New York Times article
Well, it's official. A bunch of astronomers in Prague have plucked Pluto out of the planet lineup and tossed it into an icy trash bin labeled "Trans-Neptunian Objects."
And I, for one, am pretty upset about it. Not just because Pluto’s one of my favorite planets – that small, icy changeling with the big moon and funky orbit. Like the other planets, it took its name from Roman mythology based on a specific characteristic. (Mercury is fast, Venus is pretty, Jupiter is big, Saturn is slow … you get the picture.)
Named after the God of the Underworld, Pluto’s name evokes more than an ancient god. It’s a place: dark, harsh, cold, remote, a true underworld. Its largest moon, Charon, is named after the ferryman who took dead souls across the River Styx into the Underworld. Its two smaller moons, Hydra and Nix, are named after a nine-headed monster and the Goddess of Night.
But now the International Astronomical Union, drunk with new data about the numerous icy bodies beyond Pluto, launched a thorough housecleaning of the whole classification system. Their central question: what is a planet?
It is, admittedly, a tricky question: if a planet is simply a round object that revolves around the sun, then astronomers would have to promote Ceres, the biggest asteroid in the asteroid belt and Xena, that new planet beyond Pluto. And then what if scientists find a zillion more little worlds? Are they all planets too?
The astronomers didn’t solve this problem like scientists; they solved it like bureaucrats. Determined to strip Pluto of its rank, they sought a clear way to separate it from the other planets beyond the basic criteria: “It’s really small and way the fuck out there.”
So they said a planet, in addition to being round and revolving around the sun, “must have cleared other things out of the way in its orbital neighborhood.” In other words, it had to be alone, except for objects orbiting around it, like moons or rings. That knocked out Ceres in the asteroid belt and Xena in the Kuiper Belt.
Sounds like Pluto’s safe, right? It’s got three moons. Well, Pluto was betrayed by its largest moon: Charon. Apparently Charon doesn’t orbit Pluto like most moons do, the center of gravity is between them. So boom! There goes Pluto on a technicality.
I suppose these astronomers know what they’re talking about when they discuss centers of gravities of objects 3.7 billion miles away. But they’ll look pretty stupid if the NASA's New Horizons spacecraft turns up at Pluto in 2015 and finds out they were wrong.
I think it’s kind of creepy that something so basic in our scientific culture can be changed like this, just because a planet is small and distant. Does this mean a bunch of cartographers will gather in Lisbon next month and decide that Australia isn’t a continent?
Or will Congress enact a law that Hawaii is no longer a state? (“Our new definition of a state includes 'must be connected to the North American landmass. And yeah, Hawaii is small and way the fuck out there.'”)
Scientist by their very nature like things all nice and tidy, but the universe will never cooperate. I’m rushing out today and buying Benny a Solar System mobile with NINE Styrofoam balls. Maybe I’ll have to add a little Xena, but they'll never take my Pluto away.
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Friday, August 11, 2006
Pursuit of Power III: The Cure is Worse than the Disease
When we last chatted with William H. McNeill, author of “Pursuit of Power,” old military patterns were busy withering and dying in the 17th century. You could almost hear him cackling and rubbing his hands, crying “Now I can prove my thesis! Hahahahaha!”
Maurice of Nassau and his buds had developed new methods of army organization, and their ideas spread through the world like a virus. McNeill triumphantly returned to his big medical analogy, reminding us how military changes resemble the genetic mutations of microorganisms; they break down old limits or explore new geography.
So now warmakers had the fancy weapons, the new drills, the bitty regiments. The developments kindled in Holland in the 16th century spread like wildfire. In the 17th century the new methods hit western Europe; in the 18th, they transformed Russia under Peter the Great. Then the methods spread to the New World and India during colonial expansion and infected even the Ottoman Empire.
Hoo boy. But these new methods weren’t all-powerful. Generals still had problems controlling armies of more than 50,000 men. They needed better ways to communicate. They needed some decent topographical maps. Supply was a big problem. (Isn’t it always?) Personnel administration was still all screwy, with meatheads with money and connections beating out professional officers for advancement. (That’s changed?) But most of all, war was still a sport of kings. Civilians were left alone.
But not for long. The French Revolution broke social barriers, and then the Industrial Revolution solved communication and supply problems and brought in more nifty new weapons. War became industrialized, Germany was united, everyone in Europe was squabbling, and the next thing you knew, you had World War I.
Talk about breaking old limits. As long as all military movement except for trains depended on horses or humans, the limit of muscles were the limits of armies. But the internal combustion engine changed all that, McNeill said, beginning with the taxicabs that carried French soldiers from Paris for the first Battle of the Marne in 1914.
Even a serious dude like McNeill admitted that World War I was bizarre. Germany, Britain and France were willing to fight despite massive deaths and military stalemate. McNeill tried to explain it, but gave up after a rambling page or two.
You could almost feel his relief as he turned to armaments, treating us to pages of tank photos. Tanks were first developed in 1916, and two years later they were all along the front line.
The British high command even came out with this amazing plan, called Plan 1919. I’d never heard of this plan. Apparently it laid out the blitzkrieg tactics the Germans used 20 years later in Poland. But the war ended a year early, and the Brits never used it.
But it’s still intriguing. Military eggheads before then tended to draw plans based on weapons that, um, actually existed. The British planners, on the other hand, tried to shape the future by deliberately altering the development of weapons to fit the needs of the plan. I can just see them sketching out Plan 1919 to their subordinates, airily saying, “Now if we can just put some big guns on treads, old boy …”
Except for this interesting aside, McNeill used the rest of this book to launch a broad, sociopolitical discussion of the two world wars. I plowed through some of it, but it made my head hurt. So I gave “Pursuit of Power” a respectful farewell salute and toddled off to watch “Supernanny.”
So did McNeill prove his thesis? I don’t feel qualified to judge. I mean, when you think about it, it’s a weird little thesis. So the advanced armies are the deadly viruses, and the backward natives are the once-healthy cells, falling by the millions to the scythe of progress. Does that make my new buddy Maurice a genetic mutation? Oooh, my head hurts.
I think McNeill successfully showed how technological advances in weapons break previous limits, allowing armies to run amok until they hit new limits. Seventeenth-century armies became unwieldy at 50,000 because communication broke down. Then came telegraphs and phones and armies grew larger.
Now we have the Internet and satellites, and the sizes of future armies seem almost infinite. Perhaps if we refrain from blowing ourselves up long enough to develop space travel, we’ll see history repeat itself over planets and systems instead of countries and continents.
And perhaps that’s one of the book’s points. In mankind’s pursuit of power, our ambition will always outstrip our capabilities. Yet while our reach exceeds our grasp, we struggle to handle the technology we hold now, today. We’re like greedy toddlers, unable to eat the candy in our hands, yet always crying for more.
##
Maurice of Nassau and his buds had developed new methods of army organization, and their ideas spread through the world like a virus. McNeill triumphantly returned to his big medical analogy, reminding us how military changes resemble the genetic mutations of microorganisms; they break down old limits or explore new geography.
So now warmakers had the fancy weapons, the new drills, the bitty regiments. The developments kindled in Holland in the 16th century spread like wildfire. In the 17th century the new methods hit western Europe; in the 18th, they transformed Russia under Peter the Great. Then the methods spread to the New World and India during colonial expansion and infected even the Ottoman Empire.
Hoo boy. But these new methods weren’t all-powerful. Generals still had problems controlling armies of more than 50,000 men. They needed better ways to communicate. They needed some decent topographical maps. Supply was a big problem. (Isn’t it always?) Personnel administration was still all screwy, with meatheads with money and connections beating out professional officers for advancement. (That’s changed?) But most of all, war was still a sport of kings. Civilians were left alone.
But not for long. The French Revolution broke social barriers, and then the Industrial Revolution solved communication and supply problems and brought in more nifty new weapons. War became industrialized, Germany was united, everyone in Europe was squabbling, and the next thing you knew, you had World War I.
Talk about breaking old limits. As long as all military movement except for trains depended on horses or humans, the limit of muscles were the limits of armies. But the internal combustion engine changed all that, McNeill said, beginning with the taxicabs that carried French soldiers from Paris for the first Battle of the Marne in 1914.
Even a serious dude like McNeill admitted that World War I was bizarre. Germany, Britain and France were willing to fight despite massive deaths and military stalemate. McNeill tried to explain it, but gave up after a rambling page or two.
You could almost feel his relief as he turned to armaments, treating us to pages of tank photos. Tanks were first developed in 1916, and two years later they were all along the front line.
The British high command even came out with this amazing plan, called Plan 1919. I’d never heard of this plan. Apparently it laid out the blitzkrieg tactics the Germans used 20 years later in Poland. But the war ended a year early, and the Brits never used it.
But it’s still intriguing. Military eggheads before then tended to draw plans based on weapons that, um, actually existed. The British planners, on the other hand, tried to shape the future by deliberately altering the development of weapons to fit the needs of the plan. I can just see them sketching out Plan 1919 to their subordinates, airily saying, “Now if we can just put some big guns on treads, old boy …”
Except for this interesting aside, McNeill used the rest of this book to launch a broad, sociopolitical discussion of the two world wars. I plowed through some of it, but it made my head hurt. So I gave “Pursuit of Power” a respectful farewell salute and toddled off to watch “Supernanny.”
So did McNeill prove his thesis? I don’t feel qualified to judge. I mean, when you think about it, it’s a weird little thesis. So the advanced armies are the deadly viruses, and the backward natives are the once-healthy cells, falling by the millions to the scythe of progress. Does that make my new buddy Maurice a genetic mutation? Oooh, my head hurts.
I think McNeill successfully showed how technological advances in weapons break previous limits, allowing armies to run amok until they hit new limits. Seventeenth-century armies became unwieldy at 50,000 because communication broke down. Then came telegraphs and phones and armies grew larger.
Now we have the Internet and satellites, and the sizes of future armies seem almost infinite. Perhaps if we refrain from blowing ourselves up long enough to develop space travel, we’ll see history repeat itself over planets and systems instead of countries and continents.
And perhaps that’s one of the book’s points. In mankind’s pursuit of power, our ambition will always outstrip our capabilities. Yet while our reach exceeds our grasp, we struggle to handle the technology we hold now, today. We’re like greedy toddlers, unable to eat the candy in our hands, yet always crying for more.
##
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Pursuit of Power II: Christine Meets a New Guy
Despite my best intentions, I abandoned McNeill’s “Pursuit of Power” after the first chapter and spent two evenings watching TV instead.
But Monday night, which offered a choice between reruns of "Hell's Kitchen," "Project Runway" and "Wife Swap," drove me back to reading. So I gave Chapter Two a try.
McNeill was yakking about the years 1000-1500, when Chinese advancements in industry and armaments anticipated European achievements by several centuries.
So why didn’t a Chinese Columbus discover America? China had the iron and the coal industries and the powerful sailing ships. They had paper money and crossbows and guns and gunpowder and Confucious knew what else.
The book’s answer was that to exploit such advancements, a society had to support lots of merchants and manufacturers. But China didn't want to do this. Their society had different values. Chinese merchants and manufacturers couldn't flourish. Instead of passing their crafts to their sons, merchants and manufacturers put their limited profits into education and land for their boys. The Chinese government controlled everything through Confucianism, and Confucianism didn't like the marketplace.
Europe could have gone the same way in those years, McNeill said. Christianity didn't think much of the marketplace either. If the Popes Innocent III and Boniface VIII had succeeded in uniting western Europe under a papal government (a true Holy Roman Empire), Europe might’ve been like China.
But the popes couldn't pull it off. Apparently God wanted Europeans to buy light artillery on a large scale. So Europe remained a puzzle of states and markets could flourish in the cracks, building increasingly powerful weapons. Gee, what a relief. Cuz the world really needed those cannons and muskets.
Meanwhile, back to Chapter Four. Military history books often remind me of small-town newspapers: the same people keep popping up again and again. If you’re studying the 12th century, you get Ghengis Khan; if you’re in the 1500s, you find Elizabeth of England and Philip of Spain.
Now McNeill was discussing the Thirty Year’s War in the 1600s, and the Swedish king Gustav Adolf promptly floated up like Banquo’s ghost. Oh, hi there, Gustav, how ya doing – still fighting the Battle of Breitenfeld? Go get ‘em, man.
But then a new guy marched onto page 126: Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange, captain-general of Holland and Zeeland in the 1500s. How come nobody told me about this dude? I thought Zeeland was a boring town in west Michigan. (1)
Maurice was a drill sergeant – literally. Confronted by the Spaniards and their weird little tercios (2), he dreamed up the idea of systematic drilling to make his soldiers more efficient. He analyzed the complicated motions needed to load and fire a matchlock rifle and came up with the number 42. (3) He taught his soldiers to make each movement in unison, responding to a shouted command.
That’s where the guy on the cover of this book, the soldier in the red poofy pants, came in. Drillmasters used pictures showing each of the 42 motions, all displaying the same funny guy: he fired his musket, took down the musket, uncocked the match, blew on the pan, charged the musket, etc. They’re lovely pictures, made from engravings, although stick figures probably would have done just as well.
But Maurice did more than hand out pictures. He introduced regular marching and smaller tactical units and made his guys dig entrenchments with spades.
“Powess and physical courage all but disappeared under an ironclad routine,” McNeill said. “The old heroic patterns of military behavior withered and died.”
_________________________________
(1) The real Zeeland is a province in the Netherlands. Dutch settlers brought the names to Michigan, so now we have the thrilling locales of Holland and Zeeland, 5 miles apart on the highway to Grand Rapids. Yippee.
(2) The tercios were a formidable force in the 1500s: a crowd of pikemen (guys carrying long wooden poles) protecting a fringe of musketeers posted around a central square of more pikemen. The Spaniards loved their tercios and insisted on sending them out long after their usefulness had ended.
(3) The answer to life, the universe and Everything.
But Monday night, which offered a choice between reruns of "Hell's Kitchen," "Project Runway" and "Wife Swap," drove me back to reading. So I gave Chapter Two a try.
McNeill was yakking about the years 1000-1500, when Chinese advancements in industry and armaments anticipated European achievements by several centuries.
So why didn’t a Chinese Columbus discover America? China had the iron and the coal industries and the powerful sailing ships. They had paper money and crossbows and guns and gunpowder and Confucious knew what else.
The book’s answer was that to exploit such advancements, a society had to support lots of merchants and manufacturers. But China didn't want to do this. Their society had different values. Chinese merchants and manufacturers couldn't flourish. Instead of passing their crafts to their sons, merchants and manufacturers put their limited profits into education and land for their boys. The Chinese government controlled everything through Confucianism, and Confucianism didn't like the marketplace.
Europe could have gone the same way in those years, McNeill said. Christianity didn't think much of the marketplace either. If the Popes Innocent III and Boniface VIII had succeeded in uniting western Europe under a papal government (a true Holy Roman Empire), Europe might’ve been like China.
But the popes couldn't pull it off. Apparently God wanted Europeans to buy light artillery on a large scale. So Europe remained a puzzle of states and markets could flourish in the cracks, building increasingly powerful weapons. Gee, what a relief. Cuz the world really needed those cannons and muskets.
Meanwhile, back to Chapter Four. Military history books often remind me of small-town newspapers: the same people keep popping up again and again. If you’re studying the 12th century, you get Ghengis Khan; if you’re in the 1500s, you find Elizabeth of England and Philip of Spain.
Now McNeill was discussing the Thirty Year’s War in the 1600s, and the Swedish king Gustav Adolf promptly floated up like Banquo’s ghost. Oh, hi there, Gustav, how ya doing – still fighting the Battle of Breitenfeld? Go get ‘em, man.
But then a new guy marched onto page 126: Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange, captain-general of Holland and Zeeland in the 1500s. How come nobody told me about this dude? I thought Zeeland was a boring town in west Michigan. (1)
Maurice was a drill sergeant – literally. Confronted by the Spaniards and their weird little tercios (2), he dreamed up the idea of systematic drilling to make his soldiers more efficient. He analyzed the complicated motions needed to load and fire a matchlock rifle and came up with the number 42. (3) He taught his soldiers to make each movement in unison, responding to a shouted command.
That’s where the guy on the cover of this book, the soldier in the red poofy pants, came in. Drillmasters used pictures showing each of the 42 motions, all displaying the same funny guy: he fired his musket, took down the musket, uncocked the match, blew on the pan, charged the musket, etc. They’re lovely pictures, made from engravings, although stick figures probably would have done just as well.
But Maurice did more than hand out pictures. He introduced regular marching and smaller tactical units and made his guys dig entrenchments with spades.
“Powess and physical courage all but disappeared under an ironclad routine,” McNeill said. “The old heroic patterns of military behavior withered and died.”
_________________________________
(1) The real Zeeland is a province in the Netherlands. Dutch settlers brought the names to Michigan, so now we have the thrilling locales of Holland and Zeeland, 5 miles apart on the highway to Grand Rapids. Yippee.
(2) The tercios were a formidable force in the 1500s: a crowd of pikemen (guys carrying long wooden poles) protecting a fringe of musketeers posted around a central square of more pikemen. The Spaniards loved their tercios and insisted on sending them out long after their usefulness had ended.
(3) The answer to life, the universe and Everything.
Friday, July 21, 2006
Pursuit of Power I: Deadly Germs in Poofy Pants
"The Pursuit of Power: Technology, Armed Forces and Society since A.D. 1000" by William H. McNeill.Amazon.com listing
I’ll admit, I picked up my library copy of William H. McNeill’s “Pursuit of Power” with some trepidation. The book was yellowed and waterstained and the cover showed some weird guy in a teeny feathered hat and poofy red pants.
As usual, I skipped the preface. I can’t stand prefaces, where an author describes the epiphany that led to the book (“… and so I wondered, why hasn’t a thorough discussion of nickel-iron octahedrites been attempted?”). Then the author spends two pages thanking everyone but their dry cleaner. (“… To my Uncle Mervin, who offered many helpful suggestions when he wasn’t drunk.”)
So I turned to chapter one: “Arms and Society of Antiquity.”
And stopped dead.
I didn’t understand a word of it. What’s all this about the “industrialization of war”? Why is he talking about bronze? Who cares where tin was mined? This is ridiculous, I thought, I could be watching “America’s Got Talent.”
I sighed. Perhaps I should read the preface after all. It was only two pages, not counting the acknowledgements (“Thank you Hugh, for piloting me through the intricacies of Chinese historiography.”)
Thank heavens I read it. This book had a point, and McNeill wasn’t afraid to clearly lay it out in the preface. He’d published a book a few years before called “Plagues and Peoples,” dealing with the interactions between people and microparasites. A creepy topic really. I dislike reading plague books, which leave me twitchy and prone to examining my tongue in the mirror.
In “Plagues and Peoples,” McNeill addressed the abrupt changes that occur in organisms due to a mutation or a change in environment, changes that briefly allow them to escape previous limits. The most important microparasites affecting people were disease germs, so he wrote about those.
In “Pursuit of Power,” McNeill turned his attention to macroparasites. The most important macroparasites affecting people were other people, violent conquerors who snatched all the good food, shelter and pretty girls without contributing anything.
Therefore, macroparasitism among people turns into a study of the armed forces, with special attention to war equipment. Changes in armaments resemble the genetic mutations of microorganisms; they break down old limits or explore new geography.
To take this analogy further (and McNeill stretched it to the limit), well-equipped and organized armies meeting a more backward society act like deadly germs attacking a patient. The advanced guy almost always wins.
And where does this leave us? In real trouble, according to McNeill. As war became more advanced, increasingly dependent on industrial might, muscles and courage became less important. But our “ancient, inherited psychic aptitudes” remain the same. We still want to beat our breastplates and rattle our spears, but now our spears are rockets and nuclear missiles.
Now, isn’t that just jolly. Aren’t you glad I read the preface? Well, it had to be done. I returned to that first paragraph in chapter one, “Arms and Society in Antiquity,” and it made a little better sense now. A little.
“The industrialization of war is almost as old as civilization,” McNeill said. Privileged fighting men used bronze weapons and armor made by specialists. This wasn’t really industrialization, though, because it was so small-scale. It took a ton of painstaking work to make a warrior’s full panopoly and the stuff lasted forever.
But things change. McNeill says. “One can detect in the historic record a series of important changes in weapons systems resulting from sporadic technical discoveries and inventions that sufficed to change preexisting conditions of warfare and army organization.”
In other words, as germs mutated to cause ever more dangerous diseases, new weapons were invented to cause more destructive wars. In both cases, the old limits no longer held, and wholesale craziness broke out for a while until an equilibrium was established.
And what were these changes? The first was our old buddy bronze, not because it made pretty armor, but because it led to improved designs for war chariots. The new designs meant lots of guys could have chariots now, not just the rich ones. Whole armies could roll around the battlefield, shooting arrows. That meant populations with lots of horses could kick some serious butt.
The next change was iron, which meant every guy could get his own armor and wreak a little havoc. Then came what McNeill called “the cavalry revolution.” Guys learned to ride and shoot their bows at the same time. The steppe nomads loved this, and the next thing you knew, you had Genghis Khan in your backyard.
For the last big change in antiquity, we can thank the Iranians, who bred bigger horses, horses big enough to carry a guy in full metal armor. Armored horsemen cared less about arrows and could wave their maces and swords around. With that discovery, the age of antiquity was over and we could get into all that fun medieval stuff.
By the end of chapter one, I was OK with the book. McNeill’s writing was a little involved (I mean, look at the quote about weapons, and that was one of the simpler sentences). But he had a nice, organized mind and could reduce an insanely complicated topic into something I could wrap my head around. I was prepared to read on. Maybe I’d learn something about the weird guy in the red poofy pants.
I’ll admit, I picked up my library copy of William H. McNeill’s “Pursuit of Power” with some trepidation. The book was yellowed and waterstained and the cover showed some weird guy in a teeny feathered hat and poofy red pants.
As usual, I skipped the preface. I can’t stand prefaces, where an author describes the epiphany that led to the book (“… and so I wondered, why hasn’t a thorough discussion of nickel-iron octahedrites been attempted?”). Then the author spends two pages thanking everyone but their dry cleaner. (“… To my Uncle Mervin, who offered many helpful suggestions when he wasn’t drunk.”)
So I turned to chapter one: “Arms and Society of Antiquity.”
And stopped dead.
I didn’t understand a word of it. What’s all this about the “industrialization of war”? Why is he talking about bronze? Who cares where tin was mined? This is ridiculous, I thought, I could be watching “America’s Got Talent.”
I sighed. Perhaps I should read the preface after all. It was only two pages, not counting the acknowledgements (“Thank you Hugh, for piloting me through the intricacies of Chinese historiography.”)
Thank heavens I read it. This book had a point, and McNeill wasn’t afraid to clearly lay it out in the preface. He’d published a book a few years before called “Plagues and Peoples,” dealing with the interactions between people and microparasites. A creepy topic really. I dislike reading plague books, which leave me twitchy and prone to examining my tongue in the mirror.
In “Plagues and Peoples,” McNeill addressed the abrupt changes that occur in organisms due to a mutation or a change in environment, changes that briefly allow them to escape previous limits. The most important microparasites affecting people were disease germs, so he wrote about those.
In “Pursuit of Power,” McNeill turned his attention to macroparasites. The most important macroparasites affecting people were other people, violent conquerors who snatched all the good food, shelter and pretty girls without contributing anything.
Therefore, macroparasitism among people turns into a study of the armed forces, with special attention to war equipment. Changes in armaments resemble the genetic mutations of microorganisms; they break down old limits or explore new geography.
To take this analogy further (and McNeill stretched it to the limit), well-equipped and organized armies meeting a more backward society act like deadly germs attacking a patient. The advanced guy almost always wins.
And where does this leave us? In real trouble, according to McNeill. As war became more advanced, increasingly dependent on industrial might, muscles and courage became less important. But our “ancient, inherited psychic aptitudes” remain the same. We still want to beat our breastplates and rattle our spears, but now our spears are rockets and nuclear missiles.
Now, isn’t that just jolly. Aren’t you glad I read the preface? Well, it had to be done. I returned to that first paragraph in chapter one, “Arms and Society in Antiquity,” and it made a little better sense now. A little.
“The industrialization of war is almost as old as civilization,” McNeill said. Privileged fighting men used bronze weapons and armor made by specialists. This wasn’t really industrialization, though, because it was so small-scale. It took a ton of painstaking work to make a warrior’s full panopoly and the stuff lasted forever.
But things change. McNeill says. “One can detect in the historic record a series of important changes in weapons systems resulting from sporadic technical discoveries and inventions that sufficed to change preexisting conditions of warfare and army organization.”
In other words, as germs mutated to cause ever more dangerous diseases, new weapons were invented to cause more destructive wars. In both cases, the old limits no longer held, and wholesale craziness broke out for a while until an equilibrium was established.
And what were these changes? The first was our old buddy bronze, not because it made pretty armor, but because it led to improved designs for war chariots. The new designs meant lots of guys could have chariots now, not just the rich ones. Whole armies could roll around the battlefield, shooting arrows. That meant populations with lots of horses could kick some serious butt.
The next change was iron, which meant every guy could get his own armor and wreak a little havoc. Then came what McNeill called “the cavalry revolution.” Guys learned to ride and shoot their bows at the same time. The steppe nomads loved this, and the next thing you knew, you had Genghis Khan in your backyard.
For the last big change in antiquity, we can thank the Iranians, who bred bigger horses, horses big enough to carry a guy in full metal armor. Armored horsemen cared less about arrows and could wave their maces and swords around. With that discovery, the age of antiquity was over and we could get into all that fun medieval stuff.
By the end of chapter one, I was OK with the book. McNeill’s writing was a little involved (I mean, look at the quote about weapons, and that was one of the simpler sentences). But he had a nice, organized mind and could reduce an insanely complicated topic into something I could wrap my head around. I was prepared to read on. Maybe I’d learn something about the weird guy in the red poofy pants.
Saturday, July 15, 2006
Christine's Military History Seminar Returns!
After a brief hiatus (ahem, nine months), I proudly announce the return of my own personal, private, slightly flaky military history seminar.
Longtime readers of this blog may recall how last fall's horrifying TV season drove me away from the tube and into the library. I've always been interested in military history, so I turned to the nice folks at Ohio State University. The history department posted a preliminary reading list on its web site. These folks are really hard-core; they actually consider a 100-book list comprised of six sections with authors like Clausewitz, Caesar and Thucydides a "preliminary list." I'd like to see the real list.
Here's the List
I began with Carl von Clausewitz's "On War," which nearly chased me from military history forever. Then I read Paul Kennedy's "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers." Clause was very impressive, Kennedy less so. I had great fun abusing Kennedy.
Read my blogs about Clause
Clause the Sequel
Kennedy: Rise and Fall of a Really Long Book
Next on the hit parade is "The Pursuit of Power: Technology, Armed Forces and Society since A.D. 1000" by William H. McNeill. Gosh, reading the title alone makes me tired.
Longtime readers of this blog may recall how last fall's horrifying TV season drove me away from the tube and into the library. I've always been interested in military history, so I turned to the nice folks at Ohio State University. The history department posted a preliminary reading list on its web site. These folks are really hard-core; they actually consider a 100-book list comprised of six sections with authors like Clausewitz, Caesar and Thucydides a "preliminary list." I'd like to see the real list.
Here's the List
I began with Carl von Clausewitz's "On War," which nearly chased me from military history forever. Then I read Paul Kennedy's "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers." Clause was very impressive, Kennedy less so. I had great fun abusing Kennedy.
Read my blogs about Clause
Clause the Sequel
Kennedy: Rise and Fall of a Really Long Book
Next on the hit parade is "The Pursuit of Power: Technology, Armed Forces and Society since A.D. 1000" by William H. McNeill. Gosh, reading the title alone makes me tired.
Friday, July 14, 2006
Long Live the Revolution!
Armed with basic media equipment and Internet access, the little people are fighting back!
Here is a poor schmuck just trying to cancel his AOL. His tragic story has now been featured in the New York Times and NBC's Today show.
Vinny Tries to Cancel AOL
And here is a clip called "A Comcast Technician is Sleeping on My Couch."
Nighty-NIght
Let the masses rejoice!
Here is a poor schmuck just trying to cancel his AOL. His tragic story has now been featured in the New York Times and NBC's Today show.
Vinny Tries to Cancel AOL
And here is a clip called "A Comcast Technician is Sleeping on My Couch."
Nighty-NIght
Let the masses rejoice!
Thursday, July 13, 2006
No-Benny Vacation, Part Two
Then the rains came.
They held off until afternoon, granting us a good morning at the beach. Ron splashed around in the chilly water while I lay on a towel and read "The Ladies No. 1 Detective Agency." Hunger drove us back to the Harbor House Inn, where we changed before lunch.
I had only 40 minutes before my pedicure, so we scarfed hot dogs at a diner and watched the gray clouds darken through the plate-glass windows. Then I placed myself in the gifted hands of Studio 506 for a basic pedicure with sparkly metallic polish.
I left the salon and stepped into a typhoon. Ron stood at a nearby corner, holding our only umbrella and clutching a plastic shopping bag to his chest. "Ice cream!" he said decidedly, ignoring my squeaks as I hopped around in those weird flip-flops salons give you.
"My pedicure!" I groaned, splashing ankle-deep into a puddle.
"There's an ice cream place!" Ron said. He handed me the umbrella and started forward.
There was no inside seating at the first ice cream parlor, or the second. We could now barely see through the wall of water, so I whisked us inside a Greek gyro place and collapsed into a booth. Undaunted, Ron left the restaurant and returned with his ice cream. More sodden tourists arrived, wiping their faces and wringing out their shorts, until the place was full. I didn't know there were that many people in Grand Haven.
Resigned to waiting, I looked over the local paper, The Grand Haven Tribune. Typical stuff, until I hit the editorial page. The first letter to the editor was from a visitor from Greenville.
____________________________________
"To the Editor:
"My husband and I chose to spend our Fourth of July this year in 'beautiful' Grand Haven.... After dealing with the congestion of pedestrians and traffic, we were very much looking forward to a relaxing dinner. We selected a popular establishment on Washington Street with outside seating ...."
(I could almost hear the jungle drums beating. What was ahead? An injury? A mugging? An offensively loud car stereo?)
"I looked over my husband's shoulder to see a man walking toward us wearing a huge snake around his neck .... I am deathly afraid of snakes ... and quickly left our table."
(End of problem, you might say. But the lady's ordeal was not over. She returned to the table only to encounter the snake man again.)
"I didn't hesitate to flee again to the safety inside the restaurant ... trembling and sobbing."
(I felt kind of bad for the lady at this point. But she wrote on.)
"My appetite for dinner and my love for Grand Haven were both gone .... Are these the kinds of tourists that Grand Haven is trying to attract? People that walk down the streets with exotic -- and [possibly unsafe) animals that scare women and children?"
__________________________________________
Well now. Perhaps it is best if this lady does not return to Grand Haven, especially if she seeks relaxation during one of the town's busiest weekends (my pedicure lady said it was wall-to-wall people over the Fourth). But I doubt the snake man was a tourist, and I'm not entirely convinced that the city should launch a campaign to reduce irresponsible reptile-walking.
They held off until afternoon, granting us a good morning at the beach. Ron splashed around in the chilly water while I lay on a towel and read "The Ladies No. 1 Detective Agency." Hunger drove us back to the Harbor House Inn, where we changed before lunch.
I had only 40 minutes before my pedicure, so we scarfed hot dogs at a diner and watched the gray clouds darken through the plate-glass windows. Then I placed myself in the gifted hands of Studio 506 for a basic pedicure with sparkly metallic polish.
I left the salon and stepped into a typhoon. Ron stood at a nearby corner, holding our only umbrella and clutching a plastic shopping bag to his chest. "Ice cream!" he said decidedly, ignoring my squeaks as I hopped around in those weird flip-flops salons give you.
"My pedicure!" I groaned, splashing ankle-deep into a puddle.
"There's an ice cream place!" Ron said. He handed me the umbrella and started forward.
There was no inside seating at the first ice cream parlor, or the second. We could now barely see through the wall of water, so I whisked us inside a Greek gyro place and collapsed into a booth. Undaunted, Ron left the restaurant and returned with his ice cream. More sodden tourists arrived, wiping their faces and wringing out their shorts, until the place was full. I didn't know there were that many people in Grand Haven.
Resigned to waiting, I looked over the local paper, The Grand Haven Tribune. Typical stuff, until I hit the editorial page. The first letter to the editor was from a visitor from Greenville.
____________________________________
"To the Editor:
"My husband and I chose to spend our Fourth of July this year in 'beautiful' Grand Haven.... After dealing with the congestion of pedestrians and traffic, we were very much looking forward to a relaxing dinner. We selected a popular establishment on Washington Street with outside seating ...."
(I could almost hear the jungle drums beating. What was ahead? An injury? A mugging? An offensively loud car stereo?)
"I looked over my husband's shoulder to see a man walking toward us wearing a huge snake around his neck .... I am deathly afraid of snakes ... and quickly left our table."
(End of problem, you might say. But the lady's ordeal was not over. She returned to the table only to encounter the snake man again.)
"I didn't hesitate to flee again to the safety inside the restaurant ... trembling and sobbing."
(I felt kind of bad for the lady at this point. But she wrote on.)
"My appetite for dinner and my love for Grand Haven were both gone .... Are these the kinds of tourists that Grand Haven is trying to attract? People that walk down the streets with exotic -- and [possibly unsafe) animals that scare women and children?"
__________________________________________
Well now. Perhaps it is best if this lady does not return to Grand Haven, especially if she seeks relaxation during one of the town's busiest weekends (my pedicure lady said it was wall-to-wall people over the Fourth). But I doubt the snake man was a tourist, and I'm not entirely convinced that the city should launch a campaign to reduce irresponsible reptile-walking.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
No-Benny Vacation, Part One
Well, we're all back home again.Ron and I spent a mind-bending four days without Benny, who was visiting my sister in South Haven, Mich.
It's embarrassing, really, how quickly we adjusted. Within 24 hours, Benny's little table in the living room, usually strewn with toy spaceships, matchbox cars and abandoned sippy cups, turned into a coffee table buried under newspapers, car keys, junk mail and half a Snickers bar.
Our old habits of 9 years B.B. (Before Benny) quickly returned: lazy weekend mornings, long bike rides, brunch downtown, movies, restaurants, the New York Times Sunday paper, big fat books, tiny little purses, complete sentences, wine with lunch ... the list goes on.
But I sometimes got the feeling that Ron wasn't totally with me. I'd be lapping up my ham-and-cheese crepe at an outdoor cafe, cheerfully babbling about Meryl Streep's performance in last night's movie, and Ron would just stare into space, lower lip protruding.
"This is great ham," I'd say.
Ron glances at my plate. "Benny likes ham."
Sigh.
It would be better in Grand Haven, I told myself. I'd booked us two nights at a bed-and-breakfast in this touristy beach town on Lake Michigan. My goal was relaxation verging on outright boredom and Grand Haven did not disappoint. The town was mostly empty that Monday and Tuesday, resting during the brief interval between Fourth of July celebrations and the Coast Guard Festival in August.
Monday was beautiful, bright and warm, with a cool breeze off the lake. I strolled around while Ron napped, then we went to dinner. Then we settled on the B-and-B's front porch with our books, waiting for the 10 p.m. performance of the World's Largest Musical Fountain. According to the tourist pamphlets, this water-and-light show, created in 1962, uses 32 600-watt subwoofers, 14 power amplifiers and 12 high-frequency horns.
A crowd gathered on the boardwalk below, boats circled in the harbor. Other guests joined us to await the spectacle. The show began, and frankly, it was a little weird. The lights flickered, the music swelled, the water sprayed (courtesy of a “huge” nozzle bed system).
Then a deep voice boomed from the darkening sky: “I AM THE MAGICAL FOUNTAIN. COME WORSHIP ME WITH CHESTS OF GOLD, PRECIOUS OILS AND FLOCKS OF SHEEP.”
Well, maybe the Fountain didn't say that, but that was the gist, if you know what I mean. Ron and I stared in stunned disbelief while the Fountain played a series of long-forgotten tunes, many old enough to collect Social Security. The Fountain would introduce each song, chuckling at the funny titles. The whole thing was a little strange.
What's more, this panopoly of water and light is not really the largest in the world. The city of Grand Haven's web site reluctantly admits that theirs is the "once largest musical fountain in the world."
"Only recently has the size been exceeded in a musical fountains," the website goes on. "The unique character of this fountain has not been duplicated."
So where's the real largest musical fountain in the world? The city sniffily admits that one is in Las Vegas, Nevada: "Where water conservation is critical and glitz is the byword."
Well, I hope they're ashamed of themselves over there.
##
It's embarrassing, really, how quickly we adjusted. Within 24 hours, Benny's little table in the living room, usually strewn with toy spaceships, matchbox cars and abandoned sippy cups, turned into a coffee table buried under newspapers, car keys, junk mail and half a Snickers bar.
Our old habits of 9 years B.B. (Before Benny) quickly returned: lazy weekend mornings, long bike rides, brunch downtown, movies, restaurants, the New York Times Sunday paper, big fat books, tiny little purses, complete sentences, wine with lunch ... the list goes on.
But I sometimes got the feeling that Ron wasn't totally with me. I'd be lapping up my ham-and-cheese crepe at an outdoor cafe, cheerfully babbling about Meryl Streep's performance in last night's movie, and Ron would just stare into space, lower lip protruding.
"This is great ham," I'd say.
Ron glances at my plate. "Benny likes ham."
Sigh.
It would be better in Grand Haven, I told myself. I'd booked us two nights at a bed-and-breakfast in this touristy beach town on Lake Michigan. My goal was relaxation verging on outright boredom and Grand Haven did not disappoint. The town was mostly empty that Monday and Tuesday, resting during the brief interval between Fourth of July celebrations and the Coast Guard Festival in August.
Monday was beautiful, bright and warm, with a cool breeze off the lake. I strolled around while Ron napped, then we went to dinner. Then we settled on the B-and-B's front porch with our books, waiting for the 10 p.m. performance of the World's Largest Musical Fountain. According to the tourist pamphlets, this water-and-light show, created in 1962, uses 32 600-watt subwoofers, 14 power amplifiers and 12 high-frequency horns.
A crowd gathered on the boardwalk below, boats circled in the harbor. Other guests joined us to await the spectacle. The show began, and frankly, it was a little weird. The lights flickered, the music swelled, the water sprayed (courtesy of a “huge” nozzle bed system).
Then a deep voice boomed from the darkening sky: “I AM THE MAGICAL FOUNTAIN. COME WORSHIP ME WITH CHESTS OF GOLD, PRECIOUS OILS AND FLOCKS OF SHEEP.”
Well, maybe the Fountain didn't say that, but that was the gist, if you know what I mean. Ron and I stared in stunned disbelief while the Fountain played a series of long-forgotten tunes, many old enough to collect Social Security. The Fountain would introduce each song, chuckling at the funny titles. The whole thing was a little strange.
What's more, this panopoly of water and light is not really the largest in the world. The city of Grand Haven's web site reluctantly admits that theirs is the "once largest musical fountain in the world."
"Only recently has the size been exceeded in a musical fountains," the website goes on. "The unique character of this fountain has not been duplicated."
So where's the real largest musical fountain in the world? The city sniffily admits that one is in Las Vegas, Nevada: "Where water conservation is critical and glitz is the byword."
Well, I hope they're ashamed of themselves over there.
##
Pictures! Pictures!
Here are some belated pictures from two family outings. The first batch is from a visit to Kensington Farms, a cute place about 30 miles from Ann Arbor. We visited all the animals and went on a hayride.
The second batch is from Greenfield Village, a big indoor/outdoor museum complex in the Detroit area founded by Henry Ford. We attended "Day Out with Thomas" featuring Thomas the Tank Engine steaming along the tracks. It was a great day, with treats and activities and a ride on the Thomas train. Benny was beside himself.
The second batch is from Greenfield Village, a big indoor/outdoor museum complex in the Detroit area founded by Henry Ford. We attended "Day Out with Thomas" featuring Thomas the Tank Engine steaming along the tracks. It was a great day, with treats and activities and a ride on the Thomas train. Benny was beside himself.
Friday, July 07, 2006
"Where's the Liquor!"
I'm battling a slight hangover today, subsisting on Snapple and buttered toast. Ron and I spent last night guzzling margaritas on our deck with friends Amy and Jason, visiting from out of town.
The drinks were my fault, of course, the result of a brainstorm in Target's summer clearance aisle Thursday morning. I picked up some $2 margarita glasses while Benny snagged a plastic martini shaker with a big blue parrot on it.
Then we headed to the supermarket for some tequila, where I cruised the beer aisle with mounting irritation.
"Where's your liquor?" I asked a grocery clerk. He looked at me warily, as well he might: a wild-eyed woman in a wrinkled shirt, followed by a tiny toddler clutching a martini shaker. They didn't have any liquor, of course, and I trudged over to the drugstore and bought my hooch there while the cherry cheesecake melted in the car.
But all was ready when Amy and Jason arrived (and Ron) and we headed out to eat. Benny was as naughty as naughty could be in the restaurant: whining, pouting, refusing to eat, demanding snacks and stickers and aspirin (wait, the last was for me).
Disgusted, I left the restaurant and marched Benny back to the car, where I stuffed my howling son into his carseat ("Benjamin Andrew, you are going home and to BED!") Then I slumped behind the steering wheel and glared resentfully at happy, childless couples strolling by.
Ron turned up with our friends and negotiated Benny's release so we could walk around downtown too. Then we returned to the house, where I rushed to the freezer and was pouring margaritas before Amy could take off her jacket. Benny received a glass of ice water with a plastic martini stirrer. (Yeah, I know.)
Benny went to bed at 8 p.m., shrieking with outrage. Then he was up at 5:17 a.m. ready for the day. I felt slightly nauseous; Ron had a headache from the tequila. I brought Benny to our bed, but that never works -- he just flops around and giggles.
Finally Benny slid off the bed and picked my socks off the floor. He held them up to me and asked "Mommy, wake up?" I admitted defeat.
Today I'm taking Benny to my sister's for five days. Halleluiah.
##
The drinks were my fault, of course, the result of a brainstorm in Target's summer clearance aisle Thursday morning. I picked up some $2 margarita glasses while Benny snagged a plastic martini shaker with a big blue parrot on it.
Then we headed to the supermarket for some tequila, where I cruised the beer aisle with mounting irritation.
"Where's your liquor?" I asked a grocery clerk. He looked at me warily, as well he might: a wild-eyed woman in a wrinkled shirt, followed by a tiny toddler clutching a martini shaker. They didn't have any liquor, of course, and I trudged over to the drugstore and bought my hooch there while the cherry cheesecake melted in the car.
But all was ready when Amy and Jason arrived (and Ron) and we headed out to eat. Benny was as naughty as naughty could be in the restaurant: whining, pouting, refusing to eat, demanding snacks and stickers and aspirin (wait, the last was for me).
Disgusted, I left the restaurant and marched Benny back to the car, where I stuffed my howling son into his carseat ("Benjamin Andrew, you are going home and to BED!") Then I slumped behind the steering wheel and glared resentfully at happy, childless couples strolling by.
Ron turned up with our friends and negotiated Benny's release so we could walk around downtown too. Then we returned to the house, where I rushed to the freezer and was pouring margaritas before Amy could take off her jacket. Benny received a glass of ice water with a plastic martini stirrer. (Yeah, I know.)
Benny went to bed at 8 p.m., shrieking with outrage. Then he was up at 5:17 a.m. ready for the day. I felt slightly nauseous; Ron had a headache from the tequila. I brought Benny to our bed, but that never works -- he just flops around and giggles.
Finally Benny slid off the bed and picked my socks off the floor. He held them up to me and asked "Mommy, wake up?" I admitted defeat.
Today I'm taking Benny to my sister's for five days. Halleluiah.
##
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Enron's Kenneth Lay
Lay's obit in Wired
Good heavens, Kenneth Lay of Enron just died of a massive heart attack. I remember when I was living in San Francisco in 2000 and reading about Enron's spectacular success. The company was no. 7 on the Fortune 500, for crying out loud, with over $100 billion in annual revenue.
That seems like a lifetime ago, those days when I worked at AllBusiness.com, rented my movies from Kozmo.com and ordered groceries from Webvan.com. Now all three companies are extinct, reminding me of piezophilic bacteria, those weird little microbes living in impossible conditions.
(And yes, I had to look up the name. Now that I have, perhaps I can work the term “piezophilic” into casual conversations:
“Gee, Ron, you’re acting positively piezophilic today. Maybe you should go find your laptop and work some more.”
“That kid is totally piezophilic. If he doesn’t get his peanut butter crackers at precisely 2:30 p.m., he falls apart.”
Hmmm … maybe not.)
Anyway, piezophiles live in extreme, high-pressure environments like the bottom of the Marianas Trench. These guys love such absolutely insane conditions that some scientists think they’d survive on Jupiter’s moon Europa.
more on these weirdos
But bring a piezophile up to the surface, with all that nice air and light, and zap – it’s dead. Bring an exquisitely calibrated dot-com out of the 90’s high-pressure frenzy and it pops.
(Or in the case of Webvan, slumps with the soft hiss of leaking air. For years, only the green cupholders at Pacific Bell Park remained.)
So now we have Kenneth Lay, disgraced, convicted, unable to justify buying a $100,000 yacht while Enron was going under. And he’s gone, a victim of too much light and air. How piezophilic.
Good heavens, Kenneth Lay of Enron just died of a massive heart attack. I remember when I was living in San Francisco in 2000 and reading about Enron's spectacular success. The company was no. 7 on the Fortune 500, for crying out loud, with over $100 billion in annual revenue.
That seems like a lifetime ago, those days when I worked at AllBusiness.com, rented my movies from Kozmo.com and ordered groceries from Webvan.com. Now all three companies are extinct, reminding me of piezophilic bacteria, those weird little microbes living in impossible conditions.
(And yes, I had to look up the name. Now that I have, perhaps I can work the term “piezophilic” into casual conversations:
“Gee, Ron, you’re acting positively piezophilic today. Maybe you should go find your laptop and work some more.”
“That kid is totally piezophilic. If he doesn’t get his peanut butter crackers at precisely 2:30 p.m., he falls apart.”
Hmmm … maybe not.)
Anyway, piezophiles live in extreme, high-pressure environments like the bottom of the Marianas Trench. These guys love such absolutely insane conditions that some scientists think they’d survive on Jupiter’s moon Europa.
more on these weirdos
But bring a piezophile up to the surface, with all that nice air and light, and zap – it’s dead. Bring an exquisitely calibrated dot-com out of the 90’s high-pressure frenzy and it pops.
(Or in the case of Webvan, slumps with the soft hiss of leaking air. For years, only the green cupholders at Pacific Bell Park remained.)
So now we have Kenneth Lay, disgraced, convicted, unable to justify buying a $100,000 yacht while Enron was going under. And he’s gone, a victim of too much light and air. How piezophilic.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
The Video Game
Saturday was a great day. I spent it at Meadowbrook Theater at Oakland University near Detroit. My short play "The Video Game" was performed twice.
Ron stayed with me all afternoon and we watched about a dozen plays. The writing was excellent and the actors' performances just outstanding. There was a great play called "Writer's Block," about a guy who is terminally ill, just has one more night to live. Death is hovering around his apartment, drinking beer and doing pushups. Meanwhile, this guy wants to write one good poem before he dies. It was really funny. Really.
There was also a sweet play about a couple who meet at a pizza place. He goes there every day to buy lunch from her and they both try to be cool, but come off all kooky and weird.
I'm very pleased with how my play turned out. I was worried because I didn't agree with some of my director's choices. He comes from the directing school where they strike out all the stage directions and just work from dialogue. Which sounds just dumb to me.
But I kept my mouth shut, cuz hell, I'm not the director. I gave this guy the play, and now he gets to run off and interpret it. And I'm glad I did, because the director's changes actually worked out. He had a bomb exploding at the end, instead of Ed shooting Frank. I still like my way better, but his way did add some tension to the dialogue. I mean, the bomb's just there, ticking away in the medical bag.
***By the way, if you haven't read the play and are wondering what the hell I'm talking about, email me and I'll send you a copy. The play is a conversation between two characters in a video game loosely based on Metal Gear. They sit around while the gamer is fixing a snack and chat about their careers.
Anyway, the first performance was a little stilted and the sound booth messed up the bomb explosion. But the second performance just rocked. The audience seemed to enjoy it, laughing and everything.
I made the display poster for the play, which features chocolate-chip military camouflage and a big paper cookie. The camo pattern was easy to find at the local arts and crafts store. I don't know what these moms are putting in their scrapbooks these days.
So that's done, which is kind of a relief. I've been a little nervous. Time to work on my submission to next year's festival.
Ron stayed with me all afternoon and we watched about a dozen plays. The writing was excellent and the actors' performances just outstanding. There was a great play called "Writer's Block," about a guy who is terminally ill, just has one more night to live. Death is hovering around his apartment, drinking beer and doing pushups. Meanwhile, this guy wants to write one good poem before he dies. It was really funny. Really.
There was also a sweet play about a couple who meet at a pizza place. He goes there every day to buy lunch from her and they both try to be cool, but come off all kooky and weird.
I'm very pleased with how my play turned out. I was worried because I didn't agree with some of my director's choices. He comes from the directing school where they strike out all the stage directions and just work from dialogue. Which sounds just dumb to me.
But I kept my mouth shut, cuz hell, I'm not the director. I gave this guy the play, and now he gets to run off and interpret it. And I'm glad I did, because the director's changes actually worked out. He had a bomb exploding at the end, instead of Ed shooting Frank. I still like my way better, but his way did add some tension to the dialogue. I mean, the bomb's just there, ticking away in the medical bag.
***By the way, if you haven't read the play and are wondering what the hell I'm talking about, email me and I'll send you a copy. The play is a conversation between two characters in a video game loosely based on Metal Gear. They sit around while the gamer is fixing a snack and chat about their careers.
Anyway, the first performance was a little stilted and the sound booth messed up the bomb explosion. But the second performance just rocked. The audience seemed to enjoy it, laughing and everything.
I made the display poster for the play, which features chocolate-chip military camouflage and a big paper cookie. The camo pattern was easy to find at the local arts and crafts store. I don't know what these moms are putting in their scrapbooks these days.
So that's done, which is kind of a relief. I've been a little nervous. Time to work on my submission to next year's festival.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Christine the Hermit Crab
I'm getting fairly determined about this writing thing. I managed to write in Chicago during Memorial Day weekend, tapping away in the Swissotel lobby after Ron and Benny went to bed in the room. This past weekend, while Ron was in Tahoe and I stayed with Benny, I wrote every day but Saturday.
The main challenge is finding a suitable place. I start bouncing off walls if I'm home all day, so I've been researching cafes and libraries. Last week I tried the Saline District Library, tucking myself away in the tiny
Local History room.
Saline is a cute little town just south of Ann Arbor. Benny attends the Saline Early Childhood Center two days a week -- it's a cheerful place, and cheaper than Ann Arbor daycares. So I'm scouting Saline locations so I can drop Benny off and then work nearby until it's time to pick him up.
Saline does have a wonderful cafe: a bright space with brick walls and free wireless access. I can buy a toasted bagel and coke for two bucks and spread my stuff out on one of their tables. But the cafe's a busy
place: people tend to plunk down one table over and hold loud conversations.
Monday morning it was a sunburned, middle-aged lady with frizzy hair who held a 20-minute monologue that (I swear) went like this:
"So I told her I was tired of the commute and she said "Move here." And I said, "I can't move there," and she said, "Sure you can," and I said, "No I can't," and she said, "Why not?" and I said, "It's too far," and she said, "It's not too far," and I said, "Yes it is..."
Last week was worse. On Friday a big crowd of Saline matrons took over the cafe, yakking loudly for TWO HOURS. Then came the moms and rowdy children.
The Saline library also offers free Internet access and seemed a viable alternative. I spread all my stuff out in the research area. But then Sandy at the research desk started holding long, involved conversations with everyone in the damn town. So I retreated to a back room, surrounded by dusty binders and a microfilm machine. A giant bust of a dour old man guarded the door. (I first thought it was Abe Lincoln, but it's actually Orange Risdon, Saline's founder.) Orange and I were happy until some old guy turned up, unfolded every map in the room, and rustled them for 40 minutes.
Maybe it's my attitude, I told myself as I drove back to Ann Arbor, a total of 20 words written that day. I vowed to explore one more place, the Ann Arbor Public Library, then give it up and buy good earplugs. And there I found my home. The third floor is as silent as a tomb. I actually worry that I'm disturbing people with my keyboard tapping. And if a cleaning lady does turn up and loudly poke her dust mop into all 100 bookshelves (it does happen), I can retreat into a tiny room custom-made for people-haters like myself.
Ah, heaven.
The main challenge is finding a suitable place. I start bouncing off walls if I'm home all day, so I've been researching cafes and libraries. Last week I tried the Saline District Library, tucking myself away in the tiny
Local History room.
Saline is a cute little town just south of Ann Arbor. Benny attends the Saline Early Childhood Center two days a week -- it's a cheerful place, and cheaper than Ann Arbor daycares. So I'm scouting Saline locations so I can drop Benny off and then work nearby until it's time to pick him up.
Saline does have a wonderful cafe: a bright space with brick walls and free wireless access. I can buy a toasted bagel and coke for two bucks and spread my stuff out on one of their tables. But the cafe's a busy
place: people tend to plunk down one table over and hold loud conversations.
Monday morning it was a sunburned, middle-aged lady with frizzy hair who held a 20-minute monologue that (I swear) went like this:
"So I told her I was tired of the commute and she said "Move here." And I said, "I can't move there," and she said, "Sure you can," and I said, "No I can't," and she said, "Why not?" and I said, "It's too far," and she said, "It's not too far," and I said, "Yes it is..."
Last week was worse. On Friday a big crowd of Saline matrons took over the cafe, yakking loudly for TWO HOURS. Then came the moms and rowdy children.
The Saline library also offers free Internet access and seemed a viable alternative. I spread all my stuff out in the research area. But then Sandy at the research desk started holding long, involved conversations with everyone in the damn town. So I retreated to a back room, surrounded by dusty binders and a microfilm machine. A giant bust of a dour old man guarded the door. (I first thought it was Abe Lincoln, but it's actually Orange Risdon, Saline's founder.) Orange and I were happy until some old guy turned up, unfolded every map in the room, and rustled them for 40 minutes.
Maybe it's my attitude, I told myself as I drove back to Ann Arbor, a total of 20 words written that day. I vowed to explore one more place, the Ann Arbor Public Library, then give it up and buy good earplugs. And there I found my home. The third floor is as silent as a tomb. I actually worry that I'm disturbing people with my keyboard tapping. And if a cleaning lady does turn up and loudly poke her dust mop into all 100 bookshelves (it does happen), I can retreat into a tiny room custom-made for people-haters like myself.
Ah, heaven.
Signor Ugarte is Dead
I've had a good writing streak – four chapters in three days. Any day I get to write is a successful day, and here I've written three days in a row.
On Monday I wrote a tricky scene between two politicians who are former lovers: a man (Zodiac) and a woman (Percy). They've bickered through the whole book about how to apprehend a dangerous criminal.
So it'’s Chapter 25 and they'’re at it again, squabbling about security measures and killer assassin robots. Looks like the criminal might actually be dead this time, which would solve all of Zodiac'’s problems.
Then suddenly Zodiac asks Percy why she left him so long ago. Percy blames Zodiac, saying he turned ruthless and obsessed with power. Zodiac doesn'’t buy it -- he doesn'’t think you can turn feelings on and off like a faucet whenever it'’s convenient. He says she never loved him, that there was somebody else first. "Where is that man?" Zodiac asks. "Is he dead?"”
Percy won'’t talk, but Zodiac has puzzled it out: that other man is the wanted criminal, and Percy has been trying to protect him for the whole book. So now Percy is traveling to identify the body of the man she once knew. And Zodiac is now her enemy and can cause all kinds of trouble.
Meanwhile, Percy'’s sister is still trapped on the space station. And since Humphrey Bogart probably won'’t turn up with letters of transit, she'll have to think of a way out. Maybe she'’ll get arrested.
On Monday I wrote a tricky scene between two politicians who are former lovers: a man (Zodiac) and a woman (Percy). They've bickered through the whole book about how to apprehend a dangerous criminal.
So it'’s Chapter 25 and they'’re at it again, squabbling about security measures and killer assassin robots. Looks like the criminal might actually be dead this time, which would solve all of Zodiac'’s problems.
Then suddenly Zodiac asks Percy why she left him so long ago. Percy blames Zodiac, saying he turned ruthless and obsessed with power. Zodiac doesn'’t buy it -- he doesn'’t think you can turn feelings on and off like a faucet whenever it'’s convenient. He says she never loved him, that there was somebody else first. "Where is that man?" Zodiac asks. "Is he dead?"”
Percy won'’t talk, but Zodiac has puzzled it out: that other man is the wanted criminal, and Percy has been trying to protect him for the whole book. So now Percy is traveling to identify the body of the man she once knew. And Zodiac is now her enemy and can cause all kinds of trouble.
Meanwhile, Percy'’s sister is still trapped on the space station. And since Humphrey Bogart probably won'’t turn up with letters of transit, she'll have to think of a way out. Maybe she'’ll get arrested.
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
This Robot is Malfunctioning
Ron tried not to laugh at me this morning as I staggered into the dining room at 5:30 a.m. He's one of those early birds who contentedly munch cereal in the weak morning light.
I, on the other hand, lurch helplessly around the kitchen, toasting a Snapple and drinking a waffle. I glare at him before retreating to the home office.
"I hope this schedule is worth it," I say, "because it's shortening my life."
The scene inside the office wasn't any better. I'm at a tricky part in my novel, of course, and the hamster in my mind just wouldn't run on his wheel this morning. I've rewritten half my novel --45,300 words -- and now it's time to launch the second half.
So I sit there staring at two very scary words: BOOK THREE. The novel's first half was mostly rewriting; now I had to come up with all new stuff. My heroine is now trapped in a space station -- sort of a space-age Casablanca, crowded with people desperate to get out. She's lucky not to be dead, or at least trapped on Mercury. (My heroine would see little difference between the two.) The villain is following her, but she doesn't know it, and so is a newspaper reporter. Plus weird assassin robots are swarming everywhere, which is never a good thing, and many of the robots are malfunctioning, which makes it even worse.
Since I couldn't write the damn scene, I created lengthy treatises on my imaginary space station. Then I flipped through my writing books for a nice little pep talk. I found this lovely bit by Anne Lamott:
"So you sit down at, say, nine every morning or 10 every night. You turn on your computer and bring up the right file and you stare at it for an hour or so. You begin rocking, just a little at first, and then like a huge autistic child.
"Then, with your fingers poised on the keyboard, you squint at an image that is forming in your mind -- a scene, a locale, a character, whatever -- and try to quiet your mind so you can hear what the landscape or character has to say above the other voices in your mind. The other voices are banshees and drunken monkeys. they are the voices of anxiety, judgment, doom, guilt. Also, severe hypochondria.
"There may be a Nurse Ratched-like listing of things that must be done right this moment: foods that must come out of the freezer, appointments that must be canceled or made, hairs that must be tweezed. But you hold an imaginary gun at your head and make yourself stay at the desk. There is a vague pain at the base of your neck. It crosses your mind that you have meningitis.
"Then the phone rings and you look up at the ceiling with fury, summon every ounce of noblesse oblige and answer the call politely, with maybe just the merest hint of irritation. The caller asks if you’re working and you say yeah, because you are.
"Yet somehow in the face of all this, you clear a space for your writing voice, hacking away at the others with machetes, and you begin to compose sentences. You begin to string words together like beads to tell a story."
----------------------------------------
This passage reflects my experience, except for the part where she actually wrote something. I took Benny to daycare and went back to BOOK THREE. Dissatisfied, I went back to Book Two and started messing THAT up, until mercifully I had to stop for a phone call. I interviewed a very nice lady for a newspaper article -- you know, writing that actually earns money -- and now I'm wrtiing in my blog because I'm scared of my own novel. Wish me luck.
I, on the other hand, lurch helplessly around the kitchen, toasting a Snapple and drinking a waffle. I glare at him before retreating to the home office.
"I hope this schedule is worth it," I say, "because it's shortening my life."
The scene inside the office wasn't any better. I'm at a tricky part in my novel, of course, and the hamster in my mind just wouldn't run on his wheel this morning. I've rewritten half my novel --45,300 words -- and now it's time to launch the second half.
So I sit there staring at two very scary words: BOOK THREE. The novel's first half was mostly rewriting; now I had to come up with all new stuff. My heroine is now trapped in a space station -- sort of a space-age Casablanca, crowded with people desperate to get out. She's lucky not to be dead, or at least trapped on Mercury. (My heroine would see little difference between the two.) The villain is following her, but she doesn't know it, and so is a newspaper reporter. Plus weird assassin robots are swarming everywhere, which is never a good thing, and many of the robots are malfunctioning, which makes it even worse.
Since I couldn't write the damn scene, I created lengthy treatises on my imaginary space station. Then I flipped through my writing books for a nice little pep talk. I found this lovely bit by Anne Lamott:
"So you sit down at, say, nine every morning or 10 every night. You turn on your computer and bring up the right file and you stare at it for an hour or so. You begin rocking, just a little at first, and then like a huge autistic child.
"Then, with your fingers poised on the keyboard, you squint at an image that is forming in your mind -- a scene, a locale, a character, whatever -- and try to quiet your mind so you can hear what the landscape or character has to say above the other voices in your mind. The other voices are banshees and drunken monkeys. they are the voices of anxiety, judgment, doom, guilt. Also, severe hypochondria.
"There may be a Nurse Ratched-like listing of things that must be done right this moment: foods that must come out of the freezer, appointments that must be canceled or made, hairs that must be tweezed. But you hold an imaginary gun at your head and make yourself stay at the desk. There is a vague pain at the base of your neck. It crosses your mind that you have meningitis.
"Then the phone rings and you look up at the ceiling with fury, summon every ounce of noblesse oblige and answer the call politely, with maybe just the merest hint of irritation. The caller asks if you’re working and you say yeah, because you are.
"Yet somehow in the face of all this, you clear a space for your writing voice, hacking away at the others with machetes, and you begin to compose sentences. You begin to string words together like beads to tell a story."
----------------------------------------
This passage reflects my experience, except for the part where she actually wrote something. I took Benny to daycare and went back to BOOK THREE. Dissatisfied, I went back to Book Two and started messing THAT up, until mercifully I had to stop for a phone call. I interviewed a very nice lady for a newspaper article -- you know, writing that actually earns money -- and now I'm wrtiing in my blog because I'm scared of my own novel. Wish me luck.
Monday, May 22, 2006
5 a.m. Swim Time
Look at the time on this post. It's not even 7 a.m. yet. I've been up since 5 a.m., surfing the web, reading email, reviewing notes for my novel. I should feel very virtuous, but instead I'm just crabby.
This is the first salvo in my campaign to write every day. Early morning is the only guaranteed time I can sit at my computer and wrestle with my fiction. Until 7:30 a.m., it's just me and the cat. After that, Ron leaves for work, Benny starts romping around and the weird guy next door starts power washing his driveway or something.
I used to write at night; that's how I wrote my first Europa Society play while holding down an editor position in San Francisco. For three months I worked until 6 p.m., napped until 8, then typed until midnight. But that's not practical now. Evenings mean dinner, bath and bedtime for my toddler, and are often my only time with Ron.
I've tried to write while Benny naps, but I just can't relax. I start at every little sound, whether it's the cat playing with a toy or our neighbor playing with his motorcycle. I'm sure Jack has a good reason to park his bike in the driveway, rev up the engine, and stand around staring at it for 30 minutes twice a day. But it doesn't do my nerves any good. When I manage to ignore the cat, the motorcycle, and somebody's noisy landscaping service and actually start typing, Benny wakes up an hour early.
So that leaves the appallingly early time of 5 a.m. for optimum writing -- after a shower and two bottles of Snapple, of course. This morning my brain wasn't fooled at all: "Why aren't we in bed?" it asks. "What is this thing called Light? I don't like it." So I coaxed my brain with Google News and four scenes from "Dr. Faustus," and it has graciously allowed me to post on my blog.
As in any crazy endeavor, I first look around for someone who's already done it. But none of my friends and family are insane enough to ponder sticky plot points at 5 a.m.
The best role model I could find was Lynne Cox, a long-distance swimmer who has kicked her way across the English Channel, the Bering Straits and the seas of Antarctica. Next to her, I'm nothing. This gal spends her life getting up at 5 a.m., diving into icy water and splashing around for a couple of hours.
I read Cox's memoir "Swimming to Antarctica" last year with bewildered astonishment. As a teenager, she'd meet her coach at dawn by some horrid bay, all ready to swim. "I can't believe you're doing this," her coach said once. "There is frost on my car windshield."
Cox knew she was a little obsessed. She underwent a series of tests at an underwater lab and scientist found that her body had exactly the same buoyancy as seawater. This should be a wakeup call.
Her response? "It's not easy to get out of a warm bed at 4:30 and do this. You have to really want it."
I guess that sums it up. If you're serious about a goal, you have to do whatever it takes. You have to really want it. So here I am at 7 a.m., trying to be a writer. I hope I want it as bad as I think I do.
This is the first salvo in my campaign to write every day. Early morning is the only guaranteed time I can sit at my computer and wrestle with my fiction. Until 7:30 a.m., it's just me and the cat. After that, Ron leaves for work, Benny starts romping around and the weird guy next door starts power washing his driveway or something.
I used to write at night; that's how I wrote my first Europa Society play while holding down an editor position in San Francisco. For three months I worked until 6 p.m., napped until 8, then typed until midnight. But that's not practical now. Evenings mean dinner, bath and bedtime for my toddler, and are often my only time with Ron.
I've tried to write while Benny naps, but I just can't relax. I start at every little sound, whether it's the cat playing with a toy or our neighbor playing with his motorcycle. I'm sure Jack has a good reason to park his bike in the driveway, rev up the engine, and stand around staring at it for 30 minutes twice a day. But it doesn't do my nerves any good. When I manage to ignore the cat, the motorcycle, and somebody's noisy landscaping service and actually start typing, Benny wakes up an hour early.
So that leaves the appallingly early time of 5 a.m. for optimum writing -- after a shower and two bottles of Snapple, of course. This morning my brain wasn't fooled at all: "Why aren't we in bed?" it asks. "What is this thing called Light? I don't like it." So I coaxed my brain with Google News and four scenes from "Dr. Faustus," and it has graciously allowed me to post on my blog.
As in any crazy endeavor, I first look around for someone who's already done it. But none of my friends and family are insane enough to ponder sticky plot points at 5 a.m.
The best role model I could find was Lynne Cox, a long-distance swimmer who has kicked her way across the English Channel, the Bering Straits and the seas of Antarctica. Next to her, I'm nothing. This gal spends her life getting up at 5 a.m., diving into icy water and splashing around for a couple of hours.
I read Cox's memoir "Swimming to Antarctica" last year with bewildered astonishment. As a teenager, she'd meet her coach at dawn by some horrid bay, all ready to swim. "I can't believe you're doing this," her coach said once. "There is frost on my car windshield."
Cox knew she was a little obsessed. She underwent a series of tests at an underwater lab and scientist found that her body had exactly the same buoyancy as seawater. This should be a wakeup call.
Her response? "It's not easy to get out of a warm bed at 4:30 and do this. You have to really want it."
I guess that sums it up. If you're serious about a goal, you have to do whatever it takes. You have to really want it. So here I am at 7 a.m., trying to be a writer. I hope I want it as bad as I think I do.
Thursday, May 11, 2006
We Return Triumphant
Ron let me sleep in a bit this morning, so we got a late start. The RV was due in Ypsilanti on Friday, and we all felt tired and grimy. We hit the Ohio Turnpike that day, hoping to make it home by nightfall.
I'd woken with a slight head cold, but I couldn't take any medicine because I was also carsick. High-speed winds came roaring up out of the south, buffeting the RV. Ron fought for hours to stay in his lane, while the trucks ahead weaved and swerved and passed dangerously close the edge of bridges. Benny whined for raisins and I clutched my armrest and tried not to sick up.
Construction almost foiled us around U.S. 23, with crucial ramps connecting the highway to 475 and 94 closed, but we pulled into our own driveway before dinnertime. The neighbors came out to hear our adventures and Benny happily chased the kitty. It took an hour for Ron and I to unload the RV and pile everything in the living room and dinner was takeout pizza from Cottage Inn.
Still, we were pleased. Benny and I each took long baths and we happily fell asleep in our own home. I was just glad not to be moving.
##
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
The Walls Are Closing In
This was the best morning of the trip - nice and warm. It was pleasant to lie in the bunk over the RV cab and listen to the jets take off from Dulles International Airport.
With Shenandoah and Manassas under our belts, we were ready to head back. We hit the Pennsylvania Turnpike and started gobbling up the miles.
High-mileage days like this are tough on Benny, who doesn't appreciate the single-minded rush of a 10-hour trip. We tried to stop for exercise - it was a beautiful day, after all - but turnpike service plazas aren't exactly toddler-friendly. Each plaza featured clusters of restaurants and stores surrounded by miles of asphalt. Since we were in the RV, we had to park with the trucks, which meant scurrying across the massive park lot, holding onto a squirming, protesting Benny, who hated to be carried.
So exercise for Benny meant racing around a deserted restaurant with Ron and I posted at each end of his makeshift track. Then we piled into the RV and tried to make another 100 miles before Benny went nuts.
Exhausted, we left the turnpike just west of Youngstown, Ohio, seeking some fabled campground in Leavittsburg. It had cable TV, a rec room, a volleyball court - sounded awful. But the lady at the toll booth had a better idea. She recommended the campground at West Branch State Park. The facilities had been recently expanded and renovated. Ron disliked crowded RV parks anyway, so we took her advice and drove 13 miles off the highway, the RV rocking and moaning all the way. I'd stuffed my computer's wrist rest through the handles of some particularly troublesome cupboards, but the window over the table still rattled and a haunted door near Benny's bed still creaked open at odd times.
West Branch's campground was beautiful, woodsy and sweet-smelling, with a lovely lake near our site. Ron built another fire in a faint, cool drizzle while Benny sat nearby in the dirt and provided a running commentary: “Fire, hot! Fire, hot! Daddy builds fire, hot!”
I served leftover spaghetti and corn for Benny and microwaved soup for Ron and myself, and we ate outside, lingering in the soft air until the rain picked up. Then we all bedded down for our last night in the RV.
I woke at about 4 a.m. in a state of panic. I'm not prone to claustrophobia, but suddenly the ceiling above me felt frighteningly low. I was in the bunk over the cab, against the wall, with the ceiling inches above me. Trying to fight my mounting panic, I herded Ron aside and climbed down. I stood beside the large, open window over the RV's table, panting.
It was a full 10 minutes before I could breathe calmly, with Ron almost beside himself with worry. I'd never been claustrophobic like that, just never. Finally I calmed myself (and Ron) and climbed into bed with Benny, whose ceiling was much higher. It still took a long time to fall asleep.
##
With Shenandoah and Manassas under our belts, we were ready to head back. We hit the Pennsylvania Turnpike and started gobbling up the miles.
High-mileage days like this are tough on Benny, who doesn't appreciate the single-minded rush of a 10-hour trip. We tried to stop for exercise - it was a beautiful day, after all - but turnpike service plazas aren't exactly toddler-friendly. Each plaza featured clusters of restaurants and stores surrounded by miles of asphalt. Since we were in the RV, we had to park with the trucks, which meant scurrying across the massive park lot, holding onto a squirming, protesting Benny, who hated to be carried.
So exercise for Benny meant racing around a deserted restaurant with Ron and I posted at each end of his makeshift track. Then we piled into the RV and tried to make another 100 miles before Benny went nuts.
Exhausted, we left the turnpike just west of Youngstown, Ohio, seeking some fabled campground in Leavittsburg. It had cable TV, a rec room, a volleyball court - sounded awful. But the lady at the toll booth had a better idea. She recommended the campground at West Branch State Park. The facilities had been recently expanded and renovated. Ron disliked crowded RV parks anyway, so we took her advice and drove 13 miles off the highway, the RV rocking and moaning all the way. I'd stuffed my computer's wrist rest through the handles of some particularly troublesome cupboards, but the window over the table still rattled and a haunted door near Benny's bed still creaked open at odd times.
West Branch's campground was beautiful, woodsy and sweet-smelling, with a lovely lake near our site. Ron built another fire in a faint, cool drizzle while Benny sat nearby in the dirt and provided a running commentary: “Fire, hot! Fire, hot! Daddy builds fire, hot!”
I served leftover spaghetti and corn for Benny and microwaved soup for Ron and myself, and we ate outside, lingering in the soft air until the rain picked up. Then we all bedded down for our last night in the RV.
I woke at about 4 a.m. in a state of panic. I'm not prone to claustrophobia, but suddenly the ceiling above me felt frighteningly low. I was in the bunk over the cab, against the wall, with the ceiling inches above me. Trying to fight my mounting panic, I herded Ron aside and climbed down. I stood beside the large, open window over the RV's table, panting.
It was a full 10 minutes before I could breathe calmly, with Ron almost beside himself with worry. I'd never been claustrophobic like that, just never. Finally I calmed myself (and Ron) and climbed into bed with Benny, whose ceiling was much higher. It still took a long time to fall asleep.
##
Never Call Retreat
CIVIL WAR BATTLEFIELD AT MANASSAS (BULL RUN)
I woke up with a splitting headache. My first thought was "Carbon Monoxide Poisoning!" since propane makes me nervous. A dozen things in this RV run on propane, including the furnace, the stovetop and the water heater. So I climbed down from my bunk with vague thoughts of looking in the mirror to see if my cheeks were rosy.
Ron looked at me curiously as I staggered past. He was pouring milk for Benny, whose cheeks were always rosy. No help there. I decide a more intelligent move would be to check the carbon monoxide detector, but I couldn't understand the thing. There were lots of green lights, so I decided we'd all live. So I gave up the idea and fished a Snapple out of the cooler.
We were in a bit of a pickle this morning because both our holding tanks were reading two-thirds full and our fresh water supply was low, which made showering a risky business. Ron used the bathhouse through the trees so we had enough water for myself and Benny. I'd given up on the idea of showering Benny - I'd never get him back into that stall -- so I gave him a sponge bath on the kitchen counter instead. Much less traumatic for both of us.
We pulled into the campground's empty dumping station about 10:30 a.m. to empty our tanks and replenish our fresh water. I went into the office to reserve our space for another night and buy a few groceries. When I returned, our small RV was dwarfed by giant road yachts. Ron was scuttling between the trailer and the station's water faucet, looking annoyed.
“I know,” he said. “I was going to wait for you, but then half the Fifth Naval Fleet showed up.”
We finally escaped to U.S. 29 and headed to the battlefield. Manassas, or Bull Run, was the site of two major Civil War battles. The first clash in 1861 was the very first battle of the war. Washington was so confident that the Union would lick those rebels that civilians followed the soldiers to watch the battle and enjoy a picnic lunch.
The Manassas Visitor Center featured an amazing map that laid out the events of that first battle. Tiny lights blinked on and off, revealing troop movements. Blue lights were Union, red lights were Confederate. Battles were indicated by flashing yellow and orange lights. The whole display was so dramatic and clear, Ron and I were captivated. Benny loved the lights too. “Red, blue, orange!” he yelled.
We walked the one-mile, circular trail behind the center, following the battle's movements. Things went badly for the Confederates at first, even with the Union commander's dinking around and wasting time. Then fresh Confederate troops arrived, and rebels rallied behind Stonewall Jackson in the battle that gave him his nickname. When the Union army finally retreated, they ran smack into a crowd of panicked picnickers racing back to Washington D.C.
The weather today was gorgeous, warm and sunny. Benny was tired after the walk and refused his lunch, so we put him in his carseat and hoped he'd nap while we took a driving tour of the second Manassas battle in 1862. It was a far-flung battle, so the tour required lurching up and down two-lane roads in our ungainly RV, covering the same ground repeatedly.
Benny was asleep by the first stop, so we sat in the tiny parking lot near Battery Heights, reading the battle guide and wondering how we would get out again. Then a small hatchback car turned up and parked close behind us. We watched in dismay as three people got out, walked over a cannon-ringed hill and disappeared in the tall grass. They never returned. I even climbed the hill to look for them, but they were gone. So we reluctantly executed an extremely tight 12-point turn and sped away.
We missed the second tour stop and had nearly left the county before we found a place to turn around.
“Only nine more stops,” I said cheerfully. “At this rate, we'll be finished by midnight.”
Benny slept until we foolishly took a shortcut on Featherbed Lane, which was narrow, unpaved and insanely bumpy. We nearly ripped off our mirror passing a tree-cutting machine, and a passing gravel truck scared us half to death. By the time we reached stop 5, Benny was complaining and I was counting my teeth.
We completed the tour by 4 p.m. and headed back to the campground for dinner: spaghetti and corn on the cob. Afterwards, Benny and I visited the laundry room. When we returned to the site, Ron had built a campfire, with our three lawn chairs arranged around it. We toasted marshmallows and made smores, then put Benny to bed.
With Benny asleep, Ron and I sat beside the dying campfire and talked about the coming weekend. The RV was due back Friday and we'd have two more days to adjust to reality again. This trip was a real chance for Ron, Benny and I to spend time together, and we didn't want it to end. Somehow, we'd have to work small escapes into our daily lives. We talked about buying a tent and camping throughout the summer, visiting relatives or just playing around. Benny was getting older and traveling was much less daunting.
The air was getting cooler, and we retreated into the RV, folded clean laundry, and went to bed. Tomorrow we would head home again.
##
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