I know it was here yesterday ...

There's something missing in this picture.

It's strange to wake up in the morning, step out on the deck, and discover your neighbor's house is missing.
I will admit that at first, in the predawn darkness yesterday morning, I didn't immediately notice what was wrong. There was just this bleary-eyed sense that there was something not quite right.
Oh, yeah! There was a house there yesterday, and now it's gone.
Duh.
It's just not the kind of thing you expect, so it takes a little while to wrap your head around it, especially at 6 a.m.
Our neighbors are summer people. The house actually was a 14-foot-wide mobile home -- a nice one, with a pitched roof and vinyl siding. I wouldn't call it a trailer; it wasn't a flat-roofed trailer-park monstrosity.
About a month ago, after things started thawing out after the cold snap, I heard water running at that place. Apparently the pipes had frozen, broken, then thawed out.I called the water department and got the water shut off, but I'm guessing there was substantial water damage.
Perhaps the damage was bad enough to replace the dwelling. With a stick-built house, you have to tear down and rebuild. Maybe with a mobile home, you just haul the whole home out and move a new one in.
The place got moved Monday, but it was dark when I came home from work and brought the boys home from Scouts Monday night. I didn't notice until daylight Tuesday.
Yeah! There used to be a house there!

Annie and Lexie
on the back deck last summer
with the neighbor's house in
the background.

A high school Renaissance

Clearly, Katherine was appalled.
There she was, dressed as a serving wench, and who also shows up dressed in period costume for the Mount Pleasant High School Madrigal Dinner? Kissy Missy and me.
How appalling.
How fun.

I wore my usual costume as a monk -- it's amazing how much mileage I've gotten out of the darn thing since that summer at Scout camp -- and Kissy Missy dressed as a princess. We were lovely.
The event was terrific, as well. Great music, great food, a good fund-raiser for the vocal music program.


Serving wenches Kayla, Annie and Ashley, three of the 11 members of "The Nine," (don't ask) who performed at the Madrigal Dinner.

ACT scores

Andrew scored a 31 on his ACT.
Wow. Beyond Wow.
Composite score: 31 Percentile: 98
English: 29 Percentile: 93
Math: 28 Percentile: 92
Reading: 34 Percentile: 98
Science: 34 Percentile: 99

Combined English and Writing: 27. Percentile: 85.

He whines that he has trouble writing. Trouble? When he's better at it than 85 percent of the college-bound students?
I'd love to have more students with that kind of "trouble" in my writing classes.
I'm going to need to get a bigger post office box to fit all the pitches from universities.

Is it spring yet?

Daffodils in the snow outside Moore Hall today.

Two weeks ago, the temperature hit 77 degrees. Easter was cold and windy, and Thursday, schools across mid-Michigan had a snow day.
Temperatures so far this week have averaged 43 percent below normal.
Who did this?

Another hero passes. So it goes

Kurt Vonnegut died last night.
USA Today quotes Jon Stewart as saying "As an adolescent, (Vonnegut) made my life bearable," and he put it better than I possibly could.

New York Times (subscription required)
LA Times
AP (through Forbes)
USA Today
The Washington Post
PBS "Now" interview by David Broncocchio
The Nation (Make a donation)
The Guardian

The coolest car on the road

It's the coolest car on the road in Europe -- even cooler (and smaller) than the Cooper Mini.
It's the Smart car, made by DaimlerChrysler.
Yes, it's small -- two of them fit into a normal parking space. It gets about 40 mpg, and seats two people (or one person and a pair of skis) comfortably.




I first spotted a Smart on I-275 near Detroit several years ago, and was intensely curious about it. DCX just hasn't seen fit to import it into the United States, although it has a passionate following in Europe.
Katherine fell in love with the Smart

during her trip last year and brought back a little model for Andrew. He thought it was cool, too, and declared he wanted one.
When he got to Germany, he started shooting pictures of them, and is more determined than ever that he wants one.



Now, the Web site Smartusa.com says DCX will begin selling Smarts in the United States in 2008. However, it won't be able to sell them in California -- the three-cylinder engine can't meet California emissions standards.
(Huh?)
Now, here's an irony: The Smart is so small and affordable that DCX has been losing about $5,000 per car trying to build the brand. Old truism: Little cars make sense, big cars make money.

München

More from Andrew's trip



A Munich street scene




The Munich office of Eurohypo AG, a leading real estate and public sector banking house:

The Olympia Tower, marking the site of the 1972 Olympic games.

Incredible art


















And a wide variety of specialty shops,

some of them quite interesting and amusing.

Images from the roof of Deutschland

The true meaning of 'Alpine' skiing

The brilliant turquoise of an Alpine Lake

The summit of Germany's tallest peak.

Wow... that's a long way down. Get my skis.

Andrenalin and jet lag

Andrew's home.
He made it back right on time -- all the planes arrived when they were supposed to. (Clearly, he wasn't flying Northwest.)
By the time he got back about 9 Thursday night, he'd been up for nearly 24 hours, so it was asking a bit much for him to be coherent.
But he gave me a beret, which he had bought in Paris. And his sister had asked for a "hot German boy." Andrew brought her one.
He posted this to his MySpace:

I have absolutely fallen in love with Garmisch and Zugspitze (both in Germany.) If you haven't been there, all I can say is that it's one of the most beautiful places in the world. I think I'd like to own a 'cottage' there. And the skiing isn't too bad either.

More as he wakes up.
But how ya gonna keep'em down on the rez, now two of'em's seen Paree?

Coming home

I woke up at 3:15 this morning. Andrew's plane was scheduled to leave Paris at 9:20 Paris time -- 3:20 Eastern time.
It did, and he's on his way home.
He'll change planes again in Atlanta, fly to Detroit, then take a bus back to Mount Pleasant. I can hardly wait to see him.

How I drive my students nuts

An image, taken from a Journalism 202 PowerPoint, of an ice rescue attempt that is about to go bad. As part of an in-class exercise, journalism must deal with numerous unexpected twists in this story.

Tomorrow and Friday, in my Introduction to Writing for the Mass Media class, students will take part in an in-class exercise that involves a tragedy.
A man riding an all-terrain vehicle on an ice-covered pond breaks through the ice, becomes hypothermic in the frigid water and drowns, despite rescuers' efforts. It's based on a real event I covered a number of years ago.
This fictional event takes place at an Isabella County park just outside Clare.
The students, through a PowerPoint presentation, "witness" the end of the tragedy. Their task will be to write a relevant, powerful news story.

The characters the students will meet include:


• Clare Police Chief Dwayne Miedzianowski, who is first on the scene;
• Isabella County Sheriff Leo Mioduszewski, who arrives later and takes command;
(Skill No. 1: Spell all the names correctly and get the titles correct;
(Skill No. 2: Keep straight the difference between sheriff's departments and police departments

Leo Mioduszewski, left,
and Dwayne Miedzianowski.
Yes, they're real people.

• Clare firefighter Alexander Aswabin, a Canadian Anishinabe who was born near Michipicoten and who grew up on Wikwemikong Reserve on Manitoulin. He crawls across the ice, gets close to the victim, but breaks through the ice himself.
(Skill No. 3: Is his ethnic heritage relevant to the story?)
• Witness Guido "Tuna" DiFrangelantonio, 61, of Grand
Rapids, who saw the victim break through the ice and called 9-1-1. He requests that his first name not be used. ("People hear the name 'Guido' and they think I'm a hood. Call me Guido in the newspaper and I'll break your knees.")
(Skill No. 4: Remember that unofficial sources can be as important as official sources, but must be used with care;
(Skill No. 5: Treat sources with respect, especially those who are not used to dealing with the media.
(And see Skill No. 1.)
• The victim's widow, who is initially reluctant to talk to the press. ("Media jackals! You're just here to exploit me in my time of tragedy!")
(Skill No. 6: Many victims and survivors really do want to talk, if you find a way to let them know you really will listen.)
The best students will follow the twists and turns in the story, and provide detailed, objective, yet passionate reporting.

More Zugspitze

The weather is beautiful at the highest point in Germany, apparently. Visibility greater than 70 km.

Zugspitze!

E-mail from Andrew:


It can be done.
Herr Roehmer has set up a way for some people to go skiing on Zugspitze after the gondola ride. but he needs for everyone who wants to go to have parent permission before they can go. [He needs paperwork.]

Essentially, I need you to get an e-mail to Herr Roehmer telling him that you think I'm a good enough skier not to fall down and crack my head open.
You can email him, or maybe call the hotel if need be, but that can get expensive.



Tell everyone that it's absoultely beautiful here. I feel like moving to Garmisch. The mountains are absolutely stunning. I'll show you the picture that I got that left me absolutely speechless. You'll love it.

FYI: A girl on the trip has the same camera as I do and has let me use her battery charger and converter. My camera died before I got to Dachau. Sorry, no pictures. I have taken some 350 pictures and still have over 750 pictures left for Paris. Yay!


That's about all for the moment. I'll tell you everything when I get back. [Or at least as much as I can remember.]

-Andrew

E-mail from Dad:

Herr Roehmer:

You have my permission to let Andrew Ranzenberger ski on Zugspitze after the gondola ride. He has the skills necessary to ski safely.

Get that boy on the mountain!!!!

Mark Ranzenberger

Across the Atlantic

Katherine, Andrew and Margaret at
Mount Pleasant High School as Andrew, Margaret and 21 other travelers leave for Germany and France.

As I write this, Andrew's plane is approaching the coast of Europe. He's 6 miles above the Atlantic, eating up a mile every six seconds. He'll be on the ground in a couple of hours.
We were up at 3:30 in the morning. The school bus for Detroit Metro left at 5:45. I have never seen Andrew so geeked for anything. The predawn darkness was windy and cold, but he was more ready for this than for anything. He had seen this moment in his mind's eye for months, and he had to be ready for this. It wasn't an adventure. it was a passage.




His flight to Atlanta went off without a hitch; he collected $20 from a cash machine at the airport, and boarded Delta Flight 130 with no apparent problems. The plane left on time.
He'll be dragged out when he lands in a couple of hours, but it's only just the beginning.
Munich, the solemnity of Dachau, the incredible ski resorts of the Alps, the glory that is Paris.
It's his.
I fell in love with Europe. His sister fell in love with the place, as well.
Sending two kids to Europe in less than a year has been a stretch, but for them to know there is more than the lakes and the dirt roads, that they can have the world, is more than worth it.

The Night Before

Andrew leaves tomorrow for Europe.
It's not like I haven't done this before, but I don't think I'll ever get used to it.
Passports, preparations, making sure everything's in order -- I know he'll be fine.
I will never forget my trip, as a 17-year-old, to Paris. It changed me, and this will change Andrew.
In 28 hours, he will be in Deutschland.
I guess he's excited. On the way home tonight, he said, "I'm leaving for Europe. And everybody else just goes on living."
Bon Voyage, buddy.

So Leno sez to Kissy Missy ...

..."You're looking lovely tonight."
She just beamed. She had managed to win a pair of tickets to the Jay Leno performance at the Soaring Eagle Casino & Resort. The prize package included a "meet and greet" before the show with the star.
We were at the front of the line.
"Thank you," Kissy Missy said.
"And who's this with you?" Leno said. "Your father?"
The show was good anyway.

Obsession

"Dad," Andrew said. "Just stop obsessing about my trip to Europe."
He looked a little bit exasperated with me.
"Am I obsessing?" I asked, fiddling with the new digital camera I bought, and will send to Europe with him. (Note to self: Must buy lithium batteries because the recharger won't work on European current.)
"Yes," he said. "Just stop it."
I denied it. I'm not obsessing.
"Andrew? Look! I found images of the interiors of all the aircraft you'll be flying!"
Airliners.net has an amazing catalog of photos of commercial aircaft.
"Dad, you're obsessing."
"I am not." But Flightview.com has a really cool system where you can track, minute by minute, the location, speed and altitude of any commercial flight. Let's see, he'll be on Delta Flight 130 from Atlanta to Munich, and look! Today's flight is 31,000 feet over North Carolina right now, traveling at 519 knots! Wow!
"Dad, stop it."
"Wow! Look at the candid traveler photos of the mountains behind the hotel where you'll be staying!"
"Dad ...."
(Note to self: Must get better daypack for him.)
"Just let it go, Dad."
"Andrew, you know about the quart Ziploc rule, right?"
"Yes. Dad ..."
"You know, I'd really feel more comfortable if I took you to the airport, rather than just putting you on a school bus at 5:30 in the morning."
"You'll live, Dad.
"Now just be quiet."
I'm not obsessing. Where did he ever get that idea?

Speed!

We just installed high-speed, all-wireless Internet at the house.
I can't help but recall that the first modem I ever used was a 300 baud device built into a TRS-80.
My first Mac a 14K modem built in. Nine years ago, we moved up to a 56k. In reality, transfer rates were more like 22 to 33 K. There we sat for nine years, until yesterday.

How fast?



Not bad for the boondocks, and very close to the advertised speed.

That's faster than the newspaper, which is connected to an alleged T1. There are other issues at the paper, too.



But compare that to my office at CMU:



Now that's freakin' fast!

Training in the exurbs

The address is 790 Township Line Road, Yardley, Pa.; the headquarters of Journal Register Co., the United States' 10th-largest publicly traded newspaper company. It's in a complex of offices in Bucks County, a far suburban area in what once was farm country between Philadelphia and Trenton. Today, the county has a population of more than 600,000, and has grown by more than 20,000 people in the last five years.

The building itself is identical to two others on either side, and reminds me, for some reason, of the anonymous, utilitarian office buildings that were thrown up around factories during the 1930s and 1940s.

Few of them still stand these days. People preserve beautiful buildings, but the purely functional have a tendency to disappear and be replaced by different architecture. Out there, in the greenfields where metropolitan areas have grown together, function may follow form.

JRC is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, publishes 27 daily newspapers and several hundred weeklies and shoppers, and runs a couple of hundred Web sites.


Yet the world headquarters of this company sits quietly, anonymously in rented space far from the bustle of the media world. The thick, glass doors off the elevator lobby are kept locked, and traffic is minimal. The site has a training room, but it's mostly just tables, a projector, Ethernet connections and a whiteboard. The Mac lab and the PC lab where I teach beginning writers and designers are more sophisticated -- and those are outmoded and need to be replaced.

The office itself seems to be mainly an accounting office; perhaps paying attention to the bottom line is appropriate for a company that's lost half its market value in the last year. The walls contain framed art -- but it's abstract, suburban vanilla office art. The only thing I saw that was specific to the company was the framed certificate that JRC is traded on the NYSE.

In the back room are a couple of stacks of framed images apparently moved from the old headquarters in Trenton. They seem to be images of newspaper plants and other industrial scenes. Putting them up on the walls has not been a high priority, and images of front pages? great journalism? I suspect no one thought of that.

Perhaps I'm just a romantic, but I'd expected life, buzz, excitement, ideas -- it's the media! What emanates from headquarters is ... nothing.

Philadelphia in the Snow

A Northwest Airlines flight crew waits for a crew to replace an empty oxygen tank aboard a DC-9 at MBS International Airport.

8:58 a.m.:
We had been scheduled to be in Detroit by now, but hey, that's what happens when you fly Northwest.
I'm on my way to Philadelphia with three co-workers, planning to go to a training session on JRC's new content-management system. It will take a week.
The weather has been a major concern. For the past week, it's been pretty clear that some sort of bad weather would be blasting the Midwest this weekend. It's here.
I got up at 4 a.m., and it wasn't snowing. By the time I got out of the shower, it was snowing heavily.
But we got over to MBS just fine, one time. We did our part, and the TSA confiscated my lighters, as expected. Boarding flight 1708 to Detroit was just a little late.
Then the flight crew of our aging DC-9-30 discovered a little glitch: Someone forgot to fill a cockpit oxygen bottle.
The delay here is likely to cause us to miss our Philadelphia connection.

10:20 a.m.
We arrive in Detroit. Our Philadelphia flight is to leave at 10:21. We’re at Gate A-11. The Philly flight is at Gate A-61. Yes, it’s as far away as it sounds. What are our chances?
Actually, pretty good, considering the weather. Seems the pilot of the flight to Philadelphia has been delayed by the weather. I’ve never heard an announcement like this: “Our pilot now has arrived, and we expect to begin boarding soon.”
We were supposed to be in Philadelphia at 11:55 a.m. We left Detroit at 12:10.

12:39 p.m.
There is sunshine at 33,000 feet. It’s pretty.

1:40 p.m.
We’re on the ground in Philadelphia, and it’s just starting to snow. I’ve rented a Ford Fusion, and I like it. Our destination is 40 miles up I-95.

5 p.m.
Checked into the Hampton Inn in Yardley. The place reminds me a lot of the parts of northern Oakland and Kent counties where sprawl is just creeping in. The hay fields are being converted to office parks, condo developments and subdivisions. The Ethernet connection to the ‘Net is free, and seems fast.
The town itself reminds me a lot of the Pretty Little Town where Everyone Comes Home for Christmas in the movies. Maybe it was just the way the snow was falling on the 250-year-old town, but it really is picturesque.
It has a Starbucks, right near the banks of the Delaware Canal.
I bought apples, oranges and grapes to munch on. I’ll eat my veggies.

The Damaged Ranzenbergers

PART ONE: It began one afternoon when Kissy Missy uncrossed her legs and stood up. She didn’t realize her foot was asleep, and in her words, “It just folded over.”
Ouch. Beyond ouch.
X-Rays clearly showed it was broken. “A nice crack,” said the emergency room physician.
She’s gotten pretty good, actually, on getting around on crutches. She reports that the motorized carts at Meijer are much faster and more fun than the motorized carts at Wal-Mart.
She’s expecting to be in her hot-pink cast until at least March.

PART TWO: Katherine says she was in gym class, doing pushups. She’s not a big fan of phys ed (takes after her father), and she suddenly heard a loud “snap” from her wrist.
Ouch. Beyond ouch.
She reported this to the unsympathetic gym teacher, who believes that Our Precious Redheaded Drama Queen has a tendency to magnify every little ache and pain to crisis proportions. Well … this time, she wasn’t malingering.
Katherine was told to go play volleyball – and she spiked a killer return. Unfortunately, that spiked her wrist, too.
It turns out not to be broken, only badly sprained. The splint comes off next week.


PART THREE: “Man, I’m really getting fat,” I thought. My belly was bloating up, but the weight gain wasn’t there. Middle age, I thought.
Then Thursday, my gut started to hurt. I recalled what Dad went through when he was in his early 50s – he called them “gut-aches,” and that’s a good description.
Through the weekend, it just got worse and worse. Monday, there was no argument about me going to see Dr. Szelag. He rushed me into a gastroenterologist, who pronounced that I have become the latest victim of diverticulitis, a particularly nasty little condition that punishes middle-aged men who didn’t eat their vegetables, fruits and roughage.
The pain, really, was debilitating. Right now, I’ve missed two days of work recovering, and it may take longer. I’m on a clear-liquid diet (“Let your bowels rest”) and I’m sleeping a lot. I’m hungry. I hurt.
Whine Whine Whine.
Well, the addiction counselors say that nothing changes until it hurts more not to change than to change. Bring on the fiber, baby! I heart oatmeal! At least, I heart it more than this!