Thursday, July 22, 2010

Adventures on Yakima St

In Massachusetts when I was younger we called the Department of Motor Vehicles “The Registry”, most places call it the “DMV” and here in Washington it’s simply “The Department of Licensing” aka the “DOL”. No matter what you call it, I’ve always considered it a shoe-in for the gold medal at the World’s-Most-Boring-Place-on-Earth contest. Well that’s what I thought anyway, until I hit the DOL on Yakima St. in Tacoma yesterday.

I drove to Yakima St looking for a sleek metropolitan style building, but found the DOL tucked into a shopping center with only a cheesy blue “Driver Licensing” sign to indicate its presence. In an effort to save our tax dollars, the DOL thought it was a good idea to rent a store front in between a liquor store, a Subway and the dollar tree. The room, complete with tile floor, fluorescent lights and a shopping cart or two, was clearly once a Fred Meyer or a Safeway. Instead of aisles of groceries the body of the store was filled with rows and rows of hard plastic chairs. Most of which were occupied. Madison insisted on coming in, even though from experience I knew she was going to be bored out of her skull. Still, it was an alternative to sitting in my hot car with my sister, nephew and Max. Madison was a trooper she lasted about five minutes in the place before she decided she’d rather be squished in the back seat of the Prius reading picture books with her brother and cousin.

Bear with me as I try to run through the seamless and fantastic organizational process of the DMV (DOL, Registry whatever). Okay first you get in a long line to get a number, this number allows you to sit and relax in aforementioned chairs for the hour or so that you wait to be served. Back in my day we used to have to stand in line for the entire time, so actually now that I think of it, the take a number business is quite lovely. They give numbers that also have letters in front of them which clues in the kind- hearted and patient workers to the service you will need. For example R for renewal, E for enhanced and so on. There’s a big screen that announces who is next and which window to attend. So it isn’t horrible per se, especially if you have, let’s imagine, eight games of scrabble going with your friends via the iphone.

As I was standing in the first line I met a very nice woman about my age and her mom, who was also very likable. We did a little small talk and they even saved my spot in line when I had to dash off to the ATM machine to press clear since my entire account information was still on the screen. The woman my age had been to the DOL once already that morning, but had to go back to get her mom to vouch for her or something like that. I’m not quite clear on that piece. Anyway, I got my number and hunkered down in a chair a couple of rows behind my new friends. (We liked each other, but I didn’t want to seem desperate for DOL kinship).

Then there was the waiting. Waiting is a strange thing. It separates the strong from the weak, the sweet from the ugly and the kind from the kind-of-crazy. But really, when push comes to shove (and it will just about come to that in a few paragraphs so hang tight) even seemingly good people can go bad.

So there I was watching the clock, texting my sister, playing scrabble, checking my email and occasionally chatting with my fellow waitees. Things were slow, but not unpleasant really. I enjoyed a light conversation with the man next to me about the DOLs of the future, I suggested they’d be obsolete, everything could be done online; he took the other argument, the one where our world is so overpopulated and so many more people will be needing the service of the DOL, but with all the cut backs in the state there would never be enough employees and so on. What we were dealing with was nothing compared to the chaos of the future. Nice fellow, half empty glass and all. Our conversation was interrupted when R378 was called to counter number 1, “Ooh I’m R379, I am going to be next.” I bragged out loud. Mr. Half Empty was R402. He turned and struck up a conversation with the woman on his right. I went back to scrabble when suddenly there arose such a clatter…

R378 happened to be those nice women I met in line earlier-the ones who saved my spot. I have no idea what went down, but something happened and the mother, (who I will now refer to affectionately as my friend) started screaming and then started to storm out. Not wanting to be outdone the clerk behind the counter mumbled something that I think sounded like “Never come back” and of course my friend came charging back. “Excuse me?” She started shouting and wagging her finger. Her head was bopping a million miles a minute. Then she addressed the entire crowd—all of us in our rows and rows of seats. “You know these people at the DOL are rude. You know they’re rude to us.” She got some Yes ma’am and You got that rights from the crowd. “Oh look at that, he’s calling the police. Go ‘head.” (then to us again) “I don’t even think he’s really calling the police, but he can go ahead I ain’t afraid anyway.”

A few moments pass and the guy behind the counter is either really speaking to the police or doing what my aunt used to do when my cousins were naughty which would entail pretending to have an entire conversation with their father about how bad they were, when really she was just talking to the dial tone. I didn’t think he was pulling an Auntie Sue. This was the real deal, he was giving the police a description. Meanwhile the rest of us were whispering to each other, sure there was a moment or two when we all tried to look away or pretend to busy ourselves, but the pretenses were gone. This was quite a show. Now we were speculating and taking sides. My friend was going on and on, “That’s right, you call them. Uh-uh, you got it wrong, I’m five foot two. Wait a minute,” at this point she takes a big step back and puts herself in the middle of the room and says “Not black, I’m gooooolden brown.” She looks at all of us for our approving nods, which I felt obliged to give, given our relationship. You see forging a friendship at the DOL is something akin to being old army buddies.

I swear we made eye contact at that moment and I felt like I needed to say something, so I leaned over to Mr. HalfEmpty and told him that I met her earlier in line and she was really a great lady. Two rows in front of us a man with all of his front teeth, but strangely none of his back, said “I went to high school with the daughter. She was always a good kid. Real friendly.” I suddenly pictured the two of us—front tooth dude and me—as character witnesses at the trial. As if reading my mind, my friend gets up real close to the guy behind the counter who is still on the phone with the cops and then steps back and addresses us again. “I didn’t get physical with this guy. Did anyone here see me gettin’ physical? If you did you better speak up right now. (she paused, did this amazing full body wag and then said) That’s what I thought.See now I got my witnesses.”

“This is just like Social Security, except at Social Security they have cops on the premises.” Half Empty says to me. “They are so rude there. That’s why they have to have the cops. Ever been there?” “Uh-uh” I say feeling suddenly as if I have missed out on some exclusive club. “No? Really? In fact they were so rude last time I was there I’m going back with my lawyer on Thursday.” I had no idea what to say to this and then I blurted in my typical Little-Miss- Diplomat way “I bet it’s a hard job to be behind that counter all day.” That was stupid, so I followed that quickly with, “But still they should be respectful, there’s no reason to be so rude.” “Mmmhhmm.” He nodded noncommittally. I couldn’t tell if I had gotten out of his good graces or not and for some reason I cared. Just at that moment my number was called. “Good for you,” Half Empty remarked. Maybe he really was HalfFull after all or maybe he was just happy I was leaving.

Right around that time my friend and her daughter stepped outside, as did the unhappy DOL clerk and his supervisor. The cops came, but I am relieved to say they didn’t single me out as a character witness. Strangely, no one really wanted to hear my side of it. Well no one except the clerk behind window number seven, because the first thing she said to me when I approached the counter was, “Oh my God. What happened out there?”

Monday, July 19, 2010

Food for Thought or Thoughts on Food

Yesterday I started my day with honey nut cheerios. For lunch I had half of a roast beef sandwich on a nice thick sub roll, tortilla chips and a freshly baked oatmeal chocolate-chip cookie. At some point yesterday afternoon I enjoyed a brownie. Dinner was a grilled chicken salad, big chunk of French bread and for dessert, yes I still had dessert, a vanilla cupcake slathered with chocolate frosting from one of our favorite spots-Hello Cupcake in Tacoma. While it is a stretch to say this is the norm for me, it certainly isn’t a rare indulgence. I love my sugary high carb. treats. I like healthy food, too, of course-note the grilled chicken salad. But let’s put it this way salad is like Drew Barrymore’s boyfriend, what’s his name? Oh yeah, Justin Long--nice, dependable, cute in his own right. However, home-baked chocolate chip oatmeal cookies are like Brad Pitt or Jude Law--irresistable, beautiful with a slight touch of danger. (For those followers who prefer drooling over females go ahead and replace Justin Long with Lisa Kudrow and Brad Pitt/Jude Law with Scarlet Johansen and Salma Hayak.) Now you get the picture.

I am sure some of you are like me, right? We understand the whole eat to live not live to eat concept, but can’t quite commit to it. Forgive me if I sound like a five year old, but it’s just not fair that some of the yummiest foods are the foods that should be off limits. Wouldn’t it be nice to fill our days with our favorite foods? I propose that if you love to fuel up on chocolate chip cookies, French bread, greasy, wood fired pizza and Ghiradelli chocolate bars (milk, not dark) you should just go for it! If you prefer to fill your day with cheetos, soda and ice cream, then so be it! All in favor…say thigh. I mean aye.

The other day I was in the locker room at the gym. There was this woman there, about my age, well she looked a little older really, still she was cute and confident. She was strutting around that room like she owned the place. I tried not to stare, but on her petite naked body she was sporting quite a pouch. Clearly she didn’t have a baby in tow, but her belly was round like that of someone into her second trimester of pregnancy. You know me, I’m not often judgmental, but I couldn’t help staring at this woman, surely someone who took exercising seriously, but couldn’t kick the sugar habit. Before I could look away, she caught my eye and that’s when I remembered that I wasn’t in the locker room at all, I was in my bathroom and that girl I was staring at was me! What are the odds that Mike installed funhouse mirrors in the bathroom without me knowing? Not likely, I suppose.

Let me stop here and note something that some of you might be thinking right now, how can a girl who can often squeeze herself into a size 4 sit here and cry to me about bad food choices and fat belly pouches? I really don’t know how to answer that, I know that there would be people happy to be my size. I do appreciate this. But I believe that you should take care of whatever you have and the truth is I am taking care of my sweet tooth and my taste buds, but the rest of me, well not so much.

It’s not so easy to change and that’s why I am writing this. I figure if I shout out to the world (aka my 29 followers) that I am thinking about changing my ways maybe I will hold myself more accountable. Perhaps before I grab that third slice of pizza I will think of that girl in the mirror and grab something healthy like a hot fudge sundae instead. Ugh, just kidding, maybe I will grab a handful of carrots or (gasp) maybe I will just walk away from the third piece….imagine that?

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Chirp and Hope

Greetings friends, I join you today from a sunny patch in my backyard. It's about 78 degrees, not a cloud in the sky, I'm sitting on a blue camping chair with my feet kicked up on a cushy outdoor ottoman. The lake is calm, the birds are chirping, the fish are jumping, the dragonflies are giving each other piggyback rides, (aren't they playful?).

I have responsibilities in the house, but truth be told, one of us needs to be outside whenever the kids are in the lake. The kids have been in the lake at every possible moment, so here I am parked with my laptop, my Kindle and a few crumbs from a much enjoyed chipwich--a sacrifice only a mother can make.

Speaking of mothering, yesterday morning, I heard a relentless chirping that seemed to be coming from the master bathroom. Max and I noticed that whenever we stepped outside rather than the noise growing, it got quieter, muffled. It didn’t take too much detective work to realize there were birds in my ceiling (different than bats in my belfry, you crazy jokers). Well there was nothing this damsel in distress could do about it, even though my heart went out to the little tweeties, I wouldn’t even know where to begin to get into the ceiling and save those creatures. Once Mike got home there was some eyelash batting, some sweet talking and soon he was trudging up the stairs with ladder in tow. It seems some momma bird had made a nest in our bathroom fan, which she accessed from a vent near the roof of our house. At this point in the story you might suggest, “Hey it’s survival of the fittest, baby, if you’re stupid enough to make your nest in an air vent, you ain’t worth saving”. To this I say, if we let every child suffer because of their parents stupidity, humanity would have died out long ago. Now you think “Touche, Aimee” and you let me continue my story.

Mike reaches in to the fan area and pulls out a tiny limp baby bird. It was so adorable, small and clearly on its last legs. It was covered in grey downy feathers and couldn’t have been more than a day or two old. That sweet bird, who had been chirping all day, lay still in Mike’s hand. He was barely breathing, not chirping at all, eyes closed. It didn’t look good. We headed out onto the porch with him. The kids had a nest that they had found weeks before and they left it sitting in a Swan shaped planter on the front porch. There was some serious discussion as to what to do with the bird. Madison named the little creature Chirp. Mike put it in the nest and then put the nest in a nearby bush, where he thought there was another nest and perhaps another bird might take care of Chirp. I wasn’t really satisfied with this, but decided to acquiesce for the time being. In all honesty Mike was sure that Chirp wouldn’t make it through the night and I was beginning to agree.

We went back in to the house and headed upstairs only to hear another bird chirping in our ceiling. Once again Mike reached up and found a sweet little bird, this one had more life than the first. He took her to the nest after we named her Hope. As soon as he went to put Hope down, our little friend Chirp stretched up with his little baby bird mouth wide open looking for food. Definitely a good sign. He may look all tough, but that softy husband of mine was back in the house with both birds in tow. He had placed their nest into that Swan planter I mentioned earlier. I called the vet who gave me the number of a wildlife rescue. Of course the rescue agency was closed. We did some research on the internet and found out that we could feed the birds cat food soaked in water. We read that we should use a toothpick to feed them, not a dropper or syringe, and we read that baby birds need to eat every two hours. The birds took to the cat food like a goat takes to a coke can and all was well. There was conflicting advice on what to do about night feeding. Some sites said that they would need to eat through the night, just not as frequently as every two hours. Other sites suggested they would sleep well if they were in a dark place. No matter what all the sites agreed that they needed to be kept warm. So we stuck them in the oven at 200 degrees. No, no, I’m totally kidding, we wrapped them up and put them in our closet out of the reach of our cats.

We read that you could feed your baby birds certain bugs including flies if you removed their wings. So Mike caught a fly and tore off its wings, put it on my bedside table and suggested I give it to one of them during the first night feeding. Of all the jokes I have told in my blogs this, unfortunately, isn’t one of them.

It’s been a long time since I have had to get up and do a middle of the night feeding, but at 3:00 with no help of an alarm clock, I startled awake. I listened carefully but there was no chirping coming from my closet. I am not going to lie, it crossed my mind to roll over and go back to sleep, but I thought “What if they aren’t chirping because they are dead!” On my way to my closet I gave the dead fly a glance, but really how could I decide who got the fly. Every mother out there can agree with me that you can’t give one baby a treat like a wingless fly and leave the other baby without. So I left the fly where it was and thought Mike could handle that during the 5:00 am shift. I crept into the closet, carefully closing the door behind me so the cats wouldn’t get in and looked at the babies. First I checked to see if they were breathing and they were. Their eyes were closed and they were sound asleep. Just as the first time your baby sleeps through the night, I was at a loss, do I wake them to eat or do I just leave them be? I decided they had to eat, so I took some of the wet cat food, put it on a toothpick and started tapping at their beaks with it. Then I started making some horrid clicking noises, that sounded nothing like a momma bird, but it was the best I could do standing in my closet at 3:00 a.m. The birds scooted in to each other and away from me. I gave up, they clearly weren’t hungry.

This morning the wildlife people called us back and told us to put the babies on the roof as close to the vent as possible. They confirmed my belief that it is an old wives’ tale that a mother bird would not come back to their babies if they had been handled. Mike set the whole planter on the roof and we have for the most part left them alone. The wildlife people have assured us that if they chirp loudly enough momma bird will find them. Sure enough, we have seen a beautiful little bird circle our roof several times today and she eventually landed in the planter. So it looks like the wildlife people were correct, little Chirp and Hope will be fed by their real mom and will eventually fly off to become the wild birds they were meant to be.

On a side note we remain hopeful that the swan planter won’t confuse the water fowl living on the lake, as we don’t need any big Canadian Geese trying to mate with our plastic planter. But, if by some miracle they try and succeed, at least we will know how to take care of the babies.