Thrifty Thrifting

I usually end up tossing the discount coupon they give me at the thrift store donation center. At those times, my mind is on clearing out rather than acquiring more, and I never get around to using it when my attitude is otherwise.

Today, as I waited in a line of cars driven by folks with a similar disposition of dispossessing, I saw three high school-aged girls walk up with a couple of items each. They dropped them into the bin, accepted the coupon, and proceeded into the store. I admired their shrewd saving sense, even as I waved off my own coupon. 

Books for the Dub

I love listening to an audiobook while I'm cooking, and this evening, it was The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali, a story spanning decades from the 1950s to the 1980s and crossing oceans from Iran to New York City. The novel was well recommended, but I think I chose it in part because last year, I listened to Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar. I was profoundly moved by that story of a young man who had moved with his dad to the States from Iran after his mother was lost when her plane was shot down by the USS Vincennes. 

When I was in high school in Switzerland in the late 1970s, several Iranian students were attending the school, too. Scions of wealthy families connected to the Shah, most were enrolled at our American school to learn English abroad, but not so far away as the United States. Those kids were a cultural force, and knowing them, living in the Middle East myself, and following the political upheaval of 1979 and beyond is definitely a draw for me when it comes to an Iranian setting.

In high school, we all learned Persian cussing. To this day, I could call bullshit or tell someone to go fuck their mom in Farsi, a skill I'm marginally proud of. At any rate, tonight, the main character in the novel describes her love of learning geography, and one of the examples is Portugal. "In our language the country is called Burtuqal," she says, "which means orange."

I've been to Portugal, and I know that vocabulary; the word for orange is the same in Arabic, which I learned in school in Saudi Arabia. But I never made the connection. How can it be that Portugal is named after oranges, or oranges after Portugal, and I never knew it? 

But how glad I am that I know it now!

Foxsplain Me

Who likes this shit?

It's a fair question in light of this week's news cycle, right? 

Who really thinks it's a good idea to pardon violent insurrectionists, gag government health agencies, conduct personal loyalty tests of federal employees, and install a Diet Coke button in the Oval Office? (And let's not even get started on the environment, reproductive rights, immigration, and transgender issues.)

I just don't get it, but although I'll never agree with such perspectives, I can't live the next four years condemning 51% of the electorate as selfish, ignorant morons. So, as a critic seeking clarity, I'm adding to my news providers. 

We'll see how that goes.

Eyes in the Sky

There's been a lot of helicopter traffic around here lately. 

Such roof-rattling whomp, whomp, whomp is not unheard of in these parts: Washington, D.C., is right over the bridge; we can see the Monument and Capitol from our balcony. The Pentagon is even closer, only a couple miles away. Even so, there seems to be an uptick in activity this week.

I've done my best to limit my media consumption and stay as positive as possible as a democratically elected president takes office and implements policies with which I disagree profoundly. Still, the sight of the wealthiest man in the world giving a Roman salute in celebration of this administration and witnessing the merciless codification of the hateful, revenge-driven rhetoric that framed the campaign has been hard to shake off. 

And then? 

There are all those helicopters.

A Poor Substitute

I debated long and hard when a friend and former colleague asked me to take the long-term sub job when she goes out for a month to recover from a hip replacement in April. I would be teaching science on my old sixth-grade team in the room right next door to mine, which is as tempting an offer to substitute as I can imagine.

In fact, that very room was the site of my first ever substitute job, back in the spring of ‘93, when I was subbing and looking for a full-time teaching position for the next school year. That particular sub job was not memorable other than being the first and also being located on the team at the school where I was eventually hired and stayed for my entire career. 

The same cannot be said for other sub jobs I took. There was the one where the 8th grade at another middle school girl lied about her name, pretending to be somebody else. That was hardly surprising, but the lack of support I got when I reported the incident did take me aback. “That’s unlikely,” said the teacher next door. “It really doesn’t sound like her.”

Another memorable interaction happened when I was encouraging a student at the alternative high school to do his U.S. History assignment, which was using crayons to shade a map, basically coloring. He refused to even take the handout. "This seems like a pretty easy job," I told him, "and you're here, so why not just do it?"

He sucked his teeth. "I'm here because it was this or jail," he scoffed, "but I'm not doing any work."

Three decades later, I have a broader skill set, but I'm not sure if I could do anything other than what I did then, which was to nod and walk away. A substitute has limited leverage, and students know it. 

That brings me back to the deliberation at hand. As much as I detest the idea of trying to teach with all the drawbacks of a temporary position, I wanted to help my friend out, and her co-teacher, another good friend, was applying intense pressure. I also liked the idea of being back at my old school for a few weeks and having the chance to catch up with my former students, now in 7th and 8th grade, and I was curious to see how the ephemeral nature of such a job might change my perspective on being in the classroom. 

And so, I agreed.

Feed the Cold

Yesterday, we hunkered down and fought the frigid weather by staying cozy by the fire. However, after sleeping in this morning and finishing a jigsaw puzzle in the early afternoon, I couldn't stay inside for another minute. I tried to get Lucy to walk with me, but she gave me a serious side-eye and put the brakes on before we were even out of the complex. 

It was cold, 22 degrees, but after bringing her back in, I snapped my trapper hat and headed back out for a walk on my own. It didn't take long after climbing the stairs and moving briskly through the neighborhood hills that I removed my hat. Soon, my jacket was only three-quarters zipped, and my scarf loosened. By the time I hit mile one, I was carrying my scarf and mittens in my hat as my coat waved behind me. 

"It's getting colder," a fellow walker admonished me with raised eyebrows, and I nodded in agreement as I passed her. As I continued along, I thought about ways to combat the cold. Hibernation is always a temptation, but action is effective, too, and so invigorating to boot.

Not That Hungry, Man

Heidi was talking to her mom on speaker this afternoon. "I got myself a frozen pizza to have during the game," her mom said.

"That's festive!" Heidi answered.

"Yeah, but you know what I was looking for and couldn't find?" her mom continued. "TV dinners. What? They don't make those anymore?"

The conversation continued on about the convenience of such a product. "Sometimes I just don't feel like cleaning up after cooking," her mom said, "and those are the perfect solution."

"I don't know," Heidi responded. "Honestly, I haven't looked for a TV dinner in years."

"When I was a kid," her mom recalled, "we used to love them because they came with a dessert."

"You used to get them for us," Heidi reminded her, "especially when we had a babysitter."

"Right," her mom agreed, "I would always ask the sitter what she wanted and get her one, too."

As they talked, I remembered the exact situation unfolding at our house when we had a babysitter. But I also remembered hating those TV dinners. Besides the fact that the food wasn't very good, they were always cooked unevenly-- something was scalding and dry, and something else was cold or mushy. One part of the meal always stuck to the foil tray, and not only did the dessert always taste a little like the entree, but the vegetable (which was usually yucky peas and carrots) always had some of the dessert on it. 

Even so, I found it hard to believe that food companies had actually come to their senses and discontinued such an iconic, if profoundly flawed, product. So, as the two of them continued their conversation, I did an online search of the grocery stores near Heidi's mom. Don't worry, dear reader, Hungry Man is still a thing; they just changed the packaging, which is why she couldn't find them. 

You can still have your sliced turkey and gravy dinner, or fried chicken, or even your Salisbury steak, along with several more updated options, like boneless rib-shaped pork patties. These days, the foil has been replaced by black plastic, and you just have to pop the meal in the microwave to heat and eat. 

And yes, they all come with a brownie.