Reason #458 why I'm not cut out to be a Californian

Books for Botox.

Because beauty may be only skin deep, but the satisfaction of knowing you got some free botulin toxin for your face in exchange for some kids' books lasts forever.

I'm only happy when it snows

There is a variety of mood disorder known colloquially as Seasonal Affective Disorder. In the DSM-IV it is actually not a separate disorder, but rather a specifier which can be tacked onto a diagnosis of Major Depressive Disorder or a major depressive episode in Bipolar Disorder. Basically this specifier is a fancy way of saying "the person becomes depressed when a particular season (usually fall or winter) begins."

I think I have reverse Seasonal Affective Disorder.

For the first twenty-five years of my life, I lived in places that had four seasons--one of these being cold, snowy winter. To be fair, I used to feel down fairly predictably from just before Thanksgiving through my birthday, which is a week and a half after Christmas. However, the most wintry weather tended not to arrive until a few weeks after my birthday, by which time I was already feeling much better.

I was a little nervous about moving to Northern California on account of the lack of seasons. "But we do have seasons here," Mrs. Gerbil pointed out. "We just only have two: wet and dry."

At first, the prospect of six straight months of sunshine seemed like a neat little novelty. I snickered when our neighbors complained about the "heat wave" that first summer; it was in the low 80's and about 10% humidity. (My definition of a heat wave is that it's got to be hot and humid.) But then I got tired of the sunshine. I got cranky, and I longed for a thunderstorm to improve my mood. None arrived.

When the rains started, I was pleased. Grey skies mean fall; and fall means winter's coming. But, of course, the rain never turned to freezing rain or snow, and I got cranky. I wanted some snow to cheer me up. Instead, the daffodils came up and the skies began to clear. I felt cheated. Spring had arrived, and I'd never gotten my winter! And the next twelve months were much the same.

Perhaps it says something about my personality that I love inclement weather. I'm a sucker for the pouring rain, thunderstorms, snow, and grey skies of all shades. I'm not keen on freezing rain or tornadoes; but otherwise, anything but constant sunshine floats my proverbial boat. Indeed, when I was two I drew a sun wearing a big ol' frowny face.

Last week the rains began. Mrs. Gerbil is a little cranky. She misses the sun. Me, I'll take what I can get.

First class

Last week I went back to my old stomping grounds for a little visit. I had racked up enough frequent flyer miles on Continental that my flight was free... plus $10 "tax," of course. (How do you assess sales tax on something that is free? Ask an airline executive; I sure don't know the answer.) To my delight, I even had enough miles to fly first class--but only on the way there.

I had never flown first class before. I'm intimately acquainted with the uncomfortable nature of the seats in the main cabin, and I figured that the big cushy seats in first class would be thousands of times better, especially for my preggo self. Plus, I was flying overnight; and so I thought I'd get a decent night's sleep (something I've never accomplished in coach).

Oh, I was so very wrong on both counts.

The first-class seats were indeed big and cushy. However, after about an hour I realized that they were actually less comfortable than coach seats. A former physical therapist of mine once explained to me that airplane seats are designed for passengers who are 5'10"--i.e., six and a half inches taller than I am. (Given that I once had to explain to her what a treatment goal was, I am not sure I should have believed her about seat proportions. But it sounded right.) The first-class seats also appeared to be designed for people considerably taller than I--and considerably wider to boot. In the ultimate irony, I found myself with too much leg room. I like to rest my feet on a carry-on tucked under the seat in front of me, as this prevents my feet and my butt from going numb. In first class, my carry-on was too far away from my little tootsies.

As for my disappointment with not sleeping, well, it's really my own damn fault. The magic of pregnancy also brought me the magic of getting up to pee several times a night, not to mention the magic of generally decreased quality of sleep. I'm not sure why I thought I would get nice, uninterrupted sleep on an airplane when I can't even get this in my own bed; but I suppose I really did set myself up for a letdown on this one.

There is, however, at least one distinct advantage to first class, and that is the food. The food is better and more plentiful than in coach. We even got little tablecloths for our tray tables. There was apparently also free alcohol, of which I obviously did not partake. (I wonder if the flight attendants put two and two together after observing my vehement refusal of wine and my multitudinous trips to the bathroom.)

Oh, and there were warm salty nuts. Lots and lots of warm salty nuts. They kept appearing in little ceramic bowls.

I was happy to be back in my rightful place in coach on the way back to California. I put my feet up on my carry-on bag, got a bit of sleep, and noshed gladly on little pretzels from a foil bag.

I will admit, though, I did kind of miss the warm salty nuts.

Now what?

Animaniacs came out just as Mrs. Gerbil and I were starting high school. The timing could not have been better. We were just barely too old for kids' cartoons, but just old enough to get adult humor. For Halloween of our sophomore year, a bunch of us even went out trick-or-treating as several of the Animaniacs. Appropriately, Mrs. Gerbil was Wakko, and I was the Brain.


I love Pinky and the Brain. Like all good cartoons, the plots are highly predictable. But there's something just extra cool about lab rats with designs on world domination. With few exceptions, each episode ends with Pinky's question, "Gee, Brain, what do you want to do tomorrow night?" and the Brain's answer, "Same thing we do every night, Pinky--try to take over the world!" And by the next night, the Brain has already developed a brand-new, highly detailed plan. How much time does he actually spend thinking up new plans? Does he mull over possibilities for a while, or does the whole thing come to him all at once? We will never know.

But one thing is certain: once one plan fails, he manages to come up with a new one. The Brain does not sit around and ponder where to go from here. He has no need of that cliche "next steps," because the only thing on his agenda is to try to take over the world again.

The phrase "next steps" fills me with a weird sort of revulsion. I was taught to avoid cliches (like the plague, haha) at geek camp; and yet my visceral reaction to "next steps" is very much unlike my visceral reaction to other cliches. It's similar to my visceral reaction to words like "sustainability," "green living," and "ecoresponsibility." These are fantastic concepts, but sometimes I think they fall victim to name-dropping. (I admit, I had to Google "sustainability" to find out what it really meant, so many times did I hear someone say "we're focused on sustainability" without mentioning how, exactly, this focus was accomplished.)

Because Western thought and life are quite linear, I suppose it only makes sense that we should think about what to do next. I'm fairly certain that my problem with the phrase "next steps" is that it gets used when nothing's actually been accomplished yet. For instance: I used to work in a non-profit that worked with a whole bunch of other non-profits. As a group, we had tremendous difficulty deciding what to do now, and yet somehow we were perfectly happy to discuss (for hours at a time) what to do next. Non-profit paralysis had set in for many of us--the deadly combination of not enough money, not enough time, and not enough resources. Having "next steps" meetings was a defense against having to do something in the present that might, of course, fail.

The other problem with "next steps" is that someone actually has to follow through with them. Brainstorming "next steps" is great; but who's going to make sure the list doesn't wind up in the circular file? Perhaps it's an odd sort of motivation for those who aren't actually doing anything measurable in the present, a way to avoid feeling aimless once the first task is finally completed.

Or perhaps I am too much of a cynic. Perhaps I don't have enough patience or tolerance for other people's way of doing things.

Some (including but not limited to Mrs. Gerbil) have said that the world would be much better off if I ran it. So I think tomorrow night I'm going to try to take over the world. I'll plant subliminal messages in car commercials that link the phrase "next steps" to "I will do whatever Gerbil says."

The Battle for the Toy Box

Next month, select Wal-Mart stores are supposed to begin stocking the Tales of Glory line of Biblical action figures.

Apparently there is a "Battle for the Toy Box!" going on. It seems to me like a pretty one-sided battle, declared by the side that perceives itself to be under attack. But that is a snark for a different day.

For today, I bring you: The Nativity Play Set.


You will notice, in the lower right-hand corner, a choking hazard warning. Presumably this is due to the diminutive size of the molded PVC Baby Jesus.

Now I may be a heathen Jew--and a secular heathen Jew at that--but it's always been my understanding that one is supposed to take Jesus into one's heart, not one's trachea.

But then I wonder: if you successfully swallow the plastic Baby Jesus, does it transubstantiate itself into a plastic Communion wafer?

I would test my questions myself, but I don't want to lend credence to the old fear that Jews eat little Christian babies. Then again, PVC was not around during the early days of blood libel. So perhaps my excuse should be that I just don't want to set foot in a Wal-Mart ever again.

You, too, will be assimilated

I have now lived amongst Bay Area Californians for two years and three weeks. I have striven so hard to maintain my small-town, East Coast sensibility in this land of "greener than thou," "size matters," and (my personal favorite) "I was first before you were first." And I'd thought I was doing a darn good job of it.

There is sort of an unspoken rule at BART stations that passengers should form the closest possible thing to a line while waiting for their trains. At the edge of the platform, black tiles mark where the doors of each car will (or ought) to be. Rarely is there a single-file line behind any of these tiles; two or three deep seems to be the norm. And, for the most part, the First Commandment of the Playground is observed--i.e., Thou shalt not butt in front of thy neighbor.

Owing to my bizarre work hours, the trains are hardly ever full when I head into work. If there's a Giants game, coming home is another story, although even then the problem is more the fine odor of the drunk fans than their multitude. But sometimes, especially weekend mornings, there are a lot of people trying to go to San Francisco all at once.

Some people will still line up almost patiently at the edge of the platform. Others, however, will mill about aimlessly while waiting for the train--and then swoop in sideways once the train arrives, displacing the people in line. Often this results in glares, disgusted sighs, and not-so-subtle comments to traveling companions of "oh my God, what a bitch!"

Butters have always bothered me because of their blatant disregard for the social order of the line. Most of the time I don't care where I am in a line, as long as the line keeps moving and no one is stealing anyone else's place. But witness my evolution--or de-evolution--on this issue:

June, 2005. I'm at the head of the line while waiting for BART. Someone butts in front of me. "Jeez!" I think. "That person has no manners!"

June, 2007. I'm at the head of the line while waiting for BART. Someone butts in front of me. "WTF?" I think. "Can't he see I was here first?"

As much as I hate to admit it, I've become Nobuttus of BART.

With only about half of my small-town circuitry remaining, I'm now part of the swarm.

Resistance is futile.

The nanny state, redux

Add to the list of brilliant legislation being considered by the Golden State a bill which would require all pets to be spayed or neutered. If this becomes law (and it's already passed the state Assembly), mutt owners will be fined for not altering their pets, and owners of registered purebreds will be eligible for an exemption--for a price, of course.

Yes, this bill has good intentions. Overpopulation, abuse and neglect, and lack of appropriate housing are serious problems in these parts, and not just for H. sapiens. If everyone would just prevent their pets from breeding, maybe we wouldn't have such problems.

There oughta be a law, right?

Be careful what you wish for. In the words of Assemblyman Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale (Butte County):

"This is a prime example of why this Legislature becomes a laughingstock, when we want to reach into that personal aspect of peoples' lives telling them this is how you need to handle your animals' reproductive capacity. We ought to be tackling other issues."

I can't believe I'm saying this, but I agree with a California Republican.

Let's imagine that this bill becomes law, and it is fully enforced. As only registered purebreds will be allowed to keep their 'nads, after a certain number of generations the only animals available for sale or adoption will be either purebreds themselves (and thus allowed to reproduce) or a cross between two different breeds (and thus prohibited from reproducing). Mutts, lacking the necessary equipment to pass along their variegated legacies, would become artificially selected out of the population.

Hypothetical as this situation may be, it sounds an awful lot like a really scary thing that begins with an E and ends with a UGENICS.

I made a comment to this effect to Mrs. Gerbil this morning. She reminded me that just because a law is on the books doesn't mean that everyone is going to obey it. This is true. However, why bother to pass a law which you don't want everyone to follow? Why incorporate penalties (like a $500 fine), if not to deter lawbreaking?

I have a better idea. Instead of giving the state the power to determine who's worthy of breeding, why not fund sliding-scale (or even free) spay/neuter clinics? There's nothing inherently wrong with mutts that their owners shouldn't have a choice about whether to have them altered--just as there's nothing inherently wrong with purebreds.

And, if you think about it, mutts are pretty darn consistent with the (often over-hyped) Californian ideals of diversity and multiculturalism.

PS. For the record, our furry bundle of joy was spayed twice before we adopted her. The shelter mistook a post-op Josie for another calico and (somehow failing to notice her shaven, stitched-up underparts) opened her up again before realizing their error.

The price of convenience

According to the newsletter Mrs. Gerbil received the other day, the Alameda Green Party is congratulating itself over preventing the construction of some cell phone tower somewhere. I don't know where the tower was supposed to be, as Mrs. Gerbil has already recycled the newsletter and the link which should lead to the newsletter doesn't actually yield anything of use.

But this will not stop my snark. Oh, children, my snark cannot be stopped.

I will concede that cell towers are ugly. I'll also concede that I had no idea that there were so many ways to disguise cell towers. But it's not just aesthetics (or lack thereof) that fuel protests against cell tower construction. It's the possibility of a health hazard. It's the intrusion of commercial activity into non-commercial zones. Oh, and it's the principle of the thing.

Now, I'm all for preservation and good planning and all that, but there's a fundamental problem with cell tower nimbyism: No cell tower, no cell service.

Many people have no land line because their cell phones are their primary phones. That's great for people who know they can always get reception. Mrs. Gerbil and I each have a cell phone, but we also have a land line because cell phones aren't 100% reliable. On our landline we have a cordless phone and an old-school phone with a 25' cord. (Why the ancient model? Because we can't use the cordless to notify PG&E that the power is out.)

If cell tower construction is restricted, then existing towers may get overwhelmed--and then we'll all bang our heads on the wall to the tune of "We're sorry, all circuits are busy now. Please try your call again later."

When I decided to get a cell phone about five and a half years ago, I chose my company based on local coverage. The best coverage in my area came from Verizon or Sprint, but it was well known that there was no Sprint reception on Coventry Road. Coventry is full of all kinds of fun shops, and as I lived about a quarter mile away, I was there all the time. Needless to say, I chose Verizon. Verizon, however, does not have such great reception in our bedroom in Berkeley. But this doesn't bother me. I can put up with the lack of reception in our bedroom, because the only way to fix this is to put up a cell tower on the bed. And that's just plain silly.

However, I also don't subscribe to the belief that cell phone ownership equals constant accessibility. So I suppose it's okay to support the restriction of cell tower construction if you don't mind not being able to use your cell phone everywhere and all the time. But if your cell phone is necessary for your survival, then cell towers are your necessary evil.

The nanny state

There is much kerfuffle out here in California over so-called "nanny state" legislation. Members of the state senate and assembly have come up with a number of fantastically intrusive proposals in recent months, including bans on

1) incandescent light bulbs;
2) spanking;
3) children under 4'9" in the front seat of the car;
4) children under 4'9" in the back seat of the car without a booster seat; and
5) smoking in the car while children are present.

The state senate is to hold hearings on smoking in cars in the very near future. Now, I do believe that smoking is a public health issue. Smoking is prohibited in a lot of places in California, including restaurants, hospital entrances, and Berkeley bus stops, although citizens like myself are left to enforce the latter with varying degrees of success. Several months ago, at the Hayward BART station, I had the following exchange with a woman who meandered into my personal space with a lit cigarette:

me: Excuse me, would you mind smoking somewhere else? This is a no-smoking zone.
smoker: What the hell? I just came over here. I can smoke if I want to.
me: I have been sitting here for a while, and I don't mind if you smoke elsewhere. Just not here.
woman: What the hell?
me: Thank you for respecting the needs of a person with asthma.
woman: Oh, respecting your needs? What about mine?
me: I don't mind if you smoke somewhere else. But it's against the law to smoke right here, and I have asthma. Thank you for respecting my health.
woman: [wandering away, talking loudly into her cell phone] Sorry, some white bitch says I can't smoke near her ass. Oh, wait, that white bitch don't HAVE no ass.

So yes, smoking is a public health issue. But there's something about this no-smoking-in-your-personal-vehicle thing that really gets to me. I'm no lawyer, but it seems to me that one's car is an extension of one's residence. It's a private space. But the boundaries between private and public are a lot blurrier in the car because, unless your ride is pimped out with tinted windows (which are heavily regulated in this state anyway), everyone can see what you're doing, all the time.

If you smoke in the car with the windows up, your car smells like an ashtray. If you smoke in your house with the windows closed, your house smells like an ashtray. Anyone in a closed car will inhale second-hand smoke--but so can anyone in a closed room. Is it really worse to be in the car than in the house? I'd be willing to bet that kids spend a lot more time in houses full of second-hand smoke than in cars. So why target cars?

I think the answer is that it's a lot easier to enforce a ban on smoking in the car. The police can obtain immediate evidence that someone's smoking in the car--no need to justify a search warrant if you can see the crime in progress.

But you know, there are many other things in California which pose health hazards to children and other living things. There's pollution, crime, poverty, homelessness, abuse, disease, neonatal drug addiction, abysmal public education, gang violence... all of which are much harder to solve with a single piece of legislation.

If this bill passes, I hope someone will be able to sleep better, knowing that parents will be fined for lighting up while driving their children to school--in a district where less than 50% will receive a diploma and where gangs have more power than the principal.

There oughta be a law

(Dude! This is my 100th post!)

I received a jury summons today, for the end of this month. I was very upset, for I'd received a jury summons last year, and I'm supposed to be off the hook for 12 months.

(I didn't actually serve on a jury last year. I didn't even have to report to the courthouse to find this out, as I'd had to do in Massachusetts about eight years ago. California jurors call after 5pm the day before to find out their status: report the next day as summoned, don't report at all, or call back after 11am for possible afternoon service. One's jury obligation is considered fulfilled regardless of whether one actually has to show up.)

So, yes, I received my jury summons, and I was pissed. But I have a poor concept of time out here. I'm used to gauging the passage of time with the help of seasons--by which I mean spring, summer, fall, and winter, not "wet" and "dry." Obviously, I couldn't figure this one out via memories of crimson foliage, drifting snow, muddy slush, or godawful humidity. I had to do some major detective work as to the date of my previous service:

1) It was during a period of semi-dryness, when it wasn't quite warm enough for short sleeves, but not quite cold enough for a hat and gloves.
Therefore, it must have been in October, November, February, March, or early April.

2) I know where I was working at the time.
Therefore, it must have been sometime between November and July; combining this with #1, it must have been in November, February, March, or early April.

3) I was working more than half-time.
Therefore, it must have been sometime between January and July; combining this with #2, it must have been between February and early April.

I then consulted last year's planner. If my service had been in March or April, I would have to make a most unpleasant call to the Superior Court of California...

...and guess when my service was?

That's right. The beginning of February.

They sure don't waste any time, do they?

Can't we all just get along?

"Cultural competence" is currently quite the topic of interest in mental health services, especially in California. A lot of people here are peeing themselves over making sure that their agencies are "culturally competent." In my never-ending quest for a Better Job, I keep coming across ads that devote more space to the agency's interest in "cultural competency" than to the description of the actual job.

I disagree with the entire concept of "cultural compentency." How do you know when you are "culturally competent"? There is no exam to take, no set of prohibitively expensive workshops to attend, no embossed certificate to hang on your wall. And who gets to decide which "cultures" one must be "competent" in? Most of us aren't even "competent" in our own culture--let alone able to describe exactly our own cultural influences.

"Cultural competency," I think, implies a mysterious package of skills. I would rather be culturally aware. I think it's important to know at least basic things about other cultural groups, especially as may affect therapy. But we should learn from our clients as much as they learn from us. And we must be prepared to be wrong--and accept it when we are.

Once I was the only lesbian on staff and the only Jew, secular or otherwise. So my caseload kept getting padded with lesbians, Jews, and lesbian Jews. I'm not religious at all and was never even a bat mitzvah, so I'm not sure what really qualified me to be Super Jew Therapist. It was our practice to ask clients during their intakes whether they wanted their therapist to have any particular characteristics, such as gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. Maybe five percent of my intakes indicated some preference. The rest said, "I don't care. I just want someone who can help me."

Certainly, there are cases where therapist-client matching is a great idea, if not a necessity. A client who speaks little English is probably best served by a therapist who can speak his or her native language. A client who has extreme difficulty trusting white men should probably not be placed with a white male therapist. My move to California was precipitated, in part, by paternalistic heterosexism; and when I became depressed as a result, I specifically sought a lesbian therapist. Though I'd had an excellent straight male therapist in the past, I didn't want a straight man listening this time.

Recently I read a comparison of treatment-related philosophies from the 1970s and today. I think the context was how managed care has shifted psychology's priorities. There was this whole list of factors which were pretty much diametrically opposed, including length of treatment, emphasis on thoughts vs. feelings, and case conceptualization. One of the pairs was "individual differences" (the 70s) and "diversity" (today). At first I was quite confused. How were these mutually exclusive? And then it dawned on me:

Individual differences emphasizes the uniqueness of the individual, rejecting the homogeneity of the group.
Diversity emphasizes the homogeneity of the group, rejecting the uniqueness of the individual.

(And all of a sudden, this interview made a whole lot more sense.)

Racism sucks. Sexism sucks. Homophobia, bi-phobia, and transphobia suck. Anti-Semitism sucks. Ageism (though completely legal under federal law unless you're over 40) sucks. Ableism sucks. Dude, discrimation sucks.

However, it's impossible to talk about "diversity" without endorsing stereotypes. There's nothing inherently bad about stereotypes. What's bad is assuming you know everything about your 10:00 intake... at 9:59.

War on Christmas

This time of year is really hard for me. Historically, I start getting depressed just before Thanksgiving and stop sometime after my birthday (10 days after Christmas, hint hint). In recent years things have been somewhat worse. It could be that I've already been under stress before the ever-lengthening holiday season and therefore have had a lower tolerance for Enforced Happiness.

Or it could be Enforced Happiness in general. There are exactly two Christmas carols which I actually like--I am a secular Jew, mind you--and these are "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" and "Angels We Have Heard on High." The rest I could do without. Especially in stores; stores are overstimulating enough already! Enforced Happiness also includes advertising of all sorts, including (but not limited to) radio, television, and print ads.

Or it could be this whole "War on Christmas" myth. I do not understand this business. If anyone's trying to remove the meaning of Christmas, it's those who make it into a capitalist orgy. The way I see it, retail workers who wish people happy holidays instead of a merry Christmas are actually preserving the meaning of Christmas. When did Christmas become a reason to spend lots of money? I might be a secular Jew, but I know that Mary and Joseph weren't exactly rolling in dough.

When I was a baby, my parents decided that we should give presents on Christmas. We lived in a very WASPy area, and they didn't want me to feel left out once I began school. Every year we constructed a Christmas bush with branches clipped from our pine trees and a whole bunch of electrical ties. Sometimes my mother would pick up discarded bits of real Christmas trees on her way to work and add them to our bush for extra variety. One year we discovered--the hard way--that I am violently allergic to white pine. As soon as I could open my eyes again, we transferred the ornaments to the ficus. After that incident, we decided to hang the ornaments from the piano instead.

Perhaps I grew up with a skewed version of Christmas. Christmas was something which belonged to other people and which I could dabble in, if I wished, but it was never something I could do for real. Christmas meant shopping and wrapping and stress and you know, I used to love it... except that it was always phenomenally depressing.

So I reserve the right to wish someone happy holidays if they wish me a merry Christmas. Does that make me anti-Christmas? No stranger has ever come up to me on the street and wished me a happy Hanukkah, nor a comfortable fast on Yom Kippur, nor a happy new year in September. But that doesn't bother me. What bothers me is when people get all het up (in Decembers of late) when someone wishes them something other than a merry Christmas.

Does it really matter? If Jimmy the Cashier doesn't wish Mrs. Jones a merry Christmas, is Mrs. Jones doomed to have a terrible time on December 25? Isn't it okay just to acknowledge that there are a whole slew of holidays in December (Christmas, Hanukkah, Ramadan, Kwanzaa, and the winter solstice, to name but a few) and cover all the bases with a generic holiday wish?

If Mrs. Jones needs prompting from Jimmy the Cashier to have a merry Christmas, Mrs. Jones has some serious issues.

I'm glad Christmas comes but once a year.

I guess you can't have everything

In my short life, I have resided in the following places:
1. Southeastern PA, 17 years
2. Western Massachusetts, 4 years
3. Northeast Ohio, 4 years
4. Northern California, 17 months and counting

I have spent a lot of time lately musing about the differences between Cleveland and Berkeley (Berkeley wins by a nose); between Western Mass. and Berkeley (Western Mass., dude, no contest!); and between PA and Berkeley (you can take the girl out of the East Coast, but you can't take the East Coast out of the girl).

At this point it should probably go without saying that I'm not a huge fan of California.

One area in which the Bay Area kicks other locales' butts is public transportation. This is a plus for two reasons:
1. Driving around here completely sucks; and
2. Public transit stories! 'Nuff said.

Berkeley also has more noodle houses than you can shake a (chop)stick at, multi-lingual signage, and the interesting yet totally scary Hayward Fault. The Hayward Fault is a "creeping fault," which means it moves constantly but very, very slowly; and after a couple of decades it displaces things like curbs, staircases, and Memorial Stadium. (Seismologists apparently track such movement with a creepmeter, which sounds more like something you'd want to have if you were single.)

But Berkeley lacks a lot of things. Among these:
1. Inclement weather. Forget spring, summer, fall, and winter; the seasons here are Wet and Dry.
2. CVS. Around here, if you say "CVS," people think you are talking about the rape crisis center.
3. Soft (read: completely stale) pretzels delicately scented with car exhaust.
4. Urgent care centers with evening and weekend hours.
5. Stores where you can get your watch batteries replaced.

Let me say a few words about items 4 and 5. People get all het up about the ER being clogged with non-emergent patients. Yes, it is a problem when people have to go to the ER for primary care because they don't have (enough) insurance. But some non-emergent, yet definitely ill, patients wind up in the ER because it's the only place open on evenings and weekends. There are fewer than five urgent care clinics in this general vicinity, but they don't operate on an urgent care schedule. They operate on a primary care schedule. Which means that if you find yourself with a nasty respiratory infection at 3:00 on a Saturday afternoon (as my wife did in August), the only thing to do is wait around for two hours in the ER for a prescription for antibiotics (which we did). It's not just the un- or under-insured who go to the ER for primary care. It's also the sufficiently insured whose illnesses don't know from normal business hours.

About those watch batteries. I have two dead watches at the moment. I know of two sorts of places which replace watch batteries: drugstores and jewelry stores. This end of Berkeley has a severe lack of jewelry stores. So I took my watches to Longs--but this happened to be the only Longs which does not deal in watch batteries. The cashier couldn't suggest a single place in Berkeley where I might have better luck. So I went to another drugstore, Elephant Pharmacy, which stocks health foods, yoga paraphernalia, and DVDs, but not watch batteries. The cashier helpfully recommended the Longs I'd just visited. I asked the ladies at two bead stores for suggestions. All of them said, "Try Longs." I went to a convenience store and asked, "Do you replace watch batteries?" The owner pointed to a display of AA, AAA, and 9-volt Duracells. "No," I said, producing one watch, "watch batteries." "Oh, no," said the owner. "We don't do that. Try Longs."

I do not understand Berkeley.

Don't try this in your office

I had one of the worst interviews of my life a week ago. It's taken me a week to recover. This interview was really over after ten minutes, but it lasted an entire hour because I haven't yet learned how to bow out gracefully.

How would I describe this interview, if I had to use but a single word? A few possibilities:

Violating.
Inappropriate.
Power-struggly.
Godawful.

In an attempt to reframe my experience, I decided to come up with a list of the Top Ten Things Not to Do in an Interview. Now, mind you, there already exist a ton of advice sites for interviewees on what not to do during an interview. These are pretty obvious. For example: Don't put your feet up on the interviewer's desk. Don't snap your gum. Don't giggle if you fart.

No, I'm talking about advice for the interviewer. Because it's not just the candidate who has to make a good impression.

Inspired by actual events, I present:

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF INTERVIEWING

1. Thou shalt not ask thy candidate about his or her personal philosophy and then declare that it is wrong.

2. Thou shalt not ask thy candidate vague questions, refuse to provide any additional useful information, and then declare that his or her answer is wrong.

3. Thou shalt not preface thy question with, "I know I am not allowed to ask this," and then proceed to ask thy candidate a disguised version of thy illegal question.

4. Thou shalt not compel thy candidate to elaborate on any matter to which thy candidate referreth as "personal."

5. Thou shalt not interview candidates whom thou hast no intention of hiring in the first place. If thou interviewest candidates whom thou hast no intention of hiring in the first place, thou shalt not convey this information to thy candidate.

6. Thou shalt not belittle thy candidate.

7. Thou shalt not get huffy when thy candidate sayeth that he or she honoreth the Sabbath. For I am a jealous G-d and besides I have already made it quite clear about my feelings toward the Sabbath.

8. Thou shalt not cut thy candidate off by saying, "you really believe that?"

9. Thou shalt not present information which is incorrect or untestable in order to prove thy superiority over thy candidate.

10. Thou shalt not do all of these things which I have commanded thee not to do, and then inform thy candidate that thou really liketh him or her and that thou really wouldst like to hire him or her, but thou canst not do so and is that not a shame.

Pretty obvious too, don't you think?

Apparently not.

Have van, will travel ineffectively

Once in a while I will suck it up and drive to work. Normally I just suck it up and leave the house by 7:45am to walk to the train, get on it, get off it, walk some more, and get to work by 9am. But on the days that I suck it up and drive, I can leave the house around 8:15 and have a pretty good chance at getting to work a few minutes before 9.

Driving to work takes less time than going by train, but it's (a) more expensive, with the price of gas these days; and (b) so much more aggravating. The only way to get theah from heah is to go through the Caldecott Tunnel. Which, if one is driving away from San Francisco in the morning and towards San Francisco in the evening, isn't nearly as bad as the other way around. But it still sucks, because within the space of about half a mile, four lanes and an entrance ramp must suddenly become two lanes and no entrance ramp.

No, let me rephrase that. Over the distance of about half a mile, four lanes and an entrance ramp filled with impatient, me-first Bay Area drivers with their cell phones glued to their ears must suddenly figure out how to use their turn signals and merge in a polite fashion and somehow wind up with two lanes of completely intact cars. During commute time, this can take anywhere from 5 to 25 minutes in the direction I head. And, as noted above, this is the less trafficked direction.



On Thursday I drove to work because I couldn't get my butt out of bed on time, my wife and I couldn't get our butts out the door in time to get mine on the train, and I really needed my butt to be in a meeting by 9am. The drive in was actually quite smooth. But on the way home, there was apparently a horrendous accident on the interstate, several miles after my exit, and I traveled maybe 3 miles in 20 minutes. Although things were megatons better once I got off the interstate, I was not a very happy camper. I was rather irritated, and I had to pee.

So I came upon the tunnel and its snarl of cars all trying to be in the same place (i.e., first) at once. My strategy for the tunnel merge is to let anyone in front of me as long as they (a) use their turn signal and (b) haven't already tried to cut someone off. This often pisses off the person behind me, but I think I'm modeling good behavior, you know? Around here, getting ahead by a single car length seems to be cause for orgasm; and there are much better methods, yo.

I'd already let a few cars in front of me when I noticed a beat-up turquoise van three cars in front of me. We were at the point in the merge where the signs no longer read 2 LEFT LANES CLOSED 1/2 MILE AHEAD or 2 LEFT LANES CLOSED 1/4 MILE AHEAD, but rather 2 LEFT LANES CLOSED MERGE RIGHT. Our lane wasn't going anywhere. But the driver of this van was. He zipped over to the far left lane, where there was practically no traffic because the lane was ending in about 500 feet. He zipped along, periodically slamming on his brakes to avoid rear-ending those trying to merge. His passenger evidently thought this was great fun, for he was laughing hysterically and gesticulating wildly with a half-full Dr Pepper bottle (presumably containing Dr Pepper, but one can't be sure).

I let maybe 5 or 6 more people in front of me as the far left lane ended, the turquoise van cut someone off at the last minute, and the second lane began to disappear. When the second lane ended, I looked in my rear-view mirror and saw none other than the turquoise van right behind me. Among the two people initially behind the van and me, we must have let at least 10 people in front of us while the turquoise van was partying it up in the not-so-fast lane. One step forward? At least thirteen steps back.

Schadenfreude or no, I couldn't help but start to feel better about that day's commute. And I think California needs a new class of moving violations:

Driving While Stupid.

Shh! Don't tell anyone I'm here.

I'd heard rumors about this, but now I know it's true:

Gerbils are illegal in California.

Fearing for my gerbilly freedoms (what few there are these days), I tried to change my location on my profile to "Undisclosed." But no! Blogger wouldn't accept the update. Perhaps this is an honor reserved for Dick Cheney.

So I guess I really have no choice...

I can hear the sleep-talking of the girl that I love
As she lies here beside me asleep with the night
Her hair in a fine mist floats on my pillow
Reflecting the glow of the orange streetlights

But I’ve got to creep down the alleyway
Fly down the highway freeway
Before they come to trap me I’ll be gone
Somewhere they can’t find me

Oh baby, you don’t know what I’ve done
I’ve committed a crime, found out too late
I was born to a gerbil mommy and a gerbil daddy
But gerbils aren't allowed in the Golden State

So I’ve got to creep down the alleyway
Fly down the highway freeway
Before they come to trap me I’ll be gone
Somewhere they can’t find me

Oh, my life seems unreal, my crime an illusion
In a law badly written that I must obey
And though folks here aren't uptight by nature
They sure aren't polite to creatures
Who'd snack upon the vineyards every day

So I’ve got to creep down the alleyway
Fly down the highway freeway
Before they come to trap me I’ll be gone
Somewhere they can’t find me

If you need me, I'll be in my bunker.

A room with a perfectly acceptable view

I have been living in California now for just over six months, and I am still in the throes of culture shock. There's this philosophy that everyone has to be first all the time. Unfortunately, not everyone can be first at the same time. In fact, only one person can be first in any given situation. That's, um, kind of part and parcel of being first.

This is why I hate the highways.

I am, however, getting used to the skylines out here. I like being up in the hills sometimes, where if it's not too hazy and my eyes and brain are getting along with each other, I can see the Golden Gate Bridge. I'm not so sure about the bone-dry hills dotted with scrub. They look like armpits. Giant human armpits. With green hair.

And every so often there is a kerfuffle about something ruining someone's view. In this particular case, some people are concerned about power lines blocking their view of the bay. They're trying to get the lines put underground, a project to be funded by additional property taxes. All those homes are worth a lot of money, you know, and apparently, imperfect views decrease their value. But many of these homes are owned by retirees, who bought them a long time ago for a lot less than their current worth, and who can't afford any more property taxes.

The old-timers don't mind the power lines. It's the newer residents who do, the ones who bought their multimillion-dollar houses for millions of dollars... and who must not be very happy with their houses. Because hy worry about how much you can get for your house, unless you're planning to sell it?

I grew up in a little itty bitty historic town on the other side of the country, whose two claims to fame are 1) it was founded by William Penn and 2) pretty much the entirety of downtown appears in the movie "Signs." My hometown has regulations about what color you can paint your house. (At least in San Francisco, Victorian houses are pink and purple, the way God intended--not colonial red, forest green, and Chesapeake blue.) I like rolling hills that are green in the summer, red in the fall, and spiky with bare branches the rest of the time. I like rivers and creeks. I like snow. Um, I really like snow. A lot. Also thunderstorms. I miss severe weather.

I also miss the view out of my bedroom window. Until a few months ago, the view was of the lumberyard. The main building was on the other side of our next-door neighbors' house. When I was little, we used to jump off the weird 3-foot ledges that stuck out of it. We decorated that white wall with flying rotten walnuts and muddy balls. From my window I could also see some of the other buildings, like the mill and the sketchy storage building.

Then the developers came and knocked it all down. In its place will be a "traditional neighborhood development" that is anything but traditional.

When I went back for Thanksgiving, I could look out my window and see houses two blocks away. I could see cars on other streets. I could see a lot of things I'd never seen from there before, things that had always been there. It was very disturbing. I wanted my old view back--which is to say, I wanted no view at all.

Sure, I was upset when the cell phone tower went up behind the old Acme grocery. It's tall and ugly. But I like being able to use my cell phone when I visit my parents, and they like using their cell phones. And I bet those people who fret about the power lines enjoy using their cell phones, too. How do we get all this lovely cellular reception? By having tall, ugly cell phone towers. Just like we get electricity in our homes by having heavy, ugly wires strung between tall, ugly poles.

So, go ahead. Put those wires underground. Then start thinking about subterranean cell phone towers. Because the more cell phones there are, the more towers we need--and the more likely one will wind up in your backyard.

Oh, and I'll take my lumberyard back now, please.

Ich bin ein East Coaster

The Governator is in China, spreading the good news about California.

Among the good news: "Come to California. Maybe Maria's going to cook some wienerschnitzel when you come!"

I may still be a cynical Philly girl at heart, but I swear I am not making this up.