And fry it in bacon grease, of course
humor
12/21/12 12:01am (in Chukotka)
IT IS 3:01AM HERE AND 12:01AM 12/21/12 IN CHUKOTKA, RUSSIA, AND I JUST TOOK A PICTURE FACING EAST, HERE IT IS!!!!
just kidding. lol.
For real, here is a 30s exposure of the view east from the front porch of my duplex apartment, taken a few minutes ago at 3:03am. Too much weather to see big dio, but the dateline is definitely within visibility. The verdict is in, folks, the world is not ending, unless the end of the world is taking the form of complete coverage by sea ice. In which case, for us on diomede the end of the world would be hard to notice :-).
Today
Kids sent to the office: more than I remember (4? 5? something like that)
Kids who threw me completely off by standing up and announcing a decision to voluntarily go to the office: 2
Best thing I had to say: “LUCAS! Put your tooth BACK in your pocket!”
Chicken Wire
Quote of the week:
“A girl’s gotta have standards, even with chicken wire, a girl’s gotta have standards.”
Louisiana
–that’s his name. Well, it’s not his name actually. But, as a substitute teacher, I have to use good memory hooks; I find out this student is from Louisiana, the name stuck fast. Also, a relevant fact for later: I have this thing I do sometimes: I bring in half a dozen doughnuts and I tell my students they win a doughnut by putting me on my heels–do something to impress me. Mind you,if you’re going to ask students for excellence, you do not use supermarket doughnuts, no that would be idiotic; thankfully there’s a little doughnut shop in town that is as wildly amazing as it is pricey.
I subbed yesterday for a photo/computers teacher. When I saw “photo/computer” in the job description, what happened wasn’t so much that I ignored the computer half, more that I never even got that far. Photo. Photo. Wait…I can spend time in a classroom doing stuff with…photography? Really?
I stopped, did a quick pinch-test, nope, not dreaming, this is real. Great!
The lesson plan took all of 5 minutes to cobble together: can’t go wrong with good photojournalism. Aaron Huey.
Louisiana picked a war photo (this one: aaronhuey.com/afghanistan), and he did not address even one of the three assigned questions. In this failure, he wrote this, perfectly succeeding:
I don’t know what to think I saw this man walking not knowing if he had a bomb on his chest or if he was on our side we kept on driving he stared at us until we disappeared I still think about that man he stared at us with a grin on his face as if he was saying “we got you we got you once you think your ok we got you.”
“Um, so, I didn’t know how to answer any of the assignment questions, so I just sorta put myself in his shoes and wrote something” Louisiana told me, handing in what he’d done, what he’d done instead of completing the assignment. Louisiana was smirking, because he wanted a doughnut.
He got one.
Food story two: rabbit
(from a week ago)
Neighbor and his little boy walking out of their cabin when I walk out of my cabin to go do some business in the bath house, Hey Dave we saw a rabbit gonna go get him, the little boy dressed up in his stalking cap and jeans and boots and toting a bb gun just like the one I got Christmas morning how many years ago, Sure let me just do some quick business and I’m there. In my jeans and hoodie. It’s cold out.
My neighbor takes the road up the left and the little guy and I go right to wait, but the rabbit was too smart saw and knew he was being flushed into the blazing sight of a bb gun wielded by a dangerous 7 year old, so the rabbit doubles back past pops who doesn’t take the shot so his little boy can have another chance. They keep going, I go back to put on gloves, hands real cold, they keep going, the rabbit’s gone and the little guy’s feet are really really freezing cold Daddy I need to go back to the cabin my feet feel like ice! Daddy I can’t walk my feet are ice! So my neighbor hoists up his little boy and I carry the .22 in my right hand and the little guy’s bb gun in my left and we walk back to the cabin, I can’t feel three of my fingers even though it’s not that cold out right now, neighbor says OK lets go over to the other thicket and find another one so we go, find the rabbit highway and split and start, I’m shivering and wondering which finger I won’t feel next and then a white dash and I see where he went. Hey over here lets head back to the main road I think he stopped close by so we double back and the big white rabbit takes a few more strides toward the road then up, my neighbor still hasn’t seen him but I know I saw him, I stay put he goes up on the road and up further and back into the woods and back down and finds the rabbit. I get closer, still can’t see, Ok I can’t see him still, you see him? You see him then, ok, you take your shot. He wanted to give me a chance, but better a rabbit than a chance right? Crack like snapping a small dry branch echoes muted through dry cold air and Yup got him. Lost feeling in two more fingers on my left hand and where there is feeling it hurts like hell and now my chest feels kinda funny but not woosy because a cute rabbit just got shot, but something definitely feels not right, breathing feels funny. My neighbor goes to his cabin to grab a bite to eat and I go to the bath house to warm up and when I get in and close the door I feel really not good and my head hurts and my hands hurt where I can feel them and my breathing’s funny.
Hands under warm water, hands under warm water, things get better and five minutes later all’s well. Body into shock from cold body out of shock thanks to warm water, it’s been a while since I’ve been that cold. I step out and my neighbor’s got the rabbit on the tailgate of his truck and ready to go and he shows me how to skin and gut it, half an hour, now there’s rabbit in a pot in the fridge marinating and hearty alaska rabbit stew tomorrow. We shoot the breeze about how chicken at the grocery store is just ridiculous, how you can eat rabbit every day if you want, there’s a lot of these guys around. Go out and an hour later you have a pelt in one hand and a rabbit ready to cook in the other. Can’t even get to town and buy chicken from Safeway and get back in an hour.
Well, I will have to go to town for the veggies, but I think that’s ok.
Confession
Here in Guatemala, after the rain, these huge beetles come out. I mean, really freaking huge. And slow. Flying, slowly, loudly, seeking..uhh..well, I really have no idea what they’re doing at all. They come in numbers, too; we’re talking 5-8 at every street light, and who knows how many in the darkness in-between. The little ones are the size of a film canister, the really big ones would give your hands mass a good run for its money.
After living here for 9 months good dave gave in to bad dave, in a weak moment my goodwill caved in to crude desire. I punted a giant flying beetle.
So, did I mention that these beetles also have a giant Rhinoceros-like horn?
Hippies out of control
Great photo that came in on my blog feed (blog: bubblevisor). Or maybe it’s not an out of control hippie van but an engineerhippie van.
I have one problem and it’s bothering me–what music would be heard coming from such an impressive vehicle?
Would it be bumpy piano hipster rock (Arcade Fire, Avett Bros,…) or heavy metal, old school classic rap (Gangster’s Paradise) or classical (if classical, what classical? Baroque? Romantic? Modern? Stravinsky?). Phillip Glass? Pink Floyd? U2? Classic rock?
Actually nevermind, dumb question. The obvious answer:
Music success
If Google shows a music group Wikipedia page before the official page, is that a good thing or a bad thing?
Belly feel win
There’s this kid in the office who spends a lot of time trying to bug me. Any way he can make fun of english or white people or my accent or my hair, it’s all free game, lets try to get under dave’s skin.
I resist. I smile and laugh. Always.
But the other day, I fought back.
He walked over and asked me to connect the internet, throwing in one or two of the spanishly-butchered english words and a slimy “yyYYYYeeeaahh.”
But I interrupted. I softly put my hand on his belly. He stopped talking. I took my hand off and he kept talking, so I put my hand on his belly again, more firmly (but still softly).
He stopped talking and sputtered some bad words in spanish.
Yes ladies and gentlemen, this day I won.
Prerequisites
1. Understand english
2. Understand spanish
3. Understand soccer
4. Know FC Barcelona
Ceviche
So I’m watching the Real Madrid – Barcelona game last week and eating ceviche (a really delicious central american dish with fresh shrimp) and my gut’s all like “something’s not right man. These shrimp are at room temperature.” I’m a tough guy, so I ignored my gut.
Six hours later my gut was like “screw you.”
April Fool’s (birth)Day
M, this is for you.
A few days ago I realized April Fool’s day is coming up soon, and I have been thinking a lot about it. Lots of things have come into my mind and heart when I realized that April Fool’s day is something deeper, a clear window into human condition. I only realized this when the concept of birthday and the concept of April Fool’s day came together in my mind, which happened thanks to my dear friend from school and my old Troop leader from Boy Scouts, who were both born on April 1st.
Wait, April Fool’s day? There are a lot of Holidays that are great for getting all windy about–Commercialized Christmas, unThankful Thanksgiving, Egg-riddled Easter, Baffling Boxing-Day, et cetera–but really Dave, April Fool’s day? Yes, April Fool’s day. And a birthday. Humor is one of things we still really have no clue about, and birth is the beginning of life.
Is this whole post just a hackneyed cliche? Ends and means, friend, ends and means.
In the past six months, my mind has been really occupied by this thing, human essence, human condition, or whatever you might want to call it. Living in Guatemala has been a wild experience so far–not at all what I expected, but more learning than I can shake a stick at it. Two things have been separately wandering around my mind–the celebration and remembrance of birthdays, which many don’t do here (the lower two thirds of the population, the poor, usually don’t know their date of birth), and why we find humor in the unknown and unexpected (like April Fool’s jokes).
Two days ago, in a twinkle of a moment these two things dovetailed and immediately made all the sense in the world and opened up this window, this lens that helped me understand this idea of humor and the celebration of birthdays.
It’s long, so click to read more–
Camera timer
