Unlicensed

(Hi… yes, yes it is awkward to begin an essay with a parenthetical aside but I’m going to, hell, I might italicize it as well, being unlicensed and unregulated and all. I just wanted to say that there are several links to previous posts in this one.  Feel free to check them out if you care to.  But, hey, maybe you could read all the way through this one before you do, because, I’m pretty sure that if you jump elsewhere on your phone, I probably won’t see you again.  Thanks.)

They came to take away my "dad blogger" license away back in September.  A couple of guys sporting beards and superhero tees knocked on my door.  The one with the bigger beard suggested that I knew why they'd come. I did.

I hadn't done the obligatory back-to-school post yet.  I scrambled mightily to get one up on time the year before, but this year… yeah, nothin'. Also, I haven't posted in a long while, which is usually pretty forgivable but, months...?  I've also made a concerted effort to talk less directly about the boys, again, understandable, but, sort of off brand.  And, I neglected to do a Father's Day piece, which is, well, unheard-of.

I was informed that I can only wear my cargo shorts to do yardwork, which seems reasonable and I'd already been doing that.  They wanted my "World's Greatest Dad" mug as well but decided I could keep it when I told them it was in the back of the fridge full of bacon grease (which in and of itself makes me the world's greatest dad).  They also asked for the decoder ring I used to translate the stuff the boys wrote and said early on which didn't make sense.  I told them I'd like to keep it because I've actually got drawings and stories and such that I haven't yet figured out.  They seemed cool about it.

There were a few other caveats as well.  In honor of my nearly ten years of service to the community of dad bloggers, I am allowed to post anything I want on Father's Day and the first day of school – no questions asked.  But, I mustn't post new sentimental slop as I did for so many years at any other time, at least dad slop, I guess.  I can, and this surprised me, repost old pieces when I'd like.  I gather this is a result of the "throw-back Thursday" clause.

The one thing that really had the whole system messed up was that the name of my blog here is, and shall always remain, "ihopeiwinatoaster."  I guess not having a reference to "daddy" or "father" or "pop" or anything Star Wars lets me keep using my same domain.  Usually, you are asked to archive your "Dad" period and, if you wish to continue blogging - which no one in their right mind should - you need to start afresh.  Ha, I knew that stupid handle was a good idea.

There was a lot of mumbo-jumbo legalese.  I had to initial off on a few subjects I'd need to stay away from - Lego and tee-ball and doing laundry and broken arms and, let's see, uhm, homework and math and misspellings, whimsical writings and inexplicable drawings and, oddly Harry Potter – because, apparently, it's the dad's with younger kids turn to write about the good stuff.  I can see all that, really, and there's a really good cadre of fresh dads taking up the cause… God love 'em.  I had to write a piece to say I understood the terms of the dissolution and to say goodbye, see above.  However, because of the domain name loophole, I can just keep posting here.

Listen, I actually think it's good that they stopped by and took the license, I may go rogue every now and then and talk about the boys, but I think in principle the gag order is valid.  There is a sweetness and a sentimentality in writing about babies, toddlers - just children in general - that should be explored.  I certainly have read a great number of posts from men about their kids over the years which have moved me to tears.  And, you know what, I hope that continues.  However, I'm not really the guy to do it anymore.

The wickets get a bit stickier as children turn to adults or, in my case, boys grow into men.  The stakes are a little higher, tales of teddy bears and movie scares and misspellings and odd math no longer seem appropriate, even, as I worked very hard to do, if they are told tenderly and lovingly.  It's no longer my business (was it ever?) to tell you about them.  There are crushes and heartbreak and failures and successes and books and fights and glories coming to learn from, and they will.  But, those are now their stories to hold or to share.

So, I was supposed to have this submitted to and approved by the Blog dudes by the end of last year, but, well... I didn't.  That's because I didn't want them to see this last part.

You see, I'm not done yet.  I've got more to say, a few more stories to tell, some advice to give.  I've worked very hard to honor and respect N and Z over the years I've been doing this and I think I can still do that.  Not by sharing their awkward and embarrassing teenage angst and pubescent bodily functions (which I see bloggers using more than I'd like to), but by offering a little help to them as the years go forward.

I can offer them a little more of me by sharing my past dreams and even my current hopes, perhaps…

There is an undeniable arrogance in assuming your kids will want to know more about you as they go on in their own lives.  It's embarrassing but, here's the thing, two things really - I'd give a lot to see something like this from my own father and I've heard that from a lot of guys over the years.  Also, over and over again folks say to me that the boys will treasure the posts I've done here over the years.  I've been proud to curate their childhood, proud to have thought deeply about them, considered them, and I've been so very proud that they are my sons.

There are a lot of folks I should thank from those years I was sorta in the scene… but I won’t.  I would hope they knew, know, whatever.  Some offered me much needed technical support, others lifted me when I was falling, some were frank in criticism, some just liked the words I lined up into weird rows.  Trying to name them all would be irritatingly long and probably ill-advised.

However, there is one individual I would like to call out: You, kind reader.  Yeah, you.

When I write, I don’t imagine a big audience or entertain the notion that there’s some sort of “ihopeiwinatoaster Nation” out there.  No, I’m pretty much talking just to you on the porch watchin’ the trees grow and the wind blow or in the kitchen waitin’ for the coffee to finish and the biscuits to bake.  I’ve tried to keep it casual and soft here - although, I have gotten my britches in a bunch a few times - and I intend to keep it that way.

Thanks for stopping by, I know you are busy, I hope this maybe slowed you down a bit.  Feel free to poke around in the basement archives if you’d like, but that’s hard on the Blogger phone app… oh well.  It’s a sad truth that blogging was meant to be done on a computer monitor, not a tiny screen in your palm.

God’s peace to you kind reader. 

Here's a picture of me in a blue workshirt.  Not a picture of the boys. (Sorry, it was required... weird, I know.)

Cheers...

On Maths and Misspellings

For nearly seven years I've maintained this page.  It is hard to say why - although I have tried, over and over and over - I have composed nearly five-hundred posts.  I suppose that is because of the quicksilver quality of intent.  Early on it was quirky and fun, bordering on silly, towards the middle it was about storytelling and these days, well, the mercury has slipped from my hand.

For instance, there was a time when I teased a lot about Nick's spelling mistakes - don't get me wrong, I still think they are hilarious - but, as I look at this now, today, a different perspective presents.  He tried. He didn't care if he couldn't spell a word, he used it anyway.  If he spelled "seconds" "cecants" or tried "explanishion" for "explaination," who cares? 

Here's the thing, he's still trying on words.  He has a wonderful, clever and almost playful relationship with words these days.  Sometimes, still, he may use a word incorrectly, but, often, there is a sort of loveliness in his mistakes.  The other day he used a mashup that still echoes in my mind, "aloneliness" for "you know, when you are by yourself in your room and missing your friends."

Indeed, Nick, I do know that feeling.


More than once over the years, I poked a little fun at Zack's weird math problems and charts and such.  There were a lot of numbers in the, well, stuff he crafted and drew and noted.  There are a couple of examples in this post, The Quirky Little Math Piece (or Move Over Einstein) (no, your title's too long).  In it he did a strange backwards equation, and another, stranger, algebraic-like thing.  When he handed it to me he asked, "Is it right?"

I told him it was.

He still likes to get things right and the math has gotten much more accurate.

Here, I'll show you:

This is on the opposite side:

Finally, he got out the graph paper to present his final answer, showing his work:

I don't really get what it is, something to do with the total possible permutations on a Rubik's cube.  He says it's right, I don't doubt it.


I spoke earlier of intent.  Boy, that's a rabbit hole of a word - but it comes down to purpose, reason.  'Intentionality' is actually a philosophical concept.  Although it all seems clear in the definition, my intentions have been anything but - they've shifted, morphed, evolved, wavered.  They've at times been pure and true and at other times they have been misguided, mismanaged, muddled.

I guess when I started out, I wanted to show you them.  Then I sort of got the notion that I was showing them them.  I think that may have changed into me wanting to show you me showing them them.  At times, more recently I've been trying to show them me.  Add wanting, at times, to impress or agitate or endear or cajole, well... you.  Confused?  You get used to it.

This is the part where I conclude with one all-encompassing theory of intent.  I shone a light on the misspellings and maths way back when because I thought it was cute and fun, which they were.  Today though, I see what they are doing now, who they are becoming, with such deeper clarity because of those very things.

So, here's my theory:  We can't know intent, we can only guess at it.

You're welcome.

Peace.

From Marci's "... things you don't expect to hear from the backseat at the breakfast table ..."

Sunday morning breakfast humor:
"Excalibutter"

Yes, indeed you are correct, Nick said it...


Thanks for stopping by, quite a "sellabrashin" wouldn't you say?

(If you were to view my blog in a real web browser, in other words, not the lame mobile mode, you'd see that there are "random" posts, and an archive and a whole bunch of "topics" off to the left of the posts.  One of them is "misspellings" and another is "take-home folder."  Some of them are really sweet and cute... just thought I'd let you know.)

On Meatballs and "Stuf" (sic)

When we were kids - and by we I mean me and maybe two others - I listened to a lot of comedy records.  Weirdly, nearly everyone I knew had them, Carlin and Cosby, Bob Newhart and Red Skelton, Cheech and, of course, Chong, even an off-color black comedian or two like Redd Foxx.  There was a societal homogeneity to life when I was a kid, I mean we all knew them, these funny guys - and they were all guys.  Our parents listened to them late nights as the party was winding down and us kids, well, we listened to them when our parents were not around.

I'm glad I did, listen to them, that is.  I was thinking this morning about how to proceed and for some reason those old albums came to mind, and I got to thinking about comedy writing - something I think is about as hard as writing gets - and then just writing in general.  Comedians tend to structure their acts one of two ways.  Some tell a series of jokes, one leading to another, often in staccato rhythm, you know, the classic "and speaking of shoestrings..." approach.  The others tell longer stories, the jokes and bits woven into the fabric of a larger story.  I always preferred the later, Cosby's "Noah" bit comes to mind.

When I write, I prefer to languish, even wallow some might say, in longer stories, but, lately I've been struggling with that.  I could tell you that it's because I don't have the time I need.  You know, kids and life and the fast pace and unslowing rhythm of this hyper-modernity we all must suffer,  but that's just glorifying busy and I hate that.  I could also reason that the time to reward ratio is way off-balance, but that would be self-indulgent and more than a little sad. I could say that often these stories get away from me and spin to places I don't want you to know are in me, but, I covered that in my last post... bother.

I did short silly pieces when I first started around here, my blog was formatted not unlike those old joke-tellers, and I wonder if maybe that wasn't a better way to go, you know, "one and done," that sort of thinking.  It sure seems easier, perhaps even more engaging for you, but I have trouble doing that anymore.

"What's this got to do with meatballs?" you might be asking yourself, I know I am.

Here goes...


I made meatballs the other day.  I make them from scratch grinding the beef chuck and pork country ribs in my trusty Oster.  It's sort a pain in the ass but I grind five or six pounds and make a lot of meatballs, they freeze well.  Nick came in and was helping me make the balls.  There wasn't much teaching or even conversation, I'd already covered that a long time ago with Playdo.  We stood, watching the birds and the wind out the tired kitchen window, and, well...

That's it.  Here's the recipe:

There could be a lot to tell you about this recipe, like my inability to remember measurement abbreviations or why it says mysteriously "325g" there at the bottom.  Or that I use flatleaf Italian parsley and not the curly kind and put in more garlic than this recipe calls for.  I can only hope that in any number of years I'll remember that this stained and annotated piece of paper and ink holds a story, a pretty long story.

But today, all I want to remember is the watching Nick's hands shape meatballs as the porch chimes sounded and the wind blew brown oak leaves across the greening yard.

Here's a collage of things I found in pockets, which is quickly replacing "take-home folders" as my go to source for strange things around here:

"... but wait, there's more."  That's what I always say, isn't it?

Who did which?  What's the shark thing about?  Who forgets the second "f" in stuff?  Who's "Little Owlly" and is that his dog?  Is that an oboe fingering?

Truth is, I'm not really sure.  Like I said, I just pulled them out of the pockets of jeans before I washed them.  Could I make things up, conject, even fictionalize?  Sure, and that'd be fun.  In fact I had long stories about all of those little pieces of paper fomenting in my little mind, but, for some reason, I don't think I'll do that today.

Sometimes the story might be in not telling the story, hell, I don't know.  Maybe the story's not ready.  Or, and I think this is closest to the truth, maybe the story is just short, and concise and, well, just simple and I have trouble accepting that.  For now.

Perhaps that's what those old vaudevillians knew, sometimes a gag is just a gag.  Sometimes a joke is easy and plain.  There's plenty of time for long stories, but sometimes, the story is done with us before we are done with it.


I've been in a writing slump lately, "writer's block" they call it.  I don't really believe there is such a thing.  I don't like the connotation it has.  I may not be writing so much, but, I'm not in a creative void.  I've been looking at other things, listening to music, viewing documentaries, singing new songs, reading non-fiction and children's lit, watching baseball.

It seems like there was one more little thing I wanted to tell you...

Oh, yeah.

These dudes turned twelve this week.

I guess that's the story I've been trying to tell around here...

Peace and thanks for stopping by.

Why You Can't Pin Memory on a Timeline

Memory baffles me.  The process of it.  As I get older, approaching fifty-six, I look back with anything but clarity.  I've tried to hold onto the timeline of it all, but, I gotta admit there are months I am not really sure about.  Did I work for that drunken Algerian French dude before I worked in fine dining with that pretty, crazy girl at the Hilton?  When did I live in that apartment with the deck and a pretty little sun room where I painted horrible paintings and was happy?  A rich girl and a guest house in toney Michigan with a Chris Craft and a sinking pontoon boat?  Was it when I was twenty?  Was I ever that young?

It's overwhelming really.  I sometimes feel like I'm not up to it, remembering causes avalanches of images and faces and places and, well... feelings.

It is easy to get caught up in the factual details of memory.  You hear folks do it all the time, "Was it Tuesday or Wednesday?" or, "Where were we going on that trip?"  Honestly though, I'm not sure a brain is capable of keeping all those details at the ready.  If you're trying to tell a story about seeing a child, say, hit a home run or get thrown out at first, I don't need to know the model of the car you took to the game.  But, and here's the thing, the trick of memory, the car may be revealed because it rode along with the story because both were discussed in the back seat of a late model Ford F-150, red.

Stories reveal emotion, it is their divine business, and they can be persistent.  Just as I am writing this, in the back of my mind, I am going through the story of those two restaurants.


The owner was named Jacques, it was a four-star place with a menu full of rich, classic French food.  I liked working there and he was pretty good to me.  I waited tables on weekends and bartended a couple of weeknights and... here we go.  

The moment I stopped trying to figure where this all fit in the time frame of my life, all the emotions flooded down on me.  A wide, white bowl of Veal Navarin, with turnips and haricot verts with couscous, the aroma of fresh thyme and rich demi-glace coming up off of it as I set it on a white linen tablecloth.  Crusty creme brulee, fresh orange juice mimosas.  God, I loved that food.  I loved working there.  It was called "Voulez-Vous" - and that's the trick of memory I spoke of.

He fired me one night for neglecting to put a few entrees on a check, I'd served four Charcuteries and only charged for one.  He was drunk and so was I.  We shouted.  It was an accident but for some reason he thought I'd done it on purpose, to get him.  He was as red as the beets vinaigrette we'd served that night and as mad as only a French-Algerian can get.  I walked out with my apron still on.  I remember crying as I walked down Third Avenue.  Crying in anger I'm sure, but crying at the loss as well.  He'd taught me so much about service and elegance and grace, about cuisine and wine and technique.

From there I went to work at the Hilton - "Nicole's" was the name - and met the crazy, pretty girl.  Just to prove my point, I'm now recalling how all that went down.  A girl who'd worked for Jacques worked there and they hired me as a back waiter sight unseen.  I don't think I'd have gotten the job without the experience I had there at "Voulez Vous."  Her name was Cathy and she was an actress.  We went out for a few months and she left for California and shortly thereafter I left for home, Ohio.  Yes, there is more to that story, but it's best kept for another time.

Man, I'll tell you what, once you start thinking back like this, the waves just keep coming.  Just before I left town, I went to see Jacques.  I wanted, ostensibly, to ask him for a reference, but I also wanted to make amends and say goodbye.  I went early afternoon and the place was dark and empty.  He sat where he always sat at the bar, back to the hostess stand.  He'd heard the door or noticed the light had changed and simply shouted that they were closed and would open at five.  I didn't know what to do, in fact, I nearly just slunk out.

I hesitated and he turned.  "Bill, Bill," he said, pronouncing it as he always had, like "eel" with a 'b' in front of it, "You've come back to us!"  He was short and balding and a little tubby and I can still see him waddling across that dining room in all its elegance and shaking my hand.  It's funny, he apologized over and over.  He confessed to what trouble he'd gotten into with his wife.  He told me I was one of the best young servers he'd ever had and offered my job back to me right there.

I explained why I was there.  I told him, as I told everyone, that New York City had won, had beaten me, and I was heading home.

"To Hioho," he always mispronounced Ohio, probably to irritate me, "Merde, you are better than that.  Stay, work for me again and you will run this place someday."  It's important to note that he had an almost comically outrageous french accent.

I told him it was all arranged, lease let go, job quit, U-Haul ordered.  (God, I'd forgotten all this, which is patently false it would seem because here I am recounting it to you right now.)  He invited me to the bar and opened a bottle of wine, a Sancerre if memory serves - and it does.  We gossiped about old employees and regulars.  He winced as he told me how many of my regulars complained when his wife told them he'd fired me, she was the hostess and part owner, Julia.

I'd only planned to stop by quickly.  But the wine was good and the staff came in, many of whom I still knew.  I ate dinner with them, the chef made me serve. The rush started and I hung out for several hours, Jacques making drinks for me and introducing me to patrons, calling over regulars and making me feel important.  Julia was happy to see me and continuously chided the poor man for firing me.  It was an unforgettable night, though, apparently, I almost did, forget it that is. 

You know, for years he gave me a glowing reference and, in all seriousness, he made me the professional waiter I became. But, what I remember most is him walking me out the side door onto the sidewalk of Seventy-sixth Street.  He handed me a hundred dollars mumbling something about buying some good wine with it, and hugged me, tears running down his again beet red face.

I can't speak for you, but, the emotional back door to my room of memory is the best way for me to get in.


Over the years, I've let this digital diary act as a depository of memory, an archive of sorts, for both me and the boys.  But, as I illustrated above, memory is not as easy as just taking a picture or jotting down a story, putting the date on it, and filing it away.

The other day Nick was looking for something to do - yes, we let our boys get bored.  He was in the corner of the closet rifling through the bins of forgotten toys and projects and books they've made when he found his writing journal from second grade.  He brought it out and went through it, laughing at his misspellings - as I have been for years - and the confused little stories, non-sequiturs, inexplicable drawings and stickmen. 

Soon Zack was looking over his shoulder and Nick told him his journal was in the bin as well and went to get it for him.  Z began looking at his and realized because the assignment had been a daily writing prompt, they probably had the same or similar entries.  Starting at the beginning, they laughed their way through, day by day - "Wacky Wednesday" or "Tell a Story Tuesday."

And "If I Had Three Wishes."

Zack's third wish was "3 more wishes," classic, and Nick wants a "germen sheperd named roney."

Here's a couple more, "Field Day" and "10 Things My Teacher Taught Me."  (Nick went with "feald" and "tot.")

Here's the page with both from Zack:

And this is Nick's:

They've been teasing each other back and forth this whole time.  Nick tells Zack he just wrote the "same flipping thing, over and over" for the 10 Things one.

"Well, who spells field, f-e-a-l-d?"  Zack says back through a laugh, it's all good-natured fun.

"Well, you're over there bragging about hitting home runs."

"Yeah, well what part of 10 things don't you get, you only wrote down three."

"Yeah..." Nick replies back.  And then he says  "oh..." long and drawn out, the oh-I-get-it sigh.

"That was my first day back after I broke my arm."

We all go silent for a moment or two, the memories, Marci's, Zack's, poor Nick's and mine, settling in around us, so quickly, so effortlessly.

And that's why you can't pin a memory on a timeline.  They twist and wrap around each other, one carries another, two, three, several seemingly unrelated bits lace together and tell another memory, a different story.  

You know what?  Go back and look at that last image.  You can click it and it gets bigger.  Just those two entries, side by side.  His third and final thing is "helping." Man, that's a great story.

I can even overcomplicate it more.  When the boys perhaps see this in forty or fifty years, what ghosts of memory will they see?  Will it be their second-grade classroom or Mrs. G?  Will they remember all the "Feald Days" of those early elementary days as one event?  Will they remember sitting on a couch remembering and laughing at their silly journals?  Will they remember how jarring and emotional the quick memory of Nick's broken arm was?  Will they be more interested in the stories I tell of restaurants past and dreams set aside?  Will they get to choose?

I think not, I never get to...


There's one last - that's a lie there's never a last thing.  A long time ago, in the opening paragraph, I mentioned an apartment with a porch and a sunroom.  I painted garish abstracts on big canvases with acrylics.  I was happy.  I had a large work table I'd made from two-by-fours and a sheet of plywood covered in a muslin dropcloth.  On it, off to the corner nearest the porch, was a cactus, a "Christmas Cactus" to be precise.  I'm sure you've seen them.

Here's a picture of the one that is blooming here in the dining room.

I wonder if seeing that bloom didn't put me in mind of that table which made me ask myself when that was and then all the memories who weren't sure where they belonged piled back on me.  But memory is not kismet.  It is poignant, playful, powerful but there always comes with it a deliberateness.  As though we knew we needed to remember something.

I've kept you too long, thanks for sticking with me.


From Marci's "... things you don't expect to hear from the backseat... "

"He's pirouetting like a mad man."


I saw that ballet in college...


Peace, and all that.

Four-Hundred-and-Fifty-Three

I don't look under my foot and find crazily curious or seriously silly drawings and the like much anymore.  But, every now and then something does come to my attention.  I've had this stack on my desk for a while now.  Do you mind looking at them so I can tenderly archive them into the fabric get them off my desk.

Let's see...

This was in one of Nick's notebooks for school.  That dino is too damn cute to intimidate any thing bigger 'n a bush, in my opinion.

There's this from Zack:

This is, clearly, a Ninja fight.  There are a lot of questions one could ask here.  Which direction is the carefully rendered "death star" headed?  Is Ninja Dude on the right executing a fatal death kick, ducking the star, or falling dead onto his face?  Do these dudes know each other?  Why are they blind folded, seems hard to duck something with a blindfold on?  Why is my favorite part of all this the shadow underneath horizontal dude?  What is the damn context here!?

Lets move on to this top-hatted turtle from Nick:

Again, more questions than answers.  Is that his natural shell or is it giant checkerboard Jamberry of some sort?  Why is he going uphill?  Is that a monocle?  Why is he hoofed and how can he be holding his cane?  Was he finalist in the Monopoly piece competition?  Is that Lincoln's Hat?  Again, I need context!

Let's try something that makes more sense, like this Maze from Z-man:

Yeah... well, that didn't work

Perhaps this lesson Nick did to study for a test a while back:

Well now, see.  This all makes sense, doesn't it... ?

Both of the boys worked on these, the fianl renderings are all, I think, Zack's, but I heard them talking about names and such together.  In a perfect world of my own design - fiction, that is - these are names for some as-yet-realized punk-pop-heavy metal-post-apocalyptic-fusion bands.  The truth is, they are names for clans - or guilds is it? - they lead or are a part of in a couple of on-line kids games they play.  I like the fiction better:

REMiup.  A bad REM cover band?

XTOXiC A good XTC cover band?

 BiO ToXiC  Aren't they a basketball team?

I hate to say it but XContaminated just doesn't work for me... for anything.

I think this is the final logo, XToxicon.  I think it's a mash up of all of them...  I love that, "The Toxic Keepers".

They did mock up something for a glam rock tribute band.

Sorta just speaks for itself, doesn't it.


So, that's what I found, thanks for taking a look.  It's been fun.


I've been doing this a long time now, it'll be five years around Thanksgiving.  Four-hundred-and-fifty-two posts, not too far off from my hope of a hundred a year.  Sometimes I poke around in the archives.  I wince a bit at some, laugh at many, and, even this short ways away from them, I feel the weight of melancholy that hangs on them.

Writing this post, I decided to try to recapture what I did earlier on in this trip, I hope you don't mind.  If you write or paint or sing or whatever, I think it's important to look at how you used to do things.  It can offer insight, that's true, but it can do more - it can offer a sort of validation.  You can say to your former self, "hey, that was good" or "you were right about that" or "I cried again, just as you did when you did this."  It can feel good, but there's more:  If you recognize and validate the thoughts you once had as good and right, you can rest assured that your future self will probably feel the same about what you're doing now.

Make sense?

As always, peace.


If you are interested, there's tons more of this stuff in the Archives.  Try the labels "silly" or "take-home folder" or "paper arts" or my personal favorite, "hairbrainage".