My fridge stinks!!!!

So, I pull open the door, and it smells like rot.

I think it's the 2 huge tins of homemade sauerkraut I put in Pyrex dishes the previous evening.

The funny thing is, is that it tastes pretty good.

Kids in my apartment's backyard.

Towards the end of last month, I went out mid-afternoon on a weekend to the back alley to do recycling and take out trash, and as soon as I opened up the backdoor of the apartment building, I see 3 (hispanic) kids who were playing in the yard all stopped and looking up at me.

"Do you need help with that?", the oldest (a chubby boy around 11) asked me.

"No, but if you get the gate to the back alley, that would be huge," I was like.

And, the kids all ran to go open the backgate.

I asked them more or less where they came from, and it turns out that their aunt is the young woman who lives in 1st floor rear who I've met a couple times, and they were visiting her for the day from a near suburb.

After I did the trash and recycling - I got the young girl (about 6) to open up the trash can and the young boy (about 5) to open up the recycling lid - I asked them about their visit as I walked back to the house.

The young girl showed me a roly poly she had on a big leaf, and the young boy opened up his hand and had a roly poly in it.

Then, the older boy took me over to show me 2 spiderwebs by the backdoor of the apartment building, and a place where a garter snake once came out from behind the building and scared them.

After that, the young boy was standing over by the spider web looking at a spider, and his older brother translated his (English) mumblings.

"He says he's Spiderman," he was like, and at that the young boy looked up at me and just started screaming "ahh! ahh! ahh!" really excitedly, like he was totally stoked about Spiderman.

Then, I said bye, and told them to be careful and not go into the street, since cars go fast down there and they could get hurt.

...for a second originally, I had thought they were kids in the neighborhood, just randomly playing in some other house's backyard...

Crazy Ph.D. student debt: $200,000?!??!?!

This one (white) guy I know from the beach is a late-stage graduate student from a West Coast program, and he moved back to the city since he lived here a long time ago, and now works as a bartender while he's finishing his dissertation.

Somehow the topic of student debt got broached, and he was like, "I figure, if I owe you $200, that's my problem, but if I owe you $200,000, that's your problem" (i.e. if you give out $ that'll never be paid off in full, that's stupid of you).

I'm really not sure if he picked those #s out of his ass, or if he really owed that much.

Part of me almost thinks that he really owes $200,000 for his Ph.D.

He was saying that the city he lived in was expensive, and a 2BR was $1400 a month, and that if you didn't get a TAship you were effed.

The way he doesn't realize how interest payments can eventually cost more than the capital also makes me think he might not be the best with money.

What a f*ck*d situation.

Disturbing dream of shaving:

The other week I dreamt -

I'm in front of the bathroom mirror looking closely to see if I should shave or let the stubble be, and all of a sudden I see all these long gashed out sections where the razor had stripped off patches of skin from where I was shaving a second time against the grain to get a very smooth shave.

Then, I remember I can't shave for a while, till all that heals.

Then, I wake up.

New word I'm hearing a lot:

"the gig economy" (= how more and more work is for very limited duration and you have to kill yourself to secure the next limited duration job).

That really is adjuncting, and Uber, and tutoring, and people I know who worked as temps or something like that for law firms.

Where are all the jobs at?

Reflections: (Mexican)s work hard.

I was thinking the other day of the recently divorced (Mexican) woman I know from the local taqueria, who works incredibly long hours at 2 jobs to support her family with no help from the government.

Honestly, she is a mega-giver to the economy and the govt. budget, and gets like nothing in return.

It seems like so many (Mexican)s you see in the city are like that, working so many hours at so many jobs.

It really is insulting and racist and irrational for someone like Donald Trump or whatever Republican have you to call them lazy and takers.

I bet trust fund kids contribute way less per capita, on their own initiative (though fees on their parents' $ managed for them might be higher).

My new Spanish vocabulary item:

"paletero" (= "ice cream vendor").

The other week I was working from home on a very hot day, and I heard the bells of an ice cream cart outside.

I ran downstairs and outside and caught the (Mexican) guy, and he humored my Spanish.

I asked him (in Spanish) what I should call in order to catch the attention of someone with work like his - I suggested "paletador" - but he taught me that no, the word is "paletero", and I should be like, "ey, paletero!".