a lesson in yard sale etiquette

We held our yard sale today. It was originally supposed to be yesterday, but we totally chickened out after seeing the ENTIRELY incorrect weather forecast for the Seattle area on weather.com (as one of my friends put it, "They never give Seattle enough credit."). We didn't realize what a big deal it would be to reschedule for the next day, but apparently we screwed up ... BIG time.

The problem begins with our over-preparedness. We had advertised our yard sale on craigslist to maximize our customer base. In the wonderful craigslist ad that Rachel wrote, she also listed some of the sweet gear that we were making available to the public at greatly discounted prices. Among this sweet gear was a particularly coveted roll of bubble wrap, which is probably the second piece leading to this particular woe: our stuff was too awesome ... or at least, people really like bubble wrap.

So we decided to postpone the yard sale from yesterday to today, seeing that the liars at weather.com were predicting sunny warmth all day. We deleted our old ad on craigslist and replaced it with an updated one but did not think to do anything more than that to cover our tracks. Little did we know what a can of you-know-what we had opened!

And we wouldn't find out until the next day (today) when we arrived at the site of the yard sale (our friend's house) and were told that, not only did one overzealous customer come knocking on their door yesterday at 8am looking for a space heater, but they also received a bit of what they termed "hate mail" taped to their door. It went something like this:

"Sure hope it's nothing serious -- but what happened to the yard sale?? FYI -- if you cancel or postpone, it would be nice to leave a note. Some of us got here at 8am."

The letter was written on the back of a printout of our craigslist ad. We had upset a true planner. And we felt some small amount of remorse about it, too, but we did share a chuckle.

It wasn't until later in the sale that a dowdy middle-aged woman with a bit of a grumpy face walked up to our sale, scouring the premises for what appeared to be something very specific. When I finally made eye contact with her, she demanded to know where the "large roll of bubble wrap" was. I informed her that it had been claimed, only to be subjected to several exasperated sighs and the declaration that the bubble wrap was her entire reason for coming out to the sale today ... and apparently -- as she went on to say -- for coming out the day before, as well. The dowdy grumpster proceeded to quasi-shout a litany of complaints that almost exactly mirrored the above-quoted letter, revealing herself to be our hate mailer ... as well as a real fan of bubble wrap. Rather than confront her about any of these oddities, I apologized profusely and then looked away until she skulked off.

Don't let this happen to you. Have a care, if you hold a yard sale, and realize that people really do love them and take them incredibly seriously. For some it truly seems like some kind of competitive sport or cutthroat part-time job ... and you really just don't want to get in the way of that.

Speaking of quasi-hate mail, check out this website chronicling some hilarious and disturbing passive aggressive notes.

And speaking of nothing at all related to anything else in this post, check out this website of the place I went to yesterday and risked life and limb to make a bunch of fools eat my dust in go-cart racing!

Tacomaroma

Do you smell that?

Wait, do you mean the smell of fear? ... or the smell of paper mill funk as you drive by the Tacoma Dome (where Britney and the cast of both Glee and American Idol come to wow the crowds)? That's right, it doesn't really matter. They smell awful similar.

Picture it:

We were in Tacoma visiting colleagues at the Tacoma office -- something of a storefront operation accessible to both the physically handicapped (thanks to a lovely long ramp) and the batshit crazy! We had just returned from the office, perhaps a little overexcited about our yummerino soups from Infinite Soups (surely the gem of Tacoma), when I noticed a man beginning the in-accordance-with-the-law-gradual incline of the ramp outside. I was curious, as he struck me as different than our usual volunteer interviewee (but, as he was an African American male, I thought this was more a good thing than something to be concerned about). It wasn't until he entered the building that I had occasion to think otherwise.

As he shut the door behind him, I heard a whisper from behind me of my soup-slurping colleague saying (in dramatic fashion) "He locked the door." Of course, this started me into a bit of a panic, but being a cool customer, I suppressed this instinct, welcomed our guest, and waited for him to announce his business ... all the while trying to gauge whether the door had truly been locked (it appeared that if any lock had been engaged, it was only the button lock on the door handle, which would have no impact on one's exit from the premises.)

Our guest was a flurry of vocabulary from the get-go, requesting a private audience with "either a male or a female" staff member about a "confidence matter" before rejecting this idea and settling into a folding chair next to our lunch table (conveniently located mere feet from the entrance) and launching into his story without really any preamble (or else it was all preamble -- as you'll see, it became difficult to tell).

He proceeded to tell us about his situation. He had somehow been transplanted (by train, it appeared) from Maryland and had accumulated a menagerie of teenaged daughters (each of a different ethnicity: white, black, Latino, and Native American ... pretty impressive) that were experiencing no small amount of turmoil. He told us that one of his daughters had been raped by "the Cubans" and (after a long detour into his current strained relationship with one of the girl's mothers involving DV (Domestic Violence) charges and stolen food stamps) mentioned that he may or may not be on something of a vigilante trip to destroy the aforementioned Cubans. He framed all of this as something of a warning to the ineffectual and bureaucratic "system" (a.k.a. the Tacoma Police?) that he may do something and repeatedly said that -- should he do something -- he wanted there to be a record that he had come to somebody beforehand.

His story, when intelligible at all, certainly had elements with which one might sympathize, but mixed in with the other two-thirds of his diatribe that was entirely incoherent and increasingly disturbing. Upon rereading the above crystallization of his ramblings, I see I have not done them justice. Suffice it to say that when our guest mentioned that he would have "no problem pulling the trigger" and flashing what I took to be a somewhat menacing glance in my direction and then proceeded to (we think) inform us that he had two "sides" (either coleslaw and mac and cheese from KFC or sideARMS?) on him that I decided it was finally time to unfreeze my petrified ass and try to coax our friend toward the door.

This was achieved more or less without incident, though he made some ominous reaches into amorphous pockets (to turn off a Walkman, as it turned out), some raised voices, and some decided dilly-dallying around picking up his backpack to leave.

Upon his departure, the authorities were informed of the general gist of our lunchtime conversation, after which I chugged the cold remnants of my "Ethiopian Greens" soup and got the hell out of Tacoma. On the way back to the office, my fellow manager and I compared "last moment thoughts" which ranged from "when I get shot in the stomach, how likely is it that a police officer or other emergency respondent will arrive in time to save me?" to "I bet this would be so much less definitively frightening if I were more religious."

In any case, life continues, despite another visit to Tacoma, and with that continued life come continued reflections: How much danger was I ever actually in? Did I handle the situation appropriately? Should I have given "our guest" more leeway? Less leeway? Should I assume that every middle-aged man with a large backpack and fatigue pants walking up to the office is a threat?

Luckily Ethiopian Greens soup tastes good hot AND luke-warm-to-coldish. That's all I've got to say about that.

Why I Like Glee

So after a near-death experience while in Tacoma this morning (see future entry, hopefully tonight) I've had to recuperate at home with a little Laphroaig and some hulu repeats of Modern Family and Glee. I've professed my love for the former before (though not to the extent it deserves), but this may be the first time I've admitted to my affection for the latter. The jury was out for a while, but it's solidly in now: I like Glee.

Why do I like Glee? Well, there are the over-produced, self-indulgent musical numbers. That's certainly a big factor. But more than even the musical numbers, I think what I like about Glee is that it's actually in a weird way somewhat unpredictable. Sure, the Gleesters pair up in predictable ways and break up in even more predictable ways, they win competitions in even more annoyingly predictable ways, and they face many of the overly predictable foibles and exploits of typical (or at least TV-typical) high school kids.

And yet I like it. It's strangely appealing in a way that for a while kept me wondering (in a very un-Sopranos-or-the-Wire way), is this a "good" show? And I'm not sure that I've entirely resolved that question still, but I have experienced enough of it to know that it is a good show for me. Despite all of it's seeming predictability, Glee is a quirky, weird little show with little moments of shocking bizarreness or poignant reallifeness. Like the uncomfortableness of Sue Sylvester (hilarious Jane Lynch, a Second City alum!) blackmailing the school principal after date raping (or, as Wikipedia has just informed me, "drug-facilitated sexually assaulting") him, or the some schizophrenic (a good word for the show, perhaps) storyline between Mr. Schuester and his crazy pregnancy-faking wife, or the more-complicated-than-they-should be relationships of the various high school students that remind me of the illogical, uncertain high school existence moreso than other pretenders.



But why do I really like Glee? The list:

-The Schuester hair jokes, which are really in full effect since the show's return two weeks ago. Rachel loves these jokes, too, for the same reason that I'm a little sensitive about it -- my hair is kind of Schuester-like. Though I did find some vindication in the most recent episode in which Sue admits that she only comments on his hair (which had previously been liked to a bird's nest and lesbian hair among other things) because she is jealous of it's waviness ... and lustrousness.

-Lines like "You're about as sexy as a cabbage patch doll. It's exhausting to look at you." ... particularly when they're directed towards the endlessly flummoxed and flabby Finn, at whom it is exhausting to look.

-Unapologetic devotion to particular pop icons. Though I'm still waiting for the David Bowie episode.

-The way it makes it's seemingly unforgivable underdogs (Puck, Quinn, Schuester's wife) somehow so forgivable that you find yourself rooting for them? Was I the only one that thought Schue was overreacting about the faux-baby?

-Speaking of Schue's overreaction, the unexpected and jarring moments of legitimate pathos have got to make the list. When he finally confronts his wife about her deception, a scene not entirely unlike the Tony-and-Carmela-split-up scene in the Sopranos, there is some true pain going on there ... impressive particularly for a guy that spent most of the season fighting off the urge to jam out with a full-on white boy's overbite.

-The ability to seemingly deny that certain characters and plot points ever existed. As much as I love Needle-nosed Ned the Head, jettisoning Stanley Tobolowsky's character was probably a good idea, and the fact that they did it without a moment's worry devoted to explaining it away is refreshing.

I think that's enough for now, though you can expect to revisit this topic in the future. I've also got a lot to say about "Lost" these days but will probably hold off on that until no one remembers this ridiculously long post devoted to a middling teeny bopper show. Now it's time to reflect on the day's other, more traumatic, experience. Stay tuned.

Holding Pattern

Life is in upheaval during this time of intense transition, and yet I can't help but feel like many parts of it are in a bit of a holding pattern. I've all but stopped any serious effort to continue reading or doing much in the way of productive pursuits. I am, however, enjoying my new MacBook Pro. (Let's not talk about the fact that the day after I caved and bought this beauty, Apple released it's latest updated MBPs.)

I did read a bit of "Still Failing at Fairness" (2004) before realizing that it was truly more of a refresh of the original "Failing at Fairness" than a sequel. SFAF did provide me with this compelling statistic: 98% of kindergarten teachers are women. That's actually up 8% from the original FAF (1994). Sounds like I'll once more be surrounded by the ladiez. My lot in life, apparently.

I've decided that it's time to start reading the pre-Institute required readings, too, which will delay further progress on the "So You Think You Can Teach" reading list. We'll see if I ever get back to it.

Our time in Seattle is almost up. We leave here bright and early on May 6th, a little over two weeks away, and there is still a LOT to do. Rachel has been working hard to get rid of all of our furniture, and so we are both currently clutching our computers while perched on the bed, which has been relocated to the living room and has been repurposed as a bed/couch/chair/desk/kitchen table. I've also been taking bag upon bag of clothes donations to work each day. We are really paring down our material possessions right now, which is a very liberating feeling. Today we got rid of our coffee table and futon (Ding Dong it's finally gone!!) and have already lost our dining room table and chairs, my desk and dressers, the microwave, TV, DVD player, and some lamps. Yeah, it's getting pretty empty.

Failing at Fairness ... and Blogging!

It's been a while ... again! But I have a better excuse this time: For at least part of the time since my last post I've been "South of the Border" down Mexico-way visiting mi hermano in Guadalajara, where he's teaching English. As for the rest of the time, I don't have a lot to say about that.

I have, however, been able to continue reading and just finished "Failing at Fairness" by Myra and David Sadker, a husband and wife team of education researchers specializing in sexism in education. The book was interesting in a lot of ways but also seemed to be fairly out of date ... probably why they've updated it with a "sequel": "STILL Failing at Fairness." I'm curious to start SFAF, but some of my reflections on the original ...

The Sadkers explore sexism in schools from early childhood through graduate school and identify blatantly sexist practices, barriers, and attitudes at every step along the way. Many of these challenges (and the most interesting, to me) are those perpetuated by well-meaning educators and administrators who don't even know the impact of their actions.

I don't remember elementary school as crystal clearly as I wish I did, but many of the attitudes described regarding school boys' perceptions of girls and what it would be like to be a girl (that is to say, the "I'd rather die!! mentality" struck me as very true and reminiscent of my own childhood. Interestingly, girls are much more open and positive about the idea of what it would be like to be a boy (either for a little or long while), and some said they even wish they could make the change. (There is no real discussion of gender identities beyond heterosexual male and females in the original FAF ... perhaps SFAF?)

Another discussion that resonated with me was that of female protagonists in children's books (at the time of publication, vastly outnumbered by male protagonists) and the very limited role of women in textbooks of all kinds. When I was in high school I remember a new history textbook coming out that featured special text "boxes" or "sidebars" discussing the "important" role of women during each era in history and even remember thinking then that if the role was really so important, why wasn't it just included in the general text of the chapters?

The Sadkers also pointed out flaws in teacher education through the years (for instance, encouraging teachers to stock more books with male protagonists because "girls will read books about boys but boys won't read books about girls") and the various challenges faced by women attending college, graduate schools and professional schools (including a very interesting section on women in medical school in the early 80s -- around the time both my mother and aunt attended). They explore "controversial" ideas like single sex schools which -- though equivocal in their endorsement -- they seem to find more good in than bad.

The Sadkers also point to many things that teachers can do to stem the tide of sexism in their classroom. For instance:
-ensuring that books with strong female protagonists are prominent and in abundance
-making an effort to call on and interact with girls at least as often as boys
-interacting with girls in a way that values their achievements, actions and input
-discussing sexist texts, practices or other challenges openly with students
-exposing girls to traditionally masculine subject areas and careers, identifying role models, and encouraging exploration of these areas

... and many more. As a future kindergarten teacher, I'm very glad to have read this book. While talking to several people about it, I got the impression that many people believe this to be a problem of the past (another reason I'm very glad to read SFAF next!) or a problem relegated to communities of color and/or poverty, but it is clearly an important issue and one that I hope I can address in my own future classroom.