Find peace, Grasshopper

David Carradine, star of the 1970s TV show “Kung Fu,” which mixed Asian characters and influences with a Western setting and “Fugitive” story arc, apparently killed himself in Thailand this week. Carradine, who beat out Bruce Lee for the part, played a half-white North American, half-Chinese Shaolin monk who fled China to escape imperial authorities in continued to pursue him and find U.S. family members in the Western United States. His character’s name was Kwai Chang Caine.

Along with “The Rockford Files” and “Barney Miller,” this was the favorite show during my two years of heavy mid-1970s TV viewing. I probably identified with a rare Asian character on TV: a character who was, like my sister and I, half-Asian and half-white (we even shared a family name). The final episodes of the third and final season – particularly the series finale, “Full Circle,” which I’d love to watch again (along with the “Miami Vice” series finale) - even more directly tackled issues of racism, interracial romance, and violence against Asians and Asian Americans.

The show de facto showed that Asian immigrants were not new to the United States and dealt – usually delicately – with racial issues when black-white issues were still at the forefront and North America’s contemporary new immigration (partly of Asians, Africans, and Latin Americans) was just beginning in earnest.

Another favorite actor of mine, Bruce Lee, fled Hollywood after losing this part (to a non-Asian actor) – after allegedly developing the series idea – and began filmmaking in Hong Kong. There he produced several hit movies – including the extraordinary “Enter the Dragon” – but apparently stayed bitter about Hollywood racism and ultimately died young.

“Kung Fu” – which promoted an ethic of justice and personal serenity (always starting with flashbacks in a Chinese monastery – where Master Po calls Kwai Chang Caine Grasshopper) - and ending with a fight that Caine feels forced to get involved in (Caine as a somewhat standard circuit-riding do-gooder – a la “Quantum Leap” or “The Pretender”)) - probably both reflected and contributed to North Americans’ interest in martial arts and Asian culture and religions. (Before Jackie Chan and “Kung Fu Panda,” it no doubt also helped inspired Carl Douglas’ disco smash “Kung Fu Fighting” (even though the show had its own great theme music): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhUkGIsKvn0.)

Alas, Carradine enjoyed little professional success after “Kung Fu,” despite a short revival in a mediocre mid-1990s version of “Kung Fu” set in a modern-day U.S. city, except for a recent recurring role in Quentin Tarantino’s ultra-violent “Kill Bill” movies. (Penny and I did serve in a Hollywood test audience for a mediocre movie with Carradine and Stockard Channing that became “Death Race 2000.”) Carradine, 72, was in Thailand filming a new movie. He apparently hung himself in his Bangkok hotel room.

A revamped movie – a la the new “Star Trek” movie – is apparently in the works.

-- Perry

Ohio update

Grandpa Beck grew up with two brothers and a sister. His sister, Mildred, who I visited in Mt. Vernon in December, is up at the Cleveland Clinic, where she will have thyroid surgery today. His two brothers, Loren and Ronald, have been living in Outlook Manor, a nursing home near St. Ann’s Hospital in Westerville. Loren, who left his Delaware County home after his wife died, has dementia. Ronald was a wealthy engineer for the auto industry in Detroit. But he was estranged from the rest of his family, his wife died a number of years ago – until Loren went up about 10 years ago and rescued him. He was rich, alone, and dealing with behavioral health issues. Although Grandpa has four stepdaughters and many adoring grandchildren on our side of the family, Mildred has just one son and one grandson and Loren has just one adopted daughter, Jeannie, who we visited in Marietta some 15 years ago.

Ronald died early in the morning Thursday. Grandpa, Aunt Sandy, and Uncle Don had visited Loren and him this weekend.

But only Jeannie was around Thursday morning at the nursing home, as Aunt Sandy – out of sick leave from helping take care of Aunt June – was in the hospital in Marysville with Uncle Don, who was experiencing heart problems earlier this week, on top of other health problems. Sons and daughter-ins-law on Don's side of the family were keeping an eye on Grandpa in Don and Sandy's absence - a role I may take on for a few days later this summer. Later Friday Sandy took Grandpa, who already sees through only one eye, to the opthamologist - substituting for Don, who usually takes him.

Before leaving for the hospital, Sandy asked by e-mail for prayers for June. June goes for throat cancer treatment five times a week. But doctors say she has less than a year to live and Sandy says she seems a little depressed. June will find out on Saturday, June 20, whether her tumor has been shrinking and - by extension - whether treatment will continue (yes if yes; no if no). Sandy asked for prayers for daughter Diana too.

Son Dustin receives Supplemental Security Income checks and lives by himself in an apartment in Lancaster.

Ronald’s body is being cremated and family members have not yet scheduled a memorial service at a funeral home in Westerville. Click here for a tiny bit more information: http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/dispatch/obituary.aspx?n=ronald-d-beck&pid=128029688

We’re planning to see another family members who’s been fighting health problems, Grandma Mary, at a surprise 40th anniversary party for one pair of Stephanie’s uncle and aunts (Marvin and Pat) back up in Mt. Vernon late Saturday afternoon. I’ll hope to get a chance to watch or listen to the Belmont Stakes during the party. Go, Mine That Bird!

Lots of folks could use prayer in our family, but among them: Jeannie, Loren, Mildred, Grandpa (Marston), Don, Sandy, June, Diana, Dustin, Barb, Grandma Mary, Marvin, Pat, Bobby, Terree, Bob, and Nancy.

Ronald’s life and death also remind us of people’s struggles with behavioral health issues: from the musician whose story we watched last night in “The Soloist” to our friend Brant to close family members (including our son).

Ronald also reminds us of the specter of growing old and sick with no one around – something we fear if we have no more kids since we don’t know if Vincent will be a “dutiful son,” Stephanie is an only child, and I only have one sister, brother-in-law, and nephew who we aren’t able to spend a lot of time with. Koreans traditionally expect descendants to visit their graves – this is something that my first stepmother June, when she was very ill, feared would not happen – and, if our bodies or ashes are buried at Concord Cemetery or elsewhere – it’s hard to imagine who would do this regularly if at all.

-- Perry

Very early June update

We did not end up going to the baseball game in Columbus this weekend. Saturday I went to a training on how to approach visiting sick church members. Stephanie mowed and clipped the front lawn and tended to some more plants. Our landlord’s air-conditioning repair people replaced the house’s central air-conditioning condenser outside.

We also took a nap and went somewhat inadvertently to the movie “Lymelife," a tale of Lyme disease and 1970s suburbia that reminded me a bit of Ang Lee’s somewhat edgier “Ice Storm.” It featured among others Jill Hennessy from “Law and Order” and “Crossing Jordan,” Alec Baldwin from “The Hunt for Red October,” and - from another 1970s tale of suburban woe - Timothy Hutton, from “Ordinary People.” (One of the two Caulkin brothers in the movie, Baldwin, and Hennessy in the movie pictured below.)

Sunday was our church’s big annual outdoor Pentecost Sunday service plus potluck. We weren’t able to talk Vincent into going to that – they honored graduating seniors and gave them a cake. But Vincent pleasantly surprised us by going to the annual end of the year church youth group picnic and swim (another potluck) at the Jewish Community Center (with parents too). He had basically not been to a youth group event since the start of the year Deam Lake event (see “Deam Lake”). But his girlfriend’s parents have put her on a diet of two visits with Vincent per month. After a late night out with Vincent and her older sister’s former (?) boyfriend Seth, Samantha was also on a cell phone ban. So, cut off somewhat from her Vincent went with us to the pool party and then went out for some more food with Stephanie, his former prom date (Jessi), and her mother and a friend of Jessi. Afterwards, somewhat manic Vincent came home and had a somewhat long, interesting conversation with Stephanie, which I didn’t catch all of.

The background for the late night and Samantha diet (he had still been walking her home from school almost every day, evading her parents’ ban in that respect) includes him urging her to resist her parents’ wishes more and him starting to hang out with Seth, a 20-year-old with a car who apparently also lives with his parents and has no job and is not going to school (all like Vincent). Seth supposedly has a kind of trust fund, was the youngest KY elected official (serving on the Moorland city council), and plotted last year with two 14-year-old girls to kill one of their friends. To learn more click here:
http://www.wlky.com/video/15979277/index.html

At the youth group picnic we learned that a church family knows the would-be victim.

So, now instead of going over to Samantha’s family’s house every night or walking her home every day, Vincent is riding around town with this accused murder conspirator who ironically ended up pleading guilty to the charge Vincent originally earned (making terrorist threats).

Monday, I remembered, was the fifth anniversary of my first day at the Presbyterian Center (June 1, 2004), and in the afternoon I remembered to bring in some treats.

I have been discovering with my new position (especially administrator of the Presbyterian Panel) I am more responsible for bringing in my own paying clients. Click here to see my first product as new Panel administrator (I wrote the summary based on results of a survey we take every three years – my predecessor wrote the survey and there is no client for this once every three years survey: http://www.pcusa.org/research/panel/summaries/08fall-summary.pdf )

It’s remotely possible that without such clients someday someone could decide to end the Panel, which might also involve cutting my position. Having some of this in mind made meeting all of these researchers in government and especially in the private sector (Gallup, Nielsen, Arbitron, etc.) at the conference in Florida more interesting.

Monday was the last day of school for students in Stephanie’s school district. Stephanie has been winding down for a while, since she has stopped pulling students. Wednesday was a second annual International Festival which she helped organize and got a front-page article in the local paper (lunch pictured): http://www.news-tribune.net/archivesearch/local_story_148134641.html

Monday Stephanie kept on eye on 5th grade students who had not earned a trip to Holiday World in southwestern Indiana.

Tuesday and Wednesday Stephanie has planning, grading, and clean-up days (though grades were due back on Friday). (We weren’t able to get Vincent up to work on his classes on the faster computers in her room.)

Next week she’ll substitute tutor for a couple of days. Then summer school will take place 8-12 for the final two weeks of June.

-- Perry

Rachel's out!

The relatively new owners of Preakness winner Rachel Alexandra have decided not to run the horse in the Belmont Stakes next week. Recall that Louisville jockey Calvin Borel rode Rachel to an easy win in the all-female Kentucky Oaks in early May and the next day rode long-shot Mine that Bird, a male, to a strong win in the Kentucky Derby, bringing Mine that Bird back from dead last. When Rachel was sold and the new owners thought she was OK not race against males, Borel picked her over Bird – the first jockey to win the Derby on one horse and then switch to another horse even though the Derby-winning horse was still in the Preakness. Borel rode Rachel to the lead and then the victory in the Preakness. But Bird – ridden by another jockey – again came back from dead last and almost caught her at the end. Borel who in half a dozen previous wins had not had to push Rachel, did so to get the Preakness win. I wondered in a previous blog entry whether Borel might have won on either horse, since the new jockey had a harder time getting Bird through traffic than Borel had had in the Derby.

Bird’s owners thanked Rachel’s owners for letting them know quickly about their decision – they said that the Preakness had taken too much out of Rachel and they wanted to let her rest more. Bird’s owners said the decision was probably good for them, but bad for racing, nipping another Rachel-Bird showdown in the bud. Borel thanked Bird’s owners for being patient with him. The jockey who rode Bird in the Preakness was already committed so they were without a jockey, but waited to find out if Rachel would run, partly figuring that Borel would be available if she did not. And so Borel will be back riding Bird for the first time in a race since the Derby.

One thing to keep in mind is that the Belmont – at 1.5 miles – is the longest of the Triple Crown races, and, if Bird can close like he did in the Preakness, and have more time and distance to catch the leaders – though not now Rachel – he might win. They’ve already called this possibly the Calvin Crown, instead of the Triple Crown, because Borel could become the first jockey to ride two different horses that – collectively won the Triple Crown.

One interesting sidenote: Perhaps the fourth most famous U.S. horse race is the Travers, in August, usually on national TV, and this is run in Saratoga Springs, in the first of my two research sites, where one of my Albany area informants used to hang out to follow the races. Rachel may already be lined up to run another race in lat e June. But, if both Rachel and Bird race in the Travers, this could elevate this race’s profile – and that of Saratoga Springs.

-- Perry

Surprises

Vincent surprised me by putting away most of his clean laundry, doing most of his chores, and cleaning some of his room prior to the slated arrival of his girlfriend (which was conditional on fulfilling these responsibilities). The air-conditioning repair people may have unpleasantly surprised our landlord – but not really surprise us – by concluding that our (rented) house needs a new (central or forced-air) air-conditioning compressor. They’re supposed to come back Saturday with one (perhaps like the one pictured).

-- Perry

Late May update

Vincent also had an appointment with the psychiatrist that ultimately prescribed medication for him, which we got to late enough today that we had to reschedule it for the end of the month. Last time Dr. Knox said the medication he's currently on has enough side effects that he can't be on it forever. So now - at the end of June - she'll decide whether to try a new medication or have him go cold turkey. Since he's now 18, there's a little bit of ambiguity now as to whether we should be going in with him to speak with the psychiatrist and what happens if he really doesn't want to keep taking medication. The court order said he must keep on with counseling and medication unless behavioral health providers say it’s OK to quit. (It's over in Jeffersonville, IN, so maybe Stephanie and Vincent will go next month and not be late like Vincent and I were.)

Mom went to the orthopedic doctor and got an X-ray. The doctor is sending her for an MRI, recommending focusing on posture and taking hourly breaks to do back exercises, and pooh-poohing physical therapy or chiropractic medicine. They did not talk about surgery, which Mom isn’t enthusiastic about. Mom knows there are several things going on – back problems, knee problems, general health problems, also posture (and she says that sitting all day hunched over a computer is probably bad for her posture also) – but she is unsure how disciplined she can be about posture and daily exercise. The doctor, who is rather old, said that one reason he’s in this area is that he too has faced similar issues. Mom canceled her PT appointment. Doing more assessment first may be good, but I’m not a big fan of no PT or other kinds of treatment. Going in to PT at least forces you to do the exercises a couple of times a week, and to get additional instruction, which is better than nothing. Cost may be an issue here too (plus the time to go to PT – though Mom might do it on the way to or from work). This seems look progress on some fronts, but not others. (I’m not sure how much retiring would permit Mom to attack these challenges more effectively.)

(Mom said that Florida Governor Charlie Crist – hot off of announcing a run for the U.S. Senate – today vetoed a pay cut for state workers, who have not gotten a raise in four years. Pay stability restored and MRI scheduled, Mom will lead an induction of new officers for Tallahassee’s American Association of University Women branch tonight.)

Stephanie’s father will face another court hearing after Tuesday’s. His tenants are apparently suing him for allegedly changing a handicapped ramp. He can settle for a small amount or go to trial and potentially get settled with a much larger dollar amount. Stephanie urged him to settle and then sell the property. Most of his 3-4 remaining properties seem to Stephanie to be more trouble and expense than they’re worth, especially given the state of the Central Ohio economy, which means that most tenants can’t really afford to pay rent and the pitfalls are many (thieves ransacking empty apartments, tenants suing, etc.). Part of what Stephanie’s father is probably doing is carrying on a family business and like my mother resisting retirement.

(Pictured above is the Columbus South End’s Buckeye steel plant, where Stephanie’s father once worked, which – like the West Side General Motors parts supplier factor that Mom and I also drove by this past weekend - is completely shuttered now – endemic of problems with Ohio’s manufacturing economy.)

-- Perry

More appointments

Tuesday was a big day with Stephanie’s father in Franklin County court over a landlord-tenant issue that has been brewing for some time, and Stephanie’s mother and my Aunt June back to chemotherapy treatment. Then today my Mother was off to the orthopedist for the first of appointments with doctors and physical therapists about her back problems that her regular doctors just recognized a few weeks ago. Today I went back to work for the first time in two weeks and Stephanie’s school had their second annual International festival, which Stephanie helped organize. Tonight is our final Children’s Fellowship, which may be inside (thanks to the rain). Sunday is an outdoor Pentecost worship service (weather permitting) with me serving as head usher for the third and last time this month, after our final (bilingual) Sunday school class of the school year. I am tentatively slated to go to a training for hospital visitation at church Sunday morning and at least Stephanie to a Columbus Clippers baseball game with some former high school classmates Saturday night at the new Arena district stadium (pictured above) between downtown Columbus and Goodale Park. We’ll see which of these work out. Hope confronting medical and legal issues this week is going OK for our family members.

-- Perry

Memory lane

My week-long travels through South Florida reminded me of several trips:Miami area: My family made a couple of trips to the Miami while we lived in Gainesville. During one trip we camped in the Everglades (something I replicated twice with others), and on another trip we traded houses with the family from whom we had bought the Palm View Estates house – who had moved to Hollywood, FL, where I stayed for the conference last week. I don’t remember their house so well, but remember going to the Orange Bowl parade in Miami. I didn’t think so much this past week about Everglades trips.

Once as a family we visited the Fort Myers area, but I only remember going to Sanibel Island. During the mid and late 1990s and while I lived in Sarasota, I visited the Miami area several time: Once a flew there and stayed for 4 ½ days, doing research for my book – leaving Columbus, Ohio, just minutes after turning in grades. I thought about this trip when I was planning this trip, for it’s the only time I had contact with the Fort Lauderdale airport (I flew into there) and stayed on Miami Beach. A few years before I stopped in Jupiter and driven to Tampa before and after five days on Miami Beach for my first American Sociological Association meeting. And before that I had flown into Miami to meet Abby, whose parents were staying on Miami Beach. That ASA experience was memorable for a variety of reasons: One was – I flew into Miami, even though many tourists were having trouble renting cars and then getting carjacked. And, sure enough, one of my New School classmates got carjacked in a rental car. Last week was the first time I’ve flown into Miami since then (although I tried to route our Guatemala flights through Miami – unsuccessfully – note that in the book trip that followed my ASA trip I flew into Fort Lauderdale, not Miami). On the ASA and book trip I got to spend a decent amount of time on South Beach, on the second trip interviewing people around the beach. I also visited various friends and their families, including two I visited this time (Andrea and Daniel) and one I didn’t (Greg and his family subsequently moved to Texas). At some point in there I went to Miami Beach for “family weekend” at the Barbara Brennan school, which was then meeting at a hotel in Miami Beach. Then weeks before I headed to Tallahassee, then to Minnesota, away from Sarasota (and two months before 9/11), I visited Daniel and Andrea again.

A year before this, in late August 2000, on Stephanie and Vincent’s first amazing trip to visit me in Sarasota, on Sunday we drove down to Fort Myers, where her great aunt and family lived (with their Vietnamese pot-bellied pigs and the dog that helped inspire the Frisco acquisition – with all those famous pictures from that trip) – lived in Fort Myers Shores (where she and her extended family lived for some 25 years before Lana and Dick moved up to Tennessee (pictures to be posted eventually) – there are still cousins there – some of them drove up to Ohio for Aunt Catherine’s funeral – but I didn’t look them up – on a Thanksgiving visit by Papa Larry to Tallahassee and Bradenton – he rented a car one day and drove down to Fort Myers Shores to visit with them.) We stopped by the Ford-Edison mansions (before a renovation). Then we happened upon the Shell Factory store/attraction, on Tamiami Trail in North Fort Myers on our way home, which she had visited with her grandmother and father in past trips she made to Fort Myers, when her grandmother was alive. In and around Bradenton and Sarasota – and even around Tampa and St. Pete – I thought of various other visits they had made to see me in Sarasota and in turn me to see them in Bradenton (including that worldwind Memorial Day weekend Saturday in Tampa and St. Pete (eight years ago this coming weekend) and then – critically – the next Sunday – when we drove to Myakka Springs state park with the dog, through Arcadia (where Aunt Lana had once lived), and then Stephanie urged us to keep going to visit Zora Neale Hurston sites – putative, at least – around Lake Okechobee and in Fort Pierce (not all so putative, as it turned out). (Of course, don’t forget our trip to Orlando several years ago, when Mom (and sometimes) me were at the Florida AAUW meeting, Vincent was at an anime convention, and Stephanie and I visited the botanical gardens in Orlando and then Eatonville, where Zora Neale Hurston grew up.

(Of course, just 1 ½ years ago – I think – was my last visit to Bradenton and Sarasota, when I drove down from Tampa – hours before a conference I was attending was to start there – and did my favorite widest arc through both of our old neighborhoods and out on the beaches – Anna Maria Island, Bradenton Beach, Longboat Key, St. Armands Key, and Lido Key – Several times my family came from Gainesville to visit Sarasota, including the Ringling Museum and Asolo Theater, St. Armands Key and Lido Key, and even the antique car museum and New College. On this trip I overlapped with where I went 1 ½ years ago – but I purposely did something things – skipping some things I did last time (before I got my digital camera and before blogging – the beaches, the Presbyterian church, and downtown Sarasota)).

And then there’s another gripping Memorial Day memory. Four years ago today (Tuesday) or tomorrow, Grandma Martha arrived in Bradenton to help us finish packing – and several of the people I visited with in the past 24 hours (Marilyn, Emma, and Caroline) also helped us pack – while Vincent said good-bye to his Manatee School for the Arts friends – including in a party after school Friday) – and then we pulled out Saturday morning. The way I tell the story isn’t literally true – but of course I thought of it as I was driving across the Sunshine Skyway Bridge at lunchtime today. At lunchtime on Memorial Day Saturday 2005, I was driving the big rental truck over the bridge – on the way to Louisville) – overlapping the beautiful Tampa Bay and Fort Desoto Beach on a sunny morning – and turned to Stephanie and said: Now, tell me – Why is it again that we’re moving away from here?

(Six months later – the last time Stephanie, Vincent, and Frisco have been to Sarasota/Bradenton – the four of us visited a few days before Christmas – we didn’t really visit my New College friends then – but visited Marilyn. Stephanie was in Orlando a couple of years ago with Angie, for a conference, and Marilyn, Brantley, and Emma drove over to visit – but Marilyn told me she felt pretty sick during that visit. (Marilyn’s mother loves the Kentucky Derby, and they’ve all talked about getting up there, but getting Marilyn and her family up there would be quite an undertaking.) One month before, Stephanie and Grandma Martha met at the Orlando airport, and then they drove to the AAUW in West Palm Beach – which I thought of as I drove past West Palm Beach on the freeway (back in Gainesville days my family and I only went there once and I skipped it for my book trip. After 4 ½ days in Miami, I stopped in downtown Fort Lauderdale to interview Mom’s AAUW friend, the Broward County historian, before heading across Alligator Alley to interview Andrew and Jan’s old diving instructor. Instead of trying to get to Ford-Edison (since I knew it closed early), I detoured and drove through Immokalee (site of agricultural worker organizing) before making it to the Tampa area.)

There’s one very important trip I left off. During spring break 1984 (25 years ago – if I’m counting right), Melanie and I headed to Tallahassee while Cindy and one of her brothers headed to West Palm Beach. Melanie, Cindy, and I were all housemates in the “Red House” in Swarthmore, and Melanie and I were starting to go out. (I’m remembering a somewhat ill-fated foray down to Sarasota with Abby – while we were staying with Todd in Tampa – when the recently resuscitated Fiesta broke down in Bradenton, and we had to wait for it get fixed).) Melanie and I visited Todd in Inverness (I’ve driven through there within the past couple of years), and then we slept in our car in the Holiday Inn parking lot on Lido Key. Then we drove past Avon Park (where I also went on my book tour) and then stopped on the shores of Lake Okechobee (which Melanie remembered from Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”). There we came across an African-American woman and her grandson who had been fishing on the lake. Somehow the grandson had become trapped in the trunk, and somehow I crawled back through the back seat to rescue him – or something like that. We kept driving along the lake and the canals that empty the northern Everglades into the Atlantic and picked up Cindy at a campgrounds in West Palm Beach. After visiting the Everglades and Naples (which I did not replicate this trip . . . OK – I’ll be frank – Just now I think I’m combining trips. The Okechobee/West Palm Beach trip that included visits to the Everglades, Naples, back to Avon Park, and to St. Augustine was a later trip, after the spring break trip (I think). For spring break 1984, Melanie, Cindy, and I went to Tallahassee, but it was still cold and rainy there. So around Wednesday we got back in the car and continued south. We wound up in Fort Myers on Thursday morning. We drove over to Sanibel Island where we stayed on the beach. This situation became three’s a crowd a little on the beach. Even though it was a little cloudy, we got a little sunburnt and a sea shell – at the world’s third best seashell – cut her foot and was bleeding. We wound up staying in a cheap motel in town – the Korean-owned and run Green Wave Motel (I remembered it partly because of the Green Wave is the mascot of Tulane University in New Orleans – probably an unintentional connection). Sunburnt and all we went to Fort Myers Beach to eat dinner. Probably the next day we headed down to Naples to connect with Andrew and Jane there.

One more trip I remembered: In very early May 2000, having just returned from Ohio and finished (for the most part) my dissertation research, I went for job interviews for one-year jobs at central PA’s Bucknell, where Abby had taught (I bombed), at central Michigan’s Albion (where Andrew taught), and then – at a school I had always wanted to teach at – Sarasota’s experimental, progressive, four-year public liberal arts college, New College. I remember I flew down to Tampa Sunday afternoon, rented a car, and drove on Interstate 75 to University Parkway, and found my motel (in the Day’s Inn which ended up being blocks away from where I lived for the year). Then I hopped back in the rental car and drove the three or four miles to St. Armand Circle, which my family and I had visited several times when I was a child – and had supper there (before heading back to the motel for one of my TV shows). In the morning I met the person who became my sponsor/mentor the next year, Penny (a sociologist) for breakfast, talked with a sociology class about my research, had tea with some students, and had lunch with Sarah, the person whose place I ended up taking for the next year (and who I’m still friends with). I remember walking around the campus (and being ferried around by Sarah). I sat in on Sarah’s class in the building on the bay (where I soon had an office – though I never taught there) and sat in a great class, a social theory class taught by David – in the same building – which I compared favorably with seminars at Swarthmore and the New School – and which helped save me on the college. It was a beautiful early May day – and I wore the same clothes more or less that I wore at the conference last week at Hollywood Beach – and I left with a good feeling (somewhat unjustifiably good in hind sight) about teaching in New College and living in Sarasota (Penny also showed me the house where I ended up living for a year). Amazingly, a week later I was back in NYC agonizing about which of the three offers to take (I ultimately picked New College). Interesting trip with several features I was to replicate this past week (flying out of Tampa, rental car transaction there, driving over the Skyway bridge, walking around New College campus, etc., etc.)

Interesting memories throughout.

-- Perry

Mother's Day weekend

Mother's Day weekend 2009 started out with a walk with Stephanie, Frisco, and me. Frisco is not as tough on small dogs as he is on big dogs, and this little dog is one he had met before, Munchkin. They got along pretty well.

Friso was then off with me for a regular doctor's visit. I felt a little bit bad after Dr. Kaur (below) and her colleague poked and prodded him (two shots, one blood sample, a rectal thermometer reading, and two nose drops!).

The animal theme continued as we stopped - on our way out of town - at the local government animal shelter to renew Frisco's license (now armed with new shot records). The licensing part was easy. But Stephanie insisted on looking at the dogs at the shelter (we had left Frisco home). Sure enough she found some dogs - including a poor, sight-impaired Yorkie who will probally never get adopted. I steered clear of this, figuring emotional attachment and raising the hopes of dogs and shelter staff. We can't afford another dog, and Frisco wouldn't tolerate it.

A couple of weeks later investigators were there too, checking out allegations of fraud and mismanagement against the shelter.

The shelter is south of town and stopped there not just because Frisco was due for annual license renewal (made necessary partly because of a animal control issue we faced a couple of years ago) but also because we were headed south of town anyway. On the way to our destination we somewhat inadvertantly drove around the first of the small towns we checked out on Saturday: Shepherdsville, KY - an almost incongruous combination of a giant flea market, an old-timey Main Street downtown, and a slew of fast food joints and big box retailers just a block away, next to the interstate. Once we crossed to the correct side of the highway, we were soon at our destination. Stephanie has long been a shoe afficianado, and about 10 years ago Stephanie began to discover that one of the reasons why her feet hurt so bad was that she wore lots of bad shoes(not enough arch support). So she began experimenting with more expensive shoes - finding stores in Tallahassee, St. Paul, Sarasota, and now Louisville that carry shoes by Dansko, Birkenstock, and the like. A major on-line shoe retailer - from whom she bought me also not cheap shoes a couple of years ago for my birthday - it turns out - although it's officially headquartered in Nevada - has their warehouse south of Louisville - near Shepherdsvile - and also near the United Parcel Service hub at the airport, south of town. Zappos.com, Stephanie learned earlier this spring, has an outlet store in that warehouse. The warehouse - pictured below from the road - is, as you can see, very big.

Below is Stephanie standing outside the outlet store door.

Once we got into the store, given the size of the warehouse, it was small and a tad disappointing.

Once Michael (below) helped us, we found some Dansko shoes, and we picked up that you really have to go there pretty regularly to find stuff if you're looking for something in particular. Stephanie was (looking for something in particular), which she didn't find. She did get a good-price pair of shoes (Vincent and I usually object is she doesn't spend at least $90), but we could relax that here. She got a pair of Danskos for 1/3 the regular price.

I also looked a little, but may have to come back when my current Zappos shoes wear out even more. From Zappos we drove an exit south, instead of north (towards home), on Interstate 65, to the Bardstown exit Soni and I had missed in January. Bardstown is a town south of Louisville - the cradle of Catholicism in KY (even before Covington) - home of several nearby distilleries and Catholic institutions, including the monastery Penny, Mom, and I visited John at in summer 1987 - when he was staying there (where the Catholic theologian Thomas Merton once lived) - and a town I believe the FL summer Latin tour went through in 1979 - on the way to Lansing, Michigan. I've driven through here twice now in January on the way to and from our church officer retreat at a nunnery. On Mother's Day weekend Sunday, Stephanie and I drove through it - past the restaurant where Soni and I ate in January, past the state park where the "Stephen Foster" musical is performed (Stephen Foster apparently wrote "My Old KY Home" after a visit to Bardstown), past the Chinese buffet where I ate 1 1/2 years ago on the way to the retreat, past the old courthouse square, past the dinner train the runs out of Bardstown, and past several old distilleries (and some kind of exhibit area near one). Some of these distilleries feature huge warehouse-looking - probably vats where the whisky ages - including the last ones we visited (pictured below) - I think for the Heaven Hill liquor company - that are really kind of peculiar looking, almost prision-like.

On the way home we also drove through Mt. Washington, in northern Bullitt County, and then in on Bardstown Road. We stopped at an Indian restaurant we had noticed months ago, that the proprietor of another favorite restaurant of ours had recommended, and spent a while there (it was good but service was slow). During our time there we got a fateful call from Vincent, who told us he had left the dog in the backyard (which he is not supposed to do - thanks to Frisco's separation anxiety, the dog wines which annoys the neighbors if any of them are home - all the more so because he didn't have any idea when we were coming home). As it is, he wanted us to pick him up at his girlfriend's - which we said we couldn't do, since we were still waiting for our food and - as soon as we were done eating - we'd need to rush home to rescue the dog - since it was almost dark and with a barking dog in the dark our neighbors might eventually call the dog shelter people we'd visited earlier in the day. (Vincent got mad and siad he'd stay at his girlfriend's. I eventually picked him up after church - on Mother's Day Sunday - and by then he had finally overstayed his welcome - and that helped produce a you can only see Vincent twice a week rule for Vincent's girlfriend - which is good as far as we're concerned - but marked a big change - since he used to go over there for hours EVERY DAY. A sign of a good "ethnic" restaurant - lots of the customers there were South Asian Indian Americans (but it's hard to pick out since it's in a rather run-down old shopping center).

So we'd already had our big meal for Mother's Day weekend. On Mother's Day Sunday after church Stephanie walked to a plant store in our neighborhood and then I drove to pick her up with a bunch of plants she'd bought. After this, she spent a couple of hours working with them, mainly in our front yard. Frisco helped a little. (Mostly) fun weekend!

-- Perry

You go, girl!

Congratulations to Preakness Stakes winner Rachel Alexandra and rider Calvin Borel and runner-up Mine That Bird and rider Mike Smith. Rachel is the first filly to win the race since 1924, and Borel is the first jockey ever to abandon a Derby winner who was running in the Preakness to ride another horse. Click here to see the exciting race: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTJUTJJCmR0

Can't believe that was the smallest in-person audience in 25 years to watch the Preakness - in the struggling Pimlico (Maryland) track. We'll see about the size of the TV audience. Did the Rachel-Mine drama - that continued for the past two weeks and into the last few inches of this race - overcome any of the bad taste in people's mouths about recent horse injuries (Barbaro, Eight Belles)?

Would Mine have won if Borel had chosen him instead of Rachel? Would Borel have been able to maneuver Mine into contention without going wide around the final turn? Will Rachel be able to hold off Mine in the longer (1 1/2 miles) Belmont Stakes? We'll likely find out in three weeks.

-- Perry

Keynote talks

Thursday night’s American Association for Public Opinion Research keynote speakers were both interesting. Nielsen research head honcho Paul Donato saw survey researchers going back to the future and then heading in new direction. Donato described how in-person surveys gave way to phone surveys, which costs and then missed coverage with all-cell phone households gave way to Internet surveys, which now also seem imperiled because of rather extreme duplication (same people on multiple “Internet panels”) – especially with apparent “professional panelists” – and missed coverage – with the “digital divide.” Donato said we may be going back to in-person surveys (he may have mentioned regular mail surveys in here somewhere).

But Donato also highlighted new digital research strategies (which he called "listening,
as opposed to "asking," which is what he said surveys do). Nielsen (the company that historically monitors household TV viewing) has apparently started tracking and “coding” (categorizing and counting) text in Internet chat rooms and on blogs and is assessing volume and content. He also linked viewing of CNBC business reports with consumer spending two weeks later. If a lot of people are watching CNBC, they’re worried about the economy – and that means they’ll spend less two weeks later. Another Another fascinating example Donato gave was what he called “electronic ethnography” – sending subjects cell phones and texting them every hour during the day to ask what they’re doing and asking them to take pictures of what’s in the refrigerators and cupboards every day. (Yet another example was linking social networking Web sites with Geographic Information Systems – so friends could monitor their friends’ whereabouts – like on Yahoo mapping – and researchers were monitoring both: both what friends were saying and doing and where they were at.)

Ken Prewitt, director of the Census Bureau during the Clinton Administration, not so implicitly criticized Donato for focusing on commercial issues and for not talking about areas in which universal coverage is important. For democracy and fair policy-making to work, the United States needs something like the census that covers everyone. Prewitt battled the Republican Congress back in the late 1990s about whether Census 2000 would employ sampling – and lost. (About this, Prewitt quipped: When you look out the window to see if it’s raining – do you insist on looking out all of the windows before deciding to go out with an umbrella?) Right off the top, Prewitt suggested, because of concerns about the census and immigration control, without sampling, the census is likely to miss up to half of Latinos. And when so much of government resources (from Congressional seats to Community Development Block Grant funds) is allocated on the basis of census information, this is fundamentally unfair. Ultimately – since sampling seems unlikely to win out now, too – the government may have to abandon the household as the unit of census enumeration (partly because cell phones and e-mail addresses aren’t intrinsically linked with geographically based households; and partly because household surveys – in-person, phone, or regular mail – are so expensive) and may need to turn more to administrative records (gathered for some other purpose, like Social Security records – which at this point aren’t very accurate except for certain information that is key for the program they’re gathered for) and perhaps for the kind of digital information that Donato called for.

-- Perry

Around the kitchen table

The shot

Getting ready

Singing at mass

Headless procession

Weekend surprises

Among the surprises this weekend:

We’ve generally felt we’ve been pretty safe from worrying with Vincent about those triple vices: sex, drugs, and drinking. Apparently no more are we going to be immune from worrying about these with him (especially if you include tobacco).

I’ve talked with two different survey researchers who are also immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe about the Georgia and Kosovo wars. I even sent one of them – with whom I argue a little – my blog entry last summer “Georgia on my mind.” Who would have thought?

It’s been one year this week since the May 20 KY presidential primary. On the anniversary of the weekend in which I made calls both for then Senator Clinton and then Senator Obama’s campaigns, at one of many electoral politics polling presentations I’ve been to, I learned that 25 percent of Clinton voters across the country did indeed vote for Senator McCain. And nearly half of those who voted for other Democratic presidential candidates (mainly Senator Edwards – not a very big group), voted for McCain. Apparently racial politics played at least a small role here. Few of these voters “stayed home” (didn’t vote) to protest. And few supporters of other Republican candidates defected (as the Democrats). Readers may recall not only our coverage of the Democratic primary, but also my blog entry from Boston about the pseudo-focus group with wavering former Hilary supporters. Of course, in the end, Obama didn’t need all of the Clinton voters to win relatively easily. Without the financial crisis in the fall and the eventual tide against Governor Palin, these folks could have posed a much bigger threat to Obama.

We’ll see what other surprises – pleasant and unpleasant – await me this weekend. Go Rachel Alexandra (in two hours)! Go, Rockets (tomorrow night). I’m going to go for a swim instead of taking a nap now.

-- Perry