Category Archives: Over the Transom

Lawn Biodiversity

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Today’s l’esprit de l’escalier. A fellow from Real Green Green Lawns or True True Green Grass or whatever the franchised lawn-care service calls itself came by recently and I opened the door. I should know better than to answer the door. Could be a land shark for all I know.

Actually, the dog was making a fuss, so I didn’t really talk to him. I could hear him start his pitch, but I waved him off. No thanks, no thanks.

“But you have so many weeds!” he said. That I heard. Dandelions in particular had returned after the last mowing, though not quite as thickly as before: their season is just about over. One more no thanks and I closed the door.

Instantly I realized what I should have said: “I call it biodiversity, buster.”

Duck in Residence

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Last week I noticed a duck nesting in our back yard, near the wall of the garage in a thicket of tall grass that doesn’t seem to be coming back as robustly this year as usual. I was moving a plastic sandbox toward the garage door, with a mind toward taking it out and leaving it for the garbage collector, or someone like the fellow who recently took our plastic kid pool before the garbageman could get to it. I looked down and there was the duck, fairly well camouflaged.

A few weeks ago, a duck and a drake spent time in the back yard sometimes, especially when the heavy rains left large puddles. Could be this is the same duck.

Nesting duck, SchaumburgI left the frog-shaped sandbox near the nest — the green curve in the picture, though it looks closer to the nest than it actually is — and then put a couple of other sizable objects nearby to make a perimeter around the nest. My thinking was to discourage the dog from approaching the mother duck or her eggs.

That might not have been necessary, though. I’ve been watching the dog as she’s been in the vicinity of the duck, and she seems leery, very unlike her reaction to, say, a squirrel or a mouse. Maybe, in whatever way they have, snarling dog and hissing duck have reached a truce. That would be good. I figure an enraged duck, who can carry out air strikes and other attacks, might be able to do the dog some harm.

Occasionally during the warm afternoons, the duck isn’t on the nest, and I see she’s warming several eggs. I’m not sure why, but it’s been a good year for fecund birds in my back yard.

Leninade

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At $1.99 for a 12 oz. bottle, Leninade brand soda is overpriced. It also has 150 calories and 38 grams of sugar, which is like eating nine and a half four-gram sugar cubes. And I can’t quite place the taste, beyond it being sweet and mildly fruity (the color is orange, but it’s not an orange soda or lemonade). The vague “natural and artificial flavor” gives it whatever taste it has. I drank it, but not all at once. I did it roughly in thirds over three days, and the girls sampled some too.

Yet I couldn’t resist the bottle when I saw it in a hardware store recently, though that was before I knew all that detail.
Leninade Soda BottleIn case that’s hard to read, under the star on the bottle’s neck it says, Join the Party! Over the hammer and sickle, Get hammered & sickled. And under the name, A taste worth standing in line for!

Not really. But amusing.

The back is a little harder to see when the bottle’s empty. That’s a Lenin-like figure quaffing a bottle of Leninade, presumably.
LeninadeMore verbiage on the busy back, not counting the Cyrillic:

A PARTY IN EVERY BOTTLE!

Surprisingly Satisfying Simple Soviet Style Soda

Beware the repressed Communist party animal who is really a proletarian in denial masquerading as a bourgeois Cold War monger!

Our 5-year plan: drink a bottle a day for five years and become a Hero of Socialist Flavor.

Misha, chill down this bottle & chill out!

Drink comrade! Drink! It’s this or the gulag!

I can’t say I didn’t get a few chuckles from the over-the-top copy. You can go all sour on the idea, noting that Lenin founded a totalitarian nightmare, and asking why there’s no cola having sport with a certain other totalitarian nightmare founded by an Austrian corporal, but that doesn’t take away from the amusement value of Leninade. Maybe it shouldn’t be that way, but historical reputations, like life, are unfair.

Also worth noting: I don’t believe this cola is furthering the cause of socialism one iota. The manufacturer, Real Soda in Real Bottles Ltd., is clearly a capitalist success story of the most American kind.

Bargain Books

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Bargain Books arrived in my mailbox the other day. It’s a paper catalog produced by the Edward R. Hamilton Bookseller Co. of Falls Village, Conn. How much longer will there be paper catalogs?

A while yet, probably, but I’ll still show this bit of ephemera to one or the other of my children and say, remember these, they’re on their way out. A few of them, such as the Sears Catalog, were once as big as phone books, even in the 1970s. You know, phone books. One or the other of my children will not be impressed. Youth looks forward.

The catalog is essentially a remainder table. Guess some mailing list algorithm somewhere detected that I’m fond of remainder tables — which is true, I always take a look — and so I took a look into Bargain Books. It promises books in the following categories: Arts & Entertainment, History, Home & Garden, Cookbooks, Military History, Biography, Healthy Living, Fiction, Crafts/Needlecrafts, Science & Nature, and Children’s Books, plus Bargain DVDs.

It seems like a fine selection, but some of those categories are a bit stretched, let’s say. In History, for instance, I found Secret Journey to Planet Serpo: A True Story of Interplanetary Travel. By Len Kasten. “On July 16, 1965, a massive alien spacecraft from the Zeta Reticuli star system, piloted by alien visitors known as Ebens, welcomed 12 astronaut trained military personnel aboard their craft. This volume exposes the truth of the human-alien interaction, revealing that our government continues to have an ongoing relationship with the Ebens to this day.”

Hatchlings on the Hoop

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Warm and cold weekends have been alternating, and this weekend was one of the cold ones. A radio report I heard on Friday spoke of frost coming to places like the Dakotas, an unusual May event even for those chilly climes. No frost here but it was still unpleasant much of the time, though by today I could sit on my deck for lunch in temps just high enough to be pleasant.

The nearby hatchings were having lunch, too. This year a pair of robins has taken up bird-making duty in a nest they built on top of the basketball hoop hanging from our garage. It’s an old and weatherbeaten basketball hoop, unused for a few years now. No bird has ever ventured to build a nest there before that I know of.

I noticed the nest a few weeks ago, but today I noticed the baby birds. From my vantage on the deck, I could see the hatchlings pop their heads up as the adult bird approached, worm in beak — it looked exactly like it does in photos and illustrations, with the outline of the tiny beaks visible, pointing upward to get their meal, and the adult bird lowering the worm toward them. With all the rain we’ve gotten lately, there must be good worm hunting nearby.

Funny that Audubon came up yesterday, even indirectly. I’m no Audubon, but I don’t mind watching birds now and then, as long as I don’t have to go out of my way to do so.

Thursday Folderol

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Rain, cloudy days, rain, cloudy days, rain: that’s been the pattern this week. Mostly quiet rain, but with a few thunderstorms thrown in for good measure.

I mentioned earlier this week that Aunt Sue liked her cats. Later I remembered that I scanned a slide of my Uncle Ken made by my father in the late ’50s, with the cat Ken and Sue had at the time. I don’t remember that cat, but I heard about him.

KenAdolphlate50sThey named him Adolf, for reasons that should be all too obvious. As for Ken, he seems to have been in his Dali period.

Not long ago I received an email from the principal of Schleswig-Holstein High, who takes a schoolmarmish view of the what we used to call “senioritis” (inflammation of the senior, I guess) and the upcoming graduation ceremonies that Lilly will be a part of.

“The last days of school should be no different in decorum than any other regular day of school,” the principal said. “Parking lot celebrations and other disruptions on the last days of school or on graduation rehearsal day cannot be tolerated. Students participating in these activities will be subject to penalties of suspension… and loss of senior brunch and commencement privileges.

“Parents, please support this position! I do not want to have to deny these privileges to your child. Please note that during the ceremony use of air horns or other devices will not be tolerated and participants will be escorted from the building. I hope that all celebrations outside of school are fun and safe.”

I’ll go along with him about air horns. I don’t want one going off in my ear. Here are my other thoughts about graduation decorum, schooled as I was by the Class of ’78.

A circular in the mail recently reminded me that Harold’s Chicken has come to my part of the world. This is good news.

Harold'sWhen I worked nearby, I used to visit the downtown Harold’s locations, and back in the ’80s, my friend Rich first took me to a Harold’s in Hyde Park, Chicago. (Harold’s been chasing that chicken a long time.) Even Rich, whose culinary standards are pretty high, enjoyed Harold’s fast-food chicken. My standards are lower, and I was an instant convert. One bite indeed. We’ll be going to #41 soon.

Bilingual JWs at the Door

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Awake! (Japanese)A couple of Jehovah’s Witnesses showed up at the door not long ago, one an English speaker, one Japanese. Whatever else you can say about them, they do their research. They left a copies of Awake! in both English and Japanese. The cover of the Japanese edition, published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, is posted here.

The headline says: Is the Bible Just a Good Book?

The JW were in the news — the real estate news — recently for selling JW HQ in Brooklyn for very big bucks, about $700 million. That kind of mammon will not only buy a fine new HQ in upstate New York, where real estate is cheaper, but probably a lot more granular data mining on behalf of propagating the doctrine. Seems like something of a hard sell to me. Blood transfusions don’t come up all that often for most people (fortunately), but no Christmas? Wonder when they get around to telling potential converts about that.

I showed the magazine to Yuriko. She shrugged.

The Noah Bell on My Nightstand

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Ted Striker: Mayday! Mayday!

Steve McCroskey: What the hell is that?

Johnny: Why, that’s the Russian New Year. We can have a parade and serve hot hors d’oeuvres…

April ended with heavy rains and chilly air. May Day passed under gray skies, with equally chilly air. Yet the grass is long, buds are everywhere, and birds are noisy in their pursuit of making baby birds.

Sometime in the spring of 1986 (probably), I bought a noah bell at a Wicca gift shop in Austin. Strictly speaking, I don’t think Wicca had anything to do with the store, which was stocked with crystals and incense and other esoteric-flavored knickknacks, but that’s how I referred to it later. Maybe that’s gross insensitivity to Wicca, but even my enlightened Austin friends got a chuckle out of the description. Things were different in the ’80s, I guess.

In our time, naturally, one doesn’t even have to go out to find Wicca supplies.

Thirty years later, this is my noah bell.

noah bellThis is what it sounds like, struck with a stainless steel spoon: Noah bell rung three times.

Interestingly enough, it sounds about the same when struck with a plastic pen. Note that there’s no clapper. There used to be one, which was made of wood, but it disappeared sometime over the last three decades. It wasn’t made of copper, so I know it wasn’t stolen.

My bell is about 4¾ inches (12.5 cm) tall, not counting the ring on top, and 3 to 3½ inches (up to 9 cm) in diameter, since it’s more oval than circular. A smaller noah bell with a clapper sounds like this.

I still have the large tag that came with my noah bell, because of course I do.

Noah Bell FrontSo it’s not just a noah bell, but a Maharani brand noah bell. A maharani is the wife of a maharajah, so I suppose that’s like naming your brand Queen or Empress.

Noah Bell BackOLD INDIAN BELIEF needs to be all caps? That’s told of other bells as well, and I have to wonder what kind of lily-livered devil or evil spirit would be scared off by the sound of a bell. Don’t they cover that in evil spirit training? Then again, I ring it around here sometimes, and we’re not bothered by evil spirits that I know of.

The company that imports these bells from India is called Maharani Imports. According to its web site, “Maharani Imports specializes in whimsically themed wind chimes and mobiles made with recycled iron, handmade fused glass beads, and Noah Bells all assembled together in Mumbai. We also have many costume and semi-precious necklaces, earrings, and bracelets…

“We are based outside of Dallas in a small rural town called Bartonville. The company has been in that location since 1980 and we are located on a 30 acre ranch property with many rescued animals. Namely we have about 6 donkeys and 9 llamas, which we welcome you to come visit by appointment if you are nearby!”

Bartonville’s just south of Denton, and I’m not so sure that it’s particularly rural any more. But I can see how the good folks at Maharani Imports might have discovered Austin early as a solid market for their products. My own noah bell now spends most of its time on the nightstand near my bed, along with a lamp, a stack of books, a small statue of Lincoln, and some other bibelots.

Ravinia Circular ’16

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The annual circular advertising this summer’s shows at Ravinia Festival arrived in the mail recently. Wonder how long printed circulars of this kind will be mailed at all, but for now they are.

It’s been a while since I’ve been to the venue, but I’ve enjoyed all of my visits, such as the long-ago August night in 1989 when a lunar eclipse was visible high over the concert. Or our attendance of a children’s concert in July 2002.

Ravinia 2002Ravinia, in Highland Park, Ill., on the North Shore, is the Midwest’s Wolf Trap. Or rather, since Ravinia’s a lot older than Wolf Trap, with outdoor music performances held there for more than 100 years — Wolf Trap is the Ravinia of the East Coast, open only since 1970.

In any case, Ravinia gets some A-list acts, and charges accordingly. Prices are for seats in the pavilion or for lawn seating, and they’re printed on the circular. Some of the concerts, especially lawn seating for some classical musicians, charge a reasonable $10, and I’d seriously consider paying $25 to hear the CSO play the entirety of The Planets while I relax on the lawn. (And ponder whether that should be “The Planets” or The Planets.)

On the other hand, I was curious to see who commands the highest pavilion seating ticket prices. Is it Bob Dylan? No. Paul Simon? No. Don Henley? Dolly Parton? Diana Ross? Nope. Those are all close, but Duran Duran tops the list at $160 a pavilion seat, and a steep $55 for a lawn ticket. Moreover, they’re playing two nights in a row, which is fairly rare at Ravinia.

Am I missing something? I remember Duran Duran as a tolerable early ’80s band that had a handful of hits. Must be their fan base is larger than I realize. Even so, here’s something I’m sure I’m missing: Duran Duran at Ravinia for $160 a pop.

The Impermanence of the Wisconsin Buddha

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The Wisconsin Buddha cracked apart sometime this winter. (How many times in the history of English has that exact sentence been written?) A little background is in order. Some years ago — when we lived in the western suburbs of Chicago in the early 2000s — we visited southern Wisconsin one weekend, and chanced across a yard sale, though I forget exactly where. We acquired the Wisconsin Buddha there for a modest sum.

It’s an inexpensive ceramic yard ornament, jade green with flecks of blue. It’s also an Indian-style seated Buddha, in as much as I understand Buddhist iconography. Could be a bodhisattva for all I know. Very likely the operators of the Chinese factory that churned out thousands of them cared little about their representational meaning, though at some point, someone had to design the thing, and perhaps they had something specific in mind. Maybe it’s patterned after a sculpture I don’t know.

That reminds me of the estimable Charles Hambrick, the professor who taught my Eastern Religion class. Professor emeritus these days, but last I heard still with us. The concept of the bodhisattva came up in his class. A friend of mine was sitting next to me, and he said, “That’s what the song is talking about!” Yes, indeed.

Since we acquired it, the Wisconsin Buddha’s been for us, fittingly, a yard ornament. Does that count as doing its dharma? But it’s inanimate so — I don’t know, and will leave it at that. First the statue was in our back yard in the western suburbs, but for the last 13 years or so, it’s been perched here in the northwestern suburbs under some bushes near a fence that divides the back yard from a small bit of land that connects to the front yard. If you didn’t know it was there, it would be hard to spot.

On Sunday I was cleaning debris off our deck and noticed that the figure was face down on the ground. Looking more closely, I saw that it had cracked all the way across horizontally, a few inches from its base, and the top part had fallen over. A cycle of freezing and thawing? Wind? The dog, who sometimes goes near that fence? Something else?

I put the pieces back together again, and I may or may not glue them together. I’ll take this as a lesson in impermanence.