The lab rat

I went to the UC Davis Center for the Mind and Brain this afternoon to be a subject in an experiment designed, the ad said, to assess short-term memory. All subjects had to be older than 60 (I qualify). Turned out, the long-term objective of the study has to do with short-term memory in schizophrenics (age not specified); my cohort is the "control" group.

So I sat in a soundproof room in front of a computer monitor, wearing a set of headphones (through which came the sound of the ocean) and holding a gameboy-type control. My task on the first go-round was to spot the horizontal red oval amongst the varying patterns of vertical red and blue ovals; if the oval was unbroken, I pushed the left button on the console, if it was a broken oval, I pushed the right button. The second go-round switched the colors on me and I had to find the blue horizontal oval and indicate broken or un-. Kinda boring but not difficult, and the pattern stayed on the screen until I made a selection.

Then came the second part of the experiment. Either three or four small squares, each a different color, was flashed on the screen for maybe a hundredth of a second. This would be followed by a second set of colored squares that would remain on the screen until I decided whether the second squares were the same or different than the first ones. Sometimes, the first flash of squares would be followed immediately by multicolored squares, then I'd see the second set. Another part of this section was selecting which square had changed color. This was really, really hard; the trick (if there was one) was not to "look" at anything but instead focus on the little focal point in the center of the screen. I got marginally—only marginally—better at it when I got into a kind of trancelike, nonthinking state, which makes me think that perhaps the real nature of the experiment is to induce schizophrenia . . .

I'll get $15 for this 90 minutes of button-pushing, and when they asked me if I'd be willing to be in their database of potential volunteers for other studies, I said sure; $15 is $15.

The thrill of Bill

Bill Clinton came to UC Davis this evening to campaign for Hillary. The announcement in the paper said he'd be speaking at 9 p.m. in the Pavilion (aka the old Rec Hall) and that there'd be seating for 1,800 to 2,000 people. Susan, Bill and I wanted to hear him, so we headed over to campus about 7 o'clock. A lot—a LOT—of other people had the same idea; when we got there, the line was already literally around the block, several people deep all along its length. But we figured what the heck, we were there, and we might get in, so we found the end of the line and took our places in the queue. The north wind had begun blowing earlier in the day, and it picked up and got colder as we waited. And waited. But the crowd was good natured, lots of joking and speculating on whether any of us all the way back where we were would make it into the hall (one woman said, "If I don't get in, I'm voting for Obama!").

I saw some university staff people and other non-student-looking types in the crowd, but most were students, and I felt encouraged and heartened by their evident interest. But my nominee for the most inspiring person there was the young man right behind us in line. His name was Nick, and he's in the fifth grade in Orangevale, about 35 miles east of here. He wanted to come hear Bill Clinton, and so he and his mom drove over and got in line. Nick said he's interested in the election, and he and his classmates talk about it sometimes. Right now, he says, about half of his class is for Hillary, and the other half is for Obama. He himself hasn't yet made up his mind.

We didn't get in. We ended up watching some of Clinton's remarks on the TV monitor in the Fox 40 truck; the guy at the controls saw a bunch of us standing outside peering in his windows, and he opened the side doors so we could see better, and he turned up he sound so we could hear. Nice of him to do that, and in future I will think more kindly (well, a little more kindly) about the Fox 40 organization.

I was disappointed not to get to see Bill up close and personal, but I've seen him in person twice before. What I was really hoping for, and what made me feel the most disappointed, was that Nick didn't get in, either. If I'd had the chance, I'd have given him my spot.

Relativity

Johnny Podres died Sunday. I remember seeing him pitch for the Dodgers after they moved from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in the late 1950s, and though at the time I doubt I knew his age, I guess I always thought of him (and other ball players) as much older than I. But he wasn't, as I discovered in reading his obituary: he turned 75 this past October. That's only 11 years and some months older than I am today.

How can that be? I felt so much younger than he when I watched him play ball, and now I feel such surprise that he was so young. Time and age are relative, I guess, and they compress with age . . . leastways, my age . . .

Temping

I answered an ad for help taking inventory at the Avid Reader bookstore, and so today, from 10 a.m. to 6:30 p.m., I read out prices from books while my inventory partner made hash marks on price sheets. I must have handled a thousand books, maybe more. It's all a blur.

The sections I inventoried were Philosophy (religion, astrology, etc.), Science/Nature (the funnest and most frustrating section because there's so much there I want to read but no time to browse today), Reference (a giagantic category encompassing foreign language instruction, dictionaries, study guides, etc.), Business (lots of Nolo Press titles in that one), Parenting (overall impression: parents are terrified of their children and need many, many books to help them deal with the little tyrants), and the Remainders (how did most of these get published in the first place?)

I can tell you that the most popular price for a paperback book is $14. 95. I saw many titles that I would have loved to linger over, but titles weren't what we were supposed to be paying attention to. One title, however, did stick in my mind: Madame Bovary's Ovaries. I intend to take a closer look at that one the next time I'm at the bookstore.

Stuff

On a visit to the Davis Public Library yesterday, I checked out In Flagrante Collecto (caught in the act of collecting), by Marilynn Gelfman Karp, a folio-sized paean to collections of all kinds and to their collectors, also of all kinds. There are lots of illustrations of things people have collected, interspersed with Karp's discoursing on the allure of it all.

Some of the collections are what you'd expect—stamps, baseball cards, old advertising signs, postcards, matchbooks—but some are truly bizarre. Ever met anyone who collects those tags attached to mattresses and upholstered furniture, the ones that say "Do not remove under penalty of law"? Apparently, many flouters of the law have amassed these in carefully tended collections. And how about "wait your turn" tickets, those little paper tabs imprinted with a number that tell you how long you have to stand around until the deli guy takes your order? These, too, are considered collectible by Ms Karp, who claims to have quite a few of her own.

I like lots of things and some part of my psyche would like to collect any number of interesting objects, but though I blame my lack of space as the reason I don't, I know the real reason, which is that everything that I bring home that could be called a collection never gets collected. It just ends up in a drawer or on a shelf behind something else, and dies of neglect. Oh, well . . . I'll be happy to save mattress tags for anyone who'd like them.

Watch your tongue

Lake Superior State University has issued its 2008 List of Banned Words, and not a moment too soon. I agree with most of their selections (among them, "wordsmith" and "authoring") and only regret that past entries are still around ("Your call is very important to us" [1996]). I don't know if "future plans" has made it to any previous list, but it gets my vote.

Diana Ross, call your agent . . .

. . . in the name of love, before you break my heart . . .
Think it oh-oh-ver . . .

Wish fulfillment

OK, the weather mavens got it right this time—plenty o' rain, more-than-plenty o' wind. I got off lightly compared to some (who had whole trees fall on their houses). Still, it was exciting in a scary kinda way, especially when a large limb crashed onto the roof of the house next door with an alarming WHOMMMP sound; luckily, it did little if any damage. All I suffered was a power outage, and in that I was joined by nearly the whole town. Mine was off for 23 hours, and as of yesterday, some people still were in the dark. Luckily enough, the lights downtown stayed on (Downtown Business Assn clearly has pull with PG&E), so, since no electricity = no cooking for me, I headed down to Crepeville for dinner along with a whole lotta other people, there and at other restaurants, bookshops and whatever else was open and lit.

But it was dark, really dark, in the parts of town that didn't have power, and it was disorienting. You don't realize how much light is usually around, not just from street lights but from lights inside houses, or porch lights, or even traffic signals. And the cloud cover added to the sense of inkiness. Add the hazards of branches and other debris all over the sidewalks and in the streets, and you've got some perilous walking or driving conditions.

But the birds didn't seem to mind any of it. Despite 50 mph winds and horizontally falling rain, the house finches were at the feeder. Looked a bit bedraggled, mind you, but apparently unfazed. How strong they must be.

Surveying my deck yesterday, I discovered this souvenir the wind had left (look at the right side of the feeder):
Here's a shot of the limb that fell next door:
And here's where it came from:

Iowa

Barack Obama has won the Democratic Iowa caucus, and no matter what happens after this, I am here to say how amazed, stunned and utterly thrilled and grateful I am to have lived to see a black man (with his black wife and black children) on a platform declaring victory in a run-up to a U.S. presidential election.

People say nothing changes, but that's not true. When you have a black man and a white woman both vying for the office of president, both having a legitimate shot at getting elected, a lot has changed, and for the better. We have a long way to go, but as the old Virginia Slims ads used to say, we've come a long way, baby. A long, long way.

Update on The Big Storm: Had some decent rain this afternoon, and it's sprinkling right now (9:15pm), but so far no sign of the monster winds that have been forecast. I expect to be disappointed in my hopes for a big one, though later tonight and tomorrow could bring some good stuff.

Yesterday and tomorrow

Riding my bicycle yesterday afternoon, heading west along Rd. 29, came on a big red-tailed hawk at the edge of the opposite side of the road, hunkered down over his lunch of fresh rabbit; above him on the wire, a turkey vulture waited patiently for his turn.

The weatherpeople are forecasting a big storm for tomorrow and Friday. High winds and lots of rain here in the valley, blizzard conditions and snow levels in feet, not inches, in the Sierra. I'm excited at the prospect; we haven't had an honest-to-goodness good storm in a long time. But I'm not holding my breath; more and more it seems that forecasts of big weather turn out less so in the actual event. But maybe this time I'll get lucky.

Do hawks hunt in the rain? Are there any critters out in the rain to be hunted?

Save the date

New year, new calendars. I always have several of them—they're cheaper than buying art—and there are a couple of them hanging in the kitchen, one or two in the bedroom, and one on the wall next to my computer. This year, I also have a page-a-day one that sits on the desk, each day featuring a New Yorker cartoon, which will give me no excuse to begin any day in a grouchy mood.

Looking back through the "main" calendar for '07 (the one I write on) makes me realize how much goes on in my life—little things, like haircuts and dentist appointments, and bigger things, like vacations, weddings and (this past year) funerals. I'll transfer the birthday and anniversary reminders from last year's calendar to the new 2008 model, but I'll save the outdated one; old calendars are my diaries, and unearthing a 10- or 15 year-old one from a box or drawer can make me remember the details of those long-gone days better than anything.

The obessive-compulsive birdwatcher

I hung a tube feeder on the rail of my deck a week or so ago, and for the first few days, I didn't see a single bird in its vicinity. Then I went away for a week, and when I came back, the seed level in the feeder had dropped significantly. Seeing a scrubjay nearby, I figured it was he and his pals who had been at the feeder, but in the last couple of days, there have been several different kinds of birds showing up. Every time I see one out there, I grab my binoculars and stare at it, hoping to get some idea of what it might be; a finch? Could be . . . Or a sparrow? Maybe . . . but what kind of sparrow? Leaf through the Sibley's field guide, look fixedly at the drawings, try to match what I'm seeing on the deck with the beautifully drawn illustrations in the book. Hmmmm . . . Decide to record what I see (or think I see), and get a new notebook to write my guesses down. They kept coming, sometimes just one at a time, sometimes two, or three. Spot bird, grab binoculars, focus, stare, get Sibley's, stare some more, make notes, think I might have misidentified, make another note . . .

Birding . . . it's not just for Sundays . . .

A birthday remembrance

Today my older son, John, would have been 44 years old. He died Oct. 12, 1986, a few weeks before his 23rd birthday. I guess you really can't wish a happy birthday to someone who no longer celebrates them, but I don't care; I think of him every day.

Happy birthday, son. I miss you.

John at 18
August 1982

Long winter's night

It's 5:15 p.m., and I'm in my pajamas. I'm not ill; it's just that my pajamas are fleecy and warm. It's been cold and drizzly all day—not really raining, more like a fat fog that can get you as wet as a real rain if you stay out in it long enough. I walked downtown a bit ago to have tea with Alison and Allan, and now that I'm in for the evening, getting into my pajamas seemed the perfect wardrobe choice for a cold winter's night. Plenty of things to read (my accumulated mail came with a couple of new magazines and about six catalogs, and I'm two-thirds of the way through Richard Ford's The Sportswriter, which I'll probably finish tonight), not to mention my recently acquired cable TV hookup, which may actually have a decent movie on it somewhere (or a marathon showing of Law & Order: [insert spinoff subtitle here]. And I'm pretty sure there's some wine around here. Summer will be here soon enough; right now, I'm enjoying winter.

Home again

Back home. SoCal was cold and dry; Davis is cold and damp. I prefer the latter, and so does my hair. I had a good visit with my family, got caught up on events and states of mind, delighted in my granddaughters' exuberance and sweetness. Glad to have gone, glad to have returned; the best kind of journey, I think.

From spin class to Canter's

Went to the YMCA this morning with my cousin to do a spin class. It just takes one of those to remind me a) how out of shape I am and b) how much I hate spin classes. But it was good exercise, the most I've had in weeks, and if a little sweat is good, a lot of it must be even better.

Then, needing a dose of Jewishness to balance the Christmasness, we got in the car and drove over to Fairfax Ave. and Canter's Delicatessen for corned beef and coleslaw on rye. Delicious.

Heading home tomorrow . . .

How little we know

Watched the Kennedy Center Honors on TV this evening. Brian Wilson was one of the honorees. I loved the Beach Boys' music, still do, but I haven't paid much (read: any) attention to the pop music scene in years. So I missed hearing about Wilson's struggles with mental illness, drug abuse, weight gain, loss of the creative spark that made him such a seminal figure and his comeback in recent years. None (or very little) of this was mentioned on the show, but he looked so uncomfortable, so stiff and wooden, almost like he'd had a stroke, that I couldn't help noticing. It took my cousin's telling me about all of it to make me aware. And what I thought was, we go along taking pleasure in things created for us by others, blithely unaware (and not wanting to be) of what their lives may feel like, what the giving takes from them. We just want more of what we like. Made me sad for him in a way I can't be very articulate about yet, and that I owed him an apology.

SoCal Christmas

Another beautiful Christmas Day in Southern California, both inside . . .



and out . . .

A beautiful day, period.

Lights! Lights! Lights!

A house a few blocks from my cousin's, lit to the teeth and synchronized to Christmas music, and so over the top it's good . . .

The night before the night before Christmas

To Torrance and cousin Joe's yesterday evening; I'll be here through Friday. The kids brought me down and stayed for dinner: enchiladas and tamales and a green salad, preceded by chips, dips, etc. etc. etc. It was all delicious, as usual, and anyone who went away hungry has only him- or herself to blame. We were nine at table: Joe, Debbie, son Alan and wife Elizabeth, cousin Sue, my 88-year-old aunt, Marie (Joe and Sue's mom and my mom's sister), Fred, Jen, Shannon, Courtney and me.

My auntie and my granddaughters. My mother died when my sons were very young, so I'm happy to have Shannon and Courtney be with her sister, even for these brief visits.