Mitzi Mittens, beloved pet, dies at 14

Mitzi Mittens, beloved pusset of the Nesmith family, died on Friday in Cedar Rapids.  She was almost 14.

Mitzi had lived with lymph cancer for the past year, and had done remarkably well on a regimen of steroids and vitamins, continuing her daily schedule of patrolling the back yard, sitting on laps, and keeping the family company. She was taken acutely ill on Friday morning, and passed later that day.

Adopted by the family when she was a small kitten, Mitzi had an endearing personality that combined curiosity with restraint. Everyone loved her nose stripe and chin dot, like an exclamation point on her face.

She loved to nap with the boys, Robbie and Eli, and enjoyed following family members around the house. She had very good manners, and was very polite when asking for a taste of someone's ice cream. She knew her name and came when called.

Not much of a hunter, she could be trusted to stay in the yard and not harm small critters living there except for the occasional butterfly. She enjoyed rolling in garlic mustard and mint plants while outside.


One of her favorite pastimes was to join the family as they played board games, first walking over the board and pieces, and then sitting with her back to everyone. She was a good kitty, and the family often told her so.  They will miss her very much.

The funeral will be held on Sunday or Monday, depending on the weather.  No flowers; please send memorial donations to the Cedar Valley Humane Society.

Poison Season

It's weed-poisoning season.

I thought I missed it--usually I poison weeds around the time forsythia blooms (that's when the weeds are "actively growing.") This year, forsythia came and went, and the dandelions popped up.  They were beautiful.

And suddenly they were not.

Our weed-studded lawn stood out among the rest of the lawns of our lovely tree-studded older neighborhood.

I knew I needed to so something: poison the weeds.

I have such mixed feelings about using this stuff.  I'm living in Iowa, one of the big contributors to the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico because of all the farm fertilizers that wash down the Mississippi.  I don't want to be even a small part of that.

Plus, there are bunnies that live in our front yard. I'm not super-crazy about them--they nibble anything I try to plant in the front garden--but they are fellow creatures. 

And food for the neighborhood's barred owl family.

Still, the dandelions are so ugly, and the crab grass that arrives later in the season isn't pretty either.
I tried using an organic weed and feed in the past.  In fact, when the boys were little, that was all I used.  Unfortunately, it isn't very effective.  I didn't notice any change in the yard when I was using it, alas.

The salesperson at the nursery said that it's not too late to use it.  It rained last night to make the grass (and weeds) damp so that the poison would work.  No rain for the next couple of days so it won't wash down into the Mississippi.

So off I went with the weed poison and my spreader feeling very torn.

I cheered myself up by singing "Keep Your Hand on the Plow" while I spread poison.

Let's hope it does what it needs to do with the least possible amount of damage to other organisms.

Confusing Spring Ephemerals

There's a page in my bird book called "Confusing Fall Warblers." It has pictures of all the warblers (small migrating songbirds) that look similar in their fall plumage.  As in: they are all small, olive drab, and way up in the tops of the trees.

This flower-geek post is going to be about something similar: spring wildflowers that confuse me every year:  Bloodroot, Hepatica, Spring Beauties, and False Rue Anemone.

They're all spring ephemerals--they appear in the spring, and then die completely back by summer. And they all have small, simple white flowers.  And I always mix them up!  This bugs me.

As a word person, I like to know the right word for everything.  I think I've finally got these flowers figured out.

I wasn't sure I'd see ANY wildflowers when I went over to Palisades-Kepler State Park this week.  Our winter was so long and cold that I didn't know if the flowers would be up.

But look what was there to greet me at the start of the trail!  Pants!

As in Dutchman's Breeches!  They are probably my favorite spring wildflower, mostly because of the name.  Once you know the name, there's no way you can see these comical flowers--that look like starched white bloomers hanging crotch-up from a stem--and not laugh.

But these don't confuse me.

Here are the confusing ones, and I'll explain how I figured out how to tell them apart.

This is Bloodroot.  Its white flowers are usually a bit bigger than the others', and they stand on taller stems. The stamens are conspicuous and yellow. The tell-tale sign that they're bloodroot is the deeply-lobed leaf that's usually curled around the stem.

Apparently, they also have orangy roots, but I'm not going to pull any up to see.

Next comes Hepatica, above.  This one's tricky because the best way to identify it is by the three-lobed, mottled leaves.  Sometimes the leaves are underneath the leaf litter in the woods. Hepatica are sometimes called Liverwort (what a great word--but not very pretty!) because, like our livers, the leaves have 3 lobes.

Hepatica can sometimes be pale purple as well, which makes it look like

Spring Beauties!  You can be sure that you're seeing spring beauties--not Hepatica--if the plant has long, thin grass-like leaves.  But Hepatica always likes shade, and Spring Beauties sometimes bloom in the sun.  Kind of like

This little flower, which was just coming into bloom when I was walking.  It's a False Rue Anemone, and it has delicate little leaves that come off of the stem.  Sometimes it can be quite large later in the spring.

I saw some other less-confusing flowers on this trip, too, like this Wake-robin with a bud about to flower.

And some Wild Oats, also about to flower.

Hope you also get out to see the spring wildflowers--and that you don't get confused!

Hunter-gatherer in the Hy-Vee

Some women love shoe shopping.

I love grocery shopping.

Good thing, too, because it's one of the chores that I do for the family.

Not sure why I enjoy it so much.  Something about walking into a well-lit, well-stocked grocery store makes me feel energized and capable.

These days I usually shop on Thursday mornings.

Maybe that's one reason why I like grocery shopping: my unusual working schedule (half time teaching at Coe and assorted freelance writing assignments) allows me to shop when I'm not stressed and the store is not crowded.

Thursday morning grocery shoppers are primarily senior citizens, moms (and, more frequently these days, dads) with little children, and me.

At the store entrance, I grab a cart, put on my reading glasses, and pull out my list.

The produce section is one of my favorites. I roll my cart past pyramids of oranges, bunches of bananas, tables of apples. 

After picking up some "Jazz" apples, I see a display labeled "Jungle fruits."  Intrigued, I walk over. There are baskets of starfruits, mangoes, and prickly rambutan, along with a few pineapples. I grab a starfruit--something to tempt Eli the picky eater.

I stop to feast my eyes on the wall of greens just beyond the fruit.

After a long, cold winter, I welcome the opportunity to see leaves.  Like the starfruit, these greens came a long way to this Iowa grocery store--I'm guessing they traveled by truck and plane to get here. Some days, I feel guilty that my food has a pretty large carbon footprint. Other days I'm just happy that it's summer somewhere and that I can benefit.

As I roll by, I look forward to summer days when I can bike down to the farmer's market to buy produce.

Once past the produce, I push my car through each aisle, scanning the shelves for items on the list--where do they keep the garbanzos, anyway?--and placing them into the cart.

At the far end of the store are the meat counters. Chicken thighs are on sale, so I grab a package.  They'll go in the crock pot later this week.

Longingly, I walk by the fish counter.  The display is beautiful.

I love fish.  But this fish has come a long way--Iowa is about as far from an ocean as you can get.  I'm often a tiny bit disappointed when I've bought it.  Besides, my family isn't crazy for fish.

This aisle is more Iowan, I think.

Some of the aisles at Hy-Vee, our local grocery chain, puzzle me.  Like this one:  an entire aisle dedicated to pop.

The bigger Hy-Vees also have enormous displays of every kind of yogurt, especially Greek.  Where's the Noosa?

There are other puzzling items.  Even if I don't buy, I enjoy seeing them!

I wheel my cart up to the checkout; there's no way I can go into the "12 items or less" line. That's OK.  I love pushing my full cart up to check out.

When I'm shopping on Thursday mornings, I often roll past old couples shopping together, their cart holding just a few items: a couple cans of soup, some Danishes, a can of decaf coffee, a bunch of bananas.  Some day, that'll be me and Bruce, shopping for just us.  We shopped together before--before kids, that is--and maybe we'll do it again.  I wonder how it'll feel after the years of shopping for a family, thinking about nourishing growing boys, looking at new items and thinking "I bet Eli will like this" or "Robbie loves spaghetti--I'll make sure to make it this week."

As I put my items up on the conveyer belt, I feel glad that I'm here, at the grocery store, and glad that grocery shopping needs to be done more often than shoe shopping.

Chorale Midwest to Present Broadway Cabaret

The choir I sing in here in Cedar Rapids, Chorale Midwest, is trying something new and fun this spring: a Broadway-style cabaret.  

Here's a story I wrote about the event to send to local media outlets.  Not sure if they'll pick it up, but I can at least share it myself!  If you love Broadway--or the Chorale Midwest--come join us!

Chorale Midwest will present a Broadway music extravaganza, “A Journey Down Broadway,” on Saturday, April 5 at 2:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. at Echo Hill Presbyterian Church, 9000 C Avenue NE.

For the show, the church will be transformed into a Broadway café where guests can enjoy refreshments while listening to Chorale Midwest soloists and ensembles sing songs from favorite musicals.

The “Journey Down Broadway” will include pieces from “West Side Story,” “Rent,” “Les Miserables, “Company,” “Candide,” “Jersey Boys,” and more.

The Broadway theatre ambiance will begin as guests enter the building, which will be set up like a theatre lobby. Doormen will welcome them, CDs will be available for purchase, and free refreshments will be offered. Relaxed cabaret seating will allow guests to socialize during intermissions and before the show, as singers mingle with the crowd.

“We chose a Broadway theme because we want to offer our audience a chance to hear and see a different side of our group,” says Bradley T. Barrett, artistic director and conductor of Chorale Midwest.

The group is known for its a cappella sound and for performing diverse, challenging choral works from multiple musical genres. Chorale Midwest will be presenting its traditional spring concert at the end of April.

 Tickets for “A Journey Down Broadway” are $15 and are available on Chorale Midwest’s website, www.choralemidwest.org, or from any Chorale Midwest member.

Writing News Stories with my Students



Local resident repels invaders after damage discovered

Mouse damage, including this hole in a pastry cloth and scattered poops, were discovered by a local homeowner.

A chewed-on chocolate bar, a pastry cloth with a hole in it, and a scattering of mouse feces in the cupboard tipped off a local homeowner to an invasion of mice in her kitchen.

“I won’t say I didn’t scream when I found tiny nibble marks in my Endangered Species Supreme Dark Chocolate bar,” says Jane Nesmith, 52, of Cedar Rapids.

A chocolate bar (left) and bag of licorice (right) show signs of the mouse invasion.

While searching for an early-afternoon pick-me-up yesterday afternoon, Nesmith discovered the mouse-eaten chocolate bar in the top drawer of the cupboard underneath her stove. After some searching, she discovered more damage caused by small rodents. Besides the ruined pastry cloth and scattered feces, a bag of black licorice had been chewed through by tiny teeth.

Nesmith had to halt research on a profile article she was working on to address the issue. All the drawers had to be emptied and pulled out of the cupboard. “We’ve had pet rats, so I’m not a rodentaphobe,” said Nesmith. “Still, once I found that chewed up pastry cloth, I knew that this meant war.”

The contents of Nesmith's cupboards--and the drawers themselves--had to be removed for cleaning and mouse-proofing. "Did our house get broken into again?" asked Nesmith's son, Eli, 16, when he arrived home from school.  The home invaders were very tiny this time, but they did not steal any electronics.

Internet research suggests that mice often enter homes when the weather is bitterly cold, and they find their way in through small holes in walls—around electrical conduits and plumbing. Nesmith discovered such openings around the electrical conduit under the sink and the gas pipes behind the cabinets, and went to work at once plugging them up.

“The internet article suggested stuffing holes with steel wool,” said Nesmith. “But I didn’t have any, so I used bunched-up aluminum foil instead. And I secured it with duct tape.”

Nesmith filled mouse-sized holes in the cabinets with crumpled aluminum foil.
She secured the foil with the Handyman's Secret Weapon.

A visit to the hardware store allowed Nesmith to pick up mouse traps (“the kind where you don’t have to see the dead mouse,” Nesmith said) and ultrasonic mouse repellers. Nesmith also placed cotton balls dipped in peppermint oil throughout the cupboards, following the internet information that mice hate the smell.

"No View, No Touch" traps are now underneath the Nesmith sink. 
No mice have been caught, but Nesmith hopes they have been repelled or blocked out instead.

 

Early morning visits to the traps showed that no mice had been killed. “I am hoping they just were no longer able or willing to enter my cupboards,” says Nesmith, whose cat, Mitzi, 13, was not up to the task of mouse extermination.

Mitzi Mittens Nesmith, 13, had no comment.

Stolen items return!

I was meeting with a student this morning when I got a phone call.  Odd--I rarely get phone calls in these days of email and texting.

It was the Cedar Rapids Police.  They had my Kindle.

A woman came into the Police Department on Friday with it.  She'd bought it from a co-worker who'd gotten it from someone else.  When she tried to register it so she could install apps, a message was sent to her:  this Kindle was reported stolen.

I'm very grateful for her for taking it to the police!

Anyway, once they found the serial #, they knew it was mine.

"Can I have it back?" I asked. 

"Yes," said the officer.

He also had another question.  I'd had a diamond ring stolen, too, and the PD had also come across a ring that they thought had been stolen. 

"We got it on Tuesday.  Someone had tried to sell it at the local pawn shop near Coe.  He said he had bought it for his girlfriend at Wal-Mart, but when the pawn shop staff looked at it closely, they knew it was worth a lot of money." 

They checked with one other person who'd had a ring stolen, and she said it was too small to be hers; this ring was a size 5, like the one I reported missing.  He wondered if I would look at this one. 

The police officer brought the two items over to Coe, and I talked with him out in the parking lot.  He handed over the Kindle, in a heavy plastic ziplock bag.  (By the end of the day, I got all the apps restored, my books back on the virtual shelf, and the Kindle re-registered.)

Then then he showed me the ring.
"That's it!"  I said.  I recognized it immediately.  I put it on my finger--I have size 5 fingers like my grandmother, so it fits just fine.

The officer asked me if I knew what it was worth.  I said I'd never had it appraised.  He asked me if I would appraise the ring and let him know how much it was worth.

"We can't arrest the guy who brought it to the pawn shop because he'd just say he bought it off the street," he explained.  "But if it's worth over $1000, we can arrest him for having stolen property in his possession, and it'll be a Class D felony." 

Apparently, this guy has been involved in some other burglaries--or maybe he's just a suspect.

So, OK.  I'll go get this appraised.  Maybe it'll help them get the guy off the streets.

As for the other stuff--it's still out there somewhere.  I suspect that he sold the items "on the street."  But still: if someone who bought something from him decides to get some quick money for it at a pawn shop, those things may make their way back to us. 

But for now, hurray for honest people and for pawn shops and for the CRPD!