Bernadette smacked me in the shoulder, “I can’t believe it got it right!”

She held out the small, red orb to me. The screen read, “refrigerator.”  It was an electronic game based on the game 20 questions that someone had bought for The Boy. Basically, you would answer “yes,” “no” or “maybe to a series of questions and it would guess (with fairly good accuracy) what you were thinking of. It was sort of fun.

Bern wanted to know how it was so accurate and looked it up on the Internet. After she found out that it used a simple AI algorithm, she said, “It’s sort of like what’s-his-face.”

Ever the geek, I replied, “Do you mean Alan Turing? The mathematician who developed the test to check for true artificial intelligence?”

Ever the mom, she replied, “No, the little guy on SpongeBob…his wife.”

“Karen? Plankton’s wife?”

“That’s it!”

Somewhere in that exchange lay the key to figuring out the difference between men and women, but I’ll figure that out later…

Anyway, I was playing with the 20Q game later and decided to see if it could guess,

“wife.”

20Q: “Animal, vegetable, or mineral?”

Me: “Animal.” (only because there was no “angel'” category.)

A few more questions were asked and answered until, “Does it have a tail?”

Bernadette: “What are you doing?”

Me: “Checking you for a tail.”

More questions and then, “Does it have claws?”

I answered “no” since there wasn’t a well-sure-if-you-get-her-mad button.

Finally it announced its guess of “a crush.”

I thought, “Hmmm. Yes, but not quite the answer,” so I pressed “no” which gives it a chance to ask five more questions. I answered those questions and waited to see if it would guess “wife.”

The guess scrolled across the screen, “Is it a soul mate?”

I smiled and pressed, “yes.” Very correct, indeed.

 

It's all about finding the right market, right? Oh well, If you're not getting rejected, you're not writing.

Thanks to everyone for the warm welcome back. Now for the beginning of the canoe trip...

The canoe trip all-in-all was a great trip, there were a few details that stood out, however. We arrived at the outfitters on time and rented the canoe. We piled into the van, canoe in tow, with a very nice couple that we chatted with. We drove for a while and at some point I hazarded the question, "How long do you think the trip will take with the creek at its current level?"

"About four hours at a leisurely paddle," was the reply.

I figured since we could always paddle a little harder at points, that wouldn't be too bad. It was a little longer than we had planned, but that was okay. I don't recall Bernadette or I choosing an actual drop-off point. I think we went with "upstream" for maximum clarity.

The beginning of the trip was idyllic. We saw mother wood ducks on the water with their ducklings trailing dutifully behind. When we got close they would hurry their little tails as fast as they could away from us.

The Boy caught some frogs with a net and let them go after showing them excitedly to us when we landed. It was peaceful and both the weather and the scenery were fantastic.

I checked my watch and an hour had passed. We snacked a little and paddled on. After another half hour had passed, we passed a familiar bar that was visible from the creek. What was odd was that the bar, by road, wasn't terribly far from where we had been dropped off.

It was about then The Boy asked, "Are we at our destiny yet?" Since

we were nowhere near our destiny nor near our destination, Bernadette and I looked at each other and shrugged it off. I will admit that I did start to paddle a little bit harder at that point.

We found another place to stop for a while. No frogs this time, but we did find something else... mosquitos. Biblical plague types of numbers were involved here people. They loved our canoe. Its arrival must have been foretold in some ancient mosquito prophecy because pretty much all of them came to worship it in a highly mobile cloud. They seemed to be all males since we didn't get bitten at all. Had they actually bitten us, I don't think we would have made it back.

We shoved off and spent the next half hour alternating between paddling and swatting mosquitos until the bottom of the canoe was lined with their tiny, spindly corpses. It did serve to keep The Boy occupied. I know this because as soon as they were gone, we faced the return of "Are we at our destiny yet?"

We took it with aplomb though. Bern did make the observation that when you're in a canoe, with no real place to land — the banks were higher and steeper at this point of the trip — you're basically trapped. It's sort of like the movie Alien without the bother of someone's chest bursting open to release a peppy carnivore. Then again, the crew of the Nostromo didn't have to paddle the ship through space with a six-year old, so we'll call that a wash.

Time passed, we paddled. Not quite enough to qualify as feverishly, so we'll just go with avidly. Regardless of our efforts though, I noted that I could have outwalked our pace by at least a factor of two as I watched the shore slide by.

Luckily we had that aplomb going for us.

We passed the bear which was close to the point where our cabin was located. The watch read four hours into the trip at that point.

The trip by car from the cabin to our landing point takes roughly three minutes. By canoe, the trip takes about an hour. I now suspect there are small spots of curved space along that part of the creek that dilate time. I may go back and look for them later, without a six year old along, but I was too busy avidly paddling to care then.

We landed — finally — and I walked to the outfitters while Bern and The Boy stopped at the local country store for snacks. The outfitters is a 30 second drive mind you, but a 15 minute walk. With oars. And life vests.

Like I said, it was a great trip, but I did manage to take notice of two drop-off points that would have made for a shorter, much less "Are we at our destiny yet?" laden trip for the next time. I'll also evidently need to help the people at the outfitters redefine "leisurely paddle."

 

We went on a nice canoe trip over the weekend (more on that later) and towards the end of the trip, I looked up and saw what seemed to be a large, black bag in a tree.

I asked, "What's that in the tree?" (I had already been told there was a bear in a tree earlier in the day but the idylls of a weekend at camp must have gently washed that fact from my mind.)

Bernadette said, "That must be the bear." She was kind enough to leave off "idiot" since she knew I had heard about it.

We were sort of excited to see it, but The Boy remained lukewarm on the subject. Sometimes I think if he can't play with it, have it fetch him something, or snack on it, an object's value drops drastically in his book.

We paddled past, stared at fuzzy bear butt for a while, and I suspect we would have hurried back to our landing point so we could get back to camp and look at the bear up close and from the front, but the previous four hours of our trip had disabused us of the notion that there was such a thing as "hurry" when you're in a canoe.

Once we did get back to camp, (it took another hour make the roughly two mile journey) we hopped in the truck and went down to take a look. Here's what we saw (click to embiggen):

 

She's about 30 feet off the ground and doesn't look at all comfortable, but there she is. The bear was asleep as far as we could tell. What you can't really see in this picture are the two cubs that were with her in the tree. This is also probably the reason that she can sleep so well in this position.... kids.

Bernadette called the game commission to make sure the bear would be able to make it down and she was assured that bears can get themselves out of positions like this. She was gone the next morning. We didn't check for ourselves, but the rest of the valley already had and passed the news to us.

 

My wife and I were driving around the other day and got caught behind a particularly slow driver. I don't know how we get into conversations like this sometimes, but here it is:

The Wife: "If that idiot wants to park, he should use the lot over there, not the turning lane."

Me: "Yeah; that and I don't like his license plate."

TW: " 'He Gene?' Maybe his name is something like Howard Edward Gene."

Me: "He should have sounded it out before ordering it. It sounds like his boyfriend's name is Gene."

TW: "He can't be gay. Gays don't drive minivans."

I briefly thought about this in an effort to refute it, but I then realized that not a single one of my gay friends has a minivan. Curious.

Me: "So you're saying that gays have too much style to drive a minivan?"

TW: "Exactly... Lesbians, however, do drive minivans. I have experience with that."

We pulled into the lot and she caught site of the guy driving and said, "He's elderly too."

Me: "So there aren't any old, gay dudes?"

I hadn't known that it wore away over the years like a fine patina gently buffed off of a favored copper pot.

TW: "...and look, he's using a handicapped spot."

Me: "Yet another fine reason for him not to be gay."

The Wife countered with, "Just as good as you thinking he was gay due to his license plate."

Touché, mon coeur.

We ended up laughing at how goofy we sounded as we got out, but overall it was quite the educational day for me.

 

The Spin Cycle topic for the week was "What if?" It was a hard one for me. I like where I am in life and where it seems to be heading. I have a wonderful wife and a great son -- well, most of the time at least. I like my job and I rarely want for anything. As a result, I rarely play the "what if?" game with my life. So I was about to pass on this week's Spin Cycle (please forgive me for even thinking it Jen) and then the one thing that I play "what if?" with came to mind. It's not my usual light fare...

What if... my mother had not refused to go to the GYN for her regular checkups for no other reason than she didn't feel like it?

What if... They had caught the the cancer earlier, before it moved from her ovaries to the rest of her body?

What if... she never had to go through all the pain of surgery and chemo?

What if... She never had to be an inspiration for others by supporting them in the chemo ward and walking in benefits?

What if... I never had to watch the light fade from my mother's eyes?

What if... With the help of some wonderful hospice workers, we didn't have to take care of her broken shell of a body after that light had faded?

What if... I didn't have to go through that dark period of loss?

What if... I never had to see my Grandfather, tough as nails, raised in Hell's Kitchen, who fought in the Battle of the Bulge, set aside a book on "Dealing with the loss of a child" when I would go visit?

What if... I never had to realize that not only did I lose a mother, but my grandparents also lost a daughter, and my father lost a wife?

What if... My mother lived past the age of 42?

What if... She had been able to see me get married, dance at my reception, and cry tears of happiness mixed with a wistful nostalgia of when her son was little?

What if... She had gotten to meet her grandchild and spoil him and do wonderful (and stupid) things that her son would then later blog about?

What if... I didn't feel compelled to be on the local board for the American Cancer Society just so I could do something.. anything?

What if... One day there was a cure and no one ever had to write a "what if" about a parent, or a child, or a friend, or a loved one?

Recently, I had the pleasure of taking a drive with my in-laws, my son, and my wife. We were off to do some family thing, but that's not what's important here. The ride is what I want to talk about.

The drive we were taking was a 45 minute ride. Not bad as far as rides go. We stopped for lunch along the way (I had one of the best paninis ever, thanks for asking) and then continued on to our destination. We were about 10 minutes out from arriving and for some reason my mother-in-law was possessed to say, "We should stop at the toy store."

Hello? There's a six year old in the car and we're almost there and will actually be on time and you bring up a toy store? I looked for a suitably heavy object to stun her with but the damage was done.

The Boy piped up, "What toy store?"

Luckily, I'm quick in a crisis and came up with, "Your grandmother is thinking of another city entirely. There is no toy store in this town." I punctuated it with a Dirty Look.

Grammy got the hint and backed me up with, "My mistake, there is no toy store in this town. Score one for my Jedi mojo.

Seriously though, I know they had kids; I'm sleeping with one of them. Do they lose that kind of common sense over the years? The kind of common sense that declares you don't fill a six year old's head with visions of toys on an outing?

Weens.

So we arrived and did the family thing. Blah, blah, blah. We had a great time. Yada, yada, yada.

...and we're back in the car. We're pulling out and my father-in-law looks to the left, announces that the store he's looking at sells ice cream, and zooms off for home. I remembered (too late, luckily for grammy) that they keep the tire iron under the seat but he was driving and I figured it was best not to whack him one.

The Boy: "I want ice cream."

Yeah, because you knew that was coming. God forbid pappy could have figured that out beforehand though.

So we were treated to the extended remix of "I Want Ice Cream," for the next twenty minutes. It's sort of like the song, "I Want Candy," except that there's no tune, you can't groove to it, and it inspires madness and despair.

At some point my FIL told The Boy that he would find him a place to get ice cream. Whatever. I was thinking of walking home by that point.

Finally, we find a McDonald's. Close enough, they have sundaes. We pulled in, gave our order (The Boy opted for chicken nuggets because they're so much like ice cream), and waited. For a long time. Because I've evidently offended the gods and deserve this ride.

We get to the window and get part of our order. Not all of it mind you since counting to two is a life skill that the chick that worked the window never mastered. The skill she did master? Apathy. Truthfully, she could have turned pro. If apathy could be spent as currency, she could have retired then and there.

She literally stared at us when we said we ordered two sundaes and only received one. She didn't turn to correct the situation or ask anyone else to. She stared. Eventually we taught her the concept of this "two" through a combination of speaking slowly and complex gestures involving our index and middle fingers held in a sort of "V" shape.

Welcome to central Pennsylvania!

We finally pulled out. I was more than ready for drinks by this point when more FIL says, "Why don't we go see the deer?"

There's a guy who has some land fenced off. He keeps deer on the land. They look like...um...deer. My son has seen the deer before but in an effort to magically transform the interminable into the intolerable, my FIL offers to make our trip even longer.

Just. Freaking. Awesome.

We drove a bit out of our way. We stared at the deer, they stared at us. Some had antlers, some didn't. They were trees as well. Yippee.

Finally we arrived home. I'm not sure the vehicle came to a full stop before I got out, but I was out.

I'm still plotting to get my in-laws back for that ride.

 

Last week we decided to go to the other Catholic church in town. I'm not entirely sure why, but I just go with the flow when it comes to things churchly.

We got there and the one nice thing was that the priest doesn't have a thick, gooey accent straight out of the Eastern Bloc. I could actually understand what he was saying. I didn't listen, but that's completely beside the point... I could have listened. He also had nice hair. It was a little long, so from a distance it looked decidedly like a fuzzy helmet, but it looked fine up close.

Of course, being church, those were about the only positives to me.

The first thing I noticed is that this priest (do I have to capitalize "priest?" I guess since I never bother capitalizing "god," that's sort of a moot point. Like they're going to add another year on to my life sentence in hell for disobeying the style guide.) sings every damn verse of the hymns. Every. Verse. Come on dammit, the other church does one and three. It's a time saver, let's get with the program here.

There was another thing that bothered the crap out of me about the church music. They did those songs. The ones where they pick a psalm, throw some organ in the background, and slap some arbitrary notes to the words. Seriously? It sounds like someone is reading the newspaper to song. It's stupid. Stop butchering the last movement of Beethoven's 9th like that. It's criminal. God should make you weep nothing but grapefruit juice for perpetrating that on us.

Behind me was what I like to call a "rusher." One of those people that is at least two words ahead whenever there's a group prayer or singing going on. I don't know the words to this stuff really well and that dude was not helping. Recite and sing at the correct tempo, jerkoff. No one is proud of you because you finished first.

Also at this church was "Farting Guy." I call him that because once, in church, this guy was sitting next to us and letting them rip. This only happened once, ten years ago, but you don't forget stuff like that. Yet another reason to stick with the old church.

Overall mass lasted only marginally longer than the other church, but if we could move to the verse one and three system we could get out of there earlier and I would consider that church instead, regardless of the perils of "Farting Guy."

After mass, they had a thing for the kids which included an "epiphany cake." This is where you take a cake and put something inside like a bean and whoever gets the bean gets to wear a crown. I've always had issues with the epiphany cake and its potential to cause dental damage to an overzealous eater. This time, however, they put a little (but large enough to be an awesome choking hazard), plastic baby Jesus inside.

Really?

It's lucky parents were they to dig through their child's slice before they dug in. I'm sure "asphyxiation by baby jeebus" would be a real hoot down at the coroner's office.

I'm not sure which church to go to now. Maybe I should come up with a third offering for town. I'll have to work on the plans for that. I'll let you know when they're done.

 

So I really wanted to do the Spin Cycle this week and I kept racking my brain trying to think of either what I was guilty about in the past or what I was guilty about now and I just kept coming up with nothing.

Don't get me wrong, I have done things that I've been hugely guilty about in the past. There was the first woman that I was engaged to that I broke off. There were other women too, some with names that were erased by a combination of alcohol and time. There was that persistent feeling that I should have been by my mother's side more during her chemo even though I was a three hour drive away and taking college courses. I made it home nearly every weekend, but it never seemed like enough.

I do the occasional thing now and then that I feel guilty for, but nothing big like in the past; I outgrew that hedonistic asshole phase. I might spend a little too much time on the computer or not help out around the house as much as I usually do, but the associated guilt is fleeting at best. Small stuff, small guilt.

Then I started to wonder if I had reached some glorious state of amorality. Well, not amoral, just differently moralled (bite me, I can make up words.) I say 'glorious' because wouldn't it be wonderful not to feel guilty about things sometimes?

Then I realized it wouldn't be so glorious.

Feeling guilty, for all its pitfalls, shows us what we care about. Where our humanity lies. It points us in the direction of our flaws so we can kick at them and try to overcome them. It shines the light on things we could have done better so we can actually do them better the next time. Maybe not as perfectly as we would like, but better.

It's about growth.

I realized that over the years, I've felt less guilty about things because I've done less things to be guilty about. I've gone and grown in spite of myself and learned to forgive myself for the dumb things I've done and will undoubtedly continue to do.

Wishing you the same :)