Whither the Bee?

I finished a book last night!  And the crowd goes crazy!

This is not news, but you should see my reading pile.  My backlog has grown to a height that would cause my mountain-climbing sister to pause before considering a summit attempt.  Parental pass-alongs, estate sales, library sales, and Goodwill stores are all my undoing, as is that evil American Council of the Blind thrift store in West Allis.  Boswell Book Company on N. Downer Street suckers me in with author talks by the likes of Craig Thompson and John Scalzi; I may sneak out without a $24.95 autographed hardcover in hand, but the pesky bargain shelf ambushes me on the way to the door.  Curiosity killed the cat, but it's burying me alive.

You'd think, then, that when I finish an amiable read like Samantha Bee's I Know I Am, But What Are You, I would instantly fling it back through the portal into the ocean of resale print whence it came, the better to make room for its successors.  However, I'm a cheapskate.  If I've spent 50 or 89 cents on a volume of inspirationally snarky personal essays for which, in an earlier, pre-abundance era, I might have shelled out $2.98 plus $3.49 shipping from the Edward R. Hamilton catalog, it feels like I've turned a profit.

What to do, then, with this exemplar of the epistolary, this Woodstock of wit?  I resell some medium-priced books on Amazon.com, but few popular titles sell for more than a literal penny.  Giving the book to my sister-in-law, who earlier had giggle-snorted her way through David Sedaris despite her Christian upbringing, would be an option; but with Ms. Bee's chapter on rude characters who expose themselves to the author on a recurring basis as if she were a perv magnet, this seems unwise.  That's before we even get to her confession of releasing a psychopathic, rapist guinea pig into her basement with the cats.

I decided at last to stage a ninja attack under cover of darkness and donate the book to one of the Little Free Libraries that have sprouted in our city, and many others, in recent months.  As my Beloved Spousal Unit has described in her blog, Dante's Wardrobe, the Little Free Library movement is a casually organized community resource provided by private citizens for the benefit of their neighbors and neighborhood.  It's a friendly sharing of books over the back fence, only the back fence is now on a prominent street corner.  The collection is a bit spotty, but you've got to love the due date.  It is possible, Dear Reader, that one or two items from our local giveaway spots may have found their way back into our home, adding to my personal Magic Mountain.  Oh, what foul cruelty Fortuna has spun to me today!

Samantha Bee, her guinea pig, and her murderous cats are now lurking inside the box at N. 52nd and W. Vine, waiting to pounce on a curious, bypassing pedestrian.  Neighbors, be forewarned!

"X-U" Too, Buddy!

Word came last night that K.Q., creator of alternative worlds and a college radio friend, has suffered a small stroke. His demeanor remains feisty and humorous; he later posted on Facebook, "I'll still beat you in Scrabble if you don't make me use my left hand."

Have I been called out?

With K.Q. in mind, this seems an excellent time to disclose my burgeoning Scrabble habit -- possibly an addiction by now. (Yes, I know I'm supposed to use the ® symbol after each instance of the word Scrabble. Let's pretend I did.)

I have two principal enablers: my Beloved Spousal Unit, who challenges me routinely and defeats me regularly in our epic series of spirited analog contests ("You're going down, Tile-Boy!"), and Pogo.com, a multi-user gaming site that is the licensed host, promoter, and operator of the "official" online version of Scrabble.

(If you think I'm shilling here, please be advised that I am not an obsolete English coin, nor do I own a bloody sock. Ahem.)

The two Scrabble experiences are different. Keeping our rivalry casual and friendly -- the usual trash-talking at kickoff time notwithstanding -- Beloved Spousal Unit and I rely upon Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Ed. as our handy reference. Utterances such as "A-H", "E-R" and "U-M" are old friends, and I've inherited a familiarity with the wonders of "J-O" and "Q-I" from my Scrabble-playing parents. These are all fair game according to Merriam-Webster.

Subsequently, however, my overconfidence in thinking I'd become a bona fide Scrabble person led me online to Pogo.com, where the game site's Scrabble-playing 'bot -- and the carbon-based life-forms that frequent the Pogo.com community, I might add -- immediately confronted me with nuggets of rare ore such as "A-A", "O-D", and "X-U". A thorough knowledge of two- and three-letter words is essential for a full and healthy life, granted, but "X-U"? What the bleep?

Turns out, a xu (n.) is a Vietnamese coin. Not just any Vietnamese coin, but a formerly minted Vietnamese coin, as obsolete nowadays as the English shilling (or the word "nowadays"). The plural of xu is xu, too. All of which is completely irrelevant, of course; the only thing that matters is that "X-U" somehow snuck into the Official Scrabble Player's Dictionary, 4th Ed., the standard reference used for online Scrabble. To the automated 'bot, "X-U" is as good as "C-E-N-T"; just another allowable permutation of the 26 letters of the alphabet, hence, just as likely to appear depending on the game situation. It's a great way to use two inconvenient letters in the same turn while increasing your vocabulary, thereby impressing and angering your friends.

With an arsenal full of "A-R", "P-E", and "U-T", as well as the aforementioned "X-U", I now feel vaguely qualified to respond in kind to Recovering Carbon-Based Unit K.Q.'s all-comers challenge: "You're going down, Tile-Boy!"

(Please don't hurt me.)

Three Card Wenceslas; or, Tegwar Revisited

Ten years ago at a family reunion, my sister and I started to play a game that we called Three Card Wenceslas. We'd never played it before, but we both picked it up fairly quickly and, before long, became totally absorbed in a spirited contest.

Three Card Wenceslas has no rules. We made it up as we went along.

She would play a pair. I would meld. She would draw from the deck. I would raise. She would knock. I would discard. And so forth. Complete and utter improvisation. Complete and utter nonsense. Even the name of the game was phony. But we played confidently (and loudly!).

Our mom's cousin wandered over. By that time, my sister and I had progressed to Three Card Blind Wenceslas, played with eyes closed. I think I was holding a card to my forehead. The improvisation continued, with plenty of trash-talking between us.

Our cousin took this in for a while. Finally he asked, "How do you know when someone wins?"

"We just did," I said. Ba-da-boom!

A bit of a lowlife prank to pull on a relative, granted, but at least we didn't scam anyone for money (I rationalize). However, it turns out the cosmic joke of the situation has been on me all along, and I've only just realized it.

You see, I've just finished rereading Bang the Drum Slowly, the touching, tragicomic 1950's baseball and mortality novel by Mark Harris. It was the first time since my early teen years, when I was a budding baseball geek, that I'd read the book. Also, by chance, the 1973 movie version starring Michael Moriarty and Robert De Niro was shown the other night on Turner Classic Movies.

Both are terrific, the book moreso than the movie, but that's not important now. What is important is that the fictional ballplayers played a fictional card game to scam unsuspecting bystanders in hotel lobbies out of their fictional spare cash. The ballplayers' card game was called "Tegwar", and it had no rules. The play of the game was eerily familiar, right down to the trash-talking!

Buried like an intelligence mole in the Early 1970's quadrant of my baseball-addled subconscious, "Tegwar" had been lying in Wait (so to speak) for decades. It reemerged ten years ago as "Three Card Wenceslas" -- the T-W letter combination is too improbable to be purely coincidental, don't you think? When I came across the Tegwar bit in Bang the Drum Slowly recently, the realization of what I'd likely done sent chills up my spine. Cue the Twilight Zone tones!

We'll see our cousin again this summer. Hopefully he'll get a good laugh at my expense when I tell him the "Tegwar" story. It still might work out for me in the end, though; I'm pretty sure I can sell my remaining inventory of "Three Card Wenceslas" rulebooks on eBay.

In Which We List Ten Life-Long Favorites for Which I Must Remember to Thank My Parents, Who Introduced Me To Them

1. A. A. Milne
2. Dr. Seuss
3. The Wizard of Oz
4. Chocolate Jumbles
5. Macoun Apples
6. RPI Hockey
7. Beethoven
8. Scrabble
9. Tom Lehrer
10. Monty Python

On Baby Boomers, Silver Zloty's, and Cosmic Things

It's happened. Our tame, elegant family cruiser, The Silver Zloty, has become an object of nostalgia. If only in our own minds, that is; you don't hear the music industry writing songs about 1992 Camry's. But it had to happen, just as assuredly as once-modern '57 Chevy's, '66 Mustangs, and '73 Super Beetles in their time became wistful objects of recollected desire. My '82 Tercel may have been the bee's knees, and our '88 Dodge 600 took us from Point A's to Point B's, but the Silver Zloty really aims to please!

This fact was driven home, so to speak, on this past weekend's round trip to Madison on I-94 for a Mothers' Day gathering. The Silver Zloty's ancient C-V joints popped and creaked, its tires flopped, its obsolescent cassette deck whirred, and its A/C system went unused due to a lack of ozone-destroying freon, its original supply of which we'd long ago released in a bid to kill off what remains of Earth's atmosphere. Long the recipient of $500 and $800 repair increments, per Wait's Laws, the Zloty has seen us through three multiple-trip moves, numerous weekend outings and holiday sojourns, and hundreds upon hundreds of workday commutes. It's been the sole survivor in our livery stable for more than ten years. It's still running -- just like us.

When my beloved spousal unit and I take the Silver Zloty out, fill it with 87 octane, and pop in the cassette of The B-52's Cosmic Thing album -- our soundtrack for twenty years of happy travel, the tape itself starting to fade and wobble -- it's not just a drive but a cruise. "Roam if you want to!/Roam around the world!"

Road trip!

Spherical Recreations

Colorful balls are such a pleasing form. They practically shout out loud: "Sports!" "Games!" "Toys!" And above all: "Recess!"

Superballs from the toy store. Billiard balls on the bumper pool table at the the Y, where we had summer day camp. A game of 8-ball with my dad on the pool table at the volunteer firehouse. A croquet game in progress in the backyard. Yellow tennis balls. Yellow golf balls. Miniature golf balls in every primary color. Baseballs, softballs, and wiffle balls; basketballs, bowling balls, soccer balls, volleyballs. Red-rubber kickballs at school. Red cricket balls too, or so I understand. Pinballs. Bocce balls. Nerf balls, even.

That pile of colorful balls at the Ikea entrance -- sanitized hourly by the staff, surely -- in which you can happily lose a kid for an hour. There's nothing that's not happy about a pile of balls.

Which probably explains my current obsession with a simple, freeware computer game that I found on Yahoo: the aptly named "Pile of Balls". It's an absurdly simple, Tetris-like recreation in which you manipulate the falling balls, three at a time, into color groups that vanish when you get four or more together. Every so often, a satisfying little fanfare sounds -- "Ta-daaaaa!" -- and you advance a level. I have yet to survive Level 7, but it's not for lack of trying.

Toy models of atoms and planets in science class are fun, too. Speaking of which, I've been following the updates of American astronaut Mike Massimino (@Astro_Mike) on Twitter. He'll be on the Space Shuttle that launches into orbit in about a week. I'm really envious; pretty soon he'll have a large blue and green ball out the window to play with.

Confidential to "Boom Boom Von Doom"

The flat-track roller derby craze that began around 2002 is chronicled by reporter Paul Wachter in today's New York Times Magazine.

He wrote a pretty good article. Still, he didn't capture the full extent of gonzo exuberance that you and your fellow Mad Rollin' Dolls displayed at your "bout" in 2005, the first I'd ever seen. I hadn't laughed so hard in years -- and I daresay, neither had your grandmother, nor my beloved spousal unit, nor the rest of your traveling fan club.

Though you're now retired from the Quad Squad, no doubt collecting a hefty pension while waiting for that phone call from the Roller Derby Hall of Fame, I say thanks to you once again for being such a colorful crazy-person. You continue to entertain us all. "'Boom Boom' is in the room!"

Scrabble People & Upwords People

I was raised with affection by Scrabble People. Perhaps you know the type: research scientists, math homework helpers, bridge players, dictionary readers, Tchaikovsky listeners, amateur genealogists. Scrabble people are all about the information.

My beloved spousal unit is an Upwords Person. In Upwords, unlike Scrabble, all tiles count for one point only, but you can stack tiles atop one another, creating three-dimensional patterns. Upwords people are all about the patterns.

Scrabble People feel best about making high score. Upwords People feel best about connecting two previous plays on the board with a really clever word.

Scrabble People use their knowledge. Upwords People use their imagination.

Scrabble People email. Upwords People create greeting cards out of fancy art paper.

Scrabble People do the acrostic puzzle in the Sunday New York Times. Upwords People play rummy on their Palm Pilot.

Scrabble People attend the ballet. Upwords People go to the ballpark.

At the ballpark, Scrabble People keep score with a mechanical pencil and keep the pitch count. Upwords People keep score with art markers, color in the diamonds, and doodle in the margins.

To relax, Scrabble People read history and historical fiction. Upwords People create three-dimensional craft projects.

In the Old West of the 19th Century, Upwords People organized and ran the Pony Express, risking life and limb to get the mail to the destination, over dusty trails and through dangerous territory, by sheer determination and persistence. Scrabble People invented the telegraph.

You want Scrabble People to design your nuclear power plants. You want Upwords People to organize the emergency response.

Scrabble People like routine. Upwords People like road trips.

Scrabble People subscribe to magazines. Upwords People buy 'zines at the newsstand.

Scrabble People file their taxes online in mid-February. Upwords People mail in the forms on April 15th. In the evening. The late evening.

Both Scrabble People and Upwords People like "Monty Python's Flying Circus", which is one reason they end up together. Scrabble People like the witty, verbal sketches of John Cleese and Graham Chapman. Upwords People prefer the more cinematic Michael Palin and Terry Jones sketches as well as Terry Gilliam cartoons. (Nobody's sure about Eric Idle.)

Scrabble People dig Groucho Marx. Upwords People dig Harpo Marx.

Scrabble People watch Patrick McGoohan in "Secret Agent". Upwords People watch Patrick McGoohan in "The Prisoner".

At the core, I'm still a Scrabble Person. Being with an Upwords Person, however, has truly enriched my life. Besides, she's the one with the Ph.D.! "Be seeing you" on April 15th at the post office -- right after the ballgame!

Ten Things I Know

1. How to spell and pronounce "Schenectady", "Schaghticoke", and "Rensselaer". Extra credit for "Oconomowoc" and "Fond du Lac".

2. The suburban backyard in Upstate N.Y. where a Volkswagen is buried.

3. The famous frozen custard stand in Milwaukee where MLB Commissioner Bud Selig eats his lunch daily (two hot dogs with relish).

4. How to make a killer French Onion soup; and how to get kicked out of a bar in Paris using only a French-English pocket dictionary.

5. The precise moment during the chorus of Gladys Knight's "Midnight Train to Georgia" when the Pips chime in with "Whoo-whoooo". (Hint: It's a beat later than you think.)

6. The B-52's song that requires both a cowbell and a door buzzer.

7. The family recipe for chocolate jumbles -- and the crucial baking tip.

8. How to get a two-minute penalty in adult rec hockey for "Unnecessary Roughness: Board Checking". (Hint: It's easy if you can't stop all that well.)

9. Where in Wheeling, West Virginia to get the best blueberry muffins on Easter Sunday.

10. How to sing "Rubber Ducky" ("Quietsche Entchen") in German.