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Why I won’t be saying (much) about that whack job in Florida

Debra Legg — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 19:18:40 +0000

Gen. David Petraeus spoke out against his plans yesterday, and I tweeted a link to the story.

That's the last you'll hear from me about the deranged "minister" in Florida who seems to have captured the country's attention with a celebration of hate-mongering he has scheduled for Saturday, the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

I bit on a similar hate fest back in the spring, and I still kick myself for giving an evil "pastor" in Kansas exactly what he wanted: Attention.

I fear that other "clergy" are following his gameplan. Justify vile deeds in the name of Christianity, orchestrate over-the-top stunts and everyone will watch. Mostly - thank God or Allah, take your pick - they'll disagree, but in the process you'll generate enough attention that a few more off-balanced folks of a similar bent will join your "cause."

The plan's worked for the Kansas "church" for years, and now it appears to be working for the guy in Florida as well. Hillary Clinton's spoke out against his plans. The White House has , feeliweighed in, for Pete's sake.

And all of this for a "pastor" whom most estimate has a congregation of about 50 on any given Sunday. If so few in Florida are listening, why should the rest of us pay attention to him either?

That's why this post has few details, no names and no links. Everyone still knows whom I'm talking about, but at least I won't generate more juice with the search engines.

There are others who choose a different path because they feel compelled to counter evil done in the name of religion. I respect that approach, because you never know when a nutjob's off-balance ideas can gather enough momentum to take hold among desperate people. See: Hitler and virulent anti-Semitism.

I'm also well aware of the century's old quote, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

For now, though, I'm looking at the number of people who actually listen to him - I'm not counting the number of Facebook "fans" he has, because people on Facebook will friend ducks if they look friendly enough - and I'm not seeing numbers big enough to justify worldwide attention.

That's why he's getting no more of mine.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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The soccer coach who’s trying to kill me

Debra Legg — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 18:20:12 +0000

Wear shoes that you can run in on Monday, Big Guy's soccer coach told me late last week. The parents are going to play the kids during practice.

Me? I asked with mock shock. Oh, I don't run. Can't run, actually. They used to time me with a calendar in PE class.

You can run faster than your kid, can't you? he asked.

You've seen my kid, I countered. I haven't been able to outrun him for three years.

Well, maybe you'll be like that kid in PE class and won't get picked to play, he offered.

Oh, come on! scoffed another mother as she rubbed her baby bump. If I can do it, you can.

Appropriately chagrined, I wore running shoes to yesterday's practice. In my case, they should be called plodding shoes. I sat on the sidelines and hoped enough other parents would show up and I would be able to continue to sit. No dice.

Big Guy's eyes got wide, and then he laughed. "You're playing? I thought you didn't know anything about soccer."

"Oh, I might have some surprises for you," I said, and it turned out that I did. I scored a goal, which I'll count as only about a quarter of a point because the tiniest player on the team was at goalie.

Big Guy's eyes got wide again. "Game on," he said.

Except this was a game he was never going to win without teamwork - and that was the coach's point with the entire exercise.

It's hard to coach a scrimmage of 6- to 8-year-olds and have the kids learn anything from it. With an opposing team of parents, though, the coach could concentrate on directing the real players. The real team also would have bigger players - though in my case, not necessarily more skilled - to try to get around. The bigger players could cover more of the field faster - again, that offer doesn't apply in my case - which would force the younger players to spread out instead of hovering around the ball like sharks after chum.

And it worked spectacularly.

I saw a hesitant little first-grader learn to step up big and stop the ball on defense. I saw a third-grader deftly maneuver around me and speed away with the ball. Not that it took much speed - a snail with an espresso shot could have managed it. And I saw a kid figure out that what looks like an easy goal because he's close to the net isn't necessarily the smart shot to take if a teammate closer to center has an easier one.

Most importantly, I was able to reinforce that with Big Guy on the way home. "Did you see what coach was working on with A and J? Do you understand why?"

"Yes," Big Guy said. "It's harder to kick from an angle. It's easier for someone in front of the goal."

Wow. And my point was going to be "pass the ball."

Later that night, I got an email from the coach. The practice was great, and he'd love to do the parent game again.

I am 10 years older than dirt, and I do believe you're trying to kill me, I responded.

But I have to admit, the practice was great, as well as a great idea.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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Mack

Big Guy — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 17:57:59 +0000

Editor’s note: Clearly, I am failing Big Guy educationally. He took his imaginary dog to an American League baseball game? Unacceptable. We must watch more National League ball before he starts to think the designated hitter is a real part of the game.

Last month I took a trip with Mack. I played fech with my dog. We went to a yancies game. I liked it. then when we came back I played more fech. We wolct. We saw a carnvol. and we saw lots of trees.

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If you think school isn’t hard enough, go to kindergarten

Debra Legg — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 19:30:11 +0000

I'm confused. Genuinely perplexed, as opposed to the fake puzzlement I sometimes try to pull on the guys. As in, "I just don't understand why you thought it was a good idea to cut gaping chunks out of your hair."

Part of it's my usual back-to-school fog that stems from being whacked over the head repeatedly this time of year by those who view our children as a slothful, spoiled, school-hating generation.

But most of my befuddlement comes from the incessant, migraine-inducing drumbeat that more time in school would cure all the country's problems.

"When you compare the quality of education that students get today versus what they could get with additional instruction - not to mention what our international competitors are already doing -- it makes a compelling case for this drastic change," Michael J. Wilson, national director of Americans for Democratic Action, wrote today.

I don't know how it is in Mr. Wilson's house - actually, I know little about Mr. Wilson's house except that he does have children, which gives his position a little more credibility with me than those of random critics who try to "fix education" without having been near a classroom since they graduated.

But I can tell you that in this house there's a 5-year-old who comes home from his extended-day kindergarten beaten to a mental pulp every day. He's learning - at a far more rapid clip than I did when I was his age or even than his brother did two years ago - but it's exhausting.

He's doing well, thanks in part to two fabulous preschool teachers whom I really should send a dozen roses each. Possibly Godiva chocolates, and maybe a gift certificate for a day spa, too.

Could he be doing better - as well as those kids among the educated elite in China or the 65 percent who can actually read in India? Maybe, but here's the little secret that you don't know unless you've actually been around a school in recent years.

They're already learning tremendous amounts - so much that it threatens to bury the far too many students who enter unprepared. Horridly unprepared in some cases, as in "can't hold a pencil" or "can't cut with scissors." Even among parents who try to do the right thing by sending their children to preschool or working with them at home, it's hard to be adequately prepared because most kindergarten readiness lists are hopelessly inadequate.

Maybe that's because they focus on listing the bare minimum, as opposed to what children need to know to excel. Identify some alphabet letters? Kindergarten starts now with learning words in the first week. How can a kid who knows only some letters begin to learn to read?

Maybe it's because some teachers focus on "give me the tools, and I'll teach them."

Whatever the reason, the lists and advice don't go nearly far enough in helping parents make sure their kids know what they need to know academically. I still feel guilty over that one with Big Guy. Yes, he "knew" all the letters and their sounds, but he couldn't recall them out of alphabetical order. Which means he didn't really "know" them at all.

And if parents who try are thrown massive curve balls, what about the children of those whose parents don't? Yes, those children might benefit from more time in school, but at that age I wonder if their little brains and their little butts can handle more than they are already.

A great number of these kids will eventually "catch up" - some are "behind" simply because their bodies and minds aren't ready yet.

I fear that under our current system, though, some never will. Yet I equally fear a system that thinks chaining kids to desks for more hours a day is the answer.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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Leave them kids alone

Debra Legg — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 22:03:07 +0000

Just as sure as someone's going to be selling a box of crayons for a quarter every August, you can mark the annual bashing of American students on your calendar in the vicinity of Labor Day.

Thanks to cartoonist Jeff Danzinger, we don't have to wait for this year's edition. It landed today, in a drawing featuring an obnoxious American teen wearing a "Skul Suks" T-shirt interrupting a classroom of studious Chinese and Indian children.

Yes, the Chinese education system has improved dramatically in recent decades. Just a generation ago, rural children attended school for only four to six years. These days, the country has slashed illiteracy rates and increased time in school. Americans, please note that public preschool was part of this plan.

However, criticisms that the system has created an educated elite still abound, and corruption has been a problem in the rural schools' initiative.

In India, however, illiteracy remains at 35 percent and the country's colleges have room for only 7 percent of its college-age population. Rural schools are poorly funded and staffed, and the illiteracy rate for girls is even higher than the overall rate.

Is either of those the system we want to replicate here - China's educated elite or India's tradition of uneducated females?

Education reform would be a lot easier in the United States if we did. Instead, we have this stubborn little insistence on giving every child - elite or non-elite, urban or rural, male or female - a chance. Or, at least, we say we try to.

The results are, of course, uneven. That's in part because the starting line is staggered. There are children who enter kindergarten knowing how to read, and there are children who begin not even knowing how to hold a crayon.

We try to educate them all, because we believe in human potential. We believe in opportunity. Or, at least, some of us do.

But when those efforts fall short, we look for fingers to point. The digits usually are aimed at those bad, bad teachers or those slacker kids.

That's not what I see when I look around.

I see a third-grader on our street who was disappointed because homework wasn't assigned until the second day of class. I see a kindergartener who rushes home and pulls the day's reading homework out of his backpack in a rush to get started. I see kids every morning with their noses stuck in books at the bus stop.

It's easy to miss those in our rush to condemn, in our haste to create pricey programs and expensive consultants who will solemnly tell us what's wrong and then send us an outrageous bill for a cure that doesn't work.

It's easy to overlook as we breathlessly condemn milennials as the attention deficit order generation. Oh, they'll pay attention all right. We just refuse to meet them on their terms.

What if, just for a day, we gave up on the notion that America has gone to hell in a lunchbox and pushed out of our minds the idea the countries that make no attempt to educate everyone do a better job than ours?

If we did that, we might see something other than Danzinger's cartoon.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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Find out now or worry til later? It’s a toss-up

Debra Legg — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 21:32:17 +0000

I've often wondered if my grandmother didn't have it easier when my grandfather sailed off for World War II in the Pacific.

Back then, there were newsreels, newspapers and radio, but that was about it. Sure, the big news spread quickly - Pearl Harbor and D Day. But the daily battles and casualties - she wasn't likely to know. She probably didn't even know where her husband was half the time or more.

Sometimes I envy her that, though I can't imagine what she went through in an era when telephone service still primarily was party line and letters could take months to arrive.

And I can't imagine how she would react to today's technology that sends, just hours after it happens, headlines such as 7 troops killed in Afghan bombing directly to my home. Headlines that immediately make my stomach drop down to my shoes.

Let's see, when was the last time I heard from Dad? About two hours ago, wasn't it? Whew. It was well after that attack had happened. He's OK. I later opened the story to find out the attack was no where near his base, and I felt guilty at the same time I felt relief, because someone else's husband or son or father or brother did die today.

That was in contrast to Friday, when I heard about the news first from Dad. "I'm OK. But it was horrible," he panted. "I'm still shaking." He hung up by saying what he always says in those situations - "I can't talk about it. Just watch the news."

I never have to watch the news because I have Google alerts set up for his forward operating base and his unit, as well as for The Army Times. Even if I hadn't, I couldn't have missed this one. "This weekend the big event was hard not to notice," another blogger wrote. "Sometimes things just hit close to home so its hard not to see the smoke, so to speak. "

And that's the way it was all day Saturday, as friends called and messaged. Some were looking for word of Dad, others were offering me support, and I appreciated each and every one of them. They made me feel a little less alone.

Each new call, though, sparked a new round of questions from the guys, so I wound up retelling a sanitized version of the story:

The bad guys managed to get onto Dad's base and attack. The bad guys lost badly. The U.S. Army did its job, and did it well. Big Guy seemed to like that story. Boots was oddly quiet.

By nightfall, I was simultaneously exhausted and restless from the retellings. I thought of my grandmother as I staggered to bed and decided that I shouldn't envy her, because I prefer knowing to what I'm sure must have been months of gnawing uncertainty.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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What’s in Dad’s care package

Debra Legg — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 14:48:30 +0000

This week's theme: Bananas and Balboa.

They're seemingly unrelated, but Dad loves both and I lucked out on both counts.

Trapped with the guys in one of the unrelenting downpours that marked our trip back east, we decided to browse the dollar stores for DVDs. We hit the mother lode, including the original "Rocky." It's one of Dad's favorite movies - and by favorite, I mean it falls in the category of "would watch it 24-7 if there were an all-Rocky cable channel."

We also found what I thought was a megapack of banana chips at another store and sent them as well. I found out it wasn't a mega enough pack when a friend raided Dad's desk in the dead of night and finished them off. Note to self: Put banana chips on the shopping list.

The rest of the package consisted of assorted cans of tuna plus a can opener, because I'm tired of overpaying for tiny individual servings. Honestly, I can't believe it took me that long to send a can opener.

Oh, and there was the Recommended Dad Allowance of Paydays, and I need to increase the RDA because other friends have developed a fondness for them as well. Plus they're one of the few candy bars you can ship when a package is traveling between two places that are routinely 10 degrees hotter than hell.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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Egg-free blueberry coffee cake

Debra Legg — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 15:20:27 +0000

I know I have a blueberry coffee cake recipe ... um, somewhere. Where the heck did it go? Aw, never mind. I'll just Google.

I'm glad I did, because the new one I conjured up went over well last week at a Teacher Appreciation Breakfast our Parent Teacher Association held. One teacher said it reminded her of the blueberry buckle she used to enjoy when she lived in Indiana. I can see why. I googled that recipe after the breakfast, and they are very similar.

The coffee cake recipe goes together very quickly - the longest part is in waiting for it to bake. I wound up making two - one and a half for school, half for home - and even with the recipe doubled my hand mixer still handled it with no problem.

The texture of the cake is eat-with-your-hands firm, though incredibly moist thanks to the hefty load of blueberries. The streusel adds a nice crunchy contrast. I can't wait to try it with other berries as well.

It's based on a recipe from Joy of Baking. The original calls for one egg, and I used Bob's Red Mill Egg Replacer and sour cream instead.

Blueberry coffee cake
Streusel Topping:

1/3 c. sugar
1/3 flour
1/4 c. cold butter or margarine, cut into pieces
1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Mix the dry ingredients and cut in butter with a pastry blender or fork until it resembles coarse crumbs.

Cake batter

1 c. all-purpose flour - I used half graham flour in order to rationalize letting the guys eat it for breakfast.
1 tsp. baking powder
1/8 tsp. salt
1/4 c. butter or margarine at room temperature
1/2 c. sugar
2 tbl. of Bob's Red Mill Egg Replacer mixed into 2 tbl. hot water then cooled
1/8 c. sour cream
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/3 c. milk
2 c. fresh blueberries

Combine flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

Beat the butter with a mixer until smooth. Add the sugar and beat until light and fluffy. Add the cooled egg replacer, vanilla and sour cream. Beat until just combined. Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk and beat until just combined. Spread the batter into an 8- or 9-inch square pan coated with cooking spray then smooth with a spatula. Spread the blueberries on top, then sprinkle with the streusel.

Bake for 40 to 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. My 9-inch pan was done in 40 minutes, while the 8-inch took 50.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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For some of us, digital IS the down time

Debra Legg — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:34:57 +0000

I have a new nightly routine of late, mainly because the old one wasn't working.

Use to be, I'd tuck the guys in and then toss fitfully in an attempt to doze off. I'd eventually give up and get up, raiding the fridge before returning to bed to toss and turn some more. This often went on for hours.

Last week, though, I figured out that the solution was as close as my nightstand. For the past several nights, I've picked up my phone and started going over the emails I missed during the day. The Slashdot daily stories summary - it's one of the few email subscriptions I still use - usually lands at about that time, so I can always find something to read.

After an hour to 45 minutes, I'll start to nod. I put down my phone, and I'm off to dreamland with far fewer empty calories consumed than in the old days.

It's ironic that my nightly phone surf-a-thon led me via Slashdot to a story earlier this week that explained how digital devices are depriving our brains of downtime. "When people keep their brains busy with digital input, they are forfeiting downtime that could allow them to better learn and remember information, or come up with new ideas," the New York Times proclaimed.

Let the hand-wringing begin anew. The article is filled "research suggests" and "scientists suspect," all leading to this breathless discovery: "Processing a barrage of information leaves people fatigued." Or maybe it's merely a suggestion.

In my case, it's pure bunk. Maybe that's because I'm a freak or maybe, just maybe, it's because I've always been this way and technology finally caught up to my habits.

"Best wishes to a wild and crazy girl who finds 30,000 things to do 27 hours a day."

By the time my high school band director wrote that in 1982, I'd already settled into a late-night routine of scoring baseball games on radio. Or frantically scribbling in a now embarrassingly angsty journal. If I'd had a Blackberry back then, I would have spent a whole lot less time trying to remove stains from blotty ballpoint pens from my bed linens.

Perhaps it's yet another sign that I'm a freak, but only rarely do I benefit from true "down time." Those few occasions usually come after I've been awake way to late the night before trying to will myself to sleep because, after all, too much digital is bad for us.

Sorry, New York Times, but I don't need to clear my head. I need to focus on something other than the cacophony of thoughts galloping through it. I don't want to think about today's to-do list that didn't get done or the insurmountable pile of stuff waiting the next day.

I want a distraction from all of that, and that distraction is Slashdot on my Blackberry. What else can I do? The radio reception here is way too lousy for me to score a game.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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Determination

Debra Legg — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 20:04:34 +0000

How can the kid who can't find his shoes in the morning lock his eyes onto a soccer ball as if they were guided by a laser?

Why is it that the boy who routinely turns in test papers with questions unanswered, not because he's stumped but because he's rushing to move on to the next thing, can unerringly spot a ball flying at him from across a field and stop it from reaching the goal?

The quick and obvious answer: Soccer is more interesting than shoes or schoolwork.

That answer, though, is an oversimplification. It's not that Big Guy's lack of focus most days is anything unusual for his age. It's that his hyperfocus on the field is very, very different.

He's been that way since his first season of play. Even at age 4, he had an almost preternatural feel for where the action was. He's never complained that no one would let him kick the ball, and he's never picked grass or stared at clouds. He's even learned to love playing defense, which is a big change from last winter.

And it stuns me twice a week to see the rapid transition from the kid running around the house in a mad panicked search for his shin guards to the steely-eyed player. He might quit his homework four times a night, but once he's crossed the white lines, I marvel at the way he just won't give up. He's in perpetual motion during the game, and at halftime he'd rather be kicking the ball around than sitting and resting, even if it's 100 degrees, he's dripping in sweat and his face is as red as his uniform.

It's not that I'm declaring him profoundly talented, though he has and I'm already having to temper dreams of a future as a baseball or soccer superstar. Not crush them, mind you, but inject a little reality. "I can't wait to come and see you play. But you need to get an education, too, because even the best players don't play forever."

I do readily admit, though, that he's going somewhere that I've never been when he's on the soccer field. It's a place of complete concentration and focus. I envy him a bit.

It gives me hope for his future, too. I dream of the day when he'll be able to find his shoes and finish a test as quickly and as thoroughly as he can locate a soccer ball.

Copyright 2010 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

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