Memory Triggers

By Steffani March 24th, 2010, under Animal Fare, Family, Life, Music

BalticBeachinKahlberg-1993It’s funny the way common, ordinary things can trigger memories.

I stopped this morning to get gas at Sam’s Club.  The sky was blue and the sun was shining.  The air was crisp, but not too cold to enjoy standing there holding the gas nozzle.  (For some reason I have this insane ability to always pick the gas pump with the broken-off nozzle holder thingy.)

Anyway, as I held the nozzle pumping gas, the gulls in Sam’s Club parking lot started to screech.  Trigger pulled.  There I stood smiling to myself on a fine spring morning…a song running through my mind…

“Wor de Möven schrieen gell im Stormgebrus, dor ist mine Heimat, dor bin ick to Hus.”

It’s a line from an old folk song in Plattdeutsch about the Baltic Sea and where the waves from the freshwater roll up on the sand…where the gulls cry as the gales blow in, that place is my dear homeland.  There I am at home.

My little Mama used to love that song, and would sing it often.  Even after she had lost most of her memories, she still remembered the words to that song.  All I’d have to do is start singing it, and she would join in.

Thanks for visiting me for a few moments this morning, Mama.  I haven’t forgotten your song;  I never will.  I haven’t forgotten you either.  I can still see you in my mind walking down the beach at Kahlberg in ‘93, the wind in your hair, the gulls flying overhead, and a song in your heart and on your lips.

Tags: , , , , , , , ,
1 Comment

Little Bobbie…Remembering Bob

By Steffani February 22nd, 2010, under Family, Grief, Life

Two years ago today I was visiting you in the hospital, Dad.  It seems like both a lifetime ago and yesterday, all at the same time.  I didn’t know how serious things were, but I gather from things I heard later that you knew your days were numbered.   I know how much you didn’t want to be a burden to your kids at the end of your life, but I wish you could have shared the truth with me.  I wish I would have known that I had less than two more days to spend with my best buddy. 

I think if you had had your druthers, you wouldn’t have wanted either of your kids to see you in those last few moments, Dad, mostly because you wouldn’t have wanted us to remember you as  you labored for your last breaths.  I hope wherever you are you have forgiven me for being there any way.  Surely you knew me well enough to know that I couldn’t not have been there.  It is difficult enough for me, still, to think of you as having traveled to somewhere I cannot follow.  It would be unthinkable for me not to have at least been there to wish you bon voyage. 

My best buddy and me

My best buddy and me

 

Worry not, Daddy.  I don’t remember  you as you were on that last day.  I remember you in your white shirt, tie and sport coat waving a blow dryer at your frozen pipes on an extra-cold Florida morning.  I remember you sitting at the table for breakfast with your hair too long, and all Albert-Einstein like.  (Thanks for that by the way…I have your cowlicks, you know!)  I remember dancing with you in the Bashenows basement on New Years Eve.  I remember feeling proud when your aunts would say how much I took after you and would call me “little Bobbie.”  And I remember riding around the yard with you on that old Wheelhorse lawnmower. 

I love you, Dad.

Tags: , , , , , , ,
1 Comment

Adrift and Weatherbeaten

By Steffani February 9th, 2010, under Current Events, Life

Granted:  In comparison to recent geological tragedies and climatic calamities like Hurricane Katrina, ten inches of snow seems rather inconsequential, but I’m going to whine about it anyway.

According to a local newspaper, we were running 9.9 inches below the average snowfall this season.  I was fine with that.  I figured it was a reasonable trade-off since we’ve been having lower than average temperatures.  I mean, fair is fair, right? 

So in an effort to remind myself that even abhorrent things like blizzardy weather aren’t all bad, here’s my David-Letterman-style top ten list of things I like about blizzards.

10.  Extra free time because activities get cancelled.

  9.  Snow hides the yucky brown dormant grass in the yard.

  8.  Evergreens in my side yard turn into Currier and Ives creations.

  7.  Who am I kidding?  There aren’t ten good things to say about blizzards.

  6.  I can’t even come up with four things for the list. 

  5.  Cold weather bites…hence the phrase biting cold.

  4.  I’d rather be someplace warm and sandy with salt spray in the air.

  3.  BOO!

  2.  FRICKING!!

  1.  HISS!!!

Tags: , , , ,
2 Comments

The Great Split Pea Shortage

By Steffani January 12th, 2010, under Cooking

The latest result of the global economic meltdown here in the Metro Detroit area is the great split pea shortage!  I’m not just talking about one store being out of split peas, you know.  I’m talking about close to half a dozen different stores having nary a split pea to purchase.  It seems that everyone around here who enjoyed a ham for Christmas decided to enjoy split pea soup in the New Year. 

I don’t know if the economy in Southeast Michigan is improving yet or not, but people are sure enough getting back to basics.  That’s a good thing.  Apparently everyone who used to just throw that hambone away listened to their mom and grandma talk about making soup out of that bad boy.  Unfortunately nobody told the grocery stores this, otherwise they would have doubled their split pea order for January.

We celebrated New Year’s Eve with a standing rib roast, and I popped the rib bones in the freezer for when my pot of split pea soup is gone.  Now I just want to know if a barley shortage is going to be next?

Tags: , , ,
No Comments

I’ve Got A Song Stuck In My Head

By Steffani January 3rd, 2010, under Life, Music

It is said that this happens to everyone at one time or another, but it happens to me so regularly that I swear I have an internal disc jockey. 

Now, for the most part, I’m a happy person, and I’m also someone who wakes up quickly.  It isn’t unusual for me to wake up with a song in my heart, in my head, and on my lips.  I like waking up that way.  I love music, and over the years I’ve collected a fairly large database of music on my cerebral hard drive. 

Frequently my inner DJ pulls out a song that I’ve recently heard on the radio or in a movie.  Sometimes it’s a song that’s been stuck in my husband’s head that he’s been singing for the last few days.  But every now and then, my inner DJ turns impish and digs through the massive storage of my mental music library and comes up with a rare, odd and humorous gem.  I love it when the DJ does that.  It’s like bumping into a friend you haven’t seen in years!

This morning was a rare gem morning.  The song was written by John F. Palmer and Charles B. Ward in 1895.  It’s a pop standard with one of it’s most famous recordings done by Guy Lombardo’s orchestra in the early 1940s.  Funny isn’t it?  I wasn’t around when it was written, nor even when it was popular, but there it is playing around in my brain.  Life is good.

What’s the song, you ask?  “The Band Played On.”  And for anyone out there fortunate enough to know the melody, feel free to sing along…

Casey would waltz with a strawberry blonde
As the band played on;
He’d glide ‘cross the floor with the girl he adored
As the band played on;
Well, his brain was so loaded
It nearly exploded
The poor girl would shake with alarm;
He’d ne’er leave the girl with the strawberry curl
As the band played on.

And if you need a little help with the melody, click the link below to hear the song and sing along!

Guy Lombardo: \”The Band Played On\”

Tags: , , , ,
2 Comments

A Dolt to the nth Degree

By Steffani October 6th, 2009, under Education

A funny thing happened last weekend while I was studying for my Investments class.  While trying to work my way through an exponential formula, I discovered a formula that wasn’t anywhere in my textbook.  This newly discovered formula looks something like this:

Me = dolt∞

That’s right!  I not only discovered that I am a dolt, but a dolt to the power of infinity.

Now before you all rush to add comments encouraging me to be less hard on myself, let me tell you the story.

I was working on trying to understand a  formula for valuation as the present value of dividends.  The formula was V = D divided by k˙.  That’s right.  According to the book you had to divide by:

 

k˙

 

k to the dot power?????  WTF?  I know I’ve been away from mathematics for a while, but using a dot as an exponent?

I dug through my textbook, looking for k to the dot power.  I found several examples of it with no explanation.  So then I started rooting around in my financial calculator manual.  Still no k to the dot power.  Finally, when neither book was fruitful I began googling in earnest:  dot power, dot as an exponent, exponent dot. 

After a good couple hours of this activity I was frustrated and brain dead, so I stopped and took a break.  I had a little lunch, read a few emails, etc.  Then back to the books with renewed mental energy.  That’s when I saw it.  

(This is the embarrassing part here!)  Not only were there several examples of k to the dot power, I now noticed that there were also similar examples like infinity to the comma power!!!! 

The editors of the textbook had punctuated formulae as if they were just another part of the sentence.  It just so happened that the periods and commas actually rode lower than the divide-by line making the punctuation marks look like superscript for the denominators of equations. 

And I, in my wisdom, never even considered the fact that the punctuation marks were simply that–punctuation.  Doh!

“Learning, n. The kind of ignorance distinguishing the studious. ” ~Ambrose Bierce

Tags: , , , ,
2 Comments

Mad Pride

By Steffani September 6th, 2009, under Values

I saw a story recently on “Primetime” about the next social movement out there–Mad Pride.

What is Mad Pride, you ask?  Well according to their website at www.mindfreedom.org it is “a movement that celebrates the human rights and spectacular culture of people considered very different by our society.”  Hmm.  That’s a nice little handful of words, but it doesn’t really say much, does it?

Judging from the story I saw on TV and the little bit I read on the website, one of the major focus points of Mad Pride is the right of individuals with mental illness to make their own decisions about their treatment.  They want to have the right to refuse treatment, stop their meds, etc. 

Truthfully, I feel bad for these people.  From what I understand, the side effects of many of the psychotropic medications are at best unpleasant, and at worst nearly intolerable.  No matter how sympathetic I might feel though, I cannot reconcile myself with the notion that we should allow someone whose thought processes are compromised make their own decision to refuse treatment.  Modern society is full of examples where people whose cognitive abilities are compromised are legally prohibited from doing certain things that may impact society at large.  Children are not allowed to make all their own decisions due to lack of full development.  People under the influence of certain substances are not allowed to drive.  Older persons suffering from dementia are frequently not allowed to make their own medical or financial decisions.  Should we abandon all these practices in favor of their human rights as well?  Of course not!  That would be bad for society.  The same is true for individuals with mental illness.  Sure there’s something quite valuable they might gain, but it is at a possibly high cost that someone else might have to pay.

Lest anyone think I am not for human rights, trust me, I’m for them.  Why I am so much in favor of everyone’s human rights, that I firmly believe that in order to ensure human rights for everyone, we need to all remember that our own rights cease when they infringe upon the rights of another.  It’s like everyone’s rights are a bubble that surrounds them.  As long as you aren’t busting somebody else’s bubble pursuing your own individuality, freedom and happiness, you’re good.  That cognizance of and concern for others in our proximity is what makes a civilized society, right?

Tags: , , , , ,
3 Comments

Happy Birthday, Dad

By Steffani August 18th, 2009, under Uncategorized

Well, Dad.  Today would have been your 81st birthday.  Here are a few things I’d like to tell you not just today, but every day.

I love you, Dad.  I know I’ve told you that before, but you can never say it enough. 

I never told you how it made me feel when I was a little kid and you’d call me your Tomodach, your buddy.  I thought that I must’ve been pretty special for you to call me your buddy.  Sure, you were my dad, and I was your daughter, but how many dads call their kid their friend?  I never heard any of the neighbor dads call their kids that.  None of my friends’ dads either.  So thanks, buddy.  I’ll never forget that.

And you know how I always used to holler out to the living room after you had tucked me in, telling you that you’d forgotten to pull the string on my music box?  I was really just trying to steal a few more minutes of your time.  Thanks for putting up with it.  I realize now you were probably trying to study.  You were going to school nights to get your Masters Degree at the time.  So now that I’ve thanked you properly, don’t say I didn’t, cause I did! 

It seems that you had a starring role in every good memory I have from my childhood.  From lawnmower rides to dancing in the Bashenow’s basement to fried chicken to the Santa tags on Christmas presents, there you were! Thanks for all the great memories. 

You know, I always thought it was cool that I looked like you too.   I liked that your Aunt Tressa would look at me and call me little Bobby.  I never really gave much thought to a resemblance after I grew up, though, until one day I was showing some pictures of my wedding reception to a coworker.  She was looking through a short stack of them, and stopped on a picture of you and me, saying “guess there’s no question that this is your dad, huh?”  Not knowing what she was talking about, I looked at the picture and saw the two of us side by side, smiling identical smiles.   I knew I had your crooked grin, but I didn’t realize my regular, day-to-day smile was yours as well!

I’m going to quit rambling here, Dad.  I could keep going like this for next to forever, so I’ll get to the point.  Thanks for helping to shape me into the person I am.  I really do try to practice a lot of the lessons you taught.  Check back with me from time to time.  I’m still a work in progress, but you already know that, don’t you? 

Happy Birthday, Dad!  I miss you, and I love you.

Your Tomodach

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
No Comments

Unexpected Outcomes

By Steffani August 5th, 2009, under Current Events

I read an interesting article about the “Cash for Clunkers” program yesterday.  

According to Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson in a letter to the U.S. Senate, more than half (53%) of the new vehicles being purchased are from foreign manufacturers.

In times as tough as these with the federal deficit growing exponentially, isn’t it good to know that our tax dollars are being used to subsidize foreign auto manufacturers as well as our own Used-to-be Big Three? 

Is this what the government intended to happen?  Did they think there were any American-made vehicles that can compare to the foreign market when it comes to fuel efficiency?  Or maybe they thought that the American consumer has blind faith regarding automobile warranties, failing automobile manufacturers and a government that can’t figure out how much money is required to run a program through the coming autumn?

I know the current administration is under a lot of pressure to “fix” the economy, get people back to work, and make sure that we all live happily ever after.  But please!  Would somebody tell them it’s okay to slow down a little bit and think things through a little better?  Have they already forgotten how well speed worked with the first bank bailout that they pushed through?

Tags: , , , , ,
No Comments

Rant Aftermath

By Steffani August 5th, 2009, under Blogging

Well apparently I shouldn’t rant, because it obviously blows all ideas out of my head.  Here it is more than a week later and the cupboard is still bare.

Hellllloooooooo!!!  Ideas?  Is anybody in there?

No Comments

« Older Entries