We’re on Hold for a Couple of Days

The Camera Crisis of 2009 is in the process of being resolved. Plus, I think linnearly and want to write about the vacation chronologically.

The good news is that I will have Idaho Cousin and Grand Teton pictures by Saturday morning. And that is when I will resume.

Goldilocks and the Three Cousins — Vacation Part Two: Utah and Idaho

Some family history for context: Mom’s younger brother, Ross, married his high school sweetheart, Joyce, when they were both 18. This was back in the 1950s, when such things were closer to the norm. After a few years, Ross and Joyce had a baby, then moved from their hometown in Illinois to Colorado, where they had two more babies. Then they moved to Idaho, the kids grew up, Ross tragically died of cancer in his late 40s, Joyce remarried a nice guy named Sam, the kids married, at least one of the kids divorced and remarried, they all converted from Catholicism to Mormonism, they all had a bunch of children, two now have grandchildren or step-grandchildren, and they all stayed in Idaho. The last I saw of them was in Colorado, when we were all children. Mom stayed in touch with Joyce, however, so when we began planning this trip, a visit to Joyce, Sam, and the Idaho cousins became part of the itinerary.

I wasn’t sure how this was going to go down. I even fretted about it, because I that’s one of the things I do best — fret. But realistically, I figured we’d end up somewhere between a disaster and a fairy tale. It was closer to a fairy tale: Goldilocks and the Three Bears, to be specific. Cousin #1 was too perfect, Cousin #2 was too … something, and Cousin #3 was just right! The cousins are aligned by the order in which we visited them, which is not birth order.

However, first we visited Joyce and Sam. As you may recall from the previous post, Dave and I arrived hellishly late and Joyce had to meet Mom at the airport. So they had a nice morning reconnecting and talking about my late Uncle Ross and bonding and all that, while Dave and I tried to recover from our travel ordeal. We then drove from Salt Lake City to Sam and Joyce’s home close to the Utah/Idaho border, and officially began the “visiting relatives” portion of the trip. I can’t say enough good things about Sam and Joyce as hosts. They were wonderfully generous and cordial. Sam is incredibly easy to get along with, and Joyce fell all over herself trying to make us feel at home.

Then it was off to visit Cousin #1 in Idaho Falls. I have pictures, but there were major camera issues during this trip and so I do not have access to those pictures yet. They’ll be posted eventually, although I don’t post pictures of minor children, so it will just be the adults. So why did I deem Cousin #1 “too perfect”? That’s said with quite a bit of admiration, but also a sense that he’s not someone I’d hang out with if we lived in the same city. Different styles, different values, different modes of being. He’s a good guy, I like his wife, I’m sure the 5 boys — 4 of whom are 8 or younger — will grow up to be delightful young men, etc., etc. But really, their house is astonishingly neat and clean with no household help and all those children. This is mind-boggling. There’s a lot of regimentation in their home, which I suppose is necessary with that many children. Also, Cousin #1 gets Masters degrees as a sort of hobby, and his wife takes Serious Classes. I admire this to no end. They are like Vulcans. And I am no Vulcan. We had a lovely visit, we ate pizza, and I left hoping that one of the other two cousins would be from my planet.

Cousin #2 is from my planet, but we don’t speak the same language. We visited her the next day. She lives in a modular home (used to be called trailers, but they really are modular homes) on a vast ranch with her husband and a few of their children. Two of her sons live in a house that the rest of the family abandoned due to sewer issues, but they come by each night for dinner. And a married daughter with children lives a short distance away. There are many dogs, some of which are “indoor” dogs and some of which are “outdoor” dogs. The younger daughter is 18 and in a 2-year program that will give her some kind of certificate deeming her beyond great with horses. She loves it, and hopes to work on a dude ranch some day handling the horses, possibly in Colorado. Dave and I liked her best, which seemed to throw her because she apparently gets lost in the shuffle and has been reportedly quite active doing the teenage-rebellion thing against her parents. Anyway, I asked her how many horses her immediate family owns, and it’s something like 20. But each horse is owned by an individual instead of there being “family horses.” So her mom has 3, she has 5, one brother has 2, another has 3, etc., up to about 20 total. Cousin #2’s son-in-law hand-builds awesome furniture out of rough-hewn cedar. There will be pictures, I promise.

Then it was off to visit Cousin #3, who was my favorite. He’s the one I’d like to get together with in the future, and he might be coming here in the fall, which would be great! His wife is funny and a bit sarcastic, so I could see bonding with her if I had the chance to get to know them better. He shares my love of cooking and made dinner using cast iron cookware, which is something I’ve gotten into lately. Their house was cozy (”just right”), the one son we met was independent without being annoyingly rebellious (”just right”), and we talked about our lives after dinner without it feeling like an interview with a stranger (”just right”). I wouldn’t exactly call this guy “Baby Bear,” but he matched my “Goldilocks” better than the other two.

Then it was off to Jackson, WY, and the Grand Tetons. That will be the next blog entry, some time early next week. I may even have recovered some of the pictures by then.

“Air Travel Is So Glamorous” — Vacation Prelude and Part One

Prelude

Some of you have heard my explanation about the genesis of this vacation, and you probably want to skip this paragraph because it’s the same thing I’ve always said. And that is: After my dad died last year, my mother — a burnt-out caretaker 13 years his junior — was talking to her priest, who said to ”Pat, I want you to travel.” She replied, “I’m going to.” He then asked “Where are you going?” And she said “Wyoming — Yellowstone!” This is that trip.

We could not have done this trip without Dave, and we were fortunate that he wanted to join us. After much consultation, we agreed on a 3-part trip: short visit with relatives in Utah/Idaho, 2 days in Jackson WY and Grand Teton National Park, and Yellowstone National Park.

I carefully aligned our flights so that Dave and I were scheduled to arrive in Salt Lake City about 20 minutes before Mom, allowing us to meet her there. However, the morning we were to leave, as I was taking Eddie to the vet for boarding, I got an uneasy feeling that we had not made sufficient contingency plans. So I did something I rarely do — I called Mom while I was driving.

My car is manual transmission, aka stick shift. I need two hands to drive. There is no third hand available for the cell phone. So I called while sitting at what is normally a lengthy stop light.

“If something goes wrong, we’ll use Aunt Joyce as the switchboard,” I said.

“Why can’t I call you?” Mom asked.

“Because the voice mail on my cell phone doesn’t always work,” I said.

“Why?” Mom asked.

“Just trust me and don’t leave a message,” I said as the light turned and I had to make a left turn with a cellphone wedged between my ear and shoulder.

“But that’s not right,” Mom said.

HONK!!!! went the car behind me as I failed to put on my turn signal for the next sharp left I had to make.

“FUCK YOU!!” I yelled into the phone, meaning the driver, not Mom, which I had to explain once I was parked at the vet’s.

So we’re off to a good start already. I left my dubious Mom with instructions to call Aunt Joyce if there were a problem, and I said I would do the same.

Part One

Those carefully scheduled arrival times I mentioned above? They didn’t happen.

Dave and I were flying on Frontier, which is currently at the top of my list of Airlines I Don’t Hate Right Now. The day before, I did online check-in for the two of us because that’s the kind of thing I do.

Here is why online check-in is important: Say, hypothetically, you’ve booked a flight from Washington to Salt Lake City with a transfer to a connecting flight in Denver first. And say, hypothetically, that your flight to Denver is delayed 3 1/2 hours due to a mechanical problem. Under this hypothetical scenario, if you have checked in online, the airline may automatically rebook you on another connecting flight, maybe even on another airline, so that you do not have to stand in line with the teeming masses and figure this out at the airport. Which is what happened — we didn’t have to stand in line, because Frontier rebooked our second flight before we even arrived at the airport.

So thanks, Frontier Airlines and whoever came up with online check-in! Also, thanks for the two $50 vouchers, which are around here somewhere because I haven’t thrown out a single piece of paper since we left, although I will confess that I don’t actually know where the vouchers are. But I have them. Somewhere.

This begins a round of trying to contact Mom. As it will turn out, when we are on the ground, Mom will be in the air, and vice versa. All. Day. Long. So I call Aunt Joyce and tell her what’s happening. She wants to leave messages on my cell phone, however. I tell her no. Why is it that the 70-somethings don’t accept the notion of failed voice mail? Later that day, I spend the better part of an hour talking to my unhelpful carrier, and I still don’t have voice mail on my cell phone. This will be solved, but it wasn’t going to be solved while we were traveling.

Having nothing better to do, Dave and I go to the United counter, which is the airline that now has our second flight, from Denver to Salt Lake, and which is incredibly busy. The man who stands there directing people to his colleagues asks us what we want. Seat assignments, we tell him. He says his colleagues won’t be able to help. I look at them. They are under siege. But we decide to stick around and take our chances. Sure enough, when we do get to an agent, she gives us great seats in Economy Plus, for an extra charge. What do you get in Economy Plus? Nicer seats with extra leg room. I am 5′ 10″ and expecting to put in a 20+ hour day by time we land. Of course we’re going to pay the extra charge, which is only $39 each.

I then call Aunt Joyce, who volunteers to meet Mom at the airport since we won’t be there. It’s a 90-minute drive for her, but she and her husband will do that because otherwise my 76-year-old mother will be stranded.

Hours later, Mom calls my cell phone (and I have several voice messages from her and Joyce on my phone — too bad I can’t get at them) and actually reaches me.

“I’m in baggage claim, where are you?”

“Denver.”

“What?”

“Did you call Joyce?”

“No. Oh, wait, here she is.”

So that part works reasonably well. Dave and I then make reservations for a Hampton Inn near the Salt Lake City airport. Because our flight out of Denver is weathered in for a while, we arrive there just before 2 a.m. With the time change, this comes to a 22-hour day. We are not in the best shape at that point. The Hampton Inn is not all that easy to find, although the guy at the Hertz counter got us fairly close. But it is worth it. The clerk puts us in the quietest room he has open and, mercifully, we sleep. Sort of. If you don’t count Dave’s leg cramp in the middle of the night and my general inability to sleep from having been wired all day long. But eventually, we are something approximating rested, and get up in time for the free breakfast.

Hampton Inn gave us a great room, a better-than-decent free breakfast, and a few hours of sanity when we were desperate, all at a very reasonable price. Thanks, Hampton Inn!

Next up: Aunt Joyce, Sam, and the Idaho Cousins.

(Very) Odds and Ends

It’s another link day — cats, cooking, and common sense healthcare.

First, let’s look at the cats. Specifically, let’s look at 1,000 pictures of cats. Some of these animals are absolutely gorgeous.

As for cooking, a question that comes up now and then — and especially now, in the shaky economy– is whether certain items we consider panty staples are cheaper to make at home than to buy at the grocery store. An article on slate tells us one woman’s experience making bagels, cream cheese, yogurt, jam, crackers, and granola. She evaluates not just cost, but taste. The results might not be what you expect. I know I was surprised by one item in particular.

Finally, there’s common sense in health care, a hot topic these days with our devastatingly expensive “system” and the various thoughts on how to address it. This satire starring Fred Willard gets right to the point.

Does the Dog Die? A Brief Review of A Wild Sheep Chase, by Haruki Murakami

Surrealism usually doesn’t do much for me, and it took a while before I got into this book. But I’m glad I stuck with it, because it’s extremely funny in spots. It’s also hard to describe, but I’ll give it a shot.

An unnamed 20-something Japanese advertising executive inadvertently uses an image of a sheep that has great meaning to some sinister entities. As a result, he’s got to find that sheep! And sheep tend to look alike, although there are a few breed distinctions. (Actually, there are more than a few — check this comprehensive list, complete with pictures, from our helpful friends at Oklahoma State University.) But really, finding a single sheep? Not simple.

So Ad Exec frets about this for a while, at which point his helpful girlfriend gets involved and they take a leisurely approach, even though they only have 30 days total before the dire consequences occur. And weird things happen, and there’s symbolism and self-discovery and growth, blah-de-blah-de-blah. I think this is a good book, but I’m not one to make a sales pitch for surreal literature. Amazon has 113 reviews, 92 of which are 4 star or better. I’ll defer to my fellow readers there. Yeah, I know, I’m supposedly doing book reviews. Some are easier than others, and I don’t get paid to do the hard ones, so I’m punting this time.

As for animals, Ad Exec has a cat for whom he makes arrangements before taking off on his quest, so he’s fine. The cat even has a couple of funny bits. An elderly border collie shows up, to no real effect. And the sheep mill around and act like sheep. Of course they have more complex personalities than most of us realize, but a lot of animals are like that — ciphers until we get to know them. Anyway, this book is entirely SAFE for animal lovers.

Does the Dog Die? A Brief Review of Bachelor Brothers’ Bed & Breakfast, by Bill Richardson

I have to thank my Internet friend, Karen from Nova Scotia, for this little gem. And it’s little–only 152 pages. But it’s packed, with hardly a wasted word and at least one quotable phrase per page. I loved it!

Narrated by 50-something fraternal twins Virgil and Hector and a few of their guests, the book takes us to a remote town on a forested Canadian island, where Virgil and Hector operate a B&B for bibliophiles. In fact, some guests visit simply in order to read Proust without distractions. Some of the stories are sad, some wildly hilarious. For example, there’s the man whose office goes on a retreat (is there anything so vile as the office retreat?), leaving him in the woods to talk to the trees — one of which orders him to “get the hell out!” Then there’s the ne’er-do-well cousin who, after an epiphany, “spent the rest of his days, and the rest of his income, traveling the world, seeking out musical eggcups. He picked them up in Istanbul and Paris, in Geneva and Beirut.” Waffle, the brothers’ cat, and Mrs. Rochester, the parrot they inherited from their mother, hunt mice together, with Mrs. Rochester calling “kittykittykitty” when she spots one. I laughed out loud about every other page.

This is great book for animal lovers. Mrs. Rochester has one salty phrase in her vocabulary, which she uses at some of the most inopportune moments. There are also some very happy chickens, a music-critic Pekingese named Valentine, and a vast assortment of other pets. The only sad thing that happens is a brief mention of a parrot — not Mrs. Rochester — who died elsewhere. Plus, Waffle is a mighty huntress of small prey. But I have no qualms about recommending this book as SAFE for animal lovers, including and maybe especially bird lovers. Enjoy!

Pigs, Baseball Players, and Cats

We need a break from the book reviews. So here is a video about Tammy Hann Harlan, the Appalachian Pig Lady. I’m privileged to call her my friend.

These college baseball players had a dance-off at a tournament during a rain delay, and it’s pretty funny. It starts off slow, but I was laughing out loud by the middle. Never underestimate the capacity of young guys to be goofy.

And, from my own computer archives, here are some sayings about cats:

“There is no snooze button on a cat who wants breakfast.” _Anonymous

“Cats are smarter than dogs. You can’t get eight cats to pull a sled through snow.” _ Jeff Valdez

 ”In a cat’s eye, all things belong to cats.” _ English proverb

 ”One cat just leads to another.” _ Ernest Hemingway

 ”Dogs come when they’re called; cats take a message and get back to you later.” _ Mary Bly

 ”Cats are rather delicate creatures and they are subject to a good many ailments, but I never heard of one who suffered from insomnia.” _ Joseph Wood Krutch

 ”People that hate cats, will come back as mice in their next life.” _ Faith Resnick

“I have studied many philosophers and many cats. The wisdom of cats is infinitely superior.” _ Hippolyte Taine

 ”There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.” _ Albert Schweitzer

 ”The cat has too much spirit to have no heart.” _ Ernest Menaul

 ”Time spent with cats is never wasted.” _ Colette

 ”Some people say that cats are sneaky, evil, and cruel. True, and they have many other fine qualities as well.” _ Missy Dizick

 ”You will always be lucky if you know how to make friends with strange cats.” _ Colonial American proverb

 ”Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want.” _ Joseph Wood Krutch

 ”Cats aren’t clean, they’re just covered with cat spit.” _ John S. Nichols

Lastly, some business: For the rest of this month, my blogging will not occur on anything resembling a regular schedule. In July, I will likely go back to my usual Wednesday and Saturday postings.

Does the Dog Die? A Brief Review of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

Recommended for my book group and long on my reading list, this book was quite enjoyable even though it had a few elements of those insufferably twee British novels that are over-stuffed with eccentrics behaving cutely. Yes, there were eccentrics behaving cutely. But I sensed a moderating hand — thanks, moderating hand! — and in the end, the book was more what I’d call “easily accessible historical fiction” than anything else. I guess that means it’s also a beach book. Well, it’s out in paperback now and it’s beach season, so have at it! In other words, yes, I’m recommending this book.

“Guernsey” is told through a series of letters to or from writer Juliet Ashton, a young woman seeking purpose in post-WWII London. And many of Juliet’s correspondents are from Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands. The Nazis captured and occupied the Channel Islands, but not until after many of the children were sent to other parts of England. What followed were complex interactions among the locals and the Nazis, struggles to survive in the face of blockades by both sides of the war, and the ethical dilemmas that resulted. This is where the twee dies in the face of the poignant. Before Churchill relented and allowed Red Cross ships to provide crucial supplies, the islands were denuded of trees in order to provide fuel, the residents and occupiers nearly starved, and most of the pets were euthanized (and farm animals killed for meat) in order to preserve resources that the people needed. The authors give a strong sense of courage in a desperate situation, but the book stays about as light as is possible given the circumstances. And in the end, twee rises to live again and everyone who’s still around goes on to live happily ever after, or something like that. Please don’t be put off by my cynical tone — I loved this book, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it, and I give it my highest recommendation. I just thought the occasional twee moments were kind of odd.

As for animals, I already mentioned that most of the pets had to be put down in order to keep them from eating food the already-starving people needed to survive. Each family was allowed to keep one, but no more. Exceptions existed for egg-laying poultry and, in the book, birds were better off than other species. For example, intrepid parrot Zenobia captures a villain.

But the mass euthanasia breaks my heart. It would be a terrible situation for a pet owner, and yet from a logical standpoint, it had to be done. War is violent, and animals do not receive a special dispensation even though they are innocent bystanders. There is also a sad moment where the “pig whisperer” kills the last one after having scratched its back in a friendly way. Feral cats and dogs fared no better. And there are a couple of other mentions of harm coming to specific animals.

After much thought, I am going to declare this book MOSTLY SAFE for animal lovers. The actions against animals are much more told than described, and you’ll know from reading this review if the mass euthanasia would be too much for you. It’s important to remember the consequences of war, I think, and this was one of them. Otherwise, the book is a delight, and most people will enjoy it.

Does the Dog Die? A Brief Review of Lucia, by Andrea De Robilant

I think it would be fun to discover a scandalous — or even interesting — ancestor and then write a book about that person. Andrea di Robilant has done just that by telling the story of Lucia Mocenigo, his great-great-great-great-grandmother. By virtue of being married to Alvise Mocenigo, of a powerful Venetian family, Lucia traveled across Europe and witnessed such events as Napoleon’s conquest of Venice, as well as his defeat in 1814.

Lucia herself had some compelling traits: she was determined at her core, her devotion to her sister and her son drove many of her actions, and she certainly didn’t lack opinions. She was also insecure and a bit of a nag in my opinion, which didn’t help her marriage to the perpetually philandering Alvise. It was clearly a marriage of convenience, but that was a message she seemed to have missed. Still, she showed elements of being a strong, independent woman when not fretting about her family. For example, after Alvise ordered her to take charge of one of his rural properties, Lucia raised pigs and sheep, which I found remarkable for a woman who had previously spent her entire life in the city. In fact, she and Alvise quarreled when she decided to raise cattle as well. Later, while hovering over her adult son and his disturbingly controlling tutor in Paris, she took up the study of biology, chemistry, and other sciences at de Jardin des Plantes, working with esteemed professors to achieve a certificate in botany. Lucia had an intense affair with Austrian military officer, rented much of her home to Lord Byron in a tempestuous landlord/tenant relationship, and generally showed a knack for being wherever history was made. Despite her missteps with Alvise, I found her shoulder a lively perch from which to view the fall of Venice and other Napoleonic era events. If you read history books at all, I recommend this one.

As for the treatment of animals in the book, I will toss out my usual caveat that as times change, so do attitudes towards animals — and we treat them better than our predecessors, as a rule. Horses, being a mode of transportation first and foremost, were viewed as somewhat expendable, for example. They also died on the battlefield along with the men who rode them. However, these situations are merely mentioned, not portrayed, so I am going to declare this book SAFE for animal lovers.

Does the Dog Die? A Brief Review of The Hamilton Case, by Michelle de Kretser – and a Discourse on Blogging

This book made me confront what I’m dealing with in writing this blog. Specifically, my “hook” is that I do book reviews for animal lovers. Most people end up here for other reasons, but I try to be consistent. There are about 84 billion blogs out there — I always wanted mine to have a theme, it does, and I’m sticking with it.

So what do I really mean by “book reviews for animal lovers”? I try to review books on two levels: is it good, and would it upset someone who doesn’t like to read about violence to animals or upsetting story arcs involving animals? Now, one of the reasons I chose that theme is because I don’t like those books myself. And I read a lot, at least one book a week, often two, so I’m a good person to screen those books out for others.

But — and this is really important in my review of The Hamilton Case — I have to repeat: I am disturbed by violence to animals and upsetting story arcs involving animals. Usually, I can mentally sift through disturbing treatment of animals in a book and address the book’s overall quality. In this case, I cannot.

Yes, I recognize that most people would like this book for the writing, the setting, the character development, the twists, etc., etc. There are even some beautiful passages incorporating appreciation of animals. And I agree with the critics who consider the book realistic.

But I didn’t like it. In fact, I intensely disliked it. Not only is it COMPLETELY UNSAFE for animal lovers, but there are also a couple of upsetting images that I can’t get out of my head and would love to. I couldn’t get past that and read the book on another level. So it probably is a good book, but I can’t recommend it.

As is often the case with such books, the people don’t fare so well, either. But, as I noted, the point of this blog is the treatment of animals in the book. And The Hamilton Case fails that test severely.