Kelli pre surgery / Kelli Today
Damn she's beautiful.

This land is your land, this land is my land

Continuing with the Guthrie family theme, here’s a couple of stories related to public property.

~~

December 12, 2004 (coincidentally Chris Achilles’ birthday): A citizen (who happened to be an off-duty employee from another municipal agency) called reporting a man had cut down a tree from a municipal park, loaded it up into his vehicle, and then drove off. The caller noted the plate number and description of the suspect vehicle and the description of the suspect driver. *

An officer (whom I like and admire for several reasons) arrived at the suspect residence later to discover the tree already up, decorated, and sitting in front of the front window.


The officer, feeling embarrassed for the kids at the house, asked the man about the tree. He said the tree had “already been knocked down” and he had “just cut it loose.” The officer gave him a stern lecture (well, not really all that stern, she felt bad for the kids) and told the man she had to write up the report. As far as I know he was never prosecuted.

It’s one thing to go out to the boonies to cut down a tree for Christmas but it’s quite another to go into a local park, in full view of other citizens, and stealing yourself a tree. Sheesh. "Public" does not mean "free for the taking."

~~~

On a similar note, Anchorage has a Community Garden program. There are two gardens in town but it’s the same set-up for both: For the fee of $30 for the growing season (pretty darn short in Alaska) one gets a 20 by 10 foot plot of land and water. The idea is that you can grow vegetables and fruit on your plot to eat and thereby a) lower your food cost and b) provide you all the joys of gardening. The plots are particularly attractive to the Hmong immigrants in the densely populated, land-poor Mountain View neighborhood. The Salvation Army picks up most of the cost of the plots for some families and the plot-renters visit their little piece of garden every day or two.

Pretty cool really.

Unfortunately once in a while we get calls from irate gardeners reporting cabbage theft and the like. I vividly remember one guy nearly raving mad because this woman was going from plot to plot and picking herself enough of everything for a salad. When confronted, the woman said “the sign says ‘Community Garden’ and I’m a member of the community” and kept on picking.

Aaaaaaaaaarggggggggggggggggggggh!

The trick is that once the vegetables are picked, what are we going to do? The damage has been done. I suppose you could put everything back in the ground and hope it continues to grow but if I had been tending a crop of asparagus and some chick came along and pulled them up, I would be nearly raving mad myself. Plus there might not be time to plant another crop.

Imagine all of your hard work ending up under Italian dressing at some anonymous ig'nant's dinner table.

Grrrrr.

So maybe this holiday season the lesson is to leave as few tracks in the snow as you can, so that others can enjoy the public lands as they were meant to be enjoyed: by everyone and as fresh today as they were yesterday.

~~
* Here's a trick for all of you trained observers out there: If you get a license plate of any suspect vehicle it's great but you need two more things. First you need a description of the vehicle bearing that plate. A lot of folks tend to transpose numbers or cannot remember them for a very long time (we're talking seconds here). If you come close on the plate but note the type, color, and any unique characteristics of the vehicle then you are a good witness. Second you need to get a look at the driver. The registered owner of a vehicle can easily claim to not have been the driver during the criminal rampage you witnessed. The better look you get, the better chance you'll have to place them behind the wheel when asked to point them out of a photo line-up.

~~
Photos:
Woody Guthrie
Christmas Tree Close-Up
Hmong Woman in her Mountain View Garden by Marc Lester, Anchorage Daily News

You Can Get Anything You Want

Yesterday I heard a Fresh Air interview with Arlo Guthrie celebrating the 40^th anniversary of the Alice’s Restaurant.

First let me say that Fresh Air’s Terry Gross is fantastic. She has a low-key style (which SNL mocked) but she doesn’t ask those softball Larry King questions. She conducts a smooth interview (unless you are Bill O’Reilly or Gene Simmons) but isn’t afraid to ask the difficult questions and get interesting answers. I hated her style at first but now I much prefer it to all the shouting on some other “infotainment” shows. Let’s hear it for TG! Give it up, Philly!!!!

Ahh.. Arlo Guthrie. The world changed but he never did.

Which is good because the world has changed right back to where we need him: we are involved in an unpopular war, the country is divided between conservatives and liberals, and we all need a little reminder that we are all just folks trying to get along in the world.

The first time I heard Alice’s Restaurant was in the back seat of Chris Achilles’s dad’s car on the way to an arcade or a movie or some such adventure. He introduced us kids (maybe 9 or 10 years old) to both Alice (and her restaurant) and to the Motorcycle Song.

One of my best friends at work comes from Oregon and she grew up pronouncing the two-wheeled motorized menace as “motorsickle.” The first time she said that on the radio as a dispatcher she received nothing but mocking feedback. She still says “motorsickle” when she’s not on the radio but it’s with bitterness in her voice. And you don’t pronounce the non-motorized vehicle as a bye-sigh-kle. Think about it.

Which is what Alice’s Restaurant did for me: made me think. First, it was a great song for the 10 year old kid who soaks up complicated lyrics like a sponge. Chris and I and probably Sherry Dion’s brother Chris could all recite most of Alice’s Restaurant. Probably still can.

We used to make up different lyrics to all kinds of songs back then. This was back when Chris Dion’s “Pong” was the state of the art gaming technology. Being deprived (nostalgically so in my memories now – see “poetic license”) meant that a tape recorder and a tape of one of Chris Achilles’ novelty records (“Flying Purple People Eater” et al) could lead us to singing along and changing lyrics to all the popular songs of the day and generally being creative without the requirement of being “artistic.” Chris had natural musical ability which he later focused on the drums but I certainly had no musical inclination (see “guitars”) yet I remember a lot of making crap up and juvenile improvisation.

Doctor Demento tunes could transition into Beatles tunes could transition into Officer Obie’s twenty seven eight-by-ten color glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and the paragraph on the back of each one telling what each one was, as sung by Arlo. Remember Arlo? This is a post about Arlo.

Alice’s Restaurant has great timing. It has lush imagery. It has humor that appeals to the young and the old, those knowledgeable in the ways of the time it was written and those who never lived through that time.

It’s so absurd that it has to be mostly true.

And the way he tells the story is so lovely, with the tangents twisting off and then coming back to reconnect. It’s an American classic and Arlo is an American treasure. Sure, his dad was an icon and that’s hard for a son to live up to, but I think Arlo’s done a fine job.

He bought the church. The one where Alice used to live and where they had Thanksgiving dinner back in 1965, after they took out the garbage.

It’s now an interfaith church, welcoming everyone who can bring their own God or just bring themselves.

Drop by his website: www.arlo.net or just drop by the church.

You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.

Poetic License

Both my mom and J-bro read my Elvis Log story and thought it was strange that I referred to the flaming log recipient as “the Southern Woman.” Better memories than mine remembered that it was actually a Swedish woman. Mom generously suggested it was my “poetic license” and thought it was intentional. I told both of them that it was really just faulty memory. Blonde + Elvis Lover = Southern Woman. Or not.

Another relative, when hearing my mom suggest it was clever “poetic license,” commented along the lines of “Eric uses a lot of poetic license in telling family stories.”

Movie producer and raconteur Robert Evans

reminds us “There are three sides to every story: yours, mine, and the truth.”

That’s what it’s all about, folks. What I remember is what I remember. Feel free to comment on inaccuracies, grammatical errors, my hairstyle and complexion, and pretty much anything else you want to (except criticizing my wife, which is one thing I’m going to bounce off of here).

This blog is just this blog. It’s not THE TRUTH.

When I find the Truth, I shall spread it to the masses like butter on hot toast. Until then, you get this. Do with it what you will.

Happy Holidays!

Walking on Scorpions: Grannies gone wild.......

Bill German, without having read my Red Hat Sex Club conspiracy theory, took this picture (click on the title to go to his blog entry).

Truth, they say, is stranger than fiction.

Pavlov’s Syringe

Y’know how some cats and dogs get trained inadvertently to come running to the sound of the electric can opener, thinking it’s dinner time?

Bailey comes a’runnin’ to the sound of my wedding ring clink against the side of the insulin bottle when I roll it to mix the contents before drawing a syringe.

She gets her shots with meals, so it’s a normal enough response, but it’s a little strange. It’s such a distinct sound – metal against glass. Industrial. Techno.

“Mister EA, Mister EA, Mister EA, please draw it up, draw it up, draw it up. Could you draw it up a little more, draw it up like that, please draw it up, draw it up, draw it up draw it up. Say Hallelujah peoples, say Hallelujah, oh yes, oh yes, and it was in my belly bitter but in my mouth it was sweet!"

Or someink.

~~
apologies to BT and M. Doughty. Go find "Never Gonna Come Back Down;" you'll be glad you did

Stream of Holiday Consciousness

As I have gotten older the memories of the holidays of my youth have begun to blend together.

I remember at least two holidays in the winter when a flaming log rolled out of our fireplace onto the floor. Here is the top of the fireplace and the family in question. I'm the eldest child, J-bro is number two, and rounding out the top three is Drew.

Of these two flaming logs, the one which caused the greatest scar on the floor and the most vivid memory occurred during Elvis Presley’s “Live from Hawaii” concert. The Elvis log landed on the long black wool skirt of the only guest in attendance who was actually watching the concert, someone I will call “The Southern Woman.” None of my immediate family have ever been Elvis fans so I recall (perhaps only in wishful-thinking nostalgia) that it had served her right: I would have much rather watched The Love Boat or The Wonderful World Of Disney or whatever was on one of the three other channels in Anchorage at the time than the sweaty white jump-suited “King .”

On a prior occasion my dad was close by the fallen log and had reacted by simply reaching down and grabbing the log in his bare hands and throwing it back into the fireplace with no damage done. At the time I thought this was heroic. Now I realize that it was probably mostly instinctive and painful. Although that meets a certain definition of heroism I suppose.

The “Elvis Log” rolled out of the fireplace and onto the Southern Woman’s skirt while my dad was in the kitchen, far away from The King’s concert. He raced to the scene of the fire, picked up the log barehanded, and threw it back into the fireplace but by the time he arrived the carpet had begun to smolder. I’m not sure whether he happened to have a Stanley shop knife with him or whether he used some other piece of cutlery to cut a hole in the carpet to expose the underflooring, but soon it was cut and water was poured on the scorched wood.

And ugly green throw-rug sat on top of the ugly multi-colored green and gold 70’s carpet until it was replaced decades later.

During that time if one had folded back the rug and parted the labia of the split carpet, they would discover a dark burn mark that looked a little like this.

I’d like to think The King would have been appreciated it.

~~
Photos:
http://www.aperfectworld.org/
http://www.younameit.com
~~

Thanksgiving story coming. J-Bro, don't give away the commemorative punch line!

Happy Anniversary To Us

Kelli and I have been married two years today.

She’s been sicker than a dog the past few days (which in our house is saying something) but looks to be rebounding slowly. Darn winter cold/flu season anyway.

~~

On another note, I think I was a bit too proud of the Red Hat Society piece. I left it up on top for a week because, honestly, I thought it was near genius. After a week, it seems barely clever. And nary a mention from either Susie Bright or Simon and Schuster. I didn’t expect Ariel Levy’s editor to get back to me but Susie’s answered an email before. Oh well, I still think she’s the bees-knees. She’s just a busy little sexpert.

And it’s not supposed to work the way I daydreamed anyway. I shouldn’t be “discovered” and given a huge advance because I’m so stinkin’ funny. I guess I should be working my butt off and polishing and editing and then whoring, whoring, whoring it to anyone who will read it.

For what it’s worth I’ve amassed a good 250 pages of stuff just in the blog. Tying things together (if possible) or expanding on one or two that could be folded together nicely would still yield a good amount of material. We’ll see where it goes.

Imagine me, a guy who thought he could write a little and decided to start a blog which forced me to write more often, in under a year I’ve got all these delusions of adequacy.

Oh well, dream big or why bother dreaming, huh?

More soon.

To everyone reading this: you rock. Of this I am sure.

The Red Hat Society = Women Gone Wild !

From http://www.redhatsociety.com:

While visiting a friend in Tucson several years ago, Sue Ellen (Cooper) impulsively bought a bright red fedora at a thrift shop, for no other reason than that it was cheap and, she thought, quite dashing. A year or two later she read the poem "Warning" by Jenny Joseph, which depicts an older woman in purple clothing with a red hat. Sue Ellen felt an immediate kinship with Ms. Joseph. She decided that her birthday gift to her dear friend, Linda Murphy, would be a vintage red hat and a copy of the poem. She has always enjoyed whimsical decorating ideas, so she thought the hat would look nice hanging on a hook next to the framed poem. Linda got so much enjoyment out of the hat and the poem that Sue Ellen gave the same gift to another friend, then another, then another.

One day it occurred to these friends that they were becoming a sort of "Red Hat Society" and that perhaps they should go out to tea... in full regalia. They decided they would find purple dresses which didn't go with their red hats to complete the poem's image.

The tea was a smashing success.

Soon, each of them thought of another woman or two she wanted to include, and they bought more red hats. Their group swelled to 18, and they began to encourage other interested people to start their own chapters (18 women don't fit well around a tea table). One of their members passed along the idea to a friend of hers in Florida, and their first "sibling" group was born.

Sue Ellen's fondest hope is that these societies will proliferate far and wide. We have now held three successful Red Hat Society conventions — entire hotels filled with women of a certain age wearing red hats and purple outfits! Could world domination be far behind?

World Domination Indeed. Here’s where my conspiracy theory begins.

“Women of a Certain Age” Oh how I love that term. Now that very young girls have embraced what writer Ariel Levy calls “the Raunch Culture” and wear the Playboy bunny logo on belly shirts or “With These Who Needs Brains” tube tops, I find myself rather fond of “women of a certain age.” In an time in our culture when fun-loving Tara Reid simply looks like a burn-out train wreck waiting to happen any day now and when Drew Barrymore is the poster child of “oh I’ve been there, did that, and got the t-shirt when I was age 11 through 14,” koo-koo-ka-choo Mrs. Robinson has less of a scandalous air than when the movie first came out. Mrs. Robinson was simply a woman mature enough to know what she wanted sexually. Good for her!

I grew up in a culture where the media taught boys that when girls or young women had slumber parties it was all semi-nude pillow fights leading to the inevitable bisexual explorations. Mmmmmm. Oh, the lovely delightful soft- and hardcore perpetual fantasies of the feisty co-ed. Who am I to dispel this myth? Why would I even want to? Heck, I’m a guy who while I was single, desperate, and dateless, thought that Maxim and FHM magazine were on the right track. Well, until I saw the (now former) editor in chief of Maxim magazine on an infotainment “debate” on culture and realized that taking “how to pick up hot young loose chicks” advice from a guy who looks like Bill Gate’s geekier younger brother was probably a mistake.

Back to the Red Hat Society Conspiracy Theory.

Friends, this is about sex.

If the younger set is all trip-hopping, Bacardi Breezer swilling, skank-dressing, sex crazed, female chauvinist pigs then “women of a certain age” should get a piece of that action but in a much more refined manner.

Who are they kidding? “Red Hat” is obviously a reference to the head of a penis. Pink, red, or purple hats? It’s all a matter of the firmness of your grip, ladies. Accessorizing with a scarf is a matter of personal choice: wear one if you enjoy the look of an uncircumcised member or don’t if you prefer your penises cut into a crew neck instead of the traditional turtleneck.

The addition of feathers and other outlandish paraphernalia are the equivalent of those colored bracelets junior high school girls purportedly wear signifying what sexual activities they are willing to engage in.

This is an underground movement, gentle reader, and it’s motivated by unbridled lust of our elder stateswomen. Despite the crap that MTV and FHM and Maxim are trying to sell, hot sex does not end at age 29. You don’t have to go back to Mrs. Robinson to see that this notion is creeping to the forefront of our culture. I’ll bet you’ve heard of Stifler’s mom. I bet you are well aware that Stacy’s mom has got it goin’ on. The youngest Desperate Housewife is 30 and the rest of them don’t take her seriously anyway. And unlike Sex in the City, DH is a show men watch too.

The grandmas have got it goin’ on too. The next time you see a “little old lady” wearing a big flowery hat, know it well that she’s looking for hot action. And I’m not talking about ‘grandma’s getting on the bang-bus.’ “Women of a certain age” will demand sheets with a high thread count as well as steamy hot lovin’.

Gentlemen, the Red Hat movement is upon us. You’d better get your shit together if you intend to keep up with this trend. If you are planning on going through a mid-life crisis where you get to divorce your long-suffering wife and date some “hot young chick with more boobs than brains,” well you go ahead. I suspect your ex will simply don a red hat and find a satisfying and varied adventure of her own.

If you are married and your wife is suddenly disappearing to lots of RHS “teas,” that’s your cue to start paying a lot more attention to her at home - and I don’t mean you need to clean the catbox more often. Get your ass out of the recliner and put a little romance back into the game. Treat her like you did when you were dating. Don’t just love her, LOVE her.

Also, losing some weight will make your dick look bigger. Or at least that’s what they say in Maxim.

~~

Photos:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Hat_Society
www.redhatsandmore.com
www.gawker.com
www.maximonline.com
Fiddlest

Oh and just a tiny word to those with no sense of humor: I mean no disrespect to the lovely ladies of the Red Hat Society. This is my attempt at satirical cultural commentary. Send hate mail about my writing, don’t bother defending anyone’s or any group’s honor, k?

Also, kudos to Susie Bright and her audible program In Bed with Susie Bright for bringing Ms. Levy to my attention.

Grow Up!

Okay, so I’m just as nerdy and geeky as anyone who maintains a freakin’ web log.
I freely admit it. But some things just go a little too far.

Witness this:

Perhaps if I felt a little… oh, I don’t know… inadequate in the light saber department… I’d want to wear a pair of Star Wars boxers.

Did I mention that I don’t wear boxers because of that whole “grandfather clock” thing?

Well, never mind about that.

But here’s where it goes too far. On the back of these boxers there is this graphic:

Well, I guess one person’s “dark side” is another person’s “fine bootay.” Or someink.

Maybe it's the cold medicine talking.

Oh... Now I Get It

Someone put brochure cards for a rustic inn in Willow, Alaska in the dispatch breakroom the other day. That’s cool, I’m always interested in brochures, if not necessarily spending any time in Willow. Nothing against Willownians, but there’s nothing in Willow that I can’t find in a hundred other locations in Alaska.

Well, maybe.

I am not a graphic artist, nor have I ever spent the night at a Holiday Inn Express, but I did take a two day seminar in graphic design which changed the way I look at things like brochures.

Here’s my assessment of this lovely piece:

You've got to admit, the name is strange. What the hell is a gigglewood anyway?
But I digress.

Calling Willow "the perfect midway retreat between Anchorage and Denali" is stretching things a little bit. If you are driving from Denali and get all the way to Willow, then not continuing on to Anchorage is just plain lazy. But it works for a selling point to the tourists, I guess.

The pictures are blended well and the whole thing gave me a good feeling about spending the night at the luxurious Gigglewood Lakeside Inn.

Except for the name. What the hell? Gigglewood… I did not get it.

Then my eye hit the bottom of the stairs. Oh my.

Get out! That thing has veins and stuff.

Well, at least it's pointed the right direction.

Easy Come, Easy Go

The State Of Alaska has this great thing called the Permanent Fund. The fund is currently about $30 Billion which is invested in companies outside of the state so that we’ll have a couple of sheckels to rub together once the oil is gone. The earnings of the fund are used partly by state government, partly reinvested back into the fund, and partly distributed as a dividend to the citizens. Getting at the principle requires a vote of the people, not just an act of the state legislature. It’s pretty stinking brilliant really.

There is a personal connection to the fund: My grandfather was a member of the board of trustees of the fund (he may have chaired the board briefly).

Anyway, what you folks from the Outside probably know of the fund is that each year Alaskans (currently defined as someone who has lived in Alaska for at least one year) get that dividend check each October. No one wants to lose that “free money” so I’m fairly certain the Permanent Fund is safe from a big spending spree of the state for some time to come.

The amount varies but this year each Alaskan got a check for $845. That’s $1690 for Kelli and I. Usually this means I pay off some credit card bills and Kelli gets the dogs’ teeth cleaned and checked, etc. This leaves us a couple of bucks to get myself a new MP3 player or whatever, Kelli gets herself some Fiestaware or whatever, and it makes Christmas shopping more fun and less stressful.

Yet each year something comes up. Last year it was $3000 of vet bills for Sugar Baby.

This year we got to take Bailey to the vet on Halloween. She threw up her dinner. For most dogs one would just say “ewww,” clean it up and move on. For Bailey it’s a little different. She’s an insulin dependent diabetic and so we had loaded her up with insulin as she was eating. By throwing up her food that means she was fully loaded with insulin but with no food. Bad juju.

Two days in the animal hospital and $985 later, she’s back and good as new. Sure we will have to keep an eye on her for a couple of days to make sure she doesn’t throw up. Oh and we need to make sure the poop is of proper poop-like consistency: not too runny but not so firm that she’s straining.

It’s a delicate balance.

I’m not complaining. Luckily the state paid for the vet bill (by way of the dividend) and both the babies are happy and back home.

While my friends are enjoying their new iPods and Fiestaware, we are reaping the benefits of two healthy dogs.

Until next year about this time.

Slips of the Tongue

Oh get your head out of the gutter.

Have you ever said something but even as you said it you wanted to reel it back in?

One of my lovely coworkers yesterday received a call about a motor vehicle accident involving a single vehicle striking and killing a moose (not an uncommon occurence).

In a moment which I completely sympathize with, she found herself asking the caller "Is the moose still dead?"

You cannot make up stuff like this. While it probably did not inspire a whole lot of confidence from the caller, it makes me laugh.

The Shocking Death of Pastor Stew

(AP) 11:54 a.m. ET Oct. 31, 2005

WACO, Texas - A pastor performing a baptism was electrocuted inside his church Sunday morning after adjusting a nearby microphone while standing in water, a church employee said.

The Rev. Kyle Lake, 33, was stepping into the baptistery as he reached out for the microphone, which produced an electric shock, said University Baptist Church community pastor Ben Dudley.
Water in a baptistery usually reaches above the waist, said Byron Weathersbee, interim university chaplain at Baylor University.

Lake was pronounced dead at Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center, nursing supervisor Pat Mahl said. The woman being baptized apparently had not stepped into the water and was not seriously injured.

Pastors at University Baptist Church routinely use a microphone during baptisms, said Jamie Dudley, the wife of Ben Dudley and a business administrator at the church.

“He was grabbing the microphone so everyone could hear,” she said. “It’s the only way you can be loud enough.”

About 800 people attended the morning service, which was larger than normal because it was homecoming weekend at nearby Baylor University, Dudley said.

Lake had been at the church for nine years, the last seven as pastor. He had a wife, Jennifer, a 5-year-old daughter and two 3-year-old sons.

At a remembrance attended by about 1,000 people Sunday night at First Baptist Church, Ben Dudley told the UBC congregation that they would move forward as a church.

“I don’t know how, when, why, where or what’s going to happen, but we will continue as a church in the community because that is what Kyle would have wanted,” he said.

Happy Not Quite Halloween

Two separate callers today, on the business line and thankfully not 911, called to ask if it was okay to "trick or treat" tonight, since tomorrow is a Monday.

I suggested that, while the police department has no official policy on the practice of pagan rituals, it was not illegal to don a mask and ring your neighbor's door to ask for candy any ol' day.

I did caution them, however; that one would be less likely to be mistaken for a burglar and shot and/or pepper-sprayed if one did such a thing tomorrow night which is actually Halloween, but that the choice was up to them.

I do hope they choose wisely!

I Love Citizens!

People seem to love these stories. Please stop me if it gets boring.

And I realize that when I get home I'm just a citizen like these folks:

1) October 25, 2005

Woman calls 911 because she was chipping ice in her freezer and punctured the lining. She tells the fire department dispatcher that it "started spraying out some sort of gas"

Fire dispatcher asks: "so is this a freon leak?"

Citizen says "I don't know, it's a Frigidaire."

(call taken by the woman known alternative as Jerbear or TK-Ho depending on if she’s answering her cellphone or competing in a Tae Kwon Do tournament)

2) Today, October 29, 2005

Man calls me because his grandfather is having difficulty breathing. I transfer him to the paramedic dispatcher.

Medic dispatcher asks: "does he have history of heart problems"

Citizen: (talking to Grandpa): "Do you have heart problems?" then answers "Not right now"

Medic dispatcher clarifies: "Does he have a diagnosis of heart problems?"

Citizen: (talking to Grandpa): "Have you had hypnosis heart problems? (speaking more clearly for grandpa to understand) "HYPNOSIS, have you had HYPNOSIS?"

3 ) Before my time, probably apocryphal, but still a good story:

Citizen calls because she believes her husband has died in his sleep.

Medic dispatcher says "Is he breathing?"

Caller: "I can't tell"

Dispatcher: "Get a mirror hold it up to his mouth. Now tell me if you see a reflection"

Later, supervisors discussed with the dispatcher that what she told the caller was actually the test to see if the patient was a vampire, not the test for respiration.

I love my job.

Has anyone seen Domino ?

I want to see this movie. Mostly I want to see it because the trailers lead me to believe it will be a lot of fun: quick-cut, gritty, complex. Something like the remake of “Get Carter” but without Sylvester Stallone’s usual brand of bad acting screwing things up.

But then I read a little about the actual person who was Domino Harvey. She died of a drug overdose on June 27^th this year at age 35.

the real Domino Harvey

She was born three and a half months after I was. Doesn’t seem fair, does it?

Well, not that I should have died first, that’s not what I’m getting at. It’s just that she died young. And she died bitterly.

She was undeniably unhappy. She had sold the rights to her life story but could not get script approval. Some reports say she was very upset that the script “cleaned up” some of her life (her bisexuality) but at the same time promoted itself as having some really raunchy scenes. How would you feel if you sold your story and then they picked and chose which things would be acceptable to a mainstream audience and which would not?

At the end she distanced herself from the film and all members of its production.

Oh yeah, and she was on house arrest awaiting prosecution for methamphetamine trafficking. She was out on one million dollars bail and was looking at a life sentence if convicted. She denied all charges.

While she was on house arrest she had three minders, hired to keep her from using drugs or alcohol. She was, however, taking Zyprexa, Trazodone, Clonazepam, and Mirtazapine at the time of her death so it is clear she was suffering some serious mental health issues. Her minders report she had been feeling lethargic and had been hearing voices that night as she filled the tub to take a bath. They later found her unresponsive as the result of a Fentanyl overdose.

The thing is: I want to see this movie. Yet I’d much rather see a documentary about this complex person who was Domino Harvey. I guess I’ll wait for the DVD.

If you see it in the theater, let me know what you think.

~~~

Zyprexa (generic name: Olanzapine) is usually prescribed for Schizophrenia and/or Bi-Polar Disorder

Trazadone (brand name: Desyrel) was originally prescribed for Depression but is most often prescribed for difficulty sleeping.

Clonazepam (brand name: Klonopin) is usually prescribed for Panic Attacks

Mirtazapine (brand name: Remeron) is usually prescribed for Depression

Fentanyl (brand name: Duragesic Patch or Actiq Lollipop – no kidding, a little heroin sucker) is a strong painkiller. It’s usually used when nothing else works and when the subject has chronic pain. It’s also the “knockout gas” that the Russians used to subdue the terrorists in that theater in Moscow but also killed a hundred and sixty hostages in the process. Word on the street is that some folks will chew their Duragesic patches in order to get the drug into their system faster. While I try not to judge, I think these folks might be considered "junkies."

Games People Play

Lots of sad things happen at my job. Lots and lots and lots. Too many to dwell on. Babies die heart-breaking deaths, children die accidental deaths, teenagers die stupid senseless deaths, adults die horribly sad deaths, the list goes on.

The first year or two, when all these tragedies are new, it has a heart-dampening effect on a dispatcher. After nearly ten years in, I’ve learned to use my feelings to either empathize with the families of the victims or as motivation to do my best to do the most efficient job I can thereby getting help to them as quickly as possible.

Then I leave the bad things at work. Nothing good comes from bringing the darkness home.

Happily, sometimes we get calls which are just so wonderfully absurd that they can brighten nearly any otherwise crappy day. Here are two such calls.

1) Picture it: It’s a lovely Monday 11:30AM on a spectacularly sunny summer Alaskan day. There is barely a cloud in the sky and the cartoon birds are chirping and landing on the outstretched cartoon fingers of cartoon women singing cartoonish songs.

Then the call comes in. A caller describes a scene right out of a movie: a rather large woman handcuffed a very skinny man, quickly shoved him in the trunk of her Saab, and drove off with him locked in the trunk. The calltaker quickly enters the call and the dispatcher immediately sends the area cars racing to intercept this abductor and rescue the victim. The first several officers arrived and performed a perfect felony traffic stop. They surrounded the car, weapons drawn, and ordered the woman out slowly. They had the woman back up to them and lay on the ground where they handcuffed her and took her to the back seat of a patrol car. Then they let the man out of the trunk.

Upon further investigation it was determined that this was not a felony crime but rather a… um… er… well… a nooner. What the witness reported turned out to be a fun little bondage game played between a consenting couple.

Lesson: Love the kink but keep it indoors or at least not in a public place. Also the man could have received a citation for not wearing a seatbelt.

~~

2 ) Skip merrily to today:

911 hang-up from a residence. The calltaker loads the call and then recalls the residence, getting an answering machine. She leaves a message that the police will be dropping by for a visit. She then recalls several minutes later to have a lovely conversation with an embarrassed gentleman.

Here’s my rendition of the call (this is not an actual transcript):

911: “We received a 911 call from your residence, what’s going on today?”

Male Resident: “Um, nothing.”

911: “Okaaaaay. Who called 911 then, did you misdial?”

Male: “Well… um… I did.”

911: “Is there someone else there with you?”

Male: “No, I’m alone now.”

911: “Okaaaay, so why did you call?”

Male: “I was sitting in my recliner and my wife jumped on me, knocking it backwards with her on top of me. Um… I told her if she didn’t get off of me that I would call 911. She didn’t so I called but she got off so I hung up.”

911: “So you were in a physical fight then?”

Male: “No, no… it was certainly not a fight. It was… um… (sigh) well, it was erotic playing gone awry.”

911: “Oooooooooh, I see. So you don’t need the police, fire department, or paramedics?”

Male: “No, no. I ... um… I just thought I hung up and the call did not go through.”

911: “Aaaaaaaah - Okay. Well if no one there needs the police I’ll go ahead and cancel the call.”

Male: “Yeah, I’m sorry I called.”

911: “Okay, well have a good day sir”

Male: “(chuckling with embarrassment) well I think I might in a little while.”

911: “ooooooooooo-kay, b’bye now”

Note: Yes we did talk to the female half a bit later, so it was determined to be a-okay.

Lesson: Like diamonds, 911 is forever. The second you hit that last “1,” we gotcha till we’re ready to let you go. A little like a bondage game of our own. But not as fun.

Play safe now,

Your buddy Eric.

~~

Pictures from:
http://www.imsplus.com/ims34.html
http://www.hawaii.gov/dot/publicaffairs/ciot/
http://sj.blacksteel.com/

Lovely food, ironic name

They call them bottomless fries but it seems the more I eat, the more bottom I have.

A shame really.

Oops!

Y’ever have a day when everything is going well, then you screw something up and don’t even realize it until later?

It doesn’t have to be a big mistake, although it could be. It could be something that only you will ever know about. If you are like me, it haunts you.

The beautiful thing about my job is that, to be successful, you have to own up to your own mistakes immediately. It’s better to rat out yourself than be “caught” later appearing either oblivious or as if you were trying to sweep something under the rug.

I tell my recruits that the folks who are good dispatchers are the ones who second and third guess themselves and who agonize over their errors, at least for a day or so. I also say that those folks will probably die early of a stress-related illness, but that they will be good dispatchers in the meantime. I’m smiling when I say this, but I’m not entirely kidding.

Two months short of 10 years on the job and I’m still screwing up here and there. Again, usually nothing serious – it could be a typo like putting a description in a call like “SUSP LSW (last seen wearing) BLU BBCAP, GRN SHIT, BLK PANTS.” Oh yeah, he’s really wearing a blue baseball cap, a green shirt, and black pants but GRN SHIT sometimes leaps out of your fingers and into the call.

Sometimes it’s a misstatement on the radio. In the heat of dispatching six officers to six different calls in a hurry so they didn’t decide to do something on their own and get tied up while I still have dozens of calls waiting for officers, I once sent an officer to a non-injury accident involving a green Chevy sedan and a “Black Suzuki Grand Viagra.” My co-worker RR immediately said “Yeah, comes with its own lift kit.” Okay, so it’s really called a Grand Vitara. The fact that a dozen officers called in to mock me on the phone afterward was punishment enough.

All this babbling being said, here’s something in the news that takes a little of that sting away. No matter what stupid mistakes I have made at my job, I have yet to make one like this:

Car Ticketed With Dead Body at the Wheel

AP Oct 21, 6:26 AM (ET)

SYDNEY, Australia (AP) - A traffic warden slapped a parking ticket on a car which had its dead driver slumped at the wheel outside an Australian shopping mall, an official said Friday.

The body of the 71-year-old man, whose identity was not immediately released, was discovered Thursday in a parking lot in the southern city of Melbourne, The Age newspaper reported Friday.

The man had been reported missing nine days earlier and was known to be seriously ill, the newspaper said.

Nevertheless, a parking officer who inspected the vehicle failed to notice the man inside and issued the parking fine two days before his body was discovered.

Paul Denham, the mayor of Maroondah council, where the man was found, said the parking officer was "distressed" to learn that the dead man had been inside the car.

"Our local laws officer checked and wrote out the ticket at the rear of the vehicle and placed the ticket from the passenger side on the windscreen," Denham said in a statement. "The local laws officer did not notice anything unusual regarding the vehicle, and is extremely distressed to have learned of the situation."