California dishwasher steamrolls Finnish Family TV spin-off
Lacking imagination, that machine took a conventional protest route: it stopped making ice. Conventional failures are easily fixed — once the repairman locates the right component. That search took a couple of weeks. After restoration of ice-maker functionality, the repairman noticed that the refrigerator door was about to ‘fall off’. “But,” he told us:
“Don’t worry. It’s a quick fix. I just need to…”
“… order a part,” I thought.
“ … order a part,” he concluded.
Note: Photo from 1960's, Carteret, NJ, Dan, Marjorie, Grandpa Martin, Wendy, David, Dad, Sandi, Mom
While we wait, the dishwasher failed in a more subtle and devious fashion. It continued to make noise and use water, but it also dislodged debris that had accumulated deep in the bowls of the mechanism. It then propelled these scraps and dregs into the dishes The accelerated sediment and sludge were embedded deep into the molecular structure of the dishes that were supposed to be washed. It was ugly. In short: the dishwasher had become a dish dirty-er. Thankfully it didn’t have a ‘spin cycle’.
While we tried to solve that problem, we noticed that the water softener had also clogged. A ‘close’ examination, well, a ‘cursory’ look illuminated the cause.
“There is a bird’s nest blocking…”
“Is the mother bird ..”
“No, it is an abandoned nest. But it’s clogging the back flow.”
After we fixed the water softener and ordered a new dishwasher, the television, admiring the subtlety displayed by the dishwasher, developed a devilishly devious affliction.
Background:
Tom and Melika took Nazy and me to dinner and a show:
Eric Idle and John Cleese: together again at last … for the very first time.
It was a great show — incredibly funny. I can also report that John Cleese has gained a lot of weight.) He recalled “A Fish Called Wanda” movie.
“People complained that we made fun of stutterers —maybe rightfully so,” he said. “But interestingly, no one complained that we squashed a human being with a steam roller.”
Later that week, “A Fish Called Wanda” was available on-demand from Cox Cable. Nazy and I assembled the popcorn and settled in for an evening of laughter. The TV had other plans..
“I am having trouble with these British accents,” Nazy said as the movie began.
“It’s dubbed in Portugese.” I thought. “Me too.” I said. “But I think we have a bigger problema.”
“That’s not English!” Nazy declared. Accurately.
“Was Tiger playing with the remote?” I asked.
I spent ‘a while’…
Aside
Tiger wanted to be carried. And, he didn’t want me to carry him he wanted..
“Mamon Joon should carry me,” he said.
“You’re very heavy, Tiger,” Nazy replied as she picked him up. “I’ll carry you for a little while.”
“I want you to carry me for a big while.” Tiger replied.
End Aside
Note: Nazy, Dan, Mitra, Memphis, 1970's
Speaking of ‘whiles’, I spent ‘a big while’ attempting to alter the movie’s language. It was easy to change the display language, i.e. the written language used to communicate with the cable box. It was (much) more difficult to change that miscued change from Finnish back to English. It was impossible to change the movie’s language. We gave up and watched a horror show: the news featuring plans for transition to a different president.
“Maybe it won’t be as bad as we think,” Nazy began.
Spousal Interrupt: “I never said that, Dan. It will be much worse than we think.”
“Worse than we think? That’s not possible, my dear!” I replied, but I started again:
“Is his business experience going to be useful?” Nazy asked.
“Dan!” Nazy complains.
“How bad will it be, Dan?” Nazy asked. (Note that I've reconstructed the initial sentence of this vignette. Again.}
“He’ll probably use his business acumen, eh, business background.” I replied.“Maybe he will sell off the under-performing states,” I thought. “I think he will spin off the successful states — like California.” I replied hopefully.
“Spin off?”
“Yeah. And I bet that the heartland would be happy to pay for a wall around California,” I continued. “I just hope they don’t block the Colorado River,” I thought.
“Have business people been good Presidents?” Nazy asked.
1980’s - Hanover, New Hampshire 
“Herbert Hoover was a businessman.”
“Hoover?”
“He was President of the Great Depression.”
“That’s a long time ago, Dan.:
“There’s also Bush and Cheney.”
“How very reassuring, Dan.” Nazy concluded.
More cheerfully, we’re looking forward to Thanksgiving — a time of fun, food and family. Our family grew during 2016.
It began on the island of Cyprus where Darius and Christiane were married in April.
Expansion continued in July with the birth of Arrow, the newest member of the grand(est)son community.
I’ve tried to capture our evolving and growing family with images from several decades of our life. As I was thinking about this, I realized that during the 1980’s we moved five times. We had homes in Memphis, Vancouver, Houston, Hanover and The Hague. At one point, we had spent four successive Christmas’ in four different cities.
We had some interesting Thanksgivings during our travels. For example:
Note: Mitra, Melika, Darius, Dan in Berlin, 1990's
Mitra, having started college in September, was coming home, to The Netherlands, for Thanksgiving. And then the phone rang…
“You’re at the airport and you forgot your passport?” I mumbled. “And you only have a nickel in your purse?”
“What’s going on?” Nazy asked.
“We’re reaping the benefits of a Princeton education.” I replied. Mitra arrived the next day.
For last week's letter, click here
The Family, 2000's Lucern, Switzerland
The Family, 2010's Lebanon