Just Finished Reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

I just finished reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the first volume of the late Swedish writer Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy.  As you might suspect, the setting of this story is Sweden...and the trilogy's title refers to the name of the story's magazine that Mikael Blomvist, one of the two main protagonists, runs.  In this first story, he finds himself found guilty in the courts for defaming a seedy wealthy industrialist and readies himself for a short jail term.  He then finds his future plans radically altered by another aging industrialist, named Henrik Vanger, when the latter hires him to investigate the 1966 disappearance and presumed murder of his daughter Harriet.  Blomvist is chosen for this job largely because of the extensive background check performed for Vanger by Lisbeth Salander, an antisocial prodigy with a flair for getting in trouble with the authorities...and the other main protagonist.  The novel involves several other characters, including several "suspects' in the Vanger family...but Blomvist and Salander are the standouts.  The story eventually has them meeting up with each other and becoming a formidable investigatory team, eventually solving the Harriet Vanger affair...and then going further with other matters.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is one of the best written thrillers I've come across in recent memory...and I've gone through quite a few lately.  The protagonists are very likeable and unforgettable, especially the enigmatic Salander.  I strongly recommend it to anyone who is into the mystery genre of fiction.  It was also recently made into a movie...featuring among others the British actor Daniel Craig, performing between James Bond roles.  Perhaps you've already seen it; I haven't yet, but since it's on Netflix I'll probably watch it now that I've read the book.  And I will most definitely be reading the next in the trilogy, titled The Girl Who Played with Fire...

Campaigns for Local March Election Underway

Late yesterday afternoon I was driving here in Gainesville along NW 43rd Street, northbound.  As I approached the 16th Boulevard intersection I saw several people smiling, waving at the passing cars, and holding up signs touting the candidacy of Annie Orlando for city commission.  I thought oh no, here we go again.  March local elections.

It never fails to amaze me that, with the already pathetically low voter turnout we have in this supposedly democracy-loving country of ours, my home town of Gainesville regularly holds its commission elections in March...when voter turnout is almost certain to be around a quarter of total registered voters or less.  This gives candidates with more extreme views and a more hardline, committed following of a relatively small number of voters the opportunity to sneak into elected office when a November election with its higher (but still too low) turnout would more likely prevent this from happening.  We have three races for our local government body that will be voted for on March 11...one at-large commission seat that will represent the whole city of Gainesville and two district seats that will represent certain sections. 

Aside from the fact that Annie Orlando is a Democratic Party candidate who seems to have establishment support for the at-large seat, and the Democrats usually win city-wide elections here in Gainesville, the alliterative, geographical, pop musical, and American historical nature of her name will probably garner a few extra votes as well.  The name Annie Orlando has that sonorous, alliterative ring to it, the Joe-Montana-like geographical glamour, the Tony-Orlando-and-Dawn pop musical allure (for those old fogies among us), and, last of all, the Annie Oakley American western history appeal...although that one is a tad more obscure than the others. 

I don't know which candidates I'll be voting for, but at least I'll find out more about who's running in the next few weeks and go to my precinct and cast my ballot on March 11.  I take my this civic responsibility of voting seriously and haven't missed an election in more than thirty years.  Annie, your name has pizazz but don't count on my vote unless I discover there's more substance behind it...

Finished Reading Michael Connelly's The Lincoln Lawyer

I recently finished reading my first Michael Connelly novel, which I had borrowed from my local public library.  Always a little unsure when I begin a new author, I was encouraged when I stepped up to the check-out counter and the attendant began praising my selection, titled The Lincoln Lawyer.  Later I found out that many others also liked this novel, with some claiming that it ranks as one of the best of Connelly's works.  It was not only his first foray into writing a story about law, but was also adapted into a film...about which I knew nothing. 

The Lincoln Lawyer is told in the first person by young hotshot (and very cynical) Los Angeles defense attorney Mickey Haller.  He definitely has his own philosophy about the legal profession that leaves little room to think about lofty concepts like principles and justice.  Still, as the story develops, something interesting happens: he begins to feel the pangs of a conscience and sets out to right what he considers wrongs that he has done...unintentional wrongs, but wrongs nonetheless. 

The story involves the defense of a spoiled and irresponsible rich young man, backed by his rich family, who is charged with aggravated assault and attempted murder of a young woman.  The defense investigation, as do typical fictional investigations, rankles some people and causes some severe responses.  Ultimately, the trial takes place under very conflicted circumstances for Haller.  The author kept me as a reader interested and in suspense, wondering both who was truly guilty and how the protagonist would be able to get himself extracted from the dilemma in which he had become trapped.  But the biggest impact this story had for me was its probing into the thoughts of opposing lawyers as they relate to presenting their sides of a case to a jury.

When I served as a juror a few months ago, I got the feeling that the lawyers on both sides were manipulating the jury with behavior that was designed to play on our emotions instead of providing us with the evidence and sufficient testimony we needed to arrive at an appropriate verdict.  Connelly's depiction of how trials are conducted did little to change my opinion...it only affirmed it. Both sides act on the surface with an air of deference and respect to those serving jury duty, but actually hold them in low regard. 

I liked The Lincoln Lawyer and will definitely seek out more of Michael Connelly's works.  As it turns out, he was born the same year I was, grew up and went to school in South Florida in the same county as me, just a few miles away, and now resides here in Gainesville.  Those coincidences are interesting...and admittedly a little creepy as well...

Mid-Life Medical Field Career Change Options

Yesterday I paid a visit to Santa Fe College here in Gainesville as a part of that institution's outreach to people 50+ years old who may be contemplating mid-life career changes or are possibly looking for something interesting and productive to do after retirement.  The focus was on careers in the medical field for which Santa Fe offered programs, such as nursing, respiratory care, nuclear medicine technology, cardiovascular technology, dental hygiene, and radiography.  I am interested in some of these, especially cardiovascular technology, nuclear medicine technology, and radiography.  These are areas of professional growth that will only be in higher demand as the years pass and the "baby boomers" enter a period in their lives of more prevalent medical care...along with the advances in technology to diagnose and treat them...and with a corresponding increased need for those trained to handed those new technologies. 

My father retired in 1982, at age 56.  He lived another 31 years, which although making  up a pretty decent life span at 87 years, also was marked, after retirement, by a retreat from the world and an ever-increasingly reclusive life within the walls of his house.  I do not ever want to be like that, even though I am reclusive by nature myself.  But I do recognize that I am a human being, and being as such, part of what I am necessitates me being an active, participating part of society, as difficult and painful doing that can be at times.  Continuing after retirement with some meaningful employment that utilizes my God-given abilities is a good way to continue this social involvement.

The academic advisor, Scott Fortnoy, guided those of us attending the workshop/tour around the various classrooms of their programs, pointing out what the jobs demanded from employees as well as important aspects like pay, hours, available of jobs, and the prospects for their growth.  He did a great job with his presentation, and I came away from the experience even more interested in employment in the field of medical technology.  The programs I am interested in are two-year degree programs, and may not be practical for me to pursue until I actually retire from my current job...which may not be until 2017 or even later.  I'll have to further investigate my options, though, and Scott made it clear to us that his office is open for us to visit and get answers to our questions.  I think I'll take him up on that...

Changing NFL Extra Point Rules

The current National Football League commissioner Roger Goodell has just come out suggesting that the extra point after touchdowns is so nearly automatic that it should be eliminated and teams just be given seven points after a touchdown...with an option to pursue an eighth point with what we now call a two-point conversion.  If that play is unsuccessful, a further point would be deducted and the scoring team would get only six points for all their trouble.  I don't like that idea: no one deducts points in a game in any sport unless it is because a scoring play has been reviewed and overturned.  Instead, in my opinion, they  should keep the system basically the same as it presently is, with the only difference being that an extra point attempt would take place on the twenty-yard-line (as the line of scrimmage from where the ball is hiked to the placeholder, making the kick essentially 36-37 yards long)...still probable but certainly not a shoo-in. Also, successfully kicking extra points, even from the current close range of today, is more problematic in college football and very "up in the air" on the high school level.  Placekickers should keep their important role on the team and in the sport: my suggestion would make them even more a deserved focus of attention.

I remember the times back in the early 1970's when NFL teams that had accurate long-distance kickers could consistently get themselves into field goal range by just getting into the opposing team's territory.  My Miami Dolphins racked up a lot of points that way by running a ball-control offense, getting a few first downs to the point where they had gotten a little bit past midfield, and then sending in Garo Yepremian to boot another long three-pointer.  In reaction to the ever-increasing ease of scoring field goals, the NFL rules were changed and the goal posts were moved from the goal line to the back of the end zone.  My suggestion about moving the extra point attempt back to the 20-yard line is in keeping with this sort of change and doesn't dramatically change the nature of the game, as Commissioner Goodell's proposal would...

Broadening (and Diluting) the Meaning of Addiction

The other night...I mean LATE night, while I was at work, I tuned in to the Coast-to-Coast AM radio talk show hosted by George Noory.  He had as a guest the famous science fiction writer David Brin.  Brin was in the middle of discussing the nature of addiction, and was about to state what he believed to be America's greatest addiction...but Noory quickly interrupted and shrewdly broke to several advertisements while keeping the listening audience (the ones who were still awake, that is) waiting in anticipation.  When Brin finally got back to the topic, he laid it out bluntly: in his opinion, the greatest addiction in our country is "self-righteous indignation".  While agreeing with Mr. Brin that this is indeed a problem in the United States, I have a couple of beefs about his statement.  For one, self-righteous indignation is something affecting humanity as a whole, not just one particular country or culture.  Also, it is timeless: just look the Bible, which is full of people who get themselves in a self-righteous huff about others (and usually end up rebuked for it).  But beyond the common assertion I hear that Americans are collectively guilty of things about which other people in the world are virtuous, the very appellation of "addiction" that Brin uses is erroneous.  It would be better to term this phenomenon as a "thinking error", "attitude problem", or "character flaw" instead of the emotionally charged word "addiction".  On the other hand, David Brin may just be following a common trend, which involves broadening the meaning of a heretofore precisely defined word to the point that it essentially becomes meaningless.  Hence we get a television series titled My Strange Addiction that groups compulsive behaviors like sleeping with a blow dryer or eating toilet paper, along with eccentric choices like living around a bunch of hairless rats, all under the umbrella designation of "addiction".  But there's more...it's becoming more acceptable to describe any kind of attachment to anything or any activity that one has a special fondness toward as an addiction.  What ever became of the narrower concept of addiction as being deeply dependent on an ingested chemical substance like nicotine, alcohol, heroin, and the like?

That having been said, I appreciate David Brin for at least bringing up self-righteous indignation as a societal problem.  I think too many folks resort to it too quickly when dealing with opinions or behavior that they see in others and with which they differ instead of trying to put themselves in the other person's position.  And why not? Look at the professionals in the opinion media and how they go about with their pious posturing, regardless of their positions on the issues, conservative or liberal.  And don't get me started with Nancy Grace.  You know, those people make me so-o-o self-righteously indignant!

A Couple of Reverend King Quotes

Even though today is the official national holiday celebrating Martin Luther King's birthday, he actually would have turned 85 on January 15 had he not been assassinated back in April of 1968 and instead survived through the subsequent years.  Known chiefly for his important contributions to our national civil rights movement as well as being a worldwide inspiration for his advocacy of human rights, Reverend King also had much to say about life in general...and what makes up a life truly worth living.  He encouraged people, regardless of their socioeconomic station in life, to take pride in their work and not demean it with a sense of inferiority or succumb to how others may look upon it.  Here are a couple of quotes of his in this regard, which I gleaned off of the Brainy Quotes website:

Whatever your life's work is, do it well. A man should do his job so well that the living, the dead, and the unborn could do it no better.

and...

All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.

I think that's a pretty wise way to look at things...

Just Read My First M.C. Beaton Story

I recently discovered a prolific mystery writer going by the name of M.C. Beaton.  The book I read was Death of a Bore, which as it turns out is just one of a long series of short mystery novels featuring Scottish Highlands constable Hamish Macbeth and all of which sport "Death of a(n)" titles.  This story presents Macbeth as an amiable and protective, albeit uncomfortably nosy policeman of a small "backwoods" town called Lochdubh, reminiscent of the Sheriff Taylor character in the old Andy Griffith TV series.  And by the titles it is obvious that all of the stories are murder mysteries: no lost kilts or bagpipe heists here to solve.  I enjoyed the various personalities in Death of a Bore, and am confident that many of them resurface in other novels of the series.   The "bore" in the story I read is a self-important writer who visits Macbeth's town and starts a creative writing class: after taking submissions from the enthusiastic students and then mercilessly insulting their writing abilities, he is found shot to death...with suddenly a load of suspects.  Hamish Macbeth plods along and naturally solves the crime, although I wasn't satisfied with the solution. My  biggest enjoyment out of this novel was how Beaton depicts life in the Scottish Highlands.  As it turned out, she would know more than most, being a resident of Glasgow. 

Oh, by the way, M.C. Beaton is a pseudonym for Marion Chesney, who under the Beaton name is also responsible for the Agatha Raisin mystery series.  Chesney is still writing and enjoying life...and has her own Facebook page if you'd like to check it out...

NFL Conference Championship Games Tomorrow

Tomorrow will be the day of the National Football League conference championship games for the 2013 season.  Winners will face off in the Super Bowl.  In the National Conference, the Seattle Seahawks will be a formidable opponent at home against the San Francisco 49ers, who went to the Super Bowl last year (and very narrowly lost).  In the American Conference, the Denver Broncos will host the New England Patriots.  I like the NFC teams, largely due to their coaches, and dislike the AFC teams for different reasons.  I'm a big fan of Seahawks coach Pete Carroll and his positive enthusiasm, which is pretty infectious.  The 49er coach Jim Harbaugh is somebody that I initially didn't care for, as I felt he was a bit too abrasive.  Now I've come to a different conclusion: he is a man of his convictions and won't back off from them just to get to placate others...and he does have a blunt demeanor to his personality.  But I kind of like that, though.  I also like the San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick and the way he socked it back to the Carolina Panthers in last week's playoff game.  He's got spunk, and unlike Lou Grant...I like spunk!

On the other side, I dislike Denver for various reasons.  For one, I'm sick and tired of the way their quarterback Peyton Manning, who never could beat my Florida Gators when he played in college for Tennessee, is always treated as some kind of superhuman football Einstein.  His baby brother, though, has won more Super Bowls than him and I'd like to keep it that way.  I also dislike the way that the Denver organization, led by John Elway, allowed Tim Tebow to turn the franchise around in the middle of the 2011 season from a last-place loser to a division and first-round playoff game winner...and then unceremoniously dump him in favor of King Peyton.  I do like their coach John Fox, though, and share with him the same medical situation, albeit not to the degree that he had it before he successfully underwent corrective surgery in the middle of the season.  Still, overall I dislike Denver and would have an easy time rooting against them tomorrow were they playing anyone else besides the New England Patriots, a franchise whose arrogance and historical disregard for the rules dwarf anyone else...except possibly the New Orleans Saints and their "bounty" scandal of last season.  Illegally videotaping other teams' sidelines during games in order to cheat on their strategies makes all of their three Super Bowl victories (for the 2001, 2003, and 2004 seasons) suspect in my mind.  I admire qb Tom Brady and his skill and poise...too bad he doesn't play for the Miami Dolphins, their divisional rival and the NFL team I root for the most (mostly in vain).  So I'm not sure who to pull for in this game...but right now I'm leaning toward Denver (while holding my nose).  Regardless who wins it, though, it will be the SF/Seattle winner that I will want to win the upcoming Super Bowl...

Weight and Work Schedule Hamper Long Distance Running

I've tried to determine exactly why it is that my running seems to be leveling off at a relatively short daily mileage and I never seem quite ready to undertake a long distance race like a half-marathon.  One reason is that I have gained some weight over the past few months and could stand to lose about twenty to twenty-five pounds.  Another is that, since I changed my working hours to a graveyard shift last March, I have had a degree of difficulty with my time management.  I used to either be at work or sleeping for most of the nighttime, with my "free" remaining discretionary time occurring during daylight hours.  This larger daytime "window" gave me a greater opportunity to regularly go out running.  Now I have a narrow time window after I awake in mid-afternoon before the sun sets...and I do not want to run in the dark.  But since I don't see my work schedule changing anytime in the near future, I will have to adapt to this problem. 

Another advantage I enjoyed when I used to run in the late morning/early afternoon was that, during weekdays, my home neighborhood was almost empty, with most residents out at work or school.  The traffic level was pretty low, so I usually could run without having to pay undue attention to cars either passing me or pulling in or out of driveways. 

I do have the option of going down to my local gym (Gainesville Health and Fitness) in the evening hours to run on one of their treadmills.  But treadmill running, while being useful as a way to run during conditions that would otherwise prevent doing so outdoors, isn't an optimal way to consistently train for road running races. In "normal" running, there is the action of my feet pushing off against the hard surface of the road and the need for my own mind to take authority in my pacing, things that treadmills remove from the running experience.

Sometimes at night I'll just run a few minutes in place inside my home or run a short distance back and forth across the living room/hall area.  Still, this isn't the same thing as getting out on the road...

I suppose that I could still run during late mornings/early afternoons with my current schedule, but that would entail me either splitting my sleeping hours around my running time or going to bed immediately thereafter, neither prospect sounding very pleasant or feasible.  So for now I'm just going to have to be very disciplined with my running and keep my eyes open for the cars late in the afternoon...    

Finished Reading Terry Goodkind's Soul of the Fire

I have just read the fifth book in Terry Goodkind's lengthy fantasy Sword of Truth series, this one titled Soul of the Fire.  As with the previous volumes, the protagonists Richard, Kahlan, and Zedd spend a great deal of time traipsing around various lands trying to deal with crises that they are usually responsible for creating in the first place.  This is so because the solution to the crisis at the end of one book almost inevitably creates a dire crisis for the next book.  In the preceding book, Temple of  the Winds, Kahlan had summoned something called the "Chimes" to heal Richard of the plague.  After the healing, though, these denizens from the underworld present a major problem as they go about sucking magic from the world.  And in a fantasy series, you just can't have critters running around depleting the world of magic.  No problem, though...the heroes in Soul of the Fire eventually figure out how to deal with them...and I'm confident that whatever they did will come back to bite them in the "aft end" in the next book! Also, there is usually some new country or kingdom introduced that is the focus of the story, and in Soul of the Fire this is more true than ever.  So in reading each successive book I feel as if I'm not really getting anywhere: volumes 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 are upcoming and I don't know how anything will change substantially.  Still, I must be a glutton for literary punishment as I plan to push through to the bitter end...

The Polar Express a Hit With Me

Last month I was walking through my living room on the way to do something or other when I noticed what my wife and daughter were watching on TV.  It was another one of those Christmas shows, a movie whose title I was familiar with but never got around to watching: The Polar Express.  I quickly forgot what I was doing and became deeply engrossed in it, even though the movie was about halfway through already.  A boy was riding a magical train to the North Pole where Santa and his elves lived...only this boy had stopped believing in Santa. The story was poignant and typical Christmas: what mesmerized me was the way animation, computer enhancement, and real-life acting were seamlessly mixed together to form a unique type of cinema with its own special appearance.  Tom Hanks was ubiquitous, playing the train's conductor, the story's narrator (the boy grown up and looking back), a  mysterious transient on traintop, and Santa himself.  The focus of the story was four of the children riding to see Santa...along with that conductor.  Each child had an important lesson to learn from their experience, a lesson revealed by the message that Hanks the Conductor punched out on their magical tickets.  Later on I watched The Polar Express again, this time from the traditional starting point, to complete the experience.  For such a movie that emphasized special effects, thrill ride scenes, and graphics, I was surprised by how deep both the story and characters were.  The movie, as I later discovered, was an adaptation from a written story by Chris Van Allsburg.  This was a real tear-jerking experience for me and I would recommend The Polar Express to anyone, at any time of the year...

Look East at Early Evening Sky

I just stepped out of the house to discover the early evening sky is crystal clear...not to mention very pleasantly cool.  I looked out to the east and saw quite a spectacle.  Directly east and high up from the horizon is the moon, almost at its full phase but still technically gibbous waxing.  Just left of the moon (toward the north) is Jupiter, the two forming an impressive sight together.  To the right (south) of the moon is Orion, easily the most striking constellation with its bright stars Betelguese and Rigel situated on opposite sides of its three-star asterism "The Belt".  Rising just above the east-southeastern horizon is Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky.  Up higher from the moon is the constellation Taurus with its red star Aldeberan and the smudgy-looking famous cluster Pleiades close to the zenith.  Left of Jupiter are Gemini's twin bright stars Castor and Pollux, and up (west) from them is Capella, another bright star...in the constellation Auriga. 

It seems that lately the skies have been more cloudy than clear, which is unusual for this time of year.  But during the next few nights we in northern Florida may be treated to some very clear nights...conducive to some fun winter sky-gazing...

Personal Time Management a Priority

In the course of my daily life, I find myself needing to reconcile three often opposing forces: daily routines, non-routine "things to get done", and special events. Routines are those activities that are either basic to my daily health and maintenance or are interests, the nature of which lend themselves to incremental improvement over day-to-day practice. In the latter category I place daily activities like running, foreign language study, reading, and writing (hence this blog).   An extension of this  category are activities done on a weekly basis, like attending church, small group meetings, or mowing the lawn. "Things to get done" are the items that, given any particular day, are peculiar to that day but taken together figure into my life maintenance.  Examples of this are doctor/dentist appointments and having my house re-roofed (which will actually occur on Wednesday).  The third category, special events, is similar to the second but tend to take up great parts of a day...or even several days.  Going on trips with the family, or travel of any kind for that matter, belong to this type. Since all three forces place demands on my already-scarce time or confine me to a place when I want to be somewhere else, they tend to arise at each other's expense.  Being more or less a creature of routine, I have thus a tendency to experience anxiety when events lend themselves to crowding out those daily routines that I want realized. Part of the efforts of "self-improvement" that I am engaging in now involve both managing my own time in order to accommodate, to a realistic but optimal degree, those daily routines which I value while effectively negotiating the often stressful (to me) torrent of punctuated or special time-consuming events that tend to arise around all of us to varying degrees.  I am not one of those people who will ever make the complaint "I am bored"....I frankly don't understand people who allow themselves to feel that way, much less express the sentiment to me as if I am somehow responsible for making their life more interesting.  There is so much around me that is interesting...I simply do not have the time to cover it all!

To deal with these three aspects of personal time management, I need three tools...they can either be in "paper" or computer form or internalized within my head...but they all require some advance planning at the start of the day:  (1) A calendar which I can fill in and refer to regarding special events, "things-to-do", and weekly activities, (2) a list of things that I want to accomplish each day, prioritized by the importance and urgency of the activities, and ultimately (3) a time map of each day, with hourly blocks filled in by planned activities, based on what is on (1) and (2).  It is (3) that I can then carry around with me to guide me through a day and ensure that much, if not all of I want to do gets done...and with as little anxiety as possible in the process.

Advance planning of my day's activities may seem at first to be a bit cumbersome, but like other things if made into a timely, daily habit then it will come naturally to me.  And this is what I am currently dealing with now...

Mixed Results with NFL Playoffs, My Running Plans

I'm sitting here early Sunday evening, considering a few things and enjoying life.  The NFL playoffs look as if, with only one game left this weekend to finish and that result looking to be in Denver's favor over San Diego, what many pigskin prognosticators and the beginning of the season had forecast will be proven true: San Francisco plays at Seattle for the National Conference championship and New England plays at Denver for the American Conference title, with the winners of those games facing off in the Super Bowl.  It almost never happens like this, but this year it looks as if the favorites will prevail.  I had wanted that Seahawks/49er pairing in the NFC, but the AFC has been pretty disappointing.  First I wanted Miami to make the playoffs, but they blew it playing poorly in their final two regular season games.  Then I wanted Kansas City to advance in the playoffs, but they blew a 38-10 lead over Indianapolis and they're out, too.  Now I'm left with San Diego, but alas, they are currently behind Denver 17-0 in the third quarter with little sign of an offense so far.  Oh well, it looks as if I'll be pulling for the NFC in the Super Bowl!

The weather today was beautiful, reaching a high of 65 with very low humidity.  I went on an afternoon run of 3.25 miles around my neighborhood.  I had plenty of energy throughout, but didn't feel that I was ready to try a 13.1 mile half-marathon anytime soon.  Unfortunately, I need to decide very soon whether to enter the Ocala Half-Marathon, scheduled for next Sunday morning.  I'm thinking instead of running a 5K race here in Gainesville with my daughter on February 1 in preparation for next month's local FivePoints Half-Marathon, an event that for various reasons I haven't been able to run in since 2010...

Finished Reading David Baldacci's The Collectors

After skipping from the first to the fourth in his five-volume (so far) Camel Club series, I decided to go back to David Baldacci's second book The Collectors with the hope of realigning myself into the "proper order".  Still, I already know some crucial things that won't unfold until the third book, titled Stone Cold.  After finishing The Collectors, I am especially glad that I didn't read book three first, as the ending evidently flows directly into the next book.  I would have been lost had I skipped around further.

Having said that, I found The Collectors to be a worthy successor to volume one, which was also titled The Camel Club.  John Carr, the protagonist ex-CIA agent with the assumed name of Oliver Stone, once again finds himself embroiled in shady goings-on in the Washington, D.C. area among the various national security agencies there, this time with the Library of Congress being a murder site.  A mystery involving spies passing secrets to enemies combines in this book with the introduction of a "new" character named Anabelle, with whom I am already familiar after reading book four, titled Divine Justice.  She is an expert con artist who runs afoul of a major underworld gangster after conning him out of forty million dollars.  But to see how that subplot resolves itself, I'll have to read Stone Cold.

In The Collectors, Oliver Stone and his three pals in the crime-busting Camel Club once again work to solve assorted mysteries while trying to avoid kidnapping, torture, and imminent death.  My pleasure in reading Baldacci's books in this series, however, derives more from his characters and how they relate to one another than the action and adventure.  I haven't considered any of the three books I've covered so far to be especially deep or memorable, but they were enjoyable experiences nonetheless.  Maybe you'd think so as well, so why not start with book one, The Camel Club?

NFL Playoffs Down to Eight

The National Football League playoff field has been whittled down to eight remaining teams, and I'm sad to say that I don't care for most of them.  Still, I plan to follow the four games this weekend and root for one team in each game.  Last week, Kansas City, which at the start of the playoffs I had wanted to represent the AFC in the Super Bowl next month, blew a third quarter 28-point lead to Indianapolis and lost 45-44.  That leaves San Diego as the only team left in that conference that I like.  In the NFC, Seattle and San Francisco are still there, hopefully to play each other the following weekend to see which one goes to the Super Bowl.  On the negative side, my least favorite teams New England, New Orleans, and Denver are still in the running as well. In the upcoming games, I want Seattle to beat New Orleans, San Francisco to beat Carolina, San Diego to beat Denver, and Indianapolis to beat New England.  Regardless who advances to the next round, though, I'll always have a favorite lined up for whatever games are scheduled.

Here is a list of the teams according to my preference:

1 Seattle
2 San Diego
3 San Francisco
4 Carolina
5 Indianapolis
6 New England
7 Denver
8 New Orleans

I wasn't always a fan of the Seattle Seahawks, but last year I came to admire and respect their head coach Pete Carroll.  He is very engaged with his players and generates great enthusiasm from both them and the fans.  You can see the imprint of such a leader when you notice how the team is almost unbeatable in their home games due largely to the fan presence there.  I used to feel the same way about New Orleans Saints coach Sean Peyton, but became disenchanted with him when it came out that under his leadership some of the players were being paid extra, under the table, for injuring opposing players in games.  Who knows, maybe Carroll is involved is some kind of insidious subterfuge as well, but at this point I have to evaluate him according to what I see.  And based on that, I wish he were coaching "my" Miami Dolphins instead of the Seahawks...

Just Finished Reading Great Expectations

I just finished reading Charles Dickens' novel Great Expectations.  At the risk of being visited in my dreams by the ghosts of high school English teachers past, present, and future, I'm going to attempt a semblance of a review...

In Great Expectations, which is set in mid-nineteenth century London, Dickens examines the then-very strongly delineated class distinctions in England of that era.  Pip, an orphan boy, is taken in by his strong-willed sister and her amiable, easy-going husband...who becomes a strong friend to Pip.  He grows up in a working class neighborhood and has a scary run-in with an escaped convict.  Later, after becoming bonded as an apprentice in his brother-in-law's smith craft, Pip is notified by a crafty lawyer and his equally crafty clerk that he is the recipient of an endowment from an anonymous source, with the intention of making him a gentleman in the upper class, with "great expectations".  The story then winds on, examining Pip's ordeals and pretensions as he tries to reconcile his former and present lives with the people he had come to know on both sides of the social divide.  Along with this is a recurring subplot focusing on an eccentric reclusive elderly woman and her adopted daughter, with whom Pip falls in love.

Great Expectations has a great range of emotional expression, with a generally sad feel to it that has a great amount of humor nonetheless.  I think I enjoyed the characterizations more than anything, especially those of the aforementioned lawyer and clerk.  I couldn't help thinking that, as a child, Pip displayed more common sense and reason than when he had moved away to become a gentleman.  The adults in this novel at times reacted in a very irrational, childish manner, creating a scenario that reminded me of the cartoon satire series South Park and how they generally portray adults.  As a matter of fact, after reading Great Expectations, I wonder whether the creators of that series might have been thinking of it...after all, they even at one time had a character named Pip who was patterned after this story.

I think that, regarding Great Expectations, the population is divided three ways about it:  the overwhelming number who never read it, the number who only read it because they were assigned it by an English teacher, and like me, the number who read it on their own.  I belong to that last category, which in all probability is also the smallest.  I'm glad I read it, though, and regret that high school, at least for me, tended to make what could have been fun reading into something of an ordeal...

Expedient Political Attacks on Hillary Clinton and Chris Christie

I can't help but take the current political news and attacks on perceived 2016 presidential front-runners Hillary Clinton and Chris Christie with anything more than skeptical disdain.  I'm seeing the political spin war going on full blast between Democratic and Republican advocates on TV, almost three years before the election...and of course neither Clinton nor Christie has expressed whether they are even leaning toward running.  But public opinion polls are driving the media furor, first by revealing that if Clinton gets the Democratic nomination, then the only Republican with a chance to beat her is Christie...while with a Christie GOP nomination, Clinton comes out as the only one with a chance.  Therefore both sides see it as an imperative to ruin the credibility and consequently the political viability of their "opponent" by pushing anything that hints of criticism.  So former Defense Secretary General Robert Gates conveniently comes out now with a "tell-all" book that paints then-Secretary of State Clinton in an unfavorable light, while (New Jersey) Governor Christie is being depicted as something of a vindictive, hot-tempered dictator with the current "lane closure" scandal being pumped through the media.

The irony of all this is that there are elements within each party that dislike their own opinion poll leaders and would like to promote potential candidates more suitable to their ideological leanings.  As for me, I think I can handle either a Clinton or Christie presidency, individual drawbacks and party ideology notwithstanding.  Both of these seem to be capable leaders and interested in appealing to the political center, which just so happens to be where I see myself...

Two Florida Counties Rashly Close Schools

Early this morning I was listening at work to the news on my radio around three AM when they were discussing how bad the weather was up north, with all the snow, frozen roads and very cold temperatures.  Then I heard the news that it was so bad that schools would be closed for today as far south as Virginia, to which I had to stop and reflect.  You see, I had just heard that a couple of northern Florida counties also had announced that school would be cancelled for today, in spite of the fact that temperatures were only dipping into the twenties (above zero, as opposed to much of the Midwest) and there was no remote hint of snow or sleet for the area.  So I'm getting in my mind the enormity of the weather-generated crisis up north...and then neighboring counties like Columbia and Clay suddenly shut down school.  Why?

It's true, as my wife pointed out to me, that if a child in a family of working parents gets sick and needs to stay home from school, someone will also need to stay home to take care of them.  But usually that is a situation that only a minority of families have to deal with at any one time.  When the entire school system gets unexpectedly shut down, though, all families with working parents have to scramble around to accommodate the situation...so that situation had better merit the decision to cancel those classes.  In this case, those responsible for closing schools in the two aforementioned counties acted rashly and irrationally without taking into account the consequences of their decisions.

Why Fans Sometimes Root for Rivals

This morning on the sports talk radio, on ESPN's Mike and Mike Show, the two presumed "Mikes" were discussing why fans of a particular college football team would turn around and root for their bitter rival in a bowl or championship game just because they were in the same conference and/or state.  To these Mikes, team loyalty should overrule conference or state pride.  They gave as an example the large number of University of Alabama fans who say they will be rooting for cross-state rival Auburn (who beat them in a crucial game late this season) in their national championship game.  The announcers may not have understood one thing, though, that plays in my mind when deciding whom to support...

I grew up in Florida, not Gainesville where I now live, but rather in the southeastern part near Miami.  From the time I was twelve I rooted for any Florida team that played anyone else that was outside the state, be it Florida State, Florida, or Miami (or Florida A&M, Bethune Cookman, or Tampa for that matter).  It wasn't until later in life that I planted myself here in Gainesville where the University of Florida is and became primarily a fan of theirs.  I think that may be the same way with a lot of fans growing up and living in Alabama, who from childhood got used to pulling for Alabama or Auburn...whoever happened to be playing at the time.  I myself never got too deeply into the sometimes hateful rivalry that developed between Florida and FSU, so I'm quite alright with the Seminoles winning tonight's national championship game with Auburn.  However, I will be pulling for the Tigers to beat FSU as I am grateful for them beating Alabama and knocking their coach Nick Saban out of a chance to play in the title game. 

So I'm "slightly" rooting for Auburn tonight, but if Florida State wins as expected that will be fine as far as I'm concerned, even as a Florida Gator fan here in Gainesville...

Relaxing on Day Off

I spent much of my free time on my day off today reading and hanging around drinking coffee...with a little bit of church and football thrown in.  The sermon was about seeking joy in life, with the main reference being Philippians.  The football was first the San Diego-Cincinnati NFL playoff game (which "my" Chargers won) and now the San Francisco-Green Bay game in zero degree temperature (who knows how that will turn out).  The coffee was at Starbucks in my local and very busy Oaks Mall and the reading was of George R.R. Martin's A Dance With Dragons on my Kindle.  The weather has been unseasonably warm today with it approaching eighty degrees.  But tomorrow night, after a day of rain, it is supposed to drastically drop about forty degrees in the span of just a few hours, after being in the low sixties all day, down to the low twenties.  What a roller coaster ride this winter weather is here in northern Florida!  At least we don't have to deal with sleet and blizzards...

Radio Jocks Say Runners Aren't Cool

A couple of days ago, I heard a couple of radio talk jocks rambling on, on a local sports program (WRUF/850), about how neither of them liked to run and how it just wasn't "cool".  Both seemed to deem it "cool", though, to relate the degree to which they didn't like running.  One of them had a wife who, seven months after giving birth, had run a marathon.  He was so graciously able to excuse her behavior, but railed against others he would see running around the neighborhood while belittling people who sought any kind of personal fulfillment in running long distance races.  Being a runner myself by inclination and determination, I felt that these two were either basically a couple of jerks or they were cynically trying to stir up some interest...any interest...in their show, which was most likely failing in the ratings. In their mutually agreeable rant against runners, I kept hearing the word "cool" being bandied around, and I began to wonder whether these two had truly grown up after all...or whether they were permanently trapped in an adolescent mindset...more of a prison to themselves than to anyone on the outside that they may choose to deride from their imagined (and greatly deluded) "high" position...

Running is a great activity, even if you can't bring yourself to call it a sport.  Although not everyone can run, it is certainly more accessible to the general population than the "glamour" sports of football, baseball, and basketball.  Running for me is not a matter of looking "cool" or outcompeting others (although during races my competitive nature comes out) but rather having a special time when I can challenge myself to grow both mentally and physically while facing square-on the limitations that both the world and my own body place on me.  For me, I think that's pretty cool, but I would never expect the two children I heard on the radio to ever understand that...

NFL Playoffs Start Tomorrow

The 2013 NFL season playoffs begin this weekend with four first-round games.  My preferred teams, the Miami Dolphins and New York Giants, both missed the playoffs this year, so I have to pick the best of the survivors to root for.  In the AFC, Kansas City is at Indianapolis and San Diego is at Cincinnati.  I want KC and SD, both wild card entrants, to advance.  In the NFC, I'm pulling for the home teams Philadelphia and Green Bay to win against wild card visitors New Orleans and San Francisco, respectively.  Those games, especially the one in Green Bay, should be interesting in that weather conditions will be frigid. 

Ultimately, I'd like to see Seattle (which received a bye for this week) and Kansas City play in the Super Bowl.  My least favorite Super Bowl lineup, based on the teams that have made the playoffs, would be New Orleans against New England.  Most likely, though, I'm seeing a Seattle vs. Denver championship game...

My Top Favorite Song of 2013

Every year I come out with my own top personal list of favorite songs.  Lately, this list has been comprised mainly of music released before the year in question, often by several years.  This year, I cannot think of a single song that came out in 2013 that I would consider to be a favorite.  Heck, I'm not even inclined to make a "favorites" list for 2013, although there is one song that I do regard as my clear favorite for last year: Kasabian's Switchblade Smiles.

Kasabian is a British alternative rock band that I have been following since 2005.  Their 2011 fourth album Velociraptor! contains several good tracks, and Switchblade Smiles is a buried treasure on it.  This song reminds me greatly of Led Zeppelin at their best...and I think the old Robert Plant could have made it into a monster.  There is a recurring catchy guitar riff that stands up alongside anything the great "Zep" has come  out with, and there are different melodic themes that circulate throughout.  But there really is no need for Robert Plant to cover this song since Kasabian's own lead singer Tom Meighan has his own special style and vocal talent which he uses well in this effort.

Often I'll hear a song that figuratively knocks me off my feet when I first hear it, but after a few listens I tire of it.  The reverse is true with Switchblade Smiles: at first, I didn't care too much for it but suddenly realized one day what a masterpiece it is.  And I've never tired of it since!

Back in 2007, near the start of this blog, I listed and described my (then) 25 all-time favorite songs.  Well, there's been a lot going on in the interaction between the musical world and my brain during the past seven years and I think a revision, "2014 edition", is called for.  Look for this in a few weeks... 

New Year's Eve Visit to Downtown Gainesville

Last night Melissa and I paid a visit to downtown Gainesville's Bo Diddley Community Plaza to join in the New Years Eve festivities and hear a concert by a Beatles tribute band calling themselves The Impostors.  It was fun to just sit there watching people mulling around and sometimes acting silly while listening to a few of my old favorites from years gone by.  The Impostors knew their songs for sure and were deft with the instrumentation, but the vocals in my opinion were sorely lacking.  Still, I enjoyed hearing them go through tunes like I Saw Her Standing There, I'll Get You, I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends, The Word, Revolution, Back in the USSR, and even Hey Bulldog (although with this song they mysteriously decided to end it with the very "non-Beatles" James Bond theme).  We hung around until the group went on a break and then made our way back to the house, where we all ushered in the New Year together as a family. 

Here's a pic of that plaza and the band performing...

My December 2013 Running Report

This final month of 2013 saw me cutting back on my total mileage and missing some days in the middle due to what seems to have been a viral illness.  I ran a total of  80.2 miles in December, while I ran on 26 out of the 31 days.  My longest single run was for 5.5 miles.  I missed out on a 9K race in the middle of the month, but was already beginning to feel under the weather when I found out I would need to go in to work the morning of the race.

Since the end of September, there have been four local races ranging from 6K to half-marathon in length that I had intended to run in but for various reasons have skipped.  Still, next year there is the Ocala Half-Marathon in on January and, later in February, the FivePoints Half-Marathon here in Gainesville.  Let's see if I can't make it to at least one of these, even if I have to walk part of the race...

Read My First Louis L'Amour Novel Yesterday

In a temporary change of genre, I just read my first Louis L'Amour novel, a 1980 story titled Lonely on the Mountain.  L'Amour is a famous author primarily of westerns, but with a sprinkling of other types of fiction, which I was surprised to also include science fiction.  Upon further reading about him, I discovered that this author had written 100 novels and 250 short stories,  quite a feat of prolificacy.  The book I read was simply what I picked up off the library shelf and was one of those novels that continued to highlight a particular recurring set of characters...in this case the Sackett family.  In Lonely on the Mountain, the plot flows around the quest of the Sackett brothers (this is all taking place in the post-Civil War far west) to drive several hundred cattle hundreds of miles through all sorts of dangers in order to rescue a relative, who had made the request under duress.  I liked L'Amour's writing style, but I have to admit that while I was intrigued by how he depicted life in the wilds of the American frontier in the late nineteenth century, I didn't particularly care for the way that the characters fell squarely in either the "good guys" or "bad guys" columns: I like more complex personalities in my fiction.  But overall I had a pleasant go of it with this story and may find myself delving into some more of Louis L'Amour's works in the future (especially the science fiction)...

Many Playoff Spots in NFL to be Decided Today

Today the playoff lineups will be decided for the National Football League 2013 season.  I'm gratified to see that this year the Miami Dolphins are still in the running, favored to win their game against the New York Jets while at the same time needing either Baltimore to lose or San Diego to win.  But regardless how the other teams do, I'll be proud of the Dolphins if they can win their final regular season game and earn their first winning season since 2008.

Elsewhere, other teams are vying for playoff spots as well.  Dallas will play Philadelphia and Chicago will play Green Bay, with the winner of each game advancing into the playoffs.  Also, New Orleans and Arizona find themselves needing successful outcomes in games today in order to secure for themselves a playoff spot.  Other teams in both conferences are jostling around in the standings to see who wins their divisions, who will have first week byes, who gets home field advantage, and whether they will be division winners or simply wild card teams.  So a lot is at stake here, not just for the teams trying to make it to the playoffs. 

Although I'll be busy today doing other things, I'm looking forward to see how everything "plays" out, especially for Miami...

Holiday Visit to NFR's Duck Pond

Last night, Melissa and I paid a visit to Gainesville's North Florida Regional Medical Center...nothing serious, you understand.  No, we were on a sightseeing mission, to the facility's duck pond which rests on its east side by busy Newberry Road.  Every Christmas holiday season, they install many lights and decorations there, and residents flock to the site after sunset to view it all.  I've managed to live in Gainesville since 1977 and somehow miss this traditional hometown experience, but this year we got out to take a stroll around the grounds.  There were a lot of people there, mostly families composed of parents and small children.  It was a scene of low-tech extravagance that could have been produced seventy years ago, with pleasant seasonal music piped in on strategically located speakers.

The top picture is a panoramic shot of the duck pond and its surrounding lighting taken from the Newberry Road vantage point. The bottom shot is, well, you know...

Finsished Reading Baldacci's Divine Justice

Today I finished a quick read through David Baldacci's novel Divine Justice, which is the fourth installment in his Camel Club series.  I earlier read the first volume, also titled The Camel Club, several months ago but inadvertently skipped the next two books.  Actually, I picked Divine Justice because it happened to be what was on my library shelf when I stopped by the other day (usually I check out my items after placing holds on online catalogue searches).  As it turned out, with this series it is a good idea to read the books in order, as Divine Justice feeds heavily off the events of the immediately preceding book Stone Cold and often refers to events from second book The Collectors.  Still, in spite of feeling irritated at missing out on much of what underlies the developing story in Divine Justice, I was still able to follow it.  One reason is that Baldacci's heroic characters are very likable and are fun to follow, demonstrating humor and rapport with one another.  Not that what transpires in this novel has much to laugh and smile about: it's just refreshing, after plowing through the ponderous fantasy series of George R.R. Martin and Terry Goodkind with their ever-grim characters, to see a few with the ability to take things in stride every now and then.

The Camel Club series is about ex-CIA professional assassin "Oliver Stone" (his assumed name) and his collected assortment of loyal friends (hence the series title)...and how they struggle to get through their various crises.  I felt that the first book was better, while Divine Justice reminded me of television's David Bannister or MacGyver going to small towns and getting caught up in their dramas and scandals.  I didn't like it then and I don't like it now.  Still, the writing was easy to follow, the story flowed well, and the characters were compelling.  And the book wasn't too long, either! 

I suppose that now I'll go back to #2 and read The Collectors.  Excuse me while I go to my library's catalogue and place it on hold...

Seem to be Recovering from Sickness

It looks as if I might finally be coming out of the sickness that sidelined me from running for several days this month.  It has been difficult for me, as I have been suffering from general inflammation, allergy feelings, a sense of a sinus-type infection, and all sorts of mysterious aches and sore spots hitting different parts of my body.  It wasn't the flu, but there was probably some kind of viral component involved here.  But in the last two or three days, my energy level seems to be returning.  Yesterday I ran once around my block (.7 mile) and today I ran 2.1 miles.  Hopefully, this trend of recovery will continue for me: I first noticed that something was amiss nearly two weeks ago...

Finished Reading Koontz's By the Light of the Moon

I just finished reading Dean Koontz's 2002 novel By the Light of the Moon.  In a very speculative, nonscientific way, it explores how nanotechnology can be used and abused to affect the basic constitution and behavior of humans.  A man and his autistic brother are abducted by a mysterious elderly man who seems to be a scientist.  He gives them a shot of some mysterious substance and leaves them to try to escape their captivity on their own in time to avoid a deadly attack by another party.  They eventually link up on the road with a woman who has had the same traumatic experience.  The story develops with the three discovering how the injection has changed them and the nature of the injections, with involve nanotechnology...along with the role that the "mad scientist" who had kidnapped them had played earlier in their lives.

By the Light of the Moon strongly hints at a sequel with the way that the protagonists come out at the end of their ordeal, but none has ever been written as far as I know.  Also, a late-night radio talk show host was introduced into the story whom Koontz obviously patterned after long-time Coast-to-Coast AM host Art Bell.

By the Light of the Moon isn't very long and provides some good escapist reading even if it doesn't exactly convince me about nanotechnology...

Temperatures Today Much Cooler Than Forecast

In another one of those massive goof-ups, the weather forecast for today, as I heard it this morning on the radio while driving home from work at 7:30, had one more "hot" day in store for us here in northern Florida (Gainesville) with temperatures climbing into the low 80's before conditions started to cool tonight...eventually making way for a pleasantly cold Christmas morning.  But there's only one problem with that prediction: by the time I had walked out of my workplace, it had already chilled quite a bit.  Now, at ten in the morning, I'm sitting here with the temperature at 57 degrees...and there is at present a "new" predicted high for today at 66 (I doubt we'll even reach that).  So the forecast was way off because they didn't anticipate the cold front sweeping down that fast from the northwest.  Not that I'm complaining, you see...

I love cool days in the winter with cold nights that don't quite get down to freezing.  Plus, in Florida, when it gets that cold, conditions are usually very dry, as is the case for today and tomorrow.  And that's what is happening now, and at just the right time: Christmas Eve and Christmas! 

May all of you enjoy a merry, merry Christmas!!!

Dolphins Still in Playoff Hunt After Loss

The Miami Dolphins had control over their own destiny going into the final two weeks of the 2013 NFL regular season...and they couldn't handle it, failing in essence to show up at Buffalo's stadium yesterday afternoon and getting wiped out by the underdog Bills 19-0.  Amazingly, though, Miami still has a reasonable shot at getting the final wild card spot of the AFC in the playoffs if they win next week at home against the New York Jets, a team they already beat on the road this year, 23-3.  Along with a Dolphin victory, though, they need for either Baltimore to lose against Cincinnati or San Diego to win against Kansas City.   But I'm not going to get all wound up next Sunday worrying about them: I'll see where they stand when the regular season has ended and then appraise how they did this year.  Of course, I'm enthusiastic about Miami's prospects should they get into the playoffs as they have had a tendency this year to overachieve against favored opponents.  Unfortunately, they also have fallen flat against some teams they were supposed to beat...like Tampa Bay and twice against Buffalo.  Good thing they won't be playing any of them should they make the playoffs...just teams like Cincinnati or Indianapolis, division winners that the Dolphins have both beaten...

Simultaneous Universal Opposition

We in this America of ours today find ourselves in a particular situation, politically: all of us (the ones who actually care one way or another, that is) find ourselves simultaneously as being in the "opposition".  If we belong to a fringe party or belief system outside of the standard Republican/Democratic paradigm, then we're always in the opposition, regardless. But nowadays even the mainstream finds itself feeling left out of the process while the "other guys" are in there doing things that we just don't like.  For Republicans, they have had a Democratic liberal president in Barack Obama since 2009...not only has he passed a national health insurance law (although it was largely based on Mitt Romney's Republican plan in Massachusetts and took into account features of the Heritage Foundation's proposals of the early 1990's) and had the temerity to shake the hands of both Hugo Chavez and Raul Castro, but he hasn't even invaded another country yet (threatened attacks against Syria, the assassination of Bin Laden, and drone strikes in Pakistan and Yemen probably wouldn't count).  Yes, to them that Democrat is "out of control".  Would be that we had a GOP president, they would probably be completely ignoring calls to balance the budget as they had the entire time that their "guy" Bush was in there running the country for the previous eight years while running up massive deficits.  The Democrats, for their part, see the tea party everywhere, controlling the House of Representatives and slowing the legislative process to a standstill and shutting down the government...and state governorships and legislatures are dominated in most states by the Republicans, who are basically passing laws against women's reproductive rights, restricting voter access to the polls, getting rid of government unions, and refusing to participate in Obamacare by not allowing Medicaid expansion....but generally faring quite well when it comes to balancing their budgets, encouraging business development, and keeping taxes low.

I recognize that there is good and bad on both sides, and I'd like for the good people who hold office to see this as well and work together to implement the good while rejecting the bad.  Instead, though, I see demonization and hyperbole as the sadly emerging norm when it comes to dealing with the opposing party...

Brittle Athletes of Today

Is it just my imagination or is today's big-time athlete more prone to injury?  Whether speaking of baseball, football, or basketball, it seems to me that what usually determines a particular team's success or failure for a season is whether they have somehow been able to avoid serious injury...or have succumbed to this ominously increasing trend.  I'm looking at the Los Angeles Lakers, which at the start of last year looked as if it just might coast to the championship with superstars Kobe Bryant, Steve Nash, and Dwight Howard. But injuries crippled this team throughout the season and both Nash and Bryant seem to be permanently out of play with a succession of tears, breaks, and nerve damage.  Derek Jeter, Derrick Rose, Michael Vick, Robert Griffin III, Rob Gronkowski, Aaron Rogers...the list goes on and on.  My Florida Gators football team lost most of its starting lineup with injuries, including the quarterback...and then the backup got injured!  Just look at any team and you'll see something where a star on it has been sidelined with injuries.  I know injuries have always played a role in sports, but I wonder if something about the way today's athletes are trained and play contribute to the problem.

It used to be that athletes were gifted with their builds that gave them an advantage in their sports and, sure, the bigger and faster ones tended to be more successful.  But now that the science of athletic performance has advanced as much as it has, athletes now are becoming stronger and faster...and the sports are placing greater and greater strains on their bodies as they try to keep up with each other as a natural part of competition. It seems, though, that with enhanced performance comes a corresponding increased brittleness, a higher susceptibility to injury...

Duckman's Anti-Gay Rant and Consequences

There is this reality show on Arts and Entertainment channel called Duck Dynasty that supposedly exalts the lifestyle and beliefs of a family living and working somewhere in rural Louisiana.  Looking like ZZ Top wannabes, the male members of the family all sport large beards, their trademark I guess.  Apparently, along the course of the show, a Christian worldview has been identified with them, prompting evangelical churches across the country to embrace this series as one of their own.  But now, one of those men, a dude named Phil Robertson, has touched off another of those "Chick-Fil-A" variety social media firestorms by making derogatory comments about gays.  Here we go again, with the calls from the "pro-duck" side to boycott A&E after they made the decision to suspend Robertson for a few months from the series.  I say to those who want to boycott this channel to please stop and reconsider...all it will accomplish in the end will be to give second thoughts to anyone in television thinking of starting any more series spotlighting a family practicing their religion...while reinforcing the oft-held belief to the world that Christians are narrow minded bigots, hampering those of the faith who are trying to spread the love of Jesus and his gospel message.  Besides, I've heard that the next season of Duck Dynasty has already been filmed, complete with Mr. Phil Robertson prominently featured in the episodes.  And the next taping comes later, after a few more months.  So how exactly did they propose to enforce that suspension, anyway?

I think a lot of Americans who tend to look down on homosexuality for whatever reasons of their own look at how the gay rights movement has succeeded here in the passing of anti-discrimination laws, benefits for same-sex partners, and the ushering in of same-sex marriage into our society...and see this as a threat of some kind.  But they fail to take into account that, for much of the rest of the world, in countries like Russia, Ethiopia, and Uganda, for example, the trend is in the direction of persecution of gays.  And some Islamic nations, whose legalism Christians often loudly point out against them,  are very legalistically opposed to gays, offering prison and even death as punishments for those convicted of the "crime" of having a different sexual orientation. 

To me, the very essence of being civilized as opposed to being barbarian is to have educated and incorporated within oneself the realization that the people in our society have a diversity of appearances, backgrounds, beliefs, and characteristics.  Everyone differs from each other in some way, usually many ways.  We can choose to either find common ground with them where we can or to emphasize the differences.  I'm sure Phil Robertson has some common ground with me and many aspects to his life and character to appreciate, but when he goes off on a rant against people he sees himself as being superior to, I don't exactly feel very magnanimous to respecting HIS point of view.  After all, isn't arrogant pride a sin in the eyes of the Lord, too?

This isn't at all about whether you or I approve of homosexuality or oppose it.  Rather it is about demonstrating a civil respect for others who are different from us and recognizing that there is more to a person than those aspects which displease us...

The Sunda of Indonesia

Many years ago, I used to check out one particular book from my local library that piqued my interest.  It was a compilation of small articles taken from various world languages, some of them with very exotic (and sometimes beautiful) scripts.  Some of these languages were in the highly populated island nation of Indonesian.  In particular, I remember two languages: Javanese and Sundanese.  Both of these languages are spoken on Indonesia's very densely populated island of Java, with the former comprising the predominant ethno-linguistic group there.  The Sunda people are concentrated on the western end of the island while there are Madurese on the far eastern side.  Today, however, in spite of the lovely traditional scripts, both Sundanese and Javanese are written using Romanized script: check out Wikipedia to see for yourself.  Sundanese strikes me at a glance to be similar to Indonesian, that country's official language.

The Sundanese are a primarily agricultural society that, like most of the rest of Indonesia, practices Islam with a strong traditional culture which predates that religion for millennia.  They have their own creation story and many orally-passed-on stories that speak of a culture that is ancient and profound.  I am interested in learning more about their culture as well as listening to some of their more traditional music. 

More to come... 

Feeling Under the Weather

For nearly the past week or so I have been feeling very crappy, under the weather. It isn't the flu, and I am functioning through it, albeit without enjoying it one bit.  One casualty in my daily routine, though, has been my running...which I may or may not pick back up after recovery.  The way I'm feeling right now, the prospect of getting out there accumulating miles doesn't exactly thrill me.

So far, I haven't missed work and hope that I won't.  I have sought medical help in all this and am working out some prescribed remedies.  Hopefully, they will work and I'll make a timely and full recovery.  But the overriding thing I want to do right now is sit/recline still and quiet, either watching TV or listening to pleasant music.  Sounds like a great blueprint for my future!

Doubly Frustrating Monday Night Football Game

Last night I was following a very frustrating Monday Night Football game between the Detroit Lions and the Baltimore Ravens...frustrating on a couple of counts.  You see, I was rooting for Detroit, I team that I don't like, to beat Baltimore, I team that I do like...all because I felt that "my" team, the Miami Dolphins, had to beat out the Ravens in the regular season in order to get the last available playoff spot for the post-season.  And it was also frustrating because the Lions kept turning the ball over and dropping pass after pass.  They still almost pulled it out, getting themselves a brief lead toward the end of the game.  But Baltimore squeaked out a win with an improbable 61-yard field goal in the closing seconds.  As a matter of fact, they managed to beat Detroit without a touchdown...scoring 18 points on six field goals.  I hope that's the last time I feel that I have to root for Detroit.  And it apparently turns out that it was unnecessary after all, because...

All Miami has to do is win its last two games and they are in the playoffs as a wild card team.  The reason is that Baltimore can now win their division outright with a final game victory over Cincinnati.  And if that happens, then Miami wins the wild card tiebreaker with the Bengals, whom they defeated in the regular season.  Should Cincinnati win that game, then Miami (with those two final wins) beats Baltimore out with a better regular season record.  So it's doubly frustrating in that I could have been ENJOYING the Ravens putting it to the Lions the way they did last night.  In any event, I feel free to cheer for Baltimore again, at least until they (hopefully) face Miami later in the playoffs...

Obama Shakes Castro's Hand...So What

Some of the more politically opportunistic opponents of Barack Obama have gone on the media warpath complaining about him shaking the hand of Cuban president Raul Castro at the memorial service for Nelson Mandela this past week.  Apparently, those folks are concerned about the human rights violations on that island nation which has brought so many refugees over to our primarily Floridian shores and come to constitute a potent conservative Republican voting bloc within that state.  I am not all that enthusiastic with the totalitarian/autocratic rule of the Castro brothers over the Cuban people either, but the fact remains that they are the internationally recognized leaders there and have to be dealt with as such...like it or not.  The whole idea of diplomacy is wrapped up in how to deal with other parties with which one has differences in order to gain the best outcome without resorting to war against them.  So it is always valuable for the leaders of all nations to know each other and to practice common courtesy.  President Obama shaking Castro's hand was nothing more than this, any more than it was when he was courteous to Venezuela's late president Hugo Chavez a few years ago (for which he also received flack).  Some of us, myself included, look at the ridiculous attitude of snubbing Israel and its leaders on the part of some Arab nations (some of whom we entertain close relations with) and see that as being childish.  Well, we're doing the same if we can't at least show a little decorum and maturity in our own dealings...

Miami Wins Important Game Vs. New England

Well, maybe this is going to be the year that the Miami Dolphins make their return to football respectability, after all: they have just hung on to defeat the New England Patriots 24-20.  Now Miami stands at 8-6, guaranteed at least to not have a losing season.  And their last two regular season games are against divisional foes the Jets and the Bills, both behind the Dolphins in the standings.  They are both very beatable.  As far as the playoffs are concerned, Miami's biggest challenge is Baltimore, but the Ravens have a pretty challenging end-of-season schedule and might not be able to keep up.  Also, San Diego seems to be surging...but Miami beat them already and has the tiebreaker advantage should the two finish with identical win-loss records.  But Miami lost to Baltimore a few weeks ago, so they need to best them with their record. 

This team has been fun to follow this year, the bullying scandal notwithstanding.  Let's see how far they go...

New Strategy for Learning Chinese Characters

I have been studying how best to dramatically increase my learned Chinese character vocabulary and have come up with a plan that might just provide explosive growth.  The key is in breaking down a character into its component two parts: radical and phonetic.  The radical part of a character, besides placing it in its proper order in traditional Chinese dictionaries, also categorizes it according to its general meaning.  The phonetic part, on the other hand, only hints at the character's pronunciation. Take, for example, the chemical element for neon.  Neon, being a gas at room temperature, carries the radical 气 for that meaning (gas/vapor/air), while its pronunciation of nai (third tone) carries the phonetic 乃, which other characters of similar pronunciation but different meaning carry.  Together, they constitute the composite character 氖 for neon.  This is a character building principle that pervades Chinese.

My plan is to use an old Chinese-English dictionary that does a good job of breaking down each of the 5,000 characters it contains into radicals and phonetics.  Only instead of the systematically classified and numbered radicals that are usually ordered in dictionaries, I will categorize the characters according to their phonetics.  I believe this will make my memorization more enduring and will also aid me when I encounter an unfamiliar character in regular text.

Job Nixes Race Plans Again

Once again, my workplace has tripped me up just as I was going to enter a running race.  Before last Thanksgiving I was about to sign up for the 10K Turkey Trot here in Gainesville, but fortunately I hadn't paid anything yet before I discovered that they had me scheduled to work on my holiday, something that is not supposed to happen...especially in a place where seniority is supposed to count for something (I've been working there for more than 26 years).  But it was a trade-off of sorts, since I made some extra money for my extra work.  Besides, as I wrote in a previous article, I would have a December 15K race on the 14th that I could run in...and it would be on a Saturday, my day off and on which I don't believe I ever had to work since I switched to the graveyard shift in early March.  So last night I tried twice to register online for the event (for which I was also signing up my daughter, who was going to run their 5K race), but a glitch kept the registration from going through.  No problem, I'll just sign up and pay on the morning of the race, right? Then, while at work last night I was notified that I have to report in for Saturday morning...in direct conflict with the race.  So  the only two times that I have had to unexpectedly report for work in the past 9+ months have come when I was about to run a race. Once again, I suppose that there will be that trade-off of making some extra money for my trouble.  And I have to admit that it was quite fortunate that my online registration (and payment) was prevented in both instances, saving me a tidy sum of money in the process...

Consensus, Not Ideology, Drives Electorate

I have a problem with the way that our American system of political representation works.  A big problem.  I'll examine the recent presidential elections, but the problem permeates all the way down the line to the state and local levels.  It is about how candidates run in elections, why voters vote for (or against them), and then how the newly elected interpret the results.

You can go back for many, many elections and still come away with the same conclusion.  The winner of each presidential election has successfully presented himself as the more reasonable of the two main candidates and who is more dedicated to using common sense to govern and handle the nation's issues than is the opponent.  The appeal is clear: whether one is talking about ideologically "pure" conservatism or liberalism, the electorate as a whole will vote against the candidate who presents him/herself this way in favor of a candidate who, while probably ideologically bent on the "other side", seems to project an image of pragmatism and compromise.  Yet that very candidate, upon election, often abandons that cloak of consensus building and claims a "mandate" to ram the ideology of his or her party down the population's throat.  This happened after the 2004 reelection campaign of George W. Bush, who immediately following his razor-thin victory over languid, uninspiring John Kerry, proclaimed a "mandate" for himself and his party.

When it became clear that Barack Obama was going to win his reelection campaign against Mitt Romney on election night last year, many media talking head pundits expressed that this indicated that in his second term, Obama should claim this "mandate" and strenuously pursue more progressive policies.  But in truth, the election taught a different lesson, as far as I read it: the voters didn't trust Romney's catering to the right-wing ideological wing of his party, and his selection of Paul Ryan went a long way to confirm that fear in the eyes of many, who instead went over to Obama...the status quo president who seemed to have done a reasonable job so far.  Following the maxim of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" isn't exactly a mandate for an ideological assault.  By the way, President Obama, to his credit, has resisted people in the far left wing of his own party who want him to  aggressively push their agenda on the country.  It's a shame that the opposition party is completely clueless about this principle of governance and instead allows its own tea party/kool-aid wingnuts to dictate its own policies...

I have one word of beginner's advice to the extremists in either party who think they are as pure as the driven snow with their "principles": stop depicting the democratically elected representatives from the opposition party (and even the moderates from your own) as the "enemy"!

Finished Reading Koontz's Watchers

I just took a little break from my long journey through two different drawn-out fantasy series (Terry Goodkind's The Sword of Truth) and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire) and read one of Dean Koontz's novels.  I first came to know of the existence of Mr. Koontz gradually as I, while browsing through the Stephen King books in the fiction sections of various bookstores and libraries, would reach Koontz's books, signifying to me that I had gone too far on the shelf and needed to backtrack to King.  After a while, I decided to check out this prolific writer who seems destined to be compared, for better or for worse, to his more renown colleague by dint of alphabetic proximity.  At this writing I've only scratched the surface of his vast bibliography, having only read Shattered, Intensity, Midnight...and now Watchers.

In writing Watchers, Koontz sewed together three independent themes (eventually) into a cohesive story.  There was a man and woman coming together as a couple, each having to deal with broken pasts and heartache.  There was a top-secret government project with military applications involving the genetic manipulation of animals to raise their intelligence.  And then there was the good old typical psychopathic killer roaming around reaping mayhem everywhere he went. During the first part of the book, the man and woman were presented as separate plot lines, as was the killer.  It was interesting to surmise how the author would eventually bring them all together...but by Dean, he did!

Dean Koontz writes in clear, easy flowing language which  some may regard as shallow but which I appreciate and want to emulate as a writer.  There is such a thing as being too fancy...just get to the point of the story and make it vivid enough to me and allow my imagination to create the imagery.  Watchers accomplished this, and within the constraints of what I believe Koontz wanted to do with it, I think he was successful.  A "plus" was that the book was relatively short, a refreshing break from the fantasy sagas I'm reading... 

Last Weekend's Football Games

Looking back on this past weekend in college and pro football, I have a generally positive outlook on the future with the teams I want to succeed (and some of those I don't).  Ohio State lost their Big Ten championship game to Michigan State, so the winner of the SEC championship game, Auburn, has a clear shot at the national championship game against Florida State, who easily handled Duke in their ACC championship game.  I don't think I could have dreamed up a better title matchup...unless of course it had been Florida winning the Southeastern Conference instead of Auburn. But alas, the Gators had all sorts of issues with their team this year and suffered a miserable 4-8 record.  I am happiest of all, regarding the national championship picture, with the exclusion of Nick Saban's Alabama from being in it after their momentous final-play loss to Auburn a couple of weeks ago.  Although I am a Floridian by heart, I'm going to pull for Auburn against FSU simply out of gratitude for the Tigers beating the Saban Tide. 

In the NFL, Miami managed to play well enough in Pittsburgh to win 34-28, in a game marked by a desperate , multi-lateral final play by the Steelers that very nearly saw them scoring the winning touchdown. But but their runner had stepped out of bounds (just barely) and the Dolphins kept up with their wild-card race rival Baltimore at 7-6.  I don't know whether or not Miami will manage to make the playoffs this year, but from where I stand a winning 9-7 record would mark a successful season for them.  Tampa Bay and Jacksonville have also recently done well, each team now at 4-9 and in next-to-last place in their respective divisions after 0-8 starts.  I don't know exactly what this means for them...are they getting better or simply playing more loosely without concerns of "choking up" in important games (of which there are no more for them this year)?  I don't know, but it's still pleasing to see them playing stronger.

Pondering Whether to Follow NHL

I wonder what it would be like to attend a hockey game in person.  I'm not a northerner, having grown up in south Florida and currently living in north Florida for more than 36 years, so ice hockey is not a sport that I ever played or was ever played in any school I attended, including college.  We do have the Florida Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning NHL pro teams here in Florida, but I think maybe their main source of fan appeal is from transplants from the north. 

On channel 33 where I live, I can often watch NHL games and sometimes do, although I am not at all clear about the various rules in the sport.  In particular, I feel a bit clueless about what constitutes off-sides and icing penalties...and I'm not sure what the rules are restricting opposing team access to the goal area.  I think that perhaps I should pay a visit to YouTube to see if there isn't some kind of video illustrating these rules.

Earlier this spring I enjoyed watching the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs and was excited at the play of "my" team, the Chicago Blackhawks.  However, if I ever do go to attend hockey games, I'm sure my allegiances will naturally shift to the most "local" team around, which is Tampa Bay...which I hear actually did win the league's Stanley Cup championship playoffs one year and in so doing traumatized everyone to the point that they cancelled the following year's season...

Actually, all kidding aside, it was a management's lockout against the players in a labor contract dispute that caused the season-long cancellation.  But the Lightning got a "two-for" out of it: they got to be defending champions for two straight years!

Finished Reading A Storm of Swords

I just finished reading George R.R. Martin's third volume in his ongoing A Song of Ice and Fire fantasy series, titled A Storm of Swords.  Fantasy fiction as a general rule tends to be violent, but Martin seems to delight in killing off one protagonist after another...and whoever is left standing is left BARELY standing, often maimed and hopelessly scarred, both physically and emotionally.  A Storm of Swords doesn't disappoint, if this is the kind of outcome the reader is expecting.  The world in which Martin works his literary magic is a cutthroat one, with medieval "honor" combining with the gore and horror of medieval warfare. There are no cell phones or Internet here to clear up false rumors circulating among the royalty, and those rumors can touch off wars that bring whole regions to ruin and famine with thousands brutally slaughtered in the process. 

I'd like to think that there are some characters in this series who are destined to endure to the end of the final volume (whenever that's going to be published at some indeterminate future date, if ever), but I'd be deceiving myself if I thought that the author thought that any character was indispensable as long as his or her demise could further the story.  So I've learned, as a reader, to emotionally distance myself from all of the characters here...and I don't think that's a very good thing for writers to instill in their faithful readers.  Still, I'm plodding on ahead, carnage notwithstanding, to the fourth book titled A Feast for Crows.  Since crows have often been described in this series as feeding on the dead, I entertain little hope for the survival of any of the rest of the sorry, hapless bunch...

Today's NCAA Football Conference Title Games

Today marks that time that all true college football fans look forward to each year, and some have more than a passing interest since one of their own teams is involved.  It is conference championship game Saturday!  Now that the Pac-12 and Big Ten conferences have finally joined in with the playoff concept, almost all major conferences now have a championship game...and the results will determine the national championship game lineup as well as which team gets to play in which bowl game.  The conferences getting the most attention are the Atlantic Coast, Big Ten, and Southeastern since the teams involved in those contests are the highest ranked and figure in the national championship game.  Top-ranked Florida State plays 20th-ranked Duke in the ACC, a game that hardly anyone (including me) thinks will go Duke's way. The Big Ten and SEC games should be close and exciting, though.  Ohio State, currently undefeated and ranked #2, faces off against Michigan State in the Big Ten.  Should Michigan State win this game, the Southeastern Conference title game between Auburn and Missouri should determine who faces Florida State in the national championship game. The only problem I see with all this is if Ohio State wins their contest, finishes undefeated, but still gets deprived of a national championship opportunity because of bias in favor of the SEC.  I hope that does not happen.

Other major conference matchups include Stanford vs. Arizona State in the Pacific-12 and the final week for the regular season in the Big-12 (they have forgone having conference championship games).  In the Big-12, Oklahoma State, Texas, and Baylor at present are still in the running for that conference's championship, depending on how their games go today.

As far as the games which are already lined up for today are concerned, I'm pulling for Florida State, Michigan State, Auburn, and Arizona State in their respective contests.  I guess that ultimately I'd like to see Auburn and FSU face off for the national championship: Florida State is a "home state" team and I am grateful for Auburn beating Nick Saban's team, whichever one he happened to be coaching (it happened to be Alabama this time).  But if Ohio State wins their game today, I want them included in the title game next month...

Nelson Mandela's Full Life Ends at 95

In 1984, from time to time MTV used to show a video of a group calling themselves "Special A.K.A.".  The song was Free Nelson Mandela and had a rich African musical flavor to it.  It was the first time I had heard of the imprisoned African National Congress leader, who would eventually emerge from his confinement into the presidency of the very country that had taken away his freedom for nearly three decades of his life.  His burning desire was to eliminate the Apartheid in South Africa and allow for all South Africans equal opportunity of expression, movement, and economic activity.  What many in the world celebrate him for nowadays, especially on this day of his death at age 95, is how he fervently worked to reconcile the whites and blacks in that great nation following the end of that horrendous system of racial segregation and oppression.  Moreover, Mandela, who could probably have retained the leadership of South Africa for life, served out his one elected term and then left office...a great sign of humility and respect on his part and a strong example for his successors to emulate.  I admire him for all of that, but I have to admit that I initially had misgivings about him during the mid-to-late 1980s, suspecting that perhaps he had plans to amass power and rule his country as a dictator like Fidel Castro in Cuba.  Instead, Nelson Mandela turned out more like George Washington in terms of his ability to unify his country and voluntarily step down from what must have been a very tempting amount of power.  God bless him!

Weather Forecast Suddenly, Drastically Changes

I was watching my local weather TV station yesterday evening when they displayed their day-to-day forecast for the upcoming week, stretching ahead to a five-day outlook.  The temperatures were projected to be higher than usual for this time of year, but on the fifth day they had a projected high of 67 degrees with a low of 46.  That would be more to my liking and gave me something to look forward to.  But a funny thing happened between last night and this morning: the forecast for that very day changed to a high of 82 and a low of 63, with no cooling in sight!

We're already experiencing near-record high temperatures for this time of year here in north central Florida...and evidently more is to come.  Ironically, it seems, though, that every time I tune in to a football game anywhere else in the country, the spectators are all bundled up in winter clothing.  Only down here things are continuing to operate in "warm" mode.

I'm also getting sick and tired of the talking anchor heads on my local TV news station WCJB/Channel 20.  They consistently brand anything in the weather that doesn't involve clear, hot skies all day long as "bad".  For me, I've had my share of clear, steaming hot days (and nights) much too much this year and would like a little respite from it.  Just give me a nice, cool overcast day, please...