Invisible and odorless

The spider usually sets off the smoke detector in August, so I was surprised to arrive home and  hear a repeating piercing beep.  Went upstairs and opened the smoke detector carefully, not to spoil Mario's handiwork. Replaced the 9v battery.  The alarming beeps continued.

Back downstairs, I gingerly opened the thermostat, again remembering Mario's electrical rescue, and replaced the AA batteries.  The beeps were giving me goosebumps.

Upstairs again to check the doorbell chime.  Back downstairs I found a forgotten smoke detector that's wired-in. This was turning into an Edvard Munch moment with bonus stair-climber workout.

Rounding the corner into the bathroom I find the beep source, the carbon monoxide detector I saved from my parents' house. Isn't carbon monoxide a winter killer?  Every CO horror story I've ever heard clamors into my anxiety between the shrieking beeps.

I move the detector to different electrical outlets feeling guilt for never pushing those TEST MONTHLY and RESET buttons. Should I be getting myself outside into the hundred-degree fresh air before I become woozy and unconscious?

There was that spell in junior high when I wouldn't ride in the car in the Nebraska dead of winter without the window open because I was so sure we were all a-gonna die from fumes. It's a miracle my family didn't just drop-kick me out into a snow drift and drive away. This anxiety was between my two phases of moth phobia, but smack in the middle of the pancake anxiety year.


Now, I could just unplug the *%! bleaking CO detector and throw it in the dumpster, then toddle off to beddy-bye. That story would have the pride-goeth outcome where I drift into a happy sleep with a tad bit of nausea before death.  Or I could let the CO detector keep shrieking, and have a sleepless night worrying about dying, kind of like a bad night camping. Or I could maybe call the Fire Department and have them check it out.


Feeling too torn to actually call 9-1-1, I looked up the phone number in the Yellow Pages for our Fire Department.  Sure, wasting those precious seconds could be the difference between life and death, between dying in my sleep and going outside into the hundred degree fresh air to live another dang hot day. Apparently when it is not a 9-1-1 emergency, the Fire Department phone is answered by a cleaning woman who might be your mom. She hems and haws with you about whether or not your CO detector might have gone a little funny in the head.  She reassures you that putting your call through to dispatch will not cost you hundreds of dollars and could be good for your peace of mind, which you are rapidly losing what with all the shrieking barks of that Tasmanian devil CO detector.

So that's how I ended up with four hunky Plano firefighters in their turn-out pants and suspenders in my kitchen taking readings on their carbon monoxide gizmos and filling out official forms.  They took readings near my gas water heater and upstairs near the gas furnace.  When I mentioned that my fireplace is gas, they ask if I had used it recently.  It was clear they might would drive me straight to the loony bin if I answered yes.  

I thanked them profusely for retrieving my peace of mind, and told them I would be calling my 89 year-old next-door neighbor right away.  "I don't want him to have a heart attack seeing the firetruck."  


"We don't either," they said sincerely.








Let's review what we learned in this Unit, boys and girls:

• Firefighters are our community helpers.
• Check your smoke detectors regularly.
• Stock up on batteries.
• Test your electrical outlets monthly.
• A carbon monoxide detector is a good thing to have, but they don't last forever.
• It's good to know a Mario who can fix electrical problems.
• It's wise to check on elderly neighbors in this heat.

© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Keep cool!

http://dallasmorningviewsblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/07/power-failure-i.html

This is the link to my guest post on the Dallas Morning News Opinion Blog in which I worry about the North Texas electric power grid.

I belong to a triumvirate of mama worriers. We have divided up the woes of the world so as to share the burden and be better informed for our fretting.

The word "triumvirate" poses some problems. The vir means men. I'm not sure that you could find three men who could do the quality worrying we do, and we are not even wise Latina women. Changing the word to triumvirettes doesn't help, but it would present interesting costuming and choreography challenges.

triumvir
"one of three men in the same office or of the same authority," 1579, from L. triumvir, from Old L. phrase trium virum, genitive plural of tres viri "three men," from tres "three" + viri, plural of vir "man" (see virile). Triumvirate is from 1584.

We considered calling ourselves the Three Musketeers of world worries, but none of us carry guns. That led us to the Three Mouseketeers. We would look great in Annette's ears and sweater, with the pleated skirt and saddle shoes.

Annette Number One worries about the U.S. economy and employment. If she has extra time she worries about the global marketplace.

Annette Number Two is in charge of diseases, plagues, and health care. She's got a full load with swine flu, bird flu, mad cows, food poisoning, insurance, and pharmaceutical recalls. Her bonus category is Florida.

I am Annette Number Three. I am in charge of worrying about the environment. Global warming, energy conservation, toxic landfills, the disappearing honey bees and family farms, migratory birds, and drought.

In case you are having that dream about the final exam for a history class you never attended, the First Triumvirate refers to Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey. The Second Triumvirate was Marc Antony, Octavian (aka Caesar Augustus), and Lepidus.


© 2009 Nancy L. Ruder

Thankful for leftovers already

Teaching art is like always being on the fourth day after Thanksgiving, and trying to make something fresh and appetizing out of the same old leftovers. Today I'm grateful for donated leftover items, though it may take years for me to find the right combination to use them.

Thanks to the Woolly Mammoth for getting caught in the rain with a bunch of colored tissue paper in 2004. The colors bled in ways that look much like fall leaves.

Thanks for the bountiful okra harvest, no kidding! We used okra and tempera paints to make the prints.

Thanks to the school that quit using Tektronix Phaser 200 Series Printers Transparency Film sheets "with perforated tab". We are whittling away the stack making our school feast placemats.

Thanks to the woman who gave me three giant boxes of fancy scrapbooking papers in 2006. We photocopied an autumn leaf paper for the backgrounds of our placemat collages.

Thanks for the chance to use that brittle and faded construction paper to make crayon leaf rubbings. Now how else can we use that up? I'd be grateful for the storage space.

Thanks for folks who save old magazines and catalogs. Thanks especially for my former job that invites me back to work in a lovely library surrounded by beautiful fall foliage just ready to be pressed.

A song stuck in my head can be as unwelcome as the contents of that Tupperware way, way back on the refrigerator shelf for who knows how long. This time, the leftover song helped me realize the science potential for the preschool placemat project.

Cling-cling! Ding-ding! The Duettino from Act I of "The Marriage of Figaro" stayed in my head after the splendid Dallas Opera performance Sunday afternoon. Static cling is just the thing for science this week. The transparency film lets the kids experience static electricity. The film lifts, moves, and holds the tissue paper pieces as if by magic as we assemble our placemat collages. No glue is necessary, and neither is a technical explanation of the phenomenon.

FIGARO
Supposing my lady
Calls you at night:
Ding ding: in two steps
You can be there from here.
Or if it should happen
That his lordship should want me,
Dong dong: in three bounds
I'm there at his service.

SUSANNA
And supposing one morning
The dear Count should ring,
ding ding, and send you
Three miles away,
Dong dong, and the devil
Should lead him to my door?
Dong dong, in three bounds ...

Our creations are ready to be laminated. Somewhere out there Wolfgang and Leonard Weisgard are rubbing party balloons on their hair.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Dance of the Sugarplum ISBNs

Last Saturday at the literacy workshop we played with Wikki Stix to form letters. Wikki Stix are basically pieces of yarn coated with colored wax. They have endless kids' craft uses, but I hadn't considered the teaching possibilities before. At the workshop we used Wikki Stix to form letters and numbers on a flat surface, then make crayon texture rubbings on paper over the formations. Wikki Stix adhere to the table unlike most texture rubbing craft materials, making it much easier for preschoolers.

The possibilities for creating animation and flip book sequences with the Wikki Stix rubbings really recharged my brain's dry cell battery. What if a marching band of red wiggler worms formed mutating numerals a football halftime show? With the Wikki Stix it was so easy to make incremental changes and produce quick rubbing images.

This Saturday I worked at the library preparing order forms for books, large print materials, and audio books. ISBN numbers danced around in my head like a proofreading nightmare version of "The Nutcracker".

International Standard Book Numbers used to be ten-digit identification codes that had a good beat you could almost dance to or type from memory. Now they are cursed thirteen-digit headaches that identify each individual media format for a particular title. As the day progressed, the ISBN numbers began to wiggle and shimmer, uncurl and travel when I tried to type, like enthused wax-dipped yarn dervishes. If they didn't all begin with 978, I would never have been able to corral them on paper!


The second edition of Mary Appelhof's Worms Eat My Garbage has just one ISBN:
9780977804511

Judith Viorst's new book, Alexander and the Wonderful, Marvelous, Excellent, Terrific Ninety Days, has all these ISBNs for various formats:
9781400105281
9781400135288
9781400155286
9781416550051

Barack Obama's Audacity of Hope has twice that many number assignments. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets has thrice just in English. Form those numbers, my little red wigglers, between the yard markers and the hash marks.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Every hat has a silver lining

This men's hat interactive learning tool for the chapeauly-challenged will use the same format as the electric quiz board I made for Camp Fire Girls in 1966, but without the dry cell, peg board, wires, and lightbulb.

Round #1

1. Many people born in the late Fifties name this flat cloth cap worn for driving on the road or golf course after which long-time Mattel Barbie boyfriend?

2. In Esphyr Slobodkina's classic children's picture book, the peddler demands that what animal give him back his caps?

Round #2

1. What two movie stars looked great in eight-panel newsboy caps?

2. A bucket cap can be worn with the brim flipped up or down. It can be worn while singing, "There is Nothing Like a Dame," or on a fishing trip with Colonel Henry Blake of the M.A.S.H. 4077th. Name two other famous and clueless bucket cap wearers. "Who are these people?"

3. Because of its shape, a bucket cap is often referred to by the trademark of what disposable paper drink holder?

Round #3

1. Usually a light, straw hat with a stiff wide brim and a flat shallow crown, but not necessarily named for the most common and colorful order of the dragonfly family, what silly plastic hats are worn at political conventions?

2. While similar to the hat worn by Mary Poppins' significant other as played by Dick Van Dyke, what different term designates the stiff straw hat with a flat crown worn by Renoir's lunchers and the young Bob Dylan at Woodstock?

3. "Who are those guys?" What hat convinces Butch and Sundance that Joe Lefors is on their trail?

Round #4

1. I'm too old to remember Buster Keaton wearing this hat style named after a thick-crusted pastry filled with chopped meat. What man's hat style having a low, flat crown and a snap brim is sadly invoked in Charles Mingus' elegy for jazz saxophone great Lester Young? [Listen free.]

2. Named for an 1882 work by French playwright Victorien Sardou, what soft felt hat with a brim that can be turned up or down and a rather low crown creased lengthwise is a symbol for both Frank Sinatra and Indiana Jones?

3. A slouch hat is a soft hat with a flexible wide brim and chinstrap most commonly worn as part of a military uniform. The Australian slouch hat is sometimes called a bush hat, and is worn with one side of the brim turned up or pinned to the side of the hat. What golfer joins Crocodile Dundee and the Man From Snowy River as familiar Australian hat wearers?

Round #5

The Daily Double! Sean Connery as Captain Marko Ramius wears the traditional Russian fur cap called a Ushanka in what 1990 movie?

1. Perhaps you missed the NPR segment about Basque sheepherders and Dutch ovens in the western U.S. What round, visorless cloth cap originally worn by male Basques has a name derived from the Late Latin birrus, "hooded cape"?

2. Lyle Lovett would rather you steal his girlfriend than touch his John B. hat having a high crown and wide brim of what brand?

3. Hamid Karzai , known for his handsome peaked hat made from the aborted fetuses of Karakul sheep, is the president of what country?

Final Round

1. Not to be confused with a homburg, this stiff felt hat with a round crown and a narrow, curved brim is named after what event at Epsom Downs?

2. Having nothing to do with pins and strikes, this hat made by Thomas and William Bowler was a frequent symbol in the surrealist work of what artist?
I've got Sherlock's thinking cap, but need new flashlight batteries before we can consider trilbys, panamas, and gimmes.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Why spelling is still important

SpellCheck cannot tell you how to pack your duffel bag for a weekend getaway:

The Woolly Mammoth emailed his fretting mama from Italy to say he is alive and well. He wrote that he spent last weekend "on a beach near the town of Grossotto." I was quick to Google "Grossotto," which is in the mountains near the Swiss/Italian border. No beach in sight. High on a hill with a lonely surfboard, Layee odl, layee odl layee-oo!

Grossotto is the home of a solar park, a large array of solar photovoltaic collection panels used to turn sunlight into power. It's probably a good place to catch some rays, but not necessarily to watch bikini volleyball.

Studying the map of Italy hanging above the kitchen sink while loading my dishwasher, I'm guessing the Woolly Mammoth went to a beach near the town of Grosseto. Grosseto is near the sea and close to his study center. It sounds like a better place for swim goggles than for Google.

My travel budget is for a weekend getaway to Gross-out-oh, Texas. That's where you find old men in Speedos holding sheets of HyVee store brand aluminum foil while beached in webbed lawn chaises after the Senior Swim at the city natatorium. Do walruses get sunburned?

One little student is working on the phonetic "G" sound . He has pictures of a goose, a goat, and a garbage can:

Guh, guh, guh, juice.
Guh, guh, guh, goat.
Guh, guh, guh, trash!

The Woolly Mammoth might oughta maybe better check the spelling before he departs next weekend. He's going to look like severe juice goat trash wearing a Grossotto parka at the Grosseto beach.

© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Greased pig wrestling

Don't tell PETA--it wasn't an animal at the county fair! I wrestled a greasy, deceased over-the-range microwave oven out of the wall and down to the dumpster. Yes, my Sharp is riding that big Carousel turntable in the sky.

It had been installed on the cheap by a previous condo owner. The electrical cord was cut, and the wires stripped and twisted under connection caps tucked behind the drywall. The wiring probably went to a harvest gold range hood back when the condo was built around 1980. That's a bit too scary for me.





There's a hilarious greased pig photo in the Bloomington, Indiana Herald Times of July 8, 2007. I'm not interested in debating the cruelty of this old time county fair event. I just want to have a hot shower.

Installing a replacement shouldn't be as greasy an operation. I get my Rosie The Riveter Meets Helen Reddy mindset going, but I probably shouldn't install a grounded outlet or try to lift a fifty pound appliance while attaching it to a mounting frame! I am woman, hear me roar, hear me call for a handyperson. I am strong, I am invincible, I am not an electician.


© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Dad's Dizzy

No, it's not a spring baseball reverie about my dad snoozing on the couch while Dizzy Dean and PeeWee Reese did the play-by-play of baseball games in the early Sixties. This time that apostrophe doesn't denote a possessive. Dad is dizzy, or he was yesterday. The doctors told him he might be goofed up because of crystals in his ears.

Unbeknownst to most of us vertebrates, we have calcium deposits in our ears. Bits of this calcareous material can break off and float around in the inner ear fluid, like baby icebergs awaiting the Titanic. These teeny-weeny otoliths sometimes impinge upon nerve endings due to changes of position and gravity. And wouldn't Impinging Otoliths be a great name for a rock band?? This type of dizziness is called benign positional vertigo.

Ear crystals sounds very New Age. Put an ear, maybe Van Gogh's ear, under a pyramid to grow crystals with powerful energy. In Bluebirds we grew crystals on charcoal briquettes in foil pie pans in Julie B's basement. True, I've met some children and adults who listen like they have briquettes in their ears, but this is not the case with Dad.

After Bluebirds, we entered Camp Fire where we had to meet requirements in science as well as nature, citizenship, art, home, sports, and other areas. When I showed some interest in electricity, Dad helped me by providing a dry cell battery, wires, a light bulb, pegboard, and a telegraph toggle for my guided experiments. He also gave me a crystal radio kit for Christmas, or maybe prompted Santa along that line. Unfortunately, all I remember about the crystal radio experiment is the red headphone set and wrapping the wire around and around a tube.

It's been forty years. You would think kids these days could cross two wires and disintegrate oto-icebergs the same way they defeat aliens on those video games. The possibilities are dizzying.

Otolith is from the Greek oto indicating ear, and lithos for stone; one of many minute calcareous particles found in the inner ear of certain vertebrates and in the statocysys of many invertebrates.

Calcareous is from the Latin calx for lime; containing calcium, calcium carbonate, or limestone: chalky

Crystal is from the Latin crystallum which is from the Greek krustallos. And here I thought krustallos were those burnt toast crumbs in the bottom of the toaster oven.

Impinge is also Latin from impingere to push against. To encroach or trespass...Maybe Encroaching Otoliths is a better band name.

Some Camp Fire science projects:
S-316
Learn Morse code.
S-317
Make a string telephone.
S-318
Record a mock radio broacast.
S-319
Write and send a telegram.
S-320
Make a crystal radio set.

© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Hope for hard-hit rural Nebraska

Driving south on I-35 near the Kansas-Oklahoma border we saw a big convoy of cherry-picker utility trucks headed the opposite direction. The trucks all had lights flashing. Some were towing trailers where workers might sleep between extended shifts. My sons and I hope the trucks are on the move to bring more repair crews to the parts of Nebraska still suffering without electricity since last weekend's severe ice storm.

It's good to get a slushy snowball smack of perspective upside the head! We take electricity for granted. We expect thermostats to respond to our hot-flashy whims. Microwaves exist to nuke fattening diet entrees. We consider the snow-covered landscape in terms of "winter recreation opportunities"*. Kids pout if they aren't entertained by a variety of electronic devices around the clock. How would we survive without refrigerators, homogenized and pasteurized milk, USDA graded beef, email, and rechargeable defibrillators? Some of us get cranky without computers, glue guns, and fruit smoothie blenders.

Imagine how crabby we could get without heat for a week, and without ways to keep our livestock fed and watered. Nebraskans help their neighbors. They remain stoic about the economic losses. Whole towns collaborate to keep old residents warm, and young residents in dry diapers. I have in my lap a photostat of my great-great grandfather's handwritten memoir of homesteading in the Republican River valley in April of 1873. Being stoic is good while sheltering your babies, wife, horses, and oxen in a roofless log shanty. I'm thankful great-great grandparents, August and Dorothea Sasse, kept their children alive in the cold. I'm glad the cherry-pickers are heading north. We wish the residents and the repair crews a quick, safe resolution to their problems.


*A game of shuffleboard to decide between hot cocoa and hot cider is my idea of winter recreation.

The Ice Storm Survey

Through the email miracle of forwarding friend-of-a-friend tidbits, I got hooked into pondering the choices of books and games I would make in case of a prolonged power outage due to a Dallas ice storm. This is a variation of the mental games I've played most of my life, "Fantasy Dinner Party Guests", and "Stranded on a Desert Isle".

The premise is you are house-bound without electricity for a few days after a big storm. What books would you want to have if you were alone, if you were reading aloud with someone, and if you were ten years old (limit two per category)? What games would you want in those same categories?

I had the great good fortune, as I see it now, to grow up in a place where blizzards and snow days were a feature of every winter. We didn't lose power often, but diversions back in those olden days were far less dependent on electricity than now. We had batteries for the transistor radio. I didn't actually write on a slate by the light of a candle like Abraham Lincoln.

During a blizzard, we listened to the weather. Not the weather report on the transistor, but the howl, swirl, and shriek of the wind, the creaking of the very cold house, and the sleet hitting the windows. There are few things more satisfying than being wrapped up in a comforter made by your grandma, listening to the weather, and rereading your favorite book, knowing it doesn't matter when you get to sleep because school is already called off for tomorrow. Possibly one of the few things that are more satisfying is a rowdy game of Yahtzee with all your cabin-feverish family and any friends who bravely tromped through the drifts for a visit and some excellent homemade sugar cookies!

If you beg me, I will share my choices. If you share yours, I will forward them to the friend-of-a-friend without your name or email address. It's a fun thing to ponder, even if it is still warm enough to wear shorts and flipflops in Dallas.
_____________________________________________________________
Does anyone have luck with the Blogger "Search This Blog"? Does it ever yield results?

Squirrels jumping into transformers

Now that I think about it, the whole explanation seems unlikely. During snowstorms back in Nebraska in the late-Seventies the electrical transformers on power poles would sometimes explode quite loudly around our neighborhood of small, older apartment houses. We believed that the explosions were caused by cold-crazed squirrels leaping into the transformer units. This was twenty years before I heard the term "suicide bomber". Our lights would flicker after one of the explosions.

Whenever I make pork chops and Spanish rice, I get a visual memory of looking out to the northeast from our apartment balcony window toward the alley, the parking lot, and the power pole with the transformer all covered with four to six inches of snow.

The one-bedroom apartment had bright Husker red shag carpet. The kitchen was one corner of the living/dining room. The fridge and range were harvest gold. We were the newlywed managers of the 8-plex, so our rent was $145 a month! Our phone bill was $7/month. We didn't have a car payment on the banana yellow rusty Chevy Nova. Our black and white t.v. was about 12" diagonal.

Our crockpot was avocado green. And yes, we had macrame plant hangers.

We got up early to use the snowblower and shovel so the residents could get their cars out of the lot and up the gravel alley to go to work and school. I would brown the thick pork chops in a heavy cast iron skillet. Didn't have to add oil to the pan then because the chops weren't trimmed of all their fat.

Put the browned chops into the crockpot. Add a can of stewed tomatoes with green peppers, one canful of water, 1/2 tsp. dried parsley, 1 tsp. chili powder, 1/4 tsp. sage, 1/2 tsp. salt if you are young and don't even know about blood pressure, and 1.5 cups uncooked rice (not Minute Rice). Stir. Plug in crockpot, and set on low. Go to work and school. Come home and shovel the lot and sidewalks again. Collect rent checks. Vacuum stairway. Serve pork chops and Spanish rice with Gallo Hearty Burgundy. Wash dishes by hand. Listen to Miles Davis.

Electricity Girl

Perfectly splendid fall day with bright leaves, sweaters tied around our waists, and hot air balloons in the thin blue sky--just right for an afternoon of mother-son bonding over home repairs! With the help of my youngest, let's call him Igor*, I have replaced both the front and back exterior light fixtures. I have also installed a cover over the electrical outlet outside the front door which is stupidly positioned next to the automatic sprinkler head. Now my twinkly Christmas lights will be happy, and we will all be able to see the keyhole to unlock the door. Once again I have used my superpowers to benefit humanity.
*

My superpowers were revealed when I was about ten years old and enjoyed our school science unit about electricity. For my birthday I received The How and Why Wonder Book of Electricity. This amazing paperback by Jerome J. Notkin, Ed. D., and Sidney Gulkin, M.S. in Ed. was copyrighted 1960, and cost fifty cents. It included a chapter of "Activities for Junior Electricians". I also received a birthday dry cell battery, a white porcelain miniature socket with a flashlight bulb, and a switch.

My dad was available to counsel and advise the Young Electricity Girl as she worked through the Junior Electricians activities, if necessary. Activity number eight was "How Can We Make a Quiz Board?" I still have the quiz board I constructed on a piece of masonite pegboard. My parents brought it down here the last time they visited, along with The How and Why Wonder Book of Electricity. Due to recent housekeeping lapses, the Amazing Electricity Girl doesn't know exactly where she put the quiz board, but it's here somewhere! Superheroes can't always be bothered with little details.

Dad also exhibited saintly patience while I earned a Camp Fire Girl bead for changing a faucet washer. He was my technical advisor and transportation provider for fossil hunts and rock-tumbling when I thought my future might be as Young Lapidary Girl. He was also instrumental in my development as a patient, philosophic Young Fishing Girl.


Catching butterflies was the science hobby that really engaged our entire family. My dad made the frames for our nets, and my mom sewed them. We all raced around getting a lot of exercise and fresh air, and eventually learned to catch butterflies in our nets. We studied the field guides to identify our catches, learned their habits, and searched for their caterpillars and cocoons. My mom perfected the technique for using a carbon tetrachloride kill jar with minimal damage to specimens. Her eye for detail and perfectionism inspired us to further efforts. We all fell in love with swallowtails and sphinx moths. The names were poetry, and the fragile scales glorious. Mom was a model for perservering to master technique as she became expert at mounting specimens for display. She was very good. A lab or museum would have respected her skill.

Although we were hunters during the few years this hobby captured our imaginations, we became more attuned to nature, more respectful or its gifts, and ultimately far more protective of our fragile environment.

I didn't grow up to be an electrical engineer, but I did have a sense of my ability to reason out solutions to practical problems thanks to being Young Electrical Girl. I learned to apply liberal doses of perserverance and patience to problems, and to even consult the owner's manuals and field guides of life.

Complete the circuit. Smell the honeysuckle. Enjoy the energy.