Besides the scores of crises that California already has, another has reared its ugly head (and antlers). Researchers are spending three hundred thousand dollars to determine why deer are getting killed crossing Interstate 280 in the Bay Area. At the time the news article was published, Department of Fish and Game officials had astutely isolated the main cause for these freeway tragedies. Duh…… the deer are getting hit by speeding cars!
According to officials, the carnage seems to have a distinctive pattern. “We’re trying to understand why some deer don’t make it to the other side,” one said. “It seems older deer are generally successful in making it across the freeway. The highway slaughter typically involves younger animals.” Speculating what might be done to solve the problem, present ideas include building wildlife tunnels under the freeway, or installing deer-proof fencing along certain portions of the road.
Now, doing research is something I love. Learning about this funded study, then, I figured perhaps I could help out the Department of Fish and Game (plus the deer community and my bank account), by subcontracting to come up with insights and solutions to the problem. So while I’m waiting for Sacramento to get back to me regarding my five thousand dollar proposal, I’ll let you in on some of my preliminary findings.
1. Young deer have shorter legs than older ones. As I know personally, shorter legs mean you can’t run as fast. If you can’t run as fast, faster objects usually beat you to any given point… especially on highways. Cars are faster than deer. So legislation should be considered restricting deer from crossing roads until they are at least 21 years of age (in deer years), or 36 inches tall at the shoulders.
2. “Deer Crossing” signs seem to give these young animals a false sense of security. In this entitlement society, if you’re important enough to have your own sign, you certainly feel that sign should protect you. This, of course, is a fatal assumption. It is well known, that California motorists have a difficult time reading signs at 80 mph, or concentrating on the road while texting and eating their In-N-Out burgers at the same time.
3. There appears to be too little collaboration between deer and chicken. After decades of “crossing the road” in jokes and such, few if any chickens have ever been documented as killed or maimed, and their legs are far shorter than those of even the youngest deer. With more understanding of their crossing techniques, then, the Bambi Brigade might substantially reduce their highway tragedies by adopting such foul, time tested, road-crossing strategies.
4. It is said that deer have dichromatic (two-color) vision that poorly distinguishes the colors orange and red. If this is true, cars painted these two colors should be permanently banned from using Interstate 280 under any circumstances.
5. Most deer cross the road in order to find a better selection of vegetation to eat. This being the case, the Department of Fish and Game should carpet bomb one side of the highway with surplus Agent Orange defoliant, thus eliminating any need for them to cross in the first place.
6. Finally, the cost of this safety research may simply be a colossal waste of taxpayer money. My investigation has seemed to uncover that deer may not be the brightest gang in the glen. This was evident when I interviewed a juvenile I found pacing nervously on the shoulder of a deserted section of Interstate 280. Here’s a partial transcript of our exchange:
Me: I’ve been watching you for over twenty minutes, now, and you haven’t tried crossing the road. Why not?
Deer: Duh, I’m waiting to see if any cars are coming.
Me: Have you ever had any close calls crossing the highway?
Deer: No, cell phone reception is pretty crappy in this part of the state.
Me: Why do you think the "deer crossing" signs have not improved safety?
Deer: They have. None of us have ever been hit by other deer crossing the road, just those damn cars.
Me: Do you look both ways before you cross?
Deer: No, I look just about the same as I do now.
So there you have it. California spending more taxpayer money to rescue a species that perhaps would be better served by the leveling effect of natural selection. Of course, considered all the other money this state wastes, at least this time the Sacramento Stupidos can dupe the taxpaying public by saying they’re trying to save us a buck here and there, and lots of doe, as well.
Recently our local newspaper reported that there had been a change in the election results for a local School Board seat. While I didn’t know the surprise winner, I certainly fit the description of someone who should have been solidly in his constituency. But as with any politician, it’s dangerous to jump on a bandwagon simply because you think the candidate is “one of you.” And certainly the surest way to get elected here in California, (no matter how good or bad you are), is to somehow link your campaign to the support of teachers, and in a small town like this, by touting your Christian values. So, here’s my take on the whole thing, exactly as I expressed it in a letter to the editor after reading the article.
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Letter To The Editor:
As a retired CVUSD teacher and Christian, I wasn’t automatically encouraged by the front page news, that the registrar’s final vote tally determined a surprise School Board winner who strongly and unashamedly supports these two constituencies. (Champion, December 1) Quoting the article, he said, “(I) will be an advocate for the teachers and emphasize Christian values. Everything will revolve around the teachers. That’s where my prejudice lies.”
First of all, coming into any governing body with “prejudice,” closes one’s mind to ALL the possibilities needed to solve important issues. Secondly, revolving one’s efforts around teachers instead of kids, is backwards. Kids should come first, even when it conflicts with those who educate them. And in the end, if it’s good for kids, it’s usually good for teachers, too.
Finally, being an advocate for “teachers” can only be decoded as support of their union, which in other than salary and/or working condition issues, rails only minimally against the smaller but more insidious instructional stresses that actually wear it’s members down, and ultimately burn them out.
As for this new School Board member’s emphasis on Christian values, if he means in the conduct of his daily personal and professional life, that’s great. But if recent history has shown one thing, it’s that such “emphasis” has too often mutated from personal belief, into a zealous mission to inject religious ideology into public policy, forcing those who don’t agree to conform. Such a stance would not only be divisive, but an unnecessary distraction from the current educational issues that need fixing.
That said, good luck to the newest School Board member. I hope that after he’s sworn in and the realities of the job finally hit home, he is guided towards solutions using an open and unprejudiced mind, with sole focus on his greatest constituency, the children he has taken an oath to serve.
Paisano (December 1, 2012)
(NOTE: If you’re a man, you can probably skip this post because you’ll learn nothing new by reading it. Every word will make perfect sense to you, while those same words will be scrutinized with great suspicion by your female counterparts.)
I think the term “Dirty Old Man” is mostly unfair. The other night I was flipping channels when I came across a movie where two attractive young ladies were walking past a stoop in some urban neighborhood. Sitting there were two older men, who when the women walked by, began to beam and made some comment about the scenery getting better by the second. Showing obvious disdain, one female said to the other, “Ignore them, they’re just dirty old men.”
As I could well have been one of those smiling gents, her comment ticked me off. So I looked up the term, “dirty old man,” in a number of on-line dictionaries. Let me give you just four of the definitions I found, then comment on each in defense of we older guys around the world:
1: “An older man that is thought to show an unnatural interest in sex.” The problem with this definition, is that it assumes that a geriatric interest in sex is unnatural. If you want to prove that’s bogus, just go to a mall someday and watch an old man slumped on a bench, seemingly exhausted from all the walking he’s been doing. Notice how quickly he perks up when a pretty woman in a tight skirt or short shorts walks by. And, if only for a moment, he sits upright and swivels his arthritic neck around like he was an owl, watching her posterior sway rhythmically as she fades from clear sight. It’s as natural to him as breathing. It’s an instinct planted deeply within him by the Creator.
2. “An older man who is sexually interested in younger women or girls.” To this definition I’d simply utter, “DUH…?” Of course his interest would be in younger women. Have you stopped to consider the wrinkled, gravity ravished selection he might have at the Senior Citizen Home? You see, while a man’s body and mind deteriorates with age, that tiny impulse button implanted deep within in his brain, (the one meant to maintain the population of our species), continues to work around the clock. And when a beautiful or sexy young woman walks by, that button kicks in like it did when the man was young, unchecked by the obvious variable that it’s now encased in a disintegrating body. Again, the response is automatic, and proven by the fact that the last thing about which that old man will ever think before lapsing into a final coma, are the supple breasts of the attractive nurse standing at his bedside.
3. “A mature or elderly man with lewd or obscene preoccupations.” This is probably the most inaccurate definition of the bunch. It seems a little presumptuous that many women think any older man that “flirts” with them wants to get them naked and into the bedroom. Let’s be realistic here! How embarrassing would it be for an old guy if he was actually invited to strip down and “do the deed” with a gal half his age or less? It would end up badly, like going to a “high noon” shootout without your pistol or ammunition. And if it’s one thing old guys don’t need more of, it’s embarrassment regarding their dwindling physical prowess.
4. “An older man who offends people by being sexually interested in someone younger than him.” First of all, if my innocent “flirtiness” offends a woman, (or anyone for that matter), I’m sorry, but I see it as pretty much THEIR problem. Being offended is always a matter of perception, and with the advent of social media it’s become a cottage industry in this politically correct society. I would hope, instead, that if I smiled at a young lady as she walked by, (unless I was doing so with my hand down my pants), she would take it as a show of my appreciation for her attractiveness as a member of the female species. As a male, I would think that seeing herself through my old eyes, and realizing she absolutely still “had it,” our meeting would be the highlight of her day. And rather than be offended, why not think of it as her having “made” some pathetic old guy’s day, as well?
Finally, why should society be offended when an older man shows sexual interest in younger women, anyway? Everyone knows it’s almost always a mental exercise on his part, a reverie of the days when he was truly efficient in the skill of pursuing and capturing the hearts and attention of the opposite sex. After all, what does an old man have if not the dreams of who he WAS at a time when he was really GOOD at it? Discounting the few among us who truly are perverts, then, older gents are getting a bad rap for simply trying to recapture their youth. And that’s much of what we do to fill the time while we’re waiting to die.
Just a note to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. And if you don’t happen to celebrate Christmas, best wishes, anyway, for a fantastic Tuesday, December 25.
When I wrote my letter to Santa this year, I told him there was only one thing I really wanted. It was for him to do something extra special for those of you who faithfully read this blog. Now, considering the sincerity of my request, and the fact that I’ve been a pretty good boy for over seven decades, I was taken by surprise when I received the following note:
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Dear Paisano,
Thank you for your letter. It is always refreshing to receive mail that requests nothing for oneself, but for others, instead. That being said, however, I regret to inform you that I cannot give presents to your readers because the request violates Section D, Subsection 3f, of the North Pole Ethics Code. It states: “Santa shall NOT, at the behest of a person or public enterprise, give presents to others which blatantly resemble patronage or outright bribery, and whose goal is to keep those recipients active and involved in said enterprise.”
I’m sorry, then, but I won’t be able to fulfill your request. Good try, however! Perhaps YOU can come up with something to wish your readers a Merry Christmas! After all, as Mrs. Claus often says, "A little something is better than nothing at all."
Best regards, Santa
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Here, then, is my musical contribution to your holiday season. I arranged and recorded it last Christmas for a family friend who absolutely loves to dance. So, click the link, HERE, and get up and start moving!! “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town.” Peace, love, and good health to you all in the New Year.
(WARNING: This post contains vivid descriptions of a type of oral surgery. If you strongly dislike visiting a dentist’s office, or cringe and feel faint when some of the unspeakable procedures conducted there are openly discussed, then close this page and come back in a week.)
Back in September I wrote a post about the “Mayan Calendar and the End Of Time.” Well, December 21, 2012 is less than a week away, and due to an emergency dental referral, I’ll be spending it undergoing an Apicoectomy (Ape-icko-eck-tuh-me) at the hands of my local oral surgeon. Of course, the confluence of this unplanned procedure and infamous date, made me begin to wonder if there was more than coincidence involved. Were those pesky Mayans plotting to screw up my dental affairs? Had they singled me out as the sole recipient of their calendar’s wrath?
Nah…, the procedure didn’t seem to be that big a deal. After all, “ape” means a “large, tailless primate,” and “ectomy” means “surgical removal.” So my initial thought was that my dentist was suggesting a therapy where I visited a zoo, and witnessed a tree surgeon removing a stranded orangutan from the canopy of a fake rainforest. He wasn’t, however. What he meant was far less entertaining than that.
Similar to when I took Geometry twice, it seems an old root canal had given up and failed. To POSSIBLY save the tooth, then, an apicoectomy was suggested. He said it wasn’t a big deal. The oral surgeon would simply cut a trap-door-like incision in my gum, then lift the tissue away and expose the tooth’s root. Of course, he might have to remove some of the bone, too, but heck… he does that all the time.
Now if the root isn’t cracked, this makes the chances better that the tooth can be saved. In that case, the friendly endodontist will whip out his trusty saw, and chop off the root end of the infected tooth. Of course, he might also have to scoop out a little more of the surrounding gum tissue to assure that all the infection is gone. Not to worry, though… he probably has a little scooping tool made just for that. And I’ve heard he makes ice cream cones at Baskin Robbins on his day off.
After the root tip has been truncated, the cavern in my gum will be medicated, and the root sealed with a silver filling. (No, the Lone Ranger is NOT doing the procedure!) Of course, the rest of the crater created by the now evacuated bone and tissue, will be retro filled with an expensive, synthetic bone material not covered by my dental plan. Then the oral surgeon will reposition the gum flap like a puzzle piece, and suture it back in the correct place. That shouldn’t be a problem either… as he learned embroidery from his wife, and it’s become one of his most passionate hobbies.
Anyway, when I awake from my peaceful slumber, my tooth will hopefully be as good as new. BUT… if by chance the good doctor happened to find a crack in the root while he was cutting and scraping and probing and scooping, it’s going to end up just like me in those Geometry classes I mentioned… up and out of there! Yes… upon regaining consciousness, I may learn that dear old tooth #4 has be purged from my mouth, and become a discarded “former” member of the Paisano mastication team.
Considering this flood of new information, then, I must reluctantly admit there may well be a Mayan connection between December 21, 2012 and this pending apicoectomy. And for me, it might truly spell disaster. Perhaps those “end time” theorists who are predicting a world-ending “polar shift,” were basically right, but made a slight translation error by switching two letters in the code. Maybe instead of a “polar shift,” it really should have read, a “molar shift.” That sounds like a tooth extraction to me… and a shift from my mouth to a trash can!
These days, one of the saddest things for local teachers, is they no longer have the time to teach creatively using materials they’ve developed and tailored for specific subject areas, as well as for the various learning styles of the children they serve in their classrooms. Instead, they have a rigid schedule to which they must adhere, so as not to fall behind in that ever important task of year-end test preparation.
The era in which I was taught the craft of teaching, stressed education and development of the “whole child.” And what we did each day was based on an honest attempt to give them skills for an entire lifetime. These days it seems too many kids are being treated as “heads on a stick.” The short-term goal is packing their brains with information which is known to be on the statewide tests, then drilling them day after day until they become numb and just want the whole “learning” thing to end. Of course, there is no long-term goal in this scenario, that is, other than perpetuating the myth in the public’s view, that good scores are always synonymous with a good education.
Now, this post is NOT meant to be an in-depth discussion of how education of young kids has gone down the crapper. If it was, I’d probably get comments from irate parents who couldn’t care one whit if their kids are being taught to THINK AND PROBLEM SOLVE, as long as those test scores are looking good. Let’s face it, there’s no real way to measure the benefit of things like art, music, discussion, and critical thinking in the classroom. Maybe if there was, and a quantitative score could be compiled, such parents might cut old schoolers like me some slack, and wouldn’t see us as so cranky and out of touch.
The REAL purpose of this post, then, is to briefly contrast how radically classroom instruction is changing. Recently I found a song I wrote in 1999, to use in my Second Grade classroom as a final review of the information we had gleaned in a science unit on “Whales.” As I began collecting the information that might find its way to the final quiz, I thought the kids might enjoy singing this song each day while reviewing for the test as they sang. There were at least twenty-five “mentions” of things embedded in the song’s verses, that actually ended up on the unit final, either whale vocabulary, life-cycle facts, or geographic references that every smart whale would need to know.
Just for perspective, the way local primary kids would learn about whales THESE days, is to read a half dozen pages about them in the state sanctioned science book, then complete a similar number of “fill in the blank” pages in its companion workbook. Little more would be added by the teacher, lest he or she veer off schedule and fall behind the district mandated timeline. And, since “singing” is not important in the current curriculum, use of my whale song might be considered an almost treasonous waste of classroom time.
Anyway, for all you “modern” educators and testing specialists out there… sure, I have NO PROOF that reviewing for a quiz by singing a silly song I wrote, made a statistical difference. All I know is, the kids passed their unit quiz with flying colors. Of course, it could have been because of my superlative teaching :), or the great notes we took, or the excellent books we read and video’s we watched. Or maybe it was the drawings and diagrams we made, or the notebooks and picture files we compiled, or the art projects we crafted about all aspects of a whale’s life.
Maybe it was the tapes we heard of whales “singing,” or the whale artifacts we made into a classroom display and actually touched with our own hands. Or it might have been all that whale math we did, computing and comparing their weights, and figuring out the mileage between locations on their migratory trek. Perhaps it was because we collected money and adopted a real humpback named, “Lightning,” and followed his “sightings” in at least two of the world’s oceans. Yeah, come to think of it, that dumb ass whale song probably didn’t make one bit of real difference when everything is said and done. Oh, well… at least it had a catchy tune, and was great fun to sing!
(A Paisano Postulate: The Creator thought it important enough to equip us with five senses. It seems reasonable, then, that the more of these senses children use as they learn, the wider and deeper that learning will become, the clearer and more interestingly subject matter will unfold, and the more relevant and permanent their knowledge will be. And, if education is truly about LIFE preparation, it should equip boys and girls to deal with the complexities they will certainly face when they become adults, not simply make them good test takers.)
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If you’d like to hear the song and learn a little about whales yourself, click HERE. Thanks to Lo-Fi for “cleaning up” the original cassette recording, and showing me how to link it to this blog.
In my last post about the assassination of President Kennedy, I mentioned that my dad and I were in Los Angeles looking for an automobile when we learned the tragic news. It turned out, that because it didn’t seem appropriate nor practical to do business on that bleak Friday afternoon, we came back a few days later to purchase what became, (tah dah,) my first brand new car.
Now, for a New York kid that was only twenty-two, I had already bought and owned four cars, each with money I had saved from jobs since Junior High. One of them was a 1932 Plymouth that didn’t run, and was pretty much ruined when I tried to turn it into a rat rod. The next two were Mercurys, a “hot” 1950 coupe powered by a 352 cubic inch Packard engine, and a 1953 hardtop that ended up blowing a rear end on a trip back from the Adirondack Mountains. My last car before being inducted, was a blue and white 1956 Chevy that was, as we called it then, “cherry.” Rather than put it in storage during my three year enlistment, however, I reluctantly sold it to a close friend.
Obviously, every car I had ever owned was bought “used.” So our trip to Felix Chevrolet on November 22, 1963, was indeed unique. My dad had impressed upon me, that in California a CAR (not a dog) was man’s best friend, and without one that was reliable I might find myself stranded on a busy freeway, unable to get to classes. So between my Army savings, and an unsolicited but generous contribution from him, the decision was made to buy “new.” And buy we did. I ended up driving off the lot in an amazing, fire engine red, 1964 Chevy Chevelle Malibu.
I was SO proud of my new “ride!” I probably washed that car twice a day for the first two months I owned it. And when my Jr. College Freehand Drawing teacher gave us a homework assignment to draw something at our residence, you can guess what I chose as my subject… MY BRAND NEW CAR ! So, for those of you who weren’t around in 1964, or couldn’t pick a 1964 Chevelle out of a lineup, I’ve included those pencil drawings at the top of this post… artistic renderings of my first true automotive romance.
Epilogue: As it turned out, I ended up keeping this car for almost ten years. I would have kept it longer were it not for the fact that it was totaled by a large district delivery truck in my school parking lot. Seems the idiot driver parked on an incline, and forgot to secure the emergency brake, allowing the massive vehicle to roll fifty feet into my “baby,” like a bull charging a bright red, shiny cape. It was an assassination, clear and simple… just like the one on the day we first met!
Forty-nine years ago today, President John F. Kennedy was gunned down in a motorcade through Dealey Plaza, in Dallas, Texas. Bullets fired from high inside the Texas School Book Depository Building as his car passed, not only cut short the life of our youthful and vibrant 35th President, but ripped a hole in the hearts of citizens like myself, shattering for good what was certainly an era of American innocence.
As with most people alive when this tragedy happened, where I was and what I was doing at the moment of that fateful news, is still indelibly etched in my memory. A few weeks earlier I had just been discharged from the Army, and decided to take advantage of the local Junior College system by relocating from New York to California, and living with my dad who I hadn’t seen for almost twenty years. On that Friday, November 22, 1963, the two of us were at Felix Chevrolet on Figueroa Street in Los Angeles, looking for a car I could use for school. Our brief time walking around the huge lot had been more than strange. Instead of being mobbed by hoards of salesmen eager to make a deal, it was absolutely deserted. Even if we had been pushing a wheelbarrow full hundred dollar bills, not one salesman would have been there to notice.
After about twenty minutes we walked toward the showroom entrance looking for someone to answer our questions. The moment we opened the double doors and stepped in, it was obvious that something was very wrong. There were small clusters of people gathered throughout the building, many of them crying and sobbing as others held them close. There was conversation going on, but in such a hushed manner that it was impossible to understand what was being said. At one end of the showroom was a television surrounded by silent spectators, a few sitting on a lounge with bowed heads, but all with postures that indicated they were distraught.
Dad and I walked up to a man who was standing alone, away from everyone else. We asked him what had happened. Turning to us, his answer was tragically simple. With tears still evident on his cheeks, he said, “The President’s dead. They killed our President…!” Dad and I looked at each other, absolutely stunned. In the time it had taken us to drive the freeway from Orange County to downtown Los Angeles, we had lost our national leader.
The rest, of course, is history. But it’s funny, isn’t it? I still get emotional just writing about it. Not only was the life of my President, my Commander-In-Chief, and the beneficiary of my first vote snuffed out that day, so was much of my youthful optimism about the United States of America.
