New Yorker 2011I find Techland difficult country. The terrain is steeply mountainous, the language alien and the natives impatient. Though when they birth a new gadget or app, the flash of colorful lights and all the party noise are so enticing! But frustration, wasted money and time have taught me to wait. I figure, let the enthusiasts grow that baby up some before I venture over there to meet it.

Lately, the buzz is about Siri, the “intelligent assistant” on the newest iPhone iteration, the 4S. Just as Captain Jean Luc Picard of Star Trek, The Next Generation commands his First Officer (“Number One” Riker) to make it so, so may we command Siri to make it so. Maybe so. Time will tell.

Meanwhile, I have plenty to fill the void: lounging on the couch, peeling grapes, keeping up with my chosen profession (shrinkdom). And my unchosen profession (running a business, a.k.a. the practice). And the second oldest profession (motherhood). As for staying married, a woman’s work is never done.

Speaking of which, darling Hubby is tech-impaired. Texting eludes him, checking e-mail’s off the radar, and does he ever have his phone on him when I need him? I despair, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t see the value. Or he sees it, but the learning curve’s not worth it. 

So we’re visiting with a couple of a certain age, only older, and animatedly chatting away when the husband starts, and raising one hand— Excuse me a moment please— pulls out his iPhone with the other. He lifts it to lip level and tells it: “Remind me to pick up my medicine from Walgreen’s tomorrow.”

The phone replies, in a pleasantly modulated female voice, “So you’d like me to remind you to pick up your medicine tomorrow?” 

“Yes, please,” he tells it. Returning to us, he says, “Excuse me for interrupting. My memory isn’t what it used to be.”

“Wow!” I ejaculate. “What was that?”

The wife says, “Meet Siri.” 

“Amazing!”

Hubby says, “Come on. That’s not realistic. It should whine, Why me? Or, Ask your wife!"

We all laugh. 

“Or, Not again! Or how about, I’m busy tomorrow. Try next week, maybe Monday or Tuesday.” 

We crack up.

“Does it work as a GPS?” I ask. “Hearing directions would be so much safer than reading them, especially driving alone.”

“Yes, it does that,” the husband says. “It’s great!"

"Yeah," the wife says, "I love it when it tells me, Take this exit, just as I drive by it."

New Yorker 2011So, we’re a month into 2012. How’s it going? Off the junk food yet? On the treadmill? Jumping on and off the scale like it’s burning your feet? I hear those growns— I mean, groans. I’m with you.  It’s SO HARD. As Oscar Wilde quipped: I can resist everything except temptation. 

When everyone in your house gets cozy on the couch to watch the game with peanut M & M’s and pretzels, it’s painful.  But when they entice you— “Come sit down! Have some cheese and crackers!” that’s diabolical.

Because, probably like me, you’re tempted: “Maybe… just one?” Right. One leads to two leads to the whole bag. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. William Blake 

Whether we’re breaking a bad habit, or building a good one, it’s human nature to resist change. Change is anxiety provoking. And if the change is “good for you”? Health food makes me sick. Calvin Trillin 

When I manage, from the darkest depths of Mordor, to retch a “No thanks!” I amaze myself.  Proudly, I wait for an admiring look from Hubby. Maybe I’ll even get a “Good for you!” Instead, I get a snort, a dirty look and a muttered, “Buzz kill.” 

Devastating. How to choose? It’s a lose-lose. Either we support our health, and lose our mate(s). Or, we lose our health, and support our partner(s) in crime. Now you know why people keep drinking and drugging.

It’s a two way street though: Just as our loved ones affect us, so we affect them. When we jump up and down on our shared social web, “Hey! I dieting! I’m exercising! Why don’t you?!” the resulting wave throws them off balance. They don’t like that. 

Let’s get real. We’re surrounded by friendly enemies.

"I believe my subject is bewilderment. But I could be wrong." Donald E. Westlake 1933-2008Yesterday, while doing time in the seasonally long checkout line at the supermarket, Christmas muzak forced itself in my ears: It’s the MOST wonderFUL TIME of the YEAR….  Ha. More like, over-rated. No, over-advertised.  

What’s a synonym for advertise?  Hypnotize. Via TV, radio, facebook, google, twitter, tablets, phones, you name it, vendors use it to do it. From Black Friday through New Year’s Eve, everywhere you go, eddying masses of shopping-bag-encrusted people with glazed eyes at half-mast get in the way. Especially in parking lots. Oh joy.

From behind me in the queue, a woman’s voice broke up these festive thoughts, “Did you get the croutons?”

A second female voice answered, “Capons? I thought we were going with turkey. Do they even carry capons here? Awfully fancy.”

The first voice said, impatiently, “Croutons!”

The second, “Coupons?”

The soundtrack changed to Rudolph, The Red Nosed Reindeer had a very shiny nose, and if you ever saw it and I was at the OJ Bar & Grill, standing at the bar with Dortmunder, my favorite thief, waiting for Rollo, the meaty, blue-jawed bartender to notice us. Meanwhile, the regulars at the bar talked amongst themselves. Oh joy!

Overhearing the regulars at the OJ is the best of all possible interludes in this best of all possible worlds: a Dortmunder caper by Donald Westlake. (Also in this, the real world.)

As you know, Westlake is my favorite author.  The reasons are many, and here’s another. In every stream of action there are lulls, during which people around us talk, and who listens? Westlake. Master alchemist, he takes this dross and makes comedic gold.

At some point in every Dortmunder caper— Oh, when? The anticipation!— the gang meets in the back room of the OJ. Which means passing by the bar where the regulars take sloshy slugs at life’s pressing conundrums. And miss.

Let's listen. We gotta wait for Rollo anyway.

When Dortmunder walked into the O.J. Bar & Grill on Amsterdam Avenue at four minutes before six that evening, Rollo, the bulky, balding bartender, was painting MERY XM on the extremely dusty mirror over the back bar, using some kind of white foam from a spray can, possibly shaving cream, while the regulars, clustered at one end of the bar, were discussing the names of Santa’s reindeer. “I know it starts,” the first regular said, “’Now, Flasher, now Lancer, now—‘”

“Now, now, wait a second,” the second regular said.  “One of those is wrong.”

For Terry

I call my mom, aged 86, every week to ten days. I know I should call more, but that’s all I can stand. 

First Week June: Let The Games Begin

“Hi Mom. How are you?”

She carps, “Baby Sis still hasn’t printed out your blogs for me to read. I don’t know what her problem is.” 

Baby Sis works a sixty+ hour week as a high-powered criminal defense attorney for the feds, and puts in another forty between home and parenting two young children with her equally busy architect hubby.  Maybe she sleeps. She and Mom live in the same megatropolis.

“A blog is an online magazine, Mom. I’ll be glad to send you the pieces I’ve published to mine.”

“I know what a blog is! No, don’t bother. Baby Sis will do it.” 

Mom doesn’t “need” a computer, e-mail or the Internet. Her time is too valuable to waste on learning such nonsense. Besides, she knows everything already. 

I print off and mail Mom the year’s collection of posts.

***

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***

Back to the arena, where Mature D is interviewing Little D. 

Mature D:  So little girl, you threw down the gauntlet! Will Mom dish up some approval, do you think? 

Little D: I hope so!

Mature D: Knowing Mom, not likely.

Little D: Really?