Worth your weight in gold?

Have you ever said that someone was worth their weight in gold?

Per this linked article on the Chicago Tribune website, gold closed today on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange at $1,788 -- down slightly from an intra-day high of $1801 an ounce.

When I was in high school, I worked in the jewelry store in the Chicago exurb of Boondockia back in 1973-74. (I was the delivery boy and shipping clerk. I seldom interacted with customers. Unless it was to sweep up after hours, I was only allowed on the store floor during the Christmas season. I helped put away watch trays and ring trays at closing time, too. I was not allowed to wear cuffed trousers. I'm sure you can figure out why.)

Anyway, this experience has been on my mind lately when I hear the breathless updates on surging gold prices. I seem to recall the jewelers being upset -- back in 1973-74 -- that the price of gold had soared to $75 an ounce.

This set me to ciphering. An ounce of gold today is worth nearly 24 times what it was worth 38 years ago. (1800 divided by 75 = 24.) The only thing that has gone up as much as the price of gold is college tuition.

Once I got to ciphering, I couldn't stop. There are 16 ounces in a pound. I found this USA Today story from March, describing how the federal government is thinking about rewriting bus capacity rules because Americans are getting heavier than ever.

According to Larry Copeland's USA Today article, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that, today, "the average weight is 194.7 pounds for men 20 and older and 164.7 pounds for women that age range."

Finally, I'm above average at something.

Anyway, back to my ciphering: If a man is "worth his weight in gold" (and assuming that he is of average weight), he is currently worth $5,607,360 ($1,800 per ounce * 16 ounces per pound * 194.7 pounds).

I only wish I was.

For most of us, to be called 'worth our weight in gold' would be a good thing. But I suppose this could be a cutting insult to Warren Buffet of Bill Gates.

For want of a nail.... an Unscientific Survey about how we got in this mess

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.

For want of a shoe the horse was lost.

For want of a horse the rider was lost.

For want of a rider the battle was lost.

For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.

And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

This morning the United States finds itself with its credit downgraded by Standard & Poors and the stock market is reacting just like startled sheep: running blindly in almost any direction. The markets are hemorrhaging. My Facebook news feed is lighting up with persons lamenting the loss of their retirement savings -- again.

Now, if you're inclined to maintain some perspective, you might realize that Standard & Poors is only one of three major credit ratings services. The other two, Moody's and Fitch, have maintained the United States' top rating, Moody's reporting today (per this Bloomberg News report) that, because of the American dollar's unique as a reserve currency, "the U.S. government can support higher debt levels than other governments.... Over time, the dollar’s role may be eroded, but we see no immediate threat."

Still, this is not a time for us to rest on our oars. Standard & Poors has fired a warning shot over the nation's bow: We'd better get our financial house in order.

In yesterday's Chicago Tribune, columnist Steve Chapman wrote that the recent FAA shutdown was caused by the Senate's unwillingness to go along with cutting a part of the Essential Air Service initiative, a federal subsidy for commercial air service between smaller cities, that was enacted in 1978 and was only supposed to last 10 years while the airline industry adapted to deregulation.

House-passed legislation providing funding for the FAA proposed to cut only $16 million of the $200 million program, eliminating subsidies for service to 13 cities, subsidies that can amount to thousands of dollars per passenger. In a time of debt crisis, a reasonable person might think that this would be an easy cut to make. But the Senate would not accept it, and the partial shutdown of the FAA followed. For Chapman, this illustrates the difficulty of making real cuts in the federal budget: "You can't cut the big stuff because it's too important. And you can't cut the small stuff because it's not worth the bother."*

This is a fine fix we've got ourselves into as a nation. But the kingdom is not yet lost. The rider may even still be on the horse.

The question is this: Can we figure out what nail was omitted from the shoe? What chain of events has led us to this stalemate?

All of American history is yours to mine as you create your theory. If your explanation gets too long, make it a post on your own blog and leave a link in the comments. Let's start a discussion here, people.

And, in the spirit of getting the ball rolling, here is my hypothesis. Naturally, there's a Chicago angle.

In the aftermath of the unhappy 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago and Hubert Humphrey's subsequent loss to Richard Nixon, the Democratic Party set up the McGovern-Fraser Commission to reform delegate selection processes. One memorable consequence of this commission was that the elected Illinois delegation controlled by Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley's was challenged at the 1972 Miami Beach Convention by an unelected bunch led by maverick Ald. William Singer and the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

The stated reason for knocking out the duly elected delegates was that the Illinois delegation did not include an adequate proportion of women and minorities. The credentials committee agreed and the uncommitted, but duly-elected, Illinois group was thrown out in its entirety (including the duly-elected women and minority delegates) and the Singer-Jackson group (which was pledged to Senator George McGovern) was seated in its stead.

It made for great television; I remember staying up until 4:00am to watch.

But the 1972 Convention debacle was just the beginning of the mischief caused by the McGovern-Fraser Commission reforms. That Commission, I think, was the nail.

Even the linked Wikipedia article acknowledges, "One of the unintended consequences of McGovern-Fraser reforms was an enormous surge in the number of state party presidential primaries."

Primaries are huge business in the United States these days -- and extremists control the primary process in both major parties. The extremists are not just nominating presidents, they are nominating candidates all the way down the ballot. The state legislators who draw the new legislative maps are survivors of this process. And maps have been redrawn now three times since (and a fourth is upon us).

The insidious practice of gerrymandering was named for Elbridge Gerry, a New England Patriot who served as James Madison's Vice President. So the drawing of partisan maps is nothing new. But the map drawers are. And so are the computers that aid them in their polarizing task.

Of course, we can't put the nail back in the shoe the way it was originally -- and we shouldn't want to: Women and minorities participate in both parties now and that's a good thing. Besides, the health nuts would go crazy at the thought of any return to smoke-filled rooms. So my solution is open primaries. I want people to vote for the Democratic and Republican nominees in all races. I think this would have a generally moderating effect on the political climate -- and the persons emerging from such a process might be able to make the decisions necessary to provide the real reforms our beloved country so desperately needs.

That's my suggestion. What's yours?

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* The perceptive readers of this blog may recall that the FAA shutdown has ended and wonder whether the Senate agreed to the proposed $16 million cut in this dubious program. The answer, of course, in classic Washington style, is both yes and no. According to this August 6 AP story by Joan Lowy (the link is to the website of the Boston Globe) the cuts remained after a bipartisan compromise was reached:

But the bill also includes language that gives Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood the authority to continue subsidized service to the 13 communities if he thinks that it is necessary.

Lowy reports that the Democrats expect that Secretary LaHood (a former Republican Congressman from downstate Peoria, Illinois) will dutifully find that all of these subsidies are necessary after all.

Who's punishing whom? Youngest Son serves a stretch of home detention

You could call it "being grounded." We do. But the psychologists among you might misunderstand and think that "being grounded" is a good thing.

Youngest Son will start college in a couple of weeks. He started pushing the envelope of parental tolerance some time ago, really ratcheting things up as his senior year of high school drew to a close.

As the youngest of five, Youngest Son has had the opportunity to learn from, and emulate, his older siblings. And what kid is satisfied to merely tread in his brothers' and sisters' footsteps?

Thus, for example, while Middle Son may also have "dipped," we never found out about it. Youngest Son brought his Skoal into the house, where I could find and confiscate it. (I firmly believe that the cheapest, most odiferous cigar is less offensive than chewing... and spitting... tobacco. But, on the other hand, athletes these days are constantly told that they should never, ever smoke. So baseball players somehow use chewing as a means of identifying themselves as a group. If anyone can explain why, please leave a comment.)

Curfews have also been extended with each passing sibling. I'm pretty sure we used to get the kids back by 10:00 or 10:30 on weekdays. Youngest Son has pushed this back to 11:30.

Look, I understand that teenagers and 20-something college students are incapable of sleep before the wee small hours. (I even invented a descriptive name for kids at this stage; I call them nocturnals.) This isn't about them getting sleep. It's about me getting sleep.

They may not have to get up in the morning -- summer jobs for teenagers were the canaries in the coal mine for this never-ending recession -- but I do. I sleep better knowing that they're home safe, under my roof, even if they're watching South Park DVD's in the den or playing Madden in the basement.

Those of you without kids at this phase may say, hey, aren't the kids out later than that every night when they are away at college? You would be right, of course, but this is not a matter of logic. When kids are at home, they are their parents' responsibility. We know (or should know) whether they're home or not. When they're away at college, we don't have to know.

Anyway, in recent weeks, as he and his friends prepare to go their separate ways, Youngest Son has been in regular danger of violating even his liberalized weeknight curfew. All the kids knew that they had a good chance of getting by me, if they were late, just by not waking me up as they snuck into the house. I'd fall asleep in the recliner... waiting... and be completely unable to prove whether the kid in question had or had not made it whom on time.

Falling asleep in front of the TV during or just after the news is a cherished American tradition, isn't it?

Well, the other night, for whatever reason, I was not asleep. Maybe I was having trouble finding something besides "Ancient Aliens" or "Pawn Stars" on the History-Military Channel-Discover-NatGeo-Science channel checkoff I perform every night. Long Suffering Spouse wakes up and objects when I put some show on black holes or mysteries of the outer planets. "You're just putting this on to fall asleep," she'd tell me. You're only waking up to tell me this, I'd say to myself -- and only to myself -- and go back to "River Monsters."

Anyway, it was nearly midnight and Youngest Son was not yet at home. "Where are you?" I texted him.

"Driving Brennan home," came the reply. (I like to think that Youngest Son hands his phone over to his passenger to respond when my texts come in. I have some messages that seem to confirm this.)

When Youngest Son finally wandered in, I had no choice but to assert parental authority. He was grounded.

The next morning -- or, actually, the next afternoon since the kid never gets up until after noon -- Youngest Son began badgering his mother. "How long am I in for?" he'd ask. When I came home, he began asking me the same question. "I don't know," I told him. "The parole board has not yet met." The secret to a happy marriage: Make no unilateral decisions, particularly involving the disciplining of children. I always consult with my wife and we always agree with whatever she says. Then we inform the prisoner at the bar.

The upshot of our discussion on this occasion was that Youngest Son would again be permitted to see the outside world on the weekend. Though his Legion baseball season has ended, there was some discussion that he might be pressed into service pitching for a friend's travel club over the weekend. We let him go out Friday, but we enjoined him strictly to let us know if he was going to have to pitch Saturday. He'd have to come home early if he was; otherwise, we said, we'd let him out until 12:30. That is his usual weekend curfew.

He texted me before 10:00 that he'd not be pitching. I reminded him then that he had to be home by 12:30 -- not driving someone home and therefore, technically, on his way, but actually home inside the house. I told him to simply consider this a friendly reminder from his probation officer.

He made it home by 12:30am.

He woke up Saturday around 12:30pm -- and in a panic.

Youngest Son announced that he had a graduation party that he had to go to. Well, those of you without kids at this phase may be tempted to ask, um, wasn't graduation somewhere in late May, early June? And it was -- but, in the modern age, the custodial parents get their parties first, in the weeks immediately following the actual event. The non-custodial parents have to catch up later. (And, yes, these are all Catholic high school graduates we're talking about. You though that only "publics" had complicated families?)

Anyway, this was a non-custodial parent of the girlfriend of Youngest Son's friend and Youngest Son's friend had specially pleaded with Youngest Son to put in an appearance.

Now I know when Youngest Son woke up Saturday because I'd been sent to rouse him specially. It seems that Middle Son had finally heard back from Older Daughter about the boys coming to visit her in Indianapolis this weekend. Middle Son had said that this was the only weekend he could go, what with weddings and the CPA exam and other obligations, but Older Daughter had put him off until the last moment because she wasn't sure until then that she and her husband would be free. Now they were -- and Middle Son was willing to bring Youngest Son along because their sister has a small refrigerator that Youngest Son can use in his dorm. This is what I told the boy when I woke him.

"I want to go to Indianapolis," said Youngest Son, "but I have to go to this graduation party."

"When does it start?" I asked.

"Two hours ago," said Youngest Son.

"No problem, then," I said. "Your brother has to help someone move this afternoon. He said he can be here by 5:00. You can go and be back. How's that?"

And so it was agreed. I had some books to return to the library and I changed out of my painting clothes for that purpose -- only to have Youngest Son blow a gasket.

"I have to go now," he said.

"I'll be right back."

"No. Wait. I'll take them. Then I'll just keep going."

Long Suffering Spouse overheard this colloquy and her antenna went up. "Where is this party?" she asked.

Youngest Son named a nearby suburb.

"Your brother will be here at 5:00," she warned.

"I'll be ready," he said, dashing out the door.

I'd gone back to helping Long Suffering Spouse and we were making fine progress when Younger Daughter returned from work. (She's managed to keep her campus job during the summer. It's not a lot of hours. But it's something.) "You let Youngest Son go to Wisconsin?" she asked.

"Wisconsin? No, he's at a graduation party in Niles," I said.

"Oh," she said. Long Suffering Spouse and I kept working.

Middle Son turned up at 5:00pm as advertised. It was then that we realized that Youngest Son was nowhere in evidence. I texted him. He called back immediately.

You have to understand that the young people do not actually use their phones as phones without a compelling reason. Youngest Son said his friend, Brennan, had flipped out at the party. He's had troubles at home, we knew, but the picture Youngest Son presented suggested that things were more serious than we knew. He couldn't yet leave. Youngest Son and another friend wanted to wait until Brennan's mother arrived to take charge. "But your brother is already here," I told him. "I understand your concern, but you have a preexisting obligation. Wrap things up there and get back here pronto."

He assured me he would.

I had a chance, then, to visit with Middle Son -- but he was not his usual jovial self. In fact, he seemed rather cranked out of shape. "We won't get there until 10:00," he grumbled, which I thought an exaggeration, even with the time change.

"He's close by," I assured Middle Son. "It sounds like a serious situation, but I'm sure he'll come right home as soon as he gets the kid taken care of."

Time passed.

I texted the boy again. "Leaving in 20," he wrote. I thought this was rather rude, given his other commitments, but I was distracted by, and becoming increasingly concerned with trying to jolly up, an obviously surly Middle Son. He presently excused himself to take a phone call. And then another.

"What is going on here?" Long Suffering Spouse asked me -- but I had no ready explanation.

Middle Son was so angry he wouldn't eat. Now Long Suffering Spouse was really worried.

Eventually -- and I mean eventually -- Youngest Son showed up.

It became evident that Middle Son was trying to find someone else to take to Indianapolis, which struck me as odd since his brother had finally showed up. I'd told Middle Son just to leave without his brother several times, but he wouldn't go -- and now he wouldn't take the kid.

It wasn't long thereafter that Youngest Son fessed up. He hadn't been in a nearby suburb after all. The party was in Wisconsin -- well over an hour away. His friend did have a problem and his mother did have to be summoned, but she was in Wisconsin at that family's summer home anyway. "This isn't over," I said.

I did, however, leave the room. An equally-stunned Long Suffering Spouse and I went out to the front porch where Younger Daughter and Middle Son were conferring in between Middle Son's phone calls. "I know you've been waiting a long time," I began, "but you can take him now. He was in Wisconsin. He had no business being in Wisconsin. No permission. But we'll take care of that when you bring him back. You can take him if you want."

The looks from Younger Daughter and Middle Son said it all. They knew where the boy had been. They'd known for some time. Everyone knew except Long Suffering Spouse and me. Middle Son did not want to be stuck with his brother under these circumstances, especially where (Long Suffering Spouse and I finally figured out) his continued presence at our house was only to prompt his brother to confess. The threat was implied, but it was real: Either you tell them yourself or I will.

Actually, I have to give Middle Son high marks for how he handled that.

And Youngest Son's contrition, when he did finally get past his anger at his siblings and at a capricious fate and realize it was all his own dumb fault (this took a day or two), seems pretty genuine.

Younger Daughter is just happy that someone besides her is in trouble.

And last night Youngest Son began asking, "So, how long am I in for?"

He leaves for college on August 22. "Before Labor Day," I told him.

"No, really, how long?"

"Before Columbus Day for sure."

But it will be awhile -- probably Thanksgiving -- before he drives one of our cars again. Which means, once we release him from home confinement, we'll be doing extra dropping off and picking up. I think this may be why some parents become over-permissive: They are unwilling to shoulder the additional burden that comes with punishing a kid. I'm not thrilled about it either. But an impression must be made -- and some surfaces are harder than others. Concrete. Diamonds. A teenager's skull....

Paul McCartney and Middle Son in Wrigleyville

Middle Son lives in Wrigleyville these days; Sir Paul was just visiting, putting on a couple of concerts at Wrigley Field Sunday and again last night.

There has been no mention in the press as to whether Sir Paul saw any of the giant rats that Ozzie Guillen claims to have seen at that historic venue.

If the editor's note to Edna Gundersen's article (from the July 28 Chicago Sun-Times) can be believed, yesterday's concert was a special occasion: It was 51 years ago yesterday, on August 1, 1960, that the Beatles gave their first public performance in Hamburg, Germany. Of the members of the group appearing on stage that night, only one besides Sir Paul is still alive. Do you know who that person is? (Answer at the bottom of the post.)

Middle Son texted me last night: "I can't believe you're not in Wrigleyville tonight -- it's nuts how many people have been here the last two nights." (The spelling has been corrected and abbreviations expanded, of course.)

It's not the first time Middle Son has seen Boomers trying to recapture their lost youth. In his college days he was obliged to work as an usher at a Rolling Stones concert at Soldier Field. He said he got a contact high from all the greybeards' doobies. He was both shocked and amused at the sight. I couldn't help but hear my father's voice ("you kids think you invented everything -- Gene Krupa went to jail for smoking that stuff in 1943!").

I remember a time when kids not much older than me thought the Beatles were decidedly uncool. After all, their concert audiences seemed to consist mostly of screaming, swooning teenage girls... the type whose daughters screamed and swooned for the Back Street Boys... and whose granddaughters (yikes!) now scream and swoon for Justin Bieber. Well, their older sisters had screamed and swooned for Elvis... and their mothers had screamed and swooned for Frank Sinatra.

How's that for a noisy course in American musical history?

I admit: I wouldn't have minded going to Wrigley for a McCartney concert. Had I the disposable income, I might have tried to cadge a vistor's parking permit from Middle Son. Maybe next time....

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Trivia Answer: If you answered Richard Starkey, MBE, you probably bought your Bealtes lunchbox on eBay. Pete Best was on the drums in Hamburg; Ringo did not join the band until Mr. Best was dismissed.

Not to decide is to decide: About this debt ceiling "deal"

My mother-in-law will breathe easier this morning, at least: Her Social Security payment will come this month as scheduled.

"It will come regardless of what Congress does, or doesn't do this weekend," I tried to tell her Saturday, but she would not be consoled.

That brief conversation really showed me just how accurate was this Jeff Danzinger cartoon.

Long Suffering Spouse commented this morning that nothing in this deal seems to address the issue of jobs.

But I rebuked her: Clearly Congress is very concerned about jobs. All 535 of theirs.

The important thing is we now have a deal (pending some last-minute glitch, like the Tea Partiers and "Progressives" in the House joining forces to scuttle the whole thing).

And the deal is this: The government can borrow some of the money Mr. Obama wants to borrow right away -- and we'll continue to disagree about how, when and whether to pay any of it back.

The centerpiece of the "agreement" is that a 'super-committee' of Congresspeople will be formed, composed equally of Democrats and Republicans. They must report to the nation by late November, and Congress must act on their report by Christmas Eve in order to trigger the other incremental debt ceiling limits.

Christmas Eve. How appropriate. Only people who believe that Santa really is a jolly fat man in a red suit, sipping Coca-Cola at the North Pole, will believe that a single report will ever be issued.

The Democrats on the Committee will argue for tax increases ("revenue enhancements" and "closing loopholes") which the Republicans will absolutely refuse. Then the Republicans will propose cutting various social programs, which the Democrats will absolutely refuse ("you're trying to balance the budget on the backs of the poor!"). Then someone will say that we'll have to cut Social Security (which, finally, will unite the committee -- they will bravely oppose anything that might get seniors angry at them) or the military (an idea that might get some traction until the Republicans realize that defense contractors might be hurt and the Democrats realize that the Republicans are trying to hamper the President's conduct of foreign policy).

No, I'm not optimistic. Every spending program, no matter how futile, has a constituency (even if it's only the bureaucrats who administer it) and a high-sounding purpose. Every special interest group now has several months to rally support for the survival of their pet programs.

The only way out of this mess is for the President to use his "bully pulpit" to build public opinion in favor of the hard choices that must be made. He could start by dusting off the last special commission report. But Mr. Obama will not do this. Whatever his other virtues may be, Mr. Obama has shown himself to be the delegater-in-chief, trusting Congress to figure out how to lead us out of this mess. This is what he did with health care, too. He seems unable to grasp that Congress will only bravely lead down a road that has been fully paved with favorable public opinion.

Or is that too harsh?

Curmudgeon's conundrum about 'contributions'

Usually I just sign the papers that the accountant sends me each quarter. If I read this stuff, I might have questions -- and, I've learned the hard way, the accountant bills me for his answers.

Admittedly, I'd do the same for him, if he ever hired me for something. He hasn't. (One of us is clearly smarter than me.)

But this month, as I was making my quarterly rendering unto Caesar, I couldn't help but notice the certification language in the Illinois Employer's Contribution and Wage Report form.

I am, you will recall, a solo practitioner. I have no employees. Yet I still have to send money into the state every so often for unemployment insurance.

Before I swore off asking my accountant questions, I asked once whether I could collect unemployment if I ever laid myself off.

He laughed.

"I take it that's a 'no'?"

"No, Curmudgeon, you can't lay yourself off," he said.

"Can I fire me? Lately I've become quite dissatisfied with my performance. And I have a bad attitude."

"No, you can't fire yourself either."

"Well, how can I collect unemployment?"

"You can't."

I started to ask why -- and stopped. The answer would have bankrupted me.

Anyway, that check every quarter to the Director of Unemployment Security was a recurring sore spot in my life even before I noticed the certification language:

I hereby certify that the information contained in this report and in all accompanying schedules is true and correct to the best of my knowledge and belief; and that no part of the contribution reported was or is to be deducted from workers' wages."

Don't you just love how the word 'tax' can be translated as 'contribution' when rendered in bureaucratese?

Maybe it was the word 'contribution' that caught my eye in the first place.

But I reread that last part again -- certifying "no part of the contribution reported was or is to be deducted from workers' wages" -- and I started thinking.

I mean, as a solo, money I don't pay out in expenses is money I can take home. So, therefore, any money I pay out as expenses is -- effectively -- deducted from my wages... including (yikes!) this 'contribution' to the state!

I've been worried sick since. If I'm reading this right, if I don't pay the tax (er, contribution) I violate the law. On the other hand, if I do pay the tax I have violated my solemn certification....

I'm overthinking this, aren't I?

Do you suppose this is how Wesley Snipes went wrong?

Solve the budget/debt ceiling crisis? End the wars

Speaker Boehner's assertion that the government borrows 42¢ of every dollar that it currently spends is apparently correct. At least it has not been roundly denounced as irresponsible slander, falsehood or calumny.

No one likes paying taxes; certainly I don't. Naturally, I want the other guy to pay more first -- cutting subsidies to the oil industry, for example, seems like a gimme putt to me. On the other hand, my (flat rate) Illinois income tax went up this year by 2¢ on the dollar. There are any number of forces pushing me over the financial cliff at present -- but that tax increase is way down on the list. The Republicans are irresponsible for refusing to consider even the most minor tweaks on the revenue side.

Meanwhile, the Democrats are wimps. Wimps as in Wimpy, the character from Popeye, who was constantly trying to borrow money for hamburgers.

Oh, the Democrats say they want "historic" cuts -- but the Republicans counter that the Democrats are long on rhetoric and short on specifics.

While I'm inclined to disbelieve anything that issues from a politician's lips, just on principle, I can't help but think that there may be more than a particle of truth in this one.

Therefore, I hereby take it upon myself to offer some sure-fire cost-cutting measures: End the wars. End all the wars. To wit:

• The War in Iraq;
• The War in Afghanistan;
• The War in Libya (yes it is a war, Mr. President);
• The War on Terror;
  
• The War on Drugs; and
• The War on Poverty.

None of them have worked. None of them could work.

Wars are fought against nations. Take the enemy's capital; accept the surrender of the surviving members of the belligerent's government and go home. The American military can win real wars. Occupation, however, is fraught with peril. Yes, it worked in Germany and Japan. It did not work in Iraq (though the surge reversed matters, hopefully for long enough to cover our withdrawal). It has not worked in Afghanistan (the Taliban is resurgent -- and counting the days until we march out of there, too).

And "wars" against concepts make even less sense. To win our "war" on terror, we make 95-year old women remove their diapers. We have set up mini-despots at every departure terminal, empowered to grab the crotches of any persons they choose. We have enriched murderous criminals in Mexico and Columbia in our hypocritical "war" on drugs. Hypocritical, you ask? Well, our last three Presidents have all admitted drug use of one kind or another at some time in their lives (although Mr. Clinton insisted he didn't inhale). Exactly how committed can we be to eradicating this "scourge" that people at all levels of society, including the most powerful and best-educated, use regularly? And poor people have subsidized cell phones now, but gangs, gang violence, and endemic crime persist in our inner cities. So much for our "war" on poverty.

Balance the budget? End the wars. All of them.

Curmudgeon adopts a respectful attitude toward adoptive parents

I mentioned just last week that Long Suffering Spouse's old roommate Penny would be coming to lunch yesterday.

This is the first time that Penny and her family have come to visit us in over two years (see, Curmudgeon's parenting skills in evident decline).

As I mentioned then, Penny and her husband Carl have four adopted children. The girls are 19 and 15 now. The twins, Tim and Tom, just turned five.

The twins came to Penny and Carl as critically ill preemies. Penny was trained as a nurse, and she needed every skill she ever learned to take care of those babies. Their breathing problems are largely behind them now; she's not getting up every night to clear out their lungs. Most of their still-frequent ER visits are for more traditional bumps and bruises. But there are still developmental deficits. Tom was more mobile and more verbal than Tim when they visited in 2009; he's talking now and will attend a 'mainstream' kindergarten in the fall. He probably could teach the class: He reads well, spells, and does basic math problems quickly. I quizzed him; I can testify that he's not 100% accurate on larger numbers, but he really knows the smaller numbers. It's not just memory.

Tim still isn't talking, and he's a clumsy walker, but he communicates with a kind of sign language and an iPod Touch that vocalizes for him. Of course, Tim has to know what button to push to express his actual concerns. In other words, even if he can't yet talk, he clearly can read. I watched him yesterday pull video boxes off the shelf, pull out the paper inserts and study each closely. He went straight for the Pixar movies -- he's a discriminating film viewer.

I had to frequently discourage Tim from trying to remove the DVDs from the boxes. But I was not vigilant the entire time: When I was out of the room for only a minute, Tim had trouble trying to pull Toy Story from its case -- and snapped off a good quarter of the disk.

Tim will not be attending a mainstream kindergarten this year -- but Penny and Carl are sure he will be mainstreamed soon and I can't help but believe them.

These are truly bright, inquisitive kids. Tim has to touch everything. Tom can be a little fearful; he likes to watch movies standing behind someone and peeking around. And, of course, if you fail to keep a close watch on them at all times, they will venture into places where they can really get into trouble. Youngest Son came back from running and weightlifting and went upstairs to take a quick shower before joining us all for lunch. He was rather surprised when Tom began banging on the bathroom door.

And neither of these little guys would be alive without the sacrifices made on their behalf by Penny, Carl and their older daughters. Long Suffering Spouse and I can't imagine having to cope with five-year olds on a daily basis at this stage of our lives; that realization only deepens the respect that my wife and I have for Penny and Carl's accomplishments.

It was an impressive, and exhausting, visit. Long Suffering Spouse really wanted them all to stay for dinner, too, but Penny said the boys were just about to go critical. Sure enough, within five minutes, they were screaming and crying their eyes out. Penny explained that part of the twins' problem was they didn't want to leave -- but she had already figured out that they were getting overtired. Their sisters each held on to one as Penny and Carl made their goodbyes. "They'll nap in the car," Penny told Long Suffering Spouse -- but there was no chance, she said, that they'd ever nod off at our house, not with all sorts of stuff that remained unexplored. (I don't know if the twins napped -- but I passed out minutes after they left.)

I know some folks get a little weird about adoption; they don't quite understand how an adopted child can ever be the same as a "real" one. For my part, I've never understood that view. I like what Jack Benny's daughter, Joan, wrote about her adoption. She said that her parents told her that, in a way, she was more loved than a biological child. After all, parents who have a child the old-fashioned way have to take what God gives them -- but adoptive parents choose to bring home a particular child.

Penny and Carl's children couldn't be more truly theirs; the girls actually look like Penny and Carl these days. I don't know if Tim and Tom will ever actually look like Penny and Carl -- they're Korean, while Penny and Carl and German and Lithuanian respectively -- but I wouldn't bet against it.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

There has been talk of adoption in the Curmudgeon family of late. Older Daughter and Hank haven't yet been able to start their own family. Older Daughter is notoriously impatient; she typically skips from Step A to Step S or T in an eye-blink, bypassing all steps in between.

Thus, because Older Daughter hasn't yet become pregnant and so many of her friends have, she's already thinking that she might never be able to have children.

For my money, such talk is premature. But if Older Daughter and Hank do wind up adopting, the children they adopt would be their children. And they would also be my grandchildren, without question.

Hotel open for business during remodeling

I mentioned recently that Long Suffering Spouse is painting the house this summer.

The whole house.

That includes the kids' rooms -- areas into which we have dared not venture for more than a minute at a time for some 15 years (just long enough to roust a sleeping kid for school or close a window during a sudden cloudburst).

Although it might not seem so dangerous to enter a room in one's own home, particularly now that three of our children live off the premises, you'll have to take my word for it just how crazy-foolish-bold the notion really is. See, two of the three bedrooms have been continuously occupied by one teenager or another since 1996 -- and still are. (Well, Younger Daughter's now 21 -- but don't get picky with me, I'm on a roll here.)

The third bedroom, unoccupied since only January 2010, was immediately turned into a storage depot containing treasures and trash from all five kids. We not only don't go in that room, except for the path to one window we've somehow maintained, we can't get in that room.

Once Long Suffering Spouse undertakes a task, it will be done. There's no denying or delaying it. I've been virtually no help at all, of course, but last weekend even I was polishing silver and washing knick-knacks as we labored to put the dining room back together.

"Just wait until one of them buys a house," Long Suffering Spouse muttered darkly, every five minutes or so. When my folks passed, we kept a lot of their stuff in hopes that we could pass it along to our kids. But none of the passes have yet been completed.

"Don't give the plan away," I counseled. "At Christmas, wrap some of this stuff up in a box, put a big, gaudy bow on it and put it in their house and under their tree."

Anyway, the living room is done, the dining room is done, the upstairs and downstairs halls are done, the kitchen is done and Long Suffering Spouse is working in earnest in the bedroom that was used by all of our boys at one time.

"There's more nail holes than plaster in here," she told me. Well, each one has had their plaques and their posters and their old football and baseball jerseys and each one has had distinct ideas about how best to display these items.

Plans to paint the den and the addition are, however, temporarily on hold because Older Daughter and her husband Hank are coming up from Indianapolis this weekend for a wedding. Naturally, they'll be staying our house.

"Where's the wedding?" I asked. A nearby church was named.

"And the reception?" In a nearby suburb, I was told.

"You know," I said, "there's about 70,000 hotel rooms between here and there. And our house is all torn up with your mother's painting."

"We're staying at a hotel Saturday night," Older Daughter said. "But Friday night we want to be at home."

By "we" I am pretty darn certain Older Daughter means only herself. Hank is understandably not as comfortable under our roof as he might be elsewhere -- despite the luxurious accommodations we have provided for them on past visits. (See, Curmudgeon acquires a futon to solve a family dilemma.)

You know... they're both working now. They have more disposable income these days than I do. And, because of our proximity to O'Hare International Airport, there really are thousands and thousands of hotel rooms within a very few miles. If she and Hank want to come over and visit -- great -- but staying overnight is disruptive. They come in late. They get up late. There are curling irons and extra soaps and lotions and shampoos to work around in the bathroom. And we try to be good hosts -- but the last time Hank was over he wanted to watch Wimbledon. (He is such an Anglophile. Older Daughter told us he actually got up early to watch the Royal Wedding live. Oy!) Before that, he wanted to watch the Indianapolis 500. OK, the latter I could understand, given that he is a native of the place -- but these are not things we would usually watch.

Anyway, I'll start in to whining in this vein for awhile and Long Suffering Spouse will nod sympathetically -- and then shut me down. "She wants to spend time in her own house," she'll say. "It's still her house to her." Then Long Suffering Spouse will get a bit misty and I'll apologize for being a grump and matters will be settled. We'll have guests Friday night.

Meanwhile, Middle Son stopped by the house the other night for a meal and to accompany my wife to Costco. He goes with her every couple of months so he can stock up on stuff for his apartment. He pays his way; he drives my wife to and from; he's generally cheery. And he won't change channels on me if I'm watching the Sox game either. (Of course, if I'm watching a musical, he'll object vociferously....)

Anyway, Middle Son's visit/Costco run went smoothly this week. He declined my invitation to come by the house and paint. But then he said, "Stan's block party is Saturday."

Stan was on Middle Son's baseball team in high school and college. They roomed together, for a time, in college as well. Stan does not live with Middle Son these days -- but a few months back he threw a party at Middle Son's apartment. Fortunately, he invited Middle Son.

Stan is a character.

And Stan's annual block parties are legendary. Of course, Stan has nothing to do with the planning or the preparation or the bills for these block parties. But Stan's uncle does and the uncle and a few like-minded neighbors have somehow convinced the more straitlaced property owners on the block to go along with this once-a-year blowout. Stan lives with his uncle.

"So, yeah," Middle Son continued, "Stan's block party is Saturday and I'm going. I may need a place to crash Saturday night." Our house is within reasonable stumbling distance. And this is not a party one drives home from.

So, apparently, we're going to have a houseguest on Saturday night, too.

Oh -- and we're having company Monday, too. Remember Penny? Penny was Long Suffering Spouse's college roommate. Penny and her husband, a retired Marine lawyer, live in Virginia, but they're in the Midwest this month visiting friends and family.

I'm leaving work early today. Long Suffering Spouse is going to need a lot of help getting ready for this weekend. But I don't think a lot of painting will get done.

Havin' a heat wave....

Sari, who lives in the greater Phoenix area, where temperatures have hit 117 this summer, can call me a wimp if she wants. But, dog gone it, it's hot here.

The official high temperature yesterday was 99° F. This translates to something like 50° in Europe. It's not just our dollars -- our degrees aren't worth as much over there these days.

Yesterday's 99° high was shy of the official record of 101°, set in 1901 (that's for you, Al Gore), but that mark was easily exceeded at a number of unofficial reporting stations. And it was not cooler near the lake.

Lake Michigan is supposed to be our natural air conditioner, moderating temperatures winter and summer both. But if the winds are wrong, as they were yesterday, there is no relief even at the lakeshore.

It was hot enough to send all the local TV talking heads into a tizzy. I can't really blame them. Other than lawyers, TV talking heads are about the only other folks who have to dress up when it gets this hot.

Of course, I had court yesterday morning. This morning, too, come to think of it. I haven't had to be in court for over a week -- but, on the hottest days of the year, I have matters up. How did I get so lucky?

At times like this, the weather-people like to talk about something they call the Heat Index. Near as I can tell, the Heat Index is the inverse of the winter Wind Chill: It's just that little extra added insult to injury that you can dab like sunscreen on your self-pity as you go forth, reluctantly, into the oven outside.

Back in early February, we had two feet of snow here. Lake Shore Drive was shut down. Courts were closed. Drifts were four and five feet high. Because snow had drifted near my front door, to get my sidewalk clear, I had to pile snow over my head.

At the time, folks were saying oh, I wish it were 90. You know who you are. Don't you feel foolish now?

Curmudgeon dabbles in shameless cross-promotion

I received an email from Susan Harris, a blogger whose on-line empire includes, inter alia, Boomer Turn-Ons. Her posts have cropped up several times in Jay Harrison's ezine BoomSpeak. Most important (to me, anyway), Ms. Harris left an actual comment on one of my recent posts.

I really like comments. (That is to say, I really like comments that are not spam or robo-comments. You can't expect a lawyer to make an unqualified statement, even in a personal blog, can you?)

But to return to Ms. Harris and her recent email. She was circulating a story proposal, looking to entice features editors stuck for story ideas into writing about the growing phenomenon of "Boomer blogs," that is, blogs written by, for and about persons of a certain age.

The strength of this proposal is obvious. Persons of a certain age actually read newspapers. The downside, sadly, is also obvious:

But if a story appeared in the newspaper, hesitant boomers might flock to the Internet... if only to look around at carefully previewed, safe sites.

Ms. Harris suggested I alert my "media contacts" about the idea.

But that's a problem. I'm an anonymous blogger. The good news about being anonymous is that no one knows where to send the Sheriff with the summons. The bad news is that no one also knows where to send a check. And while I actually do have some media contacts -- OK, a couple of reporters accepted my Facebook friend request (submitted in my actual name)... and a couple of others didn't reject me out of hand -- I am obliged to admit that, even in real life, I'm not exactly well connected with the 'dead tree media.'

Maybe if I didn't call it that....

Still, I wish to get in the spirit of Ms. Harris' venture. Let me pass on her suggestions by quoting liberally from her press release. (Don't you wish professional reporters admitted when they did that?) Ms. Harris provides this list:

Overview of Blogs aimed at Baby Boomers

The big guns

· AARP has professionally written blogs on every topic. http://blog.aarp.org/

· NBC Digital launched a family of “Life Goes Strong” blogs in May of 2010. They cover Play, Work, Life, Tech, Family, Style, Home, etc.

Magazine-format blogs

· Boomer Café, written by seasoned newsmen Greg Dobbs and David Henderson, began way back in 1999.

· Boom Speak is an ezine for Boomers who like to think they’re still edgy, by graphic designer and author Jay Harrison.

Individual blogs with unique voices.

· Going Like Sixty is smart and funny, penned by recently retired publisher Mark van Patten, now chronicling his move from Kentucky to Costa Rica.

· Boomer Turn-ons covers the TV, music, technology, second careers, etc. that are turning on a DC-based ex-hippie-turned-corporate-blogger and her friends.

· Baby Boomer Daily covers Boomer culture, politics and celebrities. Terry Hamburg waxes nostalgic about the cultural waypoints that Boomers experienced.

· Bodacious Boomer is also irreverent and funny, by a Texan.

· GeezerSisters is written by Ruth Pennebaker, author of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.

· AgingHipsters.com, begun in 2003, is the granddaddy of Boomer blogs.

· Second Effort is the work of a Chicago “Curmudgeon” who defines himself as “a dinosaur” and “an Ozzie and Harriet person living in an Ozzy and Sharon world.”

· Boomer Chronicles is written by a Boston-based journalist, self-described feminist and lesbian.

Single-topic blogs

· Dirty Hippie Radio covers music.

· Boomeropia is about travel for Boomers.

· Boomers Offshore is for Boomers living outside the U.S.

· HappyHealth.net is about aging, not specifically Boomers.

· The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide covers consumer choices.

Boomers blogging to showcase their services

· Boomer Tech Talk, written by social media professionals, has excellent content.

· The Savyy Boomer covers all types of marketing to Boomers.

· Lots of Boomer blogs are written by life coaches and counselors. Examples are Feisty Side of Fifty, Retirement as you want it, Contemporary Retirement, So Baby Boomer, Midlife Crisis Queen and BoomerLiving.com.

It's nice to be listed among such accomplished writers and with such distinguished sites.

Technical note: If this list comes up as gibberish, it's because I imported it from a Word document. And I'm a WordPerfect guy. I will press publish now and see what happens....

Update: I think all of these links are live now... including some where the links don't look like links. I'd try and fix that, too, but that seems beyond my technical ken on a busy morning.

Disappearing people

Have you ever noticed that the people you most want to talk to are the hardest to find? I'm not certain if this is just a corollary of another rule (the people you least want to talk to are darn near unavoidable) or whether it should be considered a free-standing Law, as in Murphy's.

I've been trying to reach a colleague now on a number of matters for weeks. We have so many matters together that my list is growing longer -- and increasingly urgent -- but she's seemingly disappeared from the planet. Her assistant denies this; she says that my colleague is in a meeting, or at a closing, or just ran out for coffee. The assistant says my colleague will definitely call me right back -- but it doesn't happen. I've had a stray email or two from her -- merely increasing my workload and my anxiety -- but no closure on any of these problems.

Of course, my problems with this colleague are minor compared to those I have presently with another lawyer for whom I am supposed to be handling an appeal. I have called, I have emailed, I have wandered over to this man's office. I can't get him to talk to me. I've done everything but take out a personal ad. I may try that today.

Years ago, when I was in college or law school, when someone disappeared for weeks at a time, people would say -- "Oh, Sam? He's fallen in love." Often enough, given our youth and the popular culture (it was the 70s), the statement was true.

There's no such excuse in either of these cases. At least... I don't think so.

Some of our collective fears about lost privacy seem to have been overblown: Although it's harder than ever to avoid knowing that someone is looking for you, it's still fairly easy to stay out of sight if you don't want to be found.

What the Women's World Cup really means in America

Judging by my Facebook news feed, all sorts of people have been watching soccer recently.

Some will no doubt see in this the arrival of soccer as a truly major sport in America. There will be those who claim that the sacrifices -- and extensive monetary losses of big-time operators, like Lee Stern, or small-time operators, like a college classmate of mine who was the uncrowned Soccer King of Chicago's South Side -- have finally paid off.

Don't you believe it.

Men's soccer will never be more than a minor sport in the United States no matter which player is married to what Spice Girl (Old Spice?).

The significance of the recently concluded World Cup is not that soccer has gained a foothold on American attention -- but, rather, that women's sport has.

Title IX was enacted when I was just a little younger than Youngest Son is now. There was an effort to jump-start women's sports at the high school level -- but, in my unenlightened corner of the world, nearly everyone who wanted to participate was viewed with suspicion at least. I knew that some of the girls' gym teachers seemed just about as macho as the boys' gym teachers, but I didn't know why. If Hamilton's Mythology ever mentioned anything about Sappho or the Isle of Lesbos, it was carefully sanitized. Of course, one of my friends had a little sister who had gone out for gymnastics. I had the distinct pleasure of seeing her, whenever I could possibly find any excuse, in her tights -- and, I can assure you, on the authority of my careful, slack-jawed, moony observation, that she was not the least manly. But she seemed to me to be, at the time, an apparent exception.

In a generation, things have surely changed -- and, in this rare case, it's all actually good.

Whatever stigma that may have attached to women's sports is long since gone. Archaic attitudes (and, with the exception of my friend's sister, my attitudes were pretty archaic in high school) have been entirely changed. Although they weren't nearly as serious about it as my sons, both my daughters participated in high school sports.

And here's the thing that tells me that there has surely been a transformation. When the White Sox game was over yesterday, Youngest Son flipped on the women's final. He doesn't like soccer as a men's sport -- but he's prepared to watch it as a women's sport. He was interested.

Postscript: Younger Daughter came into the den during the 'extra time' and tried to explain things. It didn't help. I still don't get soccer.

But I could appreciate seeing the whole field. I wish we used that full-field view more for baseball and football broadcasts. These games are telecast with stationary cameras in center field (for baseball) or showing only the line and the backfield (in football). So much happens in both sports away from the ball. In the 1940s and 50s it might not have been possible to show the full field and viewers wouldn't have been able to see anything on the small screens if directors had tried. But, in the age of giant HD sets, we ought to reconsider that, don't you think?

How Long Suffering Spouse is spending her summer vacation

At our youngest niece's First Communion, Ferdinand, the First Communicant's step-father, tried to fill in an awkward silence by making small talk with my wife (his sister-in-law), Long Suffering Spouse.

For those who came in late, Ferdinand is either the second or third husband of my wife's sister, Josephine. The numeric confusion arises because Josephine married her first husband twice. I've never consulted Emily Post for an authoritative ruling on the question. The point is that Josephine had two children during her first marriage and, a few years later, two more when she married the same guy. The niece in question (if you're still following along) is the youngest product of that second union.

Awkward silences often occur at family gatherings, even where there are no step-anythings to worry about. Have you ever wondered about why a second husband is a step-father or a second wife is a step-mother or why the children of the new spouse's past unions are step-siblings? My current theory is that they are called this because of the necessity of stepping around any number of topics at family events.

Given the coolness of the relationship between Long Suffering Spouse and her sister Josephine, there would probably have been awkward silences at the back of the church on this spring morning even if the first/second husband and his new wife weren't there along with Ferdinand.

But there they all were, all spiffed up and looking polite, and the awkward silences were particularly awkward and long.

Humans are verbal creatures. As much as everyone claims to enjoy silence, most people don't shut up long enough to enjoy it. Ever since the cell phone became ubiquitous, a walk down any city street is a swim through a sea of murmur, as nearly every passer-by carries on some vitally important conversation with some unseen someone at the other end of a cellular connection.

Have you ever attended a meeting where the discussion lagged? Silence begins to crush the room, weighing everyone down. Each individual becomes hyper-conscious of his or her own internal noises... the stomach rumbling... a knuckle cracking... the tickle in the throat that demands to escape as a cough.... Someone always cracks under the relentless, increasing pressure. Maybe with a cough. Maybe with a rude noise that was waiting for the quietest possible moment before it could no longer be contained. If you've been lucky, the guy everyone hates will ask, "I had a question about slide 23?"

Well, on this day, at the back of the church, Ferdinand cracked. Ferdinand is the guy everyone hates anyway (except Josephine, so far as we know). And me. I don't hate Ferdinand; I reserve that emotion for a very select few. But he does creep me out.

Anyway, Ferdinand could take the silence no longer. So he turned to my wife (a teacher, you know) and asked, "And what are you doing this summer? Eating bonbons and watching the soaps, I suppose?"

Long Suffering Spouse would never hit anyone in the back of a church. So she merely smiled -- a smile that would instantly freeze the blood of a penguin -- and said, "Oh, yes."

Another awkward silence ensued. I think even Ferdinand realized, in some dim way, that he'd really stepped in something this time. (Which suggests another possible explanation for step-father, mother, etc. -- but I will not pursue this thought at present....)

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

If you've come with me this far, you may have begun to feel cheated. You began this essay in the hopes of finding out how Long Suffering Spouse is spending her time away from school, only to be subjected to a long discourse about a difficult conversation among extended family members.

Well, of course, Long Suffering Spouse is not eating bonbons or watching soap operas. No, this summer, without a wedding to occupy our time, or surgery (hers or mine) to fill the days, Long Suffering Spouse has decided to paint the house.

With the exception of a touch-up here or there, the house hasn't been painted since before we moved in. In 1996.

There's no question that the house needs it.

In a perfect world I'd be able to take off a couple of weeks and help her. I'd hate it, of course. I painted my parents' house in 1973 -- I remember listening to the Senate Watergate hearings every day on the radio as I worked. And Long Suffering Spouse and I painted our first house before we moved in. That's a chapter in the book all by itself.

So I know how to paint. What I don't know is how to make enough money to afford two weeks off. So I'm here in the Undisclosed Location -- and not blogging, in part because I'm feeling guilty for not helping more at home.

And there are other parts, too, which I've written about, but not yet blogged. And may not blog at all.

I may be back tomorrow. I may not be back for awhile.

We'll see.

Still here... sort of: Laments of Curmudgeon, Esq., solo practitioner

Crisis management is in full bloom here at the Undisclosed Location.

I had an appellate brief due a couple of Mondays back -- but no client. (Long story -- which can not told because it would necessarily involve identifying client details.)

But I navigated those tricky procedural shoals safely, just in time to plunge into another appellate brief, on double-secret final extension, that in fact got filed, as required. Sadly, that is a contingent fee matter. If I ever see a payday on that one it will be at least a year -- and maybe three or four years -- down the road.

But the job was done, and I'd done it as well as I know how -- just in time to tackle an unexpected (freebie) project that took my every joule of energy during the first part of this week. Meanwhile I'd solemnly promised to assist a colleague in responding to a summary judgment motion. The response is now due next Tuesday -- and, as I read through everything yesterday and started my research, I realized this, too, is going to be a major uphill struggle. I already knew that this is a also contingent fee matter. If we can survive this motion, we have a good chance of getting a decent settlement. If.

But these blocks of not-immediately-if-ever-billable time are inevitable in my practice. While the checking account is seriously depleted at present, I took comfort in the knowledge that I had a good payday coming -- soon -- from another appellate matter that I'd handled on an hourly basis earlier this year. The attorney who brought me in on the brief assured me that the client is a 'good pay' -- it just usually takes 60 days or so.

Monday was Day 60.

Tuesday I got an email from my colleague: Could I resend my last bill? It seems she never quite got around to billing her end of the project.... *Sigh.*

So... if posting remains sporadic here... and this is likely... it is only because I have gone into grim-struggle-for-survival mode.

Again.

Putting down roots -- and the dangers of transplants

Younger Daughter is the natural science major, not me, but I've been formulating this hypothesis for a while now: Some day science will recognize that animals (including us humans) have roots, almost like plants. Putting down roots in an area is not merely a figure of speech.

Nor am I talking about couch potatoes or the teenager who merges into a beanbag chair in front of a game console; I'm serious.

How many times have you heard of folks moving away from the neighborhood upon retirement? How many of them thrive and survive in their new locale?

The man we bought our first home from was on his way to retirement in Florida. He didn't last two years. He also didn't make 60.

There was a couple who was particularly welcoming to us when we were new in the parish. A few years after our paths crossed, however, they put their house up for sale and moved to the new Del Webb Sun City development -- in Huntley, Illinois. That's not that far away -- 45 minutes, give or take, in reasonable traffic. Still, they were away from home and hearth and all their daily routines. She died first, within a year; he followed soon after.

So many ex-cops die young. Is it just cumulative stress? Surely that must play a part. But so many pull their pensions after 30 years and get the heck out of Chicago (which has a residency requirement, after all, that many policemen resent bitterly). They go somewhere -- anywhere -- that isn't here. And a lot of them don't seem to last.

Some people plan ahead for retirement and put down roots in two places; when shuttling between them both becomes a bother, they can settle for one. There are many ex-Chicagoans living long and happily in Wisconsin or Michigan or Scottsdale or Marco Island. But too many other people just pull up stakes from their long-time homes and go -- not necessarily on a whim, mind you, but following a dream -- to these same places and it ends badly, and too soon. Maybe they fell in love with the place on a vacation. But they haven't prepared. When they get there, they don't know a soul. It takes a toll.

I'm no gardener, but I know from Long Suffering Spouse that young plants are far more likely to 'take' to transplanting than more established ones. When you re-pot a plant, you take the old dirt and put it in the new pot. That gives the old plant the best chance to adapt -- and the least shock to its roots.

Young people can move more easily than older ones. They haven't yet established their 'roots.' But here, now, in Chicago, is where I've raised my children. Here is where I have occasionally tasted success and too often sipped the bitter brew of failure. I don't know everyone in the parish. I don't know everyone in the Loop or at the Daley Center. But I know a lot of faces. I know the routines. I know the whipsaw changes in the weather. I know shortcuts. I know the gray pre-dawn when the birds start singing. I know when to expect the first fireflies and when the annual cicadas will start their evening droning. I know when the trains are due. I can hear the nearby Kennedy Expressway at night and the big trucks or the morons on motorcycles racing thereon. I'd love to go to a lot of places. But even if I someday get the chance to travel, I'll need to come back here, to Chicago, to nourish my spirit.

This isn't science -- not yet, anyway -- not as far as I know. But when millions of dollars are poured into a grant and excited scientists announce a link between longevity and living in one place (any place, except maybe Chernobyl), remember you read it here first.

Curmudgeon has a grand time getting the family van repaired

Even with gasoline over $4 a gallon, I sometimes need a car. This distinguishes me from my teenage Youngest Son and 21-year old Younger Daughter who always need a car.

Monday afternoon, I had a meeting in the western suburbs. Tuesday morning, I had court in Wheaton. After only modest wailing and gnashing of teeth, I successfully negotiated the use of the family van. Youngest Son and Younger Daughter had to double up Monday morning; this deprivation will someday enrich one or both of their therapists.

But it gets worse. The van was running rough Monday afternoon. The engine never died, and it never backfired, but it rocked and rolled at every stoplight; there was even some ominous shaking at cruising speed. Still, I made it home without incident.

The "check engine" light came on when I went to pick Youngest Son up at school.

Regular visitors will know that I am not mechanically inclined. I have changed the oil and even changed the spark plugs on cars, mostly on my parents' cars, though I recently came across a tool for setting the 'gap' on spark plugs in my basement. But I last worked on cars a generation ago. Cars changed.

About the only thing I can analogize this to is the difference between DOS and Windows. I could do things to computers, once upon a time, when DOS was the operating system. I could fix things, troubleshoot, diagnose. I was no expert, but I could even write simple programs in Basic and run them. Windows, in that sense, was inaptly named. It was more like an iron door slamming shut on the amateur.

So it was with cars: Electronic ignition, I believe, is the term that was used when it became literally impossible to change one's own spark plugs. I guess you might still change the oil on most cars, but you can't responsibly dispose of it anywhere, so it has become virtually mandatory to take the car in for almost any issue.

And so, when the check engine light clicked on, I was obliged to go to the dealer.

You'll notice that it was I who was obliged to make this trip, not Long Suffering Spouse. Long Suffering Spouse, you may recall, is a teacher. I am self-employed. That means, whenever something must be done during the business day, I have to do it. No one has to procure a substitute to take my place when these frolics and detours come up. Of course I broached the topic with her anyway; I have a million things to do just now and really could ill afford to be out of the office all day. But my protest was feeble -- only half-hearted.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I figured the van needed whatever the modern equivalent of a tune-up is. The place where I recently bought tires and had the brakes re-done could not provide this service.

Now the dealer that I went to is not the dealer from whom I bought the van. When the American auto industry collapsed, huge numbers of dealers were closed down by the shrinking car companies. The place where I bought the van did not survive the winnowing. I could have walked there. The dealer to whom service issues must be taken is in Skokie. I could walk there, too, I suppose, but it's about 14 miles away. I'm really not in shape for that, and wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase would only complicate the matter further.

Anyway, this 'new' dealer has no particular loyalty to me. I have not bought anything from it except service. It's not that the other dealer would have been any more loyal to me, or protective of my interests, merely that this 'new' dealer has less reason to pretend.

You've heard it said, I'm sure, that dogs can 'smell' fear. There are dogs being trained right now to 'smell' cancer; some research suggests that this will someday soon be an invaluable detection tool.

In general, people are not gifted with nearly so sophisticated an olfactory apparatus as our canine companions. But some rare people can smell automotive ignorance. These persons thrive as automobile service representatives. And it is in this sense, and I hope in no other, that I came into the service area at the dealership reeking like a wagon-load of Limburger early Monday afternoon.

I explained the problem as best I could to the service representative, thereby confirming his initial impression of my ignorance. He had me sign a consent to allow his mechanics to diagnose the trouble and directed me to a waiting room where I could sit on uncomfortable chairs and read old magazines while they figured out how to proceed.

You would probably like to believe that a mechanic thereafter hooked the car up to a diagnostic computer and otherwise investigated the problem. And, though I think that may also have happened, here is what else the dealer might have done:

First they looked up my FICO scores; they checked my Dun & Bradstreet. They looked at detailed credit reports on Equifax -- and maybe Trans Union or Experian besides. They looked up how many children I have, and who's still living at home; they checked the phase of the Moon and whether Sagittarius is rising. Their staff psychologist watched my anxious fidgeting in the waiting room. All this data and more was then considered by an algorithm in a sophisticated computer program -- credit scores here (oh my!), patience level there (oh dear!) -- and two numbers flashed on the screen. The first was the maximum amount the dealership could charge me without my immediately bursting a blood vessel; the second was the number of hours, days or minutes that I would tolerate waiting for the car to be returned.

After an hour and half, the service representative came and told me what it would take to get me back into the family van.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Monday night, after my request to have my wife go to the dealer in my stead was heard and summarily denied, I told her, "You realize that this is going to cost us a thousand dollars?"

"Why?" she asked. "What makes you so sure that you know what's wrong and know how much it will cost to fix it?"

"You know I don't have the faintest idea what's wrong," I whined. "I won't even be able to repeat half of what they eventually tell me is wrong. But it will cost a thousand dollars."

"You're imagining things," she said.

"Fine," I said. "You'll see. They take one look at me and figure the job will cost a thousand dollars."

"You're crazy."

"You'll see."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The good news was that the work was done by late afternoon. (My patience score must have been very low.) From the time I drove in the service entrance until the call came to pick up the car was barely 3½ hours. That includes 1½ hours I spent waiting for them to decide what they would tell me the trouble was.

I'd gotten Youngest Son to pick me up in the meantime. I needed to vamoose after getting the estimate, so I set off walking. Youngest Son, who'd already picked up his sister from summer school, met me en route.

And the other positive note is that the van seems to be running fine now.

But you're wondering -- I hope -- what the job cost.

Well, of course, Long Suffering Spouse was right, as she always is. The repairs did not cost a thousand bucks.

They cost $1,010.

Left behind today's headlines -- Curmudgeon reviews the news

NEWS: The world did not end this weekend; atheists amused

Views:You'd think a preacher would know his Scripture better.

The Gospel of Matthew warns (at the end of the parable of the wise and foolish virgins, ch. 25:13) that you do not know either the day or the hour of the Master's return. Luke 12:40 says, "You also must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come."

However, there is some good that can come out of this failure -- if Harold Camping's erroneous prophecy reminds us to curb our wretched excesses, to behave better, and to live our lives as if the end may come at any time. Even the atheists, chortling about how silly these True Believers look after having not been assumed bodily into Heaven, should recognize the wisdom of this.

As for Camping's followers, they should go back and review Luke 21:8 and Matthew 24:5. There, Jesus warns that many will come in His name and warn of the end times. But, He says, don't fall for it.

(For the record, I stuck close to Long Suffering Spouse all weekend. If she started levitating, I told her, I was grabbing onto her ankles for dear life.)

NEWS: Gas prices allegedly falling in the United States

Views: Nationally, gasoline prices are supposedly below $4 a gallon, at $3.9074 per gallon. But Chicago continues to lead the nation, averaging $4.38 per gallon for self-serve unleaded gas. It's running around $4.45-4.49 in my neck of the woods; there are lower pump prices in the more distant suburbs.

In other news, oil company executives remain at large.

Does anyone ever listen to those Democratic and Republican broadcasts on the weekend? You can watch Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison's address at this link; it was on the radio when I was getting dressed Saturday.

Her statement provides a good example of why I can never belong to either party. Sen. Hutchison makes sense when she says domestic energy production has to be increased to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. She may even have a point when she says that the Obama administration is hostile to increased energy production at home because of arguably overstated environmental concerns. We pay the price at the pump for the Obama administration's ideological purity.

However... the BP oil spill did happen. We can't turn the corporates loose on the land and sea unwatched -- as we seem to have done prior to that oil spill. (Disaster plans to protect walruses in the Gulf of Mexico didn't exactly impress me.) Maybe the Obama administration has overcorrected; maybe more permits for deepwater drilling should be issued.

But Sen. Hutchison did not call for repeal of the billions in tax breaks we give the oil companies. Instead, she warned "the Obama administration is seeking to impose more regulations and taxes on oil and gas companies." Repeal of subsidies would not be a tax increase for the oil companies; it would be an end of unwarranted special treatment. And given the billions in profits that the oil companies are reaping, it seems the very least we should do.

NEWS: President Obama visits "ancestral home" in Moneygall, Ireland

Mr. O'Bama (as he will be called more than once in the next day or two, even in respectable news sources) is a politician from the South Side of Chicago. Of course he has some Irish roots.