Gambling is a Crap Shoot

It's the weekend, and there is a casino in my future, which I am looking forward to, and that has caused me to ruminate on some of my more memorable casino adventures.  One of them was a number of years ago at the Blue Chip in Michigan City.  It was a Saturday evening, and the place was crowded, and I couldn't find a seat at an affordable blackjack table.  I walked around and around looking for a spot.

Then suddenly I saw a table where only one woman was playing.  I glanced at the bet-limit sign and was astounded (but delighted!) that there was a $5 table with empty seats.  Maybe they had just opened that one up, I thought.  In any case, I immediately climbed up on a stool and gave the dealer $100.  He gave me four green chips, worth $25 each.  I said I would like some $5 chips, and he gave me a kind of odd look, then directed my attention to the sign at the end of the table that I had obviously misread.  This was not a $5 table -- the minimum bet was $50.

"Cripes," said I (or words to that effect), "that's too rich for me."  As I grabbed the green chips and slid off the stool, the woman gave me a look of complete disdain, revealing in one quick up-and-down survey of my person that I wasn't even worth her attention since I couldn't afford to make $50 bets.

I let her go ahead and feel superior because I knew that really high-class people play blackjack in Monte Carlo, not in Indiana.

Sushi Schmushi

My partner and I get together with a couple friends for dinner out about once a month, taking turns choosing the restaurant.  Last night we dined at a Japanese hibachi and sushi place.  You can bet I didn't chose it ("What? Raw fish?  Are you kidding me?").  It could have been problematic for a number of reasons.

First, I have been accused all my life of being a picky eater, which I have always considered extremely unfair since I love some things that lots of other people won't eat, like liver, and lima beans, and potted meat.  Second, I have never had a reputation for either flexibility or adventurousness in anything, much less foreign cuisine.  And third -- well, when it was my turn to choose the restaurant last month, I picked A&W.  In short, nobody who knows me would expect anything less than my being dragged into the joint kicking and screaming.

Nevertheless, I pulled up my big girl pants and promised myself I wouldn't be a party pooper.  I don't suppose the two scotch-and-sodas I had at the bar while waiting for the rest of our party to arrive hurt anything either.

So here is my review:  the miso soup was very good, the raspberry vinaigrette on the salad was too, the hibachi chef was very clever and funny, and the shrimp he made me were excellent.  Altogether it was a very fun experience.

Oh, and as for the dreaded raw fish -- well, of course, I had some.  I tried three different sushi rolls, then had seconds on my favorite one, which was crab salad, avocado, and fresh salmon with honey wasabi sauce. 

Who are you callin' picky?

Keep This and All Politics Out of Reach of Children

The phone rang just now, and the caller ID said it was Directory Assistance at 248-555-5555.  That piqued my curiosity, so I answered it.  A recording began, some guy telling me he was with the RNC.  I hung up immediately.

The Republicans must be in major trouble if they have to masquerade as Directory Assistance to get people to answer their phone calls.

Just in the nick of name

In a Wikipedia article called “Nicknames of United States Presidents,” the only thing listed for the current guy is “No Drama Obama,” which is lame, but at brainshavings.com, something titled “The Pretty Darn Exhaustive Obama Nickname List” includes 256 epithets, only a handful of which are not pejorative, and even those are probably sarcastic. 

Presidential nicknames are American as apple pie.  According to the Wikipedia article, the prize for the most nicknames goes to Martin Van Buren (9) while Warren G. Harding had none. Many presidential nicknames are familiar -- we all know who the Father of His Country was and which ones were called the Sage of Monticello, the Great Emancipator, and the Father of the Constitution. (Or we should, but okay -- Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Madison.)

There were old ones: Old Hickory, Old Tippecanoe, Old Kinderhook, and Old Rough and Ready (Jackson, W. H. Harrison, Van Buren, Taylor), and riffs like His Rotundity, His Fraudulency, His Obstinacy, and His Accidency (John Adams, Hayes, Cleveland, Tyler, the first veep to ascend on the death of the president). Naturally, lots were less than flattering, such as the Peanut Farmer, the Grim Presence, Big Lub, Tricky Dick, and the Gipper (Carter, A. Johnson, Taft, Nixon, Reagan, a reminder that he had been a movie actor).

Referring to the president by his initials started with Theodore Roosevelt, because he signed TR to many things, but it didn’t recur until Franklin Roosevelt. He was always eager to emulate his cousin Teddy in all things, but I suspect the use of his initials came from newspaper editors who realized that FDR took up lots less space than Roosevelt in headlines. The trend continued for HST, JKF, and LBJ (Truman, Kennedy, L. Johnson) but not for Eisenhower because they could use Ike. It died out after that, unless you want to count Dubya.

I thought about the initials thing for our current president, but I'm afraid too many people might confuse BHO with a cable network.  I guess he will eventually earn a nickname.  For his sake, and that of our country, I hope it's a complimentary one.

Credit Quandary

Mexican for supper last night, and it was yummy.  I whipped up some guacamole and also ground beef with my very own taco seasoning.  We didn't have any refried beans, but then I found a can of black beans in the cupboard and decided I ought to be able to figure out how to make my own, which I did, and it was very good.

My partner fried some tortillas so we could have crispy beef and bean tostadas with cheese and salsa and black olives, and, of course, sour cream and guac.

Having taken some to share with a coworker, my partner reports there is yet another person who thinks my guacamole is the best they've ever had.  My dilemma is whether I keep my mouth shut or admit that the guac recipe came from Alton Brown on foodnetwork.com.

Regardless who gets credit, the meal was superb.  Soji the Chihuahua loved it too.  Yes, I know my tiny dog is supposed to be on a diet and not be given people food, but doesn't she deserve a taste of home now and then?

Can you trust a tombstone?

Having found Great-Grandma Knez's headstone at Bohemian National Cemetery last week, I was able to come up with her death certificate online (for free).  It says her son, my grandfather, gave the personal information such as birth date, maiden name, parents' names, etc.  Somebody did a lousy job one way or the other.  The tombstone says she died aged 57, and the death certificate says she was 55 (born in 1857).  The date of death is November 21 on the marker and November 22 on the certificate.  I'm going with the certificate.  The doctor should know. 

I consider tombstones to be reliable primary sources, but they can have the wrong information.  A great-grandfather on my mother's side, William Thomas Weatherford, had a brother named George who died at age 13.  I saw George's headstone and was surprised that his birth date was the same as William's, meaning they were twins.  Later I discovered George was actually a couple years older than William.  Apparently the grieving parents gave the stone cutter the wrong kid's birth date.

This recent find got me all charged up genealogically, and while I was rummaging around on the Internet this morning, I found a site called FamilyLink that promised me I could search the world for information about my family.  I signed up for a free three-day trial, but within an hour I called them to cancel it so it wouldn't be billed to my credit card.  A woman named Crystal handled my request, confirming my identity, and providing a confirmation number.  I was prepared -- in fact, anxious -- to tell her the reason I wanted to cancel the subscription was that they don't have squat, but she never asked me.  I guess she already knows.

Back Now

We've been away on a nice little trip to Chicago and points north, partly to celebrate our 26th anniversary and partly to please the genealogist in me.  For years I've wanted to visit Bohemian National Cemetery to see and photograph the graves of my father's family who are buried there.

Bohemian National is a huge cemetery taking up 122-acres on Chicago's north side, founded in 1877 and still going.  I knew that my grandparents are both there, as well as their twins who died in infancy, and one of my great-grandmothers.  A nice woman in the cemetery office looked up where these people were, gave us maps and directions, and sent us on our way.  My partner was brilliant in reckoning locations.

Grandma Knez's ashes are in the Masaryk Memorial Mausoleum, and we found and photographed the niche front that bears her name and dates.  My grandfather and the babies have no headstones, but we determined where they had been buried because of the other relatives buried in the same plots who did have markers.  My grandmother's mother, Ludmila Melka (1866-1919), has a headstone, which I photographed, but then I got a real bonus by finding this one:

The inscription reads:

MARIE KNĚZ
zem.21.list.1912
v stáří 57 roků
Spi sladce drahá matko



When I got home and checked dates, I was able to confirm that this was my other great-grandmother, Grandpa Knez's mother.  It says she died on 21 November 1912 at age 57 years.

That sentiment at the end (Spi sladce drahá matko) appears on Ludmila Melka's stone also.  I'm glad I didn't get it translated until I got home.  I admit I am a big mush and that sentimental moments tend to puddle me up, and there were plenty of those that afternoon in the cemetery.  If I had been told then that it means "Sleep sweetly dear mother," it would probably have set me to sobbing.

Nine Eleven

In September 2001 my partner and I took a trip to Las Vegas (our first) for our 15th anniversary.  We stayed downtown at the Golden Nugget, arriving on Sunday, September 9, and planning to leave on Thursday, the 13th.  We didn't get home until Tuesday morning, the 18th, because of what happened on the previous Tuesday.

I got up early that morning, around 6:45 local time, which was 9:45 in the east.  My partner was still zonked out after a late night of gambling, so for something to do I turned on the television but kept the sound really low.  What I saw was really amazing. 

Now, I am extremely non-violent.  I dislike movies and shows with graphic and/or excessive violence, but for some odd reason I really love seeing things blow up -- cars, bridges, buildings, boats, whatever.  I don't know why.

And right there on the television screen I saw an airplane fly into a skyscraper and blow up.  Whoa! I thought, how cool is that!  Then I realized I was watching CNN, but I assumed it was an entertainment segment showing a clip from a movie.  They showed it again, however, which prompted me to turn up the volume so I could hear what they were saying.  And be horrified.

Reduplicate-Schmeduplicate

There is a construct in many languages which linguists call reduplication.  That sounds redundant, but that's really what it's about -- words (or perhaps more properly, idioms) made up of repeating sounds.  There are many reduplicatives in English which we hear and say all the time, probably without giving it much thought. 

First there are words in the strict repetitive form, many of which sound like baby talk (bye-bye, choo-choo, wee-wee, poo-poo) while others aren't quite so juvenile (goody-goody, hush-hush, so-so).

Rhyming reduplicatives change the initial consonant (willy-nilly, fuddy-duddy, lovey-dovey), and the alliterative (sometimes called "ablaut") form changes the vowel sound (dilly-dally, wishy-washy, tick-tock, ding-dong).

And then there is schm-reduplication, derived from Yiddish, which is often derogatory or dismissive (money-schmoney, fancy-schmancy).

For the ultimate in redundant reduplication, however, I think we'd have to go with itsy-bitsy teenie-weenie.

Magna Labor Day

On Monday, September 3, 1973, my friend Marcy and I were in London taking a half-day sight-seeing tour around the city that was included in our vacation package.  Our British tour guide stood at the front of the bus talking into a microphone, telling about the sights we were seeing.  She pointed out the American Embassy as we passed it, noting that it appeared to be closed and wondering why that should be.  After a moment's reflection, it occurred to the Americans on the bus that it was Labor Day, a holiday.

"What's it for?" she wanted to know. 

Several people tried to explain it to her, and it became clear that explaining what Labor Day is for is not easy.  I don't think she ever got it, probably because saying -- even in several different ways -- that it's for people who work just doesn't make a lot of sense.

According to the U. S. Department of Labor, Labor Day is "... a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country."

Too bad none of us was that eloquent back then.  And too bad there aren't more people working right now to contribute to our prosperity.

On a brighter note, I recall a joke our tour guide told us that morning about a sight-seeing bus taking a group of American tourists all around London and environs.  At one stop, they all pile out of the bus, and the tour guide tells them they have arrived at famous Runnymede, where King John was forced by his barons to sign the Magna Carta.  A guy from Cleveland says,  "When did he do that?"  The tour guide answers, "Twelve-fifteen, sir."  The American turns to his wife and says, "How about that, Edna?  We missed it by twenty minutes."

Yeah, I know.  But that's how I remember the Magna Carta was signed in1215.

Just Some of the Things

I ran across a blog yesterday on which a woman had listed 30 things she had done in her 30 years of life.  I got to thinking I could compile a list of 65 things I've done in my lifetime.  Most of the things I thought of were really boring and not terribly out of the ordinary, like going to Girl Scout camp, and taking a trip to Europe, and having my picture taken with Sparty.

Then I thought maybe I would try to come up with just one really unique thing I have done.  I thought of the time in the summer of 1979 when I played percussion in the Macomb (Illinois) Municipal Band.  At one of our Friday evening concerts in the park, we performed Leroy Anderson's "Syncopated Clock," and I was the clock.  But then there was also the time I danced with a pimp at Houlihan's.

I just can't decide between those two.