting hero).

Saul > Sentence

New content is canceled today-- Catherine, Ian, and I watching the penultimate episode of Better Call Saul . . . all the timelines are coming together and things are mainly black and white (and bleak).

The Key To Teaching High Schhol

I really have to remember to thank my children for providing so much material for my classroom-- it's so much easier to teach teenagers when you have a couple of them (and a big shout out to Theo for leaving his school ID in the van, so that Ian was caught in a lie about how many kids he drove to the tennis tournament-- he's got a provisional license and should only have one other person in the car and he would have gotten away with it if it wasn't for the ID left in the cupholder-- and will Ian learn his lesson and only drive the proper number of people . . . of course not . . . because, like most of the teenagers I polled today . . . very few kids follow that rule, even though there might be dire consequences . . . especially when you're speeding up the Parkway, totally lost, during rush hour).

Dave's Still Got It (Aside from a Thick Head of Hair and Speed)

This weekend, I took a break from racquet sports (I played pickle-ball, badminton, and tennis last week) and met up with my pick-up soccer group for our first session on the brand new turf-- I haven't played since doing indoor soccer last winter because I didn't want to sprain my ankle on the shitty rock hard grass at the park but now that the turf is done, I'll attend-- and for any of you wondering, I've still got it-- the touch and the vision and creativity, the ability to play passes with either foot, the one-touch and the give-and-go, the fake pass and the step-over . . . all that jazz-- all that's missing is speed and agility and quickness and my knees.

Apology Note to My Biceps (and the rest of my muscles)

I'm sorry I went to the gym this morning and lifted weights when I knew that we had to remove a couch from our living room-- never again (hopefully we won't ever have to buy a couch again, and I won't have to worry about this-- the stupid couch wouldn't fit through the front door so we had to carry it out through the sliding door, onto the deck, down the stairs, and from the backyard to the front-- when am I old enough to hire people to do this kind of work?)

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished (by Dave)

Some of you may be familiar with how I live my life (Dave-style) and one of the cute and quirky things about my particular style of living is that instead of throwing stuff I don't want into the trash, sometimes I just toss it onto the common table in the English Office . . . so when Sara Murphy (affectionately known as Smurphy and one of my favorite people in the universe) came into my class, holding a stack of paper and said, "You forgot your photo-copies on the table, here they are," I felt really bad-- but I had to tell her (mainly because I knew the class would enjoy the information) that I didn't need those photo-copies and they were actually trash that I had inconsiderately tossed onto the common table and that though she had tried to do a good deed, she had instead exposed me as the total jackass that I am . . . but at least I have this blog in which to reflect upon these moments and maybe I won't do this again for a couple of weeks.

The First Thing I Do in the Morning

Before you can wake up and smell the coffee, someone has to make the coffee.

Note to Self: Wear a Belt!

Once every school year I either forget my belt or decide my pants fit perfectly and I don't need a belt-- but I always forget that once I start moving around and sweating-- and yesterday was particularly humid and sweaty-- that my pants loosen up and start falling down . . . so I had to improvise and use a type-A phone cord as a belt, which worked pretty well (but not as well as an actual belt, which I will ALWAYS wear now-- until I forget).

This One Goes to 11

 

Episode 11 of my podcast We Defy Augury is up . . . while it's inspired by the new Don Winslow novel "City on Fire," it's more of a clip show-- I run through all the mob tropes in the novel and provide audio examples from famous films.

Another Labor Day, Another Greased Watermelon Water-polo Rugby Match

Yesterday was the end of the season picnic at the Rutgers pool and the end of the season picnic culminates with the greased-watermelon-rugby-water-polo match in the deep end of the pool . . . and it was the usual melee-- no goggles allowed, so everyone's eyes were burning, a few of us (including me) got kicked in the head, lots of dunkings and near drownings, a lack of ability to sweat because your skin gets covered in vaseline, and so much treading water that by the end, it was difficult to pull yourself out of the pool-- but I also noticed something with the dynamic-- the game was seven on seven this year-- kind of small-- and the only people playing are the crew that is my age (around fifty) and our children (and some of our children's friends) and the rest of the eligible pool members-- all the twenty and thirty and forty year olds-- pull up chairs and watch the match . . . we got exactly one new player, a 44 year old named John who was a water polo player-- and he told me after the match "I didn't realize it would be so intense! and I thought I would swim circles around everyone but there are some really good swimmers," which is true because one family is all swimmers and their kids can grab the watermelon and submerge to the bottom of the pool and swim with it, which is pretty much an indefensible play . . . anyway, this gladiatorial event may die (sink and drown) with our generation (and I think this year's match caused me to pass a very small kidney stone, I won't go into further detail on that front).

Graduation Wine

Action-packed Saturday: I took  a long bike ride on the tow road (and with the cross country coach, who I ran into on his bike in Johnson Park) and then I drove to Clark with Ian and we bought a used bike because he keeps growing and then I installed some basement window well covers-- I should have done that a long time ago-- and Catherine bought a new coach and chair and then we went to Flounder Brewing for a beer and now we're getting dinner ready and drinking the bottle of wine that the kids and I got many years ago, which was specifically for once Alex graduated and went to college-- and it actually tastes quite good.

Back to School

Total brain fog-- today was some kind of epic Professional Development Day at school (and even though what all the teachers want to do is get set up, figure out lesson plans, talk to people that are teaching the same classes as them, and get ready for the kids . . . but we need to be inspired) so we had two hours of music and dancing and edu-tainer Dr. Adolf Brown, what happened to be at William and Mary at around the same time I was there (but he was obviously making something of himself, attending class and then many levels of graduate school, while I played darts and ping-pong) and though he was a great speaker, his message could have been conveyed in twenty minutes-- basically that the kids are bringing baggage to school and so are the teachers, and we've got to empty our own backpacks and see that the kids are carrying cumbersome weight in their backpacks-- and there was some prop comedy with a mirror and some toilet paper jokes (even though good teachers never have stomach issues-- you get on a schedule and never stary from it . . . one of the reasons I wake up early) and then we had ANOTHER 90 minute meeting after the two hour meeting and then we rounded it out with a department meeting . . . meanwhile, Catherine was moving Alex into his dorm room on Rutgers-Livingston Campus (which is only a mile or two away from our house, so I can certainly do some Rodney Dangerfield back-to-school action) and so I got to check out the finished product once I got out of school, and then we stopped by the high school to see Ian play in the soccer scrimmage (but he had to call for a sub, he's got a pulled stomach muscle-- I told him to rest it) and anyway, I'm definitely feeling old, overwhelmed at school, a kid going to college, another a high school senior . . . but once the students come, everything will sort itself out.

Mafia Redux

If you're looking for a well-written organized crime tale in a different setting than usual (Providence! Like Crimetown!) then check out Don Winslow's new one. City on Fire . . . it's got all the mob tropes-- I'm cataloging them now for my next episode of We Defy Augury . . . but if you're looking for something a little different, try the Italian mobster film Gomorra . . . it's cycles between the quotidian and extreme violence: the ins and outs of illegal toxic waste disposal and trying to make it as a mobbed up tailor and the assassinations and terror that occurred in Italy during the Scampia Feud . . . there's not the romance and drama and fun of Goodfellas and The Godfather, just daily life in the criminal underworld.