Memorial Day

Today is Memorial Day, the day we remember those who died protecting our country and our freedom; and while it's good to thank those who are serving, it is important to remember that this day honors our fallen.  So this morning, as I sit in my kitchen, I am thinking about those who never came home.  My father talked about comrades who were killed in World War II.  He thought of them often.

It got me to thinking.  I was anti-war during the VietNam era, but not anti soldier.  I wore a POW bracelet, something many of us did.  The name on my bracelet was Captain Clifford Fieszel.  He was declared Missing in Action, although initial reports from the Viet Cong claimed they had him.  I think of him, someone I never knew, and wonder what happened to him. How terrible for his family, never to have known.  I hope someday, the remains of those who died there will be returned so that they may be honored properly.

So today, before you light up the BBQ and pop open that beer, take a moment to think of those who gave their lives for this country.  Those men and women who paid the ultimate price and whose sacrifice was not in vain. 

Happy Birthday, Dad

Today would have been my father, Robert Myers, 93rd birthday.  I hope wherever he is  he is celebrating.  I am sure there is BEER wherever he is or he wouldn't be there for long.  And some really good Dixieland music.  Gotta dance!

My Dad's folks split up when he was about nine or ten and after his father was killed in an accident, he was shuttled around to relatives and finally, against his wishes, ending up with his mother in New York City.  I always got the feeling that life in Chester PA was much more to his liking than New York City, even if it was a bit rustic.  I remember him telling me about one of the places he lived- his dad's girlfriend- who had INDOOR PLUMBING.  His dad had a roving eye, apparently,so that did not last.  He told me once that when he and my mother were arguing and he considered leaving, he thought of how he felt and knew he didn't want us to grow up like that.  They worked it out, whatever the problem was. 

My father served in World War II and was at the Battle of the Bulge.  His stories when we were kids made it sound like Hogan's Heroes, only later did the stories darken.  He never forgot the bitter cold of that Christmas in Belgium or the warmth of the Belgian people who fought with them against the Nazi's.  He told me about the women bringing their fine white linens out to cover the guns.  He asked them about it and they said that it was a small price to pay to be free.  The experience most certainly stayed with him all his life.  He never forgot the war or the people who did not make it home.   

I miss my Dad and have been "channeling" him lately.  I open my mouth and my father comes out!  I inherited his off-beat sense of humor, his love of cooking and his square fingers.  I did NOT inherit his dancing gene.  My daughter got that.  I wish I had more of his joie de vivre ; his sense that everything will work out if you let it.  He used to tell me "Don't take life seriously.  You don't get out of it alive."

Kids

My daughter is twenty-five, almost twenty-six.  In her lifetime,there  has always been cable.  Computers were small and are getting smaller everyday.  She had a cell phone when she was thirteen.  Cars have GPS built in.  The radio looks for your station AND tells you what song is playing.  Technology is a constant in their lives, they take it for granted.  So WHY is it SO FREAKING HARD to get kids of a certain age to LEAVE A MESSAGE when they call you?  Seriously.  I forgot to take my cell off "stun" and when I looked I saw I had a missed call from her.  Called her back and left a message asking her to call me but my cellphone is the spawn of Satan these days and it turned itself off.  Missed another call.  No message.  I am guessing she called me on her break, because when I called her back she did not answer.  I left HER a message confirming our plans for this week and asking that she call me back.  This was a moderate problem.  I HATE it when I miss calls from her and there are no fewer than SIX in rapid succession; again NO message.  Now I am frantic, in Mom mode, picturing her stranded by the roadside or in Emergency or something heinous.  Heart in throat I call her back to be greeted with a breezy "Hi Mom, I figured it out" or  "what temperature should I cook the chicken at?"  COULDN'T you leave me a message so I don't go into warp drive?

Working the polls

I have worked the polls for several years now.  It's a tough job, believe it or not.  First of all, it's a LONG day.  We are there from 6 a.m until around nine ( no later than 9:30 is the decree)  You have to smile and help people and try not to let moody , grumpy frustrated people get to you.  You get an hour meal break.   Sometimes you have to work with difficult people ( NOT what happened for me yesterday, thankfully, but it happens)  I try to keep it light.  Things to remember when voting ( again , in no particular order)

Don't get angry at the poll worker if they can't find your name in the register.  They aare doing the best they can to find your name and help you vote.

Don't yell at poll workers and insist that you have "always voted here"  Again, not their fault if there was a demographic shift  and you are voting at the church ( where you suddenly recall voting at LAST time)

If you are having trouble with the the vote recorder ( that box in the booth) ASK for help.  We had an elderly lady who slid her folded ballot into the recorder and could not figure out where her ballot went.  I took the recorder apart and found it after she left.  I was certain she had put it in her LARGE purse and none of us wanted to insist she empty it to see if she had put it there.  We gave her another ballot and she voted, but the mystery of where her ballot went was solved by the next voter entering the booth who said that there were already vote marks on the recorder.  In trying to clean it, we saw the ballot stuck in the recorder.  I helped an elderly Armenian couple who had not used a recorder before, and a few new voters who were too shy to tell us up front this was their first time.  

Try not to leave anything behind.  We had a voter leave her driver's license in the booth.  One of the crew took it to her after we closed the polls and got everything verified.

Remember, poll workers VOLUNTEER for this. Poll workers make it possible for you to vote in person and in your neighborhood.  Many cities have dispensed with the polling places and have gone ALL vote by mail.  If you enjoy voting in person, remember the tired person at the table is making it possible for you to do so.  I always say "thank you for voting" to our voters.  It's nice to hear "thank you for being here" from our voters.

We had about a 10% turn out, a lot of our voters are "vote by mail", so hopefully more than that 10% contributed to this election.  Congratulations to Eric Garcetti.  I hope he will be the mayor we need, after eight years of that smiling idiot ( I know I shouldn't sugar-coat how I really feel about AnVil, should I?)    Hopefully we will move forward and be the wonderful city we used to be!

Elections and other things

I am up early, as I am working the polls today.  If you  live in the City of LA- PLEASE VOTE. It's important.  Even if we don't agree on the choice of Mayor ( I  am going for Garcetti, more because former Mayor Dick is pushing Wendy and as a City employee, HIS agenda scares me.)  Who ever is elected has a LARGE mucky stable to clean out after four years of AnVil ( I love the Downtown News' sobriquet for our current Idiot in Chief. )  As a City employee, I still have hope.

It's a long day  6 a.m. to around 9 or 9:30  I have coffee and a five hour energy drink for late in the day.  I am sure I will be talking about the experience tomorrow.  It's almost always a positive one ( I did have one time when the inspector was TERRIBLE and I had to call for backup.)  The people I am working with today are the same folks I worked the primary with. Nice people.  

GO VOTE ( and if you have voted already- THANK YOU!)

Going Buggy at LAPL

Most days, I  Like my job, I really do.  Today was just NOT one of those days.  Starting with a misunderstanding that left me frustrated and upset, I spent the better part of the morning trying to untangle a mess. When it was solved, I raced off to a meeting.  It was a productive meeting and I was feeling pretty good.  It was kind of past lunchtime so I grabbed a snack and went back to my desk to see what was there.  I had a grey interoffice envelope and when I opened it, I found a plastic grocery bag with dead cockroaches in it and a note from the sender telling me, here was the proof I asked for....   uh... 

Here were the actual instructions:

If you see bugs, try to kill one and put it in a baggie.  GSD needs to see the proof of the bugs, as a lot of places call in bugs and don't have them ( it's NOT the Library Department that calls them in, but we are being painted with the same brush, apparently)  SHOW the bug to the person from GSD when they come to the branch.  This will also determine what type of pesticide will be used.  This particular librarian  does not have a mean bone in her body, so I know it wasn't anything malicious or directed toward me, especially since I would have known where it came from and  it would have been an unpleasant conversation with someone's boss if it had been.  No this was just someone totally mishearing the instructions.

I sealed them in a ziplock and sent them back.  I will check on their pest control order. Tomorrow!

Wednesday morning...

Long day ahead of me and the new sleeping tablets the doc gave me did two things; I didn't sleep any better ( I keep waking up WIDE awake every two hours) AND when I did sleep I had vivid nightmares. ( Can I get a meeting with Brian de Palma,? I've got some story ideas for him)

I see where Prince Harry  is touring the east coast.  It must be hard to be born into a "job" where about 50 % of the people think you and your family should go away.  As an American, I don't think much about the Monarchy, but I think the new generation of royals will make some real changes in the system.  Personally, I like the public personae of Will, Kate and Harry.  They have the "common touch" and  at least by all appearances do care about things.  They are not just up in the balcony rattling their jewelry.  They are in the trenches.  I heard they refer to the family business as "the Firm"  It's one way to look at it.  I wonder what that must be like.  I had a friend, a LONG time ago, whose father owned a very successful car dealership.  His father let him "play" with his dream of being in the music business- I think he gave him two years to do something- then he told him if he wanted to inherit, he would need to learn the job and it was time to do it.  He made my friend work every job at the dealership, learn the business from the ground up.  Smart move.  It gives you perspective and compassion if done correctly.  I assume my friend is running the show now, although we lost touch years ago; the dealership is still there with the family name on it.

I can't WAIT for the mayoral election to be OVER!  I am disappointed that both candidates chose to tramp through the mud-bogs  during these final weeks. Please, I would prefer you remind me why I want to vote for you in the first place, not why I don't want to vote for your opponent.  If I am undecided, I look at who is doing the nastiest mudslinging and vote for their opponent.

I see the IRS got caught targeting certain groups for audit.  Well, well well, THAT is going to make them even more beloved, isn't it.  They need to take a look at the tax collection system and make changes to it.  It's not right when the really wealthy pay less of a percentage than the average working stiff.  If you just paid a percentage, period and were done with it, no deductions or loopholes, I wonder what the outcome of that would be.  People will argue that there won't be any charitable donations and people with large families will have problems, maybe we can look at that, but  the tax code is HUGE and confusing and we need to make it much simpler.  This probably won't happen in MY lifetime, but you never know!

It's Monday

Yesterday was Mother's Day.  I got a phone call from my daughter, calling me on her lunch break from work.  It was nice to talk to her.  I was missing MY mom like crazy the past week, some Mother's Days are rougher than others and this one for some reason was unreasonably difficult.  We didn't do much, tooled around Tujunga looking for something to store all of my husband's mike stands.  Didn't find anything good, but we will keep trying.  It was nice to finally go into that little antique store on Foothill.  He has some nice stuff, but nothing I was looking for. 

On Friday, we met a friend for dinner in Glendale at a place that serves Georgian -style food.  It's called the Old World Restaurant.  The food was good, but I think the owners did not know what to expect when the three of us walked in.  They seemed... confused that we were there.  Given that the place got good reviews in Westways recently, I wondered at the reaction.  The person who waited on us was probably an owner.  When we were leaving she said "I like you.  You should come back"  We probably will .  The food was pretty good.  I am still longing for the Georgian Eagle dish we had in San Diego.  I found a recipe and will be fooling around with it in the near future.  I will let you know how it turns out- or not!

On Saturday, because I am involved in a union and because we need to become more politically active as part of our affiliation with a larger union, I phone-banked for Eric Garcetti.   I made 97 phone calls. I was there from 10 am until about 2:45.  To say it was tiring is an understatement.  The room we were in had some sort of electrical problem and the bank of lights behind me would flare up for a few minutes then go dead.  This happened all day long.  It made me somewhat cranky, as my eyesight is getting worse as I am aging.  Thank goodness I brought my reading glasses with me.  I HAD thought I was going to be walking the precinct.  I was ready for that.  Phone-banking?  Not so much. The funniest thing I heard was a voicemail message, pretending to be the phone company giving the disconnect notice.  The only problem was it was NOT the standard voice, so I knew it was faked.  Good idea though.

Phiolsopy of Music

If you know me, you know I have been having some issues of late and the way I am dealing with them is to listen to music.  Yes I am listening to music at work. I discovered that some very kind soul had loaded my all time favorite album "Late for the Sky" by Jackson Browne, in it's entirety on Youtube.  Ok I suppose that's illegal but in my own defense, I own several copies of the album so I am not ripping off Jackson by listening to it somewhere else.   I could be wrong about that, but it was a true salvation to find it yesterday.  Now, I know someone- or used to know someone- to whom Music was God.  He always acted like Music was the only truth and Musicians were holy men. I love music and I have been know to immerse myself in it to help me change my mood or just to cope, but God?  Nope.  Listening to Jackson ( and gee, we have been "companions" since I saw him open for America in the summer of 1973, so I can call him Jackson;)  )   I was struck again by the precision of his songwriting.  His lyrical content and phrasing has always blown me away.  The juxtaposition of terms ( in Fountain of Sorrow for instance he is "taken by a photograph of you") I understand what he means but the fact that you usually take a photograph and now the singer is being taken by it struck me as very cleverly phrased.    I began to think about the songs that I listened to as a teen.  More than any other type of music, I enjoyed the singer/songwriter genre of the late 60's and early 70's .  These men and women were our philosophers, our poets, our authors.  We would sit for hours and talk about the songs and what they meant to us. The philosophy of rock and roll crept into our daily conversations.  I recently told someone "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice"  Our dreams, our successes and our failures - and how to handle them- are often sung about in the music of that era.  Sometimes, it was just a comfort to hear what you were feeling , eloquently expressed.  I was thinking about the music my daughter listens to.  I have about a 15 second tolerance for rap, so I am not the one to talk about it, but it seems to me that most of it is angry and intolerant.  The degradation of women is especially disconcerting.  I for one do NOT like to be called 'bitch"  no matter how you mean it.  It's still a curse word.

So I will continue to look for musicians who can sing me a story, make me think or help me dream again.  I want to be able to sing along sometimes too.

Reading the good parts of the news

It's been heartening to see the news about those three kidnap victims freeing themselves.  You have to wonder what kind of fiends these three brothers were to be able to imprison them for so long.  Too bad we can kill these guys, resurrect them and kill them again . I think the same thing about the Boston Bombers, BTW- and think they should ship the body of the one back to the mother in Russia and let HER deal with it.  He was so anti American, he doesn't deserve a bit of our soil covering him.  I'm sorry.  I have compassion for people of other faiths as long as the way they live their faith does not try to destroy other people who don't believe as they do.  Don't get me started about those West borough "Church" idiots.  That's not a church, it's a hate group with some kind of weird agenda hiding behind the church. 

But those women who freed themselves deserve kudos.  I wonder how they were kept hidden for so long.  There was an article about other famous kidnap victims. Jaycee Dugard, who received 20 million from the State of California, set up a charitable organization to help other people in similar situations.  Way to go!  She sounds like she has a good head on her shoulders and has surrounded herself with caring people.  Good for her.  The article I read was really kind of sad when it talked to Elizabeth Smart, whose religion taught her that since she was no longer a virgin, she was worthless and would never be married.  I am sure that contributed to her mindset, that she might not have tried to escape because of it. I think she worked through those issues within her faith.  She has married and become a spokesperson for others in crisis. 


These women, who by freeing themselves from captivity have freed themselves from being victims and should now be considered victors. 

One encounter.

This is a reproduction of a conversation I had at yesterday's event. 

Me ( looking at the spread of food, knowing it's Vegan)  "are there nuts in this?

Twentysomething snobby girl ( insert know it all voice)   "It's Vegan"

Me Yes I know it's Vegan, but are there nuts it it? 

Twentysomething {sighing}" it's VE-Gan" ( she was speaking slowly, as if she were explaining to a three year old.)

Me:  "YES, I am aware it's vegan, but vegan food can contain nuts and I am allergic to nuts.  Not just mildly allergic; I am CALL THE FREAKING PARAMEDICS allergic.   I am Call 911 BEFORE I put it in my mouth allergic.  So I REALLY need to know if there are any nuts in this food."

Twentysomething.  "It's vegan"

Monday

I read a meme that said "if every day is a gift, I'd like to know where I can return Monday"  Yep.  I seem to never be ready for it, when the alarm goes off in the morning. Monday.  Again.  It doesn't help that the weekend was a blur of feeling blah and going to an event that was just plain.. weird.  I need to process the things that happened, both verbal and nonverbal encounters with people I have "known" in some way for the past several years. I need to figure out what it all meant and how I will respond in the coming weeks.  When I do, I will post about it at the appropriate time.  If you are dying of curiosity, message me.

Who ordered this rain, anyway?  Last week it was a million degrees and today it is raining!  Welcome to Spring in California. 

The Mayoral election is coming up in a few weeks.  Whoever wins will have the interesting task of explaining how we went form "OMG the City is going to file for bankruptcy any minute now" to  "oops we have a surplus of 119 million."  How did THAT happen?  Did they "manufacture" a crisis to slam  the workforce with "Austerity measures"?  Yeah. They did.  Is anyone surprised about that?  I don't mean to go all "conspiracy theory" here, but local politics is a shell game.  The City workers, more than any other issue is held up as the problem.  Our salaries are just a small part of the budget but it's the BIG bugaboo when it comes to making any kind of cut.  For the record, I took a salary CUT last year to work for the City of Los Angeles, when they knew all along there was a surplus, otherwise what are we paying those budget people in the CAO's office to do?   If they keep it up, I will be paying to work there.  You lose bright young people if you don't pay a decent wage to begin with.  Commitment to public service only goes so far and it doesn't put bread on the table.  If they "fix" the pension system as they claim they need to I will NEVER be able to retire.  I will be rolling my walker down the halls at Central Library until I am 85....

Happy Monday.

How do you deal?

I have a social obligation this week which promises to bring me in contact with an associate who, the last time I encountered her , was UNSPEAKABLY rude.  I would like to ( quoting Jacqueline Kennedy) cut her dead, but I was not raised that way.  My mother gave me constant lessons in manners and social etiquette is ingrained in me.  I hope I can just avoid this person. The problem is, she sees nothing wrong in her behavior and she has a HUGE ego about her abilities ( my mother would have said "well, SOMEONE has to like her" see Mom COULD be snarky!) I hope to avoid her.  Fingers and toes crossed, but it does make me wonder, how do you deal with interacting with people you would not be friendly with if you were given the choice? One thing is for sure, I will keep my mouth closed and move away if I am near this person.  Not a fan.  Funny because before I got to know her, I liked her.

Saturday night

Boy I am a barrel of FUN!  I have been sleeping on and off all day long.  No idea why but I feel crummy.  I was NOT out drinking last night, just up at 5 and fell into bed around 2 a.m.We went out last night with one of our neighbors to go out for dinner and a show at the Downtown comedy and Blues club.  It's been a while since we went there and longer still since I have been on Spring St.    I used to work on Spring in the early 80s and again in the early 90's  It's become "Yuppified" but still holds the air of shabbiness that people seem to think of as "hip"  The club used to be on  rth and Main, now in the old Alexandria Hotel on 5th and Spring, which I remember as a flop house and drug haven.  It still reminds me of that, but I bet the rooms that are apartments are pretty cool. I don't know though.  I used to know the guy who owned it, but have no clue if his kids still own it or they sold it.  It is weird. When I asked where the bathroom was, someone from the Comedy club actually walked me down the hall to one of the restrooms.  He told me that the place was haunted and yeah it is.   We had dinner at a Mexican place where the food was decent, nothing that makes me say "oooh YOU have to try this place" but it was nice to sit outside and have dinner on a warm spring night.

The show last night was hosted by a friend, Julian Michael, who is one very funny guy.  He started the night out singing with the band and I was really impressed.  The band was the Deacon Jones band ( NOT the football player who played for the Rams in the 60's)   They were pretty good.  The comics were only mildly funny, Julian always makes me laugh and he did again.  The "warm up" comic was better than some of the "acts" and the headliner was just NOT funny to me.  She was bombing and she knew it and took time to pick on the white faces in the crowd as being "uncool and not getting it"  I GOT it, alright, but I stopped laughing at toilet jokes in first grade.  Here's  a clue; threatening people to make them laugh is not funny.  I won't go out of my way to see her again. 

Friday , are you trying to tell me something?

It's FRIDAY, finally!  I thought it would never get here.  Another Fun filled week at work.  ( The fun never stops at the Fun Factory)  I shouldn't complain.  I actually like my job, most of the time.  There are days I would chuck it all to live under a bridge, but mostly I enjoy the process of getting things repaired.  This morning, however, it's all I can do to talk myself into doing another eight hours.  I broke a glass in the dishpan and neatly sliced my finger on a piece I missed .  Argh!  Can I JUST go back to bed and start over?

It's funny, but I am at the end of my career and as we get closer to retirement, the  old-timers ask each other "how much longer do you have?" as if it were a prison sentence and not something you worked hard to get!  I think I have six or seven years.  I have to have that meeting with the retirement people soon.

Planning on going to see my very funny friend, Julian Michael, this evening.  He is performing at the Downtown Comedy Club, actually he is HOSTING the show this evening.  He always makes me laugh.  Check him out- he has a few things on youtube, but he is NOT the exercise guru - that's Jillian Michael.

Resturant Rules

We eat out from time to time, mostly at small establishments, if we are not grabbing fast food after a long day.  I have come up with a small list of things that I look for in judging whether my dining experience will probably be a good one .. or not.

Here they are in no particular order

1-If the coffee is bad, the rest of the meal will be too.  It's not hard to grunge the pot and if they haven't done that, they don't care about the rest of the food either.

2 If the tables are sticky, the place is not clean.

3   If the menu goes on for pages, they probably don't do ANY of the dishes well ( thank you Gordon Ramsay)

4 If you ask the waitstaff what THEY eat and they hem and haw, leave IMMEDIATELY.  It's not good when the staff doesn't eat their own food.

5  Try to see if your waiter or waitress is running all over the place and doesn't have a clear work station before you decide he or she is just a poor server.  Sometimes mismanagement shortchanges the staff.

There are probably more but that's all for now.  Last night we went to a place called the Hill Street Cafe in La Canada.  DON'T go there.  My "fajitas" resembled bad chicken soup and the waitress tried to tell me that the over-boiled mess was something I should "expect" when you order from the "Fit Fare" menu.  YIKES!  I can cook something that is low fat and low sodium and tastes good.  It's not that hard if you have an idea of what you are doing.  I am NOT a master chef, but it IS possible.  Just NOT at the Hill Street Cafe in La Canada.  I posted a negative review on Yelp.  This was the third time we went there. The first time the breakfast was pretty good.  I only remembered the negative experience of the SECOND visit after we sat down.  I recall thinking I should never come back to this place.  The third time's the charm, as they say.  Never again!

Writer's Block

I made a promise to myself to try to write something every day, but I have not kept that promise; although I do write often it's just not every day.  I struggle with what to say and sometimes the news is NOT helpful.  I was heartened by the news that tobacco growers are turning to garbanzo beans.  That's good   I LIKE garbanzo beans.  Hummus is yummy and I like them roasted.  I am allergic to nuts and roasted garbanzos are a nice nut-like snack.  But is this something people want to read?  I doubt it. I try to be positive, although I speak "Sarcastic" fluently and sometimes the snark overtakes what I want to say.  It's been a trying week already. Yesterday, a homeless patron was found dead at one of the libraries.  It appears to be natural causes, but it's distressing nonetheless.  I hate to say this, but this sort of thing happens more frequently than we realize.  It makes me sad to think of people dying alone on the sidewalk.  I wonder about the man's family, if they miss him and are looking for him. It's just a sad thing.

Changing up my meds to see if the ringing in my ears is caused by the medication or something else.  The noise is annoying.  I have been trying to get a handle on some of the anxiety I am feeling by listening to music with my MP3 player.  I don't play music that other  people can hear in my cube.  I think it's somewhat rude to be blasting your music in the office.  My musical taste may not be for everyone.  I have been listening to the wonderful Jeff Larson, whose music is so soothing and energizing to me.  He is quite a find- another "gift" from the band America, who I say are my favorite band.  I love them.  I know their music is not for everyone and I have had a polite disagreement with a friend who is a real music aficionado and I appreciate his take on things.  He just doesn't "get" 70's "California Sound" singer-songwriter music.  As my dad would have said "that's what makes it a horse-race"  America has introduced me to many of my favorite musicians, including the beautiful and talented Cindy Alexander and Jackson Browne.  YES I saw Jackson OPEN for America in 1973 at  the Hollywood Bowl. Just Jackson and his guitar.  He was ( and I hate this word) magical.  I still remember "Song for Adam"  that was the one that got me.  It still does.

Looking back at this I guess I DID have something to say.  I guess the way to conquer "writer's block is just to start writing something- ANYTHING-and see what comes out!