Category: Uncategorized

The Double Flush

We’ve all encountered them (maybe you are one): women who flush the toilet when they step into the stall in a public facility. As a child of the California desert, and a sailor, the water waste offends me. But I’d like to get past that to consider what motivates some women to pre-flush in public.

Women are, as women know but hate to admit, public toilet slobs. The very nature of feminine hygiene is somewhat to blame, it’s more complicated and requires more accoutrements. But it doesn’t excuse lapses in common courtesy, like making sure the tissue seat cover actually flushes and isn’t left half in the bowl and half on the floor for the next gal. And need I say more than “squat splashback”? (Well, maybe I do–you know, when you squat instead of sitting for fear of what’s on the seat, and the extra elevation caused more splash.)

Most women, on entering a public toilet, are like the mom I heard guiding her young daughter in the public facility at a Utah ski resort, “Don’t touch anything. It’s filthy. Don’t let your clothes touch the wet ground! No, I’ll flush it with my foot . . .” And Utah’s toilets, even in the ones drenched in melted snow and sprinkled with gravel in the ski base lodges, are infinitely cleaner than the typical New York restaurant john on a good day.

No wonder women approach strange toilets with trepidation. But I’m still at a loss to understand how flushing before you use it helps. Assuming the last person flushed (and actually took note of whether the flush was effective–but most women, seeing an unflushed toilet, will move on the next if they possibly can) how does changing the water in the bowl improve the public toilet experience? Do they do it at home, too? How long does it take their toilets at home to refill?

The Courtesy Flush

Like so many of society’s dirty little habits, Jerry Seinfeld brought the courtesy flush to light in his sitcom. I don’t recall the specific episode, but George was undoubtedly involved. ItÕs another public toilet requirement, aimed at making the experience a little more pleasant for everyone. WeÕve all been there, maybe it was something we ate, or a particularly stressful day. But the courtesy is not to be confused with . . .

The Cover-up Flush

This is a distinct variation on the courtesy flush, intended to cover up embarrassing sounds so that the unfortunate perpetrator doesn’t have to slink out of the restroom hiding her face, or wait until nobody else is around before coming out of the stall. Some women, even when experiencing intestinal discomfort, will hang on until they can use someone else’s flush for cover. This is particularly impressive, given the circumstances.

The Inspirational Flush

Distant cousin of the childish prank of putting a sleeping person’s hand in a cup of warm water. Sometimes your body just need a little encouragement

I these pandemic days, stories of our nation’s last enormous, culture-changing event may seem quaint. But perhaps there are lessons to be learned and applied today.

Ordinary (and extraordinary) people share their thoughts about our post September 11th world.

From a NYC Firefighter

Ken Rogers is a New York City Firefighter and also a member of St. Bart’s Sailing. I’ve sailed a lot of miles on Long Island Sound and in the Caribbean with Ken. On Tuesday, September 11th, he was one of the people about whom I worried the most. I reached him by phone early on Wednesday morning and wept in relief when I heard his exhausted voice. He had been there. He was alive. Firefighters he’s worked with for years were not. As of October 21st he was still attending funerals.

Sunday, September 16th,

All over, people are leaving flowers and lit candles by firehouses. They cheer and wave when we drive by. They look at us sadly from a distance. They approach carefully and speak their sympathy. We have received cards, food, and discounts for funerals.

At the site, a thousand volunteers are unused every day. They come from all over the country, and transportation was very restricted for most of them.

Today I finally have a break in the pace for the worst of reasons. I am going to a funeral, the first of many to come.

Ken Rogers

Ken has also emphasized that one of the best ways you can help is by contributing to the fund for the families of the lost firefighters.

From California

Wow.

When I heard about the first plane (as I was sitting on the toilet listening to NPR…”and where were you when you first heard?” oh well, it WAS 5:45 AM here, afterall)….anyway….when I heard about the first plane, I thought some idiot obviously has some navigation training needs.

When I heard about the second plane, it hit me that I was, am and will always be a New Yorker, and they hurt my city. It was as if a personal friend was attacked. Those Towers, were the sentries that guarded us (at least from New Jersey or Staten Island). The Empire State was the beauty and the Towers were the strength of NYC architecture. All week I was crying, sobbing saying “they hurt my city.” At the time I didn’t know that they’d also killed my cousin.

But, you know? Now that I know they killed my cousin (controller of Windows on the World), it doesn’t feel much different from them hurting my city. We all experienced hideous losses, when it hits your family it’s just more in your face. Though watching it first hand is in your face enough.

For the first week, I stayed up late watching TV. I couldn’t get enough of it. I watched the telethons and gave the money. It seemed so surreal to send disaster relief money to the city you lived in for 27 years and that is the richest city in the world. Now I think I’ve shut down. I watch sitcoms (yeccch) and only occasionally watch the news. When I think about Howie (cousin), I don’t feel anything. I try to go through the days as if everything is normal. It’s a lot easier to do from 3,000 miles away.

I see American flags all over and something about them bothers me. I know it’s supposed to make people feel better. But to me it smacks of “my team is better than your team…my country is better than your country…my way of life is better than your way of life…my religion is better than your religion.” It brings me back to Vietnam when people who were against the war were beaten up for being unamerican, by people waving the flag as an emblem of their superiority.

Mona Rosenthal, Pasadena, California

From Downtown

This breathtaking story was circulated at the Securities Industry Automation Corporation.

The events of September 11 still haunt all of us and will for some time and maybe forever. There are plenty of stories which began on that day, New Yorkers in fights for survival, making their escape from Downtown Manhattan. This is our story, as it happened, from 86 Trinity at the Amex [American Exchange], on that fateful day. This is my account of it, I think it needs to be told.

I was running up Wall Street from Water Street when the second plane hit, my bus had stopped its route at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge to turn around, so I had to hoof it to get to work. The sky was foreboding and dark, office papers drifted down from high above pushed outward by the blast of the impact, like some morbid ticker tape parade. People hurried toward the seaport, some running, some screaming, others crying. This scene accurately foreshadowed what was to come, to an unsuspecting downtown business district.

My team were already busy at work on the [American Exchange trading] floor, as the events unfolded before their eyes on CNBC, CNN and other news services. From the 1993 WTC bombing I had a decent idea of what to do. Since the Con Ed power grid goes beneath the WTC, I went to the Amex service desk to get ready for an immediate powerdown. Before doing so, I ordered all my technicians to the commsite for safety and to keep track of them.

While at the service desk, we saw that the Pentagon had been hit, and felt how widespread this event could be. I went back and forth to our commsite and the desk several times. Then while on the trading floor, there came a crash and the entire building shook. People began to scream and run off the floor. I just remember standing there looking up at the giant high gold leafed ceiling waiting for it to break open in a shower of rubble. I went to the front of the building to see what happened. I went downstairs and looked at the front glass doors and they were as black as pitch. One could not even see the smoke moving across them. It was then that I realized that we were in trouble.

So I proceeded to the Comsite, through a clogged hallway of very frightened people. A senior person was doing his best to calm them and direct them. I moved thru the crowd and went to talk with my team. They were anxious, yet very calm. We handed out respirators which we used to clean equipment and rags which, when wet, would help folks breathe. By this time, a lot of people from the hallways had come into our area also, to seek clean air, which we had due to our old air conditioners which were standalone, and not vented to the outside. We did our best to calm everyone down.

We came up with a plan, and that simply was to evacuate via the back door at 123 Greenwich Street and make our way down to the water’s edge via Battery Park where the ferries are. Hopefully, there would be clean air there. Then we could take ferries, or travel along the coast to the bridges, or just jump in, if we had to. I had a walkman at my desk and gave it to someone to monitor who confirmed that the first building had fallen, much to our shock. Then a third shift tech called in from home and I asked him how did the building fall, How!? He couldn’t tell from the video.

I went out on Greenwich Street, twice, to check the air quality and ash levels, and noticed they were diminishing by the second test. Since I felt that we were targets, too and did not know the scope of what was happening, thought it best to go. Most others thought that way also, so no big decision here. We readied up and the team was together.

Just then, security came in and said the Police want us to evacuate. So there it was, the decision made….time to go….we were ready, our plan in place, our masks ready, we also put hats on which we had from the Amex.

We went calmly in two files out that back door into what can only be described as a Pompeiian situation. It was dark like early night, and the entire area was covered by an Erie grey ash blanket…almost like a new snowfall….we could hardly recognize the landscape, it was like a nuclear winter scenario. We proceeded up Greenwich street and turned left up Rector with the intention to turn right on Trinity Place wherein we would have a direct route to the water and hopefully clean’ air and blue sky at battery Park near the Ferry. We were not prepared for what happened next.

I carried up the rear and yelled for my crew to stay together… Just then, another rumble. Louder than loud….sounding like jets flying over, very close…but no! People began to scream…then run at full pace.. (the second building was collapsing….we did not know that!!)

I stopped and turned to see what I saw…and what I saw rising from the blackness which already draped us….was this monstrous heaving wall of debris, smoke, pulverized concrete and glass , a mass the size of a building , brown and black and much denser then the already blackened sky….It was traveling at us as I stood almost frozen, in what was a timeless second of awe and amazement ….this beautiful, wonderful, horrible terrible mass of fury coming at us from both down Trinity Street and up from Rector Street, on the perpendicular…..like we were in a giant bowling alley… It was moving fast, 150mph fast…I knew instantly we couldn’t out run it. And when the trance of that eternal second was broken…I too, turned and ran…Just then I saw a door to a cafe swinging slightly from the corner of my eye…I grabbed someone in front of me and pulled him in, as the cloud blew by…ominously… Again, we were plunged into complete darkness, smoke began to fill the room, as it had filled the Exchange…and for the second time I really thought that this was it… I thought the building was going to come down or catch fire…all I could think about was what a mess I had left my apartment in, and that someone would have to clean it!!

Several of my crew who were further down the street were knocked down and pounded into the ground. They are all OK, now. Others managed to find refuge in buildings up along our route. They were in groups of two or three all separated from each other. It was agonizing not knowing if everyone was all right, but I trusted in their common sense and survivability. We tried calling on the Nextels which at first was futile. Several of our group were in the café with me along with a fireman from Flushing, and several other fine folks. We just waited to see if the once again blackened streets would clear.

We waited quite a while not knowing what was happening out there, as the soot settled. From my Walkman I learned that the second building had collapsed…I dared not tell anyone.

Outside brief rays of light hit the street, as the ash settled. This was encouraging, and we decided to wait a little more to get better air. Smoke was slowly finding its way into our area, and it was getting hard to breathe… We decided to make a break and complete the escape to Battery Park and the water’s edge. We began to establish contact with the group, meeting at different intervals or hearing of their safety ahead of us. Some took to the ferries, we made for the bridges, upon hearing that all of us were accounted for.

We then made our way to the Manhattan bridge and joined a mass exodus of thosands who wearily crossed the expanse, not exactly sure what just happen, each with their own story, quiet and pensive, certainly happy to be walking to blue sky… looking back periodically at the scarred darkened smoke filled skyscape where the once ever prominent symbols of our beloved city once stood.

This story was just an average story and does not compare to what happened to those at the site; New York’s Bravest, New Yorks Finest, workers, air travelers, moms and dads and kids… all gone in an instant… in a snapshot of time… an event indelibly imprinted in our memories…objectified…

I have seen “gound Zero” several times. I have seen the wreckage right next door… It is awesome, and terrible… and unbelievably close. In the days following the attack we’ve worked to recover the operation, the building and our ability to trade.

We’d come to work over the Brooklyn bridge with police escorts, through many checkpoints, with Army, Airforce, and National guard manning the stations. On the roofs of buildings, anti-aircraft guns were in place, while Helicopter gunships circled over downtown. F-16, and F-18 Fighter jets routinely patrolled the Hudson and East Rivers. This brought a sense of comfort to me, if not a bigger sense of the surrealness of the situation. The place where we worked was indeed a war zone.

Four or five times we were evacuated from our work areas at the NYSE [New York Stock Exchange] or the Amex with bone chilling quickness and renewed fears. The reason was the uncertainty of stability of some of the larger buildings which shadow our area. There was a tenseness which pervaded our beings when at these work sites. No one ever yelled, everyone was always aware of their position in relation to ground zero and those unstable buildings. We always worked in twos or three’s, having radios which communicated with our building’s security desk in case of an alert or evacuation command.

New Yorkers have risen to this challenge and responded to this event not in anger or in blame but in compassion and love and a willingness to help. I have never hugged so many people hello in my life! I have met folks from the nationl guard, the army, fire departments and from FEMA…. as far away as Riverside Calif [!]…I thanked them, they thanked New Yorkers for being so kind!!

Its all been very emotional.

The country has risen to the challenge and the world has responded in kind…We are now closer as a humanity then we have ever been…we have set the example, one of determination and resilience, and that is our best and most poignant retaliation.

I am impressed and proud of my team’s ability to handle this ordeal and to return to work not 24 hours after the event in some cases, to the very spots from which we literally ran for our lives. They represented themselves well in the disaster support effort.

Three weeks slipped by in what seems like a split second. I’d like to commend my managers [names cut for privacy], I like to thank the SIAC [Securities Industry Automation Corporation] techs at the NYSE for supporting us so proficiently [names cut]. An incredible amount of work was completed by SIAC and the Exchanges to demonstrate to the world our determination and fortitude. Again, I thank everyone for their support and their efforts from Security, to Operations, to HR, to Engineering, QA, Development, and Facilities engineering.

There are so many of you and you are all responsible for the statement the Amex made Monday morning, Oct 1st, 2001 by being the first American Company to open within the frozen zone, one block from ground zero. This is SIAC at its best.

I think it was Saturday afternoon 9/29, on my way home, when I heard the bells of Trinity Church ringing for the first time since the event, with power restored , a warm inner light illuminated its majestic stained glass windows. I had forgotten about those bells and what they meant to me. The history of them; when they rung in victory in other churches built on that site, for the sons of the American revolution, for the war of 1812, the Civil war, WW1, WWII…and now again for a tearful recognition of a different kind of victory , but always to the same formula of American spirit, expert in the art of life and the ability to move forward in freedom and democracy.

Those bells sounded so wonderful.

Frank Moscati
SIAC Technician

From the Air

This could be a fabrication, but since I only received it once (meaning it wasn’t heavily circulated), and since the details have the ring of truth, I’m sharing it – as with the others here, it’s a story that needs to be told. If you know anything about this story (especially if it’s a hoax), please let me know. The unidentified author apparently lives in Washington DC but was stuck in Colorado during attacks.

I just wanted to drop you all a note and let you know that I arrived safe and sound into Dulles Airport tonight at about 6:00. It was an interesting flight. The airport in Denver was almost spooky, it was so empty and quiet.

No one was in line for the security check point when I got there so that went fairly quickly, just x-ray of my bags and then a chemical test to be sure nothing explosive was on them. Then I waited 2 1/2 hours to board the plane. What happened after we boarded was interesting and thought I would share it with you.

The pilot/captain came on the loudspeaker after the doors were closed. His speech went like this: “First I want to thank you for being brave enough to fly today. The doors are now closed and we have no help from the outside for any problems that might occur inside this plane. As you could tell when you checked in, the government has made some changes to increase security in the airports. They have not, however, made any rules about what happens after those doors close. Until they do that, we have made our own rules and I want to share them with you. Once those doors close, we only have each other.

The security has taken care of a threat like guns with all of the increased scanning, etc. Then we have the supposed bomb. If you have a bomb, there is no need to tell me about it, or anyone else on this plane; you are already in control. So, for this flight, there are no bombs that exist on this plane. Now, the threats that are left are things like plastics, wood, knives, and other weapons that can be made or things like that which can be used as weapons.

Here is our plan and our rules. If someone or several people stand up and say they are hijacking this plane, I want you all to stand up together. Then take whatever you have available to you and throw it at them. Throw it at their faces and heads so they will have to raise their hands to protect themselves. The very best protection you have against knives are the pillows and blankets. Whoever is close to these people should then try to get a blanket over their head-then they won’t be able to see. Once that is done, get them down and keep them there. Do not let them up. I will then land the plane at the closest place and we WILL take care of them. After all, there are usually only a few of them and we are 200+ strong! We will not allow them to take over this plane. I find it interesting that the US Constitution begins with the words “We, the people” — that’s who we are, THE people and we will not be defeated.”

With that, the passengers on the plane all began to applaud, people had tears in their eyes, and we began the trip toward the runway. The flight attendant then began the safety speech. One of the things she said is that we are all so busy and live our lives at such a fast pace. She asked that everyone turn to their neighbors on either side and introduce themselves, tell each other something about your families and children, show pictures, whatever. She said “for today, we consider you family. We will treat you as such and ask that you do the same with us.”

Throughout the flight we learned that for the crew, this was their first flight since Tuesday’s tragedies. It was a day that everyone leaned on each other and together everyone was stronger than any one person alone. It was quite an experience. You can imagine the feeling when that plane touched down at Dulles and we heard “welcome to Washington Dulles Airport, where the local time is 5:40.” Again, the cabin was filled with applause.

It has been a very long day and one that I am glad is over. I have been constantly reminded this day of the article in JAAMT that Barbara Williams recently wrote where she referenced the tornados in Oklahoma and said something like, “Do we get mad and shake our fists at God in anger? No, we go on and conquer our fears and continue our lives.” It is my hope that is what we do now. Last night I saw a program with college students where one of them said that at their campus there are no more hyphenated titles, i.e., African-American, etc., everyone is just an American. No one will ever be able to take that pride away from us.

Paris

In the Republique Metro station in Paris, there is a passage between two lines that shortens the walk from one platform to another by about five minutes. But it’s a one-way passage–passengers arriving on one platform may use the passage, which has one-way doors at one end, to quickly reach the other, but hapless riders coming from the other line have to go the long way around. Metro “insiders” know that the latch on the door on the left end is broken.

Since the Paris Metro is notorious for making its riders walk most of the distance they want to travel, this seemingly small victory over the system feels like a coup, particularly to the visitor–doubtlessly Parisian commuters take it in Gaelic stride.

New York

The passengers waiting to board Flight 1599 to Milan was growing restive. Because of a gate change, some of us had made a mad dash from one concourse to another, and the departure time had been delayed by 30 minutes. When gate staff announced boarding of first class passengers, a crowd, bordering on a mob, formed around the gate door in the corner, surrounding a bank of three seats, a pillar, and a trash can situated near the door.

First class passengers squeezed through the throng towing their excessive carryon luggage. One gate staff checked their tickets, while another surveyed the crowd and said, “the line is behind the chairs. You must move behind the chairs,” indicating the narrow corridor formed between the chairs and the wall. Nobody paid him any attention.

Grumbling, he stepped behind the counter and came back with a pair of poles with an expandable strap in between.

“You must get behind the chairs,” he declared again, and tried to force the crowd on the wrong side of the chairs away from the door by setting up his rope and poles.

“Too late,” was the general response, “you should have set up the barrier before you made the announcement!”

“Please form the line behind the chairs by the wall!” he grew agitated.

“This is New York and you aren’t Mayor Guilani!”

Remarkably, the gate staffer continued trying to bend the increasingly angry crowd to his will until he was simply overwhelmed. The passengers moved his barrier out of their way and proceed to the gate.

Another artifact of the mid 1990s highlighting a technology that today is in every mobile phone, tablet, computer, and car. Maybe your coffee maker, too. But my conclusion here is as true today as it was back then.

Handheld GPS units are the most remarkable devices. A little gadget the size of a cel phone receives signals from dozens of satellites and interprets what they’re saying to tell you exactuly where you are on the face of the earth. Think about that. Think about how much information you can hold in your hand — geographic information that scores of explorers spent their lifetimes learning. And you can have it delivered to you, from space to your hand, for an investment of under $300.

When I travel, I take my handheld GPS and store waypoints at important locations. I have waypoints across Turkey and France. Although the GPS is ostensibly intended for sailboat navigation, I think of it as a geographic diary. In it’s little memory are the places I’ve taken it. I can tell you, in a matter of seconds, exactlly how far it is from where I’m sitting now to Marmaris on the south west coast of Turkey, or to Angers, a small town in western France. Or the exact spot where my snowshoes didn’t support me in the fine powder and I sank up to my waist in the snow near Quebec City.

Now that’s inherently cool.

However, no matter how much adjusting I do to the thing, the altitude function never seems to be right. I’ll be standing on a 1000 foot hilltop and it will tell me I’m at 200 feet. I’ll be sailing in Long Island Sound and it will say I’m soaring through the clouds. Sailing along in a friendly breeze can feel like flying, but I don’t think the GPS is capable of presenting interpretive data.

So no matter how magical I think my little GPS is, no matter how much fascinating data it can provide, I have to put it down and look around me to see the view from sea level…

This article from the mid-90s(?) is quite dated, but I’ve retained it because it’s a snapshot of life at that time, and it’s very easy to forget.

Is this the party to whom I am speaking…

Long distance telephone providers are responsible for the death of common courtesy in this country. I was raised to answer the telephone by identifying myself. But telephone solicitors have browbeaten me into the most crass of telephone manners out of self defense. I no longer offer callers any information when I pick up the receiver. My “hello” is vague enough to allow me to become almost anyone, from a ditzy spouse of the “decision maker” to hostile hired help. But most often it’s the prelude to a firm “no” followed by a hang-up.

A hang-up! I never imagined myself hanging up on anyone. What would my mother say?

Actually, she would appreciate the theatrics of my occasional role playing: “no, I can’t possibly subscribe to your video series, I’m about to declare bankruptcy.” Actually, the sympathy I’ve gotten from that one has almost made me feel guilty.

But the frequency of phone solicitation has become so frenzied that around here even the practice of yanking their chain has gone the way of the courteous answer. These days, if the caller ID doesn’t identify them I don’t pick up. If I’m near a phone with no ID display (rare since I have three displays) and find myself being asked if I’m “Susan Me … Ma … korskie?” I feel completely justified in answering “no” and hanging up.

During December, Time Life Books sales people called me twice a week. They kept telling me how I was enjoying something called Ancient Civilizations. They repeatedly called back to check up on my reading progress, until I angrily declared that I had not bought the book from them (which was true) and did not want to buy it or any other book from them. When I want a book I order it from Anazon.com. Amazingly, they haven’t called back. If only Gevalia would take the same hint.

To be fair, Gevalia is a little more justified in their persistance. I did, afterall, subscribe to their service a few years ago to get the free drip coffeemaker (a $49 value), then cancelled after a few months, having stockpiled two year’s worth of gourmet decaf coffee beans. I think I used the bankruptcy excuse. A year or so later I broke the carafe and couldn’t find one the same size at kitchen supply stores. So I called Gevalia to order a replacement, fully intending to pay for it. They didn’t have it in my color, and after a couple phone calls back and forth said sent me a whole new coffeemaker. I still haven’t resubscribed.

But the worst by far are the phone companies. There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that I’d be willing to listen to long distance plan options and pick one over the phone. Once years ago I asked a salesperson to fax me their plans. She explained that she was an independent contractor working from home and couldn’t fax me. That’s not my problem Š. Click

More recently an AT&T saleswoman rattled off a whole list of benefits before I could stop her. “Do you offer airline miles?” I asked. “Our market research has shown that airline miles is not the best way to serve our customers.” She replied. Not this customer, baby. Click.

I interrupted the most recent salesgirl (I use the term intentionally) who got through to me: “I’m not interested in switching my voice service, but to you offer DSL?” “I dunno, what’s that?” she countered. “It’s a high-speed connection for Internet access, and if you don’t know what it is then I’m wasting my time talking to you.” Click. I’m sure Mom would approve of that.

One Ringy-Dingy, . . .

My local phone company, Nynex which is now Bell Atlantic, sold me this absurd bundle of options that includes voice dialing and a second number on my main phone line that rings differently. In typical 90s managed market style, the whole package is the cheapest way to get the options I really want (voicemail, call waiting, caller ID). My office telephone has a huge number of (mostly unused) speed dial slots, and now my phone service offers me 50 more, in addition to 30 voice dial numbers. As if I’m ever going to program in and remember that many numbers! I can’t even remember how to program the phone.

So they activated this new second number and within a couple hours it was ringing. Guess who called? A telephone solicitor!

In mid-December a representative from a carpet cleaning company called to tell me I’d been selected to have the carpet in one room of my home shampooed for free, which room would I like done? Well, I replied, since I only have carpet in one room, it would have to be the living room. Thinking ahead to my New Year’s Day party, and that the carpet had been down for two years without being cleaned, I told them to come on over.

I only have carpet in one room …

I did a little on-line research and discovered that they were actually a sales office for Kirby vacuums. By the time the two guys showed up with their amazing machine I had concentrated all my energy on sales resistance. I’ve been in third world markets. I’ve bargained with Turkish rug merchants. Two boys from Mount Vernon weren’t going to get the best of me!

They set about demonstrating the wonders of the Kirby Generation Six carpet cleaning system. They showed me the dirt their machine could suck out of my carpet. They showed me how easy it was to handle. They showed me how it’s so powerful it can suck the feathers out of my down comforter, and the grout out from between the tiles on the kitchen floor. I was polite enough not to point out that I’m not interested in cleaning my downstairs neighbor’s apartment as well as my own. They showed me the upholstery attachment, the curtain attachment, the plant misting attachment, and the “portable” feature for cleaning the car.

it can suck the feathers out of my down comforter …

I was impressed with the way they built the case for my ultimate purchase, first asking how often I vacuumed, then asking if it wouldn’t be worth $2.50 each time. I was taken aback by the way they overtly checked out my apartment and complemented or expressed mutual interest in color schemes, CDs, the birds, and the shape of my coffee mugs.

I wouldn’t go near a hand-knotted oriental rug with that thing …

Finally, the leader took me into the kitchen to “go over the numbers” while his partner set about shampooing my carpet. Scratching out numbers on a scrap of paper he told me about how he’s in the middle of a sales contest, so he’s offering a higher turn-in value on my pathetic old vacuum, as well as a very reasonable monthly payment plan. I wouldn’t even have to start paying for a couple months, but they’d set me up with a new machine tomorrow. And although he referenced the $1,500 final purchase price, he never actually pointed out that those payments would go on for 18 months — after all, the cleaner is good for at least 25 years. I didn’t bother to point out that at $80 a month, I’d have to vacuum more than once a day for it to cost $2.50 per cleaning. But kindest of all, I didn’t laugh in his face at the proposition that I spend $1,500 for a machine to clean my 12 by 12 foot patch of living room carpet. Was I tempted? Not in this reality. I wouldn’t go near a hand-knotted oriental rug with that thing, and the notion of dragging it out to mist the plants just to get my money’s worth was laughable.

In the end I pointed out that they’ed called me and I’d told them I only had one carpeted room. They couldn’t blame me for accepting the offer of a free cleaning — the initial caller hadn’t said a word about selling me anything. They went away disappointed, but assured me that they weren’t angry. I ended up very happy with my clean carpet for the holidays. I wonder if Hoover has any sales offices in the area …

This article is from the mid-1990s when I indulged a brief obsession with Antarctic exploration.

he antarctic is about survival. As Morgan in Antarctic Navigation learns during a stint at the US base on the continent, it’s a completely hostile environment.

During the (southern) winter of 1999 a scientist stationed at the south pole for the winter discovered a lump in her breast. For all the high-tech equipment at the southernmost base, there was nothing the outside world could do to help. During the antarctic winter, no plane could fly to the pole, land, and return to the relative safety of New Zealand. Gender aside, she might as well has been a part of one of Schackleton or Scott’s expeditions.

Finally a plane did make the round trip, just barely. But rather than trying to land, it dropped the emergency medical equipment she needed to operate on herself. On the television news we saw footage the other polar scientists taped as they retrieved the package in the icy darkness.

I’d have a lot of respect for nature in a place so remote, cold, dark, and windy that a military jet can’t go there.

In the (southern) summer of 1997 six sky divers went there to parachute down onto the South Pole. Three of them died because they neglected to open their parachutes.

When I heard about this at a cocktail party my first question was not “Why?” but rather, “How. How did they arrange to do such a frivolous thing?” But of course the answer is money–they each paid some enormous sum for the chance to jump the pole.

I heard an interview on NPR with one of the three who jumped successfully. Two who survived were tandem jumping — they were tied together. The other four were to link up in the air for a while before opening their ’chutes. The man being interviewed described jumping from the airplane at 8000 feet (above the ground, which is at 9000 feet above sea level) and beginning to reach for his friends. The next thing he knew he was half way into the “red zone,” which is the zone in which you want your parachute to be out. He deployed it at about 1000 feet and landed. Two of the other three jumpers never deployed their ’chutes, the third had started to when he hit the ground. The Chilean government still has all the equipment (these jumpers probably went through Chile because the US government would never sanction their trip, but I speculate . . .) but it is suggested that there was no equipment failure.

The interviewer asked if he thought they could have been better prepared and he described their preparation as adequate. Then he said they had not jumped together before, so they were unfamiliar with each other’s flight positions and habits. He mentioned that they’d been on oxygen on the airplane, but that he didn’t think any of them were suffering from altitude sickness. Then he described the ground, an endless field of white that lends no sense of perspective.

Amazing as it may seem, as a scuba diver I can understand how they could fall thousands of feet without realizing it, and without checking their altimeters. Placed in an alien environment, the mind and body react unpredictably.

But I cannot understand how they could risk jumping in one of the most hostile environments on Earth without jumping together somewhere safer first. They were not well prepared, they were arrogant. What a sad testament to have died ill prepared in a fatally dangerous sport, having gone out of their way to do it in a tremendously hostile environment.

This essay is from the early 2000s. The rug is now in my living room and the basket holds yarn in the bedroom.

Tucked partially under a chair in my office a colorful basket squats, slightly misshapen from being packed, on an equally colorful carpet. Souvenirs both, but neither declares its point of origin. To do so would give away their pedigree . . .

Caveat Emptor

To visit Turkey and not buy a carpet is to defy some law of Byzantine nature.

“Beautiful Kilims!”

“Just step into my shop, only for a moment.”

“Where are you from? You want to buy a carpet?”

Swarthy men try to be non-threatening while exuding Turkish aggressiveness. My first carpet, bought my first day with two weeks of shopping to go, represents a moment of weakness. It’s not a bad rug, just not a great one.

The Turkish carpet salesman is one part used car salesman, one part art dealer, one part psychic. He reads you as you approach, speaks your language, describe his products in historical, cultural, falacious detail, and convinces you that you need a carpet for the foyer in the home you may one day move to.

Most Americans have never experienced anything like Turkish carpet shopping. It’s far more seductive than a Turkish harem, much more dangerous than Turkish prison, and approached properly, as much fun as a Turkish bath.

Never Let Them Know What You Want

You venture into a shop draped with intriguing silks, kilims, and woolen rugs. He urges you to sit, take some apple tea or Turksih coffee, let him show you some things. You’re weary. You’ve heard that if you accept a drink you’re agreeing to buy something.

“What size?”

“What colors?”

In no time his minions have unrolled a half dozen marvelous specimens. It would be impolite not to at least look. “Which do you like? I’ll show you more like it.” You’ve been warned not to let on which you like. But your every gesture and glance tell him volumes. Like a lamb to the slaughter, a minion separates you from your discouraging friends and negotiates a price. You emerge blinking and dazed into the sunlight with a tightly wrapped bundle and far less money than you had going in.

My office rug, a thick wool affair of deep reds, blues, and greens, was my third carpet. It, and number two came from a recommended dealer amid the chaos of Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar. In my possession was a written note from a friend with shopping instructions and the name of Hassan’s shop. To the Turk, friendship, no matter how tenuous, is tremendouIy important in business. This note made all the difference, although Hassan had no recollection of my friend who’d shopped there several years before. He showed us rugs that fit my written instructions, and his minions did not separate us to move in for the kill. I selected an old tribal carpet in a design my friend did not currently have in his collection. That was carpet number two.

I had settled on number three even before that. The moment it was unrolled I was hooked. I saw many more rugs after it, but in the end I returned to its jewel tones and single center medallion. Among us I and my friends bought three rugs and four chair pads from Hassan, and we all had Turkish coffee.

Sipping and Shopping

A week or so into our trip (between the two rug-buying episodes), we visited a grocery store in a small coastal town to buy provisions for our chartered sailboat. The store was well stocked and boasted a modern scanner at the computerized cash register. Working from a list we blithly filled two shopping carts.

Mid-way through our spree, the store clerk asked if we’d like apple tea. Shortly a tray of little glass cups was delivered from a nearby restaurant and we sipped it while we double-checked our list. Some old traditions do stand the test of time.

Migratory Sales Techniques

Two months later touring the stalls at a country fair in the Loire Valley in France, an old man in a booth full of baskets asked my friend (of carpet number two) and I to have a glass of wine with him. On sheer instinct (a Turk in France?) we declined. Certainly previous customers had accepted his offer, and he poured himself another glass without us. Then he demonstrated his baskets. Woven of a flexible grass, they can be soaked and crushed, soaked and reformed. He dipped one into a bucket of water, pulled it out and crushed it flat.

“What shape?”

“What color?”

He cheerfully searched through his piles and produced one after another for my inspection. I payed him the asking price–the relief of a civilized land where one does not have to bargain! And I managed not to suggest that he include rugs in his inventory next year.

It was 2002, a hot summer afternoon at the beach in North Carolina. Bruce and I were lounging on the upstairs deck of the beach house he rented for a week every July 4th. I told him about the project management course that many of my co-workers had signed up for the previous January and dropped out because it was so much work.

The course was one of the first offerings in a new graduate program offered by my company in conjunction with Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. The program, I explained to Bruce, included five professional certificates and, ultimately, a masters degree. To get there required ten courses like the one that so many of my co-workers had found too challenging to complete. But for all the drop-outs, there was a group who had completed it, and who were signing up for more courses in the fall. Everything – tuition, textbooks, and visits by the professors every three weeks – was paid for by my company.

“It seems to me that if my company was offering to pay for a masters degree, I wouldn’t hesitate to sign up,” Bruce said. He could sometimes be a master of understatement.

Four years later as I accepted my diploma on a stage in an auditorium in Dallas, I silently thanked my brother who did not live long enough to see me see it through for giving me the right perspective at the right moment.

Four years later as I accepted my diploma on a stage in an auditorium in Dallas, I silently thanked my brother who did not live long enough to see me see it through for giving me the right perspective

Forget the four years in between. Suffice it to say that earning a masters degree, even one or two courses at a time, while working full time does not leave time for very much else. Let’s cut to the big finish: May 20, 2006.

By the spring semester of 2006, enrollment in the SMU graduate certificate program at my company was down to two students: myself and Ming. About eight of our fellow students had graduated in May 2005, but Ming and I had started a semester later and, unlike many of that first class, had never taken more than two courses at once.

The last several semesters had been all on DVD — with so few students the company would not fly in the professors. Distance learning has many pros and a few cons. One important pro for SMU engineering students is the staff in Dallas who work with the distance students. Debra, center above, was our lifeline. Ming and I made a point of finding her in her office when we got to SMU the day before graduation.

Her warm Texas welcome confirmed that we’d each made the right choice by coming to the ceremony. In fact, all of the professors and staff who we met during our visit expressed great pleasure that we’d traveled to Texas for the event. And we were hardly in the minority – many of our fellow graduates were distance students who’d also travelled from all over the country.

As I accepted my diploma on a stage in an auditorium in Dallas, I silently thanked my brother–who did not live long enough to see me see it through–for giving me the right perspective

The graduates lined up by degree and school for the morning commencement ceremony. We learned that there were twice as many distance grads as on-campus students.

Ming and I and Ming’s wife Alice explored the SMU campus and stocked up on SMU logo items at the bookstore. On Friday night Ming wanted to try mechanical bull riding, so we asked at the hotel for a bar that offered it. We were directed to a club where the bulls had been retired, but the local FM rock station was having a party. The Violent Femmes rocked the house!

On Sunday morning before flying home I had time to visit a couple Dallas sites. I found a full-blown cattle drive, all done in bronze, in Pioneer Square.

A painted X marks the spot in the street where President John F. Kennedy was shot by Lee Harvey Oswald. I visited The Sixth Floor Museum and the adjacent grassy knoll. Standing across Elm Street it’s apparent that it was an easy shot from that sixth floor window , and an equally easy shot from the grassy knoll,

I was unable to solve the mystery, if there is one, so I packed up my shiny new diploma and few home.

Christmas of 2004, the east coast McCroskey family, depleted by one sorely missed member, elected to spend a few days in a beach house on the nearly deserted outer banks of North Carolina.

The neighborhood cats never knew what hit them.

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