Maybe. I’m not sure. In 2011, I covered a story about a woman in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma who was fighting her landlord’s efforts to evict her – and her kangaroo. The woman had an Australian red kangaroo in her apartment. She said she had a legal right to have a kangaroo in her apartment under the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act.) She has a letter from a therapist who says that due to her depression, she needs a ‘therapy kangaroo.‘
After fighting her landlord and the city of Broken Arrow for several years, the kangaroo’s owner has finally thrown in the towel. In August, 2013; she turned over the kangaroo to an exotic animal park, The Garold Wayne Interactive Zoological Park, located about 60 miles south of Oklahoma City. To see photos of the ‘therapy kangaroo’, go to: Therapy Kangaroo.
Kangaroos and Twizzlers. This ‘therapy’ kangaroo’s name is Irwin. According to his owner, Irwin’s favorite food is strawberry flavored Twizzlers, which I think is appropriate considering that he is a red kangaroo. I doubt that kangaroos in the wild eat Twizzlers, but if they do, that might explain why red kangaroos are red. I don’t know enough about Australia or kangaroos to be sure about this. Apparently, Irwin isn’t the only kangaroo who eats Twizzlers. There are several videos on You Tube of kangaroos eating Twizzlers. Here is one of them. Kangaroo Eating A Twizzler. I know an executive at Hershey, the company that makes Twizzlers. I will ask him about this when I see him next week.
Can you imagine what it would be like to live directly underneath an apartment with a kangaroo in it? Boing! Boing! Boing! I wonder if this woman’s landlord was able to rent that apartment. I have never personally received a rental application from someone with a ‘therapy kangaroo‘, but I did once get an application from somebody with a ‘comfort pig.’ I have often wondered if there is a therapy animal that a landlord can refuse to allow in his building on the grounds that the animal is inherently too dangerous. Is there a point at which the safety of the other tenants in the building and the neighbors trumps the ADA? I have asked this question to a number of lawyers who specialize in disability law, including government lawyers, and none of them had an answer. Frankly, I am not sure what I would do if I got an application for an apartment from somebody with an obviously dangerous animal, like a ‘comfort rattlesnake’ or a ‘therapy grizzly bear.’ What would you do in that situation if you were the landlord?
Apartments are getting smaller and smaller in San Francisco and Berkeley. As a general rule, the newer the building, the smaller the rooms. 8′ x 8′ bedrooms are now common in new buildings, including expensive ones. And now, micro apartments measuring only 240 square feet are popping up all over San Francisco. Not to be outdone, the city of Berkeley has given permits to build 160 square foot apartments, and construction of them will begin soon. 160 square feet is the size of a one-car garage. These apartments are so small that every room has to serve multiple functions. For example, in the micro apartments scheduled to be built on Shattuck Avenue near Berkeley Bowl, the kitchen table will have a foot pedal underneath it. When you press down on the pedal, it will lower the table. Then you can cover the table with a mattress that is stored in the wall. Although micro apartments are small, they are not cheap. Most of the ones in San Francisco rent for over $2,000 a month. Would you pay $2,000 a month for an apartment that is so small that you have to sleep on the kitchen table?
Rooms in existing buildings are shrinking too. Many landlords are moving walls within apartments in order to create more bedrooms. They take space from other rooms, usually living rooms. I have seen recently remodeled apartments in downtown Berkeley with living rooms that are only 5 to 6 feet wide. You can touch the 2 opposite walls by stretching out your arms.
I teach American history at a junior high school in Orinda. My students often tell me that I tell them stories in a way that makes it sound like I made it all up, but that isn’t true. I don’t make up these stories. History is full of odd coincidences and strange people. Thomas Hardy said: “While much is too strange to be believed, nothing is too strange to have happened.” Here is a tale of an odd coincidence.
Jefferson and Adams. As every American schoolchild knows (or should know), the Declaration of Independence was written by Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. After the Revolutionary War was over, Jefferson and Adams became political enemies. It wasn’t just because Adams was against slavery and Jefferson owned a lot of slaves. They had completely opposite political philosophies. Adams was the head of the Federalist Party, and Jefferson was the head of the anti-Federalists. For over 20 years, Jefferson and Adams did not speak to each other, but in their old age, they patched up their differences and became friends and pen pals, writing to each other frequently. On July 4, 1826; exactly 50 years to the day after Thomas Jefferson and John Adams signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776; John Adams died at his home in Quincy, Massachusetts. On his deathbed, John Adams’ final words were: “At least Jefferson still lives!” However, unknown to Adams, Thomas Jefferson died shortly before Adams that same day at Monticello in Virginia, and Jefferson’s final thoughts were of Adams.
If you have a fireplace or wood burning stove and would like some free firewood, give me a call! I give free firewood to my tenants when I have it, and right now, I have lots of it. Its mostly Douglas fir 2x4s cutoffs left over from construction projects. The wood is unpainted and cut to fireplace size.
Never burn painted or varnished wood, plywood, or particle board. You can get very sick breathing in the chemicals that are given off when these things are burned, and never use your fireplace as a trash burner.
I teach American history at Orinda Intermediate School one day a week. I have been doing this for a long time. I like to tell stories to my students about improbable people and unlikely historical events. These stories get and keep their attention.
and died in 1882. McLean was fond of telling his friends and dinner guests that: “The war (The Civil War) started in my backyard and ended in my parlor.” He was telling the truth.The first battle of the Civil War was the First Battle of Bull Run. The battle was fought on July 21, 1861 in Manassas, Virginia on Wilmer McLean’s farm. McLean’s house was commandeered by the Confederate army just before the battle and became the headquarters of their commanding officer, General Beauregard. The first canon shot fired in the first battle of the war blew up McLean’s rose garden. While General Beauregard and his staff were eating lunch in Wilmer McLean’s kitchen, a Union canon ball fell down the kitchen fireplace chimney, blowing soot all over the food, the general, and his staff. When the battle was over, there were thousands of dead and dying men all around McLean’s house. After the battle, McLean decided to move. His house was situated at a strategically important location. Several railroads intersected in Manassas, and the main railroad line that connected Richmond, Virgina and Washington, D.C. went right past McLean’s farm. It seemed obvious to McLean that the 2 sides would fight over his farm again, which they did. The Second Battle of Bull Run, fought a year later in 1862, was even bloodier than the first.
Crunch is one of my favorite restaurants in downtown Berkeley. It open last year and was a hit from Day One. Complete meals cost around $8, which seems cheap to me. Everything on the menu looks beautiful, the meals are filling, and ingredients are fresh and healthy. On the other hand, their dessert looks extremely unhealthy. They only have one dessert – Tempura Oreos. They take 6 Oreo cookies, dip them in tempura batter, deep fry them, put them on top of a bowl of vanilla ice cream, and then cover the whole thing with Hershey’s syrup. God only knows how many calories are in this this dish!