-This is our "ool." Notice there's no "p" in it. We'd like to keep it that way.-

So reads one of those novelty signs that adorn changing room walls in public pools. Any camp counselor knows that the audience most in need of this reminder is too young to grasp the humor, and perhaps too young to read at all.

Chlorine can only do so much. I like to think that our bodies can accept non-potable water despite its impurities, so long as the microbial passengers are familiar. Because sometimes we have no choice.

In the past few hours, two siblings have contributed water-themed stories that push my own hydro-understanding beyond a reading of Blue Gold.

From New York, my sister tells me of a college that responds to algae by putting bottles of water in all of the student mailboxes.
[Link]
A week ago I asked my aunt if she could remember the exact moment bottled water overtook tapwater in this country. She couldn't, and neither can I; my vaguest guess would be the late nineties.
Nevertheless, there hasn't been much grumbling about the high prices paid for plastic bottles of plastic tasting water. Gouging at raves, I expect, but why should people with faculties in good working order stand for this?
My theory? Water was the cheap, forgotten utility. People didn't value it until it was gone. DC residents with fewer options are mobilizing, but too little, too late, too disenfranchised. People with the means to do so want to pay more for the bottle the same way they want to buy brand name items. Unconscious snobbery? You bet your glass.


From Virginia, my brother contacts me from his office, where he and many of his coworkers have been trapped for hours by rapidly rising flood waters.

This has happened before, as seen in archival photos provided by the Richmond Public Library.

The speedy accumulation of water took them all by surprise, but it made sense; the James river curls around this beautiful, expensive, and delicate area of the city, a point so low that floodwalls are required to keep it dry in the best of times. Dueling weather systems made the area a funnel, putting over ten feet of water between the streets and the surface. Since nearly all parking in this area is street level, the floodwater moved all the cars about like toys in a child's bathtub. Before a larger piece of automotive flotsam plugged the gap, many cars washed off the streets and into the James. Even as the waters recede, dead jeeps and sedans tangle in odd, muddy configurations in a once vibrant area that is now condemned.

And now it has happened again, as seen in these pages provided by the Richmond Times Dispatch.

The troubling question for city leaders now - is it possible to rebuild? Is it advisable? For many companies, including my brother's, this might seem to be the best time to move out of downtown. It will take time to repair their operations, and for all of those employees and managers on the second, third, and fourth stories looking down, the slurping sound of the last water down the drain lingers.

-Where is it?-

It has been week since Pittsburgh. Should anyone want to visit me here, this is the most important thing to learn, a good rule of thumb for living with clean-freaks:

If you set down an object, it will not be there when you return.

-Bringing out the Bread-

I'm cleaning out the pantry in preparation for the coming move out of my apartment. Some of the items need to be tossed, like the (at least) one-year old Cous Cous. I ate the rest of the bread, and tried to anticipate how much food I'll need until the weekend.

Anticipation tells me that I'll probably need more bread, if only to soak up the rest of spreads (butter, honey, peanutbutter, etc.) - although, maybe not, since the last stick of butter has vanished entirely. If only the rest of my junk would disappear when I turn my back, this process will be that much easier.

Okay, I can throw away the cous cous, or the bag of raisin bran I never planned to use for lack of milk. But I have uncovered a healthy number of Campbell's brand tomato soup cans, and while the product inside will outlast my siblings' future grandchildren, I'd rather not travel with them all.

Since I keep coming across the cans as I clean, I've made a new rule; everytime I encounter a can of tomato soup, I fire up the stove and cook one in memory of the famous pop artist born a few blocks away from this location.

The third batch is on the stove now. It will be the third bowl in as many hours. Is that unhealthy?

There are.. some liberal additions to the steaming pot. Slices of squash attained from the South Side farmer's market on Tuesday. Smoked salsa, also from the farmers market. Garlic powder. Iguana Hot sauce.

Piquant is my style.

No porridge, gruel, or oatmeal, this bowl is for you:
Hot Soup Girl
Girls Are Pretty: 'Start a Family Day'
Candyboots: 'Inspiration Soup'

zzzZZZzzz..Sleep Study..zzzZZZzzz

One week of Sleep Deprivation, Radiotracers, and Wires on the Cranium.

-Tuesday night / Wednesday Morning / Wednesday night / Thursday Morning / Thursday Night / Friday morning-

Reconstructed from chicken scratches jerking across several legal pad pages, with parentheticals only as needed for clarity. I remember the act of writing, but not the content.

They are wiring an older woman when I enter. Accustomed to the drill of not checking in, I take my book to the break room. Flo nods hello from her office, she’s on the phone.

Reading ‘My Cold War’ in the break room when the older gentleman – as yet unwired – walks in with Michael Crichton’s ‘Congo’ under one arm and a vhs tape under the other.

“Mind if I pop this in?” He doesn’t really ask, but I say okay. Turns out the movie is Flashdance.

“Filmed in Pittsburgh” he says proudly, and a bit defensively, too.
I completely understand.

Jennifer Beales dances to ‘Maniac.’
“Do you remember when you were that limber?” the last is directed to the woman who has just finished the wiring process.
“I was never that limber.” She replies without a trace of embarrassment. A third participant in the healthy senior sleep study sits down on the couch. On cue, Flashdance goes from sensually suggestive to simplistically slutty. Tech C. takes me out to the wiring room at the same time Jennifer Beales removes her friend from the strip joint.

Maybe tonight is intended to be folksy, but a number of the staffers here have taken it upon themselves to be generous today. Tech D. allows me to visit the fourth floor vending machines. Scientist J. drove in with some old movies. Tech C. has given me a long cord on my wiring, so all the breakroom is within my reach.

So here I am tethered, until seven in the morning. This is the deprivation we were promised. My resources for whiling away the time are at hand: 3 books, 2 movies, one legal pad. I’m using the latter to write this.

So cruel – the scientists are making me stay up all night, but they are not allowing me to roam freely through the halls of this medical fun house. As before, my cranial wiring is connected to a tether that allows me a six foot radius in the breakroom. How can [I] entertain and occupy myself with so few diversions? I’ve read several books here, but this activity seduces the tired mind. This evening I began to nod over a book, and the tech from the control room came over to inform me politely but firmly that I needed to put the book down and do something else.

He could not see my head drooping; he read data indicating that I was not reading down line by line, which his machinery registers as clearly as a typewriter bell. Maybe the brainpower used to focus and unfocus one’s eyes appears less energetic, but I shall endeavor to prove the incredible return of this style of reading, gaining in perspective what it gives up in speed. The same thing happened to me in college, actually, and I continued to take notes on a two hour and fifty minute lecture even as my head nodded, and my pen continued to form letters, but never advanced rightward on the sheet of paper after each character, so that each character occupied the same space.

-Cricket-

If you have ever passed a bush with a single cricket inside, you probably know that it shuts up the first time you get close. The second time you pass the cricket (on your way home) it pauses only one beat before continuing the chorus.

I would suggest diving in after it at that point; it's essential that we keep members of Class Insecta guessing.

-Eight days a week-

So many errands need to be done, and so much can be written about my extended intermission. There has been travel and interviews, beaches and kayaks, and a vacation with nightlife eight days in a row.

And to think, I never wrote the last section of the Sleep Study Chronicles.

So much to do, eight days are not enough.