As is the case from time to time, I have found myself in the middle of reading a number of books at once. This is because I read circumstantially...that is, if I am at a specific time and place I'll have a certain book available to read while in other situations others will be available. I also avail myself of audiobooks and CDs that I check out from the library. For example, I am listening to Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe (by means of CD) whenever I drive...I'm about two thirds through it. I have an audiobook version of Brandon Sanderson's The Way of Kings, the first (and rather lengthy) book in his new, ongoing Stormlight Archive fantasy series, that I listen to on my little MP3 player at convenient times. I'm at the halfway point in that one. I'm also midway through Isaac Asmov's fourth book (paperback edition) in his Foundation series, titled Foundation's Edge, which I've read before several years ago but have forgotten the details. And I have just begun Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, a very long book whose contents don't seem transferable to the cinema, although more than one movie...including even a musical, of all things...have been made from it. I say this because much of the text is composed of Hugo's musings on society, morality, and religion...how can that be effectively portrayed on the big screen? No, I never did see any of the movies...I like to form my own internal images of the characters and locales from the written story before I see how others interpreted them...
All of the above I checked out from my local public library. And with each of them, I searched the books online on the library website and placed holds on them so that they would notify me when they were ready for pickup...and at the library branch closest to me. The only exception is the audiobook, which downloads directly from the online site that checks them out. Now that's not to say that I don't have a sizable and growing library of books in my personal possession. I need to get them organized and begin to read some of the many that I haven't yet read...most of them are science fiction novels and short story collections. I'm also gradually accumulating books on my Kindle. However, the public library is a great resource for reading and I have of late been heavily relying on it for my books...
Sunday, September 27, 2015
Saturday, September 26, 2015
Major Lunar Eclipse Sunday Evening
The moon will be offering a nighttime show on Sunday when it passes through the Earth's shadow, culminating in a lunar eclipse. The effect will be a darkening...although not complete obscuring...of the moon...for around three hours for observers in the Eastern United States. The total eclipse (the moon completely inside the Earth's shadow), for our EDT time zone, will be from 10:11 pm until 11:23 pm with the partial phases starting and ending 1-2 hours before and after. The total eclipse will be visible in eastern North America, South America, western Africa and western Europe. East Asia and Pacific Oceania will completely miss it, even the partial eclipse, because they'll be in the middle of the day when it happens...and you can't see a full moon at that time...
This event is being called the "supermoon eclipse" or the "super blood moon". The reason for the "super" designation is that the moon will appear to be slightly larger than usual because it will be at its perigee (closest point in its orbit) to Earth, while "blood" seems to refer to the ongoing string of consecutive eclipses six months apart. The earthsky.org website can furnish more information about this if you're interested...
If we're fortunate, the skies in Gainesville will be clear enough to watch this lunar eclipse, although in recent weeks a clear night sky hasn't exactly been something to count on. I'd like to thank my Facebook and workplace friend Evelyn for having posted about this upcoming astronomical show, giving me some forewarning about it...
This event is being called the "supermoon eclipse" or the "super blood moon". The reason for the "super" designation is that the moon will appear to be slightly larger than usual because it will be at its perigee (closest point in its orbit) to Earth, while "blood" seems to refer to the ongoing string of consecutive eclipses six months apart. The earthsky.org website can furnish more information about this if you're interested...
If we're fortunate, the skies in Gainesville will be clear enough to watch this lunar eclipse, although in recent weeks a clear night sky hasn't exactly been something to count on. I'd like to thank my Facebook and workplace friend Evelyn for having posted about this upcoming astronomical show, giving me some forewarning about it...
Thursday, September 24, 2015
Grateful for Break from Torrential Rains
Not one who enjoys extremes in weather, I am heartened by the reprieve we've been getting the last few days from the nearly devastating rainfall that has pounded and flooded us this past summer. And now it's fall season...not that a technical astronomical event as yesterday's fall equinox, with the sun's position on the elliptic passing across the celestial equator on its way into the southern celestial hemisphere, automatically calls for an instant climatic change where I live. But still, I'm looking forward to our weather pattern shifting from a tropical (and humid) orientation, with storms brewing in the Gulf of Mexico and then passing over us, to one more temperate (and dryer), with cold fronts sweeping down from the northwest. In any event, the temperatures may still be pretty hot outside, but at least the relative lack of precipitation is allowing the water that has saturated the ground to recede. Of course, that's not saying that there won't be a big storm today, tomorrow, or the next day...
Wednesday, September 23, 2015
Baseball Great Yogi Berra Passes Away
The great Yogi Berra, who as New York Yankees catcher over the course of his playing career won ten World Series championships and three American League MVP awards, has passed away at age ninety. As a little kid growing up in the early 1960s, I quite naturally assumed that he was named after then-cartoon superstar Yogi Bear. I didn't understand his greatness then, but I did appreciate the baseball card of him I collected from the backs of Post cereal boxes...along with those of other early 1960s baseball players, including his teammates Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris. Later on I came to associate the name "Yogi Berra" with the chocolate drink Yoo-Hoo, which he promoted for a long time on TV commercials. It was only later in life that I came to esteem not only the on-field accomplishments of this iconic sports figure, but also his humanity and humor. And, of course, all of those incredible "Yogi-isms"...many of which I'm hearing on ESPN as they pay homage to his memory: "If you come to a fork in the road, take it", "The game isn't over until it's over" "It's like deja vu all over again", "I really didn't say everything I said", "Baseball is 90 per cent mental. The other half is physical", ....and on and on it went. As his off-beat quotes piled up over the years, there began to be a question as to whether some of them may not have come from him. Oh well, I love hearing them, anyway...
Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Just Finished Reading John Updike's Rabbit, Run
John Updike, who passed away in 2009, was a writer of both short stories and novels, as well as serving as a regular critic for New Yorker magazine. He was also someone whose works I never got around to read, and only did so this time because Stephen King's most recent novel Finders Keepers led me to him. Although Updike wrote a lot, his most famous work seems to be the Rabbit series, the first book of which he published in 1960 and spaced subsequent installments in approximately ten-year intervals as he examined the unfolding life of its main character, Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom...
Set in 1959, Rabbit, Run, as the first book is titled, sees Harry, our "hero", at age 26 in his home town of Mount Judge, Pennsylvania (a mythical suburb of Updike's mythical city of Brewer). He is a former high school star basketball player and can't seem to let go in his mind of his old "glory days". He lives near both his parents and those of his wife Janice, whom he had married after discovering that she was pregnant with his first child. Janice is now pregnant again, and Harry is a door-to-door salesman for kitchen gadgets. Being something of a dissatisfied "seeker" in life, but never really knowing exactly what he wants or in which direction to look, he starts up his car one night and spontaneously takes off in it, going several hundred miles south and west before returning to Brewer. But he has left his wife, and the story takes off from this disturbing beginning. How it develops and ends I'll leave you to read for yourself...
Self-discovery and personal fulfillment in the face of social obligations and responsibilities is a theme I found in Rabbit, Run. The problem with the character of Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom is that, while he is continually upsetting the latter, he is clueless about the former...ultimately projecting the impression of himself as being something of a selfish, manipulative jerk. I never could get into this character's mind or find a basic for empathy/sympathy. Sure, we all have that struggle going on in our lives between what we want for ourselves and how we respond to others' expectations of us. But Harry never seems to learn anything from his experiences: he is so focused on whatever situation he is currently in that he cannot see beyond it...and the ramifications of his often destructive behavior...
Not only did I find Harry a disagreeable character, but I didn't get how Updike portrayed his thinking. Although he is 26 and fully engaged in what people would call "adult" behavior, in dialogue Harry speaks like a little kid...reminding me of Dennis the Menace's way of talking ("Jeepers, Mister Wilson!") Yet, when he is alone and the author wants to express his thoughts through the general narrative, Harry comes across as a very serious, contemplative man. Was this discrepancy intentional on the part of Updike? Who knows...but I had difficulty with his protagonist as someone who I could imagine as being real, and that was a huge problem for me with this book...
As far as I know, the Rabbit series is comprised of four books. The next one is titled Rabbit Redux. Seeing how it is set in time several years later than Rabbit, Run, it might be intriguing to see how Updike developed Harry Angstrom's character, if at all...
Set in 1959, Rabbit, Run, as the first book is titled, sees Harry, our "hero", at age 26 in his home town of Mount Judge, Pennsylvania (a mythical suburb of Updike's mythical city of Brewer). He is a former high school star basketball player and can't seem to let go in his mind of his old "glory days". He lives near both his parents and those of his wife Janice, whom he had married after discovering that she was pregnant with his first child. Janice is now pregnant again, and Harry is a door-to-door salesman for kitchen gadgets. Being something of a dissatisfied "seeker" in life, but never really knowing exactly what he wants or in which direction to look, he starts up his car one night and spontaneously takes off in it, going several hundred miles south and west before returning to Brewer. But he has left his wife, and the story takes off from this disturbing beginning. How it develops and ends I'll leave you to read for yourself...
Self-discovery and personal fulfillment in the face of social obligations and responsibilities is a theme I found in Rabbit, Run. The problem with the character of Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom is that, while he is continually upsetting the latter, he is clueless about the former...ultimately projecting the impression of himself as being something of a selfish, manipulative jerk. I never could get into this character's mind or find a basic for empathy/sympathy. Sure, we all have that struggle going on in our lives between what we want for ourselves and how we respond to others' expectations of us. But Harry never seems to learn anything from his experiences: he is so focused on whatever situation he is currently in that he cannot see beyond it...and the ramifications of his often destructive behavior...
Not only did I find Harry a disagreeable character, but I didn't get how Updike portrayed his thinking. Although he is 26 and fully engaged in what people would call "adult" behavior, in dialogue Harry speaks like a little kid...reminding me of Dennis the Menace's way of talking ("Jeepers, Mister Wilson!") Yet, when he is alone and the author wants to express his thoughts through the general narrative, Harry comes across as a very serious, contemplative man. Was this discrepancy intentional on the part of Updike? Who knows...but I had difficulty with his protagonist as someone who I could imagine as being real, and that was a huge problem for me with this book...
As far as I know, the Rabbit series is comprised of four books. The next one is titled Rabbit Redux. Seeing how it is set in time several years later than Rabbit, Run, it might be intriguing to see how Updike developed Harry Angstrom's character, if at all...
Monday, September 21, 2015
Return to Running, Albeit Cautiously
I am cautiously advancing once again with my running, being careful not to cause any aggravation to my right foot, which I now see is a case of plantar fasciitis. I do the appropriate stretches recommended for this affliction before running and then run on a cushioned surface while wearing thick-soled running shoes. I will continue to train this way at least until the end of October...and then I'll see where I stand. I still maintain hopes of running some long-distance races down the line...but they'll most likely be early in 2016. The main ones ahead of me are the Ocala Half-Marathon in January and Gainesville's FivePoints Half-Marathon the following month. I had been considering trying to complete a marathon-distance race sometime this winter, but the foot problem has put that idea on hold...unless I make dramatic progress during the next few weeks...
Sunday, September 20, 2015
Miami Dolphins, Especially Head Coach, Display Indifference About Loss
I watched in dismay today's Miami Dolphins football game against the Jacksonville Jaguars. Dismay is the proper word for a number of reasons. For one, they lost, pure and simple...and in the worst possible way: Jacksonville won on a last-minute field goal, 23-20, after they moved into field goal range because a Dolphins defensive player angrily shoved back at a Jaguars player after the end of a play and was called for a personal foul. As the camera followed this player walking back to the sidelines, he didn't seem particularly perturbed at what he had done...and neither, it appeared, did any of the other Miami players. In fact, the Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin not only remained completely taciturn and untalkative at the game's end (and for most of it as well), but he actually had the nerve to clap when Jacksonville kicked through the winning field goal with only seconds left. What is it with this guy and his team? Where is the kind of passion I see in other NFL and college football teams? Why should the Dolphins organization expect me, as one of their fans who followed them since 1968, to feel anything other than abject apathy about that team's performance when their own coach and players seem indifferent? Miami has a lot of talent out there...although they do seem to have some issues on their offensive line. Still, they have an excellent quarterback in Ryan Tannehill and enough key players to fill in gaps in their lineup. After all, every team has its own weaknesses. And I'm okay with the Dolphins having their own. But weaknesses or not, they just don't seem to care that much whether they win or lose...
Saturday, September 19, 2015
Just Finished Reading Isaac Asimov's Prelude to Foundation
The late science fiction writer Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) originally published his Foundation series as a trilogy in the 1950s...or least that's how people in general regarded it, for it wasn't until the 1980s that he added the final two books to make it a quintet. And upon rereading Book Three, titled Second Foundation, I also felt that the good author didn't properly finish the series and needed to add something else to make it a whole. I've read all five books before, but time has passed since my first voyage through Asimov's Foundation universe and I forgot many of the more detailed facets of his saga. During that last decade of his life, he also wrote two prequel novels dealing with how the pivotal character of Hari Seldon came to develop his theory of psychohistory that drove the narrative in the series. These two, Prelude to Foundation and Forward the Foundation, I hadn't read before. But before taking on Book Four, Foundation's Edge, once more, I decided to take a little detour and read the first one...
In case you haven't read any of my other Foundation series book reviews on this blog, let me lay down the "foundation" of the story as it pertains to Prelude to Foundation. It has been more than 10,000 years since our galaxy has been unified under a single political authority called the Empire, with its capital based on a very densely population planet, called Trantor, near the galaxy's center. Unlike the case with Star Trek or Star Wars, the intelligent population is entirely human. The origins of humankind have been lost to history, although there are myths that people originally came from one planet, with Aurora and Earth coming up often in speculation. Also, there were apparently very advanced robots back then at the beginning, too...whether or not this information is ultimately relevant to the book is up to you to find out. In any event, Hari Seldon is a mathematician by training from an outlying planet in the empire who visits Trantor and gives a speech in which he states the possibility of developing a new science, which he calls "psychohistory" and combines psychology, history, sociology, and mathematics to be able to make long-term forecasts about the future state of the Empire. Upon being notified of Seldon's speech, the sitting Emperor seeks him out in order have him propogandize the Empire's agenda...in spite of Seldon's informing him that his theory has yet to be developed and his ultimate conclusions about the Empire's future are as yet unknown. With the aid of others, Seldon flees into the very complex underground world of Trantor, encounters very disparate societies...and tries to hit upon a workable strategy for developing his psychohistory.
Having read the Foundation series before and picking up on some of the hints that Asimov laid throughout the book, I was able to figure out early on some of what would be revealed at the conclusion of Prelude to Foundation as a surprise ending. As it turns out, looking back on it all, the author may well have felt the need to write the book this way, especially considering the shocking way he concluded his series at the end of Book Five...
Because Prelude to Foundation is chronologically the first book in Isaac Asimov's Foundation according to his fictional narrative, I would instead recommend to new readers that they start their reading with the original Book One, simply titled Foundation...and read through the five-part series before reading the two prequels. Or, maybe, do what I did and, after reading Book Three, go "back in time" and read Prelude to Foundation. In this way, it may help you if you hadn't read beforehand Asimov's other series about the Empire and what preceded it...
In case you haven't read any of my other Foundation series book reviews on this blog, let me lay down the "foundation" of the story as it pertains to Prelude to Foundation. It has been more than 10,000 years since our galaxy has been unified under a single political authority called the Empire, with its capital based on a very densely population planet, called Trantor, near the galaxy's center. Unlike the case with Star Trek or Star Wars, the intelligent population is entirely human. The origins of humankind have been lost to history, although there are myths that people originally came from one planet, with Aurora and Earth coming up often in speculation. Also, there were apparently very advanced robots back then at the beginning, too...whether or not this information is ultimately relevant to the book is up to you to find out. In any event, Hari Seldon is a mathematician by training from an outlying planet in the empire who visits Trantor and gives a speech in which he states the possibility of developing a new science, which he calls "psychohistory" and combines psychology, history, sociology, and mathematics to be able to make long-term forecasts about the future state of the Empire. Upon being notified of Seldon's speech, the sitting Emperor seeks him out in order have him propogandize the Empire's agenda...in spite of Seldon's informing him that his theory has yet to be developed and his ultimate conclusions about the Empire's future are as yet unknown. With the aid of others, Seldon flees into the very complex underground world of Trantor, encounters very disparate societies...and tries to hit upon a workable strategy for developing his psychohistory.
Having read the Foundation series before and picking up on some of the hints that Asimov laid throughout the book, I was able to figure out early on some of what would be revealed at the conclusion of Prelude to Foundation as a surprise ending. As it turns out, looking back on it all, the author may well have felt the need to write the book this way, especially considering the shocking way he concluded his series at the end of Book Five...
Because Prelude to Foundation is chronologically the first book in Isaac Asimov's Foundation according to his fictional narrative, I would instead recommend to new readers that they start their reading with the original Book One, simply titled Foundation...and read through the five-part series before reading the two prequels. Or, maybe, do what I did and, after reading Book Three, go "back in time" and read Prelude to Foundation. In this way, it may help you if you hadn't read beforehand Asimov's other series about the Empire and what preceded it...
Friday, September 18, 2015
The Florida Teams as the 2015 MLB Season Draws to Close
At the start of the 2015 Major League Baseball season, the National League's Miami Marlins were given a lot of support in the sports media for being a team that was on its way up...definitely a playoff contender and even possibly vying for the East Division title. In the American League, on the other hand, the Tampa Bay Rays, after losing its longtime manager Joe Madden to the Chicago Cubs in the off-season and trading away some of its major talent, weren't expected to do much beyond finishing last in their East Division. Instead, the Rays, with its new manager Kevin Cash, surprised most of us, actually being in first place for much of the early part of the season and remaining in wild card contention until just recently. Miami, however, started out dismally slow and never recovered. After the All-Star break, they went into an even worse tailspin, actually falling briefly into last place in their division. Of late, however, they have been playing very well and are now solidly in third place...albeit with a horrendous 64-83 record. This team disappointed me and many others this year: proven veteran players that they acquired in the off-season, with the notable exception of overachieving 2nd baseman Dee Gorden, have had substandard performances. Losing their star slugger Giancarlo Stanton halfway through the season to injury didn't help, either...and don't get me going about their pitching...
Tampa Bay is currently only a half-game ahead of last place Boston with a 70-76 record, considerably better than Miami's but getting worse. They have sixteen games to go in the regular season to try to stay out of the cellar. Seven of these games will be against the Red Sox...and they will most likely determine where the Rays end up in the standings. As for the Marlins, I'm sure at this point that they're just looking ahead to 2016 and the many changes they will need to make: a new manager would be a good start...
Tampa Bay is currently only a half-game ahead of last place Boston with a 70-76 record, considerably better than Miami's but getting worse. They have sixteen games to go in the regular season to try to stay out of the cellar. Seven of these games will be against the Red Sox...and they will most likely determine where the Rays end up in the standings. As for the Marlins, I'm sure at this point that they're just looking ahead to 2016 and the many changes they will need to make: a new manager would be a good start...
Thursday, September 17, 2015
Voter Turnout, Presidential Election, Off-Year Elections
The second Republican presidential debate was held last night, this time on CNN, and it was that network's turn the following morning to be all giddy about its "news" story. But to me, as I have interpreted the last few elections, both of presidential election years and of the "off" years, whoever ends up winning the Presidency (or US Senate seat, or state governorship) in politically-divided (or "purple") areas will depend more on voter turnout than on the candidates' comparative virtues or ideology...unless these characteristics are seen as being way over-the-top. Take the state of Florida, for example. I ask you: does it make any sense at all for this state to go for Barack Obama, a left-leaning Democrat, in 2008 and then elect as governor a tea party right-wing Republican, Rick Scott, in 2010? But wait, there's more...two years later, the state went right back and went for Obama again! Yet even with this, I'm not finished...this same Florida turned around in 2014 and returned Mr. Scott, a favorite of Sean Hannity, back to office!!!
I don't believe for an instant that the Florida people politically veered left in 2008, turned back right in 2010, switched back left in 2012 and then doubled back right in 2014. No, what happened was that a larger segment of the Democratic-leaning voters decided in the 2010 and 2014 off-year elections that they weren't "motivated" enough to get off their asses and invest about 10-15 minutes of their oh-so-precious time at their local precincts...
Well, 2016 is an "on-year" election, so I expect my fellow moody Democratic voters to be "motivated" once again to actually participate in the electoral process. Which doesn't bode very well for any of the candidates currently running on the Republican side, regardless who ends up wearing that party's mantle in the general election. Of course, should either party commit political suicide by nominating someone without a prayer of a chance at winning a nationwide election, voter turnout won't matter much. Unless, that is, BOTH parties end up nominating "unwinnable" candidates...which I see as a possibility right now with Trump and his repulsive personality ahead on the Republican side and the leftist/Socialist Sanders surging with the Democrats...
I don't believe for an instant that the Florida people politically veered left in 2008, turned back right in 2010, switched back left in 2012 and then doubled back right in 2014. No, what happened was that a larger segment of the Democratic-leaning voters decided in the 2010 and 2014 off-year elections that they weren't "motivated" enough to get off their asses and invest about 10-15 minutes of their oh-so-precious time at their local precincts...
Well, 2016 is an "on-year" election, so I expect my fellow moody Democratic voters to be "motivated" once again to actually participate in the electoral process. Which doesn't bode very well for any of the candidates currently running on the Republican side, regardless who ends up wearing that party's mantle in the general election. Of course, should either party commit political suicide by nominating someone without a prayer of a chance at winning a nationwide election, voter turnout won't matter much. Unless, that is, BOTH parties end up nominating "unwinnable" candidates...which I see as a possibility right now with Trump and his repulsive personality ahead on the Republican side and the leftist/Socialist Sanders surging with the Democrats...
Wednesday, September 16, 2015
Just Finished Reading A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge
I was rummaging through a pile of stuff in the house when I came across a science fiction novel by Vernor Vinge that belongs to my son. Upon further investigation into this author, I discovered that he has written a science fiction series titled Zones of Thought. I got a copy of the first book, titled A Fire Upon the Deep, and just finished reading it...
One thing about science fiction that is often considerably different from more reality-based genres like mystery, crime, war, or romance is that the "world" that the author has introduced, along with the technology within it, involves an extensive use of new terminology and concepts. This can make sci fi reading a bit cumbersome at the beginning of a story as the reader struggles to understand what the heck is going on. A Fire Upon the Deep is no exception, with its own computer lingo and Vinge's idea of a galaxy divided into four different zones that affect attainable velocity and consciousness. Since he didn't explain everything up front at the beginning, I had to just read on in faith until I could start to make sense of the scenario. Once I did, though, it turned out to be a pretty good tale...and with well-developed characters who brought out the feelings of empathy, sympathy...and sometimes antipathy...that made them believable and memorable.
Three situations drive the plot in A Fire Upon the Deep. One is the accidental reactivation, by human explorers, of a long-dormant, malevolent transcendant entity that threatens the very existence of life in the galaxy. Another is the stranded party of people fleeing this Blight, as it has come to be called, as they struggle to survive around their adopted planet's dominant life form: the Tines. And the third centers on an unlikely foursome as they race through space to rescue the survivors and recover from that group's grounded spaceship what may be the only thing that can stop the Blight...
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of A Fire Upon the Deep, besides those four galactic zones, is how Vinge studies the concept of group identity and consciousness through the civilization of the dog-like Tines. I was also impressed with his unpretentious writing style...this made it much easier to grasp the mind-stretching ideas he was introducing into his story...
So now I'm hooked on another series. A Fire Upon the Deep came out in 1992. The next book, A Deepness in the Sky (1999), is said to be a prequel to the first book. And Book Three of the series, the last one to be published, was only released in 2011. So Vernor Vinge's Zones of Thought project isn't exactly one that I should sit around awaiting the next installment: he took 12 years to get around to the last one...
One thing about science fiction that is often considerably different from more reality-based genres like mystery, crime, war, or romance is that the "world" that the author has introduced, along with the technology within it, involves an extensive use of new terminology and concepts. This can make sci fi reading a bit cumbersome at the beginning of a story as the reader struggles to understand what the heck is going on. A Fire Upon the Deep is no exception, with its own computer lingo and Vinge's idea of a galaxy divided into four different zones that affect attainable velocity and consciousness. Since he didn't explain everything up front at the beginning, I had to just read on in faith until I could start to make sense of the scenario. Once I did, though, it turned out to be a pretty good tale...and with well-developed characters who brought out the feelings of empathy, sympathy...and sometimes antipathy...that made them believable and memorable.
Three situations drive the plot in A Fire Upon the Deep. One is the accidental reactivation, by human explorers, of a long-dormant, malevolent transcendant entity that threatens the very existence of life in the galaxy. Another is the stranded party of people fleeing this Blight, as it has come to be called, as they struggle to survive around their adopted planet's dominant life form: the Tines. And the third centers on an unlikely foursome as they race through space to rescue the survivors and recover from that group's grounded spaceship what may be the only thing that can stop the Blight...
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of A Fire Upon the Deep, besides those four galactic zones, is how Vinge studies the concept of group identity and consciousness through the civilization of the dog-like Tines. I was also impressed with his unpretentious writing style...this made it much easier to grasp the mind-stretching ideas he was introducing into his story...
So now I'm hooked on another series. A Fire Upon the Deep came out in 1992. The next book, A Deepness in the Sky (1999), is said to be a prequel to the first book. And Book Three of the series, the last one to be published, was only released in 2011. So Vernor Vinge's Zones of Thought project isn't exactly one that I should sit around awaiting the next installment: he took 12 years to get around to the last one...
Monday, September 14, 2015
Piecing Movie Fragments Together
For most of the movies I've seen, I sit down at the beginning and watch them through to the end. However, there are movies I've experienced piecemeal...I may start off with a clip near the end, then maybe a scene toward the middle or beginning, usually because I encounter them while channel surfing at those particular stages. After a few "sightings" of such a movie, I'll start to form a picture of it as a whole, with gaps throughout that I haven't yet seen. Usually a movie like this is one that I feel I would like to watch but for whatever reasons can't seem to find or make the time for it. In this category, for me, is the latest Star Trek movie: Into Darkness. I knew there was a real nasty villain in it, played by Benedict Cumberback, with whom Spock had a chase/fight scene. There was a brutal attack on Federation headquarters early in the film. Something else about Scotty in a bar somewhere getting drunk with his weird-looking alien buddy when Kirk calls him. Kirk and McCoy running in hooded robes from a mob of painted aboriginals on a red planet, with a volcano erupting in the background. A huge black spaceship crashing into the downtown of a large city. And on and on it went, until...
Until I finally had enough of all the fragments and set out to watch Star Trek: Into Darkness in its entirety. I checked out my streaming Netflix and, for a change, they actually had the movie I was searching for! Last night I enjoyed it from start to finish...it was worth it, one of the best Star Trek movies ever made. The next movie in the series comes out next year. In the meantime, maybe I should put together some fragments from other movies I've never completely watched...
Until I finally had enough of all the fragments and set out to watch Star Trek: Into Darkness in its entirety. I checked out my streaming Netflix and, for a change, they actually had the movie I was searching for! Last night I enjoyed it from start to finish...it was worth it, one of the best Star Trek movies ever made. The next movie in the series comes out next year. In the meantime, maybe I should put together some fragments from other movies I've never completely watched...
Sunday, September 13, 2015
Gators Manage to Win Sloppy Game vs. East Carolina
After the University of Florida football team breezed by New Mexico State in its first game of the 2015 season 61-13, many fans expected a similar outcome yesterday against their second non-conference opponent, this one being East Carolina. But the Pirates were a much better team than Florida's first opponent: last year they beat then-seventeenth ranked Virginia Tech 28-17, clobbered North Carolina 70-41 and severely challenged the SEC's South Carolina before finally succumbing 33-23. And then they played the Gators at the very end in the Birmingham Bowl, losing a hard-fought contest 28-20. So East Carolina was never a second-rate team. That having been noted, however, it was clear to me that Florida played a very sloppy game yesterday in spite of their ultimate 31-24 victory. The Gators committed turnovers directly leading to ten East Carolina points, and two crucial penalties cost them dearly...one nullifying an early touchdown and one putting the Pirates in good field position for their last touchdown drive. Also, Florida was remiss at capitalizing on the many East Carolina fumbles in the first half. The quarterback play was generally good, but Will Grier threw three passes that should have been intercepted...while the one pick he did throw was a deflection off the receiver...
Florida plays Kentucky in Lexington next Saturday evening. By all accounts, I think the new Gator head coach Jim McElwain is doing a good job...but man, that dude can really get agitated on the sidelines...
Florida plays Kentucky in Lexington next Saturday evening. By all accounts, I think the new Gator head coach Jim McElwain is doing a good job...but man, that dude can really get agitated on the sidelines...
Friday, September 11, 2015
Just Finished Reading Isaac Asimov's Second Foundation (Again)
As I continue to reread renown science fiction writer Isaac Asimov's celebrated Foundation series, I have just finished Book Three of the five main books, titled Second Foundation. The story is set tens of thousands of years into the future, as humanity...now inhabiting the entire known galaxy...is recovering from the destruction of the ten thousand year old Empire that once politically, economically, and militarily united them all. Hari Seldon, the famous psychohistorian/mathematician who had predicted the Empire's demise and had laid out plans for two "Foundations"...one on the planet Terminus at the galaxy's frontier and the other at "Star's End"...has been dead for four hundred years. His plans were for the two Foundations, the first run by physical scientists and the second governed by psychologists, to preserve and then spread into the galaxy to resurrect human society into another, more benevolent empire and avoid a protracted dark age. But those preparations have come unraveled: a singular element in the form of psychic mutant named the Mule has conquered much of the galaxy, unanticipated by Seldon and throwing off his equations and predictions. How the Mule's reign culminates and its ramifications dominate the story of the first part of Second Foundation. And the Second Foundation becomes forefront in both the confrontation with the Mule and in Part Two of the book...the main questions being (1) where exactly is the Second Foundation located, (2) who are in it, and (3) what exactly is it up to...
Second Foundation is a good, fast read...especially for science fiction when sometimes the heavy emphasis some writers place on discussing technical matters, in order to give their works more credence, can bog down the reader. Instead, Asimov adroitly moves the plot along while presenting sympathetic characters. As opposed to the beginning of the Foundation series, however, I am finding that some of the themes of the developing story line deal more and more with paranormal, psychic abilities...that, I'm afraid, tends to inject too much uncertainty and too many possibilities into the narrative, making it harder for me to follow and even harder to relate to...
Foundation, Foundation and Empire, and Second Foundation were all published in novel form in the 1950s. Asimov would wait until the 1980s before capping off this series with Foundation's Edge and Foundation and Earth. I decided to take a little detour in this series and next read (this one for the first time) his 1980s prequel novel Prelude to Foundation, which purportedly goes back to the earlier years in Hari Seldon's life...
Second Foundation is a good, fast read...especially for science fiction when sometimes the heavy emphasis some writers place on discussing technical matters, in order to give their works more credence, can bog down the reader. Instead, Asimov adroitly moves the plot along while presenting sympathetic characters. As opposed to the beginning of the Foundation series, however, I am finding that some of the themes of the developing story line deal more and more with paranormal, psychic abilities...that, I'm afraid, tends to inject too much uncertainty and too many possibilities into the narrative, making it harder for me to follow and even harder to relate to...
Foundation, Foundation and Empire, and Second Foundation were all published in novel form in the 1950s. Asimov would wait until the 1980s before capping off this series with Foundation's Edge and Foundation and Earth. I decided to take a little detour in this series and next read (this one for the first time) his 1980s prequel novel Prelude to Foundation, which purportedly goes back to the earlier years in Hari Seldon's life...
Thursday, September 10, 2015
Tomorrow's 9/11 Television Coverage
The terrorist attacks against our country and its people on the morning of September 11, 2001 should never be forgotten or swept under the rug. I don't know how all of the various news channels and networks on TV plan to cover it...I only know from my TV schedule about the two channels that plan to devote special programs in remembrance of this outrage against America: MSNBC and The History Channel. Late tonight, at 1 AM Eastern Time, MSNBC will have a one-hour show about 9/11, while tomorrow morning at 8:30 they will rebroadcast, as they do every year, the NBC Today show as events unfolded that tragic morning 14 years ago. The History Channel has a whole slate of interesting programming scheduled for tomorrow. But I'm hoping that, although other channels may not be setting aside time for special programs exclusively devoted to 9/11, they will still be giving a considerable amount of air time about it on their regularly scheduled shows...
Wednesday, September 9, 2015
Just Finished Reading Exit Ghost by Philip Roth
Philip Roth is one of those famous writers whose works have slipped by me over the years. Stephen King, in his latest book Finders Keepers, dropped Roth's name a few times...prompting me to investigate something he wrote. I went to my local public library branch and grabbed Exit Ghost off the shelf...it had the added incentive of being relatively short. Unfortunately, Exit Ghost is apparently the last book in a long series that Roth had been writing concerning the fictional character of Nathan Zuckerman, a famous New York writer. Since I tend to try to avoid picking up books in mid-series, end-of-series has to be the worst! Nevertheless, I gamely pressed on with my reading...
The setting of Exit Ghost is New York City of 2004, right at the time of the presidential election between Bush and Kerry. Zuckerman, who has gone into retreat to woodsy western Massachusetts for more than a decade following death threats emanating from around the New York metropolis, has shed all of the trappings of his former life and has been devoting himself, in rural isolation, to his craft of writing. Unfortunately, he was diagnosed with cancer a few years earlier and had been compelled to return to the city off and on for treatment of the disease and the complications arising from that treatment (I'll leave the sad details for you, the potential future reader, to find out). During one of these return trips, at that time I mentioned, he decides to stay in town for a year...and becomes involved in two subplots that intertwine throughout the book. What they specifically are and what happens I'll leave others to discover for themselves. Let's just say that there is a lot of introspection here, presented in the first person narrative by Zuckerman...
There are many things I derived from Exit Ghost. One is that I didn't need to read all of those other Zuckerman books after all...Roth did a masterful job of creating a complete story here without making me feel as if I needed to go back to previous stories to fill in gaps. Another is the author's Jewish heritage and experiences as he applied them to his characters. Roth also employed a device that I found intriguing: the playing in Zuckerman's mind, eventually transferred to paper, of imaginary conversations he has with characters...when in the real narrative of the story his communication with them is full of awkwardness and missed moments. This resonates with me...and probably would with many people...as I've often recreated scenarios from the past with different outcomes if only I had said this or that...of if the person I was talking with was just a little more reasonable or compassionate...
In Exit Ghost, Philip Roth explored a potential problem that many authors of fiction face as they tend to put much of themselves and their own lives into their characters. Sure, it's "fiction", but can one, by reading a writer's books, conversely work backwards from the fiction and make conclusions about his or her personal life? I have to admit to believing sometimes that Nathan Zuckerman IS Philip Roth in fictional disguise...but that's probably not the case at all. Well, maybe Zuckerman does serve as a spokesman for many of Roth's views and they may have some common life experiences, but he is make-believe nonetheless. The problem is that once I realize that an author is speaking their views and expressing at least some of their own real-life experiences through a particular character, the temptation is to extrapolate that everything that character says and does has a reality to it reflected in the life of the author...
And finally, for the purposes of this particular blog entry at least, there is that recurring theme of mortality and aging that pervades the book. This probably resonates stronger with someone like me who is close to 59 and who just lost a friend from elementary school to cancer than it would to someone in their twenties or thirties. How does one deal with the progressive degeneration of their physical and mental abilities? If this subject bothers you, then perhaps Exit Ghost may not be the book you want to read. Then again, if such is the case, maybe it's a book you need to read...
The setting of Exit Ghost is New York City of 2004, right at the time of the presidential election between Bush and Kerry. Zuckerman, who has gone into retreat to woodsy western Massachusetts for more than a decade following death threats emanating from around the New York metropolis, has shed all of the trappings of his former life and has been devoting himself, in rural isolation, to his craft of writing. Unfortunately, he was diagnosed with cancer a few years earlier and had been compelled to return to the city off and on for treatment of the disease and the complications arising from that treatment (I'll leave the sad details for you, the potential future reader, to find out). During one of these return trips, at that time I mentioned, he decides to stay in town for a year...and becomes involved in two subplots that intertwine throughout the book. What they specifically are and what happens I'll leave others to discover for themselves. Let's just say that there is a lot of introspection here, presented in the first person narrative by Zuckerman...
There are many things I derived from Exit Ghost. One is that I didn't need to read all of those other Zuckerman books after all...Roth did a masterful job of creating a complete story here without making me feel as if I needed to go back to previous stories to fill in gaps. Another is the author's Jewish heritage and experiences as he applied them to his characters. Roth also employed a device that I found intriguing: the playing in Zuckerman's mind, eventually transferred to paper, of imaginary conversations he has with characters...when in the real narrative of the story his communication with them is full of awkwardness and missed moments. This resonates with me...and probably would with many people...as I've often recreated scenarios from the past with different outcomes if only I had said this or that...of if the person I was talking with was just a little more reasonable or compassionate...
In Exit Ghost, Philip Roth explored a potential problem that many authors of fiction face as they tend to put much of themselves and their own lives into their characters. Sure, it's "fiction", but can one, by reading a writer's books, conversely work backwards from the fiction and make conclusions about his or her personal life? I have to admit to believing sometimes that Nathan Zuckerman IS Philip Roth in fictional disguise...but that's probably not the case at all. Well, maybe Zuckerman does serve as a spokesman for many of Roth's views and they may have some common life experiences, but he is make-believe nonetheless. The problem is that once I realize that an author is speaking their views and expressing at least some of their own real-life experiences through a particular character, the temptation is to extrapolate that everything that character says and does has a reality to it reflected in the life of the author...
And finally, for the purposes of this particular blog entry at least, there is that recurring theme of mortality and aging that pervades the book. This probably resonates stronger with someone like me who is close to 59 and who just lost a friend from elementary school to cancer than it would to someone in their twenties or thirties. How does one deal with the progressive degeneration of their physical and mental abilities? If this subject bothers you, then perhaps Exit Ghost may not be the book you want to read. Then again, if such is the case, maybe it's a book you need to read...
Tuesday, September 8, 2015
Watching Some U.S. Open Tennis Matches
During the last few days I've been watching the U.S. Open tennis tournament, one of the major events in the sports world. ESPN and ESPN-2 have been showing the various matches, which for both the men and women are now down to the quarterfinals stage. Right now France's Kristina Mladenovic has her hands full with Italy's Roberta Vinci...both players were unseeded for the tournament. Tonight will be the much-hyped match between the Williams sisters Serena and Venus, with Serena going for the first calendar-year tennis Grand Slam since 1988. Yesterday, England's Andy Murray and Switzerland's Roger Federer each had close matches against their respective opponents Kevin Anderson and John Isner to try to qualify for the quarterfinal round. Murray lost his and Federer won...it was interesting to compare the demeanor and behavior of the two as they were tested like this. Murray was agitated and cursed while under adversity, while Federer was poised and confident...just as much when his back was against the wall as when he was triumphant. There's a lesson here: whom do I want to emulate the most in my own personal walk through life??!!
I am by no means a tennis fanatic as my parents were for decades, but I can see how one could get drawn into the sport. It's not like football, basketball, hockey or soccer where the clock determines the sport's parameters...no, tennis is more like golf or baseball in that, as a player, you can be only one hole or out...or in tennis, just one point...from victory. But that last hole, out, or point MUST be accomplished or ultimately you lose...
I am by no means a tennis fanatic as my parents were for decades, but I can see how one could get drawn into the sport. It's not like football, basketball, hockey or soccer where the clock determines the sport's parameters...no, tennis is more like golf or baseball in that, as a player, you can be only one hole or out...or in tennis, just one point...from victory. But that last hole, out, or point MUST be accomplished or ultimately you lose...
Monday, September 7, 2015
Melissa and I Celebrate Our 29th Anniversary
It was 29 years ago on this date, on a Sunday afternoon, that my sweetheart Melissa and I got married in a small southwest Gainesville church. And now, in 2015, I can say that my love for her has only gotten stronger as we have gone through many seasons in our lives together. She is a priceless treasure!
Happy Anniversary, my dear Melissa!
Happy Anniversary, my dear Melissa!
Sunday, September 6, 2015
Just Finished Reading John Grisham's The Brethren
Last month, Melissa and I went to a retreat in Ocklawaha, on the shores of Lake Weir not far from Ocala. During it, one night after dinner, we got into a discussion with the others sitting at our table about the books we liked. When I mentioned John Grisham, a renown author of many law-centered novels, the guy seated on my left suggested his two favorite titles: The Testament and The Brethren. Having already read three of Grisham's books (The Pelican Brief, The Firm, and The Appeal) and being disappointed in that last one, I was anxious to get a little advance encouragement before taking on another of his works. With that endorsement in mind, I just finished reading The Brethren. As it turned out, my new-found friend was right: it was one of Grisham's best...at least with the limited number of his books that I've yet read...
The Brethren refers to the informal name given to a trio of ex-judges serving sentences in a low-security federal prison near Jacksonville, Florida. They come up with a scam extorting money from various men across the country whom they have snared answering their fake ads in magazines for male pen pals. Concurrently, a presidential campaign is on, and the CIA director, intent on having the country's military budget dramatically increased, has created a candidate out of an obscure Arizona congressman. How these two subplots ultimately connect determines the flow and outcome of the story. Grisham kept what could have been a lot of extraneous material and characters out of this novel and made it an easy and quiet suspenseful, enjoyable reading experience. Naturally, you're going to have to read it for yourself to discover the details and its ending...
If you're inclined to believe in the invisible hand of forces behind the scenes in our politics manipulating politicians and public opinion with their cynical actions, then The Brethren is the book for you. It was published in 2000, a full year before 9/11 and the "Truther" movement with its "false flag" accusations arising from that tragedy. It also reaffirmed a sad truth of our times that I've learned from the mistakes of others: never express anything in a letter, the phone, or on the Internet that you aren't fully prepared for the entire world to know...privacy as we grew up expecting as an inalienable right is almost nonexistent anymore, regardless what the written law says...
Now I'm going to get hold of John Grisham's The Testament...well, after I read some other books by other authors, that is...
The Brethren refers to the informal name given to a trio of ex-judges serving sentences in a low-security federal prison near Jacksonville, Florida. They come up with a scam extorting money from various men across the country whom they have snared answering their fake ads in magazines for male pen pals. Concurrently, a presidential campaign is on, and the CIA director, intent on having the country's military budget dramatically increased, has created a candidate out of an obscure Arizona congressman. How these two subplots ultimately connect determines the flow and outcome of the story. Grisham kept what could have been a lot of extraneous material and characters out of this novel and made it an easy and quiet suspenseful, enjoyable reading experience. Naturally, you're going to have to read it for yourself to discover the details and its ending...
If you're inclined to believe in the invisible hand of forces behind the scenes in our politics manipulating politicians and public opinion with their cynical actions, then The Brethren is the book for you. It was published in 2000, a full year before 9/11 and the "Truther" movement with its "false flag" accusations arising from that tragedy. It also reaffirmed a sad truth of our times that I've learned from the mistakes of others: never express anything in a letter, the phone, or on the Internet that you aren't fully prepared for the entire world to know...privacy as we grew up expecting as an inalienable right is almost nonexistent anymore, regardless what the written law says...
Now I'm going to get hold of John Grisham's The Testament...well, after I read some other books by other authors, that is...
Saturday, September 5, 2015
Preseason Football Rankings 'Rank'le Me
The college football season began this week, culminating today in the first full day of games. Already there are preseason polls out, ranking not only the top 25 teams in the country but even the most likely prospects to win the Heisman Trophy as player of the year. To me, these polls are ludicrous as the structure of college sports is very different from that of the pros. Each year, the seniors leave school...as well as those underclassmen entering the NFL draft early...and the various schools have to essentially overhaul their teams. Plus, the entering freshmen class of players adds another level of uncertainty to each school's outlook for the upcoming season. Yet Ohio State is Number One without having played a single game...some media folks are making an issue of the "fact" that Alabama has dropped down to Number Three after several years of being ranked preseason as One or Two. They have to be kidding...
Well, maybe the rankings do have a certain bearing on things as we go through our first weekend of college football. Those who gamble on the games need to have something to go by as they lay their money down...even if they don't yet know how good or bad the teams are going to be this year. If I were a betting man (and I'm not...but I'll leave that for a future blog post), I would wait a little bit into the season before I began to wager any serious money. On the other hand, Vegas puts its own line out for the individual games...no need after all to follow some mythical rankings chart when no games have yet been played...
Well, maybe the rankings do have a certain bearing on things as we go through our first weekend of college football. Those who gamble on the games need to have something to go by as they lay their money down...even if they don't yet know how good or bad the teams are going to be this year. If I were a betting man (and I'm not...but I'll leave that for a future blog post), I would wait a little bit into the season before I began to wager any serious money. On the other hand, Vegas puts its own line out for the individual games...no need after all to follow some mythical rankings chart when no games have yet been played...
Friday, September 4, 2015
Just Finished Reading Sue Grafton's "R" and "S" Mystery Novels
I've been a big fan of mystery writer Sue Grafton, whose claim to fame is her "alphabet mystery" series featuring California private investigator Kinsey Millhone and the titles of which have been published in alphabetical order, with just a couple of "letters" to go until completion. I'm also going through it in alphabetical order, sometimes running across a book I've already read...but most of them are new reads. This was the case with my latest: "R" is for Ricochet and "S" is for Silence, published in 2004 and 2005, respectively. This is significant because Grafton has compressed Kinsey's ongoing sleuthing adventures to the point where the stories themselves are set in the late 1980s...and this can be important when dealing with such things in the stories as telephone access and computers...
Although I've enjoyed reading these books, I have to weigh in on the negative side about these last two. In "R" is for Ricochet, the character of Kinsey Millhone is made passive and secondary by another character, a young woman named Reba who is the individual our private eye has been hired by Reba's father to guide through her initial stages of parole after imprisonment for embezzlement. Reba seems to assume all of the spunky and intelligent aspects of Kinsey that I have come to admire...leaving the detective to spend most of the story "tagging along" or dealing with her 87-year old landlord's romantic situation or that of her own...quite separate from the main story line and presenting an annoying distraction for me, the reader. As for "S" is for Silence, much of the story is presented as a 34-year flashback to a young woman's unsolved disappearance...no Kinsey in sight anywhere. When she does occasionally make her presence known and finally figures out the case, her method and reasoning for finding the main culprit in the story is unexplained. I was so frustrated by the ending to this book that I went on the Internet to read others' reactions...and found that many of them agreed with me...
If these last two books of Sue Grafton that I just read happened to be the first ones for me as well, I might have decided to abandon reading any more of her books. As it is, however, I know that she is much more capable of producing a good result...after all, I've now gone all the way through book #19. I'm looking forward to a better story with the next Millhone novel, which I discovered is titled "T" is for Trespass...
Although I've enjoyed reading these books, I have to weigh in on the negative side about these last two. In "R" is for Ricochet, the character of Kinsey Millhone is made passive and secondary by another character, a young woman named Reba who is the individual our private eye has been hired by Reba's father to guide through her initial stages of parole after imprisonment for embezzlement. Reba seems to assume all of the spunky and intelligent aspects of Kinsey that I have come to admire...leaving the detective to spend most of the story "tagging along" or dealing with her 87-year old landlord's romantic situation or that of her own...quite separate from the main story line and presenting an annoying distraction for me, the reader. As for "S" is for Silence, much of the story is presented as a 34-year flashback to a young woman's unsolved disappearance...no Kinsey in sight anywhere. When she does occasionally make her presence known and finally figures out the case, her method and reasoning for finding the main culprit in the story is unexplained. I was so frustrated by the ending to this book that I went on the Internet to read others' reactions...and found that many of them agreed with me...
If these last two books of Sue Grafton that I just read happened to be the first ones for me as well, I might have decided to abandon reading any more of her books. As it is, however, I know that she is much more capable of producing a good result...after all, I've now gone all the way through book #19. I'm looking forward to a better story with the next Millhone novel, which I discovered is titled "T" is for Trespass...
Thursday, September 3, 2015
CNN Amends Debate Rules to Let Fiorina In
CNN has just recently amended its rules for which candidates qualified for its Republican presidential debate, which will take place on September 16. Last month's Fox News main debate limited participants to ten while relegating the seven other "major" candidates to its secondary "happy hour" debate. The criteria for who got in for the prime time debate was the average of several public opinion polls taken beforehand...fair enough, I suppose. California former business executive Carly Fiorina finished low in those early polls...most likely due to lack of name recognition outside her home state...but performed very well in the debate provided for her and jumped markedly in the polls held afterward. Unfortunately, most of the polls CNN used to determine their lineup for the upcoming debate were those done before those two Fox debates...so Fiorina once again didn't make their cut of ten. Recognizing this flaw, one that essentially nullifies the performances of the candidates in the first debates, CNN slightly adjusted their rule to allow Fiorina in as the "eleventh" candidate. But this is also, in my opinion, not enough...she has jumped in the polls far beyond any "eleventh" place and by no means should be regarded as an "extra" candidate. The fault for her initial omission is with CNN for having placed too much weight on early polls. Their excuse is that not enough more recent polls had been taken...that strikes me as being a bit disingenuous, especially when all I see when I watch cable news channels on TV is public opinion poll after public opinion poll...
Tuesday, September 1, 2015
Just Finished Reading Madeleine L'Engle's A Swiftly Tilting Planet
I've been reading, off and on, Madeleine L'Engle's science fiction series for children called the Time Quintet. I just finished reading the third book, titled A Swiftly Tilting Planet. In it, we once again find the Murray and O'Keefe families, featuring main characters Meg and Charles Wallace. But several years have passed between books two and three, and Meg has just married her old friend Calvin O'Keefe while the precocious Charles Wallace has by now turned fifteen. A new crisis presents itself at the story's beginning: a South American dictator has gotten hold of the atomic bomb and is threatening a nuclear holocaust if his near-impossible demands are not met. Meg's father, a physicist who has direct access to the White House, tells the grim news to his family. Meg's mother-in-law, who is present at this moment, places a charge on Charles Wallace to set things right...and presents him with a "rune"...which takes the form of a prayer to heaven to influence the various forces on earth to rescue the speaker during a dire crisis. Charles Wallace, with Meg psychically tuning in through a process called "kything", then travels back through time with the help of a nifty unicorn and tries, by subtly entering the minds of different people (and with the help of that rune), to influence events enough to change the present and alleviate the nuclear crisis...
First of all, let me just say that I "get it": this is a children's story, and fantasy and implausibility are lathered on thick here. That being said, I have to object to the idea expressed within it that there is such a thing as an evil ancestral line any more than there is a benevolent one. But part of the project that Charles Wallace is engaged in is just with that in mind: change the line of descent to the present so that the genetic makeup of the current ruler in that South American country is "good" instead of "evil". Maybe I'm making too much of this, but it bothered me nonetheless...
So now I've finished three of these books, with two more to go. But wait, I just found out that the author had also written another series parallel to this one...a series featuring the O'Keefe family and the eventual children of Meg and Calvin. Maybe I'll just wait a few more years, Lord willing, before I start on that one...
First of all, let me just say that I "get it": this is a children's story, and fantasy and implausibility are lathered on thick here. That being said, I have to object to the idea expressed within it that there is such a thing as an evil ancestral line any more than there is a benevolent one. But part of the project that Charles Wallace is engaged in is just with that in mind: change the line of descent to the present so that the genetic makeup of the current ruler in that South American country is "good" instead of "evil". Maybe I'm making too much of this, but it bothered me nonetheless...
So now I've finished three of these books, with two more to go. But wait, I just found out that the author had also written another series parallel to this one...a series featuring the O'Keefe family and the eventual children of Meg and Calvin. Maybe I'll just wait a few more years, Lord willing, before I start on that one...
Monday, August 31, 2015
My August 2015 Running Report
Although I accumulated mileage during August, my running ultimately was unsatisfactory as at the end, I suffered an injury of sorts on my right foot between the arch and heel. As such, I've missed five days running for the month, and this will continue substantially into September. Instead, I have been riding my bicycle more...that is, when it isn't torrentially raining outside...and using my portable stepper exercising machine. I plan to continue with these while my foot recovers, and add the use of my gym's elliptical cross-trainer. As for August's total, I ran 259 miles...
Hopefully, this running layoff won't last too long...but I have to give myself time to heal...
Hopefully, this running layoff won't last too long...but I have to give myself time to heal...
Sunday, August 30, 2015
My NFL Favorites in Each Division This 2015 Season
It's getting closer to the start of the National Football League regular season this year, with the opening game between Pittsburgh and New England on Thursday, September 10 less than two weeks away. So, as I usually do this time of year, I'm going through each division and picking my favorite teams. No, I'm not predicting which ones will win each division...I'm strictly going by personal preference. And since I'm doing this blog basically as an ongoing writing exercise, I'll explain the reasons for my picks...
AMERICAN CONFERENCE
East Division: MIAMI DOLPHINS-The Dolphins have been my team of choice since 1968, their third season of existence in the then-American Football League and when I was eleven going on twelve. I suffered through two sub-par, typical expansion team seasons...and then Don Shula came over from Baltimore to coach them. They won two Super Bowls under his direction and appeared in five...but more incredibly, during Shula's 26-year tenure there, they had only two losing seasons. His successor Jimmy Johnson enjoyed some moderate success in his four years there, but from 2004 through 2015 Miami has enjoyed only two winning seasons. And their last playoff appearance was in 2008. They've frustrated me to no end the last two years because in each one they were in an excellent position to make the playoffs...only to choke up instead. Will they be any better this year? Guess we'll find out before too long...
South Division: JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS-Until 1977, I lived in South Florida. But ever since the Jacksonville franchise came into existence I've lived the closest to that city. I've always rooted for them unless they were playing Miami...although in recent years their mediocrity has made it often an exercise in futility. If they finish higher than last, I'll be surprised.
North Division: BALTIMORE RAVENS-I've always admired the swarming defense of the Ravens...it reminds me of that of the Dolphins during their "No-Name Defense" era of early '70s Super Bowl glory and the "Killer B's" of the 1982 season when they made another Super Bowl appearance. I also feel a bit of gratitude to Baltimore for having been so kind as lose to Miami late in the 2007 regular season, giving them their only win and keeping them from going 0-16. The Ravens are by far my favorite in this division.
West Division: SAN DIEGO CHARGERS-I can't root for Denver after it abandoned Tim Tebow right after he got them into the playoffs in 2011 for the first time in years. I've always despised Oakland and feel neutral about Kansas City. But I like the Chargers for their quarterback Phil Rivers. Unfortunately, the management of this franchise has been remiss about retaining the talent around him. Still, I'm going to pull for them when they're not playing a Florida team or the New York Giants...and I believe they have a good shot at making the playoffs this year.
NATIONAL CONFERENCE
East Division: NEW YORK GIANTS-When the Giants upset the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl capping the 2007 season...ruining the Dolphins' bitter divisional rivals' quest for a perfect record...I vowed to myself that I would begin to support them on a regular basis. And, what do you know, they repeated the feat in 2011 against the same villains! Let's see, another four years have passed...do the Giants still have it in them? Probably not, but my gratitude hasn't diminished. Besides, I admire their quarterback Eli Manning, and head coach Tom Coughlin has my respect going back to the Jaguars' old glory days when he led them into the playoffs soon after their inception into the league.
South Division: TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS-This is a team that should have done much better last year than 2-14...so I have high expectations for them this time around, especially after getting what could eventually be a Hall of Fame quarterback in Jameis Winston. But high hopes abound easily before the first game is played. They're going to have to figure out ways to keep their composure in close games in order to pull some victories "out of the hat". Fortunately, Winston has plenty of experience in this area and seems to be a natural leader on the field. The Bucs have the potential to be the turnaround team of the year. Of course, I root for them primarily for one reason: they are a Florida team...and for the first 18 years I lived in Gainesville, the nearest one to me...
North Division: GREEN BAY PACKERS-I like the Packers not only for their outstanding quarterback Aaron Rodgers, but also for their tremendous fans. I especially like the custom at Packer home games for Green Bay players, upon scoring touchdowns for their team, to go jumping into the stadium to be mass-hugged by their supporters. It's nice to root for a team with a great shot at the championship, and the Pack fills the bill here.
West Division: SEATTLE SEAHAWKS-I followed Seattle from time to time as they were first getting used to their then-new head coach Pete Carroll. I was impressed by Carroll's exuberance and positive attitude. This guy has a lot of fun out there coaching his team, and his expressiveness is infectious. So when they won their first Super Bowl a couple of years ago, I was already all aboard with the Seahawks. They have, I believe, what it takes to make a third consecutive Super Bowl appearance...if Green Bay or Dallas don't prevent them.
As for the teams I oppose the most, let's just say that I dislike, in order of intensity: New England, Buffalo, New York Jets, New Orleans, Indianapolis, Pittsburgh, Denver, Oakland, Houston, and Dallas...
AMERICAN CONFERENCE
East Division: MIAMI DOLPHINS-The Dolphins have been my team of choice since 1968, their third season of existence in the then-American Football League and when I was eleven going on twelve. I suffered through two sub-par, typical expansion team seasons...and then Don Shula came over from Baltimore to coach them. They won two Super Bowls under his direction and appeared in five...but more incredibly, during Shula's 26-year tenure there, they had only two losing seasons. His successor Jimmy Johnson enjoyed some moderate success in his four years there, but from 2004 through 2015 Miami has enjoyed only two winning seasons. And their last playoff appearance was in 2008. They've frustrated me to no end the last two years because in each one they were in an excellent position to make the playoffs...only to choke up instead. Will they be any better this year? Guess we'll find out before too long...
South Division: JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS-Until 1977, I lived in South Florida. But ever since the Jacksonville franchise came into existence I've lived the closest to that city. I've always rooted for them unless they were playing Miami...although in recent years their mediocrity has made it often an exercise in futility. If they finish higher than last, I'll be surprised.
North Division: BALTIMORE RAVENS-I've always admired the swarming defense of the Ravens...it reminds me of that of the Dolphins during their "No-Name Defense" era of early '70s Super Bowl glory and the "Killer B's" of the 1982 season when they made another Super Bowl appearance. I also feel a bit of gratitude to Baltimore for having been so kind as lose to Miami late in the 2007 regular season, giving them their only win and keeping them from going 0-16. The Ravens are by far my favorite in this division.
West Division: SAN DIEGO CHARGERS-I can't root for Denver after it abandoned Tim Tebow right after he got them into the playoffs in 2011 for the first time in years. I've always despised Oakland and feel neutral about Kansas City. But I like the Chargers for their quarterback Phil Rivers. Unfortunately, the management of this franchise has been remiss about retaining the talent around him. Still, I'm going to pull for them when they're not playing a Florida team or the New York Giants...and I believe they have a good shot at making the playoffs this year.
NATIONAL CONFERENCE
East Division: NEW YORK GIANTS-When the Giants upset the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl capping the 2007 season...ruining the Dolphins' bitter divisional rivals' quest for a perfect record...I vowed to myself that I would begin to support them on a regular basis. And, what do you know, they repeated the feat in 2011 against the same villains! Let's see, another four years have passed...do the Giants still have it in them? Probably not, but my gratitude hasn't diminished. Besides, I admire their quarterback Eli Manning, and head coach Tom Coughlin has my respect going back to the Jaguars' old glory days when he led them into the playoffs soon after their inception into the league.
South Division: TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS-This is a team that should have done much better last year than 2-14...so I have high expectations for them this time around, especially after getting what could eventually be a Hall of Fame quarterback in Jameis Winston. But high hopes abound easily before the first game is played. They're going to have to figure out ways to keep their composure in close games in order to pull some victories "out of the hat". Fortunately, Winston has plenty of experience in this area and seems to be a natural leader on the field. The Bucs have the potential to be the turnaround team of the year. Of course, I root for them primarily for one reason: they are a Florida team...and for the first 18 years I lived in Gainesville, the nearest one to me...
North Division: GREEN BAY PACKERS-I like the Packers not only for their outstanding quarterback Aaron Rodgers, but also for their tremendous fans. I especially like the custom at Packer home games for Green Bay players, upon scoring touchdowns for their team, to go jumping into the stadium to be mass-hugged by their supporters. It's nice to root for a team with a great shot at the championship, and the Pack fills the bill here.
West Division: SEATTLE SEAHAWKS-I followed Seattle from time to time as they were first getting used to their then-new head coach Pete Carroll. I was impressed by Carroll's exuberance and positive attitude. This guy has a lot of fun out there coaching his team, and his expressiveness is infectious. So when they won their first Super Bowl a couple of years ago, I was already all aboard with the Seahawks. They have, I believe, what it takes to make a third consecutive Super Bowl appearance...if Green Bay or Dallas don't prevent them.
As for the teams I oppose the most, let's just say that I dislike, in order of intensity: New England, Buffalo, New York Jets, New Orleans, Indianapolis, Pittsburgh, Denver, Oakland, Houston, and Dallas...
Saturday, August 29, 2015
Just Finished Reading Isaac Asimov's Foundation and Empire
Foundation and Empire is the second book in the late science fiction writer Isaac Asimov's Foundation series. Originally a part of the Foundation "trilogy" back in the 1950s, Asimov wrote two more books in it during the 1980s and then added two prequels. After his death in 1992, three other sci-fi writers wrote authorized Foundation novels as well...bringing the total so far as I know it to be ten books. I happen to possess all of these books. Unfortunately, they are buried in the deep recesses of my garage, which I desperately need to declutter and organize. But even if one reads all of the Foundation books, in order to understand the full context of Asimov's futuristic imaginary universe it is necessary to go through the four "Robot" (or "Spacer") novels as well as the three-part Empire series. This begins to become apparent toward the end of the Foundation series...and although I haven't as yet read the two prequel Foundation novels, I understand that this is true for them as well...
As for Foundation and Empire, there is little I can tell any prospective reader without giving away the first book in the series, also titled Foundation. In very general terms, I will say that this second book deals with the Foundation...and with the Empire...as if that wasn't obviously self-evident. But for more than half of the book, another element enters the story...and it is this part I found to be the most compelling...especially its chief antagonist and the sly manner in which Asimov wrote him into the story. As for the first part, I did pick up an important theme expressed within it that I myself have learned over the course of my lifetime: if you are working for an organization, individual, or cause and are so committed and excellent with the results of your efforts that you begin to be recognized for that excellence, then your biggest opposition...as well as your eventual downfall...most likely will come from among those for whom you are so diligently striving as they will begin to perceive you as a threat to themselves. Sounds cynical, but it has been borne out with my own experiences time and time again, sad to say...
As for Foundation and Empire, there is little I can tell any prospective reader without giving away the first book in the series, also titled Foundation. In very general terms, I will say that this second book deals with the Foundation...and with the Empire...as if that wasn't obviously self-evident. But for more than half of the book, another element enters the story...and it is this part I found to be the most compelling...especially its chief antagonist and the sly manner in which Asimov wrote him into the story. As for the first part, I did pick up an important theme expressed within it that I myself have learned over the course of my lifetime: if you are working for an organization, individual, or cause and are so committed and excellent with the results of your efforts that you begin to be recognized for that excellence, then your biggest opposition...as well as your eventual downfall...most likely will come from among those for whom you are so diligently striving as they will begin to perceive you as a threat to themselves. Sounds cynical, but it has been borne out with my own experiences time and time again, sad to say...
Friday, August 28, 2015
My Running Detoured by Foot Pain
Although I would like to train up to be able to run in the upcoming half-marathon races (even possibly marathons) this fall, I have developed a nagging pain in my right foot that may just derail any substantial running for a while. I am looking for ways to get around this problem, which involves pain that only occurs at impact, neither existing at rest nor with simple muscular exertion. So right now I'm working at alternative forms of exercise, including getting my old dilapidated cheap-o bicycle out of the shed and riding it around the neighborhood. I also have a portable stepper exercise contraption that I can use as a "no-impact" exercise...not to mention that I can do modified push-ups using it that serve as an alternative to abdominal crunch exercises. And then there is also the elliptical cross-trainer machine at my local 24/7 gym. In any event, I have to give my foot enough time to heal while avoiding aggravating whatever problem currently exists. I haven't given up on my race plans...well, at least not in a general sense: the upcoming October events may not be feasible for me, but toward the end of the year I see no reason not to resume competition...which for me, isn't against any other runners, but rather to simply finish with reasonable times...
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
Just Finished Reading Sue Grafton's "P" and "Q" Mystery Novels
As I continue along with the so-called "Alphabet Mysteries" of writer Sue Grafton from "A" to "X" (her latest "letter"), I just finished reading a couple: "P" is for Peril and "Q" is for Quarry. I was happy to discover that I hadn't read either before...sometimes I forget which books in the series I've already gone through...
In "P" is for Peril, protagonist private investigator Kinsey Millhone, a single mid-thirties California ex-cop, is hired to look into the disappearance of a woman's ex, a physician working at a senior care center. There are all sorts of subplots involved, especially an ongoing Medicare fraud investigation at the center, the missing man's marital relationships, and his wayward daughter. A second story in the book, intertwined with the main mystery, is Kinsey's new landlord for her office: a couple of brothers...and she has started to become romantic with the younger one. But with them as well, a mysterious and sinister past is revealed. Plenty of suspects to go around with this story. I thought the ending was quite intriguing...
In "Q" is for Quarry, the panoply of suspicious characters continues as Kinsey is hired by an old police associate to team up with another ex-cop...this one retired...to investigate a cold (long unsolved) murder case: a 1969 "Jane Doe" killing involving a dumped unidentified young female corpse in a remote area. Subplots in the story include the dire medical problems of Kinsey's police partners, as well as new information regarding her own clouded family past. At the conclusion of the book, it is revealed that author Sue Grafton had based her story on an actual cold case involving very similar circumstances...
Now I'm working on her next novel in the series, "R" is for Ricochet...
In "P" is for Peril, protagonist private investigator Kinsey Millhone, a single mid-thirties California ex-cop, is hired to look into the disappearance of a woman's ex, a physician working at a senior care center. There are all sorts of subplots involved, especially an ongoing Medicare fraud investigation at the center, the missing man's marital relationships, and his wayward daughter. A second story in the book, intertwined with the main mystery, is Kinsey's new landlord for her office: a couple of brothers...and she has started to become romantic with the younger one. But with them as well, a mysterious and sinister past is revealed. Plenty of suspects to go around with this story. I thought the ending was quite intriguing...
In "Q" is for Quarry, the panoply of suspicious characters continues as Kinsey is hired by an old police associate to team up with another ex-cop...this one retired...to investigate a cold (long unsolved) murder case: a 1969 "Jane Doe" killing involving a dumped unidentified young female corpse in a remote area. Subplots in the story include the dire medical problems of Kinsey's police partners, as well as new information regarding her own clouded family past. At the conclusion of the book, it is revealed that author Sue Grafton had based her story on an actual cold case involving very similar circumstances...
Now I'm working on her next novel in the series, "R" is for Ricochet...
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
Light 2015 Atlantic Hurricane Season Entering Most Intense Phase
The 2015 Atlantic hurricane season, which has been predicted to be very light with few named storms due to cooler Atlantic waters, has so far vindicated the prognosticators. Until just recently, there have been only three named storms, none of which have made much of an impact although two struck the U.S. mainland. This past week, Danny followed the common Africa-to-West-Indies trans-Atlantic path, strengthening to hurricane level. But then, as it approached the Leeward Islands, it weakened and was sheared into nothing more than a rainy low pressure area. Following Danny westward across the Atlantic, close to its path, is Erika, a much larger storm in area. Although Erika is only a minimal tropical storm at this writing with maximum sustained winds of 45 mph, forecast models have it passing safely between two shear zones as it passes just north of the Leewards, Puerto Rico, and Hispaniola and enters the warm waters of the Bahamas. According to the current projected path, slow-moving Erika may be approaching the east coast of Florida as a minimal hurricane by this Sunday. Still, right now there is a huge shear zone covering the eastern Gulf of Mexico and most of the Florida peninsula that, should it remain in place, would weaken Erika if the potential hurricane makes a Floridian landfall...
I'm not too concerned about Erika possibly hitting Gainesville in north-central Florida, especially as it looks right now as if it will only make it to weak hurricane status and then probably weaken again. But the media will probably amplify the coverage, since the tropical storms this year have been too few and far between and Erika might be the first full-fledged Atlantic hurricane in 2015 to threaten the U.S. mainland (tropical storms Ana and Bill earlier hit the Carolinas and Texas, respectively)...
I'm not too concerned about Erika possibly hitting Gainesville in north-central Florida, especially as it looks right now as if it will only make it to weak hurricane status and then probably weaken again. But the media will probably amplify the coverage, since the tropical storms this year have been too few and far between and Erika might be the first full-fledged Atlantic hurricane in 2015 to threaten the U.S. mainland (tropical storms Ana and Bill earlier hit the Carolinas and Texas, respectively)...
Monday, August 24, 2015
Stock Market's Ten-Minute Thousand-Point Plunge This Morning
Wall Street's Dow Jones Average shocked the news world this morning as it went into a ten-minute free fall, finally leveling at a thousand points lower and scaring the bejesus (or dickens...or choose your own epithet) out of everybody. This is after Friday's loss of 531 points and right on the heels of a massive selloff in the Chinese stock market. The prices rose back up to around down a little more that 100 points...but over the course of the afternoon, the average has crept back downward...it's 350 points at this writing. The White House laid much of the blame for this fall at the doors of Congress, which it claims is dragging its feet at passing important fiscal legislation. But what seems to be powering it all to me is the bursting of China's financial bubble...and their government's reevaluation of their currency...
It is too early right now to see whether this drop in the stock market is only a temporary scare like those in 1987 and 2010...or the sign of a traumatic economic downturn, as in 2008. But the market suddenly has MY attention...
It is too early right now to see whether this drop in the stock market is only a temporary scare like those in 1987 and 2010...or the sign of a traumatic economic downturn, as in 2008. But the market suddenly has MY attention...
Sunday, August 23, 2015
Just Finished Reading John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men
When I was in the ninth grade, my English teacher assigned John Steinbeck's novel The Pearl as a required reading. I did not like it at all...and since then 44 years have passed until I picked up another work of his. As it turns out, the book I finally did choose, the short 1937 novel Of Mice and Men, is another Steinbeck story that is now commonly assigned in high school. After reading it, though, I can understand why perhaps my English teachers may have passed up on it: the language is pretty rough in places and there are some areas in it with sexual material...not necessarily something that they were ready to deal with in high school in the early 1970s...at least not as a required book...
Of Mice and Men is about two young men: the smart but uneducated George, short in stature, and his traveling and working companion, the mentally challenged near-giant Lennie. Lennie has a fondness for petting little furry creatures like mice, but he cannot seem to handle any for any length of time without accidentally killing them with his strength, which he chronically underestimates. Ultimately, he wants for George and him to buy a small plot of land of their own where they can live off of it and he would get to tend the rabbits. The two are migrant farm/ranch workers on their way to a new job at a ranch in California. Once there, they encounter problems with a bully who not only feels challenged by Lennie's size and demeanor, but also is extremely jealous about his own attractive newlywed wife, whom the men working there regard as a flirtatious "tart". You might imagine some scenarios for trouble...and you'd be right...but since I'm not going to give away the story, you're going to have to find out what happens for yourself!
The thing that struck me the most about Of Mice and Men was how Steinbeck moved the story and revealed the personalities of the characters with extensive dialogue, keeping the narration and introspection to a minimum. That was pretty impressive. Another thing he did involved misdirection...leading the reader to anticipate a climactic conflict in one direction while ultimately leading into a different one...an outcome that, having finished the story and looking backward at it, seemed completely reasonable. Steinbeck also examined racial prejudice and injustice, as well as how everyone needs to have something to believe in and dream for...and how a good, feasible dream can spread like wildfire through a dispirited group of people and revitalize them. But perhaps most of all, he spotlighted the plight in his times of the mentally disabled and how they, especially the ones who were poor, were often misunderstood and treated unfairly. I sometimes wonder to myself just how much better off they are today...and how much more we need to do...
Get a copy of John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men: it won't take you very long to read it and it will be worth your while. And, besides, you won't have to impress some high school English teacher with a book report after you've finished...
Of Mice and Men is about two young men: the smart but uneducated George, short in stature, and his traveling and working companion, the mentally challenged near-giant Lennie. Lennie has a fondness for petting little furry creatures like mice, but he cannot seem to handle any for any length of time without accidentally killing them with his strength, which he chronically underestimates. Ultimately, he wants for George and him to buy a small plot of land of their own where they can live off of it and he would get to tend the rabbits. The two are migrant farm/ranch workers on their way to a new job at a ranch in California. Once there, they encounter problems with a bully who not only feels challenged by Lennie's size and demeanor, but also is extremely jealous about his own attractive newlywed wife, whom the men working there regard as a flirtatious "tart". You might imagine some scenarios for trouble...and you'd be right...but since I'm not going to give away the story, you're going to have to find out what happens for yourself!
The thing that struck me the most about Of Mice and Men was how Steinbeck moved the story and revealed the personalities of the characters with extensive dialogue, keeping the narration and introspection to a minimum. That was pretty impressive. Another thing he did involved misdirection...leading the reader to anticipate a climactic conflict in one direction while ultimately leading into a different one...an outcome that, having finished the story and looking backward at it, seemed completely reasonable. Steinbeck also examined racial prejudice and injustice, as well as how everyone needs to have something to believe in and dream for...and how a good, feasible dream can spread like wildfire through a dispirited group of people and revitalize them. But perhaps most of all, he spotlighted the plight in his times of the mentally disabled and how they, especially the ones who were poor, were often misunderstood and treated unfairly. I sometimes wonder to myself just how much better off they are today...and how much more we need to do...
Get a copy of John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men: it won't take you very long to read it and it will be worth your while. And, besides, you won't have to impress some high school English teacher with a book report after you've finished...
Saturday, August 22, 2015
Gainesville and Its Coffee Shops Swell Back Up With Students' Return
Well, this is the weekend that the population in Gainesville swells back up again with its transient University of Florida student population returning (as well as a few attending Santa Fe College). It's time once again for me to reconfigure my routes through town, especially to and from work, that have me driving through pockets of heavy student presence. Looks like I may be taking some detours east on Waldo and Williston Roads or west on I-75 to avoid not just the University of Florida traffic, but also that of the public schools, which are also beginning. Moreover, it will again be necessary for me to keep tabs on important events taking place on campus...not because I'm planning to attend them...but rather because I'm avoiding them and the traffic emanating therefrom. And, of course, I might as well resign myself to the fact that, starting next week, I'm more likely than not to walk into any Starbucks and not find one empty seat left: that's too bad since going out and sitting somewhere in public tends to focus my thoughts and helps me with some of my personal academic goals...
Maybe it's finally time for me to just face reality and make the big break from Starbucks...and start going to McDonalds instead. Since I only drink regular brewed coffee, anyway, why not save some money and go somewhere that I know will provide not only free Internet access (actually, I rarely go online except at home or on my cellphone), but also plenty of empty seats to choose from while charging much less for their coffee? McDonalds fulfills all of these criteria, and furthermore, it isn't generally considered "cool" enough by those hipster and yuppie types who like to camp out for hours in the more highbrow coffee shops, hopelessly clogging up all of the seating along with the myriad students who use them for study halls (nothing inherently wrong with studying there...I do the same). And since I'm a working-class kind of guy, why not hang out in a working-class place like a national fast food chain? The only problem I have with McDonalds is that sometimes they act confused when I order coffee at any time other than during breakfast hours. Still, more often than not I get my order right away and can go on to study, read, and write to my heart's content. And what's more, McDonalds are just about everywhere...there's even one within easy walking distance of my workplace. Yes, I suppose it's just about time for a change in venue. I just hope that McDonalds remains "uncool" in the minds of many, especially all those pesky students...
Maybe it's finally time for me to just face reality and make the big break from Starbucks...and start going to McDonalds instead. Since I only drink regular brewed coffee, anyway, why not save some money and go somewhere that I know will provide not only free Internet access (actually, I rarely go online except at home or on my cellphone), but also plenty of empty seats to choose from while charging much less for their coffee? McDonalds fulfills all of these criteria, and furthermore, it isn't generally considered "cool" enough by those hipster and yuppie types who like to camp out for hours in the more highbrow coffee shops, hopelessly clogging up all of the seating along with the myriad students who use them for study halls (nothing inherently wrong with studying there...I do the same). And since I'm a working-class kind of guy, why not hang out in a working-class place like a national fast food chain? The only problem I have with McDonalds is that sometimes they act confused when I order coffee at any time other than during breakfast hours. Still, more often than not I get my order right away and can go on to study, read, and write to my heart's content. And what's more, McDonalds are just about everywhere...there's even one within easy walking distance of my workplace. Yes, I suppose it's just about time for a change in venue. I just hope that McDonalds remains "uncool" in the minds of many, especially all those pesky students...
Friday, August 21, 2015
Just Finished Reading Finders Keepers by Stephen King
Stephen King's latest novel Finders Keepers, which I just finished reading, is the middle book in his ongoing series that began with Mr. Mercedes. In it, a celebrated writer by the name of John Rothstein (apparently a fictional amalgam of John Updike and Philip Roth) has gone into self-imposed isolation from the world for many years as he continues his writing...but without publishing any of his works. This proves to be problematic as one of his most renown works, the "Runner" trilogy, and which features the young American anti-hero character of Jimmy Gold, seems to trail off in the final book with a marked sense of anti-climax...as if there were more to come in the series. But if Rothstein had written any more books in the Runner series, he's not publishing. Enter Morris Bellamy, a deeply disturbed man who has identified so closely with the Jimmy Gold character and is so disappointed at the ending of the third book that he feels compelled to find any new books for himself...eliciting an unwelcome encounter with Rothstein at his retreat. I'll spare you the details except to say that the story does get around to connecting itself with the previous book, Mr. Mercedes...and that its unlikely trio of protagonists...Bill Hodges, Jerome Robinson, and Holly Gibney...once again team up to set things straight. In the midst of their endeavors, King inserts some hints as to what direction the final book in this trilogy will take...
I enjoyed Finders Keepers and found it to be better than Mr. Mercedes...unusual for the second book in a trilogy. But what I got the most out of it was the John Rothstein character...and the real-life writers of John Updike and Philip Roth. So much that I'm now starting to read Exit Ghost, one of Roth's more recent books, and am working to get hold of the first book in Updike's celebrated Rabbit series. Roth, by the way, is known probably the most for his stories Goodbye Columbus and Portnoy's Complaint...
So now I await Stephen King's final installment in this series. In the process, he joins George R.R. Martin, Daniel Abraham and Brandon Sanderson in the "club" of authors whose ongoing series I've caught up with as I patiently anticipate what's up next...
I enjoyed Finders Keepers and found it to be better than Mr. Mercedes...unusual for the second book in a trilogy. But what I got the most out of it was the John Rothstein character...and the real-life writers of John Updike and Philip Roth. So much that I'm now starting to read Exit Ghost, one of Roth's more recent books, and am working to get hold of the first book in Updike's celebrated Rabbit series. Roth, by the way, is known probably the most for his stories Goodbye Columbus and Portnoy's Complaint...
So now I await Stephen King's final installment in this series. In the process, he joins George R.R. Martin, Daniel Abraham and Brandon Sanderson in the "club" of authors whose ongoing series I've caught up with as I patiently anticipate what's up next...
Thursday, August 20, 2015
Soccer: UEFA (European) Champions League Qualifying Playoffs Underway
International professional league soccer can be downright confusing at times. At the same time that the various leagues are going on with their regular seasons, a parallel "league" is also taking place. In Europe, the UEFA takes the 22 top finishers of the various European leagues from the previous season...and then adds 10 more teams to comprise the 32 that will begin group stage play in a few weeks. Those 10 teams are now being determined through a series of playoff games. Fox Sports and Spanish-speaking Galavision are showing several of them on their different channels. On Galavision (Gainesville Cox Channel 89) I just saw the ending of one between Celtic (of Scotland) and Malmo (of Sweden) with the former prevailing. Right now I'm viewing the second half between Valencia (of Spain) and Monaco on Fox Sports 1 (Channel 62)...Valencia currently leads 2-1...
Since I can't watch all the various European leagues in professional soccer, this Champions League gives me the opportunity to acquaint myself with teams that I normally would not be able to follow...especially those from Spain, France, and Italy. Also, it's fun to see how well (or poorly) some of the English (Barclay's) Premier League teams fare against their European competition...
Since I can't watch all the various European leagues in professional soccer, this Champions League gives me the opportunity to acquaint myself with teams that I normally would not be able to follow...especially those from Spain, France, and Italy. Also, it's fun to see how well (or poorly) some of the English (Barclay's) Premier League teams fare against their European competition...
Wednesday, August 19, 2015
Just Finished Reading (Again) Isaac Asimov's Novel Foundation
Foundation, originally written in serial form in the 1940s and then revised and combined into a complete book in the 1950s, in turn is the first book in a series of science fiction novels (also named "Foundation") set more than ten thousand years into the future, when a galaxy-wide empire envisioned by author Isaac Asimov is going decadent and beginning to crumble. On its capital planet of Trantor near the galaxy's center lives Hari Seldon, a "psychohistorian" by profession. By using intricate mathematics and principles of psychology, sociology, and history, Seldon determines that the Empire will soon dissolve and a prolonged dark age, lasting many thousands of years, will pervade the galaxy. But he has a plan to shorten that time span, and embarks on an elaborate scheme of projects and foreseen dilemmas (which he terms "Seldon Crises") to steer humanity back on a fast-track to reunite under a new (and hopefully improved) empire. The story thus develops with Seldon explaining his ideas to mathematician-recruit Gaal Dornick as well as to his persecutors working for the Empire. It then jumps ahead fifty years to another situation with other characters when a Seldon Crisis forces their hand and directs them onto a path toward Seldon's goals. These leaps of time between stories, with subsequent new characters and an accompanying Seldon Crisis in each one, continues on throughout the book. What happens in them I leave you, the reader, to discover for yourself...
I have read the opening novel Foundation a couple of times before, but I only read the core series of five novels in its entirety once. It had a great ending, and I recently decided to go through it once more. There are also a couple of prequel novels Asimov wrote for it, as well as three other "Foundation" books that others wrote after his death in 1992. Maybe I'll get around to reading them, too, but for now I'm rereading the "five"...
Next in the series is Foundation and Empire...
I have read the opening novel Foundation a couple of times before, but I only read the core series of five novels in its entirety once. It had a great ending, and I recently decided to go through it once more. There are also a couple of prequel novels Asimov wrote for it, as well as three other "Foundation" books that others wrote after his death in 1992. Maybe I'll get around to reading them, too, but for now I'm rereading the "five"...
Next in the series is Foundation and Empire...
Sunday, August 16, 2015
Just Finished Reading A Memory of Light by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
A Memory of Light, which was published in 2013, is the fourteenth and concluding book in Robert Jordan's fantasy series The Wheel of Time. This last book, as well as the two preceding it, were written by Brandon Sanderson after Jordan's death...with careful attention given to the original author's vision and extensive notes. In such a finale, I was naturally concerned at what was going to happen to all of the various characters introduced in the series...I instinctively knew that not all of them would survive. Well, I found out...but don't worry...I'm not giving anything away. And, of course, how the main struggle between the Dragon Reborn and the Dark One turned out is resolved as well...and in a curiously satisfactory way, too. Yes, although plowing through these fourteen books amounted to a sometimes tedious, drawn-out project, I feel vindicated for my efforts by how it ended...
Now that I have finished reading the Wheel of Time series, I can go onto the Wiki website exclusively devoted to it. A few months ago I had gone on it to collect a little background information about one of the characters and inadvertently read premature information about her demise. Now, though, I'm done with the series and can go back to the Wheel of Time Wiki to fill in gaps in my memory of people, places, nations, and events...
If you're someone who likes reading involved, lengthy fantasy series with compelling characters (and the characters are what won me over), then by all means treat yourself to The Wheel of Time. But it will take you a while to get through it, and there is an awful lot of information to absorb and try to keep up with. Still, it easily beats just sitting for hours on-end channel-surfing the TV. Engage your mind, I say...The Wheel of Time most definitely will accomplish that!
Now that I have finished reading the Wheel of Time series, I can go onto the Wiki website exclusively devoted to it. A few months ago I had gone on it to collect a little background information about one of the characters and inadvertently read premature information about her demise. Now, though, I'm done with the series and can go back to the Wheel of Time Wiki to fill in gaps in my memory of people, places, nations, and events...
If you're someone who likes reading involved, lengthy fantasy series with compelling characters (and the characters are what won me over), then by all means treat yourself to The Wheel of Time. But it will take you a while to get through it, and there is an awful lot of information to absorb and try to keep up with. Still, it easily beats just sitting for hours on-end channel-surfing the TV. Engage your mind, I say...The Wheel of Time most definitely will accomplish that!
Saturday, August 15, 2015
Theme Park Rides: My Personal Favorites
As I mentioned in yesterday's article about theme parks, I have my own personal list of favorite thrill rides, including a few on a more subdued level. Some of them are roller coasters, some aren't, and some are water park rides. I haven't exactly been a theme park junkie like some people who travel across the country and even abroad to visit and compare the various parks and rides. My experience is confined to a few parks within driving range of Gainesville, Dolly Parton's Dollywood in eastern Tennessee, and that one roller coaster in Dania, near Fort Lauderdale. First, I'll rank the parks I've been to (including water parks):
1 Busch Gardens-Tampa
2 Universal Islands of Adventure-Orlando
3 Wild Adventures-Valdosta
4 Disney World Magic Kingdom-Orlando
5 Disney World Epcot Center-Orlando
6 Wild Waters-Silver Springs
7 Dollywood-Pigeon Forge, Tennessee
8 Cypress Gardens (now closed down)-Winter Haven, Florida
9 Universal Studios-Orlando
10 Disney MGM Studios-Orlando
11 Blizzard Beach (Disney World)-Orlando
Actually, I've enjoyed all of the above theme parks and have my favorite rides in each of them. Now, here are my eight all-time favorite rides I've been on:
1 POWER SURGE (Wild Adventures)
This ride superficially resembles a Ferris wheel, but the passengers, securely strapped and fastened in their seats, soon find themselves hurled up and spinning and toppling in different directions as the world around them becomes a chaotic blur. This has to be one of the more terrifying rides to behold from the ground...it took me a while to muster up the courage to ride it. And as no two rides are exactly alike, I've never gotten so accustomed to it that riding it hasn't disturbed me at least a little...perfect! Only one problem: since Wild Adventures switched its ownership, Power Surge was removed. Sometimes it appears at county fairs...it was at the Alachua County Fair two years ago, but was out of service and unavailable. I also rode it back in 2005 at Cypress Gardens, which has since closed down...
2-MONTU (Busch Gardens Tampa)
Montu is what I call the "Cadillac" of roller coasters, providing an extremely smooth, comfortable riding experience. But like Power Surge, it can appear pretty imposing from the ground level. Montu is a hanging steel coaster that undergoes several loops, which for me is a good thing. When dealing with the "G's" that thrill rides place on passengers, inverting loops can alleviate the effects...I'm not supposed to ride anything that puts an overload of them on me. So Montu and Power Surge work quite well in that regard...
3-KUMBA (Busch Gardens Tampa)
Kumba is another looping steel coaster at Busch Gardens, this one where the passengers' feet are firmly resting on the floor within their compartments and not hanging out loosely. To me, it has a great initial climb...and that dive soon after the apex is epic! Visually, I prefer Kumba's lush green surroundings to Montu's sand...it is a bit more jolting, though. Still, it has always been one of the two absolute requirements for me during a Busch Gardens visit....although I prefer Montu by far...
4-DUELING DRAGONS:FIRE (Islands of Adventure-Orlando)
Now known as Dragon Challenge and renamed for dragons appearing in the Harry Potter book The Goblet of Fire, Dueling Dragons features two separate coasters, Fire and Ice, dispatched simultaneously and often hurling themselves at each other like, well, dueling dragons! In one of these high-flying encounters, Fire would momentarily hover over Ice as the latter passed close underneath...giving a sensation of floating weightlessness that Ice didn't have. I loved this coaster and always sought it out when visiting. Unfortunately, it's buried at the back of the park and requires a trek to reach.
5-TORNADO (Wild Waters)
I'm not sure whether or not Wild Waters will remain in existence after its adjacent park of Silver Springs became a state park. In any event, it has been several years since I've been there...it is the closest park to Gainesville that features "rides" and you can't beat the price. My favorite water ride is here: the tubular Tornado, a ride that requires the participant to cross their hands over the chest and cross ankles...and remain lying still as they steeply slide down into the black tube's opening at the top. The tube convolutes to where you're actually inverted at one point while blindly sliding within it before being twisted back around at the landing. Wild Adventures has a similar ride at its own water park (or at least it did a few years ago).
6 AVIATOR (Wild Adventures)
I believe Aviator is still at Wild Adventures, and it is one of the first thrill rides I rode on to any extent. It is more of a panoramic-view ride, with passengers seated at spokes from the center and rising up high from the ground while rotating at a brisk speed in a counterclockwise direction. I loved sitting high up there in the sky (hence the name "Aviator"), going around like that with such a view of everything beneath...I remarked that I could easily stay up there for hours with a good book in hand and a coffee, only coming back down for refills and bathroom breaks. But alas, that's not how they run things in these theme parks!
7 SPACESHIP EARTH (Epcot Center)
I like a lot of things about Walt Disney World. One thing that I DON'T like, though, is having to wait in endless lines to go on any of their rides...often even when I've made an advance "appointment" using their express system. There is one important exception to this repeated frustration: Spaceship Earth, which is the "entrance" ride to Epcot Center, right underneath the giant golf ball. You may be standing in a line at the start, but it is constantly loading with its conveyor belt system. Soon enough, you're on a visual educational tour through the history of humanity's progress in the area of communications...and in the process you get to sit for several minutes in air-conditioned splendor (this can be important during the dog days of summer in central Florida). Spaceship Earth is not exactly a "thrill ride" per se, but it is one that anyone could ride...and as such everyone in your party can experience it and share their reactions...
8-THUNDERHEAD (Dollywood)
Thunderhead is the best wooden roller coaster I've ever been on. No other has come as close to it for its smoothness...but I still have to place it on my list with an important caveat: I'll probably not ride it again due to the factor of the gravity pressure that rides of this genre inevitably place on the passenger, especially during the tight winding at the end. But it was by far the best ride in the park (that Tennessee Tornado steel coaster was brutally harsh)...
Well, I think I'll just leave this list at "eight" and move on. Truth be told, I don't feel any particular urge to go rushing out to any of these theme parks and relive my old experiences...my memory serves me pretty well. I also noticed that, with some of the more well-known rides, you can get on You-Tube and vicariously experience them through the cameras of other riders...
1 Busch Gardens-Tampa
2 Universal Islands of Adventure-Orlando
3 Wild Adventures-Valdosta
4 Disney World Magic Kingdom-Orlando
5 Disney World Epcot Center-Orlando
6 Wild Waters-Silver Springs
7 Dollywood-Pigeon Forge, Tennessee
8 Cypress Gardens (now closed down)-Winter Haven, Florida
9 Universal Studios-Orlando
10 Disney MGM Studios-Orlando
11 Blizzard Beach (Disney World)-Orlando
Actually, I've enjoyed all of the above theme parks and have my favorite rides in each of them. Now, here are my eight all-time favorite rides I've been on:
1 POWER SURGE (Wild Adventures)
This ride superficially resembles a Ferris wheel, but the passengers, securely strapped and fastened in their seats, soon find themselves hurled up and spinning and toppling in different directions as the world around them becomes a chaotic blur. This has to be one of the more terrifying rides to behold from the ground...it took me a while to muster up the courage to ride it. And as no two rides are exactly alike, I've never gotten so accustomed to it that riding it hasn't disturbed me at least a little...perfect! Only one problem: since Wild Adventures switched its ownership, Power Surge was removed. Sometimes it appears at county fairs...it was at the Alachua County Fair two years ago, but was out of service and unavailable. I also rode it back in 2005 at Cypress Gardens, which has since closed down...
2-MONTU (Busch Gardens Tampa)
Montu is what I call the "Cadillac" of roller coasters, providing an extremely smooth, comfortable riding experience. But like Power Surge, it can appear pretty imposing from the ground level. Montu is a hanging steel coaster that undergoes several loops, which for me is a good thing. When dealing with the "G's" that thrill rides place on passengers, inverting loops can alleviate the effects...I'm not supposed to ride anything that puts an overload of them on me. So Montu and Power Surge work quite well in that regard...
3-KUMBA (Busch Gardens Tampa)
Kumba is another looping steel coaster at Busch Gardens, this one where the passengers' feet are firmly resting on the floor within their compartments and not hanging out loosely. To me, it has a great initial climb...and that dive soon after the apex is epic! Visually, I prefer Kumba's lush green surroundings to Montu's sand...it is a bit more jolting, though. Still, it has always been one of the two absolute requirements for me during a Busch Gardens visit....although I prefer Montu by far...
4-DUELING DRAGONS:FIRE (Islands of Adventure-Orlando)
Now known as Dragon Challenge and renamed for dragons appearing in the Harry Potter book The Goblet of Fire, Dueling Dragons features two separate coasters, Fire and Ice, dispatched simultaneously and often hurling themselves at each other like, well, dueling dragons! In one of these high-flying encounters, Fire would momentarily hover over Ice as the latter passed close underneath...giving a sensation of floating weightlessness that Ice didn't have. I loved this coaster and always sought it out when visiting. Unfortunately, it's buried at the back of the park and requires a trek to reach.
5-TORNADO (Wild Waters)
I'm not sure whether or not Wild Waters will remain in existence after its adjacent park of Silver Springs became a state park. In any event, it has been several years since I've been there...it is the closest park to Gainesville that features "rides" and you can't beat the price. My favorite water ride is here: the tubular Tornado, a ride that requires the participant to cross their hands over the chest and cross ankles...and remain lying still as they steeply slide down into the black tube's opening at the top. The tube convolutes to where you're actually inverted at one point while blindly sliding within it before being twisted back around at the landing. Wild Adventures has a similar ride at its own water park (or at least it did a few years ago).
6 AVIATOR (Wild Adventures)
I believe Aviator is still at Wild Adventures, and it is one of the first thrill rides I rode on to any extent. It is more of a panoramic-view ride, with passengers seated at spokes from the center and rising up high from the ground while rotating at a brisk speed in a counterclockwise direction. I loved sitting high up there in the sky (hence the name "Aviator"), going around like that with such a view of everything beneath...I remarked that I could easily stay up there for hours with a good book in hand and a coffee, only coming back down for refills and bathroom breaks. But alas, that's not how they run things in these theme parks!
7 SPACESHIP EARTH (Epcot Center)
I like a lot of things about Walt Disney World. One thing that I DON'T like, though, is having to wait in endless lines to go on any of their rides...often even when I've made an advance "appointment" using their express system. There is one important exception to this repeated frustration: Spaceship Earth, which is the "entrance" ride to Epcot Center, right underneath the giant golf ball. You may be standing in a line at the start, but it is constantly loading with its conveyor belt system. Soon enough, you're on a visual educational tour through the history of humanity's progress in the area of communications...and in the process you get to sit for several minutes in air-conditioned splendor (this can be important during the dog days of summer in central Florida). Spaceship Earth is not exactly a "thrill ride" per se, but it is one that anyone could ride...and as such everyone in your party can experience it and share their reactions...
8-THUNDERHEAD (Dollywood)
Thunderhead is the best wooden roller coaster I've ever been on. No other has come as close to it for its smoothness...but I still have to place it on my list with an important caveat: I'll probably not ride it again due to the factor of the gravity pressure that rides of this genre inevitably place on the passenger, especially during the tight winding at the end. But it was by far the best ride in the park (that Tennessee Tornado steel coaster was brutally harsh)...
Well, I think I'll just leave this list at "eight" and move on. Truth be told, I don't feel any particular urge to go rushing out to any of these theme parks and relive my old experiences...my memory serves me pretty well. I also noticed that, with some of the more well-known rides, you can get on You-Tube and vicariously experience them through the cameras of other riders...
Friday, August 14, 2015
Theme Parks...and Me
A tragic event happened at the Cedar Point theme park near Sandusky, Ohio (on Lake Erie) yesterday: a man was struck and killed at the site of one of their roller coasters after his cellphone spilled out while riding it and he scaled a fence afterward and went into the underlying restricted area to find and retrieve it. A lot of people lose stuff on theme park rides, usually coming out of their pockets. I have always been careful when attending them to wear a fanny pack and stuff anything I didn't want to lose in it. But going into an area where the coaster is going to be diving at high speed? Not very wise...
I used to be very averse to riding theme park rides of any kind...well, I WAS brave enough to ride Dumbo, It's a Small World, and If You Had Wings at Disney World back in 1973...and the Congo River Rapids at Busch Gardens in '86. But I avoided the more serious ones until my own children were of age to ride them (which they boldly began to do)...and so I decided to "face the fear", as my son Will then liked to put it. We started, in late 2002, going to Wild Adventures just southwest of Valdosta, Georgia, and in the next few years also visited Busch Gardens, Universal Studios of Orlando (both parks contained within), Walt Disney World (Epcot, Magic Kingdom, MGM Studios, and Blizzard Beach...we never got around to Animal Kingdom), Dollywood (in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee), and Wild Waters (a water park feeding from Silver Springs). Will, Rebecca, and I would go on the more challenging rides while Melissa would gamely ride on those a little more subdued (like Ant Farm at Wild Adventures, ET Adventure at Universal, and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad at Disney). I got over my fears of inversion, extreme heights, and sudden changes in gravity during this time...and built up a list of personal favorite rides (maybe I'll write about them in some future post). When I went down to visit my father in Hollywood, I stopped on a couple of occasions in Dania and rode South Florida's then only roller coaster: the wooden Dania Beach Hurricane off Stirling Road next to I-95 (it's since been dismantled and moved to another part of the country). From 2002 through 2006, my family together regularly attended theme parks and I went on most of the rides...some many times (e.g. I've ridden Busch Garden's Montu 26 times and Kumba 22). But since that time, the kids have grown up and Melissa isn't really a "thrill rides" kind of person...understandable: before 2002 I was downright phobic about them. So I haven't been to any theme parks in the past few years. Still, Melissa and I could still go to places like Universal and Disney that have lots to offer visitors besides the rides...
There are also a couple of factors that have diminished the quality of our theme park experiences. One is the travel to and from the park site, usually on the Interstate and for around two hours on the average in each direction. That can get to be tedious whether you're a driver or a passenger. The other is the problem these parks have with long lines for their rides. For a two-to-three minute roller coaster experience, it simply is not worth the aggravation to have to wait upwards to an hour or more to have the opportunity. Once we stayed at one of Universal Studio's hotels for our vacation (July 2003) and as a side benefit each of us received an express pass for the many rides. Now THAT was great, almost running through the express lines and getting to ride our favorites many times! But that experience was also a bit more expensive, too...
I'd like to attend some of the better theme parks again with a more balanced approach: don't just concentrate on the rides, but take in all of what they have to offer. Still, there are some rides I'm sure I couldn't resist going on again...unless of course that entails having to wait 1-2 hours in line beforehand...
I used to be very averse to riding theme park rides of any kind...well, I WAS brave enough to ride Dumbo, It's a Small World, and If You Had Wings at Disney World back in 1973...and the Congo River Rapids at Busch Gardens in '86. But I avoided the more serious ones until my own children were of age to ride them (which they boldly began to do)...and so I decided to "face the fear", as my son Will then liked to put it. We started, in late 2002, going to Wild Adventures just southwest of Valdosta, Georgia, and in the next few years also visited Busch Gardens, Universal Studios of Orlando (both parks contained within), Walt Disney World (Epcot, Magic Kingdom, MGM Studios, and Blizzard Beach...we never got around to Animal Kingdom), Dollywood (in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee), and Wild Waters (a water park feeding from Silver Springs). Will, Rebecca, and I would go on the more challenging rides while Melissa would gamely ride on those a little more subdued (like Ant Farm at Wild Adventures, ET Adventure at Universal, and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad at Disney). I got over my fears of inversion, extreme heights, and sudden changes in gravity during this time...and built up a list of personal favorite rides (maybe I'll write about them in some future post). When I went down to visit my father in Hollywood, I stopped on a couple of occasions in Dania and rode South Florida's then only roller coaster: the wooden Dania Beach Hurricane off Stirling Road next to I-95 (it's since been dismantled and moved to another part of the country). From 2002 through 2006, my family together regularly attended theme parks and I went on most of the rides...some many times (e.g. I've ridden Busch Garden's Montu 26 times and Kumba 22). But since that time, the kids have grown up and Melissa isn't really a "thrill rides" kind of person...understandable: before 2002 I was downright phobic about them. So I haven't been to any theme parks in the past few years. Still, Melissa and I could still go to places like Universal and Disney that have lots to offer visitors besides the rides...
There are also a couple of factors that have diminished the quality of our theme park experiences. One is the travel to and from the park site, usually on the Interstate and for around two hours on the average in each direction. That can get to be tedious whether you're a driver or a passenger. The other is the problem these parks have with long lines for their rides. For a two-to-three minute roller coaster experience, it simply is not worth the aggravation to have to wait upwards to an hour or more to have the opportunity. Once we stayed at one of Universal Studio's hotels for our vacation (July 2003) and as a side benefit each of us received an express pass for the many rides. Now THAT was great, almost running through the express lines and getting to ride our favorites many times! But that experience was also a bit more expensive, too...
I'd like to attend some of the better theme parks again with a more balanced approach: don't just concentrate on the rides, but take in all of what they have to offer. Still, there are some rides I'm sure I couldn't resist going on again...unless of course that entails having to wait 1-2 hours in line beforehand...
Thursday, August 13, 2015
Perusing Past Election Result Maps on Wikipedia
This morning I've been using Wikipedia to go over presidential election results from the past 70+ years, concentrating on the nationwide maps showing the general election results, broken down by individual counties. I was surprised that my current home county of Alachua, home to the University of Florida and a supposed "blue" Democratic area in northern Florida surrounded by a sea of "red" Republican counties, went for George (H.W.) Bush in 1988 over Michael Dukakis. And in the extremely close election between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon in 1960, it was the Republican Nixon who won Alachua while surrounding counties went for JFK. But then again, that 1960 election was the last one that consistently had the South pretty much run by very conservative Democrats (the "Boll Weevils"). For example, if you look at the map showing where the biggest support for Franklin Roosevelt was in his 1944 election against Thomas Dewey, it was in the southern states. But in 1964, the South underwent a realignment that would only be interrupted when favorite son candidates Jimmy Carter (Georgia) and Bill Clinton (Arkansas) successfully ran for the high office. Conservative wing Republican Barry Goldwater won the Deep South in '64 and, four years later, independent candidate George Wallace would split it with Nixon. Nixon swept the area (and almost the rest of the country) from George McGovern in 1972, and the shift of conservative southern Democrats to the Republican Party had begun. Still, there are pockets of strong Democratic regions in states like Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina in spite of their states' now consistently Republican orientation. However, there are other states in the country whose shifts are a bit more puzzling...
Until the past few elections, for example, Kentucky was one of those states that could go either way. The Democratic strong areas were always in its far western area near the Mississippi River and in its far eastern area near West Virginia. Now those areas seem to have gone over to the Republicans. Speaking of West Virginia, it used to be strongly Democratic...but has undergone a flip-flop of its own. Another state that has drastically changed its political orientation is Oklahoma, which used to have a large Democratic base in its southeastern section but which now seems to be uniformly Republican...
Being someone who loves to pore over maps, I could spend hours upon hours looking at the ones Wikipedia provides. I trust their data, although I know that there are areas that Wikipedia's articles might just be suspect for their objectivity. But when it comes to data like this, they are a great source. They're also useful for keeping up with sports standings, too!
Until the past few elections, for example, Kentucky was one of those states that could go either way. The Democratic strong areas were always in its far western area near the Mississippi River and in its far eastern area near West Virginia. Now those areas seem to have gone over to the Republicans. Speaking of West Virginia, it used to be strongly Democratic...but has undergone a flip-flop of its own. Another state that has drastically changed its political orientation is Oklahoma, which used to have a large Democratic base in its southeastern section but which now seems to be uniformly Republican...
Being someone who loves to pore over maps, I could spend hours upon hours looking at the ones Wikipedia provides. I trust their data, although I know that there are areas that Wikipedia's articles might just be suspect for their objectivity. But when it comes to data like this, they are a great source. They're also useful for keeping up with sports standings, too!
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
The Books I'm Currently Reading
Right now I'm in the process of reading three different books...and each one is part of a series. I'm about three fourths of the way through Stephen King's latest novel Finders Keepers, which is book #2 in his ongoing trilogy...Mr. Mercedes was the first one. I'm liking the second book more, which introduces new characters and a new story while integrating them with the heroes of the previous book...and has hinted at what the third and final book may entail. I'm also a little more than halfway past A Memory of Light, the final, fourteenth book in the Wheel of Time fantasy saga by Robert Jordan, with Brandon Sanderson writing out this volume (as well as the previous two) following the original author's untimely death (not that deaths are ever "timely" in nature). Naturally, as you might expect at this stage of the game, the events are leading toward a crescendo with the forces of light and darkness facing off on many different fronts. And the third book I'm reading is Isaac Asimov's Foundation, the first of seven books in his science fiction Foundation series. He wrote the first three in the 1950s and then waited nearly thirty years before producing the last two...and then tacked on two prequel novels. I've just begun my rereading of Foundation...
I also plan to read mystery writer Sue Grafton's "P" is for Peril after finishing A Memory of Light. So I have plenty of reading to occupy myself with for a while...
I also plan to read mystery writer Sue Grafton's "P" is for Peril after finishing A Memory of Light. So I have plenty of reading to occupy myself with for a while...
Sunday, August 9, 2015
Went to Retreat in Ocklawaha with Melissa This Weekend
This weekend I joined Melissa at a retreat held at a Lake Weir resort in Ocklawaha, Florida (a few miles southeast of Ocala) for some students and alumni of Asbury Theological Seminary, which she attends. Melissa went down there Thursday, but as I couldn't get time off from work, I had to wait until Saturday morning to join her there. The focus of the retreat was marriage and leadership, with different people making presentations on various topics. The atmosphere was relaxed and informal with about 16 in attendance. They provided us with breakfast, lunch and dinner Saturday and breakfast on Sunday morning before the final presentation, which was how to foster creativity. I enjoyed the whole experience as well as the facilities, which provided (as you can see from the pictures) a grand view of the lake...which I had never visited before. Saturday evening I also enjoyed an after-dinner table discussion with some new friends when we discovered a mutual affinity for books...especially stuff in the science fiction/fantasy realm. Everyone was not only friendly but showed a warmth and acceptance that I had not experienced to such a degree with events of this type. Melissa and I are both grateful for having been able to go there...
Friday, August 7, 2015
Yesterday's Republican Presidential Debates on Fox News
Yesterday all seventeen major Republican candidates for president
faced off in two debates. The ten making the "cut" were onstage at 9 PM
on Fox News, while the other seven held their pee wee debate earlier at
5. The idea of having such debates this early in the campaign season
makes little sense...until you realize what may be the main force
driving it: big money campaign donors. And why not, with no
restrictions on political contributions anymore after the U.S. Supreme
Court, in its Citizens United decision a few years ago, equated
spending with protected "free speech". If you happen to be a
politically active tycoon, you are going to wait until the field of
candidates gets whittled down to the point where the more viable
candidates who represent your interests are left...no point in
figuratively flushing your money down the proverbial toilet, after
all...
This morning the folks on Fox News were all giddy about their debates, and discussed who did well and who didn't. The consensus view seems to be that Marco Rubio came across better in the prime time debate while Carly Fiorina stood out in the other. As for the others, somebody said that Jeb Bush seemed to struggle a bit with his answers while another regarded Rand Paul as looking too "sour". As for me, I find this spectacle to be a bit on the hilarious side...both the debate and the analysis. Not only is it way too early in the campaign to hold debates like this, but with our cyber-technology in 2015 anyone can get access to information about the candidates just by punching in a search on their computer or cellphone. Not that they would, mind you...most folks are terribly apathetic about politics, even when we're talking about the presidential race. After all, when 40% of registered voters sit out a tight presidential election, the idea of trying to lure their interest fifteen months before the next one with debates between seventeen contenders approaches the ludicrous...unless, as I already pointed out, you're someone looking for a promising candidate to fund with your fatcat money...
This morning the folks on Fox News were all giddy about their debates, and discussed who did well and who didn't. The consensus view seems to be that Marco Rubio came across better in the prime time debate while Carly Fiorina stood out in the other. As for the others, somebody said that Jeb Bush seemed to struggle a bit with his answers while another regarded Rand Paul as looking too "sour". As for me, I find this spectacle to be a bit on the hilarious side...both the debate and the analysis. Not only is it way too early in the campaign to hold debates like this, but with our cyber-technology in 2015 anyone can get access to information about the candidates just by punching in a search on their computer or cellphone. Not that they would, mind you...most folks are terribly apathetic about politics, even when we're talking about the presidential race. After all, when 40% of registered voters sit out a tight presidential election, the idea of trying to lure their interest fifteen months before the next one with debates between seventeen contenders approaches the ludicrous...unless, as I already pointed out, you're someone looking for a promising candidate to fund with your fatcat money...
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