Hawkeye

Jake's been going to a lot of science conferences lately. Right now he's in Potsdam, near Berlin. About a week and change ago, he was in Leipzig. While he was in Leipzig, I received a very short e-mail from him, from which I quote the following:

"I just met Alan Alda. Nice guy."

My brain subsequently exploded. Alan Alda.

As in "M*A*S*H".

As in Benjamin Franklin Pierce.

As in Hawkeye.

As in one of the men very high on my "If Only I'd Been Born in a Different Decade ..." list of men who slay me. (Those interested may read about two other men on my list here.)

Oh, now don't get too cocky, Alan Alda.

It's not called my "If Only I'd Been Born in a Different Decade ..." list for nothing. I've seen you lately.

And it's a little upsetting.

Fortunately, Hawkeye wasn't wearing the glasses when Jake saw him. Jake says he looked more like this:

But passed out alone on a couch at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. He was there filming a PBS documentary called "The Human Spark" that will air next year. Jake stood across the lobby and watched him sleep with his mouth hanging open and his lurpy frame struggling to find a comfortable position on the über-modern couch. Jake only had a few minutes between sessions and managed to, from his vantage point, mentally will Alan Alda awake so that he could go sit by him and strike up a conversation. They talked for a few minutes about the documentary, and Jake told him how much he and I love "M*A*S*H". Jake says he was very gracious and seemed geniunely flattered.

To which I replied, "That's just great." And stuck my head in the oven.



JEM

P.S. You owe it to yourself today to read a few of these Hawkeye one-liners. You'll thank me.

Flying the Old Black, Red and Gold

Germans aren't really patriotic.

Which isn't surprising. After being screwed over by not just one but two nationalism-obsessed regimes in under 50 years, Germans have a right to be a little skittish about touting a love for the Vaterland.
To be fair, most of the rest of the world would still feel a little chilly at the sight of a mass gathering of Germans chanting "Deutschland! Deutschland!" in a fervor of national pride.

It still brings up some bad memories.

This is why, up until two years ago, it was considered to be in very poor taste to fly a German flag in Germany.

You could find a few black, red and gold tricolors in the vicinity of the Reichstag, Germany's capital building in Berlin, but virtually nowhere else.

But in 2006, Germany experienced something of an identity crisis when its soccer team made it to the World Cup.

And won the bronze.

For the first time in a really long time Germans were proud of their country, and they wanted to wear it on their sleeves.

And so they did. A little awkwardly at first, like getting on a bike for the first time in decades. The world watched slack-jawed as it happened, not quite sure how it felt about the new development, but ultimately decided it felt good to see its competitors develop a little confidence. A little bite.

And it has stuck.

It's Cup time again (Euro Cup this year), and the tricolors are flying everywhere.

But calling it patriotism, I think, is a stretch. It's more like team spirit. Time-wise and otherwise, the sentiments don't seem to extend beyond soccer season.

Which is too bad. Because they've got a pretty awesome country here.

Germany is the wealthiest country in Europe and, trailing only Russia, the most powerful. It brought us the printing press, considered by many to be the most significant invention of all time ...

a religious reformation that shook the monolithic Catholic Church to its core ...

and many of the greatest and most recognizable classical composers the world will ever know ...

Bach

Beethoven

Not to mention the first Mormon apostle to be born outside the United States since John Widstoe — President Dieter Uchtdorf (who, by the way, recently visited our very own chapel here in Dresden and is just as charming, genuine and generally awesome as he seems on T.V.).

They also have great cuisine, including all manner of wienies and mustard and pickles and these things ...

German potato dumplings. Oh, mama.

And let's not forget, last but certainly not least ...

Heidi Klum — breathtaking international superhero, I mean supermodel, and hilarious, endearing, level-headed host of Project Runway and Germany's Next Top Model (which blows ANTM clean out of the water, but that's another post entirely).

What's not to love? All things in time, I suppose.



JEM

Then, Yes, We're Thinking of the Same City

Today in English class, the students asked me where I was from, exactly, in the United States. I told them Idaho, which is in the Rocky Mountain region of the country, in the west. Usually no one has heard of Idaho, so I explained that it is a big state with not many people and lots of potatoes and cows.

"Do you know of a city called Provo?" one woman asked.

Yes, I told her, stunned that she had, apparently. I studied at a university in Utah, I said, and I had been to Provo many times. "Do you know people in Provo?" I asked her.

Turns out Provo is sister cities with her city, Meissen, which lies 10 miles or so outside Dresden, and the two cities maintain a correspondence.

"Zhey come to our Stadtfest (city festival) every year," she said. "And zhey trink vahter."

Cowboy Diplomacy

From the BBC today:

Bush in Germany on 'final tour'

Mr Bush was greeted by Mrs Merkel as he arrived in Germany

US President George W Bush is in Germany on the latest leg of what is likely to be his last tour of Europe.

His talks with Chancellor Angela Merkel are expected to focus on Afghanistan, Iran and the Middle East peace process.

Earlier, Mr Bush attended a summit with EU leaders in Slovenia where they threatened Iran with further sanctions unless it suspended nuclear enrichment.

He said an Iran with a nuclear weapon would be "incredibly dangerous" to world peace.

Mr Bush will later travel to Italy, France and the UK on what is being seen as an eight-day farewell tour of Europe.

During the trip, Mr Bush has held out the prospect of a global deal on combating climate change, which he said could be achieved by the end of his term in office in January.

US President George W Bush issues Iran warning

The US president and his European hosts ended the summit by admiring a show of Slovenia's dancing Lipizzaner horses — a fitting image the BBC's Oana Lungescu at the summit said — as it suggests the days of cowboy diplomacy are over and, after the strains of the Iraq war, Europe and the US seem back in step again.

Whatever divides the US and Europe, our correspondent adds, they remain the world's inevitable partners, united not just by history and values, but also daily trade worth $3bn.

###

Don't tell anybody this, but I secretly relish how much Europeans dislike the U.S. Because no matter how much we disgust them with our fast food and our SUVs and our Wal-Marts, in the end they always have to grit their teeth and smile because we're stuck together, and they know it.

And I think that's kind of funny.

President Bush accepts a barrel of herring as Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel grits her teeth and smiles.

JEM

We Have a Verdict. And a Gender

Noggin profile shot clearly shows our child is human.

Went to the doctor on Friday for the 4-month check-up, and the ultrasound was conclusive. Apparently the alien has developed into an actual human child. A human child with a perfect nose and XY chromosomes.



JEM

Public Service Announcement

Did you know that May, June and July are the three months of the year one is most likely to stumble upon a baby bird that's fallen out of its nest?

If you happen to find a baby bird on the ground, the first thing you should do is look around for its nest and, if you can find it, replace the bird. If you can't find the nest, assess the bird. Is it injured? Is it a nestling or a fledgling? The Interwebs tell us that a fledgling is fully feathered, can flap its wings and hop. If the bird you've found is a very young nestling or if the bird is injured, it's a good idea to consult a veterinarian for suggestions. It is possible to hand-raise a baby bird but the mortality rate is very high and they require a great deal of special attention.

However, if the bird is a healthy fledgling (see above photo), it's likely that it hasn't actually fallen from the nest, but rather has left the nest. Simply place the bird in a nearby bush or tree where it is not in imminent danger. Odds are likely the bird's parent is nearby and will pick up where you leave off.

It is not, in fact, advised that you panic while standing outside in your pajamas and hustle the little guy back to your apartment in a hand towel. It is further unnecessary to build the bird a nest out of a milk carton and some old socks and attempt to feed it mashed-up hard boiled eggs with a tweezer and water from an eye dropper for several hours.

Now you know.





JEM

They Came Bearing Gifts

I promise I'll stop rambling about my parents' visit in just a second. I just wanted to share one final photo from the cutting room floor.

Go get 'em, Dad.

On a related note, as soon as my body is no longer the home of a developing alien life form, I'm totally picking me up one of those outfits.

But I digress. What I really wanted to talk about today was this:

The agony and the ecstacy.

When they visited, my sweet parents, not unlike conquering Spaniards trying to make good with the natives, brought with them gifts from faraway lands. It was like Christmas. After a whole year of no Christmases.

Here are some of the American-bought goods they brought for us:

— Brown sugar. Whenever I mention that I miss brown sugar, Germans always say, "We have brown sugar here." To which I obnoxiously roll my eyes, snort and say, "THAT is not brown sugar." Basically, what they have is brown-colored granulated sugar. It's worthless. Not that Germans would know what to do with real brown sugar if they were swimming in it: Germans who have never been to America don't even know what chocolate chip cookies are. I know. Can they even be considered human?

— Measuring cups and spoons. The metric system rules all here. They do everything with it. They tell time in the metric system. They write poetry in the metric system. They're actually on the metric calendar, which has 10 months, 100 10-day weeks and 1,000 days total. But the most baffling thing they do with the metric system is cook with it. OK, it does make a lot of sense when measuring liquid to do it in milliliters. I'll concede that. But 5 grams of baking powder? For real? They expect me to WEIGH it? Germans swear it's the most logical way to do it, but I will never believe it. And now that I have my own measuring cups and spoons, I can stop pretending like I do.

— Gigantic bottles of ibuprofen. Hands down, one of the most obnoxious aspects of German life is that you can't get medicine — any medicine, whatsoever — at the grocery store. You have to go to a pharmacy that sells nothing but medicine and that conveniently keeps hours worse than an American bank. So there you are, with your brain exploding, and you realize you're out of ibuprofen, so you drag yourself to the pharmacy, and miraculously you manage to catch one that's open. Now you have to ask a pharmacist to retrieve the ibuprofen, which comes in itty-bitty boxes of 20 tablets, for you from behind the counter. The pharmacist is then required by law to read you your rights, telling you how exactly to ingest ibuprofen without killing yourself, which is, at this point, exactly what you're considering doing with it. It all seems terribly cautious for a country where the legal age to purchase alcohol is 16. Thankfully, we now have over 7 million ibuprofen capsules and will not be requiring the pharmacist's services any time soon. (Expectant mother note: I've read that ibuprofen can make developing aliens feral, so I'm not personally benefiting from this one quite yet.)

— Eye drops. Jake's eyes are always red and dry. I suspect it has something to do with working at a computer for 8 hours every day and then coming home and working at a computer until he falls asleep or until I'm able to lure him away with food or ... other tempting incentives. Like a friendly game of badmitton or chess. Anyway, he uses eyedrops a lot. And his luck with German eyedrops (which must also be acquired at the dreaded pharmacy) has been not good. Even the strong stuff, he says, is like tap water. Fortunately, my mom works for eye surgeons and she hooked Jake up with the good stuff. Fo reeels.

— A metric ton of buttery microwave popcorn.

The only popcorn Germans eat, and by many accounts, even know about, is sweet, like kettlecorn. I'm not opposed to this. What I am opposed to is that I can't get salty, buttery, artery-clogging popcorn at the movie theater or toss some in the microwave when I want to watch a movie at home. How am I possibly expected to enjoy great cinema without it? Inconceivable!

— Vanilla and almond extract.

What's weird is they do have extracts here, like orange and lemon. But not vanilla or almond, my two all-time favorites. Everything I make now will taste like sugar cookies.

And finally ...

— Jif peanut butter.

Mother's milk.

I call this photo "Jif Jugs", and I apologize if you find its unintentional obscenity offensive. But it's an insincere apology because I think this is one of the funniest pictures I've ever starred in.

Here's the thing, I love peanut butter. A lot. It was basically all I ate for my first two years of college. Without it, it's entirely possible I could have starved to death. I owe it my life. And I owe it a large portion of my happiness, as well, for being so deliciously crunchy and for pairing so nicely with honey and raspberry jam and milk. Germans don't share my sentiments. They hate peanut butter. They do have it here. Technically. But it's gray and it tastes like glue. Frankly, if it was the only peanut butter I'd ever been exposed to, I'd hate peanut butter, too. But I'm convinced their animosity arises primarily from the fact that they don't have access to Jif, which is the finest peanut butter in existence. Even among American peanut butters like Skippy and Peter Pan, which are light years ahead of German peanut butter, Jif shines more brilliantly than the sun itself. I don't know if it's how they roast the peanuts or if they work some kind of voodoo at the Jif factory involving virgin sacrifices and chicken bones, and I don't even care. It's amazing stuff. My dad feels the same way. He was concerned that since I have not been eating any peanut butter during my pregnancy, I might produce a child with a life-threatening allergy to peanuts, which would inevitably result in my father's having to disown the child. Dad's request when he bestowed the Jif twinpack upon me was that I eat as much of it as I can throughout the pregnancy so that my unborn child will grow accustomed to the substance and hopefully somehow be able to get a sense of its true heritage. It's a mission I humbly accepted. And after being reunited with my Jif after nearly a year apart, I can tell you that my heart has only grown fonder.

Thanks, Mom and Dad, for taking such good care of us. Our eyeballs are lubed, our arteries are clogged and your grandbaby is properly peanut butter-innoculated thanks to your endless generosity.



JEM