In 1971, Jane Goodall, wrote a book called "In the Shadow of Man" about chimpanzees. It was about a woman who hid behind bushes and peeked at chimpanzees. Taking my cue from Ms. Goodall, I too have been hiding behind native foliage (the plastic fichus tree) peeking at a rare and skittery species—the Americanus Computer Engineerus. These are my observations.
The Americanus Computer Engineerus (common name: Key Banger or Computer Guy) is a shy creature given to a solitary existence foraging among plastic fichus trees, behind rickety temporary walls constructed of mud and palm fronds called cubicles. Key Bangers often decorate their mud and palm frond constructions with family photos, free posters, and calendars depicting attractive computer components. Face to face communication is unusual among Key Bangers.
One fine day under the strange pulsating rays of the florescent bulbs preferred by the Eastern Key Banger, my research associate and I observed a rare one on one Key Banger exchange.
“Well, I’m going to lunch.” A juvenile Key Banger attempted to address a more senior Key Banger.
An awkward pause, of approximately three minutes passed while the Key Bangers avoided eye contact. My research associate and I exchanged strained looks.
The senior Key Banger scratched the back of his neck while sitting in stony silence.
“Are they communicating?”
“Yes, but it’s very subtle,” I assured my associate.
“How can you tell?” he inquired.
“Because I feel itchy and wildly uncomfortable.”
At long last, the senior Key Banger said, “Well, have a good lunch.”
I scribbled a few notes into a spiral ring notebook and double underlined the words “confirm the existence of Key Banger Hubs.” The lowland natives of fichus tree land related to me that they had observed the curious phenomenon of large gatherings of Americanus Computer Engineerus gathering in hubs. They described these hubs as a gaggle of computer consultants (i.e. Key Bangers) congregating at “conferences,” huddled in corners, sitting in bean bag chairs, banging at keys. The natives assured me that it is possible to observe these gatherings only if one is careful to stay downwind so as not to spook the hub. I am determined to observe a hub, first hand.
It turns out that I am married to an Americanus Computer Engineerus. My husband, a first rate example of a Key Banger, migrates weekly, and then returns to our nest to tape receipts to notebook paper. He’s really good at it. The receipts are really flat and smooth when he gets done. I always tell him how nice they look.
He also likes to read a book with a prancing horse on the cover called “Jakarta Struts” and another book with a coffee cup on the cover. The coffee cup book is about “Java Beans.” I tell the grand children that their Poppy is in the circus, and that he’s a bareback trick rider. They love to hear stories about how Poppy can balance a coffee cup on his head while his horse, Jakarta, prances around the ring.
My research continues.
We have been married thirty-one years in October and I feel confident that any day now, I will master the Key Banger language called Acronym, which is an ancient form of Sumerian—ASAP, PDQ, HTTP.
Jane Goodall set the standard for fieldwork while peeking at chimpanzees. When she had a baby boy she named him Grub. Jane Goodall is my hero for helping me understand that it is possible to understand those different than ourselves if we are observant, patient, and willing to name our children names like Grub.

Linda (Grubbing for Answers) Zern

 

Once upon a time the Egyptians lived in bedroom communities known as mud holes. The problem with these bedroom mud holes is that they not only lacked access to decent museums featuring mummies, but the Egyptian’s backyards disappeared into the Nile River—once, twice, sometimes seventy-two times a month at high tide.

This caused a lot of confusion when the mud overlapped. No one knew where the chain link fence guys should put in the new fences or who belonged to which papyrus patch. It was a mud hole mess—all the time.

So the Egyptians invented algebra, which helped them keep their mind off of the mess in their back yards.

Until one day a guy named Jut, realized that he could get back at his neighbors, whom he suspected of fudging the chain link fence lines, by insisting that the local school board force his neighbor’s children to learn algebra which kept them at home in their hovels and out of Jut’s mud. Jut was a real joker.

Algebra became a national craze, right up there with “Dancing With the Pharaoh’s Architect.”

Then Muslims conquered everyone with their swords and their peaceful interest in spreading the use of the zero. Not wanting to be the only ones made miserable by mathematics, the Muslims continued conquering—well, everyone, proving that math makes people overly enthusiastic, perhaps even manic-depressive.

Proof, also, that the Arab nations are to blame for the widespread heartbreak caused by algorithms, the word “algebra” is, in fact, an Arabic word meaning “A Poo-Poo Platter of Numbers for Occidental Suckers.” In the 19th century British mathematicians took up the math gauntlet, which is why “the colonies” kicked their junk in 1776.

“Taxation without representation” was a popular catchphrase in the colonies that would later come to mean that the new, shiny government would require all college students to take College Algebra rather than taking Accounting, so that no one would know how much taxation without representation they (the government) would actually be doing in the future, because it was going to be a lot.

That’s how I made a “D” on my first quiz in College Algebra. I hate Jut.

It is my opinion that cultures that invent things like the zero are silly people bent on cornering the market of world oil supplies, under the code name of silly looking letters like OPEC (note: the use of the silly zero shaped letter at the beginning of the still sillier sounding code word.) I rest my case.


Linda (Keeper of the History) Zern





 

“I have a package for **Jack Silas,” the man, in the snappy delivery uniform, informed me.

“He’s dead,” I said.

“Sorry, I’ll notify,” he hesitated checking the return address on the package, “hmmm, someone . . . and, I am sorry.”

The man in the snappy delivery uniform waved the package over his head with that slightly uncomfortable shuffling of the feet that indicates that the conversation might be in danger of drifting toward one or two potentially toxic subjects such as—death—or, the trade war with China caused by over protectionism and un-do union influence on our elected officials. I reassured him.

“Oh no, don’t worry. Jack’s been dead forever. He’s a ghost now. Sometimes people see him when they wake up from a nap on the couch.” I smiled, pointing to the actual haunted couch.

The man in the snappy delivery uniform started backing away from me still waving the package, only now he was waving it in front of him. He stumbled over a trailing stem of pink vinca as he continued to make his get-away through my flowerbed.

Sightings of our ghost, Jack Silas, have included one incident on the wooden bridge that covers our well, one example of shimmery air hovering over the couch post bedtime, a feeling of extreme unease resulting in one family member (who will remain nameless) arming himself with a hammer and wandering around the house all night, and an actual visual sighting in the laundry room, on laundry day, near the dryer—by me. Jack was wearing a striped shirt, no pants.

It’s not that Jack wasn’t wearing pants. He might have been. It’s that he was see-through on the bottom—just to clarify.

Having a ghost is better than having a dog for the assigning of blame when playing the family blame game. Stuff gets lost. It’s the ghost. Unexplained messes, smudges, dirt, or fart smells, it’s the ghost. Weirdly broken tchotchkes that the three-year old, Conner-boy, may or may not have been playing with—then that darn ghost has been at it again. Unknown noises, screams, wails, shrieks, and coughing—inside the walls—well, then obviously the ghost is kicking up his heels, or you might have squirrels.

A ghost can be very handy. I recommend having a ghost—except when they start receiving mail—then the situation just gets so complicated. I mean how do you handle the forwarding issue?

I have been openly mocked for reporting my personal sighting of Jack Silas, the ghost, but I shall not recant. I did, in fact, see a misty figure of ghostly proportions on laundry day, his appearance so real that I thought someone had walked into the laundry room, and so real in fact, that I turned to speak to that person. I gasped and started to cry when I noticed that the “person” was wearing a striped t-shirt and no pants. The kid who carried the hammer around all night, heard me gasp, clear across the house, and he makes the most fun of me, which is rich when you consider the hammer stunt. I can’t help it if I see dead people, for some of us the veil is very thin, and the next world is just a forwarding address away.

Linda (Ghost Whisperer) Zern

** The name has been changed to protect the ghost!




 

“Nice hat,” I told five-year old Zoe when she arrived at my house. She walked through my garage, looking jaunty in giant pink plastic earrings and necklace, elbow length pink opera gloves, and a pink ball cap with glitter stripes.

“I don’t want the spiders to fall on my head,” Zoe replied matter-of-factly, adjusting the My-Little-Pony purse on her shoulder and pulling her hat down over her ears.

I looked up. Spider webs, their keepers busily spinning, weaving, and repairing, formed a crisscross pattern of spider lace over our heads, a canopy of creepy crawler hammocks filled with desiccated bodies that stretched across the garage ceiling in ever more complicated and convoluted territorial boundaries. Okay, okay, sorry . . . bottom line . . . there are a lot of spiders in my garage.

“Hey! Do you see what’s in those spider webs?”

Three-year old, Conner, joining the party, squinted at the nearest spider herd and said, “Skee-toes.”

“That’s right, skee-toes; Ugh, I mean mosquitoes. Exactly.” Zoe adjusted her hat so that it tipped rakishly over her right eye.

I said, “Children, YaYa’s spiders are keeping us from being carried away by skee-toes; I mean mosquitoes; I mean blood suckers.”

They both frowned.

Eyes narrowing, Zoe asked, “Do spiders suck blood?”

“Yes, I mean . . . no, not our blood . . . bug blood, oh forget it; come in and get a cookie.”

Sitting at the dining room table, cookie crumbs trailing across the surface, Conner looked up at my dining room light fixture, a faux antique deal, complete with fake cracks, a crackle finish, and a pesky filigree of tiny spider webs that resist my every attempt at spider eradication.

“YaYa?” Conner asked.

“Yes.”

“You like Haunted Mansion Disney?” He flashed his dimples.

“Hey, funny boy, have another cookie.”

FYI - I’ve become the little, old lady that lives in the spooky house filled with spiders and haunted light fixtures, so, my new motto is: “Spiders is good. They eats the cockroaches.” (from Fletch Lives)


Linda (Skeeter) Zern