Monday, February 28, 2022
Podcast Presents 7 Ideas for Increasing Focus on Tasks
Sunday, February 27, 2022
Speed Golf: A Viable Alternative to the Original Sport?
I was watching yet another PGA tournament this Sunday afternoon...with yet another group of completely different golfers vying for the title...when it occurred to me what was missing from the sport: timing, which would add more of an athletic dimension to it. I had all the rules for this new sport worked out in my head, a kind of golf that used the same course, clubs and balls but was much faster and more action based. And then, just before I set out to write my article on this great invention of mine, I decided to do an online search using the words "speed golf"...sure enough, it's already been invented with professional tournaments going on for ten years already. According to "their" rules, in an 18-hole round each golfer gets the usual score of total shots, to which is added the total minutes taken to run the course...giving the final composite score. I don't know if they time the interval between holes...I wouldn't, timing only between the tee and hole. Also, according to "my" version, I would completely discount how many shots are taken and only go by the time taken to accomplish it...and I'd have the golfers on a particular hole all tee off and play simultaneously...no tedious breaks with players analyzing and lining up shots! I think that adding the element of timing would make golf more similar to tennis in that the tournaments would tend to go more consistently to the sport's stars instead of being spread out so much among so many. And, of course, I think it would be a lot more exciting to watch. Will speed golf ever catch on as a major sport? I don't know, but reportedly its major tournaments are shown on CBS and ESPN...next time they show one I'd like to see how they do it...
Saturday, February 26, 2022
Just Finished Reading The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle
Friday, February 25, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Leslie Nielsen in the Movie Airplane!
Thursday, February 24, 2022
Fascist Putin, Praised by Trump, Invades Ukraine
Fascist Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, as expected for weeks, today launched his country's invasion of neighboring Ukraine as tanks are rolling in and bombs dropping across this besieged nation. Putin's biggest American buddy, fellow fascist Donald Trump...who tried to overthrow our dearly cherished free and fair presidential election a year ago...has been full of nothing but praise for Putin, calling his Ukraine strategy of aggression "genius". And other right-wingers, most notable among them FoxNews' Tucker Carlson, have made no secret of their unbridled support for Putin...what has my country come to? It's true that under Vladimir Putin and his predecessor Boris Yeltsin, Russia shed its previous aggressive communist ideology in favor of social conservatism...lining themselves up nicely with the political right on several ongoing issues in America. But don't these people see what carnage, damage and disruption this military takeover of another sovereign nation is going to cause? This isn't like some football game with folks choosing, say, the Rams or the Bengals...this is life and death, and some of my compatriots need to get their heads screwed on right and their hearts drastically changed. As for my own heart, it goes out to the Ukrainian people in this time of crisis and suffering...
Wednesday, February 23, 2022
Weekly Short Stories: 1982 Science Fiction, Part 2
Tuesday, February 22, 2022
TikTok as Forum for Diverse Ideas & Opinions
I have had the short looping video app TikTok on my smartphone for a few months now, never putting out anything on my own but rather just scrolling through the randomly appearing posts of others. My use of it reflects how I used Twitter: to get people's brief reactions to what is going on around us as well as their general philosophies of life. Before, when I used Twitter...and social media in general...what I saw was pretty much set in advance by my choice of people I followed and was thereby inherently slanted. When I flick through video after TikTok video (I don't follow anyone or participate in their interactive options of reactions to posts), I'm getting more of a cross-section of viewpoints about most anything, but weighted heavily in favor of current events and issues. And since the people putting out these videos are for the most part neither celebrities nor anyone I personally know, I am not having to deal with inner conflicts about those individuals whenever I happen to disagree with a posting (and that happens a lot)...I can focus on the message, not the messenger. Some of the videos out there do stretch the standards of modesty and propriety a bit, but I suppose in a free speech environment it's better to err in that direction than in that of censorship. Speaking of censorship, just about every mainstream social media platform practices some sort of content regulation and TikTok has its own issues as well...seems that criticism of some autocrats has been suppressed in the past and there was a recent scandal in which a site urged students to vandalize their schools. I also know that Trump hated TikTok and wanted it banned in the United States...had it not been for him I probably wouldn't have even considered it: thanks, Donald, in a backhanded sort of way. Is this app perfect? No way...not by far...but it is always interesting. TikTok as I see it presented is a crazy, chaotic kind of digital bulletin board, a welcome, more grassroots kind of entertainment to check in on whenever I get tired of the contrived and narrative-driven mass media news programs I see on TV. I'm not necessarily recommending it for you, but I've seen it as a good source for independent opinions and information...although as with everything else it's crucial to be discerning in filtering it all through and not automatically accept everything I read or hear...
Monday, February 21, 2022
Ideas for Breaking Through Mental Barriers, As Related by Rob Dial
On a recent Mindset Mentor podcast hosted by Rob Dial, he laid out three ways to break through mental barriers...and he used for an example an area with which I am only too familiar: long-distance running. According to Dial, a noted ultra-marathon runner is asked by someone to help his friend get over his running block: he can't surpass five miles for a single run without losing his energy and needing to stop. The "ultra" man accepts the challenge to help him out but insists that he commit himself to three things: (1) repeat to yourself "I will never quit", (2) don't give your pain a voice, and (3) continually think of things in your life that you are grateful for. The story goes like this: on their very first run together, the friend not only breaks his five-mile barrier but runs for 100 miles! With the repeated mantra of never quitting, Dial explains that your body responds to the voice inside your head...another example is the placebo effect in which healing occurs seemingly because the mind is convinced that the ingested "medicine" is effective for the body. With not giving pain a voice, the point is to not to focus on things you don't want, but instead to switch to emphasizing that which you desire. And thoughts of gratitude cause the brain to release chemicals that benefit action and reduce anxiety and discouragement. As for me, I employed these three principles during the half-marathon yesterday...and they worked, although had I not heard this episode of Rob Dial's podcast I think I still would have done all right. Who knows, maybe I was already practicing these suggestions, albeit in a different form...
Sunday, February 20, 2022
Ran Gainesville's Five Points Half-Marathon This Morning
Saturday, February 19, 2022
The Burden of Relevancy in Academic Conversation
I have a daydream fantasy, one that I believe few others have. It goes like this: along with all the inane radio talk shows hosted by political extremists, self-proclaimed experts on money or the law, paranormal promoters, and sports know-it-alls there is one program in which the host, a master of informed questioning, has as guests people who are knowledgeable and competent in diverse academic fields, ranging from medicine to physics to language to mathematics to agriculture to mechanics to economics...or anything else. In each interview they spend the allotted time exploring the actual content of the field for discussion, not necessarily its applications or implications to society or the guest's life history. Now I know this is just cognitive reverie on my part, but what if I were to become like that host and ask those around me about their own fields of expertise? My guess is that they would mostly be reticent about sharing many details of their specialized knowledge, trying to steer the conversation toward their own life narrative or what career achievements they have won...and question my own rationale in asking them in the first place. And simple curiosity and a desire to learn new things just don't sound like good enough reasons...there has to be demonstrated relevancy to push the topic forward. On the other hand, since I haven't tried this how do I know that would happen? I do know that there is an increasing gulf in society between those "in the know" about science and technology and the bulk of the population, which at best takes it all for granted and at worst outright rejects science and advanced learning in favor of nonsensical notions...
Friday, February 18, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Clint Eastwood
Thursday, February 17, 2022
Constellation of the Month: Canis Major (the Great Dog)
Wednesday, February 16, 2022
Weekly Short Stories: 1982 Science Fiction, Part 1
Tuesday, February 15, 2022
Podcaster Rob Dial's Strategy to Manifest Whatever You Want
Monday, February 14, 2022
Happy Birthday, My Dear Sweet Melissa
Well, Melissa, it's that time of year again...Happy Birthday! It's also that time of year for me to reflect on how grateful I am to have been so blessed with such a wonderful, beautiful woman as you. May the days, weeks, months and years ahead be full of joy, love and health for us and those around us...
Sunday, February 13, 2022
Just Finished Reading Murder in the Manor by Fiona Grace
It seems that Fiona Grace is a prolific English author of numerous cozy mystery book series. With the one I'm starting, the Lacey Doyle Cozy Mysteries, she has already published a prodigious 9 novels in just the past three years...but that's nothing: her aggregate total, the way I've figured it, is 33 books from 2019 to now! You might think that this would interfere with the quality of her writing, but from what I gather after just finishing reading her first Lacey Doyle novel, Murder in the Manor, her writing quality is just fine, thank you. I was curious, though, about how other readers reacted to this story and checked out Goodreads...my eyes were opened. Review after review dismally panned the book, and there was a consensus that there is no Fiona Grace. Her apparent prolificity is explained by there being a multitude of anonymous writers penning the many books bearing that name. Makes sense to me, although in the final analysis it doesn't really matter, only the story itself. Lacey is a 39-year old American woman whose dirtbag husband just pulled a no-fault divorce on her because she hasn't born him any children...and then has the gall to demand for spousal support from her. She's an antiques dealer working for a New York company...to get a break from her domestic drama she travels to England, to a small quaint village she once stayed at as a child with her family. There she quickly opens her own antique shop, gets to know various characters...both good and bad, and then a murder happens (she is initially the top suspect). The narrative progresses to the crime's solution...naturally, Lacey figures it all out. As stories go, I liked it...especially considering that the book's series title advertises it as a cozy mystery...no pretense here. If you're going for a literary classic instead of pleasure reading, you probably won't give it raving reviews on Goodreads, either. Armed with the knowledge that "Fiona Grace" probably isn't writing these stories, I'm still open to exploring other books attributed to her...including other series...
Saturday, February 12, 2022
Just Finished Running Gainesville's Depot Parkrun 5K
Friday, February 11, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Tony Dungy
Thursday, February 10, 2022
Russia, Authoritarianism and the Populist Rabble
Wednesday, February 9, 2022
Weekly Short Stories: 1981 Science Fiction, Part 4
Tuesday, February 8, 2022
Gainesville Bookstores of the Past
I'm sitting here reminiscing on Gainesville bookstores from years gone by...there have been a lot of them and some were outstanding. Funny, though, although with audio media, phonograph records went through a number of digitilizations, first with compact discs and then to MP3 and now streaming, printed material is taking a while being synchronized with our computer era. Sure, Kindle is prospering and it's easy getting books on it...that is, if they are still in print. Unfortunately, most of the ones out of print are unavailable in the digital era and you have to get the hard copy to read them. Amazon has largely supplanted local used bookstores as a source of these old books, but as one who likes to browse shelves and pick up books and leaf through them, it falls short in that respect. In Gainesville, we still have some bookstores, but I remember times when there were some awfully good ones, like...
Book Gallery---This store, the "original" Book Gallery until it spun off into Book Gallery West on NW 16th Blvd (that one still stands), was in the Publix shopping center on N. Main St. between 10th and 16th Avenues. In the late 80's we'd go there as our number one source of used books...the used book collection was vast.
Goering's---Situated on the NW corner of University Avenue and 13th Street, it was loaded with all sorts of books and magazines, one of my favorite browsing spots. Before the building was torn down for construction, they had opened a second store further west on University past 34th Street but both closed down.
Gainesville Book Company---Located in the industrial park on NW 97th Blvd off 39th Avenue, this small shop was loaded with ultra-cheap used books...I especially liked the science fiction collection and bought many of the Stephen King books I would read through this period during the 2000's decade. They were open every other weekend.
Borders---A huge store with new books now occupied by the equally-excellent DSW shoe store on Newberry Road near I-75, I loved browsing through it and found some excellent puzzle books...and got hooked on the Magicians series by Lev Grossman. They also had a great CD and DVD collection as well as a big coffee shop/sitting area.
Media Play---Across from K-Mart off Newberry Road just west of the Interstate, this store...like Borders...featured books, CDs and DVDs.
Barnes and Nobles---On Archer Road right near the also-now-defunct Atlanta Bread Company...where I used to hang out for their excellent coffee and sitting area, I spent a good amount of time here. B&N has their own "Kindle", which they call "Nook". My take on the two is that until out-of-print books are available on them, then they are going to continue to be secondary to hard copy books.
The Florida Bookstore---Right across from the University of Florida campus on University Avenue, it was a primary supplier of textbooks, class material and school supplies. Of course, other companies have sprung up in the area to replace it, but I wish this one was still there. Once it briefly had a second outlet on SW 34th Street, but now there's a Sherwin Williams paint store at that spot.
The "First" Books-a-Million---Replacing the Skeeters restaurant on NW 13th Street, Books-a-Million was my primary stopping place before my graveyard shift job in the 1990s...I'd always get the flavored coffee of the day and then browse around. I read the first four Harry Potter books sitting in there, a few pages at the time, as well as some others. It's been replaced by the used bookstore 2nd and Charles and still has an outlet on Newberry Road near the Oaks mall.
Walden and B.Dalton at the Oaks Mall...I usually didn't go to these unless I happened to be walking through the mall on other business, but they were always fun to stop at and browse.
Archer Square bookstore...I don't remember this business's name, but it was in the Archer Square shopping center on Archer Road just west of 34th Street that featured a Winn-Dixie and Tony and Pat's Pizza, along with a kiddie's place called Fun Factory. It was in the 1980s and I would walk across the field from my nearby apartment and browse around...it was here that I bought my first Isaac Asimov sci-fi anthology paperbacks.
Westgate Plaza used bookstore...I don't remember this one's name either, but they had a great selection of books...I bought Frank Herbert's entire Dune series here. Now the whole plaza, along SW 34th Street just south of University Avenue, has been demolished and is being rebuilt, but the bookstore left a while ago.
I'm sure I'll think of more, but it's kind of sad to see these fine establishments come and go...they deserved better...
Monday, February 7, 2022
Rob Dial's Podcast Discusses Overthinking
The other day on the Mindset Mentor podcast I listen to regularly, host Rob Dial discussed how folks tend to overthink, and he suggested a constructive way of looking at it: we are not our thoughts. That tends to conflict with the commonly held view that people's learning, experiences and accomplishments define them. For me, I've long had this notion of separating the "I" as a separate identity from how I mentally process my ideas and experiences...unfortunately, whenever I bring this up in conversation with others I get nowhere. I even wrote about it many years ago on this blog and got an angry response from an old high school buddy of mind who got the idea somehow that because he was good in mathematics then that made him an expert in everything else...that's like some I know who are under the impression that, because they have money and/or worldly status, this makes them somehow more spiritual than me. Both cases are examples of people who confuse who they are with external manifestations of their lives...and that includes their thoughts. Dial encourages us to do what I believe is called "mindfulness" at various points of our day: whatever we're doing, wherever we are, stop and get notice of what is around us, even to the point of noticing things we'd discard as irrelevant to our functioning. This, he maintains, will help to turn our often-wayward thinking back to our control instead of it controlling us as it often does. The particular show I listened to also brought to mind how I can often over-analyze situations and scenarios to the point where I'm too discouraged to even engage in them...enough is enough with that...
Sunday, February 6, 2022
Just Finished Reading Maui Murder by Jasmine Webb
A couple of days ago Maui Murder, Jasmine Webb's second installment in her Charlotte Gibson mystery book series, became available to me through my library and I wasting no time checking it out and reading it. I like the earthy, irreverent 30-year old protagonist "Charlie", who has fled back to her home island in Hawai'i after shooting a gangland robber of a Seattle bank where she was employed. Now she works at an ice cream shop...when not taking on murder mysteries, that is. In this story Jo, a young woman, has been killed and found in the ocean...her bereaved father, hearing of Charlie's success at solving the last murder, is offering her $100,000 to go after Jo's killer. Without going into plot details, she enlists the aid of familiar characters like her best friend Zoe and septuagenarian women Dot and Rosie while crossing paths with the cops and having to deal with her loving, but sometime overbearing mother. My only problem with Jasmine Webb's writing as Charlie interviews Jo's coworkers at her software development company or encounters her ex-boyfriend is that men tend to be treated as stupid, sexist creeps while the women are smarter and much more socially enlightened. I noticed this some in her first book, but now it's forming an unpleasant pattern...still, I plan to continue reading this entertaining series when the next book is available as Charlotte Gibson will no doubt encounter a fresh set of male idiots...
Saturday, February 5, 2022
Ongoing Beijing Olympics to Me a Big Yawn
Friday, February 4, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Brian Flores
Thursday, February 3, 2022
Just Finished Reading Aloha Alibi by Jasmine Webb
Before checking out the short novel Aloha Alibi by Jasmine Webb from my library I had never heard the term "cozy mystery" before, but now that I've read it I'm pretty sure about what this subgenre of mystery fiction is all about...and I like it. Aloha Alibi, published just this past year, is billed as the first book in the Charlotte Gibson Mysteries series...but this author is really churning out the books, with the fourth one already coming out this year! Charlotte "Charlie" Gibson is a young adult millennial, an intelligent underachiever in school who works at a jewelry store in Seattle when it is robbed one day, the criminal being a hood from an area crime family. Forced to shoot dead the man who is about to kill her, she has to flee to her childhood home on Maui, Hawaii after his brothers swear vengeance. There she lives with her doting mother (who is always trying to get her to sleep with men to produce grandchildren), gets a job at an ice cream store, is reacquainted with her old school friend Zoe (now a doctor) and of course gets embroiled in a murder mystery. Along with two eccentric, but highly capable and shrewd elderly ladies who are vying with her for the reward money, Charlotte dives into the case...since this is "Book One" in the series you can surmise that she survives it all. Aside from the mystery itself, I was charmed by the social interplay between the characters, giving the story a very warm and funny aura that attracted me to the characters...I could especially relate to Charlotte's early adult struggles with economic independence. When the next Charlotte Gibson mystery is available from my library for me to read (I just put it on hold), I'll continue with this series, which I recommend as fun, "cozy" reading....