My kid had to use those tiny rubber bands on her braces that help adjust the teeth. Sometimes she had to use strong rubber bands, sometimes weak. But dig this: the rubber bands weren't delineated by a number or color system. They were named after countries.
There was New Zealand and Switzerland and Italy, which is the weakest rubber band. The strongest rubber band my kid had to use was Japan, which was pretty strong, but not as strong as Korea. Korea is the strongest rubber band available (one of the orthodontist's assistants told me that).
Even though the rubber band portion of the Braces Trauma was over weeks ago, I'm still finding tons of itty bitty Italys and Japans all over the house, as if the kid was shooting them out like it was some sort of trick orthodontic slingshot. They're squished in the corners of the bathroom vanity drawers, they come out in the laundry, and they still pepper every carpeted surface of the house. They're like needles from a Christmas tree; I'll still be finding them in six months.
Other people swallow the Italy and Japan orthodontic rubberband thing whole and move on. Not me.
I wonder who came up with the countries-for-orthodontic-rubber-band name system. I cannot find the brand on the internet. Perhaps it was a disgruntled Korean man or woman, or someone who does not like Italy.
Note: As I took today's photo, my daughter asked me if the rubber band was just there or if I planted it for the photo. I told her it was just there (truth). Then she said, "That's a Japan. Italys were really wimpy and if that had been an Italy it totally would have been broken."
In 1961, young Chris Kendall broke a fall by grabbing for a hot stove. The burn was bad enough to require medical attention. Behold the resulting paperwork in its entirety:
One slip of paper denoting a three dollar and 25 cent bill--stunning, no matter which side of the healthcare reform issue you are on.
Click the image to enlarge. Many thanks to Darryl Kendall for sharing this with me. Darryl is available at jckendall[AT]adelphia.net.
Standing in the "dental" aisle of the discount grocery for 10 minutes staring at the rows of toothpaste while you try to decide between advanced fresh, whitening, and anti-gingivitis is uncool.
Dandruff is uncool.
Vitamins are uncool.
Knowing that toothpaste indecision, dandruff and vitamins are uncool is uncool.
One of the things that surfaced during my research for the RealDoll story was the topic of real women. Many of the doll owners complained that "RealGirls" just want good-looking young men or wealthy and powerful men. One even referenced Hugh Hefner and his little darlings and I laughed out loud at my computer screen.
Maybe that's fine for the trophy wives and their respective hunters, but babies, if you want to know sexy, Erin know sexy.
I'm not going to give you that tired old list of looking-into-my-eyes, rubbing-my-feet, champagne and strawberries stuff. I am 44 years old for chrissake. I can do a little better than that. Here goes:
-Overtipping the overworked lunch waitress is sexy (and I mean just slipping a few extra bills under the sugar bowl without making a big showy deal of it).
-I do not miss smoking, but I do miss men lighting my cigarette.
-Whispering something sophisticated and funny in my ear at a dinner party is sexy.
-Work Chinos are sexy. So are the men in them. I don't care about that beer belly, darlin'.
-Desire is sexy. I'm not talking about simply being horny, I'm talking about profound desire, the sort that says I want you. I want to be as close as two people can be, to draw you into me and put my mouth on your mouth and have you so completely that the edges between us blur.
-Taking both my hands in either of your hands and pulling them up above my head and holding them there with our fingers interlaced while we kiss in bed is sexy.
-The concept of coupling is sexy.
-I've watched many people climax. Almost all of them get a smoky satisfied look in the moment between the apex and the denouement--arguably the very essence of sexy.
The sexiest thing a man can do is love women for who they are, for their crow's feet and bad coffee and tears.
I am conducting a whole slew of guided discussions for the Cuyahoga County Public Library system. Illuminating Twilight covers all four books in Stephenie Meyer's popular vampire series.
The kids have the best time with this. They simply love talking about the books and I love seeing them get pumped up about reading. Plenty of adults attend as well. Sometimes I even get mom/daughter teams, which is wonderful.
The Army Veterans Hospital in Broadview Heights (south of CLE proper) opened in 1939 and catered mainly to WWII veterans. After the war, it housed tuberculosis patients. In 1965 the facility was transferred to the Ohio Department of Mental Hygiene and facilitated people with disabilities, many of which were children. It officially closed in 1992.
The City of Broadview Heights purchased the complex from the state in 1996 and moved the municipal administration to the adjacent Thorin Building. The old portion of the hospital was essentially abandoned, with much of the equipment and medical records still inside.
With no heat or maintenance, and area animals finding shelter inside, the vacant hospital fell into startling decay within a few years. To make matters worse, teenagers, homeless and the curious were constantly getting into the building, which was also rumored to be haunted.
Controversy always swirled around the old hospital, from the way it was abandoned to whether or not it contained asbestos and black mold. The building was razed in 2006. I was a local reporter in this area from 2001 through 2006 and the old VA hospital was often the subject of my beat. I had a chance to "tour" the interior of the hospital before the wrecking ball put it in it's grave.
I will never forget the inside of that building. Here are some pictures I took that day. Click on any to enlarge.
I expected it to feel creepy inside--and the space absolutely had a specific energy, but it thrummed with an overwhelming sadness. It was the saddest place I've ever experienced.
Metal cribs were strewn about in one ward. They included locking tops and resembled cages more than anything else.
The exterior of the building was literally falling down before the city could amass enough funds to demolish it.
Many of my best photos went to the publication I was writing for at the time. The industrial kitchen, with its massive mixing machines and ovens, should have been cool, but it just felt empty and sad like the rest of the facility. The operating room was horrible, with decrepit cases of knives and drills lining the walls.
The chapel remained as one of the least damaged portions of the facility.
The curtains were cropped so children couldn't reach and climb them. At some point in the 70s, the grounds surrounding the hospital were opened up as sporting fields for local clubs. One of my neighbors still recalls hearing the screams of the patients through open windows on warm summer days as he played soccer in the front lawn.
It was terrible and dangerous inside the old hospital. There was broken glass and dangling debris everywhere. I had to sign a release and don a protective mask before I could enter.
By the time I toured the hospital, much of the contents were gone, but what was left still told stories ...
... and told and told and told.
I was fascinated with the demolition of the building. On one unseasonably chilly afternoon in September 2006, I watched for a few hours along with a small crowd as two backhoes chewed away at a particularly obstinate wing. A massive steel bucket pounded away on one side of the annex while a giant jaw-like claw bit away at the other.
Just before 6 p.m., a plume of steam shot from one of the machines after a particularly violent fight with a tangle of rebar. The bucket shuddered and clamored to the ground. The huge steel arm curled under and the vehicle retreated, victim to a severed hydraulic line. The claw, however, kept on with the pummeling--at least until one of the crew began yelling at the operator. Something was out of whack with backhoe number two--one of its pins, a 2.5" solid steel rod--had snapped like a toothpick. The crew hung it up for the night.
"Both machines broke," one of the workers told me as he fingered the busted piece of steel.
It was as dramatic and symbolic a fight as I've ever witnessed. It was so real. The men, the hospital, we who watched, the rugged backhoes--we were all involved in the fray. Each of us had a point of view.
I respected the hospital that day, and the way she wasn't going to give up without a fight.
* * *
Related links:
Another page featuring the old VA hospital with many more photos and pages from patients' records. Whomever took these undoubtedly was in the facility a few years before me.
Guess what? The Nobel Prize brouhaha doesn't have a lot to do with you. It's the international community saying thank god the United States has finally gotten that tyrant out of the White House and has someone in there who recognizes the other peoples of the world.
The rest of the world really hated George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and their antiquated cold war attitude. Awarding Obama was sort of like a strange sigh of relief from across the globe.
Furthermore, Thorbjoern Jagland, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee,isn't the slightest bit sheepish about the decision.
The following is directly from the "narrative" section of a police report I picked up yesterday. I have lightly edited the text for brevity/clarity and to eliminate all names.
On Friday, October 2 at 8:45 pm, I worked security at the Brecksville-Broadview Heights High School homecoming football game with four other officers. At the start of the third quarter, another officer and I stood on the home sideline, near the fifty-yard line, when we noticed a male wearing nothing but a football helmet and a wig streaking across the field. Please note, the helmet lacked a chin-strap.
The white male, who had a thin, muscular build, ran out from behind the visitor stands and across the field to the west. After a brief second, we chased the male to the southwest corner of the stadium. The male then scaled the eight-foot fence,* which surrounds the field, before we could reach him. He headed towards the honors parking lot and into the area on the south side of the high school.
I gave chase and maintained sight of the male even though he had a large head start. The male looked backwards repeatedly, and knew uniformed patrol officers were chasing him. The wooded area where the male ran into was recently cleared out for a new gas line and came out onto Summit Circle.
As we neared the above development, the male took off and threw down the football helmet as he continued to flee. While running in the wet, deep** and clumpy mud, I fell covering my uniform/leather gear*** in said mud. The male subsequently crested a small grade/hill in the woods and I lost visual of him. However, other officers were already on Summit Circle and noticed an unoccupied vehicle parked on the cul-de-sac.
Upon further inspection of the vehicle, an officer located the car keys lying on the front left tire. He also noticed a pair of pants, shirt, shoes, and wallet on the front seat. Moreover, a chin strap**** was located on the back seat of the vehicle. All of these items were in plain sight from outside the vehicle.
The officer entered the vehicle using the key and found an Ohio license. The physical description matched that of the male who streaked across the field. The vehicle was re-secured. A note was left on the vehicle and the keys and football helmet were taken back to the police department.
A short time thereafter, an officer stopped a group of males. The males admitted to him that it was in fact (name omitted) who streaked across the football field. The male eventually turned himself in and is facing charges of disorderly conduct, obstruction official business and public indecency.
Because of the male's actions, ten officers were "tied up"***** for an extended period of time while looking for him.
* That's a CHAIN LINK fence. Hope the kid was careful.
** Sort of arousing until you get to "clumpy."
*** Re-arousing.
**** Aha!
***** Does anyone else sense a subtle recurring theme here?
The kid's court date is scheduled for later this month. Yes, he is over 18. It's probably ill-advised and I do feel bad about the cop's mud bath, but I'm sort of rooting for the kid.
I don't care if what this cryonics guy says about Ted Williams and his frozen head is true or false; DO NOT let anyone freeze me when I croak.
DO NOT turn me into a plastic dead guy either, even if it's for high-minded educational purposes.
Put my sorry dead ass in the cheapest coffin you can find and burn me up. Then everybody go on and have some scotch and ham and talk about how great I was for a couple of hours--just like you're supposed to do it: regular. No funny business.
Last week, Cleveland Scene ran a feature I wrote on urban oil and gas drilling in Ohio. The story unleashed a flurry of online controversy that my editor Frank Lewis wrote about for this week's paper.
As most of you know, I normally write humor and essay. The drilling story was a nice departure that required droves of research and interviews, but the aftermath of comment wars was sure difficult to take at times. I'm getting those tell-tale hang-ups as well. It's funny how people behave.
In the end, I hope the story ignites a few appropriate fires. This issue begs different points of view and plenty of attention.
The fun part is when you get to the point that they don't even notice it wasn't something they actually said," says Jenkins. "Sarah Palin, in her own odd vernacular, is incredibly sort of quotable and eloquent, in her own Palinesque way.
On page A2 of today's Cleveland Plain Dealer, there is a photo of a pro-gun advocate demonstrating outside the Supreme Court carrying a sign that says "GUNS SAVE LIVES."
On page B1, a sidebar story reports there were 130 homicides in Northeast Ohio in 2009 through September, 79 of which were the result of gunshots.
The deaths of eight US soldiers who were killed in a gun battle in Afghanistan topped the headlines this weekend.
It is not possible to describe how delicious these pretzels are. Warm and fresh out of the oven? GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE! These totally kicked ass over those nancy mall pretzels. My kid and I made them. It rocked our faces off. We left two nekkid, two were dressed with sea salt, two with cinnamon sugar, one with seasoned salt and one with Parmesan cheese.
I spread one of the salted ones with cream cheese and that was as good a lunch I've had in I don't know when. The Goat is having one right now for breakfast. He nuked it for about 15 seconds. They'd reheat nicely in a hot oven for a few minutes as well.
Quit playing with yourself and make these pretzels right now. The ones you goof up might look a little funny, but they'll be wonderful just the same.
First I was freaked out by this, then I found the robot garnered my sympathy. I was rooting for Big Dog as he traversed the rocks and snow. I felt bad for him when he skittered on the ice.
Schlep through the ad and watch this Youtube whatever you do.
Blast pops, Pixie Sticks. Kooky Chews. Dots, Chunkies and Licorice Snaps. Bit-O’Honey and Mary Janes; Necco Wafers and Razzles.
B-B-Bats, Lemonheads, Atomic Fireballs. Mounds and Almond Joy. Milk Duds. Malted Milk Balls and Charms Pops. Junior Mints.
Now and Laters.
