chicago '08

I may as well buy the glasses and get the beehive now. this is where my face is headed.

I miss these people. I have been thinking about my grandparents lately, especially my grandmothers. there were never 2 more different women. I remind myself of Gram when I put coffee grounds on the bushes, obsess about wasting electricity, and sweep the porch.

I think of Memaw when I powder my face, have a cocktail, and am drawn to tacky yard ornaments, like fake deer. also when I eat okra or black-eyed peas.

I think we're going to a talk next friday. it will be our first official yale event. (except for a student film club screening that ended horribly when they tried to project VHS, and you would have thought the world was ending.) I have been working to prepare Hugsband for the talk. we're going to see David Lynch, the director, discuss meditation. the problem is that Hugsband loves asking questions, and I imagine a scenario in which the audience is encouraged to inquire about the finer points of transcendental meditation. Hugsband will raise his hand and query, "is it true that during the filming of eraserhead you also worked a paper route?" when he went to see Gunner Hanson, Leatherface from texas chain saw masacre, Hugsbanad practically had to be escorted out of the building for diarrhea of the mouth. his questions flowed nonstop. he was even trying to get the guy next to him to ask some of his questions. I can imagine it now, "Wifey, ask David Lynch who he likes better, Isabella Rosellini or Laura Dern."

I bet it's Isabella.

we witnessed some natural drama on the backporch this afternoon. actually, it wasn't that natural. Hugsband caught the fly and put it in the web in order to see the spider in action.

my car window is finally fixed. when I called around to price it, I was told that it would cost over $200. when Abe asked how much I was going to pay for the window (and he asks how much I pay for EVERYTHING), he was outraged and yelled at us. "why you didn't ask me first?!" Abe said that he would take care of it. two days later, he gave me a business card and said, "take it here. they do it for $159." when I dropped off the car the next day, the woman asked if that was my landlord who had come in and demanded lower pricing. when I admitted that it was, she said, "he's quite a character. he was in here arguing all afternoon. I told him there's absolutely no way I can make it any cheaper." I had no idea he would actually go into different shops and haggle about the cost of our window. he's very protective of his tennants.

when I saw Abe today, he asked about whether I like the replacement glass. he told me that he remembers paying $10 for a window. "only $10! that guy was going to come here and fix it and it not take even one hour and it cost $200! do you make $200? you're a doctor and you don't make $200. why that guy can charge $200?"

we went to the beinecke library today. it is built of a type of marble that allows light to pass through it. the book tower, six glass-enclosed stories in the middle of the building, are accessible only to librarians. in the event of a fire, they have a few minutes to escape the glass enclosure before the oxygen is sucked out in an attempt to save the books.

on our bike ride tonight, we saw at least 40 nighthawks soaring over Yale's practice fields. we used to see their outlines and hear them in the dark in bloomington, but this evening it was still light out. yet another tactic to get Hugsband out of the house!

I am starting a comedy routine. it will be delivered in the style of Jeff Foxworthy, but don't let that scare you away. rather than point out identifying features of rednecks, I plan to illustrate reasons why various bands cannot be called punk. for example, you cannot be called punk when your band's clothes are provided by dior. you cannot be called punk when you star in romantic comedies. you cannot be called punk when your hair stylist charges $300 per cut. that sort of thing. I have never claimed to be a punk expert, nor have I aspired to be one, but it doesn't take a Jeff Foxworthy to point out these things.

overheard from the mouth of my Hugsband: "well, anyway...happy birthday, Mom. when you get that present, don't throw anything away. there's a rebate I want to send in and I need the UPC."

we were in Hugsband heaven tonight. we went on a bat walk with a park ranger/ naturalist. it was well advertised as a free outing, but we were the only people who showed up. the ranger was very nice, answering our numerous questions. he told us that bats are more closely related to humans than to mice.

I joked with my coworkers that the only way to get Hugsband to go for a walk with me is to make it into some kind of animal search. looking for bats and nighthawks after dark, bird watching in the morning, snake walks in the heat of the day, looking for box turtles in the woods, checking on that cocoon 2 streets over any time, seeing what those naughty wild parrots are up to at dusk- I have a range of tactics.

we spent labor day at a clam bake on the sound. that's what you want to hear, isn't it? well, we really spent labor day eating an enormous breakfast at 11am at an Ilona-tastic diner in a nearby small town. breakfast was followed by a nap so long that it took 3 hours to shake the grogginess.

I reunited with Abe. he's back from 3 weeks in the czech republic. he gave me an enthuiastic hug that, were he 10 years younger, would have bordered on creepy. (he once told Hugsband that 'I don't like skinny girls; more like that is good' with a gesture towards me. compliment? I think not.)

I finally got my sherry hour invitation from the director of the clinic. turns out sherry hour is in the middle of the afternoon, and I will see clients after. I love doing play therapy with alcohol on my breath.

Hugsband is in the process of calling all of the parents of his students. it's very cute to watch. all of the parents are pleasantly surprised and a little chatty. the school is quite racially diverse (35% white, 31% black, 9% latino, 25% asian), and the grade levels are divided by ability. they might as well be divided by skin color. it's really terrible. I don't understand why in 2005 such disparities still exist, and I really don't know why the school would insist on separating kids by 'ability' (it should be called 'experience') when the curriculum is the same for everyone. one of Hugsband's colleagues was calling the classes 'high' and 'low', and Hugsband suggested they find something else to call them. sadly, he could call them 'has means to get out of town in case of natural disaster' and 'would be stuck because of limited resources'. certainly, I saw things like this is LA and chicago, but the disparities in new haven are even more striking. it's enough to send me on another month long vacation on my ranch in texas with my head up my ass.