More adventures at my Favorite Baltimoron Store

So I went to the neighborhood Food Depot, my favorite Baltimore store, to pick up a couple of odds and ends. I bypassed the carts and picked up a basket, with the intent of getting in, picking up maybe 5 or 6 items, and getting out. However, as often happens with me in this store, I ended up with more than I came for. There was a sale on yogurt, so I picked up about 12 cups of those, then I passed by a few other things I just had to (NOT) have, and next thing I know my basket was stuffed with about 20 items, give or take.

I trudged past the 10- and 15- items or less express lanes and over to the regular lane with the shortest line. When I made it to the conveyor belt and got ready to unload my goods on it, the cashier, seeing me holding a basket instead of pushing a cart, said "Sir, you can take your stuff to the express lane."

"But I have more than 15 items," I said.
"Well, you can take it to the 10 items or less line."

Say what, now?

"Umm, you know," I said, not being able to resist an easy bit of smartassery, "if I've got more than fifteen items, that means I also have more than ten items."

Woooooo, that heifer was MAD with me...but oh well, what can you do?

#4

So I am a grandfather again, for the fourth time - all boys (one of these days I will get a granddaughter, although hopefully no time soon). My newest, Mr. Kevin was 7 lbs, 10oz, and like his big brother, #2, "Hurricane" Darius, took his sweet time making his arrival. But he's here and will be returning to (my) home with mom and big brother in a few days. Something tells me that in the very near future - given the power of Mr. Kevin's lungs - I may be thinking about changing my name to the Sleepy Nerd...

Bogeyman-ia

bo·gey·man/ˈbo͝ogēˌman

Noun:  Somebody believed to be evil: somebody or something regarded as hateful, evil, or frightening

I have spent my life trying (with varying degrees of commitment and success) to be a good person, and I've lived what could be considered a pretty decent life. I've gone to good schools, got married, raised kids, worked good jobs, been involved with respectable organizations, and in respectable activities, have strong ties to the church, etc.

Yet none of that matters when I walk out of my front door every morning. For when I leave the comfort and safety of my home and enter in society, I become, in the eyes of many, a "suspicious character". I know there are many of you out there, my brothers and sisters, that can identify with what that means: Police cars coming up behind you and running your plates to see if you have anything they can use as a reason to pull your over (or inventing a reason to pull you over even if they don't - otherwise known as "DWB": Driving While Black), store employees following you around or appearing out of nowhere mainly to keep an eye on you, and of course, the ubiquitous spectacle of women clutching their purses and/or snatching up their children, and getting the hell away from you as fast as possible. Most days I can either take this all in stride with a laugh or shake of the head; some days, however, it pisses me the hell off enough that I just want to snatch one of those skittish women's purses - not to steal it, mind you, but just to whack her upside her bigoted head a few times, Aunt Esther style (and if you're Black and over the age of 40 and you don't know who Aunt Esther is, get off my blog, you fish-eyed fool. H'ah, glory!).

bogeyman

"The term bogeyman is also used metaphorically to mean a person or thing of which someone has an irrational fear."

Now many folks would respond to me by staking the position that Blacks, and particularly Black males, commit violent crimes at a rate disproportionate to our overall population percentage. And while this is an undeniable, tragic problem that has many causes but few - to this point - solutions, the argument ignores one essential fact: just because most violent crimes are committed by Black males, it doesn't mean that most Black males are violent criminals. To me, this is a critical distinction, yet if you are inclined to see Black males as bogeymen, then it's a point that won't amount to a hill of beans to you. I guess that's the thing about us bogeymen: either we all look alike, or we're all just so frightening that even though we may each look different, all those good, innocent people we're scaring can't be expected to remember what distinguishes one of us from the other. Neither can those good folk be bothered with context when it comes to us bogeymen: being dressed in your work clothes, church-going suit, pushing a stroller, holding your child's hand, being on a date with your sweetie...none of these things matter when a bogeyman's elevated levels of melanin are perceived by someone else's photo receptors and the resulting signals trigger waves of distrust and fear throughout their bodies- because any other reaction would require rational thought, and really who has time to be rational, reasonable, or logical when bogeymen are roaming about?

bogeyman

 Noun  Someone or something that people believe is bad and causes problems

This brings me to the case (or non-case, if you're a member of the Sanford, FL Police Department) of the shooting of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman. I won't rehash all the details of the shooting, or restate any of the follow up stories; you've no doubt read and/or heard them all by now, many times over. I guess the thing that sticks in my mind - throughout the coverage of Zimmerman's changing stories; the questions of who attacked whom and who was defending himself against whom; the conflicting accounts of whether he was or wasn't injured, whether he had or didn't have a broken nose; whose voice was heard screaming - throughout all of this, I ask myself over and over: what was Trayvon Martin doing on the night of the shooting that George Zimmerman found so suspicious? Such a simple and obvious question to ask, but one without a sufficient answer (or any answer). What was Trayvon doing that was suspicious? 
Was he trying to break into a car? Peeping into a window of some body's home? Following somebody? Or was George Zimmerman's "suspicion" of Trayvon Martin just due to the latter's "Walking While Black"?

Yes, I'm aware that NBC admitted to doctoring Zimmerman's 911 call, but let's say for the sake of argument that this proves he wasn't targeting Trayvon for his race. Then what was Trayvon doing that was suspicious?  Is Zimmerman some expert on drug abuse that he knows definitively what someone looks like (and from a distance, no less) what a person looks like on drugs? What was Trayvon doing that was suspicious? 

Until we hear from Zimmerman himself (and not his family members and various lawyers and mouthpieces) and hear just why he was found Trayvon Martin "suspicious", then the only thing I can conclude is that Zimmerman looked out his car window, saw himself a real live bogeyman that he couldn't possibly conceive of  "belonging" in his neighborhood, ambling along aimlessly (as 17 year olds are wont to do), and wearing a hoodie no less (which as we know, according to Geraldo Rivera, is justifiable grounds for murder ) called 911, then - in disregard of the dispatcher's recommendation - decided to follow after Trayvon, setting off a chain of events that turned Zimmerman into a modern-day St. George, slaying a Black dragon.

No matter what your stance on this tragedy is - whether you are outraged that Zimmerman is not in jail, or whether you are outraged that Zimmerman is being unfairly treated; whether you think Zimmerman is a racist thug, or whether you think Trayvon was; whether you think Zimmerman stalked and killed Trayvon or whether you think Zimmerman was defending himself from an attack from Trayvon; whether you are outraged by, weep for, or otherwise mourn the loss of a 17 year old, or whether you have so little regard for the lives of people of color that you are angry that fictional characters whose death you wept over when reading a book are played by Black actors in the movie adaptation of that book ; whether the circumstances of Trayvon's death stirs up echoes of history and/or identification with constantly being viewed with suspicion, or whether you can't quite understand why some Black folks' reactions  are as strong as they are - I would think you would want to know the answer to the question: What was Trayvon doing that was suspicious? Then again, maybe you don't need to know; maybe being a "bogeyman" was enough to create suspicion.


Until we find out the answers, I'll just thank God that the "Stand Your Ground" laws don't exist in Maryland. I might be dead already...

Baltimorons, the Carry Out Edition

Baltimore, like every city, is chock full of carry out joints where you can buy your favorite subs, chicken boxes, ethnic food, pizza, etc. As you might expect, and no doubt have experienced, these spots are hotbeds of Baltimoronic activity. Now I'm sure none of my blog followers would ever behave this way (suuuuuure, you wouldn't) - but just in case, let's talk about it:

1. Most carry outs offer variations on pretty much the same fare. It shouldn't be that hard to figure out what you want. I mean, usually you know that you're going to that joint before you get there, and after you get there, you're probably going to be standing in line for a minute, looking at the menu posted on the wall, or that you picked up from a stack on a counter; how much time do you need to figure out what the hell you want to eat?
2. As a special case to #1, talking on your cell to someone else about what they want, after the point at which it is your turn to order should be justifiable grounds for a group beatdown. Figure that shit out before it's your time to order...
3. The prices of any and everything that you can buy in the carry out are clearly listed. Don't be lazy and ask how much the chicken box is when you can clearly find the answer out for yourself with a minimum of effort...
4. If you're going to argue with your cook/cashier about the total for your order, make sure your math skills are up to par. If everyone else in the joint has listened to you arguing about your total, added the numbers up for themselves, and determined that your total is what was actually rung up, why are you still arguing about it?
5. There ain't a carry out joint on the face of the planet that's not going to charge you extra for cheese. Seriously, get over it and pay the 30 cents...
6. It doesn't cost any extra to be polite. Really, you're the one up in this greasy spot getting yourself some grub; how do you figure that makes you better than the people preparing it for you? And if you're a regular customer at the carry out, why would you want to keep coming back to the same place if the workers and/or food annoy you so much? Not only that, but do you really want to piss off the people responsible for fixing your order?

Just a little friendly advice for you carry out Baltimorons, from the Angry Nerd (not that my readers would need it, of course)...

"Jeopardy!", the Audition (conclusion)

To read part 1 of "Jeopardy!, the Audition, click here
To read part 2 of "Jeopardy!, the Audition, click here

Finally, the time came for the auditions to begin. There were 24 of us aspiring contestants for that audition session. Ours was the middle of three sessions that day in Philadelphia, and that contestant search team was going to be there all week, while a second team was holding auditions in Dallas at the same time. These were the first two of twelve cities the auditions were being held in, which meant that there were a lot of people auditioning for a very limited number of slots.

The first thing we did was to line up to take head shots (baby, I'm a star!).  We received our polaroids and headed on into the conference room. The three man search team, an energetic, lively trio, introduced themselves, and got us all pumped up and ready to rock and roll...but they were really doing was setting us up to be smacked down by the first challenge: a 50 question test that was similar in format to the online test we all passed to get the audition in the first place.

Like the online test, the questions appeared on a screen one at a time; however, there were three differences: first, we were all writing the answers rather than typing; second, we didn't have to phrase our answers in the form or  a question; BUT third - and most important - instead of fifteen seconds, we only got EIGHT seconds to write down a response before the screen moved on to the next question! Now, I don't know if the degree of difficulty of these questions was harder than on the online test, or if it just seemed that way because of the reduced time we had to answer, but let me tell you something: eight seconds ain't shit when you're trying to come up with trivial, obscure answers to questions in all manner of random categories not of your own choosing, especially when you're in a room full of tense, INtense, competitive smart people all trying to outdo you and make some money. Out of those 50 questions, there were three or four that I absolutely had no clue as to what the answer was, and another 2 or 3 that I absolutely DID know but couldn't think of in those eight seconds. The rest I had answers for, usually almost instantly, which was definitely gratifying. There was one potential problem, though: the very last question was right in my wheel house: "Ag is the chemical symbol for what element?" Aww suki suki now, finally a chemistry question!  I had come into this thing hoping, as someone working in the chemical industry, that I'd get at least a few science questions, but question #50 was it for this test. No problem, Ag is the symbol for silver; hell, I was just working with some silver nitrate a few days ago, so I had no doubt about this one. Yet for some reason, I had this nagging feeling that stuck with me for the rest of the day and night that in my haste to get that test over with, I might have written down "gold" instead of "silver". Now I'm not sure whether I actually did, but the paranoia was creeping up in me big time. I could just imagine the conversation:

(Contestant search producer: "Mr. Keel, it says on your application that you are a Chemical Research Associate. So can you tell us why you wrote down gold instead of silver for the last question?
Me:  "What? Er...um...huh? I did? Um, see what had happened was...wait, uh, are you sure?")

After our tests were collected, along with our applications, head shots, and a list we had to bring of five facts and stories about ourselves, the search team left the room to grade the tests and look over our information. This gave us time to act like a room full of school kids: "What'd you get for this question? Anybody know the answer to that question? Man, I wish I had about two more seconds to answer that question!" This had the somewhat cathartic effect of making us each realize that we weren't alone in feeling like real dummies after that experience. Everybody seemed to know the answer to a couple of questions that others didn't know, and likewise didn't know the answers to a few questions that other people did know, and there was no one making a claim to knowing all the answers. I think we all were relieved at that...

Once the search team came back into the conference room, tests graded and our paperwork in hand, it was time for the real deal: head to head competition! Before we got started, the guy who seemed to be the top dog on the coordinating team went over the importance of not ringing in too soon on a question, as that locks out your ringer and keeps you from immediately being able to answer. However, it was revealed during a brief Q&A that the lockout is only for a half second, so that if you were quick enough and slick enough with the ringer (which was similar to clicking an ink pen) you could, after the lockout, still ring in on answer if the other contestants were either too slow or had also had lockouts. The importance of personality also was stressed; it wasn't enough to know stuff, you had to present that knowledge in a way that was going to have some appeal on TV. So, armed with that advice, it was time to let the games begin...

We were called up three at a time to play the game as you would on the real show. However, after almost every question, the game would be paused as someone from the team (often more than one of them, or even all of them) offered a critique of the way the question had been played: whether the contestant was loud enough, or sounded confident or enthusiastic enough,  or was looking down or off in the distance while giving the answer, whether someone was having issues with the ringer. The critiques were not sugar-coated; the search team was mostly positive, but stern in their assessments.
No scores were being kept, but it wasn't hard to see who was good at the game and who wasn't. Meanwhile the rest of us watched and learned and waited for our chance. When each trio of contestants finished playing, they were interviewed in front of the rest of us. They had to state their names, where they were from, and what they did, after which members of the team would ask them for details about what they did, and questions about things they had written on their applications. After each set of interviews, we all gave a hearty round of applause, and the next group of three contestants were called up.

I was called up somewhere in the middle of the pack, and being me, I worried while I waited about whether their was any significance to the order in which we were being called upon. Was it based on the test scores? The overall package that we turned in? Alphabetical? Completely random? Who knew? No one ever found out their grades, either on the written test or the online test which got us here in the first place, so it was just left for me to sit, observe, worry and speculate. On the other hand, being called up in the middle of the pack was definitely a good thing in term of picking up pointers and learning from the mistakes the people ahead of me had made.

Right front the start I felt in my element during the game. I rang in with perfect timing on two of the first four answers (I got them right) and just missing ringing in first on the other two, both of which I knew. This got me a critique from the team: I was only pushing the ringer once, while my opponents were hitting theirs multiple times. I was lucky to hit the ringer with the perfect timing on the questions I got right, but not so much on the ones I got beat out for (which they could tell from my body language that I knew). I needed to do better with the ringer - much better.

After that it was on! I can see how contestants on Jeopardy! get on a roll; it's not just that they know more than their opponents (although I'm sure that can happen), but that they get into a rhythm with their clicking the ringer that puts them at an advantage. That's what I felt after the critique. It turns out the guy to my left was feeling it too, and we but on a serious battle against each other. I ended up being a little more aggressive, and rang in first a few more times, but my aggressiveness led to two wrong answers, which this other guy quickly jumped on. The third guy - poor thing - got left in the dust. He was able to get a ring in maybe twice (and he answered one of those incorrectly, which I was only too happy to pounce on). All in all, even though no scores were being kept, I did pretty doggone good, and I think I might have had a slight edge on the guy I was duking it out with.

Then came the interviews. Turns out the guy I was battling with is a Harvard grad who had just quit his job to open up a restaurant - in New York City, no less. The third guy was - I think - a teacher, but he seemed so deflated by the beatdown he received, that nothing he said was even remotely memorable. As for my interview, the search team asked questions about my job that gave me the chance to explain what I do with a good amount of detail; and amazingly enough, no one's eyes appeared to glaze over the way they normally do when I try talking about the joys of electrochemical and metallurgical research. I also told the story about my grandson Darius (aka the Hurricane) jumping out of his crib at 2 in the morning and scaring the hell out of me, which got a big laugh...on the way back to my seat after I was done, the guy sitting in front of me - who I talked to while we were waiting to get our head shots, and who turned out to be a news reporter in the D.C. area and who had also been, in his younger days, a DJ at an R&B / Hip-Hop station in upstate New York (a fact which everyone found to be hilarious because this dude looked to be about as old-money preppy whitebread as you could get) clapped me on the shoulder and said, "awesome, man!", which is pretty much exactly how I felt right then (I had even temporarily forgotten about the whole silver/gold worries).

After a few more rounds of head to head competition and interviews, we were done. Nerdy as those folks were, they were an impressive bunch, that had done some interesting things in their lives. But while I hadn't traveled to Europe, or started my own business, or had any unusual hobbies or collections, or built a life-size pinata of myself for my 25th birthday (which someone actually did), there were three things about myself that stood out in that group: #1, I was the only Black contestant in that session, #2, I was the only one in the session doing any work in chemistry, or in the sciences, period (unless you want to count the high school chemistry teacher), and #3, besides the retired college professor, I was the only one who was a grandparent (hell, there might have been only one other person in the room even old to qualify). So it remains to be seen how much all of that will matter...

After I was done, Mike - who did a little sight seeing while I was auditioning - and I went to a sports bar he found. We both decided we wanted to try famous philly cheesesteak sub, so cheesesteaks and beer it was (for the record, the cheesesteaks we had didn't taste any better or different than any other cheesesteak we had ever eaten. Maybe the "movie star" could have picked a better spot, LOL). After that, the road dawgs made our way back to Baltimore, with Mike taking pictures while I took the wheel. The drive back was just as easy as the one going up; the only negative to the trip was the SIX DOLLAR toll we had to pay - in ONE direction - at all toll in our "fair" home state (seriously, Maryland? SIX  FREAKIIN'  DOLLARS?). Aside from that, it was a great experience - challenging, nerve-wracking, stress-inducing - but in the end, pretty damned fun.

(and yes, I am still worried that I wrote "gold" instead of "silver")

Jeopardy! the Audition (continued)

To read part 1 of "Jeopardy!", the Audition, click here.

OH MY GOD, WHAT TIME IS IT???

It was 10:40AM. Why didn't my alarm go off? I pulled out my phone; it was indeed set to go off at 10:30 - 10:30PM (wonderful...you can remember all manner of facts and figures and trivia, but you can't set a damned phone alarm...)

After a couple minutes, my heartbeat returned to normal, and I realized I still had plenty of time to get myself together. First order of business: De-funkifying my nasty breath. That hour of sleep had given me a case of the yuck-mouth, and combined with the leftover taste of chef's omelet (complete with onions and peppers and three kinds of cheeses), I knew I needed to freshen up - QUICK.

I made my way to the hotel gift shop, reached to grab a pack of Eclipse gum (damn, how did my hands get so ashy?), and then asked the cashier if they carried any lotion (geez, and look at my fingernails!) and nail clippers. I left the gift shop, headed to the nearest men's room, pulled my tie out of my jacket pocket, tied it (three times before I liked the knot), slathered my hands with lotion, clipped my nails (which would have been easier if I had done them BEFORE lotioning my hands), and as I walked out, popped three pieces of gum in my mouth, chewed the life out of them, then chewed on a couple more after that. There. Now I'm good to go...

With about a half an hour to go before audition time, Mike and I walked around to where the auditions were being held. Outside of the conference room there was a table, on which there was a can of "Jeopardy!" pens, a stack of applications, another stack of paper that had a space to write your name, followed by a series of lines numbered 1-50, and a stack of 8"x11" sheets of cardboard. I glanced off to one side and saw 3 people already filling out the application, so I grabbed one of everything and joined them.

I sat down, said my hellos, and joined in the conversation as I filled out my paperwork. Sitting with me were a retired professor from Blacksburg, VA (where Virginia Tech is located), a chemistry teacher from northern Virginia, and a graphic designer from Silver Spring, MD. As it got closer to 11:30, more and more people filed into this reception area. Although everyone was polite (and some were very friendly), two things stuck in my mind about them: #1, look at how these people are dressed! Is it possible to look more nerdy than this bunch? and #2 listen to them talking about past Jeopardy! winners, recent Final Jeopardy! answers, and Alex Trebek like they were Star Trek groupies or something. OMG, this is like GEEK CENTRAL! Look at these people! I'm waaaay cooler and dressed better, and just as smart! But then...

"And how about that Final Jeopardy! question from last night (a question that none of the contestants answered correctly)?" the graphic designer (a lumpy, dumpy 30-something guy wearing a drab grey shirt, an even more drab, severely faded, rumpled pair of what were once blue khaki-style pants and some beat-up hush puppies) asked. And a voice sounding like just mine came from out of what appeared to be my mouth, saying, "I know right? That was a tricky one, although I should've figured out from the clue that it was Fahrenheit 451." The others sitting around that table - the lumpy dumpy graphic designer; the matronly high school chemistry teacher with the awful blue and white flowered dress; the retired college professor, who would look good dressed in a Santa Suit at Christmastime, but in his green shirt, baggy brown corduroys, and taped up glasses, not so much; the young guy with the tinted glasses and scruffy beard, who looked like he was wearing his big brother's suit (to go with some beat down running shoes), and who, despite living in Tampa, Florida, bypassed the audition in Orlando so he could come to Philadelphia to visit some obscure museum that no one else had heard of; the guy who had gone to elementary school with a former big winner on the show, and who seemed to be both jealous of him and to have a huge man-crush on him; the approximately 6 foot tall, 90 pound lady with the droopy brown hair, and profoundly sad face, and who was auditioning for the third time - all smiled and nodded in agreement at my assessment, as if I was one of them.

And then I gasped "Oh my God, maybe I AM one of them! Maybe they're all looking at me in my suit and tie and thinking I'm the nerd! No wonder that restaurant manager was ignoring me and treating Mike like a movie star; he probably DID look like a star standing next to me..."

OH NO...I'M A JEOPARDY! GEEK!!!

(TO BE CONTINUED)

"Jeopardy!", the Audition

So the time had finally come for me to make my trip to Philadelphia for the "Jeopardy!" Audition. When my new "road dawg" - my Brother-in-law, Mike - found out about the audition, he didn't waste time in letting me know he wanted to take the road trip with me, which was pretty cool.

My audition time was 11:30AM. We got rolling early (around 6:45 or so) to try to avoid catching the worst of the morning rush hour traffic. The plan worked great, as we pulled in front of the Sheraton Society Hill, where the auditions were taking place, a little after 8:30 - but that left me with almost three hours to kill before the audition.

Since neither of us had eaten yet, the first order of business was breakfast. We quickly found the hotel restaurant, where after standing unattended to for a few minutes, we were greeted by the manager, an attractive, perky, 40ish blond who instantly turned on all the charm and flirtation she could muster towards us - or more accurately, towards Mike:

"Would you prefer to sit in the back, or up here in front with a view of the lobby?", the manager asked.
"How about right here?" Mike asked, pointed to a raised table and chairs at the front of the restaurant, which looked directly out onto the lobby.
"Well now, that's a good choice", she said, as she led Mike around to the opposite side of the table. "You should want every body to see you; you look just like a movie star!" She held the chair out for the "movie star", who was wearing an ordinary blue sweater, jeans, and white sneakers. Meanwhile, I - wearing a nice grey suit with a brown and white pinstripe shirt with French cuffs, and brown shoes polished to a perfect shine - got no such love; I seated myself.

"Can I get you gentlemen something to drink?" she asked, and we placed our orders.
"What are your names, by the way?"
"I'm Michael."
"Michael? Wow, I've always loved that name! Everyone I know named Michael is just a wonderful, wonderful person! How about you sir, what's your name?"
"I'm Keith."

**crickets**

"Okay, well let me go get those drinks for ya!"
(I was beginning to have doubts about this "road dawg" idea)

After we devoured breakfast, there were still a couple hours until the audition. Mike and I walked around the lobby for a few minutes, then found ourselves in a smaller room just off the lobby. The room looked like it could have been used for small meetings; it had four plush chairs, a fireplace, and sliding wooden doors.

We sit down, got comfortable, made some small talk about the decor of the room, and of the hotel in general. Everything was nice and relaxed, and I wasn't worried at all about the audition. But then...UH OH! I looked at Mike, Mike looked at me, and we both knew: the "ITIS" had descended upon us both! What's more, I had, for some reason, woke up around 3:30AM, and in all my excitement and anticipation, never made it back to sleep. So now I was REALLY feeling it...

"Look, man" Mike yawned, as he sunk deeper into his chair (which, since it was identical to mine, I knew was ridiculously comfortable), "You can close your eyes if you want to. I'll make sure you don't oversleep."

As I looked at the race between his ass and his eyelids to see which could droop the lowest the fastest I knew his idea had a fatal flaw: this here knee-grow was going to be asleep BEFORE I would be; who the hell was gonna wake HIM up so he could wake ME up? So I pulled out my cell phone and set the alarm for 10:30 - I thought...

Next thing I know, I sat straight up in my ridiculously comfortable chair like somebody had jolted me with an electric cattle prod...

OH MY GOD, WHAT TIME IS IT???

(TO BE CONTINUED...)