...Help...

Soundtrack of the Day: "So Tinha de Ser Com Voce" by Antonio Carlos Jobim, on the album Fotografia

As my days of housesitting come to a close I find myself feeling itchier and itchier. Not because of the fabric softener used on the sheets, or a new kind of soap.

No, I feel itchy because of the dogs.

And I'm not even allergic.

These dogs are the sweetest, happiest, friendliest beasts you can imagine. But the trouble is, they defecate all over the house. All over the house. At first, I thought it was limited to the sitting room, but then I found piles of feces in the bathroom next to the sitting room. And then the living room. And then, finally, the master bathroom, upstairs. If you've never had the pleasure of rounding a corner only to be confronted with 5 piles of shit, I do not recommend this experience. (Incidentally, if it's something you think you may enjoy, please do call me and I'll give the housesitting gig to you.)

The routine is this: I wake up at 6:30 am, walk downstairs, past the sitting room. I notice several piles of crap. I pick them up. I let the dogs outside, to hopefully evacuate their bladders. While they're outside, lying down, I fix their food. Then I leave for work. When I come home, I let them out again. This time, they stand in the doorway looking at me as if to say, What are you doing? We poop inside, thank you. I then spend the rest of the evening discovering hidden piles of doodie.

I have asked if the pups can spend their days outdoors, but the answer is no. They are "inside dogs." Listen: A dog needs it's freedom! It needs to be able to run, dig, pee and crap where it pleases. Oh, and it needs a patch of grass on which to perform the necessary butt-scoot procedure. Especially if it has long hair, because long hair, as everyone knows, attracts what scientists call "dingleberries." And the only cure for dingleberries is the butt-scoot procedure.

Guess what?! These dogs have long hair. And no grass. And- joy of joys!- they like to climb onto the bed and hang out. You can probably imagine what this means. Yes, that's right. It means I really ought to have set up one of those toddler-proof gates at the entrance to the bedroom. Because, while I have never actually found any evidence of fecal matter on my bed, the thought of it really freaks me out. At night, I go to sleep cringing and wake up in the same position, for fear of rolling over onto a patch of contaminated bedding.

After several days of living in that kind of a situation, your whole body begins to feel as though microbes are crawling on it, and it makes you itchy. So, I'm glad to be going home to my apartment. Where, if I feel itchy, I know it's time to purchase a delousing agent of some kind.

Once there was a bunny...

Yesterday, I stumbled upon this lovely website, containing the work of a class full of children. Apparently, their assignment was to make animals out of leaves and then write stories about them. The stories were intended to teach the children about adjectives and also proper story construction (beginning, middle, end).
Although the stories are short and sweet, they could still use a little work. I am prepared to offer certain members of the class (those individuals who I feel would be most responsive) my suggestions.


One day there was a beautiful frog and the frog hopped away to a pond. The frog was hopping on a lily pad and the frog hopped in the pond and ate some flies. It hopped and hopped and never stopped.
By James

Now, I feel you have done an excellent job of utilizing the repetition device. However, rhymes are a little tired, James, and I think you're better than that.

One day there was a turkey who lived in the forest and she ate some berries. Then she saw a friend and they played together and they ate berries. Now they had to go home, but tomorrow they would still be friends, and they both lived happily ever after.
By Tiana

You're a smart girl, Tiana, but sometimes, you do just enough to get by. If you would push yourself, you could be an outstanding writer. For instance, could this she-turkey find something to do besides eating berries? Let's also be aware of our tenses from now on.

99 years ago an ugly fish swam in a dark, deep ocean. Then he saw a ugly mean octopus and the mean ugly octopus ate the ugly fish. The octopus felt bad, because he threw up.
By Corey

Truly a masterpiece. What a dark, twisted yarn you have spun. Rage, disgust, disease-it's all here. My colleagues feel that your ending could use work, but I say screw 'em! This is a mood piece. Bravo, Corey!

Once upon a time my peacock ate some grass in the wild. A kid tried to pull a feather off the peacock, but he didn't. The peacock lived happily ever after.
By Jophiel

Jophiel, I feel sorry for you. You're obviously foreign, and don't understand how English literature works. What I'm looking for is some more about the battle between Kid and Peacock. How did the peacock thwart the child's attempt? Were you the child? Give it some thought.

500,000 years ago there was an octopus that lived in a place called Cakeland. An octopus joined him at the delicious, icing ocean. They went out with a cup and scooped up a cup of frosting.
By Morgan

Now, when I first read this story I thought it was a blatent case of trying to one-up Corey. I soon realized how wrong I was. You have your own brand of genius, Morgan. You challenge Darwin's theory of evolution by suggesting that Octopi could exist a half a million years ago! And Cakeland? Truly inspired. Professors Ciniglio and Devine and I would very much like to hear more about this Cakeland.

Once on a dark night a bear went in a castle. He finds a treasure box. He took it to his house. He was so happy. They lived happy every after.
By Jesus

I... I can't... how?... *sigh* I guess I just expected more out of JESUS, for Pete's sake. Clearly our Savior has a little trouble with tenses, and with keeping track of HOW MANY BEARS ARE IN THE STORY.

Once upon a time there was a stinky mouse. My mouse ate the garbage in the can. Finally the mouse threw up.
By Fadumo

Really? Really? You're going to plagerize Corey? Vomit was his finale. If this were a university, you'd be out on your ass, Fadumo.

A long, long time ago Jesus was born and a jaguar was so bad. It scratched meat. It was a rabbit that it killed. He gave the rabbit to Jesus.
By Landon

Excellent use of Biblical symbolism. Too bad the jaguar didn't give Jesus some writing talent!

85 years ago a king cobra lived in a dangerous, tropical jungle. After a while the king cobra hunted for lots and lots of meat. The king cobra ate meat for the rest of his life.
By Ryan D.

What a sad, sad tale. Oh, Ryan! The lonely king cobra and his meat pile! It kept me up all last night- what a haunting image. You have a gift, my friend.

Once upon a time there was a beautiful butterfly that lived in a backyard. When my butterfly was in the backyard she saw ten beautiful flowers and then she flew and drinked nectar. When the butterfly was drinking nectar a person came out. When Betty saw the butterfly she took a net to catch the butterfly for a pet.
By Kim

Holy crap, Kim, what is going on here? Do you want to talk about it?

A long time ago a disgusting fox lived in the forest. The fox tried to eat Corey'’s fish, but the fish swam away. The fox was sad.
By Jason

What I am seeing here is a little boy with self esteem issues. Perhaps you should contact Corey and talk to him about why you feel so inferior to him, and why you feel his writing is so much better than yours.

Those are only some of the works from this class. You may subject yourself to further stories, or view the LeafArt here: http://www.moreland.k12.ca.us/Baker/class/pavlos/leaf/leaf.html

Who Asked You?

Last week, the annual Stanford Jazz Workshop was held. I went last year, and it was one of the best experiences I have ever had. Unfortunately, Real Life began a few months ago, and I have been rendered permanently busy (there are an awful lot of Sudoku puzzles to be done, dammit, and only so many hours in the workday). Therefore, I am unable to attend any such workshops.
But, Jake called me from Stanford last Tuesday night. "Hey! Larry Goldings was here today."

"Oh, I know! You're so lucky!"

"He's every bit as cool as you said."

"Yeah? Did you get to meet him?"

"Well... he taught a master class. ... He's playing tonight!"

"Aww, man. Really? With who?"

"Peter Bernstein and Bill Stewart."

Well. That's when I let out a deafening scream, cursed myself for having a job that doesn't involved several weeks off whenever I feel like it, and spewed forth more swear words then even George Carlin would know what to do with.

Jake just laughed.


This exchange jogged my memory, and the rest of the week was flooded with thoughts of last year's Jazz Adventure, and more specifically, the people I met there. There was Madeline Eastman, Randy Porter, John Wiitalla, Vince Ladeano, Peter Bernstein, Dena DeRose ... and that's only scratching at the surface of the incredible faculty. But, it is my fellow attendees that I wish to focus on.

I was studying vocal jazz there last year, which means I was thrown into a room full of egotistical cry babies who clapped on 1 and 3. Don't get me wrong, most of them were really nice, and even more of them were very talented. But, since I was one of the youngest, there were a few (mainly women) who wanted to give me advice- and tons of it. Certainly! I thought to myself. By all means! Do you have an album out? No? How about a recording contract? Not that either, huh? Well, then quit acting like it. For God's sake, you've got timing like Lawrence Welk.

"You really need to work the mic. You know, like, work it?" offered a tall, thinskinned woman. She then turned to Fred, our theory instructor. "Why can't we just buy a computer program to do all this stupid transposing for us?"

I know. It made me cry, also. I know that somewhere in their little chick singer brains these women meant well. But, that was only part of it. Mainly, they were using my youth and inexperience as a way to broadcast their own knowledge to each other. "You never call 'Summertime' at a jam session" one of them snorted. She was turned towards me, but delivered this tidbit as she glanced around at the rest of the singers, looking for a reaction. She happened to be right, but I wasn't going to give her the satisfaction.

"Honey, you're in charge of the musicians," a helpful and well-dressed black woman told me one night at a vocal jam session. "You own them! When you're in front of a band, ain't nobody more important than you. If you don't want more people to solo, you just come right back in. You're the singer. Nobody will mind. They're here for you."

I can only guess that this was in response to the piece I'd just sung. About 7 people wanted to solo on my tune. Let 'em, I say. Hell, the fact that any horn players are willing to show up and spend time at EgoJam ought to get them at least 12 bars on a tune, if not a gift certificate to Red Lobster. But, apparently, in my infinite naivete, I had neglected the first rule of Divaism: He who playeth of the instruments that are valved, slided, keyed, stringed, yea even skinned, are no more than one level above the lint you find betweenth the cushions of thine couch.

So that's fun.

And later on in the week, it got even more fun. Eventually the singers got bored with trying to top each other using the "Marginally Helpful Advice That Proves I Know More Than You" category, and began attempting to one-up each other with anything else they could think of. Once, a woman with an unfortunate chin-to-neck ratio even blurted out in the middle of Denny's, "Black guys love me!"

What?

Apparently she has big boobs and a butt or something. I don't know. That's when the musicians and I tuned out. "Just keep lookin' at your food and maybe it will stop," John Wiitalla said.

And that was the most useful advice I got all week.