A Fieldtrip to the Zoo

Last Friday I had the privilege of going with my daughter's class on a field trip to the Reid Park Zoo here in Tucson. Along with another parent, I had the responsibility to keep track of three kids, including my daughter, while we were at the zoo. Each of the kids had to carry their own water bottle throughout the day, while we tried to remind them to take frequent drinks in weather that climbed to 102° Fahrenheit. Yes, this is Tucson, but no, it isn't supposed to be that hot yet.
From about 8:30 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. we were outside in the heat. After we finished looking at the animals at the zoo, we went to a nearby park, ate lunch, and then played an array of games. The kids did gunnysack races (in pillowcases), three-legged races, freeze tag, etc. They also tossed water balloons back and forth to see how far they could toss them without them falling to the ground and bursting.
The teacher planned several activities throughout the day that would get the kids wet and help them to cool down. As they were finishing up with the balloon toss, the parents got to chase the kids and pour water on them or get them with the remaining water balloons.
I don't know how the kids did it, but they never seemed to slow down, despite the heat. They just kept running. I was tired and hot, and I even got to sit in the shade during several of the activities.

Tucson Bike Fest

For three years I have been biking to school, making a trip of over four miles each way. For a while I rode a Scattante street bike, but realized I wasn't getting much of a workout on it. It was almost like I was cheating. Consequently, I decided to get the cheapest Walmart bike I could find. We found one that had been banged up a good bit and was marked down to $35. It served me well for almost a year and a half until one night some brazen thief came and took it off my front porch. The one day I got careless and failed to lock it up after parking it on the porch was the day someone came and stole it. But this is Tucson, I should have suspected that. As a result, I woke up to a slight sound--usually nothing but an alarm clock will wake me up, just ask my wife. I instantly remembered I hadn't locked up my bike, so I quickly looked out the window and saw it was gone. The next instant I was running down the road in sandals after a white mini van that was speeding away down our normally quiet street, but I was too slow to get a license plate. I take a little comfort in knowing that one of the brake pads was missing, the other three were worn to a frazzle, and the wheels had been wobbly from the time I bought it. But they probably still managed to get $10 or so out of it to help pay for their next drug fix.

I spent the next few days trying to find a similar bike that would give me a good workout and that would be within my price range. I got lucky after calling around to several local stores. Once again I found a bike for under $40. Like the one before it, it has served me well for some time now, and also like the one before it, I need to change its break pads. While most drivers are quite courteous to bicyclists here in Tucson, some force you to make abrupt stops. On one occasion, not very long after we moved here, I started riding my bike through an intersection after the light turned green. As I was nearing the middle of the road, I heard brakes screeching for what seemed like an eternity. I was lucky to get to the middle of the road before a pickup truck slammed into the car that had been beside me at the light but that had started out a little slower. The two vehicles slid right behind me and took out a sign posted on the center median. That experience along with two or three others has made me ride with more caution, and perhaps, use the brakes more than I need to.

Fast forward to the end of March 2009. As I was waiting at a stoplight near the University of Arizona, I noticed a plastic container with brochures announcing the Tucson Bike Fest, a month-long drive to get people to stop driving and start cycling to work or school. I grabbed a brochure and two or three times a week I entered all the times I rode my bike to work and school during the month of April. The organizers of the event along with the numerous sponsors had various events throughout the city, including an occasional bike station where cyclist could stop and grab a quick breakfast, a t-shirt, a bike bell, etc. During the second week of April, I won a water bottle from Ajo Bikes in the weekly drawing. In addition to prizes, the camaraderie of the event, and the opportunity to talk to new people, I also got to see some of the benefits to biking that I had kind of overlooked. For the month of April, this is the data I received after entering online all my trips to school on my bike. I'm not sure how the cost in savings was calculated, but I'm sure I saved at least that much after factoring in gas, wear and tear to a vehicle, and a very pricey parking permit at the university.

Your estimated cost savings is $76
Mode	Trips		Vehicle Miles Saved
Carpool	0		0
Vanpool	0		0
Transit	0		0
Walk	0		0
Bicycle	46		190
Telecommute	0		0
Totals:	46		190
Pollution Reduction
Reduction in carbon monoxide:			3.85 lbs.
Reduction in oxides of nitrogen:			0.56 lbs.
Reduction in organic compounds:			0.41 lbs.
Greenhouse Gas Reduction
Reduction in carbon dioxide (and other gasses):			160.26 lbs.

On the fourth of May I received a phone call from an employee of the city of Tucson informing me that I had won one of the two grand prizes, a $540 Trek Allant donated by Trek Bicycles of Tucson. I went and picked it up today and was treated to some of the best service I have ever had at a cycling store. Not only did the store throw in a few bells and whistles such as front and rear lights, a bike bell, and an insulated bag to go on the back rack, but they also took the time to answer other annoying questions from someone who knows very little about bikes aside from the basic tire changes and a foray or two at replacing the bearings in the bottom bracket. I rode the bike home from the Trek store and enjoyed one of the smoothest rides I've had in a long time. The only setback was that whenever I stopped, I had to remember that I was no longer riding a woman's bike (the last two bikes we found below $40 were women's bikes).



Anyway, I offer a heartfelt thanks to the many sponsors of the Tucson Bike Fest for a fun and eventful month.

An Eventful Few Weeks

My comprehensive doctoral exams are finally over! In fact, I finished them nearly two weeks ago. For the first time in years I have been able to relax a little at the end of the semester instead of pushing myself to the edge of my sanity for the final month of the semester.

A few weeks ago a good friend of ours gave us four tickets to go watch a NASCAR race at the Phoenix International Raceway. Due to a couple of accidents on the interstate, we arrived late, and having never been to a NASCAR race, we didn't have earplugs. For those of you who have gone to a NASCAR event, you're probably saying "amateurs"! We were fortunate to have ladies all around us scrambling through their purses racing to be the first to give us earplugs for our three kids. We all enjoyed the opportunity to watch it live, even if it was quite the hassle packing everything up at the last minute when we learned that we had tickets. As for my favorite part of the race--we didn't get to see any spectacular wreck or anything, so I would have to say my favorite part was after a minor wreck when the caution car finally pulled off the track and all the cars started racing again. With all the cars passing close together, the air filled with the multiplied sound of all the cars passing close together.

If I could do it again, I would take earplugs and I would put the movie Cars in our portable DVD player for the kids to watch on the way to the track.
Two days after our trip to the racetrack, our family enjoyed an evening at the Pima County Fair. Last year marked our first time at the fair here, and like our NASCAR experience, we were novices. We paid full price for the rides, and as a result, our kids only got to go on a few of them. This time we bought tickets in advance, so every ride was marked down considerably. As a result, we spent a very full and fun evening at the fair for a reasonable price.

Having grown up on a farm, one of my favorite parts of the fair was going through the barns to look at the animals. It reminded me of the good old days of raising lambs in 4-H and taking them to the fair. At the same time, it's nice to see and even smell farm animals again after living for years in the city. One of these days we're going to escape the city (at least to a certain degree) and actually have a yard with some room to move around!

Who can pass up the chance to ride in the teacups?
Even the goats are willing to pose with passersby.
This kind girl pulled her chicken out of its cage with an apparent full-awareness of what a treat it is for "cityfolk" to pet chickens.
For those who have not seen our barnyard, well here it is.
Debs got to watch our mischievous son during our ride on the ferris wheel. Both he and the girls loved looking down at the lights of the fair. In fact, we couldn't get Bells to take her eyes off the lights. She turned her head for the picture, but her eyes remained fixed on the lights.The girls loved the rides, and Gabs grew just enough during the last year to be able to go on some of the bigger rides. It's tough to top the experience of taking your kids to the county fair and watching their faces light up with each new adventure.

So having gone twice, what will I change for next year? We'll probably listen to some Chris LeDoux (i.e. County Fair and The Ride) as we drive to the fair, and we'll get a friend to watch the kids while I ride the ferris wheel with Debs.

This last Friday and Saturday, Gabs lost her first two teeth. Each night the Tooth Fairy left her eighty cents in shiny new coins. After losing her second tooth, she told us how she was planning on catching the Tooth Fairy that night. She was so tired, however, that the Tooth Fairy had little trouble retrieving the small tooth from under her pillow and replacing it with a few coins.

On Sunday evening, Grandma Hansen called to speak with Debs, but Gabs got to the phone first, which resulted in a ten minute play-by-play of losing her teeth and getting money from the Tooth Fairy. Don't ask me how you can talk about something like that for ten minutes, but if you're interested in hearing the story, you can call and talk with Gabs--I'm sure Grandma Hansen could tell you all about it now also. If I understand right, Grandma Hansen finally asked to speak with Debs, but when Gabs went to give her the phone, she saw a wonderful opportunity, which she conveyed to her grandma over the phone, "Well it looks like Mom is changing Erik's diaper, so shouldn't I just talk to Grandpa instead?" From what Debs tells me, Gabs then proceeded to tell the story about her teeth to Grandpa.

How lucky can two parents get to have such adorable children!?

Christmas in Malad

This year we had plans of staying in Tucson for Christmas instead of making the thousand-mile drive to visit family. But it wasn't to be, Deb's grandma died shortly before Christmas, causing us to make some last-minute schedule changes. On December 21st we drove to Malad, Idaho with perfect roads the entire way. The following day we drove through a winter snowstorm over Malad Pass to get to the funeral. On the 23rd we returned to Malad to spend the next few days with my parents, two of my sisters, my brother, and his wife and two kids. They all arrived on the 24th.

Trena Doll, my second-oldest sister, almost immediately enlisted Spens, my younger brother, and I in a very important project. She gave us both a shovel and had us pile snow in my parent's back yard. We dutifully obeyed and before long we had a nice-sized hill of snow constructed out of snow that wasn't packing very well. Fortunately, on Christmas it snowed all day (17 inches worth) and the snow packed splendidly. Our sledding hill went quickly from then on and we quickly realized that we would have to create a turn to keep the sledders from running into my parent's house. Here's some footage of the end product. In the video you will see my Dad ride with Bells. When it was over, she kept saying, "Grandpa tipped us over!"



Dad did, however, have better rides, including one where he raised a finger to the sky to indicate he was number one and that he had gone the farthest. Gabs didn't buy it though and called him on using his hands to go further.


Also while we were in Malad, I spent some time scanning one of the family photo albums. ELK, our ten-month-old son, wanted to get at the book and seemed to have all sorts or strategies to do so. His Grandpa's job was to see that he didn't get to it. Sing, my youngest but older sister, caught it all on camera. You decide who won!



When the last of us left on the 27th, we had enjoyed a memorable Christmas together in my parent's small, but cozy home in Malad! Thanks, Mom and Dad, for letting us all come. And thanks to the rest of you who went for making this Christmas an unforgettable experience!

Richard Tyler Files

I pulled The Complete Works of William Shakespeare off my shelf and counted the number of plays he wrote. If the edition I own is halfway decent, it looks like Shakespeare wrote about 37 plays that are still extant today. Has anyone read two of them? Three? Four? All of them?

Early this year a professor of mine introduced me to the personal files/notes of Richard Tyler, a former professor of Spanish. While Shakespeare was writing plays in the late sixteenth century and early seventeenth century, Spanish playwrights and artists became a part of the most extraordinary period of artistic and literary genius in Spanish history--the Golden Age. Richard Tyler not only read more comedias/plays from the time period than anyone I know about, but he also wrote plot summaries for many of them. I spent a good part of the summer scanning thousands of 5 in. by 8 in. cards on which he had typed summaries with his typewriter.

For those of you who are not familiar with Spanish comedias, I will briefly summarize them for you. In general they are fairly lighthearted with all sorts of twists, turns, and coincidences. Often they address topics such as honor and nobility. Okay, so that was comedias in a really, really small nutshell. Richard Tyler also wrote summaries to tragicomedias, essentially a play in which the protagonist or protagonists face a dreaded outcome either because of their own actions, because of fate, or because of their conniving rivals.

So just how many Spanish plays from the time period did Richard Tyler summarize?
Answer: about 1,700.

About how many lines do each of the plays contain?
Answer: about 3,000

Are the plays written in prose or poetry?
Answer: poetry

How many five inch by seven inch cards are in this collection of plot summaries?
Answer: approximately 7,950

How many playwrights are represented by these plot summaries?
Answer: about 190 playwrights can be identified by name; however, many of the works are from an anonymous playwright or of doubtful origin.

What playwright is most represented by this collection of plot summaries?
Answer: Lope de Vega--the collection contains OVER 300 summaries of plays written by or attributed to the "monstruo de la naturaleza" ("monster of nature"--this is a title that Miguel de Cervantes, the author of Don Quixote, gave to Lope de Vega because of the inordinate amount of works that Lope generated)

So if these plays are in Spanish, why should I care if some professor wrote all these plot summaries?
Answer: Richard Tyler wrote these plot summaries in English. Therefore, they are a great resource for a wide variety of people. They can be used for comparative studies. They can be used for someone trying to find the next play they want to study. Sometimes Richard Tyler read a less-used version than the one that you get in your Spanish class. Consequently, some of his plot summaries may slightly differ from the "canonical" version used today or may even have an additional character or two. For those of you don't care to do research, you can simply read them for the fun of it...well, when I manage to make them more widely available. I think you will find that the summary alone is fun to read and shows just how creative and colorful these playwrights were. I am including a random example from among the plot summaries. It is not really a "canonical" work by any means, but it gives you an idea of the twists and turns you can expect. NOTE: Take a little time and try to get all the names straight! Amor secreto hasta celos by Lope de Vega

Did Richard Tyler do anything but read comedias and write plot summaries?
Answer: If 1,700 plot summaries weren't enough, Richard Tyler also kept a prodigious number of cards with bibliographic information related to specific playwrights and topics--well over the number of cards used for plot summaries. While we can get bibliographic information at the click of a mouse on the internet, all he had to do was sit down at his card file. It is difficult to find other references to some of the works mentioned in this file on the internet or elsewhere. Additionally, Richard Tyler also has "idea files". These files contain cards with a word or a phrase on them as well as the bibliographic information for the comedia from which they originated. For instance, numerous cards address how comedias refer to "eyes". Sometimes eyes are used as darts or cupids arrows. Other times they send out venom, etc. etc. etc.

What other fascinating things can you tell me about Richard Tyler's life work?
Answer: You don't have the time, so let's just leave it at that!!!

Remodelling by an amateur

For some time Deb has been trying to get me to put in a ceiling fan in our living room. A few weeks ago I ran out of excuses, so I scraped away all the popcorn texturing in our living room, which we were happy to be rid of. Then came the painstaking tasks of learning how to create the type of knockdown texture that we wanted, fish wire through the walls, etc., etc., etc.

Unfortunately, we forgot to get some before pictures, but here are some pictures mid-project along with some of the end result. A project that would take an experienced person a few days took me weeks since I wanted to make sure I did everything right the first time. There's nothing like spending hours on something just to realize you not only have to do it differently, but also fix the problem that you created by doing it wrong the first time. It's amazing what a project like this can do for your confidence. I started out thinking I would need to get help from more experienced friends, but when I realized they didn't have much time to offer, I decided I'd just have to find out how to do most everything using the internet and books. Well, it worked, and I learned a lot in the process. Now all I can hope is that the next project goes a little faster!

Picture 1: Holes in the wall/ceiling to fish the electrical wiring to the center of the room--plus the mess of the living room.

Picture 2: A close-up of some of the holes and wiring before adding nail plates to protect the wiring.

Picture 3: The walls and ceiling after patching everything up and painting.

Picture 4: The newly installed ceiling fan.

Picture 5: The room after finishing!

Setting Traps for Thy Neighbor...or Two...or Three...or Four

No, I'm not trying to ensnare my neighbors, but I am setting traps for their benefit as well as our own. Two weeks ago we set some mouse traps next to the fence that separates our back yard from our neighbors back yard. We had noticed a few mice coming over from the neighbor's yard and nibbling on some of our garden plants. I was somewhat lackadaisical about resetting them or putting fresh bait on them after we caught a mouse. Consequently, we only caught five mice that week.

At the start of this week I thought we would only have five or six mice left, so I decided to wage an all-day war against them and rid ourselves from the small infestation creeping in from next door. I grabbed a particular food--which I won't mention here--from the fridge and baited four traps. When I checked them, there was a lizard and three mice in the traps. I began to wonder if indeed we were halfway if I had caught three mice that quickly, so I baited and set the traps again...and again...and again. For a while I was able to just stand back about twenty feet and watch as the mice crawled over from our neighbor's back yard. Some of the mice were so small that they stood on the bait without springing the trap, which I must admit, frustrated me to no end. Fortunately in some cases an adult mouse would come and eat and it would catch the two simultaneously. All told we caught fifteen mice this last Monday.

After I had caught nine, I went over to our neighbor and told her how I had been watching mouse after mouse meander into our yard from her side of the fence. I'm not exactly sure why she acted so surprised because her back yard is absolutely filthy, but she assured me that she would notify her husband as soon as he got home from work. The following day we caught five more mice and we have caught a few since then. All told we have caught about thirty mice in less than two weeks. As you surely can imagine, I have had a hard time eating the particular food I used to bait the traps after all that carnage. Additionally, there is no "mouse talk" during mealtime. Who could have possibly imagined catching thirty mice using the old-fashioned traps. If I had it to do over again, I probably would have put a barrier up and set up some bait so the mice would eat it and then have to go right back to the neighbor's back yard to die.

I have been told that mothballs work well at holding mice at bay, but I would love to hear other suggestions since the mice breeding ground next door seems to have no supply shortage.

P.S. Don't mention this to my daughters! A few weeks ago we watched Ratatouille. I'm sure you can imagine the rest! One evening my youngest daughter came out with me while I was watering the garden. She saw a mouse going for one of the traps and started trying to coax him over to her by saying "Here mousy, mousy. Here mousy, mousy." Meanwhile, she had the palm of her hand facing downward as she used her fingers to signal that she wanted the mouse to come to her. I discretely made enough of a disturbance to scare the mouse away from the trap. Imagine that, I set up all those traps just to find myself obligated to shoo one away from an almost certain death!