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.

Oops

Well, I knew it would happen sooner or later, but I've gone two weeks without posting. Some might say that's due to a lack of dedication to the blogging lifestyle and others might say, "Good for you! You got a life!" I wish I could attest to the veracity of the exclamatory statements of the latter group, but, alas, it probably has more to do with the former option.

That said, a couple of exciting things HAVE transpired over the last 12 days. In no particular order:

Rachel finished law school!!! Okay so there is SOME particular order. I can't adequately describe quite how glad I am that law school is OVER and also quite how impressed I am with my wife for completing it. She's a soldier.

We went to Portland! (Part I of Rachel's Guilt Over Missing Andy's Birthday Leads to a Prolonged Birthday Celebration ... which REALLY needs to be retitled) We had awesome Lebanese (not usually my favorite) food at Nicholas Restaurant, explored the Pearl District, saw the largest independent bookstore in Portland, drank a local brew at some bar tended by a pissy barmaid and scarfed a bacon maple bar (and waited half an hour to do it) at Voodoo Donuts.

We also hosted a Murder Mystery Party (Part II of RGOMABLPBC) in which my fictitious bride was murdered at our wedding reception, prompting an evening-long investigation that uncovered ugly truths and disturbing mysteries. It was a lot of fun and Rachel (a.k.a. Inspector Poirot) did a great job of both organizing the party and solving the crime.

Finally, March Madness has once again taken up more than it's fair share of my time over the last week or so. The Buckeyes just lost tonight, thus sinking my longshot bracket. It's been fun, but particularly since we'll be out of the country (Meheeko, here I come!) for the majority of the rest of the tournament, I'm not sure it's an entirely bad thing to lose some interest.

I'll be trying to get back in the swing of posting more about education and other things involving my future life as an educator. A friend has sent some links to some an interesting website and a book or two regarding early childhood education. My father-in-law also forwarded an article about experts condemning "proposed core standards" for young students, which will probably have to be addressed in an upcoming entry along with a question he has posed to me about the very nature of charter schools and their relationship to teachers unions. Heavy stuff.

Scary Book

Since finishing "Other People's Children," I've been reading the next in my book series, which I think I'm going to call "Think You Want To Be a Teacher? Think AGAIN!" This one is called "Relentless Pursuit: A Year In The Trenches With Teach For America" by Donna Foote. It's a journalistic/enthnographic treatment of TFA, primarily following four first-year corps members (CMs). Between Foote's likable writing style and the fact that I'll be facing many of the described perils in several months, I'm having trouble putting it down.

Major takeaways (or reasons to be afraid so far) are:
-children just may actually URINATE in my classroom
-institute sounds unbearable (5:30am to midnight or later for 5 weeks straight??)
-the actual teaching that comes AFTER institute doesn't sound all that much better

But all in all, reading "Relentless Pursuit" is confirming my belief that this is something that I will enjoy and feel good about doing ... even if I don't feel WELL while doing it.

It's Valentine's Day. Rachel and I are feasting on fancy salad and Crepes Coquilles St. Jacques (scallop crepes) followed by bubbly and Cupcake Royale's DEATHCAKE (V-Day special).

Super Bowl snack idea

Apparently they're called "Google Heart Attacks" when they are on sale at the Google cafeteria, but I think they'd make a helluva Super Bowl snack! Burger (with optional bacon and egg) between two Krispy Kreme donuts (or alternatively one KKD cut in half and then grilled). I've got a pain in my chest just thinkin about it, but ... mmmmm.