I finally broke down and mimiced part of Jack's blog -- the "Current Terror Alert Level" as designated by Sesame Street Characters (see side bar -- Thanks Jack!). If we hit Elmo, run for your lives. But if you see Oscar the Grouch (oddly enough), we have at last achieved world peace.
(~_-) -- Oh by the way, MERRY CHRISTMAS!! My Christmas this year was more satisfying than I've known in some time -- I think that has a lot to do with money being a bit more precious now that I'm on my own, plus coming home after a long time of being away. Things that were tired and tedious last year are fresh and exciting this year, and I at last have some frivolous shopping ahead of me without the impending doom of rent impinging on the fun (gift certificates are the best!!). The only thing that didn't quite add up was my family's team losing this year's tundra bowl* by 3 whole touchdowns...We're gunning for you next year, Team Hawvermale!!

*tundra bowl is our annual family football game, with my uncle, two cousins, and a friend of theirs on the opposing team, and my brother, cousin T, mom's boyfriend, and a random 'recruit' on ours. I blame our loss this year entirely on Fred having Ebola, and the fact that our team can never gel because we don't have a consistent 4th...in previous years, due to greater variations of physical strength and talent, we still had a fair match up. But my two cousins and their friend are all teenagers now, with boundless energy, durability, and a lot more savvy...with body types equaling out, the sore fact is, we need a cemented fourth.

The bad news: all those suitors who were planning gala surprise Valentine's weekend getaways for me are just going to have to reschedule (but if you're nice about it, I'll give you priority on the waiting list). The good news: my step-dad is coming to San Francisco that weekend. Yay!

On the sidebar to the right is a new link -- "Elise Groo in Serbia." This is not some weird reference to myself -- this is in fact the Elise that I worked with at Jack's Bakery over the summer of '99. She is sardonic, nomadic, and hysterical, and I am overjoyed that googling someone's name can lead to getting back in touch. Anyway, she just left for Serbia and she takes beautiful pictures.

So, today is our first day at Hayward. It's a more modern facility, slightly more upscale vending machines, slightly more urban people -- a little more mellow, a little less parental. The Auburnites threw us a good-bye party, cooked us a homemade meal, left us a huge gift basket on our last day...in short, we're terribly spoiled! But thus far living at home -- not having to leave at 7pm on Sunday & knowing I'll be going home tonight -- is nice. I feel like there's so much to get done, especially christmas shopping before I leave for Bethlehem on the 22nd. They're giving us two whole weeks off for the holidays, which is a gift in itself.

Wish me luck -- got to pare down the finance$ without those per diem$. And Happy Holidays to all, across religion and culture.

Last night I went for my usual swim. This consists of sitting in the hot tub for half an hour -- contemplating the usual bluster of blackbirds who gather in the pines after first flying in swooping formations, scattering, landing everywhere, then bouncing to a branch and disappearing into the warm inner depths of the trunk area (note to self: come back as a blackbird next time) -- until I get too hot to deal, and then swimming 20 laps in the pool. From my post in the hot tub last night, though, I noticed that the pool-cleaning vacuum machine was going haywire -- it kept surfacing and spitting and hissing and then re-submerging and speeding up and down the pool's length, not at all like its usual slow and steady bottom heavy self. I have an innate, visceral fear of underwater thingies brushing up against me when I'm not paying attention, especially serpentine-corded ones that might suck your toes if you don't see it sneak up on you, but I figured what-the-hey, I like my swim.

I swam one lap -- back and forth -- and then the vacuum threw a fit and I had to stop in the deep end to time my next lap away from it. The deep end is only 5 feet, so I can stand and contemplate. As I watched the vacuum zoom down towards the other end in a fury, something along the pool's rim to my left caught my eye...

...it was a blackbird, swimming!!

My only theory is that in the fluster of its arrival it flew into one of the pool's gutters, and then since the lip of the gutter is recessed slightly under the rim of the pool, it must have gotten wet and been unable to fly back out. My presence -- or perhaps a particular fit of the vacuum -- must have led it to seek escape via swimming. It kept its wings spread out at its sides to give it some float and treaded with its teeny tiny legs towards the edge of the pool. Had I not been there this would have been futile and had depressing results. But I was there. I lifted my hand beneath it, but that only caused it to try to fly instantly, before my hand even broke the surface, and thus it hopped right back into the water. We tried again; it hopped again. But by then it had swum to the very edge of the pool, to where it could not hop forward, and I used both hands to lift it up and out.

The remarkable thing about this bird was its calm, and its enormous sense of dignity. Upon reaching solid ground -- never once struggling against me or lamenting my presence -- it kept its soaking wings out to its side and walked slowly and carefully -- like a courtier spreading her embroidered skirts out in their full glory to exit the room -- and then crossed into the bushes and hopped to the lowest brances of the pine tree. It then proceeded to hop and fall off several small branches -- too wet to keep its balance -- until it found a particularly fluffy one to support its weight and braced itself against the trunk. It then fluffed itself up and gave me a relieved look.

It never once gasped, hissed, panicked, fought, or rolled its eyes the way scared or hurt birds will. It just swam, rode the elevator, and left the lobby. It was charming.

It's those moments -- tiny toothpick bird feet on my submerged hands, supernatural dignity, human and beast together for 30 seconds of rare union -- that I absolutely live and breathe for.

I tried a persimmon today. It is quite extraordinary after 24 full and hearty years of food consumption to discover not just a new fruit, but one that actually has an appeasing taste and texture (i.e. one that is not on the fringe simply because its taste is not compelling or because its texture is mealy, etc). The particular kind of persimmon that someone brought in looked much like a small orange tomato, but was hard and firm. Apparently most persimmons need to ripen and become soft, but these could be eaten hard.

It's really hard to describe the taste. There's an element of a kind of squash to it -- pumpkin or butternut, if one were to eat them uncooked -- and that's definitely apparent in the texture as well, though not explicitly -- but sometimes there was a slight essence of plum, a hint of tomato (I emphasize, a hint -- I can't stand raw tomato usually, so more than a hint would have lessened my experience), a sense of cinnamon or nutmeg -- all of it smoothly melded together enough to defy direct comparison.

If you haven't tried one, do. It's kind of like eating an October night -- before it gets truly cold, when you could still sit out on a screened-in porch so long as you wore a relatively warm jacket, and you could smell the last tiny hint of the summer's flora on the air, and the first hint of fallen leaves.