There are days when you're not too psyched about getting back to work -- you're having trouble selling a story, no one will write/call you back -- and then you discover YouTube videos of a cockatoo named Snowball dancing to Another One Bites the Dust. And then, inexplicably, your day just becomes . . . better.
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
There are times when I start to worry about where my life is headed. No, I haven't started drinking too much or hanging out with a biker gang. I'm worried about how amazingly happy it has made me to see that the city of Oakland has finally made good on its promise to send me a miniature green bin for recycling food scraps. If the sight of a small green bin at the bottom of my stairs can put me into a good mood for the morning, what's next? Shouldn't I be aiming higher?
Yup, apparently the sixth grade environmentalist inside me is alive and well, since about two months ago, a switch inside of me flipped and I became obsessed with the idea of recycling green waste. I think it may have had something to do with the copious amount of leeks I was consuming (leading to a copious amount of inedible leek stems) -- but whatever the trigger was, the result has been a mess: an assortment of plastic bags around the kitchen filled with strawberry stems and avocado pits that I leave around for a week till they start to smell. I'm not sure if they'd smell less if I put them into a green bin, but whatever. Something about it seems more hygenic, more secure. And it's a hell of a lot cuter than a plastic bag filled with rotting avocados.
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
So. I live near Lake Merritt, the so-called "jewel" of Oakland. (It's nice, all right, but for a jewel, it has more than its fair share of goose shit.) Nonetheless, I love the lake. Love walking around it, running around it, have even been known to paddleboat on it. The one thing I can't imagine doing on it is actually touching the water. I was upset, therefore, a few months ago when I saw two parents standing on the sandy/goose-infested beach by the bandstand urging a small child in water wings -- presumably their offspring -- to go swimming. Horrifying. I considered calling child services.
Anyway, all that is neither here nor there. What I really wanted to write about is a mystery of Lake Merritt: Today, Peter and I were driving past it and we caught sight of a floating platform in the middle of the lake (itself a strange sight) with an outhouse sitting on it. Yes. Floating platform with outhouse, moored in the middle of Lake Merritt.
I do not understand what is going on. True, tomorrow is the yearly "Lake Merritt Rowing Club Regatta," so presumably the outhouse is for the race officials. But come on, people. It is not like Lake Merritt is the San Francisco Bay. That platform is within view of actual park service bathrooms -- how was it possibly worth renting an outhouse, attaching it to a dock, and pulling the dock into the middle of the lake? Very, very strange.
This is up there with the time when we saw a ten pound fish -- clearly not the sort that usually populates the lake (I think anything over a pound might die from contamination) -- floating dead in the water. Did it get swept in from the bay? Did a fish monger in Chinatown dump the day's leftovers? Was it a beloved pet? Unclear. But at least fish are *supposed* to be floating in the water. Port-o-potties? Not so much.
I am going to break my self-imposed blog silence for a momentous occasion: a trip to the post office. Don't get too excited. I'm just hoping that by writing about it, my blood pressure might drop back to normal.
See, I needed to mail an application for a fellowship that I'm applying for. It's due Thursday. Today is Tuesday. I figured I'd drop it off, do a little express mail action, and be on my merry way. After all, the last few times I've been to the post office my experiences have been, if not pleasant, at least tolerable. But then again, I'd never been to the Grand Lake branch.
Oh my fucking god. I'm not sure where to start. Perhaps I'll first ask you to stare at this computer screen for twenty-five minutes without doing anything or reading anything, to simulate what the first half of my experience was like. Then I'll invite you to imagine the following:
-three windows, two of which were staffed by people who probably rocked the "How Slow Can You Go?" part of their entrance exam
-a third post office employee behind the other two, who emerged from the back room every few minutes carrying what looked like the same package out to the front and then back to the back, occasionally looking toward the 15-person line with an expression of bemused interest, as if to say, "Gee, will you check out that line? Someone should really do something about that!" before picking up her coffee cup and disappearing into the back room again
-Some of the stupidest people I have ever seen in my life. Including:
-one grandmotherly woman (I wanted to like her, but wait) who tottered up to the counter and asked to see the entire stamp collection. She wanted flowers. And not just flowers, but a particular flower, a flower that apparently was extremely difficult for the extremely slow woman behind the counter to locate, moving, as she was, at .00000002 of a kilometer per hour. After about seven minutes of stamp inspection, the woman pulled out her credit card to pay. The line, growing by the minute, sighed in relief -- but we were too soon! For some unknown reason, she took her credit card back and repeated the ENTIRE PROCESS again, starting with stamp examination and culminating in a painfully slow extraction of money from her gigantic purse, and then another 7 minutes of waiting. Meanwhile, at the other counter . . .
-Another woman, bearing a Trader Joe's bag full of packages she wanted to return, was handing them over to the woman behind the counter, by which I mean placing them, excruciatingly slowly, on the bullet-proof plastic Lazy Susan separating the customers from the postal employees. Then the post office employee slowly, ever so slowly, began typing each into the computer, and coming up with registered return receipts and insurance tabs for each one. Then, after this had gone on for about ten minutes and the woman (presumably) was about to pay, the post office employee looked at the addresses on these packages, and noticed that they were all addressed to the woman. Yes. She was sending them back to herself. "You know, these are all going to just come back to you," said the post office employee, as an audible groan erupted from the line. "You need to readdress every single one and bring them back." I had a moment of sympathy for the woman, but it quickly evaporated when she continued to stand at the counter, asking follow up questions ("What do you mean they will come back to me? But I would still like them to be registered receipt!") and insisting on buying her insurance for the packages ahead of time.
Then, just as she was sent away to do her re-addressing and I took a triumphant step forward to buy an envelope and send one item Express Mail, another woman -- heretofore lurking on the sides, waiting to bring back up some packages that she, too, had mislabeled, announced that it was her turn. I stepped aside. The line grumbled.
-FINALLY, I was called. To be honest, at that particular moment I was feeling a little sympathetic toward the woman -- after all, she had been dealing with the flowered stamp lady -- but that, too, quickly evaporated when we had the following exchange:
Me: I would like to send this express mail, and get postage for a 2-pound envelope going to New York.
Her: (Blank stare. Then, finally) So you mean you want postage for this for 2 pounds, going to New York.
Me: Yes.
Her: You know, you're going to have to come back to mail that. Anything over 13 ounces you have to come back and mail in person. You can't just drop it off in a mailbox. You have to come back.
Me: Okay, that's fine. I'll come back and drop it off.
Her: Because, you know, if it's over 13 ounces I have to ask you questions about it. You can't just drop it off and walk away. You have to wait on line and I have to ask you questions. Like, for example, is it hazardous? Or fragile?
Me: No. It's a book. It's fine. I just want to buy the postage now. I'll come back later.
Her: I'm just warning you about what you're going to have to go through. You can't just drop it off in a mailbox.
Me: Okay.
Her: (Putting postage on my express mail envelope) You know, you missed the cut off for today. It will get there in two days, guaranteed. 3pm. But you missed today's cut off.
Me: When was the cut-off?
Her: It was at three pm. You missed it.
*Side note: It was now like, 3:07. I'd been at the post office for about 20 minutes.*
Me: So, it'll get there by Thursday then.
Her: (blank stare) What's today?
Me: Tuesday.
Her: Tuesday, Wednesday, yes, Thursday. Yesterday was my day off. I have no idea what day it is. Yes, Thursday then, by 3 o'clock.
Me: Okay, that's fine.
HEr: You could still go to the main post office. There it's four o'clock. But here it's three. Because they have to come and pick it up. You missed it.
Me: Okay.
Her: Your postage for the two pounds will be $8.99. Priority Mail.
Me: I just want first class.
Her: (Another blank stare. Then) It's over 13 ounces. You can't send anything first class that's over 13 ounces. It bumps up to priority mail.
Me: Is there anything cheaper?
Her: You can do ground. Or media mail.
Me: It's a book.
Her: You didn't tell me that.
Me: It's a book.
Her: You can do parcel post then.
An interminable amount of time passes as she scans my credit card, carefully folds up my receipt, and passes my paperwork back through the slot. By this time, the line is still well out the door and the other postal worker has worked through three separate customers.
As I walked out, a man stuck all the way at the entrance looked at me and said, "What, did it take , like an hour?" I tried to make a joke or some lighthearted comment about the craziness of the post office, but instead all I could say was "Yes, yes it did," with what could only have been a crazy smile, and pushed past him into the sun.
This, my friends, is why the Soviet Union collapsed.
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
If I'm going to retroactively continue this "including links to things I've written" tradition, I might as well mention that I had a piece a while back on Salon about tips on how to survive as a freelancer. Check it out here.
I almost forgot to mention that I have a big piece in this month's Popular Science. It's about a week I spent trying to live completely anonymously. Which, it turns out, is pretty much impossible.
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
So. After a long round of trying to find a place willing to evaluate my sleep for free (it's for an article, not an actual sleep problem), I was thrilled last night when someone called me from a sleep disorder clinic to tell me they had a last-minute opening in their Fremont office. Could I be there in two hours? I immediately agreed.
I'll admit: I've always liked the idea of being hooked up to electrodes. An MRI would have been even better (who cares about claustrophobia when you get to see the inside of your brain!) but for now, the electrodes would have to suffice.
I'm not sure what my point in this post is except to say that as a result of my sleep study, I am really, really tired. First, I was sleeping in a strip mall. There was a mortgage office next door and a Safeway across the parking lot. A Holiday Inn would have had a more relaxing atmosphere. Second, I didn't get hooked up to all the electrodes till just after 11pm, which is almost past my normal bedtime. This wouldn't have been a problem if the technician hadn't bid me good night with the sentence, "I'll wake you up around six." That, combined with the fact that I had electrodes on my head, chest and calves, bands around my chest and ribs, a oxygen monitor on my finger, and two plastic tubes up my nose, made it very difficult to sleep. (Not to mention the fact that I had performance anxiety -- there was a camera in the bedroom so that the technician could monitor my position.)
So when she came back to my room at 5:59 am, on the dot, I was not at my finest. Nor do I feel like I'm at my finest right now, nearly twelve hours after the wakeup call.
But at least I got hooked up to electrodes. I haven't gotten the results of the analysis yet, but suffice it to say, I'm excited.
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
Why do you think it's okay to go into the cafe bathroom and take a huge, smelly dump? And spend your time on the toilet playing some weird hand-clapping game that I, sitting at a table next to the bathroom, could hear through the door?
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
I've been trying to stick to a 5-6 day a week workout schedule, and recently decided to give myself a break from laps around the lake (3.2 miles of "I'm bored") by going to a cardio hip hop class. Because that sounds fun, right? As I've noticed previously on this blog -- after the other time I tried this class -- I figured out a very successful strategy for not feeling dumb and uncoordinated in such classes: stand in the back so that you can't see yourself. Then stare at the teacher and pretend that they're you. Result? You look fantastic. In my case, that means that I have suddenly morphed into a black man, but you know what? That image is almost more realistic than me actually perfecting a body roll. So I'm sticking to it.
Anyway, last Friday's class was great and I left energized, so energized, in fact, that I stopped by my friend Josh's house afterwards to show him my "moves." Actually, to be more specific, I tried to play it off like it was Josh who wanted to see me dance -- but he was on to me. When I asked, "Do you want to see the dance?" he responded, "I know you want to show me the dance," and reluctantly agreed to watch. So I went out onto the sidewalk in front of his house and ran through the routine.
Fine and good, if a little embarrassing. But as I walked away from his house into the bright mid-morning sun, I felt a pinch in my shoulder. Like, not a little tweak, but some serious pain -- and it didn't go away. Rather, when I sat down in a nearby cafe to try to get some work done, it began to radiate down my arm and make me feel slightly nauseated. I started to wonder if my hip hop routine were actually pushing me into shock.
The pain didn't go away, so I bought some Aleve, convinced the people at the cafe to give me some ice, and called my med school friend, Jenny, to see what she thought might be going on. Unable to determine simply by phone whether it were a simple muscle pull or something more serious, like a pinched nerve, she suggested that if it didn't feel better, I go to the emergency room.
I didn't do that, which turned out to be lucky because if I had, the cause of injury would have been really really embarrassing. See, because it turned out that what I had wasn't a pulled muscle, or a pinched nerve. It was a hip-hop induced muscle spasm in my rhomboid. I think it happened when I threw my arms above my head at the same time as performing a hip thrust. (Do not try this at home.) Once I'd taken a bunch of ibuprofen and had Peter press his entire body weight, via his elbow, into the offending muscle, the pain went away, for the most part -- but it's still a little sore, and when I went running yesterday, it started cramping up again.
So now I'm left in a quandary: Do I lay off the hip hop? Or can I go back on Friday? Because the thing is, the class is really fun. And a lot of the people in the class are older than I am, and don't appear to be doing any damage to their rhomboids. But still, I question: is it worth the risk?
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
Just in case anyone thought I was exaggerating.
Notice how it is not hovering, but sitting on the edge of the feeder.
This is the blog for Salt Magazine.
