Susan's Scribblings the Blog

I recently saw an advertisement for a device which allows men to breastfeed babies. It was attached to an article about a husband who complained on social media (Reddit) that his wife, in his opinion, should pay for infant formula out of her own pocket since she chose to give up breastfeeding after six months. The post has since been taken down, because he got an earful from both genders about his lack of common sense.

After perusing the article (https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/lifestyle-buzz/man-demands-wife-pay-for-formula-after-she-stops-breastfeeding/ar-BBVuJH4?li=AA2dnLi),  I spotted the video for the Father’s Nursing Assistant:

(https://designyoutrust.com/2019/03/the-fathers-nursing-assistant-japanese-device-allows-fathers-to-breastfeed-their-babies/).

This is a vessel resembling a pair of breasts which a man can fill with milk and wear like a vest to provide the nursing experience for himself and the baby. Designed by a Japanese firm, its purpose is to enhance the bonding experience between father and child and aid with sleep (which appears to be a big problem lately for Japanese parents and their children). The right breast is where the milk is poured and stored, and the left breast seems to be fitted with an artificial nipple for the baby to latch onto. It’s a smooth robotic looking two-tone whitish tank with straps. It also appears to come with an app to gauge feeding and sleeping time (the babies’ rather than the parents).

It was introduced in Texas at the SXSW festival in Austin, Texas, and looks to be popular. I wonder how society will deal with this in public restrooms, and could whipping out this gadget in a park be considered lewd behavior?

There is a good side to this: it brings men into the picture more than before, because they’re not so detached from feeding baby as they would be by just popping a bottle in the kid’s face. It’s contact and comfort. Not a bad idea.

But does it come with a carrying case, or a bra?

First was the toilet paper debate: now comes the bra debate. A person using Twitter handle @nakaimosu posted a query about how other women put on their bras; by hooking it in front and then shifting it to the back (whom I refer to as Swingers), or simply reaching around the back and hooking it (or Back-Hookers).

I’m a Back-Hooker from day one. And excuse the TMI, but I was one of the first girls in those last months of elementary school who used a bra, so I’ve got a few months of extra experience. Never was a Swinger.

I don’t think anybody puts on a skirt with a zipper in front and then moves it to the back, so why do that with a bra? You want it to be in the right position from the start, the “girls” well contained and supported, without the added exertion.

Imagine exercising before you’ve got the exercise clothes on. Why bother? You’ve already worked up a sweat.

Bras are designed with elastic support on the bottom band, so all that extra motion and tension moving it around your torso can’t be good for it. Nobody has to be a contortionist to hook a bra in back, either: if you feel it’s not worth trying, perhaps you should go for a front closure model; they are out there. You put it on like a vest.

Hooking in back can be done from the bottom up or the top down and, depending on whether the bra has two, three or more hooks, takes seconds to accomplish. Of course it takes practice but, since even guys practice how to unhook them, let’s try getting them hooked one step sooner.

If trying to hook something that fights back bugs you, see if you can get a slightly larger size to practice with, or simply practice with an extra bra and don’t try to put it on. Keep your arms down and bend at the elbows. Try holding the left and right tabs at their middles, and reach under and up behind you, then try to hook one set. Once you get the hang of hooking one, you can move to the others in turn. Know how many hooks you have before you start, and pick one set to hook first.

There may be videos out there, too. I’m not going to try starring in one, though.

In olden days, women had assistants to dress them. That meant the dressers probably hooked their own. Modern times have introduced Velcro®, but I have yet to see those on a bra. Why not, I don’t know, but hooks have nearly always been the go-to. We’ve dealt with the contraptions themselves since the first bras were introduced in the 19th century. It is said that an early bra was patented in 1863 by a fellow named Luman L. Chapman from–of all places–Camden, New Jersey. So Camden gave us drive-in movie theaters and bras. Of course, bras often were misplaced in cars at drive-ins, so it figures.

It is also said that many women wear the wrong size bra. This often explains back problems and poor buoyancy under one’s clothing. Retailers still offer consultations with experts trained in how to fit one with the proper bra. It can be worth the time.

If you can expend the effort to be a swinger, waste some more being a Back-Hooker with the right size bra.

Girls, including your own, will notice.

Turkeys and geese know when spring is coming long before we humans receive any reminders from the media to pay attention to it. They start cavorting in our personal space, often at the inconvenience of life itself. But it is the approach of mating season, and birds will be birds.

Earlier this week, somebody caught a video of a true gentleturkey helping his harem cross the road by raising his gorgeous tail like a crossing guard would a stop sign and blocking traffic until all the ladies ambled across, and here it is for you to watch: https://www.smalljoys.tv/turkey-helps-cross-road/.

Another assembly of post-Thanksgiving survivors blocked a local road the other day while I was in traffic. One fellow got out of his car, hoping to herd the group along, and the male turkey went all Robert DeNiro Taxi Driver on him, hoisting his plumage and stepping up to face off with the dude, who got back in his vehicle and chose, wisely, to wait it out like the rest of us.

I had no idea those pudgy winged creatures could travel so much and so far, but these birds clock some serious miles from their wooded homes to enter suburbia.

Geese, of course, fly until they molt at right about the time of nesting season. While they’re grounded, they mate, have young, walk and poop all over the place. My workplace has a prime geese vacation spot between us and the highway, so every year we deal with little green logs of goose droppings for about five months. The payoff is seeing the parade of goslings each year, in groups of anywhere from three or four to eight or more, flanked by proud parents as they march in a slightly meandering row to the next eating, swimming or pooping location.

Maybe love is, indeed, for the birds.

I leave it to them. Meanwhile, I’m off to clean my shoes.

Some of the wrong people appear to be going or not going to college. My mother should have gone, but her mother would not pay a penny of tuition, and student aid wasn’t what it is now.

When I went to high school, my guidance counselor hinted that I wasn’t college material; I applied anyway and was accepted to Rutgers evening division. I went one course at a time and paid cash.

I continued that way for a while, and got a two-year degree, then took a break because of life dynamics, applied to the University of Pennsylvania and got in, and finished my bachelor’s degree there. I paid cash and got tuition refunds at work, but I earned back each cent by doing the work.

So when I heard that celebrity parents like Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin paid to have their children admitted to colleges the illegal way, I was just as shocked as everybody else. It is possible to get in the old-fashioned way, but life has taught us that it deals a bad hand to some folks as well. Some deserving applicants got turned away from good schools because students such as Lori Loughlin’s daughter by designer husband Mossimo, Olivia Jade Giannulli–who appeared on a YouTube video talking about her preference of social media status over classwork–took space they didn’t earn because mum and pop pulled a heist paying off some money grabbing jerks for favors.

If justice were to be served, the convicted parents should have to shell out fines equivalent to the costs to reinstate admissions to some of those students turned away, so they can have the shot they deserve for free. As it stands now, Olivia has lost sponsors, as has her mother, but those future world changers have lost a lot more because they were stepped over by cheaters in a world where education has taken the wrong fork in the road into the town of Corruption City USA. Honesty still counts, and that’s where the law will focus in this instance.

The difference between customer service and customer servitude is how the customer treats us. I recently had an email exchange with somebody who could have benefitted from taking a step back before venting, or at least might have benefitted either from a better education or  some more intense parental guidance in childhood.

There is nothing more annoying than to have somebody stand on a soapbox and talk about something they obviously know nothing about. First, some folks who might not know that they don’t know, will learn something wrong; second, the speaker often winds up spiraling down a hole of ignorance from which they rarely return without a long ladder with rungs of restitution to climb to get back some self worth.

Of course, a customer service person often suffers stoically through such experiences, and we do not reply in kind, but if I could write back to this particular person, here is part of what I would say:

Dear Customer:

With regret and a few grumbles under my breath, I fulfilled your request today, but I really feel sorry for you. That may come as a surprise to you, since you were so adamantly stalwart in your convictions and made such an effort to be the type of customer that employees like me begrudgingly must regularly handle. It was your objective to make us feel bad, but I feel the wrong kind of bad when it comes to you and your future as a customer.

You accused us of a “bait and switch,” and it’s obvious that you are unfamiliar with what that term means. The scam involves a promise of something which the person with the offer then says is not available or has been replaced by another less desirable thing. The truth is, we helped you so much that, had you taken your blinders off and spent a moment looking at what we did for you, you would have found that, rather than baiting you, we actually set a whole smorgasbord under your nose and asked for nothing in return but your continued business.

So after a year of a passive business relationship in which you didn’t lift a finger to enjoy what we offered, you have decided to grouse by email and smugly say goodbye. I hope that someday you realize how many bridges you are burning before you find yourself with few options and fewer people who are happy to recognize you when you want something. When you think you’re right all by yourself, it is a hollow victory.

Funny thing is, no matter what, the customer never seems to feel better, and neither do we. However, the emptiness is usually replaced by a lot of thanks from happy customers who use their time judiciously to counteract the doofusses who come by every so often. I am grateful for them all, and I always hope they get more than what they want; what they truly deserve.

I have a newspaper carrier who probably will never make the major leagues. Since I read two papers and have two different carriers, my delivery rate is about fifty percent right now. It’s not that I don’t get the paper; it just isn’t anyplace accessible.

The regional paper is right in front of me on either the walk or the lawn, thanks in no small part to Jeep Man, my loyal delivery person who has one heck of a flinging arm and shoots that paper straight out the window of his trusty vehicle every morning.

The local paper, on the other hand, is a different story.

Whoever the carrier is, they apparently pull up to the apron of my driveway, take a few steps from their vehicle to the sidewalk and let sail, so the paper may wind up on my top step or, most often, on either side of it, down in the greenery. Sometimes I guess it slides off the steps and plummets earthward, but often it just lands there with one shot. Some days it’s so lightweight it might blow off on its own. On one famous morning, I looked in vain for the paper, only to look up casually and discover it nestled in the tree branches above the walk, where its green bag camouflaged it perfectly.

How do I know all this detail, when the paper comes at around 3:00 AM while the world is sleeping, including me? Applying my Holmes-like power of deduction, I have seen the footprints in the snow on white mornings when the paper comes, so I can clearly see what they have done. My best guess is the delivery person has one heck of a hook on their pitching arm.

Yesterday we had some snow I didn’t see coming, probably because I was so busy I missed the weather forecast again. As I went out the door to sweep and retrieve the regional paper, I saw the telltale footprints from the driveway to the pavement, but I saw no trace of the paper. It wasn’t on the steps, so I figured it had to be in the greenery, so I went into what winter has done to my home-front gardening efforts and poked around with my broom hoping to unearth the paper. No success.

When all efforts fail, one does what one must to get the news; I bought a paper at Wawa and called the paper’s offices to discuss my issue. My operator had a pleasant voice and the patience of a saint, but after two or three attempts to find my account (which panicked me, since we’ve read the paper since before I could read), she finally found us in the system and informed me that I had never provided a delivery location preference.

That’s a thing now?

I said my understanding was that the paper would be on the doorstep by 7:00 every morning, so I expected it to be there, to which she replied that she had updated my account to specify that. This morning the paper was on the step, and I found the missing paper, now that the snow had been rained upon and melted, several feet from its usual location near some garden debris.

We’ll see how the delivery goes for a few days more. Maybe the pitching averages will go up. One thing is sure: I doubt I will stop reading the papers and rely on other sources, especially because I like the puzzles, the comics and Dear Abby.

Newspapers still matter, even if they’re hard to throw.

With the Academy Awards just a day away, everybody is getting excited. Awards events have a special degree of hype not found in sports, and even without team colors or hometown rivalries, people look forward to seeing what movies will win acclaim.

I am a fan of author and columnist Lisa Scottoline, one of countless women who become a big melting pot of estrogen for Bradley Cooper, who is lined up to win something along with Lady Gaga for the umpteenth remake of A Star is Born. I picture her on the big Sunday night with fuzzy slippers on and cozy beverage at the elbow sitting in front of the big screen. I am planning on watching with a friend, and we decided on ice cream and cake (if I get it made), and maybe I’ll have a cup of tea. I’ll be watching for Black Panther to win Best Picture, which would be one of the most epic cinematic inclusive moves the Academy voters could make.

A cozy chair is good no matter whom you are watching on Oscar night, because the ceremony tends to be lengthy and a bit boring at times. Sure there have been adrenaline moments such as when Jack Palance did one-armed push-ups, when Prince sang for an audience who seemed relieved to finally have a musical score without a hint of Broadway in it, or when Whoopie Goldberg appeared in various nominee-themed costumes as hostess and blew the viewers away.

Oh, that’s right: we have no host this year. Or do we?

Maybe the movies should be the host. Maybe Bradley Cooper as Rocket the Raccoon should be the host. Maybe Chadwick Bozeman should take the mike as Black Panther and host the show. No, not happening. Lisa’s slippers will be getting hot and sweaty and my cup of tea cold and dingy before that happens. There is decorum in these events, and one must have the proper host or none at all.

Let’s just hope they don’t bore us out of enthusiasm for ever watching again.

Over the past few months the folks running this glittery dog and pony show have attempted to update its image, even going so far as to suggest a popular picture category for movies which would not otherwise be considered for nomination because they are deemed too commercial. That was scrapped when commercial fandom got insulted.

It’s bad enough that some movies are never considered while some that are never seen by the general public are lauded and given awards. Find me a movie which is attended by everybody, and that should be the best film of the year, because it brought us together for a common cause. Those “upper crust” movies keep classes isolated and do nothing for expanding the human condition.

But standing on a soapbox every year has done nothing to help the campaign to get the voters on board. It may never happen. At least we have an excuse to snack again.

I like solar toys. They can become an obsession, so I don’t go overboard, but I do have over a dozen of them. Solar toys have been around for a while, and I just noticed something that says a lot about how inventions can evolve with time.

Whoever first stuck a small solar panel onto a plastic base holding a hula girl shaking her hips or a jiggling arm-waving character surely must have patted themselves on the back. The little things can sell for only a dollar, but set in a window or under an office light, they can provide a harmless distraction from the doldrums of life. They wiggle and wave happily, stopping only when clouds form or the lights go out. Like us, they don’t feel much like being happy on dark days.

The problem with solar toys has been in their initial design. It seems all the manufacturers have put the solar panel in front of the toy. This means that, if you put it in the window, the sun has to be able to bypass the object blocking the panel to activate its motion. This is why you often find solar toys set at an angle on a windowsill.

Recently, however, I got hold of two toys in which the panel has been installed in the back of the object, allowing the toy to face forward into the room unimpeded by shadows.

Whoever said, “Maybe we should put the panel in the back,” has probably seen his bosses slapping themselves on the forehead in a “d’oh” moment.

So the older versions may become obsolete, but it doesn’t matter. They’re harmless fun, and you can see just what people enjoy watching by what types of toys they buy. Often they’re simply waving seasonal characters like snowmen or Easter bunnies, but I have a couple which came from Japan with round character heads which sway lazily and can threaten to put me to sleep. My first one I bought at Target, and it’s faded from being in the sun too long, but I love it, front panel and all.

You’re looking them up on Amazon now, aren’t you? That’s okay: so am I. Might as well add to the collection, since I have the windowsill space to spare.

Valentine’s Day is considered a holiday for lovers, which is fine except when you don’t have a lover. It seems that holidays always exclude somebody for all the wrong reasons.  Everybody should be happy on a holiday.

If you can’t be happy on the holiday, be happy on the day after. That’s when all the overpriced stuff that everybody emptied their wallets for gets marked down. For a day like Valentine’s Day, chocolates go on sale, so I thumb my nose at all the guys who didn’t treat me like a queen the day before, and I treat myself like one and save money as well.

Love yourself, and others will love you, they say. I guess my perfect match didn’t get the memo. That’s okay. The divorce rate is still an issue in this country, as is domestic violence, so being eternally single can be a good thing.

My big problem is with most of the chocolate on Valentine’s Day being milk instead of dark. Dark chocolate is supposed to be better for you, which is probably why there is so little of it available.  Vendors sometimes serve your addictions rather than your health.

So on the day after the cards are read, the wine uncorked and the whoopee a memory, I’ll grab a little something and curl up with a good romantic novel. Or I’ll work on writing mine. Not sure which way it will go, but either way I’ll be content.

Chocolate is for lovers.