In October my running stats were pretty much commensurate with those of the previous few months...just plodding along, exercising every day. The major difference was that, with the onset of the fall running race season here in northern Florida, I was able to enter a couple of middle-distance races here in Gainesville, both 10K (6.2 miles): the Tom Walker Preview on 10/15 and the Run the Good Race on 10/22. Both were held on Saturday mornings, the first out on the Hawthorne Trail and the other in the office park and residential area around North Florida Regional Medical Center. I ran both seeking to establish a reasonable.pace for my age, finishing with times of 1:04:55 and 1:03:20, respectively. My legs were sore in the immediate hours and days following each race...my training has been on soft, level surfaces, and the hard, hilly asphalt surfaces in these races were a bit uncomfortable. I thought maybe I should train more under these conditions for future events and then concluded that I don't want to overtrain and overstress the soft connective tissue...a problem plaguing athletes in today's "only winning matters" sports world. In November, there will be two half-marathons (13.1 miles) offered, both along that same Hawthorne Trail...I've already signed up for the first on Sunday the 6th and if all goes well, might try out the second one two weeks later. As for my walking, since I naturally rack up the mileage due to my generally active lifestyle, I haven't been measuring it for months, although I easily average several miles a day. Oh, with regard to that upcoming half-marathon on November 6th, the Florida Track Club is organizing it and they have included pacer runners based on different finishing times...the slowest is running at a 2 hours 20 minutes pace. My plan is to run just behind that pacer...it should alleviate a lot of the pacing problems I had when I ran the preview race earlier this month. Hopefully, the weather will hold up for that morning...
Monday, October 31, 2022
Sunday, October 30, 2022
My #7 All-Time Favorite Album: The White Album by the Beatles
Saturday, October 29, 2022
Mass Rallies Creep Me Out
Back in the fall of 2020, when COVID-19 was going full blast, then-Florida Gator football coach Dan Mullen praised the over-full College Station, Texas stadium of his rival Texas A&M following a close loss to them, stating that UF needed to "pack the Swamp [their stadium]" as well. Soon thereafter the next game against Missouri was moved back because of several positive COVID test results among the team. Now, although this scourge is still raging unabated, there are no crowd restrictions, and the expectation is full stadiums in every football game out there...at least the college ones. Just a few months earlier in '20, news outlets like CNN were meticulously filming...often using zoom lenses to distort the effect...beaches that were beginning to draw crowds following their reopening, trying to create the impression that assemblages were still improper. Then, suddenly, mass protests started after the police killing of George Floyd and, just like the snap of a finger, the emphasis on avoiding crowds changed to embracing them...for the protest demonstrations across the nation, that is. And so have mass rallies, protests and sporting events been used to manipulate public opinion even to the point of brainwashing people along a certain narrative. I like to watch sporting events, but the tens of thousands of yelling fans creep me out almost as much as do those Trump rallies with all the head-bobbing grinning zombies pictured together behind the Orange Man as he blathers on. I have attended a church in which a pastor got up in front of the congregation and acted as if we had all been doing something wrong by previously staying at home and watching online services in 2020, and then pronouncing it all over (even though it wasn't). Packed churches, rallies, demonstrations, stadiums, concerts, whatever...getting a bunch of people together in a concentrated, noisy mass to parrot whatever happens to be the organizers' intended narrative...is the opposite of democracy, where people can individually calmly, quietly, and anonymously select their own leaders and vote on referenda. I remember in 2016 immediately following Trump's election (which I recognized although I didn't vote for him), demonstrations against him were organized with the ongoing mantra "NOT MY PRESIDENT!". I thought that was a bit over the top, but four years later it paled in contrast to Trump's refusal to concede the 2020 election and his call to Washington for militant groups like the Proud Boys to swarm the Washington Mall in protest of the Electoral Vote official certification by Congress, resulting in the violent storming of the US Capitol building. If you derive a sense of legitimacy about anything by seeing masses of assembled people agreeing with you, then I believe you are a part of a serious problem that is only growing in this country. Sure, I get it at sporting events...it's fun for everybody to get together and root for their team. On the other hand, I was watching the baseball playoffs the other day and the home crowd, whenever their pitcher was on the mound, would loudly boo whenever the umpire called a ball on a pitch that was clearly far outside the strike zone...there's a difference between being passionate for your cause and being a dishonest, sore loser...did you get that, all you Trumpies? I didn't think so..
Friday, October 28, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Elon Musk
the bird is freed ---Elon Musk
I thought I'd keep the language sloppiness to this Twitter submission by the richest man in the world, who just bought Twitter and made it his own private company to do with as he pleases. As is the case with business innovators and tycoons, I have a degree of admiration for Elon Musk and his vision for the future. This is especially true with his SpaceX plans to travel to and eventually settle the planet Mars, and his Falcon 9 rockets kick major ass, to put it crudely. One problem that seems to infect people of this stature, though, is that because they have shown themselves to excel in a few things, then that means they are geniuses in everything...which clearly isn't the case. Musk says he wants Twitter to return to the old days during the Trump presidency when anyone could put out any disinformation on this social media platform with no accountability other than that of dissenting comments. The only problem I see in this is that it's already been established that foreign governments hostile to the U.S. have used venues such as Twitter and Facebook to plant false narratives under fake identities in order to unduly shape public opinion and influence elections in favor of candidates more to their liking...I've heard no acknowledgement of this problem from Musk, though. Well, although I tend to avoid making "tweets", I've been on Twitter before Trump, and stayed there during what I regard as a fascist demagogue's reign as our 45th president. I will continue to be there as well after Elon Musk's takeover, but I wish the dude would focus his attention more on his companies' wonderful accomplishments and plans in future technology and not be so full of himself...which I recognize is probably a complete waste of my wishing efforts...
Thursday, October 27, 2022
2022 World Series is a Rematch of Classic 1980 NLCS
In 1980 I enjoyed watching the resurgent Atlanta Braves under rookie manager Joe Torre rise from their divisional cellar to achieve a winning regular season record, although they were still a couple of years from making the playoffs. Instead, the playoffs for the National League championship pitted the Philadelphia Phillies under manager Dallas Green against Bill Virdon's Houston Astros in a best-of-five series. Both teams had their retinue of great players, the Phillies with Pete Rose, Mike Schmidt, Tug McGraw and Steve Carlton and the Astros with Joe Morgan and Nolan Ryan...just to name a few. This series, which I initially cared little about, turned into what I still consider to be the most exciting league championship series ever played, with the two opponents playing series brinksmanship on a level I haven't seen since...at least, that is, until the Boston Red Sox turned the tables on the New York Yankees in 2004 after trailing their best-of-seven series three games to none. I remember that last game with the series tied two-two and the Astros had built up a 5-2 lead after seven innings...with ace Nolan Ryan pitching for them. Yet the Phillies miraculously came back for a squeaker 8-7 win in ten innings...unforgettable! Since then, of course, Houston jumped over to the American League and has been dominant there for the past five years or so...they won the pennant last year as well but bowed to Atlanta in the World Series. Critics of the changed playoff system this year point to 100+ win teams like the Braves, Mets and Dodgers losing to upstart teams like the Phillies and the San Diego Padres, but over on the American League side the best regular season teams prevailed in their playoffs. Houston is heavily favored over Philadelphia, but just like back in '80 I'll be rooting for the spunky, never-say-die Phillies. Game One is tomorrow evening in Houston...
Wednesday, October 26, 2022
Weekly Short Stories: 1987 Science Fiction, Part 4
Tuesday, October 25, 2022
Dramatic vs. Incremental Personal Transformation
Monday, October 24, 2022
Time Off at Book Sale and Starbucks, Election Comments
Sunday, October 23, 2022
My #8 All-Time Favorite Album: Houses of the Holy by Led Zeppelin
Saturday, October 22, 2022
Ran the "Run the Good Race" 10K This Morning
Running In the USA is a good website that has a detailed running race calendar for just about anywhere in the country...I regularly consult it, which is how I first found out about today's race. Back in 2019 I ran one local race here in Gainesville, titled "Run the Good Race" and which features a 5K (3.1 miles) or 10K (6.2 miles) option, the course being in the North Florida Regional Medical Center office park and the hilly residential area behind it. Back then it was held in April...click HERE to read about my experiences...but after the Covid-19 cancellations it was revived last year, moved to October. Since at that time I was still recovering from my July open heart surgery, I didn't participate. Early this morning, though, I was able to and managed to pull my sorry old body out of bed and get down there. There were some similarities and contrasts with last week's 10K on the Hawthorne Trail...let me discuss the differences first. I mentioned last Saturday that there were too many "Galloway runners" in that race, runners who would go through a repeated cycle of walking for a set time and then running for a set time: I didn't encounter any of these today. Neither did I experience the annoyance of bicycles buzzing by me at high speed as happened last week. There were not only indoor bathroom accommodations at today's race, but participants could also huddle indoors from the cool early morning temperatures before race time. Also, last week's race was runner-centered, organized by the Florida Track Club. Today's event was Christian-themed and had as a goal to raise money to fight the trafficking of women, a very noble cause. And, of course, this race didn't take place way the heck in the middle of nowhere as did the other! As for similarities between the two, the biggest standout was the hilliness of the course in both of them and how I have not trained for hill running...I need to insert something for that in my future routine. For today's Run the Good Race 10K I passed the finish line as the timer read 1:03:20...for the complete race results, click HERE...
Friday, October 21, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Ursula K. Le Guin
Thursday, October 20, 2022
I Want Condensed Baseball, Please
The Major League Baseball playoffs for 2022 have finally reached the League Championship Series, when the top two teams from each league play a best-of-seven series to determine who will be playing in this year's World Series. Last year's champion, the Atlanta Braves, won their division but were eliminated in the playoffs by wild card Philadelphia. In the Amercian League Houston, who lost to the Braves in the '21 Series, is playing the New York Yankees. Meanwhile, on the National side the Phillies face the upstart San Diego Padres for that league's pennant. I like to watch baseball, although for nearly all of the time a game is going on, nothing is really happening. Much of the time I'm okay with this as I can easily walk away from the TV and do other things. But since there are already built-in breaks after each half inning, I'd like to have the option of watching a game with the action condensed to eliminate any time in which the ball isn't in play or there's no action on the bases. I'm guessing that most games could be reduced to about 20-25 minutes this way. Of course, while a game is going on live this couldn't be done, but why not have an option...make it late at night if that's convenient...where the game is presented super-condensed, eliminating the boring commentary and dugout bubblegum-blowing and spitting? This especially makes sense to me when I have another commitment, such as work, and can't get myself in front of a TV to watch a live game....I sure don't want to invest more than two hours to watch a repeat broadcast! Will my suggestion ever be adopted? Probably not, since it's probably all about advertising, anyway...
Wednesday, October 19, 2022
Weekly Short Stories: 1987 Science Fiction, Part 3
Tuesday, October 18, 2022
Mixed Feelings About a Recent Podcast Promoting Freedom
On a recent Mindset Mentor podcast of his, Rob Dial examined the notion of freedom and how his audience needs to exert more of it in their lives. To the extent that each of us already has the freedom to make significant choices in our lives and only need to recognize it and begin to change our self-defeating habits that hold us back, I agree with his premise. I especially related to his claim that surrounding people expect one to be the same from day to day and that sudden changes...even for the better...are often seen as threats to be put down. But before one goes off and starts behaving in ways detrimental to others, oneself, and his or her relationships, it's a good idea to sit down and understand that freedom only works within a framework of standards and laws. Once when I was a kid in elementary school, a few of my classmates (and I) often chanted the mantra "It's a free country!" when objecting to our teachers' policies on matters we didn't agree with. Fast forward to 2020 and across the country in the middle of a dangerous pandemic is an explosive growth of self-styled "libertarians" who think they're some kind of heroes by refusing to wear a protective mask around others while proclaiming the sovereignty of private property. But I saw one of those self-proclaimed libertarians walk into a privately-owned grocery, with its own mask mandate, without a mask...and with a big grin plastered on his face: hypocrite, he expects everyone else to follow "his" rules in his own workplace! I'm also a little hesitant about endorsing an attitude about freedom that focuses on present feelings and diminishes the significance of past commitments. I remember a great old movie, You Can't Take It with You, in which an entire family "drops out" to pursue their own interests and skirt working for a living. But their patriarch had already amassed a small fortune to support them, and they had no problem with having two paid housekeepers working at their home. Which brings me to an important principle about freedom: is my attitude toward the subject such that if everyone else in the world adopted it, we'd be better off or worse? A mature attitude that acknowledges personal responsibility and respects work...especially that of a menial nature...is, in my opinion, an indispensable prerequisite to asserting one's freedom. How does that old beer commercial go? Yes...you only go around once in life: make your choices and feel free. And if those choices are hurtful to others, I suppose you're also "free" to fabricate an ideology to buttress your behavior and make yourself feel "principled"...
Monday, October 17, 2022
Just Finished Reading Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
Everything I Never Told You is Celeste Ng's first novel, and it won all kinds of acclaim after it came out in 2014. I had already read her 2017 book Little Fires Everywhere...read my article about it by clicking HERE. With this first effort of Ng's, the focus is on an American family living in the Midwest in 1977: the mother Marilyn, the father James, and their three children Nathan, Lydia and Hannah. Ng clearly delineates the often diametrically opposed perspectives of each of these members, their love for one another and the inevitable conflicts, sometimes very intense. And...I'm not giving away the story since it happens at the beginning...Lydia's drowning death in the nearby lake is the trigger setting off not only the story's subsequent events and how the surviving family members resolve their grief and conflicts, but also many interspersed flashbacks, including those from Lydia herself. There is an ongoing mystery as well: how and why did she die, and what about the teenage rebel neighbor Jack, whom Nathan loathes and suspects of foul play regarding his sister? Guess you'll have to read it to find out. As for my own reactions, I will say that there is a lot of scrutiny about the marriage between white Marilyn and Chinese-descended James and the real (and imagined) hostility and prejudice that they and their children unfairly receive for this. And Marilyn is loaded with resentment for how she had wanted to become a physician but was held back by resistance from her own family and society as a whole because she is a woman. So, I get it, this story...compelling as it was...I believed still derived much of its critical success from appealing to victimized identity groups, not that I am diminishing the fact that discrimination and prejudice affect us. What appealed most to me personally was how Ng reveals the often-wide chasm of communication differences between parents and their children, especially with regard to how mother and father often transfer their own past, frustrated dreams to their sons and daughters, expecting them to accomplish what they themselves could not. That I also totally get, and the author nailed it perfectly. Everything I Never Told You is very well written, but it's also pretty sad and might well cause anyone reading it to reflect on their own family histories and relationships...
Sunday, October 16, 2022
My #9 All-Time Favorite Album: Snowflakes are Dancing by Isao Tomita
The great French classical composer Claude Debussy (1982-1918) wrote a number of tone poems and what he termed "symphonic sketches", much of his work based on the piano. In 1974 ISAO TOMITA arranged some of Debussy's tone poems into an album compilation using the Moog synthesizer and other electronic sound equipment, titling it SNOWFLAKES ARE DANCING after the first track. It's my #9 all-time favorite album, but from the end of 1974 and through the next year I was mesmerized by it. My local South Florida album rock radio station, WSHE, played one of its pieces, Arabesque No. 1, repeatedly in its rotation and even one night played the album in its entirety. By the way, Jack Horkheimer, the director of the Space Transit Planetarium in Miami, used Arabesque as the theme music for his long-running five-minute PBS star gazing show. The songs on the album are all instrumental, naturally, but Tomita does generate imitations of human singing on some of them: Arabesque, Golliwog's Cakewalk, Passepied and The Engulfed Cathedral. Some tracks send the listener down the proverbial musical rabbit hole with their dreamlike mysticism: Gardens in the Rain, Claire de Lune and The Engulfed Cathedral stand out. In 1975 I bought this album and played it so much that I concluded it was exerting too much influence over me, so I took it and smashed it, that's how significant it was to me (later on I bought another copy). The songs on Snowflakes are Dancing have an insidious way of getting under my skin, but I no longer let myself get carried away by them...that's good because I can hear it on YouTube whenever I like...
Here are the tracks on Snowflakes are Dancing in the order of my liking:
Saturday, October 15, 2022
Ran the Tom Walker Preview 10K This Morning
The Florida Track Club annually holds the Tom Walker Memorial Half Marathon in November...this month they offered a "preview" shorter race, 5K or 10K as you wish, on the same course: the paved Hawthorne Trail. The starting and ending point is the same: that part of the trail that cuts through the west end of Boulware Springs Park, on SE 15th Street in Gainesville. After several months of skipping races, I decided to avail myself of this one since it was 10K (6.2 miles) in length. I've also run on the Hawthorne Trail a number of times in the past...for some reason, though, I keep forgetting how sloped it is. At this morning's race time, 8:00, the temperature was in the upper fifties and very pleasant. Everyone running in the 5K and 10K races started at the same time...since I just wanted to establish a workable running pace, I deliberately kept to the back of the crowd. As the race bore on, it quickly became obvious that many if not most of the entrants were engaged in something known as the Galloway Method, in which the runner runs for X number of minutes, followed by a walking break of Y minutes...and the cycle goes on and on. I've even trained this way and it works. But it's extremely annoying and even unsettling to be trying to determine my own pace while different people are speeding past me (especially when they are in groups), only to suddenly go into a walk...I even had to swerve to avoid one of them when he abruptly began to swing out his arms and run just as I was passing him. Not only did I have to contend with the Galloway crowd, but bicyclists apparently decided that buzzing closely past the runners at high speeds was a peachy thing to do...between the two groups I somehow managed to focus enough on my own running to finish with, for my purposes, a reasonable time of 1:04:55. I am a member of the Florida Track Club and as such didn't have to pay to run in this race. Next month's Tom Walker Half Marathon will require an entry fee although as a member I'll be getting a discount. I'm not exactly what you would call a social runner...no, let's just come out and admit I'm pretty damned antisocial...so participating in these events is quite a stretch for me, besides the very uncomfortable aspect of having to get up so early in the morning...and don't get me started about the parking. Next week I'm considering running in a different 10K race, this one held in town behind North Florida Regional Medical Center. I wonder if the Gallowayeans and cycle freaks will follow me there, sigh...
When the results are posted online, you can see them by clicking HERE...
Friday, October 14, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Judy Garland
Thursday, October 13, 2022
Constellation of the Month: Cepheus (the King)
Wednesday, October 12, 2022
Weekly Short Stories: 1987 Science Fiction, Part 2
Tuesday, October 11, 2022
Examining My Mail-In Ballot for General Election
The other day Melissa and I received our mail-in absentee ballots for the November general election. There are the easily understandable partisan races, such as for US senator, US representative, governor, state cabinet seats, state representative, and Alachua County Commission. Then comes a long list of judges that I'm somehow supposed to know whether to retain or kick their sorry superior asses out. This is followed on the ballot by officially nonpartisan races for circuit judge, Gainesville mayor, city commission, and five "soil and water conservation" seats. Seeing these makes me automatically wonder who the stealth Republican candidates are in our heavily Democratic city...I strongly suspect at least one of them took great pains to wipe their Facebook page clean of any past comments they might have made concerning COVID-19 policy or the 2020 Election. On the ballot's flip side are three Florida State Constitution amendments, along with three more local referenda. I haven't a clue what to do about the judges...seems like our judiciary has become extremely politicized and will only get worse as vacancies arise. As for the "nonpartisan" races, I'm not voting on any of them until I can distinguish the candidates' party allegiances. As for that flip side, I don't see the point in "changing" the Florida Constitution after a previously approved amendment to restore voting rights to felons who had completed their sentences was negated when the state legislature subsequently added the condition that they first pay an exorbitant penalty fee for their incarceration. As for my recommendations on this ballot, I have none...just my own opinions, for better or for worse. You're entitled to your own as well...why not inform yourself and vote this time around?
Monday, October 10, 2022
Podcaster Advocates One Special Attitude Shift
On his Mindset Mentor podcast the other day, personal development coach Rob Dial hit upon a familiar topic of his: how we talk to ourselves. Whereas in past shows he emphasized building oneself up instead of irrationally claiming to be inferior and failure-prone, this time he took a different tack, promoting the idea that folks can experience a much better existence if they would do apply just one principle to their daily lives. Instead of approaching a task or obligation with the words "I have to do this", switch to an attitude of gratitude and say, "I get to do this", while considering the blessings of being in such a situation when so many in the world are deprived. "I have to go to work" becomes "I'm grateful that I have a good job that I get to go to". "I have to drive someone somewhere" becomes "I'm grateful I get to own a good, dependable car that I get to drive around". "I have to tell someone I love something unpleasant" becomes "I am grateful to have such a wonderful soul in my life with whom I get to share my trials". "I have to clean and declutter my home" becomes "I'm grateful to get to clean this home for the space, shelter and privacy it provides". "I have to work out" becomes "I'm grateful I have a body that is healthy and mobile enough for me to get to exercise". And on and on it goes. It doesn't mean I have to be a Pollyanna and pretend problems don't exist, just to put it all in perspective and count my blessings. Sounds reasonable to me...now it's time to sign off, since I have to get to take the dog outside...
Sunday, October 9, 2022
My #10 All-Time Favorite Album: Kasabian by Kasabian
KASABIAN is an English alternative rock band, and their 2004 debut release, also titled KASABIAN, is my #10 all-time favorite album. I first heard their first American hit single from it, Club Foot, while listening to my favorite radio station at the time, 100.5/WHHZ "The Buzz"...they were Gainesville's only alternative rock broadcasters. Although I didn't care for that song as much, I began to notice this very creative and talented band when the next track L.S.F. (Lost Souls Forever) begin to get airplay and I saw its video on YouTube. Then came Reason is Treason, another song from the album: Kasabian was definitely a new favorite of mine. They stay true to their rock n' roll roots with the guitar and drums strong on their songs, but they also are fearless with the keyboard and instrumental backgrounds. For this first album the band consisted of songwriter Sergio Pizzorno, who also did backup vocals and guitar, and wrote all of the lyrics. Chris Karloff, who would leave Kasabian during their recording of the next album, co-wrote some of the music and was also on guitar. Chris Edwards was bassist and Ian Matthews drummer. The group's front man was Tom Meighan, who would be asked to leave Kasabian in 2020 after he allegedly beat up his fiancée. The two eventually married, but Kasabian goes on without him or his trademark voice. But in 2004, Meighan's imprint was everywhere and although probably not the best singer in the world, like the Stones' Mick Jagger, you kind of liked it anyway somehow. Here are my listings of the tracks from the album Kasabian, in the order of my preference...you can hear them on YouTube:
Saturday, October 8, 2022
Baseball Playoffs Underway Amid Debate about Home Run King
Friday, October 7, 2022
Quote of the Week...from Friedrich Nietzsche
There are two different types of people in the world, those who want to know, and those who want to believe. ---Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche was a nineteenth century German philosopher...I could get into his thinking, but it was the above quote of his that I found especially pertinent to today's world, so I'll focus on that instead. It all comes down to the narratives that people live by, and their intellectually dishonest way of only accepting information that upholds those narratives while either dismissing or ignoring anything that invalidates them, often demonizing the unfortunate bringer of the unwelcome information. Mike Pence says Biden was the duly elected president in 2020...that contradicts the MAGA election deniers' narrative, even to the point that there were outcries to hang him as a traitor. And what about Dr. Fauci and others who properly informed the public about the dangers of the Covid-19 virus: that cramped a lot of selfish people's lifestyles...and since they didn't want to wear masks, they bought into anything that dispelled their effectiveness. In today's Internet world where search engines are rigged to give users the results they want to see and social media like Facebook routinely puts "facts" on their newsfeeds meant to bolster the preconceived notions of their users, the type of people that Nietzsche referred to who "want to believe" seems to be growing in numbers while their power of influence in our society is consequently increasing, especially with regard to politics and elections. Donald Trump once claimed that he could step out onto 5th Avenue in New York and shoot someone without losing his supporters...yet after that comment he was elected president with his fans wanting so badly to believe that he is a completely different person than he really is. A large...and I fear growing...segment of our population believes what it wants to believe, and damn reality when it contradicts those beliefs...
Thursday, October 6, 2022
Just Finished Reading Fairy Tale by Stephen King
When I heard Stephen King, my favorite author, was coming out with a new novel, I quickly put a hold on it at my public library...eventually they got around to me on the waiting list. It's Fairy Tale, at least partially set in the present time on Earth in America...and the author does try to make this typically dark Stephen King book conform in a number of ways to the elements of fairy tales. Charlie Reade is the protagonist, a 17-year-old whose father is a recovering alcoholic after the accidental death of Charlie's mother...all this comes out very early in the story, so I'm not giving anything away here. But to go much further in describing the sequence of events and characters might be a little over the edge for prospective readers, and I hope that you're one of them. I will say this much: I saw a parallel in this novel's structure and characters to his earlier book 11/22/63, especially with regard to how Fairy Tale's cantankerous, colorful Howard Bowditch is very similar to 11/22/63's Al Templeton, not only with regard to their respective personalities but also the very special roles they play in sending the protagonist down the proverbial rabbit role into adventure and peril. Since I'm a big Al Templeton fan and 11/22/63, which I've read at least five times (I've lost count), is one of my all-time favorite novels, that resemblance worked for me. One other thing: this is a dog lover's book as well...and I'll just leave it at that. For me, Stephen King is to fiction as Regina Spektor is to music...I can't wait to see what they have lined up next. Don't wait for the TV or movie adaptation to Fairy Tale: just get the book even if you have to put it on hold at your public library...
Wednesday, October 5, 2022
Weekly Short Stories: 1987 Science Fiction, Part 1
Tuesday, October 4, 2022
High-Level Sports Competition Breeds Fragile Athletes
The fragility of top athletes as they engage in their respective sports at the highest level has become a major issue, although it's always been present. I think there are two reasons for this: one, while it's possible to improve athletic performance by changing the human body through exercise, diet, medicine and supplements, we all still have very sensitive soft tissue that is prone to injury and inflammation. During the last two weeks, Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa was taken off the field twice...it appears now that he suffered a brain concussion in the first game against Buffalo, but that it was misdiagnosed, and he was wrongly cleared for the next contest against Cincinnati. Then the injury became obvious after a hard hit, and he is now out indefinitely. Before all this, though, Tua was already known as being injury prone...he was plagued by knee, ankle and hip injuries while playing for Alabama in college. But although football is clearly a hard contact sport, in others like tennis injuries have come to dominate the headlines, often dictating who the eventual tournament champions will be. Federer, Nadal, Williams...to be the best can put a heavy strain on the body, and for these champions who want to stay in the picture as they age, the prospects of career-ending injuries are increasing. As a fan of a number of different professional and college sports, I've grown to follow the games less for who's going to win or lose, and more for appreciating the competitive moments in each sport, regardless of who's playing or my own preferences. But maybe that's how I should have been following sports all along...
Monday, October 3, 2022
Podcaster Discusses Negative Overthinking
Sunday, October 2, 2022
My #11 All-Time Favorite Album: Moving Pictures by Rush
The 1981 RUSH album MOVING PICTURES is my #11 all-time favorite album. Although I had already heard and enjoyed the opening track Tom Sawyer and Limelight, I didn't know of the rest until one Saturday night/Sunday morning in the 1990s at the post office when I worked the graveyard shift and a local alternative rock station (on 97.7 then) had a show called "Saturday Night Sixpack", on which they would play six albums in their entirety. Moving Pictures was featured one week, and after hearing it I quickly became a Rush fan. After listening to pretty much this trio's entire catalogue of albums I concluded that this album was far and away their best, although I also recommend their Greatest Hits CD that features timeless hits spanning the decades. Moving Pictures has only seven tracks...but what tracks they are! As already mentioned, it opens with Tom Sawyer, proclaiming a new kind of warrior, who thinks independently outside the box and acts likewise. For some unknown reason I automatically associate it with being outside the Reitz Student Union (on the west side) on the University of Florida campus...some songs have a strange way of bringing up seemingly random connections. It's followed by Red Barchetta, with a sweet tale of the singer recalling his youth and the time he got to drive his uncle's antique racing car on the open road, and the impromptu race that followed...it features one of the seriously most unforgettable guitar riffs I've ever heard. Then comes the "song" YYZ, an instrumental piece showcasing the extraordinary guitar talent of Alex Lifeson. Side One closes with Limelight, one of those many rock songs I've heard over the years mirroring a band's own experiences on tour. The flip side opens with The Camera Eye, nearly 11 minutes long, largely instrumental but also sung with obscure lyrics that seem to compare Manhattan with London. Then it's Witch Hunt...seems that much of the disfunction we see nowadays with mob/cult political extremist behavior on the part of ignorant, fearful rabble also existed back then in 1981...and probably always has and always will. The song spells it out bluntly, putting me squarely in Rush's corner on this somber issue. The album closes with Vital Signs, a personal favorite that extolls "deviation from the norm" as a sign of health, not something to be condemned and excised from society. Moving Pictures has a recurring theme to it: informed, independent individualism with a personal conscience. But if the lyrics were all it had, it still wouldn't be a favorite of mine. The outstanding instrumentation and the virtuosity of Lifeson, Lee and Peart on their guitars, keyboards and drums make it a true masterpiece. Alas, sadly Neil Peart passed on in 2020, and Rush is no more except in all their great past music, Moving Pictures being the best...
Next week I begin my "Top Ten" countdown of all-time favorite albums...
Saturday, October 1, 2022
My September 2022 Running Report
In September I ran a total of 411 miles, with 20 miles being my longest single run...I also ran each day. In spite of these numbers, I've actually been taking it relatively easy with my runs, usually spreading them out over the course of each day and going slow, slow, slow. I do think I'm in good enough shape to engage in a few races over the next few months, as the longer distance events start to make their appearance during this progressively cooler time of the year in northern Florida. As for my walking, it was the same as in August...I naturally have plenty of opportunities to walk a bit over the course of my job as well as the day in general, easily covering, I'm sure, 100 miles in September although I'm not measuring it. Although Gainesville has a cool weekly, FREE race Saturday mornings at 7:30 (at Depot Park, just south of downtown), I just do not like getting up that early in the morning to go out there: no races for me this past month! Besides, I'm partial to the longer events such as 10K (6.2 miles), 15K (9.3 miles), and half-marathon (13.1 miles). In Gainesville there will be two 10K races in October and two half-marathons in November...still, I will need to get up early in the morning to run in any of them, dang it. And should I run in one or more of them, I will be focusing on covering the distance...of course, if I feel like seeing how fast I can go, I will...