Skip to content

Year: 2006

Weekend Hound Blogging: Phoebe’s First Year Among the Apes

October 22, 2006 • • 3 Comments

One year ago today, Action Phoebe, the hound of adventure, came to live with us. Over the past year, she’s learned to go for walks, got an education, had a few baths, and made herself at home. She came to us as a spooky greyhound, but she’s come out of her shell so much that people have remarked that she’s turned into a lab.

Her real birthday is November 8th when she’ll turn 3, but we celebrated today with a long walk down the trail near our house and perhaps, later, they’ll enjoy a bowl of Frosty Paws. She’s a great dog, but then aren’t they all?

***

Want to make a fast friend by saving a greyhound in Central Texas? Check these pups out. Or go here to find a greyhound near you. You can also go here to find out why greyhounds are running for their lives.

If you have dogs who need proven leadership, go here to find a cat.

Old Photo Friday

October 20, 2006 • • 2 Comments

During the summer of 1979 we moved from Washington, DC to Subic Bay in The Philippines. Along the way we stopped in Austin to visit my aunt. She lived in a duplex on Arroyo Seco and her dog shared the backyard with her neighbor’s golden retreiver, Jeremy.

The first morning we were there, we heard my brother screaming, “He’s eating me! He’s eating me!”

We went out to find that Jeremy was introducing himself by licking my brother who was pinned up against the house. I took this picture of my sister after we learned that Jeremy didn’t actually eat people and was in fact very friendly, but the look on her face suggests that maybe we weren’t so sure.

In Which, I Finally Get to Use the Word ‘Dastardly’

October 19, 2006 • • 4 Comments

The most chilling aspect of the futuristic society imagined in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 is the fact that the people willingly gave away their rights and liberties. The thing about firemen going door-to-door burning books always seemed a bit silly, but the larger point, namely Bradbury’s vision of how America could become a totalitarian state is truly eerie.

More interested in being consumers than citizens, more engaged in passive entertainment than in civil discourse, Bradbury’s fururistic populace willingly gave away all their rights and liberties in the name of being kept safe and so long as they were all entertained, had plenty to buy, no one cared or noticed that a war was raging in the skies overhead, that a nuclear apocalypse was fast approaching, or that those who did notice were quietly disappeared.

In short, apathy, much like that which greeted the Military Commissions Act that was signed into law yesterday. We appear to already be on the road Bradbury imagined. This despicable law gives the president the right power to detain anyone for anything for any period of time, so long as he believes that that person is somehow helping terrorists.

Cheney says that debating these issues helps terrorists. Now I don’t think that those of us who don’t support Bush and his policies will be rounded up and sent off to ‘Gitmo, but it should be of grave concern to everyone that nobody knows who the next president will be. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Bush is incompetent, in over his head and a fool, but I do not believe he is evil and I do not think there is any intention of rounding up political enemies, but even so, sacrificing this nation’s core values for the sake of safety and political advantage is shameful and evidence of a lack of fitness for the office.

At this point the only thing that will give us any balance, any oversight or accountability is to elect as many Democrats as possible to the US Congress. That is the only way we get oversight or accountability. Divided government is the only hope we have now to slow down or even stop the constitutional bleeding, but only we can make ourselves stop being afraid of terrorists and start being afraid of what can be done in the name of safety.

Bradbury’s vision suddenly seems frighteningly prescient. It probably won’t come to pass, but then every people who gave up their rights, their liberties, their values to be safe probably thought the same thing. When I used to teach Fahrenheit 451, we used to discuss whether or not it could ever really happen here. Sadly, I think the answer is yes.

If you haven’t already, check out Keith Olbermann’s commentary on this. He’s the only TV journalist who really seems to be calling it like it is, and his willingness to stand up to the Bush administration and call them on their dastardly machinations is truly inspiring.

Albuquerque

October 18, 2006 • • 1 Comment

-This is from a road trip in ’95.

Walking low streets, I breathe mountains
Frosty morning air steals into my lungs like perfect smoke
Later desert warmth will rule the day, and storms…
Skies blaze with fiery clouds
Balloons navigate the misty currents
My feet walk conquistador paths and missionary trails
Turned streets that lead past adobe homes and pueblo bungalows
To breakfast in a warm and welcoming diner:
Bagel and cream cheese with fresh green chiles

©1995

A Fine Austin Brewery

October 17, 2006 • • 6 Comments

Last week I stopped in at HEB for some beer and saw a brew I’d never noticed before – Independence Pale Ale. As I was checking out, I saw that it’s brewed here in Austin. The beer was a very good pale made with lots of hops, especially cascade hops, which happens to be my favorite variety.

It turned out that last weekend was the second anniversary of the Independence Brewing Company and that my wife had already made plans for us to go to the celebration. She’d never had the beer and so was surprised to see that that’s what I had happened to buy.

On Saturday, we went to the brewery in one of the many warehouses off of East Ben White. The brewery is very small and the people friendly. There was a band and Jasper was there wagging his tail and greeting the guests, but I didn’t try the beer named for him. I did try the Freestyle Wheat which was crisp and refreshing as well as the Bootlegger Brown. The Brown was my favorite. I’m not a big fan of browns, but this one with its dark color and rich chocolatey flavor reminded me more of a porter. Delicious.

The Independence Brewing Company is the best thing to happen to Austin beer in a long time, at least since the days of Celis and Waterloo. Hopefully, they’ll grow and continue to brew great beer for many years to come.

Space (I Believe In)

October 12, 2006 • • Leave a comment

If you believe in space, go visit the Bad Astronomy Blog for some truly stunning recent pictures of Saturn and Mars. I’ve been going over there just to look at Saturn all day and Mars for the past week. There’s nothing more important than stopping occasionally to gape and wonder at the profound beauty of the universe.

It’ll do you good.

Hatchet

October 12, 2006 • • 1 Comment

I have one class of middle school students and no idea what literature to teach. I’m set with my high school kids, but middle school. Woof.

After exploring the room I inherited, I found class sets of books that seem middle-schoolish. One in particular jumped out at me – Hatchet by Gary Paulsen. I heard this book was good so I started my kids on it and then proceeded to get out ahead of them.

Hatchet is about a thirteen-year-old boy named Brian who is traveling in a two-seater Cessna to see his dad in northern Canada. The pilot has a heart attack forcing Brian to try to figure out how to crash land the plane… in the middle of nowhere.

Brian’s struggle to survive in the vast Canadian forest with only his windbreaker, the things he had in his pockets, and – you guessed it – a hatchet makes for an interesting coming of age story in which the young hero must learn to let go of his old problems and one-by-one solve the riddles of his new life which is quickly reduced to its simplest terms: food, water, warmth. Paulsen’s fast-paced writing, which is immediate and internal, simultaneously takes the reader inside Brian’s psyche and deep into the pristine wilderness of the northern forest.

By the end of the book, it’s hard to leave Brian and his lake in the woods, and the deus ex machina ending, while logical, leaves the reader wanting more. Paulsen’s fans thought so as well prompting him to write a sequel, Brian’s Winter, that changes the ending of the first book and extends Brian’s adventures into the more perilous wintertime.

By the end of Hatchet, I’m left wanting to go camping to escape into the wilderness but not under circumstances as dire as Brian’s. Books take us places, though, and I thoroughly enjoyed spending a summer on that nameless lake watching Brian learn for himself the ancient lessons of man’s survival as he discovers the clarity that comes with self-reliance.