Halloween with the King

My husband quit wearing his pig mask.  For years he kept a full rubber headed, blunt-nosed, cigar-smoking pig mask near the door on Halloween.  When the tiny Tinker Bells and Bat Men approached in innocent anticipation and rang our bell, he’d rush into position; sweep the snouted face over his head, swing the door open, and growl.  What pig growls? 

The tiny trick-or-treaters, stunned mid-sentence, could only step back and stare.  Their parents would press forward just in case the need arose to swing into protective action.  But it was all in good fun, ha ha!  We kept lots of Snickers and Milky Ways in a large jack-o-lantern bowl, and never rationed the kids.  It’s the least we could do to compensate for the confusion.

Now, that mask, wadded up and stuck to its latex self, jams a corner in a box in the attic along with residual spider webs, my witch’s pointy hat, and a life-sized, glow-in-the-dark plastic skeleton.  It’s just as well. 

Our claim to Halloween glory, my husband’s and mine, was the year we won the costume competition dressed as “Pat.”  You remember Pat, don’t you?  The androgynous character from Saturday Night Live who creeped everyone out because you could never be sure:  Was Pat female or male? 

Pat had short-ish curly black hair; so we bought wigs.  Pat was heavy; so we padded ourselves – this was back in the lean days, you understand.  Pat had breasts, though it was never clear if these were man breasts or woman breasts; we incorporated accoutrements for the illusion. Black horn-rimmed glasses, matching blue plaid snap-button western shirts, Wranglers, and boots completed the ensemble.  

But the crowning touch was Pat’s wheezing, whining voice.  My husband perfected it.  He spoke for us both all night long.  The voice, and the self-caressing gestures that made the judges cringe, blink, and pull away as though they’d just inhaled a big whiff of yellow onion, secured the trophy. 

Aahh.  Those were the days. 

In my heyday, I dressed as Andy Rooney, the Living Dead, even punk rocker Sid Vicious – or at least someone he would have hung out with.  One of my students spiked my hair in what he called a “Statue of Liberty,” and lent me his heavy black leather jacket.  Ripped black nylon hose, chains hanging and safety pins everywhere; black lipstick and black fingernails.  Man that was fun. 

One year I wore a Superman costume complete with boots and cape.  I flew all over campus that year.  The kids loved it.  Not sure what my boss thought when I attended a meeting at the District Office in full Man of Steel regalia.  I felt powerful.   

I kept the full-body panther suit handy and wore it for many years, whenever the mood struck me, not just Halloween.  Where is it now?  No matter.  The moths have had their way with it. 

It’s not important.  The past few years, the number trick-or-treaters in our neighborhood have dwindled to single digits.  We still stock up on just-in-case candy, but wind up sending it to my husband’s office the next day.  The kids don’t visit houses anymore.  They wear store-bought costumes prescribed by Hollywood merchandisers and patrol stores downtown or at the mall, moving from merchant to merchant with their parents, working a pattern for maximum take, minimum interaction. 

Gotta be this way.  I understand.  Still… 

Gone is the excitement for a teenager, face painted, costume pulled together out of mom and dad’s closet, carrying his pillowcase, and running through the darkness with his friends, thrilled with the imaginary world that’s only open once a year.  This year, teens will dress like Snookie.  They’ll buy false six-pack abs and make like “The Situation.” 

Sigh.  

The next step in homogenizing Halloween?  Government takeover!  Connecticut lawmakers have a bill pending that will move the event in that state to the last Saturday of the month instead of the 31^st.  OK.  Why not?  Civilize it.  School nights.  I get it. 

But I’m not done.  I don’t have to give it up.  I’m not a kid.  And I still have an Elvis in me.  I’ve got a hankering to dress up like Elvis.  I know.  I should settle for Priscilla Beaulieu, but she’s just too easy.  Anyone can tease her hair into a rage and line her eyes with a magic marker.  

But Elvis.  Elvis!  Now that’s Halloween!

Meet the New Boss ~ Same as the Old Boss

Occupy Wall Street has drawn our attention, but trying to understand them feels too much like trying to find Waldo:  Lots of details and no center of focus.  We’re unclear where we should be looking.   

When asked by news media what their cause is, protestors at each location have answered with a remarkable range of hopes, dreams, frustrations, and non-sequiters.  One said, “We’ve got to get the money out of politics.”  Another said, “These corporate dollars should be going to schools.”  A third said we should be growing corn for ethanol!   

Even those who seem to be targeting the unpunished bankers of Wall Street haven’t articulated what they want.  In the unlikely event that a Fat Cat in a high rise had even the mildest inclination to inquire, who would step forward and speak for the protestors?  What would she say? 

No doubt there is unrest in the United States.  Something’s wrong and Americans don’t like it.  At the very least we know that Washington’s infuriating partisan charade has settled into our living rooms.  While politicians play-act, they seem to mirror the malaise drifting across the countryside, through our towns and businesses, tugging at us, weighing us down, contributing to our economic doldrums.

But the thing is, most of us don’t understand the conglomerated behemoth of a financial system that has swollen and continues to swell.  What does it want?  More?  Shouldn’t it be on our side?  After all, if it saves us, we save it.  Right? 

We do know that we resent “them” and blame them for the joblessness sleeping on our couches and standing in the kitchen in front of the fridge at midnight.  We feel them reaching into our pants pockets when we know they have money of their own.  We don’t like the arrogant, indifferent attitude that shrugs its shoulders and looks away when asked what has gone wrong. 

Even the analysts don’t seem to understand our economy; otherwise it wouldn’t be so easy to find “experts” with views diametrically opposed.  They’re giving it their best guess, God bless them everyone, but “black is white” and “up is down” just aren’t helpful.  Have the banks flexed and the government flinched?  Who’s in charge?  What are the rules?  Who’s the enforcer? 

When pelted with fact after conflicting fact, that is, opposite statements which all may be true, we cannot surrender just because we’re unable to spell out our own internal certainty that we’re being messed with on a national scale.   

That’s where the Occupy protestors come in.  But they didn’t think it through.  They haven’t done their research or planned their arguments.  They don’t have a spokesperson or a point to stay on.  So they camp out and shout out the Tommy Smothers retort, “Oh Yeah?” 

They know they’re right about the gut of the American people:  We know in our hearts and minds that those whom we’ve trusted are screwing us over, either through their greed, their cynicism, their self-interest, or their incompetence. 

We know our protestors mean well.  We also know the road to hell.  One of several fates looms for Occupy Wall Street.  First, they and their affiliates could slip into that pale corner of the conversation inhabited by those who failed to plan and thereby planned to fail.  They could become the shooting star, the flash in the pan, the limp noodle of grass roots movements. 

They could, God forbid, lose control, vent those frustrations borne from their own lack of focus, lack of leadership, lack of response, and ineffectiveness.  They could be put down the hard way.  Ill portent for all involved. 

And a third, most intriguing option presents itself:  Occupy Wall Street has amassed a mountain of food and supplies, filling a cavernous space near Wall Street with those donated goods to sustain their movement.  

Even more interesting, they have collected $300K and opened a bank account.  That’s right.  Amalgamated Bank, which bills itself as the only 100 percent union-owned bank in the United States, is the repository of Occupy Wall Street funds. 

Who signs those checks?  Who will be paid to do what with that money?  Will the cities “hosting” these occupations be repaid for the added sanitation services, for example?  Will Occupy Wall Street redistribute these funds among the other Occupy groups across the country?  With no stated goals and no pact with anyone, the imminence of irony arrives.   

Will “Occupy” go corporate?

Goodday Australia!

Hello Innaloo!

So great to hear from you!

Keep reading!

TDP ~ Carolyn

Dad, Can I Sell Pot? Go Ask Your Mother!

What you permit, you promote.   

I received a swift demonstration of this lesson when I was a high school principal.  During Breast Cancer Awareness Week I chose to ignore a student’s T-shirt sporting a smiley face declaring, “I Love Breasts!”  He was a good kid after all.  Happy go lucky.  His shirt reflected breast cancer awareness, right? 

Next day, a half dozen of his buddies donned similar shirts, now depicting happy hands reaching toward the breasts they loved.  By the end of the week, awash in inappropriate references to healthy breasts and all that affection, I learned another lesson:  It’s a whole lot easier to loosen up than it is to tighten up. 

It looks like the federal government is about to be schooled in those two truisms.  

The Justice Department practiced benign neglect when Californians, and voters in other states, made it legal to cultivate and sell medical marijuana.  They did nothing, thereby promoting the actions of enterprising vendors who established dispensaries across the country. 

Sure enough, business boomed and expanded into lucrative markets.  “Research and Development” introduced new, improved products.  All aspects of the marijuana industry flourished, from cultivation to sales.  One Northern California dispensary reports selling $51million dollars’ worth of medical marijuana between 2004 and 2007.  It paid no sales tax citing the state law exempting prescribed medicines. 

Even President Obama declared he had little interest in going after state policies related to legalized cannabis in spite of the fact that they contradict federal laws.  Why?  Civics 101 taught us that states can make laws stricter than federal laws, but not more lax.  Yet Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder gave the issue low priority.  OK.  Just look the other way. 

Now, after15 years of inattention, the Feds have wakened from their benevolent snooze.  And they woke up cranky.   

U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag said, “[Prop.  215 was intended] to allow marijuana to be supplied to seriously ill people on a nonprofit basis, but it has been hijacked by people who are in this to get rich.” 

You can see she’s shocked.  Seriously. 

This week, the Justice Department notified dozens of California’s dispensary owners, as well as residential, commercial, and agricultural property owners involved in activities deemed to be drug trafficking, warning them to cease such operations within 45 days or face consequences including bank account and property seizure, civil lawsuits, and criminal prosecutions.   

“These actions should surprise no one,” the Justice Department intones, “[the DOJ is] simply making good on the threats they’ve been issuing for years.”  Like the permissive parent who warns and warns and warns a child, but fails to follow through, they’ve now reached a threshold and lost their temper.  Let the punishment begin.  

That’s the unpleasant business of tightening up.  Reason doesn’t always prevail when you’re trying to save face. 

In the name of logic, and at the risk of showing my naïveté, I wonder aloud, why isn’t medical marijuana dispensed from pharmacies?  No other drug prescribed by a doctor can be sold from a dispensary unless it’s a licensed, regulated pharmacy. 

In every other case, a doctor sees a patient, diagnoses a problem, and issues a prescription.  The patient takes his prescription to a pharmacy; the pharmacy dispenses the drug, which the patient takes home and ingests.  Why is medical marijuana different? 

Even those who might object to recreational use of the drug accept its medicinal benefits.  At the very least, the medical community itself endorses marijuana as an alternative to mainstream drug therapy. 

So, why is it OK for those patients to acquire their medicine out of a storefront?  Why is it acceptable for those patients to fire up their Maui Wowie on the premises, essentially getting high in public?  Oops…we can all stop at the drinking fountain and take our pills.  We can even get high at the brewpub without so much as a fare-thee-well.  Best not cast those stones. 

The better question is:  Why must they buy their prescribed treatment in sometimes unsavory and unsafe circumstances?  If my grandma has glaucoma, why does she have to traverse the unkempt masses to secure her legally prescribed remedy?  (Why do so many medical marijuana patients seem unkempt?)  That’s just wrong. 

Somebody needs to step up and be a parent, er, leader.  Define your terms:  what’s legal, what’s not?  What’s medicinal, what’s recreational?  Set clear expectations and realistic, enforceable consequences.  Then do what you said you would do.

Is Time Running Out for the Beautiful People?

Here’s the beginning of our ignominious end - NBC News anchor Brian Williams teased viewers this week with the headline of an ominous lead story coming up on the nightly news:  certain hip replacements are failing and will have to come out. 

Easy for him to say.  Seems thousands of bionic men and women now face the daunting prospect of enduring a double surgical procedure to remove and replace their…replacements. 

So what’s next for Jane Fonda and all the rest of us boomers who’ve succumbed to deteriorating joints and metal-on-metal replacements for our ailing bones?  Jane’s a perfect representative of the post-boom phenomenon.  She’s had knee and hip replacement along with back surgery.  She’s 72, healthy, and looking great.  But that may be more aptly attributed to her cosmetic surgery.  She’s owned up to having the bags under her eyes deflated.  

What if all manner of high-tech enhancements developed and implanted over decades of the boomers’ era turn out to have a shelf life, as it were?  What if it’s not just Jane Fonda’s hip and knee replacements that will need recycling?  What about her baggy eyes? 

More than a few folks have had similar elective procedures.  Sure they’re non-essential and totally vain.  But are they susceptible to the ticking clock, too?  Are we approaching the Y2K of the self-conscious aging elite? 

If we don’t get this under control, we could wake up to the luddites’ nightmare:  All our technology turns on us, rebelling in the most unfortunate and unattractive ways. 

Remember Eddie Murphy in the remake of “The Nutty Professor”?  He had what we all want – a magic elixir – one sip and voila!  Thin!  Sexy!  Funny!  But of course, no Fountain of Fitness can exist in the real world. 

Murphy’s Professor Clump, as his newly svelte alter ego Buddy Love, seized the opportunity to pursue the girl of his dreams, the one his flabby, unfortunate self could not hope to impress.  But alas, in a crucial, public moment, just like Jane’s time-sensitive hip, Buddy’s potion breaks down.  Before our eyes, the professor bulges back to his prodigious former self, body part by gelatinous body part. 

Given the impending expiration of our man-made yet mortal appendages and restitutions, we could find ourselves in the same discomfiting circumstance. 

What if nose jobs expired, for example?  Right in the middle of “Keeping Up with the Kardashians,” Kim’s pretty proboscis might just revert to its original, lumpy form.  A whole new kind of reality could present itself if the Plastic Surgeons of America sent a recall notice for the scaffolding underpinning Bruce Jenner's face work.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                Imagine all the serene conversations in Hollywood bistros and suburban country clubs when, out of nowhere, a timer goes off and dozens of lifted foreheads advance to their rightful, age-appropriate positions, coming to rest somewhere in the neighborhood of one’s delicately plucked eyebrows.  In Washington, Nancy Pelosi would blink, giving Republicans in Congress false hope of victory. 

Why, those eyebrows themselves would travel into real estate appropriated by tacked-wide-open eyes, creating uninvited squints even in the shade of Carrera sunglasses. 

What if Botox … oh, never mind.  It does expire.  We know already that.  The wax melts and you’ve gotta keep getting shot up if you want to maintain that expressionless guise of indifference. 

Otherwise, Joan Rivers might disappear altogether. 

Hair transplants!  That would be hilarious!  What if those perfect plugs just unplugged, on cue, like so many spontaneous champagne corks, no matter where the “plug-ee” might find himself?  Like an electrified porcupine coming undone on the fairway, or the boardroom!   

In an apocalyptic scenario, voluptuous lips would shrink back to their original, severe Frau Bluchers.  Silicon breasts would collapse leaving folds of skin and yards of unfilled fabric limp in their wake.  All those pinned-back ears would once again flap free. 

Reminiscent of the cages being flung open at the zoo, all God’s creatures would run in gleeful abandon, returning to their natural states. OK, maybe not gleeful. 

I decline to reveal where I might wind up in such a scenario.  Parts of me could be susceptible to the fall of the empire, shall we say?  But which parts and where they’ll land remains a confidential, eyes only, need-to-know Top Secret.   

Suffice it to say that I keep the joints greased with glucosamine and the clocks wound tight.  Vigilant.  Ever vigilant.                                                                                                  

Big Brother Married Nurse Ratchet

Uh, oh.  Mark Zuckerberg is at it again!   

First we caught him sneaking his face-recognition software into Facebook without letting us know.  Now he’s following us around the web, even when we’re not logged in to Facebook. 

Oh my goodness, Mark, Mark, Mark!  You megalomaniac, you! 

Of course we lost control of our Older Male Sibling long ago.  Back when we put our Social Security numbers on job applications we surrendered ourselves to being watched and dogged by what has become a voracious, titanic mogul in the sky. 

Until recently, I didn’t feel watched or dogged.  In fact, I had a hard time imagining that any one person up there in the cloud could be bothered with the mundane routines of my comings and goings.  Ho hum.  

But of course it’s not my comings and goings that interest the industrious Zuckerberg clan.  Their interest lies in my willingness to spend my money on their stuff.  

Case in point:  My experience with Spanx.  It’s underwear, OK?  Specialized body slimming underwear – the latest thing in the 100 Years War of the Waistline.  If you want to know more about Spanx, you’ll just have to look it up.  But do so at your own risk. 

I confess I went onto the Spanx website and shopped around.  I didn’t buy anything because I didn’t buy their pitch.  OK, I kind of do accept their squeeze-it smooth-it pretend-it’s-not-there premise, but their stuff is ‘way too expensive for me.  Still, I noodled around with the detached interest of a shopper who hopes to find a comparable product at a reasonable price at Kohl’s. 

Let’s say that was Monday.  WEDNESDAY, I got a catalog, from Spanx, with my name on it, in the US mail!   

Did Mark Zuckerberg just send me a Spanx catalog?  Now that’s weird. 

And he’s meeting with all kinds of powerful people – House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, Budget Chairman Paul Ryan - the President!  What’s that all about?! 

I’m starting to feel a kinship with all those conspiracy theorists who believe “they” are reading our mail and tapping our phones.  Pass the aluminum foil. 

You know, my crazy Aunt June thought her sister-in-law (my crazy Aunt Daisy) was reading her mail, opening her electric bills, and examining her cable viewing habits.  Turns out, she was!  Caught her red-handed steaming envelopes!  Not so crazy after all.

Now Zuckerberg unveils some of the most drastic changes ever made to Facebook's service.  The fear among users relates to what some say portends a worrisome privacy situation on the social network, led by Mr. Z’s new feature, “Timeline,” and changes to “Open Graph.”  Zuckerberg said he believes these “improvements” will help users share every single facet of their lives on the social network.

Timeline provides users with a way to view "the story of your life," including a collection of all the “stories” users have shared on Facebook over the years, as well as the pictures they've posted, and the applications they've used.  Oh yes, it’s all in Mr. Z’s sky-vault.

Facebook's updated Open Graph enables users, thanks to Timeline and a new addition, Ticker, to see what a “friend” is doing in real time, for example if he’s watching a movie on Netflix or listening to a song on Spotify (whatever that is!).  Then the viewer can engage in that same activity from within the social network.  Imaginary friends have become virtual friends.  

If that’s not enough to make you twitch, over the other shoulder comes OnStar following us around town even if we cancel their GPS service or never activate it in the first place.   

Not only does OnStar store data on your vehicle diagnostics like oil changes, tire pressure, the gas type you use; information about crashes such as whether you’re wearing a seat belt or whether an airbag deployed; and the car’s GPS/location information – including the speed of the vehicle, when the vehicle moves, and the precise location of the vehicle moment-to-moment.  All the more ominous when we’re reminded that GM offers a “free” trial of OnStar with each new vehicle it sells.  

I haven’t had that kind of monitoring since I was a teenager trying to elude my dad. 

Of course, OnStar reserves the right to sell aggregate data to third parties likely to be advertising, insurance, and analytics companies eager to gather as much information about us as they can for their own prying, greed-based reasons. 

And you thought you were alone. 

Your Mother Doesn't Live in Outer Space

I’m not one to lose faith in the human race, but even a person with my high level of patience and boundless optimism can be tested.   

Some things just make me wonder if we humans will ever grow up.  Are we evolving? 

OK, sure, we’re standing upright.  That’s important, but so 2 million years ago.  We created Facebook and yogurt-on-the-go, though some may question whether these represent progress. 

It’s just this news item I ran across the other day:  “Orbital mess may require high-tech maid service.” 

Come on!  Really? 

The brain trust that developed our space program, the brilliant thinkers who put the International Space Station and all manner of satellites into the sky bringing us everything from the NFL Red Zone to GPS pet tracking, the brightest and the best among us merged onto the intergalactic highway and just threw the trash out the window? 

It’s so disappointing.   

Twenty-two thousand objects large enough to track from terra firma circle above our heads, not to mention the countless chunks of space rubble too small to track, but still large enough to damage human-carrying spaceships or valuable satellites.  The International Space Station had to maneuver out of the way of this cosmic flotsam more than once.  That involves a bit more effort than swerving to avoid a cast off tennis shoe on the freeway. 

“We’ve lost control of the environment,” admitted a retired NASA senior scientist.  That’s a pretty big environment!  It’s not just a teenager’s bedroom you can close the door on.  

To be fair, 25 years ago, when scientists around the world first noticed their slovenliness could cause problems, they came up with agreements to limit new space junk.  They signed a pact guaranteeing what they sent into orbit would eventually fall back to Earth and burn up.  It actually worked. 

That was a close one. 

But wait…what’s this?  Another headline?  “Earth braces for giant piece of space junk.”   

You mean the grand “it’ll flame out and fizzle on re-entry” scheme is flawed?  OMG.  A six-ton NASA satellite the size of a school bus reported to be “tumbling in orbit and succumbing to Earth’s gravity”…will crash to the surface Friday [today].  Or maybe Saturday.  They’re not sure exactly when, or where. 

Great.  “Out-of-control crashing satellites don’t lend themselves to exact estimates even for the precision-minded folks at NASA.”  Ha ha ha.  LOL.  NASA scientists did, however, calculate the odds of a person being struck by a piece of this debris at 1-in-3,200.  I feel much better now. 

Adding insult, two recent incidents dumped enough junk into our cosmic greenbelt that the original problem re-asserted itself.  (We may be able to write that sci-fi disaster screenplay after all.) 

First, two satellites crashed into each other.  Go figure.  In the vastness of space they found each other, like that guy wandering in the desert who trips over the only log for miles.  Looks like we have a surplus of circumnavigating high-tech tree trunks.  

Then, in what’s characterized as an anti-satellite weapons test, the Chinese used a missile to smash one of their aging weather satellites into more than 150,000 dangerous hunks o’ junk, more than three thousand of which are large enough to trace with ground radar.  

In response to this, an expert panel at the Department of Defense huddled up and began developing all manner of unusual strategies, techniques, and weird space technology to vacuum up all the extraterrestrial trash accumulating above us. 

They’ve designed cosmic nets, magnets, even gargantuan umbrellas to collect the clutter and dispose of it properly.  I guess that means they’ll bring it back home and take it to the dump.  

The good news is the demand for these gadgets means jobs.  The project requires a wide range of workers, from those with high levels of technical skill and expertise who will create the machinery and launch it, all the way to those who will operate the levers on the colossal garbage trucks patrolling our solar system like so many Wall-E’s. 

The bad news is we must scale down our noble dreams of celestial exploration.  We’re reduced from Galaxy Quest to orbiting street sweepers.  

Considering this and the budget cuts to NASA and SETI, we won’t be exploring new worlds or seeking out new life forms and civilizations.  We won’t boldly go where no one has gone before.  

No.  Like chastised adolescents, we’ll go timidly right back where we went before and clean up after ourselves.