Betsy Devine: Funny ha-ha and/or funny peculiar

Pigeons with friend

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

I was walking through Warsaw’s Old Town market square when I noticed a sudden flurry among all the pigeons.

One minute the pigeons, like me, had been randomly strolling the cobblestones, taking their time. The next, they were hustling and cooing and flying and flocking down toward the pump end of the square.

They had seen something that meant a lot to them–the slow approach of a pink-parka-wearing woman with grocery bag.

The birds flocked to her, she turned the bag upside down, and cobbles around her were covered an inch deep in bread crumbs.

The friend of the pigeons had turned up with lunch, one more time.

It happened on Sunday, November 18, peacefully, without pain, after long illness.

To several generations of physicists, Sidney was guru, clown-prince, and zen-master. Sidney was the centerpiece of a thousand stories from the time that he was just a loud-mouthed brilliant fifteen year-old aka Squidney rampaging into Chicago’s sci-fi fan community.

There’s a lot more to say but I’m too sad to say it right now. We loved you, Sidney.

As for how Sidney would like to be remembered–this photo by Lubos Motl is simply perfect:

Lunch at the Pierrogeria

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

Or should that maybe be PQ?

The root of Polish “pierogi” is “pir,” for festivity. Pierogies look like half-circles of dough because they start out as circles you cut with a drinking glass–then you fold each in half over some bulging lump of good filling.

People boil, bake, or fry these fat little dumplings in many different Slavic home kitchens.

Frank’s dynamic Grandma Wilczek, who grew up in Babice, made delicious fried pierogi every Thanksgiving. But Warsaw’s Pierrogeria goes way beyond Grandma, offering pierogi with every kind of filling from mushrooms and spinach to blueberries, raisins, and rum.

Yum. I really like Polish pierogies. But I’m afraid that if people keep taking me out to wonderful Polish restaurants, meal after meal after meal, I’ll look more like a fat little dumpling than I really want to!

Gate to Warsaw Old Town

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

Warsaw’s Old Town got brick walls around it in 1339.

And again, much more recently.

The Old Town’s cobbled streets, dignified marketplace, and medieval townhouses had to be rebuilt from heaps of rubble. Nazis terror-bombed it in 1939, then dynamited much of what was left in 1944 as revenge for the Warsaw Uprising.

The Old Town was rebuilt from the rubble. Our guide’s grandfather was one of many Polish citizens who would go every night after a full day of work elsewhere to help, as a volunteer, on the reconstruction.

By 1980 the restoration was so complete that UNESCO added it to their list of World Heritage Sites.

A beautiful place, a history to inspire pride.

Warsaw Mermaid, Old Town, Warsaw, Poland

Originally uploaded by wronaphoto

…stands guard over Old Town.

Frank and I are staying instead in New Town (outside the old city walls) which was settled by upstarts in the mere 15th century.

Marya Sklodowska (better known, even with two Nobel Prizes, under her married name, Marie Curie) was born in the New Town. And the beautiful Hotel Le Regina, whose recent guests signing its Golden Book include Michael Palin (wow), John Malkovich (ooo), and the Bee Gees (really?), is also in the New Town.

It was too dark for me to take photos when we walked around today, under the expert guidance of professional Warsaw guide Malgorzata Binkowska. But wait until tomorrow!

Billie and Walter at Nobel parties

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

Frank’s Aunt Billie and Uncle Walter came with us to all the Nobel fun in 2004. Now a new adventure–Uncle Walter (although, I’m sad to say, not Aunt Billie) will be joining us in Poland to visit the village where his mother was born, Babice near Cracow.

In the photo, Uncle Walter is getting ready to say something funny, as is so often true in real life. This is going to be a lot of fun! Many thanks to Adam Zielinski and to the Foundation for Polish Science for arranging this journey of discovery.

Blogging this, as so often, from yet another airport!

Take one former Republican rising star, whose years spent “pushing the envelope” on campaign tactics have left him cynical–and very ready to talk. Allen Raymond spent three months in prison for phone-jamming crimes, telling the Boston Globe later that Republicans were now so “ultra-aggressive” and “ruthless” that he feared saying no to RNC-bigwig James Tobin could shut his consulting firm out of future business.

Add one former Page-Six gossip-bigwig, Ian Spiegelman. Gawker printed (I won’t even quote it) the blistering letter that got him fired from the New York Post. He’s said to describe himself as a “revenge fetishist.”

Put them together and what you get might be a real page-turner–How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Law Breaker. Coming out soon from Simon and Schuster.

More on this in Blue Hampshire. It’s quite a story

Arrrr, matey!

Across the wide ocean these days from my kin and crewmates, I was hoping to replace some Skyping with some skullduggery.

That is, we could team up online to chase treasure and glory in that thar new online Pirates of the Caribbean game. To demo how it works, I set up my account just last week.

I started with just “Besty”–not a misspelling so much as a family tease-name. She had battled her way up to level 3 by the time I added “Sven.” What a surprise! Low-level Sven has had more than 10 invitations (to friendship or crew); the more-skilled and longer-played Besty only got two. Invitations really help get to higher-level game play–I hadn’t realized how much Besty was missing out on.

Scurvy dogs! What part of “avatar” don’t pirates understand?

Sun god Ra on Kon-Tiki sail

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

…in a balsa raft with the sun god on your sail.

Talk about adventure! And Kon-Tiki was an adventure my father talked about, with enormous enthusiasm.

And, from all the books my father urged me to read in my pre-teen years, Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl wrote two of the ones I loved best.

So visiting Oslo’s Kon-Tiki Museum with Frank was both sweet and sad. It was sweet when I thought how my father would have loved to be there with us. It was sad when I added this to oh-so-many adventures I’d love to have shared with him, in all the years since he died.

Here’s what I still share with him–sailing the paths of the universe with every one of your friends, every one of the people who have shaped your life. Some of them, when you are lucky, will be by your side. All of them, always, will shape your future adventures.

Not even Kon-Tiki’s sun god could be more powerful.