Trip Commentary

First, a general comment: all 4 flights were booked to capacity. Not one empty seat on any flight. Sardines-in-a-Can syndrome is the new business model, accompanied by news articles in the on-board magazines about how expensive it is to operate an airline. And, as a matter of fact, the day of my return flight is the same day that my airline company announced that it was filing for bankruptcy protection.

Commenting on arrivals/departures: arriving early at a gate means that your plane filled with anxious flyers who want to deplane sits on the tarmac because all the gates are already filled with other anxious flyers who want to push back from the same gate your plane is trying to occupy. The joy at hearing the captain announce that we're 20 minutes early evaporates instantly.

Commenting on baggage fees: the way to avoid the $25 bag fee charged by American Airlines appears to be to stack up as much luggage as you can, breeze confidently through all the alleged screening lines, including the little stand that informs the traveler that all carry-on bags have to fit between the metal bars, then go to the head of the line of passengers wanting to board and feign ignorance when told that you cannot possibly carry all that luggage on board -- and must gate check it. See, using this little trick, you get to check your baggage BUT you don't have to pay the checked baggage fee!! Voila: not only does the savvy traveler get to fly the bags free, but they get to carry on several huge, bulky items, including over-sized duffel bags stuffed with all their worldly possessions.

How did I learn this little trick? Because I cannot lift my bag (which legally fits inside an overhead compartment, by the way) into said overhead compartment, I checked it when I checked in and was shocked to find I had to pay the $25 fee to check my one lonely, legal-sized carry-on bag. When I questioned the "free bag" idea, the clerk smiled and charged my credit card. After talking to seasoned flyers and paying attention to what all the scofflaws were doing, I followed suit and carried my bag to the gate on the trip home. Being in Group 4 for boarding, it is obvious that there will be no overhead bin space left for me upon my boarding, so I went brazenly to the gate and requested a gate check for my bag. Mission accomplished with no fee -- and my bag made it off the plane quicker than I at my destination.

Commenting on boarding: why on earth does first class board first? So we peasants in the cheaper seats can file past the elite, bumping their elbows, staring at them to see if we recognize "anyone" worth recognizing? Has no one thought about boarding from the back to the front? Or from the window seats to the middle seats, and then to the aisle seats? I was the middle on the way to, so moved the arm rests up and out of the way so I could get out when the other row sharers arrived. It amused me to see how quickly the arms came back down after they had claimed their spaces; I usually leave the arms up so we all have more elbow room. On the way coming back, I was the aisle, so I was the person bumped by every single person who walked down the aisle and back, as well as that damned beverage cart that also blocks in 8 rows of passengers at a time and will NOT be moved to accommodate anyone who has to go to the bathroom or deal with a child's dirty diaper.

Commenting on passengers: I recently read about the parents who are complaining about the "kiddie ghettoes" created at the back of planes when young children and their parents are forced to sit in the last rows to minimize the disruption to other passengers. On the flight to my destination, there were a few children; on the two legs returning home, the first leg surrounded me with a total of 5 lively, squirming, babbling, kicking children who threw snacks on the floor, screamed when they dropped their toys, leaned over the top of the seat where they were being held by a parent and reached out for the hapless traveler seated behind them. One child, noticing that I had "nothing" to do, handed me his storybook and demanded that I read him a story. When I politely refused, he complained to his mother, who was absorbed in her own book and ignored him. When he again handed me his book and told me to read to him, I told him to tell his mother to read as she seems to enjoy reading.

But my favorite mom was seated behind me on the way home, the selfish bitch mom who is used to the world accommodating her needs. After being interrupted by her very young female child (probably 4 years of age) who had to go potty, the mother told her to wait until she was done with her conversation, assuring the child that it's rude to interrupt mommy when she's talking on the phone (we had not yet departed). Of course, the child had to go potty, so the war began between taking care of a child's needs and making mommie happy. It escalated when the child wanted to play with mommie's I-Pad, but mommie screamed at her, loudly and quite suddenly, "No! No! No! That's NOT the way MOMMIE plays that game! Give me MY I-Pad. If you can't play the game the right way, you can't play it at all!"

Now, let's not get into the discussion about the appropriateness of entertaining a child with an I-Pad and focus on the lesson mommie teaches the daughter, a lesson that came back to mommie not too much later when the child changed the language on the I-Pad and mommie goes beserk. After mommie's tantrum, she demands of the child to explain why she changed the language. The child's answer was simple: because that's the way she likes HER I-Pad, so DON'T TOUCH IT!! "Leave it alone, mommie," the daughter told her when mommie tried to grab it from her.

Commenting on common courtesy: at the beginning of the last flight, the woman seated across from me, a woman who obviously does not have children (or maybe she had children but abused them viciously), threw her I-Phone onto the floor in a rage because the "damned thing" wouldn't keep its charge, then it dropped her call, and then it connected, but she couldn't hear the party on the receiving end of the call. She retrieved it in a profanity-laced rant, then started making derogatory comments about parents who bring children onto a plane before she realized the little ones were watching her actions and listening to her very, very closely.

At the end of the flight, she jumped up before the seat belt sign was turned off and started retrieving her personal items from a bin stuffed with her belongings (is there not one single airline employee anywhere who enforces the size and quantity requirements for carry-ons?). Swinging her first bag down from the bin, she hit me with it. When I spoke up and told her to be more careful, she turned toward me and told me to "watch it" because she had to get her luggage out of the bin and she had to get off the plane because she was at her limit with the crap she had to put up with on this plane.

Yeah, I stood up and intimidated her with my size, but after staring her down, I offered to help her retrieve her belongings so we all could get off the plane in a safe and orderly manner. Then, when I had her blocked behind me, hemmed in with her half-dozen bags, I directed the family with the 3 kids to gather all their belongings and go out ahead of us, including the fuming volcano behind me. They almost argued with me, but they had heard the constant string of comments about their children, so took advantage of my kindness to round up the troops and deplane.

Commenting on the travel experience, sometimes, you don't get what you want, but other times you get what you deserve.

P-New-Moan-Ya

Nothing like flying a coupla thousand miles to spend 10 vaca days sick. I thought the worst of the cold I’d hosted for the previous 10 days was over, so climbed aboard the planes and took off for T’giving. Man plans; God laughs. Evidently, somewhere along the line I introduced either bacteria or virus into my already compromised immune system and my cold became community acquired pneumonia, which seems to be pretty common in older folks especially.

Rather than touristing hither and yon, I’ve sat on a couch, feeling awful and then much worse, and watched the Hallmark Movie Channel. My dotter admits that should have been a clue, but we missed it. Sunday, I felt like death warmed over, so dotter convinced me to go to a walk-in clinic at WalMart, citing my ashen hue as an unflattering complexion color. One look by the receptionist led to the nurse on duty coming out; she said I needed the next level up and sent me to urgent care.

They were both nice and efficient, traits not often seen in CA clinics. The doc came in, assessed the situation, diagnosed the CAP, prescribed several lines of defense against it, told me it’s okay to fly back home BUT, if I am not over it by Friday, directed me to return to an urgent care for chest x-rays and blood work.

Do I feel better? Yes. Do I feel ready to return home? No. I’m tired, really, really tired – and still am plagued with “cold” symptoms that aren’t a cold. I’ll make it home and I’ll make it to work Wednesday, then I’ll sleep until I go to work Thursday. Friday, if I’m not at least 90%, I’ll go to urgent care to find out why and go from there to well again.

Another Age-Related Tragedy?

The pilot, 82-year-old former Oklahoma State Sen. Olin Branstetter, and his 79-year-old wife, Paula, also died when the plane spiraled out of control and nosedived into the forest.

There were no survivors.

I blogged about this danger previously, noting that older pilots are engaged in plane crashes far more often than younger pilots. This time, it is an athletic coach and his assistant who are the victims of a very old pilot at the stick in an airplane. I don't want to see an 82-year-old driver behind the wheel of a car, especially on a freeway: today's auto goes far too fast far too quickly for an aged driver to react appropriately in case of emergency. Put that same old-timer behind the stick in a plane that travels in excess of 100 mph and expect the worst because statistically, that's what you're going to get!

J. Edgar: Lights, Camera, but not much Action

J. Edgar is not a bad film, but it’s also not a good film. It’s disconcerting to sit and watch a film, rather than become involved in it, but that is the J. Edgar experience for me this afternoon. I anticipated a better, more engaging movie when I saw the previews, as well as the list of actors, but the totality of the characters, the acting, and the script does not live up to my expectations.

Leonardo DeCaprio is an outstanding actor and he does a credible job in the role of J. Edgar Hoover, but the script doesn’t support his acting ability. In scenes with his film mother (Judith Dench), I had flashbacks to Psycho as the relationship is creepy in a really creepy way. When it appears she is dead (hard to tell life from death due to the make-up) and her son puts on her beads and her dress, I expected him to turn away from the mirror and be in the scene in the basement with dear old mummy in the rocking chair!

And, although I’m sure the director, Clint Eastwood, intends the sexuality to be inferred through the viewer’s point of view, the film ends up as a vehicle for “outing” J. Edgar Hoover without anyone coming out and saying “he’s so gay.” Dear old Mom hints at her own disdain for Daffodils, but it doesn’t seem as if Edgar takes her words to heart. The viewer is left to believe that Edgar and his assistant, Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer), enjoy a platonic love affair for darned near 50 years, and that strains both gay and straight credulity.

The shift from past to present is distracting, along with using writing a memoir as a tool to make the shifts. I like a story told chronologically so I can develop the "this is what happened, this is why it happened, and this is what resulted from the happening" understanding of the sequence of events. The emphasis on the Lindbergh baby kidnapping is made to become the turning point for the FBI, but it falls flat and feels unemotional and unimportant. The loyalty of his life-long secretary (Helen Gandy) and the secret secret Hoover files purportedly used to blackmail people in high places ends at a shredder; fade to black screen. Not only do I not believe that all those files were shredded, but I also don’t believe that a young, good-looking woman, Helen Gandy (Naomi Watts), would work for almost 50 years for a man who, first, asks her to marry him on date 3 and then turns his back on her to be with his more than loyal male “assistant,” Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer), who comes across as so totally gay that even those of us who don't have any sense of gaydar know that he's gay!

I was excited when I recognized the actor who plays Michael Weston (Burn Notice), but thought he was playing one of his TV role characters, rather than Robert Kennedy, when he used a phony Boston accent and brushed his hair to the side. He's much more believable on Burn Notice than he is as Robert Kennedy.

See? Even trying to hit the high points reveals that there aren’t many and they aren’t very high. Best scene in the movie? Toss-up between Edgar’s reaction to his mother’s death and/or Tolson's reactions to Edgar’s death – and someone has to die to make the scenes work. Yeah.

Updating the Lucky Rooster

Nope, I didn't win the big one, but a couple down the highway hit the lottery for $20 million!! On the other hand, I didn't lose either: I hit 2 of my 5 quick picks for 3 numbers each, a fete I've never done before, much less twice. I don't get millions, but I do get $22.00!

Yeah, I know: don't spend it all in one place.

One Special Day for the Rooster

Yesterday was touted as a special day for being lucky, with all the one’s in a row. On Wednesday, my international student from China brought me lunch, and as we shared a delicious feast and spicy chat, he revealed that because I am a Rooster in the Chinese zodiac, it could be a great day for me in many ways, including financial reward. Huzzah! After the thousand dollar vet hit, I could use some financial reward, AND the girls were meeting at a local casino for the all-you-can-eat buffet, just what all of us need prior to gorging during T’giving eating celebrations. With the stars aligned with such potential, it was all systems go.

I decided to walk on the wild side and tucked a twenty into the spending compartment of my wallet and off I went. First, we all signed up for a casino card because we each saved 10% at the buffet: ka-ching. Then, I decided to put my four dollar bills into the penny slots outside the buffet line and, ka-ching, I won $9.00! Of course, the biggest win of the day was the next hour spent sampling the buffet, but when it was time to leave, one of the gals and I decided to spend our way back to the exit. Yep: one dollar in and $10 back, so I left clutching my cash in hand and had a ball in the process.

Deciding that I had something to crow about, I stopped at one of the convenience gas stations that sell all the lottery items and bought 5 scratchers and 5 quick picks for Saturday’s drawing. Another ka-ching: spent $5 on scratchers and had a $5 winner. Won’t know about the quick picks, but I’ve already had so much fun risking it all for instant wealth that regardless of the outcome, it’s been a hoot.

Before You Ring the Bell

Workplace politics make it challenging to report a colleague/co-worker for any suspicious behavior and/or suspected wrong-doing, especially if the colleague/co-worker is an accomplished liar. My personal ethics require me to go to the mat to right what is wrong, but I learned over a lifetime that there are far more protections for the wrong-doer than for the reporter. Reporting can cost the reporter not just the job, but put him/her on the receiving end of a spotlight that taints an entire career.

Joe Paterno has been fired for doing what he most likely was required to do: report an alleged crime to school personnel. Had he dialed 9-1-1 as many suggest he should have done, he may have been fired on the spot from the fall-out of his accusations based solely on alleged victim's statements years after the fact. Instead, he followed protocol and is now fired for reporting alleged crimes up the chain of command. Do or don't do and the result is the same: the alleged perpetrators have all the protections of the law, while anyone standing between them and the alleged victims are fair game to be dragged into the fray.

During my career, I submitted written allegations against colleagues for conduct unbecoming, unprofessional, and illegal. My actions gained me a negative reputation, and one administrator told me I was a trouble-maker and to mind my own business. After vicious rumors spread like wildfire about me, including that I was having sex with both students and colleagues in an office next to my classroom during lunch, an accusation that any one of the dozen or so students in my classroom with me during that time would have refuted, I decided to keep my mouth shut and relocated to another worksite.

Message sent and received: henceforth, I minded my own business to the best of my ability.

A specific instance of physical abuse against a child got me into even hotter water when the male student arrived at class with what looked like evidence of a fierce fist-fight. When I asked him what had happened, he told me that he and his father had gotten into it -- and he came out on the losing side of the argument. As a mandated reporter, I reported to Social Services; later that day, I was called into an administrator's office to join the admin, a deputy, the student, and his father. End result: the father told me to mind my own damned business because his "boy" is 18 years old, old enough to serve his country and to be a man, and if he couldn't take a punch, he was no son of his.

Message sent and received: henceforth, I minded my own business to the best of my ability.

A colleague was accused of providing drugs and engaging in a homosexual relationship with a student. I knew nothing except after the fact, refused to discuss what I thought I knew, and received a subpoena to testify in the trial. I stated that the male student fantasized constantly about his homosexuality, sharing wild stories about this person and that, but that I had NO SPECIFIC KNOWLEDGE of anything involving this student and this teacher, which was the truth. The male teacher was found not guilty of all allegations except providing pot to the student, but my reputation was trashed with innuendo by the prosecutor that the male teacher and I were involved in a sexual relationship and I was covering for him. The fact that the alleged sexual activity at the core of the trial was homosexual did not factor into the accusations: trashing me somehow proved that the allegations against a colleague were somehow true.

Message sent and received: henceforth, I minded my own business to the best of my ability.

No bell can be unrung, so it's difficult to decide whether to pull the rope or walk away. If I don't know from first-hand involvement, I walk away because I've learned my lessons the hard way: all people lie, cheat and steal to advance their own agenda and will gladly and forcefully throw anyone under the bus to save their own ass. And, young people also lie, cheat and steal to advance their own agenda. Young people live in a fantasy world wherein they create tangled scenarios that involve unsuspecting people in sometimes shocking situations; before the truth can be unwound, the people unwittingly involved in these fantasies can be dragged into situations about which they either knew nothing or participated peripherally.

Are the adults always innocent? No, of course not -- but is Justin Beiber the father of a baby or is it just another sick girl's fantasy being played out on a very public stage? Were any of the college athletes accused of a gang rape of an alleged prostitute ever found guilty? No, the charges were dropped -- finally -- as unfounded. We rush to judgment based on our own emotional agenda, rather than waiting to let the truth come to the surface of all the media mudslinging.

Unfortunately, both Joe Paterno and the President of Penn State, as well as others caught in the shoulda, woulda, coulda now share my knowledge at the expense of their careers, as well as their personal and professional reputations. They have no protection of the courts, but the persons accused of the actual crimes can take the heat off themselves by fanning the fires that consume other lives. I'm not sure how justice is served by firing Paterno and the President, but I do know how it puts the spotlight on the mandated reporters' alleged failure to do ... something, rather than on the alleged perpetrators of an alleged crime.

By the time justice may be served, it will be far too late on far too many levels for far too many people.

Nov 9: First Fire of Fall

Chilly, crisp night that turned dark early, nary a star in the sky, but the almost glow off to the west of the set sun. One-third of a fire log, a cushion on the wrought iron bench, and Mia's blankie next to us, Daisy and I curled up and watched the fire, the night sky, the plane lights, and the first twinkling of the stars.

It takes a lot to get better than this.

Early Bird

Perhaps Daisy is just preparing for T’giving dinner or maybe she’s suffering from Post Traumatic Dog Attack Syndrome, but she caught, killed, and brought into the living room one of the doves that frequents the backyard bird bath. I don’t like to think of my little girl being so aggressive, but she did turn on the attacking German Shepherd when it took down Mia. She’s no shrinking violet about defending her people and her territory, although I don't see the yard doves as enemies, but a beautiful part of the landscape.

After I removed the bird and cleaned up the mess, Daisy and Mia went outside to bask in the sunshine. I’ve kept Mia’s E-collar snugly fastened around her neck to protect the stitches and the drains until her return appointment Friday, so didn’t think too much about it when the two dogs cuddled together and Daisy began grooming Mia. Imagine my surprise when Mia came back in minus every one of the stitches! Somehow, she must have talked Daisy into pulling out the stitches; thankfully, the drains are still in place.

I cleaned the wound site and it is healing just fine, even without the stitches. We’re going to take our first walk this morning since the attack, but we’ll make it a short walk and not take any of the routes we know are populated with wandering dogs – which is challenging in a neighborhood where far too many dogs have been left behind when the residents abandoned their homes.

Nope: no call-back from Animal Control. I guess the residents were more convincing in telling lies than I was in telling the truth.

It's a Crime

Mia, Daisy and I were attacked by a German Shepherd in the front yard of a home by which we were passing during our early morning walk Sunday. The dog came at us from behind, chomping Mia’s haunch in its huge jaws and pinning her to the ground.

When Daisy went into attack mode to protect us, the dog dropped Mia’s haunch, clamped its jaws onto Daisy's neck, and began to take her toward the front porch, pulling me to the ground knees-first in the process. What saved Daisy was her sweatshirt, which the dog held onto rather than Daisy’s neck. As I scrambled to get Daisy free, hitting the German Shepherd repeatedly with a strong stick I carry and screaming at the top of my lungs, Mia was still on the ground where the dog had left her. Thankfully, a man from across the street ran to the property to distract the Shepherd, who dropped Daisy before he got all the way to the porch. I grabbed Daisy and Mia's leash and we took off down the street. A woman watching the scene yelled to ask if we were okay, but I just wanted to get the hell out of there as fast as I could, so yelled back, “I don’t know” and kept running toward the corner.

When we arrived back home, I saw the gaping wound in Mia’s haunch, examined it, and decided that I’d better take her to a vet because I didn’t know if the attacking dog had shots or a disease. After calling 5 facilities and getting the same referral to an emergency vet hospital down Valley, I called and said we were on our way. Thankfully, Daisy was okay, shaken up and trembling, but not injured, so she crawled into her canvas casita and stayed home while Mia and I drove the 40 miles to the pet ER. Yes, I was shocked almost speechless when the low estimate for services was $1000, but the high estimate was $1400. I could not risk my dog’s welfare by refusing the necessary treatment for her injury, so I pulled out a credit card when they would not examine Mia without the low estimate paid in full. I did, however, write onto the estimate that I would not pay more than a total of one thousand dollars, so they would have to adjust their services accordingly, to which the vet agreed, and Mia went off to the ER and I headed back home to wait.

I called the local police dispatch to report the attack when I got back home, but the lukewarm response let me know it’s no big deal. He could take a report if I wanted, but I really needed to call Animal Control as it isn’t a police matter, especially since I was vague on the details, such as whose dog it was that attacked us. Realizing it would do me no good to argue, I drove back to scene, took down addresses, and walked across the street to the front door of the house where the woman had been and from which I believe the man who ran across the street also had come. I assured them that I don’t want to get anyone into trouble, but I want to know whose dog it is so I can inform Animal Control, the agency that can make the owners keep it contained. The woman told me that she’s seen the dog in the front yard at the house across the street where we were attacked.

Monday morning, I called Animal Control and left the details, including my contact info. Sure enough, I got a call from the AC officer “investigating” the case, but he was at a standstill because he visited the house and talked to the residents. He toured a fenced yard with a large permanent kennel and told me that he’s sure the dogs there could not get out of their surroundings.

When he questioned me, he indicated that there really was not enough “evidence” to support my accusations because I didn’t know definitively whether it was a German Shepherd (even though I clarified that I knew for certain that it was a German Shepherd), whether it was male or female, whether it had long or short fur, the pattern of dark/light fur, how much it weighed (although I said it seemed to be a bit bigger than Mia, who weighs 80 pounds), and/or whether it came from that property or somewhere else because it came from behind us.

At that point, I stopped him and asked if he had ever been attacked by a large dog, to which he admitted he has. I asked if he had taken the time during his fight for life to note the genitalia of the animal attacking him, which got a slight smile and a more sympathetic ear. He admitted that the residents have 2 German Shepherds, a male (about the size of Mia) and a female (who is a bit bigger than Mia), but they assured him that their dogs never get out of the yard surrounded with a 5’ wooden fence. Well, I argued back, that fence would be nothing for a determined German Shepherd to clear with a running jump, so unless they keep the dogs kenneled, I’m sticking with my story that it’s one of their dogs that attacked us.

That’s when he also admitted that the residents weren’t home Sunday, so they have no idea whether their dogs were behind the fence or in the front yard attacking me and my 2 dogs as we walked by the house. I, however, have physical evidence of my knee injuries, as well as my dog’s injury and vet bill, and a witness to the attack who has also observed the same dogs in the front yard on many occasions. Thus, the preponderance of the evidence indicates that … it’s those dogs at that house. I asked the AC office to DO SOMETHING because next time it could be a child that dog attacks. Had I not been able to beat off the dog with the stick I carried, I doubt that I could have saved either Daisy or myself; a child would not stand a chance against the ferocity of the attack we were subjected to by this dog.

And that’s the crime, that the owners will lie to protect themselves, rather than be concerned with what their dogs could do to another person or pet walking by their home on a Sunday morning.