"Back in the USSR"

Well not really.  A few weeks ago we were at a concert of a Beatles tribute act (Classical Mystery Tour) and one of the songs they played was this Beatles classic.  It just further reminded me how things can change.  There is no longer a USSR in existence.  Yet this week with the Syrian crisis, the intervention of the Russian President and the strained relations between the US and Russia it brought back memories of our issues with Russia.  How many of you remember practicing nuclear attack drills in elementary school.  Even as a kid I wondered how hiding under my desk in my elementary school would protect me from a nuclear attack and radioactive fallout!

Last year we had a young Russian hockey player live with us for several months.  He has since returned to his home in Kazan and is playing for the Kazan Bars, a minor league hockey team to the AK Kazan Bars of the KHL.  He and I correspond by email regularly keeping up on each others' lives.  He tells me about visits from his fiance, his current studies to become a coach and his playing statistics.  I tell him about our life after he left the US, our grandson and updates on what we are doing.  We often exchange photos like the one he sent me here:



We developed a connection that transcends language, culture and politics.  To my husband and me,  he is our Russian son and we are his American parents.

As I was talking to my son (the one who lives in Nashville) he was saying that I better be careful right now with communicating with someone in Russia.  I know he was joking yet it brought back memories of when I was a child and Russia was our enemy in the Cold War.  I can't think of that right now.  I just want to be able to continue to send emails and keep in touch with my "Russian son" in Kazan.   

Reliving Our Youth Yet Living in a Digital Age

This past weekend we attended an outdoor concert of the Classical Mystery Tour (www.classicalmysterytour.com).  This is a Beatles tribute act which my husband and I have seen several times.  Two of the performers in the band are friends of his so we always enjoy seeing the show.  We brought along a group of our friends who are about our age so we all were able to relate to the time period when we first heard many of the songs that were performed.

The concert venue welcomes people to bring picnics and wine and to enjoy the evening as they wish.  We had a table but were surrounded by families with younger children.  As the sun set into the West the venue was lit with candles and fire pits where families and friends gathered.  The children lit those multicolored glow sticks and then fastened them to their heads, necks and wrist.  It looked like some futuristic tribal ritual with the running and dancing children all aglow with light.

There was a dance floor in front of the stage that was packed with people.  There were couples, children, parents and grandparents all dancing and swaying to the music while singing ALL the lyrics to ALL the songs.  As is common with any concert now many people raised their arms holding cell phones to get photos and video of the show to share with their friends.  One person even had an iPad they were using to take video!  I guess I would not think to bring a tablet like that to a concert and then take photos. 

It was a beautiful night and a great concert.  As one of the performers told us many of the later Beatles songs were never heard in concert by the Beatles themselves, they were just released on records or tape.  The crowd loved all the songs and was very happy with the performance. 

It's so interesting to me how humans like to hold back the darkness of the night.  Between the candles, fire pits and glow sticks the crowd was alight.  Maybe it's part of our collective unconsciousness that if we light the night we can hold back the monsters of the darkness.

In addition to the light from the crowd there was the glow from cell phones and iPads.  I'm of an age where I remember years ago at the end of a concert the crowd would signal their happiness and desire for an encore with lighters held above their heads.  Now in the digital age the crowd holds their cell phones!

It was a great evening! 

Struggling with something to write about

First of all for those of you who are English composition experts I know my title is not grammatically correct.  Yet this week I am just struggling to write about something.  Usually a topic or something jumps out at me and I feel great about the topic and the ideas flow.  This week ... nothing! 

I guess it is just media overload this week.  It started with the Mtv Video Music Awards early in the week.  It seems like everywhere you look you see clips or photos of Miley Cyrus and Robin Thicke in their very questionable performance.  I did not watch the awards but have heard about it non-stop, on the internet, television, in blogs and Facebook.  I won't weigh in on this, too many other people have.  Yet I can't help but think that Miley, Robin, their publicists and their marketing teams are all ecstatic about the unrelenting coverage. 

Now we in the United States are on the brink of another war or at least some type of military action with Syria.  Again, I don't want to comment here but it seems from what I have read people are tired of war and tired of the United States being the police force for the world.  Let someone  step up if it is important to more people than those in Washington DC. 

In my little world I am just missing my grandson (as well as his parents) who live in another city and state about five hours away from where I live.  I'm struggling with completing my dissertation.  Finally I just want to get a few tasks completed at my house and enjoy the long weekend.  My needs are tiny compared to things that are "trending" and overtaking the internet, at least this week. 

Watching this constant media barrage makes me just want to focus on my little corner of the world and do what I can for those people I love and care about. 

What about you?  Do you gobble up what is trending or do you want to disconnect and just focus on what is important to you and what you can influence? 

The Highway Twins

I live on one side of town and my office is on another side of town.  So every morning I make the drive around I 465 to go to work.  It's about a 40 minute drive so while dodging the crazy drivers who are trying to text and drive at 70 miles an hour I get to notice what is happening around the city. 

One thing I have noticed are two Indiana State Police officers who patrol this stretch of highway.  Both are motorcycle officers.  I have never seen their faces.  All I see are their huge police motorcycles and then the two of them dressed head to toe in black with their visored helmets. 

They usually are on one particular stretch of the highway.  One officer will be posted to the left of the road standing up with his motorcycle between his legs.  He has a hand help radar gun to his face and is measuring the speed of the oncoming traffic.  His partner is usually a few hundred yards further down the highway waiting for the word to catch someone who is speeding.  Those of us who travel this highway every day know to watch for them and to slow down. 

Several times a day some unsuspecting driver, thinking speed is more important than safety goes cruising by at significantly more than the speed limit and,

Bam! They are busted! 

Twin number one tags them with the radar and twin number two chases them down with lights and sirens going.  It's probably a surprise to these motorists that there are motorcycle highway patrol officers working the interstate. 

I don't know anything about these guys,  in fact I would not even be able to identify them.  I have only seen them in their full, head to toe black, with their helmets and visors. 

I appreciate the work they do.  Keeping the highways a little safer is an important job.  They are there, rain, shine, summer and winter.  It takes a certain amount of courage, and probably a little of being an adrenaline junkie, to chase down a motorist on an interstate on a motorcycle. 

Thanks guys!  Your work is appreciated.  If you would only get that idiot who passed me this morning at 70 miles an hour with his cell phone on his steering wheel trying to text and drive. 

Perception

One of my favorite things about summer and television is that several of my favorite shows, especially many on TNT, are on during the summer.  I wait in anticipation for True Blood (HBO), Major Crimes (TNT), Rizzoli and Isles (TNT) and now like King and Maxwell (TNT) and Perception (TNT). 

Perception is one show I really enjoy.  The premise of a brilliant man who is a college professor (neuroscience), who is also a paranoid schizophrenic as well as a consultant for the FBI is just way out there.  It's so fun to see how the writers of that show are able to weave his visual hallucinations into the script.  It's also amazing how those hallucinations (or possibly his unconscious mind) are often telling him something he is not able to yet realize in his conscious mind. 

I teach psychology classes at a community college and often use clips from Perception or from Big Bang Theory in my classes to illustrate points I am trying to make in my lectures.  In Big Bang Theory, Sheldon does a much better job of illustrating classical conditioning (Sheldon Trains Penny) than I can by talking about that concept.  With clips from Perception I am able to demonstrate how the brain works or the behavior of a paranoid schizophrenic much better than just talking about it. 

As a college professor I am always looking for video that demonstrates the theories and concepts of psychology.  It is a continual process and fortunately there is material everywhere (thank you YouTube!). 

Wasting Time When I Should Be Writing

Today I should be working on my dissertation.  I am in edits right now and that is not my favorite thing to do.  My adviser has sent back my proposal with lots of edits and suggestions.  I'm used to working with an editor but I'm just not motivated.  The trouble is I am on a deadline to get this done so I can start my research and time is flying by. 

During my graduate school work I have written extensively to my professors that I am a procrastinator.  It is something I have struggled to manage and control through all my classes. When I started my doctoral program many times I found myself submitting an online assignment right at the due date.  I seem to need a certain amount of push from the looming deadline to get my creative or academic juices flowing.  As classes progressed I worked hard to slay this dragon - and toward the end of my class work I often celebrated turning in assignments early. 

With the dissertation I am not facing a deadline for class or even a online assignment.  I am working alone against a timeline I laid out with my adviser several months ago.  Today I had planned to work several hours on my edits.  So far I have caught up on email, cleaned out my desk, organized all my files and updated all the calendars the building that I manage for a community college.  I've done lots of things but nothing really substantive toward my dissertation writing. At least I left my Kindle at home so I am not reading a book, although I have discovered the "Amazon Cloud" and now can read from any device. 

This is not going to work.  I'm not sure why I am avoiding my work, it is not hard or even terribly creative.  It is just tedious and very detail oriented.  My adviser even has given me extensive notes to follow to make my proposal better.  I have got to master this because I am committed to having this done so I can participate in graduation in May 2014. 

If anyone has advice I would appreciate it.  So far I have made charts and set deadlines.  I have told friends and my writing partners about my goals.  Many people are checking on my and I tell them I am doing fine - but I am not.  I have explored my feelings and realized some of this is fear of failure - or possible fear of success.  I'm not sure which.  I just want to get motivated to finish this final leg of my academic journey. 

So if you are reading this send me suggestions, thoughts or prayers that I get this under control and start moving forward.  I want to be done and need to stop wasting time when I should be writing! 

Billboard

So I'm driving down the highway to work this morning and just to the left of the interstate is a huge billboard with a watermelon on it.  The billboard says Now Entering the Watermelon Capitol of the Midwest.  What!  When did the west side of Indianapolis become the entryway to the watermelon capitol of the Midwest?  I did not see a news story about that wonderful happening? 

After thinking about it further I'm sure they are talking about western Indiana as the watermelon capitol of the Midwest.  The billboard was sponsored by the Indiana Department of Agriculture and the Illiana Watermelon Growers. 

So continuing the summer produce theme I have been following on the last few blog posts I thought I would talk about watermelon.  Here in the Midwest we are able to get watermelon all year.  In the winter they are shipped in from some other country and are usually really expensive and not very good.  But if you need a watermelon for a recipe or just need a fix they are available. 

But in the summer when the watermelons are coming from local growers, ripened in the fields and picked fresh they are just shy of heaven in my book.  There is nothing better than cutting into a summer watermelon where the fruit is bright red and the juices run along your knife as you cut it open and pool on the cutting board.  These watermelons are sweet and juicy and I can eat them at every meal, even breakfast.  Watermelons are one of my favorite summer treats so I'm glad I live in the midst of the watermelon capitol of the Midwest. 

Several years ago one of the hockey players who lived with us loved watermelon.  I would purchase a whole one and cut it up into chucks and put it in the refrigerator.  He would eat the entire melon in one or two sittings.  So whenever I look at watermelon I am reminded of that player (who is now playing professionally on the East Coast). 

So I'm glad I live in the Watermelon Capitol of the Midwest.  It was just surprising to see that billboard proclaiming it next to the interstate. 

What is your favorite summer treat?  What specific things are just the epitome of summer for you?