An apple a day.

Behold! My new favorite apple. It's called the SugarBee, and I wonder if there was some apple chicanery going on. 

The SugarBee is trademarked to the Chelan Fruit Cooperative of Chelan, Washington, and yet claims that the whole thing was an accident. They have an involved story of the Little Honeybee That Could: 

One sunny spring day, a honey bee was buzzing throughout Mr. Nystrom’s orchard, collecting nectar and cross-pollinating apple blossoms along the way. The honey bee stopped at an unknown tree and collected nectar and pollen from a blossom.  As the day went on, the little honey bee passed that pollen onto a Honeycrisp tree. Little did this bee know its cross-pollination between a Honeycrisp and an unknown variety had just resulted in the beloved SugarBee® apple we know and enjoy today!

Months later, when apples of every shape and color began to grow, Mr. Nystrom discovered this all new variety of apple in his orchard! It was large and round, with bright red and yellow coloring. He took a bite…. “Yum!” The apple had a crispy firm texture and was unbelievably sugar-sweet. He was thrilled and spread word far and wide of a new delicious apple variety, which he then called B-51, commenting again and again on its sweet and crunchy nature.

Mr. Nystrom seems like an odd character, going around saying "Yum!" all the time, but it's the Pacific Northwest, where odd things happen. But did this strange cultivar just "appear" from the popular Honeycrisp, which was in development at the University of Minnesota from 1960 until 1991? Seems a little fishy.

But what is not fishy is the SugarBee. It is what they call an eating apple, like the Honeycrisp, as opposed to the cooking apple (Rome, Granny Smith) or throw-at-your-brother apple (crab apple). It is indeed quite similar to the Honeycrisp, but not so damn huge. I love Honeycrisps, but getting through one can be a chore, like eating a big grapefruit; I can start to lose interest about halfway there. The SugarBee is just the right size, about the size of a Gala apple, with sweet, refreshing flavor and a nice crunch. However it was created, good job. 

I can assure you that my reaction, however, did not include the word yum. It has been a long time since I was four years old.   

Valor.

Valor is a word one doesn't hear much anymore, not even in connection with those who have demonstrated it unquestionably. Funny thing, isn't it? 

Courage may be in short supply these days, but it isn't one of those virtues (like chastity or temperance) that have been diminished to ridicule in popular culture. What it has been diminished to is badassery. The badass is the kind of hero we celebrate now. 

"Well, Fred," you probably are not saying (because you're not a dummy), "the badass and the person of valor are both fearless in the face of opposition. Ain't no difference."

Oh, yes, my fine straw-filled person, there is a huge difference, as we shall see. 

Valor, according to Merriam-Webster, means "strength of mind or spirit that enables a person to encounter danger with firmness : personal bravery." Badass, however, is defined as "ready to cause or get into trouble : MEAN," or "of formidable strength or skill." This is a world of difference, the difference between the men who manned up (yes, manned up, sue me) who stormed Omaha Beach and the Mary Sue of fiction, who is never really in danger because she's such a badass no one can lay a glove on her. Slay KA-WEEN!

The badass in modern nomenclature may not be mean, but definitely knows how to pick the right targets, generally those constrained by law or integrity from pulverizing them. The valiant, on the other hand, have little say in what targets they will strike, and many of them will be remembered today because the targets turned out to be unassailable. The badass, then, is little more than a kid putting on Hulk gloves and trying to beat up Daddy, while the valiant are able to steel themselves in the face of death itself.

But even more important than that, the badass is usually only fighting for his own interests. It’s always about one’s own glory, never about being part of something more important. To the badass, the self is the most important thing.

P.J. O'Rourke wrote:

I have only one firm belief about the American political system, and that is this: God is a Republican and Santa Claus is a Democrat.

God is an elderly or, at any rate, middle aged male, a stern fellow, patriarchal rather than paternal and a great believer in rules and regulations. He holds men accountable for their actions. He has little apparent concern for the material well being of the disadvantaged. He is politically connected, socially powerful and holds the mortgage on literally everything in the world. God is difficult. God is unsentimental. It is very hard to get into God's heavenly country club.

Santa Claus is another matter. He's cute. He's nonthreatening. He's always cheerful. And he loves animals. He may know who's been naughty and who's been nice, but he never does anything about it. He gives everyone everything they want without the thought of quid pro quo. He works hard for charities, and he's famously generous to the poor. Santa Claus is preferable to God in every way but one: There is no such thing as Santa Claus.

And for that matter, the fallen heroes of America that we mourn today exist, while the badass, in all his or her movie and TV glory, does not. 

Butterfly.

Butterflies are free! Bumblebees, three for $1.

I saw this majestic butterfly the other morning. It was so large I was sure it would fly into my face if I disturbed it, but I'd hoped it would stay still long enough for the photo. 

I'm enjoying spring, or at least I keep telling myself how much more I like it than winter. But the gnats are getting quite rude, and I've already donated a pint to the Mosquito Annual Blood Drive. Now it turns out we have poison ivy among the bordering weeds, for the first time in all the years I've been here. 

In my mind I'm renaming the seasons; instead of Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter I will say Itch, Burn, Mold, and Shatter.

So yesterday morning I stopped at Home Depot and got a big ol' jug of weed killer, one that specifically lists poison ivy and poison oak on the front. The cashier asks, "Does this kill poison ivy?" I said if not I'd be back for something stronger. Agent Orange, perhaps, or napalm. 

I couldn't use it yet, though. Saturday turned into a day-long rainout, but not without advantages. It appeared that my wicked neighbor, the one that will be arrested by the feds, was going to have his annual cookout and pool-opening party. How do I know? Because his wife's sister was over the day before to help clean the house. I don't think they let her stay for the party. Well, every family is weird in its own way, and some are weirder than others. 

Anyway, it looks like the party was a bust (one car showed up). 

On the whole, though, the weather has been pleasant enough this May, and helpful to my new tree. A friend asked if I've been watering it once a week, as the nurseries suggest, and I pointed out that I haven't had to bother since we've had lakes of rain this month. 

One last thing: About that huge butterfly?

So I lied a little. Cute, though, ain't he?

Emergencies: Illness or Dumbness?

I was wondering the other day, after leaving Walmart, whether more visits to emergency rooms are caused by sickness or stupidity. Whether more come from "I'm having trouble breathing" or "Hold my beer."

It's a good question, I think. We like to pretend that all the bad things that come our way are from bad luck or karma or even the malice of others, but a lot of them surely come upon us because we are being dumdums. Just how much does stupidity account for our use of emergency medicine? With a holiday weekend upon us, it seems like a good time to have a look at this.

"How'd he get an M-80
stuck in there?"

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (and let's assume they still have some credibility on these things after Chinese Death Virus) says that of 130 million visits per year, 35 million are injury-related. (Forty percent of us were in the ER, according to this, although some people skew the numbers, either because they are very ill and go multiple times, or because they use the ER as a primary care service). It looks like the regular health emergence far outweigh the accidents.

Of course, if our friends in the health bureaucracy were to weigh in, they might say Nay Nay! That so many of those illnesses were caused by people doing stupid things, like eating fatty foods, drinking, smoking, being sedentary. not getting vaccinated, and so on. Any ER visit resulting in those things must be counted as stupidity! Why, if they were smarter about their health, they might never have to go to the ER at all! 

I guess they'd be right in a way -- eating every meal at Carl Jr.'s, for example, or drinking a handle of vodka a day would be poor choices for someone who wants to be healthy. But it's also no fun to talk about; really, it's anti-fun. Somehow it's a lot more fun to wonder how many people's last words were, "Hey, watch this!"

Just to show that the CDC is a confusing morass, however, in another section they post, "Number of emergency department visits for unintentional injuries: 97.9 million". How did we go from 35 million to 97.9? No answer. But let's leave it there. 

I guess if I wanted to dive deep enough into the stats available to the public, I might find out how many people got hurt doing any of the following:

• Not running from fireworks quickly enough
• Jumping on a rickety ol' trampoline
• Thinking they're still 16 when they're over 50
• Swinging on a rope
• Trying to jump something on a bike
• Dancing too enthusiastically
• Pretending to be a superhero for a kids' party
• Trying to do an amazing feat of dexterity of any kind (no dexterity actually being demonstrated)
• Jumping in a pool without looking to see where the water is
• Standing too close to the piñata whacker 
• Showing playfulness by trying to dance on a table or other object not intended for dance
• Attempting winter sports out of season (and vice versa)
• Playing on the kiddie jungle gym
• Trying to slide across the hood of the car like a TV cop
• Attempting a keg stand when college is waaaay in the rearview mirror
• Parkour at any age

As you can see, many of these items could be accompanied on the police report by "Alcohol was involved." So be careful out there this weekend, folks -- if you bother to read this blog, you're precious to me! 

A word from the CEO.

Good morning, friends and customers. It is I, Frederick Key, founder and CEO of Fredcoin, and I wanted to take a moment of your time to talk about the state of cryptocurrency and the safety of your investment in Fredcoin.

You've probably been hearing a lot of horror stories about hotshot young investors being wiped out with the collapse of cryptocurrency values in recent weeks. Terra Luna lost more than 99% of its value. A fellow who invested $15,000 in Cardano watched the value of his investment drop to $3,000. South Korean investors want to strangle a 30-year-old brat whose crypto collapsed like an angry toddler. It might make you ask yourself, "Myself, should I take my money out of the world's finest cryptocurrency, Fredcoin, and put it in something safer, like an old cigar box?"

To which I would like to reply, with all due respect: Are you nuts? How can you cheat yourself out of the fantastic investment offered by keeping your shrinking dollars in Fredcoin? Why, Fredcoin is rock solid!

As solid as the 
Old Man of the Mountain!

Let me tell you a few reasons why Fredcoin won't face the same risks of those other, lesser cryptocurrencies. 

1) No leverage. Often investors put themselves at risk of catastrophic failure by using debt to invest in a currency. But you'd have to be whacko to take out a lot of debt to buy Fredcoin! Everyone knows that!

2) Liquidity issues. When the stock market goes south, bargain hunters show up. That doesn't happen with most cryptos. But with Fredcoin, the bargain hunters are among the investors! Yes sir, you can't drop further than rock bottom!

3) Security breaches. We at Fredcoin can assure you we've had none of them. Why, to be a target of hackers, you'd have to have something of great value, right? QED! Nothing to worry about.

4) Big-time investors skewing the market. If Elon Musk jumped aboard the Fredcoin bandwagon, that would cause a rush to inflate the value of it. But that could equally cause a terrific fall if he or a bunch of profit-takers sold out just as quickly. Well, I assure you, no big-time investor is showing up at my door, no sir! 

So there you go, four reasons why Fredcoin is the most bulletproof of all the cryptos. No matter what else happens in the market, remember: Your Bread Is Safe With Fred! 

P.S.: Mr. Musk, if you should want to contact us for any reason, just use the link to send an email, okay? Just like if you want to say hi or something.

He’s always been kinda screwy.

 

Per &@%#$! aspera ad &@%#$! astra.

Think of this as my graduation speech to the class of 2022. 

I took the photo above from a storm sewer in the neighborhood. The photo is real. The words are my words of advice to the youth of America who can't seem to stop seething with envy long enough to build their lives. They can do it -- but it takes effort, including the effort to stop looking over the shoulders of those who started out with more advantages.

I know what that's like. When I started in publishing, many entry-level jobs were unpaid or barely-paid internships, which meant that the only people who could take them were rich kids living on their parents' dime. I had to sneak into the business through the backdoor, being a jack-of-all-trades for a small circulation nonprofit magazine that was run by four people plus me. While other my age were padding their résumés, I was filling my skill box, and the best jobs I've had ever came from employers who appreciated the difference. 

Still, not having the connections one would get from the chummy Ivy League set has always been a disadvantage for me, but so what? When the magazines started to fold and the dot com bubble burst, all of those guys were as unemployed as I was, and many for a longer period. 

What I'm trying to say is not that you should stay in a lousy position or a lousy town, but that you have to play the hand life deals you. You can't always trade them in. Know what you can and can't change. And toughen up, buttercup. You'll get a lot further and stay a lot happier if you don't let your life run on envy.

Spending too much time with others.

I sometimes do editorial work for a publisher of schoolbooks. Their books will be on a single topic, and I'll have a couple of weeks to get the book checked and cleaned up. I'm not always interested in the topic, but I don't mind the work. The publisher pays a fair rate, pays promptly, and the experience is quite educational. 

Alas, there is one thing about the assignments that bothers me. Simply put, by the end of the two-week period, I am so sick of the topic that I wish I'd never heard of it. 

Let's say that the publisher wanted to put out a book on Frederick William III of Prussia, one of the better known Fredericks. This would not happen, because no American schoolbook publisher will ever want to put out a book on Frederick William III of Prussia, and in fact most dead white guys are not getting so many books these days. I use it for an example because it is not going to come up.

Here's ol' Freddy Bill Trois now.

At first I am fascinated by many of the things I did not know. Reigned for almost 43 years! Was a shy kid! Wouldn't use personal pronouns! Was a fiscal reformer! Attempted to unify the Protestant churches of Prussia under royal control! Got his heinie kicked by Napoleon! Married a woman named Auguste, who was born in August! What a fascinating window into the progress of Central European political life concurrent with the early days of the American Republic. 

After the first week, I've had about as much of Prussia and its kings as I think I'll ever want. 

So now I'm discovering that Freddy B never lost his fear of Jacobinism taking over as in France, and that while he was willing to reform the high levels of the civil service was dedicated to holding on to royal privilege, and I'm starting to wonder what I ever saw in this project. The king is thought to have suffered from an inferiority complex, and I'm beginning to find it justified. Sucking up to the tsar never works out the way you think it will in the long run. As week 2 progresses, the book's subject begins to feel like an overnight guest who thought he was invited to stay the summer, and I have to find a way to get rid of him short of murder. 

The final days before deadline are the worst, as I go back to deep-dive for the information I had trouble confirming on the first passes, only to find that the book's author took them from biographies of Frederick William II or Frederick William IV by mistake, and now I'm perfectly content to kill the author along with the king. If they do not get out of my life at the deadline day, I may just set off an explosive and take them with me. 

At last, the job is done, and Frederick William III is gone from my life for good. In the meantime I have learned a number of things about Germany and European royalty and the Napoleonic era, and I feel a bit more erudite. 

And so it has always been with me and education, since I was a bitty little Fred learning to read: The journey is worth the effort, but the effort sometimes feels like it may be fatal.

Off to the doc.

I have an early appointment for a checkup today -- you know, oil pressure, engine timing, etc. Should be routine, although I expect that my weight will still be the same, sadly (must be all those pancakes-in-a-cup), and I want to talk to the doctor about the anti-neuropathy pill I'm on to prevent back pain. It makes me sleepy, as I've noted here before, and that interferes with my workday.

Not a chance in hell I'd forget my appointment. I have gotten texts from two different sources, a robocall, an email, and an email to alert me to a message on my online medical account, all to remind me of this morning's appointment. 

"Hey, see y'all at eight tomorrow!"

"You got it, Mister Doctor! See you tomorrow night!"

"Tomorrow MORNING, dummy!"

Do people really forget to go to the doctor? Do they get busy and blow it off? Or do they just chicken out? I'm not counting last-minute accidents or emergency splenectomies or anything else that would require a reschedule the day of the appointment; let's assume that in truth those account for very few unanticipated cancellations. 

It was easy enough to forget a doctor's appointment in the pre-smartphone era. Even before I started getting the harassing messages from the doctor's office last week, I was getting them from my own phone, since I'd set the appointment in the calendar with various staggered reminders. Now it's impossible to forget.

So that leaves blowing it off (rude) or chickening out (🐔). I personally come from a long line of shower-uppers, people for whom being five minutes late is a mortal sin. When we say we'll be there, we'll be there, even if you don't want us to be. However, chickening out can happen to anyone. 

We can all have some trepidation about going to the doctor, that as fit and healthy as we feel he will find some horrible unexpected illness. ("It's the creeping crud... You have three weeks to live.") For some people it's worse than nerves. Iatrophobia is a powerful and unreasonable fear of doctors or medical tests. As someone with acrophobia, I know how overwhelming phobias can be. I would recommend that anyone who knows he or she has iatrophobia tell the medical personnel at the time of the appointment. They may be able to help.

Now: Off I go on my merry way, hoping the doc finds nothing new wrong with me. Barring traffic problems I will be there. It is the way of my people. Fear is natural; rudeness is not.

Battle of the Cup Cakes!

Way back in 2019 I reviewed Kodiak Cakes' Flapjack in a Cup, the microwaveable breakfast-on-the-go. TLDR version: Weird but I liked it. Probably most things I like can be reviewed that way.

Since then some things have changed. In 2021 Kodiak Cakes was acquired for a big pile o' undisclosed dough by L. Catterton, a private equity firm that also owns very unrelated outfits like Birkenstock, Alliance Animal Health, West Marine, and Boll & Branch. 

Also since 2019 a new old competitor has entered the pancake-on-the-go war: The Artist Formerly Known As Aunt Jemima (TAFKAAJ). Yes, I refer to the Pepsi-owned Pearl Milling Company, which dropped Aunt Jemima in 2020 and now everything is racial harmony and lollipops in America. They've now climbed into the ring with a very similar and similarly priced nukeable pancake in a disposable cup. 

Today we face two important questions: 1) Is Kodiak still good, or has the small family company been ruined by evil capitalist investors? And 2) Who has the better pancake in a cup? 

We'll sample the challenger first. 

The challenger comes up strong--by coming up strong. The little bit of dry ingredients and quarter-cup of water has baked up into this fluffy structure. Includes a delicious pancake scent to help wake up the kiddies. 

Tough sponge shown here, as is common with microwave baking generally. It easily clumps off the spoon. But the taste is very good, totally pancakeish, and this blueberry variety contains little blueberry bits that rehydrated nicely during the 70-second nuke. It is rather dry, though, and like normal pancakes cries out for some kind of syrup. The cup helpfully recommends using some Pearl Milling Co. fake maple syrup, but that defeats the whole "pancake to go" concept, especially if you drop a clump off your spoon as I did. You'd wind up with a sticky mess all over the inside of your Corolla. 

And now the reigning champ: 

Oooh, not nearly as much rising on the Kodiak flapjack. Could be a result of the higher protein that Kodiak advertises in its products. Might this be a problem?

No, the champ looks good coming out of the cup. Still, the proof of the pudding, etc. How does it taste?

Result: For road pancakes (and I don't mean crushed squirrels), the Kodiak is superior. This product has little maple nubs in it that take the place of syrup, so you get a moist and flavorful bite. Nutritionally (and does anyone really care if he's eating pancakes?) the Kodiak is higher in calories, but does have more than double the protein, which may make you feel less logy than pancakes normally do. (Just for the record, I did not eat both of these products on the same day. I have enough trouble staying awake during work.)

The winner and still champion of the mobile pancake is... Kodiak!

Wildflower myths.

If you grew up anywhere where there was grass -- and yes, in the outer boroughs of New York we had lawns -- you undoubtedly heard some floral myths in your childhood gatherings with the other knuckleheaded kiddos. The best known one is probably that you can make a wish while blowing the seeds off the white top of the dandelion. 

Well, you can make a wish, but don't expect a response. Wishes don't come true, kids! Wishes are stupid! All you did was spread those stupid weeds around some more. Thanks a lot.

I have enough dandelions on the lawn this year to make a billion wishes, and as they say, if wishes were fishes, we'd be up to our necks in herring. Or something like that.

Somewhat less common myths about the flowers on my vast estate include the following:

BUTTERCUP

The dumb myth about the buttercup is that if you hold it up to your chin and it reflects a yellow glow, that means you like butter. Well, duh. Everyone likes butter. Even vegans like butter, although they think it's bad for the cows and maybe us. I'm surprised when I recall being afraid the buttercup would turn my chin yellow and expose my illicit butter love to the world. The way my old man ate butter (half a stick or more per corn on the cob, please) (and he was rail-thin), a buttercup would have made him look completely yellow if there was any truth to the myth.

There may have also been some myth about the buttercup revealing your true love, but that was definitely girl stuff and, in those days, girls were known by the CDC to be infected by cooties. Although the nice ones maybe not so much. And the cute ones.

HONEYSUCKLE

The myth here was that if you picked the flower, bit off just a tip at the end, and sucked on the flower, it would taste like honey. It does not taste like honey. It tastes like a flower. It's not bad, but it's not honey. Fortunately the flowers are not poisonous, and are in fact edible. 

Clearly the confusion exists because of the name, but the name really means what it says. Merriam-Webster says it originated from "Middle English honysoukel clover, alteration of honysouke, from Old English hunisūce, from hunig honey + sūcan to suck," so it's been in the mix all the time. It still doesn't taste like honey.

Kids would pretend to like the taste of the flower, but the flowers don't taste like much. It was a sort of gang obedience, wee tots' peer pressure. "Yeah, it's delicious!" Eh, not so much. But sometimes it's easier to pretend and go do something more fun than to disagree and start an argument.

I sometimes think that in the story of the emperor's new clothes, the kid who sees that the emperor is naked wouldn't necessarily shout the fact, but would instead strip down to his birthday suit and yell "Lookit me! I'm an emperor, too!" and go marching after him. I knew a few kids like that. I think some of the adults I know now would do that, actually.

⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕

Those are a couple of myths about backyard plants of which I know. Got any of your own? Share them in comments!

Busy bee.

This week has been the craziest week of work since I went freelance. Which is good, because I need the dough. Don't you want to make more money? Sure, we all do!

So I've been a busy little bee this week, barely able to compose this blog. Why, this week alone, I:

• Proofread War and Peace -- not the Tolstoy one; this was written by Herb J. Zietlinker and is much longer.
• Fact-checked Funk & Wagnall's New World Encyclopedia -- "Gk through Gz" was particularly troublesome.
• Felt a little muscular so cut down a couple of sequoias and built a community outhouse in the park.
• Copyedited the new Molly Yeh cookbook, 1,750 Recipes that Prove I Am Not Just a Web Influencer But Really Can Cook (Honest!).

I think I may actually be busier than many bees. Here are some for comparison purposes. 

Notice that these honeybees just sit there motionless on your screen. Also, they're so lazy that they're in black-and-white. I'm starting to think bees' industry is overrated. 

Anyway, all of the things I was doing interfered with the things I wanted to be doing, such as writing novels, commenting on the Great Lileks's site, promoting Fredcoin (the only cryptocurrency with Yippee! Yappee! and Yahooey!), or taking a shower. You know, it's those little things that make life more enjoyable. Next week should be less onerous.

Boot burglar.

You may recall that last year baby dog Izzy annihilated my L.L. Bean duck boots. Ripped the inside out of one of them, chewed the toe clear off the other. He made a fine job of it, yes sir. 

He's gotten much better about destroying things that belong to others since then. His own toys he can and does destroy, but he's mostly left my shoes alone. 

But then.... WHO DID THIS?

On the left, my injured shoe. On the right (camouflaged by the wood) are bits of leather and the leather shoelace. 

I have tended to leave these boot/shoes on the porch, to avoid tracking in mud or anything else, or leaving them in the way of still-untrustworthy Izzy. Sure, I've been a little concerned that some bum, hobo, transient, bindlestiff, or vagrant might make off with them, but our place is outside of the main town area, and the fellows mentioned tend to be too lazy to come this way. But the other morning at four, large dog Tralfaz wanted to go out to relieve himself, and of course MeToo, FOMO dog, a.k.a. Izzy, did as well. Fazzy immediately centered on a spot on the lawn, and in the darkness I feared some skunk or rabbit had expired there. But no -- it was my sorely pressed duck boot. 

Was it a stray dog? That fox who's been hanging around? Someone's cat? A BEAR? Okay, not a bear, or the shoe would have been consumed and pooped back out. I've seen a lot of that fox of late, but chewing on a human shoe seems like a very domesticated thing to do. 

So it's a bit of a mystery, and I'm not likely to solve it. Considering that large hallmuffin Tralfaz was sleeping inside the front door, right next to the crime scene, and made no alert, I'm not going to catch the villain in the act. What kind of a security team do I have here, anyway?

Hailstones the size of kumquats.

Monday turned into a dark and stormy afternoon. 

Suddenly, a shot rang out! 

No, that's not right. What happened was, we were warned that there might be strong winds, and hailstones up to 1" in diameter. Which is great if you own a Safelite franchise, but not too good for the rest of us. Later the hail forecast was revised down to maybe hail the size of peas, but as it turned out we just got wind and heavy rain. All gone in three hours. 

But I have to say: What is wrong with these people? Don't they know that meteorological phenomena are supposed to be compared to sporting equipment? It's tumors that get compared to fruits and vegetables. 

I've seen that remark elsewhere, but I am dead certain I first heard the observation out of George Carlin, then America's foremost observer of cultural language oddities, speaking with Don Imus on the latter's radio show. Carlin also noted how bizarre it would be if things got mixed up, like if the forecast called for hailstones the size of testicles. I think we can agree that would get our attention, though.

I have found that this observation holds true almost 100% of the time. People mentioning their operations say that the tumor or cyst of whatever that was removed was the size of a grape, an orange, a grapefruit, etc. But hailstones, which really are the only meteorological items that fit, come in sizes such as golf ball, baseball, and so on. 

This does put our local forecaster in a spot, though, because what sporting good is the size of a pea? What could he have told us Monday? Hailstones the size of the top of a golf tee? That doesn't do it. Sadly, small hailstones defy the common naming conventions. 

If you have any ideas for other small sizes in which hailstones may occur, please note them in comments. As for me, the day it's raining watermelons is the day I hide in church and wait for Jesus to come back.  

You take the bad with the good.

 

Washday!

Mondays were traditionally known as washday in the Western world. Sundays were the dress-up church days, the days to feast, and for those in domestic work (wives, daughters, servants), everything from table linens to undies got the treatment in the kitchen on Mondays. With everything being done by hand, and water heated on the woodstove, it was a much different process than it is now. 

Thank God, ingenuity, and capitalism that we don't have to do it that way anymore. 

Some people still hate dealing with laundry, and I can understand that. If you have to fetch the teens' perilously odiferous clothes from all over the room -- God forbid they should use the hamper -- you might resent the work, and you might almost wish for the old laundry pot on the woodstove, because at least you could boil the stink out of Junior's socks. 

If you have to use a Laundromat, or a communal laundry in your building or complex, you might also find it a heinous chore, stuck outside the home with anyone wandering by to watch you fold your unmentionables. My first apartment was a mother-in-law type arrangement that actually had a washer and dryer, but when the landlord threw me out to get his actual mother-in-law in the place, my next bachelor pad had no such amenity. I had to take my clothes down to one of the local laundries and sit there while they went round and round.

Except for the schlepping, it wasn't so bad, though. I'd go on a Tuesday or Wednesday night, when nothing much was going on. It was quiet enough so I could read there. During baseball season I could run across the street to a bar and watch the ball game for a while. But I had to make sure I got back before my quarters ran out. Once in a while someone comes up with the bright idea to open a combination laundry/bar, but we never had one where I lived in the city. 

I like doing laundry now. I have a washer and dryer off the kitchen, not downstairs in the unfinished crypt, and let's face it -- this is one chore now where the machine does most of the work. If I had a machine that could clean my refrigerator, I would be using it every week.  

Salute to the police.

Today is Peace Officers Memorial Day, a day established by the Fraternal Order of Police to commemorate those who have been killed in the line of duty. In this house, we salute them and we thank them for their work in an all-too-often deadly vocation.

Readers interested in the real perils and human costs police work in this stupid era of ACAB and black-clad fascist "antifascists" will find a lot to ponder in the book Shots Fired: The Misunderstandings, Misconceptions, and Myths about Police Shootings, by Joseph K. Loughlin (former assistant chief of police for the City of Portland, Maine) and true-crime author Kate Clark Flora. 

This book is not a wad of "copaganda"; it is a realistic, sometimes grim attempt to explain to the general audience what officers go through in deadly encounters. It also is a powerful and thorough answer to questions many of us have after shootings by police, such as why the police fire so many bullets in such encounters, why they didn't shoot to wound instead of kill, and the old Hollywood favorite, why they didn't shoot the gun out of the suspect's hand. (Which is fine if you're the Waco Kid; otherwise, oy.) 

The authors tell real officers' stories of all sorts of deadly events, as well as the aftermath on the perpetrators, victims, and the officers themselves. One chapter, "Sometimes They Won't Stop," is about the manhunt for the Boston Marathon bombers in 2013, and if you look up harrowing in the dictionary you might find that chapter. At the time of noted asshole Dzhokhar Anzorovich Tsarnaev's capture, all I knew was that the police had shut down a large section Watertown (which enraged a couple of conservative commentators) but they got Dzhokhar while his asshole brother went out in a blaze of glory. I had no idea just how involved and terrifying the situation was. 

The effects of encounters that end with the death of the suspect upon the officers themselves are long-lasting. In old cop shows a detective might blow a punk who has it coming away and go back to work like nothing happened, but that's not reality. Even if there weren't all kinds of negative, even dangerous, public reactions in the wake of such things, even if there weren't politicians quick to sell out their own cops, and even if a fatal shooting didn't guarantee being investigated up the wazoo, the officer involved can expect to get put through a wringer on several fronts by his own mind and by the department. When the authors tell me that the police at large are desperate to de-escalate and not draw a weapon, I believe it. 

Shots Fired came out in 2017, after the Ferguson riots of 2014 but before the Floyd riots of 2020. You can just imagine how many more chapters could be added in a new edition.

I found the book gripping on every page, so of course I recommend it. And I recommend thanking a police officer on this day, even if you get pulled over for speeding. Traffic encounters can be the most deadly to police of all, which is one reason why they can be deadly to drivers as well. Living in a well-ordered society means that some public employees work in a war zone. 

Bug off.

 

The Wordle menace.

Once there was a guy named Wardle who wanted to do something nice for his gal, who loved word games. So he invented a little five-letter word guessing game he called Wordle. 

Well. 

Since then, as you probably know, that little game has become as addictive as crack and as big a fad as the Pet Rock. The brilliant little twist, allowing people to post results of the once-a-day puzzle without giving away the answer, makes it a natural for social media. Now people are playing it all over. Josh Wardle, the inventor, sold it to the New York Times, a former newspaper, for million. It's become hot enough to get lampooned by New Yorker cartoonists. 

But more than that, it's been ripped off mightily. Wardle's idea was not entirely original (see, for example, the TV game show Lingo, which originally aired in 1987), so while the Wordle name and design is trademarkable, the game is not. So now we have Facebook's own Daily Word Puzzle, which is available as a five-, six-, and seven-letter game. 

Then there's WordHurdle, which has five-, six-, and the even tougher four-letter variant. Four-letter words don't run through letters as fast, and there are many four-letter words, so that version is the trickiest. It can inspire you to say your own inappropriate four-letter words. The site also has a game called Phrazle, in which you have to guess an entire phrase.

For a real challenge, there is the evil Antiwordle. In that game you don't win; you just try to stay alive as long as you can by not guessing the right word. The problem is, when you use a letter that isn't in the word you can't use it again; when you use a letter that is in the word, you must use it again; and when you use a letter that's in the word in the right position, you must use it there again. My worst score so far is three; my best is fifteen.

And even that's just the beginning. Quordle has you solve four five-letter Wordle-type word puzzles at the same time using the same letters.

Octordle has you solve eight five-letter word puzzles at the same time using the same letters.

This just opens the door for Hexadecordle, you realize. 

I have only played it once, but there's also Lewdle for dirty words only. (They call their own repository of possible answers the "Dicktionary.")

Words not your bag? Well, there's Nerdle for math kids, or Globle and Worldle for geography fans. By now there's probably Nukedle for atomic weights and Spacedle for constellations and Xdle for algebra and Garble for gibberish. I can't keep up with them all. 

Where will it all end? It'll fade at some point, when the smart kiddies who made Wordle a hit go on to something else. Management at the Times will panic, and in trying to "improve" Wordle will ruin it, just as they did with their newspaper. And then we'll go on to some other damn thing, I guess. 

Fredcoin: It's Catchy!

Yes, friends, I have an exciting message for all of you investors or soon-to-be investors in the world's greatest cryptocurrency, Fredcoin! 

Perhaps you've put your hard-earned cash into Fredcoin and are wondering what I, Fred, am doing to bring in other investors. Perhaps you're on the fence about slinging your shekels into Fredcoin. Well, I'm happy to tell you that we have yet another advantage other cryptos don't. 

"Gee, Fred," I hear you say, "you already offer many of the features associated with other cryptocurrencies -- silly name, dubious enterprise, shady practices, potential catastrophic loss of investment, bizarre business plan -- what can you offer that the other guys don't?"

And I say: A jingle!

Yes, I have been in conference with Top Men in the "ad game" to bring out this exciting and totally original jingle to promote Fredcoin. Are you ready? Hit it, Doc!

Diamonds! Daisies! Snowflakes!
Fredcoin!
Chestnuts! Rainbows! Springtime!
Is Fredcoin!
It's tinsel on a tree!
It's everything a cryptocoin should be!

Sable! Popcorn! White wine!
Fredcoin!
Gingham! Bluebirds! Broadway!
Is Fredcoin!
It's Fred's alone but luckily for you
If you have some cash to blow
Some sacks of cash to blow
Then you'll buy Fredcoin too!
Fredcoin!

Isn't that awesome? Just send me some of that silly old U.S. currency and we'll get you its investment in Fredcoin right away. Also includes our terrific investors' kit to get you started, including an 8-track tape explaining my investment philosophy, a valuable Fredcoin matchbook, and the booklet "Why Fred? Why Now?" So write today and get wealthy the Fredcoin way!

Beep, honk.

It's been said about Illinois and Massachusetts and New York and I guess anywhere that winter is an issue: There are three seasons here -- fall, winter, and construction. 

Well, yesterday I had to make a drive to Pennsylvania, and on the way I found that here in New York, construction season is in high gear. And I haven't put up any of my decorations yet!

I tend to be a lot more patient with construction delays than other causes of traffic jams, partly because I sympathize with the guys working, but also because there's a feeling that things are ordered and not in horrible chaos. An accident with blood and heads rolling on the pavement -- well, that's going to take a while to clean up. A crime scene where a meth addict ran into a school bus while being chased by the troopers is going to require everyone and his brother on the scene for medical help and to make sure the evidence against the guilty idiot is preserved. A massive road failure like the collapse of an overpass? Might as well hunker down and take a nap, drivers.

But regularly scheduled constructions projects with flagmen and drivers doing a courteous zipper merge? May take a while, but we'll get there. We just hope we don't have to pee while we're waiting....

21 years of bad luck.

My wife got a new vanity, which means she has a much nicer place to apply her makeup and such. So the mirror over the old bureau was sentenced to the trash collectors.

It's one of those trifold mirrors, so you can be discouraged by your reflection in three different angles. 

You know the type.

I've mentioned before that our garbagemen will take anything -- anything but a solid-iron basketball hoop bracket, that is. It's the only thing I have seen them refuse. So I duly schlepped the mirror(s) out to the curb for pickup. 

But then the old paganistic superstitious side of me piped up and said, "They're gonna bust that mirror. Are you consigning them to seven years of bad luck? No, wait, twenty-one years? Or will it just redound to you, since you're the one making them do it?"  

So then I wondered how we got into the superstition about broken mirrors and the very specific sentence of seven years' bad luck for the crime. 

According to an article by the University of South Carolina's Barry Markovsky, Romans first made mirrors from polished metals and "believed their gods observed souls through these devices. To damage a mirror was considered so disrespectful that people thought it compelled the gods to rain bad luck on anyone so careless." As for the seven years, Romans "believed that the body renewed itself every seven years," so once your body had been replaced entirely from the time of the breakage, you would be a new person and unbound by your disrespectful act. 

Were the Romans nutty about this? Maybe they were just off by a few years. You may have heard the estimate that 98 percent of our body's atoms are replaced every year, and if you want to go down the quantum rabbit hole on this, be my guest. I ain't got time for that now. 

I can only say that I don't believe the Roman gods are watching me through the mirror, so I eschew the notion that I'm going to have bad luck until 2043 if those three mirrors break. In fact, I'd wager that if I do have bad luck until then, it’s just my own bad karma, that's all. 

New tree.

Mr. Philbin asks if I'm going to post a photo of the new tree. He hinted in a way that seemed to indicate I would be letting down the side if I didn't, having dragged you all through the traumatic loss my thundercloud plum through old age and black knot, then through the pulling out of the stump with chains and the final removal of the stump itself via root & stump picker, leaving a large hole that remained unfilled for weeks. 

I said Sir, you insult me. I left out many of these grim details when I told the story. But yes, I will invite readers to see the new red maple I put in the hole last week. And here it is. 

I know it's kind of underwhelming. Even the hole looks bad. 

The hole will be improved when I get some more dirt and some mulch this week. The tree, well -- time takes time. 

I have gotten some good plants from the big garden chains, but in this case I wanted to go to a local place with a good reputation. You know what that means: 💸💸💸 But it was worth it. The tree is more than six feet tall now, and was trained with an eight-foot-long bamboo stick, so it's straight as an arrow. Its leaves are fresh and stuck on pretty well. I won't say I got a bargain, but if it lasts as long as the other maples nearby, it could be amortized to a few bucks a year. Well worth it for the shade, the water and soil retention, and the beautification of the property. Holes in the ground usually don't lead to better property value, unless they're small and on the putting greens.

My wife winced when I told her that this hole project (har!) cost about $400, beginning to end, and it didn't make me want to jump up and cheer either. But, c'est la tree. Only God can make a tree, says Mr. Kilmer, but it was up to me to buy the thing. 

Moms!!!!!!!

Happy Mother's Day to all those moms out there! 

My mom was a pretty tough lady, God rest her soul, and indeed she had to be. There were many times we kids were threatened with death, severe violence, or abandonment at a Dickensian orphanage. In my opinion, a child that doesn't get that kind of thing from his mom (the threats, not the follow-through) is not trying hard enough. Or his mom is a perfect saint. 

I won't go into the usual blah blah blah about the history of Mother's Day and how the creator regretted her creation -- you can read that anywhere today. For that matter, many mothers regret their creations from time to time. Instead, I wanted to point out the other holidays or special commemorations that occur around Mother's Day. 

Now, it's no coincidence I'm sure that Lilac Sunday occurs on the second Sunday of May every year, just like Mother's Day. Or that Iris Day is celebrated on May 8, which is always close to Mother's Day if not smack on it. Well, maybe it is a coincidence, but with all the flowers bought for moms on this day, I doubt it. I may not smell a rat, but I can smell a flower.

National Hospital Week and National Women's Health Week both start today, which is an obvious tie-in to Mother's Day. For most of us, Mom is our #1 healthcare provider in our early years, and so we worry about her own health. There seems to be a connection. For that matter, May 8 is World Red Cross Day. And who gave you more bandages that Mom? 

Also, May 8 is National Outdoor Intercourse Day, and that's one way to become a mom. I wonder if anyone goes around claiming that he loves camping because Mom and Dad conceived him in Yosemite? Wouldn't surprise me. 

May 8 is also supposed to be National No Socks Day, a day when we parade around sans socks. This would seem to be another rite-of-spring type event, but wait! May 9 is Lost Sock Memorial Day! Now we start to see the connection. Moms do most of the laundry even in these enlightened times; No Socks Day may just be a means to cover the fact that so many socks, tragically, have been lost. And so it's no surprise that May 10 is Clean Up Your Room Day, when kids are supposed to get all the crap cleaned out and straightened up, and undoubtedly many lost socks will be found. Do it for Mom, children!

Whether on purpose or by happenstance, there are many reasons this week to think about our mothers and all the misery through which we put them. Get your mom something nice, if you can. And if, like mine, your mom has gone to her rest -- well, with rotten kids like us, she probably earned it, and God bless her. 

I take it back.

All right, all right, I take it back. I'm not going to go out and kill everything this spring. It seems Nature has been reading this blog and decided to teach me a lesson yesterday. 

If nothing else, the rhododendrons have been spectacular this year. Further, though, I've hardly seen a single wasp on them -- but I have seen plenty of bumblebees. We're fond of those guys; they actually rated a hard B on my grading of backyard bugs some years ago. 

They've been called flying pandas, and it's hard to disagree. 

Next, I was with Izzy in the backyard when we saw a little ball of gray fuzz. Was it some weird and likely poisonous fungus? No, it was a tiny mouse that skittered away from us, but not very far. He didn't seem to be very good at being a mouse yet. I mean, the dog isn't so likely to see him when he's still, but I could, and Izzy could surely sniff him out. But I let the mouse go because he was cute. That's how they get you, you know -- one tiny one is cute, 500 tiny ones or one huge one are a nightmare. But let it be for now.

The last event of the day also happened in Izzy's company, as we emerged from the front door and saw traffic stopped in both directions and a couple of guys milling about. It seems there was a huge turtle in the middle of the road. He likely was heading for the pond across the street, and ran out of gas on the meridian. Fortunately I had not put my snow shovel in the garage yet (yes, we've had snow in May) and I managed to get the chap off the road and into the grass on the other side. Only flipped him over twice. Not that he looked particularly grateful. 

So there's my wildlife story --  Mutual of Omaha's Suburban Kingdom -- but rest assured that while I no longer wish to kill everything out there, there are many things that will perish if they cross my path. Yellowjackets, you've been warned. 

Spring! Time to kill.

Spring is here! We're almost done with temperatures in the thirties and the risk of snow! We've had snow in May around these parts, so I don't discount the possibility. However.

Time to get the rubber mats off the porch steps -- walk at your own risk, suckas! Time to figure out which of last summer's gorgeous plants have up and died. And time to KILL KILL KILL!

What am I planning to kill? Better to ask what am I NOT planning to kill. Mwa ah ah!

1) Weeds. Weeds on the lawn. Weeds on the walkway. Weeds in the cracks on the driveway. Weeds on the sidewalk. Weeds in the woodpile. Weeds on my chinny chin chin. All the weeds. Dead! 

2) Bugs. Wasps' nests. Ants' nests. Termites' nests. Individual spiders. Worms. Flies. Ticks. Gnats. Fleas. Dead!

3) Groundhogs. Kill or chase away. I'm tired of their sinkholes in the lawn. I have purchased some smokers that will send them running or kill them. Kill them DEAD! 

Ah, but even in the depth of this murderous depravity is the spark of life. My dead tree is gone, the stump finally removed, and yesterday I put a young red maple in its place. It looked so large in the SUV, so small on the lawn near its larger mates. I planted it with tenderness and care. I will mind it and bring it to root in its new home. 

And if it dies, I'm spraying the lawn with Agent Orange and calling it a day. Paint it green! Pave the Earth!

Axcents.

As you may know, I grew up within the friendly confines of the Five Boroughs, raised by parents who had grown up in Brooklyn and Queens. My father was a real dese-and-dose guy, possessor of a classic accent most associated with New York. A friend of mine had fun with the meme generator regarding the way we speak:

The last one's an expression rather than an accent, but ask anyone who grew up before 2000 in the city what they call ground beef and you're likely to be told chop meat.

The New York accent has spread to New Jersey, counties of the lower Hudson Valley, and a good ways out into Long Island, as the blue-collar population moved to the 'burbs in fits and starts in the postwar era. But what we think of as the New York City accent is much different from what people in the Civil War period considered a New York accent. I don't know much about it, but some examples of now-extinct northern American speech are detailed here.  

What people consider a street-level New York accent was spread and has been perpetuated by the movies. Wise-crackin' cabbies, surly cops, gum-chewin' secretaries, tough private eyes, all kinds of New York City working stiffs populated the pictures, and America loved 'em. 

Curious accentologists will find a good summary at a Wikipedia page, believe it or not. It notes that some of the classic features formerly associated with the New York accent, like goil for girl, are extinct in practice. I suspect that the spread of Italian Brooklyn accents in New York wiped that out, making the New Yorker sound less like Moe and Curly ("a woise guy, eh?") and more like Vinnie Barbarino ("Whussup?"). 

Obviously the city has been crisscrossed with different ethnicities and languages and foreign accents over the centuries, making an ever-changing mélange. I wouldn't want to be a professor of this stuff, because by the time you catalog it, it's different. O. Henry wrote of New York, "It'll be a great place if they ever finish it," but that will never happen any more than the accent will stay put.