Dress for Success

Although the taping, prep and clean-up can get tedious, Catbird loves to put color on walls.  She keeps a shirt and pants, well-seasoned from previous paint jobs, clean and stowed in the back of the closet.  So earlier in the summer, when friends were preparing to move into a new house, Catbird was ready with brushes, drop cloth, and funked out shoes.  She loaded her ipod with Selected Shorts and This American Life, ditched her watch and rings, changed into older glasses, and tucked her hair into a splattered gimme cap.

On the way to the site, Catbird stopped at the local Stop and Rob for a large diet soda, and was entertained when the woman from the red Miata stopped her at the check out and asked Catbird if she "did exteriors."  

"No, ma'am," Catbird replied, conjuring her best blue-collar demeanor,  "I only do interior work."

Catbird chuckled about that through several coats of paint.
***

Then earlier this week, Catbird began a project of her own.  Without bothering to bathe or apply make-up, Catbird pulled on bleach-spattered capris and a blouse with holes worn clean through.  She removed the door from her spice rack, and set off to buy supplies to begin painting the utility room.  First stop took to her favorite DIY shop for a consult and to evaluate the door for (duh - duh- DUH)  evil-devil oil-based paint.  

It seems Monday is a busy morning for the paint department; not only was there a bit of a wait, there were also plenty of  opinions as to how Catbird should proceed with the project.  The test for oil was unclear, but all the men standing around waiting for their paint to be mixed agreed that a 75-year-old wall meant at least one or two of those layers were likely to be oil-based.   

While Catbird looked at sanders and considered her options, the crowd around the paint counter thinned.  One fellow who had finished his paint purchase made a point to come back and ask Catbird what she decided to do.   Catbird conceded the trim will need to be sanded AND primed before any new colors can be applied.  Fellow painter commiserated and agreed she had made the right choice.

Then he asked her if she'd like to go Honky-Tonkin' tonight.  "You know: two-steppin'.  Everybody can two-step."

When Catbird politely declined, he ratcheted up his game.  "At my age, it's not fore-play," he joked, "It's seven and eight play." 

Catbird wasn't sure she followed that fully, but she did get the general drift.  She laughed and thanked him for the invitation and, thinking only of her dear sweet physicist, declined once again.

Only 24 hours earlier Catbird had been encouraged to lose 30 pounds (yes that particular amount was named) by someone she loves, so her ego appreciated the invitation for a night out.  It is always nice to be asked.

She wonders, though, if those long lonely single days might have been improved by spending less time at the Clinique counter and more time in baggy jeans looking at strap-on tools.  She might, at least, have supplemented her income doing interiors.

Technology of Love

If you know Catbird at all, you know she is completely besotted with her grandson.  Since Dear Boy lives in Indiana and Grammy Catbird lives in Sweet Home Austin, much of our relationship is through the wonders of video technology provided by Skype.  

Dear Boy is three years old and will begin Montessori School September 1, but potty training must be accomplished for this to succeed.  Dear Boy has the mechanics down, but would rather continue whatever has caught his focus than interrupt play to keep his pants dry.  Motivation has been difficult to maintain.  Dear Boy has patient and creative parents who continue to try new things.  Trying to help, Grammy Catbird offered to buy Dear Boy the gift of his choice if he could go one whole week with dry pants.  Dear Boy thought about it for a moment and replied, "hmm...well, maybe I could go one day."


A trip to the library (one of the wonderful things Dear Boy's parents do with him) turned up a Sid the Science Kid video that involved the use of charts.  Dear Boy loves Sid the Science Kid and his clever Mama was inspired to make a chart for recording potty successes, which Dear Boy was anxious to tell Grammy Catbird about on their last Skype call.


Grammy Catbird loves all things crafty and wanted to find out how Dear Boy enjoyed that process.  


She asked, "What did you use to make a chart?"
 "Stickers!"

Ah.  Grammy Catbird asked, "Great, and when you made the chart did you use...a squirt gun?"  
Dear Boy giggled and said, "nooOOOOooo..."  

"Did you use...Hairspray?"  
Again, giggles and "nooooOOOOooo.."


"Did you use a ruler?"  
Dear Boy looked confused, then looked at his Mama, who said,  "Um, actually, we used the computer."


Oh.

A computer.


Of course.

Clearly Grammy Catbird was conjuring images from the middle of the previous century. Sigh... My physicist says someday we may be called upon to demonstrate the lost skills of an earlier era.  Catbird keeps an old cigar box stocked with crayons,  construction paper, scissors and a ruler for just such an occasion.  She has a recipe for playdough in her head, too, and knows how to create a fort from dining chairs and old blankets.  Whether the situation calls for computer technology or paste and paper, when it comes to her grandson, Grammy Catbird is ready.

A Lovely Postscript

Born 13 August, 2010 (day after HandsOn School closed), to Dr. Kennedy Fozao, University of Buea laboratory colleague of my physicist at the HandsOn School, a son:

Harry Batinyuy Fozao

Consider my physicist (AKA Harry) proud and honored.  Catbird, too.

Coming Back, an Epilogue

In our final days at the Buea Cameroon HandsOn School (http://handsonresearch.org/), Catbird asked the international faculty what they most looked forward to in returning home. These eminent scientists had volunteered their summer vacation time, research and teaching expertise, passion for science, and grace under difficult and unpredictable circumstances for two-plus weeks of hard work in Buea, Cameroon.  They traveled from India, Scotland, and various parts of the U.S.; and, in addition to those countries, represented Colombia, Canada, France, Germany and England.  

 

Mt Cameroon from U. Buea Campus

Someone please pass Catbird a thesaurus so she can look for a variety of superlatives because this group rocked.   With at least two extra days for set up at U. Buea, and no telling how much planning and preparation at home, these scientists maintained a grueling two week teaching schedule.  Eight a.m. daily we departed the hotel by bus for the 15-minute ride to U. Buea, where the faculty then ran their labs, facilitated presentations and discussions, judged poster sessions, conducted tutorials, presented scientific demonstrations, organized round table discussions and supplemental sessions, etc. until 8 p.m. when we crammed back on the bus to return to the hotel.  With no running water on campus (and not always at the hotel),  power outages, intermittent internet connections, absent and delayed equipment, traveler's complaint, bee stings, and at least one case of full blown food poisoning, these scientists delivered finest quality science education with poise and good humor.  

Some of these scientists have been with us since the first HandsOn school in India in 2008.  For others, Buea was their first HandsOn experience.  Whether they were veterans or novices, Catbird and my physicist absolutely trusted and depended on these people.  

When Catbird and my physicist faltered under the stress of ongoing budget crises and sleep deprivation, and our tempers frayed, these folks buoyed us with their camaraderie, stepped up to take on additional tasks, and proved themselves repeatedly as professionals and as friends. 

Ah, so, back to the question Catbird had asked them: what do you  most look forward to in going home?  As expected, top answers included leaving behind the hairy mildews of Cameroon's rainy season and returning to dry clothes, dry shoes, dry bedding.  DEET-free skin was mentioned.  As with most travelers anywhere, the return to routine diet (especially salads which we carefully avoided on the road) and one's own bed were mentioned several times over, as well as the ability to brush teeth with tap water and shower with one's mouth open. One young scientist described how his wife has taken a job in another state while he will stay to  finish his graduate work, and he wanted to get back to spend as much time with her as possible before she moves...sigh.  

Catbird was continually humbled by these people.  Her own longings for home were more sybaritic: a soak in her own deep bathtub, a plate of cheese from Antonelli's cheese shop (http://www.antonellischeese.com/), and return to a sense of social order that includes punctuality, transparent  banking, honoring one's commitments, traffic flowing in agreed upon directions, etc.

Layover, Charles de Gaulle Airport, returning home

***
So now HandsOn School in Buea is over.  The 45 participants have dispersed to their 17 home countries.  The scientists have returned to their home labs and academic responsibilities.  Catbird has soaked in her tub, slept in her clean dry fresh-smelling sheets, eaten Fourme d'Ambert cheese and driven down Lamar with the assurance that most other drivers will obey the rules of the road.  Her hair is clean, her skin no longer reeks of DEET.  And she hasn't had to cram twice daily with 32 other people onto a bus more appropriately scaled for 14.  

And, surprisingly, Catbird feels a sense of let down, of loss.    

She isn't depressed exactly; she is too happy to be home for that.  But Catbird does miss being around such superior quality people and hopes they all return for the next school. 

In 2012. 
In Shanghai.  

   

 

It looks like a deadly nerve gas was released in Charles de Gaulle Airport,

but really it's just exhausted scientists waiting for their next flights.

 

Stress

"Stress is the unavoidable by-product of caring deeply about something or someone."  Oy, jeese.  Catbird must care an awful lot about Hands-On Research School, Cameroon, because her stress level is higher than Mount Cameroon itself, whose peak we did finally see briefly one morning this week.  Did we mention it is the rainy season?

Mt. Cameroon from University of Buea

Gray hairy mildew inside and and air pollution outside.  Catbird's freshly washed pajamas went sour on the clothesline outside our room.  Twice.  Catbird conceded defeat and threw them in the dirty laundry pile.  Likely there will be discards when we arrive home.  Fellow Physicist next door showed me his canvas fanny pack--completely haired over. Just like the wall behind Catbird's nightstand.

Catbird did make an excellent choice in ditching the comfortable walking shoes (can't wait to get back to them) for her clunkier but waterproof hiking shoes. Even waterproof boots won't help you when the rain pours in from above,though, so there is a pair of socks in the office windowsill, hopeful for enough air and sun to prevent fungal slime.

Birds enjoying the rain

Campus is actually quite pretty but spread out, and this is not a litigious society, so Catbird's daily walk to the auditorium, meals, etc. includes leaping over several drainage ditches and slogging through running water and mud as often as not.  This morning Catbird found herself skating across an algae slick on the smooth concrete and counts herself lucky to have remained upright.  Catbird is well aware there may be a patch of wet concrete out there just waiting for her ass and elbow to land.

Daily path from Catbird's office to auditorium

One of the labs here at the Hands-On School studies human locomotion.  To enhance the data collected, they have asked some of the local folk walking by with trays of peanuts or bundles of yucca on their heads to come in and walk across the sensor.  Since many people farm the back acreage of the campus, there is a daily parade of workers skilled in the art of balancing loads.  Our first recruit was a young woman who brings her roasted peanuts to sell every day in front of the labs; she was quite shy and not a little intimidated by the process, but she was also game and did very well.

The flatworm lab is new this year and very exciting.  The young woman who runs the lab is really a great speaker and teacher and is passionate about her worms.  We surely hope we can recruit her again next year for HandsOn Shanghai.  My Physicist says she is a rising star and we expect great things from her.  Of course, that is true of most of the lab leaders here. 

It was a major battle to get campus to unlock the bathrooms in the labs and here in the Administration building where Catbird works, the staff refused.  ("That's not how we do it here.") Catbird was provided a key, which bent like playdough when she tried to use it, so she hikes three buildings over to the lab wc. This can take careful planning on Catbird's part.    

 

There has been no running water on campus this week.  Rain barrels collect roof run-off and then those barrels get dragged into the bathrooms where one is provided with a bucket to scoop it into the used toilet.  Catbird suggested the best thing we might do for the University of Buea is to send them a plumber.  FPs pointed out that the absence of materials such as PVC pipe might render the plumber moot, and Catbird concedes the point.  As a second choice, we use a lot of handwipes and their ilk.  Too bad we didn't bring more.

Our first evening with our lab leaders, one tripped and cut his foot.  We used a good bit of our liquid hand sanitizer just getting the foot clean enough to examine.  After we disinfected and dressed the wound, Catbird requested a driver to take her to the nearest pharmacy to replenish her supplies.  At three (count them:THREE) pharmacies, we were told NO hand wipes, NO hand sanitizer, NO peroxide, NO alcohol.    We now consider it liquid gold and measure it out by drops.

(Catbird has tried to post this many times and hope for the best this time.  Cannot preview so forgive the rough edges.)