Sometimes the thing you don’t expect is the thing you need most.

As a friend pointed out recently, it’s been some time since I wrote here. It’s not been an intentional hiatus; rather, my creative energies have been focused in other directions and my life, as a whole, has been more than a little unstable. I’m working to change that.

My employment situation, such as it is, has stabilized. While still serving, in title only, as Director of Engineering for the company, I have been told that I’m now an independent contractor. I’m being paid at an hourly rate equivalent to half my previous salary. I am receiving no benefits and am having to pay COBRA rates for health insurance out of pocket. My work week is twenty hours, which I have decided to provide as two 7-hour days and one 6-hour day. I don’t work one minute longer.

I now admit to myself that I was angry about this situation; insulted, I was in a right snit for some time. I’m over that now, and it’s no longer personal. Being an independent contractor has some advantages, but beyond even those, I have found myself with a refreshingly new mindset. Before, as a full-time employee and member of management, I tended to become very invested in virtually every aspect of my job. The company’s engineering successes were my own, but so were the many areas in which the company failed its customers. I felt personally responsible for and attached to these failures, even though most of them were completely unrelated to my performance. To an extent, I became the company.

That’s changed now. As a part-time independent contractor, I remind myself daily that the problems I see are not mine anymore. I just work here. Customers who depend on me to provide engineering support for their systems are up in arms over my reduction in hours, fearing that they’ll be left hanging in the event of an emergency. I sympathize, I emphasize that none of this was my idea, and apologize on the company’s behalf. I then give them the boss’ phone number, hang up, and divest myself of any negative feelings. I am not the company any longer.

The company itself is in deep trouble. In a few weeks or perhaps a few months, there’ll be nothing left of what was once a thriving concern. I’m watching it happen, doing what I can and what I’m able in the hours I work, and I’m distanced from it now. My feelings are different from before in the same way that watching a car accident on television is different from being involved in one. It’s a bit jarring and unpleasant to see, but then you just change the channel and laugh as Gregory House calls someone an idiot again.

Birds have continued to occupy a large sector of my time and emotional energy lately. From May through early June, Allison and I along with Chelsea (and occasionally Raymond) managed the Parrots of the Caribbean aviary at the Georgia Renaissance Festival. We volunteered there last year and enjoyed it thoroughly. This year, the founder and director of EarthQuest, Steve Hoddy, asked us to run the parrot exhibit for him.

It’s a beautiful facility. The aviary is roughly a square 75 feet on each side, completely covered with a material called shade cloth. The cloth keeps parrots and cockatoos in, keeps birds of prey out, and cuts the sun’s rays by a considerable factor, keeping the aviary cool. Inside, the birds are completely free to fly around or perch in their favorite spots. Guests, who enter through protected doors, walk among the birds, interact with them, and enjoy the spectacle.

It was a ton of work, much of it spent in either sweltering heat or drizzling rain. Because of my personal choice not to use a glove when handling and training large birds, my hands sported impressive carnage for weeks. Because I was working full-time during all this, I had not a single day off for the entire two months, other than a single work holiday. I grumbled, I groaned, and I complained far more than Allison would have liked, but I also have to admit that I enjoyed every minute, and that I’d do it again in a heartbeat.

Of course, the work involved dressing like a pirate! Allison outdid herself in putting together pirate costumes for the whole family; I had a great pair of boots, homemade pirate pants, some blousy linen pirate shirts, a real leather bandolier, a headcloth and an authentic-looking pirate hat. I even kept my beard long for most of the time, despite sidelong glances from co-workers. Arrrr.

One of the joys of working with birds is that they all have distinct personalities which are as colorful as their plumage. Let me tell you about a few of the dear friends I met and worked with during the festival.

Rainbow is a beautiful scarlet macaw. He’d be much more beautiful if he hadn’t gone through some hard times. Rainbow was overbonded to his owner, an older woman who passed away a couple of years ago. In a profound grief reaction, he pulled out every feather he could reach, picking himself clean before he finally got over her and moved on. He’s starting to re-grow feathers now and is as colorful as his name might suggest, but it’ll be another year or two before he’s in full feather again.

Rainbow is on a bit of a power trip. His favorite game is making people jump. He will wait until a group of people, preferably small children, are standing very close to his perch. He chooses his moment carefully. When no member of the group is looking in his direction, he will suddenly unleash a piercing, strident squawk at an incredibly loud volume, then bob his head in satisfaction as the people all jump out of their skins. I cannot help laughing. People are his favorite toys.

Mom and Dad are two blue and gold macaws who represent the sort of marital success I wish humans achieved more often. They’ve been together for thirty years. As a mated pair, they’re less interested in human interaction than most single birds, but they’re not totally reclusive. Dad loves to display, spreading his wings wide and puffing up his feathers and being a total macho-bird, whenever anyone draws too near. The two are difficult to handle, and most people tend to bring them in and out of their cage on a stick rather than by hand. I’m far too stupid and stubborn for that, though. They’ve stepped up onto my hands many times, sometimes even without inflicting serious injury.

On one particular day, when it was time to go from aviary to cage for the night, they were being stubborn. Dad kept biting at me each time I reached for him,and Mom kept running away. The rule had always been to pick up Dad first so as to avoid any protective aggression. Since he wasn’t having any of that, though, and because I was frustrated, I simply picked Mom up from the ground where she’d fled and walked away. There was a loud, indignant squawk, and I looked back to see Dad looking very worried.

“Come on, Dad,” I called over my shoulder, and raised my opposite arm. In what to me was an indescribably special and beautiful moment, the huge bird raised his wings, jumped from the perch, and majestically soared across the aviary, flaring at the last moment to execute a perfect landing on my outstretched arm.

One of my duties during the festival was to introduce the Birds of Prey show, a most impressive falconry demonstration presented by Steve Hoddy himself. I would go out before the show with one of the parrots or cockatoos perched on my hand, and talk a little about our parrot exhibit, parrots in general, and parrot rescue. I would then admit that parrots are birds that pray they don’t get eaten by birds of prey, at which point I would introduce Steve. His first line would refer to his birds eating birds that talk, and my parrot and I would silently disappear as Steve began the show. I had a blast doing it, and toward the end I even brought my own bird, Mila, to visit the aviary and help me with the intros. Mila knows several cute tricks, which she performed to a very attentive audience, and she really seemed to love being out there.

EarthQuest is big on environmental education, so Steve performs shows for schools, environmental organizations, parks, and other various hosts throughout the year. He recently did a show for a Cub Scout troop in Jasper, Georgia, giving me the opportunity to photograph the demonstration. The above photo is one of a set which you can see on my Flickr photostream.

Allison has found herself far more comfortable with many of the large birds than the was before this experience. Also, Chelsea, Allison’s 21-year-old daughter, surprised us all. I don’t think she’ll mind my telling you that she’s been afraid of birds for years. She doesn’t mind looking at them or even cuddling with our tiny little green-cheeked conure, but a bird flying toward her used to send her running for cover.

A strange thing happened during the festival. While helping in the aviary, Chelsea met a lot of the birds and actually grew close to some of them, particularly a pair of umbrella cockatoos named Oupay and Qupay. Brother and sister, the two are nearly inseparable but are also the cuddliest that two birds can be without spontaneously morphing into teddy bears. Working with these birds brought about a huge change in Chelsea’s outlook. She began not only working around birds but actually enjoying it! Suddenly I had a most eager student quizzing me on every aspect of bird handling, enthusiastically reporting every successful experience to me, and actively seeking out opportunities to interact with the parrots and cockatoos. The birds seemed to like her, too. She could, in fact, readily handle one or two birds that tended to exhibit very poor manners toward me.

Before we were finished, she was not only participating in the early training of a previously unhandled and untrained amazon parrot, but allowing some of the fully flighted birds to fly directly to her arm. A former bird-phobic became a novice bird trainer/handler right before my eyes, and I am enormously pleased and proud.

The last day of the festival was bittersweet. I looked forward to having more free time, but saying goodbye to the birds was hard. I’d gotten used to their company, their antics, their chatter and even their noise. We’ll get to visit them at the EarthQuest preserve, but we won’t be hanging out two days a week anymore, and I miss them.

There’s a lot more going on in my life, but this post is nearing 2,000 words. Tune in for the next exciting episode, in which I sunburn myself to a crisp and visit my hometown.

Note to British readers: Please substitute “right” for “left” and “left” for “right” in the following discussion.

Note to Jamaican readers: This will be very confusing, and you might want to skip it entirely and go hit the beach instead. Irie, mon.

It may be due to my general mood, but driving on the highways around Atlanta has become a twice-daily exercise in frustration for me. We have huge, high-capacity roads here, and in some spots there are eight lanes in each direction, but we still somehow manage to clog them up. My 40-mile drive this morning took two hours, making me late and annoying me more than it should have.

I have been watching other drivers very closely, and I’ve noticed a few things that could really improve traffic flow. They’ll never be implemented, of course, but they would work if we could somehow make them happen.

In Germany, on the Autobahns, they have a strictly enforced law called “Rechtsfahren.” It means, simply, traveling on the right. The left lane(s) are for passing only. If you are caught driving along in the left lane for no good reason, you will find yourself on the receiving end of a very large fine. This is called lane discipline, and it works beautifully there. Of course, in Germany, driving is taken very seriously. Getting a driving license in Germany can cost the equivalent of thousands of dollars, and requires that the new driver pass rigorous tests. Germans give their driving their full attention. German automakers laughed when American markets began to demand cupholders in their automobiles, because no German would dream of sipping a cup of coffee or tea while driving.

Here, driving is what people do while they put on makeup, talk on mobile phones, read the newspaper, gesticulate wildly with both hands at their passengers, do their hair, eat fried chicken, and watch television. Yes, I have personally seen all of the above on Atlanta’s highways. Lane discipline, unfortunately, is largely unheard of.

Every day as I drive to and from my office, I see people puttering along in the far left lane, traveling very slowly, blissfully oblivious to the people whizzing by them on the right. They remain absorbed in their phone calls or are simply too clueless to notice that they’re traffic obstructions.

In Atlanta, we even have some HOV lanes. These High Occupancy Vehicle lanes are designed to allow people who are carpooling or carrying multiple passengers a clearer route around traffic — sort of an award for driving “green.” There’s generally only one such lane, though, and one is only allowed to enter or exit that lane at designated places. Invariably, on any given day that we use the HOV lane, there’ll be one idiot who believes that since he’s carrying a passenger, he can get into that lane and go as slowly as he likes. We can’t pass him until we come to an exit where we’re allowed to exit and re-enter the HOV lane, and he won’t get out of the way either, so we’re stuck. I can’t imagine the thought process that went into obstructing an HOV lane that way, and that’s probably because “thought process” is a gross exaggeration.

Oh, the Georgia lawmakers have tried to fix the problem. In fact, their solution is absolutely brilliant: conflicting laws! The German autobahns don’t have speed limits to deal with, so Rechtsfahren works. Our elected wonders have ignored this difference and effectively implemented Rechtsfahren and speed limits simultaneously. The law is called “slower traffic keep right,” and police are beginning to enforce it. It’s creating a terrible mess.

Suppose I’m on a two-lane highway. Traffic in the right lane is moving at 65 MPH, which is the posted speed limit. It has now become impossible to use the left lane without breaking a law. If I get into the left lane at 65 MPH or less, I’m breaking the “slower traffic keep right” law. If I get over there at 70 MPH, I’m breaking the speed limit. If traffic in the right lane is instead moving at 70 MPH, which is more usual here, and I drive 70 MPH in the left lane, I’m breaking BOTH laws. I’m going too fast and too slow simultaneously. It sounds like Laurel and Hardy. It is, basically.

It’s even worse on the surface streets. I was at a traffic light last night on a major city street. The signal was red, and there were 12 cars in front of me. It took FORTY SECONDS from the time the light turned green until I was able to move. That’s insane. That means that it took each car in the queue an average of over three seconds to begin moving. I should add that we could all clearly visualize the traffic light. Everyone saw it turn green at the same time. The light did not take forty seconds to reach me, the 13th car. Every car in the queue COULD have begun moving at exactly the same time, and we could have taken spacing as we went, but instead we have this ridiculous caterpillar effect. Every driver just sits there until the car in front has moved eight or ten yards, then slowly creeps away. That average, of course, doesn’t count the cell phone guy or the make-up lady who aren’t even looking to see when the light changes — they can’t be bothered with something as mundane as paying attention.

I was cut off this morning by a moron who decided it would be permissible to make a left turn from the right lane, just because he’d forgotten where he was meant to be going, and didn’t feel he could manage the inconvenience of going around the block.

High-speed highways that come to a complete stop every single day are a sign of the apocalypse, I think. I blame the cupholders.

It’s been an interesting couple of weeks.

Two weeks ago, my co-workers and I were given an “offer” by our employer. The company is apparently broke, and we were given the “opportunity” to go to work as “freelancers” for about half our previous compensation, with no health insurance or other benefits, and with the company not even handling tax or FICA withholding. In other words, each of us would be an independent contractor — except that the company also said that we needed to work a 30-hour week, and be in the office all five days from 9 AM to 5 PM. There’s apparently some deficiency in someone’s math skills.

One of my co-workers accepted the deal. She and her husband are insured through his employer and he does quite well. Another co-worker is trying unsuccessfully to re-negotiate the deal. Neither of them really saw this for what it was. The employer wants us to sign that deal because it amounts to a de facto resignation from full-time employment. They don’t have to terminate us, and don’t have to worry about unemployment liabilities.

I declined the offer in writing.

Two weeks later I had heard absolutely nothing from anyone. Then, this past Friday, I received a diminutive paycheck in the amount that would be expected under the new agreement, which I did not accept. On top of that, I got a call saying that one boss thought the other boss was handling things, so no one did. I was told that the company didn’t want to lose me, and was asked what would make the deal acceptable.

I think my response was reasonable. I said that there were two issues here, not one. My full-time employment situation needed to be dealt with first, and that if they were terminating that because I wouldn’t voluntarily do so, they needed to put it in writing. Once that was done and all liabilities associated with the full-time job (like the missing half of my paycheck this week, and my remaining vacation time) were resolved, I would happily entertain offers of part-time or contract employment.

Today, I got an e-mail from the owner of the company that didn’t answer any of my questions at all, and also told me that our working hours were being reduced by 50%. That’s a 20-hour week, not 30. If I couldn’t accept that, I was told, then I should submit my resignation.

So now I’m waiting another 24 hours for an answer to four questions:

1) What is my current pay rate?
2) What do you plan to do about salary owed me to date?
3) What do you plan to do about unused vacation time owed me?
4) Am I an employee or an independent contractor?

I guess we’ll see how that goes. If I get written confirmation that they’re cutting my salary in half as well as my working hours, then that’ll be a valid reason for resigning and will not disqualify me for unemployment, should I find myself in need of it. There’s also a hostile work environment right now, since the one co-worker who took the deal is already acting as if I am the one raining on her parade.

Meanwhile, the Georgia Renaissance Festival opened this past weekend. Allison and I are managing the “Parrots of the Caribbean” aviary for Earthquest, and our first weekend went very well! Saturday’s crowd was huge, and Sunday’s was somewhat smaller due to rainy conditions, but everyone had a great time.

There’s one bad apple in every bushel, of course. Another volunteer, someone who’d been helping with landscaping inside the aviary, reacted badly to a clerical error that left him off the volunteer list. Of course, he had a ticket and got in anyway with no difficulty at all, but he was sufficiently miffed that he made the mistake of cursing, berating, and abusing Allison in front of a crowd of onlookers when she merely greeted him at the end of the day on Saturday. I was not around when this happened, and I think that’s probably a good thing, because we would have ended up in a hospital and/or a jail. He had the good sense not to turn up on Sunday, and he will find that he’s somehow been left off the volunteer list for all the remaining weekends through June 7. Unless he plans to apologize, and that seems unlikely, it’s probably better I don’t see him again. I can still see Allison on the edge of tears, and I’m damned angry.

Finally, last night after we got home from the Renaissance Festival, tired, hungry, and wiped out, Allison got a call from an irate relative. Back on Easter Sunday, I shot some portraits of family members at the request of Allison’s mother, who was aware this was for the purpose of building my portfolio also. After the photos were done, tweaked, and posted on Flickr, someone apparently became unhappy that his first and last name were on the photo and demanded immediate satisfaction.

This, of course, simply reminded me of how stupid I’d been. It’s absolutely essential to have signed model releases for all photographs — even of family members — if you’re going to put them on the Internet. I was quite proud of the entire set, but since I didn’t get releases in writing, I’ll not be able to use them beyond the purpose that Allison’s mom had in mind, which is inclusion in her photo album. She now has prints for that, though, and is apparently pleased with them. I left my setup shot on Flickr, and may eventually put Allison’s or Chelsea’s photo back up.

I am really tired, really stressed, and now I think I’ll go find something de-stressing to do. Thanks for listening to me as I vent.

As I walk out through the glass door of my office building and into the serene stillness of the parking lot, one clear voice shatters the silence.

At first the voice mildly annoys me. After hours of listening to the whirring of computer fans, the clicks of my keyboard and mouse, and the ringing of the telephone, these few seconds of precious quiet are a much-needed respite for my fatigued ears. After no more than a second, the annoyance is replaced by curiosity. I stop in my tracks, not wanting even the soft padding of my own footfalls to drown out the sound.

After a few moments, I see him, high above me on the branch of a tall loblolly pine tree. He is much too far away for me to discern much about his appearance, but his movements make it clear that he is the source of the strident calls. It’s difficult to believe how clearly and how reverberantly his small voice is carried to my ears.

His song is a marvel, his music beyond beautiful. He sings with no knowledge of notes, of key, of meter. Oval blobs spread across five lines on a piece of paper might somehow convey the vision of Bach or Brahms, but could not begin to do justice to this performance. He’s never had a lesson, but his innate talent argues eloquently for his professionalism.

I stand and listen for several minutes. The song changes frequently. New notes are added, new patterns form, and new rhythms emerge, and each is more interesting than the last. That such songs were being sung just outside the cage of glass and metal that imprisons me for most of the day seemed obvious. How many other things in life that mattered had been taking place just outside my window? How many had I missed? I would not miss this one. Just once, just for a few minutes, I would put all other business aside and give myself the time to enjoy this impromptu concert.

That songbird, I reason, probably has as much to worry about as I do. Civilization and deforestation encroach further and further into his habitat with every passing day. Predators, drawn to the very songs that captivate me, seek to end his life to nourish themselves. His very nature requires him to migrate hundreds of miles, twice yearly, to survive. He might even have a family to help feed, and a mate to protect and care for, and a nest to maintain. With all that on his little mind, he can take the time to find a comfortable branch, settle in, and sing. Can my life possibly be so badly prioritized that I can’t take the time to listen?

I stand in this parking lot with the potential of being jobless by week’s end. I have no health insurance due to my employer’s mismanagement, nor do my co-workers. I have health problems, I have debts, and as the middle years of my life slowly pass me by, I’m convinced that I’ve not accomplished a tenth of what I should have. This has caught up with me emotionally many times over the recent few weeks, and I have alternated between periods of dogged determination to do something positive and periods of sadness and dejected resignation. It’s been a dark time. Against that backdrop, even the dimmest of lights is a searchlight to me.

Presently, my searchlight finishes his song and raises his wings, flexing them powerfully and leaping from the branch. He dives to gain airspeed, his dark feathers glistening in the afternoon sunlight, and then he swoops toward me, soaring over the warmth of the asphalt. In a flash he passes over my head, crosses the roofline, and is gone.

I can only stand slack-jawed as I regard the majesty with which he flies. His grace and aplomb are as natural as his voice. I walk to my car slowly, honored and truly, unexpectedly awed and moved by the experience. I open the car door and get inside, starting the engine. The radio comes alive. The fan whirs. The engine hums. Life, as I’ve always known it, resumes.

For now.

I would like to acknowledge poet Marcie Hans and her beautiful poem, “No One Clapped”, from which I have borrowed the title of this piece.

Some of the best photographs I’ve ever taken have been happy accidents.

I was once a very active pilot. I’m not now; I fly desks and mixing consoles and digital workstations now, and I have gradually grown away from airplane flying. Still, airplanes and airports and the people and lore that surround them have never ceased to hold a nostalgic, passionate appeal for me. I’m afraid I have become something of an armchair pilot, but the love of aviation will never die in me.

I have a fairly long commute to and from work. To break the monotony, on Tuesday evening I decided to go home via an unusual route. The road I used is not one I’m intimately familiar with, and I had not noticed the small, grass airstrip by the roadside before. Now, two men were pushing a small Cessna 150 out of a hangar and toward the strip. Fascinated, I quickly turned the car around and returned, parking next to some telephone equipment so as not to trespass on private property.

My camera, which has been with me every day for months now, rested in its spacious new LowePro bag* next to me on the passenger seat. I grabbed it, put on the 200mm zoom lens, and practically leapt from the car just as the plane began to taxi toward the far end of the grass runway. I watched it intently through my lens. I may have been watching a bit too intently, in fact, because presently a bright yellow Piper J-3 cub came zooming in, just a foot or three above my head, landing downwind. After checking to make sure I’d kept what little hair I have on my head, I snapped a few frames of the perfect landing.

Moments later I saw the cloud of dust that heralded the application of full power by the Cessna, and I once again raised the camera. I shot one frame just as the main gear left the ground, and a second a moment later as the plane began to climb. I followed the plane with my lens, zooming out to keep it in frame, until it passed over my head and I nearly fell over backward. A gymnast I am not.

As I recovered my balance, I turned and saw the plane climbing away against a beautiful backdrop of sunlit clouds, and by happy accident, I must have tripped the shutter at precisely the right moment. When I got home and saw the image, my emotional response was absolutely shocking.

This is the moment that makes flying more than the simple balance of thrust, drag, lift, and gravity. It’s the moment when the ground that has been our master loses its power over us, and we are free to roam all three dimensions. It’s the moment when the mind, as well as the body, takes flight. Those few seconds, just after takeoff, are magic.

I share the photo with you because I hope I captured some small measure of that feeling, that longing that it inspired in me. Photography, if nothing else, is a beautiful way to communicate feelings, emotions, and those other parts of our minds and souls that do not lend themselves to mere words.

* I have an amazingly wonderful fiancee’ … have I mentioned that lately?

I apologize for the headline, but it’s a fairly common trait among aviation people to be a little callous about airline crashes. I admit that I’d be far less so if I were personally involved, and I hope no one is deeply offended.

Last month, a Turkish airlines 737-800 crashed on approach to Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport. The cause of the crash, until recently, was somewhat puzzling. Reuters reported on Wednesday that Dutch investigators have now determined the cause of the crash.

As the aircraft passed through 2,000 feet on an approach flown by the autopilot, there was an apparent malfunction of one of the aircraft’s two radio altimeters, which judge its height above ground. The left instrument indicated -8 feet (8 feet below ground) and happened to also be the instrument the autopilot was using.

This erroneous signal caused the autopilot to reduce power to idle and begin a flare, believing that it was at touchdown when in reality it was still nearly two thousand feet in the air. The plane assumed an extreme nose-up attitude, stalled, and struck the ground tail first. The rest of the aircraft then pancaked into the ground, killing 9 of the 134 souls on board and seriously injuring 28 more.

Why didn’t the crew cross-check their altimeters during the approach? Why didn’t they notice the throttles being retarded to idle at altitude? All of the flight crew were among the dead, so we will perhaps never know. The aircraft’s flight data recorder, which contained data from the plane’s last eight flights, showed that the same altimeter had malfunctioned on two previous approaches and that the crew had successfully recovered in each instance.

I know that it’s very, very wrong to find humor in a situation like this, but I was unable to prevent the image from entering my head. I was always a big fan of the sitcom, “WKRP in Cincinnati,” because in my radio career I met at least one of every character created for that show. The show’s most famous and highest-rated episode featured a Thanksgiving promotion that went horribly wrong, and when I saw this Turkish 737 smashed on the ground on national TV, in my mind’s eyes and ears stood Arthur Carlson in tattered clothes, breathlessly saying,

“As God is my witness, I thought Turkish could fly.”

I haven’t had a lot to write recently, so I thought I’d share something with you that I’ve recently rediscovered.

I read this many years ago while in high school, and while the title and author were lost to my memory, the content and its impact on me never faded. I recently made an effort to look it up and managed to find it and read it again, and discovered that I still could not get through it without a tear coming to my eye.

Here, then, is that wonderful piece of writing by the author of “The Forsyte Saga.” Written in 1911, it is now in the public domain, and is brought to you through the courtesy of Project Gutenberg.

Quality
By John Galsworthy

I knew him from the days of my extreme youth, because he made my father’s boots; inhabiting with his elder brother two little shops let into one, in a small by-street-now no more, but then most fashionably placed in the West End.

That tenement had a certain quiet distinction; there was no sign upon its face that he made for any of the Royal Family–merely his own German name of Gessler Brothers; and in the window a few pairs of boots. I remember that it always troubled me to account for those unvarying boots in the window, for he made only what was ordered, reaching nothing down, and it seemed so inconceivable that what he made could ever have failed to fit. Had he bought them to put there? That, too, seemed inconceivable. He would never have tolerated in his house leather on which he had not worked himself. Besides, they were too beautiful–the pair of pumps, so inexpressibly slim, the patent leathers with cloth tops, making water come into one’s mouth, the tall brown riding boots with marvellous sooty glow, as if, though new, they had been worn a hundred years. Those pairs could only have been made by one who saw before him the Soul of Boot—so truly were they prototypes incarnating the very spirit of all foot-gear. These thoughts, of course, came to me later, though even when I was promoted to him, at the age of perhaps fourteen, some inkling haunted me of the dignity of himself and brother. For to make boots–such boots as he made–seemed to me then, and still seems to me, mysterious and wonderful.

I remember well my shy remark, one day, while stretching out to him my youthful foot:

“Isn’t it awfully hard to do, Mr. Gessler?”

And his answer, given with a sudden smile from out of the sardonic redness of his beard: “Id is an Ardt!”

Himself, he was a little as if made from leather, with his yellow crinkly face, and crinkly reddish hair and beard; and neat folds slanting down his cheeks to the corners of his mouth, and his guttural and one-toned voice; for leather is a sardonic substance, and stiff and slow of purpose. And that was the character of his face, save that his eyes, which were grey-blue, had in them the simple gravity of one secretly possessed by the Ideal. His elder brother was so very like him—though watery, paler in every way, with a great industry–that sometimes in early days I was not quite sure of him until the interview was over. Then I knew that it was he, if the words, “I will ask my brudder,” had not been spoken; and that, if they had, it was his elder brother.

When one grew old and wild and ran up bills, one somehow never ran them up with Gessler Brothers. It would not have seemed becoming to go in there and stretch out one’s foot to that blue iron-spectacled glance, owing him for more than–say–two pairs, just the comfortable reassurance that one was still his client.

For it was not possible to go to him very often–his boots lasted terribly, having something beyond the temporary–some, as it were,
essence of boot stitched into them.

One went in, not as into most shops, in the mood of: “Please serve me, and let me go!” but restfully, as one enters a church; and, sitting on the single wooden chair, waited–for there was never anybody there. Soon, over the top edge of that sort of well–rather dark, and smelling soothingly of leather–which formed the shop, there would be seen his face, or that of his elder brother, peering down. A guttural sound, and the tip-tap of bast slippers beating the narrow wooden stairs, and he would stand before one without coat, a little bent, in leather apron, with sleeves turned back, blinking–as if awakened from some dream of boots, or like an owl surprised in daylight and annoyed at this interruption.

And I would say: “How do you do, Mr. Gessler? Could you make me a pair of Russia leather boots?”

Without a word he would leave me, retiring whence he came, or into the other portion of the shop, and I would, continue to rest in the wooden chair, inhaling the incense of his trade. Soon he would come back, holding in his thin, veined hand a piece of gold-brown leather. With eyes fixed on it, he would remark: “What a beaudiful biece!” When I, too, had admired it, he would speak again. “When do you wand dem?” And I would answer: “Oh! As soon as you conveniently can.” And he would say: “To-morrow fordnighd?” Or if he were his elder brother: “I will ask my brudder!”

Then I would murmur: “Thank you! Good-morning, Mr. Gessler.” “Goot-morning!” he would reply, still looking at the leather in his hand. And as I moved to the door, I would hear the tip-tap of his bast slippers restoring him, up the stairs, to his dream of boots. But if it were some new kind of foot-gear that he had not yet made me, then indeed he would observe ceremony–divesting me of my boot and holding it long in his hand, looking at it with eyes at once critical and loving, as if recalling the glow with which he had created it, and rebuking the way in which one had disorganized this masterpiece. Then, placing my foot on a piece of paper, he would two or three times tickle the outer edges with a pencil and pass his nervous fingers over my toes, feeling himself into the heart of my requirements.

I cannot forget that day on which I had occasion to say to him; “Mr. Gessler, that last pair of town walking-boots creaked, you know.”

He looked at me for a time without replying, as if expecting me to withdraw or qualify the statement, then said:

“Id shouldn’d ‘ave greaked.”

“It did, I’m afraid.”

“You goddem wed before dey found demselves?”

“I don’t think so.”

At that he lowered his eyes, as if hunting for memory of those boots, and I felt sorry I had mentioned this grave thing.

“Zend dem back!” he said; “I will look at dem.”

A feeling of compassion for my creaking boots surged up in me, so well could I imagine the sorrowful long curiosity of regard which he would bend on them.

“Zome boods,” he said slowly, “are bad from birdt. If I can do nodding wid dem, I dake dem off your bill.”

Once (once only) I went absent-mindedly into his shop in a pair of boots bought in an emergency at some large firm’s. He took my order without showing me any leather, and I could feel his eyes penetrating the inferior integument of my foot. At last he said:

“Dose are nod my boods.”

The tone was not one of anger, nor of sorrow, not even of contempt, but there was in it something quiet that froze the blood. He put his hand down and pressed a finger on the place where the left boot, endeavouring to be fashionable, was not quite comfortable.

“Id ‘urds you dere,”, he said. “Dose big virms ‘ave no self-respect. Drash!” And then, as if something had given way within him, he spoke long and bitterly. It was the only time I ever heard him discuss the conditions and hardships of his trade.

“Dey get id all,” he said, “dey get id by adverdisement, nod by work. Dey dake it away from us, who lofe our boods. Id gomes to this–bresently I haf no work. Every year id gets less you will see.” And looking at his lined face I saw things I had never noticed before, bitter things and bitter struggle–and what a lot of grey hairs there seemed suddenly in his red beard!

As best I could, I explained the circumstances of the purchase of those ill-omened boots. But his face and voice made so deep impression that during the next few minutes I ordered many pairs. Nemesis fell! They lasted more terribly than ever. And I was not able conscientiously to go to him for nearly two years.

When at last I went I was surprised to find that outside one of the two little windows of his shop another name was painted, also that of a bootmaker-making, of course, for the Royal Family. The old familiar boots, no longer in dignified isolation, were huddled in the single window. Inside, the now contracted well of the one little shop was more scented and darker than ever. And it was longer than usual, too, before a face peered down, and the tip-tap of the bast slippers began. At last he stood before me, and, gazing through those rusty iron spectacles, said:

“Mr.—–, isn’d it?”

“Ah! Mr. Gessler,” I stammered, “but your boots are really too good, you know! See, these are quite decent still!” And I stretched out to him my foot. He looked at it.

“Yes,” he said, “beople do nod wand good boods, id seems.”

To get away from his reproachful eyes and voice I hastily remarked: “What have you done to your shop?”

He answered quietly: “Id was too exbensif. Do you wand some boods?”

I ordered three pairs, though I had only wanted two, and quickly left. I had, I do not know quite what feeling of being part, in his mind, of a conspiracy against him; or not perhaps so much against him as against his idea of boot. One does not, I suppose, care to feel like that; for it was again many months before my next visit to his shop, paid, I remember, with the feeling: “Oh! well, I can’t leave the old boy–so here goes! Perhaps it’ll be his elder brother!”

For his elder brother, I knew, had not character enough to reproach me, even dumbly.

And, to my relief, in the shop there did appear to be his elder brother, handling a piece of leather.

“Well, Mr. Gessler,” I said, “how are you?”

He came close, and peered at me.

“I am breddy well,” he said slowly “but my elder brudder is dead.”

And I saw that it was indeed himself–but how aged and wan! And never before had I heard him mention his brother. Much shocked; I murmured: “Oh! I am sorry!”

“Yes,” he answered, “he was a good man, he made a good bood; but he is dead.” And he touched the top of his head, where the hair had suddenly gone as thin as it had been on that of his poor brother, to indicate, I suppose, the cause of death. “He could nod ged over losing de oder shop. Do you wand any boods?” And he held up the leather in his hand: “Id’s a beaudiful biece.”

I ordered several pairs. It was very long before they came–but they were better than ever. One simply could not wear them out. And soon after that I went abroad.

It was over a year before I was again in London. And the first shop I went to was my old friend’s. I had left a man of sixty, I came back to one of seventy-five, pinched and worn and tremulous, who genuinely, this time, did not at first know me.

“Oh! Mr. Gessler,” I said, sick at heart; “how splendid your boots are! See, I’ve been wearing this pair nearly all the time I’ve been abroad; and they’re not half worn out, are they?”

He looked long at my boots–a pair of Russia leather, and his face seemed to regain steadiness. Putting his hand on my instep, he said:

“Do dey vid you here? I ‘ad drouble wid dat bair, I remember.”

I assured him that they had fitted beautifully.

“Do you wand any boods?” he said. “I can make dem quickly; id is a slack dime.”

I answered: “Please, please! I want boots all round–every kind!”

“I will make a vresh model. Your food must be bigger.” And with utter slowness, he traced round my foot, and felt my toes, only once looking up to say:

“Did I dell you my brudder was dead?”

To watch him was painful, so feeble had he grown; I was glad to get away.

I had given those boots up, when one evening they came. Opening the parcel, I set the four pairs out in a row. Then one by one I tried them on. There was no doubt about it. In shape and fit, in finish and quality of leather, they were the best he had ever made me. And in the mouth of one of the Town walking-boots I found his bill.

The amount was the same as usual, but it gave me quite a shock. He had never before sent it in till quarter day. I flew down-stairs, and wrote a cheque, and posted it at once with my own hand.

A week later, passing the little street, I thought I would go in and tell him how splendidly the new boots fitted. But when I came to where his shop had been, his name was gone. Still there, in the window, were the slim pumps, the patent leathers with cloth tops, the sooty riding boots.

I went in, very much disturbed. In the two little shops–again made into one–was a young man with an English face.

“Mr. Gessler in?” I said.

He gave me a strange, ingratiating look.

“No, sir,” he said, “no. But we can attend to anything with pleasure. We’ve taken the shop over. You’ve seen our name, no doubt, next door. We make for some very good people.”

“Yes, Yes,” I said; “but Mr. Gessler?”

“Oh!” he answered; “dead.”

“Dead! But I only received these boots from him last Wednesday week.”

“Ah!” he said; “a shockin’ go. Poor old man starved ‘imself.”

“Good God!”

“Slow starvation, the doctor called it! You see he went to work in such a way! Would keep the shop on; wouldn’t have a soul touch his boots except himself. When he got an order, it took him such a time. People won’t wait. He lost everybody. And there he’d sit, goin’ on and on—I will say that for him not a man in London made a better boot! But look at the competition! He never advertised! Would ‘ave the best leather, too, and do it all ‘imself. Well, there it is. What could you expect with his ideas?”

“But starvation—-!”

“That may be a bit flowery, as the sayin’ is–but I know myself he was sittin’ over his boots day and night, to the very last. You see I used to watch him. Never gave ‘imself time to eat; never had a penny in the house. All went in rent and leather. How he lived so long I don’t know. He regular let his fire go out. He was a character. But he made good boots.”

“Yes,” I said, “he made good boots.”

And I turned and went out quickly, for I did not want that youth to know that I could hardly see.

No, I have nothing to say about the Super Bowl. I recorded it on my Tivo and plan to watch the commercials at my convenience, skipping the extraneous football* action.

This morning presented some unusual news, though. Today is Groundhog Day, a holiday the Germans once called Candlemas. If a particular groundhog, one Punxsutawney Phil of Pennsylvania, sees his shadow this morn, six more weeks of winter are assured, or so reads the legend. Since the release of the Bill Murray vehicle, “Groundhog Day,” Punxsutawney has seen huge crowds of visitors flocking to their town to witness the amazing prognostications of this silly woodchuck.

I think the woodchuck — or perhaps his throng of handlers — has finally lost his mind. This morning at 7:25 AM Eastern, Phil apparently declared that under a bright sky, he saw his shadow beside him.

Punxsutawney, according to most authorities including real-time GOES imagery and National Weather Service observations, was under heavy (as in 100%) cloud cover at that time. Unless seeing his shadow from the television lights is somehow sufficient, Phil’s prediction is crap.

Of course, most woodchucks live to be no older than ten years, and according to the Groundhog Club of Punxsutawney’s Inner Circle, Phil is now 123 years old and probably suffers from some sciuridine form of Alzheimer’s disease, if he is not already among the walking undead.

In any case, Phil has clearly outlived his usefulness as a weather forecaster, and in the interest of letting younger, brighter talent take the spotlight, I’d like to suggest a new career for our old friend.

* American Football. They kind they play with their hands.

UPDATE 28 Feb 2009: Several letters (the old fashioned kind, printed on paper, sent in envelopes with stamps) have been dispatched to higher-ups at Georgia Power and its parent company, Southern Company. I have also contacted the Georgia ACLU. So far, there has been no official reply from the company, although in recent weeks my logs show that they do seem inordinately interested in this particular blog entry.

I got a new camera for Christmas, a Nikon D60 that my fiancee picked out for me. New cameras represent huge events in my life because of my love of photography. My last new camera was bought in April of 2002, and it was also a Nikon. I must admit to being a bit of a Nikon snob.

My new camera has rarely left my side since December 25. It goes to work with me, it goes shopping with me, and it accompanies me on even mundane errands. However, I have also looked hard for photo opportunities in the last few weeks, and that was the impetus for a recent trip to Euharlee, Georgia, and Georgia Power’s Plant Bowen, said by some to be the third largest coal-fired generating plant in the country. Rising from rural surroundings adjacent to the quiet Etowah river, the plant is an impressive sight from up to ten miles away, with two smokestacks rising 1,000 feet above ground level and four 380-foot natural draft cooling towers. I had wanted to pay a visit and photograph the plant for some time, and the new camera provided a perfect opportunity.

For reference, here is a view of the property, courtesy of Google Maps. I have marked several points of interest; you can click the blue pointer for more information on each point.

View Larger Map

I’ve spent a lot of time around sensitive facilities, and I know not to drive through gates or place myself on corporate property. I know what to shoot and what not to shoot, and I know the law. Allison and I drove first to the south side of the plant, looking for a nice establishing shot. I found one along Atwood Road, a nice view of two cooling towers framed by an interesting pattern of towers and 500 KV transmission lines. (Click the picture to see other sizes and more info on Flickr.)

We then drove around to the east side of the plant on Covered Bridge Road, noticing how tantalizingly close we were to the huge cooling towers. Allison had never seen such a cooling tower in operation, so I found a small area of gravel on the right-of-way where I could stop and take a few shots.

I got back into the car and took a quick photo of a very odd piece of construction equipment that was approaching us on the highway. (The shot was not very successful and I have not posted it.) I then pulled back out onto the pavement northbound and noticed that a Georgia Power pickup truck had been parked behind me and was now following me.

In retrospect, I really wish I’d stopped and asked if I could be of assistance. The pickup truck followed me, remaining less than one car length from my rear bumper, for nearly half a mile. He made no attempt to get me to stop, but definitely did his best to be intimidating. Eventually, as I passed the recreation area entrance and left the vicinity of the plant, he broke off, but stopped and continued to observe me as I continued on my way.

When I posted my photographs on Flickr, I discovered I was not the first person to be treated this way by Georgia Power security personnel. Another photographer on Flickr had an even worse experience, as described on one of her photos. In her case, the security guard approached her and asked her to erase her photos.

That set me off, and I wished even more fervently that I’d stopped and gotten some firsthand experience with these paranoid security people. Can you imagine asking people to erase photos taken on public property? I couldn’t. It’s Hitleresque to say the least.

On January 21, I sent the following inquiry to Georgia Power’s corporate communications department by way of their web site.

After being closely followed by one your company trucks while taking photographs from the public highway adjacent to Plant Bowen, I read on another photographer’s site that photography in these areas is against “company policy” and that your security people have forced people to erase photographs taken there. Please explain how your company policy affects people on a public highway.

Today, January 30, I received the following reply from Lynn Williams of Southern Company, parent company of Georgia Power.

Mr. Johnson, the response below was provided by a security employee at Plant Bowen:

Covered Bridge Road is a County Road that divides our Plant Site with GPC Property on both sides. Due to the nature of our business and our high threat level of risk, anytime a vehicle or person is observed leaving the county road entering on to GPC property, Security will attempt to speak with these individuals and request some form of identification. If these individuals are observed photographing while on GPC Plant property we advise them that photographing of the plant site is not allowed without permission from GPC Plant Management and request that they erase the photos. We provide them with the number for Corporate Communications if they would like to make that request. At no time has anyone ever been forced by Security to erase photographs on GPC Plant property or from the Roadway surrounding the property.

Not knowing any particulars of Mr. Johnson, I would suspect that he could have been observed making photographs from the County Road. If this were the case possibly the Officer was attempting to obtain a vehicle description and License Plate Number from the vehicle to submit a report of this observation of someone making photographs from the roadway to submit to Corporate Security.

Great. “Corporate Security” now has my license number and vehicle description on record. I wonder what they plan to do with that information? Clearly these people are counting on the fact that most people do not know their rights as photographers. With very few exceptions, in this country, if you can see it, you can photograph it legally. The exceptions are sensible ones: Nuclear generating plants, military bases and operations, and people with a reasonable expectation of privacy. Bowen isn’t nuclear, it’s not military in nature, and I didn’t shoot pictures through any bedroom windows. I’m covered.

There are people, though, who do not question authority. She says their security people ask for identification and ask that photos be erased. I wonder how many people would have the knowledge and the presence of mind to know that they aren’t required to erase pictures, and in fact are not even required to identify themselves to a private security officer on public property, outside his area of authority.

Therefore, this morning I decided to push a bit harder. I sent the following back to Ms. Williams.

I’m afraid this isn’t an acceptable response. Your security employee states:

“…photographing of the plant site is not allowed without permission from GPC Plant Management.”

I would like to know what law supports your employee’s statement, or what special rights your company may have to restrict photography otherwise protected against US law. The only things that may not be photographed from public property, even in this post-9/11 era, are nuclear plants, certain military operations and installations, and people who have a reasonable expectation of privacy (such as people inside their own homes). Your plant falls under none of these categories.

If your employee (the one following me in a pickup truck) made a report to “corporate security” about my taking photographs from a public street, and that report included my license number and vehicle description, I would like to know what will be done with that information. My actions were completely legal, and if your company claims they aren’t, perhaps the proper authorities should become involved.

We’ll see where it goes from here. People should not be hassled, interrogated, or treated like criminals for simply recording a visual image of things they can see. The New York City subway and the BART system in San Francisco have both been in the news for trying to prohibit photography in their facilities; in neither case is there a law or statute in place, but Port Authority police and BART fare inspectors have abused photographers regardless.

It’s got to stop.

If you are a photographer in the United States, I urge you to read (or even carry with you) an excellent pamphlet published by an Oregon lawyer called “The Photographer’s Right.” You can download it in PDF form and print it in any convenient size. If anyone knows of a comparable document for photographers in other countries, please let me know of it and I will post a similar link here.

Something very real and personal is troubling me, and I need to write about it to clear my mind and try to find direction. Thus it seems I have returned to my original motivations for writing this blog. It’s about time!

Unfortunately, some of what I write might be damaging or at least embarrassing for those involved. For that reason and that reason only, I am not going to reveal any real names. I may also change certain details and facts not essential to the story in order to further disguise the identities of the principals.

Many years ago, back in my hometown, I operated something called a Computer Bulletin Board System, or BBS. Similar to today’s internet forums, BBS users called in using a modem and participated in discussions, file sharing, or both. Over the few years that it was operating, my system attracted a fairly regular group of callers. Many of them became my good friends and remained so long after the BBS was no more.

One of those people was an intriguing southern lady I will call Belle. Intelligent, well-read, and a facile and expressive writer, Belle was possessed of a southern grace and charm that made conversations with her a joy. She and her husband Frank, a professional of considerable talent and reputation, had a teenage son whom I will call Neil. I knew Neil only in passing, having said hello to him now and then during a visit to their home or when seeing him out in public with his mom.

Years passed. I found myself in a new city, and then another new city. Life marched on at a very fast pace, and before I knew it, I was barely in touch with most of my friends from home. My career as an audio engineer grew not at the pace I had envisioned, but at a pace with which I could be satisfied. I was working, doing something I loved, and that was more than some people could boast at the time.

One day, an e-mail arrived from Belle, telling me that her son Neil was in Atlanta, married, and interested in a career in audio. I was asked if I could be of any help, and I felt that I could be, even though I had really never been much of a mentor to anyone. The first meeting with Neil was encouraging enough to buoy my confidence, and I began to work with him, bringing him into studios and introducing him to the people with whom I worked. Eventually, he was even able to take on some of the simpler work my clients needed, and worked independently with them.

After a time, we both decided he needed more formal training than I could provide, and his parents arranged for him to attend a school out of state. A few months later, he returned and had gained both knowledge and experience. We worked together a lot more after that, and over a period of time, Neil and his wife, a young lady I will call Sue, came to be counted among my most valued friends.

At one point, Neil took a job working as live sound engineer for a band at a local church. His confidence impressed me and apparently the band leader as well; I would later learn that Neil’s approach, confident but not cocky, got him the job. He worked hard, but after a few weeks he discovered that working with a live band was very different from studio recording, and he felt overwhelmed. It was at that point that he called me for help.

At this point I found myself in a difficult situation. If I stepped in and put things right, instructing him as he went, I would feel as though I were taking a gig away from him, and he didn’t get many of his own. I wanted him to look good. If I did nothing, though, he was going to falter and lose even more confidence, and that’s not conducive to success.

I made a deal with Neil. I would come help, but my help would be of the sotto voce, tactful sort. He would in turn introduce me as his assistant, nothing more. The arrangement worked, and I was gratified to see Neil’s mixes improve steadily, week by week.

One Saturday night, I received a call that Neil was being unexpectedly sent out of town, and that I would need to fill in for him on Sunday morning. I appeared at the scheduled time, a bit rattled by the short notice and lack of sleep, and made a classic mistake, the sort that all people living a lie eventually make. I had intended to regulate my performance, to throw in a few amateurish mistakes or throw the mix just a few degrees left of perfect, so as not to show up my “boss.” Instead, groggy and on autopilot, I just mixed as I ordinarily would have.

After the service, the band leader called me aside, clearly with something on his mind. After complimenting me on the mix, he questioned me in a conspiratorial whisper.

“You aren’t really Neil’s assistant, are you?

“No,” I replied, “but I’m here to help him.”

“What exactly do you do for a living?”

“I’m an audio engineer.”

I had no choice; I told him the truth. The lie, I explained, had been for an extremely good reason, and I told him an abbreviated version of the story you now know. To his credit, he accepted and understood it. I’ll tell you about this man sometime. He’s the real thing.

From that point, Neil and I worked together, and I don’t mind boasting that our combined efforts made that band sound better than they’d probably ever sounded. There were obstacles, tense moments, and discouraging failures, but there were also some spectacular wins. I had to kick Neil around a bit to keep him on track, and there were a few stern lectures after disappointing performances and lapses in professionalism, but there were also a lot of moments when I was unashamedly proud of him.

I had always worried about Neil and Sue because their relationship was, at times, rather volatile. They fought, and sometimes I would hear both sides, sometimes only one. Neil took a promising job once that required some out of town work, and Sue panicked and freaked out at the separation; my phone rang constantly and I did my best to help, even getting Sue out of the house several times to distract her. He eventually had to leave the job because she could not stand the time away.

When I heard that Sue was pregnant, I was at once overjoyed and gravely worried. Excessive maturity was not a worry for either of these two. Neither had enjoyed great luck with employment, and their housing situation was dire. Allison and I offered all the help we could; as a mother of three, Allison had no small supply of advice, and for my part I tried to prepare Neil for the responsibility that awaited him. By this time my career and life had precluded me from doing much work with Neil at the church; that task was all his now. I still stepped in from time to time to fill in or to help with the occasional problem he couldn’t handle.

I would occasionally hear disturbing things. People at the church would tell me of remarks Neil had made at my expense. Gossip is a dangerous thing, and my strategy is to ignore it. This I did, although Allison advised me several times that she smelled trouble brewing.

Allison and I spent the entire weekend at the hospital when we heard that Sue was in labor. It was a difficult labor which ended in a C-section, and we worried and prayed and tried to keep Neil from losing his mind, so acute was his stress. All involved survived and were none the worse for wear, at least after a bit of time to recover.

At first it seemed things would go well. Neil displayed a remarkable change in maturity and attitude, quit smoking and drinking, worked hard to support his family, and did his part for the band. He seemed to be stepping into the role of father quite well. We all had dinner together one evening on the occasion of a visit from Belle, and the family seemed well-adjusted and normal. After that I heard a story of a loud, shouting fight the two of them had, apparently in front of the baby, and I strongly cautioned Neil about such things. Babies hear, even if they don’t necessarily understand language, and they react and respond.

Fast-forward now to November of 2008. A member of the church contacted me and asked me to handle audio for a musical drama celebrating Christmas. The task seemed complex and critical in nature, and she felt my skills were needed to make it work the way she wanted it to. I agreed. She said she’d contacted Neil, too, and that he’d be involved, and I looked forward to this opportunity for us to work together again. I was also asked to narrate, which meant that I had lots of recording to do prior to the first rehearsal and precious little time to complete it. I did, but only just.

When I arrived for the first rehearsal, I was in for the shock of my life. First, as I set up the equipment I’d brought to play back narration and music, Neil took me to task, visibly upset that I had not called him and involved him in recording my narration parts. Explanations that I’d been short of time fell on uninterested ears. Incredulous, I let the tirade pass and continued to work.

The rehearsal moved slowly. Hours passed. Neil was surly and disinterested, responding to requests for help but making his displeasure known. To my dismay, snide remarks and negativity gradually gave way to open hostility. Constant barbs flew my way, as if my very presence was an affront to Neil and his position. Anyone can have a bad day, but this crossed a line with me. The rehearsal itself was difficult enough, and I became so distracted and absorbed in the work that I forgot to eat, a bonehead move which resulted in a hypoglycemic crisis that afternoon as I was leaving the church. By this point, Neil had gone home.

I did not confront Neil about his behavior at the rehearsal. Instead, I carefully drafted an e-mail explaining that this sort of behavior precluded any sort of working relationship. I expressed that I still needed his help with the production, since I had no hope of finding other help on such short notice, but that after that I was not interested in any future projects with him. I felt hurt, angry, and betrayed.

I was forced to fly to California on business just before the program. I returned the day of the show, just hours before the final dress rehearsal. Allison dragged my sleepy body out of the airport and directly to the church, where I began setting up. Neil had not yet arrived. He did finally show up, quite late, and immediately asked to talk with me privately.

The story he related was disturbing. He said that the previous night, he had gone to visit a friend, someone of whom Sue did not approve. When he returned home later than expected, Sue had gone crazy, screamed and yelled at him in front of the baby, and clawed at him with her nails. He showed me the marks on his arm, and the wounds did appear recent and consistent with an attack by someone with long nails. He intimated to me that Sue had resumed drinking, and that he had had a bit to drink the previous night as well.

Neil claimed that no physical contact had been made with the baby, but that the entire altercation had taken place in the same room where the child was sleeping. I advised him that he was treading dangerous ground and that he’d better get his act together before the situation escalated and someone got hurt, particularly the baby. At that point, he claimed he needed to go home right away and continue to deal with the situation, and I could do nothing but concede the point. Off he went, and Allison became my assistant for the day and evening. She performed admirably. The production went extremely well, and we were all very proud of the result.

As the weeks after that production wore on, I worried deeply about Neil and Sue’s situation. Sue had a history of emotional extremes, Neil was known for a quick temper at times, and an innocent child’s well-being seemed to hang in the balance. I called once to check on them and was brushed off, Neil being unwilling to talk about what happened because Sue was within earshot. The situation was too volatile to ignore, but I also could not violate Neil’s confidence by talking to anyone about it.

Allison, feeling my pain, decided to take matters into her own hands and did what I should have done much sooner. She called Belle and Frank and related to them what Neil had told me, expressing the concerns we shared for all of them. I felt like the worst kind of snitch, but I also knew that the best people for Neil to have on his side were his parents. He just did not seem equipped to handle this on his own.

When Neil got the call from his parents, he denied everything. The story he told me, he explained, was a lie intended only to get him out of working that day. None of it had actually happened, he claimed, and that claim was repeated in a voicemail left on my phone. Everything was under control, he said, and no one should worry.

A couple of weeks passed until one night, on my way home from work, Sue called me and asked if I had time to talk. I said that I had time, and she immediately told me that she was calling while Neil was out so that he would not overhear.

What followed was the most confusing stream of information I have ever heard. At first she wanted to tell me that the stories I’d heard about the baby being struck during the altercation were untrue. Since I had not heard any such accounts, I was immediately suspicious. She then went on to tell me that she had been the perfect mother, that nothing Neil had told me was true, and that in fact Neil was smoking crack and doing hard drugs on a regular basis and physically abusing her.

Then, incredibly, she launched into a tirade about how disappointed she was in me for betraying her to Neil’s parents, who (in her opinion) don’t like her anyway. Because I didn’t call her to confirm Neil’s story that day, because Allison tried to put information in the hands of people who were in a position to counsel and help, I was pushed to recant. She actually asked me to call Belle and Frank and tell them that the story Neil told me was a lie — how insane would that be?

At some point during the conversation, Neil walked in and was allowed a few moments to speak to me. He apologized for the lie, gave a satisfactory explanation of something else I’d mentioned in my e-mail, and apologized in a roundabout way for the abuse we were getting from Sue. Sue then regained control of the phone and continued to scold me. She contradicted herself several times. She was being abused by Neil at one point, but that soon changed and there was never any abuse. They were fighting constantly, but they were not fighting. They needed help but did not need help. Each time I advised that they seek counseling as a couple, I was told, “But there’s nothing wrong with ME, it’s HIM!” I am sure that if Neil had been allowed to speak I would have heard a mirror image of that statement. The running theme, in between descriptions of how horrible and out of control things were, was that everything was under control and no outside help was needed.

The conversation degenerated to the point where I was being called a lousy friend and a traitor if I agreed with what Allison had done, and at that point I snapped. I will let anyone call me names and will endure endless vituperation with a smile, if the conditions are favorable, but I don’t tolerate abasement of Allison under any circumstances.

At that point, I informed Sue that contrary to her beliefs, Allison had done her a favor by calling Neil’s parents and not a nosy government agency that would be all too eager to start a deep, probing investigation of their life’s every orifice. I brought her the news that their problems had an emotional effect on us as well, and that I’d spent a lot of my time worrying about them. I did not fail to mention that both Allison and I had gone out of our way on dozens of occasions to show them friendship, treating them like family, and that I did not appreciate her insults and vitriol by way of thanks, and I then terminated the conversation. Only Allison saw or heard what happened next, something that men don’t do.

After spending some time with me, helping me regain my composure and calm down, Allison let Frank and Belle know about the call. I got on the phone at one point as well, just to relate what I’d heard; Allison had heard only one side of the call, after all. They said they planned to call again and see what they could do to intervene in this difficult situation, and I sincerely hope they are able to help. Meanwhile, my cell phone just rang with Neil’s number on the display, and I could not bring myself to answer it.

My life has a lot of problems. My health isn’t great, my job is unstable and a constant source of stress, money is tight and the economy stinks, and I spend more time in my car every day than I spend with Allison. Those problems positively pale beside what these two kids are facing. Lack of steady employment, a baby to raise and feed, relationship issues, vehicle problems, housing problems, inexperience as parents, no geographically close family … this is a recipe for disaster if something doesn’t get better, fast.

I doubt myself. That conversation with Sue shook me. Am I, indeed, a jerk and a lousy friend? I think Allison did the right thing by bringing a family member into the situation so that these two will at least have the chance to get the help they need. Most of the time, I think I did the right thing in passing along the other things I heard when talking with Sue. There is a marriage, a child, and a family at stake. Still, I regret the intrusion into their lives and the dishonesty of having … snitched.

I have the feeling I’m going to struggle with this for a long time.

A word about comments: please feel free to comment, but if you happen to know me well enough to know who I’m talking about, please don’t use any real names or otherwise identify any of the characters in this story other than Allison and me. Thanks.

A few years ago, I lived in the small town of Douglasville, Georgia. Shortly after moving there, I began to discover that there was a reason that the town was kept in a remote, out of the way county. It had a reputation for being populated by a disproportionately large number of rednecks.

That stereotype was in no way dispelled by the efforts of the people who made the local signage:

As one might infer from the amount of rust seen on the bolts of the second sign, literacy faults like these are seldom noticed in Douglasville, let alone promptly corrected.

A couple of weeks ago at Thanksgiving, Allison and I had the privilege of visiting her parents for a wonderful family get-together and holiday meal. The setting was their beautiful house, nestled in the woods beside a picturesque mountain lake. Their community, which surrounds a golf course, is considered quite upscale, and has a manned security gate where guards issue passes for vehicle access.

This morning, while driving to work, I noticed the pass on my windshield that I’d neglected to remove, and also remembered that I’d planned to blog about the literacy fault I had previously found there. It seems that no matter how formal the setting may be, there will always be subtle, heart-warming reminders that we’re still in Georgia after all.

From today’s news (emphasis in the last paragraph is mine):

BEIJING, Dec. 6 (AP) - (Kyodo)—China successfully launched a hybrid rocket Friday for the first time, Xinhua News Agency reported.The rocket, “Beihang-2,” was launched from a launch site in northwestern Gansu Province and reached an altitude of 3,000 meters before its head was parachuted to the ground 1.2 kilometers south of the site 15 minutes later, Xinhua said.

The launch was mainly intended to test the performance of the rocket’s hybrid engine, designed by the School of Astronautics of Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics. A hybrid rocket is known to cost less in launch as it does not explode.

As I recall, it took our rocket scientists a while to develop cheaper, non-exploding boosters, too.

Hello all.  I’m on the road again this week at March ARB near Riverside, California.  It’s been quite hectic, and in reality the very last thing I’ve got time to do right now is write a blog entry.  However, something in this morning’s news struck me as rather outrageous, as so often happens when I make the mistake of noting what goes on in the world.  It involves another idiot, and it occurs to me that the very best thing I can do in terms of dealing with such idiots is warning the world about them.  After all, the more bloggers put someone’s name on the internet, the more likely it is that a Google search for that name will turn up something interesting!

Today’s idiot: Massachusetts State Trooper Michael Galluccio.

A Boston couple, the wife in labor with contractions spaced about three minutes apart, were driving in the breakdown lane of a major freeway.  Several other troopers had waved them on, advising caution but otherwise causing no problems.  Such laissez-faire law enforcement would not do for Trooper Michael Galluccio, though. He stopped the couple, made them wait while he finished writing a ticket to another motorist, and then cited them for a traffic infraction, costing them five to ten valuable minutes while the pregnant woman continued in her efforts as pregnant women are wont to do.

Here’s to you, Trooper Michael Galluccio, you idiot!

I’m almost ashamed that in yesterday’s workday rush, I failed to remember the significance of November 10.

Each year on that date in Silver Lake, Minnesota, a long-retired lighthouse is brought back to life and sends forth a piercing beam of light, and in Detroit at the Mariners’ Church, a bell rings out.  It tolls six times now for reasons that are rooted more in politics than in memory, but it used to ring twenty-nine times.  Each sound of the bell memorialized one life lost on that most famous of Great Lakes freighters, the SS Edmund Fitzgerald.

All of us have probably heard the haunting melody and moving lyrics of Gordon Lightfoot’s 1976 song, written both to memorialize and to pay tribute to the ship and her crew.  The song is wonderful, but while most of it is accurate, it doesn’t tell the whole story.  Neither does anyone else, at least not very often, now that the wreck has faded into history.

The SS Edmund Fitzgerald in 1975

The laker called the “Mighty Fitz” was a behemoth when she was built in the late fifties.  An investment property of the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company of Milwaukee, she was designed to be the largest vessel plying the Great Lakes.  At 729 feet from stem to stern with a 75 foot beam, she wasn’t the biggest in 1975, but she was of well above average size for a laker. Despite her size, in keeping with Great Lakes tradition, she was referred to as a boat, not a ship.

She had but one purpose, which was the transportation of processed taconite pellets.  These balls of concentrated iron ore are the lifeblood of the steel industry, and nowhere in the U.S. is taconite more abundant than in Minnesota.  Lakers like the Edmund Fitzgerald could load up their holds at ports in Minnesota or Wisconsin, then profitably and economically transport the ore to any of dozens of iron works situated around the Great Lakes.

Like most lakers of the day, the Edmund Fitzgerald had cabins at her bow and stern, with the bridge situated atop the bow.  Between the cabins lay a flat deck covered with loading hatches.  These huge openings with removable covers allow easy loading and unloading of the pellets by dockside machinery.  The hatches are each twelve feet by fifty-four feet in size.  A crane was required to remove and replace the hatch covers, which were secured to their openings by clamps that had to be laboriously resecured after loading was complete.  

Captain Ernest McSorley was the captain of the Edmund Fitzgerald at the time of her demise.  When Lightfoot describes him as “well seasoned,” he’s not kidding. McSorley had been the master of nine vessels over his 40 year career as a mariner; he had assumed this, his tenth command, in 1972. At 63 years of age, this veteran of both lakes and oceans had earned the respect of his peers and his men alike.  He was known in particular to be highly proficient at handling large vessels in foul weather. A Canadian by birth, McSorley lived near Toledo and had planned to retire once the 1975 shipping season was over.

On November 9, 1975, a Sunday, the Edmund Fitzgerald departed from Superior, Wisconsin, loaded with taconite for a steel mill near Detroit (not Cleveland, as Lightfoot mistakenly wrote.) As they moved out onto Lake Superior in the treacherous, unpredictable weather of November, all aboard knew there was a chance they’d encounter a gale, one of the strong, unpredictable, storms that Great Lakes captains call November Witches.

A second laker, the Arthur M. Anderson, fell in behind the Edmund Fitzgerald for the crossing, and the two set off at 13 knots bound for the locks at Soult Ste-Marie.

The storm hit the next day, with high winds and ten foot seas by 7:00 AM.  It was a witch by anyone’s standards.  Building quickly, the winds reached 43 knots by 3:20 PM, and waves topping 30 feet in height were battering the boats as they tried desperately to reach safety.

Heavy snow soon dropped visibility to near zero, and hurricane-force gusts slammed the vessels. No men were allowed on deck; the waves and wind were strong enough to wash even a well-secured man overboard, and in these conditions, a life vest was little more than a cruel joke.

By 3:30 in the afternoon, the situation looked dire indeed. The Edmund Fitzgerald’s two bilge pumps were working furiously to discharge water which was flooding in, presumably through damaged ballast tank vents. The radar was damaged and inoperative, and the boat was listing slightly.  The Anderson was doing somewhat better, and still had functioning radar.  Within an hour or so, the Fitz slowed to allow Anderson to catch up, and McSorley asked Captain Jesse Cooper for help with radar coverage.  

The vessels, at this point, were tantalizingly close to the relative shelter of Whitefish Bay. McSorley put out a radio call to any vessel near Whitefish Point, inquiring about the radio beacon there. The ocean freighter Avafors answered, and advised that the beacon appeared to be down. McSorley advised the Avafors, “I have a bad list, lost both radars, and am taking heavy seas over the deck.  One of the worst seas I’ve ever been in.”

The end came quickly, when it came. At shortly after 7:00 PM, a series of huge rogue waves hit the Anderson. The crests of the waves were so high they could be clearly seen on the Anderson’s radar. They slammed into the Anderson with such force that they damaged lifeboats hanging 35 feet above the waterline. The waves came out of the northwest, and Cooper saw that they were headed directly toward the Fitzgerald. Cooper immediately radioed the Fitzgerald to warn Captain McSorley and check on his status. McSorley reported, “We are holding our own.”

Those were the last words ever heard from the SS Edmund Fitzgerald. At 7:25 her target disappeared from the Arthur M. Anderson’s radar.  

Theories abound about what happened, and how the ship could have gone down so quickly without a flare, a distress call, or a trace on the surface.  Early theories held that the boat must have broken in half on the surface.  She was so long that it was possible for her bow and stern to sit on two wave crests while her mid-keel was out of the water; the alternative was also possible with the ship high-centering on a single wave crest, her bow and stern suspended in the troughs.  Only after the wreckage was discovered and surveyed was this theory finally put to rest.  The two halves of the ship rested only a few yards apart, making a surface breakup extremely unlikely.

The US Coast Guard report held that the ship took on water due to improperly secured hatch covers.  The theory was that the covers allowed water to slowly flood the cargo holds, eventually resulting in a loss of stability and buoyancy that sent the ship to the bottom.

The Lake Carriers Association, the trade organization that represented a dozen or more shipping companies including the operator of the Edmund Fitzgerald, didn’t like this theory because it put the company’s employees at fault.  While it was well known that laker crews were often less than cautious about completely securing every hatch cover clamp and that the clamps were often broken or damaged, the LCA decided to blame charts instead.  They felt it was far more likely that the governments of the two countries had supplied the operators with inaccurate charts.  Because of this, the Fitzgerald had struck an incorrectly charted six fathom shoal and breached her hull below the waterline.  Their theory held that the captain and crew knew nothing of this deep hull damage and cargo hold flooding until it was too late; the vessel had nose-dived directly to the bottom and broken in half on impact.

The National Transportation Safety Board initially rejected both the Coast Guard and LCA theories.  They eventually backpedaled, agreeing that the boat probably sank due to water flooding in through the loading hatches.  However, rather than blaming the crew, the NTSB put more of the blame on the design of the hatch covers and on the storm itself.  From their final report:

“The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the sudden massive flooding of the cargo hold due to the collapse of one or more hatch covers. Before the hatch covers collapsed, flooding into the ballast tanks and tunnel through topside damage and flooding into the cargo hold through non-weathertight hatch covers caused a reduction of freeboard and a list. The hydrostatic and hydrodynamic forces imposed on the hatch covers by heavy boarding seas at this reduced freeboard and with the list caused the hatch covers to collapse.”

There were no survivors, and no bodies were recovered.  Generally, the bodies of drowned men eventually surface, due to natural decomposition processes that produce buoyant gas.  When the water is cold and deep, as it is in the vicinity of the Edmund Fitzgerald’s wreck, the bodies are instead preserved.  The Edmund Fitzgerald is now a memorial.  No dives are allowed upon her wreck.  Lake Superior, in song, legend, and reality, does not give up her dead.

There are twenty-nine men who know what happened that night, and why their ship disappeared without so much as a flare or distress call.  None of them can speak.  They lie entombed in the broken wreck of their ship, seventeen miles from the safety of Whitefish Bay in 530 feet of water in a lake that holds her secrets closely.  

Gordon Lightfoot, two crew relatives, and the bell.

In 1995, the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society sought and received the approval of the Canadian government and the families of those lost in the wreck to dive upon the Edmund Fitzgerald and retrieve her bell.  The bell would serve as a tangible memorial for the families and survivors of the crewmen.  A replica bell carrying the names of the 29 lost would replace it at the wreck.

The bell is now part of a memorial located at the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point.  Painstakingly and lovingly restored, it stands alongside a horribly smashed lifeboat, several life rings, and a few other items comprising the only tangible remains of the great vessel claimed by the November Witch.  

As Gordon Lightfoot wrote and sang, “The iron boats go, as the mariners all know, with the gales of November remembered.”

It doesn’t, of course. I’m betting the title got your attention, though, just as a similar headline did when it appeared today on news aggregator fark.com. The story itself, posted on the web site of KATU-TV in Portland, Oregon, is a textbook example of the dangers of spin (or, at the very least, irresponsible journalism.)

For those who want the executive summary, here it is. Wind power has been very, very well developed along the Columbia River in the northwestern United States. New wind farms are going online regularly, and an ambitious plan is in place to further encourage and support wind power.

Wind, as any sailor will tell you, is a fickle thing. Sometimes you have none at all, and at other times you have more than you can use. There have been occasions, recently, when so much wind power was dumped onto the electrical grid that it exceeded the load on the grid, a dangerous condition that can cause voltage to rise and circuits to trip.

This is a great thing!  Isn’t it? Those western states have managed to generate so much wind power that we don’t know what to do with it all, right?

Wrong.

As the article correctly points out, traditional sources of electricity are still out there. Power plants that use fossil fuels and nuclear energy are generally built and operated at great expense by corporations who want to see a return on their investments. They’re not about to dial back their generation capacity, cutting their income, so that wind power can take over when it’s available.

If we have too much power, then, who cuts back? Hydro does. Hydroelectric power is also well developed along the Columbia river, and when the supply of wind power exceeds demand, the dams cut back their generation.  

When a hydroelectric dam stops generating, the water still needs to go downstream or the river will drop, so instead of passing the water through the generators, dams just send it over the spillways. Water passing over a dam’s spillway becomes highly aerated. Nitrogen dissolves in the water, and the excess nitrogen makes fish uncomfortable or worse. This is the basis for the KATU story — those wind turbines are forcing the dams to spill more water.

Is wind power hurting the fish? Of course it isn’t! There is no causal link here at all.

In the first place, they could dial back the wind power if necessary, feathering the blades of these modern, advanced turbines so that they catch less of the wind and produce less electricity. They don’t do it, presumably, because it would be stupid. They want to generate more power by clean, alternative means, and that’s why the wind farms are there.

They could shut down a coal-fired plant for the duration of the surplus. Trading dirty, resource-gobbling capacity for clean, renewable capacity makes sense! This isn’t done for the oldest reason of all, which is greed. The plant owner who shut down would lose money, because he gets paid to turn a non-renewable resource into both electricity and pollution.

What’s really killing salmon? Greed is killing salmon. Greed is more powerful than wind. The wind farms and hydro dams are continuing to provide clean, cheap, resource-efficient power, and in return they’re being told by the big coal-fired behemoths, “Sorry.  There’s not room in this town for the three of us, and we were here first.”

Would anyone care to bet on which of the major players in the fossil-fuel power industry paid off KATU’s reporter to blame it on wind?  My money is on PG&E.

A much more interesting blog than this one is under construction. It’s long, based on an idea from MMM, and it’s taking a lot of time to write. I promise it will see the light of day soon.

I’ve gotten back into the habit of reading my friends’ blogs, and I’ve done pretty well at keeping up for a month or two now. Google Reader helps me by keeping track of what I’ve read and what I’ve yet to read. This morning, the “Next” button took me to the blog of a friend I used to chat with fairly often, but with whom I’ve been somewhat out of touch.

I really have been feeling rather down for the last few days, and perhaps that’s why I took something I read on that blog rather badly. Everyone has the right and responsibility to look after those they’re close to.  This blogger feels that her sister is “slumming” because she’s involved with a man who isn’t employed, drinks more than he should, isn’t highly educated, wore a name tag on his last job, and isn’t very physically attractive. The word and the reasons hit a little close to home for me, and I reacted. Before I could apprehend myself for aggravated criminal shitheadedness, I left a whiny, knee-jerk comment objecting to the generalization which probably wasn’t even a generalization.

There is a semi-formal definition of slumming on Wikipedia, but mine is simpler. Slumming is when a person of perceived greater worth dates someone of perceived lesser worth, purely for the thrill of it.

I cannot say I’ve experienced slumming firsthand. I have never passed on the imaginary pathogen known as “slum cooties.” I have, however, been judged on such criteria as my socioeconomic status, the density of my hair, the condition of my teeth, my weight, and my job. Some people really think that these are the indicators of one’s worth as a human, as a companion, and as a life partner. Naive as I am, I still can’t believe we (as a people) not only tolerate this level of superficiality, but espouse and embrace it.

Oh, of course, we put a nice, modern, politically correct spin on it. The old bumper stickers that read, “NO FAT CHICKS” are completely unacceptable now. The sentiments are still around, though.  Ever see this photo?

How To Spot A Rich Guy

Sometimes, I really don’t know what to make of this picture. Natural selection works in all sorts of strange ways.  Some women will feign attraction to a man, and even marry him, because his wealth outweighs all of the other criteria which select against him. On the other hand, sometimes a woman will be honestly, emotionally attracted to someone regardless of physical and socioeconomic deficits which select against him. Is the woman in the picture, as most people surmise, “out of his league?” Is she, in the alternative view, so shallow he may be out of her league? Wait. Could it be — horror of horrors — that the two of them actually care for each other as people, rather than as bank accounts or bodies? Could it be that they’re holding hands and being seen in public together because they love each other?

Okay, you’ve caught me. I’m an idealist. I believe that love does exist, and I believe that love is blind and deaf and financially clueless, and that it draws two people together by their hearts. I believe that a life partnership that’s not based on love first and foremost is a fraud. Many times I have seen situations that are very much like that photograph. If I even start to wonder about what they see in each other, I immediately accuse myself of the aforementioned criminal shitheadedness and remember that I know nothing about their relationship beyond what I see on the surface, and that it might well be based on exactly what it should have at its core.

My life has been punctuated by a series of failed relationships. Some ended amicably, if painfully, and some ended badly. Until my present fiancee’, though, every single one of those women wanted something other than me. They wanted a big bank account, a full head of hair, a perfect smile, an advanced degree, a slim body, bigger muscles, and more fashionable clothing and eyeglasses. What I had, what I did, and what I looked like were all much more important than who I was. I am not bitter, and I’m not angry about this. I hope all of them eventually find what they were looking for, and that they’re lucky enough to find love at the same time, with the same person.

I’m sorry, anonymous blogger. You have every right to worry about your sister. Except for the drinking and the fact that I’m not unemployed (yet?), I’m probably an awful lot like your sister’s new beau, and it was far too easy for me to swing that around and make it personal. When I remember that a lovely woman of fine lineage and good education considers me worth her while and worthy of her hand, a lot of the sting disappears.

One of my idols, George Carlin, once said that inside every cynical person there is a disappointed idealist. Nothing could possibly describe me more accurately.

Breaking with tradition, I will deny you the choice of which you shall hear first, and proceed with the good news.

Allison now has a blog!  She had asked me to set one up for her days ago, and I’ve finally gotten the work done. You can find her new blog at http://kd4dcy.net/allison.  I expect it will make more interesting reading than mine on a more regular basis.

Now for the bad news.  Keiko, our sweet and gentle bear of an Akita, passed away yesterday, apparently as a result of a snake bite.  He was an old fellow, but we all loved him very much, and the humans as well as the animals miss him greatly.  We’re all very sad at the loss of our friend, and none of us are ourselves just now.

Allison has used her new blog in a way that I used to use mine, as therapy.  Writing was always a good release for me, and this morning it appears to have helped her a bit too.  Her blog about Keiko is wonderfully emotional and tells his story, as well as the story of his predecessors, much more eloquently than I ever could.

There is other news, but it can wait for a less somber, more appropriate time.  For now, we will take some time to grieve, to remember, and to cry.

In memory of Keiko 1995-2008

The Sydney Sun-Herald newspaper has published a list of what it considers the “Top 100 Books of All Time.” There is no indication of how this list was arrived at, or whether it represents the results of a poll or a simple editorial opinion.  

Upon reading the list, my first reaction was to be rather disappointed in myself.  I have read in their entirety only four of the listed books, which doesn’t bode well for my literary background.  

Moments later, reason asserted itself and my dismay was softened when I realized that the list was ridiculous.  Many of the books that I consider important and good in a literary sense are notably absent from the list; War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy is an example.  Other, more modern books seem to hold places on the list purely due to their public appeal, such as works by Stephen King, Patricia Cornwell, and Dean Koontz.

The top of the list made me feel completely vindicated.  What literary critic would name the Harry Potter books as the best books of all time?  They’re entertaining, they’re popular, and they’re certainly trendy, but can they possibly be the best books of all time?  I hope not.

Here’s the list.

1 Harry Potter series - J.K Rowling

2 Twilight - Stephenie Meyer

3 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen

4 The Obernewtyn Chronicles - Isobelle Carmody

5 My Sister’s Keeper - Jodi Picoult

6 To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee

7 The Book Thief - Markus Zusak

8 Breath - Tim Winton

9 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

10 Break No Bones - Kathy Reichs

11 The Power Of One - Bryce Courtenay

12 Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk

13 Magician - Raymond E. Feist

14 The Bronze Horseman - Paullina Simons

15 Mao’s Last Dancer - Li Cunxin

16 Memoirs Of A Geisha - Arthur Golden

17 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold

18 Cross - James Patterson

19 Persuasion - Jane Austen

20 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte

21 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger

22 The Secret - Rhonda Byrne

23 Marley and Me - John Grogan

24 Antony and Cleopatra - Colleen McCullough

25 April Fools Day - Bryce Courtney

26 North & South - Elizabeth Gaskell

27 In My Skin - Kate Holden

28 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte

29 A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini

30 The Other Boleyn Girl - Phillipa Gregory

31 Nineteen Minutes - Jodi Picoult

32 Atonement - Ian McEwan

33 Shantaram Gregory - David Roberts

34 Pillars Of The Earth - Ken Follett

35 The Pact - Jodi Picoult

36 Ice Station - Matthew Reilly

37 Cloudstreet - Tim Winton

38 Jessica - Bryce Courtenay

39 A New Earth - Eckhart Tolle

40 The Princess Bride - William Goldman

41 Running With Scissors - Augusten Burroughs

42 Anybody Out There? - Marian Keyes

43 Life Of Pi - Yann Martel

44 Seven Ancient Wonders - Matthew Reilly

45 People Of The Book - Geraldine Brooks

46 Six Sacred Stones - Matthew Reilly

47 Memory Keeper’s Daughter - Kim Edwards

48 Brother Odd - Dean Koontz

49 Tully - Paullina Simons

50 Tuesdays with Morrie - Mitch Albom

51 The Catcher in the Rye - J.D Salinger

52 Eragon - Christopher Paolini

53 Eat, Pray, Love - Elizabeth Gilbert

54 It’s Not About The Bike - Lance Armstrong

55 A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens

56 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry

57 The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho

58 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell

59 A Fortunate Life - A.B. Facey

60 The Mists of Avalon - Marion Zimmer Bradley

61 The Notebook -Nicholas Sparks

62 Water For Elephants - Sara Gruen

63 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom

64 The Host - Stephenie Meyer

65 Dirt Music - Tim Winton

66 Eldest - Christopher Paolini

67 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon

68 It - Stephen King

69 World Without End - Ken Follett

70 Emma - Jane Austen

71 Temple - Matthew Reilly

72 Little Women - Alcott Louisa May

73 Lean Mean Thirteen - Janet Evanovich

74 Scarecrow - Matthew Reilly

75 American Gods - Neil Gaiman

76 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

77 P.S, I Love You - Cecelia Ahern

78 All That Remains - Patricia Cornwell

79 The Last Lecture - Randy Pausch

80 Past Secrets - Cathy Kelly

81 The Persimmon Tree - Bryce Courtenay

82 Husband - Dean Koontz

83 Plain Truth - Jodi Picoult

84 Wicked - Gregory Maguire

85 Spot Of Bother - Mark Haddon

86 Always And Forever - Cathy Kelly

87 The Road - Cormac McCarthy

88 Cents & Sensibility - Maggie Alderson

89 Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris

90 The Shifting Fog - Kate Morton

91 We Need To Talk About Kevin - Lionel Shriver

92 Everyone Worth Knowing - Lauren Weisberger

93 Hour Game - David Baldacci

94 Darkly Dreaming Dexter - Jeff Lindsay

95 The Woods - Harlan Coben

96 Half of a Yellow Sun - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

97 Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides

98 Scar Tissue - Anthony Kiedis

99 Infidel - Ayaan Hirsi Ali

100 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks

I have been thinking a lot lately about the stuff of life.  No, not single-malt Scotch, but DNA.  I just finished re-reading a very interesting Robin Cook novel called “Mutation,” in which a physician entrepreneur and researcher meddles with his own unborn son’s genes with terrifying results.  Genetics are not my area of expertise, but who could not be fascinated by the sheer complexity and power of this amazing molecule in the shape of a double helix?  It’s a biological computer program, written in a language unique to life, and we understand less than 5% of the code as of now.

An episode of “House, M.D.” last night brought DNA back into my mind, and for some reason I could not remember the word for the sequences of DNA that fall between the genes and are not replicated during transcription.  The word totally escaped me, and I refused to look it up as a matter of pride, so I kept trying to think of it for the rest of the evening until I fell asleep.

When I awoke this morning, I got up, drank some lemonade, gave the dog a treat, and suddenly remembered that the word was “introns.”  I suppose that the dog, the lemonade, or the orthostatic hypotension could have separately or collectively caused my memory to disgorge the information; who can say?  I immediately texted this word to Allison, who had also been trying to remember it.  She responded by calling me a “sexy geek,” which made my day.

Today I found myself sitting down to lunch with nothing to read.  That’s fairly unusual for me, since if I’m eating alone, I generally have some reading material at hand to keep my mind occupied while I attend to the needs of my body.  I’ve read novels, industry periodicals, nonfiction, and even product literature over lunch in the past, but today my quick search turned up nothing of interest.  So, I sat down and simply ate.

I’d been eating for only five or ten minutes before my mind began to wander.  In the restaurant, two television sets were on and tuned to CNN and Fox News.  The only “news” was political, and this probably contributed to my bored, desperate turn toward my inner mind for entertainment.  I thought about DNA again, and its helical structure, and remembered something I’d read in the Feynman Lectures on Physics years ago.

Feynman did one entire lecture on the symmetry of the physical laws.  We assume all of our physical laws to be symmetrical.  Symmetry can be explained in a really simple way.  If you can take something (an object or an intangible) and do something to it (rotation, reflection, translation, etc.) and it looks the same as it did before, that thing is said to have symmetry.

I remember that Feynman used an odd example that really set my mind in motion.  I’m going to do a terrible job of re-describing it and I don’t have the books at hand, so bear with me.

Say we make a solution of common sugar in water.  We then shine a polarized light source through that sugar solution and observe the light on the other side.  We will notice that the plane of polarization of the light has been rotated from the original, and that it has rotated to the right.

Now let’s hypothetically construct some sugar artifically.  It’s not hard to do, but we won’t go into the process here.  We’ll dissolve that sugar in water, and shine the same polarized light into it.  Oddly enough, we discover that the light’s polarization hasn’t rotated at all!

Now, let’s add some bacteria to the water and let them eat some of the sugar.  After a few minutes, we’ll then shine the light through the container again.  Wait a minute!  The light exiting the container has rotated now, all right — but to the LEFT!

What happened?  The natural sugar rotated the plane of polarization to the right because natural sugar — glucose, in particular a form of glucose called dextrose or d-glucose, has a right-handed helical structure.  When we created our synthetic sugar, we made something with the right chemical formula, but it actually contained equal parts of d-glucose (dextrose) and l-glucose, which is left-handed!  The rotations cancelled and we saw no effect until we added bacteria.  All life that we’re aware of, right down to bacteria, either produces or uses right-handed sugar molecules.  The bacteria ate only the d-glucose, having no use for the l-glucose since it can’t broken down for use as food because the enzymes don’t fit!  We were then left with an l-glucose solution that rotated the plane of polarization to the left.

This started a thought process that began with left-handed sugars and went rather awry, with amusing consequences.  I began to realize that because of the symmetry of physical laws, it is entirely possible that all life on earth could have come to be the opposite way.  Almost everything in nature that has a helical structure rotates to the right.  What if somewhere, somehow, life either evolved or was created that was based on all left-hand structures?

An interesting idea for a science-fiction premise began to form in my mind.  Complications are what makes fiction interesting, after all.  Edwin A. Abbott took away one dimension and came up with a whole world called Flatland.  What if we created a world that hosted a majority of normal, right-hand-helix humans like us, and a minority of left-handed-helix humans based on Z-DNA?  We could call them Leptans, and the circumstances of their life would be most interesting.

To a Leptan, most of the foodstuffs on earth would be essentially non-nutritive.  Leptans would have enzymes that can only break down left-handed sugars, and to construct their proteins they would require left-handed amino acids that also aren’t found in nature in any significant quantity.  Food for leptans would have to be synthetic, since a cannibalistic population could not be self-supporting and would die out quickly.  

Interaction between leptans and humans would be unusual.  A leptan and a human could probably not produce offspring, because their DNA would not fit together and could not be combined during meiosis.  How a human body might react to “contamination” from a leptan body cell, or vice-versa, is something I can only speculate upon, lacking the knowledge of genetics and immunology to actually analyze the possibilities.  There could easily arise unique and unprecedented problems with leptans and humans living in close proximity.

Would leptans grow to resent the majority of humans?  Would they come up with ugly, racial slur-like names for us, like “dexters?”  Would there eventually be a leptan uprising, with the leptans releasing some horrible enzyme or toxin that’s fatal to humans but to which leptans are immune?  Would the majority of leptans turn out to be left-handed in terms of manual dexterity, and would the functions of their two brain hemispheres be reversed, or is that not the result of a symmetrical physical law?

Leptans would almost certainly be a better-looking, healthier people than humans.  When all food has to be produced via very expensive synthetic means, I don’t think gluttony would be a big problem.  If a leptan did find himself getting a little porky, he need only turn to the food of humans.  He could eat at Dunkin Donuts every day and never gain a pound, because his body could not process the sugar.

There seemed to be no end to the interesting premises associated with the leptan race, and I spent the rest of my lunchtime thinking about this.  I think it’s a great idea, and I’d love it if someone ran with it.  At the very least it’d make a good “Twilight Zone” episode, but it could easily be fleshed out into either a movie or a full TV series.  ”Leptan Uprising” even sounds like a really good name for a video game.  If you make your first million selling this idea to Spielberg or NBC or Nintendo, please be so kind as to give me some small credit.  I haven’t quite figured out how to “copyleft” the notion.

This blog has taken what I have come to consider an unwise turn in the last few months.  Outrage at several idiots and the people who provide support for those idiots led me to turn this area into a place to vent my frustrations and voice my discontent.  Clearly the mass media, direct communication, and the court system and regulatory authorities are the proper outlet for such issues.  I will try to turn back toward my original course, that of a personal outlet.  However, I make no promises for my ability to resist temptation should I encounter yet another idiot.  Considering what country I live in and taking into account the last few months of fark.com headlines, that does seem depressingly likely.

I generally consider myself an apolitical creature.  I will never be a politician because I have not mastered their primary skill, the art of lying.  I do listen to talk radio quite a bit, though, and exposure to political topics is unavoidable.  This morning, Herman Cain, filling in for Neal Boortz on WSB-AM in Atlanta, ranted incessantly about the new mantra of politicians everywhere: “Drill here, drill now, Pay Less.”  The more I hear this, the more convinced I become that the United States political machine believes that we are all blithering idiots.

Cain grates on me under the best of conditions.  His questionable grammar and odd pronunciation drive me to distraction.  How can a man pronounce “hour” and “Iowa” such that they are both two-syllable words and sound exactly alike?  His manner of speech goes far beyond an accent.  He speaks his own dialect.

Setting that aside, though, let’s analyze this idea that producing oil domestically will somehow reduce gasoline prices.  First of all, drilling is expensive.  It costs money to have a crew of men wielding a thousand tons of equipment put a piece of pipe five miles into the earth.  Leasing the land to drill into also costs money, and so does extracting and transporting the oil produced — provided the well finds oil in the first place.  Oil companies that spend this sort of money expect a return on that investment.

Oil has a price on the world market.  The U.S. doesn’t set that price, nor does Exxon or BP.  The price fluctuates, hovering at or near what the market will bear.  Let’s say, for purposes of argument, that the current world price for a barrel of crude oil is $100.  If a company could sell domestically-produced oil at $100 a barrel on the world market, why would it sell that oil a penny more cheaply here in the U.S.?  It wouldn’t, of course.  If it can make $100 or even more than that on a barrel of oil, it will.  The mantra should be “Drill Here, Drill Now, buy an American a Yacht.”

I’m all for reducing our dependence on foreign oil.  At the same time, attempting to compel people to get behind that effort by promising lower gasoline prices is dishonest and wrong.  Oil companies are large, powerful, politically-connected, and greedy.  Once the Arabs and other foreign oil exporting nations no longer have a stranglehold on our economy, you can bet that the energy industry will take over.

Few people realize another key fact.  Much of the “oil” we buy and import from foreign nations is finished gasoline.  Why?  Because the United States has not seen the construction of a single new oil refinery in 32 years.  Even if we had sufficient domestic crude oil, we don’t have the refining capacity to produce any more gasoline than we are already producing — which is clearly not enough, or we wouldn’t be importing the stuff.  Drilling solves nothing.

T. Boone Pickens, a lifelong oilman, has already figured this out and is spending millions in advertising trying to get this very message across to the American people.   He claims to have a plan that will get us closer to energy independence and out of a mess that he admits we can’t “drill our way out of.”

Gasoline prices in Atlanta, which were about $3.60 per gallon before Ike threatened Texas, rose in some places to over $5.00 per gallon this past weekend, even before Ike hit.  Refineries in Texas were not heavily damaged, and production was only mildly disrupted.  Prices didn’t go up because of supply and demand. Prices went up because people were greedy and found an excuse to make money from the misfortune of others.  Gasoline prices, unlike crude oil prices, are set by the seller and are subject to all manner of capricious whims.  The price gouging continues even today, well after the storm has passed and everyone has the word that damage was minimal.

Sonny Purdue, Georgia’s governor (that’s what they call you when you’re better at lying than all the other people in your state), signed new laws last month implementing stiff penalties for price gounging, and threatened to enforce them.  Predictably enough, I have not seen a single news report of a gasoline retailer being charged with price gouging, even though hundreds clearly committed the offense.

I’m tired of being gouged at the pump.  Back around 2003 we were paying between $1.00 and $1.50 per gallon for gasoline, and no amount of political nonsense will convince me that it now costs four times what it did then to deliver a gallon of gasoline to my tank.  Greedy people are getting richer and I’m getting poorer, and that makes me angry, political or not, because it makes me feel I’ve got a sign on the back of my pants that says “Drill Here, Drill now!”