Raisins

I once asked my Mom why she didn't like raisins very much and she said that she had a cookie once that she thought was chocolate chip and it was really oatmeal raisin.  And that she has never forgiven those raisins.

So it's really a pity that I can't show this to her.

Ann's daughter, part 2

I am still my mother's daughter.  If looking pretty much like photocopy of her doesn't make that case, then there's always how I spent today.

We got about 12 inches of snow last night, so ...

I got up this morning on time,
had breakfast,
checked on-line to see if Ride-On* was running (no),
shoveled out my car,
tried to sell the kid near me who was helping his Dad on the moral imperative of cleaning off the top of the car (with illustrative anecdote), and
went back upstairs and changed into dry pants.

Then I made real hot chocolate with milk, **
enjoyed it while listening to public radio,
put on coat, scarf, hat, and gloves, and
walked to work.***

Pretty much every single item on that list comes right out of the Ann Snow Day Handbook.  One time, when Sara and I were kids, there was a snow day on the day we had a dentist's appointment.  So instead of rescheduling, letting us sleep late, making French Toast, and playing board games, Mom rousted us out of bed before our normal get up time because Mom made 8:00 dentist appointments and, because our dead-end street didn't get plowed very often made us walk the mile and a half through the snow to our appointment. ****

I'm pretty sure that it was uphill both ways, too.  Mom had lots of hardy pioneer spirit.

She would have been so proud of me today. *****



* The county run bus system.

** Mom wasn't a fan of processed foods.  Among the things that Sara and I loved that Mom hated were Pop-Tarts, tubes of raw cookie dough, and Swiss Miss.  Once, in an effort to lure us away from the grey powder, she made us "instant cocoa" from powered milk, powdered sugar, and cocoa.  The fact that we thought that it was "good but not Swiss Miss" and "kinda weird" probably gave her a real nice warm glow inside.

*** So that I didn't lose my good parking space.  It's easier to walk a mile in this weather than it is to get over losing the space one has shoveled out.

**** It can safely be assumed that I am still outraged by this.  

***** Of course, she would also be very confused because as I remember any shoveling that she asked me or Sara to do -- or anything else that even hinted of hardy pioneer spirit -- made us complain loudly and piercingly or quietly and sullenly.  Probably me more than Sara.  She had at least some hardy pioneer spirit.  

Lagavulin

I was given a bottle of Lagavulin 16-year-old for Christmas.  I hadn't opened it yet because I've been finishing the bland-but-pleasant Concannon (Irish Whisky) that I had bought for myself, largely because I liked the name.

And often trying something new because you like the name is fine.  You might end up with something you love.  I found a wine that I love that way.*

Lagavulin not only has a cool name, but the back of the box has marketing educational text which I reproduce here, for the pronunciation help if nothing else.

And tonight I'll give it a try while I continue to read Last Call, Daniel Okrent's fascinating look at Prohibition.


*I can't actually remember the name, but I remember the label, so I'm sure there will be more of it in the house soon.  

Lagavulin 

Many believe that this is one of the oldest distillery sites in Scotland.  In 1816 local farmer and distiller John Johnston founded the first legal distillery here at Lagavulin (pronounced Laga - voolin, after the Gaelic Laggan Mhouillin, "the hollow where the mill is"). 

Today, the four onion-shaped stills at Lagavulin are neatly tucked into a whitewashed jumble of buildings by the sea on Islay's (pronounced Eye - la) rocky southern shore, guarded by the imposing ruin of Dunyvaig Castle. 

There's  nothing hurried about life on Islay or about dark, intense Lagavulin, which receives the slowest distillation of any Islay malt, then spends sixteen years in old oak casks before being bottled. 

Pungent and potent, this is the great Islay malt.  With richly peaty, deep, smoky flavours, it has an intense, long, ambrosial finish. 

Lagavulin is the majestic Islay destination on a journey around Scotland's six malt whisky making regions.  The other Classic Malts are:
Glenkinchie - Lowland
Dalwhinnie - Highland
Cragganmore - Speyside
Talisker - Island
Oban - Western Highland

See?  Now I feel like I've learned something.

Scheduling

Whenever Mary Ann would ask me to direct for the children's theater, I'd always ask for the June slot because that's when my theater year is usually least active.  Looks like I'm not the only person who thinks that way.  From a New York Times ArtsBeat piece on Linda Lavin agreeing to be in Nicky Silver's new play Too Much Sun:

Whether Ms. Lavin would like the play was only one potential hitch. There was also the question of whether she would be busy filming episodes of the sitcom “Sean Saves the World.” Mr. Silver took a gamble on that. 

“When I was talking with Vineyard about doing the play,” Mr. Silver said, “I asked for the last slot in the season, because that would be hiatus time. It’s hard to cast plays in New York with TV going on, but that last slot is always your friend.”

My people*

I am German and English on my Mom's side and English and Irish on my Dad's side.  So I am one quarter German, half English, and one quarter Irish.  Nonetheless, I ascribe 90% of what I am and what I do to either my German background or my Irish background.

As I never wear socks with sandals and never would, I don't tend to attribute any of my character or behavior to being of English descent.



"9 Chickweed Lane" by Brooke McEldowney

*The Germans, not the Nazis.  Just ... thought I'd clarify that.

The bisque is recommended

Fenner also spent a few years in Washington, working for the Justice Department, and he shared quite a few meals there with John E. Smith, a lawyer from Atchison, Kansas, not far down the Missouri River from St. Jo, who was then working for Senator Dole and later became the house attorney of an Omaha trucking company.  Fenner still likes to talk to Smith about eating in Washington - the Cuban food at the Omega and the Middle Eastern food at the Calvert Cafe and the chili at Hazel's Texas Chili Parlor.  Fenner believes that Hazels' recipe was so secret that she carried it with her to the grave, although some other Washington eaters believe that it was handed down intact to a man with a tattoo, and still others believe that it was not the sort of recipe anyone would have to guard very closely.*  Fenner's favorite restaurant in the Washington area was the renowned Silver Spring fish house called Crisfield Seafood Restaurant.  He misses practically everything about Crisfield's. 

"They know how to treat children," I heard him say once. 

"They know how to treat oysters," said Morisseau, who did some eating in Washington himself.**

My Dad used to have lunch at Crisfield's pretty often because it was just a few blocks up Georgia Avenue from Hopkins APL where he worked, but I have an even better connection to Trillin's paragraph:  Two of the people who "knew how to treat children" at Crisfield's were Ned and Nancy, my friend Mollie's parents.  Ned ran the raw bar and Nancy ran the cash register and you'll never meet two nicer people.

I got to know them during the years that Mollie and I were housemates and during part of that time Mollie was the day care provider / favorite aunt / playmate for then babies and later toddlers, Charles and Samantha. Mollie's folks are the kids adopted grandparents and even though Ned and Nancy have retired to North Carolina, the families are still close with lots of visiting.  They do know how to treat children.



*Crisfield's is still open in the same location.  Omega closed after a fire.  The Calvert Cafe was renamed Mama Ayesha's in 1994 after its founder Mama Ayesha Abraham, who died in 1993.  It's still be run by her family.  And Hazel's Texas Chili Parlor is also closed but is the gastronomic mother, if not legal entity parent, of chili parlor chain Hard Times.  This article from DC's City Paper tells the fascinating story.

**Alice, Let's Eat by Calvin Trillin.  Page 122 in the 1978 copy of the Vintage Books paperbook I have.

Typical work email

From our receptionist who has had to put up with me for nearly 15 years:

From: [the front desk]
Sent: Friday, February 07, 2014 3:31 PM
To: Leta
Subject: Boxes in mailroom

My reply:

From: Leta
Sent: Friday, February 07, 2014 3:43 PM
To: [the front desk]
Subject: RE: Boxes in mailroom

Thank goodness.  I was afraid the kittens wouldn't get here before the weekend.

Can’t believe the vendor forgot the air holes *again.*

Hey, do we have a litter box anywhere around here?

Inclement Weather Policy

I asked my boss and he confirmed that this is, indeed, the basis of our Corporate Inclement Weather Policy:

On May 19, 1780, an unexplained, near-total darkness fell over much of New England, at midday. The more superstitious believed that doomsday had come. In New Haven, Connecticut, Colonel Abraham Davenport spoke out against adjourning the town council on account of the darkness. He said: "I am against adjournment. The day of judgment is either approaching or it is not. If it is not, there is no cause for adjournment. If it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. I wish, therefore, that candles may be brought."

My Civic Duty

By the time I reached the Age of Majority in Maryland I was a tax payer, with a vehicle registered with the MVA, and registered to vote.  In Maryland, one is (or was, at the time I first became eligible) eligible* to serve on a jury once every three years.  Montgomery County is (or was, I should check this**) a one-day or one trial jurisdiction, unless one is chosen for Grand Jury service, which is three months, once a week, usually on Thursdays.  

So my history of being called for jury duty looks like this:

In my 20s:  

-  I got a summons for Jury Duty, showed up at the court house, and found that the only possible trial for that day had just settled, so we were released.  Time spent doing my civic duty:  about 15 minutes.

-  Three years later I got a summons for Jury Duty, showed up at the court house with a bad cold, a box of Kleenex, and cough medicine.  Dozed in a chair until we were released around noon.  Time spent being on site and willing to do my civic duty:  3-ish hours.

-  Three years later I got a summons for July Duty, showed up at the court house, and was part of a group chosen to be interviewed for selection.  It was a robbery case and I had had my purse snatched a few years previously, so I was dismissed. 

In my 30s:

-  Three years later?  No summons.  

And none ever since.

Frankly, I was beginning to wonder what they thought was wrong with me.  I'm pleasant, I know how to dress for a grown up occasion, what?  

So, even though I figured that I would get a bureaucratic run-around, I called the Jury Office for Montgomery County.***  Phone was promptly picked up by an actual person who was delighted to help me.

She looked me up.  And just like Gopher in Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree, I wasn't in the book.  It seems that Montgomery County thought that I had moved out of their jurisdiction.  I said that, no, I've lived here a long time.****  

And so the nice lady put me back in the system and mailed me an invitation to complete a Juror Questionnaire (Do you live here?  Are you a criminal?  Can you read this questionnaire?  Are you old and possibly demented?).  I've completed the questionnaire and now and waiting to once again join the folks who are entitled to decide the fates of others.  I won't get to stand up and yell  "You're out of order!You're out of order! The whole trial is out of order! They're out of order!"*****

In fact, I won't get to say anything in the courtroom, probably.  But as a big fan of our civil liberties and the documents on which they are based that speak so highly of the right to a trial by a jury of one's peers, I am happy to be given the chance to be one of those peers.

Truly.  The joke is that one's fate is decided by 12 people too dumb to get out of jury duty, but is that really what we want?  

I'll be checking my mail!



*This is one of those times where I agree with the bureaucratic language.  Serving on a jury truly is a privilege and one is "eligible" to receive privileges.  

** I checked. All of these are still the case.  

*** David's reaction when I told him that I outed myself to the Jury Office:  "You *called* the Jury ....  Huh..."

**** So it wasn't me, it was them.

***** Come on.  Al Pacino in And Justice for All, of course.

Useful skills

Me:  So Malinda was telling us that she had to go online to figure out how to tie a noose.*  And I told her that I figured that out one night when I was backstage with some rope and some free time.

David:  Huh.  Well.  I guess I'll sleep better tonight knowing that you don't have any rope in this room.

Me:  Oh, that's okay.  I can use always use the tie to your bathrobe.  Or the drawstring from my pajama bottoms.

David:  .....

*For the gifts from the cast to the director and staff of The Pillowman at Silver Spring Stage.  They gave each of us an adorable stuff hedgehog with a noose around its neck.

A note on the text

“Were there many changes?”
“The play was very much what it was when it was first sent to him. All those scenes were there, the same flow of the play. But he would tweak the beats, and he'd shape the sequences within the scenes.”

“How interested was he in the actors being faithful to his dialogue?”
“Oh, it's not even a question. I think everyone in the room understands that the language the playwright uses is not just the broad ideas. That there can be as much meaning in the syntax, or in the rhythms the playwright has written, as in the broader meanings of the theme. There was never any kind of 'we’ll improvise something here.'” 

On rare occasions Margulies would solicit advice from the actors.

“Did he accept your suggestions?” “He definitely responded to, but it was not like anyone ever went in and said, 'Listen, Donald, this is what I want to say here.'” 

Arye Gross talking about creating the role of Ira in "Brooklyn Boy" for Donald Margulies.

http://www.jewish-theatre.com/visitor/article_display.aspx?articleID=1260

And PS:

“How was working with Dan Sullivan? How did he work with you on your character?”
“You’d just start going through the text, and he’d say 'Why don't you come in from this area over here?' He'd never tell you exactly what to do, but just a couple of broad strokes. And then as rehearsals progressed -- I think after two weeks -- we did a run through of the play. And Dan maybe gave each of us two or three notes. And you'd think ‘I'm doing so much, he only has these comments?’ And you start to wonder, well, maybe he doesn’t like me, he doesn't think I'm good enough that it's worth commenting on. But what you realize throughout the process is that his direction is -- he sculpts. You can do the whole play, and the only note will be 'You know, these two lines that you have, you're putting a little pause in between. Pull those right together.' And when I put these two lines together, boy, you find that one little adjustment is having a subtle shift on some kind of undertone in the scene. Or he'll give a little physical note that suddenly propels you into an entirely deeper meaning.” Dan’s style with the physical staging is similar, Gross explains. “For the most part, there's not a lot of work on staging, unless there's a problem. And then he's making a visual composition, a balance of where the audience’s eye will go, and who they should be looking at in a scene. I think Dan is a masterful director.” 

Check and check

Only in community theater --

My "to do" list for today includes the following:

1.  Scrounge empty cigarette packs.  Preferably of non-girly cigarettes.  (Check!)

2.  Fall down. (Check!)

Now back to the real world...

We're moving; I'm not moving

My office is moving from Silver Spring to Crystal City.

And I've been thinking a lot about where I should live, based on what this will do to my commute.  Friends suggested relocating to Virginia.  

So I did some poking around on line for apartments.  The move is not until March, but it never hurts to look.  And I found a place in Arlington that was kinda do-able.

But.  And it's a big but ... *

I can't shake the belief that moving to Virginia and letting my tax dollars go to Richmond would send a signal that I most adamantly don't want to send. 

In Maryland there is Marriage Equality.  In Virginia, there isn't.

In Maryland, capital punishment is rarely applied** and is being considered for abolishment because it is the second most unfairly applied form of punishment in the US.  (Crack vs. powder cocaine is the first.*** )  Virginia's execution rate per capita is 4th in the nation (after Oklahoma, Texas, and ... Delaware).****  

I just can't bring myself to appear to "vote with my feet" that I am for the death penalty and against marriage equality.  

I'm not against the death penalty in all cases and think that it can be a good prosecutorial bargaining chip but it hasn't been proven to be a deterrent, it's really expensive, and it's applied with unsupportable amounts of bias.

I'm very much for marriage equality.  Enough so that I actually wrote to politicians supporting it. Writing to politicians is just asking to be put on solicitation lists which I hate.

Enough so that I bought a special license plate to say so.

I am for marriage equality because I am for equality.  And I'm for love.  And families.

"But your vote would count in Virginia!"  people like to say.  

My vote in Maryland helped pass marriage equality.  All my friends' votes in Virginia didn't stop a law writing homophobia into their constitution.

We are moving our offices to Virginia (among other reasons) because it is "business friendly" but I'm staying in Maryland because it is human friendly.

* ... pause for TWSS ...

** 5 people in 35 years, 25th state per capita with a per 10,000 rate of .0009.  HT to Death Penalty Info

*** IMHO

**** 108 people in 35 years (second only to Texas w 472) and a per 10K rate of .188

How to make my brain bigger

I took a class in finance via Coursera a few months ago.  Why?  Because I thought that learning something about what my boss knows very well and deals with all the time would help me do my job a little better.  And because learning stuff for free on the internet?  Totes awesome!

My class was taught by Gautam Kaul of the University of Michigan.  Yep, I was an "enrolled" student at the University of Michigan for a semester!  And (ahem) Princeton for my world history class.

Here's the course description:  This course is primarily devoted to the fundamental principles of valuation. We will learn and apply the concepts of time value of money and risk to understand the major determinants of value creation. We will use both theory and real world examples to demonstrate how to value any asset. 

I loved that class.  And worked my butt off.  I found myself repeatedly saying something I do not actually ever remember saying while I going to University of Maryland on my father's dime: I'd really love to, but I can't -- I have homework to do.  I skipped fun stuff to do finance problems sets (and later to write history papers); I chose watching videos of Professor Kaul and his electronic whiteboard over watching sit-coms or reading; and I pounded ideas about present value and future value into my head*.

It was really fun (no, really, it was) and it made my brain a little bigger.  There's still lots of room for brain expansion so I'm going to take some more courses.

Introduction to Finance taught me the following:

1.  The world runs on algebra;****

2.  Finance is algebra with dollar signs;

3.  Finance includes statistics;

4.  Statistics for finance is algebra with dollar signs in Greek.

Oh, and ...

5.  Net present value.

All the rest was commentary.


* To wit:  money now is always better than money later; compounding is the strongest force in the universe after duct tape**; and how to calculate payments versus total cost.***  

**Okay, I actually already knew that one.

***Which means that I will never be at the mercy of a salesman's calculations about what something will cost me.  I can figure it out on my own!!

****As a collateral benefit, I now understand Algebra better than when I was actually taking it in high school.  Sort of the way that taking French greatly improved my knowledge of English grammar.

Out of one, many

Although I've been to New Zealand twice, I didn't go to church while I was there.  The first time wasn't over a weekend (I think) and the second time ... I just didn't.  Which is rather too bad because if I had spent a morning with a congregation of the Anglican Church in Aetearoa, New Zealand, and Polynesia* I could have been part of the communal responses in  the liturgy.  However, this past Sunday I got the chance to make up for that.  

This is from our church bulletin:  "The revelation of Jesus as Lord and Savior was first made known to the wise men, but from there, spread to all corners of the word.  To mark this, our liturgy during the season of Epiphany will come from a different corner of the world:  New Zealand. At our 10:30 service, the confession, absolution, Eucharistic prayer and post-communion prayer come from our sister Anglican Church in Aetearoa, New Zealand, and Polynesia."  

I've missed church for the past few weeks for one reason or another and I'll be out again this weekend for a family funeral, but I greatly enjoyed the chance to recite the familiar ideas in a  new way.  A kind of foreign exchange.  And I'll be happy to return to the familiar phrasing as well.**

The confession:  Merciful God, we have sinned in what we have thought and said, in the wrong we have done and in the good we have not done. We have sinned in ignorance; we have sinned in weakness; we have sinned through our own deliberate fault.  We are truly sorry.  We repent and turn to you.  Forgive us, for our Savior Christ's sake, and renew our lives to the glory of your name. Amen.

The absolution: Through the cross of Christ, God have mercy on you, pardon and set you free.  Know that you are forgiven and be at peace.  God strengthen you in all goodness and keep you in life eternal.  Amen. 

The Eucharistic prayer:  
God of past and present,
We your people remember your Son.
We thank you for his cross and rising again,
We take courage from his ascension;
We look for his coming in glory
and in him we give ourselves to you.

The post communion prayer: Father of all, we give you thanks and praise, that when we were far off you met us in your Son and brought us home. Dying and living, he declared your love, gave us grace and opened the gate of glory.  May we who share Christ's body live his risen life; we who drink his cup bring life to others; we whom the Spirit lights give light to the world.  Amen.

I'm rather glad that the Lord's Prayer is consistent across the Anglican Communion.  I'd really miss my mondegreen.



*Aetearoa is the most widely known and accepted Māori name for New Zealand.  It is used by both Māori and non-Māori, and is becoming increasingly widespread in the bilingual names of national organisations.  (per Wikipedia) The full title of the collected Anglican churches in New Zealand is "The Anglican Church in Aetearoa, New Zealand, and Polynesia." (per the Church)

**After all, "wherever you wander, wherever you roam, be happy, and healthy, and glad to come home."

The Parable of my Talents

I am a woman of a few talents.  I can sing some, so I sang in the choir as a teenager and I'm warm and pleasant and very good at saying "Good morning!" while handing people things and "Thank you!" while accepting their money, so I've been an usher for the past several years.

Knowing of my peculiar obsession with interest in theater, I am sometimes approached to direct the Christmas pageant or some variation on it, but I usually get out of that one because Christmas pageant-type anythings usually have enough people in them to set off my conflict alarm.*

There were a couple of talents of mine that the church had left buried in the ground until recently:  I like to read and I like to talk, so certainly I like to read out loud.  The church name for the person who reads out loud is a "lector."**  So, in addition to ushering, I am now a lector, which makes me very happy.

Here's how it works:  Late in the week Steve, who coordinates the lectors, sends a reminder that one is scheduled to read on the coming Sunday.  The reminder includes what one is scheduled to read, with the first lector reading from the Old Testament and the second lector reading from the New.   Beth, the church secretary sends a preview copy of the bulletin and the "Synthesis," which provides context and commentary on the readings and the gospel.  Speaking as someone whose favorite part of the rehearsal process is tablework, I'm really glad to get those.  Makes the reading much less cold.

On the Sundays when I lector (when I lect?) I start the service seated with the Acolytes behind the choir on the Epistle side.  Before church I check that what I am reading has been flagged at the beginning and end of the reading and that my reading is continuous rather than, say, verses 1-3, 9-15, and 18-22.  The person reading Old Testament lesson goes up to the Large And Very Authoritative Looking Bible on the lectern, which also being rather large and authoritative, nearly completely masks the bible, but that's fine as it also masks the Post-It flags.  Anyway, the Old Testament reader, climbs up on the little step-stool (so as to be seen by the congregation over the Large and Authoritative Lectern), turns on the mic and the light, and says "A reading from ________."

We are asked not to bring our bulletins with us to the lectern because it should be clear that we are reading directly from the Bible.***

For some reason most things that have to do with theater do not make me nervous but microphones do.  Maybe it's because I can hear myself talking or maybe it's because everyone should have some odd thing that makes one nervous, but reading a long paragraph in church with the words in front of me to an audience that is mostly paying attention makes me more nervous than anything else I do "on stage."  I think if I'd been told to project to the back of the house and there was no mic I wouldn't be as nervous, but not's not the deal.

And because I am an actor I try to balance how I read.  I want to treat it like a cold reading at an audition and really embody the characters.  But this is not about me. So I don't.  On the other hand, people pay more attention if one doesn't, uhm, drone.

So I do add a little color to my voice here and there and I slightly set of quotes from narrative.  Today, for instance, I read the story of the conception of Samuel (1 Samuel 1:4-20, for those following along at home) and -- to make this a visual -- you can could say that I read it thus:

Therefore Hannah wept and would not eat.  Her husband Elkanah said to her, "Hannah, why do you weep?  Why do you not eat? Why is your heart sad?  Am I not more to you than ten sons?" After they had eaten and drunk at Shiloh, Hannah rose and presented herself before the Lord.

Rather than, say,

Therefore Hannah wept and would not eat.  Her husband Elkanah said to her, 

"Hannah, why do you weep?  Why do you not eat? Why is your heart sad?  Am I not more to you than ten sons?" 

After they had eaten and drunk at Shiloh, Hannah rose and presented herself before the Lord. 

At the end of the reading, the button is "The Word of the Lord" to which the congregation responds "Thanks be to G-d." ****

After the Old Testament reader is finished, he or she (sometimes) turns off the light and (sometimes) turns the pages to the Epistle reading for the convenience of the Epistle reader.  And then one is free to return to one's seat in the congregation "with the satisfying feeling that one's duty has been done."*****

One day the church will figure out how to benefit from another of my talents:  my multi-gallon per day capacity for a nice, hot cups of tea.


*As the number of people in a cast grows, the likely number of times you'll have the entire cast together diminishes.  So I try never to direct anything with a cast larger than eight.

** The name for the kind of reading out loud that David does is called "being a volunteer."  He reads textbooks and such out loud for an organization that provides spoken versions of written material to the blind and others with reading challenges.  They are called Learning Ally and would happily accept a donation.

*** It is clear that most of the congregation is following along in their bulletins because of the page-turning noise that happens at some point in one of the day's readings.

**** One time I got up there and halfway through the reading, I suddenly couldn't remember the button, even though I have heard it and responded to it for decades and have said it as a lector several times.  But I am actor and so I told myself silently -- as I was reading out loud -- what I tell myself on stage when I start to worry about a line from another scene:  "Do not worry about that line.  Say your next line.  When it is time for that line, it will come to you."  And it did.

***** W.S. Gilbert, The Gondoliers.  Of course.

It really comes in handy

I was at the quarterly meeting of my investment club today and our hostess is Orthodox Jewish.  The topic of carrying during the Sabbath ("what about your children?  Can you carry them?") came up and so my friend was explaining that some Jewish communities create what she described as a sort of fence to enclose, say a neighborhood, and make carrying acceptable within that space.

"Oh," I said, "an eruv?"

My friend's jaw dropped and she said "You know that?!"

Her equally stunned husband said "How do you know that?"

"Public radio." 

"Huh," said the husband, "maybe they shouldn't be defunded."

Lucky Wil, Lucky Leta

Wil Wheaton captures pretty much exactly how I feel when I get to work on a good show which happens to me more often than is truly fair.  

I would get out of my car and nearly run in the door for rehearsals for August: Osage County this past spring and I am counting down the hours minutes until I can get back in "the room" for Farragut North.

"And I know I keep saying it, but I’ll say it again: this is awesome. I get to work with people I love making a show that I’m proud of ..."

A sign

... that perhaps I've been spending too much time in pubs with my theater pals:  I got an email and the screen name was Bill W.

My new role model

Herman Cain is largely incoherent and self-aggrandizing which makes him to great fun to read.  Okay, to very rarely read.  Like this one interview, which is all I've seen in a while.  For which I am grateful.

But anyway ...

Have you and Romney had contact since you suspended your campaign?We have chatted about, No. 1, what my interests are going forward [in terms of being part of his Administration]. And I said, “Governor Romney, with all due respect, I’m not lookin’ for a job. I don’t want to be your VP pick, and I don’t want to be a Cabinet member. Because I’ve got other things in my career that I’m interested in doing.”

Did he ask you about those posts in particular?No. I just volunteered that information. I don’t know what he was thinking … No 2., I gave him some advice on sharpening his message. And he has taken a lot of that advice. Last week he rolled out his energy policy. I loved it. It was a five-point plan. And he even said to me, “Notice, I’m starting to use a number-point plan.”

I love that Mr. Cain "answered" a question he hadn't been asked and then used that answer to self-promote. This is definitely something to try in the future and I suppose the answers have to be addressed to people to whom one could plausibly have spoken.

F'rinstance:

No:

"And I said, 'Johnny Depp, although I am very flattered, I'm not running off to Geneva, Switzerland with you.  I have other things in my life that I'm interested in doing.' "

Yes:

"And I said, '[name of director I like working with], although it is very tempting, I cannot let you give me first refusal on the best roles in all your future shows.  My calendar is pretty crowded as it is and we should allow others to think that they have a chance."

Note that the idea doesn't have to be plausible, just the supposed offerer.  

Read more: http://swampland.time.com/2012/08/27/qa-herman-cain-isnt-looking-for-a-job-from-romney-but-he-has-a-few-pointers/#ixzz24lUnvjTl