Ceiling critters

Mysterious gray smudge on my kitchen ceiling
Mysterious gray smudge on my kitchen ceiling

What is on my ceiling? Looks like a thumbprint—gray, like newsprint. Except… my kitchen ceiling is the cottage cheese type. A thumbprint isn’t possible.

In the back of my mind was a recent dinner party, at which a bottle of zinfandel misbehaved or, rather, its cork did, and red splattered the ceiling. But not there. And anyway, I cleaned it all, didn’t I? Could this have been a remnant? I couldn’t imagine what caused the gray smudge. I made a mental note to clean it somehow.

Next day, having forgotten all about it, I did a double take. Was it that large yesterday? Looks like two thumbprints today. I got up on a ladder and looked through a magnifying glass.

Oh, it’s a dusting of something. Mold? In the desert? I rubbed my finger across the spot. Wait a minute, use the high-power portion of the glass. Yikes! Are those microscopic heads? They’re moving! They’re alive.

I got a camera and snapped a macro photo, having much trouble focusing while wavering on the ladder. I sent the photo off to Uncle Lenny. Handy to have an entomologist in the family. Lenny always responds right away, but he must have been teaching a class.

Gray ceiling smudge magnified!
Gray ceiling smudge magnified!

“You know I’m not the hysterical type,” I wrote him hours later, “but now that I know there are critters multiplying on my ceiling, right over my head in fact, I can’t think of much else.”

“It was likely a single egg sac that hatched. Chances are they’ll die anyway since there’s nothing to eat.”

A mist of diluted bleach took care of them. But what were they? Caterpillars, Lenny said. Probably laid by a moth.

Caterpillar found scarfing my olive tree leaves, pooping on my patioRight. I leave the doors and windows open and we always have moths fluttering around. A moth laid an egg sac on my kitchen ceiling. I had caterpillar hatchlings. Cute.

Chinese torture contraption ?

Seen from the street: Chinese torture unit, or what?
Hong Kong hair salon?
Hong Kong hair salon? Seen from the street: Chinese torture unit, or what?

Can anyone tell me what this contraption is? I took this picture through a window in Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon, after a dinner at Spring Deer, the famous and fabulous house of Peking duck. What are they doing to those poor women? Does it hurt? Click the picture for a larger view. I saw several shops in the neighborhood with this weird torture unit visible through the window.

Hong Kong peking duck, carved tableside
Hong Kong peking duck, carved tableside

Cougars loose in Chicago, Scottsdale AZ

On the loose in Scottsdale, AZ
On the loose in Scottsdale, AZ
On the loose in Scottsdale, AZ

A cougar on the loose in Chicago today met its unfortunate end, poor thing. Was it stalking an epicurean meal, or lost in a cement labyrinth?

My parents live in Scottsdale, Arizona. Not long ago, they were overjoyed to find a cougar lounging on the wall of their front porch. They called it a puma. They shot theirs, too, and these photos are the result. Click on one for a slide show.

Not killed, in Scottsdale, AZ
Not killed, in Scottsdale, AZ
Brother killed in Chicago, 4/14/08.
Brother killed in Chicago, 4/14/08.

Legal lay-offs

Tropea, Italy

Today’s Wall Street Journal reports that law firms are curtailing their associate programs. Some are delaying the start dates of new hires, and some have actually rescinded employment offers to law students about to graduate. The salary for new lawyers at major firms is around $160,000.

This interests me because I was in the law biz pre-Bob Arno. But more so because my nephew, about to graduate from Harvard Law School, has one of those lucrative job deals, offered a year ago near the end of his second year of law school. I’m not worried about my nephew—he’ll graduate at or near the top of his class. I’m just astonished at how crass and cold-hearted employers can be, especially in a small segment of business in which everyone makes relatively big bucks.

The article paraphrases

…James Jones, senior vice president at legal consulting firm Hildebrandt International. Law firms, he says, are reluctant to lay off people because it is expensive and time-consuming to staff up when the market regains its vigor.

What about being reluctant because you’d be putting people out of work in hard times, because they’ve worked hard for you and you feel a modicum of loyalty, because you like them?

Granted, the WSJ has only paraphrased Mr. Jones, who may well have said more than what makes a good read. I hope so. Associate lawyers in competitive firms work themselves to the bone and, for some, it never gets better.