Strange bathroom bedfellows

Except for the kitchen, I would guess our home’s bathrooms are just about the most important places we can occupy. Oh sure a comfy bed is important but I can sleep almost anywhere when I sweep the peanut shells away. But after I’ve jostled that gut-harbored chili dog in the car all day or just double chugged a 2 liter bottle of soda , that white-tiled echo chamber is my true sanctuary.

Of course the odd things you find in a bathroom are not all organic. I recently found my wife’s freakish pairing of technology in a nail clipper with a tiny built-in light and a giant magnifying glass. While I understand that along with Ol’ Susanna, we geezers in training have been around the bend a few times, I have to be honest, I don’t want to see any giant toe parts and ‘3D’ finger nails all 'sunshiny' bright in my face’!

Can somebody also explain to me the allure of having nose tissues with built-in goo in them? These ‘Puff’ brand facial tissues seem to be very proud of the fact that they have some kind of lotion woven inside the tissue fabric. Gee, silly me - I thought the whole purpose of Kleenix was to get the wet stuff off my nose, not put it on?

Finally, the showers in my house have phones built-in to the wall. I am not sure why this was a good idea originally but doesn’t everyone think that Ma Bell is all wet? Even assuming that I WANT to take down a message while washing my hair, I never can find anywhere to stick my pencil!

Manual labor

Well my long holiday break is near its end. It was nice while it lasted but the rest of the world wants to get back to work so I must oblige as well. I don’t want to give the union folks any ideas but it seems if they would delay reporting to work on January 2nd to make stuff, then I would have nothing to buy and could sleep in another few days or so.

While Christmas was lovely, I will have to say the weather was a constant concern. No I did not have any real problems but it was always on my mind. I typically travel a lot this time of year so dodging storms and wondering which airports would remain open is a bit of a chore. Snow seemed to follow me around this year but luckily I avoided direct contact. My car did get frozen to the parking lot however which was fun and a freak tornado messed up some houses on my way home but other than that the mayhem was minimal.

The after Christmas ritual was that I finally settled in to read all the instruction manuals for the piles of consumer goods traded over the season. Like most men, I refuse to read any instructions upon unpacking. But UNLIKE most guys, eventually I actually look forward to digging into the pages of those diminutive little ‘how to’ books. I don’t know if it is the compact size, the colorful photos, or the poorly translated English that intrigues me so.

This year the instruction manuals were more work than usual though. Every book now is printed in a variety of languages. Some pages have each paragraph switching between French, English, Spanish, and Chinese, while others have books within books for each respective language. I cannot tell you how disappointing it is to sit down with an instruction manual that should be 50 pages of sleep-inducing reading, only to find that a mere 5 pages is in your native tongue.

Geez I can’t get to sleep in only 5 pages of a tiny little book – what are these manufacturers thinking. I need at least 10 pages of instructions just to allow my mind to wander a bit and another 10 to get drowsy. I guess I need to buy more complicated toys next Christmas but these LEGOS manuals are just so darned interesting and colorful too. My New Year resolution is to learn to read ‘How to’ manuals in at least 4 languages. After all how hard can it be? … all I need to know 4 colors and when to push and when to pull!

‘Simpleton’ is Best!

I have a genuine affection for technology. Now I am not just referring to high end computers or fancy robo-gizmos, but the ordinary household hardware too. You know the stuff, it’s that fancy schmancy cyclonic suction vacuum, computerized toaster, or the fridge with an in-the-door internet monitor. Now just because I like the stuff does not mean I have a big enough vault to own most of these high-end appliances. Besides, I never have been a huge fan of mixing extreme vibration, cold, heat, or humidity with new-age electronics – that’s NASA’s job. When you want stuff to work – simple is best!

Now the exception to that rule is my coffee maker. Since I have never joined the ranks of the Starbucks set, my family makes sure I have a top notch computerized coffee appliance always at the ready. Actually they are less concerned with the coffee’s flavor quality as much as providing a ‘foolproof’ maker that I cannot find a way to screw up and make a mess. I have somewhat of a storied history of abusive relationships and bad break-ups with bargain-brand coffee machines.

Normal, less costly coffee makers, once switched on, simply pump hot water to a filter cup containing ground coffee and on into a decanter below. If you forget to put a cover down or slip the decanter into its slot, the machine doesn’t care – as punishment for your stupidity, it just shoots water, coffee, or grounds in any ol’ direction. My Cuisanart Grind and Brew is like a smart but stubborn mule. If I forget to put the filter hatch down, leave a grinder cover off, or neglect to seat the decanter properly, the pot will ‘beep’ incessantly in protest. The real test is to figure out what all that beeping means but usually it is obvious – the operator is a simpleton.

As much as I genuinely love my genius coffee donkey, I noted a newer and more sophisticated java brewer recently called the ‘Tassimo Brewbot’. Now the machine looks pretty nifty but I have to object to the advertising for this creepy little computerized beast. The Madison Avenue marketeers for some reason think it is a good idea to portray the coffee machine as a little humanoid robot that ejects brown liquids from its body into your favorite beverage cup! I’m not sure about you, but I don’t want robot coffee maker with a kidney infection anywhere near my morning cup of joe. I think it already ‘Sucks’ that my Dustbuster caught a cold recently and probably passed along the virus to my laptop. Yes I love my brave new world technology gadgets as long as they are healthier, less needy, and generally more SIMPLE-MINDED than me!

Witless and Wrapless

I cannot seem to get into the swing of Christmas this year. No I am not depressed or stressed over time or finances. In fact I have a pretty easy life except for that getting up out of bed and having to feed and drive myself around thing. If I could solve those last couple of issues, I could finally achieve a total slovenly existence like Santa for 364 days a year.

I guess I have reached the age where I really don’t need anything, so wandering from store to store looking for gifts is less than thrilling. I used to love looking at all the ads in the newspaper and now whenever I look at the newspaper its physically diminutive size distracts me from the pleasure of the Christmas ads. That little type in newspapers is ALREADY too small – why do they continue shrinking the newspapers?

Wrapping gifts also used to be a real treat for me. I would spend hours trying to find ways to hide goodies in unsuspecting everyday objects. I once sawed a tomato soup can in half after steaming off the label. I proceeded to scoop out the goop, fill it with a gift card, sand, and padding to the EXACT weight listed on the can, and re-glue the label. That takes a lot of work and artistry for a gift which will spend only a fraction of its life under wraps and in the food pantry.

Just to see if I could, I made a three layer postcard with the center layer cut out for a dollar bill. When the whole thing was sandwiched together, ironed and trimmed, it just looked like an ordinary postcard. I mailed it off to my family. They received it fine, but were unwilling to destroy the card to retrieve the hidden money in the interior of the card. I should have used a three layer cake instead - funny how everyone seems to tear those apart without remorse?

These days I am lucky if I even want to mess with decorative wrapping paper since I hate storing the stuff for every specialized holiday. I think it would be just easier to get some barrio taggers to spray paint all over gifts before I give them to the recipients. I recently decided that a dark RED plastic Target bag was so opaque, it would prove BETTER than any old flimsy wrapping paper. So I cut it up and dressed the Christmas booty in it. Except for my Dad’s Christmas honoraria, wrapped in crossword puzzles and funnies – I think those Target-bag wrapped gifts are sure to be better READ than anything from our scrawny rag of a newspaper!

It’s time to have THE TALK!

I did something really challenging at Thanksgiving – I made my family TALK. Yes, somehow I corralled everyone into the same stockyard and got them away from the caloric turkey-trough, computers, and TV for a few minutes of an actual honest to goodness, face to face, 'blab-fest'. Better yet, this was not some inane ‘convo’ about Black Friday deals or the annoying antics of wanna-be starlets and reality TV freaks. No this was the sizzling fresh and uncomfortably hot topic about their personal opinions on, of all things, IMMIGRATION.

Now before you light your hair on fire and run for the border in disgust with passport in hand like my family attempted, trust me, my motives were not actually political at all. You see, I recently had the opportunity to join a ‘digital media’ class taught by our local PBS television affiliate known as the ‘nineNetwork’ here in St. Louis. We met for about 15 hours a week for close to a month and the studio provided media professionals to teach our classes how to film stories and edit interviews using their HD video cameras and Apple’s ‘Final Cut’ software to edit the finished product.

The nineNetwork, is currently producing a television documentary called ‘Homeland’ which attempts to address the immigration issue from personal perspectives rather than the typical political one. If all goes well, you should see the end product on your local PBS station by Spring 2011. I’ve linked the site address HERE should you wish to piece together a new perspective on the immigration issue, or simply want to leave a ‘piece of your mind’. Regardless, all comments are encouraged and welcome as they all ultimately contribute to the overall understanding and relevancy of this much maligned topic.

While it was certainly challenging to venture out of my comfort zone to play ‘cub’ reporter / editor and interview strangers for a few weeks; I was surprised at how rewarding it was to simply sit with my own family members and talk to them too. Oh sure, we ‘jaw’ all the time just like you do with your own brood on the day’s work, weather, cars, TV etc. But rarely do we all sit around a table and look at each other ‘eye to eye’ and dare discuss controversial current events like immigration. Too much fear that somebody might take offense or judge one another poorly, especially when compounded with the stress of a holiday get-together.

Happily however, it turned into a very rewarding experience for all. It seemed that once the initial shyness of recording comments for posterity had evaporated, the group honestly enjoyed having the chance to ‘speak-up’, listen, and interact without constraints, and ‘on the record’. Even after the ‘official’ roundtable had ended and the camera was bagged, the conversation continued. My wife commented later in private, that she had learned something NEW about her brother after nearly 46 years and she had really enjoyed the overall discussion.

So the moral of the story is ‘HAVE THE TALK’! Find a way to muzzle the electronics and endless media onslaught for just a few minutes per week and have a conversation TOGETHER with the people who YOU know best and SHOULD know you. Don’t be afraid – it’s actually loads of fun and you may end up learning (or teaching) something new. No you won’t always agree, nor will you or your family's opinions always be appreciated or particularly insightful, but that’s not the point. Your mission as an immigrant to this brave new world of familial conversation, is to simply crack the door open into the ancient but lost art, as a respectful SOURCE of discourse of course. Enjoy!