In this day and age of disposable items, cell phones rank high on the list of things that are replaced on a regular basis. As technology changes, so do cell phones; what is new today may be passe tomorrow.
I'm good with passe, as long as it makes phone calls. I have been holding on to an original Motorola Razr V3, living like it was 2004, avoiding the extra monthly data charges. It did what I wanted it to: made and received phone calls. The camera 
was a bonus feature that I used occasionally. I don't text, so the numeric pad was fine for adding names to numbers in the address book. We were comfortable with each other.
It was, however, inevitable: my long-time friend and companion began to falter. Little annoyances at first, like the back falling off, were not a huge problem. Eventually the rudimentary form of Java it contained stopped working and I could no longer play the sample games that came with the phone. When it started thinking there was no SIM card installed when there was, I knew it was the beginning of the end.
But what to do? I was left behind years ago by the smartphone train, an abandoned caboose on a spur line no longer used. Shelling out additional fees every month for a data plan is not in our budget, which severely limits the choices. I could buy an unlocked brand-new Razr over the Internet for around $50, or I could take one of the free flip phones my service provided. I checked every angle and option, working on what we call "Lucy Plans" (after Lucille Ball and her antics on "I Love Lucy"): what if I get a free phone and then try to sell it on e-Bay so I could by a Razr? How about turning off and on the existing phone every few minutes to make sure it is working? What about selling plasma every month to pay for a data plan?
Eventually the zero cost plan was followed and I was the owner of a new phone that wasn't a Razr. Cindy, as she has for years, sat patiently on the sidelines of my indecision and waited for me to make a choice. She also volunteered to trade phones with me, as she had no attachment to hers...a Razr V3xx. To paraphrase Captain Kirk at the end of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, "my friend, I've come home."
Every year in August, as the Earth passes through rock and dust fragments left behind by the comet Swift-Tuttle, last time it came near the Sun, these small particles collide with the Earth’s atmosphere, burning bright, creating a blazing yet momentary streak of light across the sky.
There were no meteors to be seen this year from our vantage point. The Perseids, one of the more consistent meteor showers, were hampered by the full moon and a thin scattering of clouds.
Vacations as a child were almost always camping, which meant night skies were never hampered by city lights. I remember many nights in various states with my dad, my mom, and my sister, gazing into the night, watching the stars roll by (and sometimes listening to the radio).
Even without the meteor shower, the sky was a beautiful sight. Despite the full moon it was still filled with visible stars. I leaned against the car and gazed into the night, looking at light that traveled through time to get here, gazing at the sky’s majestic beauty, remembering when...
Sunday we will attend the Madonna del Grappa picnic at Lower Manning Park. It is the picnic of my fore bearers, all revolving around good food, good friends and how we ended up in Santa Barbara.
The pinochle games played
by older men, the accordion player who serenades the group, the wine that is shared. As children we would pay our dimes and get into the "cake walk", trying to guess the number that would be called when the bell stopped ringing, hoping we would win, but just not the dessert our family brought.
I have fond memories of the picnic baskets of my parents and grandparents, traditionally only brought out for the various Italian picnics over the summer; heavy wicker and wood hampers filled with durable plastic plates and silverware, tumblers for cold drinks and wine and enough tablecloths to cover several benches, reserving our spot amidst the other tablecloths, butcher paper and signs.
The deep-pit barbecues will turn out chicken, ribs and sausage to be served with the traditional polenta, salad and bread. There will be too much food to eat, but the point of the picnic was never the food, much to the chagrin of those who insist in lining up early and being first to receive their food. The point was, and is, to relive those memories of picnics past and set the stage for future picnics, insuring opportunities to celebrate our heritage and relive memories.
Unintentional eavesdropping. It's what happens in the airport, waiting in line at the theater, walking through a shopping mall. There are dozens of web-sites dedicated to what you overheard in various cities across the globe, in your office, in public.
Things are hardly ever in context when all you hear are several words from an incomplete sentence, missing the balance of the conversation.
The best conversations I don't intend to listen to occur at the Farmer's Market. Heard last week:
"...my roommate, who surfs, has taken to drinking rye whiskey with Coke and uses frozen strawberries for ice cubes..."
"...do you think that was a fake arm?"
"...you should really consider starting your own state..."
"...is this natural hemp?"
"...are you sure those red things are okay to eat?"
"...walking out, shutting the door of your house, not even saying goodbye to him, leaving all your clothes, everything, and starting over..."
"...her Facebook page is to sterile..."
Why do we listen? Are the lives of others that interesting? What causes conversations to be remembered while others fade rapidly into oblivion?
I've let the post sit for almost a week, hoping the time would help me tie things together and come up with an appropriate ending. Much like the dangling conversations of those around me, this is incomplete, waiting for another sentence or two to fill in the blanks and put it all in context.
For most of the past week in I was in Wisconsin, spending time with my fellow quality department members at the company headquarters. One afternoon we had a team building exercise that was a car rally. This rally provided a few hours on a Thursday afternoon to drive a course that made use of some scenic roads, showing me places I had not seen nor likely would not have had the opportunity to see, as well as the team building intent: to rely on others to get you where you needed to go.
We were scored based on information found on the course. We counted signs, kept track of the number of T-intersections we came to, copied information onto our 
scorecard. No smartphones or GPS systems were allowed, and the largest part of the score was the accuracy of our mileage. We did not finish first nor last, but we did finish and enjoyed drinks and dinner after the rally, comparing answers to questions specific to the Wisconsin countryside.
The details of the first car rally I was in is lost in the wisps of memory. It was in Santa Barbara, that much I know for certain. I was not the driver or navigator, likely a whimsical back seat passenger in either a Fiat or a Porsche, depending on who was driving, watching for signposts, learning rally basics. We set out on the rally course separated from the car in front and in back of us by a few minutes, each convinced they were going to make the best time of the day.
The finish of the event included stories from other competitors. We found out where we had gone awry, what instructions we had misunderstood and where we had followed the course correctly. The results were announced and well, how we did that day is immaterial, especially as I don't remember that part either. I had become addicted to the process, trying to out-think the instructions, split the time clock right down the middle and be in the running for the overall best performance.
Time-Speed-Distance (TSD) Rallying was very different from how most people think of motor sports. Each car was given a set of written instructions and sent off at intervals, all on public roads. The goal was to follow the course, maintain the given average speed (always legal, of course), and arrive at the checkpoints where our arrival time was clocked, giving us a score based on how close we were to being on time.
It was not a competition of speed, but rather of precision driving and navigation. The driver relied on the navigator to provide the instructions while the navigator relied on the skills of the driver. It was exciting, sometimes frustrating and always fun.
I started driving and my best friend became the navigator. At first, both of us mainly concentrated on staying on course and following the directions, more by feel than anything. I added a tachometer to the car for more accurate tracking of speed. As we gained experience, the difficulty of instructions (sometimes purposely misleading) and timing became easier to overcome. We soared to the top of the Novice category, winning the March March rally. Winning as a Novice meant we had to move up to the intermediate group, which is where we stalled and remained until we each moved away.
What mattered then and now is that the rally concept requires people to work closely together while doing fundamentally different things. Communication, trust and interdependency, building relationships and learning about one another, the foundations for the success or failure of a team.
In this day and age, families generally live hither and yon, many miles apart, and this subset of the Tabacchi family is no exception. This weekend we are fortunate that our relatives have traversed the many miles and arrived in Bellingham by plane and by ground. Words escape me when I try to thank them for making the journey.
It is a vital time for everyone, reconnecting, talking, eating, laughing loudly, updating. Most importantly we are together again and can pay tribute to those who caused us to be, brought us to where we are and made us the people we are today. Memories are the diary we keep in our heads, an instance, a thought. We carry in our hearts their smiles and joy, their tears and sorrow. We carry around their love for us, but most importantly we carry around our unconditional love for them.
Together, we are better.
As child of the space age, exploration beyond our atmosphere defined my childhood. As I wrote last year, I somehow convinced my parents while I was in grade school to allow me to take our television to school on days when Saturn rockets would launch carrying men into space or when capsules carrying those men would plunge through the atmosphere and splash down on the blue waters of the Pacific.
On April 12, 1981, we were again glued to the television as the Space Shuttle Columbia became the first shuttle to orbit the Earth. We watched history in the making as the first spacecraft intended to be used more than once lifted off from Complex 39 Pad A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Since the late 1960s, Pads A and B at Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39 have served as backdrops for America's most significant manned space flight endeavors - Apollo, Skylab, Apollo-Soyuz and the Space Shuttle. The shuttle raced off the pad, literately taking off like a rocket, especially compared to the lumbering Saturn rockets that slowly built up speed, lifting heavy payloads to Earth orbit and beyond.
On July 8, 2011, I watched the the Space Shuttle Atlantis lift off, the last shuttle to orbit the Earth. Dragging a television into my office wasn't necessary, as the all-knowing and ever-present Internet provided the images. The world has changed dramatically in the last 50 years since Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space, and much of the technology that has changed it was born of the space program.
Ear thermometers, smoke detectors, hand-held vacuum cleaners, water filters, ergonomic furniture, portable X-ray machines, programmable pacemakers, concentrated baby foods, freeze-dried instant mixes, biofeedback techniques used to reduce stress, kidney dialysis machines, reflective materials used to insulate homes, water purification technology, flame-resistant textiles, telecommunications and the Global Positioning System (GPS)...the list goes on and on, and almost all of these items pale in comparison to what some consider the single greatest result of the space program: microprocessors.
During the 1950s, computers were the size of a supermarket. Traveling into space required computers that could fit into a much smaller footprint, the now practically non-existent phone booth (see telecommunications in the paragraph above). Companies experimented with ways to reduce the size of computers, eventually resulting in the microprocessor. Every one of the tiny computer chips found in personal computers, commercial airplanes, automobiles, washers and dryers, cell phones and tens of thousands of other products trace their beginnings back to those integrated circuits first developed for the space program.
Times are tough and many of us don't have the money we need to live on; the government isn't funding much in terms of space exploration and there will be a several year gap before NASA puts its own astronauts into space. The roar of millions of pounds of thrust putting men and women into orbit will not be there to inspire the next generation to study math and science, so if there ever was a time when more investment in science education was necessary it is now. Scientific growth means economic growth and there is still much to discover.
The future of manned flight looks to depend on private companies like SpaceX, Lockheed Martin and Boeing for low earth orbit vehicles, while NASA aims to solve the next step in exploring ever further in space. It doesn't matter who works on what, but rather that the work continues, that dreams are dreamt, that the impossible is sought to be made possible, that we continue to look to the new frontier, wherever that may be.
These are the salad days of summer here in the Northwest. Not quite warm enough for most items in the vegetable garden, lettuce continues to be main harvest, at least for the moment. As they say, when life gives you butter leaf and iceberg, you make salad.
The cold and soggy spring, served up by the current La Niña, produced one of the chilliest months of May on record, pushing strawberry harvest into mid-June. The early varieties are late and the later varieties are on time, so strawberry season has been compacted into a short period. 
Just-picked, sun-ripened strawberries, loaded with natural sugars that rapidly convert to starch once the picked. The fresher the berry, the sweeter the taste.
I have not always been a fan of strawberries. As a child, strawberries and shortcake for dessert meant I was having shortcake. I did not appreciate the complex volatile flavors. Turning down strawberries always produced unusual looks in others; who turns down that scarlet exterior, filled with the flavor of summer sunshine?
It was during my first job in the food industry as a product developer that I was introduced to strawberries from the Pacific Northwest. Picked, sliced and packed at the peak of their flavor, they were different from the berries available in Southern California. The flavors were deeper, the core wasn't white, the juice deep red. The names of the varieties were just as intoxicating: Shuksan, Totem, Rainier. And they were packed with sugar, which is always an added bonus.
High tea would be incomplete without strawberry preserves along side scones and clotted cream, traditional lemonade is better with with the addition of fresh sweet strawberries, fruit salad is naked without the deep red color of sliced strawberries. Today strawberries are a welcome addition to my plate. I still need them to be sweet, as for me it embraces and enhances the flavor.
Too soon we will pack summer away for another year, carefully storing it in boxes and photographs, dreaming of when we can unpack it again. For now, we relish in it being here, living for and in the moment, taking in all that summer can supply, placing some strawberries into the freezer to open when need to feel the warmth of summer on our back.
This isn't the first time I have written about the Summer Solstice Parade in Santa Barbara, and it certainly won't be the last. It is a sunshine-soaked Santa Barbara tradition that is absolutely the most unique exper
ience that anyone can attend. In Celtic mythology, summer solstice is a day to make wishes and then let go. The parade is just that: a wish made on a summer day, visualized in may colors and dimensions, arising from the heart and soul.
The heart of downtown Santa Barbara is transformed from the Spanish-style business district into an explosion of color and music filled with illusions and imagery, creativity on steroids, beating back the "June Gloom" that can envelope the area.
This year, look for the car from Gilligan's Island. If you have an extra bottle of water, find the small slit in the side about eye level and press the bottle through (they'll thank you for it, trust me). Clap when they go by and tell them I love each and every one of them.
Summer Solstice is a celebration to manifest your wildest dreams. Today, as it is with many days, I dream of Santa Barbara, my family and friends who are there, the times of my life spent there and the times yet to be.
What is it about music that stirs my soul? Certain songs set me to move, to tap my feet, to dance to the music, to feel it with my very being, with my heart, my brain and my soul. It doesn't matter where I may be: sitting here at the computer, writing a business e-mail, at a restaurant. When the urge to move, even just mentally, occurs, it happens.
Scientific studies have shown music can equalize our brainwaves, affect blood pressure, heartbeat, respiration, pulse rate, body temperature, strengthening memory and generating a sense of well-being. The dentist plays music for a reason, as it helps disguise or balance out the sounds of equipment you'd rather not think about.
Music changes my perception of time and space. Listening to certain songs take me to specific moments and places in my life. Many of my memories are fixed to songs, processed in the right hemisphere of my brain, the different neurons responding based on what kind of music is playing. I go to that far away place within the caverns of my memories when reaching for my favorite music would cause the world to drift away.
Pieces of familiar music serve as a soundtrack for the movie that plays in my head, calling back memories of a person or place that is disappearing into the fog of time, snapping them back into the foreground of my mind, putting the past front and center in the present.
The Winter that seemed to last forever and the Spring that never really was have passed. Given the extended period of cold and wet, it's not much of a surprise that our roses had held off making an appearance. As the week wore on, they started to show themselves, just a little at a time. I first noticed some white peeking through, then some pink. And as always, I breathed a sigh of relief that the pruning I had done months earlier didn't frighten the plants into never growing again.
I am a hesitant pruner
. I never liked to trim the trees that were in the way of the walk; they went to a lot of trouble to grow and who was I to cut off a branch here or there? It took years for me to understand why it is needed (control shape, encourage more growth, improve health), and that it can be good for your plants, shrubs and trees.
Not all my pruning opportunities were successes. I still remember the Philadelphus virginalis (better known as Minnesota Snowflake Mock Orange) that I, well, pruned is too kind of a word to use. Butchered may be a bit strong, but you get the general idea. I am still haunted by the memory of its malformed shape, looking more like a gangly creature than a shrub. I was lucky it was at the rear of the house so none of the neighbors could really see it.
Fortunately roses are very forgiving and they are no worse for my pruning. Soon we will be enveloped in their intoxicating aromas, a myriad of colors and exquisite forms. It is no wonder that many consider roses to be the quintessential flower, as once they start there is generally no stopping them, producing a parade of nonstop color.
"I am glad that in the springtime of life there were those who planted flowers of love in my heart." - Robert Louis Stevenson
It is finally summer here in the northwest. It was a magical transition, from cold and damp to warm and sun. The overcast skies and rain that have persisted long after they should have given way to a bright, blue sky with the occasional puffy white cloud.
The temperature is expected to reach 70°F today. Bellingham has gone 249 consecutive days without reaching 70°F. We are not going to break the record of 254 days set in 1955, according to the National Weather Service, which keeps records for this area as far back as 1949. That is a record I am sure all Bellinghamsters will be happy not to leave to history.
For now, the sun is out, flowers are blooming, the vegetable garden is finally flourishing. The Winter that seemed to last forever and the Spring that never really was have passed.
And while summer solstice is over two weeks away, I will revel in the pastel colors of the dawn and dusk, and the azure sky in-between. This is the sort of day we can live with, soaking in all the rays the sun can provide. It will seem perfect. It will be perfect.
Dreams can be fleeting, with just the smallest flecks of images and color left in your mind when the morning comes. Others stay with you, filling your mind with visions that you try to fill in and stitch together to make the dream more coherent.
Last night, I dreamt of zombies. Not the zombies of "Thriller" with their orchestrated dance moves. Not the zombies of "Night of the Living Dead" or "Dawn of the Dead" by George Romero. Not even the zombies of "Shaun of the Dead", a brilliant meld of intelligent humor and bloody horror.
These zombies were...organizing.
Humans have been trying to interpret and analyze what dreams really means since the dawn of time. Some cultures believe understanding dreams allow you to more fully understand the meaning of life. Thought to be messages from the gods, profound and significant dreams were submitted to the Roman Senate for analysis and interpretation.
Dream interpretation is certainly not an exact science. Read enough books or web pages and you will find that zombies in dreams have several theoretical meanings, such as the mindless acceptance of ideas, an unquestioning nature, a tired listless state.
Organizing Zombies...try interpreting that.
Typically is it the survivors that are organizing after a catastrophic event. Survivors come together as a group, a de facto leader emerges and a plan developed, changed and altered again and again to fit the circumstances. Even the best documented survival plan is only good for a while, then you need to work out the details on your own. I can only imagine the same would apply to a zombie apocalypse.
I wish more details of the dream were still available to me. Within five minutes of the end of a dream about half the content is forgotten, and by the ten minute mark about 90% is gone. If the content of dreams reflects aspects of memory consolidation taking place during the different stages of sleep, what memories was I consolidating that lead to organizing zombies? What were the purposes of their organizing? Don't zombies live in the here and now? If so, why were they planning for future opportunities?
I tried to go back to sleep to recover more zombies-related thoughts, hoping for dream recurrence, but no more walking dead entered my sleep. I did dream of cake, which carries a much simpler interpretation: I want cake. Today, I will have cake. And avoid organizing zombies, just in case.
My life has been filled with books. I don't remember my introduction to what has become a life-long captivation with the magic of reading. The memory of Charlotte's Web is firm, but why I wanted to read it is lost in time. Perhaps it was the attraction of comic books, stories with words and pictures, the structure of a story with multiple visuals. Maybe it was being read to as a child, helping to build my vocabulary and to learn the connection between the written and printe
d word. Whatever the reason, whoever it was that put a book in my hands, I am thankful for the experience.
Amazon.com has announced that sales numbers for e-books have outsold regular book sales 105 to 100 since April 1st of this year. Physical books have taken a backseat to digital versions. As one book reviewer wrote, it was Kindle vs. kindling and e-books have won.
Does it matter how we get our reading material? The reading itself is the larger goal. Books we read help to develop our ability to think critically. We explore their content in our own imagination, bound by the magic of a good author.
Despite e-books becoming the norm, I am slow to switch from print to pixels, from my fingers feeling the paper pages to feeling plastic, from dog-earring pages to electronic bookmarks. I appreciate the wealth of knowledge available electronically, but I miss the tactile aspect of a physical book, one you can curl up with to take to the local coffee shop. Mostly what I miss is the smell of a good book, the lignin in the paper breaking down and smelling like vanilla, that heady scent filling used bookstores and creating a hunger in all of us.
If you are like me, you spend more time reading news online than in the paper. It is easy to open a browser and have the world news at your fingertips. With sometimes instant updates and differing perspectives, the wealth of news available is almost beyond comprehension.
At the same time, onlin
e news outlets don't seem to give the big picture, the true depth that some stories require. The frenetic pace of going from breaking story to breaking story, the world coming apart at the seams with the click of a mouse.
Newspapers aren't frantic. They don't carry the less important news, the items that make up so much electronic fodder. They carry the stuff that actually matters. Reading the newspaper takes time, and during that period you get the whole story and realize the apocalypse is not about to happen.
For me and Cindy, the Sunday paper is a ritual. The rustle of the pages, a cup of steaming coffee, not having to go to work. My weekend isn't complete unless it involves the Sunday paper. It may only be an hour or so, but it is time well spent.
Life moves fast. Take time to slow down and enjoy it. Switch from pixilated fonts to printed fonts and read the Sunday paper. After all, comics are far superior in a newspaper than online any day.
It was not the first job interview I ever had, but it was the most memorable. As a recent college graduate, I interviewed for quite a few jobs. I was gaining experience at how interviewing worked, what questions were typical, how to respond without too many "ummms" and "aahhs". I was becoming discouraged, as my college degree was opening doors but my lack of experience was shutting them in my face. I put on my interview suit, the one my paternal grandparents bought me after I graduated from college, and walked in to another nondescript office in another nondescript company and waited my turn.
I don't remember most of the interview. What I do recall is telling the interviewer at the end of our time that I hoped to see her again soon, something I had not said at the conclusion of any other interview. Perhaps it was because it actually sounded like I could fulfill their requirements. Maybe it was that she was about my age, a first in the bevy of interviews I had gone through. It was, more than likely, due to her bright blue eyes and her nice smile.
And so it came to pass that I was offered the job. My first real job lead to my first apartment, my first non-department store credit card and, eventually, to my first and only wife. It was Cindy who interviewed me, whose smile intoxicated me, who, as my supervisor, should have been verboten to me. I was young and didn't know you weren't supposed to fish off the company pier, especially with your boss. Ignorance was definitely bliss, as I eventually asked her out and she accepted.
The rest, as they say, is history. We were married on May 10, 1986. It has been twenty-five years since we said "I do" to each other. Life has thrown us curve balls, handed us lemons and dropped a wrench in the machinery on many occasions. It has taught us to never take for granted the moments we have shared, to learn to live with intensity and how completely we have learned to love.
Cindy Lane, I love you for who you were, who you are and who you will become. Thanks for putting up with me over the years and the years yet to come.
Life is spectacular, amazing, and difficult.
There are lessons to be learned each and every day. Failure is as important as success, as we learn from both. Parents, teachers, and family share knowledge and provide support. We make mistakes, become overwhelmed, get confused, say or do things that we later regret, sometimes hurting others or ourselves in the process.
We don't own anything. According to an American Indian proverb, "We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, we borrow it from our Children." We are stewards of everything. We came into this earth owning nothing, and we will leave it in the same way.
Is success being rich, having status, gaining possessions, that certain job, providing influence? Some people are happy with achievement, losta stuff surrounding us, being somebody rich and famous, being really busy; others are not. Both are successful if they are happy with what they have. We have tools and resources available to us, and the choice is ours to use them or not.
Life is spectacular, amazing, and difficult. What we make of our life is, of course, up to us.
On this day in 1985, the corporate executives at Coca-Cola lost their mind, changed the formula on its flagship brand of soda and released New Coke. The response? Negative, to the surprise of only Coca-Cola. The original formula, re-introduced as Coca-Cola Classic, was back on the market in less than 3 months.
It was the best of intentions that took Coca-Cola to the edge of faltering. New Coke is studied to this day in business schools as an example of how never to underestimate the attachment consumers have for some items.
Of course, nothing stays the same and things change every day. Some are easier to accept or are even welcomed; computers no longer take up entire rooms, medical imaging equipment is widely available and your cell phone, well, it still makes phone calls, but it is so much more than that.
Change is inevitable. We approach change in as many ways as there are people in the world. Some eagerly look forward to the newest items. Others reluctantly adapt because there is no other choice. Still others wait along the sidelines, hoping that change will pass them by. Some choose not to bother with it and stand their ground, looking change in the eye and sending it packing.
We all know the best laid plans are bound to go astray. Change hardly ever happens in a straight line but generally comes at us form many directions all at once. How we choose to manage the twists and turns of life, how we adapt and respond to these inevitable changes is entirely up to us. It is what makes us individuals, gives us opportunities to learn, gain experience and grow. Roll with the changes or get rolled over.
We signed up for rain when we moved to Washington State. The annual average precipitation in Bellingham is 34.84 inches with rainfall fairly evenly distributed throughout the year. Rain I can deal with; that's what jackets and umbrellas are for. We don't have to water the grass 
or any of the established plants. Things are typically green and lush, albeit sometime a bit soggy.
This time of year we long for the beautiful sunny day with a brilliant blue sky devoid of clouds. We run outside when the clouds part and rays of sunshine fall upon is, generating Vitamin D. A chance to clear away a few weeds, plant vegetables, mow the lawn, tidy the yard. The clouds return soon and rain follows, watering in the newly planted items.
Gotta go...there is a break in the clouds.
"There's too much sky and not enough blue, too many questions to why I love you. There's too many clouds and not enough sun; the clouds must fall on everyone." - Teitur
In human history, lack of sleep is a relatively recent problem. Sure, there were the occasional sleepless night when children were born, hunting season was at its peak or an emergency occurred. Historically speaking, humans, and the balance of the animal world, have had enough sleep.
Our ancestors
weren’t woken up by cell phones in the middle of the night, worrying about the mortgage or trying to sift through the information overload from the previous day. Our bodies use sleep to recover from the day of stress they were subjected to, recharging for the day ahead.
This week was one of those weeks. Multiple late night phone calls from work coupled with being down a person has resulted in too much to think about and not enough time to do it in.
After one day of sleep loss, animals compensate by increasing the intensity of sleep; in the short term, we try to balance things out. After a few days of sleep loss, our bodies no longer try to compensate for lost time; we don't sleep any more deeply or any longer than we would under normal conditions.
Things will eventually balance out, of that I am sure. Until then, I dream of sleeping, perchance to dream...
Some believe life is like following a path: education, career, kids, in some order or fashion. Sometimes the path veers to the left or right, but it continues forward, taking us wherever we need to go. Others see the path as cyclical and multidimensional, like pancakes stacked on top of each other, circling back around to similar points in time and experiences, always moving forward but not in a straight line.
I have circled around on some things more than I care to remember: multiple cities, different houses, various jobs. Now, twenty-seven years after completing college, I am headed back to school. While I've never really stopped learning, this is the first time I have circled back to formal education.
As a traditional college student, I was in an exploration mode, finding out what I was capable of doing, learning what would be the foundation of knowledge that my career, whatever it turned out to be, would later rest upon. As an adult student, I won't be exploring or laying a foundation, as I already possess considerable industry knowledge and can focus my learnings into real-life situations.
This time around the education pancake will not include parties, dorm life or free time between classes. Some things won't be different, as I will once again feel like a new student standing at the bottom rung of the academic ladder, faced with an increased workload and teachers who seem so incredibly smart.
Happy birthday to my favorite sister who turned 16 x 3 on Friday. Originally written for her 40th birthday, this is just as fitting today as it was all those years ago.
You all know Julie in one capacity or another: family member, long-time friend or the picture on the post office wall. Most of you know her as she sits before you now, but I would like to share a few memories of her from my own growing-up period.
The year was 1963. On television, people watched Huntley and Brinkley for the news; The Andy Griffith Show was the highest rated comedy; The Andy Williams Show was the best variety show (how many of you even remember what a variety show is?). On the radio, The Beatles scored their first of many #1 hits in the US with "I Want to Hold Your Hand". The Los Angeles Dodgers, who had bailed out on Brooklyn a mere four years before, shock the New York Yankees in the World Series by beating them in 4 straight games. The Washington-to-Moscow "hot line" communications link opens, designed to reduce the risk of accidental war. Julia Child, “The French Chef”, debuts on educational television.Julie Ann was born to Jim a
nd JoAnne Tabacchi on March 25 of that year. Her proud parents were positive that this bouncy little girl was the most beautiful baby ever, outside of her older brother, of course. I was equally impressed that something so small and noisy and smelly could cause such a great stir. “Jewey”, as I lovingly called her, moved in and, well, life was never quite the same after that. I was the perfect child, just ask anyone who was around back then. My sister, on the other hand, was the devil herself in human form.
In those days, car seats were for the weak. We had fun climbing front-to-back-to-front-to-back-to-front-to-back in the car, a Ford Country Squire station wagon, complete with the fake wood paneling on the sides. I was content to sit and read or just look out the window at the scenery, but my sister, on the other hand, wasn’t satisfied with peace and quiet. No, she would agitate and aggravate and torment me to no end, until all that poking and prodding resulted in her having an imprint of my hand somewhere on her body, which would then result in me getting yelled at from the front seat by our parents, leaving a smirk on the face of Little Miss Innocent that required removal with another well-placed hand imprint and the cycle would replay itself over and over.
I’m sure my father still wonders how both Julie and I survived each other. It wasn’t for lack of trying, I assure you. Somehow we managed to co-exist throughout school without much damage. When I went away to college we actually missed one another (but would only admit it to our mother, never to each other). I think it was then that I realized she was not only my sister but one of my friends as well.
So, after 40 48 years, what have I gotten from my dear sister? A few headaches, advice (solicited or otherwise), a brother-in-law, a sense of humor, hand gestures, a shared interest of poking fun of our relatives, and unconditional love. Happy Birthday, Julie. We love you. Fred, Cindy and Laura.
Stars shined through the scattered clouds. It was still dark this morning when I arose, a slight chill in the air. Mostly what I noticed was the silence. No cars driving by, no birds chirping, no breeze through the trees, no rain upon the window.
Consider the power of silence: listening to your heart, thinking clearly, readying the soul to converse with God. We search for silence in quiet places such as forests, the sea, places of worship, libraries, our homes. There are no distractions in silence; it is in silence that we can find what is truly important in our lives. Thoughts that occupy our minds tend to vanish when we sit in the silence. Silence gives our minds an opportunity to sort out our thoughts, tossing aside the unnecessary while allowing the important enough time to form and crystallize.
As I finish writing this morning, the silence has been replaced by the sounds of birds, the clucking of chickens, the scampering feet of cats, cars passing by, an airplane lifting off from the airport. The remnants of the morning silence will remain with me throughout the day, reminding me to take a moment and just be.
The sound of shattering glass is one of the most piercing, frightening and recognizable sounds on earth. Every piece of glass has a natural resonant frequency, which is the speed at which it will vibrate if bumped or otherwise disturbed by some stimulus, such as a sound wave.
Glass wine goblets are especially resonant because of their hollow tubular shape, which is why they make a pleasant ringing sound when clinked. If a person sings the same tone as that ringing note, the sound of their voice will vibrate the air molecules around the glass at its resonant frequency, causing the glass to start vibrating as well. And, if that tone is sung loudly enough, the glass will vibrate itself to smithereens.
Can't hit that note? Alternately, a strong gust of wind can lift the glass top from a patio table up, off the frame and across the yard, dashing it on the edge of the deck, breaking it into a gazillion pieces.
Yes, I speak from experience.
Our glass-topped patio table looked as light and airy as a summer day. It made it intact through three different moves with nary a scratch. Many a meal was eaten upon it, many a friendly gathering around it. A burst of wind changed all that, creating the opportunity to remember just how strong nature can be, returning the table top to smaller pieces, similar to the grains of sand from whence it came.
Fortunately the damage was limited to the table top. No people, cats or chickens were injured during this event. Tempered glass is a wonderful thing.
In the parable of the broken window, one side of the story is that "everybody must live, and what would become of the glaziers if panes of glass were never broken?". The light and airy summer days will be here soon enough; the table will be replaced, the manufacturer will be paid and life will go on.
I was still sleepy. My allergies were acting up. I was distracted by, um, something shiny. Take your pick or make up another reason, it is immaterial. What does matter is instead of letting the chickens out of the hen house and into the run, I managed to let them out into the yard. The chickens are free-ranging today.
Ah yes, poultry in motion.
As urban chickens, our flock enjoys all the benefits of cosmopolitan Northwest living without having to worry about the high cost of housing. As a general rule, poultry don't invest much thought in the vagaries of the real-estate market, or so I've been told.
As opposed to the chickens in Chicken Run, the hens in our flock are homebodies who do not want complete freedom but do enjoy a good walk around the yard. They will return to the safety and warmth of the coop when the time is appropriate. They do not plot and scheme endlessly to contrive by any means necessary to get under, over, or around their chicken-wire prison wall. They will, to no surprise, take advantage of my slow reflexes and spend time in the yard, as opposed to the run. The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, so to speak.
For today, in addition to providing fresh, nutritious eggs and quality nitrogen-rich fertilizer, we'll have nontoxic pest and weed control. At dusk they will put themselves back in the coop and roost for the night, returning tomorrow to the confines of the run, waiting for the next opportunity to make a break for it.
For a few days this week we were bathed in the February sun. As long as you were inside and looking through a window near a heater vent, it was easy to imagine basking in the warmth of the sun. Once you were outside, however, it became a different story.
Clear skies mean lower temperatures. High temperatures have been in the 30s, lows in the 20s, wind chill knocking off about 15 degrees.
Humans are warm-blooded animals, also 
known as homeotherms. We regulate our body temperature, to the extent we can, balancing heat production from our metabolic sources and heat loss from evaporative cooling (better known as perspiration). In a cold environment, our body heat is conserved by constriction of blood vessels near the body surface and by waves of muscle contractions, or shivering, which serve to increase metabolism. Another heat-conserving mechanism, goose bumps, raises the body hairs; not especially effective in humans, this works well in animals as it increases the thickness of the insulating fur or feather layer.
Cold, of course, is relative. It is much colder in other areas, not so cold in others. What is cold to Cindy isn't that cold to me. Cold is relative to age as well; what wasn't that cold to me in the past is now cold. The natural slowing of metabolism as we age means the body becomes less efficient at generating heat and maintaining our normal body temperature.
Staying warm is a priority. The cats still enjoy sunning themselves in the window, with or without a heater vent. I find socks and a long sleeve shirt are necessary, even with the heater vent.
Photographs. Images created by light on a light-sensitive surface, like photographic film or, more likely today, an electronic imager. The word "photograph" is based on the Greek words for "light" and "drawing", together meaning "drawing with light".
There is nothing quite like a photograph. It captures a moment in time, there to enjoy and relive at your leisure. Distances are shortened, memories are rekindled, common threads and found. Family photos span decades and generations, providing history lessons with personal meaning. We see our own images in the faces of relatives. When photos are passe
d from generation to generation, so are the stories behind the pictures, creating a link from present to past.
This week brought a gift to my family in the form of a picture of my paternal grandmother, her siblings and her parents. They arrived in Santa Barbara in December 1929, so the photograph was taken some time after that. My grandmother is the third from the left. Viewing this photograph is like traveling in time, looking at clothing, furniture and especially their faces and expressions, peering in from the view of the photographer.
Family faces are very much like magic mirrors: we see the past, present and future through people who belong to us. The images that represent the past speak to us in the present. They are the past recorded and, for as long as we wish, the past relived.
America is a true melting pot made up of people from all different parts of the world. We are all Americans but we identify each other by our backgrounds. Although we are proud to be Irish-American or whatever else we may be, we are most proud to be Americans first and foremost.
From 1876 to 1924, over four and a half million Italians arrived in the United States, established hundreds of mutual
aid societies and publish Italian-language newspapers that provided an news source for new immigrants who could not understand English. The Sons of Italy was founded in New York around 1905; through this and many other organizations, Italian-Americans acknowledged the cultural traditions of their homeland while celebrating their achievements in America.
All four of my grandparents immigrated from Italy to the Unites States. My blood, my heart, and my history was spawned by those who came here from faraway shores. I give thanks to America for giving me freedom and quality of life, but my foundation comes from the lands of my forefathers.
Super Bowl Sunday: the biggest game of the year, the culmination of another great season and played this year by two of the most legendary teams in the league, the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers. Parties will be held, countless people will venture out of their homes and head to their local water holes to enjoy the big game.
More than a billion people worldwide will watch the game; much of the United States wi
ll grind to a halt to witness history in the making, the bragging rights for another year.
This year, as with many past years, I will be trimming the roses.
Don't get me wrong. I like sports. The games entertain us, distract us from our day-to-day lives. Add in speed, a splash of rivalry and a dash of danger and you've got the makings of excitement. I've seen horse racing, roller derby, Formula 1 racing, ice hockey and many others up close and personal. I bleed Dodger blue. I know all the words to "Hail to the Redskins".
That last one is the reason I have not watched a Super Bowl since 1992. If the Redskins aren't playing, I'm not watching. I watched occasionally just for the commercials, but the Internet made that unnecessary.
Whenever I watch my favorite sports teams my adrenaline shoots and I am into the game. When they are not playing, I'm not interested. I have trouble moving my enthuiasm to the game as opposed to the teams involved.
Super Bowl Sunday is a great day to shop. One year we were the only people in an office supply store and had great service when we shopped for a laptop. Movie theaters tend to be sparsely populated, as does any location without a television.
Best of luck to the Steel Curtain and the Green and Gold. May your team play the game of the century. I'll be pruning the roses, wistfully thinking about next year.
Another closely-guarded secret has been unearthed, this time without the help of Julian Assange. Internet Today has published the list of Colonel Sanders’ 11 secret herbs and spices, the recipe to KFC’s stranglehold on America’s fried chicken addiction.
What makes us wa
nt to know someone's deepest thoughts? Is it trust? It is the desire to make a connection with a person or a thing? Evolutionary monkey curiosity?
When someone asks if you want to know a secret (or vice versa), the question denotes two qualities: the deep sense of trust conveyed by sharing one and the august responsibility associated with knowing the secret.
Is it better to tell secrets? There are consequences and benefits of secret-keeping. Scientific studies have shown that divulging secrets does improves your health, but concealing them does not necessarily cause physical problems.
The fact that it is a secret makes us more curious. Do we want to know the secret because we think it may benefit us in some way, or do we want to know why it is a secret? We all have a skeleton or two in our closet, sometimes small and mostly inconsequential, sometimes large, perhaps criminal.
Where would humans be without a thirst for knowledge? The world around us holds countless secrets waiting to be unearthed.
For many years he was the only other male in the household. Creamsicle, a marmalade tabby with a square dog face and I were the men of the house. The two of us shared a special bond, guys sticking together in a home filled with females.
It is hard for me to remember a time when cats weren't part of my life. Midnight, Snowball, Bif and Stewart were among the cats at my parent's house. There was Seymour, the orange and white tabby who started off as a neighbor's cat and eventually came to live at our house instead. As an apartment dweller in college, my roommates and I named the local cats after cheese (Jack, Monterrey, Colby, Brie).
Creamsicle lived with us for nearly 15 years, arriving as a tiny scrap of fur and leaving us as a senior citizen. In between he was Laura's constant companion, through school years, friends that came and went, various houses and two cities. He was her first alarm clock, licking her face when it was time to get up in the morning. When she read a book, he was in her lap. When she sat at the computer, he shared the desk with her.
Creamsicle welcomed each additional cat and dog into our home with open paws. A gentleman to the very end, he lost his eyesight but managed to get around fairly well with hardly a complaint. As with all God's children, he is now free of pain and happy once again, never wanting for laps, open doors, catnip toys or full dishes of food.
St. Thomas Aquinas wrote about animals possessing a soul that is different than what humans have; St. Francis of Assisi saw animals as God's creatures to be honored and respected. God created heaven to be a place of perfect bliss, and I no doubt God will complete my happiness by having Creamsicle and other pets that have owned me over the years by my side.
Time has been a recent strong focus for me. Good times, bad times, productive times, wasted times. Time in front of me, time behind me. Time heals all wounds. Or as Nick Lowe put it, "Time Wounds All Heels".
Time is the measuring syst
em used to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them. We use it to quantify rates of change such as motion, growth, appearance, etc.
Dinner time. Work time. Free time. Play time. Class time. Bed time. Time is a valuable commodity, even if we don't always value it. Who wouldn't want more time to sleep? Or less time sitting in traffic? More time to chat with co-workers instead of just a quick hello, I’m fine. More time for projects, for priorities, for whatever makes us happy. Less time taken up with drama, more time for being productive.
Time is a valuable resources, one we do not have the luxury to waste. Money, gold, any material thing, can be recovered. The time we spend can never be recovered.
Time is fleeting. Make good use of your time.
For much of human history people didn’t locate their thoughts and emotions within the brain. The ancient Egyptians considered the heart to be the organ associated with an individual's intelligence and life force and was preserved for the afterlife, while the brain was removed and discarded. In numerous places the Bible uses the word "heart" as a place of intellect, thought, emotions, character, love, compassion and faithfulness.
Recently I read a study that suggests gut instincts don't come from your gut, but rather your heart. The findings did not indicate your heart is terribly good at providing insight into what to d
o, nor did the research indicate any particular way to improve decision making.
Then, you may ask, why bother talking about it? The study did find evidence there is more to the idea of trusting your heart than we may realize. People who were more aware of their heartbeat, meaning those who could estimate how fast their hearts were beating without directly measuring their pulse with their fingers, were better at tests that relied on intuition rather that logic or strategy.
The heart is the central link between itself, our brains, and our hormonal system. The heart is in a constant two-way dialogue with the brain; emotions change the signals the brain sends to the heart and the heart responds in complex ways.
Following the path of the heart can be a messy business. There might be bumps, bruises, cuts, and scratches as you move along the road. The mind may be the content of who you are, but the heart contains the distillate of your very being, the essence of what makes you who you are. Listen to your heart.
was a bonus feature that I used occasionally. I don't text, so the numeric pad was fine for adding names to numbers in the address book. We were comfortable with each other.
