Bethany Storro's bogus acid attack story: just who's the victim here? - David Loftus

Whenever I travel out of state, I hear that Oregon has a generally positive image among U.S. citizens: naturally beautiful, politically (or at least environmentally) progressive, and a great place to visit. So why does every national news story that comes out of our region have to do with nutcases? (Remember the Rajneeshees, Tonya Harding, a mayor lost her job because she had posed in lingerie on one of the town's firetrucks, and earlier this year, a man who gave other bus riders unwanted haircuts?)

Yesterday, Bethany Storro made her first appearance in court to plead not guilty to three charges of second-degree theft. If the name doesn’t ring a bell, she’s the 28-year-old who made national news after calling 9-1-1 and claiming an African American woman had walked up to her and thrown acid in her face. True, the alleged attack occurred in Vancouver, across the Columbia River from here, and Storro’s plea was heard in Clark County Superior Court, also in the state of Washington, but she was treated for her burns at Legacy Emanuel Medical Center here in Portland, so most of the print and broadcast stories about her have spread across the U.S. from local news outlets.

Storro’s horrific story not only spread nationwide and earned an invitation to the “Oprah Winfrey Show,” but funds to help with her medical expenses were set up at Umpqua Bank (my bank, incidentally), and Riverview Community Bank; and the Safeway supermarket chain started a collection for her because she was employed by a Safeway store. In all, more than $28,000 was donated to Storro from around the world.

Unfortunately, the police could not substantiate her story. The sunglasses that supposedly protected her from being blinded by the acid splash could not be found. The splash pattern didn’t resemble a splash but a careful and even application. Parts of her face that should have been protected by the sunglasses were burned.

Although she provided a fairly detailed description of her “attacker” (late 20s/early 30s, wearing a green shirt and khaki shorts, had three piercings in her ear) and police released a composite sketch of the “suspect,” later they confronted her over the discrepancies and on Sept. 16 the Vancouver Police Chief announced that Storro had admitted the injuries were self-inflicted. She had wiped drain cleaner on herself and hoped to get a new face from the ordeal. Her trial is scheduled for Dec. 20.

Oddly, another woman was attacked with acid in Arizona just two days after Storro’s incident. Derri Dias Velarde, 41, suffered second-degree burns on her face and chest after a woman threw acid on her outside her home in Mesa. I find no mention of an arrest so far, but police say it was not a random attack. Velarde is recovering at her parents’ home in Middleboro, Massachusetts.

What strikes me as especially unpleasant about the Storro story is how quickly and widely her false report was spread, and how easily some people believed it. Perhaps I should say "believed and acted upon it"; it's fine to believe whatever you like, based on what may be incomplete or erroneous evidence, but don't take action because of it, when it's not your business.

Not very many African Americans live in Vancouver, or are seen on its streets, and there have been reports that black women were harassed there in the days following Storro’s hospitalization. She’s obviously a very troubled girl, and it’s a shame she not only hoodwinked lots of credulous and generous donors but indirectly victimized others and heightened racial tensions with her bogus tale.

Although ultimately she needs psychiatric care, of course, I wonder why she was not charged with making false statements to a police officer as well as theft. It’s a sad, sorry story all around.

Still Hoping for Change - Jeff Weiss

Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign focused on two words: "hope" and "change."  To a country filled with citizens who saw the nation's economy burn in the background of two wars while the sitting president fiddled, "hope" and "change" sounded great.

Now, as the two year anniversary of Obama's historic election win approaches, very few Americans have seen improvement.  The stock market didn't crash, but the housing market is still faltering, unemployment rates are still sky-high, and many people are running out of hope.  We have been told many times that the recession is over, but no one is quite sure when the recovery will trickle down to us regular folks.  I can agree with how the woman in the above video feels.  I supported Barack Obama in 2008.  I volunteered for his campaign.  I voted for him.  And I spent a good part the last year and a half defending him to others who just don't see enough results.

It's quite possible that - even though things aren't great now - they could easily have been worse if Barack Obama was not the President of the United States.  But, it is very hard to try to ask people to imagine how much worse things could be, when they find themselves worse off now than before Election Day of 2008.  I still support President Obama and as of now he will have my vote in 2012, but for his sake as much as everyone else's, I hope he will have a stronger list of accomplishments by the time he starts campaigning.

Bedbug, Bedbug, Who's Got the Bedbug? - David Loftus

When I was a child, my parents tucked me into bed every night with a little rhyming exchange that they must have taught me but was typically started by me:

-- Good night.

-- Sleep tight.

-- Don’t let the bedbugs bite.

-- I’ll try not to.

I don’t remember wondering what bedbugs were or what they might do to me, any more than I suspect many of us considered the implications of “Now I lay me down to sleep…” or “I pledge allegiance to the flag….” It was just another comforting daily ritual.

So it’s a bit startling to be reminded of that nightly exchange from my early years -- and to see variations of it quoted in one story after another -- in the news. Bedbugs are a big deal this year!

The tiny parasitic insects known as Cimex lectularius, shown in the photo doing its thing, like to to live in beds and suck human blood. Others varieties of Cimex prefer bats or poultry, and other warm-blooded animals. C. lectularius often live in beds and can feed without disturbing their hosts. They’re brown and about the size and shape of an apple seed. They’re not a big enough health threat that the government is apt to throw huge amounts of money at them, but there is a problem from skin rashes and allergic effects that make it hard for people to sleep. (Plus the huge psychological problem of knowing your safest, most comfy haven has been invaded by wee beasties!)

With the help of DDT, these pesky critters had pretty much been eradicated from the U.S. during the 1940s, but they’ve experienced a huge resurgence since 1995, even in major metropolitan areas. Cleanliness and caretaking won’t keep them out of your home, the experts say; you can pick them up anywhere from hotels to buses. Recent surprising locations that reported infestations were the Sheraton Manhattan in Times Square, Nike’s flagship store on East 57th in Manhattan (which had to close down), the Grand Hyatt in San Francisco, and the Hilton Palmer House in Chicago. In my neighborhood, they’ve been reported in apartment building and on the Portland State University campus just a block or two away.

This revolting development is another prompting to become more aware of how interdependent we all are, individuals and nations, whether we like it or not; and for each of us to be more conscious of the people and surfaces we come into contact with every day. Recent new Web sites such as bed-bug.org, bedbugsguide.com, bedbugger.com, and bedbugregistry.com keep track of the spread of the little monsters and offer tips on how to avoid and fight them. In today’s news, USA Today reports a big turnout for a Bedbug University North American Summit in Chicago.

This problem highlights how precarious our place is at the “top” of the critter chain. Any time, a tiny challenger could make serious inroads into our complacent civilization. AIDS took a big hunk out of our confidence starting 30 years ago. Another disease that was nearly eliminated, tuberculosis, has made a serious comeback with the help of easy flights to and from the less-developed world.

I’ve wondered whether the common cold might someday develop enough resistance to our nostrums that it could live in balance in our systems permanently -- an unfriendly but not fatal symbiote -- and we’d all trudge through each day with a permanent, ongoing case of the sniffles and cough.

Personal Faith or Professional Compassion? - Ryan John

Last year at Eastern Michigan University (EMU), a school counselor named Julea Ward was expelled from her counseling duties after refusing to counsel a homosexual student on his relationship difficulties.

Ward refused to counsel the student on the basis of religious conviction and recommended the student see another counselor. Following her expulsion from the university, she filed a federal lawsuit against EMU which claimed her First Amendment right to freedom of religion had been violated. In late July, a judge ruled in favor of EMU’s claim that its school counseling curriculum adhered to the American Counseling Association’s Code of Ethics which mandates “professional neutrality and a strict non-discrimination policy.”

In Georgia, former Augusta State University (ASU) student Jennifer Keeton, a student in the school counselor masters program, filed a federal lawsuit against ASU, claiming staff had required her to accept homosexuality or be expelled from the school’s masters program. Keeton was assigned remediation assignments from faculty that were designed to increase her sensitivity toward the gay community.

Suspicion arose based on her class writings and discussions concerning homosexual topics. Failure to complete these required tasks would lead to Keeton’s dismissal from the graduate program. After first agreeing to it, she reneged and stated the University’s assignments were aimed at making her accept such homosexuality in contradiction to her religious beliefs. Keeton lost her legal battle recently when U.S. District Judge Randal Hall dismissed her case.

I applaud ASU’s proactive approach in assigning Keeton tasks that would test her flexibility with the gay and lesbian community after hearing her respond negatively on such issues in her class discussions and writings. Perhaps ASU and other school counseling programs could “nip it in the bud” even earlier on the application for admission into the school counselors graduate program.

I atttended a conservative Catholic college. I interviewed our director of counseling for a class I was taking. A self-confessed liberal, he told me he almost hadn’t gotten the job because he exposed some “liberal tendencies” when faced with a question about how he would handle a pregnant student.

I wonder how Ward was even hired in the first place at a gay-friendly institution like EMU. I suppose I can see how a job applicant wouldn’t be familiar with the campus culture prior to experiencing it first-hand, even though such familiarity should be an integral piece of the interview preparation process. But, as EMU values its gay-friendly atmosphere, as my institution values its Catholic beliefs, they should have raised hypothetical questions during the interview process to gauge where Ward stood on these important issues. Kudos to my school for hiring our director of counseling forty years ago, despite his honest expression of some fundamental religious differences.

As a graduate student in a school counseling program myself, I believe that remaining non-biased, non-judgmental, and client-centered should take precedence. The only book a counselor should be devoted to is the American Counseling Association’s Code of Ethics.

One Last Sniff, Then On to the Pistachios: 48-Hour Film part 5 - David Loftus

Sabra finished shooting her Chinese girl scenes about 1:00 p.m. Sunday, and then drove me back to the city from the Valerios’ farm. When I got home, I took off all my dirt-covered clothing and had a shower. My wife Carole said, “You look like you could use a beer.” She was right.

So we went to our local pub and I was halfway through a salad and my second pint -- maybe about 4:30? -- when my cell phone rang. Brian McKee, the cameraman, wanted to know if I could do one last shot for the film. I had to go home, put back on the dirty clothes I’d worn all weekend, and rejoin Brian.

The script had called for a brief shot of my character sniffing the urine sample on his clothing while riding the bus home from work. Dan had planned to do a “guerilla” take on board a city bus, but that seemed too dicey, particularly given that we were only a couple hours from the deadline to turn in the film.

So we shot the scene at a Portland Streetcar station just outside Powell’s Books instead. Brian lurked at the far side of 10th Avenue while I planted myself at the stop. The other “passenger,” the girl, and the traffic were all fortuitous elements. You’ll see this sequence early in the film between 0:42 and 0:50.

Dan’s script for “A Hole Story” won Best Writing for the 2009 Portland 48-Hour Film Project.

Which brings us up to this year. At 7:00 p.m. on Friday, August 6, we received our assignment: character would be Pete (or Pam) Peterson, artist; prop was pistachio nuts; and line of dialogue would be “I have a surprise for you.” Our particular team was assigned the genre of Mockumentary.

We had a lively brainstorming session from 7:30 to 10:30. Several separate ideas that surfaced during that time would come together in the finished film. Dan was interested in the self-referential, post-modern idea of inserting videos within a video. Someone called pistachio nuts “addictive,” which raised the notion of bringing the prop into the story as an actual addiction. Dan’s team had worked on other stories in which a guru figure teaches a novice how to do something, and it was suggested our artist could be a video filmmaker who knew how to make viral YouTube videos.

It was only in Dan’s script that the character became a filmmaker who expressly could not make such a video, though he was trying desperately to do so. That would allow Dan to parody some of the most famous viral videos on YouTube, such as “the Numa Numa Dance” (Gary Brolsma lip-synching to a Moldovan pop song in front of his computer Webcam), guys getting injured doing stupid things, and cute animals.

When I was describing my thoughts, I conscientiously referred to the as-yet hypothetical protagonist as “Pete or Pam Peterson” -- but speaking quickly, I ran them together. The person next to me, Alex Huebsch, heard them as one word and suggested the character’s first name should be “Peteorpam.” This not only made for a great inside joke for the other Portland filmmakers who would recognize a slurring of what we’d all been assigned, but would sound like “Peter Pan” to a wider audience. Best of all, it set up a “who’s on first”-style comic dialogue with a package delivery person played by Dylan Hillerman.

I didn’t get the script in my email box until something like 9 a.m. Saturday, and arrived at Dan’s house well after 10. We shot some of the script in around his house: a sequence involving a TV repairman that Peteorpam arranges to have pushed off the roof (which did not make the contest-entry version), and the deliveryman sequence (which did). Then we headed out to the Valerios’ farm, site of last year’s imaginative film about digging a hole to China.

Part six:  Critters in the House






Read part one: Overview of The 48-Hour Film Project


Read part two: Daniel Elkayam and the Overcast Productions strategy


Read part three: Digging a hole to China


Read part four: In the dirt and through the earth

Writing Creative Facebook Status Updates: a style guide - David Loftus

Friends and colleagues who keep tabs on my Facebook page often remark,“you’re keeping busy,” by which I gather they mean I'm doing a lot of work. I respond that I’m staying active, which is not exactly the same thing.

I see my job on Facebook as not just marketing and networking, but entertaining my friends and family. Updates don’t have to be just “hard news”: you can also post about odd things you saw on the street or thoughts that crossed your mind. A stream of status updates that mention only what or where you’re eating, or who you’re hanging out with, gets tiresome. Anything that provokes thought or a smile will do, but wit, wryness, and the offbeat get extra points.

For example, odd things you observed or experienced can be entertaining:

• David Loftus checked out his very first Cormac McCarthy novel from the library this afternoon and found a playing card -- a Joker -- tucked into the pages. I take that as a good omen.
  
• … got to hear two young women alternate between hysterical, barking giggles and chanted rap lyrics festooned with f-bombs ... followed by two men discussing third-degree burns from a motorcycle exhaust pipe and a campfire. Yep, the 33 is an interesting bus line.
  
• … was waiting at the outdoor library book return box and watched a guy drop a book, open, face-down, in the rain ... and tried very hard not to wince.
  
• … picked up a portobello mushroom vegetarian sub at noon to carry around until dinner time, and five hours later discovered he had a salami and ham. Had to wonder how the other guy felt about his sandwich.
  
• … just passed a homeless man without giving him any money, and the man said he would hold my children for ransom and not ask for anything less than $10 million. Boy was he wrong on so many counts. . . .
  

Things that made you mad or disgusted are always good for discussion, although it’s better to express your passion with elegance and indirection than with an all-out rant:

• David Loftus watched a man toss his cigarette butt on the sidewalk and wished he was large enough to tell him to pick it up and dispose of it properly.

• … walked out of the Safeway to be greeted by the sight of a street kid popping the zits on the upper back of his female companion. I try to be open-minded and tolerant, but . . . .

On the other hand, the right kind of sledgehammer blow can be entertaining, too:

• David Loftus says, “could I spare a dollar for a pack of cigarettes” ? Of course not! . . . that wouldn’t kill you fast enough to make it worth it for me.

If you can take something you observed and come up with a thought, interpretation, or extension beyond the observation, that’s a plus:

• David Loftus realized, while watching people texting on their hand-held mobile devices this morning on the bus, that to say someone is “all thumbs” may mean something entirely different from what it once did.
  
• … wonders why street kids are never accompanied by a stray Dandy Dinmont, Bichon Frise, or Chinese Crested? Even a Great Pyrenees would be a change from the usual pit bulls.
  
• … was wondering what the girls who were sitting next to him and texting all through the movie are going to do when it comes time to raise a family.
  
• … was reading a pamphlet on STDs among elders and read “Have you ever had unprotected sex with a prostitute?” and thought: “Of course not! Her pimp ALWAYS stands guard over us.”

Of course if you make unusual choices, that can be worth reporting:

• David Loftus thought “Mary Poppins” followed by “Shutter Island” was a fine DIY Sunday double feature.
  
• … downloaded a Mozart harpsichord concerto and Bob Seger. I believe in a balanced diet.

• … hadn’t realized that dumpster diving goes a lot more smoothly after a couple of bourbons. Of course, he started scrounging seriously when he was vastly underaged.
  
• … doesn’t imagine anyone else is reading Richard Matheson’s The Incredible Shrinking Man and Jane Austen’s Emma at the same time.

Wordplay, if it’s sufficiently sophisticated, may charm your Facebook friends:

• David Loftus wonders whether a situation in which two strangers establish a rapport by picking on a third might be termed a “dis connect.”
  
• … knows there’s more than one way to skritch a cat.

• [with reference to a certain Jewish holiday meal:] … says, What? NOT a path-over satyr?
  
• … has no particular objection to any religious sects . . . as long as it’s between consenting adults.

Philosophical notions and intellectual speculation offer a nice change of pace, especially if there’s a humorous or shock element to them:

• David Loftus wonders if he can interest some deep-pocket investors in an air-guitar manufacturing plant.
  
• … is designing a very strict licensing program for prospective parents which will be enacted the minute he becomes dictator of the world. Don’t presume YOU would pass it.
  

Even a pointed quotation, if it’s not well-known or widely distributed on the Web already (something from your own current pleasure reading is the best bet here), can also please:

·      “We are all of us obliged, if we are to make reality endurable, to nurse a few little follies in ourselves.” - M. Proust

·      “Life is a lot more fragile than we think. So you should treat others in a way that leaves no regrets. Fairly, and if possible, sincerely. It’s too easy not to make the effort, then weep and wring your hands after the person dies. Personally, I don’t buy it.” - Haruki Murakami

Every once in a great while, there’s a rare and moving flash of beauty in your life. It’s important to share those:

• David Loftus was walking the dog when he saw a tiny green hummingbird flitting about the South Park Blocks in the spitting rain. Dang, those things are so tiny and delicate, you fear a single drop of water would bring them down. . . .

Qur'ans and Bibles and Mosques, Oh My! - Ryan John

A while back I wrote a blog commentary about how amazed I was about the plans to build a mosque at Ground Zero.

This week I was equally amazed when Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam leading the effort to build the mosque, stated that if the location was moved away from the intended site, violence would erupt. Rauf told CNN: “The headlines in the Muslim world will be that Islam is under attack.”

I grew up in a relatively peaceful American era, considering our war-stricken past. However, I always wondered how the country could get to a place where civil war was likely, or a world war was on the brink. I can understand both now, particularly a civil war and here’s why: Let’s say…

1)    Florida pastor Terry Jones goes through with plans to burn Korans on 9/11 anniversary.

2)    The White house and military make continued public stance against this church’s plans and clearly express their opposition.

3)    Muslims protest the Qur'an burning and violence occurs on American soil, furthering tensions between Muslims and Americans.

4)    Since the White house already sided against Qur'an burners, all legal support goes to Muslims and angry American protestors bear the brunt of legal action.

5)    Other radical Christian groups from all over the U.S. join in support of this Florida church, defending their right to freedom of speech and stating that if Muslims can practice freedom of religion, why can’t we practice freedom of speech no matter how offensive it may be.

6)    Angry, patriotic Americans watch as the same government that supports Muslims’ freedom of religion by building the mosque is blatantly ignoring American citizens’ right to freedom of speech, and get fed up. They form militias throughout the country to fight not only Muslim groups, but our own military.

7)    The extremes will recruit the moderate centrists from both sides as violence escalates to war level.

I agree with Sarah Palin, who said the Qur'an burning is insensitive in the same way that building a mosque at Ground Zero is insensitive. The American people are told to be tolerant as Islam practices an American right to freedom of religion, but the American government and media can’t ask Muslims to keep the peace as group of 50 Christian radicals do something … well, radical yet consistent with the American right to freedom of speech?

Meanwhile, General Patraeus is concerned about how this Qur'an burning image will conflict with Muslim morale in the U.S. and overseas. Why isn’t a similar concern for American troop morale expressed with the images of a mosque being built blocks away from ground zero? But the troops are so loyal to their commander that they hardly question it and support whatever effort is in put in front of them.

The United States government needs to be consistent in its stances. They can ask Americans to peacefully allow a mosque to be built, but cannot ask the Muslim community to remain peaceful throughout some American stupidity? Why not just ask the Muslims to peacefully allow a boneheaded demonstration of free speech?

It is religious radicalness from this Florida pastor, BUT I can see how fringe, apathetic Christian Americans could take up with his cause if Muslims are freely revolting with support from our own government.  That’s how I can envision a modern day Civil War.

Defiant “Pastor” Declares 'Burn a Koran Day' will Go On as Planned - Jeff Weiss

A militant self-styled minister yesterday declared his planned “Burn a Koran Day” event will go on as planned in Gainesville, Florida despite an outpouring of pressure from the everyone from the Obama administration to General David Petreaus to New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg to call off the event.

Terry Jones, the so-called “pastor” of the Dove Outreach Center, a non-denominational church that boasts a whopping congregation of fifty people, said he has “no intention” of canceling the book burning. Jones, who believes “Islam is of the Devil,” planned the event to commemorate the nine year anniversary of the September 11^th terror attacks.

Most sane people realize that the very image of Americans burning the Islamic Holy book will do nothing except incite rage among Muslims across the world – and very possibly bring harm to our troops overseas. Still, Jones and his followers refuse to cancel their hate-inspired event.

God help us.

Why Glenn Beck is Destroying America - Jeff Weiss

Once upon a time there was a mildly successful cable TV host named Glenn Beck. Beck appeared each weeknight on CNN's HLN channel and commented on the news of the day, without much fanfare. Then, after a few years he moved from HLN to the Fox News Channel and all hell broke lose. Besides calling President Obama a racist and joking about killing Speaker of the House Nancy Pelsosi, Beck has made his television show a platform for fear and loathing in America.

Democrats and Republicans have never seen eye to eye, but thanks to cable TV commentators, the gap between the parties have never been so great and no TV host has done more to cause that divide than Glenn Beck. Beck uses his television and radio programs to promote hatred and distrust on a daily basis. When someone is trying to convince you of something and has absolutely no facts to back them up, they most often will use fear tactics to sway your opinion. And Mr. Beck is the King of Fear. He wants you to distrust your President, fear anyone who lives in America who wasn't born here, and hate anyone who isn't a “Christian.”

The scariest thing about Glenn Beck is that people listen to him. His show on Fox News Channel currently brings in more ratings than what CNN, MSNBC, and HLN air opposite him combined! His fear rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial brought in huge crowds (while Beck claims 600,000 people attended the event, other news organizations have stated the number to be under 100,000). As long as people pay attention to Glenn Beck, he won't be going away any time soon.

That sound you just heard was the great American melting pot exploding.

That Can't be History; They're Telling a Story! - David Loftus

On one of the Internet discussion lists to which I subscribe, someone recently complained about the public television series “History Detectives.” The hosts pretend they’re meeting the subjects of the show at the door for the first time, he wrote, and it just goes on from there: that is “soooo fake”!

Several more sensible members pointed out that most television shows are contrived; that the stars of “History Detectives” are just that -- stars, who don’t do the actual research and writing of the show themselves; and that the area(s) in which this particular list specializes as fans, students, and collectors also involve storylines and scripts. Others listmembers said that viewers are perfectly aware of how contrived the show’s presentation is, though the historic and cultural content are often fascinating and solid.

These comments were both right and wrong. The show is rather contrived (but for fairly valid reasons, as I’ll explain in a moment), and though the demographic it attracts is undoubtedly higher in income and intellect than it must be for the most popular shows on TV, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that some viewers and fans aren’t aware of its tricks.

When I was a full-time newspaper reporter, we regularly got comments and complaints from readers who didn’t grasp the difference between news and analysis, between an article and an opinion piece; and who cheered for a satire as if it were straight and sincere commentary. After I published a mocking essay about Jimmy Swaggart’s sexual escapades, a reader wrote in to state that after reading it, David Loftus “earned all of my respect. What a shock to read such a fair, unbiased, not one-sided, unphony report that wasn’t trying to destroy someone.” I only wish I’d been there when his buddies enlightened him.

I saw a few episodes of “History Detectives” early in its run, and I found it a fairly interesting show. Yes, I was irritated by its misuse of Elvis Costello for its theme, but there have been far worse examples (such as Nike’s use of John Lennon’s “Revolution” to introduce a new line of shoes). I was amused at all the self-grooming by Elyse Luray, the requisite pretty blonde, who repeatedly pulled her hair from her face on camera -- one of those classic subconscious expressions of self-consciousness that one expects to see only in teenage girls . . . although I was equally entertained to see Naomi Wolf do “the flip” many times with her brunette mane during a bookstore appearance in the mid 1990s. It seemed an ironic reflex from the feminist author of The Beauty Myth. Perhaps Ms. Luray’s video crew has cleaned up her act in more recent shows.

But to get back to the complaints about the show’s “fakiness.” Every program on TV has to have a story arc. All programs, from a taut drama like “24” to the documentaries on the History Channel and Animal Planet, have one. If “History Detectives” presented only the bald facts, in chronological order of discovery by the researchers of the show, then it wouldn’t hold half the audience it has. Also, when you have to crank out new content every week for a season, a formula eases the pressure. It may be an extremely obvious and repetitive formula, such as those employed by the TNT caper series “Leverage,” which stars Tim Hutton and has plot holes you could drive a truck through, but which I watch for its charming lead characters and witty dialogue (and because it’s shot here in Portland, so I often see actor friends of mine in walk-on roles), or it can be much more subtle. But it’s guaranteed to be there.

At the end of my sophomore year of college, I learned that a classmate in English with me was changing his major to history. I asked him why. Well, English literature is so subjective, he explained; you can write almost anything and it works. With history, you’re dealing with facts.

There must be plenty of good reasons to switch from English to History, I told him, but that does not strike me as one of them. Inevitably, history involves storytelling by its scholars, no less than literature. Not all the desirable facts and data survive for you to retrieve them, and you have to pick and choose between the ones you’ve got and build a case -- a plotline -- to persuade your colleagues and readers that this is what “really happened.” But even eyewitnesses couldn’t necessarily give you the whole picture, or agree with one another about what happened.

People today haven't come to a satisfactory conclusion about what happened on a late November afternoon in Dallas in 1963. One of the biggest ongoing debates among scholars of early U.S history involves two written documents: Is the Constitution a codification of the ideals expressed in the Declaration of Independence, or more of a conservative betrayal of those ideals? Historians steadily debate which is the case.

So don’t berate “History Detectives” (or any other report, on television or elsewhere) for being “contrived.” Everything is contrived in the sense of being a honed artifact with a mission, to a lesser or greater extent, whether its purpose is to persuade, enlighten, entertain, or more likely, all three.

Recycling, Part 5: A Cast of Real Characters - David Loftus

Most of the time, unless you try to retrieve beverage containers during the day, you probably won’t run into your neighbors in the apartment building's recycling rooms. My schedule has tended to prevent me from collecting until after 11 p.m., but even on weekends I rarely encounter people in the halls or elevators, let alone the recycling rooms. When I have, I suspect they couldn’t imagine what I am really up to: they probably think I am taking recycling to the bins, rather than removing it from them.

Things get more interesting at the supermarket recycling station. It should be no surprise that most of the people you meet there are either homeless or look as if they were. Many of them bring their spoils in sacks, garbage bags, and even purloined shopping carts (despite a warning sign that tells people to keep carts outside, because the floor space between the two banks of recycling machines is fairly narrow). Maybe one in 12 or 15 will be a decently dressed citizen like yourself.

Some of your fellow gleaners are wrinkled, discolored, disfigured by wounds, and filthy; some just look down on their luck. They’re old, they’re young, they’re white and other races; some jabber to one another in other languages (usually Spanish, although I think I’ve heard Chinese and Russian). When I started collecting in fairly cold weather, I was largely spared their body odor; however, a film of spilled alcohol and soda pop on the floor makes it rather sticky as well as giving the space its own peculiar aroma. (I changed into mud boots for this part of the job, then old sandals with hard plastic soles when the weather got hot.)

It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that emptying and unjamming the machines, or washing down the sticky concrete floor, is the low-man-on-the-totem-pole job for supermarket employees. Bottle returners press a button and call into an intercom throughout the day to let the store know somebody needs to come out and fix things.

As you can imagine, I was pleased on those rare occasions when I found the room empty of any other life. But for the most part, my colleagues in the recycling room have been polite and patient. People wait their turn, and apologize for bumping into one another or getting in each other’s way.

It is as if these bedraggled characters are going about their day at the office -- which, in a way, they are. I saw ragtag gleaners give up on a recalcitrant bank of recycling machines and hand off their remaining empties to another stranger waiting his turn.

Hard times have made some of them touchy. One time I left my cart of bottles in the room and went down the block to the supermarket’s loading dock to see if an employee were around to help us out. When I came rushing back to the room, a small older lady growled that she wasn’t going to steal my bottles; stung because that hadn’t even crossed my mind, I answered crossly and defensively to that effect. She apologized.

One time, not realizing a fellow was feeding bottles and cans into two adjacent machines simultaneously, I slid a bottle into the machine he was momentarily not in front of, only to notice that a higher amount than 5 cents appeared on the digital readout. The truth dawned on me and I stepped back in mild but silent disgust, ready to write off the lost bottle, but he dug into his pocket and refunded me the nickel that he would collect inside for my bottle.

To be honest, my colleagues at the redeeming machines disgust me far less than my respectable neighbors who can't be bothered to redeem the money they spent on beverage containers at the checkout stand, stuff the wrong things in the recycling bins, tear the labels off bottles and crush the plastic and aluminum so thoroughly that the machines can’t read them, don't rinse out their soda and beer bottles and food cans, push paper and limes and other flotsam into cans and bottles, and throw food and other non-recyclables into the recycling bins when they belong in the garbage chute.

At least the homeless folks are doing something useful for themselves. Lazy or ignorant or impudent neighbors are shoving off more work on other people.


Read part 1, the overview of my experiment


Read part 2, diving for cans and bottles


Read part 3, a visit to the loading dock


Read part 4, the recycling machines