setting the clock in Midland

While staying in the Holiday Inn Express in Midland TX recently, we were unable to set the clock. It had a convenient label glued to the top of the clock, explaining in exciting detail how to set the alarm - good thing, too, because it was like finding the Easter Egg on a Sony DVD. You have to hold this button down while pressing the Alarm button, and you have to hold your tongue just right.

But it doesn't do much good to set the alarm if the clock is six and a half hours off. I suppose you could offset the alarm time by that same six and a half hours, but I didn't think of that, because we had already had too many margaritas at Summer Mummers. Besides, we were still shedding popcorn all over their carpet.

Turns out the trick is to find the power button and press it. I'm not sure it was turning it on or off, but it doesn't matter - you press it and the hidden clock button starts responding (it's under the clock). As far as I could tell, nothing was really being turned on or off by pressing the power button, but it somehow affected the clock button. So, to set that button:

1. Turn the clock over.
2. Press the power button.
3. Hold down the clock button and press the hour button. If nothing happens, press the power button again.
4. Still holding the clock button down, press the minutes button until the time is correct.
5. Now you can set the alarm, by following the instructions glued to the top of the clock - if they are still there.

As for setting the radio stations, that one is beyond me.

Zen and the meaning of Facebook

I spend a lot of time on Facebook. Maybe more than I should. Maybe not.

Thing is, I don't consider it a waste of time at all. Relationships are very important to me, and living down here in Houston as I do, I am a long way from the people I care about, in Wichita Falls and in Midland, and in other places.

If and when I visit my friends in those far away lands, the thing I most like to do is to sit and listen to them talk. I don't care if they tell jokes, gossip about the theatre, complain about the theatre, rant about politics - it doesn't matter, because I just love to hear them talk. If they occasionally let me join in for a quick word or comment, so much the better. But that can't happen very often - I can only go visit just so many times in a year.

Facebook gives me a virtual social life. Yes, I'd much rather be there in person with my people, sharing guacamole, hugging them, actually hearing them, smelling their after shave or cologne. But at least online, I can see the posts they offer, one after another, and I can go away and do chores and errands and then come back and see what was said while I was gone.

As for the games... well, if I play one, and you play the same one, and we send each other a cow or a chicken or a mango tree... and if I send you a Mafia Wars getaway car and you send me a .22 pistol (which I don't really need), then the same purpose is served as if we had exchanged actual phsyical gifts - is it not? If you give me a smores maker, does it matter if I need it, does it matter what it cost, does it matter if I ever use it or not, does it matter if I already had six of them in the closet? No, the thought is literally what counts. You thought of me enough to give it to me, and the message was "I see you, I like you and I'm glad you exist," whether there was a card saying it or not. It is the same with a game on Facebook: we play it together, just as we might at a small party, just as we might if you came over to visit with a Scrabble board. Would I rather be in person with you? Of course I would! But virtual, while not to be confused with reality, is truly the next best thing to reality.

If you do or don't play the games, at least I can see what you say, and comment on it, and there is a sort of fellowship to experience. I can see the pictures you upload, and enjoy them, and remember how you look in person, and see Jena's twins holding hands in their car seats, and see Hilary snuggling with her SO, and read about Midland Lisa's mysterious Body Pump activities in Midland, and WF Lisa's family in Wichita Falls, and my favorite cousin in Kentucky when she finds the time to post. I can hear from Maria in Albuquerque, and know that she is OK this week, and I can find out I fought as Beau's or Greg's capo (whatever that is) and snagged $34 from some rival gangster. I can accept a coconut tree or a goat from Allison, whose father I used to sing for when he was a choir director at church and at MSU. I can learn when Jenn's poor bruised body is sore from Lisa's Body Pump torture session. I can learn that I don't know about some of them as much as I thought I did.

And I can let them know when my cat dies, and when I am about to go clean Carlsbad Cavern again, or when I am going to show up at Mummers on the way back through to Houston. Or I can just let them know when I am feeling a little down, and they give me a virtual attaboy to make me feel better.

Yes, the games are inane and silly. Yes, none of you are really, truly here in my little office. Yes, I wish I could be there in your presence, in reality, more often. Yes, I know that my flat panel monitor is no substitute for the sound of your voice. But limping is better than a wheelchair, fuzzy vision is better than blindness, and a virtual hug is better than no hug at all. It may be all electrons and ones and zeros moving across data lines, but it's still love because you're a real person whom I know, somewhere up in WF or over in Midland.

Facebook is right up there with cell phones. It can be annoying in the wrong context, but I sure am glad it's there when I need you to be there.

Now... who needs some zinnias?

A little family history

I got a copy of this photo while visiting my uncle in Colorado this week:

The parents in the photo are Mr. and Mrs. Smith, my great grandparents. The pretty little girl in the right side of the photo is Mamie, my maternal grandmother.

Now look again at the mom. Her name was Sally Vermillion Smith, and her brother (not in the photo) is by sheer coincidence also named Vermillion, and he lived on a ranch at the base of the Guadalupe mountains back in the day. He is one of the cowboys who saw the bat flight from the cavern looking like smoke, and made several trips to the natural entrance to watch the bats exit the cave close up.

It was he who took Abijah Long to see this phenomenon, and (according to one version of the story), Mr. Long suggested to Mr. Vermillion that there could be some profit made by mining all that guano, but Mr. Vermillion thought it was silly, and so Mr. Long filed the mining claim in his own name.

The other version is that Abijah offered to go to Carlsbad and file the claim on both of their behalf, but then filed it in his own name, thus cheating Vermillion out of his share. This is the version I had always heard, but actually the version above makes more sense to me having heard it - even though Mr. Long's book makes it obvious to anyone familiar with the cave that he never visited beyond the bat cave section until it had paved trails and lighting, contrary to his claims about exploring it - and thus exposing himself as being at least a little dishonest.

But then again, who wouldn't stretch the truth a little when something as famous as Carlsbad is concerned? And besides, the dude hired Jim White, which led to the world knowing about this wonderful cave - so in a way he has a firm place in the cave's history.

Too bad nobody remembers Vermillion's first name. Note to all: write down that oral history.

Noises, off and on and from cats

When I moved away from Wichita Falls some years ago, I thought I would never be able to do another show at Backdoor theatre again. That's my home theatre, where I learned anything I know about acting or being in a show. In 2004 I moved to Midland TX, where I learned to treasure Midland Community Theatre and the friends I made there. Now I live in the Houston area, and while I won't sell the theatres here short - they do set high standards - it's really hard to do theatre when you have to drive 45 minutes each way for rehearsals because the theatres are so far apart here.

But thanks to my best friend still trapped in the Falls, who allowed me to live in his home for a couple of months for rehearsals and performances, I was able to audition for, and have a role in, the funniest play ever written, Noises Off! (The title is supposed to have an exclamation point, you see).

I did that show twelve years ago, playing Freddy/Phillip, but the part I always wanted more than any other was Lloyd, the director, who speaks such lines as "No, Freddy, we have several minutes left before we open." This time, I got the part I wanted most. But beyond that, I was privileged to work once again with my favorite director, Gare Brundidge, and with my best friend, Dave. The downside was that I had to drive between Houston and Wichita Falls once the show went up. But then, I did some calculating, and I think I actually drove fewer miles doing that than by making the round trip for every rehearsal in Houston.

An added benefit was that Dave served as my personal trainer. When I stood on the stage for the audition, I was offering 235 pounds of mass to the gravity of this planet. I now weigh around 200 pounds, give or take a kilo here or there. Granted, when you perform in Noises Off!, you do get your exercise - I learned that twelve years ago - but most of it was improved diet and my 90+ minute walk each day.

So now I'm back home, and glad to be here, and the Houston heat and humidity is beginning to return. The real heat is actually in July and August, but June is at least warm, though not as warm as Wichita Falls.

******



Our cat, Pearl, is dying.

Some of you know about Pearl, having met her. We named her Pearl because she was born on the 50th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, and because she is sort of pearl-colored, or cream. You can see by the picture she is one pretty cat -or she was when she was younger and healthier. Age robs cats of all but their inner beauty, too, just like most people. Yes, there are exceptions.

We have been trying to deal with a thyroid tumor (some cream in the ears apparently keeps that in check), impending renal failure (which has been impending for about ten years, and which I suspect we never really had to worry about), and some inconvenient seizures (they had something for that, too), but the last week or so she has quit eating and excreting - that means pooping, for you non-medical types out there. We took her in to see if there was some blockage that could be removed, but it turns out that her lack of appetite has more to do with the fact that she has cancer. How's that for irony? We move here to work for M. D. Anderson, the cancer center, and our cat gets cancer. So now she's on steroids to improve her appetite, and to make her feel generally better, but we are now considering her to be in Home Hospice for kitties - she is dying, and we have to figure out when the right moment is to have her put down. At what point is starvation far enough along to end it all? When is her life no longer worth prolonging? If she were human, the answer would be more clear - you keep people alive as long as you can, as comfortably as you can. But with a cat? A cat who can't even tell you if it hurts? I don't want to make that choice.

We have already decided not to have any more pets. Life without a pet is going to be radically different - beyond the expenses we will be relieved of, from vet bills to food and litter, there will be the things we did or didn't do solely because we had to accommodate the cat. We don't use actual bath mats because cute little Pearl peed on them when we did. We don't use floor mats just inside the front door for the same reason. We carefully check before we open a door to make sure she doesn't get out and get eaten by an alligator. We keep three litter boxes throughout the house to make sure she doesn't have to suffer any inconvenience when she needs to empty her little kitty bladder. Until recently, we couldn't eat without saving some for the cat, especially if chicken or tuna is involved. We are agreed that life without Pearl will be better and more convenient. Yet there is still the fact that we have had that cat for over 17 years, and we expect her to jump on the bed at night time and get in the way, we expect her to follow us into the kitchen and beg for food and get underfoot, we expect her to try to kill us as we go up or down the stairs.

It's going to be a different life. But for now, we have to keep that cat as comfortable and happy as we can, because it's either that or have her put down sooner. And we want to postpone that as long as we can.

Bucket Lists

First, the one somebody else came up with:

Place an X by all the things you've done and remove the X from the ones you have not, then send it to your friends (including me).

Things you have done during your lifetime:

() Gone on a blind date
() Skipped school
() Watched someone die
(x) Been to Canada
(x) Been to Mexico
(x) Been to Florida
(x) Been to Hawaii
() Been to NYC
(x) Been to Las Vegas
(x) Been on a plane
() Flown a plane
() Been on a helicopter
(x) Been on a motorcycle
()Ridden ATV's
(X) Been lost
() Gone to Washington, DC
(x) Swam in the ocean
(x) Swam with Stingrays
() Cried yourself to sleep
(x) Played cops and robbers
() Recently colored with crayons
(x) Sang Karaoke
(x) Paid for a meal with coins only
() Paid for a huge bill (thousands) in single dollar bills
() Been to the top of the St. Louis Arch
(x) Done something you told yourself you wouldn't
(x) Made prank phone calls
(x) Done something VERY naughty (your mother would gasp)
(x) Been down Bourbon Street in New Orleans
(x) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose
(X) Caught a snowflake on your tongue
(x) Danced in the rain
(x) Written a letter to Santa Claus
(x) Been kissed under the mistletoe
(x) Watched the sunrise with someone
(x) Hiked a Volcano
(x) Blown bubbles
(x) Gone ice-skating
(x) Gone sledding down a big hill
(x) Gone to the movies
() Been deep sea fishing
(x) Driven across the United States ( alone or not)
() Been in a hot air balloon
() Been sky diving
() Been white water river rafting
() Been bungee jumping
(x) Inner tubing down a slow moving river
() Boating on Lake Powell
() Gone snowmobiling
() Lived in more than one country
(x) Vacationed in another country
(x) Toured Europe
() Ran for your life from NY street thugs
(x) Lay down outside at night and admired the stars while listening to the crickets
(x) Seen a falling star and made a wish
(x) Enjoyed the beauty of Old Faithful Geyser
(x) Seen the Grand Canyon
() Seen the Statue of Liberty
() Seen the fireworks over Mount Rushmore on the 4th of July
() Gone to the top of Seattle Space Needle
(x) Been on a cruise
(x) Traveled by train
(x) Traveled by motorcycle
() Been horse back riding
() Ridden on a San Francisco cable car
(x) Been to Disneyland OR Disney World
(x) Truly believe in the power of prayer
(x) Been in a rain forest
(x) Seen whales in the ocean
() Been to Niagara Falls
() Ridden on an elephant
() Swam with dolphins
() Been to the Olympics
() Walked on the Great Wall of China
() Been spinnaker flying
() Been water-skiing
() Been snow-skiing
() Been to Westminster Abbey
() Been to the Louvre
() Swam in the Mediterranean
() Been to a Major League Baseball game
() Been to a National Football League game
() Swam with sharks (knowingly)
() Went Scuba diving
(x) Swam with barracuda
(x) Snorkled
() Been to Alaska
(x) Watched volcano lava up close and personal
() Danced ballroom
() Gave birth to a child
() Paid a fertility clinic for services
() Buried a child
(x) Been married
(x) Been divorced
(x) Been married twice
() Gave birth to a child at home
() Gave birth to a child under water
() Gave birth to a child without pain killers
() Had a c-section
() Has and did, or is, raising more than 2 children
(x) Sent a child through college
() Walked on a glacier
(x) Swam in a lake
(x) Saw a bear up close in nature (no fences)
() Been in, or been to, jail (even if for 1 hour)
() Visited someone in jail
(x) Know someone who has been in jail (longer than a day)
() Been in the movies or TV (extra or actor)
() Met a star (famous person)
() Got an autograph of someone famous
() Lived next to someone famous
() Related to someone famous
(x) Thrown a party (big or small)
(x) Drove way over the speed limit
(x) Argued with a cop
() Gotten out of a big speeding ticket in front of a Judge
(x) Been beaten up
() Beat someone up
(x) Sang on stage
(x) Loved deeply
(x) Grown a garden
(x) Raised animals
(x) Owned a dog or cat
() Home schooled children
() Sat in natural hot springs
() Banked money in the Caymans Islands
() Been a Vegetarian
() Been a strict Vegan (eats NO animal products)
(x) Fought against the IRS (and won)
(x) Been to court
(x) Been stung by a bee
(x) Been face to face with a snake in the wild
() Been bitten by a snake
() Been bitten by a spider
(x) Played a prank on someone
(x) Sued someone
(x) Built a snowman
() Been in a major car accident and lived to tell about it
(x) Been in a small car accident
(x) Had a house built
(x) Built a house (or helped build one)
() Had a cabin built
(x) Been personally in the hospital for any reason
(x) Had a major operation done in the hospital
(x) Had flowers given to you
(x) Given flowers to someone
() Had a professional massage done
() Had a massage on a tropical beach
(x) Have given someone else a full body massage
() Had plastic surgery done
() Had a mud bath from a spa
(x) Owned your own business
(x) Given thousands of dollars to charity
(x) Won a major prize in a contest
(x) Been enrolled in college
() Graduated from college
() Graduated from trade school
() Stitched (sewed) up a cut yourself
(x) Been a teacher
() Watched the professional X-games live
(x) Broken a bone
(x) Been stranded at an airport
(x) Been to a concert of a famous band or group
() Died and brought back to life
() Reported a crime in progress
(x) Participated in Patriotic movements
() Joined the Army
() Joined the Peace Corp
() Hiked the Y
() Hiked Timpanogos Cave
(x) Been to a garage sale
(x) Had your own garage sale
(?) Saved someone from dying (I've donated platelets enough times that I can say that)
(x) Sat around a camp fire
(x) Given a speech in front of a crowd
(x) Joined a cause
() Rode a bike down the board walk on the beach (for miles)
(x) Wrote a book (published or not)
(x) Read a big novel
(x) Kissed on the beach
(x) Started a group
() Been a surrogate mother for someone (carried their child in your womb)
() Lived on an island
(x) Learned a different language
(x) Sent someone love letters in the mail
() Joined a different religion or philosophy
() Sewed an entire piece of clothing (ie. dress or pants)
(x) remodeled a home (one room or entire thing)
(x) planted flowers
() planted an entire yard of grass
(x) Been fishing
(x) Roller bladed
() Been a lifeguard
() Gotten a tattoo (real one)
() Worn a thong bikini (and looked good in it)
(x) Been over weight (more than 10 lbs)
() Worn a bikini after having lots of kids (girls only)
() Danced the Salsa
(x) Worked on the engine of a car
() Put up Christmas lights on your house outside
(x) Played Santa Claus (all dressed up) (or Mrs Claus)
() Made a gourmet meal from scratch
(x) Been married longer than 10 years
() Have twins or triplets
() Coached someone through the birthing process
(x) Sang a child to sleep
() Know how to cook without recipes
(x) Bought a house
(x) Bought more than one house
(x) Played dead and others thought you really were dead
(x) Danced around your living room naked (didn't dance well, of course)
() Thrown a costume party
() Written your name in perm. ink on something you shouldn't have
() Broke into a friends house and cleaned it
(x) Fiddled around with a Ouija board
(x) Shaved your head or got a flat top (baldy or at least super short)
(x) Wrote a rant letter to someone (telling them off)
() TP'ed someones house or room

Now, here's my own list:

Things you have done during your lifetime:

(x) Performed in a play that ran more than five weeks
(x) Hiked more than ten miles in one day
(x) Written a play and seen it performed
(x) Seen the Alhambra in Spain
(x) Had an entire stage all to yourself during a musical
(x) Gotten lost in a cave
(x) Explored an abandoned house
(x) Stood on a tile or floor two thousand years old
(x) Been in the southern hemisphere
(x) Been to a castle (or ruins of a castle) once owned by an ancestor
(x) Sang in a choir in a church more than 750 years old
(x) Walked on a grave dating from the Crusades
(x) Toured the Tower of London
(x) Been under a bat flight
(x) Seen a vampire bat, not in a zoo but in a cave
(x) Eaten food from a street vendor in Mexico
(x) Seen the International Space Station and a comet on the same night
(x) Eaten snails (escargot) with butter
(x) Seen a real live sea turtle, not in a zoo but in the sea or near it
(x) Slept with a candidate for public office
(x) Heard gunfire in your own neighborhood
(x) Seen someone get shot with a gun
(x) Seen a stealth bomber in a hangar, under armed guard
(x) Had dinner with a Scottish man wearing a kilt
(x) Gone swimming in a cave where people had drowned before
(x) Climbed a ledge where people had fallen to their deaths before
(x) Worn pink pajamas in public
(x) Given a eulogy at a funeral
(x) Done a secret act of random, senseless kindness
(x) Appeared in a television commercial
(x) Designed one or more websites
(x) Picked up a hitchhiker on an impulse
(x) Lost more than 30 pounds in one unbroken effort or program
(x) Faced the possibility of dying
(x) Pulled off a tough guy bluff to protect someone else
(x) Hiked in a tropical rain forest, in the rain
(x) Been a designated driver for your friends who were Partying Down™
(x) Pretended to be British and pulled off the ruse
(x) Pretended to be anything you're not and pulled off the ruse
(x) Refused to do something that was socially expected, for moral reasons
(x) Written a letter to a national publication, which was then published

But the real Bucket List is supposed to be the things you want to do before you die, but haven't yet:

() See Rome.
() See Pompeii.
() Walk on a glacier.
() Visit Australia, and actually throw a shrimp on the barbie.
() See a Broadway show, on Broadway
() See the solar eclipse in 2012
() Celebrate the winter solstice on the Yucatan peninsula as the Mayan calendar ends.
() Have a tiny walk on role in a successful movie.
() See a Lillian Gish film in a theatre.
() Eat an avocado from my very own tree.
() Take the tour in Gruta del Palmito and see where I proposed to GA 25 years ago.
() Tour Kew Gardens.
() Give Laura San Giacomo a nice backrub.

Plants of happiness

I'm really enjoying the plants I have in my little house and yard. One of my newest is this orange tree we bought on sale because the nursery had left it out during a freeze, and all the leaves were frosted off. They're coming back to life and looking very nice now:


I'm really pleased with this one, because I thought I had lost it. I had planted this avocado seed, which had sprouted into a little tree about three inches tall, and an unexpected frost seemed to have killed it. But recently, when I went out to pull weeds in preparation for my spring garden, I found that it had survived, and sent up a new shoot:



Notice to the right is a new baby plant that I was trying to replace it with - another seed.

And finally, my little potted ocotillo. Sonya, my caving friend from from the Dallas area, shared a cutting from her ocotillo a few years ago, and I put it in cactus potting soil, and carefully misted it until it could grow some roots. It hadn't leafed out in a while, so I was afraid it was dead this time, but you never know with ocotillo, and it leafed out again to my delight:



I love plants.

Time machine malfunction

My time machine is messing up... again.

I've oiled and calibrated the flux capacitor three times now, and still it messes up. I wanted to go visit the dinosaurs and get some nice photos, maybe some video, but things keep going wrong.

I set it for the usual 65 million years ago, because that's when they were supposed to start disappearing, give or take a couple of million years - and you know they've got it pinned down to a couple of million years, being the obsessed sticklers for accuracy that they are.

But I showed up in 1956, which happens to be the year I first became fascinated with dinosaurs. Here is the first illustration I saw, in our home encyclopedia, which my parents probably bought from a slick salesman with a thin mustache:








These days, scientists are pretty sure the T Rex didn't stand like that. Here is what they really look like as far as posture. It allows the rex to balance nicely on those huge back legs without getting his tail dirty:



So they're getting closer. But as I said, my time machine keeps messing up. In the last month, I have arrived in Imperial Rome wearing a 1979 leisure suit, I have appeared in some Mayan village wearing something more appropriate to a Rocky Horror Picture Show debut, and I walked into Woodstock in 1969 wearing a business suit.

So when I arrived in 65 million BC, finally, my viking costume was probably close enough to fool the cavemen, as suspicious as they might be. I probably should have tried to look a bit more intimidating, as they might have been less likely to take my camera and use it as a hammer, and I might have come back with a more decent photograph of our friend the T Rex.

I can describe it, though. The second picture above is about right as far as posture and shape, but the color is wrong. The T Rex was jet black with red stripes, running his length and widening for his body, then narrowing again at the tail.

The movies have them all ferocious and scary and aggressive, but they're actually amazingly shy and easily intimidated. They don't fight at all - they're giant, effective scavengers, probably the ancestors to the modern day vulture.

When they feed, they pivot nicely on those huge hips, and the tiny forearms hold the corpse still while the huge jaws and teeth crush the bones and rip out chunks of flesh. The bones and flesh are chewed in mighty gulps, and the Rexes do this in teams of four or five. The locals leave them to their work, because they are doing an important job, environmentally speaking, and because they stink to high heaven, and you would not, repeat not, want to barbecue one of them.

And they don't roar - they have a loud, nasty hiss when they jostle each other for best dinner position, or if they feel threatened.

So no pictures, because I have no intention of having another of my cameras used for grinding corn.

I still love to watch Jurassic Park, accurate or not.