6 of May

We peddle a lot of nostalgia these days.

A few years ago, Facebook stole my idea and began telling me about things that had happened on the same calendar date in previous years.

We enjoy the synchronicity of same dates. Although cosmically comically meaningless, humans seem to enjoy calendrics (autocorrected to “cake drive” = 🥮🚗)

On this notable day in Milwaukee sports, when the Bucks have taken a solid 3-1 lead in the Eastern conference semifinals (and at a time when people are actually paying attention to the Bucks!), and the Brewers are poised to beat Max Scherzer, I look back on my May 6th.

Arcia and Gamel each with 2 hits tonight, Giannis was a monster tonight (becoming only the second Milwaukee Buck in history to score 35+ points and get 15+ rebounds in a playoff game - and the only person not named Kareem to do that.)

It’s heady times here. 

So It Goes

It's with a heavy heart that we said goodbye to our dear friend, Rex Grossman, this week.

Eleven and a half years ago, Rex entered our newly married lives in Omaha, Nebraska.  I feel sure that i remember that Rex was born on a farm in Council Bluffs, Iowa (Brooke thinks it was in Nebraska) on the 27th of November 2006.

He survived orthopedic surgery on his right foreleg in his first year of life and moved to Milwaukee, coincidentally, when we did in the summer of 2007.

Rex was a ridiculously good looking dog.  In his early years, he would literally stop traffic, with drivers pulling over and getting out of their cars to meet him and ask what kind of dog he was (Beagle / Boston Terrier aka a Boglin Terrier).  Rex enjoyed riding in cars - when those people stopped he often seemed to think they were there to get him and he would try to jump into their cars.  (This was also often our method for catching Rex when he was still a runner and we'd have to flag down strangers and ask them to open their car door to coax him in and allow us to recapture him).  In so many ways Rex's stay with us seemed like a temporary, fleeting thing and he seemed to think that he was soon to be on to something else - to his next big thing.

In subsequent years, Rex became acquainted with Doctor Singh, whose summer cabin i expect we largely funded.  Rex survived a toy-induced blockage surgery, mysterious intestinal strangulation (possibly caused by an allergic reaction to avocados), death by chocolate when he ate Grandpa's Christmas gift from under the tree, an eventually explicable summer of malaise in 2013 (caused by a toothpick that had lodged itself under his skin for several months), and finally a prostate cancer diagnosis in September of 2017.

Reading this list of historical woes that Rex went through, it probably seems we were bad human caretakers for a pet.  We weren't, but things often seem other than they are.  Rex often seemed like a bad dog... screaming and crying loudly anytime we were in public (or in a car).  Pulling incessantly on walks.  Reliably emptying out the bathroom garbage can if ever we left the house and forgot to put it on the toilet seat.  Rex often seemed to sullenly slink away upstairs to lie under the bed when we were home.  He generally shied away from hugs and kisses.  But all of this, i think, was a complex psychological game that Rex was playing, because, vorallerdings, Rex was a genius dog.  A jock who loved playing ball more than life itself and a prototypical 'bad boy', but very self aware (a high IQ and high EQ, as it were).

Rex had a deep and abiding love of Harley Davidson motorcycles - he would sit and watch as one rode by if we were on a walk, or look out the window as one passed us on the highway.  We're pretty sure that Rex was a tough biker dude who had been reincarnated as a cute little puppy dog as karmic payback for a tough life knocking peoples skulls together.  For certain, this life wasn't Rex's first go round.  He was an old soul, and wise beyond his years.

Rex Grossman was a good dog... the best of dogs.  He was our dear friend.  We often called him "our lodger", because he seemed more like a stranger who had come to stay with us than a family member (that's why he had his own last name!).  He became a part of our pack and we a part of his. 

We will miss him, and will howl at the moon for a good long while in his honor.  Aooooo!

Roman Numeral J Greatest Hits: 7 May 2007 - 18 June 2007

Throughout most of the month+ prior to my previous post I had a lot of fine ideas for blog entries, but just never got around to blogging them... I'm sure many of you wasted precious moments checking the blog for updates and i want to try and make it up to you, Faithful Reader, by providing you with a sampling of discarded blog entry ideas, that never came to fruition. Enjoy!

I Would Like to Be a Sell-out
Over Memorial Day Weekend, brooke & i decided we needed to lighten our load before the move to Milwaukee and we had a neighborhood yard sale, at which we tried (and to a large extent succeeded) to sell off several of our large items and a good many small pieces of crap.
We advertised in the World Herald (and oddly enough got free Whopper coupons because of it) and people came from all over to view and haggle over our garbage.

At the time it occured to me that i was simultaneously selling a good many books and was pretty well willing to part with almost anything i own for the right price. I'm not into stuff... i'm just into money.

So, my idea was that i would try and market a sweet cruiser bike, a versatile glass-top desk, and some of my books on Amazon Marketplace in an attempt to make a little money off the blog...

Suddenly It's all Good

I meant for this post to be about how just as we were preparing to leave Omaha, everything about it seemed to be getting better and better.

The farmer's market produce was improving, getting better produce each week, the weather was lovely, the College World Series was just getting underway and Shakespeare on the Green was looming. At the same time, we were mentally preparing ourselves for taking what would likely be our last leave of Omaha by going to all the bars, restaurants, and events we'd always meant to get to, but somehow missed like Taste, Tanduri Fusion (which we highly recommend), and Omaha's most recent addition, The Slowdown.

The Slowdown is Saddle Creek's new facility and their grand opening featured a number of great hipster bands (Connor Oberst played a "secret" Thursday night pre-opening show). The place is fantastic, with a balcony, pit & ample seating both near and away from the music (so you can actually have a conversation while a bad band is playing...) Slowdown also features games to play, pool, and some of those sweet garage door-style windows for nice days and would be great for seeing a band at or just hanging out at. The crowd, at least those first two days, wasn't the typical Saddle Creekers, however, mostly, i think, because it was too clean and not enough of a dive...

The crowd was a mix of older folks who go to check out all the new "things & events" in Omaha and the exceedingly young variety of hipster who are convinced nobody who goes to Sokol drinks, they just go to dance... Then there was another type of person who i couldn't quite place... the sort of person who handed me this invite to a kegger, because he butted in fron tof me at the bar. But the music was fun, the lines were long, definitely cool stuff

Taste of Joel & Brooke

This was always going to be an ill-fated entry, but i had the idea to do a brief tour of all the food we'd had recently... Mostly at Taste of Omaha, which happened just before we left (see "Suddenly It's All Good"), Taste of Clinton (which featured somewhat less food and some last minute restaurant visits - really, it would have been a waste of your time, so it never materiealized.


Well, now you're all caught up with Roman Numeral J, thanks for riding along...

Turn my pants into shorts

It's March in Omaha, which means the sun is shining (onto the sun porch), it's occasionally uncomfortably hot both here and outside, and despite the idyllic weather, none of the bars in town have their outdoor seating set up yet.

Early on in our tenure here in Omaha, brooke heard a statistic on the radio (almost certainly false, but nonetheless exceptionally compelling) that Omaha had as many sunny days per year as Fort Lauderdale (or Fort Knox, or perhaps Miami Beach... i can't remember any more). On first moving to Omaha this seemed like an apollionic blessing. Omaha seems to have a lot less of the heavy, bleak, gray season that i remember growing up in southern Wisconsin, and later in Iowa and Minneapolis. Almost every memory i have of Clinton is gray-colored...

Awkward Off-Rythm Clapping on Both Sides of the Aisle

Alas, the finest of the candidates in some races didn't win through, but a moderately non-bad result to the evening's elections. The Democrats control the House of Representatives and the Senate is still up in the air as of this writing, but much closer than it was. Overall, it seems that people were slightly swayed by the story that they were displeased by "the way things were going", but some of the most interesting races have turned out disappointingly.

First off, all you Texans, shame on you for not electing Kinky Friedman as your next governor. What the hell, a former country singer and mystery novel writer & you pass? Granted, he refused to raise any money, not wanting to take part in the absolutely necessary bullshit of electioning, but still, Texas, i thought you were better than that.

And then the Republicans successfully re-elected their man, Joe Liebermann, to the Senate over pretty cool guy Ned Lamont. This win, i think, simply comes down to the fact that republicans, who have no souls, can vote strategically much more easily than Democrats (or even us Greens). They came out in great numbers (enough to elect a Republican governor soundly) & voted for Lieberman without even holding their noses, i think, because they knew, he was their man. Well, Connecticut, i'm sorry for your choice, it was the wrong one, but i know it wasn't the true sentiment, it was a team Right ploy that worked well.

I also found out, only just tonight, that Malachy McCourt was running for governor of New York. How could you not have chosen him, NY? he's Frank McCourt's brother. In all seriousness, though, this qualifies him to be a public servant more than most any other politician, republican or democrat, can claim.

In Nebraska it was a less-depressing experience than usual, with many of my local choices winning, several of the ballot Initiatives (Nebraska had more than any other state... that may or may not be true) going the right way... & even our house seat, still up in the air, though Esch will likely lose before the morning... He was so much closer than anyone thought he would be. Also, Doug Patterson appears to have garnered 5% of the vote for Secretary of State, thus giving the Green Party official status in Nebraska. Next cycle they can actually run candidates full time, rather than spending so much of their resources on ballot access. I hope that sticks. All in all, it's been, as i said, a slightly non-depressing evening of election results. It's hard to get very excited about anything that goes on with people that are so almost entirely opposed to the things i am for, but yes, the pseudo-left has won tonight, and that's better than the whole-assed right, so hooray.

Everyone go see Borat to celebrate...have some deviant sex, mock a deity, and wear some American Flag Underwear. This isn't a win, it's one of those wins where the other team misses the field goal in the closing seconds and you just say, whew, now we have to get serious (or else you lose to the Dolphins two weeks later).

Stuff It

Reinhabiting the Martha house has been more of a challenge for me than i expected it to be. This is mostly due to the fact that brooke and i have very different senses of style and stuff viability (sV).

Having taken 1 year in Chicago, while brooke stayed with her job in Omaha, she seems to have developed the sense that the Martha house, where we've both been since July 2003, is now her house, rather than our house as it formerly was...sort of. Part of the problem is the fact that having recently had a mid-sized wedding, we have an inordinate amount of new stuff, which necessarily requires space for it to be housed. This space is generally created by getting rid of old stuff. So far, very logical.

The problem is, i often have a very different sense of an items sV than brooke does. Our first major purchase after our wedding was a brand-spanking-new couch and chair for the living room. This made our old chair and couch obsolete, so we called St. Vincent's and had them come pick up the excess furniture. As it was being carted away, however, i was thinking about what a great couch this one had been. It had the rare commodity of being a couch i could completely stretch out on, great for sleeping, and we already owned it.

There is a hobbit term, which i can't verify at the moment (not having the trilogy on hand), called motham (i think), the idea being that it is an item currently in your possession for which you have no use, but you hold on to it with the idea in mind that it will be useful at some point in the future. Books, in particular, i am unable to part with, because i may need to refer to them at some point. Or a coaxial cable splitter, a 3-prong adapter, a set of James Arthur Vineyards wine glasses; at some point, i may want them again.

I know i am not alone in these thoughts of stuff. Sites like ebay, freecylcle and the amazon marketplace thrive on people wanting other people's old crap. This isn't the first time i've had thoughts like these, but now that i'm in the throes of a new round of throwing away and passing along, i just needed to think them out loud again. I like stuff, i enjoy it, and does anybody want the last two years of Entertainment Weekly's?

Omaha & Back

"...greatly exaggerated"

This moring, Brooke & i went to the Farmer's Market in Omaha's Old Market, and, after finding it painfully understocked & not buying anything we stopped to have a coffee & sat at an outdoor table... As we were sitting there, Kate, a girl i used to work at Metro Community College with, but didn't know very well, walked by. She was smiling and said, "I'm so glad to see you. I thought you had died." This struck me as odd, but i thought it might just be an expression... something like 'it's been so long,' just weirder, but then she went on to explain that she literally thought i was dead, because she'd heard that somebody named Joel who worked at Elkhorn (the Metro campus i worked at) had died, and she thought it had been me, since she didn't know my last name. She said she'd wondered what i'd died of, and how sad that was & was oddly apologetic that she hadn't come to what she thought had been my funeral (she used her baby as an excuse).

She imparted to me that she was very happy i wasn't dead, a point we could agree on & we parted amicably, if awkwardly... See you later

...and i just can't hide it.

I've arrived in Omaha safe & sound... A lovely flight after waking up to a 04:50 alarm (crazy) & a seat-mate who was great. She & i exchanged not one single word the entire flight (except i muttered "Gesundheit" when she sneezed, but i don't think she heard me, so it hardly counts). We were cordially & comfortably silent, it was great.

In other exciting news, because i am visiting Brooke, i have access to a digital camera for the weekend (hooray), so i can share real-time photos with you, my loyal readers. Instead of my 'found photo' blogging, you can see some actual photos of the stories i'm telling. ...