Black Friday Fun

Overheard at Target circa 11:30 am on Black Friday...

"Wo-man, I'm like to sit down righ-chere in the middle of this aisle and go to sleep. You've had me up since two am."

"Oh suck it up you big wuss. I've sat up in a tree with you for eighteen hours straight. I don't wanna hear it."

That's why I go out on Black Friday.

It's all about the entertainment for me. Sure, I buy a few things. Some deals are just too good to pass up (like a copy of The Princess Bride for $2), but the real fun is meandering through the store and alternately watching a sleep-deprived shopper pulling the last portable DVD player off the shelf and my shopping partner, Patricia, happy-dancing over a Pink Floyd t-shirt in the right size.

I only see Patricia three or four times a year, and somehow, we always end up shopping. Well, she shops, and I mostly travel behind in her wake, awed at her ability to find a deal. We have a good time, though. Her enthusiasm is infectious, and neither of us take ourselves too seriously (as evidenced by the modeling we did in the dressing room of a department store).

We ninja'd through traffic, spent an inordinate amount of time in the bookstore, undressed a mannequin, tried unsuccessfully to tip the guy at Steak-n-Shake's drive thru, bought matching leopard-print sleep pants, and laughed uproariously...a lot. As entertainment goes, it was a lot of bang for my buck.

It beats the hell out of staring at football all day in a tryptophan coma...or sitting up in a tree for eighteen hours straight.

I hope your Thanksgiving was happy and your Black Friday shopping productive. :)

Stress

I recently asked my Facebook friends to suggest possible blog topics. The last month or so has been particularly stressful, leaving me creatively dry. A few of my friends openly commented, but more messaged or texted me with their ideas. One of the first suggestions I received was to write about the stress that was bogging me down. I liked the idea, but I'm not willing to publicly share all of my life, and I didn't want to write a whiny "poor me" post.

I sometimes start a writing session by playing word association. I'll type a word, usually the topic I'm considering, and then I'll type whatever word jumps into my mind as a result. After a few minutes the random words get in line in my brain, and I'm in business.

This time, the words refused to form neat prosaic lines. I've learned that fighting the words is futile, so I let them have their way. As a writing exercise, it was fun, and I learned some new html code playing with the indentation. Enjoy.

Stress

stress

wears

tears
repress

pain

disdain
less

yields
distress

builds

wins
impress

no one
mess

goes on

spins
guess

ing game
assess

ing blame
redress

abuse

excuse

begins
confess

fears

tears

sins
press

ure eases
duress

releases
bless

new leases

friends
stress

hammering coal

forging soul

diamonds
yes

Thank You J.K. Rowling

Yesterday, I took my son to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1, a fact that seems fairly mundane given that literally millions of other parents did the same. But for me, it was special, a not-quite-final step on a journey my son and I have traveled together.

Ask anyone with a 19 year old son. Having him choose his mother as a movie date is a rare thing. A young man of 19 generally prefers his friends, his girlfriend, even his younger brother for an evening at the multiplex.

But this was Harry, and Harry is ours.

I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone eight years ago when a student recommended it. I remember thinking the characters were vivid and likable and the plot was original, but most importantly, I remember thinking my eldest son, then 11, would like it. I had not come to grips with the fact that he didn't enjoy reading fiction. I love fiction passionately. I had read stories to him since he was in the womb. How was it possible he didn't feel the same way I did?

The only fiction my son ever enjoyed was fantasy. He had a collection of books about dragons and the origin of dragon myths. He liked stories about magic. Harry seemed the perfect vehicle to show him the the joys of reading fiction for pleasure.

I bought him the book and then watched it sit on the floor next to his bed, untouched. When it disappeared under the pile of various and sundry crap that always seems to litter his floor, I changed tactics. I offered to read it aloud to him at night. He has always enjoyed being read to...it's how we got through Jane Eyre, so he could pass Senior English.

We started with chapter one, "The Boy Who Lived," and I could see the interest on his face, but then as we read chapter two and the first part of chapter three, I lost him. He was the same age as Harry, and he hated the way the Dursleys treated Harry, so much so, he wanted to stop. The effect of that mistreatment is mitigated in the movies by making the Dursleys objects of derision, but in print, with nothing but an 11 year old's imagination, it was powerful.

We stopped reading for a week. He refused to read a story where the character he identified with was so powerless. I begged him to persevere, swore to him it would get better, and promised the Dursleys would get their comeuppance. And he finally, albeit reluctantly, agreed. Once Hagrid arrived and whisked Harry away to Hogwarts, he was hooked.

Interestingly, Voldemort never seemed as threatening to my son as those abusive, neglectful Dursleys. There is a poignant moment early in the Deathly Hallows where Harry takes one last look at the cupboard under the stairs. My son and I turned to each other, and he smiled. Both he and Harry had moved past those bad times early in the story. The Dursleys no longer held any power over either of them. It was one of those transformative moments the best kind of stories bring, where you feel what the character is feeling.

After the first book, my son read the rest of the series on his own. The summer the fifth book, The Order of the Phoenix, was released, we went to a midnight release party. He was a piece in a game of wizard's chess. We drank butterbeer and ate lots of foul-tasting Bertie Botts every flavor beans. Then, we both stayed up all night with the book. Yes, we each had a copy.

We have seen all of the movies together. Even as he got older, got his driver's license, and became more independent, we still shared Harry. He never considered seeing any of the movies with anyone else. We discussed the different directors' visions, the minute changes in plot, the choice of actors. (Neither of us got over the loss of Sir Richard Harris and his Dumbledore. The new guy never measured up.)

I'm glad the producers decided to break the last book into two movies. Even though my son and I both groaned after the last scene in part one, I have at least one more Harry Potter experience to share with my son. I'm glad it's not over yet.

I sobbed, yes, literally sobbed, through the last twenty pages of The Deathly Hallows, and I know I will cry at the end of the last movie. I love those characters that much. They are real to me. That final sacrificial walk Harry takes into the forest is archetypal and so well-written, I was there with him. And so was my son. He walked that journey with Harry, and he cared as much as I did.

Thank you J.K. Rowling. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Never, Ever Piss Off a Writer

I texted the title of this post to my friend, Pam, just last week. I was being facetious at the time, but the story I just stumbled across via Liana Brooks' blog is proof positive that it's true.

Cooks Source Magazine, a for-profit publication, lifted a post from this writer's blog and printed it without her knowledge or permission. She contacted the magazine and got this response from the editor:

But honestly Monica, the web is considered "public domain" and you should be happy we just didn't "lift" your whole article and put someone else's name on it!

Wrong answer. Aside from the fact that lifting someone's writing and putting your name on it is plagiarism, my blog and everyone's blog is protected under copyright law. While most folks don't mind being quoted or linked...we do want readers...you may not take my writing and print it for profit without my permission.

Writers on the web are an interconnected bunch, and this gem of a response from Cooks Source bounced around from blog to blog, including John Scalzi's blog (one of my personal favs) which gets approximately 10,000 hits per day. Blog readers reported it to several watchdog organizations, and then it blew up on twitter.

@neilhimself (Neil Gaiman) retweeted it. He has 1.5 million followers.

People found the Cooks Source Facebook page and flamed it mercilessly. I'm sure they'll be taking that page down any moment now, but check it out if it's still there. Wow...just wow...

Edward Champion did some investigating and discovered that Cooks Source has made a fine living reprinting content from the Internet without permission.

Any money Cooks Source might have saved by stealing from mostly unknown writers will probably now be paid ten thousand times over to lawyers. Honestly, after following this thread from link to link, I'll be surprised if they're still in business this time next month.

Never, ever piss off a writer.

Lies, Damn Lies, and well, you know the rest...

I hated my statistics class in college with a blue passion. The words "standard deviation" still make me shudder. Ironically, though, I find reading statistics someone else has generated endlessly interesting.

For instance:

• E-book sales comprise 9% of all trade book sales year-to-date in 2010, up from 3.3% in the same period in 2009.


• Between 2000 and 2009, four-year institutions of higher learning raised tuition an average of 46%.


• By the end of the day tomorrow, $3.7 billion will have been spent on campaign ads, up 75% from 2008.


• Almost 85% of people who snore exceed 38 decibels of sound, the equivalent of light highway traffic.


• The average American eats 10-12 pounds of chocolate per year.

Lord knows, I'm doing my part on that last one.

Recently, I've become fascinated with the statistics for my blog. Blogger tracks your page views by blog post, time of day, geographic place, referring URL's, and the search terms that got people there. Some of the statistics are illuminating, but most leave me bemused.

The United States is naturally the country in which most people view my blog, but just this week alone I had 19 views from the Netherlands and 14 views from Russia. Really? What am I saying that interests the Dutch? Or the Russians? I even had four views from Slovenia. Wow...

I normally have the biggest viewing spikes when I put up a new post which makes sense, right? But occasionally, I get these crazy spikes on old posts. My post on Self Doubt contains a Diana Ross video. 457 people viewed that one in one day, a month after the original post. My readership is modest, so I'm attributing that spike to Diana and not my own words of wisdom.

Posts which share titles with something more famous get lots of views as well. My Invictus post has been very popular, although I suspect some folks are disappointed when they find me instead of Matt Damon. Expectation is the Root of all Heartache has also gotten mad hits. Again, some poor high school student looking for help with his English homework is probably frustrated when he finds me.

Embedded pictures lead people to me. Twice, I have included pictures of buffalo in my posts. (Here and here.) Both have brought people my way. I wonder if any of them stayed after looking at my buffalo?

The most entertaining statistic is the list of most popular search terms which connected people with my blog. My name is at the top of that list...no big surprise...but once you get past the obvious, I find myself in WTF country. Just this week, people found me by googling "he makes my cherry pop" and "Jazzercise with colostomy." Last month, someone used "I never sit on a toilet." Granted, I have actually used the words "he makes my cherry pop" and "I never sit on a toilet," but why would you google those phrases? I've used "Jazzercise" multiple times, but this is the first time the word "colostomy" has graced my blog.

The big dumb eighth grader inside of me wants to let loose a string of random, unrelated words just to see what kind of bizarre Slovenian (no disrespect to Slovenians intended, it's just...Slovenia?) traffic I get. So here goes...

I would expect Dutch apple pie and Russian dressing to make my cherry pop, but expectation is the root of all heartache. Mark Twain knows I don't wear a colostomy bag, even if I never sit on a toilet. It's all lies, damn lies, and well, you know the rest...

I am the master of my fate, Diana Ross, I am the captain of my soul.

Lessons My Son Learned at the Track (and other good parenting tips)

Yesterday, my son learned three important lessons about sport.

1. Any sporting event can be turned into a social event when you spend more time in the parking lot outside the venue eating, drinking, and playing games than you do inside watching.
2. A sporting event in which you are generally disinterested becomes all-consuming for two minutes when you have cold hard cash riding on it (pun intended).
3. Mocking overdressed twenty-somethings as they stagger back to the parking lot, carrying their ties and stilettos, is a sport unto itself.

My Kentucky friends know all about Keeneland, but for those of you in places where thoroughbred horse racing is merely an interesting setting in a movie (Secretariat was filmed at Keeneland), let me enlighten you. We have two major tracks in Kentucky: Louisville's Churchill Downs (of Kentucky Derby fame) and Lexington's Keeneland. Keeneland is open year round for off-track betting, but they only hold races on site twice a year, a three week meet in the spring and another in the fall.

The Keeneland Fall Meet is in full swing. Because it is a limited engagement, people flock to the track in the thousands, and because many young Kentuckians fancy themselves members of the horsey set, they dress to the nines. Then, they get ground-level grandstand seats and drink themselves stupid. The real horsey set is up in the exclusive boxes and party rooms far removed from the unwashed masses.

Although I'm not a serious racing fan (could you tell?), going to Keeneland on a gorgeous October day is a good time. Yesterday, I was invited by my restaurateur friend, Mike, to his first annual Keeneland tailgate party. (We had several moments of debate as to whether something could be called an annual event until it's held for the second time a year later.) Our kids are all good friends, so they came as well, and it was the first time for several of them, including my younger son.

A young man's first trip to the track is nothing if not educational.

Pam's husband, Mike B., walked him through the betting process. He explained how the odds work and how you determine the payoff on a bet. I worried for a moment, and then shrugged it off as a math lesson. My son listened intently, asked a few pertinent questions, and then made his pick...based solely on the name of the horse (which honestly, is how I pick my Derby horse every year). He liked Cajun Pride, and so did I...I think I might have read a romance novel with that name.

I placed a $2 bet for Cajun Pride to win in the fifth and gave my son the ticket. We made our way through the crush in the grandstands to get as close to the rail as we could. The horses are beautiful, and I like to be close enough to hear the pounding of the hooves when they pass.

Again...educational. By the fifth race, the horsey set wannabes had consumed enough beer and Kentucky bourbon to throw conventional standards of appropriate behavior out the window. It's a bit like a frat party with horses and designer clothes. In true sixteen year-old fashion, my son thought it was hilarious.

His attention was diverted by the horses and their jockeys bedecked in their racing silks parading down the track and being loaded into the gates. In spite of my general disinterest in racing, that part is pretty cool. As is that moment when the bell rings, the gates open, and the horses charge down the track. Cajun Pride took the lead with authority. My son found himself screaming right along with the inebriated folk as we watched our horse barrel around the first turn and down the backstretch. Unfortunately, I knew what was going to happen. Very few horses have the endurance to lead wire to wire, and poor ole Cajun Pride was no exception.

Cajun Pride faded in the final turn and came in fourth. Pam's pick, Sudden War, crossed the line first, netting her a whopping $3.80 on a $2 bet. My son looked around, saw the well-heeled drunks throwing their tickets on the ground, and followed suit. It was the only bet we made all day, and we were both fine with that. Another lesson learned.

Our tailgate was set up just outside the rail on the final turn, and we watched the rest of the races from that more peaceful vantage point. The kids played corn hole and tossed a ball around, and the adults kicked back and enjoyed the incredible fall day. Mike worked magic on three small grills, and we feasted on clams, shrimp skewers, rack of lamb, and filet mignon. My educational moment was realizing one should always take a bonafide chef to a tailgate party.

The day wound down with the now disheveled, but still overdressed kids returning to the parking lot. I pointed out a guy in a shirt and tie standing in the bed of his pick-up and attempting to swing from a tree limb to my son.

"You never, ever want to be that guy."

The fellow's friends were trying to coax him into the truck so they could leave. My son pointed at them.

"I never want to be those guys either. I'd wait til he was hanging from the limb and drive off."

I think his friends were contemplating doing just that. Luckily, Security came along, and the guy changed his tune and got in the truck.

So in addition to the aforementioned lessons about sport, my son learned some life lessons as well.

1. Unless you have been invited to the horsey set's private boxes, you should wear comfortable clothing to the track. Corn hole is difficult in stilettos and you don't have to dry clean beer stains out of blue jeans.
2. You might as well bet the horse with the cool name because the payout on the favorite sucks.
3. If you plan to act like an idiot, make sure your friends really like you.

Smart People Rule the World

I had a head-spinning, fly-completely-off-the-rails moment in my classroom yesterday.

Not because students were misbehaving. No...the students in that class are awesome kids. I went berserk because more than half of the students in the class said they don't think of themselves as "smart people." Then, they went further and said they don't want to be labeled as "smart people." It's just not cool.

This from advanced English students...pre-AP kids who jumped through rigorous hoops to be in the class...kids who are reading and discussing Plato's Republic.

Are you kidding me? Are you FREAKING kidding me?

Let me take a few deep breaths and back up.

As I said, we are reading Plato. After each reading assignment, I prepare three or four questions that serve to illuminate the reading and bring the concepts into the 21st century. I lob those questions into my classroom like conversational grenades. These kids are tremendous readers and thinkers, and they lob their responses right back at me. The discussion is always vigorous, and one of my goals is to teach them how to listen to a different point of view and disagree respectfully (a lost art these days).

So yesterday, we reached the section in which Socrates says that philosophers should be kings. The first grenade I tossed out there was this: Should the smartest people in a group or community be the leaders? Turns out that question wasn't a grenade. It was a thermonuclear weapon of mass destruction.

Overwhelmingly, the kids said no, the smartest people shouldn't necessarily be the leaders of any given group or community. I pointed out that a room full of smart people were arguing against smart people being in charge. That's when they started denying being smart.

"Oh, Ms. Owens, there's lots of people smarter than us."

"We're not really that smart."

"I don't think of myself as a smart person."

WTF? My goal of teaching respectful disagreement went out my nonexistent window, and I flipped.

"What do you mean you don't think of yourself as a smart person?"

I heard myself getting loud, and I knew my tone had changed from calm facilitation to righteous indignation.

"It's not cool to be smart."

"Says who!?!"

Shrugs all around. "You know...everybody."

"Oh. Everybody. Of course. Everybody says it."

Yes...now we were firmly in the land of derisive sarcasm.

"I've got news for Everybody. Everybody is going to wake up when he graduates from high school and realize he needs the smart people. Everybody is going to need a smart person when he gets sick. Everybody is going to show up in a smart person's office with his hat in his hands when he needs legal help. Everybody is going to be a slave to the next must-have gadget that a smart person designed. Everybody is going to be punching the clock in a company a smart person runs. Everybody is going to realize that he is just a cog in a big machine that has a smart person at the controls."

I think I might have slammed my copy of Plato on a kid's desk at this point.

"Or even worse...maybe Everybody will never figure it out. Maybe he'll just be an ineffectual, frustrated underachiever who stays stuck in a rut his whole life and never figures out why he's so unhappy. Or he'll find a scapegoat to blame for his stupid choices...the government, his boss, his teachers...and the BEST part...he won't even be cool anymore. Because while Everybody has power in the halls of a high school where he preys on the inherent insecurity of his fellow students, once he graduates, he realizes the smart people have moved on. They are doing important smart people things, and he is nothing more than a dim, unpleasant memory."

A moment of silence descended when I stopped to breathe. I knew my blood pressure was up because I could feel my pulse in my forehead.

The kid sitting right in front of me said, "You really don't like stupid people, do you Ms. Owens?"

The class erupted in laughter, and so did I. The tension was broken, and I was able to answer his question like a reasonable person.

"I have no problem with people who are ignorant because they haven't been taught yet. I'm a teacher. That's what I do. My problem is with people who not only choose to remain ignorant, but who revel in their ignorance...wear it like a badge of honor."

The dumbass has become a staple of American TV and movies. Watch one episode of The Jersey Shore, and you'll believe with certainty we are doomed. Really. Is it any wonder kids think stupid is cool? But I didn't say that to my class.

I told them to be happy they could be counted among the smart people. I told them to believe it and to own it. Philosophers might not be kings, but smart people are captains of industry. The big problems our country faces will be solved by smart people, not pundits, talking heads, or self-serving politicians. Smart people are doing all the work that truly matters.

Like it or not, smart people rule the world.