Paul-is-Dead Movie

While searching my sadly inadequate streaming Netflix to try to find some interesting movies to watch, I came across one with an intriguing title: Paul McCartney is Really Dead: The Last Testament of George Harrison. So I selected it to see what it was about.  This film presented itself as a documentary that purported to prove the conspiratorial urban legend that the Beatles great musician Paul McCartney was killed in a car crash on November 9, 1966.  According to this "theory", his death was covered up, with the collusion of the remaining three Beatles (as well as British intelligence), and a new "Paul" (nicknamed Faul for "fake" Paul) replaced him after extensive plastic surgery.  The movie covered this and made the standard claims, as well as a few that I find hilarious.

For example, hints about Paul's death were supposedly surreptitiously put by the surviving band members into the albums Rubber Soul, Yesterday and Today, and Revolver.  One problem with this, though: all three albums were released BEFORE Paul's alleged death!  You can look up the facts yourself; for me, it's a bit more personal as my parents, ardent Beatles fans during this period, quickly bought each album as it released.  I was there: the sequence of events didn't work with the narrative I was hearing from my TV.  So the movie's entire plausibility, predicated on a couple of audio tapes that the late Beatles lead guitarist George Harrison supposedly made in the hospital right after he was severely stabbed at his home in 1999, comes crashing down with this monumental boner.

As for conspiracy theories and urban legends, I am a sucker for them because they are fun to follow, like the idea that the Apollo moon landings were a hoax, JFK's assassination was a sinister conspiracy involving disparate elements, or ... Paul McCartney's covered-up death in 1966.  But although I tend to be squarely on the skeptical side of these notions, I still expect those presenting their arguments for them to at least make some attempt to be correct with basic circumstantial facts.  And the fact here is that the makers of Paul McCartney is Really Dead: The Last Testament of George Harrison totally screwed up...

...unless, of course, this was DELIBERATE misinformation designed to discredit the "Paul-is-dead" believers.  And thus protecting the real "secret", which is that he really did die!  Oh, the fun I can have with this...

Adequate Rainfall Still Eludes Us

Well, today we were suppose to really get some serious rain, and that would be followed by a couple more days of good precipitation.  But only late at night did we finally see some rainfall around town and it wasn't very much.  This morning I tuned in to my local TV weather forecast and...

...and the forecast for today had mysteriously changed from one of rain to one of "sunny, with some clouds".  This isn't good.

Google Maps Street View Feature Intriguing

I was checking out the latest edition of Google Maps the other day and was pleasantly surprised at the enhanced quality of their "street view" feature.  It was a little disconcerting, however, to see how often different neighborhoods, mine included, were recorded on garbage pickup day, with the ugliness all out there by the street for everyone (in the world) to see.  As for me, I had a broken fan/stand jutting out of my garbage receptacle in plain view for everyone.  And man, my shrubbery was desperately in need of trimming. Thanks a lot, Google!

Still, it was fun to "travel" down various roads, especially ones that I had gone down in the "real" world.  For example, I explored the street view of Midtown Manhattan, first stopping by for a return visit to Junior's restaurant at Broadway and 45th Street, and then going down Broadway in the northerly direction toward Central Park.  Along the way, I noticed the eatery in which my wife, daughter, and myself ate breakfast the first morning of our visit there in April 2010: the EZ Deli.  And there were the stairs that we climbed to the second floor, where there was some seating available for us to eat our food after buying it in the rather cramped (but remarkable for its culinary diversity) ground floor store.

I wonder how extensive street views are for Google.  I'd like to check out some other countries for this feature, but realistically I don't see it happening anytime soon in most other places. But even if this is only a domestic feature of Google, I still see myself playing the role of armchair tourist as I visit places like Philadelphia, Boston, Washington D.C., Chicago, San Francisco, Honolulu, and so on... 

Welcome Rain, Finally

Just when it looked as if northern Florida would finally follow the examples of other regions of the world at our latitude (like western Mexico and northern Africa) and transform itself into a barren desert, it finally rained a bit this afternoon and evening.  Whew, I was getting a little worried there.  Of course, that was only for a couple of hours...we'll need a lot more than that to get out of our drought.  And also, even deserts experience some precipitation every now and then.  I'd like to see a pattern to this rainfall before switching the focus of my "weather" writings to complaining about the excessive rain! Well, the forecasts for the next couple of days do include some rain...but how much?

Speaking of the rain, I was tickled again when I walked out of Publix this afternoon and discovered that it was raining (finally).  I wasn't amused at the rain, you see, but rather at the line of intimidated customers massed together under shelter, afraid to get a little wet walking the short distance to their vehicles in the parking lot.  For me, I (smilingly) stepped straight out into it, getting a little soaked but none the worse for wear...

NBA Injuries Mounting in Playoffs

I may just be noticing this because I am following the sport a little more closely than usual, but aren't there a lot more injuries taking place in NBA basketball in the last few days?  Chicago's star guard Derrick Rose is out with a season-ending injury, and he'll probably miss out on playing in the 2012 Olympics.  His teammate Joakim Noah suffered an ankle sprain, with his absence most likely a major contributing factor to his teams last two losses to Philadelphia in the playoffs.  With the New York Knicks, Imam Shumpert suffered  a knee injury and Amar'e Stoudemire just returned to action still tending to his own hand injury.  And Baron Davis was put on a stretcher with what at this writing looked like a horrendous knee injury during today's game.  Orlando's Dwight Howard was already out for the season due to his own injury...

It is beginning to look as if the winners in this year's playoffs will be the teams who survived injury the best, avoiding it completely being the preferred option.  Well, the Knicks were pretty much out of it anyway: even though they won their game with Miami today, they're still behind in the series 3-1.  But Chicago and Orlando are in serious trouble, each team unexpectedly on the verge of playoff elimination with their own 3-1 deficits.  It's sad about Rose's injury, but he seems to be one of those players prone to them, having now missed stretches of games this year due to four different injuries.

Afghanistan: Why Are We Still There?

The United States has now been militarily involved in Afghanistan for more than ten years.  The original purpose was to eliminate the Al-Qaeda presence there and to overthrow the ruling regime, peopled by the Taliban movement and a supplier of sanctuary to Al-Qaeda.  Well, the Taliban has been out of power for ten years and Al-Qaeda is most likely much more active in other countries like Yemen and Somalia.  Osama bin Laden was assassinated a year ago...not in Afghanistan, but in Pakistan, where he was enjoying protected sanctuary by the military there.  You know, our "allies".  So why are we still hanging around there?

I believe that there is a school of thought within our defense and intelligence communities that sees occupation of foreign territories in itself as a positive benefit for our national interests.  This train of thought presumes that if we left Afghanistan, then a "vacuum of power" would open up and forces hostile to our interests would quickly replace us there, causing all sorts of problems.  On the other hand, what actually might happen is that the place would revert back to being essentially ignored in the international scheme of things.

The United States may withdraw most of its military presence from Afghanistan in the near future, but it has apparently learned from the past, when it neglected this country after aiding it in its fight against Soviet occupation in the 1980's.  That neglect may have contributed to the Taliban eventually winning control over the impoverished country a decade later.  But the Taliban, unlike Al-Qaeda, is a popular political movement in that part of the country, as well as having a strong ethnic connection with the Pashto people.  So trying to suppress it by force may have given the impression of ethnic favoritism, analogous to a degree with the struggle against Sunni insurgents in Iraq during our occupation there.

The United States and its allies will not destroy the Taliban in Afghanistan: it is too entrenched among the population there.  The best bet is to assure that no movement there is foolish enough to ever again harbor terrorists who attack the United States as they did on 9/11. Ultimately, this problem in Afghanistan will only be resolved through political agreements, not by warfare. So why are brave American soldiers still being exposed to injury and death there?

Annoying Experience at Starbucks on Archer Road

I just got off from work and am sitting in the Archer Road Starbucks, which claims to be always open until midnight.  But tonight, my experience there is a little less than desirable. For one, they have all of their stock in ugly stacks of boxes right in the middle of the store, spoiling the ambiance from the get-go when I walked into the joint.  Second, the only available seat puts me in a back corner.  Right across from me are two very, very loud Spanish-speaking men who apparently think that talking so loud that everyone in the room can hear them plainly is a sign of manhood.  Then there is the bathroom.  I started back there, but a female employee raced past me and went inside to clean it.  Everything here just seems a little out of sorts.  Annoying.  Irritating.

The University of Florida graduation ceremony is tomorrow for most of the colleges.  After that, the student population should thin out a bit.  Perhaps, just perhaps, I may find myself with better seating choices here than tonight.  Assuming, or course, that the worker who told me this Starbucks is ALWAYS open late was truthful. But even so, I may just need to carry some really heavy duty earplugs to muffle the unwelcome sound of these blabbermouths if they return and decide to bestow their decibels on everyone else...

The New Look Sprout Late Night

It's been a while since I checked in on my "last resort" channel on late night television: Sprout.  And it isn't because of the wonderful selection of programming available at that time to choose from, either.  Actually, TV pretty much sucks like crazy when I plop down in my living room recliner after a hard day of work, expecting SOMETHING interesting on the air.  Sometimes, as has been the case lately, there is interesting sports programming (like the current NBA playoffs).  A good movie may be showing as well.  I also like to watch South Park, although truth be told, I can get my fill of that series from my computer.  Other than that, though, late night television is a vast wasteland of mediocrity.  So why haven't I been turning to Sprout all this time?  Simply because I am usually so tired around midnight that I pass out unconscious in my chair. So back to Sprout...

Sprout, as I reported in this article a while back, is a cable channel put out by Public Broadcasting that is targeted at little children and features cartoons like Kipper (my favorite), Berenstain Bears, and Thomas the Tank Engine.  I had come to enjoy watching Nina (a young lady) and Star (a stuffed talking star puppet resembling a pillow) between the cartoons with their cute, sweet, and gentle banter.  The other night I tuned in to Sprout to see more of the same.  But wait, Star had changed his appearance.  And although Nina was the same, the way their segment was filmed was very different, and more to my liking.  So, no, I don't like the new Star, but I do like the overall new presentation.  And given the poor quality of television, it looks as if I'm going to be seeing more of Nina and Star...

Obama's Bin Laden Ads Appropriate

Recently the Obama reelection campaign has come under criticism for citing the President's successful effort to assassinate Osama bin Laden, the terrorist leader who authorized the 9/11 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 Americans, in recent ads.  I can understand why the Republicans would oppose this: it was a crowning achievement of his administration and demonstrated how, as commander-in-chief, he was performing his proper duty to protect the country from terrorism.  You can be sure that the GOP will paint Obama as being soft on national defense and terrorism, and I predict an avalanche of lies coming out in THEIR ads about him in the upcoming months.  So what's wrong with Obama bringing up the truth about something very pertinent to his performance as President? Already, the opposition is describing President Obama's role in the mission as being essentially passive, while in reality he was intricately involved in the planning and decision making. The mission itself was fraught with all sorts of potential traps and disasters, and its successful outcome was anything but "slam dunk". Ironically, Mitt Romney, who as with just about every other issue, has flip-flopped his position on the bin Laden raid (he used to be opposed to it, now is in favor), has contributed to the perception that the presidency is just a passive element in the undertakings of the military by flippantly stating that had the opportunity come up while he was President, he would have given it approval, too.  What, with a casual wave of the hand? Talk about passive disengagement from your job!

It is obviously the Republican Party's strategy to divide Barack Obama's decisions and record as President into two categories.  The controversial decisions are O.K. to bring up in campaign ads, but those actions on the part of the President that unified the nation are apparently verboten and almost sacrilegious, somehow.  Don't people like Arianna Huffington, who has criticized the Obama campaign recently for these ads, see that they are playing into the strategy of people who would be doing the very same thing were their "guy" sitting in the Oval Office?!

Hot Weather Rekindles My Swimming Enthusiasm

I'm sitting here watching my TV, looking at channel #106, which is my local weather station (not The Weather Channel, of dubious worth much of the time) and viewing my local forecast for the upcoming week, featuring temperatures surging into the 90's and no rain.  And that old yearning to go swimming has started to come back over me.

Last year I was working on improving my swimming form with the backstroke, crawl, and breaststroke.  I was especially motivated with the latter two. as I found that I had the unfortunate tendency to quickly build up an oxygen debt due in inefficient breathing techniques.  So, I have decided to concentrate on bettering my form with these strokes and not push the idea of accumulating laps, like I have done in the past.

I wonder what would be the best time to try to get out to my nearby YMCA pool...there's that annoying water aerobics class at 9 AM, and when the public schools let out in a few weeks I probably won't enjoy going out there in the late mornings.  Afternoon/early evening is out of the question, since I have a job to go to at that time.  I suppose I could go out there around 8-9 AM, but I like to use that time to study at one of my favorite local coffee hangouts.  H-m-m, only one solution I see to getting out to that pool...

I need to get out there when it opens around 6 AM.  I live close enough to the YMCA (one mile away) to quickly go there, practice swimming for about a half hour, and then return home in time to engage in my routine of early morning family interaction and transportation.  But getting up that early, well, that's going to be quite a challenge for me...

My April Running Goals Attained

The month of April saw me once again attain the cumulative 100-mile mark in my running, with the total being 108.04 miles.  The longest run I did was 10 miles on April 9. I ran on 27 out of April's 30 days.  Since I had been undergoing all sorts of medical exams and doctor visits this month (another one today, groan), I wondered how all that would affect my running.  The answer?  Not at all!

I plan to continue with my 100 mile per month goal.  I'd also like to run in some races, although my intention isn't to beat anyone or improve on my time: I just like to make running a more social event every now and then.  But alas, the races are becoming few and far between as we enter mid-spring and head for probably another scorching summer.  Well, I'll keep checking up on any races that might be offered...

Kyle's Flawed Argument to Goth Kid

Dan Quayle, while he was serving as vice-president under George "Poppy" Bush, once made a fool of himself.  Uh, let me narrow that down to the particular time (among many) he made a fool of himself that I am interested in.  There was a TV series on at the time called Murphy Brown, starring Candice Bergen.  The lead character had discovered she was pregnant and decided to have the baby instead of aborting it.  Great for the pro-lifers, right?  Well, not for Mr. Quayle, who publicly criticized a FICTIONAL character for her out-of-wedlock pregnancy. Suddenly millions of Americans felt a wave of stark terror envelop them when they realized that this dude was only a heartbeat away from the presidency!  Why do I mention this now?  Only to reassure you dear readers that, although I may be about to commit a similar act of foolhardiness, I am in fact several steps lower than Dan Quayle was in the line of succession to be president of the good old USA.  So here goes...

The cartoon series South Park is something that sharply divides the population: either you love it or hate it.  I happen to be in the former category, although some episodes (and parts of episodes) were/are really seriously off-base.  Well, that's satire, I suppose.  Still, I have to take issue with an assumption expressed in the episode titled Raisins by Kyle, one of the main characters who often is the mouthpiece in the series for rational arguments.

In Raisins, Kyle is trying to convince his friend Stan, who is down in the dumps over his girlfriend dumping him for another boy, to leave the overly pessimistic Goth kids clique and get back to his normal life.  One of the Goth kids tells Kyle how painful life is, which angers Kyle.  He retorts to the Goth kid (and I'm paraphrasing) that he doesn't know what pain is and why doesn't he try living in a third world country to find out.  The Goth kid comes back with a silly reply, and the impression is left that Kyle's premise of misery and pain being somehow justifiable in poor countries (and conversely UNjustifiable in the prosperous West) is simple, factual common sense truth.  I say bull!

Whether one is talking about foreign missionaries, Peace Corps volunteers, Madonna/Angelina, or other do-gooders who presume that people in poorer nations are in the throes of misery (and inferiority), the fact remains that happiness (and unhappiness) is relative to the context that the person is living in.  How would one of you "Westerners" like it if there suddenly was revealed to be a society somewhere that was much more technologically advanced than us?  And that the people in that society came to dominate the international media and decided on their own that we were miserable in our relatively less prosperous lives and that they needed to send people over to our lands to make us more like them?  Well, that's how some of us regard and treat those "third-worlders", with the same condescension (and possible prejudice).  Sure, help people in need, especially if they request it.  But don't assume that because of their circumstances they deserve to be less happy than us.

Conversely, being in Western society can raise up all sorts of factors contributing to emotional turmoil.  Ever heard of the "rat race"?  Well, it just keeps getting worse, folks.  And we want to spread THAT to the rest of the world ???!!!

2012 NBA Playoffs Start Toady

Today, the National Basketball Association playoffs begin and every series looks to be competitive and interesting, even those pairing up the disparate #1 and #8 seeds.  It’s sad that everyone acts as if they are somehow entitled to play for and win the NBA championship, which is actually a very high honor.  Not to attain it and whine about it is tantamount to poor sportsmanship, in my opinion.  Still, you keep hearing about all these players in mid- or late-career supposedly concerned that they won’t win one.  Boo, hoo…

As I did for the “Sweet Sixteen” college teams during the NCAA Division One championship tournament, I am taking the NBA’s “sweet sixteen” and ranking them by how I like them.  This time, though, I believe that the seeding is more accurately reflective of each team’s prospects for advancing.  So instead, following each personal preference entry I will include that team’s seeding within their conference, followed by that conference (e for East, w for West).  Here goes…

1-San Antonio Spurs  [1w] 

2-Dallas Mavericks [7w] 

3-Boston Celtics [4e] 

4-Chicago Bulls [1e] 

5-Miami Heat [2e] 

6-Orlando Magic [6e] 

7-Los Angeles Clippers [5w] 

8-Atlanta Hawks [5e] 

9-New York Knicks [7e] 

10-Denver Nuggets [6w] 

11-Utah Jazz [7w] 

12-Memphis Grizzlies [4w] 

13-Philadelphia 76ers [8e] 

14-Indiana Pacers [3e] 

15-Oklahoma City Thunder [2w] 

16 Los Angeles Lakers [3w]

Now just because I have a team relatively lower in my preference list (eg Indiana), that doesn’t mean that I dislike it.  I just happen to like others more.  The only exceptions are Oklahoma City and the Lakers (especially the Lakers)…

Friendly Attack By Large Dog

A few days ago, I was running a couple of laps in my neighborhood.  On the first "backstretch" headed back toward my house I detected movement from the left out of the corner of my eye.  Very soon, no peripheral vision was needed as a very, very large, brown dog came charging across a lawn and out into the street, making a beeline to where I was heading.  When we met, it jumped up on me.  Since I wasn't being torn to shreds by a hostile dog, I took this as a sign of friendship on the part of this "beast" and rolled with the experience, sweet-talking it with language and a gentle tone I have long used on my own dogs.  And I did this while still running, of course. My new gargantuan companion decided to go on a short jog with me as well.  When I finally was ready to go back into my house, my pal was waiting and ready to go inside his new "home".  I held his collar and, after giving him a big hug (he really was quite affectionate), found the owner's address and phone number on a tag hanging from it: the dog had escaped his kennel in his yard and had already gone way down the road from his proper home.  The owner, obviously flustered at this probably-repeat canine Houdini act, drove by, thanked me, and took old Jake into her car.

Jake reminded me of another dog with his sociability: T-Bone from back in my childhood.  But T-Bone was relatively small and didn't practically knock people down by jumping on them or scare them by charging at them.

Other people besides me are using the road to walk dogs (properly on leashes), walk with babies in strollers, or just walk/jog for exercise or basic transportation.  They don't need inconsiderate dog owners who are careless about letting their dogs run loose.  Especially when they are humungous, regardless of their ultimately friendly nature. Still, Jake was quite a friend to me that day: I wonder whether he'll remember me should he get loose again.  What am I saying...OF COURSE he's gonna get loose again!

Early to Rise, Late to Rest

I probably am not the most efficient person in the world pertaining to personal time management, but the fact remains that of late I have been experiencing "full" days, rising around six in the morning and getting home from work around 11:30 in the night.  In between is a host of activities and routines, some externally imposed like work and doctor/dentist appointments (too many of these lately) and some internally imposed like writing, running, and foreign language study.  And I do have a family with which I want to stayed engaged and spend time together.  The result is a full life with me passing out tired at the end of the day, often without accomplishing some of the things I had set out to do.  One of these things is writing a daily blog article.

Not that very many people read this blog, but as I have said before, writing it is a good discipline with which I have been (more or less) successful for the last five years.  And I see no particular reason why I shouldn't make it a lifelong discipline as well...

So maybe you'll see some patches when I miss a day or two in a row.  Still, there are more than 1,700 articles in this blog and they cover a wide range of subject matter.  If you are looking for something in particular, just use the convenient search engine (next to the "B" for Blogger insignia) in the top left corner: it references just this blog's material...

Suns Eliminated, NBA Playoffs Around Corner

The Phoenix Suns, which for years has been my favorite team in the National Basketball Association due to their fantastic guard Steve Nash, found themselves eliminated from the playoffs after falling to Utah 100-88.  The game was closer and tougher than the final score, but a loss is a loss and the Suns simply didn't have enough to compensate for what, quite frankly, amounts to a long-term decline in this franchise's talent.  I don't understand how an organization like Phoenix, which once had an outstanding coach and an all-star cast of starters, would allow themselves to fall back so badly, leaving them relying on basically two players: their "franchise" star Steve Nash and Grant Hill.  And Hill has been injured for the last part of the season, leaving the team at an almost unforgivable disadvantage to other teams.  It reminds me of what happened to the Miami Dolphins in football over the past fifteen years.  Only...

I grew up in the Miami area and followed the Dolphins since 1968.  I will always be a fan of theirs, win or lose.  But I have no personal connection with the city of Phoenix, or the state of Arizona for that matter.  In fact, with the recent reactionary, hateful politics dominating that state in the last few years, I am inclined to root against them for that reason alone.  The only reason I pull for them to win anymore is Nash's presence on the team.  And if he ever leaves for another team (or retires), they can forget it, as far as I am concerned.

The playoffs are right around the corner, and I am excited at the upcoming action.  I see great potential for upsets this year, as well as long, protracted seven-game series...

Grueling Seasons, Cherished Memories

I just dropped off my daughter, a junior in high school (and a terrific, talented actor), for a post-production cast party at the home of her drama teacher.  The production was an ambitious musical adaptation of the Cinderella fairy tale, complete with a Rodgers and Hammerstein score.  There were nine grueling performances, and the cast I'm sure is relieved to be over and done with it (although in retrospect they'll most likely cherish the memories).  So their "season" of auditioning, memorizing lines, learning songs and choreography, rehearsing, performing, and (now) celebrating this play is almost over.  I, too, experienced memories of an old bygone (and grueling) personal season of sorts when I drove through the party site's neighborhood: I hadn't been there since I had trained for and run my first marathon in late 2010 and early 2011.

For several weeks back then, I was building up my running distance by devising new extensions to my already-established course.  I did this largely by running in different subdivisions further and further west from my home (which was the start/end point).  In the end, during the longest runs comprising 15+ miles, I entered this relatively distant neighborhood, comprised of large, older homes well spaced apart on sloping, winding roads and interspersed with pretty woods.  Although I was usually tired by the time I reached this area on those runs, I always looked forward to running through the beautiful surroundings.  I also remember what I was always playing on my MP3 as I ran: a shuffle of Radiohead songs spanning all of their studio albums (along with some "extras"). To this day, when I hear one of those songs, it often takes me back to that era (and area)...

I think that sometimes we may conclude that a worthy, fulfilling experience is closed off from us ever repeating due to some adverse circumstances that come along and trip us up (what I call the "obdurate future" with recognition to Stephen King).  My super-long training runs back then, topped off by that 26.6-mile run on 1/15/11 (and passing through that aforementioned neighborhood), were largely physically unpleasant but satisfying to me on a deep, personal level.  But even should I decide not to repeat the goal of training for marathons in the future, outside circumstances or not, I can still run (or even just walk) through that subdivision and experience its beauty through the simple expedient of parking in either a nearby shopping center or church parking lot and using that as a closer starting point for my running (or walking)...

But of course, part of the whole experience was my outrageous goal of running a marathon at age 54 and those long, long sessions on the road. Who knows what the future may bring: there may be other kinds of similar "marathon"-caliber endeavors on the horizon for me, although they'll probably have absolutely nothing to do with running!

Bad Book, Good Book

I made a very inexpensive mistake the other day...or was it really a mistake?  I went to a local bookstore (the Gainesville Book Company) that is only open every two weeks but sells used books at a large discount.  For $2.25, I picked up paperback novels by Patricia Cornwell, David Balducci, and ... Harold Robbins.  That last name intrigued me because of the reference that Star Trek characters Kirk and Spock made to him in their fourth movie The Voyage Home, Robbins described in retrospect as being one of the "masters".  Although I had never read anything of his before, I knew that he had a profane, raunchy style of writing.  Well, the book I read, Never Enough, was plenty of both.  Unfortunately, the story was also incredibly disjointed, spread out over decades and stopping here and there to cover various events along the way.  About a third of the way through, I threw up my hands in frustration and switched to another of my purchases.  Then I discovered that, although Harold Robbins was listed as Never Enough's author, no, actually the book was written by an unknown author after Robbins' death, albeit imitating his style.  So in truth, I still have yet to read anything by Harold Robbins (not that I am particularly interested in doing so anymore).

The next book I picked up (and now reading) was Patricia Cornwell's crime mystery Trace.  It features the return of crime sleuth Doctor Kay Scarpetta as a medical examiner. Cornwell's writing is a pleasure to follow, especially after the unpleasant experience with the Robbins imposter.  By the way, this is my first Patricia Cornwell book...

Friends of the Library Book Sale Returns

My local newspaper The Gainesville Sun has a good article about the upcoming semiannual Friends of the Library book sale, to take place this Saturday through next Wednesday.  The books and media are used and dirt cheap, attracting hordes of hoarders (with their cardboard boxes) from all over the region.  It has gotten to be quite a tradition for me, not that I usually purchase very much here.  But it does paint a stark contrast with how the publishing industry has been headed in recent years.

When I walk into the huge Jacksonville Town Center Barnes and Noble bookstore, I am struck by how the sales section for their electronic Nook reader has taken over a large section of the store's center, appearing to be eating away at the surrounding hard copy paper book displays.  The push is definitely on for customers to abandon paper in favor of readers like Nook or Kindle.  At the same time, there seems to be an increasing popular fervor over old cheap used books, which still completely undersell the electronic downloads.  Besides, there are myriad out-of-print old books still under copyright but which are unavailable electronically.  Some of these can be bought over the Internet, and many are quite cheap.  But nothing beats these used book sales, except...

The library still stands out as the great bargain location for books and media.  Unless you have some kind of obsession about possessing and accumulating books, simply checking them out will usually do quite nicely.  And now you can also download books from the library free of charge electronically, either on your reading device or on your computer.  Good deal, I say...

Still, I will most probably return to the Friends book sale and try to find some remote parking spot, after which I will jostle with the crowds and look for books that are put out for sale without any regard whatsoever for alphabetical order.  And then, of course, after I'm done browsing and am ready to check out, the line shouldn't be too hard to find: sometimes it is so long that it snakes through and around the warehouse-size sales floor!

Crummy Campaign Makes Me Want to Skip TV News

I may have to just skip watching the news on TV altogether until after Election Day this November.  It is so, so tedious listening to candidates, their hired spin doctors, and the hack media “pundits” laying out the political manure thicker and ever thicker, until the stench is unbearable.  So until it’s over, I say goodbye to CNN, HLN, FoxNews, MSNBC, and the “old three” ABC-CBS-NBC.  Besides, I can get my news easily from the newspaper and the Internet.  After all, it’s going to be bad enough having to put up with the increasingly nasty mudslinging political ads for the next six and a half months…

There, that felt better just writing it out!

P.S. I still think that Newt Gingrich would have made a better Republican nominee than Mitt Romney.  For one, nobody, regardless of how conservative or liberal their political sentiments are, has the faintest clue as to what Mitt Romney would do were he elected as president (except possibly Mitt Romney, but then I’m not even sure about that).  With Gingrich, though, you can get a pretty good idea about his agenda.  Plus, Newt has some charisma going for him, something totally absent in the presumptive nominee.  And speaking of Gingrich, the landing of the space shuttle Discovery, riding piggyback on a large aircraft, at Washington D.C. earlier today reminded me how much the former Speaker of the House supported our space exploration efforts.  Neither Obama nor Romney seems to have the slightest interest or vision for the space program, sorry to say…

List Madness: I Rank the James Bond Movies

Before any arguments ensue, let me take a page from the late Richard Milhaus Nixon's repertoire and "make one thing perfectly clear": this rankings list is solely based on my relative enjoyment of the James Bond movies.  For example, I have heard good things about On Her Majesty's Secret Service with its one-time Bond portrayer George Lazenby, but I personally thought this Bond was completely off-character.  And some others have blasted the two movies featuring Timothy Dalton as Bond, especially License to Kill.  But once again I'm going by my own preferences and I thought Dalton was a great James Bond.  To each his own, I suppose.  Anyway, here is my list.  Following each movie title (and year) I have the actor playing James Bond in abbreviations: Sean Connery [SC], George Lazenby [GL], Roger Moore [RM], Timothy Dalton [TD], Pierce Brosnan [PB], and Daniel Craig [DC].

1-Goldeneye, 1995 [PB]
2-Casino Royale, 2006 [DC]
3-You Only Live Twice, 1967 [SC]
4-License to Kill, 1989 [TD]
5-Doctor No, 1962 [SC]
6-For Your Eyes Only, 1981 [RM]
7-Thunderball, 1965 [SC]
8-Die Another Day, 2002 [PB]
9-Diamonds Are Forever, 1971 [SC]
10-Goldfinger, 1964 [SC]
11-The Living Daylights, 1987 [TD]
12-The Spy Who Loved Me, 1977 [RM]
13-From Russia With Love, 1963 [SC]
14-Live and Let Die, 1973 [RM]
15-Moonraker, 1979 [RM]
16-Octopussy, 1983 [RM]
17-Tomorrow Never Dies, 1997 [PB]
18-A View to a Kill, 1985 [RM]
19-The Quantum of Solace, 2008 [DC]
20-The World is Not Enough, 1999 [PB]
21-The Man With the Golden Gun, 1974 [RM]
22-On Her Majesty's Secret Service, 1969 [GL]
23-Never Say Never Again, 1983 [SC]

I understand a new Daniel Craig Bond movie is coming out this year.  Let's hope that it returns to the level of Casino Royale...

Yanks Home Game on ESPN Now

Ah, yes, this is the way it should be... I'm sitting back in my recliner right now on my day off, enjoying a home New York Yankees game on ESPN HD.  And to top it off, it's the bottom of the fourth inning and the Yanks are beating their overrated opponent, the Los Angeles Angels, 5-1.  It's getting to be a spring ritual for me, each year getting to know the "new" Yankee lineup.  Of course, there are the old stalwarts like Swisher, Jeter, Rodriguez, and Rivera.  But there are also new faces as well.  Well, I guess I'll just sit back now and enjoy the action (and the long, long stretches of accompanying inaction)...

NBA Musings

In spite of my earlier conviction that I would never be interested anymore in the National Basketball Association after the pointless impasse between management and labor that resulted in the threatened cancellation of this season, I can't deny my interest in this exciting sport.  So the greedy money grubbers all eventually realized that, regardless of which side of the conflict they were on, they stood to lose an enormous amount of money from prolonging it.  An agreement was consequently quickly reached in time to salvage a shortened regular season.  But I was bummed out anyway over the incredible avarice going on here...

Still, although in an indirect sense I'm probably paying for this league of the filthy rich through advertising and TV programming rates, I am not paying any more than anyone else. I may choose to watch a game on TV instead of something else, but I am not attending games.  Nor do I buy anything that has the official endorsement of the NBA, its teams, or players.  But I have found avoiding the NBA to be difficult, so here I am close to the end of the regular season and beginning to look forward to the playoffs.

Steve Nash and the Phoenix Suns are my personal favorites: this is because Nash is my favorite NBA player.  His playmaking intelligence and skill on offense reminds me of Peyton Manning's mastery of offense in football.  Were he playing for another team, I'd be rooting for them instead.  However, the Suns just might miss out on the playoffs this year.  And there are other teams I tend to support as well.

Here are my favorite NBA teams, listed by preference:

1--Phoenix Suns
2--San Antonio Spurs
3--Dallas Mavericks
4--Boston Celtics
5--Chicago Bulls

And here are the NBA teams I oppose the most, starting with my least liked:

1--Los Angeles Lakers
2--Oklahoma City Thunder
3--Well, that's it, actually...these are the only two teams I really want to see lose.  I used to be vehemently against the Miami Heat, but something recently completely turned my opinion of them around. When Peyton Manning was considering joining up with the Miami Dolphins, Heat stars Dwyane Wade and Lebron James publicly promoted the NFL franchise and expressed their wishes that the star quarterback would move his career to Miami.  So what that it didn't work? That still left me with a good enough feeling about them that I often find myself rooting for the Miami Heat (unless they're playing one of my aforelisted "Top Five", that is)...

One way for the Thunder to redeem themselves to me would be for them to defeat the Lakers in the playoffs, should they find themselves matched up in a series.  As for the Lakers, they can redeem themselves if they do but one thing: get rid of Andrew Bynum, who assaulted a Dallas player on the court during a playoff game last year. I can't root for any team that would accept this kind of thuggery...

The Worst James Bond Movie Ever

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion: as for me, the worst James Bond movie ever made is the 1983 Never Say Never Again, a rogue production not fitting in (at all) with the "official" series.  The story wasn't even original, with the plot and characters from the 1965 blockbuster hit Thunderball shamelessly ripped off with the story flow very sporadic. But the most disappointing aspect of Never Say Never Again was the dismal performance of original Bond actor Sean Connery, after much fanfare was made about him returning to his old role. Connery appeared stone-faced and apathetic throughout the movie, as if he were just there on the set to clock in to work, put in the time, and pick up his paycheck.

This movie also has by far the worst scene in the entire James Bond series, an overly long, drawn out fight, almost seeming to be conducted in slow motion, between the aging Bond and one of the heavies.  What a sad, sad spectacle.

The one redeeming element of Never Say Never Again was the scintillatingly villainous performance of Barbara Carrera, who played a sadistic, sexy assassin working for the evil SPECTRE crime organization. But she was in the movie too little, sad to say, to salvage this monumental waste of the moviegoer's time.

It might be argued that the 1967 comedy/spoof Casino Royale was the worst James Bond movie, but it never had any pretensions to being anything other than a farcical vehicle to further showcase the comedic talent of Peter Sellers.  So generally speaking, that film doesn't get counted as being one of the James Bond movies.

And because of its independent nature apart from the other films in the series, some don't even count Never Say Never Again among the Bond collection.  But it's there, like it or not...although I challenge anyone to say that they liked it with a straight face (and not lying like a politician).

Perhaps accusing Never Say Never Again of being a rip-off of Thunderball is a bit unfair, though.  After reading up on it a bit, it seems that the whole Thunderball project was immersed in controversy and legal wrangling, with different parties claiming ownership over the story's rights.  So maybe I was pointing the "blame" finger at the wrong movie. Regardless, though, I thoroughly recommend Thunderball... and thoroughly DON'T recommend Never Say Never Again.

Welcome (Temporary) Reprieve from Smoky Haze

A fire currently consuming about 20,000 acres north of Gainesville, in the Columbia/Baker Counties border area, has sent noxious clouds of choking smoke southward to cover my once-fair city for the past few days, making a mockery out of any consideration of mine to do any outdoors running.  So instead I had been resorting to the indoor treadmill, which though is not as desirable as open-road running, at least suffices as a temporary measure.  Today, however, although I could still sniff a hint of smoke in the air, the haze had dramatically lifted enough for me to hit the road again.  This I did with gusto, finishing my run having covered 7.74 miles (with my customary near-constant pace, giving me a time of 1:09:11).

Yes, that was a pleasant reprieve from the haze, but I am realistic: the winds can and probably will shift again, sending the smoke back my way (in which case its the treadmill again).  Besides, as the parched ground is all around us in drought-stricken northern Florida, we already have a plethora of wildfires popping up all over the place, not just north of us.  Sadly, I don't see the situation improving anytime in the near future...

Michael Moore Invites You to Walk With Him

Michael Moore (you know who he is, right?) is one of those "Tweeters" whom I follow (I follow several highly opinionated people with political views spanning the spectrum).  In the recent few weeks, he has been doing something pretty cool: "virtual walking".  Well, maybe that's not quite as accurate a term as I would like: Moore actually is physically going out on walks.  He just would like to invite you to "share" in his experience by walking "with" him (in a virtual sense, that is).  So, for example, he'll tweet that he's going to begin his walk at 1 PM.  That means that people following him on Twitter can walk and, I suppose, communicate with him via the "Twit" app on their smart-phones. Or perhaps people will get some sort of feeling that, even though they may be out walking alone, in a sense they are somehow walking with Michael as well (and derive a feeling of social connection).

I wonder if somebody out there is interested in some "virtual running" as well, as I am more interested in that than I am in walking.  You don't need a celebrity like Michael Moore on Twitter, though: just finding someone on Facebook who is into running might work just as well...

Medical Concerns Cleared for a Year...Somewhat

Since last August, I have been experiencing an assortment of medical issues, with one of them overriding all of the others and making them seem trivial in comparison.  Yet through all these months of concern and medical test after medical test, I have experienced no symptoms arising from this condition, which if shown to be worsening, could demand some pretty heavy, major corrective surgery.  Yet on each successive test, culminating with today's, I have been the same as before, no worsening at all indicated.  So my chief medical specialist has decided to just space out the tests a year apart, a pretty good bit of news, if I may say so.  This means that, hopefully, I can live my life as I do right now without any changes.  Still, I was cautioned against overly strenuous physical activity, which the good doctor seems to think includes marathons and even half-marathons (on the former, I agree; with the latter, no).  Oh well, those races are overpriced to run in anyway, I guess, and here in Florida they're only offered in late fall and the winter.  Still, I can engage in some shorter distance events (which are cheaper) just to get a little social dimension going with my running hobby, and these shorter races are more of a year-round proposition.

So let me check out the upcoming local races and get myself back into the swing of things.  If I do decide to participate in a race, though, it will be not to finish ahead of others or to achieve a fast time.  Rather, it will be for me a fun meeting with other people who share my interest in running.

Stephen King’s Obdurate Past, My Obdurate Future

Stephen King, in his latest novel 11/22/63, repeatedly refers to the past as being obdurate in nature.  What does he mean by this?

First, you need to understand King’s context here.  11/22/63 is a story about time travel, specifically of someone (the protagonist, Jake Epping) who is able to “step backward” from 2011 to 1958…and then try to prevent John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1963.  During his struggles to rectify history and make things “right”, he encounters all sorts of inexplicable obstacles to the fulfillment of his quest that seem random and happenstance.  So the past is obdurate, according to Epping’s first person account of his experiences: it does not want to change and will resist efforts by time travelers to alter history, well-intentioned or not.  After reading 11/22/63, I have something to add to Stephen King’s observation regarding the nature of time: it isn’t just the past that is obdurate: so is the future!

I think that there is a good reason that many people believe in the inevitability of fate, in spite of their willful attempts to determine their own destinies.  I myself have had my own personal projects that seemed to be stymied in crucial moments by seemingly unrelated reasons, causing me great discouragement.  But you know, for those endeavors in which I matched time’s stubborn resistance to change with my own stubborn determination to succeed and never gave up, it seemed to have the ultimate effect of “changing time’s mind” to the point where it recognized the new path that I had made for myself as the legitimate progression into the future.  So this obduracy of time may just be a device, implanted within our own consciousness, to filter out the things we actually care enough about to commit ourselves to, even in the face of daunting and arbitrary obstacles.

This Blog is Five Years Old Today

Today marks the fifth anniversary of this blog of mine.  The past few weeks have been more sports-oriented...well, modify that to spectator-sports-oriented...well, modify that again to couch-potato-in-front-of-the-television-sports-oriented!  Oh, well, that seems to be where my attention tends to be directed right now.  I'm haven't been in much of a philosophical state of mind lately, and politically speaking I feel such a sense of hopelessness about the breakdown of political leadership around me, as well as the incredibly inane, ridiculously low level that the 2012 presidential campaign season has come to, that it pains me too much to write about it.  And although I often write about personal matters (such as my running), even that has been subdued for various reasons, some of which I would rather not discuss in this type of forum.

Still, I plan to keep plugging away at it, and hopefully you will be able to derive something of interest and/or value from my writings, which of late have veered somewhat away from serious matters and more toward sports and entertainment...

Statistics and Carlos Pena

If there is one thing I know about major league baseball, it is that statistics dominate discussions about the sport.  But statistics simply don't always serve as a good predictor of what's going to happen in any particular game.  Take yesterday's season-opening contest between the Tampa Bay Rays and the New York Yankees.  Rays fans were welcoming, after a year's absence, Carlos Pena back to the team.  Unfortunately, he had been suffering through a serious batting slump in the preseason, hitting only around .100.  To compound things, the starting pitcher for the Yankees, CC Sabathia, had thoroughly handled Pena in past games, with the Rays batter only able to muster one measly hit in more than 20 plate appearances.  And then there is the Yankees star relief pitcher, Mariano Rivera, against whom Pena had been hitless.  Sounds like a hitless game to me for Carlos, right? Wrong!

All Pena does is hit a grand slam home run against Sabathia in the first inning and then drive in the winning run in the bottom of the ninth with another hit, this time against nemesis Rivera.  So...just throw the statistics out the window, for all that they're worth!

2012 MLB Season Commences

The Major League Baseball season has begun again, with all 30 teams entertaining high hopes for 2012.  I am looking forward to watching a few games, although I don't plan to be fanatical about it.  As for the teams I plan to follow, this year I'm going to play it cool and just get to know those teams whose games are broadcast more often.  Here in Florida, a channel broadcasts Tampa Bay Rays and Miami Marlins games. Sometimes I can pick up a game on the MLB channel.  And ESPN tends to spotlight games featuring teams in major markets like New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles.  And, oh yeah, there's that WGN/Chicago channel, which will broadcast a few Cubs and White Sox games.

Above and beyond watching baseball to root for "my" team of the moment, I enjoy just sitting there watching the interaction between pitcher, hitter, and catcher, regardless who is playing or what the score is.  And keeping track of the unfolding situation within each half-inning as hitters reach base (or not) and managers try to figure how to score runs (or prevent them) can be pretty interesting as well.

Here are some things in baseball I'm NOT interested in: Fantasy Baseball, which players are making the most money, behind-the scenes talk about players and managers, and excessive attention to obscure statistics (e.g. Batter "X" is hitting .286 with a runner on second with one out in road games against teams in the same division).

Oh, one other thing I like about baseball: with the high-definition picture quality available today, I can not only enjoy watching the game: I can also enjoy watching the people in the stands watching the game!

Kentucky's Fans Are a Riot

The University of Kentucky won the NCAA championship basketball tournament Monday evening with a 67-59 win over Kansas, after its fans had rioted in the streets, spreading vandalism following their victory over cross-state rival Louisville in the semi-final game Saturday.

I have never been able to figure out the mindset of Kentucky fans, anyway.  Violent riots because of happiness after a win?  H-m-m.  It brings to mind what they once did following a home football game against my Florida Gators. 

It was back in the 1990's sometime while UF had Spurrier as their coach.  The Gators were in Lexington, just whippin' up on the Wildcats on a Saturday afternoon (like they usually do).  As I recall, the score was something like 55-7 in the fourth quarter.  Then, Kentucky managed three straight scores and was able to cut the final margin to 55-28, still a runaway Florida victory by any account.  Also, you could easily imagine the amount of substitution going on with second-string Florida players getting some on-field playing opportunities.  So that "great" Kentucky fourth quarter wasn't exactly comparable to a match between first teams. Still, after the game was over the Kentucky fans were so enthralled by their last three touchdowns that they acted as if they had actually won the game, rushing en masse out onto the field and even taking down their own goalposts! Still, as hilarious as that may seem, at least they didn't riot as they did the other night.

I have relatives on my wife's side of the family living in Lexington, and they naturally root for UK and are thrilled with their championship.  Good for them.  I wonder, though, what they think about the riots...

My Running in March and (Hopefully) April

After missing five straight days of running due to illness and recovery, I finally got back into the swing of things today, hopefully reestablishing my earlier routine.  I ran 6.2 miles on my local YMCA's treadmill, avoiding the summer-like ninety degree conditions outside.

March represented a mixture of success and failure with my running.  Until I got sick, I had been keeping up with my projected 100 miles for the month.  But I still finished with a respectable 89.08 miles.  I ran on 23 of the 31 days in March, with my longest run being for 8.0 miles. 

April may turn out to be problematic for my running for a few reasons, some of which I will withhold from this blog.  But one stands out: the weather looks to be hotter than it has been for this time of the year, so the mileage figures may drop on that account alone. Still, on a day-to-day basis at least, my plan is to consistently go out and run a moderate amount each day and let the future take care of itself...

Stephen King's 11/22/63

I have finished reading Stephen King's latest novel, his time travel story 11/22/63.  From the title (and that you now know it involves time travel), you can probably surmise its overriding theme: an attempt to go back in time to prevent the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy on that date.  Having already witnessed an early Twilight Zone episode with the protagonist "stepping back" to try and avert Lincoln's assassination, I was "taken aback" myself, in a manner of speaking, the other day when, while channel surfing I landed upon a "later" Twilight Zone episode with its hero thwarting JFK's murder itself.  So the formula is definitely an old one...

I liked Stephen King's version of this theme because, in his typical fashion that I have come to appreciate, it has great character development, coupled with a greatly detailed exposition of those times (1958-1963) in which the time travel took place.  And it resonates with me personally, because although I was only a little kid at the time, I remember what that era was like as well.

Every (good) author of time travel tales brings something unique and special to the genre.  King, this age's master storyteller, naturally does as well with his revelation that the past is obdurate: it does not want to change and will act to hinder any change-minded travelers by setting up obstacles in their path.  Throughout the story this theme takes on a sinister nature, with the past being the enemy of protagonist Jake Epping and causing all sorts of problems (and even tragedies).  But at the end...well, I guess you may already know, the end of Stephen King stories can pack a pretty big punch, and regarding the "obdurate past", it's a pretty heavy blow, as well as a perspective-shifter...

One of my all-time favorite time-travel movies is Groundhog Day, a non science-fiction comedy that, at least to me, has the Hindu-like theme of repeating one's living existence until perfection is attained (King touches upon this as well in his Dark Tower series). In both Groundhog Day and 11/22/63, there is a feature I term the "reset button" in which whatever the time traveler just changed in the past gets wiped clean and the past goes back to being just as it was before the "meddling".  When I learned of the "reset" in 11/22/63, I felt that this would be a device used somehow to end the story.  Was I right? Ego-inflating or not, I'm not saying.  After all, I want YOU to read Mr. King's excellent story and throw some feedback my way...

Unattractive NCAA Title Game: Ky vs Kan

The NCAA men's championship basketball game is set for Monday, with my least favorite team in the tournament, Kentucky, favored to beat Kansas.  Kentucky got there by beating "my" team, Louisville, 69-61.  And Kansas held off Ohio State 64-62.  I'm pulling for Kansas in the finale, in the same spirit that I rooted for the New York Giants to upset the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl five years ago.  But then again, we're talking about Kentucky in basketball, not New England in football.

Governor Etch-a-Sketch and President Open Mike

Just to illustrate how futile this presidential campaign season truly is, here are a couple of examples that should enlighten you, whatever your political perspective may be. Recently, one of GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney's campaign managers, in a television interview, dismissed his "guy's" shameless catering to the extreme right wing of his party by comparing his campaign to the toymaker Ohio Art Company's flawed product Etch-a-Sketch: once Romney is assured of nomination, he'll just, like the children's toy, conveniently erase the image he's been pushing for the past six years and create a brand new one that the centrist voters will supposedly buy.  And during a recent summit meeting with figurehead Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, President Obama leaned over to confidentially tell real power Vladimir Putin's dupe that once he (Obama) is reelected, then they (Obama and Putin) can deal with some of the more thorny missile defense issues between the two countries.  Unfortunately for the President, there was an open microphone that picked up his comments.

So both candidates, Romney and Obama, should be suffering heavily now for these gaffes, right?  Well, the last public opinion poll shows Obama picking back up the ten percent in job approval rating he had most recently lost due to spiking gasoline prices.  And Romney continues to chug on toward the Republican nomination with his arsenal of fatcat donors and a not-so-surprising endorsement from George H.W. Bush.

With the way that news is presented nowadays, one channel, FoxNews, made a lot of hay about Obama's open mike gaffe, while another, MSNBC, pushed the story about Romney's "Etch-a-Sketch" campaign. CNN covered both but dwelt on neither: both stories are apparently gone and forgotten, as far as they are concerned.  I suppose the upshot to all this is that neither story is strong enough to sway the problematic "undecided" voter, who will probably wait until just before the election and then make their decision based on completely irrelevant, emotional, and stupid reasons.

Being a kid once, I had myself yearned for an Etch-a-Sketch back in the early-to-mid 1960s.  I had seen the commercials showing how easy it was to draw pictures on the screen, which gave the appearance of something very high tech (at least from a child's perspective).  But one Christmas I got one as a gift and was very disappointed when I discovered that I could only draw straight vertical or horizontal lines on it.  Those TV ads were a fraud and I knew it, although I hadn't yet learned the word "fraud".  So when I first heard of the political reference to Etch-a-Sketch a few days ago, my fraud-sensitive ears automatically perked up...

Viral Attack Nixes March Running Goal

It doesn’t look as if I will be attaining my monthly running goal of 100 miles in March.  I had been keeping pace with that goal, but Tuesday afternoon a severe respiratory virus hit me hard and I have been sidelined.  Maybe I’ll be able to resume running by Saturday, but that won’t be enough to make up the difference.

I’ve had my share of seasonal allergies and sinus infections in recent years, but I have usually successfully avoided colds, the flu, and any nasty virus in between.  But not this week, unfortunately.  Usually, I can function through the sinus infections and allergies.  But a virus can completely shut me down, which by Wednesday was exactly what happened.  Today seems a little better, though, and I foresee further improvement tomorrow.   But when I was in the worst part of it yesterday, I couldn’t imagine ever recovering, it felt so bad…

The Neighborhood Terrorist

The recent tragedy of the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, an innocent teenager shot to death by overly zealous "citizen cop" George Zimmerman in a Sanford, Florida subdivision, has yet to be fully investigated. But this story has strongly galvanized public opinion, which seems to largely be going down the path of a narrative of racial persecution. Martin was black and his shooter wasn't. End of story, here comes Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and company to instantly whip up furor about how blacks can't even walk the streets without the danger of being persecuted, even to the point of death. Sadly, I think that they are correct. But there is a broader, even more ominous issue involved here, partially obscured by the racial framing of this tragedy.

I do my running primarily around my home neighborhood, in which I have lived since 1989. I run down the same streets and past the same houses over and over (and over) again. I'm not black nor do I wear a hoodie when running. In fact, I look like some pathetic white middle-age codger with a running shirt, shorts, cap, and running shoes. I hold (very visibly) a Gatorade bottle in my hand while running. Still, from time to time I have the unsettling experience of noticing vehicles slowing down around me and even stopping in the middle of the road as I run by, as if they are trying to determine whether I "belong" in "their" neighborhood. There seems to be this presumption that pedestrians are de facto suspicious and motorists are de facto legitimate, when in reality it is the person alone on the street who is more vulnerable to the motorist.

The idea that people-at-large can pack guns on themselves and go about judging who "belongs" and who doesn't, frankly, scares me. As a matter of fact, it is a form of terrorism, as far as I am concerned. This dude Zimmerman was warned by the police not to follow Martin, but he kept on. He was the aggressor, but in his mind he was the "good guy" trying to protect the neighborhood. And that's the operating definition of a vigilante: someone who thinks they're the "good guy" and who presumes the personal right to enforce their judgements against the "bad guys", even with violence and killing. But the effect of this behavior is to terrorize people to the point where they are too afraid to walk the streets in their own neighborhood anymore. So we're talking about more than a vigilante: the term "terrorist" fits more to me.

I have to compare which type of terrorism threatens me the most, the "Al-Qaeda" brand that brings out the stereotypical image of an Islamic extremist, or the home-based type in which individuals run rampant imposing their (often prejudicial) black-and-white worldviews on others with the force of arms. And I sadly must conclude that it is the latter category that imposes the greatest threat to me. By far. How about you?

Early Evening Sky Spectacle Returns

Looking out upon the west early in the evening, I see once again a spectacle involving the moon, Jupiter, and Venus. Only this time it is Venus above Jupiter, still very beautiful to behold. And now, looking toward the east, I see Saturn as well.

I wonder how many people even look up in the evening sky, and then, of those who do, how many know or even care about what they see...

NCAA Hoops Down to Final Four

This year's edition of the NCAA men's basketball championship tournament has come down to the Final Four stage. The sixteen teams good enough to make it that far have gone through twelve games over the past four days. In my article written on the morning of 3/22, I ranked the teams in two ways: (1) by which ones I liked the most (or least), and (2) by how good I thought they were. As for the games just played, in the "Happiness" category" (1), I went 7-5. In the "I'm-a-Smart-Ass" category (2), I went 10-2, once again exemplifying what I have been told by others in my past: I'm too smart for my own happiness!

There are three games left and then a new champion will replace last year's, which was of course... (do you remember?)...oh yeah, Connecticut. The teams left are Kansas, Louisville, Ohio State, and favored Kentucky. If things go the way I WANT, Louisville will beat Kentucky, Ohio State will beat Kansas, and then Louisville will beat Ohio State for the national championship. The way I THINK it will go down, though, sadly looks to be completely different: Kentucky beats Louisville, Kansas beats Ohio State, and Kentucky beats Kansas for the title. Yuck!

"Sway" Voters Bother Me to No End

It should amaze me to note how quickly presidential approval rises or falls from week to week, or how much relative preferences in polls dramatically shift from one candidate to another in a campaign. After all, the president or a candidate may say something silly or even disagreeable from time to time, but that should not be enough to account for the sometimes drastic shifts in public opinion polls. If Obama's approval rating was recently at 50% and now it's suddenly down to 40%, something substantial must be causing this, right?

The only discernible reason I see for the 10% drop in our president's job approval rating is the sudden hike in gas prices, which brings up an interesting point. All I've heard from the right for the last four years is how Barack Obama is a socialist who wants the federal government to manage the economy. These voices fervently support the idea of a privately-based free market in which prices for goods and services are regulated, not by the state, but rather by the law of supply and demand. Well, I suppose that's all very good and fine if prices are cheap, but when the market for a necessary commodity (in this case it's oil) dictates a rapid spike in price, somehow it is the "socialist" president's fault for not directly intervening with the authority of the government to hold costs down.

As for the presidential candidates running on the Republican side, I can't for the life of me figure out the drastic changes in polls from even one day to the next. After all this time, you might rationally suppose that people, with all of the media access available to them these days, would have been able to form their own opinions and preferences regarding these candidates. Instead, a large swath of the voting population seems to be content with swaying with the political breeze. It's these "sway" voters who scare me more than the demagogues seeking power and who also have inspired the kind of almost insanely negative and largely dishonest campaign banter that has been inflicted upon this nation over the course of recent months...

C'mon, if you haven't been able to figure out whom you support or oppose by now, you might just as well stay home and forget about it, as far as I'm concerned. Because, quite frankly, that would mean you're just the kind of voter who would put a real problem into office (and into power) because of some vague, irrational, and emotional appeal ...

Tebow to Jets

A couple of days ago it was announced that Denver had traded their previous year's starting quarterback Tim Tebow to the New York Jets. After all, they now have their "messiah" Peyton Manning who will supposedly lead them to Super Bowl glory, although he only won one Super Bowl in fourteen seasons with the Indianapolis Colts and the dude is, well, getting along in years and coming off four neck operations. So Tim will be packing up and joining an outfit rife with dissension and with a starting quarterback in Mark Sanchez who has been publicly criticized by his teammates, is very inconsistent with his play, and by all accounts is probably the touchiest quarterback in the league. Oh that's just great, the sports media pundits say soaking with sarcasm, that's all Sanchez needs. The minute he throws a pass off the mark, the Tebow maniacs in the stands will be screaming for their hero to take over! Yeah, what was the Jets management thinking anyway?

I did hear a couple of people on ESPN and sports talk radio mention that fact that the Jets offensive coordinator this year is Tony Sparano, who employed the wildcat offense when he was coaching Miami. A player like Tebow is perfect for this formation, which necessitates a run-proficient quarterback. In Miami, Sparano employed pass-savvy running back Ronnie Brown for this role.

The smart thing for the Jets to do regarding Tim Tebow is to throw him into the game on third (or fourth)-and-short situations, a scenario that he excelled at in his freshman year at Florida in 2006 when they won the first of two national championships in three years. Back then he never threatened to replace the Gator starting QB Chris Leak and still got into the game in crucial situations. Playing him this way would throw defenses into confusion while releasing the pressure, both from Tebow and from his fan base, to give him game appearances. And providing Tebow an assigned, specialized role like this would also give Sanchez a sense of security at his starting position.

Once it became clear that Peyton Manning was going to join Denver, the vicious attacks against Tim Tebow's abilities as a starting quarterback in the NFL resumed in the sports media. This in spite of the undeniable fact that he was the pivotal agent responsible for his team turning a dismal, cellar-dwelling season around and making the playoffs for the first time in years. And then going on to knock off heavily-favored Pittsburgh in their first playoff game.

I think that some teams are clueless about effectively using a player like Tebow with his special (and very useful) set of skills. Denver falls into the clueless category. They could have kept their starter Kyle Orton for the last two years while sending in Tebow for those aforementioned short-yardage situations. Instead they allowed an avoidable quarterback controversy to fester. A Sparano-led Dolphins team could have integrated this talented, positive, tough, and spirited asset into their offense in similar manner. I don't think the current Dolphin leadership understands this, though. They, like Denver's John Elway, are thoroughly immersed in the doctrine that the NFL is a PASSING league, by gum, and not even wins and a division title under a different strategy will sway them. But the Jets might be conducive to adapting their offense...and since they are in the same division as my Dolphins, the prospect of facing them twice a year with the Tebow "wild-card" element factored in scares me a little...

Oh, one more point. Can any franchise be more clueless than the pathetic Jacksonville Jaguars, who had a chance to obtain the one player who would fill their half-empty stadium every home game? Their new owner is on record as saying that had he owned the Jaguars back when Tebow was in the draft, he would have sought him. Where was this master of hindsight, though, when he actually had the chance to pick him up? I don't know, but wherever he was he was sitting on his hands. Then again, the college draft is coming up next month, along with the opportunity for further wheeling and dealing. Maybe Tim Tebow shouldn't get too comfortably settled in New York just yet...

NCAA Sweet Sixteen: My Preferences and Rankings

Seeing that this is the morning of another day of tournament competition, I think that if I want to make my preferences and predictions for the "Sweet Sixteen" colleges remaining in play for the NCAA basketball championship, I had better do it now, before the fact. Instead of filling out a bracket, though, I will list the teams I want to win the most, with my personal ranking of each team's real excellence level in parentheses. Here goes...

1 Florida (7)
2 North Carolina (6)
3 North Carolina State (12)
4 Louisville (4)
5 Indiana (14)
6 Baylor (9)
7 Xavier (15)
8 Ohio State (8)
9 Cincinnati (13)
10 Ohio (16)
11 Wisconsin (10)
12 Michigan State (5)
13 Marquette (11)
14 Kansas (3)
15 Syracuse (2)
16 Kentucky (1)

As you should be able to see, my prospects for a happy tournament ending are bleak, with my three least favorite teams also happening to the three BEST teams. Still, Florida is currently playing their best basketball of the year. And if ANYONE manages to beat Kentucky during the tournament, I'll regard that as a personal victory of sorts. But don't count on it: they are, in my opinion, head and shoulders above the rest of the field...

NFL QB Musical Chairs Continues

As I continue to dwell disproportionately on sports topics this month, I would like to comment on the quarterback musical chairs game currently being played out in the NFL. Most of the commentary I hear and read concerns Peyton Manning signing with Denver and the impending trade or release of their quarterback last year, Tim Tebow. But other things are happening as well, including miffed quarterbacks in Tennessee and San Francisco who feel betrayed by their team's management for having gone out to get Manning to essentially replace them. This is especially the case with 49er Alex Smith, who had a spectacular breakthrough season last year and who was speaking recently with the Dolphins. Miami, for their part, signed David Garrard, formerly of Jacksonville. This after Jacksonville signed Chad Henne, formerly of Miami. Are you keeping up with this?

I like Garrard a lot, and if he stays healthy, he could be the catalyst for success that Miami has been missing over the past few seasons. However, their other quarterback contending for the starting job, Matt Moore, did play well once he was giving the starting role last year. So I see a good situation down south. As for Henne, maybe playing in another city will help his career; after high initial hopes, he never seemed to click for Miami.

Tim Tebow, I'm sure, will be picked up one way or another by another team, but it may be a long time (if ever) before he gets his starting role back as quarterback. He wins games and generates fan enthusiasm and media interest. Sounds like a formula that an NFL owner would have to take very seriously before passing up on him. I just don't want him down in Miami with fans screaming for him every time Garrard or Moore goofs up on a play...

Peyton to Join Denver Broncos

Today it has been revealed that much-sought-after veteran NFL quarterback Peyton Manning, after a relatively short period of “shopping around” the league for a team of his preference, has decided to sign with the Denver Broncos. It is interesting, at least to me, that John Elway, the team’s executive vice-president and a celebrated Bronco Super Bowl-winning Hall of Fame quarterback in his own right, was the chief force bringing in Manning. After all, when Elway was first drafted into the league in 1983, it was by the (then Baltimore) Colts, the same franchise that cut Manning less than two weeks ago. Back then, though, Elway had warned the Colts that he simply would not play for them. But they drafted him nevertheless and ended up trading him to Denver. And now, another Colts-to Broncos history repeater…

Being a Miami Dolphins fan, I was disappointed that they failed to sign Peyton Manning. I thought he would have been a good fit for this talented team that needs an offensive leader. I was further disappointed when their other prospect, Green Bay’s backup quarterback Matt Flynn, decided to join the Seattle Seahawks instead of coming to the Dolphins. Now Miami is left wondering why they can’t seem to close the deal with their prospects.

Now that Peyton Manning is slated to become Denver’s starting quarterback next season, I would be very surprised were Tim Tebow to remain with the franchise. I think he’ll probably be traded, but to where? Please, oh please let it not be to the Miami Dolphins! I don't think that they have a clue about how to effectively use him...