Ask a Silly Question

I stopped by the gym today to reactivate my membership after it lapsed a while ago when my credit card expired. We exchanged polite small talk as the sales manager updated my account. "So, you're a teacher, eh?" he started. "Do you have any plans for the summer?"

"Well," I answered, "I'm going to join the gym!"

Founding Fathers

My mom and I spent a little long-distance genealogy time this morning. The website we use has changed a bit since last she was actively using it, and so I was answering her questions as best I could. We chose an ancestor at random to use as a study case and started from there. Jones Temple is my five times grandfather on my mother's mother's side.

With a few clicks and a little analysis we traced our line back a few generations from Jones to a family living in Virginia in the early 18th century. "Well," my mother laughed, "it's not William Bradford, but it's pretty good." She was referencing my last big family tree discovery, which happened to be on my father's side.

"Who knows?" I replied, "maybe someone is descended from the Jamestown guys."

We turned our attention to more recent relatives, but our conversation stuck in my head. So after we hung up I kept digging, and? Believe it or not, it turns out that my 11 times grandfather did indeed immigrate to Jamestown, not in 1607, but just twelve years later.

I called my mom to give her the news. "He got here in 1619," I reported. "Which, I would like to point out, is one year earlier than the Pilgrims."

We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled...

As summer vacation continues routine is out the window, and the days expand and contract to take on shapes of their own.

Take today for example:

Lucy and I woke at 6 and rose 30 minutes later; our young new neighbor breathlessly approached us as we made our first exit to ask what to do when your car is towed for no sticker; after assisting him as best I could, there was breakfast for all and Heidi, too, when she made her way downstairs around 7:30.

There was plant-watering and dog-visiting until it was time to meet a colleague at the dog park and then head over to try a new kebab place for lunch, dining al fresco at iron cafe tables in the shade outside the library. Arriving home with our exhausted puppy we decided to let her nap as the housecleaner did her job and take in a movie.

The Big Sick was entertaining, and finding Lucy still a little sleepy, we headed off to the pool for an hour. Now Heidi and Lulu are out on a walk while I prepare zucchini cakes, grilled chicken, and sliced tomatoes with basil for dinner.

From here? Who knows what the evening will hold? But isn't that the beauty of it all?

Like Cats and Dogs

Still no sign that Penelope is embracing the whole puppy thing; there is spitting and growling and hissing and yelping whenever the two of them get even a little close. No worries though- they have the rest of their lives to work it out.

Not so Lazy Days

Summer school starts at my school on Monday, and I am thankful not to be involved. One argument against summer vacation from school is the documented lapse that many students experience after so many months away. Not every kid has the summer full of reading and unstructured playing and  swimming and listening to the radio and doing chores and taking day trips and vacations and having conversations at dinner that I had when I was younger. Those activities were stimulating and involved critical thinking and problem solving that exercised my young brain, even if the game shows and soaps I also watched did not. Or did they? Maybe summer is kind of like the R.E.M. sleep of a kid's life, an active rest essential for proper development. Now if only they could find a way to measure that.

Kayak with a Twist

"Sure!" I said when my friend Mary asked if I would help her put her kayak on the roof of her new car to take to the beach.

"Ew!" I said when she flipped it over and showed me a season's worth of wet leaves and rodent-chewed styrofoam.

"No worries!" I said when the hose splashed me as I held the boat up at an angle so she could squirt it out.

"Hold that while I pull!" I said once we had the tie-downs around the kayak.

"Oops!" I said when we noticed the roof was bowing in beneath the styrofoam blocks.

"Let's Google it!" I said during the test-drive when Mary predicted she wouldn't be able to last the 6 hours down to the beach listening to the high-pitched vibration coming from the roof.

"Wouldn't it be funny if that fixes it?" I said after we read that if the straps are flat they will vibrate like the reed in a saxophone and sing the whole way, but if you give them a twist it will stop.

"There you go!" I said when it worked.

"Right!" I said when Mary laughed that at least I had something to write for the blog, and I should call it Kayak with a Twist.

Jiggity Jig

It was a zippy 7 hour trip along Lake Erie, up the Southern Tier, through the Alleghenies down to the coastal plain, and through this undrained swamp we call...

HOME