TurkeyMonkey

I returned from Kalamazoo, Michigan, on Monday, but it�s taken the last three days to fully recover. Those medieval studies conferences really take a lot out of you. A quick recap of my adventures in the Midwest:

We arrived in Kazoo, brandishing fresh haircuts and 20-foot banners, on Wednesday afternoon and went straight to Western Michigan University to set up the Penn Press booth. First impressions were exceedingly positive � giant, state-of-the-art basketball gym and football stadiums, both of which were dedicated to a benefactor named Waldo. (So, just to answer the age-old question: Waldo is on Stadium Drive, on the outskirts of Kalamazoo.)

Unfortunately, when we found our way to the conference facilities, it was clear that Waldo had not seen fit to endow any non-athletic buildings. The Medieval Congress was held in two large dormitories, which were like a cross between a working-class-neighborhood grammar school and Abu Ghraib prison. Although about three thousand people attended the conference, the bathrooms would have been more suited to, say, twenty. By the end of the first day they looked like the washrooms of a 747 after a transatlantic flight.

–The Penn Press booth. Ain’t it grand!

After checking into the Holiday Inn and unpacking my things, I realized that my shower didn�t have any bathtub. It was just a nozzle jutting out of the wall, with a curtain cutting across the middle like in a hospital room. Curiously, there was also a large plastic armchair. When I went to hang up my blazers, there was no closet to be found � just a bar at thigh level next to the front door. Then it dawned on me: I�d been given a handicapped room.
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Tomorrow morning I’m catching a flight to lovely Kalamazoo, Michigan. What’s in Kalamazoo? you might ask. Well, the Medieval Institute of Western Michigan University, for one. And the 39th annual International Congress on Medieval Studies, for another. And, of course, lots of overtime.

I’ve been charged with staffing the Penn Press booth at the conference (we have a disturbingly large list of medieval titles) and assisting my boss, Humanities Editor Jerry Singerman — In Kazoo, he says, “use the full title.” I’m not entirely sure what to expect at a convention of medievalists. Something akin to an anachronistic Meadowlands joust-fest, I suppose. But it’s been ages since I picked up ye olde flail. A few frosty brews, though, and I’m sure it’ll come back to me.

I haven’t had a chance to do much of a background check on Kalamazoo, a town of 75,000, but I did find learn of one interesting local law. Aparently, in Kalamazoo it is against the law to serenade your girlfriend. Oh yeah? Just try and arrest the medievalist lovers, Joe Law. You’ll have me to answer to, and I’m bringing my long sword.

–From the program: “Coming to the Congress this year is a replica of a medieval cart used in England around the years 1320-40. … the cart took more than 900 hours of research, design, and construction.” Time well spent, I say. Can we say, “Overtime for one, overtime for all!”

In the May issue of Wired, my cousin, Charles C. Mann, has an excellent article on the emergence of aquaculture — fish farming on a scale similar to Purdue-brand chicken manufacture. A number of species have been fished to the brink of extinction, he says, and as the demand for fish among developing countries grows exponentially each year, there’s real threat of “the aquatic equivalent of a neutron bomb.” Cam, as we Manns like to call him, says that the solution may be ocean ranches, motorized pens that roam the seas for months and then arrive at their destination chock full of plump protein ready for market.

Now, I like fish as much as the next guy, but — well, I don’t really like fish. They’re filthy little googley eyed freaks, in my opinion. I mean, I’m thrilled that technologies like aquaculture may save cod, the beloved national fish of Portugal (and, I believe, the chief ingredient on every item on our wedding menu). But what intrigues me about the article — what I love about every one of Cam’s articles — is his ability to make a technical subject as accessible and fascinating as a Michael Crichton novel.
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A year ago, when Ana and I got engaged, I assumed that planning the wedding wouldn’t be that taxing a chore. For starters, we decided to spread out the decision making over the course of one and a half years. Also, wedding planning is mainly the domain of the Wo-Man, and, having a penis, I figured that I’d be stuck with only a couple fool-proof tasks — say, for example, picking a band and getting the rings. Like every other assumption in our blessed relationship, this was dead wrong.

Here it is, six months before the big day — October 9, 2004 — and I’m in as deep, if not deeper, than my lady friend. Who would’ve guessed that one of these friggin’ mixers could take up so much of my free time. Freelancing, which I once considered my chief recreational hobby, has taken a big backseat. Basically, it’s in the trunk. Every day Ana gives me a new task: update our wedding website, order the rings, find a DJ, update Ana’s Knot.com community profile, etc. It’s becoming clear that if I want to have her as my Sugar Mama, MD, I’m gonna start picking up the duties of the stay-at-home mother. To be fair, she chips in much of the time, but the brutal truth is that just about every fact of wedding planning requires five-plus hours.

Take, for example, registering at Macy’s yesterday. …
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