Trees, Please

Photos of some nice trees in my neighborhood.

And, oh yeah, please stop the war.....
The big trees outside my house are beginning their slow strip tease act.....
......so you are all welcome to visit with a rake in hand! :) Here's a funny story. Two years ago I had raked all the leaves into a HUGE pile at the edge of my yard, right next to the sidewalk. Apparently, a couple of drunk guys had a little fun jumping around in them late one night. The next day I noticed these guys going through all the leaves with their bare hands. I said, "Uh, are you looking for something?" One said, rather sheepishly, "Yeah, I think I lost my glasses in these leaves last night." I said, "Well, let me get you some gloves because there's all kinds of nasty dog poop raked up in those leaves." The guy just groaned. And he did not find his glasses.

Me and My Shadow!

If only.......

Two Award Winners

One of these guys is my brother. The other is named Guy, as in Guy Fieri, winner of The Next Food Network Star and co-owner of Johnny Garlic's in California. My brother is famous for his barbeque skills in cooking as well as organizing and managing fantastic barbeque cook-offs and events all across the U.S. He's won a gazillion awards for his barbeque. Ask any country music star in Nashville who serves up the best barbeque and you'll hear my brother's name. He's also pretty darned good at all those barbeque fixin's that round out the ultimate barbeque dinner. If you need your next shindig catered and you want your guests to remember the food.....go to www.arlieque.com and check out the menus. You won't be sorry. Tell 'um Lucy Blue sent ya, ya hear?

Charlie Brown Might Be Jealous!

My crazy and wacky neighbors across the street carved many, many pumpkins! :) I must admit, when they had them all lit up the other night it made me smile. Who doesn't like seeing a bunch of carved pumpkins all lit up on the porch?

As for being all "woman" and fixing my own heating problems, I was a little premature in celebrating my "fix it" abilities. Turns out one of the gas jets (the one that actually lights all the other jets) was clogged and the filter was in emergency need of replacement. A visit by a bonafide repairman and all is well and functioning smoothly. I've got better heat now than I've had in a couple of winters. Come on over. Spend the night. You'll be warm.

My House is a Very, Very, Very, Fine House....

I wonder. Does anybody really "get" many of my titles that are lines from songs of the past?

Last night I went to see the Umbilical Brothers, a very talented "mime with sound" duo from Australia. We first had dinner at the Copper Cellar and then headed over to Clarence Brown theater. About an hour before leaving for dinner I discovered I had no heat in my house (yes, I knew it was cold but just thought the thermostat was out of whack and on "away" or something). I realized this by venturing down into the scawy, scawy basement and seeing a red light flashing in the little portal on my heating unit and NOT seeing the cute little "blue flame." I made the necessary calls to the landlord and to a friend who works for KUB ($90 for an after hours call which the landlord would pay but still) and to a heating and air fix-it man recommended by my landlord. He said he charges $65 for a house call and wouldn't be able to get to me for nearly 24 hours. You see, it dipped to below freezing (29) last night in K-town and there was a freeze warning out and he was covered up. Fortunately, this nice fix-it man told me how to remove a panel on the unit, look for the reset switch and just try that. So, after returning from the theater, I did as he suggested and Wa La ...... the wonderful whoosh of the unit firing up and delivering wonderful, glorious HEAT! :) Can you imagine? It would have cost $65 for a fix-it man to do what I did. And yes, it gave me a brief powerful feeling to know that I conquered my little heating problem. Most would say, "Come on, Lucy Blue, any idiot knows about the reset switch." But those who truly know me.....know that I am NO fix it person. It was a little "I Am Woman" moment for me.

Survival

Yesterday I went to the East Tennessee Historical Society to view the documentary, "Living On: Tennesseans Remember the Holocaust." I also viewed the traveling exhibit of black and white portraits of Tennessee survivors and liberators. There are 64 survivors and liberators of the Holocaust living in Tennessee. I was surprised. One man from Franklin, TN, Jimmy Gentry, who helped to liberate Dachau in Germany, vowed to never talk about his experience and what he saw. He thought if he didn’t speak of it, it would go away. He finally began talking and writing about his experience in 1985 after meeting a survivor living in Nashville. Another liberator, Harry Snodgrass, now living in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, helped liberate Buchenwald and a prisoner came up to him at the fence and asked if he had a cigarette. He had 3 packs of cigarettes on him but there were so many prisoners standing at the fence that he feared it might cause a riot if he got them out. He knew he didn’t have enough for everyone so he just said, "No, I don’t." The man said, "Wait here a minute," and ran off. When he returned he gave Harry Snodgrass a small tin and inside was a dirty cigarette butt and as he gave it to him, he said, "Thank you." You can imagine how this U.S. soldier was humbled by that simple act and why he will never ever forget it. By telling this story, others won’t forget it either. That’s why it is important that we hear these "first person" accounts from survivors, refugees, hidden children, and liberators. Harry Snodgrass also says, "for evil to exist it just takes good people to do nothing."
In the audience of about 100 yesterday was Arthur Pais, a survivor, part of only ten percent of the Lithuanian Jews who lived. I saw his story portrayed in the documentary and I watched his emotional reaction as he watched himself and others. He, his father, and his brother were sent to Dachau in Germany (his mother and sister to Stutthof in Poland). I wanted to say something to him after the film. I’ve talked with two other survivors of the Holocaust in my lifetime. This time, however, I couldn't bring myself to go up to him. I don’t know why. I wanted, however, to tell him how sorry I was for what happened to him, his family, his friends, and his neighbors. So very sorry.

You can read some of these Tennesseans’ stories for yourself: http://www.wnpt.net/livingon/

Finally....Friday!

View from HSS (building where Chinese class meets) looking towards Art & Architecture Bldg.
Levi, where are you today? You can see my Chinese professor, He Laoshi (Professor He). Yes, He is a she and He is pronounced "huh?" as if you're asking a question.

Tennessee plays Alabama tomorrow afternoon. My "younger" boss told me that if his mother didn't want to go then he promised his extra ticket to me. Promised. Of course, that was before he met the cute blonde and I don't really have to even finish this little story, do I? Promises can't compete with cute blondes. Season tickets to UT games are expensive. Many employees have them but as you have to pay several hundred dollars all at once to get them.....I've never had them. I've been fairly lucky to get tickets given to me many times. It certainly won't kill me not to be at the game. I can hear the announcer and the "TD" fireworks go off from my house.

I've been extremely bored the last 2 days. Extremely. I've been reading Yu Hua's "The Chronicles of a Blood Merchant" and that's probably the most brain-stimulating thing I've done. I'm still involved in going through poetry and other writings and doing some editing. Maybe I'll post a poem called "A Visit to Dachau in 1978." I was 16 years old when I "toured" (that word sounds very awkward when one is speaking of a concentration camp) Dachau. It was the first concentration camp built in Germany and is very close to Munich. I wasn't wise enough to fully appreciate the significance of my presence there but I was old enough to understand what I was seeing and to feel incredible sadness for all the souls lost there. Speaking of the Holocaust, I will be attending a film screening this Sunday at 3:00 at the East TN History Center called "Living On: Tennesseans Remembering the Holocaust." It's part of an ongoing series involving survivors and liberators living in Tennessee.

And if I want to pull a Monthy Python after that ("and now for something completely different") I can always go to the screening of Hitchcock's classic, "Psycho" at the UC later Sunday evening. Okay, maybe I'll skip the movie.

Pictures and Words

Dark skies above Neyland Stadium but this cleared out 10 minutes after the photo was taken.

The camera doesn't do this red-tinged green leaf justice.

We have beautiful gingko trees planted nearby. Unfortunately, they planted the wrong sex and every year we deal with......
Their smelly offspring!

Being that I’ve embarked on a ambitious little program of health eating and exercise, I took a nice 20 minute walk after lunch (green beans and tuna fish, no bread, unsweet tea). Snapped a few shots along the way. Tonight I will meet with Renato and Mega and we will talk some crazy English at a coffee house. It’s Korean Culture Night at the I-House and you know what that means: delicious Korean food. I believe that all Asian foods are healthy foods.
I looked over a lot of my poetry last night that was haphazardly stacked under the coffee table. I even revised a couple. That’s the funny thing about poems. If you let them sit for a while and revisit them....it seems easier (at least for me) to see the flaws and edit them. I’ve been thinking of making a little chapbook of the poems. I probably have around 70-75 poems, maybe more. Would that be just the most awful gift ever? To give someone a chapbook of your poems? Some things I write are very close to my heart and emotional and actually letting someone read those words would be like disclosing my personal journal entries. I fear what people might think and even as I type these words, I smile. It just sounds ridiculous. Fear of other’s thoughts? Sometimes I write things out of frustration over a little thing. I’ve ranted about cell phones before. Two years ago I apparently wrote a poem regarding this frustration. A silly thing, really.

The Everlasting Mobile Phone

Such a nuisance
Intrusive, obnoxious
Connections
Disruptions
Loud speech
Restaurants, cinemas, my elevator
Ridiculous sounds
Artificial glows
Everywhere
Mounting daily
Tethering humanity
Scarring privacy.

Have I mentioned that I now have a mobile phone? About a month now. Yep. Me. And that, my friends, is a fine example of the irony of life.

Just For My Dear Bro......

Ah ha ha ha ha ha
I enjoyed some baozi (steamed dumplings) last night, courtesy of some friends. Don't worry, brother. Your dumpling experience is just over a month away! :)

Max

Turn that head around, young man. You're in time out!

This past weekend some friends and I went to the 27th annual Greekfest here in Knoxville. It’s held at St. George Greek Orthodox Church. I’ve never been inside the church before so we went in for a few "no flash" photos. Beautiful stained glass windows and a very impressive painting in the dome, not to mention the pageantry of the altar with things gold and marble, make this an impressive sanctuary. After buying some Greek food and pastries (always the delicious gyro for me) we enjoyed some traditional Greek music and dancing. Of course, we couldn’t leave without a baklava sundae.

Reminiscing.....

When I was 20 I went on a trip with my father and bunch of other sales people to Canada. We spent some days in Montreal, traveled by train to Quebec City, and then back to Montreal. It would be the only time I would ever travel with my father without my mother and brother. When I was younger I wanted to go with him on buying trips (he was in the wholesale florist business at that time) to Taiwan, Singapore, Manila, Tokyo, etc. My mother wouldn’t let me go, fearing that he would not adequately look after me. She was probably right.
My son and I took a trip together when he was nearly 20. We enjoyed a week long cruise to Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel, Mexico. My son and I have traveled a lot together but this was our first trip in many years and the first trip with my now "adult" son. We had a blast! We get along very well and this vacation couldn’t have been better. My son discovered that he loves to snorkel and I expect one day he will return to Grand Cayman to vacation. We spent a lot of time laughing and talking and discussing the future. We also spent a day in New Orleans prior to the cruise so my son was able to experience New Orleans prior to the hurricane. We even caught a few beads on Bourbon Street (I didn’t even have to raise my shirt)!
It was an IPV (incredibly perfect vacation).

Would You Be Mine? Could You Be Mine? Won't You Be My Neighbor?

About a block from my house there’s a convenience store called "Sam’s Party Store." I would often go have a chat with Sam on Sunday mornings when I’d walk to get the newspaper. When Sam was diagnosed with lung cancer about two years ago, he sought treatment and turned the store’s management over to his daughter and son-in-law. Sam’s treatment was successful and I occasionally see him at the store. It’s nice to have a place close by when you need an over-priced jug of milk, some cat food or a 2 liter of diet coke. I drop in frequently, especially when walking to and from work and campus. This is Ted, who’s not really very shy. Maybe it was just a bad hair day. Ted adopted one of my little feral kittens I rescued about 6 months ago. He is also my neighbor, living in an apartment in the house next to mine. It’s good to have neighbors like Ted. When the power steering suddenly went out on my car and I struggled to get it parked in front of my house, it was Ted who quickly discovered my fan belt had snapped and he replaced it for me. He also recaulked my upstairs bathtub. Do you know how happy that made me? He is currently in the process of caulking my downstairs windows and then will work on the upstairs. Hopefully, my $300 heating bills will be a bit lower this winter. Ted is more of an "oldie" like me so it’s nice to have him as a neighbor. Most of my neighbors come and go every 9 months, normal with young college kids. Still, I enjoy the hum of a neighborhood alive with younger people. Last weekend UT played the University of Georgia in Athens, GA. It was not on regular TV so I could not keep track of the score. I knew, however, that we were winning, compliments of all the screams and hoots from the party somewhere behind my house. Yes, I like all my neighbors, even the ones who party well into the next day.

Nora Ephron has a new book out called "I Feel Bad About My Neck." She is around 65 and writes about what "really" happens to your body when you’re a woman and you’re heading towards, through, and out of menopause. I saw her on a talk show recently and she was hilarious. She gives such sage advice in the book as "If the shoe doesn't fit in the shoe store, it's never going to fit." I think I’d like to read this book. Maybe I’ll put it on my Amazon.com wish list. I’ve never received a gift in the mail from someone seeing my amazon.com wish list and deciding to send something to me. It’s a little much to hope for, don’t you think? Of course, I’ve never actually told but one person that I even have a wish list. I keep a few items on there to remind me of what I’d like to have if I could have it. Things that aren’t crucial for survival (okay, the sheets are an actual need) but might just make me smile. We all need things like that.
And speaking of necks, I really don’t mind mine...yet....but you still can’t see it.

It's All In The Delivery!

My friend, Tracy, and her husband, Hua, are expecting their first child. For the last three weeks I have been calling the baby "xiao qi ji" which, in Chinese, means "little miracle." Or so I thought. I was in Tracy’s apt. Sunday evening and a couple of our friends dropped by. One of them is also Chinese. I told her proudly that I refer to the baby as "xiao qi ji." She gave me a confused look and then looked at Hua, who repeated exactly what I said. Or so I thought. She said, in English, "Oh, little miracle." I said, with just a touch of indignation, "Yes, that’s what I said so why didn’t you understand me?" She smiled and said, "Well, qi ji (pronounced "chee jee") also means "penis" (if you say "jee jee" instead of "chee jee" and trust me, they are very similar). My mouth dropped open and I said, "You mean I’ve been calling the baby ‘little penis’ and you didn’t tell me!!!!" Everyone laughed. Apparently, I wasn’t ALWAYS saying it incorrectly and since they knew what I meant, Tracy and Hua were too polite to tell me that sometimes I was calling their little baby a "penis." I swore right then and there never to call the baby "little miracle" (at least not in Chinese) again. It’s all in the way you say it and I just can’t be sure I’ll say it correctly. To give you an example of the complexity of the tones in the Chinese language, the word "shi" (pronounced "sure") means "is," "busy," and the number "ten," depending on the tone you make when you say it. Who knows how many other meanings there are for "shi." Can you just see me living in Beijing and having successfully hailed a cab or ordered exactly what I want to eat in a restaurant, confidently exclaim, "It’s a miracle!" but it comes out all wrong and I’ve just shouted out, "It’s a penis!" No, I don’t think so. It will now be the first word on my list of Chinese words never to use. Perhaps I should learn the word for "vagina".......just in case.

Buddhas Buddhas Everywhere!

You say you want to see more pics from my journey to China? Well, alrighty then. These are the Yungang Caves near Datong, China, Shanxi Province. Look closely at Wuzhou Mountain and see the dark dots. Those are all caves full of carved Buddhas.
It really was amazing. And some of the Buddhas were HUGE! I reached halfway between the ankle and the knee on one.
Incidentally, I visited these caves just after eating lunch where I ate donkey for the very first time. It's considered a "specialty dish" of this particular region and I must say.....it wasn't half bad.




Hundreds of smaller carved Buddhas were carved into the cave walls. A tourist website, www.theculturedtraveler.com, says: The temple/monastery comprises 53 grottos with more than 51,000 stone bas reliefs and figures of the Buddha carved out of a living mountain. They range from thumb-size to a 56-foot colossus. The visitor’s eye is dazzled by the multitudes: sitting Buddhas and standing Buddhas, thoughtful Buddhas and smiling Buddhas, Buddhas of every mood and description. They are the oldest stone carvings in China.

New Friends....

This semester I continue to volunteer as an English Conversation Partner with students attending the English Language Institute of UT. My current students are Renato from Peru and Mega from Indonesia. Mega is from a town in the mountains near West Jaffa and about 2 hours from Jakarta. I’m not sure of Renato’s hometown. Both guys are very personable and their English is quite good. It’s much harder to do well on the TOEFL exam than it is to speak understandable English to Americans. Both Renato and Mega hope to receive TOEFL scores high enough to attend UT. Yesterday evening, Mega and I met at Panera Bread (Renato was studying for a test) and were soon joined by two more ELI students, Ju Ya (like Julia without the "L") from South Korea, and Kayo (pronounced "kai yo" from Tokyo, Japan (far right in photo). We had a great time talking and laughing. I invited the girls to join us again next week for a little "crazy English talking." Mega enjoys it when I feign a heavy southern accent and speak very, very fast. He says he wants to be able to understand people here in East Tennessee and has specifically requested that I speak fast so he can "practice understanding." ha ha Strangely, because of being around foreign friends so much these days, I have begun speaking slower, more distinctly, and without accent. I am now much more likely to say "we will" instead of "we’ll" and instead of "aren’t chu goin’ with us," you’ll hear me carefully pronounce "Are you going with us?" It’s just easier all around because I don’t have to repeat myself and my friends are accustomed to my slowed down speech and they understand me very well. It does sound a little funny, however, when I catch myself speaking this way to long-time American friends! :) Actually, it sounds downright nerdy.
About the film I viewed Tuesday night: "Up to the Mountain, Down to the Village" is a documentary about three Chinese (now in their late 40s) who, as educated youth living in China’s cities, were separated from their families and sent "up to the mountain and down to the village" to a rural and remote village in China to be "re-educated" by the peasants as part of one of the biggest youth movements (17 million) in world history, all courtesy of Chairman Mao Zedong. Eventually, after around seven years of living in fairly squalor conditions, they were university educated, came to America, married and had children. As cameras documented, they all returned to the villages where they were sent to see how things had changed or if they had changed. Two took their American-born teenaged children along with them. The documentary was in English and subtitled on occasions where they were talking with folks in the village in Chinese. The film left me with many questions and I felt perhaps I was only hearing half of the real story of their lives during those years. The director, Chris Billings, will come to UT next week to give a talk and I plan to attend. Perhaps I’ll even watch the screening of the film again as it will be playing just before the discussion. You can watch a trailer here: http://www.uptothemountain.com/film.html

Random Photos

Here's a couple of random photos from my trip to China. I have hundreds stored on my computer and not enough funds to convert them to paper. Yet. This man was fun to talk with. He spoke English and was a professor of psychology at a university in Beijing. Many older Chinese practice their Chinese calligraphy with these types of brushes and you can see the water bottles attached to the tops of the handles. Water flows through the bars and out the brushes and they literally practices their strokes on the sidewalks of smooth slate or other surfaces. It's very interesting because the characters quickly fade. The character you see in the top photo is the character for "America." It's one of the few characters I know. And speaking of things Chinese (I know, I know, I talk about China a lot).....I will be viewing a movie called "Up to the Mountain, Down to the Village" tonight in the Library auditorium. It's about 3 Chinese citizens who were sent to the farms during the Cultural Revolution. They had no agriculture experience. This is how it was during those unfortunate years in China. It tells of their struggles and their perseverance in very trying years. Prior to the movie "Chinese snacks" will be served at the I-House. I wonder what that will be. My friend and I will check it out. More later, LB