Happy Birthday

My sister was just what every little sister should be. She wanted to do the things I did. She wanted to be where I was. She wanted to follow me where I went. There's nothing wrong with that. But I was a typical older sister and didn't want my four-years-my-junior little sister tagging along with me everywhere. 

On my best friend's eighth birthday she had a party at her house. I was invited and my sister wanted to come too. I did not want her to be there. My mother was understanding, but she reminded me that it would be very difficult for my sister to understand that she just shouldn't go with me to the birthday party. Mother agreed to distract my sister while I slipped out the front door and walked down the street. I remember reaching the corner of our property and hearing my little sister call for me from the upstairs window. It had taken her only that long to discover my absence and realize her abandonment. She may not remember this incident, but her calls for me to come back and let her come with me still echo in my memory.

My sister was just what every little sister should be. She idolized me for years until she grew wiser and realized that I was a very flawed person. This realization took her a very long time and in the meantime, I was often pestered by my little sister standing at my elbow doing everything I did. I found this especially irksome because I had a vastly different view of and relationship with my older sister. There are three of us girls and I fall in the middle, two years younger than the older and four years older than the younger. I wanted to be nothing like my older sister and took every opportunity to prove that I was different, that I was not her. (This also was a mistake, but one for another time.) I thought my younger sister should take strides towards being her own person, being different than I. To this end, I took to ignoring her when she became too tiresome.

We lived in a small home and shared bedrooms until I was well into my teens. This left very little room for a quiet moment alone. I would sneak into the attic and crawl among the stored blankets and winter clothing whenever I wanted time to myself. Usually I spent the time reading and avoiding chores. Inevitably, my sister followed me, thus defeating my seclusion. She talked to me. She brought dolls for us to play together. She brought a book she couldn't even read yet and sat quietly next to me. She never read her own pages; she just carefully watched me out of the corner or her eye, waiting to turn her page when I turned mine. I just ignored her.

My sister was just what every little sister should be. She learned, over time, that her constant attention irritated me, and that she could gain more of my time by making planned attacks instead of a sustained barrage. She noticed, too, that I spent much of my evenings writing in my journal, and later in life, writing simply because I liked to write. My sister also learned that I was most vulnerable to her pleas at the end of the day after school, chores, and living with four siblings had worn down my snarky responses.

I don't remember when my sister began leaving notes on my pillow, but she can't have been very old, probably around four. Sometimes there was an impetus for her note: I had yelled at her that day for touching my stuff; I had gotten in trouble for something and spent part of the afternoon crying; I had refused to let her play with an electronic game our older sister got for Christmas. Whatever the reason, my sister would address the issue of the day and hope that I wasn't sad anymore, or wasn't mad at her anymore, or would maybe let her play with the game tomorrow. When there wasn't an occasion for a note, I received a masterfully crafted card, or drawing, or popup piece of art always addressed to me and always signed LOVE. Sometimes she put her name. Sometimes she just wrote I LOVE YOU. She probably doesn't know until now, but I kept them.

My sister is everything a sister should be. She is a remarkably accomplished, beautiful young woman who has lived a better life than I have. She began dancing when she was ten and has never stopped since. She has won trophies and championships for her talent, skill, poise, and hard work. She has turned around and shared her knowledge through teaching. She has traveled abroad on a university medical study team and presented her research at nationally renowned conferences. She put herself through a bachelor of science university degree, an Emergency Medical Technician certification, and is now in paramedic school.

Even more than all that, my sister is still a loving, caring, and purely good person. I am more proud of her than of almost anyone I have ever known or ever met. I'm sorry I was such a terrible older sister.

Happy Birthday, my one and only Little Sister.

The Office

I noticed it the first time I watched the finale, but I didn't say anything at the time. In the first place, I was watching alone, and there was nobody to comment to in the room. In the second place, I expected the internet would notice the error and would say something. And in the third place, I don't believe in commenting at televisions in the delusion that what I say will in any way influence the events being portrayed by actors on my screen.

But it's been a while and I've never heard it mentioned and now I have to say, has nobody else noticed that Oscar folded that paper crane wrong?

It's the most distracting thing in the world to me and I have not been able to get over it. My writing doesn't usually demand lengthy research, but for this post I have spent hours exploring possibilities and trying to come up with a reasonable explanation for two seconds of an old tv episode.

Here is the fundamental problem: the fold Oscar makes in the one shot of him folding, before he holds up a perfectly completed paper crane, is the wrong base fold to get a paper crane. You literally cannot get a paper crane out of the fold he is making. And the fold the he does make would put a completely unnecessary crease in the paper.

For the first time on my blog, I have pictures! Because there's no way to explain this impossibility without them. These two photos are of what is called a waterbomb base, one of the two most common base folds in origami. I've been folding origami since I was five, so I recognize the base folds when I see them.

The other most common base fold is called a square base and looks like this.

Detailed differences between the two are not important right now, but do you see that they're visually different? Here is a screenshot from the episode showing Oscar "folding" origami.

Clearly the waterbomb, right? That's the problem. The paper crane he holds up in the next shot comes from the square base, not the waterbomb. There is no way to get a crane out of the waterbomb unless you unfold it, start with a square, and proceed like a normal person to fold the crane the right way.

In the short shot, Oscar proceeds to firmly crease the fold he's just made. Out of curiosity, and in an attempt to see if it were possible, I started a crane using the base Oscar has. Not being an applied physicist, I was not certain how the crane would be affected by the fold that Oscar makes. To be as methodical as possible, I also only folded the fold Oscar did in the show and then unfolded and started from the beginning.

I folded it four times with that crease and ended up with a completely erroneous crease in one of these four places: the base of the neck/tail, or the base of either wing. Oscar's crane doesn't suffer from unnecessary creases. I went through several more attempts to make sense out of the folding as seen on tv, but all I did was further vindicate my original position.

Oscar's line at this point is "But, seriously, you made a nine-year documentary and you couldn't once show me doing my origami."

IT'S CAUSE YOU CAN'T FOLD ORIGAMI, OSCAR!!!

Deep breath. Exhale. I'm fine.

The puzzling thing to me is that someone clearly made a paper crane. Oscar's holding one in the shot. And Oscar's folding a waterbomb base in the previous shot. So clearly someone somewhere on that set knows at least a little about folding paper! So why the incongruity? 

I can think of only two reasonable explanations. 1) They were originally going to have him fold something besides a crane. Something that, naturally, gets folded from the waterbomb base. But then someone decided it'd be better to hold up a crane than a frog and the animal was changed without the base fold shot being redone. Or 2) The one guy who knew how to fold the crane was a mildly disgruntled employee and deliberately misguided the folding in order to get his own back at the producers.

To be honest, I'm leaning more towards option 2. Thanks, dude. You kept me awake at least sixteen different nights over the last year and a half puzzling about your stupid folding. I hope you're happy. 

The Gods of the Copybook Headings

This is a poem by Rudyard Kipling that Brian found and showed to me and now I want to share it. Copybooks were blank notebooks used to practice penmanship and other skills (like spelling) by repeatedly copying in the blank space a phrase or traditional saying printed at the top of the page. The printed phrases were referred to as "copybook headings."

A couple quick notes that may help: "Spirit" is used to describe the hippie idea of doing whatever you want. Stilton is a type of blue cheese. "Feminian Sandstones" is a term coined by Kipling, most likely to make another ancient-sounding reference to materialism or other worldly values. 

The Gods of the Copybook Headings

As I pass through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.

We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind.

We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.

With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.

When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "Stick to the Devil you know."

On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
(Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death."

In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die." 

Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return! 

~ Rudyard Kipling, 1919

Conversation Champion

A pregnant friend invited me to go visit a pregnant neighbor with her. Having never been pregnant, I contributed nothing to the hour of ensuing conversation except obligatory nods, smiles, and "I see"s. I was thinking about leaves (like on trees) when suddenly Neighbor mentioned how odd she thought it was that she and baby had been tested for strep.

"I thought that was a throat disease!" she said with slightly widened eyes. "Weird, right?"

I chimed in before my brain-to-mouth filter had received adequate warning to engage, and contributed what little I knew about strep. I actually found it fascinating that strep was a chain-like form of bacteria and that, though strep throat was one of the more common manifestations of streptococcus, the bacteria could, in fact, cause a number of other problems. I found it, therefore, no surprise that Neighbor had been tested for strep, though it was news to me that such was the standard operating procedure. But, I speculated, strep could very likely cause complications with a fetus, and wasn't strep related to meningitis? I seemed to remember having read that somewhere. Yes, now that I thought about it, I was pretty sure streptococcus could cause meningitis. And pink-eye. That's another one that people don't often realize is a streptococcus family of infection. Of course, pink-eye, as far as I'm aware, has never killed anyone. But, oh! Wasn't there a necrotizing form of strep? I thought I remembered there being a branch of the family that ate fle—

Neighbor was staring at me with mouth agape.

What in heaven's name was I talking about? Was I just about to tell a woman—a pregnant woman I just met—about flesh-eating bacteria? These two women have been talking for an hour and twenty minutes and have both managed to make it that long without entering a dissertation on the many branches of streptococcus. Can I really not contribute something remotely normal to such an established conversation?

I should have said something about leaves.

It's All About the Presentation

With Brian having nasal surgery this weekend, (more on that another day) I seized the obvious opportunity to try my hand at cooking a new but hearty meal. My culinary skills have vastly improved from the days I've mentioned before but I realize I've a lot yet to learn. 

Brian approved my suggestion for a dinner of roast beef and mashed potatoes and further accompanied me to the store to select the roast and pick up some onions. Brian thinks everything is better with onions. He's only partially wrong. But that's another topic entirely.

I called my mother, who supplied me with excellent instructions for fixing the meal in my slow cooker and all things looked successful four hours later when I taste-tested the broth and poked the meat to see if it was bleeding. It wasn't and the broth needed only a little more seasoning. I was pleased. 

The upcoming faux pas portion of this endeavor may have escaped into general ignorance but for two things: Brian's sister's fiancé arrived immediately following the error and Brian was still laughing, and then Brian's mother visited within the next couple days and he found it amusing enough to tell her. So now I figure the rest of my social world may as well be included.

I cooked what turned out to be a rather good roast, particularly considering that it was my first roast. My mother, however, never measures anything when she cooks and always gives me approximate proportions in her instructions. She had directed me to fill the slow cooker "about half way" with liquid for the broth. This I did, but I ended up with it filled a little more than three-quarters with the broth. By the time I added the potatoes, onions, and carrots a couple hours later, the broth fully engulfed the two roast rumps. This was not ultimately a problem except that to me the entire concoction looked very deceptively like soup.

A short aside: It has been easily fifteen years or more since my own mother has cooked this same meal for me, so I literally did not recall how she served it. I remembered only that she used to cook cabbage in hers, and I always hated the taste of boiled cabbage. It was such an awful thing to include in an otherwise delicious meal. The cabbage had this horrible habit of half floating in the broth bowl and dripping everywhere. Any attempt to eat it ultimately soaked the rice in your rice bowl and no amount of rice and beef in the same mouthful negated how terrible cabbage tasted.

How lovely, now, to be in charge of what goes into my broth! Cabbage was banned. Carrots were delicious. Potatoes an absolute necessity. And onions by request. I'm fine with that. I pulled out the roast, sliced it on a cutting board, and placed it in a deep bowl over which I ladled generous amounts of broth and vegetables. I set the bowl in front of my rather groggy recovering handsome and returned to the kitchen to fix the peas he wanted as a side and wait expectantly for the feedback that would come after a bite or two.

Silence reigned. 

Not only was there no feedback, but I wasn't even hearing the scrape of the spoon against the bowl. I stopped and looked at Brian who was staring deeply with furrowed brows at the bowl before him. I asked if everything was all right. He turned to me and just stared with a puzzled smile beginning to creep across his face. He stood up and carried the bowl back to the kitchen. He hadn't even tasted it yet! What could possibly be wrong?

"Sweetheart, you're so strange. It's roast beef! It's not a soup."

For heaven's sake, if it's not supposed to be served as a soup it oughn't to be cooked as a soup! Whose fault is that? Certainly not mine. I've been racking my brains since then for experiences to reference on how this meal is normally served. But now for the life of me, I cannot remember how my mother served roast beef. I know there was rice . . .