fauxklore

I am fairly sure this is the latest I have ever done a year in review. Let’s just say that I’ve been crazy busy. Anyway, here we go in the same format I’ve used for several years now.

The worst thing that happened in 2024 was the whole fiasco with the HVAC leak in late June / early July. Which turned out to be due to a blockage from a line in a unit above mine, so didn’t involve as much money as it might have, but it was still very stressful.

Beyond that, there was also some medical stuff. Having cataract surgery was actually a really good thing. It was quite miraculous the morning after the first eye was done when I could read titles of books across the bedroom without putting on my glasses. (The second eye also went well, but that was a less dramatic change.) The knee issues that I had later in the year were also a big deal. Let’s just say I have good days and I have bad days. Getting old sucks.


Books: I read only 36 books in 2024, which is pathetically few for me. That was 14 non-fiction books and 22 fiction books. Favorites were Sleeping With the Fishes by Mary Janice Davidson, Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, Sounds Like Titanic by Jessica Chiccehotto Hindman, Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt, and a couple of Dick Francis mysteries. The worst book I read during the year was The Naked Face by Sidney Sheldon, a suspense novel full of racism and homophobia.

I didn’t manage any used bookstore runs over the year, though I did give away 4 books. I have at least 60 waiting to go out.

I belonged to three book clubs, one of which has disbanded.

As for book-related events, I went to the Moby Dick Marathon in San Francisco in October and even read one chapter (Chapter 8, The Pulpit).

Ghoul Pool: I finished 6th out of 14 players with a final score of 117 points. People I scored on were Jimmy Carter, Daniel J. Evans (unique), Shannon Doherty, Janis Paige, Jean Malaurie (unique), Bud Harrelson (unique), and Faith Ringgold (unique).

Travel: My only international trip of the year was to Portugal (Porto and Lisbon) and the Azores in May / June. But I had plenty of domestic travel. I went to New York City in late January / early February. Then to Salt Lake City in late February / early March for Roots Tech. The total solar eclipse took me to Bruceville, Texas (near Dallas) in April, including an Israeli dance camp. Also in April, I had an overnight trip to Richmond for the Virginia Storytelling Alliance gathering. In May I went to Colorado for RhinoStock (a memorial for a friend) and also had a quick trip to Indianapolis to go to a baseball game, which unfortunately got rained out. I flew back to Dallas in July for the National Puzzlers League con, adding on a train trip to Oklahoma City to go to a baseball game. In August, I went to a Jewish genealogy convention in Philadelphia, and added in a couple of days in New York City for Lollapuzzoola (and theatre going, of course). And in October, I made a quick trip to San Francisco for their Moby Dick Marathon.

Genealogy: I’ve continued mentoring members of my local Jewish genealogy society on Lithuanian Jewish genealogy. As I’ve probably mentioned before, when I was starting to do genealogy research, other people helped me, so I feel happy to be able to help other people.

In February, I went to Roots Tech, which is a large genealogy conference held annually in Salt Lake City. The most interesting thing there was the presentation on using DNA from an old envelope - amazing, but not ready for the general public yet. I also went to the IAJGS convention in Philadelphia in August, at which I finally got to meet a cousin in person, as well as doing some volunteering.

Baseball: As I mentioned above, I had a failed attempt to go to a minor league game in Indianapolis (damn rain!) but a more successful game experience in Oklahoma City in July.

Culture: I went to 10 musicals and one non-musical play. My favorites for the year were Tick … Tick .. Boom at the Kennedy Center, Harmony on Broadway, Soft Power at Signature Theatre, and Suffs on Broadway.

I saw 7 movies in theaters and two on airplanes. Favorites were Next Goal Wins, Shari and Lamb Chop, and My Penguin Friend.

Storytelling: I performed in a Better Said Than Done show in February and emceed at the Women’s Storytelling Festival in March. I told a story at the Artists Standing Strong Together New Year’s Eve storytelling show. I went to several local story swaps (some in person, some over zoom), as well as zoom story swaps in Los Angeles and in Ottawa, Canada. I saw a friend’s storytelling show as part of Artomatic. And I participated in several discussions of Grimm fairy tales.

Museums and Art: I went to an exhibit of Dorothea Lange’s photos at the National Gallery of Art with a friend (and looked at some other art in the museum afterwards). I saw a Judy Chicago retrospective at the New Museum in New York City. I went to much of Artomatic. And I went to the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza in Dallas and the American Banjo Museum in Oklahoma City.

During my trip to Portugal, I went to a stained glass museum in Porto, the Museo Nacional de Azulejo (National Tile Museum) and Oceanario (aquarium) in Lisbon, and the Museum of Myths and Legends in Sintra.

Other Stuff:

I participated in Lollapuzzoola (a crossword contest) in August. I played board games, sometimes with the National Puzzlers’ League, sometimes with people I know from the loser community. I also went to other loser events, including a few parties and a couple of brunches.

I went to Kochavim, an Israeli folk dance weekend (in association with the eclipse).

I did a tour of M&S Schmalburg’s fabric flower factory (via the New York Adventure Club).

I attended a few lectures in the Leading Jewish Minds at MIT series (over zoom). And I went to a reception for MIT president Sally Kornbluth.

I’ve probably forgotten something or other among this, but it was a weird and stressful year. And I think that compared to normal people, I still did a lot of things.

Goals: So how did I do on my 2024 goals? Frankly, not very well. I did not circumnavigate the globe going westward, though I did map out about half of a general plan for doing it, so I’ll give myself a 5% on that goal. I didn’t make it to any national parks. I also did nothing about cleaning out my saved files of genealogy emails. I read 37 books out of my goal of 80, so I get only 45% there. I did make some progress on organizing my bedroom, but I don’t have a good metric for that. I’ll estimate that I accomplished about 50%. I finished just about 2/3 of one afghan (out of a goal to finish 3 afghans) so I’ll give myself 22% on that goal. I still haven’t found my parents’ slides. I made it to one AAA ballpark (Oklahoma City), and had an attempt at going to a game in Indianapolis, which got rained out. So I’lll get 25% on my goal of 4 AAA ballparks. I did fairly well on exercise the first part of the year, but my knee injury meant that I did very little from August on, so I’ll give myself a 60%.

So, overall, I’ll give myself a rather pathetic 23% for the year.

Which brings me to goals for 2025:

• Circumnavigate the globe going westward. I think I have a plan for somewhere in the October / November time frame.
  
  
• Go to at least 4 minor league baseball games.
  
  
• Finish 4 crafts projects.
  
  
• Read 80 books, with a stretch goal of 100.
  
  
• Finish going through my parents’ photographs and slides.
  
  
• Revisit / update my life list.
  
  
• Organize genealogy files.
  
  
• Go to at least 3 national parks.
  
  
• Learn to read Hangul (Korean writing system).
  
  
• Sort through cassette tapes.
  
  

I’ve been fairly busy over the past few weeks. The biggest thing was the Women’s Storytelling Festival, which deserves its own entry. In the meantime, you can still buy a virtual ticket through April 1st and listen to 16 hours of recorded stories. Go to the WSF ticketing page.

In terms of other stuff I’ve been doing, here is what I can decipher from what I scribbled on my calendar and notebooks.

Leading Jewish Minds at MIT: Emily Pollock gave a talk on Continuities, Contradictions, and Carmina Burana: The Problem of Carl Orff. The short version of the problem with Carl Orff is that he used nationalistic language to get his teachings (primarily about pedagogy and primitivism) accepted. He was interested in the medieval, ancient Greek, and Baroque pasts, which led to him using simplified, repetitive rhythms, for example. As a result he did things like write music to replace Mendelssohn’s for A Midsummer Night’s Dream. His best known work is, of course, Carmina Burana, which is a scenic cantata (not an opera) and was based on medieval Latin poems. It premiered in Frankfurt in 1937.

That led to the question of whether or not music is political. Professor Pollock noted that, while his music was praised by Hitler, Orff was not a member of the Nazi party. The nuances have to do with historiography, i.e. how we tell the tory and music as a cultural phenomenon. She didn’t have any real answers to this. Orff is played in Israel, while Wagner is, in general, not.

Incidentally, in talking about other German music of the time, Pollock talked a little about Winfried Zillig's opera, Das Opfer, which has to do with the fatal Terra Nova expedition of 1912, during which Robert Falcon Scott and 4 of his companions died on their return from the South Pole. (By the way, the opera apparently does not include Evans, who died earlier than the others.) The intriguing part of this is that the chorus is dressed as killer penguins, who surround Oates and perform a victory dance as he walks into the storm to die. I have not actually heard this opera, but I do think the world needs more music with evil penguins gloating about human deaths.

MIT Presidential Tour: Sally Kornbluth, who has been the president of MIT for about a year, has been doing several trips to meet with alumni (and other community members) and it was Washington, DC’s turn on March 7th. This started out with drinks and hors d’oeuvres for Leadership Circle members (which has to do with how much you donate). The room where that was held was a bit awkwardly shaped, making it a bit hard to mingle, though I did have a few interesting conversations. Then we moved to the general reception area, where they had several food stations, as well as a photo booth and a 3-D printer making coasters. I liked the photo they got of me.



Eventually (after more eating and socializing), we were herded into a conference room for President Kornbluth’s talk. Well, actually, she was interviewed by Annalisa Weigel, who is a member of the MIT Corporation (and a big name in the aerospace world). I was glad they started off with the elephant in the room. Namely, we’d had an opportunity to write in questions beforehand and I am pretty sure I am not the only person who asked about safety of students in light of the Palestinian situation. I thought she had a reasonable reply, mostly focused on enforcing existing rules re: campus protests. There was a lot of stuff about how MIT will address other little issues, like climate change, before getting to some more frivolous subjects, e.g. her hobbies, which include a capella singing and making felted flowers. Eventually, we went back into the main room for coffee and dessert (which included chocolate-dipped strawberries). There was also more swag, e.g. ballcaps and tote bags. All in all, it was a nice evening out.

Book Clubs: R.E.A.D. discussed Clara and Mr. Tiffany by Susan Vreeland, which is a novel based on the life of Clara Driscoll, who designed almost all of the famous Tiffany lamps. Crones and Tomes discussed The Thread Collectors by Shauna J. Edwards and Alyson Richman. (You might recall that R.E.A.D. had done that book previously. I did not reread it, since it had been recent enough that I remembered the gist of it.) I should probably also mention that I took some time out from the Women’s Storytelling Festival to call into the TCC Book Club for our discussion of The Places In Between by Rory Stewart, which is about his walk across Afghanistan.

Medical appointment: The last of the catch-up on medical appointments was pretty routine. Mostly, I got the updated pneumonia vaccine that they give to old folks, as well as the final Hepatitis B booster and the RSV vaccine.

Artomatic: I leveraged off being in the vicinity already (for my medical appointment) to go to opening day of Artomatic. This is an art show (including visual art and performance art and films and pretty much anything, since it’s unjuried). On the way there, I stopped at Call My Mother for lunch and, while I know it’s popular, I still find it disappointing and a crime against bageldom.

Anyway, I started at the top floor and worked my way down, managing to look at about half of the displays at Artomatic before fading out. I did take a break to look at a couple of short movies, the best of which was a cartoon about a support group for cats, which resulted in all of the cats moving in with an elderly woman.

This is called “Pink Compass, True North" and is by Sarah Jane Rodman.



Unfortunately, I didn’t capture the name and artist for this sculpture, but I admired the balance and the use of shapes and colors.



This painting by Giovanni Zelaya is called “The Dream is Alive” and depicts Mae Jemison, Sally Ride, and Ellen Ochoa.



There was also a whole wall of little paintings and what looked like refrigerator magnets. depicting books with titles like “Everything I don’t like is WOKE: A book for basic dickheads” and “How to talk to your dog about The Fall of Constantinople.”

I need to get back and see the other three (maybe four) floors of art. One of my friends is doing a storytelling show there, so I hope to get there for that.

Other Stuff: The Saturday before the Women’s Storytelling Festival, we had a Voices in the Glen story swap. I told “Clever Greta,” which is a Grimm story and quite suitable for women’s history month. That Sunday, we had our annual business meeting. And the Sunday after the festival, the Better Said Than Done board had a postmortem of the festival.

We’ve also had three Grimm Keepers meetings because one had had to be postponed due to conflict. “The Children of the Two Kings” is one of the weirder stories, which is saying a lot since my immediate reaction to most of the stories is that they’re really strange. What made it weird is that, while several things are similar to incidents in other stories (e.g. impossible tasks that have to be done for the prince to marry the princess), there’s a recurring image in it involving the use of glass tools, which nobody had any reasonable explanation for. Our discussion of “The Little Donkey” has inspired me to think of trying to do something with the idea of a support group for people who have been turned into animals (or, who were born as animals, but became human.) Finally, we just talked about “The Turnip,” which needs a certain amount of fleshing out to be satisfactory, but I think I could make it tellable. By the way, this is not the same as the Russian story about the giant turnip that takes several people working together to get out of the ground. It’s a tale of sibling rivalry and revenge.

Also, I’ve played board games several times, including managing to make it to NPL Game Night the past three weeks. I had a stupid accident this past Thursday in which I tripped over a concrete parking stop in a supermarket parking lot, ending up with various bruises, including a black eye. At least, so far as I can tell, I didn’t break anything. And, I went to see the William Shatner movie. You Can Call Me Bill with my friend, Kim, this past Sunday, which was interesting but decidedly not what I was expecting.

I still need to do a lot more housework. And do my taxes, the hardest part of which is always finding all of the statements I need.

Celebrity Death Watch: Bill Rice was a country music singer and songwriter. Robert Brustein was a theatre critic. Ado Ibrahim was the Ohinoyi of Ebiraland, which is some sort of Nigerian traditional ruler. Frank “Hondo” Howard played outfield and first base for the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Washington Senators (who became the Texas Rangers). Tyler Christopher was a soap opera actor. Linda Horseman wrote books about law, women, and social issues, including one about Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Ken Mattingly was an astronaut, who flew on Apollo 16 and a couple of space shuttle missions. Oleg Protopopov was a champion pairs skater. Dick Drago was a relief pitcher, who played for several teams including the Red Sox.

Betty Reardon was a leader in peace education. Gord Smith was a sculptor. Simon Sze invented the floating=gate MOSFET. Bob Knight was a basketball coach. Don Walsh was an oceanographer. Michael Bishop was a science fiction writer. Maryanne Trump Barry was a judge and the sister of a famous grifter. Betty Rollin wrote memoirs about cancer. Radcliffe Bailey was a prominent mixed-media artist. George “Funky” Brown played drums for Kool & the Gang. Suzanne Shepherd was an actress, known largely for playing older women. Herbert Gold was a novelist who was considered adjacent to the beat poets. Mars Williams played saxophone for the Psychedelic Furs among other bands. Ann Rachlin wrote stories about classical music, among other things. Linda Salzman Sagan drew the illustration for the plaque on the Pioneer spacecraft. Jean Knight sang “Mr. Big Stuff.” Charles Peters was the founder and editor-in-chief of the Washington Monthly. Steve Jurczyk was a NASA administrator. Elliot Silverstein was a film director. Ron Hodges was a catcher for the New York Mets. Les Maguire performed with Gerry and the Pacemakers. Tim Dorsey wrote a series of novels about a vigilante anti-hero. Frances Sternhagen was an actress, primarily in theatre. Mary L. Cleave was a shuttle astronaut. Charlie Munger was the vice-chairman of Berkshire Hathaway. Julius W. Becton, Jr. directed FEMA from 1985 to 1989.


Matthew Perry was an actor, best known for playing Chandler on Friends.

Frank Borman was an astronaut. He commanded Apollo-8, which was the first mission to orbit the moon. Later on, he became an executive for Eastern Airlines.

A. S. Byatt was a novelist, most famous for Possession. I hadn’t realized until looking at her obituary that she was Margaret Drabble’s sister. Her death also finally got me to stop confusing her with V. S. Naipaul, which whom she had pretty much nothing in common other than the use of two initials.

You cannot possibly need me to tell you who Rosalynn Carter was. In addition to marrying Jimmy Carter, she put a lot of effort into activism relating to mental health. And, of course, both of the Carters were active in charities, including the Carter Center and Habitat for Humanity. I don’t expect Jimmy to last long without her.

Marty Krofft was a puppeteer who, along with his brother, Sid, was responsible for such TV series as H. R. Pufnstuff.

John Nichols was a novelist, known for The Sterile Cuckoo and The Milagro Beanfield War.

Henry Kissinger was Secretary of State and national security advisor under Nixon and Ford. He was known for “shuttle diplomacy,” during the Yom Kippur War. On the plus side, he fostered U.S. relations with China and detente with Russia. But he was also responsible for the bombing of Cambodia and Laos during the Vietnam War. as well as supporting right wing dictators in South America. He should never have been given the Nobel Peace Prize, but that’s true of the majority of those who have won it.

Shane MacGowan was the lead singer of The Pogues. He was also a songwriter, best known for "Fairytale of New York."

Sandra Day O’Connor was the first woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court. At the time of her appointment in 1981, there was no women’s restroom near the Courtroom. She was generally conservative (by the standards of the time), usually siding with William Rehnquist, but tended to make narrow decisions on issues like aborton and the role of religion in public life. By the standards of certain current justices, she would appear very liberal due to her respect for precedent. She was on my ghoul pool list and earned me 8 points.

Non-celebrity Death Watch: Anne Giotta was my friend, Kathleen’s, mother. She was a lively woman, who continued to be active and engaged in her nineties.

Clint Weathers was known as ZenRhino to pople on TinyTIM, a MUD I hung out on from time to time. I was privileged to meet him (and eat his cooking). I particularly remember a recipe of his that started with telling you to turn off the smoke detector. I recommend reading his obituary, which includes a lovely poem he wrote.

A Left-over Photograph: I never posted this picture of a car I saw in the parking lot at McKay’s Used Books earlier in November. It amused and scared me in equal measures.



Grimm Keepers: Our most recent discussion was of “The Mouse, The Bird, and the Sausage.” I am, apparently, the only person in the group who has collections of songs from Broadside Magazine, since that’s where I originally knew this story from. We had an interesting discussion of other related stories, most of which are the ones where husband and wife exchange responsibilities. The weird part of the Grimm version is that the three creatures (if you can call a sausage a creature) all have fixed roles, instead of taking turns at doing the various jobs. At any rate, it’s always an interesting discussion.

Thanksgiving: I had a very low-key Thanksgiving this year. I cooked a mildly restive meal (salmon with wild rice and succotash) and curled up in bed with a Dick Francis novel for most of the evening.

Library of Congress: mallorys_camera was in town and we managed to get together to go to the Library of Congress on Friday, after a little confusion on my part as to which day we were talking about getting together. Fortunately, my friend, Teri, who works there was in town and offered to meet us there and show us around. I’ve been there a bunch of times but I still learned some new things. And I got my reader’s card, which is something I’ve intended to do for ages but hadn’t gotten around to. We visited the Gershwin room (George’s piano!), the Whittall Pavilion (where the Stradivari live, when not being played), the Grand Hall (whence the painting of Minerva in this photo) and the overlook of the Main Reading Room. Afterwards we went to a nearby Starbucks for hot beverages and more conversation. It was a very nice afternoon, with lots of lively conversation.



The Medicare Saga Concludes: The person I talked to at Social Security who told me she was messaging the local office was successful in moving things along and I finally, after two months, got the approval and, a few days later, my benefits verification letter with my Medicare ID number. It;s amazing how much stress one incompetent employee can cause.

There was a minor kerfuffle regarding my 2024 retiree medical benefits because the people who write our open enrollment brochure could not have been more confusing about some changes, creating a minor panic, but the info from the the organization they outsource some of that to was much clearer and all is good.

Along those lines, I can now catch up on some medical things. I was able to refill some prescriptions before my upcoming trip. And I got my COVID booster and flu shot. I’ll get the RSV vaccine and the updated pneumonia vaccine when I’m back from vacation, as well as scheduling a mammogram and bone density test. I also need to start the process of arranging cataract surgery and do a routine appointment with my doctor, but that will all be in January.

YIVO Talk: YIVO had a zoom talk about the new podcast (well, actually, season 3 of a series, but with a different focus) from the Fortunoff Archive called Remembering Vilna. The previous two seasons of the series had been focused on individual people, while this was focused on the city of Vilna (i.e. Vilnius, Lithuania, which was my grandfather’s birthplace) via interviews with several people who survived the Shoah there. The most interesting part was when they played excerpts from the interviews. I’m going to have to find time to listen to the podcast, but it may be a while.

Virginia Quilt Museum: I drove out to Harrisonburg to go to the Virginia Quilt Museum on Tuesday. I’m not particularly fond of driving on I-=81, which tends to have too many large trucks, but the traffic wasn’t bad. However, it was quite windy, which is annoying when you drive a little car like mine.

Anyway, the main reason I wanted to go was because they had advertised an exhibit connecting historical quilts to Beatles’ songs. The connections proved to be very tenuous. For example, the colors of one quilt were supposed to remind you of “Yellow Submarine,” while another was titled “Strawberry Fields.” Fortunately, the other exhibits were better. I was particularly taken with one titled “Bearing Witness: Civil War Story Quilts by Lesley Riley.” This consisted of a series of quilts using digitally enhanced 160+ year old photographs. There are several of Civil War nurses, including Clara Barton, as well as some of soldiers. It’s all very impressive.

Another excellent collection was titled “Rock, Paper, and Stone” and has quilts made by local women capturing the textures of stones in a stormy sea, bands of malachite, ammonite geodes, and petroglyphs. There are also things like a quilt capturing New Year’s resolutions by members of the local community, another one including messages from people who served in the military during Operation Desert Storm, and lots of sewing machines and notions.

They allow you to take photos but tell you not to post them on social media, due to copyright concerns. So you’ll have to go see for yourself. But I can show you a picture of this small piece that I bought in the gift shop.

Español: Estoy estudiando español con Duolingo para mas de 365 días. Yo lo disfruto mucho. Pero todavía no sabe muchas palabras. Porque mi vocabulario es tan poco, no entiendo todas las conversaciones que oi en el tren, por example. Leo mejor que yo escucho, y entiendo la mayoría de los avisos veo. Me parece que es una buena idea para viajar a Guatemala y practicar allí.

In other words: I feel like I’ve made a fair amount of progress on understanding Spanish, but my vocabulary is limited and my grammar is weak. I don’t really understand when one should use which form of the past tense and I am completely mystified by the subjunctive. The main thing I try to bear in mind is that my goal is to be able to make myself understood and that doesn’t really require proper good grammar. I can certainly manage to read ads in Spanish reasonably well and I can understand about 1/3 to 1/2 of the conversations I overhear (on the train, for example).

Pantry Archaeology: I was looking for where my baking powder had gotten to this morning, since I want to do some baking today. It turned out to be exactly where it was supposed to be. But the idea of looking for it triggered a pantry clean-out and I found five items which I’ve listed on buy nothing. Two of those are things that I bought for one recipe which I later decided not to make. Two were things I tried but didn’t care for. The last one is the funniest one. It’s a small jar of sour salt (citric acid) that I brought home from my mother’s house when we were cleaning it out after she died just about 9 years ago. It had never been opened and, in fact, it may have actually been bought by my grandmother or one of my great-aunts and never opened by them. I was once explaining this to a fellow storyteller, which led to a discussion of family relics and their possible folkloric significance.

I’m giving the Buy Nothing folks until the weekend, after which I’ll toss anything that isn’t claimed.

By the way, I am keeping a list of things I give away, to encourage further dishoarderly conduct.

Medicare: Still waiting. I called the Social Security office on Friday and, after waiting on hold nearly an hour, the person I spoke to said, “oh, it normally takes two months and I don’t see any issues so you should get your medicare card any day now.” In other words, the guy at the office who made the copies of my birth certificate and passport over a month lied to me when he told me it should take just about a week. Aargh.

Speaking of Customer Service Failures: I have a trip coming up in December for which I have been working with a travel agent in Canada for complicated reasons, related to the person I am traveling with. Anyway, she was supposed to send the rest of the vouchers in late October, so I sent her an email the other day asking when I would get them. And I got back an email that she is out of her office indefinitely. I did contact the colleague who that email referred me to, who basically told me that she’ll talk to her about it. This has reminded me of why I normally prefer making my own travel arrangements.

Ah, good, I just got an email from her that told me it would be a month before the trip, Which is not for a few days. She is checking.

Favorite Next Door Poat of the Week: “Is this fox carrying a soccer ball? Why?”

Other Stuff I Did in the Past Week: I only made it to the first half hour or so of the READ Book Club, because it conflicted with the Litvak Genealogy group that I’m the subject matter expert for. My life is a schedule conflict.

I played code names on line with friends three times. It's good for practicing my bickering skills. How can I possibly have friends who think "The Cask of Amontillado" is a Sherlock Holmes story? (And one of those friends saw me drink a glass of amontillado just a couple of weeks ago!)

I went to both of my crafting groups. One was virtual on Thursday and the other was in person yesterday. I am making progress on my Tunisian crochet afghan but need to put in a lot more time if I really want to finish it this year.

The group I didn’t go with to see the annular eclipse had a briefing on their observing results. It would have been a great trip, but it didn’t work out. And my San Antonio trip worked out fine, as well as being much less expensive.

I have a bunch of things to write about. The biggest one is the rest of the presentations from the Jewish genealogy conference, but that really demands its own longer entry.


Shameless Self-Promotion: Artists Standing Strong Together puts on an intergenerational storytelling event on the first Friday of the month. I am part of the show on Friday November 4th, from 7-9 p.m. Eastern time. I’ll be telling one of my most popular stories, my adaptation of a folktale about the wise men of Chelm. It’s free (with donations requested) but registration is required at tinyurl.com/Nov2022TGIF.



Dropkick Murphys: I went to see the Dropkick Murphys at the Lincoln Theatre on Tuesday night. They had two opening acts. I liked Jesse Ahern’s music quite a lot, but he could use some lessons on talking to audiences, since he kept his song intros to things like “is everybody having fun?” Someone I know used to coach folk singers on storytelling and he could definitely use lessons from her. The second opener was Jaime Wyatt, who has a nice enough voice but, overall, was too country for my tastes.

The Dropkicks have a new album out (“This Machine Still Kills Fascists”) and did a mix of songs from that and older stuff. The story behind the album is that they were invited by Woody Guthrie’s daughter to go through the archives of his music and lyrics and they wrote songs using some of Woody’s lyrics. This sounds odd at first, since they are mostly thought of as a punk band, but it makes a lot of sense when you think about their political leanings, which are liberal in the Bostonian working class style. (For example, they’ve sued Republican politicians to keep them from using their songs.) Anyway, there was great energy in the theatre and I had a good time.

Here, have a sample. Two 6’s Upside Down.

Medical Stuff: I got my bivalent COVID booster on Wednesday. I had some soreness in my arm, but nothing significant. I also was somewhat tired, but that could also be related to having been up late the night before. I also got blood drawn for various tests. And I ordered my new glasses.

Intimate Apparel: A Facebook friend who I hadn’t met in person before invited me to join her at this play by Lynn Nottage at Theatre J. (We are connected through the Style Invitational Losers, as well as having another mutual friend.) She had gotten tickets as part of a two-for-one deal, so it was free. I had mixed feelings about the play, which tells the story of a black seamstress named Esther who gets involved with a man named George (played by Manu Kumasi, who I thought gave the best performance of the show). He writes her letters from Panama and she agrees to marry him sight unseen. The other characters are the owner of the boarding house she lives in, the Orthodox Jewish man she buys fabric from, and a wealthy white woman and a black prostitute (apparently a long-time friend), both of whom she makes garments for. The marriage doesn’t turn out quite how she hopes, which isn’t particularly surprising. There was one shocking moment in the play, but there wasn’t much follow-through on it. And the thread involving Esther’s relationship with the fabric merchant was unconvincing. There was a talkback with the costume designer afterwards, which was moderately interesting. I’m glad I saw the play, but I hesitate to recommend it.

I keep meaning to post here and not getting around to it. Here’s an update.


Celebrity Death Watch: Carola Eisenberg died in March at the age of 103. She was the Dean of Students at MIT during at least part of my undergraduate days and was the first woman to hold that position. Adlai Stevenson III was a senator from Illinois through the 1970’s. Edward Barnes co-created Blue Peter. Neddy Smith was an Australian criminal, who I’d had on my ghoul pool list a couple of years ago but given up on. Art Metrano was an actor who appeared in the Police Academy movies. Audrey Haine was a pitcher and Joan Berger was an infielder in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. Abigail Guzman was the founder of the Shining Path terrorist group in Peru. Don Collier was an actor in television westerns. Ida Nudel was an activist who was instrumental in freeing Soviet Jews. Norm MacDonald was an actor and comedian. Reuben Klamer invented board games, including The Game of Life. George Ferencz was a theatre director. Penny Harrington was the first woman to head a major police department in the U.S. (in Portland, Oregon). Clive Sinclair was pioneer in electronics, including personal computers. Jane Powell acted in a lot of MGM musicals. Ronald Probstein was a professor of mechanical engineering at MIT, who did a lot of research on hydrodynamics and spacecraft reentry. Sarah Dash sang as part of Labelle. Melvin Van Peeble was a filmmaker, actor, and director. Peter Palmer played Li’l Abner on Broadway. Al Harrington was an actor, best known for appearing in Hawaii Five-O. Willie Garson was an actor known for appearing in Sex and the City. Jay Sandwich was a television director who won four Emmys. Roger Michell was a film director, whose work included Notting Hill. Pee Wee Ellis was a saxophonist. Bobby Zarem was a publicist for people ranging from Dustin Hoffman to Cher. Michael Tylo was a soap opera actor. Lonnie Smith was a jazz musician. George Frayne, better known as Commander Cody, was a pioneer ion alt-country music. Lars Vilks was a sculptor who founded his own micro country, Ladonia, due to a property dispute over the location of some of his work.

Willard Scott was best known as a TV weatherman. He had also been the creator of Ronald McDonald, but the company decided they wanted to use a thinner man as their mascot.

Harold Franklin was the first black student at Auburn University. The university removed everyone else from a wing of his dorm to prevent contact with him and refused to grant him his degree by creating various pretexts to refuse to accept his thesis. It took until 2001 before they acknowledged his having been their first black student, even though he enrolled in 1964. They finally granted his master’s degree in 2020 after he had retired from an academic career at other universities.

Anthony Hewish was a radio astronomer who won a Nobel prize. He is widely reviled for having appropriated the work of his graduate student, Jocelyn Bell, who discovered pulsars.

Rabbi Moshe Tendler was an expert on Jewish medical ethics. His writings on the subject of organ transplantation (which include discussion of the concept of brain death) have been very influential in the Orthodox Jewish world.

Tommy Kirk was a child actor in Disney films, including Old Yeller and The Shaggy Dog. His later career was, alas, destroyed by drug addiction.


Health Update: I think my rib is as close to fully healed as I’m going to be able to tell. However, I wrenched my left wrist painfully last week. How? I was just trying to open a a plastic bottle of Coke Zero. See, I knew soda was bad for me. (I eventually had to resort to using pliers.)

Rosh Hashanah Leftover: I forgot to mention that I had seen a video (about cooking fish) that mentioned five traditional foods for Rosh Hashanah. These are apparently based on having Aramaic names which sound similar to words in accompanying blessings. These are zucchini, black-eyed peas, leeks, Swiss chard, and dates. I wonder if this is the source of the Southern U.S. tradition of eating black-eyed peas for the (secular) new year. Also, Ashkenazim (i.e. Eastern European Jews) added carrots to the list, presumably because of availability.Of course, a better known tradition is to eat the head of a fish or a sheep. If you’re a vegetarian, you can just have a head of lettuce!


National Book Festival: The National Book Festival was the last week or so of September and was mostly virtual. I watched two presentations. One, on book construction (i.e. book structures and bookbinding) was mediocre, but might be of more interest to people less familiar with the topic. The other was about crossword puzzles and featured Will Shortz (of course) and Adrianne Raphel. They were entertaining and there was some fun crossword trivia included. I need to find time to go back and see what other presentations I want to watch.

Aptonym: The founder of Epik, the web host of choice for neoNazis and other right-wing lunatics is named Rob Monster. And that is, apparently, his real name.

Korean Food: I went out to dinner a few nights ago with a friend who I hadn’t seen in a while. We went to ChiMC, which is a Korean place near where I live, chosen for interestingness, outdoor seating, and easy parking. She got their signature fried chicken, but I am not so keen on fried chicken, so I opted for something called tteobokki, which consists of fish cakes and cylindrical rice cakes, in a spicy sauce. It was pretty good, assuming you like spicy food, but the texture of the rice cakes was a bit weird.


Mock Jury: I spent a day in a hotel conference room being a mock juror. I can’t write about any of the details, but it was interesting and I walked away with $200. I’d do it again. I’ve filled out an info form with another company that does what sound like similar focus groups. (And I felt like Susan Dennis who seems to do lots of focus groups.)


Speaking of Finding Time: The National Storytelling Festival is going on right now. But I have two things I need to finish by October 5th, so I won’t be watching any of it until at least Wednesday. Plus, of course, baseball is another distraction, what with my Red Sox facing the Source of All Evil in the Universe in the Wild Card playoff on Tuesday. I went to Saturday’s game at Nats Park, by the way, which was exciting, but in a way that I am sure was not good for my blood pressure. Fortunately, the BoSox pulled it out, but the eighth inning was decidedly scary. And why did Alex Cora leave Austin Davis in for the ninth? Admittedly, that led to the rare sight of a pitcher being deliberately walked (and then advancing to second base, a place he probably hadn’t seen since high school) but he raised the stress level in the bottom of the ninth by giving up a two run homer.

A Follow-up re: the Flushies: You can hear me interviewed on the You’re Invited podcast. The little segment where Mike talked with me starts just about 07:34, but if you listen to whole show, you can get an idea of what my social life is like. And, as a bonus, this is a photo of the shirt I was wearing (which is part of what we talked about):



I will fully admit I don’t know what all of the equations are supposed to be. And I especially don’t know why one of them is repeated on the shirt.

I was having a good time in Chicago, until Sunday night when I fell on an uneven bit of sidewalk. I did not, at first, realize how hurt I was, but was in more pain as the night wore on. Instead of taking the train to New Orleans as planned, I came home, where I went to urgent care and found out I have broken my 9th posterior lateral left rib.

This is the worst pain I remember in my life. Tylenol helps some; ice helps less. I can look forward to about six weeks of misery.

Celebrity Death Watch: Jonathan Bush was a banker and the brother of George H.W. Bush. Paul Van Doren co-founded Vans. Leigh Perkins expanded Orris into a major mail order retailer, mostly of fishing and outdoors gear. Spencer Silver co-invented Post-it Notes. Pete duPont served two terms as governor of Delaware. Art Gensler founded the world’s largest architectural firm, whose work included the terminals at San Francisco International Airport. Lester Wolff was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Long Island. Norman Lloyd was an actor and notable for continuing to work until he was 100 years old. (He was 106 when he died.) Jim Klobuchar was a journalist and father of Amy. Richard Rubinstein was a rabbi who defended the Moonies on the grounds of anti-Communism. Patsy Bruce wrote country songs, such as “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.” Terence Riley was the chief curator of architecture and design at the Museum of Modern Art. Douglass Mossman was an actor, best known for appearing in Hawaii Five-O. Charles Grodin was a prolific actor, comedian, and talk show host. Paul Mooney was a comedian. and wrote for a number of other black comedians. Alex Dobkin was a folk singer. Roman Kent was the president of the International Auschwitz Committee. Dewayne Blackwell wrote “Friends in Low Places,” among other songs. Samuel E. Wright voiced Sebastian in Disney’s The Little Mermaid. Anna Halprin was a post-modern choreographer. Jerome Hellman was a film producer who won an Oscar for Midnight Cowboy. Mary Beth Edelson was one of the first generation of feminist artists and is best known for “Some Living American Women Artists / Last Supper.”

Eric Carle wrote and illustrated The Very Hungry Caterpillar and several other children’s books. He is also notable for founding a museum of picture book art. Another author/illustrator of children’s books, Lois Ehlers, best known for Chicka Chicka Boom Boom died a couple of days later.

John Warner spent 30 years as a Republican senator from Virginia and had earlier been the Secretary of the Navy. He was also Elizabeth Taylor’s sixth husband. Despite having been a Republican, in more recent years, he endorsed a number of Democrats, both for the Senate and the Presidency.

B. J. Thomas was a pop singer. Some of the songs he was well-known for include “Hooked on a Feeling,” “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head,” “I Just Can’t Help Believing,” and “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song.”

Gavin McLeod played Murray on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and was the captain on The Love Boat.


I don’t normally mention animal deaths, but Bo, the Obama family dog, was prominent enough that I think he deserves a note. I don’t think many Americans had heard of a Portuguese water dog, a supposedly hypo-allergenic breed, before the Obamas got him for their daughters.

Errata: I made a minor addition to the Island Hopping entry. I had completely neglected Jones Beach. And Fire Island, which I might have gone to.

Cool Baseball Trivia: On Friday May 21st, Seattle back-up catcher Jose Godoy made his major league debut, becoming the 20,000th player in major league baseball history. (The Mariners got slaughtered by the Padres, however, losing 16-1.)

Blight Flight: I watched this short play by Iyona Blake on-line a couple of weeks ago. I know her work primarily as a singer and actor, who has made numerous appearances at Signature Theatre and Creative Cauldron. The play involves a white woman trying to befriend the black woman being forced out of the house next door by rising prices in the rapidly gentrifying neighborhood. The black woman makes her question her assumptions, but the two connect at the end via a song. It was a challenging story and I’d like to see it developed into a full-length production mostly because I was left with a lot of questions about both women.


Don’t Analyze This Dream: I drove into the German embassy - literally, into the building. I pulled up next to a guard who told me to get out of the car and then took my temperature with a forehead thermometer. Another guard came over, walked around me, shook his head, but did not tell me what to do or where to go. At that point, three women came in, one of whom resembles someone I slightly know. They were given some papers by another guard and went into a door. I waited a while, all of the guards wandered away, and I decided I should go through that same door. The three women were gone. Just outside the door, I saw a small table with stacks of vaccination certificates. I walked over to a window where a guy told me I didn’t have to do anything but take a seat at a table and wait. He also invited me to an upcoming Valentine’s Day party at the embassy. While I was waiting, someone said they had gotten the number 30, which seemed to be a bad thing. The three women came back in, carrying clipboards with yellow papers. I don’t remember anything happening after that point.


This Way Lies Madness: I finally achieved Queen Bee in the New York Times Spelling Bee (a daily word puzzle). Not just once, but every day for a week or so and several times since. I have decided, however, that pursuing that every day is just too obsessive, especially on days when there are 60+ words to find. I did admittedly do it today, but there were only 39 words.


Retirement Gift: I got the retirement gift catalog from Circle-A and chose an iPad. The other possibility was an Apple watch, but I have really small wrists and thought I would find it awkward. It came on Friday but I haven’t set it up yet. I think the current offerings (which also include things like cookware and jewelry),are better than what people years ago complained about. Twenty some odd years ago,, they gave out mostly clocks, with only an engraved bowl as a non-time oriented option.

Art Fair: I went to the Old Town Art Fair in Alexandria a couple of weeks ago. I attempted to find someone to come along to be a shopping discourager, but none of my friends were interested and available. As a result, I bought a few things - a robot sculpture from Cheri Kudzu’s Bitti Bots, a brooch made from watch parts, and a book called Goodbye, Penguins, which has a rather Gorey-esque sensibility. I like some works of urban surrealism by a guy named Ralph Rankin, but he was horribly rude to me when I asked for his card, so I will never buy anything from him.


Renwick Gallery: I went to the Renwick Gallery a week and a half ago with one of the women from my crafts group. Mostly, we went to look at the Renwick Invitational, which had installations from four artists. Rowland Ricketts had a large piece made of squares of indigo-dyed fabric. He apparently grows the indigo himself. That installation also had music in the background. Lauren Fensterstock’s piece was titled “The totality of time lusters the dusk.” It was a complex mosaic piece made of glass, crystals, beads, paper, hematite, etc. and, while I thought it was interesting, it was too hard to see the whole thing at some time. Debora Moore had several pieces that involved glass flower petals blown directly onto wood and concrete bases. Finally, Timothy Horn had large pieces based on historic jewelry, as well as an interesting carriage made out of rock sugar. After looking at that exhibit, we went upstairs to look at the permanent exhibit. Janet Echelon’s 1.8 is one of the highlights, with a fiber netting that changes colors in response to lighting. My favorite, however, was Skeins by Mariska Karasz. Overall, it was a nice couple of hours.


Immigrant Food: After the museum, I had lunch at Immigrant Food, which is more or less around the corner. I had their equivalent of a banh mi, which was quite tasty. (The person I went with wanted to rush home, as she is caring for her husband who is in treatment for cancer.)

Good News: I got my blood tested a few days ago. And all of the numbers on the iron panel were within normal range. So I just need to continue taking oral supplements.

Vaccine: I had the second Pfizer shot on April 8th. So I’m now past the freedom-granting 2 week mark! Which enabled me to go to a surprise birthday party for a friend on Sunday.


Gastroenterology: As I mentioned previously, my doctor referred me to get a GI work-up to see if there was any source of bleeding which would account for my iron deficiency anemia. I had been particularly dreading the colonoscopy prep, but, as one of my friends (whose travel tastes are similar to mine) pointed out, the people who talk about how awful it is, have generally not spent much time in the developing world. The worst aspect of the prep was actually the couple of days before, when I was directed to eat a low-residue diet. No whole grains, no fruits and vegetables, no nuts - not exactly what I prefer. The clear liquid aspect of the day before was more tolerable, as tea and lemon ices are allowed. The cleansing solution doesn’t taste quite as awful as I feared - not great, but I washed each glass down with ginger ale. (I had made the mistake of buying white powerade and that turned out to be a vile cherry flavor.) I don’t need to describe the effects of the cleanse, which are actually not as bad as various bouts of traveller’s diarrhea I’ve experienced.

The actual procedure is done under moderate sedation (fentanyl and versed) so one doesn’t feel a thing. They had me try to gargle with a vile tasting numbing liquid for the upper endoscopy and my gag reflex completely defeated me on that, After three attempts they gave up. Anyway, the colonoscopy found only a few small non-bleeding hemorrhoids - and I don’t have to do it again for 10 years. For the endoscopy, the doctor took a few biopsies and the results ruled out H. Pylori (the infection that causes ulcers) and celiac disease. But my esophagus showed some inflammation, which is presumably due to acid reflux, so he gave me a prescription for Protonix to take for 4 weeks.

I’ve also looked up other recommendations for addressing reflux and they all start off with avoiding various foods - onions, garlic, spicy foods, citrus, chocolate, caffeine, tomatoes, mint, carbonated drinks. Every single thing I cook has onions, garlic, and lemon juice, and most of them have hot peppers. And life without coffee or chocolate would not be worth living. I am trying to limit quantities, but the only one of those things I could completely cut out without total despair is tomatoes. Specifically re: coffee, I saw one suggestion to limit it to a 3 to 4 ounce cup a day. Who on earth drinks a 3 to 4 ounce cup of coffee? A cup is 8 ounces, dammit.


I’ll get my blood tested again in mid-May and we’ll see if my iron has improved. If not, I’ll probably end up having to get intravenous iron infusions.


Spring Allergy Season: I like trees. Really. They’re pretty and they keep things cooler on walks around my neighborhood. But why do they insist of having sex outdoors and spraying pollen all over the place? Ah-ah-ahchoo!


ProLon: I got interested in the ProLon fasting mimicking diet program last summer when I read an article in Technology Review about it. I should note that the focus is longevity and not specifically weight loss, though one does inevitably lose weight over 5 days of eating so little. I’ve done three 5-day cycles since November and plan to do 2 or 3 more (and have bought two more kits). I’m debating when to start the next one. Probably on Monday. I will write a day by day account for anyone else who might be considering it.

I took the Metro today for the first time in a little over 9 months, because I had a doctor's appointment and I can't deal with driving in the city. The train was really empty, so social distancing was not an issue at all.


I need to get some additional lab work (iron and vitamin B tests) because of mild anemia. But everything else is stable. I do have some other things to catch up on - eye exam and mammogram - but those are not urgent.


On the way home, WMATA proved that they can continue to annoy me. I got to the Foggy Bottom station and saw the Vienna train was scheduled to come in 2 minutes. Except that right then there was a cable failure in Rosslyn and they started single tracking, so I ended up having a 20 or so minute wait.


It's only going to get worse if they don't get a bailout. They're threatening to end weekday service at 9 p.m. and stop all weekend service. That would complete screw with my social life once I can have one again.