Walking in Circles

I had an interesting visit with the shrink today. If I am walking around in shoes that are barely holding together, I am not respecting myself.  Yes, it sounds bizarre.

I was waiting to get new shoes until I had a job. The master repair job on these seven-year-old quality-make shoes only lasted six months, if that. And quality-make shoes are cheaper in the long run, but expensive up front.

I don't know how professional I will look in shoes coming un-stitched for those job interviews.

So I can't wait that long.

On the way back from the appointment, I was offered a job.
(So much for good shoes being a requirement.)

It's for the same company I left because they had an employee theft ring that I exposed, but the thieves started hiding jewelry during my shift to implicate me. I gave two weeks' notice and got the hell out.

So I think maybe I will get new shoes. And a different job than the one I was offered today.
Still, I may be walking out of that circle I've been walking. . . . .

Small Crime, Big Damage Control: part one of 1 or 2 or who knows

Okay, I've kept mum--believe it or not--on the big issues our condo has been facing lately. After we found that Evil Zombie Building Maintenance Tech (EZBMT) had stolen from a unit, (BAM BOOM) life changed for us all. I'm talking practical details. But also, emotions are engaged. There is work. There is also the rehabilitation of everybody who is left. And there is the spirit or zeitgeist of business operations, which is conducted on so many levels. It is not black and white, and oh I wish it was.

But it can't be. It's a business. It's also the home of many people, including my own. It's trust and security and money and oh-so-minor in life's big issues. Cleaning up after one Jerk: it happens all the time.

EZ's just another of the many shady asshats out there. Not a big in the scheme of things. Not smart; just clever. Not successful; except lately. But he has 24 hours every day to study how to stay away from us. Our 24 hours per day is trying to get back on even keel. And that's just wrong.

But though I insult his intelligence, his style, and his habits, he did pull one over on us. So maybe this account will also be wrong. It's just what I see.

That Missing Two Ounces of Prevention.
1. Yes, hindsight: he's done other things. He's got court-ordered child support in other states and no driver's license. I think it's a sign of one or two flaws that may have kept us from hiring this dude--except we didn't do a background check, so I can't say for sure. The idea of background checks is horrid to me--until now. And we all accepted this payroll garnishment and lack of full I.D.  by not focusing on it. And some heavy glossing from somebody else, who took it cheerily in stride: Zombie Assistant.

2. Our stupid policy manual didn't have a good enough anti-nepotism policy. And his sister-in-law is Zombie Assistant. More on that later.

Two Tons of Cure.
I rammed it through. The Board wasn't even thinking about it. They were still in shock (or, Captain Nemo was panicking)--and right after that, depression. The old Board wasn't completely averse--they just weren't thinking of it. The new ones weren't averse, they just didn't have the details.

I called firms; got bids; informed our financial professionals; prepared a presentation. We had a Special Session. And the Board said "Yes, we have to do it."

So we had a private investigator come in. After that, the tension level ratcheted up in the Board. We had to keep a secret. Employees were officially under suspicion. And so forth. It was hard.

And the employees did know they were under a shadow. They had a hard time with it. No reassurance anyone could make was untainted. We all knew that, secrets or not.

I sent the P.I. more prep documents than you can imagine, writing them all up myself. I looked at pictures of items from the on-line market--you could see parts of our maintenance room in some of the backgrounds. Others were of unknown upholstery, possibly EZBMT's house. I investigated a pile of invoices, looking for prices and buying trends. Some things I had to look up on the Internet to get a price--expensive items for building repair that are custom-made for old buildings, or out of date on price lists but still useful to us, that still belonged to us (allegedly). Investigation of other items, all priced and listed on an Excel sheet--not my favorite computer program, but damn it works well for some things.

Some of the Board yelled at me for going overly. I just kept going. I didn't even have time to tell them they were full of shit. It was delegated to me, and I did everything I could think of except rent a car and a pair of handcuffs. I knew we might not get anything out of the employees. I wanted the P.I. to have every smoking gun I could get him.

I checked Vendor Ledgers to see if we had accounts with dummy companies (possibly run by employees). I checked for shipping contracts, trying to figure out how this stuff got sent out, if its origin of shipment was from our building.  I studied forensic accounting on the Internet so that I could figure out how to get more information out of what I was looking at already.

I say alleged because I have everything except proof. And that's the critical part.

In the two weeks' worth of items I could try to track, EZ sold $1300.00 worth of stuff for less than $500.00. It's not like he was making a killing out there. In fact, if he was buying it himself to re-sell, he lost a lot of money.

Zombie Assistant
In the meantime, all of staff was reeling. Angry as we were, tense as it was, we had to project confidence.
I had to write a new conflict-of-interest policy, so that Zombie Assistant didn't open up mail about her brother-in-law. I made her sign it. (She broke it twice. That I know of.)

In the meantime, she was "Embattled Dowager", "Plucky Maiden", "Crying Victim", "Servant of Us All" and "Evil Bitch When Nobody's Looking" by turns. (The last one is customary, but heavily accented under pressure.) You should know that her work ethic, already abysmal, took a nose dive. Sure, I understand--her family and her job were in peril. I do understand. It has to be hard.

The conflict of interest policy review happened on Thursday. By Friday she was laughing as she took off early from work. Do I sound bitter? Well. I took it as a sign of what I could expect. Maybe I am right, or maybe it's a self-fulfilling bad attitude on my part.

Zombie Boss
Shortly thereafter, we fired Zombie Boss. Unrelated: but he couldn't figure out what to do. I had to call all our maintenance suppliers, because otherwise EZBMT could have allegedly continued to order everything in sight and allegedly sell it on-line. The look of mystification on ZB's face when I did this was just awful.

While I was down there handling that, EZBMT's lawyer called and asked if he could have his job back. Unbelievable. But they called the weak link. I just happened to be there.

Firing ZB has added work. Or maybe not; he couldn't cope. But there is a lot of work.

Other Zombie Maintenance Tech (OZBMT):
The pleasant surprise in this is how OZBMT has managed to shake off the Zombie virus. He understood everything right away.
     No going into units for repairs alone anymore? Thank you for covering my ass.
     Nobody else to take call? That's okay, I'll take it: we'll work it out later.
     No snow removal contract, because Zombie Boss forgot about it? Order some ice-melt; I know what to do.

It was like the sun coming out. He could show what he was made of, at last: now that EZ and Zombie Assistant weren't running their dog-and-pony show about who was the competent building tech. It conveyed that we had also missed some of the good.

Yet he seemingly had to know something about the allegedly missing items. So there's still all this fog in front of the sun. There's still this feeling that maybe he's Compensating for past transgressions. The better he got, the more I worried; I think we all did.

OZ was worried for EZ, he felt for him. EZ betrayed a lot of people. But in other ways--and OZ doesn't even know it himself--he was instantly happier, his shoulders instantly straighter. When bad things are allowed to continue, people suffer. Even if they don't know it. And that is just another reason why we have to fight the crimes, petty meanness, small evils. Even in the intangible ways, this all causes suffering.

Two or three weeks later, we informed the staff that we would have investigative interviews. We told them Friday for Monday. . . . . . .

Five Days, Four Nights, No Potato Chips

Dear Readers,
Yay! I'm back. Whenever I typed, I had to wait for each word to come up. I thought I would punch holes in the keyboard trying to make it type--word, excel, e-mail, you name it. I was gritting my teeth and giving myself carpal tunnel syndrome. Time to change that scenario--

Naturally I took my computer in on the Friday before a National Holiday. And it took this long to get it back.
I felt like an idiot when I picked it up.

I thought about mentioning potato chip crumbs and decided against it. I don't really like to tell people I eat potato chips. It seems wrong. So I just blame the pets instead.

"Did you vacuum the cat hair out of the keyboard?" I asked.
"No, I lost the attachment to the vacuum."
I thought about mentioning that he'd had my computer for Five Days and Four Nights, but didn't. Still, he must have seen it in my eyes. With a huge sigh, he dug his vacuum out of the box. Sure enough, he had a tiny wand-like attachment, but no hose to hook it to the motor. He used a regular corner attachment. I do that at home all the time. It's not enough. Sometimes I use a Q-tip and rubbing alcohol, with mixed results.

"What about cleaner?" I asked. "What do you use to clean the monitor screen?"
"I'm out of it right now."
"Does it have rubbing alcohol in it?"
He gives me a strange look. "No."
"I've heard you can use Windex."
"Not very much," he said. So now what am I supposed to do?

Did you fix the "e" key?" I asked. "It wobbles."
"No, and don't touch it!!" he said. "I'm afraid it's going to break off."

"Did you fix my memory? I should have 4 gigs of memory, but it's only reading two."
"You're okay on memory," he said. It still only reads 2 gigs.

"Do me a favor when you get it home," he says. "Run the Disk Defragmenter."
"I do run it," I said. "It's on a schedule." Wasn't he going to run it?

"Well, I dumped 9 gigs of temporary files from your hard drive, and you need to run it."
How can I have 9 gigs of temp files on a 4 gig memory? I didn't ask.
"My computer is supposed to run a temp-file dump automatically, too."
He checks. Yes, it is on a schedule. He says, "Huh." He looks at me.
"Just run it."
"Okay."  It took hours for the hard drive to defragment, so I guess it was necessary.

And I had to order a new battery. It's not in yet. They don't know when it will come in. They have no idea. Either two days or nine, or something like that. They did know when I had to pay, though: in advance.

But, I will say, this poor laptop is running MUCH better. He used the upholstery brush to clean the keyboard. Cat hair went everywhere. No potato chip crumbs were found.

Our Homeless Veterans: The Human Face

The Department of Veterans Affairs estimates nine thousand veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan are homeless. Others say it's more. To me, nine thousand is too many, by about nine thousand.

The other thing is, contrary to narrative, it doesn't have to happen all at once. There's slippage: a military man is trained to react to a crisis. When he or she comes home and it's totally different, they may cope for awhile in crisis mode. Then one thing happens, or another. The mask cracks. They end up on the street.

It's easy to say something needs to happen. There's a feel-good level to that. But then there's the part where people back from war actually have issues: broken families, the community safety net broken since they left. Others have hypervigilance, drug abuse, alcoholism. Still others: organic brain damage, or constant pain. Those things aren't pretty. Neither is war. We know who endured the most. Still endures the most.

Of the homeless population, it's estimated that 47% of them are Vietnam veterans. We failed these vets: it was partly our popular culture at the time, which I have never understood but must accept. It was also a failure on the part of  military culture, the VA culture. The lack of advance in psychology over PTSD. The enduring contribution of the Vietnam Veteran Homeless may well be that the current returning veterans are getting treatment sooner.

Good word is coming out from Eric Shinseki's work with the VA. But as I have said before, the VA doesn't work for everyone. Or it isn't the only thing a person needs.  Hey: hire a vet. Or if you're not in a hiring position, maybe just talk to one sometime. Every hello and how are you is part of their return to us. It may lead to something deeper or better. Try to know what you can in the way you can do it.

There's a few interesting stories out there. This one is from ABC News.

At Vets Edge dot Org: A true story of a veteran who nearly failed twice, written by himself.
From the Beloit Daily News: about two-thirds of the way down, the veterans' accounts start in this story.

Plantation Architecture: part 2, Arlington House

The following pictures show pieces of the Robert E. Lee plantation home, called the Custis-Lee Mansion or Arlington House. Robert E. Lee married a Custis cousin. They share family with Martha Washington.

The mansion used to overlook orchards. Part of the war reparations (which besides describing payment also describe 'repair' of injury) was that 624 acres of land surrounding this plantation was deeded to the nation for a military grave site, the place we call Arlington National Cemetery. Later, the house was purchased by the Federal Government. The history of the transaction is itself a sign of Northern resentment and shady dealings, later made right with the Custis family in part by Abraham Lincoln's own son, Robert Todd.

It's interesting to note that the first Memorial Service at Arlington National Cemetery was officiated by President Herbert Hoover in 1929, a man that most of the U.S. despised at the time. And interesting that the Lincoln Memorial is sited to architecturally answer Arlington House, starting from 1867 when the site was only swamp. Every single marble slab on the Lincoln Memorial is a specific planned inclusion; every possible message that could be made is reinforced in the execution of it. Just as the Custis-Lee House was meant to advance one family, the Lincoln Memorial was always meant to include every state and every citizen of the United States. It was built to advance Union: to honor the man who stood for Union.

President Lincoln faced off Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in his last, most fateful years. Now the Lincoln Memorial faces and answers Arlington House. The arc between these two historical tacticians calls and answers to victory and defeat, personal sacrifice to personal loss, classical Greek to classical Roman, justice to injustice, a temple in a flat park to a home on a hill. Along this arc rests the costs of victory, defeat, ultimate effort, and ideals in contention: our nation's military casualties.

Arlington National Cemetery is administered by the Department of the Army. The Custis-Lee home is administered by the National Parks Service. It is currently undergoing some renovation, but it needs a lot more.

Yesterday, I posted on my ambivalence to historic preservation of plantation architecture. But for this site, I have none. Because it stands amidst Arlington's hallowed ground, because the Lincoln Memorial answers it in full, I believe it should be restored to the utmost. Every strength we give the building shows what Lincoln was up against. Every trapping we add to its interior gives Lincoln's complex simplicity and stern but compassionate code all the more significance.

The next pictures are not so beautiful. I could have cropped them to be, but I wish to show you what kind of work preservation might entail.

A humidity sensor on a marble mantel with oak-leaf carvings.

Probably much more than a simple paint job required.

Cracking lintel.

The slave quarters have been partially preserved and provide their own answer to the house and to Lincoln himself. The Parks Service exhibit inside shows that they tried to preserve as many memories as possible from these slaves, through the gathering of geneologies and spoken or written accounts.

Mrs. Lee liked to entertain, whether General Lee was home or not. She had a built-in chaperone, a cousin who never married, and whose economic health was therefore precarious. As a family hanger-on, she was apparently irritatingly cheerful. The slave quarters exhibit recalls a slave who used to do a good imitation of her. It called to my mind that the woman's suffrage movement and the abolition movement were entirely linked in their first years--that women could rarely own property, and that no slave could.

But most of all, the story was exceedingly funny. And I think that is also worth memorializing:

Next to the house on the hill, a tiny cabin held a contingent of oppressed people. But even oppressed, they still had intelligence, and opinions, and many tactics for endurance, including humor. These slaves are part of Lincoln's self-perceived care and duty; his Memorial looks to them as well. The slave quarters also represent the Custis-Lee stake in the argument: their right to extract care and duty. The argument expressed in the architecture is therefore three-fold. The slaves were more than a class or concern: They were individuals with wit. The account also recalls that history is full of little moments. The slave's humor under duress is akin to the humor of military men who endure under duress.

Well-built but small, and no amenities inside.

The Custis-Lee Mansion and its slave quarters make Lincoln's memorial complete: they recall the totality of moral argument and military effort, political certitude and uncertain outcomes stated whole in Lincoln's Second Inaugural address. The slave cabin finishes out the Custis-Lee argument in a moral sense, reminding us that grandeur lived through the toil of others. The slave quarters also resonate to that other answer: those that lie all around, out of pain at last and some for over a century, in Arlington National Cemetery. They remind us that those that suffered in war are more than a number. They were individuals who did not attain, for the most part, their full span of years and its expression.

May they rest in peace, along this arc of conflict and care, under flat turf or on the hill. May we care over these questions, and these dead, forever.

Plantation Architecture, part I

I have cynical feelings about restoring Plantation Mansions. Most of them are depressing indeed: in want of funds, with period wallpaper books open to show what they want donations for, and  a dusty mayonnaise jar for you to put those donations in.

Most of these homes are mouldering faster than John Brown's body. In Louisiana along the (Mississippi) River Road, you can see them gradually cut out from under by river water, industrial development, weather, mold, cockroaches, mice, and human neglect. Most of them have elegant proportions that speak past the shabbiness and decay. They represent a type of architecture which will never return.

European Tradition
If this was Europe, we would prize the chateaus where elegance once reigned at high human cost. Europeans don't raze their architecture just because there were dungeons in the basement full of torture implements, or even though rich young lordlings raped servant girls in the pantry or peed on the marquetry table legs in marble halls. During the French Revolution, they chopped off the heads of the Lords in the palace and those who tried to sell luxury goods to those Very Royal. This scared the hell out of the rest of Europe, but not enough to change central government.  Napoleon showed up, and the Royal Pageant went on. So did war--but it was not a war to free the oppressed. It was a war of Kings against an Emperor. Like his forbears in French leadership, Napoleon sought to control all of Europe with a ruling class, not to abolish central rule.

Our Idea
But in this country, we ended slavery through means not strictly class-driven. It was a regional break, and yes an economic break, but not by class: all classes went to war against slave states or to preserve their 'peculiar institution'. Today I'm not delving deeply into the long but true history of how the slave class had to suffer too long, and never got an even break afterward--that's for another time. But this is where some cynicism lies when it comes to preserving Plantation Architecture.

The American ideal of equality for all, plus a disdain for losing, makes a full-out federal preservation protection of plantation items seem ludicrous. Why would the United States of America revere the homes of its lost oppressor class? Yet those who don't grow up in the South never quite figure out that shabby plantation homes recollect war depredations (Sherman's torch) or reparations (carpetbaggers). Each failing site signifies that an entire economic class was decimated, that they were taxed and driven out of business, that they gave their all (gallantly) and lost. So in the South, preservation of the "highest achievement" is complicated by the fact that their best wasn't good enough. It was too long on grandeur, too short on foundries. Too cruel to sustain, but it propped elegance. A shabby Southern plantation denotes high ambivalence due to unresolved injury and the memory of historical outrage. Pick the injury and the outrage depending on who you are.

Therefore, any restoration of plantation architecture seemingly speaks to a lack of ambivalence: that the North should have left the South alone, and onward to that slavery somehow was acceptable. Onlookers who wish the Confederate flag to disappear distrust the motives of plantation preservation. .In this country, such preservation is a political statement. But I think the statement could  and should be be more complex.

Yes, these plantation homes describe the high living of careless  and cruel rich white people. Maybe some were "good to their slaves". They turned the cruelty over to subcontractors: foremen, patrollers, estate agents, so they could accord themselves this luxury of kind treatment on the face-to-face or escape altogether. And we do this now whenever we buy goods produced by slave labor elsewhere. These homes have the capability of throwing present sins into our faces, too. The ambivalence may be about a present international economy as well.

These homes also describe, just as the Egyptian pyramids do, or Versailles, or any Gothic chapel, the workmanship and artisan craft of the working class. Plantation sites don't just describe a place where whipping posts were used--but a place where black artisans designed and built sugar refineries, timber mills, environmentally suitable homes, levees that held back swamps, defensive avenues of fire, forest fire abatement, and strong buildings for storage and their own, far-lesser habitations. Most of these artisans are not recorded in history, just as the masons of palaces and cathedrals and pyramids are not. Most of them were never remunerated and hardly recognized.

And Just Maybe . . .
Maybe historical preservation can bring out that an enslaved people contributed mightily to American historical infrastructure. That without the unnamed architects of the sugar refinery, the unnamed engineers of the levees, and the faithful work undertaken, we would not be who we are and what we are today.  I think when we preserve mansions and slave quarters, we should preserve technological works as well--less glamorous, far more important. Then we could see that despite every attempt to stifle personality, capital aggregation, and justifiable pride in the slave, their contributions remain. Our very map would be different along the Eastern seaboard and the Southern coastline were it not for these unnamed souls.

We could find a way to honor slaves at these sites as well as deplore their situation. We could advance our understanding of history and the human spirit--gifted and superior, even in slavery. Something past Gone With the Wind, King Tut, European Lords and Medieval Popes. Something that reconciles this historical ambivalence by refusing to bury any part of it. Something that gives shape to current national aspirations.

Still, though I believe this could be achieved, I remain cynical. I wonder, when the last plantation house in the South collapses, will we be done fixing the scars by then? On the other hand, I remember that forgetting history is like being blind to a warning. We have long been blind to the achievements of the unknown laborer, whether we espouse their cause en masse or not. So I do not know the answer.

Tomorrow, a plantation architecture that should be preserved . . . . or at least I think so . . . .

C.V.'s Birthday

The day after Christmas
I hear C.V. before I see him:
a beautiful baritone voice.

Only if you can, please!
Only if you can.

He jingles a plastic cup. He sees me.
"Hello, love. How are you?"

I have some change for him.
For the Season,

His cup has a jester ring of red and green
felt spikes with bells on the end.
It's Holiday: the cup is full of fold.

I drop a quarter in.
"How was your Christmas?"

The day before Christmas he said,
"Some asshole stole my bike."
"That's bad."
"Too cold to ride it anyway."
He laughed. "I'm almost glad to let it go."

But for Christmas, he had a wonderful time.
His former wife's children had him over.
She died some time ago.
It makes him sad
And he drank a little.

"You know," he says. "I never drink.
But I thought one wouldn't hurt."

I nod. He changes his story.
"I stood up and I was dizzy.
And the kids told me to sit down and rest.
I was drinking cranberry juice. I didn't know
anything was in it. And they just kept giving me more."

I nod again.
"But I had fun," he says.
"The only thing I feel bad about,
I wanted to take pictures of my children
and I forgot."

I nod, third time.
"You'll find another opportunity."
He nods back. "Yes I will."
He smiles at me. "New Year's Eve is my birthday."
"Well, how about that?" I smile back.
"Only if you can!" he calls. "Only if you can."

On New Year's Eve,
he has a boombox with him,
still playing Christmas music.
I slip a dollar in: "Happy Birthday."

The Set-up: 126 Words

Zombie Boss resigns. I clean his desk, the papers as scattered as his mind. He avoided conflict; he shoved those things aside. I find bills that should have been paid, shingled with post-it notes. On them, Zombie Assistant paints a problem. I find bills that belong to others, or for things we don't pay. These have no warnings.

An employee has already said Zombie Assistant hid bills from him. Then she'd call our President, worried over bills unpaid. I find a stash she moved into his office, after.

She used his failings. She shortened his tenure, and I think his life.

Maybe this seems imaginary. But I see a difference in organization and placement.

The stink of ill-will covers the desk. I won't let this go.

Ann T. Power Broker

If you read the title fast, it sounds like "anti-power" broker. Take your pick.

I wrote that we had an employee theft situation here. In the immediate aftermath, the Board (herinafter, the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) closed our network to this employee in the name of records security. We also found that he had been selling things on-line that looked remarkably like items we stock here for repairs.

Bad enough that a unit was robbed. Now we had to consider other possible grievances.

Image via Wikipedia

Nemo, Watching for Tentacles.

Captain Nemo Freaks Out
We then got a legal opinion, and learned that work-site e-mail of all stripes was the property of the employer. So we looked at other employee e-mail boxes to see how widespread this marketing situation might be. And one of the League of Extraordinary Gentleman started obsessing.

Nemo recently lost his job. It was a mystery to him, but not to the rest of the League. He never does any work. He waits until other people present hours of work and comes up with an objection. I am sure he feels like this is the right thing to do, but he's a putz.

This situation excited and terrified him by turns. He browsed employee personal mail, poached the contact position from another Board member with the network administrator, et cetera. It was quite the warning on despotism. And only his peers could stop it, which is quite the lesson in democracy, too.

But we weren't very effing fast at it. And really, he had all that free time. It was hard to keep up.

We warned him. But he started giving orders, each one more erratic than the next. For instance, I received these panicky e-mails ("cut the cord on the shredders! watch all the doors to make sure no evidence leaves!") I finally let him have it. Usually I am diplomatic. Not this time. I was stomping the putz.

At the next meeting, Nemo was just as panicky and querulous as before, but more erratic and rude.
So that's just the end. I know it's not real war, but I went to war.

Image via Wikipedia

Mina Murray, we need you!

Ann T. Panic Mode
If you read that fast, it sounds like anti-panic mode. Maybe.

That "last straw" meeting was the pre-meeting before our Annual Meeting and Elections. We were headed to the mob, or at least that's what we were afraid of. Every Owner wanted to know about the theft situation. They were up in arms about the betrayal of trust. Of course, we are negligent and dumb-assed, a poor sorry excuse for leadership. But nobody was running to replace us.

We had two vacant seats. As a favor, Nemo was planning to run again by acclamation after all. He kept asking, "Now how do I do this?" None of us told him. He did figure it out though.

Weeks before, I'd nagged Allan Quartermain to run by acclamation at the Annual Meeting. And he planned to run; he just didn't want to campaign. Quartermain is just who we need--calm, humorous, and a management consultant by day.

I'd thought about a second person, Mina Murray, who is socially adept, level-headed, and an office manager. I didn't ask her though. I didn't think she wanted to do it, and two days wasn't enough notice.

But I saw Mina at the Annual Meeting, right after Nemo drove me to the brink. I think I grabbed her. I'm pretty sure I didn't shake her. I didn't get on my knees either, but nearly. Her eyes were as wide as saucers and she was nodding as if to a crazy woman while I whispered how important it was. But at least she agreed to run.

That was two minutes' notice instead of two days' notice. I'm not pleased with myself over that.

But I quickly wrote a nominating speech for Mina while Board President Mycroft Holmes ran the meeting. I also gave my Treasurer's report. We had an impromptu/tacky awards ceremony for our committee volunteers over the past year--my idea, just so we'd maybe get a few more after some recognition.

Later, I attempted to nominate Quartermain, who said he would nominate himself. Then I nominated Mina from the floor. She gave her own campaign speech--which I thought was a great sign. The vote was tallied.

President Mycroft Holmes
Afterwards Mycroft Holmes stopped me outside.
"Just how did you arrange this coup d'etat?"

"Didn't you see me?" I said. "I begged, that's how."

"No, I didn't see that. Somebody said you had, though.  But how did you get them elected?"
I debated whether to add. Because the begging was the answer.
"I talked to everyone in that meeting hall," I told him. "I fetched coffee and cookies for anyone who didn't have any. I asked them how they were."
He waited.

"When I gave my presentation, I didn't stand behind the podium," I said next. "I always come out from behind and then I am one of the people."
He rolled his eyes.

"And in my Treasurer's report, I thanked every other member of the League for something specific that they did, except I didn't mention Nemo at all."
"Huh." Mycroft shook his head.

"And then I made it clear who I thought should be nominated," I said. "And then I just hoped it would work."

"Well, thank you," he said. "I still don't know how you did it, but thank you for doing it."
"You should thank Mina," I told him. "She's the one who agreed to this with no notice."

To stop tyranny, at least in these tiny circles I run in, we needed a volunteer.

In four days time, we grew a small-minded madman, a witch-hunter on our Board. He was injudicious, indiscreet. He cloaked it all in principles ("the safety of the residents"), but he was dangerous. He was going to sink our whole damn ship in some crazed quest for secret but irrelevant information. And we have enough leaks in our ship already.

Mycroft Holmes is now calling me a behind-the-scenes power broker. What I think I did was break a power, not broker one.

Thank you, Allan Quartermain and Thank You, Mina Murray! 
We need you against the Zombies.
And Happy New Year to the Arkdale residents. 
You now have a fighting chance at one.

A Meaning of Christmas: The Nativity

The Nativity is really a frightening story with a happy ending. It had to be full of tough emotion for its participants. And we usually skip those emotions and go straight to the happy ending. We forget the uncertainty in the happiness of the result.

Consider Joseph, with a pregnant wife on the back of his one donkey in the cold. They didn't have a lot of luggage--not much extra food, not enough money. Not a lot of blankets or special clothes or the tools of his carpenter trade. They're on the road. That displacement has been ordered by the Roman government, so that a census may be taken. It's a sign that things are not going to be the same--they are a conquered people and soon to be a taxed people. They have a local despot for a king, a distant administration who props that king up. Joseph is supposed to protect Mary in the large and small things--and what's large and what's small had to change perspective every other minute.

And for all Mary had an Annunciation, she had to be worried something would go wrong or she wouldn't measure up. She's on the back of a donkey. She has to go to the bathroom now, but they also have to keep going. She has no women to help her with the layette. No midwife she knows will be there to cry on during labor pains. No midwife, even a stranger, guaranteed at all. Her first child will be born among strangers and maybe even in the dirt.  There's no guarantee in the Annunciation that she'll live through labor either. It only guarantees that she is chosen and she is blessed. That leaves a lot of room for fear of the unknown. Because being chosen is not usually an experience without suffering.

The inn they found was probably a tavern. It was a gathering place for all kinds of people--reliable and unreliable. More of the unknown. If it was crowded with others like Joseph, just trying to fulfill responsibility, we don't know it. We never hear about them. At best it was full of tired and cranky people, but possibly revelers and gossips and people who needed a little reform. The innkeeper and his staff were slammed with work. The permission to use the stable for a Birth might have been a kind impulse. But that innkeeper also didn't (as far as we know) ask anyone to make room for a pregnant woman and worried father. Maybe he did ask, and nobody had compassion. Maybe they had reasons why the innkeeper should ask someone else. Maybe the innkeeper didn't have time to ask, or maybe he didn't care enough to ask. Maybe the stable was cleaner anyway.

So Mary had a baby in a stable. It was not her husband's baby, but somehow that had been resolved--through love, or faith, or need on one side or both sides. Joseph would have stabled the donkey. He would have shoveled the floor of the stall and piled up hay while she bit her lip and waited or even possibly fussed. Possibly he snapped a little, because he felt inadequate to the task. They would have been scared to death--no matter how much meaning was packed into it for them--and possibly even more afraid, given the meaning.

She lived through labor. She had a baby on straw instead of the side of a road. It was better than their worst fears, and hard to reconcile with the prospect of a large gift to the world.

They would have changed the hay. They would have listened for threat from the tavern, from Roman centurions, from the weather, from animals bigger than a woman lying on straw. Still it was a miracle. It was good.

The shepherds knew to come, but no town or tavern resident on record came. The baby was viewed and watched and exclaimed over by men with low-paying menial jobs, uncertain hygiene, rough habits. But he was loved immediately.

It is a remarkable account, you know, just for its human effort. And this particular birth, in this particular set of conditions, later changed the world and the language of the spirit. For most of us who celebrate Christmas, it is the onset of our religious beliefs. It changed our understanding of the Divine, and where that Divine is present.

But even those with a different religion, or no religion, can ponder this and perhaps see meaning in it. They can see why decency matters, why worry and care are tied, why life is precious and poverty is hard. How much we need each other and how much we must do for ourselves, the very best we can.

Infinite possibility was born in soiled straw by one scared woman with one worried man in attendance, and a host of threats, large and small, all around.  And that infinite possibility was, and is always, a miracle.

Oh, Zombie Virus!

It gets us all!

Each in our own way. But in general, we are shambling around, trying to find our way out of the mess Zombie Boss left behind.

We have two new Board Members--which means we have two former Board Members too.  At last sighting, one of the former Bored was at the Meeting last night, strangely quiet, lounging in an unusual position on the sofa in the Meeting Room. Maybe recovering from, or delaying the rest of, a real bender? He's been getting more erratic all the time. The other one was wearing Spandex on the elevator.

We had five people who had complaints or issues. Usually no one shows up for Board Meetings. I have no idea why anyone would ever skip one! But for the new Board, it was like baptism by fire.

Me, I have turned into a weapon on the side of organization but can barely talk. I have this internal thought process going for cleaning out Zombie Boss's former office and finding all the Pending. But if you asked me to explain it, I couldn't. It is all part of the Deep Focus. My subconscious is doing it, and it's driving everyone crazy. Too bad it didn't work on the Zombies.

There is a lot of Pending. There was also a lot of photocopies of the same thing, over and over. I shredded those (not the Pending but the Duplicates).  But enough about me and papers. There are still too many left. I even had an e-mail from a desperate lawyer. I've never had a letter from a desperate lawyer before. I have almost gotten him out of Zombie Stasis. Couple more steps.

One of the new Board Members said being at last night's Board Meeting was like watching reality TV. Ha ha ha!  We almost had a fistfight between a resident and the Board President over (kid you not) laundry lint. I love our Board President. He was getting far more blowback than laundry lint ought to cause.  And I could at least speak up about that.

The meeting adjourned at 10:00 p.m. One of the new Board Members announced at 9:50 that he had ten more minutes for the Meeting. He did the right thing. We would have shambled around all night. I would not have been able to cut it off--but I did tell him, in advance, that somebody was going to have to do it. And I knew he would.

Shazzam!! Zombie Wrestling

H W F

Welcome to the HWF!! Horror Wrestling Federation!! Beamed every weekday live from the Ark House Condominium Arena, right here in HotWinds, USA!! And you're sure to see talent like never before!!!

We've got quite a match for you folks out there.

In this corner, we have: Zombie Assistant!! She's a famous villain--known to implement the Positivity SuckerSmack, the Credit-Stealing HammerLock--
Able to depress pretensions with one well-timed comment about a co-worker's body, hair, or clothes--a BodySlam, in other words--
And inventor of the unbelievably effective Snit--Lock!!

And in the other corner, we have: Georgina the Strong. Too bad she doesn't know it yet.
But she's been through hell on earth many times, and doesn't remember this is nothing compared to that.
She grew up in the Chicago projects, had an abusive husband and a drug habit, which she kicked both. She went on to become a home health aide, a strong mother, and dispenser of joy, cookies, and hugs to others--and Zombie Assistant's sometimes assistant.

The betting odds are low. Georgina's going to be a long shot to win. It's that Snit Lock, that Body Slam, that Hammerlock that get her every time. She just isn't ranked very high in the Horror Federation--

Enjoy the show, right here at the Ark House Auditorium!  And your referee tonight, at the Ark House Arena,  is Ann T. Hathaway.  Go place your bets. Remember, the odds are long against Georgina. And odds are what we call "prevailing wisdom."

For more Zombies that Wrestle, go here to the WWE Night of the Living Dead!  These people may be pikers compared to Zombie Assistant. Still, you get the idea!.

In case this isn't quite coherent--Zombie Assistant is putting her mood on everyone else. And I am going to stomp it quick.

The Axe

In this post, I am the lucky one. Even maybe the villain.

We fired someone. I am not the only one who thought it necessary, but I have thought it necessary for the longest time. I am the one who made the machinery work toward that end.

This year, Zombie Boss was more and more absent, less and less responsive to owners and contractors and staff and the Board.  ZB would call meetings and fail to show up for them, make deals or promises and not finish them out, pass the blame or the buck or the duty. He relinquished oversight, and staff ran amok with it.

We had a lawsuit that cost us over $100K when one of the owners couldn't get an answer about a grievance.  The Board handled it. We nearly didn't pay utility bills in spring and we have a cash crunch right before Christmas, which means that payroll and utilities are going to be a bit of a stretch. In winter, no heat? No paychecks? No, it's not quite that bad. We can make it. But I don't think we should wait until we can't.

In early November, we sought a legal opinion how to get out of the contract. Because the Board That Was stupidly did not get their manager contract drawn up by a legal representative, and we were stuck. Somebody cobbled it together from parts of an old contract, a raft of high-minded aspirations, and by the seat of their pants. Note: Do not do this, ever. It did not save us any money on legal fees.

The legal opinion was that we had to write an official memorandum detailing the reasons we could "terminate with cause". I wrote it; it took me a solid week. I tied our grievances to specific documents and went through them point by point. It was ten pages long, and could have easily been twenty. The back-up material was twenty pages long and could have been a hundred without much additional effort. The lawyer looked it over and said it was great. So we could do it.

Special Session of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
No sooner had the Board voted on it and learned the legal (and most protective to Owner privacy) procedure to accomplishing it, we lost another employee because of criminal acts.  I mean literally--fifteen minutes after our meeting adjourned. The entire Condo was rocked, and the Board put off the action until we could figure out what to do with new actions in front of us. We got a legal opinion on that too--I said you can't wait until it's convenient for us (e.g., I'll fire her after my vacation), you have to do it at the point of grievance.

I was ready to go. But legal said no, we were in our rights to wait.

A Final Chance
But Zombie Boss hasn't handled this crisis either. Ann T. has been doing it. Writing the incident reports, collecting them. Checking the bad guy's personnel file, cutting off his access to ordering materials and billing us, setting up procedures, damage control. I don't mean I've been alone--the rest of the Board has also been doing stuff--writing the announcements, checking the building systems, interfacing on anything I don't know. But they have day jobs. It's been scary and hard. And even in this Zombie Boss hasn't pulled things together.

So, as one Board member said, who was unhappy, we let him go "right before Christmas". We've been telling him in increasing conversations that his performance is not good and that repercussions were imminent. I gave him a list of expectations this spring; I wrote him up this summer. He's been having correction conversations multiple times a week for years now. And the entire chain of command is twisted and broken. Everyone on the Board has been working hours and hours for months and months, in areas depending on their expertise. For free. Taking off work to visit lawyers or meet with contractors. Stuff like that. And that twists chain of command too.

He had a final chance to get it right, the reprieve of over a month. He didn't meet the challenge. In the last month, working with him multiple times a week, I could see that everything he did was a liability to us all.

He's gone. We were nice about it. He was. We all shook hands. He drove away.
Still not a good outcome. The axe is always a loss to all parties. And the timing just sucks.

Zombie Boss has a million things to figure out now. We do too. This stuff goes on long after the axe has swung. I wish him luck. I'd do it all again if I had to. We were in big trouble. We still are.

In Which Ms. Frivolous Tosses Dear John, the Baker

Just now I got off the elevator with a six-foot, three-hundred pound man who lives on my floor of my building. He has a crew-cut,  looks like a retired football player and he works out at Gold's. He also bakes a lot of cookies.

A long time ago we had two dates, within the space of a week. After the first one, I was talking on the phone in front of my window and he was watching me from the window in the hall, where the building makes a 90 degree angle. It didn't last very long, but I noted it. Still I didn't pay enough attention. After the second date (I should tell you these were coffee dates or walk dates), I hugged him good-bye and said I hoped he'd call me again.

That Big Chocolate Chip on His Shoulder 
I got a blistering e-mail about how men have to do all the work to get dates. That he had already bought two cups of coffee and it was my turn to ask to go for a walk. That he didn't appreciate the tack I had taken, my tone of voice, and so forth.

I added this up with the themes of his conversation. At the time, he was looking for a job. He told me that he had cursed out the hiring supervisor at a company he hoped to work at, because she didn't process his application fast enough. He also told me about his divorced wife not allowing him to be alone with his daughter because he would spank her and she was fourteen, which is not too old to be spanked, according to him. (Like all ex-wives), she was a bitch. And then on the way home from this second date, he told me about going into a gay bar (which he wasn't, or some permutation thereof, I hadn't figured that one out yet) and being in the men's restroom and almost choking a guy to death for hitting on him.

Maybe it was supposed to illustrate his straightness. But that was enough for me. I figure if you're a guy in a declasse gay bar, you should expect to get hit on in the bathroom. I mean, you're there. And I've been in that bar. It is a hit-on-ya bar.

Somewhere in there he left me a phone message that he then asked me not to listen to, because he was so angry. He was very charming about it, but this is Ann T. you're talking to. I listened to it.

In Which John, the Baker becomes Dear John, the Baker
So I sent him a dear-John e-mail. It was about how my life was busier than I thought it was, and that I wouldn't have time for a new relationship. I got a vituperous letter back about being a bitch, dishonest, and insinuating in the bargain--not to mention those cups of coffee that I had sponged off him. I spent a serious hour thinking about giving him a five-dollar bill.

About a week after that, I was leaving the building and he was coming in. He turned around and started yelling at me. He followed me down half a block, yelling that I was a bitch and so forth. I don't run from stuff like this: absolutely fatal to run.  I turned around and told him he was done following me. And he turned away.

At the local store, I was friends with a police officer who moonlighted in security. I told him what had happened. I asked him what I should do. "Call the cops," he said.

Well, it wasn't going to be Officer Securidad that got called, you know. So I wasn't going to take that advice.

When I came back to the building, my dear John, the Baker was waiting at the back door with a toothpick in his mouth, and he was not done. He had more to say, and I was going to listen. I faced him off again and went inside. I should tell you it was pitch dark out there, and he was still fit to be tied.

I shook for two and a half hours in my apartment. And finally the word harassment came to me. So I did call the police and said it was not an emergency. Well, they sent two cars. We have really responsive police in my neighborhood. It was one a.m. You could say I over-reacted. On the other hand, I don't like being blocked access to my building in the dark.

I met them outside my building. I mean, they were fast.
"Look, thanks for coming, I'm afraid it's really stupid," I said. "But this is what happened, and this is the kind of mail he's sending."
One of them read it.
"Aw, he just doesn't want to break up with you."

Well, hell. I do not consider myself to be a frivolous caller of the police, but there it was.

"Well, if you don't think it's worth pursuing, then I think that's okay. Generally I handle things. I think it's dumb that I called you."
"Nah, we'll go up and talk to him."

So they did. I have been getting dirty looks from this man for years. He still lives down the hall. I used to listen behind the door before I went outside, to be sure I didn't run into him.

Out of the Deep Freeze
But about two years after the incidents described above, we started saying hello again. Recently he brought me cookies. I find that to be odd, but also maybe it was just a bad time. Still I had no plans to date this guy.

So he wanted to know tonight why I would call the cops on him. He prefers direct communication. But also he wanted to apologize. I accepted his apology and said that I was also sorry it happened. Then he wanted to know why. Because he just wants to know why I did it.

I reviewed. He said he guessed he could understand it, that he's a big guy and all that. But still. And this went on for awhile. Then finally I said this:

"You escalated very quickly," I told him. "You wanted me to talk a certain way, and to act a certain way, and you said whatever you wanted when I didn't talk or act as you wanted. Many of your stories were about hurting people. And then you followed me down the street yelling at me."

"It was only half a block."
"It's a long block. It's even longer when someone's screaming at you that you're a bitch as you walk down it."

I was honest. I went through it with him, I don't know how many times. By the end he was arguing with me. He thinks I didn't like him because he was unemployed. And that's when I got mad.

Somehow again, by the end of the apology, I am at fault for bringing in a third party. He never wanted to date; he never waited for me. Well, he doesn't like it when I'm straight with him, and he doesn't like it when I give him a vague brush-off.  All I can do is what I can do.

"I got you back, you know," he just told me. "I told them you were off your meds and crazy."
"I don't take meds."  (You'll notice I didn't say I wasn't crazy though.)

"I know, I just had to get you back. I'm on a report somewhere because of you."

He is just one step on my road to agoraphobic tendencies. Not the biggest one. Not the most important one. Not by a hell of a sight.
But damn it.

The Bus Bench

Coming home from very lonely places, all of us go a little mad: whether from great personal success, or just an all-night drive, we are the sole survivors of a world no one else has ever seen.

--John le Carre, "The Chancellor Who Agreed To Play Spy", 

The New York Times, May 8, 1974

Photo September 1.

I would write more, but everything is so serious right now. I have to finish this road. I think two weeks. That doesn't mean I won't blog for two weeks, but maybe not about the real stuff. I mean, the condo board.

I am catching up on your blogs and trying to comment here and there. You'll see me.

Ann T.

Shipboard Fire, September 1949

Image via Wikipedia

For National Fire Prevention Week:

My grandfather was a little older than the "Greatest Generation." He was an engineer, and so worked steadily and hard through the Depression. During World War II, likewise, he was involved in the industrial might of the War Effort, and worked long hours. In the meantime, my grandmother--a notable clubwoman and mother--ran the household.

By 1949, they decided the children were old enough to stay with  family for a week. They booked passage on a cruise, drove to Cleveland, Ohio, and boarded "The Queen of the Lakes" on September 15, 1949.  The ship, built in 1916, was a gorgeous luxury packet, with wood wainscoting and all the amenities. It could hold as many as 600 passengers. For this cruise, 524 had signed up.

The S.S. Noronic would usually cruise Lake Ontario, spend a couple of nights in Toronto's harbor (as shown above). The ship was grand, with a band and 171 crew--fabulous! From there, people would enjoy the night life and (package theatre or nightclub deal, for instance) included with the trip. My grandparents went out drinking and dancing, returning quite well-lit I'm sure from the evening of September 17th. Unlike many of the shipboard passengers, they did not bring guests back with them. But a great many passengers did.

Despite the late hour and possible Scotch-and-water overload, my grandfather, for some reason, could not sleep. He heard a clunk, the word 'fire' and got up to investigate.

One Bad Move, or Two, or Three
Apparently another passenger beat him to the concern. Don Church, a passenger on D deck, noted a smell of smoke about 2:30 a.m., when almost everyone was sleeping off their martinis. He followed it upstairs and then located a steward.

My grandmother said they could never figure out what caused the fire. They thought it was oily rags, piled sloppily together from polishing the fancy woodwork, that had warmed themselves to ignition: a kind of spontaneous combustion. The oxygen was all that was required to make a disaster. I sometimes wonder if a cigarette or cigar had a part in it.

Don Church, the steward, and another crewman attempted to fight the fire. According to the Walkerville Times:

The first person [Church] encountered was a bellboy named Earnest O’Neil, and they rushed to the linen closet. They both heard the crackling sound of fire from behind the door. Finding that he did not have the right keys for the closest, O’Neil ran to the steward’s office on D Deck to get the correct keys.

He returned with a fire extinguisher, and prepped himself for fighting the fire, and opened the door to the closet. Two others appeared to aid in the fight, including a passenger across from the closet.

Freed of the linen closet and with a fresh source of oxygen, the flames backdrafted down the hall in both directions, gaining fuel from the walls. Still with the hope of containing the fire, one of the courageous three went to get a fire hose, but as they opened the valve, only a trickle of water came out.

Church ran to D deck and got his family out. That might have been who my grandfather heard, slamming out of their cabin and running to evacuate. He stopped to notify:

[Church] soon encountered the wheelman on duty, Windsor’s Jim Donaldson, and explained the severity of the situation. Running up to A Deck, Donaldson advised Capt. Taylor and the First Mate, Gerry Wood. The Captain had returned from an evening ashore only 20 minutes earlier.

Having determined that the fire was serious, Donaldson ran to the wheelhouse to throw the ship’s whistle for the fire signal, but tragically, the whistle seized. Instead of sounding one long blast, three short blasts and another long blast – the signal for fire on board – the horn emitted a bone-chilling shriek that pierced the air without a pause.

At 2:38 a.m., eight minutes after the first passenger realized there was a problem, the ship was already 50% on fire. The harbor security called the fire service. Those responders could see the glow before they had even reached Pier 9. They called for reinforcements at 2:41.

Picture Montage: The Walkerville Times.

My grandfather pulled my grandmother to the deck, which was already starting to crowd. At this point I should tell you that none of the decks had direct access to the dock. Therefore people were trying to get out by jumping overboard. Once my folks determined the lay of the ship, they also were going to jump. The problem was, of course, all the other people who were each trying to see what they could do.  And that problem was complicated in that a great many of the crew (all but sixteen, including the Captain) had been given the night off.

Evacuation: Not for the Squeamish
So, the fire-fighting equipment did not work. There was no exit, no organization, a huge fire out of nowhere in one of the worst possible sites for a fire: a ship. The fire fighters could see people silhouetted on B deck and surrounded by fire--no way out. They tried making a ladder bridge for those who could evacuate, a heroic effort in itself:

It was clear to all that the most daunting task was how to get people off the ship. Setting up fire department Aerial Number 5, an 85-foot long wooden ladder built in 1931, at the base of Noronic’s bow, the fire fighters aligned it with B Deck at an angle of 26 degrees. It barely made contact when a woman immediately jumped upon it, as did many other passengers.Almost in frenzy, the fast-clambering passengers and the natural movement of the ship made it very difficult for the fire fighters to keep the ladder aligned on the tip of the bow. Panicked, a female passenger stumbled on the ladder and the following passengers fell into her, their combined weight focused on a small point on the ladder. With a terrifying crack, the ladder snapped in two and sent the frightened passengers into the cold water.

The Fire Department tried again:

At this time, Aerial Number 1 arrived, but could not get to the ship because of parked cars. After clearing these obstructions, Aerial Number 1 neared the ship to a distance of 90 feet and extended its 100-foot ladder to C Deck. Having been made aware of the failure of ladder 5, they braced ladder 1 with hand-ladders underneath it at 15-foot intervals.

They were also lifting people out of the water who could cling to shorter ladders--backbreaking work.

Valiant efforts were made to extinguish the flames by fire fighters, but the heat was so intense that the water vaporized before it reached the hull of the ship! The metal structure was visibly white from the intense heat. By 2:46 a.m., the fireboat tied up to the Noronic’s bow and began to pour water in via two smaller hoses and the turret nozzle.

The stories my grandmother told about the evacuation were horrible. One man thought he could get out by sliding down a wire cable. My grandmother watched as he slid down, losing all his fingers before he dropped into the water. Another man, an Olympic grade swimmer, deserted his wife and children on board ship in a neat dive. He was never seen again. Lake Ontario is deep, wide, with temperature differentials that cause turbulence. My grandmother always said that he drowned, but there was only one drowning death reported: perhaps that was the one.

Somewhere in all this my grandmother suffered severe burns to her hands. Then my grandparents got their opportunity to get off the ship. They jumped together and started swimming. Unfortunately, my grandmother got stuck in a rain of suitcases over the side. Those that were evacuating planned to do it with their luggage. My grandfather lost her as she was buffeted, and taken under, by several direct hits. Plus, with her hands injured, and less fit overall, she was not doing so well.

The Fog of Disaster
My grandfather was swimming to the dock, turning around and seeing a dark-haired woman behind him in a blue gown. It was the wrong dark-haired woman in the wrong gown. He managed to save himself, and the strange woman. My grandmother was picked up by a skiff on the third gulp down after the third or fifth suitcase. They were re-united in the hospital. My grandmother wore bandages and later had plastic surgery to repair the defacement of her hands. They were always fragile after that--not for everything, but some minor impairment.

Lessons
What use is this family legend? Well, it gave my family examples of human selfishness and selflessness, life and death. We learned disaster potentially hits anyone. Beyond that, we did not think about evacuation any better than to know not to take our suitcase on the way out.

Image via Wikipedia

In truth though, this story could have taught us many lessons:
1. To know our terrain well enough to be able to leave it.
2. To believe in safety measures and safety standards and to ask about them.
3. Pack light or do not pack at all. Possessions are a hindrance in an emergency.
4. Be a leader, even if it is only to be the first to follow instructions.
5. Keep a clear head.
6. Don't park in a fire lane.

These are pictures from before, in 1930, during, and immediately after the fire. Nobody knows how many passengers died, somewhere between 104 to 139 of the 524 on board the ship, plus an unknown number of guests--as many as 300 total. The inquiry afterward was long and pointed. No crew member died. This was thought to be significant, but I don't think it is as important as the rags, the wood polish, the possible cigar, the time-off schedule, or the fire hoses and whistle out of commission. In other words, the best way to forestall disaster is to prepare for it.

A Social Dilemma

Let's just say you're a member of a Condo Board. The previous manager didn't do any work, he may even have stolen from  you (I'm still looking). His negligence cost the association many thousands of dollars in uncollected payments. His lying about his qualifications and then giving (bad) advice led your board to approve a half-assed plan that left 1/3 of the building without hot showers. You are now spending tens of thousands of dollars to fix this. You suspect, but cannot prove, kickbacks from the previous contractors.

He talked bad about each Board Member behind their backs, de-trained the staff, left without notice after writing himself a check for unused vacation (which is against our by-laws). It was not enough to be actionable.

Now he's back in town. And isn't he friendly? You see him all the time!!

What do you do?

So, the kick ass. That's my first choice.
I think verbal abuse is my second choice, but it's not natural to me. Much.
The cut direct--you know, where you refuse to acknowledge their presence--is my next choice.
So far he has been getting stiff greetings to his most friendly overtures. I am sure this is very funny, and I come off as very gauche.
However, am I supposed to pretend he's not a lying snake in the grass?

My etiquette is at war with my principles. Please advise.

photo from spreadshirt.com

An URL to Remember

hey, Fb users--free to do, helps police officers everywhere!!

I don't have an account and I'm not ready for one--yet--sorry, peedee! I think I have to gear up on all the other things I'm not doing first.

But for those of you on Facebook, would you go

  here, 

read up if you want to, and hit "like"?

This is for Jeff Shannon at Police Mental Health blog. He's now on Facebook and trying to get his message to more people. His FaceBook  URL  is too long for those that need to access him easily.

If he gets enough hits, they'll give him an URL to remember.

A Public Assistance Mind-set, part 1

Today and Tomorrow: Two Anecdotal Reports on Public Assistance, with Two Different Viewpoints:

I don't know if I blogged about this before or not. It's a little bit about political correctness I suppose and a little about me. My main point will be, though, that public assistance comes with an attitude. When that attitude is pervasive in your life, I think it is deadening.

A long time ago, I worked for 7-11. At that time, companies such as this were eligible for supplements from the government for hiring people that fit a job-training criteria. Therefore, all of the employees in my district were sent, with pay, to the local Social Services for an interview to see if we were part of 7-11's job-training contribution to American society.

Now this program probably had the intention of rewarding companies that taught job skills, and making it easier for small businesses to hire people who didn't have those skills in the first place. At the same time, it seemed ridiculous to me. This company was nation-wide, and was doing okay. Why give money to a corporation when there were so many people walking around with real problems?

I didn't get it. It was about teaching people how to fish, instead of standing in line for the Dole.

My appointment (although I didn't realize it at the time) took up time for local S.S. (social services, not storm troopers). Multiply that by every clerk in every convenience store in town. We all know that S.S. workload is huge and heartbreaking. Conversely, it is a system dominated by a civil service mentality. So long as Some progress is made, then it's progress, so do your work steadily, slowly, and avoid burnout.  I am sure that my appointment looked like a huge waste of time to the S.S. that interviewed me.

At the end of my interview, she told me that "Yes, I did look like a disadvantaged youth in trouble" to her and so would be eligible for the program. I couldn't believe she said that to me. Was that what I was interviewing for, the position of "Disadvantaged" and "In Trouble"? How could you call a person like me disadvantaged? What about all the amazing steps I was taking, to pay my own rent, get to my own job, fix my own car for the first time in life? I had a royal blue phone and the bill was paid on time. What was so damn wrong with me?

I cried all the way to work. Shouldn't have been driving, really. My boss was flabbergasted.

"They called me a disadvantaged youth, like I have nothing going for me at all," I sobbed.

This (the same guy who told me to use napkins on a bleeding-to-death shooting victim, because they were not on inventory) got mad. "Those Assholes!" he stormed. "You're perfectly good just as you are. I'm calling the f*ing District Manager! None of my people are going to go through this. I'm telling him."

I would like to think that he supported me, but nowadays I wonder about the extra hours he was putting in while we all went to be interviewed. That may have been a major part of his ire.

My main point is this: the language of classification in Social Services is not empowering. It is a language that documents our weaknesses and not our strengths. How could it be otherwise, if they are addressing  social gaps? We aren't planning to give assistance to the able-bodied that don't need it (except, well, 7-11?). The only way to avoid this weakening language is to use number categories, which are even more dehumanizing, and--always come with a verbal explanation anyway.

Somehow I fit that description, and though I was insulted by it, it wasn't wrong. If major disaster had struck (as it did, a year after) I had no cushion.  Yet I found the process demeaning, dismissive of my humanity, and onerous. If a "disadvantaged youth's" parents learn to operate under this demeaning, dismissive, and onerous categorization, what does he or she learn? They are more disadvantaged than me, have more to overcome. We talk about generations of people on Welfare, but we don't see how the system itself can be weakening to its participants from the get. And yet starvation and joblessness are far more weakening still.

There must be a way to involve the language and actions of strength in the public assistance process. If we can do that, we can probably get people out of the bottom of the barrel and into a better world. By doing this, we strengthen our citizenry, and our efforts are more likely to gain us a win-win outcome.

Skeeters and Glass Houses

You might remember the urban swamp I wrote about? And before that, the Idiots & Mice. Well, I will tell you: this is the same building. I called the city and I griped to the Store Manager. Underlying my words, of course, is the sense that this person doesn't even want to help himself . . .

I guess those in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

Anyway, he is avoiding calling his home office Real Estate Hotline about his problems. As long as there is a bag of food trash down the stairwell, the rodents have something to eat. As long as the drains are clogged, the water won't leave. If the drain(s) have to be Roto-Rootered (what is the real verb for that?)  the landlord has to pay. Not the SM, so why is it so tough to make this call? I don't understand it at all.

So I complained to him again Wednesday. Actually pulled him from a meeting. I was told he was in conference with the District Manager--Hey! Golden Opportunity! But the DM wouldn't come out of the office, and so the Manager lied and said he wasn't there. If there is a species on earth that I don't care for? Besides mosquitoes and rats? The DM. Best buck-passers ever.

Anyway, to shut me up the SM agreed to clean it up. At his expense? I can't disagree--those months of trash could have been solved by one ten-minute pull of the can months ago. On the other hand, what is so bad about calling the landlord, or giving me the landlord's name?

I must be ferocious. Anyway, it does look better down there. My one concern is that the underlying problem, the rodents, have safe haven in the empty building. We still aren't calling the landlord. And wouldn't I just.

In the tranquil night scene you see above, it's clean. The bucket is gone, one major mosquito vector. If the drain was blocked only by leaves, then we're set. When it rains, though, the ash tray and can will fill with water and we will have some mosquito vector left. Not to the same threat though.

I did this for me. Mosquitoes love me far too much. A block or so away from my house? Trouble.

In the meantime, at home, I have a ton of stuff to do. If I can do as well as I expect from others, I will be in a better place. Of course, I have neither rats nor mosquitoes. The cats did chew a hole in my window screen Thursday night.

Behind, again! Best get to it.

Oh, and this Zemanta Thing? Sometimes it's silly, but here's a Science article saying 

Mosquitoes Should Die.

Something we non-scientists have suspected all along. Malaria, heartworms, bug bites! 

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• Ecology: A world without mosquitoes (nature.com)