The Problem With Cleveland

Cleveland's awesome. I've been here almost two weeks and have another week and a half to go.Today I got out of downtown finally (thanks to Barb), trained over to Ohio City and ate dinner and drank heavily at the Great Lakes Brewery, and had a great time. There's a lot to do here. Sure, the weather sucks -- buried in snow in the winter, drained by heat & humidity in the summer -- but that's to be expected if you're east of the Mississippi.

Cleveland is hip, it's happening, it's got charm, it's got beauty, it's got gravitas, it's got a lot for the young and young-at-heart to do. But by Christ the crosswalks are awful. The goddamn crosswalk sign takes 5 to 7 minutes to change. I'll time it tomorrow for real and report back; but my best guess is 5 to 7 minutes. You're standing there getting old while buses and cars and scooters and fixies fly by. Then you wait some more.

The other day I walked past a dude standing by a crosswalk vending his homemade music CDs.

"Take a listen," he said, offering me a pair of earphones connected to a Discman.

"I've got to get back to work," I said, taking a meaningful glance at my watch.

"Man, this light's going to take forever." I couldn't argue with that, so I listened and ended up purchasing the CD for five dollars. (Barb has since listened to it, and said it's awful. I'm glad I didn't pay what he asked, which was ten bucks.)

Portland is very pedestrian-friendly. Cleveland is not. Otherwise the city wouldn't make the hapless citizenry stand on the curb for eternity in the godawful humidity or homicidal, lake-effect snow.

C'mon, Cleveland, get your shit together.

Holy Effing Ess!

I've finally gotten into The World Ends With You, the game that sold me on the DS. It's by Japanese powerhouse publisher Square Enix (of Final Fantasy fame). It uses the dual screens to unique advantage. It has a compelling, emotionally resonant storyline -- something unusual in games.

Now that I'm into it, all I can say is (earmuffs!) holy fucking shit! The game is good, but the combat is so insanely complex that I'd like to meet the 14-year-old Japanese Ritalin-popping idiot savant who must have designed it. Then I'd like to donkey punch him. (I think -- I'm not sure what a donkey punch is. If it's something pleasurable, I take it back.)

Consider that in combat you play two characters at once. One fights on the touch screen by means of specific motions of the stylus. The one on top fights in a sort of rhythm game where you guide an arrow through a three-prong maze towards a certain symbol. You try to match the symbol at the end of one of the prongs with the same symbol on a card at the top of that screen. Sound confusing? Try playing it and suffer the consequences.

I suppose there must be someone out there, someone born in the nineties, who is really good at this game. I should probably look on YouTube for a video, and stare in awe at someone whose brain revs a helluva lot faster than mine.

It's things like this that make me realize that I'm ... not young anymore.

Experiments in Otaku or, I Think I'm Turning Japanese

So I bought a Nintendo DS. I used the Cleveland trip as justification, but frankly it's just an excuse to wallow in the failure of my Video Game Free 2008. And wallow I have been doing.
How did I decide on a Nintendo over the equally-or-even-more- appealing Sony PSP, you ask? I would love to indulge your curiousity by means of a lengthy explanation!

I have two friends who have a DS. They both are more than willing to lend me games (partially because they're generous people and good friends, partially because the DS -- unlike the PSP -- uses unscratchable cartridges rather than delicate, scratchable, and simply bizarre UMD discs). That means the gaming is cheaper on the DS (which is already $40 cheaper to buy just the device). Plus I felt that a PSP is simply a Playstation 2 shrunk down to handheld size. Wheras the DS is an entirely new system. For instance, the PSP has lots of cool games, but said games are simply ports of PS2 games that work a lot better and in fact are a lot cooler on the PS2. So basically, if you want to play PS2 games, get a PS2. Dude.

And the DS has, uh, Dual Screens. Ever hear of another video game player with two screens? Me neither. And it works. As with the Wii, Nintendo, those clever bastards, decided to just take a flyer on the hardware -- create something unexpectedly new and weird -- and leave it to the software engineers to catch up. And boy-howdy, have they caught up? I reckon they have.

Furthermore, I've been seduced a bit by the whole Japanese otaku thing, no thanks to the embarassingly named website DS Fanboy, which revels in otaku. Very greatly simplified, otaku is Japanese for geek. And were you to talk to a Japense person, they would tell you that otaku is a 100% disparaging word. They are disturbed when Americans such as myself willingly append the work otaku to their descriptions, as I'm doing in this post.

But we're Americans, baby! We make the rules. And you might recall, if you were alive circa 1906, that "geek" was a hideously disparaging term. No one would have willingly described themselves as a "geek" unless they couldn't get work as a madhouse attendant. Now we've got the Geek Squad, geek chic, Harry Knowles, etc. Being a geek is cool... kinda.

I was a bit fearful of purchasing the DS (although not really, because I could turn around and sell it at a minimum loss) because I've never really been into the 2-D gaming. I didn't get really interested in videogames until they got highly proficient at 3-D in 2001 (cf. Serious Sam). But what's cool about the DS is its, for lack of a better word, differentness. I've tried out three games so far and they're all unexpectedly good. Plus, it plays GBA games, of which there are a thousand that are good -- although all of those are old-school 2-D games of the type I might have played on my NES in 1989.

Enough on that. I'd rather be playing Puzzle Quest than writing about it. Let me just leave you with a glimpse at a tiny facet of the multi-faceted gemstone that is otaku:


See what I mean?

The Missing

I'm away from my baby for the first time since her birth: in Cleveland for three and a half weeks to train newly hired service reps for the VA. Cleveland's pretty cool, the extra money is nice, the work is fine -- the only thing missing is my family; especially this beautiful baby!

It's notable how much the missing can really hurt. I saw a fellow traveller here at the hotel step off the elevator carrying a pair of little baby girl shoes and a dart of missing struck my heart. I saw a news story about a local man who allegedly murdered his 2-month-old namesake son and felt a pang of such sorrow... that little baby deserved so much more.

I love my baby girl so much.

Thankfully, we can afford to have Barb and Elizabeth fly out in a week, and stay for the remainder of the trip. Can't wait.

The bachelor thing was fun for a day or two, but the novelty is already wearing off. Frankly, I'm a pretty lame bachelor. I hunker down in my hotel room listening to Built To Spill, drinking beer, and either reading (Lonesome Dove, which is awesome), internetting, or playing video games (see Experiments in Otaku or I Think I'm Turning Japanese, above). Tonight I spent a minute or two looking at the fireworks over Jacobs Field (I'll never call it Progressive Field!), then went back to my beer and my DS.

Baby is My Co-Pilot

Today Barb went to church thence to Robin Burrow's baby shower, leaving me and Elizabeth Rose to fend for ourselves. She's almost four months old, now, but it's been the rare occasion that we spend time with just each other. As if that weren't enough to make Daddy apprehensive, Portland's in the middle of a heat wave (The Surfer's exterior thermometer showed 108 degrees yesterday!) and there were a ton of chores crying to be done (dishes, laundry, unpacking from camping, putting together a couple of Zombie Christ orders, etc.).

We ended up having a great time together. I played with and read to E.R., carried her around a lot on my shoulder (her new carry position), fed her twice, and still managed to get most of the chores done. I came away from the experience feeling that we should make it a regular thing: Daddy-Baby Day. Not only is it great for us, it's a much-needed break for Mommy, who spends so much time with the baby (and will be spending even more, with my upcoming 26-day trip to Cleveland).

Book Review: Rendezvous with Rama

Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
Knowing only a little about the plot (humans have a brief chance to explore a huge alien spacecraft as it zooms through our solar system), I was disappointed a bit by RwR. The spacecraft is fundamentally pretty understandable. The human explorers within minutes of getting inside know the basics. It's the details that are mysterious. And Clarke does a good job of keeping them (the details) intriguing, alien, and, ultimately, inexplicable. But I was hoping for an encounter with something truly, mind-blowingly alien. No such luck. These aliens use plates, for instance, and wear belts. They like water and breathe more or less the same type of atmosphere we do. The book ends with the promise of a sequel (two, actually), and I have a feeling one exists. If it does, I'll read it.

Typically of classic SF, the characters are not in any way memorable, but they do the job of proving the reader with someone to identify with in a book that's really about scientific ideas.


View all my reviews.

History in the Making!

Today Barb put Elizabeth Rose in the Moby facing outward. It's a sign that she is officially a big baby.

In fact, her neck still isn't quite strong enough to make this position perfectly practical. While she was awake in the Moby, Barb sort of bracketed Elizabeth's head with her (Barb's) hands. Elizabeth is, perhaps, a little behind the curve in neck strength development. Regardless, she can hold her head up, just not for very long.

But the facing-forward-in-the-Moby worked. Elizabeth enjoyed looking at the world (rather than Mommy or Daddy's collarbone), and after 15 minutes conked out.

Which, as you can see, was pretty damn cute.

The Cookie Incident

I'm fascinated by the ongoing saga of The Cookie Incident. This event involves my mom, Sharon, and her (formerly?) good friend Michael. It's an incident that is very much indicative of the difficulties humans have communicating.

For the full scoop on The Cookie Incident, please read Mom's blog. It's very interesting stuff.

Here's my take on what happened:

On April 24 of this year Mom was invited to her friend's apartment. He had some seemingly bogus excuse about wanting to borrow a stool. Upon reflection, Mom thought it was exceedingly odd that Michael would ask to borrow this stool -- he has plenty of chairs. She went up there, gave him the stool in question, and he offered her a cookie. Now what happened next is subject to interpretation, but I'll present it as I remember Mom reporting it the following morning. That report, if I recall correctly, stated that Michael offered her one of his homemade cookies. She wasn't eager to take him up on the offer. (Michael is a baker of dubious quality; I was once stuck with a piece of his rum cake, or fruit cake, or mincemeat, or something, and it was pretty godawful.) But Mom is as gracious a guest as she is a host, so she said yes. Michael explained something about it containing "seeds" from "Betty," but Mom didn't make the connection that Betty was Michael's pot connection ("dealer" seems too professional a term).

She ate some of the cookie, then got up to go. Michael made a point to remind her to "take your cookie." A while after Mom got home she realized she was stoned. Except it didn't feel like being stoned from smoking grass (something she's done a bit of in her time, though she's no stoner). She called Michael and said she was feeling really funny and he responded, "That's the idea."

Mom had a terrible night, tripping out on whatever was in the cookie. She still feels a detrimental effect from the incident, and her relationship with Michael has basically crumbled -- which is too bad considering he's one of the best people in her building.

Unless, that is, he maliciously dosed her.

But I don't think he did.

One of the problems here is that Betty is involved, and Betty is generally acknowledged to be a bad person. Betty's involvement -- she provided the weed that went in the cookie that caused Mom's bad trip -- casts a sinister light on the whole Incident. But I think Betty's a red herring. I think that Michael's mention of "seeds" (? -- every stoner knows seeds don't get you high, no matter whether you smoke them or eat them) and "Betty" (=pot supplier) proves that he wasn't trying to hide the marijuana content of his cookies. He may not have been communicating clearly, but he showed obvious intent to let Mom know there was marijuana in the cookies.

We should also remember that Mom doesn't hear too well.

Next, Michael acknowledged that feeling funny "was the idea." Were he purposefully gaslighting Mom, or otherwise trying to unbalance her, he would not have said that getting high was the idea behind eating the cookie. He would have feigned ignorance. "You're feeling funny, Sherry? That's odd, I wonder why?" He knows that Mom has had incidents of psychological distress in the past. If he'd been malicious, wouldn't he have professed utter ignorance of the cause of her freak-out?

I think so.

Mom seems to now be interpreting Michael's chilliness toward her as proof, or at least evidence, of his having conspired to bring her low. My take: he's freaked out by how freaked out she got.

I don't think there's a position of fault here. Mom got dosed, and it was a terrible experience. Michael miscommunicated in a way that caused his friend to freak out on him, and now he's gunshy. Given the fact that Michael is an ex-homeless guy who is used to living solo and has been burned by society more than once, I am not at all surprised that instead of offering a defense of his actions he has simply withdrawn into his shell.

But the fascinating thing about The Cookie Incident is that no one involved will likely ever know the full story. Once emotions rise to the levels that they have here, clear, reasonable communication becomes next to impossible.

It's a wonder human civilization has made it as far as it has.

They Grow Up So Fast!

Supercliche, I know. But nine weeks into her life, Elizabeth Rose has decided that lying on her back is preferable to being held. Barb and I made a real effort to keep her close to us, either in arms or in the Moby, after she was born. At first, what soothed the baby girl was being held and walked. Then she graduated to being bounced on the physioball (see photo). Now, finally, she is a big girl and wants to lie on her back, wave her tiny limbs around, squeak and squawk, and generally be independent.

Just when I thought I was out ... they pull me back in!

I decided last year to give up video games for 2008. There were a couple of reasons for this: 1) I had played most of the games I wanted to for my original Xbox; 2) As stated below, time is short -- plus, I was attempting to clear space in my schedule for writing fiction, with an eye toward finishing the final draft of The Brooklyn House, the best book I've written; 3) I lusted after an Xbox 360 and the numerous incredible games available for it, but wouldn't spring the $350.00 for a toy; 4) I was and am a little ashamed of the fact that I like this quintessentially adolescent pastime so much -- as a 38 year old man, shouldn't I really be interested in collecting wine or studying the stock market?

Until a week or so ago, the quitting was going swimmingly. I didn't miss video games at all. I even wondered a couple of times if I would ever climb back up into the saddle of that hobby-horse. Then it occurred to me how cool it would be to have a mobile internet device. Although I'd love an iPhone, I decided to research cheaper alternatives. That led me to the Sony PSP, pictured above, and its rival in the marketplace, the Nintendo DS Lite. Both wi-fi capable machines that can slip into your jacket pocket -- and both video game platforms.

Innocently, I decided to do a little research on these intriguing machines, to see which had the better browsing experience. That done, I thought: "Well, if I end up getting one of these, I might as well know which has the better games -- just in case I ever feel like doing a bit of gaming." And before you could say "Miyamoto," my video game interest, which had burned down to a lukewarm bed of coals beneath a downy layer of ash, was a raging conflagration.

Last night I talked with brother Scott, who has two PSPs in the family, and he mentioned that one of his sons (he wasn't sure which) had lost interest in the PSP and might be interested in selling it for $50 or $75.

I said, casually, "Well, sure. Let me know."