Some Population Statistics to Chew On

In 1912, the US population reached 100,000,000 citizens.

52 years later, in 1967, the nation's 200,000,000th citizen was born in Atlanta to Chinese-American parents.

On October 16th, 2006 -- 39 years later -- the United States expects citizen number 300,000,000 to be born. Based on projections, it is expected that this addition to the population will be an Hispanic child from Los Angeles.

I sometimes teach a unit on overpopulation to my class, depending on the grade I have that year. This will make an interesting real-life teaching moment.

As for where I stand on this...I confess to not having done more research on this issue. I know that the global population in toto is commonly believed to be rising steadily. I also know that many believe that it is not overpopulation that is the problem we face.

It's underpopulation that may be the issue, at least for the rest of the world. The United States may be an exception to that: we are currently the fastest-growing industrial nation in the world, and will soon be reaching population numbers to rival China and India. This even as outsourcing and other job issues significantly reduce our ability to employ these new people. Compound this with the fact that this country has the highest quality health care in the world, so we are living longer and longer, reducing the turnover rate. (I refer to this as the bathtub faucet-and-drain problem - if the water is rushing into the tub faster than the drain can remove it, what will eventually happen? No doubt others have already used this metaphor because it is so obvious, but my kids have generally not encountered it before, so I look terribly erudite and nerdy).

I think about this in the same context I think about everything nowadays...Michael. What kind of a world is he going to grow up into? Certainly this is only one of many issues that cause me anxiety at 3 AM, thinking about his future, but it is still a concern.

Anyway...that's all for now.

Damn, It Feels Good to Be a (lil) Gangsta...

Some Mo' Michaels....

Linking to Google Pages

I just set up another page, for no particular reason than that it was there. I like the picture of Michael that I have posted there, very much.

Thursday is Hell Day

Mike P.
Originally uploaded by rapnyc.

Really. My last 2 periods of the day are usually the Classes from the Pit of Flames. I get them back to back, after the occupants thereof have been loaded up with carbs and enough sugar to launch a rocket ship. Then they are sent, howling and falling over each other, into class, where they proceed to converse, yell at each other, shout across to one another, exchange desserts, laugh, tie shoelaces, and otherwise nullify any chance of the class getting anywhere. Usually. Today, though, was an unexpected phenomenon: the first of the classes came in and everything was more or less OKAY. Weird!

I was soon to find out that Nature, abhoring the vacuum, had decided to stack the chaos and concentrate it into the last class of the day instead, where all hell broke loose. After 70 minutes of this fun, I was now ready for Extended Time, 30 minutes of EXTRA tutoring (thanks for nothing, Randi Weingarten),after which I hustled it up to Lehman in the Bronx. I am now in the computer lab in Carman Hall, where I should be finishing up my epic PowerPoint presentation but instead am drafting up this bit of breathless, deathless prose. Bad me.

Then of course...I think of da littlest gangsta...and it's all good, all over again. Sweet.

Technorati Connection

I have linked up my Technorati profile to this blog. This can be accessed via the following link:

My (Bob's) Technorati Profile

Michael at Home

IMG 2347
Originally uploaded by rapnyc.

This is my son Michael, taken when we were just farting around one afternoon. He is my light and my life. Really, it is crazy how much I love him.

Class. Is. Boring!!!

I probably should not confess this, seeing as how I teach for a living, but...

I am sitting in Prof. Gningue's class, and my eyeballs are melting out of my head. Just saying, is all.

RIP Billy (1995-2006)

Yes, I know.

He wasn't particularly friendly, even from the start. But he was our boy, our Billy Don't Be a Hero, and I will miss him all the same. More to come later, but I have a hospital meeting to get to right now.

Sleep well, Billy. Say hi to Ling Ling from us. We love you, boy.

Boy...I am so sad right now.

RIP Billy (1995-2006)
Originally uploaded by rapnyc.

billy_face.jpg

A Test of Michael

Well, now that the baby is out of the bag, I thought I would play around with uploading some pix. This is a test...

A Test of Michael
Originally uploaded by rap_

Paris Ain't Got Nothin' On New York...

...for sheer springtime magnificence! I have made no secret of it: I love, love, love, adore, venerate, worship this city. Yes, it has its priorities messed up, sometimes royally so, and yes, the real estate situation is going to prevent us from buying a property here, and yes, gentrification is slowly and corrosively eating away at my two home neighborhoods of El Barrio and Chinatown...but for sheer brilliant beauty, you would have a hard time beating out Union Square Park on an April afternoon with 72 degrees on the thermometer and a baby due in only a few months. We left the Union Square clinic, where I finally met Lisa the head nurse and where Dr. Peretta put a microphone against Ting's abdomen, allowing us to hear Michael's heartbeat. I am not going to get foolishly optimistic, but...all signs are good. Signs are good. Ting is happy and so am I.

And to top things off, I am going to a surprise birthday party tonight for Evan's fiancee Lauren, and that means 2 great things: barbecue and margaritas. Yay!

Seeya later...

Sunshine, on my shoulder...

OK, this has been a day. A beautiful sunny day, absolutely spectacular. The Yankees are up in the Bronx having their home opener, and the year is hitting its stride.

We just got back in from Beth Israel, from Ting's latest ultrasound. Whenever I go in there, I am always nervous, a legacy from the Allison incident. Michael, however, appears to be fine. Just fine. Thank God. His spine, size, everything appears to be in order, and he currently weights 18 ounces. His first pound! Only 189 to go till he matches me!

Ting is radiantly beautiful to me lately, which is an utterly cliched thing to say, but it is true. I have never seen her so happy.

I believe this baby is really and truly a gift from Grandma, dear Grandma, who passed away one year ago this week. I miss her daily. I can only hope that she is happy, reunited with all but one of her children.

Anyway. Michael is fine. Ting is fine. We are fine. More to come later.

Sunday, sprung ahead

Sunday, a sunny day, 54 degrees.

Is is two days after my 44th birthday, our 10th wedding anniversary. A wonderful party on Friday night, thanks to my resourceful, bed-resting wife. I am in Apartment 14C in Chinatown, the window wide open, the sounds of the city drifting in. Listening to Patti Smith, "Because the Night," playing through a tiny set of Creative SBS Vivid 60 speakers I got for Ting so that she would not have to rely on the PowerBook's dinky speakers. Still hammering away at my Education paper, which is due Wednesday. Later, I will need to do lesson plans for the week and in general get ready. All that is happening today, still needs to get done.

Ah, but now...right now...

Right now I am sitting on the edge of the bed, in front of a dinner tray, typing this on Ting's PowerBook. She is lying on the bed, behind me, asleep. Inside her, Michael grows day by day.

I am content. Wherever you are, I hope you are too.

Testing Flock for Windows

Can you hear me now? Good.

One of these days I gotta get organisized...

So I'm checking out the CBS Sunday Show and they have a bit about clutter and getting rid of it. I am running aboot a LOT today, this being Sunday, the day of rest and everything, so I have only a few seconds to jot this down before running off to C-Town for (ugh) 6 boxes of scoopable crystal kitty litter:

STEPS TO ELIMINATING CLUTTER
1) eliminate stuff
2) categorize what remains
3) designate where it will go

does it enhance my life or the lives of others?

get boxes and sort the things out

That is it. I just really really want to remember this. Ting is fine and so is Mike. Love them both completely. Peace out.

The Simpsons...Live!!!

live action simpsons intro

Back in Queensie today

Working on my Maple project. Buh. At this point, I have quite a few irons in the fire:

1) Ting
2) Work
3) Mom
4) Lehman
5) Maintaining the place in Queensie
6) Ting
7) Tax time

A long list, and this does not include trying to get some of the down payment back. OK, got that out of my system...back to work!

Well, spring at last...

...and we had a peaceful Sunday today, with me working and Ting lying on the bed beside me. Nice day. She is feeling a little bit of pain but otherwise she is OK. She is going to see Dr. Stein tomorrow and we should know a little better what our status is. I gotta get back to work now, because school awaits tomorrow.

So far, so good...

Well, we had a scare with the baby this week.

We had run a series of blood tests with Ting last week, and this week they came back with a finding that we had scored higher than normal for a possibility of the baby having a Spinal Tube Defect - spina bifida and similar ailments. Depending on the severity of the problem, this might have meant that the baby would not be able to walk, or would be severely retarded, or other problems.

Then we had to wait for 2 days to find out whether this actually would be the case, and if so, what would we choose to do about it? This was the most agonizing part: having lost Allison, were we prepared to do something like that again? This was apart from the cerclage issue, which made things even more distressing.

Fortunately, Dr. JAffe, who took a look at the Ultrasound, pronounced that Mike's spine seemed to be OK. That left one MAJOR issue resolved. I asked him how the cerclage was, and he said it appeared to be holding on. This was EXCELLENT news, and sorely needed. Later that evening, of course, Dr.Stein called us at home and told us that Dr. Jaffe had remarked that the cervix was in good shape as well, which while good news, still causes me worry.

How can that be? When this was the source of our previous sorrow? When they had mentioned the shortness of the cervix as recently as Monday?

Should I even be looking at this gift horse too closely? Does that make me an ingrate for what I guessis a real miracle for us? I am so worried that Ting's heart would break if it happened again, and I so want to be happy. I guess I just don't want to be so bitterly disappointed again.

And should we go ahead with the amniocentesis?

Well, well...

So it appears that Ting is pregnant again! This comes as a majopr shock, and that is the mildest way of putting it. After all these years of trying to conceive, then fertility treatments, then losing Alison, I had just about given up hope of trying have a baby...and then THIS.

OK. Deep breath. That's better.

Our baby is a boy this time. My little guy. Our little guy. I keep rolling the phrase aroound, testing it out. My son. Son. Our son. It feels so weird saying it. We're having a baby.

Wow.

I hope that we can hold on to this one this time. I miss Alison a lot some days. When a friend of moine showed me pictures of himself and his son together, the feeling was excrutiating. A day later, on the way out of Lehman, I get the word from Ting.

More to come. What a way to start March.

George, George, George of the (wireless) Jungle....

I know you do this too.

You're on a Manhattan bus with your PSP or PDA or laptop or whatever, and you decide to try surfing the web, just to see if you can. At this point, Manhattan would seem to be a dense cloud of connectivity, but I prefer to liken it to a jungle, which means that as you cross from one zone to another, never losing connectivity for more than a few seconds, you are swinging from vine to wireless vine, neh?

This is a partial list of wireless LANs I encountered while web surfing aboard a Manhattan bus:

dirtydeedsdone
lexbeach
eddie t. head
ANY
homesweethome051226
fatty
stop looking at porn & love me,
Fatty
Usman
go_red_sox
Team Zissou
kingvance
loboworld
merlot
Lipuma
lindseyworks
Peyton
Goldberg
Lisanet
AWNY
Kaplan
burnrate
straats
Weiser Network
Shadow
Doula
28E
LaiWang
gioggle
EVE
aladdin
Tomarigi_G_105
gamgee1
WLCM
gosswireless
Oreo
Dolphin
thebeach2
security_is_paramount
honors_college
Big Steve
Wireless O
Hyperion
Apple Pad
goaway99
lovesupreme
Greg's Computer
Sydney

You can learn a lot about a person from what he or she names their network. I know, I know, a brillliant insight, but hey...I found it interesting...

Later this same day...

OK. so it is now 10:00 PM. Ting has come home, we have had some (mediocre) sushi, and we are settling in for the night. I am still feeling pretty frustrated, but not as intensely as before. This is just one of those days, that's all. Anybody who teaches will tell you that this comes with the job. So I will go in tomorrow and try to make yet another bit of difference. Seeya later. Peace out till next time.

Oh, lest I forget...

Happy Valentine's Day, everybody. Reach out and hug someone.

A hard day's day

Before I begin, I would like to clarify one thing:

I like teaching. Honestly.

Having said that, though, I can tell you that there are days when I really wonder why I am bothering to do this. I am teaching elementary math concepts like slopes and converting units to teenagers who would just as soon not bother, or even try, and who then declare that they hate math and will never need to know this in the future, so why bother now?

The sad part is, they might be right. For a lot of them, this is a useless tortutre that they will put out of their minds as soon as they are physically and psychically able.

Part of the blame must lie with me, because I am teaching the class and trying to manage the whole thing, around 22-25 students in a class, some of them bored because they already know this stuff, the rest bored because they would rather be anywhere else but here. But how can I pull this into some kind of razzle-dazzle that will capture their attention? Why do I need to do that to upper high school students? They will take the soft treatment and go on to college, and promptly drop out of college when faced with the reality of what a real class demands.

As Nero Wolfe was fond of saying...pfui.

I am in a really tired, bad mood right now, and I am still facing the prospect of a long day in Lehman, and I just want to go home and sleep. I know I will probably feel different tomorrow, but man, sometimes this is a snapshot of exactly how I feel.

Discuss.

yet another test

This is being written from a firefox plugin that adds a blogging tool to the browser. Cool!

RIP, Will Eisner, one year later

Amen.


http://www.comicon.com/thebeat/2006/01/never_forget.html