Month: January 2023

This past Friday’s blog post recounted the story of a 500,000-gallon raw sewage spill in San Diego (where I live), transforming “America’s Finest City” into “America’s Foulest City.”

The raw sewage spill happened on January 16.  It geyesered up out of manholes, fouling streets and homes and businesses and San Diego Bay with…

Raw sewage.

According to the local news stories…

“…a sensor malfunction…caused the wastewater pumps to shut down.” 

The wastewater pumps were the machines at a pump station (in this case, a facility called “Pump Station 2”) which sends raw sewage to a wastewater treatment plant.

Neither the San Diego County Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ) nor any other acronymed entity has been able to determine the cause of the “sensor malfunction.”

Regarding that 500,000-gallon spill, according to this article:

“On January 18 city spokesperson Arian Collins said that number could increase as they investigate further.  ‘By the end of the week, City crews will have a final estimate of the number of gallons spilled.’”

I kept checking online, and finally – on January 23 – came this story:

That estimate of 500,000 gallons of raw sewage had grown to 11.2 million gallons.

That’s 22+ times higher
than the City’s original estimate.

The NBC 7 article reiterated:

“County officials originally said last week’s sewage spill, which impacted at least 18 sites around the city of San Diego, involved a staggering 500,000 gallons of effluent.”

If 500,000 gallons were considered “staggering,” I wonder how they’d describe 11.2 million gallons?

This City of San Diego spokesperson wasn’t saying:

“On January 23, though, Tom Rosales, an assistant director with the water recovery branch of the city’s public utilities department, said the spill was, in fact, estimated to be in the neighborhood of 11.2 million gallons of sewage.”

Rosales didn’t describe 11.2 million gallons “staggering.”

He didn’t describe it as any of these, either:

*Though I daresay 11.2 million gallons of raw sewage flowing through the streets would have been – at the very least – “breathtaking.”

So perhaps Rosales isn’t big on adjectives.

But he is a master at using many words…

To say nothing.

For instance, regarding the cause of the Pump Station 2 “sensor malfunction”:

“‘…it’s a combination of just an off-chance failure with the sensor and the logic of the program, logic that operates the pumping system,’ Rosales said, adding, ‘we haven’t completed our forensics evaluation yet.  That’s still being done and expect at some point to get an actual report from our staff to explain in more detail exactly why it failed.”

What our pal Rosales meant is:

“By the time we figure this out, we’re hoping everyone’s forgotten about our screw-up.”

Apparently the article’s author – or someone – asked Rosales what this mess was going to cost San Diego taxpayers.  He said:

“‘They have a kind of a starting point, if you will, but then they have mitigating factors along the way where they consider your record and your response and so forth, and, ultimately, it is a negotiated process that will bring it down to, I’d say, kind of very high level to something more manageable,’ Rosales said, regarding penalties from the state, adding ‘again, that’s a long process.   So I don’t want to guess what that might be, but we’ve been through it a couple of times, and we’ll go through it again with them.’”

What our pal Rosales meant is:

“The taxpayers are screwed.”

And as for Rosales’ “we’ve been through it a couple of times,” yes – San Diego has.

Including this sewage spill in 2016, a cost to taxpayers of $2.5 million:

San Diego taxpayers didn’t cause the sensors to fail.

But they’re on the hook for the fine.

Correction: Fines, plural.

And how about cleaning up the mess in raw sewage recipients’ homes and businesses?

“As far as cleanup costs go, Rosales said that homeowners and businesses have the option, if they are insured, to take care of the cleanup that way, or the city will provide cleanup via a firm it works with for mitigation.  Until claims are made, a cost estimate for clean-up can’t yet be provided.”

No “cost estimate for clean-up” as yet, but some of that, too, will be paid for with San Diego residents’…

So, let’s say I submit a claim to my homeowner’s insurance, as Rosales suggested.  But if the city doesn’t settle up with my insurance company, then my rates will probably go up.

Or, perhaps the insurance companies will simply advise as follows:

“The raw sewage flooded the streets, therefore it was a flood.  Your policy does not include flood insurance, therefore the damages to your home/business are not covered in this event.”

Rosales also referenced “the city” providing cleanup “via a firm it works with for mitigation,” but offered no contact information for residents or business owners to contact. 

It took me a dozen phone calls to track down a San Diego city employee with answers, and lucky me – I wasn’t a panicked homeowner standing on a floor that had been bathed in raw sewage.

Here’s the consoling thought in this whole smelly, filthy, completely-avoidable-11.5-million-gallon-raw-sewage-mess:

“Rosales does not expect a repeat of the massive spill anytime soon.”

Gosh, I feel so much better because Rosales “does not expect” another massive raw sewage spill “anytime soon”!

But then…he didn’t “expect” the January 16 spill either, did he?

Here’s Rosales’ final comment:

“‘We don’t ever want to spill,’ Rosales said.  ‘It happened because of some equipment failure, and we don’t expect it will happen again.’”

Wow!

Rosales doesn’t “expect” another equipment failure because…?

Because it happened on January 16 and therefore can never, ever, ever happen again?

But – how about that 2016 example I cited above, with the $2.5 million fine?

How about this example, from 2011:

And this $680,278 fine, for a 2007 raw sewage spill:

San Diego taxpayers, here’s that consoling thought:

Tom Rosales, assistant director with the water recovery branch of the city’s public utilities department…

Has a crystal ball and can predict the future!

The damage to California from the rain that began on December 16 and continued for three weeks has been extensively written about:

And exhaustively photographed:

According to the Washington Post article, we were hit with:

“Nine separate atmospheric rivers – narrow plumes of deep moisture generated by ocean storms.”

And that, said the article, brought:

• Twenty feet of snow in the central Sierra Nevada.
• A statewide average rainfall of 11.47 inches (though it was much higher – 40 inches and more – in some areas).
• Thirty-two trillion gallons of water.

“Thirty-two trillion gallons of water.”

How do we even imagine that much water?

Let’s try this:

This is Lake Tahoe:

Lake Tahoe straddles the state line between California and Nevada.  According to various websites, Lake Tahoe is 22 miles long, 12 miles wide, and the surface area covers 191 square miles.

Lake Tahoe contains an average of 37 trillion gallons of water.

California got almost a Lake Tahoe of rainwater.

But where I live, apparently some in San Diego – also known as “America’s Finest City” – decided that we hadn’t gotten quite enough liquid.

So shortly after the rain stopped, the city added this to the mix:

According to the article:

“Sewage flowed out of manholes into streets and storm drains in downtown San Diego and the Midway District…”

Specifically, into 18 different areas in downtown San Diego and the Midway District.

Let’s imagine it.

It’s a Monday, a little past 3pm.  You’ve taken some personal time off from work for a dentist appointment.  You parked on the street because the dentist’s parking lot was full.  After your appointment you head for the street, and this is what greets you:

Thousands of gallons of raw sewage.  Your car is sitting in it, up to its hubcaps.

And how do you know it’s raw sewage?

The smell.

You’re going to need a lot more of these:

Here’s an image from a video of what the raw sewage looked like, practically geyser-ing out of a manhole:

The person who shot the video described what she saw:

“It looked like a Loch Ness monster coming out of the ground…a two-foot-tall gurgling brown-black mountain of sewage.”

Where did this smelly, filthy nightmare come from?

It came from San Diego’s Pump Station 2. 

According to constructionjournal.com:

“Pump Stations 1 (PS-1) and 2 (PS-2) are the largest and most critical pump stations within the City of San Diego’s wastewater collection system.” 

Here’s Pump Station 2:

The station was constructed by Swift Lee Office (SLO), a “full-service architecture firm.”  On their website they describe Pump Station 2 (PS-2) as follows:

“PS-2 is a critical pump station; nearly 80% of the City’s sewage flows into PS-2 and ultimately into the Point Loma Wastewater Treatment Plant.  Thus, it is crucial that PS-2 remain operational throughout an emergency situation.”

Well, PS-2 sure didn’t “remain operational” through this “emergency situation.”

What went wrong at Pump Station 2 and caused the 500,000-gallon raw sewage spill?

According to the Union-Tribune:

“…a sensor malfunction…caused the wastewater pumps to shut down.”

A “sensor malfunction.”

Considering the fact that Swift Lee Office built Pump Station 2, and San Diego paid plenty for Swift Lee Office to do so, I’d like to introduce both to a concept that isn’t new, but apparently unknown to the people involved.

The concept is…

Backup systems.

You know – to back up data, like the Cloud.  On airplanes they’re called “redundant systems.”  In homes and hospitals they’re called “backup generators.”  An extra pair of eyeglasses is a backup system.  So are extra rolls of toilet paper.  And a useable spare tire in your trunk. 

In my purse it’s called, “Having two pens instead of one.” 

Pretty simple concept – yes?

Apparently not.

Since the builders and operators of PS-2 knew it was a “critical pump station,” where was the backup in case of a “sensor malfunction”?

Instead of a backup system kicking in at PS-2, raw sewage flowed until the pumps “were manually restarted.”

“Manually restarted” 27 minutes later.

The story made national headlines:

The raw sewage closed beaches:

There were lots of these along miles of our shorelines:

And, says this article:

The people who live in Park Place luxury apartments…

…and multiple other locations were not happy to be sharing their space with…

Raw sewage.

For those folks, the Union-Tribune article offered this consolation – a number to call for assistance:

“Residential and commercial customers who were impacted by the sewage spill were told to call city officials at (619) 515-3525.”

Curious, I called the number.

This is what I heard:

You have reached San Diego’s Get It Done helpline.
If you’re calling about parking issues, press 1.
If you’re calling about illegal dumping, press 2.
If you’re calling about graffiti, press 3.
If your home or business has been impacted by the recent raw sewage spill, hold your nose until further notice.
Goodbye.

OK – I made that up. But I did call the number, and I’ll talk about that in Monday’s Part II.

What caused the “sensor malfunction” at PS-2?

I thought I’d found the answer in the above NBC 7 article, which said:

“A power outage caused the city of San Diego pump station to lose function, a spokesperson for the San Diego County Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ) said.”

But – strangely, I thought – later the same article said:

“An investigation is underway to determine what caused the sensor malfunction, but on Wednesday afternoon they were able to say it was not due to a power failure.”

So – cause unknown.

The cause of the sensor malfunction is unknown, but the cause of the 27-minute flood of raw sewage seems pretty clear:

No sensor backup system at Pump Station 2:

My takeaway:

As I was researching this story I found an article from 2011 about another raw sewage spill in San Diego, which this time was due to a power outage.

When once again, “America’s Finest City” became “America’s Foulest City.”

I think this succinct – if pungent – headline sums up the situation better than I ever could:

Update:  If you think 500,000 gallons of raw sewage is a lot…check out my update on Monday, January 30.

I believe my husband makes the best spinach dip in the world.

It’s spinach-y, crunchy, slightly chewy, slightly sweet and nutty, and so darned good I can (and do) make a meal out of it.

And to answer the question in the post title …

Yes, he does put those ugly things in his spinach dip.

But – those things don’t look like those things when he puts them in the dip.

Before that, they look like this:

Described as a “grass-like sedge,” my researched introduced me to Eleocharis dulcis, native to Asia, tropical Africa, and Oceania. 

How does this “grass-like” foreign plant fit into my hub’s spinach dip?

For that, let’s dig a bit deeper.

When we do, we see the whole plant:

Those dark, round things at the bottom of the plant are called “corms”:

“A corm, bulbo-tuber, or bulbotuber is a short, vertical, swollen underground plant stem that serves as a storage organ that some plants use to survive winter or other adverse conditions such as summer drought and heat.”

Corms:  That’s what we’re after.

Harvest the plant, including the roots, and voila – corms:

OK, we have the corms in hand – now what?

We rename them…but what?

Here are some clues:

The corms are classified as vegetables; specifically, “aquatic tuber vegetables.”

They’re edible and, according to various articles, they’re good for you:

• High in fiber, low in calories, and contain no fat.
• A source of fiber, protein, potassium, manganese, copper, Vitamin B6 and riboflavin.
• Some evidence suggests that consuming these could help reduce free radicals in the body and lower blood pressure, among other benefits.

So what the heck is this dark, ugly, bulbous-looking, healthy-for-you corm-thing?

It’s a beautiful thing.

It’s this:

Water chestnuts!

Just peel off the dark ugly…

And eat them raw, boiled, grilled, fried, roasted, candied, grated, pickled, or straight from the can.

You can add them to all sorts of dishes; when I googled “water chestnut recipes” I got 16 million+ results.

So, to correct a commonly held (including me) misconception: 

Water chestnuts are not nuts.

How did they get that name?

This article had as reasonable an explanation as any:

“The name ‘water chestnut’ comes from the fact that it resembles a chestnut in shape and coloring – papery brown skin over white flesh.”

And there is a resemblance:

I couldn’t discover who gave water chestnuts that America moniker, but I did learn that most water chestnuts aren’t American grown:

“…water chestnuts are primarily cultivated in China and imported to the United States and other countries.  Rarely have attempts been made to cultivate in the U.S.; however, it has been tried in Florida, California, and Hawaii with limited commercial success.”

I also learned that we in the U.S. love our water chestnuts:  We’re the largest importer of water chestnuts in the world, with 570.06M metric tons in 2021, valued at $759 million.

I suspect that many people – including me – were introduced to water chestnuts this way:

Asian food.

How did water chestnuts transition from Chinese food to 16 million+ recipes including bacon-wrapped water chestnuts, water chestnut cake, water chestnut soup, candied water chestnuts, water chestnut salad, and my beloved’s beloved spinach dip?

I don’t know.

But let’s have some spinach dip while we ponder this:

The judge who made the above statement is my pick for Judge of the Year.  Here’s why…

New Jersey attorney Alina Habba (pictured) has several videos posted on the website of her law firm, Habba Madaio & Associates, LLP.

This isn’t unusual – attorneys are interviewed on TV and if they like how they look and sound, the video gets uploaded for all to see and admire.

Two of the videos from March 2022 have captions that reference Donald Trump “suing Hilary Clinton” and others over “Russia Hoax,” also known as the “false narrative about Russia collusion”:

Habba, described as “President Trump’s personal counsel,” has plenty to say in both videos about the righteousness of Trump’s lawsuit.

Interestingly, the Habba Madaio website offers no follow-up videos about the outcome of that lawsuit, which was widely covered in recent articles like this:

“In a scathing ruling, a federal judge in Florida on Thursday ordered Donald J. Trump and one of his lawyers together to pay nearly a million dollars in sanctions for filing a frivolous lawsuit against nearly three dozen of Mr. Trump’s perceived political enemies, including Hillary Clinton and the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey.”

Wow!  “Nearly a million dollars in sanctions” against Trump and his lawyer?

For a “frivolous lawsuit”?

A judge – finally – is telling it like it is.

And it gets better.  Here are quotes from this Washington Post story:

From the judge’s 46-page decision:

Trump is a “prolific and sophisticated litigant who is repeatedly using the courts to seek revenge on political adversaries…”

“He is the mastermind of strategic abuse of the judicial process, and he cannot be seen as a litigant blindly following the advice of a lawyer.  He knew full well the impact of his actions.  As such, I find that sanctions should be imposed upon Mr. Trump and his lead counsel, Ms. Habba.”

[The judge] described the legal complaint as “a hodgepodge of disconnected, often immaterial events, followed by an implausible conclusion.”

“The Plaintiff consistently misrepresented and cherry-picked portions of public reports and filings to support a false factual narrative,” Thursday’s judgment found.  “It happened too often to be accidental; its purpose was political, not legal.”

Who is this judge, who finally – finally – states just exactly what Trump is, and the damage Trump causes, including diverting “resources from those who have suffered actual legal harm”?

He is U.S. District Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks, Southern District of Florida (pictured).  He was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 1997, so this lawsuit wasn’t his first rodeo.

And – I’m thrilled to say – the judge does not pull his punches:

“Here, we are confronted with a lawsuit that should never have been filed, which was completely frivolous, both factually and legally, and which was brought in bad faith for an improper purpose,” Middlebrooks wrote, decrying what he called “abusive litigation tactics.”

In a blistering judgment, he said the case was “intended for a political purpose” and showed a “continuing pattern of misuse of the courts by Mr. Trump and his lawyers,” undermining the rule of law and diverting resources.  “No reasonable lawyer would have filed it,” he added.

Now you see why Judge Middlebrooks is my nominee for Judge of the Year.

Let’s revisit that last sentence in the last quote:

“No reasonable lawyer.”

The judge is referring, of course, to Trump’s “personal counsel,” Alina Habba.

Trump, Habba, and the Habba Madaio & Associates law firm are jointly liable for $937,989.39, the court found.

I have every expectation that Trump will tell Habba that since she lost the case, then she is liable for the entire fine.

As for paying Habba for her services, Trump’s failure to pay his attorneys is widely known:

And as for Trump – is he appealing?

Not very…

Release date:  March 2022.

Category:  Comedy; Action & Adventure.

Review, short version:  All thumbs down.

Review, long version:

I recently watched all 111 torturous minutes of The Lost City, and afterwards my only thought was:

“I wish I hadn’t wasted 111 minutes of my life watching The Lost City.”

Which let to this question:

“Why did I want to see The Lost City?”

Answer:  Because Sandra Bullock was in it.

Am I a fan of Sandra Bullock?

I thought I was.

Then I started thinking about the movies I’d seen her in, and realized that no – I wasn’t a fan.  I thought she was good in The Blind Side (2009), but I disliked her – or rather, the characters she chose to play – in The Proposal (2009), Miss Congeniality (2000), Speed (1994), and some of her other movies.

So my conclusion is, I like Sandra Bullock but not most of her movies.

What do I like about her?

I admire her adoption of two children (pictured, in 2019) as a single woman.  At age 58 she’s the parent of a 12-year-old son and a 10-year-old daughter, when many women her age are celebrating being empty nesters and looking forward to grandchildren.

I also admire Bullock for her staying power:  Her first film was in 1987 and she’s still going strong, when so many other aging actresses have been discarded by Hollywood.

And I’ll even admit to admiring Bullock’s credible Lost City portrayal of a romance with a male character who is younger – significantly younger – than Bullock.

He’s played by Channing Tatum, 42.  I always get him and this other actor mixed up – do you know who is who?

Yes, what I just did was stereotyping.

Like what happens in this movie.

Read on.

Here’s some of what I disliked about The Lost City:

Bullock was a producer of this movie, and chose to spend a large part of it dressed in an outfit that displayed her chest.  One giant step backwards for womankind:

I’m fine with showing skin, I’m fine with nudity, but this was purely…

And why is she the one tied to a chair, instead of him?  When will we discard the helpless-woman-needing-to-be-rescued-by-a-big-strong-man stereotyping?

In The Lost City Bullock plays a romance novel writer who has an adventure, a direct rip-off of Romancing the Stone (1984).  I saw other rip-offs, including from Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and The African Queen (1951).  The Lost City was…

Derivative:  Having parts that originate from another source; made up of or marked by derived elements.

I dislike derivative.  Come up with something original, will you?

The Lost City is supposed to be a comedy, but I don’t recall laughing.  It’s supposed to have action and adventure, but neither engaged my interest enough to care what happened to Bullock and Tatum.  Tatum’s character was mostly dopey, and Bullock’s character was tense, twitchy and mostly helpless.  As a New York Times review put it,

“But while Loretta [Bullock] isn’t as helpless as she might have been back in the old studio days, this is still about a man rescuing a woman whose eye makeup never runs even when she does.”

Speaking of reviews, I think it’s fair to say there were both good and bad:

Loved It

Hated It

To be fair, I’ll acknowledge that there were many more good reviews than bad.

And the same on Amazon:

I’d say 35,000+ reviews, and 78 percent of those people giving the movie four and five stars, is impressive.  Two examples:

Loved It

“What a pleasure!  This movie is artfully done, as it’s hard to keep narrative cohesion and thematic consistency weaving together true heartfelt romance, side-splitting comedy, and action parody.  Every character of the movie was so well done that you surfed between the different plot lines without resistance, wanting no scene to end. The cutest, funniest fun flick I’ve seen in years.”

Hated It

“The script sucked, the acting was so contrived, the directorial decisions… laughable, the cast…a farce.  Honestly, the question is what DIDN’T suck about this movie?  Mother Nature.  The scenes outside (if they were really outdoors) immersed in the splendor of the jungle…that was the ONLY winning point.”

In mid-2022 there was a slew of headlines – all of which I missed – about Bullock’s future career plans:

According to the Today Show and other articles, after starring in 50 films, Bullock said,

“‘I don’t want to be beholden to anyone’s schedule other than my own.  I’m so burnt out.  I’m so tired, and I’m so not capable of making healthy, smart decisions, and I know it.’”

And:

“‘I take my job very seriously when I’m at work,’ the actor said, adding that is it a ‘24/7’ job.  ‘And I just want to be 24/7 with my babies and my family.  That’s where I’m gonna be for a while.’”

So even if I don’t like most of Bullock’s movies, this is yet another reason for me to like Sandra Bullock:

She’s clear on her…

I’m a great fan of many things British.

And because I’m a fan, I can feel the Brits’ pain about a story from last week.

The story is about Great Britain’s failed spacecraft mission.

And the many British taxpayer dollars – or pounds and pence, in this case – going down in flames.

The image at the top is my interpretation of what this debacle may have looked like.

Failed spacecraft and spacecraft missions happen in the U.S. all the time, so I can empathize.

The failed mission happened January 9:

“The rocket was set to make history, carrying satellites on what would be the first-ever orbital launch from the U.K. on Monday night.  But Virgin Orbit says its LauncherOne rocket ‘experienced an anomaly’ just before it could deliver its payload, and the craft was lost.”

Let’s unpack this.

Virgin Orbit is owned by Richard Branson, a member of what I call the “Billionaire Boys Space Club”:

“LauncherOne” is a rocket that was affixed to the underside of a modified 747:

That modified 747 is named “Cosmic Girl”:

What asshole came up with that name?

Cosmic Girl and LauncherOne were launched from Spaceport Cornwall in western England:

The idea was that the LauncherOne rocket would separate from the 747.  The rocket would then take off into outer space, at some point separate from something else, then release its “payload,” in this case nine satellites:

LauncherOne did separate from the 747, but then experienced the aforementioned “anomaly”:

Meaning:  “We don’t bloody well know what the hell happened.”

After the failure anomaly, in a statement on the Virgin Orbit website, Melissa Thorpe, head of Spaceport Cornwall said,

“Though the mission did not achieve its final orbit, by reaching space and achieving numerous significant first-time achievements, it represents an important step forward…and demonstrated that space launch is achievable from UK soil.”

Thorpe continued,

“Yes, space is hard, but we are only just getting started.”

You want to know what’s “hard”?

Getting my venti peppermint mocha Frappuccino Blended beverage correctly made at Starbucks is “hard.”

“Space” is just stupid.

And expensive.

How expensive for Britain’s taxpayers?

According to this article:

“Virgin Orbit usually charges around $12 million for a launch, although the fees can vary.”

Then there was the cost to build Spaceport Cornwall which, according to that same Melissa Thorpe in this pre-failure article:

“Thorpe, the CEO of Spaceport Cornwall, said it cost less than £20 million ($24 million) to convert the tiny Newquay airport into a space-ready site.”

What does “less than” mean? 

Maybe instead of £20 million it cost £19.9 million?

Then there was the cost of hosting all the media and others who wanted to watch the launch, including these folks:

This article…

…said:

“According to Cornwall Council’s procurement website, it…cost a grand old sum of £8,000 [$9,700] to put it all together.”

And since we’re doing the math, I’d be remiss if I didn’t include the not one – but two U.S. satellites, paid for by U.S. taxpayers, that were onboard LauncherOne:

“From the US, the Navy Research Laboratory had delivered two Coordinated Ionospheric Reconstruction CubeSat Experiment (CIRCE) satellites to the UK.”

Try as I might, I couldn’t find a cost for a CIRCE satellite, but I did find an article that said this:

“If you have at least $290 million in your bank account, that money can go into making a satellite that can track and monitor hurricanes.  Add about $100 million dollars more if you want a satellite that carries a missile-warning device.”

So let’s guesstimate $350 million for each of the two CIRCE satellites.

Since we know that anything that comes out of NASA with a logo like this:

…is mega-expensive (as well as over budget, and past deadline).

In conclusion, here’s my message to the good people of Great Britain:

First:  Brits are known for their moderation, so why launch nine more satellites into space when, according to this article:

“2022 has witnessed the maximum number of orbital and sub-orbital launches…According to United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), 8,261 individual satellites are orbiting the Earth now, out of which 4,852 satellites are active.”

There are already more than 8,200 satellites out there.

Good people of Great Britain, did you really need to add nine more satellites to this chaos?

Second:  Everyone does some things well.  But no one does everything well.

You Brits excel at many things, and here are three of my favorites:

Your royalty – a tradition that’s been in place for most of the past 1,000 years…

Your food with fun names…

And really old stuff?  You’ve got that all over the place:

So, good people of Britain, I urge you to pull the plug on your space program now and stick with the many things you do so well.

Just imagine if you did that. 

No more aircraft with embarrassing (and sexist) names like “Cosmic Girl.”

No more embarrassing space mission failures announced in every media outlet in the world…

No more embarrassing space mission failures costing you millions of pounds and pence.

As Eliza Doolittle sang in My Fair Lady…

Publication date:  June 2022

Category:  Women’s Domestic Life Fiction, Family Life Fiction, Contemporary Women Fiction

Review, short version:  Four roses for Blake, four skunks for Kat.

Review, long version:

I believe that sometimes novelists deliberately create characters whom you love to hate. 

And I know there’s something so satisfying about absolutely loathing a character that…

I almost wallow in it.

It seems to me that one reason authors do this is to keep readers engaged as we move from loathing to liking that character, watching her/him transform from awful to wonderful, thus redeeming themselves.

In The Beach Trap, I’ll theorize that author Ali Brady was going for that awful-to-wonderful transformation in one of her lead female characters.

There are two female lead characters:  Blake and Kat.

Blake is a great character, and I immediately felt a connection to her.

The recipient of my four skunks – Kat – is so shallow, so narcissistic, and so completely boring that it was easy to loathe her.  She considers herself the center of the universe, and she broadcasts this on Instagram, where she’s a wanna-be influencer.

Does Kat ultimately transition from awful to wonderful? 

The Beach Trap premise does have possibilities.  When the story opens, Kat and Blake, both 12, happen to be at the same summer camp.  They’ve become besties, but that all blows up when they discover that they’re half-sisters – they share the same father.  (No spoiler alert needed here – it’s on the book’s back cover.)

The dad is married to Kat’s mother, and in a relationship with Blake’s mother.  He impregnated both women at the same time, which is all I need to say about him.

After their heart-breaking discovery at summer camp, Blake writes to Kat but Kat doesn’t respond.  The book fast forwards to 2022 and there’s been no two-way communication between them for 15 years.

Until an event that will change both their lives.

Through no fault of her own, Blake has experienced some tough turns in her life.  She has no self-confidence, but she’s smart and resilient and kind.  And hardworking.  I mention that specifically because…

Kat is exactly what her parents raised her to be:  useless.  Her only goal in life is to be a successful Instagram influencer, I suppose like Kylie Jenner, whose name I know not because I follow her, but because of this article:

For comparison purposes, Jenner:  377 million followers; Kat:  75,000.

So Kat spends her every waking moment focused on finding “Gram-worthy” (her word) circumstances in which she can position herself as the star of “Grammable moments” (her words), in the hopes of attracting more “people who see me, who love me, who look to me for advice,” (her words).  More followers will help Kat attract companies who will pay her a lot of money to shill their products, which in her pea brain equals success.

Here are a few more examples of Kat’s words:

“Every fourth picture is of me, since I am my brand.”

“The rest of my grid is full of artful shots of products of beautiful things I eat, drink, and discover throughout my day.”

“I look cute.”

“A yacht is where I belong.”

“My motto is:  Life is a fashion show.”

And when Kat’s – and Blake’s – father dies, Kat is ecstatic because:

“The post about my dad dying had more than triple the engagement of my average fashion posts!”

Kat does go through a sort-of transition, but it took until page 285 out of 356 pages for her to even begin to demonstrate that that she might transform into something beyond shallow, narcissistic, and boring.

If you think you can stomach spending time reading Kat’s drivel, then go for it.

Or, skip The Beach Trap.

And consider the time I’ve just given back as a belated holiday gift, from me to you:

This is the sequel (and conclusion) to Part I:  Some Words On Words from Wednesday, January 11.

“You know what those are?” my aggravated husband said, pointing to the TV screen.

We were watching the evening news, and a reporter had asked a politician a question.

“What are they, honey?” I said.

“Those are side words” he said, with something of a sneer.

He was referring to words that often start someone’s – often a politician’s – answer (or non-answer) to a question.  They’re meaningless and, in some cases, stalling tactics as in, “(Side words side words while I come up with a non-answer) …and it’s clear that the governor hasn’t…”

Here’s how side words work:

News reporter:  Mr. Mayor, what is your city doing with regards to your homeless situation?

Mayor:  Look.  I mean, you know – I’m glad you asked that.  And it’s clear that the governor hasn’t…”

The “Look, I mean, you know – I’m glad you asked that” are side words.

You hear them in various combinations all the time.

Here are more side words we also hear a lot:

“That’s a good question” and, “That’s a great question” and, “That’s an excellent question.”

Again, side word stall tactics.

I wish the interviewer would respond, “I know it’s a good question.  That’s why I asked it, you moron.”

Another side word I’m hearing more and more lately is “Right?”

News reporter:  Mr. Mayor, the governor stated that your city, specifically, isn’t following any of his team’s recommended policies and procedures with regards to your city’s homeless situation.

Mayor:  He said that, right?!! 

The mayor is agreeing, probably with a wink and a self-satisfied smirk, that yes, the governor did say that – and wasn’t that stupid?

That “right?!!” is also a hook to get the reporter on the mayor’s side.

It turns out that there’s actually another name for side words (though my hub was on exactly the right track). They’re called: 

According to this article:

“Filler words are words such as ‘um,’ ‘ah,’ ‘hmm,’ ‘like,’ ‘you know,’ and ‘alright’ that are used to give the speaker time to think, express uncertainty or make something awkward feel less awkward, or as a verbal tick.  Filler words are also known as vocal disfluencies or hesitations.

“The most common filler phrases…are ‘needless to say,’ ‘in my humble opinion,’ ‘for what it’s worth…’”

This website:

Listed additional filler words including:

Why anyone would “thank” themselves for “learning” filler words – as the above headline suggested – is a mystery to me.

I discovered many online articles that talked about filler words.

And why articulate people – or those wishing to sound articulate – should avoid filler words.  Hence the big, red “No” symbol over the “filler words” image above.

Now we come to the “punctuation” part in the image at the top of this post.

Let’s go back to a sentence from the above Resound article:

“Filler words are words such as ‘um,’ ‘ah,’ ‘hmm,’ ‘like,’ ‘you know,’ and ‘alright’ that are used…”

You see the phrase ‘you know,’ and the comma that follows it?

That’s not just a comma.

It’s…

I’ve been hearing the phrase “Oxford comma” for years, mainly because of the controversy – some of it quite heated – around the pros and cons of Oxford commas.

What I didn’t know was why the comma was called “Oxford.”  Other punctuation mark names aren’t preceded by capitalized adjectives, or any adjectives: 

Quotation marks are just “quotes,” a semicolon is just “semicolon,” and a period is just “period” (or “fullstop”).

So, why “Oxford”?

My research revealed that the “Oxford” part is as controversial as the use of the Oxford comma itself.

Let’s start with this article:

“The Oxford comma…name comes from the Oxford University Press (OUP), where for over a century it has been standard in the Oxford Style Manual.  Sometimes it’s called a ‘serial comma’ and less frequently a ‘Harvard comma’ (from Harvard University Press).”

Not true, says this article:

“The Oxford comma gets its name from being used by the Oxford University Press, but its exact origins are unclear.  It’s doubtful the use of an Oxford comma (also called a serial comma) originated at the University of Oxford.  If it did, there doesn’t seem to be any proof to back it up.”

There are other explanations for attaching “Oxford” to “comma,” but rather than getting bogged down in all that, let’s move on from the why “Oxford” to the what.

What is it?

The Oxford comma is, as are all commas, a punctuation mark.

In the English language there are multiple punctuation marks – I found articles with numbers ranging from 12 to 26 (more controversy) – but all have the same goal:

“Punctuation fills our writing with silent intonation.  We pause, stop, emphasize, or question using a comma, a period, an exclamation point or a question mark.  Correct punctuation adds clarity and precision to writing; it allows the writer to stop, pause, or give emphasis to certain parts of the sentence.”

The point of punctuation is to clearly convey a writer’s meaning, and the point of the Oxford comma is the same.

Definition:

The Oxford comma is the final comma in a list, used just before the conjunction, the conjunction often being “and.” 

Example:

With Oxford comma:  Her favorite foods were chocolate, marshmallows, cake, and chicken.

Without Oxford comma:  Her favorite foods were chocolate, marshmallows, cake and chicken.

When I read these two sentences, I see no need for the Oxford comma after “cake.”

But – how about this?

Example:

With Oxford comma:  I dedicate this book to my parents, the Pope, and Mother Teresa.

Without Oxford comma:  I dedicate this book to my parents, the Pope and Mother Teresa.

Ah-ha!  Without the Oxford comma, one might think that “my parents” are the Pope and Mother Teresa!

Awhile back my newspaper, the San Diego Union-Tribune, waded into the Oxford comma fray and invited readers to weigh in.  One pro-Oxford comma responder provided this example:

“A wife sent a note with her husband to buy some items after work.  She asked for milk, bread, eggs, frozen peas and carrots.  When he came home he had one bag of frozen peas and carrots.  She said, ‘I wanted a bag of peas and a bag of carrots.’  He said, ‘If you had used the Oxford comma I would have known what you meant.’”

Again – ah-ha!

Fortunately, there is a lighter side to the Oxford comma controversy:

So while there is a lighter side, the company involved in this lawsuit found no humor in the Oxford comma controversy:

The article says that in 2014, three truck drivers sued Oakhurst Dairy, a company in Portland, ME, seeking more than four years’ worth of overtime pay that they had been denied.

Due to the lack of an Oxford comma in a state law, the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit sided with the drivers, saying the absence of a comma produced enough uncertainty to rule in their favor.  It reversed a lower court decision.

Though three drivers filed the class-action lawsuit, about 75 would share the money – an estimated $10 million.

Here’s the follow-up to the story:

“Ending a case that electrified punctuation pedants, grammar goons and comma connoisseurs, Oakhurst Dairy settled an overtime dispute with its drivers that hinged entirely on the lack of an Oxford comma in state law.

“The dairy company in Portland, ME agreed to pay $5 million to the drivers, according to court documents.

“The relatively small-scale dispute gained international notoriety last year when the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit ruled that the missing comma created enough uncertainty to side with the drivers, granting those who love the Oxford comma a chance to run a victory lap across the internet.”

The article noted that the Maine Legislature had “addressed the punctuation problem” in the law.

In summary:

There are those who insist the Oxford comma must always be used; those who insist it never be used; and those who say to use it when clarity is needed.

If you were to ask me about Oxford comma usage, I would say this:

“That’s an excellent question!  Look.  I mean, at the end of the day, you know – in my humble opinion, to be honest, basically…

“Right?!!”

A few weeks ago there was a phrase in an NBC article that caught my attention:

“…with the soul-satisfying sight of Trump being frog-marched down the Mar-a-Lago porte-cochère.” 

“Frog-marched.”

I’d heard the expression and knew it was something bad, and something bad + Trump in the same sentence sounded good to me.

But “frog-marched” isn’t a phrase we hear often, and I decided to find out exactly what it meant.

There are lots of etymology sites online, “etymology” itself being an interesting word meaning “the study of the origin of words and the way in which their meanings have changed throughout history.”

I started my study with this site:

I learned that “frog-marched” first came into use in London, “and the earliest reference to it is in the 18 April 1871 Evening Standard” in the form of “frog’s march,” a noun rather than a verb:

“The London method is called the ‘frog’s march’ in which the prisoner is carried to the station, with the face downwards and the whole weight of the body dependent on the limbs.”

The article thoughtfully provided this illustration:

It pleases me to imagine Trump in this prisoner’s position.

Over time “the frog’s march” noun also became a verb:

“By the 1930s, the verb was used in reference to the much more efficient (but less frog-like) method of getting someone in an arms-behind-the-back hold and hustling him or her along.”

An unknown graphic artist thoughtfully provided this image:

This image also pleases me.

*****

Another word that got me thinking is “pithy.”

I encountered it in an otherwise forgettable book, when a character referred to the writing she did for her Instagram posts as “clever and pithy.”

“Pithy” has two meanings:

Of language or style: Concise; brief but full of substance and meaning. 
Of a fruit or plant: Containing much pith.

Anyone who’s encountered citrus fruit has encountered pith – it’s that yucky white stuff between the peel and the fruit segments:

But how did that stuff get the name “pith,” and how did “pith” evolve into the adjective “pithy,” referring to language?

I looked at a number of etymology sites, but this time I did better on Wikipedia:

“The term pith is also used to refer to the pale, spongy inner layer of the rind…of citrus fruits (such as oranges).  The word comes from the Old English word piþa, meaning substance, akin to Middle Dutch pitte (modern Dutch pit), meaning the pit of a fruit.”

Well, a bit of a stretch, but…OK

But – how did “pith” become the adjective “pithy,” meaning “concise; brief but full of substance and meaning”?

“Pith is also used figuratively to refer to the essential part of something.”

Ah…so if someone’s writing or speaking is “pithy,” it’s expressing the “essential part of something” in a way that’s “brief but full of substance and meaning.”

So I’d say “pithy” is a compliment

Unless you’re referring to that yucky white stuff:

*****

I love words, which is a good thing since I’m a writer.

So I always look forward to Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Year, which comes out around the end of the year.

Here are their recent choices:

The 2022 word is an appropriate choice, but…

Not a nice choice:

“Merriam-Webster’s word of the year – and this you can believe – is ‘gaslighting.’

“The online dictionary chose ‘gaslighting,’ which it defines as ‘the act or practice of grossly misleading someone especially for one’s own advantage,’ as its top word of 2022 because it has become the ‘favored word for the perception of deception.’”

“Gaslighting” comes from the 1938 play and 1944 film Gaslight, the latter starring Ingrid Bergman, Charles Boyer and Joseph Cotten:

In both the movie and the play,

“…a nefarious man attempts to trick his new wife into thinking she’s losing her mind, in part by telling her that the gaslights in their home, which dim when he’s in the attic doing dastardly deeds, are not fading at all.”

This article:

Took the definition of “gaslighting” even deeper:

“…the psychological manipulation of a person, usually over an extended period of time, that ‘causes the victim to question the validity of their own thoughts, perception of reality, or memories and typically leads to confusion, loss of confidence and self-esteem, uncertainty of one’s emotional or mental stability, and a dependency on the perpetrator.’”

In both the CNN and AP articles there was direct and indirect linking of “gaslighting” and “Trump.”

No surprise there.

There are books about it…

…and plenty of headlines, this one from several years before Merriam-Webster chose “gaslighting” as its Word of the Year for 2022:

Gaslighting:  Word of the Year.

Appropriate, alas.

*****

Let’s wrap up Part I with this story and the ultimate word game:

The board game…

The online game…

The tournament game…

Scrabble, a game that’s been around and loved – and hated – for more than 70 years, has published its brand-new…

Here’s the November story:

“Bae, yeehaw, fauxhawk, thingie, adorbs, stan, vibing and sitch are just eight of the 500 new words Scrabble has added to the seventh edition of The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary, out this month.  They will join more than 100,000 words from between two to eight letters.  The book was last updated in 2018 and published through a partnership between Hasbro and Merriam-Webster.”

“Fauxhawk”?

Is that maybe a…fake…mohawk?  As in hairstyle?

Indeed it is:

I learned a new word! 

Bring on the Scrabble Tournament!

New words, old words, Old English words, Middle Dutch words – there’s no doubt about it…

Friday, January 13:  More Words On Words And…

*****

Potholders aren’t something we give much thought to – unless you need one and it’s nowhere to be found.

You grab a potholder, lift something hot off the stove or out of the oven, put the potholder back where you keep it, and forget about it until the next time you need it.

I, however…

Have a relationship with my potholder.

Which is odd, since I don’t cook.

I was born and raised in Michigan, and though I now live in San Diego, my potholder and I go way back.

My potholder, too, is from Michigan.

My potholder traveled from Michigan to California with me.

My potholder is a two-sided Michigan Mitten:

Michigan is the only state that models a potholder’s shape. 

See?

Michigan:  Two peninsulas.  Upper peninsula, left hand; lower peninsula, right hand.

Oh, other states have potholders:

I say “Piffle!” to those.

Michigan has the perfect potholder profile.

If you live in Michigan and someone asks you where you’re from, if you’re from the Lower Peninsula you hold up your right hand and point to your city with your left hand:

It’s a very handy (get it?) visual aid.

Another way Michigan is unique:  It is the only state in the U.S. formed by two peninsulas.

As I was ruminating on potholders and peninsulas, I started wondering…

Why is the upper peninsula part of Michigan?

The upper peninsula shares a border with Wisconsin, not Michigan:

In fact, the upper and lower peninsulas of Michigan don’t even touch each other at any single point.

They are connected, but that’s by the five-mile-long Mackinac Bridge, which spans across the Mackinac Straits of Lake Michigan and Lake Huron:

So if the peninsulas aren’t connected, but the upper peninsula is connected to Wisconsin, why is the Upper Peninsula (or UP as we natives say), part of Michigan?

Gosh – I grew up in Michigan and don’t know the answer to that.

I’m going on a quest to correct my ignorance.

Want to come along?

Let’s get started here:

It turns out that we have to go back to 1787, and to land that was west of the United States that had belonged to the British.  The land was ceded to the U.S. in 1783, and in 1787 Congress organized the land into what they then called the “Northwest Territory”:

Today we recognize it as all or large parts of six eventual states – Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and the northeastern part of Minnesota – but back then it was just a lot of land.

Then people in the southeastern part of the Northwest Territory got themselves organized, applied for statehood, and Ohio became a state in 1803.  The border between the state of Ohio and Michigan Territory was defined, and Ohio made sure that their new state would include Maumee Bay and Toledo.

Why did Maumee Bay and Toledo matter to Ohio?

Here are the Maumee River and Toledo:

The Maumee River runs from northeastern Indiana into northwestern Ohio, into Maumee Bay and Lake Erie just east of Toledo.

Importance:  An east/west water trade route.

Trade route = commerce.

Commerce = profits.

You bet Ohio wanted its border drawn to include Maumee Bay and Toledo.

I know – you’re wondering, “What does this have to do with your Michigan Mitt potholder?”

Hang in there.  We’re coming to the Toledo Strip.

All was well in Ohio, says this article:

Until…

“…until Michigan applied for statehood in 1833 and drew the border between itself and Ohio.”

Michigan drew its own border, and that border included Maumee Bay and Toledo.  The disputed tract of land, five to eight miles wide, 468 square miles, became known as the “Toledo Strip”:

“Not so fast!” said the people of Ohio (especially the ones who were benefiting greatly from the east/west water trade).  Ohio governor Robert Lucas pulled some favors in Congress to deny Michigan’s statehood, and that made Michigan governor Stevens Masons mad.

So the men did what men have done since the beginning of time:

They started a war.

Masons sent 1,000 Michigan militia to the Toledo Strip, and Lucas sent 600 Ohio militia.

As wars go, the Toledo “War” didn’t amount to much; it was mostly bloodless skirmishes, arrests, lawsuits, and saber rattling. 

Until things heated up in July 1835, according to this article:

And that heat reached all the way to the White House.  President Andrew Jackson got involved, and…

“Jackson brokered a deal and in June 1836, an agreement was ratified:  Ohio took control of the Toledo Strip, Michigan would be admitted into the union as the nation’s 26^th state, and Michigan would take control of 9,000 square miles of land of the Upper Peninsula.”

Of course, that land wasn’t called the “Upper Peninsula” then.  It was just a mass of land that many in Michigan considered a useless wilderness, full of trees and Indigenous Americans.

It wasn’t even connected to Michigan!

Michigan got its statehood, and – many believed – a bad deal.

And that is how the Upper Peninsula became part of Michigan.

And this is how it turned out to be a great deal:

In 1841, Douglass Houghton, Michigan’s first state geologist, filed surveys and reports demonstrating an abundance of copper in the western part of the Upper Peninsula.  It was the start of the area’s copper boom.

Copper-seeking prospectors rushed in and since then – according to Michigan’s Copper Deposits and Mining:

“…over 12 billion pounds of native copper have been mined.”

And that’s not all – there’s this:

William Austin Burt and his surveying crew first came upon iron ore in 1844.  Within a few years, iron mines opened all across the central Upper Peninsula. 

Since its first iron ore shipment of two hundred pounds in 1846, the Upper Peninsula mines have produced well over one billion tons of iron ore.

And there’s also this:

According to this and other articles:

Trees – especially white pine – had always been plentiful in Michigan, and so had creeks and streams.  Combine the two – felled trees and waterways to transport them in – and you have a logging industry.  Waterways also transported the finished product from the mills to markets on the lower lakes.

By 1869 lumber from the Upper and Lower Peninsulas meant Michigan was producing more lumber than any other state, a distinction it continued to hold for 30 years.

In recent years, Michigan’s forest products industry – products that range from basketball court floors and utility poles to paper envelopes, furniture and much more – generated record amounts of revenue, growing from $14.7 billion five years ago to more $20 billion today, according to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (MDNR).

Copper, iron ore, lumber…

As this headline summed it up:

And as this wit summed it up:

And as I’ll sum it up:

I got this:

And I turned…

Into…

Here’s how 2023 started in Washington, DC:

January 1:

“Before lawmakers can get down to the nitty-gritty of governing, Congress has some housekeeping to do.  Most significantly, the House needs a new speaker and the dust has yet to settle with who will become the face of the chamber.”

The process for choosing a new House speaker is a vote by the majority party, in this case, 222 Republicans.

Once the new House speaker is chosen, all 434 members of the House (there’s one vacancy) take the oath of office, and the business of the House – that “nitty-gritty of governing” – can begin.

All 434 House of Representatives members can get to work, doing what we elected them to do.

What we’re paying them to do.

How’s that working out for us taxpayers so far?

Day 1, January 3:

Day 2, January 4:

Day 3, January 5:

Today is Day 4 of this fiasco.

And they aren’t even bothering to show up until noon:

What – so they can all catch up on their beauty sleep?

No House speaker has been chosen.

No members of the House have been sworn in.

And the business of the House – that “nitty-gritty of governing” – can’t begin.

This seems like an opportune time to mention that members of the House are paid $174,000 per year.

Republicans:  222 members x $174,000 per year = $38,628,000 tax dollars per year.

And since Democrats can’t do anything until they, too, are sworn in…

Democrats:  212 members x $174,000 per year = $36,888,000 tax dollars per year.

Total:  $75,516,000 tax dollars per year to 434 people who aren’t doing the jobs we elected them to do.

That we’re paying them to do.

And that, my friends, is…

Everyone does it, but no one likes to talk about it:

Die.

No one likes to talk about dying or death, our own or others.

And I’m no exception.

But I read an article that got me thinking about death:

You can see the article was published on September 4.

That’s how long it’s taken for me to steel myself to talk about death.

The article got me thinking not only about death but also – from the headline – the planning involved in what happens after a death.  Meaning, if I had to deal with a loved one’s death, or if someone had to deal with my death.

And that got me wondering about one component of that planning, about which I know nothing:

Death certificates.

“Death certificate” is a phrase we often hear in news stories:  “According to the death certificate, the victim died of a gunshot wound…” and, “The death certificate lists pancreatic cancer as the cause of death…”

But what I didn’t know until I started researching death certificates was that if I’m designated as the person responsible for settling the estate of a deceased loved one (or other person), I can’t do this without the deceased’s death certificate.

According to this article:

“There are several reasons why you may need to obtain a death certificate.  Most often it’s to serve as proof for legal purposes.  These reasons may include accessing pension benefits, claiming life insurance, settling estates, getting married (if a widow or widower needs to prove that their previous partner has passed), or arranging for a funeral.”

“What,” I wondered, “do they mean by ‘obtain’ a death certificate?  Doesn’t – someone – just send that to me after my loved one dies?”

No.

Now, I’ll be talking only about my state – California – and we know that guidelines for this (as for so many things) vary from state to state.  But I expect there are commonalities among all states with regards to death certificates.

And here’s a commonality to expect:

In California, there is no “someone” who just goes ahead and sends a loved one’s death certificate to you.  As my research soon showed…

You must ask for it.

And I must obtain not just a death certificate, but an “authorized certified copy” of a death certificate.

And I can request that authorized certified copy only if I’m a “person authorized under California law,” according to the Marin County, CA website:

“Although vital records are public documents, under California law, certificates are not open for public inspection.  Anyone may request copies, however only persons authorized under California law may receive authorized certified copies of death records.”

How do I show that I’m a “persons authorized?”  Apparently it’s not enough for me to call the county office and say, for example, “Hello, I’m the legal guardian of the deceased” or, “Yes, I’m the spouse of the deceased,” and the county sends the death certificate to me.

No – I must prove I’m a “persons authorized.”

The Marin County website advises that I do this via a sworn statement that’s part of the death certificate request form, which I may need to sign before a notary public.  Here’s the request form:

Here’s the sworn statement section:

I continued my research on the state website:

The California Department of Public Health – CDPH.

The first thing I thought when I saw this site was,

“This looks like another DMV.  This is going to take me into a black hole, just like the DMV site does.”

I was right.

The site does tell me right up front:

“Certified death records are $24 per copy.”

And to settle an estate, I’ll need multiple copies for reasons that could include selling a loved one’s house, car, boat and/or second home; settling debts and closing credit cards; claiming life insurance; notifying Social Security; closing online accounts; accessing bank accounts and investment accounts; and making arrangements with a funeral home.

I can request the death certificate via an electronic submission, a mail-in request, or through the County Clerk/Recorder.

Electronic submission seemed like the most expeditious route, so I looked at that first and learned:

“There are independent, third party companies that process online requests for certified copies of vital records.  Online services provided by an independent company may charge a processing fee on all orders.  That fee may vary with each company, and will be charged in addition to the certified copy fee.  Any questions regarding online requests or online orders should be directed to the third-party company involved.”

My interpretation:

Electronic submission will also hit you with a fee, and if there’s a problem – contact them, not us.

How about a mail-in request?

Here’s the first step for the mail-in request:

“Before submitting your application to CDPH Vital Records, please view our Processing Times to make sure they are acceptable for your needs and if this is the best option. 

“If not, you should submit your request online or to the County Recorder’s Office in the county where the death took place.”

“Processing Times.”  Let’s look at that.

“The California Department of Public Health – Vital Records’ (CDPH-VR) average time to process a certified copy request is 6 to 8 weeks.”

“Average time,” of course, means it could be less than six to eight weeks – or it could mean more – before you can begin to settle an estate.

And that “six to eight weeks” may be overly optimistic – according to this website:

Expect a Slow Turnaround
California does not issue death certifies copies quickly, even if you need them to begin executing a will or trust.  The Department of Public Health/Vital Records states that it processes requests within 10-12 weeks.  Due to the coronavirus pandemic and staffing cuts, it could take even longer.

My third option for obtaining an authorized certified copy of a death certificate is contacting the County Clerk/Recorder.  I decided to look at my county, and this led me to a list of “County Registrars and Recorders” by county and city, which led me to my county’s Office of Vital Records and Statistics:

Where I learned that they, too, charge a $24 fee to obtain an authorized certified copy of a death certificate in person or by mail.

If I go the online route through something called “VitalCheck,” there’s an additional processing fee of $12.95.  VitalCheck graciously springs for the postage if you request the death certificate by mail (and we know how “by mail” can work out), but if you’re in a hurry, there’s a $19 charge for Express UPS.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are now in that Black Hole I mentioned earlier.

And once you get your authorized certified copies of the death certificate, cautioned this article on CNBC.com:

“Don’t let the death certificates get into the wrong hands.  Death certificates can provide a lot of access to personal documents and/or assets.”

There’s a kind of irony in all this.

That the piece I need the most to start settling my loved one’s estate – the authorized certified copy of the death certificate – requires a time-consuming process that could take two months or more, but I can’t get this taken care of ahead of time.

I can’t request this until my loved one dies. Of course not. It’s just…

Ironic.

Now let’s circle back to that September 4 Washington Post article and the phrase that got me started into my research about how to obtain a death certificate.

“What do you do after someone dies?  Most people expect to deal with intense grief, but they might not realize how many logistical details arise after a death.  Those tasks can feel overwhelming:  deciding who to call, learning where to get death certificates, planning memorials and navigating finances.”

The article didn’t tell me how to get an authorized certified copy of a death certificate, so I went on the research journey I’ve recounted.

The article does talk about…

“…new apps and websites with names such as Cake, Lantern and Empathy exist to help people navigate the tumult and confusion after a loss, offering tools that range from organized checklists for the early days of funeral planning to resources for later concerns such as closing a deceased person’s credit card account or finding a home for the deceased person’s pet.”

I wondered if these sites offer information about obtaining a death certificate, so I went on Cake and discovered that they do:

Cake, Lantern and Empathy may be helpful.

I’ll designate the Washington Post article as helpful because it got me thinking about all this.  I’m now better informed, and I’ll make sure my husband is, too.

The last thing I’ll include is the full list of “Individuals Permitted to Receive an Authorized Certified Copy,” this time from a Los Angeles County website which refers to the deceased as the “registrant”:

1. A parent or legal guardian of the registrant.
2. A member of a law enforcement agency or a representative of another governmental agency, as provided by law, who is conducting official business.
3. A child, grandparent, grandchild, sibling, spouse or domestic partner of the registrant.
4. An attorney representing the registrant or the registrant’s estate, or any person or agency empowered by statute or appointed by a court to act on behalf of the registrant or the registrant estate.
5. Any funeral director or agent/employee of a funeral establishment acting within the scope of their employment who orders certified copies of a death on behalf of any individual specified in paragraphs (1) to (5), inclusive of subdivision (a) of Section 7100 of the Health and Safety Code.
6. Any individual specified in paragraphs (1) to (8) inclusive of subdivision (a) of Health & Safety Code 7100.

With regards to #4 and #5, it appears an attorney of/representing the estate of the deceased, and a funeral director/employee, can request an authorized certified copy of my loved one’s death certificate, so if I have one or both of those, I may not have to do the requesting.

Though I’ll confess I did not delve into “paragraphs (1) to (5), inclusive of subdivision (a) of Section 7100 of the Health and Safety Code” or, “paragraphs (1) to (8) inclusive of subdivision (a) of Health & Safety Code 7100.”

I just couldn’t deal with one more trip into the bureaucracy…

…black hole:

The state of Georgia is known for many things, including the setting for Margaret Mitchell’s 1936 bestseller, Gone With The Wind:

Georgia is known for peaches:

And, briefly, Georgia was in the news because of this guy:

This is Christopher Spaulding, 40, and his news coverage appeared – and quickly disappeared – back in early December, but I thought the story was worth resurrecting.

Why?

Because ole Christopher is – no question – my nominee for the list of…

The setting is Rockdale County, GA:

And the catalyst was the Rockdale County Sheriff’s Office (RCSO). 

On November 28 RCSO posted this on Facebook:

Posting a “most wanted” list is a normal thing for law enforcement to do.

Spaulding, also of Rockdale County, GA saw the post, and I guess his feelings were hurt – that everyone-got-invited-to-the-party-but-me kind of thing.

But whereas most of us who aren’t invited to the party would hide out in a dark room and sulk…

Not Spaulding.

Are you kidding?

Look at him:

This guy is a University of Georgia Bulldogs fan through and through!  Right down to his color-coordinated sweatshirt and hat!

And you can bet that Spaulding knows that UGA Bulldogs slogan from back in the ‘80s:

That’s right:  GATA.

It stands for…

“Get After Their Asses!”

So Spaulding got after their asses – those Rockdale County, GA Sheriff meanies who didn’t invite him to their “Top Ten Most Wanted” party.

He jumped right on that Facebook page and said this:

And someone at the sheriff’s department took note, did their homework, and confirmed Spaulding had two outstanding warrants.

RCSO replied to Spaulding’s post:

They took a page from Spaulding’s playbook and got after his ass, and arrested him on warrants for felony violation of probation:

RCSO politely thanked Spaulding for his assistance:

This article:

Noted:

“After Spaulding was taken into custody, the Rockdale County Sheriff’s Office reminded wanted fugitives that being left off the ‘Most Wanted List’ isn’t a get-out-of-jail-free card.

“‘Our Top 10 is compiled based off of the severity of the charges only.  By not being on this list does not mean our Fugitive Unit is not looking for you if you have an active warrant.’”

Well, RCSO, that may be. 

But Spaulding was walking around Rockdale County with not one but two outstanding warrants, and if you were looking, you sure weren’t finding.

How many other Top 10 candidates are walking around free in Rockdale County, GA?

So Spaulding has taught RCSO a thing or two about…

Now I want to return to that ABC 11 Spaulding story from above:

Something right in the middle of the story struck me as odd:

This link:

“How,” I wondered, “could finding a ‘whole alligator’ inside a python be ‘related’ to the Spaulding story?”

The link took me to this story:

I watched the video and read the Florida Everglades/python/alligator story, and found nothing “related” to the Spaulding-getting-himself-arrested story.

But – I did see some mind-boggling images of the 18-foot python…

That made clear just how huge this snake was…

Compared to the humans in the Florida lab that were performing the necropsy on it.

How big? 

Big enough to swallow a five-foot alligator:

And though the video narrator was making a joke of the story, I didn’t find anything funny in it.

We all know that pythons aren’t native to Florida, and we all know how they got there.

According to this article:

“Between 1996 and 2006, roughly 99,000 pythons were imported into the United States as pets. 

“It’s believed the pythons began breeding in the wild as a result of two primary causes:  irresponsible pet owners releasing them, and the animals escaping their loosely-kept cages as a result of hurricane or stormy weather.”

Pythons are decimating the native wildlife in the Florida Everglades, hundreds of thousands of pythons breeding and expanding the python population because the animal has no natural predators in the Everglades.

All because of irresponsible pet owners who may have started with one of these:

But when it got to looking like this:

They loaded it into their car, drove to the Everglades and dumped it.

As for that “animals escaping their loosely kept cages,” the article says:

“In the late 90s and early 2000s, storms likely enabled snakes in loosely secured cages to escape during stormy weather.”

So – Florida’s python invasion is a 100% human-caused problem, start to finish.

Irresponsible humans.

I now see that the Christopher Spaulding and the python stories actually are “related.”

Let’s take a page from Spaulding’s playbook.

And those people responsible for the python disaster in the Everglades?

Let’s…