New House Superstitions

When we began packing for the move to the new house, Mary reminded me that we needed a new broom. A new broom … really? The old one seemed in good shape. Mary assured me you left your old broom at the old house and promptly went out and bought a new broom for the new house. Of all the houses we've moved into over the years, I'd never heard of this tradition/superstition. Being a sailor and having always kept with all our nautical traditions, however, I figured I'd better look into it. I certainly didn't want to piss off any house gods. Sure enough … bringing an old broom into a new house was bad juju … you brought any bad luck you'd experienced (and old house dirt) with it. We rode the new broom to the new house. It worked perfectly.

Interestingly enough, the previous owners had left their old broom behind. I've obviously been living in the dark regarding brooms all these years.

Delving a bit further into new house traditions, I found a few more with which we needed to comply. For instance, don't move on a Friday. Yikes! That would be like leaving on a passage on a Friday. We even moved up the closing date by one day, so we didn't sign the final purchase papers or receive our keys on a Friday. Geez … everyone knows that one!

If we were Wiccas, like my sister for instance, we would have also had a house cleansing and blessing ritual, but we opted for something a bit more simple. Instead, I sprinkled salt on the doorstep when we entered the house for the first time after it was ours. Salt is evidently solid protection against bad luck and keeps the evil spirits out.

A couple other superstitions we didn't feel as strongly about …

• It’s bad luck to carry a hoe into the house. If you do it by mistake, carry it out by walking backwards through the same door — it’ll reverse the bad luck. Hmmm ... we put the hoe in the garage with no thought to bringing it into the house.

• Stuff fennel or an herb with yellow flowers and feathery leaves, into your keyhole or hang it over the door to protect your home from witches. Interestingly enough, Wiccans also suggest this and many of them are self-proclaimed witches. Go figure! Doesn't matter … fennel and yellow-flowered, feathery herbs were in short supply on move-in day.

• Paint your front porch blue to ward off ghosts. They'll think it's water and thus, you'll confuse them. Nah, no blue porches for us. We'll have to chance it.

• Never put shoes on a dresser or table. Now this is reputedly a Jewish tradition which makes sense. It's just not cool to put your shoes on the table … any time.

• According to a Norse superstition, placing an acorn on a windowsill will protect a house from being struck by lightning. This is the desert … no acorns, but we do have lightning. I've got to think about this one.

• Never pound a nail after sunset, or you’ll wake the tree gods. No trees in our yard … only cacti and we reckon the cacti gods might be okay with nail banging. We'll keep the noise to a minimum.

All in all, I think we did okay. I'm feeling like the house has some good energy and the new broom works well.

Nevada Caucusing - What's That?

What's a caucus? And why do we care? The word “caucus” derives from the Algonquin “cau-cau-as'u” which roughly translates to “adviser” in American English, a term used in American politics as early as the mid-18th century. In the USA, in order to determine who will be the candidate for President for each major political party, there are either primary elections or caucuses or a combination of both held in each state. Of the 50 states, only 12 states, plus 2 territories and the District of Columbia use caucusing We've voted in primaries before, but never participated in a caucus. Last Saturday, the Democratic caucus was held in Nevada and our precinct caucus was being held at the Whitney Elementary School, walking distance from home. We feel it's inappropriate to discuss political issues in our blog, but thought it might be interesting to share the caucusing process. It was definitely a new experience for us.

We sauntered over around 10:45. A constant stream of cars was heading into the school parking lot. As we approached, we noted that the queue for registration was very long and very slow. People were sweltering and squinting in the Nevada late morning sun. We had used an on-line caucus registration process which was supposed to streamline check-in.

Truly, this was one of the most disorganized events we'd ever seen. There were a myriad of volunteers, but none seemed to know what was going on and we received conflicting directions from nearly everyone we talked to. We finally edged our way into the school building at one fellow's suggestion and advanced further forward in the line. We saw an unmanned, open laptop with a hand-lettered sign marked “Express Check-in”. Hmm … just a thought … “Is anyone using that computer at the moment?”, I asked. “No” was the resounding response from all the folks milling around waiting to register. With our trusty iPhone in hand, we retrieved the individual texts we'd received earlier with our own unique pre-registration code. We entered them into the express computer while wearing our magic decoder rings and performing the secret handshake and in a couple of seconds a wonderful thing happened … shazam … we were checked in.

Next, we needed to find the caucus room for our precinct. Several folks pointed us in the direction of the precinct rooms. We wandered purposefully, following big black arrow signs through a labyrinth of hallways to the various rooms, but none showed our precinct number and we ended up back where we started from … which was lucky because they'd changed the meeting place for our precinct caucus to the registration hall we'd originally registered in. We attempted to sit down. “Are you for Bernie?”, a fellow asked. “We're uncommitted at the moment”, David replied. “Can we still sit here?” No one seemed to know. We scrunched ourselves into low cafeteria tables with attached bench seats. This is an elementary school and everything seemed mini.

Around 12:35, the doors were closed, the registration lines ended and the precinct chief got to work … kind of. The fellow leading the group had misplaced some letters he was supposed to read and finally, after consulting the rules and regs one more time, called the caucus to order. We thought it might work according to parliamentary procedure/Robert's Rules of Order or something of the like, but no, chaos continued. He shouted over the boisterous group, but his little voice didn't carry. One strong-voiced woman (not me) finally got the group's attention and we strained to listen to the chief's instructions.

He took a count of the total number in the group … three times with three different results. He asked for some help. There were 46 folks in the precinct group. Next, he passed around an envelope for contributions. “The suggested contribution is $16”, he advised. What is this … church? $16 for what? I thought this caucusing thing was free. “It's for the Democratic party”, he said, “because everyone who works here is a volunteer.” We didn't get it. If everyone is a volunteer and we assume the use of the school building was free and the only things we received were Bernie buttons, Hillary stickers and two #2 yellow pencils, what exactly were we contributing to?

The chief instructed us to “align”. Bernie supporters on one side. Hillary supporters on the other. Those uncommitted (there were 6 of us) were instructed to stand up in the middle of the two groups. Well, that seemed a vulnerable place to be … and it was. We had read about the process, and we thought this would be an opportunity to rationally discuss each candidate's positions with informed supporters. Instead, within seconds, we were surrounded by Bernie and Hillary zealots, screeching at each other, making few valid or viable arguments for their candidates, but rather out-screaming their opponents. Sort of persuasion by intimidation and volume. There was no relief and certainly no order. The chief said “8 more minutes remain”. Oh, my … “What if we prefer to remain uncommitted?”, we asked the chief. “Then you just leave”, he responded.

Well, we committed to the least objectionable candidate just so we could observe the rest of the process. One old, grizzled fellow missing his front teeth congratulated us on our decision to join “his” team. We weren't sure that was a good thing.

What followed was more bedlam as we turned in our caucus cards and they were counted. The chief made a big show of writing the results and doing the “caucus math” calculations with a huge black magic marker on a large tally sheet hung on the wall. He made a mistake … putting results for Sanders in Clinton's column. A mighty ruckus ensued. Chagrined, he crossed out the wrong numbers and corrected the error. Sanders won … 26 to 24. The chief then set about determining how many of the 10 total delegates each candidate was allowed. Sanders-6 and Clinton-4. The selection of delegates was very methodical. “Who wants to be a delegate?” he asked the group. People raised their hands. He counted 4 on the Clinton side and 6 on the Sanders side (making only one mistake) and then gave the newly appointed delegates their paperwork. These folks will continue on to the county level sometime in April.

That's it. That was a caucus in Nevada … kind of like herding yowling cats and then asking them to vote. The overall state result was a win for Clinton … 53% to Sanders 47%. By all accounts, attending the Republican caucus was even more lively.

Battling Addictions of the Electronic Type

It has not been much of problem while on the boat or at sea, but now that we're back in the Land of Plenty, we admit that we have some serious addictions and battling them is difficult. It's not drugs nor drink that have taken over our lives … it's electronics … cell phone, internet, TV, Words With Friends … the list goes on. We're ashamed, but we're feeling helpless.

It all started when Lin, my sister, gave me an iPhone for my birthday soon after we returned to the US last December. We couldn't figure out how to use it and doubted we ever would. Now, as unlikely as it seems, it is an integral part of lives. There's a resounding ding which beckons attention whenever a text message or an e-mail arrives. It dings all the time. Last September while crossing the Atlantic, we thought it was okay to check emails once a day. Now whenever we hear that ding … we grab for the phone to check it. Really … what could be that urgent? It's a Pavlovian response … although checking texts is probably better than salivating and drooling.

We've started sitting in front of the TV each evening. It doesn't matter what's on. We glance up while playing Words With Friends or Sudoku on our iPads … making sure to check the phone whenever there's a ding. Sometimes there's conversation which many times leads to an unanswerable question … our memories aren't what they used to be. Then Siri gets involved. Apple's Siri (Speech Recognition and Interpretation Interface) answers our questions or tells us where the nearest Chinese restaurant is or what time the local supermarket closes. Mary does not have a telephone book in the house, nor an encyclopedia, nor a dictionary/thesaurus. Why would she? Just consult the internet or easier yet, ask Siri.

We cannot go anywhere in the car/truck without the phone. We wouldn't know where to go or how to get there. After all, the iPhone is really not for telephone calls at all (although I do appreciate the R&B piano riff that sounds when a call comes in). It's a GPS … and a camera (movies or stills) and a flashlight and a message/email minder and an address book and an appointment calendar and so much more. It appears our whole life is totally tied up in this small device that we couldn't figure out how to use three months ago and is now, predictably, impossible to do without. How did that happen?

I read a newspaper article the other day (yes, my hard copy, hold in my hands, black-ink, delivered-to-my-door morning newspaper) about detoxing from cellphone/internet addiction. Technology addiction is a science unto itself. There's even a Center for Internet and Technology Addiction which provides self-tests you can take on-line (the addicted will really love this) to determine your level of addiction.

It's definitely time to get back to the boat where internet and phone access isn't as easy. Specialists recommend a gradual weaning rather than a cold turkey approach. Yes, we'll suffer some withdrawal initially. We'll get fidgety and panicky and feel a bit unsettled and disconnected … but we'll survive. We understand that in order to recover, there will be pain involved. No pain, no gain. Thank goodness we're not addicted to sailing … much.