Rooting Against the Unbeatens in College and NFL Football

It's at about the midpoint in the 2015 National Football League regular season...and about three fourths of the way through the NCAA college football season.  At this point, depending on how my "main" teams, the NFL's Miami Dolphins and the NCAA's University of Florida Gators, are doing, my emphasis on the various games I watch changes.  In both the professional and college leagues, I have my favorites besides the Dolphins and Gators.  But if either team is doing well in a particular year and could use a "boost" by another team losing...even one I usually support...then my loyalties can change.  This year the Miami Dolphins are suffering a mediocre season (so... what's new), destined to go nowhere except home at the end of the regular season.  But the Florida Gators, having clinched the Eastern Division of their Southeastern Conference for the first time since the Urban Meyer/Tim Tebow team of 2009, have a real shot at making the four-team national championship playoffs.  Just winning the rest of the regular season games and the SEC playoff game might accomplish this outright, but there are still some undefeated teams left out there...and I have been rooting for them to lose in order to enhance Florida's prospects for selection.  Even to the point of going against Michigan State, which I have supported over the last few years...so I was delighted to see them upset yesterday 39-38 to Nebraska and becoming a one-loss team (which I can once again support).  I wanted Florida State, a one-loss team and future Gator opponent, to defeat unbeaten and top-ranked Clemson (a school I usually like)...but to no avail.  And the game played between two undefeated teams in the Big 12, TCU and Oklahoma State, was a win for me regardless of the result...but I leaned toward the lower-ranked Cowboys (who prevailed 49-29).  I remember taking an interest in seeing teams ranked ahead of the Gators losing in late-season games back in 2006 and 2008, years that they eventually won the national championship.  It's happening again this year.  But Florida has got to keep on winning, too...that last performance against Vanderbilt had better not be repeated against South Carolina or Florida State, much less the eventual winner (probably Alabama) of the SEC Western Division...

Since Miami doesn't seem interested in making the NFL playoffs this year, regardless who they put in as their head coach, I have a different emphasis affecting the teams I root for late in the season.  Besides supporting secondary teams I like (that seem to have a shot at the playoffs) such as the New York Giants, Seattle, and Green Bay, I am also pulling against any remaining undefeated teams...until they lose at least one game, that is.  This is because I remember the perfect 1972 Miami Dolphins season, a feat that hasn't been matched since (although New England very nearly pulled it off in 2007)...and I don't want any other team to match their accomplishment.  At this writing, Carolina is the only undefeated team left in the National Conference, while three others are without a loss in the American: Denver, Cincinnati, and New England.  Ultimately, at worst we could end up with just one perfect season, but I want everybody to have stumbled at least once.  But should any of the teams manage this near-impossible feat, I'm pulling for Cam Newton's Panthers to do it.  And once again, I'm hoping against hope that the Giants might be able to pull it all together at the end of the year and advance in the playoffs: they seem to be the only ones not intimidated by the Patriots.  Let's see...2007: Giants barely make the playoffs but beat favored Patriots in Super Bowl...2011: Giants barely make the playoffs but beat favored Patriots in Super Bowl...2015: will this be a continuation of the four-year cycle?

Books I'm Currently Reading

I am currently rereading Philip Pullman's fantasy series His Dark Materials.  The first book, The Golden Compass, I read again just recently.  I just finished book number two, titled The Subtle Knife, and am now a little more than halfway through the final one, The Amber Spyglass.  I find Pullman's writing style and presentation a joy to read, and wish others would write stories the way he does.  I am also nearing the end of Sue Grafton's series of short novels based on letters of the alphabet.  My next book, which I'm about to start, is "V" is for Vengeance.  After that, it's "W" and "X"...and then my reading will have caught up with Grafton's writing.  I am also planning to take on a popular 2015 novel: Paula Hawkins' The Girl on the Train, which has been on the New York Times bestseller list for months...

That's the positive side of my reading right now.  On the negative side, I seem to be stuck in a number of books, a couple of them not so good...and a couple of them worthy classics.  The books are Disclosure by Michael Crichton, The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling, Moby Dick by Herman Melville, and Les Miserables by Victor Hugo.  The problem with Disclosure is that I am not only completely out of touch with its main character, with whose developing plight I'm expected to sympathize, but the cutting edge sci-fi aspect to it is outdated...by twenty years.  With The Casual Vacancy, Rowling introduced way too many characters at the very beginning and she hops around in a confusing manner from one of the many subplots to another.  Les Miserables is a good book as I see it, but it is very, very long...and I already know some things that happen to the main characters, not a good inducement to read further.  Melvilles' Moby Dick seems to be the most promising of the lot...I just need to take the time to read it...

Just Finished Reading Sue Grafton's "U" is for Undertow

"U" is for Undertow is novelist Sue Grafton's 21st book (out of presumably 26) in her "alphabet mystery" series, set in the late 1980s in southern California and featuring Kinsey Millhone, a private eye in her late thirties.  I enjoyed the previous "T" book and was looking forward to reading this one.  I wasn't disappointed.  Grafton seems to be fully back into her writing, and this story of a little girl's disappearance back in 1967 from a fenced-in back yard of an upscale neighborhood...and how Kinsey solves it...provides the necessary elements in terms of character development and suspense as to what happened.  This story, unlike many of the others, has Kinsey pretty much staying in her hometown of Santa Teresa; the fact that she recognizes some of the players in her investigation from her old high school years is important.  Along with the mystery of the missing girl, Kinsey uncovers some old mysteries from her childhood past...and discovers a new perspective on her estranged, domineering grandmother...

In "U" is for Undertow, as well as in many of her other books in this series, Sue Grafton seems to take great pleasure in exposing the decadence and feeling of privilege of many people living affluent lifestyles...many if not most of them enjoying the fruits of other people's ideas and labor.  In the hoity-toity Horton Ravine subdivision, where the story is focused, alcoholism, negligence, drug peddling and abuse, and burglary among its residents are presented as almost normal aspects of life...while they take great pains to make themselves look better than everyone else.  I like that about Grafton and have felt, from my childhood school days around snobbish, self-important classmates with rich parents, that many in the "upper" classes are nothing better than leeches on the hard work of others...

Record High Temperatures in Gainesville Today

Saturday afternoon I went outside here in Gainesville to run a little...it was 83 degrees with 53% humidity.  Not all that pleasant and a little hot and muggy for this time of year, but I could take it. Then on Sunday I repeated my run...it was also 83, but the humidity had climbed to 68%. Ugh.  Yesterday I went out to run and the temperature had climbed to 86, with the humidity still in those unpleasant-but-tolerable sixties.  Today I stood outside and was astounded at the heat.  I check my weather app on my phone and discovered that it was 91.  Then I checked that against the record high for Gainesville, Florida on November 3: 88 degrees in 1972!  The average high for this date is only 78!

I had been looking forward to a cooler, dryer November after this past extended hot and wet summer...but it looks as if I'm going to be looking forward a little longer...

K.C. Beats Mets to Win World Series as Harvey Falters in Ninth

I was realistic while watching last night's fifth game in this year's World Series, with Kansas City leading the New York Mets three games to one, with just one more victory needed to capture the 2015 title.  It would be nice for "my" Mets to win at least this game, but I felt that the Royals would eventually win out in the long run.  New York had their ace pitcher Matt Harvey and he was in top form, throwing a four-hit (all singles) shutout through eight innings with just one base-on-balls. With a 2-0 lead to protect, Mets manager Terry Collins had decided to let their closing reliever Jeurys Familia cover the top of the ninth to finish the home win and extend the series to a sixth game in Kansas City.  But upon hearing that he wouldn't be finishing the game, Harvey pitched a minor fit in the dugout and pushed Collins to change his mind.  Collins relented and let Harvey pitch...and disaster ensued. First, he walked the lead-off hitter and then gave up a double, which drove in a run to make it 2-1.  Then, with the damage already done, Collins brought in Familia to protect a one-run lead with no outs and a runner on second.  The second run scored on a throwing error at the plate by the Mets first baseman Duda, and it was 2-2...destined for extra innings.  The Royals went on to score five runs in the twelfth inning and took the World Series, four games to one.

A lot of people are criticizing Collins' decision to let Harvey pitch, but I beg to differ.  His pitch count per inning had remained consistent throughout the game and he had demonstrated continuing control over his placement.  Had Collins put in Familia, who had not exactly been consistent on the mound of late, that might have backfired as well and folks would be saying that he erred in not keeping Harvey in there for the ninth.  It was a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't type of situation, and I sympathize with the Mets manager.  Besides, I think that the Kansas City batters had more than a little bit to do with the outcome, regardless which pitcher the Mets ended up using...

Just Finished Reading Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale

From time to time I read the New York Times fiction books bestseller list in my Sunday newspaper, looking for good reading prospects.  I filter out those books that look like parts of series and focus on self-contained stories...as well as books that remain on the list for several weeks.  Until just recently, Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale has been on the bestsellers list for many weeks, and I decided it was time to give it a look.  Besides, by doing it this way before, I got another "bird" book, Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch, and that one turned out to be a winner as well...

The Nightingale, the title referring to a nickname given to one of the characters, is a historical fiction drama set in France during its Nazi German occupation from 1940 to 1945.  The protagonists, from whose perspectives the author presents the story's narrative, alternating one with the other, are sisters Isabelle and Vianne.  Isabelle is bold and lives her life on the edge, by her emotions...while Vianne is cautious and deliberative.  They are conflicted with each other by their actions, as well as by mutual grievances from the past.  But war has come to France, despite all guarantees to the contrary, and the two sisters must deal with the German occupation, each in her own way...

That's about as far as I can go about the story itself without giving away too much, but I can say that Kristin Hannah did a remarkable job with the intensity and depth of her characters, as well as demonstrating that, in times of conflict like war, moral decisions are often not only difficult to make...in some circumstances, they are nearly impossible.  This book was so good that it did something books rarely do...it made me cry.  And that's about all I need to recommend The Nightingale for anyone interested in a good story with memorable characters...and you'll also learn quite a bit about history in the process...

My October 2015 Running Report

The month of October featured me running on a cushioned surface to protect my feet as I recovered from plantar fasciitis in my right foot.  I have also been doing foot stretching exercises to alleviate the problem.  Today I ran a short distance on asphalt, on the road around my block, about .7 mile...and feel no foot pain.  I ran on every day of the month, and amassed 260 miles...

Next month I will step up my outdoor running, which should be more pleasant with the expected cooler fall season temperatures and dryer weather.  There is a half-marathon in Gainesville in the middle of the month, and the Turkey Trot, a 10K race, will be held around Thanksgiving.  Whether or not I run in either of these depends on how well my transition to road running goes in the next couple of weeks...

I Rank The Doors' Songs From Top to Bottom

One of the best rock music acts in the late sixties and early seventies was The Doors, with singer/songwriter Jim Morrison, lead guitarist/songwriter Robby Krieger, keyboardist Ray Manzarek, and drummer John Densmore.  They made six studio albums from 1967 to 1971 and generated more than their fair share of controversy before Morrison died in 1971.  When I was growing up at the time, I was only familiar with their singles releases.  My favorite songs of theirs at that time were Touch Me and Love Her Madly.  Now, since I have all albums and have listened to each a number of times, I have my own list of favorites...and not-so-favorites.  Here are all of their songs from the six albums as I personally rank them according to my liking.  After each song, the album it's on is indicated by the following code: The Doors [D], Strange Days [SD], Waiting for the Sun [WS], The Soft Parade [SP], Morrison Hotel [MH], and L.A. Woman [LA].  What are your favorite Doors songs?

1 THE WASP (Texas Radio & the Big Beat) [LA]
2 Peace Frog [MH]
3 Touch Me [SP]
4 Roadhouse Blues [MH]
5 Love Her Madly [LA]
6 Shaman's Blues [SP]
7 Alabama Song [D]
8 Riders on the Storm [LA]
9 Hello I Love You [WS]
10 Runnin' Blue [SP]
11 L.A. Woman [LA]
12 Light My Fire [D]
13 Hyacinth House [LA]
14 Yes the River Knows [WS]
15 Do It [SP]
16 The End [D]
17 Not to Touch the Earth [WS]
18 The Changeling [LA]
19 L'America [LA]
20 Break on Through [D]
21 When the Music's Over [SD]
22 People are Strange [SD]
23 Ship of Fools [MH]
24 I Looked at You [D]
25 Soul Kitchen [D]
26 Five To One [WS]
27 Tell All the People [SP]
28 Take It as It Comes [D]
29 End of the Line [D]
30 Easy Ride [SP]
31 Land Ho! [MH]
32 Queen of the Highway [MH]
33 Strange Days [SD]
34 Moonlight Drive [SD]
35 Summer's Almost Gone [WS]
36 Blue Sunday [MH]
37 Indian Summer [MH]
38 The Spy [MH]
39 My Eyes Have Seen You [SD]
40 The Soft Parade [SP]
41 Cars Hiss By My Window [LA]
42 Waiting for the Sun [MH]
43 Spanish Caravan [WS]
44 Been Down So Long [LA]
45 Twentieth Century Fox[D]
46 You Make Me Real [MH]
47 Love Me Two Times [SD]
48 The Unknown Soldier [WS]
49 Wishful Sinful [SP]
50 Crystal Ship [D]
51 Maggie Mcgill [MH]
52 We Could Be So Good Together [WS]
53 My Wintertime Love [WS]
54 Crawling King Snake [LA]
55 Wild Child [SP]
56 Back Door Man [D]
57 My Wild Love [WS]
58 Unhappy Girl [SD]
59 You're Lost Little Girl [SD]
60 Love Street [WS]
61 I Can't See Your Face in My Mind [SD]
62 Horse Latitudes [SD]

Went to Friends of the Library Book Sale Last Sunday

From last Saturday through yesterday (Oct. 24-28), Gainesville had its twice-a-year Friends of the Library book sale, which always attracts a big crowd.  Back in April, I went there with my son Will on Saturday morning when the sale began...the people at the North Main Street warehouse where it is held were so densely packed that it was nearly impossible to do any effective browsing.  This time around, Will repeated the Saturday morning visit there while I slept in.  Instead, I drove around on Sunday afternoon, found a parking space close to the site, and, although there were still many people there, I found that I could maneuver around the facility.  I needn't have bothered, though: I chose the three books I wanted to buy (for the grand sum of one dollar) at the first table I reached, marked "Science Fiction and Fantasy".  These books were Disclosure by Michael Crichton, The Winds of Altair by Ben Bova, and Expanded Universe by Robert Heinlein.  Disclosure doesn't exactly fit into the sci-fi genre of fiction, but since the author had other works in that area (like Andromeda Strain, Prey, and Jurassic Park), that's where it was stocked.  Ben Bova is an author that I've heard good things about but haven't yet read.  And Expanded Universe is a collection of short science fiction stories and essays by Robert Heinlein, one of the greatest science fiction writers of all time.  I've begun reading Disclosure, published in 1993, and already I can see that it is seriously outdated.  The novel deals with the development of computer software technology and the vision of using CD-ROMs to store massive amounts of data. On the other hand, the idea of virtual reality technology, which seems for some reason to be lagging behind in its development and marketing in our "real" world, is being pushed in the story (back in 1993) as something about to explode upon the scene...

The books should be fun reading, and I'm looking forward to reading some of the views of Heinlein on various issues...

Just Finished Reading Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird

When, after more than fifty intervening years before author Harper Lee published Go Set a Watchman, the sequel to her famous To Kill a Mockingbird, I became aware of just how embedded within the American psyche the original story had become, I finally got around to reading it for myself, never having seen the movie adaptation starring Gregory Peck.  Worthy of an almost universal reading assignment in high school English classes, somehow I had avoided such an assignment during my tenure as a student in the early 1970s...

To Kill a Mockingbird is told in the first person by the character of Jean-Louise "Scout" Finch, a young girl who lives with her widowed attorney father Atticus and her older brother Jem in Maycomb, Alabama, a small town distant from any big city.  It is the mid-1930s and Scout is entering a most memorable period in her life.  After all, she's just started the first grade!  But upon encountering her teacher for the first time, she discovers that practically everything she says is frowned upon in the classroom...even the fact that at six years of age she can already read quite well...thanks to the teaching of Calpurnia, the family's long-time cook.  In the meantime, her friend Dill, who keeps getting passed off from one family to another, often finds himself living with his Aunt Rachel in Maycomb.  Together with Jem, the three go on dares to the forbidden house in town where the reclusive Arthur "Boo" Radley lives in complete seclusion.  Who is this mysterious figure and how important is he in determining the outcome of the story?  Guess you'll have to read it to find out...

While the childhood dramas and adventures of Scout's life are going on, she discovers that her father Atticus (whom the children always address by his first name) is weighted down by a case he is working on.  Atticus has been appointed to defend Tom Robinson, a young black man accused of raping a white woman.  To Atticus, the accusation is false, but he realizes that in defending Tom, he is fighting an uphill battle against the prejudiced hearts of the adult white population...especially those of the all-white jury that will determine the verdict.  Also, the anger at Atticus for defending a black man spills over into the lives of his own children, who are taunted with racial epithets by other kids...and even adults who should have known better...

To Kill a Mockingbird is a story told on different levels.  On one level, it is something of an adventure story of a spunky little girl in a small southern town of the thirties.  On another, it is story of that child's awakening to the complex and often ugly world of adult society, complete with its bigotry and injustice...as well as the fact that pigeonholing people by race or family obscures and diminishes their value and significance as individuals.  And on still another level, in a more general sense, it is a lesson on how anyone, no matter how "good" of a life they lead, can have areas in their heart full of darkness, ignorance, and hate... 

As for the book's title, yes, Harper Lee does get around to explaining its meaning...

Baseball World Series & NBA Regular Season Starts Tonight

I don't understand why Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association pick the middle of the week to launch their championship series and regular season, respectively...unless it's due to the fact that football so dominates the spectator sports culture in this country at this time of year that other major sports would suffer in comparison were these games to take place on the weekend.  That's too bad for me, since I'll be at work when the Kansas City Royals host the New York Mets and Lebron James' Cleveland Cavaliers face off against injury-prone Derrick Rose's Chicago Bulls.  Fox (Gainesville's Cox Channel 13) will show the baseball game while TNT (Ch. 45) will show the hoops contest (and after that one, the opener between New Orleans and Golden State)...

As a side note, Major League Soccer's playoff schedule also begins in the middle of the week, as UniMas (Ch.90) will show the DC United-New England and Seattle-LA Galaxy matches Wednesday evening and the Montreal-Toronto and Portland-Kansas City matches on Thursday.  Again, I'll be at work and miss all of them.  Sigh...

My Top Ten South Park Episodes

South Park is one of those long-running television series that you either have come to like...or hate.  One problem that some folks have with it is the lack of respect it shows for the taboo subjects in our society...in other words, it's an equal opportunity iconoclastic satire show, destined to challenge your cherished notions if you watch it for any length of time.  I'm not too keen on the extensive profanity, and some of the shows that focus either on private body functions or religion don't seem very amusing to me.  But from time to time, South Park strikes a chord and comes out with a memorable episode.  It's an animated series set in the small city of South Park, Colorado.  The main characters are late-elementary school buddies Stan, Kyle, Cartman, Kenny...and occasionally Butters. Stan's father Randy, along with some of the school staff, figures in several of the stories. To date, this series, begun in 1997, has 260 episodes.  However, I haven't seen most of the more recent ones, and if I peruse the TV schedule, I usually pass up on most of the episodes featured...I'm interested in only about fifty of them.  For those who have seen this show and like at least some of the episodes, here is my personal top ten list of favorite episodes...

1-THE LOSING EDGE--Stan's South Park little league baseball team is glad to finally be finishing their boring season...the kids are now looking forward to getting back to what they really want to do all summer: play video games.  But they find out that because they're such winners, then they'll have to keep playing other statewide teams for the championship.  They desperately try to throw games, but discover that their opponents are also desperate to lose to them!  What makes this episode the best is the role that Stan's dad takes as the "fighting father" who always end up arrested for fighting an opposing father. The ending is classic.

2-PINEWOOD DERBY--Stan's entry in the annual Pinewood Derby is illegally altered by his dad Randy, who has inserted a supermagnet after breaking into the Hadron Collider in Europe.  The model car goes shooting out into space...only to be picked up by an alien ship on the lookout for planets developing space travel with warp speed.  Randy takes over from here...

3-TWO DAYS BEFORE THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW--Stan and Cartman drive a boat into a beaver damn and cause a neighboring community to be flooded.  The adults determine the flooding's cause to be global warming...and the panic ensues...

4-SMUG ALERT--Kyle's dad has a new hybrid Prius and he nags the rest of the town about how they are ruining the environment with their gas guzzlers. When they object, he moves Kyle and his family to San Francisco where he can live among like-minded people.  Stan writes and performs a song to change South Park residents' minds about hybrids...with unintended consequences.  Meanwhile, Cartman, without Kyle to torment, desperately schemes up a mission to San Francisco to rescue him and bring him back...

5-SOMETHING WALL-MART THIS WAY COMES--When a new Wal-Mart comes to South Park, its residences find themselves irresistibly drawn to its doors.  Meanwhile, other businesses in town close down and the boys find themselves walking through a squalid ghost town...that's what's left of South Park.  To rid themselves of Wal-Mart, they travel to company headquarters to air their grievances...while Cartman fights their efforts...

6-RAISINS--Partially a parody of Goth culture and partially a parody of the Hooters type of restaurant chain, Stan, after his girlfriend dumps him, is depressed.  His friends take him to Raisins, where they hope the pretty girls working there will cheer him up.  Instead, Stan feels worse and decides to join up with the morose and cynical Goth kids at school.  Meanwhile, naive Butters falls in love with a Raisins girl who leads him on for tips...

7-UP THE DOWN STEROID--Crippled Jimmy is determined to win the Special Olympics and finds himself hooked on steroids.  Meanwhile, Cartman, upon hearing that the winner receives a big money prize, decides to enter as being mentally-challenged...

8-THE BIGGEST DOUCHE IN THE UNIVERSE--The highlight of this episode, in which Kenny's soul is trapped inside Cartman's body, is the conflict between rationalist skeptic Stan and John Edwards, the Sci Fi Channel charlatan who claimed to be able to talk to dead people.  In frustration, Stan nominates  Edwards for (the episode's title)...leading to one of the funniest endings in the series...

9-MANBEARPIG--This episode is all about Al Gore and his fascination with...himself. Gore is on a mission to educate the public about the extreme danger of "Manbearpig", which he sees signs of everywhere he looks.  Never a fan of Al Gore, I think he nevertheless would have been a better choice for president in 2000 than Dubya.  Still the guy IS a bit of a head case, isn't he?

10-THE UNGROUNDABLE--Butters becomes part of the "vampire" movement at school so he can avoid obeying his parents.  Meanwhile, the Goth kids take offense at the vampire kids' similar appearance...

Miscellaneous Sports Comments

--To those who think team sports is all mechanics and that assembling a squad with talent is all that is necessary for success, I refer you to the Miami Dolphins and Florda Gators football teams.  The Dolphins went all out in the off-season to put together an imposing lineup on defense that would complement, if not surpass, their already capable offense.  But in the first four games, the "stars" did not work together as a unit and displayed little emotion.  The result: one win and three losses.  Now, with a shakeup in the coaching lineup, they are operating on the same page and are showing the spirit that their fans expect.  And the result under new head coach Dan Campbell? A 38-10 thrashing of Tennessee last week and an incredible 41-0 lead at HALFTIME today against Houston! The same is true for University of Florida football, which under its previous coach played in an undisciplined and sporadic manner.  This year, the new coach has brought together players that are probably no more talented than last year's...and of course, many of them ARE from last year.  What a difference, with a consistent output of effort, selfless teamwork, and self-control on the field, that their first-year head coach Jim McElwain has produced so far...

--In baseball's major leagues, I naturally root for the two Florida teams to make the playoffs and face off in the World Series.  Since that obviously wasn't going to happen this year, I went for the New York teams instead.  But although the Yankees choked against Houston in their wild card game, the Mets have fought their way to a World Series against last year's American League champion Kansas City.  Should be fun to watch: the only problem is I'll be at work for the first game, scheduled for this Tuesday evening...

--I was watching English Premier League soccer this morning, and they (NBC Sports) featured a match between cellar-dwelling (20th place) Sunderland and 18th place Newcastle.  Sunderland controlled the game, winning 3-0 for their first victory of the season and finally climbing out of last place.  I think they've discovered their formula for success: just play Newcastle every week...

Just Finished Reading John Grisham's A Painted House

Before I picked up a copy of John Grisham's novel A Painted House (published in 2001), I had read four other books from this prolific writer who tends to specialize in fiction relating to law and politics: The Pelican Brief, The Firm, The Appeal, and The Brethren.  I thought I'd read A Painted House, a story steeped in childhood memories and nostalgia, as a departure from Grisham's usual focus...

The setting of A Painted House is the Chandler family's cotton farm in lowland eastern Arkansas in 1952. Luke Chandler, who is seven at the time of the story and a die-hard (and very frustrated) St.  Cardinals baseball fan, is the first-person narrator looking back in time from an adult perspective.  It's cotton-picking season and the Chandlers, short on manpower, go out and hire Mexican migrants and a hill family named the Spruills to help with the harvest.  Without wanting to give away the story, let's just say that Luke's experiences with the Mexicans and Spruills drive the plot and, as he says himself, change his life.  I will say this much, though: Luke reminded me a lot of little Harry Potter in the first couple of books in J.K. Rowling's series by how much he likes to sneak around and eavesdrop on others, accumulating for himself a burden of secrets.  Also, Grisham was great with the unforgettable characters he introduced, especially Luke's grandparents, parents, Cowboy (one of the Mexicans)...and Tally, Trot, and Hank Spruill.  And then there is Luke's older Uncle Ricky, who is serving as a soldier in the Korean War and, despite his absence, plays his own important role in the story...

A Painted House was adapted to television as a movie in 2003.  I'm not sure I want to see it, though, as I have already formed my own images of the characters and events.  A Painted House gives a time capsule look at 1952 in a poor rural part of the country, showing the more traditionally based attitudes of the people back then.  I definitely recommend it... 

Super-Hurricane Patricia About to Strike SW Mexico Coast

When I finally dragged my sorry old body out of bed this morning, Melissa had already been up for a few hours and had an impressive news story ready for me: a new hurricane is about to hit Mexico.  Upon further investigation, I discovered that Hurricane Patricia, with sustained winds of 200 mph, is already the strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Western Hemisphere.  Formed in the eastern Pacific, it will soon hit the southwestern Mexico coast between the cities of Manzanillo (pop. 110,000, Colima State) and Puerto Vallarta (pop. 200,000, Jalisco State).  The former city is the major port outlet for Mexico City's trade in the Pacific, and the latter is a major tourist center.  Patricia, once inland, is expected to miss the large city of Guadalajara (pop. 1.5 million) to the west, but this storm, although relatively small for the concentrated force around its eye, will most likely devastate a large area of land.  The good folks at The Weather Channel are predicting that the brunt of Patricia's tornado-level winds will miss major populated areas, but there are still coastal villages between Puerto Vallarta and Manzanillo that will be subjected to those winds and a strong ocean surge.  Once it is inland and weakening, I expect that the main damage and danger to lives will be heavy flooding as it will dump its water over a mountainous area with valleys...

Just Finished Reading Sue Grafton's "T" is for Trespass

As I have been working my way, in chronological order, through Sue Grafton's "Alphabet Mystery" series, I have just finished "T" is for Trespass.  Because I was disappointed in her previous "R" is for Ricochet and "S" is for Silence (especially the latter), I was a little apprehensive about undertaking this next book in the series.  As it turned out, I had no cause for concern: "T" is for Trespass is one of Grafton's best...

Our hero, California-based private sleuth Kinsey Millhone, finds herself in a war of wits and daring with Solana Rojas, a con artist and master of stealing identities.  Solana, this sociopath's latest assumed name, has her own racket going whereby she "cares" for elderly people living alone...while robbing them and ultimately killing them, making the deaths appear to be natural.  Kinsey's octogenarian and obnoxious neighbor Gus finds himself stuck with Solana and the fight is on, first to uncover the villain's designs and then to rescue Gus.  I liked the suspense-filled struggle between Kinsey Millhone and Solana Rojas...it reminded me of the old confrontations between Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty...

"T" is for Trespass features a couple of other subplots, as Sue Grafton's stories usually do.  One thing that became more noticeable with this book, published in 2007 but set back in 1988, is how Kinsey shows herself to be computer-illiterate as she is totally clueless about the use and function of floppy disks.  The irony of this is that, by the book's release in 2007, a large segment of the computer world's users would also be clueless about floppy disks, albeit for a completely different reason: their obsolescence...

A Look At My Favorite Soccer Leagues

I took a few minutes today, while watching a replay of the Bundesliga's match between Werder Bremen and Bayern Munich, to check out the soccer standings in the various leagues I'm interested in.  And by "interested in", I am referring to those leagues whose games are broadcast on my TV: Major League Soccer (for the U.S. and Canada), Mexico's Liga MX, England's Barclay's Premier League, and Germany's Bundesliga...

The Major League Soccer regular season is nearly over, with a game or two remaining.  "My" Orlando City, a first-year expansion team in the league, has distinguished itself with a respectable 12W-13L-8D season...but will just miss making the playoffs.  The two teams that have stood out this year are Dallas in the West and the New York Red Bulls in the East.  These two are now the only ones left vying for the league's best overall regular season record...and then the championship playoffs will start (involving 12 qualifying teams)...

Mexico's Liga MX also has a championship playoff season following its regular season...which is split into two parts.  The 2015 Apertura season is nearing its end, with four games left for most of the teams.  Right now, UNAM Pumas are leading the standings, while the team I follow, UANL Tigres, as usual, are thick in the playoff hunt (for which 8 teams will qualify)...

In England's Premier League, defending champion Chelsea is trying to recover after a horrendous season start.  Meanwhile, the other usual standout teams of Manchester City, Arsenal (my favorite), and Manchester United are leading the "table", in that order.  Since the end of last season, when cellar-dwelling Leicester City avoided relegation by erupting on a season-closing winning tear, I have been rooting for them, too...and they continue to do well, in 5th place in the standings so far...

Germany's Bundesliga has some of the best soccer I've seen...I'm glad that Fox Sports is broadcasting some of their games...just as I'm glad that NBC Sports shows the English league.  Bayern Munich is totally dominating the league so far, with no end to their phenomenal success in sight.  I probably enjoy watching them play more than any other team in any of the above four leagues because of their high level of skill and team coordination...

There's only so much time I have to watch TV, and with that there is only so much time that they are showing soccer.  I'm starting to get a little tired at the interruptions in the various leagues' schedules as the players go back for a while to play on their own countries' teams in national matchups...I couldn't have cared less who won between the U.S. and Mexico in their recent overhyped match.  I much prefer watching league competition...

Just Finished Rereading Books by Asimov and Pullman

I just finished rereading two books from series I've enjoyed a few years ago.  One is science fiction writer Isaac Asimov's closing volume to his Foundation series, titled Foundation and Earth. The other is The Golden Compass, the opening book in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials fantasy series.  Perhaps you saw the movie based on this book. I didn't, and am rather glad: it wasn't much of a success and no others were made for the series...leaving viewers twisting in the wind with an unfinished story (the same happened with the movie Eragon). As for my review of this book...and the series as a whole...here is a link to my own blog article, written back in June, 2009, and titled Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. I enjoyed reading The Golden Compass this time around, largely due to the fact that I wasn't expending that much effort trying to understand the mysterious and somewhat complicated world that Pullman was presenting...

As for Foundation and Earth, I also enjoyed reading it once again. However, since one of the best things about this book was the surprise ending, I naturally didn't find it quite as gratifying as before.  The Asimov universe is comprised of many, many stories, books, and series and spans some 25,000 years in imagined future time.  And then, after he died in 1992, other science fiction writers wrote stories that belonged to this framework.  I'm not sure that I want to read any more stories by Isaac Asimov for a while...maybe later I'll read some of his many short stories, most of which I have stashed away somewhere in my garage...

Early Morning Sky Spectacle with Stars & Planets

Earlier this morning just before five I woke up and discovered that I had left my cell phone in my car. I went out to get it and was astounded at the clear, bright, star-filled sky.  It was a celestial winter wonderland, as the constellations I was seeing will be in the same part of the sky during the early evening next season.  Still, it was such a stark contrast with the relatively dim autumn evening sky as I saw Orion (with its "Belt", Betelgeuse, and Rigel), Taurus (with the Pleiades and Aldeberan), Auriga (with Capella), Canis Major (with our neighboring star Sirius, the brightest in the night sky), Canis Minor (with Procyon), and Gemini (with Castor and Pollux)...just to name the brightest sights...

I didn't hang around outside to watch the spectacle and the later sunrise...I still had some serious sleeping and dreaming to do.  But I heard the other day on National Public Radio (WUFT/89.1 in Gainesville) that just before dawn, if you face eastward, you can see four planets: Saturn, Venus, Jupiter...and the most difficult, Mercury.  I'm going to have to see if I can rouse myself into consciousness in the next day or two at that time for this visual treat...

Just Finished Reading Saul Bellow's Herzog

Until the past few years, I was very nearly completely out of the loop regarding contemporary and late-twentieth century American writers.  Besides Philip Roth, John Updike, Tom Wolfe, and John Irving, I was totally unfamiliar with Saul Bellow.  As a matter of fact, I only became aware of his name after hearing a song that independent/alternative musician Sufjan Stevens recorded about him on his 2007 The Avalanche album.  That's because Stevens was recording around the theme of the state of Illinois, and Bellow had lived in Chicago for a time. Well, I just got around to picking up a work of his, and with Herzog, it might have been his best, for all I know...

The early 1960s novel Herzog centers around the character of Moses Herzog, a middle-age Jewish professor and writer, specializing in the history of Romance literature, who is experiencing what we nowadays would term a mid-life crisis.  His second marriage has just ended in ruin, being kicked out of his home, and his wife taking on his former best friend while keeping custody over their young daughter.  His ongoing humiliation over this breakup is a theme throughout the story...but not the only one.  Herzog likes to write letters, and he composes them in his mind almost non-stop as he tries to figure out what direction his life has taken. His relations, professional associates, lawyers...anyone Herzog has dealt with in the past on a significant level gets the "letter" attention.  When he goes off in the story on one of these letters, the time sequence goes non-linear as Herzog relives his past through them.  Eventually he returns to the present, which in "real" time spans the novel in only a few days.  In the course of it all, though, Bellow establishes Herzog's world view, his past, and the relationships that he believes have led to his present plight.  He wonders whether he is ill, both physically and mentally.  His desire for revenge clouds his judgement and conflicts with his desire to keep contact with his daughter. He feels that he is falling apart...and then begins to see that this very nature that causes others to see him as disturbed is also that which is his strength in life...

Herzog is very deeply entrenched in the Jewish culture in urban America of that time.  I found reading about this interesting and also suspect that Saul Bellow put a lot of his own life into the story.  I had to read Herzog very carefully in order to avoid losing my way as Moses Herzog leaped from one mental letter-writing flight of fancy to another, often with little or no warning.  But now that I look back on it, that's kind of how I think, too...on one level I'm going about my own regular business during the day.  But on another level, I'm hopping and skipping around with my thoughts...although I'm not using the "letter-writing" device that Bellow so brilliantly employed to get into Herzog's mind...

2016 Presidential Politics After the Democratic Debate

I didn't watch Tuesday night's first Democratic 2016 Presidential debate on CNN since I was at work...although I doubt that I would have sat through the whole thing had I been off.  The main thing is that I consistently vote on election day after arriving at an informed decision concerning candidates and issues...I wonder how many of the reported 15.3 million debate watchers can claim that??!!  I did watch some of the news channel reactions to the debate, though, and it doesn't surprise me at all that the general consensus, regardless of how conservative or liberal the politics of the commentator was, is that Hillary Clinton came away as the clear winner...

The end result of the upcoming election to you and me will be how the winner makes decisions as President.  Although personality and "likableness" may play a part, I suspect that ultimately it will be the new President's philosophy of governance and his or her sense as to what constitutes America's greatest interests...including how its ENTIRE population is treated...not just the wealthiest 1%...

I have seen the Republican candidates get more than their fair share of media exposure...and I can, at least for myself, confidently claim that not one of them has even remotely made any impression on me that they have either my own personal interests in mind or those of anyone in my family, my friends, or associates, for that matter.  The one candidate that I held out hope for, Jeb Bush, has made some comments in recent weeks that show him as only one of many wannabes who want to show how extremist he can be on the political right.  As for polls leader Donald Trump, his appeal seems to be for those who want a supreme ruler (remember Stalin, Mao, Hitler?) whose feet they can grovel at and who they can just give carte blanche approval to do whatever he deems necessary, without any scrutiny.  As for Ben Carson, I am totally blown away by an incredible human being who can do what he has accomplished with his pediatric neurosurgery...and then act totally clueless about almost every other issue...

I'm not a big fan of Hillary Clinton...and I have never been.  I supported Barack Obama early on in his campaign back in 2008, and you can read my blog archives from back then to see my political leanings in favor of our current President.  But she is a vested, proven politician who knows more than almost anyone what it takes to get things done...and she has your interests and mine at heart, regardless whether you're aware of that fact.  Bernie Sanders, although he expresses ideas I agree with, especially in regard to a single-payer national health care system modeled on the Europeans and Canada, does not fully appreciate the benefits that capitalism and trade have brought for us and our standard of living.  I think Hillary does...and she is the only viable candidate out there for whom I can vote as the next President of the United States of America...

Florida's Will Grier and His PED Suspension

After the University of Florida football team finally seemed back on the road to national prominence, having amassed a perfect 6-0 record and rising to #8 in the national rankings, the NCAA dropped a bombshell yesterday when it announced that starting Gator quarterback Will Grier, who seemed to be developing as a top-tier college passer and playmaker, was suspended for a calendar year after testing positive for performance-enhancing drugs.  Grier was contrite and almost tearful before the cameras...but only said that he had bought something over-the-counter with something in it.  On ESPN2's excellent morning sports talk show First Take, Skip Bayless and Stephen A. Smith discussed this news.  Bayless was pointed about his problem with Grier's statement, saying that if the substance that caused the failed test was due to a legal product bought at a store, then he should be specific about what he bought and where...unless, of course, he was just repeating a commonly-spoken excuse that others from the past have maintained upon flunking drug tests.  Smith, on the other hand, was more sympathetic toward Grier, saying that the suspension was much too severe, especially considering that NFL discipline is comparatively much lighter toward its highly-paid players and that college athletes are unpaid and without due representation for their own interests.  I tend to be on the side of Stephen A. Smith in this one...

A shorter suspension, with Grier 'fessing to the NCAA about what he did take, would be the appropriate discipline in this case.  And I say this as a general sports fan, although since I root for Florida it will be sad to see him have to sit out this season and part of the next.  Florida has appealed to have the suspension shortened to only encompass the remainder of the 2015 season...but I doubt that it will be embraced by the NCAA unless Will Grier gives them something besides a vague over-the-counter claim.  As for the Gator football team, it is much more than just its starting quarterback, and besides, backup (and now starter) Treon Harris is a proven, quality competitor.  It would be a mistake to sell Florida short now that Grier is gone...

Stars are Bright Over Gainesville Tonight

I stepped outside tonight (it's between 10 and 11 as I write this) and noticed, for a change, how clear the sky is and how bright the stars are.  No clouds or moon are in sight to dim the view.  The early autumn evening sky is not exactly known for its splendor, but looking up in a westward direction the "summer triangle" of first-magnitude stars Deneb, Altair, and Vega highlight their respective constellations of Cygnus (the swan), Aquila (the eagle), and Lyra (the lyre).  I look southward, and just above the nearby tall pine trees and slightly to the east is Fomalhaut, another bright star, in the constellation Piscis Austrinus (the southern fish).  In the north, above the North Star, or Polaris, is the constellation Cepheus (the king), looking like an inverted ramshackle house.  Just east of Cepheus is the relatively bright Cassiopeia (the queen), looking like a "w" or "m" on its side, depending on how you look at it. Further down in the eastern sky can be found Perseus and Andromeda, two constellations, along with Casseiopeia, that are a part of the Greek Perseus mythology.  But to me the constellation that represents the essence of the fall season is Pegasus (the flying horse), which right now is passing near to overhead.  It is a very large constellation, not faint but not that bright, either.  Its dominant feature is the rectagular box of stars from which the horse's head and limbs extend.  I look down from Pegasus to the lower southeastern sky where lies Cetus (the whale).  It, too, usually isn't very bright...but tonight I see a pretty bright star there.  Is that Mira, I wonder...Mira is a variable star that undergoes great extremes in its brightness.  I'll have to find out about it.  Yes, the stars are out tonight, for sure...I can even make out fainter stars and constellations, such as the Zodiac's Capricornus, Aquarius, and Pisces, that are usually invisible from my yard.  It's too bad that conditions here weren't like this when we had our recent "Supermoon" eclipse...

Just Finished Reading Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe

Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe, which I just finished reading, is a historically-based fictional story in the setting of late twelfth-century England, during the reign of Richard II "Lionheart".  It centers around the social and political conflict there between noble descendants of the Norman invasion of 1066 and those nobles of native Saxon ancestry...and it delves into the precarious status of Jews in England at that time.  Various parties have returned from the Crusades in Palestine...among them King Richard (disguised as the Black Knight) and the Knights Templar, led by Sir Brian de-Bois Gilbert, a Norman nobleman.  Prince John, Richard's brother, is planning to usurp the throne of England in his absence, only to discover that he has escaped captivity in Europe and is now in England.  The "main" character of Wilfred of Ivanhoe is a young Saxon knight who had gone with King Richard in the Crusade and has returned.  His father Cedric has disowned him after discovering Wilfred's love for the Lady Rowena of high Saxon nobility, whom Cedric wants to wed to the head Saxon pretender to the throne.  And then there is the Jewish moneylender Isaac and his compassionate daughter Rebecca...along with the forest outlaws (generally benevolent in nature) thrown into the mix...and you have several different story lines going on at the same time.  There are tournaments to test the knights' swordplay, along with ambushes, captivities, and daring rescues...but remarkably there really isn't all that much of the title character of Ivanhoe.  One thing that surprised me upon reading this 1820 novel of Scott was his sympathetic focus on the plight of Jews in England and the way they were treated there...especially by the ruling classes.  On the other hand, from the convenient hindsight of our politically correct world in 2015, Isaac, with his miserly nature, was portrayed in a very negative, stereotypical fashion...

There is plenty of knightly, noble action that you might expect from an adventure yarn like Ivanhoe, but this book is also very heavy on dialogue and the discussion of social, historical, ethical, and religious ideas.  So on one level, you could read it for the surface story (which I understand has been adapted a number of times to the screen)...one another level, though, it levels some pretty serious charges at folks who like to loudly trumpet their religion over others without actually practicing it: in other words, religious hypocrites and bigots...

My Favorite Music At This Stage of 2015

Musically speaking, my preference is for independent/alternative rock...although sometimes I like to sit back and listen to classical or ambient music.  My favorite acts are Regina Spektor, Radiohead, Kasabian, Sufjan Stevens, Beck, Arcade Fire, the now-defunct (hopefully just temporarily) Gorillaz, and Spoon...in that order. Of late, I have been listening to recent album releases by Sufjan Stevens (Carrie and Lowell), Kasabian (48:13), and Spoon (They Want My Soul).  Aside from the rotation of hit songs played on my local alternative rock station, WHHZ/100.5, I have spent much of my music listening time with these three albums.  Although Kasabian's Treat and Spoon's Rainy Taxi are standout tracks on their respective albums, it is Sufjan's Carrie and Lowell that contains the best stuff, with four songs...Death With Dignity, Should Have Known Better, Fourth of July, and Blue Bucket of Gold...being some of the best he has ever done.  As for the radio songs I like the most, there are Awolnation's Hollow Moon, Beck's Dreams, Bear Hands' Agora, and the Cold War Kids' First...

I'm eagerly awaiting the release of Beck's new album and for Regina Spektor and Radiohead to come out with something new.  Regina always seems to have at least a couple of memorable tracks on her albums, but I was disappointed in the last one from Radiohead, titled King of Limbs...  

Speaking of music from the radio, I had reported a couple of days ago that WUFT had begun broadcasting their classical music station on FM-102.7.  But, alas, only a day after noting this, they went back off the air!  Maybe they were just testing...or maybe some trouble arose.  I'm still tuning in from time to time with hopes that they're back on the air for good...

Just Finished Reading Brandon Sanderson's The Way of Kings

The Way of Kings, which came out in 2010, is the first book in what promises to be many over the next several years of fantasy writer Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive series.  Although I have had my share of fantasy reading over the last few years, I began this new series because of my respect toward Sanderson and his writing after reading his excellent Mistborn series...and then reading how he he salvaged Robert Jordan's protracted The Wheel of Time series after the original author died...

The setting of The Way of Kings is an imaginary world with a tumultuous history...in other words, a typical fantasy world.  There are legendary heroic figures from the distant past called Knights Radiant and the Heralds while monsters abounded: the Voidbringers.  As usual in fantasy fiction, our more modern technology is suppressed while alternative forms are introduced: certain gemstones contain special powers to those who know how to use them and a strangely sentient phenomenon called a "high-storm" imparts power to these stones when passing through.  Also, those Knights Radiants had left behind special armor and swords with super powers to those who possessed them: the Shardblades and Shardplates.  Sanderson was very thorough about describing this sometimes nightmarish world, but his main strength here...he has done in other stories...is his character development...

The people in The Way of Kings belong to a more medieval society where royalty, knights, slaves, and wars abound and the weapons of choice are swords and spears.  There seems to be a great deal of emphasis placed on the color of one's eyes: the lighter they are, the higher the position in society they enjoy.  Four characters present the story from their points of view: the reluctant assassin slave Szeth,  the noble and persecuted bridgeman Kaladin, the young scholar girl Shallan, and the king's uncle, brave warrior Dalinar...who, during high-storms, keeps having recurring visions of the past and warnings about the future...

I can see how Brandon Sanderson can eventually turn this series into another overblown fantasy library as did Robert Jordan and Terry Goodkind with more than ten volumes to read through.  However, if he can avoid Jordan's mistake of introducing too many characters and subplots, we might have here an epic series.  It seems to me that, at least in this first book, Sanderson compares and contrasts two often disparate meanings of "nobility"...and applies them to his characters.  I expect this to continue with his next book.  So far, we only have two books in this Stormlight Archive series...it will probably be well into my senior years before it's finished...

Classical Music Now on 102.7-FM in Gainesville

Finally, a strong classical music station is back on broadcast radio here in Gainesville, Florida.  WUFT-FM, which as the University of Florida's College of Journalism radio station, formerly aired classical music as part of a mixed schedule combined with news, National Public Radio programs, and late night jazz programming.  But a few years ago, it went all news/talk and relegated its classical music to a station that could only be accessed online or with a special HD-equipped radio.  Now, it's back on the airwaves...although on a different frequency than I thought it would be.  I was surfing the radio last night when I discovered a powerful new station playing classical music just before I got to that annoying country station on 103.7 kHz.  I checked it out today, and it is that promised (back in June) WUFT classical station, broadcasting on 102.7.  I wasted no time in programming my car radio settings to give me quick access to this gem...

My Belated 2015 Baseball Playoff Picks

I should have written this yesterday, before the American League wild card playoff game between the New York Yankees and the Houston Astros...won by the latter 3-0 at Yankee Stadium.  That result affects how I look on the upcoming games, since my preference among all five AL playoff teams was in the following order:

1-Yankees, 2-Toronto, 3-Houston, 4-Kansas City, 5-Texas

Now I'm rooting for Toronto to handle Texas in their upcoming series while hoping that the Astros can capitalize on Kansas City's late-season slide and upset them in their series.

In the National League, my preferences are in the following order:

1-New York Mets, 2-Chicago Cubs, 3-Pittsburgh, 4-Los Angeles Dodgers, 5-St. Louis

The Cubs play their single wild card game against the Pirates tonight. Whoever wins this contest will face St. Louis in the next round, while the Mets are already slated to go up against the Dodgers. I think that this one-and-done wild card game format is asisine...especially considering the 162 regular season games played by each team to reach this point...not to mention that the true measure of a team is expressed over its starting pitching rotation in a multiple-game series.  That rotation is meaningless in a one-game playoff.  Also, I don't think that since both Pittsburgh and Chicago had better regular season records than the division-winning Mets and Dodgers, they should have to play against the Cardinals, who had baseball's best regular season record.  Instead, once the wild card round is completed, the four teams left in each league should be seeded according to their regular season win-loss records...

As for the World Series, since the Yankees are out of the picture, I'm going for Toronto to win it all.  Now all of this, understand, is based on which teams I want to succeed...not which ones I think are most likely to succeed.  If I went by who I thought was most likely to get to the World Series, I would still pick Toronto in the American League and the Cubs-Pirates winner on the National Side...with the Blue Jays winning the series...

Just Finished Reading Isaac Asimov's Foundation's Edge (Again)

Foundation's Edge is the fourth book in the late science fiction writer Isaac Asimov's Foundation series.  He wrote it, along with the final installment, Foundation and Earth, decades after the first three books.  Unlike those stories, the two concluding novels run together with the same protagonists, based on the same time period...which is 500 years after the beginning of the Foundation as psychohistorian Hari Seldon established it.  It's a little awkward for me to refer in the past tense to something that supposedly might happen some 25,000 years in the future, but since it's all make-believe anyway, who really cares?

In Foundation's Edge, there is another crisis in the galaxy as the Foundation, following Seldon's Plan, attempts to establish the Second Galactic Empire only a thousand years after the fall of the First.  At the midway point in this quest, it looks as if the Foundation can militarily take over the rest of the galaxy and prematurely establish the new empire.  But the novel's protagonist, a Foundation councilman named Golan Trevize, suspects that the Second Foundation, a shadowy Seldon-established counterpart to the First Foundation and which is composed of psychics, is manipulating events (and his Foundation) behind the scenes.  After revealing his suspicions to the Mayor (ruler of the Foundation), she sends him out into space to find the elusive Second Foundation, under the guise of seeking Earth, the mythical original planet of humanity.  Trevize is accompanied by an aging historian named Janov Pelorat, who is sincere in his search for Earth and isn't in on Trevize's secret mission.  Ultimately, as the story unwinds, Trevize finds himself as the focal point of a three-way life-or-death confrontation between civilizations vying for control of the galaxy.  Who will win? Trevise seems to have the answer...but what does all this have to do with robots?

Well, if you haven't been reading the Foundation series, I doubt that much of the above makes a lot of sense to you.  Let's just say that Foundation's Edge is the first book in a two-part conclusion to the Foundation series.  It deals with Golan Trevize's decision about the fate of the galaxy...and the second, Foundation and Earth (which I'm about to start reading for the second time) concerns the significance of that decision.  Good sci-fi reading...I recommend this series, as well as Asimov's Robot and Empire series...

Attended Yesterday's MLS Match Between Orlando City and Montreal

Yesterday Melissa and I traveled down to Orlando to watch a Major League Soccer match between the Orlando City Iron Lions and the Montreal Impact, two teams that are fighting for the sixth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Division...and the regular season is nearing a close.  Orlando, in seventh place, had to beat the Impact in order to at least stay in the hunt...but this match was tied until late in the second half, when Orlando kicked in the winning goal: final score Orlando City 2, Montreal 1.  In case you're wondering about the use of "City" in the team's name, it's just an affectation that MLS teams (all based the United States and Canada) use to imitate their more historically famous counterparts overseas.  For example, we have in the league "Sporting" Kansas City, "Real" Salt Lake, and the Houston "Dynamo" as well.  Still, I think it's silly to not just say "Orlando"...

Before the game we visited the nearby upscale mall where we ate at the Cheesecake Factory.  I recommend their crab bites appetizer and the pulled pork sandwich (with cole slaw inside).  Sitting around there looking at the patrons made me realize what an international magnet the Orlando area is, especially with its nearby Universal and Disney World theme parks...which as I understand is a major reason that MLS granted Orlando an expansion team franchise beginning this year.  When we got into the stadium, which is the Citrus Bowl, the international flavor of both teams as well as of the fans was prominent.  The enthusiasm that the Orlando City fans showed their team was comparable to that of Florida Gator football fans at the "Swamp" here in Gainesville.  I did my part, loudly yelling "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL!!!!" with each of the home team's two goals.  After noting a friendly couple sitting nearby leaving about ten minutes before the end of the game, we decided to prudently follow suit a couple of minutes later in order to beat the stampeding exiting crowd and traffic logjam...but not before seeing that final goal...

My impression of Orlando City as a professional soccer team is very favorable, although they have an expected modest record in the league their first year (11 wins, 13 losses, 8 draws).  Their talent level probably drops a bit after their handful of standouts, but they play very well as a team and seem to be giving their utmost to the game throughout.  And that, for me as a sports fan, makes them worth following. Of course, I'm not too fond of how they rip off the fans when selling drinks at the stadium...Melissa had to pay $5 for a simple bottle of water (without a lid) and two fans sitting in front of us shelled out $22 for a couple of cans of Heineken beer...

The idea of going to the soccer match was Melissa's, as a way of honoring me on my birthday.  We both enjoyed the game (although she's not exactly a die-hard soccer fan) and created some wonderful memories together...

Nor'easter Storm, Not Joaquin, the Concern Along US East Coastal States

Yesterday I was watching the Weather Channel when New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was giving detailed storm preparation instructions.  He discussed the two southernmost Jersey counties and how they were especially susceptible to flooding.  Around the governor on the TV screen, the Weather Channel had "Joaquin" in large letters and was showing projected paths for this hurricane, which was then (and still now) almost stationary in the Bahamas...and growing stronger and stronger.  But Christie wasn't addressing Joaquin: he was referring to the massive cold front storm, commonly known as a "nor'easter", that was spreading up the east coast of the United States.  He said that his sources had predicted heavy flooding and winds up to 75 mph (minimal hurricane force winds).  Crews were on the beaches desperately trying to deposit enough sand there to hold back the storm surge in order to prevent ocean encroachment on the inland...

Today the focus seems to be on the Carolinas, especially lowland South Carolina where 12 to 18 inches of rain are forecast over the weekend.  It is another part of this nor'easter, not related to Joaquin.  As for the hurricane, at this writing it remains in its "spot" in the Bahamas and has strengthened to a powerful Category Four with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph, but its projected future path has shifted during the past 24 hours from hitting the US mainland between North Carolina and Massachusetts early next week to completely missing land, going much further east in the Atlantic.  The funny thing about this is that, among the several computer models for its trajectory given a couple of days ago, the "European" model (which was the one model that worked with Hurricane Sandy back in 2012) diverged greatly from the others in that it had Joaquin doing just what it is now predicted to do and miss everyone...except possibly Bermuda...

My September 2015 Running Report

In September, I ran more carefully in order to recover from plantar fasciitis in my right foot.  I missed the first five days, but ran daily for the rest of the month.  I ran for a total of 171.8 miles.  My longest single run was for 5 miles, while over the course of a single day my longest daily mileage was 12.1 miles.  If I continue to improve as I have over the past three and a half weeks, I should be ready for some long-distance races early in 2016...

In the Middle of Reading Four Different Books

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...    

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...

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...        

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...

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...