The future’s pretty cool
A brief vignette demonstrating the magic of modern life.
1. I receive email from the friend hosting Thanksgiving dinner this year, thanking me for once again being the pumpkin pie provider and suggesting that some sparkling wine would not go amiss if I wanted to bring some.
2. I fire off a message to another friend, who knows a lot more about wine than I do, to ask what sparkling wine goes well with the traditional turkey dinner.
3. Wine-loving friend responds with two recommendations in my price range.
4. I hit K&L Wine Merchants online, check out the recommended wines, choose one, and buy two bottles to be held for pickup at the San Francisco store.
5. I reserve a Zipcar so I can go pick up my two bottles of fizzy goodness.
This all, incidentally, takes place in the space of half an hour, during which time I never leave the comfy chair where the cat is sleeping next to me.
Denouement: I walk into K&L this afternoon at about 3:30 and who should be standing there but the friend who provided wine guidance? So I gratefully offered him a ride home.
Filed under Uncategorized | Comments (3)Who wants to live forever?
This afternoon, I spent some quality time with a gentleman by the name of Irethorrou. He’s a 2500-year-old mummy who belongs to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; he’s been on loan to another museum for the last 65 years, but is now back in town as the centerpiece of a new exhibition about how science is giving us new insights into mummies — literally.
Now, I’m an antiquities whore. Drop me into a museum with anything from the Middle Ages on back and I’m happy as the proverbial clam. (Not to harsh on the Renaissance, mind you.) I can sit and contemplate Roman ruins or Anglo-Saxon metalwork for quite a while. So the idea of getting to hang out with a mummy is inherently appealing in and of itself. But then I saw this video about how FAMSF sent Mr. Irethorrou down to Stanford for a trip through a couple of cutting-edge CT scanners to see what’s going on under all that linen, and — well, if I were a cartoon character, my eyeballs would have been going BOI-OI-OING.
See for yourself:
Anyway, I couldn’t resist. So I hopped on the bus and headed over to the Legion of Honor, where he’s resting peacefully in a glass case in the middle of a room. On the wall above him is projected a loop of 3-D images from the scans. Around him are more display cases containing a couple of canopic jars, some burial amulets, an imposing outer coffin, and other funerary artifacts. Most astonishing and wonderful are the two plaster models of skulls, made from scans of Irethorrou and another mummy known to be his father — and forensic reconstructions of their faces.
Intellectually, I knew that mummy was a human being. But emotionally, it hit me as I looked at that face: this was a person. He was alive. He had a family, he had a job as a temple priest, and when he died, he was buried with great ceremony and reverence. And it all happened 2500 years ago, so long ago that it’s hard to imagine, so very long ago that had he not been buried in a coffin with his biography carved upon it, his name and his very existence would have been so completely forgotten that it would have been as if he had never existed. And yet there he was, lying in the center of an artfully lit room, the lid of his cedar sarcophagus propped open to reveal his well-wrapped shape. His name was written on signs on the display case, on the walls, on the website that led me to the exhibit. People were speaking it, as if he had been alive just yesterday.
The Egyptians believed they didn’t really die as long as someone still existed to say their names. How amazed and delighted would Irethorrou be, if only he knew that his belief in immortality turned out to be true?
Success!
Because I’m sure you’re all wondering: I have acquired pumpkin.
Filed under Uncategorized, triumphs | Comment (1)What price serenity?
Seven years ago, I co-authored a book about keeping your job while dealing with depression. At the time, I wrote, the main barrier preventing people from seeking professional help with mental health issues was the fear of being stigmatized — the fear that they’d be perceived as incompetent, unreliable, or even dangerous in the workplace.
How things have changed. According to a recent government survey, as cited in a useful article in today’s New York Times, the leading reason people avoid mental health care today is fear of the cost. They don’t know how they’ll pay for it, so they don’t get the help they need.
Prioritizing mental health is not an insignificant expense. I’ve spent a lot on mine over the years, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t sometimes wish I’d had the option of investing that money in something other than the continued smooth operation of my synapses. That being said, I don’t regret it. The ROI is fantastic — not a single yoga class, workshop, massage appointment, or occasional experiment in brain chemistry has been money poorly spent. If I had to eat ramen every day to make room in my budget for a good therapist, I’d do it willingly.
I realize that not everyone can afford to make even that choice. There are low-cost options out there, but not enough. Not nearly enough.
Filed under Uncategorized, progress | Comment (0)Tossed salad post 3
Another random stroll through the Internets:
- Sometimes I get into arguments about “rape culture.” I should just refer people to this brilliant post.
- This afternoon, a million authors shuddered in fear and started scrambling to finish their manuscripts.
- Back in 1963, the SF Chronicle ran an article under the now-legendary headline “A Great City’s People Forced to Drink Swill.” The article itself is less famous, inexplicably so.
- It is comforting to consider that whatever my problems may be, at least I haven’t been killed for my fat.
And that’s all I have to say about that.
Filed under Uncategorized | Comment (0)