You do know the cape doesn't actually allow you to fly, right?

We've all heard about the weird warning labels on seemingly innocuous products, or the "well, duh!" warnings that a can of tuna contains tuna or a jar of peanuts contains peanuts. We've heard about the classic warning on a Batman costume: "PARENT: Please exercise caution--FOR PLAY ONLY: Mask and chest plate are not protective: cape does not enable user to fly." And you may have seen a warning not to allow the dog to drive or operate heavy machinery after taking his medicine.

Some of our toys display warnings or disclaimers. For example, one of the cool science toys we sell is the Top Secret Kinetic Mystery. You spin a little top on the platform, and the top will spin for days. Is the toy really top secret? Does it prove that perpetual motion is possible? Is magic involved?

Nope. It's all science, as the Top Secret folks explain in an enclosure inside the box.

The "Top Secret" consists of a spinning top with a radially oriented magnetic field and an associated base that houses a conductive coil. When the top spins past the center of the base, its changing magnetic field induces a current in the coil which momentarily opens the switch to the battery resulting in powering up the electromagnet. The electromagnet then delivers enough torque to the spinning top to allow it to speed up and spin away from the center. Since the electromagnet is only engaged when the top crosses near the center of the base, one 9 volt battery can last for over a week of continual use!

Unfortunately, one of our customers from Arizona was not impressed.

Enclosed, please find your Product advertized as a --"Top Secret Perpetual Motion"
--"A Kinetic Mystery"
--"Mystery in Motion"

But it is no more than a top powered by a battery. I feel disappointed and taken Advantage of. I expect a full Refund.

We sent him his full Refund with an explanation the top is not a perpetual motion machine. As for his feeling of being taken Advantage of, I suggested that he write to the company that produces the toy.

Indian Market 2012

Michele and I made our annual trip to Indian Market, and this time we had the pleasure of Chuckie and Jerry's company. We started, of course, with breakfast at Tia Sophia's at 7:00 a.m., and after burritos and French toast, we were off to the Market. Walk along with Michele and me, and if we get separated, meet at the Spitz Clock every hour on the hour to check in.

Let's look first at the jewelry that folks wore. As always, the philosophy was, "If a little is good, a lot is better." Click on the images to enlarge them.

This woman wore her earrings, necklace, bracelet, rings, and concho belt. The hand is probably on her shoulder not as an affectionate gesture but as a way to help hold her up.

A couple necklaces are always nice.

We named these guys Scrimshaw (left) and Dinner Plate (right). Scrimshaw had a concho belt, cuff, and bolo tie with images of famous Native chiefs done in scrimshaw. His jewelry was beautiful but excessive. Dinner Plate was posing for photos with his rings, cuffs, concho belt, and bolo tie—all the size of dinner plates. He was pretty, and very strong to be able to carry all that metal and rock.

This woman had an interesting bolo tie with inlaid stones and a cool cuff.

Here is the poet Joy Harjo, whose tattoos are unmistakable. I wanted to go up and shake her old cow hand, but Michele was shy, so we didn't.

What is the stylish man or woman about town wearing this season at Indian Market? Let's take a look.

Colorful skirts are always appropriate.

I see by your outfit that you are a cowb—um, never mind.

A raspberry hat and matching water-bottle tether touched off with chile anklets will give other visitors a fright if nothing else. 

Not enough jewelry? Don't despair. Just wear every bit of camera gear.

In the middle of the most exciting and important market of the year, some people are elaborately blasé and seemingly oblivious to what's going on.

The ATM at the bank was as popular as the booth for Best in Show.

Dogs aren't allowed at Indian Market. Apparently that means "dogs with their feet on the ground and walking around are not allowed at Indian Market." But Bears are allowed.

We have a winner!

I have written here many times about some of our local self-published writers. They figure that if they run their prose through the spell-checker, it's good to go. Story editing? Forget it. Audience analysis? Not for them. A well designed cover? They have Microsoft Paint and aren't afraid to use it. Illustrations that support the text? See "Microsoft Paint," above. A price point that will move books? They have to recoup their investment from the publisher (or the local copy place), so they charge $16.95 for a 32-page children's book.

After seven years in the book business, I think we have a winner, Dipsy. Dipsy's agent brought in four books, which are so unrelievedly awful as to be worthy of display in a glass case with bits of string and dead mice.

Contrast these two passages, one from Jonathan Edwards, the other from Dipsy. They're both about the same length (85 words vs. 82 words). But notice how Edwards, in his famous sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," uses vivid, frightening images to convey the ideas of fear and dread. Kathleen Norris would say that such language is incarnational; that is, the language relies on imagery to convey meaning at multiple levels.

The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours.

The sentence, though long, is easy to follow because of the imagery and construction. Contrast it with Dipsy's account, which apparently made sense to her.

The glass was a barrier for the billowing clouds of steam pumped by machines at the rear, which like projectors in a theatre, streamed images on the stage set, shutting out the billows of the Image Chamber, as it was called, closed as  it would be on a stage set, shutting out the billows before the next ones formed, giving the viewer time to figure out what he had just seen, an imaginative world made of steam no less, wet and changeable.

Cover art should not provoke a reaction opposite the one the illustrator had in mind. Consider the cover art, which Dipsy did her own self. A lot is going on. It apparently is a preview of everything in the book.

However, nobody on the staff at the bookstore could get past the gray thing in the center of the illustration. Alan started choking on his lunch and had to be patted on the back. Ellen said, "Well, great. An erect penis in the kids' section." I told Ellen that the book was for young adults. She replied that no young adult reader would be caught dead with a book featuring an erect penis, a clown, and a giant reptile. Michele asked, "What's that red stuff? Is it flames or blood? And did the guy climbing the building just poop out an s?"

When a book causes reactions ranging from numb bemusement to dry heaves, we won't carry it—but I'll hang on to it for show 'n' tell.

I needed a key for a ham can: the mammogram

After my mammogram I just rolled those puppies up and put 'em back in the bra. The results were normal.

My appointment for a mammogram

I get my annual mammogram in late June or early July, so I called the radiology folks at the medical center to make an appointment. Naturally, I did not get a human being, although my call was very important to them. But I listened carefully, as their options had changed, and dutifully did all that the voice of the little dolly said. That was Monday.

By Thursday I hadn't received a call, so before I took myself to breakfast and then to work, I went in person to the medical center.

Registration person: May I help you? 

Me: Yes. I need to make an appointment for a mammogram.

Registration person: You need an appointment?

Me: Yes. For a mammogram.

Registration person: You need an appointment for a mammogram?

Me: Yes. A mammogram. An appointment.

Registration person: Ohhhhh! An appointment! Go down there a little ways. Sort of around the corner. There's a little room by the pharmacy. You know where the pharmacy is? It's down there a little ways. Sort of around the corner. Go in the little room by the pharmacy.

So I went down there a little ways, sort of around the corner, to the little room by the pharmacy. The dolly-in-charge was on the phone with a patient and motioned me to have a seat. No! Not that chair! The other one. I parked it.

 She returned to her call. She was very thorough, asking the patient whether he had had any surgeries, had any implants such as metal stents, joints, or shrapnel [!!], and what medications he was on. "How do you spell the name of that drug?" Lengthy pause. "Well, if I don't get it right, I'll just write something else." [!!!!!]

I waited for a long time inhaling the fumes from her perfume marinade and listening to her interrogation of the patient. Eventually another dolly came in, uttered no greeting, made no eye contact, and disappeared behind a second partition. I could hear her tapping on the keyboard in her cubicle. After a while she peered around the corner and asked, "Have you been helped?"

"Not yet," I said.

"Do you need to make an appointment?" she asked.

I thought, "Unless I miss my guess, the sign reading 'Registration' outside the door indicates that anyone in this room would indeed need to make an appointment. However, that is not the case with me. I just enjoy sitting in hospital waiting rooms to catch up on my Good Housekeepings from 2004. Continue with your tapping, my good woman." But I said yes, and presented her with my insurance card and doctor's orders, which documents she was obviously familiar with, much to my surprise.

I was out of there and at my regular table at Ruby's only 30 minutes from when I started.

The Shoe Family

Here is the Shoe Family. Shoe is checking her phone for messages from her clients. She is one busy Gaucho!

And here are Kevin and Emily. What a handsome and charming couple. They crack me up.

Where's Annette? She's at work or sleeping after a late night at work. So I'll just pop in her own photos of Annette entertaining herself while stuck in traffic.

Inflation and where we sat

When Cousin Rick and I went to the Dodgers game in 1964, we sat in Section 151 (marked with the black arrow on the stadium map below). Tickets then were $3.50, which, according to an inflation calculator, has the same buying power as $25.95 today. When we went to the game last week, we sat in section 126 (marked with the orange arrow). The tickets cost $65.00 instead of $25.95, because you have to pay Albert Pujols' $12 million salary somehow.

The experience both times, however, was priceless!

Tickets: 48 years apart

Where we sat