Got You Pegged

This morning, I decided that my life needs more multi-tasking. So, I set off on my long run with my iPod...something I haven't done for months and months (in Nicaragua, I decided running with an iPod was an all-around stupid idea so I got used to running without it). I am setting out to organize my computer files and get rid of things I really don't need. The easiest place to start is with podcasts I've already listened to. The problem is, I've had no time to listen these days. So, my iPod came for a run with three episodes of This American Life.

The first episode, from last week, was called "Got You Pegged." This was exceptionally appropriate, given my post yesterday that touched on the stereotypes of a math teacher. One of my favorite bloggers at The Gourmet Project also touched on this in a recent post. She relates two jokes she has often heard while working in the math world:
1. I asked a friend once if there were a lot of women in his computer science department and he responded, "None identifiable as such."
2. There is this saying in Boston about the college women in the area: "BU to bed, Harvard to wed, MIT to pull a sled."

Oy vey! So, this episode of This American Life was so fun to listen to, given the confluence of this idea of being pegged or stereotyped. There's a story about a woman who, while accompanying her autistic brother, was mistaken for someone who is differently abled. Another story about a young white boy and black man who were pulled over by the police for riding bikes without helmets, but the police try to find fault for something more serious. Finally, I enjoyed the story about a man who has routinely ruined every family vacation. It becomes clear how this might have happened so many times when he says, "Here's the thing about people: I don't really like them. That's why I find racism so curious. There are so many reasons to dislike people, you're going to go with color?" I often feel this way. There are so many other reasons to dislike people...and so many reasons that are totally under their control. I'm more likely to pick a reason that is controllable and dislike someone for that. That's why I have a tough time with kids who don't get their homework done. I just can't understand how they get to that "decision."

You can listen to the episode anytime at the This American Life website or you can search for TAL at the iTunes store and if you subscribe today, you'll get the Pegged episode for free (there's a new free episode posted for download every Sunday...or maybe it's Monday).

If You Get My Meaning

Today, I was editing my work e-mail "signature" and I realized that it should include my fax number. As the Athletic Director, for some reason, people need to constantly tell me things via voicemail, fax, USPS and e-mail. Constantly. But, I don't love the word 'fax' as much as I love 'facsimile.' It just sounds like what the machine does (I thought this without knowing the definition). Facsimile is, in fact, from the Latin fac simile, which means "make like." What a great word! Of course, this word existed before the machine. Too bad it was ruined when the fax machine came around.

That makes me think of some story or joke I heard...or maybe just a commentary that asks "who bought the first fax machine?" Like the telephone, who needs it if they are the only one? That seems like Jerry Seinfeld kind of humor.

For some reason, I really like words that say exactly what they mean. Maybe that's because I don't have the knack for words in general. K will ask me..."Do you know what ____ means?" Most of the time, I could get it right in a multiple choice situation, but I can't recite the definition. So, the word "photocopy" is just great. Because that's what it is...a copy that was produced by taking a picture of the document. It might also be that mathematical practical side. I like when things make sense. Although, I am happy to have "punctilious" as part of my vocabulary now. So, I have two personae I guess. I like word that sound like what they mean, but I also like words that have a nuanced definition. I like to tell my students that I'm not fastidious, I'm punctilious...which I think of as fastidious, but in a good way. I have used this word a lot in front my students since I learned it and one of them even said to me (in Nicaragua), "Ms. Dudley, I know you're punctilious..." Awesome!

I will say that I enjoy being a math teacher who can teach my kids something about words and grammar in the mix of all the numbers. I've had too many people say things to me like, "You like to read, why aren't you an English teacher?" or "You write a lot of letters, why aren't you an English teacher?" Oy! I hope that from me (and so many of my colleagues), my students learn that you don't have to be just one thing. You can actually be a person with a diverse set of skills. Or maybe it's just that I'm a big nerd, who likes learning, whatever the subject.

Kudos and To Dos

Okay, so am I the only who was tearing up during Hilary's intro and her speech the other night? She is a phenomenal leader and I was a bit sad that her fight had to end. My kudos are for MSNBC, who is showing the entire DNC live on their website. How is MSNBC doing better with this than regular NBC with the Olympics? I guess MSNBC realizes that screwing the West Coast when it comes to politics is not the way to go.

Barack made it happen tonight! I'm sure everyone is happy that he laid out some details of his campaign and what he will do as president. It got me so excited. I was reminded of a recent conversation I had with my grandmother about the state of the country. I mentioned to her my belief that I am, you are, we (Democrats) are all to blame for George Bush's presidency, especially his second term, when we knew better. Her response is that she was not culpable because she didn't vote for Bush. So, I asked, "How many people did you convince not to vote for Bush?" Personally, I'm not sure I convinced any (maybe one, now that I think about it). So, what to do this time? I don't think it's enough to vote. I always vote and am surrounded by others who vote, so there must be something more to do. I'm trying to figure out just what that is. I don't think I'm the kind to stand out and ask for signatures. So, my first start was to give Obama some money. I know there are people out there who will call and go door-to-door and I support them. But we have two months to make this happen. Eight is enough! So, what should we do? Potentially, so of my readers are not for Obama. But whoever you support, do you believe in them enough to really do something to get them in the White House or the Senate or the town office? I welcome your thoughts on what to do.

From the Mom Files

Mom emailed this today:

But in that 'You can't make this stuff up" category was this piece of MSNBC accidental humor.

As Jimmy and Roslyn Carter were doing their victory lap around the DNC stage they ran a scroll below that announced that Cindy (whaaa?) McCain is heading off to [ nolongerSoviet] Georgia to, I don't know, stare at sad displaced people. Maybe she will bring one home, just like she did in India. Anyway what made this funny was they were playing the song " Georgia on my Mind" as the Carters, looking fabulous, did their victory lap.

Ding Ding Ding!

Those of you who thought, "She doesn't seem like a running skirt person," were right! I am not a running skirt person. Or, I wasn't. I was pissed when a woman in a black skirt and camo dry-fit top passed me effortlessly in a four-mile race last spring and I've pouted about it since. But then, Runners World did half an issue on the things and so I read. Then I researched on the web. Then, I realized that I spent 10 years of my life competing in a skirt (kilt for the first seven) and I loved my field hockey skirt (although I would have felt weird wearing it to practice). Finally, I was sucked in by the cute twins from runningskirts.com to buy one at the San Diego race expo. Actually, I did give it a good 20 minutes of thought while I snacked on free granola and peanut butter.

The report: I love it. It's super comfortable and you can get it with built in undies or spandex. If you're worried about chafing, the spandex might be better, but I think Body Glide is sufficient. My skirt also has two side pockets. I haven't tried running with gel (since I've only worn this on relatively short runs), but I like the placement of the pockets in theory. So, I guess I'm now a running skirt person. Who would've thought?

And yes, I realize that the tone of my posts are a bit more frantic these days. Just a glimpse into the mind of a high school teacher returning to work. Just think about all the things I am thinking but not writing down.

Wicked Smaht

Every so often, I like to ;ut the spotlight on smart people. Reading the New York Times, they are not hard to find. The best is when they are smart and funny. This morning, I enjoyed Christopher Buckley's take on the DNC. Check it out here. I especially hope there are pictures of the prairie-dog drawn carts. You know I get a kick out of those animals, especially when they play poker.

Tough Running

Watching the Olympic Men's Marathon, I couldn't help but feel like I knew what Ryan Hall, Ritz, and Sell were experiencing. A week ago, I was in San Diego, suffering through a half marathon. Thankfully, my pace was intended to be slow and so I didn't end up too much off my goal, but it was pretty brutal nonetheless. Just like Hall and the other runners, I avoided running the tangents, just to catch whatever shade I could (not that I knew exactly where the tangent was, but I actually thought about it this time). And just like them, I made sure I got water at every stop and ran under the water misters. I'm usually one to gut out most of the race and avoid the fray of most water stops, but San Diego was a heat I haven't experienced in a while. This weekend, I figured out what that heat is like...it's like running here, but at noon. Not a time I usually run. Unfortunately, K and I were both disappointed in our race and so we decided to get the heck "out of Dodge." (That's a phrase uttered every other sentence by a CPR instructor I once had.) We hustled back to the hotel and while K showered, I spent more than 10 minutes trying to de-tangle my hair (after lots of tangling after a 10 mile training run with a ponytail, I switched to pony-braid, which was perhaps worse). I remember being a young girl and my dad told me that I should rub my hands around my head when I shampooed. The result was a bird's nest of a hair-d0 (speaking of bird's nests...there's one in the yellow arrow of a stoplight near my house...bird and all). This time, I threatened to cut my hair off in the hotel room. Perhaps that's not really a threat, but if I had scissors... Anyway, the best things about San Diego: I bought a sweet running skirt that I really like, I caught up on the Olympics, and we did a number on the Sunday puzzle since the drive home was epic (and we saw Jon Miller).

This Friday, I went to Outside Lands, which turned out to be a disappointing festival in Golden Gate Park. We saw Steel Pulse, The Dynamites, Manu Chau, Beck, and Radiohead. I would have enjoyed it if: there were less instances of men in skinny jeans and hipsters in general, I didn't end up with a headache from all the pot and cigarette smoke, I could see from 1/4 mile away, and there were less people. It was no Newport, I'll tell you that. Radiohead was the best of the night. They were just "on" and handled the power outages during their set like pros.

As a result of a late Friday, I slept until 10am on Saturday! When was the last time that happened? That's how I found out that noon in the 'Lo is the same as San Diego at 7am. My run this weekend was good, despite the heat. For my 10 mile runs, I run around the Stanford campus and at around miles 4 and 8, there is a water fountain and a bathroom! Both are adjacent to the driving range/golf course, tennis courts, and stables. What a crazy place. In addition to a good long run, I had a great tempo workout mid-week, so I'm over the rough patch that was San Diego. One thing is clear, I am crossing the San Diego marathon off my list unless they start the race at 5am or put the whole course under a retractable roof.

And now for the entertainment portion of my post. Here's a shot of me, sweaty, and braid a flyin'. No wonder it ended up so tangled.

Getting to Know Me

It's been a while since I've had a weekend where I literally was doing something every second. Monday is Day #1 with the kiddos, so there' s been a lot to do.

Here's one thing I did today.

I hand this out to the kids on the first day of class so I don't really have to talk about myself and when they are bored, they have something wholesome to look at. Maybe they'll learn some more digits of pi! Now that I have the collage made, I'm ready for year #6. Hard to believe.

Lots of Excitement Today

I am lying in my hotel room in sunny San Diego. Probably not what most out-of-towners do here, but I'll explain. For one, I am running a half marathon here tomorrow. It's a training run (slow pace), which means more time in the sun tomorrow, so I'm trying to avoid the sun today. And for two, the Olympics is on nearly all day today. Granted, NBC has decided that track cycling prelims are more exciting than the women's 10,000 m final. You know I love cycling, but the US athletes aren't even winning medals in the events they are showing. Where's the love for Shalane? Right here.


In case you weren't up between 12:30 and 2 am to watch the replay of the race, Shalane was confused about her place at the finish because the leaders had lapped some runners but she didn't know how many. The video shows a non-African runner crossing the line after the winner, Dibaba, and it's confusing for a second, but then you realize that woman has more laps to go. Congrats on getting that third place Shalane! I'm sure Marblehead will have a nice parade for you and I will do my best to channel you during my race tomorrow. We drove the end of the course today, which we heard was hilly, and it was, so I'll need the boost.

The only outing today was to Whole Foods (and then to drive the course). While we were there, Jon Miller, of ESPN fame, was also shopping.

The story: I heard the guy behind the counter say, "Hello Mr. Miller." In my head, I thought, "Oh, that must be a former teacher of that guy. Cool." But then, the response of Mr. Miller was so weird. It was as if he didn't know the kid working behind the counter or didn't care to catch up. I kept shopping and then I heard K say to the man, "I really like your style." I looked the man up and down and thought, "What is he seeing here?" He had on a blue Hawaiian style shirt with no pattern, dark chino shorts, and some older Teva-like sandals. I didn't think his style was anything to comment on. Then Mr. Miller spoke. "Well, thank you very much," he said. Then I knew that this wasn't just any old Mr. Miller. This was Jon Miller, who I've heard call the Red Sox winning the World Series on the radio. And his style, was not something to be seen, but to be heard. Funny thing is...his voice sounds the same in real life.

The final note of the day: This morning, I went to the Starbucks across the street to get the Times. By the way, this Starbucks opens at 4:30am on weekdays and 5 am on weekends. I didn't know that the San Diegans were so aggressive in the morning. Maybe the early hours are for the surfers. Anyway, I got a coupon for a $2 grande cold drink if I came back after 2pm that same day. So, since it's right across the street, I went back and tried the new Vivanno smoothie.

I first saw these advertised in Atlanta, but I can make my own smoothies, so I wasn't that interested. Today, I had the orange mango banana, which I thought it was pretty good. Who knows what's really in it, but I wouldn't turn it down if someone wanted to give me another one.

And as I close, bad news for Deena. Sad.

Cuil!

There's a new search engine in town.  My town to be exact.  Menlo Park company Cuil just unveiled their response to Google, which they claim will be better.  I like the format of the results, but you decide.

Does This Trump Newport?

From today's NYT Olympics section:

"...NBC will stream 2200 hours of live events across 25 sports on NBCOlympics.com...  Users will be able to watch the events on up to four screens at a time during each day of competition... users will see the standard world feed that is sent to all broadcasters... Users will also have access to statistics, athlete biographies and other information as they watch the action."

Consider it my new homepage.

Top 3 of the Week

3. The Foam Roller

Since I had to take a year off from running to be injured, I have kept track of anything that hurts when I exercise (in a spreadsheet, obviously).  My Physical Therapist seemed to have done wonders with my tight calves (I was pain-free for four weeks) and then I went to Nicaragua.  Everything went back to the way it was before PT.  Then one day while in Florida, I had a great run.  My soleus (the actually source of the pain) was only slightly hurting during my run.  Hmmm...  From there, I had three awful, horrible runs...the kind that make you doubt that you are even close to someone who should own running shoes.  Then I had another great run (with absolutely no pain).  What did these two great runs have in common?  For one, they were flat.  That is important for my calves, but every run in Nicaragua had been flat too, so I thought it had to be something else.  The day before both runs, I had been at the gym and gave my muscles the foam roller treatment.  Maybe there's a lurking variable here, but I'm pretty sure that there is causation between using the foam roller and decreased calf pain.  So, when I get back to Cali on Friday night, there will be a nice foam roller at my door and I will consider it one of the better investments I have made recently.  You can get one too, here.  Or, you can do what I'm doing until I get to Cali...just using some water bottles.  More evidence that foam rollers are great: when flying from Atlanta to Boston, I saw a football team traveling together and one kid had a foam roller as his carry-on.  I'm not ruling that out for the future.

2. Sunday NYT Crossword (08.03.08)

I have only recently started doing the New York Times crossword puzzle with any sort of consistency and persistence (persistency?).  Last week, I was steaming mad at Will Shortz.  Ali and I started the puzzle and were doing pretty well, but things just weren't making sense.  It turns out that we were supposed to put arrows in some of the boxes to mean "up," "down," "left," or "right."  Such as liberals was "THE <--."  I was furious about this, but apparently, that's not unusual and I've now been initiated.  I now know that the Sunday NYT puzzle might not be as straightforward as it looks and the title actually means something and the Sunday puzzle is actually hard.  So, yesterday, I brought my A game to the crossword.  The puzzle was very clever and I suggest you try it, if you have access.  So, this Sunday's puzzle was conquered (thanks to a disappointing set by Calexico)

1. Newport Folk Festival

This was just the highlight of...maybe the summer (no offense to the wonderful people I've spent time with and the country of Nicaragua).  I would have liked to attend both days, but since I've never been before, I thought I'd just check out one day and see how it went.  Not to mention that the line-up on Sunday was not to be missed: Willy Mason, Brandi Carlile, Calexico, Gillian Welch, Levon Helm, and Jimmy Buffett (well...we did miss him).  Here are some tidbits.

Willy Mason--cute guy, wore suspenders, nice voice, had a woman (last name Carlile but not Brandi) who had a great voice and played the guitar, his brother played the drums, and his parents came out to sing the last song ("Oh You Restless Fugitive"...a song that I loved but can't find reference to anywhere).

Brandi Carlile--Simply awesome!  This woman is a performer, in and out.  I love the way she uses her voice and the beautiful grittiness it can have (some credit for which goes to producer T Bone Burnett, who produced Gillian's first two CDs).  I really liked "Turpentine" and "My Song," both songs I haven't heard since I don't own her new album.  She closed with Folsom Prison Blues (which she did just the way it should be done) and encored with Hallelujah, which gave me goosebumps.  When she started the latter, K asked me if I had heard the song.  I said, "Yes, but not the Leonard Cohen version."  About a minute later, these punk kids with cigarettes, sat down next to us.  One turned to us and said "Have you guys heard of Leonard Cohen?  He does this song much better."  K just said, "Yeah, maybe, but I'm not here to complain."  Meanwhile, I had goosebumps, so perhaps her performance of that song was somewhere in between.  Anyway, I think she's great in concert and encourage you to see her, if you get the chance.

Calexico--As I said, I got a bit of the crossword done during this set.  I like their stuff and enjoyed their collaboration with Iron and Wine, so this was disappointing.  During the first few songs, the bass was so loud that it was hard to hear the songs.  The best song was "Goin' to Acapulco"with Jim James (a voice worth listening to from My Morning Jacket).  That's all I have to say about that.

Gillian Welch--Ahhhh...how long I've wanted to see her live.  There she was with David Rawlings and out came "Miss Ohio" right away.  Gillian is not as energized as the others we saw, but it was her and she played the banjo and harmonica and was just great.  She also seems very comfortable in front of an audience.  She was just chatting between songs and seems very comfortable on stage. And the best part is that you all can enjoy her performance, courtesy of NPR.  They are slowly posting many of the performances on their website.  There are lots of performances there (including Jim James...who mentions the "interweb" around 28:10...Brandon).  It also seems like they will be available as podcasts through "All Songs Considered Concerts."  I loved Gillian's "Lawman," "Gamblin' Man" (which I guess is a woman's take on a traditional folk song about a gambler), "Red Halo," and her cover of "Jackson."  And her version of Paul Simon's "Gone At Last" really is better than his.  Actually, pretty much all she did was great!  She played three new songs, which I hope means that she's going to release an album soon. 

Levon Helm--I have never seen someone so happy to be playing on stage.  Before, during, and after every song, the man was smiling and happy.  He just was having so much fun.  I would be having fun too if I beat throat cancer and was playing with a band of 10 or 12 in front of thousands at 68 years old.  Not a bad gig.  He was fabulous (despite the tequila-drinking parrotheads next to us complaining about the voice of the old guy who they thought was probably on Cialis)!  He had quite the band of horns, a slide trumpet (?), Little Sammy Davis on the harmonica, Howard Johnson on the tuba, and his daughter Amy singing.  Levon was on the drums to start but then on the mandolin for a lot of the time.  They did a great "Ophelia" and "Long Black Veil."  But I think the highlight was closing with "The Weight" with Jake Shimabukuro on ukulele, Gillian Welch on vocals, David Rawlings on vocals and guitar, and Little Sammy Davis back on harmonica.  I know that it wasn't really "my generation," but K and I left on such a high after watching these musicians pour it on for us.  

Notes for next time: Despite what they say, people were in all kinds of chairs and had umbrellas.  I definitely would have been much more comfortable if I was sitting and shaded.  I don't mind wearing a bucket hat and an SPF 30 shirt and applying sunscreeen every hour, but it wasn't for comfort.  Also, apparently this stuff is streamed online through wfuv.org if there are days when you can't make it.  I do hope to get there again in the future.  It's unbelievable to see so much great talent for the price that you would pay for just one performer. 

That's the scoop from the east coast.  Hope this finds you well.