Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Monthly Archives: December 2008
die vielen leute
It’s easy to forget what a cross-section looks like. I never saw it in the office; there, I saw retirees, the gainfully employed, and their children. This is not a true cross-section. When you spend your life shuttling between home, work, and a relatively upscale supermarket, you’re insulated from society at large.
As docs, we see something close to a cross-section in our emergency rooms. But in the ER, it’s all too simple to fall back on old prejudices. This is not what the world is. Normal people don’t get (fill in the blank).
Jaw fractures, for example. With rare exception (we ENTs say to one another), normal people don’t break their jaws. Assholes who pick fights, they’re the ones who break their jaws. Or, more properly speaking, and one of the rare cases where the passive voice really does make sense: they get their jaws broken for them.
We did the DMV thing today: California license and registration for both of us and our vehicles. Folks waiting at the DMV truly do represent a cross-section of our neighborhood. Young mothers with their toddlers . . . two three-year-olds make an on-the-spot friendship, and when one kid’s mom gets called to a window, the girl waves and says, “Bye!” The other girl says, “Bye!” And because neither learned when to stop, the ‘byes’ continue for the next two minutes.
An old man stands behind my wife, talking nonstop in a perfectly ordinary conversational tone. A sign of the times: I don’t assume he’s crazy (yet), I check his ears for wireless first. Nope, no wireless — he’s nuts. He’s not holding a number, and no one bothers to tell him he’ll need a number before the DMV workers will talk to him.
Students in dreadlocks rib each other to pass the time . . . a Middle Eastern man insists to the gal taking pictures that he’s such a great driver, he didn’t need to read the handbook . . . an overweight white dude huffs his oxygen . . . a dad brings in his teenage son for his first written test. The woman taking my forms finds out I’m a doctor and chats me up about her panic attacks when she takes benadryl at night. (So don’t take benadryl at night.) Young people who seem to be compos mentis walk up to windows expecting to be seen. No number? See ya later!
The masses titillate me/scare me/bore me. But even when they bore me, I can’t resist looking, peeking into their lives. I can’t resist listening in.
Is there a word for that, to be bored and yet feel compelled to look?
D.
Sometimes I overdo it.
I must be feeling better. When I’m depressed, dinner more often than not is tamales and rice from Lola’s. Maybe I’ll make spaghetti with meat sauce (turkey, since my dumbass stomach thinks beef is aqua regia). Only a few times since we’ve come to Santa Rosa have I made Jake’s favorite, focaccia, which is really a shame since the recipe is so damned easy.
Tonight, I went a little nuts. I wanted to experiment with a few different things. First, I made those dates wrapped in bacon. This was astonishingly easy, but I have to warn you: (A) these little bastards are FILLING! and (B) this appetizer depends on the quality of your ingredients. Splurge on big, plump, moist Medjool dates, the kind you have to de-pit yourself. And buy a good quality bacon, too.
In honor of my upcoming 30th reunion,
. . . which I have no intention of attending. Voila, BULLY, soon to be released for the PC:
I wanna play the guy who gets the girl!
D.
Dumb Dorky Dexter
I’m not sure what it says about us that we’re a Dexter family. Worse, Karen and I prefer the book to the first season, since Jeff Lindsay’s vision of Dexter was far more uncompromising than Showtime’s version.
Showtime’s Dexter is soft. He has feelings. He even seems to enjoy human company. Not so Lindsay’s literary Dexter; that Dexter is a human simulacrum who never loses touch with the inner monster.
In case you’re unfamiliar with the series, here’s the premise: due to childhood trauma, Dexter becomes a serial killer. His adoptive cop father, Harry, channels Dexter’s inner monster so that his son will only prey upon other killers. He teaches young Dexter enough forensics to keep the kid from getting caught, raising him to follow the Code of Harry. Dexter grows up and becomes a blood spatter analyst for Miami PD. This satisfies his intellectual love of blood while also giving him access to the databases he needs to track down his quarry.
Season One was mostly true to the book, with some notable exceptions at the ending. Let’s just say Showtime made Dexter too human and let another character live who should have been Too Stupid To Live. Season Two had some annoying plot twists and a bothersome ending (Dexter kills for convenience, pushing the limits of his Code). Murder becomes a sort of Deus Ex Machina, tying up all those troublesome loose ends. Still, Season Two had Jaime Murray.
Woof.
Karen’s reading the second book, which I gather diverges significantly from Season Two. I’m politely waiting my turn.
But Season Three, jeez. Last night really tweaked me. Yeah, you want your hero (or antihero, or whatever he is . . . really, TV Dexter has become far more vigilante than monster, so “hero” might well be the most appropriate designation) to be in danger, but never never never make him stupid. And last night he was STUPID. He underestimated his rival, even after his rival gave him ample cause for concern, and now he’s in deep shit.
He’s so dumb, he deserves this parody. From BangitoutVideos, Dessler:
. . . which will probably strike you as funny only if you’re Jewish and a Dexter fan. Kate, you’re probably Jewish enough.
D.