Stop, Commemorate and Listen

I got an email today from my Microsoft OneDrive storage drive, and its sole purpose was to have me remember my pictures that I took (or that I saved) on this particular day in history. At first I was bemused, and set out to craft a "get-off-my-lawn" style old man screed at the absurdity of technocratic induced nostalgia that we are currently living under... but then I saw this picture of Rex Grossman as a puppy, and was remembering this day in Iowa City in 2007 when he had his first coming out (we had met up with my parents & Tim & Jen & Family {and also, separately, with Nate & Lissa & Sandy & Angela} for Tim's Birthday).

This dog literally stopped traffic, with at least one occasion of a driver pulling over and getting out of their car just to greet & meet Rex on the side of the road before proceeding on with their errand & their day.

Man, I loved that dog...

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!

Drive

This year, I've driven across more than 2/3rds of the continental United States, from from Glendo, Wyoming to Bonita Springs, Florida; across the great state of Iowa; and around the bottom third of Lake Michigan; a bit around parts of Nebraska, Texas, New York and New Jersey.

   Source: googleMaps w/ Paint!

It's been a strange and sad year for our country, and it's not over yet, but on our recent arrival home from SouthWest Florida, I think that I won't be forging any new roads these last five weeks, so I offer my driving retrospective on 2017.

I love to travel, but a road trip is a special form of tourism.  Driving to or through a place helps you see it in a new way.  Interacting with local drivers (FIBs, the Pittsburgh Left, Georgians who don't like to be passed and speed up each time you move to the left lane to overtake them but then slow down once you're back behind them again, LA Wazers...) provides insight into the local culture. (The only better way to get in tune with a locality is to take public transit - to get around and see how people really live).

Brooke said to me (after we had just driven 21 hours to Florida for Rex Grossman's "Make-a-Wish" trip to swim and play ball in the ocean) that she loves the magic of an airplane ride... waking up one morning with your feet in an ocean, and returning home to sleep in your cozy bed during a blizzard that night (or vice versa).  I agree with this, but even when I do fly somewhere, I like to rent a car and traverse the local streets (see my video from my driving tour of Haiti in 2013 here!).

It seems un-related, but as i drove across this vast and disparate country of ours this year, I was gratified and alarmed to be reminded that we are both the nation of President Trump and the nation of President Obama.  We are such a complicated amalgam of a citizenry, it's kind of amazing that we can function (and have functioned) so well as to accomplish as much as we have.  It's not to say that there aren't massive wrongs that need righting, and injustices and indecencies and indignities that we can and should solve for - there are.  But it's not a small thing that we have created from this nation of mass diversity a grand, awesome, and terrifying power.

In my travels this year, i crossed the Mason-Dixon line, which is not a border (borderlands are thin, desperate places - see Black House by Stephen King and Peter Straub for some ideas about this), but is another cultural continental divide of sorts for us.  We once fought a Civil War over this divide, and i've heard it suggested that we are approaching a new kind of civil war in our country.  This one would not be fought along geographical or tribal lines, but a kind of neo-tribalism.  Artificial tribalism.  Managed and created tribalism.

But i didn't see that in my trips.  We are a disparate lot, and i encountered a lot of folks in my travels who were different from me - who were my Other.  But we were also united in common cause of friendliness and decency and civility.  It's not the people peppered across this land who are divided, it is the artificial divisions that are being thrust upon us by richer (not higher!) powers that are divisive.

(i expect there is more to come...)

Love li'l sandwiches

I love cucumber sandwiches. Saturday I picked up a few weird little cukes (one was called 'lemon' - I don't recall the name of the other one). Some thin-sliced radish, smoked salmon straight from Alaska (thanks in-laws)...

Oh, 1Q84, great book. Also, a celebratory vodka martini in honor of understanding and curing Rex Grossman's summer long meh-ness.  

Rex is Rex

Rex Grossman has been feeling a bit under the weather lately (see pic - note: er ist noch am leben - I know it looks a bit  like a chalk outline or some sort of ritual flooring).

He's doing well and we are once again indebted to Dr. Singh (side note to anyone in the Milwaukee Metro with a pet on the brink, Bayshore Vet in Shorewood is the best).  

** Update as of 7/10/13: Rex is back to 100% and acting normally.  We went to see Dr. Singh again today for a final check and his infection seems to have abated.  After a couple of routine vaccines, Rex was good to go, though, the promised 'sleepiness and lethargy' as a result of his shots did not come to pass...

Who's a good dog?

C'mon you Party People

In support of the overall sentiment of today's Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear and with the looming Mid-Term Selections, I've decided that now was the time to come out of my self-imposed Cone of Silence and/or Ambivalence.

Plus, Halloween is upon us again.  As some friends and I make our way around Milwaukee in T. Party garb (T-een Wolf, the Plain White Tees, Aarti Paarti, _____________), we will be working toward some of the same goals as Team Stewart-Colbert.


*   *   *

May 2019

Ah, 2010 - back when the conservative political insanity was fun...

I stand by this 2010 Halloween pub crawl theme, though our compatriots were less political in their costume and messaging than Brooke and me (although if you look closely at Grant's sign, it's a Christine "I'm not a Witch" O'Donnell reference!). 

Rex was a bit confused and just dressed up as a pumpkin... maybe he's a pumpkin spice tea?

I do recall in seeing this picture that Bethany was going as "Sal-T-Hit Girl" (the Morton's Salt Girl crossed with Hit Girl from Kick Ass).  I have no recollection of what Grant's costume is.

Bright New Day

Greetings faithful reader(s) (Perhaps i have unfortunately downgraded you to checkers, and for that i am sorry).

Here's what's going on in the exciting world of joel. I bought a new backpack. This may not seem terribly exciting to you, but it has changed my Milwaukee life. My previous backpack, which i purchased (had purchased for me, more likely) sometime in the early 90s finally decided it was time to hang it up. Actually, Rex ate one of the buckles and it became one of those 'single-shoulder back packs' that were such a fad in the late 90s/early aughts until they got into heavy drugs and ended up dying in a fiery, quite ugly riot (you remember, PackQuake 2003, i know, it hurts to remember, but we must).

Anyway, i'm back in pack. I can ride my bike again to get to school (i'm not really a good enough bike rider to carry my briefcase/shoulder bag thing), although i haven't yet, as my tires are flat. This situation really came to a crisis when my briefcase/shoulder bag thing started coming unbolted. Each day a new metal bolt thingy would pop off on my way to school. There were a total of 6 and by my last day i was down to 2, one on each side. I knew Ken didn't have much longer to go. So, i headed up to the mall & bought a new bag. I shelled out $8 for it, so i expect to get another 15 years out of this one. It's red, though. Who knows how much longer red will stay popular.

Anyway. That's my news (huh, did you ever notice that the word "news" contains the word "new"? It's like a pluralization of new. "What is new?" "What are news?")

**Note - My shiny new red bag actually ended up lasting me less than a year. I've now bought a new new backpack - 'Swiss Army Backpack' - which I've been using for the past month and a half. Hoping it lasts significantly longer. Don't trust a clearance backpack from Kohls...

And so, Milwaukee...

Once again, the interim has been far too long, but the times they are a-changin' and i've turned over a new beer-soaked leaf. Our move to Milwaukee is complete and though there are still many boxes to be unpacked and plenty of holes to be made in the walls, but last night Brooke, RexG & i walked six blocks and then directly into Lake Michigan (it was rainy & the water was freezing, so Rex was a bit unsettled {though he did try to drink most of it}).

En route to Milwaukee, we rendezvoused with Jackie in Iowa City at Bob's your uncle, a pizza cafe. We carried on to Clinton on Saturday and arrived at our new place in Milwaukee Sunday morning. An extra-special shout out of thanks to Grant, Liz, Ross, Shane & the Sahlstroms for making it possible for us to move everything we own.

Upon arrival we discovered that the house, which is exceeding cute & old-sy, was also previously leased by a complete slob. There was abandoned furniture, papers, soaps and lotions, and beers (a Coors Light & a Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy), most of which we threw out. After 15 man-hours of cleaning we were ready to move in... which we did. If Grant, Shane, and Liz were perhaps a bit dismayed at the number of bricks we own & moved, they didn't show it. They were tireless, if a bit winded, and we celebrated the move with a visit to the Oakcrest Tavern (established 2007), a decidedly non-dive bar in our neighborhood.

And so we are moved in, and starting to settle in. All are welcome anytime in Milwaukee. A housewarming is in the works, but feel free to come sooner (or later). The house is now clean
if cluttered... and ready for all comers...

The Birds and the Kitties

Ah, my young pup's getting all grown up. While still limping around the house, his condition is steadily improving and today we noticed for the first time that Rex is really starting to show some... ahem... interest.

Shortly after his arrival at the Martha house, Rex accrued a cat-shaped friend for Valentine's Day. His new friend speaks with a French accent and has a collection of slightly scandalous phrases. When the cat wags its tail, Rex (especially before his injury) enjoys wrestling and attacking, getting worked up and growling to assert his authority over the automaton.

Recently, however, Rex' "attacks" on kitty have changed. No longer confident in his direct assault, Rex has altered his tactics and incorporated "flanking maneuvers". The development is expected and natural, but it doesn't make it any more acceptable. Rex' overall plan (which is to say, our overall plan for Rex) includes being 'altered' sometime during puppy-dom, but with this week's surgery, we're not sure when the 'quick fix' option might be available to us, so more awkward moments are likely to come in our living room.

Rex Grossman is HOME!!! and seems to be doing smashingly. He’s still hobbled, to be sure, but everything we heard from the doctor was good news, he seems in a lot less pain, and isn’t on as many pain meds and has lost his glassy-eyed sadness he’s had the last several times we’ve saw him. He also came home from the vet with one of those E-Collars, because he's tempted by his bandages & stitches...

His limp is pronounced (but he’s moving around!), and he won’t be able to do stairs or jump off the couch for several weeks, but he’s back home with us, sleeping soundly at the moment. Every puppy expert we’ve talked to since getting Rex has told us that the most important thing is to introduce him to as many stimuli as possible as early as possible. So we take him in the car running errands, we've taken him to puppy class, introduced him to big dogs, little dogs, un-dogs (cats), and though his injury was hard to take and scary, he’ll likely be stronger for it in the long run. The wild, drug-addled experiences of youth are growing experiences for many of us and his time away from home, hard as it was on us, will likely make him even more comfortable with strangers than he already is. This event may not have cured Rex of his obsession with pant legs, but by the time he's fully recovered he will still be in the throes of his prime puppy years and more than ready to bounce off the walls again...

In the meantime, holding him in check, trying to yank back his desire to run and jump, his kitty wrestling have been hard to hold back.

By Example

Living up to the tradition of his namesake, our own Rex Grossman took a hard hit Saturday night. His front leg was fractured when he got caught up between my legs. I don't think i stepped on him, but whatever happened, he's down, early in his second season (spring).

Rex' vocal development has been impressive over the last 6 weeks or so and since Saturday he's been very expressive. In the great beagle tradition (half of Rex' ancestry) Rex has a wide array of barks, whines, and whimpers at his disposal.

Right after the accident happened we knew something more serious was wrong than his previous minor scrapes. His yelp was piercing and consistent, downright scary. After taking him to a 24-hour emergency vet, i've spent the last 36 hours fretting about permanant physical and psychological damage i've done to my puppy. Although he does seem to be feeling a bit better, he had to spend last night away from home and when i saw him this morning he looked sad (and stoned).

Though the final verdict is still out and Rex may ultimately require surgery, the doctor i spoke to this morning was optimistic and he could recover in as little as 2-3 weeks... an astoundingly short period of time, in my mind...

***

And, now, mid-post i've gotten a call from the doc & he does, indeed require puppy surgery (Rex, not the doctor). His prognosis is good, though, and he should look a lot better very soon indeed. Rex should be ready to win us a Super Bowl by next season...

Middling Iowa

We found ourselves in Iowa City, Iowa for St. Patrick's Day Weekend, due to a mixture of tightened budgets, familial uncertainty, and serendipity. My brother Tim had the notion to bring his family to meet up with my parents, Brooke, Rex Grossman, and me in the Amana Colonies' Wasserbahn resort. The colonies are pretty much exactly half way between Clinton, Wisconsin and Omaha and the Wasserbahn sign always looks very impressive.

Upon discovering, however, that a nightly rate for the WB hotel was approximately $14,000 Tim rethought the trip. While there was talk of my parents coming all the way to Omaha or cancelling entirely we persevered and settled on the Travelodge - Iowa City (as a side-note...click on the travelodge link and look at the picture of the bathroom {thumbnails below}. Look for a moment. Now, where is the camera?).

Not sure as to whether we'd actually go or not, Brooke and i (& Rex) settled on a single night at the hotel, thinking Iowa City only had, at most 12 hours of entertainment possibility. Serendipitously, however, my good friend nateG informed me that he had been accepted to Iowa's Mass Media program and he and lissa were thinking of making a trip to the big IC that very weekend. Additionally, jackie was also planning on being at home in Center Junction, Iowa (home of the Lib'ry Inn) and possibly making the 1 hour trip in for the St. Patrick's festivities in Iowa City.

So, we piled in the car and Rex made his longest car ride to date without incident (by which i mean peeing on us or the seat). Although having Nate & Lissa and Jackie (not to mention Sandy and Angela who live there) around probably distracted from our familial obligations, we did discover that Iowa City is a pretty damn cool town. From campus and it's old Capitol building to Masala Indian Vegetarian Cuisine to an It's Brothers satellite (untouched by us this trip) the life in Iowa City seems good. Though not as scenic, it reminded me of Decorah with just the right mix of townie life, hippie life, and college life (perhaps a little heavier on the collegial).

St. Patrick's Day started off promisingly enough, with Nate partaking in an afternoon green beer & joel tucking into a Guinness. After dinner and birthday cake with the family we headed back out to wander from bar to bar looking for open seats. The Deadwood bar was definitely a highlight, though the memory is as hazy as the air inside was. To cap off the night brooke, jax and i hit a trashy bar that may have been called the Hilltop where they were passing out Jell-O shots just before closing... a sort of parting 'one-for-the-road' sort of gift...except you pay for it. All in all, the bar scene in Iowa City mirrored the rest of the town, with a good balance of trashy, classy, hipster and poser. If you find yourself inexplicably in Iowa City, fear not for it has much to offer.

Thunder...THunder...THUnder

THUNderSNOW! Whoaaaaaaaa....

Have any of you ever seen thundersnow? Last night on the news the weatherman was talking about it and i was sort of like, yeahsurewhatever, but this morning at 5:24 am Omaha was racked (wracked?) by thundersnow and it was truly a sight to be seen. Blizzard-like snow conditions alongside the booming and crackling of a thunderstorm.

Because Rex Grossman can only occasionally make it through the night these days without having to get up and pee i was up at 3:40 & 4:45 at which time there was literally no snow on the ground and minimal sleet. An hour later (after the thundersnow had started) there was at least a foot and a half of snow on my sidewalk and apocalyptic signs all around...

Seeing the thundersnow was like this world-altering sort of moment, where you sort of think you know how things work, but now rules are being broken and you just have to accept them. It was a big snow storm, but then occasionally, interruptively, the sky would boom & proclaim a thunderstorm... but the snow & wind would continue. It was a very strange thing. We're most of the way dug out, though tomorrow is another snow day for almost everybody... The sight was truly mesmerizing. Two natural phenomena that simply don't belong together working together to impress me... Man i'm a lucky guy...

Gains & Losses

I buried my guinea pig today. Bitey Gilbertson, possibly the greatest guinea pig of all time has passed away.

2007 has been something of the proverbial roller coaster thus far and i've been in something of a funk, but i feel like the digging and filling of a hole in the ground has worked some therapeutic magic on me. So, as Jonas Mekas' project enters its 54th day i share the sparrow's feeling of freedom and release, with it comes the need to tell my story.

As i said, 2007 has already had its highs and lows. Gilbertson's passing was really hard to take. When we came back to Omaha after Christmas we noticed a sudden weight gain in him. After a couple of vet visits he had some treatment that was working on and off, but he wasn't himself. He died in his sleep, likely of a sudden heart failure.
That same weekend, Brooke's birthday, DaveT, Carolyn & Brigette were visiting and we accrued a new family member. Rex Grossman, a 2-month-old 'Bogle' (or perhaps a Boglin Terrier), came home Sunday afternoon. Part Beagle, part Boston Terrier, Rex seems to have gotten the best of both doggie worlds and is a fine looking, kinda gross, puppy. Aside from a nasty poop-eating habit the little guy is pretty cool.

On a related 2007 hi-low, January was spent watching my precious Bears win their way through to the Super Bowl and after Devin Hester's opening return i thought it was our year. But despite my obvious disappointment at the outcome they had an amazing run and i am actually excited for next year.

My first quarter of teaching at Metro Community College wraps up next week. The quarter went fairly well, though, i think what it was really good for was giving me an idea of how to do this next quarter. I've seen growth in several of my students and will likely only have to end up failing/giving incompletes to a couple of them.

It's also the season of graduate school news. Stanford wrote me to request that i kindly not go to school there, please, but i did get an acceptance letter of sorts from UW-Milwaukee. The last few days have been quite spring-y indeed and though i hear a wintering is coming this weekend, overall, things are looking up.