O, Canada??

Yoo hoo, y'alls....I just learned that Fargo, ND, set a record snowfall for one month! At 12:30 p.m. today, Fargo had received 85.09 cm of snow in December, which broke the record for one month's snowfall set in 1927.

The national weather service guy figures that'll be it for Fargo this month even though there's one more day to go. Grand Forks might get some more, but not Fargo.

How does that compare with wot you-alls got in one month up there?

The rural Cass County snowmobilers are ecstatic even as they shovel....

Oy....

Arbella is having one hell of a time. She hit the trifecta at the end of august: retirement, selling her condo, and moving to a (strange & wonderful) new neighborhood.

She had an epiphany of sorts today. When crossing the street to the metro from her apto, she waited till the light turned green, looked to the left to make SURE there wasn't any traffix, started across, and paused just momentarily when a fellow pedestrian behind her said "hey!"....

at that point, a white car SWOOSHED past her nose, missing her entirely, thanks be, but causing her to stop and ponder wot had happened in mid-crosswalk. yes, she had the green light, and NO, the white car was NOT visible at all when she started. it must have been going maybe 50 mph....

the other pedestrian then said "hey, i told you!!" indeed he had, but i hadn't paid attention.

anyway, arbella is now realizing that she is enjoying borrowed time. she imagines that had the white car struck her, she would now be deader than a doornail (thanks, charles dickens), and everything that's happened since is GRAVY. so....

she's very GLAD she's here. and she's resolved to pay much more attention when she crosses the streets here. and she's resolved, also, to pay MORE attention to the other pedestrians/passengers on this ship of fools......

god love y'all....life is indeed short, and fragile, and precious. how completely arbella tends to ignore this....


"

laff-o-matic

Need a chuckle?

My favorite political cartoonist, the Post-Gazette's Rob Rogers, has this gem:

"Washington DC"

This afternoon in the National Gallery book shop area, I was browsing the various displays while waiting for my companion to arrive. (The companion was struggling past various blockades set up in preparation for handling the crowds at the coming Inauguration.)

There was one nice display of fold-out maps of our nation's capitol, so I picked up the various samples and unfolded them. Now, Washington DC officially comprises some 61 square miles with almost 10,000 people per square mile. However, these foldout maps of "Washington DC" show only a very small part of town: basically, a reader of these maps could conclude that DC is nothing more than the Capitol Mall area plus the immediately surrounding neighborhoods: Capitol Hill to the east; Adams Morgan, Columbia Heights (just barely), Dupont Circle, and Woodley Park to the north; the Waterfront to the south; and Foggy Bottom and Georgetown to the west.

'Tain't so! Petworth, my new neighborhood, isn't even on these maps. I was glad to see the Columbia Heights metro stop, which is the one directly to the south of us, made at least one foldout map. Maybe this is thanks to the new shopping mall and its Target store there.

One of my former coworkers at Gally lives not too far away from me, and she calls the whole area "Midtown." Shades of NYC? Well, Midtown NYC is mostly business--Rockefeller Center, the Empire State Building, etc. DC's Midtown is largely residential.

Interesting. Also, I checked out my Petworth address' walking score (85), and it's higher than my Georgetown address' (78). One thing that's for sure: Petworth's accessibility to public transportation is much better than Georgetown's. This doubtless helps the walking score, which basically measures how easy is it to live without a car.

Try this on your Irony Meter,,,,

The old Irony Meter has had a workout this week.

Today is the anniversary of my baptism. God's "happy anniversary" gift to me was "You're Likeable Enough, Gay People," today's NYT column by Frank Rich. I especially like that he points out gays were thrown under the bus by "sweet-talking swindler" Bill Clinton. Actually, as I remember it, Hillary also participated in this. When I didn't really have $10 a month to spare, I willingly contributed it to Hillary who at the time was making her first forays into fundraising for her US senate campaign. Then, having harvested quite a bit of $$ from the gay community, she supported Bill's "Defense of Marriage" act. And I'll leave it to you to explain just HOW Bill Clinton could figure he qualified as a defender of marriage.

Earlier this week, I was privileged to be at a friend's house as she was preparing for Christmas Eve dinner. Christmas music was playing on her radio, and she paused in her chopping (!) to tell me that the selection playing at that very moment was one of King Henry VIII's favorites. Ah, yes. Henry loved Christmas carols in addition to wassail. Such a kind-hearted, loving Christian. The Pope actually called Henry the Defender of the Faith, but presumably that was before Henry threw the RC church under the bus when they wouldn't give him a divorce.

Irony, irony everywhere....

It's here again! Merry Christmas!!

For those of you who are not just dreaming of a white Christmas, here's my favorite version of the old Bing Crosby classic:



Yes, indeed....May your days be merry and bright!!!

International Understanding

The snow reports are flying in here to sunny DC, and they are saying things like "more than 20cm of snow expected today, 13cm has fallen so far...." (for which, thanks to Rook's Nest).

It's certainly not my fault that all the snow is falling north of here, and that the reporters live even farther north, as in Canada.

I may be faulted for not knowing wot they mean precisely by a "cm" of snow. I fear I'm not alone in this, either. We Ugly Americans are well known for our ignorance of life (and the metric system) outside our borders.

Thus, in the interests of fostering international understanding, I've placed a metric converter on the side of my blog. You can convert practically any measure you can think of to practically any OTHER measure.

When Rook's Nest says more than 20 cm of snow is expected, you can go the metric conversion chart and learn that this means almost 8 inches of snow--on top of the 5 inches they've had so far. In other words, they're floundering around in about a foot of snow up there.

My goodness!!

Elf Yourself a Merry Little Christmas UPDATE: MORE ELVES!!

To all my family, friends, and readers: A Dance to Christmas Fun
by Mary E. (short for Elf). May you have a lot of it!!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

UPDATE: here's my niece Lu's two kids and their grandparents!!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

UPDATE 2: Here's little Mia!!

Go,go,go!!

Welcome to Georgia, Yurrup!

I swear to the goddess, it's just more fun every day finding out how provincial and WRONG i am about most things. Guess this must be why it's good to embrace change in one's life. it expands your margin of error, if nothing else.

this is day 4 of my official residence in the new apartment. i got to show the building engineer my new "gilbert shortcut" mini tool with scissors. he was telling me he would come soon to tighten the screws on the bottom lock on my door, but i told him i'd done it myself...with the wonderful little tool martha sent me for my birthday. the building engineer doesn't know yet what a hardware freak i am, but he's got me beat on several fronts: e.g., he has a snake for the bathtub drain, and it's on a wheeled cart!

and i've come to the realization that the safeway store behind our building sells all that smithfield ham, scrapple (in many flavors!!),and chitterlings because most of the people in this neighborhood have roots in GEORGIA. (we live on the intersection of Quincy and Georgia NW). four days ago, i thought safeway was just providing an outlet for the kind of ham that other, p.c. DC residents wouldn't touch with a 10-foot pole. but cathy tells me her mom always said smithfield was the BEST ham. "they fed those hogs peanuts!!"

and today, cathy said, as she was unpacking books and shelving them on the bookshelves on the porch, "this apartment reminds me of Europe." Yurrup!? why? "because of the street sounds." now that i think of it, i never heard the street sounds from below in the wonderful apartment in Montmartre, but that's cuz i was deaf last time we were there. I'd been sucking eggs cuz i no longer could hear the little birds in the trees outside my condo. But Yurrup!!!

speaking of safeway...they sell steak over there for $1.99 a pound (though no NY strip steaks or tenderloins) and the last time i checked the price of steak in my former neighborhood, it was either $15.99 or $19.99, depending on the grade (US Prime or US Choice). there's nothing wrong with US Good, though, which this appears to be. It's just not as fatty.

there are still unopened boxes everywhere, but it's beginning to feel like home. it IS home. mine.

Gran's great Xmas gifts for 2008

Are you just waking up from the chaos in your life to realize that CHRISTMAS IS COMING, THE GEESE ARE GETTING FAT? And that you haven't sent one card, present, tub of Omahas, or thin slice of US currency? Calm yourself. There's plenty of time....hey, the USPS is still on the job!

Here's Gran's 2008 suggestions for gifts, and this year, Gran is taking the economy into account. Nothing here over $25-$30 or so.

1) Can of tennis balls. So what if they don't play tennis? Do they have a dog? Do they need to strengthen their wrists? Do they like to bounce a ball while they wait for public transportation?

2) Obama apparel: t-shirt, hat, sweatshirt, muffler. The Inauguration is coming, and it's still in January. (Maybe Obama can do something about THAT, too.)

3) New USD$2 bill. Heeey....this has historical value in this momentous year of social and cultural change. [Grannies: do the math...if you have 7 grandkids like Xtreme English, the usual tab for those crisp bills for the little mutts' cards is $350. With the new USD$2 bill, it'd be $14!! tadatadatadabingbinglebing (sound of grandma doing a bit of tarantella on top of the kitchen table). One of the banks, which shall be nameless, has a post on "Top ten gifts for Christmas." In it, they seriously badmouth giving cash as thoughtless and disrespectful; they suggest giving a nice CD at 3%. Isn't that just like a bank? I think this one was founded by Scrooge and Marley, or is it Marley and Scrooge?

4) Disposable digital camera. They can take pictures this Christmas and send them to the relatives they didn't invite.

5) Whole Foods Gift Card. Forget the bulky Omaha Steaks. A Whole Foods Gift Card can be purchased online, shipped in an envelope, and redeemed at any WF store anywhere. Unlike steaks, they never go bad or expire. Maybe your giftees don't eat meat or cooked food....they will love you when they buy their cans of tuna or bags of raw organic carrots with their WF Gift Card. Maybe they'll even have enough left for a bottle of Mad Dog 50/50!!

6) Homemade cookies. Well, that's ambitious...maybe just cookies. A case of Oreos?? As they say in real estate parlance, it shows well. Looks nice all wrapped up.

7) A year's subscription to Street Sense, the best newspaper in DC--"Where the Washington Area's poor and homeless earn and give their two cents." An annual subscription is $40, which is above our limit, but you can buy a copy of Street Verses, a compilation of vendor writings and poetry for just $12.50 (including shipping).

8) A DVD of "Pauwel's Circus," a documentary that takes a look at a family of European clowns whose heritage in the circus world stretches back more than a century. This was a fabulous little film, although I do confess I snoozed on and off through all but the first and last five minutes. I'm still looking for the piece of paper the filmmaker herself gave me last Sunday. It has the address of the distributor in Belgium....More on this later.

9) Did I mention cards? A Christmas card is very popular this time of year. Xtreme English stopped sending them in bulk back about the time she quit ironing and making her bed, but people do love to get them, especially with a letter inside, which has the added value of being a nice surprise.

10) A Bhangra DVD or download. Bhangra is Punjabi folk music and dance that is taking the dance clubs by storm. This is happy music, peeps! Great for workouts...more fun than the tarantella. Here's a sample:

The Usual Suspects....

i keep visiting my regular blog stops and finding GREAT POSTS!!

like yesterday's "When Fruit Flies Go Bad" in Snail's Tales -- if you go there, be sure to click the domestic associates link...

and today's Red Nose which has a great photo of BRICKHENGE -- Red Nose has signed up with Holidailies, so that means she has to produce a new post every day during the holiday season, or something like that. More for us!!

and "Santa Claus Parade 1 and 2" in Rook's Nest -- you will find much concern over the pipe band's bare knees!

and a totally touching post, "the world's fastest dog slows me down" on Five String Guitar. I'm betting that Speeder can cure cancer.

i will go get my keys to the new place tomorrow, and if i can remember it, i'll take my camera along to record the space before i fill it with my stuff. the movers bring the bulk of it on saturday afternoon, and the cable co. will be there sometime on saturday also--between 5 and 8 pm...gack!

HTBC*

I was meandering among the blogs this a.m....checked in at kokopelliwoman, whose blog is chock full of great posts (esp on politics and music) and who (once she returns from vacation) has promised to do a meme as requested by Kay. This morning I discovered a widget for gapingvoid: cartoons drawn on the back of business cards down on the right side of her blog. It's probably been there all along, but I've been, ah, busy rearranging my livelihood, life, and living quarters (more like dimes).

The creator of gapingvoid is Hugh MacLeod, whose profile says this:

Short Version: I draw cartoons and create "Blue Monsters" for a living.

Long Version: Besides "cartoons drawn on the back of business cards", my main gig is Marketing Strategist for Stormhoek, a small South African vineyard, whose Web 2.0 approach to wine making is currently getting a lot of international attention in the wine trade.

My other main interest at the moment has been working with Microsoft on The Blue Monster Project, which has all to do with finding new ways to get the company to tell its story better.

The most-read page on gapingvoid is "How To Be Creative"*, with "The Hughtrain" ["The market for something to believe in is infinite"] running a distant second. My favorite page on the site is this one, where I talk about some of my favorite early biz-card cartoons, and what inspired the thinking behind them.

Here are only some of these great tips:

#9 Everybody has their own private Mount Everest they were put on this earth to climb.

#19 Sing in your own voice.

#22 Nobody cares. Do it for yourself.

I also love his cartoons on the backs of business cards. I still must have a couple hundred business cards from all my various jobs with titles. It's always seemed a shame to just throw them out when my title changed, though that's usually what I did. When I was packing to move, however, I did find some strays pockets of business cards.
Opportunities are everywhere!!!

Swell Management!

I stopped by my future apartment today to pick up some mail and check on the progress of the "cleaning and painting" being done on my new home.

There was a CREW of 3 or 4 people...some painting, some laying new kitchen tile, another laying new bathroom tile. Every room in my apt will be NEWLY refurbished by next week sometime.

The apartment management company, Bernstein Management, operates apartment buildings in DC, MD, and VA. I looked at apts in three of them, and every single place was shiny clean and in perfect repair.

I told the building manager today that I'd never seen anything like this outside of a convent!

The convent in which I spent my handful of years in religious life was really three buildings: the novitiate, the provincial ("pro") house, and the home of the old and infirm sisters.

The upkeep of the buildings was in the strong, chapped hands of one Sister Harriet. Sister Harriet, despite her enormous responsibilities and long hours, actually was retired--from hospital administration--and living out her days at a less strenuous, if not exactly leisurely, pace.

Sir Alexander Fleming, famous for describing and naming Penicillin, visited Sister Harriet's hospital one time and said, "Sister, this is the cleanest hospital I've ever seen in my entire life." I don't recall if she swooned or not, but if Sister Harriet was fond of mops & buckets before this event, she loved them devotedly after that. And she never hesitated to use strong measures to keep dirt at bay.

Once or twice a year, she gave each of the novices a package of steel wool and a bottle of powerful wax remover. She sent us out into the corridors to remove the floor wax that had built up by the walls and in the corners during weekly buffing by heavy floor polishers. Since we had taken the vow of poverty, there were none of the rubber gloves sported by the likes of Donna Reed and other middle-class housewife types on TV. (There was no TV, either.)

After a day of floor wax removal, none of us would have been able to leave a fingerprint since the whorl things on our fingertips had been eaten away by the steel wool and cleaning potion. It was always a relief to wake up the next morning and find that our fingernails were no longer soft and gummy.

Books talk a lot about the "odor of sanctity" in convents. What people are smelling is not sanctity....it's soap. I'm looking forward to moving into the good, clean smell of a freshly painted and refurbished apartment next week. If that's sanctity, I'll take it.

More Good Reads....Some also in print

**Snail's Tales has another great post today on the way many religionists behave when someone suggests an alternative point of view.

**And the December 11 issue of Rolling Stone has two great "National Affairs" articles:

"The Last Recount" by Matt Taibbi..."In Al Franken's race in Minnesota, blue and red tangle for the final time in the Bush era"

"Same-Sex Setback" by Tim Dickinson..."Don't blame Mormons or black voters--the California activists who tried to stop Prop 8 ran a lousy campaign." (Hmm...Too bad the movie "Milk" didn't come out before the election....wonder why not? You don't have to be paranoid these days, but it helps!)

**And serendipitously relating to a previous post, "Rethinking Living Arrangements," in TIME GOES BY recently, the cover article of the December 1 2008 NEW YORK magazine, "Alone Together" by Jennifer Senior, discusses "The Loneliness Myth."

Personally, I learned fairly early in life never to be afraid of loneliness...it's always a huge opportunity to make friends, even if only with yourself.

Fascinating statistic: guess how many households in NYC consist of one person living alone. It's, um, one in 2!!!

Good Reads....updated already!

Not having much time to assemble my own thoughts these days, I nevertheless am keeping up with my favorite blogs. For especially thought-provoking posts, check out A Little Red Hen on AIDS prevention and Kay's Thinking Cap on the Founding Fathers' views on religion. For a stunning photo of the beach in broad daylight, check out Red Nose. Blogging in Paris has another fine photo accompanied by a great poem....

There's more, natcherly, but I think the bylaws of Blogging Without...what was that, anyway?...Guilt? say you only have to do what you want or can manage.

As my friend Irmgard says, "'Til soon...."

UPDATE: Soon is already here. For an excellent post on science vs. religion, check out Snail's Tales.