Sunlit leaf

    God, these computer systems are maddening.

    So Thursday night my Apple iMac asks me if I want to download the new version of the Tahoe software. Sure, why not? Keep all the fixes and security patches up to date. I hardly thought about it.

    This morning, I wake up, and my photos are gone — oh, they're up in the Cloud, safe. But I want them on my iMac, where they were yesterday, so I can scroll through them at my leisure. Sometimes the iCloud is balky.

     You'd think human agency could make it happen — and maybe it can, because I dealt with a variety of robots on Apple support, walking me through useless stuff I'd already gone through.  It drove me crazy that I couldn't make it work. At times, it seemed so close.

     Okay, big deal, so I'll use the Cloud instead of Photo. Half the readers probably won't even know what I'm talking about. But what galls me is Apple never even asked. Click this button and we'll give you a day — and counting — trying to undo the technical mess we made. 

    Ah well, shouldn't complain about that. Look at this lovely gingko leaf, backlit by the setting sun. A living fossil, the gingko.  Two hundred and twenty seven million years old — predating the dinosaurs — and not one second spent slogging through this balky computer system bullshit. Must be nice.

      

Wellness doesn't just happen — it requires effort

 

     Consider the information you ignore. The pages swiped away in a blink. The emails — for old fogies like us that even use email — hundreds a day, real, fake, urgent, irrelevant, scams, skipped over with hardly a glance. Plus ignored text messages, bulletins, alerts, pings. I’d hesitate to guess how much communication is filtered out, unprocessed: 90%? 99%? 99.9%? It’s amazing anything gets through.
     Meanwhile, random stuff snags your attention. It wasn’t the poetry of the subject line, “Wellness Wednesday: Mental Health and Self-Care Week 7" that hooked my interest. Maybe because I had just gotten an MRI on my torn-up left shoulder. A little wellness might hit the spot. And what is “self-care” anyway? It sounds almost raunchy.
     I opened the message.
     “Self-care is the practice of taking care of your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health,” wrote Chicago Public Media human resources manager Stephanie Sferra Bassill. “While many people view self-care as a form of selfish indulgence, prioritizing yourself is an essential component of overall well-being.”
     Hmm... I thought... let me get this straight: my employer is urging me to set aside this work nonsense, these bothersome interviews, the endless tappity-tap-tap on a keyboard, and just live a fuller, healthier, happier life?
     Well yeah. I can do that.
     Where to begin?
     For some reason I skipped the first, physical health aspect, and went straight for mental and emotional, dialing the number of a friend I’d been meaning to call. Isolation is a modern plague — we think we’re so connected by social media, when we’re really staring at a screen alone. I got his voicemail. A second friend. Also voicemail. A third. Again voicemail. No wonder we’re all so frazzled. A fourth call. Any guesses? Voicemail.
     People really don’t use the telephone anymore.

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Artificial intelligence overlords still a work in progress

 

Saint Jerome and the Angel, by Simon Vouet

   
     My wife went to the White Sox game Wednesday. Which caused a twinge of envy, both for her belonging to an office that socializes together, and because the Sox were playing the Guardians, the Cleveland team.

     It was rainy day. And first thing in the morning, I was concerned that the 1:10 game would be rained out. So I plugged what I thought was a very simple, very direct question into Google: "Is today's white sox game cancelled?" I didn't think it would actually be cancelled so early in the morning, but it was supposed to rain all day, and I was curious to reach some site that would keep me posted. This is what AI served up:

     Could she have the wrong day? That happens. I checked the White Sox Schedule site. Nope, there was indeed a game that afternoon, stated bold as brass. Though a jillion dollars worth of AI couldn't seem to take that into account, couldn't figure out if the Sox had a game scheduled in a few hours or not. A fairly straightforward question.

     I know this is my self-flattering bias at work. AI seems to be working just fine, helping students undercut the value of their educations, and allowing office grinds to be fired en masse, replaced by puffs of electrons up in the Cloud. And yes, I will probably still be savoring examples of AI incompetence up to the moment the robot guards herd me into the camp. But before people are going to pay money for this shit, it has to at least work, right? Forget amazing, or essential, or impressive, or even useful. This is bush league stuff. 

It's right between Shangri-La and Wakanda

 

Chicago Public Schools board member Ellen Rosenfeld.

     With the state of Israel being continually mugged in the court of public opinion, I decided to check out Monday's celebration of the nation's 78th birthday, held by the Consulate General of Israel in Chicago. See how they are holding up.
     The location was kept secret, as is the Israel practice, a reminder that, for all the menace assigned to Jews, they're still the ones who have to lurk in the shadows, worrying about being killed, which anyone who has visited Europe must notice. Church doors are wide open for anyone to walk in off the street, while with synagogues, you find yourself being buzzed through one of those 90 degree security pens after being sniffed for explosives.
     Plus the prospect of disruptive protesting. The We Love Bunnies of Israel Club at Northwestern, should one exist, couldn't hold "Pet a Soft Bunny Day" at Deering Meadow without being shouted at by passersby, if not organized mobs.
     Expecting something fancy, I put on my blue blazer and khakis.
     "These are Israelis, right?" said my wife, whose point of reference is when you could take a taxi from Israel to Egypt and sleep on the beach. But I read the room in advance correctly. Some of the 500 guests actually wore neckties.
     Security had to be cleared. "You want to hear my Torah portion?" I asked the stern man giving me the once over, referring to the passages read at my bar mitzvah. "Yes," he said, and I began to rattle off the beginning of Leviticus 25, in Hebrew. He waved me through.

      The first partygoer I recognized was comptroller Susana Mendoza. I hurried over, and watched her show off a photo of a map of the Middle East that her son brought home from Smyser Elementary School, where the nation that since 1948 has been known to the world as "Israel" is labeled "Palestine" in that odd performative denialism that some seem to imagine moves the ball of justice forward.
     "All these kids think Israel is Palestine because that's what they're being taught," said Mendoza. "It's everywhere."
     I asked her if she felt strongly about Israel.
     "I wouldn't be here if I didn't," she said. "Everyone should feel safe in this city. It's scarier for Jewish people."
     I suppose. Contemplating that map, I'd be tempted to say, with a brisk wave of the hand, "Well, look at that! They have their country, right there. So what are you bitching about?"
     But that's callous, and there's enough callousness going around without adding more. Harshness is the rule of the day. One way to understand Israel now is the former deep bench of peaceniks have been swept away by years of frustration, not to forget the Oct. 7 massacre. Now they've got the same rigid nationalists that are plaguing this country, busy blowing Gaza to smithereens, a gift to anti-Zionists everywhere. Strange times indeed, when the Mayor of New York is a more vocal enemy of Israel than the king of Saudi Arabia.

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Flash: Eli's Cheesecake makes non-cheesecake cake

     Imagine, for a moment, a friend says, "I'm going to Wrigley Field to watch the Cubs play." You process this information, then observe, benignly: "It's a nice day for baseball." And your friend replies, "Oh no, I'm not watching the Cubs baseball team, but the Cubs soccer team. They also have a Midwest Premier League soccer team."
     You'd be gobsmacked, right? You'd think, "How did I possibly miss that?!"
     Now you are in the mindset to share an experience I had this week. I'd mentioned in my column that it was my birthday, and my friends at Eli's very kindly sent a cake. Made me feel special. But opening it, I was confronted with a surprise: it wasn't one of the ne plus ultra Eli's cheesecakes I've been rhapsodizing on this blog for the past 13 years, next week. No. It was a chocolate layer cake, specifically an Old-Fashioned Triple Chocolate Cake. 
    We served it Sunday at our Father's Day grill out, and let me tell you, the results were extraordinary. "I want THIS cake at my next birthday!" my wife enthused. Twice, lest I miss the hint, as I sometimes do. She even explained why: she likes the frosting — especially the frosting, elaborating that this is unusual because she is generally is not a fan of frosting. Often, with cake, she skips the frosting, sliding it aside. Too sweet. But not this frosting. This frosting, however, has that essential quality of being Not Too Sweet. I don't want to say that the consensus among my guests was that Eli's is hiding its light under a bushel by making all these fine cheesecakes when it is also capable of making such a superfine, magnificently dark, dense and rich but not too sweet chocolate cake that is not a cheesecake. But conversation unfolded among those lines.
     They also make a tiramisu and a classic carrot cake, as I learned after checking on the Eli's web site, curious as to whether the company actually sells this non-cheesecake cake, or if it is, I don't know, something experimental, or maybe something special their bakers whipped up in a fit of whimsy just for me. (A hint of how my mind works and why life can be so frequently disappointing). 

     The good news is, they do sell this truly excellent chocolate cake, for $64, which might seem a lot, but then again, you have not yet tasted the cake. I will also point out that they claim it serves 12, and while I would not accuse Eli's of false advertising, I will observe that we were 15 and we only managed to finish less than half the cake. Yes, we were filled with my wife's superlative tilapia ceviche and flank steak and good Romanian garlic dogs and potato salad. That said, I believe 1/12 of a cake this dense and rich and fantastic would kill any average adult after any decent meal because, believe me, I wanted more than anything else to dive in for more cake, and kept scraping up various bits left on the plate, but just couldn't physically do it. That damn Ozempic perhaps. We froze the rest for the next happy occasion.
    My bone deep honesty requires that I remind you that Eli's does spend a fortune advertising on this blog between Thanksgiving and Valentine's Day, and the cynics among you might consider this log-rolling, though you would be wrong. Were the cake just ordinary cake, were it cake consumed by my guests with an indifferent shrug and a few benign comments ("I am eating this cake now") I would have let the experience pass unremarked upon. But the twin facts that a) Eli's makes non-cheesecake cake and b) it is really very, very good cake, obligated me to share this exciting news with you, in my capacity as a full-service blogger committed to sharing with my readership the wonders of the world.
     What you do with that information is your concern, though I would recommend the scoffers among you to order the cake here — it ships across the country — and then you can tell EGD readers your own honest, uninfluenced-by-the-application-of-money impressions, though I am certain they will be no different than mine.

     Meanwhile, my wife was still talking about it the next day.

     "That was incredible cake!" she said, holding my hand and gazing deeply into my eyes. "You have to tell them how much we liked that cake."

     I promised her that I would.

Dirty politics, dirty soda and dirty Mormon wives

     The trouble with trying to keep tabs on what's happening, politically, is we've reached such a thunderous crescendo of jaw-dropping ineptitude that the only way to even touch upon it is with cursory glances. Over the long weekend, no fewer than five earth-shaking shocks reverberated, starting with our nation basically surrendering to Iran. Space is tight, so let's jump right in:
     1. The Strait of Hormuz remains closed, less than 24 hours after ...
     You know what? I'm not doing this. Either you long ago grasped the full-blown disaster that hourly unfolds, or you never will. No reason to rub it in, for the former, nor annoy the latter by pointing out colors they can't perceive.
     Not when we can talk about dirty soda instead. I'd heard, vaguely, of the beverage, as some kind of mania in liquor-challenged Utah. The Sun-Times of course has been keeping up on the trend. But I never gave it much thought, until dirty soda arrived Saturday on Center Avenue in the form of an ambitious 11-year-old neighbor who, taking advantage of garage sale traffic jamming the street, set up a stand selling what I assumed was lemonade.
     Children's lemonade stands are my Achilles' heel. I have no defense against them. I could be bleeding, profusely, driving to the hospital with a tourniquet around my arm and, spying a stand, would still pull over and hurry to press money on the young entrepreneur.
     For one simple reason: When my younger son was a lad, he once set up such a stand at the foot of our driveway, on our little-traveled suburban block. The sight of my boy sitting there, with his pitcher and his cups and his handmade sign, wanly calling "Lemonade. Lemonade for sale" to the empty street broke my heart — truly, part of me died, right there, and my restless ghost seeks redemption for indifferent humanity by patronizing lemonade stands.
     So when, during weeding Saturday, I noticed the activity next door, I immediately stood up, pulled off my gloves, ran inside, grabbed cash and raced over.
     Only it wasn't lemonade. It was dirty soda — pop mixed with whipped cream and a variety of flavored syrups, garnished with a cherry and a gummy. The mom explained that dirty soda is a thing on a television show, "The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives." Mormons don't drink, generally, so they've taken to guzzling 44-ounce egg creams on steroids.
     Fortunately, my industrious neighbor child had Diet Coke — I'm dancin' with Mr. Diabetes, remember — so I took my dirty soda back to my office. It was actually quite delicious, though I only nibbled the gummy shark swimming in it — and began my research with Season 1, Episode 1 of "Mormon Wives."
     OMG. I'm not sure I can express the plot of the reality show in words. Four young Mormon women started making TikTok dance videos and, apparently, having unspecified sexual escapades with each other, or each other's husbands, or both. But that's like saying "Hamlet" is about a prince who is sad. It doesn't come near to capturing the spirit of the thing. "Mormon Wives" is a show about humiliating yourself and your friends online for profit.

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The glass elephant

      The glass elephant was in my mother's purse when she died, one year ago today. 
      She'd had it most of her life — taken it to Europe with her when she went to entertain the troops, at 16, as a good luck token. I should have asked her the story of how she got it. It's two and a half inches long, pressed glass, cheap. Something won at a carnival in the early 1950s, perhaps. So let's say a boy won it for her or ... reflecting current sensibilities ... that she won it herself. Though frankly, I prefer the won-it-for-her version.
     She lent it to my father as he circled the world as a government scientist. Europe. Africa. Asia. Australia. Carrying the elephant guaranteed safe return. Nobody ever lost it. 
      My brother got to the hospital first, and ended up with the purse, and the elephant. Less sentimental than myself, he didn't want anything of hers. When we cleaned out her room at the dynamic senior living facility in Addison, we divided her effects between things to throw away, and things I was keeping. I envied him his strength. I'll throw it all away too, eventually. Or someone will. But not now.
     I let six or nine months go by — and how quickly time seems to pass, while crawling — then did ask  him for the elephant. At one of our regular lunches he delivered it. Though I was almost sorry I had. Back home, regarding it, I felt a deep pang, almost a shock, as truly sad about her passing as I ever was, because I realized, in that moment, that its locus of significance rested with me and me alone. Nobody else would ever know, or care. Like the glass trinket, her entire world, really, rested in the palm of my hand or, rather, some clump of neurons nestled somewhere in my head. Talk about a fragile weight, a glass elephant. Someday, it would be gone, and before then, I, or someone, would release this glass animal into the slipstream of life, and it would rush away to be, at best, treasured by someone who appreciated its  ... 
     I plugged the picture above into Google Image Search and — to my surprise — learned it is an L.E. Smith pressed glass elephant, made by a Pennsylvania glass company. Twelve dollars and twenty-five cents on eBay and it's yours. We have so much knowledge now.
     Not that it would be her glass elephant, which I added to a little menagerie of her elephants  set up on a shelf in my office. She collected them or, rather, expressed a fondness for this one, and elephants became our father's go-to gift. I moved the group to a better spot, to take a picture, and realized that one member of the herd was missing, a fine green stone elephant that my father bought in South Africa. I hunted for it longer than I should — so much crap in my office — trying to tamp down the almost frantic urgency by thinking of something she used to say when we'd lost things as children: "You'll find it when you're not looking for it."
     That never quite worked — I remember being more annoyed than anything else. And it didn't work very well now, as I hunted around in places I'd already looked. Finally I went off to do other things and, distracted, found some critical distance, and moved on. It occurred to me that I was frantically trying to keep my world together a little longer, in face of the great scattering sure to come. In the end, one less elephant might even be a good thing. Though I still hope to find it. When I'm not looking for it. My mother was a smart woman, in many ways.