bearing blog

Homemaking for Engineers.

Incidentally, the last post marks the start of a new topic category, "Homemaking for Engineers."  I'm going to phase out the old one, "New Paradigms in Homemaking," on the grounds that "Homemaking for Engineers" is ever so much cleverer and will probably inspire me to post on the subject more often.  Besides, it really does describe my viewpoint on the subject pretty neatly.

There are times when I think I should have named the whole darn blog "Homemaking for Engineers."   

Laundry engineering.

About two months ago we moved into our new house, designed to fit our somewhat unique lifestyle.  Among the built-in features is a second-floor laundry room.  It's lighted and spacious, with front-loading machines and space on top of them for folding, a hanging rod and places for baskets, and also room for our diaper changing table.   

We assigned a workable, comfortable laundry room high priority.  (Consequently the bedrooms are smaller than is usual in new-construction houses.)  In the last six months or so before we moved, I developed the expectation that I would cheerfully wash, dry, and fold two baskets of laundry every day, as soon as we moved into the new house with the nice new laundry room.  Surely it would be easier than descending two flights of narrow, uneven stairs to the damp and cobwebby duplex basement and climbing up again with full baskets.

Of course, it isn't exactly easier than what I was really doing, which was letting Mark descend two flights of narrow, uneven stairs to the damp and cobwebby duplex basement, etc. Anyway, I'm still trying to figure out how to fit laundry into my day. 

I'm incrementally making improvements in the laundry algorithm.  The first step was to stop Mark's practice of going round the house with an empty basket and collecting tablecloths, dishcloths, bath towels wet diapers, his clothes, my clothes, kids' clothes, all together into one mixed-up load.  I have a generous amount of folding and sorting space in the new laundry room, but not enough to sort that.  I bought new laundry baskets and put one in each closet to collect the different kinds of laundry, and decreed a ban on future laundry-mixing.

(Mark: But... I don't have enough laundry in any of these individual baskets to make a full load!

Me:  Good.  Laundry's done for today. 

Mark: <blank look>

Me:  We just increased our surge tank capacity.  Consequently, we have the opportunity for a partial shutdown.

Mark:  Ah.)

(N.B.  Actually, it wasn't quite like that, but I'm playing the scene for comic effect here.)

That innovation set the stage for a second one a bit later.  I had been putting the kids' clothes on hangers upstairs in the laundry room, then carrying it down to hang it in their closet on the first floor.  But then, after some experimentation, I discovered that the laundry output increased incrementally if instead I carried their clothes down in baskets, fetched kid-size hangers from the closet, clothed the hangers while seated at the kitchen table, and then returned the clothes to the closet rod.  I think that this productivity increase is due to the elimination of the bottlenecking step of remembering to carry empty kid-size hangers upstairs.    (Fortunately, I have already incorporated clearing the kitchen table into my daily routine, or there would be another bottleneck along this particular process path.)

There's still plenty of room for improvement.  I told Mark this morning that what I really need is a pilot-scale laundry room, and pilot-scale laundry to accompany it.  He said I needed direct-something-or-other simulation instead.   I forget what, as it was a term I wasn't familiar with.  But as I'm likely to get neither,  I guess I'll have to stick with tinkering with my process on-line.  Good thing I don't have any technicians, or I'd have to buy them a lot of pizza.

Making idols. (Not a metaphor.)

Stories of congregations, and occasionally entire mainline Protestant denominations, that have lost touch with their Christian roots are by now old hat.  But every once in a while, you come across one that almost serves as its own satire.

Take, for example, the case of the Lutheran church ladies fashioning clay images of pagan goddesses.  I think blogger Russell Moore, at the link, put it best: 

There's a time to fight for a restoration of one's church to fidelity and orthodoxy, and then there's a time when one no longer has a communion of churches, but a sub-Christian organization.

Sometimes it is hard to tell when that transition has been made. When you get to Asherah worship, I think the ship has sailed.

Um, yeah.  See all the little idols right here.

"The Well-Connected Mother."

A wonderful article at Touchstone Magazine by Juli Loesch Wiley.  It seems to say it all, concisely, beautifully, about marriage, pregnancy, childbirth, caring for one's own children.

Men are often tempted to think that their bodies were made for their own use. To a great extent this is true for everyone: Your hands, sir, are yours, they are for your use, and mine are for my use. A man can indulge this illusion of autonomy even further by supposing that even his genitals are there for himself. They’re a source of at times almost compelling drives and intriguing sensations. Even his testes are useful for him, in that the hormones they produce provide certain secondary sexual characteristics he has an interest in maintaining.

But a woman’s body has all these nooks and crannies which are no use to us but evidently were put there for someone else. Don’t get me wrong: We women have our pleasure doodads and our own hormonal self-interest as well. But then, well, there’s the womb. That’s not there for me. I can do without it. It was obviously put there for someone else. The same is true of mature mammary glands, rich with branching ducts and reservoirs, as they are found in nursing mothers and as they are not found in childless females, however nubile and Partonesque they may be.

Read the rest.

What makes wives happy.

According to a study by W. Bradford Wilcox and Steven Nock, published in the 3/06 volume of Social Forces, the top predictors, in order, of a woman's marital happiness are:

1. Her husband makes an effort to listen, regularly expresses affection and appreciation, and regularly shares quality time with her:  a constellation of behaviors that Wilcox and Nock name "emotional engagement."
2. She perceives that housework and other family responsibilities are divided fairly.
3. Her husband earns 68% or more of household income.
4. She and her husband have a strong commitment to the "norm of lifelong marriage."  The example given:  a shared belief that "even unhappily married couples should stay together for the sake of the children."
5. She does not work outside the home.
6. She and her husband share attendance at religious services.
7. She holds "traditional" attitudes about gender roles.

Goodness.  No wonder things are going so well for me. 

I told Mark about this.  He didn't like the term "emotional engagement." 

Emotionally engaged?  I don't have to be "emotionally engaged."  Any rational person should know that emotions are an important factor that must be included in all calculations of how to behave.

What I learned today.

If you have more than a few pieces of furniture from IKEA, and you have a two-year-old boy, don't leave Allen wrenches lying about the house.

The gift that keeps on giving.

Very funny, from breed 'em and weep.   Be sure to read the comments.

Her mom must be a good sport.

Why exempt public schools from sex-abuse lawsuits?

Amy Welborn points to this NCR article about efforts to oppose a Colorado bill, or rather certain language in a bill, that eliminates the statute of limitations for child-sex-abuse lawsuits --- for some institutions that perpetrate the abuse of children.

Why so much opposition?  Because it exempts public schools.

According to the article, when a 17-year-old boy began his testimony about how the former president of the Estes Park, Colorado public school board molested him, the panel  chairman (Sen. Ron Tupa, a Boulder Democrat) walked out.  And the other committee members interrupted the teenager,  until he was finally ordered to stop giving his statement.

This is rich:

[Panel chairman Senator] Tupa, a social studies teacher in Colorado’s Boulder Valley School District, was absent for much of [Martin] Nussbaum’s testimony. Later, he told the Register he has seen no information to indicate a problem of sexual abuse in public schools.

Perhaps if he'd stayed in his seat and listened (this was a hearing, after all) he would have seen some.   Here's part of what he missed:

Charol Shakeshaft, a Hofstra University researcher who prepared a federal report on public school sexual abuse, submitted written testimony to the Colorado Legislature that stated: “The physical sexual abuse of students in public schools is likely more than 100 times the abuse by priests.” Her testimony said most of the accused are shifted from one school to another and are seldom fired.

Martin Nussbaum, an attorney for the Colorado Catholic Conference,... submitted written documentation of 103 cases of child sexual abuse in public schools in the past eight years that have resulted in teachers losing their licenses. Most license revocations came only after criminal convictions.

A police investigator stated on the record:

"...Any officer can tell you that the majority of sexual abuse against minors occurs in our public schools.”

Lifting or at least extending the statute of limitations is probably not a bad idea.  But why exempt the institutions with the biggest problem?

Reverse-engineering the Suzuki method.

I like to get out and about in the afternoons, but I don't much like going to too many appointments in one week.  Already our family has swimming lessons on Tuesday evenings, an early-childhood music class on Monday mornings, and a monthly science class at the local nature center.  So I have been reluctant to add musical instrument lessons for Oscar, even though I'd like him to start.  The primary reason is my resistance to adding yet another specific time and place that I have to show up. 

I only have one homeschooled child so far.  I can't let this get out of hand so soon.

The secondary reason:  I'm not sure that Oscar's ready to handle an expensive musical instrument.  Every time I get my guitar out, if I turn my back for a moment, he can't stop himself from turning all the pegs.

But I've seen two little friends really bloom into loving their Suzuki violin and guitar lessons, respectively, and I know Oscar is a bit jealous of them.   Finally I hit on a temporary solution:  the recorder.

I knew already that any lessons before age eight, I wanted to do in the traditional Suzuki method.  (In that method, the parent begins by taking lessons herself with the child present; later, the parent and child take lessons together.  Also, the pieces are learned by memory at first rather than introducing note-reading, and attention is paid from the beginning to beautiful tone production.)  I hear that many Suzuki teachers in the U. S. have given up on getting parents to take lessons with their kids, which is too bad.  It sounds like fun to me!

But with a little bit of research, I discovered that we could probably learn the recorder together, at home, with some self-discipline on my part.   There are many advantages:

• The instrument is inexpensive --- five dollars for one that looks and sounds sufficently important and impressive to a kindergartener.  I bought four!  (Now I need to buy some even cheaper ones for my toddler to play with.)
• It's also highly portable and easy to care for.
• It's simple enough that, because I can already read music well and my ear is reasonably well trained, I can learn the basics myself pretty quickly.
• The Suzuki books and CD are available for the recorder, as are a number of other resources (see, e.g., this one.)

I spent some time interviewing my two friends, the parents (respectively) of the little violin and guitar students, about their lessons:  what happened on the first day, how the lesson goes, what the kids learned first, how many pieces they learn at a time, how long they take to learn a piece, what skills are covered in what order.  I learned that the "syllabus," so to speak, is highly dependent on the instrument itself.  For example, the boy learning guitar learned how to hold his guitar and play a note right away; the girl learning violin spent a whole month just learning how to hold the bow.  The first pieces learned, too, are carefully chosen to complement the skills needed to learn to hold the instrument and produce good tone.  I also learned a few details, e.g., that the student learns to "take a bow" at the end of every lesson and practice, and that the family is supposed to play the CD as much as possible at home.

Then I turned to the Suzuki book, which had some basic messages for the beginning student and instructor, and tried to figure out from the order of the early pieces how one would proceed.  As far as I can tell, you start by covering up most of the holes with tape, and the first lessons are about producing the difficult low notes without squeaking, which requires the learner to work from the start at blowing gently.  (Most other recorder methods begin with the "easy" higher notes.)   Pieces of tape are removed one at a time as the student learns fingering, but in the very beginning he can focus on breathing and tone production.

I'm listening to the CD (which has harpsichord and viol backup, and sounds very cool and medieval).  I'm also working my way through the first few pieces, and Oscar is begging to be allowed to have "his" recorder, which is still locked away in the cabinet, or at least to be allowed to hold mine.  A little anticipation is good for him, I think. 

I plan to do a "lesson" once a week and practice daily, just as if we were doing traditional lessons.  I've no illusions that without an instructor I'll be able to reproduce the "real" Suzuki method, but I'm hoping I can approximate it and at least learn whether Oscar needs to be signed up for outside lessons or whether he even really would want to.  I'll write more about this as we go.

A lovely surprise.

A joyful surprise arrived in my e-mail box on St. Patrick's day.  Our friends K. and E., who are Milo's godparents (and we're the godparents of their son who's the same age as Milo) sent the news that they had their second baby early that morning --- very fast, unexpectedly on their apartment's bathroom floor!

As I read E.'s (the dad's, that is) brief account, I hooted with joy (and laughter) for them.  He described it as "amazingly smooth" and "much smoother and easier" than the (hospital) birth of their first.  I had encouraged them to look into homebirthing when they were first pregnant.  They interviewed one or two  homebirth midwives and decided against it.  Surprise!  I can't help but grin like a maniac.  I'm so happy for them.    

K.'s labor was two hours and nine minutes long, from the very first contraction --- and it really was the first, she says, there wasn't any prodromal stuff  --- up to the moment E. caught the baby.   E. sent a photo that their boys' aunt took just before the paramedics arrived.     In the picture K. is getting ready to nurse the baby boy, who is wrapped in towels.  She looks as if she was just about to lift her sweatshirt to latch him on when someone said, "Smile!"  She is grinning from ear to ear --- she looks gorgeous, radiant.  The baby's chin is up, searching.  He is chubby-cheeked and pink, with dark hair. 

I went over later with some red raspberry leaf tea (it's all I had in the fridge!) and heard more of the story.  The worst part, according to K., was riding in the ambulance after the delivery, to get the newborn tests at the hospital.  Even though they'd both been up for hours and hours and hours, they were glad to see me, wanted to talk, and too excited to sleep.  Especially E. the dad, who was exhiliarated and thrilled, obviously, but still had a kind of deer-in-the-headlights look about him!  (My godson the toddler, on the other hand, was very tired and near meltdown, so I didn't stay long.)   

E. showed me the digital pics from just after the birth, which included many shots of firefighters posing while holding the swaddled, sleeping baby.  "That guy's the rookie," E. told me, pointing to a young-looking man made burly-looking by the big firefighter coat.  "This is only the second fast birth he's been to."  Really?  And the others?  "Well, let's see.  The driver said he'd been to more than thirty.  And the others had all been to a bunch too."

I have a feeling that this happens more often than people realize, despite the near-heroic language used to describe unexpected home births in local news stories.  I looked into planned unassisted home birth, quite seriously, for some time before each of my previous pregnancies.  We wound up both times hiring a midwife (who is a wonderful match for us --- very hands-off and gentle) , but I learned enough to know that most of the time, particularly if there are a lot of interventions, particularly in the hospital, an attendant is more likely to create a problem than to solve one.    The best attendants stay out of the way and let birth unfold on its own. 

Which is probably one reason why fast labors, the kind that happen on bathroom floors (provided the mother is healthy and the infant is full term), seem to be comparatively problem-free and fairly smooth.    Google for local news stories about fast unplanned home births and read them.  I just did.  Some of them mention aspects that were obviously perceived as alarming by the parents --- and, crucially, by the reporter writing the story --- but that happen commonly and aren't necessarily really problems:  e.g., "the baby was born with the cord wrapped around his neck."  (So was E. and K.'s baby.  E. unlooped it.)

The other reason why fast labors (again, provided the baby is full term)  may go well is simply that a fast labor is almost by definition one that's working really smoothly.  Problems slow it down, don't speed it up, you know? 

Actually, most of the last two paragraphs is just my perception, plus my memory of having read all that somewhere, perhaps in Emergency Childbirth:  A Manual by Gregory J. White.  The data about the safety of unplanned home births of healthy babies is pretty hard to come by.  It seems that most people who study home birth safety lump planned and unplanned home births together (probably because they mine the data from birth certificates), and the few who have separated them lump preterm and fullterm deliveries together. 

Anyway, I went home from K. and E.'s house with a new thrill in my heart, the kind that always leaps up when I am lucky to be near a new baby with a gentle birth story, that birthglow I guess.  Throughout my own pregnancy, almost 20 weeks now, I've been oddly detached, maybe too busy to think about it much.  Seeing this new little person asleep in his daddy's arms has got me feeling pregnant again, in a good way, and wanting much more to meet my own new little one, who's only just starting to make Little One-self known to my senses. 

I got home and told Mark, "I'm jealous.  I wish that would happen to me."  (Come on folks, even you fans of hospital birth!  She had fewer than 15 contractions, none of them closer than five minutes apart!  Wouldn't you?)

He said, "Oh, so it's 'I'll have what she's having,' is it?"  He paused for a beat and added, "You can't have what she's having."

Postscript:  I gave E. my copy of Emergency Childbirth for a present inscribed "Great job!"  (I was in too much of a hurry to write anything smarter than that.)  Guess I'll have to get another copy for myself.