Wooden Roller Coaster Chatter

While looking at YouTube to see if I could find that long wooden roller coaster I had described before on this blog as being “legendary” (it is Shivering Timbers at Michigan’s Adventure park in Muskegon County, Michigan), I discovered a few others worth that high billing. The most interesting of the bunch is much closer than Muskegon, Michigan: it is The Voyage at Holiday World in Santa Claus, (southern) Indiana (on Christmas Boulevard). Here is the link to a video of that ride. The above picture of The Voyage is from Wikipedia.

I have an annual-pass to Busch Gardens in Tampa, which is much, much closer than is Holiday World. And still it seems like a major ordeal to drive down there (about 130 miles distance from Gainesville). But that’s not all.

I have yet to visit a theme park where the simple act of walking through it isn’t thoroughly exhausting in itself. And in the hot summertime? Forget it! It makes me appreciate even more the single big coaster that Boomer’s of Dania, Florida had (well, I guess Boomer's is kind of like a theme park). If I lived down there I probably would have ridden it more than 100 times by now!

The Movie Star Trek and Its Trick

With the new Star Trek movie, which I recently saw, comes a new departure from reality. We find out over the course of events in the movie that we are experiencing an “alternate” universe of Star Trek, put into play by using the device of time travel through a black hole. Nice ploy. Now, in subsequent Star Trek movies, the writers are free to mess around with this alternate universe, changing ITS course of (fictional/speculative) history with impunity and without any concern as to how it would affect future Star Trek scenarios (especially that of Star Trek: The Next Generation). Any character can now be killed off and any planet destroyed. After all, this is a different universe! As “cheap” as this strategy may seem, it does add a much-needed element of suspense to the series. Now, when Kirk (or Spock or Uhura or McCoy or Scotty or anyone else) is hanging by one hand on the edge of a cliff with his adversary trying to pry it off, we can never be too sure that (s)he’s going to get out of it alive. The writers are also free to write new scenarios regarding the Klingons and Romulans. And they are also free to introduce the Borg and Q, staples of Star Trek: the Next Generation (occurring later on the original Star Trek timescale), earlier in time to allow interaction with Kirk, Spock, and company.

Yes, I generally feel that time travel can often be used as a “cop-out” science fiction trick in that it is all-too-easy to present mind-boggling paradoxes to the viewer. Although this does happen with the 2009 movie Star Trek, it also works to liberate this series from any constraints regarding its adherence to the fictional “Star Trek history”. I say bravo!

Gandhi Statue at UNF

Here is a photo I took today of an interesting statue in the middle of the University of North Florida campus in Jacksonville, Florida. It is of the great twentieth-century Indian non-violent activist Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, commonly known as Mahatma Gandhi.

His example is sorely needed in the midst of today's pervasively bellicose political climate, both domestically and abroad.

Poppy the Jumper and His Sons

One of the recent “light” news events adorning the national news channels was former President George H.W. Bush’s annual birthday sky-diving jump. This year, HLN’s Robin Meade was invited to jump as well, and was then granted an exclusive interview with the former President. I thought it was funny how the other networks covered this event, trying to crop out and marginalize Robin’s presence there.

After the event, “Poppy” Bush, still dressed in his flight gear, stood before the cameras and microphones, flanked on each side by sons George W. Bush and Jeb (I guess Neil didn’t quite count as a son on this occasion). I felt that our last President really looked small and insignificant standing next to his father. But he did seem very comfortable and happy in his retirement! Although I recognize that as President and Commander-in-Chief, George W. Bush is ultimately responsible for the failures of his presidency (there were some successes as well), I can see from contrasting how he and other former members of his administration (like Dick Cheney and Karl Rove) behave nowadays that he would have been more successful had he been surrounded by a more decent, public-spirited circle in the Oval Office during his tenure.

And then there was Jeb standing there quietly on the other side. While his brother George was making his trademark offhand comedic remarks, Jeb was careful and polite with his comments. No doubt in my mind exists on his future in national politics, like him or not.

Lakers Win NBA Championship

Congratulations to the Los Angeles Lakers for defeating the Orlando Magic four games to one and winning this year's National Basketball Association championship. The Magic did blow two golden opportunities during the series to win games but played poor defense and missed easy shots. Oh well, they're unhappy now. But they exceeded everyone's expectations of how far they would go this year and had a wonderful season. As for Los Angeles, they played the Magic as a complete team (unlike Cleveland with Lebron James and his "cast of extras") in spite of the superstar presence of Kobe Bryant. They deserve all of the accolades they are receiving!

Starting Twitter Anyway

Having just written an article warning about the dangers of Twitter for short-tempered people (like Senator Grassley), and having also identified myself in said article as such a short-tempered person, I naturally decided to screw everything up by signing up on it myself.

For those already thriving on Facebook, Twitter may seem a bit redundant, as Facebook junkies already have a pretty good means of communicating every dinky little trivial thing going on in their lives (and with dinky little trivial pictures). The present (and future) value of Twitter for me depends on how much certain parties use it to dispense information about themselves. So, at least at the beginning, I have confined my "following" to various musical artists I enjoy listening to with the aim of finding out when their next CDs are coming out. I had quick success with this when I read that the Canadian band Broken Social Scene, one of my favorites, is back in the studio recording their next album!

As far as more personal "following" is concerned, I still don't get Facebook, much less Twitter. The way I see it, I say pretty much everything I want to say on this blog. Anyone with Internet access can read it if they want to. And many people who know me know of it, but don't read it. So why should I invest MORE time on other sites trying to reach them, already knowing how apathetic they are??!!

I never was much of a "show and tell" kid in early elementary school. But I do remember some classmates who would regularly get up in front of the class and relate everything that happened to them the previous day, from the moment they got out of bed in the morning to the moment they fell asleep at night. Right or wrong, I instinctively feel uncomfortable with this type of behavior. Which may go a long way toward explaining my current attitude about Facebook and Twitter.

Anyway, with sites like Twitter, I am certain that caution is the best policy!

Weather "Blown"-Casts

Last weekend, I turned on my television and tuned in to the weather station. The forecast was for generally clear-to-partly-cloudy skies, but for Monday there was nothing but rain and storms predicted. So I braced myself for a dark and damp Monday. Come Monday morning, though, I looked at the same channel and saw a forecast of clear skies and sun! But lo, ahead, on Wednesday, it did look quite stormy (to the prognosticators). On Tuesday, that prediction for Wednesday held up. But once again, come Wednesday morning, the outlook was once again for clear sunny skies. But wait, a very rainy Thursday was forecast! Then Thursday morning came around (are you sensing a pattern here?) and the forecast once again was severely changed. And not a drop of rain fell the entire day (leading to my previously reported excursion to Devil's Millhopper).

So this past week, there have been three days (Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday) for which the meteorologists predicted much rain and stormy weather. And each time the forecasts were drastically altered when the actual days arrived.

Which brings me to the question: Since weather forecasts are continually changing as the forecast day approaches, when (if ever) can one come out and they that they "blew it"? I've heard a lot over the past several years about how accurate forecasters are regarding the severity of the upcoming hurricane season. Almost always, these "predictions" are modified as the hurricane season progresses. But isn't that kind of like "cheating"? I mean, if I were watching a football game and one team unexpectedly scored five touchdowns against the other in the first quarter, wouldn't it be a little too late for me to change my bets (if I gambled, that is)? With the weather, shouldn't the term "forecast" be altered to "mid-cast" or "blown-cast" when the target day (or hurricane season, if that's the subject of the forecast) is already upon us and the prediction is being changed?

Devil's Millhopper Visit

This past Thursday, I drove over the two miles from my home to where Devil's Millhopper, a Geological State Park, is located. It is a huge, ancient sinkhole sporting its own special variety of plant life (as opposed to the surrounding land's flora). This is a rather modest, small park, with a $2 parking fee, a small picnic area, and visitor's office in the front. A 0.6 mile nature trail loop (which I naturally had to run) encircles the sinkhole. The bottom of the Devil's Millhopper sinkhole (117 feet deep) can be gradually reached by descending a long, twisting wooden path/stairway. Actually, the descent was quite easy; the walk back up was a killer!

Anyway, here are some pictures I took of my experience.

Baseball Geniuses, Please Explain

I'm sitting in my recliner late in the evening, surfing channels on my television. There are a few baseball games on, although none of them have any of the American League Central Division teams that I'm following. But there was a close National League game involving the St. Louis Cardinals and the Houston Astros. It was the bottom of the ninth, the score was tied 1-1, and the home team Astros were up at bat to try and win the game. The Cardinals pitcher was throwing a lot of balls, even walking a batter. The inning progressed to the point where Houston had runners on first and third with only one out. And then the St. Louis manager did something that leaves me scratching my head (I'm glad I'm not a Cardinals fan).

Remember me telling you that the St. Louis pitcher was having trouble pitching the ball into the strike zone? Well, their manager decided to intentionally walk the next Astro batter, loading the bases with one out. Yeh, I understand that only the runner at third counted at this stage of the game and that this tactic would give more opportunities for putouts and double plays. But it also had the harmful effect of putting the Cardinal pitcher's back up against the wall. He could no longer afford to walk another Houston batter (or else walk in the winning run for them), and worse, they knew it. So naturally, the next Houston batter came out swinging, since he knew that he would be getting good pitches in the strike zone to hit. And surprise, surprise, he looped a single into shallow centerfield, allowing the winning run to easily cross the plate.

Sometimes I think that these managers simply think too much and end up outwitting themselves. This sort of nonsense usually happens at the end of close games. Deliberately loading up the bases by intentionally walking a batter is only useful if both (1) first base is the open base (thereby creating a very viable double play scenario) and (2) the pitcher is confidently throwing strikes and is having no control problems. Or, if a particularly dangerous, clutch hitter like Derek Jeter (of the Yankees) is up at bat (better having him as a base runner instead of a batter in this situation). None of these conditions existed for this game, so I'm really not sure what the St. Louis manager was thinking.

Hotheads: Avoid Twitter!

It may be time to consider the potential for harm with Twitter, the booming Internet short-message site. Republican Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa recently "tweeted" a couple of nasty comments about President Obama's "sightseeing" tour of Paris. The President was on an official trip to commemorate the June 6, 1944 D-Day landing of the Allies on the coast of Normandy, France during World War II. One might have thought that Grassley, a major-league flag waver and approver of just about anything promoting war, would have been on the President's side in this matter. Instead, he angrily (and almost incoherently) commented on Twitter that Obama thought he was a "hammer" and that Grassley and other senators were "nails". You see, Grassley is angry, angry, angry, because this very active president is prodding the Senate to act on health care. Had Senator Grassley not had this "instant" medium to spew out his wrath, he might have let matters cool down by waiting a while. But now, the already short-tempered senator has made the news with his ridiculous, anger-inspired remarks on Twitter. Also, Grassley needs to become reconciled to the fact that Obama is now the President (something many Republicans seem to have a problem respecting) and no longer a junior senator that Grassley can feel (and act) superior to.

The Twitter phenomenon is just a high-tech manifestation of what can happen to any of us in our daily walk through life. For during the course of a day, many things can happen to anger us and cause us to speak or act out of anger. The results could last much longer than the few seconds that brought on the reaction. And even ruin a career, destroy relationships, and bring on personal peril.

I brought this up because I myself have a tendency to speak impulsively out of anger. Almost always, when this happens, I come away from whatever incident provoked my angry reaction much more upset with my own reaction to it than with the cause. I've seen Senator Grassley before display his short temper, be it on the Senate floor, on a committee, or talking to the press. Twitter really isn't a very positive mode of communication for such a "hothead". If he opposes genuine, meaningful health care reform in this country, he needs to come up with a more effective political strategy than pitching fits on Twitter!

Sick? Stay Home!

Recently, in my local newspaper, was an article about a girl who had just graduated from high school. Her great accomplishment? She had gone all the way from kindergarten through her senior year in high school with a perfect attendance record, including never missing school due to illness. Sure, the article pointed out, she was sick from time to time, but went to school anyway on those occasions.

I've read this sort of article before, where a student pulls off this supposedly heroic attendance feat. And each time, I groan, wondering how many other students were infected by one of these "great attenders" over the course of their years in school. For myself, I had numerous illnesses, especially during elementary school. Some of them, like chicken pox, measles, mumps, and flu, were highly infectious. I don't count it as a mark of personal shame that I missed out on school during those times.

Even though I often didn't like school, I still wanted even less to miss it because of sickness. I came down with the flu at the end of the sixth grade, totally missing out on the last few days I would have had at my old elementary school (I'm 52; there wasn't a "middle school" yet). And I missed two weeks at the close of my senior year in high school, also due to flu. I also was hospitalized due to surgery earlier that year and missed school for a few days.

I don't see any virtue in compiling a perfect attendance record at school. But this sort of mania about attendance can also transfer to workplaces, many of which give out annual awards to employees who never call in sick. And as is the case with school, I know from personal experience that many of these employees come to work sick and make others sick! In this age of pandemics, can we still afford to carry on with this counterproductive mindset about attendance?!!

AL Central Hard to Follow

In an earlier article, I wrote about my decision to change how I follow Major League Baseball this year. Instead of following the home state teams (along with the Braves and Yankees), I instead chose to concentrate my attention on the five teams of the American League Central Division. As it happens, I probably chose the division with the least exposure in the national media.

After the first game I saw this year, which introduced me to the Chicago White Sox and their players, I haven't been able to watch a full game with any of the other teams. I was able to catch small segments of games involving the Cleveland Indians and Minnesota Twins, but not complete games.

The other day, I was watching the disappointing MLB Channel (too many highlights and analysis, not enough actual games). And lo and behold, they were showing a game involving the Detroit Tigers, which I hadn't been able to see play so far this year. It was an exciting game (tied in extra innings), and the Tigers pulled out a victory. But I later discovered that this was an old American League Championship Series game rebroadcast from many years earlier.

The MLB Channel keeps putting on old "classic" games like that. The problem I have with this is that I want to watch games that are happening NOW, please. Like, how are THIS YEAR'S Tigers doing (I heard they were leading the division)?

It's been harder for me to find baseball games, both on TV and radio, than I had expected. It seemed to be, at least in the past, that I was always unintentionally stumbling across a game when surfing TV or tuning the radio dial. Now it seems that the sources for that programming have dried up somewhat. Well, maybe that's not so bad; after all, I don't really want to spend my entire existence watching or listening to baseball games!

Beck and Scientology

During this current "retro" period of my lifelong odyssey through popular music listening, my interests have fallen upon certain musical artists, one of them being Beck (Beck Hansen). He first achieved nationwide fame in 1993 with his quirky single Loser and followed that with several critically-acclaimed albums, most famous of which were Odelay and Sea Changes. Through the years, though, my only exposure to his works came via radio play. So I've missed out on the great body of work that this talented artist has produced. Recently, besides obtaining CDs of his, I have watched some of his videos on YouTube.

In the comments section under one of the Beck videos, someone had written of being a big Beck fan until hearing that he followed Scientology. Now that person won't listen to his music anymore (I suppose that (s)he accessed that particular video not to watch it, but to deliver the negative comment).

I have heard of several celebrities involved with Scientology, most famous of which are Tom Cruise, John Travolta, Isaac Hayes, and (now) Beck. As a collective group, I have found these people to be much more professional in their work and poised and gracious in their behavior toward others than are others in their fields. These are not the sort of people who get arrested for drugs, DUI's, or violent crimes. But be that may, the media nevertheless seems to have stigmatized them just because of their membership in this offbeat religion.

It's one thing to criticize some aspects of a religion; it's another to stigmatize people because they follow that religion. But I suppose that if that individual wants to reject Beck because he has followed Scientology, then so be it. I suppose I could get mired into a discussion on the relative pros and cons of this religion, but then I would be digressing from the main point of this article, which is to defend Beck.

I will say this, though: a lot of what followers of more mainstream faiths have against Scientology are present in their own religions, but they are blind to this. And those whose religions preach exclusivity (only through THEIR doctrine can an individual attain salvation, and all others are condemned) will naturally frown upon ANY outside faith. Although I personally have no interest in Scientology, I respect the rights of others in society to come to their own conclusions about it and won't ostracize anyone who subscribes to its beliefs.

I think Beck is a great artist and am coming to more fully appreciate the depth and beauty of his music. To make his Scientology connections a litmus test for whether or not I listen to him makes no sense to me. I have no problem with various religions coming under scrutiny and being criticized. I do have a (very big) problem with followers of various religions being stigmatized for their beliefs.

Beirut's Song: In the Mausoleum

Above is a video of one of my favorite bands: Beirut, led by singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Zach Condon. Beirut is greatly influenced by French, East European and Mediterranean music. This track is from the recent The Flying Club Cup CD. Following the recording of the CD, each track thereof was performed again by Beirut and filmed by the group La Blogothèque at different locations in Brooklyn, New York. You can access the other videos from the website Flying Club Cup.

A Dog's Plea

[Author unknown; probably a pretty smart dog, though]Treat me kindly, my beloved friend, for no heart in all the world is more grateful for kindness than the loving heart of me.

Do not break my spirit with a stick, for although I should lick your hand between blows, your patience and understanding will quickly teach me the things you would have me learn.

Speak to me often, for your voice is the world’s sweetest music, as you must know by the fierce wagging of my tail when your footsteps fall upon my waiting ear.

Please take me inside when it is cold and wet, for I am a domesticated animal, no longer accustomed to bitter elements. I ask no greater glory than the privilege of sitting at your feet beside the hearth. Keep my pan filled with fresh water, for I cannot tell you when I suffer thirst.

Feed me clean food that I may stay well, to romp and play and do your bidding, to walk by your side and stand ready, willing and able to protect you with my life, should your life be in danger.

And, my friend, when I am very old, and I no longer enjoy good health, hearing and sight, do not make heroic efforts to keep me going. I am not having any fun. Please see that my trusting life is taken gently. I shall leave this earth knowing with the last breath I draw that my fate was always safest in your hands.
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Actually, the above "A Dog's Plea" adorned the wall at my local veterinarian, whom I visited yesterday. I found a copy on the Internet, and the author is apparently unknown. I thought the text really captured the essence of what it's like to have a wonderful, loving dog as a pet. Our household has two: Cuddles and Freckles (pictured).

Self-Esteem, Aspirations, and Obligations

Having spent my formative adolescent years in the seventies (actually, I thought I had pretty much figured everything out about life by the time I was eight and man, was I wrong), I was immersed in the burgeoning self-esteem movement. And what, you may ask, was that? Well this is (and thank you for asking) the idea that, more than anything, people, especially the young, have to be treated as special, unique individuals whose choices in life are all good, as long as it's THEIR choices. Who's to say what's good or not? And their enthusiasm and creativity mustn't be squelched in any event.

So, the way I see it, my obligation to society isn't just to follow the rules, responsibly take care of my family and myself, and to show charity and benevolence to others. Now I'm expected to chart out and live my own "unique" path, dazzling others with my creativity and personal pizazz. Did others before the 1970s feel this burden on themselves? Maybe, but not to the degree that folks nowadays generally do.

I think it's great to hear when my friends and family accomplish interesting things in their lives. I hope that they are possibly feeling the same about me whenever I occasionally do a "good work". But I think that I still pretty much subscribe to John Lennon's Watching the Wheels message instead of being a terribly busy type.

Perhaps you fail to make the connection with the "self-esteem" movement and the pressure to conform to an expanded idea of living a self-fulfilled life. But any good idea (and self-esteem is a good idea) can be twisted into something that is counterproductive. That all of us, as unique individuals, are innately worthy and have something to say certainly sounds great on the surface. But if you were to extrapolate from this the notion that society EXPECTS us to express that "something" through our works, then self-esteem does become a burden of sorts.

I can't begin to count the times someone has told me that I was smart (or even a genius) as an introduction to berating me for not putting my supposed higher intelligence to better use. Looking around and comparing myself with the people in my life, I don't see myself as being especially smart, but I don't think that I'm stupid, either. I do want to improve myself in some areas and would like to realize whatever potential I do have. And receive recognition for it. But I can't fall into the trap, at this age of mine (52), of judging the value of my own life by others' perceptions of how well I have been using my talents to serve society.

Let's just say that I have my aspirations, and that I am careful to keep those separated from my obligations. I have enough self-esteem both to feel hopeful for my future progress in the areas I have mapped out for self-improvement, as well as to reject any negative criticism from others for "not doing enough".

Retro-Music Again

From late 1990 until early 1995, I was deeply immersed in rediscovering famous musical acts by purchasing and listening to their albums, including "deep" tracks I had never heretofore heard. The triggering event for this occurred with the release of Led Zeppelin's first box set late in 1990, and a local radio station's (103.7/WRUF) playing of the entire set on the air. Sitting there listening to songs I had never heard, I realized what an incredibly talented and creative band this was. And for the next two years, I got to know every Zeppelin tune out there and became quite fanatical about their music.

I still listened to music on radio then, as it had not yet deteriorated in quality to the sad state that it's in today. But my focus was on Led Zeppelin and, later, other artists such as Rush, the Moody Blues, the Police, Yes, and REM. I call this period of time my "retro" period for my interest in past works. After 1995, although I would discover some old work from time to time, I returned to radio listening as my primary source of popular music.

Not that there weren't some times that the quality of music on the radio had dipped a lot. But in 2003, I discovered the genre of independent/alternative music, which was played on a local station (100.5 WHHZ "The Buzz"). And from then until the end of 2007, that music (and that station) was my primary focus for listening. But in 2008, WHHZ abandoned playing independent artists and copied the mainstream rock of 103.7/WRUF. That left me fumbling around the dial for ANYTHING that didn't sound like garbage (and there were some good songs out there, to be perfectly honest).

Earlier this year, I was listening to AOL Radio, on their Indie Rock Mix station. I heard a string of great songs which I had never heard before. One of them, Chicago by Sufjan Stevens, was actually from 2005. I then devised a method for investigating newly discovered musical acts. I went to YouTube and did a search on Sufjan Stevens. The result was a plethora of videos (mostly unofficial) of his music. As I listened through them, I was impressed to the same degree that I was eighteen years earlier with Led Zeppelin. So I began to personally amass his collected works, which comprise six albums (plus five Christmas albums) and put them on my MP3 for personal listening. At the same time, I went to LastFM.com and placed the name Sufjan Stevens in their search engine. The result? A radio station ("Sufjan Stevens Radio") that played artists similar to Stevens. In this way I discovered several other great artists, such as Andrew Bird, Iron and Wine, Beirut, Broken Social Scene, Metric, and Jose Gonzalez. I also became more interested in looking into the past works of alternative acts like Death Cab For Cutie, Beck, Arcade Fire, and the unfortunately-named New Pornographers.

So my musical interest is almost entirely concerned with the past works of this new generation of independent/alternative musical artists. The main differences between this "retro period" and the one in the early 1990s are that radio then was still listenable, radio now generally isn't, and (most of all) I have a great system on my computer, using AOL Radio, YouTube, and LastFM.com, to generate music suited precisely to my tastes.

I sometimes wonder to myself why my musical tastes have centered around the above artists. And I think I may have part of the answer. On my MP3 that has these artists on it, I also have selected Beatles songs that I like a lot (like Eleanor Rigby, Hello/Goodbye, and All You Need Is Love). When I am listening to this MP3 player (on "shuffle" mode), the Beatles songs fit in seamlessly with all of the rest! And thus my hypothesis, which follows.

In 1970, I was saddened by the breakup of the Beatles. Like many others, I searched the airwaves for similar-sounding replacements. Even the solo former Beatles all seemed to diverge from the band's former sound (especially Paul McCartney). And now I feel that the acts I have discovered have that same "something" that the Beatles had: the only difference is that these acts aren't being idolized on a mass scale as were the "Fab Four". Exception: Iron and Wine reminds me more of an acoustic Led Zeppelin than of the Beatles.

How long will this current "retro" period last? Well, that depends a lot on whether or not radio can present a better choice of programming formats. And whether or not at least one of those stations will play independent/alternative music.

Hardliner Heels

There seems to be a certain segment of society containing people who will always demand the most serious punishment for transgressors of the law and the most serious consequences for those whose lifestyles and politics differ from theirs.

After the horrific attack on the World Trade Centers, the Pentagon, and Flight 93 on September 11, 2001, these people came out of the woodwork, with some even clamoring for the United States to drop nuclear bombs on unfriendly predominantly Muslim countries. This was Ann Coulter's "shining" moment, when she actually said, "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." In this climate, desperate fear called for desperate measures, and our sad national chapter of detainee torture ensued.

Another "emergence" of this viciousness occurred during the 2008 presidential campaign when John McCain and/or Sarah Palin would be speaking to a crowd of supporters and, when reference was made to opponent Barack Obama, someone in the crowd would yell out "traitor!", or worse, "kill him!"

And now we have the case of the abortion physician who was murdered within his own church in Kansas. How many of these hardliners publicly denounce the murder but privately approve?

So we don't have to go to totalitarian or authoritarian countries like Iran or North Korea to discern a mean-spirited segment of the population who make a pointed effort to impose their intolerance on the rest of society. The vicious "do-gooders" abound here as well. We may think we live in a free society, and maybe compared to most other countries, we do. But I believe that, should our personal freedoms we cherish so become restricted, it will much more likely be due to homegrown, all-American hardliners than to any foreign threat.

Fading Into Obscurity vs. Big Brother Paranoia

With the increasingly intrusive Internet pervading our lives, I at least am developing a feeling that my privacy has diminished considerably over the years. Sure, I freely choose to write this blog and send it out, with my name on it, to anyone with Internet access to read. But with the technology as developed as it is, just about any "click" I make on the computer over the Web is traceable back to me and can be used to create a profile, at least one regarding the collective use of my computer (which my whole family uses at various times). I wonder whether everyone else really understands how little privacy they have on the Internet? But this loss of privacy, I believe, is quite different in nature than, say, someone sneaking a peak into your house or listening to your phone conversations.

We may all be leaving bits of information in our wake as we wander through the Internet, but this is all being done simultaneously worldwide on such a massive scale that the information we unwittingly spread around about ourselves only reaches anyone's attention after much filtering. The nightmare scenario I see in this is in the future, when someone may be applying for a job and is confronted with his/her record in Internet usage. Hopefully, our elected politicians and our judges will be attentive to this and prevent it from happening through protective laws. But I wouldn't count on it.

I know an elderly gentleman (in his eighties) who was so concerned about his lack of privacy that he had his television cable service ended after he found out that the cable companies could tell which channel he was watching (using sweep analyzers). I tried to tell him that the cable company was only trying to catch those who were stealing cable service and couldn't care less what channel he was watching, but the fear persisted with him nevertheless.

Which brings me to the point of this article. In an individual's life, what is worse: being disregarded and ignored as a nobody, or knowing that some people out there are prying into your personal life? My answer, which is becoming increasingly clear to me as I age, is the former.

Information is so dispersed in our society nowadays that anyone clamoring to be seen or heard and go to extreme lengths to accomplish this and still be generally ignored. And that includes the more talented writers, artists, and scholars. Not only is this so for the living, but the greats of the past are sinking progressively deeper into the chasms of obscurity. The fact that their books and music still adorn the shelves of stores means little; there is so much to choose to pay attention to that they are also left behind in the collective mass of material.

Isaac Asimov, a very extroverted soul who never had a problem against promoting himself, wrote five hundred books in his lifetime, until his death in 1992. Now, seventeen years later, I rarely can find more than just a handful of books by him in bookstores. He is just one example of how quickly one's legacy can diminish over a very short time. Yet we are also living in a time when his works are preserved and available to the (fewer and fewer) people who want to read them!

So what legacy do I want to have? Do I want to be so invisible throughout the one life I have that no one other than my immediate family and acquaintances is even aware of my passing when I do die? Or should I realize that I might as well just go all out and make a damned public fool of myself, since no one (except possibly those same family members and acquaintances) could really care less anyway? And leave behind a relatively permanent (though probably unexamined) record of my writings and other creative output? Well, I think I've already answered my own questions with this blog. And this is just the beginning!

Cheney Grimaces Out

I'm all in favor of former Vice-President Dick Cheney speaking out now in criticism of President Obama and his policies regarding terrorist suspect/detainees, the Guantanamo Bay facility, and torture. In interview after interview (so far I've heard he's done ten), Cheney has been accusing the President of making this country more susceptible to attack with his policies.

It's clear to me that, by going through the media with his complaints instead of voicing them directly to Obama, Cheney is preparing to reap political benefits for himself and the Republicans by playing the "I told you so" card when or if a terrorist attack is launched against this country or its interests abroad in the future. This is quite different from George W. Bush's first weeks in office in 2001, when former Clinton Administration officials PRIVATELY urged Bush and his minions to be very attentive to the serious terrorist threat that Al-Qaeda presented to the United States. Now that was the true "I told you so" scenario!

So, with this in mind, why do I still favor Cheney speaking out this way? For one simple reason: it puts out, as the face of the Republican Party, one of the least popular Vice-Presidents in the history of this nation. If not THE least popular. Wait, I do think that Aaron Burr, who killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel in 1804, still can claim that title. Cheney is unwittingly joining forces with Rush Limbaugh to depict the GOP as an extremist, dishonest, and negative party, an image that stands to hurt it in future elections.

During the span of the nineties, former Defense Secretary Cheney defended former President George H.W. Bush's decision not to fully invade and occupy Iraq after liberating Kuwait from Saddam Hussein. But just a few years later, Cheney endorsed the full, unprovoked invasion of Iraq and even had the gall to tie Iraq with Al-Qaeda and the 9/11 attack. And we are left with many more Americans killed for that action (and untold more innocent Iraqis) than the already outrageous three thousand deaths from the terror attacks on 9/11.

I also believe that Cheney may be trying to lay the groundwork for avoiding any war crimes charges in the future, either domestically or internationally. Not to mention that, like most politicians at this level, he has an inflated ego and wants to paint his own legacy regarding his tenure as Vice-President.

Funny though, I don't recall Cheney giving this many interviews while he was actually Vice-President! I'd like to see whether someone has some statistics in this regard.

But I'm sounding awfully negative about the former Vice-President, and he does have some positive traits as well. Especially the fact that, with his unpleasant, grimacing countenance, he has still managed to claw himself to positions of power and influence. Wait, that doesn't really sound so positive, does it?

Now, despite my political objections to Dick Cheney and my belief that he has been less than honest in his statements, I also have a "civics" spirit and recognize that whoever held the office of Vice-President for the previous eight years deserves a modicum of respect. But only for the office, not the individual occupying it. So I am much more receptive to Cheney defending his tenure as VP than I am for him to spew out all sorts of criticisms against the present administration. Former President George W. Bush, at least to this point, has shown much more decorum and dignity in this regard.

Focusing on American League Central

I have had a great deal of difficulty getting up any enthusiasm for Major League Baseball this year, even when I have a tradition of rooting for two teams (Atlanta Braves and New York Yankees), as well as having the Florida Marlins and the Tampa Bay Rays based in my home state. So I decided to do something radically different about it.

Instead of concerning myself about the 30 teams in the American and National Leagues or living or dying by how "my team" is doing, I decided to focus on one division in one league, without giving preference to any one particular team in that division. I deliberately picked out one that didn't have any of my aforementioned "favorites" in it, too. The choice? The American League Central division, with its five teams Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Indians, Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, and Minnesota Twins. My aim is to watch any game that is available on TV (during my "free" time, of course) involving any of them (or on the radio, for that matter). I want to become familiar with each team's players and their positions, something that I haven't done too well in recent years. As far as who I will root for in a particular game is concerned, here is my policy: if an AL Central team is playing outside of their division, I will root for that Central team. Even if the opponent is one of my old-time favorites. If two Central Division teams are playing each other, then I root for the defensive (pitching and fielding) team in each half-inning. This way, I believe that I will be more involved in games as they are going on and less with the more extraneous trapping of the sport (like statistics, standings, and steroids).

I already have had an opportunity to try this new "system" out, as the Chicago White Sox just recently played a televised road game with the Los Angeles Angels, thoroughly beating them 17-3. In watching the game, I got to know the White Sox lineup, some of which were present during their World Series Championship run of 2005.

Oh yes, this is gonna be fun!

Leisure is Important

In my hectic life, I live (and die) by the clock. At least, I think my life is hectic (sometimes). And I (sometimes) live by the clock. Truth be told, I abhor being held to tight schedules and deadlines. Having free, open time lying ahead of me is something I cherish. Not that I always take advantage of that time to do something self-fulfilling. Sometimes doing nothing can be rewarding!

I look at other people and their lifestyles and I wonder why they choose to allow themselves to be so boxed in with their time. Some appear to have the notion that always being busy, busy, busy is a virtue. I've even known a couple of colleagues who have regularly, voluntary forgone work breaks, and not because there was crucial work to do either. They either don't know how to chill out for even just a few minutes or they equate rest and/or leisure with laziness.

One of my new all-time favorite songs is a sad, introspective song by Sufjan Stevens that he put on his The Avalanche album. Titled Pittsfield (after an Illinois town), the lyrics reveal an individual whose childhood was less than idyllic; apparently, a parent or guardian would put in long working hours away from home and then guilt-ride him (while he was still a child) about his perceived laziness:

You can remind me of it that I was lazy and tired
You can work all your life as I'm not afraid of you anymore

As adults of course, we need to be responsible regarding our obligations to ourselves, our dependents, and the society at large. But this doesn't imply that we should beat ourselves down with work, as if we are paying penance for simply being alive! And worse, using our perception of our own "virtue" to put down others.

Once, I was having (I thought) a light conversation with one of my co-workers. I mentioned that I liked to go the theme parks with my family and ride roller coasters. To which he replied that, yes, he used to like those sorts of things, but he's grown up now and has gone on to more important things. He didn't say this in meanness toward me; he really believed that, at his age (he was about 10-15 years younger than me) that engaging in fun, leisure activities was immature and irresponsible. I hope that this individual, who since left to work elsewhere, will "grow up" out of this potentially self-destructive delusion (well, I think it's a delusion). For occasionally breaking away from tight schedules and enjoying some leisure activity (or inactivity) is important for our health, both mental or physical. And I don't have to be a physician to know that: I have lived it, and have seen this in others as well!

A Tale of Two MP3 Players

Back in early 2007, I began to load my new Philips MP3 player with my all-time favorite songs. Eventually, I amassed more than 200 of these, most of which I have listed as all-time favorites in earlier blog articles. And I would take this MP3 with me to work and happily listen to them!

Late last year, I bought a Sansa MP3 player with more memory space (but occupying much less physical space). I hadn't put too many songs on it until this year, when I discovered several great independent/alternative acts (like Sufjan Stevens, Andrew Bird, Iron and Wine, Metric, and Broken Social Scene). And this MP3 player is loaded with their works (although it is rather incomplete, it still has 300+ songs on it). It is this player, not the former with my all-time favorites, that I have regularly been listening to.

One day last week, I accidentally left the Sansa MP3 player at home and was left with the options of listening to my "all-time favorites" or nothing at all. Of course, I tried out the old Philips MP3 playlist, thinking that it would be fun to hear the old classics again. I didn't expect what happened.

I could only listen to my old MP3 a few minutes before I had to turn it off! Why? The songs that I had come to love through the years were grating on my ears and sounded almost strange in their dissonance. Sure, I knew all of them almost by heart from earlier repetitive listening, but my tastes had drastically changed over the past three months.

In February this year, I began to refine my exposure to the enormous variety of music available by using the Internet. Specifically, AOL Radio and LastFM.com, which sets up personalized radio stations based on preferred artists. On AOL Radio, I listened to their Indie Rock station, which introduced me to Sufjan Stevens. From there, I plugged this artist's name into the LastFM setup search engine and generated a station that introduced me to the others that I now enjoy (and greatly prefer) listening to.

So now I have two MP3's: one plays the old favorites and one plays a narrow, Web-defined genre of music that is tailored to my tastes. And I find myself now greatly preferring obscure tracks from obscure albums by obscure artists over my beloved lifetime favorites.

From 1964 to the beginning of 2009, I picked my favorite songs from the pool of music that radio programmers deemed fit to broadcast. Sure, some of those songs were deep tracks from albums, but although the radio didn't play them, they still originated from acts receiving air play. So in a way I was a sort of "musical scavenger" picking my way through material others had left to choose from. In the process, I sometimes made favorites out of songs that were just the best of the sometimes mediocre pool of songs selected for airplay.

But now, with the Internet, I can forge my own tastes and "conjure up" acts that fit them best. Radio has become almost completely irrelevant to me, at least as far as music is concerned!

The time for me to purchase a third MP3 player is approaching, for I have almost filled the second one. I wonder whether the content of the third will be as different in nature from the second (Sansa) as that one is from the first (Philips)?

TV Sports Biased Toward Cavs in Series

I am getting quite tired of the general national media bias being expressed against the National Basketball Association's Orlando Magic in favor of superstar Lebron James and his Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference championship series. The Magic, who are leading three games to one, are getting relatively little attention or praise for their success so far. In fact, far more attention was given to Cleveland's one victory, only accomplished through a last-second desperation three-point shot by James. You would think that Cleveland had won the series (and the whole NBA Championship to boot) by dint of that one shot.

After the one Cleveland win, sports announcers on TV were all excited and happy. After Orlando's big THIRD win, they all seem sad, subdued, and worried. They have been quick to pin Cleveland's losses on its own players instead of given the very talented Orlando team the credit that they justly deserve for their victories.

Well, I have a message to all of the so-called sports journalists who ply their trade on television. You don't write the scripts: the players do that! And Lebron James, as good as he is, isn't the whole team, either. He deserves the Most Valuable Player award this year hands down, in my opinion. But his Cleveland Cavaliers? Sure they're a good team; they had the best regular season record in the league this year. And they could well come back and win the series against Orlando. But I have yet to be convinced of their greatness. Certainly they don't deserve the weighted attention that they are getting on the air. At least that's how this admittedly biased pro-Orlando viewer sees it.

Sonia for the Supreme Court

President Barack Obama has chosen Justice David Souter's replacement on the U.S. Supreme Court: Sonia Sotomayor, a federal appeals court judge from New York. Much is being made of the fact that she is a Latina, with some on the (bitter) right complaining that this was why she was wrongly (to them) picked in the first place. And already the nitpicking against her has commenced, with Fox News and its commentator, former Bush Administration sludge-master Karl Rove, taking the lead. All I heard on the "fair and balanced" channel was a procession of critics to this nomination. So I switched over to MSNBC to hear Andrea Mitchell interview a right-wing legal think tank spokesman rail against it as well. And his number one reason to oppose Obama's nomination? Because it was Obama's nomination!

It may be useful to remind some of these people that Obama is the elected President and will be making nominations for a while, thank you. From what I see of Sonia Sotomayor, she is a very capable, accomplished jurist who will make the Supreme Court a better institution. I wish the best for her confirmation and am keenly interested in seeing whether the Senate Republicans will allow the confirmation to proceed or whether they will decide to decimate their own party by rejecting such a highly qualified candidate from the increasingly politically powerful Hispanic community.

But now I hear that right wing extremist Rush Limbaugh, the de facto leader of the Republican Party and an authority on racist comments (he is a master at making them), has publicly pronounced Judge Sotomayor as being "racist". Now that their "master" has spoken, it will be interesting to see how many Republican senators pander to Limbaugh on this viewpoint!

Planned Running Detour Blocked

As I wrote on April 14, I had a great idea for a personal running course that ran directly past my home. The only problem was that a .46 mile section of it involved running on someone else's possibly private land. Since there were no "no trespassing" signs around, I decided that I would chance running through this stretch, which was directly behind two subdivisions (mine and the one adjacent) which, unfortunately had no connecting street between them. Hence the necessity of taking this detour behind them.

Anyone who knows me well is aware of the sometimes extreme lag time between my expressed desire to do something and me finally getting up off my butt and doing it. But last Tuesday, we were in a freaky weather pattern, very stormy with daytime temperatures dipping into the fifties (this in late May in northern Florida). I thought hey, this is a good opportunity to try out this course, and I set out intrepidly on my adventure. I entered the "mystery stretch" from my own subdivision, running between two homes down a public pathway and then turning west (left). I then ran about .11 mile past the backs of the houses in my subdivision and then encountered a thick patch of trees and brush, blocking any further advance. I couldn't go around it, because there was a drainage canal running parallel to my course, cutting that option off. So I walked into the Mirkwood-like "forest", looking around to find any way through. And then I heard loud barking. I turned to my left and saw a fenced-in back yard to the first house in the next subdivision, with two large, angry dogs growling, barking, and running toward the low fence that separated them from me. Not panicking, I quietly turned around, picked my way through the brush, and backtracked into my own subdivision.

So that option is out. But at least I finally tried it! Actually, I have plenty of good places to run, so perhaps I'm just trying too much to add a little more variety to my routine by exploring new courses in places where they are nonexistent.

Memorial Day Salute

On this year's Memorial Day, I express my appreciation for those Americans who died while protecting their country in all of our armed conflicts, past and present, popular and unpopular. And I wish the best for their survivors, be they fellow soldiers, friends or family.

It takes a special brand of courage to step out into harm's way and be willing to sacrifice oneself for the sake of a mission, or to save a fellow soldier. Many, many more have done this and survived than were killed in action. And many who have survived sustained injuries causing varying degrees of incapacitation to them, some injuries being permanent in effect. To me, they are all heroes and deserve recognition and respect for their service. And we should collectively, as a society, make sure that no combat veteran or his/her family is lacking for a home, food, or medical care. That's the LEAST we can do for these brave men and women!

Mid-Sixties Transition to Color TV

When I was a child, my family always had a black and white television set. As a matter of fact, I didn't begin to regularly watch color television at home until the year 1986! So it was relatively later on in my life when I discovered a phenomenon that occurred on television in the mid-sixties: the transformation to color programming.

Some series, like The Honeymooners or The Twilight Zone, were all done in black and white. Such series ended their runs before 1964-1965, which seem to be the years of the general transformation to color regarding programming. So shows like The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and the original Star Trek series, which started in 1964 and 1966 respectively, had all of their episodes in color. But there were many series that began in black and white and ended in color. And I noticed something curious about some of them.

When I think of classic television comedy series like The Beverly Hillbillies, Andy Griffith, and Bewitched, I almost always prefer the black and white period vastly over the color period. With Andy Griffith, the explanation is simple: coincidentally, the time of transition to color also marked the time when co-star Don Knotts, who played the crucial comic character of Barney Fife, left the series to try his hand at the movies. Neither The Beverly Hillbillies and Bewitched faced such an immediate change, though. But the quality of their shows suffered anyway. With The Beverly Hillbillies, more and more scripts were written with the idea of ridiculing the backwoods Clampetts (especially Jethro) instead of satirizing the pretentious high society of Beverly Hills, which was the original driving force behind the series' appeal. In Bewitched, I think something different happened: the plots became too predictable: Darrin would be with Samantha at the beginning of a show, Endora (the mother-in-law witch) would show up, Darrin would insult her, she would put a spell on Darrin, he would do "funny" things, and then the spell would be lifted at the end. So funny that I forgot to laugh.

Whenever I see one of these series on TV and it's in color, I instinctively switch the channel to something else. This phenomenon may have engendered a little anti-color-television prejudice on my part, as I still tend to look askance at the Rod Sterling-inspired color series Night Gallery and exalt his earlier black and white Twilight Zone. But Night Gallery has some pretty good episodes, and some of the Twilight Zone episodes are downright pathetic!

Jackie Chan's Remark

Actor and martial arts expert Jackie Chan recently committed a major gaffe (or at least that's how it is being reported), stating in essence that the Chinese people are better off without democracy because they need someone in control telling them what to do. Reading this story takes me in two different directions: one, what is a gaffe, and two, Chan's remark isn't unprecedented.

Is it really a gaffe if someone honestly expresses a heartfelt opinion about something, just because that opinion may be generally unpopular? I bet that I entertain all sorts of unpopular opinions about many things. The fact that, even with this blog going out to "all-points" on the globe, I am still relatively anonymous is the only essential difference between me and Jackie Chan in this regard. Apparently, fame can bring a strong demand to practice self-censorship in the interest of political correctness. All of us, I believe, entertain beliefs which, should they come out, would cause others to think less of us.

As far as Chan's implication that some people are better off under autocratic rule than under a democracy is concerned, many in the West have long embraced this notion, which I think is flawed but understandable. The usual rationale is that people in any country need to have their most basic needs, such as food, water, shelter, sanitation, and general civil order (i.e. no war or anarchy) met before they can understand and effectively participate in democratic self-government. The most glaring examples of the past century have been the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba under Communism, Italy under Mussolini's Fascism, and Germany under Hitler's Nazi rule. James Robeson, in the 1930s, extolled Stalin's Soviet Union as being good for its people. Charles Lindbergh (at least before World War II) expressed admiration for how Hitler had transformed Germany's economy in the 1930s. And John Lennon, in the 1970s, sympathized with Mao's China for the similar reasons.

Another reason that some prioritize other factors over democracy in foreign countries is that countries like the United States have gotten themselves embroiled in long-term military conflicts while "promoting democracy" in lands with little or no democratic tradition for their people to rely on. Hence we have South Vietnam in the fifties, sixties, and seventies. And Iraq and Afghanistan in our present time.

I say let's give Jackie Chan a break. He meant well, but the words just didn't come out right. And that's another problem with our world nowadays: any awkward sounding quote from any person with name recognition gets instantly spread over the planet and blown up completely out of proportion.

As for my own view on the subject, here it is: it isn't necessarily a simple choice between Western democracy and autocracy. Each society has its own historical traditions regarding how its people can express themselves politically. And that doesn't always involve periodic secret ballot elections and government structures patterned after our own. But on the other hand, there is absolutely nothing endemic to a society that would indicate that it could not incorporate Western democratic concepts into its system of government. Cases in point: Japan's radical transformation into a Western-style democracy after World War II and Eastern Europe's general embrace of the same after the Cold War. With Japan, it was nearly destroyed at the end of that terrible conflict and the U.S. had almost complete control over it for several years, thus enabling it to transform Japan's system of government. But in the midst of a war, it seems to me to be unrealistic to try to impose a new system on a society so embroiled in conflict. And that's what we're sadly seeing in Iraq and Afghanistan.

What Year and Decade is It?

So what year is it? Sounds simple, but it isn't. Is it "two thousand and nine" or "twenty-oh-nine"? If we were to ever get over our millennium fever and return to our original way of designating years, we would do what CBS commentator Charles Osgood has been doggedly doing over the years and say we're in "twenty-oh-nine". And, from a perspective in the future, looking back on this time, people will most probably say it like that. But while we're walking through it, we're generally sticking to the "two thousand and nine" pattern. Which brings up another question: When reviewing this decade, how does one refer to it? Before, we had the nineties, eighties, seventies, etc. But the first decade of the 2000's? Do we call it the "oh's"? Or the "zero's"? Or the "units plus 2000"? Or maybe just say "2000's"? Or even "that crappy decade"?

How we designate years isn't set in stone; other languages have other systems. Many, such as Spanish or Russian, treat the year as a mathematical number and say it like that. Chinese tends to just say the individual digit values, followed by 年 (nian), their word for year. With German, they follow the English "four-and-twenty blackbirds" model with years, e.g. calling 1946 "neunzehnhundertsechsundvierzig" (nineteen hundred six-and forty). In French, 1976 is "thousand nine hundred sixty sixteen", 1980 is "thousand nine hundred four twenties", and 1999 is "thousand nine hundred four twenties nineteen"! But at least with these, they actually KNOW what to call the years they are living through!

Personally, I prefer the designation "twenty-oh-whatever" to describe the first few years of the 2000's. And then go straight into the "twenty-teens"! Continually saying "two-thousand-this" and "two-thousand-that" keeps bringing up to me the specter of Stanley Kubrick and Arthur Clarke's 1967 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, and how far short we fell from its projection for our space program's progress by that time, now in our increasingly distant past. How depressing!

Ticket Article: Follow-Up

On Monday, I wrote about a letter to the editor in Sunday's Gainesville Sun in which a local high school student decried a police stakeout at the exit to his school's student parking lot where they issued several $104 citations to students for seat belt violations. In the letter, the student opined that if this were a campaign on the part of the police to educate teenagers on the necessity to buckle up, then why couldn't they simply have given warnings? After all, isn't that why there is a "warning" option anyway? Instead, those ticketed are faced with higher insurance costs because of this, unless they elect to spend more money for the traffic safety class option. By Tuesday, the newspaper devoted its entire editorial letter page to responses to this young man's letter. And I was initially shocked at their general tone, but ultimately not surprised.

Except for one letter, all of them criticized the ticketed student and praised the police. I don't know the ages of the writers, but they seemed to be coming from more elderly people who were intent on putting down teenagers. And then it hit me: these folks weren't objecting to the writer's driving behavior. They objected to him expressing his independent opinion openly in society.

I say this because of the harsh tone of many of the letters. The student was, to them, a child to whom life was one big series of lessons that benevolent adults had the unrestricted privilege of dishing out to them whenever THEY felt the urge. And speaking out against this was, to these respondents, an act of insolence, if not rebellion.

I want everyone, not just adolescents, to buckle up. And for everyone, not just adolescents, to be held accountable for following traffic laws, not just this one. Which is the whole point: if high school students are going to be ticketed like adults regarding their driving, then they should also have the recourse to protest their treatment in the media as well. None of the negative letters answered the question of why warnings weren't issued instead of tickets; neither did they have an adequate answer to the objection of the police camped out outside the school with their ticket pads and agenda already preset. Unless the "answer" was that teenagers need to be kept in their place, so anything to that effect goes!

I have a mixed record on this blog regarding the police. True, they are important protectors of the public. The officer who risked his life toward that purpose here in Gainesville last week is a great, heroic example. They are a glue holding our society together, keeping it from deteriorating into gang/militia zones (just look at the deplorable civil strife in some other countries). And they need to enforce traffic laws as well. Being a driver, I see more and more fellow drivers running red lights, driving severely distracted, and engaging in similar reckless behavior, threatening both me and other drivers and their passengers. Police need to watch out for these transgressors and deal with them appropriately.

But this profiling, this staking out, this hiding to catch people for violations: do we really need that much of it? Why do some police seem to be so insecure with their authority that they are so quick to resort to Taser stun guns and even firearms to subdue suspects? And why do they seem to get a free ride in the courts, with their testimonies rarely being challenged?

Perhaps the answers to these questions lie with the attitudes of a large segment of our population, which seems to hold that anyone in uniform has de facto social superiority and authority, and to question that authority is unsocial behavior. Especially if you're a teenager. At least Tuesday's editorial letters seem to indicate that.

*******
I don't plan to belabor this topic, but in today's Gainesville Sun editorial section, several letters were published that were in favor of the ticketed student, including another letter by the student himself. Making me wonder (but not too much) whether the newspaper itself was manipulating how the comments were published in order to create a scenario for keeping it going for several days as an ongoing topic (Note: while this has been going on, letters to the editor about the diversity of the programming of Gainesville's Public Radio station have "mysteriously" dropped off.)

NBA Conference Finals Starting

So now we are down to four teams left in the National Basketball Association playoffs: Los Angeles Lakers and Denver Nuggets in the West, and Cleveland Cavaliers and Orlando Magic in the East. Both series promise to be competitive and full of exciting action. The talent on these teams is phenomenal. Kobe Bryant, Carmelo Anthony, Lebron James, and Dwight Howard are the big names highlighting each team, but they are much, much more than their leaders, with so many playing major roles in getting them this far in the playoffs. I especially respect the remarkable team effort of the Denver Nuggets, with Chauncey Billups stepping up to play a crucial role in their success. Now they are in a rematch of last year's first-round series with the Lakers, who swept the Nuggets in four games then. But Billups wasn't with Denver last year. I'm looking forward to rooting for them against Los Angeles. Unfortunately, last night they lost game one at Los Angeles to the Lakers 105-103. Kobe had one of his trademark hall-of-fame games. The Magic and Cavaliers square off for their first game tonight.

Orlando is naturally the closest NBA team to me geographically, and I am proud of how they were able to come from behind in their series with the defending champion Boston Celtics and win the seventh game on the road to get to play Cleveland, which sports the best regular season record in the league this year and has arguably the best player in basketball in Lebron.

Unfortunately, I won't be able to watch these games until Sunday, since I'll be at work while they're being played. I hope that the series are close and exciting. I greatly respect all four teams, but I am pulling for Orlando and Denver in this round.

Miami Radio Could Stand Improvement

On my recent brief visit to South Florida, I had the opportunity to explore the state of radio down there. And, as in Gainesville, I am generally disappointed. At least in the English-language radio stations.

Musically, I see no more variety in what is being offered in that much larger listening market than I get here in Gainesville, at least regarding English-language programming. They have the same prepackaged, formulated formats as we do, which tend to omit huge sections of music that would be appealing to listen to. How boring!

The English-language talk show stations, if anything, are worse. Not only did I not hear moderate/liberal shows anywhere (I know they used to exist on 940/WINZ), but even the conservative shows seem to be crowded out by sports talk radio. I really don't need sports ralk radio across my entire AM radio dial, do you?

While driving out of South Florida, I turned on my radio and found myself eschewing the English-language prgramming in favor of the Spanish and Haitian. Not that it was any more diverse than the English, but it was stimulating to see how much I could understand. Coupled with the caffeine in my coffee, that helped me greatly with the early morning driving!

I suppose that a few of my millions of loyal readers may be tiring of this shameless wringing out of articles about my very brief trip to South Florida. For those, relief is at hand: I have run out of material! But I'm not guaranteeing that something else about the experience won't come to mind in the next few days or so. So be warned!

Fewer Barney Fifes, Please

In last Sunday's Gainesville Sun, a local public high school student (at Buchholz High) wrote a letter protesting the Alachua County Sheriff's Department's recent actions at his school. According to him, police were ticketing students for seat belt violations ($104) as they were leaving the school parking lot at the end of the school day. As many as twenty students (including the miffed letter writer) received these tickets. And he mused: if this was supposed to educate the violators concerning seat belt laws, why couldn't simple warnings have been issued?

As I see it, what was educated is that the police prey upon ordinary citizens in order to increase revenue and "enhance" their own work records by showing a larger number of citations having been issued. Assuming that the writer had his facts straight, I feel that this only confirms what I have been saying all along: the police unwittingly project an image by actions, true or false, of themselves as public bullies, not public servants. They have Taser stun guns and loaded firearms at their disposal. They have the power to issue costly citations and to send people to jail at will, and their testimony is rarely ever refuted in court. In fact, often it takes contradicting video evidence to overturn their testimony. And even then THAT sometimes doesn't work (remember Rodney King's recorded beating in Los Angeles many years ago?).

At the exits of both my subdivision and my workplace, I have observed police cars parked in inconspicuous places that enable them to observe drivers coming in and out. It is patently clear that they are profiling residents and workers respectively to "catch" anyone not coming to complete stops at the stop signs in these two places. In doing this, they are, like the example at Buchholz High, profiling a specific group of citizens for scrutiny.

I wrote a couple of days ago how police should be patrolling streets more and playing "gotcha" less with the public that they are mandated to protect, not persecute. I keep thinking of the old image of the big city cop walking up and down the street on his beat, making himself visible both to law-abiders and potential criminals alike and available to assist anyone in need. What kind of image do you suppose that cop what have created had he instead hid behind a bush, jumping out whenever he caught someone jaywalking or littering? I imagine we all know the answer to that one! The image would have been tarnished, just as it being tarnished today by petty, bullying behavior. We need fewer Barney Fifes and more Andy Taylors!

Childhood Perceptions of Distance and Size

I wrote on Tuesday how the 2.87 mile block in Davie that I used to jog around in my late teens (about 35 years ago) seemed to have shrunk a bit when I ran it on Monday. Naturally, the obvious conclusion to this is that I have grown since then, so things would seem smaller. But I had already grown up to the bodily dimensions I now have, so that isn't so.

The same can be said for just about any place that I am familiar with in South Florida, especially my old house that I lived in from 1960 to 1977. The back yard, which seemed huge when I was twenty, now seems very confined and cramped. The residential block on which my old house stands seems now to be incredibly small.

Distances from one point to another seem to have shrunk as well. I used to think that it was very far between my old home and my school. But it really isn't anymore!

Of course, nothing has shrunk. My perception of this points to an interesting (to me) conclusion. We tend to form, early in childhood, conclusions about distances and size that we are reluctant to abandon, even as we grow up (as long as the exposure to that setting is continuous). So even though I was no longer five years old, a part of that experience was still within me as I viewed my back yard at age twenty. As a fourth-grader going by bus to my (then) distant school in 1965, it seemed like quite a trek (although I wouldn't learn the word "trek" until the following year on television). But it was only five miles, a very moderate distance, from my house.

Now, at age 52, I can still remember my old perceptions, but can now apply my more realistic interpretations of distance and size to my old childhood settings.

Local Shooting Tragedy

When I arrived at work around 3pm yesterday afternoon, I received a cell phone call from my wife, who was also at her workplace. It seemed that a terrible disturbance had occurred not very far from our home, on the road that I usually travel on go to work (but not this time). It seemed that a man was walking up and down the street, yelling at people in cars, sometimes attacking them, and banging on the cars' windows. And he was apparently beating up a woman he knew in one of the cars. A Sheriff's Department officer, who had been in the area only to serve subpeonas, tried to calm down the disturbed individual, a young man. But he became more aggressive and angry, so the officer used his Taser on him. But the effect was only temporary, for this enraged person lunged at the officer and both tried to strangle him and reach for his gun. Whereas the officer had to shoot him, resulting in his death.

This was a major news story for Gainesville and raises several questions. First of all, as far as I am concerned, the officer's actions were exemplary and in the line of duty, protecting the public. There were many witnesses to what happened. But we are left with a death, along with the loudly grieving family members. They were very quick to arrive at the scene and express their closeness to the killed individual. But really how close? What was the connection, if any, between them and the young man's rage? And if they knew what was going on in his mind, why didn't they do anything to help alleve his distress? Or did they?

None of the passengers in the various involved cars pulled out a gun, as far as I know. There may have been someone (or more) who had one handy should the need have arisen. By all accounts, the news outlets are putting a very pro-police spin on this story. But I'm seeing this slightly differently. Let me explain.

Everywhere I have worked, management puts the pressure on its employees to always be "busy" doing something. On my present job, a part of my responsibilities is to observe how mail is being processed through a very large, complex, and expensive sorting machine. I have to be vigilant in this so that parcels won't jam in the machine, for not only can the parcels become damaged, but the machine can be damaged as well. There is also a personal safety factor involved here. But as I am calmly walking back and forth observing the running machine, it appears to some supervisors that perhaps I am not "busy" enough, and should go do something else. Management, as a rule, tends to make its employees engage in what I call "busywork": doing things that don't really contribute to productivity, but "look" good to anyone passing by.

Now let's go back to the police. They are also under pressure by their management to engage in the "busywork" of cranking up citation numbers and "enhancing" revenue by pulling over citizens for minor traffic violations. When I see a police car parked anywhere (away from the coffee shop, that is), it is usually in a spot designed either to clock motorists' speeds or to catch motorists not coming to complete stops at stop signs. They also tend to congregate at public parks, apparently hoping to catch some poor soul engaging in "suspicious" activity there (whatever that's supposed to be). Instead, they should be concentrating on their primary mandate, which is to protect the public. It was just happenstance that the officer in this tragic local story was driving by at the exact moment that he was needed.

We can't expect our police to be everywhere all the time, nor would we want that type of scenario. Sure, we have cell phones and 911, which can greatly speed up police reaction time. But we would have a better level of protection if the police were freed from their busywork and allowed to perform their primary function, which is to protect the people by patrolling regularly throughout the city without agendas. This would involve a more passive, observing type of job behavior and would not necessarily look "busy" to management. But it's what we need more of, not less.

Otherwise, we may see a rise in citizens who take the law into their own hands, all under the umbrella of their own interpretation of the Second Amendment. If this happens, expect little restraint on their part!

But that having been said, I salute and greatly appreciate that very brave officer who stood up the protect the people. He suffered injuries during the incident, and my hopes and wishes are with him and his family. As well as those aggrieved by the young man's death.

Southern Cross Eludes Me Again

When I visited my father in Hollywood, Florida earlier this week, it was naturally my time spent with him that highlighted the all-too-short stay. But I did manage to get out and do some other fun things (for me, that is). I already wrote about a couple of them: running my old school "block" and riding a super-cool, excellent wooden roller coaster (the Dania Beach Hurricane). But there was one other endeavor that I wanted to accomplish on my stay: to observe the constellation Crux (the Southern Cross) and the star Alpha Centauri (a.k.a. Toliman, in the constellation Centaurus), only visible in the continental U.S. from the southern tips of Florida and Texas.

My original idea was to get in my car at night and drive out to southern Dade County and find a spot away from the city lights with a clear view of the southern horizon where these celestial sights would be visible in the evening at this time of the year. Looking from my father's house in Hollywood would present too much difficulty, since it is further north and the view would be badly hindered by greater Miami's city lights on the southern horizon.

But my stay was only for two nights. The first night I was too tired after driving down there from Gainesville. And the second night was plagued by overcast skies. Oh well.

I think, anyway, I would prefer to be in a setting that was much more conducive to observing the southern celestial sky at night. And that means only one thing: go visit somewhere south of the Equator with generally clear skies. Then I could take it all in!

But then again, I have never visited the Florida Keys, even though I grew up not that far from them. Maybe a family excursion down there might do the trick. And I could rack up some southern star sightings to boot!

[Star chart courtesy of Wikipedia]

Dania Beach Hurricane Coaster

In spite of South Florida's determination to promote itself as a vacationland for tourists, it has done precious little in the area of theme parks and thrill rides. Tampa has Busch Gardens with its great rides (especially the roller coasters). Orlando is loaded with parks, chief among them Disney World, Universal, and Sea World. Winter Haven has Cypress Gardens and Valdosta, Georgia has Wild Adventures. All of which have good thrill rides. But South Florida? Just one place exists, and that place, Boomer's of Dania, has just one ride: the Dania Beach Hurricane wooden roller coaster. And I rode on it this past Monday (after doing the run I wrote about yesterday, as a matter of fact).

It is very easy to miss Boomer's, especially if you don't know it's there. Even when I knew its location, which is just on the east side of I-95 a few blocks north of Stirling Road, I kept turning at the wrong streets and having to backtrack. Finally, I reached this little amusement park, which is at the back of an undeveloped industrial park area.

The parking lot was small, almost empty, and (best of all) free. Compare this with the seven bucks I have to shell out to park at Busch Gardens (even with my annual pass). As I walked toward the main building (actually, I think there was only one building), I looked to the left and saw a miniature golf course. Once inside, I saw many arcade games on the right and a restaurant/diner on the left. I got in line at the ticket desk and bought my ticket for the roller coaster ride ($6.75 for one ride and $12 for unlimited rides in a day). I just bought one ride and walked out the back of the building down the walkway to the roller coaster.

The Dania Beach Hurricane, although the only coaster in this part of Florida, is now overall my favorite wooden roller coaster that I have ridden, surpassing even Dollywood's exciting-but-comparatively-small Thunderhead and Busch Gardens' twin coaster Gwazi. What I liked the most about the Hurricane were its exciting drops, leaving me floating in my seat on several occasions. And it was quite a long ride as well.

I picked a good day to try out Boomer's. School was in session and the place was almost deserted, except for employees. When I did my one ride on the Hurricane, I was the only one on it and sat a couple of seats from the front.

The next time I visit Hollywood, I will definitely ride the Dania Beach Hurricane again. My son and daughter both like riding roller coasters, and should they go with me the next time they'll enjoy the experience as well.

I was thinking how sad it was that South Florida had only one coaster. And then I realized that not only doesn't a big city like Jacksonville have any, but neither does my home town of Gainesville. I have to drive about a hundred miles (or more) from home if I want to ride one (although I have some great choices of places to go should I do this).

There's one other wooden roller coaster that I'd like to ride at some future date. I don't know the name of the park that it's in, but I do know that it's in Muskegon, Michigan and is legendary among thrill ride enthusiasts.

Ran Old Davie "Block" Again

This past Monday, while in South Florida to visit my father, I decided to drive back to my old main running course of my late teens, a 2.87 mile circuit around schools I once attended in Davie that I refer to simply as "The Block". I wanted to see what had changed and what hadn't. And I was curious to see how I would handle it some 35 years later.

This block is bordered by College Avenue on the west, Nova Drive on the north, Davie Road on the east, and SW 39 Avenue on the south. Before I ran it, I drove around it, becoming increasingly dismayed in the process. Chain link fencing seemed to be everywhere. Nova High School was so completely fenced in that it looked more like a low-security prison than a high school. Broward College (formerly Broward Community College) had a lot of construction work going on at its College Avenue side, presenting a bit of a challenge that I would have to run through. West of College Avenue, Nova University was unrecognizable, having completely transformed itself over the years. And its vast, open blacktop area, where I had gone in December 1972 to watch the Apollo 17 final moon mission launch, was completely gone, with a street (SW 30 Avenue) cutting through where it had been. North of "Broward College" (that just does not sound right to me), where there had before been wonderful, open fields, was a campus of Florida Atlantic University. But here I'll accept the tradeoff: FAU being here is thoroughly cool. The former field lying along Nova Drive in the north is gone, with buildings and chain link fences replacing it. On the street's north side is a shopping center containing Publix and Blockbuster Video (and many, many little stores). There's also now a Ruby Tuesday at the corner of Nova Drive and Davie Road. Going down Davie Road was also a disappointment. Broward {Community} College had developed here and plugged up most of the formerly wide-open space with buildings and parking lots (but what should I have expected after 30+ years?), but they did line their eastern side with some beautiful landscaping. The duck pond was still there, essentially unchanged. And the two Nova elementary schools, other than their chain link fences enclosing them, were largely the same as well.

Google Maps, at the southwest corner of the "block" where Nova High School should be, instead shows something it calls "Bill Gessner Sports Complex". But when I drove (and later ran) by, all I saw were the old Nova phys-ed field, baseball diamond, and their old track with the football field inside it.

I was probably nuts for doing this, but I set out on my run at about one in the afternoon, on a very sunny and hot day, temperatures being in the low to mid nineties. Public school was in session, so I drove down to the nearly empty Broward College parking lot (they must have been on break, or else business is really bad now). I began my run there northward along College Avenue, almost immediately encountering the construction work but running through it without any real trouble. As in the early years of the seventies, I tried to run on grass when possible. And I noticed something interesting: the ground in South Florida is different from that in my home town of Gainesville. While down south the soil is pretty hard and sturdy, in Gainesville the surface has treacherous little holes under the top where it can be very easy for a runner to twist his/her ankle.

I managed the run well, always finding a place to run on. Unlike Gainesville, there were no hills, so that made it even easier. The only real problem I had was with the wilting heat and sun, but that didn't get to me and I finished the run at an easy pace, doing it in 24:38. Which was pretty much the pace I used to run for my jogs back in the 1970's.

I had the distinct impression that this entire area had shrunken over the years, as the distance I ran didn't seem to be anywhere near as formidable as it had in the past. Even when I was much younger, lighter (by about forty pounds), and in better general physical shape. So go figure. But although the area wasn't as pretty as it used to be, I'm not surprised. It's been a long, long time. Actually, I probably should be marvelling about how little things have changed over the years!

The Golden Compass: Reading Adventure Begins

How's this for coincidence: this past Wednesday afternoon, before work, I went to my local public library and, on impulse, checked out Philip Pullman's fantasy novel The Golden Compass. Later that evening, I called home to see how things were going, only to find that my family had rented out The Golden Compass on DVD. None of us had mentioned this to each other, and The Golden Compass has been out for some time. How freaky can it get?!!

I have begun reading The Golden Compass (it took a few days for me to able to get started) and have read Chapter One (naturally, I'm avoiding the movie right now). And just that one chapter is enough for me to know that this is one good book! Just the first few pages alone contain a wealth of intriguing ideas and mysteries. It also brings to mind an old science-fiction short story I once read titled The Wall Around the World.

Anyway, it looks as if my reading will be focusing on The Golden Compass, and then the other two volumes of this, Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy.