Suburban Crime

From my local newspaper, the Beacon:

"Two back-to-back egg throwing incidents occurred in the same neighborhood, police said. Police suspect [!] that someone threw eggs at a 2002 Lincoln in the 3000 block of Green Oaks Drive overnight between Feb. 16 and 17. The next night, someone threw eggs at a 1998 GMC Jimmy in the 6000 block of [adjoining] High Ridge Road."

The uncertainty implied by the final sentence makes this a true gem:

"Police believe the incidents are related, though they had no information on how much damage the vandalism caused."

Signs

An inconvenient convenience?

(Is this a war relic?)

Wednesdays now any direction!

Agnostics welcome

Coming Soon?

Two days ago I saw the first V of honking geese returning. Now I hear birdsong.

Could it be that the long winter is finally coming to an end?

Really?

From the Upcoming Events section of our children's school newsletter:

03/31   "March is Reading Month" ends

Ice

I had heard about America's apparent obsession with cooling even before I came to the States, although I wasn't aware quite how omnipresent it is.

For instance, people drive their air-conditioned cars from their air-conditioned homes to their air-conditioned offices. On the way back, they may stop to do some shopping at an air-conditioned mall, and in the evening they might drive to an air-conditioned cinema or pick up some food at an air-conditioned take-away.

Now don't get me wrong: I have nothing against a bit of climate control when it's baking outside and/or near maximum humidity. But the strange thing about air-conditioning is that whatever the weather, whatever the season, air conditioning units are always set to about 5°C cooler than is agreeable. As such, my wife had to take a jumper (sorry: sweater) to work all last summer.

Ice is another manifestation of this phenomenon. Everything that is not cooked is served chilled. At our local sports centre, the water fountain dispenses ice cubes. Our fridge has a water inlet hose in the back so that it can make an endless stream of ice cubes all by itself. And when Hurricane Ike swept through Texas and Louisiana last summer, the emergency services handed out food, water and - you guessed it - ice.

In restaurants, drinks are always "on the rocks", and we've had to learn to make a point of ordering drinks without ice. In fact, the first thing they bring you when you sit down is a large glass of iced tap water (usually at a ratio of 1:1, ice to water). And if you are foolish enough to reject your complimentary iced water, waiters give you a very pitying look as if you were doing something extremely unwise.

Sometimes, however, people go over the top even by American standards. A few weeks ago we went out for a meal and, to avoid the hassle of explaining that we didn't like freezing drinks in mid-winter, meekly accepted our iced tap water and refrained from pointing out that our juices had arrived ice-chilled after all. But then shortly after ordering our food, the waitress came and put a large bowl in the middle of our table. "Your ice," she said.

Start Early

From the 'Enrichtment Camps' section of our local community education brochure for summer 2009:

CAMP MILLIONAIRE

(Ages 10-14)

Do you want your kids to get excited about managing their money? Do you want your kids to understand the value of a buck? Do you want your kids to grow up and live the lives they dream of? At Camp Millionaire you will empower your kids with the knowledge that they are fully in charge of creating their own lives, and that includes how much money that want to have when they grow up. Your child will walk out of our program truly feeling like they can be a millionaire one day.

The cost of the one-day course: $230.

Robocalls

Without a shadow of a doubt, robocalls are the worst thing since the invention of the call centre. Barack Obama may have used them to great effect during the presidential election campaign, but I reckon that they must be the nearest you can get to telephonic purgatory.

So what are they?

Robocalls are like call centre agents, except that they don't get paid or take breaks. Just like with their human precursors, the telephone number is selected and dialled automatically by the system. But in sharp contrast to their flesh-and-blood counterparts, robocalls are just recordings that play back about a second after you pick up the phone. Perhaps there's even a clever voice-activated ("Hello?" = go) mechanism that prevents them leaving messages on your answering machine.

One distinct disadvantage vis-à-vis the invariably college student call centre agent is that the recipient/victim of a robocall cannot vent his fury in a way that will have any neurone-triggering effect whatsoever. If it annoys you that you get a robocall, tough luck. The system couldn't care less. Shouting, screaming, smashing your telephone or thinking up snide remarks will help you not one iota. Robocalls are impervious, unfeeling ... well ... machines.

After months of seething frustration at this most mindless of marketing exercises, I have now stumbled upon a solution (O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!): the moment the robotic voice begins its inane pitch, you hit the number "5" on your keypad. The result? Your telephone number is removed from the system's database.

And the rest is silence - at least until the next call centre robocalls you.