Himalayan Nostalgia

The Rubin Museum is devoted to art of the Himalayas. I happen to be interested in all things Himalayan, so visiting the museum has been high on my list of things to do. However, the impending arrival of an Indian friend (and mountain climber) inspired me to check out the museum sooner rather than later.

Just as an aside, I have been looking forward with great anticipation to this friend's visit. I love this man. He has saved my life on more than one occasion. And I'd like nothing more than to do the same for him. Which might well be necessary. He is due to arrive in a week or so, but his communications have been somewhat enigmatic. For example, he said "I'm flying in to New York City on September 11, so can you pick me up in Newark, NY?" Or more challenging: "I am returning to NY on Friday at 4 p.m. and have a dinner that night in Washington D.C. How do I get there?"

I received this email only yesterday and he's leaving India in a couple of days. I think I'm far more stressed than he is. Another reason to scurry over to the museum in search of a Buddha who can help me out. I'm thinking White Tara (compassion and serenity).

The Rubin, formerly a Barney's department store, is tucked away on a side street in Chelsea. I was expecting something tiny, but I walked in to an elegant lobby with five more floors above it. Serendipitously, I stumbled into my own private tour, conducted by a former Tibetan refugee now living in the U.S. We spent a good hour together during which she corrected many of my misconceptions and directed me to exhibits for further study. When I'd had enough education for one day, I sought out Tara and we had a lovely talk. Now I'm ready for anything.

Fickerage.

Since I blogged about playing Skee-Ball on my iPhone for hours upon end, I've been asked two questions:

1) How?

2) Why?

Although this might prove to be a most boring post, I'll answer.


The blue thing that looks like a rocket flying out of the 30-cup is a ball you can buy when you've acquired enough tickets. I have all of them, and my favorite is the Cow Ball, which doesn't have a tail, but which shows spin very well. The 40- and 50-cups are obscured by the ball, but probably all of you have played RL Skee-Ball.

Each game consists of 9 balls, which count down on the scoreboard (ergo, the 9-ball is the first ball to play). The award for each ball, if any, is multiplied by the bonus, which ranges from 0 to 10 (maybe higher, but I don't go there). The bonus is increased when you reach various score plateaus, and also if you sink a shot in a lit cup - the cups light randomly, from 0 to 4 times a game.

HOW: The factors determining the success of a flick are finger pressure (affects range and bounce, if the ball hits the edge of a cup), direction, speed (range), starting and ending points (range and speed), and curvature (spin). The hardest shot for me is the left 100-cup, because I'm right-handed. The right 100-cup is my money shot, where I aim almost all the time.

WHY: At first it was just fun. I learned the various shots and tried to increase the bonus, as you would if playing at an arcade. I also tried to earn tickets so I could buy things - balls and/or trinkets. The tickets you spend still appear in your overall score for ranking purposes.

Later I decided I wanted to get to the #400 ranking, so I had to develop a strategy. Currently my ranking is #641 and I have won 488,928 tickets. Making what I think is the best estimate of my average score (which of course improved over time), that equates to just about 63,000 flicks. People pass me every time I take a break, and at this level I assume I am competing with idle teenagers who spend all day flicking and texting simultaneously. I, however, am a responsible, hard-working adult with a wife, so I can only flick three or four hours a day. It is a big disadvantage, and I had to maximize my rate of winning tickets.

Leaving out all the deliberations and trials, my current strategy is to flick continuously. I aim for my money shot, the right 100-cup. Often I find my shot going astray, but I keep flicking and adjust on the fly. All of the factors come into play, so the adjustments are subtle and interesting. I can hit 20 shots in a row or miss 7 in one game.

Since the maximum bonus at the start of a game is 6, I had to decide when to attempt a lit cup. A cup is never lit for the first shot, so at the moment I'll shoot for a lit cup that appears on the 8-ball or 7-ball, unless it's the left 100-cup, which I don't hit often enough. Sometimes I don't take those shots because the ball is taking too long rolling around, or because I'm flicking too fast, or because I'm in a rhythm and don't want to interrupt it.

Whew, that's it. Time to rack up a few more tickets.

Bras, Breasts & Hilarity

Who among us has not had a mother, grandmother or (ack!) peeping saleslady tell us to bend over and wiggle our shoulders when trying on a new bra so that we fill those cups as best we can. Only after we shimmy then stand can we determine whether a bra truly fits. Even I, with my little button boobs, have had this experience.

Naturally I'm speaking to our female readers, but I'll bet you guys did not yawn and skip over the first paragraph. Am I right?

Of course I'm right and Nora Ephron would be right too. I don't like everything Nora Ephron does. Some of her stuff is too self-deprecating for me. But she can really nail the female experience from time to time. We just saw "Love, Loss and What I Wore," which she wrote with her sister. And although it has been tagged a chick show, Durf laughed just as hard as I did. He laughed at the bra-fitting story above and even harder at the "mono-boob" story that followed. Futhermore, he was *not* the only man in the audience and I caught them laughing too. I didn't see anyone nodding off at any point in the production.

So you're gonna have to remind me. What's wrong with chick shows?

A NYC Secret Only the Tourists Know

When Tash was here for a visit, the first time we found ourselves in Grand Central Terminal and heading for an exit, she suddenly veered off course and went and stood with her face pressed to the corner of a wall outside the Oyster Bar. Hmmmmm. What did I say to upset her, I wondered. Or...maybe she was playing Hide and Seek with little Ricky? When she didn't come out of the corner, I turned to her husband (Big Rick) for help, but he was no longer beside me. I looked around and found him pressing his face to a corner on the opposite side of the room, some 40 feet away. Oh man, I thought, and I'm letting these people stay in my home?

Turns out the alcove outside the Oyster Bar, know as the whispering gallery, was invented and built by architect Rafael Guastavino so that tourists from all over the world could teach New Yorkers a thing or two about the architectural wonders of their own city.

If you and a partner stand in opposite corners of the alcove and whisper into the wall, you can hear each other quite clearly. Durf and I tried it last night. It works!

Evelyn Crabtree, I Presume?

On a recent special occasion, Durf took me to a restaurant that, according to at least one reviewer, has the "best fare between San Jose and Westchester."

Crabtree's Kittle House is located in Chappaqua, NY. We don't go to Chappaqua often because the tires on our car don't grip the gold brick on the road too well. But on this particular night, we made our way to another lush estate. It wasn't easy to find, though. No advertising. Probably a Chappaqua signage law. But we finally located the restaurant inside what appeared to be yet another large Westchester mansion. Our table overlooked a lawn so big we couldn't see the the edge.

I astutely concluded that we must be on the old Crabtree estate. Yessiree. Mr. Crabtree of Crabtree and Evelyn fame and fortune. The next day, I decided to research how in the world Mr. Crabtree ended up in Westchester County. Are you all laughing? You should be. To save myself further humiliation, I won't go into the history of Crabtree & Evelyn.

Instead, I'll report to you that the Kittle House originally belonged to a family named Kittle. They farmed for a living and this place...well, it was the barn. But now it is a most beautiful barn with a fabulous restaurant inside.

Change and wolf.

I realize the title makes little sense, but I couldn't figure out how to tie... WAIT! I have it!

Two optics are being built now, so my NuSTAR life has changed forever. Instead of starting at 05:30, I'll be starting at 04:30. The scariest part of that for me isn't getting up at 04:00, it's having to go to bed at 20:30. Maybe I'll try something I did when I was in the habit of staying up very late, many years ago. I'd be up until 2 or 3 in the morning, then get up in 3 or 4 hours for work. When I got home, I'd take a short nap, and I was able to go on like that for months. Of course, I'm not 30 anymore.

One change that is part of my new schedule is that Twila won't be getting up with me and making my coffee. Hopping out of bed at 5 was no problem for her, but 4 is ridiculous. I have to decide whether to make my own coffee at 4, or wait until I get home. It's just a matter of how long it takes. I don't want to have to get up at 03:45 just so I can have coffee.

Also, the lab is on a true campussy campus, not the cookie cutter industrial buildings that some companies like to call their campus. It is part of Columbia University, after all. There are trees and open spaces. I see deer almost every day. But today I saw a wolf! Yessiree bobberskins, it was a wolf. It was 05:29:30 and dark, and my headlights caught it running across the road about 15 yards in front of me. It quickly disappeared into the dark, but I got a clear view of it. It was neither a coyote nor a fox nor a dog, all of which I've seen many times. I hadn't seen a wolf in the wild before, but there was no mistaking it.

Possibly when I'm going in to work at 04:30, I'll see more of them.

Jazz in Westchester

Do any of you music mavens know who this is? The title offers a clue, of course.

Throughout August, Tarrytown hosts free Sunset Concerts on Thursdays at the Lyndhurst Estate (described in an earlier blog). I use the term "free" advisedly because of the $10 parking fee.

I finally made it to a concert and was astonished to see the turnout. Westchester does love its jazz. Undeterred by the cover charge, the monied Westchesterites drove their BMWs, Mercedes-Benzes, Jags, and Lexi onto the beautiful west lawn of Lyndhurst, and in a moment of reckless abandon, donned flipflops and carried picnic baskets to the banks of the Hudson...right behind the bowling alley. (An upscale *private* bowling alley, to be sure.)

I've never taken a fancy to jazz. I don't know if it's because of my classical training or my pathologically ordered mind. (Helene, you'll have to weigh in on this as the most accomplished musician among us.) But the setting was glorious, the weather perfect and the gemutlichkeit widespread!

Flicking.

I know I haven't been blogging much lately. I should have more free time for blogging, because the time I have to be at work is less now than it has been and ever will be again. Today I got home at 07:30. Only one optic is being built now, and there are only 14 layers, so I don't have a lot to do. The second optic is going to start soon, maybe today, which will double my work load. When the optics get to a certain size, I think 60 layers, the number of mirrors doubles, and so does my work on that optic. When they're both over 60, I'll be a busy beaver. Now I have a lot of free time, but I've been busy flicking.

The problem is an iPhone app, Skee-Ball. Just like the ones at the arcade. I flick my finger and the ball rolls down the lane, jumps up, and goes in one of the holes. My score is put on an ordered list of all the players. I started at 18,000 or so, and my goal is to get to 400, since an app reviewer wrote about the game, calling it addictive, and said he'd gotten to 400.

The game was fun at first, but now I'm just obsessed with getting my ranking to 400. So I come home from work, read the paper, then flick, flick, flick. When I have breaks at work, flick, flick, flick. Eventually, of course, I feel guilty doing nothing but flicking, so I do something productive, like pay my bills. After I pay a few, I feel like I deserve a short break, so flick, flick, flick. Clean up my office. Flick, flick, flick. Go to the store. Flick, flick, flick. You get the idea. It's flicking ridiculous.

I don't have far to go. At the moment I'm ranked 814. But it's getting harder. The scores are farther and farther apart, so I have to sink more and more balls to move up. And every time I look, I've dropped a couple of places because people have passed me. But, little by little, I'm approaching 400.

There, I've blogged!

Flick, flick, flick.

Live Every Day Like...

...your hair is on fire.

That Zen (?) phrase was on a t-shirt Durf gave me for my birthday. He thinks it captures my approach to life, so I might as well advertise it. I'm not sure he's right about my life in general, but I certainly celebrated by birthday that way this year. I started celebrating on Friday and didn't let up until I put out my hair last night about 10 p.m. STG, it was the best birthday ever! Now I want to do it all over again.

A Tip? You're Freakin' Kidding, right?

I have issues with the whole concept of tipping, but that diatribe belongs on a political blog, not here. In practice, I have been strongly influenced by my siblings and Durf who all advocate tipping from the heart. And so I do. But some days my heart is compassionate and generous. Other days it's as black as coal. Allow me to explain.

I recently had occasion to travel to and from JFK via an airport shuttle bus. On the outbound trip, my driver was Mr. No-Nonsense. I approached the bus and our exchange went something like this:

NN: JFK?
TLS: Yes
NN: Ok, this bus. Which airline?
TLS: Virgin America
NN: Ok, Terminal 4. Just one bag?
TLS: yes
NN: Ok, I'll take it. You can board the bus.

When we arrived at JFK, Mr. NN announced the terminals in a loud, clear voice. As we approached terminal four, I dug around in my purse for a few extra dollars to add to the tip I already had ready. In my opinion, the service was perfect. Not unctuous. Not surly. Just business-like, informative and helpful.

On the inbound trip, however, my driver is Mr. Angry Man. I approach what I hope is the correct bus and Angry Man extends his hand palm up. I'm confused, so I ask, "Is this the bus to Grand Central?" Angry Man glares at me and leaves his palm in my face. A stand-off. Finally we move on to some actual conversation:

AM: Ticket?
TLS: I already have one.
AM: Ticket!
TLS: Oh, Ok.
AM: Where you going?
TLS: Uh, Grand Central
AM: Take your suitcase on the bus. I don't have room in cargo.

So I drag my suitcase onto the bus, but I can't stow it because I'm not strong enough to lift it over my head onto the overhead rack. The bus is full, so my suitcase sits in the aisle (instead of on a seat).

Shortly, Angry Man gets on the bus, announces the route and then says, "I have one more thing to say, so everybody LISTEN UP! See this sign?" He points to a sign that says, "Gratuities are at your discretion but much appreciated." Then he says, "Most people don't understand that sign. THIS one is more to the point. So all of you who are wanting me to haul around your heavy bags, think about it." And with that, he flips out a second sign, rips off some tape and slaps the sign to the back of his chair. The sign reads, "Drivers depend on tips." Then he pounds on it a few times to emphasize his point and without another word, throws himself into his seat and starts the bus.

When we arrive at Grand Central, I want to stick around to see what kind of tips he gets, but I have a train to catch.

Chess Anyone?

I'll bet most of you don't know about Manhattan's Chess District. Well, I didn't either, until my bro and s.i.l. came to visit. They said they wanted to check out the chess district in NYC. When I gave them a blank look, my brother said, "Don't you know people play chess in Washington Square Park?" When I shook my head, he followed up with, "Didn't you see the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer?"

In my defense, I am a member of the non-chess-playing minority in the Slesnick family. And my knowledge gap becomes a veritable chasm when Dan and his family are around. Not only do they all play chess, they play tournament chess.

So off we went to Greenwich Village where the chess district can be found along Thompson Street (chess shops galore) and in a section of Washington Square Park where chess players and patzers congregate and play for money.

We watched some players in the park (see photo). I really didn't see how either of them could concentrate. Playing with a clock, their knees bounced constantly with excitement or, perhaps, nervousness. And each move was punctuated with a loud slap at the clock. That would drive me crazy!

We also visited the renowned "Village Chess Shop," which is open 24 hours a day so that people like Stanley Kubrick can stop by to play any time they want. However, players must abide by some strict rules, which are posted prominently in the play area:

Caveat drivor.

I realize I'm always griping about the drivers in NY, but it is a phenomenon. This morning I was driving home from work. It was a quiet, sunny Sunday. Then I saw flashing lights ahead. When I got to the lights, I saw a car smashed against a telephone pole. I mean, really smashed, so much that only a foot or two of the front of the car remained. The rest was squashed. I couldn't see the driver, but the airbag was still inflated and sitting in his seat.

Accidents aren't unusual, but it is a quiet village road. With a speed limit of 30 MPH. I bet he was speeding.

Religious fervor.

I was bouncing around on the web a few days ago and I decided I needed some Buddhist doodads. Here's what I got:

License plate frame
"May you be happy. May you be free from suffering."

Refrigerator magnet
"When you are arguing with a fool, make sure he isn't doing the same thing."

Refrigerator magnet
"How people treat you is their karma; how you react is yours."

Sticker
"Only one time is it essential to awaken. That time is now."

Bumper sticker
"You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." - Buddha

T-shirt
"Live simply so that others may simply live." - Mahatma Gandhi

I put the license plate frame on, but it didn't work. People still tailgate and give the occasional salute. Do you think the bumper sticker might work?

So You're Not a Museum Person?

Well, have I got a museum for you. Dia:Beacon. And it's a mere 35 miles north of Tarrytown.

It's not a joke museum, not a light-weight, fluffy, lowest-common-denominator tourist museum. It's a serious museum, but with something for everyone.

So you have some Andy Warhol (no explanation needed), some Sol LeWitt wall drawings which look like my old high school geometry homework -- after it has been graded. I spent a long time in the LeWitt gallery trying to figure out if I could replicate the drawings.

You also have some Dan Flavin (fluorescent light structures), some _____ (can't remember his name), an exhibit consisting of crushed automobiles with interesting post-crush paint jobs.

And many others.

And then...AND THEN... up in the attic, I found a treasure trove of Louise Bourgeois's penis sculptures. My goodness, the cherry on top!

My Job, Part 2b: The Optic

(If you're interested in how the telescope is being made and how it works, there is some info in the comments in Part2a.)

I blabbed a lot yesterday, so I'll just post a couple more pictures now. First, here is a baby optic - only 8 layers. This is a real one... it will be going into space. The picture isn't great quality because I took it this morning with my phone.


Here is another cellphone photo. It's half of one of the frames that will carry an optic into space.


There is a cyclotron on the property. Don't worry, it's too small to create a black hole. This morning I took a photo of the target area (it was being worked on).


Finally, one of the guys planted a garden just outside the lab.

My Job, Part 2a: The Optic

This part of my job blog was delayed because the photos were on my lemon Apple. It's the most interesting part, IMO.

When I wrote Part 1, the optic was at 130 layers, with only 3 to go. Everyone was nervous, because it was so close to the end (133 layers), but I was thinking, "Oh, come on. Relax. Everything will be fine!" Then layer 131 appeared and I broke glass on 6 layers. That was an unpleasant moment. On the plus side, my 6 broken pieces only put me in 2nd place on the All Time List. My boss is in first with 7, but I'm the first to do so many all at once. As you might know, though, one of my mottoes is: "If something is worth doing, it's worth doing to excess." That might not have been the best place to apply it, I confess.

The satellite will carry two optics. Both are built with glass that is .25 mm thick and is coated with various materials in Copenhagen. Each optic has 133 layers of glass that are separated by graphite spacers. Here is a side view at about 130 layers:


Everything has to be SO precise, because is is a NASA project, which means it is a U.S. Government project. That means that every single procedure has to be tested and tested and tested, then the results are submitted, and the job goes to the company that pays congressmen the most. But I diverge.

During the day technicians put epoxy (very special epoxy, just like all the other components) on the graphite and put the glass on it. Then they add hardware that presses the glass and epoxy together for several hours. So when I arrive at an ungodly hour in the morning, the optic looks like this:


I drink a lot of coffee to fake being awake at that time and I have to remove the hardware with my shaky hands, body, and mind without breaking glass, which I have PROVEN is impossible. Anyway, this post is getting long, and before you nod off yourselves, I'll just post a few more pics.

The optic without the hardware:


I'll interject that after the glass has been epoxied to the spacers, the other side of the spacers is ground to within 20 microns (micrometers) of specification. The optic looks like this when it's rotating on the lathe:


Finally, here is a photo that is beyond description (thankfully):

Ground Zero

Two years ago when I came to NYC, I wanted to see the WTC site. I'm not sure why. I don't typically need or want to see disaster or memorial sites. But some I do. I suppose if the disaster or tragedy feels like my own personal tragedy -- whether or not it is shared by millions of others -- then just being at the site is cathartic in some way.

But when I went to the WTC site in 2008, I saw construction cranes. That was it. The viewing experience was not cathartic. It was not sad. I was simply looking at a construction site.

I went back there a couple of days ago, and I must report that the cranes are still there. If I were from Mars, I might think that the crazy inscrutable earthlings put cranes on the memorial site for some profound reason that I couldn't understand. After all, there are always hordes of people around the construction site taking pictures from every angle.

But I'm not from Mars, and I know better. I know what the memorial is supposed to look like, including the mirrored pools in the footprints of the old buildings. I think the theme "Reflecting Absence" is entirely appropriate. So now I'm just feeling impatient, and still waiting for my catharsis.

I Want a Divorce!

...screamed hundreds of New York women (ok, maybe a few men, too) early Monday morning.

New York is a progressive state. I still think so. But it was the last -- dead last -- state to allow no-fault divorce. On Sunday, it caught up with the rest of the states. NY actually went the whole nine yards and now also allows one spouse to boot out the other whether she/he wants to go or not. As it should be.

However, there is a downside to this law. Some collateral damage, if you will. An entire industry of (mostly) women are now unemployed. In the bad old days when you had to have a reason for requesting a divorce -- which most often turned out to be adultery -- it was damned hard to get the goods (i.e. evidence). So the cuckolded spouse (usually the woman) employed a *seductress* to entrap the philandering spouse. I don't know exactly how that stood up in court. All I know is that the entrapment business was thriving. (I did *not* make this up.)

So now we have all these seductress impersonators looking for work. I'm thinking they could find some book and movie deals, though, don't you?

Sooner or later.

Thank you to everyone who offered condolences about my father. It makes a difference, and I appreciate it.

Things are looking up, as they always do, sooner or later.

For one thing, my job is going great. (Tomorrow I'm going to post some photos of the optic under construction... unless some disaster happens before then.) The boss-person with whom I had a bit of a dust-up is really a good guy, and I respect him. I think he respects me, too. Tension makes people do funny... well, non-funny... things.

The other big looking-up item is that I finally have my computer back! Technically and splitting hairs, I don't actually have "my computer" back. I have a brand new, shiny 3.5 GHz 27" iMac, which Apple gave me for free. I would have had it Friday, except I had to get someone to transfer my old hard drive to this one. The guy at the repair shop said it is very rare for Apple to hand out free iMacs. Also, they didn't call him to confirm that it was a lemon Apple, which they'd always done before. I guess going bonkers on the phone with Apple that time when I was a little bit toasty wasn't as bad as I'd thought. This computer is really beautiful, fast, and fun. Of course, I had 653 emails to deal with, and now I'm diving into bills and such. But I'll get caught up, sooner or later.

Museum of Jewish Heritage

As have most of you, I've read many books, seen many movies and been to many museums that tell the story of the Holocaust in various profound and moving ways. But I wonder if revisiting the story again and again is much like the experience of war, as reported by many veterans. If you see enough horror, will you become desensitized to it?

I was thinking about this as I made my way through the first of three levels in the museum's core exhibition. I traveled through the exhibition as it was meant to be seen, starting with the introduction to Jewish culture and history, moving on to persecution and the Holocaust, and then finishing with stories of post-war experiences and reflection (some hopeful, some despairing).

Here, in short, was my reaction. On the first level, I was somewhat engaged, but I kept thinking, "They could do so much more to draw us in." Then when I got to the second level, specifically the section on the Holocaust, I felt as though I had been hit over the head with a sledgehammer. I could not complete the journey through that floor. I escaped to the "renewal" section, and to be honest it was quite difficult as well. I listened and watched people describe their search for surviving family members. Many talked about having to go on completely alone in the world -- looking for community, but often not finding it for years and years. It was incredibly painful.

So I don't have the answer to the desensitizing question. All I know is that it hasn't happened to me yet.

Memories of my father.

My very first memory of Dad was in our kitchen in Clinton, NY, when I was 4 (1950). He was teaching me to write my name. I noticed that my mother was crying at the kitchen table and asked Dad what was wrong. He said I was going to have a new brother or sister and that Mom was feeling emotional. A short time later my sister Janice was born.

In 1954 my mother was pregnant again and close to her due date. We were staying with my Grandma Freund. It was in the middle of Hurricane Hazel, the biggest hurricane I ever experienced. Dad and I were sleeping in his bed and Mom was downstairs, when he had to get up and take her to the hospital, in spite of fallen wires and trees and dire warnings to stay inside. That night my sister Judi arrived.

One of my most poignant memories occurred in 1957 when my mother made Dad move out. He and I walked about a mile to an elementary school and sat on its steps to talk. Soon we were both crying.

In 1961 I was a sophomore in high school, and I ran away from my mother on a snowy day. I walked awhile and then called my father. He was living with Grandma Freund at that time. He picked me up and took me in. We drove home together singing, "Side By Side".

He was working for Syracuse Vending then, a company that grew and thrived largely because of Dad's expertise and efforts. One night I was with him and the owners of the company in Moran's Rathskellar in Manlius, NY. Dad wouldn't let me drink, of course, but things did get rowdy. At one point he ripped my shirt half off, which I thought was great fun. But when we got home, Grandma was furious!

In 1963 Dad and I were living in an apartment on Butternut Street in Syracuse, when he told me that he was going to marry Dottie and move to Arizona. I didn't want to leave my high school or my girlfriend, so I stayed in Syracuse and lived with my mother again. After that, Dad and I didn't see each other very much.

Last October was Dad's 90th birthday, and my wife, Twila, and I went to Florida to help him celebrate. He was enthusiastic, always ready to do something, and flirting with waitresses, as always. He said it was his best birthday ever. That was the last time I saw him.

Dad was the most alive person I've ever known. He was always upbeat and active and more than happy to argue politics. I was sure he was going to live to be 100, and I can't believe he's gone.

I love you, Dad.

VJ Day

If you don't yet, then I am quite certain by tomorrow at this time, you will know exactly how NYC is celebrating VJ Day this year. Here's a clue (see picture).

This sculpture was imported from NJ for the week, just in time for today's kiss-in. I decided to skip the kiss-in and try to get a shot of the statue without all the cheesy imitators by going to Times Square a day early. But really, what was I thinking? All the Edith-Shain-and-anonymous-sailor wannabes, were already out practicing. It's easy to get drawn in to the spirit, though. As I watched I felt a terrible itch to go up to each couple and rearrange arms and legs so that they matched the statue a little bit better.

The whole thing was pretty hilarious. You had the young ones who went up and just did their thing in front of the statue, not giving a hoot whether they matched. The middle aged ones were totally obsessed with getting the pose just right, which made them look awkward in the extreme. It was like (I imagine) watching Rush Limbaugh trying to grope...well, anyone. You just wanted to turn away. And then there were the older couples who were fun to watch, except I kept worrying that *he* was going to drop *her* so I began to stress about how long it would take the ambulance to make its way through the crowded city.

The Healing Powers of...

...Troilus & Cressida. Really, I'm not kidding. It was still a pretty gloomy day yesterday in all respects. But we had tickets for Troilus & Cressida at the vaunted Hudson Valley (outdoor) Shakespeare Festival.

Let me tell you, you haven't seen Troilus & Cressida until you've seen Cressida sing Beyonce's "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on it!)" with all her girlfriends. But the audience actually burst into cheers when Hector (as Ella Fitzgerald) and Achilles (as Louis Armstrong) lip synched "Can't we be Friends" to each other.

If the play hadn't made us giddy with delight, the setting would have. Incredible. There we were, sitting in a tent on the lawn of the gorgeous Boscobel Estate, looking out onto the Hudson River as the sun went down and the Trojans & Greeks came charging over the hill on the horizon.

Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so here to stay...

Everything considered, yesterday was less than a great day.

1) I had another fight with my boss. He told me something and I told him it was BS. It turned out that we were both half right. Since he's the boss, though, his half is bigger.

2) My dad died.

3) A painful, uncomfortable, and sometimes embarrassing infection in the lower half of my body returned with a vengeance, just a few days after my antibiotics prescription ran out.

I know today will be better.

New York, City of Midgets

I read a fascinating article in the paper recently reporting that average clothing sizes are smaller on both coasts than in the interior of the US (based on retail sales, of course). Exactly why that might be true in New York is obvious, at least to me. New Yorkers are short. Or I should say, shorter.

This realization has dawned on me only gradually with the accumulation of New York experiences. For example, I have noticed that when standing among a group of people before an exhibit at a museum, I rarely feel the need to push people aside so that I can see. I simply look over the tops of their heads. And when watching a film crew in Times Square, I do not have to climb the pretty red steps to see what is going on.

Generally I have found it to be quite advantageous to be a corn-fed midwesterner seeing the sights in a town of short people. But then there's the crowded-subway experience, which is decidedly mixed for a tall person such as myself. On the one hand, unlike the little people around me, I can actually reach the upper grip bar, and therefore I never lack bar space for hanging on. On the flip side, I am expected to use the upper bar so the little people can use the vertical poles, which means my arms get tired. Furthermore, at the end of a long day of intense sightseeing in hot and humid weather, I am not immune from worrying about the little person with his nose pressed to my armpit on the subway.

Up the River...To the Big House

I attempted to enter Sing Sing yesterday, but somehow ended up at the Caputo Community Center in Ossining, NY. Come to find out, Ossining was formerly known as Sing Sing.

Name changes are common in Westchester County, that's for sure. Take Sleepy Hollow, for example, which was formerly known as North Tarrytown (yawn). In 1996, it assumed the name Sleepy Hollow for blatantly commercial reasons. Specifically the town wanted to capitalize on all the tourists who would come to town and pose as headless horsemen, before dining in one of the expensive downtown cafes. (See picture.)

Ossining also changed its name for commercial reasons. The local merchants freaked out when they discovered that customers assumed the "Made in Sing Sing" label meant that the product was made in the prison, and not by unincarcerated village craftsmen.

That was way back in 1901, but Ossining is still schizophrenic about whether or not to publicize its connection to the prison. Some think it's ghoulish. So the compromise is a little "self-serve" museum tucked into the dark recesses of the community center. There you can see photos of Sing Sing torture methods (and you thought George Bush invented water boarding!), view ingenious and deadly shanks, and learn all about girl fights at the prison.

I was the only one there, so it's hard to say if ghoulish is bad for business or if ghoulish needs to be a little more front and center.

OMG

The utility bill was correct. I can't even talk about it.

Snickers won't do it this time. I need a giant cinnamon roll.

Well, well, well.

When I spoke with Apple last Tuesday they told me they'd replace my iMac if it had a hardware (other than a software) problem. All I had to do was boot from the installation disk and see if the problem was still there. I didn't have my installation disk, and I didn't want to wait for one to arrive, so I took the computer to a repair place. That was a week ago, so I was thinking, "Why is it taking so long to boot from an external drive to see if it works?" This morning I surprised them by showing up and asking what was going on. They said they'd ordered a world of parts, which had two meanings for me: 1) It is definitely a hardware problem; 2) They're throwing darts. But I told them to keep it and see what happened. I didn't need a new computer, just one that works.

The repair place called a while ago and said ... they can't fix it! I guess that proves something. So I called Apple, expecting a lot of hassle. There really wasn't much hassle, though, and I was surprised by the result. They're giving me their latest and greatest model, a 27" 3.2 GHz iMac, for... FREE! My old one is 24", and I upgraded this one to 3.5 GHz for a paltry sum, but...

OMG!

:^)

P.S. My boss called and I'm going back to work tomorrow. MMMMMMMMMM.

P.P.S. My dad is continuing to slowly improve, but he isn't lucid long enough to talk on the phone, and they don't know what's going to happen. I was going to blog about that today, and I will when I have more information.

Carny Scam

We went to Coney Island on Friday. These days, I enjoy most rides only vicariously. Since I began running back in the late 70s, I have not been able to ride on anything the least bit spinny, like this one: (Can you see Tash & Tatiana?)

Nor will I ride on anything that takes you into the stratosphere and *then* spins you, like the ride in the second photo.

Carny games are another matter. I admit that they pull me like the moon pulls the ocean...or whatever. I am well aware of how difficult it is to win anything on the midway. I've even read with great amusement the ingenious game-rigging that carnies engage in to prevent you from walking off with a $5 stuffed toy.

But we all suffer from a certain amount of arrogance from time to time (don't we?). I figured I could find a game to play that couldn't be rigged. You're probably way ahead of me. I chose the horse race game. One that Durf and I have played many many times. It's the one where each player takes a seat with a water gun mounted in front. At the sound of a bell, you advance a horse by shooting water at a target. The first horse to the finish wins. And of course the shooter gets a prize. There must always be a winner among the shooters. SO...Tatiana and I stepped up to play. It was just the two of us. One of us would win a prize.

We sat, we aimed, the carny said, "Everybody ready?" and the starting bell went off. Tatiana and I concentrated hard. When the game was over, I was sure I had won but I planned to give Tatiana my prize. Well, you probably know what happened, right? Just before the starting bell, someone slipped into a seat down at the other end of the booth. And yep, she beat us both by a mile. She didn't even claim her prize. Boy was I steamed.

Turn off the AC? :p

Not in my lifetime. It is an annoying electric bill, though. The electricity itself cost $188. But they also charged $189 to deliver that electricity to us. It would have been cheaper to send it by FedEx. Twila's stressed over the bill, but I'm not. I shed stress like a bee sheds pollen.

Playmates

Tash & family make great playmates. During their short visit, we managed to squeeze in a Coney Island trip, a play (remember the actress on heroin?), the Greenwich Village street festival, visits to Columbia University and NYU (so that 10 year old Tatiana can decide which one she wants to attend), and WII tournaments in the evenings. Oh and a "death march" (so dubbed by Natasha) around Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow. It was a tad hot and humid and perhaps a few too many miles for a five year old, but we did cover some territory.

With the Columbus gang gone, it's pretty quiet here, but that's ok because we have a big decision to make -- one that requires a lot of thought. We need to decide if we can turn on the air conditioner! There's nothing like a $400 utility bill to convince a person that she/he can tolerate extreme heat and humidity. In truth, we know something is terribly wrong somewhere and somebody's got some 'splainin' to do!

I'm blogging.

The primary purpose of this post is... well, Twila told me to do it. Her theory is that a blog is best if there is an entry every day, and she's too busy at the moment to blog. So now I'm doing it, although she had to come home from Greenwich Village and tell me again to do it.

The first and best news is that my brother (1/2) called and said my dad had stabilized, so he might survive. I think that's great news, but I'm a little confused about it. I'll just have to wait and see what happens.

The reason Twila is so busy is that we have guests, Twila's sister and her family. They're really nice and it's great to see them and we've been having a lot of fun, but that's why Twila has been so busy. It's also interesting having 6 people in our apartment, when we thought it was a bit crowded with just us.

Speaking of our tiny apartment, we got our first electricity bill today. $388. It was shocking.

I have some time off work because one optic is done, one hasn't started yet, and there isn't any glass. My boss, my real one, not the one I feuded with, said he wants to guarantee a minimum hours of work a week, so this is sort of a paid vacation.

I want to post Part 2 of my work blog, but the pictures are on my iMac, which is still in the repair place. That's interesting, because all they had to do was determine if it's a hardware problem or a software problem, which everyone already knows. I called them Thursday and they said they want to run a few more tests. That's the same thing the doctor said about my dad before he went critical, so it's hard to be optimistic.

It Couldn't Last Forever

Well, we finally saw a bad play. Perhaps it's because 9,554 performances of "Perfect Crime" was just one too many. It was certainly at least one too many for the lead actress, who delivered most of her lines with her eyes closed. She didn't sound impaired, although she delivered her lines with no spaces between the words. But the closed eyes and facial distortions led Tash to conclude she was high on heroin. We were all highly (so to speak) entertained by her odd behavior -- so much so that none of us could recap the plot of the play afterward.

BLECCH!

I haven't blogged in a while, perhaps a relief to many, but a blog without posts (although Twila's have been excellent, IMO) isn't much of a blog, so I'll blog why I haven't been blogging. And the reason is BLECCH!

It started on Sunday night. My father went into critical condition after having had an operation to remove a bowel obstruction. Now they're saying he has only a couple of days to live. I cried, now I'm okay.

On Monday night my iMac completely froze up for the 4th time since April.

Tuesday I broke glass on the telescope. SIX layers.

Later on Tuesday I did fierce battle with Apple, an arrogant company if there ever was one, demanding a new computer. Eventually they made me take the lemon Apple to a repair center to have them verify it isn't a software problem, even though the symptoms are the same as the first three times it went south, and although the computer wouldn't even boot. As of today, Thursday, I have not heard back from the repair center.

This morning I got to work at 05:30 and there was no hardware on the tool - the first thing I do every morning is remove the hardware, then prepare it for the day guys. So I did what I could and then left. At 07:00 my boss, the same one I feuded with, sent an email asking me why I went home, and I told him it was because I didn't have anything to do. So he wrote back and said he'd left me a note in the lab, telling me what to do. Now I'm wondering why he didn't leave the note SOMEWHERE I COULD FIND IT, which seems like it should have been obvious. I should have left him a note telling him where to GO and what he could do when he gets there.

To top things off, I decided I had to work on my finances ASAP, since finances are basically money, which everyone needs, especially since Republicans blocked the single-payer health care option, but I'm not going there at the moment. I do my finances using Quicken, which runs under Windows XP on my iMac, which is at the repair center. But I figured out what to do. I bought and installed Quicken for Mac, then attempted to restore my Quicken data file from Mozy.com. (Smart move having offline backup, neh?) So I went to Mozy and requested the file and they told me they'd send an email when it is ready to download, and that was NINETY minutes ago, and still no email.

So BLECCH!

Matchbox Redux

Tash and (part of) her clan arrived safely yesterday and will help us explore NYC and environs for a couple of days. During this time I will be revisiting my childhood, specifically the period during which we lived in a home with one bathroom. At that time the family numbered six. And we are now six here in Tarrytown.

When I was a kid, I recall only snippets of bathroom issues. I remember my father pounding on the bathroom door when either my sister Trina or I was spending an inordinate amount of time behind said door, which we locked, of course. Trina definitely deserved to be called on the carpet because she spent a lot of time primping. I'm not sure what I was doing. I might have been looking in the mirror, but I definitely was not primping.

As for the current group, I would say Tash and/or her husband Rick are the most likely candidates to be primping behind a locked door, but we will soon be pounding on it. And that's a promise.

Croton-on-Hudson

Is that a pretentious name or what?

Nonetheless, Croton boasts some unique attractions that inspired me to make the trip north. First, it is the north end of the aqueduct trail I keep telling you about. I have yet to stay on the trail for an entire run, but now I know what awaits me at one end.
The road across the top of the dam has been closed to vehicular traffic since 9/11, but pedestrians and bikes are free test their various phobias.

Croton is also one of three towns in the U.S. that still has an operating dummy light. (I don't know how this statistic has been verified, so if you know of a fourth, good for you!) Here it is:

Cute, but dangerous, they say. But towns in Westchester County would always choose cuteness over safety.

And last but not least, I saw a write-up of the Blue Pig in the NYT and I just had to check it out. It is a to-die-for ice cream factory. See the photo below.

Unprepossessing for an ice cream *factory* wouldn't you say? And there's something wrong with a person who would use the word "pig" in the name of his ice cream store.

NY Critters

I confess, I don't like sharing my house with critters. The level of my intolerance varies considerably with my mood, but I am never what you would call welcoming. In Dublin, we lived in the migration path of a couple of million lady bugs. As interesting as that might be, I did not look forward to sharing my bedroom, bathroom, kitchen and morning cereal with hundreds of these guys every February.

Now we find ourselves in New York. I don't know about you, but when I think of New York, it's sometimes difficult *not* to think about critters, especially when my foot is sharing a puddle with a dead rat. Furthermore, it doesn't seem incongruous to use the words rat, cockroach and New York City all in the same sentence.

Come to find out, I am not alone in this perception. When asked which U.S. city has the worst bedbug problem, an overwhelming majority of polled people named NYC. But in fact, NYC ranks only 28th.

NONETHELESS, the local papers have been *full* of bedbug stories lately. And I admit it's making me uncomfortable. One recent and noteworthy outbreak was in the (ritzy) Upper East Side's very own Victoria's Secret. You can bet your bottom dollar I'm done shopping there. For good!

Rain.

When I posted the photo of my amazing air-conditioner vertical exhaust, a friend asked, "What happens if it rains?" Good question. This being New York, rain sometimes comes down. Here is a photo of an uncovered skylight with clouds in the background:


When the rain comes down, it hits the skylight and rolls off onto the roof and then down to the ground, etc. However, this being New York, sometimes the rain doesn't come down, it goes sideways. One night Twila and I were sitting in the living room and the rain started going sideways. Suddenly she jumped up and shouted, "It's raining in here!" Well, my gosh, it was. I investigated and rain was entering the AC exhaust skylight and running along the ceiling to a place where it becomes vertical, which happens to be right over Twila's chair. I realized I had to fix that.

Here is the modification I applied to the skylight cover. I cut a flap in it, so I can insert a tool and turn the thing that opens and closes the skylight. Problem solved!


That is, almost. This being New York, rain can start suddenly and with very little warning, even on days that are supposed to be sunny. If we're out and I've forgotten to close the skylight, rain could come in. At least Twila won't be in her chair.

Farmers & Beefcakes

When we lived in CA, I had to get up early to go to the farmer's market. Otherwise my favorite farmer-baker would be plumb out of those excellent gooey sticky buns. And by 9:30, the entire block or two or three that the market spanned would be so crowded that I'd have to literally *push* my way from one end (bread) to the other (strawberries).

So this last weekend, I started early toward the Tarrytown Farmer's Market. I arrived at the appointed place about an hour after it was to have opened. Before my eyes stood six (that would be 6) booths containing an alarmingly small selection of goods. Good-looking goods, for sure, as the lines for onions and arugula would attest. But really, six booths?

Mind you, that would be approximately double the number of booths at the Loveland Farmer's Market. And I don't think I would ever use the words "good looking" to describe the anemic collection of wilted plants for sale in Loveland. But I expected more from NY.

Maybe Tarrytown hosts so small an event because each of the little communities here in lower Westchester County has its own farmer's market. And the towns are so close together, perhaps the farmers expect that we will hop from one market to the next, much as people hop from one garage sale to the next on any given weekend morning.

What I did find in abundance on the street in front of the TT Farmer's Market, were fire trucks. More fire trucks than booths, in fact. For a moment I thought the trucks were evidence of a catastrophe that had befallen the town and kept all the other booths from setting up. But on closer inspection, I saw many a beefcake firefighter sunbathing on and around his truck and/or interacting with the milling crowd. New York sure does love its firefighters.

My Job, Part 1: The Project.

NASA is planning to launch the NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array) satellite in February 2012. Its primary mission will last two years and includes:

1. take a census of collapsed stars and black holes of different sizes by surveying regions surrounding the center of own Milky Way Galaxy and performing deep observations of the extragalactic sky; 2. map recently-synthesized material in young supernova remnants to understand how stars explode and how elements are created; and 3. understand what powers relativistic jets of particles from the most extreme active galaxies hosting supermassive black holes. NuSTAR will be the first focusing high energy X-ray satellite in orbit, providing more than two orders of magnitude improvement in sensitivity as compared to previous high energy missions.

"Well," one might wonder, "WTF is a high energy X-ray satellite?" I'm glad you asked. However, I'm not going to tell you the details. A great description is on this webpage. Basically, NuSTAR will be a telescope that looks at X-rays rather than light. Here is a drawing of what the satellite will look like:

If you look at the end of that optics thingy on the right, you can see that there are two circles. The optics housing is two cylinders, each of which contains an optic. My job is to help build those optics.

Here is a NASA photo taken May 16 that shows the first optic with 82 of the eventual 133 layers:



Of course, I can do better, and I will in Part 2. The optic is now at 130 layers, and everyone is more nervous than a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.

The Marathon is On My Mind

Here it is...the first tangible reminder that the NY Marathon is coming up fast. Anyone interested in running? The lottery is long over, but I understand if you run for certain charities, you can still get it. I don't know about running unregistered, though. NY plants "bandit catchers" in Central Park to scoop up unregistered runners and eject them. I've heard they catch about 400 every year. And let me advise you that training in NY is probably not wise, given the number of cracked and uneven sidewalks (if you run on the streets), or old rotten roots and protruding rocks (if you run on trails). I'm so banged up I could probably enter the wheelchair division.